Chapter 88
88. Sleeping Together
Actually, Eleanor is fairly good at respecting boundaries.
She tries to grope me whenever she gets the chance and leans in, saying we should sleep together—but if I refuse, she eventually gives up.
So as long as we'd promised to really just hold hands and sleep, she wouldn't try anything weird.
Probably.
Or not?
Honestly, I wasn't completely sure, but if Eleanor tried to pull anything stupid, I could just stop her by force.
The invitation to sleep together had been meant to see whether it could solve her insomnia, so there was no need to worry over nothing.
And I wasn't even at the stage to worry about that yet. Sleep is for nighttime, and it's still broad daylight.
After that, Eleanor roughly explained the situation of the war between the three major factions.
First, the human kingdom army, which had developed at a terrifying pace over the past hundred years, declared war on the elves under the pretext of reclaiming their territory.
I heard that the Great Forest where the elves had settled was considered part of the human kingdom's territory.
But it hadn't actually been under effective control for a long time, and they seem to think this was their chance to drive out the elves and seize the forest.
The problem is that to reach the High Elves' Great Forest, you have to pass through Dark Elf territory.
And the kingdom army called the High Elves and Dark Elves together a nonhuman faction occupying their territory.
In other words, they meant to attack the Dark Elves and High Elves alike without distinguishing between them.
And geographically, the Dark Elves would naturally be hit first, so it looked like the elves ought to unite and stop the kingdom army.
Those insane, goddamn elf bastards didn't unite at all—instead, they suddenly declared war on the Dark Elves.
Only the Dark Elves, still completely in the dark, ended up fighting a two-front war without even a declaration of war.
“Of course, we gave them the pretext first. We just didn't make the declaration; the war had already started before then.”
Right. If they had been attacked outright, Eleanor wouldn't be worn down this much.
“But even so, those forest freaks' declaration of war was a little... strange in a lot of ways.”
Well, it had been a hundred-year war, so there were probably all kinds of tangled threads. At this point, the original pretext probably didn't matter anymore.
Honestly, leaving the elves aside, the fact that a human kingdom had kept a war going for a hundred years was already abnormal.
It also seemed less like the Dark Elf camp was getting dogpiled from two sides and more like the three sides were all tangled up, fighting each other.
“You... are planning to go fight, aren't you?”
Eleanor noticed what I was thinking right away and said with a worried expression.
I nodded.
Thanks to a hundred years of development, the kingdom army on the 9th floor was stronger than the ones on Floors 7 and 8.
And among them, there would naturally be forces as strong as Eleanor or Mercedes. Otherwise, the balance would be off.
I've already gotten strong enough, so it's not like I especially want to take them on—but I don't have any reason not to fight either.
“It feels a little ridiculous saying this to someone who's grown stronger over the last hundred years, but don't die.”
Even Eleanor, who used to love the smell of blood clinging to my body, is saying things like this after a hundred years.
Come to think of it, that's pretty funny too.
**
Even if the war has lasted a hundred years, individual battles don't last a hundred years.
Aside from this fortress, the Dark Elf territory extends farther, and I heard that sporadic skirmishes were breaking out here and there in each region.
Of course, the enemies' ultimate goal is still to take this fortress, so whatever happens, it's certain they'll come this way.
And the scouts' job is to spot them a step ahead and intercept them. I decided to take on that role as well.
Once we moved a little outside the village, to an area where the fog wouldn't interfere, the enemy came into view right away.
Judging by the flags, they were definitely the kingdom army. But something about their composition was odd.
“What is that, a zombie?”
Whether undead or monsters, anyway, there were nonhuman creatures mixed in among the army.
No, if anything, there were more monsters than people.
I could see a few mages in the enemy ranks, and it looked like they were controlling or commanding the monsters in some special way.
Come to think of it, if they'd kept the war going for a hundred years, they must have needed a way to conserve manpower.
If they captured monsters, trained them, and sent them to the battlefield, they could save not just soldiers but weapons too.
“How many mages are there... let's see.”
First, I tried to spread my mana lightly and sense the enemy's numbers accurately.
-Kiiing!
But then, with a strange sound, my detection was cut off. At the same time, one of the monsters let out a shriek.
-Greeeek!
They must have prepared some kind of means to block detection. A surprise attack is off the table.
“■■■■, ■■■!”
When the kingdom army mage shouted some unidentified spell-like words, the monsters' momentum changed.
They must have sensed my presence and gone into battle formation. Good, let's see what you've got.
I equipped my sword and shield and stepped forward. The monster unit started charging the moment they spotted me.
-Thwack!
I lightly kicked the leading monster and sent it flying far away.
The flying monster slammed into a tree several times and went tumbling down, but the other monsters charged in without caring.
A human, not an elf, had shown up and sent a monster flying, but there was no sign of the assault stopping.
The mages either hadn't noticed what was happening, or they'd noticed but couldn't stop the monsters, or something like that.
I had half expected that since they were an army, they'd make some strategic move, but I guess not.
-Shwaack!
Then I instantly sliced through the neck of the monster rushing at me and shoved my way through their formation with my shield.
In a fight where it's one against many, it's better to break in and wipe them out like this than to trade blows.
My level still hasn't been going up lately, but it looks like I'll be doing a lot of hunting for the first time in a while.
**
My level still didn't go up this time. As expected, my level is too high for this floor.
Even with the monster unit count easily over a hundred, this was the result, so I shouldn't expect to level up for a while.
Even if leveling up isn't going well, I'm still improving my stats little by little through my own training, so it's not a big deal.
After wiping out the monsters like that, I returned to the fortress and got ready to share a bed with Eleanor—putting it that way sounds a little strange.
Anyway, I got ready for bed. First, a bath, since I'd come back soaked in monster blood.
Even in wartime, the Dark Elves' bath was still excellent. If anything, it felt even better than before.
The bath was larger overall, and maybe because they'd mixed herbs or something into it, it felt like my fatigue was melting away too.
Ah, the Dark Elves' mixed-bathing culture was still going strong.
The Dark Elves who liked humans kept coming up to me without caring that I was naked, which was troublesome in all sorts of ways.
Anyway, after finishing my bath, I finally got into bed with Eleanor in the castle bedroom.
“......”
I had agreed to it, but was this really okay?
If Eleanor weren't wearing that negligee, I probably wouldn't have felt this awkward.
“Come now, you must be tired too, so lie down already. My bed is very comfortable.”
“Uh, um.”
“Don't be so scared. I told you, we'll really just hold hands and sleep.”
Eleanor grabbed my hand and pulled me in. In the end, I lay down beside her and ended up looking up at the ceiling.
I didn't know whether the promise to really just hold hands and sleep was true, but as soon as Eleanor lay down, she took my hand and interlaced our fingers.
“If a surprise attack happens in the middle of the night, we'll have to get up right away anyway. There won't even be time for anything between a man and a woman.”
Come to think of it, a ruler in wartime probably wouldn't have time to relax like that. Probably.
-Fwoosh.
At Eleanor's gesture, all the lights in the room went out. I obediently lay there and closed my eyes.
I closed my eyes, but I had no intention of just going to sleep like this.
I intended to meditate and circulate my mana instead.
Eleanor, who really did lie down right beside me while holding only my hand, breathed softly before speaking in a small voice.
“My dear.”
“Why?”
“Are you really human?”
“What about it?”
“Don't humans only live for a hundred years?”
“Generally, yes.”
“I see.”
Eleanor moved her lips as if hesitating over something. If she didn't ask first, I wasn't going to say anything either.
While fighting during the day, I spent a lot of time wondering whether I should tell Eleanor about my story.
I worried and worried, but I still didn't have an answer.
Leaving aside the fact that she's an NPC, I was wondering whether this was really something I should tell Eleanor.
As for my own feelings, I'd already once spilled them out to the Eleanor who had lost herself when I left the 8th Floor.
It had been no different from talking to a wall, so even though it was a different situation from now—it didn't really make me feel any better.
Then again, I wondered whether telling this self-aware Eleanor would change anything.
More than anything, the problem was how Eleanor, who had strongly inherited the habits of the Night Elves, would take what I said.
Eleanor loves freedom. She hates being bound to anything and always wants to go wherever she pleases.
To Eleanor like that, would it really be okay to tell her that she was an NPC bound to the tower's system—?
-Huff, huff.
Eleanor's steady breathing rang in my ears. The warmth of her shoulder against my clasped hand was comforting.
The meditation I was never really able to focus on in the first place was completely broken, and I slowly drifted off to sleep.
And then, for the first time in years—I had a long dream.