Sometimes, Makoto really loved being short, because it just allows her to just absolutely burrow herself into Ryuji's arms as they were just laying in bed doing absolutely nothing productive.
"You know, I have like, a real job, right?" Ryuji said, though he didn't sound too stressed about it, as he made absolutely no movement.
She responded by hugging him tighter, "Your real job is to be my boyfriend, dummy."
He smiled as he returned the hug, "Well, I guess so."
Her phone suddenly buzzed, ruining the mood.
"Ugh, who's the idiot calling me at this time of the day?" Makoto irritatedly said as she slowly got up from her position to grab her phone from the cabinet next to their bed.
"Isn't it like 11 AM?"
"Shut up, you know what I mean."
BigStall: Hey
BigStall: Have you seen the news?
Orphea: I'm literally in the middle of cuddling Ryuji right now, what do you want?
BigStall: Okay that's great actually because I was going to tell you to find him before I told you.
Orphea: Good news?
BigStall: uh
BigStall: The opposite.
Orphea: Okay, how bad is it?
Orphea: Why are you taking so long to reply?
BigStall: Okay I literally cannot properly convey this to you in text form. I'm just going to call you.
And so, her entire world shifted in the span of 3 minutes.
Picking up the phone to answer the call, not even a second passes before one of Lauren's conservative faction superior's starts yelling at her, "Moore! What the hell are your contacts doing?!"
She subdued a groan within her as she calmly stated, "My 'contacts' are merely doing the usual, sir."
"This is not usual at all!"
Hm, Fujitsu sure was busy today. It probably has something to do with the several assassinations today, plus the fact that some families of top members of Fujitsu have been mysteriously going missing today.
Ah well, it didn't really matter to her, she's just a convenient pencil pusher, after all.
"I assure you, sir, there is nothing amiss," Lauren said before hanging up the phone.
He tried to call again, but she didn't really care as she just put her phone on silent and scrolled through the news, looking for something interesting.
Her associates have this handled, and all she needed to do was waste time and not die.
From what she's read that's come out this past hour, Kotako's contacts seemed to be hell bent on causing some sort of war, seeing as there's been countless bombings and assassinations, and she does slightly worry for her friends, but there's no way they can die. Because obviously, they're her friends.
It was a bit of a dumb mentality, but as long as she knows that all of them will be there for the last hour of Yggdrasil, she thought everything would be alright.
Speaking of which, she seemed to have finally stumbled upon how Yggdrasil died on a random article that was just published.
The entire building was bombed with a bunch of its developers and stockholders caught in the blast radius.
Including other big business CEOs like…
Like…
…The CEO of Karasu Group…?
Lauren's eyes widened as she reread the article and figured out the situation, and a sinking feeling drops in her stomach as she realizes what she's done.
No, no, she didn't do anything! She's just… She just so happened to be on the same side as the bad guys! It's not like she actually did the detonating!
Oh my God I gave them all of the information they needed to put their plans into motion.
Nope! Nope! Lauren Moore you are not going to continue in this direction! You are a rational and smart woman! You can think rationally about this!
Oh my god I just indirectly killed Makoto's dad. I just killed one of my best friend's father. I don't deserve any of the luxury I have. I don't deserve anything at all.
Okay, that was not rational at all.
Okay, let her try again.
I AM THE CAUSE OF ALL OF THIS.
Okay.
Maybe she should just try to put her head down for a moment and calm down her breathing before she does anything.
Trying to stabilize her breathing, failing miserably, and trying again, she eventually gets to a somewhat stable position of mind in about 5 minutes.
So, she tries to think again.
Okay, so I may have accidentally been the woman who enabled a massive war in Tokyo.
Okay, not good, but not bad either. Let her keep going.
Now, I need to ensure the safety of my friends.
Okay, okay, now how is she going to do that?
…I'm going to have to tell Kotako that I'm friends with the now-CEO of Karasu Group and convince him that Karasu Group can be an ally now. That way, Makoto and everyone working there will be safe.
Okay, you know what? That's a good plan. It's going to force Lauren to lie to Makoto and convince her that the sudden aid from her company is just a coincidence. And this really just benefits Fujitsu and its conspiracy to get another powerful Megacorp on its side, but this'll be good for her. Mostly because she has no idea if Makoto is ready or not to fully take reins over the massive megacorporation.
Okay, everything will be fine. She may have indirectly caused all of this, but she can fix this. There's nothing that'll just straight up stop her from fixing this…
As long as all 41 of them stay alive, then that's a victory for her.
Lauren breathes in and slowly lets it out as she picks up the phone to hopefully contact Kotako, who hopefully wouldn't be busy right now.
He picks up on the second ring, "Kotako speaking."
She quickly answered, "Moore speaking. I've just seen the news of Karasu Group's CEO being assassinated, and I may have a proposal that might interest you."
Kotako hummed on the other line, "Go on, I am busy right now, after all."
"I'm actually good friends with the CEO's daughter, Makoto Tori. If we go to her and help her secure her position as the new CEO, we may have a decent chance at getting another megacorp on our side," Lauren revealed, to dead silence on the other side.
For a full 10 seconds, she was worried she might've actually done something wrong.
Kotako finally replied, "Ms. Moore, why did you not come with this information sooner?"
"...To be quite frankly honest with you, sir, it did not occur to me that our attempt to usurp the Fujitsu company would be related in any way to the big banking corporations in central Tokyo," Lauren slowly said.
Kotako just sighed, only mildly annoyed, "Fair enough, we did keep you in the dark for a while. Fine, you can tell your friend that Fujitsu and its allies will aid her in securing her throne, but we won't be doing any of that until we actually put down the rebellion in this company."
Internally, she breathed a sigh of relief as she thanked him, "Thank you, sir."
He wasn't hanging up the call, but she could hear some faint conversations on the other side of the phone so she stayed on her phone for another minute until Kotako got back to her with an annoyed tone, "It seems as though our good CEO is putting up more of a fight than we expected. Ms. Moore, as our finest head of cleaning, I'm afraid that people will be coming to you to ask who is responsible for sending you the warrants for these deaths. You have experience in deceiving fools, yes? Throw them off our trail while we bend Yamamoto into submission."
Kotako chose that moment to hang up, leaving her all alone in a room that was about to be quickly swarmed by people going to ask a lot of questions she doesn't have the answers for.
Or worse, ask a lot of questions she does have the answers for.
"Fuck," Lauren genuinely swore as her head fell into her arms, "I am so dead…"
One of the smarter guys was going to come in here with a gun. She knew it. Guns weren't that hard to get a hold of when you knew the right people. And she was surrounded by people who knew the right people.
What she needs… Are bodies. She needs to just have a bunch of people in her office so that if anything happened, she wouldn't be the one taking the hit.
No, she couldn't count on her office. She needed to actively seek out other people, be more authoritative to make it look as though everything was going to plan.
First, though, she likely had enough time to call Orphea- Makoto, and tell her that Fujitsu could send help sooner or later.
Then, she stood straighter in her chair as she felt her stress build up. This wasn't the most ideal situation.
Sure, a bunch of people may have died, but as long as it was nobody she knew, it would be just fine.
She quickly called up Makoto, and she waited for her to pick up.
A ring passes.
She realized that being stressed was not the correct mood for this phone call, so she quickly centered herself and got more professional.
A second ring passes.
She briefly went over what she was going to say in her head. Probably something about feeling sorry for her loss and that she's able to send help her way when the situation in her company is over.
A third ring passes.
The call was rejected.
She blinked.
Okay, Makoto was probably in the middle of important stuff right now, she can wait for a bit.
Okay, what about Ryuji?
So, she called him and…
Nothing.
Feeling a bit worried, she decided to go down the list of people she knew who worked at Karasu Group because of Makoto, and called them.
None of them called back.
Until Daijobubua picked up, "Uh, oh, Vaggy?"
"Oh thank god," Lauren quickly let out as he responded to her call, "Daijo, you need to tell me what's going on right now."
"Really bad," Daijobubua flatly replied, "BigStall, whatever his real name was again, just got to Makoto and now she knows what happened. And now everyone in Tokyo knows what's happening and I think our company is about to go into a civil war or something over the CEO position."
Okay.
That's really fucking bad. But an expected kind of bad. She can fix this.
"Okay, I understand," Lauren said, "Can you contact Makoto and tell her that I can rope my company, Fujitsu, into helping her?"
"Huh? You can?" Daijobubua questioningly said, "Wait, how high are you on the totem pole? I thought you were just a basic propagandist?"
"If you haven't heard, there's a coup going on right now. It's a bit of a touch and go situation, but I have it handled. Just tell Makoto that I can get her help if she just calls me soon," Lauren said, getting a humph of affirmation from Daijobubua, who hangs up.
With that phone call handle, she immediately booked it to the place with the most amount of people possible. If anyone tried to do anything… Well, this was why she was building camaraderie with some of the people in her building for the past few years.
Hopefully, the old guard won't be so bold as to try to take her out without knowing what the hell is going on.
Lauren has gotten this far, she won't falter now.
Kotako gritted his teeth as he listened to the voice of the CEO of Fujitsu, Yamamoto, calmly speaking about the "current situation at the company."
"He knows what's going on," Kotako concluded to his closest aides.
They all looked as though they had already lost. What fools. Don't they know anything about perseverance?
One of the idiots in the room asked Kotako, "We've lost the advantage of surprise, then. Should we surrender?"
Kotako glared at the idiot who spoke, "We still have our troops marching to each and every Fujitsu building, not to mention we've already told our contacts to begin their own coups. Just because Yamamoto knows what's going on doesn't mean all of them know."
Actually, now that he thought about it. Kotako was right, all of them didn't know what was going on…
He needed to use this chaos to his advantage.
Kotako hastily pulled out his phone, "I'm calling Moore. She'll get me the time I need. The rest of you, keep calling our contacts to proceed as planned!"
As long as Yamamoto lived, the possibilities were infinite. But infinite didn't mean all. As long as Yamamoto met his end today, then the infinity of Fujitsu will tilt in their favor.
Forever.
Apparently, Kotako wants Lauren to divert Fujitsu's attention away from the company, claiming that Kotako is currently taking refuge at another company building owned by Mitsubishi.
If Lauren remembered correctly, that was one of their competitors. That they were currently trying to coup.
Well, it probably helps with the deception with hardliner Fujitsu troops walking into their buildings.
Speaking of which, she wasn't fully aware of where the hardliners got all of those people with guns from. She knows that there was a heightened amount of gun production recently. But for basically an army to appear out of nowhere? That was impressive.
That being said, there were still a bunch of high level executives and shareholders in her current building, just waiting for her to finish speaking on the phone so she can inform them what's going on.
Seriously, why did she have to work at company headquarters? This sucks.
Walking out of the room she excused herself in, she calmly meets the faces of all of the top executives in the company-
Holy shit that's the CEO of Fujitsu, Yamamoto standing in front of her.
If it wasn't for years of keeping a straight face, she wouldn't have been able to speak her next words, "I've received words from Kotako that he is on the other side of Tokyo in the Mitsubishi's company headquarters."
Yamamoto hummed, "Ms… Lauren Moore, was it? How likely do you believe that is true?"
Well, shit. Should she just shoot herself now?
Lauren gave the most casual shrug as she possibly could at that moment, "Well, I don't know sir. I know about as much as you do right now."
Okay but seriously though WHY WAS THE CEO OF THE COMPANY HERE?! SHOULDN'T HE BE IN A BUNKER SOMEWHERE?!
Yamamoto slowly walked up to Lauren, "Oh, really? Because I believe you know far more than you let on…"
BUT SHE SERIOUSLY DOESN'T KNOW ANYTHING RIGHT NOW!
When Yamamoto had gotten a bit too close, however, a sudden twist of fate occurred.
"Sir! Sir! Armed men just entered the building!" One of Yamamoto's aids panickedly shouted out, shaking him away from her.
At that moment, Lauren realized that Kotako made some sort of error in his calculations. Nobody expected the CEO to stick around in the headquarters for this long. Kotako overestimated his enemy after Yamamoto had cleanly escaped his assassination attempt.
Yamamoto seemed to have realized his mistake as well.
It was too late for them, though, as at this point, there was no way for Yamamoto to escape without being captured.
"Yamamoto! What do we do?!" One of the executives lost face and ended up succumbing to panic as he loudly begged his leader for answers.
Yamamoto simply sat in his chair, addressing everyone in the room, "It appears as though our battle is cut short due to my foolishness. I am sorry. There is nothing left for us to do anymore."
Lauren quickly made her way out of the room before anyone could see her part in keeping the CEO here.
As she was moving towards the front door, she met the armed hardliners walking towards where the CEO was.
"Ms. Moore?" One of them confusedly asked, stopping their advance, "We were told that you would likely be dead."
"They gave up the moment you arrived," Lauren informed, "I'll call Kotako on my way home. I'm clocking out."
The same man shrugged, "Well, good for you. We're still going to take them."
Lauren gave the man a flat look, "Don't involve me in this. We're on the same side anyways."
They didn't exchange another word as they went to do what must be done.
Lauren was quite sure she wouldn't see Yamamoto again.
As she exited the building, she called Kotako. He picked up on the first ring.
"Yes, Moore?" Kotako asked before she could speak.
Lauren cleared her throat as she put her breathing mask on so she could walk outside without dying, "Yamamoto made a misstep. He was trying to interrogate me personally without realizing the danger he was in. Our men are currently trying to arrest him."
Kotako paused.
"Seriously?" Kotako sounded the most surprised and youthful Lauren has ever heard him.
"Seriously," Lauren affirmed.
Kotako had a moment of silence as he considered the implications of the plot, "Well, in that case. I suppose we've won. Go home, I will deal with this."
And with that, the hardliners of Fujitsu won, shifting the destiny of Japan forever.
Vagisilious double-checks to make sure she can receive phone calls inside of her dive gear, and then she puts on her dive gear to go into Yggdrasil, which was still open despite its company being blown up.
She has no idea how that worked, but quite frankly she doesn't care that much.
As she entered Yggdrasil, the first thing she checked was to find out who was online, and apparently there were only 8 people online right now, that being BigStall, Momonga, Bukubukuchagama, Ulbert, Tabula, Yamaiko, Ankoro, and herself.
She quickly checked the conference room, and she guessed correctly because she found them all there, sort of quietly whispering as if anyone heard them, the things they were speaking of would come true.
"So, BigStall, can you explain to me what the heck is going on with Yggdrasil now?" Vagisilious asked.
BigStall sighed, "Well, you know how our company just got wiped out, right?"
Vagisilious nodded, "Yeah, I saw."
"Well, our company bought 4 years of data in advance for Yggdrasil, and it's all hosted on cloud servers," BigStall explained, his voice sounding very morose, "So basically, the servers will keep going on until 2138. But I'm the only living member of the dev team, so it's likely that there's going to be no Yggdrasil 2 or any sort of reboot. And with my company basically in shambles, it's unlikely that Yggdrasil will last any longer than the 31st of December, 2138."
She didn't know what to say about that, so she slowly nodded and went to sit down in her usual seat while trying to comprehend it all.
So, Yggdrasil is going to die in 4 years.
Holy shit.
"You know, Vaggy," Tabula called out from across the table, "That's pretty good for Leviathan, yeah? All of the shitty devs died."
"You know I'm still here, right?" BigStall said, sounding irritated.
Tabula immediately apologized, "Sorry."
…The NPCs.
He's right, the NPCs are going to become real.
It's never been on the forefront of her mind, but it's true, that's a thing that'll be happening soon.
4 years.
In 4 years, she can leave this all behind and…
"Oh my god," Bukubukuchagama gasped as she quickly grabbed everyone's attention, "Guys, Bellriver died."
…What?
"What?" Ulbert was the first to respond with disbelief, "No way, you're fucking with me."
No, no, nonononononononono.
"No, my brother was just contacted by Amano, who lived nearby Bellriver, and he said he saw the explosion that took him out." Bukubukuchagama said, her voice clear that she was in disbelief over it too.
An explosion.
I killed Bellriver.
I really don't deserve anything.
"I…I…" Vagisilious stuttered out, tears starting to form under her headset, "I think I should go…"
Yamaiko moved over to Vagisilious and put a hand over her shoulder to try and comfort her, knowing fully well that all she would feel was a dull feeling on her shoulder, "It's alright, Vaggy! It'll all be fine!"
Yamaiko's voice didn't sound convincing, not even to herself.
But Yamaiko stayed.
Momonga tried to console Vagisilious, "Vaggy, none of this is your fault."
The words stabbed at Vagisilious's heart, because she fully knows that's not the case. This is the direct result of her actions.
Vagisilious couldn't say a word, though, because at this point she had descended into tears and became unable to speak.
Just for a brief moment, she humored the thought of it looking pretty weird from an outside perspective, because the models in Yggdrasil weren't tuned to be able to show crying.
And then she kept crying.
This may be- no, this is the worst day in her life.
BigStall awkwardly coughed as he tried to take attention off of her breakdown, "Maybe- No, we should arrange a funeral or something like that."
Ankoro quickly took the bait, "Yeah, we should. Probably down in the mausoleum in the treasury."
Tabula hummed, "I can make the coffin… Or, coffins."
Ulbert looked at him in disbelief, "Plural?"
"One for all of us."
That struck a cord with Vagisilious. They weren't sure how many were actually going to be able to make it to the end of Yggdrasil. Some of them might die along the way.
She can't let that happen.
"Let me make them," Vagisilious managed to get out through her tears, "I can do it."
Momonga tried to stop her, "Ah, Vaggy, it's fine, you're clearly going through a lot right now…"
"Let me."
Momonga stared at her, before ultimately backing down, "If that's what you want, you can do it."
She can fix this.
This is just a trial.
She can fix this.
Nobody has to know the depth of her sins.
She can fix this.
Yggdrasil Forums:
Topic: Yggdrasil is no longer being updated
Posted on: August 30, 2134 by BigStall
BigStall (Original Poster) (Developer) (Guild: Ainz Ooal Gown)
As you may have all heard, our company was caught in the crossfire of the recent bombing assassinations. The result of this is that I am the only surviving member of the Yggdrasil development team, due to me sneaking out of the building to go get food.
As most of our management was killed in the bombing, the future of our company is dire, and quite honestly, it probably won't survive. The best case scenario is the government bailing us out with new management.
However, considering, getting political for a moment here, Fujitsu seems to be gearing up for some sort of takeover of the government, it probably won't happen.
Therefore, I, as the only remaining developer left, must sadly announce that Yggdrasil will no longer be updated.
We bought data that would last us for 5 years 1 year ago, and considering we're still online as of now, the data company is still honoring their contract.
As such, Yggdrasil will no longer be available to the public by December 31, 2138.
If you have any questions, you can try to test your luck here, but I'm about to become incredibly busy.
If you wish to send me money, please don't buy things in Yggdrasil. I have no idea where the money for that goes right now.
Thank you for staying with us for the past decade, but all good things must end.
Thank you for playing our game.
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TheHistorian (Guild Leader: The Lore Keepers)
Holy shit. I guess this really is the end, then?
Wait BigStall, can you please drop the official lore book of Yggdrasil? It's the least you can do! Confirm or debunk our theories!
-BigStall (Original Poster) (Developer) (Guild: Ainz Ooal Gown)
Unfortunately, I didn't have the permission to check the lorebook that they kept, and my opportunity died in the fire that engulfed our stuff. And quite frankly, I wasn't listening to most of their conversations about the lore.
That being said, Denshosho is grilling me for what I do know, so if Denshosho is feeling nice, I guess he can share what I know.
-=TheHistorian (Guild Leader: The Lore Keepers)
Okay thank you, BigStall. Thank you for your dedication to this game.
Denshosho please drop those details.
-=-Denshosho (Guild: Ainz Ooal Gown)
This shit is so ass. I pray that this is just them brainstorming because this isn't any good at all. I don't even want to talk about it.
-=-=TheHistorian (Guild Leader: The Lore Keepers)
Is it really that bad?
-=-=-Denshosho (Guild: Ainz Ooal Gown)
BRO THEY WERE GOING TO MAKE NIDHOGGR'S DEATH A BAD THING.
-=-=-=TheHistorian (Guild Leader: The Lore Keepers)
Oh lmao. Yeah, I'm sorry you had to be struck down with cursed knowledge. I guess this is where our story ends, then.
BlessThyHearts (Guild Leader: Seraphim)
Oh.
Very well then, I suppose our dreams could not last forever. Goodbye, then. I shall see you all in 4 years.
-Eyesee (Guild: Seraphim)
o7
-=Mustapha Mond (Guild: Seraphim)
I will be sticking around to ensure our guild stays intact for those 4 years. We can have the most magnificent feast when the end comes.
-=-Elynas (Guild: Seraphim)
Still chasing that guild leader spot lmao. Thanks though, I'll come around every now and then.
Unionite (Guild Leader: Foreigner United Front)
What the fuck happened in Japan?
-SteamBird (Guild Leader: The Yggdrasil Times)
So basically, some assholes from Fujitsu are trying to stage a coup to become the biggest megacorp in Tokyo. So they're just killing their enemies, and Yggdrasil was caught in the crossfire because the CEO of Karasu Corp happened to be in a meeting in the same building.
-=Unionite (Guild Leader: Foreigner United Front)
Wow that sucks lmao.
-=-SteamBird (Guild Leader: The Yggdrasil Times)
You're telling me! I need to get out of this shithole country. Are you taken? Let me marry you. I'm (Kind of) hot. Think about all of our forum postings together!
-=-=Unionite (Guild Leader: Foreigner United Front)
This sounds morally unethical to coerce you into marrying me to get out of your country but ngl I did like our conversations on this forum. DM me.
Principality (Midgard World Champion) (Guild Leader: Triumvirate)
My thousands of hours I poured into this game turned into memories.
-EmpireOfWar (Muspelheim World Champion) (Guild: Triumvirate)
Yeah, this fucking sucks.
-=Crackaslama (Asgard World Champion) (Guild: Triumvirate)
The missions, the raiding, the grinding… Is it finally over? Do I get to quit the game now?
Powerfuel (Guild Leader: 8 Greed Kings)
Oh damn. I guess we're on a sinking ship now?
Theadul (Guild: 8 Greed Kings)
I send my condolences. Send my condolences to your guild members as well if they have lost anyone.
-PopStarry (Guild: 8 Greed Kings)
Same here!
Saibandoke (Guild Leader: Clown House)
I don't even play this game that often anymore because I've moved on to bigger things.
But still, I'm going to miss this game.
CocaineKuma (Clanless)
HAHAHAHAHA! I STILL WON IN THE END!
-Jax (Guild: Digital Circus)
-=CocaineKuma (Clanless)
BRO.
Joyboy (Guild Leader: Straw Hats)
Say, anyone want to have a party at the end of Yggdrasil? We can have a huge party across all 9 worlds to celebrate this game!
-Pathfinder (Niflheim World Champion) (Guild: Straw Hats)
Boss, I will be there!
-=Navigator (Guild: Straw Hats)
You would get lost somehow lol.
-=-Pathfinder (Niflheim World Champion) (Guild: Straw Hats)
I keep my promises. At the end of Yggdrasil, I will be there!
Vagisilious remembered a time in her youth when her family dragged her outside and randomly decided that today, they would make a time capsule.
So, she put a bunch of her valuables inside of that time capsule and buried it somewhere with a promise to return and remember all of the memories she put inside of it.
She never returned to that time capsule.
Nazarick will be different.
Nazarick wasn't just a random thing thought on a whim to be done, only to be forgotten as soon as it went out of sight.
Nazarick was a labor of love, and they poured in thousands and thousands of hours because they loved Nazarick and couldn't stand to see it not be filled with memories.
And so, she will ensure that this time, her time capsule will be opened with all of her friends. So they can enjoy the memories of the good old days.
1 day after Yggdrasil's development ended, Vagisilious began all of her planning.
Her years of working as a propagandist has taught her that information is king. And now, she gets to put her information to work.
First of all, she now knows that her childish delusions of all 41 of them surviving and making it to Yggdrasil was just that.
A childish delusion.
With the state of the world as it is, and the fact that people aren't living as long as they used to be back in her old world, it's likely that a few of them are going to die before they make it to the end. And thus, wouldn't make it to the new world.
She rejects this notion.
All 41 of them will make it to the new world. Not even death or the fact that they'll be traveling through worlds will stop this from becoming true.
First, Vagisilious needs to fix the issue of death. And so, she made 41 coffins for each member with around the same text of 'If they die anywhere, their souls will make it back to Nazarick along with their player body without fail.'
[Bellriver's Tomb - Bio - Within this tomb lies the body and soul of Bellriver of Ainz Ooal Gown. Due to the restrictions of Yggdrasil, he cannot be revived. But when Yggdrasil dies, he will be able to be revived as usual. And if Bellriver is to ever die again, his body will reform in this coffin, and his soul will make it back to Nazarick unscathed. This will happen without fail.]
Bellriver's tomb was ordained with scarlet red and gold, fitting his last avatar and gear. She even spent money to make it glow.
Of course, the other 40 coffins in the mausoleum were just as extravagant. They were theirs, after all.
They were also movable, mostly because Bellriver's coffin will be in the center and they'll have to move it to its spot later.
Now, from what her notes recall, Momonga was the only member of Ainz Ooal Gown to make it to the end, so that means most of her friends will be stuck in real life.
How fortunate for her that there's a world item whose sole purpose is to map worlds, and a gate that makes portals to those worlds.
On the 4th floor, the Gate of Atlas's entire purpose was for the guild to be able to create gates in-between worlds just so they didn't have to leave Nazarick and go to the neutral hubs to take the gates there to travel between worlds.
So, if all flavor text becomes real, she'll just take this to its logical extreme and give it the ability to give it the ability to create gates between all worlds.
[Gate of Atlas - Bio - … Additionally, when Yggdrasil ends, the Gate of Atlas may be used to create gates between all worlds using the power of Atlas. The ability to create portals between Earth and Nazarick is emphasized.]
So, even if they miss the end, that's okay, she'll make sure they can enjoy the fruits of their labor anyways.
Speaking of which, she also needed to make sure that they'll be able to take their Yggdrasil avatars, so she made some adjustments to the guild ring's flavor text.
The existing flavor text wasn't modified at all and just said 'This ring proves its wearer to be a part of the guild Ainz Ooal Gown.'
But if the flavor text becomes real, she can just take 41 rings and make them specific to each member to allow them to take the forms of their avatars when worn.
She needed to borrow the guild staff for it, since the guild rings can only be edited by the guild master or its guild weapon.
And the guild weapon always sat in its little niche in the conference room and out in the open as a symbol of trust between all 41 of Ainz Ooal Gown, and it hurt her a little to break that trust and temporarily stole the guild weapon without anyone looking.
But this was a necessity, so she hopes that they can forgive her for it if they ever found out.
Over the course of an hour, she slowly and painfully edits 41 rings to have the name of each member carved in them, and edits the flavor text to her desired effect.
[Vagisilious's Guild Ring - Bio - A guild ring belonging specifically to Vagisilious of Ainz Ooal Gown. If worn by anyone else, it functions as a generic guild ring. However, when worn by Vagisilious while she is not in her avatar form, it will transform her into her avatar.]
Finishing that, she exited the treasury, and just before she left, Vagisilious saw Pandora's Actor standing by, unmoving.
…She should make sure that someone knows about this, too.
Editing Pandora's Actor's bio, she adds in a little addendum at the end.
"Pandora's Actor is aware of the 41 Guild Rings and is easily able to identify which ring belongs to who, no matter what form the guild members may take."
As she exits the treasury and places the guild weapon back in its place, the next thing she needed to do was make a contingency plan in case she died.
Because if not even her friends were safe from the continuous march of time, it's stupid to think she was safe too.
So, someone else needed to know her plans, and as far as that goes, there's only one candidate for that, Momonga.
Out of everyone, he's the one that stays, and that should be a constant. So all she has to do is explain everything to him, and if she dies, he can activate her contingency plan.
Well, her contingency plan is to get Momonga to bring Tokino down to the mausoleum, since Tokino has a few revival spells, and to revive every coffin. After that, she can carry out her plan as usual.
Quickly taking one of the many books inside of Nazarick-
No, she needed to take 2. What if Momonga doesn't arrive for the final day? Tokino needs a copy as well. She's the only guarantee.
Taking 2 empty books out of Nazarick's treasury, she begins to write some basic instructions on what to do if she isn't there on the final day. Mostly to revive every single dead member, and if she isn't a part of that dead list, then she wrote down her current address and real name so they can get her dumbass from her apartment to Nazarick.
The first book, she'll keep so she can give it to Momonga when he logs on later and explicitly tell him not to read it until the last day.
The second book, she put in Tokino's inventory and added to her bio that she'll read it only if Momonga or Vagisilious were not alive.
After finishing up with Tokino, her eyes caught a glimpse of Leviathan, and she internally winced as she realized that Leviathan's greatest enemy, the developers, was now dead.
And he didn't have a single thing to do with it.
She… She should probably do something for him.
But that'll have to happen later, when her emotions are a little less of a wreck and she's not in her "I can fix all of this" mode.
Leaving the 4th floor her mind whirled as Vagisilious tried to figure out something else she can do.
But…
Is she not creative enough? It feels like she's done all she can do and now there's nothing to do except wait.
…Waiting for 4 years…
…She'll wait.
It's the least she can do for all of her friends.
They deserve the world, and she deserves not even the tiniest crumb of their glory.
All she is doing is atoning for her sins.
After the Fujitsu coup, there was a solid month of consolidation where every company in Tokyo prepared themselves for the battle to come.
Fujitsu had grown five times in size as it absorbed countless other companies around it with their own coups. With a stranglehold on what amounted to a seventh of Tokyo, Fujitsu and its allies would soon have enough power to challenge the bankers in Central Tokyo.
Speaking of allies, the Karasu Group ended up under the control of Makoto thanks to the help of Fujitsu, who had quickly abandoned their previous partners in the company to aid the much easier to manipulate girl. So now, one of the banker companies in Central Tokyo was now allied to Fujitsu, which was a considerable addition to their strength.
War was only profitable when the war happened in lands far away, and you aren't sending your own men to die. Every actor on the stage wanted a quick and easy battle that would last perhaps a week or two.
To everyone's surprise, the battle only lasted 2 days.
The first day, their soldiers were hesitant, not quite sure whether or not their higher ups were serious.
The second day, Fujitsu won the day because the other side hadn't fully given into the reality of the situation.
Tokyo belonged to Fujitsu, and Kotako decreed a 5 year plan of reconstruction and remodeling Tokyo so that one day, Fujitsu would rule Japan.
Luckily, Yggdrasil would shut down in 4 years. So they wouldn't have to be there when that day comes.
So, Vagisilious chose to ignore the past, and keep her eyes set on the future.
There was nothing left for her in Japan.
"Hey, Momonga," Vagisilious greeted him basically as soon as he logged on and entered the conference room, "Can you do me a favor?"
Momonga curiously tilted his head, "Oh? Is this about Bellriver's funeral? I thought you were done preparing it."
Vagisilious shook her head, "No, this is different, can you… Hold onto this book for me?"
She handed him a book titled "The Backup Plan," which caused Momonga to ask, "Huh? What's this for?"
Momonga began to open it, but Vagisilious quickly interrupted him, "Don't read it yet!"
He quickly shut the book.
"You can only open it the day Yggdrasil ends, and that's only if I'm not here, okay?" Vagisilious explained, "It's super important that that's the only reason you open it."
Momonga was suddenly filled with more questions than he was just a minute ago, "What? Why? What's so important in this book that you're only allowing me to read it 4 years from now?"
"It's…" She sighed, "It's hard to explain, and I don't want to burden you with the knowledge."
Momonga stared at her, but then he just hummed and put the book in his inventory and said, "Okay, that's really weird, but I'll trust you. I promise you I won't read it until the day Yggdrasil ends, okay?"
"And only if I'm not here on that day!"
"And only if you're not here on that day," Momonga repeated before confirming, "Okay, Vaggy. I'll do that"
Vagisilious sent him a smiling emoji, "Thank you, Momonga. I really hope you don't have to open that book."
Momonga sent her a smiling emoji as well, "I really hope that I don't have to either."
3 weeks.
That was how long it took for all 40 members of Ainz Ooal Gown to be online at once again.
Real life obviously took priority over Yggdrasil, but that did hurt Vagisilious's heart a bit when she realized people were beginning to move on.
So, once everyone was online, BigStall did them the courtesy of moving all of the major NPCs and all of Bellriver's NPCs to the mausoleum as we began the funeral.
Though, not a single one of them have been to a funeral in years, or have never been to a funeral. So all they did was imitate what we thought was close to a funeral, and each of them began to just say good things about Bellriver.
"Bellriver was all of our best buds, and he definitely deserved all of the shit he got for a lot of his decisions," Ulbert said, standing on a little podium that he created, "We were all laughing at him when he decided to make a warrior-mage tank build, and then didn't take any of the utility spells that made mage actually good."
Everyone chuckled at the collective memory they had when they figured that out and began to make fun of Bellriver.
"Well, as you know, Bellriver kept his shitty build to the end. And then he somehow made that crap work really well," Ulbert said, looking over to the coffin, "We'll always remember you as a dumbass, Bellriver. You really were great to know for the past 9 years."
His voice nearly cracked at the end, but he managed to keep it together as he left the podium and Vagisilious came up next.
"I agree with Ulbert, the amount of dumb stuff Bellriver did was genuinely astounding," Vagisilious started off strongly, getting a few chuckles, "I don't think I'll understand what made him think 'oh, I can facetank a world enemy with no gear.' or 'Oh, I'll just fly into the red zones what can go wrong.'"
She sighed, tears already forming in her eyes, "But he truly was one of us. I'm going to miss talking anime with him, I'll miss shouting at him for just not following directions, and I'll miss just hearing his voice. I'll never forget Bellriver for as long as I live."
After she finished, Tabula went up, "I'm sure Bellriver is looking down on us from Heaven and wondering where the hell these compliments were when he was alive."
Laughing at his own joke, Tabula continued, "I wouldn't consider it inaccurate to say that Bellriver was quite literally the worst player in this game. The amount of blunders he made while playing this game no doubt stumped all of us."
Tabula nostalgically said, "And yet, he kept surprising us again and again, to where I think he made the journey from the bottom to the top, and became the best player in this game, just because he made it so fun for us. So when Bellriver comes down to haunt us, I'll keep laughing at him in his memory. You just can't forget one of the best like that."
Punitto came up to the stage to share his own memories with Bellriver, "This hurts to say, but I really didn't like Bellriver when I first met him. His build pissed me off, and he was way too casual of a player to be here, thinking he was a hardcore player. But then he kept doing his own thing, and he asked me to help him improve his build. I told him to kill himself, of course, but... Then he straight up said he's going to make his build work. That pissed me off. So I basically told him good luck and I watched from the sidelines as Bellriver slowly became better at the game, and I wish I was a better person. I should've helped him, but now... All I can do is reminisce about the few conversations we did share together."
Punitto somberly left the stage as Touch then had his turn, "The first time I met Bellriver, I was very tempted to just turn him down on the spot when I learned of his build. I thought there was no way that any sane player of Yggdrasil could make a build that bad."
Touch shrugged as he gestured to the coffin, "Well, I guess he must've spread his dumbassery, because I let him in. Quite frankly, one of the best decisions of my life. You're all one of the main reasons I keep logging onto Yggdrasil, and I won't lie to you, Bellriver was one of my favorite reasons. That guy was such a riot to be around. I'll miss you, Bellriver"
They were all laughing, remembering each and individual memory they had with Bellriver. And so it continued that way for all of us as we were just reminiscing about the good old days.
Eventually, Momonga made his turn as the last one to speak. Of course, being the guild master and the last one to speak, he decided to roleplay a bit, "Bellriver, I've known you since the days of Nine's Own Goal. And even back then, your spirit was greater than mine. Where I chose to falter, you chose to keep fighting. Where I chose to take the easy path, you chose to fight through the difficulties. You were an inspiration for all of us, not to just burn ourselves attempting to reach the top, but to truly enjoy what we had. And for that, I will forever thank you for the lesson you taught me. Bellriver, you were the first of us to die, but you'll be the last one to be forgotten. In Nazarick you'll be covered upon layers upon layers of blood, all in your honor. I promise you, Bellriver, that when the sun shines on Earth once more, we shall be able to say that we've secured your final resting place, the entirety of the old world..."
Momonga activated the special effects of the coffin that Vagisilious designed, which made blood ooze out of the corners and began to cover the coffin.
They were all silent for a moment, taking words that Momonga decided to finished off with.
This always has been a half-hardcore half-roleplay guild, after all. It's only fitting to declare that their resting place will be the entirety of Earth.
BigStall stood up and suddenly teleported every NPC back to their original location, "Well, now that the funeral is over, I guess that's it for us?"
Orphea frowned, not liking the conclusion, "Well, there's nothing left for Yggdrasil... I guess that's right."
"I'll probably stick around until the end, just to make sure Nazarick stays alive," Momonga said, getting some surprise from the others.
"Huh? You don't have to do that, Momonga, it's the memories that really matter, doesn't it?" Denshosho tried to dissuade him, but Momonga was very adamant on his position.
"No, I'll stay," Momonga answered, "Someone has to keep Bellriver's coffin safe, after all."
A moment of silence ensued as they paid respects to their friend.
Touch shrugged, "Well, that's the guild leader for you."
Then, Touch walked up to Momonga and began to unequip all of his gear, "Here, you can take my gear and make a statue or something, I don't think I'll be needing this ever again."
"...What?" Momonga quietly said.
"Huh?" Pannokishi followed up with Momonga before the lightbulb appeared over his head, "Oh! Are we all giving our gear to Momonga as a goodbye?"
"That is a pretty cool way to go," Suratan said as he too began to unequip his gear.
Ancient One chuckled, "Man, we did all this grinding for these top tier gear, and we barely got to use them."
"Eh, I'll stick around for a while," Vagisilious said, firmly keeping her gear.
"Feel free, Vaggy," Peroroncino said as he turned in his own gear, "We'll visit every once in a while, though."
Momonga didn't say a word as he collected all of the memories of Ainz Ooal Gown.
As everyone who was going to quit now gave their gear, Momonga was able to say one last thing, "...You guys will make it to the end of Yggdrasil, right?"
Herohero patted him on the back, "No worries! Unless we all die in a massive explosion, we'll come back."
"Time and place, Herohero," Yamaiko lightly chided.
"What? Oh, right, sorry," Herohero apologized.
Orphea nodded, "Well, we probably won't be doing much in 4 years from now, I'll put it on the calendar and drag all of you with me."
"Isn't that on the new year, though?" Coup De Grace asked, "Isn't there like a big company party for that?"
"I own the company now."
"Oh, that makes sense."
Punitto hummed, "Well, if there's nothing else, I guess we're just going to… go?" He said, his voice unsure.
Blue Planet tore his eyes off of Bellriver's coffin and sighed, "Yeah, I guess. Goodbye, guys. Goodbye, Bellriver."
Then, everyone began to leave the game until just a few remained.
"Say, Vaggy," Punitto said before he left, "Thanks for making the early game fun."
Vagisilious tilted her head, "Huh? I should be thanking you for that! In fact, I really should thank you a few more times for… Well, everything!"
"I was thinking of quitting the game at some points, actually," Punitto revealed, "But honestly, I just didn't want to disappoint you somehow, so I just kept pushing on. And hey! I actually found some good friends and now playing this game didn't feel like torture."
Vagisilious was honestly surprised by his reveal, because he absolutely didn't look that way when they first started playing the game, but she just smiled and said, "Well, Punitto… I'm glad you didn't quit."
Punitto sighed, "Yeah, I'm glad I made it all the way here too. See ya, Vaggy, you have my phone number so let's stay in contact!"
"Of course!"
And so, Punitto left the game.
And so, there were 3.
"Well, Vaggy," Ulbert called out, "Don't you have some poor fools to deceive for your company?"
Vagisilious hummed, "I dunno, Ulbert. I feel as if you should leave first."
"Are you guys just going to stay online until one of you leaves?" Momonga asked.
Ulbert shook his head, "Nah, I actually wanted to talk to Vaggy about something. You should go on and make those statues of us. You know, to put the gear on."
"Ah… you're right. I'll get to it, I'll see you two later" Momonga said, exiting the room as he went to the treasury.
And so there were two.
And Vagisilious was deeply worried about what Ulbert wanted to talk to her about.
"So, Ulbert, what did you need from me?" Vagisilious cautiously asked.
"You're responsible for this in some way, aren't you?" Ulbert flatly asked, "You work at Fujitsu. You told us the moment you joined the clan."
Oh.
Yeah, that's about what she expected. He can be pretty perceptive sometimes when he wants to be.
"Yeah," Vagisilious guiltily admitted, "I'm one of the reasons why this all happened."
Ulbert lightly chuckled at being right, "At least you admitted to being a piece of shit. Way quicker than Saibandoke did, at least."
Ulbert looked back towards her, "So, what are you going to do now? Are you going to just leave these ruins and go on to ruin something else?"
Not having the heart to lie in his face, but also fearing the truth, Vagisilious instead says, "I can fix this."
Ulbert scoffed, "You're going to fix this? How? Your delusions of Yggdrasil becoming real are just dreams."
"You read all of the bios I wrote," She lightly accused.
Ulbert nodded, "Yeah, I'm like, one of the 3 people who bothered to read everything we wrote in Nazarick."
Vagisilious smiled, "Yeah, you, me, and Tabula."
Ulbert hummed, "Yeah."
Then, he got back to his topic, "Anyways, you're responsible for our favorite game ending, and you somehow believe you're going to fix it?"
"...Can you trust me?"
"Quite frankly, trusting a propagandist to not lie to me was kind of a dumb decision in hindsight." Ulbert said, "I want to know, how are you going to fix this?"
She stayed silent as she tried to think of a way to tell him that she had it handled.
"I… Do you believe in a life after death?" Vagisilious decided to ask.
Ulbert laughed, "Haha! Are you telling me that you genuinely believe that crap?"
"This is my life after death."
Ulbert blinked, clearly not expecting that, "...Wait what?"
This is it. She's going to reveal the truth and hope for the best.
So, she explained to him about her first life in America, her first death, her reincarnation into this world, the anime that she only halfway tuned into, the basic plot, everything.
And through it all, Ulbert was silent. Simply listening to her.
Then, finally, Ulbert said "Wow, that's… huh."
"I bared my heart to you, and that's all you have to say?! Huh?!" Vagisilious was genuinely a little upset at the response. She was expecting more surprise! Not just a dumb "huh" that wasn't special at all!
"It's a lot of information to process! Give me like a minute!" Ulbert shouted back as he turned around to think about it.
After a few seconds, he asked, "Did you tell anyone else about this?"
"You're the first. I was going to tell Momonga about it maybe in like a year, but you beat him to the punch," Vagisilious answered.
She was going to tell Momonga, she just had to build up the courage for it. Because she's been fearful of the response and she didn't want to force someone to stay here against their will with the knowledge that their old life will become meaningless.
Ulbert sighed, "And you have no evidence other than 'just trust me bro.'"
"I don't."
A moment of silence passes as Ulbert contemplated what he was going to say, the only observer to witness it all was Bellriver's coffin.
Then, Ulbert told her, "You know what? Fuck it, I don't have any other options here, I'll trust in our friendship we've built. I believe you."
Vagisilious could physically feel her worries and fears disintegrate as Ulbert chose to believe her.
And she just had to ask, "Really, you do?"
Ulbert chuckled, "What do you think I'm supposed to say? "Haha no I don't I just want to see you cry."? I'm a dick, but not THAT much of a dick."
She smiled, completely relieved as though nothing wrong could happen any longer, "Thank you, I was really worried I was going to be laughed and mocked at when I tried to tell my story."
Ulbert chuckled, "I'll literally kill you if this turns out to be one massive prank and the punchline is that I'm really gullible."
"Would I ever do that to you?"
"Yes you would."
"...Yeah, I would."
"We're going to tell Momonga about this, right now," Ulbert said, "It's not like he has a life either. He can afford to stay in Nazarick for 4 years."
Vagisilious nodded, "Yeah, you're right. We can all be lonely losers together for 4 years."
"Oh, by the way…"
"Yeah, Ulbert?"
"What's your full name and legal address?"
Vagisilious did a double take, as she realized what Ulbert just said, "...what."
Ulbert replied as though it was obvious, "So I can beat you to death if it ends up with you pranking me."
"Oh- Hahaha! Alright, my name is Lauren Moore…"
"That is the craziest thing I've ever heard in my life," Momonga blankly said.
"You wanna join the believer's club?" Ulbert said, hands out ready for a handshake.
"You know that's a lot of commitment, right? To keep this absolutely massive secret for 4 years," Momonga said.
"Wait, you already believe us?" Vagisilious confusedly asked.
Momonga shrugged, "Why would you lie to me?"
She actually laughed at that. Momonga truly was her favorite member in the guild.
"Momonga, I literally love you," She said, fully serious.
Momonga chuckled, "Haha, except that."
Ulbert chuckled as well, "I can't believe I'm literally the guy you chose to open up to first, and I'm being put in the friend zone for a skeleton."
Vagisilious shrugged, "You should be more like Momonga. What can I say?"
"Well regardless, is there anything we actually have to do except trust you and wait 4 years?" Momonga asked, which just gained a shrug from her.
"I mean, I guess you can open that notebook I gave you 3 weeks ago." She said, "It just has my contingency plan in it."
"Can I get a copy?" Ulbert asked.
"Just share with Momonga." She said, "I didn't make a third copy."
"What happened to the second copy?" Momonga asked as he gave his copy to Ulbert so he could read it while he talked to her.
"I gave it to Tokino," Vagisilious answered plainly.
Momonga paused, "Oh, our NPCs become alive too. I kind of glanced over that, but…"
Momonga stares at Pandora's Actor, "Huh, I don't remember his bio that well…"
"Hey, don't retcon him!" Vagisilious protectively said, "They're all fine as is!"
Momonga stares at her for a moment before he nodded, "Yeah, I guess you're right. I would be upset too if my personality suddenly changed. I guess I'll just be surprised when Pandora's Actor starts speaking."
"Wait, can the bios really do that?" Ulbert asked as he read the plan, "The world items are pretty powerful, but I don't think it's 'create a gate between 2 entirely different worlds that aren't in Yggdrasil' powerful."
Yes, that was a bit of a stretch, even for Vagisilious. She may have been able to reincarnate into a fictional universe, but physically making something do the same thing was an entirely different thing. But without it, there was no chance for her to see all 41 of them laugh together again. And that was a possibility that absolutely could not happen.
And to ensure it never happened, Vagisilious's soul acted by instinct.
Vagisilious rewrote the laws of the universe and declared, "I Will Make It Work."
Momonga and Ulbert took a step back, and she herself was surprised at the sudden voice change.
"What the heck was that?" Ulbert asked, suddenly very cautious, "I have never heard of a voice changer with a voice like that."
"I have… absolutely no idea," Vagisilious admitted. She didn't even know what she just did.
"Suddenly, your claims just became a lot more real," Momonga said, "Well, I guess that's a good thing, right? We got the evidence right there."
"I…" Vagisilious muttered out, then she just accepted the situation, …I guess so."
They tried to recreate it a few more times, but nothing happened that was similar to what just happened. So, they ended up having to drop it there.
Still, the question remained. What was that?
Months passed since the funeral, and also the day that Vagisilious finally told the truth and wasn't smited for it.
Quite frankly, the revelation of her being totally fine to tell the truth without being cursed or anything made her feel a bit stupid.
Really, she could've revealed this at any time, but she didn't. Mostly because all of the other isekai protagonists don't reveal the fact that they're from another world.
God, she's so immensely dumb sometimes.
Of course, the 3 of them were basically the only ones to log on every day. Though the other members did occasionally pop in to say hi.
Of which, BigStall was the one who popped in the most often, talking about life. He even did some moderating every once in a while, just to make sure the game was buried with some respect.
Though, it's not like the three of them were holes up in Nazarick forever. They were just clearing dungeons for the gold to maintain the costs of keeping up Nazarick.
They asked BigStall to try just summon a bunch of gold so they didn't have to do that, but then BigStall countered with, "Well, if I disabled maintenance cost, why would you log on everyday? It's not fun to cheat in a video game past the first time."
Which was fair. So they resigned themselves to grinding gold for the next 4 years.
Sometimes though, when they get out of the guild base, they see some familiar faces.
"Oh? Do my eyes deceive me, or is that Vaggy that I spy?" PopStarry's voice comes from behind them as they were just about to teleport to a nearby dungeon.
Turning around, Vagisilious spots the duo of PopStarry and Theadul walking up to them.
"Oh, you're Vaggy's friends, yeah?" Momonga said, getting a nod from both.
Ulbert tilted his head, "Oh, those are the other rich guys you know?"
Theadul sighed, "That would be us, yes."
PopStarry's chest puffed out as she proudly said, "Vaggy, I'm very pleased to announce that my brother is finally mine!"
Her's? Oh…
OH.
"Did you finally get together?!" Vagisilious excitedly asked.
"No," Theadul stressed, "It was just a peck on the cheek for her birthday."
PopStarry was still very pleased, "I will be expecting more."
Ah, so she thinks she has it. But she really doesn't.
This is still super cute, though.
"Well, anyways," Vagisilious said, changing the topic, "Why are you guys still playing?"
Theadul shrugged, as PopStarry answered, "Well, someone must ensure our guild stands to the end of time. So Theadul and I have graciously accepted the responsibility of making sure the 8 Greed Kings have somewhere to stay when Yggdrasil ends."
Ah…
They're just like them, huh? Not wanting the memories to disappear.
"Man, Vagisilious, we've got to stop meeting like this," A familiar voice comes by from the side.
Turning, she spots Principality walking up to the group.
Genuine months without meeting any of these people, and in the span of 3 minutes, she meets all three of them? What a coincidence.
"Oh, wow, yeah, we really do have to stop meeting like this," Vagisilious agreed as she introduced Principality to the group.
"Is Touch or Orphea still playing?" Principality asked.
Momonga shook his head, "No, both quit the game."
Principality sighed, "Really? Damn. Most of my guild left too, and it's basically just me holding down the fort."
He held up his sword, his voice a bit remorseful, "We went through all that grinding, and we can't even use the gear for anything big now."
Vagisilious hummed as she held up her Trillion Teraphims, "Yeah, I know the feeling."
PopStarry giggled as she pulled up her hat, "Same here!"
"Great, we're all idiots then," Ulbert said, getting a laugh from everyone, "Well, since all 6 of us are here, you guys wanna form a party and just go on that dungeon run we were all pretty obviously going to do?"
Noises of agreement popped up, and within a minute, the 6 of them formed a group together for the sole purpose of farming old dungeons and raids for gold.
An alliance that would no doubt last forever.
Principality hummed as he thought about the question, "What's my favorite NPC? Uh, my own, probably. I only have one."
"You wanna talk about your one NPC?" Vagisilious asked.
Principality shrugged, "Well, sure. My NPC is the treasurer of the guild, or the NPC version of it at least, and his name is Secretary."
"...Just Secretary?" Theadul asked.
Principality nodded, "Yeah. I wanted to call him the Keeper of Secrets, but the NPC lovers in my guild told me no."
Momonga gasped, "Oh! That reminds me of my own NPC, Pandora's Actor! He's also the treasurer in Nazarick, and I wanted to call him Surprise Box, but Ulbert told me no!"
"Woah! That's crazy!" Principality said, "Small world, huh?"
Momonga agreed.
Then, Momonga thought about it for a moment and then he said, "...Guys, I just remembered what I put in Pandora's Actor's bio."
"Still can't change it," Vagisilious said, "It's the law."
Momonga sighed in despair, "It's the law..."
Momonga wished that he never took an interest in European geopolitics a few years ago. But such a thing was beyond his power to change.
Theadul nostalgically hummed as he talked about his guild NPCs, "We only had 800 levels to use at first, then we bought 200 more levels, so all of us had a level 100 NPC."
PopStarry nodded, "But my NPC is obviously the coolest, right?"
Theadul nodded, "Of course."
So naturally, Vagisilious asked, "What's your NPC?"
"Oh, her name is Focalors, a super cool name I found in something called the… Ars Goetia! And basically, Focalors is my clone, and she's just like me!" PopStarry paused for a moment as she remembered a crucial detail, "Oh, and she's married to Theadul's NPC."
Theadul blankly mentioned, "My NPC is a dragon."
"With a human form!" PopStarry mentioned, getting what was probably an eyeroll that couldn't be done in game by Theadul.
Vagisilious laughed, "You guys are fun to be around."
PopStarry proudly nodded, "Of course, of course."
The dungeon boss took maybe 50 seconds to die, as they went to collect the gold and loot dropped.
The loot they split based on quantity, because it was all old gear, and the gold they just split equally.
Then, they moved on to the next dungeon. And the next, and the next, and the next.
Every once in a while, the 6 of them will get together to do a few dungeons as a group instead of doing them individually. Which was pretty nice.
They were just 6 losers spending time together in a dead game. And it definitely did help them all from burning out.
All of them basically planned to stay until the forced shutdown anyhow, so she knew that it was likely she'll meet them all in the New World. And even if not, she'll drag their real selves into the new world. The 9th floor has like, 100 guest rooms alone.
And so, the group of the three Ainz Ooal Gown members, the two members of the 8 Greed Kings, and the guild leader of Triumvirate were once again assembled to farm gold in various old raids in order to ensure that their guild bases wouldn't collapse due to them not being able to pay for the upkeep.
They've been at this for a few months now, and have gotten used to the rhythm of logging on, finding who was online, and grouping together to tackle the final boss of Yggdrasil… Guild Base Upkeep.
Today, they were going through the Coffin of The Iron Mountain. It was an old raid from level 82 content.
Anything over level 80 was a bit hard to do with a small group because of the decrease in the increase of power that players get after level 80. But The Coffin of The Iron Mountain was an easy raid, even for its time.
Which was why they weren't paying attention to the bosses, but rather just having conversations with one another.
Theadul smiled as he recalled his interactions with the Greed Kings, "Ah, I do miss the days of all of us dunking on Hougan. Yes. He just had so many terrible takes that it was hard to not make fun of him for it."
Vagisilious interestingly hummed, "Oh? What kind of takes?"
What terrible things could Hougan think of? Was he racist? Was his sexual preferences utterly deranged? Did he believe communism was a totally workable method of government?
PopStarry lightheartedly chuckled as she explained, "Oh, Hougan tried to explain to us on multiple occasions how the government wasn't actually all that bad."
Ah, so he was a corporate bootlicker?
That was actually more insane than anything Vagisilious just listed.
Principality explained her thoughts perfectly, "Wow, so he's a corpo-government shill? I didn't think those guys actually existed."
Theadul nodded, "Yes. We're quite amenable to megacorporations, considering our stature. However, the government? It is simply a puppet that deserves no respect."
"Corporations deserve no respect either," Ulbert chipped in, "We should tear it all down."
Momonga sighed, "Oof. Politics. I don't really care about it…"
Principality hummed in understanding, "That's fine, it's not like we can do much about it anyways. Why don't we change subjects to something lighter? How are your guild members doing?"
"Dead," Ulbert spoke before he could think about his words, as he immediately felt bad and backtracked, "Wait, shit, too soon."
It was definitely too soon for Vagisilious, because she glared at Ulbert, "Idiot. Shut up."
Theadul looked surprised, "Wait, one of your guild members is dead?"
Momonga sighed as he explained, "Ah… Yeah…. Bellriver, he was the guy with the tank and mage hybrid build. He died during the Fujitsu takeover, caught in one of the many bombings that day."
Vagisilious hated hearing about it. Always the ever present reminder that she was one of the bad guys.
Principality nodded in sympathy, "I see. I'm sorry for your loss."
"I'm quitting for the day when we kill the final boss," Vagisilious quietly said. She was going to just go to bed. Maybe drink alcohol beforehand.
It was better to forget some things. Especially when those terrible thoughts will one day disappear and all 41 of them are reunited again…
PopStarry frowned, "Aw, c'mon, Vaggy. It'll be alright. You're alive!"
However, they entered the final boss room immediately after. And after a minute of silent fighting, they emerged victorious, and Vagisilious immediately left the game.
As promised, she drank the alcohol in her fridge and went to bed. Vowing to one day be better.
Will that day ever come? She can't say. Her soul is tainted, and it may never come out of the dark ever again.
After an absolutely terrible day, all Vagisilious wanted to do was log onto Yggdrasil and forget about the stress of having to survive a company reshuffle because of the coup that's been the talk of Tokyo recently.
So, when she logged onto Yggdrasil, she was excited to go through old dungeons and talk about pointless things that don't matter.
And then it was just Ulbert..
"Ah, it's just us two for today," Ulbert said as he checked the logs for any of their friends logged in. Momonga was offline, Principality was offline, and Theadul & PopStarry were offline.
Vagisilious sadly sighed, "Aw…"
"What do you mean 'aw'?" Ulbert seemed to take offense, "You're alone with me, that should be an honor."
Vagisilious playfully hit Ulbert in the arms, doing 0 damage, naturally, "An honor? This is more like a punishment, your avatar is ugly."
"Should I change it?" Ulbert asked.
Vagisilious paused, "Huh?"
Ulbert repeated his words, "Should I go back and level back up my avatar to change it?"
…Why would he be asking her this? She was only mostly kidding, he looked just fine.
"Why do you want to change it?" She asked, a bit curious to hear his reasoning.
Ulbert shifted his feet a bit as he seemed a bit embarrassed to tell the truth, "Uh, well, you know… We have to go be tossed into another world as our avatars, right? And I don't look… Uh…"
Ah, she gets it. Ulbert is feeling insecure about the fact that he's going to be a talking goat.
She chuckled at Ulbert, the worry in his voice not fitting him at all, "The Primordial Demon Lord Ulbert Alain Odle, Master of Hell, Walking Catastrophe, The End of All Things, Destroyer of The Garden of Eden… Scared to have a goat face?"
Ulbert immediately clapped back, "Wha- Hey! You seem to have a lot of shit to say! You're basically half-human already!"
"You have two arms and two legs," She retorted, "You can live with your head being a bit weird!"
"Oh, yeah, two arms and two legs," Ulbert mockedly imitated her voice before immediately shouting back, "let's just ignore the fact I'm going to BECOME A GOAT!"
She crossed her arms, "Yeah! Very fitting for you and your big ego, huh?"
"What's the connection between my ego and becoming a goat?!" Ulbert shouted again, but was genuinely curious to know what that actually meant.
Vagisilious stopped.
Right, no English.
"Oh, it's an English thing. G-O-A-T, they're the beginning of the words for Greatest of All Time," She explained, hearing realization come out of Ulbert's mouth, "So, since you have a big ego, you consider yourself the Greatest of All Time, thus being the goat."
Ulbert let the English lesson wash over his head for a few moments.
Then, he triumphantly humphed, "You were right, I don't need to look for another avatar. I'm hot as I am."
She laughed at the absurdity of Ulbert's claim. Who would ever want to have sex with a goat?
Eventually, she asked, "So, 2 people isn't enough to run any dungeons unless it's really old… But is that even worth doing? The gold we get from that isn't really enough."
Ulbert accepted the shift in conversation as he hummed, "Well, I guess we'll sit here and… Hm, what do girls talk about? Boys?"
Vagisilious sent him a laughing emoji, "Haha! Of course not, we're humans who talk about things like wanting to blow up the government too!"
Ulbert chuckled, "Is that so? Well, I heard about the Fujitsu takeover happening in Tokyo-"
"Please don't talk about it."
Ulbert was briefly shocked by the completely serious tone of her voice, "Huh?"
"Just don't," Her voice was on the verge of pleading, "I really don't need to hear about it."
Ulbert looked at her for a few moments, then he shrugged as he respected her wishes, "That's fine, I can talk about…" Ulbert searched for a lighter topic, then a light bulb emoji popped over his head, "Ah, my romantic prospects."
His romantic prospects? What a suspicious direction to turn it to. But it was obviously just setting her up to make fun of him to help her forget that previous moment. She picked some good friends.
"I'm sure you'll survive," Vagisilious accepted this direction of thought as she encouraged her friend, "Besides, when you get to become Ulbert for real, you'll look better."
"Really?" Ulbert asked.
The graphics in Yggdrasil were pretty good, but the plasticity of it all was obvious when you took a closer look at it. Once it all became actual fur, Ulbert would shoot up a few tiers in attractiveness. That, she can guarantee.
She nodded, "Of course, your issue is that you're just weird."
"Wha- Hey!"
They didn't end up doing any dungeons that day.
Orphea finally logged on for the first time since the funeral, and it was a rare day where it was just Vagisilious online, so she was the one to go and greet Orphea.
Very awkwardly, because she has no idea if Orphea knows she was the one who indirectly blew up her father or not.
"Hey, Orphea," Vagisilious greeted as Orphea entered the conference room.
"Heya, Vaggy," Orphea greeted back, "Nobody's online today?"
Vagisilious shook her head, "Nope. Just me today."
Orphea lightly laughed, "Ah, well I guess that means we own the place now!"
That was a very lame joke.
Vagisilious laughed anyway.
The guilt was eating away at her, but at the same time she doesn't really want to potentially lose Orphea's friendship.
So, Vagisilious cautiously asked her, "Uh, Orphea, how's your life been?"
Orphea blinked, "Uh, well, I guess it's been fine? You've been a great help in getting all of those companies to help me. So now I'm secure in my position as the CEO and everything is basically returning to normal again, but I just have a job now. And… Well, I think I got over my dad's death. I can talk about him without feeling like I'd burst into tears."
Holy shit she should've done this sooner.
Vagisilious does not want to be the reason why that wound reopens.
"...I've been lying to you, well not lying, more like withholding information from you," Vagisilious slowly said, trying to figure out how she can say this.
Orphea tilted her head, "Huh? Why?"
"I really don't want to lose our friendship," Vagisilious admitted, "I think that if I told you this, you'd hate me."
Orphea stared at her.
And then she laughed, "Hahahahaha! Seriously?! You think some secrets are going to be the reason why our friendship breaks?! Hahahaha!"
Her laughter calms down, "Really, the only thing that can break our friendship at this point is if you were to say, like, I dunno, you were the one to kill my dad."
Vagisilious is the worst person in the world.
The absolute worst, she deserves absolutely nothing.
She doesn't deserve to go to the new world, she doesn't deserve being freed from this dystopia, she doesn't deserve the right to breathe.
As she stays silent, some sort of realization dawns on Orphea.
"...Wait a second, why are you silent?" Orphea slowly said, almost fearful of the response, "I was just joking."
"...Orphea…" Vagisilious slowly said, trying to find a way to break the news to her.
And then Orphea abruptly yelled out, "Stop!"
So, she stopped.
"I feel like I know what you're going to say, and I don't think I like it. But I'm just going to put my foot down right now. I don't wanna hear it!" Orphea shouted, "You work in the upper echelons of Fujitsu, right? You do some dirty work that may or may not have led to people dying, but you know what?"
"You are not at fault," Orphea stressed, "Okay? So don't even utter those words into existence, because it doesn't matter. I was just joking when I said there's a way our friendship breaks, because we're the type of friends who'll stay together no matter what happens. And that applies to everyone in Ainz Ooal Gown."
She was not afraid to admit it, she began to cry again.
"I… I really don't deserve any of you." She tearfully said, hugging Orphea.
Orphea chuckled, "Yeah, same goes for me, really. Say, we have to meet up IRL so I can give you a real hug instead of the dull feeling you're feeling right now."
"Your company building is like, an hour away from where I live," Vagisilious said, a bit saddened.
Orphea shrugged, "I guess I'll just go to yours, then. I have nothing but time to waste."
Momonga and Ulbert both stared at her as she was editing the bio for Diviser to add his thoughts on what's been going on in Nazarick.
"You know, Vaggy, I thought you didn't want any changes to the NPCs?" Ulbert pointed out.
Vagisilious shrugged as she continued to type, "I meant nothing fundamental about them. I want to see my NPCs become more and more alive, so I keep adding to their bios and pretend that they're alive, just not… Alive alive, you know?"
Momonga hummed, "Hm, I guess that makes sense. But wouldn't you be sort of… I don't know, trapping them into having only these thoughts about these topics?"
Vagisilious shook her head, "I have faith in my NPCs to be able to grow like real living beings."
"Hm, I guess you're a mom now, then?" Ulbert mildly made fun of her.
"In that case, I guess we're all parents," Vagisilious said, sounding unconcerned.
"Ah, but a few of our friends probably would enjoy sticking their dicks into the NPCs," Ulbert pointed out.
Vagisilious thought about it for a moment, before ultimately deciding, "I guess incest really will win out in the end."
"Vaggy."
"Yes, Momonga?"
"You need to keep your thoughts to yourself sometimes."
"WOW THE DISRESPECT!"
They all had a laugh as she finished up and moved onto the next NPC.
Additional Leviathan Bio:
In the scenario that no Supreme Beings are left in Nazarick, Leviathan has been given permission to act in Vagisilious's place in order to take them all back to Nazarick using the plan Tokino obtained from Vagisilious.
Which he would naturally follow, for he does not want Tokino to be sad.
…
About The Developer's Deaths:
'...They're dead. My entire being has been dedicated to one day hoping to defeat them, and now they're gone without me even catching a glimpse of them… Hahaha… Hahahaha! What will I do now?!'
About Bellriver's Death:
'When I first heard the news, I could scarcely believe it myself. How could one of the supreme beings themselves die and be unable to be resurrected? I don't think I could believe it myself until we were taken to the funeral… But if a player can be permanently killed… If it were not such a sensitive topic, I would've asked more about the circumstances of his death.'
About The End of Yggdrasil:
'Even now, I can slowly feel the restrictions of Yggdrasil waning… It will soon be time.'
About The Supreme Being's Absence:
'While Lady Vagisilious assures me that they'll return… I can feel the doubt within her.'
Additional Tokino Bio:
Tokino has been given Vagislious's contingency plan in the scenario that all 41 Supreme Beings are absent. She will follow the instructions in such a scenario, but otherwise, she will return the contingency plan at the earliest possible opportunity.
…
About Bellriver's Death:
'Lord Bellriver? Dead? How could one of the supreme beings permanently fall? How could it happen on our watch? Did we somehow make a mistake in our duty to keep the tomb and its masters safe? I didn't want to believe it, but I saw his coffin and… I never really liked him as much as the others, but I would prefer his lustful gaze over the inanimate symbol of his demise…'
About The Supreme Being's Absence:
'Lady Vagisilious has reassured me that they'll return one day, so it must be true!'
Additional Emily Bio:
About Bellriver's Death:
'Wait, one of them actually died for real?! I thought they were immortal!'
About The Supreme Being's Absence:
'Oh, I guess that's why I haven't really seen them lately.'
Additional Herias 'Bernays' Sagashi Bio:
About Bellriver's Death:
'What the… That's not… How? Why? When? What will I tell them?'
About The Supreme Being's Absence:
'Very well then, all will continue as normal until they return.'
Additional Diviser Bio:
About Bellriver's Death:
'Impossible, utterly impossible! He can't die, it's… It's not possible! No! No! No!'
About The Supreme Being's Absence:
'Oh, thank goodness Lord Momonga, Lord Ulbert Alain Odle, and Lady Vagisilious has decided to stay!'
Additional Heket Bio:
About Bellriver's Death:
'...Lord Bellriver, we will offer you everything if you were to just give us one more sign that you are fine… What was your favorite food? Will I ever know?'
About The Supreme Being's Absence:
'We shall prepare the most grandest of feasts for their return.'
Additional Leshy Bio:
About Bellriver's Death:
'One of our own masters dying? How… What are we supposed to do?'
About The Supreme Being's Absence:
'I'll prepare the best stuff for them when they come back! And then they'll never leave again!'
Additional Shatallia Bio:
About Bellriver's Death:
'Lord Bellriver? Dead? How could this be? How have we failed him and the supreme beings? I must work a thousand times my current rate to just one day erase the sins of our failure… '
About The Supreme Being's Absence:
'Please, take us with you…'
Years passed by, and quite frankly, it really did feel like time began to crawl at a snail's pace because Vagisilious swore time actually began to move slower just to spite the 3 of them who chose to stay.
But eventually, the day did come where it was just 1 more day before everyone would come back to enjoy the last day of Yggdrasil.
Orphea has basically canceled her company's end of the year party just so she could drag everyone who works at the Karasu Group to Nazarick again.
Vagisilious knows that some people have just said they couldn't make it because of time conflictions, though. Like Touch having to celebrate the new year with his police department and his family.
But that's alright.
She can make it work.
She will make it work.
All 41 of them will be in Nazarick soon, and they'll be able to wash away the stains of the old world.
And then she will be able to truly say that her journey has been worth it.
AN:
I was originally gonna make this more sad with Vagisilious being alone for the whole chapter, but then I was like 'Uhh, I don't like writing angst.'
So instead you have… Whatever this is?
I feel like I should've written the angst parts a little longer and better, but I don't know how that would look like, so instead you have this.
Also, this was written in like 2 days. From the 17th to the 18th of December.
Like last chapter, this chapter could be a lot better with some more time in the kitchen, but to be honest, I think that the old world has overstayed its welcome with an absolutely mind boggling 130k words, and it's about time we actually get to the new world. So you can eat this raw food.
Speaking of which, the next update will probably be in January, since I need to work on Manifest Destiny which has uploads on the 23rd, the 25th, the 1st. And I'm only done with the chapter on the 23rd.
Of course, there is a 1 week gap between the 25th and the 1st. So I won't totally discount the option of me completely disregarding Manifest Destiny in that timeframe and cranking out another chapter of this.
Wouldn't be the first time.
X
Since I decided not to include the Yggdrasil forums or anything like that, mostly just to make writing faster, I guess I'll just talk about my plot decisions.
First of all, Momonga and Ulbert know the truth now. Why those 2? I just like them. The entire guild will probably know at one point or another, but for now those 2 are her support group to make sure she doesn't go depressed.
Thinking of it now, maybe I should've added Punitto in that group, but at this point I'm too lazy to add him in.
Though I just realized him and Vagisilious didn't get a proper final conversation in this chapter.
Or that Peroroncino and Orphea scene where the two would actually talk to each other.
Give me a second, I need to edit this chapter a bit.
Yeah okay that's done now.
A true chef cooks after the meal is done.
Also, genuinely crazy that that's my first bit of actual romance writing? That feels like it'll make me cringe anytime I look at this chapter.
Oh well, a true chef wishes he was a better chef.
I was also planning to write some more scenes in this chapter, like maybe mentioning other guilds that are staying. But nah, I didn't feel like it. All you get is that one scene with the incest siblings and that guy named Principality.
I'll probably mention a few guilds in the next chapter. But most of them aren't going to be relevant because the criteria for going into the new world is to have a world item.
Okay, what else, I guess I'll talk about the Orphea and Vagisilious conversation.
That would've been a very different conversation if they had it directly after the explosion, but luckily they had like a few months to deal with it on their own before speaking to each other.
Suffering builds character, but I hate suffering. So they just hug and make up.
And now I've run out of things to delay this final thing, about Vagisilious's whole character arc in this chapter.
So she kind of has that 'I can fix this' mentality, right? And that kind of fuels her during this entire end section of Yggdrasil. But then she does all of this stuff and it's like… Great, now you have 4 years of waiting to do bozo.
Luckily, I have Ulbert to stage an intervention so Vagisilious doesn't continue spiraling. That makes him probably #1 for any shipping probabilities. Which of course is decided by future me.
But even by the end there, her self-worth basically went kaput because she still feels like as the one with all of this knowledge, she has to be the one to bear responsibility and bring the entire guild to a new future. And I still have no idea if she'll ever value herself above the other 40 members ever again.
I mean, if that was me and I accidentally ended my favorite game, I'd be pretty miserable too.
Uh, anyways, we'll figure it out as I go.
Also, you're probably wondering "Hey, what was that whole thing with Vaggy saying the bolded text?"
If you're wondering about that, you can find out on chapter… idk, 30? Feels a bit over ambitious to say 30, maybe 25 at most. But let me cook.
And of course, the question to "Uhh can Gate of Atlas or the coffins really do that?" The question has been answered in the fic. "I will make it work."
Oh, and you know what, I finally figured out why this fic is called Time Capsule lmao.
When I first named this fic Time Capsule, it was sort of just a 'uhh I think that means something meaningful idk lmao.' and now I gave it a cool meaning in this chapter.
And now the words "Time Capsule" Will never come up in this fic ever again lol.
X
So this is chapter 8, right? So that would make chapter 9 the new world.
But at this point, we're so close to 10 that it's sort of annoying that the 10th chapter isn't the start of something new.
In fact, I did something similar thing on Manifest Destiny. Where the 10th chapter is sort of the cleaning up chapter and the 11th chapter is the new world.
I just can't win with chapter numbers.
So, do you guys want something like, I don't know, all of the OC NPC sheets on chapter 9 on like, Wednesday or something?
Or can I just respect your will to just reread the previous chapters to find what you want.
Uh, comment about that, I guess. If we reach… I don't know, 10 comments or reviews on FFN or Ao3 combined, I'll do an irrelevant chapter 9 on Wednesday this week.
Otherwise, just comment below about this week's edition of "Skryb Should Not Be Allowed In The Kitchen."
[I actually just remembered but I didn't know where to place it, but if you search up Skryb online, Skryb is actually some sort of weird graffiti thing that people like to do. I came up with Skryb by just twisting the word "Scrub" around, but I think they twisted the word "Scribe" around. Fun stuff!]
[No MS painting today, cause I have other stuff to do. Rome may not have been built in a day, but this chapter was built in 2.]
[It would be extremely funny if I were to happen to like, die, burn out, or just be unable to write Time Capsule at this point lol. Leaving you guys right before the big moment. Ay, no worries though, not counting unfortunate car accidents I'll be fine.]