Interlude 3: Glen and Royz

Going back in time a bit...

Miss Micah, the foxwoman who was both a chef and Royz’s envoy, headed to the kitchen, and Chelsea followed to help. While they were gone, Royz and I talked about things we didn’t want them hearing.

“Ele had told me that it’d been a while since he met another [Reincarnator], so I knew that there had to be others, but I’d never expected to meet one,” I said.

“You’d be the sixth one I’ve met in all my years. It seems we appear every century or so.”

“You said you’d been ruling for a hundred years, didn’t you?”

“Yeah. Spent my first five hundred or so wandering, then I became the Emperor because I was so bored. Once I was, I had fun treating it like a town-building game, and before I knew it, it’d been a hundred years,” Royz said with a smirk.

“I’m smelling some things I sorely missed from the kitchen. Is Miss Micah making Japanese food?”

“Yup! I picked her up while I was wandering, and eventually when she awakened to the [Cooking] Skill, I taught her everything I knew. Now she can make all the Japanese, Chinese, and Western meals from our past lives.”

“So that’s where the medicinal cooking stuff came from...”

“By eating that, I kept myself going. No beastmen ever thought of eating such things. They’re all musclebrains, thinking they’re fine just eating salted meat...”

“So the current Emperor is a musclebrain too, huh...”

He sighed deeply when I said that. “I kept watch and gave him some advice for a while, but when my illness got worse, so did his attitude. Before I knew it, I’d been exiled.”

“He must’ve thought he could do it all without you.”

“That fake fortune teller was always with him, giving him advice. That probably made him think that. When I used my Sage-level [Appraisal] on him, I was shocked to see that his class was Swindler. Now that I think about it, there was something else weird there,” he said, looking into the distance as he remembered. “He also had ‘Worshiper of the Proxy, Driven by Envy’ as a second class, with ‘Blessing: Ash of the Spirit Tree of Origin’ showing. I ran out of mana and collapsed while I was trying to read the ash’s effect, so I don’t know anything else, but I wonder what it meant...”

“There are way too many words I’m interested in there,” I said, confused. “I don’t even know where to start. Who is the Proxy?”

“You know that many gods created the world back in the age of mythology, right?”

I nodded.

“The gods created the world, but the Proxy and Spirit King were the ones who brought it to prosperity. That’s what was written in the texts I could read once I became Emperor.”

I immediately looked over to the King of Spirit’s temporary kitten form, asking, “Really?”

Ele was looking down, but he nodded. «...There were various races in the world that the gods created, but nothing else. She and I worked tirelessly to make the world richer.»

“So the Proxy was a woman. Is she still in this world?”

«I do not know. I did not have a contract with Her, so I cannot sense Her location.»

“You helped Her without making a contract, huh...” muttered Royz.

Ele lifted his head, blinking. «Now that you mention it, that’s true. I used my powers to help Her, without ever making a contract. She was someone whose happiness made you want to lend your assistance... How strange...» After muttering that, he curled up on top of the box and fell asleep, seemingly telling us he wouldn’t say any more.

“Changing the subject here, but Chelsea’s Skill is really something.”

“Yeah... It’d be easy for her to destroy the world.”

“If she made a Charm seed or something, she could take it over.”

I froze at his suggestion. I hadn’t thought about that.

“And if she handed out seeds that could endlessly produce food while Radzuel is still in a famine, she might even be made a Saint.”

I had thought of that, so I nodded. “She’s promised to always talk to me before making seeds, and never to make any bad ones, but I don’t know how far it’d go...”

“That’s why I wanted to marry her... Jokingly. But she’d be under my protection here.”

“It’s true, just being under the King of Chronowize’s brother’s protection wouldn’t really mean much to other countries.”

Royz smirked. “The necklace I just gave her has my crest carved in it.”

“You don’t mean... Proof of your engagement?”

“Nope. Proof that I’m her guardian. Micah has the same one. Ask her later if you’re worried.”

I nodded, despite not fully believing him, and headed to the kitchen where the girls were.

“If you’re that worried, you should just propose yourself...”

I pretended I didn’t hear what he muttered...