Relief

I'm Halbert Magna, age 19.

I'm the eldest son of the Magna family, well known within the Elfrieden

Kingdom land forces. I myself used to belong to them, but after some stuff

happened, I was forced to transfer to the Forbidden Army.

To add insult to injury, my commanding officer was my childhood

friend, the earth mage Kaede Foxia, who liked to end her sentences with

"you know." To think, now I had to take orders from her... I wished it was

all just a joke.

On top of that, what was I doing now? Right now, rather than a sword, I

was swinging an entrenching tool (a round-edged shovel which can also be

used in close quarters combat) instead.

Marching orders had come for the Forbidden Army, and when I arrived

on the site, I was tasked with piling up dirt, hollowing out the middle,

pouring in a gooey liquid (?), reinforcing the sides with gravel, then

planting saplings on either side. After that, I would set up the street lamps

filled with the lightmoss that are common in the capital, the kind which

absorb light during the day and are phosphorescent at night, repeating these

same tasks over and over.

To sum it up simply, I was doing roadwork.

Summer had ended, but the sun was still hot, and I was digging up dirt

and making piles with it over and over.

"Why... does the Forbidden Army... have to do... roadwork?"

"You there. Stop prattling and get to work, on the double."

Wiping the sweat from my brow, I looked over to see Kaede standing on

top of a simple scaffold, smacking the railing with her megaphone as she

gave orders. She must have been feeling the heat pretty badly herself. Her

trademark perky fox ears had drooped down like dog ears.

"Hey, Kaede, is this really...?" I began.

"You can't do that!" she protested. "Hal, you're my subordinate, you

know. You must address me properly as the site foreman."

"...Foreman, is this really a job for the Forbidden Army?"

"This is the sort of work that the Forbidden Army does now, you know,"

she answered.

"Surely we could leave this stuff to construction workers."

"There just aren't enough of them, you know. This is part of a plan for a

kingdom-wide road network, you know. We've hired unemployed people

from the capital as well, I hear, but we're still so short of hands, I'd even

ask a warcat to help."

Even so, would you normally have the military do this sort of work? I

thought.

"Besides, we can't have just construction workers come here alone, you

know," she said. "The further you go from a settlement, the more powerful

the wild creatures get, after all. And if we hired adventurers to protect them,

it would cost a fortune."

"So, in the end, we're just cheap labor, is that it...?" I asked.

"If you understand that, then get to work, on the double," she said.

"You're an earth mage. Can't you do this faster with magic?"

"I can't afford to expend my magic here, you know," she said. "Hal, are

you going to dig tunnels through the mountains in my place?"

I said nothing.

I went back to my work of digging up dirt and piling it up.

It's better than being forced to dig a tunnel without magic, at least, I

thought. What kind of old-fashioned hard labor sentence is this...?

Noon came. We went back to the camp and were given a two-hour

break.

Inside the tent we ate, chatted, or used the simple beds (they were no

more than stretchers that had grown a little fur) to take an afternoon nap.

Apparently that king strongly encouraged naps after eating. It was

something about how it improved work efficiency.

So work in the Forbidden Army literally came with "three meals and a

nap," but... once people found out what kind of work was involved, there

was no way they would be jealous of us.

Anyway, I wasn't going to make it through the afternoon if I didn't eat,

so I wolfed down the lunchbox I had been supplied.

Today's lunchbox was meat and vegetables between bread. Delicious.

The meat was lightly spiced, which felt like it helped relieve my

exhaustion. It was apparently a dish called shogayaki which that king had

come up with. It was a menu he was experimenting with now that the

production of the seasonings the king was having the mystic wolves make

for him — "miso," "soy sauce," and "mirin" — had gotten on track.

In the Forbidden Army, we were often served the king's experimental

menus like this. The meals were one of the few things that made me happy

that I had been forced to transfer to the Forbidden Army. The meals we'd

gotten in the land forces had prioritized quantity over quality. The kind of

thing you'd picture from the words "A Man's Meal." Honestly, eating here

even once had been enough to convince me I didn't want to go back.

"That king... If nothing else, I've got to recognize his gift for cooking," I

admitted.

"They really are delicious, you know," Kaede agreed. "The dishes our

king comes up with."

At some point, Kaede had sat down next to me, and she was eating the

same menu.

"Also, it's incredible that we can eat fresh veggies every day, you

know," she continued. "They come in from the closest village to here that's

hooked up to the castle by road. The reason roads are great is that they

make it easy to maintain supply lines, you know."

"The roads we're building are being useful right away, huh?" I asked.

"With this transportation capacity, you can almost call the food crisis

solved already, you know. We can bring food from the areas with a surplus

to the areas where there are shortages. We'll be able to transport foods that

we couldn't before because they didn't keep long enough."

"...Is he doing this because he knows all that stuff?" I asked. "That king,

I mean."

"He's an incredible man, you know. His foresight is almost frightening."

Well, I thought Kaede was pretty amazing for being able to understand

all of that, too. She could be a bit silly in some ways, but Kaede had some

pretty high base specs. She could use magic, and she was sharp, too. That

was probably why she had been chosen by the king himself.

...As her childhood friend, it did frustrate me a little, though.

...I need to do my best, too.

"Well, now that you've eaten, will you be taking a nap, Hal?" she asked

me.

"Well... I am tired. Guess I will."

"In that case, you can rest your head in my lap, you know," she said.

"Bwuh!" I spewed my tea.

Everyone was suddenly looking our way. More than half of those

glances were from men who clearly wanted to kill me.

Now, even though I'm biased as her childhood friend, Kaede is cute. It's

nothing to write home about, but her figure's not bad, and those fox ears

and tail really work in her favor. It wasn't surprising that she was treated

like an idol in the Forbidden Army.

The king had told me to serve under her so that the men wouldn't look

down on Kaede, but, honestly, I think that with one request from Kaede,

these guys would gladly have gone to their deaths. That was why their

murderous rage was directed at me, for being so close to her.

I coughed desperately. "What are you saying?!"

"People were talking about how the princess did it for the king in the

park in the capital a little while back, you know," she said.

"I'm amazed they could do that in a place where so many people could

see..."

Well, they're engaged and all, so maybe it's not that odd, I added to

myself. It's far better than not getting along at all.

"People are saying we'll have a royal heir by next year. Though, partly

because the king is from another world, the betting pools for the heir's

name haven't been able to narrow down a list of candidates."

"...You're talking an awful lot about something that's none of your

business," a voice said.

Kaede yelped.

When I turned to look in the direction of the sudden voice, I saw King

Souma, sighing and slumping his shoulders, and Princess Liscia, her face a

deep shade of red, standing at the entrance of the tent.

"Hey, you two. How've you been?" King Souma asked, addressing us

casually.

"I'm full of energy, you know," Kaede managed. "Your Majesty, I see

that you and the princess are the same as ever."

"Yeah, we haven't changed much, have we, Liscia?" King Souma asked.

"You're right. It makes me wish you'd show a little more awareness of

your position as king."

King Souma and the princess sat down at our table, as though it was

perfectly natural for them to do so, and started having a friendly chat with

Kaede.

Huh? Wait? What's going on?

King Souma and the princess were sitting across from me and Kaede

while the dark elf who'd been with them at the cafe stood waiting by the

entrance. Since I felt better just knowing that that blue-haired woman

wasn't around, that was probably evidence I'd been traumatized by the

experience I'd had last time.

Then King Souma turned the conversation to me. "Halbert, have you

gotten used to things in the Forbidden Army, as well?"

"Yes, sir! I have no issues!"

"So formal..." he muttered. "Where did the spirit you had before go?"

"I apologize for my behavior that time!" I said immediately. "I was

terribly rude to you, Your Majesty..."

"King's orders: Don't be so uptight and formal. Also, no more of that

'Your Majesty' stuff. Souma's fine."

"No, but..."

"'Hal', did you not hear me? That was an order."

"...I... I understand... Souma."

"That's good. I was just thinking I'd like a guy my age who I can chat

casually with," King Souma... Souma... said, seeming satisfied.

What the hell, man? Seriously? I thought. Well, if he's requesting it

himself, fine. I don't feel much respect for his authority, anyway.

"So... why are you here, Souma?" I asked.

"For an inspection, that's all. I want to see how the roadwork is

progressing."

"You don't need to tell us to take our jobs seriously. We already are," I

said.

"So it seems. I took the road coming here."

"You'd better be grateful," I said. "We're breaking our backs to build it

for you."

"And I reward you with good food and wages, don't I? You're receiving

plenty of compensation."

I got used to talking casually with him in no time. Souma'd never felt

like a king to begin with, anyway.

When he saw we were finished eating, Souma rose from his seat. "Now

then, you two, why don't you join me for the road inspection? I'd like to

explain road construction for Liscia."

"...What, isn't Kaede good enough for that on her own?" I asked. "She's

the one in charge here."

"I want to show her the actual work of making the road, you see," he

explained. "Besides, it's at times like this when you should do what your

superiors want and take the chance to build connections. It'll come in handy

later, you know?"

"How is it going to help me?" I demanded.

"Well... we're studying how to make instant gelin udon right now," he

said. "Just add water and anytime, anywhere, even out in the field, you'll be

able to enjoy gelin udon. I might be able to arrange for some of the samples

to make their way to your unit..."

"Right this way, sire. I'll show you around." I rose to my feet and

saluted Souma.

Instant gelin udon. Now we were talking. I wasn't going to let this

chance to add some variety to our already-limited selection of field rations

slip away.

The princess and Kaede seemed amused by my sudden change in

attitude, but I didn't let that bother me. Food was my number one priority,

after all.

The five of us — me, Kaede, Souma, the princess, and the dark elf guard

— arrived at a section of road that was currently being paved. There,

Souma asked me to demonstrate the work procedures for everyone.

First, I piled up dirt to create the road's sides.

"Once he's piled up the dirt on both sides, we pour that gooey stuff over

there in the middle," Souma said, explaining road construction to the

princess.

"What is that gooey stuff?" she asked.

"Roman concrete... It's a mixture of volcanic ash and lime. It will

harden as time passes. It also has a unique viscosity, so it doesn't crack

easily. If you want to see how tough it is... Well, if you look at that over

there, I think you'll understand."

After saying that, Souma pointed to a giant lizard that was larger than

many buildings. The giant lizard was towing a number of wheeled container

cars behind it. The container cars were packed full of construction materials

and provisions for the soldiers.

The giant lizard, rhinosaurus.

Also known as the great horned lizard, this super-sized lizard was

distinctive for the two great tusks which grew from atop its nose. (If Souma

had been describing it, he might have described it as, "Take a rhino, add a

Komodo dragon, divide by two, then multiply the size by ten.") They were

omnivorous and gentle, easily becoming attached to people, so they were

used in big cities to haul large volumes of cargo like this. When they were

enraged, they had an unstoppable charge, so I had heard of them being used

to assault castles, as well.

"It's so tough that even if that rhinosaurus rammed it at full speed, it

won't crack," Souma explained.

"That is incredible," the princess said. "It's that hard?"

"No, actually, it's flexible where it needs to be, so it distributes the force

that's put into it. In the world I came from, there were buildings made with

this concrete over 2,000 years ago that were still standing."

2,000 years? Four times longer than this country's existed? I thought.

Wow, that's amazing.

"Moving on, the street lamps he's setting up on either side of the road

are the same as the ones in the capital. There are a lot of wild creatures, so I

doubt people will move by night often, but with these, they won't get lost if

they do. As for the roadside trees he's planting, they're 'warding trees' from

the God-Protected Forest."

"Warding trees?" the princess asked.

"Aisha, you explain."

"Yes, sir! These warding trees constantly emit waves that monsters and

wild animals dislike. They probably do it to keep giant boars from eating

them. In the God-Protected Forest, we plant these warding trees densely

around our villages in order to prevent incursions by monsters and

animals."

"I see," the princess mused. "They're like a simple barrier, huh."

When he heard the princess's response, King Souma gave a satisfied

nod. "Now that's what I call local know how. Anyway, if we planted them

densely over a wide range like a road, there's no telling what that'd do to

the ecosystem. So rather than fully block them off, we'll leave a reasonable

number of gaps so that we're just discouraging them from approaching."

"Why? Wouldn't it be better to stop them entirely?" the princess asked.

"Okay then, Liscia. If the ashen wolves and red bears, which change

their hunting grounds seasonally, can't migrate because of the road, so they

stay where they are instead, run out of prey, and then start attacking

livestock and houses, what will you do? Or, what if giant apes and giant

boars, which will end up staying in one place the same way, come down to

the villages to tear up the fields and, in so doing, spread leeches that

previously only existed in the mountains to the village... What if that

happened?"

"I get that we absolutely shouldn't do it, but why are your examples so

specific?!" she asked.

"Because coping with dangerous animals is a problem that all local selfgoverning bodies must face," Souma said, an exhausted look on his face.

What's a "local self-governing body"? I wondered.

Unlike me, Kaede seemed to understand, and she was thoroughly

impressed.

"Wowwie... You've thought it through that far. I should have expected

no less from our king, you know," she said.

"Hmm. Well, all I did was bring along a bunch of knowledge from the

world I was in before," Souma said.

Kaede's eyes sparkled, and Souma blushed a little as she stared at him.

As she watched those two, the princess seemed a little miffed.

"Um, Princess?" the dark elf asked.

"What?" the princess demanded.

"That's one scary look you've got on your face."

"I-Is it? ...Well, you're not one to talk, are you?"

"Huh?"

Then, at that moment...

"No!"

...there was a sudden cry. Wondering what it was, I turned to look in its

direction and saw the dark elf looking at a letter, her face distorted with

emotion. There was a white bird perched on her quivering shoulder.

Was that a messenger kui?

Using a kui's homing instinct and ability to pick up on waves emitted by

its master at a long distance, it was possible to communicate between an

individual and a fixed location. With the exception of the Jewel Voice

Broadcast, which almost felt like cheating, this was the fastest method of

communication. So, did that mean someone had contacted her?

"What is it, Aisha?" Souma asked.

The dark elf spoke through quivering lips. "I've just received word from

the God-Protected Forest that there's been a major landslide!"

◇ ◇ ◇

"I've received a message from my father, the chief of the dark elf

village," Aisha said. "'Last night, a sudden landslide swallowed up around

half the village,' it said. There had been a lot of rain in the God-Protected

Forest lately... Yes. There are... many people missing... Ohh..." Aisha's

voice caught.

Her homeland and family had just been hit by a terrible disaster. It had

to have been quite a shock to her.

...I'm concerned, but I don't have time to comfort her, I thought. In this

situation, as the king, what moves should I be making?

While I was silently thinking that, Hal said, "Hey, you could at least

comfort her..." but Kaede was already pulling him away by the ear before I

could say anything back in response.

"The king is thinking right now," she lectured. "You mustn't interrupt

him, you know."

I watched her drag Hal off. What a good childhood friend she was.

...Okay, I've sorted out my thoughts. I raised my face, taking action

immediately.

"This unit will go to aid the dark elf village!" I declared.

Hal held his ear and blinked at me repeatedly. "This unit? There are only

around fifty of us."

"Disaster relief is a battle against time," I told him. "We don't have time

to turn back to the capital. Fortunately, the God-Protected Forest is closer to

here than to the capital. First, I'll dispatch this unit as an advance team!"

I gave each of them their orders.

"Liscia, return to the capital and request they dispatch a relief unit. Also,

talk to Hakuya and have him send food, clothing, tents, and other relief

supplies to the dark elf village."

"I understand, but... Don't you have a 'consciousness' working back in

the capital? If you do, wouldn't it be faster to contact him through that?"

Liscia asked.

"I can't. Living Poltergeists only has an effective range of 100 meters or

so. Dolls can ignore that range limitation, but they can't do paperwork, so I

didn't leave one behind."

If I'd known this was going to happen, I would have left at least one doll

behind. If I had, I might have at least been able to communicate that

something had happened.

...Too late for regrets now, I guess, I thought.

"So, there you have it," I said. "Someone needs to go make the request

in person."

"I get it," she said. "Leave it to me."

"When you go, bring the bodyguards we brought here with you! It'd be

no joke if something were to happen to you on the way there."

"I think I'll be fine, but... Understood. You take care of yourself, too."

Liscia immediately ran off.

If I stopped to think about it, it was pretty amazing that I was making the

princess of a nation play messenger girl, but Liscia probably didn't mind.

We were of the same mind on these things.

"Aisha, how far is it from here to the God-Protected Forest?" I asked.

"Half a day on a fast horse," she said. "At a normal march, it'll take two

days no matter how we hurry."

"Two days... When did the disaster strike?" I asked.

"It was during the witching hour, from what I gather."

"It's already been nearly half a day, then? The soonest we can arrive is

two and a half days after the disaster... Having only half a day before we

reach the 72 hour mark is going to be rough."

Hal looked confused. "What's that? What do you mean by 'the 72 hour

mark'?"

"In natural disasters like this, that's the line after which the death rate for

those in need of rescue shoots up. It's three full days after the disaster

strikes. It's called the '72-hour wall.'"

"Sorry. Could you say that in a way that's easier to understand?" he

asked.

"It means that a lot of lives can be saved in those 72 hours."

"I get it now... Wait, in that case, we can't dawdle here! Shouldn't we be

getting our butts to the God-Protected Forest, pronto?! It's gonna take a full

two days, isn't it?" he demanded.

"I know that," I said. "Do we have a carriage?"

"The original plan only called for us to use carriages when we came here

and when we left. If we need to get enough carriages for fifty people, that's

going to take time."

"Damn!" I said. "Is there no other way to move around...?"

I noticed something. Hal and the others looked to see what I was looking

at, then gulped.

I was looking at the beasts pulling the container cars. If you take a rhino,

add a Komodo dragon, divide by two, then multiply the size by ten, you

would have these giant lizards, the rhinosauruses. They were big, but they

could run continuously at high speeds comparable to a steam locomotive.

"...Hey, Hal, Kaede," I said.

"What?" Hal asked cautiously.

"What is it?" Kaede asked.

"It'll probably make us all nauseous, so will you be okay?" I asked.

"I'm quite resistant to motion sickness, you know," Kaede said.

"...I'll deal with it," Hal muttered.

"You will? I'll tough it out, too, then."

I immediately gave the order to fifty members of the Forbidden Army.

"Unload all the freight from the container cars! Fortunately, the road

runs near the God-Protected Forest, but once we get into the woods, we'll

be traveling on foot! The lighter our load, the better! Leave the materials

where you unload them! Even if they're lost, you won't be blamed for it!

I'll give a written apology to Hakuya and get off with a little scolding!

Also, bring all the food with us! We can't do something lame like show up

to offer aid, then have to sponge off the locals for food!"

"""Yes, sir!"""

Following my orders, the Forbidden Army soldiers speedily unloaded

the container cars.

As you might expect from people who'd been doing nothing but

construction work, they moved fast. The way they efficiently worked

together to carry off the materials made them look like skilled movers. They

really did feel reliable.

"No, we're soldiers, remember?" Hal complained.

"Stop prattling and get to work, Hal," Kaede said.

Kaede was using her magic to easily move materials that would

normally have taken a few big strong men working together to lift.

Earth magic was, in the end, the magic of gravity manipulation. It didn't

create earth or stone from nothing: it manipulated what already existed.

That was probably why she could do tricks like this. It was a huge

contribution.

...Right now, I was probably the least useful person here. Since I had

below-average strength, even if I joined in with the soldiers, I would

probably just be in the way.

As I stood there watching them work for lack of anything better to do,

Aisha came up to me. "Your Majesty..."

She looked weak, as if she might break down at any moment.

Ever since I'd recruited her, Aisha had been at my side as a bodyguard,

so I felt like I had seen a lot of her expressions. Her determined face when

she made a direct appeal to me, her imposing warrior face, her childlike

face when she was eating something, the face like an abandoned dog that

she made when she had to wait for that food... I had seen many expressions

from her, but this one was new.

To see a girl who was so much more powerful than me looking so weak

pained my heart. Aisha was always protecting me as my bodyguard, but

now it was time for me to protect her. I placed my hand atop her head,

which was roughly the same height as mine.

"S-Sire?" she asked.

"Leave this to me." I pulled her in, resting her forehead on my shoulder.

"I have no power, and I'm far weaker that you, Aisha, but I'm in a position

to make a lot of people move. So leave this to me. If there are lives that can

be saved, I'll save all that I can."

"Sire... Siiiiiiiiire!" Burying her face in my shoulder, Aisha began to cry.

I gently patted her head.

Until we were ready to go, I comforted the crying Aisha.

The God-Protected Forest was a forested area to the south of the

country.

The name apparently came from the legend that a giant god-beast that

took the form of a goat-antelope protected this forest.

That said, there had been no claimed sightings of it in recent years, and

now the only proof of its existence was that its divine protection kept

locusts from attacking the forest, kept droughts from drying it up, kept cold

waves from freezing it, and kept the trees green at all times. This god-beast

that only showed it existed through its divine protection... did it really exist?

The dark elves were the ones to claim their forest was under the godbeast's protection.

The forest had to be approximately as big as the Sea of Trees around Mt.

Fuji. They called it a forest, but it was actually the autonomous domain of

the dark elves, and that xenophobic race had never let the other races enter

their forest. Even Aisha had come to appeal to me for a crackdown on

trespassers.

This time, there were close to fifty (hundreds once you considered the

units to follow) humans coming to provide relief, and we would be entering

the forest, but this was by request of the chief's daughter, Aisha, so it would

be treated as a special case, apparently. The dark elves lived in the forest,

defended their independence, and hated outsiders.

As a matter of fact, despite the catastrophic landslide they had suffered,

they apparently hadn't sent a request for aid to the capital. If Aisha hadn't

been contacted, we might never have known the disaster had happened at

all. It was admirable of them to try to solve their problems on their own, but

it was stupid for them to let the number of deaths shoot up because of it.

"They've become hardheaded because they don't even try to look at the

outside world," Aisha spoke sadly as we walked through the God-Protected

Forest. "Because I made contact with you, sire, and you listened to my

opinions, there were signs of that beginning to change, but..."

Her voice became indignant.

"This isn't an era where we can live in the forest alone. With the threat

of the Demon Lord's Domain, we never know when they'll begin to move

south! If we shut ourselves away in our forest, do they believe the god-beast

will really save us when the time comes?! The god-beast is the protector of

the forest, it's not the protector of the dark elf race!"

"Y-Yeah..." I said, taken aback.

"That's why we dark elves should study and learn about the wider

world!" Aisha was impassioned. It felt like the first time she'd looked so

respectable in a while.

"Besides, if I stay in the forest, how would I eat Your Majesty's

delicious foods?!" she added.

...I take that back. Aisha was still Aisha.

Well, it's better that she's like this than to have her be tense and anxious,

I thought.

Soon after we arrived in the dark elf village, we were met by a

handsome man who looked to be in his twenties.

"Oh, Your Majesty!" he cried. "How good of you to come."

His handsome face bore a certain resemblance to Aisha's. Could he be

her big brother?

He was tall, probably at least 190 cm. I could tell from the accessories

he wore on his head and arms that he was of a high rank, but the fine-

looking robe he wore was covered in dirt. He looked a little tired, as well.

As she stood before that young elf, Aisha thumped her hand on her chest

once. "Father, I have brought His Majesty here with me."

"Well done," he said. "Your friendship with His Majesty must have

come about through the guidance of our god-beast."

"Father?!" I exclaimed.

My surprise brought a smile to the young elf's exhausted face.

"My king, it is a pleasure to meet you. I am the chief of the dark elves

and Aisha's father, Wodan Udgard. Thank you for taking such good care of

my daughter."

"Oh, sure. Um... You're awfully young."

"Pure-blooded elves stop aging once their bodies mature to a certain

point," he explained. "We live three times longer than humans, too, so while

I may look young, I've still lived 80 years."

I see, I thought. That's about the same as the elves and dark elves you

see in stories, huh? Those say that elves're long-lived, stay youthful for a

long time, and that they're all beautiful. Though, my chamberlain, the halfelf Marx, was an old dude, wasn't he? Do half-elves age differently, I

wonder?

Setting that aside, I whispered to Aisha, "He seems welcoming. I

thought dark elves were supposed to be xenophobic?"

"My father is the head of the cultural liberalization faction, so he's

understanding of cultural exchange with the outside. Father was also the

only one who approved of me going to make an appeal to you."

"I see. The reason you don't worry about the rules is because of his

influence, huh?" I said. I shook hands with Wodan. "I am the (acting) king,

Souma Kazuya. I am here by the request of Aisha to provide relief."

"It's good of you to come," he said. "Also, you're the king, so please,

you don't need to be so formal with me."

"...Righty-o. Is this better?"

"Yes. Still, I never expected the king himself to come here."

"I happened to be doing an inspection at the time," I explained. "I've

brought the fifty members of the Forbidden Army who were at hand as an

advance party. A few days from now, a second group with relief supplies

should arrive."

"I'm grateful. The truth is, I'd love to have the whole village come to

welcome you, but given the circumstances, I hope you'll understand."

"I know," I said. "It really is an awful situation."

The dark elf village was in the center of a thick circle of warding trees.

There were villages like this dotted around the forest, and the dark elves

lived in them. If you were to look at the God-Protected Forest as a country,

this village would be the capital, and there was an order of magnitude more

dark elves living here than anywhere else.

The eastern third or so of that village had been carved away by the

landslide. It looked like a slightly elevated slope on the eastern side had

collapsed. Perhaps due to the long spell of rain, there was a large amount of

water flowing over the exposed surface. The ground might have loosened a

fair bit. Our one salvation was that it was sunny now. If it had been raining,

we would have had to worry about another collapse while we worked.

"What are the damages like?" I asked.

"We've recorded nearly one hundred casualties already. There are still

more than forty missing, as well."

That's a lot, I thought. It's going to be a battle against time to see how

many we can rescue.

"Let's begin the relief operation immediately," I said. "However, there's

a risk of secondary disasters, so it would be a good idea to have the women

evacuate. Also, have some people keep an eye on the mountain, please. If

the mountain moves in the slightest, or there are any weird noises, have

them report it. If it were to collapse again while we're carrying out relief

operations, that would be a serious issue."

"I will do that at once," he agreed. "Is there anything else you would

like to ask of me?"

"Please compile a list of the missing. We'll erase them from it as we

manage to ascertain their safety."

"Understood."

Once I worked things out with Wodan, I gave orders to Aisha and the

Forbidden Army.

"Aisha."

"Yes, sir!"

"Have the women evacuate to a place that doesn't look like it will

collapse. Consult with Wodan to decide where is best. You will escort them

and ensure they're delivered there safely."

"Yes, sir! Understood!"

"Good," I said. "Starting now, the Forbidden Army will begin operations

to search for those whose safety is unconfirmed. You guys have a lot of skill

at digging, I'm sure. Listen closely, and if you hear voices calling for help

in the dirt, carefully rescue them!"

"""Yes, sir!"""

"However, be absolutely sure that you don't do anything you can't

handle. If it looks like there may be another collapse, retreat even if you're

in the middle of saving someone. The rescuers cannot be allowed to take

even a single loss. Understood?"

"""Yes, sir!"""

Nodding at the Forbidden Army soldiers' response, I shouted an order.

"We will now commence relief operations!"

The relief effort was an all-out battle.

Everyone came together, doing everything they could. They called the

names of the missing, listened closely, and if there was even the slightest

response, they would carefully move the dirt and sand aside.

It didn't matter who was a soldier and who was a man from the village,

they worked together moving the earth and cutting apart fallen trees, then

pulling out the people trapped underneath. Kaede was using her magic to

move huge rocks, too, while the women from the village were feeding the

displaced and tending to the wounded.

As for me, I had teamed up with Hal, and we were carrying out search

operations.

"Hal, under that thick tree! Someone's still breathing!" I called.

"Huh?! I don't hear any voice," he said.

"Well, they're there! Just dig!"

Hal had a doubtful look on his face, but when he dug where I told him

to, he found a little girl's hand. "Seriously...? Just you wait, we'll have you

safe soon!"

Hal moved the earth aside, pulling the dark elf girl out.

She already had brown skin, so it was hard to tell, but her complexion

was looking bad. After being trapped in the moist earth for all this time, that

was to be expected.

It was a good thing that the summer heat was still lingering. Were it a

little later in autumn, she might have died from the cold while she'd been

buried.

When I came back with a blanket, Hal was holding the girl and patting

her on the back. "You did well. You're going to be okay now."

"...Wah... Wahhhhhhhhhh!"

"It's okay! You're okay now!" Hal desperately tried to calm the wailing

girl.

If you ask me, men are useless at times like this. Hal and I were both at a

loss for what to do, just repeating "It's okay," over and over.

I wrapped the girl in a blanket, waiting for her to calm down before

calling over a nearby Forbidden Army soldier. "Take this girl to a safe

place."

"Yes, sir! As you command!" the soldier said.

Once we had seen the girl off, Hal said to me, "I'm amazed you knew

she was there. I couldn't hear her voice at all."

"Even while we're talking, I'm searching," I said.

"Do you know some sort of searching spell?" he asked.

"Not quite... This is what I'm using." When I stretched my palm out to

Hal, a little thing burrowed out of the ground and jumped up onto it.

Hal looked at it, blinking. "Is that... a mouse?"

"A wooden one, yeah."

It was a mouse carved out of wood, about 10 cm long. I had been

manipulating it with my Living Poltergeists ability to search for survivors

under the rubble. My ability was able to operate at long distances if I used

dolls, but it seemed they only needed to be shaped like a living creature, not

necessarily a humanoid one. Even as I was showing this one off to Hal,

there were another four wooden mice moving around almost like real mice

and looking for those in need of rescue.

"It's a wonder that you were carrying around something like that," he

said.

"I found them in a shop while I was on my date with Liscia," I said. "I

thought I might use them for something, so I put them in the rolling bag

with my other self-defense items."

By the way, that bag had also held two small-sized Little Musashibo

dolls which I now had on patrol in the area. Even in places where the

landslide had damaged the roads, those lightweight little guys could jump

around easily enough.

"Your ability is more amazing than I'd ever have thought," he said.

"Yeah. I feel like this is the first time outside of administrative tasks that

I've gotten some use out of... Urkh!" I crouched over and started vomiting.

"Whoa, what's this, out of nowhere?!" Hal called out to me, sounding

concerned. "H-Hey, Souma."

"Blech..." I managed, then coughed violently.

"A-Are you all right? Why'd you suddenly start puking?"

"...S-Sorry. While it was searching, one of my wooden mice... it

suddenly found a really badly damaged body..."

"Damaged...?"

"The eyeballs were—"

"No, stop! I don't want to hear it!" Hal looked away and plugged his

ears.

I looked at the dirt in front of us.

When the news covers disaster areas, they focus on the tragedies of the

affected and the hopes of the survivors. However, now that I was actually

experiencing it firsthand, it was a hell greater than I had imagined. This

reality was too harsh for a general audience. It would break their hearts.

Still, I didn't have time to be thinking about that.

"Hal! I've found two people in need of rescue, in the shadow of a rock

50 meters ahead of us and to the left."

"On it!"

—For now, I just had to kill my emotions.

We diligently continued with our relief efforts. We managed to dig a

great many dark elves from the earth and rubble.

All of them were injured in one way or another, and many had serious

injuries that couldn't be taken lightly even once they had been rescued.

Often, by the time we managed to dig them out, they had already expired.

At first, the ratio of living to dead among the rescued was half and half,

but now it was leaning more heavily towards the dead. When I considered

that, of the close-to-one-hundred casualties Wodan had mentioned when we

had first arrived in the village, only two-tenths had been dead, it was clear

that things were getting worse as time passed.

The searchers were showing signs of heavy exhaustion, as well. They

had been resting in shifts, but it had now been three days since the disaster

had occurred.

It had been hard on the dark elves, of course, but also on the soldiers

who had come a long way and then spent a full day searching. They had

already dug out a fair number of those in need of rescue (some alive, some

not).

I thought it would be wise to check in with Wodan to confirm how many

people were still missing. If we could narrow down the number of victims,

we could focus our manpower on searching the area where we thought they

would be.

As I was thinking that...

"O Godbeast! Why have you let this happen?!"

...I heard a desperate cry.

When I looked, I saw a young (?) dark elf man who resembled Wodan

wailing as he struck his fists and head against the ground.

Aisha had returned from evacuating the women and children, so I asked

her about him. "Aisha, who is that?"

"That's... my uncle, Robthor Udgard, He's my father's younger brother."

"From the way he's crying and wailing, I guess that means..."

"Yes," she confirmed. "His wife and child, in other words my aunt and

her daughter, have yet to be found."

"That must be... difficult. Are you okay, Aisha?"

"Well, you see... If my father is the head of the liberals, my uncle is head

of the conservatives. I didn't have much contact with them... His daughter

was still young and cute, though, so it pains me to see this happen to her..."

"I see..."

We were well past the 72 hour deadline. If she hadn't been found yet,

that meant...

Then, Robthor looked in our direction. When he saw us, he walked over

towards us, stumbling as he did.

"King... O, king... Why?"

Robthor grabbed me by the lapels, causing Aisha to yell at him, but I

motioned for her to stand down. Rather than gripping them tightly and

trying to lift me up, he was just grasping at them, as if clinging to me. If I

simply brushed him away, he would probably collapse.

"O, king. I have done all I can to protect this forest. So why has it taken

my family from me...?"

I was at a loss for words. I looked over to Aisha.

"My uncle opposed the periodic thinning," she said. "He said it was

unthinkable that dark elves, as protectors of the forest, should cut down

trees needlessly. The place that collapsed was one where we couldn't do

periodic thinning because of my uncle's objections," she explained.

That's... I don't know what to say...

"O, king! Tell me why! Why would the forest I protected destroy my

family? If I had cut down trees like Wodan and his lot, would my family

have been spared?!"

"There's... no way to know that," I said.

"No!" he howled.

"True, if you carry out periodic thinning, take care of the undergrowth,

and increase the land's ability to hold water, it's possible to create

conditions that reduce the likelihood of a landslide. However, it only makes

it less likely. In a case like this, where heavy rain over a long period was the

cause... It could have happened anywhere."

"No... You're saying we just had bad luck, then..." he murmured.

"In terms of where the landslide happened, yes. However, periodic

thinning means there's always work going on in the forest. The workers

may hear strange noises, see the forest seeming to shift, and notice other

warning signs that a landslide is about to occur. If they notice, there are

things that can be done. People could have been evacuated."

This has also been said to be an advantage of using mountains for

terraced rice-fields.

You would think cutting down the trees to make room for rice paddies

would make landslides more likely, but it actually reduces the odds of

landslides that result in human casualties. Because people have to go into

the fields all the time, they quickly notice the warning signs, and that makes

it easy to respond. The strongest countermeasure against landslides is to

watch the forest at all times. The elves didn't have debris flow detection

systems like in modern day Japan, so that made having people on watch all

the more important.

"I've protected the forest all this time... was I wrong to do that?" he

moaned.

"Your belief that you were protecting the forest was wrong," I said.

"Nature's not so fragile that it needs people to protect it."

Aisha had told me before that the trees in the God-Protected Forest were

long-lived. That was why they hadn't noticed it had turned into a

beansprout forest and the ground had been weakened. Even though they had

simply been lucky that nothing had happened yet, they'd convinced

themselves they were protecting the forest.

"If it's egotistical for man to destroy the forest, so, too, is it egotistical to

try to protect it," I said. "Nature is meant to go through cycles of death and

rebirth, yet we're trying to keep it in a state that's convenient for us. All

people can do is manage things through periodic thinning, keeping the

forest in a state where we can co-exist with it. Trying our best not to wake it

from its slumber."

He seemed speechless.

At that moment, one of my wooden mice discovered something.

"There! I found a parent and child!" I cried.

"Wh-Where?!" he stammered.

"Hold on... They're in a collapsed house ahead and to the left of us, two

meters from the mountain ridge!"

We rushed to the spot, moving the sand and dirt aside. When we did, we

found a little girl and a woman I assumed was her mother in a gap between

the collapsed lumber. The mother was holding her girl tightly, trying to

protect her. When Robthor saw them, he let out a breathless sigh. Clearly,

they were his wife and daughter.

When we pulled them out, the woman had already expired.

Just as I was thinking all hope was lost... Aisha raised her voice. "Sire!

The child is still breathing!"

"Get her to the relief team, immediately!" I shouted. "Don't let her die!"

"Understood!"

After wrapping the child in a blanket and seeing her and Aisha off, I

looked to Robthor, who was crying beside his wife's body. I thought maybe

I should let him be, but this man still had things he needed to protect. I

couldn't have him stopping here on me.

Placing a hand on his shoulder, I said quietly, "She protected your

daughter to the very end."

"...Yes..."

"Pull yourself together! It's your turn to do it now!"

He seemed startled. "Yes... Yes...!"

Speaking through sobs, Robthor nodded again and again.

Some time after that, the second relief team that Liscia had gone back to

call for arrived. With the search for all missing persons completed, the

advance team was relieved of their duties.

For the reconstruction work, the more numerous and better-equipped

second team would take over.

After offering one last silent prayer for the fallen, the advance team

returned to the capital. The mud-covered and exhausted members of the

advance team were packed into the container cars like frozen tuna about to

be shipped out. Right about now, Hal was probably resting his head in

Kaede's lap and taking a good rest.

I was in a similar state myself, riding in the carriage with Liscia who had

come to pick me up.

We had left Aisha behind in the village. With her homeland in that awful

shape, there was no way she would have been able to focus on her duties.

For the time being, I had told her to wait in the God-Protected Forest.

As I leaned against the window, dozing off...

"I wasn't able to do anything this time," Liscia said sadly.

"You went to call a relief party, didn't you?" I asked. "Everyone worked

their very hardest. Actually... if there's anyone who was unable to do

anything, it was me."

"Hardly. I hear you were a great help out there," Liscia tried to reassure

me, but I shook my head.

"I'm the king. In times of crisis, giving commands in the field isn't the

king's duty. A king's duty is to prepare for a crisis before it happens. I...

didn't do enough of that."

"That's not..."

"I think the Forbidden Army worked well as a relief unit. Still, there

were more places where I came up short. Means of communication, longdistance shipping, accumulation of aid supplies in each area, medical teams

attached to the relief party, psychiatrists to treat patients with PTSD... I

came up short on all of those things. Because I was so focused on the food

crisis and the issue of the three dukes, I was lax in my preparations."

I looked at my reflection in the window, covered in mud and wearing an

expression of exhaustion.

Liscia was looking at me with concern, but I pretended not to notice.