"Will You Take the Hit?"
"Want to get hit?"
─A plan, you say. Well, I do have one. Curious?
"Yes."
─And if I told you, would you follow it?
"That depends on what it is."
The sword flinched.
It wavered for a moment. I could have mistaken it for the same twitching as before, but the emotion bleeding off the blade was different.
He was looking at me as if in mild surprise.
─…Unexpected. I thought you'd refuse outright.
"I simply like efficiency as well. That's why I came here, after all."
No matter that I'd returned and everything was already over — the sight of a Celestial still made my hand itch to kill.
Celestials and demons were my old enemies, and the Celestials above all were objects of my loathing.
And yet the reason I had come here anyway was to secure the most efficient alternative available.
"I can accept whatever's necessary for my purpose — but no more than that. So don't try to provoke me. Answer honestly."
─…I'll answer faithfully. But understand one thing. I have already given up a great deal, and I am giving up even now.
The reason the Empire's 'enemy' could ambush an imperial prince and a Grand Duke 'in the heart of the capital' and walk away unscathed was simple.
Hwangyeolgong, who stood at the very apex of the Empire, had shielded them from everything.
From his perspective, he was sacrificing a considerable measure of the imperial family's dignity and authority.
But then again—
"That goes for me too."
I smiled bitterly.
Just as I had let the great Emperor go free — for the sake of the Celestial Hwangyeolgong standing before my eyes, and for the sake of 'the other me' inside the Interference Dungeon.
I, too, had abandoned a great deal to be sitting in this room.
"So? What's your answer?"
─I'll give you information and an alternative. What you do with them is your business. I have my hands fairly full on this end as well.
"I'm listening."
─Based on what we've uncovered, three calamities will come.
"I know that much."
The octopus monster Kraken, the scorpion monster Scorpio, and the demon that had appeared only briefly in the broadcast footage of the Siege Warfare.
Some believed it was the demon the Sword God had summoned, but that demon had merely been one sealed away in the Sealing Sword.
Something far stronger would likely show its face in its place.
─Well informed. Do you also know which of them is the most dangerous?
"Kraken, obviously."
One could argue the demon might be more dangerous, but the Kraken I had seen was close to 'superior-grade' already.
Deoen wasn't so deranged as to release two superior-grade demons at once — the demon would be, at best, below intermediate.
The sword moved, as if in agreement.
─Correct. The threat classifications are Extreme, Supreme, and Intermediate. The Intermediate ones will be handled on their own without our intervention — so we need only deal with the other two.
"Is that classification based on World Boss standards?"
─I classified them by the Outlanders' standards. Isn't that more convenient for you?
"It is, yes."
Kraken — Extreme-grade.
The demon — Supreme-grade.
Scorpio — Intermediate-grade.
Intermediate World Bosses were something the players had been farming for ages, and with the playerbase having grown stronger this season, they'd bring them down without any help.
But the remaining two were beyond what players alone could handle.
"And the alternative?"
─I will handle the Supreme threat myself. You lot need only stop the Extreme one.
"I doubt it's that simple. What's the reason?"
It didn't seem like he was avoiding Kraken out of fear of it.
Judging from everything I knew of Hwangyeolgong's personality and conduct, he prized efficiency, but he was not the kind of man who flinched from an approaching calamity.
The sword answered calmly.
─The Extreme threat can only be opposed when certain conditions are met.
"Ah."
Conditions.
Right — this wasn't simply a matter of barring an ancient monster's path like in the old days.
Under the name of 'monster', these calamities would be handed a quest: World Boss Subjugation.
Needless to say, various restrictions would be placed on Kraken, along with multiple conditions that would make him vulnerable — and fulfilling those conditions would fall to the players.
Granted, since Biran had breached a system meant for players only and waltzed onto the academy grounds uninvited, the Empire could probably meddle in that side of things too…
But letting the players handle it was simply the easier path.
─The material for the Supreme threat already exists, along with a plan for dealing with what follows. However, this end must bear losses of its own, so I cannot spare attention for the Extreme one. Will that be a problem?
"As long as you help block the Initial Damage, I don't care."
If we could somehow contain the Initial Damage that erupts the moment it appears, the rest didn't matter to me.
While the players and I took down Kraken and Scorpio, the Empire could keep the demon occupied. That was all.
Still, one thing gnawed at me.
"Are you saying you already know where the demon is right now?"
─I am. It's an existence I've known of for a very long time. Why do you think Karia once harbored demonic energy?
"…Karia?"
"Huh?"
Karia's gaze bounced between the sword and me.
I couldn't sense it now, but there had been a time when she carried a vicious demonic taint within her.
I'd assumed it was simply done so as not to provoke me… but perhaps there was a far more fundamental reason.
─Every experiment Karia conducted began with that one. The Spirit King's fall was merely a part of the greater experiment. It's all meaningless now, of course.
"You were aiming for something even bigger? That's not a pleasant thing to hear."
─I'm merely being honest with you. That's how things run efficiently, as you yourself demanded.
"……"
CRACK!!!
I swung and hammered the sword with everything I had.
The blade went flying and buried itself in the wall.
Karia hadn't moved to stop me — presumably because she knew an attack wouldn't register anyway.
─…Ugh. What was that for?
"You talking so high and mighty pissed me off. Want to get hit again?"
─You've already struck me.
"Well, that's true, isn't it."
Maybe I was the one who should stop taking the bait.
Why did he keep making me out to be the villain here?
The sword glared at me with something like exasperation.
─…You've always been like this, but I don't understand. What reason do you have to rage so fiercely over matters of the spirits?
"The experiments disgust me. Experiments using demonic energy — whether it's on Celestials or anything else."
Rasty loathed those experiments even more than I did, but that didn't mean I liked them any less.
Those damned experiments had played an enormous role in dragging the world toward annihilation, after all.
And the ones performed on spirits — those I despised most of all.
"Anyway, let's summarize. When the Initial Damage hits, we block it together. After that, the Empire handles the demon, and Kraken and the scorpion are ours."
─One thing to make clear: the damage we block covers only imperial territory. Anything beyond that is not our concern.
"Weren't you the one saying they'd all become subjects of the Empire one day?"
─Will become.
"Hm."
So that's how this goes, is it?
It wasn't that I couldn't understand.
The Empire had its own agenda, and going by its conduct all this time, it was never going to play the role of guardian.
Quite the opposite — every kingdom that failed to contain the damage would simply hand the Empire one more pretext to swallow the continent whole.
If we were equals, that might be a price worth tolerating.
"Then let's do it this way."
I hadn't come here to negotiate for friendship.
The full map of the continent spread out before me.
Using blue mana as my quill, I drew long, sweeping lines across it — as if uniting the kingdoms and the Empire into one.
The continent divided neatly into four.
"From this side through the south — including imperial territory — you block. I'll take the east. The north and west, well… they have strong players up there, so they'll manage well enough on their own."
In the north sat the Eden Federation, home of the Angel Guild.
The west was studded with top-tier guilds, so they'd hold the line somehow.
The south and east, by contrast, were thin on both players and residents — those regions would need me and the Empire to step in.
The sword spoke, its voice tinged with displeasure.
─Is there really a reason we must take a loss?
"Yes. Take your loss like a good boy."
It was the least he could do to pay back what I'd spent sparing him.
─……
"I'm joking. Well — not entirely joking."
─Is mockery your special talent, by any chance?
"Less a talent, more a habit I picked up from someone utterly insufferable — ah, never mind, that's beside the point. It won't be much of a loss for the Empire either, you know."
The enemy of the kingdoms. The chief architect of the continental war.
If an architect like that extended a helping hand to shield the south, imperial influence over the south itself would only deepen.
And that would help, in however small a measure, with the continental swallowing the Empire so badly craved.
─…That doesn't add up. Weren't you the one who didn't want the Empire growing?
"It's a price. A toll calculated from years of grudges and this and that. But don't get ahead of yourself drinking that celebratory soup — I have no intention of actually letting you eat anything."
If they truly tried to swallow the continent, they'd witness a neat bit of magic: every bite they took would vanish an equal stretch of imperial territory in return.
─……
"I'll take that as settled, then."
My business here was done.
Just as I moved to leave at once, the voice behind me caught me at the door.
─Why did you not cast Biran out?
"Biran?"
Unsagong Biran.
A student enrolled at Eli Academy, one of the Empire's Six Swords, who had approached me deliberately on Hwangyeolgong's orders.
She herself hadn't known it, but the purpose of her approach was to build rapport with me — to pile up a weight on my conscience.
The more important a person Biran became to me, the more unshakable the Empire she trusted and followed would become in my eyes.
I turned back to him, one hand on the door handle.
"Her skills are decent. She has talent."
─That's all?
"I don't know what you take me for, but the Academy accepts anyone with talent who doesn't cause problems. The Six Swords are no exception."
Whether Biran became someone important to me or someone entirely irrelevant, my choice would not change.
If the Empire misbehaved to the point of deserving destruction, I would tear it down no matter how Biran stood in the way.
And if Biran herself wished for the Empire's fall, as long as it didn't cross the line into deserving annihilation, I wouldn't lift a finger to interfere — not so much as a fingertip, short of the massacre threshold.
Once a target was marked for 'execution', that judgment did not change on a whim.
"Speaking of which — send Nea to the school too."
─Why that child?
"I'm going to educate her."
While I was at it, I figured I'd better fix whatever was rattling around in that head of hers.