DAR Vol. 7 Chapter 26 Part 1

Chapter 26 – Uncle Gry and the Sword Saint

The Adad Empire bordered the Kingdom of Nereus, where Roa and the others currently found themselves.

Beneath the emperor’s castle in the heart of the empire lay a passage known only to the imperial family and a select few of their closest retainers.

“Honestly, why must I be the one to do this…?”

A man grumbled. Two attendants followed closely behind him.

The underground passage was so narrow that two adults walking abreast would brush shoulders. Its ceiling was also low enough that a particularly tall man might scrape his head against it.

The passage was dim, and the scant illumination provided by the few magic tools installed along the walls was their only guide. Groundwater appeared to be seeping through the walls, leaving moss growing along their lower sections and the entire passage dank with moisture.

“I understand that no one is permitted to enter or leave without a member of the imperial family accompanying them, but forcing me to play errand boy…”

Despite voicing his displeasure, the man continued down the underground passage. He wore a neatly trimmed beard framing his face and garments of a deep yellow hue, the color signifying the imperial family of Adad.

Eventually, the passage came to a dead end, where they found themselves standing before a massive wooden door.

“Karakara! Are you in there?!”

The man shouted at the top of his lungs. Judging by his call, Karakara appeared to be someone’s name. After a brief silence, the wooden door slowly creaked open.

“…”

A small figure pushed the door open just wide enough to silently peer through the gap. He barely reached the men’s stomachs in height.

This was presumably Karakara. He stared up at the man suspiciously, as though silently asking what he wanted. He looked like a young boy, yet there was something strangely mature about his demeanor that made it difficult to dismiss him as merely a child.

“Karakara, make everything on this list within one week!”

Without waiting for a response, the man thrust out a sheet of paper. Karakara cautiously extended an arm through the gap and accepted it.

His arm was covered in fur.

It was not merely hairy. It looked nothing like a human arm and instead resembled an animal’s forelimb. Upon closer inspection, the edges of the face peering through the gap were also covered in soft, fluffy fur.

To describe his appearance exactly as it looked, he was wearing a costume.

Karakara appeared to be clad in a full-body bear cub costume. Only the facial area had been cut away to expose his human face, and the head even had a proper pair of bear ears.

Over the costume, he wore a crude tunic fashioned from a piece of cloth with a hole cut into it. Such an outfit would have appeared comical in the middle of town, but here in this underground passage, it merely made him look more unsettling.

“…”

Karakara silently accepted the paper and read it. He then reached beneath his tunic, pulled out a small black slate, and began writing on it with white chalk.

『One week is impossible.』

That was what he had written on the slate he held up for the man to see.

“Impossible?! Do not presume to talk back to me! Your only duty is to obey our commands!”

With that, the man turned on his heel without waiting for a response.

“Have everything ready by the deadline! I will not tolerate any delay! Is that understood?!”

The man delivered those final words as he strode away.

His pace was hurried, almost as though he were fleeing. Even the attendants following him appeared frightened as they hastened after him.

<…>

Karakara silently watched them leave, then released a long, quiet sigh.

<…How boring.>

Karakara murmured. It was a voice no human could hear.

<I don’t want to make something this boring. I can’t muster any enthusiasm for it. One week? I could finish it in half a day if I felt motivated, but I don’t want to…>

Muttering with profound disinterest, Karakara closed the door.

Beyond it lay an expansive chamber. Karakara leaned his back against the closed door and heaved another deep sigh.

<Incompetent, incompetent, incompetent! Put me to proper use! Several centuries have passed since my master died, yet not a single human capable of using me properly has appeared! This country is full of incompetents!>

He clenched the paper he had just received. It crumpled with a sharp rustle inside his fur-covered hand, collapsing into a tightly crushed ball.

<Master was wonderful. He pushed me to my absolute limit! He made full use of my abilities without wasting a single bit of them! All of Master’s marvelous ideas! It was my mission to bring them to fruition! I worked until I nearly died, producing results while trembling at the thought of being worked into the ground! Those were such fulfilling days!>

Karakara clasped his hands before his chest and gazed dreamily into the past. A seven-colored radiance no human could ever possess shimmered within his moist eyes.

Karakara…

He was a magic beast.

Although he looked like nothing more than a boy wearing a bear cub costume, he was actually a magic beast known as a fairy. Even the portions that resembled a costume were part of his body.

His species was called Gruagach. Gruagachs belonged to the same family as Brownies, household fairies that found joy in assisting humans.

Fairies were alchemical creatures created through alchemy.

Many had since escaped human control and gone feral, but they had originally been created by alchemists who wanted servants that would labor exactly as commanded.

That was precisely why Karakara was so particular about whom he accepted as his master.

He sought a master capable of drawing out every last measure of his abilities.

For the moment, he reluctantly served the Adad Empire’s imperial family because of their connection to his former master, but it was hardly what he desired. The moment he found a truly worthy master, he intended to cast those incompetents aside.

In the first place, Karakara had not formed a Familiar Contract with anyone in the Adad Empire. Although they called him Karakara, he himself had never acknowledged the name, so he had never entered into a contract with any of them.

Consequently, no one could hear his voice, and all communication had to be conducted in writing.

He obeyed the imperial family’s commands merely to pass the time until he found a master.

<I want to make something interesting…>

Karakara’s abilities were specialized entirely for craftsmanship.

He was a fairy alchemical artisan who assisted alchemists and created whatever they desired. With his vast reserves of mana, he excelled at crafting magic tools.

However, he was incapable of conceiving new ideas on his own. That was the inherent limitation of a being created as an alchemical creature.

Karakara was ultimately an alchemist’s tool, a being brought into existence to provide assistance. That was why he sought a capable master who could furnish him with all manner of ideas.

<I’ve already made everything in Master’s research tomes that can be reproduced…>

Since his master’s death, Karakara had continued creating everything within the research tomes that could feasibly be made. Those creations now formed the foundation of the Adad Empire’s prosperity, but Karakara himself remained dissatisfied.

Recently, he had attempted to recreate the concept behind a magic tool called a magic tube, which his master had left behind. However, the attempt had ended in failure.

The result was an imperfect magic tool.

Depending on how it was employed, it might still have some practical use, but the finished product fell far short of his ideal. He lacked the inventive faculty required for creation. He understood that much, but as an alchemical creature, he could do no more than recognize what he lacked. He could not conceive the inspiration necessary to overcome that deficiency.

Karakara desperately yearned for a new master who could supply whatever was missing within him.

<…This is so boring. Even though I have all these materials. Even though I have so many companions to help me. It’s boring.>

Karakara surveyed his surroundings.

He stood within an enormous hollow, a cavern so vast that its farthest reaches could not be seen.

Countless shelves filled the cavern as far as the eye could see. They towered so high that their uppermost reaches vanished from sight, and every one of them was packed tightly with materials.

Karakara was inside the Adad Great Dungeon, a colossal dungeon sprawling beneath the Adad Empire.

It was what remained of a research facility created by an alchemist of old, one that had also served as both a farm and a ranch for procuring materials.

This was the deepest level of that storied place.

Karakara was its current provisional master.

To reach this deepest level, one had either to traverse the Great Dungeon, where magic beasts roamed, or use the underground passage connected to the imperial castle that the original owner had once used and enter through the rear entrance.

That rear entrance was the very door against which Karakara now leaned. He had placed magical restrictions upon it so that no one but himself could pass through.

<This isn’t interesting…>

Karakara once again released a long, heavy sigh.

𑁋

Unaware of Karakara’s mutterings, the men who had just issued him his orders were retracing their steps through the underground passage.

“What a creepy fellow! He infuriates me!”

The man spat out the words. He had hurried away from the door where Karakara resided and had already put considerable distance between them. There was no longer any chance of Karakara overhearing him.

“Your Highness, you should not say such things. Karakara’s abilities have contributed greatly to the empire.”

One of his attendants admonished him. The man, the Second Prince, grimaced bitterly at the rebuke, but his expression soon relaxed into a smile.

“That fellow will soon outlive his usefulness! Once that happens, I will have him executed!”

“What?”

The attendant looked startled, evidently hearing this for the first time.

“My younger brother, the Third Prince, is already taking steps to acquire an alchemist who has appeared in the Kingdom of Perdu. I hear the alchemist is remarkably talented despite his youth. Once we have him, we will have no further need for that creepy fellow! I will make him pay for every act of insolence he has committed against us!”

The Second Prince did not know that Karakara was a magic beast or that he was the provisional master of the Adad Great Dungeon. Nor did he know that Karakara was merely an alchemical artisan rather than a true alchemist.

Karakara was so exceptionally skilled as an alchemical artisan that amateurs like them could not discern the difference.

Such a misunderstanding would have been inconceivable while Karakara’s master was still alive. However, as one generation of the imperial family succeeded another, information about Karakara became conflated with that of his former master, the alchemist, and was eventually passed down incorrectly.

Karakara himself had found correcting their misunderstanding too troublesome and had never bothered to deny it.

They were likewise unaware that the other side of that door led to the deepest level of the Adad Great Dungeon.

Karakara had never permitted anyone else to enter and had behaved as though nothing more than his private magic-tool workshop lay beyond it.

“He cannot even make magic potions! That makes him a second-rate alchemist, does it not? Once we obtain a replacement, there should be no problem with executing him.”

“…Karakara has created a great variety of magic tools. I have heard that the magic tube he recently produced could even become the primary armament of a warship… His skill in crafting magic tools is first-rate. I do not believe there is any need to execute him…”

“That contraption is useless without a mage to operate it! I have decided. He will be executed!”

The Second Prince declared with an indignant snort.

“While we are at it, we shall also teach my foolish younger brother, the Third Prince, and those ex-pirates of Nereus, our sworn enemies, a painful lesson!”

The Second Prince grinned. It seemed that another scheme, separate from the seizure of the alchemist, was already taking shape within his mind.

At present, he could not even begin to foresee what consequences that scheme would bring about.

𑁋

The royal capital of the Kingdom of Nereus was overflowing with jubilation. Its residents were surging toward the coast, each striving to arrive before the others.

At the center of the celebration stood Roa and the members of the adventurer party Nostalgia. Showered with praise by the enormous crowd, they all wore smiles despite their embarrassment.

This public celebration honoring Roa and the others marked the successful completion of a subjugation request upon which the fate of the royal capital had depended.

Roa had arrived in the royal capital of the Kingdom of Nereus only a few days earlier.

Yet his accomplishments had already led the residents to embrace him as though he were one of their own. Since he had protected their city, they presumably regarded him as a comrade now. The people of Nereus possessed that sort of straightforward disposition.

Roa normally had such a low opinion of himself that this manner of praise would have left him bewildered. This time, however, he seemed conscious of how much he had contributed during the battle and accepted their acclaim without reservation. Every time Roa smiled, the twin magic wolves Roo and Phi bounded happily around his feet.

It was a heartwarming sight.

As he watched, Kristoff, Nostalgia’s scout and swordsman, smiled with satisfaction.

He had contributed to the battle himself, but more than anything, he was delighted to see Roa acknowledging his own accomplishments.

The request had felt almost like an ambush sprung upon them by the queen of his homeland, the Kingdom of Nereus. Even so, Kristoff now felt deeply grateful that they had accepted it.

Indeed, the subjugation had been commissioned by Scarlet, the Queen of Nereus.

What had begun as harassment by the neighboring Adad Empire had ultimately resulted in a vast horde of magic beasts advancing upon the kingdom. Since circumstances made it difficult to mobilize Nereus’s national army, the queen had entrusted the subjugation to Roa and Nostalgia.

Behind Roa and the others, the enormous head of a magic beast had been placed on display as proof of their victory.

It belonged to a Lesser Leviathan, an upper species of the colossal sea serpent known as the Sea Serpent.

Nor was that all. Numerous Sea Serpent carcasses had been arranged along the beach where Roa and the others stood. They were the spoils of the recent subjugation.

Had these magic beasts reached the royal capital, even its formidable defenses would not have allowed it to escape unscathed.

Kristoff felt proud that they had protected their homeland.

However…

Naturally, Roa and the members of Nostalgia could not have defeated so many enormous sea-dwelling magic beasts by themselves. They had received assistance from many others.

Kristoff surveyed the area, but none of those collaborators were present.

Captain Sabas and his crew had likely made the greatest contribution. A ship was indispensable when battling magic beasts at sea. Without their aid, Roa and the others would never even have been able to fight.

Yet Captain Sabas and his men were nowhere to be seen. Though their pirate ship also served as a trading vessel, they were still pirates. Deciding that they were unsuited to such a public occasion, they had declined to participate. By now, they were probably raising celebratory drinks at some harbor or on a pirate island.

Prince Karlheinz, who had protected Roa both openly and from the shadows, was absent as well. Despite being a prince, he also served as one of the queen’s covert agents. Unable to stand openly upon such a public stage, he too had declined.

The final collaborator, Sword Saint Gelt, was likewise missing.

Although he had retired from public life, he was a former Marquis and remained the active Sword Saint. His presence would have lent more than enough distinction to an occasion such as this.

Kristoff had therefore assumed Gelt would participate, but at some point, the man had disappeared. He had vanished so completely that it was almost as though he had never been there at all.

Even before then, the Sword Saint had been behaving strangely. Something appeared to be weighing heavily upon him, and Kristoff had found himself concerned.

No matter whom he asked, no one knew where the Sword Saint had gone.

…Where could he have gone? Perhaps he was watching from somewhere nearby.

Kristoff swept his gaze across the surroundings.

However, Gelt was nowhere to be seen.

“Is something wrong?”

Noticing Kristoff repeatedly glancing around, Roa called out to him.

“No… Come to think of it, Uncle Gry isn’t here either, is he?”

Kristoff hesitated over whether to mention the Sword Saint, then remembered that another individual who should have been present was also missing.

“Uncle Gry? He said he didn’t want to become a spectacle and went off somewhere. Honestly, he’s so selfish.”

Roa spoke with a pout. He had presumably wanted Uncle Gry to celebrate his achievements alongside him. Instead, Uncle Gry had prioritized his own mood, leaving Roa dissatisfied.

“Well, I’m sure he’s watching from somewhere.”

There was no possibility that the Gryphon who doted so excessively upon Roa would miss seeing the brat showered with praise. Kristoff gave Roa a wry smile.

“I suppose that would be all right…”

Roa still appeared unconvinced. However, the excited residents soon began speaking to him, leaving him no opportunity to continue worrying about Uncle Gry.

As Roa disappeared into the crowd, surrounded by smiling residents, Kristoff’s own smile broadened.

𑁋

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