Rival? (1)
The Snake Bandits.
A bandit company that operated in the vicinity of Baidu, the wealthiest city in the south. Assassination and ambush were their craft, and venomous snakes their favored instrument — which was how they came by the name.
Their usual prey were the smaller merchant caravans and tourists bound for Baidu. Compared to other outfits, the harm they caused was almost trivial, and so Baidu never paid them any real attention. The city preferred to spend its strength wiping out the other gangs.
The Desert Scorpion Bandits who ranged across the south of Baidu, the Twin-Hump Camel Bandits to the north, the Barbary Sheep Bandits to the east — those were large-scale operations that never shied from plunder or murder. Naturally, they commanded far more of the city's concern.
But not a single soul among Baidu's upper crust knew the truth.
The Snake Bandits had been quietly fattening themselves in the dark.
Unlike the other companies, which simply raided villages and moved on, they had chosen to absorb them. Baidu being the prosperous city it was, a considerable number of small settlements dotted the land around it. Operating out of the west, the Snake Bandits swallowed every village in that direction and brought them to heel. Then they conscripted the young and turned them into bandits.
The youths who at first refused, insisting they would never become thieves, eventually drowned in the pleasures the Snake Bandits provided — and volunteered of their own accord.
By devouring villages instead of merely looting them, the Snake Bandits succeeded in swelling to an enormous size without anyone being the wiser. And even after their ranks had grown, they never showed their true face. They went on operating in secret, just as they always had.
Why, even now, with their power so greatly increased, did the Snake Bandits continue to operate at a level beneath the other companies?
Just what was the true aim of their chief — Vikendi Salmus?
In a darkened room, a sturdy middle-aged man with a short, athletic crop of hair was bowing his head before a woman whose expression was steeped in languor.
The shadows lay so thick that her face could not be seen. One thing, however, was certain: her hair fell in rich waves all the way to her chest, a deep navy touched with violet.
"....."
Tension clung to the man's downturned face. He did not dare lift his head. She had not told him he could.
Still bowed, he opened his mouth.
"A suppression force has been dispatched to put down the Snake Bandits. Counting Masters, Fairies, and common soldiers together, they number some three hundred. The commander is a 4-Star mage — Prince Owen Pazniri."
"Is that so? Hmm... that's strange. I distinctly told you not to do anything that would catch the Witch Queen's eye. So why, then, was this carved in plain sight on the Oasis Clock Tower?"
A snake shall swallow magic!
"I swear upon the gods, I never ordered my men to do any such thing."
"And you think an incompetent like a god is going to stand witness for you?"
"...What?"
"....."
"I-I'm sorry."
He had come within a breath of lifting his head and looking her full in the face. He ducked it again in a hurry and apologized.
Amusement colored the woman's voice as she spoke to him.
"Want to see my face? Then raise your head."
"No. The fault was mine."
"I said it's all right to look up. Come now. Raise your head."
Caught by that languid voice as if by a spell, the man lifted his head.
"....!"
His eyes flew wide.
"What's the matter? Did I startle you?"
"...No."
The person seated before him was, without question, a woman. The face, however, was a man's — and not just any man's. It was his own.
Nothing in the world was more nauseating than watching a face identical to his own speak in a ripe, womanly voice.
"Anyway, go on. A suppression force of about three hundred, a greenhorn for a commander — I've got that much. But you didn't drag me all the way out here just for that, I assume? Because if you did, I really will do something about it."
"N-no. It isn't that. It's just... Plasma is with the suppression force."
At the words do something, the man rushed to speak. When this woman said she would do something, she meant it — and whatever she did tended to end in a very, very bad place.
"Plas~ ma~. So they sent Plasma, did they~?"
The name drew a smile of genuine interest across her lips. A stronger card than I expected, Oscal, she thought.
Plasma was one of the Witch Queen's seven Fairies, and the second strongest among them. A Magic Swordsman who could wield blade and spell in the same breath, he was a troublesome opponent even before one considered the rest — for among the six attributes granted to Masters and Fairies (None, Light, Darkness, Fire, Water, and Nature), he commanded a special attribute that belonged to none of them: Lightning.
Lightning was a special attribute. There was no such thing as a perfect countermeasure against it. That single attribute alone was why she considered Plasma the most troublesome of the Witch Queen's seven.
"And? The losses will sting, I'll grant you — but the Snake Bandits can handle someone like Plasma, can't they?"
Plasma was one of fewer than two hundred 7-Star powerhouses on the entire continent of Gaiarium. And this woman had just said that a mere bandit company could stand against a man like that.
Which meant the Snake Bandits possessed far more force than the world had ever been allowed to see.
"Don't tell me you called me here to ask for reinforcements against him?"
"No. I am merely pointing out that one of the Fairies who guard the Witch Queen has left her side."
"What? Pfft — ahahahaha!"
"....."
The woman burst out laughing. The smile never left her mouth as she asked him,
"You've never set foot inside the Mage's Palace, have you?"
"I— no. I have not."
"Mm~ so that's why you're saying something so stupid."
"...My apologies."
"No, no. Saying stupid things is the prerogative of stupid people. Yes. Feel free to exercise that right all you like."
"....."
The man very nearly let his face twist. He was not so weak that he had to swallow humiliation like this from anyone. But the woman sitting in front of him was far stronger than he was — no, far was a word that did not begin to cover it.
If a being like that called him stupid, then he was stupid. Deny it, and she would do something about that too.
Damn it.
The resentment, though, he could not quite swallow.
"So don't you dare attack the Witch Queen just because one piece has stepped off the board, you idiot. Understood?"
"...Thank you for the advice."
He managed the reply, just barely. She had said it, but he had never actually fought inside the Mage's Palace, and so he could not fully take the words to heart.
"Still. Those children who were all huddled together have come outside. I can't very well let this opportunity slip by."
The woman smiled.
"....."
The man who had been facing the woman only a moment before opened his eyes in bed. Attractive women lay around him, not a thread on their bodies — his Fairies.
"What a ghost of a woman."
He shook his head, pushed aside the Fairy coiled around him, sat up, and drank some water.
"Mmh... Master, you're already up? Hm?"
Roused by the rough shove, one of the Fairies rubbed her eyes and spoke. She tilted her head at the look on her Master's face. Then something seemed to occur to her, and she asked,
"Did you meet that woman?"
"I did. I thought I'd gotten fairly strong. I'm nowhere close. I didn't even notice she was using magic."
"....."
The place he had met the woman had been none other than his own dream. She was a mage comparable to the Witch Queen — no, perhaps even greater.
A chill ran down his spine. If that woman had decided to kill him, he would have died without so much as a twitch.
How much stronger did he have to become before he could face her? Before he could even see through her magic? The thought was bleak.
"What did she say?"
"She told me to kill Plasma."
"And reinforcements?"
"None. She'll probably do something once the fighting starts, but... that was all she said."
"Then the losses are going to be ugly... I really can't stand that woman. She treats us like tools she can use whenever she feels like it."
"That's why we get stronger. Strong enough that she can't use us as she pleases."
He was still speaking with his Fairy when a voice called from outside.
"Have you risen, Chief?"
The man who had come for him addressed him as Chief.
"I have. What is it?"
"The ones who departed from Baidu have arrived at Kiba Village. And... they attacked the village. In the process, the 8th and 10th Units were wiped out."
"Tsk. Damn bandits never listen, do they. I told those bastards not to attack."
"Th-that's..."
Crack—!
The man stretched the stiffness from his body and stepped outside in nothing but a robe. Fortunately, the sash at his waist kept certain things from being put on display.
"Enslave the families of every bastard who disobeyed my orders. Kill anyone who resists. Turn the women into sex slaves."
"Y-yes, Chief Salmus."
The man's name was Vikendi Salmus, chief of the Snake Bandits.
Blood slicked the streets. Corpses of camels, snakes, and people lay scattered everywhere, and blood had been flung across the outer walls of buildings and across the ground. In the heat, the stench rose fast.
"Nnngh. I'm beat. Aquaril — you hurt anywhere?"
"No, I am unharmed. Are you all right, Master?"
"Obviously. Kanisia, Abraham — you two?"
"I'm fine."
"I too remain unharmed, Lord Alan."
I nodded at the sight of my party, not a scratch on any of them.
It had been ten days since the suppression force I belonged to had left Baidu, and we had decided to take a short rest here in Kiba Village to regroup. I already knew the Snake Bandits had absorbed the western villages, so I had told my party not to let their guard down.
Not long after, the Snake Bandits came pouring in from every direction. And that was not all. The villagers who had been smiling and welcoming us only moments before turned into bandits themselves and fell on us.
Caught off guard, the suppression force took considerable casualties in the first clash. Crossing the desert had already drained everyone's stamina, and the soldiers who had drunk the water the villagers offered them could not muster any strength at all.
But the suppression force had some thirty Masters and Fairies among its ranks. The counterattack came quickly.
"What a waste... I wanted to kill the enemy captain myself."
"Then you can have the next one."
Kanisia licked her lips, eyeing the corpse crumpled at my feet with open regret.
There had been two among the enemy worth watching, and those two had been the captains of the Snake Bandits who hit the suppression force. One of them had charged the nearest target — me — and died on my sword. He had been a 3-Star Master, but he was no match for someone standing on the threshold of 4-Star.
On top of that, my Strength stat currently sat at a staggering 70 points — 62 plus 8. Among 3-Stars, there was not a soul who could stand against that.
As for the other bandit captain...
"Ptew! This nobody actually thought he could take me."
He was going up in flames.
Courtesy of Chae Gillard — the 4-Star mage who'd received the same welcome from Plasma that I had.