Chapter 132
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 132
A small child lying on the floor next to Pesil spoke up.
Usually, when the hunters said they would be back within half a day, they arrived at least an hour early. Today, they were unusually late.
"It's probably because they're bringing back so many deer," Pesil replied.
The child gave a faint smile. They’re a bit later than usual, everyone thought. Rather than feeling anxious, they were simply tired of waiting.
Time continued to pass, and soon an hour had gone by since the promised half-day mark.
"Daddy... when is he coming...?"
The eyes of those weary from waiting were now clouded with undeniable anxiety. The adults seemed just as uneasy. Nul and a few others gathered the children who were near Niphrim and Pesil and led them outside.
Several more hours passed.
The hunters still had not returned.
Sensing the gravity of the situation, Pesil grabbed Niphrim’s wrist and pulled him outside.
The surprise party to celebrate Niphrim’s recovery no longer mattered. Outside, the rain had softened to a gentle drizzle.
The sun was setting.
There was no reason for them to be this late.
The villagers paced restlessly, their faces pale with worry.
"Everyone..."
Pesil’s hand, clasped in his, trembled violently. Feeling the tremor, Niphrim reached into his shirt and toyed with his dagger.
His thoughts turned to the smoke he had seen yesterday.
They told me it was normal for smoke to rise from a village.
Niphrim hadn't seen much smoke in his life. His existence had been spent enduring the experiments of the 'Third Eye'; he’d never had the luxury of watching the peaceful smoke of a cooking fire.
The smoke he knew was always thick and acrid.
It was the smoke of the battlefield, the kind that rose when a village burned.
That kind of smoke didn't just consume houses; it consumed people. It billowed to ominous heights, and the mere sight of it made one’s face contort in disgust.
The smoke I saw yesterday...
He didn't have the knack for telling the difference between the smoke of a cookfire and a burning village, but the intuition forged by his past whispered to him.
The smoke he saw yesterday was not from roasting meat.
Smoke from a simple fire could never rise high enough to be seen from so far away.
"..."
He pulled his hand from Pesil's grasp. Startled by the sudden movement, she trembled and looked up at him.
"Lansler?" she asked, using the new name she was still getting used to.
"I’m going back inside."
"Oh? Right, okay! Go on in..."
Niphrim was usually a man of few words, so his sudden clarity flustered Pesil, who nodded repeatedly.
The murmurs of the villagers, whose anxiety had reached its peak, grew louder. In the grim atmosphere, the children were the first to burst into tears.
In a corner, some seemed to be organizing a search party, but they were clearly struggling to get started.
After scanning the scene, Niphrim slipped back into the building while Pesil wasn't looking. He could climb out the back window and bypass the crowd at the front. Once clear, he broke into a run, heading for the wooden fence surrounding the village.
He had a single suspicion.
To confirm it, he first had to find the hunters who had left that morning.
Niphrim sprinted up the mountain path. At times like this, he was immensely grateful for his modified body. He ran relentlessly without losing his breath.
He didn't keep track of the time, but it couldn't have been more than thirty minutes.
"Hah."
He didn't even need to search for the temporary shelter the hunters had mentioned.
As he ran, he found a conspicuous scene: several giant trees had been knocked over.
As he drew closer, the situation became clear. The trees had been snapped at the base, and recently. By the looks of it, they had been brought down by sheer brute force.
And beneath those trees...
There were corpses.
They were horribly mutilated, no part of them left intact. They were so mangled that Pesil would have emptied her stomach at the sight.
With a stoic expression, Niphrim nudged a piece of scattered flesh with his hand.
Only after checking the blood-soaked clothing could he be certain they were the hunters.
"Just as I thought," Niphrim muttered.
He'd felt that there were an unusual number of monsters lately. The Troll's appearance had only deepened his suspicions.
All those creatures had been driven to this mountain, meaning they had lost their territory to another force and been pushed out.
The culprit—the one that drove the monsters here and slaughtered the village hunters—was an advancing army, and it was on this very mountain.
The smoke Niphrim had seen yesterday was indeed from that army attacking and burning a village.
Then, where are they now?
The rain, which had been so light it seemed ready to stop, began to thicken. A heavy droplet landed on Niphrim’s brow and rolled down his face.
For a moment, he was lost, unable to see the enemy. Then, as if remembering something, his gaze dropped to the ground.
He had been too preoccupied with finding the hunters to notice.
Footprints.
The footprints led diagonally up the slope.
He had unknowingly crossed their path on his way down. While he was descending, the army had been ascending from another direction.
Though their paths had differed, theirs would inevitably lead them through the village.
They had missed each other by a hair's breadth, but the army was undoubtedly heading for the village.
The shape of the footprints...
...belonged to Orcs.
*
Tracking them wasn't difficult.
An army’s march was naturally slower than an individual’s. It took Niphrim no time at all to catch up to the Orcs' trail.
Before long, he saw the backs of the Orc party through the dense vegetation.
These aren't ordinary Orcs.
A single glance revealed that each one was heavily armed. That alone confirmed several things.
They weren't a wandering tribe. Nor were they scavengers searching the mountains for food.
He followed closely, silencing his movements.
The Orcs' march was loud and chaotic. Having no rivals in these mountains, they lacked even an ounce of battlefield tension. And why should they? Niphrim himself had already cleared out the few monsters that remained.
Listening to their crude and complex chatter, he picked out several titles from the words he couldn't understand.
Legion Commander.
Chieftain.
There are fewer than thirty in sight... is this a detachment?
If so, where was the main force? How many were there?
What is their goal?
Niphrim, who had been trying to analyze the situation, immediately changed his mind. Preparing a response was more important than a full analysis.
Whatever the identity of this Orc group, it was certain they were heading for the village. Since it was an unremarkable village, they would likely burn it to the ground just like the last one.
He had to stop them.
He didn't spare a thought for the petty consequences—that his strength would be revealed, that the villagers might cast him out, that his small hope for a quiet life would be crushed. Niphrim quietly drew the dagger from his shirt.
Though he hadn't been able to land a proper blow on the Gatekeeper of the Primordial Core, Niphrim was a man who had subjugated dungeons just one rank below the Great Evil Caves.
No matter how much stronger these Orcs were compared to normal ones, he didn't think they would be a match for him.
His only regret was the lack of a proper weapon. A sword and a dagger were fundamentally different tools. A dagger was a secondary weapon; it wasn't meant to be swung wildly on a battlefield.
Shhhhhhh.
The sound of the rain grew heavier, the rustling of the leaves seeming to blanket the entire world. Using the noise to mask his presence, Niphrim slowly closed the distance.
With an inadequate weapon, he needed to slit as many throats as possible in the initial surprise attack.
However, as he moved swiftly through the terrain to close the gap...
The Orcs' march stopped.
As if an order had been given from the front, every Orc suddenly raised their weapon and grew alert.
Just before an Orc could turn its head, Niphrim barely managed to dive into the bushes.
...Was I detected?
In this rain?
In the rain-soaked mountains, thick with the scent of earth, his own scent couldn't have reached them. He shouldn't have been caught by his footsteps or presence either.
As he held his breath, questioning the situation, a short, thumping sensation pulsed through his heart.
The pulse, thick and tangible, was detection magic. There had to be a mage among them—an Orc Shaman.
"Ha, haha."
Realizing the situation, Niphrim stopped hiding and stood up.
Staggering forward through the rain, he almost looked like he had lost his mind.
"I suspected it, but there really is a Shaman. I guess this is a proper unit after all."
"Yeah, hiding never really suited my temperament anyway," Niphrim muttered to himself. The Orcs shouted something at the top of their lungs, but their voices were drowned out by the downpour.
With a smirk, Niphrim staggered toward them.
A magic arrow flew from among the shouting Orcs.
Simultaneously, the Orc horde let out a collective war cry and charged.
*
He ran, stepping over the corpses of Orcs.
He hadn't been able to scavenge a useful weapon. They used axes or thick clubs, and when he had tried swinging an axe, it hadn't fit his hand at all.
By the time Niphrim sprinted back to the village, the wooden fence at the entrance had already been smashed.
The rainwater washing down the path was red. It was the moment his last shred of hope vanished.
Stepping over the broken fence, he saw the Orcs standing in a circle around the central plaza. The small village was packed with so many of them that it was impossible to even estimate their numbers.
In the center of the assembled Orcs, a single figure sat on a chair that had been placed in the plaza.
Niphrim looked up and saw the military flag planted in the mud right behind him. It was an ornate commander's banner.
That Orc was the leader of this army.
Niphrim had a rough idea of why all the Orcs were gathered in the plaza despite the rain.
Only one thing came to mind.
"I am Kaltum, Chieftain of the great Kariem Tribe."
Chieftain Kaltum spoke with a clarity unusual for an Orc. After a few seconds of silence, Niphrim asked:
"Where are the villagers?"
"I received word that our warriors were attacked on their way here."
"...Where are the villagers?"
The conversation was going nowhere. As Niphrim glared at Kaltum, the Chieftain met his gaze calmly and gave a short laugh.
While ascending the mountain, Kaltum had happened upon the pile of monster corpses at the bottom of the cliff.
Who killed so many monsters? A human? What kind of human?
Kaltum loved the strong. Just as his curiosity about this mysterious enemy was piqued, he received word that one of the units following his vanguard had been attacked.
Kaltum was certain—this frail-looking, blonde man was the one who had slaughtered the monsters at the cliff. He was the strong man Kaltum had been curious about.
"Where are the villagers?" Niphrim asked again. With each repetition, his voice grew thick with rage.
Only after the third question did Kaltum call for a subordinate.
"Bring it."
Niphrim felt something drop in his stomach.
It wasn't "Bring them."
It was "Bring it."
Following Kaltum’s order, a subordinate Orc brought out a straw sack the size of a person.
The bottom of the sack was damp. Even without opening it, one could tell it was filled with many round objects.
"Bring them."
When Niphrim saw the sack and tensed as if to pounce, Kaltum gave an order to another Orc.
This time, the villagers were dragged out in a line, their hands bound.
Most of them were women and young children.
It seemed every adult male in the village had been killed.
"Ever since I saw the monster corpses at the bottom of the cliff..." Kaltum began.
"..."
"I have wanted to face you in a fair duel."
The captured villagers were gagged. They couldn't speak, but they all let out panicked, muffled sounds, drool mixing with the rain.
Their frantic eyes were fixed on Niphrim.
"That is why I kept these humans alive."
Pesil was among the captives.
"If I win?"
"I will withdraw from this village without another word. I will also spare the prisoners."
"I can't trust you."
"I know the perception humans have of Orcs. But know this. Carve it into your mind. I, Kaltum, am a great warrior. Those who call themselves great warriors do not lie when a covenant is made."
"..."
"I am offering you a covenant."
Niphrim furrowed his brow.
In this situation, it wasn't a matter of trust; he had no choice.
Kaltum held all the cards. No matter how strong Niphrim was, there was no way he could win against the horde of Orcs filling the village.
Protecting the villagers in the process was absolutely impossible. He had to accept Kaltum’s proposal.
Niphrim drew his dagger.
Kaltum, who had been watching Niphrim, showed a faint smile. He stood up and grabbed his hammer.
The clash required no signal.
Closing the distance in an instant, the two exchanged blows.
There were no interruptions. The Orcs surrounding the plaza simply watched the duel with bated breath, offering no interference.
VROOOOM!
Kaltum’s hammer sliced through the air. His attacks were straightforward, yet they left almost no openings. A blow of that nature should have created a vulnerability, but Kaltum's strikes were not so easily dodged.