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Chapter 79
Translator: Yonnee
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She thought so because the bricks were engraved with ancient runes along the passage.
It wasn’t well managed like the teleportation gate and the runes didn’t shine, so Gorz and Luke didn’t seem to have noticed at all.
No, Radis also might not have noticed had she not seen the gate at Larrings and Dvirath.
‘Maybe this passageway is an ancient magical relic like a gate.’
Sometimes, while passing the chest to the other as they took turns carrying it, Gorz and Like chatted as though they wanted to fill the long silence.
“When we first came here without knowing anything, I didn’t know how many times I went back and forth. It’s just dark everywhere and there’s no end in sight.”
“Bwahaha, jwust like our futuwe!”
“……”
Then, silence again.
“Wash it the fifsh one? We pwepawed hawd and finawwy went to the ewnd!”
“Yeah, that’s right. When we opened the stone door, a large clearing appeared, and we looked around because it was just so amazing. There were white trees all over the place…”
Watching Gorz blabber on like that, Radis decided to set aside her suspicion of him for the moment.
The landscape he was describing exactly matched the forbidden region that she remembered.
It seemed like this passageway was actually connected to the forbidden region.
“…And there were eggs at the edge of that clearing. I knew it instinctively the moment I saw them. Those are monster eggs!”
“Kehehehe!”
“I heard they were a little salty!”
Radis shook her head and asked.
“Someone bought them?”
Gorz replied excitedly.
“I heard they boiled them and ate them all up!”
“You’re absolutely nuts.”
Indeed, there were more weirdos out there than she previously thought.
Such requests were usually sent to the subjugation squads.
In case they could find the horn of a black unicorn, or if they would ever come across the tusks of a shabel tiger, then collectors would come forward and buy them for prices even higher than a mana stone.
There were times when just parts of a monster were more expensive, like a specimen of a night fog butterfly for example. And even when they didn’t know what they’d be used for, there were also times when certain people wanted to buy monster meat or blood.
“We once akshidentally bwoke a monshter egg back then, geh, then a low-ranked monshter came all the way here, wight?”
“A ghoul, an imp and a harpy all appeared suddenly that we were so terrified out of our wits.”
Radis was dumbfounded.
“You were so terrified that you thought to use them to terrorize the border villages? Are you bragging? Do you want to get hit again?”
“Noooo!”
Gorz grumbled.
“We did that because we don’t want to go hungry! After some rumors broke out that the viscount who boiled the eggs suffered a lot because of the spread of miasma, we couldn’t sell any eggs at all. You can’t even imagine it, but it’s hard for mercenaries like us to survive without having to resort to such tricks.”
“And that’s how you’re justifying the cowardly acts that you do? You were bound to be caught one day in any case. As I did.”
“Ah, yes, Ma’am! How can a lady of noble status, who is doing her part as an apostle of justice, ever understand low lives like us.”
After hearing Gorz answer like that, Luke stomped his feet—which were getting numb—and then shouted the same words again.
“We made a mistwake! We won’t do it agwain! We’ll tuwn ower a new weaf…!”
Radis glared icily at them and turned away.
Apostle of justice. Ridiculous.
She wasn’t doing this because she was sticking her nose into things.
She never wanted to be an apostle of justice.
Her principles remained the same as they were in her first life.
Her hands were full with just protecting herself.
Sure, sometimes she slipped out of the marquis’ estate and hunted some monsters, but it wasn’t for some great cause.
The biggest reason was because she wanted to collect magic stones as they would fetch for high prices, and also because she knew that actual experience with battle was the most efficient way of training.
There was also some hope that she could be beneficial to the marquisate.
In any case, it wasn’t because she likened herself as an apostle of justice or whatever.
‘Should I say it’s also because I don’t want to go hungry?’
Ridiculous, really.
After Gorz repeatedly did what he had done with the monster eggs because ‘he didn’t want to go hungry’, Gorz had harmed countless people and soon eventually became a wanted criminal. Then, he was executed.
‘No matter who it was who found out, they’d do the same thing and stop it.’
Radis concluded so.
She didn’t do it because had some great cause in mind, just as Gorz said so sarcastically.
Since she knew that a tragedy was about to happen, it’s just that she wouldn’t allow it to happen.
That’s all.
They took breaks once in a while, but how long had they been walking now?
At last, the end appeared.
There was a round clearing right there, and a huge stone door could be seen.
Luke brought the torch between the cracks in the stone, so the clearing could be seen more clearly.
“This…!”
Radis was certain.
This passage really was an ancient magical relic.