Chapter 129 : Chapter 129
Chapter 129: Black and White (4)
“The two of them have finished their conversation.”
A short while later, a soldier came to the reception room.
“The young lady has requested that the guests be brought to her.”
Young lady.
It was a title that didn't suit the usual Ibi at all.
Ibi herself would probably be disgusted if she knew she was being called that.
…Yes, if it were the usual ‘Ibi’.
I saw the companions glance at each other, as if they had immediately felt the sense of incongruity that came from that title.
Meanwhile, the soldier who had delivered the message also glanced around the reception room, observing the other soldiers.
“Were there any inconveniences?”
He was asking us, but from the direction of his gaze, he was actually asking his fellow soldiers.
As if to ask if we had made any trouble.
At this.
“Yes.”
I answered with a grin.
“Thanks to everyone being so kind.”
In fact, the adjective ‘kind’ for the dark elves of Krom was probably as awkward as Ibi being called a young lady just now.
Sure enough, the soldier who had asked also showed a slightly puzzled reaction to my choice of words.
“…Is that so?”
But in the end, he didn't question it further.
He must have just thought it was a meaningless, polite remark.
More importantly.
“Nothing happened.”
One of the soldiers who had been openly watching us in this room all along—and was probably his superior—said so calmly.
Not only that, but the other two soldiers who hadn't spoken also nodded silently.
The soldier who had believed them immediately dismissed the slight doubt he had held.
He would never have imagined that before he came in, I had cast 「Word Command」, saying, 『Act as if nothing happened.』
So naturally, what I said was not just a polite remark.
One of them had been very ‘kindly’, answering my questions as much as he knew.
And he had also obediently followed my 「Word Command」 to act as if nothing had happened as soon as he woke up.
“When the guests are ready, I will escort them.”
“Understood.”
In the end, believing the words of the three, the soldier left the reception room with a respectful salute.
And so, once again, only the three soldiers who had been here from the beginning remained in the room.
Still in a ‘charmed’ state by me.
***
“…You’re here.”
Ibi, who had been waiting alone, greeted us with her usual attitude as we entered under the soldier's guidance.
“Sister…!”
As soon as she saw Ibi, Lily, who had been the most worried about her among us, immediately rushed towards her.
Then.
“…!”
She suddenly stopped in her tracks.
Seeing Ibi's atmosphere, which was clearly different from when she had gone to talk to Kain, despite her tone of voice.
In fact, her tone of voice was also, strictly speaking, not the same as usual.
If anything, it felt like she was pretending to be her usual self as much as possible.
But the biggest change was, of course, her attire.
Ibi was dressed in a rather fancy outfit, not the so-called ‘rogue outfit’ she usually wore, and had been wearing until she came here.
That is, she was dressed in a way that the nobles Ibi always cursed would wear.
To the point where she could be called a young lady without any reservation.
“…What.”
Perhaps because she herself was well aware that the outfit was awkward, she showed a slightly embarrassed reaction to our blank stares.
“If you have something to say, say it.”
“It doesn't suit you.”
“Fuck, I know that too!?”
As soon as I said what I had to say as requested, Ibi immediately flared up, got up from her seat, and shouted.
“You told me to say it if I had something to say.”
“At least pretend to be a little considerate!”
It's a cliché to say that it suits them well as a courtesy in a scene of image change like this, but what can I do if it really doesn't suit her?
In fact, as soon as my companions heard my immediate reply, they showed a horrified reaction as if to say ‘you really had to say that’, but no one denied or corrected my words.
Even Miki or Lily, who would have usually tried to cheer Ibi up by saying it suited her, were at a loss for words.
If we were just talking about whether it looked good or not, of course, it wasn't bad in that sense.
Ibi was the type that had a good ‘hanger’.
Whatever she wore, she looked good.
But, that was fundamentally not the right clothes for Ibi.
Because it was clothes that her usual self would never have chosen to wear.
What does that mean?
“…Would it kill you to say something nice.”
The her of now was not the ‘Ibi’ we knew.
She was ‘Evie Midrashi’.
Lily, who had felt this and flinched, shook her head lightly as if to deny that fact, and then carefully began to speak again.
“Um… I have something to tell you, Sister.”
“What is it?”
“About your fath… the Baron, we've found something out. I don't know, how to tell you this…”
As Lily trailed off, as if she found it difficult to continue, Ibi said in a nonchalant tone.
“What, that he's planning to invade Tiaria?”
“…! Ah, you knew?”
“He told me everything a while ago.”
“…He may not have told you everything.”
As Toric said, he would have only told her the truths that were okay to tell.
“Kain is planning to use you as a tool.”
So I told her the truth.
That Kain had been making many children in Tiaria from the beginning with the purpose of invasion, and that he was planning to use her, one of them.
My companions, especially Lily, showed a worried reaction as if I were being too blunt, but I still had to say it.
For the sake of Ibi, who after listening to my story to the end, looked elsewhere for a moment as if lost in thought, and then.
“……So what?”
Showed a reaction of ‘so what’.
At Ibi's reply, my companions flinched.
Especially Lily, who had been the most heartbroken to hear this truth, looked somewhat shocked.
“He made me to use me? Well, of course. Isn't that how it is? The parent-child relationship?”
“Th-That's……”
Not true, Miki tried to deny immediately, but he couldn't finish his sentence.
“Can't I just use him too?”
Seeing Ibi continue like this.
“Then… are you really planning to conquer, Tiaria?”
“You guys saw it too. How rotten that damn city is.”
Ibi answered Toric's question firmly.
“People die on the streets every day, but have you seen anyone give a damn? The buildings in the uptown get taller every day, but the slums haven't changed at all from when I lived there.”
I could see Ibi's two fists, which were placed on the desk, clench tightly.
“But the damn god who is supposed to be watching from the sky, and the great noble bastards who always look down from high places, are all just busy pretending not to see! Even the apostles of justice who have saved the world several times, don't seem to think that's evil or anything, and just fucking leave it alone!”
“…….”
Lily, who served a god, Miki, who was one of the nobles, and Toric, who was once an apostle of justice, all fell silent, unable to immediately deny Ibi's words.
“…Of course, I never thought of doing anything about it. I never even dreamed of it. Because I can't do it alone. I've been watching one person with a will of their own struggle their ass off for over 10 years to do something, so would I have?”
Ibi, who let out a hollow laugh, continued.
But now, a chance to perhaps achieve that dream she had never even dreamed of had come to her.
“A chance to, at the very least, turn that fucking place upside down with my own hands has come. I can at least change something…!”
She said, she would never miss that chance.
“……But there's no one I can trust here. As you guys said, this is a place where even the man who is my father is only thinking of using me.”
My life has always been like that, Ibi added again, as if in self-pity.
“There were only guys around me who tried to use me in one way or another. The guys who were my friends, the guys who were my kin, the guy who pretended to be my father, and the guy who is my real father.”
Then, Ibi, who had suddenly lowered her gaze, paused for a moment, as if she couldn't bring herself to speak.
“……You guys weren't.”
But in the end, she gathered her courage and opened her mouth again.
“So, lend me your strength.”
Before we could even react, Ibi quickly continued.
“There must be a way, whether as mercenaries or something else. I'll give you the best treatment. I'm supposed to be the child of the most successful family here, so I should be able to take care of the five of you.”
“S-Sister Ibi…”
“I can tell just by looking. My father, and the other guys here, are all guys who only think of Tiaria as a stepping stone to a bigger place, and once they step on it, they won't give a damn what happens to it afterwards.”
“Then why…”
“But they have power. They have troops. Those monster-like guys who move even with a knife in their neck, there are a lot of them here. And those guys will be following my orders.”
“Sister, that's…”
“We have to catch that Demon King bastard, right? I'll help you with everything. In fact, I've even received permission to use the troops as I please after we conquer Tiaria. Think about it, they're an army. How are the six of us supposed to fight them all?”
This was true.
To get to the Demon King, we had to break through his numerous troops stationed beyond the Wall, and our own strength was not enough for that.
Therefore, we needed an army of our own.
People who could buy us time to get to the Demon King.
“The dark elves here would be a force that could easily take on the Demon King's army beyond the Wall.”
And the elite dark elf soldiers of Ibi, no, Evie Midrashi, would be a huge help in that fight.
In short, we were now at an important crossroads.
In exchange for handing over Tiaria to them, would we have the strong warriors, the dark elves of Krom, join the fight against the Demon King's army along with our companion ‘Evie Midrashi’.
Or, would we oppose them and stop the Tiaria invasion plan here.
And Ibi, as if pleading with us to choose the former, looked at each of us in turn.
“…You, you have to find your father who disappeared while fighting those guys.”
First, Miki.
“You, you said you wanted to meet the mother who gave birth to you and abandoned you.”
Next, Lily.
“You, you want to take revenge on the guy who killed your family!”
Then, Toric.
“You… you want to help the person you hold dear, who is trying to catch the Demon King no matter what.”
Rine, and.
“…You said we have to catch him, the Demon King.”
Me.
“I'll help you.”
So, so that she could help us, she asked us to help her first instead.
“……Please.”
In a desperate voice I had never heard from her before.
…So the companions must have no longer been able to deny that it wasn't just her attire that had changed.
Lily and Miki, who realized that it wasn't just a sense of incongruity from her attire, but that Ibi herself was not the usual Ibi, eventually took a step back from her.
Ibi, who seemed slightly flustered by that reaction, immediately turned her gaze towards me.
It was a look that was waiting for, no, expecting my answer.
Answer carefully.
Just then, ‘The Beginning’ spoke to me.
As that rogue said, the dark elf legion could be a great help when fighting that pretender.
But to do that, you must first offer them Tiaria.
As I said before, to let me know that I was at an important crossroads.
It was the first time I had heard it directly in the form of advice from ‘The Beginning’ like this, instead of as a ‘narration’.
At that, I.
“Ibi.”
Looked straight into Ibi's slightly frightened eyes and answered.
“──I'm sorry.”
As I always had, in front of this choice.
“We can't help you.”