The Golden Rule Shop

The reason Serengeti had chosen her words so carefully.

She must have been wary that I was the Demon King himself—or some fragment of him. The shadow had already tried to seize control of my body; her caution was only natural.

So the game was designed so that the Demon King could never be killed… is that it?

The outline was becoming clear. Only a Player who held special rights could destroy the Demon King’s true essence. But the Knight King Wilhelm had never been a Player. He had been nothing more than a character I moved with a mouse.

If all of this was the Goddess’s plan, then killing the Demon King purely as a game was something that had never been part of her design.

She had made certain it could never be reached through the game alone. Only a Player could slay the Demon King. That meant I needed to examine the conditions for becoming a Player in the first place.

Die inside the game and you are summoned as a Player. But Wilhelm’s death was not my first character death.

In my case, after Wilhelm fell I created a new character and was summoned with the message that I had achieved a “Hidden Piece.” Yet if character death was the sole criterion, something still felt wrong. I had raised hundreds of characters. Plenty of them had died along the way. Only when Wilhelm died did the Player phenomenon occur.

Because I owned Unique-grade gear? No—far too many people had become Players for that to be the answer. If not a special item, then what standard had been used for the summons?

You become a Player when the strongest character you ever raised dies.

That was the only explanation that made sense. I had always preferred hardcore play. If a character’s build looked unpromising I simply abandoned it and started a new one. The gap in power between my characters had grown enormous; ordinary deaths never triggered the summons.

After that I had used other characters to gather everything Wilhelm needed, then spent years of grinding to push his growth ceiling higher. His raw talent might have been inferior to Randolph’s, but the perfection of his body was incomparable—a vessel refined to the absolute extreme, one that had finally brushed the realm of Demigod.

Only when that strongest character, Wilhelm, died was the environment complete for me to be summoned as a Player.

And so I had finally claimed the Demon King’s head…

Then the blue screen appeared. Probably the Demon King’s authority at work.

The limits of the game. Wilhelm, lacking Player rights, could never defeat the Demon King no matter how strong he became. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠The consequences spilled into reality itself—the blue screen locked me out completely. In that interval the Demon King tried to change bodies.

Before the star could be stolen by the Demon King, the Goddess took Wilhelm’s life.

Game Over. In the end I had no choice but to start over. That was how the unprecedented character carrying thirteen Hidden Traits and overflowing talent had been born.

One mystery solved… and new ones appear.

Not every thread had been untangled. First question:

Who sent Serengeti out of the Demon Realm?

She had returned to the territory bound to a horse. I had vaguely assumed that if she survived the Demon Realm she would eventually make her way home. Later, in the Golden City of Arcana, Hudson had confirmed she had indeed ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠returned to the territory. Yet the method still defied easy guessing. Serengeti herself said she remembered nothing after that point. Someone must have intervened and smuggled her out under the Demon King’s nose—or her superhuman survival instinct had let her crawl all the way back on her belly. The latter felt vanishingly unlikely.

Then what of my body… Wilhelm’s body? Did it become the Demon King?

The Goddess had taken only Wilhelm’s star and his life; the body itself remained in the Demon Realm. The Demon King might well have used that corpse for his resurrection. Plenty of demonkin specialized in death and the animation of corpses.

In any case the Demon Realm was shattered. The Demon King blew away half of it trying to activate the magic circle meant to kill me. Half of the Great Expedition succeeded.

It had not been a total failure. That was why the Demon Realm had been unable to stir after the expedition’s collapse—because it too had suffered half, or more than half, of its strength destroyed.

But—

The traitors. The so-called 8 Heroes, everyone except me, must have been involved.

Without those traitors, perhaps we could have achieved complete victory. I would find every last one who colluded with the Demon Realm.

I’ll slaughter every single one connected to this.

I would never again show mercy simply because someone was an NPC. Everyone who had hindered me, who was hindering me, who would hinder me—I would give them the end they deserved. For that, rapid growth was essential.

“Damn it! How many warps just blew?!”

“My sword! Where’s my sword?!”

“Move faster!”

Outside, the noise had grown unusually loud.

A Monster Wave. The city was under attack.

Which meant—

The warps haven’t been maintained for a long time. They’ve connected to the Dark Space.

None of Pangenia’s continents are joined. After the war between light and darkness, when the Goddess Rhea died, the continents sank into darkness. That was why only pure darkness—the Dark Space—lay beyond the edge of every city. The sole links between continents were the warps. Leave a warp unmaintained long enough and a Monster Wave pours through it. The problem was that maintaining warps required astronomical amounts of gold.

So Marquis Weiser was so broke he even neglected the warps.

I clicked my tongue softly.

“……I’ll finish this quickly and come back.”

The Dark Space. Also called the Gap.

Descend deep enough into its Abyss and the Rulers of the Abyss appear. Leave a warp open long enough and those things could emerge.

That would be extinction.

The moment a Ruler of the Abyss stepped through, the city’s fate was sealed. Ordinary star-rank Transcendents could not stand against them. Knight’s Garden, whose powerful knights had almost all perished, stood no chance whatsoever. If those things appeared, I would run too. Fail to escape before every remaining warp sank into the Abyss and you would be trapped in the Gap forever; death would be the only way out. The Dark Space severed every form of connection—even a Teleport Book became useless.

“Fight! We must defend the city!”

Marquis Weiser heaved his heavy body upright atop the wall and drew his sword. A few knights still held the functioning warps. Terrified citizens crowded in front of those that still worked.

“Marquis Weiser! When a Monster Wave strikes, safely evacuating the citizens is a noble’s duty! What in the world is this?!”

Priest Andrew raised his voice among them. Why block the warps that still functioned? At the very least the powerless citizens should be moved to safety first.

The marquis nodded.

“Priest Andrew! If you will assist, then so be it.”

“Understood.”

“Open the warps!”

The knights stepped aside and a few citizens passed through. Yet most refused to move once they heard Andrew was staying behind.

“You must leave at once. Let us all meet again alive!”

“How can we flee alone while the priest remains here?!”

“If we delay any longer the other warps will be affected. Hurry!”

“We refuse! We’ll fight together! We’ll defend the city together!”

It was a clear glimpse of the citizens’ blind faith in Priest Andrew. Losing the city would also leave them wanderers. The marquis knew that well; that was why he had used Andrew.

“Gah!”

“Don’t let them through!”

“Aaaagh! My leg!”

Not far away, knights and monsters were locked in bloody combat. Some warps stood inside the city itself—meaning the fighting had ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠already reached the streets. For now only small fry like dark goblins had appeared, but stronger specimens would soon pour through the broken warps.

There were only two ways to stop a Monster Wave. One: an alchemist repairs the broken warps. The other:

Destroy the broken warps.

That was the simplest and surest method. Yet the road ahead stretched endlessly. Once a Monster Wave began, the volume pouring through the warps reached the scale of an entire legion. The city’s standing forces alone could never clear a path. Turning ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠my back and walking away was not an option either.

A sub-quest had appeared right before my eyes. Massive experience—how could anyone simply walk past that? And it was not alone.

I never expected it to begin here. Main Quest 4 had started at the worst possible moment.

This is the worst.

I could not clear a main quest with zero preparation or countermeasures. Even if I succeeded, failing to rank high enough would be a pure loss. Fleeing and retrying later would be the wiser choice; if I never challenged it at all, it would not count. And above all—the Golden Rule Shop.

A shop accessed with Broken Fragments of the Golden Rule?

A privilege I desperately needed. That was why I had to place in the Hall of Fame rankings. Under normal circumstances I would have left without a second glance.

Priest Andrew. Serengeti.

Those two faces would not leave my mind. If this city vanished, they would vanish with it—the most honorable priest, and the closest knight who had once thrown her life away for me.

Even ten minutes and a clear becomes impossible.

The real problem was the time limit built into the quest itself. Hybrids every ten minutes. Anything called a Hybrid was monstrously powerful. A Black Skin Hybrid alone was a Level 10 monster. What came after needed no further comment.

I have to open a path—fast.

I had to clear it within ten minutes. Yet Isabella and Hudson alone would not be enough, even with Hydragon added. Destroying every warp inside ten minutes looked impossible no matter how I calculated it.

But it was not as though no method existed at all.

Ziiing!

I activated the Teleport Book. A warp shimmered open, showing the scenery of Basrak Forest on the far side.

“Oh! Our friend! Coming to the forest again? Then we must hold a festival today as well!”

The High Dryad—lord of the forest and sovereign of the dryads—waved from the opposite side of the warp. I smiled faintly.

“I need a little help, friend.”

What else were friends for, if not moments like this?

*

“……”

“……What is that……”

“Wh-what in the world is going on……?”