Chapter 5
Chapter 5
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Translator: Ace
Chapter: 5
Chapter Title: Hunting Festival in the Blizzard (3)
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Whiiiing...
The cold grew ever more intense.
Beyond the madly pouring blizzard, twenty shadowy figures approached.
The orcs from beyond the mountain peak.
Having realized that the group sent out on outpost duty hadn't returned, they had come out to search themselves.
[Grrr—]
Leading the remaining nineteen orcs was a warrior chief whose head was at least three times larger than the others.
Soon, the orcs arrived at the outpost.
[Gruk?]
But the outpost was empty.
As the regular orcs tilted their heads in confusion...
[Sniff sniff sniff...]
The warrior chief kept his guard up, nostrils flaring.
A faint scent of blood rode the wind.
It wafted from a snow mound not far from the outpost.
Sensing something amiss, the warrior chief ordered them to dig through the snow pile.
The regular orcs shoveled away the surrounding snow with their massive hands.
And then.
[Kuiik!?]
[Chiiik! Chiiik!]
[Grrr— Gruk!]
Shocking sights appeared before the orcs' eyes.
Corpses.
The frozen, blood-soaked bodies of their comrades lay buried in the snow.
[Grrrrr...]
The warrior chief examined his subordinates' corpses closely.
Thirteen bodies in total.
The entire outpost crew had been slaughtered.
The state of the corpses was utterly gruesome.
Most orcs had their ankles severed—specifically the Achilles tendons on the back.
Cause of death: excessive blood loss and hypothermia.
The warrior chief checked the remaining bodies.
Sharp blade marks scarred the legs in multiple places.
The calves and inner thighs had been targeted, arteries sliced.
The groin wounds were so horrific that even the savage orcs dry-heaved.
Cause of death was likely excessive blood loss and hypothermia.
...Crunch!
The warrior chief ground his teeth.
He wanted to catch the enemy right then and flay them alive, but the blizzard buried all traces, making it impossible to guess the attacker's identity.
The warrior chief decided to take his subordinates back to base and report everything.
[Grrruk! Kruk!]
Soon, the twenty orcs turned back toward base under the warrior chief's command.
In the pitch-black snowy plain whipped by blizzards.
Rather than rage at the enemy, the orcs' minds swirled with images of their gruesomely slain comrades and terror at the unknown assailant possibly lurking nearby.
Whiiiiiing...
The blizzard carried by the biting wind blinded their vision.
The warrior chief orc, at the forefront, turned to count the number of subordinates following behind.
But.
[......?]
Oddly, there were only eighteen.
They had set out with twenty including himself, so nineteen subordinates should be trailing.
Stragglers, perhaps?
Sensing something wrong, the warrior chief counted again.
[......!]
This time, seventeen.
Definitely strange.
The panicked warrior chief counted a third time.
Now, sixteen.
It was maddening.
As the warrior chief counted once more in this incomprehensible situation.
[Gruk!?]
He witnessed a shocking sight.
The number dropped from sixteen to fifteen.
The rearmost subordinate sank into the ground without even a scream.
A pale shadow mistaken for blizzard mist flickered ghost-like beside it before vanishing abruptly.
[Kr—aaaaah!]
The warrior chief charged out with his axe raised.
In one bound, he descended the hillock and stood in the middle of the snowfield.
The orc that had just fallen lay dead with a hole in the back of its neck.
Behind it, three more corpses lay at intervals, identically slain.
Four subordinates lost during the march.
[O—oooooh!]
The warrior chief scanned the surroundings with bloodshot eyes.
In that instant.
...Slash!
A sharp whoosh cut the air as a red bloodline streaked across his vision.
The warrior chief jerked his head back swiftly. A white blade flashed past his nose bridge at invisible speed, grazing it.
His nose burned.
Hot blood streamed down, reddening his jaw before freezing into thin frost and shattering.
Soon, the white ghost glimpsed earlier materialized before the warrior chief.
"That dodge just now wasn't bad."
Federback.
"Your reflexes are decent enough."
He faced the orc warrior chief head-on.
Federback thought.
'This guy's... about average, I guess.'
By his standards, the warrior chief orc before him was on par with a regular orc soldier level 1.
Of course, based on the era before regression, when the Demon King raged at full power.
'But for a warrior chief? Not even close.'
Federback vividly remembered orcs empowered by the Demon King's might.
Especially the pinnacle warrior chiefs, each dubbed "man-slayers" and reigning as objects of terror.
This one was far from them.
Generously, just a regular adult orc soldier level 1.
"Show me your grit, you monster."
Federback swung at the warrior chief orc.
The warrior chief roared and brought down his axe.
Thud—clang!
But it bounced off Federback's shield.
[Kr—woooooh!]
The warrior chief slammed his axe to shatter Federback's shield, but it was impossible.
Kagagak! Kagigik! Thwaaang!
Federback didn't hold the shield vertically but at an angle, deflecting the axe.
Blocking head-on couldn't withstand the power, so he glanced it aside.
This was parrying—a feat only veteran warriors who wielded shields like extensions of their palms could manage.
Kagagagak!
The axe blade scraped long across Federback's shield, sparking profusely.
At the same time.
...Stab!
As if punishing the failed attack.
Federback's blade tip precisely stabbed the gap left by the passing axe.
...Stab! ...Stab! ...Stab! ...Stab!
Inner right forearm, left armpit, right flank, inner left thigh.
Each failed attack turned tender inner flesh into bloody messes.
The warrior chief felt his mind growing hazy.
Federback's white sword and shield blended into the blizzard, nearly invisible.
Conversely, the warrior chief's brown wolf pelt and black axe blade stood out glaringly.
Pu—wk!
Federback's blade, hidden in the blizzard, plunged a handspan into the warrior chief's chest.
[Kr—aaaaah!]
The warrior chief screamed with all his might, but Federback paid no heed.
He simply recalled the essences of Meursault Swordsmanship learned before regression.
Federback continued swinging.
Not to kill in one blow or inflict major wounds.
Shallow cuts.
Drawing just a little blood was enough.
Drip— Drip— Drip— Splurt—
The more Federback's blade moved, the more bloodlines etched across the warrior chief's body.
His rage-heated body kept the blood from freezing.
Bleeding continued.
The Meursault Swordsmanship's First Form was named Bloodletting for no coincidence.
[Huff—! Huff—! Huff—!]
The warrior chief felt strength ebbing away.
Vision blurred, limbs heavy.
Yet Federback wielded his blade in maximally dry, efficient motions.
Ultimate murder art via shifting center of gravity—from blade to hilt to blade—freely moving focal points.
This wouldn't do.
...Grit!
The warrior chief ground his teeth.
He prepared a final charge.
Stomp the ground hard and lunge.
Kwa—boom!
The warrior chief stomped one foot forcefully.
But.
Suuk—
The spot he stomped suddenly sank beneath him.
At the same time.
...Pffft pffft pffft!
Sharp wooden stakes jutting from the pit skewered his instep.
[Chii—iiiiiik!?]
A trap.
He'd stepped right into a booby trap.
The warrior chief collapsed, clutching his foot and rolling in agony.
One foot fully crippled by the stakes.
That wasn't all.
Whiiiiiing...
The vicious cold and wind froze his mangled foot.
Overwhelming pain and chill left him unable even to rise.
At that moment.
"Not getting up?"
The blizzard-hidden ghost, Federback, appeared before the warrior chief.
"Then you'll never get up."
Simultaneously, blood sprayed from the warrior chief's eyes.
Federback's blade tip had sliced his nose bridge, bisecting both pupils and stealing his sight completely.
[Kaaaaaaaah!]
The orc warrior chief clutched his face and screamed.
No will to resist remained.
A bloody, trembling worm crawling the ground.
No different from the others' ends.
Federback looked down indifferently.
"Must've felt good raiding Meursault lands. Worthless beasts."
Simultaneously, Federback's hand seized the warrior chief's hair firmly.
"I won't kill you quickly. You need to stay alive as long as possible."
[......?]
The warrior chief couldn't grasp why Federback spared him immediate death.
But Federback offered no explanation.
"Though maybe dying quick would've been better."
How much time had passed?
New orcs descended from the base beyond the peak.
Their comrades kept vanishing on scout duty.
They froze near the outpost.
[Chiiiiiik!?]
Dozens of corpses strewn in horrific states.
All throats severed.
As if a death god on the wind had reaped only heads with a scythe.
The orc soldiers hesitantly combed the massacre site.
Soon, they found the warrior chief.
...Flinch!
Blood-soaked, but not yet dead.
Neck intact, body twitching faintly.
[Grrruk— Chiik?]
The orcs called to him and approached.
But.
[Grrgrrrr...]
The warrior chief's expression upon hearing and lifting his head was bizarre.
Blind perhaps, he shook his head wildly, mouth gaping in near-tears terror.
A face of horror, voiceless, lips forming warnings to flee.
Seeing their ever-valiant warrior chief like this for the first time, the subordinates froze.
But.
[Grrruk!]
[Chiik—Chiiik—]
[Gurrrrrr!]
The subordinate orcs mustered courage, approached to support him.
Whoever did this couldn't be unscathed.
Injured in sub-zero 40-degree cold, they'd likely frozen dead by now.
But the warrior chief just kept shaking his head.
Voicelessly mouthing warnings to his subordinates: flee.
Right then.
Lurch—
As their hands touched, the warrior chief's body jerked violently.
Lurch— Lurch— Lurch—
His face twisted in agony as his silenced voice resumed.
[Kku—waaaaaah!]
The wretched scream startled the subordinates into recoiling.
Then.
Crack crack craaaack!
The frozen abdominal wound tore vertically long, something emerging from his gut.
[Kyaaaaah!?]
The orc soldiers screamed shrilly, collapsing in shock.
Splatter— Splatter— Splosh!
On the pristine snow, something blood-drenched crawled out.
"His insides were nice and warm."
Federback, coated in fresh blood from the warrior chief's belly.
He brushed aside dangling intestines like vines.
"So cozy I nearly dozed off."
The orcs, legs limp, crawled backward.
Federback approached slowly.
Despite the raging blizzard, he was crystal clear.
A gentle curve etched in the terrified orcs' eyes.
Steaming hot blood, Federback's lips drenched in it forming a warm smile.