Who was the strongest [Hero] in the history of Placeholder? Depending on who you ask, you’ll get wildly different answers. Ask a human, and they’ll probably tell you Jake Smith, the first [Hero]. Ask a beastborn, and they will likely tell you Sarah Smith (though some may answer Garrik Valhice, but he is not the most common answer). Ask an elf, Elluin Hunter. A dwarf, Samson Stonebreaker.

From an objective standpoint, every single [Hero] has their points in favor.

Jake was a master swordsman whose [Sunder] ability could rend even the most formidable enemies in two with a single blow.

Sarah was an unparalleled healer capable of stymying entire undead hordes by herself.

Elluin’s life was cut short, but even in such a short time, he showed what he was capable of when he single-handedly stopped the Demon Lord of Wrath’s monstrous form that would have devastated Dryadal.

Garrik and Samson had little success against the [Demon Lord], but they still are household names in their respective nations because they saved their homes from annihilation.

However, there is one [Hero] that is an enigma. One [Hero] that no one is quite sure where to place in the ranking of [Heroes].

Kilroy Jenkins, the second [Hero] to be sent from Earth and the only [Hero] to defeat a [Demon Lord] in a single day (where the previous [Hero] had failed time and time again).

According to some, he was the most powerful [Hero] to ever walk Placeholder, which is why System saw fit to send him home because he was too powerful to remain here. According to others, he only beat the [Demon Lord] with underhanded tricks that were too sly to be done by a [Hero], so he was sent back in shame. And if you asked this [Historian]… well… [Hero] Jenkin’s greatest moment may have even been an accident.

- Excerpt from “A Ranking of Heroes”

-------

I was dead again. That had to be the first time I was ever relieved about that fact. I also found a bit of humor in it because at the end of the day…

I died to a frickin’ mop. I couldn’t help but laugh. The most powerful [Demon Lord] who had ever graced the land of Placeholder, and he had died to a wet floor and a mop.

I was glad to finally be rid of Pride, but it turned out that I wasn’t done dealing with the aftermath just yet.

System : Warning! Mana reserves at critical levels! Full regeneration might not be possible!

I mentally frowned. Is this because of the negative mana I died at?

System : Warning! Mana reserves at critical levels! Functionality may be disrupted!

Yeah, that doesn’t sound good. Is there anything I can do to fix the deficit or something?

System : Warning! Disabling consciousness module to save mana

What does that-

That was all I got out before I was engulfed in a dark and dreamless sleep… For what felt like all of five seconds.

System : Warning. Major event detected. Deactivating temporal controls

Whosa. What? I tried to blink my eyes to help wake up, but that obviously didn’t help much.

A static-y [Scry] sprung to life, with audio crackling in and out.

It was of the throne room that I had literally just died in.

“Well, that *static* somethin’,” Gertrude said. “I *static* believe a [Janitor] *static*.”

The entire room shared relieved looks. Then, one of them finally asked what I believe all of them were thinking.

“So, what do *static* now?”

That brought the room to a lull. I was a bit confused because I was sure they would get back to business as usual, just like they always did whenever I died.

I hadn’t realized the main difference between Pride form and the other lives. Pride had lived for a long time compared to the others. In fact, while I had paid next to no attention to my underlings while I was alive, I still knew enough to finally put 2 and 2 together.

None of the original people that were under me were still alive.

I lived almost 80 years. Most of the people in that room have never been alive when there wasn’t a [Demon Lord] ruling over them. Or at least, if you can count what I did as “ruling.”

Either way, Gertrude, the only one who had been alive from before all that, was the first to speak up.

“I think it’s time that we put aside our squabblin’ and figure out how we’re going to deal with Titus the next time he comes back,” she said. “And to do that, I think we need to come up with some rules fer takin’ down the [Demon Lord].”

“You mean like… an accord that all the nations would bind ourselves to?” one of the elves asked.

Gertrude nodded. “Sure, whatever you wanna call it. Just something that will cut through all the bickering and make sure the [Hero] gets to the [Demon Lord] as soon as possible. And with as much help as possible.” She looked over at the elves. “We can’t have the same thing that happened last time happen again. If we get another man-beast [Hero], we can’t have Dryadal holdin’ ‘im back hopin’ that the [Demon Lord] will cause a bit of chaos in Gram before he becomes their problem.”

The elf looked insulted. “Are you saying that this was our fault?”

Gertrude sighed. “No, it ain’t yer fault. If it was anyone’s, it was yer granddaddy’s, but the blame doesn’t fall all on them.” She looked over at the Gram delegation and at her own. “We’ve been pushed to warmongerin’ to try to keep our own people afloat, but at the end of the day, ain’t it all just been caused by the [Demon Lord]?” she asked as she looked around.

“He took down our main huntin’ ground, so we needed somewhere to get food so our people wouldn’t starve,” she said. Then she looked to Gram. “And you were hurtin’ for cash because’a all the zones that were destroyed by that Necromowhatsit guy.” She paused and gave a deep sigh. “Ya know, that Necroninny woulda never came around if I hadn’t’a hesitated. He only got so strong ‘cuz of all the undead the [Demon Lord] created.” She looked between the elves and the Gram delegation. “So, I guess what I’m trying to say is… I’m sorry.”

“[Queen] Gertrude, you have no need to apologize-” [King] Gram started, but she cut him off.

“Yes. Yes, I do. I’ve made my share of mistakes, and it’s high time I owned up to them. I’ve waged war on poor nations that ain’t never did me wrong.” She looked over at the dwarves. “We also took some of your northern land, not that it seems like you’ve been usin’ it much. But, if there’s a way that we can repay you-”

The dwarven [King] shook his head. “No. We have plenty within our walls. However, perhaps that was our folly that we sealed ourselves off from the rest of the world and let the [Demon Lord] run rampant.” He gave a resolute look. “We shall do better from now on, but how can we keep something like this from happening again?”

There was a lot of debate about what precisely the “Demon Lord Accords” should be, but in the end, they could be summarized with a few main points.

No matter the nation the [Hero] showed up in, they would send them to Faroff when the next [Demon Lord] was due to appear again. All nations and peoples would accede to any reasonable request made by a [Hero] who was on a mission to slay a [Demon Lord] As long as the [Demon Lord] was alive, he was to be the focus of all nations’ military. No nation would be allowed to declare war on another It would be considered a crime against international law to knowingly harbor the [Demon Lord] or make deals with him.

Besti wasn’t happy with the last provision since they needed me to establish new settlements in their arid homeland. However, they were outnumbered, so they grudgingly agreed.

There was also a sorta optional 5th point that was made. One of the problems that the people were running into was that I only came back every 50 years or so. That meant that most people didn’t know what I did in my first life… or too much about any [Hero] except for personal favorites.

The result? A non-mandatory motion was put forward about establishing museums dedicated to the struggle between [Heroes] and [Demon Lords]. The [Heroes] would have statues and information about the good they did in the world while I… would have a listing of my crimes so that people wouldn’t forget.

I wasn’t sure how popular those museums would be, but I was a tad annoyed. Mainly because it was a good idea from their point of view, which meant it was bad for me.

Anyway, the talks took a while, but that was a good thing, not because I enjoyed political discourse, but because it gave me a chance to troubleshoot.

Do you have a diagnostic mode or something? I asked.

System : Activating diagnostic mode

There was a bunch of static, but it did seem to work. I was greeted by an overlapping array of thousands of strands of mana going in all directions.

My hopes about being able to fix it from the inside somehow were dashed almost instantly. That was way too complex for me to figure out before it decided to “save mana” again by just yoinking my “life support.”

Or, at least, that’s what I initially thought. Then I came to one end of the spectrum where the strands looked like they had been stretched thin or broken.

Did… it not have enough mana to keep this section up? I asked. While I had no way of parsing the details of an incredibly complex magical enchantment, I was competent enough that I could tell which parts were supposed to go back together.

The only problem was that I didn’t have any mana I could give it. First, I was dead, which meant no mana regen, and second, I was pretty sure that my mana deficit was what initially caused the problem.

Then I remembered something.

Are you able to access my inventory?

System : Inventory module available. Siphon mana from physical inventory sources?

Do it… But leave me at least 20 mana potions, okay?

There was a pause, and I watched as the matrix repaired itself before my eyes.

System : Functionality is no longer at critical levels. New state Dangerous-Recovering

System : Inventory to mana module consumed the following. Magicite – 3 pieces. Mana potions – 187. Total 15,391 mana.

To be honest, I had completely forgotten about the magicite. And I was utterly shocked at how much mana those little rocks sucked in from the fey forest.

I might have just discovered the battery for my ritual. I thought before shaking that off. Yeah, let’s not alienate the fey. Besides, I doubt the “no attacking” part of my oath would let me get away with that.

However, I briefly thought about what would happen if I [Disrupted] the oath to get as much mana as possible in the short window it was inactive. I figured it would work, but I doubted it was worth getting permanently on the wrong side of the strongest spellcasters in Placeholder.

I decided I could use a distraction and finally switched back to the [Scry] from the diagnostic mode. They were still hammering out the details of the accords.

I had almost had enough of the talks, and I thought about switching to watching something else, but they were nearly done drafting the document, and I figured I could at least watch the signing.

I was glad I stuck around to the end. One last surprise awaited everyone after all the [Kings] and [Queens] of the nations had signed the accords.

“And that’ll be my last act as [Queen] of Gert,” Gertrude said right after she signed her name in barely legible cursive.

“[Queen] Gertrude, what do you mean?” one of her [Berserkers] with her asked.

“What I mean is this. I’m steppin’ down. I’ve been rulin’ over our great country for so long, but I ain’t been the right one to do it,” she shook her head. “Just bein’ strong don’t make ya a good leader, and I got a good dose of humble pie fightin’ this last [Demon Lord]. I think it’s time for someone else to step up and see what they can make outta Gert.”

Her people protested, but she cut them off with a shake of her head.

“Take a look around outside when ya get the chance. Didja know they got fancy lights that run on mana now?” she asked. “Not only that, compare yer weapons to some of theirs. They have swords that’ll do more damage my big ole axe, well, aside from all the skills I got for it.” She shook her head. “We’ve fallen behind, and we’re stuck in our ways, and I can’t blame no one but myself for that.” She gave a brief chuckle. “There’s a sayin’ we got back on my old world. You can’t teach an old dog new tricks. So, here’s hopin’ that we can get a young dog to lead in my place and that maybe he can finally make somethin’ outta that frozen wasteland up north.”

Her people protested, but she was deadest… just like always.

“What are you going to do instead?” they finally asked.

Gertrude thought for a moment, then looked over at the Dryadal delegation.

“You all mentioned something about that big zone in the middle of your kingdom that ain’t no one can get through. Do you mind if I give it a shot?” she asked.

They looked at each other, argued a bit, and then one of them stepped forward.

“We think it would be best if all the plans for the ritual stay where they are. They are safer there than any vault we could make for them,” he paused. “However, we lost much when the capital was destroyed. Our history, art, artifacts that were on display, and so much more. Any of that you could bring us would be greatly appreciated.”

She walked up to the man before slowly shaking his hand. “I’ll see what I can do. Yer people’ve gone through a lot, and I’ll do my best to help ‘em where I can.”

After that, Gertrude almost headed out immediately, but the other people there had to talk her through the process of leaving behind her [Queen] class.

“I, Gertrude Armstrong, hereby give up my claim on the land of Gert,” she stated with a bit of coaching. “May the next ruler lead ‘er well.”

System : Tapping into System communications for Gertrude Armstrong

System: No longer eligible for dual-slot class [Berserk Queen]. Class demoted to [Juggernaut]

I blinked in surprise. The level 25 [Berserker] class is [Juggernaut]? … Why does that not sound like a downgrade?

As Gertrude said her goodbyes, I decided that was enough watching her, so I simply turned off the [Scry] and sped things up.

If that helped save some mana, all the better.

------

System : Warning. Major event detected. Deactivating temporal controls

Great, what now? I thought. Maybe a few months had passed, but I was not entirely sure. And once again, I was greeted by the sight of Gertrude.

Gettin’ real sick of seeing the [Berserker]-lady. I grumbled at no one in particular.

However, I had to wonder. She was wandering around with not another soul in sight. How was this supposed to be a pivotal moment?

“The place is even more dead than I thought it would be,” Gertrude grumbled to herself. “I guess they weren’t jokin’ when they called it the time wastes.” I mentally thanked her for giving me a clue of where she was before she continued. “The one thing I don’t get is, where are all the monsters at? I thought this placed kill off a whole lotta adventurers or somethin’.”

They probably just died from age. Not that you would notice that. If you take your age and move it a couple hundred years either way, I doubt it would do anything important to you with how bugged you are.

She paused and leaned on her greataxe.

“Though, come to think of it. If monsters can just pop outta nowhere all willy-nilly in this world, where are the monsters in the oceans? Or the ones in that other place with all those dragons to fight? Why don’t monsters show up there?”

Everything slowed down once again for several minutes, and I could only groan.

Gertrude. What the frick did you just do? I mentally complained at about a tenth of the speed of normal.

When things got back to an average working speed, I learned the answer… when Gertrude was jumped by a nearly translucent spider that seemed to blink in and out of existence at will.

She dodged out of the way and swung her greataxe, but hit nothing but air.

“Come back here, ya little coward!” she shouted as she ran in the direction it seemed to have gone in.

She crested a hill and was greeted by the sight of an entire swarm of the newly created monsters.

The madwoman grinned. “I’ve been itchin’ for a fight. I guess you’ll have to do.” She charged at the beasts, and I was about to watch the first action since my death when I got the same message again.

System : Warning. Major event detected. Deactivating temporal controls

Frickin’ again? What now?

My [Scry] was pulled away from Gertrude, and I was soon deep underground and centered on a dwarf.

“Fall back! Monsters from the Below! Everyone, get back! I’ll buy you some time!” he bellowed.

He seemed to be in the prime of his life, so that statement should have given people confidence. However, there was one small issue.

The only weapon that he had in his hand was a hammer. Not a Warhammer, but a hammer used to help chisel out particularly rough patches of stone around ore veins that [Miners] didn’t want to damage.

And facing him was a swarm of monsters from the below.

They were four-legged creatures, about the size of a dog, but comparing them any further to our canine friends would be a horrible disservice.

These creatures were horrifying.

They had no eyes, hooked claws on their “feet” that they used to attach to walls, and the joints on their back legs were backward, giving them an awkward gait. I figured out the reason for that last bit when they finally showed me the real way that they got around.

They jumped. Not in little, tiny hops, but leaps that were dozen of feet long and often took them from the floor to the ceiling or from wall to wall.

Then, as all the dwarves, save one, were running for their lives, I finally got to see the first attack from the new monsters. One of them lashed out with a tongue from its long, tubular face. It stretched out impossibly far, nicked a dwarf woman, and she didn’t get back up.

The “hero” sprinted towards her.

“You’ve got to get up! Move!” he shouted.

“Can’t… move,” she said back. “Paralyzed.”

He didn’t reply. He stowed his hammer, scooped her up, and then tossed her as far as he could to the other running dwarves.

“Get her out of here!” he shouted. Then, setting himself up in a chokepoint between the horde, he took his stand.

Three of the new monsters leaped directly at him.

He’s so screwed. I thought.

However, the System had other plans in mind.

System : Tapping into System communications for Samson Stonebreaker

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

System: Your base class has been set to Knight

System: Heroic Mentality detected. “Stand strong in the face of evil”

System: Heroic skill unlocked. Fortitude

“[Fortitude]!” he bellowed as a shining, silver shield and hammer appeared in his hands.

The leaping monsters hit him and bounced off like they had hit a brick wall.

I mentally snorted. Well, fine. If you want to save him that bad, I guess he’s not screwed. I told the System.

However, he wasn’t out of danger just yet. The leaping monsters massed about a dozen feet in front of him and began circling him with their awkward gait.

The dwarf’s entire goal was to buy time, so he was more than happy with that outcome.

That left it to the monsters to make a move, and they did when one impatient monster shot out its tongue. The dwarf blocked it with his shield, but that unleashed the flood gates. Tongue after tongue lashed out, and the poor level 1 [Hero] couldn’t keep up. One finally nicked him, and he crashed heavily to the floor.

That was quick. I was getting ready to move the [Scry], but I had failed one of my own rules.

Never underestimate a [Hero].

“I’m… not… done… yet,” he shouted as he forced himself back to his feet.

That shouldn’t have been possible, but apparently, the tap into System communications hadn’t ended yet.

System: Heroic Mentality detected. “Press on through difficulty”

System: Heroic skill unlocked. Grit

Another one? I groaned. Come on! That’s bull spit!

With those two skills, he was practically invulnerable to the four-legged monsters. Oh, they still tried to paralyze him or bowl him over, but he refused to move, and he slowly took them down one hammer swing at a time.

Eventually, he was the only one left standing.

Well, dang. Looks like the new [Hero] got off to a strong start. I thought. I wonder how many levels that was worth? His skills seem pretty strong. I paused. But is he a good matchup against me? I mulled that over.

After a bit, I concluded it was a favorable matchup. My main problem with [Heroes] was their inexplicable ability to one-shot me whenever. Meanwhile, since he just had [Grit] and [Fortitude], I didn’t see much that I had to worry about.

However, that wasn’t the end of the new monsters from the below. I kept the [Scry] around the area for a while and learned that the four-legged ones were called “below leapers.” Meanwhile, there were smaller, colorful ones that looked like grubs, but were larger than a fist.

I figured out what those did before anyone else because I got to watch when the first poor sap picked one up. It immediately started flashing, and all my experience as a gamer knew what that meant.

That’s gonna exp-

The ensuing fireball cut off my thought.

Yeah, it turned out that while I may have decades of gaming experience to know that flashing enemies are bad, the citizens of Placeholder did not. At least they learned quickly, though.

Those were the “below wrigglers.”

However, one more type showed up that was simultaneously the scariest and the easiest from that land down under… Not Australia; I think they might actually have scarier things than these.

Where was I at? Right, the below broodmothers.

They were capable of spawning wrigglers in a seemingly unending amount. Which meant that you just had to set one of them off and watch as an entire horde of enemies went up in smoke/acid/ice/whatever other element the wrigglers were.

So, easy to take care of… as long as you could vent the explosion away from friendlies.

They didn’t always get that part right.

However, while I was [Scrying] around the dwarf mining area, I encountered one final enemy. It wasn’t even from the below, but it was somehow even worse to deal with.

Stone crawlers.

Think of a giant worm. Then think of a worm bigger than that.

Repeat until your worm could easily swallow a grown man whole, and then learn that that was their primary mode of attack.

Yeah, they could burrow through even solid rock at great speed, then swallow their victim whole to kill them with acid damage in their stomach.

They were pretty useless if you could find a way to stop their momentum (like [Fortitude]), but it turns out that I hadn’t described the thing that really made them terrifying.

They came in different variants.

Copper crawlers. Iron crawlers. Silver crawlers. Gold crawlers. Then, of course, the terrifying version. Adamantium crawlers. Because obviously, we needed to have a jet-black version of the worm monster that was immune to almost all physical attacks.

That creature could likely have destroyed an entire dwarven city if given the time, but, fortunately for the dwarves, the [Hero] came in clutch. By accidentally getting eaten, using [Fortitude] to shrug off the acid damage, and then dealing enough damage of his own to its squishy innards to kill and loot it from the inside.

Yeah, I was pretty sure that attack placement didn’t use to matter, so I mentally added it to my list to see if the crawlers were a special case or if there was a patch that made armor actually function like armor.

With that, I was somewhat confident I had learned all I could about the new monsters in the deep underground and the below.

However, that just made me worried.

That patch Gertrude caused… It added monsters to the time wastes and the below, but what else did it add?

I frowned. If I was going on the assumption that it had added monsters to the biomes where I didn’t already have monsters…

The first place I checked was water. I had explicitly not created any monsters in the water because I had used the water to get around back in my first life, and it had been quite convenient.

It took a while to find someone out on the water outside of a zone (since I knew monsters would only spawn with someone around), but I finally did it.

The first monster I saw did nothing but annoy me.

It was perhaps the laziest designed “monster” I had seen. It was nothing but a fish that had a pointed edge to its face, and it didn’t seem that strong.

In reality, the main reason it annoyed me was probably just that I didn’t like water monsters. I blame the slaughterfish from Morrowind[1].

Though, I suppose it was interesting watching it scare the [Fisherman] reeling it in.

“A monster?” he shouted. He dropped the rod as the fish frickin’ jumped out of the water at him, but as he pulled out his sword and one-shot it, I mentally changed my estimation of him from [Fisherman] to [Warrior] with a [Fisherman] subclass.

Either way, the thing that surprised me the most was that… He was surprised.

Don’t patches normally retcon everyone’s memory? I thought as the [Fisherman] stared down at his kill. Shouldn’t those types of monsters be common knowledge, then?

“[Identify],” he cast. “A knife fish? By Jake’s sword, is this a new type of monster?”

I watched him take it back to the city, and by all accounts, no one had ever seen one before. Which meant that apparently, the System had decided against memory manipulation this time.

Not gonna lie, I was pretty happy about that. For once, everyone else would get to deal with what I had already gone through a dozen times. Though, I guess that wasn’t the only reason.

It turns out it’s a lot easier to gather information about new monsters when everyone is talking about strange new monsters.

I heard about the knife fish in rivers, lakes, and the sea. There were rumors of even larger waterborne monsters in the deepest parts of the sea south of Gert, but none of those seemed to be substantiated.

I decided I would go ahead and just assume we had some type of leviathan now.

As for the below, I had already gotten a pretty good rundown from watching the new [Hero] wreck so many of them. They had the new leapers, crawlers, and broodmothers.

I didn’t even think to check the deathlands, but apparently, the deathlands just spawned zombies now. No body necessary.

That was going to be a headache. I was already sure of it.

I was kind of hoping to hear if there were monsters in any of the more exotic biomes like the dragonlands, the ashlands, or maybe even super high up in the great central mountains, but at the end of the day… no one had any reason to travel there except for me. That meant I would have the joy of discovering them myself.

Yay.

The new monsters were accounted for.

Except for the ones that I didn’t want to account for.

Please tell me that’s just a fluke and that monsters can randomly mutate. I begged as I saw the newest atrocity and the name that the slaying adventurer had [Identified] it with.

It was a waterborne monster, and I begged the System to stop there, but of course, it didn’t.

They found water versions in lakes and rivers. Ice versions in the far north, or mountains. Poison versions in the great swamp to the south. Fire versions in the desert, and even camouflaged ones in the forest.

Though I gotta admit, the below version was kinda cool. It was all black, and it floated upward instead of being affected by gravity and-

Oh, I should probably tell you what I’m talking about.

Daves.

Motherfrickin’ daves.

The System must have decided that the normal lime-green daves were lonely, so it added the light blue jelly daves, the dark blue icey daves, the purple toxic daves, red firey daves, and the incredibly hard-to-see forest daves.

I was sure those last ones would be terrifying.

Well, not quite as terrifying as the below daves. They would roll along by sticking to the floor or jump at you from the ceiling, and if enough grabbed you, they would pull you back up to the ceiling with them.

Also, I had no idea what damage type they were dealing, which immediately made them scarier in my book.

With my mental bestiary filled out, I was done with my spying and ready to get back to fast-forwarding through time.

Until I had a thought.

I wonder how the fey are doing? I haven’t checked on them in ages.

So, ignorant of my role in Primavia’s sleep, I played a game of “find the fey forest” and then forced my way in with my [Scry] as usual.

I’m not sure what I expected going in, but it wasn’t a group of fey mourning around a pink crystal set on top of a leafy shrine. One, in particular, was weeping and saying the words, “Please wake up” repeatedly.

Did I come at a bad time? I asked before I realized my question was going to no one in particular. I still didn’t have a way to communicate with them from my end, and I didn’t see Primavia anywhere.

I was about to turn off the [Scry] and come back another time when one of the fey suddenly gasped.

“Mine own [Queen]!” she shouted. “He’s back!”

She pointed in the direction of the [Scry], and suddenly I had dozens of irate fairies swarming my screen.

“How couldst thee?” the one who seemed like the leader shouted. “The lady did trust thee almost as much as one of us. She bethought of thee like an immortal brother, but thee hath mine own [Queen] to this!?”

I froze and thought.

Wait. Pride didn’t do anything to the fey, did he? I have to admit, while I was riding in the backseat of my own body, I wasn’t always paying the most attention. I did zone out quite a bit. So, I was worried that there was something I missed over that near-century-long span of not being in control.

Fortunately, despite no way to communicate, one of the other fairies realized a problem.

“Mine own [Queen],” she stated. “The curmudgeon hast nay way of knowing our laws. He doesn’t realize the heinousness of his actions.”

Meanwhile, I was starting to get a sinking feeling. Wait. [Queen]? But she’s not Primavia...

The lead fairy laughed hysterically. “Then allow me to introduce mine own self. I am Secondavia. Second of her name, [Queen] of the fey. Cometh hither, and see what thee has’t wrought!”

With a wordless cast, my [Scry] was suddenly yoinked behind the tiny flying woman. It was dragged into place, and I finally got a good look at the crystal… with Primavia sealed inside.

“Behold! The fate of the greatest of us, Primavia, [Queen] of the fey!” she shouted. She did violate our most sacr’d of laws an meddl’d in the ordinary outside of the forest, and hither the lady lies asleep to payeth the ultimate price.” She paused as more tears began streaming down her cheeks. “We knoweth not if’t be true the lady shall ev’r wake, and the knowledge the lady hadst within her own self wast priceless to the existence of our very people.”

Then, the weepy voice was gone as she suddenly dragged the [Scry] to look her directly in the eye.

“So, begone! Get thee gone, foul demon! Thee did manage to doth this most wondrous of harm while holding to the letter of the treaty, but knoweth this! I shall consider t broken ‘ere thee cometh hither again! Leaveth! And doth not returneth or, treaty or nay, we shalt forevermore devote our existence to thy suffering!”

There was nothing to say to that. I closed out the [Scry] and then fell into a deep silence for a bit.

And there go my last allies. Thanks a lot, Pride.

If I had a head, I would have banged it on the nearest wall.

I now basically had the entire world against me. But…

I guess this isn’t really any different from my first life. I thought with a mirthless chuckle.

I had put it off long enough, but the talk with the fey solidified that it was time to take stock and figure out my plans for my next life.

The first thing I thought about was Demon Lord form.

Pride… Is a no go. I immediately decided. I tacked that form onto the list of “do not get this form.” I did have to grudgingly admit that it was powerful and that it was almost directly responsible for getting a near-working time magic ritual, but it was way too risky.

There’s every chance that if I get Pride form again, he’ll make the same decision to give up time magic… But immediately.

I also didn’t know if the System would be able to pull another Almighty Janitor out of its sleeve the next time. Who knew how long it would take to kill me then?

So, that left greed or envy on my list of possibilities, but I… wasn’t feelin’ it.

Maybe I won’t immediately force myself into a form this go around, hmm? I thought. Yes, it’s a good contingency plan, but the demerits just aren’t worth it. I thought back hundreds of years to my first life. Besides, I didn’t start out with a form that life, and I felt like I was the most lucid then. Maybe I can replicate that and then pick out a form later?

That settled, I moved on to the next bit.

So, the ritual. I really wish Pride had paid more attention to all of that stuff. I inwardly groaned as I thought about all the times that awful version of me waved off amazing breakthroughs in time magic as “not worth his time.”

However, I did remember the request that led to Pride pivoting to world domination.

Unless they exploded in the blast or something, there should still be plenty of the prep materials for the ritual in Dryadal’s capital. I paused. Unfortunately, I think they would have kept a lot of that in their inventories.

I distinctly remembered about half of them vanishing out of existence and winced.

Half of the pieces of the [Restart] ritual were still better than none, so I still chalked that up as one of the first places I should check out… after leveling again.

So, infernal snails first. I decided. It should be a quick trip, just a [Teleport] and then-

I paused. Will I even have enough mana to cast [Teleport]?

I was running into another issue. I had spent so long as Pride, who didn’t care a whit about mana or stamina costs, that I forgot my usual limitations.

However, I distinctly remembered not having anywhere close to 500 mana even when I was level 18 in my first life.

So, even with my wands, that it took me a bit to remember I had, I was still betting that I didn’t have enough. To make matters worse, I had to remind myself that [Flash Step] was back to having a cooldown this life.

Dang it. I thought. I’m going to feel so slow and weak.

I didn’t have a clue how right I was.

However, despite all the negatives I saw when I took stock of my past life, there was an additional positive that took me a bit longer to realize.

The prophecy about me failing time magic… It came true. I laughed and would have cried tears of joy if it was possible. Instead, I just had to settle for a long, happy laugh.

That may seem like a strange reaction, but I had my reasons. The main one? Well, the way I saw it, if a prophecy came true once, it had to be done, right? Now that my “prophesied” failure had come to pass, any future attempts were anyone’s game.

That means that I can do this. I just have to play it smart.

I kept things on fast forward for the rest of the 50-year stint. There weren’t any other major events, so it passed quickly.

My good mood did not last very long into my new life because my biggest complication was upcoming.

System : Warning. Obelisk is only in Dangerous-Recovering state. Respawned body may have extra limitations

Right as it said that, my body was mercilessly dumped onto the ground next to the tutorial obelisk.

I immediately gasped in pain. It felt like my entire body was on fire.

I also got yet another message.

System : Maximum HP has been reduced to ½ normal. Maximum MP has been reduced to 1/10 normal. Maximum SP has been reduced to 1/5 normal.

I struggled to my feet as I took a look into the obelisk.

I saw a frail, slightly hunched figure staring back at me.

It’s okay. I’ll make this work. Or, I’ll just get a new body by dy-

System : Respawning disabled for all non-tutorial dimensions. Death is currently permanent. Next respawn available in 52 years, 3 months, 17 days, 12:34:39:381 hours.

I desperately wished for the ability to say a myriad of four-letter words at that point, but instead, I took a deep breath.

“Looks like we’re back to hard mode,” I said as I clenched my fist and stared at my reflection.

I had the chance of dying for real, and I was the weakest I’d been in centuries. I could practically feel the System telling me to go die.

“Not a frickin’ chance,” I said as I turned to take in the starting room for the 5th time I’d spawned there.

“You hear me?!” I shouted at the ceiling and the uncaring System. “You may think this will break me or kill me, but it won’t! I’ve been through worse! Take your best frickin’ shot!”

I was likely projecting, but I could almost feel it answer…

It most certainly would.

[1] Morrowind – The third RPG in the Elder Scrolls series. It featured a strange and exotic land full of fantastic creatures... And weak enemy fish whose sole purpose in life seemed to be to kick off the battle music randomly, and make water travel even more annoying.