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Overlord (Light Novel) - Volume 13, Chapter 6 Gunner and Archer Part 3
Volume 13, Chapter 6 Gunner and Archer Part 3
This chapter is updated by NovelFree.ml
“...Here.”
“Yes.”
Having reached the topmost level, Shizu and Neia exchanged looks. There was only one door here. That would mean it was undoubtedly their objective.
They nodded to each other, and then kicked the door in.
They had long since abandoned any thoughts of a covert entry. After all, they had just fought a big battle with the Vah Un. That said, the two of them leaned against the threshold of the door, in case someone attacked them in the instant it opened.
However, their caution had been in vain. Therefore, they both leapt into the room at the same time. Neia grit her teeth against the pain from her shoulder and went left, while Shizu went right, and they both covered each other.
The first thing they saw was a large, canopied bed. Perhaps its lace trimmings had once been white, but age had blackened them. The room also contained a simple dresser and human-sized furniture such as a cabinet and others. These pieces of noble-styled furniture were old and damaged, and they did not look like antiques so much as used goods.
A quick glance across the room revealed no demihumans.
Shizu raised her chin to signal to Neia, and Neia silently approached the cabinet before opening its doors. Of course, Neia opened it from the outside and stayed out of its way in case anything happened, while Shizu pointed the muzzle of her spell gun at the interior of the cabinet. “...Not here.”
After that, the two of them looked to the bed.
They checked that there was nothing underneath it, and then they approached the bed.
Part of it was bulging up.
Neia looked to Shizu before nodding to show she understood, and then she flipped up the blanket.
There was a pretty-looking lump of lustrous purple meat there. No, it would be better to say it was a huge maggot. It was about 90 centimeters long, and it did not have hands, but stubby feet.
Shizu pointed her gun’s muzzle at it without any hesitation, and Neia hurriedly called out to her.
“Wait! That’s the target we were sent to rescue, the prince of the Zern!”
“...This?”
That was what the Zern envoy had told Neia. However, she could understand Shizu’s doubts, because Neia had been quite confused herself when the Zern had given her the description of the Zern prince.
The Zern were a species of demihumans whose royalty looked very different from other individuals of their species. In addition to that, they ought to be sexually dimorphic too.
“Er, can you hear us, Zern prince-sama?”
“―Mm. Speak. It seems you are not my food.”
He sounded like a teenager. Neia was curious as to where his voice was coming from and examined him, whereupon she saw that his maggot mouth was opening and closing.
“That’s right. We’ve been asked to rescue you. Let’s start by getting you out of here.”
He was still a prince, even if he looked like this, so she had to abide by the rules of etiquette. In addition, she would need his race’s help when finding the Sorcerer King. Therefore, she ought to do him a favor now, instead of offending him. “Was it a request from my eggmates (comrades)? Who asked you to do this?”
“It was a Zern called Beebeebee. Do you know her?”
“Beebeebee, you say? Ah, her, then? Hm… But if I leave this place, Jaldabaoth...-sama will be angry. This will place the Zern people and particularly the King in danger.”
“While I’m not too sure about the details, it seems the King has passed away, so we must rescue you at the very least. That is why the Zern made this request of us.”
“What!?”
It was impossible for a human like Neia to read the expressions of the Zern prince, who could not be anything but a gigantic maggot. However, she could clearly sense the profound sorrow in his voice.
“Oh, Father was actually… I see. That bastard Jaldabaoth… In that case, can you get us safely out of here?”
“Your Highness’ underlings will be guiding us out, so I think it should be fine.”
“I see… oh human heroes, who have come this far to aid me, I have a shameless request for you. Can you pretend that you carried me off by force while I was resisting you?”
That request was probably just in case.
“I understand. We shall pretend it is so.”
“Thank you very much.”
The prince raised his head. While it looked just like a maggot raising its head, this was probably how his species expressed their gratitude.
Neia wrapped the prince up in the sheets like a baby ― if he had been a baby, he would have been scared to tears; she had experienced that twice now ― and carried him on her back.
She firmly tied the blanket around her chest, so it would not loosen even when she was moving vigorously.
The weight on her shoulder made Neia hurt. She wiped away the sweat beading on her forehead and used the necklace’s magic.
Her wounds healed instantly. Now she would be fine even if she had to run with the prince on her back.
“Are you feeling alright? If it hurts, please tell me right away.”
“No, I am not uncomfortable… but you smell delicious. It makes me hungry.”
Hearing those words spoken from the vicinity of her neck made Neia shudder.”
“...What do the Zerns eat?”
Shizu asked a question which Neia did not want to ask.
“The bodily fluids of living creatures, be they alive or dead.”
A chill ran down Neia’s spine.
“...I’ll get angry if you do anything weird to my junior.”
“There is no need to worry. I am not hungry enough to do such a thing to the heroes who came to rescue me. While I have not been allowed to leave even once since the day they brought me here, they took care to feed me, at least.”
If she knew exactly what they fed him with, she would probably have dropped him like a ton of bricks, so Neia hurriedly stopped listening. Fortunately, Shizu did not ask further.
“...Alright, let’s go.”
“Okay.”
“Please do.”
After that brief exchange, the two ― three of them began to move. There was no time to waste on idle chatter during a clandestine infiltration.
Fortunately, they managed to return to the larder without incident. This was when Shizu raised her hand to stop them.
“...There are people inside.”
“I’ll leave them to you.”
Shizu readied her spell gun and forcefully opened the door.
Then, she stopped. Shizu looked back.
“...Not sure who they are. Zerns. Many of them.”
They ought to be the recovery team. Specifically, they were the Zerns who had brought Neia and Shizu here.
They had probably arrived first because Neia and Shizu had been later than they had said.
After entering the room, the five Zerns inside turned as one to them. The sight of these monsters with unreadable faces doing the same thing together generated a feeling inside Neia that was either fear or revulsion.
Neia undid the sheets on her back, and revealed the Zern prince within.
“Ohhh! It’s the Prince!”
It was Beebeebee. Neia would not have been able to tell them apart if they did not speak. However, if they were as different from each other as the prince was from them, she might not even have been able to tell if they were fellow Zern.
“Oh eggmates of mine. I hear my father has passed on. I know that he ― Jaldabaoth ― does not intend to keep his word. But where will we flee after betraying Jaldabaoth? He has already conquered our lands, and installed his trusted demons as their rulers… are we not destroying ourselves by choosing to rebel?”
“Your Highness is correct to be worried. But to him, the Zern are no different from livestock. Our hero Boobeebee was a little late to arrive before him, yet it was judged enough reason to have the flesh torn from her shoulder.”
“What! Boobeebee, you say!?”
The Prince’s shuddering told Neia that said Zern must have been of quite some status.
“Once everything is over, will the Zern find a place under Jaldabaoth’s rule? We have determined that the answer is no. My Prince, there is no time, let us save these words for―”
“―You fools. Can we leave that question until after we run? This is the turning point. Once we cross it, we must follow our course to its very end. Now is the only time we can turn back. Tell me, once we go back to our hive, once we go back to our hills, how do you intend to live on?”
“That… that land is vast. Surely there will be a place where we can hide.”
“You think so? Do you intend to have the species walk the road to destruction for this fleeting, wavering chance? Give me a more concrete, more practical solution.”
“In, in that case, not everyone is in service to Jaldabaoth, we could form a resistance…”
“You fool. That will only invite destruction from Jaldabaoth. An ant swarm draws more attention than a single ant.”
Beebeebee fell silent as the prince shot down each and every proposal. It would be bad if this went on. Neia and the others had carried out this dangerous operation to this stage. If the prince now went, “We can’t do it after all”, their efforts would have been wasted.
It was then that Neia came up with something to soothe the prince’s worries.
“Ah, in that case, why not have the Zern go to the Sorcerous Kingdom?”
“The Sorcerous Kingdom? What is that?”
It was not just the Zerns, but also Shizu who looked to her.
“Yes. It is the country where Momon resides. He is the hero who once drove off Jaldabaoth in the Kingdom.”
Neia sensed the Zerns were staring at her, but she did not know the implications of their looks. How could humans understand a Zern’s expressions?
“Is what you say true?”
That single sentence was enough for Neia to understand why the Zerns had kept quiet. They doubted the truth of Neia’s words. But that was only to be expected. The better one knew Jaldabaoth’s power, the harder it was to believe that anyone could defeat him.
“I mean every word. I learned this through reliable channels. In fact ― Shizu-san?”
“...She’s right. Neia speaks the truth.”
“Also―” this was the crucial part. Neia psyched herself up internally. “If you go to the Sorcerous Kingdom like this, I am sure they will accept you as refugees.”
“Refugees, you say…”
There was bitterness in the prince’s voice.
“But if you can provide information about the Sorcerer King of the Sorcerous Kingdom, I am sure that you will not be slighted even when you go there.”
“Hold on, hold on. Why would they be happy to hear about their own King?”
“Ah, yes. Right now… ah… The Sorcerer King’s location is unclear…”
“Is that not very bad? In the worst case scenario, he might even be dead, is that not true?”
“A moment please. His Majesty cannot possibly be dead. There is concrete evidence, and we are verifying it now.”
Neia told them about how the Sorcerer King might have fallen to the hills where the demihumans lived, so she wanted to count on their help to search for him. The prince fell silent. Is it not going to work? Neia thought, but since she had already made her pitch, she could say nothing more. The ball was now in their court.
Also, even if they could not provide any direct assistance, they ought to be able to at least provide knowledge, as they had promised.
“...I see. If we do them a favor… but will we be accepted, as demihumans? The Sorcerous Kingdom is a nation of humans, is it not?”
“No, it is not. The Sorcerous Kingdom is a nation ruled by one of the undead.”
“The undead!?”
Both the prince and the Zern surrounding him exclaimed as one.
“Are you telling us to go to such a dangerous place!?”
Every race harbored a strong hatred of the undead. Even Neia had been that way before she had come to understand the Sorcerer King. She was moved by the realization that the people before her were similar to how she had been not too long ago.
“A moment please. The Sorcerous Kingdom might be ruled by one of the undead, but its great ruler is an open-minded and noble king, and I have personally witnessed humans coexisting peacefully with demihumans within the country.”
“You’re actually calling the undead great, I can’t believe humans are so―”
“―That’s enough. Neia-dono, I apologize if my subjects have given offense. However, is the Sorcerer King truly as great as you say he is?”
“Yes.”
Neia held her chest high as she replied to the prince’s question.
“... We cannot read the expressions of human beings. But I understand that someone as brave as you ― who has delved deep behind enemy lines in order to effect a daring rescue ― must be making such a statement with the utmost confidence. Therefore, I shall believe in him as well ― not the Sorcerer King who is one of the undead, but the Sorcerer King in whom you have placed your faith. Let us entrust ourselves to the Sorcerer King, then.”
“Ohhhh!” the Zerns cried out in joy.
“It seems we have reached a decision. In that case, I pray you will flee to the Sorcerous Kingdom with all due haste, my prince. Unfortunately, there is some very bad news, namely that one of Jaldabaoth’s trusted demons will be coming soon. I thought it would be a few more days before he arrived… but it will be bad if we are found. Alright, let’s go.”
As a species, the Zern were largely composed of females, with very few males. Pretty much only the king and the prince fell into the latter category. If a tribe’s males were wiped out ― although there were cases where females could change sex ― the tribe would be set on the path to extinction.
Therefore, the prince needed to flee to an absolutely safe place ― the Sorcerous Kingdom, which was why they had had the preceding discussion.
“Jaldabaoth’s trusted demon? He’s coming?”
There was a word the Zerns had said which she could not ignore.
“Mmm. Have you not seen him? He has three trusted demons by his side, and one of them is coming here.”
“...We need to defeat him here.”
As he heard Shizu’s words, the prince ― who had been left on the ground ― suddenly thrashed around.
“Are you insane!? You two must be quite strong to have been able to rescue me, but even then, you’ll never be able to defeat him!”
The label of “strong” only applied to Shizu, but Neia could not find a chance to cut in and thus she could not clear things up.
“...They say he teleports between many cities… Him coming here is a rare opportunity. If you miss it, you won’t get another chance.”
“That is true…”
“My prince!”
“Calm down and think about it. If we can kill one of Jaldabaoth’s aides, his chain of command will fall into chaos, and it will be harder for them to find us, who are not heading for the hills but for the Sorcerous Kingdom… then, is it possible to defeat him?”
“...Don’t know. But this is the only chance.”
“Then let’s take it. I’ll bet on the strength that let the two of you kill the Vah Un!” the Prince said. He had been quite shocked when he saw the demihuman’s corpse on the way back. “Listen well, all of you. From now on, we will help the two of them defeat the wicked Jaldabaoth’s minion!”
“Yes!”
“There are two humans, and six of us. Until recently, the eight of us were mutual enemies, but now we are comrades in arms. Such is the stuff of which heroic sagas sing.”
Eh? Surprised, Neia rechecked the number of Zern present, and after seeing that she had not been mistaken, she hurriedly spoke up.
“Wait, please wait. You don’t need to get involved in this, my prince. After all, we came here to protect you!”
In addition, what could this prince do in combat? However kindly one wanted to interpret his intentions, he was still a gigantic maggot that crawled on the ground. Honestly, it would be less troublesome if he simply followed them like a battle standard.
“I see, so to you, your mission is over since you have helped me escape. I see, I see. However, with my help, it should be easier to defeat Jaldabaoth’s henchman. No, I should say that without me, it will be very hard for you to defeat him, even if you are the heroes who defeated the Vah Un.”
Shizu had defeated the Vah Un by herself. Neia had nothing to do with it. Even so, the prince still counted her as a hero, which made her very embarrassed.
“So, do you mean that we can do it if we get the help of all the Zerns?”
The prince made a strange noise.
“No, no, great heroes. It’s not like that. I can cast spiritual spells of the fourth tier.”
“The fourth tier?”
Neia was surprised. The fourth tier of magic was a realm that only geniuses could barely reach after much hard work. In the Holy Kingdom, the only people who could cast such spells were the high priestess Kelart Custodio and the Holy Queen Calca Bessarez.
Neia glanced to the side, thinking Shizu would be as surprised as herself, but Shizu’s face was as blank as ever. That was a difficulty rating 150 maid demon for you ― such things did not even faze her..
“A...ah...are all the Zern as powerful as you?”
The prince made another strange sound, and thrashed like a caught fish.
“I am special.”
“Precisely. That’s why he is the prince.”
After hearing the Zern’s proud voice, Neia mused, I see, and recalled the contents of the classes she had once taken.
That’s right. The royalty of some species are so much more powerful than the commoners that they seem like a different species entirely...
“That said, I do have a weakness… namely, I am very slow.”
Well that’s true, Neia thought. That much was obvious at a glance.
“If someone gets close to me, I’ll be killed without the chance to fight back. Therefore, may I trouble you to carry me? I can cast spells when signalled.”
“I see. I understand what you wish to do. However, could the Zern ― that is to say, your royal guards ― not carry you instead of ourselves?”
“Unlike our prince, we specialize in melee combat. The two of you fight from a distance, I believe?”
“That is true… hm. It would be better if Shizu-san or I carried him… no, let’s leave that aside for now. It would be bad if we dragged the prince into this and he ended up dying.”
“...Neia. There is a special meaning to carrying the prince… That’s why he suggested going with us.”
“Fufufu. Indeed, there is. I say, do you know anything about him? That withered-tree demon who decorates himself with heads?”
“...There are several demons like that. Silk Hats, Crowns, Circlets, and Corollas.”
Shizu counted the four types off on her fingers.
“...I believe that henchman demon must be one of them. But… if we encounter a Silk Hat, we ought to flee. Even I could not win against one.”
“So you knew!?”
Neia was surprised, and then that feeling was replaced by anger. When they had prepared for the mission, Shizu had said that she did not know much about the henchman demons.
Had she lied to them?
This was because if she was trying to keep information on Jaldabaoth’s army from the Holy Kingdom, it would mean that Shizu had never been under the Sorcerer King’s control from the start. It also meant that Shizu’s existence did not prove anything about the Sorcerer King’s safety,
“...I trusted you! And in the end you were lying to me from the start!”
Caught up in her emotions, Neia seized Shizu by the shoulders. She used a lot of force, but the maid demon did not seem hurt. It was not because Shizu had no emotions, but because that amount of strength was nothing to her.
The unbearable regret and resentment made Neia want to cry. She had thought that she had forged a bond with Shizu, but in the end she had turned out to be nothing more than a laughingstock. Neia could not help mocking herself.
Shizu’s face was as blank as ever. However, there was a subtle change there which only Neia could read.
It was distress, contemplation, or perhaps ― remorse.
“...I’m sorry.”
Shizu squeezed those words out after a long silence. It hardly qualified as an apology ― in fact, it only served to stoke the flames of her anger. But right now, Shizu seemed strangely helpless, and seeing her like this helped Neia regain a bit of her composure.
Carefully, like she was doing something she had never tried before, Shizu quietly continued.
“...If you knew how strong the henchman demon was, you and the others might have been afraid and not carried out the operation. But for the sake of Ainz-sama’s victory… we must win this battle. That was why I lied.”
Every word she said had been carefully considered before being put together into a heartfelt, agonized statement. But those words also contained a genuine and immovable faith.
Neia did not know how to see through her lies. Not to mention she was a demon ― no, even if she were not a demon, Neia would not be able to tell if a blank-faced girl like her was speaking the truth.
However, even if she were feeding information to Jaldabaoth as a spy, or trying to bring down the Holy Kingdom from the inside, Shizu’s actions until now did not match up to those motivations. She ought to have acted more sensibly.
And more than anything else, Neia wanted to believe Shizu. Part of that was because her existence was a testament to the Sorcerer King’s survival, but also because the mysterious connection she had to Shizu was irreplaceable to Neia.
“...All right. I believe you. But please, don’t look down on me any more. I would gladly face any danger or fear for His Majesty’s sake.”
Shizu looked visibly relieved. As expected, she could not have been a spy. As for why, that was because she was clearly not suited for it. As she thought that, a natural, unforced smile came back to Neia’s face.
“Alright, alright, can we get back to the previous topic? If you know so much about them, can you tell us about that demon’s abilities?”
“These demons all possess the same abilities, but they are not very strong in their base forms. However, the problem arises when these demons are able to obtain the heads of intelligent creatures… particularly those of magic casters.”
According to Shizu, demons of that type could equip themselves with the heads of magic casters and use the powers of the heads’ owners. Silk Hats could use four heads at once, Crowns could use three, Circlets could use two, and Corollas could use one. Their threat level rose exponentially if they managed to obtain the heads of exceptional magic casters.
“No matter how good a head a Corolla equips, it can only cast spells of up to the third tier. Silk Hats, on the other hand, can cast spells of up to the tenth―”
“Wait!”
“Hold on!”
Both the prince and Neia interrupted Shizu.
Neia and the prince exchanged looks. While Neia could not read the prince’s face, Neia was certain that he was thinking the same thing as her.
“...After you.”
“Umu… er, did you say tenth tier? Are fifth tier spells not the highest tier of magic?”
It was as the prince said. Neia had heard that this was the limit of magic. The reason why she felt that the Sorcerer King could use sixth tier spells also stemmed from that.
In response to the prince’s question, Shizu shook her head as if to say, Haa, what will I do with you?
“...The tenth tier is the highest tier of magic. The spell that Jaldabaoth used to call down meteors from the sky also belongs to that tier.”
“How, how can we beat ― eh? Eh? No way! Don’t tell me, His Majesty, who stood with Jaldabaoth…”
As the shocking truth hit Neia, the prince was also shuddering in shock.
“The tenth tier? No. It can’t be, right? The tenth tier… Could it be true… And to think, I was so proud of myself and my fourth tier…”
No, the fourth tier was already very powerful. He would have been justified in being arrogant. There were precious few magic casters who could reach that level.
“Shizu… I’d like to check something, but… can His Majesty use spells of the tenth tier... too?”
“...But of course.”
Why are you still saying this? Shizu’s tone seemed to imply. She sounded like she was rolling her eyes. It might have been the first time that Neia had so clearly discerned Shizu’s feelings.
The prince, who was a fellow magic caster, was twitching from the tremendous shock.
“Hah? Hah? So the king of the land to which we are fleeing ― the Sorcerer King ― is such a powerful undead being? Does mastery of the tenth tier mean he is over twice as powerful as me?”
“...Haaa.” Shizu sighed deeply. “His Majesty.”
“Eh?”
“...Call him His Majesty.”
“Ah, yes, yes. His Majesty is truly powerful…”
When one thought calmly about it, Shizu had actually been quite brusque with the prince of an entire tribe, but since Shizu was speaking about matters of fact, Neia tacitly acknowledged her actions as she expressed her agreement.
“Indeed, Prince-sama. His Majesty is incredibly powerful!”
“Ah, yes.”
“...Prince. If you could find someone that powerful, he would be in your debt!”
“You, you’re absolutely right! Then we shall give your earlier proposal ― to search for His Majesty in the hills ― our fullest support!”
Neia clenched her fists in excitement.
“Thank you very much, Prince-sama. ―Now then, Shizu, could you continue what you were saying just now?”
“...About how powerful Ainz-sama is?”
“We were talking about that henchman of Jaldabaoth. Ah, I’d like to hear about the Sorcerer King as well ― could you tell me more after we return safely?”
“...Hm. Multi-head demons with multiple equipped heads can use them all at once and cast multiple spells at a time, but there are several conditions. First, each head can only use two spells at once. In addition, there is a limit on how many tiers of spells which can be cast at once. For instance, Silk Hats can cast a maximum of 15 tiers of spells at once―”
“―15 tiers! Do spells go up to a maximum of 15 tiers!?”
“...They don’t go that high. The tiers of the spells added together can be up to 15.”
The prince writhed in relief at Shizu’s answer.
The fact that Neia could surmise a bit of how the prince felt through his actions began to frighten her.
“...Moving on. The important thing is how many heads that demon can equip at once.”
“Two. One is a demihuman head, and the other is the head of a human like yourselves.”
Neia had a bad feeling about this. Jaldabaoth had been holding a human body back then. Had its upper half not been missing?
“What was that human head like, Prince-sama?”
“Unfortunately, I cannot tell apart individuals of species other than my own. Ah, I do know about the other head. It belonged to the queen of the demihuman species called the Pandecks. Her name was the Grand Mother.”
Neia wanted to ask more about the Pandecks and the Grand Mother, but Neia had more pressing things she needed to learn.
“I’d like to ask about the human. What color was her hair?”
“By hair do you mean the fur on the head? It was light black.”
“Black? So it doesn’t belong to someone from the Holy Kingdom?”
Neia’s heart was somewhat at ease. For a moment, she had wondered if the head belonged to the Holy Queen. Now that her guess had been proven wrong, she felt a sense of profound relief. At the same time, Neia noted that this might be a hint to another riddle.
She had heard that humans from the southern regions generally had black hair. So that’s it, Neia thought. Had Jaldabaoth come from there, she wondered.
To the Holy Kingdom, the southern regions were not a land that was ruled by humans. Less than half the population was human, and many of those had the blood of other species, and that number was steadily increasing. According to what Neia knew, only the Holy Kingdom, the Empire, and the Kingdom were ruled by human royalty. The City-State Alliance and the Theocracy did not have royal families.
So that was why no news about Jaldabaoth had reached these human-dominated countries.
“...Incidentally, multi-head demons cannot use the abilities of heads which do not belong to magic casters. They do not gain the abilities of warriors by equipping a warrior’s head. That is because there are other demons with those abilities.”
“In that case, the demihuman’s head… Prince-sama. Can you tell us a bit about that Grand Mother?”
“All right. That is why I want to fight with you. The Pandecks are a species that feed on moss, and they look like us.”
In other words, they looked like maggots.
Neia felt a twinge of revulsion at the thought of a demon that adorned itself with the head of maggots.
“...Was the Grand Mother also a spiritual magic caster?”
“Indeed. I use the Yin principle of the Five Elements, but the Grand Mother was the opposite; she used the Yang principle of the Five Elements. Yin and Yang are two extremes, and spells of one can resist or hamper spells of the other.”
“...I see,” Shizu nodded. “Letting him come with us would improve our chances.”
“Mm. I am glad that you understand. Personally, I am very unhappy that a demon is using the head of the Grand Mother. Indeed. She was my first love, after all.”
“My prince!”
“What are you saying! How could you fall for a female of another species!”
“Ahhh! That was a childish crush! It’s different now!”
While it sounded like a saccharine-sweet topic, all she felt about a maggot’s first love was utter disgust.
“In, in that case, assuming our enemy is a Circlet who can equip two heads at once, how many total spell tiers can it cast at one time?”
“...A maximum of six tiers. Incidentally, Crowns can cast a maximum of ten tiers.”
“Then if I use fourth tier spells, it will only be able to cast spells of the second tier. Of course, that is simply nullifying that bastard, so you still have to be careful…”
“...Next is that human head. We know too little about it. Neia?”
“I’m sorry. I regret to say I do not know the black-haired person. Still, I’m quite surprised. I thought that you would just jump right into the fight, since you’re Shizu.”
“...Ainz-sama said collecting information is very important.”
“Ahh, as expected of His Majesty. What an excellent notion!”
As Neia said this, Shizu reached a hand out to her, and Neia immediately grabbed it and shook.
“...Good girl. If you were cuter, I’d put a sticker on you. Maybe a furry sticker.”
“...A sticker? Ah, you put one on me already, so I don’t need another. Please paste it on someone else you like.”
“...Mm. You’re the first person to dislike my stickers.”
“Eh?”
Neia exclaimed in surprise as Shizu said that she was her first. After that, she immediately realized that perhaps she ― as a demon ― had not had many dealings with humans. No, it was possible that others might have despised her in their hearts but had not dared to voice it, due to their fear of her as a demon. While she wanted to poke fun at her for it, Neia could not do anything like spoil the fun of someone who was loyal to the same supreme being as her. Thus, Neia simply let it pass with a bitter smile.
“...Indeed, humans do not have fur, much like we Zerns. That is why they live in houses like these. Why not dig holes like we do?”
“Prince, we’re straying off-topic. We don’t have much time ― we need to deal with this before the humans attack this city.”
“...Mm. In conclusion, the prince will be going too.”
Nobody spoke up against it. Or rather, Neia had been the only one to voice her opposition to it.
“Regarding our tactics, we will handle the frontline, but what should we do if there are guards who block us? Allowing a spellcasting opponent to move freely is very dangerous.”
“...I’ll engage it in close quarters combat.”
Nobody asked if she could do it. She was half of the team which could defeat the guardian Vah Un ― although that was all Shizu’s work ― or so everyone said. Nobody doubted Shizu’s abilities.
“All right. Then let’s move. Before approaching the henchman, place us in the barrels and move us in. If you tell them you’re bringing food to the henchman demon on his orders, you’ll be able to get close to him.”
By “us,” the prince was referring to himself, Neia, and Shizu. As long as the three of them remained undetected, they could continue maintaining their deception ― the Zern betrayal had not been detected. This was a tactic that could only be put into effect now.
Once again, Shizu and Neia hid inside the barrels they had used to enter the city.
“Shizu-san. We’re really lucky.”
Shizu poked her head out of the barrel.
“...Why is that?”
“Look. Everything’s going well for us. Thanks to the Zern’s betrayal, we managed to save the prince, and even Jaldabaoth’s henchman is here. If we defeat him, we’ll have achieved a great accomplishment. That way, nobody will be able to speak ill of us any more. We’ll also be able to easily assemble a rescue party to find His Majesty.”
“It was all coincidence.”
Neia was defeated by Shizu’s somewhat harsh tone.
“Eh? Ah, i-is that wrong? We’re lucky because it was a coincidence… well, we were this successful because His Majesty made you his property, so I guess in that sense, it’s not really a coincidence.”
“Ainz-sama’s… property...”
“Ah, maybe property wasn’t the right word, huh?”
“...I don’t mind. Neia.”
“Eh?”
“...I like you very much. You’re not cute, but I don’t mind giving you another sticker.”
It hurt a little to be called “not cute” over and over again, and as she thought this, Neia said, “Never mind,” and ducked back into her barrel.
