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Tate no Yuusha no Nariagari (LN) - Volume 18 - Chapter 1




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Chapter One: Sloth 


After finishing breakfast, we started our activities for the day. Those who hadn’t been present for the meal—including Ethnobalt and Therese—were already off starting work or training. 
Meanwhile, I headed with Glass and Raphtalia toward the medical facility where Kizuna was being treated. I’d been told that they had almost reached the next stage of her treatment for being turned to stone: the removal of the complete paralysis of her entire body. 
We entered the magical treatment room inside the facility. The room itself had lots of ofuda plastered over the walls, making it look like the site of some scary ritual. Kizuna was standing transfixed in the middle of all of that, her fishing rod out in front of her. She looked like she was only sleeping. 
I had to wonder, not for the first time, how she got herself turned to stone like this. As I was thinking, a professional in this world that was called both a curse master and a healer spoke up. 
“The paralysis will be broken soon,” he said. We remained quiet and just watched as the ofuda around Kizuna started to glow with a faint light. That light proceeded to gather around the unmoving Kizuna. A moment later the light scattered again, and with a shudder, the paralysis was broken and Kizuna started to move. 
“Kizuna . . .” Glass, concern in her voice, started forward at once, but immediately after being released, Kizuna’s entire body started to give off a flickering purple aura. I recognized it at once—I’d used curse series gear myself. Glass had surely worked it out too, because she readied her fan and had a stern look on her face. 
“Ah . . . so listless,” Kizuna whimpered. Keeping her fishing rod in front of her, she simply dropped to a horizontal position and started sleeping. 
“Kizuna?” Glass ventured. The response was little more than a moan, Kizuna barely opening her eyes and looking in our direction. She looked totally doped up. 
“Are you okay?” Glass asked. 
“I guess . . .” Kizuna replied. “Where am I?” 
“A medical facility in our base,” Glass told her. 
“Oh . . .” Kizuna responded, completely without engagement. She wasn’t even surprised to see me here! She definitely seemed very different from the Kizuna I had known before—listless was one way of putting it, or another way would be to say she looked like she was just annoyed to be having to do anything. 
“She’s acting a lot like you, Mr. Naofumi, when you don’t want to do something,” Raphtalia observed. 
“You think I act like that?” I replied with a suitable note of incredulity. 
“Yes, you do.” Raphtalia quickly put me right. “But maybe not quite as openly as this.” They say that seeing your faults in others can be a way to correct them in yourself . . . but I always get things done in the end. No correction necessary. 
“Kizuna, pull yourself together! We’ve finally managed to save you!” Glass pleaded with her. 
“Good for you,” came the lethargic reply. It looked like Kizuna just wanted to be left alone to sleep, and all she did in response to Glass was roll around. 
“Is this the cost of the curse? Something like that?” I asked. Kizuna was generally unable to attack humans, but just like me, she should have gained that ability by using a cursed weapon—of course, only as a last resort. Glass and the others had told me about it and that the cost of the curse was to make her weaker. 
“No . . . the cost for that weapon is a simple, direct reduction in level and power-ups. I can’t imagine it would turn her into this pathetic creature,” Glass bemoaned. 
“Hmmm,” I responded. We proceeded to carefully check the condition of the weapon that Kizuna was holding. It was a fishing rod with a peculiarly twisted aura to it. The reel, which was a bit bear-like, definitely caught my eye. I was also quick to notice a strange black accessory—like handcuffs, almost, connecting Kizuna to the weapon. 
“Kizuna! Pull yourself together!” Glass tried again, this time with an added light slap to the cheek. Kizuna moaned, and then something like smoke started to well up around her. With a brief sound of surprise, Glass almost slumped to the floor, even as she still held onto Kizuna. The smoke continued to swell, filling the room. 
“Stardust Mirror!” I used the mirror version of Shooting Star Shield to create a barrier, fencing off the smoke, and then lifted Glass up. Kizuna was currently not one of my party members and so she had been pushed out by the barrier. 
“Glass, are you okay?” I asked. I held her, and Raphtalia tried to wake her by slapping her on the cheek. 
“I’m . . . still here.” Glass rejoined us, rubbing her cheek as she stood up. 
“You okay?” I asked again, now that she could hear me. 
“Yes, I think so . . . but what happened?” she asked. 
“That strange smoke emerged from Kizuna. You were the closest, and it made you collapse,” I told her. 
“I’m not sure what this is inside me . . . a feeling of complete lethargy . . .” Glass reported, her face looking pale. 
“Kizuna, excuse us. I need to talk to Glass. You just wait here,” I said. Kizuna only groaned a bit in reply, unable to even do that properly. 
We left Kizuna on the ground in the room full of smoke and headed back outside. Then we called in one of the curse masters and had them take a look at Glass. It turned out she was suffering from a light curse—one that, thankfully, could be treated quickly. Just in the time since we left the room, Glass was already fully conscious and standing on her own two feet. 


 


“What’s going on with Kizuna?” Glass managed to ask. 
“She did attack you, didn’t she? Someone who is meant to be her ally,” Raphtalia said, clearly worried. 
“No. From what we saw in there, I’m not sure I’d call that an attack by her,” I responded. It certainly didn’t look to me like Kizuna had instigated the action herself and much more like her weapon was to blame. 
I spoke to Kizuna through a glass window in her room. 
“Kizuna, can you stop using that weapon? It’s causing all sorts of problems,” I said. 
“What? Did you say something?” she replied lazily. Kizuna was still lying down with her back to us. A few more seconds passed and it was like I’d never even spoken. 
“Kizuna! What are you lying around for? Hurry up and change your weapon!” Glass chided her. 
“Bah . . . such a pain,” came the response. Kizuna continued to lie on the floor, even as the mysterious smoke continued to fill the room. At least it looked like we’d managed to contain the smoke in the room, but now strange vibrations in the air, strange pulsations, started to pass through the walls and come at us. 
“I’d put good odds on that weapon being the thing making Kizuna all loopy,” I said. 
“I agree,” Raphtalia stated. 
“Remember, Kizuna was being held by a vanguard of the waves and S’yne’s sworn enemies. I wouldn’t put it past them to booby-trap her in case she was ever saved,” I continued. We already knew they had used some kind of strange corruption on the four holy weapons and brought the holders under their control. Kizuna was now the only one of the holy heroes left on this world—it made sense they would do something to her that wasn’t going to kill her but would also prevent her from getting back into action even if she did escape. 
“We should have destroyed that accessory before we turned her back,” I lamented. 
“We did try,” Raphtalia responded. 
Indeed, we had given it a try. 
“So just what kind of curse is this?” she asked. We all looked at Kizuna again. It was like the pollution was spreading out from her. I didn’t like it. 
The curse masters had placed new purification ofuda on the walls and closed the room up again. 
“If it’s another curse based on the seven deadly sins . . .” I thought back over the trend we had seen in the past. I had been wrath. I still wasn’t sure what it would have been like if the rage completely overtook me, but the urge to destroy stuff and kill people had been overpoweringly strong. Ren the Sword Hero, meanwhile, had suffered from greed and gluttony. Itsuki the Bow Hero had been pride, but his had been a bit of a different curse, making him more righteous than anything else. Then there was Motoyasu the Spear Hero, suffering from lust and envy. Looking at Kizuna lying on the floor, complaining about doing anything at all, the one that seemed to apply was . . . 
“Sloth. You think this might be a sloth-curse weapon?” I asked. If it was sapping her will to do anything, while also polluting the space around her, sloth seemed pretty appropriate. “Whatever it is,” I continued, “we need to get her to change it.” 
“Kizuna! Please, change your weapon at once!” Glass pleaded. “That weapon is even influencing your mind!” 
“Huh . . . okay . . .” she responded. It almost sounded like she was going to actually make an effort! Kizuna placed a hand on the fishing rod and tried to change its shape . . . but nothing happened, and she just slumped lazily back to the ground. 
“Can’t change it . . . what a pain . . .” she managed to say. I met her eyes and swallowed hard. They looked like the eyes of a dead fish, blank and lifeless and horrible. 
Did she love fish so much she was starting to become one? If you bumped into her in a dark alley at night, with those eyes, you would run for your life. 
“It seems she can’t change her weapon . . . and she’s also completely lifeless and listless,” I summarized. 
“So even though we ‘saved’ her—even though we have her here—she hasn’t actually been saved yet?” Glass lamented. 
“That’s the short of it. They really did a number with their booby-traps.” I shook my head, wondering how they forcefully turned one of the holy weapons into a curse weapon. When I thought about it, she had been in a strange pose—fishing rod out and all—and so we should have been a bit more alert. We needed to break the curse before we restored her to normal. 
“How to break this curse, then? Can we break the accessory with, what . . . some hot spring water that works on curses or some holy water . . . something like that?” I asked. I tried to break the accessory using magic, but it was just repelled. This one was far tougher than the accessory they had been using to control the vassal weapons. 
“Ah, this is all such a pain . . .” Kizuna reached out, took a steamed bun I’d put in the room for her, and started stuffing her cheeks while lying on the ground. At least she could work up the concern to eat, if nothing else. 
“We’d better go report this to the others,” I said. 

“Okay,” Raphtalia agreed. We proceeded to gather the others. 
“Bah! This situation sucks!” L’Arc muttered, clicking his tongue. 
“Therese, is there anything you can do?” I asked. 
“I’ll give it a try . . .” she replied. She gingerly moved over toward Kizuna and started to intone some magic. The effects of the accessory that Imiya had made for me were providing Therese with a considerable amount of protection. L’Arc had told some pretty wild tales of her exploits in battle, so if this problem was rooted in magic, maybe she could resolve it. However . . . “It’s not good,” she eventually said. “It feels like they’ve fused the holy weapon and accessory together and are forcing it to retain the shape of a cursed weapon.” 
“Which means maybe Lady Kizuna can overcome it by getting stronger,” L’Arc said. 
“I can’t say if that would work or not. It’s using the power of Kizuna and the holy weapon as its medium. If Kizuna gets stronger, the accessory will just get stronger too,” Glass explained. 
What a freaking pain! That said, we couldn’t just leave Kizuna like this. We had no idea when Bitch, S’yne’s sworn enemies, or the remaining enemy vassal weapon holders would show up to attack. We needed to bring Kizuna back into action as quickly as possible. 
“Fehhh . . .” Rishia murmured, her only contribution. 
“How about if I played some magical purification music?” Itsuki asked. 
“Shall I sing?” Filo suggested, joining in with proposing how to break the curse. That had worked in the world we’d come from . . . and in the Cursed Lands, for example. 
“I’m sure you could purify the area around Kizuna. It would likely work to protect us, but I think it’s unlikely to do much to Kizuna herself. The seat of the disease lies within. It’s likely you would just delay the spread of the corruption a little,” Glass explained. The more I heard, the more annoying this entire curse was turning out to be. 
Then Ethnobalt raised his hand with another proposal. 
“My home, the Ancient Labyrinth Library, has copies of almost all of the books ever written in this world,” he explained. “We might find some clues there as to how to deal with this.” Ethnobalt had been the ship vassal weapon hero when we first met him, but during the battle with Miyaji he had been chosen as the holder of the book vassal weapon. He was a race called a “library rabbit,” so a book definitely suited him better than a ship. “There are legends saying that impossibly difficult problems of the past were solved by searching Ancient Labyrinth Library archives,” he continued. That didn’t sound like much to go on, but it was probably better than doing nothing at all. 
“I’ll remain here and continue to play a purification song, in order to impede the spread of the curse,” Itsuki said. “Naofumi, you and the others can use that time to go and find a way to save her. How does that sound?” I didn’t really have any choice but to nod to this proposal. 
“Itsuki . . .” said Rishia, a little concerned for him. 
“No need to worry, Rishia. We simply have to do the best that we can,” he replied. 
“I guess having you guys here, watching over and protecting Kizuna, will make it easier for us to leave,” I reasoned. It would not be amusing in the slightest if our base of operations was attacked and fell to the enemy while we were all out trying to find a book. The base being occupied would be bad enough, but it would also mean that we’d need to rescue Kizuna a second time. 
Filo’s singing would probably be good backup for Itsuki, and so I decided to ask her to stay too. 
“I should also tell you that the Ancient Labyrinth Library is located some distance from the closest dragon hourglass. The round trip will take a while even if we use Return Dragon Vein. We need to choose the people to leave behind quite carefully,” L’Arc added. 
“Just what kind of place is the Ancient Labyrinth Library?” I asked. I had passed by it before but not really seen the place in any detail. 
“You were dropped with Kizuna into the never-ending labyrinth, right, Naofumi?” Ethnobalt confirmed with me. 
“That’s right,” I replied. 
“The Ancient Labyrinth Library is a similar place . . . a massive maze that continues on forever. It is said to be the place that all knowledge in this world gathers . . . the destination of all books,” Ethnobalt explained. I still couldn’t really imagine a building housing what he was describing, but as a video game lover, I thought it was really ticking some boxes for me. It sounded something like the Akashic Records, a pretty common trope in my chosen forms of entertainment. 
“Library rabbits are monsters who live in the library. We have the power to feel, somewhat vaguely, the location of books that people are searching for,” Ethnobalt revealed. Now that sounded super convenient. They also seemed to be thinking that not having the ship vassal weapon was going to slow us down, but they seemed to be forgetting someone. Me. 
“As far as getting there goes, I’m thinking the mirror vassal weapon’s skill Teleport Mirror will get the job done. If my memory serves me correctly, I should be able to take us there as it’s somewhere I’ve been before,” I said. The mirror vassal weapon was pretty tricked out with movement skills using the medium of mirrors. It had a selection of various similar movement skills. The mirror was a pretty capable weapon when it came to movement abilities. Sharing traits with the ship vassal weapon, it had skills like Portal Shield and Scroll of Return. To say I had “been there before” was maybe a stretch, as I’d just dropped in briefly by way of Ethnobalt’s ship. But I was pretty sure it would work out. “So there’s no need to worry about movement time,” I continued. “We just need to work out who is going to come along.” 
“Monsters will appear in the labyrinth areas, so we’re going to want people who can fight,” Ethnobalt added. 
“Right here.” S’yne immediately raised her hand. “In a special dungeon—” 
“Lady S’yne is explaining that she has the perfect skills for use in a deep-level labyrinth,” came the translation from her familiar. But it sounded a bit inconsistent to me. I wouldn’t categorize a special dungeon and deep-level labyrinth as being the same. Surely “deep-level” meant a labyrinth that specifically went down many floors. 
“You didn’t say anything when we were in that labyrinth beneath the city where the music vassal weapon holder was hanging out,” I commented, just a little snidely. 
“In that dungeon—” S’yne started. 
“Lady S’yne is saying that that place felt different from one in which her skills would apply,” her familiar explained. I wondered for a moment if I’d be able to obtain that “feeling” if I trained harder. 
“It’s true that the underground labyrinth and Ancient Labyrinth Library have a similar structure, but the rules that apply to them are a little different. In terms of depth . . . I should think the Ancient Labyrinth Library goes deeper,” Ethnobalt assessed. Reflecting on my own experience in the never-ending labyrinth, there had been different rules there, such as restrictions on transport skills. 
“So what’s this ‘perfect skill’ she has access to?” I asked. In response, S’yne turned her vassal weapon into a ball of thread. 
“The labyrinth skill, Ariadne’s Thread?” she replied. 
“Using this skill will auto-map the area being explored. If the dungeon has rules that interfere with transportation, it can also ignore those and instantly transport you directly outside,” her familiar said. That actually did sound really convenient. The kind of standard return skill that always showed up in RPGs. 
“But isn’t transporting a large number of people difficult for you, S’yne?” I asked. I recalled that when she used that skill to jump to a pin, she had said it was dangerous to take a group with her. 
“That will be fine—” S’yne said. 
“This skill is purely used for escape, so the burden is only about the same as when transporting alone,” the familiar explained for her. 
“I must say . . . the vassal weapons from other worlds have some truly incredible powers,” Ethnobalt said, clearly impressed. Seeing as he was born there, he was probably impressed to hear about circumventing the building rules that he had been dealing with his entire life. 
Still, Ariadne’s Thread . . . That was famous in my world as the means used to escape the minotaur’s labyrinth. 
“So you’d be fine even if you got cast into the never-ending labyrinth, S’yne,” I commented. 
“Yeah,” she replied. That really was convenient. If we’d had S’yne with us back then, we wouldn’t have had to use the bioplants. 
“That makes S’yne a fixture then. Add in Raphtalia and Ethnobalt . . . Glass, what about you?” I asked her. “Do you want to stay and keep an eye on Kizuna?” Glass glanced at Kizuna’s room for a moment but then looked back at me. 
“No. I need to prioritize finding a way to cure her,” she replied. 
“Pen!” Chris chimed in, moving toward Itsuki and displaying an intent to help him resist the curse. He was a shikigami, making him pretty resistant to this kind of problem. So Glass was going to leave Kizuna with Chris and come help search for the solution. 
“Okay, that’s fine with me,” I said. “Anyone else?” I was pretty sure the killer whale sisters would want to come along—and indeed, they raised their hands next. 
“Right here, little Naofumi. We don’t want to miss out on the fun!” Sadeena said. 
“That’s two more!” Shildina added. I didn’t see any major problem in taking the two of them along. 
“L’Arc, what about you guys?” I asked. 
“I’d love to tag along, but there’s going to be a wave in a neighboring nation soon, so I need to go take part in their strategy council,” he said. Of course, with most of the holy heroes gone, the frequency of the waves was really ramping up. Those nations working in cooperation with Kizuna and her allies had been bolstered by our recent deeds and were now tackling the waves very seriously. L’Arc taking part in such a council meeting was completely natural—and a good thing. 
“Any chance it’s some kind of trap?” I asked, just to be sure. 
“That’s my biggest worry, but I can’t always fall back to relying on you when something happens, can I, kiddo?” L’Arc responded. Good point. 
“The power of this accessory you have given me, Master Craftsman, will allow me to overcome any peril we face,” Therese offered. I decided to just let her be. 
S’yne proceeded to place a small needle into L’Arc’s sleeve. She could use that to move around or spy on events at a distance. 
“If this gets jammed—” she started. 
“Lady S’yne says that if this pin is jammed or something happens to it, she will immediately inform you, Master Iwatani,” her familiar relayed. 
“That sounds like a good idea. If you can hold your council meeting in a place I’ve visited before, that would be useful too,” I suggested. 
“Sure thing. We’re intending to hold it in the place Kyo controlled,” L’Arc replied. I immediately knew the place he was talking about. When I was here before, I dropped in there by way of Ethnobalt’s ship just before my departure. I should be able to travel there just using Return Dragon Vein. 
“Okay then. Let’s all get started,” I told them. 
“Sure thing!” L’Arc seemed pretty full of beans for some reason. And so Raphtalia, Raph-chan, Glass, Ethnobalt, S’yne, Sadeena, Shildina, and I all headed straight for the Ancient Labyrinth Library. 
 





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