[INDEF. HIATUS] Regrets and Wishes: One More Chance

Chapter 19 - Shizue Izawa: Incandescent Heart

PRIOR WARNING: Started from now, if I want to make a character speaking in a clearly different language, I will depict it in two possible ways. If it's only a short phrase, I will write the full translation and tell what language is being used with dialogue tag. If it's a long phrase or full speech, I will write the Romanized spelling of that language in the dialogue, then put the original script and the English translation right after that.

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第19章　シズエ・イザワ：白熱した心

(Rimuru's Perspective)

In a room inside the temporary health facility that our town has, Ciel and I are sitting on chairs near a bed.

The night has fully spread its wings. Seen through the window are the gibbous moon and countless twinkling stars littered around it, painting the dark sky with such a beautiful scenery. At least an hour has passed since the nightfall. The remaining ogres have successfully been evacuated.

Basically, the evacuation went like this, according to Ciel's report: after a while the orcs had begun attacking from the northeast direction, she—her split consciousness manifested in my [Multiple Parallel Existence]—led the ogres who were still alive at the time to run into a prepared huge transportation magic circle through [Thought Communication].

In the map, our town—or the Sealed Cave in general is located rather far in the west direction from the ogres' village. The magic circle was intentionally placed in the east of the village in order to confuse the orcs and some clowns among them, in case they were trying to track down the ogres' whereabouts. We don't want them to find our settlement, not in a time like this.

The final result: forty-seven out of three hundred or so managed to survive.

There were several reasons why we decided to wait until the orcs actually attacked them and ended up technically letting more than four-fifths of the ogres slaughtered. As a superior race, experiencing huge loss and humiliating defeat against those far weaker than them would teach a great life lesson to them.

They would understand a glimpse of how hard and painful the life was for the weak who were nothing but a target to be ruthlessly stepped on and devoured—those who were living in constant fear of losing their beloved and their own lives at any time. With loss, they would learn to treasure and appreciate more what they were currently having. And with defeat, they would learn to never look down at the weaker races, no matter how much weaker.

There would be resentment, no doubt. Resentment towards the orcs for having killed their precious comrades and maybe even resentment towards us for not saving them much earlier. But in the end, they had to realize, doing an action out of pure resentment without thinking over what should be actually done wasn't going to bring them anywhere, and could even lead them into their own destruction faster than what the orcs did to them.

In any ways, we're supposed to come to pay the ogres a visit tonight. But we still have some things that are yet to be done. The dinnertime should've been finished by now, so I try to contact whomever goblina is still in the building where the evacuated ogres are sheltered.

"Is anyone there?" I open my [Thought Communication], hoping there is someone who'll answer.

"Yes, my lord?" answers a voice just in time. It's Harumi's voice, as far as I can remember. She is a goblina working in the public kitchen whose usual tasks are to arrange food into bowls and to distribute it to our hobgoblin workers every mealtime.

"Please tell the evacuees that I can't pay them a visit tonight as I still have some businesses to deal with tonight. Instead, I will visit them tomorrow after sunrise. Get it?"