The First Clash Between World City and the Great Tomb of Nazarick, the Role of a Trap Thief

"Since these automated guards can take orders from Eve."

"Their value goes beyond minor skirmishes."

"We can send automated guards to infiltrate countries around the world."

"They could even try learning human martial arts and magic created by humans."

"With that kind of exchange, World City would surely gain a great deal."

Roy felt pleased with his own ingenuity.

Death Knights could not learn skills, but that was not necessarily true of World City's automated guards.

Their intelligence was generally low, and he could hardly expect much from randomly generated AI guards.

Still, they were considerably smarter than Death Knights. Perhaps there was an opening there.

Eve immediately replied:

"Rest assured, Supreme One. Your subordinate has already drawn up a plan based on your wisdom."

"The first batch will tentatively consist of one hundred guards, using only level-18 veteran guards. Registering adventurers of that number and caliber should avoid attracting attention."

"After all, the Re-Estize Kingdom currently has a population of eighteen million, but only around twelve hundred adventurers of platinum rank or above, starting at levels 15-17."

"Too many would easily invite an investigation."

Eve's intellectual ceiling was not necessarily much higher than that of other wise minds.

There were limits to what thinking could accomplish. Even a god of Go could not give a world champion a ten-stone handicap.

But her strengths were rapid responses and the ability to process countless plans in parallel.

Ever since arriving in World City, she had been continuously generating and iterating on plans.

By the time Roy raised the question, Eve already had a contingency plan ready.

She simply believed all of it had been guided by Roy's wisdom.

Ahem.

You're making me seem rather redundant.

Roy felt like a programmer from his previous life.

Whenever he used AI to generate code, he felt that his own handwritten code was rather poor.

Traditional programming had become obsolete.

Still, however capable Eve was, she remained his loyal prime minister and a member of his harem.

Hmph. I'll beat you some other way in the future.

At that thought, Roy's confidence returned. He could take his time learning and raise his intellectual ceiling anyway.

"Excellent. That's exactly what I had in mind. Proceed with that approach."

"But if we send them out, we need to use [False Information]. Apart from remembering that they have a master whose orders they must obey, they must retain no information about World City."

Automated guards were extremely cheap, so Roy naturally would not invest much emotion in them.

They were essentially humanoid monsters with a measure of intelligence.

Roy had no qualms about using and sacrificing them for his plans. At worst, he could generate replacements or resurrect them.

"As you command, Supreme One!"

"By the way, someone in World City proposed a plan targeting the Great Tomb of Nazarick."

"Give me an objective assessment of its effectiveness..."

Roy recalled the Bone King's wisdom. The Bone King was certainly no great genius, but there were still things worth learning from him.

He quickly picked up the Bone King's trick, presenting his own plan in a roundabout way before asking Eve to evaluate it.

A faint smile appeared on Eve's face:

"Supreme One, this is an excellent plan."

"Especially the way it constructs the adventurers' identities and directs the trail toward the Argland Council State. That is truly ingenious."

"But the overall chain of events is too long, and the process too slow."

"Why don't we use Gate to bring the two sides face-to-face?"

"A Trap Scroll!"

Roy caught on immediately and realized he had been overcomplicating things.

With that hint from Eve, he immediately launched into an enthusiastic explanation:

"Exactly. We only need to find a Trap Thief among the automated guards and make a suitable Trap Scroll."

"The scroll needs to contain Gate and several other magical effects, transporting the people from the Great Tomb of Nazarick straight to the Space Dragon."

"At the same time, we'll use the All-Seeing Eye to observe the Space Dragon. He'll definitely feel threatened."

"Then they'll inevitably fight, and the two sides will become enemies!"

Roy's original plan had been to send dragon-shaped magical beasts to attack the Great Tomb of Nazarick's guards, then leave behind information pointing to the Argland Council State.

That would steer the Great Tomb of Nazarick's investigation toward the Argland Council State.

But it was too inefficient.

The Platinum Dragon Lord was a rather cautious Dragon Lord.

Unless the Great Tomb of Nazarick directly moved to destroy the Argland Council State, he would keep watching.

That would fail to keep the Great Tomb of Nazarick occupied.

But if Gate brought the two sides into close contact, they would have no choice but to fight.

Brilliant!

Still, Roy asked hesitantly:

"Do we have a scroll like that?"

"The Great Tomb of Nazarick's experts won't easily fall for a Trap Scroll."

"Even if they do, they have powerful resistance to traps."

Eve immediately answered:

"Please rest assured, Supreme One. The Great Tomb of Nazarick's talent cannot compare with World City's."

"We have Kallida, the finest scroll-crafting master in the world."

"With her, there will be no problem."

Although Roy had reviewed the settings of over ten thousand NPCs throughout World City, he could not possibly remember every detail.

Fortunately, he could bring out the divine artifact [Wondrous Guild Codex] at any time.

It contained all their information.

With a mere thought from Roy, the relevant character settings appeared in the codex.

Name: Kallida Copper Bell.

Race: Dwarf

Class levels-

Thief: LV15

Trap Thief: LV10

Trap Master: LV5

Enchanter: LV15

Expert: LV10

Artisan: LV5

Scroll Expert: LV10

Scroll Master: LV5

Sage: LV15

High Sage: LV10

Total class levels: 100.

Having heard far too many dwarf jokes, Kallida had written the most extensive Book of Hatred in the world.

This had led her to decide to eliminate all racial bigots.

Unfortunately, she lacked the strength to confront so many racial bigots head-on. The dwarf artisan therefore chose to become a thief, setting traps and exploiting the advantage of her short dwarven stature to annihilate her enemies.

The thief class tree had several branches, including Explorer Thief, Assassin Thief, Trap Thief, and others.

Explorer Thieves primarily handled trap disarming and reconnaissance, advancing to [Stalker].

Assassin Thieves focused on combat, unlocking the [Assassination Master] and [Ninja] classes.

Trap Thieves, meanwhile, specialized in all kinds of mechanisms.

She knew nothing of smithing, but she could combine all sorts of scrolls.

Roy had only just finished reading the female dwarf's information when Kallida sent him a message:

"Your most exalted Majesty, do you require a scroll to be crafted?"

"Yes. A Trap Scroll capable of handling level-100 NPCs and successfully transporting them to the moon."

"Your Majesty, your request is quite simple."

"First, the trap should ideally be built around the three spells [Time Stop], [Gate], and [Perfect Unknowable], supplemented with Time Stop countermeasures, Greater Hesitation, Information Concealment, Information Counterintelligence, and various other spells."

"Completing the entire trap would consume resources worth approximately one billion gold coins."

"Would Your Majesty approve?"

That's expensive.

Crafting scrolls consumed the corresponding resources, and the cost was hardly negligible.

Time Stop was a tenth-tier spell, Perfect Unknowable was ninth-tier, and Gate was eighth-tier, with a whole pile of effects such as Information Counterintelligence added on top.

All those effects had to be inscribed onto a composite scroll, then converted into a trap that an ordinary adventurer could use.

Naturally, it cost even more than a Super-Tier Magic scroll.

A single scroll cost one billion gold coins. If they made ten million, wouldn't World City go bankrupt?

Considering World City's finances, Roy nodded and said:

"For this first experiment, I authorize you to complete the trap at that price."

"But in the future, find ways to conserve resources and reduce production costs. We have great need of scrolls like these."

"The more, the better."

The female dwarf immediately replied:

"Your subordinate will spare no effort to reduce the scroll's price to the absolute minimum."

"But your subordinate has one question."

"Go ahead."

"May I ask, Your Majesty, does the enemy we are targeting have any tendency toward racial discrimination?"

This dwarf master specifically targeted racial discrimination with retaliatory strikes.

Roy answered plainly:

"Of course. They discriminate against the human species, and some of their members call humans insects."

"Oh, those damned racial bigots!"

Fierce fury blazed within the female dwarf:

"Your subordinate will spare no effort to create the perfect trap."

"Go."

Roy was very satisfied with the dwarf thief's performance.

He had brought the vast majority of the game's classes and skills into reality, which meant World City possessed unmatched adaptability.

No matter what enemy they faced, World City could always produce an appropriate countermeasure.

Against absolute numerical superiority, countermeasures were naturally useless.

But reality rarely offered anyone absolute strength. Those with the most options could adapt to their environment and survive.

Having arranged for the Trap Scroll's production, Roy decided to send the Great Tomb of Nazarick a welcoming gift.

Still, he had doubts about how the trap would be set up:

"Eve, this Trap Scroll doesn't seem like something a dragon would possess."

"Wouldn't that expose a flaw in our story?"

Eve quickly answered:

"Supreme One, your subordinate has already made preparations. We can establish a religion hidden in the world's shadows."

"It will be called the Dragon Worship Cult."

"The Dragon Worship Cult's mission is to worship dragons and use scrolls bestowed by a divine dragon to deliver delicious food to it."

"This time, several members of the Dragon Worship Cult were hiding among the Re-Estize Kingdom's adventurers."

"Their original intention was to find powerful living creatures to feed to their divine dragon."

"The people from the Great Tomb of Nazarick became involved and were unfortunately transported to the moon."

"It was truly an unfortunate accident."

"Later, after an investigation, the Great Tomb of Nazarick discovered that one of the Dragon Worship Cult's headquarters was located in the Argland Council State."

After hearing her out, Roy gave his approval:

"Excellent. That's exactly what I had in mind."