Before Demiurge began explaining, Ainz prepared to sit down.
Only then did he notice that the seat Demiurge had prepared for him was made from a pile of bones.
Admittedly, it was large enough for his current body, and the materials appeared exceptionally valuable.
It certainly suited the image of someone who might one day rule over the dead.
As a temporary throne, there was really nothing to criticize.
However, deep down, Ainz still considered himself human.
No matter how strongly his undead body influenced him, he still thought of himself as a human first.
And only after that, an undead being.
Unfortunately, he did not seem to have much choice.
Demiurge was staring at him with barely concealed excitement, clearly awaiting his approval of the throne.
Ainz could hardly remain standing forever.
As the one presiding over the meeting, Demiurge would not begin explaining the plan until Ainz had formally taken his seat.
So Ainz steeled himself.
He tried to convince himself that the thing beneath him was merely another piece of equipment and that he should not care too much about its appearance or what it was made from.
Then he sat down and adjusted his robe with as much dignity as he could manage.
It felt strange.
If he were being truthful, he would much rather have had a soft chair like Lucien’s.
That one looked far more comfortable.
But this was hardly the right situation to bring that up.
“You prepared both of these seats, didn’t you?
You put a great deal of thought into this.
Go ahead and begin.” “I am deeply grateful for your approval!” Demiurge’s breath almost seemed hot with excitement.
He forcibly suppressed his nerves and began explaining the plan in detail.
First, Nazarick and Lucien Vale could be regarded as an unbreakable alliance.
Nazarick could provide a vast number of elite combatants, while Ainz himself was capable of creating an effectively inexhaustible supply of undead soldiers.
Those soldiers were powerful, required no provisions during wartime, and carried no risk of betrayal or surrender.
Kill.
Kill.
Ainz had already conducted preliminary tests on lower-tier undead such as Death Knights and Death Warriors.
In this world, their combat ability far exceeded that of ordinary elite human cavalry or infantry.
If hidden mid-level or high-level powers attempted to interfere, Nazarick’s stronger members would be capable of handling the overwhelming majority of them.
As for beings whose strength approached that of the Floor Guardians, Demiurge, influenced by Ainz’s caution, now firmly believed such individuals might exist.
He had prepared two possible ways to deal with them.
The first was recruitment.
They could be offered greater wealth and higher status than they possessed under their current rulers, weakening their existing loyalties.
Depending on the circumstances, Nazarick could then either genuinely bring them into the fold or lure them somewhere isolated and eliminate them.
The second option was direct suppression through force.
Combat-oriented Guardians would engage the enemy openly, while Lucien and Ainz remained concealed nearby.
They would observe the opponent, analyze their weaknesses, and strike at the perfect moment for a decisive kill.
Used together, those two methods would be enough to crush the ambitions of almost anyone who attempted to contend for supremacy.
“Then have you considered beings who exist far beyond the normal scale?” Lucien finally raised the question that had concerned him most since his conversation with Ainz.
“If some higher-order existence intervenes and tries to stop us, what do we do when the difference in strength is simply impossible to overcome?” That was also one of Ainz’s greatest concerns.
If the enemy were merely someone on their own level, or even a handful of hostile players, the situation would actually be manageable.
Ainz could cripple them with Super-Tier Magic, then let Lucien move in to finish them off.
Against two top-tier combatants attacking in succession, survival would be extraordinarily difficult.
Even possessing an ordinary World Item would not necessarily change that.
But truly abnormal native entities would be different.
An unknown Demon King, a player who had somehow exceeded the level one hundred limit, or even one of the gods spoken of in legend.
Those possibilities could not be treated the same way.
“As expected of you, my lords.
Your caution is truly without equal.
You refuse to overlook even the smallest possible danger.
I can only admire such thoroughness!” “To tell the truth, this was the one point I had been unable to resolve before today.” “However, I believed that was simply because my own intellect was insufficient to comprehend the full scale of Lord Ainz’s magnificent design.” “But today, I finally understood!” “Please allow me to offer my humble conclusion.” “Assuming that such monstrous beings truly exist, which I believe is already unlikely, then they must themselves be restrained by some kind of limitation.” “Either that, or beings at that level simply do not interfere in conflicts and changes of rulership taking place beneath them.” “The reason is simple.” “If they possessed both the ability and the willingness to control such matters directly, then they would already have ruled this world from the very beginning.” “Yet based on everything we have observed so far, that is clearly not the case.” “I also considered another possibility.” “Perhaps beings who might be called gods do not permit outsiders to interfere too heavily with this world, or perhaps they refuse to allow any single race to dominate the entire world.” “If Nazarick alone attempted to seize absolute supremacy, such an intervention might indeed occur.” “But that danger has now been greatly reduced because of Lord Lucien’s presence.” “We would not be carrying out unreasonable extermination of other races.” “Instead, we would simply separate the lands of humanity, or more broadly, the living, from the territories of the undead.” “Compared with how this world already functions, we would merely be consolidating its existing nations and placing them beneath rulers powerful enough to command them all.” “Even if the beings who established the laws of this world truly exist, a struggle for political supremacy of that kind should still fall within acceptable bounds!” Demiurge finished his explanation with obvious enthusiasm.
Both men seated opposite him fell into thought.
From a purely logical standpoint, there was not much wrong with his reasoning.
Of course, if gods truly existed, there was no guarantee they would behave logically.
They might simply dislike Lucien and Ainz, appear without warning, and beat them into the ground for no reason beyond personal preference.
But that possibility was absurdly impossible to account for.
More importantly, even if they followed Demiurge’s proposal, they were hardly going to begin by declaring war on the entire world.
A plan on this scale would inevitably require slow development.
They would expand gradually, consolidating their position one step at a time.
If some godlike entity eventually intervened, they could simply reassess the situation then.
However, Lucien still had another question to consider.
There was no doubt that he had little desire to return to Earth.
Back there, he had possessed neither status nor influence.
Most of his life had been spent immersed in games.
Now YGGDRASIL itself was gone.
If he returned, even making a living might become a problem.
So…
Did he actually want to become the ruler of humanity?
Or perhaps even the ruler of all living beings?
Demiurge had suddenly placed that possibility in front of him only moments ago.
Now Lucien needed to examine his own desires seriously.
As he considered it, images of what the world might look like after everything succeeded began appearing in his mind.
The thought produced a strange, almost irresistible excitement.
It was as though a soft feather were brushing repeatedly across his heart, leaving an unbearable itch behind.
Yes…
If someone genuinely possessed the power to reshape the world, how many people could truly look at that temptation and reject it like some selfless saint?
“So, according to your plan, my role is to assassinate exceptional enemies whenever they appear?” “Not entirely, Lord Lucien.” “Occasional assassinations would certainly be important.” “But your truly irreplaceable role would be ensuring that the outside world knows the King of Assassins genuinely exists.” “Your reputation alone would make potential enemies afraid to act and make others far more willing to accept our terms.” “That is the position only you can fill.” (To be continued.)