Carpe Diem and Valhalla

Carpe Diem and Valhalla are two stages of one institution. Carpe Diem begins in Haramark as a famous but tiny team shaped by Jang Maldong, led by Dylan Edward, and sustained by Chung Chohong and Hugo Richard. Its name means to seize or live for the day, a fitting creed for Earthlings whose Paradise careers can end in any expedition. Seol Jihu chooses it because his Nine Eyes mark its recruitment notice with the Golden Commandment. By joining, he receives more than a strong party: he enters the community that teaches him how strength, trust, training, and responsibility must coexist. (Volume 1, Chapters 24–31; Volume 2, Chapters 1–3)

Valhalla is the formal successor created after Carpe Diem relocates to Eva. It retains the predecessor's people and elite standards but adds registration, officers, finances, intelligence, training pipelines, city obligations, and a political program. Through that structure, Seol's team can uproot Eva's predatory organizations, restore cooperation with the Federation, expose human collaborators, help lead the final war, and participate in postwar reconstruction. Volume 10 explicitly places Valhalla at the center of Paradise's liberation and then shows it thriving after Seol resigns. Its importance is therefore institutional rather than merely biographical: it is the means by which one exceptional fighter's relationships become a force able to survive his departure. (Volume 4, Chapter 31; Volume 5, Chapters 1–10; Volume 7, Chapters 18–21; Volume 9, Chapters 12 and 15; Volume 10, Chapter 44)

Structure and operating principles

Carpe Diem's compact team

At its introduction, Carpe Diem is one of Haramark's top five teams despite having only three active members after an earlier loss. Even Sicilia and the Triads sometimes request its help. This reputation comes from quality rather than numbers: Dylan is a High Ranker and the members possess enough experience to take missions that ordinary small teams could not survive. The office also contains serious training facilities, making daily preparation part of membership rather than an optional private habit. (Volume 1, Chapter 24; Volume 2, Chapters 1–3)

Dylan is the current leader by Jang Maldong's appointment. Jang Maldong's position is not reducible to an ordinary team rank; his authority comes from training, judgment, and the respect of people whose careers he has shaped. He can identify when a talented recruit is not yet ready for a team's immediate tactical need, and he can prepare successors without claiming the representative's office for himself. (Volume 1, Chapter 24; Volume 3, Chapter 4)

The small team operates through familiarity rather than detailed bureaucracy. Members share space, train together, argue openly, and know one another's strengths. That intimacy produces loyalty, but it also means responsibilities can be “up for grabs.” The model works while the roster is small enough for direct conversation. It becomes inadequate once Seol wants to recruit more people, manage assets in multiple cities, and represent Eva. (Volume 3, Chapter 4; Volume 5, Chapters 5 and 9)

Leadership as communal responsibility

Seol's path to leadership is not established by power alone. Ian forces him to articulate what a team is for, how he would recruit, and what burden follows the desire to wear the crown. A leader's decisions can risk people who cannot safely refuse without leaving the community. Seol must therefore explain objectives, listen to expertise, and accept that trust does not give him unlimited permission to improvise with other members' lives. (Volume 3, Chapter 4; Volume 5, Chapter 5)

The confrontation with Kim Hannah after the Eva Alliance counterattack becomes the clearest governance lesson. Kim Hannah deliberately withholds a successful plan to make Seol feel what the others experienced when he ordered the first Eva strike with almost no consultation. Her method is manipulative and she accepts punishment, but her argument is accepted: even correct action can corrode an organization if the leader treats companions as pieces who must follow. Authority must be matched by meetings, disclosed reasoning when possible, and rules that let responsibility be assigned fairly. (Volume 5, Chapter 5)

This principle continues into Valhalla. Seol retains final authority as representative, but Kim Hannah advises and administers, Jang Maldong controls much of training, and team leaders receive operational responsibility. Members can challenge a proposal without thereby becoming enemies. The organization is strongest when the representative sets purpose and accepts accountability while specialists decide how their domain should function. (Volume 5, Chapters 5, 9, and 10)

Administration, intelligence, and finance

Kim Hannah supplies the institutional knowledge Carpe Diem lacks. She prepares intelligence on Eva's organizations, manipulates public information, designs registration and authority systems, controls expenditure, and turns a moral objective into sustainable pressure. Her charity and debt-refinancing strategy is not random generosity: it helps civilians while attacking the loan, nightlife, slave, and protection economies that fund the old alliance. (Volume 5, Chapters 1–5)

Under Valhalla, administration becomes a permanent function. Money belongs to the organization rather than being an unlimited extension of Seol's personal desire to help. Recruitment, contracts, contribution points, public reputation, royal negotiations, and Neutral Zone operations all require records and staff. The later Intel Team formalizes Kim Hannah's information role, while her Earth company gives Valhalla a cross-world economic base after the war. (Volume 5, Chapters 4, 9, and 10; Volume 10, Chapter 44)

Combat teams and elite recruitment

Valhalla initially preserves Carpe Diem's elite standard. Its early recruitment notice accepts any class but requires Level 4 applicants to be near High Ranker and prefers Level 5 or above. This is not a claim that every later trainee already meets that threshold. It is the doctrine used while the new organization needs immediately deployable specialists and cannot afford to dilute a small core with large numbers of unprepared recruits. (Volume 5, Chapter 10)

Seol plans a military-style team structure without trying to eliminate members' personal freedom. Smaller attack teams can operate independently, while a headquarters force remains available. Team leaders receive authority for missions and personnel. Some veterans resist command because they prefer fighting to administration, which shows that combat strength does not automatically equal managerial suitability. (Volume 5, Chapter 9)

Kim Hannah later restructures the organization into four principal teams: her Intel Team, Ghionea Marcel's Team 1, Kazuki Ayase's Team 2, and Oh Rahee's Team 3. The arrangement survives Seol's resignation and redistributes old founding members among teams to prevent the institution from remaining a set of private circles centered only on him. (Volume 10, Chapter 44)

The Haramark youth system

Seol adds a development system inspired by youth programs in professional sports. The former Haramark office becomes a place to train newcomers who are not yet ready for Eva's front line. Strong performers can be called up as formal members; regulars whose performance declines can return for further development. Experienced Paradise veterans do not need to pass through the same introductory route. (Volume 5, Chapter 9)

This pipeline resolves a tension between elite recruitment and long-term growth. Valhalla can maintain immediate standards while investing in people who would otherwise never receive Jang Maldong-level training. It also preserves Carpe Diem's original home as living infrastructure. The move to Eva does not erase Haramark; it converts the predecessor's office into the place where later members learn its discipline. (Volume 5, Chapters 9–10)

History

A team that lives for today

Seol first hears of Carpe Diem from a Haramark bartender. The team is famous enough that ignorance of it would make a resident look like an outsider, yet its recruitment notice contains only a single line and no qualifications. The apparent openness conceals a difficult reality: the team has only three active people and needs a Warrior who can contribute immediately. Dylan initially resists taking an inexperienced Level 1 even after Seol's extraordinary Neutral Zone record becomes clear. (Volume 1, Chapter 24)

The meeting establishes the core personalities. Hugo already knows Seol and responds warmly. Chohong is suspicious of claims that sound impossible and confronts him directly. Dylan listens, verifies, and asks why a recruit capable of entering a major organization would choose them. Seol cannot explain the Golden Commandment openly, but his choice reflects what Carpe Diem will later become for him: a place whose value is not reducible to size, security, or prestige. (Volume 1, Chapter 24)

Seol's subsequent expedition gives the team evidence it can trust. His judgment, survival, and combat potential stop being résumé claims and become witnessed behavior. By Volume 2 he is a member, celebrates with the others, and submits to their training culture. The office gives him comrades who will correct him, carry him, and demand work from him rather than worship his talent. (Volume 1, Chapters 25–31; Volume 2, Chapters 1–3)

Loss and succession

Carpe Diem's participation in major expeditions and wars costs it people. Dylan's death removes the leader who had balanced Jang Maldong's standards, Chohong and Hugo's temperaments, and Seol's rapid growth. The vacancy cannot be filled by declaring the strongest survivor leader. Seol wants the role, but Ian's questions expose how little he has considered recruitment, purpose, or the effect of command on other lives. (Volumes 2–3; Volume 3, Chapter 4)

Seol begins taking responsibility for rebuilding rather than merely inheriting Dylan's chair. He becomes involved in recruiting an Archer, considers what kind of team he wants, and accepts that his choices create a recognizable institutional “color.” Jang Maldong supports him as long as that vision does not become self-indulgent. This is the beginning of Carpe Diem's transition from a team Seol joined to a community he is responsible for extending. (Volume 3, Chapters 4–6)

The roster broadens through people with different relationships to the core: Phi Sora comes from conflict and reluctant cooperation; the Yi siblings are developing recruits; Flone is a unique spiritual companion whose power must remain concealed; Ghionea Marcel is a proven Archer; Seo Yuhui and Kim Hannah bring sacred and administrative authority. Their entries do not all follow the same contract, and not every frequent ally is a member. The team's strength lies in integrating distinct obligations without pretending they are interchangeable. (Volumes 3–4)

Leaving Haramark with a declared purpose

By the end of Volume 4, Seol makes his institutional ambition explicit. He will move to Eva, become the city's representative organization, uproot its entrenched abuses, apologize to the Federation for human crimes, and create an alliance with real cultural exchange. The declaration is larger than Carpe Diem's existing structure, which is precisely why relocation requires transformation. (Volume 4, Chapter 31)

The departure preserves emotional continuity. Chohong, Hugo, Phi Sora, and the others carry the old relationships into the new city; Maria chooses to join before the carriage leaves. Haramark remains the place where Seol's Paradise life and team identity began. Valhalla will later use the old office for training rather than discarding it as an embarrassing small beginning. (Volume 4, Chapter 31; Volume 5, Chapter 9)

War on Eva's predatory order

Eva is governed in practice by a Royal Council of eight Earthling organizations whose businesses and political influence distort the city. Seol's group refuses a slow accommodation. On its first night, Carpe Diem attacks the VIP auction house and Royal Pattaya, targeting slavery, predatory trade, torture, and other crimes. The action announces that relocation is not a search for comfortable territory. (Volume 5, Chapters 1–2)

Force alone would let surviving organizations present Carpe Diem as another conquering gang. Kim Hannah therefore combines raids with information and economic strategy. Reports expose the old organizations' crimes while temporarily minimizing Carpe Diem's public role; charity distributes food and living expenses; and long-term lower-interest refinancing releases civilians from the alliance's debt economy. Public trust rises because people experience material change rather than only hearing Seol's moral claims. (Volume 5, Chapters 3–4)

The Eva Alliance answers by attacking Carpe Diem's base while its main force is absent. The Triads respond to Carpe Diem's request, and the wider conflict destroys most of the alliance. Kim Hannah also manipulates reports of injuries to Jang Maldong and Seo Yuhui in order to intensify public outrage. The plan succeeds strategically but produces the internal leadership confrontation that teaches Seol why an organization cannot be governed through unilateral “trust me” orders. (Volume 5, Chapter 5)

From Carpe Diem to Valhalla

With the alliance broken, the team resumes formal registration. Registration requires a new name and an internal system suitable for more than a handful of people. Members propose several comic alternatives before anonymous voting produces a tie between Golden Lion and Valhalla; the final choice is Valhalla, the mythological palace and utopia where honorable warriors gather. (Volume 5, Chapter 6)

The name fits both continuity and ambition. Like Carpe Diem, it speaks to warriors who can die at any moment. Unlike the old name, it evokes a place large enough to gather heroes and to serve as a destination. The opening ceremony announces that Eva is Valhalla's responsibility and warns outside organizations against treating the city as unclaimed profit. The registered body is a successor, not a cosmetic rebrand: assets, leadership, membership, and mission continue, while legal status and organization change. (Volume 5, Chapter 6)

Royal partnership and the Neutral Zone

Valhalla moves rapidly from new registration to the vacant position of Eva Royal Family's partner organization. Evangeline loses recognition after its representative's conduct and relationship to the old alliance are exposed. The royal partner seat gives Valhalla official influence and duties, while Seol's relationship with Queen Charlotte Aria helps the crown recover from manipulation. (Volume 5, Chapters 7–9)

News of the rise spreads through human territory: a small team has defeated Eva's alliance, become an organization, and taken the representative seat in an unusually short period. Calls from allies and interested powers flood the headquarters. The reputation creates recruitment opportunities but also raises expectations. Kim Hannah insists that internal structure must be completed before fame outruns administration. (Volume 5, Chapter 9)

Valhalla also acquires operating rights over a Neutral Zone and must prepare for hundreds of entrants. The task requires supplies, instructors, stores, contracts, and three months of attention inside an area cut off from outside communication. The organization recruits elite veterans before entry and uses the Zone to identify and develop new talent, including Eun Yuri. (Volume 5, Chapters 10–13)

Tigol Fortress and an alliance in deed

Seol's promise to reconcile humanity and the Federation is tested at Tigol Fortress. Valhalla's expedition and allies become central to the restoration of the World Tree and to the reversal of a battle involving the Federation, humanity, and Parasites. When the tree revives, the strategic and symbolic landscape changes: races harmed by human exploitation fight on the same side against a common enemy. (Volume 6, Chapters 4–14)

The battle proves that Valhalla's diplomacy is not a public-relations slogan. Its members risk themselves in the Federation's decisive defense, and the resulting cooperation gives both sides reason to trust future coalition plans. The organization becomes a hinge between institutions that could not have coordinated merely through a royal declaration. (Volume 6, Chapters 10–15)

Reform and exposure

After Tigol, Valhalla reforms its internal system while Seol undertakes further personal training. The organization can no longer rely on emergency mobilization around his presence. Its growing members, alliances, and political responsibilities require teams able to act while the representative is absent. (Volume 7, Chapters 1–2 and 9–15)

The next large operation targets human collaboration with the Parasites. Valhalla captures perpetrators and uses screens in every human city to broadcast evidence, turning a hidden network into a public crisis. It then holds a formal announcement with witnesses and demands that organizations prove innocence through action rather than empty denial. The ultimatum is coercive, but it responds to conduct that places humanity itself at risk. (Volume 7, Chapters 18–21)

Valhalla does not personally absorb every compliant organization. Its role is to establish the factual and political conditions for a broader coalition. Sicilia, the Triads, royal forces, guilds, and independent teams retain their own names and chains of command. The distinction matters because the final human alliance is larger than Valhalla even when Seol is its most influential organizer. (Volume 7, Chapters 18–21)

Preparing Paradise's liberation

As the final war approaches, Valhalla coordinates people, training, intelligence, and relationships accumulated since Haramark. Its members are few compared with mass organizations, but their average quality is exceptional. Veterans who followed Seol through repeated disasters can be assigned to fronts where an ordinary numerical force would collapse. (Volume 8, Chapters 1–12; Volume 9, Chapters 2–9)

At the confrontation with Twisted Kindness, fewer than half of Valhalla's members remain standing and none are unhurt. The text emphasizes that each member is a powerhouse and veteran despite the organization's small roster. Holding the Parasites' strongest Army Commander long enough for support is one of the clearest demonstrations of the recruitment doctrine: Valhalla's strategic weight greatly exceeds its headcount. (Volume 9, Chapter 12)

The operation also reveals its cost. High Rank does not prevent shattered limbs, exhausted healing, destroyed artifacts, or collapse. The group's culture of following Seol “to hell and back” is a source of courage and a reminder of how often institutional loyalty has been spent in extreme combat. The final victory must lead to more than another mission if those sacrifices are to have meaning. (Volume 9, Chapter 12)

Liberation, mediation, and departure

After the Parasite Queen's defeat, Paradise faces disputes over land, rights, reconstruction, Federation promises, and the future of Earthlings. Seol becomes mediator because he has both the strength to restrain factions and a record of uniting humanity with the Federation. His two central rules are restitution to rightful owners and priority for repairing war damage. Valhalla supplies the authority and relationships that make those principles enforceable. (Volume 9, Chapter 15)

Seol also uses his final divine opportunities to restore people, including Dylan and Ian, and gives them invitations. This does not simply reset Carpe Diem to its opening roster; the resurrected men return to a world and institution transformed by the consequences of their earlier lives. Their restoration closes personal wounds while Valhalla moves into a period that no longer requires permanent war leadership from Seol. (Volume 9, Chapter 15)

Before leaving, Seol gathers the members and prepares to step away. His departure creates legitimate fear because Valhalla and Seol have become nearly synonymous. The later history answers that fear by showing Kim Hannah's successful succession rather than by making Seol remain an eternal representative. (Volume 9, Chapter 15; Volume 10, Chapter 44)

Kim Hannah's Valhalla

Kim Hannah becomes representative under enormous pressure. She founds and aggressively grows a company on Earth, creating synergy between resources in the two worlds. She spends on employee welfare and community benefit, attracts new talent, and reforms teams so the organization no longer depends on the exact internal arrangement Seol preferred. (Volume 10, Chapter 44)

The result is not mere survival. Valhalla stands stronger and operates better internally after Seol steps down. Members recognize the changed conditions of peaceful Paradise, but the institutional evidence is still decisive: the founder created a body capable of selecting a qualified successor, and that successor improves it. This is the final stage of the Carpe Diem project—the family survives by becoming an organization without ceasing to remember the team from which it grew. (Volume 10, Chapter 44)

Membership and authority

Membership changes across the story. The following table separates periods and functions rather than presenting one timeless roster.

The Yi siblings, Maria, and other founding or later members also matter to operations, but links are omitted where the corresponding local article target is not part of the verified manifest. Allies such as Teresa Hussey, Charlotte Aria, Sicilia, the Triads, and the Federation never become members simply because they fight beside Valhalla.

Major operations and responsibilities

Resources and capabilities

Headquarters and training

The Haramark office is the predecessor's home, gym, and meeting place. The Eva headquarters provides the larger physical and political center required by Valhalla. Retaining Haramark as a youth facility gives the organization a two-stage development system and preserves access to the environment where its original standards were formed. (Volume 2, Chapters 1–3; Volume 5, Chapters 6 and 9)

Finance, contribution points, and contracts

Carpe Diem earns money through missions and members' work; Valhalla adds centralized budgets, businesses, contribution-point management, official contracts, and public expenditure. Kim Hannah repeatedly reminds Seol that organizational money must be allocated rather than spent as an impulse. Postwar, the Earth company makes finance a permanent cross-world capability. (Volume 5, Chapters 3–5 and 9–10; Volume 10, Chapter 44)

Intelligence and public legitimacy

Reports on Eva, the Assassination Guild's information network, Sinyoung contacts, royal administrators, and Kim Hannah's analysis let Valhalla act with more precision than a combat team. Public legitimacy is a strategic asset because it determines whether a strike looks like reform or gang warfare. Charity, evidence, witnesses, and open announcements are used alongside violence rather than after it. (Volume 5, Chapters 1–5; Volume 7, Chapters 18–21)

Member equipment

Important artifacts remain assigned to individuals rather than becoming anonymous communal property. Seol Jihu uses the Sura Demon Spear and Spear of Purity; Flone is connected to Flone's Pendant; members use resources such as the Festina Earring and Gold Stamp under particular custody and conditions. Valhalla's capability comes from coordinating these owners, not from claiming every member's relic. (Volume 2, Chapters 28–31; Volume 3, Chapters 56–93 and 104–112; Volume 7, Chapters 133–137; Volume 8, Chapters 179–200; Volume 10, Chapters 248–253)

External relationships

Haramark and Teresa Hussey

Haramark gives Carpe Diem its first reputation, missions, and royal relationship. Teresa Hussey's trust in Seol supports the team without converting it into a royal unit. Even after relocation, the city remains emotionally and operationally important through the retained office and through people whose loyalty was established there. (Volumes 1–4; Volume 4, Chapter 31)

Eva Royal Family

Valhalla becomes Eva's royal partner and representative organization rather than replacing the monarchy. Seol and Kim Hannah help Charlotte Aria understand and exercise responsibility, while Sorg Kühne provides lawful administration and recognition. The relationship is mutually corrective: Valhalla gains legitimate city authority, and the crown gains a partner capable of breaking the organizations that had captured state functions. (Volume 5, Chapters 1–9)

Triads, Sicilia, and independent organizations

The Triads are Valhalla's closest partners during the Eva transition and save its base during the Alliance counterattack. Sicilia is another high-level ally with its own leadership and interests. Later organizations may follow Seol's coalition or accept Valhalla's demands, but they do not thereby become branches. Valhalla's political strength often lies in aligning independent bodies around one operation. (Volume 5, Chapters 1–5; Volume 7, Chapters 18–21)

The Federation

The Federation initially has strong reason to distrust humanity because of exploitation and broken agreements. Seol makes reconciliation one of the purposes of moving to Eva. Tigol Fortress, the World Tree, and the later wars turn that promise into shared sacrifice. Valhalla becomes a reliable intermediary because it acts against human criminals as readily as against external enemies. (Volume 4, Chapter 31; Volume 6, Chapters 4–15)

The Seven Sins

The Seven Sins grant classes, quests, authority, and rewards to Earthlings, and several Valhalla members have direct religious relationships with them. Valhalla is not a church or divine order. It makes institutional choices through its representative and members, sometimes petitioning or bargaining with the gods rather than receiving a complete program from them. (Volumes 1–9)

The Parasites and human collaborators

The Parasite Queen and her forces are the strategic enemy that makes human–Federation unity necessary. Human collaborators are especially dangerous because they corrupt organization networks from within. Valhalla's response combines intelligence, public evidence, reform, and war, culminating in the final liberation campaign. (Volume 7, Chapters 18–21; Volumes 8–9)

Sinyoung

Sinyoung is tied to Kim Hannah's past and to the large-organization model Valhalla both uses and challenges. It can provide intelligence, gifts, personnel contacts, or opposition according to interest. Seol's growing organization gives Kim Hannah the power base she was denied, but Valhalla does not exist solely as revenge against Sinyoung. Its success eventually makes the old rivalry one relationship among many rather than the institution's defining purpose. (Volumes 3–7)

Current status

Valhalla remains active after Paradise's liberation. Seol resigns as representative, and Kim Hannah succeeds him. Her Earth company, welfare spending, community investment, recruitment, and team reorganization remove doubts that the organization will collapse without its founder. The later institution is described as standing strong and doing even better internally than before. (Volume 10, Chapter 44)

Carpe Diem no longer exists as a separately registered team, but it remains Valhalla's predecessor and cultural core. The founding relationships, Haramark facility, elite standards, and memory of Dylan continue inside the successor. Describing Carpe Diem as simply “disbanded” would miss that continuity; describing Valhalla as merely “Carpe Diem renamed” would miss the change in scale, law, and responsibility. (Volume 5, Chapters 5–10; Volume 10, Chapter 44)

Identity and legacy

Carpe Diem's identity is immediate and personal. Its members live for today because Paradise can kill them tomorrow, train because reputation cannot protect them, and accept one another through witnessed conduct rather than polished affiliation. That culture gives Seol the trust from which he can lead, but it also resists bureaucracy and depends heavily on people who know one another well. (Volume 1, Chapter 24; Volume 2, Chapters 1–3)

Valhalla preserves the heroic intimacy while adding future time. A utopia for warriors is not only a place to die honorably; in this story it becomes an organization capable of making Eva livable, training successors, reconciling peoples, defeating an existential enemy, and continuing in peace. Its development from elite team to representative organization parallels Seol's development from gifted recruit to accountable leader. (Volume 4, Chapter 31; Volume 5, Chapters 1–10; Volumes 6–9)

The decisive legacy is independence from the founder. Seol's strength and relationships make the transformation possible, but Kim Hannah's successful succession proves that Valhalla is more than his personal following. By the end, it can change team structures, build businesses, attract talent, improve welfare, and serve Paradise without requiring Seol to remain at the head of every table. Carpe Diem taught Seol how to belong to a team; Valhalla becomes the institution through which that lesson outlives his active career. (Volume 9, Chapter 15; Volume 10, Chapter 44)