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Chapter 125
Chapter 125 – It seems to be a Secret Consultation with Emil
Completely unable to come up with a good plan on how to explain the matters regarding the human hero, Renya visited Emil’s room.
In Renya’s castle, all his party members had been properly allocated their own rooms. Just like in the mansion in Kukrika, Emil’s room was a considerably vast area in the basement section.
One has to walk through dark corridors while relying on candle light providing an amount of illumination that can’t be called sufficient by any means. Her room doesn’t really enjoy a good reputation among the maids either.
The biggest reason for that was that the room was nothing but eerie.
Even for Renya it’s a place he doesn’t like approaching frequently, despite it being an area located inside his own castle.
Once he passed through the dim corridors, a bulky, metallic door awaited him in front.
It just has a boorish knocker and knob affixed to its smooth surface, lacking any other kind of decoration.
Renya uses the knocker and calls out to Emil.
“Emil, are you there? There’s something I’d like to discuss with you for a bit.” (Renya)
The surroundings consist of thick stone walls and the metallic door.
Renya wondered whether his voice didn’t reach the inside of the room, but after waiting for a short while, the knob turns and the door is slightly opened.
The one who quietly showed her face from within was Emil who had her hair tied in a side tail today as well.
“That’s rare, for you to come to consult me, Renya.” (Emil)
“Even I think so. But, is it fine for me to enter? Or do you want us to go somewhere else?” (Renya)
“Please, come in. Though it’s a bit messy, okay?” (Emil)
Fully opening the door, Emil shows Renya inside the room.
The room’s interior was brightly illuminated in comparison to the corridors, but probably because it was underground, Renya still felt a strange oppression nevertheless.
The fact that there isn’t a single window either only served to spur that feeling on.
As the illumination used here is something caused by sorcery, it’s plenty bright, but even so it gives one a cold impression when compared to sunlight.
The room’s furniture consists of a bed and a box with clothes. All the other furniture are tables which are fully packed with some kind of experimental equipment-like items. It’s certainly a mess here, Renya judged.
“Well, sit down. But then again, there’s no place to sit down either. I guess you can sit down on the bed?” (Emil)
Emils offers Renya the bed while dragging out a chair from below a table for herself.
Taking her up on it, Renya sat down on the edge of the bed.
Just as he does that, Emil starts to act as if she’s wiping away her drool while licking her lips.
“What are you doing?” (Renya)
Unable to understand the meaning behind her actions, Renya asks her casually. Emil waves her hands in panic.
“Ah, no, it’s nothing. So, what is it that you want to consult me about?” (Emil)
“As a matter of fact, it’s about that armor whom I’m making work as the gatekeeper of this castle, but
” (Renya)
The moment he said that, Emil’s face became stiff.
Due to the all too sudden change in her expression, Renya, who started to speak, becomes surprised.
With awkward movements, to the extent that it would seems that she’s making creaking sounds from around her neck, Emil takes her eyes off of Renya and looks into the far distance.
“E-Even if you discuss that with me, I think it’s a troublesome subject, you know?” (Emil)
Hearing how Emil’s voice trembles, albeit only slightly, Renya’s face becomes grim.
“Are you really telling me that?” (Renya)
If she’s serious, that’ll be quite a problem, Renya thinks.
Although even Renya at times tends to forget due to her aloof words and deeds, Emil is a demon possessing reasonable strength. Moreover, she’s someone that calls herself a researcher among demons.
Even though he has admitted repeatedly that it’s a prejudice, in Renya’s eyes someone with the title of researcher attached to them is someone that cannot help but start to meddle with a target in the name of curiosity, no matter how dangerous it might be.
Such a researcher is now saying that she’s giving up all hope without even listening to the details of the consultation.
“Well, seen from my standpoint, you, Shion and the others seem to be disinterested in that kind of area, therefore I think it’s not unreasonable for you to be unable to understand.” (Emil)
Emil says with her eyes still averted.
A slight amount of sweat surfaces on her forehead.
“Emil, at least in this city there’s no one superior to you in these kind of matters, is there?” (Renya)
“Isn’t that actually something you should clear up with Frau?” (Emil)
“Certainly, you’re right there, but
” (Renya)
Renya scratches his head.
Even Renya was aware that this would surely be the most reliable and shortest way to get what he wanted.
“She would dodge the issue by saying What, there’s no problem ~no! don’t you think?” (Renya)
“Ah
that’s possible for sure.” (Emil)
While nodding as if having understood and accepted Renya’s rebuttal as valid, Emil turned her gaze back towards Renya, who was in front of her.
“Even if there might be someone who understands these kind of matters, I’m sure that there’s likely no one besides me who could also be able to put it into words.” (Emil)
“What do you mean?” (Renya)
“You know, Renya, the contents of that armor; they are far more dangerous than what you have been thinking.” (Emil)
Emil’s voice was tinged with seriousness.
The Emil, who looked like she could happily hum even when testing things on a living person or handling something that looked to be a matter of life and death, speaks in a way of deliberately letting the seriousness in her vocal tone show through.
Naturally, Renya becomes tense after listening to her.
“Basically the armor is like an undead. It might be strange why a fairy like Frau is capable of creating something like that, but a few of them do exist. However, what makes it different from a normal undead is very likely it’s entirely different manufacturing method. The manufacturing method of undead, or rather their origin itself is largely divided into two types,” Emil says.
One is them spawning naturally.
As it’s often said, it’s a pattern where people or creatures become undead after dying while possessing strong emotions on the verge of death, transforming them into beings which use those emotions as their foundation.
“It looks like in most cases it’s negative emotions such as resentment, hatred and sorrow.” (Emil)
“Well, I guess that’s probably because a guy harboring feelings of delight won’t succeed in becoming an undead? If they died in a state of being, so to speak, close to heaven, they will likely ascend obediently,” Renya says, but Emil denies that by shaking her head.
“It’s not completely impossible. It’s exceedingly rare, but such souls do exist.” (Emil)
Essentially it seems that it’s completely unrelated to the emotions being positive or negative with the only important point being that they have to be strong emotions to the extent of allowing them to cling to this world.
However, given that most of the living beings have an inclination to manifest strong negative emotions such as hatred or grudges rather than positive emotions such as joy and delight, the percentage of undead left behind with such negative emotions is much higher.
The second method is someone who was made or rather becomes an undead forcefully through some kind of sorcery.
The spell <Turn Undead> to create wraiths and vampires was something long lost, as those who passed it on as spell have already ceased to exist among the humans, but using said spell is possible if it’s someone who studied sorcery to a high degree, as is the case on the demon continent. Actually Emil says that she can use said spell as well.
A demon’s lifespan is considerably long, but if they turn undead, they can continue to exist for eternity until they are destroyed.
With just that reasoning, it’s not that rare for a demon, who studied sorcery to the degree of being able to use the spell, to become an undead on the demon continent.
Even further, where the simple spell <Create Living Corpse> is concerned, most demons apparently know of it and can use it.
The spell can’t create anything but weak undead to the point where they have no ego, or rather it’s no exaggeration to say that they don’t possess one, such as low-ranking zombies or skeletons once they have moved on from being rotten corpses.
“So you are saying that neither method applies to the armor?” (Renya)
“Correct. The words to express that are
I guess you could call it a patchwork of souls?” (Emil)
Due to Renya blinking his eyes in surprise, unable to understand the words he heard, Emil ponders how to phrase it best while saying,
“Even though you can’t say that it’s completely the same, that armor-kun resembles the technique of creating a perfect soul that was used among demon researchers a long time ago. Are you aware of the belief that the souls of living beings are incomplete and full of holes?” (Emil)
Being asked that, Renya shakes his head.
There’s no reason for him to have heard of such a belief after coming to this world, and in his former world such a belief would leave the stage after being asked “Soul, what’s that?” in the first place.
“The souls possessed by humans, elves, beastmen and of course demons are incomplete, having many holes. If it was possible to fill these holes to compensate for the souls’ imperfection, just how many perfect souls would one be able to create if they patched the countless souls existing in this world together? And, won’t those perfect souls lead to the existences called gods? In the past there were people who fervently researched these ridiculous questions.” (Emil)
Renya thinks about Emil’s words.
Her manner of calling it a patchwork probably refers to trying to fill those lacking parts or holes by repeatedly dividing and joining souls, which are said to be imperfect and full of holes, after preparing a great number of them.
What’s left behind is the doubt of whether that’s really possible to accomplish, but Renya urged Emil to continue for the time being.
“The research naturally fell through. In the first place, something like processing souls is far too unreasonable. Even if you were to compensate for the incomplete parts of a soul, you have to consider just how many components a single soul possesses, right? Moreover, if you reach such a level, defining those souls as being imperfect becomes vague unless you know what perfect is. If you were to ask me, I don’t think it was a research worth its time, but you know how people are.” (Emil)
“Knowing about that means that you have taken part in the research for a bit, doesn’t it?” (Renya)
“Uh
” (Emil)
Emil faltered a bit due to Renya’s retort.
It seems I hit bulls-eye. When Renya shows a mean smile, Emil’s cheeks blush slightly and she turns her face away.
“I don’t have to explain any further, right?” (Emil)
“Sorry. Please continue.” (Renya)
Renya bowed his head since he would be troubled if she were to stop her explanation after becoming bad-mooded.
Emil, who mumbled something under her breath while looking at Renya, exhales once after a short moment and continues,
“I will lay aside the idle gossip of stuff like reaching the place of the gods and so on, but that armor-kun’s content are very likely beings that resemble perfect souls quite closely. In other words, as countless human souls have been bundled together and refined into one, they are existences that have been allowed to ascend to an elevated position as existences. The armor is full of such things.” (Emil)
“There is a reason why the armor will start to eat people gradually as compensation, if it’s released only slightly from its seal,” Emil added,
“I think it tries to complement its own ego by gradually predating on souls for the sake of supplementing its own holes and imperfectness, you know? I’ve been told that this is also the same reason why wraiths use energy drain and why vampires suck blood.” (Emil)
According to her understanding bloodsucking to vampires is like a reproductive act, but after having her return to the current matter by raising his hand to caution Emil that she was about to digress, Renya asked,
“Going by only what I heard
it sounds like those contents are extremely dangerous, aren’t they?” (Renya)
Even though it’s still fine since it’s under Renya’s and Frau’s proper control for now, if he’s told that it’s an existence that might very well continue to devour people once its control is lost, Renya even feels that treating it as a dangerous being is still not enough.
Moreover, going by the failure of the research to complement souls, its predation won’t come to an end no matter how many people the armor’s contents devour.
“That’s right. It’s also the reason why I don’t want to get involved in this. Renya, do you know what you want to do with that armor-kun?” (Emil)
“As a matter of fact, the hero of the beastmen arrived in this city. Since his behavior was far too retarded, I turned him away once, but I have been told that next time he will come to have a meeting with the human hero after properly sending a messenger and setting a schedule
” (Renya)
“Based on his status, he isn’t a person you can refuse, is he?” (Emil)
“Indeed, but I can’t believe that presenting the armor just like that and saying, This is the hero will be accepted by the other party so easily.” (Renya)
At very least I’m pretty sure that we will be told to show them its contents.
Having said that, even if we show its contents, there’s nothing but that black smoke-like cluster inside. I can’t possibly imagine them being able to understand after having told them that this is the hero.
“In other words, you are saying that you want something that can be shown?” (Emil)
“Yes. Ideally it would be great if we could put something human-like in there.” (Renya)
It’s kind of extreme, but it would be enough with simply putting a freshly severed head that could talk inside the helmet, Renya thinks.
As long as the other party can consent to this being the hero after the armor removes its helmet, shows its head and talks with them, then it won’t be any kind of problem for Renya, even if there’s nothing below the head.
“Uwaah
the creation of a god’s vessel? 
 How troublesome.” (Emil)
“A god’s vessel?” (Renya)
Renya says, parroting the phrase he isn’t familiar with.
“Well it’s a continuation of the previous story about the complementation of souls. It’s about a body created with a perfect ratio following the idea that a god’s soul should be put into a suitable vessel. Since there’s a tendency for the soul to be influenced strongly by the flesh, it was researched that there’s no point in an imperfect body, even if the soul itself is perfect.” (Emil)
The fact that you can dish out that information so smoothly is probably owed to you getting involved with this story more than once, Renya assesses.
But, even though he thinks that, he doesn’t let it show on his face or say it.
It’s because he fully knows that he would offend Emil if he did.
“I think it should be fine even if we don’t make something that close to a god’s vessel this time, but those matters require me to consult with Frau for starters.” (Emil)
“Can I request that of you? And in addition, as fast as possible.” (Renya)
The present state is that we don’t know how fast the beastman priestess and hero will come back here, but no matter how soon that might be, it’s absolutely necessary to get ready in advance so that we won’t run into any problems.
“If you’d like, you can get in contact with Frau through me.” (Renya)
“Yeah, I’d like to ask that of you
after all even I will be troubled if I’m snapped in two due to meddling in the wrong way.” (Emil)
Emil shows an unpleasant smile, but the words she said aren’t words that can be washed away by smiling.
Renya turns a severe look at Emil.
“You are saying that such possibility exists?” (Renya)
“I can’t definitely state that it doesn’t. I mean, after all the only ones controlling that armor are you and Frau, Renya. Getting involved with something you don’t control yourself is usually a suicidal action,” Emil laughs.
“If you think that it’s dangerous, refusing this is
” (Renya)
“Won’t it be alright as long as I can talk with Frau through you, Renya? Besides, it’s necessary, isn’t it?” (Emil)
“That is, well,
” (Renya)
If Emil is so cautious, Renya believes that it would be better to become defiant and introduce the armor as the hero rather than forcing things.
Though, if he did that, he wouldn’t be able to predict at all what kind of effect it would have.
“I guess my biggest worry is that my sleeping hours will be cut down since it’s a very urgent task.” (Emil)
“That is
I’m sorry
” (Renya)
Not knowing what else he could say, Renya simply apologized to Emil who said that in jest.
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