Grendel Mountains (1)
Day broke, and with morning came the train’s departure.
As one would expect from a train powered by magic, it didn’t need an engineer, so it could run without any trouble at all.
Even if I hadn’t been here, I figured it would have made its way to the beastmen’s village all on its own, carrying no passengers at all—just like that ghost town we’d passed through a little earlier.
“...So there isn’t anyone on this train after all.”
I explained the situation to Rain and his party.
Last night had been too late, and besides, they’d been caught up in the tentacle ambush by accident, so I hadn’t said anything then. Up until yesterday, the train had been full of people, but then the beastman adventurers had suddenly turned on everyone, taken hostages, and vanished, I told them.
I didn’t know the exact details either.
Still, it was clear enough that because of those bastards, every passenger on the train had disappeared.
“The ones who attacked us were beastmen too.”
Rain said through clenched teeth.
He’d probably been trying not to show it, but after being driven to the brink by a beastman attack and hearing about the other adventurers disappearing, he was furious.
Beastmen and humans had never exactly gotten along. Louis, for her part, had entered the beastman race class as a dragon race member rather than an ordinary beastman, but her origins were different, so she didn’t get saddled with the kind of public prejudice beastmen usually faced.
And she was a dragon.
It didn’t really sink in, but she was a dragon—a powerful race.
“Yeah, yeah. That’s enough. That’ll do.”
-schlrrk
I told the tentacle while it was fixing my hair.
Honestly, the biggest reason I kept this thing around was that, oddly enough, it was excellent at doing hair.
If I wanted, I could even make it wash me during a massage or a bath, but that kind of thing tended to invite a lot of misunderstandings, so I tried not to.
“Why would the beastmen suddenly do something like this?”
“How should I know?”
At any rate, these mysterious incidents caused by a large number of beastmen...
I had a rough idea why, but not the specifics.
If it were connected to the story of the scoundrel, I could probably piece it together well enough, but unfortunately, I didn’t remember anything about that bastard causing trouble that would make the beastmen suddenly flip out.
Did two quests overlap?
What I did know was the beastmen-and-humans-hostile storyline.
I’d already seen a hint of it when I tried to interrogate the beastman trackers I’d captured yesterday.
[A sudden blaze consumed the targets!]
[“Ugh, what’s going on?!”]
[“Back off. It’s a curse-type flame.”]
The massive fire that suddenly swallowed them up had clearly been an act meant to conceal information on purpose.
So I hadn’t been able to read their memories or pry out anything useful, but that only made one thing clearer to me: there was some kind of “bastard” behind this.
Among the beastmen, there weren’t any NPCs at least who could use curse-based black magic like that.
In other words, the culprit had to be an outsider.
Someone who wasn’t originally from Sabna, the beastman kingdom—some outsider black mage or something had gotten involved.
Or someone could’ve stored black magic in a scroll, I guess. But they usually don’t bother with that kind of thing.
Well, if I kept looking, I might find other possibilities too.
“...So, what are you planning to do?”
It wasn’t exactly a matter of great importance to me.
“Huh?”
Rain tilted his head.
For one thing, I didn’t have the time to escort these guys all the way to a human village.
So they were apparently just following me without really thinking about it, but it seemed like I should at least ask.
“I’ve got my own business, so I’m heading for Sabna. But what about you lot? Are you really okay going to a place where beastmen live?”
Only a few days ago, they’d been attacked by beastmen and driven right to the edge of death.
If I hadn’t been there, they probably would’ve all died in the forest. And considering there had even been pursuers who came after them later, even if they’d managed to detox the poison, the ending would probably have been the same.
Could they really face those beastmen again after all that?
And if, worst-case scenario, this wasn’t just a few resentful beastmen but the whole race had turned hostile toward humans...
Then these guys wouldn’t get out alive.
Come to think of it, what about the cargo? There was no way this was a situation where they could keep transporting goods.
Obviously, the Turk Merchant Guild’s employees were all human too, and the guild itself was human-owned.
Elves only looked down on humans; they didn’t necessarily hate them, so business had still been possible. But if the beastmen were actively hostile to humans, then that was the end of that.
If I knew how to operate the train, I’d just load them up and send them back, but the problem was that the employees had vanished along with Louis, so that was that.
“...I think it’ll be fine. Saying all beastmen are like that is just prejudice. Besides, if you think about it that way, humans have bandits too, so we’re not exactly in a position to talk.”
“I see.”
Still, it looked like these guys were all right with it.
At Rain’s words, Aria and Thomas quietly nodded in agreement, and since they didn’t seem to hold any particular grudge against beastmen themselves, it seemed fine to bring them along.
“Then it’s settled. We’ll keep heading for Sabna. But before that...”
“Before that?”
So I’d better take a little insurance.
I could put a barrier on them, sure, but I’d already cast a simple barrier on all the employees. Still, they’d all disappeared in the end.
That barrier had only been set to prevent them from being harmed, which meant that even if they didn’t get injured, they still couldn’t resist those beastman adventurers.
-schlrrk
“...Let’s give it a try.”
“Uh, that’s a tentacle, isn’t it?”
“Yeah. It looks like this, but it’s pretty capable.”
I set the tentacle on my lap.
【 Holy Cursed Black Tentacle – Lv.160(★) 】
※Special trait: Split
When I saw this tentacle again on the train, a good idea had come to me—specifically, about that Split mark on it.
It was an ability that divided its stats in half in exchange for creating another self, a clone identical to itself.
Normally, only slime-type monsters could use it, but for some reason this tentacle seemed able to do it too.
Wasn’t its original level around 320?
Right now, its level was 160.
Probably the other half was with Louis and the others, but for the moment, this was all I had.
If I kept splitting the split, the level would drop to around 40.
At that point its size would get smaller and it would clearly turn into a one-sided trash mob, but if I raised its level further from here...
-zzzt!
“Huh? W-what are you doing?!”
“The tentacle’s getting bigger and bigger...!”
“I’m just sharing a little of my mana with it. Don’t worry. It’s not like I’m planning to eat you or anything.”
...Though in another sense, maybe I could eat them?
-schlrrrrk!
As the tentacle on my lap drank in my mana, it began to grow larger and larger.
【 Holy Cursed Black Tentacle – Lv.160(★) 】
【 Holy Cursed Black Tentacle – Lv.210(★) 】
【 Holy Cursed Black Tentacle – Lv.290(★) 】
【 Holy Cursed Black Tentacle – Lv.320(★) 】
【 Holy Cursed Black Tentacle – Lv.440(★) 】
The thing’s level kept rising.
Aside from simply absorbing experience, it could also gain levels by absorbing mana, but when I’d experimented with that before, the efficiency had been absolute trash, so I hadn’t used it much.
At least it doesn’t drain mental power. That’s a relief.
Even now it was guzzling mana like crazy.
It was only something I could do because I was confident in my mana recovery, but if anyone else tried it, they might actually die. So yeah, it was dangerous.
Still, this should be enough, right?
【 Holy Cursed Black Tentacle – Lv.500(★) 】
Good. At least the size stopped at a reasonable limit.
Its volume had stopped increasing at a certain point, so thankfully it didn’t end up devouring the train or anything.
Not that it had ever been unable to adjust its size freely in the first place.
“Uh... Is that really okay, Sian?”
Right now, it was about the size of an adult man, writhing on my lap.
Rain and Aria, who had been watching from the side, were naturally stunned, and Thomas had wrapped herself in rock armor just in case the same thing as yesterday happened again.
“Yeah, it’s fine.”
At this point, I’d leveled it all the way to max.
It was small, but in terms of raw stats, it was far stronger than it had been when it invaded Astral City.
Of course, it was still only high level in the sense of level, so compared to an actual level 500 monster it was much weaker. Still, this was probably enough to be comparable to a level 300-something dragon.
Maybe about twice as strong as Louis?
-schlrrk! Schlrrk!
“That’s right. Are you happy to be back to normal?”
Then the tentacle licked my face, and for some reason it felt like a dog licking its owner’s face—like a retriever or something.
-schlrrk! Schlrrk!
Next it stretched across my whole body and even burrowed under my clothes. As it sent tendrils over my chest and legs, a white mucus began to ooze out.
In return, I took some salt out of my subspace and sprinkled a little over the tentacles.
-schlrurururk...! Schlrurururk!
“Hey, why are you suddenly acting out?!”
What kind of cheap trick was that?
Maybe I should really just pickle it in a salt jar?
“All right, calm down. And shrink back down and come here.”
-schlrrk.
The tentacle shrank to the size of a puppy and climbed back onto my lap. If its size was small enough, it was honestly pretty cute.
The bigger it got, the grosser it became.
Hmm. At this rate, each one should be around level 166 or so.
Anyway, this seemed about right.
A level around 500 should be enough, right? It should be no problem against most beastmen, and even if a high-level wyvern came at us, it probably wouldn’t be a big issue.
That settled the preparation.
“Now split. This time, not into two—into three.”
-schlrrk!
And then the tentacle became three of the same size.
Three tentacles crawled all over the train.
Seen one way, it was a pretty rare sight. Seen another way, it was downright horrifying.
“It’s increased.”
Aria watched with obvious interest.
Were the humans of this world not bothered by tentacles at all? I mean, sure, different cultures and environments could make that possible, but... well, whatever.
“More exactly, it split. One became three.”
“I see...”
【 Holy Cursed Tentacle Triple Threat – Lv.166(★) 】
※Special trait: Split.
The name had gotten weird, but it turned out just as expected.
“All right. Then each of you take one of these. They’re small, but they can swallow a minotaur without breaking a sweat, so they should be fine as escorts.”
“Really?”
“Y-you want us to carry those tentacles?!”
“Sian, I don’t think that’s a very good idea.”
...Hm?
What, did these guys hate tentacles?
“What’s wrong? Why are you all reacting like that? I made these specially to protect you. Got a problem with them?”
“Well... people’s stares aside, that thing is sticky and gross, so honestly, just touching it is...”
That was odd.
This wasn’t the reaction I’d expected.
No, wait—Aria didn’t seem to find it gross at all. In fact, she already looked like she’d gotten friendly with the tentacle.
“Wow, it’s cute. Since it’s small, it’s easy to carry around too.”
She was already talking to it like that.
“Haaah... don’t lick me so much. It tickles.”
And now the tentacle had gone into her clothes and was writhing against her chest, yet she wasn’t resisting at all...
...
I looked at the other adventurers for a moment.
Rain had reluctantly set the tentacle on his hand, but he was keeping it as far from his body as possible and turning his head away.
And the dwarf had actually built a stone wall so the tentacle couldn’t touch her at all. The poor thing just kept climbing the wall like a snail.
But Aria, rather than pulling the tentacle out of her chest, seemed to be enjoying it instead—
“Hah, ahh?! T-there’s too much over there—ah, hihit...”
Ah, I was used to things like that.
It wasn’t like I hadn’t seen girls like this once or twice since arriving here.
And there was something I learned later: the god Aria worshipped was one who had shared wisdom with humanity and greatly contributed to the development of life.
Can you guess who that god was?
It was none other than Divabella, the Transcendent of Time.
The one who had personally raised and taught the Great Sages, and whose hobby was walking around naked with his women.
The “Earth Mother” that the church called upon when using divine power did refer to Crecia, but apart from the teachings of the church, their underlying ideology actually worshipped Divabella.
Come to think of it, Aria did give off a feeling a bit like the Grand Sage Alena. Even her looks, when Alena was blonde, shared some similarities, and her personality too was strangely similar in subtle ways...
Well, she’s gotten friendly with the tentacle, so I guess that’s not a bad thing.