CH 63

“Let’s follow the tracks,” Luisen suggested. It was one thing if they had passed by without discovering this; now that the two believed the blood that painted these footprints belonged to the captain’s wife, the young lord needed to personally confirm whether or not she was alive. How else could he face the guard captain later on?

“I believe it’d be best to return to Confosse. We’ve already done enough to fulfill his request.” Carlton considered it a waste of time to stay here. The search could be conducted by the villagers. The outcome was unlikely to change even if they joined forces.

“Don’t you find it strange that only the captain’s wife was taken away?”

“We have no way of knowing the centipede’s intentions. Besides, we also have no way of knowing if we’ll find the captain’s wife if we were to follow these tracks.”

“…Still, what if she’s alive? We should save her as soon as possible.”

“Then the villagers and the guard captain will take care of it. We have no time to meddle in another’s affairs.”

As Carlton said, they couldn’t afford to meddle. However, Luisen couldn’t feign ignorance now. The guard captain who worried about his wife and was waiting for the birth of his child; the chief who had cried alone in the kitchen at the news of Anna’s disappearance. The villagers who were overjoyed at the centipde’s death. Luisen had gotten to know them now.

Now that he’d gotten to know them, he couldn’t easily leave, carefree and unfeeling. Even if he were to leave this place and travel far away, his anxieties would hang to the tips of his hair, serving as a worrying reminder of the village’s plight

Time. If time was an issue, was there no other way to resolve this?

Luisen wracked his brains and thought of a good idea. “Let’s ask the chief to deliver the news to the guard captain. That way, we won’t have to return to Confosse and we’ll have more ease in our timeline. Hm?”

“Why would you go this far?”

“Something feels dangerous. I don’t think we should just abandon these villagers–these people don’t have the strength to protect themselves.”

Carlton fell into contemplation. No matter what the young lord said, he still thought this matter was pointless. ‘If I said no, right now, he’d listen to me, but… He’d be disappointed with me.’

He’d be the cold-hearted beast that turned a blind eye to those in need and only cared about his business. Though it was true that Carlton was that type of person, he didn’t want to appear that way to Luisen.

Furthermore, Luisen’s argument held some weight. As he said, if they sent someone else to Confosse, they’d have half a day to spare. Then, it wouldn’t be too much of a waste of time to join in the search. Even if they couldn’t go and convey the news to the guard captain directly, they’d save face by searching for his wife.

“…Alright. However, we can only spare half a day. If that time goes by and nothing appears, we must leave.”

“Of course! I won’t be stubborn at that point!” With Carlton’s permission, Luisen told the villagers that they’d decided to follow the centipede’s footprints. Several strong-looking village youths volunteered to follow the young lord.

***

Even though a long time had passed, the centipede’s footprints remained intact. It was fortunate that the sky hadn’t rained and the weather remained dry all the while. As they walked along the tracks, the two reached a big rock–the very same rock that could be seen from the village.

A large open space surrounded the large rock; the tracks were cut off due to the thick piles of fallen leaves.

“So it must have come over here…” Luisen crossed his arms over his chest and looked around. There was a rock over there and open space here. Just where would the centipede have gone? Unable to work it out, he looked towards Carlton.

“If a centipede’s den were to be here, it would be over there.” Carlton pointed at the large rock.

“Over there?”

“Centipedes like to be under rocks–dark and narrow.”

“Have you ever seen monsters that look like centipedes before?”

“No. However, monsters follow the creatures they resemble. Spider-type monsters spin webs; ant-type monsters cluster around and swarm others.”

“Mm…” Luisen really had no desire to know that. A spider or an ant the size of a child? Ugh. Just imagining them was gruesome and hair-raising. Luisen scratched at his arms automatically.

Carlton approached the giant rock. When he removed the fallen leaves piled up around it, a narrow gap between the rock and the ground appeared. At a surface glance, it looked like the gap was formed naturally.

“This must be the entrance to the centipede’s burrow.”

“This? Isn’t this just some gap in the ground? Isn’t it too small for something of the centipede’s size?”

“It may look like that from here, but it’s probably quite spacious below. The ground underneath is soft soil, and it would be quite easy for that monster to dig and build its home.” With that said, Carlton threw a small stone into the gap. The echoes from the stone rolling around lasted a long time. He was correct–contrary to its outward appearance, the burrow must have been deep and wide inside.

Luisen nodded. Carlton’s logic had never been wrong. The young lord thought it best to listen to smart people.

“I’ll have to go in.” Carlton hesitated–he wondered whether he could take the young lord inside something like a centipede burrow. For now, though, the centipede was dead; the young lord wouldn’t be in much danger. And, he was worried that something may happen to the young lord if he left Luisen on the surface. So, Carlton had Luisen follow him by holding onto his cape.

Carlton entered the cave first, followed by Luisen, and finally the youths from the village. As the mercenary said, after passing the narrow entrance, the inside was wide enough to stand and walk comfortably. However, the way forward was so dark it was hard to tell how deep the burrow was.

The group cautiously advanced while carrying a small torch. Like that, they walked for a long while. The path slightly careened downwards, so it felt like they were walking into a dark pit. The more they descended, the more the burrow smelled unpleasantly fishy. It must have been the combination of blood and rotting grass alongside the centipede’s natural scent. Furthermore, the walls were marked everywhere with the centipede’s footprints.

‘It’s definitely a centipede’s burrow, but…’

No matter how far they went, nothing appeared. As the long passage continued endlessly, Luisen’s initial tension had disappeared; now the young lord was struck by weary boredom. Suddenly, the surroundings changed: the ceiling had risen up and the sides opened wide. They had exited a hallway into a room. They had finally reached the end of the burrow. As he passed through the threshold, Carlton paused.

Luisen had been following absentmindedly and hit his forehead against the mercenary’s back. “What is it?”

“There’s something in front of us.”

“What’s in front of us?” Even though Luisen eagerly looked ahead, his eyes weren’t used to the darkness and couldn’t see very well.

“It’s on the floor.”

At Carlton’s words, a village youth stepped forward and shone a light around. ‘It’ appeared in that light.

A foot. A human foot.

Women. Three women were laying side by side on the floor. All of them were late-stage pregnant women and looked similar in physique and age. It looked as if the monster had purposely collected these pregnant women and displayed them side by side. They were stupefied by the unexpected discovery.

Did the centipede do this?

“Who’s the guard captain’s wife?” Carlton broke the silence.

One villager, who returned to his senses at the mercenary’s question, observed the women. “Here! This person is Anna.”

One of the three women was the captain’s missing wife. According to one of the village youths, the rest were also women from nearby villages along the forest borders. On the surface, the women looked perfectly fine. They must have been held underground for a long while, but they didn’t look thin or weak.

As a result, the village youth took courage and inspected them in closer detail. “They’re breathing! Their hearts are beating too…I think they’re alright.”

At first glance, the women appeared to be locked in deep sleep. ‘Whew.’ Luisen was incredibly relieved. ‘It was good to follow the centipede’s footsteps. If we hadn’t, we wouldn’t have found this burrow or saved these women.’

“Let’s hurry and take them outside. Let’s each take one person into our arms to move them,” the young lord said.

Underground, they had nothing to simulate a stretcher; it would take time to go out and bring one below. The best idea would be to carry the women in their arms. There were three women and three people that followed them from the village, so the numbers matched perfectly.

While the villagers took care of the women, Luisen and Carlton looked around the room to see if anything else was there.

The young lord, while fumbling around in the dark, inadvertently brought the torch to the wall. “Nngh.”

He had thought the walls were quite uneven–it turned out to be a huge bust.

The bust looked quite strange. It had the shape of a goat with four horns and three eyes. The torso protruded upwards and looked down, as if it were watching over the three women.

Below the bust, there was a stone platform. It wasn’t large, but soft cloth covered it; there were golden candlesticks on both sides with an incense burner in the center.

“Is this an altar?”

The shape and arrangement looked quite similar to altars seen inside churches. The only differences were in the decorating elements: gold candlesticks instead of silver; animal bones instead of flowers.

There was a gold plate placed atop the center of the altar. When one thought back to a church’s altar, that place was reserved for special holy relics. However, when Luisen lifted the object atop the plate for close inspection, it was a pocket knife the size of a finger. Though the darkness made it hard for the young lord to see, the knife was blunt and its engravings and decorations looked cheap.

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Once again, Luisen glanced at the altar and the bust. “This is… too…strange.”

Everything in view was just too unnatural and illogical. Why was there an altar in a centipede’s den? What could that bust mean?

The giant centipede had only chosen pregnant women and kept them alive in its burrow. Sometimes, monsters were known to store their food fresh, but these women did not look as if they were set aside to serve as food stocks. They had been laid so neatly–as if they were displayed in front of that bust.

What kind of monster would do that? They eat, destroy, and breed. Those were a monster’s instincts; they were called monsters because they were slaves to those instincts.

The young lord was certain that a human’s hand must have meddled with this centipede’s burrow. Golden candlesticks, altars–those were things that only a human could retrieve.

‘So then, someone commanded the centipedes to retrieve these women?’

A human who played with monsters as if they were instruments

Luisen knew someone like that very well.

TL: What is this, resident evil? D: I’m not sure I want to find out what that altar was for.