Chapter 25: Marketing (1)
Since Yakt Spinner’s resurrection, Leon has informed Ha-ri that he would like to make him a guild member of his guild.
“Then… I’ll have to go through the formalities and register separately! It’s… a bit complicated and will take some time.”
“Alright, go do your business.”
After dismissing Ha-ri, Leon walked down the empty hallway with Yakt Spinner and then──
“Kuluk…!”
-Kick!
Leon choked back the blood that was spitting out of his mouth.
[Are you okay, my knight?]
The feedback came immediately but Leon was relieved to see that the only people looking at him now were the Goddess and the Holy Knight.
“It’s okay.”
Arianna gritted her teeth at Leon’s words.
[After all, appointing a Holy Knight in a land that lacks faith is a bit much]
“It had to be done, don’t you think?”
In the dying world, it was fine because the overwhelming power of the land protected Leon but now the faith had spread to only a tiny minority.
Holy Knights are living saints, agents of the gods and it took a tremendous amount of power to elevate such beings. A drain that even Leon, with his lion’s heart, could not endure.
-Leon?
Leon smiled benevolently, reading the thoughts in the Yakt Spinner’s mind.
“It is not your fault. It is my fault for not being strong enough.”
[How is this your fault, your goddess is lacking]
“Divinity is not to be blamed in any case. Please withhold your words.”
At those words, Arianna was silenced. Their Knight of Glory was faithful, even in times like these. So much so that it was hard to believe he was an atheist who didn’t believe in gods.
[My knight, your goddess is always grateful for your devotion. However, the immorality of your goddess and the gods for not acting on your lack of faith has hurt you]
The goddess felt the need to hasten what was going on in the pantheon within his heart.
[Rest well, trust in your gods and wait]
“Arianna?”
With those words, Arianna returned to the Lionheart King’s Heart, where their pantheon had been evacuated, where she found the gods waiting for her.
* * * *
On the day that Lionheart King Leon turned 121 years old when the world was destroyed by evil and only one knight remained, Leon kept all the fallen Holy Knights alive and evacuated the pantheon into his heart.
To their shame, the gods took refuge in the saint’s body, and for 180 years they watched the Lionhearted King destroy the Evil Ones but the gods did not stand idly by. They bestowed upon him all the strength and power they could give.
They made their one remaining saint bear all the burdens thus all the gods of the pantheon owed Leon a debt they could not repay.
“What is his condition?”
Demera, the god of life and fertility, inquired.
“Not well, my knight has overdone it.”
The God of War and Flame was furious.
“What has become of King Lionheart, who once bore the glory of the gods in all their splendor?”
“Keep your head down, War. He fought for more than two hundred years for the gods, and he won.”
“I know and that is why my teeth are chattering!”
It was not the Lionheart King who was to blame.
He was disgracing himself, for he loved the Lionhearted King, Leon Dragonia, more than anyone else.
The Goddess of Light and Justice looked around at her brothers and sisters, who must harbor similar feelings, and spoke.
“The time has come to break our 180-year silence, my brothers and sisters. I can no longer watch my knight suffer.”
How could they support the Lionheart King and restore the glory of their Pantheon?
He shouldn’t be the only one to bear the burden. The gods themselves had to take an active role in the situation.
“My brothers and sisters, we must support our only saint.”
“No longer the only one.”
It was the God of Iron and Blacksmith who stepped forward. He was a muscular deity, conspicuously small and dwarfed by the others, but as strong as any of them.
The one the dwarves worshiped, their lord, Heto had just mentioned the newest saint.
“That child, Yakt Spinner, has become a new saint.”
“Hmph…A saint who doesn’t believe in divinity.”
“Are you complaining War?”
“Of course not! To become a saint, one must serve the divine and prove oneself worthy, and he’s not qualified for that!”
There were not a few deities who agreed with him, but there was only one reason for their silence.
“The Lionheart King has vouched for him. What could be greater?”
“Greater…!”
At that, War looked dumbfounded and there were murmurs of impatience around him.
“Justice, in your opinion, is Yakt Spinner good enough to be a Holy Knight?”
Arianna spoke up.
“As a pure being that has thwarted the plots of evil for millennia he may lack faith, but he is full of honor and loyalty, Iron.”
“Hmm…! Leon and Justice place too much emphasis on chivalry. Honor is not enough to win a war.”
War rumbled on, and he still seemed dissatisfied.
Arianna turned to Iron, knowing he would eventually honor the new Saint.
“Iron, there must be a reason you mentioned the Yakt Spinner. What are you thinking?”
Iron chuckled at Arianna’s question.
“One hundred and eighty years ago, we lost all the Holy Knights except one, the Grail Guardian, who burned himself to the ground as a vessel for the descent of the divine until the very end.”
“……I know this for a fact.”
“I learned of this world through the life of the only one of us to gain a believer.”
“Is that so?”
“I have seen the world through the eyes of my faithful, and I have discovered an interesting child.”
Demera, Goddess of Life and Fertility shared what she saw with the other gods.
[Brothers, this time we’re in the hot Naju Plains!]
It was a broadcaster. Mr. Park, a farmer who also streams on the Internet.
After experiencing the miracle of blessed rice, he traveled to the Naju Plain, which was said to be just as purified as the Hunan Plain.
“What is that?”
As some of the gods scratched their heads in confusion, Iron explained.
“On this world, the homeworld of the Lionhearted King, they’ve recently developed the medium of internet broadcasting, which is quite an effective way to spread news.”
“You mean to preach to them?”
“That’s right, show them miracles and demonstrate our divinity in action, but that’s not all, the entire world is tied together by a space called the Internet.”
At that, War questioned.
“But why didn’t King Lionheart think of this? He was an inhabitant of this world.”
Iron shook his head and spoke the unfortunate truth.
“It seems that when the Lionheart King died in this world, the Internet was still just beginning to develop dramatically.”
Iron then began to describe a concrete plan.
“We will promote faith in all corners of society with blessings that can be used immediately, including Life (Demera), and the means of promotion will be the internet and news.”
“But what about trial and error? Even Leon’s ambitious newspaper would have taken twenty years to get off the ground.”
“That’s where our new Holy Knight comes in.”
“”?????””
The gods stared in wonder.
* * * *
-Kiruk.
The resurrected Yakt Spinner calculatedly assessed his situation and what he needed to do next.
[Lack of maintenance. Need a centralized information processing unit.]
First of all, his computing power is significantly lower now that he has no backup from the city, and his main program is not running with any certainty but even he, a machine, has his doubts as to why he is able to move when he should be perfectly still.
Why is his computing power, which should be zero, at the level of a sub computer?
The A.I. has analyzed thousands and tens of thousands of cases, but it realizes that this is not a logical explanation. Above all──
[I am Heto, God of Iron and Blacksmithing, and from now on you are my spokesperson and I am your guardian]
A being spoke to him without any communication devices, and in “any language” he could understand since the beings called Hunters had invaded the city.
Phenomena that don’t exist in the program, that are physically impossible, are entered into the data and Yakt Spinner could only come up with words to organize them.
[Divine system at work. Anomaly A into the divine system. Set aside.]
The second problem arises when the machine is faced with a phenomenon it can only conclude, “I’ll just have to let this one slide.”
[Output 13%. Needs immediate repair.]
Since the body has been reduced to a hundredth of its size, the power output has dropped significantly.
Even at this size, the original 13% power output is ridiculous for the machine.
The destroyed body could not be repaired and he hacked into the domestic computer system to find a replacement, but most of the substances on the planet could not replace the original armor, and even if they could, the quantity was insufficient.
It was then that Iron spoke.
[See this, feel this, this is the ‘metal of the gods’ from which your body can be made]
-Bam!
It was invisible but palpable and he could calculate even though he had no data.
The anomaly he felt when I fought Leon, divine power. With this, he could manufacture his own body.
[What do you want me to do?]
With Iron laugh, a ‘revelation’ descended and the strong artificial intelligence quickly began to learn the necessary knowledge.
* * * * *
“Huh, Chief. Look at this!”
“What is it?”
“It’s a video, is this authorized?!”
Hunter Association Chief Kim Jin-soo’s eyes widened when he saw the video shown by his subordinate.
“Naju Plain? YouTubers?”
The video began by showing the vast rice fields of the Naju Plain.
[I’ll show you the benefits of our Manshinjeon Rice, a special crop that only grows in our Naju Plain.]
The narration begins with a voice that sounds too perfect to be a machine, a soothing voice that you can’t help but like.
[You ask, “What makes Manshinjeon rice so special?” This video will answer that question].
Flawless, ultra-high-definition video in 16K, with music that was never heard before.
[Manshinjeon farmers’ mornings start at 5 a.m. every day].
The flowing video is the work of a pro.
[The Manshinjeon farmers begin with a reverent prayer session with the temporary priest, Mr. Choi, and the farmers. Look at that. He’s still praying to Demera, the goddess of life and fertility]
The camera approaches the farmers as they pray toward the altar. Their faces are peaceful and unblemished, more like practicing monks than farmers.
[What makes the crops of the Pantheon of the Ten Thousand Gods so special?]
-The crops blessed by Demera make you healthy and cure diseases just by eating them. My wife had dementia, but now she’s fine!
– I was cured of a long-standing heart condition and can now run 100 meters in 6 seconds!
It’s all nonsense, but as the screen transitions the video shows a sick dog running around after eating rice, a dying cancer patient is cured, etc.
[All of this is possible for one reason: the Pantheon of Ten Thousand Gods served by His Majesty Leon Dragonia, Lionheart King of the Pantheon Guild].
-Demera!
-Hail, Lionheart!
-Long live the other gods of the pantheon!
“”…….””
Eventually, the video was viewed by the Association staff in the Hunter Division but they didn’t speak until a few seconds after the video ended.
“……Who made this?”
“…Isn’t it His Majesty Leon?”
“You think he’s a youtuber?”
“……Did one of the deputies make this?”
It was weird. Why would he make a video like this in the first place, let alone an overly high quality video?
Isn’t it a bad commercial? The comments were similar.
-What is this, a commercial?
-What a waste of talent.
-Isn’t he the survivor that’s hot these days? He captured Cheongju Gate.
-You’re a joke. Even though I’m a foreigner ignorant of the Internet, can I steal this?
-What’s more, it’s been translated into 104 languages. Did some crazy Payne make it?
It was a blatant , and the gods are being invoked.
Even the cheesy commercials they pay for on current affairs programs these days aren’t this blatant and illogical.
Eating rice cures cancer? A goddess blessed the land?
These are the kind of things that would be ridiculed as nonsense.
The problem is that everything was absolutely true.
Eating rice really does cure cancer, and there were Association employees who saw the goddess… and at the center of it all is the Lionheart King from the Otherworld.
In other words, this is Leon’s video.
“Leon, I need to see him right now.”
What was he thinking? As Kim Jin-soo prepared to go out, he called Han Ha-ri.
“What are you thinking?”
………
……
…
In Leon’s penthouse, Yakt Spinner pulled his USB-C converted prosthetic arm away from the laptop.
“Lord Yappy, are you done with my laptop?”
Yakt Spinner nodded as he returned Han Ha-ri’s laptop.
[Operation Marketing Phase One successful. Moving to Phase Two. Network hacking in progress.]
