Some days I wonder what it would be like to sit down and discuss history with people who actually knew who I was.

Then I remember that would be pretty awkward because of my strange interaction with life and death. For any given historical event, there’s a bit less than even chance that I was dead while it happened.

Excerpt from my journal

------

Joseph the [Paladin], a devoted member of the church and protector of the Saint, pressed his ear to the door.

“Quiet!” he hissed to the other [Paladins] crowding around him. “I can’t hear!”

“What are they saying?” Lucas asked.

“I’ll tell you once you all shut up!” Joseph hissed again.

However, he needn’t have asked for quiet as the next part of the argument was heard loud and clear.

“And I defeated the entire eastern front alone!” the [Demon Lord] shouted. “And then since that wasn’t enough, I killed the frickin’ [Necromancer] after he ascended to become a frickin’ lich!”

“Oh, you killed a single undead. Big deal!” the Saint shouted back. “I could have done the same with a single [Holy Cure]!”

“Oh, you think you’re such a bigshot now, [Hero]?” the [Demon Lord] continued. “Then fine! Prove it! Take me out then!”

“Maybe I will!”

“You don’t have the guts!”

There was a long pause.

“Are they… having a lover’s quarrel?” Lucas asked quietly.

System preserve us, I hope not.

However, any arguments were quickly cut off as all the [Paladins] present felt Sarah preparing to attack through the [Enhanced Party].

“Quick! We have to help her!” Joseph called out as he burst through the door.

The others followed suit, but none of them need have bothered.

All they could do was bear witness as the Saint unleashed the largest [Cure] spell any of them had seen… and the [Demon Lord] was laid low.

System: Hero Sarah has slain the Demon Lord! The realm will have relative peace for the next 50 years. Demon morale will be reduced for the duration

Before any of them could ask what led to that turn of events, the [Hero] rushed over to the [Demon Lord] on shaky and off-balanced legs.

“Titus!” she shouted as she shook his limp body and cried over him. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry! Please! Wake up!”

“Let’s… give her some space,” Joseph said as he motioned the rest of the party back, and they all walked out without another word.

“She did it. She actually did it,” Lucas said.

Well… mostly without a word.

The gathered party glared at him as Joseph gathered his thoughts.

“I think it best that the world doesn’t learn what happened here today,” Joseph finally whispered. “If the entirety of Placeholder hears about the Saint’s and [Demon Lord’s]… complicated… relationship, I can’t think of anything good that would come of it.”

“Should we all swear it?” Edwin asked.

Joseph nodded. “Yes. Let’s do that. We take what happened here to our graves.”

------

Meanwhile, I was back to floating in a sea of nothingness.

Well, can’t say I expected Sarah to just off me like that. I chuckled humorlessly. Note to self. Avoid [Heroes]. They’re terrible for my health.

I was trying to avoid thinking about how I would spend those next 50 years when I got another surprise.

System : Magic, All perk detected. Activate Enhanced Scrying Array?

System : Magic, Advanced perk detected. Activate Temporal Speed Controls?

AltSys? Is that you?

I waited a few moments but got no response.

Right, can’t be. Must be more automated messages.

I was a bit suspicious of those options since they were things that my second least favorite admin setup, but I didn’t have anything else to help me kill time.

Sure. Activate Enhanced Scrying Array.

All around me, screens lit up and began showing various places in Placeholder.

However, when I say all around me, I mean it. They were behind me and even above and below me. The part that nearly broke my brain was that I could somehow see in all those directions.

Stop! Stop! I screamed mentally.

The screens flickered and died.

I took a deep internal breath before continuing. Can you activate that just in one section? Like… just in front of me like a row of computer monitors or something?

A much more manageable (and directed) set of screens appeared.

Better.

One immediately caught my eye. It was Sarah crying on the ground, alone.

My body’s not there. I realized. Hmm. If my body doesn’t stick around, maybe that’s why I got to keep my inventory last time I died.

However, after focusing on the one screen for a bit, it gave me audio. That wasn’t exactly welcome as all it did was let me hear her sobbing.

So, I decided to look around and see how everyone else was reacting to my death.

Sam was the first one I looked to, and she wasn’t taking it well.

“You could have at least let me go first this time,” she said as she squeezed David Junior to her chest.

Lindsey seemed to be taking it a bit better, but it was hard to tell how much of that was a front so she would still appear strong in front of her people.

She called for a guard, made some gestures, and then rose and walked out of her tent.

The entire throng of Besti gathered surprisingly fast.

Oh, she’s making an announcement? I focused in to get audio.

“My people, today we mourn the passing of the [Demon Lord] who brought great aid to our people, Titus. May the next [Demon Lord] hold fast to the same bonds of friendship we forged with this one.” She paused as she and everyone there pulled out various containers of water. “To Titus!” she proclaimed as she poured the slightest bit into the sand.

“To Titus!” they answered back.

So, that’s how they honor the dead? I asked. Honestly, I was pretty touched by the showing. Water was precious to those people.

When the announcement was complete, Lindsey went and found Sam, and the two grieved together.

After that, I decided that was enough of Besti for the moment, so I went through the relatively short list of people I knew who were still alive.

Richard, Ethan, and Samuel from Perfume Jury already had their own screens, so I was able to find them quickly. They were all in Vir, and it seemed like one big party was going on throughout that entire country. However, they didn’t seem like they were taking part.

I had to admit. I was a little bit happy that they didn’t join in on celebrating my death.

And then there’s this A-hole. I thought as I observed Nick, their fourth member, drinking and partying it up.

As much fun as watching an old cat-eared man drink to the point of vomiting, I figured out how to swap out his screen.

Wait. Who’s that? I asked as I took a closer look at the new scry. The man was alone in the wilderness and didn’t seem to be celebrating my death. Instead, he looked pretty angry. Or at least I assumed that was why he was shouting with a raised fist.

Audio suddenly cut in. “- my chance for vengeance from me, but I swear this to you, [Demon Lord]!” the man shouted. “If I can’t take revenge, then my son shall! And if not him, his son after him! The line of Dave shall not end until we have laid you low ourselves! I will-”

Dave [Son of Dave]. I finally recognized him. The funny thing was that he still had the dave I’d ordered to guard him.

I put him on mute and thought for a moment.

How did he figure out where I was? I asked. I ignored all of the screens for a bit and just thought. Sarah took months to track me down, and that was with a tracking spell. Though, I guess she was pretty slow because her party had to carry her everywhere.

But what kind of class is [Son of Dave] anyway? It must be an advanced class, or he would’ve never made it that far, but it still doesn’t make sense. [Knight], [Berserker], [Warrior], heck even [Martial Artist] all say what they do.

However, as I listed those out, I realized that one of those was not like the other.

Wait. [Martial Artist] wasn’t an option for any of us at Comic-Con. I mentally frowned. Lindsey did have [Monk] later on, but does that mean that… The System can just add new advanced classes on the fly? I didn’t like the sound of that. If that’s the case, then what would [Son of Dave] be besides a class devoted to seeking revenge against the [Demon Lord]? And would some type of tracking skill be that out of the question for a class like that?

I looked back over at the son of a Dave that was still railing against me.

You… might become a bigger problem than I thought.

Speaking of people railing against me, I also decided to look at Gertrude. She also wasn’t happy that she didn’t get to kick my butt personally, and it looked like she was taking her frustrations out by having an all versus one brawl at a tavern full of [Berserkers].

You’re also gonna be a problem next life, aren’t you? I asked no one in particular.

However, I had plenty of time to worry about those particular headaches, so I decided to finally try out the second option that AltSys’ automation had left for me.

Activate Temporal Controls.

System : Limited Temporus skill detected. Temporal Controls limited between 1X and 10X speed.

Time magic skill name, get. [Temporus]. I zeroed in on the first part of the message. Now I just have to unlock the skill… I think I do that by getting another [Temporus] spell? Anyway, get the skill, grind it to 10, chug approximately a million mana potions, and cast the time travel spell. That was ignoring the fact that I still had to figure out the actual spell I wanted to cast, but it helped me have a more positive outlook when I reduced it to such a simple checklist.

Then I finally noticed the “limitations.”

Holy frick! Ten times speed with no levels in the skill!? How is that legal?

However, I figured it out pretty quickly. What’s the easiest way to magically make something seem ten times faster? Cut your own speed to 1/10th! In other words, I was currently capable of slowing myself down a ton using whatever interface AltSys had left me. However, I couldn’t maintain speeding myself up enough for it to be relevant.

Either way, I immediately bumped it up to 10 times speed and watched the screens blur by. I was glad that I would only be spending the equivalent of 5 years (plus however much time I spent at normal speed) instead of 50.

Ten times speed with no sound was much more tolerable to watch Sarah in. So, I watched in ultra speed as the [Paladins] came and finally got her up off the ground. Then, I watched her claim the obelisk, debate upgrades for a few seconds (at least, from my view), and leave.

The biggest surprise was that Sarah decided to walk instead of being carried around.

A part of me was content to leave everything running at that speed until my next respawn. However, as time went on, I grew increasingly frustrated with the scrying screens.

Slow down! I finally ordered. They obediently dropped to normal speed. No! Not that slow! You stupid piece of junk!

While mentally snapping at an inanimate spell matrix was not the craziest thing I had done in my life, it still gave me pause.

Deactivate scry. I commanded.

One by one, the screens winked out. I could already feel my irritation decreasing.

Overstimulated. I thought to myself. I’m trying to process too much stuff at once, and it’s making me grumpy.

So, I just floated there in the void. No sights, no sounds, no feeling. Just my thoughts.

This is actually kinda nice. I thought.

-------

Somewhere between 5 and 50 years in sensory deprivation would definitely have been enough to drive me mad… again.

However, with the ability to activate the scrying array whenever I wanted, I had gotten rid of the critical thing that would have turned sensory deprivation into torture.

Also, I had been harboring suspicions about the [Ageless] perk for a while, but I think that first stretch of being awake and waiting for respawn was what clinched it.

That perk was screwing with my perception of time.

For the same reason that I could spend six months trying the same tutorial boss fight over and over again without major issue, or go dragon hunting for 14 years straight (even if I was insane at the time), I was completely fine watching Placeholder’s equivalent of reality TV for 5+ years.

Nah, reality TV’s definitely scripted, so that’s a bad comparison.

Maybe the news?

Not that either…

More than a dozen simultaneous sped up copies of the Truman Show?

Yeah, I guess I’ll go with that.

Not to say I didn’t slow things down during the exciting bits.

Those primarily involved Sarah. I got to watch her be welcomed back as… well… a [Hero]. There was a feast, an award ceremony, and a profoundly unhappy beastborn woman who barely kept up her façade.

After that, things were quiet for a bit until her group heard about an undead obelisk in the deathlands that had been missed.

I had laughed about Sarah as a combatant right before she killed me.

However, I wouldn’t have laughed if I saw that version of Sarah come at me.

Frailties fixed. Level 25. And shining like the dawn with a new skill, [Radiance].

Or, I guess, in her case, [Holy Radiance]. Yeah, her broken [Holy] skill even combined with that.

The best I could tell since I never caught her explaining it to anyone was that it was a toggleable area heal that healed only allies… and the undead.

And probably would have healed and therefore done damage to me, but that’s also just conjecture.

Either way, when they got near the corrupted obelisk, she just activated [Holy Radiance] and strolled up to it. Any zombie that got too close was immolated in a matter of seconds. And yes, that included the higher-leveled ones like flesh or bone horrors.

Have I mentioned that level 25 [Heroes] are kinda scary? If not, I definitely should have.

Despite Sarah’s newfound power making me want to make a brown stain in my then non-existent pants, it was honestly the best TV I had to watch. The only other things of note that happened in the first few years were… well… the funerals.

I got to watch over Sam as she passed from old age. With the help of a few brave [Monks], her family even made it to the Oasis to be by her side. So, she went surrounded by family, her best friend, and with David Junior clutched to her chest.

Honestly, the only thing more I could have asked for would have been for me to also be there with her at the end. She had been my closest friend, even if Lindsey had claimed that spot from her side.

I was incapable of crying in that state, but that did not stop me from grieving. I kept the scrying array off for a few days after that.

A part of me just felt like giving up for a while, but I knew I couldn’t do that. I had people to save, and I convinced myself that perhaps the next time around, I could find a way to keep Sam united with her bestie until they were both old and grey.

Speaking of her bestie, Lindsey was the last of our party to go.

While I had been touched by the display of mourning when Lindsey announced my death, it didn’t even compare to hers.

There was weeping, families embracing each other for comfort, and entire jars of precious water spilled on the ground.

Her people had truly loved her.

I was initially a bit jealous if I’m being honest. However, when I compared the decades Lindsey spent with them to my couple of years, I realized I was being a complete and total idiot.

However, the deaths didn’t stop with her. The last funerals of note were for Backroom Allegor-… No, I think I’ll give them the respect they deserve just this one time.

All four members of Doom Fury passed as well.

Richard went while he was on one last adventure. He and his party explored the west, looking for new monsters, zones, or just about anything. I think that he was hoping to go with a sword in his hand, but the System had other plans for him. They didn’t find any foes that were a big enough challenge, and he passed during the night while they were on the trail (on his birthday, just like any other age-related death).

Samuel and Ethan also died of old age, but they were surrounded by their families. Honestly, I didn’t even know they had families, but Samuel’s half-dwarf children and Ethan’s half-elf children made that abundantly clear. The Mage’s guild erected statues in the capital cities of Vir and Dryadal for Ethan, and the church of System throughout the entire world proclaimed days of mourning for Samuel.

As for Nick… well, to be honest, I never liked Nick. I didn’t bother finding out when he kicked the bucket or how the thieves guild responded to it. I just knew that the next time I tried to [Scry] him based on a random whim, I couldn’t.

It may have been a bit callous of me, but I have to wonder if the other reason I disliked him is that he brought up memories of another [Rogue]. And I desperately wanted to keep those memories under wraps.

Either way, all of them lived nearly to the age cap. Whether it was a perk of being a high-level adventurer or if they were all just too stubborn to die, I wasn’t sure.

Speaking of being too stubborn to die, Gertrude, the [Berserk Queen] of Gert, was still alive and kicking. Except for the fact that she favored punches over kicks most of the time, but that’s beside the point.

Whatever bug had caused Gertrude to look like she was in her twenties, even when she was well over 100 years old, was still going strong.

I was reasonably confident that she was “immortal,” at least as the fey measured that sort of thing. She would never die from age at that point.

However, she was also immortal by my reckoning as well. If she couldn’t die of old age, she would only die from combat. And good frickin’ luck killing Gertrude in battle.

Speaking of immortals, I also tried to sneak a peek at the fey during my time respawning.

Let’s just say that wasn’t my brightest idea.

-------

I wonder what Primavia is up to? I asked during one of my rare stints of going normal speed through time. It was a random thought, but I was allowed to have my share of those during my long stint in the land of yet-to-respawn.

I tried to switch one of the screens over to her, but it kept scrying random locations instead.

Oh? A challenge? Bring it on!

So, I played a rousing game of “hunt down the fey forest.” First, I just moved the scry around all over the place looking for them, but I got bored of that quickly. It quickly devolved into “zoom out as far as I could and then look for forests in suspicious places.”

There you are! I thought when I finally found it. The scry started freaking out once again, but I somehow managed to force it in to take a peek at Primavia.

“I bethought some daw wast attempting to [scry] me and mine own court,” she stated as she stared directly at the spell. “Thee shall payeth f’r yond insolence!”

Maybe this was a bad idea. I should-

“[Scry Lock]!” she cast.

Before I could pull out of there, she grabbed hold of the magic and locked it in place. I no longer had control of that screen.

However, the damage was worse than I thought. I didn’t just lose control of that one screen. I could no longer move any of the screens.

“Cometh sisters!” Primavia called. “Gaze at the daw yond hast did dare to magically intrude on our domain.”

Fairies flew over to mock and jeer at the [Scry] spell while I was helpless.

“Mine own queen, if ’t be true the scryer is an intruder, then peradventure we shouldst bringeth him hither in person,” one of the fey said to the [Queen].

I… think she said they should bring me to them?

“A grand idea! Track the toad down, and we shalt has’t our excit’ment with him!” the [Queen] announced.

Primavia began casting as the other fey began muttering and heckling each other.

“I shalt beest the first to track him down!”

“Nay! Thee couldn’t trace a [Scry] if ’t be true t wast from one of thy ears to the other. I shall track down the interloper first!”

I didn’t know if the fey would be able to find me, but I didn’t like the idea of sticking around to find out.

Deactivate scrying array! I mentally screamed.

System : Error deactivating array. Magical control sequence subverted. Searching protocols for solution

“This spell hast the touch of the fey all ov’r t! This isn’t a prank by one of thee jesters, is’t?”

A chorus of nays answered the grumpy fairy.

“Nay matter, I am close to breaking the sorcery. Then the worm shall beest flogg’d f’r his impertinence.”

Any day now!

System : Protocol found. Applying “play recorded message”

System : Well, if you’re seeing this, you accidentally picked a fight with the fey while you were still respawning. That was pretty dumb. Anyway, you’ll learn your lesson after what comes next. Best of luck!

“Mine own queen I has’t locat’d the interloper!” one of the fairies exclaimed as she rushed over to Primavia.

Uh oh.

“Then we shalt meeteth visage to visage!” Primavia pronounced.

No, no, no!

“[Grand Teleport]!” she cast.

I felt the world shift, and I was surrounded by blinding light and a cacophony of chattering fey.

Then I felt pain in my entire existence.

It’s safe to say that my… soul? spirit?... whatever I was in that disembodied state didn’t take kindly to being brought back into the land of the living.

I didn’t process a single word the fey said for the next bit. I was too busy having no mouth but needing to scream.

Test. Test. Can thee heareth me apparition? I heard Primavia’s voice in my mind.

Yes. Was all I sent back at first.

Valorous then thee-

My thoughts spilled out rapid-fire. SendMeBack, sonOfABirch, pleaseMakeItStop. Wait. YouCan’tDoThisToMe. I’mAGuest. It’sMeTitus.

Primavia was taken aback for a moment, but then I could feel the glee radiating from her.

T is to thy misfortune yond the rules of hospitality apply not to the unliving, apparition. She gloated. So, thither is naught yond keeps me from scattering thee still into oblivion.

I didn’t quite understand everything, but “scatter thee into oblivion” made the rest of the meaning pretty clear.

Wait! No! Don’t do this! I fought through the pain and began pleading for my life. I had no idea what would happen if I died again while in that state.

And wherefore shouldst I not? she asked. Thou art a threat to me and mine own people.

I don’t have to be… I’ll swear it! A [System-Binding Oath] not to harm you!

Oh? Yond is forsooth an offer. However, it is still of nay benefit to me. What else shall thee giveth?

I didn’t have a clue what a fairy queen could possibly want. So, in my pain, I chose perhaps the worst possible option.

I asked.

What else do you want?

A single fav’r of mine own choosing. Thee wilt doth it immediately once I asketh t of thee.

A single unspecified favor to the [Queen] of the fey. That immediately rang alarm bells.

I can’t-

Then t is a pity yond this is the last we shalt meeteth, Titus. The thought came over with a sneer.

I could feel a gathering storm of magic, so I did what I had to. I caved in.

-----

I swore the oath Primavia wanted. I would be unable to harm any of the fey, and I would have to do a single favor that she would specify at a later date.

She then “graciously” teleported me back to my void.

All things told, it could have gone a lot worse. It also drove home how much more advanced the fey were in magic than I was.

Anyway, after learning the hard way never to try to [Scry] the fey, and taking a few days to recuperate, I went back to having Sarah as my primary source of entertainment.

One of my favorite memories of that time was after she had gotten over the worst of her grief… and she went out and ran.

The sheer joy on her face as she could run laps around all but other high-level adventurers was beautiful.

She didn’t get to be carefree for long, though.

She was soon busy with what I can best describe as being a “political activist.”

Shockingly, it turns out that her “saving the world from the [Demon Lord]” didn’t magically turn back decades of propaganda and racism against the beastborn people.

Not to say that it was worthless. It did do a number on the inquisition as there was zero doubt in everyone’s mind that Sarah had killed me. To attempt to imply otherwise would be to go against the words of the System itself.

So, the inquisition lost most of its steam, but most of the beastborn in Vir were still basically peasants and were just as easily marginalized for other reasons.

Thus, the protests. At first, they were nonviolent ones: Sarah and a group of people protesting taxation rates of all things.

And that took some digging to find out what she was even talking about. I had to spend quite a few days just listening in on various conversations in the castle before I finally felt I had things figured out.

The answer?

Vir was approaching flat-broke.

A protracted war against the undead required paying soldiers. Losing lives to the undead horde decreased the number of taxpayers. And the biggest issue of all was the loss of zones. When you have to pay a certain amount of gold in upkeep to the System, and the only reliable way to generate new coinage is to hunt monsters, losing areas where monsters spawn is a debilitating blow to the economy.

Not that Sarah and the other protestors got that background. Vir failed them twice over by acting like everything was okay and by putting the squeeze on the lower class instead of across the board.

So, despite Sarah’s best efforts to avoid it, things devolved into riots.

And once a cycle of violence gets started, it’s hard to get it to stop.

The [King] quelled riots with the army, continued to spread propaganda about the evils of the beastborn, and just generally made things worse for everyone involved, at least based on my utterly biased perception of events.

However, there ended up being a solution to all of that. The best I can trace it back to was to one solitary day when Sarah was once again peacefully protesting.

A human man threw a brick at her, which, while threatening in our world, was a pretty laughable attack for a level 25 [Hero].

Either way, he said something along the lines of “If you don’t like Vir so much, why don’t you leave?”

The thing that still makes me laugh every time I look back on it?

The madwoman actually did it. She called in some help from Dryadal, and the beastborn of Vir just up and left.

Now, that’s definitely an oversimplification of things. Especially since it was a decade-long logistical nightmare that would later become known as “The Great Beastborn Exodus.”

Ironically the residents of Vir were glad to see them go. From their point of view, they were getting rid of “freaks” and “mutts.”

However, it was just the everyday residents that were celebrating. It was about that time that the [Nobles] and [King] realized they’d fricked up. In an “I will never be able to financially recover from this” kind of way. They made some half-hearted efforts to get the beastborn to stay, but any attempts were crushed under the wheels of their own propaganda machine.

So, by the collective will of nearly everyone in Vir, the beastborn left.

Not that they did so alone.

Sarah traveled back and forth from Dryadal to Vir a lot in those days, leading the caravans of people. She always had a comforting word or a [Restore] spell to the people making the trek. Not to mention that being in a caravan with the [Hero] did wonders for morale.

In other words, Sarah was a big reason that people were making the plunge at all.

That’s probably why some idiot in high standing in Vir tried to have her assassinated.

They tried to poison her. The greatest healer Placeholder would ever know, and they tried to poison her.

I still can’t keep a straight face when I think of that.

However, trying to have the [Hero] killed is kind of an international incident. Dryadal put as much pressure on Vir to investigate the matter as they could, and the church of Vir should have had Sarah’s back. Unfortunately, the new head of the church in Vir was a spineless toady of the [King]. So, that combined with Dryadal not having that much they could use to hold leverage over Vir meant that not much was done.

Speaking of Dryadal, they held up through that period much better than Vir, especially from a money standpoint. A big part of that was due to their fortress in the east. It attracted monster attacks from my eastern zones nearly once a week, and it was fully manned at all times so that no monsters would go any further. In addition, having a massive supply of hostile zones to the east that adventurers, or reserve army battalions, could go to farm monsters was a huge boon.

So, even though Dryadal dealt with several of the same problems as Vir, especially the casualties for the war with the [Necromancer], they came through it mostly unscathed.

Meanwhile, with the lower-class population devastated and their financial situation in ruins, Vir finally cracked.

That was the first time that the Scrying Array slowed me down by itself.

----

System : Warning. Major event detected. Deactivating temporal controls

Wait. What’s this?

All of my scrying array screens flipped over to show a single view. It was the throne room of Vir, which I had gotten decently acquainted with during my many hours of scrolling around.

“My liege,” an armored man said as he knelt before the throne.

“Rise, [General] Isaac Graham,” [King] Vir replied. “This must be a matter of some urgency if you have come here personally.”

“It is indeed sire. It is a matter of urgency and secrecy,” Isaac answered gravely.

The [King] motioned his dozen or so [Guards] to leave. Once they had, he continued. “Do not keep me in suspense then. What is it?”

“It is a message for your ears only, and I worry about eavesdroppers.”

The [King] motioned him forward.

Isaac went up the steps and approached the throne. He leaned forward and whispered in the [King’s] ear.

“I bear a message from the people,” Isaac whispered. Fortunately, the scry auto zoomed in so that I could hear him. “It is time for your pathetic reign to end.”

He pulled his sword out of his inventory, and [King] Vir’s eyes went wide.

“[Guards]! Help!” the [King] screamed as the blade plunged into his chest.

However, this was Placeholder. The blade came out clean and with no visible wound. Only to be plunged back in again and again.

The [Guards] rushed into the throne room, but it was too late by the time they got there. After the fourth and fatal strike, Isaac’s sword came away with blood.

He carelessly wiped it off on the body before turning to face the [Guards].

“[Halt]!” they called.

I wondered why they didn’t rush him, but taking a closer look at their quivering arms and bodies, I realized that [General] Isaac must have been a higher level than I expected.

“Gentlemen, you are warriors in your own right,” Isaac said casually. “So you must understand why this was needed.” He put his sword away and walked down the steps to stare each [Guard] in the eye. “The [Nobles] and the [King] have sat back while we have gone to war. We have paid the price in blood for this kingdom’s safety, while they have sat back and grown fat on the taxes they have stolen from the powerless. Why should the reign of this land not be in the hands of those who have fought for it?”

“But, we swore our loyalty to the [King]!” one [Guard] shouted.

“You swore your loyalty to the position, not to the man,” Isaac countered. “And am I not better suited for that role?” He strolled back up to the throne, shoved [King] Vir’s lifeless body off it, and then sat down. He spread his arms wide. “Join me! With me as [King], we can usher in a new era of prosperity for this country!”

About half of the [Guards] looked at each other and then knelt.

“We pledge our loyalty to [King] Graham!” they shouted.

“Very good,” Isaac replied. “And the rest of you?”

“We would rather die than serve you!” one brave [Guard] shouted.

“Ah, that would be a pity,” Isaac replied with a shake of his head. He gave a sharp whistle, and after several tense seconds, dozens of soldiers in full armor burst into the room. “But it can most certainly be arranged,” he said as each standing [Guard] was surrounded by blades and spears.

The remaining [Guards] went down to a knee and pledged fealty one by one.

“Now, for my first act as [King], we must purge the rest of that traitorous lineage from Placeholder,” Isaac stated. “Do not let a single one escape!”

-----

I could see why that was detected as a major event. It’s not every day that you see a new faction be born.

The Gram Military Justice Council. Yeah, somehow, military dictatorships always seem to end up with names that seem a bit ironic.

However, just because a new faction was created didn’t mean the old one was gone. That, in turn, led to the Vir Civil War. One side had questionable loyalty to a lineage that had mostly just fricked things up, and the other had the army.

Yeah, it could hardly even be called a fight.

A [Prince] or two did manage to escape and tried to resist the coup, but the [Guards] they were able to bring to the fight were heavily outmatched in both skill and number.

They were defeated soundly, which, if anything, just made [King] Graham even more popular.

And the new [King] was already wildly popular with the people. That was probably due to a confluence of factors. The people’s built-up resentment towards [Nobles], the “heroics” of the army protecting them from the undead, and perhaps the most important was that he led the military from the front.

Isaac was no armchair [General], and I mentally added him to my list of people I should do my best not to get on the wrong side of.

The war was finished in a relative flash, and Vir was now known as Gram, with the capital renamed to match.

In a rare move for someone playing politics, it did seem like Isaac did his best to improve the conditions after that.

However, the main problem was that the country was still nearing flat-broke even after liquidating most of the [Noble’s] assets.

His solution to that was not the one that I expected, but that was more a failing on my part to notice the obvious.

If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. If all you have is an army… well… everything looks like “room to expand.”

With all of the ill-will the previous regime had built up towards the beastborn, I was sure that Dryadal would be their target. However, that was also a bad guess.

It turns out it’s pretty easy to pivot hatred towards beastborn into hatred into pretty much anyone non-human. That, and pushing the narrative that the dwarves simply sat back and watched as the undead invaded, made it easy for the people to buy in to pressuring them.

Not that he needed much buy-in. Isaac was in charge of the army, so he could basically send them off where he wanted.

And that’s how the “Gram Military Justice Council” first expanded into Pumil.

Honestly, I had to give him credit as a military leader. His army tactics were solid and seemed to have taken cues from the Romans, which he may have heard from an isekaied grandfather. He used the same shield and spear formations they did but took them a step further by dividing his entire army into parties. The leader of each party was then in charge of keeping track of everyone’s stamina and health. Then it was a simple matter to have his soldiers rotate whenever any of them started getting low on a given resource.

However, just because you’re practically invincible to arrows and calvary charges doesn’t mean you’ve automatically won (quick sidenote about calvary charges, they were much less helpful in Placeholder since horses had less HP than the moderate to high level people riding them). So, that’s when he followed it up with the second part.

Siege warfare.

Specifically, magical siege warfare.

Apparently, if you get a dozen [Mages] and bump the cast time up to be measured in hours, you can get some truly impressive fireballs.

By the time Pumil sued for peace, Gram had gobbled up swathes of their southern territory and forced them to pay tribute to end the war and declare a peace treaty for the next couple of decades.

It was a complete victory, but it wouldn’t have been nearly as easy without several key pieces of planning that went into it.

First, they took over the Faroff Forest dungeon to train [Soldiers]. Yeah, [Soldier] as an advanced class, that’s another related part of their success.

Anyway, they stationed multiple mages there with all the elements covered, kept them all in a party that didn’t get the kill, and then funneled through 10 [Soldiers] at a time to get the last hit on the boss. Apparently, 10 was the max size of a party. I don’t know when that got set or if it was a patch.

However, a couple of levels in key places can really make or break an army, which made a huge difference.

Second, besides leveling, they also had other training. Those formations don’t make themselves… well, unless you have [Rapid Formation Change], but I guess Isaac didn’t like spamming that whenever it came off cooldown.

Either way, the increased discipline of the army definitely didn’t hurt.

And last, but most important, they had to make sure that Drydal didn’t interfere since Drydal’s army was also experienced. For that, it was pretty straightforward. He just had Gertrude keep them busy.

Okay, there was a bit more to establishing a Gram-Gert alliance than just “hey Gertrude, do you wanna fight Dryadal for us?” but I would be lying if I said there was much more.

Dryadal didn’t lose ground, though, because it had a resident Saint to turn that fight into the “unstoppable spear” vs. the “invulnerable shield.” And that’s a fight that goes to the shield in Placeholder, at least this time.

I would have thought that Sarah would run out of MP first, but it turned out that she and the few [Paladins] that remained with her were capable of making even Gertrude run out of steam. Or, at the very least, SP.

Neither side gained anything, and they agreed to a grudging peace.

However, speaking of Sarah, she had her own bit of drama to deal with.

It turns out that the people of Dryadal weren’t exactly fond of humans. It also turned out that more than half of Sarah’s [Paladins] were human.

Yeah, all but three of her party members left before the war started. Fortunately, that meant that she finally had space in her party to recruit some adventurers who could deal damage.

She gave several people a try, but one of the few that stuck around was a young woman: an elven [Rogue] named Faylen Sarrel.

I didn’t like her much, but she seemed pretty dedicated to helping Sarah out, and the two grew close, despite an age gap that I guessed to be about 30 years.

Either way, they stuck together through the war and even more through the peace afterward. It was a bit shocking, but there ended up coming a point where there wasn’t that much for Sarah to do.

With no undead to kill, Sarah spent a lot of time healing people, but with her crazy level in [Animae], her [Holy] skill, and the mana pool that being level 25 gave her, it wasn’t an exaggeration to say that she ran entire cities out of patients.

So, she got to go out and have adventures. She visited the Besti tribe in the desert, went with some [Cartographers] to map uncharted areas in the east, and even went as far as the eastern boundary of the world.

Meanwhile, Faylen was by her side the entire time, which irritated the crud out of me.

A big part of why I didn’t like her was that Faylen kept pestering Sarah to name her as her “successor,” which I learned meant that she would become [Hero] when Sarah died.

Sarah flatly refused every time Faylen asked. Well, right up until it was nearing time for me to be reborn yet again…

------

I watched through the scrying array as Sarah and Faylen chatted by themselves on their adventures. Once again, Faylen brought up being named successor, and I did the out-of-body equivalent of rolling my eyeballs.

“You know, every time you ask me that, it sounds like you’re worried I’m going to die,” Sarah chuckled.

“But accidents can still happen!” Faylen protested. “And, well… you are getting pretty old.”

Sarah gave her a flat look. “Thanks for the reminder, but you’re not exactly a spring chicken yourself.” She shook her head. “You don’t have to worry. I plan on living right up to 100 years old. And even if I don’t, I trust System will make the right choice for the next [Hero]. I see no reason to interfere.”

“But what if something goes wrong with your next fight with the [Demon Lord]? Wouldn’t it make more sense to have the next [Hero] ready to step in?”

Huh, I can’t believe Sarah still hasn’t told her. I thought as I continued watching the pair through the scry.

Sarah sighed. “Fay, do you swear you will keep what I’m about to tell you a secret?” she asked.

“Of course,” Faylen replied.

“No, I mean it. Swear it on oath to System.”

Faylen’s eyes widened, but she complied. “I solemnly swear to System I will tell no one what you’re about to tell me.”

Ah, now for the big reveal…

“There won’t be a next fight with Titus because there doesn’t have to be,” Sarah stated. “As long as he’s in his right mind, he’s perfectly reasonable… well, except for how stubborn he is.”

Gee, thanks.

Faylen’s eyes narrowed. “Maybe I misheard you, but it sounds like you and Titus-“

“Were friends, yes,” Sarah replied.

“Then you’re a traitor!” Faylen shouted. She pulled out her knife and plunged it into Sarah.

Sarah, meanwhile, grabbed her hand and held it in place, with the knife still sticking into her body.

“[Heal],” she cast.

“I trusted you!” Faylen snarled as she tried in vain to wrench her knife away. “But you’re just another traitor!”

“We’ve known each other for decades,” Sarah said quietly. “You know me better than that.”

However, it was then that the rest of Sarah’s party showed up to find out what was causing the commotion.

Sarah finally let Faylen go, and she stomped away. “I thought I did,” Faylen muttered to herself.

Surprisingly, there were few repercussions for that on either side. The only difference was that they both gave each other the silent treatment for the rest of their trip back.

Aside from that, you could hardly tell anything was wrong. And once they were back, Faylen even asked if they could go somewhere away from prying eyes to talk it over one more time.

However, Sarah didn’t catch the murderous looks that Faylen shot at her back. She didn’t see the sketchy nighttime meeting Faylen had with another [Rogue]. And she couldn’t hear my pleading with her not to go.

And that was how the [Hero] and a [Rogue] ended up going on a countryside stroll together one evening.

System : Warning. Major event detected. Deactivating temporal controls

There was no change to my scry I was watching. The entire array focused on the pair as I screamed into the void.

No! Sarah! RUN!

“I’ve given it a lot of thought,” Faylen said. “And I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have attacked you.”

“Water under the bridge,” Sarah replied. “It wasn’t that much HP, and I shouldn’t have sprung something that big on you out of the blue.”

The two stopped as Faylen continued. “However, I think this means you really need to name me your successor.”

Sarah rolled her eyes. “This again? I told you-“

Faylen held up her hands. “Listen. Whoever becomes [Hero] after you won’t know about the [Demon Lord], but if it’s me, then you can be sure I’ll treat him as he deserves.”

Sarah hmmed in thought as I continued my useless screaming at her.

“I suppose it would be good to know that he would be looked after when I’m gone…” Sarah replied. “Do you swear you’ll take care of him?”

“I solemnly swear by System that I will take care of the [Demon Lord],” the [Rogue] replied with a false smile.

“Well… I suppose in that case….” Sarah cleared her throat. “As [Hero] of Placeholder, I hereby declare Faylen Sarrel to be my successor. May she uphold the ideals of a [Hero] as both Jake and I strove to do.”

“And that’s all I needed,” Faylen said with a wicked grin. Her knife flashed out and cut Sarah across the chest.

“What are you doing!?” Sarah screamed more out of shock than actual pain.

“Taking my revenge,” Faylen sneered as she took Sarah to the ground. “The [Demon Lord] took everything from me, and I will be the one to kill him!”

However, Sarah didn’t even put up a struggle, and that’s when I finally recognized what Faylen had done. Her weapon was poisoned with the same scorpion venom that Nick had tried to use on me. Sarah was stunned, and she didn’t have [Status Effect Resistance] to save her.

Sarah! No! I screamed along with the dying [Hero] as Faylen’s blade came down again and again.

All I could do was watch in horror as the knife came down dozens of times and eventually came back bloody, all the while Sarah begged her to stop.

However, the [Rogue] didn’t quit until the System itself confirmed Sarah’s death.

System: The Hero has been slain! The Hero’s chosen successor has been given the opportunity to take up the mantle

No! I cried. You can’t let this happen!

System : Tapping into System communications for Faylen Sarrel

System: Congratulations! You have been chosen as the new Hero of Placeholder!

I would have raged against the System, even more, had the following messages not shown up immediately.

System: You have shed innocent blood. You are unworthy of the mantel you have usurped. Fight and then perish as an enemy of Placeholder

System: Class has been changed to Fallen Hero

System: Faction has been changed to Demon Lord

And finally, one message that went out to the entire world.

System: Faylen Sarrel has fallen to the side of evil for her murder of the previous Hero! She will be forever clad in black and have red eyes, and a new Hero will be chosen to take her place!

True to the System’s message, I watched Faylen’s clothing and eye color change before my eyes.

A part of me felt a bit of catharsis seeing the shock and horror on Faylen’s face as she tried to process what had happened. The only other comfort I found was in planning revenge.

You’re dead. I thought as I activated ten times speed on time controls. I focused all the scrying array on her. I no longer cared about anything but seeing Sarah’s murderer dead as soon as possible.

The time passed quickly, and soon enough, I found myself staring back at the tutorial obelisk again.

The first message to greet me upon respawn was hardly unexpected, though I didn’t realize I was allowed to have repeats.

System: Wrath Form Set

I looked at the hulking figure in the reflection and spoke with a voice like gravel. “Faylen Sarrel… you’re going to suffer before you die.”