Book 9: Chapter 9:

“Bro, I know you said you want to troll them, but this is…”

Rao and Fenrir looked over large billboard that was just finished. It pointed south so that any potential End Bringers members approaching the town would see it. More importantly, it showed what looked like a rather edgy player wearing all black covered in spikes surrounded by Rock, Shogun, and a few of the other bestial companions belonging to members of the town. All of the animals formed a giant cuddle puddle around the edgy-looking player. To top it off, there was text that read, “Why Bring The End When You Can Bring The Cuddles?”

As it turned out, Nell’s maids were excellent painters. They had plenty of time to practice new hobbies together in reality before getting into gaming for Nell… and Rao. So, while the maids put the finishing touches on the billboard, the two men on the ground discussed it.

Fenrir was clearly proud of it as he nodded with his arms crossed over his chest. “It’s beautiful.”

Rao, on the other hand, was significantly less impressed. “I love you bro, but it’s so… tacky. Like, it doesn’t fit at all. We’ve got a normal fantasy looking town and all that, and then anybody who comes close is going to see… this.”

“You’re right. It needs more rainbows and sparkles.”

“I think it’s going to make our own friends cringe more than it makes our enemies cringe.”

“They’ll get used to it. As long as we surround ourselves with the cringe, we’ll grow used to it. We’ll embrace it. The cringe will be our friend and our savior. Those who cannot handle the cringe will be uwu’ed.”

“U… uu-whoo? What’s that?”

Fenrir faked a gasp. “You don’t know about uwu?! What about owo?!”

“Oh-woah?”

“What’s this?”

“What?”

Fenrir sighed. “You’ll learn, Rao, don’t worry. I’ll educate you on the ways of the cringe.”

“I’m scared, bro.”

“Don’t be. I’m here.”

“That’s why I’m scared.”

“Come on. What’s the worst that could happen? You start ironically using cringey language whenever you talk and then slowly slip into using it unironically because you’ve gotten used to it and, before long, become the cringe that you swore to destroy?”

“Are you speaking from experience?”

“Absowolutely. That being said, I just thought of a beautiful way to use psychological warfare against them.”

“What?”

“Well, I told you about the submarine idea.”

“Yeah.”

“That’s the serious ship we’re going to make. You know what we need now?”

“What?”

“A troll boat. Imagine this: a super cutesy boat that’s pastel pink that has like… if possible, basically loudspeakers. Or some fantasy equivalent capable of amplifying noise over long distances. Anyways, we take a really cutesy, but fast, boat, toss somebody on there who wouldn’t mind singing a really cringy song, and then we send them down there. It would be like a drive-by shooting except replacing drive-by with sail-by and shooting with cringey singing. They’d want to stop the boat, but it’d be too fast, so they’d be forced to listen to the singing. Wait… I just thought of something even better.”

“I’m scared again.”

“Imagine. One day, you and your edgy friends are chilling around thinking about how to torture somebody or something. That’s when you hear somebody in the distance singing about love and friendship while being really cringe about it. After a few minutes of this, that’s when you hear it. That’s when you hear whistling through the air… before hearing explosions all around you due to a missile strike. Then, even after the explosions are over, you still hear the singing as your friends and allies scream out in pain and agony all around you. Somebody could be missing a leg to the tune of somebody singing about love and cupcakes.”

“I hate everything about that.”

“Exactly why it’s a good idea.”

“How do you even come up with this stuff?”

“Eventually, after so many years of being edgy and griefing people the normal way, you get bored and look for new ways of doing it. In my case, I want to troll them in a way that anybody can find funny. Even they should find it funny unless they just have no sense of humor. And honestly, if I can make them laugh with my plans, then that’s better for us. Even if they still attack us… if I can make them laugh first, they’ll respect us. Kind of.”

“Why would you want their respect?”

“Because even if they attack us, so long as they respect us, they’ll treat us differently.”

“How do you mean?”

“Look at it this way. If I go and grief somebody who I don’t care about at all, I’m probably going to destroy everything they have without a care in the world. I’m not going to care about the player behind the avatar. I won’t care about leaving them anything. I won’t care about giving them a fair chance. Blah blah. Now, personally speaking, if I respect the target of my griefing, I’m going to take things a little bit easier on them. I would rather grief them while they’re online and capable of putting up a defense than not. I might leave some of their items and infrastructure around so that they don’t get completely wiped and have to start over from scratch. I would still intend to destroy them, but I wouldn’t want to destroy them to the point where they quit and never play again.”

“Huh… I guess that makes sense. If you like somebody being your enemy, you don’t want them to stop being your enemy. Or something like that, I guess?”

“Yeah, pretty much. There’s also the bonus effect of making them join you. If we can show that we’re more fun than the End Bringers, especially if we’re able to piss off their leaders, then we might be able to convert some more of their members to work for us instead. That’s another thing. I don’t really care about whatever fodder they send at us. What we need to try and do is deal wit their leadership.”

“Like, assassinate them?”

“Nah. Nothing that grand. Instead, what we have to do is drive them insane. Find some dirt on them and expose it to the members. Like… if you’re going to join a group of players in a game, you want the leaders to be competent, right?”

“Right.”

“So, let’s roleplay a little here. You’re a super edgy guy who wants to cause death and destruction and make people rage and all that. Got it?”

“Uh… sure.”

“Good. Now, you join a group full of similar edgelords led by people you decide are the edgiest and coolest of them all.”

“Alright.”

“Now, imagine seeing the leaders you respect as the edgiest and the most badass… become seething and full of rage over somebody playing stupid songs and making fun of them in really silly and cringey ways.”

“I think I see where you’re going with this.”

“You should be able to. Why would a bunch of trolls want to follow leadership who gets trolled so easily by something so stupid? If anything, their first mistake was trying to take on some edgy appearance and reputation. All we have to do is destroy the image of them being edgy badasses and we do a massive amount of damage to their morale. This would be way harder to do if they never tried to give themselves the image and rep that they have. If they were just some normal group of griefers having fun, kind of like us, then this sort of counter-trolling wouldn’t be anywhere near as effective. But, as it is, they’re basically roleplayers. Edgy, asshole roleplayers. And if there’s one thing that I learned from my time as a griefing troll… it’s that roleplayers are the easiest targets.”

“You really were a horrible person.”

“I know. I ruined the fun of so many roleplayers even though part of me always wanted to join them and roleplay, too.”

“I can’t really imagine you being the roleplaying type.”

“It’s fun every now and then, but only one-on-one. I don’t know. It’s kind of embarrassing to do in groups. But if it’s just me and Aza, or me and Nell, then I have no problem playing a role and acting cheesy with them. But if it was me, Nell, and Aza all at once… I don’t know if I’d be able to do it.”

“Huh.”

Fenrir shrugged and stretched his arms high above his head. “Anyways, got any other questions?”

Rao copied Fenrir’s stretching. “Don’t think so.”

“By the way.”

“Yeah?”

“How’s stuff with the maids going?”

Rao’s demeanor immediately changed as his cheeks turned a gentle shade of red. “They’re uh… going good. I guess.”

“Absolutely zero progress has been made with them, huh?”

Rao slumped his shoulders and nodded. “I don’t know how you do it. You know, like… I used to be content with how things were. Everything was fine. I figured I’d be happy as long as I get to be around them every now and then, and… I guess I was afraid of trying to take things to the next level. But every single day that passes, I feel less and less content. Like, I want more. I feel like I’m wasting time. Every day that I’m not with them is a day wasted that could have been spent doing… couples stuff with them. I want to hold their hands, and I want to hug them, and take them on dates, and all that stuff. Every day that passes is another day where I’ll never be able to do those things with them, and I can’t get those days back. Man… I want to date them so bad.”

Fenrir’s plan worked. Looking up at the billboard where the maids were, he saw that they were all there and listening in with blushing expressions of their own. Meanwhile, because of Fenrir disarming Rao first and distracting him from their presence, he was able to get Rao to open where they could hear.

Of course, he kept it secret that that was his plan all along.

“And why don’t you date them?” Fenrir asked.

“Beccause, bro, it’s not that easy,” Rao answered. “Like… how am I supposed to choose? What are the chances of me getting lucky like you and dating all of them? And they’re always with Nell. I don’t want to take any of them away from her. And… I don’t know. I don’t think I’m that interesting. Like, you? You’re awesome. But me? I’m just some dude.”

“You’re awesome too, Rao. Give yourself some more credit than that.”

“I can’t just tell myself that I’m awesome and believe it.”

“Then I’ll tell you it until you believe it. You’re awesome, Rao.”

“Bro…”

“Awesome. Awesome, awesome, awesome. Awesome.”

“I’m gonna be honest, it’s not really having an effect.”

“Dang. But seriously, don’t put yourself down. And I’m telling you. If you could confess to them, they’d probably fall into your arms and be happy to date you together.”

“If you say something like that you’re gonna get my hopes up and then I’ll just be even more depressed when it doesn’t happen.”

“Then I’ll get your hopes up and promise that it will happen. If I do, I get to rub it in your face later and tell you I told you say. I’ll sing and dance about how I’m right and you were wrong.”

“I’d let you if it means dating them.”

Fenrir sighed and gave Rao a couple of smacks on the back.

Meanwhile, the maids struggled to concentrate on applying the finishing touches to the billboard as they were much more interested in listening to Rao.

“Don’t think too hard about it,” Fenrir said. “Just be honest with them sometime. Open up about your feelings and confess to them.”

Rao sighed. “I’ll… try to build up the courage to do that. Will you let me cry on you if they turn me down?”

“They’re not going to, but I’ll let you cry on me if they do.”

“Then if you’re so sure they won’t turn me down, will you let me cry on your if they say yes?”

“From happiness?”

“Yeah.”

“Then sure.”

“My chest already feels tight just thinking about either result.”

“Save the tears for when you actually try.”

“I—I’ll try to.”

A few more moments passed and that was all the time the maids needed in order to finish up the billboard. Nothing much changed aside from adding some more details to the various animals cuddling the End Bringers member in the painting, but Fenrir wanted to make sure that all the pets were painted to look as cute as possible, and those extra details helped to bring out their ultimate cuteness.

“Great work!” Fenrir shouted up at them.

Rao looked around for a moment to try and figure out who he was talking to before remembering that the maids were up there.

Now, had Rao been anybody other than—well, Rao, Fenrir would have expected him to realize he said all of that while right in front of the maids with them within hearing distance. However… Rao had zero reaction to remembering that the maids were there other than smiling because they were there. The idea of the maids hearing everything he just said didn’t cross into his mind for even a second.

As for the maids themselves, with the job done, they jumped down from the billboard as if it was nothing. Such a jump in reality could potentially break bones or, at the very least, cause significant pain, but the jump was no big deal at all within the game.

Rao might not have reacted any differently to realizing the maids were still there, but the maids, who just got done listening to everything, were not nearly as unresponsive.

One of the maids, Emily—the short and clumsy one of the group with brown hair and what appeared to be the biggest chest due to her short height—walked up to Rao… and tripped. Or rather, she did what looked like tripping.

But to Fenrir, he thought it was obvious that the clumsy girl made herself trip on purpose.

Emily stumbled forward with her arms open and out, and her face was the first thing to touch Rao as she planted it right into his chest. In the next moment, she wrapped her arms around Rao and tightly squeezed.

There’s no way she’s not trying to secretly hug him while making it look like an accident, and making it way too obvious, Fenrir thought.

As for Rao, he wrapped his arms around the smaller girl to catch her and make sure that she didn’t fall. “Woah—hey, you alright?” he asked, looking down at her with nothing but genuine concern on his face.

Even though he was just talking about how he wanted to hug them, now that he was… he was convicned of it being an accidental trip and just wanted to make sure that she was alright.

Emily looked up at Rao and nodded. “I—I am! Thanks for umm, catching me. Ehe…”

“You need to be more careful, but I’ll always be here to catch you whenever I can,” Rao said.

Emily’s cheeks turned a brighter shade of red as she tightened her arms even more around Rao. “Ehe… you always catch me whenever I trip around you.”

“I don’t want you getting hurt.”

Emily practically nuzzled her face against him, making the rest of the maids watching a little jealous.

That was when she noticed something.

Given that Rao was tall and she was short, and given that her chest was undeniably on the larger end of things, her nuzzling her face against his abdomen also caused her to rub her chest up against his crotch.

As soon as she realized what she was doing, her cheeks turned bright red as she let go of Rao and jumped backward.

That caused her to really trip.

Rao lunged forward to wrap his arms around her again, turning their bodies around in the process so that he would be the one to fall and hit the ground first which allowed her to fall on top of him.

Fenrir couldn’t help but to look at the scene with eyes of disbelief. This… this is an anime development here. Trips like this actually happen?

Somehow, in their fall, the two ended up in a position that looked rather… intimate. Emily ended up planting her breasts right on top of Rao’s face as one of her legs brushed up against his crotch. At the same time, Rao somehow had one hand squeezing her breast while his other hand was on her rear.

All Fenrir could do was stare at them with a poker face while the other maids looked like they were taking notes.

After a few moments, Rao realized what sort of position they were in and hurried to fix it by grabbing her in more appropriate places and helping her get up. “So-sorry! I—I didn’t mean to—”

“It’s—it’s alright!” Emily said. “It was my fault!”

“It’s not your fault. I should have been more careful.”

“It’s fine! I promise! Besides, I… umm… I… if… if it’s you… then… I—I wouldn’t mind if… you touch me more okay I have things to do bye see you later love you I mean umm yeah okay killing myself anyways bye.”

Emily turned to run away… only to trip again. Fortunately for her, the maids were closest to catch her so that she didn’t end up embarrassing herself even more around Rao.

The maids made a quick escape together after that.

“Told you,” Fenrir said.

“Huh?” Rao asked.

“What do you mean ‘huh?’”

“What did you tell me?”

“That they like you.”

“What makes you think that?”

“Did you… did you not hear what she just said?”

“Oh. I… was distracted by how beautiful she is. I heard her say that she was fine and then… everything else she said was kind of blurry. She just looked even more beautiful up close, man.”

“I want to smack you.”

“Bro, what’d I do?”

Rather than smack Rao, Fenrir gave him a pat on the shoulder as he sighed again. “I’m going to start calling you a dense harem anime protagonist. You deserve it.”

Rao couldn’t have been more confused by what Fenrir was talking about, but he also couldn’t have been happier about getting to see the maids some more, even if he missed something major that would have made him the happiest man in the world.

Well, even without hearing what she said, he probably was the happiest man in the world at the moment anyways.