“Hmm, so you’re the demon?”

 

The equipment to bridge the gap between Earth and the new world of Yggdrasia, as well as the mana-gathering and mana-storage systems, were located within a military compound. The hallway that would lead me there was also the one connected to the command center where the military generals were. A very strange man wearing round sunglasses and a black cloak was lying in wait for me in the hallway.

How odd, to see just a single person here… no, wait, he was accompanied by a pack of dirty stray dogs behind him.

But this was weird. I wasn’t exactly indiscriminately throwing around my demonic magical power around the place all the time, but I also wasn’t suppressing my racial skill of [Fear].

Perhaps the man was resisting it the way some trained knights and soldiers could, but that pack of stray dogs should only be normal animals. Yet not only did they show not a lick of fear, they were even baring their teeth and growling at me, looking obviously, unnaturally hostile.

Was it hypnosis? Or drugs?

[Sunglasses-Wearing Man] [Race: Human ♂] [Weirdo]
[Magic Points (MP): 5/5] [Hit Points (HP): 110/110]
[Total Combat Power: 182]

Just a normal human, although his combat power was quite high considering. Perhaps he knew some sort of martial art, and I was sure the other factor was the magic power he possessed, even if he barely had any.

He shouldn’t be a problem to me in terms of combat power, but I still didn’t know who he was. I narrowed my eyes at him, and he took an exaggerated step backward.

“Ooooh, now that’s scary. Thought you were just a cute little lady, who knew you were a demon? Look, I’m getting goosebumps.”

As the man rolled up his sleeves to show me, he suddenly whipped out an oddly-shaped knife that looked like a bolt of lightning, using it to cut into one of the dogs next to him.

“Go.”

The wounded dog leaped forward without even a single whimper. It came in contact with my mist and immediately froze in mid-air, the ice sculpture sailing past my side.

“…what were you trying to do?”

He chuckled. “Oh, I’ve just finished my preparations.”

Right then, what looked like some fog burst out from the frozen dog and flew into the man.

I sensed a sudden outpouring of something similar to magic power from him, and I took a reflexive half-step dodge. The wooden door and the frozen dog diagonally behind me began to be invaded with greyness at visible speed.

Wait a minute, is this…

“…petrification?”

“Cor-rect! Amazing, I’ve never seen anyone managing to dodge it right on the first time!”

 

What did he do? Even in Yggdrasia, only certain monsters have the ability of petrification. It wasn’t something Earth’s technology could replicate.

 

“Who are you…?”

“My, sorry for the late introduction. My name’s Herdu, and I come from a long-established line of Czech black mages. If you’re a real demon, you should know the mages of old, right? Tell me who’s better, me or them?”

As he gave his introduction, he stabbed his knife deep into the neck of another nearby dog. Herdu smirked even as the spurting blood smeared his face, and he once more absorbed something.

[Sunglasses-wearing Man] [Race: Human ♂] [Black Mage]
[Magic Points (MP): 50/5] [Hit Points (HP): 110/110]
[Total Combat Power: 182]

He was holding more magic than his limit… I see. He was probably forcibly turning the lifeforce of other living beings into his own magic power.

He was one of the Earthborn mages. These people must have done a lot of experimentation to leave behind their magecraft in a world that no longer had mana. The way they do magic was fundamentally different from people in Yggdrasia.

But you know…

 

“Can you dodge this time?”

Herdu once more fired his chantless spell. His magic power was absorbed into the wall, then suddenly reappearing on top of my head.

I just swung my hand to whack it off-course.

“…huh?” Herdu gaped in disbelief.

I brushed off the stony powder sticking on my glove, as if they were nothing more than dust.

“…tsk, tricks,” Herdu said, slashing into several more dogs in succession, killing one and only lightly wounding two others. As the two wounded dogs dashed towards me, at the same time, Herdu also shot his spell with the magic power he gained from his kill.

I didn’t dodge. A single swing of my arm flung both the flying spell and the attacking dogs away. Herdu’s face twisted in shock as he saw what I did.

“Haahhh?!”

 

The spell composition was interesting, and I thought it could be quite effective depending on how it’s used. It would have been dangerous to me if I’d still been a Low Demon.

But you know, there’s a fundamental problem… you’re using way too little magic.

Since he’d been killing every single time he used his spell, he must not be able to store the magic gained from the lifeforce of others. The maximum amount of magic power Herdu could use at any one time was likely to be only 50.

Upon the sight of his spells being so easily parried, he began to lose his composure, his face twitching.

 

“W-who the hell are you?!”

“Who? Didn’t you already say it yourself just a while ago?”

Or perhaps… he didn’t actually think I was a demon?

He recalled his words, and his face rapidly paled. He once more prepared to raise his knife against the defenseless strays, perhaps in a last-ditch attempt to struggle, perhaps to run away. I stretched out my hand and squeezed.

 

*crack!*

His knife shattered, the stress suddenly too much for it. His spell composition unluckily unraveled, and his limbs began to turn gray from their tips, turning into stone.

Herdu screamed and wailed, tormented by the backlash of the black Curse magic. I leisurely walked close to him. He tumbled on the floor, trying to get away, his legs already failing him.

“…where are you going?”

“W-wait, please wait! I-I can give you money… I mean people! Animals! I can give you as many lives as you want! Yes, you’re a real demon, right?! M-make a contract with me. I know! I know demons can’t unleash their true strength in the mortal world without a Contract with a human!”

 

What the hell was he saying? Didn’t he see how I dealt with the army outside?

 

“That’s right! With a contract with you, I’ll become the greatest mage in this world! Once I do, I’ll give you as many souls as you want! Kids, women, whatever you want!”

“I see…”

So he would make children into living sacrifices. To me.

“Unfortunate for you, I already have the best contractor. Cheap souls like yours aren’t worth my time.”

I gently touched the fingers of my hands together and crushed my palms against each other. The stray dogs he had been controlling until now abruptly regained their senses. They stood stock-still for a moment in blank shock, then they began to growl hungrily at me and Herdu.

The stray dogs didn’t attack me, fearing me. But Herdu was right there, his arms and legs petrified.

I walked past the crawling man. He called after me in panic.

 

“H-hey, wait…”

“Sorry. I’m in a hurry.”

 

I ran to the end of the corridor. I heard sounds of growling, of fighting behind me, and a short while later, the dying screams of the man who called himself Herdu echoed in the compound.

 

*

 

After a while, the hallway widened. There was a vending machine and a bench. A giant man, advanced in years, was drinking from a small can. He quietly turned around upon noticing me.

“The spirits of virtue are astir. I see your true face, evil spirit wearing human skin. This is the world of man. Return to hell where you belong, dark one.”

The old giant said, stretching out his hand that held the can with the words ‘RED BEAN SOUP’ written on it toward me. Then he squeezed, and the steel can folded like wet paper.

 

‘Spirits of virtue’? Earth had so little mana even I, an archdemon, was finding it difficult to stay here. There was no way the elementals holing up in the spirit world would show up.

Seemed like this old man was also an Earthborn mage like Herdu. He seemed slightly different, though. He could see that I was a Demon right away.

[Huge Old Man] [Race: Human ♂] [Shaman]
[Magic Points (MP): 3/3] [Hit Points (HP): 130/130]
[Total Combat Power: 144]

The old man took out a tree branch, leaves still attached, and began chanting some sort of incantation.

“—O’ spirits, grant me the power to repel evil!”

In response to his call, what looked like three balls of light floated out from the tree branch.

Hmm… that was surprising. He actually called up real elementals. Weak and so immature they might as well be babies, but real elementals all the same.

But the spirits had been forced to appear in a world without magic, and their very existence was eroding by the seconds. Even their weak magic was being absorbed by the old man. They were beginning to peter out.

 

“My name is Ohan. Dark spirit, you shall perish before our virtuous power!”

“—Leave—”

I said, putting magic power into my voice. The elementals were forcefully sent back in an instant.

“…huh?” Suddenly losing the power of the spirits that he had stolen, the old man shrunk into a size smaller, as though he had also lost a part of his life force at the same time. He staggered, falling onto his knees. My claws gripped his head.

“…did you not hear their screams?”

The old man froze in terror. I took all his life force and his heat, then crushed the shriveled frozen head into dust.

“So that’s what the Earth mages are doing…”

 

In a world without mana, the techniques they were leaving behind were those that stole power from others.

If this continued, this world would be heading towards destruction like Yggdrasia, too. But with the power I had at the moment, I couldn’t stop it yet.

There was something else I should be doing instead. I continued deeper down the hallway.

 

Some time later, a double door appeared in my view.

I felt the presence of only a single person inside. I carefully opened the door, watching for any more ‘mages’. I didn’t know what room it had been originally, but right now it had an ‘altar’ made out of stacking tables covered with cloth. It looked like a chapel.

There was a priest praying to the cross set on the altar, his back turned to me. He slowly stood up and turned around, greeting me with the gentle smile of an old Father.

 

“Greetings, demon.”

[Middle-Aged Priest] [Race: Human ♂] [Saint]
[Magic Points (MP): 150/150] [Hit Points (HP): 250/250]
[Total Combat Power: 840]

This guy… he’s a little different.

---

A/N: The work of the remaining magicians on Earth ranged from giving advice by divination, academic research of the soul, to assassination.

If an Earth magician was fighting against a normal human one-on-one, then their skills would make them quite strong, but they don’t actually have any experience fighting someone really powerful.

---

Previous Chapter | Index | Next Chapter

The project to research the ‘Applications and Uses of Technologies and Resources of Yggdrasia’, done under the auspices of the government of a certain country, was bearing fruit after decades of work and a ludicrous amount of funding. Its progress could be roughly summarized into stages as follows:

The first stage, information gathering through the dispatch of watcher drones and stabilization of the local area.

The second stage, acquisition and genetic analysis of people with paranormal abilities who were linked to the discovery of the new world.

The third stage, development of a mana gathering system that made use of the aforementioned genetic data.

The fourth stage, development of a basic theory to create avatars that were growth-capable with mana.

The resulting large-scale mana gathering system had been the VRMMO World of Yggdrasia. The game project had proceeded without a hitch. Through the use of around three million players as ‘miners’, extraction of the new world’s resources and development of magical weaponry had begun.

 

But the corporation had encountered a large obstacle even before a year had passed.

The genetic analysis of one hundred children with paranormal abilities had been completed, and they were deemed no longer useful. They had been sent to the other world as test subjects for the experimental monster avatars, and at the same time to be disposed of.

The experiment had ended with all the test subjects either dead or crippled. The results had been used to develop militarized monster avatars. However, just as they were beginning their test runs, an incident happened.

 

The destruction of a medical facility and the mass murder of its staff, apparently done by a single girl.

She had also been witnessed in Yggdrasia, and was suspected to be the ‘rabbit’ beastman girl with abnormal combat power. Her appearance on Earth had shocked all those involved.

The scholars and researchers had determined that she either had a power to allow her to travel across dimensions, or a power to Digistruct herself here from the other world.

In case of the former, then if they could analyze her power, they would possibly gain the capability to transport not just mana, but also resources such as the rare metal ‘mythril’ and ‘adamantite’ back to Earth. Even in case of the latter, she would still give them the possibility of mass mana collection. The government had ordered the corporation to either capture her or analyze her genetic information. However, they soon found out that she was powerful enough to be called the Dark Lady in Yggdrasia. Their progress stalled.

 

And one day, the corporation’s center of research into the new world was attacked.

The 12th research center had been the base of the game developers, as well as where the players-slash-resource-miners were being managed. All of their security staff had been killed. The culprit had slipped through the stringent security and surveillance system, leaving no traces of themselves. The attack had earned them the nickname of ‘The Ghost’.

No one knew if the culprit was a singular person or a group. As the corporation continued their investigation with the assumption that it had been done by a foreign special task force with the purpose of industrial espionage, the 4th research center, where magical weaponry were being developed, fell. Not only were all of their main researchers murdered and their facilities destroyed, the fifty soldiers on-loan to the center for operational testing had also gone missing. As a result, the government then revised their assumption of the Ghost’s goal to be ‘information of the other world’. They gave the order for the army to protect the remaining research centers.

Yet their efforts might as well have been a joke in front of the Ghost, who had gone through the security like a hot knife through butter, killing hundreds of soldiers and researchers of the 7th center. However, the Ghost’s identity had been revealed by the remaining records.

 

It was the Dark Lady of the other world, alias Whitehare.

There were unconfirmed rumors that Whitehare bore a striking resemblance to one of the former secret alpha test subjects, a girl with a paranormal ability: No. 13.

No. 13 had been a girl with a congenital pigment deficiency. Her father was unknown, her mother a woman with Japanese heritage. When she was eleven years and one month old, her identity was erased from official records, and she entered the other world as a test subject.

No. 13 had suffered a psyche collapse and fell into a vegetative state due to an accident during the test. She had survived by unknown means, and was thought to be planning her vengeance against the corporation.

Her power was to ‘cause misfortune in others’, and so she was called the Demon Child.

Yet even through mental stress caused by abuse that at times bordered on being torture, she still showed no signs of gaining the power of Probability Manipulation that the corporation was hoping for, and she had been designated for disposal. She was hypothesized to have awakened a new, unknown ability through her psyche collapse and the mana of the new world.

 

The 7th research center had reported her power to be unfathomable, and her threat level extremely dangerous. But the corporation had analyzed her total combat power from the camera footage of the time she attacked the medical facility; they had deemed it to be around ten thousand, and as only several months had passed, they assumed her power could have only increased by 50% at most.

However, she had shown personal power equivalent to a battalion of tanks, as well as abilities of Probability Manipulation and Frost. The corporation found itself in a hurry to devise countermeasures.

 

The Ghost was now redesignated as Whitehare. As she had destroyed the 4th and the 7th research center yet leaving the 12th intact, the corporation now believed her goal to not be ‘facilities connected to the other world’, but instead ‘mana-extracting facilities’.

The extraction and storage of mana required large-scale equipment. Thus, there were only three locations that held them. Two of them had been the 4th and the 7th research center, and the final was a military compound.

Currently, the plans for the equipment that had been placed at the two research centers, as well as the researchers who had designed them, had all perished. Any reconstruction efforts would require the remaining facility to temporarily cease operation to be inspected.

And even if they could manage to finish the inspection, redesign, and operational testing, it would still take them several years. It was why the final location must be defended, no matter how many lives they might need to sacrifice. The military compound was preparing for Whitehare’s assault with a division of soldiers.

 

“Do not let her get in!!! Fuck that little white bitch up good! If I don’t see her pumped with more holes than my grandma’s flip-flops, heads are going to ROLL!”

The commander of the compound, brigadier general Hestor, slammed his fist on an expensive-looking table and shouted in apoplectic rage.

His hostility against Whitehare was of a far more personal nature than what was required for someone of his standing. Hestor’s nephew had been one of the officers deployed at the corporation. The young man respected him and had followed in his footsteps, and he himself was very much fond of his nephew.

His nephew would have one day picked up his torch to become an excellent protector of this country, if only he hadn’t gone missing at the 4th research center. Hestor still hadn’t lost hope, but if his nephew had been caught in the hands of that terribly cruel Whitehare, then his fate was sealed.

Hestor angrily huffed as he finished his outburst. Right at that moment, his young secretary entered the room. He glared.

“What?!”

“Sir! …umm, the people requested by the government have arrived. What is your order?”

“…them, I see.”

Brigadier general Hestor didn’t bother hiding his displeasure at the report.

 

Upon her destruction of the medical facility, Whitehare had called herself a Demon.

Everyone involved had thought it no more than a metaphor, that she was simply declaring her resolve for vengeance. But one of the high-level government officials hearing it had said that they knew some very suitable people, and had so generously sent them over as backup.

 

Several minutes later, three men arrived at Hestor’s office from the military helicopter that had brought them here.

“…so you’re here.”

 

One was a lanky man around thirty years of age, wearing a black cloak and a pair of round sunglasses.

One was an American Indian man, old and muscular, his cheeks bearing strange tattoos.

And one was a white-haired middle-aged priest, with an average build and a gentle smile.

They belonged to an organization that only unofficially existed, which the government employed to deal with ‘special’ jobs. They were modern mages.

Around a thousand years ago, mana still existed on Earth. At the time, there had been ‘witches’ and ‘wizards’, people with the capability to bring about supernatural phenomena, though they had never shown themselves in the spotlight.

But as mana gradually vanished from the world, so too did the number of these practitioners drastically decreased. Some had survived by joining hands with influential men and women of the time, and they continued to develop their unique skills.

 

The man wearing sunglasses was named Herdu. A practitioner of an Eastern European school of black magic, he sacrificed living beings instead of using magic power, using the lifeforce of their death throes to power his Spells.

The American Indian man, Ohan. He utilized the lifeforce of himself and of his surroundings as ‘qi’ to do Shamanism.

The middle-aged priest, Aiden. He was said to be a Saint who had succeeded in drawing out power from the soul by honing his own. He made his living as an exorcist.

 

“You know what the job is, correct?”

Hestor said bluntly, his misgivings plain to see in his gaze. Herdu merrily replied.

“They said a demon’s shown up? Awesome. I’ve always wanted to meet a real one.”

“…exterminating demons is my duty,” Ohan said.

“Indeed, it is what we have been told. How wonderful that a demon has appeared. This is undeniable proof that God existed!” And Aiden was the last to speak.

Despite the disbelief Hestor held upon hearing their words, he thought he’d seen an unfathomable flame in their eyes. He decided on a somewhat lighter approach.

“…I would like you to guard the hallway leading to the crucial facilities and the control room. Ask the soldiers to guide you. I’ve left the nearby room empty, so feel free to use it as you wish,” Hestor said.

The three men gave their responses and left the room. Hestor collapsed onto the black leather chair and sighed deeply.

“Goddamn are they freaky…”

With the force he had, he couldn’t possibly need their help.

Yet if the worst did happen, then he wouldn’t have a single idea what the three men would do. Hestor consoled himself by subjecting the meddling government high official to the worst obscenities his mind could cook up.

He couldn’t show those government officials any real-time footage due to informational security. So he could only make sure to compile some footage with extra info afterward to vindicate himself before them.

Several days later. The report that he had been, in a way, looking forward to finally arrived.

 

“Whitehare has appeared!”

 

So you’re finally here, Hestor thought, his hurried footsteps carrying him to the control center. His hand formed a fist in unconscious tension.

Whitehare possessed four noteworthy powers.

First, her invisibility to the eyes of digital equipment. This was solved by simply using real human eyes and the decrepit technology of analog filming.

Second, her physical capabilities that allowed her to move several times faster than a human could. The countermeasure had been extra training in aiming without digital equipment and training movement perception for his soldiers.

Third, her mist of extreme cold. All his soldiers were equipped with cold weather gear that allowed them to be active even in minus-50 degrees Celsius environment.

Fourth, as well as the most dangerous, was her Probability Manipulation. It was proposed that this ability was also what granted her long-range capability. In theory, they should be able to deal with it by not allowing her a chance to attack at all, sending so many bullets downrange that she wouldn’t be able to keep up with her ability.

 

He arrived at the war room. A monitor was hastily prepared to display analog footage. On the screen, the yellow earth, normally scoured by a dry wind, was now being covered by a white mist. The air temperature dropped drastically. Vision was bad, but not completely blinding.

Within the mist, a girl of white appeared in absolute composure. Whitehare was here.

She must have made her entrance knowing that her identity was now exposed. But no one expected her to simply walk through the front gates as if she owned the place.

Hestor saw her for the first time. Before he knew it, his eyes were wide open.

Whitehare was an adorable girl in her mid-teens with scarlet eyes, pure-white hair, and astonishingly white skin. She was clad in an outfit resembling that of a bunny girl’s, which left her shoulders and arms exposed. Her bunched-up short skirt and her pair of rabbit ears, no less adorable, bounced and swayed in concert.

Whitehare noticed the gaze of the soldiers. She gave a shy smile, fingers pinching the hem of her skirt to give a curtsy.

She looked so relaxed, so lovely, as if she was a character straight out of an animated movie. The field officer, captivated by the sight of the girl, even forgot to give the order to shoot. Hestor jolted back to reality with a gasp, and his furious order rang out in the command center.

“What the fuck are you doing?! SHOOT HER!!”

 

After a moment’s delay, tens of thousands of bullets rained down on her.

According to the scholars and researchers, her Probability Manipulation only applied to a single target at a time. It wasn’t unbeatable. If you can dodge all of them, I’d like to see you try, Hestor thought, his eyes glued to the screen.

Abruptly, she disappeared.

“…huh?” Hestor unwittingly exclaimed in stupefaction.

Screams rang out the very next moment, the screen shaking frantically. Then he heard the report. The artillery unit of sixty soldiers situated several hundred meters away had all been transformed into ice, cold-weather gear and all. There were no survivors.

Howls of rage, of terror, of gunshots and explosions followed one after another.

“What the hell is happening?!”

At the moment, the screen was showing footage of what a soldier was manually filming instead of AI-driven surveillance cameras. It was why Whitehare was outrunning the camera.

Hestor needed to get an image of the battlefield, anything at all. He switched the wall monitor to display the digital footage of surveillance cameras. High firepower units like the tanks were being disabled and frozen in pinpoint strikes.

But something else held his attention: a unit of soldiers was showing a notable lack of unity. He questioned the field officer, and the officer had looked uncomfortable. The report was no less strange.

 

“S-sir… a group of soldiers suddenly started saying ‘the Bunny’ and some other nonsense, and they seem extremely confused…”

“Fucking IDIOTS!!!”

 

Of those among his soldiers who’d seen Whitehare, some were confused, some excited. They were made useless.

Admittedly, the younger soldiers might have found it difficult to fire on such a lovely girl without a single moment of hesitation, but they were still trained soldiers. Was this the power of the other world’s Dark Lady, to have disabled them so easily? His spine chilled with the thought.

“Get the camera team on the heli!”

First and foremost, he needed to confirm Whitehare’s location before he could have a grasp of the situation. Several of the anti-tank helicopters, until now only standing by due to the unavailability of the electronic system, took to the air and began to send overhead footage of the battlefield.

The unit equipped with power armor was standing stock-still in a white wasteland like rows of frozen trees, their armor unresponsive, ice completely encasing them. Whitehare took notice of the helicopters. She turned her hand toward them and made as if to crush something in her fist.

Hestor reeled back despite himself, squeaking in fear, feeling as if her eyes had looked straight at him. The man himself was fine, but the officers watching the digital monitors around him had all collapsed, blood erupting from all over their bodies. The filming helicopter failed to keep themselves aloft, every single one crashing to the ground. The screens went black.

 

***

 

After I finished dealing with all the units equipped with heavy weapons and magic weapons, I poured magic power into the cold mist I’d spread throughout the area and turned it into a blizzard.

They were so annoyingly prepared against the cold. They wouldn’t die, but the remaining were pretty much just foot soldiers, so they probably wouldn’t be able to move for quite a while.

As I expected, fighting head-on really took a chunk out of my reserve. I’d refilled with the mana storage tank I found when I was smashing up the 7th research center, but I still spent nearly twenty thousand of my magic power.

Still, if this was the best they could bring against me, then Yggdrasia’s countries were still more dangerous.

There weren’t many units equipped with magic weapons. Perhaps the normal soldiers still hadn’t been informed about me, or perhaps they just didn’t have enough of the weapons.

“Well then.”

I set the freezing blizzard to last for a while. I took information from the device of one of the soldiers, and I headed to the facility that held my objective.

A tenacious soldier still tried to train his gun on me even when ice already invaded half his body, and my straight sword cut off his head, sending him to rest. My elbow pierced through the thick steel door.

I continued going deeper inside, mowing down the occasional magic-weapon-wielding foot soldiers. I came to a wide, straight-running hallway that would lead me further in. A strange sunglasses-wearing man was waiting for me, blocking my path.

 

“Hmm, so you’re the demon?”

---

A/N: It’s mayhem among the soldiers…

It may look like she’s wiping the floor with them, but if they all were equipped with magic weapons, then even Shedy wouldn’t win. She’d been going at it so carefully because she didn’t want to have to deal with magic weaponry.

---

Previous Chapter | Index | Next Chapter

It had been several months since the official release of the MMORPG World of Yggdrasia. Due to the Dark Lady Whitehare’s campaign that had begun at the same time as the official release, in the eyes of the new players, World of Yggdrasia had now become a game set in a world being threatened by the Dark Lady. Recently, with the beginning of what was assumed to be a new special event — the ‘Dark Pixie Attack’ — veteran players were now aware that even the Central Continent was no longer the relatively safe sanctuary it used to be. They, former beta players, continued to busy themselves in catching up with the latest info on the VR forum.

 

“So what the hell is with this event? I can’t even safely hunt outside.”

“‘Safely hunting’ is such an oxymoron, though I know what you mean. Maybe the high-ranked guys can handle it, but the new players must be pissing their pants.”

“They’re called ‘Dark Pixies’, right? Yeah, they’re gross as fuck. Not the Dark Bunny Lady’s minions, right?”

“Hmm… the devs didn’t really say anything outright, but I have the feeling they want to pin it on the Dark Lady.”

“But like, you know how flip-floppy the devs are with their game direction? Like, the details we’re getting aren’t fitting together, if you know what I mean.”

“It feels to me like since that corporation’s so huge, there’s a department that’s making up an event by themselves and didn’t notice the main management.”

“Personally I think the event’s nice. Killing those dark pixies raised my maximum magic a lot.”

“I guess it’s an event for the hardcore gamers, then.”

“Aww… but I’m the having-fun type. I just want to open a potion shop.”

 

“So I’ll preface this by saying that it’s still not confirmed information, but apparently it doesn’t have anything to do with the Bunny Lady.”

“What do you know?”

“A part of the demihumans is fighting against humans now, right? They’re saying they worship the Bunny.”

“Really? That’s… troubling. There’s been a lot of requests at the adventurer’s guild to defend towns against demihuman terrorists, but they’re freeing slaves, right? Fighting them feels awkward.”

“There’s that too, but those demihumans also sometimes come help out whenever a town’s being attacked by the dark pixies. In other words, the Bunny’s faction doesn’t have anything to do with the dark pixies.”

“Umm… so the Dark Bunny Lady isn’t a villain?”

“I mean, they’re just on different sides. Another two small countries’ Saplings were just destroyed the other day. She’s basically the enemy of the human race.”

“Yeah, ‘human race’ being the operative word there... by the way, I’ve come across some weird info.”

“What what? Come on, spill!”

“There’s this particular site that’s only open to its members, and it says the Bunny’s goal is to liberate the Saplings from the humans stealing their mana and save the world, since mana isn’t infinite."

“Lol the fuck is that? Who wrote this fanfic?”

“No, seriously. Assuming that’s true, then the Bunny’s actions and the demihumans’ actions make a lot of sense in a weird way.”

“God, the hell kinda twist is that…”

“I mean, it’s not really official info. Just some rumors I picked up.”

“Now that’s interesting. If it’s true, then I can worship the Bunny Lady without any regrets.”

“If so… then who’s our enemy?”

 

***

 

The game had officially released the Rank 6 update. Rank 5 in this world was termed the Expert rank, and the new rank surpassed even that, requiring the players to go beyond human limits. The rank upgrade quest was brutal, but all the same, a small group of players had succeeded.

[Isaac] [Race: Human ♂] [Player]
[Magic Points (MP): 200/200] [Hit Points (HP): 320/320]
[Strength: 25] [Vitality: 22] [Agility: 25] [Dexterity: 10]
[Swordsmanship 5.5] [Defense 3] [Reinforcement Magic 4] [Healing Magic 3] [Self-Reinforcement]
[Total Combat Power: 2290] 

“Please surrender! We won’t harm you!”

To the south of the Eastern Continent was the 61st human country, a small country named Arruine. In a nearby wasteland, Isaac’s clan was locked in combat with a group of beastman resistance fighters.

 

As a player who had had contact with Shedy, the Demon Lord Whitehare, Isaac believed that the demihumans’ efforts to liberate their enslaved comrades was a praiseworthy endeavor. But he could not stand by if the same demihumans were trying to destroy the Saplings.

Arruine’s knight squadron had been planning to raid one of the resistance’s bases. Isaac had heard the rumors at the adventurer’s guild, and he had been skeptical of the anonymous quest for investigation that the guild had issued. To prevent the destruction of the Sapling, he had rallied his clan and arrived at his current location.

The party had focused on speed and combat power. There was Isaac, the warrior; Weed, the scout; Sandria, the magician; Guy, the tank; and Mia, the healer. There were only five of them, but the party was as powerful as dozens of knights.

Everyone were at Rank 5 with their combat power close to 1500. Isaac had broken the limits and reached Rank 6, and his total combat power was nearing 2300.

 

The base they’d discovered had housed nearly forty demihumans. Isaac had given his call to surrender, but the resistance team leader, a feline beastwoman, had declined. They began to chip at each other in small skirmishes. Isaac’s party only had five members, yet they were putting up more than a good fight against forty resistance fighters.

Player characters weren’t affected by fatigue and were well-balanced in their status. Isaac had given his call to surrender once more with that fact in mind, and the beautiful feline beastwoman that was their leader silently walked up to Isaac. She wielded two swords, both curved like the katana.

 

“My name is Selille. What is yours, warrior?”

“I’m Isaac. Why are you trying to destroy the Saplings? Did Shedy… did the Dark Lady ordered it?”

Isaac’s party had once traveled with Shedy and talked with her. They could no longer see the NPCs as simple AIs. They moved, they acted just like real people. Isaac’s party was hesitant to simply rely on force just because it was a quest.

“We indeed revere her. But we do not do so because she is a Dark Lady.”

“Then why…?”

“…because our Lady is the only one doing the right thing to fix what had been our ancestors’ naiveté,” Selille scowled, her reply bitter.

“…naiveté? And what do you mean by ‘right’…?”

“I shan’t talk any further. It would be an insult to our forefathers. This is not something that concerns you, human. If you wish to stop us, then show me your strength.”

“…everyone, don’t interfere.”

Isaac helplessly readied his sword.

[Selille] [Race: Beastman ♀ (Feline)] [Swordswoman]
[Magic Points (MP): 150/150] [Hit Points (HP): 250/250]
[Total Combat Power: 960] 

With Isaac’s [Identification], he determined that Selille was a swordswoman of around Rank 5. Isaac himself was equivalent to Rank 6, even if he hadn’t gotten all the way there yet. He had over twice her combat power.

He couldn’t understand what she’d said. But if she, the leader, lost here, then this resistance squad would probably retreat.

Everyone else ceased their fights to instead watch the leaders’ duel with intense focus.

Common sense would say that with her combat power, Selille wouldn’t even be able to win against the scout Weed, much less Isaac. Yet ever since the battle was joined, even with his superior power and speed, every swing of his sword looking as if it could cut apart boulders like butter, he had not once scratched Selille.

 

“…w-why…? I’m Rank 6…” Isaac muttered in bewilderment.

Selille looked at him with pitying eyes.

“Rank 6? Who granted you that title? Regrettably, the only person in the world who possessed swordsmanship of the sixth rank is the Blademaster. He seems nothing more than a fool at first glance, but I assure you, behind the fool’s appearance lay a monster beyond the realm of man.”

“…a monster…”

 

Isaac had completed the quest and had gained the title of Rank 6, but Isaac had not yet reached [Swordsmanship 6].

Skills, such as swordsmanship, were automatically installed into avatars. But no one possessed swordsmanship skill equivalent to the 6th rank on Earth, and only the Blademaster Calimero had the skill even in Yggdrasia. The game had based the skill upon the Blademaster, but the recreation of his swordsmanship was still not yet perfect.

To recreate the skill of swordsmanship, the system would need to analyze millions of different patterns of combat against all kinds of enemies. If there was only a single swordsman, there would be far too little data to do anything.

The same went for magic spells of rank 7 and above. Their only users had been the high elves, and they had long since been extinct. It was the reason why the developers had been delaying the Rank 6 update.

And even the recreated Rank-5-and-below swordsmanship skills and magical spells were only usable. It might not matter when the players were fighting monsters, but when they fought against opponents of the same skill level, they would soon find themselves falling behind in experience, in tactics, even if their ability scores were higher.

And finally, while the players might have the heart to feel sorrow, anger, or to be moved by a story, they still didn’t have the resolve.

 

Isaac was struck dumb by the truth thrusted before him. Selille sheathed her swords.

“Isaac. You have more than enough strength. But as you are at the moment, I do not think I can lose to you. Out of respect for you, we will retreat for the time being. Your comrades had not attempted to kill us, and you… you had treated us as people.”

The woman turned away. Just as she was about to depart, Isaac called out despite himself.

“W-wait, please wait!”

She stopped.

“…what is the ‘right’ thing, then?”

“…I shall tell you one thing. The magic of the World Tree is the life of this world itself. What do you think will happen if it is spent without end?”

 

Selille and the demihumans said no more. They left in silence.

Isaac’s party stayed quiet, unsure what they should say to their leader. A whisper left Isaac’s mouth.

“Is this place… is this world truly just a game?”

 

***

 

“…you’ve got nerves of steel, don’t you?”

 

Quarancinq was the City of Magic, as well as Yggdrasia’s holy land for all things magical. Its Tower of Truth housed the laboratory of Marlene, the Heroine of Magic renowned as the Sage. She was hosting a certain visitor.

Seated on a manticore-leather sofa, Marlene crossed her supple legs. In front of her were two men. One was Mason, the Temples’ ambassador that she had met many times. The other covered his whole body with a pitch-black cloak, the hood even hiding his face. The heavy presence of a Hero that Marlene was releasing sent even Mason gulping, yet the other man only gave an exaggerated shrug.

“No no, I’m actually scared out of my mind just sitting here. Please, just think of the info as my gift of gratitude for allowing me to have an audience with you.”

“…I admit, it’s quite the interesting news.”

 

There were two small countries, their histories still young, on a tiny continent to the northwest of the Central Continent. Their Saplings had been destroyed.

The vast majority had believed it to be an attack of the Dark Lady Whitehare, but the true culprit had been the demihuman resistance. The group had been composed of elves, dwarves, and beastmen, and their travel had been assisted by aquatic demihumans, the merfolk.

However, while the two countries only had a few tens of thousands of people each, how could only a thousand demihumans have brought down the countries without the help of the Dark Lady?

But if the information brought by the man in front of her was true, then the Hero Gold, the Warrior, had been their vanguard. He himself had broken through the castle gates and destroyed the Sapling.

Even Marlene could not believe it at first, but the man had brought proof. He’d shown her the images captured in a state-of-the-art magitool, and she had had no choice but to accept the truth.

Gold was a man who loathed hurting the citizens. Why would he turn his sword against those very same people?

The attack had gone with surprisingly low casualties, as a matter of fact. Their goal had been only the release of the demihuman slaves and the destruction of the Sapling. Yet considering the fact that such important news had still not yet reached the wider world, she could assume that the vast majority of the survivors were having trouble even just evacuating. The continent was high up north, and with the Saplings gone, they must have returned to being an icy wasteland.

It was a simple conclusion. Marlene could easily imagine the outcome just by hearing what had happened, so there was no reason Gold couldn’t have.

The face of the uncouth man flashed through her mind. Maybe there was something he had to do even if he had to sacrifice the many for it, she thought.

 

It was info that she could acquire sooner or later. But if a Hero had switched allegiance to the Dark Lady’s side, then it would be a huge change in the current balance of powers.

Before, the humans only needed to worry about the Dark Lady, who always acted alone. The demihumans were a nuisance, but only that: just a nuisance. Yet now, with another force capable of destroying Saplings that wasn’t the Dark Lady, human countries would need their security to be several times more stringent than it was at the moment.

The Western Continent where she was also had a Dark General, the Orc King. If they all came to attack, even Marlene would find it too much to handle. Early information was worth tens of thousands of gold coins.

 

“So then, what do you want of me? I’m still not done with the mana absorption magic circle.”

“We thank you for your consideration, but it is not yet necessary. Just the mobile storage of mana and magical signal detection you have given us were more than useful enough.”

“It’s fine. I got my payment.”

As a reward for completing two of the Temples’ requested spells, Marlene had been given fifty of the newest model of rapid-fire magic guns, as well as thirty thousand rounds of ammunition.

“Then… do you want me to give you the Dark Lady’s head?”

The man chuckled. “Oh no, I would prefer it if I was allowed to take the Bunny’s life myself, if possible. No, what we wish to request of you is a summoning circle to call upon the Fairy King.”

“…the Fairy King.”

 

The Fairy King was even mentioned in the nursery tales of this world. Legend had it that there was a ‘Fairy World’ separate from this material world, and that the Fairy King and Fairy Queen lived there.

Did this man truly believe the stories to be real? Yet it was a fact that the man in front of her had summoned the dark pixies throughout the whole world in his belief. He was the source of the current chaos.

And of course, Marlene too had received a request to hunt for the mastermind. He knew of it, and yet the man still dared to show up in front of her with so much nonchalance. He even began to negotiate.

But his daring was exactly what caught Marlene’s interest.

 

“What’ll I get?”

“Complete cooperation from the Temples. Supply of human resources. Information about the other Heroes. Blackmail of royalty and nobility of this country and others. How about it?”

Marlene slowly nodded.

If the Fairy King, or at least something similar, truly existed, then she was at least a little interested in witnessing what would become of the man’s wish to this existence.

“All right. One last thing, then. Would my partner in crime mind letting me see his face? Show me, mister Brian, mastermind of the dark pixie incident.”

 

The man silently removed his hood, revealing the demented grin of a madman, his undeniably artificial eyes of black machinery laid bare, untouched by any VR alteration.

---

Previous Chapter | Index | Next Chapter

The city was suddenly plunged into darkness as their electricity vanished. Screams of fear and anger rang out. Black smoke from fiery accidents roiled up the sky.

I leaped on top of a tall building and peered down on the 7th research center. As I expected, they’d switched to their indoor generators. Still, it seemed their generators weren’t as powerful as the 4th’s, as the number of drones had visibly decreased. The soldiers on guard against possible attacks were now running around in a hurry.

Their main equipment and computers seemed to have already been disconnected from the network as a countermeasure against hacking. Looked like they’d learned from the 4th. I think I could still hack them directly if I used [Dimensional Manipulation], but I wasn’t used to the new skill yet. Doing anything that required accuracy was still difficult.

But, well, if I was going to test my [Dimensional Manipulation], I might as well try out another new ‘ability’.

I aimed my palm at the roof of the 7th research center building, focusing my eyes, and used my new skill to create a dimensional warp at the target.

I vanished from the roof of the tall building with a fwip of rushing air—

“Whoa?!”

—and teleported onto the roof of the 7th research center, my feet about 30 centimeters above it. I tucked into a forward roll, only barely saving myself from tripping, and moved into cover.

 

This was… somewhat difficult to use. It was the first time I ever tried ‘spatial teleportation’. I was constantly using my mist to sense my surroundings, so the sudden change had disoriented me.

I was limited to only locations I could see, and just a jump of several hundreds meters already ate up five thousand of my magic. Maybe it’d get better if I had more practice with it.

Oh well, no point worrying about it. I’d practice my teleportation once I got back to Yggdrasia.

 

Alright, focus. I moved toward the roof entrance, my attention on any possible cameras. With the evolution of my Cyber-Manipulation, I was quite sure I now no longer showed up on digital cameras, but analog ones would still see me. Also, I always felt strangely uncomfortable whenever I was in front of the lens, perhaps a legacy of the times I was still a human… I wondered if it was just me?

I unlocked three digital locks and entered the research center. Through the door was a stairwell that doubled as an emergency exit. There were security cameras, but not that many. They had a 180 degrees field of vision, but only around half of it would actually show up on the terminal screens, while the rest were just motion sensors. I could just ignore them. Probably.

 

I reduced my weight to the minimum necessary, then leveraged my inhuman capabilities to drop all the way down to the ground floor.

The floors upstairs were where the normal employees were. I left them alone. The 12th research center, which was a high-rise building in the middle of downtown, had all its important equipment high up. On the other hand, the 4th research center, which had an arsenal of experimental weapons, instead placed their crucial equipment deep below ground, perhaps to avoid losing them to bombing attacks. Most of the high-ranked researchers working with them were also located nearby.

This place was architecturally closer to the 4th, so my plan was to raid them from below with the assumption that their important facilities were also underground.

But this stairwell only went to the first underground floor. If this place was the same as the 4th, then my only choice was to use the dedicated elevator to go underground.

“Before that, though…”

The underground generators and computers were carefully air-gapped, so I couldn’t deal with them directly yet, but I could still hack the aboveground equipment to disable their satellite communication.

 

I entered the first underground floor from the stairwell and headed toward the elevator that would bring me to the bottom.

There were almost no researchers or staff members around. Instead, there were soldiers patrolling in two-man teams, all of them fully equipped with night and infrared-vision masks and more.

…should I tell them digital equipment wouldn’t see me? I readied my straight sword and combat knife, silently sneaking up to a pair of soldiers. I waited until they went into a camera blindspot and stabbed deep into their necks, killing the two at the same time.

I froze and disintegrated the spilled blood and jammed the two corpses into the corner of a nearby room. Then I immediately left to deal with the next soldiers, one pair after another.

Where was the elevator? If it turned out the place didn’t have an underground after I’d done all this, I was going to sulk.

 

“…ah.”

I just had an idea. I picked up a mobile device from one of the soldiers I’d disabled. As I expected, it had a map of this floor. So that’s where it was…

I slowly moved toward an unmarked door, disabling any soldiers I met on the way, and entered the room. I headed to the back and touched a blank wall, revealing the disguised elevator.

Of course, I didn’t just press the elevator call button like an idiot. I quietly forced the doors open and went into the shaft, dropping to the bottom. It was the sixth underground floor, it seemed. The second to the fifth underground floors didn’t hold any facilities. They looked to be nothing more than the foundation for the aboveground building.

It would have been a scene straight out of a comedy if the elevator was coming at that exact moment. Thankfully, it was still staying on the bottom floor.

I lifted up the elevator box with one hand, the other gently forcing open the door to the bottom floor. There was a soldier standing guard there, wearing some seriously bulky equipment.

I let out some mist to check out the area. There really was just the single soldier. Was that thing covering them a sort of power armor? I didn’t know how much confidence they had in their armor, but it was true that with it on, I’d have a more difficult time stabbing them with the blades I had on hand.

I could tear them apart with my claws, but I didn’t think I needed to.

I slipped through the elevator door gap as mist, flicking myself to directly above their head. I turned human behind them, twisting their neck 180 degrees, killing them.

 

The alarm suddenly sounded.

“…eh?”

I took a closer look to see if there’d been anything on their armor that could have done it. It turned out it wasn’t on their armor, it was the soldier themself.

“…an avatar?!”

Motes of light slipped from the gaps in the armor, and the empty hunk of metal slumped on the ground.

The manaless avatars usable on Earth could only exert 70% the physical capabilities of a normal person, no matter who was driving it. It had been the reason why they’d been researching mana to develop a military-capable avatar, and it was also why I didn’t expect them to use avatars here… aaah, I see. That’s what the power armor was for.

They must have decided to use electricity instead of wasting mana. Maybe the reason why I felt like this place was generating less power was because they were using it in their power armor.

As I busied myself in my thoughts, soldiers equipped from head to toes ran toward me from the other end of the corridor.

 

“Target sighted!”

“No digital equipment! Aim with your eyes!”

“—target confirmed! It’s the bunny girl! No. 13!”

“Shit! The damned demon’s come here again!”

 

‘Demon’, I see… I was indeed one, but it sounded less like they knew what I was and more like someone devout was just cursing me.

Well, whatever.

The soldiers fired their magic assault rifles, filling the hallway with enchanted bullets. Magic weapons might have been able to hurt me the last time I came here with just ten thousand combat power, but now? It just felt like they were throwing peas at me.

Anyway, so I’d been so careful to keep my identity hidden, but I never expected I’d be revealed like this. It was honestly a bit depressing.

“Hahh…”

Fine then. I thought it was about time anyway. I’d cut their communication, so it’d probably take a bit of time before the information spread, I thought, trying to console myself.

I didn’t need to hold back any longer. I blew mist of extreme cold at them, freezing the bullets that filled the hallway and the soldiers all at once.

 

***

 

“So it is her…”

Audrey, the current Deputy Director of the 7th research center, muttered as she heard the soldier’s report. The terrible hunch she’d had had become reality. Audrey rubbed her forehead, trying to dislodge the slight headache she’d gotten.

 

No. 13. The girl of white who’d entered a new world with a monster avatar, fighting even until the last moments of her life, and at the end, becoming a true monster. She had come back for her vengeance.

At that time, she had called herself a Demon. In fear and in shock, Audrey had reported the girl’s words to her superiors, but they and the government had taken it as nothing more than the ramblings of a mad girl, saying it was “just a religious declaration of ‘evil’”. They had given the order to all the research centers to capture her and investigate her ability. They only saw her as an esper with the ability to cross between worlds, no more.

But the girl was no simple esper. She might as well be a real demon with the power she held.

Audrey had also reported the mass murders and the battles between the girl and the militarized monster avatars, yet the top brass only waved it off as the natural happenings of another world. They still thought it was someone else’s problem. They didn’t see the danger.

 

“Deputy Director! We’ve lost contact with the fourth to the seventh sections!”

“No signal from the soldiers at the ninth!”

“The main power plant had fallen! Switching to reserve power!”

“Efficiency of life support system dropping from low temperature!”

“A part of the data server is not responding!”

 

The staff members’ fearful reports rang out, painting a terrible picture.

The girl hadn’t shown herself until now. But Audrey knew that what happened was in the capability of No. 13 if the girl got serious. The control room where Audrey was only had two flesh-and-blood soldiers as guards, four staff members, and herself. If the reports were correct, and if this control room fell before the girl, then all the military data about mana would be virtually wiped out.

The only thing left would be the data about the 12th’s player avatars that were capable of growth by consuming mana, as well as the small amount of magical weaponry that had been manufactured and given over to the army. The militarized monster avatars, still in the middle of development, and the knowledge of their applications on Earth would be gone forever, buried in the darkness of this vault.

 

Something hit the titanium steel door with a hefty, metallic clang! The impact repeated several times, and mist blew in through the cracks. In scant moments, the fog transformed into the shape of a person. Stood there was a girl of white with rabbit ears. No. 13.

“Keep her away!”

“Hold the line! Hold the fucking line!”

The two soldiers aimed their magical assault rifles. The staff members, minds muddled by fear, pulled out their handguns.

“Stop!”

Audrey shouted before she could even think. She knew they could do nothing to the girl.

Yet before her warning could reach them, the hail of bullets was already loose. No. 13 squeezed her hand, and blood poured out of every single inch of the bodies of everyone holding a gun. They collapsed in pools of crimson.

 

Audrey was the only survivor. She whimpered. Her legs gave out.

No. 13 tilted her head at the sight of the woman, rabbit ears flopping. Realization flashed across her face.

“Aah, it’s you. Long time no see.”

The girl sounded as if she was just meeting an acquaintance by happenstance.

What the hell are you saying with so much blood on your hands?! Audrey thought. Strength, or at least something resembling anger, returned to her heart.

“YOU! Do you not feel anything, killing so many?!”

No. 13 only narrowed her eyes a fraction. “I suppose it’s not exactly fun killing animals I’m not eating…” she replied, sounding as if she was just hunting deers or ducks.

“A-animals…?” Audrey said, dumbfounded. Then she shouted, her voice reverberating in the room, “Do you truly feel nothing?! They had parents! They had families they loved!”

Shedy silently approached the sitting woman, looking down on her with frosty eyes.

“Loving families? What’s that? Parents? Mine kicked me for being an eyesore. Did you know they’d tried to choke me to death?”

 

Words failed Audrey. She thought she could hear those scarlet eyes saying something.

 

—Are they not humans?—

 

Audrey had read her files. She’d known her family situation. She even knew of the rumors that the adults in the facility were mistreating her.

But it was the first time she truly realized that the girl in front of her, No. 13, had not received a single bit of love ever since she was born.

She understood now, how heavy the sin of mankind was, that they had created the demon in front of her.

 

“I only care about my ninety-nine comrades, and… well, whatever. By the way, would you mind telling me where the military base that got the data is? I won’t kill you if you do.”

 

After No. 13 got what she wanted from Audrey and destroyed the data stored at the 7th research center, the girl vanished as if melting into the darkness. Until several days later when Audrey was rescued, the woman could do nothing beside sitting there with knees hugged, her head hung low.

---

A/N: Shedy already no longer cares a whit about the people who used to be her parents. Or to be more precise, ever since she’d stopped being a human and started being a demon, she’d been absolutely apathetic about them.

What she currently cares about are mourning the 99 secret alpha testers, and the few kins she has. And a certain ‘Promise’ she has too, but it’s getting into spoiler territory about the end.

---

Previous Chapter | Index | Next Chapter

We were at an electric stand on the highway, waiting for the car to charge, and I was moping around in my usual outfit of a parka and denim skirt. Jennifer, the self-proclaimed Dark Lady worshipper, was fidgeting in restlessness. She waved her smartphone in front of my eyes.

“Hey, Shedy, can I go on the internet already? Pleaaase?”

“…as long as you don’t talk about me.”

“Aww…”

Bullseye.

She’d been trying her best to stop herself from telling everyone about me, apparently, and it was about time for her internet addiction to relapse.

She started speaking in a hurry, trying to defend herself. “B-but our server’s locked super tight! Even my company’s intelligence division can’t get into it! And everyone in the group already knew that world’s real!”

“…what?” That was surprising. I looked at her, and Jennifer puffed up her modest chest in pride.

“Our group already thought that world was too suspicious in the first place. Too real, you know? We started to look around, and once I recovered a deleted log in my company, we found out the truth! Amazing, right?!”

So she actually managed to figure it out by herself. So talented, yet her personality’s so disappointing…

Anyway, it wouldn’t be good if anyone else knew about Yggdrasia. Had she even given any thought about the reason why that corporation would want to be secretive about what might as well be the greatest discovery of this era?

 

The corporation might still not be able to travel there yet, but they had a new form of energy called ‘mana’ and the technology to make use of it. They’d only been applying it in a military context in the form of magitools, but if information spread, sooner or later this world might be able to use magic too.

Offensive spells allowed you to destroy vehicles with your bare hands, and healing spells could regenerate lost limbs in a blink of an eye. If people here knew how to use them, they would turn into a swarm of locusts to devour Yggdrasia’s mana dozens of times faster than they were doing at the moment.

Currently, only a single country was hoarding the information, so there was no real chaos in Yggdrasia or here, and I could still deal with the problem quietly.

But if the knowledge spread throughout the world and they got ready for an invasion… then I would destroy the civilization of Earth, genocide or not.

 

“…Shedy…? It’s getting kind of… cold…”

“Really? Anyway, mind telling me who knows about it?”

I let loose some coldness and demonic presence and shot her a glance of crimson eyes. Jennifer twitched and stood ramrod straight.

“No, nonono, please don’t kill them! There are some middle-eastern royalty and some serious celebrities in there too!”

And then she just blurted out their names and so much more information in her panic.

“No one will know.”

“Eeehhh…”

“Oh, fine… Jennifer, you tell them that whoever leak the secret is going to get their whole country wiped off the map.”

“R-roger, ma’am!”

Her face twitched, herself remembering the tragedy that had happened to the 7th research center. This should be enough for the time being.

 

“What are you going to do online?”

“Umm… I haven’t logged in Yggdrasia for a while, and I wanted to check out the news too. Let’s see… there it goes.”

“You can log in with that phone?”

“Aaah, no, no full-diving into your avatar, but you can use the VR forum and a few other things when logged in.”

“Hmm… can I borrow your ID?”

“Eh? Um, yes, but why…?”

She tilted her head in puzzlement but still gave me her phone.

 

Generally, logging in with a personal account required biometric authentication, so no one else could do it aside from the account owner themselves. Not a problem for me, though. I took out my prepaid phone, tapping it against Jennifer’s to copy her ID, and logged in in incognito mode with my [Cyber-Manipulation]. At the same time, I also restored the user ID of No. 13 that I had once used and had since been deleted.

In incognito mode, I browsed through the historical records of the forum Jennifer talked about, gathering a few glimpses into the situation of the other world.

Dark pixies? What are those? Apparently they’re really making a mess of the human countries right now. No one knew what they were? Didn’t look like an official game event. They seemed a bit different from militarized avatars.

And one of the Heroes was missing? If it was that weirdo, then I hoped he’s actually dead.

…mm?

A strange ringing sound rang out. Some sort of icon appeared in a corner of my vision. This was… a mail? Why? How? I checked the sender, but there was no text, only a symbol that looked like a tree.

…the World Tree?!

 

“…eh?”

The mail automatically opened, and I instantly logged out. In front of me, in front of my real body, there floated two white magic stones.

Were these the Saplings’ magic stones? The moment the thought passed through my mind, they flew inside me and were absorbed. I immediately felt more powerful.

[Shedy] [Race: Bunny Girl] [Archdemon Lv. 23]
・The rabbit demon of Laplace. Trickster and guide of man’s fate.

[Magic Points: 81,300/91,000] 6,000 ↑
[Total Combat Power: 90,400/100,100] 6,600 ↑
[Unique Skill: <Causality Alteration> <Dimensional Manipulation> <Absorption> <Materialization>] 
[Racial Skill: <Fear> <Mist Form>]
[Simple Identification] [Human Form (Wonderful)] [Subspace Inventory]
[Dark Lady]

It’s the real deal. They were exactly the white magic stones that I received whenever the soul of a secret alpha tester transformed into a new World Tree Sapling. And not only that, No. 01’s Cyber-Manipulation even evolved?

It seemed the newly evolved skill was no longer restricted to only cyberspace. I think I could now use it on real space, too.

But what happened? Did somebody other than me destroy an existing Sapling? I thought the demihuman resistance still hadn’t had that much power yet, but maybe they could handle a small rural country.

This was the proof of their resolve. They were the one to have allowed the humans to go so far, after all. If the demihumans had made their decision, then it wouldn’t be my place to say anything.

But, well, I never thought the World Tree would use the connection to me to send the magic stones all the way to Earth. The Tree was more skilled than I imagined.

 

“What’s wrong?”

“No, nothing.” Jennifer looked puzzled at my answer. I gave her a faint smile. “Anyway, it’s about time we should leave.”

“Yes, ma’am!”

We got on her fully-charged car.

The magic stones were a nice surprise boost to my power, and I got more magic to play with now. Maybe I could even splurge a little bit and test out my new ability.

I leaned out the car window, my hand aiming at a highway camera that was staring at us, and I squeezed.

 

***

 

The 12th research center had been the location housing the internet department, and there, a terrorist had murdered all members of the security team without leaving a trace. They were nicknamed the Ghost.

At first, the incident was believed to have been industrial espionage done by a rival company or a special task force of a foreign country. The 4th research center was supposed to have tightened their security in response, and yet even the compound fell victim to the Ghost who had once more left no traces. Beginning with Deputy Director Jace, who’d been the on-site supervisor, two hundred thirty eight main researchers and eighteen ex-mercenaries serving as security guards had been killed.

At the same time, fifty soldiers on-loan from the army had gone missing. The group was formed from elite soldiers, with the majority of them having once suffered damage to their psyches from a previous mistake by the corporation (the ‘Madness of Brian’ incident, in which the corporation was forced to pay six million dollars to the army as reparations), plus a few new members to supplement the team before the elite group returned to their duty. There were no records of them having left the compound, and so the army was suspecting the corporation of human experiments.

The researcher casualties were also a large setback, but not as much as the complete destruction of research data stored in an air-gapped supercomputer and the supercomputer itself. The facility doing experimental work on magical weapons was also reduced to rubble. Total loss was over twelve billion dollars. It was a heavy blow to the corporation.

As a result of the incidents, the government and corporation now assumed the Ghost’s goal to be information about ‘the other world’ and ‘mana’. They further ramped up security, their main targets being any travelers from the east. They returned the magical weapon project back to the 7th research center, where previous research data still remained, and special forces of the army were now deployed as security guards.

At the same time, the internal intelligence department of the corporation was also surveilling over three-thousand two-hundred of its staff members who were showing suspicious activities. The surveillance was done 24/7 with the use of security cameras all over the country. But one day, all of the department’s computers, including the mainframe, had suffered an external hacking attempt. Overvoltage damage had rendered them unusable, resulting in the loss of thirty years’ worth of the suspect database and surveillance data.

 

***

 

“Shedy, we’re nearly there! Let’s go let’s go!”

“…so we are.”

It was several days after. We arrived at the state housing the 7th research center. It wasn’t really all that far away, but security checkpoints and police pullovers had gotten a lot more frequent, which ate up a lot of our travel time.

I supposed it was about time I leave Jennifer… If anything, I should have cut ties with her ever since I acquired my Dimensional Manipulation and deleted the data implicating her.

“Alright, that’s far enough. Thanks for the ride.”

“What?! No! I’ll go with you until the end! Of course, I’ll help you in Yggdrasia too as a member of the Dark Army…” she said, rushing, trying to get her words out as fast as she could.

“Jennifer.” I interrupted her, turning my voice a fraction harsher.

 

She wasn’t aware of how much danger she was in. The government and the corporation had been suppressing media reports, but there had been many deaths at the 4th research center. And this place would be the same. Many more would die.

And even if she knew Yggdrasia still existed, somewhere inside of her, she still believed it was just an extension of a game.

 

“In Yggdrasia… in that other world, the human race is stealing magic power from the Saplings without limits. It was why the balance of the world was collapsing.”

“Eh…? I-isn’t that really bad…?”

“It is. It’s why I’ve been destroying the Saplings that the humans were using as undeserved sources of mana. I do it because I know no other way.”

“Then that world will be fine, right? That’s good…” Jennifer sighed in relief, her expression brightened. She had her own attachment to that world, I was sure.

I continued, my voice low.

“Yes, I’ll save that world. Even if I have to sacrifice every single human there.”

“…eh?”

She gaped, seemingly not yet registering what I said.

“I’ve destroyed about twenty Saplings over there. Millions have died by my actions, and many more will. Perhaps tens of millions, even.”

Imagine a modern city of Earth. Then imagine it suddenly losing all its electricity and petroleum, and starving carnivorous dinosaurs were being released in limitless number. How many people would survive?

“B-but…”

“That world is no game. Do you understand?”

I reminded her of the reality of Yggdrasia. Jennifer went pale, her head hung low.

That’s what it meant to be on the side of the Dark Lady. On the side of the Evil of the world.

“You should stay on the side of humans,” I said, “…goodbye.”

 

I walked past her, our backs turned against each other, and I ran toward the 7th research center.

No one else needed to stain their hands with blood aside from me. The Dark Lady, the Demon.

Jennifer understood my words. She stayed root at the spot, head still low, until I could no longer see her.

 

“…well then, let’s get started.”

The day turned to night. In the distance were rows of high-rise buildings. The lights of the town blinked on.

In the center of it was a large compound, a gaping space within the forest of concrete, as if someone had scooped off all the tall buildings there. The corporation’s 7th research center. The place that had killed me and the secret alpha testers.

As I expected with the messes I’d made, there was ludicrous security. I already saw innumerable drones just from afar, and there were people patrolling the place who looked obviously military.

I could just rely on the power of an archdemon to force my way in. Or I could do this another way.

I activated [Causality Alteration] and [Dimensional Manipulation] at the same time. I stretched my right hand toward the city and gently squeezed.

All the lights I could see vanished from the streets, plunging the city into darkness.

---

A/N: So which faction destroyed those Saplings? Actually, as long as the castle barrier falls, the World Tree itself can eliminate the Sapling.

A belated map update.

---

Previous Chapter | Index | Next Chapter

The human army was approaching the demihuman’s hidden village.

They were marching through the forest, so no horses or carriages. Everyone was on foot. But their number was reported to be about a hundred, and nervousness ran through the villagers as they were informed of the situation.

“Do they have knights? What about their provisions?”

“There were about ten canine beastman slaves at the back of their formation. They were carrying a mountain of supplies, but the soldiers were carrying some too, so I don’t know how many days they’d packed for. And about the knights, umm… I think maybe around five or six.”

“What are their goals? Are they heading here?”

“I don’t know… They look like they’re searching for something, so I think it’s only a matter of time before they find us.”

 

As the elven hunter relayed the report, the adults began their discussion, their faces grim.

There were quite a lot of people in the hidden village, but most of the youngsters and the hot-blooded men had gone to join the resistance. The only people remaining were adults with low combat power, women, children, and the elderlies.

 

“Everyone, please stay calm. We should focus on thinking of a solution.”

“Princess…”

The elven royal twin appeared from the log mansion. Several frowned upon seeing Gold behind them, a human. The princess noticed them. Her eyes faintly narrowed, and she quietly turned to look up at Gold.

“Sir Hero… you must have heard the report. Which country do you think the army should belong to?”

“…they sound like a company from Seize Kingdom.”

If the group had around a hundred men and five or six knights, then they’d be split into two platoons, each led by a platoon leader and their second-in-command. Overall command was held by the company leader and their aide. Considering the number of men, Gold expected it should be a large country rather than a small one.

The villagers gasped, knowing that a large country was attacking them. Their fear spread to the children, and one of them tried to run toward Gold, seeking safety in the herculean man. But the kid’s mother held onto her child in a panic. She pulled the kid away from the human.

Gold stayed quiet. The princess continued the discussion as if nothing had happened.

“…sir Hero, what shall be your intention?”

“Sister…” her younger brother whispered his disapproval at her inaction against the mother, but she ignored him, continuing to stare at Gold.

“…if they come, I’ll talk to them.” Gold replied.

 

If the human soldiers didn’t notice the village, all the better. Their marching course was slightly veering off the village, as a matter of fact. But then their scouts found the place, and unsurprisingly, they began heading directly for it.

The next day. As the troops approached the fence surrounding the hidden village, the voice of a man who appeared to be the company leader rang out in the forest.

 

“Hear me, demihumans! Our company belongs to the Second Division, Outer Western Front, Seize Kingdom! Our country had been assaulted by evil monsters called ‘dark pixies’, and we have been pursuing the fugitive responsible for summoning them. They were reported to have come here! Surrender peacefully, and allow us to do our investigation!”

 

Just as with any other country, Seize Kingdom was also suffering from attacks by the dark pixies suspected to have been summoned by prison escapists, criminals incarcerated for holding dangerous ideologies.

Their hideouts had been raided and scoured by investigators. The report had revealed that their goal was not simply sowing chaos in society and overthrowing governments with the dark pixies — they wanted power enough to destroy the system of nations itself. To that end, they were plotting to summon the Fairy King by using the dark pixies as a medium.

As the worldwide attacks all made use of the same summoning of dark pixies, the humans had determined that a single mastermind existed. Yet they could not find a single trace of this mastermind beside the name ‘Brian’.

Seize Kingdom had discovered one of the summoners’ hideout in the western forest. They had found the fugitive and several accomplices, but the criminals had all killed themselves with poison. The arrest was a failure. Then, the Second Division in charge of this mission had ordered two battalions to split into companies to comb over the forest as a special investigation task force. As eight companies combed through the enormous western woodland, one found traces of a camp left behind by a hunter. They cut their way into the forest depths, and there they found the hidden village.

Once the company leader was aware of the demihuman nature of the village, combined with the fact that the demihuman resistance was making trouble all over the world, he concluded that the village was related to the criminals he was pursuing. He came to the hidden village with an aggressive order of unconditional surrender for the villagers.

But the people appearing to answer him were only an elven girl who looked ten years of age and a well-built human man.

 

“I am Gold of Torrann! I ask, is there anyone here who know of my name?!”

The company leader widened his eyes upon hearing the name. It was the name of one of the Heroes, the Warrior, the man whose fame had spread throughout all of the human race. The company leader, himself a viscount, had had a single opportunity to see him several years earlier. He knew the Hero’s face.

“Oooh, sir Hero! What twist of fate brought you here? You should know this is the territory of Seize Kingdom. This is our land!”

This forest was over a thousand kilometers away from the westernmost village of the kingdom. It held not a single trace of the human race, and yet the company leader had shamelessly proclaimed it theirs. Gold faintly frowned, and he answered the man.

“In my journey to train myself, I had come to rely on the aid of this village. I swear to my own name that there is no such criminal here. I beseech you to seek elsewhere.”

“I apologize, but I cannot comply, even if you are the Hero. Our mission concerns the survival of our very own country, the Kingdom of Seize. As such, we cannot allow any foreign interference to our domestic matter… ah, but pardon me! Sir Gold no longer belonged to a country. Please, I ask forgiveness for my mistake.” The company leader said and bowed, his politeness without a trace of sincerity.

 

Gold was the oldest among the Heroes, and people had held him in high esteem for many years. Yet ever since his overwhelming failure to prevent the destruction of the Sapling and his country’s collapse — even if the country had been assaulted on two fronts at the same time by the Dark Lady Whitehare and the Troll King — military men and women of countries throughout the world now treated him with contempt and ridicule, thinking his power to have declined. The lower-ranked knights, those who had idolized the Heroes, were the most disappointed. The company leader even hated him, believing Gold to have betrayed their trust and expectations.

 

“…indeed, Torrann no longer existed, and I am no longer royalty. All the same, do you mean to say you cannot trust the words of a recognized Hero?”

“You say you still possess the Hero’s power? When you couldn’t even protect your country? At any rate, we have no intention to pin any crime on the demihumans, nor will any indiscriminate persecution happen to them.”

“Then…”

“In case we judge the village to be unrelated to the criminals, and as long as you pay tax to our country, then I shall entreat the Second Division commander to allow this settlement to continue existing. One hundred large gold coins. If you can’t pay, then turn yourselves into slaves to pay for it! Women, children, anyone who can move!”

“What?!”

Not just Gold, even the villagers staying behind were wide-eyed in disbelief.

 

At that moment, the hitherto silent elven girl spoke up and stepped forward.

“Please wait!”

“What now, little elven girl, something to say for yourself?”

“You claim this forest belongs to the human Seize Kingdom. However, this region is far away from human territory, and no humans wander here. Why do you say this land belongs to you?” The princess protested, dauntless before the company leader’s tyranny.

The man only scoffed.

“It’s decided in the international summit meeting, of course. Any land of the world is governed by the country that controlled the Sapling in the region. It’s how the world can have its stability.” The company leader said, naturally proclaiming that the whole world belonged only to the human race as if it was a matter of course.

The princess widened her eyes a fraction, then quietly closed them.

He spoke with arrogance, that was true, but she could see where he was coming from if she looked upon his words from the viewpoint of the human rulers. All living beings pursued territory, to find a place where the group could raise their young in safety and to expand it. This village had done the same — it was built upon territory stolen from wild animals. Calling only the human race ‘evil’ for doing what all life was doing wouldn’t be right, she thought.

But the human race had gone too far. They were completely rejecting coexistence with all life that held territories. In other words, the humans were making war with the whole world. It was the reason why even the World Tree, the pillar that propped up the world, had abandoned them.

But there was no point to her trying to explain all this to a simple military man of no importance. It’d just be meaningless words.

 

“Understood. We do not have human coins, though we do possess some mythril silver coins issued by the nation of elves. If it isn’t enough, then I shall surrender myself and my brother to be slaves… sir Hero, would you be our witness?”

“Princess… that’s…”

The mythril silver coins of the elven nation were as big as large gold coins, and with their artistic value in consideration, were worth ten times as much. And the princess even offered herself as a slave in case it wasn’t enough, asking a Hero, one whose words held significant power, to witness the contract.

She could have appealed to Gold’s kindness and asked him to, if not kill them, then at least repel them, and he would have accepted. But the elven princess hadn’t allowed herself to so easily rely on the sword of a Hero. Her nobility and bravery struck Gold deep in his heart.

Yet the elven princess had taken the greed of mankind far too lightly.

 

“Is that what you want, elf girl? Fine, here’s a better deal: we’ll take all your villagers as slaves, your mythril silver coins, and any valuables you have. Then we’ll see what the king has to say for your ‘wish’. Men, take them into custody!”

“Wha…”

The princess was speechless. The human army began their march toward her. The earth shook with their steps.

 

“And you call yourself a knight?! You would raise your spear against the innocent?!” Gold shouted, enraged.

“What strange words you speak, sir Hero. Demihumans aren’t human. This is our land. Resources are there to be utilized.” The company leader said, his true thoughts finally laid bare.

“Damn you!”

Gold set his hand to his sword.

“Do my eyes betray me, sir Gold? Am I seeing a Hero about to oppose us? Are you not a Hero, a protector of the world?”

Gold’s breath hitched, himself rooted to the spot. The soldiers spared a glance at the man as they broke into the village. The princess, bound by the knights, was staring at Gold as if taking his measure.

The soldiers flooded the village, tying up demihumans one after another. Gold was paralyzed by his position of being the Hero.

 

And then a familiar voice of a kid rang out from deep inside the village.

“MISTEERR!”

The elven boy named Yol scampered toward Gold as soon as he saw him, as if running away from something frightening. Taken by surprise, one of the knights reflexively thrusted his spear. Before he could register what he saw, Gold was already jumping out.

“Yol!”

 

Gold had once saved a human and left a demihuman to die. And now, he finally understood in truth the value of life as the Dark Lady had said to him.

There were no humans, no demihumans. There was just Gold trying to save a young child. He stood up, a bright aura surrounding him, the greatsword given by the princess now in his hands as if it’d always belonged there. And before the soldiers could realize what happened, Yol was already inside Gold’s arms, the knights and soldiers around him all mowed down by a single flash of his sword.

“Mister!”

“Yol… have you been hurt?”

 

The company leader shouted.

“Sir Hero, what in the world are you doing?! You will be branded the worst traitor to the human race, Hero or not!”

Gold turned to look at the man, his eyes cleared of doubt. His smile regained the absolute confidence he once had in the past, and he readied his mythril greatsword.

“Indeed… I am not a Hero of humanity. I am a Hero of the world! And as the protector of all, I cannot let you commit such atrocities!”

Gold swung down, and the light of his greatsword cut down a third of the company. The company leader, bruised and battered, had to be carried off by his soldiers. They retreated.

 

The human threat was gone. Inside the village exploding with cheers, Gold silently knelt down before the princess.

“Princess… I am a man who knows nothing but fighting. Please, tell me the truth of the world.”

“Yes, I shall, our Hero.”

 

And so, the Warrior learned of the truth of this world and stood as the vanguard of the demihumans. In order to truly save the world, he chose the path of being an enemy of humanity.

---

AN: So the Warrior knows the truth now.

He’s dangerous against the humans too, but in a way, he also acts as a limiter to the resistance who’d been getting more and more radical.

With what’s happened, there’s been a small change in the power balance worldwide.

---

Previous Chapter | Index | Next Chapter

The western region of the Central Continent held a large country, Seize Kingdom. To the west of the country was a vast forest. Hidden in the greens was a village of demihumans, its people mainly composed of former citizens of the elven country that had been eradicated by the humans.

“Heeey, Gold, ya mind lendin’ me a hand?” said a middle-aged elf who, despite his age, only still looked in his late thirties.

“Yeah, I’m coming,” replied a large man working on the fields. He laid down his hoe, taking the hand-sewn handkerchief on his shoulder to wipe off his sweat.

“Sorry for botherin’ ya. Howsit? Ya used to field work yet?”

“…it’s not bad,” Gold hesitantly replied. The elven man broke into a gentle smile.

“Right, that one. Can ya do something?”

“Leave it to me.”

The elf was pointing to a large boulder on a field that was half-way sunken in the ground. With their mastery of elemental magic, the elves would normally simply ask the earth elementals to bury, dismantle, or deal with it however they saw fit, but apparently there was quite a bit of iron in this boulder. Iron had a binding effect upon the elementals, so they were loathe to get close to it.

With a grunt of effort, magic coursing through Gold’s bulging muscles, he lifted the boulder that must have been at least 500 kilograms onto his shoulders.

“Where should I put this?”

“Whoa-umm,” the elf stumbled over his words in astonishment — he’d asked Gold to deal with it, he just didn’t think the man would actually pick it up, “the old dwarf said he wanted some iron, so just put it near the village. He’ll probably come by to break it up later.”

“Got it.”

Gold nodded and started walking. The ground heaved with his every step. The children playing nearby timidly approached him.

“…watch out, it’s dangerous.”

The kids stayed silent.

Gold put down the large boulder at the edge of the village, sending a thud reverberating through the earth. From the group of children taking nervous peeks of him from afar, a young elven boy jumped out toward him with a beaming smile.

“Mister!”

“Yol…”

Gold put on a clumsy smile and gently patted his head.

 

Two months earlier, Gold had fought as a Hero to protect his motherland, the Caliphate of Torrann, against the invasion of a Dark General, the Troll King, and his army. But just as he was heading for the battle, the country’s protective barrier was suddenly broken by a plot of Whitehare, the Dark Lady who had been wreaking havoc all over the world. With the barrier gone, only ruin awaited the Torrann Caliphate.

Gold had been locked in single combat with the Dark General at the time. He had lost, overwhelmed by the Troll King, and just as death stared him in the face, he was saved by a whim of the Dark Lady Whitehare.

The Dark Lady had said that it was a reward for his self-sacrificing attempt to save a kid and let him go.

Gold had asked her why. She said she didn’t see any difference between the life of a human and the life of a goblin as if in mockery of him, the man who’d left a demihuman slave to die.

He had felt that her words were those of a Dark Lady who only thought of human lives as nothing more than so much dust. But Gold also felt the cold gaze of disdain she had for him, and he began to doubt. Who was he fighting for?

 

When a crisis threatened the world, Heroes were born to save it.

But whose world was it?

In Yggdrasia of the present day, the human race had seized all the Saplings and had used their magic power to dominate the whole world. Gold’s ‘world’ had been the ninety-nine human countries surrounding the Saplings.

To humans, demihumans were useful cattle. To humans, goblins and orcs were useless pests. It had been the common perception of humans, and Gold had been taught it as the natural order.

Yet a single sentence of the Dark Lady had driven a crack into his worldview.

 

Gold had left on a journey to retrain himself, to eliminate his weakness, and to find an answer.

He had dove into the deep forest with nothing but scraps of food, his weapon, and his armor. He fought with all that attacked him. He strove to know everything about them.

But no answer was forthcoming. Hunger and fatigue had driven him to unconsciousness, and his savior was a small elven boy who had come to gather inside the woods.

 

Currently, the demihuman races and the human race were on two sides of a conflict. The humans had relied on their militaristic might to oppress and turn demihumans into their slaves, yet the Dark Lady had upended the power balance just by her lonesome.

All the same, as a person, the boy’s father could not have left Gold to die. He had taken him to the hidden village, and Gold was allowed to stay and recuperate under heavy surveillance.

Gold woke up, and what awaited him were gazes of wariness and  disdain of the demihuman villagers. Then the twin princess and prince of the fallen elven country came to meet him. They stared at him and traded only a few words before saying, “Stay however long you like,” and left.

 

Ever since Gold returned to consciousness, Yol, the elven boy that had been his savior, began to visit him frequently.

The boy held no hatred or prejudice against the human race, only curiosity. He asked Gold about many things, and in return the boy told him about every single thing happening in the village, the forest, as well as the White Spirit he’d once met before.

Gold was bewildered. He only ever saw demihuman children either prostrating in fear, or glaring at him with gnashing teeth as soon as they saw him.

But Yol was no different from the human children living in the countryside.

He’d talked to Yol’s father. The long-lived man had displayed astonishing wisdom. If the decadent nobility of his country, men and women who’d drowned themselves in their desires, were ‘humanity’, then what would that make the elven man?

Gold had had a heart-to-heart talk with Yol’s parents. The couple had advised him to try helping out the village with the fields.

 

It was the first time he’d done any farmwork. His meals were humble, nothing but fruits and potatoes. Yet the moment he saw the buds sprouting from seeds he’d planted on the dirt with his bare hands, he thought it was the first time in his life he ever felt something close to fulfillment.

Seeing Gold and his sincere work, the villagers slowly came to accept him.

He woke up in the morning with them and worked until sunset as they did. In the evening, he shared drinks of fermented milk with the village elders.

 

And today, as Gold was patting Yol’s head, the elven, dwarven, and beastman children approached, clinging to the.heavyset man.

“…mm.”

A little cat-eared girl around three of age stretched out her tiny arms, looking up at him.

It took Gold a few seconds to understand what she wanted. He effortlessly picked her up and gave her a ride on his shoulders. She squealed in delight, and the other children scrambled to climb onto him. He let them, trying his best to not drop them from his arms and shoulders… and he began to wonder how he could even take a step.

Then a voice called at him from afar, delivering him from his predicament.

“Heeey, Gooold! The princess is calling for yooouuu!”

 

*

 

“Sir Hero, have you gotten used to life here?” asked the princess of the lost kingdom.

“…yes, by your grace.” Gold tersely replied, slightly bowing as he stood on a rug of animal skin. Of the elven twin, it seemed the girl was the older sister. The brother next to her continued his silence.

They were in a shabby log cabin, its slightly-larger size the only thing to distinguish itself from the other village buildings. Gold knew it was the humans who had robbed the villagers of their families. He turned his eyes slightly to the side, unable to bear the princess’ gaze, and he noticed a wooden sculpture of a person with rabbit ears. The princess saw his look. She faintly narrowed her eyes, twitching the barest of a smile.

“Have you realized, then? All of us pray upon the Dark Lady.”

“…is it because… she’s the Dark Lady, milady?”

Were the demihumans, those not of the human race, aiding her because she was the Dark Lady, the lord of monsters? The thoughts behind his words went unsaid, but they reached the princess all the same. She was reminded of the girl of white who had once saved her and her brother. She looked coolly upon Gold.

“No. We follow her because of the whole world, she is the only one right.”

“Wha-” Gold was stunned, his eyes wide open. “That tragedy was right?! Hundreds of thousands of people died there!”

“Indeed. Many lives had been lost. Perhaps many demihuman slaves, too, had not managed to escape.”

“Then-”

“Sir Hero,” the princess interrupted his objection, “who do you fight for?”

His breath hitched. The barb stuck in his heart burrowed deeper.

“There is a legend among the elves. It says the World Tree and its Saplings were the pillars that held up the world.”

“I… know about that.”

“Then why is the human race using their power? Is that power not what should have been used to sustain the world?”

“…”

“I shan’t just tell you the answer. Think it through. But this is not what I have called you here for,” she turned to her brother, “Bring it here.”

“Understood.”

The prince took a package wrapped in cloth in the back of the room and brought it in front of Gold.

“This is…”

 

It was a greatsword of mythril, holding within it a strong magic. Gold’s hand shivered as he looked upon the powerful shine.

 

“It is a weapon made by the ancient elves. It had once been used by an elven Hero, our grandfather. He was killed by humans a century ago, as they had seen him as a threat.”

There were Heroes of races other than humans. But they were feared by the humans, and had all fallen before the humans’ military might.

“I…”

“Apologies, I had said too much. Sir Hero, please take it.”

“Wha…”

“It is one of the treasures of the elves that we had luckily managed to bring with us. Hero or not, I do not think anyone would be comfortable without a weapon by their side. Please, sir Hero… use it for the sake of the World.”

“… then I shall accept, milady.”

 

Call forth the Hero’s power for the world, not for the human race.

Gold bowed, overwhelmed by the answer that was still yet nebulous in his mind.

And then, right at that moment, a shout reached his ears.

 

“…t-the humans are attacking!”

---

A/N:

The princess hates Gold. The princess and the prince were the kids that were captured at the auction.

---

Previous Chapter | Index | Next Chapter

“Power down to 12%. No estimation until restoration.”

“Watcher drone efficiency down to 34%. Deputy Director, at this rate we wouldn’t be able to maintain stealth. Our indoor equipment are likely to be affected soon.”

Reports from staff members arrived one after another. Jace, the Deputy Director of the 4th research center, glowered and spat out his orders.

“Cease everything in the Experiments building except for currently running experiments. Reduce operation of the indoor environmental control system to 40%, then move the free power over to the security system. Leave the normal drones alone but order the stealth type to stay still. We’ll use them as fixed cameras… you shouldn’t be needing me to tell you all this.”

“Y-yes, sir…”

 

Damn incompetents, Jace grumbled with an imaginary tongue click as his orders sent the staff members running around in a hurry.

But his evaluation was an uncharitable one. The staff here all had the skill and experience to be hired as employees in a top-class corporation. They’d thought of one or two solutions to the problem of their own.

Jace was just the typical genius. He believed his thinking was superior, perfect. He rejected any ideas that ran contrary to his own. His constant displeasure and dictatorship tendencies had discouraged the staff members from voicing their thoughts.

 

“What about her?”

“Y-yes, sir, she hasn’t moved after parking at the drive-in… should we deploy a team?”

“Not necessary yet. Track her if she attempts to connect somewhere.”

 

Several days earlier, an incident had happened in the 12th research center. All of its guards were slaughtered.

Reports had mentioned the culprit hadn’t used a single gun, only bladed weapons. Considering the fact that they’d managed to slip through the powerful monitoring system that was even capable of detecting active camouflage, the culprit was suspected to be special forces from another company of a certain country with industrial espionage being their goal, but at the same time, the lack of tracks left behind had also given rise to the probability that it was done by an internal employee. The corporation had declared what was practically martial law.

The culprit had been nicknamed the Ghost for the lack of tracks they’d left behind. In a normal investigation, all people involved would have been questioned, but the first to discover the crime scene had been the janitor, and the employees weren’t even aware anything had happened until after the corpses were cleaned up. So the staff were ordered to continue working as normal, except everyone was now under surveillance, including those who had been absent from work.

 

The investigation department, who were doing ‘marketing research’ to those employees not in the know, had reported that a female staff member of the 12th research center who had been on a vacation was heading for this place, the 4th research center.

Her name was Jennifer Caride, 26 years old. She had been scouted as an expert in electronics. With her background of being a game hacker, she was put into the game development team for the MMORPG World of Yggdrasia at the 12th research center.

The development team was subject to continuous network surveillance. Reports showed there was nothing suspicious in her family background or her private life.

But normally, her vacation was always for gaming. Why would she come here? This region had nothing of note. And right after the incident too, at that.

 

Most of the development team hadn’t been informed that the stage set behind the game was a real world, except for a small number of staff members who were closely watched, with even a part of their private life under careful management.

But while Jennifer was young, she’d been a famous hacker since her student years. Then perhaps something had piqued her curiosity, prompting her to look through the information about the staff members and helped her realize the truth?

In his wariness, Jace had looked into Jennifer. He found out she had been frequenting a fan website of the game, but the members of the site had included royalty of a certain country, famous doctors, and celebrities. Even Jace found the place too dangerous to infiltrate.

 

He didn’t have any concrete evidence, but his suspicions toward Jennifer only deepened.

She was more than likely to be related to the murders in some way. Jace decided to observe her on his own instead of telling the investigation department his thoughts.

And at the same time she appeared, the 4th research center’s power level suddenly dropped.

He was certain. Jennifer was somehow related to the Ghost. Yet she hadn’t access any website ever since she’d taken her vacation, the highway cameras only showed her driving alone, and there was nothing else suspicious about her aside the more-than-usual amount of food she was getting.

 

“… wait… what’s this…”

“…me too… weird…”

“…where’d they go…”

 

“No mutterings! What happened?” Jace shouted, irritated by the whisperings of the staff members. He had moved to the monitoring room to better give his orders to the whole facility.

“Yes, sir, umm…” “We can’t see anyone in the fifth section!” “Same with the third!”

“What the hell?!” Jace leaned forward at the unexpected report. “What happened?! Confirm the situation with the sixth section!”

“Deputy Director, we can’t contact the sixth!”

“Out of the way!”

Jace pushed aside the staff member to peer at the terminal screen. It displayed the image of a room now dark due to the power having been rerouted to the security system. There was no one there, as though it was a holiday or late night when they’d all gone home.

“…get the guards there. Some watcher drones too!”

“Y-yes sir!”

The staff worked the terminal, ordering several drones to move to the area now devoid of people.

The images captured from the drones’ cameras were being transmitted to the terminal screens and digitally cleaned up to be brighter for easier viewing, yet for some reason, the on-screen footage was still far too dark.

“What the hell is going on?!”

“I-I don’t know, sir.”

While Jace questioned his staff, the drones continued to show empty rooms one after another. One of the drones detected a slight thermal signature inside a garbage container in the section that had been experimenting with the newest model of the magic gun. It peered inside.

One of the young staff members gulped, his face green, palm holding in his nausea. A woman screamed.

The screen showed a container packed tight with bodies, their throats all torn off. The image only lasted an instant before it was snuffed out.

The whole room was quiet, their minds blank upon witnessing a sight that looked as if it was taken wholesale from a horror movie. Then someone whispered, breaking the silence.

 

“…the Ghost…”

 

All in the room blanched at the possibility.

The serial murderer that had slaughtered all the security guards in a single night without leaving a trace was here.

 

“…call back the secret beta testers…”

“…sir?”

“Call the secret beta testers back from Yggdrasia, now!”

The staff were shocked by his order. An older staff member spoke, sounding almost panicked.

“Deputy Director! Do you plan on having the soldiers they lent us to deal with the problem?! That’s a breach of contract! You’re jeopardizing our relationship with the military-”

“Contract?! We’re having bigger problems here!”

“B-but, sir, we don’t have many weapons here for them to use. We don’t have enough of the experimental magic weapons either, and using mana required the Director’s approval…”

“The hell can that damn politician do now?! We’re not using the magic weapons!”

“Then-” The staff member cut himself off upon his realization. His face lost all colors.

“We’re using the militarized monster avatars!” Jace growled.

 

*

 

Several minutes after the recall order, the secret beta testers who had been raising their levels in Yggdrasia returned.

Currently, there were three experimental types of militarized monster avatars that were usable.

[MO-11-B] [Militarized Monster Avatar] [Experimental Spider-Type]
[Magic Points: 700/700] [Hit Points: 1000/1000]
[Total Combat Power: 2200]

[MO-14-B] [Militarized Monster Avatar] [Experimental Ogre-Type]
[Magic Points: 500/500] [Hit Points: 700/700]
[Total Combat Power: 1800]

[MO-13-B] [Militarized Monster Avatar] [Test Iridescent Armor]
[Magic Points: 500/500] [Hit Points: 500/500]
[Total Combat Power: 3000]

The last [Iridescent Armor] type of militarized avatar was created for the purpose of taking over player characters in order to gain high firepower, which was why it couldn’t be used on Earth. In terms of overall power, the [Spider-Type] was the most stable, with speed and mobility better than a light tank, plus firepower and armor equivalent to a heavy tank. But as the battle was going to happen indoor, the [Ogre-Type] was chosen instead for their humanoid shape. They were currently being rapidly charged with mana.

The company of on-loan soldiers accepted Jace’s request. Their commanding officer was having a meeting with the three platoon leaders in VR.

According to the information they’d received, the special operative nicknamed Ghost was attacking this location, the 4th research center.

The order they’d received from the government and the army generals to be here was a top-secret one. There were many, many restrictions on what they were allowed to do. Themselves moving out to deal with just a simple terrorist was liable to be a violation of military regulations, and this was why the platoon leaders had wanted to refuse. However, the company leader thought this was a chance.

Magical weapons such as small arms were already beginning to be deployed on test runs on Earth, but militarized monster avatars still hadn’t been used here. The military wanted them to be available for live combat as soon as possible, and their company was afforded some amount of discretion in order to hasten the process.

If they could get some results here, the corporation would find it a lot more difficult to refuse to supply the military with the monster avatars.

And finally,

“Isn’t it about time we try our hand at fighting humans?”

They had been killing monsters and raising their level in Yggdrasia, but soldiers were originally created to fight other humans. They had killed demihumans and refugees before in order to silence eyewitnesses, but that wasn’t a fight. That was just shooting turkeys on the loose. They had some pent-up frustration of their own.

“Alright, we’re doing this. Our mission is to eliminate the Ghost that had infiltrated the 4th research center. We’ll be equipped with the MO-14-B model. Tell those mercenary fossils in the guards to stay back.”

“””Yes, sir!”””

 

*

 

“The security guards’ signals have ceased transmitting. Sending drones to confirm ASAP!” “We’ve lost drone number 038, 039, 045, 046!”

“What the hell’s happening?! Where are the secret beta testers?!”

“All the MO-14-B have moved out… I think.”

“You think?!”

“…t-the soldiers don’t seem to be planning on telling us their locations. We can’t detect them!”

“Fucking military bastards…!”

“We can’t contact the researchers in the eighth section!”

“WHAT?!”

 

They had an invisible terrorist, the soldiers weren’t cooperating, and their researchers were still being killed. Jace couldn’t see anything. He moved to put on his personal VR set even as he was ripping his own hair out in his frustration.

“Give me a drone! I’ll go see myself!”

 

Through an audiovisual-only VR system, Jace drove a watcher drone to explore the facility interior.

Unsurprisingly, the digitally-processed camera footage continued to stay dark even through the VR connection. Only faint red exit lights and white emergency lights kept the hallways from being pitch-black.

It was quiet. Scarily quiet. Like an abandoned building devoid of all life.

Just as the thought passed through his mind, his body shivered as if in the cold. His sense of touch wasn’t even connected to VR.

 

He came to the lockers without particularly looking for anything, and what he saw sent him squeaking. Crammed between the lockers was a thing that used to be human, their blank eyes staring into him.

The corpse’s clothes marked him as an ex-mercenary in the security team. It was likely he had been killed without even a chance of retaliation, and his body was then placed there. But he wasn’t the only victim. In the dark room, another human body was huddling into a large decorative plant. The corpse looked like it was glued there, twisted and bent.

Jace barely managed to clamp down on his scream.

Fucking hell, what the fuck were the secret beta testers doing, he thought, trying to ignore his fear by channeling it into anger toward the soldiers.

There were fifty Ogre-type avatars moving out. They couldn’t be this quiet. Had they immediately met with the Ghost upon activating their avatars? They were capable of acting covertly, but unlike the other mana-filled world, their active time was limited on Earth. They shouldn’t be able to afford to move so slowly.

With that in mind, Jace drove the watcher drone to the section where the soldiers were. As always, silence reigned. There wasn’t even a single sign of battle.

Anger smoldered in Jace, anger toward the soldiers. As he headed for the VR room where they were supposed to be, he noticed the door was ajar.

Did something happen…? The door to this room was supposed to be heavily locked down. If it was open, then had they already defeated the Ghost and disconnected from VR?

“Have the secret beta testers contacted us?”

“…no…sti…ing…”

There seemed to be some sort of noise. He couldn’t hear the operator’s voice very clearly.

Yet standing still wouldn’t solve anything, and so Jace decided to peek inside through the door gap. He saw the VR capsules still closed in the darkness, so he knew they were still connected.

But something was strange. The soldiers inside the capsules looked different from what he remembered.

Had they always been so thin? So small?

He zoomed the camera in. He whimpered.

The soldiers inside the capsule were all dead. Withered and frozen in ice.

White-colored wind began dancing. A white mist covered the top of the row of capsules, coalescing into a human shape, an arm reaching out toward Jace to crush something in its hand.

 

At 30 years old, Jace once dropped the chemical he was holding during an experiment. Now his arms were burnt.

At 25 years old, his chair once broke and injured his hips. Now his bones were crushed.

At 18 years old, he once injured a rib from a football tackle. Now his lungs collapsed.

At 12 years old, he once got beaten by his father as punishment for his mischief. Now his jaw was cracked.

At 1 year old, his family once met with an accident in a car that had resulted in his mother suffering a whiplash. Now his neck was broken.

 

***

 

“And… that’s it.”

I used [Cyber-Manipulation] on the air-gapped mainframe computer dedicated to research and deleted everything related to monster avatars and magical weapons.

I had wondered how I would deal with the mana weaponry and equipment that were currently being experimented, but then I found the mana storage tank, so I just used all of it to smash everything to smithereens.

Such a pity. It was the first chance I had to refill my magic, and then I spent a ton of it to destroy everything. Back to scrimping mana once again…

 

I fiddled with the dog tag I lifted from the secret beta testers.

I had wondered how they could move so precisely, so exact. Turned out they were actual soldiers. Then did the government also have a hand in this? I wanted to deal with them too, but I didn’t have that much time. After I was done with everything, maybe.

 

Well then… next, the 7th research center.

---

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The electric car of the researcher Jennifer, self-proclaimed Dark Lady worshipper, carried the two of us onto the highway in the suburbs. It was an old vehicle, paint discolored with age.

“It’s a Japanese car from quite some time ago. I’ve driven it over five hundred thousand kilometers and it’s almost never given me trouble!”

“Mmhmm.”

I didn’t really get it. It’s probably supposed to be amazing.

Anyway, just getting a mean of transportation was honestly helpful. I could move faster by myself, except I’d be spending magic power for high-speed movement when I needed to be saving as much as I could.

Which reminded me, this might actually be the first time I rode on a car. The last time had been the truck carrying me from the hospital to the facility. It was closer to a prisoner transport than a ride. It didn’t count.

I rested my elbow on the open window frame and leaned on it. I closed my eyes, feeling the wind on my cheeks, careful to keep the hood where it was.

When was the last time I could relax like this, I wondered…

“It’s a great day for a drive! You think so too right, my Lady? Ah, should I put on some music? There’s this alternative rock band I can recommend—eep!”

My good mood ruined, I shut her up with a blast of coldness. The car skidded left and right for a moment.

“Quiet down…”

“I-I’m sorry… my Dark Bunny Lady looked so much like a normal girl I sort of just…”

What the hell was with that title? As I glared at her in exasperation, a sports car revved its engine to overtake us from behind, paying no attention to the speed limit. As they passed us by, so close they grazed our car’s side mirror and my elbow, a voice rang out.

 

“Fucking slowpoke geriatric, get that fucking scrap heap off the fucking road!”

 

I looked at Jennifer and answered her.

“You really think so?”

“…eh?”

I snapped my finger. The sports car that overtook us began to zigzag, one of its tires now burst. It veered off the highway and plunged into the empty fields.

“…did … my Lady did that?”

Jennifer’s face blanched a smidgen. Maybe I scared her a bit too much?

“…call me Shedy.”

“Huh?”

“Don’t call me the Dark Lady, people are going to look.”

Jennifer’s pale face visibly began to redden.

“Yes, Shedy! I’ll help you as best I can! Please give me an autograph later!”

Maybe I should stop being so nice.

 

*

 

“Sorry for the wait, Shedy!”

I didn’t need to eat or sleep, but humans needed their meals and bathroom breaks.

Which was why we were currently parked at the burger chain with the large M symbol that had stores open even in Antarctica and the Saharas. Jennifer came back to the car with a large paper bag.

“Is this fine, Shedy?”

She gave me some Coke in what might as well be a bucket, as well as a huge burger.

“…what’s this?”

“A normal Coke and cheeseburger! Oh, here, there’s some fries too.”

So this is the normal size… I’d lost my chance to refuse. I stared at the thing in my hand, my mind wandering.

I used to have to pretend to eat and store the food in my [Inventory], but ever since my Humanoid Form turned into Human Form, I’d gained the ability to eat if I wanted to.

I actually had tried eating. I first bought it for Blobsy, but since she preferred monster meat, the salted herring sandwich had been languishing in my [Inventory] all this time. I’d tried a bite, but it just felt like eating papier-mache.

I didn’t know if I’d lost the ability to eat normal food when I became a demon, or if the food was just terrible, but I’d learned to not leave a single scrap of food behind for survival reasons since a long time ago. So I’d still finished it. I’d honestly thought that defeating and absorbing living beings would still be a lot more satisfying than eating that.

Which was why I wanted to bow out this time too, but on the other hand, I’d never had a hamburger before. I took a tiny bite.

I stared at the thing in my hand, then took another bite.

“Did you like it?! That’s one of our national comfort food!”

For some reason, Jennifer drew close to me with a beaming smile. I pushed her face off and frostily glared at her.

“Explain where we’re going to next.”

“…yesh, ma’am.”

 

…that reminded me, there was this thing where demon worshippers gave “offerings” to their demons, right?

 

Our next destination was the 4th research center. Just as I’d suspected, the 4th and the 7th were doing research about the other world. Both of them were set up with the dimensional-crossing system.

According to Jennifer, the 7th were working on the growth-capable normal avatars and researching mana, while the 4th was doing work on the magical weapons and militarized monster avatars.

 

“What about that thing that monsterize players?”

“Aaahh… that. Yeah, that’s some crazy stuff. The players would get their game suddenly shut down and their character data deleted, they’d get their arms twisted by HQ and the 4th, and only the 12th is left to deal with their complaints. Don’t you think that’s terrible? Of course, as a player myself, I’d be raising hell too if I ever got my character deleted out of nowhere.”

 

The 4th research center was doing that too? Apparently the military stuff used to be worked on by the 7th, and the recent reckless attacks on me had begun ever since the weapon development project was transferred to the 4th.

Which meant that first facility where I’d gone all out had been managed by the 7th. I’d flatten the 4th too, of course, but the 7th was the one that I’d promised to visit since way back then.

I narrowed my eyes at the thought. Jennifer in her driver’s seat timidly talked.

 

“Umm… Shedy, are you okay with a motel’s frozen pizza for tonight’s dinner?”

“…”

 

Three days later, in the evening. We’d crossed states and arrived at the 4th research center located in the suburbs.

 

“But Shedy, we’re still quite far away.”

“We are.”

Seen from the highway, the enormous site of the 4th research center was still in the distance.

There were barely any trees around it, only sand and rocks. Other than the 4th, there were only a few drive-ins, gas stands, motels, and trailer homes. If we got any closer, we might invite some unwanted attention.

“It’s fine, just wait here.”

“B-but-” Jennifer sputtered, apparently misunderstanding that I no longer needed her. I scowled at her.

“If you die here, I’ll lose a driver. Just stay there.”

“…yes, ma’am!”

 

I dashed toward the 4th research center while trying to stay hidden behind the rocks and boulders.

Not much security. With the 12th having all its guards dying from an ‘accident’ (which just meant it wasn’t being reported), this place had ramped up its security by quite a bit, yes, but it wasn’t security against me, a demon.

A quick glance revealed to me nearly a hundred watcher drones equipped with simple taser guns flying around the vicinity of the compound.

On Earth, where they couldn’t use mana, the drones were being powered by wireless electricity. The farther they went from the wireless charger, the less efficient the charging would be. The number of drones they could field 24/7 truly showed the resources they had as a large enterprise.

And my eyes even revealed stealth drones. They were more power-hungry than normal ones, yet there were at least the same amount of them as normal drones, perhaps even more.

But it still wasn’t enough precaution for me.

In Yggdrasia, they were deploying at least dozens of times more drones at locations where they predicted me to appear.

 

To be honest, even AI-driven watcher drones were actually a pretty good way to see me.

While I’d gotten used to [Cyber-Manipulation] by now and could disappear from the vision of several drones, if there were hundreds of them watching me, the corporation might be able to realize the unnatural space from comparing all the camera viewpoints.

The human perception was really good at latching onto that sort of abnormality. It was the reason why while I could erase myself from the cameras, I still did my best to not show up on them in the first place.

But here? They didn’t have enough drones, and they had too many drones.

Just a hundred wasn’t enough for the AI to recognize the abnormality. At the same time, there was a whole hundred drones — they didn’t have enough real humans to watch every single one.

Of course, that didn’t mean I could afford to be careless. Another one of my worries was coming into direct human sight. But the corporation was so paranoid about industrial espionage, this compound didn’t even have a single window.

Anyway, to deal with both at the same time, I searched for what were probably buried power lines that fed power to the wireless chargers, then used them as a medium to hack the indoor power generator and lowered its output to the minimum.

 

As the sky began to darken, the lights of the distant 4th research center compound dimmed, if only barely.

At the same time, all the drones began to move slower. Did they change into power-saving mode? I’d thought they would change to the state’s power supply if they still can’t find out the cause after enough time had passed, though they seemed the prideful sort. Would they actually do so?

With the drone security network now weakened, I slipped through them under the cover of night. I jumped over the five-meter high wire fence, not a single part of me touching it, and entered the compound of the 4th research center.

---

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I walked through the town of night, fiddling with the ID card I appropriated from the men in the subway.

I connected the card to my smartphone and used [Cyber-Manipulation] to read the info. The man was working in the material storage department. Hmmm… not quite what I was looking for. He looked muscular so I had thought he was one of the guards. If he was just a warehouse worker, there weren’t going to be many places I could get in with his card.

And that wasn’t my only problem. Once he noticed his ID card was gone and sent in a report, the card’s going to lose all of its functions.

But I didn’t think it was going to be that much of a problem. Further investigations revealed that reissuing cards would cost quite a pretty penny, and the card owner would need to go directly to the issuing office to get their card. Most people would probably go search for them first and only request card lockage once they were certain it was lost forever, right?

He just needed his mobile device to buy things, so I was thinking I’d probably have about half a day before I needed to worry about it… anyway, if things went wrong, I’d just make something up as I went along.

Besides, I could probably manage something about the card’s privileges too.

 

“…the 12th research center.”

It was inside a fifteen-story building in a semi-industrial district some distance away from the subway station. Or to be more precise, apparently the whole building was the 12th research center.

The 12th’s purpose within the corporation was to hold the developer department of the game World of Yggdrasia. At the very least, they seemed much more likely to be aware Yggdrasia was a real world compared to the other departments, so there was no need for me to hesitate. Not like I intended to, anyway.

“[Cyber-Manipulation]”

I checked for any patrolling watcher drones nearby. I used my Skill to look through the cameras, then weaved through their blind spots to dash into the underground parking lot. I got in.

I might be able to handle the city’s cameras, but I had no confidence I could use my Skill to completely fool the cameras of a place that took security as serious as this, so I just focused on moving through their blind spots. I went around behind the guard standing alone in front of the door, who obviously looked like he’d had experience in the army. I cut his throat with a quick swipe of my knife.

Had he been a mercenary before? He was unconsciously standing in a location where he wouldn’t show up on the cameras.

I moved the body to a dark spot, freezing the spilled blood and vaporizing it into dust. I couldn’t use my more obvious abilities here on Earth. I didn’t want to stand out, true, but mainly I just didn’t want to use those abilities too much.

It wasn’t like Earth had no mana at all, but compared to Yggdrasia, there was way too little of it. Back there, my [Absorption] allowed me to recover thirty percent of my magic each hour. Here, I could only recover a single percent after three days.

I’d already spent close to thirty thousand magic points just to come here. While I still had fifty thousand left, if I froze and demolished the entire building and then it turned out it wasn’t my target, no amount of mana could last me the entire trip.

Still, if I directly absorbed people’s lifeforce with my hands instead of using my cold mist, then while people here didn’t have magic, their souls would still refill a tiny bit of my own magic pool.

Honestly, while I had no personal grudges with these guys, my impression of the corporation wasn’t so good that I’d bother picking and choosing who to spare in a pack of beasts that had bore their fangs against me. If anything, I hadn’t even a single positive emotion to associate with them. They’d understand if I didn’t bother to discriminate.

 

I held up the ID card and the staff door opened. That was a relief. I didn’t really think they would actually put up eye scanners here anyway, but I still worried a bit.

There were more cameras ahead. Before the door completely opened, I slipped into a blind spot, then removed my weight and clung to the ceiling.

Two guards came out to check the door when they saw no one on the security monitors. Before they came into camera view, I threw my foldable knives into their foreheads, using [Causality Alteration] to make sure they killed them.

They made a bit of noise when they fell down, but no other guards came.

I floated my mist around a bit to check for signs of living people. There was only one person sleeping in the nap room that was in the back of the security room, so I sent them into a more permanent sleep and threw the two dead guards in there.

It had been two minutes since I infiltrated the place. Even if I’d had a bit of real combat training in Yggdrasia, considering how I was just a normal human kid in the beginning, I’d say I did pretty well.

…but there was nothing demonic about what I was doing, at all. More like a job for the special forces, or maybe an assassin.

 

“This place, right?”

Cutting the cameras would be too suspicious, obviously, though I did cut the alarm. I edited the camera footage just in case, but even in the small chance something still showed up on camera, it shouldn’t be able to reach headquarters.

I checked the screens in the security room. Looked like the lower floors were offices, warehouses, and document storage, while the main office for the developer department and the laboratories were on the upper floors.

I threw the ID card I used into the lost-and-found bin and took an ID card from one of the guards, putting it in my pocket.

I forced the elevator doors open and climbed up the shaft. Midway through, I stopped to check for presence of people. There was no one on the lower floors, while I sensed a few life signals on the upper floors.

From inside the elevator shaft, I used [Cyber-Manipulation] to check the cameras. I found a security room and a few guards on the upper floors, so I headed there first.

That was close. If I’d cut the cameras below, they’d totally be on alert by now.

From where the cameras were placed, I wasn’t sure if I could get there without being seen. So I used Cyber-Manipulation to force static into the monitors for a single moment and used the chance to dash inside the security room.

 

“Wha-where’d you-”

I threw the machete-ish combat knife at the one who noticed me first. It stabbed into his face, killing him instantly.

Another guard ran for the alarm, while the remaining two reached for the guns on their hips.

“Fuck-argh!”

Just as one of them was about to raise his voice, I crouched and swiped his legs out with my own, while my hand threw three foldable knives toward the head of the young man running for the alarm. Before I could see the result of my throw, I slammed my elbow into the throat of the man I tripped, crushing his windpipe.

“Who the he-!!!”

As the final man aimed his gun, I cut off his hand with my straight sword and stabbed his throat before he could scream. The man trying to ring the alarm was already dead, my three knives stuck in the back of his head.

It would have been simpler if I just froze them with my mist, but then they might realize it was me. So I’d used weapons, just in case.

I took back my knives, freezing the blood and fat on them and wiped them off. I cut the alarm and headed for the server room for the MMORPG World of Yggdrasia.

 

“Hmmm…”

I used Cyber-Manipulation on one of the servers. It held nothing but player data.

I was quite certain this was where they did the overall management of the players they were sending to Yggdrasia, but there was no sign of anything resembling the all-important monster avatars.

I was sure they were being sent from here. Perhaps this was just a layover spot, and the main system of the militarized avatars were somewhere else?

There was a more fundamental question here. While this was a building with a whole fifteen floors, was a facility of this size even enough to bridge the gap between dimensions? What if the dimensional-crossing system were also set up in the other locations on my list of suspects, the 4th and the 7th research centers?

In which case, perhaps this facility really was only used for connecting the game to the other world. What should I do…

“Maybe I should just destroy it.”

I looked at the supercomputer that took up a whole floor in front of me, wondering how I’d do this. Then my rabbit ears picked up a faint noise.

 

“Mmm? Is somebody there?”

It was the sleepy voice of a woman. I knew there were other people beside the guards on the upper floors, but I’d left them alone, thinking them to be harmless since they were just doing their job.

The habits from when I used to be a human drove me to an unwitting sigh, despite my lack of need for respiration.

Fine then. If I was discovered, then I had no choice. There was a bit of distance between us, and I didn’t want to waste more magic than necessary, so I slightly released the lid on my presence and quietly turned around.

The woman held not a single bit of wariness at the sight of me, looking like a high-school girl in a white parka and denim short skirt, even if she was feeling somewhat suspicious. Then the little bit of presence I released took her by surprise. She gasped, her face twitching fiercely.

I pulled my guardless straight sword, its length about 40 centimeters, from its black-lacquered scabbard. I silently closed our distance. The redhead woman, who looked to be in her mid-twenties and was wearing a white lab coat and a pair of glasses, was shocked silent. She sank to the floor, apparently too scared to even stand.

Thank you. You’re a nice person. You didn’t scream or run. Saved me a bit of magic.

I looked down on her and put on a smile. Her eyes were opening so wide they looked like they’d fall out at any moment.

 

“…the Dark Bunny Lady…?”

“…what?”

 

The hell is that? I knew I was called the Dark Lady, but Dark Bunny Lady? What were they thinking?

Her words were so out of left field I couldn’t help but stare at her face. The rabbit ears behind my head slipped out of the hood a bit. The woman beamed.

“Aaaahh, it’s really you! I can’t believe I’m actually meeting the Lady Bunny here! This is the best day of my life! Do you know I’ve filled my room with posters of you so that you’d bless me with your visage every day—ow that’s cold!”

I blew a bit of mist at her, interrupting her impassioned word vomit. She shivered as if someone had just poured ice water on her.

“Explain.”

“Y-yes…”

 

Her name was Jennifer. She wasn’t exactly a researcher of the 12th research center, but rather one of the people managing the game.

Jennifer had also personally joined the MMORPG World of Yggdrasia as a player. She knew about how the other world was real, and how I had come back to Earth and killed a facility’s staff members.

But she still loved the idea of a real-life Dark Lady. Apparently she’d bought every single kind of promotional goods related to me.

She was also the person who’d developed the backdoor program to log into Yggdrasia. She’d been gathering similarly-minded people who used monster avatars and finding a way to contact me. She pleaded with me not to destroy this facility since they were only working on the game and nothing else, and if the place was gone, she wouldn’t be able to join the game anymore.

 

“I see… any other last words?”

“W-waitwaitwaitwaitpleasewait! I can be useful to you, my Lady, even here or on the other side too! You have something to do here, right?! I’ll help!”

Jennifer stared at me with sparkling eyes. I scowled, but took some time to think.

True, if I had someone aware of the inner workings of the corporation to help, it’d save me some unnecessary trouble. But if an employee went missing on the day right after such a huge mess, they might be able to follow me by tracking her.

Oh well, I could just erase her if she turned out to be more trouble than she was worth.

“They might suspect you, you know?”

“It’s fine! It’s already time for me to leave work today, and I’ll be taking a vacation starting from tomorrow! If anything happens, I’ll tell them I got kidnapped by the Dark Lady!”

“Umm… right…”

I didn’t think the corporation was that naive anway, but well, if she’s willing.

 

After that, after Jennifer finished her weird performance in the security room devoid of any other people and clocked out for the day, we left for the underground parking lot and got into her second-hand car. The two of us headed for my next destination: the 4th research center.

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