by Okina Baba
Things might look pretty grim, but as long as I’m alive, I gotta keep hanging on until I breathe my last.
First, let’s assess my situation.
My body is currently in the gory state of being nothing but a head.
If a monster or something attacked me right now, I’d be helpless. Or would I?
My max HP is lower than usual, probably because my body’s gone, but my MP hasn’t changed.
So if I was attacked, I could at least use magic to fight back.
Wait a minute. If I can use magic, can’t I use Healing Magic to restore my body?
I don’t know if Healing Magic can bring back lost body parts, but HP Auto-Recovery seems to be able to do it, so it’s worth a shot, right?
I have no idea how long it’ll take me to recover completely, but until then all I can do is float around and hope that nothing attacks me.
Although I don’t know how long it took for my consciousness to recover like this, so it could take ages to rebuild my body with Auto-Recovery and Healing Magic for all I know.
Actually, I wonder how long it’s been since the Demon Lord blew me up?
I wasn’t conscious, so it’s possible that it’s been days or even longer.
Maybe the Demon Lord forgot all about me in that time and wandered off somewhere?
That’s probably just wishful thinking.
I can’t do anything until my body is repaired, but when it comes to her, even having my body back won’t make a bit of difference.
Honestly, I could challenge her a hundred times and still never win.
Even if I use Immortality to do a zombie attack, it won’t make a difference if she doesn’t take any damage in the first place.
I was starting to get to the point where I could beat Mother if I used a few curveballs, but that demon-lord thing? Running away is the only option I can think of.
Hmm? No, wait a sec. If I can defeat Mother, couldn’t I beat her with the same method?
Thinking about it, Mother is still strong enough that I’d have to run away from her in person.
If the Demon Lord and Mother are connected as master and servant, then maybe I can use that connection to send some Parallel Minds to attack the Demon Lord, too?
That…might actually work.
Although it still won’t be easy by any stretch of the imagination.
I mean, look at those stats.
She basically teleported over to me from out of the range of my perception with sheer speed.
Even if I run at top speed, she could catch up to me in a second.
And by the time I notice her presence, it’ll be too late to teleport.
I’d have to just teleport around frequently so she can’t figure out where I am.
Although even then, I might not be able to outpace her.
Since she’s the size of a human, she can enter places that would be too narrow for Mother, too.
Maybe I’m better off just floating on the ocean like this?
I bet it’s safer than being on land.
Although it wouldn’t surprise me if that freaky Demon Lord can run on water or something.
Actually, she probably can.
With proper use of Dimensional Maneuvering, it’s possible to run on pretty much anything.
I could do it myself if I tried, and the Demon Lord’s got better stats and skills than I do, so she must be able to do it, too…
Ah-ha-ha.
There really is nowhere to run.
At any rate, I’m safe for now (or at least as safe as you can get when all you have is a head). And since I can currently savor the sweet freedom of being alive, the Demon Lord must not have noticed yet that I’m not actually dead.
Or maybe she has, but she can’t locate me.
Maybe I should just do nothing and play dead for the rest of my life.
But I don’t know what my Parallel Minds have been doing while I was unconscious, so it might be wishful thinking to assume she hasn’t noticed me, too.
Hrm.
Guess I should contact them.
Helloooo? This is the main body speaking. Anybody there?
Hmm? Body, is that you?
Oh, we connected. Nice.
So you really are alive. What kind of magic trick did you use?
Believe it or not, I evolved and got the Immortality skill.
What?!
So now I’ll never die!
Wow. Talk about a cheat code.
Yep. So basically, don’t worry about me.
What’s going on over there?
We’re still locked in battle with Mother.
Wow. So that means the Demon Lord probably does know I’m still alive.
Hmm? Demon Lord? Is that what that monstrosity was?
Yep.
And also the original taratect, apparently.
With stats that were all around 90,000 to boot.
Geez, what kind of impossible game is that?
Yeah. She actually smashed me into pieces with a single attack.
Without Immortality, I really would be dead.
But it took a while for my consciousness to come back like this, so who knows what’s gonna happen next time she finds me?
Yeah, that doesn’t sound good. Maybe we shouldn’t get in touch like this too often, then.
How come?
Whenever we make contact, it gets easier for Mother to detect your physical location.
Oh crap!
So we’ll interfere with the signal so that Mother can’t find you, and you just worry about running away. I’ll contact you when we beat Mother, okay?
Roger that.
Over and out.
Well, at least I know what’s what now.
My Parallel Minds are still in battle with Mother.
Which means, most likely, the Demon Lord already knows that I’m not dead.
I assumed she’d suspect that I’m alive, since my attack on Mother hasn’t stopped.
And yet, here I am, relatively safe.
That can only mean the Demon Lord doesn’t know where I am right now.
So I guess it really is safest for me to keep floating around in the ocean.
Yep. Until my body gets better, I’m just gonna pretend to be an innocent piece of seaweed.
THE ELF VILLAGE
Deep in the mountains of the Sariella region lies a hidden cavern.
In the back of the cavern is a secret room disguised behind a dead end.
In this secret room in the hidden cavern, a place considerably hard to locate, is a teleport point that connects to the elf village.
It’s hidden so thoroughly that we never would have found it without Ms. Oka’s guidance.
Even with Appraisal, I couldn’t see any hints of its existence, so I doubt anyone could find it without knowing exactly where it is.
“You must keep the existence of this place a secret, of course.”
We all nod.
A powerful barrier protects the elf village, making it impossible to enter unless you use a special teleport point.
In other words, this is one of the few entrances to the elf village. If its location was revealed, it could lead to unwelcome intruders.
Most likely, no one outside of the elves and their close confidants is supposed to know about it.
Ms. Oka probably isn’t supposed to show us where it is, either.
The fact that she brought us here seems like proof that she trusts us all deeply, but Katia’s warning is still in the back of my mind.
Katia said we shouldn’t trust Ms. Oka too much.
But she certainly seems to trust us, at least from my perspective.
Honestly, I don’t know what to do.
For now, I’m still in the ambiguous state of trusting our teacher while harboring a little bit of doubt.
“Now let us proceed.”
Ms. Oka activates the teleport point.
Light floods the room and engulfs all of us, and my vision warps briefly.
&nb
sp; Once it returns to normal, we aren’t in the cavern anymore.
Instead, we’re inside a circular building.
There are several teleportation circles on the floor, like the one we just used.
However, the details of the building aren’t important right now.
Because as soon as we arrive, we find ourselves at swordpoint.
Several elves are holding their swords out toward us.
“Please, wait! I brought them here!”
Ms. Oka stands between us and the elves, who look ready to attack at any moment.
Instead of human language, Ms. Oka is speaking the language of the elves.
We studied it at the academy, so I can more or less understand it.
However, I can only speak it slowly and in short phrases. I doubt I’d be able to interject in a pressing situation like this one.
“Name?”
“Filimøs Harrifenas.”
The man who seems to be the captain addresses Ms. Oka curtly.
“The chief’s daughter… And why have you brought humans here?”
“They are reincarnations and comrades of the hero. The empire’s army is on its way here right now. I brought them to help us fight back.”
Ms. Oka’s explanation seems to placate the man, but he still doesn’t lower his sword.
“I see. However, we cannot allow humans into the village. If they are to participate in battle as our allies, they may fight outside the barrier.”
“They will do no such thing. These people are my guests. I will not have them thrown out into danger.”
“Daughter of the chief. I will not repeat myself. Send them back through the teleport point immediately.”
Ms. Oka and the man seem to be directly at odds.
Clearly, the elves are even more clannish than I thought.
At this rate, they definitely won’t let us into the village.
“Stand down, would you?”
Just as the tension seems about to explode, a man’s voice comes from the entrance.
As soon as we see the speaker, all of us freeze.
“Potimas?”
Ms. Oka alone murmurs the man’s name in disbelief.
Indeed, standing before us is Potimas, the elves’ chieftain who had seemingly been killed by Sophia.
“That’s right. Have you forgotten your father’s face?”
Though his words seem joking, Potimas’s face is serious.
But Ms. Oka, Hyrince, and I all saw him dead.
We saw Sophia toss his freshly severed head to the ground right before our eyes.
That gruesome sight certainly didn’t seem like a fake or an illusion.
“I thought you were dead?”
“It would take more than that to kill me. Lower your swords.”
He addresses the soldiers to give them an order.
The soldiers faithfully obey, lowering their swords and taking a step back.
“Now, then. Welcome to the village of the elves.”
Despite his words, he doesn’t appear very welcoming at all.
Honestly, I’m pretty wary of him.
Part of it is the strangeness of a man who I thought was dead suddenly appearing right in front of me, but there’s something else about him that’s strange and suspicious in a way I can’t quite place.
Besides, anyone who suddenly Appraises someone they’ve just met probably looks down on others.
This is the second time I’ve met this man.
The first time was before I went to the academy, when he showed up escorting Ms. Oka.
His attitude was awful then, too. He introduced himself and Ms. Oka, then left without waiting to hear my reply.
As he spoke, a strange sensation overcame me, but I assumed at the time that it was just a physical response to how uncomfortable his attitude made me feel.
Later, Katia identified that strange feeling as the discomfort that happens when someone Appraises you.
Appraising someone without their consent is considered a very rude breach of etiquette.
Between that and his snobby attitude, it was clear that he didn’t deem us worthy of his consideration.
As if he didn’t recognize us as people.
Even now, he seems to be viewing us more as tools of war than guests, so his gaze makes me very uncomfortable.
“Come. We shall prepare a modest reception for you.”
With these brief words, Potimas turns and walks out of the room.
We hurriedly follow after him.
“How did you survive?”
Ms. Oka asks the question that I, too, was wondering.
“There are many ways to avoid death.”
This is hardly an answer.
For a moment, I consider Appraising him on the spot as payback for the first time we met, but getting on his bad side in this situation seems like a bad idea.
“What about the imperial army?”
“They haven’t yet reached the outskirts of the barrier. As of now, they are marching through the forest.”
As he speaks, Potimas exits the building.
Following him, the rest of us are at a loss for words when we lay eyes on the scenery outside.
All around us is a forest composed of such large trees that they might well be more than a thousand years old.
The roots of the gigantic trees have been carved out to form homes.
Looking back at the building we just left, I realize that it, too, is actually a giant tree.
The elf village isn’t just a bunch of buildings in a forest. It’s built into the trees themselves.
“Wow,” Katia murmurs involuntarily.
It’s as if we’ve wandered into the world of a fairy tale.
However, countless eyes soon glare at us, drawing us back to reality.
From atop the branches and in the shadows of the trees, the elves are watching us closely.
I can feel the wariness and disgust in their gazes.
It’s a fresh reminder that we’re not welcome here, as if the swords pointed at us when we arrived weren’t enough.
Concerned, I look back at Anna.
For me, this is just a rather unpleasant welcome. But for Anna, a half elf, this place is full of painful memories.
Being glared at like this on top of that could easily unearth more trauma.
Anna is putting up a brave front, but her hands are trembling slightly.
I press close to her, trying to shield her from the piercing glares.
Potimas moves on briskly, paying no attention to us.
As we follow him, Ms. Oka asks him about the current situation.
“Do you know how large the imperial army is?”
“Around eighty thousand.”
This is a surprise to me.
Is it really safe for them to send such a large army in the midst of the human-demon war?
No, it almost certainly isn’t.
And yet, the army is already well on its way.
If the demons find out about this development, I doubt they’ll miss such an opportunity.
This situation is even more disastrous than I thought.
“The trouble is that the church has provided a considerable amount of their soldiers. The fact that they’ve announced a false hero like Hugo shows that they are deeply tied to the empire.”
If the Word of God army has joined forces with the empire, that must mean that Hugo has the church held firmly in his fist by now.
Most likely, the brainwashed Yuri is with him, too.
“If their march proceeds smoothly, how soon do you think they’ll arrive?”
“Three days, I would imagine. If they’re attacked by powerful monsters or anything of the like, it might be another story, but unfortunately luck seems to have taken their side.”
I tilt my head quizzically at Potimas’s odd statement.
“The legendary-class monster who has threatened our village for years, the queen taratect, is on the move. As a result, all of the other m
onsters in the area have fled. The imperial army will likely run into few monsters, if any, on their course here.”
Another queen taratect?
The queen taratect is said to live in the Great Elroe Labyrinth, but there are four others in the world as well.
From the sound of it, one of them lives in this very forest where the elves make their home.
The elf village is at the heart of a vast forest called the Great Garam Forest.
According to Ms. Oka, the village and the barrier that protects it are about the size of the special wards of Tokyo.
And the forest, since it’s big enough to hide that at its center, is easily the size of Hokkaido.
There are many monsters in the great forest, and the queen taratect rules as the most powerful of all.
Unfortunately, since the queen taratect has moved and driven away all the nearby monsters, this works in the army’s favor.
If the queen taratect had stayed behind and maybe even run across the imperial army, that would have been much more favorable for the elves.
As for me, I’m half-disappointed and half-relieved.
We caught a glimpse of the queen taratect’s terrifying power on the way here.
When we left the Great Elroe Labyrinth, I looked down and saw the place where a queen taratect had once burst free and gone on a rampage.
The destruction was so severe that it had permanently changed the landscape.
If that thing had run into the imperial army, the latter would most likely have taken devastating casualties.
The elves would have triumphed without needing to fight at all.
But that would also mean that soldiers who are only being used by Hugo would be killed in droves.
There might even be people among them who are brainwashed, like Yuri.
When I think of it that way, I’m almost happy with these results.
I know how naive that is.
If we really do have to fight, it’ll be kill or be killed, even if the soldiers are innocent.
But some part of me can’t help hoping that if we can just do something about Hugo, the rest of it will work out somehow.
At the very least, I might be able to save my brainwashed friends from him.
There might even be more of them besides Sue and Yuri who have been brainwashed unbeknownst to me.
As I think about it, my hand automatically clenches into a fist.
“We’re here.”
Potimas enters a house built into one of the huge trees, cutting the conversation short.