Desert City Baidu
"Nngh... haaah..."
The man bound to the chair stared into empty air with glazed eyes, a low moan leaking from his throat. Light poured down from above, and his hairless scalp flashed beneath it again and again, gleaming like a lamp. Sweat sheeted off him in rivers, and drool hung in a string from his lip. There was no focus in his eyes. They were open, but whoever lived behind them was gone.
A woman watched him with open curiosity.
A cloak shimmering with violet light hung across her shoulders. A tall, pointed hat sat on her head, and in one hand she held a staff whose tip curled inward like a snail's shell. Whether the tailor had simply run short of cloth or the cut had been deliberate, her clothes were strikingly brief, and the pale, generous swell of her breasts lay half-bared in a way that was nothing short of mesmerizing.
"Lady Crow."
"What is it?"
A man had approached and spoken from behind her. He addressed the woman as Crow. She answered without taking her eyes off the practitioner bound to the chair.
"Plan Six has fallen through."
"Plan Six... you mean Chinnimoni."
"Yes, my lady."
"I know."
Even with a failed operation laid at her feet, she answered as if it were nothing of consequence. Not that she was entirely indifferent — one eyebrow had lifted, just slightly.
"It's strange, though. Haggis should have been more than enough to put the Blood Axe King down. And yet he died instead... We sent plenty of people, didn't we?"
"We did."
She had already known the operation in Chinnimoni had failed. Haggis, the one who had died there at Alan's hands, had been her Fairy. A Master and a Fairy were bound by the soul. Even if they stood on opposite ends of the continent, each would feel the other's death.
"So the Blood Axe King was stronger than I expected, then?"
"That does not appear to be the case. The Blood Axe King is dead as well."
"...He died too?"
At that, she finally turned to look at the man.
The instant her gaze settled on him, he flinched in spite of himself. It had been fine while she had her back to him. The moment she turned, the pressure that rolled off her was anything but a joke.
He was strong. Strong enough that no one, anywhere, would dare dismiss him. And yet, before this woman he had served for going on five years, he felt infinitely small. That was how far above him she stood — so far he did not dare lift his eyes.
"Are you certain? The Blood Axe King is really dead?"
"Yes. A great many soldiers saw the body."
"Haggis and the Blood Axe King, dead at the same time... Heh. Interesting."
"My lady?"
"Then who became the next ruler of Chinnimoni?"
"Gigoras Mudan, commander of the Paladins, has taken the throne. He is calling himself the Saint King."
"Pfft! A 3-Star, and he has the gall to style himself a king? There are just too many people in this world who don't know their place."
"What would you have us do?"
"What do you mean, what would I have you do? We send someone again. Chinnimoni is a city that will serve as our stronghold if the worst comes. We have to have it."
"Then whom shall we send?"
"Just pick any 4-Star and send them. Do I have to spell out even that?"
"My apologies. It will be done. Then I shall take my leave..."
His report finished, the man turned to go.
"Wait."
"Yes, Lady Crow."
Her voice stopped him in the doorway.
"That place — you know the one. The little backwater at the very end of the line."
"Which... ah. Do you mean Indigo, my lady?"
"That's it. Indigo. We ran Operation 99 there too, didn't we?"
"We did."
"And that one failed as well."
"Yes. The Dead Mancer, who was central to the operation, was killed, and we scrapped Operation 99. That said, we had treated it as a lottery ticket and invested accordingly, so the losses were not significant."
"Hnn..."
She folded her arms and made a small sound in her throat. The gesture only made her waist stand out all the more, but the man had no attention to spare for it. Five years in her service had taught him well. That hum was a habit — the one she fell into whenever something sat wrong with her.
"Is something troubling you, my lady?"
"Don't you find it strange?"
"My lady?"
"The operation in Indigo failed. Then the one in Chinnimoni failed. Two failures in a row. Is that really a coincidence?"
"...Does Lady Crow believe someone knew our plans and moved to interfere?"
"Who knows? I don't know either."
"I will look into it."
"Do that. You can go."
"Yes, my lady."
The moment she turned away again, the man let out a breath he had not realized he was holding. The pressure that had been crushing down on him vanished with her gaze, and just enduring it had left him wrung out.
Looks like I'm going to be busy for a while.
He sighed again, and this time it had nothing to do with relief. He already had more than enough on his plate. On top of everything else, he would have to send people back to Indigo — a place they had already written off. She had played the last of it as if it barely mattered, but he knew better. What she had actually told him to do was find out why the operations in Indigo and Chinnimoni had failed.
He picked up his pace, already moving to carry out her orders.
When we left Indigo for Chinnimoni, we had to hoof it the whole way. There hadn't been a single carriage running that route, so even with money in our pockets we'd had no choice but to walk.
This time was different.
This is why people live in cities.
In Chinnimoni, where trade with other cities ran thick and constant, finding a carriage bound for anywhere was easy. And Kanisia — who had been run off her feet for days — had somehow still found the time to arrange one. Better yet, we were the only passengers, so there was no one else's mood to worry about. We could ride to the next city in actual comfort.
This woman is a saint. A goddamn saint. I'm dying.
"So, Alan. What are you going to do from here?"
"From here? Hmm... from here..."
Kanisia had gotten bored enough to start a conversation. Her question pulled the memories of my previous life up without any effort at all.
Who did we fight in Chapter Four again? Ah. Right.
The next city was a desert city — or more precisely, a city that had grown up around a vast oasis. Baidu.
The name somehow called to mind a certain Chinese search engine, though it had nothing whatsoever to do with that. In this world, Baidu was a wealthy city modeled on the Dubai of my previous life.
Chinnimoni had made a great deal of money trading with other cities, but it could not begin to compare with Baidu. Where Chinnimoni's specialty was the byproducts harvested from dungeon monsters, Baidu's flagship goods were Mana Crystal Stones — catalysts for magic and alchemy that could be found nowhere else — and Oasis Water, steeped in a strange and potent mana. Both were wildly popular with anyone in a mage-line profession, and the city raked in an absurd amount of money as a result.
And a city that rich was, naturally, ruled by a queen who was absurdly strong. She was a Master of no less than 7-Star rank, and in this world they called her the Witch Queen.
Which raised an obvious question. If a 7-Star showed up as early as Chapter Four, how was a player supposed to kill her?
The answer was simple.
You don't fight the Witch Queen.
The main story of Chapter Four was about fighting the desert bandits who had been licking their chops over Baidu for years.
And Palos's Bird doesn't show up here.
"For now, we go to Baidu. Like I said before."
"Will those bastards be there too?"
"Probably. No way they'd just sit there sucking their thumbs while a city that rich sits unattended. But we won't be fighting them there."
"What? Why not?"
"Did you forget who rules Baidu?"
"The Witch Queen, right? What about her?"
"The Witch Queen is one of the strongest people in the south. And even though she styles herself a queen, she's still loyal to the Ferdium Empire. If Palos's Bird goes after her the way they went after the Blood Axe King, there is nothing we can do. There will be people there who can actually take her on."
Kanisia said nothing.
I had founded it myself, but the secret organization I had put together — Snake — was still painfully weak. Calling it an organization was generous. It was closer to a club. Four members, all of them still only 3-Star. Palos's Bird, which had powerhouses to spare, could sneeze in our direction and scatter us like leaves.
If the Witch Queen and Palos's Bird ever came to blows, Baidu would be razed to the ground. Throwing ourselves into that as hatchling snakes would only get us killed. There was no reason for a shrimp to wade into a fight between whales.
"And even if it turned out the Witch Queen was actually one of Palos's Bird, we still couldn't do a thing. We're too weak to touch a single hair on her head."
"Tsk. So what are you planning to do, then?"
When you were weak, wanting something and being able to do it were two different countries. Kanisia knew that as well as I did.
"What else?"
I shrugged.
"We grind dungeons."
And while we were at it, we would clear out some bandits and knock out the story too.
It took ten days by carriage before we finally reached Baidu, said to be the wealthiest city in the south.
"Nnngh. Even riding in a carriage this long is brutal."
I climbed down and stretched until my spine popped. The stiffness in my body eased, if only a little.
"Here's the rest of the fare. Thank you for your trouble."
While I was working the knots out of my back, Kanisia settled the remaining payment with the coachman and came back. The man seemed to be planning to stay in Baidu for a few days himself; he took the carriage and disappeared somewhere without another word.
"Let's go in."
"Yeah."
At Kanisia's words I took a place at the very end of the line stretching away from the gate. To kill the boredom, I started checking the status windows of the people ahead of us.
Mage. Mage. Mage. Mage... They're all mages.
A city of wealth, ruled by the Witch Queen — it made sense that mages would flock here. As her title implied, the Witch Queen held an advanced mage class.
"Ugh... this place isn't even in the same league as Chinnimoni."
Kanisia kept wiping at her face as she spoke. The pink hair that was her signature was already dark with sweat.
...That is obscenely sexy.
A beautiful woman soaked in sweat carried a demonic kind of charm that could bewitch any man. And sure enough, the men around us were sneaking glances at Kanisia while pretending they weren't.
Masters who could summon Fairies had little interest in the opposite sex. If anything, they were wary of anyone who tried to get close. Ordinary people were different. Ordinary people met someone they loved, got married, and lived quietly together — the same as people in my previous life.
Is it Kanisia's turn today?!
It had taken a full ten days to get here. Which meant it had been ten days without sex. The coachman had been there, and so had Abraham, Kanisia's Fairy, so there had been no happy time to be had. However much I liked sex, I was not about to put on a show in front of other men.
I should set the mood later.
"How about you, Aquaril? Holding up all right?"
"Yes. I am quite all right."
Unlike Kanisia and Abraham, who were wilting in the heat, Aquaril was taking it relatively well. Of course she was. She was water-attribute.
Good thing I changed the attribute.
I had switched my own primary attribute to water as well. Thanks to that, I was barely sweating, while Kanisia looked like she had been caught in a rainstorm.
"I wanna get inside already..."
Kanisia leaned against Abraham and whined like a child. Whining, unfortunately, did not make long lines any shorter. No magic in the world worked like that.
About ten minutes later, it happened.
"OROLLOLLOLL!!!!!!"
"Huh?"
A bizarre cry rolled in from somewhere beyond the walls.
"Damn it! Why now of all times!"
"Get out of the way! Get against the wall!"
"Everyone! This way, please! Follow our instructions!"
The sound threw the crowd into chaos. From inside the gates, soldiers came pouring out — no armor, just light clothes and drawn weapons.
A thunder of movement rose in the distance. Through a boiling curtain of sand, figures appeared astride enormous scorpions. Every one of them was dark-skinned, and every one of them was dressed in filthy rags.
"Let's plunder Baidu!"
"OROLLOLLOLL!!!!!!"
"Ah. Bandits."
Experience points. No — desert bandits.