Chapter 101: Regine (1/2)
Trusting a stranger was the gateway to danger.
While this saying wasn’t exactly right, it had some sense to it. Wasn’t that how all these girls ended up here? By trusting Duran.
Being bitten by a snake once ended up with over 10 years of fearing ropes as a result. Being cheated and thus seeing everyone as a liar…while these were over-generalizing matters, they were to be expected.A person who had been traumatized wouldn’t see thing the same way as a normal person would. The more serious cases would even involve delusions.
Duran could be said to be an extremely successful liar. Before his true identity was uncovered, no one would have ever suspect him of being so evil. If one cannot even trust a human, trusting a devil like me would probably be even harder…
Their suspicion was something that I could understand and unfortunately couldn’t do a thing about. Thanks to that, the atmosphere at the table had gotten worse, forcing me to hasten the process of releasing them.
As they say, the rabbit doesn’t feed on the grass near its nest. Duran was no exception either. He would never target those nearby his villa, but instead head to the further cities to kidnap girls. Out of the 20 odd girls, the closest city they came from was two cities away from us.
In order to dispel their distrust, concrete action was required. Right after dinner, Ancarin led the girls on a looting spree throughout the villa while I watched over Duran.
Surprisingly, she seemed to have a talent for being a bandit. In just under a day, the entire villa was scoured, its valuables looted and stacked in front of me. In total, over 10,000 gold coins were found. As for magical tools, they found 17 scrolls, nearly a hundred potions, 12 enchanted gears of which 3 were high-grade enchanted gears.
Half of the gold was given out to the girls as travel expenses and as compensation for their traumatic experience. After doing the math, each of them would get 300 gold coins.
Gold coins had a significant purchasing power within the Western Human Realms; as a comparison, one gold coin was worth 1,000 Chinese Yuan (150 USD, keep in mind the difference in living standards and costs). 300 gold coins was definitely a huge sum of money for these peasant girls, though it still wasn’t enough to make up for what they had to go through.
However, at least with this sum of money, they’ll be able to find a decent man who won’t despise them. Of course, this does not rule out any further misfortunes.
(Author Note’s: Gold coins have been set as the common currency within the Western Human Realms in order to avoid any unnecessary confusion. It can be taken that the three major empires have jointly issued this currency.)
The moment I handed them their gold and sent them on their way, I noticed a visible change in their attitudes. Some wore a look of disbelief while others broke down and weeped. Some cheered while some stood confused…either way, there was a whole gamut of emotions.
There was even a girl who rejected the money as she feared I would take her soul for doing so…this story seemed to have made its way around, even crossing the barriers between worlds…
After sending them off, I turned around to find that two of them had not left. One was Ancarin while the other was the blonde girl.
Up until now, the situation with the blonde girl could be summarized as being horrendous. Throughout our meal, she hadn’t moved a muscle. While she hadn’t given up on life as yet, she neither ate, slept or moved, causing me a great deal of headache. Thankfully, Ancarin was a different story…
“I wish to follow Master Mo Ke to Azure.”
That was the answer I was given. A short and to-the-point answer; so natural that she almost seemed happy about following a devil.
“Aren’t you afraid of me?”
“Not anymore.” Looking right into my eyes, she gave me a warm smile and said: “I’ll never forget that in my darkest hour, it was a devil that actually saved me, while a human tried to kill me.”
“…” Were you referring to the time when that ice spike almost killed me? If it hadn’t been for the grimoire flying up to take the blow, I would’ve really died back then.
While her gratitude was heartwarming, it concerned me slightly. The last thing I wanted was for her to have an unrealistic image of devils, so I had no choice but to clear up this potential misconception: “Devils are evil, there’s no doubt about that. You have not seen them before so you do not know. I’m just an exception.”
She playfully blinked her eyes and said: “Because you were raised by humans?”
“…either way just remember that devils are evil, you won’t always be so lucky to meet a kind-hearted one like me.”
“I understand, Master Mo Ke.” She solemnly nodded her head, losing the playfulness she had before. “Other than you, I won’t trust anyone else ever again.”
“…” Why did it seem like her thinking had become even more warped?
Seeing my resigned look, she flashed me a slightly complacent smile: “Plus your concern for her doesn’t seem fake.”
In order to divert attention off herself, she changed the topic back onto the blonde girl.
At that moment, I had to point out that she was remarkably optimistic…
As I sat on the dining chair, I rubbed my temples to ease the growing headache I was feeling. “I’m Mo Ke, may I know what’s your name?” I turned and asked the blonde girl.
“…” She gave me a look which said silence was golden.
“Where’s your family?”
“…”
“Your companions are gone, don’t you wish to follow them?”
“…”
“I’m a devil, aren’t you afraid that I’ll eat you if you stay here?”
“…”
Me: “…”