Is He a God?
Mad Dragon Ainharthar.
He was a being who summoned "challengers" that met certain conditions and subjected them to trials.
Countless challengers had passed through his hands, and every last one of them had despaired — because Ainharthar possessed an authority akin to a divine power, allowing him to observe and summon any challenger he chose. That was why he only ever issued trials designed to push a challenger's abilities to their absolute limit. To force them past the boundaries of what they already possessed.
"Weak. So weak."
Lately, however, Ainharthar could not hide his disappointment with the caliber of challengers coming his way.
Was it because their stats were low?
No. That was never the problem. He had always designed the trials to match their capabilities.
I can't find a single one with any grit.
The challengers' mental fortitude had grown pitifully fragile. In the past year, not a single challenger had managed to satisfy Ainharthar even slightly.
Were the trials simply too hard?
Hardly. He had always kept the difficulty consistent — and from the Mad Dragon's perspective, none of them were particularly difficult. He had been considerate, even, accounting for each challenger's limits and handing out relatively easy trials.
"Can't even manage a hundred overhead swings."
The previous challenger had been especially pathetic. He had collapsed and rolled across the floor after failing to complete a mere hundred downward strikes. Granted, the sword weighed a bit much — roughly fifty tons — but Ainharthar had calculated that the man should have been able to lift it. That was the whole point of the trial.
A 1-star Transcendent ought to be able to handle that much.
It wasn't even difficult for a 1-star Transcendent. And all he had asked was a hundred swings. How thoughtful of him. Yet the man had collapsed after five.
A moment that made Ainharthar's consideration feel utterly wasted.
"These days, challengers outnumber the old ones, yet they're so much frailer. Is it because of how they Transcended?"
The Mad Dragon Ainharthar lifted a tail sheathed in golden scales and scratched his chin.
Humans — specifically, 1-star Transcendents, for the most part — were the ones who typically challenged his trials. In the past, roughly one in ten of the proper Transcendents had ranked as "not bad." But every Transcendent who had come recently was in terrible shape.
Had they eaten the wrong Star and gotten a stomachache?
The majority had Transcended in unusual ways, consuming Stars of other divine beings rather than those of the Goddess. Ainharthar could roughly guess the reason.
The Demons of the Seven Deadly Sins are hunting down the remaining divine beings. Then they butcher the bodies and distribute the pieces to humans. Forcing them to Transcend — but to what end?
The demons were running amok. Ainharthar knew they were hunting divine beings whose presence had already scattered. He considered it little more than a vulgar game of theirs.
Hmm. None of my concern, really.
He was the Mad Dragon. Unlike other dragons or Dragon Gods, he had no interest in playing guardian of the middle realms. Tormenting challengers was the joy of his life — and the whole of it.
"Oh-ho. Already the next challenger?"
Ainharthar sensed a challenger who had met the conditions. A new toy. No — a new challenger had appeared.
A small smile crossed his face as he opened a warp and initiated the forced summoning procedure.
And then—
"……Summoning failed?"
What was this?
Summoning failed?
Did I misread something?
Impossible. He couldn't misread even if he wanted to. He was the owner of the Absolute Dragon Eyes, which pierced through every truth and every reality. Even Dragon Gods could not debate truth before him.
So he tried again.
"…………Hmm?"
Consecutive summoning failures. Strange. His authority to summon challengers was absolute. Any mortal who satisfied the conditions could never escape his summons — not even if they possessed a Unique-grade artifact with a "Summon Rejection" ability.
…They should not be able to escape. That was the rule.
There are a few cases where summoning is impossible, I suppose.
Exceptions were not entirely unheard of. Those under the direct protection of a god, for instance — Holy Emperors, Holy Maidens, and the like could not be summoned. But those two never challenged him in the first place, so they hardly counted.
I should be able to tell from their status window.
Whether someone had received a god's direct blessing was something his Absolute Dragon Eyes could simply look and see. No mortal could refuse that. No — they would not even be given the chance to refuse. Even Dragon Gods marveled at the power of his eyes. They envied this gaze that saw through everything.
And yet—
"……???"
Observation failed?
…This had never happened before.
Something that could not exist — that must not exist — had just occurred. Mad Dragon Ainharthar's expression hardened with a bewilderment he had never felt in his entire life.
…………What the hell is this thing?
I was purely, genuinely impressed.
The Radiant Pureblood Ring. To think its observation-blocking function would stop even the Mad Dragon's all-seeing gaze.
Remarkable.
Mad Dragon Ainharthar, the overseer of Main Quest 10. His coercive power was absolute — or might as well have been. The quest had been designed that way from the start.
A function that even prevents a forced start.
Still, one question remained.
Didn't it only block observation? Why did the summoning fail too?
To begin the quest, one needed to reach the Mad Dragon's nest. It was inaccessible by ordinary means, so summoning was the method — and anyone who reached Main Quest 10 was always summoned without the right of refusal. Every character I had ever played to Quest 10 had been the same.
But the Radiant Pureblood Ring was supposed to only make observation impossible. It shouldn't have had anything to do with a summoning failure.
……Then how am I supposed to start the quest?
Separate from my admiration, a slight worry crept in. No one knew where the Mad Dragon's nest was. Even if I wanted to walk there, I couldn't.
But the same problem applied to the Mad Dragon. Ainharthar was obligated to administer trials to challengers.
So—
You come to me.
A situation where neither of us could go to the other. I casually crossed my arms and drew a deep breath.
How long did I wait?
Ziiiiing—!
"Wh-what is that?"
"A portal?"
"A golden portal in the sky……!"
People recoiled in unison. A massive golden portal had suddenly appeared in the heavens — in a place no one could possibly miss. Who else could force open a warp there?
I, too, slowly looked up at the sky. And smiled.
There he is.
Auryll looked up at the sky.
Spatial transfer!
A vast circular portal had opened overhead. That was the power of spatial transfer — not ordinary warp-based teleportation, but an authority that forcibly eroded space itself to tear it open. Only great beings possessed such power. Just like the divine being Karas of the Tower of the War God, only the most exalted entities inherited that kind of authority and might.
…The divine beings of the Tower can move instantly against demons.
But it wasn't unconditionally possible. The valid targets were predetermined. The Tower's divine beings, for example, were said to hold the authority to track a demon's location the moment it looked up at the sky and force a relocation. Likewise, that golden "something" must have come seeking someone who met its conditions.
Don't tell me…… again?
Randolph. Come to think of it, hadn't he been called the "Demon of Greed"? He had acknowledged it himself, so it had to be true. What if some other divine being had tracked him down?
"That's……!"
But the moment the being revealed itself, Auryll's eyes went wide with shock.
Not a divine being. And yet that golden form was one that could rightfully be called divine.
"Mad Dragon Ainharthar!"
It was a figure Auryll could not possibly fail to recognize. Mad Dragon Ainharthar — one of the most famous dragonkind of all. One of the guardians who had cast aside his original duty of "protecting the middle realms." The anecdotes about him were beyond counting.
But the most famous of them all……
The only dragon who survived the battle against Ruin.
In the distant past, countless dragons had tried to stop Ruin and protect the middle realms. A thousand dragons had banded together to hold Ruin at bay — and nine hundred ninety-nine of them had died. The sole survivor was Mad Dragon Ainharthar.
……He had gone mad afterward, though.
Why is Mad Dragon Ainharthar here?
Auryll's eyes filled with bewilderment. And that bewilderment was resolved almost immediately.
Flap! Flap!
……Because those enormous golden wings beat the air, and he descended right in front of them.
The Mad Dragon looked down at Randolph and spoke.
—Climb on.
"……?"
What?
Climb on?
Was the Mad Dragon himself offering his back? She had never heard of such a thing. There was a reason he was called the Mad Dragon. That insane dragon never offered his back to anyone but himself. Mocking, scorning, and looking down on others — that she could believe. But this?
"Uh……?"
And yet Randolph climbed onto Mad Dragon Ainharthar's back as naturally as breathing. As if he had known this would happen all along. Come to think of it, the way he had suddenly stopped and crossed his arms had been strange from the start.
Then did Lord Randolph summon the Mad Dragon?
It seemed absurd — and yet by now, even that felt like it might be true.
The Mad Dragon beat his wings and soared back up into the portal. Watching the scene, Auryll murmured under her breath.
"What on earth is……"
"Do not doubt him. Lord Randolph is a god."
Hudson, who had forced his way to her side, muttered the words. On any other day she would have dismissed it as a dog barking.
"……"
Now, she had no choice but to believe it.
Randolph. He was a god.
After seeing the score for Main Quest 9 update, several players had immediately headed for the Tower of the War God — only to witness a sight they could not believe.
The appearance of Mad Dragon Ainharthar! It was something no one could believe even after seeing it with their own eyes. The Mad Dragon had never once left his nest. And there was no chance of a misidentification — after all, wasn't Ainharthar the being you were forced to see the moment you reached Main Quest 10, whether you wanted to or not?
Naturally, every eye turned to the emperor penguin who had summoned the Mad Dragon and ridden on his back. And his identity was revealed in an instant.
Player chat exploded into a free-for-all of arguments. But of course the conversation gravitated toward the accounts of those who had witnessed it firsthand.
Mad Dragon Ainharthar's face was twisted in a scowl.
It wounded his pride, but there was nothing to be done. Administering trials to challengers was as much his duty as his livelihood. He had suffered the humiliation of going to the challenger himself and carrying him on his back — but the process still had to move forward, didn't it?
The content of the trial, however, was his to decide.
I still can't figure him out.
No matter how many times he looked, he could not tell what this creature was. Observation failed entirely, so there was no way to gauge his level. Strong? Weak? Or something else entirely?
Fine. I'll test just how remarkable you really are.
He would simply have to examine him directly. The Mad Dragon smiled inwardly.
……He could already picture the despair on this one's face so clearly.
An oddly peculiar specimen, to be sure — but the level of challengers who came seeking trials was always more or less the same.