Cocytus proved that growth was possible. He demonstrated this exceedingly well.
Ainz thought to himself.
Without growth, one could only wait until eventually one stopped. Even if they were powerful now, there would eventually one day where they would certainly be surpassed.
Even if he had a one hundred year lead in military technology, if he no longer made any progress, then eventually there would be one day where he would lose the position of being the most powerful. Right now, the neighbouring country could probably count as a powerful nation, but if it believed that it would forever preserve its status as the most powerful nation, without any need for further improvement, that would be incredibly foolish to a fault.
“Even if those are my thoughts… but whilst I am overjoyed that the child has grown up, at the same time I worry whether I am a person worthy of their loyalty as Supreme Being.”
As he rambled on, Ainz gazed at the ceiling above the bed.
“Ah, ah, so scary, so terrifying…”
The remnants of human personality, Satoru Suzuki, once again lamented because of this new source of unease.
Since growth represents change, then who can guarantee that their current loyalty will not waver either? Even if it does not change, there is still the possibility that one day I will be considered ill-suited to be the glorious Supreme Being of Nazarick. A worry that I, who was nominated to be the Guild Leader, will lose the right to be branded as such.
“... I have to become a Supreme Being worthy of the Guardians’ loyalty… is there anyone who can teach me in the ways of being an emperor...?”
There shouldn’t be anyone who was so conveniently programmed that way in Nazarick.
Trapped in his own thoughts, the images of two persons came to Ainz’ mind. Those two were part of the dreadful five person team, respectively the one who held the title of Duke, Lord of Terror, and the one who had ‘King’ in his name, Gashokukochuuou. Carefully considering whether or not he should approach those two individuals to be educated, Ainz gave a short response to himself.
“... Pass.”
Unless he ran into a dead end, he did not wish to be taught by those two.
“Let it be… so long as no major mistakes are made during actions, I should be fine for the moment. Anyways… about those bipedal sheep…”
Ainz was already aware of the identity of the bipedal sheep long before, which was why he did not pursue specific details of the bipedal sheep’s appearance. That was a type of monster which he had encountered before in YGGDRASIL.
“Having the heads of both a lion and a mountain goat, as well as the tail of a snake, paws of a lion, and legs of a mountain sheep. That should be right… it is a chimera… “
In YGGDRASIL, chimeras walked around on two sheep legs and used their lion legs as arms to initiate attacks; a monster which was born with a lion’s head and a mountain goat’s head. This monster’s appearance was based off the deity called Baphomet.
Then why did Demiurge not directly say it was a chimera? Although he pondered this question, Ainz already had his answer.
“That is, it could possibly be a chimera subspecies. Is that how it is, Demiurge?”
Ainz laughed heartily, then added a note to his evaluation of Demiurge: ‘Unexpectedly poor name picking taste’.
“In YGGDRASIL there is also a species like Chimera Lord whose appearance was a bit… No, I should say the appearance of fish type chimera is strange to the point of being disgusting. Bipedal sheep is a new species of chimera… Theocracy chimera … having someone bring one to Nazarick isn’t a bad idea either. Then there’s also Victim…”
His appearance was exactly the same as in Ainz’ memories, except there was one feature which caught his attention.
“The language he used… it really is the Enoch language used by angels, right? It feels like conversing with someone who speaks another language…”
Because it was already automatically translated, Ainz had no idea which language was spoken, but he felt that it was a bit strange. Of course, it could very possibly be because Ainz himself didn’t understand the Enoch language.
“Let it be, no need to debate it. Good, it’s about time to set out for battle…”
Ainz once again rolled left and right to get enough of it. After he stopped and lay there, he returned to pondering over the points he was concerned about earlier.
He buried his head inside the bed and took a deep breath.
Of course, Ainz did not have lungs, therefore this was just a pretended movement. However, inconceivably, he could smell a fragrance.
“This is a floral smell… is there perfume on the bed? Could it be that wealthy people’s beds are all like this? If that is so, that really is surprising… perhaps those pretending to be wealthy can also notice this aspect? Mmmm…”
Part 3
There was a type of ability called ‘Danger Perception’.
Amongst adventurers, bandits, and others whom possessed discovery-based skills, this was considered the most important ability. Just as the name stipulates, it was an ability which enabled the detection of danger.
This ability was split into two types. One type was not reliant on reasoning or observation, merely reliant on sense to trigger awareness. The other type was awareness which was reliant on reasoning and observation accumulated from experience. The former can be described as a sixth sense internal feeling, and the latter can be described as one which was derived from the small changes in the surrounding— one derived from minute changes in sound and smell.
The latter would be naturally improved on the battlefield and during solo adventures, even if it were not intentionally trained. It was obtained through experiences by placing oneself in dangerous situations.
And ability-wise, this aspect of lizardmen was many times greater than that of humans. Biologically, their sensory organs were more sensitive, because they lived in harsher environments. Humans tended to live in safe places far from monsters, whereas lizardmen lived as neighbours to such monsters.
Zaryusu, who was a traveller and often travelled alone, was even more sensitive to slight changes in the environment.
Feeling tension filling the air, he opened his eyes.
Before him was a familiar room— although he had only stayed here for several days. Humans, even if they tried to, would not be able to make out details in this room which had no light source, but it was not that difficult for lizardmen.
There was nothing out of the ordinary in the room.
Zaryusu looked around, and after confirming that there were no strange objects, he gave a sigh of relief as he moved to sit upright.
He was an outstanding warrior, which was why even if he was sleeping moments ago, he was as awake as normal. There wasn’t an issue of drowsiness, as he was even energetic enough to immediately enter battle.
This was also related to the fact that lizardmen were habitually light sleepers.