Lord of The Karmic Armada - Chapter 40: Payback

How would you react to waking up in a completely new body—one pulled straight from a game you used to play?That’s the unexpected reality our protagonist, Licht, now faces.Trapped in the body of a character he once defeated and killed, Licht inherits not just the appearance, but the karma of the original. Branded a villain, he’s burdened with the consequences of sins he never committed.As a first-act antagonist in the eyes of the world, his fate is already written: to be exposed, condemned, and destroyed.But Licht refuses to accept that. He chooses to fight. To survive.Karma of the past be damned.Yet the deeper he falls into this world, the clearer it becomes—this is no game. It's darker, more twisted, and far less forgiving than anything he’s ever known.This isn’t a hero’s journey.This isn’t a warrior’s rise.This is a villain’s survival.

Renji was nothing special. No wealth, no fame, no grand ambitions—just a 23-year-old gamer wasting his days in a cluttered apartment, escaping reality through the immersive world of Eternal Realms. In the game, he was powerful, respected, a leader—the elven king, commanding armies and shaping the fate of kingdoms. But outside the screen, he was just another nobody.That all changed the moment his world shattered.What started as a routine gaming session took a terrifying turn when his screen flickered, reality twisted, and an unnatural force yanked him from his chair. When he opened his eyes, he wasn’t in his apartment anymore. He was in a world of towering forests and ancient magic. He was wearing regal robes, a golden crown resting atop his head. And before him stood four elven women, their expressions filled with reverence and concern.They called him King.Memories not his own flooded his mind—battles, alliances, the weight of a kingdom’s future resting on his shoulders. It wasn’t just a game anymore. This was real. And the fate of the elven race now depended on him.But Renji wasn’t a hero. He wasn’t a warrior. He was just a gamer who had no idea how to rule a kingdom, let alone survive in a world teetering on the brink of war.But Just as he was pondering on it a mechanical voice sounded in his mind.

Euri was quite passionate about wanting to become a perfect corporate slave.But after being forced to explore the sentient game infesting his miniscreen, Euri realized that he had stumbled upon an opportunity anyone on the planet would kill for. While the entire human civilization on Planet Nen struggled to deal with the superior lifeforms plaguing the extraterrestrial planes beyond their world, Euri could compete with them all for power by just playing this game!A side-gig that didn’t conflict with his dream of climbing the corporate ladder—how generous can fortune be to bequeath this opportunity to him.Transcending the spatial laws, transcending human notion of cultivation, transcending the rules of Cosmic Development Bureau, Euri began a series of crazy experiments that could perhaps destroy the millennia-spanning schemes of the most advanced civilizations controlling the macrocosm.When interrogated about this fiasco, Euri answered the way a perfect corporate slave should. “Full credit for this goes to my boss, who provided me with the opportunity...”