But There Is No Knowledge

Currently, Einheria was in a state of suffering from a severe lack of manpower.

As for deputy governors, we had been able to handle it by increasing the number of personnel appointed mainly from the Est Kingdom and Fregis Kingdom, but in any case, the development department was short on people.

The installation of mana collection devices was not keeping up at all with the territory that had expanded all at once.

The children of the development department had scattered to various regions and were each doing their best, but the number of installations was not increasing very much.

Well, since several days were needed to install a single unit, it could not be helped that the number could not be increased so easily.

As before, installation prioritized towns along the borders where rushing there immediately might be necessary, and after those were finished, they were proceeding with installations in towns with large populations and at key points in order.

However… covering a total population of a little over seven million would probably still be far in the future.

A monthly income of seventy million was far away.

For that reason, I had previously asked Otonoha to train the residents of this world so that they could install mana collection devices, but the results had not been very good.

The goblins lacked dexterity, while humanfolk inevitably lacked the ability to sense mana.

There, Otonoha suggested trying to use dwarves, and I decided to adopt that proposal.

Well, at the time I received that suggestion, we were at war with three countries, Kiriku was doing all sorts of things behind the scenes in the Kingdom of Largray… and Efaria and the others were heading toward Einheria, so we were busy, and the matter of the dwarves had been postponed. But now that those things had finally settled down, the other day I went to the former King of the Est Kingdom, Huey, and asked him about the dwarf country of Gigil-Po and the Kingdom of Kugarlan adjacent to it.

“To head to Gigil-Po, we must establish contact with the Kingdom of Kugarlan, huh…”

“If it is only to head to Gigil-Po, would it not be fine to pass through without arranging matters with the Kingdom of Kugarlan?”

As I murmured while briefly organizing the situation so far in the office, Lynferia, who was beside me as my guard, tilted her head and asked that.

“According to Huey, the Kingdom of Kugarlan seems like a potential enemy… so there may be no need to show courtesy, but even so, if we are dispatching an official envoy from Einheria to Gigil-Po, even if they are only passing through, it could become troublesome if we do not inform them.”

“Then, instead of dispatching an envoy, how about sending only a small group… or perhaps only a messenger?”

“Hmm… a small dispatch, huh. That might be better. It would not exactly be in secret, but in that case, there would be no need to intimidate the Kingdom of Kugarlan as Huey said.”

Huey had said that if we showed Einheria’s power, they would listen… but it was not yet decided that they would necessarily become enemies later. Well, I was sure we would clash with the Kingdom of Sorakil, and since the Kingdom of Kugarlan was said to follow them, we would probably end up fighting them one way or another too.

Launching a preemptive attack and crushing them was also one option, but even if we crushed the Kingdom of Kugarlan now, we would not be able to install the essential mana collection devices.

There was not enough time to build a friendly relationship… or rather, I did not want to spend time on that.

I had expectations for the dwarves, and I wanted to contact them quickly.

Well, it was not guaranteed that the dwarves would necessarily master the installation of mana collection devices… but if they could sense mana about as well as the goblins, then their dexterity should not be a problem… so my expectations were high.

Besides, I did not know how many dwarves there were in Gigil-Po, but… if there were a million of them… that alone might become an income of fifty million.

Something like that… anyone, not just me, would definitely want to prioritize it.

If we could go while ignoring the Kingdom of Kugarlan, nothing would be better.

“All right, I will adopt Lynferia’s proposal. I will leave dealing with the Kingdom of Kugarlan to Kiriku, and I will head to Gigil-Po.”

“P-please wait! You will be going yourself, Fels-sama?”

“That is my intention.”

Lynferia looked flustered at my words, but… they were dwarves, you know? I was really curious, wasn’t I? Of course I was going!

Without letting that excited feeling show on my face, I calmly nodded to Lynferia.

“Even without you going in person, Fels-sama…”

“No, exchange with the dwarves will be an important matter for Einheria as well. But Kiriku and Ilmitt are busy dealing with matters inside and outside the country, are they not?”

That was what I said, but… I thought there was a high possibility it would go better if I left it to Kiriku or Ilmitt.

Thinking about it calmly… if negotiations with the dwarves failed, our future movements would slow down, so maybe I should leave this to Kiriku and the others… wait, I had already said something to Lynferia like Kiriku and the others were busy, so I had to go, had I not?

“That is certainly true, but… if it were Kiriku and the others, if you ordered them, Fels-sama, they would surely accomplish it…”

It was not as though I did not think that too… but when I heard it from someone else’s mouth, I started feeling like, after leaving so much work to them already, would I then leave such a huge matter to them on top of that?

I did have a sense of security that Kiriku and Ilmitt would accomplish it even then… but should I not occasionally work myself?

No, I was not good at negotiations, but… all I had to do was show off our technological power and make them think that exchange with us would benefit them too… besides, for the dwarves, who were fairy-folk, installing mana collection devices should be an extremely good deal.

After all, it was a countermeasure against the Frenzy that was eating away at them… against the Demon King’s mana…

Yes, since we had this many good cards gathered, I felt like we could manage somehow.

I hoped the dwarves had not found a way to resist the Demon King’s mana on their own.

“It is true that if I ordered them, Kiriku and the others would surely bring about the best result. However, I am currently leaving domestic stability and dealings with surrounding countries to Kiriku and the others. In particular, the domestic situation still does not permit optimism. In this situation, I cannot have Kiriku or Ilmitt leave the country. When heading to Gigil-Po, we cannot proceed while installing mana collection devices along the way as usual.”

“…But in that case, is it not all the more dangerous!”

I understood why Lynferia said it was dangerous, since not being able to use teleportation meant we could not escape back to our own country in an instant, but…

“Kukuku… what danger could there be when Lynferia is with me? Besides, I cannot send Kiriku or Ilmitt into a place that would be dangerous for Lynferia or me.”

Kiriku and Ilmitt had almost no abilities suited to personal combat. In pure physical combat without using magic or schemes, they might lose to the maids, who had recently been increasing their base stats at the training ground.

There was no way I could send the two who were Einheria’s brains into a dangerous region.

The only time those two went outside was when we could prepare a flawless setup.

“This time, the ones heading to Gigil-Po will be me and Lynferia. Also Otonoha, though she is probably quite busy. One diplomat. Bangagonga, who is in charge of fairy-folk. After that, one guard for Otonoha and Bangagonga.”

Six people in total… that was probably quite a small number for a group dispatched by a country.

We would not be taking soldiers, after all.

“The diplomat… will it not be Ururu?”

“I would like to take Ururu if possible, but… I believe the diplomat who had been investigating Gigil-Po was not Ururu. It would be best to take someone who has actually been to Gigil-Po.”

“So that was the reason… and who will the last guard be?”

“Let me see… Jōsen has work in the Fregis Region, Saria has work in the Est Region… so I suppose Renge.”

Renge was a girl who stood alongside Jōsen and Saria among the strongest in close combat, an Axe Saint.

She was not exactly an idler, but she was a girl who usually looked sleepy and absentminded. However, she was a power fighter who lightly swung around a huge two-handed axe, and her single-blow firepower exceeded Jōsen’s.

It was not that she was particularly small, but because her equipment was a ridiculously huge axe, she looked somewhat small. However, when lined up with Eisha or Marie, you could tell she had a normal height. Was it called a side ponytail? She had her hair tied and hanging down on the left side of her head, but when the always sleepy-looking Renge did it, it gave the impression that it was troublesome but she had tied it for now.

Incidentally, regarding her chest armor… I felt she was on the same level as Otonoha.

She seemed to lose slightly to Lynferia… wait, staring that much was definitely no good!

Realizing that while thinking about Renge, I had been staring at… a certain part of Lynferia, I fixed my face into a thoughtful expression and turned my gaze toward the ceiling.

“Mm, if I recall correctly, Renge does not have any highest-priority work assigned to her right now. Good, it is decided with Renge. We will take Renge to Gigil-Po!”

Although I had nothing in particular to feel guilty about, I announced the decision to Lynferia as if rattling it off.

“With me and Renge, I believe the escort will be sufficient.”

Even after seeing Lynferia nod with a serious expression, showing no objection to my decision, no particular sense of guilt was born in me.

…Ugh!

“However, Fels-sama. If you are taking Bangagonga with you… the transportation will be by carriage. Is that all right? I do not know how far away Gigil-Po is, but it might take several days… or if things go poorly, perhaps around a month, would it not?”

“…”

That was the worst… since we could not take a shortcut by mana collection device, would it be a slow carriage journey from the Est Region…?

I wanted to refuse with all my might, though…?

No, immediately after declaring that I would go, I could not say, “If we are going by carriage, then I quit,” in an Overlord-like way…

…Well, the fact that Lynferia was asking if I was fine with traveling by carriage meant that my hatred of carriages was apparently common knowledge.

Should I just bring out an airship…?

It would also let us show off our technological power to the dwarves right from the start… no, passing through another country in an airship would stand out far too much.

If we were going to stand out anyway, I wanted to use it when dealing with a great country or something… we had plenty of other cards to show off to the dwarves, so I wanted to keep the visually easy-to-understand airship in reserve for now.

Besides, more than anything, if we used an airship, there would be no point in going with a small number of people…

But I hated carriages… if this was how things were going to be, I should have had them develop a car or something… no, I did not know the structure of a car, so even if I told them to make one, I would not be able to explain how it worked… but I did know the structure of a Mini 4WD, though the motor was far too much of an out-of-place artifact.

Why did those things rotate at such high speed with only two AA batteries?

Well, leaving the motor aside, if we used the rotating magic tool I had Oscar make, it seemed like we could make a big Mini 4WD… those words felt terribly contradictory, but… we could probably make something like that.

I should have Oscar make Mini 4WDs as children’s toys next time.

Heh… enough escapism. The means of transportation to Gigil-Po, huh… if Bangagonga were not there, we could run, but… after appointing him as the person in charge of negotiations with fairy-folk, there was no way we could not take him.

Was there some good method?

The Overlord might have his rear shattered by a carriage and die… so this needed serious thought.

“Let us think a little about the means of transportation. We also need to ask how long it will take to travel to Gigil-Po. I cannot exactly leave Einheria for several months on a round trip.”

Yes, that was why we could not leisurely travel by carriage.

It was absolutely not because I feared having my rear split into seventeen pieces.