WeTried Translations

Translator: Hydrogen B

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◈ Omniscient First-Person's Viewpoint

Chapter 548

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Together with the Evil God

Another weird thing crawling out now? An evil god? As far as I'm concerned, the Celestial God is the evil god.

What even is an evil god? There's no way something like that could actually exist. How does a demon that feeds on the wickedness in human hearts come to be? Chicken or egg is a fine debate topic, but human or demon first has no real controversy. Demons are created things.

I asked the regressor.

"Mr. Shei. What's an evil god?"

"They're demons. Incarnations of sin that the First Holy Maiden sealed away in the ancient past. They were all destroyed before the current era began, but their remnants remain."

"Why is something like that suddenly showing up? Weren't we supposed to be stopping the King of Sin?"

"The evil gods are where it all starts. You could say they're what gave rise to the very concept of sin."

A story I'd never heard before in my life. If it was that important a concept, it should have surfaced in someone's thoughts by now. At this point, I genuinely had no idea what was going on. I was starting to wonder if I was being messed with.

"I don't know all the details myself, but recently the priests of the evil gods have been running rampant through the Kingdom of Ten Thousand. Word has it that an entire village was offered up as a sacrifice, and those who've lost their kin are wandering from place to place. Many of those wanderers have been drifting into this Mortal Village."

"That's a useful lead. Any chance we could meet them?"

"Of course. Let me make introductions. Guard!"

"Yes, ma'am!"

When Callis called out, a boy wearing a large bone earring came running over immediately and snapped to attention. Callis issued orders to him with the ease of someone who had never truly left the military state behind.

"Is the Skull Tribe still staying in the shelter?"

"Yes, ma'am!"

"Please show these guests to the Skull Tribe. Tell them they come at my introduction. I'll finish up with the distribution and follow right away."

"Yes, ma'am!"

The barbarian boy awkwardly imitated the military state's formal procedure as he approached us. Without a military uniform, a barbarian aping the motions could only come across as stiff, but the boy seemed strangely taken with the whole thing.

"Right this way! Follow me, please!"

He led us with tremendous enthusiasm.

It was an experience hard to put into words. The Skull Tribe were a people who wore the skulls of beasts over their own heads, and thanks to the custom requiring each member to hunt a larger beast to fit their growing head, they had gradually evolved toward having smaller heads. Their heads were even smaller than the regressor's. Wearing inverted deer skulls, they spoke in resonant voices.

The earth had split open, they said, and the evil god had crawled out. The priests of the evil god had offered several other tribes up as sacrifices.

It was all so long-winded that practically none of it was useful. The one piece of information worth anything was a rough location where the Skull Tribe had spotted the evil god. Having poured out everything they knew, the Skull Tribe made their appeal to us.

"What of the immortals? The immortals who should protect the people of the Kingdom of Ten Thousand with their undying strength, why won't they help us?!"

"The Kingdom of Ten Thousand fell a good while ago, you know."

"What? The Kingdom fell? Lions eating grass! We're right here, living proof!"

"Is news just about a thousand years late reaching here, or are you the romantic sort who believes a nation persists as long as its people do?"

The Kingdom of Ten Thousand had been born as a loose gathering of barbarian tribes from the start.

Its government had a fairly organized structure of rule, not unlike the Kingdom or the Empire, but most of the barbarian tribes took the Warrior as something closer to legend or folk belief. Paradoxically, that was exactly what had allowed the Warrior to reign, the barbarian tribes living in the jungle and the plains couldn't be governed through civilization.

Perhaps because of that, even now, long after the Kingdom of Ten Thousand had fallen, they didn't seem to feel the absence.

"How long do the immortals intend to sit back and watch! If the mortals die off one by one, there'll be nothing left in the Kingdom but immortals!"

"Now then. That's a rather high-handed tone for someone who came here asking for help. Do calm yourselves."

Rashy gave a surprisingly firm answer. The deer skull of the Skull Tribe clacked its jaws shut, and Rashy shrugged and continued.

"We've also been keeping an eye on things to some extent. As you say, if the evil gods have appeared, are we not next in line? However, we too must seek permission from our patron deity. We can't move carelessly until the next offering ceremony."

"Patron deity..."

At the mention of a god, the Skull Tribe could not speak so freely either. Unlike their own gods, who existed only in tradition and faith, the immortals' god was real.

"That great spirit said to have passed the power of immortality to the soil-kin tribe... is it still sending its voice to the immortals?"

"Of course. That is precisely why we are still immortals, isn't it?"

With divine permission required, no one could push any further. The Skull Tribe bowed their heads and fell into despair.

"That said, there's no reason the help has to come from us, is there?"

"...You have someone who can help?"

"Right here. These are visitors who've come from beyond the plains out there. From what I hear, they're working to stop the world's destruction or some such. I don't know much about it myself, but these ones could help you!"

The Skull Tribe looked us up and down and nodded slowly.

"Visitors from afar? I did think they looked too slight to be the sturdy immortals I'd heard about."

"Hahaha! They may not look like much, but their skill is the real thing! Misjudge them and you'll regret it!"

"...Hmm."

No matter what was said, prejudice proved hard to shake. The Skull Tribe looked back and forth between me and the regressor with visible skepticism.

"They look like they'd struggle to break a branch. I wonder what they could possibly do against the priests of the evil gods..."

Clang, clang, clang!

That was when it happened. A great ringing of bells came one after another. People flinched instinctively, then scrambled outside to figure out what was going on.

"What's happening!"

"A raid!"

Callis's sharp voice rang out. Right after that, barbarians in metal armor began rushing all at once toward the palisade.

In the chaos, someone pointed up into the trees and shouted.

"It's those monkey people!"

The Mortal Village had a tall, sturdy palisade, but no matter how tall it stood, it couldn't match the ancient trees that had spent nearly a thousand years greedily drinking in the earth's vitality. Hundreds, even thousands of trees stretched their branches out, creeping over the top of the fence.

And perched among them were a handful of barbarians in monkey masks, watching from above. From beneath the masks came an irritating laugh.

"Ki ki ki. Everyone burying their heads in the sand like ostriches. I wonder how long they think the immortals will keep looking after them?"

A monkey mask raised one hand. The roughly twenty "monkeys" hanging from the branches chittered with animal sounds and began creeping slowly up the trees.

I glanced at Rashy and asked.

"Monkeys? What are those?"

"People who command jungle monkeys! Insufferable thieves with sticky fingers!"

"What do they want?"

"A thief only comes for one reason! Thieving!"

"What kind of thieving...?"

Before I could dig any further, the monkey masks showed us themselves. They swung over the palisade on vines and scattered nimbly to every corner of the Mortal Village. While the people screamed and fled, the monkey masks roved everywhere on their long arms and legs and shouted.

"Grab the young and fresh ones! The great spirit favors pure souls!"

"They're after people!"

The moment he said it, Rashy kicked off the ground and ran. At the edge of his sight was a monkey mask trying to tear a child from a woman's arms.

"You dare come here?!"

Rashy threw a massive fist. For such a large frame, it was a strikingly fast blow. The monkey mask caught the approach the instant it registered and flipped backward to dodge. Rashy kept hurling fists like cannonballs, but with bizarrely long limbs the figure bounced and hopped and let every blow slide off.

"There's an immortal here!"

"Ki ki ki. He's slow! Ignore him and get the child!"

The same scene was playing out all over the Mortal Village. Callis and the vigilante group she commanded led a line that pushed the monkey masks back, but that only reduced the damage, it didn't stop them. The monkey masks laughed at the vigilantes and tore through the village regardless.

The regressor watched the whole mess unfold and muttered.

"Good timing."

"Is this the Holy Maiden's blessing too?"

"Seems like this one came out well. An incident, right on schedule."

"At this point it almost feels like something knows our path and is stirring up trouble as we go. Are you sure it's a blessing and not a curse?"

"It's something we can fix. That's much better."

Just then, a shadow rose up behind us. A monkey mask had closed in with a stealth and swiftness beyond most wild animals, and shot out a long arm to snatch the regressor around the waist.

"Ki ki ki! There's another funny-looking little one here! Gotta grab..."

"Who are you calling little?!"

Heavenly Mirror, Thunderclap.

Skywarbler blazed out like lightning. The arm reaching for the regressor was severed whole, spraying a fountain of blood. The barbarian in the monkey mask screamed at the sight of her prized long arm cut cleanly in half.

"Kieeeeeek!"

That shriek of pain made the monkey masks freeze their rampage and look over. The armless one clutched the bleeding stump and kept screaming.

"Ukkit! What?! What happened?!"

"Wrong target."

The regressor stretched Skywarbler out long and scanned the area.

Rooftops, behind walls, the middle of the road, near the palisade. She pinpointed every monkey mask in a single instant, drew a sharp breath, and cut through all of them in one slash. The invisible arc of the blade carved itself into the roof, the walls, the road, the palisade, and a slash of wind tore through the monkey masks.

The monkey masks flew backward coughing blood in the gust. Those who saw their companions fall went pale with fear and screamed like animals.

"Kieeeek! Wind! They're using a wind spirit!"

"Run! Run! Kieeeek!"

"Too late."

With things already having gone this far, there was no reason to leave them alive. I'd already read their thoughts anyway. Keep a few for information, kill the rest, that was all there was to it.

That said, there wasn't any strict need to kill them all. Before the regressor could finish off the intruders, I stopped her.

"Hold on."

I reached for the regressor's shoulder. The moment I did, the world blinked out and flipped upside down. The instant my hand made contact, the regressor's body slipped beneath me like a ghost and threw me in one clean motion.

I was past used to it, thoroughly sick of it, really. The Heavenly Mirror again. Could this energy of hers not tell friend from foe? I hit the ground back-first, and the regressor was hovering above me with Skywarbler reversed in hand, half a breath from driving it into me.

'Oh, the Heavenly Mirror!'

Getting stabbed in the chest doesn't kill me anymore, so I'd been keeping my guard loose, and the regressor had already reacted to that. Right before my back hit the ground she yanked me up with a sharp grip and pulled Skywarbler urgently back behind her.

The sudden reversal sent us rolling across the ground in a tangled heap.

"Don't touch me without warning! I nearly cut you!"

"How am I supposed to stop someone who unconsciously tries to cut people without actually touching them?"

"Why were you trying to stop me?"

The regressor pushed herself up and spotted the monkey masks fleeing through the tree branches. Pursuit was possible, but the jungle was thick and dark. Tracking monkey masks one by one as they scattered through the canopy wasn't worth the effort.

"If you hadn't stopped me, those things would all be dead right here!"

"Because you didn't kill them, we can find out where their base is."

"What?"

"The ones who got thrashed badly will go back to their base, won't they? If we follow them, we can find out where it is without lifting a finger."

We could grab one and dig it out, or I could read minds. But there was no point taking the long way around. The regressor thought for a moment and answered.

"Is that right...? That's actually right. Not bad."

"It's simple enough. You have the Holy Maiden's blessing and this didn't occur to you?"

"You thought of it. That's all that matters."

Grumbling, the regressor got to her feet and looked around at the Mortal Village now that the commotion had passed. Despite the sudden attack, the villagers seemed accustomed to this sort of thing. Out here in this brutal stretch of the Wildlands, a raid was just another ordinary day.

Rashy came dragging a monkey mask's corpse and shook his head.

"Those monkey people had the nerve to come into our territory? Good grief. If they'd just come and asked, I'd have set out a meal for them..."

Callis answered his mutter.

"Strictly speaking, this isn't immortal territory. The Mortal Village is only a place where wandering mortals stay. They can't survive without the immortals' 'consideration.' And when someone attacks like this, if the Mortal Village can't overcome it on its own strength, they'll remain dependent forever."

Callis gave that cold assessment, then turned to give instructions to the vigilante members lined up before her. Armed in their own way with armor and spears, the Mortal Village vigilantes spread out to take stock of casualties.

As they did, a vigilante who had gone to a sobbing woman called out.

"A child is missing!"

For the woman, the child was everything. But for the Mortal Village, the child was one among many. In a raid of this scale, losing only one child was actually holding up remarkably well.

"...Regrettable, but nothing to be done. You can't chase monkeys through the jungle."

The woman's heart had no place in that calculation, though. Callis made the rational call, just as an arcane officer of the military state would. The barbarians of the Mortal Village, without showing much of it, agreed inwardly with her judgment.

Of course, we had no need to follow Callis's judgment.

"We'll bring them back."

After all, they'd been considerate enough to only take the one.

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