“He’s late.”
“He is. It’s been ten minutes since the time we agreed on.” I could feel Ms. Kaori’s irritation from the other side of the crystal ball.
There were two in front of me: one connected to Ms. Kaori, and the other to the bastard. The grand guildmasters had direct lines to each other, but I didn’t. Ms. Kaori made this possible by connecting the wavelengths for simultaneous communication, but I wasn’t quite sure how that really worked.
That aside, I was supposed to speak with the bastard twenty minutes after she told me about it, so she and I both were waiting around for him. But as she’d just mentioned, he still hadn’t shown, ten minutes past the designated time. No matter how much we waited, he wouldn’t show up on the crystal.
That ball suddenly started glowing; it looked like TV static was pulsing through it. At long last, an image appeared on it, slowly coming into view. When it finally cleared, the damn bastard appeared, sitting on a throne flanked by two knights.
“On top of being late, you’re on a throne? You really think you’re a king, don’t you, Imabayashi?” I laughed while grimacing.
He grinned at me. “That’s because I am one.”
There wasn’t a single hint of shame in his words; he was as arrogant as ever. Him being late on purpose made me hate him even more. In social situations back on Earth, apparently being a little late was a sign that let people know you were in charge. He was trying to send a message—one that said he was above me.
“So, what do you want? I don’t think we have anything to say to each other.” I let the venom spew through my words. I had no intention of making casual conversation with a psychopath like him. The best course of action was to listen to what he needed, then promptly hang up. I was also purposefully speaking in a rude way to show I wasn’t going to play along with his little game. I needed to make our positions clear to him from the beginning.
“You’re calling me ‘Imabayashi’ now? When did you get so high-and-mighty?”
“I’d already decided before coming to this world that I wouldn’t respect you. So what do you want?”
“It’s about you setting the slaves in Abrasil free.”
How should I go about answering this? I stayed silent for a bit, then mixed a bit of worry into my voice. “You knew about that? I shouldn’t have expected any less from the guy that trapped my father.”
The light smile that adorned his face morphed into an evil grin as he began laughing and clapping his hands. “Oh, that! That was so genius of me, taking control of his bank accounts!”
His laugh turned into a cackle of satisfaction. “Anyway, Shinobu, I’ve heard the rumors of your actions.”
I paused briefly before responding. “So? Are you going to tell me not to make a mess on your lawn?”
All traces of that smile vanished from his lips. He then changed his tone to that of someone reasoning with a child. “Say, won’t you make a deal with me, Shinobu?”
“A...deal?” The waver in my voice stopped being an act at his sudden request.
“A lot of things happened between us. I considered killing you and even plotted to kidnap Shinozuka there, among many other things, as you know.”
“And how’d that turn out for you? Ran into a few problems, didn’t you?”
“That I did. You’ve been moving around Abrasil trying to find where I am, right?”
I didn’t answer.
“You don’t have to pretend you weren’t. I told you, I’ve heard about your movements. You tried to sneak a raid on us. I know that much.”
“What are you trying to say?”
“After four hundred years, this world has entered into a state of equilibrium and safety under the reign of the five grand guilds. And in a little while, a giant revolution will throw off the balance of this same world. You know that.”
“Yes. The Agartha event,” I nodded.
“Exactly. That large-scale update will be applied to this world, the level cap will be raised, Grade 6 magic will come into play, and new skills and equipment will be implemented. The distribution of strength among us will be rewritten instantly.”
“So what exactly are you getting at here?”
“Each of the five grand guilds are preparing for Agartha under a set of fixed rules. It’d be a problem for me if my fighters, the members of the attack team on Agartha, were to die. It pains me to admit it, but warring with you would end up in losses for me too.”
“I don’t think there’d be any benefits for me to not attack you.”
“Oh, don’t be like that, Shinobu. I just told you I can see through all your movements. I know why you look so at ease right now too.”
“...What?”
“You can go to Agartha, can’t you?”
“How do you know that?”
“It’s simple—we can too.”
I’d known that because Mikagami had told us, but I didn’t think the bastard would tell us himself.
“I see. So the terms are the same for us both.”
“We also have something you don’t: numbers.”
I didn’t respond. He was right.
“Want to try to fight us? Against strong players who’ve gained the same strength from Agartha that you have?”
I gazed at him.
“The ones you defeated before were only level 99. I won’t let you in on the details, now that we have access to Agartha, but over ten of us have had our level caps released.”
“Over ten people are past the level cap now?”
“Think rationally here. The other grand guilds are on my side too. Does this seem like a war you can win? That’s how much of a difference there is between me and you right now.”
I clicked my tongue in frustration, then shook my head. “So?”
“I’m looking to control this whole world after the Agartha event comes into play. I only have as many people in Agartha as I do Keys to it, but I plan to get through the event as fast as possible, block all the other guilds from the dungeon, and monopolize the power that comes with it.”
I see. I figured as much. If the world really does end up like that, even the players would suffer, not just the natives. It’d be a nightmare for the entirety of humanity except him.
“So you don’t want to waste any of your level 99 soldiers that are going to get stronger in Agartha by making them fight me?”
“Precisely. I made sure to prepare good things for you in return.”
My ears perked up. If I believed everything he was saying, then there actually wasn’t a way for me to win. It wouldn’t hurt to hear what he had to offer.
“I’m listening.”
“I’m glad you seem to have at least some sense of self-interest.” He snapped his fingers to get one of the armored knights next to him to hand him a scroll that seemed to be made of dragon hide. “This is a blood contract. Even players are affected by promises made by these, as you know.”
It was true—players’ actions could be controlled with that contract. In the game, it was typically used when in debt to a shop, among other things. The concept of “debt” in the game was a type of aid that applied when one’s income and expenditures went into the red under special conditions. For example, if one were to die while broke and didn’t have enough money to be revived by the Church, their funds would go into the negative. One downside to this was that they wouldn’t be able to keep any of the money they made afterward, if I remembered correctly. Of course, players couldn’t undo the debt condition themselves. Had I been in debt when trying to free Alice from being a slave, I wouldn’t have been able to.