The Road to the North (3) - Dangerous Conspiracy
The Road North (3) - A Dangerous Conspiracy
Around the time the midday sun was at its hottest.
The caravan stopped in a wide clearing to rest.
And in the middle of that clearing.
Carlton and Rose stood facing each other, holding wooden staffs.
At the interesting spectacle of the slender beauty sparring with the mercenary captain, the men of the caravan, who had been lazily resting, one by one gathered in a circle.
"Alright. First, I'll attack lightly, so block or dodge as you usually would. I need to see your skill level to teach you."
[ Whizz- Whoosh- ]
Carlton said, swinging the wooden staff through the air.
It was a simple movement, without much force, but the sound of it cutting through the wind was already unusual.
'I need to restrain my mana as much as possible. To look like an ordinary beginner.'
Rose resolved inwardly, and re-gripped her staff.
Without even needing to pretend, her stance, holding the staff, was already that of a beginner.
"Alright, then... here I come!"
Carlton charged, kicking off the ground.
[ Whoosh-! ]
He had said he would just swing lightly, but the speed was so immense it was invisible to the average person.
However.
'Huh...?'
Before Rose's mind could even think 'I need to block it'.
Her body, sensing the killing intent first, reacted reflexively.
Carlton had originally intended to stop the staff at a precarious point next to Rose's face,
[ Swish-! ]
but a faint mana flowed from Rose's toes,
and her body slipped backward, retreating swiftly.
"......!!"
She dodged the captain's attack?
From the mouths of the watching mercenaries, gasps of astonishment burst out.
Carlton, too, couldn't hide his surprise, his eyes wide.
"That movement just now... that's not a beginner's reflex, is it?"
"Uh... well... I was so surprised, it just kind of happened...?"
Rose gave an awkward laugh, but Carlton's gaze had already lost its playfulness and settled into seriousness.
As if his instincts as a swordsman had been stimulated,
he re-gripped his staff and charged again.
"Then, how about this!"
[ Swish-swish! ]
Rose tried to move out of the attack range using the mana from her toes, just like before,
but this time, Carlton, having anticipated that, immediately followed up and swung his staff again.
[ Thwack-! ]
"Ah!"
Carlton's staff lightly deflected Rose's defense, then immediately twisted its direction, and its tip precariously touched Rose's nape.
"Ah... I surrender..."
Rose panted heavily, and raised both hands high.
'I thought I could at least keep up a bit.'
Even though she had subtly used mana to move, she couldn't respond at all.
If a veteran mercenary not using aura is this strong,
then just how strong are the knights who are even stronger?
"Hmm. I understand a bit now. Your innate athletic ability and reflexes are excellent, but you truly have no basic swordsmanship skills."
Carlton nodded as he withdrew his staff, but his voice didn't reach the men surrounding them.
"...?"
Only a strangely heavy silence flowed through the clearing.
"......"
"Gulp..."
The speechless men's gazes were fixed on Rose.
The old gray hood she had been wearing to cover her body.
Due to Rose's intense movements, its knot had come undone and it had fallen to the ground.
Rose's true appearance, which had been hidden inside, was revealed as it was, along with her tight, form-fitting clothes.
Moreover, the sweat from the sparring had soaked her clothes, revealing the curves of her voluptuous, almost bursting breasts, her slender waist, and her elastic hip line.
"Haa... haa...."
Crucially.
Every time Rose panted heavily.
Through her thin, sweat-soaked clothes, the shape of her erect nipples was clearly visible.
"C-crazy...."
A single word escaped someone's lips.
Only then did Rose realize her state, and startled, she quickly picked up the fallen hood from the ground and wrapped it around herself.
"Ah... I, I'm sorry. I didn't even realize my clothes were disheveled...."
Rose blushed and lowered her head, but the heavy silence that had settled over the clearing remained unbroken.
Only the rough breathing of the men, barely audible, was heating up the forest air.
After a moment of silence.
"Ahem! C-captain-nim. I, I'll just go take care of some business in the forest for a moment."
"Uh, me, me too! I suddenly have some business to attend to...."
The mercenaries, their faces flushed bright red, one by one made excuses and hastily disappeared into the forest.
Thump-thump-thump...
No one bothered to ask what kind of business they had in the secluded parts of the forest.
Even Barman, the head merchant of the caravan, cleared his throat and disappeared somewhere, leaving Rose to pull her hood tighter and blush with shame.
'This is driving me crazy, seriously....'
The journey resumed, but the atmosphere of the caravan was slightly different from before.
A strange, sticky tension.
And it lingered around the cart where Rose was sitting.
"Hmm... well now...."
Barman, sitting opposite her, no longer tried to hide his gaze.
He openly scanned Rose's chest and thighs, as if imagining the body hidden beneath her robe, and slyly licked his lips with his tongue.
The gazes of the mercenaries walking nearby also licked over Rose's figure whenever they had a chance.
Rose's momentarily revealed, unrealistic figure was enough to stimulate the males wandering the forest path, unable to satisfy their desires.
'Is it right to keep going with them like this? Should I just sneak away and go alone...?'
As Rose pondered seriously, fiddling with the edge of her hood.
"Don't worry, Rose-yang."
Carlton, walking beside the cart, spoke to Rose in a voice loud enough for everyone in the party to hear.
"What our Guild Master hates most is forcing women. Knowing how terribly those who committed such acts suffered, no one here will do anything foolish."
Although he was speaking to Rose, the actual content was a warning to his subordinates.
Behave yourselves, or you'll face dire consequences if you act recklessly.
Of course, a warning was also necessary for those who weren't his subordinates.
"Considering that the Guild Master is the Lord's Guardian, not just mercenaries, but no one in Deluna would dare to cross him. So you can rest assured."
Even Barman, who had been watching Rose with a sticky, almost devouring gaze, blushed at those words and averted his eyes.
The great Dominator, the Lord of Deluna.
The head of the mercenary guild, the Guardian, who was like his proxy.
Carlton was a veteran mercenary trusted by that Guardian.
Of course, because of that, he thoroughly controlled his subordinates, and unlike other riff-raff mercenaries who would turn into bandits at any moment during a journey, he was trustworthy.
However, he couldn't simply ignore or dismiss that voice, which was subtly warning him.
"...Thank you, Captain-nim."
As the strange atmosphere instantly returned to normal after a few blunt words from Carlton, Rose smiled and thanked Carlton.
Thanks to that warning, no particular incidents occurred during the rest of the journey.
However, Carlton, thinking there was no need to deliberately provoke others, whenever the caravan rested, taught Rose the basics of swordsmanship in a secluded spot where others' gazes couldn't reach.
"When holding the sword, relax your wrist, and when swinging powerfully, use your shoulder, not your elbow!"
Rose absorbed Carlton's teachings like a sponge.
Since she knew almost nothing, her skills rapidly improved with just simple corrections.
Unlike before, when she only swung her sword with mana, with the addition of a little technique, her coordination with mana became several times stronger.
Rose was eager to test her improved skills in a real fight.
However, not everyone agreed with Carlton's orders and suppressed their lust.
One afternoon, when the caravan had stopped for a short rest.
Among the secluded bushes behind the cart.
Two apprentice mercenaries were giggling, hidden from the eyes of their seniors.
"Hey, did you see it earlier? Her ass swaying when she got off the cart. Wow, fuck... I seriously thought my pants were going to burst."
"Don't even mention it. Just looking at her tits makes me crazy. Even the old head merchant was drooling and eyeing her, wasn't he?"
As this was the first time these two had participated in a long-term escort mission together.
What helped them endure the boring day was the lewd talk shared between two people in the same situation.
Moreover, a beautiful woman to be used as material for their lewd stories was right there with them.
"But isn't the Captain-nim funny? He yells at us to watch our eyes, but he takes that bitch into the forest every break time. Swordsmanship, my ass. They're definitely fucking, 100%."
"Hehehe, it's obvious without even seeing it. Hey, we can't just sit around sucking our thumbs, can we? When the captain and that bitch go into the forest, should we just ambush them from behind?"
A dangerous plot, half-joke and half-serious.
The mercenary group was a place where insubordination, overthrowing a leader who had lost authority, was rampant at any time.
Because of that.
Even as a joke, giving off the scent of insubordination was the childish conversation of rookies who didn't know how dangerous it was.
"We'll hit the captain in the head to knock him out, then gag that bitch and drag her into the forest. How about it?"
"Oh, fuck, that's hot! Hey, I'll go first, and you'll be second."
"Crazy. Who said I'd wait? While you're poking her from behind, I'll be ramming her mouth."
"Hey, talking about it, doesn't it sound like it could actually happen? No matter how much of a captain he is, what can he do if we hit him from behind?"
Just as they were snickering and sharing their depraved fantasies.
A huge shadow suddenly fell behind them.
"You sons of bitches...."
"...!!"
"...Lu... Luke hyung-nim...!"
The young mercenary Luke, who had come down to find the slacking apprentices, had his face contorted with rage.
< Illustration - Shed Robe >
