Chương 1: Totally Unnecessary Recap MK2

Nearly 500 years. I suppose a lot of things happened over what I would call the second act of my life on Placeholder. I guess that makes now just as good a time as any to recap everything that happened throughout that long stretch… After finding out the hard way that I come back to life 50 years after I'm killed, I discovered that I had also completely lost all of my marbles. Madness form was set immediately, and I somehow managed to stumble my way through the tutorial.

Meanwhile, the rest of the party had moved on without me. They had lived their entire lives, and with 50 years passed, they were now aged adventurers, retired outright or dead. Jake was still the [Hero], however, and he came to stop the "new [Demon Lord]." After he found me, I tricked him into trying to one-shot me with [Sunder], and I used [Reflect Attack] and… killed him with [Fire Strikes] shortly after. My broken mind thought that would trigger a server reset, and maybe things could go back to how they were.

I was wrong. I broke even further, activated madness form, and nearly destroyed most of Faroff. Several people tried to stop me, including Richard, but they did little more than delay me… except Sam standing in the way to talk me down at the very end of my time limit. After that… I fled. From there, my story expanded beyond the party I had known and grown fond of, and the cycle of [Heroes] was started fully. Sarah Smith, the beastborn orphan, was chosen as the next [Hero].

With a push in the right direction from Jake, she studied healing magic and, despite her frail condition, saved the entire city of Vir from me by boldly choosing to [Restore] me while I was in madness form. And then… I was sane and had no idea what to do next. I mostly broke down again. I went to the slums to lay low and collapsed in an alley. As luck would have it, I was noticed, and a [Priestess] was brought to check up on me… Sarah again.

After determining that she wasn't a threat since Jake told her about me, she helped me catch up on what I had missed over the past 50 years. Then, after discovering that a thief was trailing her, I led him on a merry chase and hopped Vir's wall with a wall run and a [Flash Step]. I got Sarah some levels, which she wasn't happy with, and then returned later that night only to be surrounded by a bunch of people. Said people… threw alchemist's fire at me. When it didn't hurt, they fell at my feet in reverence.

I now had my very own cult to deal with. Their origins were mostly the children I had saved during my first life, Lizzie, the young girl I saved from dragon fire, and the children of DeepMine town. I went along with them to their meeting. After dealing with their… rituals… I also realized I needed a bit of mental help. I started going to therapy regularly and managed to get things in a bit of a cadence. Things were looking up… right up until Vir threw Jake's funeral.

The children of the flame broke my commands and attacked it. They lit the church on fire, and things devolved into chaos. I fought my own cultists, Garrett, Emilia, and the Watch, and then after trying to get some healing for Garrett, Sarah stood between me and the Watch. That was essentially social suicide, and I knew it. So, I didn't let her take that for me. I became an [Actor], gave my first ever "performance," and pretended everything had been my plan all along. Then, I escaped Vir.

Oh, after getting betrayed by the thieves guild. And then, I shot off a [Message] to Sam. I was about to leave, and I was worried for Sarah, so I wanted to get the two of them in touch. We ended up having a much longer chat than I thought. She gave me back Megan's necklace that I had lost when I'd died, and I attempted to [Message] Lindsey for her. The [Message] failed, and we assumed she was dead. Then, I went to Megan's tomb in the dragonlands to grieve.

Who knows how long I would have stayed there, lost in sorrow, if I hadn't been interrupted by a loud roar. Instead, my grief latched onto the one species that I could go out and seek revenge on for Megan's death. I murdered every last fire dragon, down to a single egg. However, the final dragon I fought could communicate with my mind. And she broke through the veil of insanity. After she did, I was sane enough to finally realize what I'd done.

I used the perk points and skill points gained from all of my dragon slaying, and then it was back to Placeholder proper. My first plan was to pick up [Restore] to take care of my craziness, but it wasn't an option for me to purchase. I [Messaged] Sarah to get her advice, but she was a bit busy with the undead attacking the borders of Vir and Dryadal. She told me it had been 14 years since I last spoke to her and then asked for my help.

I dropped all my plans for dealing with the fire dragon egg and went to the first priority. I snapped up some healing spells and ran to fight the undead threat. On the way west, since I had left off in the eastern volcanoes, I ran into a group of beastborn defending one of my obelisks from the undead. That was how I met Lilly Besti, who I would eventually learn was Lindsey's granddaughter. We drove back the threat, killed the heart, and I kept pushing forward to fight the undead army from the eastern side.

Eventually, I earned the ire of the [Necromancer] and became his primary focus. That allowed all his enemies, myself, the army in the north, and Sarah and the [Paladins] in the west to push in. I made it first and discovered that the [Necromancer] was Tim. He was driven mad by his grief, and he was attempting to ascend and become a lich. I fought through the heavily trapped ruins of Besti, but I didn't make it in time. His ascendancy ritual succeeded. I decided I would rather not fight that, so I ran and hid.

My initial plan was to get Sarah to take care of it, but instead, I got help from an unexpected ally. Gertrude. We put Tim on the ropes together, but he was too strong and would have defeated us… if I didn't trick him into attempting to kill me with one giant [Death Bolt] that I used [Reflect Attack] on. With his dying breath, he gave me my purpose for the next 400 years… Time magic. He had kept a journal of his studies, and he gave it to me and warned me that 1000 years was the theoretical maximum for time travel.

From there, I stabbed him with one of Gertrude's undead bane weapons and looted his body to destroy him completely… at least, I assumed it was completely. From there, my madness started acting up again as I didn't have any specific enemies to fight or goals to focus on, but I made my way to Sarah, who [Restored] me. We argued and then parted ways. Her, back to her home, and me, to travel the world and try to learn more about magic.

Including picking up the [Restore] spell so that madness form would never happen again. I traveled north, picked up a disguise, and then joined the Dryadal church as a [Priest]… They needed all the help they could get healing people from the undead attacks, so they basically just gave me the class without any further questions. Eventually, my "clever disguise" (a pair of sunglasses to hide my red eyes) was discovered, and I was forced to move on.

From there, I tried to lay low and learn magic but didn't have much success. Oh, and I picked up my least favorite subclass. [Barber]. Anyway, I headed to Dryadal's capital and found a woman teaching magic classes. I offered to pay for one-on-one study, and she helped me figure out the basics of casting things without purchasing the spell at an obelisk. Eventually, that too was found out, and I was drugged and then cuffed with mana-draining handcuffs by Sarah and her [Paladins].

I broke the cuffs, fled to Pumil, and then put my [Miner] levels to the test to finish out an achievement. I discovered the Below, found where magicite crystals come from… and promptly left because that place terrified me. Next up on my list of achievements, I needed to kill a wolf boss. Knowing no better place to do that than Faroff, I headed back there and booked a dungeon-clearing tour with my favorite [Sorcerer].

We cleared the dungeon easily with the two of us, and I persuaded her to join me on a trip to the now-desert nation of Besti. We traveled to the east together, but I worried Sam wouldn't make it. She was fading practically in front of my eyes. However, she miraculously recovered when we met Lindsey, still up and kicking, and the [Grand Martial Elder] of the desert beastborn. Sam and Lindsey had a happy reunion. Linsdey and I… did not.

She, rightfully, blamed me for the death and destruction of the nation of Besti, and I only managed to talk her down from trying to kill me because I was willing to teach people spells. I taught bolt spells, [Summon Dave], [Heal], and whatever else I could… to a lot of people. A lot. Then I made myself useful as a [General] by ordering around the [Monks] when the next monster wave came. With all of that, and a promise to fix things with time magic, I finally got on Lindsey's good side again.

She started training me, and I spent a lot of time there. In the meantime, over one random dinner, Lilly and I accidentally uncovered my "true name" of Titus Null. I swore them to secrecy and also swore an oath to assist Besti if they asked me to. And later, I tried to leave. Lindsey stopped me and challenged me to a duel. It was a close thing, but I managed to win and assure the Besti people that I would fix their homeland with time magic. And then, I traveled quite a bit.

Met the fey and scared Primavia nearly to death. Tried to go to my castle and found out it had limited functionality, and the throne room was off-limits. And then I established my own dungeon over the ruins of Besti so that I could have a place to make a whole bunch of mana potions and study magic in peace. That dungeon was where I met the first Dave, [Son of Dave], and thoroughly trounced him. Then, I had my final confrontation with Sarah. Because of her oaths, and mine, she was forced to kill me.

With my last act before death, I tricked her into healing herself of her illness so that she would still be alive when I next respawned. That was not meant to be. While Sarah at max level with her illness gone was a terror to the undead, she could do nothing about a stun-poisoned stab in the back from one of her most trusted party members. Sarah was gone, and as wrath took over once again for my third life, I pledged that I would make her killer suffer before they died. My next life ended up being incredibly short.

Both in terms of events worth talking about and in regard to the actual timespan. The main thing of note was that I befriended the [Hero] once again. Elluin Hunter. Then, with the blessing, and supervision, of all the nations (including the newly minted nation of Gram), I took him to the east to claim the fire dungeon to show that I wasn't a threat. And I wasn't one… until I came across Sarah's killer. I caught her. She deserved death, and even Elluin agreed to that.

However, what we didn't agree on was that she deserved to be tortured. He killed her instead of letting me wound her and heal her up again, and I snapped. I entered wrath form, and Elluin was only able to stop me because he gave his life with a [Heroic Sacrifice] skill. That was when I learned the terrifying fact that [Heroes] could always kill me at the cost of their life. A fact that meant that every [Hero] was a threat, no matter their level.

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement. The next [Hero] who took over the reins, literally, was Garrik Valhice. The one who discovered the [Heavy Cavalier] class. He defended Dryadal against Gram's invasion and… stood absolutely no chance against me. That's because I decided to game the system a bit and choose what I would respawn as that time. And Pride was always the strongest of the seven deadly sins whenever that trope came up.

And so, Pride basically took over the world and reigned with impunity for the next 70 years as he prepared a time magic ritual. Or, more specifically, as he made a bunch of other people research a time magic ritual for him. Pride's lead researcher, Cameron Leach, convinced him that he needed to be undead to withstand the strain of time magic, and Pride agreed immediately.

Cameron did the ritual, ascended to a lich, turned on Pride, and then was immediately killed by Pride and the sword that had been created for that likely scenario, Insurance. Cameron cursed Pride with his dying breath, and that resulted in a curse where anything I touched in the next several lives would turn undead if I killed it. Meanwhile, Garrik also tried several times to defeat Pride, but he was no match.

He couldn't even bring himself to use [Heroic Sacrifice] because he knew that would kill his horse, Earthquake. Unfortunately, the fey realized that the ritual I was putting on was bad news. Primavia intervened and asked the [Hero] to save the world… and they would save his trusty steed. Garrik accepted, and, with a ritual, Skyquake the Alicorn was born. Garrik immediately rode to stop the ritual with a [Heroic Sacrifice] skill, but Pride cast [Restart] just before Garrik got there.

With a flood of time magic, more than 100 miles around Dryadal's capital was wiped out and turned into the time wastes, and the [Hero] was defeated. The OmniverseEngine tried to devise a [Hero] who could defeat Pride, but no simulated [Heroes] had a chance… at least… not from Placeholder. And so, with a wet floor, a mop, and a criminal case of not paying attention while floor-cleaning, Kilroy Jenkins, the [Janitor], defeated the strongest [Demon Lord] to date in the shortest span of [Heroing] in Placeholder.

Relations between the nations improved greatly after that, and the city of Jenkins was founded in the south of Pumil to be a place for all the countries to meet. It became a city of adventurers. A city of learning. And a city that would eventually house the hall of [Heroes] and [Demon Lords], created by the first level 10 [Historian]. In the aftermath of Pride's defeat, Gertrude also stepped down from leading the nation of Gert, and it was rebranded as the United North.

She mentioned that she would take a crack at trying to retrieve some things from the time wastes, and then she was never heard from again… well, mostly. I got to watch as she caused the "monster diversity" patch that forced a whole bunch of new mobs to spawn all around the world. And then, to round out everything that happened while I was waiting to respawn, the System chose Samson Stonebreaker to be the [Knight]-[Hero] to defend against the beasts that came from the Below.

He stood against those threats and hit level 25 with a unique skill making him even stronger… Meanwhile, I respawned incredibly weak. Every time that Pride had expended mana, stamina, or health, he actually just took it on loan, and I had to pay that loan off in the form of a slew of debuffs and decreased functionality. I had limited resource pools, was old, needed to sleep, and the icing on the cake was that if I died in the next 52 years after respawning, that was it. I was dead for real.

I was initially planning to game it by just staying in the tutorial forever, but that plan got kiboshed when I discovered that I could have nightmares… and the tutorial sapped all the mana I would use to cast [Restore]. I wasn't sure what would happen if my mind broke while I was that weak and vulnerable. I worked my way out as soon as possible, using the "Wilson" shield that the tutorial gives out randomly in one of its chests, and then I was teleported out right into the middle of Faroff's town square.

I managed to bluff the army and then bluff Samson into a 1 v 1 duel outside of town. Then, with copious chugging of mana potions, I cast [Teleport] and left him behind… for a while. I fled to my dungeons on Gram's eastern side and then into Fort Faroff. There, I learned that my cult had unexpectedly survived the death of Pride, and I worked with a [Watch Officer] named Theo to take care of my cult.

He hid me away, I wrote my first draft of my cult's manifesto (which unfortunately ended up as the only draft as he made copies immediately), and then I accidentally caused a monster wave. The fort beat that back without real issue, but I was stuck in there, and they knew it for sure. I tried to make good use of my time. I got in touch with the other side of the underworld while in disguise. I learned how to forge a status and established the Syndicate.

The Syndicate only loosely reported to me as "the boss," but that was fine. Mostly they were there to earn me money, as I took 10% off the top of everything they earned. The monster waves continued to give up the fact that I was still in Fort Faroff, but I didn't dare leave with the [Son of Dave] still in play. So… after the Children of Flame failed to take him out, I committed my first act of cold-blooded murder. With that grisly act taken care of, I put more organization into my cult.

I got the bottom-rung people actual classes, established the Embers as a façade charity organization that would also look for recruits, and established a hierarchy of positions including [Speaker of Flame]. With my two evil organizations in place, I was actually able to get a bit of info about the [Son of Dave] that came for me next. Unfortunately, the following [Son of Dave] was more of a trap than anything. I snuck into his room, but a group of high-level [Soldiers] was waiting for me.

At level 8, I decided discretion was the better part of valor and ran away… after lighting the barracks on fire. The fire got some kills, gave me the two levels I needed, and I auto-activated Deception form. With an illusion of the Demon Lord of Wrath in play, I sneakily killed the [Son of Dave], copied down the [Disguise Self] spell that came naturally in that form, and then saved the town from a monster wave as Filarion Silverleaf.

As Filarion, I made my way up to Jenkins without much issue and then visited the Hall of Heroes and Demon Lords. I had some… complaints… about the accuracy of the information. I got to chat with the [Historian] there, get things corrected, and also gained Kilroy Jenkin's iPod. From there, I stayed in Jenkins for a while. I apprenticed myself out to two of the greatest artisans in Placeholder history. Thorgrala Mastersmith, and Elnil Mastercarver. … Yes, they chose their last names for themselves.

Among dwarves, the last name is more "professional name" than surname. Anyway, I crafted my staff Singularity with their help and a bit of trickery to get them to work together without their knowledge. Then I wanted some armor, and they forced me to do that all myself, which is where I accidentally discovered black mithril and created the [Demon Lord's] armor.

However, they also hit level 10 in their respective craftsmen classes after accidentally finding me out, and they received a skill to craft the set of armor that would give me grief for every coming life. The Hero's Regalia. As they worked on that, I spent some time figuring out my new armor and how skill levels worked for damage values. I felt invincible with my new armor. I was not. Jeremiah Cole, the [Watch Officer]-[Hero], came next. He was a detective on Earth who was the most perceptive man I would ever meet.

Illusions and deceit stood no chance against him, and my armor didn't either because his [Hero] weapon was a pistol with a maximum damage type. He discovered me when I met him to make him a target for [Scry], and things were over with one shot… Kinda. It turned out that he was very law-abiding, and [Watch Officers] were only allowed to use non-lethal takedowns.

So, I was stripped of my armor and kept unconscious with repeated non-lethal takedowns until they had established an entire prison in the dragonlands just for me. We had our heart-to-heart where I revealed the nature of the world… and the emotionless man didn't care. From his point of view, learning that an admin was behind the Comic-Con disappearances meant that it was case solved. In retaliation, I [Restored] him because I assumed his emotionlessness was some kind of mental illness that could be treated…

Placeholder agreed enough that his emotions all came online at once, and the only thing that saved his life was AltSys whisking him out of there at the last moment. From there, I stayed in prison for the rest of my timer and bided my time. Then, once respawns were available, I cast a giant ritual that I had carved and slowly poured mana into with [Cast From SP] and sank the entire island killing everyone on it. The good news was that I was able to respawn just like normal.

The bad news was that I came back in a woman's body and was missing all but one piece of my armor. In other bad news, the System summoned over a young girl as the [Hero], and that ticked me off. I decided to keep her safe, even though I was sure it would kill me. After making it out of the tutorial, we took on an enhanced version of the Faroff Forest dungeon, where the boss was set to level 25 instead of 15.

With Erica's [Shining Barrage] and my [Reflect Attack], we took down the multi-element wolf and reclaimed the first piece of the Hero's Regalia. From there, we traveled north to DeepMine with [Commander] Lee's squad in tow. I had a quick impromptu meeting with my cult, had one of my speakers die for me to remove suspicion, and then we fought a giant adamantium spider for the first piece of my armor.

It was about to kill Erica, and we ran out of things to damage it, but I threw together the spell [Lightning Spear] at the last moment and killed the boss at the cost of all my mana and stamina… and health. I went comatose but got better pretty quickly after giving Erica a scare. From there, we cleared the next dungeons, but I made sure to clear one of them without the party there so that it would seem like the [Demon Lord] was out and doing something.

In said dungeon clear, I shot the boss with a [Lightning Spear] and then turned into Envy form to wipe the floor with it… and then the town afterward. After that, the next few dungeons were easy-peasy until we got to the one I knew I would have to go in alone. A dungeon in the middle of the time wastes. I said my goodbyes to the party and made my way in there solo. I had to fight through a lot of enemies that were temporal versions of the regular ones, and magic itself seemed to function weirdly in there.

Once I reached the center, I encountered the most gimmicky dungeon of Placeholder yet. It had an actual stealth puzzle. After banging my head against that wall for ages, I made it through… and found Gertrude. The two of us headed on to the boss together, and the boss even had a name, Undead shard of time, Illastrous. He claimed to be my son (by means of me accidentally zombifying time to create him), and he quickly turned Gertrude against me.

Then, just to make my life even harder, he cast a spell [Summon Future Nemesis: Guardian of Placeholder]. What followed was a 1 v 3 against Illastrous, Gertrude, and Mishael, the archangel of Placeholder. I won by abusing Envy form to steal each of their forms in turn to defeat Mishael, and then I came up with [Control Z] to undo a particularly brutal spell from Illastrous that put every single one of my skills on cooldown. With them defeated, I had all my armor reclaimed.

I exited the time wastes and then decided I might as well group up with Erica again. I attempted to [Scry] her but failed as the fey had captured her and the party. I kicked their butt in the trials again and got everyone free. However, I quickly learned that the fey were entering a decline without Primavia there to [Grand Teleport] them around. I stayed to help them work out [Grand Teleport] as the party moved on to the last enhanced dungeon.

Said dungeon had a twin boss that needed to be taken down simultaneously, and the party was in a pinch… until I teleported in last minute and saved the day. The world was saved, the armor was reclaimed, and… Erica was given a quest to kill me with a map marker showing that I was right by her. Erica had a showdown with Envy form, and Erica won with [Heroic Sacrifice: Shining Nova]. Fortunately, as an otherworlder, AtlSys was able to preserve her life and send her back to Earth.

Not that I would know that for quite some time. After that, while waiting to respawn, I visited the fey and spent longer among them than I would have cared to. Though, I did come out of the visit with [Appraise]. That, combined with [Advanced Message], was a complete game-changer for the time in between lives. With both of those available, I could find out people's names and send them messages to tell them what I wanted them to do all from the comfort of the void. …

And I created the world's first scams and pyramid schemes because my cult really needed the money. Which led to the most bizarre [Hero] in history… Ayluin Eltris, the [Merchant]-[Hero]. He helped foil my financial schemes and saved the world…' s markets. Hey, downturns in the economy can be really bad, okay? I guess the System must have agreed it was worth it. Anyway, I was reborn as the short and fat greed form for my final life up to that point.

I traveled to the east because my first plan for that life was to get some levels, and I ran into two very familiar liches. The ghosts of Cameron and Tim. Cameron tried to possess me but quickly discovered I was not really possessable. Instead, I managed to trap him inside my… soul?... mind?... wherever the heck he was. Then, after meeting Tim, we went over the ritual plans and realized that I was on the clock for getting things done. … Like, really on the clock. 550 years turned to less than 50 just like that.

From there, I continued my journey to Besti where I encountered [Prince] Ren. The greedy [Prince] and I were kindred spirits in a bizarre way, and we schemed together. I helped him increase the number of "treasure turtles" that spawned on the solstices and equinoxes by simply showing up as a [Monster Magnet]. That earned me a good chunk of change, and we decided to continue our partnership for a while and expand into making a dungeon together.

Over the course of that, I continued my studies of time and space magic, added studies of the Bestian language to the mix, and discovered what I took to calling the Mindscape. With a bit of inspiration given to Tim, we discovered [Gravitus] magic, and that was the final key to getting a 500-year [Restart] ritual. Then, we just needed a metric ton of mana. With new levels, a pair of teleport spells to return to Besti whenever needed, and an inventory full of gems, I went on to the next problem.

Specifically, the sheer amount of mana required to cast the ritual. And to deal with that, I decided to take a first-hand look at the Below to see if I could do anything to increase mining productivity. The Below was a struggle. My [Darkvision] barely did a thing for me down there, and I fought my way through with a [Scry] over my shoulder for quite some time. However, I got things figured out.

I discovered new plants, that the Below was upside down, and eventually created eyedrops that allowed me to see even down in that murky, awful place. Then, after inventing [Invert Gravity] to be able to see things in the correct orientation, I even stumbled across a giant piece of magicite that would later become a key component of my ritual. And then it was the home stretch. I continued my preparations, created my "Kris Kringle" alias, and took nearly 200 cultists to the east to get them some easy levels.

I leveled my 9 speakers and 9 others before the System got wise and patched things. I had been hoping to level everyone up to 25 but had to settle with making the 9 that I leveled into my very own elites called the [Fangs of the Demon Lord]. However, I still needed way more mana than I would get from just my cult. Instead, I tricked the fey into charging the giant piece of magicite from the Below. They couldn't do it from a single ley line, but that was fine.

I just let them port from ley line to ley line and followed them around to charge it. And then, the final [Hero] was chosen. Jonathan Andrews. I kept the [Hero] busy for most of the time leading up to the ritual by having him fight the undead. Undead which I had Tim raise, lead, and then finally convert to mana for the ritual after they were all re-dead. That also kickstarted the donations from the surrounding countries, and mana poured in.

Meanwhile, I spent every waking moment preparing for the cast, journaling to maintain sanity, or preparing countermeasures for things that would go wrong with the ritual. And, of course, several things went horribly wrong when I finally started casting it. We tried to keep the ritual a secret, but Gram, Dryadal, and Besti found out and sent their armies to stop it.

Tim and Cameron should have been able to hold the line even against that with their undead armies, but Cameron found a way to betray his oaths by doing the lich ascension ritual again. Meanwhile, the [Hero], who I thought I had moved thoroughly out of the way of the upcoming fight, was teleported almost directly to the ritual by the power of the fey. My personal army, augmented by summoned demons, wasn't enough to stop them, and I fought for my life and for control of the ritual.

The System counted down the seconds until the end, and I wasn't going to be able to cast it in time. However, with a clockwork heart from the time wastes, and a server reset for good measure, I completed the ritual right as the [Hero] slew me. I was sent back in time… but I was not the one in control. The admin that I had known as AltSys was, and he took me back to every single time that "AltSys" had intervened.

I was forced to ensure that everything happened just like that again, even going so far as using the pieces of admin "code" that he fed to me to "cast." I despaired of life and wanted it to end, but among cryptic talks about AltSys being from even farther in the future, he showed me exactly what it would be like if I wasn't there to stop Admin. I reluctantly admitted defeat and returned to my own time, where I was killed and swiftly respawned. Despair form set in as I shuffled to the boss room.

I planned to end my life by jumping into the corruption beneath the tutorial, but AltSys prevented even that. And then… he left. I was left alone to deal with my thoughts, and they settled on one last idea. One last purpose that I could have. I would get back at the creator(s) of the OmniverseEngine in the only way I could think of. … I would take it all down.