Chapter 1: All4One
I opened my eyes in another reality, seeing a void before the lights came in the form of screens.
[Welcome, All4One.]
The system greeted me as I watched the environment change from an empty void to a room filled with books and papers.
It was not real. In fact, it was just a virtual personal waiting space I had designed and decorated to give off a homey feel. It was night and day when compared to my dull and minimalistic apartment room which had close to nothing in terms of amenities.
Right now, my physical body was lying on my bed in the real world while wearing the VR gear that connected the implant in my brain to the neuro-nano interface, the thing that allowed me and millions of others to play the plethora of Dive VR games available today.
It was truly the epitome of technology, at least from where I stood as a 21st-century person. This was the kind of technology that was just starting out when I was in my home world. And yet here, it was an everyday piece of tech, available to the masses.
[Which game would you like to play today?]
The system's AI assistant asked while in front of me was a row of cards showing beautiful thumbnails and titles of the games I had installed in my system.
[Eden's Ascendancy]
[Shinobi Chronicles: Rising Shadows]
[Celestial Odyssey]
[Neo-Tokyo Racing League]
[Yokai Requiem]
[Elysian Blade Online]
[Yggdrasil]
[Kaiju Rampage VR]
[Pixel Shogun]
[Cybernetic Arena]
[Origami Masters]
In my time here, I had played quite a few games this world had to offer. This list was just the ones I had kept in my System's memory as I either hadn't finished them, such as the popular AAA titles Eden's Ascendancy, Celestial Odyssey, and Yokai Requiem, or hadn't gotten bored of them, like Origami Masters and Pixel Shogun. Especially Origami Masters, in which I had a playtime of over 2000 hours.
Well, there were also a few, like the ninja-based game Shinobi Chronicles: Rising Shadows and the sci-fi arcade game Cybernetic Arena that I had installed but never launched for some reason.
In this list, in between Elysian Blade Online, a Samurai-based VR game that reminded me a lot of the game Ghost of Tsushima from my original world, and Kaiju Rampage VR, a silly stress-relieving game where you are a giant Kaiju whose goal is to destroy the entirety of Neo-Japan while the military tries to stop you, there was an older game title by the name Yggdrasil.
Once upon a time, this game was the craze of every gamer and had the largest fandom in Neo-Japan. And while still loved dearly—despite its flaws and the many atrocities that the shitty devs have committed over the years— it had lost a great majority of its player base and was set to shut down permanently while the developers started hinting at a sequel.
Today was, in fact, the last day of Yggdrasil. The game servers would close the moment the clock hit 12 AM.
I checked on the top right of my HUD where the clock was situated, showing me the current time.
8:34:23 PM
"Open Yggdrasil."
[Launching Yggdrasil…]
[Connecting to the Server…]
[Loading…]
After a short few seconds, I was transported from my private virtual space to a grand hall filled with beautiful chandeliers lit with ethereal lights and crystal statues that resembled Seraphs of the Old Mythos, from one of the game's lores.
I was currently in the main hall of the guild residential area, named Resonant Chambers, on the 9th floor of my guild base, Elysium Nexus.
Situated in a location known as Ascendant Bastion, a special hidden region located near the outskirts of the realm of Alfheim, it was said to be a place that actually existed not in one of the realms of Yggdrasil, but in the interstices of the realms. Only its entrance, which was a massive tower, was situated in Alfheim.
This guild base was the home I finally decided on in this virtual game world after years of searching for an appropriate guild base fit for me and my future self.
Now, I know what you are thinking.
Why didn't I stick to the canon knowledge I had and choose the good old Nazarick as my base?
Well, for one, it was already occupied by the heteromorphic guild Ainz Ooal Gown by the time I finally learned of it and unfortunately, I was not a member of the said guild.
Not that I had any real regrets in that regard.
Secondly, my special build caused me to forego most guild bases, one of which happened to be Nazarick itself. Simply put, some of my special classes didn't allow me to claim bases that didn't have a certain level of Astral energy. Nazarick had none as it was a Tomb filled with Negative energies.
Lastly, I had originally thought of sticking to Nazarick due to its familiarity, but once I entered the game and started exploring its worlds, I was simply enchanted with it and couldn't stop myself from defining my own path in the game, not simply following what was known to me. I didn't want to be a skeletal Overlord or Goat-headed demon, or even a formless Elder Ooze. I chose a special build that felt right to me and which gave me abilities that I thought would be useful in the New World. Because I couldn't just play this game like I played the other games. This game was special. It was my lifeline. It was the source of my limitless power and ascension to Godhood once the transfer happened.
So instead, I owned my own guild base that was perhaps even better than Nazarick in some regards.
Elysium Nexus was the name it was given by the devs themselves and was originally the home to one of the 5 strongest World Catastrophe-class Bosses in the game. To acquire this guild, a minimum of thirty level 100 Players had to fight through the 10 mystical floors of this place to reach the core where the Boss simply named Arcanum Serapharum lay.
Labeled in the fandom as the boss with the most diverse and difficult-to-predict attack patterns, it was an ancient, celestial entity that was said to be the Guardian of the dimensional gap, a void that covered the space between the nine realms.
Defeating the Boss was a feat no one had accomplished since its addition in the 7th major DLC release.
Well, no one but one guild.
Nexus.
The name of the guild I had created with some of my online friends and was the guildmaster of.
In its heyday, it was a top-ranking guild with 36 full-time members. It was a guild that constantly made its appearance in the top 10 charts of the guild tournaments and was once the 2nd ranked guild in the entire game, falling just a little behind the 1st ranked guild, Eclipse, a famous Seoul-based guild that focused on Competitive tournaments.
But that was all back then.
Now, when the game was more or less on its deathbed, most of the guild members had permanently quit and the few remaining ones rarely, if ever, logged in.
Truth be told, this game was old.
In the decade or so it had existed, newer games had been released that had better graphics and even more freedom of action and sensations.
Yggdrasil had lived its life on the virtual shelf of people and it was time for it to be put away in the box of memories.
I looked around the hallway I had spawned in with a passive gaze before opening my in-game console and teleported directly to the place where I wanted to go.
Nexus Core, the 10th and final floor of this guild base and the control center of the entire guild.
This was where the Seat of the Last Warden lay, a nigh-World Class level item that was used by the one who owned the guild (aka Me) and which was quite possibly the most precious item-cum-structure in the entirety of the guild, barely overshadowed only by the real World Class items the guild had. Even still, this one was unbelievably valuable as it held Mystical and Mythical powers that had roused my curiosity a lot.
In terms of look, it was a large throne made up of light and dark crystals, situated on a pedestal of beautifully polished and processed Caloric Stone, which in itself was a World Class item. Its headrest was ginormous, stretching and expanding high into the ceiling which gave a stunning view of the Ether itself. Darkness with colorful dots and streaks of light. It was like looking at the ever-moving galaxies and stars from afar. But in the game's lore, it was supposed to be the Dimensional Gap itself.
The place where the throne was situated was a dark-themed throne room that was made with dark crystal walls and pillars made up of an unknown and indestructible substance that was pitch black in color.
There were accents of red in the otherwise dark theme and the room was lit by the light coming from the ceiling which was a void filled with brilliant and colorful dots of lights and also the chandeliers that were held by arcs that were connected to two parallel rows of tall pillars.
The room gave off a mystical and ethereal feel. One couldn't help but wonder if this room was not simply floating in the mystical space visible above.
As a matter of fact, it did. According to its lore, at least. This place supposedly existed between the gaps of the nine realms and this was the only place where the said Dimensional Gap was visible. Not accessible, though.
It wasn't as if one could confirm it by flying up and going beyond the open ceiling. There was an indestructible invisible barrier that prevented that.
I knew that because I had tried multiple times to go past it, wondering if there was a hidden bonus area there. All I got for my many efforts were many messages of "0" damage indicators.
Finally at my destination, I sat on the throne, glancing up to see the familiar void. That void felt so relatable, so familiar. I felt something similar inside me. In front of me, a vast empty room lay that could hold hundreds, if not thousands of people.
This place, while so big, was empty save for the myriad decorations done by my guild mates to not make it feel so 'bland and empty'.
In the past, it held only two beings. Amusingly, it was the same in the present but the said beings were different.
One was myself. As for the other…
I turned to my left to see the sole NPC situated on this floor. The one who was tasked with handling all the automatable tasks for the guild and who I considered my right-hand woman… even though she always tended to stand on my left.
Ahem, anyway, leaving the nuances aside, she was the NPC that I had personally created to be my companion in this world and hopefully the next, splurging a lot of real cash to buy additional character creation tool kits, extra flavor text space, and the programmable space. Furthermore, I had paid real artists to model her in-game outfits as I couldn't model for shit or at the most could only create something below average.
She turned out to be incredible.
Nix Celestine, the Nexus Guardian Overseer of all other guardians that protect the multitude of floors of this guild base.
Her character's description explained it the best.
With iridescent wings resembling the shimmering hues of a starlit night, Nix's ethereal form is a sight to behold. Her long, flowing platinum hair cascades like a silvery waterfall, reflecting the light of a thousand stars. Bright, sapphire eyes, deep and mysterious like the vast cosmos, reveal both her keen intelligence and her boundless compassion. Adorned in robes that seem to shift and shimmer like nebulae—a Divine class item fit for a Divine class being— she appears to be a living constellation, connected to the very fabric of the universe.
And she serves her Master, the All4One, and serves him with infinite passion.
I had at times felt proud and at times felt a bit embarrassed that I wrote such a description of her in her flavor text. But I couldn't help myself. She was created in the time period when I was madly toiling and perfecting things for my journey to the next reality. I was lonely and got a little too ahead of myself when the prospect of creating my very own lifelong companion came to light. I also had a terrible breakup around that time, but that doesn't matter. Not anymore.
I wanted everything to be perfect and I wanted her to be even more perfect as she was my most important creation and my companion.
With some simple commands, I brought up her Status page.
– NIX CELESTINE –
Race: Ethereal Seraph (Heteromorphic Race)
Affiliation: Elysium Nexus
Titles: Guardian and Protector of the Seat of the Last Warden, Right-hand woman of All4One
Jobs: Guardian of the Elysium Nexus Core, Guardian Overseer
Residence: Elysium Nexus, 10th floor, beside the Seat of the Last Warden
Alignment: Extreme Good
Sense of Justice (Karma): +500
---
Racial Levels:
Seraph 15 lvl
Great Seraph 10 lvl
Celestial Ascendant 10 lvl
Ethereal Seraph (Special) 5 lvl
---
Job Levels:
Ethereal Guardian 5 lvl
Astral Warden 10 lvl
Seraphim Aethermancer (Specialization) 15 lvl
Nexus Arbiter 5 lvl
Others
---
Racial levels: 40 / Job levels: 60
Total Levels: 100
---
HP: 70
MP: 100+ (limit exceeded)
PHY. ATK: 25
PHY DEF: 65
AGILITY: 55
MAG. ATK: 95
MAG. DEF: 95
RESIST: 100
SPECIAL: 100
---
Total stats: 705+
A small smile tugged at my lips as I looked at the page, reminiscing the days when I had to go through hundreds of sites and forums, and even make some private connections, to find out the best build for my future NPC(s). I was hell-bent on finding the right selection of Job and Racial levels so I could create my perfect NPC, one that complemented my build…
… Only to find her when I and my fellow guildmates stumbled upon the original Guardian and Protector of the Seat of the Last Warden, who was guarding the Final Boss of this place. In other words, the Mini-Boss before the Final Boss. Indeed, I had decided then and there that I'd make my NPC based on that unique character. I was simply enamored with her design the first time I saw her. It made fighting and then killing her a bit more difficult than it should have been. Though most of the difficulty could be attributed to her stupidly extensive and unique attacks and debuffs.
The funny part was that, once we killed the original Warden of this place, the defeated Guardian who had simply frozen in place turned into motes of light and disappeared, only to appear as an option for a Guild NPC when I took control of the dungeon and turned it into our (my) Guild Base and earned an upgrade to my race's final form, an entirely new Unique Race.
That's how Nix was born.
"Haa… Those were the days. Can't believe I've spent so much time in this place."
Closing the interface, I glanced back up at the celestial void above for a few moments before I pulled myself back into action.
"Alright, then. Let's get to the final act of this phase."
I opened my Inventory and began emptying out everything I had, including my gear and weapons except one important item that'd be needed for this. My Inventory was instead filled with a single item I had purchased in bulk. Max Tier Bags of Holdings. All empty.
-x-
"Hahaha… HAHAHAHA! FUAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!"
I laughed in mad glee as I saw the spectacle in front of me.
I was currently in Asgard, the home to the most obnoxious and evil Humanoid-based Players and Guilds in the entirety of Yggdrasil. Truly, it was a place filled to the brim with bigoted, discriminating, and self-important pompous sons and daughters of bitches. There was a good reason why Heteromorphs didn't step foot in Asgard.
The same Asgard that was currently in flames. Not just the area in front of me. Not just the region I was in. No. The entirety of Asgard. The whole realm, One of the nine worlds of Yggdrasil was currently burning.
The reason was the sole Player alive who was currently laughing like a madman while recording the spectacle with the in-game recording system.
"Haa… that was cathartic. This is for all the times you assholes PK'd and serial PK'd me and other new Heteromorphic Players. This is my revenge!"
A ping caused me to pause before I noticed an incoming call in-game.
Still observing the hellish yet beautiful spectacle, I accepted it after seeing who the sender was.
It was from one of my in-game friends.
[Um, All4One-san. What am I looking at exactly?]
My smile didn't leave as I spoke.
"Asgard. In flames. The entirety of it, the whole realm, gone."
[…]
It took the person on the other side of the connection some time to regain their bearings.
[Pardon? Did you just say the entirety of Asgard is… gone?]
"Yup. All of it. All the Guild Bases, all the Villages, The NPCs, and Player Characters. Everything was annihilated."
[… How?]
The voice carried clear disbelief, even though I was sending the authentic live video of the game to the person on the other side.
"Well, using Super Tier magic."
I answered simply. And I wasn't lying. It was indeed done using a Super Tier spell.
[Um… you're not pulling my leg, are you?]
The voice on the other side still seemed hesitant to believe my words.
"Nope. It's the truth. You can clearly see me casting the spell in the video. I said its name and everything, you know."
[Yes. You did. I don't think I've seen that Super Tier magic before. Is it one of the unique ones? Or did you somehow discover it recently.]
If it was any other time than the last day of the game, I wouldn't have answered that question, nor the person on the other side of the call would have asked with the expectation of getting an answer. After all, knowledge was precious in this game.
But this was the last day of the game. There was little point in hiding things anymore. Especially things like the name of the spell and its basic description.
"[Verdant Fury]. It's a unique Super Tier spell I got from one of my Job classes."
But due to old habits, I still couldn't give more information than was necessary. I didn't say what the Job class was.
[Wow. It must be game-breaking if it can take out an entire freaking realm. Geez, I'm still unable to accept that you just demolished an entire Realm… this is crazy. No, it should be impossible.]
"Haha, yeah. It's definitely not something I could have done any other time."
[How did you do it though? Is there really a Super Tier spell capable of eradicating an entire Realm? There's no way the shitty devs would implement something as game-breaking as that. And that's saying something after all the crazy things they've put in the game over the years.]
"True, true. The Super Tier Magic isn't actually capable of such a feat. It's just a highly powered AOE attack that destroys everything and everyone other than Divine class items and above. It is especially good at destroying structures such as Guild Bases."
[I see.]
"Now, that alone isn't enough. But then comes the Gatcha and cash shop item that helped me expand this to so large of an area."
[Oh? Which item?]
The voice seemed quite curious.
I chuckled, imagining the face—or lack thereof— of my online friend.
"Spell Echo III."
[Spell Echo III?]
"Yup."
[What's that? Do you mean the Cash Shop item Spell Echo? But that doesn't have tiers. It's a non-tiered one-use consumable item that lets you multiply your spells per single cast.]
"And you'd be right. Spell Echo doesn't have tiers…. At least the updated ones don't. But 4 years ago, before the Outer Gods expansion update, these used to be tiered and weren't implemented in this way but rather as scrolls that could be accessed even from a distance. There were three Tiers of Spell Echo: I, II, and III which linked to their potency—50%, 75%, and 100%— and the distance from which they can be used. The devs later removed it from the store and Gatcha drops after someone found a serious bug related to it that let them use it from a seemingly infinite distance and use any amount of them. It was later replaced by the new Spell Echo that kinda sucks but is 'more balanced'. Meh.
Anyhow, I had a lot of these back then, and I mean a lot of these from the Gatcha drops back when I was hunting for ultra-rare drops. I had them stored in my expanded pouches, inside Ender chests inside the old Storage locker given to players that nobody used once they improved and expanded the Player Inventory and added better Storage spaces.
Well, turns out, the ones I had didn't get deleted and somehow still worked. I'm pretty sure the devs were lazy with their job and didn't do a deep clean of the items. So, while they weren't being sold anymore, I still had the ones I got from the Gatcha drops.
So… I later found it while rearranging my storage chests, tried it with some of my AOE attacks and Super Tier Spells, and discovered something interesting in the way they behaved."
[Woah. That's… crazy. But it's just like the shitty devs to cut corners and not do their jobs properly. How else can we explain all the 'features' and 'events' that are totally not bugs that still exist to this day? Haa… But I'm curious. How many of these Spell Echo III did you use to destroy the entire Asgard?]
I focused back on the view in front of me, relishing it for the last time before the animation effects ended.
"90."
[90? Just that? How did you—]
"Thousand."
[Wha?]
"I used 90 thousand of the items."
[… How did you get so many? How much Gatcha did you play for goodness' sake?!]
"Ah, no. That's not it. Well, you know about one of the three infamous item duplication glitches?"
[Yes. But I heard they were patched? Pretty sure it has been ages since it was patched.]
"Yes. But you see, it's not exactly the case. Or rather, it was patched for all the currently existing items. Not the deprecated ones, though."
[Oh… OH! Holy crap!]
"Yup. That's how I managed to get so many."
[But still. You wouldn't have been able to transport such a large amount so easily.]
"Oh, yeah. That was a real pain. It took me 2 months to just set this up and pray that they weren't accidentally discovered. I think I was quite lucky nobody found out what was about to happen."
[Wait. Is that what you have been doing for the past 2 months?]
"Yup."
[This? This was what you were doing when you told me you were grinding for Divine class items?]
While the voice was flabbergasted by my actions, I cast [Fly] and started moving towards the ruins, my [Minimap] and [Item Location] primed and working.
"Yup."
[So, you lied to me. That's… I'm a little hurt. I really thought you were grinding and it even inspired me to do some End Game grinding. Now I feel stupid.]
The voice said in an accusatory manner but also sounded a little depressed.
"Hmm? What are you saying? I didn't lie to you, though."
I asked, holding back my smile as my feet soon landed on the charred lands of what was once the capital of Asgard.
Now, let it be known that it's not possible to rig an entire realm as realms in Yggdrasil are ginormous in size. So much so that a lot of the game's content is still not discovered to this day. But Asgard is special because it's a much smaller Realm in comparison to others.
It only has the main Capital city and some surrounding lands.
That's why what I did was possible. But it still took me 2 months of sneaking and planning.
Also, this wasn't something I came up with on my own but something that had been in my head for a while now. There was a certain Overlord FanFic I remembered reading in my first life where the protagonist did something similar in-game. I just did some casual checks and tests and found out, to my pleasant surprise, that it was actually feasible in the game. But only if there were very few players active in-game. Today happened to be one of those days.
Speaking of things that I took inspiration from, there were a few other helpful tricks I remembered from some fanfics as well and managed to make them work in-game. If I could, I would thank the Authors who wrote those fics. They helped me accomplish my goal.
[But you just admitted that you were doing this rather than grinding.]
The voice argued, but there was little heat to it.
"And that would be technically true. Tell me, Momonga. Did you hear what I told you about the effects of my Super Tier spell?"
[…]
[I don't understand? What does that have to do with anything?]
"Well, you see… I mentioned that [Verdant Fury] is a highly powered AOE attack that destroys everything other than Divine class items and above. So… what do you think is remaining scattered across the Realm of Asgard right now?"
[…]
[…]
[… Wait—No way! Are you serious?!]
My smile widened.
"Yes way! Right now, I'm looking at a lot of Divine class and above gear and tools left behind after the destruction. Hehehe… And I'm the only one in this entire Realm. Since it's finders keepers, I suppose I'll be taking it all for myself. Hehehehe."
[…]
[…]
[I'm teleporting to Asgard!]
"Heh. You can try."
I chuckled while I picked up the first few pieces of gear and items. I didn't even have to check their stats or anything. I had an entire inventory expanded to the max limit using all in-game and cash items, filled to the last slot with the highest tier Bags of Holdings— also expanded to the max. Since all the gears and items were of Divine class and the only rank above it was World Class, I could blindly pick any item I found and would still end up with an Endgame level item.
"Oh boy, this is going to be one hell of a looting session, huh."
[Argh! Why can't I enter Asgard?! The teleporters and [Gate] spells are saying Asgard is currently offline? But you're there and we're clearly talking to each other.]
Meanwhile, the voice of my bony friend whom I was still on line with sounded frustrated.
"Probably because this little act of mine likely crashed the Servers."
[What? Oh, I guess that makes sense. But doesn't that mean you're stuck in that place? Also once the server comes back online, everything will be reset to the last checkpoint, so you'll lose everything, including any items you might have taken. Wait, aren't you in a bit of a bind then?]
Heh, it was just like Momonga to worry about his friend's well-being.
"Not really. I know a way around it. It's true that that's how server crashes are handled but this one is a little different. There will be no reset as this is still just a tiny bit below the threshold before the system decides to just go for a hard reset. The servers will be online in a bit and this place will still be a hellhole."
[Really?]
"Yup. Trust me when I say this. I've spent a long time researching the ins and outs of this game, including all the mechanics, bugs, and oddities. There's a way for me to save all my acquired items even if the server decides to reset them. These items are now mine forever. I have 20 minutes to gather as much as I can before the respawn points heal and others get entry to this realm."
[Ah… I see.]
It felt like the skeleton had somehow given up on his attempts to take some of the loot.
[So you had it all planned. That's why you were willing to share this with me. Yes, there's no other way you, All4One, the greatest hoarder known in the entirety of Yggdrasil, will be willing to share loot with others. I was dumb to think so.]
"Well… what can I say? My greed is limitless."
[… Right.]
I chuckled at his dry response.
It was true. I had been given such an epithet by many and it was what I was known for.
All4One. The Player with the largest amount of money and items in the game.
The number of items I had stored within the Vault and Storage chests easily numbered in the millions at this point. And the Gold (currency) I had hoarded would put any dragons to shame.
It was enough to crush the in-game economy and spam buy the highest-priced items in the game without putting much dent in the funds.
Not that I had ever tried such frivolous action as to waste money to collapse the in-game society. I would lose so much money for literally nothing.
Finally, nobody wanted to talk about the World Items my Guild— and thus I— possessed, both publicly and privately. Yes, it was better left unsaid that I had close to two-third of them hidden away in my Treasury and some secret locations within the Guild base.
…
As for why, I was saving it all for my future.
Yes, everything was for my future in the New World. This was just the prologue to my story.
[Well, I guess have fun gathering all the items… Not like it matters anyway. Today's the last day. Also, I don't think there were that many players in Asgard. Maybe a few hundred. But did you still get the World Slayer title or something? There has to be a title for something like this, right?]
Unfortunately, there was no such title given. Either it didn't exist, or I somehow didn't qualify for it. Oh well. I didn't care for such titles either.
"Nope. Didn't get it. It probably is just a myth created by the fandom. Alright, I'm hanging up. I'll call you again 15 minutes before the Server Shut Down."
[… Alright. Take care, All4One-san. I guess I'll go find something to do until then.]
With the call ending, I focused on collecting all the laying items.
"So many Divine class items… Oh, there's a World Class item too! Nice! Oh!! Another one! Hell yeah! This is the best day ever!"
Alone, in the desolate Realm of Asgard, a lone figure roamed around, gathering powerful, endgame gears and items for himself. Truly, the epitome of greed.
That was All4One.
That was me.
-x-