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Chapter 64: Black Death (11)
Chapter 64: Black Death (11)
Chapter 64: Black Death (11)
The man with a metal bill mask.
He began speaking as he approached.
“This world has too many malignant tumors.”
What the flashlight showed wasn’t a human. It was a man towering almost three meters in height, much too tall and gangly to be called human. But due to being covered from head to toe in black cloth, it was difficult to tell his body type.
The overwhelming stature gave me shivers, but that wasn’t the problem.
“Humans, elves, the few beastkin who do not follow us, and even those despicable Elementals.... It is my duty, as well as the command of His Majesty, to restrain and disinfect them.”
The fuck is this guy saying.
The things he was saying out of the blue were harder to comprehend than classical poetry. He was clearly speaking the same language yet I couldn’t understand what he meant.
Sensing an instinctive danger, I pointed my staff at the man.
Only a few meters left to be in range. If absolutely necessary, I was going to stab the end of the calipers between his goggles.
Yet that idea only stayed in my mind because Vermel pulled on my sleeve again.
“Don’t provoke him.”
That was when I realized that the man before us was a beast above Calamity-level.
The beasts I’d encountered until now had all been animal types. None had been humanoid. Even the only Calamity I’d seen, the Homarus, had looked like a scorpion.
I’d met a beast capable of human speech at the entrance ceremony, but hadn’t seen it with my own eyes. This would be the first time actually encountering a humanoid type beast.
“What a tragedy that there is a compatriot who cannot recognize the great work of purifying and rebuilding the continent.”
The guy kept spewing cryptic words.
He spread out both his arms. The sleeves of his worn robe drew a catenary as they dropped down. His wrists dripped with wax that hadn’t fully hardened and black centipedes made scratching noises as they crawled over his arms.
“However, I will not deal harshly with someone of the same origin. The one called the Goddess claims that all are created equally, but our kind is far more equal than all the others.”
I left the man to his nonsense and gestured for Vermel to lend me his ear.
“The hell is he?”
“The Cataclysm Entero Colitica, the one responsible for all this.”
“Do you know me?”
The man stretched out his neck.
“Never have I appeared before the human race yet information has somehow leaked and now there is someone who knows of me?”
“I have no obligation to tell you.”
Yeah, because he’s a transmigrator.
“Well, no matter. We’ve bought enough time. While you were preoccupied by the disease, His Majesty’s army won a series of victories in the north. I’ve achieved my purpose and cannot find a reason to stay here anymore.”
The beak-masked man took out a long staff from subspace. Its length was a good ten feet by estimate.
“But this is the underground, full of sewage and corpses and no surveillance equipment. Would your kind even bat an eye if a couple more of you drowned?”
Was he getting ready to attack?
The gate was at our backs and the enemy was at our front. This was a straight passage so there was no way out.
If we fought, it was going to be a frontal battle.
And the opponent was a Cataclysm, a monster that couldn’t be subdued even with a host of the country’s exceptional tactical-class mages. If we didn’t have Flare, then we’d have to make our graves here right now.
Statistically speaking, the probability of us winning was immeasurably low. So to have at least some kind of chance, we had to take the first shot. I loaded up Flare so it could be fired any time.
But I deflated at what the man said next.
“Yes, I had originally intended to slit the throat of anyone who saw me here. But this is troubling even for me.”
“......?”
“Cunning elf, it seems that you know more than I thought. If you hadn’t brought the girl with you, then you originally would have been destined to die here.”
What’s this now?
Vermel had been standing stiff since earlier. His straight back was more likely due to being scared rather than from a lack of fear.
It was weird. That guy would know, too, that we were at a disadvantage in terms of power. Why wasn’t he attacking?
My mind was filled with that question, but this wasn’t the time to ask the transmigrator about it.
Something, there was something strange in the air.
It was the kind of atmosphere where if I asked now, then I’d be branded as a tactless bastard. I kept quiet and observed the situation
The man swung the scythe-shaped staff, but it wasn’t an attack motion. At the end of the swing, the banging against the door behind us that had been sounding for a while stopped.
“An elf and a Golden-Eyed. What a sight I’ve witnessed on this little outing. Consider it my returning the favor that you’re leaving with your lives despite having seen my face.”
Gulp. I could hear the sound of swallowing from beside me.
“But don’t forget that this is not yet over. There is always a chance that those around you may be sent to the Great Heavens. Yes, I cannot simply depart without doing anything for my reputation’s sake, so perhaps I will leave a parting gift.”
Those were his last words. With an uncanny laugh, the man disappeared into the darkness and his flashing eyes followed suit.
Even with the flashlight, we could no longer see the bird beak mask. It was then that Vermel finally let out a great sigh of relief.
“We did it....”
It was the tone of a person who barely recovered his money from gambling. Vermel put his hand against the wall and dry-heaved a few times.
I was also tense but not overly rigid like he was. Rather, the sewer monster that had been chasing us earlier had been more frightening.
Come to think of it, he’d be reacting like this since he knew what was going to happen in the future. It was now certain that the guy we just met was dangerous beyond imagination.
By the time Vermel and I crawled back out, the sun had set. Then as per the routine, I had to pick up the broom.
I was exhausted. Fucking hell.
After encountering the man in the crow bill mask, all indicators were on a downward trend. The amount of metal debris filling the garbage cans decreased by the day, and the funeral parlors vacated one by one.
The daily number of cases soon dropped to the double digits. It was the first time in nearly a month.
“It’s amazing. I thought it would have taken at least six months.”
In a typical pandemic, it took even longer than that. I thought I’d die of frustration back then.
[Critical Loss of Military Forces on the Northern Front][The Imperial Army Retreats Back to the First Line of Defense]The outside carried bad news, but it wasn’t enough to say that matters were getting worse. The fact that printing houses were publishing newspapers again proved that the state’s situation was improving.
“How’s Mr. Alex doing? I only heard that he was taking antibiotics everyday....”
“Well, he was discharged a while ago.”
“... Is that possible?”
It wasn’t easy to heal from the Black Death of this world once infected. Even if one did recover, a limb or two would fall off by themselves from becoming metal dust. The loss of a body part would have brought severe aftereffects.
“He lost a leg but it seems that he healed himself when his immune system activated afterwards.”
Seriously, what is he?
“Anyway, it’s good that things are going well. You should be back in school by the beginning of June.”
Shadiel patted my shoulder as if to say ‘you did well’. With this, I was done with all the quarantine work I could do.
That wasn’t the only good news. It was when I had taken the citron fruit to the infirmary as per Vermel’s request.
“I should be able to make the cure soon.”
The infirmary teacher said that all of a sudden.
She was an elf with two-tone hair by the name of Sephia Glyston. The infirmary where she was at smelled of medicine and citrus scents which was probably the kind of perfume she used.
Now there was nothing left for me to do. I could just go back to researching magic like usual and then return to my world. And not forget to keep my promise to Miss Heerlein in the process, of course.
Whether I liked it or not, I had to admit that I grew attached to this world. There were some assholes, sure, but Earth already had plenty of them. For the sake of those like Miss Heerlein and Lotte, I felt a responsibility to give them at least one weapon against the Demon King.
[Switching to Admin Mode.]
[? Create new research : Develop Plasma Confinement Device within Tokamak]
[? Create new research : Develop Heavy-water Reactor (HWR)]
[Whoa. Isn’t that too much?]
Even so, it wouldn’t be as bad as dealing with a pest. I had been meaning to do something like this before and after the summer break, anyway. It was going to be hard doing it alone from this point so I’d have to contact other labs, too.
[If you’re going to make a hydrogen bomb, then you only need the first research since the HWR is related to nuclear fission. You won’t require something like uranium if you want to use a laser as the primary stage.]
I knew that. That had been the original idea.
But my reason for putting HWR development in my mind lay elsewh....
“What are you up to?”
Snap. It was Lotte who came and broke through my thoughts.
I was in our dorm scribbling on the opened hardcover. Normally, it was in ‘Invisibility Mode’ so as to not show anyone, but I had turned it off since it wasn’t necessary for the moment.
“A hardcover. You bought it?”
“Huh? Oh, yeah.”
I was forced to.
Lotte was the first person I’d shown the Goddess-given hardcover to. With a hum, she looked over my writing, then stumbled over to the bed and sat on the edge. She looked precarious somehow.
“What’s wrong? Are you feeling sick?”
“No, I’m just tired. We haven’t slept much lately with the quarantining.”
Lotte smiled, saying that she was fine and not to worry. It was full of warmth which couldn’t be seen as a traditional noble shown in the media.
I’d never be able to make that kind of expression.
After making sure that Lotte laid down, I turned back. I was going to have to rack my brain to figure out the next magic to research.
It was when I picked up the pen and was about to turn the page.
“K–Kugh, keheugh.”
I heard coughing from behind my back.
Footnotes
1. "... a curve that describes the shape of a flexible hanging chain or cable"https://www.britannica.com/science/catenary