Once Again, the Monster Subjugation

I seized command of the subjugation force by putting Mireia out in front.

The members of the force, of course, were less than pleased. But I'd long since stopped caring what anyone thought. Anyone who ignored my orders or so much as looked at me funny got an unceremonious threat delivered through Mireia.

"Ghhk..."

Even the ones who'd been glaring at me like they wanted to tear me apart tucked their tails the moment Mireia herself issued a razor-edged warning.

I scrapped the plan to split the force in two and hunt the monsters separately, then reorganized the already-divided units according to my own criteria. Damon, the knight representative, had already been warned by Mireia twice — once for pushing back when I threw out the policy of splitting up and striking first, and once for hiding among the adventurers and badmouthing me behind my back. Now, whenever he caught sight of me, he'd turn his head, grind his teeth, and find somewhere else to be.

A Silver-rank adventurer like me using Mireia to twist the entire subjugation force around my finger — I suppose that was a situation he simply could not stomach. To be fair, even I had to admit it was an outrageous arrangement that would be hard for anyone to swallow. But Mireia's presence forced them to accept it anyway. In front of her, you could call black white and no one would have any way to refuse.

Thanks to that, I could almost ignore the stares from the rest of the force and focus entirely on how we'd handle the monsters. If I'd known it would turn out like ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠this, I should've started using Mireia for all she was worth from the moment the atmosphere first went to hell.

Shut up.

Call me despicable all you want. Can't be helped. The entire force treated me that way first.

When Mireia insisted on forcing me into the subjugation force, they actually had a choice. One option was to whisper and tear me down, the way they actually did — Why is a guy like that getting special treatment? The other was to at least try to understand — Lady Mireia picked him herself. There must be a reason.

But nobody did.

This was the timeline they'd chosen. In that case, I might as well use Mireia's authority to the absolute limit, just the way they assumed I would.

No matter how much they hated the current situation, they couldn't just run off — not while they were part of the force. This subjugation force hadn't been assembled through a guild request. It had been organized under a royal summons. Walking away without authorization was, in essence, no different from a soldier deserting. Not that anyone seemed to be considering it, with Mireia watching the force with those ice-cold eyes of hers.

With a little breathing room at last, I climbed to a high vantage point in Horn Canyon where the monsters were most visible and surveyed the situation. However I'd gotten here, I had command ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠now. I had to do everything I could to keep this force from falling apart.

I was staring out at the dark mass of monsters in the distance when it happened. Shari, who'd been stuck fast to my head this whole time, suddenly drifted forward through the air. Then she just... gazed toward the Demon Realm.

"Right. That's home for you, isn't it?"

Shari turned to look at me and gave a small nod.

I'd heard it was demons commanding the monsters we'd have to fight. Looking at Shari — a demon herself — and thinking about that made me feel a little strange. But then she made an unexpected offer of her own.

"Huh? You want to help somehow too?"

Shari nodded, smiling.

"We might end up fighting demons."

When I said that, she showed me a series of scenes filled with various demons. It always amazed me — this strange way of communicating where she could say everything she wanted without speaking a word.

"You're saying demons are the same as humans — there are good ones like me and bad ones like Patton? And the ones who love fighting are the bad demons?"

Shari made a complicated face. She nodded once, then shook her head once. Then more scenes flickered through my mind.

"You don't know whether the ones we're up against are bad demons or not — you just want me to come out of this unharmed?"

Shari nodded hard. Then she spun around me a few times before suddenly sinking straight down into the ground and vanishing.

"Shari?"

When she didn't reappear, I called her name.

"What? Where'd she go?"

But no answer came.

We established a defensive line in Horn Canyon in preparation for a monster attack. The supply wagons had some usable materials, so I had the knights and soldiers set up palisades at the approaches into the canyon. At the particularly narrow choke points, we positioned boulders on the cliffs so we could trigger rockfalls at any moment, and I stationed lookouts on the high peaks so we could keep tabs on the monsters at all times.

I sorted the adventurers by role — those specialized in close combat, those capable of ranged attacks, those suited for reconnaissance, those who could provide support from the rear — and classified them accordingly, at least for now.

Well, yeah. Of course they wouldn't. The fact that the monster force's strength wasn't limited to what we could see was something only I knew, thanks to the Narration.

From the force's point of view, it was a fair question — why weren't we splitting into two units and proceeding with the subjugation the way we'd originally decided? Even so, it couldn't be helped. Whether the force understood it right now or not, preparing a defense was the better call.

To give my decision to dig in at the canyon a little more persuasive weight, I'd asked a few of the adventurers to go out on reconnaissance. I'd seized command by force using Mireia, yes — but if the force was going to actually fight, it was better to give them grounds for accepting my orders. There was the matter of morale, too, and there was only so far you could get by barking do it because I said so. To that end, I needed to find evidence that the monster force we were up against was stronger than it looked.

"It's a stalemate."

Mireia spoke while gazing in the direction of the monsters.

"We need to make them come to us first."

"The usual me would have attacked immediately."

"..."

"But since this is Yunoa's decision, there must be a reason."

She said it while absently running her fingers along the hilt of the longsword at her waist. Having her trust me so blindly in a situation like this was... honestly, I was grateful. Even if the fact that I didn't know the reason myself was a little terrifying, in its own way.

The sun began to sink, and darkness settled over Horn Canyon. The scouts who'd gone out returned one by one to report their findings.

"Hmm... so nothing particularly out of the ordinary, then."

I listened to the returning adventurers' reports, marking anything unusual on the map as I spoke. They said there were no monsters hiding near the canyon, and no suspicious locations either. I also received the reconnaissance results on the two monster groups we'd been able to see with the naked eye in the distance.

"It's not that I have a complaint, exactly, but... is it really all right for us to just keep sitting here? Monsters get stronger the more they gather. If those two groups facing us merge into one, we'll have gone looking for trouble."

One of the scouts spoke up carefully, glancing at Mireia standing beside me.

"The frequency of monster appearances has been strangely high lately, and they've been moving with an intelligence they never used to have, haven't they? Being careful never hurt anyone. If anything, I think it's strange that those monsters can see us and still aren't attacking. On top of that, we're close enough to see the Demon Realm with the naked eye. Something is definitely going on here."

I piled on every plausible-sounding reason I could think of, trying to make it as understandable as possible. The scout tilted his head, but went back to his post as if he had no other choice.

After that, people kept coming to me, one after another, to question why the force was digging in and fortifying the canyon. Each time, I wrung whatever I could out of my brain, tacked on a reasonably convincing explanation, and sent them on their way. I didn't have a choice. The Narration had clearly said the monsters' main force was hidden somewhere — but reconnaissance hadn't turned up any evidence of it.

These weren't people coming to pick a fight just because I was some Silver-rank nobody. They had legitimate questions. There was no need to crush them with Mireia and breed even more resentment, so I manufactured the best reasons I could and dealt with them that way.

Huh? What change?

Now that was some welcome news, for a change.

My cautious attitude — pouring effort into reconnaissance — combined with Mireia's stubbornness in delaying the force's departure just to bring me along... and now, without me even meaning to, it had created the impression that there was a reason Mireia had brought me. Well, if it meant even a few less people holding a grudge against me, I wasn't going to complain.

"...Hm?"

There was something on the ground — a faint, hazy shape. I stared at it, puzzled, and it suddenly drifted up into the air, taking form.

"Shari?"

It was Shari, back from wherever she'd vanished into the earth that afternoon.