Is this really a Game?!



Cyrus sat down with a heavy sigh as he held his head with his hands. He ran his fingers through his hair before looking up and waving his hand, summoning a picture. The picture was one of 8 people.

Two of them were Cyrus and Raziel while two were older men who were standing behind them with slight smiles. Raziel and Cyrus were both smiling widely while two girls of similar age to them were right next to them.

Right next to the girls were a woman and a man that were middle-aged.

"Master, so much time has passed, I'm afraid that I won't be able to keep my promise after all," Cyrus said with a sad sigh before putting the picture back in the spatial space he had taken it from.

Back in the cave where Wolf and the others were waiting for Reign, merely 10 minutes had passed before Neil got up and hit the ground with the staff once again, this time, summoning Reign back.

"Reign!" Shadow and the rest quickly appeared in front of Reign who was clearly in a weakened state, but other than that, he was fine.

"What the hell did you do to him?!" Shadow asked with anger as Reign grabbed his shoulder.

"I'm fine, just a bit weak from the training session." 

"From what?" Shadow and the others stared at him in confusion before Reign started narrating what had happened. Hearing how the voice that Neil was talking about was actually the will of the planet shocked them all as people getting in contact with the will usually occurred much later.

For the will of the world to have actually been actively playing a part since the very beginning was something they had no idea could even happen, not to mention that this will be obviously hostile to the system.

"But if the will hates the system, what about the other planets, is it the same with them?" Shadow asked Reign as they entered the car and were making their way back to the city.

"Wills usually can't communicate like this one, they can't really talk with you, instead, they will use mana and world energy to make you sense them and communicate in that way." Aethion suddenly spoke out.

"If the mana was violent, then the will is angry, if its calm, the will is calm…"

"The more powerful the planet, which is usually connected to how old it was, the more freedom the will has, but I haven't heard of them being hostile to the system, they're all connected to it and when the will becomes a bit stronger, the system can even help you with communicating with it and learning what it is trying to tell you, as well as what it wants and needs in order to become more powerful."

"I have only heard of some powerful planets having a will that can make an ethereal body that they use to communicate with others, but nothing like the one you just spoke with, I was merely a Transcendent before my fall, so there is much of the universe I don't know about."

"Agreed, from my database, I can confirm that there were many worlds where the will had a physical body, so this is not that weird." Jared suddenly spoke out, making both Reign and Aethion glance at him in surprise.

"You have already met the will, so I am allowed to give some more information."

"Then I truly must apologize for my earlier outburst, I became used to knowing most of the things you come in contact with, and upon seeing something I had never heard about before, I lost my cool, Cyrus was well within his rights to berate me as he did," Aethion said as he sighed in slight frustration.

In the beginning, being bound to Reign's soul was something incredibly demeaning and humiliating to him. A Transcendent that back on his home planet was able to fool the Transcendents and the will had become nothing more than a feeble old man whose soul was taken by force and enslaved.

The more time he spent with Reign and the others, however, the more he realized this was a second chance for him. He did doubt that Reign would simply let him go, but if he was useful to him, then there was a slight possibility for that to happen.

Of course, he was growing a bit concerned lately as the more useful he was to Reign, the more Reign relied on him, which meant the chances of him being open to giving him his freedom back were lower.

With Jared appearing, that changed as now Reign had another capable helper, one that seemingly knew a lot more than Aethion did.

'Don't sweat it, I was shocked to find that he was the will as well, I expected a formless mass of energy, maybe a face made out of mana or world energy, not a human who had a physical body.' Reign said with a sigh as they all drove into the car without speaking. Some monsters appeared, but Shadow and the rest would pulverize them easily from inside the car, making it impossible for them to do anything.

Neil was the one that had been given the biggest surprise, however, as Reign didn't hide the fact that the voice was the will of the world and just what a will was. Learning that it was the planet that was keeping them safe and helping them out this entire time was shocking to him, he hadn't known about the existence of the will at all before.

The hatred it had toward the system, however, was something that made him worry a bit. The voice had told him to get in touch with the system and become stronger by using it, but it was only because the system was the fastest possible way they would grow in strength, the reason why he hated it, however, was something he didn't know, and neither did Reign nor the others.

'So, the other planets are all friendly with the system, none of them are hostile to it like Cyrus?' Reign asked Jared who simply shrugged his shoulders.

"I honestly have no idea, in the past, there were planets that disliked the system and wanted nothing to do with it, but that was a long time ago, I have no idea just how things are right now."

"Why were they hostile to it, can you tell me that at least?"

"Sorry, but no, I can't."

"Then what can you tell me about it?"

"Nothing, only in the future, once you become much more powerful, can I tell you more."

Reign sighed upon hearing Jared's answer, he had expected as much but still hoped that the AI would at least tell him something. 

Reign and the others left the cars upon arriving at the center. The main goal for coming down here was to try and find some Tier IV monsters, but even if there were any here, they wouldn't be able to earn any exp thanks to the fact the system wasn't present.

What they could do, however, was create a base above the tunnel and allow Neil and the others to easily come to Doncaster if they wished to. The powerful Tier III monsters were a slight problem, but M'azgara could place her monsters in the base and the tunnel, making it much safer for them.

Neil thanked them before they took the elevator and went up. They would construct a portal right above the tunnel to allow them to visit, as well as to have an easier time hunting and leveling up.

The underground city was much larger than Doncaster and had a lot more people, if Reign and the others continued having friendly relations, then they could have a lot more players helping out in the territory. 

Even with the underground city being safe and having electricity, living underground was not easy for the people, which was why so many were seemingly depressed and sad all the time. Allowing them to come to Doncaster would help lift their spirits and allow them to choose what they wanted to do in the future, but of course, that meant that Reign would have to cover a larger portion of the city with the dome in order to allow more people to live there.

With the sheer number of areas they had explored, they didn't really need the monsters in Doncaster anymore, but they did provide the players with an easy hunting area that was right next to Doncaster. 

Still, when comparing the hunting area and the possibility of having thousands more people living in the city, the latter was clearly the better choice. Reign wouldn't allow them to simply live rent-free, however. Everybody in the city was pulling their own weight, one way or another, he wasn't simply going to let new people in and allow them to do nothing.

He would be charging them rent, of course, it would be a small amount that they could easily cover by hunting a bit or doing some odd jobs. 

But for now, the main problem that Reign and the others were facing was finding a new hunting spot for themselves.