Mushoku Tensei (LN) - Volume 22 - Chapter 1.1

"My communication skills have developed."

-I dunno when it happened but along the way,
I found I didn't mind asking my friends for help.

                AUTHOR: RUDEUS GREYRAT
           TRANSLATION: JEAF RF MAGOTT

Chapter 1:

Coming Home and Making Reports

I WAS AT A HOUSE on the outskirts of the magic city of Sharia. The room stretching out before me was outfitted worthy of an evil demon king’s castle. It was furnished with a luxuriant Asuran carpet and chairs crafted from mahogany and red dragon leather, overstuffed with Millis wool. The desk was light wood to match the chairs, and the ornaments—all painstakingly created by the artisans of Sharia—would’ve impressed anyone. The fireplace glowed, its flames faintly crackling in a cozy way that, despite myself, put my heart at ease.

You’re probably wondering what part of that sounds like an evil demon king’s castle. That was all in the unsettling aura that radiated off the glowering man glaring daggers at me from his seat. His presence made everywhere he went feel like an evil demon king’s castle or a secret society. The atmosphere of a place is all about the people in it. The furnishings or whatever are just a footnote. It’s always all about the people.

“Th-that’s all I have to report for this time,” I said, wrapping up my report on events in the Holy Country of Millis. My speaking venue held the kind of homey atmosphere you might find in the house of a family pretending just a little too hard that a divorce wasn’t incoming.

Orsted always looked like he was on the verge of going ballistic. Maybe that was why Eris, standing behind me off to one side, was so on edge. Actually, the expression he wore now wasn’t his going-ballistic face at all. Hm, I see. Lately, I’d gotten the hang of reading Orsted’s expressions, so I knew what this face meant.

Right, so… It was about seventy percent doubt, and maybe thirty percent lack of interest. Not especially angry. 

So you can settle down, Eris.

“So, about this misstep… I promise I’ll clean up the mess I made here!”

Leave it to Kaijin Quag-Man to put down K*men R*der Geese!

“Oh, yes, obviously, you will be addressing that. The thing is…” From Orsted’s tone, I guessed these words were coming from the seventy-percent doubt part.

“Something troubles you, sir?”

“You told me all that via the contact tablet,” he explained. “Why did you travel all the way here to say it again?”

“I’m obligated to make my reports. Also, it looks like my plans will have to change from here out, so I thought a meeting was necessary.”

“I see…” Orsted said with a sigh. He sat back down. “Well? What are you planning?”

“I’ll keep it brief,” I said, clearing my throat. “As I mentioned over the contact tablet, Geese told me he’s gathering forces so that he can kill me in a head-on battle. I don’t know if he was telling the truth or not, but I plan to counter him by gathering powerful allies of my own.”

“Hm.”

Did he really have to look at me like he was grumbling, Exactly what you told me over the contact tablet, then? 

I thought that talking in person might lead to some new developments or something, so sue me… Also, checking in is important. It’d be no good if we were each looking at the situation in different ways.

“First I want to claim the Death God in the King Dragon Realm, then Atofe, then after that I’ll go to the North God… Oh, do you know where the North God is?”

After Atofe, I wanted to go chat with the seven great powers, starting with the strongest of them:

Number five: the Death God.

Number six: the Sword God.

Number seven: the North God.

In a past meeting with Orsted, he’d told me that the North God was easier to talk to than the Sword God, so I planned to mix up the order a little and prioritize the North God.

“I know not. Every North God’s been a wanderer. The slightest alteration in the course of history could make him appear on the far side of the world. After this much has changed, I cannot say.”

“What about normally?”

“The second North God was on the Begaritt Continent, while the third was in the warring region of the Central Continent, I believe.”

Both of those were far away, and naming entire continents hardly narrowed it down.

“Understood. Next is the Sword God, I guess.”

So the order was now the Death God, Atofe, then the Sword God… Honestly, I wanted to talk to a whole lot more people. The top great powers, in order, went Technique God, Dragon God, Fighting God, and Demon God.

Apart from the Dragon God, they’re all sealed away or missing, right? Wait, hold on…

“Speaking of,” I said, “do you think the Technique God would ally with me? I remember you saying that he split off from the Demon God, which means he should be willing to help me fight the Man-God. Right?”

“You have better uses for your time.”

“Yeah, his memories got a bit muddled, right? Okay, so what if we, like, merged him back with the Demon God Laplace to return him to his true form—ah, wait. I guess that would make Sir Perugius mad, huh? Could you maybe, like, talk to him?”

“Enough,” Orsted growled, and I shut up. “I will not ally myself with them.”

Them. Now I got what he was saying. Orsted saw Laplace and Perugius as cut from the same cloth. The same probably went for all five dragon generals.

“But, um, don’t you think if Perugius knew something about Laplace he’d speak up?”

“If he becomes my enemy, I will end him.”

“…Understood.”

I could guess why he was being so obstinate. Perugius was unaffected by Orsted’s curse. Yet Orsted made no effort to get close to him, and now this stubborn refusal. But we didn’t have a lot of options here.

Still, for some reason, I hesitated to ask. I couldn’t get the question out. It felt like this wasn’t the right time.

If I asked him, Are the secret treasures that lead to the Man-God the lives of the Five Dragon Generals? I suspected I’d end up with either Perugius or Orsted as an enemy. I owed a lot to them both, and I didn’t want to end up in the middle of their spat. Right now, the smart move was to pretend I was still in the dark.

“Got it,” I said. “Let’s go on to the next thing.”

“Proceed.”

I changed the subject. Nothing good could come from pushing a plan Orsted had already rejected. I followed Orsted, which meant he had final say on our course of action.

“While I tried pursuing various avenues in Millis, I got the impression that your, er…authority, or whatever you want to call it, was a bit lacking.”

“That is because I have none,” Orsted replied.

Don’t be silly, of course you do! I wanted to reply, but thinking about it, the Seven Great Powers were essentially athletes who’d won Olympic medals. Maybe they didn’t have any formal authority. On the other hand, the Seven Great Powers were big names in this world. Though ordinary society tended to forget about them, people with enough status at least knew them by reputation. The Seven Great Powers included the best of the best swordsmen—the North God and the Sword God. Their disciples were employed as martial instructors and guards the world over. When you thought about how strong they were and what valuable allies they’d make to any political power, Orsted’s position as number two amongst the Seven Great Powers seemed like a fairly big deal—and I was keen to put it to good use.

“Well, about that: I have a proposition,” I said.

“What is it?”

The thing was that while Orsted was a virtual nobody, Perugius was a household name. It should be easy to impress people if they thought I was in the same class as him…even if only by title.

“I’ve settled into introducing myself as the ‘Right Arm of the Dragon God’ but it’s still a bit…how should I put this? It doesn’t rattle people. Like, not many people are awed by the Dragon God, y’know? Or it doesn’t feel that way, anyway. So I was wondering if, for clarity’s sake, I could call myself the ‘Dragon King.’ We could do Quagdragon King or something, whatever feels good—” 

“No,” said Orsted.

Wait, what?

“I forbid you from using the title of Dragon King.” He was glaring at me. Like, really glaring. Yeah, I got it. I could read his face, even when it wore an expression I’d never seen before. This was probably his “angry face”.

He’s seriously hacked off. What the hell? Man, I’m trembling.

“All of them live as they please, clinging to their tattered pride. Then they die over petty grudges.”

When I didn’t say anything, Orsted continued, “You are different. That is why you may not use that name, Rudeus Greyrat.”

“I…uh… Yes, sir.”

That was unexpected. I hadn’t prepped for a real confrontation. I thought he’d wave me off with a disaffected, “You can call yourself what you want.”

Damn. I couldn’t stop shaking.

I heard a tutting sound, just as Eris moved forwards.

“Eris, don’t!” I called her off.

Relax. This isn’t a fight. It’s not even a falling-out. I said something that’s totally at odds with the boss’s plan for the company, and now he’s mad. So get out of that stance, and take your hand off your sword, okay?

“I went too far. My apologies,” I said.

“No matter,” Orsted replied, and I lowered my head. Orsted’s anger dissipated. Orsted always acted on the assumption he had the loops to fall back on, but some things were still non-negotiable. I’d stepped on a raw nerve without looking. Well, whatever. It didn’t matter what I called myself. I could project authority in any number of other ways. My own sense of majesty might not be so easy to tap into, but I could…well, hm. I could borrow a bit of authority from Ariel and the Kingdom of Asura, maybe? 

Right, let’s go with that.

“Let’s assume I get Ariel to lend me some authority, then. Who should I try to bring on our side after the Sword God?”

“The Biheiril Kingdom would be best. That is where the Ogre God resides. The Ore God can wait until later. If it comes to war, he will provide good-quality weapons, but he is no good in a fight.” Now Orsted mentioned it, I did remember him saying the Ogre God and the Ore God should be brought in with the rest.

“You mean I should get the Ogre God to join us?”

“No. It’s extremely likely that he is a disciple of the Man-God. We should crush him before Geese can collect him.” Right, the Ogre God was likely to turn against Laplace. And Laplace was the Man-God’s enemy. The enemy of my enemy, meaning that the Ogre God was easy to turn into a disciple, and therefore we should crush him first. Okay, yeah, that made sense as a strategy—building up our own pieces while also taking out Geese’s, and taking them out one at a time so that five of them couldn’t descend on us at once. That was one way to go about it.

“Is there anyone else likely to be turned against us?”

“Hmmm. No, none as significant as the Ogre God,” Orsted replied. “There is the Abyssal King Vita who lives in Hell, the labyrinth on the Divine Continent, and the Vile Demon King Qeblaqabla of the Demon Continent. It would be prudent to remove those two. Moving against them first would cause problems, however, so they can be left until last.”

“I see.” They all had such wild names. I wondered if I’d have to fight them just for the crime of being likely to be turned by the Man-God. They hadn’t done anything yet. They weren’t disciples. Would Orsted mind if I made them my allies first? I wasn’t totally opposed to fighting them—if it looked like things weren’t going to work, I could fight them then. When it came down to it, I wasn’t super keen on murdering people before they’d even gotten involved in any of this.

“All right, so the plan is I either make them my allies or neutralize them.”

“Indeed.”

The details come later, I guess.

“On to the next topic. About my plans to visit the King Dragon Realm…” 

After that, Orsted gave me scraps of information about the royal family and the nobles with power in the King Dragon Realm. That was where we left things. 

I hadn’t expected the Dragon King thing to get under his skin that badly. 

Gotta be more careful next time. 

***

“Whew…”

“Welcome back, Chairman Rudeus!” The moment I stepped out of the boss’s room, the girl at reception stood up and bowed enthusiastically. A half-elf, half-human girl. She’d inherited the long lifespan of an elf, but she was still very young. She had been hired as Orsted’s secretary after a series of rigorous selection processes over a large number of candidates. She spent all day sitting here, never seeing Orsted because he was always shut up in the back. She acted on his orders purely via written communication, while also meticulously taking care of administrative duties. What was her name again…?

“Oh, yes, thank you.”

“You don’t look well. Is something the matter?”

“Um, not really… Sir Orsted wasn’t too happy with me.”

“I see! Even you get in trouble sometimes, Chairman!”

“I might have, uh, pulled the tiger’s tail this time, so to speak.”

“Oh dear… But the CEO really does rely on you, Chairman Rudeus. He may merely hold high expectations of you.”

“Hahaha. No, that wasn’t it.”

She was resistant to Orsted’s curse and considerate of others. An all-around swell lady. The only thing was, I really couldn’t remember her name. What was it, seriously? Faristy…or Feristaly? No, that wasn’t right. Aisha would probably know, but she was with Zenith right now in the neighboring room. 

That was fine. I’d ask Aisha privately another day.

“I was thinking, if Orsted is the CEO and I’m the chairman, doesn’t it sort of sound like I’m more important than him?”

“Oh… What should I call him then?”

I wonder. Linia was the acting CEO, and Aisha was an advisor as well as the vice chief. If I was the company chairman, then that left…

“What about Commander-in-Chief?”

“…Well, he should have final approval.”

“True. Um, well, I guess run it by him,” I said.

Whatever else aside, she seemed to be doing good work here. Up till now there hadn’t been any major problems, and her cheerfulness kept everyone motivated. Orsted didn’t seem to have any complaints. I’d also been sure to hire someone in massive debt, so she had a little extra motivation to tolerate a rough day here or there.

“There haven’t been any other problems?”

“No, nothing.”

“That’s a relief. If stuff isn’t running smoothly or there’s anything else you want, please reach out to me straight away. If it’s within my power, I’ll make sure it’s done.”

“What?!” She was surprised. Why was that? It was true that our company didn’t have any labor standards it had to abide by, but I was trying to build a positive working environment.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Chairman. It’s just that Sir Orsted asked me the same thing.”

“Oh, did he? Huh.”

“He’s already made so many accommodations for me.” Ordinarily anyone offered something like that, even indirectly, would be on their guard, thinking it was a deal with the devil. That had to mean the special helmet Cliff had made was doing its job, alleviating the effects of Oersted’s curse. Good stuff.

“It’s a shame that I can’t even see his face, after all that he’s done for me.”

“That’s the fault of the curse. The moment you saw his face, all of the gratitude you feel now would turn to hatred and distrust.”

“It’s horrible, isn’t it?”

“It is. And that’s why when Sir Orsted is working in the back there, you are never to sneak a peek through the sliding panels.”

“…Wh-what sliding panels?” she repeated, confused. I coughed. Actually, so long as he was wearing the helmet a glance or two probably wouldn’t hurt. But knowing Orsted, he didn’t wear the helmet all day every day. We couldn’t be too careful.

“Doesn’t matter. I’ll leave things to you then.”

“Understood, Mr. Chairman.”

“One more thing. Can you hint to the boss that the chairman looked really agonized?”

“Of course.” She chuckled. “You know, I didn’t expect you to be so timid.”

Nothing surprising about it. I’ve always been like that. I’m about as brave as I am tall.

After that conversation, I left the office.

Right. Next up, I had to report back to my family about Zenith and the whole thing with Geese. There was a lot I needed to say. At least it wasn’t all bad news, but that was cold comfort.