Chapter 4

The status screen floated gently in the air as I tried to digest its contents. It was behaving as though I had only just acquired the skill now. The huge chunk of MP I lost from trying to use the skill was even more proof. As I explained previously, your skill level indicates how much you have gotten used to using that skill. By using a skill successfully, you increase your proficiency and, eventually, your level, allowing you to execute the skill more efficiently. Practice makes perfect, in other words. With Air Step, increasing the level reduced MP consumption and decreased the time required between activations. A skill at level 1 was, to put it bluntly, absolute trash. The MP consumption was so high that it wasn’t even worth using it in battle. I tried a few other skills, just to make sure, but they were all at level 1, too. “There’s no way this is all from the curse. If the effect had been this great, that battle would have been over immediately.” The only reason I had ever survived a year on my own was because Air Step, Control Mana—hell, pretty much everything—were at such a high level that using them was as natural to me as breathing. Assuming, that is, that everything up to the point when I woke up in this room even happened. If that sword could undo skill progression like this, the kingdom wouldn’t have needed a hero to beat the demon lord. They could have killed her easily enough without me—if not immediately, then certainly without great effort. “Perhaps after I died… Well, I suppose I’m alive, so maybe they put some new status condition on me to save me?” The status screen had said I was OK, but there were so many other problems with the information it showed that I hesitated to consider it a reliable source. Besides, it might even be some kind of advanced hex that could change the screen itself. However, there was a soul blade I could use that would ascertain exactly what kind of status condition this was. It allowed for an even greater level of detail than the status screen. If this really was some hitherto unknown condition, this soul blade would tell me its effects, and how to counteract it. “Now then, Appraise… App…raise?” As I went to search my status screen for the soul blade in question, I paused. “There’s no way…” I cringed as I considered a worrisome thought and pressed the down arrow beside the soul-blade display. The names of all the forms that had taken me through so many hardships were there. However, most of them were grayed out, with a small padlock icon beside them. When I tapped the lock, the form’s name and the requirements to unlock the weapons appeared. “This can’t be happening…” I tried to summon some of the soul blades that were grayed out, but none of them worked. Only the ones whose names were displayed in bright-white text were available to me. I rubbed my eyes once more and stared. As my anger and frustration threatened to boil over, I turned to the princess on the ground, who for a while now had been pretending to be unconscious while muttering a spell under her breath. I gave her a swift kick. “Gaaaagh?!” “You really are sneaky, Alicia. Why do you think I’ve been healing you? Don’t go dying before I can finish torturing you, now.” The spell she had been chanting was a low-level Fire spell. When I interrupted her, it went off inside the princess’s mouth. It must have hurt. I smiled. I didn’t say it, but I enjoyed watching her resist, as long as she wasn’t trying to off herself too early. I loved beating down her attempts and seeing her drive herself deeper into despair. It was very entertaining. Just as I was thinking what a relief it was to finally see the princess suffer for what she’d done, I noticed a mysterious mail icon sitting in the upper left of my status screen. I had never seen it before and was unsure what it meant. “Hmm, what to do…?” “Gh… Gablgh…” I idly trampled Princess Alicia’s stomach with my foot, enjoying how unseemly she looked and sounded as she glared at me in anger. After a short while, when I recovered from the shock of losing almost all my soul blades, I tapped the mail icon with my finger. If you are reading this, it means you have died an untimely death. I’m afraid this isn’t a joke. You are, without a doubt, well and truly dead. Or rather, you would be, had I not rewound time back to the point of your arrival once your HP reached zero. You see, what you have been experiencing up until now is called “Tutorial Mode.” When a human arrives in another world, the field they pass through imparts unto them what we on Earth might call superpowers. These powers tend to be stronger than those possessed by the natives of the other world. Yet even so, humans from Earth live, on average, much shorter lives than natives. They die almost immediately, in fact, regardless of what powers they get. As Goddess of Earth, I do not know the world you have ended up in, and I have no power there. As such, in times past, I would warn humans to be careful. However, the ways of other worlds can be difficult for humans to grasp, and few are able to adapt. Thus, I stopped trying to warn them. Instead, I created Tutorial Mode. I understand that it must be difficult to be thrust into this situation with no explanation, but seeing is believing, as they say. Tutorial Mode is my final gift to you, as Goddess of Earth. In the event of a premature death, time is rewound to the precise moment of arrival. Any skills and levels earned are deducted at a rate based on the time spent alive. You might call it a “New Game Plus” of sorts. You may not be physically stronger the second time around, but your trials have taught you an important lesson about how easy it is to die. That is my gift to you. The humans of Earth possess very little magic ability, and an individual human is exceedingly weak. Frankly, they are the bottom-feeders of the universe. Human stats are barely above baseline, but the power they obtain when crossing worlds makes them just about strong enough to defeat a slime. Without that power, even an expert martial artist from Earth would lose to an otherworld’s lowliest villager. Therefore, you must steel yourself to survive. The worlds beyond Earth are rife with danger around every corner. I sincerely apologize that I can do no more for you. From the Goddess “I see. New Game Plus, huh?” Just as the shape of the icon suggested, what I had just read appeared to be a letter. There was a lot written there that I wanted to unpack, but first: There was a Goddess. And levels and skills seemed to also exist in my previous world, Earth. From what I could gather, even ridiculously strong abilities couldn’t prevent earthlings from getting themselves killed, so the Goddess resorted to a strategy best summed up as Let them figure it out for themselves, and they can have one do-over for free. That was what saved me. I still had my doubts, but that was what the letter said. And that explained why my skill levels had tanked; it was because I had lived so long. …In any case. “Ha-ha…” Thank the heavens. Now I could carry out the oath I swore. “MUA-HA-HA-HA-HA!” All I could do was laugh. I couldn’t help myself. Even though I never actually expected to be given another chance, the oath I swore was not a lie. A shiver of delight ran through my body. This wasn’t a dream. I had as long as I liked to exact my revenge. When I finally finished laughing, I considered the matter more calmly. What to do, and where to begin? There were so many people I wanted to kill. One of them lay right there at my feet. Right now, her mouth was burned, and I had stamped on her so much that her dress was ragged and dirty. She understood now that it made no difference whether or not she obeyed. She simply looked up at me with hate in her eyes. Yes. That was it. I wanted revenge. If I just wanted to give in to my urges, I could kill her whenever. After all, their levels had been reset, too, just like mine. However, I still had the knowledge that I learned from the tutorial. I might have lost my skill levels, but I didn’t lose my memory. Thanks to my few usable soul blades, I had about fifty levels worth of stat boosts, and I could easily handle myself against a half dozen enemies who had never seen real combat, as the knights groaning around me showed. All I had to do was lay low for a little while, raise my level, and then go around picking off those bastards before they had the chance to get stronger. “Oh, wait, no. That won’t do.” For a year, I had suffered. I had been torn apart—splintered—and the pieces rearranged to form the creature I was now. My soul had been stained black with tar, and it screamed at me not to just kill them. It wouldn’t let me. So as much as I hated the look of her, I wasn’t anywhere near finished with the princess yet. She could live for now. There was still much to do. There was no need to rush. I had all the time in the world. Why kill her now and let it end? Make her suffer. Drag her down into a swamp of despair and let her rue the day she ever crossed me. There was so much more I wanted her to experience. My revenge hadn’t even begun. “Oh dear, I suppose I can’t kill you yet. What a shame; I’d come up with such good ideas for how to do it, too.” I sighed. It really was a shame. I wanted to watch maggots devour her from the inside out. I wanted to implant her with a seed that slowly converted her flesh to plant matter, until she was nothing but a mind trapped inside a numb, unmoving body. However, even if I did want to kill her right now, I had lost access to the soul blades I required. I needed more time. Time to plan out my revenge—thoroughly, so that I could enjoy the process. “First…” I used the Nephrite Blade of Verdure to heal the princess’s mouth so that she could talk. “Hey, I have a favor to ask you,” I said. “…Why should I listen to a monster?” spat the princess. What a perfect specimen she was. “Ha-ha-ha-ha!” “Wh-what’s so funny?” she asked. “Oh, that was just such a good response. Please don’t lose that defiance, Princess. I wouldn’t want things to get boring.” I sneered down at her pitiable form as she shot back a wicked glare. “You madman! Why are you doing this? What did I ever do to you…?!” “You may not remember, Princess, but I do. I know the pain that comes with betrayal. You tricked me. You betrayed me. You played me for a fool. I believed in you guys. Do you have any idea how much that hurt, Alicia Orollea?” “Ugh… Ghuh…” My eyes seared right through her skin like magma, and my tongue was razor-sharp. She may not have known what I was talking about, but she understood that I hated her guts all the same. “Now, back to the point. The favor.” I shot her a perfect smile without the slightest trace of the animosity I had been showing her before. “It’s okay if you don’t want to do it. I tried asking nicely, even patched up your mouth for you, but if you still don’t want to, then it’s okay.” Oh, you think I knew that she would refuse all along? I don’t know what you’re talking about! I never imagined for a moment she might reject my earnest request. “Wh-what?” Upon seeing my personality totally switch, the princess became worried. She always had been a sharp one. “Hmm, your tits are in the way.” “Huh?! Eek! Sto…stop that!” I kicked her over onto her front and tore at her dress, exposing the bare skin of her back. “You know, the first time I met you, I thought you were so beautiful, but now I don’t feel anything. Isn’t that strange?” Silver hair that cascaded down to her shoulders, and a pair of glimmering silver eyes. Her face, her body—they were all perfect, like a doll. She was truly a girl worthy of being called “the Beauty of Orollea.” When I first arrived, I had thought her prettier than any girl I had ever seen in my native country of Japan, and the few times I saw her undress on our journey made my heart pound. Yet now as I looked upon her delicate physique, I felt nothing. “You would defile a helpless maiden? I knew otherworlders were a load of brutish savages!” “Huh? What are you talking about? Who would want to screw a pig with an ugly personality? Don’t flatter yourself.” The thought of actually doing it made my stomach turn, and I responded with pure vitriol. “Wha…?!” “I’m simply going to write a letter, since you didn’t want to do me a favor.” “…You…you don’t mean…” “Look, all I wanted was for you to take a message. It wasn’t difficult, was it? If you don’t want to, then I’m just going to have to write it down where everyone can see.” As I watched her slowly realize what I was going to do to her, I cracked a smile. “Now, hold still, Princess. Wouldn’t want to mess up my handwriting.” “No! Aaaahhhh!” I took out the Pyrachnid’s Claw of Kindling. A twenty-five-centimeter short sword with a relatively wide, crimson blade. If we consider this the second time I was using this weapon, then the first time I wielded it was only to light tinder. Its heat was weak, but right now, that was exactly what I needed. “Hmm, hmm, hmm, hmmm! ” “Gyah! Graaagh! Aaaauuuugh! Stop! Stopppp!” I seared my message into Alicia’s back, humming over the sound of her screams. “Zo…zomeone…blease helb…” “Ah-ha-ha! Nobody’s coming to save you, Princess. I’ve made sure you have no more tricks up your sleeve.” Alicia reached her arms out toward the knights who lay around her, but none of them responded. Their arms and legs were broken and mangled, bent backward at the joints. Though they were conscious, the sheer pain they were in deafened them to the princess’s cries. “Now hold still. I’m not even half done yet, and there’s a lot more I’ve got in store for you after this,” I said, smiling. By the time I finished writing my letter, I was in a good mood, and everyone else in the room had fallen silent. I had broken the princess’s limbs to stop her from struggling, and in the end, she had passed out a little while ago from the pain. Even the knights lay still as one by one, they, too, had given themselves up to merciful stupor. I began to stand up, and my vision blurred. “Whoa. It’s been a while since I’ve felt this way.” It was a sign that my MP was wearing thin. I had been using the Pyrachnid’s Claw of Kindling in conjunction with the Nephrite Blade of Verdure to keep Princess Alicia alive. The former didn’t use much MP, but the healing ability of the latter burned through it. “Open Status.” I checked, and my MP had dropped to about 20 percent. It looked like I would have to be frugal in my use of the soul blades. I wouldn’t be able to fight like I used to until I regained my MP-recovery and cost-reduction skills. I needed to make it a priority to level up as soon as possible. “Well, whatever. I suppose I should get going.” I had done everything I wanted to here. It was time to slip out of the castle, get some things together, and put this city behind me. “…You can’t. You’ll never leave this castle alive.” “Oh, you’re still awake?” “Over five hundred knights are stationed within its grounds. You’ll be tortured and killed.” The repeated wounding and healing must have rendered her body numb, because Princess Alicia’s voice sounded clear, unaffected by pain. A defiant fire had returned to her cold, mocking eyes. Trust a princess to still hold up after rounds of torture. Though I knew she didn’t fully understand the situation and was mostly putting on a brave face, she would be right as rain with a little time, and I could have all the fun I wanted then. I was getting giddy. My contemplative silence gave Alicia the mistaken impression that her words had actually worried me, and she continued: “We show you foul outsiders a hint of kindness, and you try to take advantage of it. Oh, you will pay for this humiliation. I will pay you back one hundredfold and have you beg for death!” Her eyes shone with pure unbridled rage. Yes, this was what I wanted to see. Those eyes. The look you only got when you realized you’d been screwed over. That was enough to show me just how much pain and humiliation I’d inflicted on her.