Chapter 3 — I’m Tired of Fights like This
Everything was gone from the top level of the pyramid. A good chunk of the floor was missing, revealing the interior of the structure. There had been nothing atop the pyramid but the small shrine, but now no traces of it remained. That meant the door leading to the next area was also gone, leaving no way for participants to progress through the game.
“I’m not really worried about you, gramps, but if you fight around here, it’ll cause all sorts of problems.”
“Sorry. This is the first time in a while someone has tried something against me directly. I’m kind of curious,” Mitsuki apologized in response to Van’s grumbling. Van had hoped the Great Sage would either run away or dispatch the enemy quickly, but now it seemed like he’d stay and watch until his curiosity was sated.
“Okay, fine. But the participants will all be coming this way, so finish up before they start arriving.”
“I don’t think it’ll take that long. I just want to talk with him a bit.”
“You think that thing can talk?”
Van looked at the monstrosity before them. At first, it had looked vaguely human, but in the short time he had looked away, the creature had transformed. It now had four leglike appendages, one resembling twisted, creeping vines and another like a shaft of metal. It had six arms, each so distinct they may have come from different creatures altogether. Organs reminiscent of eyes dotted the creature all over, giving it a line of sight in all directions. There was no sign of intelligence coming from the chaotic mess of a monster. It didn’t seem to Van like there was much room for discussion.
“Hmm, I can’t say,” Mitsuki answered. “But it does seem like it wants to kill me, so it probably has something to complain about, right?”
“Give...back...Ari...el...” Though it was hard to tell where the creature’s face was, and it clearly was struggling to make anything resembling speech, it did appear to have the intelligence necessary to converse.
“Ariel... Ariel... Oh! Right, Ariel! But what do you mean, ‘give her back’? She’s not trapped with me or anything. She’s allowed to go home whenever she wants.”
“Come on, gramps. You know how rough they are when picking up girls for you.”
The orders of the Great Sage were absolute. Even if Mitsuki were to say something as casual as “she looks cute,” the Sages and their underlings would fight to the death to bring that girl to him. This had caused any number of tragedies, but it seemed Mitsuki had not been told of them, nor was he interested in investigating the matter himself.
“Well, let’s not worry about that now. If you wanted to negotiate with me, didn’t you realize attacking me right off the bat is a bad idea? If I die, you’ll never get Ariel back.”
Only those recognized by the Great Sage could traverse the boundary around his dwelling. If he were to die, it was quite likely it would be permanently sealed off from the outside world.
“Graaaaaaaah!” The monster swung a crystalline arm forward. In the direction it moved, a line of crystal formed along the floor of the pyramid. Mitsuki stood on that newly formed crystal path but was otherwise unaffected. The same, however, could not be said about Van at his side.
“Gah! What the?!” Part of Van’s body had transformed into crystal as the crystal wrapped around him. It wasn’t significant damage, but it did make it harder for him to move.
“This thing could kill you, Van; you should be more careful. Like, actually dodge the attacks, maybe.”
“There was no way I could have dodged that one. But I’m pretty sure something like this won’t kill me.” With Van’s lesser reflexes, even if he saw the attack coming, there was no way he could have moved out of the way. Although the Sages had particularly strong physical abilities, Van himself wasn’t especially skilled when it came to fighting. His abilities specialized in the creation and management of game worlds.
“Can you heal it?” Mitsuki asked.
“Probably.”
Van created a healing area around his feet. The ground around him took on a faint glow, and in short order his body returned to normal. He wasn’t omnipotent by any stretch, but placing objects in the game world was easy enough.
The crystal path under them suddenly shattered as the monster rushed forward. A number of its arms swung at Mitsuki in unison, but the Great Sage made no effort to dodge them. The creature roared as its fists found their mark, but Mitsuki didn’t so much as budge.
It was a strange sight. Anyone watching might have expected tremendous shock waves coming from the immense impacts, but nothing of the sort happened. The monster’s fists made contact with Mitsuki and then stopped, as if the creature had never intended to attack him in the first place.
Anyone with normal faculties would see this result and be overcome with fear or despair. Many would drop to their knees under the feeling of overwhelming helplessness. But this monster in particular showed no sign of giving up. One of its arms dissolved, splitting into countless tiny strands that wrapped around the Great Sage.
“If we can’t talk properly, I won’t even be able to figure out your name. Alexia,” Mitsuki called out, invisible within the writhing mass.
“Yes?” In an instant, Alexia, the Great Sage’s secretary, had appeared at his side.
“Do you know who this guy is? It seems like he has a bone to pick with me.”
“Please wait a moment.”
The Great Sage was omnipotent within this world. If he wanted to, he could figure out the true identity of this creature on his own. But he didn’t. Taking the easy route felt boring to him, so he preferred more roundabout methods.
“Hero Ein. The elder brother of Ariel. He has obtained the power of the Dark Gods native to this world and has lost most of his sanity. I imagine conversing with him will be impossible.”
“Hmm. That’s a pretty selfish way of doing things. Even if you beat me, what do you think Ariel would think of you now?”
“What would you like me to do? Shall I dispose of this thing?” the secretary asked.
“No, he went through the trouble of finding me himself. It would be rude for me to leave this to someone else.”
Ein’s arm had turned into something of a fist again, smashing Mitsuki into the ground repeatedly. Each impact shook the pyramid, causing it to break apart. The floor under them was starting to collapse, dropping everyone into the pyramid proper.
“Gramps! The game won’t be able to continue at this rate!”
“Are you sure? You should still be able to make things work.”
“The other participants are going to get caught up in your fight! It’s also going to take resources to rebuild the stage. This stuff isn’t unlimited!”
“Oh, okay. Alexia, let’s move.”
“Understood,” the secretary responded naturally, unfazed by Mitsuki still being trapped in the monster’s grip.
Suddenly, Ein shot sideways. Punching through the wall of the pyramid, he was thrown outside, over the ocean surrounding the island. Van hurriedly followed them out. Ein’s enormous fist exploded outwards, freeing Mitsuki. He then fell into the water, while Mitsuki dropped down and landed on the water’s surface.
“Is this area more acceptable?” Alexia asked, floating in the air a short distance away. Van came up alongside her to watch.
“I would think so,” Mitsuki replied.
“But please be careful,” Van said, trying to warn off his optimism. Ein was immensely powerful. It wouldn’t be that hard for him to damage the island from here.
“That’s really up to Ein, I think.”
At some point, dark clouds had gathered above them. The wind began to howl and the waves in the ocean climbed higher and higher as a storm brewed. A moment later, countless waterspouts shot up around them, drawing seawater up into the sky. Lightning flashed through the pillars of water as they closed in on Mitsuki from all directions. The clouds above gathered into a single enormous storm cloud, flashing more lightning down to the surface, connecting the sea and sky and filling the area with blinding light. The waterspouts gathered around Mitsuki, combining into a gigantic cyclone.
The sea then froze. The surface of the water turned solid as far as the eye could see, and was then ripped apart by the tornado. The chunks of ice whirled upwards, assaulting the Great Sage inside it.
Van had lost track of what was happening between the growing intensity of the lightning flashing around them and the blinding effect of the cyclone.
“Well...I know gramps would be fine on his own, but can you do something about this, Alexia?”
“He already decided he would fight the monster himself.”
For a while, Van and Alexia watched the cycle of the storm, lightning striking to vaporize the water, and ice forming cold enough to freeze even the water superheated by the lightning. The strange storm continued for a while, but when it finally abated, Mitsuki was naturally standing entirely unharmed.
“That’s not going to work...” Despite what he said, it seemed Mitsuki still intended to fight the monster one-on-one.
A moment later, the frozen surface of the ocean ruptured as an enormous mass shot up from below. It was hard to believe an entirely different creature would appear at this point, so Van had to assume it was still Ein, despite the significant transformation he had undergone. Now sporting tentacles, scales, and a shell, perhaps obtained by absorbing life living in the water, he had grown to a size that made Van and the others look tiny. A crack split the creature, separating top from bottom. That was likely its jaw. Within the maw were rows of countless teeth and a growing light.
“So that was all buying time for this, then?”
Ein roared. The howl split the ocean beneath them, forcing Van and Alexia to retreat hurriedly back to the sky. This was still just preparation.
Opening his jaw as wide as he could manage, Ein fired an enormous beam of condensed heat. The sea was immediately vaporized, the air itself ignited, and half the island was annihilated. The beam had lasted for only a fraction of a second, but it had been enough to erase everything in front of him.
“Wow... Are any of them still alive?” Van muttered to himself. The pyramid was situated at the center of the island, so naturally half of it had been blown away by the attack. Even the adventurers in the surviving half of the structure would be struck by a terrible shock wave.
“Hmm. I kind of feel like I should apologize. I guess this is proof that even if all the Dark Gods worked together, they still can’t stand up to me.” The cloud of steam created by the attack slowly dissipated, revealing Mitsuki, totally unharmed, exactly as Van and Alexia had assumed. Neither of them had been worried about him in the least.
Perhaps having finally exhausted himself, Ein had stopped moving.
“You were trying really hard, so I thought I’d see what you had to offer...but I’m tired of fights like this. I think it’s about time you came back to your senses.” If he so wished, Mitsuki could meet power with power and create a rather magnificent clash. But by the time Van had been born, the Great Sage had already grown out of such things.
Mitsuki held out his right hand towards Ein. The tentacles protruding from the creature’s mass slipped off and fell to the water below. His shell, his scales, and then whales and sharks followed suit. Everything he had absorbed from the ocean split off and fell away. The creature’s mountainous form gradually shrank, returning him to the form they had seen on his first arrival.
But the changes didn’t stop there. A crystalline spider, a dragon, a bird wrapped in flames—one by one the Dark Gods that Ein had absorbed were torn away from him. Each and every one of them held a grudge against Mitsuki, but as if understanding they were outmatched, they all disappeared with no more than a hateful glare. In the end, only Ein remained. Floating powerless in the water, he seemed otherwise in good health. He had returned to being an ordinary human.
“I feel like I just watched someone unboil an egg,” Van commented. “Or turn café au lait back into milk and coffee.”
“If Lord Mitsuki desired it, such would happen,” Alexia replied. “That is the law of this world.” Normally, there would be no way for such a chaotic mess of beings to return to normal. But what was impossible for others was easy enough for Mitsuki.
“Now you should be sane again. We should be able to talk properly now,” Mitsuki said as he approached Ein.
“Give her back... Give Ariel back!” With a splash, Ein disappeared. Van looked around to find him standing a small distance away on the surface of the water. The water was still, flat and motionless like the surface of a mirror. It was as if all of Ein’s power had been directed inward.
“He awakened, huh?” Van mumbled.
There were times when new powers could arise when one transcended the limits of the Gift. Having exhausted everything he had but still unable to measure up to his opponent, overcoming that despair and choosing to fight on, his true power as a hero had manifested. Even watching from a distance, Van felt a cold sweat forming. He was confident he could deal with almost anyone, but he wasn’t so sure he could beat Ein in that state.
Ein vanished again, appearing in front of Mitsuki, already swinging his Holy Sword. It was an attack that was backed by all of his being, every ounce of energy in his body and spirit condensed into a single blow. The holy blade struck Mitsuki’s head, a perfect attack. If this had been a battle between Hero and Demon Lord, it would have spelled certain victory for the Hero.
But this was the Great Sage, the ultimate ruler of this world. The Holy Sword snapped in two, the broken blade flying off in a random direction. Dropping the shattered weapon, Ein struck with his fists. As his right fist struck Mitsuki’s face, Ein’s arm crumpled, a fate matched by his left fist, right elbow, and then left knee.
Not slowing down in the least, Ein’s broken limbs continued to lash out, pulverizing themselves into dust. Even so, Ein continued, throwing himself on the Great Sage and biting at his neck, his teeth shattering. Having run out of body parts to use, he roared and struck with a headbutt. As with the other parts of his body, his forehead shattered. No longer having the strength to even cling on to his enemy, Ein fell to the water.
But even as he floated helpless, he continued to flail and scream.
“Now you can see the gap in power between us. Sadly, it’s not a gap you can ever cross, though if you can come up with some sort of miracle to beat me, I’d love to see it.”
As Mitsuki looked down with a sad expression at him, Ein finally stopped. He had surpassed all his limits, exhausted every shred of power he possessed.
“Please...give Ariel back... Make her normal again...”
His heart had been broken as thoroughly as his body. He had tasted for himself how useless any amount of effort or perseverance was against Mitsuki. He knew now his only hope was to beg for the mercy of his opponent.
Van didn’t find it pathetic. That was exactly what he expected from someone who fought the Great Sage. In fact, he felt Ein had actually worked pretty hard to get to where he was.
“I told you already, she’s not trapped. She can leave whenever she wants. Hey, Alexia.”
“Yes?”
“Take him back to my place and look after him for a bit. Let him and his sister talk things out.”
“Understood.” Alexia descended to Ein’s side before vanishing along with him.
“Okay, shall we go back?” Mitsuki floated up beside Van.
“What do I do about that?” Van looked at the broken pyramid, at a total loss.
“There’s no way they can keep going through the pyramid, so why not give a pass to everyone who’s still alive?” Mitsuki suggested.
“Hmm...I guess it’s a bit late to be worried about the rules I set out at the start.”
“Also, here. You need this, right?” Mitsuki held out a transparent, round stone.
“Ah, that’s the one the dog had, right?” It was a Philosopher’s Stone. Apparently, Mitsuki had retrieved it after it had been blown away by Ein’s attack. “I wonder what I should do with it. It was supposed to be used to prove you were eligible for the last boss fight... Maybe I should give it back to Takatou?”
Van started floating back to the pyramid, Mitsuki following slowly behind him.
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