<784 – Like a True Warrior (30)>
The Director instinctively recognized that the outcome he most dreaded had come to pass.
The inducement for Oknodie, the Demon King, had failed.
The inducement for the Avatar had also failed.
A brilliant move.
Summoning the Demon Realm right in the middle of the Jeido.
It was popularly known as the Operation to Break the Jeido.
Even this meticulously planned scheme couldn’t yield any expected results.
“Your scheming is brutally deep, isn’t it?”
“It’s just that Papa was careless. Always acting in the same pattern, driven by greed, making it too easy to read him, right?”
“Ha. Haha. Indeed, Dark Mana has long served as a useful tool for the Foundation. I can’t deny how we’ve grown complacent with that convenience.”
“Even when pretending to give up verbally, rallying power is the same. You were conscious of it all along, weren’t you? Much like the Major NPC Friend series that conserved strength unlike other series.”
No matter how much the odds favored them, they wouldn’t be careless.
Unlike when Oknodie was the Carefree King, now that he had become Oknodie the Demon King, there were no openings.
“Are you afraid? If you are, just watch from the sidelines. The other ‘me’s will come back to face you.”
“Heh heh… At my age, returning to the position of a challenger isn’t too pleasant. But if my body has grown young again, then my mind must too.”
The Director took hesitant steps and made a hasty attempt to bypass the three Major NPC Friends wrapped in thick robes.
However, in the next moment, he was startled by the overwhelmingly familiar energy emanating from the three Major NPC Friends.
[World Domain Expansion]
[Netherworld Erosion Initiated]
His secret weapon for the Seonhwang’s taido.
The Gate of the Netherworld, pouring out countless Wraiths like stars in the night sky.
At its center existed a massive high-ranking Wraith, of which the beginning and end of power could not be fathomed, a malicious wave.
Even though he hadn’t experienced it directly, he instinctively realized.
This was a technique of ‘kin.’
A dismissal of the Three Great Evils.
It was the technique of the Empire’s first Revolutionary.
A revolution that drove countless commoners to their deaths.
A revolution that incited the rightful anger of the starving people oppressed by the Empire, pushing them further into the corner to induce death.
The Revolutionary had aimed to gather the Wraiths amassed at the end of that revolution into a single force, using them as one bomb solely to achieve the purpose of the Seonhwang’s taido.
The remnant of that lofty ambition was felt from the Major NPC Friend cloaked in robes.
[Opening the Gate of the Netherworld]
The murderous scale of negative energy pouring from close range crushed the spell released by the Director without mercy, obliterating it to the point that not even a form could be discerned.
Under pressure so intense that casting even ordinary magic was impossible, the only type of resistance that could be exerted was one.
Divine authority.
Or an enormous amount of experience points that could be equated to that.
The Director had that kind of function too.
[Command]
If the one who starved the most humans in the world was the Seonhwang, and the one who bewitched the most humans was the Revolutionary, then the one who ordered death to the most humans was the Director.
The command was the Higher Function of Contract.
At the moment of opening, it had already reached a result of 2000 points in the Dual Extreme.
A command of that caliber exerted across many people worldwide, and the accumulated experience points stacked were truly remarkable, ranking among the highest numbers achieved by humankind.
Moreover, the Director’s command was particularly special.
[Soul Contract]
[Effect: It collects the souls of those unable to carry out the final command as payment.]
Those who couldn’t repay the numerous benefits bestowed by the Foundation through the command had to settle the Soul Contract even in death.
The ways to use the collected souls were, of course, identical to those of the Revolutionary.
To unleash a massive volume of souls in a single charge, demonstrating explosive destructive power!
The difference being that while the Revolutionary aimed for the Seonhwang, the Director targeted his greatest rival.
That rival should have originally been the Dragon Principal, not the Seonhwang.
However, the shocking ambush of the Major NPC Friend allowed for no opportunity to save this move.
[World Domain Expansion]
[Netherworld Erosion Initiated]
The clash between the soul quantity of the Major NPC Friend and the soul quantity of the Director.
What seemed like a stalemate quickly tilted in favor of the Director.
The Major NPC Friend was honestly dumbfounded.
The cause was simple.
He was simply outmatched in the sheer quantity of amassed souls.
“This crazy bastard, how many lives have you converted into Command?”
“Hahaha. I would also like to flip the question on its head. How did you figure out the exact number that matches the Revolutionary? This was the method that I ‘personally’ disclosed to the Revolutionary, you know.”
The Major NPC Friend felt a wave of nostalgia pass by as the Director’s shocking declaration echoed around him.
While protecting friends, battling external foes, and controlling villains, he maintained the favorability of his comrades.
To achieve an optimized route towards a happy ending, he naturally ended up choosing dark shadow play.
‘Yet even so, the unexpected obstacles always appeared.’
Caught off guard in a place he never expected, snagged by an unlikely random element, and inevitably, a person he thought was an ally had betrayed him, causing the enemies’ strength to grow stronger than anticipated.
There were many reasons and variables, but now he understood.
Behind all those reasons and variables existed the ‘Foundation’ and the ‘Director.’
The revelation of that existence had only surfaced in this cycle.
The cause was most likely due to Oknodie’s presence.
When Oknodie was absent.
When the Chief Scholarship Student was gone.
The Foundation had thoroughly concealed that existence.
First Wahyhiemhai hadn’t revealed himself.
Yet, the Revolutionary’s “Soul Bomb” ultimate technique existed in every cycle as this one secret move.
‘So it was you. The one who caused all our failures and despair…!’
As the Major NPC Friend unleashed the Soul Bomb, another Major NPC Friend appeared beside him and opened a new door.
The soul bombs of the Major NPC Friends, which had been maximally deficient in quantity, began to amplify their output, slowly pushing up the Director’s Soul Bomb.
[Skill Modification – Outer Door Opening]
A much larger outer door of the Netherworld formed beyond the narrow inner door of the Netherworld.
The massive door opened, and at that moment, the output of the Director’s Soul Bomb was multiplied by several times.
“Hahaha! There’s no way I can’t modify the spells I created, right? When giving something good to others, I must leave something even better for myself.”
Hurry up and open the third Major NPC Friend’s door.
Expose all your hidden cards and be buried beneath it!
With a strong declaration to swiftly conduct a one-on-one battle with Oknodie, the Director urged the third Major NPC Friend, who placed a hand on the shoulders of the two Major NPC Friends who had opened the previous doors.
“We always had one regret. If only there was one more person like me, even if there were two bodies… You must have thought about that too.”
The two Major NPC Friends, pouring all their strength into the effort yet grimacing, shot a glare at the last Major NPC Friend.
“You aren’t seriously trying to use ‘that,’ are you?”
“If you were annoyed, you should have played a round later.”
The latest Major NPC Friend, closest to the most recent cycle, was about to unleash something, while the earlier cycle Major NPC Friends struggled desperately to turn away, utilizing all their strength.
However, those busy pouring out the amassed souls in their respective cycles were not granted a chance to resist.
“I’m sorry and grateful. You two will become the most useful top-ranking Undead Monster Lich after dying twice!”
The two Major NPC Friends died from the betrayal of the latest Major NPC Friend of the same series.
With their breath cut off, the previously interrupted Soul Bomb immediately began to release souls in the same quantity as before.
“The top-ranking Undead Monster Lich has a gimmick for handling souls taken in life. If I can replenish the souls spent after dying once, isn’t that a profitable trade?”
“Hahaha! Indeed, a high-numbered Avatar, huh? The way you’re getting closer to my daughter is quite impressive. But my deeds are not so trivial that they can be overcome by mere tricks, it seems?”
The Major NPC Friend was shocked in turn.
Just how many people had he killed with his command, directly or indirectly, that he was even lagging despite refilling after losing lives for two cycles?
The Major NPC Friend’s build was [Soul Reaper].
Harvesting the souls of others to wield as weapons.
The higher the charm, the greater the success rate of [Taming], which he utilized to pull living beings into allies or subordinates.
The souls of deceased beings were used in large quantities or powerful souls to his advantage.
Without living allies, now summoned alone, the souls they commanded were like mobilizing the entire history of failures from one world.
The number of collected Soul Bombs reached a whopping hundreds of millions.
Yet, seeing himself fail and lagging, he threw away all the souls he had amassed and utilized the other Major NPC Friends as tools, only for that tactic to be crushed in real time.
“Main Body!! Isn’t it about time you assisted too? I feel like if this guy approaches you, it’s going to get seriously dangerous!”
“Oh, it’s fine if I die.”
“What?”
“There’s no way I wouldn’t know the build you all are using. Besides, this cycle’s me, super high charm, right?”
“You, main body, are you serious?!”
Even the betraying Major NPC Friend was silenced by the calm comeback.
Oknodie smiled innocently, wondering what the problem was.
“The refill of the new cycle and the resurrection of the dead cycle are separate matters.”
He was encouraging them not to worry about dying because he could resurrect them as Lich Undead after they died, just as he had done.
Unlike the main body, whose mind was full of veteran player thoughts, the empathetic Major NPC Friend felt a thudding sensation at his lips like his predecessors had experienced—
“If it’s the same whether we survive or die, wouldn’t it be better to seek a way to live?”
“I guess so.”
“Huh?”
“No matter how great you think you are, how impressive can you be that you’re treating me this way? Let’s see how capable your much-touted skills really are!”
“…!”
The betrayal completed was so shocking that even the Director, who had been enticing carelessly, was taken aback.
