World Collision - The Fourth

The status window for Yogur-tosoth floated before me like a mocking accusation.

In truth, these numbers explained everything about my current strategy.

Or rather… what the hell had this thing been eating?

Objectively speaking, Yogur-tosoth had always been an all-rounder legendary unit. High health, overwhelming magic power, authority, and combat ability. A genuine swiss-army-knife of a creature.

But after receiving just one special training session from Sesaisa, its combat score had literally increased fivefold. The stats that used to be low and hard to utilize—dexterity, charm, and spirit—had only gone up a little. Meanwhile, the truly important ones, magic power and authority (which determined the variety and potency of spells it could wield), had skyrocketed like crazy. The end result? A total score of seventeen thousand points.

My entire world’s military score was only 6,632. Roughly three thousand of that came from this guy’s personal combat power alone. Individual combat power and world combat power weren’t supposed to have a one-to-one ratio, yet this insane creature was now objectively stronger than every other lifeform in my ecosystem combined.

“Angel. What’s your assessment?”

“Three thousand three hundred and ten worlds.”

“Worlds that have even a chance of defeating Yogur-tosoth?”

“Yes. Excluding the ones that could only win by dragging him down in mutual destruction, as I mentioned before… out of the remaining worlds, roughly 2,800 out of 130 million have a realistic chance of reliably taking him down.”

“It didn’t drop by ninety percent like last time?”

“It’s actually because Yogur-tosoth has become too strong. Most worlds can’t even inflict damage on him, or they can’t block his attacks. These numbers only include worlds that can at least endure and counterattack. So the split is extreme—either they can definitely kill him, or they have virtually no chance at all.”

“Huh.”

“In short, either their abilities are heavily specialized in a magic type that counters him perfectly, or they can somehow exploit his relatively weak spirit stat… Those are the only real threats. And if you add the carnivorous candies into the mix, the number of worlds capable of facing yours drops to fewer than a hundred.”

So this was the result of that extreme early-game power spike.

“Well, yes. In the early stages, a single entity with higher individual specs than the total potential of an entire civilization tends to be far more threatening. The fact that you obtained such a being and can now command it… you’ve essentially acquired an invincible authority, sir.”

She was right. Understanding the ecosystem Sesaisa had tuned for me would probably require a detailed explanation in the next game, but for now, my world was extraordinarily stable.

“Can I dump all the remaining traits I haven’t picked yet in one go?”

“Of course.”

One Excellent Life trait.

One Excellent Military trait.

One Normal Industry trait.

Four Normal Technology traits.

One Normal and one Excellent Mystery trait.

Life = 『Artificial Evolution 2: Evolution efficiency through divinity increases by 200%.』

Military = 『Yogur-tosoth Combat Mage Promotion: The legendary creation Yogur-tosoth will now allocate gained experience toward combat-mage-specialized stats, with related abilities rising. Requires the prior trait 『Combat Mage Promotion』.』

Industry = 『Rock Industry: Significantly improves efficiency in processing 〈rock〉-based industries.』

Mystery = 『Mage Promotion: Allows individual entities to promote into mages. Promoted mages will distribute experience differently.』 『Combat Mage Promotion: Advanced class of mage. Unlocks combat mage promotion.』

These were easy choices. There weren’t really any alternatives, and these were simply the most efficient options.

The problem was the Technology section.

“……”

“Is something wrong?”

“It’s just… I have no idea how to evaluate the relative strengths of these traits.”

Technology ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠traits either made technological development easier, unlocked job classes specialized in tech development, or simply granted new technologies outright.

The issue was that my entire tech tree was 100% focused on magic. I couldn’t even unlock any proper “technology development” job classes, so every option that appeared was some kind of magic spell. I had no clue which ones were good.

If it just said “Attack Magic” or “Fireball Magic,” I could at least get a gamer’s intuition. But because Sesaisa had gotten involved, every trait was drowning in hyper-specialized technical jargon.

“Would you like me to explain each one individually?”

“No… I still wouldn’t get it. I’ve played this game for fifty thousand hours, but I always found magic too difficult and frustrating, so I only ever learned it at a surface level.”

“Ah… The community is also about to close due to the upcoming collision.”

I thought for a moment, then suddenly had a new idea.

“Hey. Yogur-tosoth. I have a question.”

“I’m going to tell you about the spells you can learn from now on. You decide which ones would be best and tell me yourself.”

“Hmm. You are currently the First Legion Commander of the Dessert Legion. Since I’ve invested so heavily in you, I need you to be competent in multiple fields. Rather than being overwhelmingly good at one thing, I’d prefer you to handle most problems with your own power. But if we look at the big picture, mastering ‘massacre,’ ‘self-survival,’ and ‘ecosystem regulation’ should be enough.”

Every time I named one of the three categories, Yogur-tosoth selected the appropriate magic on its own.

In the end, it learned four spells. I didn’t fully understand them, but supposedly this combination gave it an advantage in attack, survival, and ecosystem maintenance.

“By the way, how was Sesaisa? Did he teach magic well?”

At that, Yogur-tosoth seemed to light up with joy and began pouring out praise.

…Yeah. Sorry for being a god who doesn’t know magic.

Still, I bet that guy is hearing similar things right now.

Meanwhile, in Sesaisa’s world.

‘When will Lord Biin visit us again? If he could bestow his blessing of abundance just one more time…’

“Am I your creator? Is that bastard your creator?”

‘Lord Biin is not our creator, but he is the God of Abundance.’

‘We serve our Creator and enjoy mystery according to your will, yet we simply worship the one who has also granted blessings to this flesh…’

“…Whatever. I’m sure that guy is hearing the same nonsense from his own creations.”

Sesaisa had no time to think further. The collision had begun.

The same was true for me.

In a distant world, Soon—a politician from a narrow isekai rather than an infinitely vast universe—had grasped the true nature of this game early on.

“This game is not about leaving only one final survivor. It’s about securing a good defeat at the right moment and exiting gracefully. It’s a game that values cooperation over competition.”

Theoretically, if every player gave up on fighting during collisions and formed an alliance, they could all become gods of a single unified world. Pure theory, of course.

In other words, victory or defeat depended on how well you formed alliances, how large you grew them, and when you cashed out.

That was why Soon had immediately allied with his opponent in the first collision. In the second, there were two opponents. He allied with them too. In the third, there were four opponents, and an eight-member community of fate was born.

And Soon was a politician. He had instinctively understood what mattered most in this game.

“The essence of this game is politics. Overwhelming political power is the only thing that can secure dominance for our tribe among the eight, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠stabilize our alliance system, and eventually grant us superiority over other players.”

During the protected period between games, Soon had fully exercised his abilities as a politician. The ability his world and species focused on most was 〈Politics〉.

High 〈Politics〉 increased systemic stability, allowed efficient control over one’s species, and enabled the construction of a unified civilization under a single leader.

His species had literally become the ruling race among the eight tribes without lifting a finger. By the time the other allied gods noticed and tried to intervene, it was already too late. The hero directly commanded by Soon used that political power to begin absorbing key figures from other tribes, enacting laws, and completing a system where completely different species lived together in harmony.

Destroying that system would now mean losing the game. Soon’s tribe displayed the virtue of rulers—noblesse oblige—monopolizing wealth and in-game points from the top, while the other tribes utilized their respective strengths in different fields to stably manage their world.

“Let’s continue the policy of cooperation with the next world as well. According to the angel, there is ‘still’ no factor that would hinder cooperation.”

Indeed. He had listened carefully to the angel’s explanation of the game rules. Every fifth game, a ‘disaster’ would arrive. Only after facing that disaster would mindless cooperation with other players become impossible, forcing the use of the horrific method known as ‘soul annihilation.’

Conversely, that meant there was no reason to annihilate souls at all until the fourth game.

Aggressive strategies were inferior. The correct approach was to focus on internal development until the fourth game, build a mid-to-high level army, and emphasize defense.

This was probably the standard strategy. And Soon had logical confidence in it.

It was a winning strategy—not in the sense that it guaranteed victory, but in the sense that it offered the highest expected value.

‘Our world’s total score is 21,221. It should normally be Level 3, but through cooperation we’ve reached Level 5. Our military power alone is 1,300 points, slightly exceeding Level 4. Even if the enemy has three or four times our military strength, we can hold them off using wooden fences, earthen fortifications, and the 〈Mystery〉 present in this world. The only slight problem is that the eight tribes’ united front isn’t functioning perfectly because the allied players are trying to escape my control…’

That could be solved with political power. Therefore, when the fourth world collision occurred, he felt no worry at all. This wasn’t even the real match yet.

There was no way the opponent would exceed 21,000 points.

Even if they did, would their military power exceed 5,000?

And even then, wouldn’t they still ask for an alliance?

He had no worries. He possessed the overwhelming weapons of ‘reason’ and ‘logic.’

“The god of the next world is… ‘Biin’? Why aren’t the names of the allied gods or subordinate gods appearing?”

“It’s not that they aren’t appearing. It means that player has ascended after annihilating every single opponent.”

At the angel’s words, Soon felt as if his brain had frozen.

Then the dimensional gate opened. The envoy his tribe had sent through the gate saw ‘that thing’ floating in the sky, was torn apart and killed in an instant, and the next moment, chitin-covered monstrosities burst out of the gate. They began trampling the fragile tribe’s civilians with body slams and tearing into their flesh.

“Everyone prepare for battle! A demon has appeared!!!”

Instead of losing consciousness, Soon urgently sounded the highest-level crisis alarm and began summoning every defense force in his world.