But he ought to know that I’m a skeleton…
While Ainz had thought of spying on the two of them at night to satisfy his curiosity, he felt that doing so would change his attitude towards the two of them, so he had curbed the impulse. However, it took a great deal of effort to shake off the curiosity that flashed through his mind every time Nfirea came to discuss it with him.
I remember something about it feeling very good, so he was asked to do it a lot of times… could it be that the reason he made so much of that potion ― some kind of nutrient supplement, I think ― and then gave it to me was because…
In any case, he had decided to give it to those two Lizardmen so they would work hard on making more rare children.
The fruits of technology are first applied to the military, then sex and medicine. Is that true?…Ah, time to go back.
Chapter 5: Ainz Dies
Part 1
There were a total of four people in the room.
There were two paladins, who had come straight here after the fighting and were thus still in bloodstained armor — Remedios Custodio and Gustav Montagnes. There was the person in charge of the surviving priests, a middle-aged man who could use third tier spells — Siliaco Naranho. And then there was Prince Caspond Bessarez.
Two of them had come from the battlefield and one of them had been in charge of healing the wounded. As a result, Prince Caspond’s room was filled with the stench of blood.
Remedios had not removed her helmet even now. That was not proper etiquette for visiting a prince’s chambers at all — one could even call it disrespectful — but Caspond did not seem bothered by it and he appeared very calm.
At the same time, the atmosphere in the room was terrible, though not because of the preceding point. It was true that it reeked in here, but the reason was because the mood in the air was harsh. It was so weighty that it even seemed to dull the sunlight entering through the window.
This was not how people who had beaten overwhelmingly unfavorable odds and emerged victorious ought to be.
Caspond was the first person to speak in this weighty silence. Still, who else could speak first but him?
“Then tell me about our casualty situation.”
“Of the 6,000 militiamen we brought onto the battlefield, roughly 2,400 of them have been injured or killed.”
“…If I may add to the Vice Captain-dono’s words, there were around 1,000 wounded. The priests tried to heal them, but we failed to reach about half of them in time and they died.
“…And then half of the paladins survived, and eight priests died.”
Caspond closed his eyes and shook his head as he heard Gustav’s words.
“Against a demihuman army like that… while we can’t say losses like these are a good thing, should we be grateful that those were all we took? Or should we be sad for the sheer number of casualties—”
“The latter.”
Remedios’s still, small voice interrupted Caspond.
“The latter.”
“…Captain Custodio is right. We ought to be sad to have suffered such losses.”
Gustav and Siliaco looked down as they heard Caspond’s words.
They knew that it was a miracle — albeit a man-made one — that the woefully outnumbered Holy Kingdom Liberation Army had so many survivors when they had taken on a 40,000-strong army of demihumans. However, they also understood that saying something like this would be disruptive and unproductive, so they had no choice but to do this instead.
“Was it the Sorcerer King who defeated the demihuman forces in their formation?”
“Yes. We’re unsure about the details due to the of lack eyewitness reports during the chaos of defending the city walls, but there’s talk of mysterious undead beings destroying the army.”
“I see. That matches up with what I heard from the Sorcerer KIng. So he used the undead he created to clean them up — wiped out a massive army like that, hm? In that case… do you think the Sorcerer King can defeat Jaldabaoth?”
Caspond shifted his gaze to Remedios, but she simply pursed her lips and remained silent. The highly volatile air around the Holy KIngdom’s strongest paladin made her a figure of dread to the weak. Caspond turned away from her and toward Gustav, who immediately returned his gaze with a deeply apologetic look in his eyes and bowed his head.
“Hahh… is it really alright to bet the entire KIngdom on him? Or rather — should we think of what to do if the Sorcerer King loses to Jaldabaoth? Does anyone have any ideas for the next best thing we can do if that comes to pass?”
He was answered by silence. Amidst all this, Remedios spoke up.
“In that case, how about calling Momon over?”
The three people other than Remedios looked at each other with severe expressions on their faces.
Remedios — who felt it was a good idea — frowned.
“What? Do you have any better ideas? It’s more proper than that damn undead, no?”
“…Captain. We are now discussing what to do if the Sorcerer King dies. In such a situation, expecting to go to the Sorcerous Kingdom to get more help would be very risky.”
“Not necessarily,” Siliaco said as he stroked his white moustache.
“A moment please, Vice Captain-dono. The Captain-dono’s idea is risky, but not a bad move. How about lying about the Sorcerer King being captured by Jaldabaoth and getting Momon to come over?”
“Priest-dono, that would be too dangerous. Even if Momon defeated Jaldabaoth, discovery of the lie could trigger a war. Even if all goes well, the Sorcerous Kingdom’s impression of our country will plunge to rock bottom. And if things go badly, Momon might very well become a second Jaldabaoth and lead the Sorcerous Kingdom’s undead army into our nation.”
“Precisely, you two. And the worst thing is that the Sorcerous Kingdom will have a justified grievance against us.”
Remedios tilted her head at Caspond’s explanation.
“We’re not adjacent to the Sorcerous Kingdom, so that’s okay, right?”
“…Captain Custodio, please stop thinking of dangerous things. I don’t want to adopt any policies that will endanger us… that said, I don’t have any good ideas. How about you two?”
Siliaco and Gustav could not think of anything either.
The room was plunged into a brief silence.
Eventually, Caspond quietly spoke up.
“…For the time being, let’s each go back and think about it on our own. There’ll be no problems if the Sorcerer King can defeat Jaldabaoth.” Caspond clapped his hands together. “Then let’s talk about something else. What about the rations that the demihumans brought? Can we eat them normally? And if we can consume them, how long can they last?”
Normally, they would belong to the Sorcerer King since he had defeated the demihuman army, but he had already said that he would hand them over free of charge.
Gustav answered. He was in charge of sundry tasks like that.
“There seem to be a lot of hardened bread-like objects and vegetables that we should be able to eat. Thanks to the attack of the Sorcerer King’s undead creatures, they were captured intact, so they are in very good condition. In addition, there are also some food items which need to be further investigated, such as sour-smelling vegetables and so on.”
Preserved food was very common in the Holy Kingdom. However, these were demihuman rations, so they might belong to a species which ate rotting food, which was why Gustav said they had to investigate further.