Interlude: Administrator A
April 7th.
Around the time Jeong Hoon was locked in a bloodbath that wasn't quite a bloodbath with the orcs.
"Hmm, hm-hmm~"
Somewhere above Earth's orbit, an alien spacecraft shaped like a colossal flying saucer made its presence known.
The vessel rivaled the Australian continent—said to be the largest island on Earth—in sheer scale, and yet, curiously, only a scant handful of life-forms inhabited it.
They wore human shapes. Two arms, two legs, mouths that produced sound and could form sentences and words.
And those beings were looking down, observing Earth. Observing humanity as it began its collapse—zombies rampant, monsters appearing.
"Woooow, oh my goodness! Look at this, look at this!"
Inside that spacecraft, occupying a cramped little room and humming to himself as he watched a bank of countless monitors, was one such life-form.
Among everyone aboard, he was the one who most directly shaped Earth's fate. The one who had introduced himself to the people of Earth as an "Administrator."
From March 17th onward, he had played a vicious prank on the planet—and in the end, he was the one responsible for slaughtering countless human beings.
And right now, he was marveling at the numbers shifting in real time across his monitors.
The number held steady for a moment—then changed.
In an instant, the figure had dropped by 86,175.
Anyone in the dark would have tilted their head, wondering what on earth the number even meant.
But the Administrator, who knew every detail of the situation, cheered with pure delight—even clapping his hands—as he poured out his feelings over the shifting digits.
"Excellent, excellent! Look at this, everyo—ah wait, it's just me here, isn't it? Anyway! Look at those numbers dropping! The monster folks are putting in such a stellar performance, the count is plummeting, right? So good, so good!"
"Oho, not even ten seconds since I last gushed and it's already dropped this much more! I really ought to throw the monster folks a little bonus for this, huh? Phase One of the dimensional gates is already open, so maybe I should push Phase Two forward a bit earlier...!"
Muttering to himself as he juggled countless monitors and alien machinery all alone, he looked for all the world like one of those deranged scientists straight out of a movie, an anime, or a video game.
Of course, anyone who knew the truth would never dismiss this Administrator as a mere mad scientist.
He was a slaughterer. A being who clapped his hands and savored pure bliss while watching humanity's death toll climb in real time—from a human perspective, a psychopath without equal.
Naturally, that was a psychopath only by human common sense and human standards. From the lofty vantage of these alien beings' higher-ups, this Administrator was nothing more and nothing less than an employee who got the job done.
Whoosh!
Behind the Administrator, light suddenly flooded in.
It was the light from a door swinging open.
And then a shadow. Someone's silhouette fell across the doorway.
"Good day to you, ○○○○. I am here for an audit."
"Hm? Ah, come on in!"
Despite the sudden intrusion, the Administrator welcomed the one who had barged into his room uninvited.
He turned his gaze to look at the visitor's face.
That face, blanketed in noise and self-mosaicked beyond recognition, was a welcome sight no matter how many times he saw it.
"An audit, you say... Is it ★★★★'s turn today? Man, rough break!"
"Ah, yes. Thank you... However... ★★★★?"
"Whoops!"
Realizing his mistake, the Administrator smacked his own knee with a sharp tak.
This guy has no idea. He doesn't know a thing about the restrictions that kicked in because we've entered the Earthlings' domain!
"You see, ★★★★-nim! This is a translation error that happens because Earthlings can't pronounce our names. It comes up all the time. It's an error that crops up between different cultural spheres—plus it's a problem with the vocalization systems themselves—so there's really nothing we can do about it!"
"I-I see... Hm? But the conversation we're having right now comes through just fine, does it not?"
"Of course it does! That's the author's consideration for you dear readers at work!"
The uninvited guest who had barged in for the audit tilted his head.
Ah, damn it, I slipped up again!
The Administrator realized that the colleague standing before him had absolutely zero tolerance for meta remarks. So he revised his wording.
"Just think of it as being for the sake of convenience! And for reference, when you talk to anyone else besides me from now on, our names are going to sound like that too! So instead of names that are impossible to pronounce or understand... call me Administrator A! Administrator A! Ah, and I'll call you Administrator B. Sound good?"
The life-form dubbed Administrator B was, just like the being in front of him, responsible for managing another world. Finding the labels appropriate enough, he nodded.
"Mm... very well. I shall understand it that way for now. Then... may I proceed with my duties?"
"Yep, of course! Go right ahead!"
Administrator A cheerfully welcomed Administrator B's interference. No—he even opened a fresh window in midair and launched straight into a rapid-fire explanation.
At first, Administrator B's face lit up at how eagerly Administrator A was rolling out the red carpet.
It took less than a minute for the regret to set in.
"Okay okay okay, would you take a look at this statistical chart I pulled together? See it? The class distribution across accounts in that game Brave Saga Online looked roughly like this. So I used that as the basis for assigning classes to people. Nice and balanced! Balance locked down tight! And tomorrow—once a full week has passed since the apocalypse began, and once I figure enough people have been thinned out—I plan to fully activate the shop system. Ah! Gold! As for how to acquire gold, you see... eheheh, I've got another spectacular idea lined up for that..."
This guy never shuts up.
Administrator B stared at Administrator A—who was machine-gunning words like a fish that had found water, treating the room like his personal stage—with eyes full of one single question: How do I put the brakes on this?
And then he found a clue in something Administrator A had said.
"One moment, Administrator A."
"If players kill each other, within a two-kilometer radius on the Earth scale... ah, yes, yes! Go ahead. Administrator B!"
"This... is being updated today, is it not?"
What Administrator B pointed out was the newly updating 2. Items & Gold window in the system interface. From the survivors' perspective on Earth, the maintenance would end in an hour and the window would go live.
"Yep, that's right!"
"And yet... you have not issued a notice, have you? Is that acceptable?"
"Whoops! Now that you mention it, I haven't yet!"
Haven't... yet? The sheer near-zero sense of responsibility in that remark left Administrator B momentarily speechless—even though he was supposed to be the one conducting the audit.
"I'll do it tomorrow. Whatever! There's an important announcement tomorrow anyway, so bundling them together should be fine! Letting the pla—no no, the survivors poke around the item window out of curiosity today and dream about all the things they might be able to do with it isn't so bad either, right? Eheh!"
E... heh?
Administrator B's mind went blank for a brief moment.
But he was a man devoted to his duty. He snapped back to himself at once and resumed his audit-related questions. Administrator A, showing not the slightest hint of annoyance, kept chattering away at his own pace without a care in the world.
"As you know, I plan to start the dungeon update in earnest from May! Survivors will defeat monsters and bosses in the dungeons, earn gold and items, grow and grow even further... and from among them, we'll sift out the kind of talent our upper management is looking for! Sure, they might be cursing me out right now because things are hard, but once the survivors learn the truth, they'll be going, 'We had no idea there was such a profound purpose behind it all... Administrator-niiim, just who even are you?!' and they won't be able to stop praising me! Hahaha, I really am a genius, aren't I? Whoops! Sorry. Was that too much self-congratulation?"
For a split second, Administrator B nearly answered, Yeah, listening to you jack yourself off was goddamn unbearable.
But he held it in. Saying it out loud would only be asking for trouble.
Instead, he decided to flag something that felt a little off.
"About this survivor..."
Pointing at a spot among the windows floating in midair, Administrator B spoke.
"Name: Jeong Hoon. Age... twenty-nine by Earth standards, biologically male. Why does this survivor have a different system from everyone else?"
He believed he had struck a nerve—but Administrator A didn't show so much as a flicker of fluster on his face (though with the mosaic in the way, reading his expression was difficult to begin with).
"Ah, that guy? The Creator personally made a special request about him! But wouldn't you know it, he didn't have a Brave Saga Online account... so I assigned him a different game system! Anyway, he's alive, right?"
Anyway, he's alive, right—my ass!
Administrator B flared up for the briefest instant, but he reined himself in well enough to keep his tone level as he pushed back.
"I understand that much, but... isn't this excessively pinpointed?"
"Hm? Pinpointed how?"
Administrator B pointed at a particular section.
"Didn't you assign him that game in a way that is far too blatantly obvious? Is this really acceptable? If you get reported for abusing your authority... frankly, I do not believe upper management will simply let this slide."
In truth, even if he reported it upstairs, he doubted Administrator A would face any real consequences.
Administrator B simply wanted to see Administrator A—a creature whose entire personality seemed purpose-built to infuriate people—squirm a little.
Of course, it immediately became clear that the provocation had badly underestimated Administrator A's shameless nature.
"Aww, so what? I properly granted the Creator's dying wish before he kicked the bucket, didn't I? Anyway, wish granted, right? Jeong Hoon's alive, right? The plan's still intact, right? Then we're golden. Hahaha! I'm a genius, a genius! Uwahahahahaha!"
"..."
For a moment, a genuine urge writhed inside Administrator B—the urge to write this bastard the most vicious performance review imaginable and make his life a living hell.