Opportunity in the Game Becomes Reality Chapter 265
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Opportunity in the Game Becomes Reality Chapter 265
58. A New Era (1)
"You may subdue my body, but you will never win my heart."
-Smack!
"What are you, some tragic heroine?"
When the Heavenly King I'd dragged from Earth started spouting nonsense, I smacked the back of his head.
"H-how dare a wretch like you touch this one's head."
"If you don't want your head hit, want me to kick your ass instead?"
"...."
This one, the sole survivor of the underworld besides Lord Exceed, became my new subordinate through a master-servant contract, just like Arc Scarlet.
Having absorbed a fragment of the Creator's power, he now possesses strength greater than an ordinary Heavenly King, making him someone I could never have tamed before but since I was reborn as a god race, I could command him without issue.
The new subordinate's name is Igniel.
He looks like a handsome blond youth who might appear riding a white horse in a fantasy, but his condescending tone is extremely irritating.
"Just submit and it'll be easier…."
To Igniel, whose face was red from holding back his anger, Arc Scarlet now fully restored to her Demon King power approached and placed a hand on his shoulder.
But Igniel seemed to have plenty of complaints about her.
"If you hadn't been so stupid as to get caught by a human in the first place, I wouldn't be in this mess!"
He's not wrong.
But realistically, wasn't that possibility nonexistent?
I can't be 100% certain, but the situation suggests it was destined for me to go along with that plan.
Thinking about it calmly, even going back and forth to Earth using the ruin in Dragonlands might not have been possible without the goddess's tacit approval.
If this hypothesis is true, it means I was played by Lord Exceed and the goddess's scheme.
It's an utterly unpleasant situation, but perhaps because I gained so much from it, my anger isn't great.
So I smacked Igniel on the back of the head again for attacking the obedient Arc Scarlet.
"If it weren't for us, you'd have gone to hell together with your underworld friends. You couldn't even notice Lord Exceed's betrayal in the first place."
"Right. Right."
After I was reborn as a god race, Arc Scarlet, who had completely accepted her position, nodded vigorously.
At that, Igniel's face turned red as if about to burst, but when Arcia approached, he bowed his head as if nothing had happened.
He regarded Arcia, who had saved him, as a benefactor.
"What's going on?"
When Arcia asked what was happening, I smiled and answered.
"Igniel keeps complaining."
A powerful Mental Attack otherwise known as coaxing.
Arcia narrowed her eyes and glared at him, and Igniel flinched greatly.
The sight was so funny I couldn't help but let out a hollow laugh.
And I asked Arcia.
"The swords?"
"They're all finished."
As she said that, she pulled a pile of swords from subspace.
There were well over 100 of them, and the material was an alloy made by combining the corpses of Heavenly Kings and Demon Kings with Orichalcum, adamantite, and dragon bone.
That's right.
Even amid the chaos of the underworld, I had recovered the corpses of the fallen Heavenly Kings and Demon Kings.
Heavenly Kings and Demon Kings are all beings superior to dragons, and some parts of their bodies possess durability that doesn't lose out even compared to Orichalcum or adamantite.
Perhaps they'd also prefer being reborn as swords rather than ending in a dog's death?
Of course, this is just self-justification.
It's simply that it was too wasteful to leave them behind.
Thanks to obtaining the corpses of Demon Kings and Heavenly Kings in bulk, the Demon King trio who became my subordinates recovered their original strength, and I was also able to get Arcia's weapons in large quantities.
"How's the performance?"
"Even compared to existing weapons, they're not significantly inferior."
The swords Arcia previously used were made of Orichalcum and adamantite.
In other words, it means she possesses over 100 swords that are hard to obtain even in the Empire's Imperial Family.
"The alloy's performance is better than I thought."
"Well, the materials are what they are, and the one who synthesized them is you."
The swords are divided into two types: white and black.
The white ones were made by combining Heavenly King corpses with Orichalcum and the bones of a light-attribute White Dragon, and the black ones were made by combining Demon King corpses with adamantite and the bones of a dark-attribute Black Dragon.
Even though about 60% of the main material consists of dragon bone, the fact that it possesses strength comparable to pure Orichalcum and adamantite makes this alloy not just successful but revolutionary.
Of course, it might be that such a result was possible only because the one who made this alloy is me, a god race.
"I'll need to go tear off some more dragon bones later. I should try synthesizing all sorts of things."
For reference, the large quantity of dragon bones used to make her swords was obtained by me personally.
By marching into Dragonlands, that is.
When Rondel was in crisis, I ran around until my feet sweated, yet the dragons aside from Brangish gave no help at all despite possessing great power.
That was so galling that I vented my anger a bit and took what I came for.
It ended at this level only out of consideration for Brangish; if he hadn't been there, I might have ended up using a Magic Staff strung all over with dragonhearts.
-Chwaaaajajak!
Arcia gazed contentedly at her new weapons, seemingly pleased with them, then soon stowed them into subspace.
Without even needing to lift a hand, Arcia now able to imbue each of hundreds of swords with her will easily floated the swords into the air and stored them.
Having been reborn as a god race, Arcia can simultaneously control hundreds of Sword Auras, and has become capable of recklessly unleashing even the mysteries of the Heart Sword.
'Thanks to that, I've secured this many swords.'
If the Lordmaster Blake is a single missile, then Arcia is a bomber.
You could call her a transcendent version of Selin, the demon worshipper who flew masses of swords by mixing Sword Aura and magic.
"Does this mean the maintenance is finished?"
The Demon Kings under me have recovered their strength, and I've even tamed a new subordinate, Igniel.
On top of that, equipment maintenance is complete, so it's about time to turn my attention elsewhere.
"Are we heading to Earth now?"
"That's the plan. I've only been focused on Rondel until now."
Though I have tender feelings for Earth and South Korea, my past life's homeland, the place more important to me now is Rondel.
Because of that, Rondel's stability had no choice but to be the priority, and as a result, I couldn't pay attention to Earth right after the integration of the two worlds.
The goddess also dumped the cleanup on me, so it's about time I checked on Earth as well.
"There must be Rondel nations scheming something on Earth."
"Since it hasn't been confirmed what measures the goddess said she'd take, we need to investigate that as well."
"Right."
And so, I led my group and headed to Earth after about ten days.
* * *
Thanks to the efforts of Adrian and his companions, Rondel succeeded in preventing the disaster without major damage.
But Earth could not do the same; unlike Rondel, which had the means and forces to calm the magical disaster, they could only endure it with their bodies.
At least Adrian's warning in advance allowed them to reduce the damage somewhat, but the damage suffered this time was substantial enough to be named the Second Great Disaster.
As for just how severe it was….
"The terrain has completely changed."
The world map itself had changed.
The Panama that connected North and South America collapsed and vanished without a trace, completely severing the overland route between the Americas.
In Europe, the surface of the Strait of Gibraltar rose, blocking the entrance to the Mediterranean in a catastrophe.
As a result, the sea routes of Mediterranean nations like Italy and Greece, as well as Black Sea nations like Romania and Ukraine, were cut off.
In addition, a significant portion of the island nations of Southeast Asia was submerged, and whether due to anomalies at the South and North Poles, the global sea level rose by about one meter, shrinking the territory of many countries including the Korean Peninsula.
It was a situation that made clear once again just how well Adrian had prevented the disaster.
"Still, we're on the relatively unharmed side."
South Korea's President, Kim Min-guk, was in the middle of a conversation sitting across from Count Reiers with a small tea table between them.
Between the two lay a tablet PC, its screen displaying the newly changed terrain of Earth and the territories of each nation.
"It's a relief that the damage was relatively light, but…."
"That's right. Right now, the disaster isn't the only problem."
However, the map was a bit strange.
It wasn't because the terrain had changed it was because on lands that should have been marked blank due to nations collapsing from the two successive Great Disasters, names all too familiar to Count Reiers were written.
[Triton Continent Alliance]
[Chase Kingdom]
[Lyseth Kingdom]
[Gricia Kingdom]
They were the national names of the countries belonging to Rondel.
There were no names of famous great powers most were merely nations of middling strength but to the countries of the Earth sphere, they could not help but feel like a threat.
"They've used their heads quite well. Even without waging war, there's plenty of empty land, so they simply occupy those spots and settle in."
"On the contrary, they're even providing aid to the survivors in those regions and winning their support."
"If they win the support of the locals, then even if they claim to be the owners of that land, it becomes difficult to take action against them."
To Rondel, the existence of Earth is the new continent itself.
They must stake their claim faster than anyone else, but even so, they could not afford to ignore Adrian's reaction.
And so, the method a few nations came up with was precisely this.
A way to expand territory without waging war.
What Adrian had forbidden was war for the purpose of territorial expansion, so instead, they would win the support of the natives and legitimately take over the national leadership.
The survivors of fallen nations, who had lived each day trembling in anxiety, could not refuse the hands extended by the Rondel nations, and this operation worked perfectly.
"The nations of Earth thought only of themselves and failed to look after their neighbors, and that has become their poison."
At Count Reiers's pointed remark, President Kim Min-guk had no choice but to smile bitterly.
South Korea had helped its neighbors in its own way, but it had never stepped forward to fundamentally resolve the situation.
In the end, South Korea too had waged war against North Korea to achieve unification, placing its own interests above all else.
South Korea, along with America and Russia, continues to issue strong protests and warnings day after day toward the Rondel nations trying to settle on Earth, but the Rondel side has already confirmed the fact that even China, a great power, could do nothing and was left helpless against a single Reiers County.
So everyone treated the Earth-sphere nations as little more than primitive countries and paid them no mind.
A single nuclear missile would give their clumsy sense of superiority a proper Lesson/Discipline, but if that happened, the natives who had barely managed to live normal lives would also end up dead.
It would instead provide a Justification/Cause for war.
"If Your Excellency the Grand Duke steps in, could the situation be resolved?"
"Well. This is a highly political matter, so…."
Count Reiers, who remains only on Earth, knows only that Adrian is a 9th-circle Grand Mage, but does not know his exact ability levels.
So no matter how much Adrian is the one he serves as liege lord, he could not be certain whether the situation could be resolved.
But there was one thing he could state with certainty.
"Still, they won't be able to shamelessly ignore this side's words as before. If they make an enemy of that person, they can't help but feel uneasy about what's behind them."
"It seems fortunate that Grand Duke Lawrence is a reasonable person."
"A reasonable person."
Even for Count Reiers, who serves Adrian as his liege lord, that was one statement he could hardly agree with.
After all, Adrian's eccentric behavior had been famously notorious since his days in Rondel.
The President tilted his head as he looked at Count Reiers, who was letting out an awkward smile.
And then, at that moment.
"Mr. President, Count. Grand Duke Lawrence has arrived."
"Ohh, bring him in at once!"
The very figure they had been speaking of had appeared.
The only person capable of resolving the problem that had arisen on Earth.
Step. Step.
What appeared next was a group of people with an exceedingly splendid appearance.