On an early morning not unlike any other, the first sound of carriage wheels rolling the ground heralded the beginning of the day’s activities.

Under a gigantic tree that stood tall in the middle of a forest, a large tent made of exquisite monster skins was erected conspicuously.

Inside, two small figures could be seen. 

One had already traveled far into the land of dreams, and though the other remained wide awake yet her state wasn’t much different.

Neo was deep asleep with her body huddled into a little ball, and cute snoring sounds occasionally escaped her mouth as evidence of how fatigued she is.

She did have to endure an intense two hour training session, after all. And it was right after a long six hour march at that.

Hold your horses! I know what you wanna say, but don’t you go judging me before hearing the complete story, okay?!

I didn’t force her to go through any of that spartan training, alright? In fact, it was the exact opposite!

I did my best to dissuade her from over exerting herself in such a dangerous way, but she wouldn’t listen!

Her half demonic bloodline gives her an innate advantage when it comes to stats and skills concerning magic.

With such a noticeable growth in magic capacity every few hours, I think the magic power is getting to her little head.

She’s basically addicted to it by now… I should probably force her to stop next time though.

Magic might seem like an incredible all-purpose tool, and that’s in fact true for most cases. But it ain’t no omnipotent panacea.

Except for Heretic Magic which explicitly targets the soul, there’s no other magic nor skill that can subtly affect the mental aspects of a person.

Thus, any personality or mentality defects are near impossible to overcome. And trust me when I say this, having your strength quantified in numbers makes it much easier for those defects to be conceived.

Folks with over inflated egos have become this world’s speciality by now, y’know?

Even Kumoko in the anime fell for that illusion and almost got killed by an incredibly weakened Queen Taratect.

It would’ve been great if I could have Neo acquire the Overeating skill and offset any wear and tear with just a bite of food, but that won’t work unfortunately.

The skill’s side effects will undoubtedly apply to her since she’s a real humanoid, not a fake shapeshifter like me.

Personally, I don’t ever wanna see that skill in Neo’s status tab unless I find a way around its downsides.

In exchange, I did my best to keep her in top shape through continuous casting of Healing Magic and tens of delicious, nutritious meals prepared with all of my love and care!

Such a loving and caring guardian I am! Fufufu~

Opposite to Neo’s hectic life, my current life is basically the same as that one time when I went on vacation with my family back on Earth.

As she slept her fatigue away, I was seated motionlessly by the tent’s opening, listlessly gazing at the cloudy blue sky outside… just like I always do.

Honestly, life on land had been plain boring for the most part.

Either I’m eating something, wandering around somewhere, or waiting for Neo to rest after what felt like minimal effort for me.

Only a few interesting events like my raid on the caravan and Alexia’s failed infiltration were interesting enough to catch my attention, yet the down time in between those is fairly long.

Ever since I left the ocean, life’s pace has become much slower than what I’ve been used to for both of my lives.

Back when I was still a little fish hatchling, I had to put in incredible efforts just to survive, much less find the time to laze around like I regularly do nowadays.

Even life back on Earth was much more hectic with how much learning and traveling around I raced to do in preparation for my upcoming reincarnation.

But now I’m just… I dunno, walking on a random road in some random country while babysitting a ten-year old child who’s suffering from PTSD?

Talk about a drastic shift in lifestyle!

Don’t get me wrong, I’ve been having tons of fun with giving those self-righteous assholes their just desserts and spending time with Neoma, but it’s nothing next to the thrill I got from my underwater battles.

Is this what retirement feels like…? I’m not retired though, just taking a break.

There hasn’t been any significant change in my status in weeks however, and most of my time is wasted blankly gazing into empty space around me.

For hours on end, I just sit there like a statue waiting for Neo to wake up so that we can move along while biting on some self-invented snack.

I felt much more… alive before, and now it feels like I might go crazy from the boredom. It appears I’ve unknowingly developed a workaholic trait, huh?

As I was contemplating whether I should just return to my natural habitat and continue leveling until Filimos is born, Sage’s increasingly humane voice resounded inside my head.

 

{Notice: Condition satisfied. Acquired title [Chaos Bringer].}

{Notice: Skills [Anti-magic Evil Eye LV1] [Maddening Evil Eye LV1] were acquired as a result of title [Chaos Bringer].}

{Notice: Skill [Maddening Evil Eye LV 1] has been integrated into skill [Soul Seeker].}

{Notice: Proficiency has reached the required level. Skill [Demon Lord LV 7] has become [Demon Lord LV 8].}

{Notice: Proficiency has reached the required level. Skill [Demon Lord LV 8] has become [Demon Lord LV 9].}

 

Blinking cluelessly, I looked on as D’s iconic smartphone materialized in front of me out of thin air– the usual.

“Judging by that totally oblivious expression on your face, you do not actually understand why you got that, am I correct?” D’s voice came through the speakers.

“Yup-p! Care to explain?” I smiled, happy at the prospect of more alone time with her.

“Just remember everything you did or was involved in since you came to this world, then of what effects this had on the world.”

…I wish she’d just tell me and get it over with. I hate flipping through my memories more than anything else.

She’s basically forcing me to find a needle in a sea of hay! This is pure evil!

And as such, I will cheat by asking a friend for help.

Sage-san, I’m counting on ya!

 

{Affirmative.}

{Notice: Accessing memory archives… Complete}

{Installing Information.}

 

Along with a huge influx of information being injected into my brain, the jigsaw puzzle was gradually assembled into one complete picture.

The cause and effect became clear to my little fish brain.

Honestly, there are too many things that could’ve landed the Chaos Bringer on my head, but it all comes down to one fundamental reason.

You could say it’s the root cause of the incredible changes that happened and will continue to happen to this world.

Fate.

As Goddess Alkreya informed me, my fate isn’t linked to any universe, meaning I can do whatever I want without caring about the consequences.

This brings us to the current situation.

Observing and manipulating fate is a trick that can only be mastered by Divine beings whose strength is one level below D, and is usually controlled by O.

So the fate of this entire universe isn’t really a secret among those folks, it’s just that they find the consequences of manipulating is troublesome– unless it affects them negatively of course.

However, my presence in itself affected at least four different gods and one pivotal character of this universe.

D, Sariel, Güliedistodiez, Ouri, and Kumoko.

A natural goddess, a Seraphim, a True Dragon, I honestly don’t know what species Ouri belongs to, and this world’s ‘protagonist’.

Anyways, they’re all existences at the apex of the universe at present or will be in the future, so messing with any of their fates is pretty much fucking with this entire universe’s fate line.

Then you have happy go lucky lil’ me just playing around, affecting all five of them at the same exact time!

Yeaaah… this is bad. This is really fucking bad!

If I was O, I’d definitely be scouring through the entire universe just to find and thoroughly crush the anomaly that’s making her job much harder than it needs to be.

Fuck this, man. Why can’t I just exist without provoking some terrifying being?!

I can only hope the current relationship between me and D is enough for her to cover for me when the time comes… 

Thankfully, that’s what’s most likely to happen according to my humble understanding of D’s character.

She practically feeds on chaos and suffering for entertainment, so she might even go out of her way to make sure I’m hidden from O’s sight.

For now though, let’s focus on a very important matter, which I’ve noticed much later than I should have.

“Wait, you can actually grasp the fates of everyone on this planet through the W system, can’t you?! How the heck were you able to achieve that?!”

Sage’s information contained a piece of information I hadn’t attached much importance to before.

It was only mentioned casually in the single light novel volume I read, but the implications were nothing shot of horrifying!

“Oh? I’m really curious. How were you able to notice that?” I could hear genuine surprise in her voice.

“There was that one skill called Divine Protection in the system database– if I remember the name correctly. Although its description is vague, it literally says that it makes it easier for the skill owner to gain the results they desire in any situation.” I paused and took a deep breath. “Or in other words, it means that fate will actively bend to their whims, though not by much. Is that correct?”

“Color me surprised, my little fishie. Now I’m really curious as to how much you were able to deduce just by flipping through that little insignificant list.”

Not only was the interest in D’s voice as obvious and intense as the sun in the sky, but I could also sense a predatory gaze locking onto my figure from what felt like light years away.

Somehow, I feel like I just made the future much harder for myself… I hope it’s only my illusion.

At least I trust D enough to know that she wouldn’t be attempting to end me… Actively increasing the difficulty level of my life by a few notches is the most she would do.

“Cough– Only a couple of skill names and descriptions caught my attention. It’s nothing much, really!” I hurriedly stammered out, hoping she’d just gloss over it.

“Oh, but it seems to me that you know a tad bit too much… Or is that just my imagination, my little fishie?” She playfully rebutted.

“Anyone with access to the database and a max level Taboo can figure it out with basic logical deductions, really.” I answered, dismissing her claims with a wave of my hand and a lot of feigned confidence. “Leaving that aside, can I acquire more of those cool-looking evil eyes?”

Along with those words leaving my mouth, my own gaze turned into a predatory one not much different from D’s, and I immediately turned to face the rough direction where I felt D’s eyes a few seconds ago.

It was clearly an awkward attempt to forcefully change the subject. But it might be due to how genuine I sounded, D temporarily stopped teasing me and answered seriously.

“Nope.You only get those two– of which one is completely useless except for making you look cool. Yaaaaay, let me find the fireworks button for celebration.”

Ahhh….Although I expected this, it's still a bummer.

Evil eye skills are essentially racially exclusive skills similar to the wyrm and dragon skill series.

The only method of completely unlocking the restriction on them I know is to acquire the ruler skill Perseverance like Kumoko in the anime.

A very harsh requirement, yet a fair one nonetheless.

Evil eye skills are frankly broken– especially when they fall on multi-eyed creatures like Taratects or someone like me who’s quite literally able to increase the number of eyes they have.

Shapeshifting for the win, by the way!

Frankly, I don’t see myself ever getting Perseverance, and it’s not just due to a personality problem. As far as my understanding goes, D has probably reserved it for Kumoko.

It seems like I’ll have to make do with these two evil eyes that were oh so generously bestowed upon me by the great D.

Oh, how regrettable!

The Anti-magic Evil Eye is an entirely new addition to my skill set. I am very curious as to how this one’s connected to Potimas’s anti-skill barrier.

Not gonna lie though, this is actually the first time I’ve come into contact with the anti-magic attribute, so I will need to experiment a bit with it before actually incorporating it into my regular kit.

Maddening Evil Eye is the exact opposite however, this one’s completely and utterly useless.

I mean, why would I go out of my way to cast a spell through my eyes when I can just insta-cast a bunch of stronger Heretic Magic spells instead?

It’s fine if it’s for the sake of looking cool, but doing something like that in an actual life an death fight is plain idiotic.

Meh, it is what it is. I won’t reject free stuff anyways.

Doubly so since these two can be considered the first gifts I’ve ever from D!

“Thanks, I gues–.”

“Oh, no. You shouldn’t rush to thank me before getting acquainted with your new title. Fufufu~” Her voice came out as a devilish whisper to my ears.

In fact, she didn’t need to remind me. I could already feel the hidden effects of the title kicking in.

“This is… an amplified version of Ruler of Mischief’s hidden effect?! No, it’s different but much worse nevertheless. Sage, quickly suppress all of my emotions!” I nervously yelled.

{Notice: Deactivating emotional capacity not effective for master’s current predicament. Proceed anyways?}

“Huh? If it’s gonna be ineffective then don’t do it. Take control of my body instead, and don’t return it till I’m back to normal!”

“As much as I hate to see you in this state, I’ve gotta say– this is definitely gonna be fun to watch.” I could hear D chuckling in the background, but I was in no state to respond right now.

Ruler of Mischief’s hidden effect is exactly what you’d expect it to be, increasing your urge to mess with other beings by a ridiculous amount.

You’ve got a monstrous intellect and were able to come up with some evil genius plan to control the world?

Well, it would suck if the most important link is missing, wouldn’t it…? Ooopsie!

Your life’s perfectly ordinary, your livelihood is guaranteed, and you’re perfectly satisfied with what you’ve achieved?

Oh, dear. For me, it seems like you’re missing out on a lot of spice!

That’s the effect when it comes to other living beings. As for items or objects, I just get the urge to break or destroy them.

Sounds like it’s just a prank skill that would only lead to a bit of fun and games, right? WRONG.

I can’t turn it off, and it really gets to my head sometimes! 

Unlike Greed, which I fully suppressed and devoured, Mischief was exclusively created for me by D, so I can only suppress it with nothing but sheer will.

I had been keeping a delicate balance between chaos and order inside my head up until now, but adding Chaos Bringer tipped the balance toward chaos instantly.

And Chaos Bringer’s effect isn’t a kiddy one like Ruler of Mischief. I was granted this title because I distorted the fate of an entire universe, not as a gift from a friend.

At first, it seems like Chaos Bringer only amplified the effects of Ruler of Mischief, but I soon discovered how naive that thought was.

It wasn’t long before my harmless desire to play a prank on Neo turned into a violent, uncontrollable thirst for utter chaos and crushing destruction directed towards everything that’s not me.

Thankfully, I already have a lot of experience in holding myself back.

Otherwise I might’ve already transformed into a primal beast ruled by nothing but its instincts, albeit one with too much power.

It’s gonna take me a while till I can get back to my senses though.

I really hope Sage is strong enough to hold me back in the meantime.

If I end up hurting Neo during my fit, then I’ll most likely lose all control and turn into a beast anyways.

So please, stay safe, Neo.

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