CH 39

Goosebumps rose on her skin.

Even if she didn’t know what those were, Radis would have still taken a step back.

They were monster eggs, so naturally, monsters would hatch from there.

Besides that, it’s impossible to guess what kind of monster it would be just based on the outer shell.

Something really terrible and malevolent might be born from there.

More than that, monster eggs could invite more monsters to come.

Radis now realized what Gorz was doing.

They were summoning monsters using the eggs they had stolen from the forest of monsters.

After that, he would threaten the villagers of the towns he visited and receive the payment of ‘subjugating’ the monsters.

“But what’s this?”

That one egg was glowing.

And the shell was the color of bright ivory.

The entire egg was covered with faint patterns as though it had been engraved with gold, and there was a subtle glow leaking out from it.

The light changed to various hues the more she looked at it, so she couldn’t put a label on just what color that glow was.

Radis had seen many monster eggs back then, but she had never seen a glowing egg before.

It was evidently suspicious.

Then, she felt someone’s presence outside the door.

“You said you’d drink to your heart’s content, but you didn’t even bring any money with ya? You idiot!”

“That’s because ya suddenly talked about spiders!”

“S-Spiders! Uuugh-huuuu!”

“Euuurgh… huh? What’s with the doorknob?”

Luke pulled on the broken knob as he opened the door.

Then, he saw a stranger standing in the room. It was a boy with red hair wearing a short cloak.

‘No, a girl?’

At first glance, she seemed to be a boy because her clothes were all dirty and there was an iron club fastened to her belt. But when he looked at her face, she was definitely a woman.

And he’s met her before.

Luke shouted.

“Auction house!”

“How did you even know this place…!”

Radis raised her head to look at both Gorz and Luke. Then, she opened her lips to speak.

“There’s a few things I’d like to ask.”

“……!”

“First, have you ever killed anyone while doing this?”

Gorz and Luke stared at Radis in confusion.

“Second, these monster eggs have gold patterns, but how did fellows as blockheaded as you manage to get them?”

Radis picked up the glowing egg from the cabinet.

“Lastly, what on earth is this?”

Luke had just been staring blankly right then, but in his astonishment, he brought out a sharp dagger and shouted.

“Are you crazy? Do you wanna die? Put that down!”

Gorz, who remained still thus far, stepped forward and spoke.

“You! If you think I’m not going to get back at you just because you’re the Marquis’ person, you’re mistaken! I don’t know what kind of gall you have for coming here alone, but if you put that down, I’ll be generous enough to spare your life!”

After saying all that, Gorz reached towards Radis.

It seemed like he was going to grab Radis by her hair, but that in itself was ridiculous to her.

Radis dodged nimbly and grabbed Gorz’ by his hair instead. …That was to say, if he had even a single strand of hair on his shiny bald head, she would have reached for that, but since he didn’t.

Reaching for his beard instead clutching a handful of the scruffy hair, Radis asked.

“I’ll give you some time to think. Do you want me to let you live, or do you want to get hit because you wouldn’t speak?”

Caught by his beard, Gorz staggered forward. At this, he clenched his hands into fists and exclaimed indignantly.

“You!”

Radis sighed.

“Fine. I’ll hit you once, then let’s start talking.”

* * *

In her previous life, Robert and Radis’ high level of combat eventually raised the status of the entire subjugation squad—but it wasn’t like that at first.

There’s not many people who voluntarily joined the subjugation squad like Radis.

More cases than not, being sent to the subjugation squad was like a death sentence.

Theirry was sent there after a duel. It’s said that it’s because he killed a high-ranking person. Tez, too, was caught smuggling goods.

Laszlo was brought in for theft.

And with such a group like there, there’s only one way to discipline them.

Hit ‘em once, and they’d start loosening up.

If it doesn’t work the first time, then keep hitting.

Until it does work in the end.

However, if you hit too hard and they die, then it’s not even worth the effort of hitting that much.

So, as long as their skull wouldn’t get cracked open, or their brains wouldn’t pour out, or their eyes wouldn’t turn over, or their tongues wouldn’t turn purple—it’s all good.

It wouldn’t be good to accidentally break some bones, since those took forever to mend back together.

Moderation was key here. If you hit ‘em carefully and sincerely, equally spreading out the hits throughout all other body parts without bias, then it’ll work better.

Radis used this method of hitting today, and the first mouth she managed to open up was Luke’s very swollen mouth.

“Keeeuugh! W-We diwn’t giwe it to peopwe, Ma’am!”

Then, Gorz’ mouth soon opened as well.

“Ku-huhp! W-We happened to come across a passageway. Ku-hngh! I-It’s directly connected to the f-forest of monsters, Ma’am!”

Doubled over, Gorz’ face was soaked with tears trickling down his eyes, which were either swollen or just closed. Who knows.

“Passageway?”

“Ku-uurk! W-We entered the forest through that passageway m-many times. A-And we got the eggs from there and sold them, that’s how w-we made money…”

“So you managed to make all this money from things you got in the forbidden region? It’s a lot, huh.”

“I broke one egg before by mistake and the monsters chased after us… I knew we shouldn’t do something like that, but…!”

Radis sighed briefly as she looked down at the miserable Gorz and Luke.

Even though they knew they shouldn’t do it, they still would have repeated it diligently.

Until one day, their methods would get exposed—because of which they’d become wanted men, eventually get caught by bounty hunters, then promptly executed.

‘People don’t usually change from their ways… Should I just get rid of them here?’

Perhaps sensing the killing intent that Radis was exuding, Luke cried frantically.

“We made a mistwake! We won’t do it agwain! We’ll tuwn ower a new weaf…!”

Radis stared at Luke, who was begging her that they could ‘become her hands and feet’. Then, she looked towards the glowing egg again.

Gorz spoke.

“I-It hasn’t been long since we got that one! We only took it because it looked interesting and I thought we’d fetch a high price for it, Ma’am!”

“As long as you get money, you’d go to the forbidden region, you’d do something you’re not supposed to do, and you even picked up something like this? Ha…”

Holding her chin with one hand, Radis was lost in thought.

Gorz and Luke didn’t seem to be lying.

‘There’s a passageway leading straight to the forbidden region?’

She never heard about this before.

She often boasted about knowing every nook and cranny of the forest of monsters, but she had never heard of the existence of such a passage.

But if a passageway like that didn’t exist, these two oafs would have had to go the old-fashioned way and break through the forest of monsters from the outside just to reach the forbidden region and bring back eggs like these. No way they could have done that.

‘Even I wouldn’t be able to go to the forbidden region all by myself.’

Looking between the two sinners and the glowing egg, Radis finally came to a decision.

She soon spoke.

“Lead me there.”

* * *

Feeling like they were on death’s door, Gorz and Luke headed towards the forest, which wasn’t far from the base of the Kingsnake Mercenary Corps.

Of course, this forest wasn’t the forest of monsters.

As they walked through the deserted forest, Radis threatened them.

“If you’re just telling nonsense here, I won’t let you go.”

“It’s nwot nownsense! It’s the twuth!”

Holding the torch, Luke hastily spoke up. Meanwhile Gorz, who was walking ahead with the chest of eggs, opened his mouth as well.

“It’s been more than ten years. At that time, low-level monsters lived around here and were common in these parts of the forest. We were just hiding somewhere around here to catch some wild animals, but then at that time, we saw people in armor walking through a passageway. It wasn’t just one or two people—it was a lot.”

Walking through the thick foliage, Luke pushed aside a group of vines that was hanging between two tall trees.

Then, a small clearing was revealed at the base of a cliff that wasn’t too high up.

Between the crevice, a narrow cave entrance could be seen. It looked like an opening that had been formed after the ground had cracked open.

Gorz explained.

“Those people left their horses here and then went ahead inside.”

“Thwat’s how we smelled some money inswide.”

Gorz gulped dryly.

“But the people who went inside the cave didn’t come back out. No, well, some did, but only two people returned. It was a man in a black cloak and a child.

“A child?”

“Yes, Ma’am. But the rest didn’t return. Out of curiosity, we went inside, too, and what we saw there was shocking.”

Luke lit up the cave with the torch in his hand.

After taking a step into the cave, Radis could see what exactly was shocking.

On the right side, boulders had collapsed so that path had gotten completely blocked, but the other passageway leading deeper into the forest of monsters was so far ahead that the end of it was invisible.

“Does this path go as far as the forbidden region?”

“Yesh!”

“Yes, Ma’am!”

Then, Gorz dropped his salute and had a servile smile on his lips.

“Then that’s all we hafta…!”

Radis quickly grabbed Luke’s cloak as he was about to run away.

“Didn’t I say I won’t let you go if you’re just pulling my leg here?”

With a frightened expression, Gorz cried.

“Aiyah, we’re not pulling anyone’s leg here, Ma’am! The passageway is just long, but since there’s only one way going there, you can just go straight. The end of it is the forbidden region! You don’t even need a guide or whatever!”

“You’re the ones who took those eggs, so isn’t it right that you’ll put them back?”

Radis took her iron club from her belt and swung it threateningly.

“Huuk!”

Luke cried as Radis hit him with the iron club.

“Goruz! Goruz! Let’s jwus go!”

Gorz seemed to be muttering something under his breath, but he gulped the words back down because he couldn’t fight back.

And so the three of them walked down the dark passageway.

All they did was walk, but it wasn’t that easy.

The road itself was leveled with bricks, but the air was stagnant, moldy and humid enough that it stung their throats.

It wouldn’t have been worse if it hadn’t been for Luke’s torch.

‘I can’t believe there really is a passage like this.’

Radis observed the walls carefully.

Perhaps because it was made a long time ago, but there were areas where groundwater had trickled in and turned into small swamp-like puddles, and there were also some places where the brick walls had been cracked open due to protruding tree roots.

However, only small parts of this passageway were damaged. Most of it was well preserved.

Radis could only think that this might be because of ancient magic.