No Game No Life, Vol. 8 Page 6

  “……”

  —swiped the map to project the outside world into midair.

  The Flügel were free to move throughout all the planet’s lands, whenever and wherever they chose. Their all-encompassing vision had revealed the world map without leaving a speck of black. Everything…indeed, of the world of the Great War, which she held so dear. The sight, filled with death and destruction, should have made her heart race, yet her expression was mixed as she gazed at it.

  Back when they’d started the sugoroku game with Old Deus, Sora had provoked her:

  “It’s not like she would even think of presuming to get ahead of me, her dear, dear, master, right?”

  He’d implied, You’re gonna betray me, right? and If you’re gonna do it, make sure you do it right, okay? Then, when she wrote her Tasks, it had occurred to her: If the contents of the spaces were molded to the Task’s image by the power of the Old Deus, she could use that power to challenge her masters in a game that reproduced the Great War.

  Jibril had applauded herself when she’d come up with the Task and written it down. How had someone so overwhelmingly weak defeated someone overwhelmingly strong—and changed the world? Jibril would give it her all, and if she was defeated… She looked forward to the yet-unknown answer, still undecided…like never before. Yes, it should have been the most thrilling game ever… Looking at the scene that carried that anticipation, Jibril instead—

  “I have no right to complain after ruining it myself…”

  —swallowed the words that escaped her lips. She looked back at the situation projected on the map and got back to work.

  All those Elves and Dwarves who’d kindly gathered on Lucia… All that foolish rabble… What sitting ducks they’d been. They’d saved her quite a bit of time. She checked that the indiscriminate onslaught she’d ordered had wiped them all out. Without their Demon Lord, Demonia was as good as gone. Elf, Dwarf, and Fairy, too, had lost all their major forces. Moreover, Jibril had slain eighteen Phantasmas and seventy-eight Dragonias. Quite respectable results however you looked at it.

  They’d taken on just about every single race as almost an afterthought, and still Jibril’s Flügel piled up the achievements. But there were no tactics involved; there was no strategy. Just as in the old Great War, they’d done exactly what the strong side does and trampled all underfoot. Besides, her allies were not just the Flügel, but also Artosh and his messenger, Avant Heim. Their power existed on an entirely different plane. Should they swarm in numbers, even destroying an Old Deus would be a cinch. Things could have been this easy back in the old Great War if they hadn’t just been playing around, if they’d only given their full effort… Or so it seemed to Jibril as she let out a sigh of something not quite dismay or despair.

  Indeed… This wasn’t meant to be play, any of it. Not that she had the time—or even the right—to play. Sora and Shiro; her masters; “ ”. She had to beat them, no matter what it took.

  And so Jibril went on inscribing commands in a methodical, businesslike fashion.

  “—To lose, after all this, would be out of the question…”

  Sora and Shiro could just write a letter containing a single command—“resign” or “die”—and the game would be over. But they didn’t. Though she’d threatened them, they were taking her up on her game. The very least Jibril could do was to take this seriously. She had to win. If anything, that was her duty, and as she wrote, she considered.

  Immanity. Her masters were outstandingly talented individuals, of that much she was well aware. But however talented they might be, there was only one move they could conceivably make with such a large gap in military strength: Pull off perfect maneuvers in secret, manipulate the strings from behind. That was all. Imagining it, Jibril thought that sounded just like her masters, and she became half-certain. Immanity—a race no one had noticed during the War, to an improbable extent. This must have been the reason, the true meaning.

  …What came next? What came last? There were several things she still didn’t know. The final move, how they’d ended the War, and what Ex Machina had to do with it—

  But in any case—

  “…It is quite clear what I must do, then…”

  Yes—she had to exterminate all the other races. If there were no other races to use, her masters would have no room to maneuver, and even they would have no option but to resign. That’s what Jibril thought, but then…

  “Oh my…? It seems something has changed…”

  The words slipped out when she sensed movement across the map illuminated by the Flügel units—the situation had begun to shift. Races who to that point had acted disparately, on their own agendas, were beginning to coordinate.

  And with clear hostility toward Jibril and the Flügel.

  “Well, I suppose they would… Yes, yes… It’s quite understandable…”

  Jibril gave a subtle smile and sped up her writing. This game, the Great War, was her home turf. So her masters were indeed coming for her, face-to-face—!!

  She didn’t want to lose… She needed to win. But if she were to bring to bear all her deadly force—and yet be defeated… Yes… Jibril’s smile was full of emotion as she thought about the moment the world changed, which she hadn’t been able to see, and the moment the world would change, which she’d never see.

  If, with one last indulgence…she could observe it at the end—then—then…

  “Then will that really be enough…Jibril…?”

  Jibril found herself wondering.

  She feared losing her memory. If she was going to be so afraid, she’d prefer to die. Jibril prayed she would die by her masters’ hands as she viewed the future those same hands wove. That was how she felt. But…this game was supposed to have been the most exciting of all…

  …But it was so…

  Though she knew perfectly well how little she deserved to say it, still she thought it:

  How could her final game be so…boring?

  Is this really…? Am I really enough…Masters?

  She looked down, completely out of sorts, then wiped the tears from her command and kept writing.

  Then a roar shook heaven and earth.

  “—Mmhhyaaghaaah?! What in the worrrrrld?!”

  It had been fifty-one hours, forty-three minutes since the start of the game. The map showed the date to be 14 BT. Steph had been roused after having fallen asleep for about four hours.

  “Oh. You’re awake? It’s okay. Our Capital from before we moved blew up again, that’s all.”

  She’d been woken by an impact that had reduced the site of their Capital as of a few moments ago to a crater, apparently.

  Steph looked as if she was about to ask just what part of that was okay, but—

  “Weak sauce, man… Forty-seven hours is as long as you can go?”

  “…Anyone who sleeps…for more than five minutes, during a game…lacks discipline.”

  Sora and Shiro made this pronouncement without so much as a glance or pause.

  “A n-normal person sleeps once a day! Also—” Steph was usually pretty good at pulling all-nighters, but right now she was only 3.6 years old. “If you make me run around like that, I’ll pass out. Wait, what is this?!” She shrieked at the mass of paper covering the floor and then added apologetically, “…U-uh… I-if you’d only woken me, I’d have done my best to—”

  Steph seemed to think she had backed up the flow of orders, but Sora and Shiro, still scribbling away, answered cheerfully.

  “Ohhh, those. They’re not going in now.”

  “…Half of them…are my…equations…”

  “…W-well… Then what are you doing…?” Steph asked gingerly. The two siblings neglected to pause for even a moment to answer. But—

  “Mmm, yeah. I guess you’d call this game Si*City.”

  “…I’m playing…Harvest M*on…”

  “—Pardon? Wait… The map— When did…?”

  Instead of answering, they gestured toward the map—t
he field map that showed the whole world. Yes, it displayed the entire world with abnormal clarity. They tapped on a Scout to project its vision in midair.

  The equatorial region of central Ariela. It would have been a tropical region were the sky not closed off by ash, but in this world bereft of the sun’s rays, it was frozen over just like everywhere else. Still…

  “Wha…? What is this…?”

  There stood a City so grand, Steph couldn’t contain her amazement. It was built of stone and ancient concrete; it even engaged in Agriculture. The ones building and plowing throughout this city so reminiscent of the Roman Empire were—

  “H-how did you—? You made the Werebeasts your allies while I slept?!”

  Yes. Steph gasped in astonishment to see Werebeast units doing the work. Sora replied, still not missing a beat.

  “We can’t make them allies…but there are a few races we can get to effectively cooperate with us.”

  Indeed, because it could problematic if certain races found out about their existence. So, Sora said as he scratched his head with an ineffable sense of bashfulness:

  “…See, we just helped them a little… I mean, you gotta feel sorry for them.”

  “Since when do you—? Oh. So what’s your scheme this time?”

  Steph eyed Sora skeptically, having apparently lost interest in appealing to his humanity. He answered in a bit of a huff.

  “What’s your problem? Don’t you appreciate that we saved them from being destroyed by the mean old Elves’ heartless revenge?”

  “I highly doubt there’s anything meaner than you, the cause of that heartless revenge!!”

  It had been 118 years of game time since the incident where they’d mistaken the Werebeasts for orcs and gotten them to kidnap an Elf. Yet even now, the Werebeasts were still facing occasional reprisals from the Elves, and as a consequence, they’d been deprived of their villages and food supplies. Thanks to Sora’s anonymous instigation, the Werebeasts were now on the brink of extinction. In short—It’s all your fault, you bastard. Steph’s blame was well-placed, but now she continued as if pained.

  “B-besides… If you have so much food, shouldn’t you be giving it to Immanity—?”

  The Immanity units now numbered over 450,000 strong. They held nine cities on the continent of Lucia alone and spread out across every other continent. Meanwhile, it was hard to deny that, given the population, food was in short supply. But— Sora turned, stopping his pen for the first time.

  “So you’re saying we’ve gotta sacrifice someone—’cos that’s the only way?”

  “……!”

  “That’s what everyone’s been telling themselves, and look where that got us: war.”

  Steph hung her head, not making a single retaliatory sound. If anything, Sora was the last person she wanted to hear that from… Steph glared at him, ready to protest, but Sora ignored her and tapped the map before continuing.

  “A good deed is never lost. To give is to receive… Observe!”

  He projected another unit’s field of vision and announced that this was a step toward peace.

  “After one hundred seventy years of trial and error! At last, on this doomed world—”

  Yes, a feat that had required over a century.

  “With the use of vermiculite and chemical fertilizer!”

  “…Through hydroponics… We’ve succeeded, in large-scale…agriculture…!”

  Steph gasped in amazement as Sora and Shiro boasted. It was only natural. After all, it really was, without a shadow of a doubt, an epic feat.

  Here they’d been on a frozen land, beneath an ash-covered sky that let barely any sunshine through. The ground had a bit of heat from the blazing salvo of war, but otherwise, the planet was nearly frozen solid. Practically speaking, the soil was useless; almost all the potential farmland they might have been able to use was polluted by the ash of death. Under these conditions, they’d relied on the information in their tablet computer to dedicate a full century to nothing but trial and error. They’d used ameliorated soil and chemical fertilizer and located land free of the falling ash. With the application of hydroponics (a concept as shut-ins they’d never even heard before), they’d succeeded.

  “But the only ones who can manufacture and supply vermiculite and chemical fertilizer are Immanity!”

  No. Strictly speaking, even Immanity didn’t know how to manufacture them. Sora and Shiro gave the orders and thereafter enforced confidentiality by consistently wiping units’ memories of the process—so!

  “We have the Werebeasts work for their sustenance, and provide us with food—at rock-bottom prices!”

  After all, they were the ones providing the Werebeasts with the fundamental technology. The Werebeasts had neither right nor ability to refuse.

  “Thus! We have established logistics and economy. This is fair trade!”

  “…It’s win-win…a friendly relationship…based, on capitalism…”

  “Now, don’t hold back. Extol us to your heart’s content! In this shitty, war-torn world, we have used capitalism to build economic prosperity! Sing our praises! This is a triumph for civilization. This is peace!”

  Sora loudly lauded himself while Shiro looked on proudly, but…

  ……After thinking carefully on it for several seconds, Steph objected.

  “That’s not cooperation, that’s oppression!!”

  Steph’s expression seemed to indicate she’d almost been tricked, but Sora just heaved a gloomy sigh.

  “Yeeeesh, so you don’t even get the basics of capitalism? …Our prime minister would be so ashamed.”

  Sora shook his head and thought, Oppression? Yes, of course… That it was. The foundation of capitalism, however, is to pretend not to see such things!

  But let them say what they like. Sora sneered. Regardless, this was peace—an unshakable fact!

  “There is one drive that no living thing can defy. Do you know what it is?”

  It was—

  “Hun,ger…!”

  “!”

  Steph reacted in shock as Sora and Shiro peered at the world map together.

  “Clutching our ultimate weapons—our stomachs—we shall take on the world!!”

  “…He, who controls food…controls…the world…!”

  “If they’re hungry, they’ll have no choice but to bargain with us. But we’re the ones with the initiative.”

  The glint in Sora’s eyes was virile and powerful, like that of a supreme ruler.

  …Glrgggh.

  The grumble in Shiro’s tummy was cute and short-lived, like a small animal.

  ……

  A moment’s silence passed, and Steph sighed before chiming in.

  “…You can be frank with me… I’ll understand how you feel…”

  “—We’re so hungry, we can’t take it anymore!”

  Sora slammed the table and howled, his attitude totally shifted by Steph’s words. “It’s been fifty-one hours! We can go without sleep, sure, but we’re goddamn starving!”

  “……I want…Sp*Ohs…instant spaghetti… Drool…” Even Shiro was slurping her drool, following something invisible with her eyes.

  “…I might as well say it, but you’ll be just fine. This game, it’s an illusion.”

  “So?! Maybe if we drew a picture of some mochi, that might still taste good!”

  “…We’d at least…taste, the paper, and…paints… Drool.”

  Steph stood up to the intimidation of their ravenous eyes:

  “Um… One second for us is eight hours in the game, isn’t it?”

  Perhaps the four hours of deep sleep had refreshed her mind. She pointed out a fact far beyond Sora and Shiro’s ability—no—willingness to grasp.

  “If it takes five seconds to eat something…it’ll spoil, you know?”

  .

  It felt like the already-frozen world grew even colder. They stiffened for several full seconds as if facing reality was a laborious task itself—

  “…
All right. Forget it, then… Some free time just opened up in our schedule.”

  “…Brother… Can I sleep, just…five minutes?”

  “Go for it. Oh, drop these commands around here in the box. Wake me in five minutes, all right…?”

  Steph was in no position to argue after having just slept four hours and did as she was told.

  She went back and forth, unable to carry all the commands at once. Lulled by her footsteps, Sora mumbled, almost to himself, “…But, man… If this is really what happened in the past…”

  Rolling over with Shiro in his arms, Sora stared into space where the map was projected. He let out a chuckle full of mixed emotions at the world it showed.

  “Those humans did a nice job surviving… Tough little bastards.”

  He thought back to all the postapocalyptic games where humans managed to survive in their world. Indeed…if they could endure this hell, then nuclear winter was nothing to worry about.

  Sora’s muttering seemed to remind Steph of something, and she paused from stuffing commands in the mailbox.

  “Come to think of it, didn’t Jibril say Immanity had slain a god or something?”

  Yes. They hadn’t just survived. Jibril had for sure said as much:

  Excluding the gods themselves, only two races had achieved deicide: the Flügel and the Ex Machinas, who had slain their lord, Artosh.

  But she’d implied that it had been Immanity who’d used Ex Machina to slay him.

  And if the world had changed because of that deicide, the implication was that Immanity had ended the War…

  “…What did she mean…?”

  A grand tale. An epic poem hidden within Immanity. This is what Jibril had hinted at. Steph timidly inquired what Jibril had meant, but Sora and Shiro grinned boldly…

  “Who knows? It’s a mystery!”

  “…Jibril was just…half-asleep…”

  Steph’s shoulders slumped at how confidently they’d answered.

  “Uh, wait, but didn’t you say it would be easy to win the War?!”