Chapter 149. The Boundary Gradually Fades
“Ohhh, you’re back? Faster than I expected.”
The summoned old man who had shaken me with just a few words smiled at me with a huge pile of chains stacked behind him.
Thinking about it now, I suddenly wondered if this guy had pulled some kind of trick on me just like Dorfin had.
But when I looked at the pile of gifts behind him, I couldn’t bring myself to hate him completely.
“Thanks to an unexpected fortuitous encounter.”
“Oh! You met Ruin, didn’t you? How was he? That guy looks exactly like you, right?”
“...Did you predict all of this?”
“Didn’t I tell you? Whenever I’m bored, I do image training. Games that require thinking, like chess, stopped being fun for me.”
...
This damn bastard....
“To be honest, yes.”
The old man grinned.
“Just like you, I want that mage bastard to get screwed over properly at least once.”
“I can guarantee you that no one who knows him thinks otherwise.”
“Boringly and absurdly enough, that guy was at the center of most of the terrible things that happened.”
“You don’t exactly seem like a good person either, Mister.”
“Haha, sorry~ I didn’t think you’d be that shocked!”
“You already knew your life had been manipulated, didn’t you?”
“So honestly, I thought you wouldn’t be too surprised.”
That insane mage, the Chairman.
A fool who lived recklessly despite possessing eternal life would inevitably earn the hatred of others who also lived forever.
According to the old man, nobody wanted the Chairman to achieve whatever he was aiming for.
...
But this summoned old man also looked like a reckless idiot to me.
He had touched the subject of my mother and father without even knowing how much influence they had on me.
I was allowed to hate him too, right?
“If you were an ordinary human living only a short life, that might be understandable.”
“But if you know your place, you shouldn’t live that way.”
“...Do you think Ruin hates the Chairman too?”
“Who knows?”
The old man shrugged.
“Nobody knows what goes on inside that man’s head.”
“He’s a monster that looks human.”
“People born human like you and me can’t understand the mind of a monster.”
Just like you couldn’t know whether a beast you encountered in the mountains was full or hungry.
Just like you couldn’t tell whether its wide-open jaws were meant as a joke...
Or whether it was about to tear out your throat.
Ruin had studied humans more deeply than anyone and looked incredibly human.
But the summoned old man emphasized one thing.
He was unquestionably a monster.
“What did he tell you?”
“Didn’t he say not to be swayed by what other people say?”
“...!”
“Haha! If he told you that, then the very first thing you should’ve done was ignore what Ruin himself said!”
“You probably got a failing grade from him.”
“A failing... grade?”
I swallowed.
“Is that dangerous?”
“If you opened up and told him something really personal, he might’ve given you a passing grade.”
“Did you?”
“Hmm, maybe something about your love life!”
“That guy absolutely loves hearing about other people’s romance.”
“By now, he might be destroying another world, get inspired, and end up having another child or something.”
“....”
Phew.
Phew....
In that case...
I think I probably passed.
Thank goodness....
I grumbled as I walked over and sat down in front of the summoned old man.
Honestly, I wanted to smack him once.
Would that be okay?
Flick!
“Ow! Why?!”
“You teased me.”
“Student! Teased you? What a hurtful thing to say!”
“I heard about your situation and thought it sounded frustrating, so I helped you a little!”
“You didn’t help at all!”
“You only made me feel worse!”
“Do you even know that?!”
“Oh, come on...! You got to meet Ruin, didn’t you? Isn’t that enough?”
“What does that have to do with anything?!”
The old man rubbed his forehead where I had flicked him.
...
Why was he pretending it hurt when it clearly didn’t?
He was seriously annoying.
The summoned old man suddenly let out a short exclamation as though he had realized something.
He removed his hand from his forehead and scratched his chin.
And then...
I saw it.
The spot on his forehead where I had flicked him was faintly red.
“Huh?”
“I told you.”
“Ruin is a monster.”
“You didn’t just meet an ordinary human.”
“That short time you spent with him was an extremely decisive event.”
“Uh... H-How?”
I stared at his forehead.
“Your forehead....”
“It means you have reached the same ‘level’ as me.”
He smiled.
“Ah, and the same goes for that mage friend of mine.”
I didn’t really understand.
The same level?
What level?
Did reaching that level suddenly make me stronger or something?
...
Wasn’t that a little unfair?
“Ordinary people don’t go looking for Ruin.”
“They wait for Ruin to come to them.”
“But you went looking for Ruin yourself, didn’t you?”
“Yeah?”
“But does doing that really make someone stronger?”
“Haha, not exactly.”
“It simply means that someone like you, who normally couldn’t even touch me or that mage...”
“Can now at least land a hand on us.”
“Even so, this is quite something.”
He looked at me curiously.
“Did Ruin give you something?”
“Uh... He treated me to a meal.”
“Wow~”
The old man’s eyes widened.
“Ruin must have liked you a loooot.”
“Student, do you understand why that matters?”
“No. I don’t.”
“It means that because you received something from Ruin...”
“The Chairman can no longer casually interfere with your life.”
...
Huh?
Really?
Wait.
That guy told me he wasn’t going to help me...
But he had actually done something like this?
From the very beginning?
Good lord.
What kind of absurd tsundere was he?
Then when he said he wouldn’t help me, what he really meant was that he wouldn’t actively solve the problem for me...
But he would at least raise me to a position where I could fight the Chairman myself?
Ahhh~
So that was why Dorfin tried to eat me.
Everyone else had been steadily climbing a ladder one step at a time.
Meanwhile, someone suddenly walked over and took an elevator straight upward.
Yeah.
I could understand why that might piss people off.
“So I’m completely free now?”
“No.”
The old man shook his head.
“Now you’ve finally taken your first step.”
“You have only now become that man’s enemy.”
“Only now!”
“You finally obtained something that should normally be earned only after overcoming countless trials!”
“...Do you think the reason I never easily felt that kind of determination before was also because of the Chairman?”
“Probably.”
“He wouldn’t want the dog he raised to bite his hand, would he?”
I see....
Then was the reason I suddenly went to see the Chairman some time ago also part of his intentions?
Was he trying to replace me?
...
Ugh.
Thinking about it was making me scared and hollow again.
Let’s stop thinking about it.
“Haha! Just imagine it!”
“One day you suddenly go visit that mage, and he jumps in surprise!”
The old man imitated him.
“‘W-What?! Why are you here?!’”
“Hahaha!”
“Ohhh....”
“Ohhh!!”
“That sounds great!”
“I should try it soon!”
“Right?”
The old man grinned.
“Though if you do, you’ll probably be eliminated.”
“Uh....”
“This is probably where it begins.”
“Your life is going to be on the line from now on.”
“Uh....”
“Haha! Why are you worrying?”
“That’s exactly why I’m making you a weapon.”
“Don’t worry.”
“Eventually, you’ll probably be the one playing that guy for a fool.”
“Maybe!”
“Hahaha!”
Haa....
I had originally planned to just play the game diligently...
And maybe stab him in the back sometime later.
How the hell had things escalated this far?
At this point, even I didn’t know anymore.
It felt like a tiny wave I had created had gone out into the world...
And by the time it came back to me, it had grown so enormous that I could no longer control it.
...
Ah!
Right.
Power inflation.
It felt exactly like that.
The protagonist had already become absurdly strong.
But the manga still had to continue.
And they couldn’t introduce a villain weaker than the last one.
So a new villain appeared who was so powerful that the previous villain looked like an insect.
“...I just wanted to play a game....”
“You’re the protagonist, so there’s nothing you can do about it.”
“You are a handcrafted product personally made by the man who created an entirely new world.”
“How many people in this world do you think have a background like yours?”
“You’d find plenty in novels, I suppose.”
What a shitty situation.
Why me?
Out of all those people...
Why did it have to be me?
It could’ve been someone else.
Of course...
At this point, I had no intention of pretending I didn’t know what the Chairman had done and simply walking away.
My life had completely turned into some kind of comic book.
How could I possibly ignore it now?
“Anyway.”
The summoned old man clapped his hands.
“Let’s finally get to the main point.”
“Student, here are some chains.”
“But I didn’t actually make them for you.”
“I was just fiddling around because I was bored and ended up making far too many.”
Was that really true?
For something supposedly made out of boredom, every single chain had detailed patterns engraved into it.
It looked like he had put an incredible amount of care into them.
Still...
If he said so, then I guess that was how it was.
I didn’t really know.
But even if this man casually called the Chairman his friend...
He didn’t seem to have particularly positive feelings toward him.
So he probably wouldn’t do anything harmful to me...
Maybe?
No.
Dorfin had turned out like that.
I should stay cautious.
Yeah.
Trust no one....
“Like I said before, Student.”
“If I want to create a weapon specifically for you, I need your help.”
“After all, this isn’t going to be a weapon you can only use inside the game!”
“Huh?”
I stared at him.
“You mean I can use it in reality too?”
“How?”
“Haha, Student.”
“Don’t forget that I’m not an NPC from the game.”
“Originally, I was only a legendary figure mentioned in the game’s lore.”
“I wasn’t supposed to appear.”
“I only came out because I saw you arrive.”
He smiled.
“I used a little trick.”
As he said that, the summoned old man pulled out a small furnace and a pair of thick, pitch-black gloves.
Then he began setting things up with practiced movements.
“Originally—ah, I mean even before the game officially launched—I occasionally made weapons for Heroes.”
“The Sword of Insight.”
“Salvation’s grimoire and staff.”
“Ah! I also made Friendship’s axe.”
“And our Huisen...”
“Would you recognize him better if I called him the Fist King?”
“You know, the huge guy standing beside Salvation!”
“Really huge!”
“Muscles bulging everywhere!”
