My Villains Episode 275
52. The Ancient Gate (3)
One late afternoon in late December.
The mountain range rising to the south was finely white, as if salt or sugar were piled up in mounds. It is because of the thick snow piled up on the thick bushes.
The sky was clear without a single cloud.
If it hadn’t been for the snow covering all sides and the cold wind blowing down the hillside, it would have been a green color that could be misunderstood as autumn or early spring.
Occasionally wood gains in that achromatic landscape! Just-! A loud noise rang out. The branches of a fir or spruce tree could not withstand the heavy snowdrift and eventually broke.
Then the eyes, which had been forced to sit on the needle-thin leaves, spilled out. Surprised mountain birds flew up thanks to the food.
A short arrow pierced the air beneath the birds flapping their wings with a sound of
“Ah” .
“Oh damn. I have no luck.”
Kavas, the poacher’s son, grumbled as he woke up from his eyes. Shea, who was watching the hunt next to him, also clicked his tongue and flapped his cape.
“Shouldn’t you be blaming your skills rather than luck?”
Cavas kept his mouth shut and moved towards the bush. It was to retrieve the arrow he had just shot and to find a squirrel’s burrow that had gone into hibernation.
“Let’s go back soon. Don’t lose your strength for nothing.”
“Hang in there. There are so many birds, so I have to catch at least one.”
“We are not here to hunt. If you keep crying, will you go back alone?”
Shea was holding a tree branch in her arms. True to her words, they came into the forest not to hunt, but to gather some firewood.
“Anyway, the campsite is just around the corner, and there won’t be much delay just by shooting another arrow.”
“still. Donnell will find fault with it and have a long chat.”
“Anyway, everyone is resting waiting for the sun to set. Nobody cares about us.”
Cavas, who was talking, found an arrow among the bushes and wrinkled his face. Perhaps it had hit a stone beak, but the shaft was bent and dangling.
“Ha, no one to care? I’m afraid someone isn’t a careless Cavas.”
“what?”
“What if Mr. Nina Confair were looking for us?”
“Only the goal will cover it well.”
“That wall window will do just fine.”
Cavas untied the thread from the broken arrow, pulled out the arrowhead, and carefully removed the collar.
“I-ssi… I’ll have to catch a pheasant or a wild chicken to make it worth it.”
Shea laughed at the murmur, but Kavas didn’t care and looked around. Soon he noticed a rocky cliff rising on one side and his eyes twinkled.
“Stay here a minute.”
“what? Cabas!”
Cavas unhooked the string of his shortbow, hung it on his waist, and approached the cliff. Then he took off his gloves and warmed his hands.
“You want to go up there?”
“uh. Can you see it over there?”
He chinned up. A few dry twigs protruded from the side of the cliff.
“What is that?”
“nest.”
“nest? what nest?”
“You’ll know that when you go up.”
“hey!”
While his body was thin and small, Cavas with long arms climbed the cliff with great ease. As Shea stomped his feet, he rose more than 15 meters and disappeared from sight.
“Cabas!”
“Wow, this place is so spacious!”
Kavas, who had entered through a crevice in the cliff, looked down at Shea and waved.
“Do you see Shea?”
“Looks like it! Stop fooling around and come down quickly!”
“I understand…. What kind of bird built such a nest? Oh Shea! I have eggs too! But this is really big-”
Cavas, who reappeared after babbling alone, was holding a rather large egg in one arm.
“You want to come down like that? Dangerous!”
“Do you *ugh* know I’m going to ride a cliff like this for a day or two?”
He skillfully climbed down the cliff even with his left hand sealed from carrying eggs. Just as Shea let out a sigh of relief, the thick branches of the tree that Kavas stepped on made a snapping noise.
“Ugh!”
The rotten tree branches shattered and Kavas fell headlong, missing the egg.
“Cabas!”
Shea, who poured out the firewood, ran in surprise, but luckily he got up right away. It was thanks to the fact that he had fallen almost completely down the cliff and there was a thick layer of snow-covered bushes underneath.
“Oh damn-”
It wasn’t just luck, of course. Blood oozes through his thick linen trousers, as if his shin had been stamped on a thick branch.
“Hey are you okay?”
“It’s just a scratch.”
Unlike the horse, Cavas had a slight limp. Shea put her hand on her forehead, sighed deeply, and glared at him.
“What kind of stupid thing is this?”
“…But I got the egg.”
The egg that Kavas missed lay between the bushes without a crack. He took the eggs while limping.
“You really- no, let’s go.”
No matter how ignorant Cavas was, he didn’t know that Shea was really angry right now. In the end, he kept his mouth shut and followed Shea back to the campsite.
Four days have passed since Goleman and Cavas Shea left their hometown of Paul Ville. It’s been a week since I became Phoenix’s subordinate as an auxiliary soldier.
one week. It was not enough time to melt into any organization.
However, the group led by Phoenix had a special corner, so the three friends were adjusting easily in their own way.
The special corner was that the members were all from different places of origin. Since 24 people gathered from 11 different provinces, there was little resistance to accepting outsiders.
Of course, the distribution was not even, as half of the twenty-four were from Gistol. However, according to Shea’s observation and analysis, half of them were from the 13th to 24th ranks in the organization, so they had little influence compared to the number of people.
Well, since Goleman and Cavath Shea were also from the Gistol region anyway, it was a story that had nothing to do with it in the first place.
In any case, thanks to the nature of the organization and the special ‘guidance’ given by the veteran conductor for three days before leaving Paulville, the three friends were now able to get a rough idea of how the gang worked.
But, of course, the three friends were not without problems.
“You fell?”
The one who glared at Cavas was a man with ugly burn marks on his left cheek and chin. It was so large that even if the skinny Kavas and the female Shea were put together, it seemed dwarfed.
“A guy who was once a forest keeper fell down in the forest? Gathering firewood?”
In fact, he was a poacher, not a forest keeper, but he didn’t want to hang himself, so instead of correcting the lie I had told, Kavas just nodded.
“I am not used to mountains. The place where I was was in the forest of the flatland…
“You speak like an idiot with pride. A bastard.”
The man’s name is Donnell. Originally from Modos, he was a fierce trader with a fierce personality.
He was called ‘Burned Donnell’ because of the burn marks on his face, and according to Shea’s analysis, he was ranked around 13th. It was lower than the middle, but it was much higher than the three friends who were stuck at the bottom.
“Didn’t you fall and shed tears? Why didn’t you poke around and find your mother?”
The sarcastic man next to him was Mittelman, Donel’s best friend.
He was shorter than Shea and as skinny as Cavas, but he was an amazing shooter with a single crossbow. He had an extra thumb on his left hand, so he was called ‘Six-handed Mittelman’.
These two, Donell and Mittelman, implicitly acted as middle managers. Five other mercenaries joined from Modos plus five joined from Paulville, and a total of ten people were in charge of these two.
“I’m telling you just in case, but if you’re thinking of getting on the cart whining that you won’t be able to walk tomorrow, fuck it. I can’t open my eyes and see that. okay?”
“Oh, I see…
The three friends were able to return to their seats after receiving a bottle of ointment and a bandage after suffering for a long time.
“What are you saying so much? Whoever sees it will know it’s over.”
Golman, who was putting an iron skillet on the bonfire, frowned as Kavas grumbled, smearing ointment on his shin.
“If you don’t like that, you shouldn’t have been more careful.”
“Did I think it was a rotten branch? What if I had no luck today?”
“It’s not that, it’s a problem from staying in the forest for so long in the first place. Monsters like greenskins and direwolves sometimes pop up around here. You know that.”
“Is the nose a decoration? Even if they are hundreds of meters away, they give off a strong smell.”
Shea, who was putting firewood in the campfire, put down the branch she was holding as a poker. And it was glaring at Cavas with a cold face.
“so? You haven’t done anything wrong until the end?”
“…No, rather than not doing anything wrong.”
“What on earth do you believe in that you are so stupid and shameless?”
“what?”
When Cavas tried to protest, She Ah took the first shot.
“Please don’t do anything reckless. We are not on a picnic.”
“And what about the nurinna? please calm down Remember how your father and brother died.”
“what? How could you say such a thing?”
Cavas’ face reddened as he remembered his father and older brother who were killed by trolls. But Shea, whether he snorted or not, gave him serious advice.
“Think about what your father would say if he saw you now, Cavas.”
“This…
“To be honest, I don’t understand you. To be so careless after going through such a terrible thing.”
Cavas huffed up, as if he had nothing to say, then turned around. Then he spread a blanket on the floor and lay down.
Goleman put the salted pork on the skillet and glanced sideways at Cavas.
“I need to eat cabas for dinner.”
“it’s okay.”
“really?
“uh.”
“What eggs did you bring? Shouldn’t it be dealt with today?”
“do it yourself. Eat it or throw it away.”
Shea shook her head in disgust at Cavas’ attitude.
“It’s really bad.”
“Don’t be like that.”
Shea also didn’t say anything with her face wrinkled, probably offended.
Goleman took out a red onion from his backpack that had been set down at his feet with a wry smile. He sliced the peeled onion with a dagger and without a cutting board. It was quite a skill.
Goleman worked diligently with his hands, lost in thought. It was a habit he developed while working as a candle maker at Lianwell to indulge in trivial thoughts while doing a familiar job.
It was the mercenaries around him that filled his thoughts for the past few days.
Parangson Fusion Fantasy ‘A Novel
