No game no life vol 10, p.1
No Game No Life, Vol. 10, page 1
Copyright
NO GAME NO LIFE, Volume 10
YUU KAMIYA
Translation by Daniel Komen
Cover art by Yuu Kamiya
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
NO GAME NO LIFE Volume.10
©Yuu Kamiya 2018
First published in Japan in 2018 by KADOKAWA CORPORATION, Tokyo.
English translation rights arranged with KADOKAWA CORPORATION, Tokyo, through Tuttle-Mori Agency, Inc., Tokyo.
English translation © 2020 by Yen Press, LLC
Yen Press, LLC supports the right to free expression and the value of copyright. The purpose of copyright is to encourage writers and artists to produce the creative works that enrich our culture.
The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book without permission is a theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like permission to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), please contact the publisher. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.
Yen On
150 West 30th Street, 19th Floor
New York, NY 10001
Visit us at yenpress.com
facebook.com/yenpress
twitter.com/yenpress
yenpress.tumblr.com
instagram.com/yenpress
First Yen On Edition: February 2020
Yen On is an imprint of Yen Press, LLC.
The Yen On name and logo are trademarks of Yen Press, LLC.
The publisher is not responsible for websites (or their content) that are not owned by the publisher.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Kamiya, Yu, 1984– author, illustrator. | Komen, Daniel, translator.
Title: No game no life / Yuu Kamiya, translation by Daniel Komen.
Other titles: No gemu no raifu. English
Description: First Yen On edition. | New York, NY : Yen ON, 2015–
Identifiers: LCCN 2015041321 | ISBN 9780316383110 (v. 1 : pbk.) | ISBN 9780316385176 (v. 2 : pbk.) | ISBN 9780316385190 (v. 3 : pbk.) | ISBN 9780316385213 (v. 4 : pbk.) | ISBN 9780316385237 (v. 5 : pbk.) | ISBN 9780316385268 (v. 6 : pbk.) | ISBN 9780316316439 (v. 7 : pbk.) | ISBN 9780316502665 (v. 8 : pbk.) | ISBN 9780316471343 (v. 9 : pbk.) | ISBN 9781975386788 (v. 10 : pbk.)
Subjects: | BISAC: FICTION / Fantasy / General. | GSAFD: Fantasy fiction.
Classification: LCC PL832.A58645 N6 2015 | DDC 895.63/6—dc23
LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015041321
ISBNs: 978-1-9753-8678-8 (paperback)
978-1-9753-8679-5 (ebook)
E3-20200128-JV-NF-ORI
Contents
Cover
Insert
Title Page
Copyright
Re:Start
Chapter 1: Another Age
Chapter 2: Silent Line
Chapter 3: Formula Front
Chapter 4: Verdict Day
Chapter 5: For Answer
Crash/END
Afterword
Yen Newsletter
Download all your Fav Light Novels from Just Light Novels
Re:Start
This is the story
of an empty puppet and a flightless white bird
who joined hands and looked up at the sky.
The sky told them they could go anywhere.
But the sky would not let them go anywhere.
I am the sky. The empty sky. Your sky.
I promise.
I will be your sky. I will let you fly.
I will take you anywhere you want to go.
So said the puppet, admiring the white bird.
In the end, the puppet could not keep that promise.
They ran from it and everything else.
In the western region on the continent of Lucia—the former Kingdom of Elkia—Immanity had lost everything except for a single city in the last country they still controlled. But by now that was a distant memory. In a stunning recovery of their territory, they’d brought the Eastern Union, Oceand, and Avant Heim into a three-country, six-race commonwealth, a great power that had to be acknowledged. By now, however, that was yesterday’s news. Now word had spread that the monarch who had led this staggering advance had suddenly disappeared.
It’s all too familiar in history what happens when a country loses its wise king, its great leader. The administration stalls. Factions fight for power. Chaos reigns. And the country splits. Sooner or later, the great power declines…until, inevitably, it is said to have fallen…
…But that’s assuming the existence of a wise king or a great leader. When it’s a monarch who is neither wise nor great, then that’s a different story. For instance, a slacker king who dumps all the work on someone else. Or a shut-in leader who undermines the dignity of the state. A monarch who bets the Race Piece as if it was nothing and picks fights with higher races under policies a half step away from a reign of terror. If such a tyrant disappeared, that would be a completely different story. And that’s the tale of the Kingdom of Elkia—oh, sorry. The Republican Dukedom of Elkia.
It was as peaceful as could be. More stable than before if anything.
…With some exceptions. For example:
“…Are you listening? You have three choices.”
For instance, on the main road at a rest stop far northwest of the capital.
“You give me back my boobs, you cough up where you’re getting the drugs, or you die!! Do you understand?!”
Black-haired and flat-chested, she screamed with tears in her eyes in front of the open-air stall. Such a happy and lively town it was, filled with the hustle and bustle of merchants enjoying the boom in trade…
“Chlammy? Why, I told you, that drug was nothing more than barongrass extraaact.”
Next to young Chlammy Zell of the modest bosom stood Fiel Nirvalen of the ample bounty. The Elven Fiel gently admonished her friend.
“Barongrass is a spiritually active herb that merely inflates the breasts with air for a short period of tiiime.”
“That’s why I’m investigating this spurious substance!! Fi, can you understand how I feel?!”
Chlammy was furious. She wept profusely in her yearning to pummel the bastards responsible for this outrage against all that was right and proper. She, after all, had never been blessed when it came to matters of the chest. She had lived her life looking down at a wall that could never be surmounted, doing her best to cushion the blow with pads. But in her heart, not far from the surface, she knew more profoundly than anyone the greatness of voluminous breasts.
Three weeks earlier, the king and queen had abruptly gone missing. She and Fiel had searched for them high and low, across every plain and every mountain. Even Elven magic proved of no use to trace their whereabouts. Then, the previous night, they’d arrived here, and Chlammy had found this. It took no time for her to empty her purse.
Hastily she clutched the bottle labeled BOSOM ENHANCER. With her pinky out, without a second of hesitation, she gulped down the vial with a grand gesture.
……
It did not take long to hunt down the stall’s supplier. It was a little shop on the corner of the thoroughfare, and indeed it seemed to be doing brisk business. The line and the crowd were so massive that they could hardly even get close. Chlammy snickered as she made out what it said on the sign: APOTHECARY OF DREAMS. She slipped into the side street and reflected on the irony.
“Heh… Yes, quite. That night certainly was a dream…”
…It wasn’t as if Chlammy had trusted the concoction to be genuine in the first place. She had placed her hopes and dreams in the Bosom Enhancer with doubt—nay, with a near-certain conviction she would be disappointed. However—
“Yes, cleavage as if in a dream… I couldn’t even see my navel when I looked down.”
—her breasts had actually grown! Ah, to have boobs most plentiful! She couldn’t even hear what Fiel was saying! It was time to rush to the inn, have a toast, and feast until her entire torso was swollen!! Wait? Where do they even sell lingerie big enough for these? Ha-ha!
“It was a nice worry to have, if you will, bouncing about in my chest as I went to sleep. A most pleasant night…” Chlammy whispered, her eyes gazing far off into the distance. She made her way to the back of the shop—and without a second thought climbed over the fence of the garden where it appeared they were growing their medicines. As they faced the door on which was written FOR STAKEHOLDERS ONLY, Fiel raised her voice to rein in Chlammy.
“Ch-Chlammy? Wh-why, I don’t think we should trespass…”
“What are you talking about, Fi? It says ‘For Stakeholders Only.’ In other words, for me.”
Chlammy thought, “Apothecary of Dreams”? Fitting indeed. Yes, dreams. That which vanish the moment one wakes—nothing more than dreams.
She put her hand to her chest, which had been so cruelly brought back to reality after a dream-filled night, let the grandest of tears fall from her eyes now devoid of brightness—and asked:
“Are you saying that, with this void returned to me, with this emptiness in my barren bosom, I have nothing at stake?!”
A charlatan selling fake boobs on one hand, and Chlammy’s boobs on the other. Good and evil. What more did Fiel want to be at stake?! Sobbing uncontrollably, Chlammy started trying to kick down the door as
“Chlammy, y-you must calm down! Why, surely you knew it was a fraud?!”
“A monetary fraud, yes! But if you’re going to defraud me—don’t puff up my boobs in the firrrst plaaaaace!!”
Ah, psychological fraud…first filling the chest with joy, and then emptying it of all hope. To lift her up with a dream that could never be, and then to drop her from such unprecedented heights—it was a sin deserving of heaven’s wrath!! Chlammy freed herself from Fiel’s grasp and unleashed her righteous fury.
…Only to freeze in the wind-up when she heard someone’s voice behind her.
“…Well now. I did plant quite a variety of seeds for the medicines…”
Chlammy and Fiel turned, and their eyes opened wide.
“…but I don’t recall planting seeds for washboards or weeds. How curious. ”
They looked back on that venom-tongued being, the most curious of all, with strained smiles.
A diabolical angel with a halo over her head of prismatic hair—the thing had appeared without sound, and now she casually opened the aforementioned door.
“Master! Your humble servant Jibril has returned from deliveries! ”
“Yeah, good work—hey, it’s Chlammy and Fiel. C’monnn in.”
“…Welll-cooome… What are you…doing…here…?”
Ah, yes—those two voices answering merrily from beyond the door were, in fact, those of the long-lost king and queen. The very ones for whom Chlammy and Fiel had been searching for three weeks. The black-haired, dark-eyed older brother, an apron over his “I PPL” shirt, some sketchy implement in his hand. The white-haired, red-eyed little sister, standing on a stool, stirring a similarly sketchy cauldron. Sora and Shiro, those two siblings who epitomized sketchiness. At last, Chlammy gave them a friendly smile and said:
“That’s my line… What are you doing mucking about here?!”
Indeed, they were the very malingerers who had abandoned their administration without notice. They looked at each other. Sora apologetically took in a deep breath.
“Sorry…but actually, this isn’t muck. This is medicine. We’ve got all kinds. How ’bout it?”
He handed her a list of goods, among which was a Bosom Enhancer. How kind of him to offer a written confession of the outrage against all that is right and proper that he had committed upon her. Employing the momentum of her urge to strike him, she took the list and hurled it into the cauldron…
What were Sora and Shiro doing, you ask? Sora had a ready answer: They were killing time!
“I mean, we got chased off the throne… We’d be in trouble if they knew we were still in the country.”
He flinched not at the murderous gazes of Chlammy and Fiel. Though Sora told a sad tale as he sat in his chair, Shiro on his lap, his attitude was upbeat. More than upbeat, it was grand—it was with pride that they smiled as they continued!
“We got fired from our monarch job! We’re unemployed and penniless! Devoid even of the slightest desire to work!!”
“…Loser…shut-in gamers… That’s…us…!”
“But we don’t have a house to shut ourselves into! And you ask us what we’re doing? Is this not foolery?!”
“…The real…question is…what can we do…?”
“Oh, and when I said we were in trouble, I wasn’t kidding. We’re just about finished as human beings.”
Chlammy couldn’t help but clear her throat in the face of their zeal. They sneered.
—Why are you all surprised?
They had already been the scum of society, Sora and Shiro… “Just about finished as human beings” was far from the lowest they’d gotten! At the bottom of the valley, they’d dug a hole into the ground—and fallen through to Disboard, basically.
“But, you know, when we got to this world—we were just back at the start, right?”
“In, other words…‘New Game’… Playing again…”
“!”
Yes, they had lost their throne, their home, and their power, even their value to society. But all that, to them, was just that. Seeing their faces, Chlammy couldn’t help but remember who they were, and it took her breath away. The personal effects they had—smartphones, tablet, portable game console—were vestiges of having lost everything. Those were all they’d had when they landed in Disboard, and now those were what they were playing with.
Those were all they’d had. And now their smiles and the fingers that played with them were the ones that had played the world. Those of the world’s ultimate strategist—“ ” (Blank), greatest gamer among humans, two in one. With their smiles and fingers—what was the point of worrying even if they lost everything else? They made it clear that the world was the game and they were the ones playing. And now—
“So, when you play the second time, it’s about everything but the main quest, right?! Like…”
“…Crafting…smithing, farming…and shopkeeping, duh…!”
“You haven’t even finished the main quest! Beat the game once first!”
They were done with conquering the Ixseeds and challenging the One True God for the time being. Chlammy made clear she was none too happy about their declaration that they were going to mess around with the world’s economy, but they completely ignored her. The only answer she received came from the medicinal products arrayed in this establishment Sora and Shiro were apparently running. Fiel looked about the compounding chamber, narrowing her eyes at the pharmacological ingredients she saw.
“Barongrass… Prana… Kama leaves… Why, none of these herbs are found on this continent, are theyyy? ”
“!!”
Those elves and their foresty ways. Sora and Shiro chuckled as Chlammy gasped. Fiel had the eye to identify at a glance the effects and habitat of each herb—and to discern that Sora and Shiro’s claims were not worth trusting. If they were so broke and homeless—then how did they start this shop? Chlammy searched their faces for the truth. She was met with a smile.
“Ah, you see, I simply shifted about the globe to collect what was needed and used magic to grow them in the back garden. ”
“What do you mean, ‘New Game’? More like ‘Cheat Activated’!!”
Despite Chlammy’s protestations over the obviously broken character, Sora calmly raised a hand to silence her.
“Must you accuse me so unjustly? You should know that you get to bring new stuff along on the second playthrough.”
Yes—who cared how broken and OP she was?! If the devs said you could use her, then why not use her?! That’s right—!!
“So, on the second playthrough, we get to start with Jibril!! Thus we graduate from being broke, unemployed, and homeless! We sold materials and raised funds, and then we developed our own products and went into business! You see?!”
“…Jibril, well…have you served…”
“It was a mere trifle. Ah… I deserve not this honor…”
“…All right… I see what you’re doing now,” Chlammy murmured to Sora’s bombast, Shiro’s thumbs-up, and Jibril’s wing-folding genuflection. “Basically, the usual—cheating and swindling, right?!” She’d been holding back her urge to yell, doing her best to hear him out, but she’d reached her limit.
Sora said:
“…Sorry. Which case of cheating and swindling are you talking about? There’ve been so many, I’m not sure.”
“You’re clever to blow me off while acting apologetic, but could you stop?! I’m talking about your Bosom Enhancer. Your most wicked ruse yet, to hawk phony breasts. Give me back my dreams!!”
Chlammy screamed with tears in her eyes. But Sora looked back more quizzically than ever.
—Huh? He took out a vial of the Breast Enhancer.
“Just take another dose. If you take it every day—congratulations! You’ve got big boobs.”
“Yes, I’ll have big fake boobs that will shrivel as soon as I stop taking it, won’t I?! Does your underhandedness know no bounds?!”
Chlammy censured him with a plaintive wail. Regardless, she took the vial.
“…Big fake boobs…? Ohhh, I see. You’re saying it’s not fair because the boobs are fake…are you?”
As if he’d finally figured out why she was angry, Sora nodded several times and said…
