"Talking"
'Thoughts'
[spells]
"It's actually coming to an end, hun?"
That was all Momonga could think about as he methodically walked through the great halls of Ainz Ooal Gown, its golden linings and otherworldly tapestries catching the light and shining like tiny stars with every step. This once great monument that his guildmates and he had slaved over to build now sat empty. This place, designed to fit thousands, and that used to be filled with so much laughter and chatter of great friends was now so lifeless that the mere idea of other living beings filling its space being blasphemies.
This ever-constant 'fog' of loneliness along with no other sounds other than the rhythmic tapping of a golden staff was not helping to ease the mind of its owner. An owner that would make most men scream and lesser men faint.
The first thing people would notice would be the magnificent purple and golden robe that clung to a nearly 2 meter tall skeleton; its bones as white as freshly fallen snow, with hands adorned with many beautiful rings of different colours. The body alone produced an almost radiant aura, and that image might have even been considered holy to some. But that idea would have been shattered to a million pieces when they looked upon its skull. Jagged, sharp, with a mouth filled with dagger-like canines and a heavy brow that gave the undead a look of constant anger.
But the worst part would have to be the eyes; two pinprick red dots existing within a void of black, eyes that seemed to contain all the world's knowledge of hate and with the ability to stare deep into your soul and claim it. Combined together there was only one word that would even come too close to describe this godly figure. "Overlord".
"Overlord". A word that emanates power and respect, given only to those whose mere presence can dominate another living being. Whose tactile brilliance and kingly leadership draws in all those around them, compelling them through the act of merely existing to serve them with all their will! So what is this undead "Overlord" currently planning while walking through his great palace? Maybe a plan to wipe out a kingdom? Maybe a plan to bring peace to the world? Or maybe a plan… of world domination.
No, none of these great thoughts even shone a little in the undead's head. Instead, the Overlord named Momonga was currently reminiscing about the past as he made his way to the throne room to meet his fate.
" After all this time, the game's really coming to an end."
See Momonga wasn't actually a 2 meter tall magic skeleton, instead, he was just Suzuki Satoru, a painfully average sad Japanese salaryman who spent all his free time and money on a DMMO-RPG, named Yggdrasil in the year 2138.
DMMO-RPG's used futuristic devices connecting a proprietary console to the subject's brain. As well as utilizing an extracranial nanocomputer network, making it so that it allows one to enter a virtual world and experience it as though it were real life. Within limitations of course, while the technology was advanced it couldn't simulate every sense of the human body like smelling, the sense of touch, and so on. Making it so that the user still knew that what they were experiencing was still a program.
In this fantastic escapism fantasy game is where Suzuki Satoru would make his first actual friends of outcasts and loners. Together they formed the all heteromorphs guild of Ainz Ooal Gown, and then fought their way to the top to become one of the best guilds in the entire game. At their height of power, they had everything, owning vast treasures including 13 world items, the most of any guild. And they ran one of the only undefeated, unraided guild bases on the entire server despite having only 41 total members.
They were known, they were infamous, they were coveted… they were legends. And all of that only worked because they worked as a team, as friends. Those were the happiest years of Momonga's life, but inevitably that happiness couldn't last. As the years rolled on, and the updates became less frequent with content and quality; the player base began to slowly disappear like fine sand through tiny cracks. And that was felt most evidently through Ainz Ooal Gown. Slowly but surely the members began to leave, one by one, all for the same reason: because this game was getting in the way of their life. And no game was worth more than their lives.
Some said they would come back, some didn't. Some didn't even say anything at all. They just left one day with no words of warning, or goodbyes. Soon 41 became 31… then 21… then 11… then 5… then 3…. And finally, one. Momonga.
Momonga picked up his pace a little as his thoughts wandered to the darker corners of his mind. He couldn't leave, he just couldn't. Not when this place meant so much to him and his friends! Unlike them he didn't really have a life worth living outside, this game meant everything to him, literally.
'Years of happiness, sadness, little memories of joking with friends, getting into fights and making up, all the joys and sorrows and, I was just meant to leave it all behind?! NEVER!' Momonga thought angrily as he half pushed/ half slammed the doors of the great hall open.
'Nothing would make me leave! Not unless they shut down the damn game!... oh.'
He stopped in his tracks, his mind coming back to reality acting as whiplash as he remembered what he wished he could just forget.
'Right, they are shutting down the game. That's today.'
That's why Momonga was feeling so down, that's why he's going to the empty throne room, that's why he couldn't believe that it's-
"Really about to end."
Momonga finished that thought out loud right as he made it to the seat of his impressive throne. Well, "his throne" was a bit of a stretch, Momonga thought. They won it after clearing out what used to be a dungeon of their base in one go, honestly, it was really the whole guild's throne.
They could have made it anything they wanted it to be, but Momonga's guildmates insisted that it be modified to fit his avatar's theme. They all knew that Momonga wasn't a particularly outgoing kind of guy, instead, he was content with sitting on the sidelines watching his friends talk and just enjoying their time together. So the idea of this quiet and reserved man sitting on the most "Look at me" throne was just hilarious to them. Same thing with the golden staff that Momonga still held in his hand. A guild weapon, a literal symbol of their union. Something that was unrivaled in its strength except for world items. A symbol that if broken would mean the end of Ainz Ooal Gown. Shaped into a golden jagged staff that splits into seven golden serpents that coil at the top to form a crown, each holding a different coloured magical orb in its mouth. Shaped to look exactly like something Momonga's character, the undead Overlord, would use.
'You guys always knew how to make me both uncomfortable yet happy at the same time. Hahaha… Uwah.'
That happy memory only brought more pain to the undead as he sighed and looked down at the clock in his inventory marking the end of Yggdrasil.
23: 58: 23
'The mods and admins should be releasing the fireworks now.'
Momonga had entertained the idea of spending his last moments outside realizing the mountain of fireworks he had stored. But he just decided against it.
'My fond memories for this game were when I spent it with you guys, helping one another build Ainz Ooal Gown from the ground up. Spending my last moments anywhere else feels like betraying you guys.'
Momonga straightened up a little and chuckled as he thought about how his guildmates would have reacted to seeing him like this now.
'They would probably make some dumb joke about how the "great and almighty Overlord was getting too mushy and if he was feeling alright in the skull".'
Momonga looked back down at the counter again.
23: 59: 45
Momonga sighed.
He had to wake up at four tomorrow. He had to sleep the moment the servers
shut down in order not to affect the next day's work.
23:59:35, 36, 37
Momonga set his watch to count out the seconds.
23:59:48, 49, 50
Momonga closed his eyes.
'It sure was fun guys, just wished it could have lasted a little longer.'
23:59:58, 59—
—
—
—
—
—
'Hun? Why wasn't I automatically logged out yet?'
Momonga reopened his eyes to find that he was still very much in his undead skeleton persona, still holding onto the Staff of Ainz Ooal Gown. But no longer in the throne room of his guild base. No, instead the personification of death was standing in a small clearing of a very orangey pinewood forest in the dead of night. With what looked like white mountain peaks in the distance, illuminated only by the light of the moon and his racial undead ability to see in the dark as if it was day.
'Did the administrators postpone the shutdown? Is this a new update? Yggdrasil 2?'
Momonga had heard rumors that that shitty dev team was working on the sequel for Yggdrasil a while back. So maybe they just moved everyone from Yggdrasil 1 to this new game's starting area?
"No, that wouldn't make any sense. I still have all my gear and-
Momonga finally spoke out loud and then stopped out of shock.
"My voice, why is it so deep? I didn't buy a voice modifier."
Momonga's new voice shocked him so much because of how deep and rich it was, how foreboding he sounded, how much like a classic overlord should sound.
Momonga shook his head, questions for later. For now, he should check the chat logs, if this was a new update or Yggdrasil 2 then there would have been a serverwide notice posted. He raised one bony white hand and made a swishing motion to summon his menu - only to be met with empty air and silence.
"What? Where's my menu?"
He waved his hands a few more times, desperately trying to summon that little gray box into existence - only to be met with the same result as before.
"WHAT!?"
Just as the undead Overlord was about to panic a strange sense of calm overtook him and his raging, worried emotions suddenly died down to a very mild concern.
"Mmmh, my menu isn't opening, this definitely isn't normal. The menu is hardcoded into the technology itself so what could this mean.."
Momonga, now much calmer began to think more critically about his situation, hand still gripping the Staff of Ainz Ooal Gown while the other rubbing his smooth boney chin - 'wait? Smooth?'
This again caused the Skeleton to pause and rub his chin more thoroughly for confirmation. Yeah, the undead wasn't imagining it: smooth, although it felt like he was touching something with a thin cloth between his fingers, he could still feel his chin.
"That's not possible, Yggdrasil doesn't have feeling capabilities"
Yet his fleshless fingers would beg to differ, running up and down his boney face. Feeling every crease, crack, and edge.
Momonga looked over to the staff of Ainz Ooal Gown and let it out of his hands, it merely floated back a few feet and hovered there, slightly spinning like how he remembered items worked in game.
'The staff still acts like I'm in the game, but I can still feel everything I touch, what is going on uwah.'
Momonga started to panic again as everything around him stopped making any sense. He looked around his clearing once more and noticed a few meters from him where a small patch of purple tulip-like flowers.
"Umu, alright, this will be the ultimate test."
Momonga quickly walked over to the patch of flowers, bending down to pluck one from its life-giving roots and stem. He twirled it around in his long boney fingers, admiring how the light from the moon danced off its smooth pristine petals.
'Ok, here goes nothing.'
Momonga slowly lifted the flower up. Past his sharp chin, past his row of very, very sharp teeth, and finally up to the slits where a nose would have been. The undead took a deep breath from his mouth to calm his nerves. Closed his eyes. And sniffed.
'what.'
Momonga's hands dropped the flower, his mind completely forgetting about it as it tried to process the new information it was given.
'What?'
He had smelled the flower. Smelled it. While touch might have been on the list of things likely for the DMMO-RPG technology to do in the future, smelling was definitely not on that list. He even remembers some video where an expert making these machines said that smelling is just flat out impossible for them to do. So by being able to smell that flower just now could only mean one thing.
Momonga the skeleton Overlord, leader of Ainz Ooal Gown, was no longer in the game of Yggdrasil.
With that revelation, the Mighty Overlord only had one word worth his precious time to say.
"WHAT!?"