Deity-World Oneness
The ranks in the game were divided into seven tiers: Common, Excellent, Elite, Hero, Narrative, Legendary, and Mythic. To put it bluntly, a higher grade was simply better. The gap between a Common trait like Toughness and a Mythic one like Immortal was obvious from the names alone.
That said, you couldn’t call Mythic traits the direct superior version of Legendary ones.
Because starting at Hero grade, traits could carry the tag. These were qualities beyond any simple hierarchy of strength.
Compare a Hero-grade Unique trait like Perfect Respiration: Can survive by breathing alone with a Mythic-grade Unique trait like Absolute Spacetime Independent Entity: Immune to all spacetime-type attacks and able to acquire spacetime authorities without restriction.
What would be useful for my Dessert Legion right now…? Who the hell uses spacetime attacks in the early game? Sure, in the extreme endgame the spacetime one would be better. But at the stage where I still had to feed my forces, I couldn’t afford to pick it.
So I looked at the Mythic traits available, only to find that many of the already limited options carried the note that other players had already purchased them.
“Hmm?”
“Another top-ranked player has purchased it.”
“If another player buys it, I can’t?”
“For ordinary traits, no. But everything at Legendary and above is not only but also , so once any player owns it, no one else can select it.”
I see. Come to think of it, that rule existed in the multiplayer version.
Divine Beast: Generates a mythic-grade creation that is the literal incarnation of the world itself. Its total stats equal the current civilization’s stat total at the moment of collision. (Another player possesses this)
First Holy Land: The first territory you receive in the game is declared the First Holy Land. As long as it is not conquered, all creations receive a massive stat increase, the chance of higher-grade entities appearing rises significantly, and the Terrain level of the First Holy Land rises by 4. (Another player possesses this)
Mythic Enigma: A structure you built yourself has reached the realm of myth. Designate one existing structure or consume resources to create one. The chosen structure immediately gains one mythic function, can grow and expand without limit, and can repair itself. (Another player possesses this)
The ones that looked intuitively useful had all been snatched up. They were traits I could have put to very good use.
“Still, every Mythic trait is strong.”
“Of course they are. They need to be useful to me, right now, and keep being useful forever.”
I’d heard that the true top ranks in this game all sat above ninety thousand points.
Crazy bastards. Assuming roughly a thousand players like me were grinding points through pure labor to buy a Mythic trait, and that the others might snipe them first, I had to choose quickly.
“Angel. From your perspective, which one looks good?”
“How about this?”
Biopunk: Has discovered a new direction that achieves perfect harmony between life and science. The and stats are merged; their combined value becomes the current value. Creations gain other stats equal to their Stamina. Raising either stat now raises both, and when one falls, both fall.
“With just this, the Dessert Legion can instantly be reborn as the game’s highest-level scientific civilization! The Dessert Empire, now a super-biological civilization, will achieve a glorious victory!”
“Rejected.”
“Why! There’s objectively nothing better than this!”
“It doesn’t match my philosophy.”
“Where did the Demon King who would do anything to win disappear to!”
It also didn’t align with anti-intellectualism, and choosing it would mean I’d have to raise Industry, Politics, and Culture from now on as well.
They were already at rock bottom. Picking this would probably leave my Life stat stagnant until the fourth collision, forcing me to manage what was essentially an anarchic world in the meantime. I could still win… but that style of play wasn’t something I was used to.
“Fine. Then how about this one?”
Ultra-Integrated Collective Consciousness: The consciousness of every entity in the world becomes linked. The world’s stat becomes the entities’ stat. From now on, every entity will perfectly obey the god’s will and move with perfect efficiency.
“With this the Dessert Legion becomes a single organism! Abhojuth and Yogur-tosoth will fuse into one, creating an invincible living legion!”
“Rejected.”
“Why this one too?!”
“The core build of my ecosystem is accelerating evolution through fierce, eat-or-be-eaten struggle. That choice would make it impossible. I saw it lock the system in an old game.”
And philosophically, how the hell was that an anti-intellectualism build?
“Ugh… Mythic traits are so unique that… Then how about this?”
Transcendent Species: All normal creations lose level and trait limits. They grow endlessly like Unique entities without needing promotion trials. Every creation can consume all types of energy, and energy efficiency reaches the absolute limit.
“This would turn the Dessert Legion into monsters beyond imagination.”
“This one’s worth considering. But I’m not sure I should take it right now.”
“Huh? Why not?”
“Monster-legion builds have limits.”
The angel’s eyes widened.
“Eh?”
“No matter how powerfully you raise monsters, they can’t reach round thirty. The ‘Monster Apocalypse’ strategy using legendary and mythic creatures has a ceiling… At this game’s level, it’ll get stuck around round twenty. Maybe a little earlier or later.”
“I naturally assumed you were planning to ride the monster apocalypse strategy until the very end.”
No. That wouldn’t work.
Simply put, the explosive synergy produced by a civilization’s unified society, population, industry, technology, magic, politics, and culture generates far higher stats than any living creature can achieve through evolution and growth.
Creating a horde of strong monsters to conquer civilizations? Nonsense. That only happens in prehistoric times, not even the ancient era. It’s the equivalent of “The country fell because there were too many tigers.”
Because this game is fantasy, the strategy works to a certain extent. But past round twenty, it stops working.
Just like the strategy of sending out only inedible jellies to starve enemies only lasts a few rounds, a different approach becomes necessary at that point.
“Right now I need a plan that raises stability more than immediate combat power.”
“Your current combat power is already enough?”
“Yes. I have overwhelming offensive power that can end enemies before I even deploy Yogur-tosoth, plus Yogur-tosoth as my trump card. As you said, I can currently trigger a ‘Monster Apocalypse’ state and crush nearly every civilization.”
“That’s true.”
“So rather than becoming overwhelmingly strong right away, I need a trait that will be enormously helpful in the long run. One I can actively use at least past round twenty, and perhaps one whose power won’t diminish at all even at round thirty. Since a creature-centered build falls behind in late-game growth, it’s better to reinforce the late game than the early game.”
“Then how about this?”
The angel immediately recommended the next trait. Once again I looked at it without much expectation.
Yet unlike the previous ones, this trait caught my interest quite strongly.
“Oh. First time seeing this.”
“It didn’t exist in the game version.”
“In other words, it’s a trait for creating clones of ‘me’?”
“It’s more than that. You gain senses in every part of the world and can split your consciousness to focus on them. Effectively, it’s no different from gaining absolutely loyal subordinates equal to your level while multiplying your divine power by the same amount. For someone like you, Lord Biin, who has no subordinates, it seems perfectly suited.”
Impressive. Truly excellent.
Fearing someone might snatch it, I selected the trait immediately. There was no need to consider anything else.
I would have no subordinates throughout the game, and I would need to watch over the ecosystem at every moment and tune it. This trait felt as if it had been created specifically for me.
Purchasing Deity-World Oneness for 144,092 points.
The moment the trait card merged into my body, my senses changed.
I had already possessed the divine viewpoint that could look down on the entire world from outside the physical body.
But now I could not only “see” every part of the world but “feel” it. It’s hard to describe, but it was as if every cell in my body was a part of the world itself. I felt all those sensations at once, yet it wasn’t unpleasant, my brain didn’t explode, and I simply perceived everything simultaneously.
Next came consciousness splitting.
My current divine level was 5. In other words, I could split my consciousness into five.
Yet six clones appeared. Wait, six…? Ah, right. Since I could perform five splits, six total selves made sense. A bit confusing. Like a language puzzle.
I looked at myself looking at myself looking at myself. Every consciousness was still me.
Was this the sensation felt by insects or octopuses that possess ganglia separate from the brain? It was like having multiple brains, all perfectly linked.
No, even more than that. They were connected without the slightest delay.
“Why compare it to insects or octopuses of all things…?”
Suddenly, a tremendous idea struck me.
“Wait. Can each split mind have its own separate community nickname and ID…?”
“No.”
Damn it. Even after splitting my consciousness into six, I could only use one community account… What garbage for a Mythic trait…
But if I flipped the perspective, this was what it meant: from now on, while gathering information on other players through community activity or consulting on their ecosystems, I could perfectly manage my own ecosystem at the same time.
The higher my level rose, the easier it would become. The importance of had suddenly skyrocketed.
Still, it was worth it. Six bodies and six minds. In other words, time now flowed six times slower for me. My divine power had also increased sixfold, so the difference was negligible.
I assigned duties to each of the six consciousnesses.
One: Information gathering through community activity and exchange, plus securing points by consulting other players’ ecosystems.
Two through Four: Managing the existing ecosystem, divided by sector.
Five: Managing the new ecosystem.
Six: Studying.
“Studying?”
The consciousnesses from two to six each began to move. I answered as the one handling community activity and communication with the angel.
“I don’t fully understand the and the Yeong-rip-hak knowledge I received from Elkaider. All the information he knew about it flooded into my head, but since it was a field I had zero connection to, I couldn’t comprehend the content. I feel like a student who memorized an entire textbook without understanding a word. I’m trying to organize it.”
“Oooh. You’ve finally stepped into the study of mysteries. Player Elkaider’s knowledge was objectively impressive. He lived obsessed with gambling, but it seems he was quite competent as a civil servant.”
Is that so? Even hearing that, I couldn’t gauge exactly how impressive it was.
Sesaisa would be able to evaluate it properly, but if it was knowledge even he didn’t possess, I wasn’t sure whether I should share it.
First, for the sake of study, the sixth consciousness opened the layer of my world. I had never opened it before, so I did so simply to see if it had any other functions.
And the moment I did, what appeared before me was—
“Huh?”
Everything the sixth consciousness felt was shared with all of us. We were stunned.
A spiritual structure incomparably more massive than the shabby I had received from Elkaider, along with a tremendous flow that penetrated the entire world, circulated through my existing world. It followed the rivers, deserts, and areas near freshwater lakes, then poured every ounce of absorbed mana straight into the Nectar Oasis.
“This is…”
“Player Sesaisa did this. While violently correcting the ecosystem, he meticulously adjusted the tangled spiritual pressure and flows so that all mana would condense in the Nectar Well.”
This bastard. So he had done something like this.
I had never looked at the Spiritual Flow Realm, so I hadn’t known. Seeing how precisely and delicately the spiritual structures were constructed here, I could only marvel.
I had thought Sesaisa possessed some absurd talent that doubled mana pressure without doing anything. In reality, he had simply reinforced my world through insanely precise and sophisticated construction.
The sixth consciousness rummaged through fragments of knowledge and, as if Sesaisa had left the space empty for a future spiritual realm, slowly inserted the one received from Elkaider into the vacant spot.
Compared to Sesaisa’s refinement it was little more than ragged patchwork, but I used divine power to twist and weave the spiritual structures together, roughly entangling the new realm within them.
The world’s Mystery score has exceeded 8,579 points. Level increased to 7. You may now select a new trait.
The world’s Faith score has exceeded 4,085 points. Level increased to 6.
The spiritual realm sucked in and exhaled the world’s flow and mana like crazy. I had essentially done nothing, yet both and had each risen by one level.
What the hell was that thing? Elkaider had handed something like this over to me?
“To be honest, looking back now, taking the from Lord Elkaider and then squeezing another 3,000 points out of him was really too much…”
That was that, and this was this.
Anyway. The growth was insane. The next game would be an easy win.
The soft-hearted human who had shown mercy to those kneeling and begging was gone. It was time to return as the Lord of Mass Extinction.
“You’re really not a person at all…”