Chapter 44

“Wh-what?”

Paris was caught off guard for a moment.

The Western Empire’s Emperor, Ivan Eletia von Karman.

Paris knew this man very well. He’d come to taunt him several times, after all.

The guy only put on airs in front of the nobles who served him. In private audiences like this one with Paris, he was groveling to a fault.

He feared the Eastern Empire making contact with other factions in the Western Empire to threaten his throne.

But things were different now.

“……”

A brief silence filled the room.

Shin Jae-heon glanced at the quiet system window.

No penalty alert appeared.

It seemed irrelevant that Ivan Eletia von Karman had been a timid sort before entering the RP dungeon.

He had demonstrated overwhelming power and established the context around him as someone who had “hidden his strength until now and was finally revealing his tyrant side.”

“……Ah, anyway, the Eastern Empire is willing to provide aid.”

Paris, still unaware of the Western Emperor’s transformation, was flustered.

More precisely, he couldn’t wrap his head around how someone could change so drastically.

Just recently, the Western Emperor had been the one desperately currying favor to avoid any friction with the Eastern Empire.

But then some ominous rumors started circulating, and now the man had turned into a completely different person?

Of course, the Western Emperor going mad wouldn’t suddenly close the gap with the Eastern Empire.

Paris lifted his head again and spoke.

“In exchange for dispatching troops, we ask for nothing special―”

“The Western Empire has no need of the Eastern Empire’s help.”

At that moment, the Western Empire’s Emperor—Shin Jae-heon—cut him off flatly.

The Eastern troops heading to the West wouldn’t care only about the gates, would they?

They’d use it as an excuse to saddle them with debt, plant spies as a bare minimum, meddle in internal affairs, and conveniently sour Western public opinion in the process.

“Wh-what?”

Paris stared in shock, as if he’d assumed acceptance was a given.

Considering Ivan’s previous pushover persona, it made sense.

He must have been utterly convinced.

That the West would naturally crave troops.

The corner of Shin Jae-heon’s mouth curved upward.

“If you’re going to try your petty schemes, you’d do well to investigate your opponent first. And…”

He spoke in a low voice.

“Regrettably, the disaster has struck only the Western Empire so far. But sharing the same land, sky, and seas… can the Eastern Empire truly escape it?”

Paris’s face drained of color at those words. Then he bristled.

“A-are you saying you’ll unleash the disaster on us too?!”

Shin Jae-heon leisurely spread his hands.

Smooth words flowed from the mouth that Shin Yuri occasionally dubbed the “maw of disaster.”

“What kind of harsh words are those?”

This guy’s even worse at verbal sparring than Hunter Yian, Shin Jae-heon thought as he continued.

“If we had the power to unleash this ‘disaster’ wherever we pleased, do you think we’d waste it on this land instead of your empty skull?”

Shin Jae-heon’s finger pointed straight at Paris’s head. Unthinkingly clutching his own skull, Paris gaped.

“What do you…!”

But setting aside the head jabs, he had a point.

As Paris floundered, Shin Jae-heon shrugged.

“Anyway, make sure you remember this visit.”

A mocking sneer on his face, he jerked his chin toward the audience chamber doors.

Time to leave.

“Y-you…!”

Paris had frequented the Western Emperor’s audience chamber countless times since Ivan ascended the throne, but he’d never been dismissed so contemptuously.

Yet the emperor felt profoundly changed. An ineffable air of dominion weighed down the room.

“Y-you’ll regret this!”

Spouting a third-rate villain’s line, the crown prince stormed out.

Shin Jae-heon didn’t spare his retreating figure a glance. Instead, he turned to the hunter chat.

It was perfectly timed. A full sneer spread across Shin Jae-heon’s face.

The Magic Tower, Imperial Family, and Temple were locked in sharp mutual surveillance within the Western Empire.

But apparently not against their common foe, the Eastern Empire.

His words must have struck her as absurd; after a brief pause, So Yeri’s reply popped up.

While reading the chat, Shin Jae-heon shifted his gaze to the party status window.

The gate she’d mentioned heading to after asking about the maid seemed to be a dark one.

No fear debuff meant it was a genuine C-rank gate, just as she said.

With those skill bonuses, there was no gate Shin Yuri couldn’t clear.

No need to worry.

Shin Yuri’s status window was flashing wildly.

The Afterimage skill was repeatedly stacking and fading multiple times.

“……Was this skill always stackable this quickly?”

It wasn’t.

Until just recently, she had to activate each stacking skill one by one.

Of course, as a natural-born S-rank dealer versed in combat, her pace was already blistering.

But this was on another level.

The skills were spawning and vanishing so rapidly that even his S-rank eyes struggled to track them.

Skimming the hunter chat, Shin Jae-heon monitored Shin Yuri’s status window.

The Afterimage skill kept stacking and refreshing in a loop—she was clearly practicing something, or had devised a new way to handle her skills.

“Shin Yuri.”

He murmured the name of the one he longed to see.

It was her, as expected.

Even in his absence, she was growing stronger. Unbound by the C-rank label.

A smile tugged at his lips unbidden as he returned to the chat.

His gut told him so.

Even in an RP dungeon, basic plausibility held.

There was no reason gates would spawn only in the West out of nowhere.

He could almost picture Yian clicking her tongue.

Back on Earth, when gates first appeared worldwide.

Korea had been among the early countries hit.

Neighboring North Korea and China followed within days.

Then the world buzzed with “the cursed trio.”

Japan’s online communities even mocked Korea.

Come to gate-free Japan!

They even advertised their “safe, gate-less haven” to rub it in.

Exactly half a year later.

[Breaking] Gate under PM’s residence… Estimated A-rank

Japan fell apart.

The system was never merciful.

To it, everyone worldwide was just human—equally doled out gates to every nation.

This time would be no different.

Especially inside an RP dungeon with a one-year clear limit; it wouldn’t drag on for half a year.

Shin Jae-heon smiled soundlessly.

Eastern Empire Crown Prince Paris hastily embarked on his return journey.

The West hadn’t provided so much as a guest chamber—nothing.

With the crown prince’s status, he couldn’t very well sleep in a dingy commoner inn right out in the open, could he?

He boarded the carriage with a scowl.

“Ivan—that bastard’s lost his mind!”

He was seething.

He still couldn’t believe it.

Of course, he’d heard rumors that Ivan had changed.

‘The Western Emperor’s recent activities are suspicious. You should review the details.’

He recalled his adjutant handing over a thick stack of papers while saying that.

Urgently insisting it was important, too. Though he’d barely listened.

‘Uh, later.’

Heading out for card games with the noble playboys, Paris had brushed him off, shoved the documents somewhere, and never looked at them.

His adjutant was the type to make a fuss over nothing.

He’d assumed this was the same.

“Th-that report—where is it?”

But this time, it looked like he needed to check.

“Pardon? The report…?”

“The one on Ivan! The thick stack!”

At his words, the adjutant who’d accompanied him hurriedly fetched the documents.

“You didn’t seem to read it, so I brought it along just in case… But what happened in the audience chamber?”

Stern-faced going in, then grimacing in the carriage—something had clearly gone down.

His adjutant’s instincts screamed it.

But Crown Prince Paris had no time for answers.

What the hell had happened to that lunatic?

And when Paris turned to the first page, his jaw dropped.

[…executed his uncle Kiela with his own hands…]

“That Ivan carried out an execution?”

He couldn’t believe it.

By the time he himself ascended as Eastern Emperor, he was certain the West would be a ripe fruit ready for plucking.

The foolish West thought he was a wastrel crown prince, but in truth, he was the “brains.”

Brilliant minds are inevitably surrounded by comparative dullards who fail to grasp their intent.

Pressing his forehead, lost in self-admiration for a moment, Paris snapped back.

“Did that idiot eat something bad?”

How else could a person change like this?

The guy who used to tense up at the mere mention of his uncle.

Yet in the West—where swordsmanship and martial prowess reigned supreme—Ivan’s skills were laughably inept.

He’d avoided hunts, tournaments, every event to hide it, burying himself in “state affairs.”

(An excuse, really—he just hated going out.)

And now that guy had executed his uncle?

[Faced him sword-in-hand; Kiela’s head flew before three swings.]

In just three swings?

Crown Prince Paris began grinding his self-proclaimed superior wits.

And reached the obvious conclusion.

“Did the guy who wrote this take Western bribes?”