NOVEL NEXT WORLD chapter 2
002. You are not a god!
Just 5 minutes ago, I was in my room playing Duel on my computer.
But what was this?
The light burst out of the monitor and before I knew it, I was dragged to a strange place.
I wondered if it was a dream and pinched my cheek, but it only hurt. There was no change in the scenery in front of me.
‘Is this the afterlife?’
If not, did Duel add a new drug feature?
I always laughed off the words that I had a serious level of Duel addiction, but now I think I really need some mental treatment.
‘I’m going crazy.’
I didn’t know if it was a hallucination or not, but I decided to look around first.
A vast plain and a forest full of trees, and above them, a mountain range that seemed endless.
Behind me was the sea, and a volcanic island.
‘Was there such a place on Earth?’
A landscape that could only be found in a fantasy game.
And as if to prove the truth, there was a temple I had never seen before right next to me.
`It looks like a temple that belongs in Egypt.`
A structure that I had only seen once in a photo.
It looked more shabby than the one I saw in the photo, but it was undoubtedly a temple.
It was fine, except for the fact that the ancient Egyptian-style temple was not on a desert, but in the middle of a field.
“I’ve been waiting for you, agent.”
“Huh?”
As I wandered around and marveled at the Egyptian-style temple, I heard a clear voice from somewhere.
I turned my head and saw a woman with a very familiar appearance walking from the entrance of the temple.
I had never met her in person, but I remembered who she was.
Well, that’s because I had just used her to win a duel a few minutes ago.
It sounds a bit weird when I say it like that.
“Wow…!! Amazing sync rate! Lady! Which team are you from?”
“Pardon?”
“Which team are you from? You know, cosers these days work in teams!”
“Co, coser…? I’m sorry, but I have no idea what you are talking about, agent.”
“Wow! You really nailed the concept! But wouldn’t it be better to cosplay as a white wizard girl or a harpy girl than a priestess? Oh, are they too old-fashioned? How about a beast maid? Or at least an electric princess? If you had cosplayed as one of them, you would have gotten a lot of support!”
“I’m sorry again. My learning is so poor that I can’t understand what you are saying, agent. I would like to guide you to my master, if that’s alright with you.”
“Master?”
“Yes, I mean Anubis, the one who summoned you to this land.”
Did the concept finally take over her brain?
I would normally think like this, but there was something that came to my mind because of the situation around me and the unnaturalness of the priestess’s attitude.
The voice I heard before coming here.
A reward, we will invite you to our world, I remembered hearing strange words like that.
At first, I accepted it as a strange dream.
But when I opened my eyes, there was a strange temple and I faced a woman who was a priestess of Anubis and a panther.
Then, I had a hypothesis.
I think I need some time to check it out.
“Excuse me, do you know what GomokWiki is?”
“I’ve never heard of it.”
“What about White Wizard?”
“I know him. He is a very noble person.”
“Cosplay?”
“I don’t know.”
“Beast Maid.”
“If you mean the beastkin maids who live in the mansion deep in the southeast forest…”
“Okay. That’s enough.”
Now I think I know.
Where I am, and what situation I’m in.
‘hehehehe…’
It’s a situation that can only be expressed by saying that I’m crazy.
But I guess I was summoned to another world.
***
I spend half of my daily routine dueling, but that doesn’t mean I don’t have any other hobbies.
When I’m not broadcasting or dueling, I mostly kill time by watching anime, web novels, and light novels.
I’m so immersed in subculture that I wouldn’t deny it even if someone called me a nerd.
Honestly, dueling is also a kind of subculture in a way.
Anyway, as a nerd, I knew most of the settings in the novels.
The case right now was an isekai summoning.
A common and clichéd setting that appears frequently in novels, it was a forced trip to another world by an absolute being.
But the reason for the summoning was quite different from web novels or light novels, and at the same time, it was insane.
I would understand if I wrote a 5700-character rant about the Samshin deck.
But why was I summoned for breaking a ‘deck’ with a ‘D’ once?
‘Is it a relief that I didn’t come here by getting hit by a truck?’
5700 characters, a truck, or coming here by dueling, all of them were more normal than this.
It was already a level that ruined the plausibility.
“This way.”
In the midst of the confusing situation.
I decided to follow the priestess’s guidance first to meet the person who summoned me.
I might be able to find out the reason why he brought me here or the way to go back to the original world by talking to the god.
“This is the resting place of Lord Anubis. Please do not commit any rudeness….”
The place where I was led by the priestess was a dark space.
I couldn’t see anything and wondered if I had come to the right place.
But the priestess who had guided me had left long ago, and I had to stand still in the darkness until something happened.
‘sh*t.’
Couldn’t she have thrown me a torch or something before she left?
I was grumbling and complaining in the dark place when suddenly.
Whoosh-!
The fireplaces in the room that I didn’t even know existed started to light up.
The sight of the fireplaces arranged in a row from left to right.
At the end of the row of fireplaces, I saw two golden statues of Anubis.
Between the statues, there was a throne made of gold.
On the throne, there was a three-headed dog that was emitting a jet-black aura.
Anubis’s three-headed dog. The creature that was called the card of the gods. I couldn’t stop trembling when I saw it in person.
It was not for nothing that it had the nickname of the card of the gods. Its appearance and presence were overwhelming.
‘I guess the three-headed dog summoned me here, right?’
I didn’t know if it could understand me, but I gathered my courage and tried to talk to the three-headed dog.
“Hey, you dog bastard!! I told you not to sit on my seat!!”
“Wha…?!”
From somewhere, a small girl ran towards the three-headed dog and jumped on it.
She then kicked the three-headed dog’s massive body with both feet.
I was speechless as I watched the girl deliver a dropkick to the three-headed dog that was twenty times bigger than her.
“`text
A reckless action. But contrary to what he expected, the cerberus flew away like a feather and crashed into the wall.
“I adjusted the distorted causality and came back, only to find this bastard sitting in my place!”
“Keeing…! Keeing…!”
“Don’t act pitiful now! You’re a parasite that eats three times more because you have three heads! I’ll just confiscate your bowl!”
He finally understood perfectly.
He was not summoned to another world, but dreaming.
A terrible nightmare that he couldn’t wake up from even if he pinched his cheek.
Otherwise, how could that little girl beat up a cerberus like it was nothing?
It was a ridiculous story.
“Oh? You were already here!”
As he wondered when he would wake up from the dream, the little girl waved at him.
As if they had been friends for a long time.
“……Who are you?”
“Right. I forgot to introduce myself. I’m Anubis, a god!”
“Are you crazy?”
He was so dumbfounded that he unwittingly cursed in front of the young girl.
He should have refrained from swearing even if his mind was hazy.
“I’m sorry for swearing.”
“Normally, I would have to punish you severely for blasphemy, but it’s my fault for bringing you here without any explanation, so I’ll let it slide this time!”
“Are you playing a prank on me right now?”
“`
Some additional sentences are:
“Wow, a role-play? You’re really a god!”
“Then show me some proof.”
“Okay!”
The black-haired girl’s mouth curled up as much as her overflowing confidence.
She suddenly turned her back to me and started to shake something from her butt.
The room was dark overall, so I couldn’t see well, but when I squinted my eyes, I finally saw it.
A short and scruffy tail.
I couldn’t believe it, but it looked like a dog’s tail.
“How is it?”
“A tail-shaped anal plug?”
“You crazy bastard!! It’s a real tail
I nodded.
I didn’t look at it in detail, but the exterior of the temple was in a ragged state, as if it would collapse at any moment.
Wouldn’t it crumble down with just one bomb?
“It wasn’t like this before. From the entrance to the inside, everything was covered with gold and people visited often! But at some point, new forces appeared all over the world and our downfall began.”
Anubis, who wagged his tail as he recalled the glory of the past.
But as soon as he switched to the current situation, his ears and tail drooped like a wet dog.
He was a god who seemed to reveal his feelings without showing them on his face.
Why is the existence of a god so frail?
“So you want me to help you with the revival?”
“Yes!”
“Then I think you’ve picked the wrong person.”
You should have called a CEO or at least a builder, not a basement broadcaster like me.
I don’t know why he brought me here when all I can do is duel.
“Nope! You are the talent we need!”
“Where do you see that in me?”
“You used my deck to defeat those wicked guys.”
“Oh.”
He must be talking about the last duel I did before coming here.
The legendary match where I broke the tier deck with the three gods.
“Is the doggy god the sponsor you mentioned…?”
“That’s me!”
Nowadays, even gods watch streams and donate?
How much has the logic of this world collapsed? I feel really dizzy.
“Okay, let’s say I’m good at dueling. But I’m congenitally non-religious and I don’t have the ability to revive a religion, okay?”
“You just said with your own mouth that you’re good at dueling.”
“So what? How does being good at dueling revive a religion?”
“It does! This is the world of duel monsters, where everything is decided by dueling.”
Suddenly, an animation popped up in my head.
A world where they use cards instead of bombs, train with cards in waterfalls, and imprison people with duels.
It was an animation with a world based on pure madness, but it was also fun and sparked a craze for dueling.
If this world is similar to that one, where dueling rules everything, then I can understand.
“So you want me to revive the three water gods with dueling?”
“You’re quick to understand, that’s good!”
“Just asking, but you don’t mean to duel with only the three water gods deck, do you?”
“That’s right.”
“Then I’ll take my leave.”
I bowed and said goodbye, then turned my steps toward the exit.
Then, behind me, there was a sound of flustered footsteps and a hand that grabbed my pants.
“Wa, wait!!”
“Let go of this. Even if it’s me, I’ll quit dueling if you tell me to use only the three water gods.”
“`
“Kidding, kidding! I know my deck is crappy too!”
“So you knew and still said that? You’re evil.”
“Sorry!! But even a god can dream, right?”
“Empty dreams are better off discarded quickly.”
Any pro duelist who came here would have refused.
They had no choice, since Samshin was not a god.
“I won’t ask you to use our deck to revive us! But can’t you take on my agent role?”
“Agent?”
“Yeah! Travel the world and duel as my agent! That alone will increase our popularity!”
“That sounds fine, but what’s the reward for me?”
“Cards.”
“Please send me back to my original world right now.”
“Why! Cards are cards! They’re the best gift for duelists, aren’t they?”
“Unfortunately, I prefer money over cards.”
“Ugh…! You materialistic jerk.”
“You should have known from the broadcast.”
Anyway, in the real world, you need money to buy cards.
If you have money, you can do anything. Why would you accept cards as payment?
“So please send me back to my original world and look for someone else.”
“Can’t.”
“`
“Yes?”
“Well, the thing is. I brought you here by twisting causality, so it might be hard to send you back right away.”
Anubis, who was avoiding my gaze and fidgeting with his fingers.
His mouth uttered a thunderbolt out of the blue, leaving me speechless.
“You summoned me without my consent and now you can’t send me back? And you call yourself a god!”
“C, calm down! It’s not like I can’t send you back at all.”
“Don’t tell me you want me to revive your temple to send me back?”
“I have no such intention, so you can relax! And living in this world is not as bad as you think.”
“Do you know how inconvenient it is to live in a world where I know nothing?”
I’m afraid of how primitive the toilets are compared to my original world.
Maybe there are no toilets at all?
There are many other factors that I have to put up with.
“……Straight, vowel, folder 69.”
“What? What are you talking about!”
“Where your secret treasures are hidden. That folder is full of spring paintings.”
“H, how did you…?”
Straight, vowel, folder 69.
It was the 19+ folder that I had hidden in my computer’s C drive.
If it’s 69, it’s where I collected the 19+ doujinshi that I bought from the site. I don’t understand how Anubis knows about it.
“That’s because I’m a god!”
“……I’m starting to feel a sincere contempt for God.”
“Listen to my story till the end! You’ll surely change your mind after hearing it all!”
“Then let’s hear it.”
“The girls you loved to watch in the spring anime are actually real in this world! Don’t you want to meet them in person?”
“Huh?”
I can meet the characters that I could only access through card illustrations or fan works?
And that includes the girls with the cute theme that hit my taste?
My resolve to return to the original world began to waver.
Calm down. Even if I can meet the girls of my dreams as Anubis said, it means nothing.
I’m 25 years old, zero dating experience, zero female friends, zero times of intimacy.
It’s sad, but there’s no way I can woo them as a lifelong virgin.
It hurts, but I have to face the bitter reality and go back to the original world.
“In this world, if you’re good at dueling, you can talk to them, touch them, and even have s*x with them if you’re lucky! And you still want to go back to the original world?”
“Anubis, you’re a god!!”