Ch.117The Real Conclusion

The sudden downpour soaks the earth.

The flames hesitated at the unexpected shower, defiantly raising their heads several times, but the sky simply poured down endless streams of water.

Finally, the exhausted fire subsides as if being erased.

It was a scene both majestic and terrifying.

Feeling a chill creeping into my chest, I let out a long breath.

“Oh Elpinel…”

Millia closed her eyes and made the sign of the holy cross.

It was such an otherworldly sight that even she, who wasn’t particularly a priest, sought out God without hesitation.

Cold raindrops thoroughly soak my hair and stream down.

Washing away the dirt from my armor and body.

The reddened water formed a puddle at my feet.

Honestly, I couldn’t even guess.

Whether this was truly a divine miracle or simply a weather phenomenon.

I’d prefer it to be just weather, though.

Because if this was really the work of gods, it would be extremely unsettling.

The fact that beings who could freely wield such power were watching me.

Devout priests would offer prayers of gratitude for this… but not me.

It felt like everything I had done so far was being mocked as nothing more than a puppet show in their palms.

Even for gods, I thought they just granted priest-like magical powers at most.

I brushed away the rainwater flowing down my eyes and urged Millia on.

“Let’s go, Millia. At least we have less to worry about now.”

“Oh, y-yes…!”

Millia looked at me as if I had somehow summoned this divine miracle.

It made my skin crawl.

“…When there’s a big fire, it’s natural for rain to follow. That’s how it was in the plains too.”

There was some truth to my words.

When heated air rises with ash, rain clouds tend to form.

…Though it rarely pours down immediately in the same spot.

—-

Frider must have finished his battle too, as the chapel we approached was quiet.

More accurately, it was relatively quiet.

Compared to the rain pounding the ground, the pained groans and weakened screams were barely audible.

The chapel’s main door was shattered, and two corpses lay in the front yard.

Well, whether to call them two corpses…

One might be a corpse and the other just barely so.

One body was relatively intact, but the other was just pieces of flesh floating in a sea of blood.

Millia drew in a small breath.

Frider, why did you have to tear them apart so violently? So barbaric, really.

“Haschal, did… did Senior Frider do that?”

“I’m sure Frider had his reasons.”

Though it honestly just looked like he was venting his anger.

“Even for kobolds, tearing them apart like that is a bit gruesome.”

“Uh… yeah……”

Millia’s reaction was completely different from what I expected.

Eyes like someone looking at a field mouse crushed by a carriage wheel.

As if she had completely erased the recognition that these were human corpses from her mind.

The mental conditioning worked too well…

While I had intended this, I only meant to reduce her aversion to killing somewhat, not to this extent.

Maybe I should have her get psychological counseling from priests later.

“…Let’s go in. Demian must be waiting.”

“Do you think Demian will praise me? I fought hard too.”

Well, I don’t know.

If he’s perceptive, he might offer some praise.

—-

“Ah, it’s Millia and Haschal. Welcome.”

“Urghhhh…”

“Save me… my legs… my legs…!”

The chapel interior was filled with severed limbs floating in a sea of blood.

Demian, sitting casually on a chair, greeted us nonchalantly.

“I’m used to this sort of thing, but Millia worked especially hard.”

I leaned against the chapel entrance and took out a cigarette.

Thankfully, the wooden case had protected them from the rain, and the cigarettes inside were still intact.

“Really? You worked hard, Millia. Sit here and rest a bit.”

“Yes. Thanks, Demian!”

Millia smiled brightly and sat down next to Demian.

Kicking away a writhing man at her feet.

“But Demian, why did you leave these kobolds alive?”

“Kobolds…? Oh, um. Yes, kobolds. Senior Frider told me to keep them alive. He said he wanted to give the rescued women a chance for revenge.”

Demian, momentarily confused by Millia’s comment, quickly recovered and answered appropriately.

He’s certainly sharp in these matters… I wonder why he’s so clueless when it comes to women’s hearts.

“Is everything settled in the village?”

“I burned all the village men to a crisp. Except for the kids whose guilt is uncertain.”

I had already thrown the children into the carriage.

Despite being soaked in the rain, they showed no signs of waking up. They just trembled, pale with cold.

I didn’t want them to die like that.

I intended to leave their fate to the victims.

So I draped my shoulder armor over them like a blanket as I brought them here.

Boris’s fur silently kept the children warm.

Seeing how it only became helpful after becoming a leather garment, the saying “a good werebeast is a dead werebeast” came to mind.

He certainly became a good werebeast in the end.

“Is Frider downstairs?”

“Yes. He told me to guard this place and wait for you all together.”

Demian nodded.

Well, it’s not exactly a pleasant sight to see.

“I see? Then we’ll wait.”

He’ll come up soon enough.

I exhaled cigarette smoke while admiring the outside scenery.

The smoke that escaped the chapel was shattered by the raindrops.

“Since it’s raining, Demian, why don’t you wash off some of that blood?”

Demian’s hair and armor were also soaked in blood, probably from his rampage.

Nodding, Demian stepped outside the chapel.

By the time I finished smoking one cigarette, I heard Frider’s footsteps coming up.

—-

“What’s with this sudden rain? Not that it’s a bad thing. It would have been troublesome if the fire hadn’t gone out.”

Frider muttered, only noticing the weather after coming up.

He wasn’t wearing his distinctive fur coat, just a black uniform top and bottom.

Perhaps he had given it to the women downstairs.

“Yeah, it’s fortunate indeed.”

I threw my cigarette outside and entered the chapel.

“That’s rich coming from the person who caused the trouble. What were you thinking, starting such a big fire?”

“I was trying to drive them out for a hunt, and just got carried away.”

Frider let out a deep sigh.

I deliberately ignored her sigh while wiping the moisture from my hair.

“Anyway, now that you’re here, help me out. There are twenty people downstairs.”

Frider explained about the basement.

Though she tried to tone it down for Millia’s sake, the content was horrific enough.

So basically only two people are mentally sound. Maybe three if we count the woman who’s drugged.

Women who couldn’t even live properly without someone to care for them.

Then what about the children…

Considering their age, they seem to be born in the breeding facility rather than kidnapped women.

We can’t leave the judgment to those women.

“We can show them to the two sane women to sort them out, then hand them over to the priests? The church orphanage will raise them.”

Frider offered a simple solution.

“Priests?”

“The fire burned down the entire village, so the Empire will send investigators in a few days. I plan to ask them to call the priesthood. As for the costs of treatment, rehabilitation, and education… Faelrun will donate if I say so.”

She spoke as if it was natural to take full responsibility for the people she rescued.

Even though it wouldn’t be a small expense.

She’s definitely a good person at heart. Just a bit aggressive in character.

“More importantly, we need to clean up downstairs, so come with me. You’re the only one I can entrust with this.”

“Well, I suppose that’s true.”

“Demian and Millia, just clean up that platform. We’ll need to lay the women down, so bring some blankets too.”

The two nodded.

—-

We moved the eight imprisoned women upstairs.

We left the women from the breeding facility alone for now, as they refused to leave.

Forcibly dragging them out would only cause them to riot and try to return.

We’ll have to leave them in the basement for now. I’ll clean it up tomorrow.

Grace, the woman who saw the chapel scene, turned her head away with a pale face.

Hugging the little girl in her arms tightly.

Well, it’s a… very gruesome sight for an ordinary woman.

In contrast, Belita, the adventurer woman, spat and cursed as if pleased by the sight.

Her eyes were filled with venom.

Frider handed each of them a dagger.

“A dagger? What am I supposed to do with this?”

“Don’t you want revenge? That’s why I deliberately kept some of them alive. They can’t move their limbs properly, but their mouths work fine.”

Understanding immediately, Belita gripped the dagger’s handle with her mouth, a smile of ecstasy on her face.

After hesitating for a while, Grace also gently bit the dagger with trembling lips.

Fifteen men were still breathing. None had intact limbs.

Frider and I dragged those maggots before the two women.

The men recognized them and widened their eyes.

They squirmed frantically.

Sensing their end, each showed a different reaction.

Some begged for forgiveness and mercy.

Some moaned weakly, lacking the strength to scream.

Some spewed vile curses in their rage.

When insults about her daughter flowed from one man’s mouth, Grace’s trembling eyes filled with cold hatred.

She stabbed down with the dagger.

The well-sharpened blade began to tear the men to pieces.

As the screaming men tried to jump up, Frider and I pinned them down.

Until Grace and Belita finished their work.

It took quite a while.

—-

Frider and I cleaned up the bodies after they finished.

Though they resembled gaping gills more than human corpses by that point.

Drinking potions handed by Frider whenever they tired, the two women continuously butchered them.

Belita took four, Grace six.

Surprisingly, Grace was more passionate.

That must mean her grudge ran deeper.

Frider and I handled the remaining five.

Any longer and they would have died from excessive bleeding.

The two women didn’t complain about our methods.

After all, ours were more violent.

Regarding the children, one of the four had undergone an “initiation ceremony” last year.

With a girl about the same age as Grace’s daughter.

The cunning one had been hiding among the other three.

His head also became tomato stew.

We decided to send the remaining three to an orphanage as Frider suggested.

—-

Three days later, an investigation team arrived.

We had been extremely busy until then.

Cleaning the breeding facility and caring for the women left us with no time to rest.

Fortunately, about half the village hadn’t burned down.

We could put the eight women in beds and obtain food and supplies from there.

Frider explained the situation to the knight and priestess of the investigation team and requested support from the church as she handed over the women.

She warned them to take good care of these women as she was taking responsibility for them in Faelrun’s name.

As if threatening that she wouldn’t let them get away with any misconduct.

The knight nodded while sweating profusely.

The sight of the village filled with dismembered and burned corpses must have been quite shocking.

It seems we don’t need to worry about any misconduct.

Though I wanted to watch over them a bit longer, I was also concerned about the dungeon situation and couldn’t delay any further.

“Thank you… thank you so much… I don’t know how to repay this kindness…!”

Grace expressed her gratitude with tears streaming down her face.

“Thank you.”

Belita also bowed her head and offered a word of thanks.

Leaving them behind, we boarded the carriage again and headed for the forest.

It had been a very long five days.