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Chapter 391: The Black Ship, and the Captive Vampire.

“There there, such nice kids you are. Eat as much as you want.”

“Nyaa.”

“Gau!”

A broad smile bloomed on the face of the tavern matron. In front of the shop under the curtains of dusk, she was giving leftovers to a pair of stray black cat and black dog, but when some new guests came in, she went back into the shop.

The black cat (Bastet) and black dog (Anubis) have infiltrated the Magicraft City Steele, often called the second capital of Eisengard.

At taverns or inns, various information is exchanged. Even as they enjoyed the food they were provided from outside the tavern, the two scout-type’s hearing would never let any of that information escape their notice. And in the first place, the two of them don’t need to eat food anyway.

“Anego, ain’t it fine if we don’t eat stuff like this?”

“Don’t throw away others’ kindness. Also, if we show off the fact that we’re friendly to humans, it’ll help our information gathering as well.”

“Got it.”

Anubis wolfed down the remaining food while thinking “Is it something like that?”. Food such as these will get converted to ether that can power themselves by the magic furnace in their bodies, so it’s not like it’s completely useless.

While pretending to be engrossed in the food between them, their ears were listening attentively for information from within the tavern.

“Apparently the village of Tonam got attacked by the golden monsters.”

“Really now. What were the Magicraft Knights doing?”

“Beaten up pretty badly, or something. How many towns and villages does this make?”

“Don’t know. Things went weird ever since the day of that ‘Demonic Comet’.”

Those “golden monsters” are most likely the variants. Seems like quite a few towns and villages have been attacked already.

“There’s also the rumor that golden skeletons marched on the streets night after night…”

“What the hell is that. Where were they heading?”

“Apparently it’s to the south.”

“The south… To Eisenbrook?”

To the south from here, is the capital of this country, Eisenbrook. Due to the rampage of the giant demonic golem, Hekatonkheire, the capital had been on a continuous path of decline.

Of course, that’s not the only reason for its fall; the death of the Magicraft King, who was almost dictatorial in his one-man reign, and the lack of successor afterwards was a large factor as well.

As is the usual for a country that lost a leader it depended on, conflicts between potential successors broke out, and the nobles were engulfed in fighting for political power, leaving the populace to fend for themselves.

The people who lost their homes, their jobs, or their families due to Hekatonkheire were ignored by the nobles, and in the end, with anger and despair in their hearts, they left the capital behind.

The number of people who left the capital increased day by day, and right now, its status as the capital is already in a questionable state.

“The curse of His Majesty the Magicraft King, eh.”

“Stop it, don’t say something like an ill omen.”

“In any case, this country’s done for. It’s better if you run to Garudio or Strain. Right now, ships are still leaving, but we don’t know when that’ll end, you know. This country’s going to be isolated.”

As a matter of fact, the number of people who escaped Eisengard are increasing as well.

The people’s unease exaggerate the rumors floating around, and those rumors then further fan the people’s unease; a dark shadow had fallen on the country.

[Those skeletons that were heading south sound suspicious.]

[Then, next would be over there?]

Using a voice that the humans cannot hear, the black cat and black dog conversed.

[If that rumor is true, then the variants are definitely involved in it. There’s no way we’re not going to investigate that. Let’s go.]

[Roger that.]

Bastet and Anubis walked out of the city together with brisk steps. Nobody paid any attention to them.

When they became covered by the darkness of night, Bastet lightly jumped up onto Anubis’ back.

Anubis then began running with supernatural speed. And just like that, the two of them disappeared into the night.

This is a digression, but the figures of the two running in the night became the source of a rumor about “A shadow running in the dark night”, and they unknowingly poured even more fuel on the unease of the Eisengard populace.

“I don’t really understand, but in any case, it ended well didn’t it!”

When Robert, who fell into a deep sleep on a bed in the castle as compensation for the teleportation ability he used, woke up, it was two hours after Prince Zanbert from Raze Martial Kingdom lost utterly against Yae, Hilda and Luu following Ende and Elze.

When he loses that badly in succession, one may start to think that Raze Martial Kingdom isn’t anything much, but in this case it’s quite clearly due to our girls being too abnormal instead… I mean, they’ve gotten to the point where they can defeat an elder dragon easily by themselves, you know.

I feel bad for saying this, but I think half of our knights can win against that prince as well. They’ve not been training under Moroha nee-san everyday for nothing.

I had expected Prince Zanbert, whose heart was broken into pieces, to become pretty depressed, but he betrayed that expectation by somehow becoming high-tensioned, and near the end, it felt like he was heading into the fight knowing he would lose.

And at the end,

“I have perfectly understood just how weak I am with my own body. After this, there’s nothing except training to reach higher!”

Was what he said, with a refreshed-looking face for some reason.

Well, if the person himself is fine with that, I shall not say anything.

After passing the satisfied Prince Zanbert a letter addressed to Raze Martial Kingdom’s king, the group returned using Blau’s spatial transfer.

Robert’s going to fall asleep over there as well, isn’t he. How should I say it, it’s quite the convenient and inconvenient ability at the same time, huh.

When we were going to go back to the castle as well, a call came in on my smartphone.

It’s from King Lefan of Egret Kingdom. What is it? Maybe those giant squid-like Tentakras showed up again?

“Yes, hello.”

“Ohh, Brunhild sovereign! Apologies, could you come here quickly?”

“What happened?”

“Apparently there’s an unidentified ship coming from the southwestern sea. From the aerial scouting done with Loufs, it’s clearly an armed ship.”

The Loufs are giant birds that are used by Egret. Armed ship… A military vessel? It could also be a pirate ship.

The southwest… I called out the new world map and checked the direction. Could it be from this “Demonoid Kingdom Helgaia”?

Since back when I first learnt that the two worlds would merge into one, I’ve begun collecting information on the countries in the Reverse World. When I formed a partnership with Silhouette-san and the [Black Cats] under her, I was able to gain more detailed information than before. As such, I know about “Demonoid Kingdom Helgaia” to a degree.

Demonoid Kingdom Helgaia. It’s an island country where demi-humans known as “demonoid” lives.

The aforementioned “demonoid” is a race similar to what we in the Surface World know as demonkin. Werewolves and alraune, vampires and ogres, races that are closer to magic beasts than others within the demi-human category.

While they possess a proper culture of their own unlike goblins, kobolds or minotaurs that cannot establish communication with other races, similar to the demonkin of our world, the demonoids were also persecuted for their appearances and other factors in the past.

Several hundred years ago, a vampire calling himself the “Demonoid King” created a country for the demonoids, Helgaia, and began protecting the demonoids from persecution.

Several countries, apparently finding the news displeasing, declared war on Helgaia to destroy the country, but the Demonoid King beat back every single one of their attempts, and now nobody would touch them.

Due to that, the number of demonoids (demonkin) in the Reverse World is very small. Nearly all of them are living in Helgaia, after all. As a matter of fact, I myself have never seen a single demonkin-like race in the Reverse World yet.

Helgaia is smaller in size compared to Demon Kingdom Xenoas, but as its climate is close to that of Egret’s, being a fertile tropical island, the demonoids were able to live in peace and happiness, or so it was said.

Could the ship that’s heading towards Egret Kingdom right now be a warship from that Helgaia?

However, I felt that Helgaia is like Demon Kingdom Xenoas in its stance against conflicts; something like “We’ll take the fight if someone else picked one with us, but we won’t actively pick fights with others”.

In any case, I can’t ignore this, now can I.

“My apologies. Since the opponent is a country from a different world, I’d very much like to borrow the power of Your Majesty the Sovereign who acts as the arbiter.”

“I don’t remember becoming an arbiter though…”

Standing on the ever-beautiful sandy beach of Egret, I used [Long Sense] boosted by [Divine Eyes] to look at a spot beyond the horizon.

There really is a ship coming this way. Two, to be exact. Black bodies, and those are clearly cannons they’ve got there. The arrival of the black ships, eh.

Plus, even though that ship has a sail, it also has two large waterwheels attached on its sides. There’s no chimney, but is that a steamboat? Wait, if it isn’t releasing steam then guess it’s not one.

It’s probably a ship made with golem technology.

There’s some sort of emblem painted on the sail; is that the emblem of Helgaia?

“We can’t unilaterally decide they’re attacking us too; what should we do?”

“Umu. However, my people are fearful. First, we must learn what the other side wants.”

The Egret king, standing besides me, opened his mouth and replied. The big man, possessing a well-toned body covered in unique tattoos, and wearing Native American-ish traditional clothing, glared at the sea in front of him.

“For now, how about we send out a request for them to stop their ships? If they don’t stop with that, that would prove they have no interest in a dialogue with us.”

It’s just like what Hilda—who came together—said, first comes dialogue. Depending on their reaction, we would change our response to match the situation.

“What would you do if they attacked you?”

“Un, there’s no reason for us to sit back and obediently take a beating if they attacked us, but considering that we don’t know their reasons, and that it might affect the relationship between Egret and Helgaia in the future, we should capture them rather than kill them.”

“Umu. I am of the same opinion. If we know they’ve come here as invaders, though, then there would be no need to hold back.”

I, and then the Egret king, talked about our opinions when Elze asked a question.

According to the information I have, Helgaia shouldn’t be the kind of country that would invade others of their own volition. I think we should be fine on that regard.

“For now, I’ll head over and try to talk to them.”

I activated [Fly] and launched myself off the beach. When I reached the sky above the two ships right afterwards, I deployed the non-attribute magic [Speaker] and called out to the ships with “Ah, ah.”

“Attention to the two black ships over there. Ahead of you is Egret Kingdom territory. Stop your ships immediately, and have a small boat carry a messenger to explain—ohh!?”

The cannon at the bow of one ship fired at me in the middle of my speech. Oi oi, no matter how you see it, that’s not a friendly attitude, right? I mean, they might be thinking of me as a suspicious person who showed up by flying in the air, but firing a cannon at me is a bit too far- stretched, right.

“I’ll let that attack just now slide, but anymore would be seen as a declaration of war against us. First, we want to listen to your reasons. I’ll say it again. Immediately stop your ships, and follow our instructions. We would like to talk—”

Even though I’m in the middle of my talk, there’s some dude on the deck who’s pointing towards me and shouting something. I don’t know if it’s ordered by that guy, but immediately after, two more cannon shots were fired from the ship.

Those bastards. I take it they don’t have any intention of talking. They’re totally here to sell a fight to us, aren’t they? There’re dudes on the deck who’s shouting “Shoot him down!” and “Blast him to pieces!” too.

Before their capture, should I make them go through some scary experiences…

“[Come forth Darkness, what I seek is a ruler of the deep seas, Kraken].”

Two huge shadows appeared behind the black ships. Wriggling tentacles came out of the water and raised the two ships up, and the ships’ crew raised screams of terror and began running about, trying to escape.

The krakens, which have stuck themselves to the back of the ships, have completely stopped their movements. For the time being, I’ve ordered them via telepathy to not destroy the ships. However, I’m not done yet.

“[Come forth Darkness, what I seek is a warrior of the abyss, Merfolk].”

This time, half-fishmen with scales covering their entire bodies and tridents in their hands emerged out of the sea and assaulted the ships.

Merfolks are monsters living in the sea, but they can operate for a short while on land, and while not as much as when they’re in the water, their combat strength is high.

“Hiiiii!?”

“Uwaaaaaa!?”

The crew members drew out swords and went up against the attacking merfolks, but with their blades unable to pierce the hard scales of the latter, they were disarmed one after another.

I’ve ordered the merfolks to capture their opponents without killing them as well. The merfolks proceeded to tie the crew members up with the rope found onboard with experienced motions.

When the ships are completely suppressed, I noticed one strange thing.

Among the crew members, not a single one of them is a demi-human. I suppose they’re not warships from Helgaia, but pirates.

I landed on the ship, and asked the merfolks to bring the one who was ordering the crew around to me.

He was a large man with a full-faced beard that, I cannot deny, does look like a pirate somewhat.

“So you’re the captain of this ship, eh. Why did you ignore our instruction to stop your ship earlier?”

“Who, who are you!? A hunter sent by the Demonoid King!?”

“Demonoid King?”

By Demonoid King, does he mean the king of Demonoid Kingdom Helgaia? “Hunter”, does that mean these guys are being chased by them?

As I was going to ask him for more details, I caught sight of one of the merfolks beckoning me over to the door that leads down to the ship’s hold. Summoned beasts that can’t talk, unlike Kohaku and the others, are troublesome during times like this, aren’t they. Well, since I can roughly understand what they want, there’s no big problem.

When I left the deck to the other merfolks and headed down into the hold, I found a cubic iron cage 2 meters on all sides, inside which three women were held with silver chains binding their bodies.

Two of them were brown-skinned women wearing maid-like clothing. Dark elves… I think?

The remaining person had long silver hair and scarlet eyes, translucent white skin and slightly tapered ears. Since our knight order has someone like her, I could tell at the first glance. She’s a vampire.

She looks to be in her early twenties, but since vampires have long lifespans, I know that her appearance can’t be relied on to guess her age.

The clothing she wore was also different from the other two: a expensive-looking dress. She’s probably a noble.

“… Who might you be? You don’t seem to be the comrade of those people.”

While saying that, the vampire lady glared at me with a severe look. However, there’s a shade of fear in her eyes when she looked at the merfolk next to me. Well, it’s natural to be scared of someone bringing a half-fishman into the room with him. It’s hella suspicious.

“I am Mochizuki Touya. The sovereign of a country called Brunhild Dukedom. And you are?”

“Brunhild…? I’ve never heard of that country before…”

“It’s a small country, so. You seem like a vampire, so are you someone from Demonoid Kingdom Helgaia?”

“… Yes. I am Claudia Mira Helgaia. Wife of the Demonoid King, Alford Cula Helgaia.”

……Excuse me?

-Pixel