Hey moleman. just beat f22.

u doing good? gg>

The message hung still before Emil’s eyes, the simple words presenting themselves with little ambiguity. The same as it had when he received it almost a month earlier.

He had beaten the twenty-second floor. Emil could remember his own experiences with that floor; he and his comrades appearing in the middle of the sea in a small iron caravan, forced to fend off horrible sea-beasts and live off of what little food they could catch from within the oily depths. At least they could buy food when they eventually reached the edge of the sea.

As far as he could remember, Kitty hadn’t even been given so much as a dinghy to survive the turbulent black sea. The fact that he was alive was a miracle. The fact that he had beaten the floor was an omen.

‘Didn’t he say that he’d befriended a band of pirates?’ Emil thought to himself, shifting where he sat awaiting the royal audience. The seat he occupied was worryingly comfortable. If he’d been given the choice ahead of time, he would rather have sat on the floor. The embroidered design on the seat was hand-sewn, put together with the finest threads of lightsilk by the most prestigious seamstresses in the kingdom of Acheron. It was nothing for a simple man such as Emil to sit on. However, an envoy of the Server Alliance had to be presentable. This included sitting well, wearing the proper official clothes, and not staring into space trying to think of the best way to ask a buddy if they killed their entire friend group.

He didn’t want to be accusatory. Accusing Kitty out of nowhere could get him on the defensive. But sometimes accusing him was good. Sometimes, it let him confront himself and realize that maybe he had been doing things that were a bit bad for the people and world around him.

Balance. That was it. He had to have balance in it. The golden middle road was the right one even if the extremes could look gold-paved.

Ensuring that no citizen was watching him, Emil pulled up the writing service.

Hey Kitty! I’m sorry to ask this,

but what happened with your pirate friends?

Did something happen? You can tell me…>

Delete. Again.

Hi Kitty! I’m so happy to hear from you!

I was starting to get worried about

what was happening with Venn, since

you hadn’t written in a while, but if

you beat the floor then it must have gone…>

Delete, delete, delete. Emil sighed in frustration. Was he just overthinking things? Maybe he was going about all of this in the completely wrong light? Kitty had recently started being kinder. Less… murderous. Like that thing with the Goddess of Innocence. Didn’t he choose to spare a child? Emil allowed himself the relief of smiling at the thought. Yes, Kitty had been getting better. Especially in the tutorial tournament. A man who would willingly spare his enemies, even knowing they wouldn’t die from his attacks, couldn’t possibly do something as cruel as killing people he had known for close to a year. Because if he had been able to do that, then…

Emil shook his head. No. No. Those kinds of thoughts weren’t fitting of a friend.

And still, despite all of that, he couldn’t find the words. The last message Kitty had sent was almost two months ago, where he explained how he’d bumped into an old acquaintance while pillaging a ship. Whatever happened to him? Did he join Kitty’s pirate band, or did something happen? Then again, if he did join, then that would mean that Kitty would have had to kill him to beat the floor as well. But if he didn’t join, then, would that mean that he survived? Or did he kill him, too, just for the sake of it?

He felt his hands clench, the white, silk gloves keeping his nails from digging into his palms. This wasn’t helping. Assuming that Kitty would do something that terrible wasn’t making things better for anyone, especially not Emil himself.

There was, after all, a chance that Kitty had chosen to test those strategies Emil had presented him when he first explained his fresh plight. Changing the name of the ‘Evil Claw Pirates’ to something else, trying to get the pirates to disband altogether, leaving them behind to pretend he had already gotten to the purgatory section early—there were a number of ways that might possibly have worked to circumvent the cruel clear requirement offered. Kitty, at the time, had rejected these suggestions. And Emil had been proud of him for it. How could he not have been? The clear requirement was an obvious attempt from the Gods to restrain Kitty to the twenty-second floor, and for once, Kitty went along with it. He chose to settle down. It had made Emil so happy that he almost wanted to head to the black sea to congratulate him in person.

But now… With this…

Taking a deep breath, Emil resolved himself. He had to ask him. He had to know.

Before he threw himself into it, though, Emil cast another look around him. The waiting lobby was a big, ornate hall fit for at least three dozen waiting members. Currently, though, it contained only him. He, and the dozen guards there to ensure he didn’t do anything befitting the ‘hoeksak’ moniker. Four guards stood at the entrance to the room, four guarded the massive, well-carved doors that led to the throne room, and the final four were at his side. Emil was fairly certain that if he so much as pointed a little finger at one of them, he’d be stabbed full of holes before a single word could leave his lips.

In terms of audiences, this was the most difficult one Emil had ever procured. So far, he had met with seven kings, queens and emperors, fifteen princes and princesses, and over a hundred judges of higher or lesser rank. Most of these meetings took place either at the dining table or in their private offices. Never like this. Meeting the envoy of another kingdom in the throne room was unheard of, only justified by Simel the Survivor’s infamous disdain for humans.

This disdain was also the reason why Emil was alone. Barred from bringing his party members alongside any object of magical power, he was more vulnerable now than he had been on the first floor.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

The only reason he had been able to procure an audience at all, however, was thanks to that same disdain. Three times had he sought an audience, and three times had he been rejected. Only when he told the wronged regent that he personally knew Kitty was he able to find any success. And even then, he could only gain permission with the promise that he knew where Kitty was. For this reason, the fact that Kitty had left the twenty-second floor was almost a good thing.

It didn’t elude Emil that he was, in large part, using his concern for Kitty to ignore the much more difficult worry of his own position.

Agreeing to let himself use Kitty to procrastinate on the audience, he took to writing his message again.

Hey Kitty! Congratulations on

beating the floor! How did it go?

Did you use the strategies I mentioned

to clear it, or did something else happen?

You can tell me whatever happened,

even if you think I might not like it.

We’re both almost adults, after all.

And how did it go with Vann? Did he

choose to join you in the end?

I look forward to hearing from you,

and good luck with the twenty-third floor!>

Emil let his fingers leave the keyboard. As always, he spent a minute or so reading it through, ensuring it was written properly, without any misspellings or similar. It looked well enough, so—

“SuperMoleman of the Server Alliance, His Majesty Simel the Survivor, Blessed of Three is now ready for your audience,” one of the guards next to the throne room’s doors stated loudly, making Emil twitch at the sudden noise. “Please enter.”

Emil’s eyes darted back to the message. As he stood up, he quickly sent it away, hoping Kitty wouldn’t be too busy with the twenty-third floor to answer it within the coming month or so. The guards at his side followed him as he moved towards the throne room. Since he knew that it was customary to mainly ignore those of lower rank, he fought down the urge to smile and say ‘thank you’ to the guards opening the door. Instead, to distract himself, he kept his mind focused on the way Vary had taught him to walk properly. His back had to be as straight as a ramrod, something the trendy male corset helped a lot with, his steps had to be the exact right length—not too long, not too short—to let him walk with gravitas, while still keeping in mind to not walk too fast lest the guards at his side were outpaced by his superior stature.

Unfortunately, the straightness of his back and neck meant that he had nowhere to look save for straight ahead—right into the throne room.

The red-and-black carpet—woven with a motif of flames and phoenixes—although soft, was not soft enough to make the tight shoes Emil wore any less uncomfortable. The main source of light for the long, tall room was a row of windows on the left. The windows were quick to draw Emil’s attention, as the lower parts were made up of stained glass in the shape and color of flames, making it seem as though the city was on fire. However, as interesting as that was, to not face the room’s ruler was beyond rude, forcing Emil to turn his gaze to the main focus of the room.

A pair of dark, perpetually fearful eyes met him. The sight froze Emil in place for a moment, from which he emerged with the intuitive understanding that the king before him wanted him to bow.

It was humiliating to make an envoy bow before them, and yet, this was exactly what this king silently demanded. Any other envoy would have stormed out, showing the same rudeness in turn. An envoy was the face and voice of the person they represented. To ask an envoy to bow was to ask the illustrative person they represented to bow. This was the kind of demand that could and had caused wars in the past.

Emil knew this. However, he also knew that few nations in this world had any respect for the authority of the Server Alliance—least of all the Acheron Kingdom.

Removing the headscarf he was using to hide his hair and lack of mane, Emil went down on one knee. He let his gaze fall to face the floor. “Your Highness Simel the Survivor, Blessed of Three—”

“Put it back on,” a strained voice came across the room. The half-veiled panic in the words, the downright urgency of the statement, briefly convinced Emil that he must have heard him wrong, or that he had said something similar but completely different, as was common with foreign languages. He raised his head briefly, readying himself to ask for clarification, only to be met with eyes of fire and another demanding shriek, “Put it back on, hoeksak!”

Only barely avoiding fumbling the thing, Emil quickly returned the headscarf to his head, pushing his curly locks beneath the band and adjusting it to cover his head properly. With that done, he returned his eyes to the king.

Simel the Survivor sunk back into his throne. It was a beautiful throne, but the fabrics draped behind it drew Emil’s attention for a reason far more disturbing. They were dark brown in a way only dried blood could be, creased in ways that suggested it had at one point been completely drenched. And now that he was actually looking for it, he found the floor likewise stained. In some places only lightly splattered, tiny dots of dark brown; elsewhere, puddles bloomed across the floor, partially disturbed by handprints and the swiping of movement.

Something wet and slick crawled up Emil’s back and he felt himself shiver.

To keep the thoughts away, the memory of what he knew Kitty to have done here, he turned to look at Simel the Survivor. But it didn’t help much. The goblin was pale and thin even by goblin standards, his cheeks sunken and his eyes set in deep, dark holes that made it look as though he were constantly staring at everything in wide-eyed, twitchy horror. The regal clothes he wore, including the crown, did nothing to hide how much he looked like a child.

“Have you finished surveying the pilak of your ilk?” the king said. Although his face hid any emotion under a veneer of sheer constant terror, his voice was nowhere near as subtle, his vindictive loathing seeping into every spoken word. Although Emil had no idea what a ‘pilak’ was, he could assume by the context that it was the devastation left in the room. No, rather, the devastation Simel the Survivor had chosen to immortalize.

Realizing the rudeness of his tourist-like perusing, Emil quickly lowered his head again. “Thousand pardons. As I say, I thank you, Your Majesty, for allowing me this audience, and for my humble friends to—”

“Silence, hoeksak,” the king hissed, one hand hovering over his ear, as though he was about to hold it shut. Not acknowledging the impoliteness of his words in the least, the king turned away from Emil, forcing his loathsome and bitter gaze to fall on the guards in the room. “Leave us.”

After only a moment’s hesitation, the guards relented, the close to a dozen well-armed soldiers leaving the room in a well-organized line. Leaving Emil alone with the cruel king.

More confused than anything else, Emil asked, “Why would—” only for his inquiry to go unheard as the king abruptly rose from his throne, wandering over to the window to stare out at the city, his hand resting on the windowsill.

“Do you know why I want you on your knees?”

Unsure whether or not he should angle himself to face where the king was now standing, Emil eventually chose to turn only his face towards him. “As the group I represent has yet to find much respect in purgatory, you decided to show your authority by—”

“Because I don’t like when your kind looks down on me.” Now, his eyes turned to Emil once more, burning in the red light of the sunlit stained-glass windows. “Your species has caused me more ret’rah than any blade or prayer. Can you repay me that debt?” Face set in an expression of terrified determination, the king turned away from the window, his form cast in darkness, save for a single sliver of fiery red light framing him, making it seem as though he was on fire. Outside, the city remained in a state of rebuilding, as it had for the past two years. “Can you undo this nation’s ret’rah?”

“We…” Emil shut his eyes. He took a deep breath before opening them again. “I cannot. Nobody can.”

The king stared at him for five agonizingly long seconds before giving a small, almost imperceptible nod. “Yes—yes, that is right. You cannot. Not even our Gods can save us. In the time I was his prisoner, I prayed more than I ever have. I still do. Do you see this little book?” Within his hand, pulled from a small, perfectly shaped satchel on his belt, was a tiny notebook, as well-worn as it was plain. “In here, I have written all of the names he has erased. Nine-thousand seven-hundred and forty-two. For the ones I knew, I wrote down how it happened. When. Why.” A broken smile accompanies the ruthlessly bitter chuckle he musters. “Why… as though that was ever part of it.”

Nine-thousand seven-hundred and forty-two. The number circled inside Emil’s head, a shark introduced to a koi pond. His throat felt parched. Swallowing didn’t help, but it gave him the strength to try to speak. “Surely, Your Majesty, that number must—”

“Every night, I pray this book. It takes a month to clear through it. Do you see? I live for this. I live because they didn’t. The Gods let me live so that I may pray for their souls, that they may rest, and that the people left in his wake may find peace.” His eyes burn with empty darkness. “So that they may be avenged. That justice may be wrought. Do you understand, hoeksak? Do you understand the burden that is this crown?”

‘No,’ Emil thought to himself. ‘I don’t.’