Goblin Slayer (3)
A hobgoblin cook named Tartara lived a busy life. Frail from a young age, she could never become a warrior. In exchange, however, she had been born with a diligence rare among goblins. Starting with menial chores and overcoming every hardship along the way, she had finally risen to the position of overseeing every meal for the entire tribe.
Today marked that monumental first day on the job. She smiled, wrinkling her green skin.
“Gobuuu!”
She clapped her hands in solitary delight as she reached the kitchen. Today was the day the chieftain would finally slaughter his last treasured piece of meat. She had ordered the underlings to rub it first with the red berries that removed the gamey smell. She wondered if they had done it properly.
Brooding over that concern, Tartara opened the door. What greeted her eyes were her longtime colleagues—already butchered.
“G-Gob…?”
The kitchen was drenched in vivid scarlet blood. The goblins who had been laughing and chatting only yesterday now lay skinned and neatly disassembled by body part. What stood out most was that every single one of them had their wrists severed.
How could such a cruel thing happen? Treating goblins like nothing more than lumps of meat! Even the inferior wretches who wandered the forest outskirts would never stoop to this!
Terrified, she clamped a hand over her mouth and began slowly backing away. She had to inform the warriors of this atrocity at once. Everyone needed to know that a horrible murderer had slipped into the settlement…!
The moment she burned with that sense of duty, a thick rope looped around Tartara’s neck.
“Guhk?!”
The rope tightened, strangling her. It had to be that insane killer who had slaughtered her colleagues! The force wasn’t particularly strong, but already panicked and with her neck pinned, she couldn’t register the fact or escape under her own power.
In the end, Tartara thrashed until she suffocated and went limp. The rope’s owner dragged her slack body back into the kitchen.
Thud!
The instant the door slammed shut, cutting her off from the outside world, Tartara sensed her own death. Still, she wanted to at least see who was killing her. Even as her consciousness faded, she forced her eyes wide open. That desperate effort was not in vain; the murderer finally stepped into view.
A physique similar to—or perhaps a little smaller than—her own kind. A pink-haired human tilted his head while holding a pure white dagger.
“This one’s got some fight in her.”
With those indifferent words, the dagger swung. Tartara’s vision spun, and her head tumbled across the floor.
In the fleeting instant before the decapitated Tartara’s brain fully shut down, what rose in her mind was not vengeance, rage, or fear. It was pure admiration for a beauty she had never witnessed in her entire life, accompanied by a fragrant scent that pierced her nostrils.
That was the end of Tartara.
I thought I had cleaned up every last one, but a late arrival nearly gave me a heart attack.
“Haah… I almost let that one slip. There aren’t any more stragglers, are there?”
The storage door creaked open as I let out a deep sigh, and Rydia stepped out. She had used the stealth technique she learned from me, suppressing her presence to the absolute limit.
“You never know. That’s why I told you to stay alert. Sneak-killing one or two is one thing, but massacring this many is exhausting.”
“Still, haven’t we already taken out nearly half? That’s pretty impressive, right? Hurry up and praise me!”
“Yeah, yeah. Yona’s amazing.”
Rydia gave a small smile and patted my head. While enjoying the feeling of her hand, I quickly began dressing the goblin I had just caught.
Unlike the wandering goblins on the outskirts, hobgoblins had plenty of useful parts. Their hides were always in demand by the Magic Tower for scroll materials, their hand bones were standard alchemy ingredients, the males’ testicles served as potent aphrodisiacs, and their magic stones were significantly larger. The females lacked the last two, of course.
Unfortunately, we didn’t have time to harvest everything. I had only been dismantling for a little while when I sensed that presence and had to scramble into hiding.
I cut off the wrists first, then instead of carefully separating the other parts I simply chopped them away cleanly. I peeled only the wide rectangular sections of hide from the back and belly, then finally extracted the magic stone.
Shaaaat—
The corpse I hadn’t fully harvested crumbled into dust and scattered. This was exactly why I had thought a full stealth assassination run would be convenient. Pull the magic stone and the body disposal took care of itself.
After I finished extracting the stones from the other hobgoblin corpses strewn across the kitchen, the place looked like an ordinary—albeit primitive—kitchen once more instead of a bloodbath. A flat stone slab for butchering and prep, a large bonfire, and a wide opening in the roof. That was all a goblin kitchen amounted to.
“All right, next I was thinking we should head to where the warrior-class live… but there’s one problem we need to solve first, right?”
“Yeah.”
Rydia nodded and moved toward the storage area where she had been hiding. Inside, unidentified berries and all sorts of smoked meats hung in thick clusters… and on the floor lay a naked woman who had been rescued moments before she could be butchered.
The instant our eyes met she bowed her head deeply and began trembling violently. Her skin was completely coated in red powder mixed with water, making it impossible to tell her original complexion. They must have pre-seasoned her.
Tsk tsk. What cruel little monsters. I clicked my tongue and crouched in front of her.
“Excuse me. What’s your name?”
“S-Save me…”
“I’m Yona. An adventurer here to subjugate this hobgoblin settlement. You’re an adventurer too, right, miss?”
“I don’t taste good. Please don’t eat me, angel…”
“…Lady Rydia. This lady seems completely broken. What do we do?”
“Just so we’re clear, the reason she’s panicking is entirely your fault.”
“Come on, what did I even do? She was lying on that stone slab covered in seasoning, yet still desperately begging to be spared, so I saved her. That’s all.”
“Anyone would freak out if someone suddenly appeared, slaughtered every goblin who held their life in the balance, then licked their lips while saying it smelled delicious. Especially someone already weakened both mentally and physically.”
“That was obviously a joke! It was just my special Yona-style humor to help her relax and realize everything was okay now! I’m not a cannibal—why would I eat people? …Although in a lewd sense, maybe I would!”
“…Yona, you really don’t understand people’s hearts.”
Rydia shook her head with an expression that said, What am I going to do with this idiot? Setting aside the subtly rude remark, we couldn’t simply abandon a captured person we had discovered.
We would either have to hide her somewhere and retrieve her later, or pause the assassinations long enough to escort her out. I grabbed the still-dazed female adventurer’s cheeks and turned her face so she would look straight at me.
“Ah, uuh…”
She had already lost the ability to speak like a human and was shivering violently. I lowered my voice to a whisper.
“Do you want to live?”
“Y-Yes…”
“But I’m hungry.”
“Hiiik!”
I gave the adventurer—who looked like she might faint—a bright smile.
“So tell me someone else I can eat instead.”
“…Huh?”
“If you got captured by mere hobgoblins, you can’t be that skilled an adventurer. You didn’t come alone, did you? You formed a party with companions. Tell me where they are, and I’ll spare you.”
“T-That’s…”
After a long internal struggle, the woman finally squeezed her eyes shut and spoke.
“M-Mila died fighting on the first day. She was eaten.”
“Hmm. So one is already gone.”
“Dolores was eaten yesterday. Roasted right in front of me… Hic!”
“What a tragedy. Still, don’t cry—keep talking. The fact that you’re telling me this much means there’s at least one more, right?”
“H-Hans.”
“Oh. A man’s name?”
“Yes… Hans was offered to the chieftain because he’s male. He’s probably become their toy, but he shouldn’t be dead yet.”
“Makes sense. Goblins really do lose their minds over men. Unless he killed himself, he probably hasn’t died easily.”
“…He wouldn’t have been able to commit suicide. Hans is a coward. That’s why I promised I would protect him… I’m sorry… I’m so sorry, Hans…”
Tears rolled down the adventurer’s cheeks as she spoke. The two must have been especially close.
Anyway, I had a rough grasp of the situation. A four-person party had entered; one died in battle, another had been eaten, leaving two. Or rather, the man might still be alive and captive. Females tended to be eaten quickly, but males were passed around and enjoyed for a long time.
When we took down the chieftain or other high-ranking goblins, we would need to search their homes thoroughly.
“Ah, one last question. Answer this and you’ll be able to live.”
“W-What is it? I’ll tell you anything!”
“Your name. What’s your name, miss?”
“……!”
After thinking for a long time, the adventurer spoke in a grave voice as if she were selling her soul to a demon.
“Sally. My name is Sally.”
“Good. Sally, I’ll bring Hans back, so you need to wait here quietly until then. It’s dangerous outside with those injured limbs. Understand?”
“……Yes.”
I released the weakly nodding Sally and turned to Rydia.
“Lady Rydia.”
“Yes.”
“Shall we go straight for the chieftain now?”
“You’ve thought this through.”
Rydia nodded and drew her massive greatsword. We had secretly assassinated half of them; the remaining half would be killed openly. After all, as long as there were no witnesses, it didn’t matter.
…Honestly, I was a little angry, too.