Isekai Rebuilding Project: Volume 2

by Yukika Minamino

  She was clearly Japanese and probably high school-aged. She stared at us, expressionless. I would have appreciated some sort of surprise, or smile, or scorn. Being unable to read anything from her expression was pretty stressful.

  Miss Cielz left our side and stood beside the throne. Perhaps that was her usual position. And there she went, whispering something into the Demon Lord’s ear. We, on the other hand, didn’t kneel nor look down. We didn’t serve her, and we never planned to.

  “A pleasure to meet you. My name is Eiji.”

  Still, I spoke with a pleasant tone. Not one I would address royalty with, but one I would use to ask a visitor at my office if I could help them with anything.

  The Demon Lord had been staring at me as she listened to Miss Cielz’ report. Then, she suddenly spoke:

  “Die.”

  In an instant, I felt a stabbing pain. I gripped my left chest with my hand.

  “Wha...?”

  My mouth gasped like a suffocating goldfish. My vision was fading.

  Am I going to die again? Already? But this time, it’s for real.

  “A Kotodama. Elevated to a curse.”

  Tiamat patted my back. That’s all she did. Then I could breathe easily and my chest pain vanished.

  “Tia...”

  “Don’t sweat it. I won’t let you die while I still stand.”

  “...Does that apply if you’re on all four paws, Tia...?”

  “You’re well enough to jest. Good. Stand back a moment.”

  With that, she stepped forward, her tail slapping against the castle floor. That’s the way her tail moved when she was mad.

  ...How did I get to the point of reading her mood by how her tail moved? Isn’t it scary how far we can adapt?

  “What was the meaning of that, lass?”

  Tiamat’s tone was as cold as a gust of wind piercing through Sapporo in the dead of winter. Wind chills of negative 20 degrees Celsius. Uh oh.

  Hurry up and apologize, Demon Lord!

  “Shut up. You die, too.”

  Another Kotodama.

  “Did you not realize from our conversation that your words won’t affect me? Perhaps you’re the type that has to try anyway.”

  Tiamat piled on, completely unbothered.

  “Why...?!”

  “It’d be a waste of time to keep doing the same thing, so I’ll explain. Magic-Proof, I believe it’s called. No magic, or curse, will affect me.”

  She continued to approach the Demon Lord without a care.

  “Don’t! Stop!”

  “I won’t.”

  I assumed that this command was also supposed to be magical. Despite Tiamat being completely unaffected by it.

  “A little wild lass, are we? Trying to curse to death someone you’ve never met before.”

  Right. ‘Wild lass’ was a lot, coming from a woman who had turned into a dragon.

  “Gr... You...!”

  A sword materialized in the girl’s hand. A pitch-black, really insidious-looking sword. With one move, she leaped from the throne and went to stab Tiamat. She was so fast that Ruey beside me let out a grunt in acknowledgment.

  “Hmph.”

  The dragon spun around. With velocity, her tail ripped into the Demon Lord’s side. The girl was blown away at a comedic speed, crashing into the wall of the throne room.

  “You’re fast, but wide open. Stand, lass. I’ll make you pay for your attempted murder of my partner,” Tiamat announced to the Demon Lord crawling on the ground, looking down on her. She was so scary that I wasn’t sure which of them was the Demon Lord anymore.

  The girl did not stand. She had let go of her sword, and had curled up with her head clasped in her hands. She seemed to be terrified by the overwhelming show of violence. I sympathized. There was something off about Tiamat as a creature.

  “I said stand. Can’t you hear?”

  The dragon approached the girl, who let out a quiet cry. The dragon’s enormous jaw gaped open, and moved closer to bite off the Demon Lord’s head...

  4.

  “I’m kidding.”

  With that, Tiamat licked the Demon Lord’s face. I thought that must have been scary in its own right. She took the Demon Lord by the hand, who couldn’t move from her fetal position on the ground, and helped her up.

  “Still, it’s not very nice to tell someone to die out of the blue.”

  “...”

  “There is some reason for it, I assume. Why don’t you tell us?”

  Tiamat guided her by her hand some more and approached us. Tiamat seemed like a kindergarten teacher at the moment.

  “Which do you prefer, cats or dogs?”

  “...Dogs.”

  “Mm. Baze. Won’t you come over here and help her stay up, please?”

  “Sis, I... Okay, all right...”

  The Fenrir, with an expression that said he had completely given up, laid down next to the Demon Lord. Wow. She just used a Fenrir like a stuffed animal.

  The Demon Lord slowly leaned into him. I mean, his silver fur was really soft, so I was sure that it provided some sense of safety.

  Please, Lord Baze. Don’t look at me like that. I can’t do anything to help you. I’m sorry.

  “Now, why don’t you tell us your name? I don’t want to keep calling you ‘lass.’”

  Then Tiamat introduced herself, much more genuinely than I did. Her skills as a school counselor were coming through.

  “Rio Kodama. I call myself Leon here.”

  “Understood. Now, Leon, we are not here to fight.”

  Her tone was kind, as if to ease the tension between them. The Demon Lord nodded ever so slightly.

  Ruey and Miss Cielz didn’t seem to be following the rapid turn of events. Obviously. The Demon Lord went berserk, then a dragon tore up the throne room. I would have given them the toughest constitution award if they had maintained their composure through all of this.

  “We would like to discuss the future with you. But first, tell me about you, Leon. If you don’t want to talk in front of them, we’ll get them out of here.”

  Tiamat winked. At me. Leave it to me, she was saying. I had no doubts about Tiamat’s handle on the situation. Acknowledging her wink, I urged our friends and the dark elf to exit the throne room with me, leaving Baze to be used like a couch.

  Hang in there, Lord Baze.

  Led by Miss Cielz once more, we moved to a guest room.

  “...I never thought our lord could be so fragile,” she muttered, exhausted.

  I thought it might be best for me to console her.

  “It can’t be helped, given how young she is. Fifteen or sixteen, I presume. It would have been much stranger for anyone that age to act like a well-rounded adult.”

  “Is she really?”

  The dark elf looked astonished. From my knowledge pool of fantasy worlds, dark elves were a very longevous species. To her, a girl of sixteen must seem like a toddler.

  “Most likely, Miss Leon is from the realm of dragons, like us. She’s a Hermit.”

  “No, Sir Eiji. Our lord may appear to be human, but she has Hellion wings on her back and a rune on her abdomen. She can’t be a Hermit.”

  That would make her a Hellion, apparently. ...How did she know about the rune? Did they take baths together, or something?

  “Sometimes Hermits change forms when traveling to this world. Tia took the form of a dragon, for example.”

  I explained the situation, more or less. Tiamat had requested her form, but I wasn’t sure how Leon the Demon Lord had acquired hers. Was it a form of her choosing or of the on-site god’s? I assumed that it was the latter. It wouldn’t have worked out for someone to remain human while being tasked to torment humans. Still, I was willing to bet that she wasn’t as out there as Tiamat, so she chose the most humanoid form.

  “Now, I have a question for you, Miss Cielz.”

  Why did the Demon Lord try to kill me out of the blue? It was so sudden. We hadn’t had enough interaction with each other
for her to hate me. We hadn’t even held a conversation before. I didn’t think my life was so sinful that I deserved to be killed at first sight... I hoped.

  “I don’t know,” Miss Cielz said, painfully.

  She had whispered to Leon that we had come with no intention to fight, but to talk. Of course, she didn’t ask Leon to kill us or anything.

  “Are you sure about that, you dark elf?”

  Ruey glared at her. His complete distrust was written all over his face.

  “Unlike humans, I don’t break a promise once I make it.”

  Her glare met his, sparks flying. These two really didn’t get along. I suppose no one could have gotten along in their shoes.

  “Now, now. If we can’t believe what Miss Cielz says, we can’t even begin to negotiate. That’s our starting point, Ruey.”

  I calmed him down, holding up my palms. That being said, now Leon’s actions made even less sense. Trying to kill someone who came to talk without even hearing them out. She didn’t seem that aggressive of a person. In fact, she seemed like a quiet type of girl.

  “She doesn’t act like she looks. I wonder what’s going on?”

  Not that there aren’t people like that out there. There are loads of people that commit crimes while looking like they wouldn’t hurt a fly, and many people have an intimidating face but a heart of gold. While I kept thinking that the concept wasn’t a difficult one, I just couldn’t convince myself.

  “She tried to kill me without batting an eye.” I shook my head a little.

  We weren’t in Japan. Life was worth a lot less. While I knew that, it wasn’t something I could get over all too easily. In fact, I hadn’t killed anyone before, although I was bracing myself that such a thing could happen.

  “I don’t get it...”

  “Only natural. It’s a world you never would have come across.” Tiamat jumped in.

  I looked around to find the beautiful dragon princess standing at the doorway to the guest room. She seemed to have walked right through the castle without so much as a guide. What a free-spirited woman she was.

  “Tia. You’re done already?”

  “She cried herself to sleep. I left her with Baze,” she said as she plopped down on the couch.

  First thing’s first: I threw up a prayer for Lord Baze. He committed the ultimate sacrifice. Amen.

  “A world I never would have come across?”

  “Hm. Have you heard of the phrase ‘frozen eyes’ before?”

  “No, I’m uneducated in that world, it seems.”

  “It’s not a phrase anyone would hear or read if they are living an ordinary life. In short, it indicates abused children.”

  “What?!”

  “Habitually abused children gradually lose the ability to express emotions. Eventually, their eyes appear frozen, devoid of any light.”

  Tiamat explained this, matter-of-factly. Eyes are the window to the soul, as they say, and when children are abused, they lose all emotions from their eyes.

  “That’s why Leon...?”

  “Mm. She was a victim of domestic violence in Japan. And so, frozen eyes. To confirm that, I had to play a mean trick.”

  “Oh...”

  She had defeated the Demon Lord with direct violence. Well, not even that. She just hit her with her tail. That’s all she had to do to make Leon the Demon Lord overcome with fear.

  “What the hell...” I couldn’t help but groan.

  I knew that children are abused. As a statistic. But had I really accepted that as a fact of the world I lived in? Had I not convinced myself that it was only happening on some distant planet?

  “Does Leon want to annihilate the human race for revenge...?”

  “Not sure. I doubt that she even has that much emotion left in her.”

  “What...?”

  “Their eyes don’t freeze while they still have a drive for revenge.”

  They lose emotions because they have forsaken everything. Even the will to live. But humans are creatures of emotion.

  “Then... Why...?”

  “I can’t be certain before I have more sessions with her. But I suspect she did it because the god on-site asked. Nothing more.” Tiamat sighed.

  Again? It was orchestrated by the god on-site, again?

  “...That does it...”

  I could feel my teeth grind into each other.

  5.

  Rio Kodama, the girl summoned by the god on-site, had been given the powers to rule over the monsters. Overwhelming magic, demonic charisma, the knowledge of military strategies, incredible physicality, etc., etc.

  “It seems that even a god can’t change the deepest part of one’s heart.”

  Tiamat sighed. The Demon Lord Leon was weak against direct violence. Even if being blown away by a dragon’s tail might have been fatal for a human, it apparently wouldn’t have done enough damage to the Demon Lord. I mean, I didn’t think too many Demon Lords out there would perish at the whack of a tail. Still, while said attack barely dealt any physical damage, Leon was left cowering.

  “The actual damage output doesn’t matter,” Tiamat added.

  What mattered was the flashback she endured. One of the typical symptoms of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. The tail attack must have revived her memories of being beaten. An attack with a sword or spell might have been different enough from her memories for her not to have a flashback.

  “You knew that much before you attacked?”

  “Just a deduction with no other way to prove it. When you’re in my business...” the dragon princess trailed off.

  She’d seen it many times before, I’m sure. I gave a little nod. There wasn’t much I could do to mend the heart of Leon the Demon Lord. I wasn’t an expert.

  “The problem is the god on-site.”

  I changed the subject. What was the purpose of this sinister casting? Tiamat had said that Leon’s motivation wasn’t as simple as taking revenge upon humanity. That’s why things were complicated. A girl enacting a plan to end humanity without a shred of emotion. I felt something cold on my spine, and shook my head.

  “With time, I don’t think it’s impossible to make peace with Leon. The real problem comes after that,” Tiamat said.

  “Right...”

  The god on-site had already tried to reignite the war between humans and monsters. I doubted that the god would give up so easily even if this particular attempt were to fail. Besides, this world was still plagued by our original problem: beriberi.

  We weren’t even close to figuring out how to save this world. Burdening the food supply through war was actually a rather realistic approach. Beriberi drastically decreased in Japan during WWII as well. But that was the one option I could not accept. There is no way that a world can be saved by war.

  “Mm. Then we only have one option.” Tiamat nodded, without mocking my personal dogma.

  “We have to convince the Demon Lord to stop the war and explore how to save the world together.”

  “If coexisting is impossible, what will we do?” Tiamat asked.

  “Segregation, of course.”

  My answer wasn’t creative or unique, but humans are only meant to coexist with other humans, at least if we’re talking about equal standpoints. Could any of us coexist with an uncaged lion or tiger? The lion can claim all it wants that it won’t eat the human, but the human won’t believe it. That’s why we cage our predators. We don’t coexist with them. They are our pets.

  The same logic applied for monsters and humans in this world. Our values were too different not to start a war. Because of that, our most efficient solution at this point was to keep our territories separate from one another. The monsters would build their kingdom somewhere far away from where the humans lived.

  While it was very possible that both sides would clash again once transportation methods evolved, that would have to be dealt with down the road. I didn’t have the skills to construct a plan that will last a hundred or a thousand years.

  “And
what specific plan are we enacting, Lord Eiji?” Hieronymus asked, waving his tail to and fro.

  What I had just declared was a slogan and not a solution. If there wasn’t enough land, an attempt at segregation would turn into fighting over that land. It was out of the question for the monsters to take any land occupied by humans. Starting off with a grudge was not going to be good, anyway.

  “Tia. Are there any bountiful lands around that aren’t inhabited by humans?” I asked Lady Tiamat, the omniscient tour guide.

  “There is a plot of land that no man has touched that’s about the size of Ishikari plains.”

  “That’s a huge plot of land, isn’t it?!”

  About 3,800 square kilometers. It might be difficult to picture its size with just that number, but that was large enough to cover ten cities, including Sappporo, Ebetsu, and Iwamizawa. All of that land left untouched? It seemed like there was plenty of land to go around.

  “Earth is vast, but not to humans. Neither is the expansive universe, in fact.”

  Tiamat chuckled. While her explanation might be a little ambiguous, she meant that it didn’t matter to humans how vast a space was if they weren’t using it. Outer space was a realm reserved for highly trained professionals. For most, outer space might as well not exist. The most us commoners could hope for is imagining what could be up there among the stars.

  “Then, all the monsters will immigrate there?”

  “All monsters who wish to do so, Lord Hieronymus.”

  It didn’t seem quite possible to move the entire monster population in a caravan. I expected a good number of them to refuse to leave their homeland, too.

  “We might grow our strength in our newfound home in preparation to destroy humanity, Lord Eiji.”

  Of course, it was Miss Cielz that interjected, teasingly. Ruey flashed a frown.

  “That may become a reality. But not in the next fifty or a hundred years, I’m willing to bet.”

  The challenge of humans and monsters coexisting was not a dire issue that required immediate resolution. That required a long process of trial and error, I figured, until they could see each other as anything other than beasts to be hunted down and mere prey.