Pick Me Up!

Vol 1. Chapter 4: Side Story – Aaron – Purity for One (2)

The CEO slammed her hand on the table.

The office went cold in an instant.

“W-we’re doing our best...”

“Let me see. The proposal. You revised it, right?”

“W-well...”

“Don’t tell me it’s half-assed.”

“Um, it’s... something Lady Icar wrote, so...”

“You’re supposed to make that proposal interesting. Isn’t that your job?”

“Well, yes...”

“Give it here.”

The team lead awkwardly handed over the report. The girl snatched it.

Her eyes swept swiftly down the pages.

Pick Me Up!

Project Proposal

Author – Goddess of Mercy, Icar.

Everyone, I’m counting on you! ^^

Let’s all do our best together!

The proposal turned to the next page.

There is only one reason this project must succeed.

To save our Möbius.

Life stands at the brink of annihilation, in agony.

Please lend us your strength.

Flip.

Another page turned.

The Pantheon’s consensus is that we cannot save Möbius with our power alone.

Therefore, the Pick Me Up project will launch to obtain influence from the highest dimension—Earth—and secure enough interference power to alter our doomed fate.

Möbius aims to gather interference through a mobile game. If it becomes a hit on Earth, that alone will be enough to amass the necessary power.

The fate of Möbius rests on this game’s success!

Next page.

Recently, gacha games have been trending in the mobile game market on Earth.

I studied the genre and put together a proposal of my own! ^_^

From there, the setup for the game Pick Me Up! began.

A mobile game. The catchphrase: A summoning RPG where peace and hope come true.

Basically, the player (Master) summons heroes and uses them to clear stages.

But there’s something strange.

Normally, these games involve defeating enemies placed in each stage. But Pick Me Up! isn’t like that.

In this game, the heroes don’t fight.

They engage through conversation. Persuade through actions. Assert their beliefs with conviction. Commands like those are used to "convince" the opponent.

If persuasion succeeds, the stage is cleared.

No bloodshed. No slaughter.

Such things never occur in the world of Pick Me Up!.

Even though it’s only a game.

“.......”

Accordingly, the heroes have different stats.

Not strength or agility, but charm, intelligence, rhetoric—unique attributes like those.

Through events and training, these abilities grow, allowing players to persuade foes instead of fighting, and establish true peace within the game world.

That was the goal of Pick Me Up!.

“You kidding me?”

Thud thud.

The girl slapped the report bundle against the corner of the table.

“What’s this crap about peace and harmony? You think a game like this will succeed? Persuasion, my ass. Games need flashy battles to be fun. Smash stuff. Kill stuff. Boom boom. Got it?”

“B-but this is Lady Icar’s proposal...”

“Then you should’ve known to adjust it smartly. That’s what you’re paid for, isn’t it?”

“Then maybe you could bring it up with her directly—”

“Shut it! I said fix it!”

The team lead frowned, clearly frustrated.

“And what’s this crap. ‘A game that can be enjoyed without spending any money’... huh? Is that even a real sentence? Scrap it. Add heavy monetization. If they don’t pay, they shouldn’t be able to play. Who said anything about free rides?”

“That was... Lady Icar’s...”

“So you’re saying you didn’t change a damn thing.”

“...I’m sorry.”

“You’ve got one week. Bring me a version that’s actually good. Something guaranteed to hit.”

One week?

The team lead’s eyes widened.

“Not happy about it?”

“N-no! I’ll do my best!”

He hurriedly took the returned report with both hands.

“Then change the concept.”

“How? I mean... how should I change it?”

“I’m thinking.”

“If a game’s going to blow up, it needs a bang. Stunning graphics. Huge scale. Something like that. Can we even pull that off in our game?”

“I’ll try...”

Think. Try. Consider. Do your best.

Disgusting.

The girl narrowed her eyes at the team lead.

Then, suddenly, she muttered:

“You don’t care, do you.”

“...Pardon?”

“Even if Möbius gets destroyed.”

Her voice turned frigid.

The team lead panicked, unsure what she meant.

“Even if it goes down, you’ll just move on to some other project. So whether this fails or not, it doesn’t really matter to you.”

“T-that’s not true!”

“Möbius’s fate is someone else’s problem. Right? Because it’s not happening to you.”

“That’s not true, Director!”

“It’s fine. Be honest. I like honest people.”

The team lead looked her in the eye.

A girl with sleek black hair and crimson eyes.

But those eyes didn’t match her youthful appearance—they were deep, like an ocean trench.

She was one of the twin pillars that led the Möbius Pantheon.

Goddess of Purity, Tell.

Along with her twin sister, the Goddess of Mercy and Compassion, Icar, she was one of the supreme deities worshiped throughout every dimension of Möbius.

What she hated most was lies and hypocrisy.

She liked people who were pure to their hearts—pure to their desires.

Regardless of good or evil.

“To lie in front of her...”

That was risking your life.

The team lead murmured as if confessing.

“...Regretfully, I think it’s inevitable.”

“Inevitable?”

“I’m attached to Möbius too. It’s the realm I’ve overseen and managed. Our homeland. But the laws have already declared its end. In that case... there’s nothing to be done.”

He watched her face, afraid he’d said something wrong.

But the girl simply smiled faintly.

“Me too.”

“...Pardon?”

“I think so too. It’s sad, but it’s inevitable. If someone’s old and dying of age, what more can you do? It’s not even a disease.”

“Y-yes, I see...”

“So once development’s done, you’ll leave?”

“...Probably. If I’m too late...”

A universe doomed to collapse.

If he missed the window to escape—

He’d be left behind in the abyss of oblivion.

“So you’re assuming the project will fail.”

“Th-that’s...”

“The Pick Me Up project.”

“......”

“Be honest. No lies.”

The team lead hesitated many times.

He was a high-ranking spirit who had managed several Möbius dimensions for ages.

He had his own judgment.

“Even if the game becomes a hit and gathers lots of interference power... it’ll still fall short. We might delay the end, but we can’t reverse it.”

Tell nodded.

The goal of the Pick Me Up project was to draw interference power from Earth.

But no matter how much you gathered, you couldn’t overturn the result.

For a universe to sustain life, it had to emit power on its own.

It had to burn eternally on its own, like a star.

Pouring fuel into a star already gone cold—how long could its light even last?

You could delay destruction.

But never prevent it.

Of course, in theory, there was one way.

If you had infinite fuel, the fire could burn forever.

But where would such infinite energy come from?

No matter how successful the game, the interference Earth could supply was limited.

And pulling in Earth—a highest-rank dimension—was already an enormous risk.

If anything went wrong, Möbius could be torn apart.

“So you’re saying it’s not your problem, so you’ll just show up, fill a seat, and walk away?”

“N-no, I’m not!”

“Shut up. Bring me the revised proposal in a week. Miss the deadline and you’re dead.”

She turned away, leaving the miserable team lead behind.

“What’re you looking at? You’re all the same. You think if you run out the clock, I’ll let you off easy, huh?”

Flinch.

The other employees froze for a second.

Tch tch.

Tell clicked her tongue and walked out of the office.

A long corridor stretched before her.

Several offices like the one she left lined the hall.

Her little sister, Icar, was probably making her rounds, handing out coffee and promising a team dinner for tonight.

Ridiculous.

Tell took out her work phone and sent out a group message canceling tonight’s dinner outright.

Vrrrrrrr.

The elevator hummed.

The steel box carrying Tell ascended toward the top floor.

When the doors opened, the executive suite lay before her.

“You’re back, sis?”

On the right side of the suite—

A girl who looked nearly identical to Tell greeted her cheerfully.

She typed away on a keyboard, hard at work.

“Yeah.”

Tell gave a half-hearted reply and walked toward her own desk on the left.

A nameplate on the desk read: Co-CEO of Mobius Corp.

A plush leather chair welcomed her.

“......”

Creaaak.

The leather chair turned.

The view from the executive suite came into full display.

It was the top floor of a skyscraper.

The long stretch of city lights unfurled before her.

The city of gods.

Zero-Dimension Eden.

Once, this place was filled not with skyscrapers and highways and cars—but with grand marble halls and lush, colorful gardens.

Back then, it was known as the Pantheon.

This old-world site had only recently been modernized.

That shift came when the chairman presiding over the Pantheon changed—from Lucardis, the Sage of All Things, to the Twin Goddesses.

Shedding the relics of the past for the new.

The gods and spirits cast off their outdated robes and ancient civilizations, embracing the latest earthly advancements.

Thus was born the new city before their eyes—Eden.

“......”

Tell recalled the past.

At the time she was elected as chairwoman, her younger sister Icar had smiled more brightly than anyone and declared her aspirations.

“My sister and I have one goal: for all life in Möbius to live in happiness! There’s still a lot we lack, and we’re far from perfect, but we’ll do our best. Please look kindly upon us!”

A young girl draped in flowing cloth walked through the colonnade, receiving the blessings of the gods.

Beside her walked Tell, wearing an indifferent expression.

“Tell, Icar. I entrust Möbius to you now. You’ll do better than an old man like me just waiting for the day I die, right?”

The former chairman of the Pantheon, Lucardis, clapped his hands and laughed.

He now held the position of Alpha Zero within the company, serving as the game’s ✪ Nоvеlіgһt ✪ (Official version) director.

“My sister and I will give it our all. So no one suffers anymore. So that everyone in Möbius can live smiling. We’ll truly do our best!”

Icar responded with a beaming smile.

“Right, sister?”

“If I feel like it.”

“Oh, come on!”

Icar poked Tell in the side, but Tell only gave a deep yawn.

Events like this were nothing but a nuisance to Tell.

If her younger sister hadn’t made a huge fuss claiming this was her life’s wish, she would’ve ignored it altogether.

“And what kind of Möbius do you want to create?”

“I want to create a peaceful Möbius for everyone!”

“Oh-ho.”

At Lucardis’s question, Icar declared her bold ambition.

“Humility to the strong. Mercy to the weak. A world where no one is hurt, where no one becomes unhappy. That’s the world I want to make!”

She raised her hand high and shouted.

Tell sighed.

A world where no one gets hurt.

Such a world doesn’t exist.

“Indeed. If that could be achieved, it would be splendid!”

“Wouldn’t it, though?”

Lucardis nodded slightly.

Icar smiled brightly.

Still...

Better than her sobbing all the time.

Tell thought to herself.

Her little sister cried more often than she laughed.

Even the smallest events in the world could make Icar weep.

Like the unnoticed death of a kitten.

Like the sunflower sprout trampled unconsciously by passing soldiers.

Like the corpse of a traveler who died in the desert, unable to find water.

Every time, Icar would cry as if it had happened to her.

Mercy.

Also called compassion or benevolence.

It means to love others and feel pity for them.

But that nature wasn’t something Icar chose or developed.

It wasn’t a personality formed by a human-like upbringing.

She was simply born a god that way.

Had Tell not been born as her opposite, Icar would have given away her heart, her liver, her everything, and been discarded—used up and extinguished.

She was born a natural pushover.

In contrast, Tell’s attribute was Purity.

Though, not in the way ordinary people imagine it.

Her purity lay in being true to her own heart.

To her own desires, goals, and will.

Of course, being too faithful to that invites condemnation as evil.

But Tell didn’t care one bit for the notions of good and evil defined by humans.

She kills others to stay true to her own desire.

Even murder meant nothing to her.

In fact, she leapt over society’s norms and rules for the sake of her pure desire.

From her perspective, such behavior was something to be encouraged.

This, too, wasn’t something she chose.

Nor was it shaped.

She was simply born a god that way.

Twin goddesses, two as one.

When Tell and Icar were in harmony, the world achieved balance.

This was the most central doctrine of the Goddess Cult, Möbius’s most widespread religion.

The Goddess Cult and the Twin Goddesses were known throughout nearly every dimension of Möbius.

They had many names across the realms, but the most widely known were Tell, Goddess of Purity, and Icar, Goddess of Mercy.

Even so, hearing her little sister go on about creating a peaceful world and making people stop crying—Tell shook her head.

No way.

Even divine beings with immense authority couldn’t do what was impossible.

Like altering the fundamental thinking of all humanity to make them pursue peace.

No supreme god could do such a thing.

They were praised as gods, but they were not omniscient or omnipotent.

Merely observers and managers.

The gods' role was to manage their assigned dimension so that it ran smoothly.

From the universe’s perspective, they were just civil servants.

Therefore, when the Law declared the doom of Möbius, any effort to reverse that outcome became a massive rebellion against the universe itself.

“Why?!”

When the destruction of Möbius was decreed—

Three leading gods of the Pantheon gathered in the Library of Law.

It was the only place in the Pantheon that could read the laws flowing through the universe.

“It’s already set. The Law has spoken.”

“You mean Möbius is over? But we haven’t even done anything yet! We haven’t wiped a single tear!”

The twin goddesses had barely taken office as chairwomen.

All they had done was modernize the Pantheon’s outdated civilization with Earth’s latest tech.

After that, they’d planned to begin carrying out Icar’s grand ambitions.

But then it happened.

The message from the Law came without warning.

Möbius shall now come to its end.

No one foresaw it.

Without any sign, doom was declared.

“No way... how could this happen...”

“It’s unfortunate.”

A heavy silence fell between the two.

Meanwhile, Tell felt little emotion.

It was regrettable that Möbius was doomed, but once something was decided, what could be done?

And so—

“I won’t accept it.”

When Icar said that, Tell couldn’t help but be a little surprised.

“There must be a way to stop it.”

“You... surely not...”

Lucardis, the Wise God, turned pale.

He realized what Icar intended.

“I swore an oath. To protect the children of Möbius. Even if the Law has decreed doom, I won’t back down.”

“You mean to defy the Law? Reverse the doom? If you do that, a wave of chaos will swallow this place!”

“There might be a way. I can’t just stand by and do nothing!”

The two gods began to argue.

Tell stood one step removed, silently watching their exchange.

Icar said: I want to protect Möbius no matter what.

Lucardis said: If you try that, you’ll pay the price.

The argument dragged on.

Eventually, both turned to Tell, the bystander.

“It’s me again?”

Tell spoke flatly.

“Sister.”

Her little sister, Icar, looked at her with a desperate expression.

She always made that face when asking for ridiculous favors.

Cleaning up the mess was always Tell’s job.

So Tell answered:

“Simple, isn’t it? Try it till we can’t. If it fails, we quit. Old man, you won’t just sit back and watch either, will you?”

“Calamity will come.”

“Not my problem.”

Thus, the rebellion was decided.

Your intentions were good...

Click.

Tell rose from her leather chair.

She walked across the marble floor to the window made of full glass.

But it failed.

At first, they mobilized every possible resource within Möbius and rewound the time axis multiple times.

They tried giving heroes and ancients in each dimension a chance to resist doom.

But all those attempts failed.

The next thing they tried was the Pick Me Up Project.

Even that, however, yielded uncertain results.

Below the building spread the city’s nightscape.

Countless lights and signs intermingled.

But the night sky remained pitch black.

No moon. No stars.

In the end, the city fell into total darkness.

Each shining star once represented a dimension.

Originally, Eden’s night sky sparkled with countless stars, illuminating the city. It was a view her sister had loved.

Not anymore.

As Möbius’s dimensions were destroyed one after another, the starlight slowly faded.

Now, nothing remained.

Everything is gone.

All that remained in Möbius was Eden, the administrative dimension.

The others had long since perished.

No attempt to delay their destruction had succeeded.

The sky’s so black.

Soon the light of this city would vanish too.

Tell tipped the contents of her wine glass into her mouth.

And spoke.

“It’s over, Icar.”

Her sister didn’t respond.

Pretending not to hear, she stayed focused on her work.

At a glance, she looked normal—but dark shadows clung under her eyes.

She hadn’t slept in three days.

“Möbius is finished.”

Tap. Clack.

The sound of her keyboard grew more intense.