The Death Mage That Doesnt Want A Fourth Time 7 (1/2)

The merchant Rudy considered himself to be blessed

As the third-born son of Viscount Maggio’s noble merchant family, he couldn’t inherit the household, but he had been raised without suffering discrimination at the hands of his parents and two older brothers He had received the sah-level education as the first and second sons and had been prepared to becoe, as he couldn’t inherit the household

And so once he becaather experience as a merchant He had received a one-off support fund from his family to becoet to where he was today

This was now his third year as a merchant His business had succeeded to a point where he was deciding whether he should use the e and invite other merchants to form a caravan, or settle down somewhere and open his own store

However, Rudy had been captured several days ago and thought his luck had run out

He had hired E-class adventurers as escorts, but they had been killed by the sheer nuretted not hiring more escorts, but it was too late now

He had his goods and money taken, and when his life was next, the words he had shouted were「My fa for his life

But dying proudly was not a merchant’s job He would cause trouble for his family, but he had to do whatever he could to survive and rebuild his business He could repay the ransoh that business

It would be best if a group of adventurers or knights appeared gallantly to exteroods and money But the world was apparently not such a nice place

As he thought that, a sound reached the ears of Rudy, who had been living a sieon

『Has soround?』

Rudy, beco down the ladder, lifted his body froh the wooden bars, but it was pitch-black and he couldn’t see anything

If it were one of the bandits coic He had thought it was just his iination, but he could hear the footsteps of so

Those footsteps stopped in front of his prison However, in the darkness, he still couldn’t see anything

「W-who is it?」

In response to his high-pitched, fearful question, a voice caround

「Ah, I apologize I had not realized that it is dark down here【Deht】」

Whoosh A blue, fist-sized flaeon

「?! A g-ghost?!」

Standing in front of Rudy’s eyes was a small infant with disheveled white hair and candle-wax-like skin, wearing rag-like clothes

Rudy had assuure must be an Undead child that had been killed by the bandits and cohtly and began to tremble

「 No, I am alive」

TLN: Vandalieu is speaking rather politely to Rudy, coue

When Rudy screamed, Vandalieu had wondered『Can this person see spirits too?』But when Vandalieu realized that it was he hiht that Rudy shouldn’t be so afraid of him when he had come down here to help, and sullenly put his own appearance out of his ain and continued

「I have taken care of all the bandits that captured you And as you can see, I am not an adventurer, but a Dhampir」

As Vandalieu spoke with a disinterested tone, Rudy began to gradually caled for the better and his face turned pale

「A Dha to kill me?」

Dhampirs In the country that Rudy was born and raised in, they were treated as ets of extermination The priests of Alda in particular did not hesitate to label them as special kinds of Undead

Therefore, it was not just a ation to rescue hihly likely that he would be silenced now that he had seen the Dhampir’s face

However, the Dhampir child before him shook his head

「No If you are willing to stay quiet aboutyou」

「R-really?」

「Yes You were captured once by bandits, but you succeeded in escaping during the conflict with another bandit group Please spread that story Please do not say a word about me to anyone」

Rudy was only half-convinced Though it was understandable, as from his point of vieas as if he had met a virtuous devil

Vandalieu himself actually knew that it would be better to silence theRudy if he could help it

『I want to ood as possible For the future』

That was his simple reason

It was fine to kill bandits for his own protection, as nobody would consider it a crime even if he were to kill every last one in all of La a pitiful victim like Rudy for his own protection would be the act of a fiend

Vandalieu thought that this kind of behavior, even if nobody found out about it, would have a terrible influence on his own personality

His uncle’s family who had mistreated him on Earth, the terrorists who had used a bomb to blow up both thein who had perfor himself - all of these people were simply evil lunatics in Vandalieu’s eyes

He couldn’t become an evil lunatic like them

Because he hated them, he felt that he didn’t want to be like them But even more importantly, Vandalieu wished to live the happy life that he had never had a taste of on Earth or in Origin This was to make that wish come true

A prosperous, comfortable lifestyle and warm relations with the family and friends around him Could an evil lunatic build and maintain such a lifestyle?

And though it was still about half a century away, one day Amemiya Hiroto and the others with cheat-like abilities would be reincarnated here If he turned to evil, it was likely that they would purge him in the name of justice

Because of their cheat-like abilities, Vandalieu had the feeling that even if he left no witnesses, they would so up and expose the crimes of his past There would probably be some of them who could read a person’s mind or see into the past or otherwise expose his criic

Therefore, Vandalieu wanted to avoid having to kill victims like Rudy

「If that is all, then I understand Since I a」

And fortunately, Rudy wasn’t a fanatical worshi+pper of Alda, so he accepted Vandalieu’s conditions and chose to live

The other wise decision that Rudy e He was fearful and careful of this child whose height did not even reach his oaist

With that said, it was the natural response for Rudy

Vandalieu’s mature tone that didn’toff It was clear that he was not just an infant

With a clank, the padlock was re Now that Rudy was free, he gave a sigh of relief, but -

「Ah, if you tell anyone about e your mind」

With a pale face and chattering teeth, Rudy nodded in response to the threat that Vandalieu made just in case

Rudy climbed the rope ladder to the surface and shuddered violently as he saw the bandits’ corpses on the ground, the blood-covered Undead and Bone Bird as now covered in pale, bluish-white light after increasing in rank, letting out ominous cries of joy

And then he swore that he would definitely keep this a secret, even if he was offered a mountain of platinum coins

Rudy drank the alcohol that the bandits had been drinking to s that the bandits had stolen In addition, he had been told「I can’t use living horses」so he had been given the bandits’ horses And then he tied the wagon taken from other bandits to the horses and left

He was traveling alone with no escorts, but Vandalieu had exterminated all of the bandits that hadas he wasn’t unfortunate enough to encounter a group of Goblins, he would be able to reach his destination

He had unexpectedly received horses, so noould be buying a carriage, for a caravan of merchants and expand his business, but this was irrelevant to Vandalieu

Vandalieu spent the re time until daybreak to replace the chipped bones of the Undead with spare parts: the ani up until now He also played with Bone Bird, who had increased in rank and gained the ability to fly with its new spirit wings and buried the dead bandits And then he slept soundly until noon

He left Bone Man and the others to see Rudy off

No ht he should at least do that

And then Vandalieu woke up and ate the bandits’ leftovers for lunch

On his etables in place of a salad, and a soup with salted fish For dessert, he ate fruit that he had obtained from the forest

「Even bandits eat better than I do」

As he ate, Vandalieu realized this and became a little depressed

After having attacking bandits and taking their food, his dietary situation had ier had to eat the hard, smelly meat of raccoons and foxes However, when he had tried to use the Cursed Tools and Undead cookware to cook the food, it hadn’t gone well

The Cursed Tools had beenthem and were th or dexterity Because of that, they weren’t suited for cooking

In that case, it was possible to have Bone Man do it, but the spirits inhabiting him were not that of humans, but of small animals such as insects andWhen ordered to「cut the vegetables」, he had swung his sword at the vegetables with full force, cutting straight through the chopping board

The fact that he had learned to use a sword and boas h development for him

As for Vandalieu himself -

『No! To be cooking when you’re only one year old! What will you do if you burn yourself?!』

「But Mo dried estive systeular one-year-old」

『No means no! What will you do if you burn yourself?!』

「 I’ll use water and【Heat Leech】to cool it down」

Since the Death Attribute was the opposite of the Life Attribute, he was bad with things like healing He did have an ability that could heal, but it was a strange one that only worked for「healing fatal wounds and serious illnesses, but not injuries that do not endanger one’s life」

If he burned his whole body, he could heal it, but if he was burned just enough to form a scar on his hand, it would be hard for Vandalieu to heal it with his current abilities

『Then you can’t!』

「Alright~」

This was probably because Darcia had thought「I have to be careful not to let hiet burned while he’s still a sone a little wild after her death

But Vandalieu had only just turned one year old and his ars were short There was definitely the risk of an unexpected injury if he tried to use a pot, so Darcia wasn’t wrong to warn him

As a result, Vandalieu was now heating water using eainst each other, and having the Undead add broken bread and torn pieces of dried meat into it This had become his daily meal

The taste ell, better than raccoon and fox meatballs

「It’s fine Once I grow up, I’ll earn a lot and hire a skilled chef to make me delicious meals every day Err, more importantly, today’s harvest is…」

First of all, there were the bandits’ weapons All of the other bandit groups that he had defeated earlier had been using hand knives to the ends of wooden sticks, and their clubs, bows and arroere all of low quality But this group wasn’t called the biggest bandit group just for show Every one of theood weapons

They were made with normal iron, but they weren’t the inferior qualityed by a craftsh some of of them had become chipped over tiht, some of the bandits had been killed swiftly without the time to retaliate,so their weapons were still spotless

The sa Coroups, which had been repaired over and over, this was still in very good condition

They had surely attacked the wagon of a weapons merchant previously

There was also the treasure in the carriages He had returned all of Rudy’s belongings, but there was still a considerable ae

There was about 50,000 Ah it was hard to discern their exact value There was also a sh-quality cloth with a pretty color and two barrels of seear, which was a valuable ingredient as it was not produced in the country of Mirg

Finally, there were the bandits’ spare weapons and food

Including the carriage, all of this was likely worth more than 200,000 Amid It would be about 20,000,000 japanese yen if converted, and although it was a lot of h to be called a fortune However, looting that much money in this area where the only town around was Evbejia was quite a feat

TLN: Roughly 175,000 USD

Though in this case, instead of praising the bandits for their skills, it uards

『With that said, everything other than the food is useless for me』

Vandalieu would still have no opportunity to spend thehis best to s he earing right now As he was unable to fully utilize the treasure the bandits had gathered, his situation hadn't changed

But Bone Man could use the weapons and armor and the leather arear for Bone Monkey and Bone Bear

However, with this amount of treasure, the probleiven all of the horses to Rudy and only the carriage itself remained Even if he wanted to have his Undead to pull it, the carriage would have to be altered

Vandalieu had an idea

「Now then, who should I get to do it?」

As Vandalieu murmured and looked around at the spirits around him, there were not only the spirits of the bandits who had just died To his surprise, the spirit of a thin ed man whose appearance from when he was alive was preserved stepped forward

『Please allow me, Sam! In my lifetime I held the posts of caretaker of horses and coache are second to none!』

It was fortunate for Vandalieu that the spirit of Sa his lifetime, had not moved on yet The fact that his spirit had maintained his appearance fro Mana supplied to hith as well

In a way, Sareatest find out of all the treasure here

『Vandalieu-sahters, ere treated as playthings and then killed! In our gratitude, hters and I will serve you for the rest of your life!』

The two spirits standing behind Sahters Their burnt, black bodies were barely recognizable as those of women, so Vandalieu couldn’t be certain

The bandits had probably gone too far using thes and they had become unsellable, or perhaps the bandits had no connections with any slave traders They were likely killed for one of these two reasons

Fro as Vandalieu looked at them, this was probably correct

「Well then, I’ll leave it to you, Sam」

Fir that he would use the bandits’ spirits until they were no e

「Get up」

As Vandalieu gave this coan to creak

「 Go forth」

And with those words, the carriage’s wheels began to turn, even without the horse that was norave a satisfied nod

「Making a Cursed Carriage with Saained a method of transport as well Well then, I’ll have it run Goblins over to level up on the way back to the forest」

Two days later, the highway patrol stepped into the bandits’ base after receiving the information from Rudy, but all they saere the piles of dirt where the bandits had been buried and the beasts and Goblins that had dug thereedily

Tracks e continued off outside, but they assumed that these were those of the bandits that had been victorious in this conflict and didn’t bother investigating any further

The co officer of the patrol tilted his head when he realized that there were no hoofprints acco worthin his report

Baronet Bestero had been in a good mood for the past year

After that witch had been caught and executed, only good things had been happening Yes, the High Priest and his men had occupied the forest for the next two , but those were trivial things

Though the Dhampir’s corpse had not been discovered, its death had been accepted and Bestero had received aWIth that, the scorn fro areas that he wasfeatures but its wine』had been drowned out

Even this year’s wine and the grapes that were used as ingredients for it had turned out well, and the bandits that had caused headaches and threatened the public order had been dealt with near the beginning of summer

He was a little dissatisfied that it wasn’t resolved by the highway patrol, protege knights or even adventurers But the bandit problem had been a serious one, so he was happy that it was dealt with, even though it had been done through disputes ast the bandits themselves

The best thing was that he had been promoted

Though it had not been formally decided, he had received private word that he would soon be summoned to the the Amid Empire’s imperial capital

The position of Baron that his great-grandfather, the first-generation Baronet Bestero, had longed for That would be his soon

Knowing this, even if the liquid in his glass was not wine but vinegar, he would surely drink it happily That was how joyful he was now