Chapter 1 - Game over, and over

A succubus had pounced on me.

A succubus. A dream demon, as the name in Chinese characters means. A demon that steals men's vitality.

“Oh, please hold still.”

A succubus approaches her prey in the form of his ideal woman. Once he falls under her spell, he dreams of spending the night in bed with her. The dream is as blissful as paradise, but by then, they say, he has already surrendered his life to the demon.

You pay money for a lucky dream of pigs. You pay with your life for a dream of a demon.

You die in your sleep.

With a smile on your face.

“Struggling won't do you any good. You're already under my spell,” the demon said.

“Well? You can't move a muscle, can you?”

She brought her flushed face close to my ear and whispered.

She was too close for any man to resist. And the contrast between her being a demon and speaking so politely packed quite a punch.

“... Shall I take these off?”

As she asked, the hand around my waist slipped down toward the hem of my clothes. It was a question, but she didn't sound as if she were asking permission. If anything, her voice was closer to a plea.

“You filthy demon bitch! Get your hands off me!”

I thrashed in resistance, but...

“Ah, I like that. Please do it some more.”

The hungry succubus was no pushover. In fact, she looked as if she were enjoying herself.

“You think I'd fall to a bitch like you?”

“That's what they all say. Shall we see how long you last?”

The succubus smiled sweetly and reached for my belt.

“O God, grant me Your blessing and grace.”

To drive out a demon, you were supposed to borrow power from the other side. I prayed, desperately twisting my entire body.

“I'm sorry to interrupt your efforts, but it isn't working at all. You're still stiff, aren't you? Could your heart already be tainted? Could you perhaps be looking forward to this?”

“O God, grant me the strength to overcome these trials and tribulations.”

“Give up. They say the Goddess won't answer the prayers of a man who's lost his heart to a succubus. Here, look. You're already...”

BANG!

Someone kicked the door open and burst into the room, cutting through the heated atmosphere as if to declare that things had gone far enough.

Silver armor engraved with an upright cross.

It was a paladin of the Church.

“Hold on just a little longer! I'll save you!”

SHING!

The paladin drew his sword without hesitation. Beheading the succubus was just as clean, as though it were all one continuous motion.

SLASH!

He severed her head in an instant, sending black blood spattering everywhere. Her pretty head rolled across the floor. Even the shape of her skull was lovely, so it rolled beautifully.

“Fortunately, it seems I wasn't too late.”

Breathing hard, the paladin sheathed his sword and held out a hand.

I clasped it without thinking, but at that very moment, I realized.

“Ah.”

Right. I was supposed to be unable to move.

“Weren't you... under a charm spell?”

I'd made a mistake. I'd forgotten the “situation” I was in and taken his hand, and now the paladin was giving me a suspicious look.

“I was, but you killed the succubus, so the spell wore—”

“There are candles burning all over the place.”

Ignoring me, he surveyed the room.

“Would a starving succubus really have the leisure to light crimson candles to create an unholy atmosphere?”

He blew out a candle with a long breath.

The room grew darker. The shadows in his deep-set eye sockets deepened, casting an eerie shade over his face.

“And there's a greatsword and armor lying about. They look as if someone hastily tossed them aside like so much baggage.”

His ash-gray eyes swept the room.

“Did you ever intend to slay her in the first place?”

He punctuated his question with a deep sigh.

“Commander.”

001

“I've been wronged!”

Bound in chains, I dangled from the chapel ceiling. My body even tipped this way and that whenever I shifted my weight. I felt like a chandelier.

“Your Grace, surely no one succeeds every time. I tried to slay her, but she proved an unexpectedly formidable opponent. That's all.”

I capped off my defense with a friendly smile.

“Pretending to be under a charm spell? Absolutely not.”

“Daywin.”

The monastery's bishop, meanwhile, narrowed his eyes and glared at me in displeasure.

“Daywin, are you even aware that you're the commander of a knightly order?”

“Well... all the previous commanders died. My turn simply came around.”

“You're only ever humble at times like this. You expect me to believe the commander was bested by such a... low-grade specimen?”

“Low-grade? She was absolutely top-tier. Exactly my type.”

“I'm saying there's no way you fell under a low-grade demon's low-grade spell!”

The bishop's shout reverberated through the chapel.

Tch. No talking my way out of this.

“She was a succubus known as the Paladin Hunter. No ordinary demon.”

“Pecker Hunter or whatever she was, she was still a low-grade demon.”

“Paladin Hunter, not Pecker Hunter.”

“Daywin! That doesn't matter!”

Didn't it...? Those meant very different things.

“Our undying enemies are swarming us, and our commander behaves like this...”

“There's no hope left.”

“What?”

At my uncharacteristically serious tone, the bishop looked at me in disbelief.

“I'm talking about those things. There's no way to stop them anymore. No matter how often we kill them, they come back to life. Great nations boasting vastly superior military might have been swept away one after another. The map will have to be redrawn. If anyone's left alive to draw it.”

The bishop remained silent, apparently unable to find a rebuttal.

“The Sword Saint, humanity's supposed hope, died a meaningless death. Even the allied nations' elite forces were annihilated. My brothers in the order fell before my eyes, and now, fewer than a hundred of us remain.”

I gently closed my eyes, and old memories flickered before me. A past I could escape only through death.

“I'll say it again. There's no hope left.”

“No. As long as the Goddess watches over us, there is hope.”

Well, I'd known he'd say that. But I'd been an atheist back in Korea. Invoking another world's goddess wasn't going to give me courage I didn't have.

Korea.

It had been so long since I'd thought of home that I couldn't even remember the last time.

I'd simply opened my eyes to find myself the youngest son of a count. Strangely, the language and way of life here were already in my head. Reincarnation was convenient in all sorts of ways, I'd thought.

I'd lived in this world of magic and monsters, this other world. Now I'd reached the end of it.

I'd never intended to become a paladin. My body simply possessed an absurd amount of divine power. It wasn't because I worshipped some sham goddess.

If my family hadn't been wiped out in the first place, I'd never have fled to the paladin order. I'd have lived comfortably as a count's third son. Not that it mattered now.

BANG!

The door flew open as I was lost in thought.

“Your Grace!”

It was the paladin who'd kicked in the door last time. If the order had a designated door-opening soldier, it would definitely be him. His name was Chris.

“You must evacuate immediately!” Chris shouted urgently.

“Evacuate?”

“Right now—”

Before Chris could finish...

CRUNCH!

Part of the chapel roof vanished. As easily as peeling a layer off a crêpe cake, the stone building crumbled.

The presence was right behind my back. Hanging from the ceiling, I could feel every sound and vibration all too clearly.

Or... it had been aiming for me all along and missed because my body had tilted.

GRRRR.

An enormous claw appeared through the torn roof. Then a rotting face thrust itself in, as if demanding to be seen.

The horns that had once brushed the clouds had snapped off helplessly. The eyes that had somehow contained its overflowing mana had lost their spark. Yet its overwhelming presence remained.

A dragon.

The plague had brought even a being of mystery back to life.

The continent's Sword Saint, the allied nations' elite troops, the paladins who'd led me, and the paladins who'd followed me—all had been overwhelmed and killed by the undead.

Yes. My turn had simply come around.

“Whew.”

I exhaled slowly and drew up my divine power.

I shattered the chains coiled around me like vines in a single burst.

CRACK!

Metal fragments fell in dozens of pieces. Freed from the ceiling, I landed amid the shower of broken chains.

“Chris, bring me my sword.”

“Would you please stop leaving it lying around!”

WHOOSH!

Chris twisted his whole body and hurled the massive greatsword. What was he complaining about? He'd brought it to give it back to me anyway.

I caught the greatsword in both hands and pointed it toward the roof. Aiming at the zombie dragon's rot-stinking face, I wrapped the blade in divine power.

HUMMM.

The cold greatsword took on a color as warm as sunlight.

“Chris, about the succubus.”

“Are you finally going to admit it?”

Chris drew his sword beside me. Far from fleeing with the bishop, he actually stepped a pace ahead of me.

“As you know, when a succubus gets you, your body and mind go numb, and you flounder until you die. You die unable to tell dream from reality. No pain. No resentment.”

“Yes, which is why a succubus's spell is the most humiliating thing a paladin can—”

“It was the easiest way to die.”

Of all the choices available to me now, it had been the easiest way to die. If I was doomed to die in the end anyway, I wanted at least to decide how. I didn't want my own death to be a miserable one.

“Sorry for sticking my nose in, Commander.”

Chris gave a sarcastic little chuckle.

“No need to apologize. It failed anyway. Just as His Grace said...”

I raised both arms high. Ready to unleash its sword aura, the greatsword hummed and trembled as though about to burst.

“Turns out a low-grade demon's low-grade spell doesn't work on me.”

From high to low, I swung the greatsword.

BOOOOM!

A beam of intensely concentrated light slammed into the ruined roof.

And that was the first time.

──!

Absurdly enough, a message appeared before my eyes.

[Ending (30/31) Unlocked]

[Paradise]

『Come to think of it, Laward had a mission to save the world, but he forgot about that long ago.

He was given the chance to marry no fewer than five beautiful girls.

The end of the world didn't even register.』

Laward? Beautiful girls?

What the...

『Laward decided to spend the little time remaining before the end without regrets.

Someone else would surely make the noble sacrifices.

The paladin order, so effective against the undead, was probably hard at work.

Rather than meddling without knowing what we're doing, let's leave it to the professionals.

Laward married all five beautiful girls in a single ceremony and enjoyed the rest of his life steeped in pleasure.

He met his end without regrets.

But the world was destroyed.』

“...”

My heart feels as though it's sinking. The words before my eyes, that name, burrow deep into my mind.

I remembered.

Five years ago.

Laward was the protagonist of a game I'd played before coming to this world. A dating sim featuring beautiful girls, made by a junior from my university in their club.

A game. A dating sim, at that.

... This wasn't another world.

This damned world had saved the most important information for last. Only after five years had passed. Only when destruction was upon us.

One thing became clearer than anything else.

Game over.

Returning to the title screen.

Restarting from the first save point.

I was just an extra.

“Haaagh!”

I opened my eyes and sucked in a ragged breath. It felt like waking from a nightmare. There was a strange sensation of my racing heartbeat echoing inside my skull.

BANG!

I must have been quite loud, because someone flung the door open and rushed inside.

“What's wrong?”

This was the third time an innocent door had been abused. This time, though, it wasn't Chris, our designated door-opening soldier.

“Young master! Are you all right?”

The family butler approached, concern written across his face.

Ah. Those gray hairs I'd missed. Those familiar smile lines.

I saw a familiar ceiling. I could feel the sunlight filtering through the window and smell old books. Like a passing whiff of a fragrance I'd used long ago, the scent pulled old memories to the surface of its own accord. Gradually, it calmed me.

My room. My home. The past, when life had been peaceful enough to be boring.

“... I'm fine.”

So this was what it meant by restarting from the first save point. I'd returned to five years ago, when I'd first come to this world.

Before the world ended. Before I became a paladin. Before my family was wiped out.

All right. Time to think. About this world. And about that game.

The message window had clearly said an “ending” had been unlocked. Ending number thirty, in which the world was destroyed.

Endings.

Of the thirty-one endings, only one had the protagonist save the world: Laward rejected every heroine and set out to stop the apocalypse.

It was a hidden ending triggered only by overturning the usual goal of a dating sim: romance. An ending that left five women crying at once.

[“Ha, haha! I see. So it was... one-sided. It's okay. It's okay. Don't worry about it! I'm really... fine!”]

[“Why are you suddenly acting like this? Didn't you feel the same way about me? Y-you've found someone else, haven't you? Am I just... in your way?”]

[“How impudent. You thought rejecting me now would make me more interested in you, didn't you? A good strategy, but the wrong answer. Ha... I'll give you one more chance.”]

[“Funny. Even after hearing that, I still want to have you. Or you can have me. Yes, it's funny. Every word, every action, every expression, every gesture I showed you—I regret them all. I'd never given it any thought before, but now I suddenly do. I wish I'd been a little prettier.”]

[“... Why? Who do you think is right for you, then? Is there someone prettier and kinder than me? Or is it just that I'm... No. I'll just do better. All right?”]

I recalled the scene where the heroines' illustrations appeared one after another. They looked so fragile, so forlorn. He'd only told them he was leaving, but they looked as though their world had collapsed. Ironically, it was the only ending in which the world didn't collapse.

As I continued thinking about the endings, I realized something. What I had to do was simple and straightforward.

I had to recreate the hidden ending. I had to interfere before the protagonist got together with the heroines.

I would challenge the protagonist.

I would destroy his harem.

As a paladin stationed on the frontier, I'd never had a chance to meet the protagonist and his companions, whose story mainly took place at the academy. Besides, before becoming a paladin, I hadn't even left the house. Far from exploring this new world, I'd locked my door.

All I had to do was breathe in my room, and I could enjoy fine liquor and food to my heart's content. Servants waited on me hand and foot, and no matter how much money I spent, it never ran out. There was no reason to go adventuring.

Better safe than adventurous. Safety first.

Foolishly, I'd thought that life of indulgence would last forever. Now I had the experience of living all the way to the end of the world. I had a chance to correct my mistakes.

Rather than becoming a paladin myself, having the protagonist, Laward, save this damned world—this world that would soon be destroyed—would be...

“Wait a minute.”

A paladin?

All I had to do was stop the protagonist and the heroines from falling in love. And I knew... a vocation in which love was a sin. I knew it very well.

Why not make the protagonist a paladin?

If he became a devout paladin, he'd naturally abandon all the heroines. Paladins had to remain chaste, after all.

“That's it.”

That was the only way. Make Laward a paladin.

The more I thought about it, the more a deeply buried rage surged up. Paladins had to remain chaste. They had to preserve their “first time” until the very end. And I had been one of those paladins.

I'd lived without so much as holding a woman's hand, trying to stop the apocalypse, and what?

Pleasure? A harem?

You rotten bastard...

Let's see how you like it.

I'll make sure you grow old and die single.