“It really is incredible. Being able to bring together all of the Supreme Beings, goes to show that his name is not just for show.”
After Demiurge whose brain was top class finished, Shalltear approved what was said with delight, and all of the other guardians nodded their heads in agreement.
♦ ♦ ♦
Ainz returned to his room and leaped onto his bed. After a lengthy hang time, Ainz’ body fell into the bed, then — he began to roll around.
Rolled right, then rolled left.
He was only able to roll as such because the bed was large enough.
Although his exquisite changpao was already greatly wrinkled, Ainz, who was completely fine with this happening, continued to laugh softly as he rolled around. Of course, he acted so childishly because nobody else apart from himself was allowed to enter.
Not long afterwards, Ainz who was fully satisfied in his indulgence in the mattress, laid there facing the ceiling.
“Haaa, so tired… Ah~ I really wish to indulge myself in alcohol to my heart’s content, and drink myself into a stupor… although that’s no longer possible.”
Ainz finished complaining then gave a big sigh — However Ainz did not breathe, that was why it was merely the appearance of a false sigh.
It was because he was an undead, that was why he was indifferent to physical and mental fatigue. However, to describe it in human terms, for the past month he had been worn out every day. If he still had a stomach, it would have been long ruined by now.
Because Ainz had been enduring pressure.
Momon the warrior had vanquished the silver-haired vampire— Shalltear. For those who didn’t know, perhaps they would only consider this feat as incredible, but to the mysterious person who used a World class item on Shalltear, it would give another impression. The opponent would probably keep a close eye on Momon, or even establish contact.
That was why Ainz had remained on alert for the entire day, and had also prepared several cash items to enable him to escape at any moment. During his free time, apart from maintaining alertness, he had also done some imaginary role playing — or perhaps better called paranoia training — visualising if the opponent had showed up, would he be able to escape whilst at the same time devoting energy to collecting information.
Although being stressed out like this every day had no real impact on Ainz Ooal Gown, it was still mentally taxing on the remnants of humanity he still possessed, as the human Satoru Suzuki. During his free time where he was able to relax and be by himself, he would push aside his attitude as Nazarick’s Supreme Being, and revert to his childish behaviour. This was probably because deep within Ainz, that stressed out and tired Satoru Suzuki desired to act like that.
“I have no memories of ever having such restless and sleepless work before… makes me wonder how much overtime I will be getting this month.”
This outburst of complaint was perhaps due to the Satoru Suzuki personality taking over Ainz.
“The Great Tomb of Nazarick… no, I mean Ainz Ooal Gown… is not a corporation. Joint venture companies are compassionate enterprises, and should fully guarantee compensation for employees’ overtime.”
Rambling as such, Ainz pursed his non-existent eyebrows.
“Eh? … It can’t be because of duty allowance that I am not entitled to overtime compensation? Wow…”
Ainz once again rolled left and right. After rolling over about five or six times, he suddenly stopped moving.
“Enough… meaningless babble needs to stop here… Come to think of it, Cocytus was quite incredible too, being able to speak out as he did.”
It was surprising. Apparently Cocytus would empathise with the lizardmen.
That action of Cocytus had made Ainz feel troubled greatly.
Satoru Suzuki was the kind of person whom, when preparing a briefing, would first fully assemble all of the data, then proceed by following standard practice to the letter. As such, he was not accustomed to dealing with unexpected problems. However, if only it were mentioned in writing as part of the information, then he would be able to handle it according to the data information. In other words, for Satoru Suzuki, the key to the success of his briefings were that any problems were already dealt with at the investigation stage. Such a kind of person was extremely unsuited for situations where it was necessary to adapt to the situation, to the point that he detested such scenarios.
As it was, it was neither possible to bring data into the Throne Hall, nor have the comfort of being able to say “then, please turn to the next page.” Therefore Ainz had prepared for flow of events in the Throne Hall long before, by rehearsing the entire sequence in his mind for more than ten times. In his heart, he had even prayed that nobody would act unexpectedly.
And this small wish of his had thus been shattered by Cocytus.
He was extremely worried about what Cocytus wanted to say, but had also felt delighted.
It was because at the same time he also had the pleasure similar to that of a parent— it was as if there was a docile child in the household who had, for the first time, expressed his own opinion. The most important thing was that the person’s development had exceeded Ainz’ expectations by far.
When he returned to Nazarick previously, he asked a maid to cook a dish. What he asked for was steak. With elements such as proficiency level, she might require more practice, but the steak doesn’t require high levels to be made. He was not expecting the meal to provide buffs upon consumption, just something that could be eaten.
However the result could only be described as a blackened piece of charcoal.
Even if that maid non-stop repeated the exercise, the end product was always charred meat.
Whilst he was accepting that maid’s sincere apologies, Ainz was also able to fully accept these results which were within expectations. It was exactly the same as when Ainz was trying to equip a large sword in the clothing room.
In YGGDRASIL, only those who possessed the job-specific special ability were able to cook. This was because food could temporarily raise battle capability through buffs, which was why requiring a job specific special ability was natural. However, that maid did not have the cooking special ability.
That also meant that if he wanted to do something which required a special ability yet lacked the skill himself, he would be bound to fail.
This matter regarding Cocytus was Ainz’ objective all along, which could also be described as an experiment. Ainz wanted to test if his servants, who already had their settings fixed, were able to learn new things. This experiment concerned proving whether they could continue to develop after learning tactics or strategy. Allowing Cocytus to command weak undead was because he simply thought that through defeat he could probably obtain much more.
Ainz was extremely pleased with the end result. Cocytus had shown Ainz that there was the possibility of such growth.
Of course, there was a large difference between learning through actual actions, and merely learning through memorisation.
Ainz’ eventual objective was to acquire and perfect all of the magic particular to this world— if such did exist. Right now, Ainz was still uncertain of whether the currently existing magic was either technique or knowledge. In any case, this experiment proved that the knowledge aspect could indeed be developed.