ch81-ch100 · 093-ch92

Chapter 92

With one thing and another talked through, it was settled that the butler, Joichiro, would see Shirazawa Kana and Watanabe Yuki home. Toru's new car was set for delivery tomorrow, so he'd gratefully taken them up on the offer — but for some reason the butler had an eyebrow up: "You not ridin' along?"

"Well — it's Hayasaka-kun, after all... In that case, yes, please. I'll come by again tomorrow. Once I've gotten the university club matters sorted out, I'll come over."

"Yeah. See you tomorrow."

He gave a light nod, and she returned a truly happy-looking smile. Come to think of it, back when they were dating, their partings had mostly been something like this, he recalled. Part of him wanted to go tell his past self just how precious a promise like "see you tomorrow" was — and part of him thought that the present him might understand that even less than he used to.

"...So Toru-bro-sama and Shirazawa-sama were, that is... i-in love, were you...?"

So said Kujo Reiko, face red for some reason. Tia and Kawai Sakiho were watching this way with undisguised fascination, but the maid Azumaya Marika had solemnly begun tidying the room.

"Ahh... well. We're what you'd call ex-girlfriend and ex-boyfriend."

"My, my, my! Young love, was it! Ufufu! Come to think of it, I do hear that no small number of explorers marry their own clan members."

"Huh."

Well, sure — spend a long stretch of time sharing life and death, and it'd go one of two ways: a falling-out, or a deeper bond. There was also the strictly-business-relationship line of thought, but even then, not many people could stay perfectly dry-eyed about it, probably.

"T-T-T-Toru-bro-sama intends to... to get back together with Shirazawa-sama... — ah! What a presumptuous question that was! Ohhoho! Pray pretend you never heard it!"

"For now, not really thinkin' anything like that, though."

"Kyaaah! Don't answer! I didn't want to heaaar it!"

Kujo Reiko, hands clasped under her chin and wriggling into a little dance, was highly entertaining. Her golden drills swayed with proper commitment; mercifully, the posture kept her formidable chest armor from drawing much attention. Its destructive power being high.

"Milady, the talks are concluded for the present; let us withdraw. Taking one's pleasure in another's romance is not the conduct of a lady."

"I am perfectly aware! But Toru-bro-sama waaas..."

"What about your end, though? Kujo-family heiress — well, I dunno how all that works, but image-wise, feels like there'd be a fiancé or somethin' in the picture, no?"

"That becomes a question of how many people exist who could bring the Kujo house greater benefit than the current arrangement — the arrangement whereby marrying me off sets the explorer Kujo Reiko at liberty! At the very least, I have no intention of entering into romance with a man weaker than myself! If you would have me, then first you must defeat me! Ohhohhohoho!"

"Forgive us the clamor. We shall take our leave."

"We're going" — and with no room whatsoever for debate, Azumaya Marika seized Kujo Reiko's arm and withdrew from the room. Toru at least threw a "Preciate it" after the two of them, though whether it carried was anyone's guess. Kujo Reiko was voicing her objections at a far bigger volume.

He'd just sighed a good grief when he noticed Kawai Sakiho, who had stayed behind, raising her hand with a somewhat apologetic air.

"Um... it occurred to me — if the one who handed Seno Kyohei the drug was the Demon called Gilgeil, then about the drug itself... wouldn't Lugardo-san perhaps have some lead? Like, he made off with it from the Demon group before he bolted... or maybe even now there's a Demon within the Demon group who's connected to Gilgeil..."

"Good point."

Either way, there was no reason not to check. Toru took out his mobile and dialed Lugardo from the call history. He wasn't much for phoning people, but somehow with Lugardo it felt easy — a strange thing.

〈Toru, huh. What's up?〉

Lugardo picked up remarkably fast. He could hear what sounded like cars passing to and fro in the distance, so maybe he was somewhere near a prefectural road or a national highway.

"Sorry for the suddenness. Info share. There's a possibility Gilgeil was handing out a suspicious drug at city hall. Er — the confirmed part is that there was someone handing out a suspicious drug; the unconfirmed part is whether that someone was Gilgeil."

〈A drug...?〉

"A needle-less syringe. Apparently it came in a box, like — product-style. The guy who injected it turned into a monster. Humanoid with rock-like skin, I'd say. About two and a half meters tall; a probably-C-rank explorer had gotten up to around A-rank strength. Well, don't lean too hard on my feel for the power levels — not much experience on my end there."

〈...A drug, huh. Wait — you're talkin' like you saw it yourself.〉

"Saw it. Took it down. The guy who'd turned monster is back to human, and he's probably in Labyrinth Department custody now. If anything gets shared from that side, I'll share it with you too. Anything come to mind?"

〈Turned back into a hu— ah, no, never mind. Yeah, something comes to mind. There was an old hag developing a drug that shoots your mana intake way up, fast. Said she got the hint from EXP items in games, or somethin' — but it gets you the same result as stuffin' yourself silly at dinner till your stomach bursts.〉

"Ahh..."

Probably something like: the mana that could no longer be crammed inside him had slipped out of control and covered Seno Kyohei like an outer shell. Why the man had run amok mentally was a mystery, but Toru had little interest in the mechanics of that part.

A hahh — Lugardo's sigh, or breath, or whatever it was, carried over. Toru first took it as exasperation with him, but it gave more the impression of a deep breath taken in front of some decision or other.

〈Timing-wise it's a bit early, but better than too late. Toru — come to our settlement and have a talk with the hag I just mentioned. Old as she is, she's bound to know about the holy sword wielder. And she probably knows more about Gilgeil than me, too.〉

"A Demon settlement...?"

〈But I can't guide you there. I'll tell you how it's done. Go to the Kagurazaka main house, get approval from the main-house folk, and have them take you to our settlement. Kagurazaka's a pack of muscleheads, so show them strength and they'll fall in line. Start by flattening the branch-house crowd, and the main house will come out.〉

"Hah? Hold on a sec. That's a lot of info. Kagurazaka — you mean 'Anthem's' Kagurazaka? If you'd just show me there yourse— no, right. There's the 'oath,' huh."

If a 'House' existed that sheltered Demons, would it leave said Demons free to run around? No need to think twice. It would not. If it was the Demons who wanted the shelter, then having the 'oath' disclosed would seal off any leak of information to the outside.

〈Glad you catch on quick. We can't invite anyone to our place on our own judgment. That's the oath we've got with Kagurazaka. What we can do is nudge you along — "get Kagurazaka's approval."〉

"What is this, an RPG fetch-quest event...? Also — the Kagurazaka main-house people will actually come guide someone? Has there ever been such a case?"

〈We've never gone first with a "we want to invite this one," but I have met humans the Kagurazaka folk showed in. They're genuinely musclebrained crazies, but the main-house people don't break promises. And me personally takin' you to Kagurazaka — that's out too. It'd cut against the oath.〉

"Well, fair enough."

〈Real convenient for you — Kagurazaka Chizuru's in 'Anthem,' the clan you're mixed up with, right? Get in touch with her and have her take you to the family home. You can let a reasonable amount of the info slip to the Labyrinth Department people; I don't mind. Thanks to Gilgeil, the oath with Kagurazaka gets severed sooner or later anyway. Whether our settlement can stay as it is after that, I can't say... well. Doubt it.〉

For Lugardo, laughing as if in self-mockery, Toru had no fitting words in stock. Rummage through his wallet and drawers all he liked — all that would come out was sarcasm, probably.

"Got it. I'll see what I can do."

And so that was all Toru said. He could tell the young Demon on the other end of the signal gave a small laugh.

〈Yeah. On my end, I'll take Gaidorl and Bargas and head back ahead of you. Maybe you're worried about this town, but an S-rank explorer clan's arrived, hasn't it? Plus a Labyrinth Department bigshot's here too. Fighting-strength-wise, this place is probably among the top handful in Japan right now.〉

He didn't tack on so don't worry — which struck Toru as very Lugardo. Excuses, or grounds for comfort — call them which you liked, he had lined them up all the same; and if Toru couldn't help worrying, he could always just kick the proposal. That was the shape of it.

"Ahh... anyway, I'll try getting hold of Kagurazaka-san. Later, then."

〈Yeah. Later.〉

Pip — the call cut off.

That was kind of like a conversation between friends, huh — Toru found himself feeling strange about it. But come to think of it, the last time he'd had an easy, unguarded friend his own age was around elementary school, so he couldn't have said whether that was what this had been, or not.

◇◇◇

And so he first tried calling Saito Megumi, whose number was still in his mobile's history, gave a rough rundown of the situation, and had her hand him over to Kagurazaka Chizuru.

As you'd expect, Kagurazaka was, for some reason, still extraordinarily stiff and formal toward Toru, which mildly wore on him; but as for the matter itself she was all set to consider it positively — rather, she was about to decide on the spot — so he ended up applying the brakes: talk it over with your clan members first.

That said, intel on the Demons was something the Labyrinth Department side would want too, so in the end they would probably go. Toru thought so, and Saito Megumi, who took the phone back as the call ended, said much the same.

"A Demon settlement, huh..."

Tia said it in a way that was hard to read — whether any feeling was in it or not.

It had been the same when she'd clobbered the freshly-met Lugardo — toward Demons, her stance carried a ferocious temperature gap against her usual friendliness. But thinking it over carefully — the first time she'd met Sadoyama, too — that was when he'd driven them as far as the Sugai Dungeon parking lot, if he remembered right — her attitude toward Sadoyama had felt oddly curt.

"You know any Demons besides Gilgeil?"

"Hmm... I killed a fair few of the prominent ones, see. The Demon King Yuggarm — him, of course I remember. But I was basically what this world would call a 'hired gun,' so I knew all about my targets, but the Demon King's retainers and such — wouldn't really know."

Tia answered without showing any particular emotion. It wasn't that her green eyes had clouded; she was thoroughly her usual self, and that was — somehow unpleasant.

"Weell, once we actually go, there might be Demons I know after all — in an ohh, that guy sort of way. We were enemies at the time, so honestly I expect it'll be nothing but ones holding grudges against me."

"Figures. If they come at us, we'll just kill 'em."

"Ehh? That'd be rude to Lugardo. They went to all the trouble of staying alive — isn't putting them out of commission and taking them hostage plenty?"

"That works too. Let's just play it by ear."

He'd tried saying his careless piece in a deliberately light tone, and Tia laughed an ordinary "ahaha" for him — but Kawai Sakiho had recoiled hard enough to drain the color from her face.

Even he had to feel bad about that one. He didn't say it, though.

Then, partly to change the air, he poured coffee drinks into glasses for everyone present, resupplying their brains with sugar while they sorted the talk out.

"Anyway — delivery's tomorrow, so factoring in their side's schedule, we head out two or three days from now. The sooner the better, right? Tomorrow Watanabe's going to use the potion on his little sister — the butler said he'd go along, I think."

"If the delivery's early, going to city hall to do the paperwork might be a good idea as well."

"You can join a clan right from your mobile if you're an explorer, but Kawai-san isn't an explorer, so the office is faster — that was the arrangement, right?"

"There are various other procedures we can take care of as well, so I think having Azumaya-san accompany us would be best. In which case, Kujo-san would come along too, I imagine."

"I like Reiko, so I'm happy we'll get to be together."

The holy sword wielder beamed. Kawai made that recoiling face again, but he didn't much feel like calling her on it. That Tia's attitude toward Demons ran at about the same temperature must have been plain enough from Kawai's vantage too.

"'Anthem' will have their own this-and-that to prepare, so for now, we wait to hear back. Nothing starts till Kagurazaka-san can show us the way."

"What will 'Cleaning Sword' do while Hayasaka-san is away?"

"Ahh... they can do as they like, but I'll ask Kujo-san tomorrow or something. She was saying she'd train Shirazawa and Watanabe — feels like they could just as well dive the Sugai Dungeon with the butler along. Streaming too — if they wanna, go right ahead, is my take."

"Is it really all right for them to stream while Hayasaka-san is away?"

"Why not? If Kujo-san's on, the viewers will get fired up."

"I'll be a little lonely, though. Part of me does want to be on stream again and see everyone's comments. Of course, helping Toru comes first."

"Even so — we can hardly do 'A Visit to Kagurazaka Chizuru's Family Home!' now, can we."

"I knooow. Once everything's wrapped up and we're doing labyrinth exploration again, let's stream. Let's hit one of those out-of-the-way labyrinths Toru wanted to do. And eat the local delicacies, like they do on TV!"

With the energy of a happy dog twining about its owner, Tia shuttle-hopped side to side, behind and beside Toru. She was moving at a serious clip, yet not a drop spilled from the glass in her hand — a master's technique, deployed to no purpose whatsoever.

"Ahh... well. Yeah."

If he could keep going as an explorer like that, maybe that would be enough, he thought. That the thought had occurred to him at all meant, at the same time, that it probably wouldn't go that way.

He'd get dragged into something eventually, anyway.

Not that he minded.

If he didn't like it, he'd just cut it down.

For now — today, he had protected what he wanted to protect.

That alone should be satisfaction enough, for the time being.

Seen through the eyes of the Hayasaka Toru of back then, wasn't that a grand result — the kind that brings tears?

Savoring it as he drifted off to sleep — surely at least that much could be forgiven.