Diablo flapped his cloak and smirked.
“It is because I’m a Demon Lord from another world!”
“Demon Lord?!”
They stiffened for a moment—
Before erupting into laughter.
“Someone from the races is a Demon Lord! That’s a good joke! You’re a funny one!”
Not just the elder Yolda, but the other Kobolds were cackling, holding onto their bellies.
Diablo was overwhelmed. People had doubted him plenty of times before, but it was the first time he’d been laughed at to his face.
“They, want food!” Fennely said, moving her hands in gestures.
“Yes, that’s fine. We have plenty.”
At the elder’s orders, some of the females crept back into the hole and returned after a short while with dried meat and dried potatoes.
“Ugh...”
Their baskets were also full of dried dead insects. A bit of a hard diet for Diablo and his friends’ urban upbringing.
Well, I guess we don’t have to force ourselves to eat bugs.
They brought quite a bit of food, so it was like a small feast. Baskets of food were laid over the rug of fallen leaves, with grape wine being served in small wooden containers.
“This is better than rainwater, yes?”
“That it is.”
In truth, Diablo wasn’t much for alcohol... but, unlike alcohol, which didn’t decay easily, water and juices were hard to preserve. Antiseptics didn’t exist in this world, after all. But despite not being a drinker, after a few sips of the grape wine, Diablo grew used to it. It didn’t have much alcohol anyway.
“Mm? Is this...?”
The wine bottle was a familiar shape. It looked like the type used in Lyferia. Yolda ran his fingers across the bottle’s surface.
“This is from a Human town.”
“So I thought.”
The wooden containers had an elaborate design, too. Considering they lived in burrows under the ground, their lifestyle was rather civilized. The dried meat tasted good, but the dried leaves... didn’t. They truly were nothing more than dried leaves, and left a rough sensation in Diablo’s mouth.
“So? Where did you come from?”
Saying he came from another world(!) wouldn’t advance the conversation any.
“A city called Faltra.”
“Never heard of it.”
“I suppose it is more than ten days away from here by carriage.”
“You came from pretty far away!”
“Is everyone from the village here? I see a lot of women...”
“The men are all out since the day before yesterday. Some trouble happened.”
“Hm.”
“Among the races, the demis are better. Some even trade with us, like the Dwarves who also live underground.”
“Rock Dwarves.”
Apparently, they had visited this village once. They distanced themselves from Lyferia’s cities and chose to live in hiding. Diablo found that tendency to shut themselves in to be relatable.
It was pretty awful back then too, though...
“There are some Grasswalkers, too. We don’t see Elves and Pantherians too often, though.”
He cast a glance at Rem and Shera. They couldn’t exchange words with the other Kobolds, but the girls seemed to be enjoying their meal all the same. There wasn’t much need for words when sharing a table, after all.
But then Yolda’s foxy face contorted, his brows furrowing.
“But Humans are bad! When they find us, they start firing arrows like they’re hunting animals!”
“What?!”
“We’ve lived in this land for many ages. But the Humans came along and made cities. That’s fine. But they try to drive us out. Many of us were killed. It is unforgivable.”
“Why do the Humans attack you?”
“Probably because we can’t speak Human language,” Yolda spat out spitefully. “They don’t see us as part of the races because of that.”
“That’s foolish...”
“You think so?”
“Of course. All the more so because I can understand you. Is there any difference between you and the races?”
“Even if we have fox heads?”
“That doesn’t matter. Treating something unequally because of their appearance or customs is called discrimination. And discrimination is an unforgivable act.”
“Are you sure you’re from the races?”
“Hmph... Do not make me say it again. I am a Demon Lord from another world!”
Yolda cackled loudly.
I guess that’s how they react if I don’t show them magic.
There was something cute and affable to how he laughed, so, despite being somewhat disappointed, Diablo didn’t feel all that bad about it.
In the end, they stayed in the village, as the rain wouldn’t stop. At first, they were a bit anxious to crawl into a hole in the ground, but once they did, they found the hollow was surprisingly wide enough to stand up and walk around in.
The trees served as support pillars and the inner surface was hardened with clay. The place was pleasantly chill with a moistness in the air, and, despite the scent of animal, it seemed perfectly hospitable. Most importantly, since they were underground, the raindrops couldn’t reach them.
Fennely told Diablo about where the races’ city was in extreme detail. Apparently, the forest’s trees had markings on them, so once the weather improved, they wouldn’t have to worry about getting lost. Come nightfall, they were lent blankets which they used to sleep with their backs to the clay walls.
The following morning, they found it was hard to tell whether it was sunny from inside the hole, to say nothing of the time and the weather. What woke them up was the sound of several sets of footsteps approaching them. To be exact, Rem was the one to notice, and proceeded to elbow Diablo and Shera awake.
“Mm?”
They woke up to find themselves surrounded by burly male Kobolds.
“They demis?”
One exceptionally large male with red fur stood on guard. Diablo half rose to his feet, but before things could get any more complicated, the elder Yolda and Fennely popped out from some other hole and explained they were invited as guests.
“...It seems that red Kobold is the boss around here,” Rem whispered.
Even without understanding what they were saying, Rem could pick up on that from the way Yolda treated the red-furred Kobold. Yolda did say he was the elder, but... apparently that didn’t mean he was at the top of the pack.
The red-furred Kobold stood in front of Diablo.
“You understand what we say?”
“Indeed. Introduce yourself to me. I permit it.”
“He really talk?!”
“Of course I did. Or can you not understand me, fool?”
“Ah! Cheeky one! This my village!”
“Hmph...”
“Well, never mind... I chief, Boldboss! Never thought would give name to races!”
“Hmm. Incidentally, is something amiss? You seem perturbed...”
Boldboss exchanged a glance with Yolda. He was put off by Diablo’s attitude, who, despite being a guest in the presence of many, acted as if he was king.
There wasn’t much Diablo could do, though. He may have gotten used to speaking to people, but if it wasn’t for his Demon Lord role playing, he wouldn’t be able to finish a single sentence.
“No business of yours,” Boldboss eventually said.
“If you insist, I do not mind, but...”
He still owed them for last night’s lodging and the food they shared. If they were in some kind of trouble, he wanted to help them. Still, forcibly getting them to talk would be wrong. His gaze wandered around the other male Kobolds apart from Boldboss, when he noticed something one of them was holding.
A fragment. It looked like a thick, metallic-like shell, its cross section being visibly cracked, and it was sticky with some black, viscous liquid. There were charred marks
on it, too.
Could that be...?
“The spriggan...”
“You know it?!” Boldboss’s eyes widened at his whisper.
“Ah, no... I mean, yes, of course I do. I am a Demon Lord from another world, so my knowledge knows no bounds.”
Three days ago, he’d fired several high firepower spells and forced the spriggan to self-destruct—but he couldn’t tell them that, and they naturally didn’t suspect he was capable of that.
“This, our guardian deity,” Boldboss crossed his arms and said.
“O-Oh...”
Hiding the shiver of stress that ran through him was a challenge. Beasts that worship the spriggan—in other words, they were...
“Three days ago, invaders arrive in road near the valley. Guardian deity go there, and, after a while, big boom.”
“Mmm.”
“Look like, guardian deity fight someone. And now it like this...”
“I see.”
Boldboss glared at the ground in frustration.
“Don’t know why. Guardian deity in pieces.”
It blew itself up, Diablo thought, but couldn’t bear to say.
“Did anyone see what happened?”
“This time, very sudden. By the time we arrive...”
“I see...”
“What we do, Boldboss?!” one Kobold who had black circles around his eyes like a racoon asked. “Without guardian deity, we can’t win!”
“Stop saying stupid things! Big Human town in reach already! We can win, alone! Drive them away from land! Sure of it!”
Boldboss raised his voice in an impressive cry. But one thing tugged at Diablo’s mind.
“Big Human town?”
“Yes... I think they call it, Caliture.”
“You’re going to attack Caliture?!”
“What...?!” Rem went pale.
“You can’t!” Shera raised her voice.
“What women say?” Boldboss and the other Kobolds eyed the girls dubiously.
“Are you the beasts that have been attacking Lyferia’s strongholds?” Diablo asked without answering his question.
“We no beasts! We people. Call us Therianthropes, we allow.”
“Answer my question.”
“Hmph... We are ones who crush Human strongholds, using power of guardian deity.”
So the Kobolds were the targets of their quest, after all. The spriggan was their main force, it seemed, but Diablo had destroyed it.
“This is quite the mess...”
“You are demi. Why side with Humans?”
Diablo was conflicted. His position in this was problematic. The king of Lyferia gave him a quest to hunt down the beasts attacking the races’ towns. But now he owed the Kobolds a debt of gratitude.
And if what they said was true, they lived here first, before the Humans arrived. According to what Rem had said, they had clashed when the kingdom of Lyferia expanded its borders one hundred years ago. That meant the Humans were the invaders here.
“I owe you...” Diablo glared at Boldboss. “...Especially Fennely, a great deal. I cannot return a favor with enmity.”
“Understood. You understand what we say. Not Human, so no ill-will toward you. But some go savage when war happens. Leave if you want to live.”
Diablo said nothing. He couldn’t decide what to do. Boldboss then appended, “Storm outside now. Once weather clears, should leave.”
They really weren’t bad folk. But it would have been so much easier if they were...
†
Boldboss went deeper into the tunnels, leaving the three of them alone. With Rem and Shera badgering him, Diablo relayed the circumstances to them. Having heard the full story, the two had complicated expressions on their faces.
“...So the Kobolds were the beasts they sent us here to dispatch.”
“Oh, no...”
“...I recall Caliture’s troops marching into the forest every so often, to hunt beasts that endanger the races—or so they said, but they might have been attacking the Therianthropes.”
“That’s awful!”
Diablo related to Shera’s outrage.
“...But it’s a fact there are people of the races living in these lands, too,” Rem bemoaned pensively. “They can’t simply vacate Caliture.”
“They can’t?”
“...An Elf living in the blessed forests might not realize this, but... To live, the races need forests they can hunt in, fields they can produce crops from and land abundant with water. Those aren’t things one can prepare easily. It took a century to make Caliture habitable, and it would take another century to make another town like it.”
“Mm, but a century isn’t that long.”
“See, this is why you can’t explain anything to Elves!”
Shera flinched as Rem glared her down. Diablo had to agree that a hundred years was a long time.
“If the races were to leave this place, they would have to go somewhere that’s already inhabited by someone. Telling them to leave Caliture makes no sense.”
“I agree... Still, I’m... I’m opposed to exterminating the Kobolds.”
“We can’t do that, no matter what!”
Diablo was in agreement. The Kobolds had lived in this land first, and they owed them a debt of gratitude.
“...Caliture is a large region.” Rem clenched her first. “The races’ presence here may have grown, but there’s no need for them to fight over turf with the Kobolds. Not when they’re so few, anyway. It should be possible to broker peace here.”
“You’re right!” Shera nodded assertively. “Just like how the Elves and the Dark Elves get along!”
“...We should stop the Kobolds from recklessly attacking Caliture. And, at the same time, we need to make the Humans realize how terribly they’re treating the Kobolds.”
But that was where the snag was.
“I agree there aren’t that many Kobolds here, but... Is attacking Caliture really that reckless? They’ve already toppled the citadels.”
“...I checked the records before leaving the capital. Four citadels in the Caliture region have fallen, but the estimated causes of defeat are that the spriggan attacked, and they lost their walls or commanders in the fighting.”
“Hm.”
Diablo had defeated the spriggan, and, with this, the Kobolds had lost their primary source of strength.
“...The Kobolds seem to realize this will be a difficult fight for them, too. They probably know they’ll lose.”
“Then they shouldn’t fight, right...?” Shera said, seemingly unconvinced.
“...If nothing else, now’s the time. Given time, Lyferia’s reinforcements will arrive. They’ll rebuild the citadels and, eventually, a subjugation party will be sent into the forest. They’ll be more severe and thorough than ever before.”
“Oh...”
When they had left the capital, Diablo’s party was asked whether they wanted to come along with the army or go ahead. Which meant that, by now, the reinforcements were on their way. But with the road destroyed, they probably wouldn’t arrive that quickly.
“...It’s sad to admit it, but... this is war. The war between the kingdom of Lyferia and the Kobolds has already begun.”
“Then what should we do?”
“...Like I said earlier—first, we need to stop the Kobolds. If they attack Caliture with their current forces, they’ll be wiped out.”
“Is it that bad?”
“Yes. Caliture doesn’t just have an army... Mm?” Rem fell silent.
It was Fennely. As always, she was dressed in an outfit that barely covered her body.
I guess she’s still better than Sylvie...
She had probably just bathed, because she was wiping her wet hair dry with a piece of fabric.
“Hello.”
“Hello there, Fennely,” Rem greeted her.
She didn’t understand what Fennely had said, but did guess at her intent. Fennely smiled back at her.
“Diab
lo, war, soon start. Dangerous.”
“About that... Who decided you’re going to war?”
“Decide? Mmm...”
Fennely tilted her head in contemplation.
“...Maybe the Kobolds don’t have the concepts of a leader or a chain of command?” Rem asked with a confused expression.
“They don’t have a king?” Shera was surprised, too.
“Is Boldboss the most important person here?”
“Ah, yes! Most strong! So, most important!”
They’re pretty animalistic when it comes to strength...
Still, they had fought Lyferia for a long time. It only made sense for the strongest person to become the head of the pack.
“Anyhow, I suppose I should persuade Boldboss to stop.”
“...Don’t do anything excessive, Diablo,” Rem warned him.
A male Kobold peeked his head out of one of the holes.
“Fennely, hurry! Ritual, start soon!”
“Ah... Yes...” she said, a shiver noticeably running down her spine.
“Ritual?”
“Yes... Enemy, strong. Warriors, need courage. So, ritual... do. Before battle, ritual.”
For raising their fighting spirit?
The Kobolds needed to crush Caliture before the reinforcements from Lyferia arrived. And the faster they attacked, the better.
“Fennely, go now.”
Fennely headed down the hole.
“She looked kinda sad...” Shera whispered.
“If we’re going to convince them to give up on fighting, this pre-war ritual would be the right time.”
†
They’d gotten lost. The Kobolds’ tunnels were more winding and complex than they thought.
We should have had Fennely show us the way.
“...I hear voices from that way.” Rem pointed.
Peering ahead, Diablo indeed found a large group of Kobolds. There were two hundred or so of them gathered in a large hollow, with Diablo looking down on the place from the floor above.
“Oh, there’s Fennely.”
Shera pointed at what looked like a platform at the front of the large space, where Fennely was seated. There were several other young female Kobolds there as well.
“...Doesn’t this feel suspicious, somehow?” Rem narrowed her eyes.
Boldboss was standing in front of the females, apparently making some kind of speech before the other males.
“Let’s win!”
How NOT to Summon a Demon Lord: Volume 11 Page 6
