"Alfred..."

"Here!"

With the expedition whisked away by their captains, the castle felt like a hollow shell under gray skies. At Ouyang’s call, Alfred scampered over like a puppy chasing sunlight. The First Demon King wanted him—surely a critical mission, a path opening like a mountain pass to the peak of his life.

"Mm. When you ruled this world, you let your Blood Kin run wild and stir public wrath," Ouyang said, voice like cold rain. "I’m stripping your right to rule this world."

What?

Alfred’s heart dropped like a stone into deep water, hope snuffed like a candle in wind. This wasn’t the script to his ascent. Your Majesty, just one more chance—

He stared, eyes wide as moonlit pools, words caught like fish in a net. The truth pinned him down: when he ran Crystalglow World, he never cared for mortal lives. He let his underlings ravage like wolves in a sheepfold.

"Right. That neighboring world," Ouyang said, gaze drifting like a hawk over ridgelines. "Its power system sits higher than this one. Go make waves there."

Just as Alfred braced for a plunge, fate flicked the compass—another divine twist. He couldn’t read this Void Messenger’s playbook; the currents ran deep as a trench.

"The world of Koramor? Your Majesty wants me to manage Koramor?" Joy pricked his chest like sunrise through mist. He’d lose Crystalglow, yes, but Koramor stood taller, a city of stars with tributaries of lower civilizations flowing beneath.

It was a promotion in all but name, a banner catching wind.

Ouyang nodded, and a tiny phantom girl flickered on his shoulder, palm-sized and silver as frost.

"Saya, record this man’s file."

Then Ouyang narrowed his eyes at Alfred, a smile thin as a blade. "Congrats. You’re a Starrealm Agent now. First batch, still experimental. Remember, the world you manage is tied to your score like roots to a tree. Minor review every hundred years, major review every thousand. If your score dips too low, we revoke your management of that world. If all your worlds fail, empty hands mean you lose the Agent title."

A hundred years sounded like an ocean to mortals, but like a brook to gods. The badge gleamed, but the road ran uphill.

Ouyang produced a device like a sleek PDA, glass cold as morning dew. He wasn’t fanatical about the mystic path; he favored it, sure, but he never shunned the steel and circuits of science.

"It’s smart. Go home and study it," he said, voice steady as a metronome. "Your world’s data appears there. Nearby Starrealm Agents, scoring standards, notices—everything comes through that screen. The hundred-year minor review checks if your world meets baseline. The thousand-year major review decides if you can add new worlds. Far off for you. For now, survive the hundred-year tide."

Koramor hadn’t fallen yet, and Ouyang handed it over anyway, a move sharp as a gust that flips a tent. It was rough, but time would make it inevitable.

Alfred found himself praying, voice low as embers: may Koramor’s natives be brave and resist hard. If the strong burned out like stars at dawn, then when he took over, he could govern like a gardener pruning a quiet grove. It was his future on the line.

Beside them, Ed was shaking like a bowstring. Miss this window, and the horizon would go dark.

Ed strode forward, then dropped to one knee, right hand pressed to his chest like a knight before an altar. "Great Void Messenger, Your Majesty, may I—Ed Aranska—have a chance? I wish to devote myself to the Starrealm Management Plan’s experiment."

Even Alfred reeled, breath snagging like a kite in a tree. He hadn’t expected Ed to cut in. This was the First Demon King’s court, a storm of a man who could snuff worlds with a thought.

Ed’s boldness drew Ouyang’s eye, a lantern turning toward a lone traveler. A native of Crystalglow World, and not someone Ouyang cared much about—but the first to dare, a spark in the wind.

"Oh? You want to be a Starrealm Agent?"

"Yes, Your Majesty!" Ed’s voice trembled like a leaf. "If I can use my experience managing a world to refine the plan, it’d be my honor."

His body shook, frost threading his bones. He didn’t truly grasp the presence before him, only that it dwarfed the God King and the Underworld King like mountains over ant hills.

"Kid, you’ve got guts," Ouyang said, tone calm as winter sky. "But you’re not one of ours. Making an outsider an Agent won’t sit well. So your reviews will be stricter. Others pass at sixty. You pass at ninety. Your first world is this low-civilization Crystalglow, a world without gods. Your starting line sits lower than theirs. Do you still accept?"

"I do!"

No road back, only forward like a river cutting stone. He understood the logic. A Starrealm Agent was a civil servant of the stars, with benefits sweet as ripe fruit. Even in trial phase, those fruits should go to the ones who bled and marched with Ouyang through wars.

Ed was an outsider, with no deeds on the Eternal Sleep Continent. If Ouyang handed him the role, no one would raise their voice under his shadow, but hearts would stir like dust in a shaft of light.

Cranking Ed’s difficulty high gave others a story to swallow. His standard would be the strictest, earning his seat with tenfold sweat and a hundred nights.

"Then I appoint you Starrealm Agent of Crystalglow World," Ouyang said, placing a second device in Ed’s hands, weight firm as a vow. "May your hundred-year review come back clean."

Alfred, still stunned by Ed’s audacity, paused at the door like a man remembering his keys. "Your Majesty, since I’m taking over Koramor, the expedition hasn’t withdrawn yet—can I go now?"

"You can. Take your rookie coworker. Let him see a big stage."

Given leave, Alfred took Ed and launched like arrows into the sky.

Above the Holy City, a vast hole hung in the heavens like torn silk, a passage ripped open by a captain-class strike. The expedition had already slipped through like fish into deeper water. Alfred led Ed after them.

Koramor rose before them, a civilization towering like glass spires over a quiet plain. Crystalglow had birthed no gods; here, gods gathered like stars. They’d forged a divine civilization, complete with a king of their own.

First impression upon entry: fire.

The Thirteenth Expedition called themselves the Burning Legion, and their attacks matched the name. Flames flowered across the sky like blazing poppies, embers raining like meteors.

Two shattered spaces gaped in the world, raw wounds forced open. One led to the Divine Realm. The other, to the Underworld. First Squad Captain Ovisen hurled a sky-piercing blaze that speared the basecamps of the God King and the Underworld King like lightning through old oaks.

It was naked provocation, a gauntlet flung like a comet.

With both divine envoys fallen, the God King and the Underworld King had been bracing for war. They never expected the expedition to strike first, thunder answering thunder.

Grand Captain Thomason hovered above, a dark sun over the battlefield.

"All squads," his voice rolled like drumbeats, "sub-divine strength to the human realm—take territory, break their believers. Divine rank and above, First to Sixth, into the Divine Realm. Seventh to Twelfth, into the Underworld. Sub-divine, act freely."

Seeing the legion’s morale blaze like a wildfire, Ed swallowed hard, throat dry as dust. "Boss, do we go Divine Realm or Underworld?"

"Neither," Alfred said, eyes narrowing like a hunter’s. "Those fields burn too hot. Didn’t you see? Sub-divine weren’t invited. We’ll work the human realm."

The Divine Realm and Underworld boiled like storm seas, but the human realm wasn’t calm either.

Alfred and Ed entered an empire where the expedition hadn’t yet ravaged, but the inside fought itself like wolves in a courtyard. One side rallied around the Holy See, old churches, and entrenched nobles, banners stiff as winter reeds. The other rose in the chaos—the Minions of the Demon King’s Expeditionary Army.

The Demon King’s Expeditionary Army had appeared not long ago, a shadowed host that hunted gods lingering among mortals. Divine envoys from the Divine Realm, representatives from the Underworld—none escaped their blades.

As the elites panicked like birds in a net, the oppressed found a crack of dawn. They rose from the dust, uprisings blooming like weeds after rain.

On ordinary days, they wouldn’t have dared. The nobles had gods at their backs like mountains behind city walls. Mortals couldn’t challenge gods and hope to stand. But the Demon King’s Army lit a candle of hope; the gods were too busy fighting to guard their old altars. Without divine patrons, the oppressed stepped forward like waves cresting a reef.

Those rebels were branded "Minions of the Demon King’s Army," for they preached accepting the Army’s rule and faith in the legendary Demon King. That drew resistance like frost to flame; gods felt kinder than a Demon King. Hear the words "Demon King," and most decent folk reached for holy light.

But the trodden low carried fewer scruples. Under the gods’ rule, they starved and slept cold, nights long as winter. If they embraced the Demon King, what changed in the hunger of their bellies? The old life was proven misery, scars like tree rings. The name "Demon King’s Army" sounded grim, yes, but they hadn’t yet been crushed by its boot. So they held a final sliver of hope, a spark trembling in the wind.