Chapter 430: Cats and Dogs, and Water and Oil.
(Note: I forgot to add this in notes last chapter, but when I used “cats and dogs”, in the Japanese raw, it’s actually “dogs and monkeys”. The Japanese has their own idiom to describe it, which uses those two instead of cats and dogs. Also, most of this chapter will be written in a pure third-person POV, just a heads up.)
When the king of Dauburn, Jaharade Beer Dauburn awoke, he was in a white room.
It’s a room he’s completely unfamiliar with. The ceiling is faintly shining. He searched his murky memories; last night, unable to calm his anger, he drank a substantial amount of liquor, and then went to bed.
“What’s going on..!?”
The room is almost perfectly cubic, with only a single door. However, the door has no handles, and it wouldn’t budge at all no matter how hard he pushes it. He figured that it might be a sliding door and tried that, but it didn’t work as well.
He’s imprisoned here. The moment Dauburn’s king arrived at that thought, his head immediately became filled with the baseless belief that this is Zadonia’s work.
Only Zadonia would target him, who is the king of Dauburn. They must have used that
Mochizuki-something brat who can use weird magic, and have him be kidnapped. Thinking that they’re coming for him now after dealing with his son, he angrily kicked the door.
“Oi! Let me out of here! Do you have no shame, attacking me while I was asleep!? Fight me fair and square!”
He shouted angrily, but no responses came back. He ran all the way to the opposite end from the door, and rammed into it with his entire body’s force, but it didn’t budge an inch.
“Kuh! Who do you think I am!?”
He continued kicking at the door as his breathing grew ragged, but as expected, there’s no response.
When the Dauburn king looked around the room again, he noticed square button-like things on the floor at each of the four corners of the room.
He tried stepping on it, but nothing happened. He tried stepping on the other buttons as well, the order, but it still gave him nothing.
After going around the room several times, the now-tired Dauburn king sat down onto the floor. When he did that, however, something suddenly shook beneath the floor, and the wall to the left of the door began slowly sinking down.
Beyond the slowly disappearing wall was another white cubic room identical to the one he is in currently. These two rooms were placed side by side, so to speak.
And inside that room is another man, who is currently performing the exact same action as the
Dauburn king: looking at each other with their eyes and mouths wide open in a comical fashion.
“It’s you bastard!”
The Dauburn king shouted involuntarily, and stood up in a rush. The one in front of him is his enemy, the hated king of that nation. Zadonia’s king, Junas Lem Zadonia.
The latter also stood up, and pointed a finger at him while shouting something with a fierce face.
The Dauburn king, who was convinced that the other side was definitely insulting him just now, started running towards the Zadonia king with his hands balled into fists.
And the Zadonia king, who saw that, also kicked the floor and charged towards the Zadonia king in similar fashion.
The important preliminary doubt of “why can’t they hear the other person’s voice” has long been blown away from their minds.
As a result.
“Gah!?”
“Guge!?”
They both slammed directly into the tempered glass which was at the border between the two rooms. Since they were both running as hard as they could, the damage they received was also huge.
“Ugegege..”
“Kuuooooh..”
they both slammed into the glass face-first, the two of them held their faces with their hands and tumbled around the room in pain.
And watching their figures, writhing in agony, from another room, was a certain group of individuals.
“Touya-kun. re those two idiots?”
“Well, I won’t deny that.”
While looking at the two of them on a monitor, I replied to the flabbergasted Professor Babylon. I mean, they clearly don’t look very smart, for starters.
Once their faces stopped hurting, they began throwing insults at each other from across the glass. Even though they shouldn’t be able to hear each other at all,
“You damn coward! To think you would kidnap me after failing to beat me fairly, just how low have you fallen!”
“You damn coward! To think you would kidnap me after failing to beat me fairly, just how low have you fallen!”
“You must’ve asked that brat from that small country for this. You miserable fool! Why don’t you try doing something yourself for once!”
“You must’ve asked that brat from that small country for this. You miserable fool! Why don’t you try doing something yourself for once!”
“I’m speechless to see that someone as foolish as you can be king! Like this, Zadonia would come to its end at your generation, no doubt!”
“I’m speechless to see that someone as foolish as you can be king! Like this, Dauburn would come to its end at your generation, no doubt!”
(Note: not gonna lie, this is actually pretty funny.)
I wonder just why are they able to be so in sync with each other. Are they secretly twins or something?
“Touya-kun, do you really think you can make these two cooperate with each other? I’m beginning to feel like it’ll be a lot easier if we tried teaching ballroom dancing to monkeys.”
“Well, even for a monkey, if its life is threatened it’ll work together with a dog too. Just watch.”
(Note: again, a reference to the Japanese version of the idiom, which says “monkeys and dogs” instead of “cats and dogs”.)
I smiled while looking at the two people reflected in the monitor, who are still in the process of insulting each other.
After spending about an hour cursing the man in front of him, until his throat became parched dry, the Dauburn king finally began to feel a sense of futility.
No matter how much he curse, if that voice can’t reach the opponent then it’s meaningless.
However, when he sees the other side shouting something at him, apparently cursing at him as well, he still gets angry.
In the first place, the other guy also looks like he’s been imprisoned. Does that mean the one who kidnapped him is not Zadonia? Such a doubt, albeit extremely late, finally surfaced in the Dauburn king’s heart.
When he turned his eyes back into the room he was in, one of the four buttons placed at the corners of the room he saw earlier was blinking.
Surprised, he tried stepping on it again, but nothing happened. It just continued blinking. He tried stepping on it a few more times. As expected, nothing happened.
When he raised his head and looked at the room the Zadonia king was in, the latter had also moved to a corner of his room and was staring with a mystified expression at a blinking button.
The Zadonia king stepped on the button. However, nothing happened as well. Just like the
Dauburn king, he also tried stepping on the button several times.
The Dauburn king probably got a bit competitive seeing that, as he also began stepping on the button; as the two of them stepped on the buttons at the same time, the doors in both rooms rose up a little, and a 10cm wide gap is created at the bottom.
“Ooh!?”
The Dauburn king rushed to the door and put his hands into the gap under it, trying to raise it up further, but the door wouldn’t budge anymore than that.
“Nu, kuh.. Fuuuooooh!”
After spending several minutes wrestling with that door, the Dauburn king finally realized that this is impossible.
When he looked to the side, it turned out that the door in the other room also opened a little.
The Zadonia king was also there, putting his fingers into the gap and trying desperately to raise the door.
“What an idiot, wasting his energy like that.”
The Dauburn king sneered as he looked at that. Those words can be applied to him as well, but he did not realize that.
Suddenly, the Zadonia king seemed to have noticed something and turned his head away. The suspicious Dauburn king followed his line of sight, and saw that in the room the Zadonia king is in, another one of the buttons was blinking.
Could it be, he thought as he turned around, and sure enough, there’s a button blinking in his own room too.
The Dauburn king immediately went there and stepped on the button. Nothing happened.
However, as he kept stepping on it, the door once again rose up a little bit.
When he looked over, the Zadonia king was stepping on the blinking button in his room.
“Does it open only when both buttons in the two rooms are pressed at the same time?”
Right then, a third button in each room began blinking, all but saying to press it next.
While glaring at each other, the two kings moved to where the blinking buttons are in their rooms. And together, they stepped on the buttons at the same time.
The door moved up slightly again. Becoming convinced, the two of them moved to where the last button is, and stepped on it at the same time.
With a slow rumble, the door completely opened.
“Tch, the other side’s door opened too. How boring.”
Doesn’t this make it look like he helped the Zadonia king escape or something, was what the
Dauburn king muttered while clicking his tongue. Coincidentally, the Zadonia king was doing the same thing over in the other room.
Behind the door, a pathway surrounded by the same white walls as the room stretched out in a straight line.
The Dauburn king proceeded down the path while staying vigilant, and eventually found a set of stairs leading upwards. Light could be seen from beyond the stairs. That’s not light from things like magic light stones. It’s natural light. Seems like the room he was in until earlier was underground.
When he rushed up the stairs in one go, he ended up in front of a sandy beach he’s never seen before. Beyond it, a beautiful sea stretched out beyond the horizon. This is definitely not a place anywhere in Dauburn or Zadonia.
““Where.. Is this?””
Upon hearing a voice that’s not his own, he spun to his side in shock. There stood the Zadonia king, who was similarly in a daze.
“You!”
“This bastard!”
The two of them started running at the same time, and grasped each other’s collar simultaneously before beginning to hit one another. Rolling about on the beach, they took turns mounting each other and punching them before they were shook off and their positions became reversed, all the while growling like dogs in a fight, and continued their chaotic brawl for a long time.
“Give me back my son, you coward!”
“I have no idea where your stupid son is! Rather, you should be the one who’ll return me my son! You thief!”
“Shut your mouth! It’s you lot who are the descendants of thieves!”
“Don’t mess with me! You sure can talk, you king of liars!”
While pulling each other’s cheeks, they continued yelling at each other. It’s a messy, ugly fight that cannot be thought of as the work of two country’s kings.
“, wait, wait a minute!”
“Shut up! It’s too late to apologize now!”
“No! Look over there!”
The Zadonia king, whose face has become bruised and swollen all over, pointed to a place behind the Dauburn king, whose face was no different from his.
“You think I’ll get baited by that!”
“Buu!?”
Thinking it’s a lie to try and take his attention away, the Dauburn king instead launched a right straight, which dealt a clean hit to the Zadonia king.
After seeing off the blown-away Zadonia king, the Dauburn king, now feeling better, turned around and was greeted by the sight of the Brunhild sovereign, lounging on a beach chair placed beneath a parasol.
With a pair of sunglasses on his face and an aloha shirt, a glass of tropical drink in his hand, he was showing a very relaxed posture. A white tiger pup was besides him.
“Wh..!”
“That’s why I said look!”
“Gube!?”
The Zadonia king launched a full-powered dropkick at the back of the Dauburn king, who was too busy being surprised at the Brunhild sovereign sitting in front of him in full-on vacation mode. The Dauburn king was blown away, and landed face-first into the sand.
“How ugly, eh, Kohaku. That’s a fine example of what not to do as king.”
“Exactly, my lord.”
““Shut your mouth, you insolent brat!””
The two kings, feeling belittled by Touya, dashed across the sands aiming for the latter.
However, with a cracking sound, the area of the beach under their feet suddenly gave way, and the two of them fell into a pit together with a large amount of sand. It was a pitfall trap. The two of them easily fell into a simple trap made by nothing more than plywood boards covered with sand. The pit is only around 2 meters deep, and the bottom is padded with slime cushions, so they won’t be hurt by the fall. The sands to each side were also properly fixed in place so they won’t collapse.
“Not properly accessing the situation will come back to bite you, you know. Or rather, you two have already been bitten, havn’t you.”
“Don’t kid around! You bastard, who do you think I am!?”
“Damn you, to think of setting up a trap like this! Just what do you want!?”
“Not telling.”
With a devilish grin, the Brunhild sovereign disappeared on the spot. His actions were designed to point the two’s hostilities—which were directed at each other until then—to a third party, i.e. himself, but it cannot be denied that there’s probably some personal vendetta mixed in as well.
Due to them pulling each other down, the two kings struggled for a long time, becoming dirty with sand all over, before they finally managed to climb out of the pit.
“Damn it, that brat’s gotta be a demon or something!”
“O-oi, what’s this shaking?”
The Zadonia king, who was cursing at Touya, finally noticed the fact that the ground was shaking intermittently upon hearing the Dauburn king’s words. When he turned around, far off in the distance, a giant turtle with a huge black snake wrapped around it was heading their way.
“Gogaaaaaaaaa!”
““Geeeh!?””
The two of them jumped up with snot running down their faces, and escaped while trying to push each other out of their way.
The giant turtle chased after the two with great momentum, as if trying to trample the two under its feet.
While its movements are slow, its steps are huge, so it’ll catch up to them unless they run with all their strength. The two kings ran across the beachside desperately.
historical
“Our lord sure uses us divine beasts roughly, doesn’t he.”
“Well, he said he’ll give us a feast later, so just work hard for now, Sango-chan.”
“Right. I want shortcakes, if possible.”
“And pudding for me~”
While maintaining a speed that makes the kings feel like they’ll get caught but actually won’t,
Sango and Kokuyou continued chasing after them. In order to make them too tired to fight with each other.
“J-just where, is, this place..”
While wheezing and huffing, the Dauburn king, lying down spread-eagled on top of the sands colored orange by the sunset, muttered.
The Zadonia king, who was lying down next to him, opened his mouth begrudgingly.
“Like hell, I’ll know..”
“I didn’t, ask, you, for that!”
“Wanna go, you..!”
The two of them raised their upper bodies and glared at each other, but immediately fell down flat again. They don’t even have the strength left to hit each other.
““So hungry..””
After coincidentally muttering the same thing, the two of them raised their heads and glared at each other, but after a while, they swung their faces to opposite sides with a *fun*.
After some time, they were assaulted by a sleepiness even stronger than the hunger, and they fell asleep on the spot. Although, as tired as the two of them are, they still won’t do something like falling asleep with the enemy nation’s king right beside them. The tiredness do play a role here, but this mainly came about due to a certain person casting sleeping magic on them.
The shadows of a young man and a tiger pup stretched over the two, who are soundly asleep.
“They fell asleep rather easily, didn’t they.”
“The people in the Reverse World have lower resistance to magic, after all. Now then, time to begin stage 2.”
Touya took out a pair of chain fetters from his [Storage], and placed them on the two kings’ feet while humming.
“.. You look like you’re enjoying this, my lord.”
“No no, not at all~. This is all for the sake of making the two of them become friends. There’s no way I’ll find this enjoyable, you know? Man, it’s soo tough playing the villain.” (Note: it’s amazing how this 3rd person POV seems to be drawing out more of Touya’s evil side without even trying. Is Fuyuhara secretly better at writing in 3rd person than in 1st person?)
Lightly fending off the words of his summoned beast, who’s staring at him with half-lidded eyes, Touya began concentrating magic as he focused towards the two sleeping people in front of him.
“[O Darkness bind, give punishment to the sins of man, Guilty Curse].”
What he activated was a magic of “cursing”. Although, calling it curses would make it sound excessively ominous; in essence, it’s just a magic of constraints.
A magic that places its target under constraints with severe punishments if broken. Depending on the way it’s used, it can easily take someone’s life; it’s an ancient magic, and one that is taboo in the current age.
“Do you really need to go that far..”
“Well, these are all preparatory work. Don’t worry too much, and just look forward to the end results.”
The king of the small dukedom smiled as he replied to his dumbfounded subordinate.
- Pixel