High school student Ren Arisato falls into a world that looks like a warzone — still wearing his uniform. But he doesn't panic. He can open an admin menu. In front of trembling villagers, he casually spawns legendary divine items, mutters that he just wants a quiet life, and walks off.
Lyra, the village herbalist, becomes his guide against her better judgment. A cat-eared girl named Kiki appoints herself his official witness and sells stories about his nonsense for high prices.
When a demon ho
Do Not Bend the Knee - Seven Pillars Invasion! Welcome to the Golem Dance Venue
The southern horizon was stained a murky, blackish red.
On the outskirts of the village of Carve, in a hut atop a hill, Arisato Ren glanced at the color of the sky with half-lidded eyes, then pulled the rough blanket up over his head.
*Fwaaah.*
A huge yawn.
"...Something else showed up?"
His voice didn't reach Lyra Fernell, who was frantically stacking firewood outside the hut. Her long ash-brown braid whipped in the wind. The freckles along the bridge of her nose were lit by that murky, blackish red—nothing like a sunrise. Her fingers, clutching the herb pouch at her waist, had gone white.
"Ren! Wake up! This is no time for you to be sleeping!"
Lyra pounded her fist against the hut's door for what felt like the hundredth time. *Don, don*—the air shuddered.
Inside the hut, Ren pulled the blanket back over himself.
"...Shut up. I just got off night shift, I'm sleep-deprived."
"Night shift?! You haven't worked a single day since you came to this world! All you do is sleep or stare off into space!"
Lyra's voice cracked.
Just then, a heavy, oppressive rumbling began to echo from the distance.
*Zuzuzu... zuzuzu...*
Footsteps. Countless footsteps—tens of thousands of them.
"...Look at that. Do you even understand what that is?"
Lyra pointed at the hut's window.
Through the gap in the curtains, the plains spreading out around the village were visible. From the south, from the direction of the Grand Crevasse, countless black shadows surged forward like a wave. A massive army of demons, horns sprouting from their heads, their war banners swaying.
From the bodies of those marching at the front, heat so intense it warped the air itself radiated outward.
Seven enormous silhouettes.
The Seven Demon Kings.
"...Ah, that's Dorvak, right? Looks like he brought a bunch of friends."
"Friends?! That looks like *friends* to you?! Those are the Seven Pillars! All seven Demon Kings who rule the demon territories have come together to kill you! Do you get that?!"
Lyra screamed.
Still, Ren didn't show his face from under the blanket.
"Oh, okay. ...So, how many?"
"What does counting them matter?! There are at least thirty thousand! No matter how you look at it, it's no less than thirty thousand! You wiped out that allied army of twelve thousand last time, so now the real demons have come out! Because people started calling you the 'New Demon King,' the Seven Pillars got angry and now they're serious about exterminating humanity—"
"Hmm. What a pain."
Ren's lazy voice echoed inside the hut.
In that instant, something inside Lyra snapped.
"...Fine. Just keep sleeping, then. I'm going to get the villagers to safety."
Lyra spat the words out and turned her back on the hut's door.
As she broke into a run, Ren's voice called after her.
"Hey. Don't push yourself too hard. I'll handle it anyway."
Lyra didn't look back.
(*"Handle it," he says. Last time you "handled it," the result was that "Sword Selection" thing and all that other nonsense, and now tourists are coming from all over the world! Don't make any more work for me!*)
Screaming internally, Lyra sprinted toward the center of the village.
In her ears, the rumbling footsteps grew louder.
The village had fallen into utter chaos.
"H-Hiiiieee! Demons! It's a demon army!"
"Those are the Seven Pillars... the real Demon Kings! Look, at the front... isn't that King Dorvak?!"
"It's over! We're done for! H-Hey, run!"
Villagers burst from their homes, fleeing northward in whatever clothes they had on. Children cried, women screamed, old people stood frozen. Amidst it all, a particularly high-pitched voice rang out.
"Everyone! Over here, nya! Kiki will guide you to a safe place, nya!"
Kiki, a courier of the cat-eared tribe, waved both arms wildly in the middle of the village square. Her short orange hair and matching large cat ears bounced and bobbed. Her tail swished back and forth.
"Kiki! You should be the one running! You're a courier, aren't you?! You're fast, right?!"
"I'm not running! This is my job, after all! I'm going to watch every single moment of how Ren-kun defeats the Demon Kings, record it, and sell it! There's no way I can miss a scoop this huge, nya!"
"You're curious to a fault!"
Lyra came running into the square.
"Kiki! Take the village children to the shelter in the eastern forest! With your speed, you can manage it! I'll guide everyone else!"
As she spoke, Lyra took the arm of an old man standing frozen in place.
Kiki's golden eyes sparkled even brighter.
"Roger that! But Lyra-san, don't push yourself too hard either! If Lyra-san gets hurt, Ren-kun will get super angry, nya!"
Lyra was momentarily at a loss for words.
"...Don't be ridiculous. You just get going, now!"
Lyra gave Kiki's tail a light smack.
Laughing, Kiki gathered the children and dashed off toward the eastern forest.
—Meanwhile, the demon army had advanced to within five hundred meters of the village's southern edge.
At the front walked a single, massive demon.
The Lord of the Crimson Tower, Dorvak.
His enormous frame seemed even larger than before. Short black horns thrust skyward from his forehead. Deep crimson hair. Burning amber eyes. The heat radiating from his body cracked the ground around him with its intensity.
Beside him marched six other Demon Kings, each of a different form.
The Seven Pillars.
All of them advanced across the plains, radiating a terrifying killing intent.
"...I can see it. That shabby little hut. There dwells the human who so cruelly trampled upon the pride of us demons."
Dorvak's voice was deep and theatrical. But at the edges of his words, a faint, barely suppressed delight seeped through.
"Dorvak. I hear you were defeated by that human in a single blow. Truly, you are a disgrace to the Seven Pillars."
Demon King C, walking beside him with a bird-like beak, hurled mockery.
Dorvak's amber eyes flashed.
"...That was a fluke. For a mere human to defeat my Caldera Collapse... No matter. Today, I shall put an end to the greatest humiliation of my life. With the combined magical power of all Seven Pillars, that human's 'Divine Weapon' is nothing."
"Oh? To think you would ask us for help. It seems it truly shook you."
A sarcastic voice rose up. But Dorvak no longer heard the other Demon Kings' mockery.
His mind was filled with Ren's face.
(*That brat. That brat with those sleepy, half-lidded eyes. He made me crawl on the ground like a dog before the eyes of the entire village. I will never forget it. Today, I will sink him—along with that filthy little hut—into my sea of lava.*)
Dorvak's heart blazed.
He muttered quietly, so the other six Demon Kings couldn't hear.
"...We will gather everyone's magical power into my Caldera Collapse. Understood. The signal, I leave to you all. I will melt that hut, the hill, the village—everything—down to two hundred meters below the ground."
The army did not stop. The soldiers halted, but something pressed onward.
On the outskirts of the village, atop the hill.
The hut's door creaked open.
Arisato Ren finally emerged, sluggishly, to breathe the outside air. Messy black hair with bed-head. Sleepy dark-brown eyes. The same half-lidded, drowsy expression as always.
He gazed blankly at the thirty thousand-strong demon army spread out below the hill.
Then, he spoke.
"...Oh, wow. They're really lined up. Is this a queue for some amusement park?"
From below the hill, Dorvak's booming voice thundered.
"ARISATO REN! I, DORVAK, HAVE RETURNED! That blunder from before...! Today, I will crush the hand that wields that so-called Divine Weapon with my own two hands! Come out! If you are a man, face me in honorable combat!"
Even hearing that voice, Ren yawned.
"*Fwaaah*... Someone's yelling. It's way too loud for this early in the morning."
Then, he looked down at Dorvak again.
"Ah, that guy with the black horns. The one who got charred all over from a single swing of mine last time. Did your burns heal? That must've hurt, huh."
Dorvak's body trembled violently.
Not from fear—from rage.
"...You wretch...! That half-asleep act of yours won't work this time! I have borrowed the power of all Seven Pillars! I will turn this battlefield into a cauldron of hell! Come forth, my ultimate magic! 'CALDERA COLLAPSE'!"
Dorvak raised both arms high.
Behind him, the other six Demon Kings simultaneously channeled their magical power into Dorvak. Black, red, purple, green. Seven-colored light intertwined in complex patterns, converging into Dorvak's hands.
The air screamed.
The ground began to shake violently.
The villagers' despair became screams, racing up the hill.
"S-Stop! The ground is splitting!"
"H-Hey, look, that man—he's still just standing there!"
"Ren-sama! Run! This village will be swallowed by lava!"
*GURAGURAGURAGURA!*
The ground began to split.
Earth and soil tore apart, and from the depths, a crimson glow leaked out.
Caldera Collapse—Dorvak's ultimate magic, the very spell Ren had once copied and returned twofold. It forcibly collapsed the earth, causing massive amounts of lava to erupt from the fissures. Now, empowered by the combined magical force of all Seven Pillars, its destructive power had skyrocketed.
"Die! Arisato Ren! Sink into the lava along with this entire village!"
A massive earthquake.
The village houses shook, roof tiles falling.
Lyra, shielding the evacuating villagers, looked up at the hill.
"REN!!"
Her scream was drowned out by the rumbling earth.
It's over.
Despair flashed through everyone's minds.
That was when it happened.
Arisato Ren quietly raised one hand.
With that sleepy face still unchanged, a glowing blue, transparent panel floated up above his palm.
*Beep.*
He touched the panel with his fingertip.
That was all.
The next instant.
The world flashed white.
—No, it didn't flash.
The world was *rewritten*.
From beneath Dorvak's feet, white stone paving suddenly spread outward in a radial pattern at superhuman speed.
Stone paving.
*GOTOGOTOGOTOGOTO!*
The trembling ground. The collapsing houses. The screams. All of it receded into the distance.
The cracking earth was covered over with beautiful, patterned ballroom floor tiles.
The plains outside the village—the battlefield—had transformed in an instant into a massive outdoor dance hall.
"W-What is this?!"
"T-Teleportation?! No, this is—the ground itself...?!"
The Seven Demon Kings cried out in confusion.
And at the center of it all stood Dorvak, frozen in stunned disbelief.
The immense magical power of Caldera Collapse that had been in his hands became a ball of fire—and then vanished.
In its place, something began to flow through the area.
*Pon. Pon. Popon. Pon.*
Percussion and flutes.
Cheerful dance music, reminiscent of lively folk tunes. It began blaring at full volume from seemingly nowhere.
*Zuzuzuzuzu...*
And as if matching the music, enormous shadows rose up from all across the stone paving.
Eight to fifteen meters tall.
Giant figures made of rock and earth.
Golems.
"Th-This is... golems?! Why are there so many of them here?!"
Dorvak's voice trembled.
One golem. Two. Three. Four...
Countless golems appeared one after another. Each one began moving its face, its hands, stomping its feet in time with the cheerful music.
They were dancing.
The golems, with their enormous bodies, were dancing joyfully.
And with astonishingly synchronized folk dance moves, at that.
"Wh-What is this incomprehensible sight...! Golems... dancing...?"
Demon King C muttered in stunned disbelief.
The next moment, his body began to move against his will.
"Wh-Wh-What?! My body—?!"
His arms swung through the air on their own. His legs stepped on their own. His body bounced and spun to the music.
With an expression of pure terror, Demon King C was pulled into the circle of golems as if sucked in, breaking into a run.
"H-Hey, wait! Me too! Me too! My body is moving on its own!"
"Wh-What is this?! Stop! Halt! I am a proud Demon Kin
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