Chapter 1
Part 1
Nine individuals sat waiting around a massive black table, which itself was engraved with the guild's emblem covering the entire surface of the table. The round table of the 9th floor used as a meeting space by the 41 members of Ainz Ooal Gown still seated the guildmaster himself, but the other seats were instead occupied by the Floor Guardians rather than their creators.
The 41 large, intricately decorated chairs surrounding the table appeared no less expensive than the table. Putting them all together, unearthly materials and magnificent craftsmanship which went into the set probably cost at least as much as a large city. When including the enchantments which had been applied to the chairs, table, and room itself, the price would skyrocket into a truly ludicrous amount.
Since the chairs were required to seat humanoid undead, formless oozes, and massive abominations, they would naturally require the ability to form themselves around whoever is sitting on them, letting heteromorphic characters of any shape and size face each other with an even eyeline. No matter who sat around the great round table, they would face each other as equals.
Convincing the Guardians to sit at this table with him took Ainz almost three hours. Only in the end was he able to settle it by arguing that this was a meeting, and it was important for them to present their reports and ideas as if they were equals, without mincing words.
Although the Floor Guardians (plus Albedo, Pandora's Actor, and Sebas, minus Gargantua) were seated as equals, the same position was not given to everybody in the room. Included in the two dozen or so other individuals gathered in front of the walls were all seven members of the Pleiades with Aureole, Nigredo, and Tanya, each of whom stood at attention without a word. At last, Ainz himself entered the room, sitting at his chair with a flourish of his robe.
As he entered the room, each Guardian who had been seated promptly stood up and bowed before him, while everybody else in the room simultaneously kneeled towards the Supreme Being with perfect harmony, as if rehearsed prior (it had been, unknown to Ainz), waiting for him to sit and give him next order.
"Raise your heads, and let this meeting commence. Well done following my command and assembling here for this meeting today. Before we proceed to the main point, we will go around the table once. Guardians, if you have any issues to report with which you require assistance, do so now. Then, Albedo?" (Ainz)
Ainz turned to his right, where Albedo was seated closest to him, with two seats between so as to space everybody out.
"The integration of both the Baharuth Empire and Re-Estize Kingdom have been proceeding ahead of schedule. The initial attempts by the Empire to support a coalition against us was promptly discarded, whereas public opposition for us in the Kingdom is gradually fading. The leaders of both nations have fully abandoned any notion of rebellion, and are supporting us while building up their own territories within the autonomy we have permitted them. Likewise, there are no domestic issues to report at this time." (Albedo)
Ainz nodded sagely, then turned to the Guardian sitting next in the rotation.
"Shalltear." (Ainz)
"I have no issue to report. There have been no problems with maintaining our [Gate] network, nor any problems guarding against intruders to the Great Underground Tomb of Nazarick." (Shalltear)
He continued calling on those seated the around the table in order, with each of his subordinates reporting their progress. Some were for tasks Ainz had given out himself, others had been assigned by Albedo to assist with others' objectives. The single common point was that each of them announced success, with only one concerning report about suspicious activity in the Agrand Republic capital, where each of the various powerful counselors were gathering in one place.
Cocytus announced that every demihuman race around the great lake had been either assimilated or exterminated, depending on their disposition. In his words, they were prepared and anxious for an offensive military campaign.
Aura explained their expedition into the distant great forest of the elves, where she was observing the ongoing war between the Slane Theocracy and the Elf Kingdom. Together with Mare, they had established a network where the plants and animals of the forest themselves would spy on all activity in the entire forest.
Demiurge gave a brief summary about their recent espionage activities in the various countries, a joint operation with the information gathering specialist Nigredo to use divination magic for surveying every unprotected strategic location, while working doppelganger operatives into those which were too strongly shielded.
Most of the information being presented was just a summary of the documents which had already been delivered to Ainz some time ago, but it was still useful to listen to again. This way, he could hear what they considered to be important enough to report to everybody else, without having to ask them about it explicitly. Seeing them earnestly present their accomplishments once again made him deeply thankful that his companions had left behind such capable NPCs for him.
Ainz recalled his conversation with Tanya where they had shared stories about their second lives. On one such day, she had wholeheartedly complemented his Guardians for being such great subordinates, while herself rambling on about how much effort she had to put into developing her own soldiers into capable elites. For all her harsh words directed towards them, he could tell how important they were to her.
Certainly, his own boss back in the day would never hesitate before giving him consecutive 16-hour workdays to cover up his own mistakes, eating away at his health and sanity. Since they were quite open about their real lives compared to other guilds, they would often complain about their jobs in their off time. If he had a particularly bad day, the other guildmates would always be there to listen and console him.
They really were wonderful companions, without whom he might not have even survived this long in that hellish black company of his. If it was for the guild he had built together with them, and for the NPCs they had left behind, he would happily take on the entire world.
Ainz thought about those memories while listening to each Guardian's report. He felt himself smiling slightly, though it didn't actually show on his skeletal face. At the same time, it reminded him of his own insufficiency. Since they were working so hard to satisfy him, what excuse did he have to not put everything he had towards becoming an ideal ruler for them? In his mind, he vowed to redouble his studies on leadership.
Once Sebas finished speaking, the round table segment was over. Everybody seated again turned back to face Ainz, who gave a single nod.
"Excellent work. As expected, your work is exceptional. Continue to serve Nazarick with such devotion in the future." (Ainz)
All of the Guardians beamed at their master's praise, foremost among them being Albedo.
"We are undeserving of your kind words, Ainz-sama! To serve you is our duty, and to be allowed to do so gives us boundless joy!" (Albedo)
Ainz faced Albedo to give her another nod. They had repeated this exchange countless times before, but he believed that giving out praise in response to good work was important. Even an ordinary person would gain management experience when his life depended on it, as he had over the year and a half since the end of YGGDRASIL.
More importantly, gaining some confidence in his position let him better apply his decade of time playing the game into practical experience. Although leading a guild was not particularly similar to running a country, some of the skills he gained were transferrable, as was his own real-life work, though for a different reason. If he learned anything from that job, it was only that an incompetent boss should stay out of matters he doesn't understand.
"The Great Tomb of Nazarick was created with all of you as part of it, and it could not function nearly so smoothly without every one of you. With that being said, our purpose for meeting here is not for one of Nazarick's original residents, but to listen to one who joined later. Demiurge?" (Ainz)
"Yes. For those who may have forgotten, approximately three months ago the former Imperial Major Tanya von Degurechaff was recruited from another world into our ranks to serve as a military advisor and leader. During this time, she has been collecting information about the Sorcerous Kingdom's current military, as well as the viability of developing an army which does not rely on the Floor Guardians to function. Then, please begin." (Demiurge)
After giving that introduction, Demiurge sat back down to watch Tanya, who approached the round table, stopping at the edge immediately opposite to Ainz, where an empty space had already been prepared for this purpose.
"Thank you very much, Demiurge-sama. With Ainz-sama's permission, I will then begin my presentation." (Tanya)
Giving a standard salute in Ainz's direction, she paused to take a deep breath, then exhaled and spoke the first line.
"Based on my analysis of the present state of the Sorcerous Kingdom of Nazarick, I believe it to be impossible for us to accomplish the proposed military goals against the nation of the Slane Theocracy." (Tanya)
The same instant she finished that sentence, the room exploded.
Sebas furrowed his brow, but did not otherwise show his anger; Demiurge's eyebrow twitched, though was not visibly hostile; Victim's reaction could not be read; Ainz himself looked more disappointed than angry at the statement. Excluding them, nobody seated at the table made any effort to hide their intention to kill the traitor who dared to slander the glorious name of Nazarick.
If a casual application of Sebas's bloodlust could kill a human with above-average strength by shock alone, then what effects would serious murderous intent from half a dozen such individuals in a closed room have?
The Pleiades standing by at the side were pressed against the wall. If not for the commanding presence of Aureole Omega buffing them, those without racial resistances against mental effects might even have been hit by status effects.
The invisible Eight Edge Assassins on the ceiling could be heard clattering around in a panic, uncertain whether to support the will of the majority or get themselves to safety first.
Naturally, when the collateral damage was so powerful, the target of this aggression would experience a far worse outcome. All demon races had a strong resistance to mental effects of any form, but there was only so much it could do in front of such a level difference.
Tanya was driven to her knees, crushed into the ground as if by an invisible giant's hand, leaving her unable to move and barely capable of breathing.
"That's enough! Do not make me repeat the reason we are here." (Ainz)
Relief came from Ainz, who restored the atmosphere in the room with a single statement. He glanced over at Tanya, who was catching her breath and slowly getting up off the floor. They apologized collectively, while he thought about where their excessive loyalty came from.
Meanwhile, Tanya was struggling to get back to her feet, all while questioning the life choices that got her here. She was planning on establishing the tone of the presentation by starting with that kind of summary, thereby getting their attention, though that splendidly backfired. Evidently, she had severely underestimated their standards for what qualified as an insult towards Ainz.
"Do you mean to suggest that we would be defeated?" (Demiurge)
Before she could resume, Demiurge interrupted her for clarification. Most likely he already had a guess at what she was trying to imply, but asked so she would explain for the other Guardians.
"No, that is not the case. I believe that victory would be trivial using the full force available, however doing so would allow the targets to escape. As both the Empire and the Kingdom have been disqualified, by process of elimination, we should proceed under the assumption that the Slane Theocracy are in possession of the World-Class Item capable of mind control." (Tanya)
"Yes, we believe that to be likely." (Demiurge)
"Then, if they are invaded with overwhelming force, they are certain to take the most valuable item and flee. Publicly it would be a victory, but the greatest threat and most valuable treasure would be lost to us. This is not a result which I consider success. We must first bait them with a war which appears winnable, yet there is no force within Nazarick which is suited for that purpose. Hence, I conclude that it is currently impossible to achieve our objective." (Tanya)
"From what Fluder told us, the hundreds of Death Knights and Soul Eaters which I permanently summoned are considered an army capable of wiping out small countries individually. Would they not make for an appropriate threat?" (Ainz)
This interpretation was indeed correct, as history had shown. Forces capable of standing up against Soul Eaters were practically nonexistent, and even Death Knights were next to invincible against anybody weaker than adamantite-ranked adventurers.
The Slane Theocracy was well known as a country which enlisted and trained potential talents, so they should have a considerable pool of elites like the Sunlight Scripture, which Ainz had wiped out previously. If they were all at that level, a dozen Soul Eaters and Death Knights might indeed make for a fairly balanced war.
"Unfortunately, that may not be the case. We have already confirmed that the Theocracy was spying on your attack against the Kingdom. Despite having the information about the existence of that army, they have maintained their standoffish attitude against us. While those undead would indeed make an excellent core for an army, I expect the Slane Theocracy is hiding a force capable of defeating them, those they call Heroes and God-kin." (Tanya)
With the exception of the Republic and Theocracy, every civilized country in the surrounding area had already sent diplomats bearing tribute. Even the formerly hostile Holy Kingdom came with what gifts they could spare. The Republic, being under the protection of the Platinum Dragon Lord – often called the strongest being in the world – would be confident of their safety, but the Theocracy had no such savior, at least not publicly.
"The precise extent of strength they are hiding is impossible to guess, but since they have not attacked outright, it should be less than the full power exhibited by Ainz-sama during that massacre." (Tanya)
Tanya paused to wait for a response, looking around the table once. Several of the Guardians appeared to be in thought, while both Demiurge and Albedo only confidently waited for Ainz's answer.
"Hm… Demiurge, what do you make of this?" (Ainz)
"The assumptions are somewhat speculative, but solid overall. As the Theocracy's headquarters are considerably well secured against observation, they most likely have high-level magic items protecting against divination, perhaps items originating from YGGDRASIL. I am willing to accept the reasoning that they have a considerably force hidden away." (Demiurge)
"Albedo?" (Ainz)
"I am in agreement. When we examined the location where Shalltear was abandoned after being controlled, damage on the ground suggested that a battle took place before the World-Class Item was used, but Shalltear was unable to decisively win. For the sake of caution, we should assume that they possess an elite force which is collectively able to match a single Floor Guardian in battle. However, as they chose to use the item but were unable to fully control her, Shalltear should have been capable of defeating them if not for the item." (Albedo)
"Then we are in agreement. Very well, proceed under these assumptions." (Ainz)
"Understood. Then, I propose that we should prepare a single individual to lead the army and serve as bait for the mind control, who is made to appear strong, but not invincible. That individual must therefore not reveal their strength until the trap is sprung, and lead the army while maintaining a balance of close victories. If we were to also allow them to see that Ainz-sama himself is not in the field, this should draw them out… I believe the most suitable for this task to either be Cocytus-sama, or perhaps Albedo-sama." (Tanya)
Cocytus breathed out a gust of frigid air, having largely expected the recommendation. On the other hand, Albedo appeared to be genuinely surprised at being nominated.
"Both suggestions are rejected. As of yet, we would prefer not to reveal Cocytus needlessly. Regardless of the merit of having myself perform this role, I am far too occupied with internal matters to sit around as bait." (Albedo)
Tanya hadn't expected such an outright denial, but did not allow her expression to shift. Unfreezing a moment later, she again began to argue for her suggestion.
"However, as somebody who has already been openly associated with Nazarick, Albedo-sama would be most suitable. Furthermore, her position as Guardian Overseer would encourage-" (Tanya)
"Would those criteria not apply to yourself as well?" (Demiurge)
Demiurge didn't bother to let her finish before pointing out the obvious. In reality, Tanya had been hoping for the possibility that it would go unmentioned in favor of one of her suggestions, as she didn't really expect them to not notice. Regrettably, she would receive no such mercy, though she couldn't recognize whether his action was intended to be pragmatic or malicious.
"You have already been publicly active, so a certain degree of ability has already been revealed. Since those abilities have changed since they were last shown off, it should serve to throw off the enemy's predictions, while also luring them in with a feigned weakness. Above all, this requires the sort of command experience of which you possess more than anybody here. Why do you not volunteer yourself?" (Demiurge)
He explained this with the mocking smile of a predator, or rather it felt more like the demon ways playing with his food. Tanya couldn't guess just how much of her speech he had predicted, but he was making it perfectly clear that her tricks had already been seen through. She still had a few arguments saved up about problems in the chain of command, or not being suitable to represent Nazarick without a formal status, but gave up on playing those cards. At this point, any further excuses would be futile, if not detrimental.
"I cannot refute your logic, Demiurge-sama. Then, with Ainz-sama's approval, this mission would be assigned to me…" (Tanya)
She sent Ainz a pleading glance while reluctantly delivering a jagged approval, but he had already saved her once that day, and neither did he have any reason to refute Demiurge's explanation. He nodded, confirming their decision.
"With that being decided, I suggest that you perform the experiments to support your further theories before presenting them. You should have no issue assembling a force which matches your desired composition, but ask for assistance if required. Cocytus, you mentioned the lizardmen were ready to fight? Why don't you take some of them along?" (Demiurge)
"I. Do. Not. Mind, But. Please. Try. To. Bring. Them. Back. In. One. Piece." (Cocytus)
"Then, we'll send a couple hundred of them your way. Feel free to call up our loyal allies for soldiers if you wish, but do keep Nazarick's reputation in mind as you do so. Ah, and do try not to play around too much with the outsiders, else somebody might misunderstand your intentions." (Demiurge)
Demiurge finished his speech without the slightest shift to his gentle smile.
Thus, the meeting came to an end.
Part 2
As soon as she was released, Tanya retreated back to her room. Not the room on Demiurge's floor which she had officially been assigned, but rather the office in E-Rantel's castle which she had commandeered. It was much further out of the way, and precisely because of that she could stay without being disturbed.
For the most part, Nazarick's native residents would, by their very nature, prefer to stay within the Great Tomb, unless they were required to do otherwise for their work. Of course, exceptions would be made if they were traveling with Ainz, but generally speaking this was an accurate guess.
If it was here, she could complain in peace. Tanya walked through the door, then immediately shut it behind herself. After establishing several anti-divination spells around her person, confirming the location of every mana signature – living or dead – within 500 meters of herself, and monitoring the surrounding area for incoming teleportation, only then did she let herself relax.
"Haaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh…" (Tanya)
She let out a deep sigh. Contrary to expectations, they were already more than happy to leave the entire matter to her without so much as regulation or oversight. Were she dealing with Imperial High Command, she would have considered this a sign of their trust in her ability, but here it would simply be naive. As she had not properly accounted for that difference, her plan to evade responsibility had been derailed.
No, if I kept trying to get out of work at this point, it'd just be contract fraud. They held up their end of the deal, what with taking out Being X, so I ought to do the same. The job description didn't explicitly mention leading an army, but I suppose it's close enough that I can't really argue about it.
Even more surprising was their accepting her plan just as she had proposed it, aside from her choice of commanding officer. Yet, they said nothing and left her in total control. She had no doubt that they were capable of thinking up better plans, they had done so many times before in the records she had gotten access to. To begin with, she had gotten approval without so much as explaining any more than a vague outline of her goals.
Are they letting me direct this attack to test me? Is that why they didn't even set a schedule for me, they want to take initiative as a show of loyalty?
Certainly, if she took the hundreds of 'legendary' undead and ended up losing them, they could be resummoned within a month even if they were lost. At present, Ainz had stopped summoning them only because they were running out of space to keep them. Even the most generous possible estimate for her to organize an army and conduct an invasion would take far longer than that. Without factoring in delays due to actual combat and logistic problems, by the time she returned he could make a replacement army twice the size of what had been shown off previously.
She would probably be given most of the army Ainz had brought out in Katze Plains, as not bringing the forces which were already revealed would only rouse suspicion. She could ask for any number of POP undead for cannon fodder, as they would respawn at no cost. She would be provided a sizeable army by this world's standards, but not much more. Any other forces she wanted would have to be provisioned by her own effort, unless she could justify them as necessary to the army experiment.
As an officer, Tanya was fascinated with the idea of using undead armies. Though she had never personally had to deal with spending a winter in the Federation and all the supply nightmares that accompanied such an environment, she had heard enough horror stories from the Railroad Division to make an educated guess. When the snow and mud stopped rations and winter clothing from reaching the front, any army, no matter how well-equipped and trained would freeze and starve all the same.
On the other hand, undead would never need to eat or drink, would never suffer from reduced morale, and required no training to replace once destroyed. In many ways, they were ideal soldiers, but had countless drawbacks.
Foremost, their utter lack of adaptability in the face of unexpected situations. They would follow their orders to the letter, and in the absence of commanders on the field, this was a recipe for disaster. An undead army sent to fight against ground forces would be worthless against attacks from the sky. Let alone having no way to counterattack, they would not even bother to take cover or otherwise evade attacks. If Tanya had enough free time, she could destroy hundreds of Death Knights single-handedly simply by flying above them and dropping large rocks on them.
This flaw could be mitigated to some extent by assigning POP-spawned Elder Liches as squad commanders, which had enough intelligence to make them at least passable commanders. Unfortunately, expecting any more would be a fool's errand. Perhaps they could be taught when to fight and when to retreat, but creative thinking on the spot was beyond them.
Some of the higher-level variants of Elder Liches could perform construction management, urban planning, research, or other intellectual work, but they were limited in quantity. Since those were too high in level to naturally spawn, the only ones in Nazarick were those which had been purchased for it, such as those in the Grand Library. Naturally, those would not be made available to her.
Still, every single one of the Soul Eaters was comparable in combat power to a modern main battle tank, if not several. When their ability to function in any environment without any need for maintenance or risk of malfunctions was taken into account, they made for an incredibly potent unit. Much as a tank commander might salivate at the chance to deploy a full battalion's worth of tanks, impractical as that may be, she too could enjoy making use of such monsters.
As much as I hate war, it does get much easier when you pick the right enemy. They may not be free-market hating communists, but theocrats are a close second. Were they the modern type who know when to stay out of government I could still leave them be, but these are the worst sort of extremists. Wiping them out would be doing the world a favor.
Tanya nodded at her own mental justification. The Slane Theocracy was fanatically dedicated to its mantra of protecting the survival of humanity, to the detriment of any other races. This was not just hollow preaching, but true dedication to that cause.
On the surface, they provided military aid to the Draconic Kingdoms when they were attacked by the demihumans in the east, trained soldiers from the Holy Kingdom in their defense against invading monsters, and mediated conflicts between human nations in the interest of mutual survival.
However, behind that pristine front, they had their fair share of shadows. Attacks against demihumans were not defensive as they claimed, and they would often make preemptive strikes targeting potential threats. The primary mission assigned to Nigun's Sunlight Scripture was exactly this, hunting down traces of demihuman activity, following it to its source, and tearing it out by its roots. Isolated and peaceful villages of intelligent demihumans were no exception, and would be wiped out in the interest of safety.
The Theocracy would provide a degree of training to foreign soldiers, but most of their own training techniques remained strictly confidential. They leveraged control over temples within their country to maintain an extremely detailed register of citizens, which included their Talents as identified with magic. Of those, individuals with useful abilities would be called for service and conscripted. The training given to those foreign soldiers was only that which they would give to their own rank-and-file soldiers, those determined to have no potential.
Even their efforts to limit the scale of wars between human countries were largely for the sake of raising the total human population to be as large as possible. They would limit conflicts as they claimed, but when one was deemed incapable as the Re-Estize Kingdom had been, they would be more than happy to let the Empire invade and annex them.
Indeed, everything they did was in the interest of humanity as a whole. Humanity as a race was weak compared to the monsters around them, so they had to band together against all external threats. In their ideal world, all other species would be eliminated, leaving only humans to populate the entire continent.
"Just what do you take demihumans to be? They're a perfectly good source of human capital… is your wastefulness intended to be an insult to HR? Imperial recruiters would have you shot for squandering that much manpower." (Tanya)
She hated them. She well and truly despised them. She had thought that only communists could do something as ridiculous as discarding talent for purely political reasons, but evidently she was wrong. While thinking about such things, Tanya continued talking to herself in her room.
"I take back what I said, these theocrats are just as bad as the commies. Somebody really needs to teach them the principles of trade… even if the world changes, in the end it comes down to me to spread the joys of proper economics… what a role to have. Is this what it feels like to fight a war you actually believe in?" (Tanya)
Tanya furrowed her eyebrows once she finished speaking
Have I always been this belligerent? Even back in the Empire, there were times when I wanted to proactively attack, but those were always working towards a specific objective. For me to call for starting a war, even if the suggestion comes from a superior… have I changed more than I thought over these long years?
People would change from time in the military. This was just as true no matter the age, no matter the world. It would be more unusual for somebody not to change in any profession which expected you to follow orders which may result in killing other people, or dying yourself. Of course, Tanya's half decade in the Imperial Army was no exception to this rule.
In her case however, there was still her transformation into a demon to consider. The body would change, as would the brain. As this process was naturally far less researched than military psychology, it was impossible for her to guess at what sort of mental changes could be attributed to this, instead of her time in the trenches.
She had lived once and developed for decades as an adult male, then suddenly been made female and spent a decade developing again. After 13 years of that, she had once again had her entire body reconstructed into something no longer human, only built to resemble her appearance. Though her memories were intact, she would inevitably drift further and further from who she originally was.
Like a human Ship of Theseus, it was difficult to say whether she still was the same person she had started as. To the person in question, it was more than just philosophy, but a matter of personal identity. Should she resist in an effort to return to her old self, or should she accept the shift, even if it turns her into a more violent and ruthless person, better adapted to these brutal worlds, but incompatible with modern life. Perhaps there was a middle ground to be found, though the end result might simply leave her unable to live in either environment.
The first time around, she had lived a peaceful life in Japan, isolated from violence of any sort. In her second life, she had personally killed well over a hundred enemy mages, plus many more infantrymen on the ground, all while dreaming of a peaceful life. Perhaps by then she had already moved past what somebody who had grown up in the 21st century would consider the actions of a human being. Indeed, it was not something a sane member of modern society could – or should – be able to do. To survive, she had to change, but turning back was easier said than done.
Now, her direct superiors were no longer demonic strategists, but literal demons. If back then she had been ordered to take part in burning the city of Arene to the ground, she might now receive orders to wipe out armies and purge entire cities. And, if the objective lined up with her own goals, she would do just that.
Without a doubt, she would be hated by a great many people. Unlike Demiurge – who would be planning their actions behind the scenes – she would be taking action publicly. Ten years from now, she might be the second most hated individual on the entire continent, behind only Ainz himself.
Although, if all goes well, we'll win the wars, and information control can come after that. "History is written by the victors," as they say, and I for one am not planning on losing. If, if we can really succeed at this, once this passes out of living memory and into the textbooks, it may really be possible to establish a stable, unified government over the entire continent. Even now it feels childish to be seriously considering it, but these people may actually be able to conquer the world. Impractical as it may seem, that is one way to finally see peace.
It was truly a ridiculous plan, one which no living king would ever consider. Grudges might live for generations, and it was simply impossible for any mortal emperor to outlive all opposition to their conquest. Perhaps he could leave it to his sons, but it was only a matter of time until one of the successors would end up being some incompetent, or one generation has two capable and ambitious sons, or perhaps an advisor who decides to dethrone the young emperor in his care, fracturing the realm. Then, everything comes to an end in an instant. History recorded no small number of empires which met their end not at the hands of invading enemies, but to succession.
Meanwhile, Ainz Ooal Gown would see none of these outcomes. Nearly everybody involved was immortal or close to it, and each of them had perfect health and enough personal strength to make assassination impossible. Their loyalty was unshakeable, their personal ambitions always secondary to the goals of the organization as a whole.
The king had his flaws, but his own awareness of that weakness made him practice and study, as well as to defer to his more capable subordinates. He was not perfect, but precisely because of that, he would not become overconfident in thinking he can do anything, nor think himself invincible only to fall for some obvious trap due to his hubris. In Tanya's mind, all things considered, Ainz wasn't a bad fit for the role. He himself had admitted that the whole 'world conquest' plan came about when his passing joke was taken seriously, but surprisingly, she couldn't call it unattainable.
With the careful application of overwhelming violence, they might be able to conquer the entire continent within a decade or two. With enough careful manipulation of information, given a century or so, they could rewrite the past to record that they had always been in power. If it were then, Tanya might actually be able to retire in peace without living in fear of getting killed in her sleep by some fanatic.
She was surprisingly comfortable with the idea of living forever, in part because it hadn't really sunk in yet. Having once known the effects of aging, she was fine with not doing so again. Although she wasn't interested in re-experiencing youth – nor had the chance to do so at an impoverished orphanage – she was more than happy to have one less thing to worry about. Spending a few more decades might change her mindset, but for the time being, she had more pressing issues than complaining about immortality.
Having finished with her internal complaining, Tanya sat down to start reading through records. Or at least, she intended to.
Without warning, she withdrew her rifle from the pocket space, crouching down to take aim in the direction of the door. The action was reflexive, a conditioned response to an unknown mana source appearing, possibly indicative of an ambush by hostile mages.
Though, in this case it was not a mana signature she detected, but the spatial ripples formed by incoming teleportation. As the air began to shimmer with a pale blue light, she was already preparing a close-range optical formula, her finger hovering over the rifle's lightweight trigger.
But, she carefully eased away from the trigger. With a sigh, she stood back up while stowing the weapon, directing her annoyance towards the surprised figure which appeared between her and the door.
"Ainz, to appear in front of a mage without warning, are you asking to get shot?" (Tanya)
She was still actively monitoring the surrounding area, so there was no chance that anybody else was within earshot. Thus, there was no need for tedious formalities.
"Sorry about that, Albedo would make me bring guards along if she knew I went out, so I didn't want to be seen in the castle. I tried to send you a [Message], but it wouldn't go through." (Ainz)
"Ah… that aside, did you need something?" (Tanya)
Tanya realized that she had been too zealous in blocking out divination magic, which had included blocking incoming communication. Unlike physical obstructions like metal plates in the wall, magical defenses were simple to customize. It wasn't as though she couldn't selectively allow those through, she simply hadn't thought to do so. In other words, the situation was almost entirely her fault.
"I'd like to hear what you're planning on doing with this army you've been talking about. The organization, the problems, all that. From the way Demiurge is talking about it, he already knows all about it, and it's getting hard to follow along." (Ainz)
"Although I don't mind explaining, did you read the proposal I submitted to Demiurge? The framework of the plan should be written in there." (Tanya)
"Well, I read the summary, but as for reading the actual report, no, I gave up two pages in, sorry." (Ainz)
The report she was referring to was a formal proposal for researching the integration of undead, heteromorphic, demihuman, human, and monster forces into a practical, unified army. In a manner similar to combined arms warfare, she argued that although including different species would greatly increase the logistical burden the army would have compared to a purely undead army, the resulting force would be far more effective and versatile.
Unlike the ad hoc units she had been researching back in the Empire, this was a proposal for a non-uniform standing army. On the surface the two proposals looked quite similar, but in truth this was far closer to contemporary doctrine, though the application was obviously different.
"To put it simply, I intend to use various species to mimic either modern or World War-era army composition. In a defensive battle, I would deploy defensive undead like the Death Knights to form a line, behind whom Liches and human magic casters would be entrenched in relative safety, taking the role of light artillery to actually destroy the enemy. Even if they try to close the distance, disposable undead would exhaust them, the wall of Death Knights would stop them, all while continuously taking fire from both magic casters and a line infantry of crossbowmen to bring out the hell of trench warfare even without firearms." (Tanya)
"Shouldn't you employ more undead than just a line of Death Knights? I would expect a bigger part of the core army to be undead than that. The Soul Eaters are much higher level, not to mention the countless other types of mid-tier undead which I can make at no cost." (Ainz)
"From what I understand, their attacks are large-scale area-of-effect blasts centered around themselves, right? Putting them in the middle of most formations would just cause friendly fire. That being said, they're great for breaking through enemy lines and causing confusion. On the surface, you can think of them as medium tanks, especially if you harden them against magic by matching them up with magic-resistant undead like Skeletal Dragons." (Tanya)
"Why don't you use them as cavalry instead? Any rider undead can use them as a mount without penalty." (Ainz)
Soul Eaters looked like horses, and indeed they could be used as workhorses. On the streets of E-Rantel, one would regularly spot them pulling huge overburdened carriages without breaking a sweat.
"Although you weren't wrong to deploy them as cavalry for intimidation, I believe that would be counterproductive. The advantages cavalry offers are the mobility to strike at undefended flanks, and the shock of a charge with the full weight of the horse behind it. That being said, when the mount alone is already able to follow orders, there isn't much to gain unless the riders are considerably more powerful than the Soul Eaters themselves. If not, their own attacks will kill the rider well before they can get into range." (Tanya)
"I see. Certainly, now that friendly fire isn't restricted, some monsters which would be mounts in YGGDRASIL are no longer usable. So you pair those two together since they won't damage each other with misfires, then control them to force the enemy into disadvantageous fights. Against warriors who could defeat the lower-level Skeletal Dragons, you bring the Soul Eaters forward, while the Skeletal Dragons act as walls against long-range magic attacks." (Ainz)
Tanya nodded at Ainz's analysis. Though his logic was built on the monsters' roles in the game rather than this world, his answer was more or less correct.
"As for the other undead you mentioned, the only ones I'm currently planning on using would be Liches as squad commanders. I did have some ideas for how to make use of others, such as making Ether Spirits into artillery spotters and Bone Constructors to build makeshift catapults for said artillery cover, but we should keep it simple for now." (Tanya)
Ether Spirits were purely magical beings which could freely turn invisible. In addition, they had the special ability to planeshift, becoming able to travel long distances while remaining nearly imperceptible by moving outside the physical world. Unfortunately, as they were not corporeal undead, there was no way to use a corpse to permanently summon them, so they would have to be created on-site and discarded later, greatly limiting their usability.
On the other hand, Bone Constructors were closer to golems than conventional undead, and could be animated from any sort of bones, with the quality of the material determining the level of the created Bone Constructor. As monsters in YGGDRASIL they would only take a few forms – mostly small defensive structures – but now they could be made into any shape, and the bones would move as if they were connected by joints.
While their potential was vast, actually making something useful out of them required a capable carpenter or engineer. Within Nazarick, probably only Demiurge, and maybe a handful of others would know how to go about making one, and even then mass production would remain impossible. The next best option would be hiring human artisans, though finding some who would be willing to work with such grotesque materials was its own challenge.
"Hoh? You've really thought this out, just what I'd expect from a soldier. The Guardians have a tendency to not take threats seriously. Demiurge was designed to be a defensive commander, but his knowledge only extends to protecting Nazarick itself, not battles in general. Though, I'm sure he could get it done if I put him to it." (Ainz)
"To be clear, I do not consider the Theocracy's army to be a legitimate threat. Their regular divisions are unlikely to be a match even if we just had the undead charge forward alone, so these tactics are only being added on for the purpose of experimentation. On the other hand, if the elite special forces they are hiding truly are near the level of your Guardians, then all of this preparation would buy a little time at best. Ideally, we are overestimating them, and they would have no choice but to bring out the World-Class Item in an attempt to target the leader, that is to say, me. Once they do that, we win." (Tanya)
"Hm… I understand what you mean, but I still can't help but feel that you're taking World-Class Items far too lightly. They truly are in a league of their own, especially the Twenty. Some among them could theoretically destroy entire worlds or rewrite the laws of physics and magic, and I doubt they're any less powerful in this world than they were in the game. Even if our tests suggest you should be fine, I'm uncertain. Resurrection magic may not necessarily work on those who aren't NPCs or natives of this world, else those 'gods' who may have been players would still be around." (Ainz)
"If you're that worried, don't send me to the front lines to begin with… though it's too late for that now. Even if they are hiding a World-Class Item, their confidence in its power might mean that they won't prepare a proper backup plan in case it fails. If only other World-Class Items can stop their effects, then I doubt they'd have ever seen a case where it doesn't work. My immunity should be perfect for this, but… you're right, we shouldn't let our guard down near anything with that evil god's fingerprints on it." (Tanya)
Several weeks prior, the two of them had, at her request, attempted to research the abilities given to her by D. As there was no visible magic item to appraise, they tried to instead analyze her person, but this too resisted their efforts. Basic parameters such as MP could be read like normal, but anything more failed to give meaningful results.
When even Nigredo's once-per-day detailed analysis skill gave only garbled results, they figured they would only be able to observe abilities by their interactions with the outside world. They kept trying all sorts of effects, until eventually Pandora's Actor pointed out that her resistance against information gathering was remarkably similar to Nazarick's defenses, which were built with a World-Class Item at its core.
Using [Depiction of Mountains and Rivers], Ainz attempted to lock Tanya into a plain sealed dimension. To his amazement, she resisted the effect effortlessly. By the rules of World-Class Items, she must therefore be in possession of an equivalent item, but therein lay the contradiction. They were called 'Items' because they were all physical objects, not concepts, skills, or abilities.
Such an item could not possibly exist in YGGDRASIL, yet here she stood. After an extended debate, the conclusion Tanya proposed was that the World-Class Items, like the integrated Type-95 which they conflicted with, were created and left here by D, who had demonstrated the ability to casually manipulated the system by which the World-Class Items operated.
It was certainly a leap in logic, one which came about due to her honestly not wanting to believe that there could be many more beings with such boundless power as D seemed to carry. Assuming that were the case, any item imbued with D's power would behave the same way, though such treasures were far too rare to make up a proper sample size. Although, whether they really were sacred treasures or just leftover toys tossed in for the sake of amusement was another question altogether. Tanya was fine with not knowing the answer to that.
Given that she was now effectively a living World-Class Item for the purposes of inter-immunity, Tanya would not be affected by the Theocracy's mind control… in theory. In her experience, practical usage of theoretical value would often have disastrous consequences, as one mad scientist had made her learn.
"… Well, there's nothing we can do even if 'She' is getting involved, as much as I hate to admit it. A job is a job, I'll work something out. For the time being, I'll send out some letters to your vassals and start marshaling soldiers. In total, I need one month for them to gather, plus another four months for basic coordination and training. We'll set up just southeast of E-Rantel, in the plains." (Tanya)
"I recall Demiurge saying you'd try delaying the invasion using training as an excuse." (Ainz)
"… Three months for training, if you can give me some other mid-tier undead for wargames. This too is part of the experiment, since we need to get the humans used to fighting alongside undead, and I'd like to root out problems before we invade. Plus, letting the army be seen would help both propaganda efforts and serve to deceive foreign spies by making the army seem more real. I have my own preparation to do before then, so I can't cut back much more than that." (Tanya)
She conceded. Training an entire division's worth of soldiers in such a brief period of time would inevitably produce subpar results. However, there was no need to actually train elites solely for the sake of a ruse, only to make the army functional to demonstrate its viability. With just that requirement, even three months would be unnecessarily long. Both of them were at least vaguely aware of this, but Ainz simply shrugged.
"I don't mind the delay, we're in no rush. I'll think up an excuse for Demiurge to let you drag it out, just get the results with it so I don't end up looking stupid. Remember, don't let your guard down around them, we still haven't confirmed whether the people who controlled Shalltear really used a World-Class Item, or some Talent or Item unique to this world." (Ainz)
"Sorry, and thanks, Ainz. Then, vacation is over, so I may as well get back to work in earnest. You should probably get back before Albedo accuses you of cheating on her again." (Tanya)
Tanya stretched her arms in an exaggerated manner while sending Ainz off with a parting joke. Sadly, rather than a laugh she only saw a dejected skull looking down.
"Don't say it… that actually sounds like it would happen." (Ainz)
"… Sorry." (Tanya)
Part 3
Jircniv Rune Farlord el Nix, the feared Blood Emperor of the Baharuth Empire, sat on a luxurious couch with a grave expression. In his hands was a simple piece of paper and the envelope which had contained it, which was naturally the reason for his current appearance. Were he seen like this by an outsider, they might think that he had received dire news, or if they knew of his reputation, perhaps they might believe he was plotting some conspiracy against incompetent nobles.
To those more familiar with Jircniv's personality, the hint of desperation in his eyes would instead suggest a different cause. After all, internal policies under his control would never worry him this much. The one and only person – if he can be called that – who could put the Emperor into such a state with a simple piece of paper was of course the Empire's suzerain, the supreme ruler of Nazarick, the Sorcerer King, Ainz Ooal Gown.
It was early winter, which meant that nearly a full year had passed since the day he had foolishly asked that monster to signal the start of the war with his most powerful magic. Ever since that day, his reputation had changed from a ruthless monarch who culled the incompetent to a brutal dictator who had sided with the undead king to slaughter their enemies.
No matter how much he tried to claim ignorance of the Sorcerer King's true power, only his closest advisors and confidants trusted him and believed that. He believed he could still turn that around by plotting a coalition with the priests of the Theocracy, but that scheme was divined and thwarted as if Jircniv's planning was no more secretive than a child hiding a broken vase behind his back.
He was crushed. He was so thoroughly overwhelmed that he almost wanted to just resign on the spot, but such actions would never be allowed. Though he found it questionable whether a vassal state could still be called an empire, Jircniv was still the emperor, and he held the responsibility as its leader to protect the Empire he loved.
As far as overlords went, the Sorcerous Kingdom was relatively generous with the autonomy it allowed its subjects. They did not excessively try to remove or replace the Empire's already meager administration remaining after Jircniv's purges. They did not impose excessive taxes or massively restructure the Empire's legal codes.
If anything, the Elder Liches they sent as civil servants lessened their workload. They were not perfect, but easily more capable than the noble sons who only got the job through nepotism. The few laws they were forced to adopt, declaring all races to be equal under the Sorcerer King and banning slavery, could even be considered to be humanitarian. He had been forced to downsize the Empire's army by disbanding two legions, but they were replaced for him by undead of superior power, and in the end most of those who were transferred away were those who had already expressed interest in leaving the military after witnessing that massacre.
Every one of these actions moved the Empire one step closer towards integration and loss of autonomy, but there was nothing Jircniv could say to stop them, as none of the individual demands was particularly unreasonable. No, even before that, he had long since lost the will to resist, just as long as his Empire was permitted to continue existing.
Recently, he had even begun looking into how to either nationalize or remove the temples in his country, lest they one day speak ill of the Sorcerous Kingdom and bring down their wrath, thereby destroying the Empire into collateral damage. Only a few months earlier he had been looking at them as his last hope for escape, but now they were nothing but a liability. Unfortunately, he had nowhere near enough divine magic casters coming out of his academy to replace the temples' without severe consequences, so that particular plan was at a standstill.
When he received a request, he would not hesitate to fulfill it to the best of his abilities. If it were an order which forfeit the lives of his citizens he might still waver, but the letter contained no such demand. Nonetheless, Jircniv could not obey an order he did could not understand.
The emperor himself gave up staring at the letter, gently laying it back down on the table. Though it was only a piece of paper, one of Fluder's former disciples who had been called in for a magic caster's opinion had almost fearfully told him that the parchment was dragonskin and the wax sealing the letter came from some sort of powerful monster, one which he could not identify.
Two hours ago, he had been resting in this room when a cloud of crimson mist passed through the open window, forming into the shape of a human. It would have looked like a rather attractive human woman, if not for the fact that its body was the same crimson as the mist, now visibly having the texture of fresh blood.
He called for the guards in the next room, but the creature wordlessly pulled a letter out from inside its arm, laid it down on a nearby table, then vaporized and left the way it came. He took a single glance at the emblem pressed into the wax, then sent away the guards who came, except for one arcane magic caster and one divine magic caster among them, who he had stay. While they were leaving, he had one of them call in Roune, the head scribe.
Once the room contained only the four of them, he retold the story of how the letter was delivered, but none of them had heard of the monster before. If Fluder were still here, things might be different, but he was probably holed up in some library in E-Rantel, or possibly inside Nazarick itself. The best guess they could give from its abilities was a variant of either a vampire or a slime, or perhaps some hybrid of the two.
In the end, rather than the identify of the messenger, the contents of the letter were of far more significance than the messenger chosen to deliver it, so Jircniv set aside that topic and picked up the letter. While his three advisors held their breaths, he carefully cracked the wax seal and opened the envelope, pulling out the paper inside and carefully scanning the lines written on it.
"What… is this…" (Jircniv)
The letter contained none of the formalities which a letter to an emperor would normally contain. If one of the Empire's nobles wrote to him, for every paragraph of real information, there would be another two paragraphs of poetry, three of pleasantries, and four of flattery. Receiving a dozen pages of reply just to accept an invitation to a party was the norm. In contrast, this letter was only a single page, and it contained only six lines.
The first addressed the letter to himself, Jircniv Rune Farlord el Nix.
The second described the military obligations between a subject and its overlord.
The third requested the presence of a unit of the Empire's troops and officers for joint military training.
The fourth described the location, the northwest tip of the Katze Plains, just southwest of E-Rantel, and the time, a date three weeks from now.
The fifth and sixth were illegible runes.
"Could it possibly be a forgery?" (Roune)
Roune, who sat next to him, looked at the letter himself and leaked that comment.
"Does there exist somebody who can use materials like this for a forgery…? But, you're right, I don't think the Sorcerer King himself wrote this…" (Jircniv)
"Then, one of his subordinates who was allowed to use the seal?" (Roune)
"That'd be my guess… but why didn't they sign it? No, perhaps they did." (Jircniv)
Jircniv glanced down at the last two lines, carefully examining them, but no matter how much he looked, they were still foreign to him.
"Do either of you two recognize these runes? Are they somehow magical?" (Jircniv)
He put the page down on the table, turning it around to face the two magic casters, both of whom leaned forward to take a closer look. Though they might not be exceptional in the way Fluder was, each of them was still an excellent graduate from one of the Empire's magic schools, and were talented enough to merit their posts among his royal guard.
The arcane magic caster simply looked puzzled as he read the runes. Meanwhile, the divine magic caster's face rapidly shifted from confusion, to realization, to shock, to amazement.
"Is this written in the Language of the Gods?" (DMC)
"Hm? What is that?" (Jircniv)
"I'm not sure what language the first line is written in, but I believe the second is written in the language said to be used by the Theocracy's Six Gods and the Eight Greed Kings, traces of which can be found on some of their lost treasures." (DMC)
"Is that what it is? Can you read what it says?" (Jircniv)
"No, I'm afraid not… it's a dead language, nobody knows how to use it. Perhaps the Theocracy is hiding somebody capable of doing so, but many have attempted to decipher it with no success." (DMC)
"I think Master knew of a spell which could translate even that language, but nobody except him could cast it. Unfortunately, he took the notes on it when he left, so we would be unable to replicate it." (AMC)
"Those myths are coming up again now… what is this supposed to mean? Why would they use that language to sign a letter? Is Ainz Ooal Gown somehow connected to the Eight Greed Kings?" (Jircniv)
"Was it written as a hint for something? Perhaps the military exercises they write about are only a justification for gathering troops, and the true goal is to prepare an invasion against the Theocracy?" (Roune)
"That does sound plausible. Were the letter to be intercepted, they could claim to only be training our soldiers. If they actually spoke of an invasion and the Theocracy got ahold of it, they could get help from the Republic's Dragons, though I'm not sure even those things could defeat the Sorcerer King." (Jircniv)
"Could that be the reason they went out of their way to use dragonskin parchment? Are they warning us to watch out for intervention from the Republic?" (AMC)
The arcane magic caster who had been quiet up until now added another theory.
"I'm not sure. From how his fortress was decorated, the Sorcerer King might just normally use such a thing, but your logic makes sense." (Jircniv)
"Why would they request our soldiers for an invasion force, though? They can't begin to compare to those undead knights, are they only there to be trampled as cannon fodder?" (Roune)
"We can't guess that monster's intentions. He certainly already predicted how our discussion would go, which is probably why the letter contains only the exact amount of information necessary for us to act. I suspect the reason they didn't even specify what sort of troops to send was because the letter was intended as a test, to see what we'd send…" (Jircniv)
Jircniv put his had to his chin, deep in thought. If he sent poor quality troops, it would reflect badly on his empire. If he sent too many, he might be accused of trying to rebel. Of course, if their commander ever disobeyed orders, every one of them might be executed as traitors.
He had to get this exactly right.
"What should we do? I believe General Kabein should be in the capital, should I call him for advice?" (Roune)
"No, Kabein is capable, but he's too stubborn for this task. If he slips up and says something disobedient, it'll be the end of us. We don't know what sort of general they'll be placed under, so somebody more flexible would be better." (Jircniv)
Roune paused, then made another suggestion.
"In that case, how about the head of the Royal Air Force, Captain Hansen?" (Roune)
"Hansen? He would be good, but he's not experienced commanding large armies. Although, putting him in charge of a smaller group of elites might be better. The portion of the Sorcerer King's army we saw was made up of a few hundred legendary undead rather than thousands of lesser ones, they might prefer that composition. Any objections?" (Jircniv)
The room was silent in response. Everybody currently in the room was trusted enough by Jircniv to advise him, so they knew he wouldn't condemn them for criticizing him. If they weren't objecting, they should actually agree with his plan. Or, maybe they just didn't have any better ideas.
"Should we leave the precise selection of troops to Captain Hansen? Or would you prefer to get Baziwood-dono's advice first?" (Roune)
"Yes, I'll listen to what they think before making the final decision, but for the time being, make preparation to move the entire Royal Air Force, 80% of the Royal Guard, and all magic casters currently idle or assigned to non-critical tasks in the capital. If memory serves, that should be around 600 men in total. It's considerably more than what Hansen normally handles, but he should be able to manage. Oh, and send 'Heavy Explosion' along with them, she'd be more than happy to join up with them." (Jircniv)
"W-wait, Your Majesty! That'd mean leaving Arwintar virtually undefended, not to mention your own person! There are noble houses, and former nobles, who would be more than happy to take the chance to attempt an assassination using this chance. Particularly with how your recent reputation, this is too dangerous!" (Roune)
Roune sputtered a list of warnings in a panic. At the same time, the two magic casters exchanged a few words, then made a similar complaint.
"Your Majesty, we're also opposed to this. The number of magic casters you are proposing to use is almost twice as many as we'd deploy in wars against the Kingdom. Even our old plans against the Theocracy never deployed that many offensively. Especially with Master having left, if we lose that many magic casters now, we'd lose decades worth of training. Please reconsider." (AMC)
In response, Jircniv gently smiled while waiting for them to finish. He turned towards Roune, nodding once before giving his own argument.
"That's a reasonable concern, but I still have two of the four knights here. Although I can't rule the possibility out entirely, they'd need people of Ijaniya's level, and we've already confirmed that they left the Empire shortly after we capitulated to the Sorcerous Kingdom. If it makes you feel better, I wasn't planning on leaving the palace much in the coming months anyway, so it should still be safe here." (Jircniv)
He then turned towards the pair of magic casters sitting across the table.
"As for you two, while it's certainly a gamble, it isn't as though we're gaining nothing from participating in this. They called it a military exercise, and even if that really is just a cover, you can expect some training. I sincerely doubt His Majesty the Sorcerer King will personally train you, but they have plenty of magic casters far superior to Fluder Paradyne you could observe. Aren't you interested in whoever it is that wrote in this 'Language of the Gods' you mentioned?" (Jircniv)
After a short pause to consider the meaning behind the emperor's words, the two bowed and accepted his order.
"Then, it's settled. Roune, get somebody to call for my Four Knights and Hansen to meet me in an hour." (Jircniv)
Picking the letter up and carefully folding it back into the envelope, Jircniv got up to leave, followed by the other three, who left to perform their duties.
An exhausted Raeven walked into his room, closing the door behind him. Unlike the office in his own estate where he had paid for counterespionage plating in the walls, this office had no such function, it was only a simple workplace. It was considerably bigger than his normal office, but the documents scattered around the room were no less dense than his own. If that room held all documents pertaining to his domain, this one held most of what was necessary to run the entire kingdom.
He checked once that the door was firmly shut, then let out a drained sigh. When he opened his eyes, they naturally gravitated towards a certain cabinet. After another sigh, he started walking in the direction of that cabinet, taking out a small glass bottle to pour himself a drink.
"Good work today, Prime Minster Raeven."
The young voice which came from the corner of his room made him jump out of his skin. He turned around in a rush, knocking aside the glass and almost dropping the bottle on the floor, though he narrowly caught both.
"Are you trying to give me a heart attack, Princess Renner?" (Raeven)
"Of course not, who would take over the country if you left?" (Renner)
Renner was already siting next to his desk when Raeven entered the room, partially obscured by one pile of documents. In her hands she had a budget report from the last month, which she had been looking through until just a moment earlier.
"Prince Zanack promised me this position in the past as well, but I doubt he had ever intended to throw the entire state to me the way you have. If you don't do some work yourself, I really will take the throne this time." (Raeven)
"Go ahead, take it. If you think you can handle it, I'll renounce my title tomorrow and head off to E-Rantel with Climb." (Renner)
"Please don't. If you make me negotiate with Albedo-sama directly, I really will have a heart attack. I still want to live long enough to see my son grow up." (Raeven)
"I see. How is the wheat borrowed from the Sorcerous Kingdom working out?" (Renner)
Hearing her switch between threats and other topics without so much as a twitch to her facial expression unnerved Raeven to no end, but she was still easier to interact with than the monsters across the border. He wasn't sure how she did it, but her negotiations with them had already saved the kingdom on multiple occasions.
"For the moment, the territories are recovering. I have no clue where they got that much grain, but deaths by starvation this winter have decreased by eighty percent in territories managed by the crown, including those lands seized from collapsing nobility. Of the remaining houses, five refused the aid, and the resulting deaths have been named as cause to have them arrested for incapability for all but one of them, who had stored enough to avoid deaths. With that being said, the number of territories we have gained are impossible for me to continue managing. We simply cannot get inspectors and tax collectors out to every single one of those villages. Even before that, some of the nobles' records were so badly kept that we barely know where some of the villages are located." (Raeven)
After he finished, Renner delayed for a moment to think, then proposed a solution.
"I'll rent some golems as laborers to start on improving the roads to those territories. Even without more officials, if the infrastructure is better, it should become easier to maintain records. The villages themselves should be grateful to making trade easier, and their opinion of His Majesty should improve with this. If communication is this bad, some might not even have heard about what happened in the war, so make this the first news they hear of the Sorcerer King." (Renner)
Raeven frowned at hearing her overt motivations, entirely unfiltered.
"Without nobles crying about invading armies from the Empire, we won't be obstructed from paving roads, but can the Kingdom really afford this? The wheat alone is placing us in immense debt to the Sorcerous Kingdom of Nazarick. If we keep building debt like this, we'll never have any grounds to refuse a demand again." (Raeven)
"Even better. The more dependent Re-Estize becomes on the Sorcerous Kingdom, the easier it becomes for them to integrate us fully, not as an autonomous vassal state, but as just another territory." (Renner)
"Must you put everything you have into betraying your father's memory?" (Raeven)
"Does that matter? Which would you rather let your young son inherit, the governorship of a kingdom-sized territory, or the remains of some rubble which once had some history?" (Renner)
As if to match its timing with the end of her sentence, a torrent of mist rushed through the borders of the large window in the room, steadily solidifying into one blob. Once enough of the mist passed into the room, the form it was gathering into gradually grew more humanoid, ending as that of a human girl made entirely out of blood.
"Good evening. What is it?" (Renner)
Though Raeven immediately got on guard against the intruder, Renner greeted the monster as if it was just one of her maids suddenly rushing into her room. It responded by taking out a letter and handing it to Renner.
"This is it? I understand, thank you for your work." (Renner)
The monster bowed deeply towards Renner, who opened the window slightly, which it then used to leave.
Renner closed the window and locked it shut, then carefully pulled open the envelope to read the letter inside. Around the same time, Raeven came out of his stupor.
"What the hell was that!?" (Raeven)
"Their species name is 'Crimson Maiden', a predatory slime with assassin abilities. Apparently they make for good long-distance messengers, when teleportation isn't available for whatever reason. They can carry some fairly large parcels, and are reasonably strong, should they need to defend their delivery." (Renner)
Renner gave an uninterested summary while reading the letter she had just received.
"How strong is 'reasonably strong'?" (Raeven)
He recalled the terror he had felt for the instant it glanced in his direction, which had made him feel as though he were only a single moment away from a swift death.
"If you gathered everybody from Blue Rose together, they might be able to draw it off. Though, they wouldn't be able to get its package, nor stop it were it actually trying to kill one of us." (Renner)
Raeven looked at her, jaw still dropped.
As she read, her mouth twitched once, her practiced smile flickering for a bit before returning.
"So that's how it is…" (Renner)
Renner handed the letter over to Raeven, who accepted it only after snapping out of his trance.
"Is this, a demand letter from the Sorcerous Kingdom? Why would they ask for our army, when theirs is already so far superior? Are they mocking us?" (Raeven)
"Isn't it just for propaganda?" (Renner)
"Meaning?" (Raeven)
"If they really wanted a fighting force, they would have specifically asked for Blue Rose, or perhaps Brain Unglaus. If need be, I am more or less capable of sending either of them. Although, even they are below the level of even their messengers. They know this, of course. Most likely, they want to make a show of some cooperative military training, to make it look like they care about the subjects' well-being. Aside from that, it might also be an excuse to start gathering and training an army… we'll probably be declaring war against the Theocracy within the year." (Renner)
"How sure are you of that, Princess?" (Raeven)
"Which part?" (Renner)
"War with the Theocracy. The Kingdom is starting to recover, but another conscription now would break us beyond repair." (Raeven)
"Around ninety percent, with another five percent being war, but with a different country. Although, as you said, they don't need our levies to crush the Theocracy. If anything, we should spread the story that the Theocracy was responsible for attacking villages in the area of E-Rantel, thereby sparking this entire war against the Empire. Redirecting the blame would be good for justifying this war internally as well, turning His Majesty into one who takes revenge on behalf of the Kingdom's citizens." (Renner)
Raeven quickly realized that his workload was about to increase dramatically.
"Should I start by spreading the news about the Theocracy? We could try turning it against the old nobility by making it a story of how Gazef-dono warned of the Theocracy's schemes, but the nobles ignored him, leading to this tragedy?" (Raeven)
"Go ahead, but be careful not to go too far with agitating them. Most of the common people don't know or care about the difference between the factions, we don't want to undermine our own legitimacy with this." (Renner)
"Understood. Will you take care of dealing with the Sorcerous Kingdom's letter, then?" (Raeven)
"Of course. Judging by the timing, if they're aiming for publicity, I'm guessing they're putting that little demon from before in charge, if only as a figurehead. Lakyus mentioned once that they fought against one of the Scriptures on their own time, so maybe they'll be interested in joining them anyway. Aside from them, what's left of Gazef Stronoff's warrior band, who were attacked by the Theocracy, they should help the justification, she wants them." (Renner)
"Would using so few men really be okay?" (Raeven)
"The Empire surely already got the same letter, nobody we can call on will compare against whoever they send. Any common soldiers we drafted now would be openly disloyal, sending them would just be self-destructive." (Renner)
"I see… I'll trust your judgment on that then." (Raeven)
Raeven let out a long sigh, preparing for more sleepless nights in the coming weeks. His only salvation was knowing that it wouldn't be long before the capital was rebuilt and stable enough to move his family here, so he might see his son's smile again.
Ainz looked through the eyeglasses imbued with translation magic to read the paper Tanya had given him.
"Is that it? Aren't letters between nobles more… decorated?" (Ainz)
"Maybe, but I'm not a poet. I've had to send letters like that to the families of my men, but they're hard enough to write in a native language you used for ten years. If I tried to write one in this world's language, the product would barely be legible." (Tanya)
"I'm amazed you managed to learn to write as well as you did. When I tried, I threw away the book on the same day." (Ainz)
"If you hadn't gotten me a Ring of Sustenance to work through the night, I would have done the same. I've learned quite a few languages over the years, so I thought it would be simple enough to learn this one, but it's a nightmare." (Tanya)
The exhaustion in Tanya's voice was unmistakable. Over the last week, she had been taking advantage of the ring's ability to negate the need to sleep to study the written language which this world used internationally every night.
Unbeknownst to Ainz, she had even been pressing her magically-augmented ability to think to the absolute limit, studying in an accelerated time to read through books even faster. Even with the ring erasing the negative physical effects of sleep deprivation, her mental fatigue was already equivalent to having spent a month straight doing nothing but studying. Even after all that, writing these few lines to be grammatically accurate was the limit of her ability.
"This can't even be called a language. I'm sure you've noticed that something translate all speech to be understandable? Well, as a result of that, they have no concept of phonetics. The language has no spoken form, you have to translate it by the meaning of the characters as you read, and even those aren't consistent. Each country started making their own words, with only partial overlap between neighbors, but since it gets translated implicitly, they all end up being magically translated correctly, but using the wrong country's form in an official-" (Tanya)
She stopped her rant when she noticed that the light in Ainz's empty eye sockets had already faded.
"-Sorry. I'm not proud of how much time I've already wasted trying to understand that war crime masquerading as a language." (Tanya)
"Ah, no, but you should probably get some sleep. If it's that bad, how are ordinary people in this world able to learn it? The librarians in Ashurbanipal are starting to pick it up as well, if only a little." (Ainz)
"If you never learned a real language and were just created with a complete understanding of one, then it wouldn't be as bad. You could just learn words by their meaning without associating them with anything else. As for the librarians… they understand written Japanese, but maybe it's the difference between having been created with the knowledge and our experience of having learned it as children. I can't say for certain, and if learning requires reading more of that written atrocity, I'm fine with not knowing." (Tanya)
"Haahh… let's make it a policy to keep written communication to-the-point in this country. Should we at least copy this onto some fancy paper to make sure they take it seriously? Demiurge's dragonskin parchment is renewable, he shouldn't miss a few scrolls' worth." (Ainz)
"Please do. I'll write two copies, just have some minions send them to the princess and emperor. I'll go talk to the last one in person, but that can wait until I sleep for a couple days." (Tanya)
"Good work…" (Ainz)
Part 4
Slowly gliding while maintaining an altitude of two kilometers, Tanya looked down looked down on the growing cityscape spread out across the surrounding plains. Roughly estimating, the settlement took up thirty square kilometers, although that count did not take into account the vast farmlands which sat beyond its outer walls, nor the sites marked off for future construction.
It had a somewhat irregular appearance, with buildings of vastly different construction styles placed adjacent to each other. At one edge, within an hour's walking distance of the dense forest, thick wooden walls surrounded a village of thatched houses. Not far from those walls, a grid of rugged tents filled a considerable area, easily numbering in the hundreds, if not thousands.
Immediately neighboring the camp, sturdy stone buildings which would not look out of place in the capital of the Baharuth Empire were being built along a network of paved roads. Particularly eye-catching was a square sealed with imposing stone walls, enclosing a series of workshops, forges, and other such industries.
In the distance, she could see hundreds of large figures in the process of further construction: laying out roads, digging sewers, raising structures, and even setting up foundations for fortress-like walls, surrounding not only the current village, but enough space for an entire city.
From the sky, she could recognize the careful urban planning under which the city was developing. Unlike the village section which had obviously been left alone to sprout new buildings when they were necessary, the new part was being laid out on a well thought out network of avenues complete with sidewalks and side streets. Even if they had to accommodate fifty times the current population, there would be no need to rebuild, only to expand.
This soon-to-be major city was of course Carne Village, outdated as the categorization may be. She had already read about its explosive growth in the backlog of reports, but seeing it in person, it was something else entirely. Not even a modern, post-industrial state like the Empire could build a city this quickly, yet here it stood.
Large golems and towering undead took the place of cranes, raising walls and setting stones with a dexterity no modern machine could compete against. Directing them were Elder Liches and dwarf artisans, arguing over the details written out in the blueprint the two were holding between them. Quagoa dug out basements and foundations in the night, then goblin magic casters reinforced the walls. By the time a single day came and went, the house was already a fifth of the way towards being finished.
Moving past the expanding residential area, the rolling grasslands had been replaced with agriculture of a scale that could only be called gargantuan. Repopulating destroyed villages from the papuer's district in E-Rantel had given many a new livelihood, but the food they could cultivate couldn't begin to compare to the industrial-scale harvest being produced here. Rows of skeletons numbering in the thousands were lined up in the fields, performing back-breaking tasks with perfect synchronization.
Certainly, the yield of any farms before the advent of genetic engineering would pale in comparison, but magic to improve the quality of the soil did a fair job of closing the gap. Since such magic did not seem to have existed in YGGDRASIL, nobody from Nazarick was capable of using it, but a few dozen of the five thousand-strong goblin army stationed here were able to cast third-tier magic. Eager to please their summoner, they rushed to learn such magic which would aid her, and now the fields were fertile as could be.
When their work became less hectic, Demiurge or Albedo might well be tasked with lower priority tasks like advancing agricultural technology. With their intellect, they could surely transcend what was possible in a purely scientific world, but even without their assistance, this one city was already a breadbasket which could sustain entire countries. Given a few more years, they might even be able to feed the entire continent, provided transportation issues were resolved first.
At present, excepting the old village, nearly everything within fifty kilometers was technically owned by the state. Having fully funded the construction on formerly unclaimed land, this much was only natural. In reality, they were all being lent indefinitely to the village for their use, until such a time they could be purchased by immigrants.
Most humans who had grown up among other humans would never consider moving to a city where the majority of the population was demihuman, even when the terms were made fairly generous. Inter-species boundaries were not so easy to dissolve, and only through sharing a crisis were the current residents able to achieve such successful cooperation. If reality strayed from the plan, there would be hundreds of these houses which paid no rent and required constant maintenance.
Thankfully, Carne had the direct support of the Sorcerer King not only for construction, but even matters such as immigration. New applicants came from the surrounding territories: some were lured in by lofty promises; others driven out of old homes, now taking the risk of starting in an irregular city. All in all, the resulting growth was unbelievable.
This did not come to be without any consequences, but the troubles were still well within a manageable level. Security was exceptional with golems and Death Knights patrolling the streets, and most of the population were more than capable of defending themselves. Anybody who chose to make trouble in those circumstances went beyond being called brave, they would have to be suicidal.
The Sorcerous Kingdom was not being benevolent by funding this village, they were building a city-sized advertisement. At least half the population worshiped Ainz Ooal Gown, nearly all were at least indebted to him. When travelers came to visit, they would be surrounded by advocates for his greatness, while dissidents would quickly find themselves shunned and isolated. In a sense, it was taking full advantage of herd mentality in the worst possible way.
As for Tanya, she simply saw it as a clever use of applied psychology.
She drew slow circles around Carne. Even in the pathetically undefended Federation capital, doing so would have been begging to get shot down, but this world had virtually no counter to anybody flying above a few hundred meters or so. No bow or fireball could reach anywhere near this far; their flight magic would cap out around that altitude, excepting birds and dragons who flew on their own power. Although, more likely her small body simply could not be spotted at such a distance.
Tanya's reasons for doing this were twofold:
First, she was mapping out the surrounding area in her mind. Whether it was part of the Type-95 or a separate ability granted to her, she could not tell, but the effect was the same: to mentally map out a space and recall it in perfect detail.
This had all sorts of uses, whether simply to be familiar with a battlefield simply by visiting it once, or to recall a location she only glanced at once for teleportation in the future. For a city liable to grow into a metropolis in the near future, she wouldn't be surprised if she had to travel back here several times in the future. In that sense, observing those changes could be interesting in its own right.
Second, she was looking for a single person amid ten thousand, one whose physical description she only roughly knew. Even if only counting humans, there were nearly one thousand, a quarter of whom would reasonably pass for her target, and many of that subset were in houses, which made identifying them even more tedious.
The current Tanya could pride herself upon having some of – if not the – greatest detection abilities of anybody on the planet. Noticing powerful beings like the Guardians from a hundred kilometers away by their mana signature was not out of the question. Ainz's greatest stealth magic, [Perfect Unknowable], barely made a difference to his visibility in her mind. It certainly blocked three or four senses perfectly, and yet she had a dozen more ways to track him.
As for singling out an individual out of a crowd of thousands? If she knew precisely who to look for, it would be trivial, but she only knew their sex, approximate age, and role in the city. Was she able to find who she was looking for in those circumstances, that is to say without knowing who she was looking for? Obviously not.
If possible, Tanya would have preferred not to make a spectacle of it, even if she knew it was inevitable. Whether her apparent age, the eye-popping value of the armor she was wearing, the emblem engraved on it, the unusual method of flight, or the razor-sharp tail coming out of her lower back, she was certain to draw attention.
No, something would be very wrong with any city in which that didn't attract attention.
With a disappointed, self-deprecating sigh, she sped up and dropped in the general direction of the only person here she knew, towards a square centered around a large bronze statue of Ainz. Moments before hitting the ground, she suddenly reversed thrust to perfectly touch down with zero velocity. Such a g-force would surely break a human's spine, but she performed the maneuver with practiced ease, landing without so much as kicking up a speck dust.
As predicted, every single pair of eyes in the plaza focused on the girl who fell from the sky. These ranged from curiosity to shock, with surprisingly few fearful or openly hostile. Whether this was because she did not look threatening or they had simply gotten used to unusual happenings, not having started a panic made her job much easier.
"I am an officer of the Sorcerer King, Ainz Ooal Gown-sama. I have business with the mayor of this city, will somebody direct me to her residence?" (Tanya)
Personally, she would have preferred a more subtle approach, but becoming a public figure for the Sorcerous Kingdom demanded that she announce herself like this. That too was intended to spread the notion that she was a close confidant of the Sorcerer King, drawing more attention to herself, thereby pulling it away from those who would lead clandestine actions.
As soon as she mentioned Ainz's name, the villagers' expressions almost immediately shifted from doubt to joy bordering on reverence. Merely being associated with him was enough to turn an unknown demon into an idol to them, but as a result, there was nobody who actually stepped forward to assist her.
Without responding, Tanya scanned the growing crowd, which was even now maintaining a respectable distance from her. The front she now put up was fairly similar to when she had worked in the military, or even like her former job in management. In either case, showing weakness was strictly forbidden.
Focusing her gaze on a single point, she took a few steps forward, though she was not actually looking at the crowd.
"What are you doing, Lupusregina-san? Stop playing around and come out." (Tanya)
"Ehhhhh!? You can't pull somebody out of invisibility like that, the mood is important, the mood!" (Lupusregina)
The maid appeared out of thin air, or rather she was the reason Tanya had landed around here to begin with. She didn't know why she had been standing around the plaza invisible while gazing up at the statue of Ainz, and in all honesty, she didn't care enough to actually confirm her current suspicions.
"I'm here on official business. You know where the leader's residence is, don't you?" (Tanya)
"En-chan's? Well, of course I do. She's probably busy, or maybe she's getting busy? Could be either, I guess. Still interested?" (Lupusregina)
The audience rapidly began to disperse, with some gazes looking suspiciously like pity directed towards her. Only a few seconds later, nearly all of those who remained belonged to a single species: goblins.
"Please wait, Beta-dono. We cannot simply allow anybody to see the General. Who is this individual wishing to see her?"
The one to step forward and speak was a goblin in white armor, riding upon a silver wolf-like monster. He and three of his companions had been present from the start, but moments after she landed, one rushed off in the direction of the old village.
"Ahhh~ she's probably fine, she's Ainz-sama's… hmm, what is your position, anyway? Oh, well. Rather, you couldn't stop her from seeing En-chan even if you tried, so just give up and follow along." (Lupusregina)
"As General Enri's Paladin-Knights, we cannot concede so easily! Even if we must resist-" (Paladin)
"That trail of thought leads only to annihilation." (Lupusregina)
Lupusregina interrupted the mounted goblin before he could finish. Maybe he spoke only as his station required, but it mattered little to her. Her master had given an order, and goblins who would disobey were unnecessary.
Were she alone, Lupusregina might have just laughed it off, or had some fun pulling him into a position where he would suffer from his own conflicts of interest then enjoy his struggle. However, now Tanya was here, and on official business at that. Getting in her way now was nothing short of treason.
"Enough. Go inform your general about our arrival. Lupusregina-san, let's go." (Tanya)
"Yes~su." (Lupusregina)
Tanya inadvertently slipped into a frown. That maid would certainly execute somebody on the spot for insulting Ainz, of this she had no doubt. She interrupted to prevent a bloodbath, but the instantaneous reversal in tone told her that this was just another of Lupusregina's jokes, targeted not at the goblins but at Tanya herself.
Now that she had seen the direction the first rider had rushed off in – tagging him to continue observing until he reached his destination – she had figured out where their 'general' lived. Strictly speaking there was no longer a need to have Lupusregina join in, but she casually followed along behind Tanya, having no issue with letting the person she was supposed to guide instead lead the way.
As they walked, most everybody around stopped to look at the two of them, though not one actually made contact. Unlike the respect she might have gotten from fellow soldiers who recognized the medals she wore, this felt much more like she had become a rare animal in a zoo. It was a thoroughly unpleasant sort of attention, but it mattered little to her what they thought.
Were they interested, it would be easy to cross the city within a minute or two, but they were in no rush. She was already forcing through a meeting without any prior notice, trying to hurry it without giving any time to prepare would be needlessly hostile to somebody who wasn't even an enemy.
Thus, they walked casually, only arriving after nearly half an hour.
Enri Emmot cursed whichever malicious god led her into this situation.
She had previously agreed to become the chief of a few dozen villagers; she had not expected that responsibility would still be hers when Carne Village suddenly turned into a city of over ten thousand. Granted, half of them were the goblin army she had summoned and controlled, but just getting enough food into the city to feed everybody through the winter before the first harvest had crushed her.
When she cried about this to Lupusregina, she had laughed and promised to send over some help, but this only ended in her crying once again. Merely seeing the 'assistant' which walked into the room was enough to make her faint, leaving a mess on the floor and staining her clothes despite her age.
It was an aged skeleton in a deep indigo cloak, carrying itself with the gravitas of a wise elder. This undead monster whose identity neither Nfirea, his grandmother Lizzie, the former adventurer Britta, nor even the Goblin Strategist had any clue about introduced itself as a Night Lich, a transcendental monster on par with dragons.
This grandmaster of magic bowed its skull to her, apologized for alarming her, and declared itself a secretary sent by the Sorcerer King, Ainz Ooal Gown-sama. Everybody who listened to this had their jaw unhinge, while Lupusregina just laughed and said, "Isn't this much only natural for Ainz-sama?"
They should have been able to guess that their undead king would send an undead servant. Perhaps she had hoped for a human helper like Lupusregina or Yuri Alpha, who had come for business on a few occasions since the first time. Maybe it was her fault for not making a clear request. It might still be possible to beg for a replacement.
Truthfully, once she got over his appearance, he was an incredibly capable governor. He never complained about working through the night to finish his tasks, nor about having to work for an ordinary village girl. He would answer her questions about leadership and offer advice on how to grow, all while giving her a steadily expanding workload to help her grow. In Enri's honest opinion, the only reason the city hadn't burned to the ground yet was because the Night Lich was there to save it.
Only half an hour ago, she had been going through ledgers, trying to understand how they related to the actual state of the city. Without warning, one of the Goblin Paladin-Knights summoned by the second horn knocked on her door, then immediately threw it open before she could respond. She wondered why the goblins normally so insistent on being respectful to her would do something so rude, but that doubt was quickly cleared when she heard his warning: an agent of His Majesty, the Sorcerer King Ainz Ooal Gown, would be visiting in only a few minutes.
Without delay, she rushed off to change from her everyday clothes to the more formal dress she had worn back when she had been summoned to Gown-sama's residence together with Nfirea and Nemu. She had barely gotten it on right when the escorting Goblin Paladin-Knight jumped in to announce their arrival.
Which brings us back to the present.
The girl who entered with Lupusregina was young, exceptionally so. Without even comparing her to Enri herself, she was barely a couple centimeters taller than her sister, Nemu. Judging by her tail, she almost certainly wasn't human, unless it was some unimaginable magic item, but it was hard to call her intimidating, even compared to an ordinary ogre.
She was terrifying in an entirely different sense of the word.
Upon entering, she reached into a gap in thin air to pull out a jewel-encrusted teapot whose price she couldn't even begin to guess at, plus a few cups with comparable decorations. Lupusregina took the teapot, filling the three cups, placing one in front of the girl, one next to Enri, then taking the last one in her hand and taking a step back, standing by the small room's wall.
The girl picked up the cup, gracefully bringing it to her lips to take a sip. Though the cup was visibly still steaming, the girl didn't seem bothered at all by the temperature, instead giving a satisfied smile. She glanced over at Lupusregina who had also started drinking wordlessly, so she followed their lead as well.
Enri was no connoisseur of fine drinks, but she could tell this was something of the highest quality. The only thing she could possibly compare it to was the tea served in Gown-sama's residence, and unlike that time when she had over-sweetened the tea, this much darker liquid was somehow perfectly to her taste even without adding any sugar, an ideal drinking temperature despite the steam. She couldn't help but gasp in amazement at the drink she had been given.
Just who was this girl who could freely offer refreshments from such a wonderous magic item, to let even somebody like her drink from a gem-studded teacup? She had even been served by that Lupusregina, the same maid who lazed around unless she was working for Gown-sama or the other Supreme Beings, as she called them.
Was this girl one of those Supreme Beings from the Sorcerous Kingdom? If so, just what did that mean? From the absolute confidence with which she asserted herself, the magic treasures and radiant armor she was wearing, she must be royalty from somewhere, so was she a princess of the Sorcerous Kingdom? What could the princess possibly want from a person like her?
On one of the many occasions the dwarf smiths got drunk, they mentioned how the Sorcerer King had two other children with him when he visited the Dwarven Kingdom, a dark elf and a pale human, both girls. Neither of them were said to have a tail, so this girl should be a third one… was there some reason Gown-sama needed children to be his officers? If that really was the case, could it be, they needed Nemu for something!?
Nobody had spoken a single word since arriving, were they waiting for her to talk first? She had only learned a bit about etiquette, nowhere near enough to speak to royalty.
Even if it was Gown-sama, who they all trusted with their lives, could she really give up Nemu for reasons unknown?
Come to think of it, when they had been invited to Gown-sama's castle, he had gone off somewhere with Nemu, could it be-
"En-chan, you're thinking something incredibly rude right now, aren't you?" (Lupusregina)
"Huhh? No, I-" (Enri)
Lupusregina's comment interrupted her thoughts as if she had been reading Enri's mind. Actually, with how she often acted, maybe she really could-
"It's okay, you can say it. Even if her chest is like that, she's not in last place, so you don't have to worry about her!" (Lupusregina)
-or maybe not.
"You… what are you bringing up all of a sudden?" (Tanya)
The first words spoken by the girl were not directed at her, but at Lupusregina. Though, her words clearly reflected her bad mood.
"You definitely win against our youngest and Entoma-chan, plus you're ahead of flatchest vampire, if only slightly?" (Lupusregina)
"For you to call Shalltear-sama that, are you suicidal?" (Tanya)
Enri stayed silent, sinking back into her seat as far as she could as the temperature in the room rapidly dropped. She had no idea who this Shalltear was, or whether she was related to the 'Pettan Ketsuki Koukuu-san' who Lupusregina had mentioned before, but she was far too terrified to interrupt and ask.
"Ahhh, sorry~su. You've been playing together recently, right? I forgot you were siding with her. Could it be, today is the day we see the birth of the Nazarick Plains Faction?" (Lupusregina)
She would die here. Enri didn't know why these two had suddenly started arguing, but between Lupusregina who could casually kill a Troll and the girl who was her superior, an ordinary human like her would definitely die when they started fighting.
"Lupusregina. Please leave the room. Immediately." (Tanya)
Enri was definitely going to die.
"Ahaha, sorry, En-chan, I was trying to lighten the mood a bit. I'll leave you two to it, then!" (Lupusregina)
With that cheerful conclusion, Lupusregina practically skipped out of the room, vanishing out the door, leaving Enri on the verge of tears, and the annoyed-looking girl.
She waved her hand and muttered something, then the sound of Lupusregina laughter from beyond the door vanished.
Ahh, it was a short life. If possible, she would have liked to spend more time alone with Nfirea.
The girl took another long drink from the cup, then set it down and sighed, looking at Enri.
"I'm amazed you can put up with her jokes on a daily basis." (Tanya)
"Eh? What? Who?" (Enri)
"Lupusregina-san, who else? You're the one she normally plays around with, and I don't think I've ever met anybody nearly as skilled at getting under people's skin as her. She knows I'm organizationally not her superior, so I can't do anything even when she plays around like that." (Tanya)
"Uh, no, Lupu- Lupusregina-san's jokes are like that, but she really has been friendly, and besides, she saved Nfirea's – my husband's – life before, so… ah, but she can be… um…" (Enri)
Her jokes really had gone out of hand on more than one occasion, but it was true that Lupusregina would regularly give her personal advice, especially concerning matters of men and women Enri had been utterly clueless about a year ago.
Could she say something like that about one of Gown-sama's maids to his envoy? What would happen then?
Thankfully, she was stopped before she said anything wrong.
"Enough about her. Would you mind if we proceed straight to business?" (Tanya)
"N-no, please, go ahead." (Enri)
"Good. Then, I have read about you, but I doubt that you know of me. I am a strategic officer of the Sorcerous Kingdom under Ainz-sama, Tanya Degurechaff." (Tanya)
"Er, Dega-gure-" (Enri)
Enri couldn't make out the foreign name, or rather she couldn't make the sounds needed to pronounce it. She had no idea what a strategic officer was supposed to be, but being unable to even name the other person was the highest disrespect.
"First names are fine, nobody around here can pronounce it right anyway." (Tanya)
Was it okay for her to address royalty so informally? There's no way it could be okay. But, Lupusregina had also object to being called by Beta, and all of them called Gown-sama by his first name, so maybe using first names was a tradition in the Sorcerous Kingdom? The envoy herself said to do so, plus she couldn't pronounce her name properly anyway, so she didn't have much of a choice. Fearfully, she switched her choice of name and continued her question.
"Then, Tanya-sama? What is it you need of me?" (Enri)
"To put it simply, I would like to borrow your army for the Sorcerous Kingdom." (Tanya)
"Army? The Goblin-sans? They were summoned with Gown-sama's magic item, so I don't think it's right to call them my army. Even without asking me, I don't think anybody would object to using them…" (Enri)
"Legally speaking, you are correct. If need be, we would be able to mobilize your army, but I hear things ended badly for the last kingdom which tried that." (Tanya)
Tanya shrugged at her own joke, but seeing it fall flat, she continued the explanation.
"Besides, the summoned units are loyal primarily to you, not to the Sorcerous Kingdom. They would prioritize your safety over anything else, even if ordered otherwise. Drafting them by force would be a waste of effort." (Tanya)
"That-" (Enri)
Enri interrupted Tanya's criticism of the goblins, then froze up immediately afterwards. They were grateful to Gown-sama, to the point of already having independently warred against the Kingdom once. Depending on what she said now, their situation could grow far worse for them. Still, she felt that she had to defend the goblins she was responsible for summoning, for all they had done to save her. She gathered her breath and spoke again.
"-That is part of their nature. For them, the safety of their summoner means more than anything else. Even if it they cause problems as a result, please keep that in mind, and do not hold it against them." (Enri)
"I am aware of that. Any army made up of different species is inevitably going to require certain considerations. With that being said, insubordination would not be excused on those grounds alone." (Tanya)
Her primary concern having been resolved, Enri nodded to show her agreement.
"I understand. If they can help us in repaying Gown-sama for everything he has done for us, please make use of them, but…" (Enri)
She agreed, but could do little to mask the sadness in her voice. Carne Village's experience with war had never been a positive one. They had been raided and invaded, to the point where barely a quarter of the original residents remained. Most had lost family, all had lost friends, and of the five thousand or so goblins she had summoned and gotten to know, how many would return alive?
Tanya evidently noticed, since she sighed and started speaking again.
"What I am about to tell you is to be considered confidential information. You are strictly forbidden from sharing it with anybody else, including your family. Do you understand?" (Tanya)
Enri gulped, then after a brief delay, slowly nodded, prompting Tanya to continue.
"While it is not yet certain, it is highly likely that will be declaring war against the Slane Theocracy in the near future. The total force we possess is incomparably greater than theirs, and the addition or absence of your goblins as a fighting force is mostly negligible." (Tanya)
Confusion spread across Enri's face.
"Umm… they're not going to fight?" (Enri)
"They will fight, but they are unlikely to take part in a serious battle they stand any chance of losing. Instead, there is meaning to them simply being in the army. Tell me, how do you think undead, demihumans, and demons are seem by the people of the Theocracy?" (Tanya)
"I don't know much about the Theocracy, but I'm guessing it's not too different from how we were before Gown-sama saved us? From the way the immigrants always look at us, it's obvious we're not the normal ones." (Enri)
"In a sense you're not wrong, but the truth is even more extreme. Some of the most core principles in the Theocracy's religion call for humanity to band together against all other species for survival. If this city would be an oddity in the old kingdom, to the Theocracy, it's something to be burned to the ground." (Tanya)
Enri listened while nodding along.
"The Theocracy asserts that undead hate and slaughter all life, demihumans are monsters incapable of thought, and… I'm not actually sure what they say about demons, but somehow I doubt it's very nice. What happens, then, when you occupy them with a well-organized army of goblins, serving an undead king, and force them to interact?" (Tanya)
"Gown-sama is amazing… to think so far ahead, and spread such a worldview…" (Enri)
"Right. Of course, I can't make any guarantees on a battlefield, but the plan is for most of your goblins to be returned safely. In the best case we wouldn't even see combat, though I doubt the Theocracy would back down on this, not after everything they've already done." (Tanya)
Enri thought back to the words she had heard from the former village chief, the passing comment he had made about the knights who attacked Carne Village in the past.
"Could you please confirm something, Tanya-sama? Were the Slane Theocracy responsible for sending the knights to attack our village?" (Enri)
"They were, beyond a doubt. I read the records on the interrogation of the magic casters captured then, who were dominated to reveal their loyalties. They were sent to assassinate Gazef Stronoff, and to provoke the Re-Estize Kingdom's retaliation against the Baharuth Empire, with no regard to the collateral damage required. Depending on their response, that will likely be our justification for war, proving their hypocrisy in claiming to protect humanity." (Tanya)
She already knew this was the case. She hadn't doubted the chief's words, but hearing the confirmation still hurt. No, what hurt was just having the memories of that day brought back to the present. Enri felt tears welling up, but blinked hard and wiped them away. Now was not the time for that, she was still in the middle of an important discussion.
"… why are you telling me all this? I'm not a noble or anything, I really am just a village girl…" (Enri)
"If that's how you see it, I'm just a powerless orphan. I had to claw my way out of far worse to get to where I am now, and I despite seeing people who idle around in life instead of bettering themselves. You are currently in control of an icon of inter-species relations, and thousands of people will come look to it as an example. If you still don't see the value of your position, then there really is no further point to continuing these talks." (Tanya)
Enri suspected Tanya wasn't telling her the real reasons, but as she was now, she didn't deserve to know. Indeed, she had been given so many gifts by Gown-sama, yet not only was she unable to repay him, she hid away from the work of managing his city until he sent even more help in the form of the Night Lich administrator. The very Goblins she tried to represent, they had respectfully called her their General, but what sort of general would sit in the rear while forcing the army to die in the front?
Tanya was already starting to get up. If Enri didn't say anything else here, it would be too late. She couldn't be like Gown-sama who can single-handedly rule a nation the way Lupusregina had described, nor could she ever be some hero who could stand against armies. She had only ever been an ordinary village girl, but she could at least stand beside the Goblins who gave her their loyalty, so that they might fight with all their strength.
"Please, please allow me to come along with those Goblins!" (Enri)
Tanya blinked once, then looked up at her. Without realizing it, Enri had jumped out of her chair, and was now looking down on the shorter girl, who hadn't shifted from her seat.
Somewhat sheepishly, Enri sat back down, falling into the chair. Tanya only watched her as she did this, saying nothing until she was back in her seat.
"A subordinate of mine once said something similar when volunteering for a mission, but unlike you, she was already a trained and capable soldier. What are you thinking?" (Tanya)
She was being looked at like she had lost her mind, though when considering the train of thought which brought her to this conclusion, that might not be entirely inaccurate.
"The reason I first agreed to become the village chief was because the Goblins told me that they would protect the village as if it were my own. Their summoner means that much to them, and if I am there with them, they would have much more cause to fight." (Enri)
"Rejected. You've just given the exact reason you can't be there. Fighting to protect you worked well only because it was an independent army and your village was under attack. With you around, their personal priorities would conflict with orders, making their discipline work against them. Introducing you into the army would just create a weakpoint, as the summoned monsters would be destroyed should you die. On a real battlefield, protecting you would be difficult even for me." (Tanya)
Although Enri was nominally a general to the Goblins, all matters related to tactics had been handled by their leader, Jugem, or later by the Goblin Strategist. Her own understanding of military matters was sorely lacking, and it showed in front of a real officer.
"It might not sound convincing coming from me, but I can't recommend going to war at that age, and worse yet, doing so for a woman in that condition." (Tanya)
Enri tilted her head in confusion. She knew that she was weak, but what did that have to do with her current condition? Come to think of it, she had felt somewhat sick recently, is that what she meant? Some priests could detect and cure abnormal conditions like sickness, but she couldn't be a priest, could she?
"Were you not aware of it yourself?" (Tanya)
Seeing the confusion on Enri's face, Tanya gave up. Gathering the magic teapot and cups, she stood up to finish.
"Tell your army to gather at E-Rantel in two weeks' time, they will receive further orders there." (Tanya)
She flicked her hand again while walking towards the door, and the sounds of nature outside once again entered the room, clearly audible against the silence up until then. Turning around once more, Tanya gave her one last hint.
"We'll step out here, feel free to discuss it with your eavesdropping husband. Enri Emmot, it's belated, but Congratulations." (Tanya)
Two heavy knocks came concurrently from outside, followed by Lupusregina shouting, "Ehhh, Enfi-chan, you really did it!?"
Tanya pushed open the door, drove an elbow into Lupusregina's abdomen at blinding speed, then grabbed her and vanished in a flash of blue light. Enri was left in the room, alone with a now scarlet-faced Nfirea.
