The Extra Strategist’s Royal Road Chapter 258
A clue about the missing person whose whereabouts had remained unknown until now.
“Melodie was in the Eastern Continent…! Where exactly was she found?”
“That doesn’t matter now. When I searched that place again later, she was nowhere to be seen.”
“That’s….”
“She’s probably dead. That’s just how the Eastern Continent is.”
“Damn it! Why didn’t you protect her when you found her!”
“As I’ve said before, I wasn’t keeping track of all your vassals. Besides, I rarely show myself to humans. …To be honest, I didn’t want to go through the trouble of saving just one human. Only later did I learn about how you care for your vassals like your own body, and when I searched again, it was all for nothing.”
This one is ultimately a dragon. Their way of thinking is different from humans.
His interest is solely in me alone. He never had much interest in the vassals to begin with.
“Tch! But you didn’t find a body, did you? Then there’s still a chance she’s alive.”
“It’s better not to have false hopes. The Eastern Continent is, in your words, like a demon’s lair. The chances of a powerless human surviving there are slim.”
“That’s really comforting.”
“I’m telling you not to waste your effort.”
Vindalin shook his head.
“If that’s all you wanted to ask, I’ll be going now.”
“Wait a moment. It’s troublesome if you just disappear again like this. At least tell me how to contact you.”
“Mirabel would know about that. Ask her later.”
“Why can’t you just tell me yourself?”
“It’s complicated.”
“Still…”
“It takes time.”
“…”
I knew from Altron that dragons weren’t mentally transcendent beings, but this one was worse.
You could say he had a tendency to subtly get under your skin.
I could understand why Altron called him eccentric.
“Then I’ll be going now.”
Vindalin turned to leave.
I casually mentioned.
“By the way, Altron said if I meet you, he’d like you to come see him. Why don’t you go if you feel like it?”
“…!”
For some reason, Vindalin showed anger while frowning intensely.
“What nerve does that guy have wanting to meet me! That incompetent, irresponsible fool!”
“Did he do something wrong?”
“He did something terribly wrong! Someone destined to guide others did nothing but stand by and watch! If he had done his job properly, Mepatra wouldn’t have gone mad and fallen to chaos, and Olkin wouldn’t have lost hope! Omeron wouldn’t have done such extreme things either! What kind of guide is Altron! Holed up on an island leading the elves!”
The emotional rift seemed quite deep.
“Tell him if he wants to talk to me, he should come and grovel! Then I might listen to what he has to say!”
“No, you should say that yourself. Why are you asking others to do it? We’re not children.”
“I don’t care! You tell him! Because I don’t want to meet that guy!”
Vindalin leaves with rough steps, apparently angry.
Seeing this, Rosa says to me with suspicious eyes.
“He must be a fraud, right? There’s no way the Great Sage Vindalin would be this childish.”
“…Yeah.”
I had no words to argue against that.
* * *
After finishing my conversation with Vindalin, I enjoyed some tea while talking with Rosa.
“You did really well in the Cradle of the Swamp subjugation. As expected of a hero renowned in the Magic Continent. Only three groups, including yours, are showing proper results.”
“You’re too kind. What I’m subjugating isn’t a top-tier dungeon anyway.”
“Is that so? Sophia said this Cradle of the Swamp was comparable to the top 10 dungeons.”
“Ah, that’s true.”
That’s because Mirabel, the leader of the top 10 dungeons, had intervened.
“Thanks to Vindalin’s mediation, we were fine, but without that, we would have been wiped out.”
“You all would have been wiped out!? I-indeed, dungeons are more dangerous than expected.”
“Yes, my vassals seem to have realized it deeply through this incident. That even with teleportation scrolls, you should never underestimate dungeons.”
“…”
Rosa hesitated before carefully saying.
“…Wade, there’s something I want to ask of you.”
“If it’s about subjugating the Seven Deadly Sins, I refuse.”
That seemed to hit the mark. Rosa hastily added.
“I’ll provide all the support I can! Tell me whatever you need! So…!”
“Seeing you talk like this, something must have happened while we were in the Cradle of the Swamp.”
“…Information came in a few hours ago. Strange incidents are occurring one after another in the South under the influence of the Seven Deadly Sins. And most of them are directly resulting in casualties.”
Rosa handed over a document she had been carrying.
“This is…?”
“It’s a tally of the casualties so far. Though it’s an estimate.”
Looking at the document, I could understand why Rosa was so restless.
According to recent reports from the Southern Continent, the estimated casualties, including missing persons, amount to 100,000.
And here in the Western Continent, the same number of 100,000 casualties was reported.
It was massive damage that made all the thorough preparations seem meaningless.
The reason was clear.
“70,000 casualties just from the Seven Deadly Sins…!?”
“Yes, and the damage keeps growing. Wade… No, Ars! Please, you’re the only ones who can do this!”
The reason Rosa is speaking so desperately is because it was revealed that the Seven Deadly Sins have the ability to nullify teleportation scrolls.
Because of this, other elite forces were refusing to subjugate the Seven Deadly Sins, just like me.
It couldn’t be helped. They always acted with teleportation scrolls as their insurance. It’s natural to be scared when asked to truly risk their lives.
We were different though. We don’t have an aversion to carrying out missions while risking our lives.
“Sigh…”
“Ah! By the way, did you hear anything from Vindalin!? Someone like him must have given some advice about the Seven Deadly Sins?”
“He just spoke vaguely.”
“What do you mean vaguely?”
“I’m not sure either. He just said ‘There are no enemies there. Only hideous monsters created by oneself exist.’“
“What’s that supposed to mean? You should have asked for more details.”
“Even if I asked, he wouldn’t give proper answers. You saw how he was talking earlier.”
“Ugh… Whatever the case, we need to subjugate the Seven Deadly Sins urgently. Isn’t there any way?”
“There’s nothing we can do for now. We’ll have to wait since Juras is investigating that place.”
“…I’m sorry I can only ask this of you.”
Rosa’s expression darkened with guilt.
I was about to comfort her when Sophia appeared in the garden.
“Wade, are you done talking with that old man Vindalin?”
“Yes, I guess you’re done analyzing the magic stone from the Cradle of the Swamp?”
Sophia beamed with a bright smile.
“That’s right, it’s amazing! It contains far more magic than the magic stone obtained from Life and Death!”
“That’s great.”
“But why do you all look so down? We just subjugated the troublesome Cradle of the Swamp.”
“It’s because of the Seven Deadly Sins.”
“Hmm… But regarding that, it seems like that guy Juras has found out something.”
“Has he returned?”
“Just now. He should be in his office right now.”
“I should go see him.”
I asked Sophia to look after Rosa and headed straight to Juras’s office.
I need to talk about Princess Melodie’s matter as well.
When I visited Juras’s office, for some reason there was a tense atmosphere in the air.
Juras was sitting in his office chair, staring into space with an unpleasant look.
He gave a faint smile when he saw me come in.
“It seems you subjugated the Cradle of the Swamp.”
“Somehow. More importantly, are you alone? Where’s Yovis?”
“He died in the Seven Deadly Sins.”
“…!?”
I involuntarily flinched since Yovis was an officer I knew.
“Did you actually go to the Seven Deadly Sins?”
“Yes, the basics of investigation is seeing things for yourself. But something strange happened there. Just by going near it, some of my subordinates started going berserk.”
“That’s…”
“Since it came to that, I decided to enter the Seven Deadly Sins. And all the subordinates who entered with me died. Including Yovis.”
“So, what was in there? What was in the Seven Deadly Sins?”
“There was a sword.”
“A sword…?”
“A single sword was stuck in the center of the dungeon. It seemed that pulling it out was the key to the dungeon, but I couldn’t pull it out. So I just came back.”
Juras muttered in a very unpleasant tone.
“It means I was completely empty. Envy, pride, sloth, greed… None of them. That’s why I wasn’t qualified to pull out the sword.”
“W-wait a minute.”
This guy was saying he not only entered the notorious Seven Deadly Sins but also came out alive alone.
Moreover, he seemed unaffected, looking exactly the same as before.
“What exactly was that dungeon?”
“Who knows, but one thing is certain – you need to pull out that sword to eliminate the dungeon. I can explain any difficult parts about it. So, Ars, you should go.”
“You mean me…?”
“You should be able to do it. It might be a bit difficult but… No, it’s not really difficult at all.”
His expression was dry, as if he had lost interest in the Seven Deadly Sins.
“Rather, would you tell me about the Cradle of the Swamp that you subjugated? I’m more curious about that.”
“You… Do you have no feelings about all your subordinates dying? No, it was foolish of me to ask.”
“Indeed, it was very foolish.”
I told him about what happened in the Cradle of the Swamp.
Only then did Juras correct his unpleasant expression and smile, lifting the corners of his mouth.
“As expected, your stories are interesting. The Great Sage Vindalin and the ancient hero Mirabel…”
“Would you like to meet them?”
“Not really, I have no interest in those two.”
“I knew you’d say that.”
Whatever had put him in a good mood, the atmosphere had become much brighter.
I decided to tell him about Melodie as well.
“Hmm, the Eastern Continent…”
“Vindalin said the chances of survival are slim. Really… I feel terrible about this.”
At this rate, it’s almost as if I killed Melodie myself.
However, Juras just shrugged his shoulders.
“Unless you intentionally killed her, there’s no reason to blame yourself. Above all, it’s too early to conclude that Melodie is dead. She’s had strangely good luck since she was young. This is just my intuition, but she’s probably alive. And my intuition has never been wrong.”
When he said this, I also became convinced that Melodie was alive.
“But even so, there’s no way to find her. We can’t send people to the Eastern Continent in the current situation. Unless we knew the exact location…”
Then I thought of someone.
Elliot, who uses special tracking magic.
Juras seemed to have thought of the same thing as he nodded.
“We’ll probably be able to travel to and from the Magic Continent soon. When that happens, we can bring items closely related to the missing people. We should be able to find their location.”
“But we’ve been out of contact with Elliot for a long time. He seems to feel betrayed by us because of this turbulence incident.”
“I’ll handle that part somehow. It’ll be perfect as my new pastime.”
I felt incredibly reassured knowing that he would take charge of searching for Elliot.
After discussing future plans with Juras, I returned to the mansion with the information he had written about the Seven Deadly Sins.
* * *
At the mansion, Mirabel was learning language from Bisketa.
Bisketa was teaching her the names of objects and people.
“Eonia!”
“Eonia…?”
“Eonia Mirabel! This child’s name!”
“Eonia Mirabel!”
Mirabel was laughing like a child. Dressed in casual clothes instead of her silver armor, she looked just like a young girl at first glance.
Though her bluish skin characteristic of ancient elves stood out, she was beautiful even considering that.
Mirabel’s mouth was covered in cookie crumbs. Judging by the pile of snacks nearby, she must have eaten an incredible amount.
‘Just like the ancestor of Eo and Elena…’
She even inherited their airheaded traits.
At that moment, Bisketa’s eyes lit up when she saw me return to the mansion. Then she pointed at me and said to Mirabel, “Ars! Ars Elaine! Eonia Mirabel’s husband!”
“Ars… Elaine!?”
Mirabel glared at me threateningly. She still seems to dislike me.
Yumir approached and took my coat.
“Young master, welcome back.”
“Yeah, but was everything alright? Mirabel didn’t cause any trouble?”
“It was fine. She seems to have similar tendencies to Lady Eo and Elena basically. She found the twins cute, and Ryuna too.”
“So I’m the only one she dislikes. When she learns to speak, I should ask her why she dislikes me.”
Setting aside the matter of Mirabel.
I reassembled my vassals for the subjugation of the Seven Deadly Sins.
The vassals’ expressions hardened at the mention of subjugating the Seven Deadly Sins, a top 10 dungeon.
It’s natural since they just experienced that crisis in the Cradle of the Swamp.
“Don’t worry. We’ll rest for about four days first. Plus, we now have important clues about the Seven Deadly Sins.”
While explaining what happens in the Seven Deadly Sins, Juras also told us how to defeat it.
“Meissen, we need your power for this conquest.”
There was a necessary preparation.
“From now on, I want you to make curse-breaking scrolls.”
Scrolls that dispel curses. That was the key to conquering the Seven Deadly Sins.
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