Rise of the OtherGod Apostle: Not a Cult Leader, but a Serf?!

#138Reader Mode

#138

Right off the bat, I knew who’d barged in.

A player. And not just any player either.

Probably that strategy game nerd, I thought, instantly annoyed. Of course, this had to be Reyes’s fault. He must’ve sent a message pretending to be here, luring this guy over.

And now I’m stuck dealing with this, with this guy thinking I’m Reyes. Fantastic.

What the hell is Reyes trying to pull here?

Was this some elaborate scheme to mess with me? Or was Reyes just being his usual, impulsive self? Either way, I was the one left cleaning up the mess.

I really wanted to demand answers from him, but sending off a chat message would instantly give me away. Not an option.

“Hey, I’m talking to you,” the intruder growled. The guy was a mountain, easily six and a half feet, and his voice was like rocks grinding together.

So, what now? What the hell should I say?

My mind was a whirlwind. Maybe I could play dumb, act like some clueless NPC. If I played my cards right, I might just bluff my way out of this. But the real problem wasn’t just getting out of this mess alive—it was what happened after.

Once this guy realized he’d been lied to, he’d go running straight to Reyes. And Reyes, being Reyes, would probably just spill the beans with that infuriating, smug grin and say something like: “Oh, yeah, that guy? He’s a player.”

If Reyes had a brain cell, he’d realize I was only pretending to be an NPC to survive this insane situation we’re all in. But then again, if Reyes had a brain cell, he wouldn’t have set up this mess to begin with.

And this bastard I’m dealing with? Pandemonium holds grudges like they’re precious treasures…

If he caught on that I’d tricked him, he’d use it as an excuse to sulk and hoard every bit of useful intel, even if it cost him absolutely nothing.

Since I was aiming for cooperation, I figured it was better to just admit I was Happy God’s player. Of course, I wasn’t about to tell him my username, qwerasdf. Some secrets are better left unsaid.

I plastered on a smile that felt more like my face was cramping. “I think you’ve got the wrong idea… I’m not the Distorted One’s player.”

Pandemonium instantly cracked up, a booming, obnoxious laugh, like I’d just told the world’s best joke.

“Ha! Oh man, you’re killing me. You’re like my personal laugh button!”

“…Excuse me?”

“Listen, you moron, if you’re trying to pass as an NPC, you don’t use the word ‘player.’ That’s NPC-fakery 101.”

Except I wasn’t even trying to do that this time…

“And what’s with the whole Distorted One name-drop? Was that supposed to be your big, dramatic reveal?”

“No, I just thought—”

“Jeez, save it. You think you’re gonna make it in the Cathedral Church with this act? Even with Emergency Rescue ready, you’d probably stutter your way to a Game Over.”

He snickered and, out of nowhere, ruffled my hair like I was some little kid who’d just bombed a school presentation.

I blinked, caught off guard.

…This guy’s definitely closer to Reyes than I thought.

That would explain the unwanted advice and the whole arrogant attitude.

Trying to ignore my annoyance, I kept my face as serious as I could manage. “It’s nice to meet you. I really am Happy God’s player.”

His smirk just got wider. “This is gold. You really think just switching the god’s name makes this whole thing believable?”

“…Look, the Distorted One’s player has clearly been messing with you. I’m telling you, I’m not Reyes Floren. I’m Fabio, and I really am Happy God’s player!”

“Wow. I gotta give you props for commitment. You’re really going all-in, even after getting busted, huh?”

Before I could even answer, Pandemonium grabbed my face with one hand, squishing my cheeks together. Then he started tilting my head this way and that, like he was inspecting some kind of toy.

“So, what kind of distortion is this supposed to be? Some rando peasant face you saw somewhere?”

“It’s not a distortion—”

“Wait, wait. Did you actually snag that thing? The mirage-whatever, the relic that’s supposed to project illusions?”

The bastard wasn’t even listening. He was already dangling my reliquary between two fingers, treating it like some cheap flea market find.

“Is this it?”

“Hey, put that—”

“Athanas?”

Pandemonium’s eyes narrowed, reading the name etched on the side.

“Wait a sec, you’re not seriously…” He trailed off, that smug-ass grin finally wiping itself off his face. For once, he wasn’t cracking jokes or being a smartass. He looked… stunned, like he’d just seen a ghost or something that shattered his whole smug worldview.

Shit. No. No, no, no! It’s not what you think!

I could practically hear the gears grinding in his head, and every single conclusion he was jumping to was totally, utterly wrong.

“…So that’s why you became a Reader.”

“It’s not like that!” I snapped, maybe a little too fast.

“Oh, it’s not?” he shot back, that shit-eating grin starting to creep back. “Yeah, sure. Not like that at all.”

This is a dumpster fire.

How am I supposed to even start damage control on this? How do you explain this to someone who won’t listen to a single damn word you say?

First, I had to convince this idiot I wasn’t Athanasuki and get him to shut his trap.

But how? What kind of proof would even work on a moron like him?

“Hey,” Pandemonium said, grinning now, the smugness cranked up to eleven. “You’re not planning to show this to Athanas and cook up some distortion about how you two were secret lovers all along, are you?”

I scrunched up my face, trying to keep my frustration from boiling over.

What the hell does he even take me for…?

Oh, right. He thinks I’m Athanasuki.

Honestly, if I saw Athanasuki holding Valentine’s reliquary, I’d probably make the same leap in judgment. Especially since his power just so happens to be distortion.

It’s not exactly a stretch to assume that if some twisted bastard gets their hands on a power tailor-made for perverted acts, they’re going to use it for, well, exactly that kind of messed up, perverted acts.

“You’re seriously barreling toward a ‘Game Over’ at this rate,” he said, sounding concerned. “Hey, get a grip. You know as well as I do that relationships built on distortion are a sham. What’s gonna happen when Athanas snaps out of it and sees the truth? You’ll be miserable, man. I’m saying this for your own good. Just stop.”

For the last time, I’m not doing that!

I wasn’t some psycho messing with people’s minds and pretending to be in a fake relationship. That wasn’t me. Not even close.

“…I’m confiscating this,” he declared suddenly, his tone leaving zero room for argument.

With a flick of his hand, the reliquary floated up into the air.

My hands shot out, grabbing it and holding on for dear life. There was no way in hell I could let this reliquary be taken from me, not when it contained a real part of Athanas.

F*ck.

But despite my death grip, the reliquary stayed suspended, locked in place like it was tethered to an invisible point.

Pandemonium wagged a finger, and the reliquary jerked side to side, yanking me along with it. I swayed on my toes, struggling to keep my balance.

“Come on, just hear me out—” I tried, my voice strained from the effort.

“No, you listen to me! I’m doing this for your sake!”

When the reliquary started slipping out of my grip and floated higher, something in me snapped. The irritation bubbled over, pushing my patience past its breaking point.

“If you keep this up, I swear I’ll call the Saint!”

It sounded pathetic, like a kid threatening to tattle to the teacher. The moment the words left my mouth, I internally cringed so hard I wanted to fold in on myself and disappear.

Seriously? Is calling the Saint my only usable attack command?

What a trash-tier unit I am. What a garbage Othergod I got stuck with. S-tier in uselessness.

I felt so wronged I could scream. If I actually had the power of distortion, I’d swap this bastard’s esophagus and rectum, so everything he ate just shot straight out the other end.

“…Make a threat that actually makes sense, noob,” he said, rolling his eyes like I wasn’t even worth the effort.

The reliquary stopped swaying, but it still hung suspended in the air, stubbornly out of my control thanks to his telekinesis.

I tightened my grip on it with one hand and yanked the Saint’s relic out from under my shirt with the other.

“If you’re so curious about what’s inside, go ahead and touch it,” I said, holding the relic up like a challenge. “But don’t come crying to me when you regret it.”

“What kind of stupid trick are you trying to pull this time?” Pandemonium scoffed, barely hiding his amusement as he reached out, his finger touching the relic.

Coward.

The second his fingertip made contact, his smirk froze in place.

“What the hell is this?”

The smugness drained from his face as he stared at the relic like it had just whispered something damning in his ear.

He must’ve gotten the inscription message. Good.

“…Where did you get this?” Pandemonium asked, his voice low and deadly serious now.

“From the Saint.”

“Bullshit.” His glare sharpened. “If that were true, you’d already be at Game Over.”

“I don’t know why I’m still here either,” I admitted. “But it doesn’t change the fact that the Saint gave me this relic.”

“…So, you’re really not Sukidesu?”

“For the hundredth time, I’m not.”

Pandemonium finally shut up.

This bastard is definitely dying inside from pure embarrassment right now, trying desperately to keep a straight face.

Pandemonium was a painfully shy guy and must’ve realized how much crap he’d just spewed to a complete stranger. If he could’ve thrown himself out of the room and bolted, he probably would’ve.

After what felt like an eternity, he spoke again.

“…How old are you?”

That’s your next question? Really??

I almost blurted out my real age, but stopped. Sharing my age wouldn’t be a big deal on its own, but if he kept prying, it wouldn’t take much for him to piece together who I really was.

Yeah, no way am I calling this guy ‘hyung’ even as a joke.

So, I tossed out a number two years older than him just for good measure.

“I’m twenty-six. Though here, I’m twenty-three.”

He didn’t even flinch, his expression blank as he responded in the flattest tone imaginable.

“I’m thirty-three.”

“…Is that your body’s age?” I asked, already suspicious.

“No, I mean on Earth I was thirty-three. Here, I’m twenty-seven.”

What the actual hell.

This lying bastard didn’t even finish college, and now he’s trying to pull this crap? The audacity—using his “age” as an excuse to keep talking to me like I’m his kid brother.

I was beyond annoyed but couldn’t let on that I knew his real age.

“Mind if I keep talking informally?” he asked, like he hadn’t already decided.

“…Of course not. Whatever makes you comfortable.”

“Are you male or female?”

“Male.”

“What’s your total playtime? Don’t tell me you’ve only ever played with Happy God.”

“Across all accounts? Over a thousand hours, I think. But on this account, yeah, just Happy God. I wanted to see if having a bound trait would make a difference.”

“If you had to pick between a dog, a cat, and a dinosaur, which one would you choose?”

“…Excuse me?”

What kind of question is that?

Picking dinosaur was clearly a trap. That left me with dog or cat…

I think cats are cuter, but I really don’t want to be mistaken for someone like Napoleon.

“…Dogs.”

“Was that really something to agonize over?”

“It was such a random question it threw me off,” I said, exasperated. “Why are you even asking this?”

“From now on, answer within a second. If you haven’t thought about it before, just guess.”

What is this nonsense?

Pandemonium didn’t wait for me to process his bizarre rule, firing off a rapid-fire series of even stranger questions.

“When you eat cereal, do you pour the milk first or the cereal first?”

“Cereal.”

“Mint chocolate: delicious or toothpaste?”

“…Toothpaste?”

“Pineapple on pizza: delicious or shouldn’t exist?”

“Shouldn’t exist.”

“Dipping sauce or pouring sauce?”

“Pouring sauce.”

“Knew it!”

Pandemonium grinned widely.

…What’s his deal?

This guy was clearly a die-hard dipping sauce fan. So why was he so happy about my answer?

I’d been deliberately giving the opposite of my real opinions just to throw him off.

“If you know about the dipping vs. pouring debate, you must be Korean!”

Oh.

So, it wasn’t about the sauces after all. He was testing me with a meme only Koreans would get. For once, it seemed like this bastard actually used his brain.

Pandemonium gave me a few friendly pats on the shoulder that almost knocked me off my feet.

“Go ahead and drop the formal speech. Just call me hyung.”

“…I’m more comfortable being polite.”

Pandemonium shrugged like it didn’t matter. “Suit yourself. You said your name was Fabio, right? So, where’ve you been all this time? I thought no one played Happy God—it’s never been cleared.”

“My starting point was as a serf, so I spent nearly six months farming.”

“Seriously? You did nothing else? Just farmed?”

His face twisted into a mix of disbelief and horror, like I’d told him I enjoyed pineapple pizza after all.

“You fell into this hellish world and only farmed? You really are clueless and reckless, aren’t you?”

I never thought I’d meet someone even worse than Sukidesu, but here you are.

Pandemonium muttered under his breath, shaking his head like I was the universe’s biggest idiot.

Damn, this bastard really pisses me off.

If he thought farming for six months as a serf without a Helper in an unpatched nightmare of a game was easy, he was welcome to try it himself. Let’s see how far he’d get.

“Haha…”

Outwardly, though, I forced the most harmless, non-threatening smile I could muster. After all, I still needed to squeeze some useful information out of him.

Thanks to Reyes blowing my cover, pretending to be a seasoned player with hidden aces up my sleeve is no longer an option.

Fine. If I had to play the clueless noob, I’d do it, and I’d make Pandemonium’s ego work for me. His boastful nature will make it easy to extract some info or assistance.

Pandemonium half-covered his face with one hand, then asked, “I’ve got a serious question…”

“Go ahead.”

“So… are you actually dating the Heretic Slayer? Are you one of those gamers who likes to date NPCs? Is that your thing?”

I choked on my own breath, caught completely off guard.

“I’m not dating him, and that’s definitely not my thing,” I said, coughing awkwardly.

“Then what’s with that?” He pointed at the reliquary still in my hands.

“This?” I glanced down at it, feeling strangely defensive. “It’s… more like a desperate measure to gather information about other players. I don’t have a Helper or a system guide, so I didn’t even know chat existed until I met Reyes.”

I mixed a little lie into my explanation.

Admitting I had chosen the option [Take the risk and call out a username vs. Announce to everyone that you’re dating a game character] and actually went with the latter? Yeah, no. That was a humiliation I wasn’t ready to share.

So, I spun it as a desperate attempt to get other players’ attention when I was completely clueless. Pandemonium seemed to buy it—or at least accept it enough to stop asking follow-ups.

“What would you have done if Reyes turned out to be a total weirdo with no answers?”

…Isn’t Athanasuki weird enough to count as that already?

“I didn’t really have any other options…”

“Anyway,” Pandemonium said, waving a hand dismissively, “you should stop using that kind of attention-seeking strategy. Honestly, there aren’t many sane players left.”

“…Including you?” I asked dryly.

“Yeah,” he replied, completely unbothered.

“But tell me, has the Heretic Slayer himself ever shown up? If some random stranger wore a couple’s ring engraved with my name, I’d be pretty creeped out.”

“Athanas and I are in a cooperative relationship,” I explained quickly. “The idea was his in the first place—”

“Wait.” Pandemonium froze, his brows knitting together in disbelief. “You’re telling me you actually know the Heretic Slayer?”

“Uh, yeah.”

“What kind of explanation did you even give to get the protagonist on board with this?”

I sighed and gave him a condensed version of my first encounter with Athanas.

Athanas had dreamt of the Heretic Slayer’s introductory segment and became concerned. He started showing up at the branch library daily, searching for anything that might be a clue related to it.

Athanas had vaguely hoped that hanging around the library might lead to the next revelation—or at least get him closer to someone who knew more than he did.

Eventually, he noticed me after I woke him from a nightmare, one that had dragged on longer than usual. That was how we started talking.

At the time, I was on the lookout for players who had defected to the Order faction. Athanas and I decided to investigate the library’s basement together, and that’s where we stumbled onto a trap.

It didn’t take a genius to figure out that a player with malicious intent against the Order had set it up. I couldn’t help but worry that Athanas, with his tendency to chase dangerous leads, might become their next target.

So, I took a gamble.I told him the truth. I admitted I was a Watched One…

“…And that’s how we ended up working together,” I finished.

Pandemonium had been listening, his expression growing darker with every word. By the time I wrapped up, he was dragging his hand down his face, scowling like he’d just heard the worst news of his life.

“Shit!” he muttered under his breath.

What’s with the sudden swearing?

I blinked. “Uh… is that directed at me?”

“No,” he said quickly, shaking his head.

“Then who?”

“That crazy bastard.”

“…Insanity?”

Pandemonium shot me a sharp look. “So, Reyes has mentioned him? Good. Saves me the trouble of explaining.”

Why the hell is Insanity coming up now?

My thoughts scrambled to connect the dots. Was Pandemonium implying that Insanity was behind the trap in the library basement?

“In my opinion…” he began, before saying something shocking.

“That bastard Heretic Slayer is definitely one of Insanity’s servants.”