Galaxy TV (2)

Contrary to everyone's expectations, the Juddak did not open a live broadcast. He simply uploaded a couple of videos, and that was all.

And yet the videos racked up the highest view counts in community history. The reason was simple.

Ten billion points?

A hundred points was enough to buy a single meal even a noble couldn't dream of. And this was ten billion? It was a sum that would let a person live out their entire life without ever worrying about money again.

And yet the ten billion points were wiped from everyone's mind within seconds. Because in the video….

The video introduced one space monster after another. Mountain-sized horrors spewing tentacles from every inch of their bodies, all the way up to supergiant beasts casually chewing through planets.

Every kind of monster imaginable was captured on film. To the users, it might as well have been living mythology.

But what came next was even more breathtaking.

Contrary to Karlstein's expectations, the aggro veered off in a truly strange direction. The focus landed not on the monsters, but on the faction repelling them.

The video ended with a glimpse of the Juddak himself.

Clad in full plate armor and a scarlet cloak, the Juddak hurled a spear skyward — and a celestial body like a full moon shattered into glittering fragments. That was how it ended.

No matter how badly people wanted to believe it was staged, they had eyes. Where in any world would there be a reason to fake something with that much effort?

And it wasn't just once or twice. Every single time rumors about the Juddak surfaced, it was always like this — so by now, whether they wanted to believe it or not, they had no choice but to know.

Beyond comparison. Beyond the heavens. Untouchable.

No turn of phrase, no epithet in existence could capture the Juddak.

The second video, at least, could be watched without one's brain melting — though only because it was played at reduced speed.

It was shattering on every level. So sublime, so overwhelmingly vast, that it was almost impossible to process as reality.

And so, by Karlstein's design, the streaming service launched in spectacular fashion.

Karma points came gushing out like a broken dam.

"Whoa…. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠How much is all this, exactly?"

The gacha shop was a tidy little earner, to be sure, but nothing beat the fee-collection business. You could sell goods until the end of time and it still wouldn't touch running a platform. Of course, the market wasn't quite that simple — this was only possible because he had released enough volume to revitalize the entire market economy.

For the moment, all he could do was marvel at the points piling up.

"WHAT?!"

At a single word from Aria, that vast mountain of karma points — which had been accumulating without end — vanished with a flick, like a paycheck skimming past a bank account.

Unbelievable. A man's pride flows straight from his wallet, as the saying goes!

"…."

No complaints. Probably.

Ugh! What was the point of working so hard to earn it all when it just leaked out from every direction?!

Karlstein rolled his eyes skyward.

Some ten billion points remained. W-well, it was still something, wasn't it? Ten billion, after all. By the measure of his spending habits one might call it meager, but it was a sum ordinary people couldn't dream of in a lifetime.

Incidentally, he had no intention of personally hosting a streaming broadcast to farm points.

It would be undignified. The Emperor of the Galactic Empire, administrator of the Interdimensional Integrated Community, performing donation reaction faces? He hadn't the slightest confidence he could survive it.

"So… what should I do with this?"

Some might find it odd. An emperor getting an allowance? The Emperor of the Galactic Empire, no less?

But that was the talk of someone who didn't understand. The meaning of an allowance was anything but trivial: this money could be spent anywhere, on anything, without a shred of interference. No matter how trivial the purpose, not one word of objection — a pure, sacrosanct private fund that belonged to him alone!

Spend enough time around Aria and one naturally develops a guilty conscience. She never made a show of it, never nagged outright, but…

'Funny how one person scrimps on every last coin to run an empire, while a certain someone else…?' — meet her eyes long enough while she wore that particular look, and his conscience started to ache.

To be fair, for things he genuinely deemed necessary, "allowance" was a meaningless distinction — he'd spend like water and think nothing of it.

But really, as the saying goes —

Satisfied smile—

Satisfied smile—

Satisfied smile—

Satisfied smile—

Human beings, by their very nature, pursue happiness by spending time and wealth on things that look utterly useless.

But he couldn't exactly drain the imperial treasury on such things, could he? Properly speaking, there ought to be an entire ministry dedicated to managing the emperor's private coffers —

…An attempt that had once been shot down by the ministers' impassioned opposition. Their logic had been rather strange, now that he thought about it.

'They insist it's all already mine anyway, so it feels awkward to say no.'

Was this what they meant by infinite freedom carrying infinite responsibility? And so, watching his step around the palace was simply unavoidable.

He might have raised hell if they'd tried to talk him out of spending — that he could fight. But instead —

There had simply been far too many fanatical zealots among the ministers.

His romance-saturated collection, too, had hardly come into being on its own.

K-Chicken, K-Hanwoo beef — did anyone think those simply materialized out of thin air?

They were nothing more than the fruits of his personal investment and research, recreations of the foods he'd loved in his past life. The same went for his "growth-type space battleship" and his line of "concept-themed weapon suits."

Terrible cost-efficiency, every one of them — but you might say they were works of art, steeped to the brim in his stubbornness and his romance.

"Whew."

Karlstein let out a short sigh.

In truth, there was another reason he felt the need for a slush fund.

Suppose he spent money out in the real world? Setting aside the impossibility of hiding the transactions from Aria, everyone from the Economy Minister down to the lowliest budget clerk would know his spending records to the last decimal point.

Horrifying. It would be a public execution ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠by ledger.

A headline that must never, ever come to exist.

"Nope. Absolutely not happening."

Of course, no citizen of the empire possessed the guts to actually blame him or hold a public inquest over it — but still.

Forced humiliation! Enforced shame! He had no intention of volunteering himself as the star of a degradation broadcast, thank you very much.

Besides, there was always the community —

"Ahem."

With administrator privileges, he could even mint alt accounts for himself.