Capítulo 15: Short Stories: The Librator's Game
"Flame master on 12-4 attack the swordsman on 8-6. Flame spear, magical attack, fire
element."
"Hmm…"
Within the depths of the Great Orcus Labyrinth, inside Oscar Orcus' private room, a
young boy smiled triumphantly while the girl next to him sunk deep into thought. Her
voice was oddly seductive. The two people were, of course, Hajime Nagumo and Yue.
The two of them were sitting on sofas across from each other, with a transparent table
laid out between them. There was a square metallic board on the table, and around 64
pieces lay out on various parts of it. They were enjoying a game of otherworldly chess
before bed.
As one might have guessed from the different number of pieces, the rules were slightly
different. For one, there were 256 squares on the board. For another, the board was
split up into various terrains such as mountains, rivers, forests, hills, plains, and the
like and the pieces were categorized either as magical or physical fighters. Each piece
could learn various skills and the damage they dealt with each attack depended on the
skill and element. Players also had to keep track of various resources such as mana as
well.
The most fascinating aspect was that thanks to some magical contraption, the pieces
all played out their actions. Even now, Hajime, who was still a beginner at the game,
marveled at how his flame master fired a mini-spark at Yue's soldier, who then
doubled up in pain screaming, "H-How can this be!" before collapsing. In response,
one of Yue's mages moved all on its own to carry the defeated piece off the board while
screaming, "So this is how your side does things, huh!?"
"I've been wondering, but is there any way to take off these little cutscene type
things?"
"…If you can't do it, Hajime, I don't think anyone left alive can. This is probably the joint
work of all the skilled Liberators."
It certainly was impressive. A colossal waste of skill, but impressive nonetheless.
Hajime's impression of the Liberators had changed a little when he'd found this.
Now that it was Yue's turn, she sent her knight charging forward to cut down Hajime's
flame master. The knight made a splendid show of spearing the flame master on his
lance, crushing him to pieces. A few seconds later, the destroyed pieces of the flame
master regenerated and he cheerfully walked himself off the board.
When his flame master was destroyed, Hajime flinched a little. Not because he was sad
at losing a piece, but because there was one other interesting feature built into this
version of chess called Pain Trace. Each of the two players would register their mana
on the game board beforehand, and whenever one player lost a piece, they'd suffer a
small static shock.
"Assassin to 13-9. Attack the enemy crusader. Slash, skill, increased critical."
"Nhaah."
Hajime's assassin sneaked up behind Yue's crusader and mercilessly beheaded it. As
the crusader's head rolled to the ground, Yue's queen cried out in despair.
"My dear knight!"
Next to her, the king bore down on her in an accusatory tone.
"What? My dear knight? And just what did you mean by that, huh dear?" And so, the
queen's adultery was exposed.
After a few more turns it was discovered that the king had his own bastard son, and
the mother was none other than the other side's queen. Jealous, Yue's queen had an
affair with her court magician, but then later on it was discovered the court magician
had a secret lover of his own, and that he was a man, and that man was none other
than Hajime's army's court magician. Love blossomed between them, and the whole
royal family got involved. Honestly, it felt more like a drama than a chess match.
"Yue, how come you moan like that every time you lose a piece? It's not that painful, is
it?"
"…You just keep attacking all of my weak points, Hajime."
"Liar. There's no such… No, wait. For some reason today the shock's always been
focused on my—"
"Fufufu, that was all my doing. I turned on the feature that probes the player's
subconscious and stimulates the one place they feel it the most. I found out about it in
the user's manual. By the way, you can control the voltage output too, and I set it to
max today."
Hajime suddenly shivered. The user's manual was 500 pages long, so he hadn't had
the patience to read more than a few of them. He wasn't sure if she just read through
the whole thing, or if she found all the features she wanted by accident, but Yue now
had an advantage over him.
But what was truly frightening was that every time he lost a piece, Hajime could feel
his family jewels tingle. S-So that's what she was after. Thanks to his resistances, the
shocks had been mostly mitigated, but with how seductively Yue was moaning every
time she lost a piece, it was only a matter of time before his little man decided to poke
its head out. No matter how superior his army was, he wouldn't be able to win at this
rate. Thus, Hajime raised his voice, eager to end this as quickly as possible.
"Earth master to 16-7. Line attack from 16-8 to 16-10. Rock slide, magical attack, earth
element, advanced skill."
He was sacrificing his ability to move for a few turns by carrying out this AoE attack.
As the attack went off, Yue moaned once more, falling limp on the sofa after the shock
finally ran its course. She was twitching a little now, and her black one piece shuffled
up a little to reveal her bare legs.
"Sorry, Yue, but I'm taking this one. I can't afford to lose when my dignity as a man is
at stake."
"…Mmm, so you're finally coming at me seriously."
Beads of sweat were forming on Yue's forehead and her cheeks were slightly flushed.
After thinking for a moment, she proposed something interesting.
"If you're so sure of this game, how about we make a little bet?"
Hajime warily questioned her for further details, and Yue said that the winner could
make any one request they wanted of the loser. Apparently Yue's request would be
that they were a matching set of clothes one day after they made it back to the surface.
While the mini-soldiers down below were yelling death threats at each other and
waging a violent war for survival, Hajime and Yue were discussing their next date. It
felt utterly surreal. It also really broke the tension. For his part, Hajime didn't want to
do something so embarrassing, so he made an audacious move.
"Queen to 14-5! Activate the queen's special ability, Ruler's blessing!"
He risked sending his strongest piece into the line of fire in order to allow all his
nearby pieces to do a coordinated simultaneous attack. All of his units within a certain
amount of tiles began attacking at once! The king's illegitimate child died during the
battle! Yue's king and Hajime's queen both lamented his loss greatly, but the battle still
raged on! And lastly, Yue's moans grew louder than ever before!
That battle ended up becoming the turning point for the game, and eventually Yue was
defeated. Yue's king and Hajime's queen's love story continued, and they ended up
impaling each other on their swords. Finally, Hajime's king, who hadn't spoken a word
during the entire play, declared his side's victory and the game was over.
Hajime breathed a sigh of relief, glad he wouldn't be embarrassing himself on the
surface anymore. But because Yue was pouting, he ended up compromising anyway
and agreed to wear any one outfit she requested of him, improving her mood instantly.
So this is what they mean when they say you've won the battle, but lost the war.
As always, Hajime could never win against Yue.
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