Mushoku Tensei Redundancy (LN) - Volume 2 - Chapter 1

Chapter 1:

The Day the Doll Walked (Part 1)

THE NIGHT WAS STORMY. Pounding rain drenched the earth, and great bolts of lightning smote the earth with flashes, illuminating a lone house standing on a deserted plain.

Inside the house, two mad scientists were cackling.

“Mwa, mwaha, mwahahaha! At last, at last!”

“Yes! At last, it’s finished!” Still cackling, the scientists clasped one another’s hands and danced around the room.

“Truly, but for your genius, Master, we could never have done it!”

“Don’t be silly, Zanoba! It wouldn’t have been possible without your bottomless store of knowledge and inspiration!”

The scientists were Rudeus and Zanoba. Their mutual praise stopped with their dancing. There was something in the back of the room—a stone bed that gave off an eerie glow. On it lay a girl. She was stark naked.

“What a long journey it’s been…” Rudeus reflected on their string of failures. 

The first attempt hadn’t even powered on. It had taken dozens of minor adjustments and reversing those adjustments until they finished the first prototype. It powered on, only for them to discover it was a golem that could only mindlessly obey. There was a demand for such a thing, but it was a far cry from what they wanted to create. 

From the second prototype on, they devoted their time and labor to the development of a core with artificial intelligence and a more lifelike figure. Naturally, they still experienced one failure after another. The body did become more and more passably human, but tweaking the materials so that its movements were also more realistic led to resilience problems. When they tweaked the core instead to compensate, it stopped powering on at all. The two of them were amazed and frustrated by the fragility of the balance that made a living person work.

Failure chased failure. They repeatedly reviewed the notes of Maniacal Dragon King Chaos and even begged advice from Dragon King Perugius, who gave them hints about magic circles and spirit summoning. Dragon God Orsted offered them a hard-to-find magic stone and shared knowledge about materials. Even so, the failures continued. They’d innovated beyond the Maniacal Dragon King, somehow. As they imagined their goal would be forever out of reach, they wept. 

Before the tears from the last failure were dry, they approached the challenge with fresh resolve—only to fail again. Every failure led to small but fresh observations and discoveries.

One month prior, at last, at last, they’d had a success, and the prototype doll had powered on. It was the third iteration, with a blank, featureless face, but it’d powered on! Rudeus and Zanoba did their little victory dance, and then, once they finished extracting data from the third prototype, they immediately started work on the fourth. 

The fourth’s specs were almost as good as the final model’s. It had a human body and face, its mouth moved when it spoke, and it could move around using its own limbs. However, Rudeus and Zanoba had not run every test they should’ve on the previous prototype and had moved on without addressing several undiscovered problems. They just couldn’t resist the urge to see the doll move as it had in their dreams. 

But it would be fine! There was nothing about prototype three that they couldn’t simply put off until prototype four. They’d use prototype four to do a system check and review its compatibility with the base body for the final product.

It’ll be fine, surely, they thought. This is another step forward. This is what we want. We’re doing it for the love of the game, and this, right here, is the automaton we’ve been striving for.

“It is time!” Zanoba cried. “Powering onnnn!”

“Right!”

Zanoba, his face glowing with excitement, reached a finger toward the magic stone nestled between the girl’s modest breasts. Behind that stone, in the middle of her chest, was her core. It was engraved with complex and delicate magic circles that functioned as both her brain and her literal heart, like a computer’s CPU.

When the core powered on, the figurine would stand up on its own feet, learn by itself, make its own decisions, generate its own mana, and continue to function practically in perpetuity: a fully autonomous doll. Of course, it was also possible that it would end up collapsing from a shortage of mana. If so, it could just be returned to its bed and charged up once more.

When Rudeus first proposed this, Zanoba asked, “Wouldn’t its reliance on human intervention to restart it mean it is incomplete?” 

“Of course not,” Rudeus told him. That was precisely what would make it complete. When a person collapsed and couldn’t get up again, they also needed other people.

Zanoba’s outstretched finger stopped, hesitant. Perhaps someone else would’ve been reluctant to touch the chest of a young girl, but Zanoba wouldn’t be squeamish about a minor detail like that.

“Do you want to do it, Master?” Zanoba asked, after hesitating for some time.

“No,” Rudeus replied. “You do it. It was all your work that got us here.”

That was it. Zanoba was afraid of this moment, when their dream of nearly ten years would be realized. Never­theless, it wasn’t in his nature to be cowardly. It was barely in his vocabulary.

“Very well. Then, let us begin!”

“Yeah!”

Zanoba slowly touched the girl’s chest with his finger. His fingertip ran lightly along her skin, as though she might break, until he reached the core. Powering on the doll didn’t take much mana. Anyone could do it.

“Awaken, oh beloved daughter,” said Zanoba, intoning the power-on incantation. 

At once, there was a crackle as mana began to flow. The red light on the edge of the bed turned blue. Seeing it, Zanoba removed his finger, and for a few moments, everything was silent. The two men waited with bated breath, watching the girl power on. The processes that followed power-on were automated, so all they had to do was wait.

The girl’s black eyes blinked open. The only noise was the click as she physically disconnected from the bed. When the connection was broken, she slowly sat up. Her skin was smooth and white, and she was so slender it was as though she had no muscle at all. Her breasts were small but shapely, and she was curvy in a way that seemed almost out of place for her body type.

This girl was the culmination of the skills Zanoba and Rudeus had cultivated over long years of figurine making. Her body was constructed from artificial flesh and a skeleton of the same material as the magic armor. The base for the artificial flesh was clay Rudeus made using earth magic, to which they then added mana-rich scales from red dragons and illusion butterfly wings. To round it out, they mixed in the sap of an elder treant and the blood of an immortal demon. The finished flesh was the product of experimentation and the finest materials. It was durable enough to last almost indefinitely while feeling indistinguishable from a normal person’s skin. To make it move, it was mounted on a magic circle-engraved ­skeleton. The magic circles functioned like muscles to move the surrounding tissue. The principle was more or less the same as the magic armor, but the doll’s joints additionally incorporated parts made from the bone dust of a deathbreaker skeleton, utilizing the material’s particularly high mana conductivity to make the doll’s movements even more lifelike.

The girl raised both arms, stretched them out, then opened and closed her hands. The movement of her upper torso—the arm and shoulder, down through the chest, and the sway of her breasts—was smooth. It was incredible: sensually graceful and real.

Rudeus gulped.

“I didn’t realize it while we were making it, but look at it move. Damn.”

Zanoba didn’t answer, but from his expression, he felt the same. The girl, without saying a word, lay back down, then raised her legs one at a time, testing them. One smooth, white thigh rose, followed by the other. Still lying on her back, she bent and stretched out her knees, then spread her legs apart and closed them again, momentarily exposing her delicately constructed anatomy to Rudeus and Zanoba. These gestures were purely practical. The doll was programmed to automatically run an operational check on her joints when she powered on, then spit out errors for any parts the check caught. Literally in this case, as she had a mouth.

Finally, with a shake of her shoulder-length black hair, the doll announced, “I have powered on successfully.” 

That meant her checks were complete. The voice her artificial vocal cords produced sounded very familiar.

“Phew.” Rudeus and Zanoba each let out a breath, though their faces were still tense. 

They had failed here so many times before. Once, the doll had tried to raise its arm only for everything above the elbow to blast off into the ceiling like a mech’s rocket punch. One time, its knee had bent at the wrong angle with a dull crunch. Yet another time, it had split apart at the crotch like a bizarre sculpture, then curled up like a shrimp with dull crunching and cracking. These episodes, which could’ve come straight out of a splatter film if the body had been human, happened too many times to count during the construction of the third prototype. 

The root of the trouble was the doll’s skeleton. A person wearing the magic armor could regulate its power, but it took long experience using magic and muscles to have the feel for it. The doll had no experience, so it defaulted to using maximum strength and destroyed itself. Because of this, they had installed limiters all through its body. Even with the limiters, though, the doll’s skeleton still had the same properties as the magic armor, so it had a high resistance threshold, allowing for movement on par with a Saint-tier swordsman.

Suffice it to say, the artificial creation’s power and range-of-motion settings for bending its knees and elbows had failed many times before, so Zanoba and Rudeus were relieved that there were no issues.

“All working well, it seems,” Zanoba said.

“Yeah.” 

As if in response to their words, the figurine lying on the table turned its glassy, inorganic eyes toward Zanoba.

“May I ask your name, Master?”

“I am Zanoba!”

“Master Zanoba. You have been registered. What are your commands?”

“Register the man there as sub-master.”

“Understood. May I ask your name, gentleman there?”

“I’m Rudeus.”

“Sub-master Rudeus, you have been registered. What are your commands?”

In the course of testing the third prototype, Zanoba and Rudeus had run through this exchange many times. First, the doll had to register its master so that she would do what it was told.

“Good,” said Zanoba. “Now, thou shalt get down from the bed and stand on the floor!”

The figurine got off the bed, then stood up straight. Rudeus punched the air in triumph.

“Great! It registered its master’s name correctly, and it is following commands.” He looked down at his creation and felt a warm sense of accomplishment. This hadn’t always gone well, like when “I am Zanoba” registered its master as “master I-am-Zanoba.” Other times, it hadn’t gotten down from the bed, or hadn’t understood “thou shalt.” 

They’d resolved these problems through direct consultation with Perugius. Using his hints, they’d tweaked the magic circles, rebuilding the whole doll from scratch numerous times. Finally, it had all come together. The result of that work was the summoning magic circle engraved into the doll’s core, which covered the many things humans did instinctively.

“Try to jump a little,” said Zanoba.

“Yes, Master.” Keeping its legs together, the figurine jumped up and down. It had a pretty powerful leap. The artificial flesh was capable of generating enough force to break the skeleton, but the limiters seemed to be functioning properly.

“Spread out your arms while you jump.”

“Yes, Master.”

“Spread your legs—okay, stop.”

“Yes, Master.”

“Now start jumping again while spinning your arms around.”

“Yes, Master.”

“Spread your legs on one jump, then close them on the next.”

“Yes, Master.” The doll did just as Zanoba ordered her. Its short hair swished, and its limbs and body bounced dynamically. Its balance was excellent.

“Now make a silly face.” 

The doll paused for a moment at this unexpected command, then said, “Yes, Master.” It put its hands on its cheeks and squished up its face. But that was it; without any expression, it was weird, and dubiously silly at best. However, the doll had thought about and executed the order in its own way—in other words, Zanoba and Rudeus had gotten the result they had hoped for.

“Mm! Most satisfactory,” said Zanoba.

“Yeah…” Rudeus agreed, but he had a slight frown on his face as he looked at the doll. His eyes went to its breasts, which were small but jiggled when it jumped, then to the elaborately constructed parts between its legs. For the sake of Rudeus’s honor, let it be clear that there was nothing sexual in this look. The doll was his own creation, after all. He just hadn’t expected this level of perfection. It scared him! Though, it wasn’t his own genius that he feared.

“The similarities are just too glaring,” he said. “It’s not just the face, but the voice too, even if that was a coincidence.” Rudeus regarded the doll’s face. It met his eyes but didn’t smile. They’d built it to be capable of smiling, but it seemed it still couldn’t do it without an order. That, however, was not what concerned Rudeus.

“We’re going to get in trouble for this,” he said.

See, the figurine’s face bore a striking resemblance to someone they both knew.

“With Miss Nanahoshi, you mean?” asked Zanoba.

That’s right, the doll had a striking resemblance to Shizuka Nanahoshi, their friend from another world who slumbered in Chaos Breaker, the floating fortress. It wasn’t just the face. The doll’s hair wasn’t the same length as Nanahoshi’s, but it was black, and the body was almost exactly the same height and build. Rudeus and Zanoba had constructed a naked doll that looked just like their friend: a doll that happened to have sexy breasts and fit-for-purpose parts between its legs.

“I mean Sylphie and the others, idiot!” Rudeus snapped. It was the wrath of his wives he had to fear.

“Master, did you not say that, given Miss Nanahoshi’s long slumber, you needed someone to stand in for her?”

“Well, yeah…” 

There was a reason for the resemblance. In case Nanahoshi’s hypothesis that her friend would also be transported to this world turned out to be true, the best way to ensure future generations knew Nanahoshi’s name was for them to know what she looked like as well.

“Your wives know all that, don’t they?” said Zanoba.

“They knew we were making an automaton, but they don’t know we made it to look like Nanahoshi.” Admittedly, Rudeus didn’t think his wives would have a problem with his intentions, and Nanahoshi herself had given her approval. So long as he explained all that, they’d understand. “The problem is her breasts and the bits between her legs.”

It was a doll that looked like their friend and was capable of having sex. If his wives found out, they were not going to be chill about it. Unless he played this right, his bed was going to turn very cold. Sylphie might cry or get depressed, and he could imagine her puffing out her cheeks and saying, “You put all that work into it. Why don’t you try it out?”

None of these were good outcomes!

“We didn’t have to make them so elaborate,” Rudeus said.

“But Master, this marvelous piece of modeling showcases the full range of your skill! The nipples in particular are most titillating.”

“Zanoba, you idiot, I’m trying to be discreet! Shut up about nipples.”

“Pardon.”

Why had they made her breasts and the parts between her legs so elaborate? It was true that back when they made the plan, Rudeus’s design ideas had gone in that direction—that is, a sex doll sort of direction. However, later, they’d moved in another direction, so they ought to have restrained themselves. They could’ve kept its breasts and the parts between her legs G-rated and avoided this conversation altogether. A doll didn’t need nipples! And this was only the fourth prototype. There was no reason to have it look like Nanahoshi at the prototype stage. Rudeus had gotten carried away.

“We can’t tell Sylphie and the others about this.”

“Ah, yes. You are afraid of your wives.”

“I prefer to say I love my wives.”

Only a few people knew that they were making a figurine in Nanahoshi’s image: Orsted, Perugius, and Nanahoshi herself. Naturally, they intended to unveil it, notify the relevant parties once it was finished, and make use of it when needed. Once it came out how elaborately constructed the figurine was, Rudeus and Zanoba might be in for some serious side-eye.

Rudeus could picture Roxy’s unimpressed stare as she said, “Your little creation has a much nicer figure than me, doesn’t it?” Or she might just give him a dark look and then take some space from him. If that happened, he might as well just commit seppuku. 

“Hmm. I doubt your wives will make a fuss over a thing like this,” said Zanoba. “Everyone knows you are a man of strong passions, Master.”

“If it were just a normal doll, I’d agree with you, but I can’t help but think it looking like Nanahoshi is going to have implications.” Rudeus prodded the doll’s chest dubiously. It didn’t quite feel human, but it was very soft all the same. If he hadn’t made it himself, it would have gotten him pretty excited. Such excitement could be interpreted as cheating. 

If Eris thought he was cheating, the corners of her mouth would turn down as she said “Hmph!” and socked him with a no-holds-barred punch. She’d lay him out, get on top of him, and dominate him so thoroughly that he’d never stray again.

Actually, Rudeus might not have minded that.

As he poked the doll, it stared fixedly at his finger but otherwise didn’t react. It would only sense that it was being touched. They hadn’t given it the ability to experience sexual pleasure. If Elinalise or Ariel had been closely involved in the project, it might have been different, but both of them were busy with the struggles of motherhood.

“In that case, shall we just scrap it?” Zanoba asked, looking grim. The idea of throwing away the doll was not one he relished—the idea of throwing away any figurine, for that matter.

“No! It’d be a waste to scrap it when it’s so close to complete!” Rudeus folded his arms and began to mull over the problem. Considering the worst-case scenario, they were better off scrapping this figurine and starting again from scratch. It wasn’t possible to replace only the breasts and parts between the legs with the technology they currently possessed. That would be something to consider if they ever looked at mass production, but at present, this was a one-of-a-kind item.

“But, if it were ever discovered, you know?” he went on.

“I cannot imagine it will be. We went to the trouble of setting up our laboratory all the way out here to avoid that, did we not?”

“Yeah, but…”

They were currently on the edge of the Fittoa Domain in the Asura Kingdom. They had rented an area of the still-recovering domain from the Boreas family, then turned a house there into a laboratory. Not many people knew of its location; it didn’t even have an entrance. It was only possible to enter or leave by way of a teleportation circle.

“It’s fine for you,” Rudeus pointed out. “You won’t get in that much trouble.”

“I will. Remember, I told you that Julie has been getting angry at me as of late.”

“Oh, yeah.” Even Juliette, who was in theory collaborating with them on this plan, didn’t know about this place. She helped them with creating artificial flesh and bones, but she didn’t know where it was all put together. They’d left her out, because lately, she got grumpy when Zanoba bought sexy figurines. She didn’t destroy them or anything, of course, but she tried to shut them out of Zanoba’s sight. 

That’s just how it was. Julie was an adult by society’s standards and had been for some time, but in terms of years she was still that age: teenage. Rudeus and Zanoba had enough sensitivity to consider the feelings of a maiden like her.

“But it’s possible Julie will find the teleportation circle, isn’t it?” Rudeus asked. 

The teleportation circle that led to the lab was in the basement of Zanoba’s workshop. What if Julie went down there, learned of the teleportation circle, then stepped onto it out of curiosity? She’d end up coming face-to-face with the unclothed automaton—that is, a naked girl. She’d be in for a shock.

“No, for I take care to lock it from the inside, and I have the only key right here,” Zanoba said.

“That won’t keep Julie out. I taught her how to open locks with earth magic.”

“Julie would never open a door that I locked. She promised me as much.”

“Ah, right.”

Julie and Zanoba were so close that they practically read each other’s thoughts, but they were still technically master and slave. Julie knew there were certain lines she could never cross.

“Focusing back on the problem, what can we do?” Zanoba asked. Rudeus folded his arms in thought. Only the nipples and the parts between its legs posed a problem. They hadn’t added any other really dodgy parts. This was only prototype four—they could scrap it once they got all the data from it.

Let us not blame Rudeus for not immediately deciding to scrap the figurine. He had put a great deal of money and time into it, and they hadn’t done the tests they should have with prototype three. Scrapping it right away just because its nipples were a bit sexy would be wasteful in the extreme.

Then, a lightbulb flicked on above Zanoba’s head.

“But, Master!” he cried.

“What is it?”

“We can just have it put some clothes on!”

“Huh? Huh! You’re right! Eureka!” Zanoba’s idea made it click for Rudeus as well. At this stage, everything was hanging out! No good. But with clothes, the lewd parts would be hidden. Aside from a crazed rapist, no one was going to suddenly rip the doll’s clothes off. If they didn’t say anything, who was going to find out?

“All right then, hold on a sec.” 

Rudeus dashed off into the other room. There were clothes there that he’d gotten ready beforehand—a heavy, beige dress of the sort that was common in the magic city, along with brand-new panties and a bra. In fact, they’d planned to put clothes on the figurine from the start. Zanoba and Rudeus had been quaking with fear over a sexy, naked girl for nothing.

“Right,” Rudeus said when he returned, turning to the doll that stood there, stock still. “Put these clothes on.”

“Yes, Master.”

“Once you’re dressed, lie down on the bed.”

“Yes, Master.” It followed his commands. For the time being, with clothes on, it didn’t seem sinful anymore. She was simply a girl who looked a lot like Nanahoshi, slotted perfectly into the bed. There was nothing remotely prurient about it. Actually, if anything, she was a bit creepy because her eyes were open and unblinking.

So long as she looked like this, all his problems were solved!

“You know what? After all that, I’m exhausted,” Rudeus said. “It’s a bit early, but let’s call it a day.”

“Indeed.” 

For now, they had a plan of action. Rudeus sank into his chair with a sigh. In the end, they hadn’t been able to test anything except the power-on procedure, but the results were excellent. There was no need to panic. They could teach the figurine more tomorrow.

Rudeus tapped his palm with his fist, feeling triumphant. “Now, let’s celebrate the first great leap for our plan!”

“Yes, let’s!” Zanoba agreed. “I thought you might say that, so I have this ready!” 

He carried a cask from the corner of the room to the middle, then smashed the boards at the top with his fist. There was a splintering sound as a little of the liquid within spilled out.

“You think of everything!” Rudeus said. 

Zanoba picked up one of the cups he’d brought and scooped up the contents of the cask. It came out full of a translucent, purple liquid—Asuran wine. 

“Oh, you got any food?” Rudeus added.

“Only preserved supplies.”

“Oh, well. That’ll do.” 

The two men brought armfuls of dried food up from the cellar and piled it up next to the cask. That done, they raised their brimming cups to one another.

“To the advancement of the figurine project.”

“To the fulfillment of our dream.”

“Cheers!” 

With that, the celebrations began.

***

“What should we teach it first?”

“Now that we’ve completed a simple operations check, I’d like to run tests on how adaptable it is, how much it can remember, and the limits of the flexibility of its thinking.”

“We’ve got a lot to investigate. Let’s do all the tests we can.”

Rudeus and Zanoba drank as they discussed their future plans. When they’d powered on the doll earlier, it hadn’t outwardly done anything extraordinary, but it had interpreted and executed even ambiguous commands. It would learn autonomously, working off the basic knowledge included in its initial settings. However, just how much its intelligence could grow remained to be seen. How much would it be able to remember, and what would it learn to do? Would it be able to think and judge for itself?

“Leave it to me, Master. I shall take responsibility for giving it a broad education.”

“Just don’t teach it anything it shouldn’t know, right?”

“I might say the very same thing to you, Master!”

“When did you become a smart-ass?”

The two of them laughed as they imagined the future, filling their bellies with wine.

Zanoba changed the subject. “The ‘by-products’ you created are selling well, Master.”

“Yeah, I did make a lot of stuff while we were researching. So you’re selling them at the shop?”

“We’ve had particularly positive responses to that, er, one thing. The frog sleeve.”

“Ah, yeah…” 

It had taken a lot of trial and error before Rudeus was able to reproduce the texture of human skin. One iteration had used reinforced frog cheek pouches. It was extremely thin and elastic, but tough enough that it took a significant amount of force to tear it. Initially, Rudeus had thought he could make skin for the figurine from it, but they’d found a better material and hadn’t ended up using it. 

Instead, he’d made something…different.

“The contraceptive, huh?” Rudeus asked. It was a condom.

“Just so. Master Luke was especially pleased with it. He’s pushing on our behalf to build a factory in Asura.”

“Asuran nobles really love that sort of thing, huh?”

“You say that, but you use them too, don’t you, Master?”

“Well, you know.” He did use them—almost every night. 

After his third and fourth daughters, Lily and Chris, were born, there’d been an unspoken agreement that the next baby would be Sylphie’s. For a while, Rudeus gave the most attention to Sylphie and less to Roxy and Eris. Unfortunately, perhaps because of her race, Sylphie had not yet gotten pregnant a third time. It was possible they’d just gotten lucky with the timing with Lucie and Sieg, or maybe God was being cruel. Who knew? Either way, Eris got restless when they did it less. Her sex drive had settled down a lot compared to how it once was, but it was still a force to be reckoned with, like a wild beast with ravenous hunger in its eyes. Rudeus could easily find himself pounced upon and then Eris might get pregnant.

That was where contraceptives came in. Just use this little guy and hey, presto! He could satisfy Eris the ravenous beast without making any little beasts! No Sylphie scratching her cheek and looking forlornly at Eris’s pregnant belly. No Eris looking back with a vaguely guilty expression, defensively saying “What?” No need for any household disharmony. And this miraculous invention could be had for one, that’s right, one Asuran silver coin!

“I mean, you know,” Rudeus said. “It’s not ideal having more kids when we don’t have more people to look after them.”

“Why not simply hire a servant?”

“If we hired a servant, then I wouldn’t be the one looking after them. I can’t even keep up with six. You might not think it, but I want to watch over every one of them.”

Zanoba cackled. “That is just like you, Master.”

At this, Rudeus was suddenly inspired to ask something he’d always wondered about.

“Come to think of it, what’s the story with you and Julie?”

“Whatever do you mean?”

“Well, are you going to remarry?”

“You mean to Julie?”

“Sure, there’s an age gap, and Julie’s pretty low down in society,” Rudeus acknowledged. “But you don’t think of yourself as royalty anymore, right? It’s a sweet life, you know. Getting married, having all your children around you. You tell them how proud you are, sometimes they play tricks on you and you have to tell them off…”

Zanoba slowly shook his head, then said firmly, “I will not get married.”

“Oh?” Rudeus fell silent. Everyone had things they didn’t want others prying into. Zanoba surely had more on his mind than a simple preference. He had a whole lot of baggage—being royalty, his previous marriage, killing his little brother, what happened with Pax…

“It’s nothing exciting,” Zanoba said. “Do you want to hear about it?”

“If you’re happy to tell me.”

“As a Blessed Child, I am incredibly strong and tough, but the tradeoff is that my skin is insensitive.”

“So…?”

“The skin of a flesh-and-blood woman is too soft to provide me with stimulation.”

These words hit Rudeus like a blow to the head. It was obscene, but it explained things—like why Zanoba used a bronze statue for everything.

“That isn’t all, of course,” he went on. “There are many other things, like Pax, and Julius. But more than anything else, it would be cruel to take on a partner if I cannot give her a child.”

“Right,” Rudeus said. “But I mean, you could still ask Julie, if you get the chance. Maybe she’ll say she doesn’t mind not having children, I mean…or you could, like, adopt.” He stumbled over his words because he already had six children of his own.

Zanoba laughed without enthusiasm. “That is true.”

Rudeus decided not to say any more about marriage and returned to their original subject. These were supposed to be celebratory drinks, where they imbibed and had a good time.

“Anyway, enough about the rubbers! What about the other things? They selling well?” Rudeus asked.

“They see a modest trade. It seems they are viewed rather as curiosities, so only certain enthusiasts are looking to collect them.”

“I feel like they were pretty useful,” Rudeus said, disappointed. “Aisha loved the vacuum cleaner.”

Rudeus’s by-product inventions were many and varied. They included fans and vacuum cleaners that used magic circles, various waterproof items, and a cooler box. Each was useful, but only a few had caught on. Most of the effects could be reproduced using magic, and because of the somewhat specialized materials, they had no choice but to set the prices relatively high. Further research into the materials might make it possible to sell the items more cheaply, but that wasn’t their goal.

“Useful they may be, but Asura and Millis already have magical implements that produce the same effect, and hiring a servant is both faster and more convenient.”

“I feel like hiring a servant would take more work.” Rudeus downed his drink and sighed. Even though he’d lived long enough in this world that he might as well have been born here, he couldn’t entirely shake his previous life. “Oh, well. How about I at least put together a book on how to make them? Even if I just pass on the technology, people in the future might find a use for it.”

“A very fine idea. No doubt that book will be a marvelous discovery for anyone who wants to continue your legacy!”

“I could call it The Book of Rudeus or something.”

“Ha ha! Never would the magicians of generations to come guess that a tome bearing the name of the Dragon God’s right hand would contain instructions on how to make household goods!”

Rudeus and Zanoba cheerfully worked their way through the cask of wine, their faces growing redder and redder. A whole cask was a little more than just the two of them could handle.

“It’s a shame Cliff and Sir Bardi aren’t here.”

“I imagine,” Zanoba said after a pause, “Master Cliff would have objected to such an indecent doll.”

“He’d have been appalled, but he’d let it slide. Let’s bring him in for the next stage. Heck, we could raise a toast in his rooms in Millis.”

“An excellent idea! Yes, that’s just it! Once we have used this prototype to complete it properly, why don’t we present our first glorious automaton to Cliff as a gift?”

“Good idea! Ah, except it can’t be a girl model,” Rudeus reflected. “Let’s make it a boy.”

“A boy would be nice too.”

“Well, well. Your interests swing that way too, do they?”

“I have no feelings of desire for men, but I can appreciate the beauty of a boy. You understand, don’t you, Master?”

“Oh, I do. I understand so well I wouldn’t have minded if Fitz had actually been a boy.”

“Ha ha ha! You are something, Master!” 

By now, their party was in full swing and the two of them were getting drunker by the minute. The wine tasted all the better when sweetened with success.

“Right, okay, next time we make a boy model, and we’ll make it sooooo super cool that Cliff gets jealous.”

“Ha ha, ha ha ha!”

The two of them hadn’t noticed something important. They weren’t aware of the staring eyes watching them as they drank, nor did they realize that their conversation had been overheard. 

They didn’t see her smile.

***

“Urggh,” Rudeus groaned. “My head’s killing me.” 

The next day had dawned. As Rudeus got up, he applied an antidote to his aching head. Looking out the window, he saw that the storm had subsided entirely, leaving a cloudless blue sky.

“This late already? I guess I drank too much…” 

All the same, there was nothing like having a drink together as men, especially when it was a celebration. The doll’s indecency the previous day had thrown him a bit, but that was what it was. If the prototype was that good, he couldn’t wait to see what the future held. Rudeus felt possibility spread its wings, his heart bursting with hope and love as he turned to peek at the doll’s face—

“Uh?”

It wasn’t there. Only the bed stood there, empty. Doll-less.

“Wait, hold up. Zanoba? Where’d you put the doll?” Maybe, Rudeus thought, Zanoba had gotten up earlier and was teaching it something. As he looked around, Zanoba emerged sluggishly from a pile of blankets in the corner of the room.

“Hrm…? Master? Did you not turn off the automaton once it was in bed?”

“Turn it off?” Just like that, Rudeus’s memories surged back. He’d definitely had it get dressed, then told it to lie down on its bed. He was sure of that. “I…think so…?” 

Turning off the doll required either a command to turn off or to go dormant. The user had to put a hand on the magic stone in its chest and say the incantation. He…had not done that. 

“F-find it!” Rudeus spluttered.

“U-understood!” 

The two of them frantically hunted for the doll, but it was nowhere to be found—not inside the laboratory, nor was it right outside. It had vanished.