Part 4 of 9
“Because of its size, we need plenty of eyes to keep watch.”
Again, who cares?
Iena’s expression hasn’t changed.
It’s still fairly calm, with only a hint of stress.
Wait…still calm?
Even though she’s clearly losing?
“In other words, of all the dragons, water dragons are by far the most numerous.”
Just as I start to get a very bad feeling about where this speech is headed, a huge tremor shakes the cavern.
“Naturally, that means we have the most ancient dragons, too, hmm?”
A tremor like a massive explosion has happened nearby…
Activating my Panoptic Vision with growing dread, I find several different areas of the labyrinth where huge holes have opened in the ceiling, massive amounts of water flooding inside.
“You’re kidding me, right?”
“I wonder, little girl, can you handle all thirty-seven ancient water dragons by yourself?”
Sure enough, aside from Water Dragon Iena, thirty-seven other legendary-class monsters were trying to flood the labyrinth, too.
Aww, man.
Why did things have to turn out like this?
To be totally honest, the fate of the world and all that junk feels a liiittle over-the-top. Like, I kinda wish they’d just figure stuff out without dragging us into it.
Then again, I guess we’ve been dragged into it from the moment we got reincarnated into this world. So maybe this is par for the course…
Especially when you’re a reincarnation who’s born into working for the Word of God religion.
My dad was kind of a big deal in the black ops of the church, it turns out.
For better or worse, that means they figured out I’m a reincarnation when I was still a baby, and the ol’ pontiff took me under his wing real quick after that.
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve complained about being forced to do special agent training because of that.
Their training sucks, dammit!
But after hearing what some of the other reincarnations went through, I guess maybe I should be grateful that I didn’t have it worse.
If I hadn’t been under the church’s protection, the elves woulda captured me, right?
Hard pass.
“So yeah, I do owe the old man for all that. And I really don’t wanna get mixed up in this fate of the world biz, but I figure I can’t just take off without repaying him and stuff, y’know?”
“Is that so?”
“Yeah, totally. So I kinda can’t let you go after him, you feel me?”
“Well then, I’ll just have to get past you by force.”
With that, the chick in the white robes tosses a round blade thingy—it’s called a chakram, I think?—right at my face.
Man, why’s it gotta be like this?
Okay, I guess I already know it’s ’cause the old man picked a fight with Wakaba’s side.
That’s why I’m out here attacking her henchmen.
It’s great that they gave me a ride in this huge UFO-looking thing from the elf village to the continent of Daztrudia or whatever, right?
But then, just while I was trying to figure out what to do next, some familiar faces from the black ops call out to me, and of course I’m gonna follow ’em.
Especially ’cause my fellow reincarnations are all sooo mean to me.
I mean, I guess since I wasn’t stuck in the elf village, I’m already not part of their little group, which I get and all. But it’s a total bummer when peeps I was kinda close with in our old lives start treating me like a stranger, y’know?
So can you really blame me for feeling so awkward that I dipped out and sided with the black ops instead?
Then, next thing you know, they’re getting a whole army together to attack the Great Elroe Labyrinth.
And now these white-robed guys are coming after the pontiff’s makeshift headquarters bringing up the rear of our little army, basically.
I dodge the chakram flying toward me.
I might not look it, but I did train to be a secret agent, and I’ve got a reincarnation’s signature Cheat skill to boot.
I’m pretty confident that I won’t lose to your average rando, even if my secret skill is not as impressive as the ones people like Wakaba and Kyou got.
The problem is that my current opponents aren’t just randos.
They’re Wakaba’s personal subordinates, the Tenth Demon Army.
Elite demons handpicked and trained by Wakaba herself.
Aka a buncha freaks who wear matching white robes.
They’re probably attacking our HQ because they know the old man, the Word of God pontiff, is inside.
Isn’t Wakaba’s side on the defensive?
How come they’re invading us like this, then?
The whole reason I volunteered to guard the headquarters is ’cause I didn’t wanna get into the big fateful battle at the Great Elroe Labyrinth.
Dammit, I bet the old man knew this would happen, too, didn’t he?
No wonder he was so quick to allow me to stay here as a guard.
It was so easy, I knew he musta had some reason, and now here it is.
Most of our forces are well on their way to the labyrinth already.
The only people here at the headquarters are basically some bigwigs from a bunch of nations who won’t go out on the front lines, and their guards.
And then the others who stayed behind, like me.
That group also includes a decent chunk of the black ops squad, such as my father.
Now the black ops agents and the bigwigs’ guards are working together to fight the white-robed invaders.
As for how it’s going, I’d rather you didn’t ask…
Yeah, there’s no way we can win this one.
Each of the white-robes is just too damn strong.
The secret agents of the Word of God are elite fighters, fiercely trained from a tender age.
And the white-robes are an even match with those elites, if not stronger.
On top of that, they totally outnumber us.
We might be able to handle them one-on-one, but since they’ve also got more guys, we’re basically screwed.
Plus the bigwigs’ guards fighting with us aren’t much help. Even the ones that are decently strong still have to worry about protecting their employers first…
I mean, they’re doing their best. But it’s still only a matter of time.
Ha-ha. Guess this is what they call fighting a losing battle, huh?
…Nah, I know this is no joke.
Time for me to use my super-cheat ability to turn things around!
Yeah, if only it were that easy…
But the chick I’m fighting, who seems to be the white-robes’ leader, is too damn strong.
The chakram crashes into the shuriken I threw to counter it.
At the same time, I try to close in and attack with my ninja sword, only to be blocked by the chakram she’s got on her arm.
Even when I use a fire jutsu to shoot flames out of my mouth, she cancels it out with some kind of Dark Magic.
So far, it seems like we’re just about on the same level of strength.
Ouch, my pride.
I mean, seriously, I’ve been through all kinds of extra training since I was a baby, on account of being a reincarnation.
I figured I was decently strong, even if I can’t compete with folks like Wakaba and Kyou, who’ve been fighting for survival and getting stronger their whole lives.
Guess it’s true what they say about pride and a fall and all that.
“You are a reincarnation. If you tell us where the pontiff is, we won’t hurt you.”
The chick keeps a close eye on me as she talks.
She and I are pretty evenly matched.
If we really go at it, there’s no telling who would win.
Not to mention, there’s no guarantee the winner would come out on the other side unharmed, never mind the loser.
Their side has the upper hand.
If we take too long, I bet their backup will arrive, too.
So she doesn’t really need to push it too much.
That’s probably why she’s being more cautious than necessary—she knows they’re gonna win as long as she doesn’t royally screw up.
From her point of view, it makes sense for us to surrender.
“Yeah, I’d really love to take you up on that, buuut…”
I glance to the side.
Not far away, my dad is fighting off three white-robes at once.
Before the battle started, he told me this:
“If you want to run away, that’s fine.”
After all, the old man isn’t even here.
Sorry, white-robes, but you’re wasting your time.
But by stalling them here, we can keep Wakaba’s forces spread thin.
The more we buy time, the longer it’ll take for them to get back to the front lines.
Then again, just keeping them distracted is good enough to buy time, even if we don’t slow them down much.
So we don’t need to put our lives on the line in this fight.
I know all that, except…
“I dunno, I figure I gotta at least fight hard enough to make up for what they’ve done for me, or I’m gonna look super uncool.”
I can’t turn my back and run while my father is fighting for all he’s worth.
And the Word of God religion has kept me fed all this time, y’know?
“Go easy on me, okay, lady?”
“I see. Then I’ll try to make your death quick and painless.”
“How is that ‘going easy’?!”
Aww, man.
Why’s it gotta be like this…?
If I truly cared for demonkind, I ought to side with the ebony god, no doubt.
As a noble, I should put my land and my people first.
That is what I have been taught all my life, having grown up in a particularly important and strict noble family.
I believe that I have lived by those words all this time.
Yes, even after being disowned by my family, taken in by the Tenth Army, and following a path that’s a far cry from nobility.
If all went according to plan, I would have married my former fiancé Wald and tended to our family’s needs as his wife.
How did things go so wrong that I’ve become a highly trained assassin instead?
It wasn’t my fault, or at least I don’t think I made any major mistakes…
In the end, it all comes back to Sophia’s doing.
It’s because she seduced Wald away from me that I was driven out of my family under false accusations.
And because Sophia had ties to the Demon Lord, she laid the groundwork for most other noble families to treat me as an outcast of their own accord, too.
Yes, I know, the person who ruined my life most directly was Wald.
But still! I believe Sophia is the one who caused all of it.
How I despise that woman.
Ahem…
Perhaps my personal resentment was intermingled in this explanation, but even after all that, I nevertheless continued to live with noble pride and work for the sake of demonkind.
I chose to join the Tenth Army because I felt it would ultimately be for the greater good of my people.
No matter what I did, I knew I could never outmaneuver Tenth Army Commander White or Demon Lord Ariel.
Yes, at first I saw Lady White and the Demon Lord as enemies.
Though it was Wald who planted the seeds that resulted in my being disowned, that was all possible because of Sophia’s connections with the Demon Lord.
The nobles all took pains to exclude me purely because I was in opposition to someone with ties to the greatly feared Demon Lord.
Wald was just an indirect accomplice.
Of course, I know it is foolish to despise the Demon Lord for this, as it had nothing to do with her directly.
But surely you cannot blame me for being left with a poor impression of her?
I was grateful that the Tenth Army took me in after my disownment, of course.
Even so, that only happened because my father begged Lady White on bended knee.
Despise being forced to disown me under immense pressure from our noble family, my father still found a way to save me somehow.
Which is why I was able to go on without losing my pride as a noble, just as my father taught me.
And yet…
The reformed Tenth Army handles the Demon Army’s darkest, most secret missions.
This isn’t an official rule, but since our leader Lady White is always pulling strings behind the scenes all over the world, she often assigns us jobs like assassination and information-gathering.
By being a part of all this, one ends up learning about the dark side of this world, whether one wants to or not.
The more I learned, the more I was driven into despair.
I thought that being born into a high-ranking noble family meant that I was superior, that I knew more than most people, yet that delusion soon fell apart around me.
Soon I realized that everything I knew was just a sliver of reality as seen from a demon’s perspective, specifically a noble demon family’s.
The knowledge I thought I had about the world only pertained to a tiny part of it.
But even as I learned all this, I continued working for the sake of demonkind.
At least…I believe I did so to the best of my ability.
“But that’s all over now. Forgive me, Father…”
I murmur an apology to my father.
I know that he, too, has worked hard as a high-ranking noble for the sake of demonkind.
And of course I am grateful to him for bringing me into this world and raising me.
Yet here I am, essentially betraying demonkind instead of repaying him.
But I have made up my mind to work for the ivory god.
To sacrifice over half of humanity, and demonkind along with it.
Despite knowing full well that the correct choice for the betterment of all demons would be to join the ebony god’s side.
After Lady Ariel’s briefing, I gathered the Tenth Army and addressed them.
“The ebony god’s forces are sure to attack the Great Elroe Labyrinth. And the Word of God pontiff should be with them. If we can eliminate him, since he has ruler authority, it would bring the ivory god’s side that much closer to victory. Which is why I will be targeting the pontiff. I won’t force you to come along. Anyone who wants to join me, please do so now.”
Siding with the ivory god would mean betraying demonkind.
With that in mind, I wasn’t going to force anyone to go along with my plan.
But much to my surprise, when I declared my intentions, not a single person left.
“Are you sure?”
“Of course. Commander White took us in when the rest of the world abandoned us. We would gladly lay down our lives to serve her.”
The Tenth Army is an assortment of oddballs, none of whom are on the up-and-up by any stretch of the imagination.
It was originally an empty title with no real members at all.
While the other armies were restructured under Lady Ariel’s iron-fisted authority, she sent members of the Tenth to lower-numbered armies, until all that was left of the Tenth Army were those whom none of the other commanders wanted.
Soldiers who were demoted due to poor behavior.
Scrawny volunteers who joined the army in hopes of being fed.
But Lady White didn’t turn up her nose at this band of misfits.
She disciplined those with poor conduct and reformed their behavior.
She fed those who were malnourished.
Then she put all of us through the training from hell.
…Yes, I know, it’s because of that hellish training that the Tenth Army came together as one.
The timid and the overconfident alike were subjected to the same horrible experiences, until we understood to the marrow of our bones how insignificant we all were.
We didn’t even have the energy left to resent being put through hell.
But while she trained us mercilessly beyond belief, she never gave up on any of us.
She persisted in training us until every last member of the Tenth Army could be called an elite fighter.
…Even if one member begged her to “just kill us instead!” somewhere along the line.
It goes without saying, I’m sure, that the member in question was subjected to an even more hellish training as punishment.
Though the rest of us were forced to do the same as an exercise in collective responsibility!
Ahem.
Well, in spite of all that suffering, it’s surprisingly hard to hate Lady White.
She doesn’t talk, she’s always expressionless, and you can never tell what she’s thinking.
But if someone’s in trouble, she’ll come to the rescue without a second thought.
Even though she isn’t interested in other people…or no, perhaps it’s because of that…she casually does things that change the course of a person’s life completely.
For better or for worse.
There are certainly some whose lives have been ruined because of Lady White.
But she’s also the only person who accepted the Tenth Army, refusing to cast us aside when everyone else had long since forgotten us.
When we were in the midst of that hellish training, we kept remembering how she’d offered us a lifeline in our darkest hour.
Even though she was the one causing our new darkest hours, too.
It’s a catch-22, I know.
But I still can’t find it in me to begrudge her for it.
Besides the fact that she saved us, I’ve also seen Lady White work herself to the bone for the sake of Lady Ariel.
It’s hard to hate someone who’s so determined to help someone else.
Seeing her like that moved me.
I always thought it was my duty as a noble to work for demonkind.
But when I think about it more carefully, it was other nobles who cast me out of society.
So why shouldn’t I make decisions based on my own feelings, rather than on some obligation?
Rather than from any duty to demonkind, I want to be of use to someone who’s trying to take on the entire world for one single person’s sake.
“Hff! Hff! Will you…tell me…hff…where…the pontiff is…now?”
And now, I’m cornering one of the reincarnations and interrogating him.
The reincarnation known as Shinobu Kusama is sprawled on his back, gasping for breath like I am.
We’re both covered in wounds, panting, and sweating.
This is the first time I’ve gotten so worn-out in a battle since joining the Tenth Army.
I suppose I should have expected no less from a reincarnation.
Since he didn’t seem too enthusiastic about fighting, I thought he’d make a break for it after a while. Instead, he’s given me quite a run for my money…
“Ooh. Kinda sexy to see a chick dripping with sweat like that.”
“Shall I just kill you right now?”
How can he say such idiotic things when he doesn’t even have the strength to stand anymore?
Or perhaps he’s so exhausted that he’s just blurting out whatever comes into his head?
“Nahh. Look, I’m sorry, but I dunno where the old man is.”
“You’re lying.”
Out of all the reincarnations, Kusama is closest to the pontiff, almost a right-hand man.
Surely he wouldn’t be in the dark about the pontiff’s location.
But he just grins weakly and says it again.
“C’mon, it’s true. A ninja doesn’t lie.”
…Whether he’s lying or not, he’s clearly not going to talk.
“Let’s withdraw.”
“…Are you sure?”
I gather the Tenth Army and order a retreat.
“Yes. Clearly, he won’t talk even if we torture him. It might even be true that he doesn’t know. Either way, we’d just be wasting our time. We’ve crushed the enemy headquarters. We’ll just have to count that as a victory.”
I’m sure the question “Are you sure?” was also asking whether I should really let him live.
Kusama is fairly powerful, even for a reincarnation. If he gets his wounds treated with Healing Magic and returns to the battlefield, he’ll be a serious obstacle to contend with.
Obviously, the smartest move would be to kill him while I have the chance.
And yet.
It feels wrong to me to kill a reincarnation who was dragged into this world’s problems through no fault of his own.
“We’re going to track down the pontiff.”
I redirect my attention.
Lady White is still fighting.
All we can do is keep fighting, too.
“Let’s go, Tenth Army.”
This world is deeply unfair.
Differences in stats, skills, and indeed racial and social standing are clearly defined.
It is difficult, if not impossible, for the weak to overcome the strong.
Few can challenge an exceptionally powerful being and live to tell the tale.
The battle now unfolds before the entrance to the Great Elroe Labyrinth.
Here, the most exceptionally powerful beings are the queen taratect and the two ancient dragons doing battle against her.
The three of them were locked in a fierce battle for some time, but now that has ended in the queen’s defeat.
Even a queen taratect could not survive an onslaught from two ancient dragons.
But the two dragons must have exhausted much of their strength as well: They quickly turned tail and fled after the fight was over.
Thus, no slaughter took place on the battlefield this day.
Had the two ancient dragons stayed behind and set about taking out the rest of our forces, we would have incurred massive losses.
It is a most fortunate boon they did not do so.
Wresting victory away from an especially powerful being is nigh impossible.
Not even an advantage in numbers can change that fact.
Virtually no amount of fighters with stats averaging around a thousand can take on an opponent whose stats are ten times as high, no matter how many of the former there might be.
Our soldiers would have fallen like flies.
When a being that strong exists on the battlefield, the key to victory is how to neutralize it.
But if it’s too powerful to be neutralized, often there is no path to victory at all.
There are no longer any individuals on this battlefield who fall into that category.
However, there is still a distinct difference in the strength of each side and each soldier.
In this case, the problem becomes how best to suppress the enemies with the highest battle capabilities.
This tends to lead to the strongest fighters on either side fighting one another.
After all, sending the weak to fight the strong only results in their dying on the spot without dealing any significant damage.
Even so, one cannot discount the strength found in numbers.
Perhaps a single individual would deal very little damage, but if you repeat that with tens or even hundreds more soldiers, the amount of accumulated damage is not to be disdained.
They have already turned the tables on us in terms of numbers.
Where there were once enough taratects to blot out the entire battlefield, most have now become corpses.
The only ones that remain are the stronger individuals like greater and arch taratects.
Even those seem to be gradually losing to the enemy’s sheer numbers.
Humans surround the greater taratects and slowly but surely whittle away at their health.
The stronger humans and demons are working together, albeit clumsily, to take down the arch taratects.
I recognize a few faces among them.
Sir Balto aside, I was perhaps a little surprised to see the likes of Lady Sanatoria and Sir Kogou joining the fight.
We once stood side by side as fellow commanders of the demon army, yet now we are squaring off as enemies.
I am not without my own feelings about this, of course.
But I vowed that I would follow my young mistress for all eternity.
I cannot show mercy to anyone, not even a former comrade.
Still, while I might have known this in theory, I cannot help but feel a twinge of emotion.
It was fortunate that the Nightmare’s Vestiges forced the demon army to retreat so that I did not have to stain my hands with the blood of past acquaintances.
The human army is still staying behind to fight, but the tides of battle have turned in our favor once again.
With their overwhelming numbers and individual strength, the Nightmare’s Vestiges are easily dominating the human army.
No doubt it is only a matter of time until they retreat like the demon army.
…Though there are a few who seem to be stubbornly staying put.
“At this point, it’s basically a tradition for us to face off against you like this, huh?”
“So it would seem.”
Two reincarnations face me, a young man and a young woman.
Kunihiko Tagawa and Asaka Kushitani.
I have met them several times now.
The first time was when I destroyed their tribe’s settlement.
They were still young then, and I let them live because they were reincarnations.
The second time was in a previous major battle.
I crossed swords with them and witnessed their growth.
And we crossed swords again in the battle of the elf village, albeit through a shadow copy of mine.
By now, you could say that we are bound by fate.
Based on the strength of the two armies currently remaining, I imagine they could not ignore my existence on this side.
I do not say this out of conceit, but I am most likely the strongest fighter of either side currently remaining on this battlefield.
And so these two reincarnations have come to stop me.
“I thought about it a lot, really went back and forth about things. But in the end, I decided I’ve still gotta fight you.”
“…I see.”
I told them the truth at the elf village.
I’m sure they had many conflicting feelings about it.
And it seems they have chosen to fight.
“I cannot hold back.”
I must give them fair warning.
Until now, I have taken care not to kill them because they are reincarnations.
But this time, in this battle, I must put that aside.
Most of the reincarnations knew nothing of this world that they had been dragged into.
Yet this is no longer the case.
If they have chosen to fight with full knowledge of the circumstances, there is no longer any need to hold back.
And I have never been so skillful as to be able to carefully hold back my strength.
If we are to fight, I will aim to kill.
“Good, because I w—”
Kunihiko’s bold declaration suddenly cuts off mid-sentence.
His body slowly slumps forward.
“Sorry, Kunihiko.”
Behind him, Asaka apologizes quietly for knocking him out.
“…What is the meaning of this?”
“We surrender,” Asaka answers quite calmly. “I’m not ready to die yet, and I don’t want Kunihiko to die, either.”
She turns and walks away, carrying the unconscious Kunihiko.
Openly fleeing in front of the enemy.
For a moment, I am dumbfounded.
But Asaka’s decision is probably the right one.
I bear no personal grudge toward these two.
They likely bear one against me; still, I never particularly wished to kill them.
Asaka must realize that, and is therefore unafraid to turn her back on me and flee unguarded.
If we did fight, I would undoubtedly kill them.
As I said, I am not skillful enough to control my strength with enough precision to spare their lives.
When I fight, I aim to kill with certainty.
Given the difference between my stats and theirs, the fight would likely have been over in a matter of seconds.
I would kill them on the spot.
Thus, surrendering before the battle begins is the right choice.
It would have been wiser not to come at all, but judging by Kunihiko’s behavior, I doubt that was an option.
I watch over Asaka as she walks away.
For my part, I believe choosing not to fight is admirable, too.
Though it is not my place to say this as the person who destroyed their hometown, I sincerely hope that happiness awaits them in the future.
After the Demon Lord’s explanation, I got lost in thought.
Seriously, there was way too much to think about.
Like how the Demon Lord was just a little girl smaller than any of us.
And what I’m supposed to do now that my favorite sword is broken.
And how we’re even supposed to do anything about the fate of the world.
And what about settling things with Merazophis?
My tiny brain did its best to think all this over.
It might be the hardest I’ve ever thought about anything, even in my previous life.
Mostly because I’m not that smart.
Usually, I figure there’s no point in thinking about anything, so I just act instead.
I’ve gotten by well enough so far, and Asaka always manages to bail me out if I screw up too majorly.
Guess it’s thanks to Asaka manning the brakes that I’ve been able to charge full speed ahead all the time, huh?
But this time, even I had to give things some serious thought.
I feel like I thought for so long that I started thinking about weird stuff…that’s just part of this whole thinking thing, right?
Wait, huh? Thinking about thoughts leads to other kinds of thoughts?
…Okay, I give up.
If I keep thinking, my head is gonna explode.
Since I couldn’t get my head on straight, I was looking up at the sky when it hit me.
It sure would suck if half of humanity died.
By then, I’d made up my mind.
All right! I’m gonna fight for the ebony god’s side!
Yeah, I know it’s not very smart to spend ages thinking about something only to decide on a random impulse.
But those impulses show how you really feel.
I’ve gotten kinda attached to this world after living in it for over a decade.
Of course, that means I’ve met all kinds of people, and lost my fair share of ’em, too.
Working as an adventurer, I even saw people die.
It was saddening every time, and I often wished we’d spent more time together.
And if Wakaba’s method means half of all my still-living friends and familiar faces might die, of course I wanna stop her.
So I summed all that up to the other reincarnations, and we parted ways.
Oh, Asaka came with me, of course!
We’ve both lost our trademark weapons, but we’re still pretty strong, compared to the average human.
I’m sure we can be of some help in battle.
So I charged all the way to the battlefield, until…
“Wha…?!”
“Oh, you’re awake?”
Huh? Asaka?
“Whuh? Huh? Was I asleep?!”
“Yes, you were. But it’s still early, if you’d like to go back to sleep a little longer.”
Oh, okay…then I guess I’ll take you up on that and go back to…
“Why would I just go back to sleep?!”
Now I remember!
Wasn’t I on the battlefield?!
This is no time for sleeping, is it?!
I sit up and look around wildly, only to find that I’m not on a battlefield at all.
“…Huh?”
I’m in an unfamiliar room, where someone’s put me in a bed.
“…Where am I?”
“Uppenbebetenia.”
“…Up in the what now?”
I’ve never heard of this place in my life…
“It’s a small village. There’s no reason you would’ve heard of it.”
“Okay, hang on a sec. What’s going on here?”
Why did I just wake up in bed in a village I’ve never heard of before?
“Oh, because I knocked you out cold and carried you all the way here.”
“Whaaaaat?”
Uh, now I’m even more confused!
Why the hell would you do that?!
“Because if I let you fight, you would’ve been killed.”
Asaka shrugs, like the answer is obvious.
“…You think so?”
“I know so.”
“Yeesh…”
I sink back into the bed.
If Asaka says I would’ve died, she’s probably right.
Which must be why she stopped me like this.
“Damn, I’m such a loser…”
I mutter before I can stop myself.
In the end, I just tried too hard to think, then came up with an answer that left Asaka to deal with the aftermath.
I didn’t do a damn thing.
If anything, I just made serious trouble for Asaka.
“…You aren’t angry?”
“Why would I be mad at you? If I’m gonna get mad at anyone, it’s my own self for being so damn stupid.”
“But I’m the one who prevented you from doing what you wanted.”
“What’d be the point if I was just gonna die anyway?”
It’s not like I want to die, either.
Sure, I jumped into battle because I didn’t want my friends to die.
But I thought it over real hard before I did that.
Which means I wasn’t sure enough to make a decision right away.
I got where Wakaba and her people were coming from, too.
Besides, after talking to Merazophis, my grudge against him faded a little.
It’s not gone all the way, but I don’t feel like I wanna throw my life away to fight him.
“I thought I’d be able to handle him a little more…but by your calculations, you think I woulda died, right?”
“Yes. Definitely.”
“Oof, that hurts…”
I knew Merazophis was stronger of course. I just thought we might stand a chance of winning if Asaka and I fought him together.
But Asaka shot that right down.
When Asaka’s opinion differs from mine, usually she’s the one who’s right.
Which means I really woulda died if I fought Merazophis.
“Gotcha…”
As much as it bums me out, it also kinda makes sense.
“Guess that’s it for my quest-for-vengeance thing, then. No more playing the tragic hero.”
In my old life, I hated how ordinary I was.
I kept kinda hoping something more exciting would happen, without ever doing anything about it myself.
And then I got exactly what I wished for. I got reincarnated, my clan got wiped out, and I started honing my strength to get revenge.
My despair when my clan was wiped out and my anger when I swore to have vengeance were all real, of course.
But if you ask whether I was maybe getting a little carried away ’cause of the circumstances, I can’t say you’d be totally wrong.
When Merazophis dropped those truth bombs on us, all my dramatic feelings stopped having a place to go.
Then this whole battle for the fate of the world thing hit.
And I figured maybe I could do something important this time.
“Guess I got a little too big for my britches.”
I was always just a normal high school boy, with no special qualities.
Getting reincarnated into a fantasy world didn’t change that. I didn’t magically become a hero who can save the world.
That’s all there is to it.
“Asaka.”
“Yes?”
“Thanks.”
“Don’t mention it.”
“And, y’know…even if I am a loser and all that, I wanna spend my life with you.”
“Naturally. Why are you stating something so obvious?”
“Obvious?”
“Yes, very obvious. We’ll go on living together, get married, have babies, and finally die of old age surrounded by our grandchildren. All while saying what a good life we had, of course.”
“Sounds good to me. Let’s make sure we’re holding hands when we pass away, too.”
“Perfect.”
Welp…
I didn’t make the cut as a hero. But I better do my damndest to be a good husband for Asaka.
But for now, just for a minute, let me cry a little to mourn the death of the loser I was before.
“There, there.”
I gently stroke Kunihiko’s head after he’s cried himself to sleep.
The childlike act of crying until you’re so exhausted you fall asleep strikes me as funny somehow, and a soft chuckle escapes my lips.
Despite his self-deprecating jokes about his “quest for vengeance” and “playing the tragic hero” being over now, I’ve seen firsthand how hard Kunihiko was fighting all this time.
The way he pushed himself to his limits as if he was running out of time was such a far cry from his previous life as an ordinary high school student that it never ceased to amaze me.
I could never do that sort of thing.
I hate hard work. I don’t like doing my best.
Everything in moderation, I say.
I usually go through life preserving my energy, and occasionally try a little harder only when it’s really necessary.
That level of effort feels just right for me.
I’m not the kind of person who works myself to the bone or puts my life on the line.
I just don’t have that kind of zeal.
But if anything, that’s what makes me respect people who can do such things.
Since I can’t do it myself, I’m always impressed with people who give it their all and really try their hardest.
…Even if I don’t understand them.
Kunihiko lives his life with fiery passion.
So much so that I worry he’ll burn himself up, body and soul.
If it were anyone but Kunihiko, I would’ve stopped trying to keep up with him long ago.
I nearly told him “Let’s just give up already” more times than I can count.
But I never brought myself to say it, because I wanted to let him do as he pleased.
I liked watching him recklessly charge on ahead.
And having his back was a lot easier than you might imagine.
It certainly required a lot of the hard work and extra effort that I hate so much.
But being by Kunihiko’s side feels so right that I couldn’t imagine going anywhere else.
Kunihiko always tries to run full speed ahead, while I prefer to walk at a leisurely pace.
You wouldn’t think we’d ever be able to keep the same pace, yet somehow, we’ve managed to stay joined at this hip all this time.
Honestly, I think it’s nothing short of a miracle.
If we’d taken one wrong step, we could’ve easily wound up lost beyond all hope of repair.
I might have fallen behind, or Kunihiko might have gotten seriously injured or worse…
We always made it through with help from the advantage of being reincarnations.
But there’s no guarantee it’ll always be this way.
There’s a limit, I know.
I saw it up close when we fought Merazophis in the war against the demons.
Kunihiko and I couldn’t even take him as a team; even with Ms. Oka’s help and support from a long-distance sniper, we were just barely able to make an even match.
Merazophis was able to fend off all four of us all by himself, and managed to withdraw with barely a scratch, too.
We couldn’t win.
If we ever fought Merazophis again, Kunihiko and I would likely both be killed.
After our conversation with him in the elf village, that suspicion turned to certainty.
He was connected to Wakaba’s group, and was deliberately not killing us because we’re reincarnations.
That means he was actually holding back when we fought, and we still couldn’t come close to beating him.
He’s too strong.
I do think that Kunihiko and I can still grow stronger, too.
But we wouldn’t be able to fight Merazophis if we fought him now, and even if we took the time to train more, there’s no guarantee we’d catch up.
It’s not like we have any convenient way of getting stronger all at once, either.
Nor do we have enough time to find one.
Everything is happening so fast, and there’s nothing we can do.
In the end, I’m just an ordinary person with no motivation.
I can’t fight the flow of such enormous events, nor do I have the energy to try.
I don’t even want to have anything to do with it.
Ideally, I’d rather just watch from someplace safe.
In fact, I would much prefer that outrageous events, like a battle for the fate of the world, would take place where I don’t even have to know about them.
I want to run away.
Kunihiko, on the other hand, stayed firmly in place and thought about what to do.
He got so deep in thought that there was a big crease between his eyebrows, which is very unlike him—he never thinks for long about anything.
And his conclusion was that he would fight for the ebony god’s side.
This would mean fighting against the ivory god’s side, which also meant fighting Merazophis once again.
I’ve always let Kunihiko do exactly what he wanted.
I thought supporting him in that way was my role.
So this time, it was my turn to worry about what to do.
Should I let Kunihiko have his way, and see the fight through even if it meant death?
Or should I stop him by force?
It was a difficult decision.
I had to chose between protecting Kunihiko’s pride, or his life.
Thus, I hesitated until the very last minute, and basically decided on the spot.
When we saw Merazophis, I immediately thought: Ah, we’re going to die.
And then I acted almost entirely on reflex.
I knocked out Kunihiko, picked him up, and ran for it.
Fortunately, Merazophis didn’t chase after us.
I suppose he had no reason to.
Merazophis might be a bitter enemy from Kunihiko’s and my perspective, but far from hating us, he even seemed to feel sympathy for us.
In the end, Kunihiko’s passion for vengeance was entirely one-sided.
He realized as much himself in the elf village, and that seemed to take the wind out of his sails entirely.
Even so, the fact that he chose to fight after a rare period of thinking hard about it must mean that he had strong feelings on the matter.
And I completely disregarded those feelings.
This might be the end, I thought.
I’d always believed that there was virtually nothing that could tear the two of us apart.
But this instance might be extreme enough to qualify.
After all, I just destroyed his big, once-in-a-lifetime moment.
I was sure he’d be furious when he woke up.
It might even ruin our relationship beyond recovery.
But even then, as awful as that would be, I wanted Kunihiko to live, no matter what.
And as it turns out, my fears of splitting up were entirely unfounded.
Far from getting angry at me, he actually apologized.
While a part of me felt that I was the one who ought to be sorry, I was also thrilled and relieved that even this couldn’t destroy the bond between us.
After Merazophis killed the rest of our clan, when we barely escaped and reached a town…it was Kunihiko who held my hand and led me forward.
Kunihiko who was by my side.
So I resolved to stay by his side forever.
As long as he didn’t shake me off himself, that is.
I’m not sure what the future holds for us—even less sure than when our home was destroyed and we were left with nowhere to go and no idea why it had happened.
Maybe we’ll actually get to live the normal life I want, or maybe it’ll be the action-packed life of Kunihiko’s dreams.
Maybe we won’t have a future at all, and our lives will soon be at an end.
But that’s all the more reason for me to stay by Kunihiko’s side.
Until death do us part.
“Urgh?!”
This humanoid creature has a combination of dragon and fishlike features.
And I just sliced off one of its arms.
“Damned child!”
The…draconic merman…? waves his remaining arm around.
A torrent of water whirls through the air in sync with his movements, attempting to engulf me.
I fling a knife-size exploding sword at it.
The resulting explosion collides with the gushing water.
There’s so much water that one small explosion was only enough to slow its momentum for just a moment.
But that moment is all I need.
I use it to close the distance between myself and my opponent, aiming to slice off his head.
The creature avoids my slash by ducking out of the way, and my sword only nicks his skin.
Good thing I’m a dual-wielder.
I thrust my other magic sword toward his chest, aiming for his heart.
Just as it’s about to hit its target, a cascade of water slams into me, forcing me away.
Dammit.
I guess I should’ve expected no less of an ancient dragon. None of my usual moves are enough to take him down.
Still, he’s lost an arm and is wounded all over.
This is one of the ancient water dragons that’s attacking the Upper Stratum of the Great Elroe Labyrinth.
Sophia managed to hold them off at first, but obviously she couldn’t defend the entire Upper Stratum of the world’s biggest labyrinth all on her own, which is why I came running to belatedly join the fight.
The narrow, winding passageways of the Great Elroe Labyrinth are far from my ideal battlefield.
My greatest strength is using exploding swords and other magic swords to inflict damage on a wide area at once, which isn’t the best idea in the Upper Stratum, where it could easily cause a cave-in.
As much as I would have preferred to let Sophia handle this alone, this is hardly the time to be choosy.
Thanks to the multitude of ancient dragons attacking all at once—not to mention all in different places—to open up holes that let the ocean flood into the Upper Stratum, the entire Great Elroe Labyrinth is starting to get submerged in water.
Considering the sheer size of this place, it’s not likely to get totally flooded anytime soon. Even so, it’s not the kind of problem we can just ignore, either.
The best solution would be to take out the water dragons ASAP.
Unfortunately, they’re all ancient dragons.
Dragons are powerful enough as it is, to say nothing of the ones that have lived an especially long time and grown even stronger accordingly.
It’s going to be tough to take them down—in fact, I might even get killed in the process.
Or so I thought…but so far, that hasn’t been the case at all.
“Damn it all…! I won’t lose to a mere human…!”
“Sorry, but I’m not actually human.”
I’m an oni, to be precise.
Evidently taking my words as a challenge, the water dragon lets out a roar and raises more water.
I charge forward in response, clashing with my opponent.
The water dragon’s head goes flying.
Immediately, the wildly moving water he was controlling drops back to the ground with a splash.
I watch the dragon’s corpse sink beneath the water, then move on to find my next target.
Water dragons are strong.
They reign as the apex predators of their ecosystem, turning the ocean into a territory that no one else can cross.
They’re certainly nothing to sneeze at.
But that strength is now working against them.
They’re actually too strong.
Since they were unopposed for so long in their home field of the ocean, they’ve probably grown accustomed to destroying their targets with little to no resistance.
Which means they don’t have much, if any, battle experience.
They’ve always been able to just sink their foes into the ocean without having to fight at all.
Strong as they are, they’re used to wielding that strength in the simplest way possible.
That makes them much easier to deal with.
On top of that, this isn’t their usual ocean territory.
Unlike the ocean with its endless supply of water, this is land, albeit land that’s starting to get submerged.
They have to keep their powers in check here, just like I do.
Part 4 of 9