Chapter 155
Chapter 155
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 155
Chapter Title: Clash of the Outer Gods
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You had no choice but to counter a nuke with a nuke.
And countries possessing nukes took care of each other automatically. Nuclear war was nothing more than a scenario from fictional apocalypse tales where the world had already perished.
The situation with the outer gods was the same.
Outer god-level anomalies rarely clashed directly with one another. Unless you were some tragedy-obsessed fan of bleak, ruinous stories driven mad, there was no reason to hurl yourself into a fate of mutual destruction.
-Kyahahahahaha!
But this world truly was a post-apocalyptic one where the world had ended, and to make matters worse, this was the temple of an outer god who ruled over all works of fiction.
Thus, Avici descended.
Outer god versus outer god. It had turned into a deathmatch between nuclear powers.
-Kyahahaha! Hahaha! Kyaa! Kyahaha!
-Really? Like this?
With every movement of Cheon Yo-hwa's lips, chilling laughter echoed from all directions.
The low-res noise world spread by the [Operator of Myriad Amusements]. Avici, freed from the sands of the hourglass seal, was devouring it once more.
The two outer gods began to clash over control of the world.
[The 'Operator of Myriad Amusements' announces that a severe bug has been detected on this server.]
Myriad Amusements seemed flustered by the unforeseen crisis.
It was like a game operator showing up to what they thought was a casual user Q&A, only to have the rival company's CEO snatch the mic and declare, "Your game is trash for this and that reason," spewing venom without a shred of business etiquette. Outrageous behavior, right?
Flutter, flutter.
The true body of Myriad Amusements—the blue butterfly's wings—beat frantically.
It flitted around, surveying the surroundings. And then it realized that right here, right now, hundreds of magical girls who followed it had gathered.
"W-What's this? What the hell is going on...?"
"Has the event already started?"
The magical girls were panicking. From their perspective, chaos had erupted out of nowhere.
The blue butterfly decided to use them.
[The 'Operator of Myriad Amusements' designates the monster summoned here as a subjugation target.]
[The boss monster's name is Avici. It is an enemy that has descended by hijacking the body of Cheon Yo-hwa, student council president of Baekhwa Girls' High School.]
[Avici seeks to destroy the world. Stop Avici.]
[Users who successfully subjugate this boss monster will receive tremendous rewards.]
[Characters participating in the raid will receive temporary buffs.]
Whoosh—.
Color spread from the blue butterfly, enveloping the magical girls. It was an easy-to-recognize buff effect.
The magical girls shouted.
"Ah, see? It really is an event!"
"That thing over there is the monster!"
With the game operator blatantly drawing the line—"That's the monster"—the magical girls' agitation visibly subsided.
"Attack! Everyone, attack!"
"But it's Cheon Yo-hwa—"
"You idiot! It's a monster that stole her body!"
Rumble rumble rumble.
Some of the magical girls formed ranks, while others flailed about in disarray as they charged at Cheon Yo-hwa.
They were a ragtag bunch, but they were still awakeners buffed by an outer god. They had to be enjoying a level-up effect incomparable to before.
Yet even as hundreds of them came rushing in waves, Cheon Yo-hwa's lips merely curled in leisurely amusement.
"Ahaha."
-Ahaha.
The mocking laugh spilled simultaneously from Cheon Yo-hwa's lips and Avici's domain.
Click.
Cheon Yo-hwa lightly clicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth. Click, click, click. The surroundings, already dyed in Avici's domain, reflected the sound endlessly.
"Uh?"
"Huh?"
Thud, flop.
The magical girls who heard Cheon Yo-hwa's tongue-click collapsed one by one from the front. Some tumbled forward with their momentum intact.
One of outer god Avici's authorities: the "dream that shows a happy future." The magical girls fell helplessly into it.
It wasn't just humans—the tutorial fairies suffered the same fate.
"Hoeek—."
"T-This sinister aura... is it the Fairy Lord's?"
"I can't resist it at all..."
"I finally chopped off the corrupt king's head, but who knew a once-in-history war hero dictator would pop up right after..."
"Revolution is just one string of bad luck after another..."
Thud. Thud. The fairies' eyes glazed over before they plummeted limply.
The 'Tutorial Fairies' also possessed the attributes of fictional creations. They were anomalies closer to Myriad Amusements, in a sense. It was best to sideline them here before real combat began.
The awakeners and fairies sprawled on the ground didn't rise again.
With a single counterattack, the group of magical girls and fairies was neutralized in an instant.
'Watching from the side, so that's how it looks.'
A happy dream.
I'd only experienced that authority myself directly before, so spectating it live from right beside Avici was a rare treat.
I strolled leisurely to Cheon Yo-hwa's side.
"You okay? If an outer god eats your mind, it's game over. Yo-hwa. You need to keep holding the wheel."
"Ahaha. I can still hold on, old man."
Cheon Yo-hwa looked up at me from a slant.
"Or should I call you 'senpai'?"
"......"
"Kidding! But yeah, the outer god's mind and mine are mixing at an accelerating rate. Hmm, feels like barely keeping my eyes open after falling into an inkwell? Anyway, we need to wrap this up fast."
"That's the plan."
O Dok-seo staggered toward us.
"Ughhh. D-Did I... actually pull it off...?"
"For now. We can call the most crucial first stage cleared. Good work, Dok-seo."
"I really thought I'd die in that lotus position..."
The hotel's rear garden.
Now, the only ones standing firmly on two feet there were Cheon Yo-hwa, me, and O Dok-seo. The Saintess was waiting inside the hotel with the writers.
The other awakeners were unnecessary.
Now that we'd achieved our goal of drawing the [Operator of Myriad Amusements] into reality, sorry, but we had no more use for the magical girls.
Flutter.
The blue butterfly looked down at us.
Around the butterfly, Myriad Amusements' 'low-res noise' and Avici's 'colors' continued to flicker and clash endlessly.
[The 'Operator of Myriad Amusements' classifies the current anomaly as a malicious hacking attack.]
[The 'Operator of Myriad Amusements' henceforth treats malicious users extremely harmful to game server operations as enemies.]
Treating us like mere viruses. That was the strategy this outer god had chosen.
As everyone knew, the [Operator of Myriad Amusements] defined this world as a game and itself as the operator.
An operator naturally held overwhelming authority compared to users. But at the same time, it couldn't directly intervene with ordinary accounts one by one.
That would overstep the operator's role.
That's why it had watched us operate in the shadows to subjugate Myriad Amusements without imposing any real sanctions.
But if it redefined us as entities disrupting the game environment through 'unfair means,' the story changed. It could swing the banhammer as an operator anytime.
Outer god Avici was no different from a virus shaking the game to its roots.
To counter that, Myriad Amusements had no choice but to unleash its full power.
[At last, the stage's final boss has revealed itself. Exactly 40 days, 11 hours, and 36 minutes since the speedrun began.]
In response, our party defined the current situation in our own way.
Malicious users? Maybe. But in a 'speedrun,' exploiting glitches and bugs was fair game.
This was perfectly legitimate play.
[Now we just need to defeat that blue butterfly, and our speedrun succeeds.]
As if trying to suppress the Saintess's broadcast commentary, the Operator of Myriad Amusements kept emitting noise.
[The 'Operator of Myriad Amusements' points out that Avici was originally scheduled as a boss monster. Summoning and releasing a monster into a neutral zone harms other players severely.]
[The outer god keeps mumbling nonsense. Just the death throes of an anomaly. Ignore it easily.]
Human voices and outer god voices alternated, flowing into our minds.
[The 'Operator of Myriad Amusements' asserts that it does not harm humans greatly. On the contrary, its game server provides rapid growth to humans.]
[Oh. Now it's even trying to negotiate. First time seeing this pattern, but outer gods surprisingly avoid combat unless it's a decisive moment. They can devour the world just by sitting still.]
[The 'Operator of Myriad Amusements' offers items of immense value to characters 'O Dok-seo' and 'Cheon Yo-hwa.']
[Naturally, we hit refuse here.]
[The 'Operator of Myriad Amusements' notifies that a mere three or four people can never overwhelm it.]
I looked at Cheon Yo-hwa.
"Yo-hwa. Let 'em loose."
"Yes, senpai!"
Rrrrip.
Cheon Yo-hwa eagerly unzipped the trunk she'd brought along.
Inside the bag, structured as a subspace, were 99 hourglass vials packed tight.
"Baekhwa Girls' High! Assemble!"
Crash!
Cheon Yo-hwa flipped the trunk over, then shattered every tumbling vial with her aura.
99 ghosts were unleashed.
If the human Cheon Yo-hwa was president of Baekhwa (White Flower) Girls' High, then the so-called 'outer god Cheon Yo-hwa' was president of Baekhwa (Hundred Tales) Girls' High.
At their leader's call, the night parade of a hundred demons appeared.
-Hee, hee, hee, hee.
-Wanna red tissue? Or blue tissue?
-Koong... koong... koong....
Low-life ghost, Hinako ghost, thump-thump-thump ghost, school broadcast ghost, and so on.
Their visuals were a bit grotesque, but this was an 'assembly' nonetheless. The tide turned in an instant.
[......]
[The 'Operator of Myriad Amusements' judges further negotiations meaningless.]
[Excluding.]
And then.
For the first time in 593 regressions—finally—I witnessed the full combat power of the 'Operator of Myriad Amusements' as it unleashed all restraints and entered battle.
How would it attack?
As I braced myself fully, the outer god's mechanical voice flowed in.
[The 'Operator of Myriad Amusements' points out that Avici is a case where an enemy appeared as an ally.]
[Activates the cliché: 'Powerful as an enemy, but weakens drastically upon becoming an ally.']
"Huh?"
Zzzzzzt—!
The moment the outer god finished speaking, suddenly, the low-res noise domain expanded to the horizon.
It happened in a flash. Just a second ago, Avici's vibrant domain had been holding its own, yet Myriad Amusements' domain overrode it without care, dyeing the world.
Under the sky swiftly blanketed in noise, the Baekhwa Girls' High ghosts began to distort.
Zzt. Zzzzt.
The ghosts that had burst into reality grew progressively lower-res. From AAA-game graphics, to VR-game graphics, to 32-bit, to 16-bit.
"Ehh? Huh? Ah, senpai. What do we do...?"
Cheon Yo-hwa panicked beside me.
For some reason, I fiercely sensed Vegeta vibes emanating from Cheon Yo-hwa's face. Was it my imagination?
"W-We suddenly got way weaker...?"
"......"
Indeed.
In that moment, I realized what the [Operator of Myriad Amusements]'s true authority was.
Cliché manipulation.
Pulling out any cliché from fiction whenever it wanted.
Manipulating 'the world itself through clichés'—that was this outer god's power.