Nobita's Time Heist

“You’re overthinking it. How could a monster have such thoughts?” Da Xiong had a flash of inspiration and decided to continue the act using this premise. “Anyway, our hometown was destroyed, so we thought we might as well head north and find a job in the most prosperous part of the demon realm. We have to find a way to survive.”

If the other party were human, they probably wouldn't have been fooled at all—they wiped out your entire homeland, and you're still trying to work for them? That's just too shameless. With this kind of behavior, it's hard not to suspect what your real purpose is.

But this is the realm of demons.

Yokai lack human morality; their only belief is the ironclad rule of the jungle, with very little regard for family or blood ties. Most yokai are solitary individuals, with only a few gathering in groups. Therefore, the blue demon immediately believed Nobita and his friends' explanation, because in the yokai's code, survival is paramount.

To survive, people will do anything.

"Alright, fine, in that case, we'll find you some good work..."

The blue demon looked around the huge palace made of bones and pointed to a room decorated with pale blue ghost fire. "That guy likes to collect strange toys. There's a set of chess pieces that he absolutely loves. Every time he takes it out to play, he has to clean it up very carefully."

"From today onwards, this job is handed over to you."

Chapter 288: The Otaku's Pleasure House

"That monster is not bad." Fat Tiger found it unbelievable that he had suddenly received care from a "senior". "The senior will take the initiative to take care of the new junior. The workplace atmosphere here is much better than where we are."

"Putting aside racial differences, the level of development here is at best that of an ancient tribe. They haven't even developed the most basic towns yet." Dekisugi explained his observations and deductions over the past three days to the two underachievers as they traveled. "Nobi-kun, Gian-kun, I heard that you both went to 60,000 years ago... Did you encounter any humans from that time?"

Nobita nodded, recalling Kukuru's handsome face.

"The most recent 'agricultural revolution' for humankind occurred approximately 12,000 years ago. In other words, the civilization you are seeing, Nobi-kun, is still in the Stone Age, a relatively primitive stage. Humans in this state were distributed across the Asian continent in 'tribes' or 'clusters.' We call this 'gatherer civilization.' Their food sources were edible plants on the ground and in trees, as well as large prey that required physical strength to hunt."

“Now that you think about it, it seems that is indeed the case…” Fat Tiger recalled the delicious food he had enjoyed in the Light Clan tribe and subconsciously licked his lips. “They even said that the first prey they caught should be eaten by Doraemon.”

“They must have regarded Doraemon as a god. Humans at that time had already developed relatively primitive beliefs,” Dekisugi continued. “In short, during the hunter-gatherer civilization, humans generally relied on hunting and gathering for food, which meant they couldn’t support so many people, and the tribal population had to maintain a dynamic balance. When the food sources available for gathering in one place temporarily dried up, the entire tribe would migrate to other places.”

"This situation continued until the agricultural revolution—people discovered that by planting crops on the ground, they could greatly improve the stability of their food sources. Spring planting and autumn harvesting were safer and more stable than going out to hunt every day."

"But...that's why humans no longer migrate regularly as they did during the hunter-gatherer era, but instead settle in one place for a long time."

"Why?" Fat Tiger asked, dumbfounded. "Hunting is so much fun! I've seen Kukuru and the others hunt mammoths, it's so exciting!"

"Sigh... Fat Tiger... Xiaoshan made it very clear." Nobita gave him a speechless look. "You only saw it when they were standing on the mammoth's back. What if someone got scratched by the tusks? What if someone got stepped on by the mammoth while they were surrounding them? Wouldn't it be better to just farm peacefully than to take those risks?"

"However, after settling down, human society entered a stage of rapid population growth, and the social structure became increasingly complex. Originally, a tribe might have only a hundred or so people, and the people in the tribe knew each other, so there was no need for any management methods. The leader of the tribe must be the most capable fighter—the survival of the gatherer tribe depended to a large extent on nature, which was very harsh, and the weak had no chance of survival."

"However, the birth of agricultural civilization gave people the means to break free from nature for the first time. Even those who were not born with good conditions still had a chance to survive. Once conditions were right, the population growth rate would quickly increase exponentially. Managing one hundred people is completely different from managing ten thousand or fifty thousand people. As a result, the social structure became more and more complex, giving rise to a group of people who were not engaged in the management of others."

"That is, 'bureaucrats'."

"Oh..." Nobita and Gian looked like they suddenly understood. Suneo used to be the one to explain this kind of knowledge to them.

For example, during the trip to the African basin, Suneo deciphered that the eerie chirping in the valley was actually underground steam, and the ghosts floating in the air were actually some kind of luminous bacteria. However, Suneo's knowledge is eclectic and not profound; he knows a little about everything, but can only offer superficial popular science explanations. He can't do a comprehensive analysis from multiple angles like Xiaoshan, and he can't explain things concisely.

"As for the demon realm... I don't yet know what they eat. Perhaps a long time ago, demons ate people, but then they stopped. In any case, the defenses of this palace are quite weak, proving that King Hundred Eyes is simply unable to mobilize his demons. They are still in a relatively primitive tribal stage, without a ruling group; in other words, they are just a bunch of scattered soldiers. As long as we defeat their leader, they will immediately scatter like birds and beasts, and the Night Parade of a Hundred Demons will collapse on its own."

"On another note, alien monsters shouldn't eat people, right?" Fat Tiger surprisingly came up with an idea. "What exactly is his purpose in organizing this Hundred Demons Parade?"

……

To this day, the question remains unanswered. They are completely different races, and the fact that the other party is from outer space makes his motives even more unpredictable.

However, Nobita firmly believes that no great demon king would destroy the world without a reason. Behind all his actions, there must still be his own self-interest. If he can find out, he might be able to use that as a starting point to discover his weaknesses.

"【Powerful Odor Eliminator】—!"

(Powerful Odor Remover: As the name suggests, it can quickly remove all human odors. It appears in the classic short story "The Girl Like a White Lily." In order to find the "girl like a white lily" that his father mentioned, Nobita and Doraemon travel back to his father's childhood. However, Nobita accidentally falls into a cesspool. Although he takes a bath in the river, the smell still won't go away, so Doraemon takes out this gadget. After using it, the skin will temporarily become very white.)

They applied deodorizing agent to temporarily mask their "human scent" and prevent any monsters from detecting it—this was Xiaoshan's suggestion. Although they wore transformation plates around their necks, which fooled the blue demon earlier, the castle wasn't small. If a more powerful being came and recognized them as humans, they would be trapped with no chance of escape. Just to be safe, they took a second precaution before daring to push open the door.

"Boom——"

The heavy black stone gate required the combined strength of three people to barely push it open a crack.

The pale blue candles lit up silently, their light scattering and emphasizing the sheer size of the space.

"So big..." Fat Tiger exclaimed subconsciously.

"But... how should I put it..."

It looks a bit like a collection cabinet in a nerdy guy's room.

His collection was neatly arranged on the heavy cabinets on both sides. These cabinets were all carved from bone, the type of bone was indistinguishable, and they were unusually large, gleaming with an eerie cold light.

"Shogi, Xiangqi, Go, chess, flying machines... Seriously? How come they even have a Monopoly simulator?!"

Fat Tiger couldn't help but complain, "Is this some kind of karaoke place?"

Almost all board games invented by humankind to date are listed here. Some of them are obscure, and Nobita has never even seen them before.

"He really loves board games. These... he must have had monsters collect them from the human world, right?"

At the far end of the two collections, there is a delicate-looking, oddly shaped vase that exudes an extraordinary aura.

It seemed to possess some kind of magic, instantly attracting the attention of the three people, making them look over involuntarily.

Chapter 289: The Five New Gods

"A vase?" Fat Tiger was puzzled by this item, which was clearly a level above the other collectibles. "There aren't any flowers in it."

He looked inside and saw tiny, flesh-colored barbs on the inside of the bottle, densely packed and quite disgusting. He had initially considered reaching in to touch it, but upon seeing the barbs, Fatty Tiger suddenly felt a sense of unease. He instinctively sensed that it was something dangerous, and instead of being tempted, he respectfully placed it back on the display stand.

"Didn't that Blue Oni brother say that King Hyakume had a favorite game of chess? I guess this is it... Judging from this, he must be a crazy chess game enthusiast." Dekisugi curled his fingers and lightly tapped the bottle twice, but made no sound. "Nobi-kun, Gian-kun, come and see, there are patterns on the vase!"

Nobita and Dekisugi both bent down to examine the patterns closely. Gian, on the other hand, ran his fingertip gently along the surface of the bottle, feeling the subtle bumps, and exclaimed, "This isn't painted on, it's engraved!"

“Micro-carving, and it’s incredibly sophisticated micro-carving.” Dekisugi exclaimed sincerely, “In an ancient Chinese text, there’s a story about someone carving a wonderful scene on a walnut. Look at this vase, so many details are stacked on a curved surface, and they’re so clear… It’s truly amazing!”

Despite cultural differences and language barriers, the expressions of "beauty" seem to be the same.

The relief on the vase's surface depicts something rather indistinct: its background is a deep metallic color, and amidst the stars that illuminate the afternoon, a triangular formation of crimson stands, as if divinely inspired. This shape inevitably evokes the pyramids of ancient Egypt, silently towering and casting immense light and shadow. Beneath this absolute triangular radiance, absolute blackness forms tendrils, extending in different directions. The curving tendrils form patterns, filling the entire vase, uneven and subtly revealing a dark red hue reminiscent of blood.

A sinister aura wafted over, giving one goosebumps.

"Wait a minute." Fat Tiger carefully felt around the vase, and as his hand ran over the bottom, he suddenly made a discovery and exclaimed, "There are words on the bottom of the vase!"

Nobita decisively took out the "Translation Konjac Chips," casually turning the bottle upside down, expecting to understand it immediately. However, the strange characters began to swim like tadpoles, crawling and twisting within his vision. Just as a few outlines of Japanese appeared, they turned into gibberish.

"How could this happen?" Da Xiong refused to believe it, chewed down the whole piece of konjac slice, and stared intently with wide eyes.

Useless effort.

The distortion of the text became increasingly severe; I was determined not to let him understand it.

"Can't understand it?" Fat Tiger didn't seem surprised. He simply said, "We ate translation konjac chips and still couldn't understand the writing on the nine stone pillars in Golden Village. It was Suneo who somehow managed to understand it, and in the end, he was judged to be a bad guy."

“Perhaps, the essence of this item is an unlocking spell similar to ‘Alohomora’?” Dekisugi gave a rather vivid analogy. “Ordinary locks are no match for it and can be opened immediately. But once it encounters a lock with a spell of the same level attached, it cannot be opened.”

"I vaguely saw some familiar characters just now, all Chinese characters, but I can't remember them clearly." Da Xiong's Chinese has never been very good, and he doesn't use Chinese characters very often in daily life. Now he's reaping the consequences of not studying hard. "It seemed to say something like 'ignorance' or 'mediation'..."

……

"The veil of ignorance will eventually fall." A slightly hoarse voice suddenly rang out in the empty room. A breeze blew gently, and the will-o'-the-wisps on both sides of the wall flickered. "Only [Mediation] can be the measure of all things."

The three of them turned their heads at the same time.

A figure draped in a black robe, tall and slender, resembling a ghostly Hundred-Eyed King, suddenly appeared inside the stone gate, staring at Nobita and the others with a half-smile. His hands were behind his back, his eyes slightly narrowed, and an inscrutable smile graced his pale face. Regardless of his true form, at least the outline of his face looked more like that of an East Asian. Apart from his sewn-up eyes, there was nothing about him that made Nobita feel uncomfortable; in fact, he even felt a strange sense of familiarity.

Incredibly, all three of them thought the same thing.

At first glance, he appears refined and elegant, not the kind of vicious person who is unapproachable. Compared to the blue-faced, fanged demon outside, he seems closer to the image of a "human."

But... deep down, Nobita already understood that this type of opponent was especially difficult to deal with.

"My lord!" Dekisugi reacted quickly, immediately kneeling down to pay his respects while lowering his head to conceal his face as much as possible.

Nobita and Gian immediately followed suit, kneeling down and casually putting the vase back. Being caught by the person in question made everyone uneasy, but since they were all half-kneeling, with Koshino in the front, only Nobita and Gian could see each other's eyes. For a moment, they didn't know what to do next.

"Dong dong!"

"Dong dong!"

His heart was pounding in his chest. Da Xiong felt his mouth was dry and parched. The more he tried to hold back, the less he could resist, and he licked his lips with his tongue.

“How interesting. Can you read the words on this?” King Hundred Eyes walked past them, picked up the vase on the table with one hand, and showed a rather intoxicated expression as he explained, “I thought that only the Nether Demons and Star Spirits who have been out of contact for a long time in the depths of the starry sky would have the knowledge to understand these things.”

While he was out of sight of the three, Gian had already put his right hand into his pocket, turned his head, and gave Nobita a wink.

After thinking for a moment, Da Xiong still felt that the time was not right and shook his head slightly.

Do you believe that there is a God in this world?

Fat Tiger tilted his head, wondering why he would ask such a question in this place teeming with monsters.

"Not the kind of cheap, local gods who are swarmed around a small piece of land with eight million people, who know some minor magic, and can be worshipped and celebrated. Rather, they are gods who roam among the stars, who can kill and decide the fate of many civilizations with a single thought, who regard life as worthless, who are truly gods... who can overturn everything, who are omnipotent, and who are even beyond the comprehension of ordinary civilizations."

"A god who exists without the need for faith?"

Despite the addition of many modifiers, Nobita was still able to discern the object he wanted to describe from this pile of adjectives.

But at this moment, he was playing the role of a turtle monster from the countryside, so naturally he couldn't say anything and could only remain silent.

"The universe is far, far greater than you can imagine. The strange and wondrous things you have experienced in your lives are nothing compared to the silent starry sky."

"God exists."

"I mean, the ancient beings who truly created the existing cosmic ecosystem and maintained order, and were thus defined by advanced civilizations as the Five New Gods, do exist. Perhaps the life that was born on this planet was originally part of their plan."

He stroked the texture of the vase's surface, his tone like that of a devout believer.

"And the Demon God Chess..."

"It was invented by the mediators among them that this game is full of infinite mystery and wisdom."

Chapter 290: I need you?!

"Five new gods..."

Nobita silently memorized this name that had already resounded throughout the universe. However, for him now, that world was still too vast and too distant. The enemies before him had not yet been eliminated, and the impending crisis on this small planet was far more important to him.

“We don’t know.” After careful consideration, Dekisugi decided to provide as little information as possible, and asked, “Is this vase-like thing actually a chessboard?”

"To be precise, it's not just a chessboard, but more like a game of fate. Under its exceptionally complex rules, you can gamble anything on the outcome of a single game. You can win everything with a victory, or you can lose everything by the slightest mistake. I like it very much, after all... violence is only the means of the incompetent, while this is how the wise play the game."

He turned his upper body, took two steps, and picked up one of the many collectibles.

"Many kinds of board games have been invented by humankind, and I've collected them all. Of these, my favorite is Go, which only uses black and white stones. Its rules are simple and concise, yet the game can be played in varying degrees of difficulty. More importantly, it's very 'equal,' don't you think?"

"equality……"

……

Nobita had only ever played Othello (a game similar to flip-board) with Doraemon using Go stones, so he naturally couldn't grasp the profound meaning behind it and could only nod repeatedly. However, at this moment, a very ominous premonition arose in his heart. A pricking sensation came from the back of his head, making him feel uncomfortable all over, as if urging him to find a way to leave quickly.

This instinct stems from the sheer number of things he messes up in his daily life. Being scolded by his mother, reprimanded by his teacher, bitten by a dog, hit by a baseball flying from nowhere while walking, suddenly hit by a car, chased by Gian and Suneo… Over time, his senses have become heightened. Whenever he senses something terrible is about to happen—for example, falling asleep in class, half-awake—he always wakes up half a second before the teacher angrily shouts, “Nobita—!!”

At this moment, he vaguely sensed that it was probably impossible for him to leave peacefully.

Sigrún has taught at the Iceland University of the Arts as a part-time lecturer since and was Dean of the Department of Fine Art from -. In – she held a research position at Reykjavík Art Museum focusing on the role of women in Icelandic art. She studied fine art at the Icelandic College of Arts and Crafts and at Pratt Institute, New York, and holds BA and MA degrees in art history and philosophy from the University of Iceland. Sigrún lives and works in Iceland.

"The cannon moves across the mountain, the chariot crosses the river. The horse moves in an L-shape, and the elephant moves diagonally. In Chinese chess, each piece has a unique role, which means that their importance varies in a game. Sometimes, in order to protect important pieces, it is necessary to sacrifice less important pieces... This is the same for most board games invented by humans."

“But Go is different. Go is not about playing pieces, but about playing on the board, on the remaining ‘land’ on the board. Black and white pieces are absolutely equal. They are not individuals with special powers, but rather rely on the collective strength to gradually establish and create a winning position, erode the opponent’s strength, and ultimately win the game.”

He blew a puff of dust off the Go board and said in a casual tone, “I really like this concept. It constantly reminds me that if you want to accomplish something, the final victory is always built up by the efforts of countless tiny individuals.”

"Similarly, the final defeat must come from the negligence of a small individual. Perhaps he was just too stupid, too short-sighted, too lacking in vigilance, too talkative... But in any case, this misplaced piece became the target of the opponent's attack."

"Boom!"

With a casual flick of his wrist, as if tossing a bag of trash, he tossed something in front of the three people.

It's hard to imagine that such a terrified expression could appear on a ghost's face. Perhaps, when truly facing death, there is no difference between what humans and ghosts feel.

The blue demon who had kindly given the three directions and arranged their work was now just a head. Its thick neck had been neatly severed, and the two protruding horns on its forehead had been cruelly cut off, from which black fluid gushed. Without its horns, its head became a circle, rolling over. By sheer coincidence, it stopped right in front of the three. The moment their eyes met, Da Xiong felt a chill run through his body, and his pupils involuntarily dilated.

For someone with strong empathy, the guilt and self-blame they feel at this moment are like hell.

"To be honest, you guys arrived a little faster than I expected. I originally thought that most of you would perish at the Sword Tomb, and even if you made it through, the Vicious Mountains would take your lives. But now it seems..." King Hyakume carefully placed the Go board back on the skeleton without turning his head, seemingly unconcerned about Nobita and the others' reactions, and continued to say to himself, "You're quite popular."

“I also find it strange. You don’t seem to know anything about swords, yet the Demon Slayer calls you master. The entanglements between you humans are truly interesting.”

Now that he'd been exposed, Nobita couldn't keep up the act any longer. Deep down, he didn't want a conflict with King Hyakume so soon, but things were all interconnected, and now that he'd reached this point, he could only grit his teeth, nod slightly to Gian, and lower his center of gravity.

"You knew from the very beginning?"

"Do you think I have so many eyes for nothing?" King Hundred Eyes asked with a smile. So far, his words and actions remained elegant. "No matter what methods you used, those who were able to successfully cross the Vicious Mountains and reach my feet must have some skills."

"How about we take this opportunity to actually work under me?"

“What I can give you is not gold, silver, wealth, or other such low-level things. Those are merely the pursuits of the mediocre, the greed that has evolved to satisfy sensual instincts.” He raised a finger, surveying the three with a confident expression, a smile spreading across his charming face. “What I will promise you is the starry sky. And with it, endless wonders.”

The three of them were taken aback when they heard this, none of them expecting him to say such a thing.

"Everything you love, hate, and flock to is nothing but bubbles confined to this tiny mud planet, utterly insignificant."