CH 60

—[Present day: one floor of a multi-storey building, Shinjuku, Tokyo, Japan].

” Senpai senpai! Have you seen it already? The results of that contest!”

“The contest…? What was it?”

New Games Corporation, in the break area in front of the vending machine at the company. Two men were there. A young man overflowing with fresher spirit, was talking to another tired-looking man called Senpai, who looked restless, like a dog that hasn’t had enough fun.

“Yeah, you were talking to me the other day! We were talking about our game [Let’s Go Crush the Demon King] that was released at the beginning of this year!”

“Ah…I think we talked about something like that before…? So, so what? What about that game?”

The newcomer smirks at the senior employee, who is sipping his canned coffee with disinterest, and says, “You’d be surprised, you know?” With a twinkle in his eye, he says.

“Surprisingly, our director Matsutani’s work, [Let’s Go Crush the Demon King], won this year’s [Damn Game of the Year] award!”

“…What, seriously?”

“I’m serious,.”

New Games Inc. released the game, [Let’s Go Crush the Demon King] in January of this year. The content of the game is a sword-and-sorcery RPG, which is the royal road of fantasy… but the hero of the game, the hero, is a man with a very peculiar character.

He sets out on a journey to exterminate the Demon King in order to recover a kidnapped princess of the kingdom. but he forcibly adds heroines as friends, builds a harem, gets frisky with the middle boss, and finally, after defeating the Demon King, he abandons all the heroines so far and elopes with the princess he saved from the Demon King.

“Well… I thought it was kind of avant-garde, or a game with a really novel scenario, but I didn’t expect it to be a damn game of the year.”

“In a way, a masterpiece that will go down in history? So it’s become…”

“It’s a disgrace, though, being the damnedest game of the year. Director Matsutani was hysterical at his desk just now. As I recall, he said something like, ‘If I had kept the scenario as I had planned it in the beginning, this wouldn’t have happened!’ … or something.”

“Oh, he’s still saying that, isn’t he?”

The senior employee let out a deep sigh filled with dismay as he said this.

“(Still)… what do you mean?”

“Oh, that’s right. You’re a rookie, that’s right, you don’t know.”

To the senior employee who made a meaningful comment, I asked, “Yes, what is it? Please tell me!” The newcomer slinks up to him.

“Well, it’s nothing to hide. Actually… the [prototype] game that was made from Director Matsutani’s very first project proposal was even worse, you know?”

“[Prototype]? What’s that?”

“Prototype means [prototype]. The games we release are divided into two versions: a prototype version for presentation within the company, and a release version that we actually sell.”

“Eh…? Is that so?

“Oh. The first one we’ll make is a prototype version where only the main story part is implemented. When that is completed, we show it to the producer of the company that will fund the game development, and if he gives us the go-ahead to continue development, we use the prototype version of the game as the basis for a full-scale release version of the game.”

“Oh, wow! I didn’t know that!”

The newcomer opens his mouth wide in amazement… then grins again, full of curiosity.

“So… what was the content of that prototype version? If the prototype version and the release version had different content, that means the prototype version was rejected by the producers, right? Was it that bad?”

“That’s right, it was a mess in many ways.”

The senior employee’s expression began to relax. He had been working hard for many years under Director Matsutani, who was a well-connected employee. His mouth gradually became smoother as he was happy to have someone to vent his grievances to.

“First of all, the initial characters were different. I think… yes. A female sorceress called [Agranis] is the first character to join the heroes.”

“Eh? She’s even before [Nina the Thief]?”

“Yes, yes. And this character Agranis… is actually from [Empire], which makes the kingdom where the Demon King’s defeat takes place a virtual enemy country.”

“You mean… [an enemy pretending to be an ally]?”

“That’s what I mean. The Empire heard the news of the attack of the Demon King’s army in the King’s Castle from the spies who had been infiltrated beforehand, and had Agranis sneak into the King’s Castle in order to draw the hero who would eventually be invited by the King to appear into the Empire.”

“I see… that sounds like a pretty interesting scenario, doesn’t it?”

“Only from what we’ve seen so far, yes.”

The senior employee lets out a big sigh of disappointment and continues talking with a grin.

“…But you know what, newcomer? You’re forgetting that the hero of this story is that hero Ark, aren’t you?”

“Ah… you’re starting to get worried?”

“In the middle of the story, the hero who defeated the Demon King is in a good mood, and he’s really angry at Agranis for recruiting him to the Empire. ‘How dare you trick me this far!’ ‘. So he tries to kill Agranis.”

“That’s too short-sighted!”

“Agranis manages to escape from the hands of the hero, but… of course, the Empire is not silent. Even though they originally sent Agranis to steal the hero for themselves, they turned around and said, ‘We cannot forgive you for trying to kill our court magician, who was lent to the hero to defeat the Demon King! Hand over the hero immediately! Or there will be war!” ‘ and press the kingdom with that as a pretext.”

“So now the conflict between the kingdom and the empire is going to start… It’s quite a long story with many different elements.”

To the newcomer, who wrinkled his brow and twisted his head, the senior employee smiled wryly, “Tch-tch-tch… you’re still a bit naive, newcomer.”

“You still don’t understand who Director Matsutani is.”

“Eh? What does that mean…?”

“That person, you know, he’s a shit director who can’t be satisfied with that level of factor!”

“Really? What? What other elements were there?”

The senior employee explains under his breath, and the newcomer excitedly urges him on.

“Okay, listen and be surprised, newcomer. The Empire… in order to prepare a force to fight against the hero, they [summon] otherworldly people.”

“Otherworldly? Does that mean they’re from modern Japan?”

“Yes, yes. It’s the popular “otherworldly transfer”.

“Oh no! Is it possible that the otherworldly person summoned by that will be the next last boss?”

“No, no. They are the middle bosses, there are seven of them.”

“Seven people have been transferred to another world?”

“The last boss is the emperor of the empire. He rides on the Empire’s secret treasure, the magical armour – like the Mobile Suit from Gundam – and attacks them.”

“Ga-dam, Ga-dam, Ga-dam!”

“Hahaha, isn’t that crazy? The world picture is all messed up!”

The two laugh in front of the vending machine in a mysterious tension. What’s going on? Other employees came to take a peek, so the two of them suppressed the volume of their laughter.

“Heeee…..I have a stomach ache from laughing so much.”

“It’s so funny, isn’t it? On the day of the prototype version announcement, the atmosphere was indeed frozen, but… looking back on it now, it’s nothing but a funny story.”

Perhaps tired from talking too much, the senior employee buys a second can of coffee from the vending machine and drinks it.

“Well, that’s why in the release version, we pretended that the character Agranis didn’t exist and made the scenario up to the defeat of the Demon King. The illustration of the elopement with the princess had a completely different meaning in the prototype version… but now the whole empire element is gone. It was just an elopement as it was.”

“I see… I didn’t realise the game had such a history. But the release version also seemed to have a pretty bad scenario, but how did the producer get the go-ahead…?”

“…Director Matsutani’s father is the managing director of the producer’s company.”

“… Acha…”

The newcomer did not ask any further in-depth questions, perhaps realizing that the darkness in society was deeper than he had expected. Instead.

“No, but why I wonder.? When I heard what you were saying, I kind of wanted to play the prototype version of it.”

“Oh, seriously?”

“Maybe it’s just a case of seeing something exciting. But… the prototype version has been modified and made into a release version, so it’s not anywhere to be found anymore, is it?”

“No? Yes, there is?”

“What? There is?”

“Yeah. I think it’s probably still on the [verification server] on the floor above us. I can access it from within our company. If you do it outside of work hours, no one will say anything.”

“Really! I got it!”

“Yes! Oh, my God!”

A young employee, one of the senior employee’s subordinates, suddenly rushed into the break space where the newcomer was posing with gusto.

“Hmm? What’s the matter? Did something go wrong?”

“No, no… [Hayashida-kun] has disappeared!”

“What? Disappeared? What do you mean he’s disappeared?

“Like this… suddenly, there was a purple glow around the verification server seat where Hayashida-kun was sitting, and then, just like that, he was gone! Disappeared in an instant!”

“Huh…?”

The senior employee just tilted his head, as if he didn’t know what was going on. The younger employee seemed to be very impatient that his explanation was not conveyed correctly, for some reason. As the explanation became more and more of a ramble, the senior employee said, “Let’s calm down for a moment.”

“Um, in the first place, who is this Hayashida-kun? ”

“Huh? You’ve never met him before?”

“No, I haven’t.”

In response to the newcomer’s question, the senior employee forced the young employee to sit on the sofa in the break space to calm him down, bought him some water and handed it to him, then pointed to the ceiling.

“He’s always on the floor above us. You know the room where they keep the verification servers and the back servers?”

“Oh, I’ve never been there. Come to think of it.”

“Then I guess you haven’t met. Hayashida-kun is a part-time kid, and is a game debugger… in other words, he tests the game to see if it runs properly. He’s been working with us since last year, when we were testing the prototype version of [Let’s Go Crush the Demon King], so he’s definitely more senior than the current newcomers.”

“Really! Then I have to go say hello!”

When the newcomer is making fun of him like that…

“Daaaaaaaaaa!”

The young employee, who had calmed down a little after drinking some water, stands up again.

“That Hayashida-kun has disappeared!”

“Here, calm down first.”

The senior staff member admonished him, and the young employee sat down again… but then he began to hold his head in his hands.

“I don’t know what it means either… but he really disappeared… in an instant… like he was teleporting somewhere…”

“OK, OK… so what happened to the other people on the floor above you?”

“No, it was just me and Hayashida-kun until just now…”

“So you’re saying there were no other witnesses?”

“Yes…”

The senior employee looked up at the ceiling, as if thinking about something.

“You’re tired, aren’t you? Why don’t you go home early today?”

He told the younger employee.

“No way! Don’t you believe me?

“No, I don’t believe you… you must have misunderstood. He’ll come back sooner or later.”

“I don’t think so!”

The young employee exclaims and runs out of the break space.

“…What was that all about?”

“….I don’t know?”

The senior employee and the newcomer both tilted their heads. Later, the young employee’s words would be put away as a hallucination ’caused by fatigue from working too hard’, however.

Hayashida Mamoru. He had been working part-time at New Games for one year and nine months, and had been involved in the production of the prototype version of [Let’s Go Crush the Demon King]. but on this day, he disappeared. He never returned to this company again.