The Caster of Destruction

by Kugane Maruyama

  So then I…I was sent to this desolate village so they could spread the idea that I’m not doing anything useful in the war?

  “Did you need something, Your Highness? Shall we take a break?”

  “—Shut up.”

  The loathing he couldn’t smother leaked out.

  He could see that the knight was surprised, but he still couldn’t hold himself back.

  Spitting murder from the gap between his teeth, Barbro said, “I have orders for you. We’re going to get this Carne business over quickly and head for the Katze Plain. Make those preparations in parallel to our current activities. If we arrive in Carne, accomplish our mission immediately, and head right back, we should reach E-Rantel by nightfall. We’ll get what little sleep we can and head for the Katze Plain before sunrise.”

  The knight furrowed his brow.

  “With all due respect, I think that would be extremely difficult. Please look at this: Our formation includes the marquis’s three thousand five hundred soldiers and one thousand five hundred from the nobles backing Your Highness for a total of five thousand. In order to get our job done in a short amount of time, we are bringing fifty wagons filled with supplies instead of hordes of logistics men.”

  “I know that, so what’s the problem?”

  “The breakdown is four thousand five hundred foot soldiers and five hundred on horseback. Even if we resolve the Carne matter in under an hour, it would be quite a rush to get back to E-Rantel by nightfall.”

  “But I asked you a question. I’ll ask again: What’s the problem? We’ll just rush if we need to rush.”

  “Prince… Some of the foot soldiers will be exhausted.”

  “You seem to be misunderstanding something. Honestly, there is no good reason for us to be going to this tiny, remote village. What we need to do is defeat the empire on the Katze Plain. You’re one of the marquis’s men, aren’t you? Then I ask you: Is this a war in which we can afford to have five thousand men do nothing? Is that what you think?”

  The knight pursed his lips.

  “Don’t prioritize the wrong things. Some of the foot soldiers will be exhausted? Whip them so they keep running. You’ve been gathered here to fight on the Katze Plain.”

  And to enhance my reputation.

  “…You’re right, Your Highness. Understood.”

  The knight bowed his head.

  “That’s how you should be responding in the first place! Plot out what time we’ll reach E-Rantel and what time we’ll leave again. The details are your responsibility.”

  “Yes, Your Highness. I’ll meet with the others right away and return with the answer you desire.”

  The knight racing his horse over to his fellow commanders was already gone from Barbro’s mind.

  Does my father hate me? Or is he so senile he can no longer arrive at the correct decision? Is that why he’s trying to give my brother the throne? It should go to the eldest. If it doesn’t, he’ll antagonize the nobles.

  He was determined to turn his utterly disadvantaged situation around. He would make them regret giving him five thousand men.

  Those were the thoughts that spurred Barbro on.

  “Baron!”

  “Y-yes, Your Highness!”

  “I’m expecting a lot out of you!”

  He had the feeling the thrilled voice was saying something, but it went in the right ear and out the left.

  Damn you, Zanac. You can just stay in the capital regretting the mess you made.

  The man was his brother, and they shared blood, but in the race for the throne, he was an enemy to kick out of his way. And it wasn’t as if he loved him or anything. He wasn’t about to kill him, but if he got in his way, he wouldn’t hesitate to.

  When I’m king…what can I do with him? Should I kill him so he doesn’t become some idiot noble’s rallying cause? Would that be a waste? If he were a woman, there would be all sorts of uses for him, but… He’s not very smart, but our little sister is. I should sell her to the highest bidder… I wouldn’t want the royal bloodline to continue through her, so the best would be to marry her into a far-off country’s royal family, but… Well, if she’ll be useful in building my power base, I can think it over a little more.

  Barbro’s eyes became distant, entranced in his ideal vision of the Re-Estize Kingdom.

  Him seated on the throne, the nobles before him bowing their heads…

  His retainers, who carried out every order he gave…

  “That would be great.”

  He caught himself smirking a bit and quickly covered it with a hand.

  Right now, they would finish their business in Carne, and then the question would be how fast they could get to E-Rantel. Whether his dreams came true or not would depend on that branch in the path.

  …Assuming I force the soldiers to hurry—the important thing is to make it back before the war starts. Or what if we waited for it to start and then went in as an ambush?

  He thought it was a very good idea, but he wasn’t sure he could maneuver his troops into position to strike from their flank or behind.

  He would have liked to leave it up to the knights, but putting other people in charge didn’t seem like a good plan given that the goal was to achieve something that would win him the throne.

  As he was trying to think about what he could do to shine the brightest and be selected as the next king, he had a flash of inspiration.

  Could I use the people of Carne to negotiate with Ainz Ooal Gown?

  It was as if a ray of light was gleaming down from above.

  This was the optimal plot.

  Regardless of why Ainz Ooal Gown saved the people of Carne, Barbro felt he should be able to use them as bargaining chips.

  If this caster Ainz Ooal Gown, whom he’d never heard of, backed out of the war, the empire would lose its casus belli and be forced to withdraw unless they wanted to be labeled as invaders.

  And if what caused the empire’s withdrawal was Barbro’s actions…

  That would be wonderful! Father wouldn’t be able to ignore my opinion anymore. I would practically be guaranteed to be king.

  “Good! Most excellent.”

  If Ainz Ooal Gown just happened to save Carne as he was passing by, he might not pull out of the war. In that case, he could hand the villagers weapons and force them to fight. This was a general mobilization of the nation. The villagers of Carne would have no way to refuse.

  It seemed the king had pardoned them for not responding to the draft, but that was before the situation changed. When playing things by ear on the ground, it was up to the commander—Barbro, in this case.

  If Ainz Ooal Gown killed the farmers of Carne, then that just showed what kind of person he was, and they could use it as propaganda. That would tie in to anti-empire propaganda because it was backing him.

  Barbro trembled at the perfection of his plan.

  If he was honest, he had thought his brother was the smarter one, but apparently that wasn’t the case. He was moved to find so much ability latent within himself.

  2

  For a small village, winter was hell. It was days of waiting inside thinking of warmer seasons. If spring was late or autumn’s harvest wasn’t big enough, they would resort to eating their rice seed and sometimes still starve to death.

  There wasn’t much fieldwork, but life in a farming village meant work was never hard to find. There was a huge amount of labor to do at home. Tending to livestock; repairing farming tools; and the house, shed, and stables needed maintaining, too—there was no time to rest.

  And in Carne, they had started raising pigs so they wouldn’t have to rely solely on the rangers’ hunting to feed the meat-eating ogres. They had been able to buy the pigs with the earnings the valuable herbs brought in.

  The goblins would take the pigs into the Tove Woodlands and have them eat tree roots and the like. They had only a few because the project was still in its experimental stages, but if things went well and they made it through the wint
er with the pigs, they would probably increase their number in the future.

  Normally if farmers put animals out to graze, they would have to pay a tax to the owner of the land, but luckily Carne didn’t have to. The Tove Woodlands were home to monsters; they weren’t considered part of the human realm.

  Carne’s future was bright.

  And it was all thanks to Ainz Ooal Gown, who had saved the village and supported it in all sorts of ways, as well as the warrior of Raven Black, Momon, who tamed the Wise King of the Forest. Many of the villagers were grateful to them. Some even named them alongside the gods in their prayers over breakfast.

  Because they were overflowing with hope, the new village headwoman, Enri Emmott, had a lot of work to do.

  At it again that day, Enri, accompanied by Nfirea, was headed for a shed.

  In a small frontier village like Carne, all the residents operated together like a family. If they didn’t, they wouldn’t be able to survive. They shared farming implements, helped one another out with food, and even took turns using the oxen to plow their fields.

  So the villagers all took care of the livestock, and they jointly managed their feed. This was the shed where they stockpiled the hay that served as the oxen’s food during the winter months.

  Enri opened the door and went inside. Nfirea followed a moment after. Enri continued straight in to the mountain of hay and sat down. Her butt sank in.

  Nfirea closed the door and sat next to her. He used a spell to cast white light throughout the area.

  “Headwoman, save the playtime for later. I need you to check if there is enough hay and make a bunch of decisions.”

  “You called me ‘headwoman’ again…”

  Nfirea chuckled slightly at her dejected voice.

  “Eh, it’s fine if you want to call me ‘headwoman’! After all, it’s a small thing compared to Arg and his buddies thinking that if I tried, I could crush goblins with my bare hands!”

  After she won every arm-wrestling match against Arg and the others, even the villagers seemed to be wondering if maybe the rumors were true, which was like a stake through her heart. Incidentally, the ogres didn’t participate. If she had lost against them, she wouldn’t have made the right impression, and if she had somehow won or even put up a good fight, she would have never recovered.

  If I miss my chance with Nfi, I may never be able to get married!

  Her hands got sweaty, which she hated.

  “Oh, should I go open the window? It’s dry outside now anyway, so it won’t matter if we open it.”

  “Huh? It’s fine, isn’t it? Plus, I already made us a magic light.”

  “Are you sure? If you’re okay with it, then I’m fine.”

  The magic light was brighter than sunlight. All Enri meant was that, since it was still light out, maybe it was a waste to use magic. Well, she also wanted to change the mood. There was no special reason, so she didn’t care that he said no. But Nfirea reacted in a weird way. And his ears were bright red.

  Did he use up that much mana? From what I’ve heard, just a magic light doesn’t make you that tired… Maybe he cast some spells before we came here? Actually, he smells kind of good, different from the usual herb smell…

  “Wh-what, Enri?”

  She had brought her nose closer to him and taken a whiff. His voice became panic-stricken.

  “Hmm? Mmm…nothing. Something smelled good, that’s all.”

  “O-oh? Well that makes me happy. It’s cologne I made.”

  “Wow, are you going to sell it in town? You could probably fetch a pretty good price.”

  “N-no, that wasn’t really the idea…”

  “Hmm. Well, whatever. Anyhow, the hay here is fine. Ready to go to the next one?”

  “Y-y-yeah. But first, let’s check some things here. It’s cold outside.”

  “…It’s not very warm in here, either, but… Well, it’s fine.”

  “S-so there are several things I’d like to discuss with you.”

  Nfirea seemed nervous next to her.

  I wonder what’s wrong.

  His profile bathed in Enri’s questioning gaze, Nfirea took out a sheaf of papers.

  They were covered in tiny letters. Enri had learned to read somewhat, but as far as she could see from a peek, there were a lot of words she didn’t know.

  “The first thing is the procurement of food for Arg and the survivors of his goblin tribe and the ogres.”

  “What? Aren’t we fine for now? They helped us out with the fall wheat harvest, and we bought food for the ogres from town.”

  “Yeah, and thanks to the expensive herbs we sold, we were able to buy enough food. We definitely have enough to weather one winter. We’ll be all right even if the population increases a little. But I realized we might run into trouble if the numbers go up much more, so maybe we should think about another way to obtain food.”

  There were already fourteen goblins from Arg’s tribe living in the village now. It wasn’t as if they were reproducing. That was just how many had fled from the Magical Serpent of the West and the Giant of the East.

  “Hrm. I think we’re all right, but should we go back to E-Rantel to buy more food just in case? Really, I wanted to save some money and buy iron farming equipment.”

  “If we had iron implements for the ogres, clearing the land in the spring would go so much more quickly… I guess the only problem is that people would think something was weird if we ordered ogre-size tools that humans wouldn’t be able to use.”

  “Would it cause trouble if people found out we had ogres working in the village?”

  When the tax collector had visited in the fall, she’d made Jugemu and all the subhumans hide. They hid their portions of the wheat harvest, too, which was quite a lot.

  Since the government understood that Carne had been attacked by imperial knights, they were allowed to get away with fewer taxes, which was a lucky break. They had also been exempted from labor requests for several years.

  It wasn’t just an apology for not being able to protect them; the officials really did seem to feel guilty. Enri thought they would be suspicious of the splendid wall surrounding the village, but all she had to say was, “The great caster…,” and they accepted it without probing further. That made Enri think maybe they could get away with the ogres, too, but then Nfirea dispelled that hope.

  “Definitely trouble. In a worst-case scenario, a team would be sent to exterminate them.”

  “That’s awful!”

  “You can be mad, but there’s nothing I can do about it. Usually ogres are dangerous monsters that eat humans. Don’t forget that the only reason we’re coexisting with them is because Jugemu and the others are more powerful.”

  “I haven’t forgotten…”

  “The other issue I wanted to talk about is how we’ll recruit more people to come live here, since we don’t have enough hands. It would be great if they came around the time of the spring land clearing.”

  “That could be tricky. And what you were just saying makes me think it might be a pain because people will see the goblins and ogres and run for— What?” Enri asked. Nfirea had been acting weird the whole time, like he wasn’t really present in the moment.

  “Huh?! Oh, uh, nothing.”

  She had trouble believing it was nothing. Maybe he was tired again? Her boyfriend had the bad habit of losing himself in potion creation.

  When Enri furrowed her brow, Nfirea took a deep breath and leaned on her.

  Hmm? So maybe he is tired? It does seem like he’s doing a lot of experiments every day… But I think it’s a bit cold to sleep here. Inside the hay, it’s probably warm, but…

  As she was thinking those things, Nfirea’s body grew gradually heavier as he leaned on her.

  I wonder what’s wrong. He should really get a little stronger… He needs to eat a lot of meat. I can’t encourage his lifestyle of forgoing food and sleep to work.

  Enri suddenly felt like teasing him, so she decided to apply pr
essure in return. She meant it to be a light prod, but she ended up really pushing.

  “Uwhe!”

  Nfirea looked at Enri in shock and confusion. His face was bright red.

  Yeah, it’s embarrassing for a guy to lose to a girl, isn’t it? Then you better eat your meat.

  When she relaxed, Nfirea, with his eyes closed, flopped over onto the hay.

  For a few seconds, it was quiet between them.

  “…What’s wrong, Nfi? Did you get tired?”

  He sat up, looking bizarrely red. “N-n-nah. It’s nothing; I’m fine.”

  “Lady Enri!”

  The door was opened without so much as a knock and so forcefully that it made a loud bang.

  “Heegh!” A strange cry escaped Nfirea. “Wh-wh-why?”

  “Very sorry to bother ya! But it’s an emergency!”

  “What’s going on?”

  Enri hadn’t seen Jugemu so worked up since the troll attack. An awful feeling slunk up her spine.

  “There’s an army! An army is headed this way!”

  “What? What in the world? Which country’s army is it?”

  “Since we don’t know the crests, we’re not sure yet. But there was more than one, so…we went ahead and closed the gate! What should we do?”

  “Umm! Umm, what coat of arms did you see the most of? I might recognize it.”

  As Nfirea listened to Jugemu’s explanation, a clearly puzzled look appeared on his face.

  “That’s strange. That’s the kingdom’s flag. If I knew the nobles’ crests, I would be able to tell who it was, but…”

  Carne was a frontier village; beyond it was nothing but woodlands. That meant their destination had to be Carne, but there wasn’t any reason for them to come.

  “Why in the world are they coming here? Do you have any idea, Nfi?”

  “You mean why the kingdom’s army is heading to our village? If they were aiming for the Tove Woodlands, it would be weird to bring the military. They would just send adventurers instead. Other than that…maybe a civil war?”

  “Could that really be it?”