Those Who Bind the Possibilities

by Sakon Kaidou

  However, Ray had shown no intention of doing so, giving me the wild response that, “I still have my right arm, and I found out I can even use my mouth if I have to. I can make this work.”

  Upon hearing him mention using his mouth, Nemesis had put on a distant look and muttered “Does that count as a kiss...?”

  Personally, I thought that biting into the hilt of her greatsword form had been quite unlike kissing.

  Anyway, following that exchange, Ray had basically collapsed and logged off, making it obvious just how drained he was, both physically and mentally. No one could fault him for it.

  Rook was quite tired, as well, so he’d logged off right after feeding Liz some mithril to restore her volume.

  And so, I’d ended up being the only one of our party still online to greet the dawn.

  I was extremely sleepy myself, but as both a Journalist and a manga artist, I just couldn’t miss this beautiful opportunity to collect quality material.

  I mean, it’s not every day you get to be on the scene of a settled terrorist incident, I thought.

  Anyway, time for a rundown of all that had happened.

  Approximately one hour after the last of the Suicide Series was exterminated, Count Gideon declared that the trouble was officially over.

  With Ellie saved and Franklin’s forces destroyed, he had no reason not to.

  Well, there were some player killers that had escaped, but none of them would be stupid enough to do anything at this point, likely because they were afraid of being erased by the King of Destruction or the Super Gladiator.

  Speaking of the King of Destruction, Count Gideon had stated that he planned to reward him, Ray, and all the other Masters that had helped take care of the incident. I’d found that surprising, considering he also had to pay for city repairs. It was hard to tell whether he was just that rich or simply a good guy.

  Thinking about city repairs made me wonder how much it would cost to fix the area destroyed by me and King of Orchestras and...

  Yeah, I probably don’t want to know, I thought.

  As far as I was aware, the damage there had likely been greater than anywhere else, and I couldn’t be more thankful for the fact that they didn’t know who was responsible.

  Anyway, after Gideon’s declaration, the people reacted in two ways.

  The knights, guards, and other public officials became busy with damage reports and other post-incident business, while the civilians and Masters took to revelry.

  It was only to be expected. Franklin had ruined their big event and replaced it with a night of dread, so merrymaking was the natural response to seeing the man responsible for that defeated so thoroughly.

  Masters aside, I was quite impressed by the quick recovery from the civilians.

  I guess duel city folk are befittingly hardy, I thought.

  Still, once the sky turned bright, a significant number of carts and dragon carriages were seen leaving Gideon, and I couldn’t really fault them for that. After all, even the so-called strongest city in the kingdom, the one farthest away from the imperium, hadn’t been safe from such an incident. It was only natural to expect some merchants to be scared into taking their riches and leaving for another country.

  They were most likely heading to Caldina, so this incident had actually ended up being beneficial to them. Not exactly an unexpected effect, but still.

  Hm? Now that I think about it, this war was really profitable to them, I thought.

  Not only was Caldina the primary destination for wealthy refugees, they’d also experienced a boost in trade with Altar. Naturally, the kingdom wasn’t exporting any of its food to Dryfe, so Caldina was there to buy it all up.

  Altar hadn’t been left without its share of goods, either. Caldina had sold them lots of war-like wares, such as magic items from Huang He or weapons from Tenchi.

  But enough about them. Really, it was only natural for the “land of merchants” to take advantage of such a situation.

  Back to the aftermath of Franklin’s game.

  He’d intended to display the powerlessness of the kingdom’s Masters, to break the country’s fighting spirit and to have it merge with Dryfe through “diplomacy” before the war had a chance to restart.

  However, thanks to the hard work from the newbies and the Masters that hadn’t been caught by the barrier, Plans A and B had completely failed.

  The most significant event during this interval had been the broadcasted battle between Ray and Franklin’s unique monster, as it had had the exact opposite of the intended effect. Though Franklin had planned to completely crush him and break his spirit, Ray had achieved a miraculous victory which had uplifted the masses.

  That battle had been quite popular among us Masters, too, gaining lots of replies and comments on related discussion boards and video sites.

  It was the third biggest Infinite Dendrogram-related news story, with the first obviously being the King of Destruction’s appearance in the spotlight and his fight against Franklin, and the second being Figaro and Xunyu’s Clash of the Superiors.

  This incident was sure to get Ray a nickname or two. In fact, people were already exchanging ideas both here and in real-life discussion boards. There was even a meeting going on in the central plaza regarding that.

  Normally, such meetings were only held for people who made their debut in the arenas, but this time, they were gathering nickname suggestions for Ray, Rook, and King of Destruction, who was no longer “Unknown.”

  The proposed nicknames for Ray included, but weren’t limited to: “Dark Paladin,” because he was a Paladin that certainly didn’t look like one; “Prince on the Silver Steed,” obviously because he’d been riding Silver; and “The Light and Dark-Wielding Hero Clad in Violet and Crimson,” which made me wonder about the mind behind such a... polarizing name.

  Any of those would probably make Ray want to crawl into a hole.

  Still, there were some simple, fitting ones that I personally really liked.

  Anyway, back to the results of Franklin’s plot.

  Following the failure of Plan B, Franklin had started Plan C, which had been significantly worse than the other two, clearly designed to show that “resistance will only make it worse.” I and a few other Masters had been there to buy some time, but it was clear that we wouldn’t have been able to hold for long, and the damage would’ve been great.

  Enter the King of Destruction, who had instantly turned it all around.

  The thousands of monsters that had been meant to overrun Gideon had become nothing but punching bags for the King of Destruction to show off his power.

  Franklin had intended to show just how powerless the kingdom’s Masters were, but had ended up doing the exact opposite. At the very least, it was now clear that the kingdom wouldn’t go down without a fight.

  But it was hard to say that it’d been a good thing for the country.

  This incident not had only displayed the power of the kingdom’s Masters, but also confirmed a certain truth that was on the minds of the country’s people... and just about everyone else in Infinite Dendrogram.

  Basically, a war force with Superiors was on a completely different level than one without.

  A Superior was capable of razing an entire city, or perhaps even a whole country.

  Franklin had created monsters that surpassed 50,000 in number, while the King of Destruction had completely annihilated them all. Evidently, they had only been able to have a proper fight because they were both Superiors, while the rest of us were only waiting to be massacred.

  It was more obvious than ever that a Superior could only be countered by another Superior.

  Of course, there were exceptions, among which was my avatar, Marie Adler.

  Marie had a Superior Job, but she wasn’t a Superior because she didn’t have a Superior Embryo, and the reason why she’d received the nickname “Superior Killer” was because she’d defeated a Superior and sent the criminal to the gaol.

  Mind you, t
hat victory had been the result of many factors, such as my abilities, the Superior’s abilities, various conditions, and a lot of tactics. All of them had come together, letting me emerge victorious against the King of Plagues, Candy Carnage — a wide-scale suppression type, wide-scale extermination type Master bearing the title of “the greatest tian murderer” and the nickname of “Legions Lost.”

  ...Honestly, I still find it hard to believe I won, I thought.

  Back to war matters. The kingdom had been thoroughly devastated in the previous war because there had been no one to counter the imperium’s Superiors. In this incident, the kingdom had won because it had the King of Destruction, effectively proving that the outcome of a war was decided by the presence of Superiors or the lack of it. Because of this, the main thing to consider in the next war was the number of Superiors that would participate.

  The imperium would obviously have the three that already had accolades from the previous war: the very familiar Giga Professor, Mr. Franklin, “The Weakest, The Worst”; Hell General, Logan Goddhart, the “Contradictory Equation”; and King of Beasts, the “Physically Strongest.”

  If nothing changed, they would be the only ones, but we also had to consider that the imperium had won the previous war event and had given great rewards to those who performed well, so it was reasonable to expect more Superiors to switch to Dryfe.

  The kingdom, on the other hand, would only have two, at best: Lei-Lei the Prodigal of Feasts, who came online at highly irregular times, and the King of Destruction, whose appearance in the spotlight had made it safe to expect him to participate. Those two could easily drop to one if Lei-Lei wasn’t online on the day of the war.

  Of course, they weren’t the only Superiors in the kingdom.

  The kingdom also had the Over Gladiator, Figaro. He was symbol of the duel city and the one who’d just won against Xunyu, a foreign Superior.

  Then there was the High Priestess, Tsukuyo Fuso — the leader of the largest clan in the kingdom and the user of the Lunar Divider Field, said to be the most wicked skill one could face in a large-scale battle.

  If they were to participate, they would be an invaluable force against the imperium.

  However, Figaro was widely known as a pure solo player, so it was clear he had no intention to take part in a battle involving great numbers. Tsukuyo Fuso, too, had refused to participate because the kingdom hadn’t accepted her downright unreasonable condition — to make her cult’s teachings into the state religion.

  The former was tough on his policy, while the latter was a highly demanding Princess Kaguya, making their participation extremely unlikely.

  In fact, Tsukuyo might even switch to the imperium if they accepted her condition that the kingdom wouldn’t.

  Not to mention that Dryfe also had more non-Superior forces, both Masters and tians.

  The kingdom wouldn’t go down without a fight, but a defeat still seemed completely inevitable.

  I wonder what the Superiors themselves think about this, I pondered.

  ◇◆◇

  Duel city Gideon, twelfth district, King of Destruction, Shu Starling

  “Man, am I tired,” I grumbled. “I need some booze to bear it.”

  “Good job back there,” said Figgy. “Drink all you want. It’s on me. You too, Xunyu.”

  “ThanKs,” she replied. “I’m underAge, though, so I’ll just haVE some juice.”

  I and two fellow Superiors were sitting around the table, enjoying some drinks. We were in a private room of a high-quality club in Gideon’s twelfth district.

  Figgy had reserved this place ahead of time. He’d planned to use it right after the Clash, but thanks to a certain shithead in a lab coat, we’d ended up coming here long after his reserved time was up. Thankfully, the store had been kind enough to allow him to use this room after the incident was over.

  I was kinda impressed by the management’s professionalism. Not everyone had the guts to continue working in this situation.

  “Honestly, I’m pretty glad we have this place,” I voiced my thoughts. “If we were outside, the number of people around us would be unbearable.”

  Mind you, I had run riot in a completely different get-up than I was in now, so maybe they wouldn’t realize it was me. The Scandinavian berserker-like clothing was easy to move around in, but the costumes I wore always made me feel calm.

  “Yeah, that’s exactly why I reserved it,” said Figgy. “Sure, we could just log out, but a good battle always makes me want to cool off like this.”

  “I get whAT you mean,” Xunyu joined in. “But man, this place has sOme good juice.” She emptied her glass and ordered some more.

  Well, if that ain’t an action befitting her age, I thought. I really don’t know how to feel about her being twice as tall as me.

  “The face under the talisman and the Voice Changing Fu made me suspicious, but you really are a kid, aren’t you?” I asked.

  “I’m turning ten this yEAr,” she answered. “That’s doubLE digits, so I’m now a prOper lady.”

  “Really, now?” I said.

  Her excessively long limbs might’ve been the result of a desire to travel far and a wish to grow up. Humpty, the control AI for Embryos, could probably give a more detailed analysis, but all she ever did was lead me to trouble or watch me struggle to take care of it.

  “What are your plans now, Xunyu?” asked Figgy.

  “I still have a jOb to protect the prince, so I’ll be stAYing in the capital,” she answered. “Guess I’ll also rAid the kingdom’s dUNgeons.” The items you could get from doing so differed depending on the country you were in, so that was a good idea.

  ...Speaking of items, I still had to stock up on materials for Baldr’s ammo. It’d cost me roughly 3,300,000,000 lir.

  “Oh, but rAiding alone can be prEtty hard, especially whEN going deep into a creAted dungeon,” Xunyu added.

  You’d have to be Figgy to effectively raid dungeons by yourself. Not to mention that you’d also have to have an Embryo you could chat with just to make it more bearable.

  “Coming wiTH?” she asked.

  “I’m exclusively solo,” Figgy replied.

  “And I’m not leaving Gideon fur a while,” I said.

  “Man, you guYs are cold.”

  I can’t just leave while that walking bomb is still here, I thought.

  “If you want, I can introduce you to some duel rankers here,” Figgy said, proposing an alternative. “They’ll probably want to spar with you, too.”

  “Then should I set you up with the kill rankers I know?” I joined in. “Oh, but I don’t know bear they are.”

  I wonder what Catherine Kongou’s up to, I thought.

  “Yeah, thAt’ll help a lot.” Xunyu nodded. “Wait, uhh... Figaro is the kingdOM’s no. 1 duelist, while the beAr is no. 1 in the kill rankings, rigHt?”

  “Yes,” Figgy nodded.

  “Bearily so,” I said and did the same.

  Oh boy, I know where this is going...

  “Then how aboUT the no. 1 in clan raNKin—”

  “Avoid her,” Figgy and I simultaneously cut her words short.

  “...Is she trOUble?” she asked.

  In response, we both simply nodded.

  We were unfortunate enough to already be acquainted with that shady cultist fox, and I honestly believed that a person was better off not meeting her. Ever.

  “I see hOW it is,” Xunyu continued. “Looks like every country’s top clan owner is bad news.”

  “Come on, that’s a bit of an exaggeration...” I began. “Wait, is it?”

  The kingdom’s fox... Nope.

  The imperium’s lab coat shithead... Nope.

  Granvaloa’s military nerd... Nope.

  Legendaria’s masked lover of little boys and girls... That one deserved a red card.

  I didn’t know much about Tenchi’s, and Xunyu’s words implied that Huang He’s was no good, either.

  Well, damn, there actually wasn’t a single
decent clan top anywhere.

  The owner of Caldina’s Sefirot seemed okay, but he was somewhat scary. Like a rabbit living with a pride of lions.

  Oh, speaking of Caldina...

  “Hey, this is unrelated, but... did anyone in the arena make a move?” I asked.

  My question would’ve been unclear to most, but it was more than enough for the two I was talking to.

  “I crushed the cOre of the thing below bEfore it could do anYthing, and it was all ovER,” said Xunyu.

  “The Physically Strongest didn’t do anything,” added Figgy. “But Caldina’s Magically Strongest got involved, apparently.”

  Did he just say “apparently”? “Why the uncertainty?”

  “The mONster I killed wasn’t moVing at all,” Xunyu answered. “I later used the skill tO dig through the dirt arOUnd it and... herE.”

  She put something on the table. It was about the size of a pebble and looked very much like one, too.

  I took it in hand and grasped it with about a tenth of my strength, but that wasn’t enough to break it.

  “Hnrgh!” I grunted as I used a third of my STR, approximately 60,000, which finally made it break. “It’s dirt made by binding magic he enhanced several times over. Makes sense why the thing couldn’t move.”

  It’s like being in a skintight coffin, I thought. I know it well. The guy did it to me once...

  “I’m not too smart, so I don’t really get it,” said Figgy. “Why did they come here, anyway?”

  “To watCH our battle, obviousLY,” Xunyu answered. “I don’t kNOw why the Physically Strongest didn’t heLP the lab coat. They’re bOth from Dryfe, aftER all.”

  “Mh...” I fell silent and pondered.

  I’d known about the other Superiors in the audience before Figaro’s and Xunyu’s match even began. I’d even told Figgy about them.

  Their presence here hadn’t been strange at all. It was only natural for Superiors to investigate the abilities of other Superiors, since they were their primary opponents in this world. UBM hunting, special events, war — there were many situations in which Superiors could compete against other Superiors, so knowing their abilities ahead of time was never a bad thing.