Wanted to get another update in soon! Chapters will probably continue to be short, but over time I intend to address the ambiguities/differences in my non-canon take on the story. I still feel a bit clunky writing, but the best way to improve is to jump right into it!

Momonga was excited.

He'd just finished going through the documentation on using the dev tools provided from his World Item request, and he felt more than ready to start making good use of this power within Nazarick. He had no intent to fully re-design the Great Tomb as it'd be a poor testament to his former guildmates to overwrite their legacy, but rather to refine it into a fully functional and self-supported environment where he could spend all his time until the shutdown.

Momonga had his avatar go to the Guild Hall with its massive circular table. This room used to serve as the hub for pre-raid strategy sessions, holiday celebrations, and general socializing for all the members of Ainz Ooal Gown. As it was deserted at the moment (and likely for good, he had to be honest with himself), there were no distractions or demanded explanations as he gathered the Staff of Ainz Ooal Gown, the symbol of the guild and their crowning achievement. In the past, any use of the Staff was preceded by a group vote on whether or not it was needed or worth the risk to the weapon, but now Momonga served as the majority of one to decide how it was to be used.

At the moment, he didn't intend to use the Staff as a weapon, but rather intended to utilize its other capabilities. Though he had the ability to open guild logs and files on his own, it would require an admin authorization for every action taken. Instead, by accessing the logs from the Staff directly, he had full admin rights from the start and could make his changes much more efficiently.

'It isn't like there are enough active players anymore to raid guild bases anyways,' Momonga justified to himself. 'There's no reason I can't keep the Staff with me all the time now.'

A short walk brought him to the throne room, and he enjoyed seeing the various NPCs going about their programmed tasks along the way. A month ago he'd spent a sizable portion of his budget on data crystals to add in the "Advanced Idling Behaviors" to increase the NPC presence. While it didn't change anything functionally, it was a balm on his lonely soul to see some activity, even artificial, in the guild again.

Having his character take a seat on the throne, Momonga opened up the guild base overview. From there, he had tabs to look at all sorts of details: maps, inventories, NPC lists, terrain editors, member involvement, and more. Selecting the top panel for "NPC Stats" he pretended to crack his knuckles as he got to work.

Nazarick currently had a limit of 2750 NPC levels, a sizable amount by any standards, but Momonga had ideas. He fully intended to edit his own character in the coming days, but his first priority was changing the NPCs.

'Even if the player count is way down, now that I'm on my own in the guild having stronger NPCs, and maybe even more of them, will be the best way to be completely sure that Nazarick will always be safe,' he thought to himself. 'I can't be on all floors at once so increasing the Guardian presence and power just makes sense."

His fingers flew over console windows, adding in code and removing other bits as needed. The NPC levels threshold shot up to a hundred thousand, and he changed the level cap of the NPCs from 100 to 150.

'I won't have time to make enough NPCs to cover all these levels I added, but I like the thought of having enough to never run out. I'll probably only boost the Guardians from level 100 to level 125 for now, it's just fun thinking about leaving some room to grow yet. Besides, I can't have them so-powerful right now that they're stronger than the guild master himself!'

He continued on in better spirits than he'd felt for months, rounding up the levels of the Pleiades to 100 apiece and made sure even the homunculus maids were at least level 75. With plenty of NPC levels left over, he started slowly thinking of new creations he could make that were impossible before under the previous restrictions.

Momonga didn't just make the NPCs stronger for the heck of it, he had a plan. If his former guildmates weren't going to log in, he'd simulate his own raids using their legacies still in the guild. That would be an issue normally, considering all changes he'd made and still planned to make would revert if he took them from the guild base itself, but phase two of the process would see that unnecessary. With a flash of pixels and light, the guild master teleported to the Colosseum on Floor 6.

The amphitheater was massive and once served to demonstrate friendly PvP matches between guild members, as well as the occasional non-friendly beatdown of intruder players who'd found themselves caught on hostile territory. Momonga made his way to the VIP box, taking a moment to mentally ruffle the hair on the stationary dark elf twins Aura and Mare as he passed. He knew they weren't real, but as two of the very few child NPCs in Nazarick, he couldn't help but feel slightly better seeing their bright expressions even in his lowest moments.

Another use of the Staff had the arena's log pulled up, with more edits in place. To date the structure couldn't spawn mobs for the members of Ainz Ooal Gown to fight, but Momonga intended to change that. One of the tools he learned demonstrated how to add in mob-spawning capabilities, and he decided to add a few possibilities to the code.

By 'a few possibilities', of course, he copied the master record of mobs within Nazarick into the log of potential combatants. A few more moments added the capability to search by name, form, alignment, race, level, resistance, weakness, and a host of other factors.

All that was left was to test the new function. Momonga closed the window and approached the twins. "Follow and Defend," he formally intoned, knowing it would trigger their programming to join his party and any combat he'd encounter. He made his way to the amphitheater floor shadowed by the NPCs, eager to see their abilities with his recent changes. A brief thought had the new arena selection menu appear, and he selected a Tier 7 fire elemental to start.

A chime sounded in the background, giving only a few seconds' notice before the monster rose to existence in front of the three Nazarick denizens. In hardly any time Momonga drew the aggro of the elemental, but immediately after Aura ran forward while Mare raised his staff.

Momonga watched in mild amazement as the twins decimated the elemental in seconds, Aura completely negating its passive fire damage and avoiding its attacks as Mare boosted her abilities with a series of quickly cast buffs. The skeletal mage knew that wouldn't have happened so quickly prior to their level boost, and he grinned as he continued to summon monsters to test his hypothesis.

Tier 7 became Tier 8 became Tier 9, fire became water became shadow became poison, and nothing could withstand the duo's immense strength. After fifteen minutes, Momonga was distracted by a side notification in the arena menu simply titled 'Loot'. He clicked on it, and saw all the expected drops and gold amount characteristic to the series of elemental monsters that were just defeated.

'Oh, this is perfect!' he mentally crowed as he transferred the loot to his inventory. 'I'd hoped to have drops included, and am glad I got it right in the code the first time through! I'd assume this will work for any level monster or even boss, but I'll have to test more later once I have other things squared away.'

He dismissed the elf twins, who returned to their location in the VIP box, and made his way back to the throne room. Despite the shutdown, his deteriorating health, and the lack of other members' presence, for the first time in ages:

Momonga felt hope.

Not too crazy, but this sets the stage for everything else I have planned, namely a Momonga who takes an active interest in Nazarick itself before the shutdown while establishing the means to stay self-sufficient. Yes this will have ramifications in the new world, but no it doesn't mean he's aware of future events or considers the NPCs alive (yet).

Thanks for reading, catch you on the next one!

-Echo