Chapter 8 (2/2)
The boy’s attitude could be described as ordinary for a nobleman . He probably hadn’t left home yet, and it’s not like I couldn’t understand his attitude of looking down on slaves and beast-people, but that didn’t matter .
I had enough of thinking about what was right and what was wrong during my first time through this world . Morals and people’s circumstances, I don’t care about those . The important thing was what I thought .
And this boy had shown hostility and contempt towards my accomplice . Even if he hadn’t done that, he’d said that he would injure Minnalis, despite knowing that she was my slave .
There wasn’t any reason at all to hold myself back for a guy like this . So, Minnalis should do it if she wanted to . If she intended to drown herself in blood, I would stop her, but if she acted rationally, there was no need for me to restrain her murderous intent .
“I don’t mind if you have him to yourself . Most importantly, it wouldn’t be good for my mental health to quietly leave him alone after having my important accomplice made a fool of,” I whispered .
“Th-thank you, Goshujin-sama . ”
As Minnalis pretended to be afraid of the boy’s harsh words and covered her face a little, I clearly saw her lips rise in a smile . She couldn’t conceal an emotion that surpassed the limits of the Audacity skill .
… Minnalis, seemed overjoyed at having been given permission to do this .
She was gradually staining her mana with her murderous intent .
“… So that’s how it is . Do you understand how amazing I am?” the boy said .
“Yes, that is amazing,” said Minnalis .
The boy was enjoying himself, engrossed in going on and on about the spells that he could cast while Minnalis prepared her own spell .
I’d suddenly lost interest completely, so his words went in one ear and out the other and I simply responded with, “Yes,” and, “That’s amazing . ”
Minnalis and I had been whispering to each other while that was going on, but since Minnalis needed to focus on her spell now, it was convenient so I let him continue .
“Isn’t it? But my amazingness doesn’t end there . One day, there won’t be a single person in this kingdom, no, in any nation, who doesn’t know my name –”
“… Ice Particle Needle Poison,” Minnalis whispered finally, and her spell was complete .
Her deadly weapon, which was filled with murderous intent, ran through the air without anyone taking notice of it except for us .
“Hmm, what is this? Insects?” the boy said, his mouth that had been speaking as fast as if it had been lubricated finally stopping .
He put a hand on his neck, but there was no wound there . No, accurately speaking, there was a wound, but it was such a small one, as if an insect had stung him .
Ice Particle Needle Poison .
It was an original spell for mixing poison that Minnalis had invented, and as its name suggested, it froze poison and turned it into tiny needles .
A spell that added poison created by the Poison Demon of Phantom Flames to the ice created by a composition spell of the water and darkness elements, for which Minnalis possessed a relatively good affinity .
I’d suddenly thought of it while conversing with Minnalis during our journey from the royal capital, and together, we’d found time to develop this spell . It was difficult to control, but the amount of mana used for it was small; it was difficult to detect both visually and by its mana .
Once the tiny, ice-shaped needles pierced the target, they would immediately melt into poison and travel around the body . However, because the ice needles themselves weren’t very hard and didn’t have much force, even low-quality leather armor would repel them . Coupled with a quality specific to beast-people that allowed them to disperse their mana more easily, the situations this spell could be used were quite limited, so it didn’t become the versatile spell that we’d thought it would be .
However, the advantage that made up for this was that it could poison the target without anyone noticing .
“Oh, look at this, haven’t we gathered quite early today?” said Barkas as he and his trio showed up with immaculate timing . “Kukuku, is it because you felt like you couldn’t make your senpais wait? You sure get it, don’t you . Out of regard for this, I can forgive you if you pathetically rub your forehead against the ground and apologize, you know?” he said, grinning broadly .
It was an incredibly obvious provocation .
Seeing his eyes that were clouded over with a scum-like greed for the boy’s staff and Minnalis, it was easy to see that Barkas had no intention of forgiving the boy .
However, the boy didn’t notice this and was drawn in by this simple provocation, lashing out at Barkas out of temper .
“What did you say?! Who would do something as shameless as that?!” he shouted .
“I see . Then we should make a start,” Barkas said indifferently, lightly shrugging his shoulders .
“Yeah, I’m definitely going to make you guys cry!”
“Try it if you dare, but the important thing is to not be surrounded and killed by Goblins . Newly-registered adventurers acting brave and then getting killed by Goblins or something is quite a common story . ”
“Hah, who’s going to be killed by a Goblin?”
“No, you can never tell, you know? In this business, nobody knows what the future holds . You could die at any moment,” Barkas said, suppressing his laughter
We showed our plates, the proof that we were adventurers, to the gate guard and passed through the east gate . We’d come into the city from the south, which was surrounded by a forest with the only clearing being just around the gate, but in contrast to that, there was a plain with a clear view, just outside the east gate .
To the northeast, I could see small mountains quite a long distance away, and a sparse forest went on endlessly from the foot of those mountains, as if trying to snuggle up to them . The plain was so wide that it would take three days to get to the mountains if we walked in a straight line .
Me, Minnalis, the boy and Barkas’s trio traveled to that sparse forest without much conversation occurring .
“Well then, the competition will last until today’s sunset . Return to the Guild before then, make your report and then wait there . If you don’t return to the Guild before the sun has finished setting, you’re out,” said Barkas .
“Yeah, I know . Come, let’s go! If you follow me, we won’t lose, AHAHAHA!”
Oh, it looks like the poison has circulated quite a bit, I thought .
The poison that Minnalis had used amplified itself by consuming the targets’ mana, so it would cause the target to enter a light state of MP intoxication before unleashing its direct effects . I supposed that it would be around an hour or two until he became unable to move .
The boy entered the forest with plenty of spirit, and Minnalis and I began walking behind him . We’d been planning to separate from the boy and tail Barkas and his friends, but in the end, it would have been too troublesome and everyone would have made too much noise if we said we’d go our own way, so we obediently followed him for now . We could just cast a light illusion and get away from him once we were in the forest; after all, he would be dead soon .
I glanced around surreptitiously to see Barkas’s trio entering the forest from a different direction .
Their gaze was still directed towards us, so much plain greed in their eyes that it looked as if they would start licking their lips .
☆
Later on, a corpse was discovered by an adventurer, decomposed so completely that it was impossible to tell whose corpse it was . Everything, from the leather armor to the area around the ground in contact with the body, had decomposed to mush, releasing a foul odor .
The only thing that had preserved its shape was the wooden stick in the corpse’s hand that appeared to be a staff, but it had deteriorated so much that it would crumble if touched; it was impossible to determine what kind of staff it was .
Although a request was put up in the city of Ermia to investigate whether this was the doing of a new kind of monster, no similar corpses turned up afterwards, and the people forgot about it completely before long .