Dragon-san Wants a Friend

Volume 4 Chapter 28: Dragon-san’s Briefing Session

Nectar began while spreading the documents before us.

「First of all, I came to a certain conclusion: it is impossible to locate Taisha’s headquarters by any normal means.」

「So, it really was impossible, huh?」

Said Mikado-san with a somewhat calm expression, for he must have anticipated such an outcome. He then took a huge bite out of his red bean paste filled dumpling.

「We confirmed that there are a total of seven branch offices of the Taisha spread throughout the land. What’s more, it is now almost certain that the dragon veins – leylines – that are in their vicinity aren’t connected to the headquarters. We also considered many different things, but the conclusion was always more or less the same: it must be located somewhere in another dimension.」

「Hmm, I see, I get it... I don’t get it.」

「Which is it!? Make up your mind!」

Karura-san rolled her eyes in disbelief while I also shook my head.

Although she was normally calm and collected, it seems that when it comes to dragons, Karura-san tended to get agitated extremely easy.

「Say, did you already forget? The nature of other dimensions?」

「... Ah.」

It seems that Karura-san finally started to get what we were trying to say.

Now, if you say that you forgot all about it because of some trivial reason, I’m gonna slap you. I’m really gonna slap you!

Next to Karura-san, Mikado-san seemed to be completely clueless about what we were saying.

「Karura, don’t push their patience, please? Also, I don’t get what you are saying, like, at all. Please explain this to me so that even I can understand.」

「Ah, terribly sorry about that.」

While Karura-san’s face blushed in embarrassment and she was trying to collect herself, I took the role of explaining what was going on to Mikado-san.

「We call it another dimension purely out of convenience. In layman’s terms, it would be something like another world that exists outside of this world. If you think of this world as a water’s surface, then another dimension would be everything that is located under the water’s surface.」

「...... I feel like I’m being told something utterly incomprehensible, but is that really true?」

「Sure is. Say, Mikado-san, have you ever experienced teleportation? It is a spell that uses another dimension of sorts – leylines – to transport things from one place to another in a very short amount of time.」

There are still many different things that we don’t understand about other dimensions.

One of those things was that our laws of physics and the flow of time were not working as they should have there.

As a result, the teleportation was instant without any time lag.

Even though it was mostly a mystery, it’s existence was certain, as demons and dragons were able to interact with it by means of using magic.

However,

「The same can be said about the storages we sometimes use, but they are a different kind of dimension. We create it, but we have no control over where exactly it is located. And just like we cannot interfere with storages created by others, it will be extremely difficult to invade the dimension that someone like Ten personally created.」

Leylines are the most familiar form of foreign dimensions to us, mainly because we can sense them from our world and interacting with them is relatively easy.

However, other dimensions are an entirely different story. We don’t know anything about them and we have no idea where entrances to them are located.

So it’s no wonder that Nectar’s tracking spells couldn’t produce any satisfying results.

Since they were originally designed to track people and objects in the same dimension, they wouldn’t be able to tell if that person or object got spirited away into another dimension.

For example: if we assume that the leylines are like the public network, the subspaces that individuals create for their own use are like incognito pages.

So you can’t really access them if you don’t have the original owner’s permission.

I could make that analogy to Mikado-san, but...... No, it would be extremely confusion for him, since he didn’t know what the Internet is.

I look sideways towards Karura-san, who seemed to be thinking about everything that we said so far, and after a while she opened her mouth and said to Mikado-san:

「So basically it is something like a lock and a key, right? Dragon veins are the doors that anyone can open and come through freely, but there are also doors that are accessible only to their owners and only they know their respective location.」

「That analogy I can understand.」

We were actually amazed that Mikado-san managed to understand that at all, and then he put his chopsticks down.

「Please don’t look as though you thought I wouldn’t understand, Lava-dono.」

「Ah, sorry, it’s just that......」

It’s just that we used to encounter so many people in the past that perceived the world as they saw all around them to be everything and nothing more, that it was actually kind of surprising to see that someone would actually understand the concept of other dimensions. It was a surprise, but not an unwelcome one.

It looks like through the contract with Karura-san, Mikado-san managed to gain at least some understanding of magic. Good for us, as it would certainly save us some time for explanation.

「The Emperor is the most important person in the country. It is only but natural that I must have knowledge from all kinds of fields to be able to rule in a just way.」

「Look, I know that he looks like one, but for the sake of the argument just know that he is not a TOTAL muscle-brain.」

「It’s alright, it’s not their fault.」

Hearing Karura-san’s poisonous words, Mikado-san raised his eyebrows.

Certainly, I was thinking him to be more of a martial artist kind of person, since in his spare time he like to train together with Senjiro.

However, he was reading through the documents very thoroughly, and if there was some part that he did not understand he would send for an expert who would explain that to him.

The fact that you have to lead your people means that you must put even more work and effort than anyone else.

「Anyways, infiltrating Taisha by any normal means is impossible. Please understand that.」

「Right. We shall give up on trying to find our way inside through normal means. However, if there’s a door, then there must be a key somewhere, right?」

Said Mikado-san while taking yet another dumpling with his chopsticks.

He already ate like three of them, and considering just how big they were, you’re telling me he still has place for more?

「Yes, we also think that is the case. After all, Taisha may be located in another dimension, but it has seven branch offices throughout the land, each leading to headquarters in some way. If we find out what that way is, we may be able to exploit it to get inside. However.」

「Each branch office is being protected by many Guardians and Shrine Maidens, and even if we were to defeat them all, the only ones capable of opening the way are either the dragon or the selected Shrine Maiden. So we might want to think of some other way to get in......」

Karura-san, now much calmer than before, was now picking up a green dumpling and put it in her mouth.

From my point of view it looked just like a caterpillar, and it looks like they used some sort of fragrant grass to make it.

Maybe she wanted some sort of variety after all of those sweets she ate.

「So, the idea that we came up with is to try to replicate the structure of said gate leading to Taisha, and try to create our own gate based on the copied structure.」

「So we tried to do just that. However, those gates seem to be using so peculiar magic wave pattern, and if said pattern is not an exact match, the gate won’t even activate in the first place, thinking that the magic output is insufficient.」

「Yes, it says so here in the documents. The only ones who can operate the gate are Taisha’s dragon god and the Shrine Maidens designated by said dragon. However, there was something that I wanted to confirm with Lava. This is the copy of the spell used to invoke the gate. Think you’d be able to use it?」

Saying that, Nectar handed me a piece of paper with a spell schematic written on it.

I initially struggled to read it because of its cylindrical shape, but the spell itself was carved into a cylindrical object with lots of formulas that were basically rewriting the principles of the world. The more I read that, the more I was coming to understand.

It’s actually kind of amazing. From what I understood, it was written in such a way that almost anyone would be able to grasp the concept behind it.

Maybe it was because the demons helped to write it? Since the gods surely wouldn’t think of creating something so user-friendly.

Let’s see, let’s see. Oh, the composition of the spell itself is pretty much similar to the teleportation, but it looks like the number of people it can transfer is limited, on top of also being a one way ticket ride. After that the spell couldn’t be reused.

However, it was a method that was prone to accidents and was rather dangerous, even if the number of people was limited. Can we do something about that, I wonder......?

「Okay, so, I think this might actually work.」

「.................. Hm?」

「I mean, remember that one time when we did something similar?」

「Is there something wrong with this one?」

In that moment, Karura-san opens her eyes wide with surprise and Mikado-san’s expression becomes quite serious.

Seeing that, Nectar hurries to explain.

「I wasn’t sure enough myself, but this looks similar to the spells we saw in that room deep inside of the dungeon near Melias.」

「Yup. It may look complicated, but it seems to be rather similar to the spell we used to seal ‘Eclipse’ inside of another dimension. And this one here is even better, since it looks like it was made especially for dragons to use.」

Or maybe it was more correct that it was designed by the dragon for a dragon?

The schematic was rather detailed, made so that you wouldn’t use much magic needlessly, but it was also flexible, leaving much space for improvements and adjustments.

「Is it really possible!? Is it really something that even the best magicians of this whole country couldn’t think of while working together!?」

「No, it’s not all that great, since once we activate the spell, Ten is sure to notice that right away. We must think of some safety measures, and then engrave the formulas on some solid object. It can’t be done right away.」

「But it can do it, right?」

As I said, with the spell of this level, it couldn’t be done carelessly and on the fly. We must take our time and prepare for all possible outcomes that might await us.

But still, I decided to tease Mikado-san just a little bit.

「Who do you take me for? I may be young, but I am still a dragon, mind you.」

Now the question was, why was such a spell sealed away inside of the dungeon near Melias?

Oh well, maybe I’m just overthinking this way too much? I’m sure there must have been some reasonable explanation.

Or rather, we should all rejoice that we finally found a clue on how to infiltrate Taisha.

「If it’s the place and resources you need, we shall provide it. Lava-dono, Nectar-dono, will you build the gate for us?」

Judging by the way he said it, Mikado-san must have been waiting for an opportunity like that to come around for quite long now.

「Say, Mikado-san, I know I’m asking that a bit late, but are you really sure about this? We shall be trespassing into their territory, so are you really sure that you can allow yourself to make Taisha your enemy?」

Making yourself a backdoor into somebody else’s house was clearly a violation, in more ways than one.

For us it didn’t matter all that much. We are not the citizens of Towa, and the only thing that matters to me is getting Aru and Mikoto back to safety with us. When all is said and done, we just need to flee back to the Western continent and that would be it.

But Ten is someone who is literally sitting at the top of this country.

I’ve been observing Mikado-san for the past week, and I can say that he’s a good ruler, even if just a little bit eccentric. Still I don’t know why would he want to risk literally all he had just to get to Taisha.

But even so, there was hardly a problem here, right? So far he’s been treating us good, so I didn’t wanted to bring up anything that would cause some animosity to raise between us. That being said, there must have been a reason for him to want to get to Taisha so bad.

「Speaking of which, how long would it take you to complete the gate?」

Hearing Mikado-san ask that, I nodded my head and wondered for a while.

「Why are you in such a hurry to do this? We, on one hand want to get our friend and son back, so it’s understandable that we want to hurry. But you? It’s weird that we don’t know your reason.」

I looked at Nectar and confirmed that he was feeling the same way. Mikado-san put another dumpling in his mouth and swallowed.

Then, he slowly started to speak.

「I was always thinking about having friendly relationship with Taisha. But, this time they went too far. I want to go there so we can have a nice and long talk.」

We finally heard his purpose, but what was that sense of discomfort that I was feeling?

Maybe we should encourage him to elaborate a bit more on why he was in such a hurry to get there?

「Being the most powerful person in the entire country, is there someone who you would like to meet there, but that person doesn’t want to see you?」

「I knew it. So there is someone like that there?」

Mikado-san continued to grin, even when Nectar asked him in a stern voice.

「Taisha’s Shrine Maiden, the Head Shrine Maiden that houses Taisha’s deity inside of her, that’s who I want to meet. It is a tradition since the ancient times.」

Seeing an expression of both sadness and regret on Mikado-san’s face, Nectar and I glanced at one another in surprise.

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