A Grave Undertaking
"T-This is madness!" Billy shouted, finally snapping out of his daze. His voice boomed so loudly, completely unlike his usual timid self, that even Yohan looked momentarily startled.
"Whoa, whoa, calm down. It's not like we can just hand over my life and my friend's life here, can we?" Yohan said, giving Falco a sly wink behind Billy's back.
"Yohan. Stop trying to look cool. Please."
"Oh, come on..."
Falco, however, refused to play along. Looking as if she might throw up, she waved her hands in disgust.
"Ahem. Anyway." Yohan cleared his throat to hide his embarrassment and continued. "Like this guy just said, they're going to kill me instantly and torture her as much as possible before eating her."
Now that they had caught the attention of man-eating trolls, it was a kill-or-be-killed situation. And Yohan had absolutely no intention of letting himself be eaten by a bunch of overgrown monsters.
"Besides, this isn't exactly a bad deal for you either."
"It's too reckless! You're facing dozens of pure-blood trolls. Don't you know that even a half-blood like me is far stronger than the average human?"
Billy's protest made sense. However, neither Yohan nor Falco fell into the category of 'average humans.' One was an elf whose physical capabilities naturally surpassed humanity, and the other, though human, wielded the power of a god.
"I know, but where is that pure-blood troll right now?" Yohan asked Billy. He gave the cleanly severed troll head another light kick.
"We understand why you're worried," Falco said, finally chiming in after watching silently. She walked out the door and glanced down at the headless corpse of the troll.
"Normally, humans can't beat trolls. To overcome that innate physical gap, you need something more." Falco stepped up to stand right next to Yohan, both of them turning their gaze toward Billy. "And we happen to have that 'something more.'"
So don't worry. Falco didn't say the words out loud, but Billy understood her meaning perfectly.
"Sigh... I suppose you're right." Fortunately, Billy quickly conceded. He offered a sheepish smile. "A swordsmanship that can decapitate a troll in the blink of an eye... Honestly, I've never seen anything like it in my life."
"Hmph." Yohan snorted, secretly pleased by Billy's earnest praise.
"It's like a master of the blade... Yes, like those they call Swordmasters. Yohan, you aren't actually a Swordmaster, are you?"
"Unfortunately, no. But I do have a title that's way cooler than that."
An Apostle of the Unnamed Goddess. Of course, Yohan didn't say this out loud.
"But I still don't understand."
"What now?"
"Why are you going to such lengths to help us?" Billy seemed genuinely puzzled. From his perspective, Yohan and Falco were bizarre. They could easily run away and wash their hands of this mess, yet they were declaring war on an entire troll village.
"Believe it or not, we're actually good guys."
To be precise, we're guys who have to live good lives from now on, Yohan corrected himself internally as he delivered the cringe-inducing self-introduction.
"Good guys..." Billy repeated, his expression deadpan as he chewed on the words.
"Pfft." A moment later, he burst into a sudden chuckle. "Haha—! S-Sorry. Pffthahaha!"
To be honest, Yohan had felt embarrassed saying it himself. He actually found it much more comfortable that Billy was laughing openly.
"Yeah, well, there's nothing more suspicious than a guy who goes around calling himself a good person."
"Ugh, haha..." Billy laughed so hard he practically had tears in his eyes. Watching him, Yohan simply shrugged.
"Still, I think he's less suspicious than a vegetarian troll," Falco chimed in.
"Oh, right. Come to think of it, we were just about to ask you about that when this guy crashed the party," Yohan said, looking down at the troll's head. Falco nodded silently. The reason why Billy, a half-troll, insisted on a vegetarian diet.
"But hey, if it's too hard to talk about, you don't have to." Everyone had their own baggage. Yohan was a man who respected other people's privacy over his own curiosity.
"Don't worry. I'll tell you everything."
"Oh." Fortunately, it didn't seem to be too painful a memory. Yohan's eyes lit up at Billy's response, and Falco, who had also been curious, looked quite intrigued.
"But first... let's clean this up."
"Ah."
The three of them stared down at the pure-blood troll's corpse. Dark red blood was still bubbling out of the cleanly severed neck, and the surrounding dirt floor had long since become a muddy, gory mess.
"Hmm... Should we clean this up first?" Yohan asked Falco.
"Yeah," Falco replied with a nod.
The three decided to bury the pure-blood troll's body in the middle of the forest, not too far from Billy's cabin. Yohan had offered to carry the corpse himself, but Billy, perhaps feeling a sense of responsibility, volunteered for the task.
"Still, it's going to be heavy to carry alone." As height increased, weight multiplied exponentially. In fact, even the severed head of the pure-blood troll was incredibly heavy.
"It's fine. I'm actually quite strong."
Maybe half-trolls inherit a human's normal appearance and a troll's monstrous physical strength, Yohan thought as he watched Billy carry the massive corpse with surprising ease.
"This spot looks good. Let's get started."
"Okay." Yohan pulled out the shovels he had brought from the cabin and handed them to the other two. They immediately began digging.
"But why did you say we should leave the head and only bury the body?" After digging for quite some time, Billy paused his shoveling and asked.
"Oh, that?" Yohan drove his shovel deep into the dirt and shrugged. "Just trust me on this. It's going to be very useful."
"Well, if you say so..."
A male pure-blood troll was a giant standing nearly three meters tall. Because of this, burying the headless corpse properly required a remarkably deep and wide pit. Fortunately, digging holes was second nature to Yohan and Falco. To rob a grave, one first had to find it, and graves were almost always buried deep underground. The two veteran grave robbers dug at a speed that left Billy utterly dumbfounded.
"I feel like we've done this before."
"Yeah. Except back then, I was the one buried."
"Haha, right."
The two casually chatted as they rolled the troll's body into the pit and began shoveling dirt over it.
It seemed the Goddess was also highly satisfied with Yohan's decision.
"Are you two... really good people?"
"Of course. If we were actually bad, we would've caused trouble the moment we stepped into town this afternoon," Yohan replied with a chuckle. But he quickly swallowed his words as he remembered that the elf standing right next to him had actually been on the verge of drawing her blade.
"Alright, that's done."
They finished burying the troll's body in no time. Having deliberately dug the hole in an area with sparse grass, they meticulously scattered the excess dirt around, making the ground look perfectly flat to the untrained eye.
"Let's head back immediately. By tomorrow morning at the latest, the village will realize one of their own is missing," Billy said, his tone laced with urgency.
"Hey, no need to rush," Yohan replied. He and Falco seemed completely unbothered, despite having almost been eaten by a troll just moments ago.
"But..."
"There's still plenty of time before sunrise anyway. It's too awkward to try and sleep now, so let's go back, brew another cup of tea, and wait it out."
"I suppose so." Billy looked up, stealing a glance at the night sky. Before long, the three of them arrived back at Billy's cabin.
"Phew, the night air is definitely chilly. Stepping inside makes me realize how warm it is in here."
"Yeah. But don't doze off. We could still be ambushed in the middle of the night."
Yohan and Falco made themselves at home at the table before Billy could even offer. Meanwhile, the troll's head, wrapped in a thick cloth, sat on the floor. Yohan had ordered it 'packaged' earlier.
"What are you going to do with that?" Billy asked, casting a wary glance at the wrapped bundle.
"Simply put, it's for show."
"For show?"
When Billy questioned him, Yohan merely nodded. Billy pondered the words for a moment before a look of realization dawned on his face.
"Ah, you're going to show this to the villagers to prove how strong you are."
"Exactly."
If they simply marched into town and declared they were going to wipe out the troll village, everyone would think they were insane. But if they brought the severed head of a pure-blood troll, even the most skeptical villagers would have to listen.
Billy quickly brewed a fresh pot of tea. As three steaming cups were placed on the wooden table, the cabin felt even cozier.
"Well, let's hear your story then," Yohan said, wrapping his hands around his warm cup. Billy nodded, his expression turning solemn.
"I may be a half-troll, but I only came to live near the village relatively recently."
"How recently?"
"About ten years ago. I only lived inside the village itself for about a year, and I've been living in this cabin ever since."
Billy began to recount his upbringing. He had grown up in human society with his half-troll father and human mother. Although his unusually green skin had caused him plenty of trouble, Billy fortunately possessed more than enough strength to beat up any kids his age who tried to pick on him.
The village where Billy's family lived was located far from the center of the continent, a quiet place where most residents made a living by farming.
"Things were tight during bad harvest years, but the villagers always banded together to get through it."
"Sounds like a decent place."
"Yes. I still dream of those days sometimes."
Billy's childhood was the epitome of the peaceful, pastoral fantasy life that Yohan secretly yearned for. Of course, in this godforsaken world, such tranquil rural lives rarely lasted.
"My father, being a half-troll living among humans, often told me that if we used our innate strength to help others, good things would surely come our way."
Billy's father had put his monstrous physical abilities to good use, taking on the role of the village protector. He drove off bandits who occasionally raided the town and hunted down wild beasts that wandered down from the mountains in search of food.
"I was nine years old when it happened. A pure-blood troll came to our village."
The peace was shattered in an instant. A single pure-blood troll had suddenly invaded, leaving the village in utter ruins.