Over the past two months, Lapis had kept a close eye on the Human Realm. She mobilized every connection and resource at her disposal to procure the herbs the Demon Lord had spoken of.
She was meticulous in her work.
With the 200 gold the Demon Lord had entrusted to her, the 1,000 gold he had borrowed from the trading company, and the 300 gold Lapis had personally invested, she used the total of 1,500 gold to strike deals with trading companies across the Human Realm. Those mid-sized trading companies, in turn, contracted with apothecary guilds in various cities. And the apothecary guilds signed agreements with herb gatherers in each village.
Thus, Lapis had indirectly employed four hundred herb gatherers. A triple-layered contract, completed in a mere fifteen days.
After one month, thirty thousand roots of herbs had made their way into her hands.
The mid-sized trading companies, the apothecary guilds, and the herb gatherers alike were all delighted with this commission. They mocked some fool rich person who had thrown his money away for nothing. To them, Black Herb was nothing but a worthless weed. Getting paid to dig up weeds—there was no better deal than that.
Now Lapis quietly kept watch over a single island in the Human Realm. Sicilia, the largest island in the White Sea. The Demon Lord had prophesied that a plague would originate here.
"My lady, why have you come to such a humble place again…?"
"It's quite all right. I do this because I want to."
The physician working at the public bathhouse bowed his head, clearly apologetic.
Several physicians were stationed at the hot springs. The man was one of them.
He knew Lapis as the young lady of some noble family. She had a kind heart and came to the hot springs once every four days to volunteer her time caring for patients.
'You do run into young ladies like this from time to time.'
The physician guided Lapis toward the inner area of the hot springs with a warm smile. Occasionally, noble daughters who had been cruelly rejected by some man at the bitter end of an ill-fated romance would find healing for their own wounds by tending to the sick.
"How are the patients?"
"Same as always. Still screaming in pain. If only they'd saved even a fraction of that energy for screaming, they'd be up and running around by now!"
The physician spoke with open contempt. Just as a teacher might look down on students, this man, in his own way, despised his patients.
Lapis offered a measured response.
"I see. Are there any new patients, by any chance?"
"Yes, there's one man who was just brought in yesterday. He's making a terrible fuss, complaining about pain in his armpits and groin. His head hurts, his joints ache, his muscles feel torn – he's whining so much I'll be the one who dies first. The fever is quite severe, indeed. Probably a summer cold."
Lapis stopped in her tracks. She asked in her typical, flat tone.
"I would like to see that patient first, if you don't mind."
The physician had little reason to refuse.
The two passed through the hot spring facility's corridor and entered a guest room. The moment the door opened to where the patient was staying, the man let out a loud wail.
"Help! I'm dying! Oh, I'm dying! People of the town! This quack doctor is killing me!"
"You look perfectly fine for a naked wretch."
The physician snorted and strode toward the bed.
"A perfectly healthy-looking grown man, screaming his head off over just a cold? You might as well drop dead, you good-for-nothing."
"Help! Even the doctor's telling me to drop dead now. Where's the justice in this life? Fine, I'll die. I'll hurry up and die and go to hell to pray, 'Please let that doctor fellow drop dead too, Lord Satan.'"
"It was that Satan bastard who ruined my life, you idiot. I was hoping I might get the chance to smack that smug look off his face, but I guess you'll do."
The physician turned to Lapis with an embarrassed grin.
"I'm sorry about this, miss. This idiot is my childhood friend, and he's got a foul mouth… Please just think of him as a poorly brought-up lout."
"Well, I'll be! Living to see the day I, a proud sailor of the Kingdom of Sardinia, get called a lout by the local doctor! Hey, you quack, when you were seven and wetting yourself at the Sarakusa intersection, I never would have guessed…."
"Whoa! Whoa! You crazy bastard! There are things you can't say in front of the young lady!"
The physician roughly clamped a hand over the patient's mouth. The patient grunted in protest. Lapis sighed inwardly and sat by the bed, assisting the physician with the examination.
It wasn't much of an examination, really. It was mostly just asking how he'd spent the day, how he was feeling, whether the bathwater was nice. When the patient mentioned his joints were particularly painful, the physician drew a small amount of blood from his forearm.
"That hot spring water really does help."
The patient said in a weary voice.
"There are plenty of pretty women, the beer tastes good…"
"You fool, I told you not to drink, and here you go drinking again."
"What can I do? Take the booze away from a sailor and you've got a corpse on your hands. Hey, by the way — I noticed during my bath that a dark spot showed up on the inside of my forearm. Take a look."
The patient spread his armpit wide. There, a black blemish the size of a thumb had bloomed across his skin.
"……!"
Lapis swallowed hard.
The doctor and the patient chatted leisurely.
"Well, would you look at that. Huh, what in the world is this?"
"I figured it probably wasn't anything serious, but my body just aches all over, you know? It's got me worried for no reason."
"Your stamina's taken a huge hit. It hasn't even been half a month since you came back from the war, has it? No wonder your body's going on strike. It's just a fever from a cold. Get plenty of rest and you'll bounce back in no time."
"Really? So it really is just a cold. Feels kind of weird though. It's not like I've only caught a cold once or twice before — I've never hurt this much from one…."
"That's because you're old and washed up, you old geezer."
"What did you just call me, you little punk?"
Pain radiating from the joints outward. A severe fever. Parts of the body turning black.
Lapis recalled the Demon Lord's words and rose from her seat.
"Excuse me — something suddenly came up. I need to be going."
"Oh, is that so? Understood."
"You don't need to see me out."
Lapis held up a hand to stop the doctor from standing. She handed him two silver coins and then quickly made her way out of the bathhouse. The physician who remained in the room glared at the patient.
"Wasn't it because of you that the young lady left?!"
"Huh? How is that my fault this time?"
"Your mouth is coarse—far too coarse for a noble to bear. Honestly, this is why soldiers are hopeless. All you care about is your own looks; you can't spare even as much thought for others as the filth under a crow's claw."
The two of them started bickering again.
Meanwhile, Lapis's mind was in turmoil as she walked along the bathhouse corridor. The maids who encountered her greeted her politely, assuming she was a noble as well. But Lapis had no time to respond to each one.
'It was real. The Demon Lord was right.'
She had to find the Demon Lord immediately. After that, she needed to submit a report to the trading company. This was an emergency!
Two days later, the patient died, his entire body blackened.
A week after that, the doctor suddenly died.
Until then, no one in the city had grasped the severity of the situation. But after ten days, the regular bathhouse patrons were slaughtered en masse, and within a fortnight, people's bodies began turning black across the entire city—only then did everyone finally understand what was happening.
An epidemic had broken out.
The Kunkuska Trading Company was no incompetent outfit.
If they were, they would never have risen to the summit of the Demon Realm. The company's executives understood that even a report from a low-ranking employee whom the rest of the organization scorned had to be taken seriously if it hit the mark.
Executives gathered in the conference room. These were the senior leaders who had sustained the company for centuries.
"To think Dantalion was a prophet after all. How unexpected."
The vampire said in a low voice. Another executive countered.
"Nothing is certain yet. I still think he's just a pampered little Demon Lord."
"Hah, really. He predicted an epidemic—an epidemic unlike anything we've ever seen."
The wolf tribe elder spoke.
"What more evidence do you need? An organization must be endlessly cautious when caution is warranted and infinitely bold when boldness is required. When the employee first submitted the report, we took the typical cautious stance—because there was no evidence. Now the evidence has appeared. Comrades! Don't cling to decisions you made in the past. Clinging is..."
"The mother of regression and the father of ignorance."
The vampire finished the sentence.
"As the chairman used to say. It has been seven hundred years since the chairman passed. The reason we seven have been able to keep Kunkuska at the top for all that time is, above all, our affinity with the Demon Lords."
The executives listened in silence to the vampire's words.
Nominally, the executives were equals. In practice, the vampire was the real leader. He had protected the trading company longer than anyone.
The vampire continued in a flat tone.
"We personally subjugated Demon Realm species hostile to the Demon Lords, and in return, the Demon Lords granted us unlimited goodwill. The bond between the Demon Lords and Kunkuska goes beyond a blood pact. Dantalion may be ranked seventy-first, but he is still a Demon Lord. If he truly possesses the power of prophecy, then Kunkuska must actively assist him."
"I cannot accept that!"
From across the table, an elderly Goblin shrieked. Deep wrinkles were furrowed across his brow.
"Prophecy? Good grief, you lot have finally gone senile. Of all people, the top executives of Kunkuska believing in something as irrational as prophecy! There are only six of us comrades left, and you're this naive — I should've died long ago instead of living to see this infuriating sight. You'd be the kind to hand over both halves of your own stones to a thief, bowing and saying, 'Oh sir thief, oh noble gentleman, please take the other half as well!' How embarrassing — I couldn't even show my face in public!"
"Listen here, you chattering little dwarf."
The Wolfkin growled.
"Three human cities have already fallen. Within just half a month of the epidemic breaking out, three cities have been wiped out. I've lived for centuries, and I've never even heard of a disease that contagious. The experts are already predicting that nearly half the continent's population will be massacred en masse. How can you dismiss all of that as a lie?"
"How should I know? In any case, it's not prophecy. Absolutely not. Period."
The elderly Goblin turned his head away in a huff.
The Wolfkin scoffed.
"All you know how to do is spout off without offering any evidence. If that's what you call rationality, then quite the rationality it is. I'd rather become irrational. I'd like to believe you don't speak that way to His Excellency Paimon."
"Oh, why is His Excellency Paimon suddenly coming up? Anyway, it's not prophecy!"
The vampire slowly raised his right hand.
The meeting room fell silent in an instant. Only the sound of the Goblin's huffing breath could be heard.
The vampire spoke to the Goblin.
"Thorkel, my old friend. I do think there is merit to what you're saying."
The Goblin immediately started bouncing around as if he had never been quiet in the first place.
"Just as expected of a Vampire, noble of the darkness! You're miles ahead of that wolf with nothing but a snout on his head! Hey, you idiot wolf. Next time someone asks you 'who are you,' don't bother coming up with some other answer — just tell them 'I am the world's biggest, dumbest idiot, sir!' And whatever you do, don't you dare bring up our company's name!"
The executives around them sighed.
Even the wolfman who had been insulted didn't get angry and simply clicked his tongue. That Goblin's manner of speech was far too frivolous for a Kunkuska Trading Company executive. If his business acumen hadn't been outstanding, he would have been ousted from his position long ago.
"Now then. Let us assume for the sake of argument that Dantalion does not have the power of prophecy."
The Vampire interlaced his fingers as he spoke.
"He prophesied that an epidemic would occur. And in reality, an epidemic did occur. Comrades, if this is not the power of prophecy, can anyone venture a guess as to what it might be?"
"Hm? Well, that's... Wha—!?"
The Goblin's eyes went wide. The other executives, too, caught on to the Vampire's implication and were stunned.
The Vampire nodded.
"The only remaining possibility is this: we have no choice but to conclude that Demon Lord Dantalion deliberately caused the epidemic."
"Th-that can't be."
"My thinking is this: I would far rather he actually had the power of prophecy. If he does not, then it means he possesses the ability to single-handedly unleash the worst epidemic in recorded history at will. As for me... I cannot even fathom how one would go about dealing with such a Demon Lord."
The Vampire laid bare his thoughts. In that case, there was no way to stand against Demon Lord Dantalion.
The Vampire was the Kunkuska Trading Company's highest-ranking executive — a man who gave even fearsome Demon Lords a wide berth. He had once razed a Demon Lord's dungeon to the ground simply because Glasharavolas, ranked twenty-fifth among the Demon Lords, had failed to pay interest on his debts.
And that very same man now raised both hands in surrender.
Gulp.
Someone in the meeting room swallowed hard.