Chapter 383: The Sabi Race (1)
I released the Space Wall binding the five of them—everyone but the white one—and they crouched there with ruined limbs hanging loose, flesh split and bone laid bare, shuddering in fits. Bind them whole, the way I had the white one, and they might actually have come through intact. Blood was pattering from the wounds, and the sight stirred a speck of guilt in me, so I loosed a Healing Wave and mended them in a single pulse.
They had been slumped where they fell, croaking out mournful kwehk, kwuuk sobs. Now they pawed at wounds that had simply vanished and stared at me in a daze. I turned my gaze to the white one and spoke.
"If you're ready to talk, blink once."
When I had first caught them, the killing intent pouring off the white one had been sharp enough to make Spatial Perception prickle the nape of my neck. That edge had broken. The white tail hung low, spirit gone out of it, until my words landed and they blinked.
A thin membrane slid slowly across those slightly narrowed, pitch-black eyes, then drew back. Novel enough that a small sound of wonder escaped me.
"Huh. Interesting. Standing in for eyelids?"
Beneath the eyes and across the crown, long streaks of red and white pigment had been painted in a comb pattern, and yellow had been added to the set. Tricolor stripes. Every time the white one scowled, the three bands writhed, and it stuck with me.
I dismissed the Blue Space Wall sealing that mouth, then spoke.
"All right. Your name?"
=...And what would you do with that?=
Huh? The voice came straight into my head, the way Hiarid's did. Franc's eyes went round, and she studied the sullen white one with open fascination. I listened a moment to that voice—it tickled the ear, pitched a little high—then nodded.
"Then I'll call you Whitey."
The moment I stuck them with a title stitched from a noun and a dependent noun, those black eyes warped, and awl-sharp teeth showed for an instant.
=Alkema.=
"Huh?"
=My name is Alkema. Don't call me something strange. What's yours?=
"You can call me Whitey, if you want... Whatever. My name's Seoha. So, my question—"
=Seohada. Why did you capture us? I've never seen an Akur who looks like you. An Akur as strong as you ought to be known. Are you wandering? The giant female behind you, and that lump of chaos—are they your servants?=
This one talks a lot.
"Not Seohada. Seoha. Seoha. I captured you because I've got questions for your race. This is my first time seeing your kind, too. And yes, I am wandering. She isn't 'the giant female'—her name is Flandre, and she isn't my servant, she's my lover. The one you're calling a lump of chaos is Darky. My pet."
-I'm Master's pet!-
I answered the interruption by stroking Darky's head. The one who had introduced herself as Alkema opened her mouth first again.
=If you had questions, you could simply have requested an audience. Why would you...=
"Let me get a word in!"
Give them an inch and they just keep talking. I knotted my brows into a scowl and glared at Alkema. She looked awkward, worked her snout, and muttered.
=...Speak.=
"I'm looking for Baekcheong. I bound you like this because I confirmed traces of him entering your city, and I want information."
=...Don't tell me. The one who left Lord Baekcheong in that state...=
"Me."
=...=
Her mouth snapped shut. I spoke into those black eyes, which had clamped down around disbelief, rage, terror, and fear all at once.
"Let me say this up front. The grudge between me and him started with him. About eight days ago I managed to get my revenge, but a massive flood let him slip away, and I've been following his trail here ever since. That body, over four hundred meters long, got chopped down to about eighty. Both horns broken, hauled in half-dead. That right?"
=Th-that's impossible.=
The moment I laid out Baekcheong's exact condition, the disbelief in Alkema's eyes vanished, and shock flooded in to take its place.
"So don't even think about lying. Honest answers will serve you better."
Under the frost of my presence, Alkema bobbed her white-scaled head, then put on a flustered, troubled face.
=He took wounds grave enough to reach death, and he has lost consciousness so completely he cannot even speak. We were wondering who had done this to him, and how...=
In my talk with Agureum, I had been told he was badly wounded and on the move to be treated, but not his precise condition. Was this one actually in a position to speak with Baekcheong? And was she someone of fairly high standing among the Sabi? Either way, I had learned something useful. So Baekcheong had been unconscious.
"Where do you stand among your people?"
=...And what would you do with that?=
"I think you need to understand the situation you're in."
I narrowed my eyes and cracked my fingers—pop, pop. She took it as a threat. Tension flooded back into her, and she rushed to speak.
=I-I'm warrior class, currently in training as a priest candidate!=
A priest candidate. Just as I had thought—an extremely high station. A warrior slated for induction into the priest class, twelve and only twelve out of ninety thousand. So the mesh clothing and the ornaments had not been ordinary after all.
"How close are you to that Baekcheong?"
=Is your goal to kill Lord Baekcheong?=
Her refusal to answer straight made my temper twitch. Still, this was someone I was speaking with normally, without mental manipulation. I would have to stomach this much.
"Yeah. Once I learned it was your people who dragged Baekcheong off, I figured you were all in it together. I was going to kill every last one of you and finish him."
=That's...=
Unable to take the words lightly, Alkema flicked her tongue, face drawn tight, and seemed to lose track of what to say.
"Well? An answer to my question?"
=I-I have been raised at Lord Baekcheong's side since I hatched from the egg. Because Lord Baekcheong is the hero of our race.=
So the Sabi were born from eggs. Well, they were reptiles. Figures. And this one belonged to Ahumrek's side as well—the faction that held Baekcheong as a hero. To test whether she was lying, I asked something I already knew.
"Where is Baekcheong right now?"
=...We are escorting him to God's Land.=
"And where is God's Land?"
=......The summit of Mt. Veltical.=
The answers were taking longer and longer, but she was not lying.
"We've got good eyes. From here we can look over the mountain you live on, well enough to make out your people. And yet no matter how I look, I can't find that Baekcheong anywhere. You lying to me?"
=I'm not lying! Lord Baekcheong's condition is critical, so we are escorting him through the inner passages of Mt. Veltical!=
Oho. So that was it.
At my suspicion she shouted as if screaming, huffed and heaved, then looked at the Blue Space Wall still binding her and made a face on the verge of tears. Watching that colorful range of expressions, I wondered whether I was getting this reaction because of the Phase Stone in my heart, or whether it was simply a racial trait of theirs.
No idea. Thinking of Hiarid, and of the mermaid sisters, who conversed in a similar way, maybe it was just a trait of intelligent beings capable of speech.
=H-hey. Could you undo this? I won't run.=
Being trapped in the Space Wall looked anxious and uncomfortable, and the conversation would go better if I improved the conditions a little, so I released the Blue Space Wall binding Alkema. She staggered, caught her balance, then lifted an empty hand and stroked the scales on her head.
=Thank you for letting me go. More importantly, let us sit and talk. I think we need to have a rather long conversation.=
Was she thoughtless, or fearless? I could not tell. Or was it the opposite—too many thoughts? She did not look as if she meant to attack, so I obediently plopped down cross-legged in front of her. She squatted like a street thug, hugging her own tail and running a hand over her scales, only sneaking glances at me.
Suspecting a play to burn time, I widened my eyes in a get-on-with-it look. She flinched and opened her snout.
=First, thank you for not attacking. I still cannot read an opponent's strength as precisely as the priests can, but... you said Flandre, yes? That giant looks stronger than the priests. You are weaker than the giant, and yet you command her, and she follows you with genuine devotion. Set beside the priests... no. What I can see of you on the surface cannot be all there is.=
She kept jumping all over the place. Hard to tell what she was trying to say. It felt like rambling.
=If it is you, the lump of chaos, and the giant—the three of you—then even we...=
"If this is a stall to buy time, I won't let it slide. Get to the point."
Threatened, she looked surprised, afraid, and a little angry. A lizard's face, and yet quite a range of expressions. She scraped the ground with the tip of her wooden staff, glanced at me, and spoke.
=If I tell my father, I think he will offer some compensation as an apology. Could you not simply let Lord Baekcheong go?=
What. So this one was a silver spoon too.
"No. The Lord of the Great Sea told me to watch myself, because Baekcheong bears a grudge against me. Let him live, and the moment he's healed he'll come for me. I don't want to leave a worry behind."
Alkema, who had been carefully feeling out my mood as she spoke, went rigid. Not just Alkema. The other lizardfolk who had been listening froze like ice as well. Her white scales were trembling hard enough to see. I looked at her face, and with shaking eyes she stammered her mouth open.
=Y-you... you met H-Him... the Dra-Dragon God of Chachanghae? Truly? Really? He even gave you a direct warning??=
"Yeah."
Alkema's triangular snout worked soundlessly, her face a mess of shock and confusion. Then she shot to her feet and began scurrying back and forth in front of me.
=Th-that's impossible. The last time He manifested was during the race war with the Master of the Sky and the Flauvis. Why would He appear before an Akur, and not before us? Why? Why?=
Was the Lord of the Great Sea appearing before me really that shocking? Hmm. If Jesus showed up in front of Catholics, or the Buddha in front of Buddhists, sure, they would be shocked. That last why was aimed at me, and her face was packed with a disbelief she could not swallow. I was not entirely without a guess, but I had no reason to answer her honestly, so I tossed her something vague.
"Dunno. Anyway, if what you say is true, the last time the Lord of the Great Sea appeared before your people was—"
=Do not speak of Him so carelessly!!=
The moment the words Lord of the Great Sea left my mouth, Alkema's eyes sharpened to triangles and she let out a raw shriek—and an instant later Franc brought her fist down beside her.
KWAANG!!
Earth fountained upward and a blast roared out, as if dozens of grenades had gone off at once. The shock and the roar sent Alkema sprawling. She stared up at Franc with frightened eyes, and Franc—whether the shout had struck a nerve—glared back with a truly savage look.
=Ugh...=
Soil blasted skyward by the punch rained back down, fouling Alkema's white scales, but she could not even think to dodge. She only trembled. That murderous expression and that terrible voice were not even aimed at me, and still I was scared. I opened my mouth again toward Alkema, now a mess of dirt.
"The Lord of the Great Sea is a being you worship, not one I worship. I'd appreciate it if you didn't fuss over the words I use for him. Anyway—if you're right, the last time he appeared before your people was at least several hundred years ago?"
=Ugh... Y-yes...=
I kept questioning her as she brushed the dirt from her scales, still trembling a little.
"In all that time, has your race ever faced some enormous problem? A crisis that could have wiped you out. Something like that."
=N-no...=
"Hmm. It's not that you committed some blunder against the Lord of the Great Sea, and that's why he doesn't show?"
=Th-that cannot be. We serve Him with all our hearts, and we offer tribute every year...=
"I hear you're split into two factions and fighting each other. Wouldn't that disturb the Lord of the Great Sea's mood?"
=How do you know that?=
Scales bristling, Alkema looked genuinely stunned, and genuinely desperate to know how I knew. Come to think of it, she had said earlier that if she told her father about Baekcheong, he would offer some compensation. Add in the priest-candidate training, and the way she called Baekcheong a hero...
"Your father. Ahumrek, right?"
=?!?!
Fear and terror were beginning to gather on that face, past mere confusion, and a small sigh escaped me. It felt a little like teasing a child.
=S-so you are a hero as well. You routed Lord Baekcheong, received words directly from Him, hold the loyalty of a giant, and you even read my past. P-please forgive my rudeness until now...=
Alkema laced her fingers and bowed her head, and the five lizardfolk followed, wearing the same posture and faces full of fear. Watching them flip their attitude on the back of some misunderstanding, I was at a loss for words.
I asked a great many questions after that, but most of it was a repeat of what Agureum had told me. The only new information was that Alkema was the child of the leader called Ahumrek, and that if I let Baekcheong go, Ahumrek would offer some reward. It was time to talk things through with Franc and get the situation roughly sorted, so I gathered Alkema and the others in one place and spoke with her.
"Looks like a few choice prompts just came up. Let's lay them out."
«Yes.»
Baekcheong, half-dead, was being moved through the inner passages of Mt. Veltical toward the summit—a healing ground they called God's Land. The Sabi were split in two. Ahumrek's faction, which held Baekcheong as a hero, and Kalka-kum's faction, which stood against it.
If I tried to kill Baekcheong, Ahumrek's faction would certainly move to stop me. Kill the Sabi of that faction, and Kalka-kum's faction would stand in my way as well. Start cutting down both, and there was a high chance the Lord of the Great Sea would appear. Alkema's father stood at the summit of the Sabi's highest class—the Ahumrek faction. She had said Ahumrek would compensate me if I let Baekcheong go, but according to the Lord of the Great Sea, Baekcheong was someone I could never release.
Put it that way, and the routes split in two.
ROUTE 1
Kill Baekcheong → War with the entire Sabi race → The Lord of the Great Sea appears → BAD ENDING
ROUTE 2
Let Baekcheong go → A fully recovered Baekcheong comes for payback → BAD... ENDING?
I could play for the second route, wait until Baekcheong ambushed us, and wreck him then. Somehow that sat wrong. If possible, I wanted to kill him here, so no future trouble would be left behind. Do that, though, and it became Route 1.
«Even so, if we infiltrate, assassinate only Baekcheong, and withdraw, I suspect Ahumrek's faction of the Sabi will pursue us. And if we slaughter those who give chase, I worry the Dragon God may appear once more.»
"Hmm..."
-Boss! Boss!-
Darky, awake for the first time in a while, sat on my thigh no bigger than Thumbelina, tugged at my clothes, and called me.
"Hm? What?"
-How 'bout we send word to the priest class through that white lizard, yeah?-
"Word?"
-Didn't Baekcheong attack Boss first? Even the Dragon God admitted it, yeah. So it's justified. Justified... aw, what was that word. Ugh.-
"A just cause?"
-Yes sir! That's the one! Just cause! The just cause belongs to Boss, it does! You tell that white lizard you've got a righteous cause, so hand Baekcheong over, yeah. They refuse, and Boss gets a lawful cause to fight the whole Sabi race, don't he? Play it that way, and I figure even the Dragon God can't do a thing!-
A just cause, huh. A simple idea, but worth trying?
«That is your own thought, is it not, Darky? Even granting a just cause, should the Sabi die in great numbers, the Dragon God might take it poorly.»
-Nah, that ain't it. The Dragon God I saw didn't look like the sort who punishes folks with a proper reason and a just cause. Didn't he fix Madam Franc up as a deal with Boss? He's the type who lives and dies by cause, he is!-
«That is... true. And yet.»
"Darky's got a point. I read the Lord of the Great Sea as a pretty rational sort myself."
With me seconding Darky, Franc gave her answer as well.
«Then I shall trust in it, too.»
«Then we ought to send word to the chieftains of the Sabi through Alkema, and wait. They may call it insolent and offer battle at once, so we should make ready to fight even as we wait.»
"Right. And if the Sabi pick the fight first, we can hit back. But it can't turn into a fight because we started the trouble, so even if you get angry, Franc, bear with it a little."
«Eh— ah, I, that was—»
Perhaps remembering how she had just threatened Alkema, Franc waved her hands in a flustered, adorable little flurry.
"I know. You did it for me."
«Y-yes. Yes.»
Once Franc and I had roughly settled the direction we would take, I went back to Alkema. She looked at me with a slightly frightened face.
"I've decided to count your race as provisional enemies too. You're working to restore Baekcheong, and he tried to kill me."
Bluff first.
=W-wait a moment...!=
"Hear me out first."
=...=
"I count you as provisional enemies, but that doesn't mean I want to slaughter intelligent beings like you without restraint."
That was not what I actually felt. Still, if swallowing a small annoyance would spare me a large one, I would swallow the small one.
"So carry my words to both chieftains of your race. Hand Baekcheong over and avoid a clash with me—or fight me to protect him, and die, all of you."
=Ah.=
I caught the dazed Alkema by the shoulder, unfolded a Space Leap a fair way into the sky, laid a Blue Space Wall beneath our feet, and set us down on it.
"Watch closely."
I turned her gaze away from the western peaks, toward a saw-toothed stretch of land as jagged as the west coast back home, set Mana Cannon Mk1 to 50,000 TP, and sent about ten shots toward the horizon without a pause.
Mana Cannon Mk1
Output: 50,000 TP · Volley: 10
Target: Horizon
KRA-KOOM— KRA-KOOM— KRA-KOOM—!
Black-hole voids blanketed the horizon, erasing water, mountain, tree, and earth alike. Alkema's snout fell open, and drool strung and dripped. Let her drool. This time I wiped away every storm cloud choking the sky with the amber Space Wall, and bared the moon.
=...Ah.=
A strengthless groan slipped out of her, and she collapsed in a heap. Fear and despair welled up in her eyes. Inwardly, I smiled a smile of private triumph.
Stoking the fear had worked. The amber Space Wall that had erased the spiked lizard's head, now seeming to fill the whole sky—an illusion I had arranged—had punched straight through her terror. She had taken it, without a doubt, to mean that thing could punch through her own skull.
"I'm built for long-range combat. And Franc is a Transcendent-grade giant, built for close range. You know perfectly well how strong a party gets when close and long range are properly matched. Don't you?"
=...=
«Answer, lizardfolk.»
=Y-yes!=
I looked at the eastern sky, brightening little by little. Morning would come soon. The Sabi might be nocturnal, but with their race's extinction on the line, they would not drag their feet. Looking at Alkema, her white scales gone a bloodless blue, I spoke with the finality of a judge handing down a sentence.
=Yes...=