Bonus Story: From the Notes of a Certain Priest

Bonus Story:
From the Notes of a Certain Priest

 

HELLO, I’M LAPIS. Just your average, everyday demon.

You might say that introducing myself as a demon contradicts my claim to be average, and in fact, a lot of people (humans, that is) think so. But get a large enough group of any people together, and it makes sense that most of them would be average, no?

Putting all that philosophizing aside, you may be wondering why a normal, healthy little demon girl is writing this meaningless spiel. Well, it all started one morning when my parents suddenly kicked me out of the house, saying I needed to go see the wider world.

 

It has just occurred to me that there’s something I need to do apart from expanding my knowledge base. Yes, certain events led up to my expulsion from my home, and I think that is probably my most pressing issue.

To tell you the truth, my arms, legs, and eyes are all elaborate imitations. One of the reasons I ventured out into the world was to reclaim the real ones, but this and that happened, and I’d ultimately forgotten all about it. When I think back on it now, a part of me wonders if it doesn’t really matter… Their absence doesn’t really impede my daily functions, so I can hardly be blamed for forgetting about them.

But, well, now that I think about it, I get the feeling that I have a vague sense of where those pieces of me are. They were replaced with fakes, but they were taken in such a way that they could be easily reattached. They weren’t completely removed, in short, and there’s nothing strange in me knowing where a part of me is.

I have decided to consult Mr. Loren on the matter.

 

Before bringing this discussion to Loren, I needed to see if there were any quests at the guild that might bring us to one of the locations where I needed to go. Rather than telling him I wanted to go somewhere specifically for my own benefit, I concluded that it would be far more reasonable to make the search a detour on a larger quest.

Luckily, I found a convenient assignment. I brought it over, asked him to come with me, and received his hearty consent. Which is to say, we are going to go to an adventurer training academy together. Our objective awaits us in the labyrinth beneath the school.

Now, while our official objective involves observing potential graduates and walking around the labyrinth with them, that is merely a front, and one in which I have barely any interest. I fully intend to finish this swiftly so that I can get to my real goal. I pray the job ends without a hitch.

 

Labyrinths come in all shapes and sizes. Some are fully artificial, while others spring up in nature. Even the natural variety range from those that really did sprout up by complete coincidence to those formed by magic, or even those that are the work of certain creatures. In any case, there are all sorts.

The one beneath the academy would have to be somewhere between artificial and natural. I don’t have much experience with labyrinths, so it did draw my interest ever so slightly. But there was a problem.

This school is apparently the same one that Mr. Claes attended. We heard it from the horse’s mouth on the way here. My evaluation of Mr. Claes is practically in the negatives, numerically speaking, and the simple fact that this was his school has rather ruined it for me. However, it does seem that Mr. Claes has shed a bit of his arrogance, and he’s thus far managed to act with more modesty. To my shock and surprise.

I suspect the cause lies with Mr. Loren—who cut him down to size the last time we worked together, then saved Mr. Claes’s loved ones. How lovely to see the boy take the less trodden path of actually using the opportunities given to him to better himself.

In short, Mr. Claes holds many gifts and is blessed with more fortune. Though I get the feeling he would be better off getting stabbed in some back alley rather than reforming—for the sake of all the world’s women, you see.

Ah, of course, I don’t mean that I want Mr. Loren to stab him. Even if he is the enemy of all women, Mr. Claes has the backing of a substantially powerful organization, and even without that, I wouldn’t want to make a criminal of Mr. Loren.

 

I was pondering these matters as we met the headmaster—an enormous man who I couldn’t believe was a member of humankind. We received information on the students who were scheduled to graduate, and as luck would have it, a group that Loren had saved at a bar was among them.

Loren chose them, presumably thinking it was fate or something like it. For my part, I feel it doesn’t matter who we work with, but I got the feeling it would be a bit easier if we could skip the introductions.

If I must say something, though, not only do these children lack even a modicum of practical vigilance, they are appallingly behaved. Should I leave them in a corner of the labyrinth? Oh, no, I won’t. I won’t, but why do so many kids out there have to make me feel so inclined to do such things?

 

We entered the labyrinth with the children. To my surprise, one of the students tried to put the moves on Mr. Loren. I apologize for contradicting my previous remarks, but I really did feel like ensuring she never leaves these tunnels.

I held the feeling down.

The situation was clearly wrong from the moment we entered. Whatever monsters appeared were weakened beyond recognition. I could only imagine some process has malfunctioned within the labyrinth; the whole place reeked of trouble.

How about you try returning alive instead of focusing on your graduation, people? I found myself thinking.

Unfortunately, on top of the monsters we ran into being weak, we hardly ran into any monsters at all. The winds of good fortune carried these students so very easily to their goal.

Even if they clear this trial and become adventurers, I don’t expect them to live long, and I don’t think I’m alone there. The students we’re supervising refused to be satisfied with reaching their goal of the end of the fifth floor—they declared that they would make it all the way to the bottom.

This was convenient to me, and I felt I didn’t have to inform them that they were biting off more than they could chew, or that they would be their own ruin. However they met their end would have nothing to do with me. I was merely delighted that I would be able to make it to my goal at the bottom without any tomfoolery—when we suddenly faced an outbreak of slimes.

Alone, a slime is a lump of mucus without intellect. Once found, they can be dealt with by crushing their core or burning them. Unfortunately, they are a dire threat in large numbers, especially in enclosed spaces.

Faced with too many slimes for even Mr. Loren to slash away, our only option was to run, and we were forced to sprint every which way across the labyrinth. To add more problems to the mix, my arms and legs acted up, and I yet again had to trouble Mr. Loren with the burden of my body.

I’m sure this mass outbreak is somehow related to my failing limbs. Numerous phenomena can produce a slime, but they most naturally emerge in places with strong mana disruption. So many slimes means a considerable mana disturbance, and that is probably what is impeding my limbs, which require mana to operate.

Not that realizing this is any consolation.

 

About those slimes. I didn’t know why but they quit chasing us and disappeared somewhere. I figured they’d found some other prey. I felt lucky—I did—but a strange presence lurking in the shadows kept me wary.

During our flight, we met up with Mr. Claes, who had been proctoring a different set of students, and together we headed to the bottom floor with a student who had been nearly swallowed. The golem in front of the door had somehow been deactivated, and I knew then that something terrible was about to happen.

I nevertheless managed to find that piece of me—my left arm, by the way—on the final floor easily enough. I wondered whether that meant a little of my original power would return to me. The more power I had, the higher the chance of my identity being revealed, so I knew I would need to act more covertly.

Once I no longer have to work to contain myself, I will finally be first-rate.

In any case, I hoped that would be the end of the matter, but for some reason, the students we proctored suddenly raised the flag of rebellion. One of them declared that he would revive a dark god and become its priest. We managed to take out those arrogant little bigmouths remarkably painlessly, but to my surprise, a dark god really did revive.

That was a first, even for me. Luckily for us, the god who woke up described himself as the god of sloth. Mr. Downer Acedia stated that fighting was a pain and chose to run away instead, though he left us a massive slime as a parting gift.

It would have been surpassingly easy to burn it away, but given our location, that wasn’t the best option. A student was swallowed up as we were dithering, and of all things, Mr. Loren was swallowed as well. Everyone else aside, I couldn’t just overlook Mr. Loren becoming slime feed.

No matter what sort of damages I accrued, I very well intended to burn that slime to the ground if Mr. Loren hadn’t stopped me. I was confident he could have dealt with freeing himself from a single mid-sized slime, but I knew being swallowed by such a large one meant it would take more than physical strength to break free.

I was sure it would be impossible even for Mr. Loren, and yet…

Just how much strength does he have to be able to swing around his sword while so constricted? What’s more, his swings whittled the slime down, and I know I’m not one to say this, but he hardly seemed human.

He cut and cleaved until he had destroyed the slime’s core. I didn’t think he had transcended his humanity, but there was definitely something wrong with his body. Once he had run out of strength and collapsed, I was consumed by an impulse to examine every inch of him. However, I knew I needed to carry him to a hospital as soon as I could, so I held in my curiosity and escaped.

And that was the end to that job.

 

I think I’ll end things at that.

Mr. Loren really needs to do something about how he keeps ending up hospitalized after every job, but here I am, thinking a quest isn’t truly over until I have him on a sickbed. I think it’s all right to leave him as he is, at least as long as his life isn’t in danger.

For now, I’ll put down my pen until our next adventure.