65. Elf (2)
65. Elf (2)
"......"
As I approached, the elf, who had been bowing her head, looked up.
Her body was in a serious state, but her face was even worse.
She was missing one eye.
It didn't just end with her being missing an eye.
There was clear writing where her eyebrow should have been.
Even though I don't know the writing of this world, I couldn't possibly think it was anything normal.
Because...
In the hollowed-out part of the elf's eye, something that looked like male semen to anyone who saw it was flowing out of the empty socket.
As soon as I saw that, I felt nothing as the Queen, but the human emotions remaining within me were greatly stirred.
This was disgust.
The disgust that there are humans who would commit such acts as a fellow human.
"........"
Eyes without focus or life. The elf simply opened her mouth and stuck out her tongue just because someone had come in front of her.
There wasn't a single tooth in that elf's mouth.
'Let's just kill all the humans here.'
My mind changed.
No matter that I am a Creature Queen and not a human, I don't want to let humans who do things like this into my Colony.
Even if their Unique Ability is good, I have no desire to use the Unique Ability of a human who does such shit.
I broke the shackles on the elf's wrists.
Thud.
I laid the elf down comfortably and placed my hand on her head.
It's a dilemma.
Whether to save her. Or kill her.
If she's broken to this extent, just being alive must be a painful thing.
It's amazing she's even alive until now.
I wonder if giving her rest would be better for this elf, but since I heard from Amber how rare the existence of an elf is in this world, I'm conflicted about whether to save her.
This isn't a level that can be recovered by simply healing the body.
The elf's mind is already beyond broken; it's turned to dust.
The fact that she opens her mouth and sticks out her tongue as soon as someone approaches—even though it's not a man, but a child, and a girl at that—makes it unclear if she can even recover mentally.
I can restore her body, but I cannot restore her broken mind.
First, she was so weak that I thought she would die if left like this, so I put my finger in my mouth, got some saliva on it, and brought it to the elf's lips.
Slurp. Slurp.
The elf sucked on my finger as if she were sucking on a man's penis.
While the elf drank my saliva, I used a small amount of Holy Power to heal her.
I'd like to use a strong Heal, but my body is currently lacking energy, so it's impossible.
Whoosh—
The elf's body glowed faintly.
'This is a place that shouldn't exist.'
Originally, I was just going to destroy this place to the extent of stopping it from harming future resources, but my thoughts have changed.
I'll just have to wipe this place out.
I don't want to use the Hive Mind often, but I decided to just wipe this place out.
[ Dagos ]
[ Yes. Queen-nim. ]
[ Send small, inconspicuous Ners here. ]
[ Understood. ]
If I could, I'd just call Dagos and Gluttony to scorch the earth here, but if I go on a rampage like that, Medherun City will take a huge hit.
Medherun City is now becoming a city that stably supplies humans to our Colony.
To receive more humans, I need to help Medherun City grow, but if it becomes known to surrounding countries that Ners are in Medherun City again, it will hinder the city's growth.
Until the Ners arrive, I decided to examine every part of this place as much as possible.
It seems like a bigger organization than I thought.
At first, I thought it was just a place that kidnapped women for sex trafficking, but it was a bigger place than I thought.
It seems like a place that does every kind of evil, kidnapping not just women but even elves.
This is a place where devils, not humans, live.
==
Screams began to be heard from all directions.
They were probably surprised because monsters that almost destroyed the city suddenly appeared from their perspective.
I want to tell the Ners not to eat the humans here, but I held back.
Even if they're hungry, it's a parent's heart to want to feed them only nutritious humans.
The humans here are only humans in name; they're just trash, so I'm worried it might have a bad influence on the children.
But that's literally nonsense, on the level of "praise onion, blame onion."
The children don't think about things like that; they just think, "It's delicious," and eat them as food.
"Queen-nim."
While I was stroking the elf's hair, Amber came to where I was.
"A-are you an elf?"
As soon as Amber saw the elf I was stroking, she realized it was an elf.
But she couldn't help but notice, since the ears were sticking out to the side, it was impossible not to know.
"Move this child to my bedroom and tell Erina to heal her as much as possible."
"Understood."
Elf.
Honestly, I had a fantasy about them.
When you think of fantasy, the most famous races are elves and dwarves.
Among them, elves are said to be beauties in almost any fantasy world.
I mean the kind of elves who are good with bows, love nature, and use Spirit Magic.
But the first elf I saw was an elf who had been subjected to terrible things by humans.
It's not that this doesn't exist either.
In places with dark worldviews, there are many places where humans use elves as slaves.
I can't say it doesn't exist.
And I don't really intend to argue about that.
Because these things are happening on Earth, too. But children are different.
I watched Amber carefully carry the elf out and went to where the children were.
As soon as I opened the door and went in, I saw the children gathered in one place, trembling.
It seems the numerous screams from outside were heard here too.
"K-kid!"
The woman who first talked to me was startled as soon as she saw me open the door and enter, then she ran toward me and hugged me.
"Y-you were safe!"
"I'm fine. Everyone get up. Let's go outside."
"N-no!!! Didn't you hear the screams outside just now!? It's hell out there right now!"
"Don't worry. The situation is already over."
".... Huh?"
"I called the Adventurers here with my ability. So everyone, don't worry and come out."
"R-really? Adventurers came to save us...?"
"Yes."
The women who couldn't believe my words.
Come to think of it, it's natural they can't believe it, considering the current situation.
I just opened the door wide.
The floor is soaked in blood, but there are no corpses. That's because the hungry Ners have already eaten them all.
I always feel this way, but it's quite convenient for the Colony because they eat everything cleanly, even the bones, so there's no food waste.
The only problem is that since it's a cave, it's not a smooth place but uneven, so food scraps get stuck in between, and sometimes there's a rotten smell that's hard to bear, but that's it.
But here, the floor is clean.
The Ners left nothing behind except blood.
Thanks to that, there was no great difficulty in handling the children.
If the corpses I killed earlier were still there, the children would have panicked, and it would have been quite a headache.
"A-are we really able to get out of here?"
"B-but even if we get out of here..."
"I don't want to go out..."
"Me too..."
I thought everyone would be happy if they could escape from here, but contrary to my expectations, some of the children were afraid of leaving this place.
At first, I thought this was actually a fake situation and they were scared because they were caught trying to escape.
But listening to the words the women continued to say, it was a completely different story.
They were afraid of how they would live if they left here.
They have no parents, no friends, no one they know.
Orphanage?
An orphanage can't take in all the women either.
Taking in all the women and making them happy? That's just an ideal.
Even our own orphanage isn't increasing beyond 300 people. If we say we'll increase it more, we can't raise the increased number of women well.
I understood the anxiety of those women.
At the very least, here, if you just sell your body, they feed you and let you sleep.
But in the end, the outcome won't be good.
As you can see from the elf, the end here is eventually to be broken and addicted to drugs, and as Albert said, to be dismantled while alive, reduced to a spectacle for people, and even after death, destined to be fed to livestock.
That is too miserable.
Especially for women who were kidnapped without knowing anything.
And they aren't just any women. They are women who possess the gender that can create humans.
A decrease in such women is a huge loss when thinking about the future.
They need to grow up healthy and give birth to healthy humans.
To do that, they need to be in an environment where they can grow up healthy.
"Everyone, trust me and let's leave this place together. You shouldn't stay here long. That's why the Adventurers are coming to save us. So let's leave this place together."
And grow up hard and give birth to many humans later.
Got it?