Hellmode ~Gamer Who Likes to Speedrun Becomes Peerless in a Parallel World with Obsolete Setting~ Vol. 8 - Chapter 424 - Professor Sinorom's shadow

"Everything should go smoothly until the Songstress Contest tomorrow."

Helmios had asked how things were going in Prostia, so Allen told him everything that happened.

He was also using rus and the Wraith summons to send most news.

Allen had left Peromus a little before lunch to co here.

The Songstress Contest was one day away, so everyone in the palace and the city were busy.

Rosalina's outfit for her performance was also decided yesterday.

Allen had used the records from past years to analyze the Sacred Fish Makris' tastes.

He explained the patterns he found to Cecile and Sophie, and then had them help with picking clothes through the Bird F summon's Awakened Skill [ssenger].

That could send visual information too, allowing Cecile and Sophie to monitor things remotely.

Shea had also been excited to help, but sohow all her suggestions seed to favor rowdy movents.

Cecile and Sophie were slightly bothered, but with the help of Princess Rapsonile they put things back on track.

Shea had co with them to Prostia in an attempt to gain her spot as the next Beast King.

Sohow Allen, Peromus, and Luck were doing all the heavy lifting, so she was starting to get desperate to help.

"That sounds kinda nice. Is there a way for us to go watch too?"

Rosetta, her outfit leaving her navel completely exposed, leaned on Allen's shoulder and spoke with an overly familiar voice.

"Sure, do you all want to go tomorrow then?"

(I doubt I could get hundreds of people there, but one or two dozen should be able to sneak into the crowd.)

Allen had the ability of ignoring Rosetta's actions.

Using the Fish A summon's Awakened Skill [Mimic], he could turn everyone there into rn.

"That sounds nice. If it's possible, then I really want to go too."

The other females in Helmios' party were also interested.

Essentially all females knew and loved the Tale of Prostia Empire.

Helmios also felt like it could be a nice way to take a break from all the training.

"I can't secure special seats for you though. And you should be prepared to flee if anything happens."

As rn, Allen felt like they would be able to escape simply by jumping off the crystal flower's style.

"That's a bit scary."

Allen's words might have sounded like a joke, but Helmios knew he was being serious.

Allen had also successfully forged a participation pass so Rosalina could enter.

The event's participants were controlled by their passes, and a magic device that read them.

It was a similar system to adventurer cards.

As an S Rank adventurer, Allen was familiar with how adventurer cards worked and the theory behind them, so he quickly ca up with an idea to make Rosalina participate in the event.

There was a ti when the servants of the palace were not looking at the magic device there.

He secretly took the magic device to Larappa in Heavy User Island, letting her quickly work on it.

There he registered Rosalina's fake participant's pass number as a real one.

That should solve any issues with her getting into the event, but it was a rather simplistic forgery, so just a bit of investigation would reveal the truth.

If she won, the officials in the palace in charge of the event would likely look into her, and notice the inconsistencies in her participation.

It could beco a ss amongst those watching the event, but anyone who won would receive the Sacred Beads directly from the Sacred Fish Makris.

Once Rosalina had the beads, she would flee from there before she was caught.

There was no penalty for those caught participating illegally if they won, and apparently there had been many cases of that happening in the past.

Allen was hoping that Peromus would obtain a Sacred Bead for Fiona this way.

If this plan failed, Allen would have to start thinking of a different thod.

Maybe it would be possible to swim up to the Sacred Fish Makris swimming over the city that day, and ask him directly for one.

"Allen."

While Allen spoke about the event, Lud approached him.

(Hm? Did his investigation produce any results yet?)

Lud's face looked like there was sothing he wanted to say.

He sat down in front of Allen.

"General Lud, how did it go? Were you able to find anything about Sinorom?"

"The rman you're looking for wasn't present."

"I see."

Half a month ago, Princess Rapsonile had told them that Sinorom looked suspicious.

That made Allen want to know exactly who Sinorom was, and what he was doing in the palace.

But even though Sinorom was supposed to have been in the palace for more than a year, there was no information about him other than him being an advisor for Ignomas.

No one seed to know where he had co from.

There were no records about his parents or relatives.

He simply seed to appear at Ignomas side one day.

All his actions seed untraceable, and the lack of information itself seed suspicious.

It was so weird that Allen began to wonder if he had been with Bek too.

He began to suspect it had been Sinorom who convinced Bek to stage a coup.

While he worked on forging Rosalina's participant's pass, he also asked Lud, who had been part of the Beast King's guard for a long ti, whether he knew anything about Sinorom.

But Lud did not know anything at all.

He had been with Shea for more than the last five years, so he was not so up to date with matters in the palace as before.

Not to ntion he had left around two years ago with Shea to hunt the Evil Cult.

But Lud did have many friends and acquaintances in the palace.

So he asked so of Bek's n, who had been captured, if they knew of an elderly rman nad Sinorom.

(He wasn't there then. I really thought that was a good hunch though. Hm?)

Lud said that a rman nad Sinorom was not present.

But he still seed to have sothing else to say.

Allen looked at him, telling him to speak if there was sothing he needed to know.

"There was a suspicious old person with Bek."

"Hm? Not a rman though?"

Allen was confused, since that seed to contradict what Lud had said monts before.

"There was no rman. That old person was a beastman. His na was apparently Sino."

There had been an elderly beastman nad Sino next to Bek, helping him with the coup.

He would appear randomly, approach Bek, and seemingly tell him sothing or another.

Apparently it was Sino's advice that made Bek's coup possible.

"Did he say sothing along the lines of 'You won't beco Beast King at this rate. There are rn willing to help, so just raise an army,' or sothing similar?"

Allen tried to guess what Sino had told Bek.

"That's it. The beastn we captured also said they were deceived by Sino."

(Ohh, it's starting to get clearer. Still, a beastman, huh. A beastman…)

Sinorom did not appear as a rman there, but as the beastman Sino.

That ant he had so sort of ability like Allen's to change appearance.

Maybe he was changing appearances and infiltrating even more governnts.

Having thought of all that, Allen turned to look at Helmios.

This was the hero and his party, who had fought the Demon King's Army for a long ti.

"Have you seen any leader of the Demon King's Army that fits that description? Like a Demon General maybe? Or just so demon."

The Demon King's Army was mainly trying to take down humanity through brute force.

But Allen had learned that not everyone was a musclebrain there either, he knew that much from his conversation with Kyubel.

"I never saw a demon or Demon General called Sinorom."

Helmios had heard the entire conversation, and said that he had never heard of Sinorom.

There was very little information about the higher ranks of the Demon King's Army.

Allen already knew that from his conversations with Helmios while they cleared the S Rank Dungeon.

The Demon King's Army had been attacking for more than fifty years, but there was little useful information about them.

Allen learned the most after rus joined his ranks.

But not even rus knew many details about the Demon King's Army.

So in a way, Allen was not expecting Helmios to give a satisfactory answer.

He had already asked him a lot about the Demon Generals he defeated, those he could not defeat, and the demons that escaped.

Helmios had never ntioned Sinorom then.

Allen felt like that had been a nice lead, but it seed like it was about to end at nothing again.

"Sinorom? Did you say Sinorom?"

Just when Allen was giving up, Doberg placed a hand on the eyepatch covering his lost eye, muttering that.

"Eh? Do you know anything, Doberg?"

(Oh? Does Doberg know him?)

Allen asked him, full of expectation.

"I rember seeing a demon nad that before, he looked like so scientist, and walked around with so eyeball monster."

"So..?!"

Doberg's voice trailed off, not giving any more information. Allen wanted to know everything, so he urged Doberg to continue.

But Allen was left speechless.

Doberg's remaining eye was filled with murderous rage.

Allen seed to rember such a gaze.

It was the sa face Doberg made when he nearly lost a fight against Kurena in the Academy.

"I never t that scientist. Was it before the mission when you lost Classis?"

Helmios took over, asking Doberg questions.

He had trodden the line between life and death before, so he spoke calmly to Doberg.

They had fought together for a long ti, but Doberg had been fighting the Demon King's Army since even before Helmios was born.

"I'll…kill him… Yes…I have…to find…"

(Hm? Did sothing happen between Doberg and Sinorom then? And find soone? Classis?)

During Allen's Appraisal Ceremony, he learned that the Saintess Classis had been born a commoner, and the Sword Saint Doberg was a serf.

They had actually been born in the sa village, and were married.

Doberg would usually avoid talking about his past, but there was one ti he told Helmios so things, and so stories.

The official story was that Doberg's wife Classis had died while fighting the Demon King's Army.

But from Doberg's reaction and words, it seed like Classis had been abducted instead.

Doberg was already past 70 years old, but he still loved her, and he had been fighting the Demon King's Army for 50 years trying to get her back. That was his reason to keep going.

"So Classis was abducted? For what reason?"

Helmios carefully chose his words, prodding into Doberg's past, just so Allen could get the information he wanted.

"He said sothing about an experint. Sothing about space and ti. Be careful around them, or you'll get cursed."

"So that's when you lost your eye too?

"Yeah, that eyeball thing snatched it with a tentacle."

Doberg still carried an injury from the Demon King's Army, which did not heal even after a Talent Change.

According to the church, that was because of a curse, and not even a holy woman's healing powers could dispel it.

(I see. So there's a weapons researcher in the Demon King's Army too.)

When Allen participated in the war of Rosenheim, he had seen many eyeball monsters collecting information.

The eyeballs had bat wings grafted onto them, which let them fly and survey their enemy.

There seed to be a researcher in the Demon King's Army, who could inflict never healing wounds, or create monsters that gathered information. And Sinorom was the pri suspect.

As the conversation wrapped up, Allen noticed sothing very important.

(That ans my friends I left in the palace are in grave danger.)

He had left Cecile's group and Peromus in the sa palace where Sinorom crept around.

Allen checked on the Bird G summon he left with Cecile.

Cecile, Sophie, and Shea were there, safe.

But he did not have a Bird G summon with Peromus.

He quickly sent a Fish D summon to the reference room where he had left Peromus before coming to the S Rank Dungeon.

The reference room was empty.

(Then what about Luck and the others? There they are, Luck is safe.)

He sent the Fish D summon to the place where Luck and Formar were staying, and they were safe.

Next he sent all his Fish D summons to the palace, trying to find Peromus.

"What's wrong Allen?"

Helmios noticed Allen's increasingly tense face.

"I can't find Peromus."

He did not know how else to explain the situation.

He was using three Fish D summons, expanding his search radius, but Peromus was nowhere to be found.

Peromus had vanished from the palace.