Kail knew this world was a game since the day he was born. This world had copied the setting of <Diaros Academy>, the game he used to play in his past life.
Just as the game described, one could grow stronger, and there were even people like Sera and Izuna who possessed the ability to view status windows. The Evil God and His Apostles blatantly wielded cheat-like powers to manipulate stats.
This world was a game. There was no denying it. But he never expected such secrets to be hidden behind it.
‘This world is a game, maintained by the Sovereign God, and sought to be destroyed by the Evil God.’
Obviously, regardless of the Evil God’s intentions or results, the Evil God is evil. He arbitrarily destroys the world and corrupts and kills people in the process.
The Evil God wanted to save the people of the world and free their souls? Humans can’t perceive souls, and death itself brings pain to everyone.
So the Evil God is evil—yet, as previously mentioned, his intentions could be considered good. From Kail’s perspective, following the Evil God might actually be better.
‘If, just if—I follow the Evil God and gain liberation…… what would happen?’
Kail lost his life on Earth and reincarnated into this world. And this game, at least, was a fixed world made up of data chunks, and with the help of the Evil God, he could escape from this world.
—If Kail escapes from this world, what happens to him?
‘Back to Earth?’
If that’s possible. If I can return to Earth.
—Isn’t believing in the Evil God not so bad?
“-Kail, what are you doing? Aren’t you eating?”
“Huh? Oh—sorry, sorry. Just thinking about something.”
“What now? Didn’t all your worries get resolved?”
Yuri tilted her head and asked. That’s right. All the concerns he had before coming to the Holy Kingdom were resolved. The problem was that new worries arose.
But a man can’t whine to his woman about everything. Kail just grinned as if it were nothing.
“It’s nothing. Even if I told you, it’s a worry you wouldn’t understand.”
“…I don’t think I know less than you do.”
“It was a deep philosophical question about where the soul goes after death.”
“When you die, you go to heaven, right?”
She explained using the common theology of this world. Kail nodded, acknowledging that it could be true.
However, he didn’t truly agree with her explanation. Kail was a man who empirically knew that people don’t go to some heaven after dying.
After continuing the meal for a while, Kail glanced up at the sky and stared at something that watched over everything in this land.
Beyond an invisible barrier, something mechanically scanned the ground. Kail was no exception.
“Bang-.”
“…What are you doing stopping mid-meal?”
“Oh, nothing.”
He tried hitting whatever was in the sky. After muttering something incomprehensible, Kail went back to eating. Yuri tilted her head, unable to understand what he said. Her puzzled expression was so cute that it made him laugh involuntarily.
* * *
─……??
Above the sky, the overseer’s eye, which monitored the earth on behalf of God, realized that a fist from somewhere had attacked it and tilted its head in confusion.
Who could it be? It was an impossible attack from an unknown position.
In the end, the overseer’s eye couldn’t find the culprit who attacked it and continued to monitor the Holy Kingdom more zealously, as if expecting someone to slip up.
* * *
The residents of the Holy Kingdom must perform their designated tasks every day. Farmers till the fields, blacksmiths hammer iron, and bakery owners bake bread.
The reward for this endlessly boring cogwheel existence is absolute stability. The residents of the Holy Kingdom could live the same life 365 days a year, 24 hours a day.
There were slight changes according to the seasons, but nothing major. Today is no different from yesterday. Ten years from now, today will likely be no different either.
To modern people, this kind of life is unbearably dull, exactly like NPCs.
“Welcome! Hero!”
Even the NPCs themselves know this fact. That’s why they welcome any deviation from their usual routine. When visitors from outside speak to them, they answer the same questions dozens of times for this very reason.
Of course, Kail had no intention of asking them the same questions repeatedly. If the NPCs’ time was gold, Kail’s time was mithril or orichalcum.
Having quickly bought some bread from a shop, Kail swiftly returned to the inn through the back alleys. Waiting for him at the inn was Yuri, who had fallen asleep exhausted.
‘I came back as fast as I could…….’
While the two were relaxing, Yuri unleashed her signature move unique to pregnant women: demanding food because she was craving it.
Being a man, Kail couldn’t refuse Yuri’s request. Thankfully, it wasn’t the dead of night. Even Kail wouldn’t have been able to fetch freshly baked bread at such an hour.
The sweet smell of bread filled the room. Sensing the aroma, Yuri’s face gradually lit up with a smile.
Careful not to wake her, Kail placed the bread bag down and quietly left the inn. Outside, he stood in the alley next to the inn, watching the townsfolk stroll around peacefully.
‘Do those people…… feel satisfied with their lives?’
Could they really be called alive? Philosophical thoughts, typical of well-fed modern people, flooded Kail’s mind.
As expected, no matter how much he thought about it, the answer wouldn’t come. To a person from the 21st century, it might seem like a slave’s life, but for most medieval fantasy peasants, the life of the Holy Kingdom’s residents was the dream of commoners.
The fields of the Holy Kingdom always received rain and wind on schedule. God controlled the climate to maintain the best environment for growing crops.
This never changed. There would be no sudden natural disasters wiping them out, no random bandits killing them, no diseases causing suffering and death.
Just a predetermined fate.
A life explainable in a few lines of script.
For their entire lives, until death. And even after death, it would continue generation after generation.
“……Kail Meyer?”
While lost in these irrelevant, useless thoughts—someone called Kail’s name.
Turning his head, Kail looked at a strange little brat he had never seen before and tilted his head.
“What do you want, kid?”
“You, youuu…! Don’t tell me you forgot me!”
“No, why are you speaking so informally? Has the brat gone mad?”
The unfamiliar little brat, heated from Kail’s words, tried grabbing his collar but stopped when she realized where they were.
The kindly smiling passersby, the shopkeepers—everyone wiped their expressions clean and stared at the two, specifically at the girl trying to grab Kail’s collar.
This was the Holy Kingdom, where crime was strictly ‘forbidden’ by law.
Offenders die.
No exceptions, whoever they may be.
“……Damn it!”
Realizing this, the girl fled the scene as if running for her life. Since it hadn’t escalated to a punishable crime, the people didn’t stop her.
Kail watched the girl’s retreating figure carefully and noticed something odd about her gait.
‘What, does she think she’s some 2-meter giant?’
Seeing a gait resembling a muscular man rather than a girl, Kail chuckled, amused by the sight.
* * *
“Damn it, damn it—damn it!”
The girl, panting slightly from running so fast, sighed in relief upon confirming no one was chasing her.
She almost committed a crime. She should’ve remembered that even petty crimes resulted in death under God’s watchful eyes here.
Though she suppressed her personality, meeting the guy who caused her current condition made her lose control.
‘Kail Meyer…! Why are you here!’
Muttering Kail’s name, the girl looked down at her arm. A cold, hard mechanical prosthetic devoid of warmth. She came to the Holy Kingdom to fix this arm.
It wasn’t a bad prosthetic, but as a martial artist, she wanted her real arm back. Having her real arm wouldn’t mean she couldn’t use the prosthetic anymore, so she desired both.
Believing the Holy Kingdom’s Virgin Saintess might heal her arm, she painstakingly prepared her identity and journeyed here.
And then she runs into Kail here, of all places?
‘Damn it, damn it—can I endure this?’
The Holy Kingdom was vast—but also small. With only predetermined paths developed, movement was restricted.
If she ran into Kail along the way, she might not be able to restrain herself from committing a crime—and committing a crime in the Holy Kingdom meant even an Aura Master like him wouldn’t survive.
“Phew—I’ll have to endure somehow.”
Never meet Kail.
With that thought, Jerard returned to her inn.
“Oh, that brat from earlier.”
“Ughhh…!”
And then she realized she was staying at the same inn as Kail.
