The Demon King is Unfathomable

While Autumnleaf and Twilight were exploring the underground sewer, three humming skeletons had already arrived at Northpeak Shaft’s entrance with axes in their hands.

Arriving before the wind wall that had previously stopped countless players’ paths, Fallingshark suddenly raised her hand to stop Sinkingwhale and Hungryhungry. Then, she passed her axe to Sinkingwhale.

The latter two watched in confusion as Fallingshark rubbed her hands before leaping outside the cavern, passing through the wind wall without a hitch.

“It worked! Hahahaha! I am the first player in this brand new world!”

It was autumn, and the ground was exceptionally cold. The sun had just risen, and the steep mountainous road was covered in dewdrops.

Skeleton feet, unfortunately, weren’t known for their anti-slip property.

Falingshark slipped and tumbled downhill with a frightened scream. The only silver lining was that she bumped into a giant boulder, or else she might have rolled all the way down to the foot of the mountain.

“You lunatic…”

Sinkingwhale sighed. He walked over and pulled up Fallingshark, whose head was stuck in between her bum, before knocking hard on her head.

Fallingshark clutched her nearly cracked skull as she whimpered with a voice so pitiful that it sounded like she would burst into tears. “Can’t you treat a woman more kindly? I’m already so pitiful!”

Knowing she was being dramatic, Sinkingwhale didn’t mince his words. “A woman? I don’t consider a skeleton like you woman.”

“You scamp! Are you looking for a fight?!”

While the two of them were strangling each other, Hungryhungry stood atop the hill, mesmerized by the scenery.

A brilliant skyglow could be spotted at the horizon like a rising spark of flame. The undulating mountain range stretched as far as the key could go, dyed in the color of autumn red trees.

‘How beautiful.’

Maybe it was because she had been in the mining shaft for so long that the stark contrast took her breath away. She felt an urge to stay here forever. At least she could freely prance around here and go wherever she wanted to go.

“I never expected the world outside the cavern to be so huge!”

Looking at the enchanted Hungryhungry, Sinkingwhale and Fallingshark exchanged looks before releasing their hold on each other’s necks with a grin.

“It’s too much! How could the dog—Cough!—I mean, god developers to hide such good stuff from us!”

“I’m surprised they have already developed the map outside too.” Sinkingwhale walked over to Hungryhungry’s side to immerse himself in the same scenery she was seeing. “I thought the world outside would be made out of stock images… I have underestimated the developers.”

‘At this rate, I wouldn’t be surprised if they have coded out the human cities too. The Demon King warned us not to head south, right? Guess south is the right way to go then!’

Hungryhungry: “I didn’t notice it in the mining shaft… It’s already morning.”

Sinkingwhale: “Indeed.”

Fallingshark: “What a glorious morning sun.”

Hungryhungry: “What I mean is that it’s morning in real life too. We have been online for almost 24 hours now, right? Do you usually game for such long hours?” ṙ

Fallingshark: “Of course not! It’s too much to game continuously for 24 hours without rest. We would still occasionally go offline and move around, be it to have our meals or something.”

Hungryhungry struggled to comprehend why there was a hint of glee in Fallingshark’s voice when she said those words.

Sinkingwhale added with a smile, “Indeed. Shark ordered two portions of takeout today.”

Fallingshark’s body stiffened up. “Cough! It’s perfectly normal for a growing girl like me to have a bigger appetite! And it’s not like I had those two portions in one sitting!”

Sinkingwhale: “Oh? But you’re already twenty. I don’t think you have much hope.”

Fallingshark: “Die!!!”

Looking at the bickering duo, Hungryhungry couldn’t help but ask, “Do you know each other in real life?”

The duo exchanged looks and answered, “We have known each other for many years now.”

“That’s so nice…” Hungryhungry looked at them in envy. She couldn’t help but wonder how it was like to have a friend to talk to in real life.

“All right! Let’s stop chatting and get to work.” Sinkingwhale picked up the two axes he had set down on the floor and tossed one of them to Fallingshark.

Hungryhungry: “Wait. Don’t you need to go offline for a while to rest? You can do some exercise to recover or something…”

As Fallingshark rested her axe on her shoulder, she confusedly looked at Hungryhungry and asked, “What are you talking about?”

Sinkingwhale also looked at Hungryhungry with confused eyes. “Yeah, what are you talking about? We belong to this world. We just need to occasionally provide some nutrients to the avatar we have on earth.”

Hungryhungry: “…”

…

Meanwhile, two skeletons continued to forge ahead in the labyrinth’s underground sewer.

Autumnleaf was currently at LV5, and he was only a step away from leveling up. His stats were 4/6/3/1/1, with his strongest stat being strength, followed by constitution. His stats were almost on par with an Ors Empire’s old farmer.

This was considered a remarkable feat for an undead.

Autumnleaf and Twilight were in the midst of returning when they encountered a lizardman.

The lizardman had ink-green scales and carried a short bow on its back. It was prowling in the darkness, waiting for a chance to make its move.

The two of them tried to confront it, but the lizardman fled as soon as it realized it had been spotted. They tried to chase the lizardman, but they quickly lost sight of it. Instead, they found themselves in a bizarre place.

“It got away.” Autumnleaf looked at the vanishing silhouette regretfully.

“Where are we?” Twilight asked as he surveyed their surroundings.

They were in a palace. The ground was paved with flagstones, and the ceiling was held up by towering stone pillars. There was a dark stairway with extinguished braziers hanging along its sides, and it led up to a door.

The door was surrounded by a fence, and the fence had burnt out torches embedded in it as if an abandoned sentry post.

“I don’t know…”

Autumnleaf was also surveying the surroundings, and he found this place familiar.

It took a while before it struck him that this place was identical to the labyrinth entrance once the spider webs were removed!

“I see… This might be another labyrinth entrance,” Autumnleaf said as the green soulfire in his eye sockets flickered.

“Another entrance?!”

Twilight quickly traced Autumnleaf’s line of sight and looked toward the stairway leading upward.

‘There is a resemblance!’

Autumnleaf continued murmuring in contemplation, “There should be adventurers in this world judging from the previously released promotional video… To date, the only adventurers we have met are those inside the cages. This suggests the labyrinth entrance we occupy is only one of many others, and it might just be the most remote one of all.”

Autumnleaf stared so hard at the tightly-shut door at the end of the doorway that it looked as if he could already see what was on the other side.

‘That must be the human world!’

“Should we take a look?”

Autumnleaf glanced at Twilight, and the latter looked back at him with determined eyes.

How could closed beta players like them miss an opportunity to experience in-game content ahead of others?

“…Let’s take a look!”

The two of them went up the stairs, climbed past the fence, and was just about to open the door when it opened on its own accord.

A middle-aged man dressed in armor walked in while yawning. A mace rested on his left waist and a flintlock on his right waist. On top of that, he carried a shield worth 50,000 hell coins in his left hand.

He had likely come from a tavern, judging from the beer froth sticking to his thick beard. He murmured incomprehensible words under his breath.

Both sides were stunned when they saw each other.

Before Autumnleaf could say something, the middle-aged man turned pale as if he had seen a ghost. He hurriedly smashed his shield on one of the skeletons before turning tail to flee.

“Undead! There are undeads! Sound the bell!” he shrieked as he ran, swiftly disappearing into the darkness.

Autumnleaf and Twilight were startled.

Twilight: “What is he shouting?!”

Autumnleaf: “…I don’t know. Maybe something about seeing ghosts?”

While they were chatting, a bell chimed behind the door, and flurried footsteps sounded.

Autumnleaf instinctively realized this wasn’t a good sign, so he quickly picked up the shield on the ground and ran down the stairway.

“Run!”