Esther de Baronia - Chapter 1.2

The man is in the throne room of the castle.

The throne he’s sitting on was carved out of obsidian, and shines  with a monstrous purple-black glow, gleaming fantastically in the artificial sunlight.

It’s adorned with amethysts, irolites, benitoites and other bright purple gems, and at the top of the nearly four-metre backrest was a huge cornel pin cat’s eye that seems to stare down from the throne.

The floor is covered in white opal and the walls, even the ceiling, are finished in silvery white mithril.

A large black banner hangs from the wall, depicting a crimson sword with a white hexagram surrounded by a white circle and coiled by a snake biting its tail. This emblem is the symbol of the country.

The name of the country is “Esther de Baronia”. It’s a name that has no particular meaning, but it’s just sounded cool.

It is the strongest nation in World 1, and it is a nation that tames the most vicious demons that no other nation can match.

But the strongest is just a decoration, because there is no one to challenge it.

The man stands up from his throne in Esther de Baronia, nodding his head in satisfaction as he takes in the view.

He wears a black military uniform and a purple-black coat of special equipment for PCs [Black King’s Clothes].

The Crest of the country is written on his back, showing that he is the only person in the world who can carry it.

He stood up unconsciously, but only to stretch his tired back which is tired from sitting, then he sits down again, roughly.

“…not busy.” He said in a tone that was not suitable for this solemn space.

He can’t quite remember when it was that he started to lose sight of his purpose.

Before he knows it, he’s just doing the same old thing: getting rare monsters from the gachas that were announced every now and then, deciding on their appearance to suit his tastes, raising them, and fixing their loyalty levels.

Gaining experience by defeating lousy enemies with unintelligent AI became increasingly tedious, and even if he wants to fight a war, which is the most fun, most of the NPC countries in the vicinity had been annexed, so I had to travel far and wide, which took too much time and was too tedious to do. It’s a bit of a hassle.

There must be something he wants to do, but he can’t find the right person to do it.

He misses the festivities of the early days, and inwardly whines that the number of players is dire, and that he should be trying to improve it.

There is no point in having a quality war system if you’re going to have a bunch of players who are just going to be lured in by an ad on a famous website and are unlikely to stick around.

He was hoping that they would simplify the system and make it more accessible to the general public, but after two years of this, he is not so sure.

“Well, flood control works are a priority. I don’t think we should ask for road widening. It’s not like we’re going to get a flat tire if the amount of supplies increases. Now we need to expand the residential area. …… We can’t expand any further. Oh, I think I’ll build another town near the castle.”

He mumbles to himself in loneliness, fiddles with his fingers on the console window in front of him and gives instructions to the various parts of the army.

It’s not much of a loss if you leave it alone, but if you play it every day for a set amount of time, you’ll become accustomed to it, and you’ll continue to conduct your internal affairs with a bit of fun.

It’s the reason why he continues to play even though people around him say he’s crazy, and because he loves it.

However, recently, there has been a bigger complaint than the small population and the system.

“Not again!”

Lately, there has been an inordinate amount of emergency maintenance.

A pop-up message appears above his field of vision, announcing it, and with a disgusted look on his face, he turns it off with a violent movement.

Not so long ago, it used to happen regularly for 3 hours during the daytime on weekdays, but since the last 3 days the maintenance has come suddenly, day and night.

When he asked the management about the cause of the problem, they didn’t give him a good answer and just sent him a generic template.

It’s not announced on the official website, and even in tweets, so there’s no way of knowing what’s going on, just a text saying that ‘there’s emergency maintenance.’

He’s not complaining about the maintenance, it shows that they want to keep it up, which is fine. But to do it five times a day is too often. He can’t just fix it once, he has to do it again and again for 3 days straight.

It doesn’t matter how depopulated the game is, if you’re still running a service, you don’t want to inconvenience your players. If they can’t do that, it’s going to be the end of Apocalypse.

As he’s sure he will be forced to log out anyway, the man thought of a little place to stop, so he left his seat and lazily walked to the door.

The transfer function allows him to travel anywhere in the country without risk, but it is not always pleasant, so he sometimes travels on foot.

He took a step outside, casually staring at the workmanship of the door that opened automatically, and found a giant lizard 2 meters long holding a halberd on the ground and guarding it with its head on the ground.

The [Lizard Berserk] deployed to guard the castle. If you were to rank the monsters on a scale of 10, this would be a 5, which is a very powerful monster.

The monsters from 1 to 7 can be obtained normally, but the monsters from 8 to 10 are all charged. Most of the rare monsters are kept outside of the country, so there are only MOB Zako walking around in the castle.

“Thanks.”

He tells the lizard, but it doesn’t respond. He wishes it would at least salute him, he is driven by the emptiness of playing with dolls.

It’s a bit late for that, but he can’t help but think that a little bit goes a long way.

There is nothing more to complain about, so he walks lonely on the stage where there’s no audience, only automatic dolls, acting like a king.

The walls of the castle are made of mithril, and the silvery glow hurts the eyes. Ridiculing the futility of his efforts, the man walks down the red-carpeted corridor to his next destination.

He looks around the interior of the castle with deep emotion, admiring the work that had gone into building it from a humble hovel to a huge castle that reaches the clouds.

He visits the terrace, which overlooks the castle. Leaning against the railing, he looks down at the many subhumans and beastmen working under the blue sky.

All of them are just dolls that do the same thing over and over again. The same is true for the demons that he let them walk around him as guards.

The feeling of emptiness that would not go away, no matter how much he prospered, torments him more than any other time he had played the game.

The man has been playing this game since the beta test days.

He is about to reach his thirties, and this is the only thing enjoyable he has found in his daily life.

He is fed up with the realistic management of the territory, which he can’t experience in real life, but he spent as much as he could to complete all the rare monsters and managed all the events to the point where he collected many rare items.

He trained up his favourite monsters to the limit, fixed their loyalty to the maximum with charged items, and created an unassailable army.

The territory of the country is so large that it can be called a large nation, and the security of the country is protected by monsters so powerful that it becomes ridiculous.

He has quietly built a country that anyone would call the strongest in the world.

He’s the only person who’s ever really got into an unpopular game.

The only reason he got so far into the game when everyone else was leaving within a month was because he loved seeing the monsters he created, and he never wanted to give up, even though his RPG friends made fun of him for it.

In VRMMO’s, you can only change your own character’s appearance, but in this game, you can do whatever you want with the other characters.

He has generated over 300 demons himself so far, and it’s only because he has a particular collecting habit that he is able to look at their favourite faces and take pleasure in them. That’s the reason he is able to continue.

In a game where the demons do all the work, the items you get are for the demons, of course, and they’re also ridiculously plentiful.

Whether you’re a newcomer or an old hand, there’s no way you’re going to be able to take this castle down. Of course, there are other players, but they are just ducks who have been fooled by the desperate advertisements of the management, and unfortunately the only fierce player from the beta days is this man in this world.

The management company has stopped distributing events, the contents of the lottery have not changed for a long time, and the contents of the billing shop have not been replaced.

It’s hard for a man who is a collector to see no further development, and he is starting to think about quitting.

He has got 600 resources, 400 pieces of equipment for demons, 800 pieces of furniture, 3400 costumes, and what more does he need?

He doesn’t really have a goal in mind, and he is always ready to quit when he’s done collecting.

“No, no, no. I was expecting it.”

Actually, he has been hoping that someone would appear as a hostile force, someone would come along as a friend, or someone would come to this country. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he was hoping.

He has always looked forward to the games of war and mediation between countries, even after their heyday.

He doesn’t think that’s going to happen anymore.

There was talk of a move to RPGs, but there’s no way that’s going to happen. It’s a dream that wouldn’t come true.

He would have loved to see his demons wage war, but with the absurdity of the castle grounds, the king can’t even step foot outside the kingdom. It would be impossible for him to see it.

After spending like an idiot every month – and pouring it in every month even after the billing shop stopped updating, it would be a waste to quit, but everyone does it, moving on to the next game they like.

He doesn’t think it makes the gamers think back and lament the money they put into it.

In any case, the man feels sad that he would end up looking at the country he had made prosperous and the demons he had killed, instead of seeing the world he had hoped for, but there was no need for such sentimentality.

It’s the kind of game that one day will be shut down quietly and unnoticed. It’s the kind of thing you remember and think about.

He sighs inwardly, nods contentedly for no apparent reason, and moves on.

He thought about meeting all the demons who are in the service, but the number of them, including breeding, exceeds 200,000 lightly, so it’s impossible.

It is impossible to go to all the 17 legionaries that we treat as our entourage, because we cannot go out of the country to see them, so for the moment we went to the one that we have placed in the castle.

“Good morning, Lord Karon.”

At the back of the castle, inside a secret government office, dark brown wallpaper, a red carpet across the floor and a magical orange sphere gently illuminating the room.

A woman, sitting at a mahogany work desk, which fits the modern, calm space, stands up and bows deeply when she sees the man.

Her voice is inorganic and lacking in inflection, but after listening to it for so long, you begin to accept it as part of her personality. In fact, that’s what happened to the man.

She is the only character in the game that has AI for conversation.

She is the victim of a poorly patched voice system that was implemented by the game’s management as a last-ditch effort to allow you to make your favorite character your second-in-command.

She is the only person he can talk to and the only person who understands him……. She is the one who controls the internal affairs that have supported the man until now.

“Oh, good morning.”

Karon waves his hand with a flutter and motions for her to sit down. He looks at the woman again. She is about the age of a human being, in her early twenties. She has long, straight, light-blue hair that flows down her back, and she wears the same purple black military uniform as his.

The man who spent four days creating her is very fond of her neat face, which looks like an expensive bisque doll, and he is also very fond of her tight-skirted military uniform, which fits her slender, slim body.

The rank 9 variant called [Anomalis], she was his most beloved subordinate.

“How are you, Rushka?”

“No problem, my Lord.”

The beautiful demon, Rushka, replies in an inorganic voice that shows no hint of emotion.

How could it be? He laughed at himself for asking, even though he knew it was obvious.

Even with a built-in conversational AI, her behaviour is predetermined, and she never once uses her own judgement to express words, feelings or actions.

The only thing she does is nod her head in agreement, but after all, she’s only pretending.

He knows, but she is one of the people who has served him since the beginning. Perhaps it is just the time that has passed in vain that makes him feel so endeared.

To be honest, there’s not much he can do about Rushka, who stares at him blankly and doesn’t move a muscle.

He had designated her as his second-in-command, but all she does is handle simple quests that don’t need to be done by Karon himself. If there are any minor domestic issues, they are taken care of by her before they are reported to him.

He’s sure the aim is to reduce the amount of quests the player has to deal with so that it doesn’t become routine, but in the end it doesn’t change the fact that there’s nothing else for the player to do, in fact it reduces the amount of quests and makes it easier to get bored.

He wouldn’t say it was a bad idea, but it probably wasn’t a very good one either. The only thing he can appreciate is that he now has someone to talk to, even if it is reminiscent of the machines of a bygone era.