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Jezsere was a timid girl. A very timid one, in fact. Especially when her brother, Reyage, wasn’t with her.

In the short time I’ve spent with her in the cell, I’ve come to see her as an innocent girl, and that was why I had to ask myself once more: she isn’t adopted, right? She’s more of a Nature Elf, rather than a Dark Elf!

In actuality, from the moment she began addressing me as master, her personality seemed to have changed entirely. Her timidness had been replaced by assertiveness, and not the surface meaning of that word too…

“Master, master, why did you want to return to the Western Human Realms? You mentioned there were people you cared about here -is it sister Ancarin and the others?” She blinked at me curiously. Ever since she was sure that I wouldn’t hurt her, she had only gotten bolder by the second.

Hmm… So why did I want to return to the Western Human Realms? To find Nicole, of course!

Frankly speaking, I wasn’t too overly concerned about my predicament right now because Ferti’nier mentioned before I accepted the summoning that no one could force me to sign a pact now that I was at the level of an Overlord. Unless they were a demigod… But she clearly wasn’t a Demigod. In other words, the ball was still on my side of the court. If I really wanted to leave, I could do so any time without paying any heed to my summoner.

And that’s why you can lock me up all you want, see if I care!

More importantly, I needed to find a way to locate Nicole. I had no intention of running back to the Three Hells without accomplishing that first -one mustn’t be a cowardly Devil like that, am I right?

“By the way, how many children did your mother give birth to exactly?”

Let’s be clear here, I’m not asking this because I care about the answer. I’m just curious, that’s all… just curious…

“Oh, my mother, huh…” She thought about it for a second then began counting with her long slender fingers. “With Jezsere and Reyage included, that should be seven.”

Seven huh… that’s a number you can’t count with one hand. You can’t tell she’s given birth to that many with that figure of hers… now that’s talent.

But what was up with her claiming to have never married? I’ve long heard that these Dark Elves live in a matriarchal society, does that mean that normal married life is actually abnormal for them?

Now that I was captured, I really had not much else to do. Neither did I have much to worry about since that clan leader wasn’t a Demigod. In other words, now was a good time to do some cultural studies.

“Do you Dark Elves have a custom of marriage?”

“Marriage…” Jezsere thought about it for a second before decisively answering, “we do. Just not many of us do so.”

Not many? So the majority of Dark Elves are all b@stards then? Ahem… I mean born out of wedlock…

Essentially, Dark Elves are the kind of race who can name their mother but not their father then?

“How does your race reproduce? I doubt your numbers are low, but since there aren’t that many who get married, how exactly… Don’t tell me that two females can procreate as well?”

Faced with that clearly academic question, Jezsere immediately blushed a beet red.

“Jezsere?”

Seeing that she hadn’t replied to me yet, I called out to her. However, she merely kept her head down like an adorable blushing bunny.

“Master… must you really ask this question?”

“Mhm, I’m really curious about this matter.” Hmph, you’ll never get me to admit that bullying her is fun… never!

“Then I think it would be better if she answered the question…” Her milky white fingers immediately pointed at the practically nonexistent Dark Elven Warrior still guarding my cell.

“Her…” That blasted woman hasn’t said a word since. Why would she…

“If it’s lady Jezsere’s orders.”

Rather than refuse to answer as I had expected, she generously obliged to do the explaining for us. After hearing that explanation however, I finally understood why Jezsere absolutely refused to say it herself. Their reproductive methods could basically be categorized as either being really R-rated, really violet, or really bloody.

First off, was the most common method amongst all the races: you got married and had a kid with your partner -a natural birth.

That method wasn’t the most popular method amongst the Dark Elves for a very simple reason: whether we were talking about them or the Natural Elves, both races had a large gender disparity.

The gender breakdown amongst Nature Elves was usually a four male to six females ratio, though that might sometimes escalate to a three-seven ratio. As for the Dark Elves, three-seven was the norm. There were even times when that ratio changed to two-eight.

So what was it like to have one male to four females? A disaster, that’s what! Unless the females of the Dark Elves searched outside their race for partners, male Dark Elves basically could not perform any other task except procreate.

A normal nuclear family was impossible. And given that the Dark Elves were a matriarchal society, it wasn’t possible for the males to have multiple wives either. Not that the Nature Elves were known for having multiple wives, but it was at least still possible.

Since males were clearly in short supply, what was a healthy, mature female to do then? The answer had a lot to do with the traits they inherited from their goddess: deceptive, chaotic, violent and etc.

Their second method of reproduction employed kidnapping.

As a race, the Dark Elves had a variety of traits, and being bloodthirsty was one of them. Being territorial was another. They loved to attack foreign races who trespassed on their lands, like merchant caravans, adventuring parties or mercenary bands. As long as the target was of a foreign race, they were targets for attack.

If there was an urge for more, they would then invade the realms of other races. As for what happened once they succeeded… it was basically what you would expect of a Lolthe-worshipping race. They pillaged whatever they wanted from their targets, and if that included males, then that poor male would end up being used till they were rung dry.

Once a female became pregnant, they would return to their clan territory to give birth. The Dark Elves had a secret art that allowed them to remove the foreign half of this childbirth. That was why there were rarely any mixbloods in their race.

Finally, there was the third method: selective breeding.

The Dark Elves had a total of thirteen major clans. Every such clan had its own coliseum that was used for a variety of purposes: gladiatorial fights, creating life… Yes, creating life.

These coliseums held matches every hour of the day and these were almost always a match between a male and a female.

The Dark Elves had a habit of raising slave gladiators. These slaves were often drawn from captives from other races, though there were also Dark Elves from other clans, or perhaps traitors. For non-Dark Elves, the moment they stepped into the ring, whether men or women, they were all slave gladiators. Their one task was to kill for the pleasure of their masters, in other words, the audience.

Under normal circumstances, the matches in the coliseum could take on two formats. One was a free selection while the other had a female Dark Elf choose a slave of her liking. This chosen slave would then battle with the Dark Elf who chose him in a fair match.

If the female Dark Elf won, she could choose to kill the slave or let him go. However, it was forbidden to have relations with this slave. Weak genes were taboo in Dark Elf society.

If the slave won instead, he could choose to kill that Dark Elf or have a go at her. However, once the latter was chosen, he was forbidden from harming that same Dark Elf under the penalty of death.

Killing in the ring was completely allowed and would even go unpunished. In fact, the stronger the slave, the more excited the female Dark Elves would get. They wanted to mate with stronger partners in order to produce even stronger offspring.

This was one of the reasons why the Dark Elves haven’t suffered a decline yet. Truly, these coliseums were the very definition of inhumanity.

“…I don’t know what to say about your race anymore…”

Hearing that story firsthand from that Dark Elven Warrior, I couldn’t help but shiver involuntarily.

“So what you’re saying is that a lot of you Dark Elves don’t know who your father is then?”

The Dark Elven Warrior: …

Shameless Self-promotion

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If you liked my work translating Devil’s Evolution Catalog, feel free to check out Song of Adolescence. Also, every comment is appreciated even though I might not reply. I do read them.