Valkyrie's Shadow

Before the Storm: Act 8, Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Well, that was unexpectedly fruitful…

As twilight fell over the Sixth Floor of the Great Tomb of Nazarick, Ainz Ooal Gown, Supreme Overlord of said Tomb and sovereign of the Sorcerous Kingdom settled on a log in a bush outside of the arena. Standing a few steps away was Baroness Ludmila Zahradnik, who up until recently had been slowly crushing him under the weight of topics that mere salarymen like himself couldn’t hope to understand. All he could do was listen and ask questions, hoping he could steer the discussion away from eventually being made to offer a glimpse of the unfathomable wisdom that everyone somehow still thought he possessed.

Fortunately, his patience paid off and they drifted to a subject that he felt he could provide input on. It was one that had turned into something of a brick wall for him. Discussion on cultural events for the Sorcerous Kingdom resulted in one of two things: the NPCs would come up with something that had the singular purpose of exalting him and force every citizen in the Sorcerous Kingdom to participate, or his – albeit anonymous – suggestions would be marked as exceeding the threshold of inferior and the NPCs would unknowingly unleash all manner of scathing criticisms directly to his face.

Though he bore through it all behind the shelter of his well-practised regal bearing, it wasn’t the best thing for his self-confidence. That being said, his interest was rekindled when the Baroness broached the topic.

I even made improvements to the suggestion, like leaving out the gym uniforms part.

The natives wouldn’t know what they were, anyway.

“We’re back!”

Aura emerged from the trees without so much as a rustle of leaves, bearing a steaming plate of yakisoba. Mare followed in her footsteps, cradling a bowl of curry udon. Ainz sighed internally at the presentation of the tempting cuisine. While it was food from Earth, it wasn’t food that normal people ate. Eating cooked food was a luxury that only the wealthy could afford on a regular basis.

Indeed, the average labourer’s salary assumed that one ate nutrient paste three meals a day. Dinner consisting of a steak-flavoured gel pack plus supplement pills cost about 220 Yen. By contrast, the plate of fried noodles that Aura was holding would have handily cost a week of most people’s pay. Suzuki Satoru wasn’t counted as one of the impoverished, yet he still thought the price of real food outrageous and opted to save his money for other things.

“Yakisoba again, hm?”

“Un! It’s super addictive like the sign says!”

Ainz chuckled as the Dark Elf Ranger plopped herself onto the log beside him and started shovelling noodles into her mouth after a hurried ‘itadakimasu!’ Of course, everything about the tournament festival had been created using materials from Yggdrasil as a reference. They were idyllic scenes from the Earth that existed over a century before Suzuki Satoru’s time; one raised in his circumstances might consider it all quite fantastical. In a way, it was.

He didn’t pretend to be in any way knowledgeable about cooking, but he was fairly certain that the in-game recipes weren’t valid in the context of realistic preparation. There were too few ingredients and those few ingredients had absurd measurements. A stick of butter, a bag of sugar, and a bag of flour to make cookies, for instance. Ainz suspected it would be the case while he was investigating how Yggdrasil’s equipment crafting mechanisms operated in their New World, yet it still left him scratching his head. To make things worse, the way that the NPCs didn’t bat an eyelash at the strangeness of it all would have caused him to question his sanity if he didn’t already know that the natives cooked normally.

A long slurp sounded to his left, followed by a surprised sound from Mare. Lady Zahradnik reacted instantly, leaning forward to dab at his jacket with a handkerchief.

“There’s no need to rush your meal, my lord,” she said, then frowned at the yellow spots left behind. “This one in particular leaves behind some terrible stains.”

“I got curry in my eye,” Mare whined.

In response, the Baroness retrieved a white towel from the satchel on her hip. Motes of magic washed over Mare as she activated the item. Mare blinked several times before resuming his meal at a distinctly less hurried pace.

“You’re quite good with children,” Ainz noted.

“I-Is that so?” The Baroness replied as she drew a loose lock of chestnut hair over her ear, “I suppose I had plenty of experience with them growing up in a small village. Most of my lord father’s subjects had to tend to their work afield. People are more cautious on the frontier, so one doesn’t see children helping their parents far from the village like in safer territories until they’re quite a bit older.”

“These two are usually quite independent,” Ainz said, “but I worry about them nonetheless. One day, I hope I can find some other Dark Elves for them to mingle with.”

He glanced at the twins to see if they reacted in some way to his statement, but both were entirely focused on their meals. Once they were done, they took the teleportation gate to the Tenth Floor. The curtseying forms of Yuri and Solution shifted into view amidst the familiar scenery of the foyer.

“Thank you for your hard work, Ainz-sama,” Yuri said.

“Umu,” he responded with a regal nod. “Are there any urgent notices that I should be made aware of?”

“Not to our knowledge,” Yuri replied. “Were you expecting something in particular?”

“Ah, no. Just making sure. I’ll be in Ashurbanipal if anyone comes looking for me. Oh, by the way, is that fellow lurking in the library?”

“That fellow…?” Yuri furrowed her brow and adjusted her empty spectacles, “Ah, you mean the library’s other guest. No, he retired to his suite with a stack of books after Baroness Zahradnik’s first visit and hasn’t been seen or heard from since.”

“I see.”

“Shall I fetch him for you?”

“No! Ahem, I mean, no. I was merely curious. There’s no reason to bother him if he’s so immersed in his studies.”

“As Ainz-sama commands.”

That’s the biggest worry out of the way…

The last thing he needed was to get trapped in an awkward discussion with a crazy Wizard. When they reached the Great Library, Librarian J guided them to a study attached to the Hall of Wisdom. It appeared that the Baroness had reserved it for long-term use as there were already piles of materials organised across the long table in the centre of the room.

“I see you’ve been quite busy,” Ainz said.

“There is just so much in Ashurbanipal that I despair over how little time I have here, Your Majesty,” Lady Zahradnik replied.

“Mah, it isn’t as if you’ve only been allowed one visit,” Ainz told her. “There’s plenty of time to learn.”

“What I meant was that I have come across many things that demand my immediate attention,” the Baroness said. “It has gotten to the point where I am afraid of making mistakes that could have easily been avoided by studying the right materials.”

“…do you have any examples of what you’re referring to?”

The Great Library of Ashurbanipal was filled with the combined contributions of Ainz Ooal Gown’s members. In addition to ten years of accumulated game items populating the shelves, there were tens of thousands of real books. Most had been added on a whim to simply give the shelves the appearance of having actual reading material, though what every guild member had added tended to line up with their preferences or real-world experience.

Baroness Zahradnik walked around the table to pick up a stack of papers on the far end. She frowned slightly as she flipped through the sheets, then picked up a loose page on the table.

“Rather than citing any specific example, Your Majesty,” she said, “I struggle to comprehend the whole of it. Though I say that, I understand enough that I cannot help but be compelled to learn more. My effort to comprehend the world conveyed through these tomes is divided into grasping the philosophical foundations of the people presented, their beliefs, and the reality of their circumstances. The tomes I have gathered tell the story of a world more dark and alien than anything I have ever encountered before.”

What is she reading again?

Ainz picked up the nearest book and scanned the silver lettering on its cover.

“The 100 Landscapes of Shōwa…” He murmured, “I believe this is one of Blue Planet’s contributions.”

“Blue Planet, Your Majesty?”

“One of my comrades from back in the day,” the Sorcerer King told her. “He was the Druid who designed the Sixth Floor. Hmm…it looks like you’ve picked up many of his additions.”

He picked up another book, struggling to decipher the English on the cover for a few seconds before giving up. He flipped it open to find pictures of mountains and forests that were allegedly from Earth’s past. It was probably a foreign photobook his friend had found on the internet somewhere. As was characteristic of Blue Planet, the books he added to the library mostly contained nice scenery. He sometimes spoke at length about some complicated topics, but they didn’t make much sense to Suzuki Satoru or anyone else in the guild, for that matter.

“In that case,” the young noblewoman said, “I would be delighted if you would be so kind as to dispel some of the confusion that has built up over the past few days.”

Confusion? What’s so confusing about scenery?

“I can’t guarantee that I can clarify things for you,” Ainz said, “but what was it that you were having trouble with?”

“Please make yourself comfortable, Your Majesty,” the Baroness said as she pulled out a seat for him. “I suppose my first question is what races are involved in these records?”

“…races?”

“Yes, Your Majesty. While the information does not explicitly name any single race, there are ‘sides’ to the information that frame things quite differently. Sometimes, it is to the point where the narratives presented are contradictory. They will even try to defame and suppress one another. At the least, they’re the perspectives of several factions that seem to foster irreconcilable views.”

What was she talking about? Ainz’s gaze went to Aura and Mare, who had taken their seats on one side of the table.

“What’s your take on this?” He asked.

“I think she has the right idea, Ainz-sama,” Aura said. “The stuff that we went through is all over the place. At first, I didn’t think there could be anything so stupid in the Great Library, but Lady Zahradnik said that history is filled with surprisingly stupid people.”

“History, eh…in that case, what is this history you’ve been studying?”

The Baroness took a seat on her side of the table. She tapped her fingers on the polished tabletop for a few seconds before answering.

“A history of folly, perhaps. One where the truth was discarded in favour of any number of comforting or convenient fabrications. The problem at the moment is that we do not know what the truth behind all of these historical narratives is.”

“The results should speak for themselves should they not?” Ainz asked.

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“That is the strangest part of it all, Your Majesty,” Baroness Zahradnik answered. “Every source appears to agree on a few common things. The earth and water were ruined and the very air choked people to death. Few survived and those who did had no choice but to subsist on what limited resources were left. Beyond that, no one can seem to agree on what happened and few are interested in improving their situation.”

I guess this is what happens when you read Blue Planet’s stuff. Well, I guess I can see how Druids and Rangers would be attracted to it.

He hadn’t given the matter much thought previously, but the Great Library of Ashurbanipal was stuffed full of things that the New World’s natives would have trouble comprehending.

“Are you worried that the same thing might happen here?”

“To begin with,” Lady Zahradnik replied, “I cannot even imagine how this cataclysm was allowed to happen. Never mind the myriad factions pointing the finger of blame in every direction, other countries and different races would have surely declared a war of extermination against this threat to their survival. The civilisation described here was already suffering from devastating conflicts both between member states and domestically for the same reason.”

“Let’s just say that the civilisation and race spoken of in these histories was the dominant power,” Ainz said. “No external enemy would have been able to affect any change to their course.”

“So, even without an external threat driving them to this self-destructive end, they still decided to tread the path of ruin.”

“You may say that,” Ainz said, “but wasn’t the result inevitable?”

The young noblewoman stared at him for so long that he thought he might have broken something with his question. To the side, Aura and Mare seemed to share in her confusion.

“…I believe that is one of the prevalent narratives of the major factions that we’ve studied,” Lady Zahradnik finally said, “but much of that narrative flies in the face of common sense.”

It does?

“Additionally,” she continued, “much of what is written appears to reflect the platform of a demagogue, except it has progressed to a state that is far worse than any rabble-rouser that one might find in a city square. The vast majority of the narrative appears focused on discrediting other factions, fearmongering, and appealing to the base desires of the reader. To make things even stranger, the promise of future technological breakthroughs as solutions to an imminent problem are the main avenue of comfort while behaviours that they cultivated on the way to the problem continue to be promoted.”

“That much should be normal, shouldn’t it?”

“Not in my experience, Your Majesty,” the Baroness said. “A Farmer who foolishly depletes the soil may see a short-term increase in yields by purchasing superior equipment, but the gains are only temporary and their once-fertile fields will transform into wasteland. The true solution is understanding how the land functions and working within its limits.”

“What if magic is used to replenish the soil?” Mare asked.

“Then the magic caster becomes part of the system,” Lady Zahradnik answered. “That system still has its limits. Speaking of which, the civilisation covered in these histories is quite primitive. They’re even worse than Re-Estize. There is absolutely no mention of magic, nor is there any indication that the realities of class specialisation have been woven into the fabric of their society. It is as if everyone is ‘Level Zero’, so to speak.”

How do I even respond to that?

Of course, there was no magic on Earth; nor were there Levels or Job Classes. There were specialists on Earth, but being one didn’t grant any fantastical abilities like they did here. Even a common Farmer could mysteriously produce a larger crop than an Elder Lich directing Skeleton labour.

“It is the past after all,” Ainz said as he let his gaze wander over the books on the table. “Nothing stays the same forever and it would be quite pitiful if there was no such thing as progress.”

“Then it must be from some distant past…or perhaps some part of the world that is even more of a backwater than this region. No, that still does not make any sense…”

“Why is that?”

“Because there are elemental forces at work in the world that would not allow what is described here to come to pass so easily,” the Baroness answered. “Doing things like clearing forests would surely invite the wrath of the forest’s inhabitants. Since these people seem quite weak and primitive, I imagine that someone like the Wise King of the Forest would be an impossible obstacle for them.”

Ainz briefly imagined Hamsuke squaring up against an MBT from the Arcology Wars. Would she win? Even the weak magic that she used for hunting could be used to charm the tank’s crew. A Scorpion Drone couldn’t be charmed, but he doubted that its weaponry was sufficient to damage Hamsuke through her deceptively cuddly fur.

He shook his head free of wandering thoughts. Wondering how the technology from his former existence would stack up against various things in their New World was a rabbit hole he had wasted far too much time on in the past.

“If this civilisation is so weak and primitive,” Ainz said, “how are they relevant to us?”

“It is their behaviour that concerns me, Your Majesty,” Lady Zahradnik replied. “Throughout the passage of time, knowledge and technology may advance or decline, but the nature of a people is, well, their nature. The coming preeminence of the Sorcerous Kingdom may put us in a position where, much like the civilisation in these histories, no one can stop us should we end up on some unthinkably destructive path.”

“…I did mention that this calamity was inevitable, didn’t I? If I recall correctly, the world was coming out of an ice age and the civilisation that you’re studying rose during more temperate times. As things heated up, the environment became increasingly inhospitable.”

“Yet many of these books claim that it was a preventable tragedy,” the young noblewoman swept her hand over the table. “Their opponents spend so much time trying to attack what is being claimed and applying all sorts of derogatory labels to them that one can only wonder if there is something to it.”

Dammit, Blue Planet…

While he most often came across as someone who pined after the unspoiled views of the distant past, Blue Planet’s passion for nature landed him in some crazy places. His belief in the many hoaxes propagated during the Twentieth and Twenty-First Centuries often angered his fellow guild members whenever he brought them up. During their Nine’s Own Goal days, Touch Me had become so infuriated with Blue Planet that he had nearly kicked him from the guild, calling him an ‘insane treehugger’, a ‘science denying hippy’, and a ‘crackpot conspiracy theorist’.

Blue Planet’s views always angered the most educated people in the guild, and for good reason. According to Punitto Moe, those very same hoaxes and conspiracy theories fragmented society, allocating resources, talent, political will, and precious time away from the governments and corporations that were trying to preserve as much of humanity as they could. Billions of people who could have been saved perished as a result and the remainder were subjected to a much lower quality of life.

“Well,” Ainz decided to distance them from the contentious topic, “as I mentioned, our present reality is very different from the one you’ve been studying. We have access to magic, for one thing. Weather can be manipulated and the soil can be revitalised.”

“What of the problems that exist on the other end of the spectrum, Your Majesty?”

“Are there any that you’re particularly concerned with?” Ainz asked.

“When it comes to issues we are already dealing with,” the young noblewoman answered, “overpopulation is the most pressing issue. With the sudden takeover of the Abelion Wilderness last spring, we are running a massive meat deficit. Lady Aura mentioned that we have the means to supply what is required for the time being, but, the sooner the Sorcerous Kingdom secures a conventional supply of sustenance, the better. The problem is that being self-sufficient in this aspect would force us to convert vast swathes of territory into ranges for livestock. Trade is the other avenue we could explore, but that would leave us with a huge trade deficit. Lady Shalltear has told us that for no reason should net flows of gold ever be allowed to go negative.”

Aura and Mare nodded empathetically at the latter part of Lady Zahradnik’s summary, which was to be expected. To the NPCs, the Sorcerous Kingdom was first and foremost a source of revenue for the Great Tomb of Nazarick. They were all quite enthusiastic when it came to improving that source of revenue and incensed by the thought that Nazarick might lose gold over it.

“I take it that you are against repurposing large parts of our territory for the purposes of providing this meat,” Ainz said.

“I am, Your Majesty,” the Baroness replied, “but, more importantly, the residents of those territories would not appreciate their land being stolen from them.”

“Fair enough,” Ainz nodded, “but how long will it take us to eliminate this food deficit using other methods?”

The item used to supplement their food supplies – Dagda’s Cauldron – produced a food item when one tossed a Yggdrasil Gold Coin into it. After Cocytus had subjugated the Lizardmen and taken them as vassals, it was used to alleviate the Lizardman Alliance’s ongoing food shortages. Back then, one coin produced one fish. That fish, in turn, fed one adult Lizardman for one day.

Pandora’s Actor was quick to point out the potential hazard that the item presented to the guild treasury. Dagda’s Cauldron was designed to provide a small group of players with spawnable ingredients for food recipes, not feed real population centres. The Lizardman Alliance Village had several thousand adult members, meaning that they consumed several thousand Yggdrasil Gold Coins per day. By the end of their first year under Nazarick’s rule, the Lizardmen had eaten over a million gold coins’ worth of fish through Dagda’s Cauldron. Slowly, but surely, more and more fish farms were coming online to eliminate the Lizardmen’s dependency on Nazarick, but the idea that a single tribal village could go through so much gold was painful to consider.

I really wasn’t thinking when I promised Ainzach that the citizens wouldn’t be allowed to eat one another…

The rapid expansion of the Sorcerous Kingdom came with an explosion in its Demihuman population. In less than a year, they had gone from feeding a few thousand Lizardman mouths a day to hundreds of thousands, and then millions. Since he had promised prosperity to those who submitted to his rule, he had little choice but to watch the treasury haemorrhage millions of gold a day. The worst part was that the fact that the Demihuman tribes no longer ate one another meant that their populations only grew.

With Nazarick’s defences on ‘economy mode’, the guild base’s income generation was more than sufficient to feed those numbers indefinitely. Making it much worse was to be avoided, however. Demiurge’s move to cull the vast majority of the Abelion Hills’ population was taken precisely for that reason.

“That is a question better asked of my friends,” Baroness Zahradnik said. “Personally, I am far more concerned about the problems that the Sorcerous Kingdom may create while it attempts to solve its existing problems.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“Take our meat deficit, for instance. While we might decline to clear land for livestock in favour of preserving our territories, the fact of the matter is that someone has to come up with the meat somehow even if we trade for it. Because trade has a disturbing way of blinding all parties to the repercussions of the very activities that they incentivise, what we may consider normal economic activity may result in unintended consequences.”

As a salaryman who had worked in sales, Ainz had been fairly confident he could hold his own when she broached the topic of trade. Almost immediately, however, she proposed a conundrum that was unknown to him.

“Let us say that the Sorcerous Kingdom begins generating a trade surplus,” the young noblewoman continued. “A sizeable portion of that surplus will go toward reducing our meat deficit, but how does that happen in practice?”

“Merchants will facilitate the exchange of commodities so long as the demand the Sorcerous Kingdom creates presents them with the most attractive trade routes.”

It was a simple enough question. At least two-thirds of Suzuki Satoru’s work dealt with entertaining or soliciting prospective customers who were in the market for his company’s goods. Nothing was more annoying than losing contracts to competitors, but, in the Sorcerous Kingdom’s case, they were a huge new market that presented opportunities to everyone who wanted a piece of the proverbial pie. He couldn’t see what was wrong with that.

“That is true,” the Baroness said, “but consider the fact that the previous ‘supply’ for this market was everyone eating one another. Our laws have created a previously nonexistent market in a very short timeframe and the supply for it simply does not exist. Feeding one of our citizens means that someone else starves simply because we can pay more.”

“I can see that being an immediate consequence,” Ainz nodded, “but it’s a temporary situation, isn’t it?”

“Oh, yes, Your Majesty,” Baroness Zahradnik smirked, “dying tends to reduce one’s demand for food to zero. Those people will not just let starvation take them, however.”

“So you mean to say that the mere process of feeding our people will cause strife beyond our borders. But, again, it should be a temporary problem. Industry will inevitably expand to meet the demands of our population.”

“Which is also a source of strife,” Lady Zahradnik noted. “The expansion of this particular industry means converting land to raise livestock on. Just like in the Sorcerous Kingdom, there is no such thing as uninhabited land – the only people who claim such things are those who consider beings outside of their civilisation as entities who can be trampled without consequence. Countless conflicts will be sparked as people are displaced to create room for livestock. I suppose the most opportunistic of these ventures would see the displaced populations as an additional commodity to sell us. An ideal one, as they have invested nothing into their growth. On that note, we may fuel war economies abroad in a similar fashion.”

“War economies…”

“Yes, Your Majesty. The more valuable food becomes, the more lucrative it will be to depopulate villages, towns, and cities, selling their inhabitants as meat. A war between two countries may see both sides selling conquered populations as both a way to finance their operations and clear room for their citizens. Since our citizens do not question Beastmen from the Draconic Kingdom Campaign being fed to them, I can imagine people elsewhere being similarly unquestioning about how their meals are being procured.”

When she put it that way, the optics were potentially quite bad. He had always considered the image of a prosperous nation to be a positive one, but, the way that they were going, it sounded like war and suffering would become the Sorcerous Kingdom’s harbinger. It was far from the friendly presentation that he wanted other Players to see.

Aura raised her hand.

“I have a question,” she said. “If these outsiders don’t care what they’re eating, then why should we? Ainz-sama’s already laid out the rules, so we should play by them.”

“A valid question, my lady,” the young noblewoman admitted. “My answer is that the justice of a kingdom is the truest reflection of its character. Through both statement and policy, His Majesty has conveyed the intent to create an exemplar amongst nations. One that stands as a beacon of harmony and prosperity to all who might lay their eyes upon it. Does this continue to be true, Your Majesty?”

“Yes, of course,” Ainz replied.

“Then the first true challenge to Your Majesty’s will for the Sorcerous Kingdom already stands before us,” Lady Zahradnik said. “How will this challenge be answered? In what form will the Sorcerer King’s justice be made manifest?”

The unexpected question froze Ainz in his seat. In truth, it wasn’t something that he had ever seriously considered. Most of the time, Nazarick could just power through any problem or avoid being implicated in subversive and damaging activities. Now that they were a very visible country, however, the effects of the country’s existence were all too easy to observe.

How could he flub his way to an appropriate answer? Judging by Baroness Zahradnik’s intense gaze, he didn’t think he could escape without providing her with one.

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