by Dojyomaru
“Okay, me, too!”
Juno threw a knife at one scissor meganeura which had slipped between the other two. That dagger stabbed into one of the scissor meganeura’s simple eyes, and it fell to the ground on its back.
“Whew... Looks like the compound eye is fine,” Juno said in relief as she checked the corpse.
Julia the mage, who had been preparing her flame magic behind them, asked Febral, “Do you not need me to use my magic?”
“The claws last a long time if smoked, and are more useful that way, so if you cook them, their value’s cut in half. Please stand by and be ready to burn them all if the front line stops being able to handle the situation.”
“Okaaaay.”
The gentle beauty, Julia, smiled as she summoned a large flame in midair, but because Juno and the two up front were able to handle the situation themselves, the spell was never fired.
Having secured a large number of crab claws and compound eyes, Juno and her party had their first big haul in some time.
◇ ◇ ◇
Some days later, in the capital Parnam. The night of the day Dece and his group returned.
“...And that’s how it went down. We made bank.”
Juno, who had come to the castle for tea, like she always did, jovially related the story. Our tea parties were a valuable chance to hear the voice of the common people, and it was fun to shoot the breeze over tea with my comrades, so I welcomed it.
Juno put a biscuit in her mouth, then laughed raucously. “Seriously, I’ve got to hand it to the Monster Encyclopedia. I hear other adventurers saying it’s helped them avoid wasting parts, and improved their earnings, too.”
“I’m glad to hear it.”
It was satisfying to see that the book was having a positive impact on people’s lives.
“Hee hee, I guess it was worth distributin’ it, huh?”
“The ladies in the merchants’ district were happy to see unusual ingredients making the rounds, too.”
Roroa and Naden both piped in. The four of us were here for today’s tea.
“I couldn’t be happier to see it having a positive impact, and it looks like the acclaim for Ichiha is rising steadily, too, so I have nothing to complain about.”
“Ohh... Now that you mention it, the author, Ichiha Chima, lives in the castle, doesn’t he?” From the way Juno scratched her cheek, she had something on her mind.
“Hm? Did you want to meet him? I could call him in for tea...”
“No, that’s not it,” she said with a wry smile. Resting her cheeks on the palm of one hand, she traced the rim of her cup with a finger. “I was just thinking, if Febral found out I had met Ichiha Chima, he’d probably cry out of frustration. When the guy first read the Monster Encyclopedia, he said something like, ‘I want to stop being an adventurer, and become Sir Ichiha’s apprentice!’ The whole party stopped him, though.”
“...The problem is, there’s a lot of guys like that.”
And, as Ichiha’s fame grew, the number of them was steadily increasing. Ichiha had a promising future, and he was a talented academic. In another five years, with his looks, he was going to be a literate pretty boy. There would be no shortage of girls looking to get hitched with him, regardless of their social status.
If I didn’t keep him guarded at the academy by day and the castle by night, someone would snatch him up in no time. I expected something like that rush of marriage meetings that Poncho experienced was in the boy’s future. He was like the protagonist of an anime or manga.
I guess getting him engaged early would be one option. It was more or less decided that we would be absorbing him into our country. If we let a genius like him go, it would be a loss to our country. It would be a blow to the Union of Eastern Nations as well, but there was no way I could let him go anywhere else. The primary candidate has to be Tomoe... But I dunno.
Ichiha was turning eleven this year, and Tomoe was turning twelve. In my former world, they would both still be in primary school, and there were relationships they could only build in childhood.
I could see they were close, even looking from the outside, but Tomoe, Ichiha, Yuriga, Velza, and what was the other one’s name, Lucy, was it? I was hesitant to put any strange external pressures on them and change their relationships. But what could I do...?
“I think we should watch and wait.” I looked up in surprise, and Naden shrugged her shoulders. “It’s all over your face, Souma. I can tell what you’re thinking.”
“Huh? Really?”
When I started touching my face all over, Roroa chuckled. “We’re your wives, y’know? Figurin’ out what’s on your mind’s easy, Darlin’.”
“Wow, I dunno what to say. Wives sure are amazing, huh?” Juno said, sounding impressed. This was kind of embarrassing. “I can tell what Mr. Musashibo’s saying, though.”
“No, no, that’s the real special ability here. How can ya tell what a doll’s sayin’?”
“Julia said it’s ‘the power of love.’”
“Love...? What’s with this girl? Maybe we shouldn’t be underestimatin’ her?”
Roroa had a dubious look on her face, but Juno just stared blankly back at her.
“Well, anyway, we’re turning a nice profit because of you. If there’s anything I can do for you, just say the word.”
““Anythin’ / Anything?”” Roroa and I said with a glint in our eyes.
“Huh? Uh, well... if it’s something I’m capable of...” Juno said, despite seeming intimidated. Good, that was a commitment.
“I do, in fact, have a job for you.”
“Yeah, yeah. We were just lookin’ for a boyish girl like you, Junie.”
“Huh? Wait. Huh?”
The devilish smiles on our faces made Juno unintentionally hug herself.
Naden let out a sigh of dismay. “Geez... Explain it properly, you two.”
◇ ◇ ◇
The story now turns back to the day after the Monsterology Symposium.
On this day, I was in a room in the castle with Liscia, Roroa, Hakuya, and Genia the Overscientist. We were here to discuss the doubts I had during the symposium. I would have liked to have Ichiha present, too, but we hadn’t brought him fully into the fold yet, so he was not asked to participate this time.
In this world, there are several races that were human, but with added characteristics from various creatures. Was this the same as how monsters were constructed with parts from a variety of creatures? If monsters were created, were the races of mankind with a variety of features from other creatures created, too? These questions could shake society to its core if mishandled, so they were too much of a burden for me to handle alone.
“The reason I’ve called all of you here today is to tell you about something I was thinking during the symposium yesterday. I want to hear your frank opinions about it.”
Having prefaced my remarks with that, I told everyone about the things I described above. As for how they reacted, Liscia and Hakuya were holding their head and looking troubled, while Roroa and Genia listened with great interest. The responses were at two extremes.
Liscia let out a great sigh. “Why must your ideas always be so wild?”
“I agree entirely.” Hakuya nodded in complete agreement with her. “For better and for worse, you are constantly coming up with ideas that could upend the underpinnings of this world, so we, the people who serve you, can never relax.”
...Did he have to go that far?
“I’m not exactly saying wild things because I want to...”
“Of course not. If you were doing this intentionally, it would be downright nasty.”
“Really? I thought it was interestin’,” Roroa said with a cheerful laugh. “The monsters were all made by someone, and so was mankind... Wait a sec. If all of our races were created, it makes groups who think they’re the chosen people, like the Spirit Kingdom of Garlan, sound pretty silly.”
“On the contrary, this manner of thinking could give birth to
new elitist ideologies.” Genia brought her hand to her chin with a smirk. “From what the king’s said, there’s a distinction to be made between the human race of his world and the human race of ours, but if we choose to view them as the same, it would be easy to come up with human supremacist ideas. If you were to do that, yeah... you could use the birth of a child between the king and queen as proof of it. If you claim that the birth proves they’re the same kind of being.”
“Stop it...” Liscia said with a look of distaste. You couldn’t blame her. She wouldn’t want Cian and Kazuha being used as props for some selfish ideology... No, I wouldn’t let that happen.
“It’s not just humans.” Genia shrugged, seeing the dangerous looks on our faces. “Merumeru’s homeland, the Spirit Kingdom of Garlan, would probably say, ‘Even if we were created, we were created more beautiful than others, which proves that we really are special.’”
“Ohh, I could see them sayin’ that.”
“Their use of fallacious arguments like that only makes them more fascinating to me, though.” Genia smiled like this didn’t concern her. I couldn’t possibly do the same, though. “By the way, do you remember what I said during the symposium, King?”
“Hm? Which one?”
“When we talked about how the monsters may have been produced by someone. I said, ‘As a dungeon relic researcher, I want it to be the dungeon core.’”
“Now that you mention it... you did say that, yeah.”
“If they really do work that way, then...”
“Huh?! Madam Genia. You can’t mean...” Hakuya sounded surprised. About what?
“Heheheh. It looks like the Prime Minister gets it. Hey, King. If monsters and mankind were both created, where did mankind come from, and who made us?”
Genia laughed provocatively.
“Ah... So then mankind in this world was created in the dungeons...”
“I can’t prove it. But if your idea is correct, we can make that prediction.”
Oh, geez... I clutched my head. In the world I came from, life was born in the sea, and evolved from there. That was why we referred to the sea as our mother, and as the cradle of life.
But, for life in this world, could it be that their “mother” and “cradle” was the dungeon? The dungeon already felt artificial and manufactured as-is. They had once created mankind and animals. Now, they were the home of monsters.
The situation made me think of one word. “Malfunction.” Like how a poorly-maintained machine might do something unexpected, and cause a major accident, perhaps the dungeons that created living creatures malfunctioned, and began creating warped creatures like monsters. That was Genia’s prediction.
“...I’m scared to carry that idea through to its conclusions.”
“I know! ...It’s making me sick,” Liscia said, her face a little pale.
My face must have looked similar. Thinking about the origin of life or the future came with a primordial fear connected to life and death. If you thought about it too much, it would keep you up at night.
“Still... I feel like it’s something to keep in mind... There’s the demons, intelligent lifeforms, that aren’t on the side of mankind to consider, too.”
“Ohh, I see. If we’re sayin’ mankind was born in the dungeon, then demons may’ve been born in the dungeon, too, huh?” Roroa clapped her hands as if it all made sense to her now.
Like she was saying, there were physical differences between humans and demons (though, to me, they didn’t seem that different from beastmen), but if we traced them back to their origin, they might be the same. But if we made a mistake in how we released this information, it would no doubt cause confusion in society.
When you looked at it that way, this world was almost like a gigantic minefield. There were mines lying everywhere, and they’d blow up if you stepped on them. But the only solution was to disable them one by one. We had to take our time with it.
“If it’s going to take time, I guess we should get to work quickly.”
“Souma?” Liscia had a dubious look on her face.
“Now that Fuuga is expanding his actions into the Demon Lord’s Domain, there will likely come a time in the not-so-distant future when mankind must confront the demons once more. When we do, the degree to which our side understands the demons will change what options are available to us. If we want to reduce the threat of a return to total war even a little, we need to start preparing for it, little by little, starting now.”
Everyone nodded in agreement.
“What, precisely, should we do?” Liscia asked.
“The method is the same as when we occupied Van and soothed the hearts of the people there.” I grinned. “This is where soft power... the power of culture does the talking.”
“Nyahaha! I know what that means.”
I met the excitement in Roroa’s eyes with a nod.
“Yeah. Let’s do this the way Roroa likes.”
◇ ◇ ◇
— 11th day, 8th month, 1548th year, Continental Calendar —
It was a hot summer day. Juno walked through the shopping street in the capital, her face red with shame.
“I know I said I’d do anything to help... but still.”
Right now, Juno and her party of five were in the middle of fulfilling a quest. “Advertise the new event.” And it had been said to Juno, directly by Souma, on the night of the tea party. Naturally, she couldn’t tell her companions that, so he submitted a quest to the guild through the castle and requested Juno’s party.
“This is a notice from the palaaaace. Please, take a looook.”
“It concerns the event to be held five days from now. Please, look at this to see the details.”
Dece the warrior held up a placard, while Augus the brawler had signs tied to his front and back like he was some kind of sandwichman, and they were both calling out to people as they walked by.
The main difference from usual was that they were both dressed like clowns. They even had clown face makeup on, but it looked a bit creepy, in a way that people who were bad with horror movies, or those who suffered from coulrophobia couldn’t stand to look at for long.
Next to them, Febral was frowning. “Is it really all right for me to be doing this when I technically call myself a priest?”
“There was no other choice. Dece and Augus were both too brawny for the outfit.” The gentle beauty, Julia, tried to mollify Febral.
They were dressed as a vampire and vampiress. Febral wore a white cape and tuxedo (because it was deemed too dangerous for him to wear black in the summer heat), and had fake vampire teeth in his mouth. Though Febral was the indoorsy sort, and he looked like a literate man, the vampire look, which appeared sickly at first glance, suited him, and he got a lot of attention from the ladies.
“Even if it’s white, it’s still pretty hot...”
“Oh, my. Well, mine is black, but it’s quite breezy, you know?”
Julia was dressed like a bunny girl without the ears, but with bat wings on her back, and a pointed tail sticking out of her rear. If you factored in her figure as well, she had a real “sexy vampire” look going on. The men in town—as well as with Dece and Augus—couldn’t take their eyes off her, but because of her own gentle nature, she seemed unconcerned by the eyes on her.
Now, as for how Juno was dressed...
“This getup’s still not okay!”
She was wearing nothing but a tiger stripe bikini, with little oni horns sitting on her head. She looked exactly like the most famous oni girl in the country Souma had once lived in. If someone like Julia, whose body stuck out in all the right places, had worn that same outfit, it would have been erotic. However, with her thin figure and baby face, Juno looked more cute than sexy, so the crowd found it less arousing than Juno herself thought. Though that didn’t make it any less embarrassing for the one wearing it.
A roly-poly hand poked Juno’s exposed back. It was the kigurumi adventurer controlled by Souma, Little Musashibo. Tod
ay, Little Musashibo wasn’t dressed as a priest soldier, but as a mummy man wrapped in bandages. However, because of his roly-poly body, he looked like a giant cocoon made by a moth or something instead.
Juno gave Little Mummy Musashibo a piece of her mind, “Ki—I mean, Mister! This outfit really is not okay!”
“But it’s not any more revealing than your usual outfit, is it?”
When Little Musashibo tilted his head to the side, Juno felt like he had said that to her. An angry mark appeared over Juno’s head as she shook Little Musashibo.
“It’s totally different! I don’t have my gauntlets or scarf!”
“Stoooop iiiit.” (Flailing his arms.)
“If you want someone to dress like this, tell your wives to do it!”
“.........”
Little Musashibo blatantly looked away.
“...Don’t tell me you’ve made them before.”
“.........” (Pretending to whistle.)
“You and I both know kigurumi don’t whistle. Huh? Who? Who did you have do it?”
Because of their late-night tea parties, Juno was friends with Souma’s queens too, and her mind raced, wondering who it was.
Naden already had antlers and a tail, so this sort of costume would be difficult for her. Aisha was so fond of Souma you could mistake her for a puppy, and Roroa was a good sport and loved festivals. Either of them would have gleefully done it for him. But she felt like Liscia and Juna would both do it if Souma asked, too.
Unable to come up with an answer, Juno pinched Little Musashibo’s cheek. “Hey, Mister, tell me. Who did you make do it?”
“B-Before that...!” (Pulling away from Juno.)
Little Musashibo patted the placard on his back.
“Let’s do the quest first. You were paid in advance.”
Juno felt like he’d said that to her, and she got upset.
“Oh, fine. Darn it all.”
You better not forget this at the next tea party. King or not, you’re gonna have to let me sock you one, Juno thought. Then, half in desperation, she called out to the people walking past.