Isekai Online Game Developer

“Ah, no!”

Riji shouted in anger as she found herself about to launch the next game.

Just moments ago, she had gotten 27 kills as Tower Shibana only to lose because of her team.

This was already her ninth round.

“Why, why?!”

Hina, who had been dozing off next to her, commented upon seeing Riji disconnect.

“Really, this game is a wicked thing, just like a Gold Dragon. It nearly captivated my mind completely.”

“Ah, it hasn’t been that long; let’s play a bit more…”

It had nearly been a whole day, though.

From the Dragon’s perspective, it was indeed a short time.

But Riji was trying to regain her focus.

“No. No matter how I think about it, this doesn’t feel right. Leaving the eggs to humans is…”

“Ah, no…!”

“L-Let go!”

Hina clung to Riji’s wing.

Riji shook her off and leaped out the window.

Hina hurriedly rushed out of the Tower.

But by then, Riji had transformed into her Dragon form.

“W-Wait…! You can’t do that…!”

“What do you mean I can’t? I’ll find my egg myself!”

“W-Why…”

As Hina attempted to jump back onto Riji to stop her, it was in vain.

Hina’s small body looked like a speck of dust against the massive Dragon form of Riji.

“Grrrrr…!”

And thus, Riji took off with Hina still clinging to her.

Hina barely managed to hang on to Riji’s scales by gripping onto her neck.

“Grab here! You’ll fall if you stay there!”

Following Riji’s advice, Hina climbed up toward her nape.

This gave her a sense of stability, but it didn’t make the fear disappear.

As they soared higher into the sky, her legs felt weak.

“I-It’s scary…!”

“Then why did you climb on?”

“B-But if you burn down the human village…”

Hina couldn’t help it; she had to stop Riji.

If she let Riji go, Rai might just suspend Hina’s account.

Instead, Hina guided Riji to where Rai had gone.

It was surely better than burning down a poor village.

“Waaaaaaaah!”

And so, Hina and Riji quickly headed to a beach.

The nearby coastal gorge was where the Tower Masters had discovered the eggs.

“This place… It’s near that guy’s nest.”

As they approached the cliff, Riji muttered.

Near this deserted sea was the nest of an Ash Dragon.

Though not as annoying as a Gold Dragon, Riji felt ill at ease about the Ash Dragon.

For some reason, there was a foreboding aura.

“That guy?”

“Yeah. The Ash Dragon lives nearby. Looks a bit like that boss Hong Taeil.”

“Uh, uh… Is that it?”

“Yeah?”

When Hina pointed, a gigantic Dragon was perched on top of a huge cliff.

The Dragon had its head down on the ground, intently observing something.

“W-What…!”

Riji gasped in shock at the sight of the real Ash Dragon.

As they drew closer, the Ash Dragon’s eyes turned toward Riji.

“Ugh…”

Riji wasn’t keen on facing the Ash Dragon.

But since there was an egg down there, she couldn’t back down and headed toward the cliff.

“…H-Hello.”

“Don’t tell me that egg down there is yours.”

The Ash Dragon spoke as it approached Riji.

Hina continued to hang onto Riji while looking up at the Ash Dragon.

Riji was already massive, but the full-fledged Ash Dragon was much larger.

“S-So what! It’s normal to lose an egg once in a while!”

“You didn’t show up for so long, and it was because of this, huh?”

The grievances of the Dragons were piling up over the last couple of days.

Riji, who normally did the chores, had been absent.

“Y-You came down because of that?”

“Not exactly. I merely came to observe because the flow of mana in this area has changed abruptly. This is certainly a space where humans can no longer move.”

The Ash Dragon gazed down at the ground.

At first glance, it seemed like just ground, but looking beyond the illusion magic, a glass-like window appeared.

“W-What is this…”

Hina, who had been puzzled for a moment, recognized its nature.

This was a form of illusion magic entirely different from the existing one.

Hina also saw Rai and his party beyond the illusion magic.

“It seems like that is the work of that human. And that, what an intriguing spell.”

At the end of the Ash Dragon’s gaze was a Maple Leaf-shaped artifact.

“…I suppose I don’t need to concern myself with human affairs. But I will take that.”

As if triggered, ‘Maple Leaf Story’ rose toward the Ash Dragon from below the glass.

Having secured ‘Maple Leaf Story,’ the Ash Dragon soared back to its lair.

“Phew… I’ll call Rai.”

With a sigh of relief, Hina descended below the illusion magic.

*

“What on earth is happening?”

Something was happening above.

After a gray Dragon, Riji also appeared.

The two engaged in some dialogue before the Dragon flew away with ‘Maple Leaf Story.’

Surely, they didn’t come here just for a game, did they?

As Riji was flustered, Hina emerged from a hidden passage above.

“Tower Master?”

“Raii—”

Hina, flapping in a frenzy, explained the situation.

It seemed there was a limit to stopping Riji with mere games.

But thankfully, the timing had aligned perfectly.

“By the way, what is this place, Tower Master? This illusion magic is unlike anything I’ve seen before.”

“W-Well, it’s uh… I’m not sure…”

Hina seemed uncertain about the illusion magic as well.

Since we couldn’t find out immediately, we decided to leave here and head back.

Following Hina outside, Riji grabbed the egg.

“Wow, you really found it, human. And this is…”

“H-Hii!”

Riji pointed at Hetz with her finger.

In front of Hetz, radiating a murderous intent, a scream echoed.

“Leave him to me. I’ll handle this properly.”

“How are you going to kill him?”

“I-I’m not going to kill him. I’ll make sure this never happens again.”

“…For now, that’s fine. I need to hurry back and put the egg in the nest. But I will check if you handled it properly.”

“Yes. Understood.”

Thus, Riji took the egg and headed back.

From the atmosphere, it seemed like they needed to return in a hurry.

Thanks to that, Hetz had saved his life once.

“Let’s head back too now.”

We also set off on our way home.

We took a slightly different route than before and first stopped by a village burned by Riji’s breath.

“This is…”

“That’s a village that the enraged Hetz burned down. Naturally, most of the villagers died. Besides a few.”

The village was filled with ash.

Plants, buildings, everything had been burnt down to dust.

Bones lay scattered in various poses everywhere.

The party all sighed in unison.

Hetz could no longer continue speaking upon seeing the scene.

We then arrived at a small town where some of the children who survived were.

Fortunately, the children were holding up well with the food and clothes I had given them.

“These are the few kids who survived.”

Still, Hetz couldn’t utter a word.

“We looted the Gold Dragon’s lair and became rich. I’ll be using all that money for these kids. Not to mention other kids in similar situations.”

“…What? But that’s—”

“It’s money acquired by stealing from others.”

“That’s not true; I took it legitimately from the Dragon…”

“Exactly. It was stolen from a Dragon. The term ‘legitimate’ doesn’t suit it. Well, I wouldn’t mind if you used it after you die by Hetz’s hand.”

“……”

I planned to use Hetz’s money to create a sort of relief organization.

There are many kids in a similar plight in this world.

Not just kids, but many refugees in similar conditions.

The world became peaceful after the war ended, but compared to modern times, it’s still a dangerous place.

And the human standard of living and consciousness lag far behind the modern era.

I hope this incident can help alleviate such problems a little.

And I wish fewer people would immerse themselves in the game and cause such trouble.

“…Understood.”

Hetz nodded, seemingly having changed his mind about something.

*

Long before the update of Maple Leaf Story.

A user of Maple Leaf Story, [Ordinary Adventurer], was enjoying the Maple Leaf world like any other day.

“Pre-emptive strike.”

He was about to engage in free market trading to become stronger.

With excessive enthusiasm but lacking skill, he had plenty of money.

He intended to buy items with that money to grow stronger and level up quickly.

Compared to named users like [Corruption Power Warrior] and [Empire's Light], he was clearly lacking.

And thus, a trade was about to take place.

Luckily for him, a user appeared who would sell all the items he needed.

“I’ll raise it.”

In the trade system, each party places their items up for trade, and if both confirm the trade, it goes through.

The opponent placed their items onto the trading list, and [Ordinary Adventurer] placed an amount of meso in the hundreds of millions.

And first to hit confirm was [Ordinary Adventurer].

“Yes, I too…”

The opponent also began to move their hand to confirm the trade.

But then,

“…?!”

In a flash, the opponent withdrew all their items and placed just some random junk while hitting confirm.

It was so quick that [Ordinary Adventurer] couldn’t hit cancel before it happened.

Indeed.

He had been scammed in the trade.

“Wait, stop!”

And his trading partner vanished in an instant.

Clearly, this wasn’t their first rodeo.

“Ah, noooooooo!!”

Enraged, [Ordinary Adventurer] logged off, roaring and getting out of bed.

“What kind of scoundrel does this?!”

[Ordinary Adventurer]. His true identity was the Emperor of the Empire.