The Legendary Man
Chapter 617

Chapter 617 The Whitley Family

Still, I have to admit, what the respectable families and Paradise Island did was useful in solving the problem. Children are too weak-minded to keep secrets, so it's best to not let them know any secrets. That way, it would be pointless to target them when going after the respectable families. If I'm not mistaken, the core members around the age of seventeen and eighteen have all been brainwashed by their families. It's just like with Yasmin and the other assassins from Xiara.

Even Agent 99, who practically grew up with Yasmin and treated her like an older sister, pulled a knife on her without any hesitation. It seems the many years of brainwashing are powerful enough to make them prioritize Paradise Island's safety over that of their family and friends. I'm guessing it's the same for Lauryn over here.

I may be able to have a decent conversation with her right now, but I know I can't ask her anything about her family's location. I bet she'd rather kill herself than risk revealing any information about them. By brainwashing them to place their family's interest above everything else, the families are able to keep them under control for the rest of their lives.

With that in mind, Jonathan flashed Lauryn a smile as he asked, "I'm curious. If all eight respectable families see Chanaea as a cake, then you would definitely see each other as competitors. Take Jadeborough for example. Given how large the total market share is, there's no way the families will be satisfied with occupying just a portion of it.

Someone will likely get greedy and start plotting against the other families. I know there's an alliance between the respectable families, but I doubt you guys are all that honorable.

Surely, there must've been a lot of backstabbing going on in secret. With the amount of power the respectable families have acquired after being around for thousands of years, it shouldn't be a problem for them to investigate each other, right?"

Lauryn frowned when she heard that question.

"According to the archives, there were fifteen respectable families in Chanaea about three hundred years ago. However, the Chanaean market took a huge hit when the involvement from the western countries increased about two hundred and eighty years ago.

That resulted in a complete makeover for all the respectable families. No one knows what happened throughout the twenty years, but only nine respectable families remained after that."

Jonathan paused in surprise. "Nine? Hold on, didn't you say there were eight respectable families just now? Where did this ninth one come from?"

"There's one more that got wiped out ten years ago. It's the Whitley family," Lauryn replied.

The look on Jonathan's face turned solemn when he heard that.

The timing matches perfectly!

"Ten years ago? That was when Chanaea was in chaos, right? The respectable families were in control of the armies, but all the commanders disappeared mysteriously all of a sudden. Everyone thinks they were called back by the respectable families. Was it because of this?"

"Yes, it was precisely because of the Whitley family. I was only twelve at the time, so I didn't know much about the relationships between the respectable families. The only reason I know this is because I heard my elders talking about it after the Whitley family was wiped out," Lauryn replied with a nod.

She frowned as she tried to recall what she heard from her childhood.

"My grandpa was the head of the Blackwood family at the time. He told my father that the Whitley family from ten years ago was a lot more powerful than the Salladay family today. In case you didn't know, the Salladay family is currently acknowledged as the most powerful of all the respectable families.

According to one of the theories, Chanaea used to be split into ten parts, four of which were owned by the Whitley family alone. The remaining six were shared among the other eight families. That should show you just how terrifyingly powerful the Whitley family used to be."

Jonathan felt his heart sink when he heard that.

I first came into contact with the respectable families during the three-year battle. I tried to gather as much information on them as possible after Asura's Office was established, but there wasn't much I could replace. When I went to Lumonburg a while back, Philip handed me a chip right before he died.

That was when I made official contact with the respectable families. That was especially the case when the Goldstein family got involved. I got a taste of the power of the respectable families when I fought Garrison of the Osborne family. It wasn't until I met Lauryn and Irving that I truly learned the truth behind the respectable families.

The Goldstein family's influence can be found in pretty much every field, and they also have tons of businesses all over the world. Even so, it is nothing compared to the respectable families. The Osborne family was able to drive the Goldstein family out of Yaleview simply by sending one of its elders after them, and that happened while I was backing them up too.

Ordinary prominent families wouldn't even stand a chance against the respectable families. I thought the Osborne family was powerful, but the Salladay family turned out to be even more powerful.

Given all of that, it's really hard to imagine the Whitley family owning four parts of Chanaea ten years ago. I bet they could squash the Osborne family like a bug if they so much as wanted to! How the heck does a powerful family like this get wiped out?

With that in mind, Jonathan asked, "Who wiped out the Whitley family?"

He was really curious as to who could possibly eliminate the Whitley family, who owned almost half of Chanaea.

Lauryn looked him in the eye as she replied, "The eight families teamed up to wipe them out."

A combined effort from the eight families, huh?

Jonathan was a little shocked when he heard that, but he shook his head and let out a chuckle moments later.

"One has to be very careful when at the pinnacle of success. It makes perfect sense that the other families would try to take them out. After all, no one likes being suppressed and dominated forever," he commented.

Lauryn nodded in agreement.

"Yeah. The Whitley family was far too powerful, so they had to get rid of it. But that incident also took a toll on the eight respectable families. It took five years of planning, three of which were spent cautiously locating all the Whitley family's members. The eight respectable families then spent the next two years hunting down and killing all core and direct members of the Whitley family.

The Whitley family had three hundred and ninety-eight core members and eleven thousand and sixty-two members who shared a direct bloodline. All of them died tragically in those two years, and that's not including the countless guards and underlings they had trained."

Jonathan felt a shiver down his spine when he heard those numbers.

I wiped out the Turner family when they kidnapped Josephine back then, but they only had a few hundred members. The Whitley family had over ten thousand direct family members, and we haven't even included those from their branch families...

Now that I think about it, the Goldstein family is nothing but child's play compared to the respectable families. It makes sense why the Osborne family never took me seriously.