The Ceiling System Opens
=YggON SYSTEM ON=
ACHIEVEMENTS
─ Sword Demon Dragon Blade
▸ Cleared the Final Stage. (Complete) — Reward: 1 Guaranteed SR YggON Ticket.
▸ Cleared Sword Demon Dragon Blade. (Complete)
Reward: 1 Guaranteed SSR YggON Ticket.
▸ Hidden Event Flag: Awakened Sword Demon achieved. (Complete) — Reward: 5 YggON Tickets.
▸ Defeated the True Sword Demon. (Complete)
Reward: 'MR Heavenly Demon Divine Art' added to the Random Box pool.
=SYSTEM OFF=
"An SSR guaranteed ticket, sure, fine... but MR? I've never even heard of that grade. It gets added to the Random Box pool?"
[MR stands for Master Rare. It's a special rarity grade that only unlocks once specific conditions are met.]
"So it's higher than SSR?"
[Their value varies wildly. Some perform about as well as SR gear, others rival SSR. That's precisely why they're classified under the special 'MR' grade.]
"Hmm. So that means I can now pull something called Heavenly Demon Divine Art, an MR-grade skill, from the Random Box? Just out of curiosity — what are the odds?"
[It's treated as an SSR.]
"So it's basically meaningless, then."
MR or whatever else — what were the odds of it actually coming out of the Random Box?
[That's rich, coming from someone who pulled a UR.]
SSR, MR — none of them could so much as show their face before the odds of drawing a UR.
But that had been the exception to end all exceptions, and even Ryu Hwi had no idea how he'd managed it in the first place.
It was hard to call his usual luck good. Even with Probability Manipulation active, scraping out a single SSR had been a struggle.
Right now, then, the fact that MR Heavenly Demon Divine Art had been added to the Random Box pool didn't stir much in him.
If an MR guaranteed ticket ever showed up down the line, that would be a different story.
[You've cleared Sword Demon Dragon Blade, one of your objectives. What would you like to do now?]
"What do you think?"
Over the past month, he'd accomplished every goal he'd set for himself.
With the last of them, Sword Demon Dragon Blade, cleared, all the preparation was done.
He took hold of the 'Guaranteed SSR Ticket' glittering before his eyes.
"Time to head back."
[So the hour has come to return to that piece-of-garbage game?]
Even YggON called the game labyrinth a "piece-of-garbage game" without a moment's hesitation.
"Yeah. World of Phantasm needs to see its end, doesn't it?"
Title: World of Phantasm
Developer: Latia
Genre: RPG
A little over a month in real-world time.
Ryu Hwi had returned to World of Phantasm.
«Back already? Does that mean you've finished all your preparations?»
5555's voice came through almost the instant he set foot back in World of Phantasm.
"Yep. Granting that bizarre request of yours took some serious prep work."
He was going to bring World of Phantasm down.
And to do that, he had to Delete the core that formed the Demon God's Tower — the game's main content and the heart of its world.
"Which basically means I have to clear World of Phantasm in the end, huh?"
In the end, the old route and the collapse-of-World-of-Phantasm route weren't all that different. If anything, the new one was more of a hassle.
"Well, whatever works."
One thing was certain: collapsing World of Phantasm would deal a devastating blow to the Linzea Guild.
"Now, let's settle the books, shall we?"
He pulled up his system logs and checked his achievements across the other game labyrinths, aside from Sword Demon Dragon Blade.
=YggON SYSTEM ON=
ACHIEVEMENTS
▸ Connected to Bomber Shooting. (Complete)
Reward: 5 YggON Tickets.
▸ Connected to Hero Academy. (Complete)
Reward: 5 YggON Tickets.
...
...
▸ Connected to 10 game labyrinths. (Complete)
Reward: 5 YggON Tickets.
▸ Connected to 20 game labyrinths. (Complete)
Reward: 5 YggON Tickets.
▸ Connected to 30 game labyrinths. (Complete)
Reward: 5 YggON Tickets.
▸ Connected to 40 game labyrinths. (Complete)
Reward: 5 YggON Tickets.
▸ Connected to 50 game labyrinths. (Complete)
Reward: 1 Guaranteed SR YggON Ticket.
...
...
=SYSTEM OFF=
Over the past month, he had toured some fifty-odd game labyrinths.
That fell far short of his target, but with YggON constantly barking "Doctor's orders!" at him, he'd had no other choice.
YggON kept constant tabs on his physical condition and forced him to rest whenever necessary. And he had other matters demanding his attention, so fifty labyrinths had been about his limit.
At least he'd managed to snag a Guaranteed SR Ticket for the fifty-labyrinth connection achievement — small mercies.
[Closing the accounts on all tickets earned through connection achievements. Checking connection achievements, cumulative connection achievements, login bonuses, and daily settlement results.]
The results appeared directly in Ryu Hwi's field of view.
Standard Tickets: 1,100.
Guaranteed SR Tickets: 27.
Guaranteed SSR Ticket: 1.
Random Box Points: 63,760 RP.
It was a staggering haul. A laugh bubbled up out of him.
"If luck won't come to me, I'll bury it in sheer volume!"
[Ah, the "keep spinning and you'll win eventually" theory. That reminds me of the old story about a city that blew its entire budget on lottery tickets and went bankrupt.]
"Hey."
And here he was, getting hexed before he'd even started...
[I was merely citing a historical precedent.]
"Fine, fine. Just shut your mouth already."
YggON had given him an ominous feeling, but Ryu Hwi desperately denied it.
Even Intuition couldn't read the Random Box.
And even if a bad omen did rear its head, smashing straight through it head-on was simply how Ryu Hwi operated.
So, starting now...
[Life-Ruining Random Box, GO! GO!]
"Shut! Your! Mouth!!"
The fate of over a thousand YggON Tickets.
Ryu Hwi sat there with both hands clamped over his face, unable even to bring himself to stand.
[I only said it in passing, and yet it actually came true. I don't even know what to say. Master, you are truly magnificent. I'm in awe.]
"..."
[Honestly, at this point it's hard to even laugh. The Probability Manipulation MOD is running, and this is still what happens? Isn't this a bit much?]
"Shut... up."
[It seems proper manners call for some reaction, so I shall laugh. HAHAHAHAHAHA. Whew. How hollow.]
"Shut... it..."
It wasn't that nothing at SR or above had come out.
Things had come out, all right.
47 SRs.
1 SSR.
And everything else had been R or below.
[N 67.4%, R 28%, SR 3.6%, SSR 1%. Those are merely the averages. A hundred pulls should net you one SSR. A thousand pulls, ten. So what do you call getting exactly one?]
"A-a whole month of my effort...!!"
Watching a month's worth of grinding evaporate this pointlessly was agony in every possible sense.
[Most of the SRs you pulled are everyday items usable in real life. The Magidrive Toothbrush says hello.]
Worse still, nearly forty of those forty-seven SRs were things convenient for daily life.
They technically counted as Yggdrasil Items, but not a single one of them helped him grow stronger.
At this point, he had to wonder if he'd spent a lifetime's worth of luck on that one UR pull.
And this time, after nearly a month of scraping those tickets together, the psychological damage was especially severe.
"N-no, it's not over yet."
He still had the SR and SSR tickets left.
[It took you thirty minutes to resurrect.]
"Shut it!"
Grumbling, he moved to run the Random Box again — and his finger froze mid-air.
[Oh? Are you afraid of failing again this time? Rest assured, I have zero expectations now that I fully understand your luck has hit rock bottom. At this point, I recommend dumping all your RP into the Random Box.]
"You goddamn robot vacuum! You're killing my concentration, so shut your—!"
[I do not possess a mouth.]
He hurled YggON across the room.
A light, deep breath.
He prayed, and prayed again, that all his effort wouldn't go to waste...
"Here goes!!"
He slammed the Random Box without hesitation.
«What's wrong with you? What happened?»
«Your mental gauge just cratered. Did something happen?»
Ryu Hwi lay sprawled on the floor.
Even YggON couldn't find words, hovering above his head displaying a (┬┬﹏┬┬) emoticon in mourning.
More than two-thirds of his twenty-seven SR tickets had been total wipeout.
«Hello? Anyone there?»
"Later... I'll call you later."
«U-um. You're okay, right?»
He was absolutely not okay.
But he didn't even have the strength to answer.
Ryu Hwi cut the connection with 5555 and surveyed the wreckage the Random Box had left behind.
The results of spinning over a thousand Standard Tickets, twenty-seven SR Tickets, and the SSR Ticket.
The keepers: twelve SRs and two SSRs.
A whole month's work... gone!
YggON drifted over to Ryu Hwi and gently nudged his shoulder, as if to say hang in there.
[Master, a new system has opened. Kindly check your achievements.]
"Achievements?"
The last time he was despairing over duplicate pulls, the Combine function had unlocked.
Could it be that this time, too, some miracle feature had arrived to salvage the situation?
Cradling a small spark of hope, Ryu Hwi opened his achievements.
=YggON SYSTEM ON=
ACHIEVEMENT
▸ Executed the Random Box a cumulative 1,500 times or more. (Complete) — Reward: System 'Ceiling' unlocked.
🔔 ALERT!
System 'Ceiling' has been unlocked.
=SYSTEM OFF=
"..."
The name of the newly unlocked system made the ending obvious from the start.
"YggON. Explain."
Even knowing there'd be no hope in the answer, he asked anyway.
[When you execute the Random Box, every 300 pulls guarantees the current Pickup item. In other words, spin the box 300 times within World of Phantasm's pool, and you're guaranteed the highest-grade item or skill related to World of Phantasm.]
It was called a Ceiling because it capped the sky — a pity system.
"And there's no way to recycle the pulls I've already made...?"
[Nope. Feed them to the Combine function.]
Reality was cruel.
Ryu Hwi hammered his fist into the floor, again and again.
Why?! Why is it unlocking only NOW?! Why?!
If this Ceiling system had opened from the start, the results might have been just a little better!
"Whew."
Ryu Hwi drew another deep breath. Somehow, he managed to gather himself back up.
[It took you an hour to resurrect this time.]
"Shut it. Don't touch me right now. Or I'll crush you underfoot."
[Aren't you already crushing me? That hurts, you know.]
Ryu Hwi exhaled a long sigh, YggON still pinned beneath his heel.
He decided to look on the bright side. At least something good had come out of it, in its way.
Ryu Hwi reviewed his SR list.
SR — Teleport (Skill) +NEW
SR — Meteor Strike (Skill) +NEW
SR — Swift March (Skill)
SR — Iaijutsu (Skill) +NEW
SR — Hawk Eye (Skill) +NEW
SR — Spear Mastery (Skill) +NEW
SR — Aura Blade (Skill) +NEW
SR — Shoes of the Wind (Item) +NEW
SR — Banner of the Divine Dragon (Item) +NEW
SR — Soul Severing Blade (Item) +NEW
SR — Powered Armor V10 (Item) +NEW
SR — Summoned Beast Rammut (Infancy) (Item) +NEW
Seven skills, five items.
One of the twelve was a duplicate.
Many were skills and items from World of Phantasm, but there were others from different game labyrinths too.
All that remained now were the two SSRs.
Ryu Hwi wanted power.
Power that wouldn't yield even against the Linzea Guild — or Latia Soft.
To obtain that power, he had spent the past month buried alive in game labyrinths.
"I guess I should count myself lucky I salvaged even this much."
Two SSRs wreathed in rainbow auras.
They were his one and only salvation.