by Fujino Omori
“…Yo, Dix, you can’t mean…?”
“Yeah, something’s off. It’s time for our god to get serious and do some probing, don’t you think?”
After returning to the safe point in one piece, we rendezvous with Lilly and the others.
Aisha starts complaining about us going off on our own, but when we don’t respond, she notices our odd behavior and decides to not criticize us any further. Lyu also remains silent, not asking any questions, either.
While I feel guilty about what we did, I’m too rattled to be concerned about it right now. We head for the surface right away.
“Don’t worry about a reward. Let’s leave it as a favor you owe me,” Aisha says with a smile before parting ways with us.
I doubt she’d ever admit to it, but I’m really grateful for her thoughtfulness.
“Mr. Cranell, please consult me should you find yourself in any hardship. I am not very capable, but I will do what I can.”
With those considerate words, Lyu returns to her workplace.
“……”
I wind my way through the city streets alone.
As soon as we exit Babel Tower, I go off on my own without Lilly or Welf.
Sometimes I need to be by myself to get my thoughts in order.
It’s still early evening. The sun might be on its way down in the west, but the sky above me is still mostly blue. Bringing Lyu and Aisha along turned our fact-finding mission into a day trip.
My feet take me around the city, away from the main street crowd and noise.
“Ohhh? Is it my lucky day or what? Hey there, Little Rookie.”
“……?”
After idly walking about, just as I start thinking about finally heading home, I hear it.
Along my route back to Hearthstone Manor, on Southwest Main Street, a certain deity calls out to me.
I don’t recognize him…It’s probably the first time we’ve spoken.
He has deep-blue eyes and hair, as well as darkly tanned skin. He’s of average height, and his clothes are mostly black. I think about how he reminds me of a god—or more precisely, has a god’s frivolous smile on his face—and he sociably approaches.
After he calls me by my title, I come to a stop and readjust my posture.
“Um…Is there something I can do for you?”
“Hee-hee, no need to be so guarded—though I guess that’s impossible, huh? We gods do warrant caution, after all, right?”
Ever since I received my first level-up, unfamiliar deities have made passes at me, and if not a pass then something else. Anyway, since then, the number of messes I’ve gotten into in this town has increased dramatically. I can’t even count how many at this point.
It’s rude, but I slouch slightly in reluctance while the god laughs again. “Hee-hee! The name’s Ikelos. Good meeting you.”
“Lord…Ikelos? So, what do you need from—?”
“Just listen. Those arrogant kids of mine are pushing me around at the moment.”
After instructing me to listen, he starts listing complaints about his followers while continuously circling around me, sometimes peering at my face, other times patting my shoulder like we’ve known each other forever. Lord Ikelos’s behavior has gone past excessive friendliness to just mockery, leaving me absolutely bewildered.
Confronted with this incomprehensible conversation, I suddenly recall Lady Hestia’s advice: If some weird god seems like they’re going to catch you, hurry up and run away! I start wondering whether it would be better to forgo etiquette in a situation like this while sweat rolls down my face and—
“Know anything about a talking vouivre?”
“……………”
Lord Ikelos comes up from behind me and whispers those words without any warning. It feels like something has my heart in a death grip.
“I hear she’s got a daaamn fine face…Came from the nineteenth floor apparently. Maaan, I’d love to get just one look.”
He’s trying to get information out of me, I realize.
Lord Ikelos’s syrupy voice fills my ears, along with the sound of my rapidly increasing pulse.
It feels like every vein in my body is quivering, and my palms get clammy.
Unable to answer, I sluggishly turn to face him as though all my joints have rusted over.
His lips quirk upward, a little too close for comfort.
Those dark-blue eyes sharpen as if they can see into my heart.
“Sooo if you happen to know—”
“Bell.”
A new voice interrupts while I stand like a frozen statue.
This newcomer cuts off Lord Ikelos in midsentence.
“L-Lord Hermes…?”
“Well, well. What a coincidence, meeting you here.”
Lord Ikelos and I turn toward the speaker: Lord Hermes sporting his usual feathered hat and dandy’s smile.
He raises a hand at us as he walks closer.
“Bell, you can go now.”
“Huh…?”
“A deity is giving you trouble, right? I don’t need the whole story to notice that.”
Lord Hermes chuckles at my stunned silence before shifting his attention away from me.
As though we had changed places, he casts a sideways glance at the ever-grinning Lord Ikelos.
“Besides, Ikelos and I need to have a little chat.”
Running his finger along the brim of his hat, Hermes puts on a thin smile.
“Move along, Bell.”
“S-sorry…Excuse me.”
At Lord Hermes’s insistence, I don’t even say a proper farewell as I turn my back to them.
I quicken my pace without so much as a glance in Lord Ikelos’s direction.
“What gives, Hermes? Couldn’t you see I was in the middle of talking with the Little Rookie?”
“Well, I just couldn’t stand to watch a god sink his poisonous fangs into such a sweet child, now could I?”
“Hee-hee, what a terrible thing to say.”
Hermes and Ikelos exchanged quips without making direct eye contact after Bell left.
The two then left the main avenue and exited into a small plaza furnished with a water fountain, as though they had planned this all along. There wasn’t a single person around, making their conversation feel like a clandestine meeting.
“I paid your home a visit, only to find it empty…It took quite a bit of effort to track you down.”
“Ah, my bad, my bad. The place just didn’t feel like home anymore, so I guess I moved.”
“It might be a good idea to give the Guild a heads-up when you do that, Ikelos.”
Hermes and Ikelos conversed smoothly. Both seemed to know a great deal about the other, hinting at a long relationship.
At any rate, both gods appeared more interested in probing each other for information rather than catching up on old times.
“So? What’s this ‘chat’ we need to have, Hermes?”
“Oh, nothing major. There’s something I want to ask you…A little bird told me that Ikelos Familia was involved in an Orario smuggling ring.”
“Hey, hey, where’d you hear that? How can you be sure it’s legit?”
“Let me see…I think it was Elurian royalty?”
“…Hee-hee. A ‘little’ bird, you say? You’ve been venturing out pretty far to dig up dirt on this.”
Ikelos seemed to quickly realize Hermes’s information was too good. His grin deepened.
“Am I a suspect, Hermes?”
“As much as it pains me to investigate an old friend from our days back in the heavenly realm…Ikelos, in the past your familia was on the list of candidates aiming to join the Evils.”
“Ugh, how many times do I have to tell you those charges were bullshit? At the very least, I never claimed to be an evil god.”
Agitated by the accusation, Ikelos deftly denied it and evaded his question.
All the while, Hermes kept a constant eye on him from beneath the brim of his hat, his characteristic smile
still on his lips.
“I also have some interesting news.”
“Oh? Do tell.”
“Monsters, normal and otherwise, are being taken out of Orario and sold around the world. It’s almost like someone’s interested in spreading chaos.”
It was at that very moment…
Ikelos’s dark-blue eyes opened wide as Hermes struck straight to the heart of the matter. The edges of his mouth seemed about to split open with his grin.
“Hee! Hee-hee-hee-hee-hee-hee-hee…!! Are you saying that’s what I want, Hermes? That I have the dream of beasts—to strew nightmares across the mortal realm?! Now that’s interesting!!”
Ikelos burst into laughter as if the idea thrilled him to no end.
Hermes stayed quiet, watching the other god clutch his stomach in the throes of mirth.
Once the echoes had faded into the darkening sky, Ikelos straightened with a smile on his face.
“Sorry to say it, but that’s got nothing to do with me. I didn’t give those orders. My brats are the ones going wild.”
Ikelos laid it out plain and simple, uninterested in hiding anything.
“I gotta tell you, though, there’s way fewer idiots in my familia these days; just a lot more arrogant wise guys. They don’t show the divine any respect whatsoever. Use me to run some stupid errands.”
“……”
“But…everything they do is ridiculous crap. It’s hilarious.”
Only a deity who was desperately trying to contain their bliss would show a smile like his.
From a god’s perspective, it was men’s folly that made them interesting—that made a front-row seat to the show so enticing.
“It’s the god’s responsibility to rein in his familia.”
“You can’t seriously believe that, Hermes. The brats may be able to put up with hardship, but they can’t resist pleasure. Are we gods not the same? I can relate, painfully so. And that’s why,” Ikelos continued, “as long as they keep me entertained, I won’t get in their way.”
Ikelos leaned in close to Hermes’s face and declared his opinion point-blank.
“You can smash my head in if you like. Give me a one-way trip back to the upper world. But that’s not gonna stop my brats now, will it? It might give ’em a little trouble, but it’s only a matter of time before they sign up with someone else.”
“I figured.”
“Ehh, have a look for yourself. Use all the little brats of yours hiding around here to give me and mine a once-over. I couldn’t care less. Have at it. More interesting that way.”
At the risk of ruining himself and his followers—perhaps even looking forward to the demise of his own familia—Ikelos let those words hang in the air.
Thin smile still on his face, the god left the small plaza.
Hermes watched him go and sighed as soon as Ikelos was out of sight.
“My, my. Nothing nastier than a god desperate for some entertainment.”
“Look who’s talking.”
Hermes’s followers heckled their god from their hiding places around him.
The last rays of sunlight that still reached over the city wall illuminated Hestia Familia’s home.
Four people were currently inside while Bell’s party was out gathering information: Mikoto, Haruhime, Wiene, and the goddess Hestia. After asking Hephaistos for the day off earlier in the morning, the deity awaited Bell’s return along with her followers.
Each of the women stayed busy.
Hestia spent the day poring over her collection of books in search of information about everything from monsters to Orario’s history.
Meanwhile, Mikoto patrolled the passageways, ever vigilant.
Taking care of Wiene fell to Haruhime.
“Haruhime, found you!”
“Hee-hee, indeed you have.”
Wiene dived into a shadow cast by one of the inner walls and wrapped her arms around Haruhime in her maid’s attire.
The two were playing hide-and-seek. It was one of the games that Bell and Haruhime had taught Wiene when the two of them were in charge of looking after her.
Today, after making Wiene promise to never go outside and only play in the inner garden, the two girls took turns.
“Now you’re ‘it,’ Haruhime!”
“Yes. I am going to count now.
“Ooone, twooo,” Haruhime called as she turned to face the wall of the inner garden.
Wiene quietly snuck away, running with a grin on her face.
Robe swaying at her feet, she looked for a suitable hiding place.
…I wonder when Bell will come home.
Right as she was about to crouch behind a planter full of flowers…
Wiene’s expression clouded over as thoughts of the absent Bell crossed her mind.
He had always been right by her side, until now. Haruhime was with her, as usual, but it just wasn’t the same without him.
That twinge of loneliness was making her anxious.
In a dark world where everyone and everything tried to hurt her, that boy’s smile had become the beacon of light that saved her from isolation.
Like a child yearning for a parent’s warmth, the young vouivre girl couldn’t help but long for him.
“……”
Wiene glanced up to the third floor of the manor before her gaze fell on the renart, who was still facing the wall.
After a moment’s hesitation, she decided to break her promise and leave the inner garden.
The urge to visit Bell’s room on the third floor drew her through the passageways like a magnet.
She found her way to an unlocked door. Creak. The hinges groaned as Wiene pushed it open and cautiously peeked inside.
The room’s owner nowhere to be found, the girl quietly made her way toward the pile of folded blankets on top of his bed.
Wrapping one around her shoulders, she slowly rubbed her cheek against it.
“Bell’s…smell…”
Taking in as much as she could with one long whiff, Wiene buried her face in the sheets.
She curled up into a ball as her mind filled with memories of the boy who had always slept right next to her.
“…?”
Without warning—
People approached along the hallway.
Four in all.
Proceeding from the other end of the long passageway, their footsteps entered the room right next door, one not in use.
Thinking it a little strange, Wiene felt her heart skip a beat, believing she’d get a lecture if discovered. She held her breath in an effort to escape detection—
“Another monster, not just Wiene?”
—Voices from the other room reached her ears.
Amber eyes went wide.
Silver-blue hair rustled.
Ears, sharper and longer that an elf’s, twitched back and forth. They originally allowed her to detect intruders from far away in the vast Dungeon, but now they allowed her to pick up the details of the discussion on the other side of the wall.
Wiene soundlessly sat up in bed before she realized what she was doing.
She quietly placed her ear to the wall.
“Are you sure, Welf?”
“Absolutely. It was at the same place Bell met Wiene on the nineteenth floor…”
Welf nodded. His face stayed eerily still despite Hestia’s surprise.
Welf and Lilly had come directly home after Bell went off on his own. Hestia and Mikoto had convinced them to meet secretly on the third floor.
To make sure Wiene—and Haruhime, who had grown close to her—didn’t overhear.
“We talked. It said that we ‘smelled like her kind’…It was probably talking about Wiene.”
“Another being similar to Lady Wiene…I never thought there could be more…”
Mikoto couldn’t hide her shock as Welf went into detail about their encounter. As she fell silent, so did Lilly next to her
“…Welf, what was your impression of it?” Hestia asked.
> “At the very least, it seemed to be more experienced than Wiene. Its pronunciation was a bit odd, but it hid itself with a robe, pretended to be an adventurer…That, and I think it knew something.”
A small noise escaped Hestia’s throat at Welf’s answer. Mikoto gulped as well.
The atmosphere suddenly became much heavier. Lilly, who had been silent up to that point, opened her mouth to speak.
“Lilly thinks we should stop harboring Miss Wiene.”
“!!”
All eyes turned to Lilly.
The first one to recover was Mikoto.
“Lady Lilly, what are you saying?!”
“Lilly will be blunt. We are on the cusp of a very serious situation. An Irregular that not even the gods can comprehend, other groups on the prowl for information about talking monsters…Now that we’ve discovered other monsters able to speak, we can no longer afford to wait.”
Her point was that these Irregulars were at the heart of a major disturbance, and they were getting sucked in.
Using information she had gathered at different bars and other hubs over the past week, Lilly painted an objective picture of the situation.
“However, if we stop protecting her…then what will happen to Lady Wiene? Should we abandon her, she’ll…!”
“…It may be difficult, but there’s a chance for her outside the city wall. She’s a vouivre. Familias outside Orario and monsters living on the surface would pose little threat to her.”
Born in the middle levels, she hailed from the most powerful type of monsters: dragons.
Lilly maintained a neutral expression and explained that the vouivre girl’s potential strength would be all the protection she needed.
“She can live out her life hidden in the Deep Forest Seoro.”
“Lady Lilly…!!”
Mikoto, ever loyal to her friend Haruhime, raised her eyebrows in anger.
Lilly watched her ally’s impassioned plea coldly.
“Then tell me this: What will happen if that girl stays here?”
“!”
“Is it possible to keep her hidden from everyone indefinitely just as things are now? Once certain things are set in motion, the situation won’t allow the status quo to continue. At present, Hermes Familia is actively moving at someone’s or something’s request.”
Lilly was so devoid of emotion that her face reminded Mikoto of traditional masks from her homeland in the Far East.