Epic of Caterpillar

Chapter 1524: The World’s Conflicts

“Well, thanks to Elfina you were revived and given the opportunity to go back to Genesis, so why don’t you act slightly more grateful and help us in the war against the Humans?” I asked.

“Well, that’s… It still complicated for me.” Sol answered nonchalantly. I guess he still didn’t wanted to join. “I… want to think things through.”

“Okay, that’s all fine for me. But apologize to Elfina and tell her you’re sorry for acting so stupidly.” I said. Sol felt a bit pressured by the glare of my two big eyes, so he quickly gave up.

“Okay, okay… You really sound like a mother now that I hear you scolding me.” Sighed Sol.

“Well? I told you I am a mother. Now, do you want seconds?” I asked.

“Yeah, please.” Sol said with a calm and sincere smile.

We ended enjoying the food until we were all full, and we decided to move forward. After our long talk, Sol seemed more motivated to fight and delve into the dungeon, so we dove deeper until the last floor. There were varied monsters in the last floors, so it wasn’t so bad. Their EXP was quite terrible though, I wasn’t even able to get a single level through everything. I miss my demon lord-level threats!

Nonetheless, we quickly arrived at Floor 10, where we had fought against the aberrant Pereza. Her entire body was inside my Item Box, and I planned to use her as my meat for cooking from now on. She has a unique flavor compared to the other parasites, squid with a bit of fish and even chicken, but the flavors don’t conflict with one another, but merge together nicely. I had made some skewers with her meat and Sol ate like twelve. When he asked about the meat’s origin though, I just said “a rare monster”.

“So this is Floor 10…” Sol said. “Is this the entire dungeon? Compared to the big ones I explored back in Genesis; it is underwhelmingly small.”

“Yeah… Dungeons here are not so extensive than in Genesis because they’re not created by Gods with the intent to generate Divine Energy, so they’re not micromanaged by them as if it were a simulation game.” I said. “These form naturally through miasma or by being near the corpses of the Old Gods, giant titans and beast-like beings, the parents of Luminous.”

“They died?” Asked Sol.

“I told you he was the last one, didn’t I? They all died in a war long ago. Their bodies ended nourishing the world, but some other bodies ended rotting and corrupting too much, so they affected it negatively. This entire world only has a gigantic continent everyone just calls “Mainland” for all I know. There are two separate areas, the Fertile Lands, and the Wastelands. The Fertile Lands are divided in various parts and nations, but it is occupied by Elves and Humans, the elves have most of the most flourishing territory filled with forests, while humans got a lot of grasslands and smaller forests for themselves… And well, about demons… try to guess.” I said while looking at Sol. He quickly answered with an answer someone smart enough to guess would give to me.

“I guess they’re in the Wastelands, huh?” Sol asked. “That’s so predictable… Don’t tell me the demons just want to invade the Fertile Lands to prosper…”

“Yeah, that’s pretty much it.” I said with a nod. “It seems that that’s the whole point of their invasion and also the main intention of the Demon King is that as well. You see now? They’re not even the bad guys here, they just trying to survive. But can you call the other faction bad for not wanting to share land when they want to prosper themselves? Each one on their own. Perhaps the demons would do the same, right? There are many questions. The demons are doing terrible things to innocent people in their advance, and the humans are also doing terrible things to demons and elves in their greed. Meanwhile, the elves stand mostly neutral, but already got attacked by demons due to their passive state, and now, the humans are coming due to my fault, as I saved Elfina who had been kidnaped by them and forced to summon.”

“Yeah… I can tell- Wait, you what?!” Sol asked.

“Long story short, the Kingdom got Elfina and kidnaped her, knowing she was the only Summoner in this world. They wanted her to summon heroes to use as military power, all while using her as a bargaining chip. It was all nice and dandy until I was summoned and disappointed everyone. I mean, I looked like a caterpillar after all. But they attacked me and tried to kill me for being “useless” all while trying to get rid of Elfina. I just did what I had to do.” I said while shrugging.

“I guess I can understand your point of view in such a situation, it must have been rather frightening to have confronted so many people trying to hurt you.” He said.

“Well, it’s not like I am not used to that, in my previous life I fought whole armies of gods that just hated me for looking at the wrong direction one day. They were pretty insane and stupid.” I laughed a bit by recalling Zeus. He was really a stupid guy.

“You had quite the legendary journey…” He said. “Nonetheless, aren’t humans and demons equally to blame? And elves… I guess not so much.” Said Sol while wondering if Elves had anything else going on other than being neutral and passive.

“They do, they dislike demons and humans and don’t want to share the immense territory they got either. The humans, elves, and demons all have tremendous prejudices against one another. It is just an endless circle of hate that never really reaches an end. Kind of annoying to be honest. But it reminds me of the various circles of hate back on Genesis, but this one is way more simplistic so I don’t get a headache when remembering it.” I sighed.

“Huh… Wow, this world is really complex…” Sol said, feeling slightly dizzy. He wasn’t good at handling info dumps, I bet.