Hell Mode: Volume 7, page 14
“Ah! We’ve finally reached the terminus!”
Meruru sat in the pilot’s seat and made Tam-Tam hover before standing up by the window again and watching the pillar of light descend.
“What is that? I see a purple, slime-like object in the desert.”
At the end of the pillar of light, there was a lake with a strong reddish-purple hue that glistened in the morning sun. Meruru referred to it as slime since the water itself looked rather squishy.
“That was probably an oasis. I’ve heard that there are several such places here in the Muharino Desert.”
The crescent-moon-shaped Muharino Desert stretched across the west side of the Galiatan Continent, where the Union was located. A single river flowed through this desert, running northwest from the mountain range in the center of the continent, but it was not very wide, and there were very few green areas in its basin. In contrast, there was a lot of greenery where the water veins that flowed beneath the desert appeared on the surface, forming ponds and lakes. Towns and villages had been built around such locations.
Each of these settlements was self-governing and independent, forming a so-called city-state. They had made trade agreements and established distribution networks to carry goods to the outside world, but other than that, they had minimal interaction.
The pillar of light terminated in what was once one of those city-states. The lake that had served as its water source had clearly changed to an abnormal color, appearing poisonous and polluted.
Sophie recalled Allen pondering over why the distress call was not sent from any of the locations outside Teomenia, as similar crises were occurring in those places as well. It all made sense now as Sophie observed the scene unfolding in front of them.
Even if some people had managed to escape from the villages and towns that had fallen under attack, they likely had not made it to another city-state alive. Those who had not been killed by monsters living in the desert had surely found themselves unable to escape from the demonic incarnations that chased after them endlessly, without even needing to pause for rest. Furthermore, careful preparation was needed in order to survive away from any water sources out in the desert. It was possible that they had simply collapsed and died.
“This is terrible.” That was all Sophie could say as she tried to manage the anger building up in her chest. The people who were attacked had either had no time to ask for help or had not received it even if they had asked, and anyone who had not died in agony had been transformed into a daemonic incarnation. Just imagining it made Sophie shudder with anger before a sense of sadness washed over her.
“What should we do, Sophie? Allen told us to go to the city with the pillar of light last, right?”
“That’s correct.”
Their operation prioritized the rescue of towns and villages and the saving of any survivors. Allen had said that it would be fine to go to the pillar of light where a Demonic Deity was supposedly waiting after the situation had settled down and the safety of the people had been secured.
Sophie tried to suppress the emotions swirling within her chest and gather her thoughts.
“Princess Sophialohne.” Volmaar, who had been silent until now, finally spoke up. “First, let’s head to the village. I doubt it’s very far from here.”
“The village. Right.”
“Village?” Meruru was confused, but quickly went into action.
“All right, we can keep talking while on the move, so I’ll tell you where we need to go,” Sophie responded.
“Sure thing. Just tell me the way.” Meruru traced the control panel with her finger, causing Tam-Tam to fly in the direction Sophie indicated.
A few hours later, in the middle of the desert and about a kilometer off in the distance, Meruru spotted a huge structure that appeared to be their destination.
“Wow, there’s a big city! It’s a tree, isn’t it?! It looks just like the World Tree!”
The first thing Meruru saw was a giant tree reminiscent of the World Tree she had seen in Rohzenheim. It was surrounded by an outer wall made of bricks, which enclosed a massive area several times the size of Teomenia.
“That’s right,” Sophie said in a stiff tone. “It seems that the battle has already begun.”
Meruru tapped at her control panel, turning part of Tam-Tam’s cockpit window into a magnifying glass to observe the outer wall surrounding the giant tree.
“What is that?”
The outer wall was specked with monsters that had the upper bodies of humans and the lower bodies of scorpions. Some were trying to climb the outer wall by sticking their scorpion legs into the gaps between the bricks, while others were focused on pushing open a large gate that appeared to be the main entrance. Other monsters, taking the form of gigantic snakes and lizards, were pushing past the scorpionic ones, making their way toward the outer wall.
Arrows and fireballs were being shot down from the pathway running atop the outer wall. The battle seemed evenly matched, with the human-scorpion monsters being defeated and the other large monsters being kept in check.
Sophie looked at the human-scorpion monsters and spoke in a melancholic tone. “It seems like there are also daemonic incarnations out there. They’re almost certainly the people who lived in the nearby villages and towns.”
“Princess Sophialohne, we should get going,” Volmaar suggested, taking up his bow.
“You’re right. Meruru, can you get a little closer to the village? We need to save it!”
“Yeah! Got it!”
Tam-Tam’s speed increased, and Sophie called for them to halt once they were three hundred meters away. Her eyes spotted a soldier pointing a bow and arrow at her from the path running along the outer wall.
“Stop here, Meruru,” Sophie said. “Should we get any closer, the villagers might mistake us for enemies.”
“I guess you’re getting off, then?”
“Yes. Lord Allen left us a Griff to fly on.” Volmaar and Sophie mounted the Bird B and waited for the boarding gate at the bottom of Eagle Mode Tam-Tam to open. The Spirit A who was accompanying them approached and let out an eerie laugh.
“I will go first. Kya ka ka ka.”
“Thank you. That will be very helpful.”
The Spirit A flew down from the gate and landed on the sand, swinging down the mallet it held.
“Earthbound Curse!”
Circular ripples spread from the point where the mallet hit the ground, causing translucent ghosts and yellowed skeletons to emerge from the sand. With ghastly wails, they pounced on the daemonic incarnations and monsters.
This was Spirit A’s Awakened Ability, which restricted an enemy’s movement. It had a cooldown of one day and a radius of one kilometer, and it seemed to be effective regardless of the type of monster it was used against, but it had no effect on floating opponents or structures, even if those structures were in contact with the ground. Opponents of Rank C and below would have their movements halted for about an hour, while those at Rank B were impeded for approximately ten minutes. Rank As had that time shortened to about ten seconds, and Rank S monsters such as the iron golems in the Rank S dungeon were more or less unaffected.
The team’s Bird B flew in, Volmaar climbed on its back, and fired an arrow. Sophie manifested the spirit of the wind to stop the movements of the large monsters, and the Insect As and their Parent Beas and Baby Beas followed up by enslaving them with Slave Needle. This allowed the team that was split into three to replenish its forces.
“Looks like the battle’s already started, so I guess I’ll be joining too!” Meruru put four small multibarrel slates into her magic disc and shot the desert monsters with her multibarrel guns, two on each side of Eagle Mode Tam-Tam’s wings.
The soldiers on top of the outer wall had obviously been wary at first, but when they saw Sophie and the others fight without taking aim at them, they decided that the strangers had to be allies. They had initially loosed several volleys of arrows, but that had quickly stopped. Their power was negligible compared to that of these newcomers.
In less than an hour, the daemonic incarnations and monsters that covered the city’s outer wall were wiped out.
Sophie and Volmaar flew their Bird B toward the main gate of the town, where the majority of the monsters had been attacking. The huge gate was full of scratches, but it seemed to have survived somehow. Tam-Tam then landed, and Meruru exited, manipulating her magic disc and causing Tam-Tam to disappear instantly.
The sun continued to rise toward the middle of the sky, casting harsh light onto the desert sand, which reflected some of it back upward. Sophie, wearing a sun-blocking overcoat, silently looked up at the gate. She could not decide what to do now that she was in front of the village. She did not even know what to say. However, the fact that she had been able to save this village from its impending crisis did a lot to give her a sense of peace.
Sophie and the other three were wearing overcoats they had brought with them in their magic bags to protect them from the dust and strong sunlight. Before long, the iron door that was the side entrance of the gate opened, and armored soldiers appeared. They had taken off their helmets, revealing their gray hair, brown skin, and long, elf-like ears. Among them, one who appeared to be particularly young—in his late teens if he were a human—stepped out in front of Sophie. His hand was on the hilt of the sword dangling from his waist, meaning that he was still suspicious of the party.
“This is Fabraaze, the home of the dark elves. I am grateful for your help. However, our rules forbid outsiders from entering. Wait, you’re...”
The young soldier referring to himself as a dark elf noticed Sophie’s golden eyes staring at him, and his face suddenly took on a startled expression.
“My apologies. I never thought that the princess would come here.” A dark elf soldier, who seemed to be the young soldier’s superior, seemed to have decided to take charge of the situation. He used a hand gesture to instruct his men to release the handles of their swords. However, he continued to stand there and refused to approach.
Sophie felt a pinprick deep in her chest, but she tried her best not to show it.
“Yes. My name is Sophialohne. May I please meet with King Olvahs?”
“Please wait for... Actually, please come this way.”
At the soldier’s invitation, Sophie and the others entered the side door. Inside the thick outer wall, which was a long passageway, the sunlight was blocked, and that alone made it feel much cooler. On one side of the passage was a wooden door, which a soldier ushered them through and into a waiting room. The only entrance to the room was the door they had entered through, and the soldier asked them to wait there.
“Pheeew. It was pretty hot out there.”
Meruru, who had a Bird A perched atop her head and was still wearing her overcoat, sat down on the sofa in the waiting room and let out a sigh of relief. Compared to elves, dwarves were apparently more resistant to heat, but even so, the heat of the desert seemed to have had an impact on her. Sophie, too, found that sweat was causing her hair to cling to her neck. From inside her magic bag, she took out a leather bag filled with fruit water and began to drink.
“Yes, it certainly is. I thought it was quite hot in the Empire of Baukis, but it’s even hotter here.”
Sophie sat down next to Meruru, while Volmaar stood by the doorway. Realizing that he, like the dark elf soldiers, was wary of his opponents, Sophie felt another pang in her chest.
“So this is the dark elves’ village,” Meruru said innocently. “Have you not been here before?”
“No. I have heard about it from the elders and Her Majesty the Queen, but I didn’t know that it was this strict. Perhaps that’s how it has managed to stay safe.”
Over three thousand years ago, war had broken out between the elves and the dark elves in Rohzenheim. The birth of Rohzenheim’s Priestess of Prayer turned the tide of battle sharply in favor of the elves, and the defeated dark elves migrated to this continent, built villages throughout the desert, and were now living in hiding. Sophie had been told this story when she was a child. As she grew up, she learned that the story was indeed true, and that her homeland and the dark elves’ home of Fabraaze would send people back and forth. Additionally, she found that it was not due to an amicable agreement, but rather as a sort of mutual way of spying on one another, ensuring that they kept out of each other’s way.
“I thought you were kind of surprised to be on the team heading to the east.”
“Oh, really? Did it look that way?”
Meruru gave a triumphant, fearless smile, implying that she was rather observant of others too. “It did. Tee hee.”
“Things might get a bit messy once we meet King Olvahs. Don’t be caught off guard if they do.”
Meruru nodded at Sophie’s words of caution and responded with a question of her own. “Wait, we’re not meeting a queen?”
“Yes. It seems that only men can be the monarch of the dark elves, though. I heard that the right to succeed the throne is given only to those born into the royal family or the family of one of the elders.”
“Huh, so you don’t have to be the king’s child to become king?”
“It’s the same in Rohzenheim. We’re all equal under the World Tree.”
In Rohzenheim, elves were considered part of the World Tree and therefore did not have a family name. When asked about their origins, their response was always “Rohzenheim,” never “the country of Rohzenheim.” They had no social statuses either. Elders were those who brought people together, and the queen was the priestess who delivered the voice of the World Tree to the people. Neither was a status, but rather a position. People had to fill them, but that did not make them better than anyone else. However, the reason that the right to inherit the throne did not depend on lineage was that, compared to other races, both the elves and the dark elves had an extremely difficult time having children.
“Elves and dark elves are similar, aren’t they? Then, do dark elves have something like a Spirit God?”
Sophie and Volmaar tensed up for a moment at Meruru’s question. “That’s right. In Fabraaze, they worship the Sovereign of Spirits, Lady Fabre. She has lived longer than Lord Rohzen, so please, uh...watch your words, Meruru.”
“Ah, got it. I’ll be careful.” As Meruru nodded, the door to the waiting room flung open.
Sophie and Meruru looked back at the doorway while Volmaar, who had been silent and vigilant the entire time, stepped forward. He stood to block the entrants, a dark elf soldier and an older dark elf dressed in a robe, from entering the room. However, the robed dark elf merely ignored his presence and spoke directly to Sophie.
“Ah, Princess Sophialohne. And what, exactly, brings an elven princess here without any sort of prior notice?”
Sophie stood up, waited for Volmaar to step aside, and bowed to the elderly dark elf.
“It’s been a while, Elder Jiamnir. I’ve already explained to that soldier over there what brought us here.”
Elder Jiamnir of Fabraaze was entrusted with negotiations with the outside world and had visited Rohzenheim before. Sophie had met him several times before.
“Yes, that’s certainly true. But in that case, I believe you must contact us in advance or I’m afraid that even the princess herself would be denied entry.”
Sophie smiled softly, though she remained undaunted and continued the negotiations. “I have something that I need to tell King Olvahs.”
“I am grateful for your help in the fight against the monsters that attacked our city. As thanks, what do you say we arrange for a personal letter from the king expressing his gratitude?”
Part of Sophie’s cloak, between her chest and stomach, wriggled as the elder spoke.
“Oh, my apologies. I’ll prepare a meal soon,” Sophie said. She took one hand out from her cloak, which she had kept on even in the waiting room where they were away from direct sunlight. She unfastened the clasp around her neck, revealing her hidden arm—and the Spirit God she was holding—to the elder.
“Huh? Whoa!” the elder spluttered. He and the soldier accompanying him both stared at the Spirit God with dumbfounded expressions, remaining motionless.
“Lord Rohzen said that he was hungry. Excuse me, but could you prepare something to eat?” Sophie ended her remark with a smile.
“O-Of course! Hurry and tell the king that Princess Sophialohne of Rohzenheim has brought Lord Rohzen!”
“C-Certainly!” The dark elf soldier rushed out the door in a hurry.
“Princess Sophialohne, please bring Lord Rohzen here,” Elder Jiamnir said, urging her out of the waiting room.
“Ha ha. You’re beginning to resemble Allen, Sophie.” Rohzen whispered into Sophie’s ear with a wry smile.
“Not quite. This is necessary, so I hope for your understanding.” Sophie followed the elder out of the waiting room, with Volmaar and Meruru in tow. The group of four went down the hallway and down a side passage. At its end was a doorway leading to a garden bathed in gentle sunlight. At the elder’s prompting, Sophie and the others stepped out into that sunlight.
“Wow! Is this really a desert?!” Meruru cried out in surprise.
In front of the group, a huge tree rose about a kilometer up into the air. Its long, thick branches extended sideways, and the green leaves overlapping those of the smaller trees around its base created a massive, green canopy that covered the village like a tent. The ground below was dirt, not sand, and flowers swayed in the warm breeze. They had no way of knowing if the outer wall or the trees had come first, but without this green tent that softened the strong sunlight of the desert to the same level as the sunlight filtering through the trees of a forest, this village would have been no different from the desert outside. It, too, would have been uninhabitable.
“Oho ho. This is the power of Lady Fabre,” the elder said proudly, having now recovered from the shock of seeing the Spirit God.
“That’s quite a fine tree.” As Sophie said this, she could feel the eyes of the dark elves on her. They seemed suspicious of strangers.
