As he said those words, Ainz suppressed his uneasiness as he looked in the direction of the Death Knight, who had already left the room. Part of him felt that it was a pretty good line, so he made a mental note of it. It seemed like a line that could be used in front of other people.
“Lines, huh… those might end up being useful in the future. Maybe I should look into them…”
Part 3
The Death Knight ran.
He sprinted at top speed through the 9th floor of the Great Tomb of Nazarick.
In order to swiftly fulfil his master’s orders, he ran with a single-minded focus.
The way a creature like himself ran, over two meters tall and sheathed from head to toe in heavy black plate armor, resembled the movement of a giant rolling stone. And then, the seemingly unstoppable charge was halted by a single shout.
“—Hey!”
The voice of a woman came from the side.
While wondering if the shout was directed at him, the Death Knight continued moving for another ten meters.
“Hey! What are you doing? Why are you running so fast? I’ll get mad, you know!”
Looking behind, he saw that the speaker was a maid.
He knew she was a regular maid from the knowledge that his master shared with him.
“This is the 9th floor, the residence of the Supreme Beings! How can you make such a racket? Why are you running here — no, not running — rampaging all over the place!”
The Death Knight pondered her words, and noted that they were true. Although his master ruled this place and had given him a direct order, making so much noise was rude.
As she saw the Death Knight lower his head in apology, the maid nodded in satisfaction.
“Very good. You need to remember, you can run in some places and not in others. Since you apologized, I’ll keep it a secret from your master. You’re lucky you met me. If you met someone stricter, it might be troublesome for your master. Be more careful in future!”
The maid lightly touched her chin with her index finger, and tilted her head.
“Although… I’ve never seen you before… if you’re undead, are you Shalltear-sama’s minion?”
The Death Knight shook his head, and the maid’s expression stiffened. Her face went pale, and sweat started beading on her forehead.
“Then… whose subordinate could you be…”
After the Death Knight told her the name of his owner, the maid’s face turned a ghastly white.
“I… I… did I say something wrong? …Um… then… did Ainz-sama give an urgent order?”
the Death Knight thought. To his master, who ruled this place, any and all rules were simply suggestions that he could alter at his whim. In other words, his master made the rules. If the Death Knight were truly on urgent business, the maid’s disrespectful actions would have been punished with death at the very least.
No wonder,
As she realized this, signs of fear began appearing on her face.
Still, was that really the case?
It could sense the intentions his master harbored in his heart. However, since his master had not actually spoken those words, it didn’t count as an order.
The most important thing was… The Death Knight glanced at the trembling maid from the corner of his eye and thought.
It wasn’t just this maid. The Death Knight could feel that his master was revered by every single being here. Just by looking at his master, even a lowly summoned creature like himself was of a higher status than all of them.
The Death Knight explained to the maid that he was not under orders, and that he was simply running in order to quickly fulfil its master’s wishes.
The maid blinked, and sighed in relief. The color began returning to her face.
“Haaaa—”
She sagged visibly, like a puppet whose strings had been cut.
“Well, that’s great. That’s just great…”
She coughed.
“Sorry about that. I can’t believe I was so rude to one of Ainz-sama’s subordinates. My sincerest apologies.”
The Death Knight waved his hand to indicate that he didn’t mind. Truthfully speaking, the fault lay with himself for barging through this sanctuary. However, the maid probably wouldn’t be able to accept his apology given her circumstances.
It was clearly all right, but the maid had no intention of looking away. It was only natural for inferiors to watch superiors as they left. However, the Death Knight felt itself even more inferior to her, and the weight of her gaze was hard to bear.
They waited for each other to make the first move, warily watching each other, like a duel between two master swordsmen.
Things would be awkward if they stood here looking at each other.
As the one who had caused the two of them to stare at each other in the first place, he should probably make the first move.
The Death Knight moaned and felt the maid’s gaze burning into his back as he walked away. He was walking because things would be troublesome if another maid shouted at him to stop running in the hallways. The Death Knight could at least learn that much.
Without further incident, he reached the teleport gate that led to the floors above.
From here, he would pass through the 7th, the 6th, the 5th and the 4th floors, with his final destination being the room of Shalltear Bloodfallen on the second floor. Moving there on foot would take a lot of time, but there was no other way.
The reason why he would not pass through the 8th floor was because entry into it was forbidden. Because of that, a path had been made to skip past it.
Some people might also have wanted to bypass all the floors and go straight to the 2nd floor, but only one person in Nazarick could do that. This person was the Death Knight’s creator, Ainz Ooal Gown, the guild leader. Or rather, not even his master could do it without the Ring of Ainz Ooal Gown. It would be impossible for a mere Death Knight like himself.
The Death Knight stepped into the sparkling lights of the teleport gate. Because it was rare to see an undead being use the teleport gate by itself, the Guardian of the Cherry Blossom Sanctuary — who was in charge of the teleport gates— turned her gaze toward him, but she did not send him to the special place, and the Death Knight successfully completed his teleport.
He passed the infernal world of the 7th floor.
He passed the Colosseum on the 6th floor
He passed the frozen wasteland of the 5th floor
He passed the underground lake on the 4th floor.
At last, he reached the place that deserved the name of “tomb”.
The Death Knight exited the teleport gate, into a windowless underground chapel. Maybe it had once been a room that glittered with riches, but now all that was left were moldering bones. The only thing that remained clean was an altar where a god’s statue should have stood. In its place was a flag of Ainz Ooal Gown.
The chapel was about a hundred meters across and completely unlit. If the Death Knight had not been able to see in the dark, he would have been engulfed by a blackness so complete that he would not have been able to see his own hand in front of his face.
Several dozen undead were wandering in the darkness. Since they did not sense any body heat, they showed no hostility.
The Death Knight left the chapel through its sole door and headed outside.
In front of the chapel was an old, derelict rope bridge that was held up by ropes that looked like they were about to break. The boards below his feet were rotten through, and where some knots had come loose, the planks had fallen off, leaving nothing but empty space where they should have been. The bridge swayed gently even without the wind in the air, creaking mournfully.
Below the bridge were the silhouettes of countless corpses. They moaned and raised their arms.