五月丁香五月丁香激情

"Oto-san, what’s wrong?"

Kuina the Celestial Fox tilted her head and asked me that question. There were some mayonnaise at the corner of mouth as she did so and it was so cute.

Aura took a liking to the handmade mayonnaise I prepared back then to kill some time and had since become a staple on our dining table.

I don’t even know why I made the mayonnaise but it felt as though the world itself was compelling me to do so.

"Before that, Kuina, you have some mayonnaise on the corner of your mouth."

"Oto-san, wipe it off."

She then purposely stood up and walked over to me while merrily shaking her fox tail.

Even though it would have been much faster if she did it herself, I thought as I smiled a little.

"There."

"Thanks, Oto-san"

When I wiped the mayonnaise off of her with my hand and then licked it, Kuina smiled.

"Buu."

When I turned my eyes to the front, I caught sight of Rorono. I then noticed the thick patch of mayonnaise on her mouth and her unmoving gaze on me.

Yeah, I know what she’s up to.

To tell the truth, the most spoiled kid wasn’t Kuina but rather Rorono.

Add in that she was too shy to say anything and it was just too cute.

Nonetheless, it had to be done, I thought, as I decided to wipe the patch of mayonnaise. Before I could though...

"Rorono-chan, that’s poor manners."

The blond and stylish Aura hugged Rorono from behind and then wiped off the mayonnaise with a piece of cloth.

At that, Rorono made a complicated face. When I looked at Aura’s facial expression, I was confident that was her desired result. She occasionally did this sort of mischievous things to enjoy the various faces Rorono made in response.

"Rorono, there’s still some left."

"Mhm, thanks, master."

I wiped off the mayonnaise that Aura left unwiped. I believed she did so on purpose to see both Rorono’s disappointed and delighted faces and thus have twice the fun.

As for Rorono, her cheeks slightly reddened as she gave a pleased nod.

With that carefree atmosphere, we continued with our breakfast. Demon Lords and monsters needed only to feed on the mana in the air and on the emotions of humans. We don’t to eat food but it provided us comfort and nourishment to the mind.

In a sense, not being troubled with the provisions is a strength of ours.

"Let’s go back to our previous topic. If you remember, some time ago, soldiers came to Avalon. According to the letter, to make sure we fall in line quickly, their leader is sending out another group of soldiers. If we seem like we’re stalling for more time, those soldiers will demonstrate force."

Today’s toast was delicious and the cheese on top of it was great as well. Further on top of that were the pieces of tomato that, up until recently, couldn’t at all be gotten fresh here in Avalon and they went really great with the cheese.

After the introduction of air transportation, more and more cheap and delicious products had begun to show up here in Avalon.

We were already popular with the adventurers before but now, even non-adventurers were beginning to flock to our city to buy and eat rare and great goods at a cheap price.

As the number of people increase, so too did the DP I earned. And as the quality of life increases, so too did quality of each individual’s emotions.

I, a Demon Lord who fed on human emotions, felt so full of power.

"Do those humans want to challenge Oto-san and die? Or rather be killed by Kuina?"

"It won’t be long until they run out of patience; just a bit more and we can show them their place."

"Now, now, Kuina-chan, Rorono-chan, negligence is the greatest enemy. Their foolish heads have thought up various things and some of those just might bring us down if we’re not careful."

Aura reprimanded both Kuina and Rorono.

I smiled a little as I thought that my monsters, as ever, regarded the humans as the inferior beings, mocking them, even. Although given that they were monsters and overwhelmingly strong S rank monsters at that, such couldn’t be helped, I thought.

In truth, Avalon is often visited by first-class adventurers who are barely as powerful as B rank monsters and so we had an idea of just how strong humans could be. And if we’re talking about these three girls, it wouldn’t even take them 3 seconds to kill one.

Given that, it was understandable they were overconfident a bit.

"It’s as Aura says. Yes, humans are definitely weak but they have numbers and various tools at their disposal. More than those, they have wisdom. All those compensate for their lack of power. Besides, they also have heroes who seem to be outside the norm. So, don’t let your guard down, okay?"

Even though they were called heroes, they were only as strong as A rank monsters. Still, it wouldn’t be so strange for there to be heroes much stronger than an A rank monster so we couldn’t let our guards down regardless.

"Understood!"

"If you say so, master."

The two said so as they nodded.

"Moreover, while the humans truly are foolish and weak, they aren’t trash. These delicious cheese and tomato, the alcohol, the songs, the dances, the stories, all of these are made and developed by mankind. Things that we Demon Lords and monsters wouldn’t even bother to think of making. Think of humans as sweet little creatures that entertain us. Avalon isn’t just a farm where we can harvest human emotions; it’s a city where in exchange for giving them safety and peace of mind, they provide us with culture and entertainment. In a sense, they stand equal to us here. So, don’t look down on them too much, alright?"

Kuina and Rorono looked down on the breakfast before them and nodded. I was happy to make them realize that although humans were weak, they were also useful.

"Master, what are you planning to do about that letter from the nearby city?"

"Of course, I’m going to refuse their demand, Aura. Although I am still going to negotiate with them one last time and give them my adjusted set of conditions. It would probably end up in war nonetheless though."

"Oto-san, Kuina will do her very best!"

"For their crime of shaming master, I will make them pay with their lives."

When the soldiers came before, I debased myself in order earn some time. I would say that it was worth it for I had increased my fighting force significantly from then:

The Darkness Dragons and their skills which had risen enough to get Wight’s seal of approval; the much greater number of napalm bombs made out of materials that we could only procure through my [Creation]; and...

"How is the development of the Avalon-Ritters?"

"It’s still impossible to use whichever pair of golem cores but the restrictions are now much more lax. Of the golem cores made so far, 12 pairs have been found to be compatible. So, including the very first one and the three made after that, there are now a total of 16 Avalon-Ritters produced. I estimate that from now on, as much as 7 Avalon-Ritters can be produced in a month."

Yes, the last one was the success of the mass production of the Avalon-Ritters.

My initial estimate of producing 15 Avalon-Ritters a month was found to be impossible but nevertheless, having 7 A rank equivalent units per month is phenomenal.

For other Demon Lords, an A rank was enough to be regarded as a trump card. After all, the odds of getting an A rank monster from the synthesis of two A rank medals were less than 70%. Additionally, the number of Demon Lords whose personal medals were of A rank were just around ten percent of the population. That meant that to use two A rank medals in synthesis and thus to potentially create a single A rank monster, most Demon Lords would have to wait for two months.

Even the old Demon Lords could only make hundreds of A rank monsters in their lifetime.

And then, there was me who was able to create seven in one month. It was clearly cheating.

"Rorono, thanks to your efforts, I can be firm in the negotiations. You’ve really worked hard, thank you."

"Mhm. It’s because I promised to do better so that master never has to lower his head to those humans again. I will absolutely uphold that promise."

The Avalon-Ritters were going to be our main force in the upcoming fight and with 16 of them already made, they were more than enough.

I then hugged Rorono tightly. As for her, she triumphantly smiled and hugged me in return.

"Uuuu, Rorono-chan’s so sneaky. Kuina’s envious but Rorono-chan’s done something amazing so I can’t really complain."

"Now, now, Kuina-chan, let’s just do what we can; if it’s something awesome, master will surely praise us for it."

"I know. Mine’s in development already. Oto-san will surely be happy with it."

Kuina said so as she looked as though she was scheming something. I had a bad feeling about it but she wouldn’t do something that would put me in bad situation so I decided to let her be.

After a short while, I parted from Rorono’s embrace. She looked as though she was reluctant to do so as well but in the end slowly parted away.

"Master, I am going to pause the research on mass production for now. Continuing might yield results that will improve the synchronization of the cores but it will take an awful lot of time regardless. So instead, it’s more fruitful to focus on developing our weapons as well as optional parts for the Avalon-Ritters."

What she said made sense. It’s kind of like how it’s easier to improve your test results from 50 to 80 than it is from 80 to 100.

It’s better to choose the project that would give more fruitful results for the same or even less amount of time and effort.

"Okay, I’ll leave it up to you, Rorono. I expect much from your work. It will play an important role in my plans. Also, for that and your successes, I shall give you a reward. Tell me whatever it is you wish and if it’s something I can grant, you shall have it."

"Anything, Father?"

I didn’t know whether or not it was because she was startled but she referred to me as Father.

"Yes, anything."

"Anything..."

She began to turn bright red; I was almost expecting fumes to come from her head.

Just what can she be thinking?

"You don’t have to say it right now."

"Mhm, I’ll give it more thought."

She nodded repeatedly and then sat down to drink some tea. In that moment, Aura interjected.

"Rorono-chan, it’s your chance! Good luck to you; here’s a little something from me."

Aura, for some reason, handed over to Rorono a bottle that contained a pink and highly viscous fluid. When Rorono saw it, even her ears turned bright red.

"I don’t need it!"

She said so and handed back the bottle to Aura. When Aura looked disappointed, I whispered to her.

"Aura, what’s that?"

"An aphrodisiac."

Devoid of any hesitation, she replied so. To which, I was almost at a loss for words.

"......how come you have such a thing?"

"I got it as the spoils of war from when we fought with the [Evil] Demon Lord. I analyzed it, extracted the toxins in materials such as mushrooms, herbs, and what not, readied all the other materials, and began the mass production of it. It’s being sold in Avalon too. It’s quite popular."

"No, what I’m asking is why do you have something like that? Why even make it?"

"To earn some pocket money and to help the girls that lack the courage! Actually, the Dwarf S...mgmmgm."

Mid-speech, Rorono interrupted and covered Aura’s mouth.

"Don’t talk about that."

Rorono stopped Aura but I already knew what she was talking about.

So, that Dwarf Smith gave this to Wight.

It being effective on him was amazing since he should have been immune to poisons. But then again, maybe this mixture wasn’t regarded as poison but rather as medicine. Otherwise, if it did register as a poison, his resistances would have instantly activated and purged it out of his body.

Also, if it worked on even him, it should work on almost all monsters and naturally, on Demon Lords as well. What a frightening thing she has made.

"Well, whatever, just make sure it won’t cause any dependency on it. If such a thing happens here in Avalon, I will punish you for it, Aura."

"I’ve already made precautions so rest assured! The ones being sold are highly diluted ones so it would be extremely unlikely for those to cause addiction."

"Alright. But Aura, Rorono’s still a child; she’s not yet ready for such things."

Aura bowed and apologized while Rorono made a complicated face.

"For the moment, give me some of those. The undiluted, more powerful ones. It might come in handy in the upcoming fight."

"Will do! One dose of an almost undiluted variant is enough to render a human incapable."

"Yeah, that’s what I want."

I had obtained a weapon in an unforeseen form. A chance to make use of it might not present itself but I’ll keep it be sure.

"Now, let’s talk about something for when we’ve finished breakfast. I will obtain a new [Creation] medal today and with that, I intend make a new monster. If you’re interested, you can come along and watch."

"Yay, a new little sister! ♪"

"Mhm, I’m going to drill the new monster as her older sister."

"I’ll be happy to watch. I have been the youngest all this time so I think I want to experience being the older one."

Even though I knew it was a bit ineffective and futile, I still decided to protest.

"We still don’t know for sure that it will be a girl. It may be a man for all we know."

At that, the girls exchanged glances and then huddled up. After a short while, Kuina, their representative, spoke.

"That won’t happen! Monster made with Oto-san’s [Creation] will assuredly be a cute little girl!"

"No, what about when I used [Rebirth] on Wight and turned him into a Black Dragon of Death!? He’s a man, isn’t he!?"

After that, while I felt somewhat crestfallen, we finished breakfast and then stealthily headed to the mining area.

◇

In the mining area, as ever, the golems were busy digging up ores.

Thanks to the increased number of Dwarf Smiths that were faithfully making one golem a day, the number of golems here had increased substantially. Unlike Rorono though, they could only make up to a C rank golem which was more than enough for this task, to be honest.

"Now, everyone, let me explain the new monster I’m going to be making."

The girls looked at me with eyes full of expectation.

"Avalon’s war potential, thanks to everyone’s contributions, have grown a lot. However, Avalon still lacks an intelligence and counter-intelligence monster. In other words, we are weak in that field. And so, I am going to make monsters that will remedy that."

I knew that after I made the S rank intelligence-gathering monster, I would be made eligible to buy the B rank monster under it. So, to be able to buy them as soon as possible, I hadn’t used any DP since I bought the Darkness Dragons of the aerial combat corps.

"Kuina sure isn’t good at those kind of things."

"I might know whether there’s an enemy but not what they are saying."

Kuina and Aura who both were great at searching for enemies agreed to what I said.

After all, the most they could do would be to be prepared for any attempts at surprise attacks.

"The intelligence-gathering monster needs to be smart and be capable of understanding speech. So for that, I’ll use the same medal as I used on all of you: [Person]. The second medal will be [Water]. Water is something that can be found just about everywhere. What I want is a monster that can enter water and then hide itself in a different dimension."

I had asked Kohaku in detail about monsters with dimension manipulating capabilities. In his story, there seemed to be a restriction for those monsters to enter a different dimension. The restriction was that only some things could be used and those things have to be connected with the idea of other worlds.

For example, one of Marcho’s [Monsters of the Covenant] uses shadows and could only enter and leave another dimension through a shadow.

As for me, I would make the new monster use water given that it’s a popular thought that what lies beyond the surface of the water is a whole other world.

Besides that, it’s greatly helpful that the new monster could open an entrance to another dimension at any time and any place it wishes.

Moreover, it would seem that the other world these monsters cross to was one and the same; a monster that entered through a shadow would be in the same world as a monster that entered through water. So, the quickest way to stop a dimension manipulating monster would be to chase and challenge it in that other dimension.

For all those reasons then, to make my new monster—and its B rank subordinates that I’m going to buy immediately—have an edge even if only a little, I believed that [Water], one of the four great elements, would truly be the optimal choice for me.

"So, [Person] and [Water]. After those, I’ll add in my [Creation] medal. The one I’ll make it change to is going to be... [Song]. Songs are the symbol of the mystical. Moreover, with it, they can use sound to transmit the intelligence they have gathered."

If the monster’s going to cross another dimension, [Water] alone wouldn’t be enough.

Surprisingly, sound and water had good compatibility. After all, to transmit sound, it has to go through some medium and I had decided that water would be the medium the new monster is going to use.

With control over both sound and water, even if the sender and receiver were separated, so long as there was water in between, the gathered information could be transmitted. My plan was to create an information network made up of the new monsters I was about to create. With the S rank monster to lead the B rank monsters, they would be dispatched everywhere to gather information that would be sent back reliably to Avalon.

"Now, let’s begin. [Discharge]"

By saying the word of power, I felt a hot sensation in my palm. In the next instant, my [Creation] medal appeared. I then took out from my pocket the [Water] medal.

And then...

"[I Shall Compose]"

I summoned my Demon Lord Book and bought a [Person] imitation medal.

With that, all three medals were gathered in my hand.

"[Synthesis]"

Particles of light then vigorously flowed out from the palm of my hand.

I then chose for [Creation] to change into [Song]. The light grew more intense and it soon took the shape of the monster.

Originally, everything from this point on was random. However, thanks to my [Creation] medal, I could grasp the future I desired from the myriads of possibilities.

The possibilities for the new monster came and went.

After a while, I reached out my hand and took hold of the possibility that I wanted.

"Now, come, my new monster!"

The storm of light ceased and the new monster appeared.

It was a monster with a human’s appearance. She was a beautiful girl that had a boyish charm. A little older in appearance than Kuina, by my reckoning.

She had shoulder-length hair the color of sea. The same hue also prevailed in her strong-willed eye. Her ears were slightly pointy. A clear light blue dress covered her entire body.

That monster’s name was...

"I am a R’lyeh Diva, songstress of the deep blue sea and shrine maiden of an evil god."

Such a clear, delightful voice. Just her voice alone was enough to intoxicate me.

"Nice to meet you. I am your creator. I am the [Creation] Demon Lord Procell."

"So, you’re my patron, huh. Nice to meet you."

She smiled and then gently extended out her hand.

I took it and with a tight grip, smiled back.

Note: R’lyeh refers to a city from “The Call of Cthulhu”.