How NOT to Summon a Demon Lord: Volume 4

by Yukiya Murasaki

  There were a bunch of things that didn’t quite match up. But at any rate, Diablo couldn’t ignore the Death Knell disease.

  Batutta never showed hostility against them, so Diablo thought it would be all right to have him take care of Lumachina as they solved the mystery behind the sickness.

  —Why did he decide to make his move now?

  He could have never guessed that Batutta revealed his true colors as a result of Lumachina pressing him earlier.

  “In any case, right now, bringing Rem and Lumachina back takes priority.”

  The incidents with the Death Knell disease would have to wait. According to what Horn said, the girls were put aboard a sand skimmer, which meant they were most likely somewhere far away from the mansion.

  Sand ships couldn’t be sent out during nighttime since there were gigantic monsters out in the desert, and they were generally much more active at night. The ships would have to sail at full speed to get away from them, but there were no kinds of powerful illumination equipment in this world. That just meant they would be sailing along at breakneck speeds through a pitch-dark desert, which pretty much only ended with the ship crashing into a sand dune, a rock, or some other obstacle.

  That signified Rem and Lumachina having been taken somewhere else within this town.

  “We don’t have time to mess around... Guess I’ll have to make one of them spit it out.”

  Diablo returned to the hallway. Freezia’s effects had begun to fade, with the members of the Paladin Brigade suffering from the sub-thermal damage cowering on the ground.

  Picking out someone who looked like they could still speak, he pointed Tenma’s Staff at them.

  “Now choose: Tell me where Batutta has gone, or have this place become your grave.”

  †

  Rem opened her eyes. The flame of the lamps around her flickered. She tried to move her hands, but quickly realized she couldn’t.

  —I’m tied up with rope...!?

  Rem’s arms and legs were bound to a cross-shaped post, as if she had been crucified.

  “Wha—!?”

  “Good, you’ve finally come to...”

  Hearing a voice coming from next to her, Rem turned to find Lumachina strung up the same way as her.

  “Lumachina!? Wh-What is this...!?”

  “I only just came to my senses myself, so I’m not too sure...”

  “...I see.”

  Rem looked over their surroundings. The ceiling was remarkably high; so much so the light from the lamps didn’t reach all the way to the top. It seemed they were inside some sort of cone-shaped building. This cylindrical building had an interior wide enough to fit an entire church inside of it. There was a platform in the center of this space, which was where Rem and Lumachina were being forced to stand. They were captured by Batutta, who seemed to be involved in conducting some kind of curse.

  —Does that mean he wants to use us as some sort of sacrifice...?

  A chill ran up her spine at the thought.

  They were surrounded by giant lamps in all directions, each aglow with wavering flames. She couldn’t see beyond those lamps due to how bright they were, but her eyes were slowly getting used to it.

  Something was out there, moving around. That’s when she became aware of the ragged breathing sounds around her.

  “...What could that be?”

  “I do not know.” Lumachina’s voice was firm. “But I have quite a bad feeling about this...”

  Rem focused her gaze beyond the light of the lamps: a person. She could see the shadowy figures moving around, illuminated by the flames. They were many, and seemingly of all different races. There were many more than she previously thought.

  —And a majority of them were naked.

  “Wh... Wha...!?” Rem cried out in shock.

  “Huh? Just what is it they are doing...?”

  Lumachina’s eyes adjusted—

  There was a mass of men and women entangled with one another, enough to cover the entire floor.

  Rem reflexively averted her eyes. “...A-Are they... Are they doing...what I think they’re doing...?”

  “What do you mean?” It seemed Lumachina was completely oblivious to what she was talking about.

  Rem’s cheeks flushed red. “...I can’t explain...”

  “Huh?” Lumachina asked, bewildered.

  Rem couldn’t bring herself to say what it actually was. Just what was going on here?

  The breathing of the people here grew even more ragged. The building was filled with the moans of the men, and heavy breathing of the women. The sound of flesh hitting flesh mixed with the slopping noise of sweat and fluids, and an almost bestial smell hung in the air.

  Someone walked up the staircase to the altar...

  It was Batutta.

  He was still wearing clothes, which brought a modicum of relief to Rem. The girl that came along with him, however, was almost completely naked.

  “I-It’s...you...!?”

  It was Shiliu, the head maid with long-black hair. There was no trace of the maid outfit she once wore as nothing covered her chest or waist; though she still wore a corset and shoes.

  “Y-You’re indecent!” Rem’s shoulders were shaking.

  Batutta threw his shoulders back as he laughed heartily. “I see you’re finally awake. I was wondering what I would do if morning came and you still hadn’t woken up.”

  “Ngh... You deceived us!”

  “If you wish to detest someone, then let it be Lumachina. She should have known that a sense of justice would lead to her own destruction.”

  “I’m sorry, Rem...” Lumachina said in a feeble voice. “It looks like I’ve gotten you caught up in all of this.”

  “...By no means. Our current situation was my mistake, and I’m sorry I couldn’t protect you.”

  Rem had experienced many things during her time as an Adventurer, but she continuously fell for tricks and others’ deceptions.

  —Am I just more naïve than I expected? Shera should be the only one in charge of being stupid around here...

  With that slightly harsh thought floating around her head, she searched for a means of escape. But the restraints on her hands and legs remained tight, almost impressively so.

  Rem ground her teeth. “...What are you planning to do with us, Batutta!?”

  “Why, a ritual.”

  “Huh...?”

  “This is an altar, as you can clearly see for yourselves.”

  “...You are absolutely vile.”

  “I have never seen an altar as repulsive as this one,” Lumachina followed up. “This is a place full of wickedness, is it not!?”

  “It is as you say,” Batutta answered with a nod. “This place is filled with nothing but ‘corruption.’” It seemed he no longer intended to keep it a secret.

  “...So, it is a curse...”

  Batutta took the jar the maid was holding and removed the lid. Inside was a thick, blackish-green fluid.

  “This is the concentrate responsible for inducing the Death Knell disease.”

  “What!?”

  “By pouring this in the lake, the disease takes hold in a considerable amount of the townspeople who rely on its water to live here. Those people come to the church for help, which amounts to a large sum of donations coming our way.”

  “...You are despicable.” Rem spat the words at him.

  Lumachina was unable to bring herself to speak. She seemed to be in shock over how the person she once trusted was this much of a degenerate.

  “How do you think this concentrate is made?” Batutta asked them.

  “...As if we would know.”

  “Can you not even guess? It seems you are lacking in imagination, Adventurer.”

  “Mmph.”

  This remark ticked her off something fierce, especially since she was just thinking over how she was getting tricked far too often. Batutta hitting the nail on the head like this was absolutely infuriating.

  “The Death Kne
ll disease concentrate is made from the essence of evil. Now, how do I get that?” Batutta let his gaze wander around the room. “Look at them... Just like wild beasts, right? Those people were once pious and devout believers. They were men pure of heart and chaste women, all possessing a deep faith and a strong sense of justice.”

  “...Your point?”

  “With just the slightest push, people fall so easily.” He looked at the lamps surrounding the altar.

  —Was there something mixed in with the oil of the lamps...?

  Concentrating, she smelled a sweet fragrance coming from them. Rem instinctively stopped breathing—but it was impossible to stay like that.

  Batutta spread his arms out wide, the expression of pure ecstasy on his face lit up by the flames of the lamps.

  “Adultery... Bloodshed... Gluttony... When people fall, they lose their divinity, which is when this very essence of evil is born!”

  “Th-This is a place...to make people commit sin...?”

  Rem looked around once more. It was true there were people doing things other than just intercourse. There were glutenous people eating great quantities of the food left there to the point of vomiting it back up. There were also people with sharp, wicked instruments, raised high and ready to strike at others.

  “S-Stop—!” But as Rem was bound to the altar, there was nothing she could do.

  “This... This is just...too wrong...”

  Tears dripped from Lumachina’s face. It must have been much more of a shock for her, having lived a pure and proper life thus far. Her body was shaking.

  “Grab hold of yourself, Lumachina! This is wrong! What your sense of morality is telling you is not mistaken! Keep strong!”

  “Oh, God... God...” she muttered as tears spilled from her eyes.

  A faint light enveloped her body, the same as when she prayed.

  Batutta shrugged. “According to my research, the stronger the divinity of a person when they fall, the thicker the evil essence they create. I should be able to make a much more potent formula from that.”

  “...D-Do you really want to inflict that many people with the Death Knell disease?”

  “No, there’s only one person I am truly after...”

  “One...?”

  “Laminitus.”

  Rem was shocked. She wasn’t expecting to hear the name of the governess of Zircon Tower in here.

  “That woman is a danger, always acting as a hindrance to me. She also seems to be slowly catching on to this curse as well. This is why I must have her come under the effects of the disease.”

  “...All just for that?”

  “Laminitus doesn’t drink the water from the lake. It seems she only uses it for her cooking, but it’s harder for the curse to take effect like that. If I used a much more powerful concoction, then it should finally take hold in her.”

  “...And what will happen to the townspeople when they drink the water!?”

  “They’ll all come down with the disease, most likely. That is when our priests will heal them—but only if they pay the proper donations first!” A twisted smile came over Batutta’s face.

  “Why...? Why would you commit such a grave sin!?” Lumachina glared at him with tear-soaked eyes. “I heard you were a pure and noble person... What has happened to you!?”

  “Would you like some sort of tear-jerking story, will that satisfy you? Like if my family was killed, or I was betrayed by a friend, or maybe threatened by the Fallen, something along those lines? You imbecile, there’s no reason as to why people fall. People are born as sinful creatures, full of avarice.”

  Just as she surmised from his actions, Batutta was no longer a part of the Cardinal Authority; but that didn’t matter anymore, seeing as he was a vile, loathsome man all along. To think he was spreading a curse that targeted people without discrimination, all for the sake of money and power.

  “No matter what a person’s true nature may be like, it is also those same people who are capable of putting themselves back on the path of righteousness!” Lumachina shouted.

  “I’m looking forward to seeing the High Priest who believes she’s so high and mighty enough to lecture me giving in to lust and desire... Do teach her what true pleasure is, Shiliu.”

  “Hm-hm-hmm...” A seductive smile appeared on the almost naked head maid’s face. “Is it all right for me to make her fall?”

  “I have a visitor coming for me soon; I do not have the time to screw around here any further. This is not going to an easy person to handle.”

  “It almost sounds like you’re waiting for a lover, Master. You’re making me jealous.”

  “Just finish things up here. I’ll be back for you after.”

  “Oh, I can’t wait! What shall I do about the Pantherian?”

  “She is his slave, so we may be able to use her to slow him down. Don’t kill her, but do play with her however you wish.”

  “Understood, Master.”

  The only maid-like thing about the almost completely naked woman in front of them was how she bowed. Rem spat all manner of curses she could think of at her, but they were ignored. Flexing her fingers, Shiliu approached Lumachina, letting a prolonged, sensual sigh escape her lips.

  “Ohh~... I’m getting so turned on thinking about making a beautiful girl like you fall.”

  “D-Do not get any closer!”

  Shiliu’s white fingers grabbed Lumachina’s chest over her clothes. “You have quite the bulge here, don’t you?”

  “Ngh!?”

  “And so sensitive! You always talked like such a stiff, I thought perhaps you were just one giant sexual dead zone.”

  “S-Stop... Let go!”

  “Though you say that now, once you get a taste of my caressing, you’ll be begging me for more.”

  She revealed a long, dangling tongue, with a length so monstrous, it was enough to make you question if she was actually Human herself. It was longer than any Dwarf’s, who were known for the lengths of their tongues, and looked like it reached down her entire throat.

  “Mmn... I’ll lick the deepest parts inside you...”

  Shiliu reached toward Lumachina’s clothes, sliding a hand up her skirt and tearing away her underwear.

  “Eeeeek!?”

  Suddenly, the ground began to shake.

  The cylindrical building swayed, sand trickling down from high above. Rem looked up toward the ceiling.

  —An earthquake...?

  There was some kind of uproar going on above them. Then, somewhere close to the ceiling, a door opened. Lumachina did mention there was something underneath the town... That must mean they were somewhere underground.

  Rem had a feeling she knew what was coming. The despair that took hold of her chest cleared away, just like the clouds in the sky after rain.

  “...Diablo...”

  †

  According to the information Diablo squeezed out of the Paladin Brigade, Batutta’s whereabouts were somewhere on the western outskirts of town. There were a seemingly infinite number of tents there, with countless believers lined up even though it was the middle of the night. He couldn’t afford to search each tent one by one, so he devised a plan.

  “Shera, call your Summon. You will observe everything from above with your Turkey Shot.”

  “Huh? But it can’t see that much at night... It’s pretty much blind in the dark.”

  “It’s going to become bright soon enough.”

  Diablo raised Tenma’s Staff and pointed it toward the cloudy night sky. He unleashed his spell—Explosion.

  A detonation appeared in the air, illuminating the surroundings. Merchants and believers alike started to raise a commotion, and the same went for the people from the Church who were guarding the tents.

  “There’s bound to be one of them who will let Batutta know of this!” Diablo announced to Shera. “Search for them from the sky!”

  “Y-Yeah!”

  One or two shots of this spell wouldn’t be enough to make them rush to rep
ort to Batutta, so Diablo kept the blasts coming one after the other.

  “Explosion! Explosion! Explosion...!”

  In doing so, he was able to locate the tent the priests and Paladin Brigade members entrusted with guarding them were heading to. There were guards posted there to protect the entrance to the underground, but he held nothing back as he scattered them like leaves.

  After descending the lengthy staircase, he kicked open a stone door. He was in some sort of cylindrical area. A sickly sweet fragrance clung to the air, mixed with a bestial stench so pungent that Shera covered her mouth with her hand.

  “What’s with this place... I’m getting a really bad feeling about it!”

  Diablo recognized this place as the last stage of the limited time event back in the game. This was where the boss monster would appear.

  —Just how similar is this world to the game!?

  Going on from the entrance, a spiral staircase that ran parallel with the stone walls extended down into the bottom of this place. The size differed for the stones used in the walls and the staircase, where, on average, each one was about fifty centimeters tall, with their length and width reaching more than a meter. They were formed almost like a trapezoid in order to create the building’s cylinder-like shape. The only light came from down below.

  Getting down on all fours, Horn peered downward. Diablo told him he didn’t need to come underground with them, but the Grasswalker came along in the end.

  “H-Hey, boss, there’s something out there.”

  Diablo stared at the bottom of the room where he could make out the outlines of several people.

  In the flickering flames of the lamps, he could make out the men and women who were participating in a feast of moral depravity.

  Diablo smirked with a snort. He was trying to show this was no big deal, but on the inside, he was completely panicking.

  —Just what in the hell is this!?