The chatroom that had always been filled with players ready to celebrate the New Year was now empty. Every demographic was logged into Mizi, where they celebrated the occasion with their friends. Akira had logged onto the chatroom to mitigate the vacant loneliness of it, but he only felt hollower by doing so.
“How fast you can fall...”
Not that anyone had heard him mutter that, but a change occurred in the chatroom.
—Sho joined the chat
Akira smiled a little upon seeing this. He was one of the players who had always caused a big commotion in the arena, calling himself the Sailor Skirt Warrior. Now, he had created a team of players with similar preferences, claiming that sailor girl uniforms would save the planet and take down the Empire. In his own way, he had tried to reignite the game.
“So, when’s the next event?”
Akira didn’t expect this question from him. Akira smirked.
“Event? There’s no one to play the game.”
“Just get some more people in, then.”
How!? Akira wanted to shout into the screen, but held back. How was he supposed to gather more players in this wasteland?
“There’s not even a hundred players left. There’s nothing I can do.”
“Do it for those hundred people, then.”
“A hundred... Where there were thousands...”
This was more of a painful revelation for Akira than anything. Now that there were so few players, the game balance was completely out of whack. But Sho was suggesting this in earnest.
“If need be, I’ll talk to some people.”
“It’s okay.”
“...What’s okay?” Sho asked, but at the same time, didn’t seem like he wanted to hear the answer.
After hesitating for a moment, Akira continued:
“I think I’ll shut it down...”
Sho replied with a flood of text.
“Hey, Ono... Remember New Year’s Day back then? Remember how cocky you were!? Where’s your ever-evolving world now!?”
“I’m just one guy... How am I supposed to take on that phenomenon?”
In fact, any and all personal websites and games were disappearing from the World Wide Web. With time, the model of people concentrating to the epicenter of trends would never change. In several years, various more networks would be established, along with video-posting sites and tools where people comment with 140 characters or less... Through the various changes and evolutions of online society, the only thing that remained true was the concentrated population graph of it. Just as people gathered at metropolises, people attracted more people.
“Come off it... Where’s your signature cocky attitude!?”
“Heh. I’d love to be cocky right now...”
“If you give up, it’s really all over...! Why don’t you...?”
“Thanks for loving this game like you did. For loving my world.”
“...I don’t want to read that kind of bull! I’m done with you!”
Sho stormed out of the chatroom, and Akira left without another word. Then, he logged in as the Demon Lord of the Empire and entered a room where one of his advisors sat. A girl named Ren Miyaoji. The prima donna of the game, who was more popular than any other character.
“Thanks for your hard work, Ren.”
Akira spoke to her, but of course, she didn’t respond, Ren was only a lifeless video game character. As if to reminisce, Akira muttered:
“A lot has happened these past few years. All those players attacking the Sleepless Castle, going to your place, having this weird raid party. You getting bombarded with love-letter messages...”
There were battles over the Sleepless Castle here and there, but most of them were treated as a party or an event, rather than a full-blown siege. Some attacked the Castle with all intentions of taking it down, but were usually demolished within an hour. After that, battles over the Sleepless Castle were excuses for big parties. Players ran to their favorite advisors, some massacred the raiding players from behind, and some used their fireworks to show off.
“It was the best... Like a roaring flame. It was fun.”
Akira’s whisper wasn’t meant for anybody in particular, but rather he was telling the world itself how he felt.
“You must be tired, huh? Take a break. I think I’ll... do the same.”
Ren’s expression was unchanged; she just sat there quietly. Seeing her like this, a tear fell down Akira’s cheek for his frustration against himself.
“But Ren. I will come back. To you. So... Wait for me.”
With that, Akira left his familiar arena.
And so, Akira Ono’s world came to an end. It would take him a few more years to get back up and reconstruct another world. The trends of the online world changed day-to-day, ever-shifting. Even Mizi, the unstoppable juggernaut, would not escape the shifts of time. As everyone was tossed to the roiling current of time, Akira, too, was like a single leaf floating on its surface.
Years later, when that leaf soared again... it landed on the ground, rooted, sprouted, and eventually triggered a world-wide phenomenon. Something Akira had no idea about just yet.
Postscript
Thank you for picking up volume 3 of Demon Lord, Retry! Kurone Kanzaki, the author, here. Finally, the new edition has caught up to the number of volumes of the original publication! It took a while to get this far, but I think the contents are much more robust now! This was only made possible by your support. Thank you so much.
...And I’m writing this formal greeting in April, while this volume should go on shelves come May. We saw another advisor appear, how do you like her? She’s going to make the world of Demon Lord, Retry! a lot more chaotic. I have fun writing her, more than anything. She doesn’t have a trajectory or any order about her. She’s free, and in a sense, she’s already out of my hands. I expect her to tear things up with unexpected actions come volume 4. The Demon Lord is in for more headaches.
By the time this volume is published, I’m sure the second round of announcements have been made for the anime. And what a line-up of voice talent...! I’m starting to worry if the anime team really stayed in their budget. Let me rip open my Velcro wallet here...
In any case, the anime will premiere this summer. With all of the other anime coming out in summer, it’s going to be a lot of fun. Meanwhile, I’m sure I will be writing away in my little room. When I do go outside, I go on walks, eat at Osho (a chain ramen restaurant), or go to the supermarket... I’m living the life of a stay-at-home husband. Well, it looks like another peaceful year of writing about this Demon Lord for me.
The chapters in volume 4 have never been published before. I shudder to imagine what trouble our usual suspects will bring to Animania and the Hellion territory.
I look forward to seeing you all in the next volume, or maybe in the anime.
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Copyright
Demon Lord, Retry! Volume 3
by Kurone Kanzaki
Translated by Adam Seacord
Edited by Jack Diaz
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
Copyright © Kurone Kanzaki 2018
Illustrations by Makoto Iino
All rights reserved.
Original Japanese edition published in 2018 by Futabasha Publishers Ltd.
This English edition is published by arrangement with Futabasha Publishers Ltd., Tokyo
English translation © 2020 J-Novel Club LLC
All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this
book without the permission of the publisher is unlawful piracy and theft of the author’s intellectual property.
J-Novel Club LLC
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The publisher is not responsible for websites (or their content) that are not owned by the publisher.
Ebook edition 1.0: April 2020
Demon Lord, Retry! Volume 3 Page 22
