Mushoku Tensei (LN) - Volume 3 - Chapter 6

Chapter 6:

Infiltration and Impersonation 

T he city of Rikarisu is one of the three largest settlements on the Demon Continent. At the time of the Great Human-Demon War, it served as a home base for the forces of the Demon Empress Kishirika Kishirisu. Even now, it is sometimes referred to as Old Kishirisu Castle. 

The first surprise it has in store for first-time visitors is its unusual location. Rikarisu sits in the middle of an enormous crater, the rim of which forms a single continuous wall around the city. In times of war, these natural defenses helped the city to ward off many enemy sieges—and today, they still serve to protect the city against marauding monsters. 

At the very heart of the city stand the ruins of Castle Kishirisu, half-destroyed during the events of the Laplace War. Imposingly thick outer walls surround the broken black-and-gold castle itself, a sight that offers visitors a constant reminder of the Empress’s faded glory and demonkind’s violent, painful past. 

Rikarisu is a storied city. A place rich with history. 

And when the sun sets, visitors will come to appreciate its true beauty. 

—Excerpt from Wandering the World 

by the adventurer Bloody Kant 

Those words were the sum total of what I knew about the city of Rikarisu, which we’d now arrived at. 

There were only three entrances to the city, all of which were cracks in the rim of the crater. The walls of the crater were surprisingly tall. Unless you could fly, it’d be difficult to make your way over them. 

A pair of armed guards were stationed outside each of the entrances. They evidently took their security seriously here. 

I shot a thoughtful look over at Ruijerd. 

“What is it, Rudeus?” 

“Ruijerd…we can get into this city, right?” 

“I’ve never set foot in it myself. They always chase me off.” 

Humankind feared and loathed the Superd on an almost primal level. That much had been obvious just from Eris’s initial reaction. I’d been hoping it might be a little different with other demons, but…based on what I’d heard back in the Migurd village, that was probably just wishful thinking. 

“Just curious, but what does chasing you off usually involve?” 

“The guards start shouting at me when I approach. Before long, large numbers of armed adventurers come running out.” 

Okay, so we probably weren’t going to get a chance to explain ourselves. The guards would probably just scream, “Halt,” then call for backup…at which point we’d be crushed under a massive wave of burly men. 

“In that case, I guess we’d better go with some sort of a disguise.” 

Ruijerd shot me a sharp look. “A disguise?” 

Hm. Was that going to be an issue? “Look, hear me out. For the moment, our top priority is just getting inside, right?” 

“I’m not objecting. I just don’t know what you mean by a…disguise.” 

“Huh?” 

Wow. Apparently he wasn’t even familiar with the concept. Then again, I guess he could have gotten into the city easily enough otherwise. “A disguise is just…a way to alter your appearance and hide your real identity.” 

“I see… And how would we go about doing this?” 

“Hmm, good question. Why don’t we just hide your face for now?” I squatted, put my hands to the ground, and began channeling my magical power into it. 

*** 

“Halt!” 

There were two soldiers guarding the gate we approached. One was a stern-looking man with the head of a snake; the other a cocky-looking guy with the head of a pig. 

“Who are you people?! What business d’you have here?!” shouted Snake-Face, one hand already on the sword at his hip. 

Pig-Head, on the other hand, was busy silently leering at Eris. Damn dirty animal… You better not do anything funny, or else! 

As we’d decided beforehand, I stepped forward to do the talking. “Hi there. We’re a group of travelers.” 

“You adventurers or what?” 

“Y—uh, no. Just ordinary travelers.” I’d very nearly answered “yes,” but we didn’t have anything to back up a claim like that. Then again, Eris and I were obviously pretty young, so we probably could have passed as wannabe adventurers trying to get started… 

“Who’s that man you’ve got with you? Looks like a suspicious character.” 

Ruijerd was currently wearing a crude stone helmet that I’d whipped up only a few minutes before. It completely hid his face. We’d also wrapped the head of his spear in cloth; at a glance, you might have taken it for some sort of staff. He definitely looked suspicious, but at least they couldn’t tell he was a Superd. 

“That’s my older brother. He tried on some helmet an adventurer gave him, and then realized he couldn’t take it off. We thought there might be someone in the city who could help…” 

“Hahaha! What a moron! Ah, all right then. Go talk to the old lady in the supplies shop, she’ll figure somethin’ out.” Chortling loudly, Snake-Face stepped back and took his hand off his hilt. 

Well, that went better than expected. 

Back in Japan, I’m pretty sure the cops would have taken a stranger in a full-face helmet back to the station for a few questions, but we’d gotten off awfully easy. Maybe it was because Ruijerd had a pair of kids with him…or maybe it just wasn’t that unusual to see people wandering around the city with headgear on. 

“Incidentally, where would we go if we needed to earn some money?” 

“Huh? Ya lookin’ for a job or something?” 

“Well, we have to stay here until we can get this helmet off my brother. And if they charge a fee, we’d have to scrape together the cash to cover that.” 

Snake-Face nodded, muttering, “Yeah, guess I wouldn’t put it past that old bag.” Apparently the supplies shop lady here drove a bit of a hard bargain. Good thing it wasn’t really our problem. “You’d probably want the Adventurers’ Guild, kid. Dunno where else a bunch of broke out-of-towners like yourselves could earn their keep.” 

“Okay then. Is that…” 

“The guild’s right down this street here. Big building. Ya won’t miss it.” 

“Thank you very much.” 

“Once you’re registered there, you’ll get a slightly better rate at the inns. Can’t hurt to get your names down in the book at least.” 

With a polite little nod to the guard, I began moving toward the gate…only to pause at the last moment. “By the way…is there a reason the city’s being guarded so heavily at the moment?” 

“Oh. Yeah. Someone said they saw that monster Dead End in the area, so we’re kinda on high alert right now.” 

“Wait, seriously?! Talk about scary…” 

“Yeah, no kiddin’. Let’s hope he just wanders off somewhere soon, huh?” 

Dead End, huh? Judging from the name…if you run into him, I guess your life’s as good as over? Must be one terrifying monster. 

*** 

The buildings weren’t quite as tall in Rikarisu as they were back in Roa, but it felt like there were just as many of them. The two cities seemed to have pretty similar layouts. Most of the facilities near the entrance were stables and inns that clearly catered to traveling merchants. 

“Hmm. The Adventurers’ Guild, huh…?” 

Based on everything I’d heard, the adventurers of this world were essentially glorified temp workers. People with certain skills registered with the “agency,” meaning the guild; by completing the jobs it had on offer, you could build a reputation for yourself. Ordinary people brought a variety of jobs directly to the guild, and it handed them out to any adventurers who were up to the task. 

“I’m not sure how much we’ll be able to earn there, but it might be a good idea to register. They’ll probably give us something we can use for identification at least. What do you think, Eris?” 

“Ooh! Yes, of course! Let’s be adventurers!” The girl’s eyes were actually shining with excitement. No surprise there, really…she’d always loved listening to Ghislaine’s tales of the glory days. 

“Are you already an adventurer or anything, Ruijerd?” 

“No. I’ve never set foot in a city large enough to have a guild before.” 

Ah, right. They probably didn’t bother setting up shop in every random little village. 

“Okay. I think that’s more convenient for us, anyway…” 

A plan of sorts was beginning to take shape inside my mind. 

We couldn’t expect Ruijerd to wear that big, heavy lump of a helmet forever. And if we kept his face hidden, he’d never get a chance to improve the reputation of his people. We could always try to accomplish something great right off the bat, then start spreading rumors that a Superd warrior was responsible…but as rookie adventurers, we’d probably be running errands inside the city for the moment. Solving little problems for ordinary people might actually be the better approach. After all, it was the last thing anyone would expect from a “bloodthirsty killer.” If we kept at it diligently enough, we might build up some trust from the people in this city at least. 

Ruijerd was basically a good-hearted guy. Stuff like finding lost children was right up his alley, and it might work better to change the public’s impression of his people than running off to slay some huge beast. I mean, saving a child worked wonders for him with the Migurd village, didn’t it? Based on that, we should probably focus on helping people rather than bloody monster hunts. We could just let his kindness speak for itself. 

That said…if we wanted to get him a reputation for helping people, the helmet was going to be an issue. I’d have a hard time trusting someone who hid his face personally. Maybe we could switch to something that only covered his hair and forehead? Nah, that probably wasn’t good enough. Social etiquette might be a little different in this world, but keeping your headgear on constantly sounded pretty rude to me. 

Still, scraping away anonymously at tiny jobs wasn’t going to get us anywhere. We had to make the whole city aware of Ruijerd’s presence, and we had to convince them it was a positive thing. 

“But how the heck do we do that…?” 

First and foremost, he needed to become recognizable . No matter how many good deeds he did, we’d never make progress if they were all attributed to some “unknown adventurer.” Maybe it really would be best to start off by slaying a big monster or two? Just to get people to remember his name… 

Strength counted for a great deal in this world. Bringing down a truly fearsome beast could potentially give our little group a slight boost in social standing. Of course, everyone already knew the Superd were incredibly powerful fighters, so there was also a chance it could backfire… 

No, wait. What if the city was in imminent danger or something? Like, some giant monster’s rampaging through the streets, everyone’s cowering in terror, and the Sexy Demon Hero Ruijerd jumps in to the rescue! With dramatic music blaring in the background! 

Ooh. That could totally work. 

The main stumbling block was the fact that we needed a rampaging monster to make this happen, but I’d heard a name that sounded promising just a minute ago. 

“Ruijerd, do you know what this Dead End thing is?” Assuming it’s some sort of powerful monster, we could find some way to lure it toward the city, then take it out just as everyone started to panic. Everyone loves a nice, clean “good triumphs over evil” story, right? 

Unfortunately, Ruijerd’s response proceeded to derail my train of thought completely. “It’s me.” 

“…Uhm, what?” 

Huh? Is he getting all philosophical on me again?! 

“Some people call me by that name, Rudeus.” 

Ah. Okay, so he meant it literally. That’s one lovely nickname he’s got there… 

It did make sense. Of course you’d freak out if you thought a legendary mass-murderer was wandering around outside your city. Honestly though…“Dead End” felt like a little much. Just how terrified were they of Ruijerd? Those guards out at the gate really needed to get their act together, in retrospect. They probably didn’t even think of the Superd as people. They’d been expecting a rampaging, vicious monster; it never even crossed their minds that Ruijerd might be clever enough to disguise himself. 

“Hmm. Now what…?” 

There was a potential upside here: that nickname of his seemed to be well-known. Maybe we could use that to our advantage somehow. 

“Ruijerd. They don’t have a bounty on your head or anything, do they?” 

“No. That won’t be an issue.” 

Really now? You promise? I’m gonna take your word on that, okay? 

All right then. Let’s readjust this plan a bit. 

*** 

Before heading to the Adventurers’ Guild, we spent some time wandering through the roadside stalls clustered around the entrance to the city. Shops like these tended to be pretty similar anywhere you went, but the specific items they had on offer could vary quite a bit. For example…where Roa’s stables were full of horses for sale or rent, on the Demon Continent they seemed to favor some type of giant lizard creature. They were apparently better suited to the steep, craggy terrain that characterized this part of the world. Also, they didn’t have an organized passenger carriage system here. You had to buy a ride from one of a number of independently-operating merchants. 

We had a very long journey ahead of us. There were all sorts of things I was dying to purchase. But I already knew what we were looking for on this particular trip. We’d just have to pick up the rest a little bit at a time. 

After a quick look to get a sense for the market prices of various items, I started hunting for an affordable stall that had the things we needed. We weren’t in a huge hurry or anything, but I didn’t want to waste hours and hours out here. All I wanted to buy was a hood and some dye… Oh, and ideally some sort of citrusy fruit. 

“Hey, pops. Aren’t you asking a bit much for this dye? Feels like a bit of a rip-off.” 

“Put a sock in it, kid. That’s the goin’ price right there.” 

“Really? You suuure?” 

“Of course I’m sure, dammit!” 

“They were selling something really similar over there for half the price, you know…” 

“You serious?!” 

“Well, I’m sure your stuff’s just higher-quality, right? Hmm, this hood’s kinda nice. Look, I’ll buy the dye and a couple of those lemony things over there, so why don’t you throw it in for free?” 

“Hah! What a little haggler! Fine, you win. Take it!” 

“Oh, and while we’re here…any interest in buying a few things from us? These are genuine Pax Coyote pelts, and we’ve got a few Acid Wolf fangs too.” 

“Damn, look at ’em all! Gimme just a moment here… Two, four, eight… All righty. How’s about three scrap iron coins for the bunch?” 

“Come on, they’re worth at least six.” 

“All right, all right. I’ll give you four.” 

“Okay then. Pleasure doing business with you.” 

It took a bit of doing, but I’d managed to wrap the whole thing up in a single transaction. Since I didn’t really know what prices for most things were like around here, I wasn’t entirely sure how much money I’d just spent. To be honest, I had a sneaking suspicion the guy had ripped me off. 

Oh well. In any case, this left us with one iron coin, four scrap iron coins,and ten stone coins. This money was a gift from Master Roxy’s parents. I’d have to spend it thoughtfully. 

With our shopping trip at an end, the three of us slipped into a quiet back alley. I was a little worried we might run into some stereotypical hoodlums…but then again, Ruijerd would take care of that for us, wouldn’t he? Might even be a chance to earn ourselves a little pocket money… 

“Hey, Ruijerd. If anyone tries to mug us, could you just beat them black and blue?” 

“Until they’re nearly dead, you mean?” 

“Uh, no. Just knock them around a little bit, thanks.” 

Sadly, nobody actually showed up to hassle us. But now that I thought about it, guys desperate enough to rob people probably wouldn’t have much cash on them in the first place. 

“Okay, Ruijerd. Let’s start off by dying your hair.” 

“Dying my hair…?” 

“Right. That’s what this stuff is for.” 

“I see… So you’re going to change its color? That’s a clever idea, to be sure.” He seemed genuinely impressed. I guess people didn’t really dye their hair in this world. Either that, or Ruijerd just wasn’t aware of the concept. He clearly didn’t spend much time in towns or cities. “However, wouldn’t it have been better to choose a color that’s less similar to my own?” 

I’d gone with a blue dye—a reasonably close approximation of the color of Migurd hair. “Nah. The Migurd village is only three days walk away from here, so there are probably a ton of people here who know about them. I figured we’d make you into one of them, Ruijerd.” 

“…What about the two of you?” 

“Oh, we’re just your lackeys. You helped us out and took us in at some point.” 

“Lackeys…? I thought you were warriors, on equal standing with myself.” 

“Well, yes, we are. I’m just talking about our cover story. Don’t worry, you don’t really have to remember all this… I’ll just be acting like your henchman when we’re around other people basically.” 

Our next step was going to be putting on something of a show. 

I took some time to explain the premise of our act to Ruijerd. From this point on, he was going to be a young Migurd man named “Royce” who’d recently begun impersonating the infamous Superd warrior Dead End. 

Royce had always yearned to inspire fear and awe in people. Not long ago, he’d happened across a pair of lost children in the wilderness—one who was capable of using magic, and another who proved to be talented with the sword. He’d saved their lives, and they’d idolized him ever since. 

“You idolize me?” 

“Uhm, I wouldn’t go quite that far personally.” 

“I see.” 

In any case, these two children were actually very powerful fighters for their age. Once he realized this, Royce hit on a clever idea: Why not assume the identity of the legendary warrior Ruijerd? It seemed like the easiest possible way to strike fear into the hearts of everyone he met. Royce had always been unusually tall for a Migurd after all. And his two young companions were very competent. If he just claimed their achievements as his own, he’d be famous in no time. 

“This man’s a lowlife. He had no right to use my name.” 

“Yeah, it’s all very despicable. But let’s say this phony Ruijerd starts to go around doing good deeds. What would people think?” 

“…I don’t know. What?” 

“That he’s obviously a fake, but also a good guy at heart.” 

We needed our act to be nicely comical and kind of incoherent. The key here was to get everyone thinking of the Ruijerd-imposter as a total fraud who also happened to be a weirdly decent person. 

“Hmm…” 

“Basically, if word starts going around that this fake Ruijerd is a nice guy, we’re on the right track. The rumor will get vaguer and vaguer over time, and eventually people will just start saying that ‘Ruijerd’ is a good guy.” 

“…That sounds wonderful, but will it really work that way?” 

“Oh, absolutely,” I answered in a tone of easy confidence. At the very least, this couldn’t really hurt. Everyone already thought Ruijerd was a vicious monster; his reputation wasn’t getting any worse. 

“I see. I had no idea such a simple plan could work…” 

“This won’t be simple, believe me. And there’s always a chance something will go very wrong.” As a general rule, any long-term plan goes awry at some point. The more detailed and complex it is, the further off-track you’ll eventually end up. Still, so long as we managed to get tons of rumors flying around about Ruijerd, there was a good chance his reputation would begin to reflect his good-hearted nature. 

“True. What do you propose we do if my deception is exposed?” 

“What do you mean? You don’t need to tell any lies, Ruijerd.” 

“…I don’t understand.” 

Ruijerd was playing the role of “a Migurd who called himself a Superd.” For the most part, he’d be doing good deeds and earning the public’s affection, just like he wanted. He wasn’t even going to lie about his name. 

The whole “Royce” thing was mostly just a fallback explanation I’d use if someone started suspecting Ruijerd really was who he claimed to be. The man himself would keep using his actual name. Ruijerd would openly admit he was a Superd named Ruijerd. Everyone else would just decide all on their own that he was actually a Migurd named Royce with delusions of grandeur. 

In other words, he didn’t have to say anything that wasn’t true. I’d be handling all the lying for him behind the scenes. I felt like he’d probably object to having me deceive people on his behalf, though, so I’d decided to keep quiet about that last part. 

“Everyone’s just going to assume you’re actually a Migurd, you see?” 

“Ah… Right. I’m the one pretending to be myself… But wait, I have to act like I’m Royce, as well…? This is giving me something of a headache, Rudeus. What exactly do I need to do?” 

“Don’t worry about it. Just be yourself.” 

Ruijerd looked more than a little reluctant. Whatever his other talents, the man probably wasn’t cut out to be an actor. 

“That said, make sure you don’t snap and kill anyone just for taunting you, okay?” 

“Hmm… Do you mean that I shouldn’t get into any fights?” 

“You can scrap if you need to, but pretend that you’re having a tough time. Take a few punches, start breathing heavily, that sort of thing. In the end, try to make it look like you just barely scraped out a win.” 

As the words left my mouth, it occurred to me that Ruijerd might not even be capable of putting on that kind of show, but— 

“You want me to go easy on them? What’s the point of that?” 

Apparently it wouldn’t be an issue. 

“We want people to think you’re too weak to be the real Ruijerd. And we want your opponent to think, ‘Hey, what if he’s the real deal, though? Wouldn’t that make me pretty awesome?’” 

“I don’t think I understand…” 

“It’s a way to convince people you’re a fake, while also making them feel good about themselves.” 

“But what does making them feel good accomplish?” 

“It’ll encourage them to spread rumors that the Superd are actually pushovers.” 

Ruijerd scowled. “The Superd are not pushovers.” 

“Believe me, I know. But your strength is part of what makes people so afraid of you. If they think you’re weak, it might help us resolve conflicts peacefully, like we just did at the gate.” 

That said, we didn’t want everyone thinking his people were totally powerless, either. That might end up encouraging more harassment of the surviving Superd villages…assuming there were still some out there somewhere. This was going to be a delicate balancing act. 

“Hm. Well, if you say so, Rudeus…” 

Okay then. I think that just about covers it for now. 

I didn’t feel the need to issue too many specific instructions at the moment. It would only increase our odds of screwing something up. “Anyway…I’ll give you all the support I can, Ruijerd. But the outcome’s ultimately going to depend on you, okay?” 

“Of course. My thanks, Rudeus.” 

With the initial explanations at an end, I proceeded to bleach Ruijerd’s hair using juice from the lemon-like fruits we’d bought a few minutes earlier. 

The results weren’t perfect, but his natural emerald green hair color did fade away for the most part. I went ahead and slathered on the blue dye. 

Hmm. Not the prettiest job I’ve ever seen. 

Still, at least it didn’t look particularly green anymore. Maybe he sort of looked like a Migurd? At a distance? If you totally ignored how tall he was? 

Well, he didn’t really look like a Superd, and that was the most important thing. An ambiguous disguise was probably what we wanted anyway. The ideal reaction would be something like…“This guy kinda looks like a Migurd, but not really. And he’s calling himself a Superd, but that doesn’t look right either… So what the hell?” 

“Also, I think you should be wearing this,” I said, taking off my pendant and placing it on Ruijerd. 

“This is…a Migurd amulet, isn’t it?” 

“Yes. My master gave it to me as a graduation present, and I’ve been wearing it ever since.” With this dangling around Ruijerd’s neck, everyone would at least assume he was somehow connected to the Migurd. 

“It must be precious to you then. I’ll make sure to return it to you safely.” 

“Yeah. You better.” 

“Of course.” 

“Fair warning, I might have to murder you if you lose it.” 

“Understood, Rudeus.” 

“Specifically, I’d block all of the city’s exits using earth magic, then fill this entire crater to the brim with magma.” 

“What? You’d kill all the people living here as well? There are children in this city, you know.” 

“Right. So if you want to keep them safe and sound, you’d better take good care of that amulet.” 

“Hrm… If you’re really that worried about this, perhaps you shouldn’t let me borrow it in the first place…” 

“Come on, Ruijerd. I’m only kidding around, obviously!” 

“…” 

Now then…the next step was to get Eris in the hood I’d bought earlier. That red hair of hers was very eye-catching, and we wanted everyone’s attention to stay focused on our leading man. 

“So Eris, I was thinking…” 

At this point, I unfolded the thing for the first time, and realized it had little kitty ear-bags…sort of like the cowls white mages wore in Final Fantasy III. 

Was this intended for a beast-person or something? Damn. I may have messed this up. Eris wasn’t especially picky about her clothing, but from what I remembered of the traditional Boreas family greeting, she absolutely hated cosplaying as a cat girl. 

“Uh…well, about this hood…” 

“Huh? Oh! Uhm, what about it?” 

“I was thinking…maybe you could wear it…” 

“Really?!” 

For some reason, the girl actually seemed overjoyed. Maybe she didn’t hate that pose itself as much as I thought she did…? She immediately pulled on the hood, smiling happily. “I’ll take good care of it!” 

Well, okay then. I didn’t really understand why, but that worked out! Excellent! 

Now then…it seemed we were ready to head over to the Adventurers’ Guild. This needed to be comical . Just had to keep that in mind. 

God I hope this goes smoothly…