Volume 50 Chapter 4.4: part4

V50C4P4 For This Beautiful Sea

The countless Poratts swimming around under the sea had been hunted all night by Weed and the undead. Among the sculptural lifeforms created by Emperor Geihar, all the sea creatures flocked in to join the hunt as well. There were gigantic-sized octopi, turtles, sharks and whales... but the most impressive of them were anchovies, whose bodies reached the length of 800 meters although they looked exactly the same as normal anchovies. They wriggled their great bodies through the water at a frightening speed, and were capable of creating whirlpools and even small-scale tsunamis as they moved.

When Maylon asked why he created such huge anchovies, the answer Emperor Geihar gave her was also quite priceless.

"Don't you think they are pretty?"

"...Sorry?"

"I've made them when I was a young man. I always say, big fish are the best fish; they are tastier and just better all-around. They are the works which I created to challenge people's prejudice that all anchovies must be weak."

"Ah. I see."

"Unlike on land, creatures are not encumbered by their large size in the ocean. Had I created them more recently, I would have made those guys to be at least three kilometers long."

"..."

"...And that would have been the birth of the Great Anchovies, the absolute rulers of the sea."

Emperor Geihar smiled contently.

"I'll take care of the rest of the monsters from now. Leave them to my anchovies, and those Poratts will never threaten this land again."

"Understood."

Irene, Romuna and Bellot all prayed for the repose of the Poratts' souls as they gazed upon the sea; even if those poor creatures somehow managed to escape from this place, they would have to be chased by giant anchovies for the rest of their lives.

Ding!

<Quest Completed: An Assault of Poratts

The swarm of Poratts that had put the region of Wulhoff Reef into great danger is now gone. Because of the horrible memory this battle left in them, they will head towards the distant ocean, never to invade this land again.

84,290 Contribution Points to the Arpen Empire earned!

The objectives of the quest have been overachieved; additional 134,600 Contribution Points have been obtained.>

Weed and his companions stood side by side, taking in the view of the sea. The long battle was over, and the setting sun was painting the horizon ablaze.

***

As the sight of Weed's adventuring party completing the quest and returning safely was relayed to the viewers through broadcast, the users assembled at the north coast of Shelgium yelled out in joy.

"Victory!"

"Hooray! They've driven the Poratts away."

"We all knew we could count on Weed-nim!"

It was a long wait that they had to endure while lying near the sea, but at the end they could confirm the successful conclusion of Weed's quest through broadcast. The next moment, the sea suddenly began to glow brilliantly in front of every user gathering around.

"Woooow!!"

"Wha-, what's happening?"

"It's starting. The whole world changed when the Embinyu Church was destroyed, and the same thing is happening here again."

From over the horizon, the sea was gradually colored in a mystic emerald shade. Suddenly, dolphins leapt out from the hitherto calm surface of the water.

"Whoa!!"

"There are dolphins here..."

"Aren't those merpeople over there?"

The originally murky and grey sea full of sand slowly became clearer, until it was so transparent the whole ocean floor could be seen from above the surface. Corals of various colors were growing out of the seabed, and countless different sea creatures were swimming in the water. Even the ground underneath the users' feet was turning into soft golden beach with seashells scattered around it.

* Honk! *

Flocks of birds were feely soaring across the sky.

Ding!

<You have arrived at one of the unexplored lands of the world.

The discovery of The Wulhoff Reef!

It is the largest region of coral reefs of the Continent, spreading over the distance of 876 kilometers from the Strait of Rudin to the Alcard Sea. The depth of water ranges from 3 meters to a maximum of 80 meters, and it is home to 600 species of corals and 1,890 species of various sea creatures. As one of the Nine Unexplored Lands of the Versailles Continent, numerous adventurers have hoped to find this place since the early days. Although it was almost destroyed by the threats of Poratts a long time ago, an adventurer named Weed and his companions managed to protect it from the monster invasion.

- Your adventure has earned you 1,394 points of fame.

- Your level has increased.

- You have discovered a historical region. Your Knowledge and Wisdom have increased by 10 points each as a result of this special experience.

- The wonderful scenery has increased your Art stat by 8 points.

- You will obtain additional rewards for reporting the rare discoveries.>

"Kyaa!"

Those who had arrived early had the fortune of making some adventuring achievements by discovering a hidden land of the world.

"Ahhh...."

"This is paradise."

The users found themselves beholding one of the most unique sights in their lives unfolding in front of their own eyes.

***

"This guy should be uniting the continent now, but instead he just keeps poking around causing all sorts of trouble."

Yoo Byung Jun was watching the monitors showing various happenings in Royal Road, while looking quite discontent.

The faces of the users who were swimming and playing around in the coral sea were full of blissful smiles. They had taken off their armors and traveling garments, fully enjoying themselves drifting with the emerald waves of the sea.

Another monitor was showing the users in the Garnav Plain sweating profusely while moving the giant stones which were to be used for making the sculptures; Byung Jun noticed the bright expression on their faces as well.

"They're doing some hard work but there's hope in their future... is that what they're thinking? What's their current level of happiness?"

- 94.3781834%. This is the highest level that has been obtained in history.

"What was the happiness level when Royal Road first opened?"

- The average number taken from the entire user base was 93.3972939%. It has been decreasing every month by 3% or higher after then. The lowest happiness level reached was near 61%.

"So... he really managed to change the world on his own?"

Yoo Byung Jun recalled the reason he first created Royal Road.

He decided to pass everything he had onto the emperor of the world that he had built himself, because he wanted to mock the unfairness of the real world.

"At that time I couldn't have known that such a strange player would show up out of nowhere."

He had spent a long time watching the videos of Weed's adventures. The guy had an unparalleled talent when it came to setting events in motion which were often outrageously silly and off-the-wall, and he always found a way to complete all the nigh-impossible quests. Byung Jun had been silently monitoring Weed's entire journey, during which he had brought about ridiculously positive outcomes time and time again by working together with his companions and other users.

"The one who conquers the world of Royal Road will become my successor. And I don't intend to intervene even if he mercilessly abuses his wealth and power and ends up destroying the world... after all, I only wanted to laugh at this world, I don't care what becomes of it."

Still, he was beginning to have inkling that if Weed really becomes his successor, people would not object to it much.

"So he somehow managed to climb his way up to his current position. I must say, this is not what I originally planned..."

- Do you wish to cancel your earlier successor plan?

He had made all the necessary preparations for turning over not only the entire property of Unicorn Corporation, but also his astronomical amount of personal assets that had been kept hidden until now.

"No, proceed as is. Whichever person wins this battle will take everything."

Weed and Bard Ray.

Unbeknownst to them, it had been determined that the one who unites the Versailles Continent would become the wealthiest and the most powerful man on earth.

"Kekeke. The whole world shall kneel before my heir!"

Yu Byung Jun let out a maniacal scream.

At last, the true successor upon whom he had bet his own fate was about to be chosen once and for all, but there was still a certain unpleasant foreboding tugging at a corner of his mind...

"I just cannot shake off this feeling that Weed will become the Emperor in the end and take over everything I've got."

And if that really happens, something told him that he would probably turn green with envy rather than feeling the pleasure of accomplishing his goal. He had devoted his youth to creating the world of Royal Road, but now Weed had become a hero to its people, winning both fortune and the affection of a beautiful woman in the process. If he took over even the entire wealth of Byung Jun, including the artificial intelligence developed by him, it would be as good as handing over credit to Weed for his entire life's work.

***

Mapan was the head director of the events in Garnav Plain. Upon coming out from the tent after taking care of festival preparations, war materials supply and other urgent business of Mapan Store, he saw several lofty mountains towering high above the plain.

"What are those?"

Hidden Money, his cousin, sighed and answered, "Those are the sculptures and all the sculpting materials people have piled up."

"Th-they're... very tall."

One side of the Garnav Plain had been turned into a great mountain range as if the place had suddenly become an alpine region.

Although it was Mapan who had put the users to work, his knowledge about specific fields of expertise was limited.

"How did they do all that work in just a few days?"

"People just worked together and did it."

"Is that even possible?"

"Well, we just did it and it somehow worked out."

*Thump Thump Thump!*

*Rattle Rattle!*

"We need more bricks."

"Coming right now!"

Mapan could see users of the Grass Porridge Cult nearby swarming in like a colony of ants and building a giant statue, the staggering height of which was no less than 800 meters. Further ahead there was another great sculpture being built which occupied several hundred square meters.

"The support beams..."

"Let's proceed with the foundation work at the same time."

"The architect's skills come in very handy here."

"Safety equipment? Why would we need that? It's so much more convenient to just have a couple of Feathers of Falling."

This scene felt strangely familiar to Mapan — not only were there fence screens set up just like some construction sites for buildings or apartments, there were people driving support beams into the ground as if doing substructure work.

"Who are those people?"

"Construction Project Department from Samsung C&T Corporation."

"...Eh?"

"And those people over there are from Daewoo E&C and Hyundai E&C."

Mapan stared at them blankly for a few seconds without saying anything, and then, clearly shocked at the ridiculousness of this whole situation, asked:

"...you mean they are really from those famous companies that I know?"

"Yeah! All from different construction companies."

"...Why are they here?"

"Well, they are not the only ones; there are even people from KPF and Steven Holl."

"What are KPF and Steven Holl?"

"Some world-famous architecture and design firms."

The sculptures in Garnav Plain had become a huge issue in the real world. The sight of several-hundred-meter tall statues being built at an incredible speed had been in the media spotlight every day. Each morning, afternoon and evening, an additional 20 or 30 meters was added to the sculptures' height, which was enough to draw public attention.

Hyundai E&C had decided to provide full company-scale participation.

"A sculpting project of such a size could be called a construction, which is why Hyundai should not allow itself to be left out. Our company shall support it extensively."

The design team of the construction company presented all sorts of ideas. As its members were all players of Royal Road as well, they had already had in mind quite a lot of fresh ideas related to the field of architecture; the kind of ideas that would be most probably met with sour reactions from the heads of their team or department when proposed as a project internally in the company:

"Is that even possible?"

"You're seriously calling THIS a project proposal?"

"Money! We need some work that will earn us some money."

Hence all those ideas, which might actually be quite wonderful if realized in Royal Road, had been lying dormant until now and people finally had a chance to bring them all up.

"We don't know how exactly this will turn out, but let's just make it. We should challenge ourselves."

"Are we really building this? It's going to be 408 meters' tall!"

"What's the big deal? The guys next to us are making one that's as high as 620 meters."

They didn't need to worry about shortage of funds and building materials, as the users of the Grass Porridge Cult had been moving whole mountains from the nearby areas.

Just like building an apartment, the construction companies set up the beams and decorated the exterior with high quality materials.

Raemian, Prugio, Castle, S-Class.

The structures that bore the names of many construction company brands were built haphazardly everywhere in the plain.

"But... executive director, this is supposed to be a sculpture."

"Just focus on making it tall. The sculptors will take care of the rest."

Once combined with the concept of big-scale construction, the pace of the operation became infinitely quicker than before.

"The construction companies from Korea?"

"Yes. The average audience rating is 40%."

"That's pretty high. Which broadcasting company?"

"No, this is the average rating taken from the entire world. The rating reaches 85% in the US. Even Fox and CNN are broadcasting the project."

"Then we have to hurry up and join in as well. This is a chance to show off our company's technological prowess. The promotion we can get from this will be enormous."

Highly qualified professionals from various architectural design firms widely known in the real world had gathered together in one place.

"What should we make here?"

"I'm not sure, but let's start with the substructure work first. We can't make something that's smaller than what the other companies make."

A battle of speed in which the participants began construction even before coming up with any design! Combining strength with the architects from the Northern Regions, they were creating some incredible things.

- Looking for new ideas: we will build anything!

The Garnav Plain became a paradise of sculpting. Dragons and tigers were just some of the basic sculptures found there, and there were also statues shaped like wyverns and ice dragons as if reflecting the popularity of the famous sculptural creatures.

On the other hand, the Bug Porridge group was the birthplace of many ingenious project plans.

"Excuse me... I'm thinking of a really awesome bug."

"Tell us about it. Anything's possible."

"Well, it has three hundred legs and forty antennas... would it be alright?"

"That shouldn't be difficult at all. If we're just making it long rather than tall... it should be quite easy to construct as well."

"And it moves forward by flipping its body."

"...What?"

"Well, it's a bit hard to explain, but it will need a lot of fine hairs, too."

The Bug Porridge had set up its own territories over an area that was about 5 kilometers in radius. Within this area, there were great sculptures in the forms of various insects, but there were also a lot of common users who joined in to make their own sculptures. They wanted to learn some sculpting skills and were carving bugs that were around 5 or 6 meters in size; it would be an incredible sight to behold when all of those sculptures came to life simultaneously!

"Don't worry about the durability! As long as they don't collapse before the date of the battle, they're fine."

"Let's strive to make something that is 1 kilometer tall this time. We're going to set up a world record!"

"Faster! Higher! We can always start over if it collapses. Our focus is to make it bigger and taller than anything."

Once a great mass of people have gathered, the driving force generated by them was almost frightening. Countless sculptures had been made that were based on various animals or famous structures around the world.

"Depps-nim, there's no time to waste. You need to get up there right now."

"But... to be honest, I have acrophobia."

"Hello, I'm a psychiatrist. I can check his condition by his side so just send us up."

"Everyone push!"

The sculptors who had been forcefully sent to the top of the structures started working at the height where they could gaze upon the clouds below.

Through the collaboration between the Grass Porridge Cult and various construction firms around the world, the Garnav Plain had been completely transformed in just a week.

"Haha..."

Mapan could only let out an incredulous laugh. Of course he had expected some level of success, considering the power of the Grass Porridge cult with all the users of the Northern Continent at the center, but...

'This is just beyond my imagination.'

It felt as if he received a whole ostrich instead of the fried chicken he had ordered for delivery.

'Well, I have faithfully carried out Weed-nim's order. That much is clear.'

Merchants from the North, including Gamong, were all enthusiastically providing support as well.

A place where the largest-scale festival in the world was being held side-by-side with the largest construction project in the world! Already it had been estimated that there were more than fifty million users in Garnav Plain, and it continued to attract even more people through the constant live broadcast every day.

(To be continued...)