Pride shrugged her shoulders lightly and put away the wine bottles and glasses while Evan picked up his pen once more and turned his attention back to the map on his desk.
"Back to the 'Lizard Lord Outbreak'.
It's supposed to begin with a Natural Dungeon Break that happens when the Lizard Lord reaches level 700.
It would emerge from its dungeons with an army of level 500 Lizardmen, and other reptilian monsters, murdering millions of people and adventurers in Lacertilia.
And then it would grow strong enough to defeat and kill the Living Legend who would be the first responder sent by the Beast Kingdom.
That would enable it to grow even stronger."
Hearing Evan's words, Pride tilted her head to the side and tapped on the beast kingdom's location on the map before asking.
"This 'Beast Kingdom'. It's the home country of one of this world's transcendents, is it not?
Would a Legendary re-, Level under them really lose in a fight to a monster that just reached that level?"
"No, they would not. If the Lizard Lord is the only Legendary they would be fighting."
"You mean there is one more?"
"Yes. One that the Beast Kingdom would not be aware of until it's too late."
Hearing this, Pride nodded to herself as it made sense for the Beast Kingdom's 'Living Legend' to lose if they were fighting against two others on their level.
'And from the way he's talking, the second one is bound to be stronger than the Lizard Lord.'
"Anyway, this second Legendary would only present there because of the Demonic Hand's intervention.
They're a 'Hidden Boss' you would not know about until the end."
"A 'Hidden Boss'? You really do like using Video Game terminologies.
Anyway, is that all the Demonic Hand is planning to do?"
"No.
They would also be the reason why the Lizard Lord would be able to murder everything in Lacertilia that's Level 500 and below."
Using light magic once more, Evan generated a magic circle projection in front of Pride, allowing the high demon to study the magic circle for a few seconds.
And just as he expected, she instantly figured out what kind of spell it was.
"This…it's similar to that thing you used on the Eighth Finger. That World Magic spell I helped you imitate."
"Indeed, because It is a World Magic spell circle."
"And the Demonic Hand has this World Magic spell in their arsenal…"
"Indeed, they do."
Pride then proceeded to ask Evan about a few other details regarding the World Magic spell and Evan told her what she wanted to know.
"As of now, said Lizard Lord and the 'Hidden Boss' the Demonic Hand added into the fray are still Grandmaster level existences.
And thanks to Artemisia, the Lizard Lord would be even weaker than it's supposed to be, making it easier for them to be defeated."
Evan drew a circle around Lacertilia on the map, before poking it with his pen and continuing.
"The goal is for us to become Grandmaster level existences by the time the dungeon breaks, so we have enough power to take out the Lizard Lord, along with a good chunk of its army, and kill the Hidden Boss.
Oh, and we're all gonna do this where people can see us doing it. Adventurers AND civilians.
It's gonna boost our reputation that way."
"You're really caring a lot about your reputation these days…"
The boy leaned back onto the chair and cracked his neck lightly as he replied.
"To be honest, I did not really care that much about it at first. Not like I did not know its importance, but I underestimated its importance.
But over the past year, I have been seeing more and more of the importance of having a 'Reputation'.
Let's take a look at the Undead incident.
When Dominik's Undead Dragon showed up, Morale plunged down to rock bottom. But the instant I shouted that the 'Sword Saint' Luke was there, didn't you see how morale instantly went sky-high?
Because of his reputation as a powerful existence, as the 'Sword Saint' of the Alpha Continent."
Hearing Evan's reply, Pride nodded as she had also witnessed how the combatants who were shaking in their boots because of the Undead Dragon's 'Dragon Fear', were somehow able to pick their weapons back up simply because of the knowledge that Luke was present.
"That man, Luke.
Just how strong is he really?
His concealment must be really strong if even I cannot discern his true level."
"Well… You've obviously realised it but Luke is clearly no grandmaster-level existence.
However, he's keeping his true existence level hidden for a reason. So that no one would try to enforce the rules made by 'The Five' that apply to existences on his true level.
Basically, he's cheating the system they created."
"Rules? What rules?"
Evan gave Pride a quick rundown of the Rules that the transcendents of Aidos had made a few centuries ago and upon hearing them, the High Demon understood the reason for Luke's actions.
"The GEE also does something similar. That way they always keep the person who holds the 'First Star' title to always be an existence below the Legendary Level."
"I see.
Still…. it's been a very long while but I still can't get used to calling realms of existences, 'Levels'. They aren't called 'Existence Levels' but 'Existence Realms' in my home world."
"Realms?"
"yep.
Even the System over there displayed them as Realms of Existences.
The Legendary Realm, Sovereign Realm, Transcendent Realm, D-Hmm?"
Just before Pride called out the name of the realm above transcendence, she turned her gaze towards the door, having sensed something.
Right after, the door opened up and Eliza walked into the room with Kuro in her arms.
"Sup. Amy told me you guys were here. What're you up to?"
"We're having a little strategy meeting? We planned to relay everything to you guys later but since you're here, you might as well join us."
"Okay."
Eliza shrugged lightly and dropped Kuro to the ground before moving over to where Evan was, jumping onto his lap and leaning on his chest while her legs rested on the chair's armrests.
"Can you guys NOT do this now?"
"Do what?"
Seeing the impish smile on Evan's face as he asked the question, Pride clicked her tongue and let out a light sigh before saying.
"You know what I'm talking about. Now let's get back to business."
On Pride's insistence, Evan stopped messing around and continued relaying his plans to them, informing them about dungeons he planned to go to, and hidden pieces he planned to acquire, some of which he would keep for himself and others he was going to either give to the Empire or sell them off.
He told them about cities he planned to visit and a few other things, with Pride and Eliza occasionally tossing in their own opinions and sometimes objecting to some of his plans and the game's side quests he wanted to go on.
Eventually, Amy and Kayla who had finally been freed from the clutches of Patricia and the other High noble ladies in their Saloon returned and joined the discussion, along with Milena who materialized her physical body and Greed who came over after returning from scamming unfortunate adventurers as always.
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