The Dark Warrior

by Kugane Maruyama

  As Ainz was inwardly slumping, Narberal chattered on cheerfully. “Oh yeah, those crane flies were bowing down before your awesome power, my lord.”

  “I hardly think they were ‘bowing down.’”

  “So modest, Lord Ainz! I’m sure that ogres and the like are below worms in your eyes, but you still put on a display of first-class swordsmanship for us. I was impressed.”

  Ainz could feel the Wise King of the Forest trembling strangely beneath him. Ignoring that, he said, “That? I was just swinging it around…”

  “One-hit kill” made him sound good, but really he wasn’t. The motions of Gazef in the battle he’d witnessed earlier had a flow to them. Meanwhile, when Ainz thought back on his motions, they were as lame as a kid recklessly swinging around a sword. Everyone’s praise was only due to the overpowering destructive power that stemmed from his extraordinary physical power. His technique was nothing compared to that of a real warrior like Gazef Stronoff.

  “Not that I expected I’d be able to move like an actual warrior.”

  “…So why not use magic to become a warrior?”

  Wearing armor, Ainz was capable of using five spells. One of them would take his level as a caster and make that exact number his warrior level. In other words, Ainz could temporarily become a level-100 warrior.

  There were pros to this, like being able to use gear that only certain classes could use, but naturally, there were also big cons. For starters, during that time, he wouldn’t be able to use any magic. Also, while he would become a warrior, he wouldn’t acquire all the warrior skills, and the recalculation of his ability points would place him lower than a warrior who had been one from the beginning. Essentially, he’d be transformed into a half-assed warrior. Maybe he’d be able to defeat a priest knight or other quasi-warrior class in a sword fight, but against someone who’d collected pure warrior classes, it was doubtful.

  Still, he’d be far stronger than he was right now. The problem was—

  “There are too many drawbacks. If I was suddenly assaulted by another warrior and couldn’t use any magic for even a short amount of time, I would undoubtedly be defeated. Even if I could use a scroll and cast a spell that way, considering the amount of prep that takes, I’d be at too big of a disadvantage.”

  At the present time, when they didn’t know if there were enemy players out there, he couldn’t let his guard down. There was no point in going to the trouble to use that magic just to give himself a weak point.

  “Well, this warrior thing is just an act to hide who I really am, so it’s probably not worth getting so upset about.”

  The Wise King of the Forest jumped with a gasp and turned to look up at Ainz. “I’ve been listening to your conversation… Y-you’re not really a warrior?!”

  Ainz looked her in her black eyes and answered in the negative with a confident shake of his head.

  Narberal explained, her voice oozing superiority, “Lord Ainz is just pretending to be a warrior. It’s like a game. If he were to use his true power, he would rend the heavens and split the earth!”

  Faced with her absolute faith, her belief that him being capable of so much was a given, Ainz couldn’t get himself to say, No, that would never happen. “…Mm, yeah, pretty much. You’re lucky you didn’t have to fight me for real, Wise King of the Forest… If you had, you probably wouldn’t have survived more than a second.”

  “I-is that so, master? I, Hamusuke…will be even more loyal to you!”

  Hamusuke. That was the first thing that had popped into Ainz’s mind when the Wise King of the Forest asked him for a name. He’d given it to her that very moment, and the Wise King of the Forest was happy with it, but he realized it was totally lame. Yeah, Hamusuke was a hasty decision… Creampuff—that would’ve been more witty. Even all my old guildmates used to tell me I had no sense for names…

  So it was that Ainz, full of regret, trundled along to the Adventurers Guild atop the Wise King of the Forest, also known as Hamusuke.

  Nfirea pulled the cart around to the rear of the house and parked right outside the back entrance. He hopped out of the driver’s box carrying a lantern lit with magic, and then unlocked and opened the door. He banished the darkness of the room inside by hanging the lantern on the wall. Several barrels appeared in its glow. The smell of dried herbs coming from them indicated that this room was used to store medicinal herbs.

  “Okay, then. Sorry to trouble you, but do you mind carrying in the herbs?”

  The Swords of Darkness gave a willing reply and carefully took the bundles of herbs off the cart and put them in the storage room. As Nfirea gave directions on where to deposit each item, he had a strange feeling.

  “Grandma must not be here?”

  She was getting on in years, but her eyes and ears were still sharp, so she should have heard them clattering around and come in to greet them. That said, when she was focused on making potions, she didn’t let little noises interrupt her. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary, so he didn’t raise his voice to call her or anything.

  It wasn’t long before all the bundles of herbs had been put in the appropriate places. The Swords of Darkness were looking a little out of breath. “You must be tired! There should be some cold fruit water in the main building. Would you like some before you leave?”

  “Sounds great!” said Lukrut happily. A few beads of sweat stood out on his forehead. The other Swords of Darkness nodded their agreement.

  “Right this way, then.” Just as Nfirea turned to lead them to the main building, the door across the room opened.

  “There you are. Welcome home!” Standing there was a cute woman, but there was something troubling about her. Her short golden hair swung with each step she took. “I was so worried about you! Because you were just gone! What horrible timing you have. I’ve been waiting this whole time, wondering when you’d get back!”

  “…Uh, umm… Who might you be?”

  “Huh? You don’t know her?!” Peter yelped, surprised they weren’t on at least acquaintance terms given the woman’s familiar tone of voice.

  “Hmm? Eh-heh-heh-heh! I’m here to kidnap you! I want you to use the spell Undead Army to summon a legion of zombies, so come be my pawn! Pretty pleeease!”

  Sensing the malicious mood, the Swords of Darkness immediately drew their weapons. She kept talking even as they all assumed fighting stances.

  “A seventh-tier spell. Tricky for a plain old person to use, but doable with a Crown of Wisdom. Furthermore, though it’s impossible to control all the undead that are summoned with it, they can be led! Perfect plan, don’t ya think? Awesome, right?”

  “…Nfirea, get back! Get away from here!” said Peter in a hard voice, focused on the woman with his sword at the ready. “The reason she’s rambling on and on is that she’s a hundred percent certain she can kill us. So as long as you’re her aim, the only thing that can change the current situation is you running away.”

  When Nfirea panicked and fell back, the Swords of Darkness formed a wall in front of him.

  “Ninya, you should also fall back!” Dyne shouted, and then Lukrut spoke up as well.

  “Take the kid and run for it! You have something you need to do. It doesn’t seem like we’ll be able to help you…but we can at least buy you some time.”

  “But—”

  “Oh, your story’s a real tearjerker, huh? You’re gonna make me cry, yup. But I can’t have ya runnin’ away on me. I wanna play with at least one of ya.” She laughed delightedly at Ninya as he bit his lip in hesitation and slowly pulled a stiletto out from under her robe. As if timed for that moment, the door on the other side of the room opened, and a man like a sickly pale, bony undead appeared.

  The Swords of Darkness’s faces turned grim when they realized they were caught in a pincer.

  “…You’ve played enough.”

  “Ohh, whaddaya mean, Khaj? You made it so no one outside will hear their screams, right? Can’t I play with at least one?”

  Her to
othy grin sent chills up Nfirea’s spine.

  “Well, there’s nowhere to run now, so let’s get to it, shall we?”

  2

  The actual registering of Hamusuke went smoothly enough, but they got caught up for an hour and a half. The part that took the longest was the sketch—the time it took to draw Hamusuke. It would have been faster if they’d done it with magic, but Ainz would have had to cover the fee, so he passed.

  Of course, he didn’t want to seem tightfisted, so he was forced to come up with a random excuse. “It’s too late now, but ‘I’m interested in drawing’ was a bit forced, huh? …Well, whatever. So now we head to Nfirea’s?” he said to Narberal in front of the guild after the registration was taken care of. Then he went over to Hamusuke.

  He was already used to it. Or rather, the merry-go-round was not a ride for only the affluent (lovers and families). What was wrong with solitary older dudes getting on? Ainz no longer cared what anybody thought.

  Making full use of his high physical ability, with movements as graceful as a celebrated gymnast, he sprang onto the Wise King of the Forest. He had neither saddle nor harness, but his few hours of experience had turned him into a fine equestrian.

  The passersby who witnessed the spectacle oohed and ahhed. Some women even squealed. The looks from adventurers were particularly intense—and incredulous once they’d checked the plate hanging around his neck.

  I’m the one who can’t believe it! What happened to your concept of aesthetics? he grumbled in his head and was about to give the order to depart when a voice called out to stop him.

  “Say, aren’t you the one who went to gather herbs with my grandson?”

  He turned toward the elderly-sounding voice and found an old woman standing in the road. “…Who are you?” He already had a guess. If what she said was true, then there was only one person she could be.

  “My name is Lizzy Baleare. I’m Nfirea’s grandmother.”

  “Oh, so it is you! As you say, I escorted Nfirea to Carne—I’m Momon. And this is Nabe.”

  Nabe bowed, and Lizzy smiled at her. “What a beauty! I can hardly believe my eyes. And what is this magical beast you’re riding?”

  “This is the Wise King of the Forest, Hamusuke.”

  “I’m Hamusuke, I am, and very pleased to meet you!”

  “What! This mighty beast is the Wise King of the Forest?” Lizzy’s shout caused all the eavesdropping adventurers to look even more surprised and voice their shock among themselves: Is that really the legendary magical beast?

  “She is. We ran into her on the way to gather herbs. I forced her to surrender.”

  “Wow… The Wise King of the Forest…” She was seeing stars. “So…where is my grandson now?”

  “Ah, he took the herbs and went home a little while ago. We’re actually on our way to your place to pick up our reward.”

  The old woman was visibly relieved to hear as much. Then, with a strange look in her eye, she said, “Oh, I see… Why don’t we go together, then? I’m very interested in hearing about your adventure.”

  Her offer was music to Ainz’s ears. “Gladly!”

  Lizzy guided the group through the streets of E-Rantel.

  “Okay, let’s go in.” They’d arrived at the shop, and Lizzy had taken the key out in front of the door when she cocked her head. She pushed and the door opened silently without any resistance. “…That boy! So careless…,” she grumbled as she entered, and Ainz and Narberal followed.

  “Nfirea! Hey! Momon’s here!” she shouted toward the back, but a deep quiet reigned over the shop. There was no sign anyone was there. “Where could he be?”

  Ainz gave a short answer to the puzzled query. “Well, this is trouble.” Ignoring the uncomprehending Lizzy, he placed his hands on the hilts of his great swords. Narberal knew immediately what that meant and removed the sheaths.

  “Wh-what is it?”

  “Just follow me.” With that curt reply, he fully drew his swords, gripped them properly, and strode toward the back of the shop. He threw open the door and turned right down the hallway. He was in a stranger’s house, but there was no hesitation in his footsteps.

  When he came to the door at the end of the hallway, it took a moment for Lizzy to catch up. Then he asked her, “What’s behind this door?”

  “I-it’s where we store the herbs. And the back door is there, too…” She didn’t know what had happened, but she could tell something was wrong.

  Ainz ignored her and opened the door. The smell that assaulted their noses was not medicinal herbs but something more foul—the stench of blood.

  Peter and Lukrut were near the door, Dyne farther away. And all the way in the back was Ninya. All four were slumped against a wall, legs splayed, arms flopped limply at their sides. And all across the floor was a puddle of dark blood—enough that it looked like every drop in their bodies had been bled out.

  “Wh… What in the…?” Lizzy tottered toward the threshold in shock, but Ainz held her back by her shoulders and entered swiftly ahead of her.

  All of a sudden, Peter began to make a jerky attempt to stand. But more quickly than he could, with not a split second of indecision, a great sword sliced through the air. Peter’s head landed with a thump and rolled across the floor. Then, as Lukrut was trying to get up, the sword returned in one fluid motion to slice off his head as well.

  Lizzy could hardly believe the horrors occurring before her eyes while Dyne managed to get upright. The face he turned to them was not the face of a living thing. From its bloodless pallor, clouded eyes stared them down. There was a hole in his forehead, and one glance was enough to tell it had been fatal.

  There was only one reason the dead would walk—they’d been turned into undead.

  “Zombies!” Lizzy screamed, and Dyne lurched toward them with a hostile groan. Ainz hastily stabbed with his great sword and the huge blade went through Dyne’s neck. His destabilized head wobbled loosely as he sank to the floor.

  No one moved anymore. In the silence, Ainz looked at Ninya in the back, who didn’t so much as twitch.

  “Nfirea!” It finally dawned on Lizzy what had happened, and she ran off to look for her grandson.

  Ainz glanced at her briefly before turning to Narberal with an order. “Guard her. My passive skill Immortal Blessing doesn’t detect anything, so we can assume there aren’t any more undead around, but there may be some live enemies hidden somewhere.”

  “Understood.” Narberal gave a quick nod and ran after Lizzy.

  After seeing that both of them were gone, Ainz turned his attention back to Ninya. He slowly knelt down before him and patted him down lightly. Satisfied there was no corpse booby trap like he used to use when PK-ing in Yggdrasil, he raised Ninya’s head. Needless to say, he wasn’t unconscious but dead—probably beaten to death with a blunt object.

  His face was swollen up and in such rough shape that the word pomegranate was perhaps the most apt metaphor. If Ainz hadn’t known it was Ninya, it would have been difficult to tell who it was. His left eye had been crushed, and its vitreous humor had run down his cheek like tears. Every bone in each of his fingers had been smashed; the skin had split, revealing the bright red flesh beneath. In some places, even the flesh was mangled.

  When Ainz loosened the youth’s clothes and looked underneath, his eyes widened; he put them back the way they were and cleared his throat. “I see… All over, then…” His body had been beaten into a state just as gruesome as his face. Internal bleeding had discolored his skin, and it was hard to find anywhere that wasn’t damaged.

  Ainz silently closed Ninya’s eyes. No one heard him whisper, “It’s just a little…unpleasant.”

  “My grandson! Nfirea isn’t here!” Lizzy returned, practically screaming.

  Ainz, who had just finished gathering all the bodies into one corner of the room, answered her calmly. “I went through their things, and there’s no evidence that someone was looking for anything in particular. That must mean their aim from t
he start was to kidnap Nfirea.”

  “Agh!”

  “Take a look at this.” Ainz pointed to some writing scrawled in blood on the wall behind where Ninya had been. If he hadn’t moved the body, they probably wouldn’t have found it.

  “The sewers…? Does that mean they’ve taken him into the sewers?”

  “Hmm. The people behind this atrocity could be trying to mislead us. We shouldn’t rule that out. And I don’t know how big the city’s sewer system is, but…I think it would take quite a while to search it. What’ll we do about that?”

  “Look, there are numbers written before the words! Two-eight! That must mean something!”

  “That’s even more suspicious. It’s not clear what those numbers stand for, but…one idea would be that they divided up the entire city into a square grid of eight or more boxes to a side, and those numbers indicate an intersection. Or it might indicate some sort of address, but…would Ninya even have had the energy to think that far? Even if Ninya wrote it, do you think the culprits would really let that much information slip? It seems altogether too convenient.”

  Even more wrinkles appeared on Lizzy’s wrinkled face. She seemed just about ready to explode in anger at how awfully coolheaded Ainz was. Then her eyes moved to the corner where the four bodies were laid out.

  “Who are these people?!”

  “Adventurers who undertook your grandson’s request along with me. We had parted ways; they were supposed to be unloading the herbs…”

  “What? Then, these are your friends?!”

  Where another adventurer might have nodded, Ainz shook his head. “No, we just happened to be traveling together.” Lizzy blanched at his cold reply. “More importantly, faced with their corpses, I’ve been thinking about a lot of things, but what do you make of the fact that they were turned into zombies?”

  “Create Undead. That means they have someone who can use at least tier-three magic, right? What else could it mean?”