Chapter 10 — Heh Heh Heh... He Was the Weakest of the Four Heavenly Kings
Yoshifumi sat lazily on the throne in his extravagant audience chamber. As usual, he wore leather pants and a studded leather jacket that seemed totally unfitting for an emperor, while his subordinates bowed to him on the level below.
They were in the middle of their regular meeting. For the most part, Yoshifumi left the management of the country to the bureaucrats. Normally he was satisfied to limit himself to handing down imperial edicts when he came up with new ideas, but some things were important enough to demand his attention, so they had gathered for a briefing.
“Where’s Ranj?” asked Yoshifumi. “He’s got some balls to skip out on a meeting I ordered. Does he want to die or something?”
Being absent from these meetings wasn’t permitted without a very good reason. If someone had such a reason, they needed to request a leave of absence beforehand. For the officials who knew full well how scary the Sage could be, an unexcused absence was unthinkable.
“My apologies,” one of his subordinates replied. “When he failed to arrive for a previous meeting, we sent someone to his dwelling to check on him...and found that he had passed away shortly before...”
“Huh?” Yoshifumi blurted out at the unexpected response. Even if he threatened to kill him, Ranj already being dead was well outside of his expectations.
“There seemed to be no external injuries. He was found deceased atop his bed. It appears he passed away in his sleep.”
“Who is Ranj?” Hanakawa, dressed in his clown outfit, asked from where he stood beside the throne. He had been called there to act as court jester. Having grown used to his position, he spoke without hesitation despite Yoshifumi’s position as Sage and emperor.
“Oh, he was one of the Four Heavenly Kings.”
“The Four Heavenly Kings are Miss Luna, Miss Rena, Miss Abby, and...ah, now that you mention it, one was missing.”
“You never thought to ask who the fourth one was before?”
“I feel like I asked about it once... Ah! When I heard they were male, I lost all interest immediately! But now it is time for that timeless declaration, correct? ‘Heh heh heh... He was the weakest of the Four Heavenly Kings. He is a shame on all demonkind, dying in his sleep like that!’”
“Not that we’re demons. Also, I recruited him in the first place because he was pretty strong.”
“Sages like you are so beyond the norm, I have no idea what ‘pretty strong’ means when it comes from you.”
“He split the island in half with one swing of his sword. Oh, I guess it wasn’t quite in half. The Elven Forest was protected by some strange power.”
Yoshifumi must have been talking about the splitting of East and West Ent. The island was long and thin but still had a width of about three hundred kilometers. Hanakawa hadn’t even considered that the seemingly bottomless crevice dividing the two halves of the island had been created by a person, let alone with a sword.
“It seems rather incredible that he died, then! Isn’t this quite bad?”
“It’s kind of a pain, but it’s lame to call them the Four Heavenly Kings when there are only three of them. We’ll have to find another.”
“Actually,” one of Yoshifumi’s aides interrupted, “there is something we need to report in relation to Ranj’s death.”
“Speak.”
“Similar deaths have been reported all over the capital. We have reports of approximately five hundred victims. They all seem to have passed away at roughly the same time. It is suspected that Ranj died during the same time period. While there were aged and sick among the victims, the ordinary number of deaths in the capital in one day is about twenty, so the numbers are surprising.”
“So what, is there some kind of disease? Do we need to make Luna purge it?”
“No. The victims had no apparent connection to each other, nor were they in similar locations or of similar age. Furthermore, it doesn’t appear that the damage is spreading.”
“Huh. Okay, look into it.”
“Understood!”
With that, the conversation was over. Yoshifumi seemed surprised that one of the Four Heavenly Kings was dead, but that was about it.
“Can we move on?” A woman raised her hand. She was one of the women who had accompanied Yoshifumi to the bar in the adventurer’s guild; one of the Four Heavenly Kings. Although back then she had been dressed to match Yoshifumi, she now wore a decorated dress.
“What is it, Abby?”
“My observation network found another member of the royal family.”
“Oh? That’s kind of sudden. They must have been hiding fairly well. I thought they were getting ready to make a sudden attack or something.” When Yoshifumi had taken over the country, he had spared the previous royal family. It would have been easy for a Sage to wipe them out, but he had left some sparks alive.
“A quest was created to wipe out the remnants of the royal family, but the adventurers who took it haven’t returned. It was just one party, and it seems they managed to make it to the city where the royal was hiding and found them, but that was it.”
Even though he had let them go, Yoshifumi had no intention of letting them live easily, as he had given explicit instructions to kill the members of the previous royal family wherever they were found.
“So the adventurers were killed, huh?” Yoshifumi mused. “That’s impressive. Maybe the royal gained some sort of power?”
“I don’t know that much. I set the difficulty of the Emergency Quest at three, but would it be okay to increase the difficulty and reward?”
“I’ll leave it to you. Do whatever you like. Also, did your observation network not notice anything about Ranj’s death?”
“If he died peacefully in his sleep, then no, they wouldn’t have noticed anything.” Abby’s observation network covered the entire country, but it wasn’t omniscient. Like a literal net, it had holes in it. The holes making up the net were fairly large, so they couldn’t catch many of the finer details.
“So he didn’t die fighting anything.”
“M-May I go on?” Another subordinate raised a hand. His voice was shaky, working together with the rest of his demeanor to give a totally unreliable impression.
“What is it, Akira?”
“Hm? By that name and face, is he perhaps of Japanese descent?” Hanakawa asked. It was his first time seeing the man. It was possible they had met before, but Akira kept a very low profile, so it wouldn’t be surprising if Hanakawa had simply forgotten him.
“Yeah, he came here at the same time as me. He survived all sorts of stuff and ended up becoming a Sage’s attendant.”
Yoshifumi had been transported to this world by the Sages as part of a group, just like Hanakawa had. This method of selecting Sages had been going on for a while. In all the examples up until now, only one person from each group had ever managed to become a Sage, so the others were given the title of Sage’s attendant and awarded a measure of authority.
“Umm...our Skyguard Net caught something, so your envoys were dispatched to deal with it, but...”
“Oh, Sage news. Leave that ’til later.” This was a meeting for discussing things about the empire, so it wasn’t the place for issues related to the Sages.
The meeting continued for a while, but none of the other topics were of particular interest to Hanakawa.
◇ ◇ ◇
Hanakawa was told he would be killed if he left the capital. As such, one might think he was safe as long as he stayed in the city, but that wasn’t quite the case. The residents of the palace knew about his role as jester, but outside the palace, that information wasn’t so widespread. His clown outfit was marked with the symbol of the emperor, so it was clear he was related to the Sage in some way. As such, ordinary citizens would no doubt avoid causing him any harm, but it was hard to expect outlaws to take that into consideration.
A safety first attitude would say it was best to stay within the palace, but living there was surprisingly boring. Though he probably should have been satisfied with a life where his safety was guaranteed and his every need was provided for, humans had a tendency to get tired of safety and luxury rather quickly.
“I haven’t seen Miss Luna or the others around either,” he muttered.
Rooms had been provided in the palace for the leaders of the empire, but perhaps due to Hanakawa’s behavior, the female leaders like Luna had all left for somewhere else. They showed up for meetings, but once they were done, they left immediately. They were doing everything in their power to avoid Hanakawa.
“As followers of Yoshifumi, my initial impression of them was awful, but they actually seem rather high-quality!”
When they had been with Yoshifumi at the pub, they had dressed to match him, looking unhealthy and degenerate. But when Yoshifumi wasn’t around, they wore clothes that matched their own tastes.
“The maids seeming entirely unbothered by me is somewhat boring, though...”
Having an affair with one’s female servants was almost a matter of course. The maids of the palace didn’t show a single shred of displeasure towards him either. That being said, if he tried anything, he would lose his position as jester. That role was his only lifeline; he couldn’t afford to let it go. As such, there was nothing for him to do in the palace, so he left to wander the capital.
“I suppose so much has happened since my arrival here that I haven’t had a chance to see much of the city.”
The buildings and roads were constructed from stone. The city was lively and energetic, so Yoshifumi’s rule may not have been all that bad.
“However, there is still the possibility of it all suddenly being erased.”
No matter how peaceful things appeared, Yoshifumi’s potential threat to the people was unmistakable. He was a tyrant. Everything in the empire revolved around his whims.
“I have no particular destination in mind. Perhaps I should take a look at the adventurer’s guild?”
The guild was in the southwest block of the third layer of the capital, the part of the city Hanakawa had arrived in when he first got there. The Creator Akinobu Marufuji had turned the buildings into enormous living creatures and sent them on a rampage, but Luna had erased them along with the rest of the block. The city was divided up by walls, each section being referred to as a block. Passing through the gates between blocks, Hanakawa headed for his destination.
“Everything seems back to normal... Or perhaps not?” Although it had been reduced to an empty field, there were now roads and buildings again. But they were all entirely new. “I shudder to think of what happened to the people. Hmm, I suppose I should see the guild first. I wouldn’t mind finally having the chance to register as an adventurer.”
The cityscape was more or less back to its original layout, so he had a good idea where the guild was located. After a while, he found it but then stumbled. Someone had pushed him from the side. Caught off guard, Hanakawa let himself get pushed into an alley between buildings.
“Whoa, whoa! What on earth are you doing?!”
By the time he realized what was happening, he was surrounded. Four masked men blocked either end of the alley, two on each side of him.
“Wh-What is it you intend with me?! If you lay a hand on me, the emperor will not forgive you!”
“Like I care,” one of the men spat as they drew their swords.
“No way! The emperor’s authority is being ignored! Wait, aren’t you all Miss Luna’s bodyguards?”
Though only to a limited degree, Hanakawa could read the stats of others. They must have covered their faces, knowing it would be bad if they got recognized, but that didn’t help them at all against Hanakawa.
“I-If you do something like this, it will cause great problems for Miss Luna!”
“As long as you’re alive, Lady Luna can’t live in peace.”
“She lives in constant fear of your shadow.”
“Lady Luna has no idea we are doing this.”
“Once you are dead, we will all die to cover our shame. Our actions have nothing to do with her.”
“We have resolved ourselves to that end no matter what!”
They seemed determined to attack him, even if it meant their own deaths, leaving him no place to run.
Th-That is okay. I am still a Healer! As long as I avoid being killed instantly, I should be able to manage! I just need to prepare myself for the pain it will entail...
Hanakawa possessed attack magic that could defeat a single opponent if he had to. Healing himself while taking their attacks, he could bring the assailants down one at a time. But these men were extremely determined. They had no concern for their own survival.
“These people intend to rush me all at once, even if it kills them in the process!”
Hanakawa braced himself to charge. He would throw his full weight at them, grabbing the blades of their swords with his bare hands, ignoring any injury to himself. It was unlikely they could stop a head-on charge, so he would start by attacking the one in front of him.
As he thought that, something flashed from deeper within the alley. The two men standing in front of Hanakawa fell over, and almost simultaneously, the two behind him collapsed as well. Throwing knives were embedded in their faces.
“This is... Well, frankly, I have no idea what is going on, but I suppose I am saved!”
“Hanakawa.”
“Gah!” A shiver ran down his back as a voice called out to him from the alley.
“Come here. It’s me, Mitadera.”
Shigeto Mitadera—one of Hanakawa’s classmates. He had the class of Master Oracle and was the one responsible for bringing Hanakawa to Ent in the first place. After encountering Yoshifumi in the bar, Hanakawa had heard he’d been chased down and killed by Rena.
“Uhh...” Hanakawa began to creep backwards. Though it seemed like Mitadera had saved him, the guy was responsible for much of Hanakawa’s suffering in the past. He really didn’t feel like talking to him.
“I’m not going to do anything bad to you. If you want me to apologize for everything before, then I’m sorry. So please listen to what I have to say.”
“Oh... Then in that case, would you apologize on your hands and knees for me?”
“You... You really get full of yourself quick, don’t you? Fine. I’ll do whatever you want. Just come with me.”
Hanakawa caught a sense of Shigeto’s weakened state from his desperate voice. That was something he could work with.
No Comments Yet
Post a new comment
Register or Login