In a Different World with a Smartphone Chapter 410: Planting, and the Blue Stag.
(Author: as expected, putting out characters with the same names causes a lot of things to go weird…)
“Around here seems to be a good place.”
Bastet jumped off from the white [Crown], Albus’ head lightly.
They’re currently in a nameless forest situated close to Eisengard’s center. It’s far from towns and villages, and is a place where people won’t tread easily.
“So we’re planting it here?”
“Right. Bring it out.”
Following Bastet’s instructions, Anubis took out the “Sacred Tree” from his [Storage]- enchanted collar, and dropped it onto the ground.
“Then Albus-san. Please.”
“Understood.”
Receiving the sapling of the “Sacred Tree” from Anubis, Albus dug up a spot on the ground lightly, and planted it there. As soon as it was planted, glittery magic particles began to appear from the small leaves of the sapling. It’s proof that the G.o.dslaying Poison polluting this land is starting to be purified.
“Now all we need to do is to protect this sapling until it’s grown to a degree, huh.”
“Do we know exactly how long that is?”
“According to Uncle Kousuke, the purification radius should reach around 20 meters after 2 days or so. Once that happens, it’ll be fine to call King-sama and the others here.”
“Just 20 meters in 2 days? Can we really purify the entire country with this?”
“It’s fine; with the sapling’s growth its purification speed will also increase, apparently. Please take care of the guarding duty until then, Albus-san.”
“Leave it to me.”
Albus nodded once towards Bastet. Suddenly, Anubis turned his head towards the depth of the forest, and let out a growl.
“Seems like the forest residents are coming out to welcome us already.”
While producing rustling sounds, three small demons with green skin appeared from within the forest.
Goblins. They’re probably trying to get rid of the enemies who have appeared in their territory. They’re holding thick sticks and stone spears in their hands, and look raring to go.
At a glance, Bastet and the others can only be seen as a black dog and cat, and a humanoid child wearing armor. If their noses were actually working, the goblins would’ve noticed that these three don’t have the smell of living beings, but their own body odor had made sure that wouldn’t happen.
“Gyagyagyagyaa!”
“Gyigyi!”
“Gyaaaaa!”
The three goblins rushed towards Bastet and the others, thinking that they’ve found good food.
Alas, their opponents were anything but.
One of them had its throat caught in Anubis’ jaws, before he slammed it down onto the ground powerfully. The fangs made from crystal materials easily bit through the goblin’s neck and robbed it of its life.
And the other two had their heads separated permanently from their bodies by Albus’ crystal sword, drawn out in an instant. It only took several seconds; it wasn’t even a proper fight.
“As expected, Albus-san. Well done.”
“No problem.”
While listening to Bastet’s compliment, Albus returned the sword to its scabbard.
“Anego! Anego! What about me?”
“Waa, amazing-.”
“Flat reading!? Put more love into it, please!”
Anubis began rolling around on the ground.
“Stop fooling around and start paying more attention to your surroundings. If it’s something like that earlier, we can handle it ourselves, but if something like a group of variants came attacking we’d have no choice but to retreat, you know.”
“Heii.”
If it’s one or two variants, then Albus can deal with them by itself. However, if they started calling in reinforcements, there’s no way Albus can fend them off with him alone.
If possible, they should defeat the variants as quickly as they can. It’s fine to stall for time since that’s exactly their mission this time.
Two days. If they’re lucky, they would be able to defend the “Sacred Tree” without encountering any variants. After that, they can just leave it to the sovereign and others.
While glancing at the “Sacred Tree” producing sparkling magic particles besides her, Bastet began paying attention to her surroundings as well.
The mace and the halberd clashed together. The two pa.s.sed through each other’s sides, made a U-turn, and came back once again to bring their weapons together.
Even though it should be hard to grasp a sense of balance, the two of them are performing perfectly.
In front of my eyes, two Frame Gears, one white, one blue, were fighting against each other while standing on top of a surfboard-like flying device. Brunhild’s knight order commander, Rain-san’s s.h.i.+ning Count and one of the vice-commander, Norn-san’s Blue Moon. Oops, it’s not Norn anymore but “Norue”, isn’t it.
It was the beastman vice-commander Norn-san who said that it’s confusing having two Norns, and changed her name on her own. Or rather, instead of changing her name, it’s apparently more of making her name sound like its correct p.r.o.nunciation. Which seems to be “Noruen”, or something.
With this, the two Norns have completely split apart; the master of the black [Crown] Norn, and the wolf beastman vice-commander of our knight order Norue. On a side note, I don’t know if having the same name had anything to do with it, but the two of them have a good relations.h.i.+p.
Even though Norn looks like a young girl but is surprisingly cool, while Norue-san looks grown- up but is still innocent on the inside; they’re pretty much polar opposites, so it’s surprising in a sense.
At this time, the white and blue knights stopped in place and began exchanging blows.
“As expected, when you fight while not standing on firm ground, you end up attacking with only your upper body, huh.”
“Well, they can’t jump around or do footworks, so it’s pretty tough. Models like Elze’s Gerhilde would be completely out of the question for this.”
While looking at the two’s combat, I replied to our other vice-commander, Nicola-san, who’s standing besides me.
The professor’s group also thought of ideas like making Elze’s Gerhilde combine with Linze’s Helmwige at first, but they also had to give up later on.
The flight units used in the fight against the Magicraft King were improved to operate over longer periods, and given to Yae and Hilda’s frames for use, and these “Flight Gears” are
fundamentally designed to be used by Knight Barons and Chevaliers. It’s not a good fit for Yumina and the others’ Valkyrias.
“Most of the flying variants are the type that attacks by charging in instead of staying in a spot and attacking like that, after all. In the end, I think it’s probably about how to dodge their attacks as they charge in, and how to land your own attacks on them during that timeframe.”
Contrary to the land-based variants, who move like beasts, the flying variants are better likened to swimming fishes instead of flying birds.
Most of them would utilize their tough bodies and charge straight in like a bullet. There are also types who like to shoot crystal arrows down, but those types generally have very slow movements. Basically, they’re artillery units.
The key to aerial battles against variants lies in seeing through the difference between the bullet-types and the artillery-types, and using that to our advantage.
“And conversely, it’s going to be hard to use that to deal with enemies on the ground, isn’t it.”
“If they fly too low, they’ll get in the way of other Frame Gears, after all. The only way would be for them to switch to s.h.i.+eld mode and go into ground battle…”
Deer. While talking with Nicola-san, I turned to look at the mechanical blue deer which is currently running about on the field.
Bigger than a Frame Gear by about one size, it’s our newest Over Gear, [Dea Blau].
Over Gears can only be operated by [Crown]s. Which means, the one that’s controlling that deer is the blue [Crown], [Distortion Blau]. Which means…
“Hey! This is amazing, isn’t it! It moves exactly like I want it to!”
Robert’s voice was projected out from the speakers. Towards that voice, the only one who reacted was his fiancée who came together with him, Celes. She’s clapping with a full-faced smile. They have such a good relations.h.i.+p, as usual.
Norn’s [Leo Noir] and Nia’s [Tiga Rouge] are pure offensive-type Over Gears. In comparison, Robert’s [Dea Blau] was designed to be a defensive type focusing on mobility.
The large horns extending out of its head can form magical barriers, with which it can protect its surroundings.
At the same time, it can also utilize those barriers to carry out ramming attacks.
The professor apparently couldn’t decide between a horse and a deer for a long time, before she settled on a deer.
Cooperation between the three crown holders… Would be a bit tough given who they are, but still, a pure increase in fighting force is to be appreciated. The fact that all three of them have a rampaging streak is a bit worrying, though.
“It’s made nicely, isn’t it? That [Dea Blau] was built to make the best use of the blue [Crown]’s golem skill, you know.”
Behind us, Professor Babylon came up together with Rosetta behind her. Her trademark ether stick was in her mouth as usual.
It looks like tobacco, but it’s actually an aroma that can relax the mind, or something. I keep feeling there might be some suspicious ingredients in there, though. Also, a young girl like the professor smoking is a bad image in terms of societal perceptions.
“Is it fine taking its golem skill into account? Wouldn’t it be dangerous…”
“That prince’s compensation is the least risky one, after all. Nia could die if she bleeds out too much, and Norn could regress all the way back into an embryo. However, in the case of that prince, he just falls asleep.”
“Is there nothing like falling into an eternal sleep for him?”
Of course, that’s still different from dying, I suppose. It’s just the possibility of whether he will fall asleep forever.
“That’s alright. I say we’re using Blau’s ability, but in actuality it’s just making use of a part of its powers, and he won’t die even if that happens. There are many ways we can wake him up with… On a side note, I havn’t slept in four days.”
The professor laughed “fufufu…” in a strange way. This is bad… I’ve made her do a lot of unreasonable things recently, after all.
The professor, who has the same kind of body as the Babylon Sisters, has a far higher level of endurance than normal humans. However, the brain inside her head is no different from a human’s. As such, she still requires things like sleep.
“Then don’t come over here and go sleep. You might even endanger your life, you know?”
Actually, that was the reason why the Guinness book of records no longer keep records for longest time gone without sleep. If they had continued recording that, someone might turn up dead one day.
“I want to finish my work properly before I sleep, you see. It’d be good if Touya-kun can give me a reward, seeing how hardworking I am, you know?”
“… What do you want?”
While being wary of the professor who’s staring at me with eyes lined with eyebags, I asked. I’m quite thankful of her, so as long as it isn’t anything too outlandish, I’m thinking of acquiescing.
“What, it’s nothing hard. Just spend a hot night with me, pa.s.sionately tangled—”
“I see you want me to make you fall asleep by force.”
Alright, huge nope-. Since it’s the pervert loli I didn’t expect much, but to think she came at me with a b.l.o.o.d.y straight ball of all things. It’s honestly kinda scary if she says that kind of things while smirking at me with panda eyes.
“Then hold me. Hug me I say, hug.”
The hurdle sure went down hard. Could this be one of those arts of negotiation, where one first throws out a huge demand that’s sure to fail, then pa.s.s through a second, much smaller demand that’s the true purpose? What was it, uhh, “door-in-the-face”?
I lightly held up the professor who was waiting with her arms spread wide in front of her.
“Gufufufufu. It’s been a long time, Touya-kun’s body… Nice. I’m getting excited.”
“… I’ll throw you off, you know.”
The professor put strength into her arms around my neck and her legs around my waist, clinging on harder. Are you a koala clinging onto a Eucalyptus tree!? This isn’t a hug anymore, it’s just her clinging onto me…
And just when I felt the force in her limbs disappearing all of a sudden, I began hearing a sleeper’s breath from her. Eh, wait a, oi.
“She’s asleep-de arimasuna.”
“Seriously…”
I let out a sigh when I heard the voice of Rosetta, who’s peeking at the professor from behind me. There’s no way I can throw her off like this… She’s not pretending to be asleep, is she?
“… It’s true that she worked hard-de arimasuyo.”
“Eh?”
“Five thousand years ago… The professor was originally a genius, so she only ever worked on things she’s interested in, and did whatever she wanted without caring about others at all-de arimasu.”
“Doesn’t sound a lot different from now…”
“No no. She’s never thought anything like ‘using her strengths for someone else’ a single time before this-de arimasuyo… It’s possible that the most important reason the professor crossed over five thousand years was to meet you-de arimasu.”
What’s with that heavy love. Well, she did help me a lot in various areas.
“And in the first place, the reason why we hold affectionate feelings towards you, Master, isn’t just because you’re the owner of Babylon, you know-de arimasuyo? Our personalities and way of thinking all came from that person over there in the first place, anyway-de arimasukara.”
Rosetta pointed at the sleeping professor and smiled. Mumu… That’s true. And in the first place, the Babylon system was made so that I’m literally the only one who can possibly become its master.
While saying “We’ll give it to you if you fulfill the conditions, you know?”, it’s actually a system designed exclusively with one person in mind from the beginning. If you think about it normally, that’s quite the fraud.
Using the [Jewel of Future Vision], the professor had learnt that no other person with all elemental apt.i.tudes would appear in the next five thousand years besides me. It would be perfectly natural for the professor to make it so that I would eventually get my hands on Babylon.
I wonder if everything concerning myself and Babylon were actually all set up by this person in the first place. Well, the current situation is favorable to us, so it’s fine, I guess.
“Also, this is a bit tough. Rosetta, is the back okay?”
“Yes-de arimasu.”
I transferred the sleeping professor to Rosetta who turned her back towards me for a piggyback.
“Let her sleep on a bed in the [Ramparts]. And, when she wakes up, can you help me tell her ‘thanks for everything’?”
“Oh? Is it finally the dere period?”
“No you idiot.”
While carrying the professor, Rosetta moved back to Babylon via short-range teleport.
Since she’s done this much already, I can’t really pull away from her anymore. I don’t feel like pulling away, anyway.
A few days later, we would march on Eisengard, and the battle against the evil G.o.d would begin.
I’ll definitely drag that guy out and end all this. To be honest, it’s what’s coming after that that has me worried. Like my wedding, and the G.o.d training.
Well, there’s no choice but to do it for me.
– Pixel