The NPC Doesn’t Want to Be Number One on the Server

[The main story is complete. Extra chapters are being updated, so it's ready to binge!]

[For completed Western fantasy stories, check out the author's page: A Guide to Surviving in Another World and I Became the Sea King After Summoning Players. Plenty to read, so dig in!]

Blurb:

When Iris woke up, the world around him seemed to have changed.

First, a dense health bar appeared above his pet's head. Then strange names and descriptions appeared on the things around him.

Even his own body had changed, and his current quest was to kill the wild chickens running around at the village entrance.

[Ding! A maximum affinity for white magic has been detected. Your current class is locked as: Priest!]

Iris, a die-hard black magic fan who thought white magic was for weaklings: “...Huh?”

Is it too late to delete my character and start over?

Priests have fragile bodies and low attack power.

To most full-immersion players, they're just weak healers and support characters who can only cast buffs.

Yet a priest named Iris slaughtered his way to the top of every ranking. He purifies with his left hand and casts forbidden spells with his right, and even his kill count on the Abyssal Battlefield is miles ahead of everyone else's.

To uncover the secret behind this player who defies all logic, a reporter from The Oracle Daily has been following Iris for three straight days

On the first day, he blended into a ceremony at the Church of Light and watched the other man accept the Saint's staff, revered and adored by the clergy.

On the second day, he infiltrated the Dark Church and saw the other man crowned with a thorny diadem, warmly surrounded by worshippers.

Clutching two coronation gift envelopes, the reporter broke down. “Are you playing both sides as a double agent?!”

Would anyone believe news this outrageous if he published it??

On the third day, the game's ultimate dungeon, Nightmare Black Tower, opened.

Legend said it was a tower no dragon could fly over, and that a demon capable of destroying the world lay sleeping within.

The reporter followed Iris to the dungeon entrance, excitedly raising his camera as he prepared to cover this thrilling clear.

But the person he was tailing looked straight at him and even waved him over.

“You've been following me for ages. Want to come over to my place?”

The player, bearing titles from both major factions, jingled his keys and opened the Black Tower gate right in front of him.

#Can't broadcast this, can't broadcast that#

#On the possibility of a Saint serving both sides#

#Help, will I really not get silenced for knowing too much?#

#You ask what the dungeon's clear condition is? The boss says to kill 1,000 wild chickens first#

[Before You Read]

[1. Welcome to the world of adventurers!]

[2. The protagonist's world turns into a game; it's not a case of game characters gaining consciousness. The natives are influenced by the world's will and accept adventurers, quests, resurrection, and so on as normal.]

[3. The blurb doesn't represent the entire story. Please leave your brain here before reading, and be sure to take it with you when you leave! (Bows) (Clearing out the recycle bin)]

Next Short Story Coming Soon

For a two-person adventure story, check out I Picked Up a Hero on the author's page→

Meri was one of the many children living on a prison planet, surviving by scavenging each day. One day, she happened to pick up a strange, embarrassingly over-the-top guy.

He claimed to be a hero, but he was so useless he couldn't even light a fire.

“Right, you're a hero. Of course I believe you.” Meri placated him while stripping every last gemstone off his hero's sword.

Then one day, right in front of her, he killed the prison's guardian mech dragon with a single slash.

“Heroes... hic... heroes are supposed to draw their swords to rescue princesses.” He wiped his sword and sobbed so hard he could barely catch his breath.

Meri stared at the bare hilt in his hand. “This might be hard to believe, but... I'm actually a princess.”

...Is it too late to put the gems back?

Simon was a hero from a fantasy continent. He had only just set out from the beginner's village when he fell into a completely unfamiliar interstellar world.

Luckily, he met a princess early on. Though his princess didn't have a pretty dress, had a terribly odd temper, and was even poorer than he was!

But that was fine. A hero was supposed to rescue princesses!

He won back the gems his princess had lost and reclaimed the territory that had been taken from her.

At last, Simon asked his princess what else she wanted.

But the princess, dressed in the emperor's robes, held out her right hand to him as he knelt on one knee

“Simon.”

Even to the very end, Simon never figured out whether his princess was calling his name or answering him.

A Little Scene:

Long, long ago, there was an exiled dragon in the world. Then one day, she found a hero.

Hero: “You're so beautiful. You must be a princess in distress, right?”

The dragon thought it over and graciously accepted the compliment.

And so the greedy dragon raised her very own hero.

We may not be the heroes of a fairy tale, but you're the only one in my story.

Pairing: A princess who isn't like a princess x a hero who isn't like a hero

A dual-protagonist coming-of-age adventure, full of monster fights, romance, and saving the world along the way.

Theme: Work hard and strive forward