One drink on arrival, two refills. Can’t be helped; updates are irregular.
Chapter 427: Dragons, O Dragons! Part Four
Pencilgon: "All right, there it is! And Sunraku-kun is officially dead last!"
All the Color Dragons had now gathered, and Siegwurm the Sky Ruler had appeared as well.
Cheering from the deck of the New Land Research Vessel, Pencilgon opened Inventoria, took out a glass sphere the size of a baseball, and immediately threw it straight upward.
Drawing on Arthur Pencilgon’s STR and TEC, the glass sphere rose higher and higher...
The instant it reached the maximum height of its accelerated ascent, it burst with a sharp pop, spitting green fire into the air.
This was not meant for [Wolfgang Inner Circle].
It was a message for their collaborators.
In other words—
Pencilgon: "The ones we were waiting for are here. Now then, let’s start bringing down the golden one───!!"
Katzo: "Pencilgon!"
Pencilgon: "Hey, Katzo-kun! Time for a fun party! Come on, come on, get in line for the parade!"
Katzo: "Ugh, that is one hell of a face... Not the point. That barrier from earlier is very likely the kind that judges your actions by roleplay criteria!"
Pencilgon: "Perfect, perfect! Take evil far enough and it becomes a dark hero!"
Katzo: "Ah, this is bad! She has gone into Demon King mode! Where is Sunraku? At this rate, she might spectacularly self-destruct!!"
With a smile that seemed to compress delight, anticipation, excitement, and every other joyful emotion into a single expression, Arthur Pencilgon charged onward.
Before long, Zenith Guevara and Super Farmer joined them, swelling their numbers to roughly three times their original size.
Super Farmer: "Wow, this is great! I’m actually starting to have fun, Zeni-chan!"
Zenith Guevara: "I am not denying it, but... We are definitely on the Demon King’s side here, right!? I run a perfectly legal business, you know!"
Super Farmer: "Fresh vegetables bearing the Demon King seal! Zeni-chan, let’s do that thing! You know, the ‘I made this myself’ thing! I’ll do an ahegao double peace sign!!"
Zenith Guevara: "You’re really going to put a screenshot of your own ahegao into circulation...?"
Pencilgon: "I like it. I do not hate that sort of thing, baby!"
A group of roughly fifty people moved out from the New Land Research Vessel.
Onward, onward, onward.
Their destination was Skeletal Demon Castle: Skull Azuchi—the base of the anti-Black Dragon faction.
In other words, enemy headquarters.
Pencilgon: "Ahahaha! Move aside!"
???: "Whoa!? What the hell!?"
Numbers were the easiest kind of violence living things could produce.
Players who were not even united could not become obstacles to forty-two heavily armed knights advancing with silent menace.
Pencilgon: "All right, here we come!!"
Pencilgon, whose excitement had climbed to just short of its peak, kicked open the doors.
The players inside, who had been in the middle of a strategy meeting, all turned in surprise.
Correction: Psyger-100 alone covered their face with a hand and looked up at the ceiling.
Emilia: "You are..."
Pencilgon: "Good evening, Emilia-chan... I’ve heard all about you. Pretty impressive, really—even a mere crafting-class player went and built an entire castle."
Faced with this abnormal arrival, Emilia—who had just been preparing to move after receiving word of Noirlind’s appearance—furrowed her brow warily.
Emilia: "What do you want? We are about to move out to defeat the Color Dragons..."
Pencilgon: "Wolfgang is aiming for Clear Condition 1: the defeat of Siegwurm the Sky Ruler. And we will do it with Noirlind the Black Dragon still alive... you see."
In that instant, Emilia’s entire presence changed with almost startling clarity.
Wariness became hostility.
That one sentence categorized Wolfgang as an enemy in Emilia’s mind.
Still, because of the earlier PK problem, Shangri-La Frontier had set its red-name penalties heavily.
No matter how hostile another player might be, as long as the system’s ordinary processes still applied, there was almost no advantage to harming Pencilgon here—
Pencilgon: "Oh, right. Let me introduce the members of the Anti-Siegwurm Alliance... Hehehe. Psyger-100 of Black Blade, and P.T. Overwerke of Team 10PM."
P.T. Overwerke: "...Hahaha. Sorry, but Team 10PM committed to this side first."
Psyger-100: "I apologize for not telling you."
I see, Emilia thought, with a strangely cool head.
Apparently, a rival force had quietly grown without Emilia’s knowledge.
Still, Emilia had half expected something like this.
Emilia had never thought it possible to unite the wills of every player.
Besides, Emilia’s goal was always the defeat of Noirlind. Taken to the extreme, after Noirlind was defeated, Emilia could shift toward defeating Siegwurm as well.
But now that they had openly declared their intention to keep Noirlind alive, cooperation with them had become impossible.
Judging from their reactions, Knights Tempura and the other clans did not seem to be part of Wolfgang’s so-called alliance.
The number of allied top clans is not that important. Most players are unaffiliated or belong to mid-tier clans. What matters now is how much support I can gather...
The situation was unfavorable.
After all, the opponent was Arthur Pencilgon: the player who had first defeated a Unique Monster in this game, and who had used the PK clan Ashura Kai as bait until it was spent.
What drove Emilia was nothing more than a personal grudge. It did not possess the kind of force that could pull surrounding players in along with it, as Pencilgon’s did.
???: "........."
The situation was unfavorable. At this rate, it was only a matter of time before the majority flowed to the other side...
Then—
Pencilgon: "Whoa."
Emilia: "What was that?"
Skull Azuchi shook.
As though something had slammed into it...
While they were still considering that possibility, a player who was also Emilia’s real-life friend entered the entrance hall where Emilia and the others stood, wearing an extremely awkward expression.
Weaving through the armored knights, the player came to stand before Emilia. After hesitating, the player spoke.
???: "You people are in the way! Heave-ho... Uh, Emilia-chan?"
Emilia: "Did something happen?"
???: "Um... Listen calmly, okay?"
There was silence for about three seconds.
???: "So... Noirlind got hit with a Giant Swing by Siegwurm, got launched, and crashed into Skull Azuchi... Um, it looks like the castle keep is half destroyed."
The player Emilia was a minor celebrity among SLF users.
That was because of the achievement of building a castle almost entirely through player effort...
And because Emilia was the woman who built a fortress to defeat Noirlind.
Then, in that moment, one ice-cold thought erased every inner conflict.
Again.
Emilia: "...Bring it on."
Pencilgon: "Oh?"
Emilia: "It does not matter. Even if hundreds of people aim for Siegwurm, all we need to do is defeat Noirlind first... Yes. Yes. That is what Skull Azuchi is for. That is what everything until now has been for..."
Though Pencilgon was hardly in a position to say so, Emilia had received a considerable amount of taunting.
Yet Emilia murmured in an exceptionally quiet voice.
Emilia: "It does not matter. Yes, it does not matter at all. Bring it on. Yes. Yes."
Emilia’s facial muscles formed a smile.
Yet Emilia’s eyes were completely inorganic.
That expression was the opposite of Pencilgon’s heartfelt enjoyment—like water and oil, like the north and south poles of magnets, utterly incompatible in nature.
Emilia: "Let me declare this: Noirlind will not live to see tomorrow morning’s sunrise."
Pencilgon: "Siegwurm will sink with the moon."
With only those words exchanged, the leader of Wolfgang and the master of the bone castle parted ways decisively.