Chapter 251 : The One Who Prays Alone
Chapter 251: The One Who Prays Alone
It was a space that resembled the night sky.
Every direction was filled with the universe.
No matter where one looked, the scenery of countless distant universes came into view. It was enough to create the illusion that one had become an astronaut, drifting alone through space.
At the center of that space stood a table.
A long, wooden round table with a natural timber color, lined neatly with more than a dozen chairs on either side. At a glance, it looked much like the cumbersome dining table used by medieval nobles.
And there was only one man.
In that lonely space where no one else existed, the man occupying the seat of honor quietly placed cards onto the table.
Whenever he drew a card from the box and tossed it, the card that left his hand flew with uncanny precision, as though it possessed a will of its own.
The card glided across the air and settled into someone's empty seat.
There was something like a tray there, and on top of it were sections labeled 'Character Name,' 'Age,' 'Possessions,' 'Episode,' and other such categories.
The card the man had thrown landed perfectly on the section labeled 'Episode.'
Immediately afterward, several chess pieces floating above the table began moving on their own, and the man watched the scene with careful attention.
A short while later—
The card suddenly burst into flames.
Then it transformed into something entirely different.
“……Damn it! Again!”
Unable to contain his frustration, the man slammed the table.
Despite striking it with considerable force, neither the chess pieces nor the objects scattered across the tabletop even trembled.
Rather than falling over, they wandered freely across the table as though each possessed a mind of its own.
“It's getting worse and worse……!”
The man clutched his head.
He had been trying his best to arrange the episode cards according to the movement patterns of those pieces, yet every single time he intervened, an unbelievable Butterfly Effect occurred 'inside.'
The card he had placed this time as the GM of the game was nothing more than an ordinary Misfortune Card called 'Hospital Expenses.'
According to the rules of this game, the balance between the fortune and misfortune of all players had to be properly maintained, so he had no choice but to play it.
If this had remained the ordinary board game he had originally intended to create, the player would simply have paid part of their money and moved on.
However, once the 'Will of the World' intervened, the Misfortune Card he assigned gained 'realism.'
As a result, the player who had merely been meant to pay hospital fees had instead become fated to be scammed by one of the many quack doctors in New Valhalla City.
Well, at least this much was fortunate.
Thankfully, it wasn't severe enough to cost them their life.
Thinking that, the man slowly swept his gaze toward the other seats.
Several of them contained character sheets that had been completely burned away.
While the seats of the other players shone brilliantly and continued interacting with the board, those places were left with nothing but charred black scorch marks.
Those were the seats of the dead players.
Among them was also the seat that had once belonged to the player controlling the protagonist.
The man knew that all too well.
'I'm sorry…….'
He had done everything he could to protect them.
At first, he even adjusted the types of Episode Cards and the timing of when he placed them so they could make the best possible use of their knowledge of the Original Story and adapt to the city.
Yet despite all those efforts, a considerable number of players had sadly been 'eliminated.'
After all, while New Valhalla City possessed dazzling technology, it was also a jungle where primal savagery remained alive and well.
One careless mistake was all it took to lose one's life.
“I don't even know what I should do anymore…….”
The man let out a quiet sigh.
He wanted nothing more than to finish this damned GM role and go home.
How on earth had he gotten caught up in such an absurd phenomenon?
Naturally, he had tried everything to escape.
But there was neither an entrance nor an exit.
Even if he walked endlessly in one direction, after about five meters, he would simply find himself back where he started.
There had even been a time when he outright refused to perform his role as GM.
But after witnessing the cards, chess pieces, and various objects leave their storage box and begin moving by themselves, he gave up.
If he didn't intervene, the chaos inside the board only became even worse.
And above all—
The greatest problem was that he, too, was gradually undergoing the same Synchronization as the players.
He could feel himself becoming something beyond human.
The emotions and memories he had possessed as a human were steadily fading away, and even his own personal will was disappearing.
Knowledge and divine authority that no human should have naturally flowed into him.
At the same time, the identity that had once been called 'Christian' was gradually vanishing.
It felt as though he was becoming a part of the vast system that operated this board game.
Even his sense of duty—that he had to take responsibility for these players, send them home, and bring this game to an end—was slowly fading away.
Perhaps if a little more time passed, the ordinary 'human' and 'author' he once was would disappear entirely.
Only an unnamed 'god' would remain.
Christian was terrified of that future.
'I have to end this game as soon as possible…….'
It had already been a long time since hunger and sleep had left him.
Fortunately, his Synchronization progressed far more slowly than the players'.
And there was one dependable 'player' whom he believed would solve everything.
'Aaron Stingray.'
After finishing all the miscellaneous duties expected of him as the GM, he looked toward Aaron Stingray's seat.
Compared to every other player, an overwhelming number of cards and countless objects intertwined and moved around Aaron's character sheet.
Part of the reason was that Aaron had started with far more than anyone else.
Another was that he had monopolized the vast majority of the episode rewards.
And above all, it meant he had become an influential figure whose actions greatly affected this world.
Christian couldn't help but be astonished by Aaron's every move.
His understanding of the Original Story went without saying.
There was also his meticulous planning, his sharp intellect that pieced together situations from the smallest clues, and at times, even his willingness to cast aside his own sense of self.
Especially this time.
He himself, as the GM, had never expected the Dragon, Kallia Stingray, Irie Elisbell, and the Guardian and Black Dragon Gang episodes to overlap and explode all at once.
Yet despite all of that...
'There might be more than one Dragon.'
The moment Aaron deduced, from only that small amount of information, that there were at least two Dragons in New Valhalla City, Christian had nearly cried out in amazement.
Aaron's brilliance was remarkable in itself.
But more importantly, such reasoning was only possible because he understood this world on an incredibly deep level.
Inside Aaron's mind were probably details about the setting and every character's personality that even Christian himself, the author, had already forgotten.
Through a chain of calculations that no one else could comprehend, Aaron arrived at those conclusions.
'Please... somehow endure this…….'
Christian silently prayed.
If he were to confess one sin, then about half of the suffering Aaron was currently experiencing was Christian's responsibility.
Using the authority of the 'GM,' he had ignored the game's rules and forcibly stacked multiple cards together.
The backlash was that several troublesome incidents had erupted all at once.
As a result, unlike in the Original Story, the Guardian had been afflicted with the Curse of the Dragonkin.
Kallia was preparing for the Stingray civil war.
Even the Dragon had begun targeting him.
For an ordinary player, these would have been impossible problems to overcome.
Fortunately, Aaron seemed to be handling everything well so far.
Step by step, he was laying the groundwork necessary to overcome the coming great battle.
Sadly, there was nothing more Christian could do to help.
If it were up to him, he wanted to meet Aaron personally and give him a few hints.
But if he did that, the Will of the World might intervene again in some bizarre way and only make the situation worse.
The identity of the Dragon secretly operating in Sector E.
Its objective.
The relationship between the Stingray Chairman and the Dragon.
Even Irie Elisbell's hidden past...
Every one of those obstacles was something Aaron had to overcome himself.
'I wish you the best…….'
Aaron didn't know it, but even if he somehow solved every crisis before him in one stroke, there were still about two enormous mountains waiting ahead.
Originally, they had been the final challenges that every player—including the protagonist, Shade Wells—was meant to overcome together.
Those were the very 'crises' Christian had hinted at when he met Aaron before through the improper use of his divine authority.
Aaron was already strong.
But he had to become even stronger, faster, and more decisively.
And these trials would likely become the catalyst for his next great leap forward.
'The only thing I can do... is make sure those small misfortunes don't reach him.'
Christian could do nothing more than secretly pray in that lonely space.
Praying that Aaron, the new protagonist of this world, would overcome every trial before him.
[……It looks like the Kim Cheolsu Faction is starting to move again.]
[Faster than expected. I thought they'd still be too busy stabilizing their internal organization.]
[That just proves Kim Cheolsu's abilities are greater than we imagined. Or perhaps it's because of the Dragon's power.]
[No, that has nothing to do with it.]
[What do you mean?]
[According to our investigation, Kim Cheolsu never tried to unite the organizations into a single entity. On the contrary, he barely touched them at all. He simply preserved the structure of every absorbed organization as much as possible and grouped them together under the name 'Kim Cheolsu Faction.']
[I see. So he chose the form of a coalition organization that respects the autonomy of each group.]
Even after becoming part of the Kim Cheolsu Faction, the existing organizations continued operating their businesses and earning income in their own ways.
Kim Cheolsu neither demanded enormous tribute payments from subordinate organizations nor carried out internal purges under the pretext of enforcing discipline.
Instead, he won people's loyalty by fairly distributing the assets left behind by organizations such as Beast that had resisted him and were subsequently destroyed.
In other words, various organizations had united beneath the banner of the Kim Cheolsu Faction.
Kim Cheolsu occupied only a symbolic position while handing virtually all practical benefits to his subordinates, leaving the absorbed organizations with no reason to resist the merger.
[It's an excellent method for calming the internal friction caused by merging so many organizations. Though their unity will naturally be weaker.]
[That may change with time. We must act before they become firmly established.]
[You sound like you want to start fighting immediately. Judging by that, your preparations must already be complete.]
[Heh heh…….]
[Tch. Times like this make me jealous that you have so many brains. Most of our Wizards couldn't make use of those Ampoules and Modules.]
[Once this is over, why don't you ask the VIP? Perhaps you'll receive another 'dog treat.']
[You bitch……!]
[Enough.]
Just as the voices were about to rise, a mechanical voice cut in and stopped them.
[We didn't contact each other to argue. We came to confirm everyone's preparations and decide the day the war begins.]
[……Cyberwatch can move at any time.]
[The Black Dragon Gang is the same.]
[Our Marcello Family... would appreciate a little more time.]
[Our Technotology will finish everything by this afternoon.]
[Then it's settled.]
The man with the casual tone concluded the discussion.
[Tomorrow morning. 6 a.m.]
Tomorrow.
The war to determine the ruler of the underworld would begin.