For reasons beyond Balig’s comprehension, the Orcs insisted on running to their next target. Certainly, tiring yourself out before a battle, just to arrive at your doom a little quicker, seemed like a perfectly rational decision. Maybe he was just bitter about having to run along with them.
“Do you need someone to carry you?” Vyra grinned.
He had no wind to speak with, but he did his best to communicate a strong refusal with his eyes.
The Orc Lady smiled wider. “Fine. This should help you stay on your feet.”
A cooling feeling passed through his burning muscles and lungs. It felt like a refreshing wind had rushed through him, and when it came out the other side, he was completely revitalized.
“What did you do?!”
Balig had never experienced it before, but the results were similar to what he knew about healing magic. Healing spells, of course, belonged solely to the Holy attribute.
“I healed you, obviously.”
Maybe she was in possession of some kind of Magic Tool that contained the
No matter how hard he thought about it, the answers wouldn't come, so he stopped thinking about it.
Soon, they arrived at the next village, and the young Dwarf saw with his own eyes a reenactment of the events in the previous village. Could it have been simultaneous casting, or something much worse? The enemies who refused to yield all fell to the wrath of the earth. The emotion in Balig’s eyes when he looked at Vyra was much different from how it had been a moment prior.
The Monster who rescued me is the Orc Lord, isn't she?
He could conceive no other kind of Orc that could wipe out a Fomor village almost singlehandedly.
***
Village number three went down without any problems. I wasn't daring to hope this earlier, but could it be they're out of soldiers? They did send a lot of troops to fight the Expansionist Orcs, only to get wiped out. Perhaps all the villages are unguarded?
I shouldn't get cocky. Even if there are no soldiers left, I should still plan for a Small Baphomet or two to appear. It would be terrible if I didn't plan for it and it happened.
Anyway, we had to wait a little for the guys with the wagons to show up. Now, with all the corpses loaded, we can head home with the latest batch of slaves. There are twenty eight of them in total now, including the two that couldn't be brainwashed and the ones at the city.
On the way back, I struck up some idle chatter.
“So, if Fomors are herbivores, what’s the purpose of having such strong bodies?”
“Master, do you know the story that Fomors are descended from True Demons?”
“I think I heard that before, yeah.”
“Originally, we ate meat. One of the clans decided that they didn't want to eat meat anymore, and the Lord of Darkness who created them, Lord Baythes, got upset. They were exiled and made to degenerate into Monsters.”
“So you're actually just vegetarians,” I muttered. “If you started eating meat again, would you go back to being True Demons?”
“Even though we tried eating disgusting meat for a while, it didn't work. That's why we created the summer tribute.”
“By the way, what exactly goes on during the summer tribute?”
“That would be,” the slave pondered, then shook her shaggy head. “Sorry. I don't understand what the priests do.”
Balig can't understand what we’re talking about, since we’re speaking in the Fomor language, but he’s been glaring at me for a while. “It's weird that you're acting all friendly with them after killing their families and enslaving them,” the Dwarf muttered.
Is it weird? Now that I've brainwashed them, they're allies.
“Well, could it be you’re feeling lonely, Balig? That’s fine. I had a few questions for you anyway.”
“Of course you do,” he sighed.
“First, and this might be my own misconception, I thought Dwarves had great beards. Was that wrong?”
“Th-that’s your first question?”
“Yeah.” For a person like me, who used to live on Earth, it’s natural to imagine Dwarves as having long beards. I don't think it’s a strange question.
“Well, only a few Dwarves can grow a beard before twenty five,” he answered reluctantly. “I'm still too young. Besides, I'm a craftsman. Only dignitaries and merchants grow out their beards. Warriors and craftsman will keep them trimmed so they don't get in the way. Well, I guess there are only older Dwarves leaving the mountains, so the ones other races see mostly all have beards.”
Eh? Interesting. But this guy’s a craftsman, huh? I got lucky.
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“So what kind of craftsman are you?”
Balig rubbed his chin. “Well, I was in school to be a jeweler, so I also know a bit about metallurgy, gemology, and smithing.”
“Oh! A gemologist and a jeweler, huh? I used to be a lapidary, you know?” Mm. Our professions have something in common. I feel closer to this guy somehow.
“A-an Orc was a lapidary? When?”
Oops. I shouldn't let details of my old life slip out so easily.
“Don't worry about it.”
I can see the city wall now. Great, we’re almost home.
***
“What boring architecture.”
Oi. You're a rude Dwarf, aren't you?
Balig turned to me with an unhappy look on his face. “Do all the buildings have to be identical? And what’s with the flat stone? Weren't you a lapidary?”
“So I'm supposed to singlehandedly create unique housing for three hundred people?” We’re still a little shy of that, but the slaves are big and take up a lot of space. “People have to sleep outside until I finish, you know? They can always be decorated later.”
Saying so, I begin to focus my magic power into
I lead Balig over to Fiara. Maybe she can borrow him to help research for a little while.
“Hey, Fiara. You look terrible.”
Her eyes are bloodshot from repeatedly resisting the urge to blink. There are dark circles under her eyes even though she shouldn't have missed that much sleep. Her long brown hair, which reaches to her shoulder blades, is tangled into knots. The two High Orcs she dragged in as assistants look ready to have their souls fly out of their bodies.
“Not at all, chief! I feel wonderful!” the knowledge maniac cried out happily.
Well, yeah. I guess, for Fiara, being bored is as painful as being hungry is to Orcs. I’ve thought about her situation a bit, and I've determined that it’s wrong to say things like “she used to be an Indigo.” Because, of the four aspects of sapient beings, Mind is the one that makes up the person. Sure, her Soul used to inhabit an Indigo body, and her Body is currently that of a Wisdom Orc, but Fiara is what’s inside her Mind. I think that’s probably something that goes beyond race.
Well, but that’s just a long way of saying Fiara is Fiara.
It’s a little weird, but, following that same logic, I have the Mind of a Human. You could even say that I'm not an Orc at all, but a Human, because my Mind is that of a Human. It’s an issue of identity versus classification. People see that my classification is Orc, so they might treat me like an Orc. But my identity is closer to Human, so I might act like a Human.
Syntactically, my race is Dominance Orc, and I am Human.
“Um, chief? Who is this?”
“Oh, sorry. I zoned out for a minute. This is Balig. He’s a Dwarf I saved from the Fomors. He’s a jeweler, and he knows some things about gemology, metallurgy and smithing. I'll need him for other things later, but maybe he can help you with some of your magic core research.”
Fiara’s eyes grew wide and she clapped her hands together. “You found someone with skill this time, chief! I will make good use of him.”
“That’s great. He can speak the Human language, but would you rather learn Dwarvish?”
“I want to learn!” she leaned in, eyes sparkling.
… It was a stupid question, huh?
I quickly taught Fiara how a few words translated to Dwarvish, and I used them in a sentence, and that was enough. Controlled teaching is better than blind exposure when it comes to learning new languages. It’s not like we need to be able to do it even faster, but it is even more convenient.
“Hello, Balig. My name is Fiara. It’s a pleasure to meet you,” Fiara announced in polite Dwarvish.
“Hey, what the hell? How can you people learn a new language so fast?”
“I can tell you, but you won't be allowed to leave this city. Is that still fine?” Actually, I don't think I would let him go even if he didn't know. He’s already seen too much, and the value of his skill and knowledge is much too high.
“Where would I even leave to? I won't be going back to Dwarven territory for,” he hesitated, “personal reasons. Even if I wanted to leave, this is the Black Mountain Forest, right? I know by now that a craftsman like me can only be captured or killed in a place like this.”
“Hoh? So I can add you to my citizen’s registry is what you're saying.”
“A what, chief?”
Quiet, Fiara. I'm trying to look cool.
“Well, whatever. Welcome to my city, Balig.”
The Dwarf gave a serious nod. “Incidentally, what is this city called?”
The name of the city? I haven't thought of one yet. Going by Orcish naming sense, it would be. Vyra’s City, right? ... Thank you spirits for choosing my name. If Orcs had chosen it…
“Hmm, the city’s name,” I scratched my head under my Demonic wolf hat.
Umm… since we speak many languages, would that be fine? Maybe it’s an unlucky name, but… Ah, screw it.
“This shall be the city of Babylon,” I answered confidently.
“Babylon,” Balig murmured. “Is there a meaning behind that name?”
“You could say it means something like “to build ambitiously”.” I fudged it a bit, but the real meaning of the word comes from the Hebrew language in my old world. It hardly matters here if my explanation is accurate.
“Hmm. Not a bad name for a new city, then.”
I smiled and looked back at Fiara. “So, how goes the research?”
Fiara glanced at Balig, then back to me. She spoke in Dwarvish, “Actually, chief, I did want to test a hypothesis before sharing my results. I was going to give up on it since it needed a non-monster to test on. But,” her gaze turned to the Dwarf again and she trailed off.
He folded his arms, “What kind of test?”
Fiara looked at me for approval. I answered her gaze in New Orcish.
“You may disclose the details to him. I will resolve to kill him if he shows any suspicious movements.”
It could be that Dwarves know more than Humans do about magic cores. But if they don't know, then this information will only make hunting us down more profitable. He can't be allowed to leave after knowing it.
Fiara explains the situation to Balig, who seems to be frozen from shock. He doesn't move at all, even if I wave my hand in front of his face. Well, more importantly,
“Fiara, could I borrow a few magic cores? I want to get the Fomors housing started tonight.”
“Mm. Here, chief.” Fiara tossed over a few magic cores. It was close to instinctual. Once I held them in my hand, absorbing the Magic Power inside was easy.
“Um, this is…” I looked at Fiara, struggling to put my perception into words. She nodded as if she knew exactly what I was thinking.
“The Magic Power you absorbed is yours, just like when you kill a Magic Beast. The Magic Power you took from the core will not recover with time, as it now belongs solely to you. I want to test on Balig to find out if this is always the case, or if it's because the Magic Power in the external core is simply transferring to the magic core inside our bodies.”
“Yeah, I get why you wanted a descendent. Incidentally, the reason those two behind you are so tired is?” I trailed off, and Fiara finished for me.
“Because I had them repeatedly put all their Magic Power into the cores and then extract it again. They also had to cast spells nonstop after absorbing the Magic Power in the cores, to forcibly drain it again.”
I stroked my chin with my hand. Well, it isn't like I didn't expect something like this.
“Hum… It’s fine for now, Fiara, but go a little easy on them, alright? Their stamina for this sort of thing is fundamentally different from yours. You’ll break them before long.”
Now then, what kind of house would be good for huge things like Fomors?