Volume 7 - CH 21

Translator: Silver Editor: Namorax

「Great Elder Meeting」

The man looked to be in his forties and had a calm atmosphere about him. His green-tinged, blonde hair was rather long and braided into a complex style and he wore tasteful jewelry around his neck and other locations on his body.

At first glance, he seemed to be a dignified person……

He was the third generation chieftain, Brian Boyd Evangeline Maple.

The noise settled down after he spoke up.

Dylan bowed to him before greeting the other members of the council.

“Thank you all for relenting to my selfish request and gathering here today. Chief Brian, thank you for sparing your extremely valuable time to speak with me.”

Looking at Dylan’s lowered head, Brian chuckled and said:

“Well, in this case I think it’s a good opportunity for me. That’s why I set up this meeting and asked everyone to attend. Proceed as you wish.”

Brian’s words caused a few of the elders to stare at him in surprise.

If I wasn’t mistaken, Brian seemed rather interested in the story Dylan had to tell.

Before the meeting had even begun, the chieftain had already unbalanced things.

Dylan took a look around the room and gave Brian an understanding nod while the chief gave him a small smile.

“Before we begin the latest discussion, allow me to introduce the newest brethren to join my village. Arc-kun.”

Some people had a dubious expression when they heard Dylan’s statement.

I took a step forward and placed my hands on my helmet.

Ponta let out a groan and moved down to my shoulder before I removed my helmet.

“My name is Arc Raratoia. A pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

I bowed after my simple self-introduction.

Ponta moved from my shoulder to my back and vice versa in order to avoid falling, but nobody paid any attention to that amusing scene.

“I’ve never seen a fellow like this before.”

“A brethren with red eyes, black hair and brown skin?”

“Though his ears are those of an elf, he’s built like a dark-elf.”

“The differences are greater than I thought……”

The ten elders set forward in their seats and voiced their impression of me.

Some had known of my existence before my arrival, while others were utterly surprised by my appearance and others still doubted that I was an elf.

While various exclamations were still flying about, Dylan continued his explanation.

“He, my daughter Ariane and one other person, a girl of the People of the Mountains and Plains, accompanied me on my trip to Rouen Forest. From there they traveled to the human kingdom Nozan and proceeded to help one of the country’s royals.”

Several people seemed confused by the contents of Dylan’s story and stared down at him.

“To make a long story short, when the royal family requested their assistance they relented under certain conditions, and successfully helped the human nation.”

As he talked Dylan reached into his breast pocket, took out a piece of paper, opened it and placed it on the table.

“This is a simple map of the country they helped, Nozan Kingdom, which is located here. And this is Rouen forest, were Doranto village is located.”

Dylan began explaining the map, but one of the great elders raised an eyebrow.

“What’s the relation between the map and what you said before? Could you summarize things a bit more.”

However, when the elder felt Brain’s gaze on the back of his head, he folded his arms and said nothing more.

“Thank you. Although everyone is aware that we dispatched a relief force to aid Doranto after they suffered large casualties, does anyone know what caused said damage in the first place?”

Dylan paused for a moment and waited for a response, but no one spoke up so he went ahead with his story.

“Initially it was believed that a powerful monster had attacked Doranto…… but in actuality, the culprit was a man-made unit of undead.”    。

The majority of the great elders were surprised by what he said.

“Artificial undead!? They were created by human hands!?”

“That’s ridiculous!! Does the technology to create undead even exist!?”

“Wait, wait! How can you be sure that humans created them?”

Once the surprised outburst and doubts had settled, Dylan continued with his story.

“We can be certain that the undead were man-made because a high-ranking member of the organization that created them, a cardinal of the Hiruku religion, revealed that information…… his position was comparable to that of the elders gathered here now.”

The great elders looked at one another and questioned the legitimacy of what he said.

“The cardinal had attacked the Nozan Kingdom using those artificial undead, but was defeated by Arc-kun and the others I mentioned before. I was informed of the situation shortly after that, but things appear to be worse than I anticipated……”

Dylan marked the countries to the north and south of Nozan, Delfuento Kingdom and Salma Kingdom, on the map and used a pen to place an X over the places their capitals were located.

“The Hiruku Theocracy organized an undead army and attacked Salma Kingdom’s capital. The army numbers around two hundred thousand. It was a scouting party of that two hundred thousand strong army that attacked Doranto.”

Chief Brian let out a large sigh as he listened to Dylan’s story.

Judging by his reaction, he’d probably heard everything in advance.

However, the eyes of most of the people were blown wide open as they digested the information.

The few elders whose reaction was similar to Brian’s must have already heard about the report before and were now seeking confirmation of the facts.

I guess they wouldn’t be able to simply judge that Dylan’s story was a lie when it came time to make the final decision.

“Assuming that what you’ve said is factual, the scouts of that large undead army attacked Doranto? Does that mean that the entirety of that army will flow in the village in the near future?”

Dylan silently nodded at one of the elder’s question.

“Additionally, another army of similar size to the one that has invaded Salma Kingdom has already destroyed the capital of Delfuento. Rescuing Doranto is without question, but Nozan Kingdom will be under siege from four hundred thousand enemies from the north and south.”

Although Dylan pushed forward with the story as he pointed out things on the map, one of the Great Elders voiced a question.

“I’m a bit confused, I understand that this is a situation where we must rescue our people, but are you suggesting we save this human country as well? Why is that?”

A few of the other elders nodded along with what the one elder had said.

“Let’s talk about the conditions Arc-kun put in place when he helped the country some time ago. The conditions that Nozan accepted were ‘the emancipation of all elven and beastmen slaves and a severe punishment for any unjust enslavement in the future to be imposed. ”

The great elders’ gazes alternated between Dylan’s and my face when they heard that.

“A human country would never accept such conditions! Rather, what exactly did he do that could make a country swallow such conditions!?”

It was unavoidable for them to think so.

Dylan had yet to explain that I’d annihilated the army of one hundred thousand undead that had been sent to Nozan.

If he brought up such an absurd claim first, any credibility that Dylan had had would have vanished, so he’d deliberately downplayed it till now.

“The lord of a vast human territory of a neighboring country has also agreed to those conditions. I don’t wish for a country willing to accept those conditions to disappear. Two countries have already been destroyed by the Hiruku Theocracy’s undead army. These two are the only human leaders that remain. If they are crushed, then the future of the elves and beastmen in that area will be lost.”

Chief Brain followed after Dylan with an argument of his own.

“While that is certainly true, this is also the biggest chance we have to weaken the Hiruku Theocracy’s influence. According to the two human rulers, the Hiruku church seemed to be controlled by the Cardinals and the Pope. We can shake the Religion at its foundation.”

Some of the great elders nodded at Brain’s remark.

Although one of the elders timidly asked Chief Brian a question.

“Ho-However, are were sure that the humans will fulfill those condition? I’m worried that those guys will immediately go back on their word……”

The elder next to the one that made that comment smiled and tried to refute his opinion.

“Shouldn’t a show of force squash any rebellious intent?”

Some of the elders nodded at her remark.

Dylan picked up the conversation after that last comment.

“Even if we don’t cooperate with the humans this time, the fight with the man-made undead is unavoidable.”

Many of the elders asked Dylan to elaborate on what he meant by that comment.

“Please think about it for a moment. Although we do not know how they are making them, the Hiruku church has a method for creating undead. I don’t know the details of their magic but I understand that it has one required element.”

Silence overtook the room as all eyes were directed a Dylan.

However, on the opposite side of the room, Brian was the one that finally spoke.

“Corpses.”

Brian’s one word caused an unpleasant tension to run through the room.

Everyone seemed to realize it.

The majority of the undead soldiers we’d seen were skeletons equipped with metal armor.

Considering the necessary manufacture cost for each of them, it would be one set of armor…… and one skeleton.

How would one go about procuring the necessary human skeletons?

If I were running the Hiruku Religion, the first thing I would do was raise the dead after the funeral service.

Then there would be the bodies of the people that died during a recent war, or the corpses from a conquered city. I don’t know how many undead they can raise in a day, but I imagine that the Hiruku’s undead horde would drastically increase in size each time they created a mountain of corpses.

The undead army would multiply like rats.

Hiruku’s doctrine oppressed elves and beastmen after all, so why wouldn’t they declare war on those races after they finished swallowing the surrounding nations?

Ariane seemed to have just realized this fact as her golden eyes were wide open when she looked up at me.

The great elders had wary expressions as they looked at Dylan, but with no one offering a different strategy, only silence remained.

The option of non-involvement was already off the table, it wasn’t hard to imagine the situation becoming uncontrollable if the Hiruku religion wasn’t dealt with now.

One of the elders cleared their throat and brought up the next issue.

“It is obvious that the Hiruku Theocracy can’t be left alone. Obviously, but how can we deploy our soldiers from here? Even if we gathered the warriors and shipped them from Landfria and Saskatoon, do we even have enough ships?”

Another elder rose their own concerns after hearing that question.

“While transportation is an issue…… the first problem is gathering our forces. Against the army of four hundred thousand undead, even if we called for the warriors of every village in Canada, would they even reach ten thousand? As Dylan-dono has said, cooperation with the humans might be necessary.”

Everyone began to consider the points the two elders had raised.

Meanwhile, Dylan straightened his posture and directed his gaze towards me.

…… Looks like I was up.

“There are possible solutions to those issues. The problem of transportation can easily be handled by the newest member of my village, Arc-kun.”

After Dylan looked around the room he called out my name as the signal.

I nodded and immediately invoked my magic.

“【Dimensional Step】”

I vanished while everyone’s attention was on me, and the next moment, when I materialized behind chief Brain, all of the elders began looking around the place I had been moments before.

“He vanished!?” “Nonsense!”

While most of the elders were caught off guard by my disappearance, the large dark elf elder, who I was told was Ariane’s grandfather Fangas, immediately located where I was…… Chief Brain began to chuckle when he looked over my shoulder and saw me.

“There hasn’t been a transfer magic user since the first chieftain……”

Brian’s statement lead everyone to finally realize what had happened. Not only those who had been completely unaware, even those who had been informed by Dylan ahead of time were surprised.

It was more shocking to see something than it was to hear about it.

One curious great elder nearly fell out of his chair in order to ask his questions.

“I’ve never seen transfer magic like that before! That’s!? How far can your magic go, how much can you take with you!?”

The elder waited with bated breath for my answer, so I informed him of everything I knew.

“I can use two types of transfer magic, long-distance and short-distance. I just demonstrated my short range magic, the long-distance magic allows me to travel to locations I’ve visited before, its only limitation is my memory of the location. I have yet to test the limits on how much I can take with me.”

The surrounding people attentively listened to what I had to say while I answered the elder’s questions.

Meanwhile, one of the female great elders slowly approached me, her eyes shined a lustrous green as she ran her fingers over the 『Holy Armor of Belenus』 and she asked another question.

“Can you travel to another location from here?”

Opposed to her title as great elder the woman appeared to be in her early thirties, but it was hard to gauge her true age since she was an elf.

For some reason, Ariane glared at us with angry eyes.

When I heard “Me too!” “Same here!” as other elders rose their hands, I looked to Dylan for direction.

Dylan nodded his head once, it seems he judged their wish should be granted and that they should experience it at least once.

“When the three of you are standing next to me…… let’s take a trip to Doranto.”

The female elder looked pleased by what I said as she moved to my side and lightly stroked Ponta’s chin.

“Ky〜un.”

Ponta let out a deep purr as if she liked the woman’s fingers.

In addition to the two people who’d already voiced their interest in experiencing transfer magic, Ariane’s grandfather Fangas and chief Brian also stood up and joined us.

So I would be taking five people with me.

Dylan smiled warily at my circumstances.

Since I would be taking them to Doranto village it was necessary to memorize the image of the room first.

Thanks to the large round table and the room’s calm atmosphere it was easy enough to remember it for a short time…… afterward, I brought up the characteristics of Doranto in my head.

“Let’s go, 【Transfer Gate】.”

The great elders let out a surprised shout when the magic formation appeared at our feet and consumed us. The light overtook the room for a moment before darkness fell, when it passed we were in another location.

“Oh! There’s no mistaking those three trees! That’s Doranto village!”

One of the great elders delightfully pointed out the three trees and the cityscape surrounding their roots.

Another of the elders restlessly looked around before pulling up a few blades of grass and casually began chewing on it.

“……Bitter. This isn’t a hallucination or something of the like……”

The elder seemed to be absorbed in observing the surroundings while he muttered to himself.

“No, this is quite splendid.”

A full smile briefly appeared on Chief Brian’s face as he spoke.

My long ears appeared to be quite sensitive as I could pick up the sounds of war preparations as I looked towards Doranto.

Elder Fargas appeared to hear the same thing I was, given that he was glaring in the same direction I was.

“Dylan-dono is waiting for us so we should return. 【Transfer Gate】”

I prevented the elders from wandering off and invoked the transfer magic again, this time bringing the large room in Maple to mind.

We returned as if our excursion had been a lie. The elders were surprised by our sudden return, and Dylan had a wry smile while Ariane let out a large sigh.

“Bitter…… this transfer magic is genuine”

The elder who had chewed on the grass on our trip to Doranto was the first to speak.

He’d brought back some grass and popped it into his mouth to judge its authenticity.

“It was a valuable and fun experience.”

On the other hand, the female elder gave me a flirtatious glance and sweetly whispered into my ear.

“Kyun?”

Ponta suddenly reacted to something, but before I could figure out what, I suddenly felt something tugging at me from behind.

“Welcome back. Arc.”

When I looked back, Ariane welcomed me back with a voice so sharp it stung like a thorn.

“Well, I’m convinced that his cooperation solves the transportation issue. All that is left is our war potential, but we can borrow the power of a Dragon King for that. I think some of you were already aware, but Ferufivisurotte-sama is visiting today.”

The great elders seemed very pleased by Dylan’s explanation.

“Oh, if Ferufivisurotte-sama were to lend her strength there would be no need to worry!”

“Can we really borrow the power of the one considered to be the most wicked of the Dragon Kings?!”

“However, Ferufivisurotte-sama’s cooperation is……”

Some elders spoke joyous about the suggestion, while others had a more subtle reaction.

“……To be honest, borrowing power carries its own problem.”

Even Dylan, the one who had suggested it, lowered his eyes.

The faces of the elders became clouded at his short statement.

Dylan received their gazes, before embarrassingly looking towards me.

The atmosphere became even more clouded as a strange muffled voice reached our ears from outside the door.

《Oh, is it finally my turn. I was tired of waiting, Dylan.》

When the elders started looking around, the double doors were blow opened by a gust of wind that blew into the room.

“What!?”

“Kyun!?”

“!?”

I knelt down a little as Ariane ducked behind me to block the wind.

Ponta was blown off my shoulder, but somehow managed to

fight against the wind attach herself to Ariane’s back.

When the gust stopped I noticed two shadows standing at the entrance.