As he fervently made excuses for his behavior, Ainz began thinking about the next problem:
Who would he take with him?
Ainz folded his arms with a puzzled look on his face.
While he would like nothing more than to have Albedo or Demiurge around, they had more important things to do and they were also project leaders. If he brought either of them along, then problems would crop up in their affairs.
Aura and Mare were very good choices, especially because they were humanoids like the Dwarves. Thus, their counterparts would not be too wary of them.
Cocytus would be tricky. Granted, he was a good pick for visiting a cold and mountainous region, but he was now in charge of the Great Forest of Tob, which also made him a project leader of sorts. Ainz hoped that he could focus his energies on that task. In addition, his unusual appearance — combined with that of Ainz — would probably make the other party unnecessarily nervous.
Sebas was a good choice too.
He was currently providing administrative support in E-Rantel, with Tsuareninya as his assistant. It should be fine to bring him out with Pandora’s Actor around, but Ainz had some doubts about.his fighting ability.
Gargantua and Victim were out of the question, of course. The images of several other NPCs loomed up in Ainz’s mind, but most of them were not suitable to follow Ainz around as bodyguards.
If that’s the case, then it’ll have to be — Aura and Shalltear.
Aura — and the monsters she commanded— could be considered an ideal choice for the role of a tank. In the worst-case scenario, he could sacrifice her beasts and escape with Aura. And then there was Shalltear, the best one-on-one fighter. She could serve as a trump card against a strong foe. In addition, there was another reason why he wanted to use Shalltear.
He should have brought Mare along instead, considering that he might be facing an army. However, if they encountered a player, their priority would be to retreat and not exterminating the enemy. Thus, he would leave Mare behind this time around.
“If that’s the case…”
Just as Ainz was about to make a move, the sound of a [Message] rang within his head.
『Ainz-sama.』
“Oh, it’s Entoma.”
『Yes. I am currently traveling with Shalltear-sama and we have reached the village of the Lizardmen. Cocytus-sama wishes to send over a Lizardman with a report concerning the village’s status and seeks your permission to open a [Gate]. What should be done, Ainz-sama?』
Cocytus would occasionally send over reports on the village which he was tasked to run.
Ainz did not really know how well Cocytus had done, so typically he would give these reports a quick once-over and reply with a “Good job.” There were times that he wanted to say, “You don’t have to do this anymore”, but reporting to one’s superiors was the proper attitude to have, and in turn, he had to fulfil his responsibilities as Cocytus’ superior.
“Then open the [Gate] at the usual place… ah, no, the defensive spell should still be active. Wait an hour before…”
Ainz took out a schedule sheet and made sure of the time.
“Cast the spell at 13:46. I will lower the defenses for about two minutes at that time.”
While this building was not Nazarick, it was still shrouded in magical fields which impeded teleportation and the like, powered by the MP of high-level vassals. These fields were strong enough to impede fairly high-tier spells, but they drained the vassals to the point where he had to rotate them out several times a day. In addition, they also impeded friendly teleportation.
This was because of the friendly fire effect, which did not exist in YGGDRASIL.
Thus, there were occasions when he needed to briefly disable the defense grid to permit direct teleportation to this place. Of course, lowering the defenses meant that enemies could teleport in as well. In order to keep them from being hit by an “explosion” — as they called it in YGGDRASIL — Ainz decided to limit these brief openings to predetermined periods.
『Understood. I shall relay your message to Shalltear-sama.』
Ainz replied, “Good” before cutting off the [Message] and rising to his feet.
“…I’ll leave the choice of my clothing to you. A Lizardman is coming as an emissary of Cocytus. Pick something which won’t embarrass me.”
“Yes, sir!”
A fire blazed in Decrement’s eyes.
Her too? Ainz thought, but he did not give voice to those words. A man with no confidence in his sense of style could not say such things.
With Decrement in tow, Ainz walked while giving orders to an undead being he had created on the fly. Said orders were to inform the undead guarding the great hall of this manor about the arrival of a Lizardman via [Gate].
As he watched it disappear into the distance, Ainz contemplated the effective use of the undead which he had created.
If Ainz’s undead could report to him, then he could place them all over the world and create an undead intelligence network. Unfortunately, that would be very difficult to accomplish. Even if Ainz gave a command, the undead could only give vague responses. In addition, it was very hard for Ainz to manage the massive increase in the number of undead which he had created. There was always the risk that he might slip up and give an order to a completely unrelated undead minion by accident.
In the future, he might be able to set up some sort of system to address this problem, but that was impossible given the present circumstances.
Perhaps I could let Pandora’s Actor handle that sort of thing in my place. But then I’d have to deal with the problem of all the undead he made freezing up when he’s not in my form.
He would have to consider the matter in earnest after seeking the opinions of Albedo and Demiurge. While pondering this problem, Ainz reached his changing room.
As usual, the two lines of maids greeted him with eyes aglitter. In particular, Decrement’s eyes — as Ainz’s duty maid — were practically bloodshot.
Ainz permitted the maids to help him change while asking about Aura’s location.
Today, he would wear something in pure white.
It seemed too flashy for someone like Ainz, who was used to wearing dark browns.
On top of that, the maids adorned him with a gigantic necklace made of gold and other metals. It made him worry that the magpies would try to steal it on account of its shininess.
But the part of the outfit that made the least sense was the feathers which protruded from his back.
Am I a peacock or something? Ainz wanted to say, but when he glanced around, he saw a shared look of pride and satisfaction on all the maids’ faces. None of them looked worried, or had any expressions that could be considered anywhere close to negative. All of them had the same look of nervous awe on their faces, their cheeks tinged pink.
They were like a bunch of fangirls standing before a beloved idol.
Is this really all right? Is this really so attractive to ladies?…Looks like I have no fashion sense, after all.
As Ainz waxed melancholy within his soul, the maids finished dressing him up.
From the mirror, he noticed that there were feathers sprouting from under his arm, which made Ainz think of a monster from YGGDRASIL.
Was it an Archaeopteryx or something… I think they were pet dinosaurs for druids.
They ruffled when he folded his arms in front of himself, which was quite annoying.
But what would they say if he told them, “this outfit won’t do”? They would reply with something along the lines of “How is this unsuitable? Please tell us what clothes we should pick in future.”