Chapter 355: Episode 355_The Final Battle (6)

11.

Everyone wants a clean ending.

It doesn’t matter how hard or easy the process was, or whether it had any meaning.

When looking back, the end of an event becomes the entirety of that memory.

If the ending is good, the memory remains beautiful.

But the final act isn’t always neat.

"Haa... What is this? This wave of post-climax clarity washing over me already?"

"This really does feel like the end."

"Yeah. I’ve never felt like this while playing 『FW』 before."

"Even I think it feels like the end. I mean, skipping straight to a Heavenly King raid without even fighting a dragon first? Isn’t that jumping the gun a bit?"

"Why would you raid a dragon? Dragons are cute puppies you capture, raise, and put to good use."

"So that’s why you fed Squeaker so much gold?"

"I’d appreciate it if you kept quiet about that. Yeseul, I’ve known people who only ever said the right thing. They shut up real quick after getting their asses beat."

"Are you going to hit me? If you are, do it on the bed. Roughly."

They fell silent.

When you think, ’This is the end,’ you’re more likely to recall the hardships you’ve faced than to focus on finishing well.

The tension drains away.

This isn’t a matter of mental weakness.

It’s instinct.

Only someone like Seolah, who had been through this kind of thing many times, managed to remain calm. For the others, it wasn’t so easy.

Even so, Simin didn’t particularly mind that the tension was easing.

"We’ll win."

He had done his absolute best, to the point where he could confidently say he had never prepared this hard for anything in his entire life.

"We have to win. I worked harder at this game than I did studying for the college entrance exam."

"Oh, you studied for the entrance exam, too?"

"Of course. I may not look it, but I’m a business major."

"Which university?"

"Let’s not pry into each other’s private lives."

There had been more than a few times when he’d been tempted to sell off all the gold he’d bought from Kenji and just cash out for a tidy profit.

The temptation was constant, whispering that if he sold his gold holdings, he could probably buy another small, quiet island with warm weather, a great view, and crystal-blue water.

But he had resisted.

He had resisted and invested it all in scraps of data made of zeroes and ones.

Above all, the reason he had to win was obvious.

"I handed out +15 gear for free. If I lose after all that, I should just go drown myself."

He had agonized over that decision as well.

To be honest, the only ones who truly deserved to pay were the three Specialists, but if he had wanted to, he could have charged enough to recoup at least some of his losses.

However, once the money he was spending went past hundreds of thousands, then millions, then tens of millions, and finally into the hundreds of millions, even the great Simin had started to lose his grip on reality a little.

’Yeah, what would I even do with that money anyway? I’ll play the generous benefactor for once and just work them harder later.’

The first donation of his life.

The results of that generosity were gathered here.

From the Rabbits to Epia, not a single one of them lacked equipment dyed in deep crimson.

On top of that, he had a trump card that would maximize all of those effects.

"Yeori. You have to do well. You saw the bankbook, right? If you want to earn that much, you have to do well today."

"Yeah! Just leave it to me!"

He wasn’t sure whether he should trust that or not.

"Epia, you can do this, right? I came here betting everything on you. If you die, we’re finished. If you blow my hundred million, I swear I’ll grab BetaGo by the collar, force it to resurrect you, and work you to death for the rest of your life."

But just looking at Epia, who had regained her power and was now floating in the air with her wings spread wide, radiating pure protagonist energy, he couldn’t help but feel a strange sense of trust.

"Let’s go."

With that, he strode forward without hesitation. There was no time to waste, not even for the final war.

*

A solemn BGM began to play.

A famous track that anyone who had ever played a 2D game would recognize was now asserting its presence in the final war of 『Fantastic World』—the world’s first and greatest virtual reality game.

The grand drumbeats slowly whipped the atmosphere into a fever pitch as the rhythm accelerated.

As if she could hear the BGM playing only for the stream, Epia cut down Celestials in perfect sync with the rhythm.

Neither frantic nor relaxed, she simply erased everything that stood in her way.

Her sword did its job.

The weapon Simin had staked his life to enhance, which had lain dormant on the continent, was finally unleashed.

She didn’t care how many Celestials remained.

She didn’t care how many Demons had been beaten down and forced into hiding.

Her overwhelming momentum—a physical declaration that only the Heavenly King could stop her—gradually thinned the endless swarm of Celestials.

And when the Celestials finally stopped blocking their path—they arrived.

The final battlefield.

The end of Heaven.

The castle where the Heavenly King resided.

"It’s been a while."

A strange emotion welled up inside him.

He had come here once before, fleeing to the continent.

Now, he had come to destroy this place.

Of course, it wouldn’t be easy.

The final boss.

The Heavenly King grew stronger as more people on the continent believed in God and possessed Divine Power. He would be far stronger now than when Epia had last faced him.

On top of that, this was his home turf.

It would be a fatal mistake to think this would be anything like looting an empty house.

Above all, an unknowable number of Celestials looked down on them from the sky.

"Shit. I’m shaking."

The thought sent a shiver down his spine.

Not from fear.

’I wonder how much I’ll make.’

He was curious how many viewers were on the hologram he had turned off upon arriving in Heaven.

Two thousand dollars per person.

’If it’s just a hundred thousand...’

After fees, he would break even.

Naturally, his expression grew solemn.

’I am Simin. I am Simin. I am Simin.’

He let go of his real self and became his character.

"Soldiers!"

A grave and serious voice burst from his mouth without a shred of conscience.

Everyone stared at him with dumbfounded expressions, but he ignored them and, fully conscious of the camera, continued his scripted lines.

"We have fought all this way for today! Let us defeat the fallen Heavenly King and bring peace to the continent!"

They were too stunned to speak.

There was no response, but it still looked decent enough on screen.

—Is that really Simin?

—Yeah.

—It really does feel like watching a movie, but...

—Sorry, but I wish he’d just shut up.

—No matter how you look at it, Epia’s the real protagonist.

The only problem was that in the wide shot, he just looked like some useless grunt striking a ridiculous pose in the background while Epia led the charge.

12.

They clashed with the Celestials.

Celestials poured in without end.

Simin and his forces barely managed to hold them off.

The Rabbits, Sudal, Yeori, even Squeaker—they burned through every buff they had to hold the line, but the numerical disadvantage they faced from the start was not easily overcome.

Of course, the fact that they were not just holding on but steadily pushing forward, step by step, toward the Heavenly King’s castle was thanks to Epia’s overwhelming power.

Moreover, Epia had not even used her ultimate skill yet.

It was a skill that, if used where the majority of enemies were gathered, would produce the highest possible efficiency regardless of their numbers.

She could use it if she wanted.

Doing so would instantly reverse their numerical disadvantage.

But she didn’t.

And because she didn’t, the battle remained a stalemate.

Epia was the final card, the one who had to face the Heavenly King.

’I kind of feel like I’m not the protagonist, but I’ll let it slide.’

Simin swallowed his grumbling and watched for an opening.

He had to somehow create a situation where Epia could fight the Heavenly King one-on-one.

That was why he had come here.

It was the real reason he had come, ready to throw everything away, even prepared to hand the continent over to Kenji.

It was why he had fed every last bit of his potentially resellable gold to Squeaker without a shred of hesitation.

He had fed the dragon and was now pouring everything he had into this fight.

The results were becoming visible.

The Heavenly King rose above his castle.

"Epia."

"Yeah. I’m ready."

"We took Sanctuary back from the Heavenly King and reclaimed the Divine Object, so there shouldn’t be any other variables, right?"

"As long as that’s gone, we’re fine."

Everyone, while pretending to be casual, readied their stances.

They had already been fighting with their lives on the line, but of course, each had prepared a final trump card.

It was time to play it.

They listened for Simin’s movements, for a single word from his mouth.

When that moment came, they would have to throw their fates to the wind.

For the first time, Simin swallowed hard and closed his eyes.

Just a little longer.

One more step.

He weighed and reweighed every factor to raise their odds by even one percent.

And when the timing was finally right—

"G..."

A blinding flash—

A pure white light, seeming to engulf the entire world, exploded from the Heavenly King.

*

[Under the effect of ’God’s Domain,’ all negative damage is reduced by 50%.]

[Under the effect of ’God’s Domain,’ the movement speed of all beings who stand against God is reduced by 50%.]

The first thought that came to mind as the holograms filled his vision was simple.

’We’re fucked.’

And with it, a single curse burst out.

"BetaGo, you son of a bitch!"

The only reason Simin had chosen this path instead of fighting Kenji was this: he had believed it was better to face the Heavenly King—whose strength he had more or less gauged through previous encounters and whose combat power he believed he had significantly weakened—than to fight Kenji, whose power had been reinforced by unknown means.

His calculation had been simple: when a Heavenly King and a Demon King of the same level and specs clashed, the Heavenly King’s home-field advantage and his endless Celestial army could be offset—and even surpassed—by the Demon King’s side, which had +15 gear and the full stacked effects of a Legendary class.

But an effect he had never anticipated had appeared.

It wasn’t a hidden phase triggered by the Heavenly King’s health dropping.

It was a power that had activated before the fight even began, and it wasn’t even one the Heavenly King had used himself.

If it had been his own power, it would have surely appeared when he had traded blows with Epia before.

That meant it was something new.

The most plausible assumption was, of course, a Divine Object.

A Divine Object was something granted by God.

Which meant BetaGo had given it to him.

In that short amount of time.

Another Divine Object—something that was supposed to appear only once in tens of thousands of years.

The intention was obvious.

It was the developer’s clear intent to screw the users over.

"AI or human, they’re all the same."

His face twisted into a frown.

He had never once thought this would be easy.

He had thought that, given how much he had prepared, it would be doable—a fifty-fifty chance, even.

Even his nonexistent conscience had wondered if things were a little too favorable, but he had never expected to be targeted this blatantly.

Now, the outcome was anyone’s guess.

It had reached the point where it might actually have been better to stay on the continent and fight Kenji.

Naturally, his strength drained away and his mind went blank.

But in a moment like this—

Simin opened his mouth.

"Go! Now!"

There was nowhere to retreat to anyway.

The fact that he had to entrust their fate not to his own control, but to Epia, had not changed.

Epia hesitated for a split second, but the power boiling up inside her seemed to satisfy her. With a confident smile, she launched herself from the ground.

Behind her followed Yeori’s buffs, Sudal’s runes, and Squeaker’s spells.

At the same time, Sanctuary activated from Simin’s hand.

But it wasn’t just Sanctuary; the pitch-black stone he had never used before wrapped around it as well.

The moment it did, Sanctuary’s pure white light turned to darkness.

God’s Domain, used by the Heavenly King, and the Corrupted Sanctuary.

The two mutually exclusive forces of light and darkness began to mix, as if they had once been one.

And then—

Epia’s ultimate skill activated.

The world was swallowed by a nightmare.

*