Tens of Billions of Points
To a man sitting on tens of billions of points, it was a sum he didn't grudge in the slightest.
Reban, on the other hand, looked startled. He had named the figure in a fit of temper, and he clearly hadn't expected Yujun to hand it over without a moment's hesitation. A fortune like that, landing in his hands? Even a player in the early 600s couldn't easily scrape together points past the hundred-million mark. The instant the money changed hands, every trace of his resentment vanished.
"Spend it well."
"Yeah. I'll try to put it somewhere worthwhile."
"Right."
Reban turned away without a shred of regret.
Manuela, who had been watching from the side, looked thoroughly put out.
"So this was a problem money could solve."
"You didn't know? For someone who's lived thousands of years, you really ought to—"
"I know. I know, so stop."
"Okay."
Manuela glared. She was awfully sensitive about her age. What did it even matter?
Age is just a number, isn't it?
So thought Yujun, a man who shaved a good five years off whenever the subject of her age came up.
He had pried the Synchronization Marble out of Reban, half by force. However he'd managed it, what mattered was that he had it. His synchronization rate would climb to 14 percent, and at 14 percent—as with every threshold so far—nothing was likely to change. The moment it hit 16, the items would start coming through.
He would keep an eye out for more Synchronization Marbles, but he had no intention of rushing. He didn't feel short on anything in particular, and they weren't the sort of thing you found just by hunting harder.
What remained was the final war between the Hardline Faction and the Moderates.
Yujun flew with Manuela to where Sertiphs was. The commander always moved at the head of a host of angels, so he wasn't hard to find.
"Shin Yujun......"
Sertiphs's expression, on seeing him, was complicated. Yujun had snatched the kill on the Golden Goblin out from under him—or, more precisely, Sertiphs's company hadn't been up to catching a Golden Goblin that had already lost its weapon, and Yujun had merely cleaned up after them.
"So. You've come."
He looked less angry than embarrassed. Fair enough.
If it were me, I'd have wanted to crawl into a mousehole.
Yujun got to the point.
"You'll be handing over the item, I assume?"
"......Which item would that be?"
"I killed the Golden Goblin for you, didn't I?"
"In the end, you were the one who slew it. In that case, there is no item for me to give."
"Didn't you say that if I yielded, you'd give me three items?"
"That arrangement ended the moment we gave up on the Golden Goblin."
"Then at least give me the griffin's brain in advance."
"......And if I do, you won't simply leave?"
"Who would I be running from? Leaving because it's a hassle, maybe. Not because I'm scared."
"Precisely. That is what concerns me."
"I won't leave. I'll see this through as your mercenary to the end, so hand it over."
"Very well. I shall trust you. Once."
◈ The brain of the mythological monster, the High Griffin. Upon consumption, pure mana permanently increases by a flat 100.
Yujun took the High Griffin's Intelligent Brain from Sertiphs in both hands—not out of courtesy, but because the thing was simply that large.
This came out of a bird's skull?
It was big enough to force the thought on him. Figures.
Once upon a time, a flat hundred mana would've had me jumping for joy...
He could raise his mana now by offering the flowers of the Golden Flower Garden as sacrifice, and a hundred no longer felt like much.
Still. Better than nothing.
Offering enough gold to gain a hundred mana took time of its own, and the flowers of the Golden Flower Garden did not regenerate without end. Pick one, and it was gone. Stats had to be taken whenever they could be taken.
So he ate the griffin's brain. It was thoroughly revolting, but it was an item that raised his mana by a hundred, and he endured it. He felt the mana coursing through him swell by several thousand. A flat hundred in pure mana, once his amplifications took hold, was no joke—and all of it thanks to his items.
A gear-check game to the end.
He liked the effect. Items that raised mana by a full hundred from a single bite were rare.
Do Archangels and Great Archangels just keep things like this lying around as standard issue?
Even Sertiphs, who had introduced himself as the son of the Second Archangel, had produced the High Griffin's Intelligent Brain as if it were nothing special. Perhaps what passed for rare on the Continent wasn't rare here at all.
The thought didn't leave him feeling robbed. If anything, it made him greedy.
I should squeeze Heaven for everything it's worth before I go.
Of course, it was too early to be certain. Sertiphs might simply own an unusual number of good items. If so, the solution was to get them from him.
Those three items he said were better than the griffin's brain... what are they?
The event was over, but Yujun had not given up on the three things Sertiphs had mentioned. It might be difficult for now. Before he left Heaven, he meant to have all three.
"When does it start?"
"Not even a day has passed since the event ran its course. Two full days remain until the date originally set. It may begin sooner than expected, mind you. The players gained almost nothing from this sudden event."
"......I'm not sorry. But I'll say that I am."
"How could it be your fault? Excellence is no crime. Still, I do wonder whether you slew the Golden Goblin a touch too early."
"Sorry?"
Yujun's face went blank. Did this man actually have a conscience?
"We had finished our preparations. We were in a position to take the Golden Goblin. And then you killed it, and the event ended."
"Ah......"
Yujun watched Sertiphs spin this absurd tale, then caught the real intent buried under it.
He's saving face.
His own men had watched him get knocked unconscious in a single blow by a Golden Goblin that didn't even have a gauntlet, let alone a weapon. No superior, however thick-skinned, could endure a humiliation like that—and on top of it, he had retreated and left the mess to a single human. Yujun doubted any angel would take the speech seriously, but he played along all the same.
"Sorry for taking it first. I rushed because I was afraid someone else would snatch it."
Sertiphs, who had flinched at the words, smiled with satisfaction and nodded.
"I understand. I would have done the same. I am not trying to blame you, so pay it no mind."
"I'm grateful you see it that way. Then I should come back in two days?"
"If it is moved up, I will contact you first."
"Understood."
Having propped Sertiphs's dignity back up once, Yujun took his leave.
In Heaven, some welcomed the coming war and some did not.
Chief among those who didn't were the rank and file, pressed into service by force—angels with nothing remarkable to set them apart from their fellows. Their levels sat higher than the players of the Continent, but they held no ability that marked them as exceptional, and their odds of survival were not high. More than that, winning the war, or even merely living through it, brought them nothing. Satisfaction that the side they backed had won, and, if they were lucky, a rise in rank. That was all.
Those who welcomed the war were obvious. High officials. Mercenaries paid to take part. Angels confident in their own skill and tired of being undervalued. And, he supposed, one could include the Great Archangel who treated war as a pastime.
"Nnngh."
Yujun straightened his back. He must have picked hundreds of thousands of flowers in the Golden Flower Garden. Maybe more. He hadn't been counting, so he couldn't say for sure.
"This isn't something a person can keep doing."
At first he had gone at the work grinning, delighted at the mana to come. Now he was completely spent. It wasn't his body. He felt as if he had hit a mental limit, which was only natural after more than twenty-four hours without a rest longer than five seconds. If not for Golden Mammonism (SSS)—the skill that turned offered gold into mana—he might have abandoned the harvest long ago.
I've got points to spare. No need to hoard more gold than I can use.
Mana, though, had to be gathered for all it was worth while he still could.
And it's getting less and less worth the effort.
He had noticed the efficiency of Golden Mammonism dropping the more he used it. The more gold he offered, the less mana he gained per weight of gold. The reason was that, as the gold piled up, its value as an offering fell. In short, whoever—or whatever—was receiving the gold had grown full.
A remarkably petty being. Of course one's attitude changed between starving and having a belly slick with fat, but wasn't the drop-off a bit steep? So Yujun gathered gold and did not offer it. He gathered, and gathered, and still he withheld the sacrifice. It was a campaign to make the hypothetical being on the other end of the offering writhe with longing. Then again, he might simply have been wasting his time on his own.
I need to check whether the efficiency recovers if I wait.
If he offered a full day's backbreaking haul and received far less mana than before... what could be more infuriating than that?
"Paranet. You slipped again. See those two drops you spilled?"
Yujun scolded the summon trailing after him, an equipment item pressed into service as a basket in his hands.
"My apologies."
"Tired? That's not like you."
"Master. Forgive me. I believe I am exhausted."
"You're undead. You're not even a lich—since when does a Death Knight get tired?"
"I am still an incomplete Death Knight, am I not?"
"Incomplete how? I've never seen a Death Knight bigger than you."
"......"
"Want to stop?"
"Yes! Yes! Yes!"
"Was it that bad?"
"Truly, Master, I feel as though my eyeballs might fall out. Sewing buttons onto a doll would be easier."
For a Paranet with no eyeballs at all to complain about them falling out, the work had to be brutal.
"All right. We stop. Rest."
"Splendid!"
"Special occasion. I'll give you twenty minutes."
"......Pardon?"
"Rest easy."
"......Master? Were we not finished entirely?"
"Paranet. Do you actually want a scolding?"
"Eh?"
"You see all these flowers lying around? What we've done doesn't even show if you look at the whole Golden Flower Garden. You planning to quit while you're ahead and drop out?"
"Drop out?"
"Anyway. Shut your eyes and get a little sleep, at least."
Paranet had no eyes to shut. Nothing but bone, the sockets hollow.
"Understood......"
The answer came out drained. Yujun spoke gently.
"I know you're tired. Let's push a little more. Time this free doesn't come around often. Later we'll be too busy to come back, you know?"
"Then... only a little. Only a little more, and that will be enough, yes?"
"Right. We're about halfway, so... just think of it as doing today's suffering one more time."
"......"
The words drained whatever strength Paranet had left. For no good reason, he glared at Harp, fast asleep in a comfortable curl on Yujun's shoulder.
"And Harp? Is Harp not neglecting his duties? He hasn't done a lick of work. He only sleeps."
Paranet sounded thoroughly aggrieved. At the sound of his name, the sleeping Harp opened his eyes round and peered about. The sight set Yujun off.
"Harp's a child. You want to dump the work on a kid? Really?"
"I shall apply myself more diligently."
"Good. Smart choice."
They went on snapping golden flowers for another five hours. Then a chime rang from his messenger.
Sender: Sertiphs