The Chaotic Stone Sauna

by Nagaharu Hibihana

  Soon after Haruno drove the cleric away, word came in that the demi-humans had woken up. Haruno, Sera, Lumis, and Rin decided to meet them together in the manager’s room, which had the nicest sofa. They wanted the ever-reliable Sandra to be there as well, but she was busy giving orders outside.

  Sera had released the victims from the Oath Seal by herself, so Haruno had yet to actually meet the demi-humans. She hadn’t asked what kind they were either, so she was looking forward to meeting them now.

  “Oh, Lady Haruno. We need to prepare a seat for the one with a tail.”

  “Hmm, I believe there were some in the reception room. Let’s bring one over.”

  They brought over a backless chair according to Lumis’ suggestion. She really was the type to look out for others, demi-human or not.

  They also prepared tea and tea cakes, then a pilgrim guided four of the demi-humans to the manager’s room.

  “Oh? What about the fifth one?”

  “The last one is still sleeping... Also, these four had been traveling together and said they wouldn’t talk unless all of them were together.”

  So the demi-humans didn’t trust them yet. It was understandable, considering how they had been captured before. However, there were four of Haruno’s group inside the room and another three right outside. Even if the demi-humans were planning something, there was no need to be too wary of them.

  “I understand. Please come inside,” Haruno said with a smile and invited the four of them inside the room.

  The first one to come in was a large man about two stutos tall and plenty wide as well. The door was too small for him to pass through normally, so he had to duck to get inside.

  “So you’re the Hero of the Goddess, huh... I’m this party’s leader, Dylan,” said the man with the face of a bear. He essentially looked like a bear wearing human clothing. He had a shirt and pants on, but they looked too tight on him. Maybe they had taken away his old clothes and forced him to wear those. He tried to give Haruno a sharp and intimidating stare, but she brushed it off without flinching.

  According to him, he was a callisto, a type of bear demi-human. An average adult male of his species was about the same size as him.

  The lycaon in Touya’s party looked human besides her ears and tail, but ketolts had the face and body of a cat. Callistos were closer to ketolts, in that sense.

  “My name is Haruno. Please have a seat.”

  “...Well, I’m grateful you saved me.” Dylan gave a short nod and sat himself on the sofa. He looked fierce, but not like he was angry at all. That being said, he wasn’t creating a friendly atmosphere either.

  “Oh, let me take this backless chair.” The next man to come in moved quickly and helped himself to the seat next to Dylan. He was wagging his long, thin tail back and forth.

  This man had the face of a lizard. He was a lizardman like Rulitora and was wearing nothing but a waist apron. His body was covered in small green scales, and he was very slender compared to Rulitora. He looked shorter than Haruno, partially because he kept his body bent forward. Rulitora had an astonishingly muscular physique, so it felt fitting to say that this man was more “lizard-like.”

  “What, something on my face? Oh, the name’s Spar.” Spar cocked his head as Haruno’s party kept staring at him.

  “Oh no, I was just thinking that I have a friend who is also a lizardman. But you look quite, um, different from him.”

  “That’s normal enough... Oh, is your friend from the desert? I’m from the marsh.”

  “Yes, he’s a sand lizardman with yellow scales.”

  “No wonder. Those guys are huge!” Spar said, then opened his mouth wide and laughed. He seemed like a cheery guy.

  On that note, his species was commonly referred to as marsh lizardmen.

  And then the next guest... couldn’t enter the room. The third in line was actually a giant coming from a race called “cyclops.” She was taller than Dylan was and couldn’t get through the door with her huge body even when crawling on all fours.

  “Can’t get iiiin!” she lamented, still on her hands and knees, with an unexpectedly cute voice.

  Haruno exited the room to take a look and found a large crouching body colored blue. The staff had probably not been able to find any suitable clothes for her and instead made her a makeshift outfit using fur pelts. She may have been large, but didn’t seem to have a particularly muscular build. She looked about three stutos tall. According to the guide, she couldn’t stand up straight inside the building and had crawled all the way here.

  The giant slowly raised her head until Haruno was met with the face of a young girl. Size aside, she didn’t look much different from a normal human. She carried out each and every action slowly, and Haruno felt an almost leisurely aura about her. She had ruffled hair a shade of blue darker than her skin down to her shoulders, and a single short horn growing from her forehead.

  “Hmmm?” The giant’s large red eye peered at Haruno. The eye was round and cute, almost like a cat’s. Only her left eye was visible at the moment, as her possibly injured right eye was covered by an eyepatch.

  “How did she get inside the jailhouse, anyway?”

  “Well, there’s a cage for big monsters behind the building for criminal ravers...”

  So she wasn’t able to enter the jailhouse, but could they not have found another way to keep her? Haruno knitted her eyebrows at the sloppy way the market staff had treated her.

  “Um, so what’s your name?” Haruno asked gently, tilting her head and forming a smile as best she could. She had unintentionally started treating the giant like a young child. Something about the giant girl’s cozy aura was tempting her to act that way.

  “Ummm... my name’s Prae.”

  “Prae, is it? My name is Haruno. It’s nice to meet you.”

  “Nice to meet you too, Harunooo~”

  She couldn’t tell how old the giant was, but she guessed she was around the same age as Sera. There was a large gap between her appearance and tone of voice, not to mention the aura that made others want to take care of her. Such was this girl called Prae.

  “You’re not scared of Prae?” Haruno turned around at the voice behind her to find the fourth guest, a woman.

  “I don’t think she’s scary or anything.”

  “You’re a strange one, for a hero,” the woman laughed. She had long silver hair and white skin, and though she wasn’t as tall as Prae, she was still impressively tall relative to human women. She was quite the beauty, with ashen eyes that felt like they’d suck you in if you stared long enough. Haruno couldn’t tell how old she was, but she looked like the personification of the word “bewitching.” She was wearing a cloak, but it looked like all she had on underneath was underwear. She had probably also gotten her clothes taken away like the others. No reports had come in of the pilgrims finding any clothing, so they must have already been sold or thrown away.

  “My comrade is also a Hero of the Goddess and has a sand lizardman and a lycaon in his party.” She wasn’t going to mention the Goddess of Darkness, Rakti, of course.

  “What about you?”

  “It doesn’t bother me at all. As long as we can speak the same language.”

  “I see... Okay, let’s chat then. Prae, make sure to listen from outside the room.”

  “Okaaay~” After she gave the order to Prae, she reached a hand out to Haruno.

  “I’m Maha Melis. Just call me Melis.”

  “My name is Haruno.” Haruno grasped her hand and shook it. It was awfully cold. “Um, then getting right to it, do you mind if I ask you a question?”

  “Oh my, for me? Don’t tell me it’s my bra size... Oh, yours look a little bigger. But if you want my age, little miss, I’m afraid you won’t be getting that information right now~”

  Melis’ expression had gone dark for a moment after looking at Haruno’s chest, but she was nothing to be scoffed at herself. In contrast to Melis’ joking attitude, Haruno asked her question with a serious
tone of voice.

  “Please tell me how old Prae is. We started talking to her as if she was a child, but I’m not aware of how giants age.”

  “...She’s probably older than you are. Even if we converted that into human years,” Melis answered dejectedly, still holding on to Haruno’s hand.

  Sera and the others were shocked at the answer. Prae had been replying to them almost like an infant, but her body was that of an adult woman’s. It was understandable that she was older than Haruno, in one sense.

  “But as you can see, this is what she’s like on the inside. We’d be happy if you kept treating her the same way you just did.”

  “Oh, yes, of course we can.” Prae didn’t seem like a bad girl, and Haruno was more than willing to accept that request. Melis smiled amicably in response, and Prae started grinning as well.

  “Alright, let’s continue this inside the room. You didn’t call us all over just to ask how old Prae is, I assume?”

  “Of course. Please come inside then.”

  Haruno escorted Melis inside the manager’s room. There was something she absolutely had to ask them—whether or not they knew anything about the winged demi-humans.

  “Oh...” Haruno realized something as soon as Melis stepped inside the room in front of her. Melis had told her her name, but nothing about what race she was.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “...N-no, it’s nothing.”

  The woman in front of her had no features that would identify her as demi-human at all. Maybe she had a demi-human party, but was human herself. Or even if she was a demi-human, maybe there were personal reasons why she couldn’t reveal that information. Haruno ran through her thoughts and decided to hold off on asking for now.

  On one side of the room was Dylan the callisto, Spar the marsh lizardman, and the silver-haired woman of unknown race, Melis. On the other side was Haruno, Sera, Lumis, and Rin. Prae the cyclops was peering into the room from the hallway.

  The seven of them sat around the table and talked, but unfortunately it was not a topic they could chitchat lightheartedly about over tea. Haruno could tell that even the cheerful Spar was keeping a close eye on them.

  They had been falsely convicted and denounced as criminal ravers, so it’d be difficult for them to trust Haruno’s party all of a sudden. Though they were answering all of Haruno’s questions such as detailing how they’d gotten caught, so that was a positive sign.

  On that note, Dylan, Spar, and Melis had been captured after they had gotten drunk and passed out. Prae didn’t resist at the time since the other three had already been seized. The Oath Seal had already been cast on them before they regained consciousness, so they couldn’t escape. They had let their guard down.

  The Oath Seal was a spell that could only be used once you cleared several requirements, but the fact that the caster had been cleared implied just how far up the chain of command this case had gone.

  “Do you know anything about winged demi-humans?” Haruno wanted to become friends with the group first, but this wasn’t a situation where they could take time getting to know each other before asking questions, so she cut right to the chase.

  “Winged? I can name a few off the top of my head.” Dylan crossed his furry arms and answered with his eyes shut.

  “I heard that they lived here long ago.”

  “In Athena? I’ve never heard about that...” Spar had a confused expression on his face as he looked between Haruno and Dylan.

  Not many people would know of anything that occurred 300 years ago. The temples and old families with record books were the only groups keeping track of historical events, but Athena’s past had been covered up by both the temple of light and the sacred family.

  “...When did they last live here?” Melis inquired. She stared at Haruno with her ashen eyes, as if she was testing her.

  From the outside she looks elegant and friendly, but she must be the toughest to handle, Haruno thought. Though she was only wearing underwear under that cloak and Haruno had a clear view from how she was sitting.

  “I heard it was about 300 years ago.”

  “...I see.” Haruno answered with an unflinching expression, but Melis’ smile now seemed like it had a hint of another emotion mixed in. Only for a moment though, and she went back to looking serious after that.

  Dylan read the change in atmosphere, opened one eye, and asked Melis, “Melis, do you know something?”

  “...I’d heard that those demi-humans had lived here a long time ago, but I hadn’t heard where they might be living now.”

  “I see...” Dylan was satisfied with that answer, but Haruno couldn’t let this lead go. She couldn’t just stop now.

  “Um, do you know the name of that race?”

  “...What do you plan on doing once you find out?”

  “I would like to go and meet them.”

  “And why do you want to meet them? Would you mind telling me the reason?”

  “I could, but you might regret hearing it afterwards.”

  “I won’t answer your question if you won’t answer mine.”

  “......”

  “......”

  The two of them stared at each other silently. Spar started looking a little scared, while Rin pursed her lips.

  Melis’ response was weighing on Haruno’s mind. She was deliberating how much she should tell Melis about what they knew.

  “Looks like there’s no other choice... please lend me your ear.” Haruno said with a small sigh. Melis propped her right hand on the table, leaned forward, and brushed her hair aside with her left hand to reveal her ear. Haruno whispered to her the details of how Athenapolis’ temple of wind might be a fake one, and the real one might be among the winged demi-humans. She didn’t mention anything about Hadesopolis for the time being.

  The effect was immediate. Melis opened her eyes wide, sat herself back down on the sofa, and looked dumbfounded.

  It was the expected reaction. Even if the Goddess of Wind was a minor sect, Haruno had claimed that the head temple in Athenapolis might have been a fake one all this time. Thoughts must have been spiraling in her head right then.

  Haruno didn’t apologize, though. She couldn’t relate to some of the more emotional aspects, but this paled in comparison to how Sera and the others had reacted when they first found out.

  “...Where did you find this information?” “It’s researchable up to a point. After that, just reasoning.” Following the trail of information would eventually lead you to the Goddess of Darkness, but she couldn’t say that right now.

  Melis wore an expression of shock and some other emotion as she stared silently at Haruno, while the others all looked on nervously at the two of them. The other emotion was most likely fear. When Haruno realized that, she sighed, thinking, Am I really that scary? She wasn’t like this because she wanted to be. It was the result of her grandfather’s and father’s training.

  Prae was the only one who couldn’t tell what was going on and looked at Haruno with her head titled. Haruno’s heart was warmed a little by that and she returned Prae a smile.

  “...Glaupis.” After another bout of silence, Melis finally wrung that word out of her mouth.

  “Glaupis, you said?”

  “Yes, they were the winged demi-humans who lived in Athena about 300 years ago. I said this before, but I don’t know what became of them after they fled from this land.”

  Haruno felt like Melis was still hiding something with her reply. Glaupis didn’t seem like a fake name, though.

  “I’ll give you one more piece of information about the glaupis.”

  “What’s that?”

  “The fifth one who’s still sleeping has wings, but she is not a glaupis.”

  “...I’ll keep that in mind.” Haruno had been thinking of a way to get Melis to reveal more information, but Melis gave her a piece of mostly useless information herself as a defensive measure. Haruno’s group might have tried to investigate the last demi-human too much jus
t for having wings. She might have been protecting the demi-human from that as well by giving them a warning.

  Melis finished talking and gave a calm smile, returning to her casual attitude from before. Haruno honestly preferred that to being glared at and feared.

  It didn’t seem like they could get any more information about the winged demi-humans now, so they started talking about the four’s plans from here on instead. The three of them originally had their own goals and started traveling. At first, it was just Dylan and Spar. Along the way they invited Melis, since larger groups were safer when traveling through human cities, and the three of them traveled together from that point on.

  “What about Prae?”

  “She just popped up one day.”

  “Eheheh~” Prae gave a silly laugh from the opposite side of the door.

  The three of them had been camping in the forest one night when Prae sluggishly appeared before them. They thought she was an enemy at first, but soon realized she wouldn’t harm a fly. It didn’t seem like she had any comrades around at the time, so they decided to take her along with them.

  After listening to the story, Sera asked Melis, “Um, so when you said the four of you had to be together, did that mean...?”

  “...You understand now?”

  Sera, Lumis, and Rin all nodded. Haruno figured it out as well. The three of them were all worried about Prae and didn’t want to leave her alone.

  “Yes, I get it now. Next, please tell us what was stolen from you. We most likely won’t be able to get them back, but we’ll have the senate and the temple of light return the value of everything to you twofold.”

  “...Should we really be accepting that much?” Dylan asked, keeping only one eye open still. His tone of voice was dubious. He was probably wondering if they would really compensate demi-humans that generously.

  “Honestly, I think it barely makes up for what you’ve been through. For the people who had already been made to work as criminal ravers, we’re also planning to remunerate them for all their work done as innocent ravers.”