WE TRIED TLS
Is It Bad That the Main Character’s a Roleplayer
Chapter 254 | If (2)
> [Sir Kniiiiiight, look at this. The Warchief gave it to me.]
> [Have you even eaten? Your lifespan’s short enough already, so starving yourself like that will really make you keel over.]
Here’s the story of how I tried to escape reality by closing my eyes and ended up sleeping until nightfall.
> [Isn’t this so pretty? Hehe.]
> [You even took food with you, so why do you look half-dead?]
I briefly rubbed my temples to relieve the headache I’d gotten from oversleeping. Meanwhile, the Land Turtle’s comments, which made them sound like a grandparent, almost made me laugh. We hadn’t seen each other for just two days, but here they were calling me “half-dead” already.
“…Didn’t I specifically request we limit contact?”
That aside, why were they even here? I’d suggested only four days ago that they avoid coming here in person since the Mountain Lord, who usually never left its nest, would draw a lot of attention if it suddenly started wandering outside like this …
> [Ah, no need to worry. Everyone thinks I just caught a liking to wandering around after crossing the continent.]
…That’s what they thought?
Well, it did make some sense for someone who’d spent their whole life in this forest to suddenly realize how nice it was to move around and get some fresh air after a long trip outside. So it wasn’t all too surprising that the swamp priests misunderstood.
The problem was that, thanks to that, my reason for refusing the Mountain Lord’s visits had also completely vanished. I furrowed my eyebrows slightly.
> [Did you eat dinner?]
I’d skipped lunch and fallen asleep, so of course I hadn’t eaten… but only amateurs would honestly report that kind of thing.
“I was just about to eat.”
I lied without any hesitation. What was in the rations I’d received today again? My hand was already reaching into the Inventory to rummage through it.
> [You’re planning to eat that during the day when you can’t even light a fire?]
However, that one comment from the Land Turtle brought my actions to an abrupt halt.
A chill ran down my spine.
> [It’s cloudy today, so it should be fine.]
By the way, to understand that comment, we’d have to go back to the afternoon two days ago.
I’d been eating preserved food at the time, and the Land Turtle had asked me, “Why don’t you just cook it?”
But who the hell would just say, “Because I can’t light a fire to cook”? My whole character setting aside, even my real self’s pride wouldn’t allow that.
So I racked my brain and came up with a convincing enough excuse: “If I make a fire during the day, the smoke might give me away.” It wasn’t a lie, strictly speaking, and it was a sound enough argument…
> [You said you like eating fish, right? That guy caught some for you.]
> [Hehehehehe.]
And this was the consequence. I was now in a truly desperate situation.
“…We can’t make a fire in an enclosed space.”
> [What are you talking about? Obviously, we should go outside to do it.]
“…”
Not, that’s… There were adventurers in this world who couldn’t light a fire, okay?
There were even some who couldn’t cook using a campfire, okay?
> [What’s the problem? Why are you acting like someone who doesn’t know how to cook?]
…Damn it!
“…”
> […?]
“…”
> […Wait. Are you serious?]
No, but hear me out. This wasn’t just my problem, alright? Sure, back in my world, I burned food sometimes, but I was still the type of person who knew to turn down the heat if something looked like it was burning!
B-but in this place? There was no way to control the heat! If it started burning, there was nothing I could do to adjust the flame.
In this situation, turning regular ingredients into charcoal was practically inevitable, okay? This absolutely wasn’t my fault. It was something that would give anyone trouble!
> [Whoa. Sir Knight, you can’t cook?]
> [Wow… That’s unexpected.]
However, my fierce and logical defense only rang inside my mind and reached neither of them. I felt so embarrassed.
> [How were you so confident in living on your own if you can’t even cook?]
“…”
> [Is this guy really going to starve to death out here?]
> [Oh, that absolutely won’t do. Should we send someone to stay with you?]
“…That won’t be necessary.”
No, I wasn’t that hopeless… I only had trouble with grilling, but boiling or simmering should be fine. If I just had some sort of bowl, I could manage. Hah.
I kept reasoning with myself until I realized the more I did, the more pathetic I sounded. It was just sad.
I mean, sure, I tended to slightly over- or under-season, and maybe misjudged the water a bit, and sometimes undercooked or over-boiled things, but at least I could produce something edible.
How dare they treat me like some pathetic cooking disaster? Like some clumsy greenhorn who’d starve to death the moment he was left alone?
> [Let me grow you a fruit tree or something for now.]
Fairly depressed about my obliterated pride, I gratefully accepted the newly grown fruit tree. Honestly, I had been slightly worried about what I’d eat once the rations ran out…
> [More importantly, have you gained anything useful from living out here?]
“…Not really.”
The topic the Land Turtle now switched to was also quite troubling to me.
I stayed here to find some sort of solution to my problem, but no matter how much I searched or thought, I couldn’t find a single way.
“I did try converting Demonic Energy into Arcane Power, just in case…”
If I poured out Demonic Energy recklessly, it seemed it’d convert into Arcane Power even if I didn’t want it to. However, transitioning from an unconscious to a deliberate control of that process had turned out to be an unbridgeable gap.
“I’m not even talking about the side effects. I can’t even grasp the method.”
Of course, along the way, I did pick up on how to concentrate my power to a single point or to manifest it externally, but that was about it. I really had no idea how the conversion worked whatsoever.
I couldn’t even get started, let alone worry about side effects.
> [Aww… Then maybe… sealing is really… the only answer? I-I’m not trying to discourage you or anything…]
“Hmm…”
However, even if I hadn’t found it yet, I was absolutely sure there was some way to suppress my Demonic Energy. At least, that’s what I believed.
“For now, I’ll just keep trying a bit more.”
I mean, if there weren’t any, how else could this body’s past movements, as documented in the stack of reports I’d received, have gone almost completely undetected?
* * *
WE TRIED TLS
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> [Where’s that certainty coming from?]
While the Mountain Lord left to create clusters of edible mushrooms, fruits, vegetables, and grains somewhere nearby to take care of my meals, the Land Turtle, who was left alone with me, asked me a question.
I couldn’t make sense of what it meant by that. Even as someone used to speaking curtly, that question felt rather abrupt.
> [You still believe there’s a way besides sealing, right?]
Fortunately, the Land Turtle seemed to realize that, since it hurriedly clarified. That’s when I came to understand what it meant.
“These records contain this body’s past movements before I came to inhabit it.”
Not needing to say anything further, I reached into my Inventory and carefully pulled out the stack of papers I’d kept in one corner of it.
> [About that body’s original owner?]
“Yes.”
I then pushed them before the Land Turtle’s eyes so that it could read them properly.
Could it even read this language? That question briefly crossed my mind the next moment.
> [These are the records? Huh. Technology’s really improved a lot… Not carved on stone or clay, but on this thin, fluttery stuff.]
“…It’s called paper. It’s expensive, so it’s not widely used yet.”
> [I see… Hmm, but Knight. There’s a bit of a problem.]
“What is it?”
> [I can’t read those letters.]
As expected, the Land Turtle shook its head and admitted to being illiterate. I sheepishly pulled the documents toward me again.
“It’s a record of this body’s original owner, but there’s nothing particularly noteworthy. Most of it is testimony that he was obsessed with hunting Demons and didn’t really interact with others.”
That much only covered five years. I gently traced a fingertip across the words, wondering if the records of before then had disappeared or something. However, I soon had to stop doing so as the paper’s surface was already starting to fray due to its poor quality.
“Still… He managed to enter and leave cities without any trouble.”
> [Hmm. So that’s why? You’re clinging to the hope there’s another way besides sealing because of that.]
“Yes.”
> [That’s something worth thinking about. How did that guy manage to hide it?]
Fortunately, the Land Turtle focused on the same thing as I did. If even it thought this was strange and worth looking into, there had to be something to it.
> [First, tell me more about what he did. That’s not everything, right? You said there’s a bunch of things recorded, right?]
“Hmm…”
His actions, huh? There was way too much in there to recite the whole thing, so I should just pick out a few key points. Which of these should I read out?
Should I read out the stuff that made me think, “Why did he do this?” Or the theories and speculations the author had added at the end?
“First, the records only span the past five years. And during that time, his appearance…”
> [His appearance?]
I paused mid-explanation and tried to think fast.
If I confessed that his appearance had changed and that I thought it was suspicious. → The turtle would question why I found it suspicious. → I’d have to admit that the new look was identical to the one I happened to design for my roleplay setting → This turtle had no idea what a game in that sense was, much less what roleplaying in one might mean. → Complete disaster!
Cold sweat trickled down my spine.
“…He started completely covered up, but he gradually changed out his equipment piece by piece. It feels like he was leaving out breadcrumbs to lure in a bird.”
> [That’s strange… Why would he do that?]
If I showed even a hint of panic here, I’d be doomed. I desperately tried to act calm, wearing the most thoughtful expression I could muster and gently stroking the fragile shell of social credibility I’d barely managed to save.
Seriously, if I had to live with that shame, I’d rather not live at all…
> [And?]
“He mainly hunted Demons and criminals, and he apparently collected all of their corpses afterward.”
> [What?]
“The person who compiled this information speculated that he might have had a corpse fetish or something…”
> [You idiot, they were obviously used for sacrificial rituals!]
“There was that theory as well.”
It was one that had faded after I began traveling with the Hero, but I kept that to myself.
> [You’re telling me he’d been taking bodies like that for five years?]
“More or less.”
> [Then it’s absolutely for offerings and sacrifices.]
There were things even the Information Guild couldn’t confirm, so this very much fell into the area of speculation. I’d acknowledged as much. The Land Turtle sighed.
> [Yeah. I always found it strange. Even for a Great Demon, pulling a soul from another dimension isn’t exactly easy… But I didn’t expect this kind of trick.]
“…Are you saying they brought me here by offering up the things they killed?”
> [There’s no other way they could’ve done it otherwise. Great Demons might be strong, but they aren’t omnipotent, you know?]
All of a sudden, the file in my hand felt as if it’d grown heavy with the stench of blood.
“…How many did they sacrifice?”
> [Who knows? It’s not like I’ve ever made sacrifices myself, so I can’t say… But if I had to guess, at least a few thousand? Breaking through dimensional barriers is damn tough.]
A few thousand at least… Well, if you were to add up all the events written in the records, that alone would account for over a thousand. By simple calculation, twenty a month for five years would already give you 1,200.
There were also times when he didn’t just kill twenty in a month. He killed at least twenty and at most a few hundred. If you accounted for his actions not recorded in these documents, the real number could be even greater.
So at least two thousand, and if he was a bit more daring, maybe three or four thousand.
And he wasn’t just killing people. He also hunted Demons…
I unconsciously clenched the papers in my hands. The thick stack crinkled and almost seemed about to tear under the pressure.
“…Do you think he used the Demons he caught as sacrifices as well?”
> [I don’t really know. But Demons are living beings too… If you wanted to use one as a sacrificial offering, there’s no reason you couldn’t. I mean, you, or rather, the thing inside of you, sacrificed their own kind back in that city just fine, right?]
“…?”
When I looked at it as if asking for more details, the Land Turtle just shrugged with its shell and explained.
It was a truth I had no way of knowing because no one had ever told me about it, because all of what had happened had been hidden behind the still-intact city walls, and because I hadn’t taken a single look inside the city when I fled.
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