Chapter 175
『Eli! I came to see you! Yoo-hoo!』
A carefree voice echoes throughout the surveillance room.
In the Deep Forest of the Eld Desert dungeon, the screen shows a plain-looking woman with a slack smile waving her hand, without a trace of tension.
Her name is Léna-Lloyd Reynolds.
She’s the very woman that was just the topic of conversation.
Wait, isn’t your house on fire?
How can you be so laid back?
Next to her, a man with half his face covered by a mask and carrying a great sword places his hand on his forehead in a ‘give me a break’ gesture.
Um, if I remember correctly, his name was something Rugios… right?
I heard later on that he beat up that damn dragon slayer, Wald, pretty badly.
I really want to thank him personally.
But if I could be greedy, I wish he had finished the job properly.
But, well, that’s beside the point.
What’s going on here?
Elibel, standing next to me, has a “huh?” look on her face.
Yeah. She’s more expressive than when she was a skeleton.
Well, even back then, you could mostly tell by the flickering of the flames in her eye sockets.
『Um, Elibel…』
「Wait, don’t talk to me right now, I’m confused.」
Oh, yeah, I totally get that.
I don’t understand it either.
From the look of it, it doesn’t seem like she ran away.
Did she just come to visit normally?
But, given the timing…
『Huh, weird. I thought my voice and image would have reached the other side by now.』
Léna-Lloyd is tilting her head, puzzled by the lack of response.
『Um… Lady Léna. If I may ask, did you give any advance notice?』
『Eh?』
『Eh?』
『『…………』』
『…Lady Léna』
『Oh, no, I mean… I didn’t ask for contact information. I thought I could just wing it…』
『You can’t just wing something like this! How could you think of letting go of the country’s rights without a plan!?』
『But I had to!』
『That’s no excuse! Think about what I have to go through every time because of your lack of planning! This past month, I’ve hardly slept because of all the handover work and paperwork!』
『La la la! I can’t hear you! I can’t hear you!』
They’ve started arguing now.
I’ve seen this before.
Ah, that’s it. It’s exactly like the exchanges between Elibel and Berg.
「Sigh… Earth, I’ll just connect the call.」
Elibel, seemingly calmer now, operates the terminal.
「Hello? Can you hear me, you old hag?」
『―――! Is that you, Eli!? Yoo-hoo! Long time no see. You must have been so lonely without me. That’s why I came to see you! Yay! Oh, I’ve been super super lonely without seeing Eli―――』
Click.
Elibel turns off the audio.
「…Sorry, Earth. I just don’t feel like talking anymore.」
Sorry, I felt the same way.
Yeah. Just as you heard, she’s got a lot of issues.
She’s the type I’d rather not get involved with.
But we can’t move forward without talking to her.
Reluctantly, the audio is turned back on.
『Hey? Eli? You’re not responding! What’s wrong?』
「Shut up. I can hear you.」
『Ah, good, good. For a second, I thought you cut the audio because you didn’t want to hear my voice.』
That’s correct.
『―――Anyway, jokes aside, can you let me into the dungeon, Eli? You probably have a lot of questions, right?』
Suddenly, Léna-Lloyd’s tone shifts from playful to serious.
『For example―――about the ‘Thunder Slash’.』
Noticing the shift in atmosphere, Elibel’s expression tightens.
『―――』
A throb hits me the moment I hear that name.
「Yeah, I’ve been researching ‘Thunder Slash’ quite a bit. But I don’t necessarily need to ask you―――」
『Stop with the boring lies, Eli』
Léna-Lloyd cuts in before Elibel can finish.
『It’s been a month since then. You’ve done all the research you can, haven’t you? Your information must have hit a dead end by now. You probably only grasped the superficial aspects, not the deeper parts, right?』
Her tone is as if she can see right through us…
Is this really the same person from before?
『If you want to know, I can tell you. If Eli wishes, I’ll share everything I know.』
「……」
Elibel looks at me.
I nod.
Elibel operates the terminal and opens the teleportation gate.
◇◆◇◆◇
Now, the scene shifts to outside the dungeon.
We’re at the familiar “Zeroth Magic Research Institute,” where Elibel worked before she died.
「Why here, of all places?」
Léna-Lloyd asks with a hint of irritation.
The knight standing behind her is on guard, scanning the surroundings.
You don’t need to be so cautious, there are no traps set or anything.
「If I’d invited you straight into the dungeon, it would’ve caused chaos with the others」
Elibel plops down onto a chair nearby.
I take a seat next to her.
By the way, I’m currently in a lizardman vessel; it’s been a while.
I don’t want my real body going outside.
Berg and the skeletons are taking care of my real body.
Elibel is in her own body.
She can’t use magic, so she can’t use a vessel.
But she seems to be equipped with magic tools.
Maybe they’re concealed under her robe?
By the way, Elibel mentioned not wanting to confuse those in the dungeon, but half of that concern is probably for me.
The conversation we’re about to have likely involves my past life.
She must be accommodating my wish to keep silent about it.
「Hmm… well, okay」
Léna-Lloyd says, sitting down somewhat reluctantly.
Rugios remains standing behind her.
「So, what’s the reason for your sudden visit? Don’t tell me it’s something silly like a rebellion and you’ve fled here from your mansion?」
「What? What’s that about?」
Léna-Lloyd tilts her head in confusion, so Elibel operates a terminal and shows her the recent footage.
「Wha… what’s this? My house is… burning?」
Seeing the state of her mansion, Léna-Lloyd exclaims,
「Whaaaaaaaaat! Why my house!? It’s burning! It’s burning! My Jaeger aaaaaaah!!」
She’s freaking out, striking a pose like The Scream.
「You didn’t know?」
「I had no idea, I’m hearing this for the first time! Right, Rugios?」
「Yes, well… though one could have easily predicted this would happen.」
Rugios, sensing that Léna-Lloyd is too confused to make sense of the situation, politely explains their circumstances.
Léna-Lloyd had stepped down as Prime Minister.
In doing so, she relinquished all her political rights in the Borhelic Kingdom.
He goes on to detail how they released the people from the Nored and Löwenherz House who had been detained for the aftermath.
You can feel Rugios’s struggles seeping through the story.
He must be having a tough time…
「―――So, that’s how it is. It was an inevitable outcome. The only thing is that Lady Léna did not anticipate it… It’s purely coincidental that our arrival and our mansion being attacked happened at the same time.」
「Ah, I see. So that’s what happened.」
Elibel mutters a satisfied “understood,” and clenches her fist.
She takes a deep breath―――
「Brace yourself, you old hag!」
「Oof!」
She punches Léna-Lloyd hard, knocking her down.
「Ow! What was that for, Eli!?」
「Shut up! Die, you old hag!!」
「Ouch! That hurts—that really hurts! Stop it, don’t you hit me again!」
Ah, this is that thing, isn’t it?
She’s probably thinking she worried for nothing.
No matter how unusually strong she is, it’s no reason not to worry.
Elibel, for all her words, is kind to her family and friends.
Rugios, standing by, isn’t trying to stop her either.
「Haah… well, whatever. Let’s get back on track.」
「You’re the one who sidetracked us in the first place———」
「Aah!?」
「Nothing, nothing at all!」
…By the way, I haven’t said a word this whole time.
I feel like a statue here.
Not that I mind, really.
…I’m not bothered, okay?
Really, I’m not.
Don’t start saying it’s typical of me or anything, alright?
◇◆◇◆◇
「Now, hurry up and spill what you know. Then, once you’ve talked, you can go back to wherever you came from.」
「Eli… Don’t you think that’s a bit harsh? I’m homeless now, you know? I was thinking it’d be nice to stay over or something.」
「If the information you give is useful, I’ll consider it.」
「Alright, let’s talk then.」
Léna-Lloyd straightens up and clears her throat in an exaggerated manner.
Annoying.
「Oh, right. Before I start, there’s something I want to confirm.」
「What could you possibly need at this point?」
Elibel is visibly on guard.
「Don’t be so defensive. It’s nothing major. What made you, Eli, want to research ‘Thunder Slash’ in the first place?」
「You know it’s because it could be a threat to the dungeon—」
「That’s not it, is it?」
Léna-Lloyd interrupts her assertively.
「If that were the case, the information you’ve already gathered would be enough, right? If you just needed to know about his strength as an adventurer, his history, his companions, you wouldn’t need to ask me. There must be another reason, and there’s only one possibility—it’s about his ‘hometown.’」
「!?」
Elibel struggles to maintain her composure.
I manage to hold myself together, too.
The difference in her demeanor between normal times and moments like these is too extreme.
「It’s not about Aoba as ‘Thunder Slash,’ the adventurer. You want to know about ‘Kirishima Aoba.’ That means there’s someone among your group, right? One of his ‘hometown’ companions. So that would be—」
Léna-Lloyd looks at me as if she’s seen right through everything.
I swallow hard, though there shouldn’t be any saliva to swallow.
「Earth, right? Are you the one from Aoba’s ‘hometown’?」
『―――!』
My head throbs painfully.
Unlike before, the sensations of the real body are now somewhat fed back into the vessel.
That’s why I can feel that pain even in this body.
「Hmm…」
Léna-Lloyd strokes her chin, deep in thought.
After a moment, she turns to me.
What’s wrong?
「Hey, I’ve got a question for you.」
『What is it?』
The words that come out of Léna-Lloyd’s mouth are beyond my wildest imagination.
「―――【Do you understand this phrase】？」
She just says that.
Just that alone.
But it’s enough to hijack my consciousness.
I’m shocked because that phrase is―――
「【That reaction… good. I can speak English and French too, but the pronunciation is iffy. Glad we can communicate in our homeland’s language.】」
「…? Hey, you old hag. What did you just say?」
Elibel tilts her head, puzzled.
She didn’t understand the language Léna-Lloyd just spoke.
And that makes sense.
She couldn’t possibly understand.
Because the words Reyna Lloyd just uttered were―――
『…Japanese?』
That’s right.
The language of my previous life.
The language I used when I was human.
Why can Léna-Lloyd speak it?
The answer is easy to guess.
「Yeah, so let me introduce myself properly, Earth. My name is Léna-Lloyd Reynolds.」
And then.
「―――In my previous life, my name was Honjo Reina」
A person from my homeland stands before me.
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