“Good read, Hermit.” The dark elf grinned. “This city was destroyed by vampires.”
“I see.”
It is traditional for vampires to take the form of a bat or a rat. And, according to the popular consensus, vampirism is infectious. If a vampire bites you, you become a vampire. An epidemic that makes the common cold or flu look like child’s play. The number of vampires would multiply like rats in a basement.
“I was told that it took ten days to seize control of the entire city.”
“That’s still a breakneck speed.”
A whole city-state gone in ten days. Actually, if all them turned vampiric, that was more like a whole city-state had turned to the enemy. I didn’t know the population numbers of Gannes at the time, but I could imagine that we weren’t talking about a hundred or two from the well-built castle and walls. If there had been a population of ten thousand, for example, that would mean an army of ten thousand vampires joining the enemy. How could anyone defeat that?
“Apparently, the vampires were decimated in an instant,” she cracked a self-deprecating grin.
“How did that happen?” I asked, with a surprisingly airheaded tone.
With one swing of Shizuru the Hero’s sword given to him by the god, a holy light enveloped the city of Gannes, turning every last vampire to dust. Ash to ash. Dust to dust.
I mean... That’s not really what a vampire hunter does, though, is it? It has to be, you know, more forbidden, and apocalyptic, and underworld. Like a certain Mister D. Isn’t that atmosphere what it’s all about?
What’s with the deus-ex-holy-light, dear brother?
He owed Hideyuki Kikuchi an apology.
“Well, no one goes into battle looking for atmosphere. It’s more efficient to take care of things as easily as possible.”
I did hear that both humans and monsters were nearing annihilation, back in those times. No time to find the romance in a war like that. I understood that, but imagining the residents of the city being robbed of their humanity without reason, then having even their vampiric lives evaporated in the blink of an eye... It seemed like they were just a number.
“That’s what war is, Eiji. How can anyone remain in their right mind without simplifying their enemy into mere numbers?”
The hero killed those monsters, one after another, as if he was performing a chore; I shuddered to imagine. Isn’t that a little much to bear for a boy, one who was high school-aged at the time? Of course, I had absolutely no idea who put that heavy weight on his shoulders.
“Maybe it was penance. For him bringing over rice.”
“Who knows? I can’t say what he was thinking. I never found out what was going through his mind or what he wanted.”
“...I’m sorry.”
Even after being transported to another world, she never saw her brother alive again. Nor found out what was on his mind. We could have tried to deduce it all we wanted, but we had no way to know if we were right or wrong.
“Nothing you should be sorry for or carry with you. He’s a stranger to you,” Tiamat said, somewhat keeping me at a distance.
It didn’t seem like she was upset but more... rigid, somehow. Like a wall that would never be weakened.
“You can’t carry it all. Let me take half. And I would love for you to carry half of my baggage too, Tia.”
“Mm. That doesn’t change the total weight at all.”
Two people collectively carrying the baggage of two people. Of course that won’t make it any lighter.
“Is that a no?”
“That was the plan when I took the ring. There’s no need to ask that now.”
She twirled her silver locks. It appeared that she was embarrassed. I, too, could feel my cheeks redden.
“...How long is this going to last, love birds?” Miss Cielz asked in a very disgusted tone.
The humans did stand victorious at the end of the great war that brought the world to the brink of destruction. That being said, it wasn’t like all of the monsters were massacred. There were a considerable number of them left after the Demon Lord’s demise, and the world had a rather serious problem on its hands when those surviving monsters began attacking towns and farmlands in hordes.
With no structure to speak of, humans had to deal with these groups of monsters individually. That proved to be troublesome in a different way. In fact, the government began dealing with bandits and monsters in the same manner. They deployed their military at times, and left the town watches and adventurers to deal with them at other times. While the monsters were a nuisance, they were no longer a national threat. They were merely prey to be hunted down.
However, not all monsters succumbed to that fate. Some accepted their defeat and went into hiding to wait for a time to strike: the dark elves like Miss Cielz and those described as Hellions. The abandoned castle of Gannes became their lair, where no one lived and no one would visit. A location well-suited to playing a long con.
Of course, if humans discovered their secret lair, there was a decent chance that they would be attacked. There were some tear-jerking efforts to conceal their lair, like spreading ghost story rumors and disabling the travel road that used to lead to the city. These efforts lasted a century and a half. Finally, the moment they had been waiting for had arrived.
“The resurgence of the Demon Lord.”
“Yes,” Miss Cielz answered Tiamat, briskly.
A little more than a month ago, the figure had suddenly appeared in the abandoned castle. They had hair as black as darkness itself and eyes as dark as the dead of night, along with overwhelming magic and combat prowess. Of course, the surviving monsters from the time of the previous Demon Lord didn’t immediately recognize them as a Demon Lord. They relied on power, not political stances nor ideals. A few of them challenged the Demon Lord, Miss Cielz being one among them.
“It wasn’t even a fight,” she said, and chuckled. “I was just a toy on a fingertip.”
As would be expected. That’s what a few cheat codes could do. No power or technique acquired after any amount of blood, sweat, tears, and hard work stood a chance against cheat codes. If I was in their place, it would have all seemed ridiculous. Why bother with hard work at that point? “If you’re so powerful, you take care of it all yourself,” I’d say. Although that wouldn’t be very noble of me.
“Our Lord’s wisdom, as well as power, is truly awesome.”
Miss Cielz continued as if in a trance. Her expression told of her adoration for the Demon Lord. I imagined that the followers of Shizuru the Hero were of similar states of mind. He was from modern-day Japan, after all. Of course he would have more advanced knowledge than the people of this world.
“That alone won’t cover it. Just being from modern-day Japan doesn’t explain the strategies those monsters took, Eiji.”
Tiamat reined me back as I was chuckling. Right. Japanese civilians had no knowledge of military strategy. Other than in theory, perhaps. Our last war was over seventy years ago. There were barely any alive in Japan who had experienced war firsthand, and none of them had experienced combat with swords and magic. How could anyone in that situation conduct capable strategies?
We weren’t in a video game or a movie. Even in the sci-fi novel G.I. Samurai, where the Japanese self-defense force time-travels to feudal Japan, the self-defense force was annihilated despite their state-of-the-art technology. Wait. Did one survive?
Anyway, war is not as easy of a craft as us civilians think. You don’t have a convenient screen that shows you the enemies’ stats or anything. Just deciding how many fighters to send to which battlefield requires a lot of forethought.
“Maybe the Demon Lord got a cheat code for military knowledge, too.”
“We should assume so,” Tiamat said. “If the knowledge was brought in, we could have had an idea of the ceiling, making our lives a lot easier.”
As we continued our conversation quietly, we were nearing the city gates.
“No need to keep your human form here,” Miss Cielz remarked, as sarcastic as always.