Enjoy your valentine’s day release.

----------------------

Part 1

The time spent waiting for the cooldown of Divine Wind Decree seemed uneventful(?) for Godou. Nothing much really happened.

Godou had talked to Ferrex who managed to fill him in on some of the details of the town defence procedures in Tellap and some other trivial information.

He also wandered around for a bit but didn’t discover anything remotely important… nor did he somehow manage to do something during the 24 hour time period that would give him a guilty conscience.

Yep, in short, nothing really happened… and he was completely unrelated to the ruckus that had apparently been caused in that part of the mountain range at that time.

Thus in this uneventful(?) atmosphere, Godou inevitably found himself doing some self-reflection.

Despite the fact that he had continuously ended up against challenging opponents who were supposed to have extremely low encounter rates whilst playing Royal Road, Godou still felt strangely relaxed whenever he played the game.

It was only in Royal Road that he didn’t find himself being pestered and nagged by his close female friends and sister.

Godou didn’t know whether he should be feeling sad about this or not though. Although he didn’t really mind their company, he was the type of person would could only truly relax in the company of men.

After all, Godou did not consider himself to be someone used to interacting with members of the opposite sex and there were only some things he could only do with close male friends.

Unlike in reality, he didn’t have all those weird rumours circulating around him either. This very fact improved Godou’s mood whenever he started playing the game.

Although running into some sort of conflict all the time as rather troublesome, wasn’t that the supposed to be the norm when you played this sort of fantasy game?

Actually, that aspect wasn’t that really that bad though. Although he regretted the fact that he had briefly loosened the reins of his self-restraint, Godou almost enjoyed the act of defeating a strong opponent and making them suffer for the pain- Hold on a second!!!

With a jolt of alarm, Godu quickly supressed his thoughts which had been proceeding in a very dangerous direction.

Given how Royal Road gives you a broad range of classes, many of which having nothing to do with actual combat, having to suffer from life and death battles against outrageously strong monsters was definitely not the norm.

That’s right! I am pacifist. I don’t want to get involved in any more needless conflict!

Despite firmly believing this, contradicting memories of all the problems he had caused, both virtual and real, suddenly came into Godou’s mind.

Although, circumstances had forced him to temporarily put aside his pacifism in the past, Godou swore to himself that he would not involve himself in any other future conflicts.

That being said, Godou had full intended to help out in defending Tellap. After all, that town was the home of many innocent people. The pub owner Mark and the members of the local church of Freya who lived in the town were important benefactors for Godou. He couldn’t just leave them to fend for themselves.

Although, everyone has the potential to use special powers which should not exist in reality, a game like Royal Road needs to have balance so everyone needs to chip in to produce an effect rather than becoming a one man army right? Thus Godou resolved himself to help how ever he could.

Then, realising the contradiction in his thoughts, Godou became stuck in a bout of depression for the rest of the day.

So after this completely uneventful(?) 24 hours passed, Godou activated Divine Wind Decree once again.

According to Ferrex, it was likely that his power had a similar method of usage to Seirph’s method of casting spells. It showed more of a resemblance to the divine powers wielded by gods then spells bounded by magic circles. In short, his powers relied more heavily of how strong his imagination and ability to than visualise what he wanted more than anything else.

Coincidentally, Godou noticed that the first skill that he had learnt, Mana Weapon Creation, was also heavily reliant on this factor.

The Divine Wind Decree has been successfully activated. Due to your high level of skill comprehension, an activation incantation is not required. Divine Wind Decree will go on cooldown if you run out of mana.

+ 38% to all stats

The following skills are available:

Teleport Advanced Level 10

Body of Wind Advanced Level 10

Storm Summoning Ritual [Locked]

Max Duration: 3 hours

After reflecting on his limitations on his new skill due to his low Divinity stat, Godou had also decided to place all 595 stat bonus points into his Divinity stat during this 24 hour time frame.

Thus, visualising himself arriving in Tellap, Godou activated the teleport skill.

Godou’s body flashed and he immediately found himself in Tellap’s town square.

As always, the town seemed as crowded as ever. Although, the atmosphere around the town did not seem particularly hurried, it was noticeable more tense then Godou had ever remembered. That being said, the pubs were still making booming business as the would-be-combatants lounged in the pubs drinking and lowering their tension before the fight.

Ferrex had told Godou that it was the first time in 5 years that the advance army had failed to defeat the monster army before it reached the towns so maybe that was the reason for the tesne atmosphere.

Speaking of which, Ferrex didn’t seem to be responding to Godou for a while now. At first Godou had thought that he was still sulking but now he was getting slightly worried.

However, since there was nothing he could do for Ferrex anyway, Godou decided to just leave him be for the moment.

Godou opened up the information of his current remaining quest.

At some point in time the quest had been updated and changed. It now read:

Quest Update!

Due to recent events, the Quest “Defend Naidiriv” has been updated to the Quest “Defend the Frontier Towns”

Defend the Frontier Towns

A monster army has been spotted close by and appears to be making its way towards the nearby town of Naidiriv. Due to mysterious disappearances of the scouts in Naidiriv, the presence of this army was not detected until a few days previously.

A defence army was formed to repel this monster force. However, due to running into some unforeseen circumstances, the defence army has taken large casualties before intercepting the monster army and no longer have the power to stop its advance.

Scouts have been sent out to track the progress of the army and have confirmed that the monster army has now advanced to far deep into to be stopped before they reach Kallamore’s twin frontier towns of Tellap and Naidiriv.

Therefore a simultaneous siege of both Tellap and Naidiriv will occur.

As someone currently in the town of Tellap, it is your duty to contribute in defending the frontier towns.

Estimated time before the monster army reaches the closest Town: 5 hours

Difficulty: Unknown

Restrictions:

Must have accepted the Defend Naidiriv quest or be in town during the siege period.

Penalties:

This quest will fail if one or both of the towns fall to the monster army.

Rewards:

To be determined by your contribution in defending Tellap and Naidiriv

Godou tried to manipulate his menu to get more details on what to do next about this quest. He ended up with the following message:

To register as a mercenary or to get more information on the Tellap towns defence procedures, visit the Administration Office next to the soldier barracks.

Come to think of it, Ferrex did say something about this as well.

As Godou asked for directions from nearby passers-by, he tried to recall what he knew about the defence procedures.

Unlike the sporadic defences armies which were formed just to intercept monster raid forces, the defence systems for castle and siege defences were a lot more organised and complicated. The town defenders could basically be divide into three groups: the Royal Kallamore Army, the mercenaries and the milta.

The Royal Kallamore Army was comprised of soldiers who had been formally accepted and trained by the kingdom and had the actual occupation of a soldier. These people were mostly npcs like the regular soldiers, town guards and Kallamore Knights. The Royal Army usually acted as the backbone of the siege defence since they were the group that was the most accustomed to receiving and following orders. Thus, this group had the most stable combat ability out of all 3 groups.

On the other hand the mercenaries were comprised of the fighters who were not part of the Kallamore Army but had registered as a combatant on Kallamore’s side. This group was mostly comprised of players and could the same bonuses as the Royal Army as well as a monetary reward depending on their achievements. To join this group, you needed to register yourself by talking to the people in change of the battle as well as a level over 50. The combat ability of this group tended to vary depending on the members.

The milta was basically everyone else who was in the warzone. By default everyone who received the siege defence quest was automatically registered as part of the milta unless they were part of the Royal Army. This group was mostly comprised of the noob players who didn’t know about registering as mercenaries or were too low level to join, civilians and other non-combatants.

The milta usually helped out by treating and evacuating injured fighters, bring supplies to the front lines, putting out fires and other various supporting roles in battle. Although they have virtually no combat ability in the face of high level monsters, this group was the most numerous of the three and played a contribution to the outcome of the battle. Thus, this group was able to earn honour points just like the other two groups but did not get paid.

Milta aside, the Royal Army and mercenaries were further divided into groups of 5 or 6 called defence parties. The composition of the party varied according to the number of Royal Army soldiers and mercenaries. Most parties would have only soldiers whilst others would have only mercenaries. However, there would also be some with a mixture of both every here and there.

And that was pretty much all Godou could remember learning from Ferrex and from reading books. Since I’m going there anyway, I might as well register as a mercenary.

In retrospect, Godou found it strange that he had actively decided to trouble himself into trouble. However, with the threat of the monster army just a few hours away, Godou decided to turn a blind eye. Just this once anyway.

After a bit more walking, Godou arrived the soldier barracks. Apparently, the building next to it was the administration office so Godou entered it. Inside the building as a queue of people, no doubt there to do the same thing he was about to. Godou got in line and waited his turn until he was called out by one of the clerks.

The clerk appeared older than Godou but still quite young, probably in her early or mid-twenties. With her lovely face combined with rimmed glasses and her tied up hair style, the clerk reminded Godou of an office worker heroine in some romantic comedy movie or the receptionist of a health clinic advertisement.

If not for her bored looking expression which showed her complete lack of enthusiasm, she would have looked quite adorable.

“Hello. What can I do for you? I take it that you want to register as a mercenary?”

In a neutral tone, the clerk asked.

“Yes please.”

“Okay done. Do you want to register in a party with anyone you know or are you fine with just any party?”

“Uhm… Any will do for me.”

Godou didn’t need to ponder on that question for too long. The only other combatants he was close to was the ice mage Flay and that strange “assassin” girl who called herself Reta. He had seen both of them get killed during Seirph’s ambush so it would still take a few more days (in-game) for them to respawn.

“There’s a vacancy in the 136th Defence party so I just sign you up there.”

Ding!

You have been placed in the 136th Defence Party.136th Defence Party

Members: 5

Orders: Remain on standby.

“Kay. You have been assigned to the 136th Mercenary Party and your initial rendezvous point is the bench closest to [Mark’s Pub] on the town square. Make sure you find out where that is and go to that location when the war bells ring.”

“War bells?”

Seeing Godou confusion, the clerk continued her explanation:

“There are five large bells on each of the 4 corners of the outer walls and one on the inner walls. The war bells will ring 5 times when the monster army is spotted about 10 kilometres away from town. When the army is 5 kilometres away, the bells will right 10 times. When opposing army is about come in sight or when the walls come under attack, they will ring again continuously for 1 minute. Make sure that you get to the rendezvous point of your party within 15 minutes after the first warning bell rings.”

“Hmm okay.”

As Godou nodded his understanding, the clerk started another lengthy explanation.

“I guess I should tell you this as well. When the bell rings for the first time, the commander of the Tellap’s defence will give a basic briefing on the town defence formations and procedures. Be warned though, this commander is more on the eccentric side than any other NPC I’ve met so don’t expect too much. Then again the NPC who introduced him to me was a bit weird as well.”

With those words Godou realised that the clerk was a player like himself. Her expression had been so stiff he had initially thought she was an NPC. Oblivious to Godou’s sudden enlightenment, the clerk queried:

“Is there anything else you would like to know?”

“No that will be it. Thank you for your time.”

“No problem.”

Having finished his business, Godou made his way out of the building. As he walked out, he could have sworn that he heard someone mutter “Sigh… I know I volunteered to do this but my shift should already be over… I want to go play with Misa… God damn it, I better be getting overtime for this!”

Part 2

Thus, having registered as a mercenary and been placed in a Defence Party, Godou found himself at lost at what to do next. After checking the quest notification, he saw that there was still almost 4 hours before the monster army would be in Tellap’s sights.

“Hey Ferrex are you there?”

[-----------]

Still not responding then huh. Looks like I’m on my own for a while.

Nervous tension filled Godou’s body as he looked around him to see what the other defenders were doing. A few people were running around all over the place like chickens with their heads chopped off. Conversely, Godou also noticed quite a few people just chilling out in pubs as usual.

“That’s right. There’s no point being stressed out over this. It will happen when it happens so I guess there’s nothing else to do but relax and enjoy the peace while it lasts.”

Coming to this conclusion, Godou relaxed his body which had unconsciously become tense in the stressful atmosphere.

Thus with time to waste, Godou decided to at least go and say hello to the pub keeper Mark before the battle starts.

With that goal in mind, Godou started to navigate through the large town/small city of Tellap. On his way, he passed the Church of Freya.

Then looking at his tattered and worn clothes and remembering that the new title Lexus had given him allowed him to access the church of Freya’s armoury, Godou decided to take a slight detour and pay a visit to the church first.

Godou walked inside the church, greeted the priest in on duty and then queried about whether or not he could access to armoury to replace his equipment. Godou was pleased to note that although the priest had seemed a bit stiff when Godou had talked to him, they didn’t try to run away like previously.

Did the title “Benefactor of the Order of Freya” neutralise the scaring effect of his divinity on people with the faith stat?

Godou speculated on this as the priest gave an affirmative response and directed him to the armoury.

Godou walked into the armoury. Since the church of Freya in Tellap town was only one of the side branch churches, it did not contain a lot of high level and rare equipment. Godou didn’t have any intention of taking any even if there were any in the armour either. He felt that it would be too greedy if he did.

Because he already had rare and powerful equipment dropped by Seirph, he didn’t really have any desire to get any more. He didn’t particularly like the feeling of having to wear armour either. Godou didn’t seem himself as the type of person who would exploit the crap of a friend or benefactor when given the chance either. His sense of loyalty and morals was too strong to do something like that.

Was this a good thing or a bad thing for someone playing a VR game?

Godou looked for the simple standard issue cloth clothes, basically, the same version of the equipment he was currently wearing. He toyed with the idea of getting armour was well but discarded the thought.

Without further ado, Godou identified the cloth clothes and changed into them directly in the armoury.

Enchanted Cloth Tunic

An enchanted tunic given to the members of the Church of Freya. It has an enchantment embedded in it.

Durability:

40/45

Restrictions:

Member of the church of Freya OR

Unofficial trainee of the church of Freya

Bonuses:

+ 20 Defence

+ 5% Magic resistance

+ 5% all Elemental ResistancesEnchanted Cloth Leggings

Enchanted leggings given to the members of the Church of Freya. It has an enchantment embedded in it.

Durability:

43/45

Restrictions:

Member of the church of Freya OR

Unofficial trainee of the church of Freya

Bonuses:

+ 20 Defence

+ 5% Magic resistance

+ 5% all Elemental Resistances

“Waaa!”

CLANG!

Godou heard a frightened squeak behind him accompanied by the metallic sound of a piece of metal armour dropping on the floor.

He spun around and the sight he saw made his heart skip a beat.

A young girl near the corner of the room frantically picked up the suit of armour she had accidentally knocked down, blushing furiously. She seemed about 13 years of age. She appeared very lovely and adorable. Like a kitten that made you want to pat and spoil.

That wasn’t the problem though.

Godou felt his face redden as he realised that he had just changed in front of her. A mixture of emotions bombarded him. Panic and self-reprimand for not checking that the armoury was empty before changing.

In front of a young child he had just…

Godou was not one of those people who had an interest in young girls. Not that he had anything against people who did. Thus the reason for why his heart was pounding so fast was because of his shame and regret.

What he did was no doubt a borderline crime. Godou almost felt like turning himself in to the authorities. That’s no good! I have to explain myself so that this doesn’t develope into a misunderstanding!

“Sorry-”

“S S Sorry. I wasn’t trying to peek! I you changed so suddenly- I didn’t see any t thing!”

The girl beat Godou to the punch as he was about to apologise. It didn’t feel right to him that she was the one to apologise in this situation so Godou decided to act.

“N No. I should be the one to apologise. It was my fault that I didn’t check to see if anyone was in the room before changing. I swear didn’t mean to do that to a little girl!”

Looking at it afterwards, Godou himself thought that his exclamation sounded like the pleads of a guilty criminal about to be punished.

“L Little… Uhm yeah… I’m seventeen years old.”

“Is that so? I never would have guessed.”

“Haha yeah I get that a lot…”

With his careless comment, Godou felt very uncomfortable in this sort of situation.

“…”

“…”

Damn this is really awkward. What should I do?

Being the teenage male with the number of years without a girlfriend the same as his age, Godou had never really had much luck with members of the opposite sex. Thus, he had no idea what to do to fix this kind of awkward setting. Well, I was quite tactless of me to say that so I should apologise right? But saying thing now is a bit…

Pushing aside his fears, Godou opened his mouth to apologise.

“S-”

BANG!

The door suddenly opened and several members of the church of Freya came to replace their equipment before the siege started. Having lost his moment to apologise, Godou decided that it would be best for him if he simply left under the cover of the new people entering the armoury.

Thus Godou left the church of Freya. No doubt his next meeting with that girl who was apparently seventeen would be extremely awkward.

Okay take a deep breath in. Out. In. Out. In. Out. Godou tried to calm his mind, carefully erasing his recent mistake in the Church of Freya from his memory as he did so.

In order to do so, he tried to distract himself by opening his status window.

Status Window[quart=Name,Alignment]Godou,Chaotic[/quart][quart=Level,Class]136,Overlord[/quart][quart=Race,Title]Breaker of the Divine Decree,Destructive Saviour[/quart]

[quart=Fame,Notoriety]245062,14950[/quart][quart=Health,Mana]6457,5390[/quart][quart=Strength,Agility]89+80,90+120[/quart][quart=Wisdom,Intellect]87+170,87+170[/quart]

[quart=Leadership,Luck]21+70,278+70[/quart][quart=Vitality,Perseverance]139+70,117+70[/quart]

[quart=Sustenance,Fighting Spirit]116+70,509+70[/quart][quart=Honor,Divinity]25+70,695+70[/quart][quart=Attack,Defence]107,50[/quart]Magic Resistance98%Class Bonuses

+ 20 to all stats

+ 200 Health

+ 200 Mana

+ 20% Magic Resistance

+ able to use magic

+ there is no penalty when the skills and spells you use fail

+ can equip all armours and weapons regardless of restrictions on class, level and stats.

+ immune to from the effects of most heals, buffs, curses, potions and poisons

+ harder to improve intimacy with members of religions. Church members may fear or worship you

+ penalty upon death is doubled

+ half of the experience gained will go to your Divine Control Mastery.

Other Bonuses

Recognised by Church of Freya

+ 50 to all stats due to titles

+ 10% Magic Resistance due to titles

+ 10 Strength

+ 100 Intelligence

+ 100 Wisdom

+ 100 Luck

+ 50 Agility

+ 1000 Mana

+ 30% Magic Resistance

+ 10% all Elemental Resistances

Godou noticed his Magic Resistance had another large jump since he had last checked. This was due to him placing all of his level up bonus points into his divinity stat. With a magic resistance of 98% wouldn’t that mean that attack magic would have negligible effects on him?

For some reason, the thought of magic spells not affecting him that much seemed very familiar. So this body of mine is nearly invulnerable to magic in both reality and in virtual reality. Great… Just great.

Godou felt another wave of depression creeping up on him but he resisted falling into its clutches. With the siege in only a few hours it was crucial that he kept his own morale up.

Remembering that his new clothes also provided elemental resistance bonuses, Godou manipulated his status window to show his element resistances recalling what he knew about the various resistances stats as he did so.

Elemental Resistance[quart=Fire,Water]48%,48%[/quart]

[quart=Earth,Ice]48%,48%[/quart]

[quart=Light,Dark]48%,51%[/quart]

Magic resistance is resistance against magical attacks which are brought forth through constructions of magic circles and the like. On the other hand, elemental resistance refers to your resistance against the elements which may or may not be natural.

For example, magic resistance will reduce the damage done by a lighting strike spell but it will not do anything against a natural lighting strike. Magic resistance will reduce the damage done by fireballs but it will not stop you from burning to death in a volcano.

Having cleared his mind to a sufficient degree, Godou made his way to Mark’s pub.

Part 3

When Godou walked into Mark’s pub it was lively as ever. He had almost expected Mark to call out loud as always when he stepped in. However, the loud hearty roar he was expecting didn’t come.

Godou looked around the pub and saw Mark deep in conversation with an intelligent looking youth wearing a white long coat.

“… statistics show that on this time the number of people in this target audience is at a peak…”

“I understand but how to I know that your information is credible?”

“That’s why I’m giving you this information for free right now to prove my credibility. Further dealings will cost though…”

A portion of Mark’s conversation came over to Godou. Since Mark seemed to be in an important business deal, Godou decided to leave his greetings for later.

Instead, Godou went and ordered a drink from one of the workers. Godou noted that the waitress serving him was someone he hadn’t seen before.

When Godou had worked at Mark’s pub on the first day that he had logged on, there had only been one or two other workers besides him and Mark. Despite all of Mark’s negativity about it, Godou though that Mark’s pub was actually a pretty popular pub. It was nearly always packed and customers usually bought more than one drink during their time there.

This made it especially hard for the workers to provide adequate service to all customers. To add difficultly to that, many of the other workers only acted in 2 hour shifts. Many of the workers were actually customers who had volunteered to give Mark a helping hand as well. Thus, have worked for almost a whole day in Mark’s pub, he was confident that he knew most of the people working there.

This meant that the waitress was someone new. Probably.

Speaking of which, the waitress looked familiar to Godou for some reason. She had lovely brown hair, a voluptuous figure and a serious sort of aura around him. Looking at her diligently work, Godou thought that she appeared absolutely adorable.

Having received his drink, Godou then looked around for a place to sit. Although, he didn’t mind standing, he felt standing in a corner drinking by himself would simply be too sad.

“YEAH!!!!”

A loud cry came from on corner of the pub. Godou saw that it came from the corner which was the furthest from the entrance. The spot which had unofficially been reserved for the gambling.

Godou looked at the corner spilt between his curiosity to find out what happened and his common sense which told him to stay away from gambling drunks as well has his past memories of being forced to participating gambling marathons.

In the end curiosity won. Surely these people wouldn’t be drinking that much right before a battle, Godou reasoned. Nothing too ridiculous should happen if I go and join them right?

With that hope in mind, Godou entered the territory of the drunk gamblers. Almost immediately, that hope was crushed.

Within seconds, Godou found himself forcefully dragged into the ridiculous recreational activity of gambling.

The first thing that happened to him was he walked over was that he was hugged.

From the front.

By a girl.

Wearing glasses.

Apparently, this was one of the things that were being gambled on. One random person was pick using a spinning empty beer bottle and that person had to hug the first person who walked past them who was not part of the bet.

The betting options were:

1) Target screams/yells/swears

2) Target blushes silently

3) Target does 1 and 2

4) No reaction from target

5) Target does something else not listed

Needless to say, Godou’s reaction from being hugged by a voluptuous girl slightly older than himself was (3). Shocked that such a ridiculous thing was being gambled on, Godou became dragged into the gambler’s pace and was forced to join into the game. As testament of his luck (or not), the random person selector beer bottle never pointed at Godou.

Alsom considering the fact that the majority of the people playing this game were macho men who just wanted to hug people, Godou was actually quite lucky to walk in at that moment.

Conversely, the apparently ring leader of this game (as well as the person who hugged him) as someone Godou knew. It was the bored looking clerk in the administration office who had registered Godou was a mercenary.

However, this time, under the full force of her enthusiasm, she appeared so full of life that Godou could not describe her as anything but adorable. The difference between what the clerk was like when she was on or off the job as certainly like fire and ice. Apparently her name was Lis.

Thus as time passed, Godou noticed a few other things about Lis.

First, that she was actually the older sister the new waitress (whose name was Misa) and that she had been recommended to a position in the Royal Kallamore Army through Mark.

Secondly, she as a massive siscon and would use any excuse possible to make physical contact with her. (Apparently that had been one of the interior motives of the hugging game.)

Seeking a respite from the gambling, Godou moved himself to another location. Godou noticed that a lot of the nearby customers around Mark were listening in to Mark’s conversation with interest. Unconsciously, Godou found himself listening in as well.

“How can you be so sure that this will work?”

“Well this information can be deducted by looking that the survey information from players in the kingdoms of the central continent. Even if the date and time are a bit off, this stunt is bound to attract more customers. With your workers it would be a waste not to do it anyway.”

“Hmmm…”

“Besides this pub, I have also told all the major competitors similar information was well by the way. Whether or not you chose to follow my information is up to you but if they manage to attract more customers you will be on the losing side of the business you know.”

“Tch… this is blackmail… actually no it isn’t but it certainly feels like it. No, I still don’t believe foreigners would have such interests.”

Mark was showing the expression of a playground bully who lost a fight, without wasting his momentum, the other party pressed forward with confidence.

“Want to test it? Pull over the nearest male and female customers and see what they say? Say like… that guy! And her!”

The white coated youth conversing to Mark suddenly pointed over a Godou and the older sister of the bar waitress you just happened to be the current ringleader of the gamblers. Mark turned and dragged out two more seats for them to join the two at the table.

“Fine Godou, Lis, do me a favour and come over here for a bit”

Suddenly, having the spotlight thrown to him, Godou was forced to make his way over.

As soon as he sat down, the white coated youth conversing with Mark suddenly sprang the question on him:

“Do you have a maid fetish?”

“Uhmm… what?”

Why was it that these sorts of things keep happening to me. Not for the first time, Godou wished the world would stop screwing with him.

“Have you ever had dreams about your girlfriend or school idols dressed up in maid uniforms?”

“Of course I …”

Godou was about to deny that he had such interests when an erased forgotten memory suddenly sprung up on him.

Cheep, cheep. The chirping of baby birds could be heard.

Soft sheets. Shafts of sunlight shone through the windows, it was a calm morning. In the middle of a complete awakening, he was still dozing off hazily?

Nope that never happened. With great force of mind, Godou erased the memory again.

“… no I don’t.”

“So Mark, how long did it take for him to reply?”

“About 8 seconds I guess”

“From the statistics, that timing is extremely suspicious… Indeed, suspicious.”

“What statistics?!! That is obviously a blatant lie!”

Hearing these idiotic words Godou couldn’t hold himself back. Turning his attention on Godou, the white coated youth mercilessly pressed onwards.

“You cannot lie to the cries of your heart… I take it that you are also a regular visitor of a maid café? I saw a spark of recognition in your eyes when I said that.”

Indeed Godou had visited the maid café “The Peerless Statesman” owned by his adopted nephew quite a few times in the past but-

“…there were circumstances for that and it was convenient because I was friends with the owner.”

“Ha! There is no doubt that you my friend, are in a state of self-denial. Come release your desires.”

As Godou’s denials fell onto deaf ears, Godou found himself in situation where he could do nothing but grit his teeth in frustration. In jolt Godou finally realised that he blurted out something he shouldn’t have.

“I rest my case.”

Smiling, the white coated youth ended the interrogation. There’s no doubt about it. This guy is a devil.

Seeing the white coated youth prove his point against Godou, Mark spoke as if he was now seriously considering the youth’s idea.

“Well, I run a pub so I can’t exactly change it into a maid café like you suggested. Though I guess it would be possible to dress a few of the waitresses in maid outfits for advertisement. Since you only want information in return I guess it could be worth a shot. Lis what’s your opinion on this?”

“I’m in! I completely support this idea! fufufu… Maid costume… fufufufu… I finally get to see Misa in a maid costume…”

“So that’s what you’re after.”

Why are drunk people so hard to handle? Actually is it even possible for alcohol to affect your mind in Royal Road?

As Godou lamented on his the eavesdropping members of the pub sudden broke into another uproar.

“I want to see that too!”

“Me too!”

“I support the genius who came up this idea!”

“I approve of this idea!”

Various cries came from customers in various parts of the pub as the contents of Mark’s business deal were made public.

“Muhahahaha! Praise me more!”

The white coated youth who was no doubt the mastermind of the scheme stood up and bowed dramatically before this crowd.

Meanwhile, Godou watched this scene, speechless at how quickly the white coated youth was able to escalate matters so easily. These antics made him doubt whether or not the youth was a master of manipulation or just a plain idiot.

Part 4

Shortly afterwards, the leisurely atmosphere in Mark’s Pub was then broken by the metallic sound of ringing war bells.

Despite recognising the warning, none of the pub inhabitants moved. Godou noticed this decided to conform to everyone to see what they were waiting for. After all, his party rendezvous point was only just outside of the pub.

He noticed some movement on the town square and saw a small group of soldiers who seemed like officers making their way to the middle of the square.

“What’s everyone waiting for?”

Despite this, Godou still made sure to check with the others just in case.

“Everyone’s waiting for the commander to give his briefing.”

“I wonder what the oddball superior of mine will say this time…”

“So it’s time huh. I wonder if that guy will follow the suggestions I gave him.”

Mark answered Godou question directly while Lis expressed her doubts and the white coated youth whose name Godou still did not know presented a very suspicious response.

“What do you mean suggestions?”

Wary but curious at the same time, Godou asked the white coated youth what he meant.

“Using some of my… connections… I had a little chat with the commander and it turns out we were pretty compatible with one another.”

“Humph… birds of a feather flock together. But how did you manage to meet someone so high up? I only meet him because of Mark’s recommendation.”

“How merciless Lis... compared to that guy I’m pretty normal you know. Anyway, using my various connections to blackmail… um arrange a few coincidences, I was able to meet him.”

Although he found something distinctly wrong with that that last statement, Godou urged the white coated youth to continue.

“Yes, yes, ignoring all the moral violations of what you did what happens next?”

“Well, I suggested a speech to him that had a 100% chance of raising morale. Source: a fictional novel.”

“Wait! Don’t confuse reality with fiction!”

In response to Godou’s heartfelt tsukimomi, the youth meerly replied:

“Well, if it worked for Sora, it will work for Coronel Sky.”

One of the officers stopped and began to speak.

“ATTENTION SOLDIERS!”

An impossible loud voice rang through the town. Godou guessed that this is the effect of either a skill or a spell.

“I am Coronel Badas Sky, a proud knight of Kallamore at the commander in chief for the siege defence of this town of Tellap. And now without any further ado, I will begin my briefing session.”

The commander went straight to the point at the very beginning.

“I will not lie to you all. Our Town is currently about to come under the assault of a monster army estimated to be around 3000 strong. The nearby town of Naidiriv is also about to become under the assault of a similarly sized force. On the other hand, our forces are comprised of around 1000 combatants(soldiers/mercenaries) and 3000 civilians(milta).

Tellap has three main lines of defence. The first is the outer walls which are our only real advantage in a siege. These walls are sturdy but uneven in height ranging from 6 to 9 metres in height.

This is unfortunate because the lower sections seem to be within the limits for some monsters to get a grip on or fly over so we can expect the fighting to be tough there. Unlike the wars against other humans, we cannot expect the outer wall to do anything but stop about 85% of the monsters from getting inside.

Behind that is a second line of defence made up of multiple rows of housing and moveable barricades and reverse forces which are stationed near the town gates to destroy any monsters that make it past the first wall.

This may be the deciding factor in the siege. In the event that the first wall is breached completely and the gates are broken down or opened, all units on the first wall are to immediately retreat to the second line of defence and so on.

Tellap is a town organised so that in the case that the outer walls are breached, the closely packed houses can act as a secondary line of defence to stall the invaders from reaching the keep. The only problem would be the streets between the houses which will have to be blocked off with barricades and defended.

The roofs of the builds also have to be secured as well to prevent monsters from ambushing the defenders of the second line of defence. There are two main streets which need to be defended. This also means that once the invaders break through the first wall they will attack us in two directions.

The last line of defence is the keep which holds many important facilities such as the training guilds, the Church of Freya, various pubs and taverns. If it comes to defending the keep then we have basically lost all ability to counter attack and have to drag it out into a battle of attrition until Naidiriv city sends reinforcements for us.”

This clear and concise speech was something that was rarely seen outside of Kallamore. Rather than telling soldiers what to do in a chaotic battlefield where the fighters were in no state of mind to process new information, the commander had given a clear overview of what to expect and what to do beforehand.

Godou felt his respect for the commander rise as he realised this. Around him some people were muttering comments of approval. He wondered why Lis had called the commander an eccentric. He seemed perfectly normal Godou.

The white coated youth was staring expectantly at the commander. A wide grin on his face.

"NOW TO ALL SOLDIERS! DO NOT BE DISHEARTENED BY THIS! BUT DO KEEP IN MIND THAT JUST AS I HAVE NO GUARANTEE OF THE OUTCOME OF THE BATTLE, I ALSO HAVE NO GUARANTEE OF MY NEXT WORDS!"

However, the commander wasn’t done speaking yet. Seeing the depressed atmosphere around the city, the commander was now about rouse the spirits of the defenders and maximise morale.

“THOSE WHO EARN AN ACHIEVEMENT IN THIS BATTLE—BY THE AUTHORITY OF THE COMMANDER, I GIVE YOU THE RIGHT TO HAVE INTERCOURSE WITH THE GIRL YOU LIKE ONCE!"

“““…”””

Suddenly, a silence like the bottom of the sea wrapped around the town square. What the silence signified was—confusion, contempt, amazement. Stunned, Godou found all his new found respect for the commander go down the drain.

But, not caring about this, the commander continued.

"Furthermore! All of you soldiers who fight on the front line, after this battle is won you will be freed from further military service, and from the responsibilities to pay tax for life! The country will guarantee you veteran benefits! Therefore—don't you die a virgin! Also, those with family or loved ones waiting—you must all return alive!"

“WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

“Now! Everyone go to your rendezvous points. If you don’t have one then you are classified as part of the milta and are to meet in the town square for further orders!”

As commander finished his speech, a loud roar was emitted from the town and several military officers tackled and dragged their superior somewhere, no doubt to give a major scolding to.

Meanwhile, Godou’s only reaction was to wonder why he kept encountering these strange people. For some reason, he wasn’t as shocked as he ought to have been considering the contents of the speech.

Ding!

Status Update! The orders for the 136th Defence Party have changed.

136th Defence Party

Members: 5

Orders: Rendezvous to the bench closest to [Mark’s Pub] on the town square and wait for further orders.

With the conclusion of the commander’s speech, a message popped up in front of Godou. The pub customers started to give their farewells to one another and go in their separate ways.

“Well I’m a mercenary so I guess I’ll be going.”

Seeing this, Godou followed suit and gave his farewells.

“Me too. Want to be friends?”

“Sure.”

Lis has been added to your friend’s list.

“Oh that reminds me, I haven’t advertised myself to you two yet have I?”

The white coated youth suddenly said that as Godou and Lis stood up to leave.

“I’m an information broker who arrived here a few hours ago due to certain circumstances. Mind becoming a part of my new information network?”

“I don’t mind.”

Satoshi has been added to your friend’s list.

“Lol when did you become a tsundere? I accept.”

“Haha maybe I should have worded like: “I’m giving you the chance to become a part of my information network. Be thankful for it!” or “It’s not like I want to be friends with you. This is your once in a life time offer of joining my information network!”. Anyway, I didn’t bother registering as a mercenary so have fun on the frontlines~”

Thus Godou said goodbye to his new drinking buddies and made his way to the rendezvous point.

There were two people already there by the time he got there. One of them appeared to be a teenager wearing dark clothing and was armed with daggers. He was probably an assassin. The other one seemed to be around 20, wore light armour and was armed with a short bow. Probably an archer.

The latter appeared slightly familiar to Godou but he couldn’t remember where he had seen him before. Both of them were male.

The three of them sized each other up as they waited in silence for the last two members to arrive.

[I’m back. I finally managed to stabilise my vessel for the time being. Because I only recently became like this there will be some times went I get disconnected randomly from reality. So did anything happen while I was gone?]

The telepathic voice of Godou’s missing(?) friend greeted him after a long period of absence. Thinking about the how best to explain to Ferrex what he had been doing today, Godou decided to go with the simplest answer.

“Nothing really happened. The siege is about to start.”

[Oh.]

There was silence after that as the group continued to wait.

They didn’t have to wait long though as a minute later an armoured knight strolled up to them and joined the group.

The knight’s build was slim but upright. Although he was not particularly tall, only around 169 cm, there was a smooth sense of control and knightly grace around his movements. A visored helmet covered the top half of his face. Godou recognised the knight’s armour as the armour belonging to the Kallamore Knights.

All members of the 136th Defence Party are accounted for. Remain on standby for further orders.

Godou wondered whether something wrong with the message that had popped up in front of him. There were only 4 people present from the party. Unless Ferrex had somehow been registered as a member which should not have been possible in his current state.

Oblivious to Godou’s musings, the archer took lead of the group.

“Now that we have gathered, I think it’s time to get some introductions sorted out… Is it alright with you if I lead?”

The archer looked questioning at the knight. Like Godou, the archer had probably recognised that person as a Kallamore Knight as asked out of deference of that status.

“If fine. I’m only a Novice Knight of Kallamore anyway so you don’t have to be so respectful.”

The knight’s response however, was easy going. Godou noted that the knight’s voice as softer and higher pitched than he expected. Speaking of which, Godou felt that the archer’s voice sounded familiar to him was well.

“Hang on. Aren’t we still missing a member?”

Since no one had pointed that out yet, Godou had taken the liberty of doing so himself.

“Huh? Don’t we have 5 people here? Oh hang on you can’t see Inori from this angle.”

The others looked around in confusion and then realised the problem. The knight to a step to the side and Godou saw the fifth member who had unsuccessfully tried to hide behind the knight.

Another familiar face. And yet another awkward meeting.

The fifth member was the child-like priestess of Freya who was apparently 17 years old that Godou had met in the armoury earlier on.

Seeing her attempts to hide herself fail, the priestess immediately dropped to her knees and started kowtowing in front of Godou like a Buddha statue.

“I apologise for before! I didn’t know you were such an important figure! I’msorryI’msorryI’msorry I’msorryI’msorryI’msorryI’msorryI’msorryI’msorryI’msorryI’msorryI’msorryI’msorryI’msorry I’msorryI’msorryI’msorryI’msorryI’msorryI’msorryI’msorryI’msorryI’msorryI’msorryI’msorry”

Godou froze up at the sight of this, unsure of what to do next. He wasn’t the only one. This sight got mixed responses from the people around them.

“What the fuck just happened?”

“Wow what an asshole”

“God damn it! I want a loli!”

[Are you sure nothing happened? It looks like you somehow managed to cause a commotion while I was looking away again.]

As Godou became the target of a large amount of scorn and envy from the people around him, he suddenly felt like royal road was not going to be as relaxing as he thought it would be.

---------

Word Count: 8225

Sorry about the delay, I just got a bit caught up in rl stuff (uni prep + driver’s licence test)

This chapter felt very taxing to write for some reason. Part 3 might seem lacking (I was tired when I wrote it.)

My descriptions were very flowery/cheesy this chapter (romance/moe ain’t my forte so don’t expect much).

Btw, that awesome morale raising part of the commander’s speech was adapted from Vol 1 of No Game No Life (which is getting an anime this year.)

Table of ContentsPreviousExitNext