The Demon Lord's Welcome Feast
The dwarf investigation team consisted of five members in total. Unable to withstand Neromeltia’s terrifying presence, the dwarves had all fainted, but they began to regain consciousness one by one, starting with their leader. Having shown a threatening demeanor from their very first encounter, Neromeltia paid careful attention to her own image so that the dwarves could remain calm once they awoke. She had prepared light scones and biscuits on a pure white table along with warm jasmine tea, and now sat quietly sipping her tea while waiting for all the dwarves to wake.
“H-hey… wake up…!”
“Ugh… uuuuugh… hrrk…!!!”
Once the leader awoke and conversation began, the other dwarves stirred one after another, roused by the sound of their voices. Though everyone else had regained consciousness, the fifth and final dwarf showed no sign of waking. A member named Berko glanced nervously at Neromeltia before shaking him awake. The dwarf had been sleeping so deeply that he groaned as if he wanted to sleep a little longer, only to jolt awake in sudden fright. Clearly, the hazy memory of what had just happened had shocked him fully awake.
“Since everyone is awake now… come and have some tea.”
“N-no, thank you… We, we couldn’t possibly…”
“Hmm. It seems the tea does not suit your tastes.”
“N-not at all! How could we dare…!!”
The leader of the investigation team bowed and scraped so low that it looked as though he might prostrate himself in worship at the slightest further provocation. Neromeltia paid no heed to his refusal. After emptying the cup before her, she stored everything away in her Dimensional Storage. Then she retrieved something else from within it: a large smoked haunch of beef, an enormous wooden mug, and an oak barrel as tall as a dwarf.
“Beer and meat, just as you dwarves like them. This should be to your liking, no?”
“N-no, we…”
“Gulp!”
Just as the leader raised his hands to refuse once more, a loud sound of someone swallowing saliva cut him off. He whipped around in shock, his face turning ashen at the sight of his oblivious subordinates. Their eyes were fixed on the steaming smoked meat and the beer that looked refreshingly cool. The savory aroma of the roast stirred their appetites, while the dew clinging to the oak barrel only intensified their thirst.
“Hohoho. Your subordinates seem quite eager to taste it. Why not sit down properly?”
“How could the likes of us dare…”
“You should know that excessive refusal is not courtesy, but rudeness.”
“You lot! What are you doing?! Thank her at once and sit down!!!”
The moment Neromeltia’s tone sharpened, the leader frantically shoved his men toward the table. Neromeltia let out a small chuckle at how remarkably perceptive the leader was. The sight of him was rather amusing; not a trace remained of the dwarves she had once known.
“We gratefully accept this benevolent meal!!”
As if they had rehearsed it, the dwarves shouted their thanks in unison and began devouring the food and drink on the table with ravenous abandon. They sliced off portions the size of a normal Demonia’s serving with a fork, brought them to their plates, and cleaned them in two or three bites. To them, even a plate piled high with meat was barely a single serving. Whenever the greasy meat made their throats feel heavy, they downed an entire mug of beer. Every time they lifted a mug, they drained it to the bottom, and when pouring, they filled it until it was just about to overflow.
“Th-thank you. You already saved our lives, a debt we can never repay, and now you even treat us to such a magnificent meal……”
“It was something I intended to do anyway. Think nothing of it.”
While tearing into the meat, the leader suddenly noticed Neromeltia smiling at them. Her warm smile felt so different from the bloodthirsty expression she had worn earlier that it was hard to believe they belonged to the same person. She watched the dwarves, who expressed their joy with their entire bodies as they enjoyed the meal, with a genuinely pleased expression. It was difficult to imagine that this kind and benevolent figure was the same being who had created the bloody scene moments before.
“We’ve been out investigating for two weeks now, and all we’ve had the whole time was grain flour and jerky!”
“Even then, we could only eat a handful per meal! We were starving!”
“Honestly, even back home we only get chicken stew at best. We never dreamed we’d be treated to such a feast in this dangerous Plain of the Dead! Thank you!”
The dwarves spoke freely, their cheerful expressions showing no attempt to hide their joy. The massive beef haunch that had taken up most of the table and the barrel of beer as tall as a dwarf were completely gone in less than ten minutes. After finishing their happy meal, the dwarves sucked on the remaining bones with regret or patted their bellies in satisfaction.
“But… are you truly the Demon Lord…?”
The leader of the dwarf investigation team asked Neromeltia with a still-cautious expression. It was a question all the members had been wondering about, and if true, it would be a shocking event that could bring upheaval to the entire dwarf race. They had been too flustered and terrified to even process the situation, let alone accept it. Neromeltia had claimed to be the Demon Lord who had lived through a thousand years. Moreover, both the leader and Berko knew her full name—Neromeltia di Isis—exactly, which only deepened their shock. It was the name of the last Demon Lord recorded in dwarf history books, and after her death, no other Demon Lord had appeared as Hemonigent met its end.
“Indeed. I am the Demon Lord Neromeltia di Isis, who met my death a thousand years ago during the joint assault by the Humians and the dragons.”
“Ooooooh…!!!”
The dwarf investigation team could not contain their joy and let out exclamations close to cheers. After the Demon Lord’s death, the Demon Lord’s army had suffered near-annihilation, and her powerful and wise subordinates had either died or vanished. With the force that had stood against the Humians suddenly collapsing, Terraris had fallen into Humian hands, and the world had been pushed to the brink of destruction. The return of the Demon Lord to this death-filled world meant they could launch a counterattack against the Humians, so the dwarves saw a brilliant ray of hope.
“By the way, do you call this place the Plain of the Dead?”
“Yes, we do. Since it is swarming with the dead, we refer to it as the Plain of the Dead.”
“And while that was happening, something changed in the Taego Forest, so an investigation team was dispatched?”
“H-how…….”
The leader was so flustered that the Demon Lord knew such detailed information without ever having visited their city that he was at a loss for words. Their city was hidden in a location and by methods that no other race could ever find, so the idea of someone secretly infiltrating it was unimaginable. Even the meeting to dispatch the investigation team had been conducted so secretly that only dwarves directly involved would know about it. Yet the Demon Lord, whom he was seeing for the first time in his life, knew every detail of this secret matter, and his body trembled with astonishment.
“If you reached here from Mackenzie Mine in just two weeks… you must have pushed yourselves quite hard. After all, your kind is not suited for long journeys……”
“Ma-Ma…”
“You know of Mackenzie Mine!?”
Berko asked in the leader’s stead, as the latter was too stunned to speak a single word and could only stammer. Though Berko was a relatively sharp dwarf and managed to maintain some composure, even he could not hide his bewilderment and was sweating profusely. He had sweated so much that droplets were dripping down his neatly braided beard, creating a rather messy sight.
“Before I met my death a thousand years ago, I visited there often. I was even a regular at the Gnome’s Tear Tavern.”
“Hiiiiiik…!! You even know about the Gnome’s Tear Tavern…!!”
The leader, who had been stammering and unable to form a proper sentence, cried out in shock. Mackenzie Mine was a secret city that had never been discovered in a thousand years, and even a thousand years ago, only a handful of people had known its location. Moreover, the dwarves had lived in hiding without any contact with the outside world for a thousand years, so any outsider should either not know of Mackenzie Mine at all or assume it had long since disappeared. The fact that she even knew of the famous tavern in Mackenzie Mine was clear proof that everything she said was true. In the end, the leader was so shocked that he could barely breathe, and any further conversation had to be delayed for about ten minutes until he calmed down.