Chapter 79
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Translator: 8uhl
Chapter: 68
Chapter Title: Unwelcome Neighbors
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The words he’d spoken recently echoed in my mind.
“I plan to stay until you’re well, Miss Cherry.”
“If I’m not around, who’s going to stop this helpless young lady?”
He said he’d stay until I was well, so I suppose he’ll leave for the capital once this is all over.
Ethan had promised to repay me for saving his life, but in a way, I felt I’d already been repaid.
After all, he’d been a great help during his stay, and he was still alive, wasn't he?
So, I crossed my arms and spoke with a magnanimous expression.
“Since it’s to find your sister, I’ll let it slide.”
“What? What do you mean, ‘let it slide’…?”
Ethan, who had retorted instinctively, trailed off, his expression turning flustered.
He must have realized I was talking about his ‘repayment.’
“I don’t need any repayment. Just go find your sister once this is over.”
“I always keep my promises. I will return. As soon as I find my sister.”
“No. Don’t come back. You can return if you fail to find her, but if you succeed, stay away.”
“…And why is that?”
“I’ve told you before. My repayment is you surviving until the very end, Sir Ethan.”
*ROOOOAR—!*
Just then, a sound like monsters causing a ruckus echoed from the distance. It sounded like they were throwing a festival.
“Amy?”
Amy scurried over at my call. I pressed a pair of opera glasses into her hand.
“You remember how to get to the lookout, don’t you?”
“Yes. Pull the rope on the ceiling at the end of the second-floor hallway, and a ladder comes down.”
“Go check on the situation outside, will you? You haven’t forgotten how to use the catapult, have you?”
“I know how to use the catapult, but I can’t move all this by myself.”
Amy pointed to the bundles of firewood stacked beside them.
“We should move it together, then. We need to hurry. It looks like they’re here.”
Ethan said, swiftly lifting several bundles of firewood at once.
Knox muttered that survival was just one tedious chore after another. Then, like Ethan, he lifted several bundles at once.
I stopped Amy as she reached for the firewood. Then I hoisted the few remaining bundles and nodded at her.
“Stack the rest on top of these.”
She looked bewildered.
“Isn’t that heavy?”
“Our Miss Cherry is stronger than most men, so there’s no need to worry.”
Knox remarked as he walked past me.
Only after I urged her a few more times did Amy hesitantly stack the bundles in my arms. Even though she’d seen me use my strength more than once, she still seemed to find it hard to believe.
I carried about ten bundles at once up to the second floor.
As I carried the firewood, stacked like a tower in a feat of acrobatics, Ethan stared at me as if I were some bizarre spectacle. He parted his lips as if to speak, but then gave up and just shook his head.
“Don’t overdo it.”
“I’m not.”
At my reply, Ethan crossed his arms, tilting his head to look down at me.
“You have a tendency to do everything yourself, Miss Cherry. You should ask for help instead. I’ll help you.”
“Someone who’s leaving soon shouldn’t make such empty promises. I might get attached.”
I thought it would be better if he just left for Aurora’s side quickly.
But the thought of him leaving soon, after we’d spent nearly every day together, felt a little strange.
“But I’m still here for now. I only said it because you look like you’re pushing yourself too hard.”
Ethan said nothing more, simply stroking my head gently.
Knox, who was hauling firewood up onto the roof, spotted the two of us and spoke with a look on his face like he’d just bitten into a rotten apple.
“Enjoying your free time? It’s a complete mess outside the mansion.”
We all climbed up to the lookout to survey the scene outside.
Just as Knox had said, the scene outside was both gruesome and shocking. Near the mansion walls, a group of people was surrounded by monsters.
Three people lay on the ground before them. They all appeared to be dead.
The dead were two middle-aged women and an elderly man. Coincidentally, all of them were those with little to no fighting ability.
“Those crazy bastards.”
Amy, who had arrived first and was observing the situation, cursed under her breath. Just then, the people began pushing the corpses toward the monsters.
“Are they using the dead as bait?”
As I watched, speechless, Knox, who was observing the situation beside me, replied.
“We don’t know if they were already dead, or if they were killed.”
“All the dead seem to be the weak, unable to fight back.”
Ethan’s words echoed my own thoughts. I covered my mouth with my hand.
It was only speculation, but if they were right, I felt I would be overwhelmed by a deep loathing for humanity at such depravity.
“Miss Cherry, what’s the plan?”
Knox asked. When I didn’t answer, Ethan spoke up.
“Just say the word. If you wish, I’ll make sure they don’t set a single foot inside this mansion.”
Ethan was cold. It was a stark contrast to the man who, on the day the world ended, had disregarded his own life to save even one more person.
“For once, I fully support Lancaster. Miss Cherry, I don’t think you should let those people into the mansion.”
“That's right. Those people are coming to take your mansion. Frankly, their intentions are rotten from the start.”
Amy sided with the two men. Knox, peering through the binoculars again, added his own two cents.
“First off, regardless of how those three people died, I don’t like that they’re using the corpses of their own neighbors as bait. And on top of that, their ultimate goal is to steal the mansion our Miss Cherry has worked so hard to build? It’s enough to make me curse.”
I listened to the three of them voice their opinions one after another, my eyes slowly scanning the grounds outside the mansion.
The villagers were now right up against the mansion’s walls.
Thanks to them, the monsters we’d painstakingly driven back to the village with the catapult and lured into the forest with the Elpinus herb were now flocking back to the mansion. *Damn it.*
I agreed with Ethan, Knox, and Amy. I’m not exactly a righteous person. If I had a strong sense of self-sacrifice, I wouldn’t have survived this long.
“There’s no need to get our hands dirty. It looks like we just need to focus on defending the mansion. Our enemies right now aren’t the villagers, but the monsters flocking back here.”
At my words, everyone turned their gazes back to the monsters gathering around the mansion. Ethan clicked his tongue in annoyance.
“Hah. This is getting tiresome. At this point, it might be better to just go out and exterminate the monsters.”
“I agree. If we could wipe out the monsters and take control of the whole village like Lancaster said, that would be ideal, wouldn’t it?”
Hearing Knox and Ethan, Amy expressed her doubts.
“Come on, how could we pull off something that big? There are only four of us.”
*But if we could control the whole village, as Knox and Ethan suggested, nothing would be better.*
Most importantly, our chances of survival would skyrocket.
Brunel had always been perfectly suited for fortification, so much so that I’d wanted to buy the entire village from the start.
“Even with just four people, it’s not impossible if we strategize well. Lancaster is a genius with a sword and a gun, Miss Cherry has monstrous strength, and our little lady here is nimble.”
Knox said, looking at each of us in turn.
“And what about you, old man?”
Amy asked, pointing at Knox. He just shrugged.
“Give me a break. I’m a doctor.”
He had a point. A doctor was, in fact, the most important asset.
“Aargh! Aaaaargh!”
Just then, a scream erupted from outside the mansion. It seemed to be one of the villagers who had come up with the carts.
He was the closest to the monsters and looked as if he was about to be caught.
“H-Help me! Don’t just stand there, do something!”
One of the villagers, surrounded by monsters, shouted up at us huddled on the roof.
If Amy was right, these people had come to steal our home. We had no reason to help them.
But I hated the idea of watching perfectly healthy people die, unable to lift a finger, even more.
I knew I hadn’t done anything wrong, but I felt I’d be tormented by guilt all the same.
“Should we give the catapult a try?”
As I placed a bundle of firewood onto the catapult’s arm, the other three turned to look at me.
Amy stared at me in disbelief.
“You’re going to help them?”
I burst out laughing at her question.