The Warden of Barantraz Prison, Tramson
The Gigantia Empire.
The port city of Paral.
"Whoa, there."
The carriage, which had been galloping down the main street early in the morning, came to a halt. The window opened, and a middle-aged man with a thick mustache poked his head out. With a fleshy hand, he beckoned to a Lurker man walking along the roadside.
"Hey, you. Come here."
"M-me?"
"Yeah, you."
As the man approached the carriage, the middle-aged man thrust a bottle of wine at him.
"Chug this."
"Pardon?"
"What are you waiting for? I said chug it."
"I-I have to work. If I get drunk this early in the morning, my master will be furious."
"Are you more afraid of your master's anger, or of being dragged off to prison? I'm Warden Tramson of Barantraz Prison."
"H-hic!"
"Drink it all, now."
The Lurker man hurriedly downed the entire bottle of wine on the spot. By the time he finished, with wine dripping down his chin, his face was beet red.
"I-I finished it all. *Hic!*"
"Good, well done. Get lost."
"Y-yes, sir... *Hic!*"
The man began to stagger down the street. Seeing him trip and fall, it was clear he wouldn't be doing any work today.
"He's going to get the beating of his life from his master. Heh heh heh!"
Tramson burst into laughter and slammed the carriage window shut. The carriage pulled away.
After traveling for a while, it stopped again. A Lurker couple, looking like lovers in ragged clothes, could be seen walking by the roadside.
"Beat them."
At Tramson's command to the lead knight, the rider charged forward, pulled out a whip, and lashed out at the pair.
"Eek!"
"Argh! I-I'm sorry!"
"Stop sticking together, you pests!"
Snap! Snap!
The man and woman scattered in a panic, fleeing for their lives. Tramson watched the scene and cackled.
"Where do these Lurkers get off, acting all lovey-dovey? Hahaha! Damn them."
"Warden!"
A demolition agent ran up and bowed his head.
"You show up out of nowhere without even a word."
"My apologies."
The agent groveled.
"The problem with you is that you only show up when you need something. Did the Lord send you again?"
"Well... this time, there are some real stubborn ones."
The agent handed Tramson a parchment scroll. It was a letter from the Lord, requesting the mobilization of prison forces to forcibly demolish a slum district.
"Tsk, he should do it himself."
"Heh heh, the Lord has to worry about his reputation... He said he'd look the other way on anything you need if you help."
"Good grief. Fine. Tell him I'll take care of it soon."
"Yes! Thank you!"
The carriage started moving again. It was while traveling through a secluded forest path to reach the hippogriff airfield on the hill.
Thwack!
Suddenly, the lead knight was struck by a rock the size of a human head and fell from his horse. The carriage came to an abrupt halt.
"Whoa, whoa!"
"What's going on?"
"Zaks was hit by a stone and passed out!"
"What?"
Just as Tramson was opening the carriage door to step out, the coachman's scream echoed.
"Argh!"
"What now!"
That was when it happened. The door on the opposite side of Tramson opened, and someone lunged inside.
"Who are you!"
Thrust!
The intruder stabbed him in the stomach without hesitation.
"Ugh!"
"Damn, there's so much fat it's hard to get the blade in."
The man grumbled, then proceeded to stab him repeatedly with the dagger in his hand.
"G-get away! Aaaargh!"
Tramson was caught off guard by the sudden ambush. He scrambled to open the door and escape, but that only invited more stabs. Unable to even put up a fight, he was finally struck in the throat and died on the spot.
Both my hands were covered in blood. I wiped them quickly with a towel and pulled the Blood Sucker from my bag—a syringe-like tool designed to extract blood.
Thrust!
I plunged it into the dead Tramson's arm and extracted a thumb's worth of blood. I discarded the needle and kept the vial of blood. Next, I prepared for the 'disguise'.
My signature skill, Blessing in Disguise.
If I only wanted to copy a face, looking at the features would suffice, but to replicate a body from head to toe, I needed blood containing the target's DNA.
Slurp.
I smeared Warden Tramson's blood onto my index finger and sucked it up.
'Transform into him.'
As I activated the skill, the transformation began immediately. My face and limbs began to swell with flesh, and my weight increased. My hair turned blonde, a thick mustache sprouted under my nose, and in an instant, I became a stout, middle-aged man. The clothes I had been wearing stretched to the point of bursting before finally snapping and tearing apart.
I tidied up and stepped out of the carriage.
"!?"
Elenore, who had been cleaning up the bodies outside, flinched and pointed her sword at me. I calmly raised my hands.
"It's okay, it's me. I told you."
"H-have you... disguised yourself?"
"Yeah. It was a perfect success."
"Your name... please tell me your name."
I grinned at her as she continued to look at me with suspicious, confused eyes.
"Don't remember what we did in bed yesterday? You loved it when I licked your anus."
"Ah...!"
Only then did she relax and lower her sword.
"I guess you've never seen anyone use a disguise skill like mine before."
"Yes. It's fascinating. Wow..."
Elenore stared at me with eyes full of wonder.
"Let's finish this quickly."
"Yes!"
I opened the carriage's luggage compartment, pulled out the spare clothes Tramson kept, and changed. Meanwhile, Elenore piled the bodies of the knight, the coachman, and Tramson inside the carriage to keep them out of sight, then disguised herself as a coachman.
"We're departing."
"Right."
Clatter.
Perfectly disguised as Warden Tramson, I rode the carriage to our destination: the hippogriff airfield.
"Where is Zaks? Why have you come without an escort?"
"He had a stomachache, so he couldn't come."
"Ah, I see. But what's with that bag? Did you buy a new one?"
"Yeah. What do you think? Is it okay?"
I stepped off the carriage and naturally greeted the people waiting at the airfield. About ten people were there with bags, all of them headed into Barantraz Prison. They weren't guards, but merchants approved to trade, private contractors delivering supplies for prison management, or prison-resident repairmen carrying materials for building maintenance.
Barantraz Prison—a place where once a prisoner enters, they can never leave. It primarily housed high-profile nobles hostile to the Emperor and notorious criminals from across the land. It was a place where release or escape was a pipe dream, and one simply worked until death under harsh labor. It was a prison built on an island. With the hippogriff unit patrolling the skies, security was so tight that no one could ever enter or escape the island without permission.
"You'll be riding this one today, sir!"
"Thanks."
"We'll get you there safely!"
"Right."
The driver sat in the saddle strapped to the hippogriff's back, and I climbed on behind him. I expected it to take off immediately, but the hippogriff just flapped its wings and struggled.
"Kree! Kree! Kreeeee!"
"Why is it making such a racket?"
"Well... begging your pardon, Warden, but I think the beast is protesting because you're too heavy."
"What?"
I immediately kicked the hippogriff in the rump.
"Fly, you beast, before I turn you into fried chicken!"
"Kreeeee!"
Once I kicked it, it finally took flight. The hippogriffs carrying my companions followed one after another, and we formed a formation, flying toward the prison island.
Elenore stared intently into the distant sky. Haeru had left. She was deeply worried about whether he would return safely. At the same time, seeing him transform perfectly into another person was simply astonishing. She hadn't known such a skill existed in the world...
"Amazing..."
Haeru was phenomenal. She realized she was with an incredible person. Well, he was one of the members who had defeated the Demon King. It was only natural that he was extraordinary. Her mind was filled with the thought that she, too, must continue to strive so that she wouldn't feel inadequate.
"I will never disappoint you, and I will be with you forever..."
By the time the hippogriff carrying Haeru was no longer visible, she climbed onto the coachman's seat. She drove the carriage toward a cliffside. After releasing the horses, she set the carriage on fire. Then, she pulled out only the bodies, threw them to the wild beasts and monsters roaming the area, and vanished gracefully.
The view of the island came into sight in the distance. It was surrounded on all sides by high, thick stone walls. Soldiers emerged from guard posts set higher than the walls and waved welcome flags toward me.
According to the intelligence, Warden Tramson was the only person who commuted between Paral port and the prison.
"Welcome, Warden!"
"Welcome back!"
As I landed on the island and dismounted from the hippogriff, the guards were waiting, lined up on both sides of the path. They were all strictly disciplined.
"Please continue to lead us, who are lacking, today as well!"
"Yes, yes. I know."
I was exchanging slick greetings with the officers who had approached me when I suddenly stopped dead in my tracks.
'What is this?'
An unexpected sight unfolded before my eyes. On both sides of the path I had to walk, women dressed only in bras and panties stood with their hands behind their backs, like disciplined soldiers. My bewildered gaze couldn't help but quickly scan their underwear and figures.
'Fifty on each side, about a hundred in total... what is this? An underwear brigade?'
What the hell did this bastard Tramson have them doing? Seeing that all the women were wearing disciplined guard caps, it was clear they were prison guards.
"Are you not moving, sir?"
"Oh? Ah, let's go."
The moment I took a step, the female guards standing with their hands behind their backs all turned around in unison and stuck their butts out. A sudden feast of buttocks. They were all different colors—white, black, tan.
'What the hell is this?'
As I stopped again in confusion, a male officer next to me grinned broadly.
"What's wrong? You have to touch them as you walk by, like always."
"Ah, right."
Realizing immediately, I reached out my arms to both sides.
Slap, slap, slap, slap, slap!
I passed through the central corridor, touching the female guards' buttocks with both hands.
"Ho ho, nice, very nice. You're all well-ripened."
For the sake of a perfect performance, I became a perverted old man for a moment. From now on, I would enjoy prison life to the fullest as the warden.
"Wahahaha! This is my magnificent empire!"