Chapter 162
162. I Came to Save You (Puhuh!) (1)
Suddenly, an unknown prisoner shouted at me, calling me “you bastard.” The moment I saw his face, memories buried deep inside my mind began to resurface.
It had already been a year since I came to this world. Among the events I experienced, the first was the Lycanthrope incident surrounding Jenny’s Silver Age.
Though I could call it a level one experience, it pops into my mind whenever I get the chance. Back then, if I hadn’t relied on my wits, I would’ve really been dead.
Of course, there had been times I nearly died, but the pain from that electric shock resonated down to my cells. Imagine getting forced with a skill named “Howling Thunder” that spread throughout your body just from a little lightning.
That’s why I couldn’t forget the culprit behind that incident either. The one who had instilled my first crisis in me; just hearing the name brought him to mind immediately.
“Radon Crawler! Good to see you, you traitorous bastard! Today is your funeral day!”
That guy I faced again was itching to eat me up. Since the chains binding his body were tied to a tree, he could only growl, but his grudge was stronger than I expected.
“Hahaha! This smells like a rotten piece of garbage. Is he someone you know?”
Muto spoke as if seeing him for the first time. I moved closer, recalling him.
“I’ll definitely kill you today! Radon Crawler!”
“Surely you’re… Tr…”
“Hahaha! You should never forget what you did to me!”
He looked at me with contempt yet hoped I would remember him. I struggled to recall his name.
“Trophy Viking! Am I right?”
“….”
Wait, was that wrong? Why did he suddenly turn serious?
Then he crumpled up his face like paper and shouted.
“It’s Travel Viole! Travel Viole!!”
“Tropicana?”
“Yaaa!!”
[Erosion Rate Decrease: -20%]
[+2000 Credits]
*
The truth was, I knew. Since he was a monumental character from the villainous plot of the first chapter, I tried my best not to forget him.
Yet I messed up purposely by stating his name incorrectly. Mainly because I wanted to see him get riled up; he was not just a villain but owned a personality that was truly wasteful.
“Yeah, it’s been a while. How have you been?”
“Does this look like I’ve been doing well!? Urrrgh!”
There happened to be a suitably flat rock nearby. As I casually sat there, I saw Travel glaring at me with resentful eyes.
He clearly had no intention of reflecting on what he had done. Why would I want to call him by the right name?
“123, is that your prisoner number?”
“Ha! Yeah, you bastard. That’s the mark placed on me because of you.”
The cadets participating in the mission also stood in a circle around where I was sitting.
Trisha and Riplain looked at him like he was a zoo monkey, and Baimon was absorbed in the Archive, still uninterested in the surrounding flow.
“….”
And Mary was just staring at him blankly. Since he was the one who put Jenny in danger, she wouldn’t be thrilled to see him.
“123? Pfft! Didn’t the guards assign that too casually?”
“Hahaha! The lock number for my drawer isn’t even that simple.”
“Those bastards!!”
At the mocking from Trisha and Riplain, Travel raged like a beast again. They were well aware of the trouble he had caused. They had nearly been put in danger because of him, so they had no intention of viewing him kindly.
“Shall we just call you Password 123 from now on?”
“No, let’s keep it short and simple with ‘Password!’”
“Sounds good. Did you hear? From now on, you’re ‘Password.’”
I, along with the seniors, forcibly changed his name. Perhaps due to some frustration, Travel let out a chuckle.
“Radon Crawler. Your family must be rotting in the sewers by now!”
“What?”
Then he suddenly started spewing nonsense. However, the more I listened, the less unclear it felt.
“Before I got caught, your household must have been quite precarious. That’s why I reached out to you.”
It was when he had tempted me with promises of securing a house for my family. Of course, I had turned him down, but that meant my family had to live in a beggar-like cabin.
“How does it feel? As a result of betraying me, your family surely must have perished on the streets.”
Travel, who had been angry, suddenly began to laugh creepily. It was the face of someone with no chance of redemption.
“It all happened because you abandoned me. In simpler terms, it means you’re the unfilial son who forsook your family! Hahaha!!”
“….”
“Your sister, and of course your parents, must have resented you until the very end. ‘We shouldn’t have given birth to a bastard like you!’ they would’ve said! Hehehehe!”
What a remarkable guy. It almost felt like a talent to scrape at someone’s insides like that.
Even the two seniors joking with him were left speechless, and Mary and Baivon, who were dazed, widened their eyes.
No matter how much of a failure of a prisoner he was, that was definitely a statement calling for a beating.
At that moment, a burly man from the mercenary group stepped forward.
Whack!—
The muscular man punched Travel in the face. He looked to be in his fifties but boasted thick arms that silenced Travel in one blow.
“Stop wasting time with useless chatter. What do you expect to gain from dealing with scum like this?”
“Excuse me, but… who are you?”
Trisha asked, appearing flustered at his sudden appearance. From his demeanor, he seemed to be someone high up in the mercenary guild, and her guess was spot on.
“Speaking of which, I’m late for introductions. I am Tariel Arbelada, the leader of the ‘Saint Bow’ guild. I will be the one to lead you in capturing these kinds of scoundrels.”
“Saint Bow… That’s the guild led by one of the Four Saints, isn’t it…? Could it be…!”
Riplain was taken aback upon hearing the guild’s name, and then quickly trailed off in awe.
I had never heard of this guild before. It was a collective never mentioned in the main story, so it was hard to know of it.
So, I felt the need to directly verify whether what this man was saying was true.
————–
<Tariel Arbelada>
Race: Human
Job: Paladin
Aura Class: 8 stars
Mana: 160/160
Alignment: Realistic/Sarcastic
Feelings Toward the User: None
————–
Looking through the mana view, it was clear he wasn’t lying. With his level of aura and mana, he had a higher status than a department head.
Moreover, what was even more astonishing was his job. With that level of skill as a Paladin, it meant he must have held a relatively high position within the sect.
It seemed he really was one of the top powers of the sect, one of the Four Saints from the past. I was curious why such a strong individual would take on this task.
“I can see that everyone’s curious why I’m here, right?”
Tariel suddenly turned his head toward me. I felt chills thinking he had read my mind so accurately.
“The reason is simple. It means there are troublesome monsters that require someone like me to step in to handle them.”
He added that he wouldn’t have volunteered for no reason, implying we should turn back if we were only half-hearted. Thus, we refrained from questioning why.
“You must know about the prisoner list if you’ve looked at it. Yet, you still volunteered for this mission.”
The reason they had replaced the unskilled cadets who signed up was precisely because of that. If an unqualified cadet joined, their lives could be in danger and it couldn’t be to no purpose.
Not every prisoner caught was a pickpocket or a thug. Many were criminals who committed offenses using skills they honed, including magic.
Entities who possessed skills and were unperturbed by sentimentality. Only those firmly trained could contend with such monsters.
“It seems that the Aligieri side must have entrusted you with peace of mind, which means you have considerable talent. But can you fight against someone who was once a comrade?”
No one questioned Taiel’s words. By the point they viewed the list, they already knew everything.
Yet, despite that, they had volunteered for the mission. Some might have done it out of camaraderie towards the club, while others aimed to meet him from the very start.
“I’ll respect the choice you’ve made. However, if by any chance… you plan to converse with that individual, it would be wise to give it up.”
With those final words, he looked at Mary. He truly was someone perceptive enough to grasp my thoughts. It seemed he quickly caught on to Mary’s intentions.
This is proof that Mary’s purpose for being here wasn’t much different than mine.
*
What we needed to do now was to find out the whereabouts of the escaped prisoners.
However, the adversary was also filled with masters of magic, making it impossible to detect any traces. That was why we had been lingering here without even recouping the costs thus far.
We found some prisoner shackles they had shed, but only fingerprints remained. There were no other traces in sight.
At least some of them could be apprehended blatantly, but even interrogating them just yielded rambling responses.
It wouldn’t be worth anything, nor would it reduce their sentence if they talked. It wasn’t like we could threaten them with death either.
“Did you say not to kill them?”
“It’s an order from the royal family. Our goal is to capture them alive, and they’ve driven that point firmly into us.”
If it were an accident, that would be one thing, but killing on site would void the reward and would bring no good outcomes for those participating.
“Strangely, they seem fixated on capturing them alive. I have no clue when they’ve become so pure.”
Ultimately, killing one to instill fear before obtaining a confession was impossible. Tariel himself had found the fact absurd from the very moment we received the request.
In truth, the Empire’s knight order had been dispatched to monitor that closely. It became apparent they were fully committed.
“After all, isn’t he the sage monarch who saved the Empire? He should at least acknowledge that a life, even of a bad criminal, holds some value, no?”
“Hahaha! Let’s hope it comes to that.”
Tariel took Trisha’s opinion as an amusing joke and burst into laughter. He soon turned serious and spoke.
“Yeah, let’s hope nothing happens.”
The Emperor surely was someone who deserved to be called a Sage Monarch. However, it had been said that recently, no one could fathom what he was thinking.
Thus, it was necessary to wish for the best.
“More than anything, if we don’t catch those guys soon, it’s going to get dangerous. That mountain itself is the territory of ancient spirits.”
Currently, we had exited the railroad and entered among the dense trees.
Beyond that lay a ridge that descended down toward a cliff, and above it rose a massive mountain range.
The trees swaying in the wind made the terrain appear as if it were alive.
“The territory of spirits?”
“Indeed, they must have entered that mountain. That’s the only way to escape the Empire’s borders. However, as I just said, that’s where the domain of ancient spirits lies. Once you step in, there’s no coming back.”
It was the domain of Shaikar, a spirit at the god-class level. Normally, they were on good terms with humans, but after the Demon Beast War 30 years ago, their relationship deteriorated.
No matter how skilled a spirit sorcerer, survival there wasn’t guaranteed, even for Tariel himself.
“Even if those guys wanted to, they wouldn’t just rashly step into that domain. They must have wanted to live after escaping, so they wouldn’t do something so reckless.”
If only we could figure out the direction they had fled, we could easily catch them. That way, we’d be able to avoid getting too close to that domain.
“Thus, your lives aren’t guaranteed either. So…”
“I know those guys.”
Suddenly, Baimon, who had been silent thus far, interrupted Tariel. The group was stunned at his first statement.
“What are you talking about?”
“I said I know them! I know their location.”
Baimon pointed toward Travel, who was tied to the tree, murmuring curses that weren’t audible.
At that, everyone was startled and turned to Baimon.
“Is that true?”
“You and the mercenary group apprehended these prisoners in the forest, right? So how long after the incident did it take you to catch them?”
Today marked three days since the incident occurred. Saint Arrow had arrived on the second day and captured the prisoners found in the mountains.
However, they hadn’t apprehended them all. During the suppression process, the mercenaries had intentionally left a few behind.
The reason was to trace their location. The spirit sorcerer amongst the mercenaries had secretly inscribed a spirit ceremony onto them. If they attempted to flee, they could pinpoint their hideout.
“But isn’t it true that the spirit ceremony weakened near Shaikar’s territory, making it impossible to track their location?”
“Still, the mana itself was detectable, so at least we know they’re hiding somewhere in the mountains.”
They might have intentionally hidden themselves in such a dangerous area to avoid pursuit. Yet if there was no guarantee that it was safe, it would be better for them to be recaptured.
Additionally, they could have chosen methods like fleeing along the railroad or scattering in separate directions to evade tracking. It made no sense for them to have chosen such a perilous course.
“Perhaps they figured they could survive even in that domain. And those guys bailed outside and got caught because they didn’t trust that assurance.”
If they claimed to know, they would have to guide us to that dangerous place. The prisoners possibly preferred to be interrogated rather than risking passing through that area.
They might think it’s better to just get reimprisoned rather than take that gamble.
“Then are you saying they fled into Shaikar’s domain?”
“The very fact that they ventured into the forest is suspicious.”
From Tariel’s perspective, it sounded as if they had merely gone in to commit suicide. He had witnessed Shaikar’s power firsthand 30 years ago.
That spirit was a friend of the previous Saintess.
“Even if we knew that, getting their mouths to open is the problem. There’s a chance they might wander deep into the forest and trap themselves, losing their lives.”
“So, all we need to do is charm one of those individuals, right?”
This time, I said it confidently. Tariel, looking surprised as if to ask who I was, saw my spirited expression that didn’t waver.
*
It was that night. The decision was made to camp for the night and depart in the morning.
The prisoners had to sleep chained. Travel, leaning against the tree, felt emptiness wash over him.
His father, wishing to avoid disgrace, ultimately sold him out; no amount of cursing for relief seemed to ease his mind.
How had it come to this? Was his father, once hailed as a hero of the Demon Realm War, reduced to such a state?
Back then, how could he so easily cast aside his own son?
As hope faded and his eyes began to close, he heard a voice.
“Hey, Travel. You bastard Password!”
“Huh?”
Suddenly, someone woke him up, making him jump to his feet. Realizing it was Radon Crawler, he quickly scowled and closed his eyes again.
“I don’t want to talk to scum like you.”
“Don’t be like that. Just hear me out.”
“Get lost.”
“Are you seriously going to blow your chance at freedom?”
“Shut up and get lost… What?”
Travel blinked, startled, and sprang to his feet.
Was he trying to mess with him again? Squinting at Radon, but as he revealed what he had been hiding, Travel’s expression quickly softened.
“That’s…!”
He recognized it as the badge indicating he was a member of the Viole Family.
So, my father hasn’t abandoned me! Travel turned his thoughts to hope.
“I’ve come to save you.”
Radon said with an enigmatic smile.
