Kumo Desu ga, Nani ka? (LN) - Volume 13 - Chapter 4

4 Negotiating with Bigwigs for a Living

So I’m punishing her.

“Wait a minute! I let them go in the end, didn’t I?! And besides! If we just let them leave like that, who knows what they would’ve done?! That’s why I put a Coma status effect on Ms. Oka! Now they won’t be able to make a move for a good fifteen days! See! I’m a smart girl! So you should really let me off the hook!”

A compelling testimony.

But she still needs punishment!

“Pgyaaaah!”

As Vampy shrieks like a bird being strangled, Phelmina looks on with a satisfied smirk.

You realize you were complicit in this too, though, right?

“Eeek?!”

So I punish her, too.

That being said, Yamada and the others still managed to escape in the end, and putting Ms. Oka into a deep sleep was actually a relatively smart move. I generously let them off with only a light punishment.

For the sake of Vampy and Phelmina’s dignity, I won’t get into the specifics.

The status condition Vampy used on Ms. Oka, Coma, is apparently an advanced version of the Sleep condition.

Just as the name implies, it puts the person into a sleep from which they can’t awaken normally and it’s incredibly difficult to undo.

I have no idea when she picked up a skill with a status condition like that…

In fact, I’ve never even heard of such a condition…

Hrm. I thought I had an idea of most skills in existence, but I guess this is a reminder that there are still skills out there I don’t know about.

According to Vampy, the coma she put Ms. Oka into will wear off on its own in about fifteen days.

Why fifteen days? Because any longer than that, and her body would start rapidly deteriorating and she’d die without ever waking up.

Yikes!

I mean, I guess it makes sense. You can’t eat while you’re in a coma, so if it goes on for that long, it’s bound to be bad news.

As long as Ms. Oka’s in a coma, Yamada and the rest of them won’t be able to move too much, and Ms. Oka won’t be able to indoctrinate them, either.

Ms. Oka’s source of information is Potimas, after all.

Knowing him, he’s definitely taught her some messed-up lies.

There’s no telling if that could cause Yamada and his friends to do something crazy.

In that sense, it was definitely a good call to put Ms. Oka into a coma.

It’ll keep Yamada and the others pinned in place for the next fifteen days, and we can work on other stuff in the meantime.

We definitely have a lot to do.

First, there’s the matter of internal affairs in the demon territory.

We’ve shoved all that off on Balto.

From the end of the big war till now, Mr. Oni and the rest of the commanders have been focused on postwar cleanup efforts, but that’s mostly settled down now.

With Boobs back, too, we can probably return to business as usual.

Which brings us to our next step: an armed expedition to the elf village!

Yep, you heard me! The elf village is going down!

Now that the big human-demon battle is over, it’s about time we get rid of that PITA Potimas, which naturally means we’re embarking on a campaign to destroy the elf village.

We’re not talking about the throwaway bodies Potimas keeps flinging at us.

No, this time we’re gonna crush the real thing.

And that requires us to raze the whole damn elf village to the ground.

Which is exactly why we had to slow down Ms. Oka and the others, y’know?

Ms. Oka is an elf, and we can’t have her getting caught up in this.

I don’t know if we’ll be able to keep an eye on Ms. Oka and friends while we’re fighting Potimas.

It’s safe to assume this is going to be a crazy-fierce battle.

I do intend to rescue the reincarnations who’re being kept in the elf village, but to be totally honest, we might end up having to abandon them.

That’s just how dangerous the fight with Potimas is gonna be.

So of course I want to reduce the amount of potential distractions as much as possible.

When I fight Potimas, I want to do it under ideal conditions.

Here’s the thing, though. There’s one guy we’re gonna have to deal with for that to happen…

Dustin, the pontiff of the Word of God.

There’s no way we can have an all-out war against Potimas without his help.

“…Yet another unreasonable request.”

So yeah, here we are!

The Holy Kingdom of Alleius, headquarters of the smash-hit Word of God religion!

Sitting in front of me, or rather diagonally from me, is Pontiff Dustin himself.

Why isn’t he right in front of me, you ask?

“You can do it, can’t you? Come on, do it.”

Because the one sitting directly across from him is the Demon Lord, wearing a big smile.

The pontiff is basically the head honcho of the human race.

And the Demon Lord is the head honcho of the demon race.

Normally, you’d never even expect these two to cross paths.

Yet, here they are, sitting across from each other and even having a conversation.

Normally, this kind of event would probably be one for the history books.

And in such incredible circumstances, the Demon Lord is blatantly pressuring, even threatening, the pontiff.

Man, she’s something else.

In response, the pontiff heaves a heavy sigh.

“You want me to permit the demon army passage through human territory. You do understand what that would entail, do you not?”

Yep. That’s the main topic for today.

Let our demon army pass through human land so we can crush the elf village, puh-leeeze.

In short, we know we’re technically enemy troops, but can we come in?

Doesn’t take a lot of imagination to figure out why the pontiff called it an unreasonable request.

What nation in any world would give an enemy army permission to pass its borders?

Not to mention, the Demon Lord and pontiff are officially enemies.

Since they’re the representatives of the demon and human races respectively.

They’re just temporarily working together because they currently have a common enemy in the elves.

The enemy of my enemy is my friend, sorta.

Although they’re really all mutual enemies who aren’t quite in a three-way deadlock.

Getting rid of Potimas is more urgent, so they’ll cooperate a little as far as that goes, but that doesn’t change the fact that they’re enemies, too.

Not to mention, the demons and humans just had a big ol’ war.

Asking him to grant the demon army safe passage under those circumstances is really a rash, ridiculous, reckless request.

And yet. And yet, I say!

It’s really just the Demon Lord and the pontiff who are temporarily working together.

Not the demons and the humans—just the Demon Lord and the pontiff.

That part’s important.

Both of them are technically at the tops of their respective races, but it’s not like either of them has total control.

The Demon Lord has a pretty firm grasp thanks to her reign of terror, but that doesn’t exactly mean everyone is thrilled about it.

And since the pontiff is really just in charge of a popular religion, he can’t exert complete control over humans, either.

Religion is a convenient form of control for inciting people to action, but in the end, it only appeals to people’s thoughts, which makes it difficult to force them to believe something they don’t agree with.

Like, for instance, Let’s reconcile with the demons.

Especially when the Word of God religion has been hyping the demons up as the sworn enemy of the human race since forever ago.

If either of them suddenly changes their official stance, they’re gonna lose their ability to unify their respective bases real fast.

And since the Word of God religion is more or less built on unity, that’d basically be the end for them.

Although I’d be willing to bet some particularly faithful nobility and royals would be like, Well, if that’s what the Word of God says! so I don’t think they’d fall apart that easily.

Even though he has no lawful control over them, it’s impressive that the pontiff can manipulate people this much with ideas alone.

No wonder even the Demon Lord recognizes him as a major power.

And right now, the pontiff is saying that this request is way too unreasonable.

Hrm. The Demon Lord keeps pressuring him to do it, but honestly, I don’t think it’s gonna work.

Even I realize this is a seriously big ask. I guess I’ll just have to teleport the whole army past the human territory by myself…

“It was very difficult to lay the groundwork for this.”

Wait, why is it looking more possible all of a sudden?!

…Huh? For real?

“Ahaaa! I knew you’d be able to pull it off! Yep!”

The Demon Lord beams and praises the pontiff.

But I know what she’s really thinking. Holy crap, is this guy for real…? probably.

I mean, when I talked to him about it beforehand, this guy said even he couldn’t pull off something that crazy!

But now that he’s talking to the Demon Lord, here we are.

Our plan from the start was to open with a ludicrous demand, then say Well, if you can’t do that, at least help us out however you can! It’s the perfect threat…ahem! I mean negotiation tactic.

It’s a basic strategy to start by asking too much, then give your real request so it sounds doable by comparison, right?

The Demon Lord and I were laughing it up together about how he’d never be able to let the demon army pass through human territory, so we’d use that to squeeze whatever we could out of him, or at least that was the idea…

But what did this old dude just say?

It was “difficult to lay the groundwork”?

Doesn’t that mean he’s all ready to give us the go-ahead at any moment?

…What kind of cheater is this old man?

Listen up, reincarnations. You’re better off not trying to cheat your way through politics.

You can’t cheat a cheater with a half-baked plan, apparently…

“Are you sure about this, though? Wasn’t this a bit of a stretch, even for the world’s most popular religion?”

Ah! Demon Lord! Don’t ask him that!

The pontiff’s smile deepens, as if he’s detected my inner panic.

“Yes, it certainly was. This favor came at a considerable expense, with no regard for the consequences. And so…” The pontiff pauses for a moment, his eyes crinkling shut with a smile. “I won’t accept failure as an outcome, understand?”

EEEEEK?!

Scary?! How is this old guy so scary when he’s not even strong at all?!

We came here to threaten him, but we’re getting threatened instead!

“…We’re not going to fail. You can count on that.”

While I’m totally intimidated by the old man, the Demon Lord remains perfectly calm.

“This is the moment we’ve been waiting for,” she continues, “for so, so long…”

Though her voice is quiet, the look in her eyes is anything but.

Wild emotions churn behind her calm expression.

“Indeed. Truly, we have waited a very, very long time for this.”

The pontiff’s eyes look the same.

These two have been fighting against Potimas for an incredibly long time now.

I’ve heard the phrase ancient grudge before, but their hatred for Potimas has built up for even longer than any of those.

I really hate Potimas, too, but I bet my feelings pale in comparison to theirs.

They’ve just had way longer to hate him.

It’s even gotten to the point where they hate anything related to him.

Both the Demon Lord and the pontiff actually despise Potimas so much that they’ve basically committed genocide against anyone who appears to be an elf.

Although since elves are basically Potimas’s spawn, I guess that’s kind of inevitable.

Besides, lately, most of this elf genocide has been at the hands of the Tenth Army, under my orders… I’m not exactly in any position to judge.

But even as my mind goes off on this tangent, when I look at the Demon Lord and the pontiff gazing silently into the distance with almost nostalgic expressions, I can practically feel a cold sweat on my back.

Yeesh. We really can’t afford to screw this up.

Not that I was planning on failing, of course, but y’know?

This is Potimas we’re up against, remember?

There’s no way that bastard doesn’t have a trick or two up his sleeve.

And depending on the nature of those tricks, we might end up having to temporarily withdraw or something.

But I can’t imagine saying that when I see the way the Demon Lord and the pontiff look right now…

They’re giving off this “After a hundred years, we meet at last! Let’s settle this once and for all!” kind of atmosphere.

…In fact, it’s probably been way more than a hundred years.

I can’t blame them for having some serious feelings about it.

And the success or failure of this plot to destroy Potimas rests in my hands.

Oh hey, did my stomach just start hurting all of a sudden?

’Cause that is some major pressure.

…I-it’s fine, though! It’s gonna be fine!

This is what I’ve been preparing for all this time!

I can do this!

I just gotta believe!

At least, I’m gonna keep telling myself that.

But hey, I do want to wipe Potimas out in one go if possible, just like they do.

Especially when I think about what he’s put both of them through.

Potimas has caused plenty of trouble for me personally, too, so I’d like to put that to rest and leave the Demon Lord and pontiff feeling satisfied.

And since the pontiff managed to lay the groundwork for us, that should make things easier.

Our original plan assumed that even he wouldn’t be able to get permission for the demon army to march through human territory.

So even though it would’ve been crazy tough, I was planning on teleporting the entire army directly to the elf village myself.

It would’ve cost tons of energy, mind you!

We just figured it was a necessary sacrifice.

But now, if we can go through the human territory, we don’t have to eat that giant cost!

Which means we can put all the saved energy to other uses.

This should seriously raise our chances of defeating Potimas.

But it does cause some problems, too.

Since teleporting only takes a matter of seconds, the demon army hasn’t really started to prepare to march just yet.

Except now we have to march them through human lands, which means we have to make plans for preparation and the actual march.

The Demon Lord and the pontiff are discussing the details now.

Looks like things are gonna be busy when we get back to the demon realm…

We’ll have to prepare in a serious hurry.

Especially if we want to achieve the Demon Lord and pontiff’s dearest wish of so many years without a hitch.