"This world developed in a very distorted direction. Originally, it should have had its own path of growth. Maybe it was still primitive. Maybe it was still trapped in a darker age. But if it had been allowed to keep developing naturally, it might eventually have created something uniquely its own.
"Instead, the arrival of that game world you mentioned rewrote the underlying rules. The native systems of growth that belonged to this world were suppressed, and almost everything began operating according to the laws imported from that game."
Caelus spoke as he walked across the grasslands outside the city with Ray, who was taking a leisurely stroll to work off lunch.
"I never read the original novels," Ray said while stretching his shoulders, "but I remember seeing some questionable discussions online claiming that the first group of players who arrived here used a World Item to rewrite the world's rules so their abilities would function normally. No idea whether that was actually true."
He thought for a moment.
"The nonhuman races here already have a lot of physical advantages over humans, and some races are naturally much better at magic and other supernatural abilities too."
Caelus's eyes glimmered faintly.
Behind him, indistinct currents of black and white flowed like mist.
He was examining the structure of this world's laws.
"The balance here was broken. The original course of history should have forced humanity to unite under pressure from the other races. After surviving a long and brutal age, their Martial Arts and magic would have developed along their own lines.
"They still would have lacked the strongest beings at the very top, but humans would eventually have secured a place for themselves on this continent and become capable of standing against the other races.
"Instead, the arrival of players gave humanity enormous advantages in the short term while also placing a ceiling over its future. Now the nonhuman races keep improving because human pressure forces them to adapt, while humanity has grown complacent and wastes its strength fighting itself.
"If that continued long enough, the result would eventually become very awkward."
By tracing the flow of the world's laws, Caelus had already understood the role of the protagonist from the original story, the undead ruler now known as Ainz Ooal Gown.
He was the final player the world had drawn in after its balance had been disrupted.
Without Caelus's intervention, the original progression was fairly clear.
Players who favored humanity had arrived first, overturning the natural balance and allowing humans to occupy many of the richest and safest regions of the continent for generations.
The world, attempting to correct that imbalance and resume its own development, had eventually drawn in the Great Tomb of Nazarick, a force overwhelmingly aligned with nonhuman beings.
And Nazarick had deliberately been placed last.
This final group possessed power far beyond anything native to the world. Ainz himself was undead. Even if his existence was not truly eternal, his lifespan was still unimaginably long.
He would eventually rule the world and bring its peoples under one order.
Then, after an age so long that his soul and will finally reached their limit, he would die.
The state built beneath him would fracture.
And when that happened, every race would once again find itself starting from a much more equal position.
That had been the world's intended method of correcting itself.
But now that Caelus had appeared, the world had chosen a much simpler option.
It had issued a request.
What this world wanted was the chance to grow into its own future, rather than being forced down a path created by outside interference.
Once Ray had finished adjusting himself and confirmed that he was ready, Caelus extended one hand.
Inside the Great Tomb of Nazarick, Ainz had only just rushed back after the incident involving Shalltear and was speaking with the Floor Guardians when the air in front of them suddenly rippled.
Then an enormous hand emerged through the distortion.
[Wow! Did they all turn into figurines?]
"What?!"
That was all anyone had time to shout.
The massive hand seized Demiurge and Cocytus before either could resist and pulled them straight through the distortion.
They vanished.
The remaining denizens of Nazarick stood frozen in place.
Far away on the grasslands, Caelus withdrew his hand through the spatial ripple and casually tossed the two captured figures forward.
A demon and an insectoid warrior rolled several times across the ground.
When they finally stood, both discovered that they had become tiny.
Their bodies had shrunk to the size of collectible figures, and the power within them had vanished almost completely.
An overwhelming sense of weakness filled every part of them.
[Yep. You basically turned them into action figures.]
"I sealed their physical strength, energy, soul, mind, and most of their other abilities," Caelus explained. "At the moment, they're not much different from mobile figurines."
He pointed toward Demiurge.
"That demon's abilities are closely tied to emotion. Materials extracted from him should probably inherit something related to that."
Then he looked toward Cocytus.
"The insectoid one specializes in ice and close combat. Materials from him should be useful when you eventually head into the frozen regions of your own world. They should make decent transitional equipment."
"Thanks, Dad! Then don't mind if I do!"
Ray shouted happily.
His greatsword came down without hesitation.
Demiurge and Cocytus did not even have time to speak.
The broad side of the weapon slammed into them and killed both instantly.
Their bodies returned from their miniature, almost plastic-like state to their normal forms.
Ray put away the greatsword, drew his carving knife, and began harvesting materials from the corpses.
"Once your mission is complete, are you leaving this world immediately?" Caelus asked.
"Not yet."
Ray continued carving as he answered.
"After I finish the main mission, I want to try hunting the legendary undead Dragon Lord. From what I remember of the original story, that Dragon Lord became undead and converted an entire country into undead creatures."
He smiled.
"Something that disruptive to the ecosystem is exactly the kind of thing a hunter is supposed to deal with."
Then he added without shame, "Though honestly, I'm mostly interested in the materials."
Once Ray finished, the corpses gradually became translucent and vanished.
Caelus watched with mild curiosity.
According to Ray, the carving itself was mostly ceremonial.
More precisely, completing the harvesting ritual gave his System permission to extract the useful essence from a slain creature, condense it into specialized materials, and place those materials directly into System storage.
Ray was not literally cutting every useful organ, scale, gland, or piece of tissue from the corpse by hand.
"Do you want any help?"
"No."
Ray shook his head.
"I can't depend on you for everything. I'm still a hunter."
He grinned confidently.
"I'll admit I'm not especially comfortable fighting human-sized opponents. But if it's a giant monster, especially something dragon-related, that's exactly where I know what I'm doing."
Ray thumped a fist against his chest.
Then he told Caelus that he intended to return to his room, get some proper sleep, and begin tracking the undead Dragon Lord afterward.
"Then I hope the hunt goes well."
Caelus nodded.
Ray left without saying anything more.
Caelus remained standing where he was.
He waited.
Only after Ray had returned to his room and fallen asleep did Caelus finally begin his own work.
The very next instant, all color drained from the world.
Everything stopped.
Birds froze in midair.
Falling water hung suspended between sky and earth.
Loose stones halted in the middle of their descent.
Even the wind, normally free to wander wherever it pleased, ceased moving.
If anyone had been capable of looking upward at that moment, they would have seen something beyond comprehension.
Far above the atmosphere, in the darkness of space, a colossal figure larger than the planet itself was looking down upon the world.
Its face could not be clearly seen.
Most of its colors seemed vague and unreal, as though its body existed only partially within ordinary reality.
The enormous figure reached out.
One finger lightly touched the planet.
Countless threads of causality appeared.
He gathered them as though weaving a tapestry.
He turned the wheel of time as casually as adjusting the hands of a clock.
And history began to change.
(To be continued.)