New Discovery

Perhaps because that member of Ainz Ooal Gown had some semblance of a moral compass, the information he sold hadn't been very detailed. Still, Hades was satisfied with what he'd learned. At least now he could make some preparations.

Information about the NPCs was among it.

Hades hadn't expected Ainz Ooal Gown to have such a strange way of doing things. Just as all their members were heteromorphic, they'd spent a huge number of precious guild points creating a hundred-level NPCs who weren't very useful, and even equipped them with divine-class gear.

Even if those NPCs were armed to the teeth and had the strength of top-tier players, so what? The strongest top-tier player could defeat at most three players of the same level. Against four, they wouldn't stand a chance.

And what if the guild was invaded on a large scale, like when fifteen hundred people attacked the Great Tomb of Nazarick? What good would it do if each NPC could take on four players? They'd been up against fifteen hundred people that time.

The NPCs would've been overwhelmed even if every invader cast just one spell at them. So guild NPCs weren't all that useful for defense. The truly effective defense was the guild base's traps. Those were the key.

But that was how Ainz Ooal Gown did things. They'd created so many level-one-hundred NPCs and equipped them with divine-class gear that would make ordinary players envious.

In fact, even among level-one-hundred players, a large number couldn't afford divine-class equipment.

Before coming to the real world, Hades would've thought Ainz Ooal Gown's actions were completely idiotic. But now, seeing Albedo beside Momonga, he couldn't help wondering if the guild had somehow known in advance that they'd cross over into reality after the game shut down, and had created all those level-one-hundred NPCs for that reason.

After all, NPCs in YGGDRASIL couldn't leave their guild bases. But now...

"Since this isn't YGGDRASIL anymore, the rules have changed, and NPCs can leave their guild bases too..." Hades studied the fully armed Albedo through his lens and made this deduction.

"Hmm. If the guild rules have changed, then it was right not to try entering Nazarick with the World Will. Looks like I'll have to gather information all over again."

Hades wasn't discouraged. He was an undead character now, without all those unnecessary human emotions. Even if they arose, his undead passive skills would suppress them.

This state of mind was actually rather suited to thinking things through. He shifted the lens, wanting to examine the surroundings. So far, all he could see was Momonga and one of Ainz Ooal Gown's NPCs.

Although the heteromorphic guild didn't have many members, it still had forty-one. It was possible that some of its other members had also come to this world.

But no matter how much Hades searched the area, he couldn't find anyone besides Momonga. Just then, a reason suddenly occurred to him.

"Greater Scrying."

This eighth-tier spell let him see hidden things, but its range was limited to whatever was within his line of sight. From his current vantage point, people below were no more than tiny pixels. There was no way he could make anything out.

But the cash-shop item Monocular could channel the spell and let him use Greater Scrying effectively. That was the appeal of cash-shop items; ordinary binoculars couldn't do anything like that.

With the spell enhancing his vision, Hades continued to survey the area. He hadn't yet decided what to do next. This was no longer a virtual world, but the real one.

Momonga was in the village, and seemed to be getting along well with the villagers. Hmm, was he trying to gather information? That was quite possible.

"Hmm... Wait!" Hades abruptly paused in the middle of his observation.

The village had apparently been attacked, yet Momonga was here as if nothing had happened. Could he have been the one who attacked it? Was he only here to gather information?

Calm down. It was too early to jump to conclusions. Hades hadn't seen it happen with his own eyes, and the villagers below didn't seem afraid of Momonga. He didn't know the truth yet, and jumping to conclusions would only put him at a disadvantage.

Hades suddenly hesitated. Momonga was a fellow player, but he was a dangerous presence. In fact, every member of Ainz Ooal Gown was dangerous to him.

He'd only seen Momonga so far. He had no idea how many members of that heteromorphic guild had come here. Given how the guild used to operate, they might surround and kill him the moment he showed himself.

Hades didn't think the guild members would refrain from attacking just because this was now the real world. Besides, there were no laws to restrain them. Some people had speculated that the guild members were a bunch of people who hated society, perhaps even members of a terrorist organization like the resistance.

In Hades's original world, there was a group of people who fancied themselves warriors for justice, but in the eyes of the public, they were just terrorists, causing unrest and launching attacks everywhere. Their actions were strikingly similar to those of Ainz Ooal Gown.

Just as Hades was fretting over this, he spotted something through the Monocular.

"What's that...?"

In a forest on the outskirts of the village, he spotted two elves and some Eight-Edge Assassin Bugs with the ability to turn invisible.

"So there really are others besides Momonga and that NPC."

Hades counted fifteen Eight-Edge Assassin Bugs. They weren't much to worry about; they were only level-forty-nine monsters. But he recognized the two elves.

The Dark Elf Twins from Nazarick's sixth floor: one was a beast tamer, and the other a Magic Caster specializing in wide-area annihilation. These two NPCs wouldn't be easy to deal with.

Hades had never forgotten the stampede of beasts or Petit-Catastrophe, a lower-tier version of the Catastrophe spell. They'd lost quite a few people to those two elves back then.

"Good thing I spotted them. Now that I have, they won't be hard to deal with."

Hades continued watching. Then he saw a group of people riding horses and wearing armor come in from outside the village. They looked like soldiers, but their armor wasn't uniform, which was odd for a group of soldiers.

He kept watching. Their leader was a burly man with sharply defined muscles in his arms. When they reached Momonga, the man dismounted and began speaking with him.

Hades couldn't tell what they were saying. Greater Scrying couldn't pick up sound, so he continued watching Momonga, trying to figure out what was going on from their behavior.

Next, he saw the burly leader bow to Momonga, then lead the others toward a house in the village. Only then did Hades realize that nearly all the villagers were inside it.

He looked carefully but didn't spot Enri's father, who had given him food the previous night. He did see Enri, though, huddled among the crowd, looking rather sad.

Hades suddenly felt a pang of distress. If he hadn't left the village last night, perhaps he could've helped them. Even if Momonga had done this, he could at least have helped Enri's family.

But the next moment, that distress faded away, as if it had never been there. Hades knew it was the undead body's passive forced-calm effect.

Fortunately, he had the Seed of the World Tree. If he had to stay in an undead body forever, he couldn't stand being in this state.

The undead body's coolheadedness made him instantly cast aside those scattered thoughts and start thinking about how to keep himself safe from now on. He wasn't some bleeding heart willing to stake his life on the other side's character.