Chapter 128: The Dice that Twists Fate (1)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 128: The Dice that Twists Fate (1)
Northguard.
It was the name given to the warriors who guarded the North from Eisengar, the land of permafrost.
Of course, not all of them were warriors. The Northguard were a select few; the rest were ordinary folk.
Most northerners lived in tribes scattered across Eisengar, and Lake Fortress, our destination, was the largest of these settlements.
Inside, Lake Fortress was a small world unto itself, inhabited by people hardened by the brutal northern winds.
The canyon walls were a mixture of ice and rock, and a colossal ice wall served as a windbreak, bestowing a quiet calm upon the village.
The arrival of outsiders drew the curious villagers from their homes.
The tribespeople were all bundled in layers of outerwear—clothes made from thick animal hides and necklaces adorned with animal fangs.
The tents pitched on the snow were crafted from animal hides and sturdy wooden poles, clearly reinforced with extra layers to keep the biting cold from seeping through.
Smoke drifted up from fires scattered throughout the village.
People huddled in circles around fire pits, thawing their frozen bodies.
A cold yet resilient existence. The very landscape of Lake Fortress was a testament to their survival and their will to live.
I gave a small wave to a little girl with a runny nose who was staring at me. She started to wave back, clueless, but a woman who looked to be her mother quickly pulled her hand down.
Hmph.
The northerners were fundamentally self-sufficient, unless some oddballs, fed up with the cramped quarters, went out to bring back supplies.
With virtually no contact with the outside world, they were naturally reclusive.
Yet here these reclusive northerners were, lining the path as if mesmerized, just to get a look at Azyeth. Beauty truly is the ultimate talent.
She could close the distance between people just by standing there.
“Go on. The tribal chief is waiting.”
Jorn led us to the largest tent in Lake Fortress. Inside, an old woman sat on a pile of animal hides.
“Show some respect. This is Darka, the tribal chief of Lake Fortress.”
Tribal Chief Darka.
She was a shaman.
A bone necklace, a staff adorned with another bone necklace, bone earrings, and even a bone hat. She had so many bones on her that if all her teeth fell out, she’d have more than enough for a new set of dentures.
But what truly captured my attention was the brilliant blue gem hanging from the center of her necklace.
Lazurite.
The reason we were here.
It glowed with a crisp, blue light, despite being completely uncut.
She’s just wearing something that valuable like it’s nothing.
I wanted to just snatch it, but that probably wouldn’t be a good idea.
“Chief, these are outsiders. They’re the ones who cut down the bridge.”
“What? Cut off my legs?”
Darka shrieked in alarm.
She had one very peculiar character trait.
“But my legs are perfectly fine.”
She had dementia.
“No, I’m talking about the bridge leading to the other side.”
“The other side?”
“Yes, Chief.”
“Who’s the chief?”
“It is you, Darka.”
Darka’s eyes went wide as she pointed a finger at herself.
“Me?”
“Yes.”
“The chief?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
The conversation seemed like it would never end. I would have given up by this point, but Jorn handled it with a practiced ease that suggested this was far from his first time.
“Chief Darka, we have guests.”
“Guests?”
“Yes.”
Only then did Darka seem to register our presence. She shot up from her seat with a pop! and began circling us, her stare uncomfortably intense.
“We have guests!”
Jorn gave me a look.
I bowed respectfully to Darka.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Chief. My name is Karami, and I’m a slave trader.”
“Slave trader? What’s that?”
“It means I’m the kindest person in the world, someone who liberates slaves.”
“Oh! Is that so!”
Jorn shot me a venomous glare and roared.
“You cur! How dare you lie to the chief!”
“Hey, why are you yelling? You’re scaring people. Right, Chief Darka?”
“That’s right! Why are you shouting? You startled me!”
“…My apologies.”
Jorn bowed his head at Darka’s rebuke. A moment later, he lifted his head and glared at me.
S-seriously… I think it’s your fault for not knowing her personality when you’ve been serving right beside her…
“And who is the woman beside you?”
“This is my slave, Azyeth.”
“Hmm?”
Murmurs of doubt rippled through the tent. The suspicious glances aimed at Azyeth all seemed to say, ‘Someone like her… is a slave?’
I understood their skepticism. Azyeth’s appearance was far too ethereal for a slave. It wasn’t just her clothes; a beauty like hers couldn’t be concealed even by rags.
“A slave… you say?”
“That’s right.”
Jorn still looked unconvinced, but since Azyeth herself didn’t deny it, he reluctantly let the matter drop.
“What business does a slave trader have here? Did you come to enslave us?”
“Of course not. I never take slaves by force. I always use proper methods.”
“Then what do you want?”
My gaze fell on the Lazurite hanging from Darka’s necklace.
“I want the blue gem you’re wearing, Chief.”
“What?”
The tent erupted in an uproar.
Darka clutched the Lazurite with both hands and recoiled in shock.
“No! My grandmother gave this to me! You can’t have it!”
“That gem is the symbol of our chief, passed down through generations of our tribe. And you want to take it?”
“That’s right. I plan on having it made into an accessory for my princess.”
“For a mere trinket…”
Jorn’s face twisted into a deep scowl, his hand moving to his hip. He looked ready to draw his tomahawk at any second.
“We have nothing for barbarians like you. Get the hell out of our village. Now. Or your hides will be the next decorations on our tents.”
So this is how they’re going to play it.
Well, I expected as much.
They were already wary of outsiders, and here I was, barging in and demanding the chief’s symbol—her grandmother’s keepsake, no less.
I’d rather build some rapport and ask nicely instead of trying to force the issue, but this damned soul synchronization wouldn’t let me do things my way.
The slave trader’s soul was pushing me to be needlessly direct and confrontational.
But who am I?
I’m a transmigrator.
I had a contingency plan for just this kind of situation. An offer they couldn’t possibly refuse…
“Chief! Look at this! We found someone hiding in their luggage!”
Or I had, until… a commotion interrupted my thoughts.
“I’m tellin’ ya, I’m a dwarf! Let go’a me!”
“Quiet! You don’t look like any dwarf I’ve ever seen!”
“I’m a half-dwarf, I tell ya!”
The person being dragged in by the soldier was Perka.
“Perka? What are you doing here?”
“She was… hiding. In the luggage…”
“What?”
Seriously, Azyeth? What the hell? You knew and you didn’t tell me?
No wonder I thought I’d heard a woman scream during our descent. I’d dismissed it as a hallucination, but it must have been Perka.
Thanks to her, the northerners’ wariness toward us shot through the roof.
“Hiding someone in your luggage. So you were planning something.”
“I believe there’s been a misunderstanding. First of all, she is a dwarf, and she followed us without our knowledge.”
“I have no intention of listening to any more of your silver-tongued lies. Kneel and surrender. Otherwise, the hostage dies.”
“Eek?!”
The soldier holding Perka pressed a curved blade to her throat.
“Should I… take care of them?”
Azyeth asked, tilting her head. With her power, she could easily subdue them before the blade even touched Perka’s neck.
But fighting here would be crossing a point of no return.
Taking the Lazurite by force was an option, but it was the worst possible one. Yes, I needed the gem, but the process of obtaining it would be lost.
The interactions Azyeth was supposed to have with the Northguard would be gone. It might solve the problem of the cold, but it would push her complete liberation further away.
The right move here was to back down.
“My, I didn’t realize it was such a precious item. Very well. We didn’t come here to fight, so we’ll leave peacefully. May we take our luggage and our companions?”
“You expect us to just let go of the thieves who came to steal our gem?”
“If a fight breaks out in the middle of your village, won’t your precious tribe members get hurt? And even if we were to surrender, I doubt you have a prison capable of holding my slave.”
“That’s…”
“I’m offering you the most peaceful solution.”
Jorn fell silent, seeing my point.
He gestured to one of his men, who went outside and returned with our luggage and the frozen Hargran.
“We’ll hold onto the hostage until you’re far away from the village.”
*
Escorted by wary Northguard warriors, we were kicked out of the canyon.
Perka followed at a distance, still a hostage.
Once they deemed we were far enough away, they released Perka, who scrambled over to us.
The moment our eyes met, she must have felt guilty, because she hung her head and apologized.
“S-sorry…”
“What were you thinking, following us?”
“It just looked like it’d be a lotta fun…”
“It seems you came without permission. Sir Thorvar must be worried about you.”
“My father, worry about me? No way. That man’s got nothin’ in his head but hammers.”
Perka laughed childishly.
If I’d known this would happen, I never would have liberated her. I should have kept her on a tight leash.
“So, what now? We got kicked out. Seems like gettin’ that gem is a lost cause.”
“I wonder whose fault that is.”
“Hehe… It’s not like this is the only Lazurite in the world. If we look hard enough, I’m sure we can find another one somewhere, right?”
Of course there was.
I had more than enough money to buy one.
But as I’d told myself before, I couldn’t skip the part where Azyeth interacted with the Northguard. It had to be Darka’s Lazurite.
“First, let’s make camp near Lake Fortress.”
“Right here? Won’t the northerners get mad?”
“They told us to get out of the canyon, not to leave the area entirely.”
We weren’t outmatched in terms of strength.
“But what about Mr. Hargran? Is he even alive in there?”
“Of course he’s alive. We’ll thaw him out later. If we wake him now, he’ll just cause a ruckus. He’ll thaw on his own eventually, so let’s just leave him be. Now, let’s get to work. It’ll only get colder once the sun goes down.”
The dwarves lit a fire and, with a few deft swings of their hammers, expertly erected a tent. Thankfully, a proper campsite was established near the canyon before sunset.
Inside the tent, Perka asked me a question as she warmed herself by the fire.
“But Sir Karami, are ya really plannin’ on negotiatin’ with them? I know I’m not one to talk after makin’ things worse, but it ain’t gonna be easy.”
“I suppose not.”
I glanced toward the guard post at the canyon entrance.
By lighting a fire in the middle of a snowfield, we’d made sure they could see us. The problem was, thanks to Perka’s little stunt and my own soul’s needlessly blunt way of speaking, their guard was now at its absolute highest.
My original plan had been to hunt some demonic beasts and gift the tribe high-quality meat and pelts to raise their affinity with us. But now, it would take more than a simple good deed to win them over.
I had to get the story back on track.
The situation needed a little… spice.
And I have just the item for a time like this.
I held out my open palm to Perka and Azyeth.
“Now, you two. Look closely. As you can see, there is nothing in my hand.”
“…?”
“But if I close my fist and open it again…?”
My hand, which had been empty just a moment ago.
Now held a single die.
“Ta-da! A die appears, just like that.”
“Whoa! Is that magic?”
“Let’s call it a magic trick.”
“A magic trick! I didn’t know you could do stuff like that, Sir Karami! But why a die all of a sudden?”
“Because this is a very special die.”
The die was a base shade of pink.
A full-blown icosahedron.
Its faces were inscribed with numbers that shimmered in brilliant gold and indigo.
“This,” I said, “is the Dice that Twists Fate.”