The Baiting Operation
Cobolds are similar to goblins in their position as pseudo-humans.
Unlike beastmen, they appear to walk upright like real dogs, but because their numbers are so few, you rarely see them.
The similarities with goblins are their intelligence and lifestyle levels.
If goblins stand around 120 cm tall, roughly the same as dwarfs, then cobolds are only about a meter tall.
To humans, this might not seem like a huge difference, but between goblins and cobolds there is an important issue.
In the past, when they lived in places not too far from humans, both sides ate similar foods and lived in similar ways, so they competed, and the smaller-bodied cobolds were pushed back by the goblins.
As a result, cobolds ended up settling in dark, damp underground areas like mines or city sewers.
―Krrrl!
Lotte pinned one cobold under her foot and threatened the surrounding cobolds with her presence.
The cobolds surrounding the captured companion were clutching their picks and shovels, trembling, but they couldn’t actually attack because Ion was standing there with a sword, looking even more threatening.
Even Lotte was there, but the main threat was Ion holding the sword behind her.
Ion pointed his sword at the cobold Lotte had pinned down.
“Where is the giant spider’s nest?”
“Krruk! I-I don’t know!”
“If you don’t know, you die!”
Ion asked the other cobolds.
“You lot—do you know where the spider pack’s nest is?”
The cobolds exchanged glances and couldn’t speak.
“I don’t have time! If you don’t answer quickly, I’ll deal with this one and all of you!”
It was hard to guess his age, but the cobold with clean fur who looked young raised his hand.
“Krruk! I-I know a place where they gather food, not the nest.”
“Where is it?”
The cobold pointed at the one Lotte had pinned down.
“Release Autun, and I’ll tell you!”
“What’s your name?”
“Krruk! I-I’m Pichai!”
“Fine. Pichai. I’m the wandering knight Ion. If I trust you and release this one, can we agree?”
“We-I will keep our promise!”
“All right. I trust you.”
Looking at him trying to save his companion, it didn’t seem like he was lying.
Ion looked at Lotte and nodded.
“Lotte.”
Lotte released the front paw that had been pinning the cobold and stepped back.
The cobold Autun who had been pinned scurried toward the group, and only Pichai, who had come forward, remained; the others slowly backed away.
“Good. Where is the place where the giant spiders gather their food?”
“Krruk! I-I find it hard to explain in words. I’ll lead you myself.”
“Good. Lead the way.”
Though he had come to save a companion, when it came time to guide them to the spider nest, fear showed on his face.
Pichai’s expression grew gloomy, and the other cobolds looked sorry for him too.
I understood, but Ion didn’t have time.
The prey tied up in spider webs couldn’t move because of the spider’s paralyzing venom.
The venom wasn’t strong enough to kill, but if the paralysis lasted too long, they might never wake, so they had to save them as quickly as possible.
“Let’s go. If we’re late, my companions who came with me will become the spiders’ food.”
“How many were captured?”
Pichai reluctantly led the way, answering Ion’s question.
“One dwarf was captured. There’s not much time.”
Pichai’s eyes widened as he looked up at Ion.
“A dwarf? What’s the dwarf’s name?”
“Dvalin.”
Pichai asked with surprised eyes, then, upon hearing the name, immediately looked down.
“Krruk! Ah, no.”
“Was there a dwarf family you were specially looking for?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
Ion was about to move when a thought suddenly occurred to him.
This was the place where the Dvalin family’s treasure was kept, so seeing the cobold react to the mention of a dwarf, perhaps his family was involved.
“Have you ever heard the family name Kultahaku among dwarf families?”
The drooping Pichai suddenly perked up again, eyes widening.
“K-Kultahaku?”
“Yes. Kultahaku.”
“How do you know that family name?”
“The dwarf I need to find right now is Dvalin Kultahaku.”
“The dwarf Kultahaku came here?”
Pichai muttered to himself in disbelief, then shouted at the cobolds.
“The dwarf Kultahaku has returned! Kultahaku is here!”
“Kultahaku!”
“A dwarf? A dwarf has come?”
Lotte tilted her head as she looked at the suddenly noisy cobolds, and Ion looked surprised at the turn the cobolds had taken.
She asked Pichai.
“What’s going on here?”
“Krruk! That’s….”
The cobolds who lived in this mine were descendants of miners who had contracted with the Kultahaku family.
Before the mine collapsed, they had no problems eating or sleeping, and the place to live was good, but the tunnel had collapsed and blocked them in.
According to what Pichai had heard, there was a paradise-like area for them, but no matter how much they searched, they couldn’t find the way, and with their tools they couldn’t break through either.
The cobolds were waiting for the day when a descendant of the Kultahaku would open the way with the golden pickaxe.
So when Ion told them that the descendant, Dvalin, had been captured by the giant spider, all the cobolds volunteered to go together.
It was a touching story, but cobolds didn’t have an advantage in fighting.
But even without strength, there were many ways to help.
* * *
“Krruk! Ready!”
The white-haired old cobold pointed at a glass bottle with his staff.
The cobolds, who were more proactive than Ion in trying to save Dvalin, had originally started with just a few, then gradually increased until they finally led Ion to their village.
In a somewhat spacious area, hundreds of small holes had been drilled; these were all the cobolds’ dormitories and storage rooms.
And they had met the white-haired cobold chief, Rachanan.
The cobolds were all around two hundred in number, with many elders, women, and children.
As Ion and Lotte entered the village, they only watched the cobolds earnestly debating how to rescue Dvalin.
Then, as the oil from the oilcloth they had received from Dvalin ran out, they refilled the oil in the glass bottle, and the cobolds started whispering again.
Then a few of them rushed off and came back a short time later carrying something—a glass bottle.
The village chief Rachanan proudly pointed at the glass bottle.
“What is this?”
“Krruk! There’s oil inside the glass bottle. You insert a cloth wick into it, light it, and throw it—it explodes.”
“Hmm….”
The cobolds knew they were being outmatched by goblins in combat power and reproduction, but in intelligence they seemed to hold the advantage.
With this, the cobolds could take on the giant spider.
The plan was simple.
Ion would first take the glass bottle and throw it into the spider nest to lure the spiders.
Once the spiders fell for it, the cobolds and Lotte would enter to rescue Dvalin.
Then the waiting cobolds would burn the nest so the spiders couldn’t pursue them anymore.
That was the plan the cobolds had made.
Since they knew the way better, they decided to follow it exactly without adding anything else.
The cobolds each picked up a few glass bottles according to their roles, and Ion also took a few, stowing them in his bag.
After extinguishing the fire tied to his forehead, he followed Pichai, who was guiding the way with Lotte.
Pichai carried only a glowing stone tied to a branch instead of a torch or lantern.
It was called glowstone; the stone absorbed sunlight or torchlight and gave off a faint light, but it was very dim.
Because it was so faint, it was hard to see clearly, but in the dark tunnels it was enough to see ahead.
While following Pichai’s guidance, Ion studied the map and Lotte searched for any suspicious smells as they followed.
As they approached the location marked with a red dot on the map, Pichai tucked the glowstone into his pouch.
A bit deeper in, they arrived at the place where the spiders hung the prey they had caught in webs.
Ion stroked Lotte’s head, and Lotte licked Ion’s face with her tongue.
Then Pichai climbed onto Lotte’s back.
Lotte, who had memorized the path by smell, headed quietly but quickly toward the entrance to another passage.
From here, if Ion lured the spiders, Lotte and Pichai would go rescue Dvalin.
While waiting for Lotte to safely reach the spot, he took out the glass bottle he had stowed in his bag.
He removed the cloth wad that had been blocking the bottle’s opening with the cork, soaked it with oil, and inserted it as a wick.
After waiting a little longer, he lit the fire on the cloth tied to his forehead and the cloth on the glass bottle.
Then he dashed to the entrance and hurled the glass bottle into the inner space.
The spiders, which had been standing still, stared blankly at the flaming glass bottle flying toward them.
Eight eyes watched the bottle fly, and the moment it fell to the ground and shattered, the explosion spread fire from beginning to end.
Kwaang!
Only after feeling the explosion’s roar and vibration did the spiders move.
“Kikik!”
The startled giant spiders headed toward the hole where the bottle had come from, but another flaming bottle flew in.
Kwa kwaak!
Explosions continued, but flames erupted on the sides without blocking the entrance.
Avoiding the flames, the giant spider pack crawled forward quickly.
―Ssssst!
Spiders emerged from the hole, and Ion’s sword sliced through them as they came out.
“Kieek!”
Seeing the spider’s legs and body cut to pieces and fall, Ion ran back.
While watching the red dot on the map, he adjusted his speed so he wouldn’t run too fast.
When the spiders got too close, he would cut a few and back away, reducing speed while luring as many as possible.
The giant spiders also tried to follow from the ceiling or secret passages behind, trying to catch his footsteps.
But Ion, who was watching everything through the map, didn’t fall for it.
After luring the spiders for a long time.
Kwa kwaak!
Explosions rang out from the spider nest.
This was an explosion to prevent pursuit after rescuing Dvalin.
Hearing the explosion, the spiders flinched and turned their bodies back.
‘No, this won’t do! I’ll take care of all the ones I lured!’
Ion ran to the spiders turning their bodies and swung his sword to cut down as many as he could, then returned to the cobold village.
* * *
“Thank you.”
Dvalin was staying in the largest cave of the cobolds’ dormitory.
Ion had lured the spiders, returned, and met Dvalin lying on the bed right away.
“How are you feeling, my lord?”
“I’ll recover a little if I rest. The paralyzing venom wasn’t that bad.”
His body was weak because of the paralysis, but no unusual signs showed on the surface.
It seemed the cobolds and Lotte had rescued Dvalin without delay.
That was fortunate.
Ion nodded, and Dvalin continued talking.
“I couldn’t move, but my eyes and ears stayed open.”
“Did you see or hear something special?”
“I don’t know if I really saw it, but it looked like a pickaxe driven into the black wall.”
“Was it the golden pickaxe you were looking for?”
“No. Come to think of it, it wasn’t golden. Did I dream it….”
“If it was a dream, wouldn’t you have seen a golden pickaxe?”
If it was a dream, Ion thought it would have been more flashy.
Moreover, mentioning a black wall sounded like something he had actually seen.
“…It could be that.”
“Let’s not talk about it just between us. Let’s ask the cobolds. They probably know a lot about this mine.”
Dvalin looked uncomfortable, unlike himself.
“…That. It’s a bit inconvenient.”
“Huh? What is inconvenient?”
“The way the cobolds treat me like I’m some great person. I’m not a great person; I’m just a descendant of the family.”
Ion had felt the same feeling when talking to cobolds before, but with Dvalin it seemed even more pronounced.
“Yes. It felt a bit like being inflated like a myth.”
“So, you say. It’s really inconvenient.”
“Still, we have to talk, don’t we? If there’s really a black wall, we have to go recover the pickaxe.”
“That’s right. We have to talk….”
Ion and Dvalin called the cobold chief Rachanan to discuss it.
“Krruk! The black stone! That black stone is the problem!”
Rachanan reacted with great emotion.
“Explain in detail. What is the black wall, or black stone?”
“The way in is blocked by black stone. Even if you dig other ways, you can’t go further inside because of the black stone. But with the Kultahaku pickaxe, you can break the black stone. You can open the way!”
“Do you know where that pickaxe is?”
“I know. It’s near the spider nest.”
Ion looked at Dvalin.
“It seems it was real, not a dream. I don’t know why the pickaxe isn’t golden, but the one you said you saw— isn’t that the pickaxe we were looking for?”
“Yes. It seems that’s probably it.”
“Once your body recovers, let’s go.”
“Yes. That’s right.”
Ion told Dvalin he needed to rest more and led Rachanan out, and Rachanan came out reluctantly but without resisting.
As they came out, Ion saw Dvalin’s grateful eyes.
It took three days for Dvalin’s body to recover, and during that time Ion went up to the mine entrance, replenished water and forage for Neil and the other snowy goats, and came back down.
The one guiding Dvalin and Ion, who had recovered, was Autun, who had been pinned down by Pichai and Lotte before.
That was why Autun was afraid of Lotte.
But whether Autun or Pichai, they treated Dvalin with great care.
Three days earlier, they arrived at the area where they had fought the giant spider.
The charred remains of the exploded glass bottle and the spider corpse pieces still remained.
While passing nearby, he remained on guard, but no surviving giant spiders were visible.
Although Ion’s sword or the cobolds’ glass bottles had killed many, there should still have been plenty left, but they weren’t visible.
They seemed to have abandoned the nest where they had been eating the prey.
“Is there another hiding place for the giant spiders?”
“Krruk! No. Or I don’t know. The spiders travel roads we can’t know. The spiders keep making strange paths. They’re always there when you look.”
Pichai’s answer to Ion’s question ended up saying he didn’t know.
That made sense; the number of giant spiders was large, and they were stronger than the cobolds.
This time, Ion had lured them and used the glass bottles to cause great damage, but without cobolds to play the role of Ion, it would have been a hard plan to repeat twice.
After carefully passing the spider nest, the group arrived at the black wall Dvalin had mentioned.
It wasn’t a smooth rock wall, but a large rock that looked like a wall filled with broken black stone chunks, and embedded in the wall was a charcoal-gray pickaxe.
Even from a distance, it was a pickaxe engraved with intricate patterns that looked ancient.
“That’s it! The golden pickaxe!”
Dvalin’s eyes sparkled, and his expression brightened a little.
Finding the family’s treasure, that was natural.
But he still didn’t know why it wasn’t gold.
* * *