I Don't Want to Become a Boss, Hey

"Master Wendell was actually a traitor?"

On the way back to the village, Iris listened as Linton told her the Secret Realm's backstory and murmured, "No wonder there was so little information about him. Someone like that should have appeared in the textbooks of every magic academy. It shouldn't have been just his name that survived. So that was it."

Then she thought of something else. "Why do you know so many unrecorded secrets? Could you be someone who survived from that era?"

"Why would you think that?" Linton tilted his head slightly as he looked at the girl. "Although there are few records, if you deliberately search for clues, it isn't difficult to piece together a partial history from scattered fragments."

"Tch, forget it if you don't want to say." Iris pursed her lips, then asked curiously, "Even though I haven't known you for long, I always feel like... you seem to know everything. Hidden Secret Realms, stories that were never recorded—you're like an omniscient and omnipotent True Lord who knows all things."

"I remember you said the organization behind you was called... the Truth Society? Is it because the 'True Lord' they speak of guided you?"

Seeing Iris turn into a curious child asking a thousand questions, Linton could not help but laugh. "If the True Lord really could guide me, then the house we lived in now wouldn't be a shabby thatched hut. It would be a luxurious palace with floors paved in gold and bricks inlaid with gemstones."

"Why did you suddenly become so money-grubbing? Could you please keep up that coolness you had when casting spells for a few more seconds?"

Before her words had fully left her mouth, Iris realized she had accidentally voiced the praise she had meant to keep in her heart. She hurriedly changed the subject. "Right, did you get Wendell's relic?"

What a girl with clear likes and dislikes. She did not even call him Master anymore. Linton opened his hand, and an ancient, damaged book appeared in his palm. "The Manuscript of Deathly Silence - Fragment. This was the taboo Wendell had touched."

"It recorded some information about undead creatures. Wendell extracted the knowledge within and applied it to his summons."

"But he ultimately belonged to the Mortal Realm. He could not truly master the power of the abyss. Even if his vast knowledge and lifetime accumulation of magic could temporarily suppress the backlash, one day, when he let his guard down, he would still be consumed."

"You can control it? You won't turn me into something neither human nor ghost, like those knights, one day, will you?"

"It's not a big problem," Linton said. "When it comes to death, necromancers are the professionals most qualified to speak on the subject. So in my hands, it's very obedient."

"I'm starting to wonder whether you crawled out from beneath the abyss."

Iris sighed with a troubled expression. "I just hope that when you get caught for committing crimes someday, they won't tie me to a stake and burn me black. Even if they barbecue me, please don't add cilantro."

"What did cilantro ever do wrong?!" Linton roared.

"Is cilantro really the point here?!"

"Yes!!"

Seeing Linton's solemn expression, Iris could not help but rub her forehead. "Fine, fine, you win. Cilantro is number one in the world."

"That's more like it." Linton nodded in satisfaction. "And don't worry too much. Even if we get caught, you won't be burned as a heretic. For a rare subject like the resurrection of undead, they're more likely to study every one of your hairs with microscopic magic."

"You really don't know how to comfort people, do you?!"

"These days, nobody likes hearing the truth."

"Shut up!!"

For the rest of the journey, Iris no longer wanted to speak much with Linton. She was afraid that if they exchanged a few more words, she would lose her temper.

Losing her temper was one thing, but the problem was... she might not be able to beat Linton.

She was not afraid of fighting with real blades and spells, but because of the soul dominator, she simply could not attack a necromancer.

This is so infuriating!

Why am I being restrained by this bastard?

Is it because I'm not strong enough?

—That was indeed the case.

So it was my fault!

Thus, the young girl let her imagination run wild, her thoughts growing increasingly bizarre until she started taking her anger out on herself again.

Watching Iris's ever-changing expression, as dramatic and unpredictable as a trashy soap opera, Linton silently decided not to provoke her for the time being.

During their brief downtime, Linton opened the player forum.

He had long noticed that a player was following behind him—there was no helping it, the enormous player ID floating above his head could not be hidden.

But he had not dragged the person out. Instead, he chose to let him record his actions.

The reason was that Linton needed to make his name known beyond a small circle.

He was an NPC without a storyline, not the protagonist of the game. He could not carve out a place for himself in the history and main plot uncovered by players. If he wanted to gain more benefits from the players, he had to establish his presence.

If he faded into obscurity, the players would soon become lost amid the complexity of the Kingdom of Heavenly Principles and forget the NPC in a black hooded robe they had once encountered.

Like an internet celebrity, he needed to remind everyone of his existence from time to time in order to harvest them more effectively.

That was why Linton had tacitly allowed Tyrannosaurus Warrior to spy on him.

Of course, Linton did not want to become an internet celebrity. He hoped to become more like a hidden gem of an actor with iconic works, someone who could lurk deep in the players' minds—rarely mentioned, yet known by everyone.

Did he not know that his actions would stir up controversy among the players?

Of course he knew.

But controversy brought attention. As people said, even infamy was fame. Besides, just as the Myriad Flower Mirror had analyzed, his actions could not even be considered villainous.

It was simply that there were plenty of black-and-white thinkers surfing the internet. They believed that if someone did not do good deeds, then they had to be utterly evil. There was no such thing as neutral chaos.

But precisely because this was a game, even a villainous character would have plenty of popularity as long as they had enough appealing traits.

The reason Linton had acted omniscient in the video and displayed abilities full of taboos was to steer his image toward the mysterious side, making players want to explore him.

After all, most people did not truly resist the temptation of stealing forbidden fruit.

Judging from this alone, he had indeed succeeded.

In today's real world, "Little Black" had successfully dominated the trending searches across all social networks. Uncovering Little Black's secrets had practically become the main quest for every player.

Of course, since Linton was preparing to leave the Truth Society, he naturally did not want to truly become a villain. His goal was to establish an image in the players' minds as "a scumbag among humans" who was a little bad but generally decent, because that sort of character setting had become rather popular lately, whether in novels or games.

That was why he had explained to Iris that he would not harm players. That was why, in his final conversation with Wendell, he had pointed out that Wendell was not a good person. He wanted to plant a seed in the players' hearts: He doesn't seem like a bad guy.

But Linton seemed to have underestimated the internet users' black-and-white mentality. They ignored all the goodwill he displayed and desperately tried to portray him as a mastermind with vast ambitions, or a villainous hero walking in darkness because he bore a blood-deep vendetta.

They could hardly be blamed for thinking that way. In every field of literature and artistic creation, characters with that sort of setting were extremely popular.

In short, the players would not think he was an irredeemable villain, nor would they see him as some great philanthropist who ran around helping people for no reason—what a joke, how could the thing Little Black pursued possibly be something as lowly as obedience?

His goal was either to sink the continent because he was sick of the world, or to save the world by destroying it!

He was just an ordinary ultimate final boss!

That's all~!

From "Is Little Black Actually a Bad Person?" to "Little Black Is Definitely a Villain," to "Could Little Black's ultimate goal be turning everyone into undead creatures?" and so on, every post was somewhat different from the impression Linton had hoped for: This NPC is so awesome. How does he know everything?

Not only that, some villain fans who especially liked going against righteous storylines had even created an entire series of holy scriptures for him.

"When Little Black was born, he said he hated light, and the sky suddenly shattered. From then on, only darkness remained in the world. Little Black said he hated water, so lava erupted from beneath the earth and smelted the seas into obsidian. Little Black said he hated the living, so from then on, all people escaped the shackles of their bodies and floated freely above the land."

"The Kingdom of Heavenly Principles can exist without heavenly principles, but it cannot exist without Little Black. Just as the West can exist without Jerusalem, but the Xia Kingdom cannot exist without Neon Province. Black Gate 🙏"

"'Why Little Black Is a God': First of all..."

Linton fell silent for a long while.

Things seemed to be heading in a strange direction.

"So my goal was actually to destroy the world. So my desires were actually this lofty. Lofty my ass!!"

"Why aren't you paying attention to my super cool skill effects and the vast knowledge I displayed? Why don't you want to investigate my identity and background? Why are you all so good at making memes?!"

"Stop your imaginations already! I don't want to become a boss, hey!!"

Four chapters came to roughly ten thousand words, which was about the same as adding an extra chapter. So Shabu proudly puffed out his chest and shouted: Please vote and keep reading one more page ahead! Please, orz!!