Chapter Eighteen

  “You wouldn’t think a demon would be so hard to find in a kingdom full of humans.” Albedo said as they looked over the last place they could detect a sign of Ulbert.

  “So you don’t know?” Demiurge asked as he stood up from looking at the tracks.

  “Know what?” Albedo asked with a little frown.

  “About the unique skills of heteromorphic Supreme Beings.” Demiurge explained, “Other than the undead, most of them have some limited transformation skills… I doubt very much that Lord Ulbert is traveling as a demon now.” He said as he looked around the clearing that still had the faint odor of brimstone.

  He cleared his throat and folded his hands behind his back. “I’m very certain My Lord is now traveling in the company of humans, as a human”

  “That he was in the company of humans, yes, that much is evident. But why? He can’t have been captured.” She said, looking past Demiurge to the town on the horizon.

  “No. Definitely not.” Demiurge felt his nerves bristle at her words, even though she denied that he could have been, it still sounded as if she’d at least considered the possibility, ‘But that would be blasphemous. Absurd even. Or perhaps just more thorough than most… but I still do not care for it.’ He thought but kept that to himself. “Given that the tint of brimstone vanishes here, I believe he took on a human shape and went into town with his escort. That would account for the presence of humans but no human blood or remains at the clearing we tracked him to before. He made contact with some humans, and began to travel with them. If he went into that town, we may find some evidence of where they were taking him.”

  “I think I can guess where they were going.” Albedo said at once. Demiurge looked over his shoulder at her and waited expectantly.

  “He drove out the beastmen, it’s only natural that, if he’s not slaughtering humans too, that important humans would want to meet with him. I think if we simply go straight to the capital and wait, we’ll find him in the palace of the Queen, sooner or later.”

  The archdemon thought that over while he looked into the distance, there were clouds forming, many of them, changing the weather might arouse suspicions, but the rain held no appeal to Demiurge. The thunder rolled on regardless of his wishes, and what Albedo said did make sense. But there was more.

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  “If these humans were representatives of some significance, which yes, they probably were, then they almost certainly stopped here. My Lord was on foot, the few steps we could find indicate that they weren’t rushing, that puts them in this place by evening assuming a persistent pace. That means we should find some evidence of my creator in this ‘Sasbay’ place…” Demiurge looked at the human town with its low walls and bustling camps around it as if he’d found yet another sacred relic.

  ‘Forget it!’ She wanted to snap, ‘He left you before! The same as all our creators left! We were abandoned! They abandoned the only one to remain with us! The one who stayed with us to the last hour! The one to come with us to this world! What does he matter?! How can you be loyal to a being that hurt the only one to be loyal to us?!’ She wanted to rage at Demiurge, to scream, to shout and berate him for a fool with misplaced devotion to a supreme being that barely merited the word.

  But she said nothing. She didn’t even look at him, at least not for long enough for him to detect any sign of a hostile glare. Instead she looked at the rolling clouds. In spite of herself, her own thoughts on the matter, seeing her friend, her comrade’s longing, she gave in, at least a little. “We’ll go in and inspect this place, just to confirm where they’re going and get a description of what he looks like in his present form. After that, we go straight to their destination to establish ourselves and wait.”

  Every fiber of Demiurge’s being longed to object, the town ahead was a wretched, despised place in his mind, or at least, he knew it would have been… ‘Except that he was there, is there, perhaps? I don’t know, I can’t know… not without going in, but if he was here, that makes this place sacred! Holy! This is more than a hunt for a Supreme Being, this is… this is following in my father’s footsteps, walking sacred ground toward a longing that has burned in my breast for years since his last farewell! I couldn’t speak then, my voice wouldn’t work… I couldn’t ask him not to go… I couldn’t ask him to please stay, or to take me with him when he left for whatever higher plane called my maker away… to follow him in his walk to its conclusion is a sacred act…’

  His reverie was interrupted by Albedo’s words. “Lord Ainz’s directions were clear. We are to track him down. Not conduct a pilgrimage.” She crossed her arms in front of her ample chest, “If we know where he’s going, then the surest thing we can do is meet him there. That is all, Demiurge. I’m speaking not as your friend now, but as the Guardian Overseer appointed by the Supreme Beings of Nazarick in service to His Sorcerous Majesty, Ainz Ooal Gown.”

  Demiurge cleared his throat, straightened his back, pushed aside his sentiment, and pressed his glasses further up the bridge of his nose. “You are right.” He admitted at last. “I can walk his sacred journey another time… what matters now is following Lord Ainz’s orders, and if we wait too long, we may miss him. I can’t risk that. I won’t. Thank you for bringing me to my senses.” He said and turned around to face the blank faced Albedo, bowing at the waist as he said it.

  “It’s fine. Let’s just go, we haven’t a moment to waste.” She answered, and from there they descended into the town of Sasbay.