My Villains Episode 281
52. Ancient Gate (9)
The ghost sitting in the crevice of a rock in the corner of Donghyeol had a very grotesque appearance. The torso and limbs stiffened like a corpse and only the face giggling is eerie.
“I thought they were going underground in South Harbor, but you managed to survive.”
Luke, possessed by a poetry ghost, nodded his head with the attitude of ‘that’s what happened’.
“Thanks to you, I got over the edge of death. If it wasn’t for his cold-hearted reason, he would have been buried in the mud. I almost forsook all my responsibilities and obligations for enlightenment.”
Responsibility and duty for realization….
Yes, I remember. These crazy old friends considered ‘saving’ people their top priority. It was an absurd logic that life is full of pain and you have to let go of it.
“What did you do? The stairs were broken and the ‘creeping dragon’ was rampaging.”
“There was a special relationship. A precious relationship.”
“Ha yeah? Then, did you have a valuable relationship with the ratmen here?”
“Emm, I can’t say it’s the same, but it’s similar.”
I tried to ask the question again, but this time he opened his mouth first.
“Conversation is mutual. Since you asked and I answered, shouldn’t the opposite be true?”
When I narrowed my eyebrows and fell silent, Luke laughed and asked a question.
“Where is Miss Ellen?”
“…Ellen?”
“Yes, Miss Ellen. Even though it was short, we had a relationship, so I want to see your face.”
It sounds like a relationship.
I was disgusted and angry at the same time, but I answered calmly so as not to waste my emotions.
“Ellen is not here.”
“What do you mean no?”
“It is literally. I have something to do, so I’m somewhere else now.”
“Hey, is there such an unfortunate thing?”
“…a pity?”
“That’s right. There are people who really want to see Miss Ellen. I thought I would get a chance this time… but
I slightly narrowed my eyebrows.
“Do you want to see Ellen? who?”
“Who are you?”
The man stopped talking and raised his tattered eyelids into half-moon shapes.
“I won’t tell you.”
“what?”
“Understand. The more you put it off, the greater the pleasure.”
You have to be patient. He is the king of death who has devastated the plateau and the Bay of Blades. Now is a rare opportunity to get information from such a guy. So you have to be patient.
I parted my lips, recalling the patience I hadn’t known how many times.
“I heard you’re aiming for the Holy Land.”
“Holy ground? You mean Setenio?”
Luke let out a peek snort.
“It’s ridiculous that such a small monastery is a holy place. No, should I say that even that holy place is pathetic as a religion without foundation that is indifferent to shallow doctrines?”
“And you’re aiming for that pathetic place.”
“It is nonsense! Are you willing to waste your time on such a monastery when you save every minute and every second for a cause?” It’s a guess to see him pouring out his anger out of nowhere, but it looks like he’s having a hard time because of the priests and knights guarding the monastery.
“so? Are all the rumors about your armies sweeping through the Holy Land and the Blade’s Edge are all lies?”
“I never said that. I just want to tell you that we are getting ready to leave.”
“…leave?”
“All of them are just disgusting people. Not to mention Prince Ulkar, Landry Dailecid Akele… All of them are the ones I don’t want to associate with again.”
The Margrave of Landry is the owner of the Highlands and Unfast regions, and Daileshid is a knight and commander who has long been famous in the Odenlock region near the Bay of Blades.
Akele is the count of eastern Ireland and is the father of my Phoenix.
Originally, he was the guard commander of ‘Tow’s Den’ and the guard commander of the third admiral duke’s palace in Ireland, but now he gave up all miscellaneous positions and was told that he was only in command of the ‘Scales Fleet’.
“The losses are not insignificant. We lost countless donors. At this point, you’d better go back to Alzenberg and deal with that idiot. That is my judgment.”
Alzenberg Berkard… I think it’s the name of a certain province in Mittergerand and its lord, but I can’t remember it well.
Anyway, that’s not what’s important now.
“You mean you’re going to retreat to the Empire? Beyond the blade bay?”
Luke replied with a grin.
“Keep it a secret. If you keep your ears open, you’ll find out someday, so don’t be too sorry.”
The guy sneakily looked down at the demon’s body. The evil energy, shaped by black smoke, was scattered on the floor in a blur.
“I would like to talk more, but there is no time. May I make one last suggestion?”
“proposal?”
“Yes.”
“Are you coveting my body again? If it’s like that, I’d like to tell you to eat shit.”
Luke sighed and shook his head.
“No, no. It’s true that I realized it belatedly, but isn’t it difficult for a criminal to accept the concept of separation of body and soul?”
“Accumulating good karma is, in principle, started by sacrificing the body and soul. But I’ll make an exception for you. I will give you the opportunity to accumulate good karma as you are now.”
I repeated his words and wrinkled my face.
“…well, I’ll save your life, so act like a kid?”
“It’s still straight-forward-” While
Pook
Luke was talking, he inserted a morning star into the neck of the possessed poetry demon. The white blade, resembling the star of dawn, shone brightly with the power to burn the eyes. The undead’s body melted with a sound.
“…Yes, as always. Something radical and rude.” “Your patience has increased a lot.”
“well. I don’t know about that.”
Even as his limbs were scattered and his torso twisted and dried up, his open eye sockets were still pointing at me.
“I hope to see you in person the next time we meet. I want to appreciate your wretched, tattered soul again.”
“…Yes, I’ll see you someday. Because I am eagerly wishing for it.”
He laughed and I drew a morning star. The severed head scattered and silence came.
The morning star quickly lost its light. The blade, which had been emitting white light, became dark like a star hidden in the clouds.
In that silence and darkness, I stood still for some time.
Luke disappeared, leaving behind an armful of anger and a handful of discomfort.
What is the special and precious relationship he was talking about? Who wants to see Ellen? Could it be true that they plan to pass down the undead army as an empire?
My head was complicated, but there was a lot of work to be done.
The battle with the Ratmen was quite fierce. It was because not only ordinary rat men, but also many elite guys such as horsemen, warriors, assassins, and shamans attacked.
Eleven mercenaries, including Fritz, whose cheek was pierced by an assassin’s awl, suffered large and small wounds. There were no potions, but there were enough herbs and bandage ointments, so most of them were able to receive appropriate treatment.
However, a mercenary from Folville named Walsh was stabbed in the shoulder by an axe and was on the verge of death, so I had to treat him myself.
To be honest, the only treatment was to sterilize it using hematology, but the effect did not seem to be bad, as the boiling body cooled down and the distorted complexion straightened.
Utequai was also hit with spears here and there. When I came up to the ground, he was lying on the bare floor and was sleeping.
From what I heard, the monster Utequai ate had well over a hundred hearts. Gidon, the crossbowman, made a fuss about going to the church right away and receiving prayers for purification, so he foolishly told him not to worry because it would be solved in Seteniora.
There were also casualties. A young man named ‘Dale’, he is one of the seven mercenaries enlisted in Modos. It is said that he was pierced in the eye by an Ogre Rider’s spear and died instantly.
I’m not very close with him, so the only conversation I had with him was to give him a few orders during group training every morning.
However, regardless of relatives, my heart was heavy. It was natural for
me to feel a sense of responsibility because the young man who jumped into the world after seeing me lost his life in vain.
His body was cremated on a nearby hill, and he gave some gold coins to friends from his hometown to send to his family later.
Fortunately for the person in charge of the party, nothing was gloomy.
Thanks to the abundant loot obtained from the Ratmen, the mercenaries quickly recovered their mood.
I don’t know where they plundered it, but they had as many as eight magic tools.
Thanks to that, I had a lot of trouble with my emotions. If Ellen had been there, she would have looked at Chuck and figured out what kind of magic was on her, but now that she wasn’t there, she had to look at her equipment as if she were heading into the ground.
In the end, Heyla looked at the magic tools, looked at the level of magic contained therein, held the morning star to confirm the curse, and finally used it herself for an appraisal.
In the process, he decided to destroy the wand used by the Ratman Shaman. It was because the blade of the sword flickered like a fluorescent lamp when the morning star was pointed at the skull hanging from the tip of the staff.
There was no way a volunteer would step up to smash the cursed object, so I trampled it with my feet and smashed it myself.
But what really surprised me was that there was a sound like ‘Uh-uh-uh-‘ as if several animals were sobbing at once. I had chicken skin on the nape of my neck, but I couldn’t lose face, so I pretended nothing was wrong.
Among the loot was a belt with a metal plate, but no matter how much I tried, I couldn’t figure out the effect, so I decided to keep it for now.
Among the remaining magic tools, the most useful was a ring with a sky blue crystal embedded in it.
It is an item with a ‘concentration’ effect that slightly reduces the consumption of vitality and magic power during battle.
The other five were each a pulsion small sword ax pauldron shield. These five were distributed to mercenaries.
The distribution method was a goalpot or an auction. The way they distributed the loot obtained after dealing with ‘Starmaker Soleva’ and its minions.
The ancient silent gateway suddenly became an auction hall full of cheers and shouts.
The first sale pulse had a ‘strengthening power’ spell that added weight to the blade when swinging. Coincidentally, Gidon, a crossbowman who was contemplating whether to get a secondary armament, took it for one hundred silver coins.
The second short sword for sale was ‘lightweight’ and was as light as a fork. Its excessive lightness was not suitable for combat use, so chubby Esson took it for sixty pieces of silver for the collection.
The third was a full ax with a handle about 40 cm long. It was an excellent weapon that could discharge electricity if you waited for a week or charged with magic with the help of a wizard. Fritz, who defeated Umberta and Dervish for one hundred and ninety silver coins, got the axe.
The fourth piece of pauldron was a heavy item that stretched from the left elbow to the nape of the neck.
The spell applied was ‘shock mitigation’, so there wasn’t much of a big deal, but the build quality of the shoulder armor itself, which was made of chains and iron pieces, was very good. Umberta, who had lost her ax and was grinding her teeth, took it for one hundred and twenty silver coins.
The most popular was the last sorcery tool, a shield with a steel horn in the middle.
It had a low-level spell reflection on it, so it was such a good item that I wondered if I should just use it, so the mercenaries rushed at it with foam at their mouths.
At the end of the 15-minute auction, the veteran conjurer paid seventeen gold coins and one hundred and fifty-seven silver coins, or all his possessions, and took them.
The day after the battlefield was cleared, we immediately left the Jang Gate.
After passing through the gorge for two days, we finally reached the Seteniora Monastery.
