42.　Tales of the Gods (2): The Death God Alogoros

 

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The room lacked any sense of lived-in warmth.

A cheap blue carpet covered the floor, and the walls were painted a dull grey.

Within the several neatly arranged, plainly painted white wooden shelves, a few personal belongings of the room’s owner were stored.

“Why has it come to this…”

Sitting deeply in a second-hand office chair obtained from his workplace, the Death God Alogoros was holding his head in his hands in his private room prepared in the underworld.

Displayed on the screen floating before his eyes were recordings of the lower world’s conditions.

The Death God Alogoros.

A carrier of death with purple eyes.

A symbol of death from which the living cannot escape.

Although Alogoros is known and feared by all living beings as such, in reality, he is a lower god serving under the god of the underworld, Asava, and merely a messenger.

His appearance is neat and clean but otherwise plain, resembling a man in his thirties.

His distinctive feature would be his shining purple eyes, but even these would quickly fade into obscurity amidst other gods.

Contrary to the ominous image one might associate with the words “Death God”, both his appearance and personality are unremarkable.

That is the god known as Alogoros.

Now, as for the Death God Alogoros, he was currently in a state of great perplexity.

Messing up his peculiar hair even more, he scratched his head and exclaimed,

“This is bad… really bad! The very foundation is falling apart before the story even begins!”

…Yes, he was supposed to film a broadcast about reincarnation into another world soon.

The title is “The Miko of Slaughter.”

A dark, battle-filled story about a girl captured by a cultish assassination guild who meets her mentor, grows stronger, and overcomes numerous formidable enemies to carve out her destiny…

That was the scenario he had prepared.

As part of the preparations, using his powers as the Death God, he arranged people’s fates to ensure the story would follow the script.

He spent 60,000 mana, a significant amount for a lower god, to win the soul of the human destined to be the protagonist, “Nakayasu Misaki,” at auction, bestowing divine protection and reincarnating her.

The preparations were complete.

All that was left was to start the story and film how it unfolded.

That was supposed to be the case.

…But, however!

“Why… Why is the ‘Grim Reaper of Ashgo’ being killed!?”

The “Grim Reaper of Ashgo” was a world-class assassin, now retired.

Alogoros, sharing a similar title of “Death God,” held a great fondness for his silent nature.

Although it never materialized due to a low receptivity to oracles, Alogoros had always hoped to make him his own apostle.

“Moreover! And to make matters worse, it was Dahachie who did it…!”

On the other hand, Alogoros did not particularly like Dahachie, whom he had actually made his apostle and used as his hands and feet in the lower world.

Dahachie was an excellent apostle, very easy to use because he joyfully completed the tasks assigned to him.

However, since the night he first received the oracle, something about him had been off.

He created delusional doctrines, formed a cult of terror, and performed rituals killing people while chanting incomprehensible praises like “Offering my soul to the noble Lord Alogoros”…

As a result, in gatherings of lesser gods, Alogoros always found himself the butt of jokes, with others teasing him with names like “the noble god lol” or “The Purple Dual Rings lmao,” making him feel extremely uncomfortable.

Alogoros wasn’t interested in human souls to begin with.

His job as a Death God was to quickly collect the souls of the dead to prevent them from becoming evil spirits and bring them to the underworld.

In fact, this task has largely been automated nowadays, and his main job is managing the soul collection system.

If there is someone causing harmful effects on the flow of souls or reincarnation through the use of forbidden methods, he might order an apostle to eliminate them, but that’s merely dealing with irregularities, not his primary duty.

“It’s strange… When I checked the fate last time, the ‘Death God of Ashgo’ was supposed to follow Dahachie’s lead into ‘The Purple Dual Rings’…”

“Checking fate” refers to the divine technology of future prediction, derived from a subject’s personality, behavior history, relationships, and various other causal factors, requiring immense computational power.

As a Death God and for his duties, Alogoros had taken a seminar 500 years ago with the permission of the god of the underworld, Asava, to master this skill.

Anyway, the fate of the “Grim Reaper of Ashgo” that he had confirmed before starting the preparations for the reincarnation broadcast had drastically changed, leading to the end of his life.

The cause was undoubtedly the girl with black hair and black eyes who had witnessed his death.

There was no such girl when he had looked into the fate before.

“Where did this girl come from…? It happens sometimes, these kinds of things…”

Despite the gods’ predictions of the future, they are based solely on calculations upon calculations from the current situation at the time, aiming to produce predictions as accurate as possible.

Certainly, it’s not uncommon for some unpredictable irregularities to sneak in, leading to unforeseen outcomes.

The “Grim Reaper of Ashgo” had lost his purpose in life.

It was then that Dahachie visited him, and the “Grim Reaper of Ashgo,” who had become somewhat apathetic about his own life, skeptically followed Dahachie to the cult of “The Purple Dual Rings,” simply because “he had nothing else to do.”

There, he met a girl who had reincarnated with the blessing of the death god, known as the “Miko of Slaughter,” the third daughter of the Tóveil count family, Shula Tóveil, and became her mentor.

This was the destiny Alogoros had predicted in advance, and the beginning of the story of the “Miko of Slaughter.”

However, in reality, the “Grim Reaper of Ashgo” had already taken on a disciple before Dahachie’s visit, finding a new purpose in life in teaching and nurturing his disciple.

Naturally, this meant he had no reason to follow someone like Dahachie, the leader of an inexplicable cult, leading to a deadly conflict.

“First of all, Dahachie, who’s supposed to act on my oracle, shouldn’t be trying to kill the ‘Grim Reaper of Ashgo’… But, well, that’s Dahachie for you…”

Alogoros sighed as he thought about his often unruly apostle.

“What should I do about my isekai broadcast…”

The “Grim Reaper of Ashgo,” who was supposed to become the mentor, is dead.

“The Purple Dual Rings,” which was supposed to kidnap the protagonist and kick-start the story, has been destroyed.

Recovery was impossible.

“This was supposed to be my debut work…”

Yes, this was meant to be Alogoros’s first venture into filming an isekai broadcast.

He, who had lived a modest and diligent life dedicated solely to his duties as a god, had started this hobby because he wanted to get closer to a cute goddess he met at a seminar, who was a major isekai broadcaster, sharing a common interest… Well, that’s irrelevant for now, so let’s skip over that.

“My… My 60,000 mana…”

To reiterate, the 60,000 mana used to win the soul of an Earthling at auction is by no means a small amount for a lesser god.

“……………………Fine, I’ll just go to sleep.”

In the end, Alogoros decided to give up on various things and just go to bed improperly.

He had been working non-stop for about 5,000 years.

A hundred years of improper sleep shouldn’t bring any punishment.

The system will take care of collecting souls, after all.

Applying for vacation to the god of the underworld, Asava… can wait.

That female boss is quite naggy.

It’s one thing to talk about work, but it’s another to interfere in personal life, asking “Are you eating properly?” or “Are you keeping your room clean?”.

It’s annoying.

There was even a time she said, “What, should I cook for you?” and tried to barge into my room.

Please, no.

That’s an invasion of privacy.

If I suddenly say I want to take a break, she’ll definitely start lecturing me about what’s going on.

Just thinking about that scenario gives me a headache.

Right now, I just want to sleep improperly.

With that thought in mind, Alogoros crawled into his futon.

He turned off the room’s light and covered his head with a blanket.

The bulge of the blanket, which had been moving around for a while, eventually slowed down to just rise and fall gently.

The only sound in the quiet room was a small snoring sound.

“My… 60,000 mana…”

Correction.

Occasionally, one could hear him talking in his sleep.

 

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Author’s Message:

With this, Arc 3 comes to an end.

In Arc 2, Emi-chan was caught up in a hero’s story and received a terrible indirect hit, but in Arc 3, without realizing it, she ended up crushing one story.

The Death God was perplexed, but the supposed protagonist, Shula-chan, was able to escape her harsh fate.

Good for her!

Now, after a short Arc 4, Arc 5 will begin.

Thank you for your continued support.