23. City (4)
23. City (4)
The Medherun City I returned to was a different scene from before.
The first thing I saw was the entrance gate that one absolutely must pass through to enter Medherun City.
When I came last time, there was a very long line of countless people waiting to enter Medherun City, and they were being inspected. But now, there were really not even 10 people.
And those 10 people weren't merchants or citizens, but all Adventurers.
This was a part that showed just how engulfed in fear this city was.
As soon as I got permission to pass and entered, I felt a sense of desolation in Medherun City.
The number of people walking on the streets had been cut in half. And even that remaining half didn't have happy expressions on their faces.
Everyone seemed to be harboring anxiety due to the incidents that had occurred recently.
'Is that to be expected?'
Since Dagos raided the villages around the Forbidden Forest according to my orders, it's understandable that the citizens are scared.
Furthermore, the knights of the Padix Kingdom who had come to save the city were all annihilated.
Surely this news must have spread to the city as well. There's a 100% chance they had told everyone not to worry because the Padix Kingdom's Order of Knights was coming.
But if there hasn't been a word until now, even if the citizens aren't highly educated, they would all know what that means.
When I entered the Adventurer Guild with Amber, there weren't many people—or to be precise, Adventurers—inside the Adventurer Guild either. Perhaps they had moved to other cities to survive, or maybe they had quit being Adventurers.
In the end, Adventurers are also part of the city, so it seems they did that because they didn't know what would happen if the city fell into danger.
I walked with Amber to the shantytown where the vagrants live.
'There are a lot of vagrants.'
I thought there wouldn't be many vagrants since Medherun City itself is quite large and has a significant number of knights, but Medherun's dark side was more serious than I expected.
It's not like you see them often, but you could even see dead people. On top of that, their clothes were disheveled, as if someone had rummaged through the corpse's belongings. Or rather, rags that were hard to even call clothes.
'No. Did it get worse because of me?'
Listening to the guild members' talk at the Adventurer Guild earlier, they said that with many villages being attacked recently, Medherun City is in a situation where food is very scarce.
I heard that with trade cut off, there are many people sitting on the streets.
'If it's broken to this extent just because I attacked a few surrounding villages—and not even the city itself—isn't the Lord of this city just incompetent?'
"Lea-nim..."
"I know."
I felt someone following us from behind.
The presence that I would never have noticed when I was a man, I now sensed with the keen senses of a non-human Creature. I had detected that someone was tailing us from the moment we entered this vagrant village.
It's obvious what the intention is for someone to follow two women into a space with vagrants like this.
The probability of it being either rape or kidnapping is very high. Or it could be both rape and kidnapping.
I felt a bit excited.
This is a situation that often appears in fantasy manga or novels.
Actually, I was aiming for this in the first place.
As we started to go deeper into a place with no people, the people following us also started to boldly approach us.
"That's far enough."
A giant man blocked our path. And the men who had been following from behind also appeared and blocked the way back.
"Adventurer Amber. What business brings you here?"
"Short red hair, a scar running from your right eye to your mouth, and even a machete... You're The Slicer Dutru, aren't you?"
Amber seemed to know the man blocking our path.
But "The Slicer"? Why does he have such a scary nickname? Maybe he got the nickname "The Slicer" because he slices people up with that machete in his hand?
In a word, a villain...!
He certainly looked scary from his face alone.
He seemed to be about 2 meters tall, his body was packed with muscles, and the scar on his eye looked menacing, so if I had seen that man on Earth, it's a visual that would have made me stop in my tracks and run away immediately.
"Oho, so you know my name? Then this will be faster. Adventurer, and a B-rank Adventurer at that, why have you come to this place?"
"I'm looking for drugs or potions equivalent to them."
"Are you talking about narcotics?"
"No, it's a little different from narcotics. What I want is a drug that can accelerate human pregnancy and make them give birth quickly, or a drug that can make humans grow rapidly."
"Ha? What kind of bullshit is this? Why would an Adventurer need a drug like that? Especially a female Adventurer, at that."
"Just answer my question."
"Whoa. Whoa. Don't look at me with that expression. There isn't a drug that makes people grow rapidly, but there is a drug that can accelerate pregnancy."
"Really?"
"Yeah. But there's a problem. The mother might have her energy sucked away in an instant and die."
I suppose it would be hard without any cost.
Accelerating pregnancy means the fetus inside the human womb has to grow rapidly. Usually, a fetus takes nutrients from its mother.
Such a fetus grows suddenly? In other words, it means it eats up the mother's energy in an instant.
If that happens, nothing changes. A human who dies after giving birth to just one human is useless in the first place.
It's a drug I'm looking for to increase the number of humans, so if it's just going to stay at a standstill instead of increasing them, there's no reason to use...
Wait, wouldn't it be fine if I continuously injected nutrients so the mother doesn't die?
I could stick tentacles into the mother's mouth and keep supplying nutrients.
Wouldn't that work? I have to try this first. It's much better than worrying about whether it will work or not without trying it once.
"So, are you saying you can get it now or not?"
"Of course I can get it. But... it's expensive."
"What?"
An aura flowed from Amber's body.
A black aura-like thing was oozing out to the point where even I, who was standing next to her, was slightly startled.
This isn't something actually visible to the eye. However, it does affect the surroundings. And this is a power that only I, the Queen, can see.
That is the power to measure the strength of Creatures. The fact that that power is flowing from Amber means one thing.
'She's almost crossed over to our side. How admirable.'
It seems Amber had a talent for our Creatures from the start. The power currently flowing from Amber is almost equivalent to [Overlord] class.
Although it's slightly less than Dagos, Gluttony, and Evolute, Amber, who was simply a human, has risen to a level where she can compete with them.
The scary part here is that she shows this level of power even though she has never eaten a human like I have.
'Is it possible because she was human to begin with?'
"W-wait, could you please not glare at me like that? There's a reason it's expensive...!"
Dutru said, holding his hands out in front of him with a scared expression, stepping back slightly at Amber, who was showing an overwhelming presence that even made me slightly startled.
"There's no one who wants this in the first place, so they don't make it!"
"Hmm... is that so?"
"Haa... haa... No, are you even human? It's like I'm standing in front of an S-rank Monster."
The air that felt heavy disappeared in an instant. The person who had been tailing us was already collapsed on the floor, unconscious, and Dutru in front was also gasping for breath.
"Lea-nim."
"This seems like it will be difficult."
Come to think of it, even if such a drug existed, a huge amount of drugs would be needed to keep using it, and it's questionable whether that could be supplied.
Furthermore, it's also questionable whether a human born that way would be a normal human.
"Huh?"
While I was thinking for a moment, a small child running around caught my eye.
Seeing them running around diligently to live while eating whatever they could in this place where vagrants live, something came to mind.
"Do you guys also do human trafficking?"
"What?"
Dutru answered my question with another question.
I was about to get a little annoyed, but I said it again.
"I asked if you also do human trafficking."
"We obviously don't do things like—"
"You'd better answer properly. If you lie, I'll kill you right away."
"Urgh...! Ye-yes, we do."
"Then where do you sell the humans you catch?"
"Th-that is..."
Dutru had an expression as if he couldn't say.
Actually, I don't really need that answer. The reason I asked about human trafficking just now is simple.
I asked because our paths might overlap.
It wouldn't matter if they overlapped, but slightly annoying things might happen. However, even if annoying things happen, I have the power to solve them, so I decided not to think about it.
"Let's go back, Amber."
"Yes."
Looking at the many children visible around us, I said to Amber.
"Amber."
"Yes."
"Is there an orphanage in Medherun?"
"I've heard there is one, but I've heard it's not being operated properly."
"Hmm~ is that so?"
As expected, it's insufficient to secure food with just our Breeding Farm.
Furthermore, if operated as a Breeding Farm, it's not an environment where humans can grow properly.
In particular, they say the most delicious part of a human is the brain.
This was a part I didn't want to know, but it's because I've heard Dagos, Gluttony, and Evolute always liking brains.
Mana is important too, but mana is just seasoning, and in the end, the essence is that the human must be delicious. What determines that deliciousness is the human brain.
I don't know how that brain needs to grow to become a delicious brain, but the brains of humans raised in a Breeding Farm don't seem like they would be delicious.
'As expected, humans must grow like humans.'
To make separate food for the [Overlord] and [General] classes, I came up with the idea: shall I try running an orphanage in this city?
Breeding Farm: mass-producing humans that don't taste good.
Orphanage: a small number of humans that taste good.