Chapter 74

Open a path with your lives.

That single phrase, so abrupt yet so grand, turned Belita’s absurd misunderstanding into a truth with only ‘minor’ errors mixed in.

“Kuh…! It’s do or die! Move!”

“If we can just reach near Pelmia somehow…!”

The hired hands, whose atmosphere changed completely as soon as they heard his words, also became witnesses proving that Belita’s speculation was true.

No sooner had Lug’s order fallen than the merchant group’s employees started to open a path literally with their lives, desperately guarding the lead wagon.

While completely abandoning the other two wagons.

“No way, it was true?!”

I stopped trying to rush at Belita and just stared at them blankly with my mouth agape.

“Get out of the waaay!”

“Master Lug! Go! I’ll hold them here!”

The hired hands pushed back Belita’s subordinates while gritting their teeth.

Although their skills were clearly a notch below the enemies, they opened a wide path for the wagon to escape by making up for the difference in skill with a momentum that disregarded their lives.

Even when stabbed by spears and swords, they would instead take a step forward to grab the opponent and roll around, and instead of protecting their own bodies, they would block incoming arrows with their bodies to protect the horses’ lives.

‘…These people were never a normal merchant group from the start.’

A frenzied momentum like burning bulls. Suicidal charges that even harshly trained soldiers wouldn’t dare attempt.

It wasn’t the kind of behavior that mere merchant group employees could display.

The name Rivilla Merchant Group was probably just an external facade, a disguised identity to avoid suspicion from others.

“…I’m sorry! I’m going ahead!”

Anyway, thanks to their struggle, the wagon carrying Lug successfully broke through the enemies’ interference and started racing toward its original destination.

“What are you doing! Chase them to the end!”

Seeing this, Belita shouted sharply at her subordinates.

With an attitude that seemed to say, after all the effort to turn the adventurers’ attention and lower their morale, how could they let a single wagon break through without stopping it.

“Yes, yes! We’re sorry! We’ll chase them right away!”

Belita’s subordinates apologized in surprise and hurriedly turned to chase after Lug’s wagon.

Not just those who had been blocking the wagon’s breakthrough, but also those who had been fighting with the adventurers.

“…”

Bardu and Jane didn’t stop them.

Instead of smashing iron balls and arrows into the enemies’ fully exposed backs, they rather lowered their weapons slightly and retreated step by step.

They couldn’t be called cowards. If Lug was transporting a Jötunn heart as Belita said, that alone could be considered a breach of contract.

Since the client violated the contract first, the adventurers also had no reason to faithfully follow the request contents anymore.

Moreover, now we’re in a situation where they’ve completely run away, telling us to block the enemy with our lives and abandoning us here.

In such a situation, helping them to the end to fulfill the contract isn’t an act of faith but just being a sucker.

“Hmm…”

“No really, what is this…”

Therefore, Friede and Amy also seemed to have no intention of fighting further, just letting the enemies chase after the wagon without doing anything.

Needless to say about Amina’s trio. They were already sitting down with heavy sighs, clutching their wounds as if the whole situation had been resolved.

They’re surprisingly still alive. The humans with the least skill.

While the other adventurers were struggling with gritted teeth, were they just sneakily looking out for themselves and protecting their own lifelines?

If that’s really the case, I think my aversion to iron tokens will deepen even more. Amina must be too resentful to close her eyes.

“What? Why not fight? No surrender!”

Only Kikel, uniquely, tried to thrust his harpoon toward the enemies with a face that couldn’t understand why the other adventurers were just standing still…

“No, it’s not about surrendering… just stay still for now. The situation is turning out strangely.”

Amy stopped him. With a face that said to read the room.

“Kahuk… That right. My excitement big.”

Kikel lowered his harpoon with a faint sigh, as if embarrassed. Saying he might have gotten a bit too excited because of the bloody battle.

And so, as a result, the enemies were able to pursue Lug’s wagon without any hindrance.

Except for Belita, who was just standing still and staring at me.

* * *

They say people get talkative when they’re nervous, and Belita, who had delivered a long speech that seemed to contain her very soul, must have been extremely nervous.

Despite completely overturning the situation with that one shot, instead of chasing after the wagon with her subordinates, she was just glaring at me.

“…What is it?”

She turned her head to look at the fleeing wagon, then turned back to look at me and Friede in turn.

Then she extended her intact left hand to point at the wagon and opened her mouth.

“What are you doing? You should chase after them.”

Her expression as she questioned me seemed a bit dumbfounded, as if her curiosity was stronger than her anger toward me.

“You crazy bitch. Why would I chase after that?”

“Huh?”

Belita tilted her head and twitched her eyebrow.

“Do you think they can escape safely without you guys?”

Is that any of my business?

Seeing that Lug was really transporting a Jötunn heart, she seems to have become convinced that I too was some secret escort hired to protect the heart…

That’s an enormous misunderstanding, you know?

“How should I know? I was just trying to make some easy money with a simple request, only to be deceived by that scammer bastard.”

I answered as if spitting out the words, in a tone that said I couldn’t contain my irritation.

With a feeling of being wronged so strongly that even a cold-hearted judge who would impose the death penalty on minors would declare innocence.

Perhaps that emotion was properly conveyed to Belita.

“…Really?”

Belita asked back with a dumbfounded face.

“Yeah. I just found out now that the cargo was a Jötunn heart.”

“No… really?”

Belita gaped. She had a face like someone who found hundreds of half-human half-beast pictures in their lover’s phone instead of evidence of an affair they suspected.

“You’re saying you really had no connection, I just misunderstood, and that misunderstanding happened to be right? Ha, what the… How does that make sense…?”

Belita burst into a hollow laugh as if she found it absurd even to herself, then frowned while roughly messing up her short red hair.

“Tsk, haah. Damn it, this is troublesome…”

Then, clicking her tongue and sighing, she looked alternately at me and the wagon.

Lug’s wagon, which was already disappearing in the distance while engaging in a chase with Belita’s subordinates.

“…”

That’s a face of tremendous inner conflict.

As I was thinking that in my mind while lightly loosening my fingers grasping the longsword,

Swish.

Belita finally seemed to have made up her mind and pointed her index finger at me.

What’s this, is she going to shoot a beam or something?

The moment I reflexively took a defensive posture by laying the blade flat,

“Ssip…. Hey, you. Let’s meet again next time. I’ll definitely rip off that head of yours then, so wash your neck well and wait, okay?”

Belita started to slowly back away while delivering a line so third-rate villainous that it was rather admirable.

It seemed she had decided that chasing the wagon was more important than fighting me.

“What do you mean see you next time? I don’t want to.”

“Wh-Where do you think you’re going! You should prostrate yourself at Ms. Hilde’s feet and beg for your life!”

Or it might be because of Friede, who was approaching while swinging her steel greatsword with a face that said the opportunity for revenge had finally come.

In her current state with an injury to her right arm, she wouldn’t be able to handle me and Friede simultaneously.

“Fight left here? Strong enemy, good!”

“Isn’t this just asking for trouble…? Well, if we think of it as a chance to claim the bounty on ‘Head-Ripping Belita’… it’s not so bad.”

Even Kikel and Amy were raising their weapons again, bracing themselves.

Although Bardu and Jane backed away raising both hands lightly as if to say not to get involved, even without their help, it was four against one.

“Don’t think about seeing me next time, let’s end this here.”

Belita had no chance of winning. To the extent that I could declare so confidently that we should settle it to the end.

You know, people tend to become endlessly confident when they have the upper hand. Just as they become endlessly cowardly when at a disadvantage.

“Ha, look at how these things talk. Am I that funny to you?”

Belita revealed her teeth with a hollow laugh as if dumbfounded.

“Yeah. You could change your job to a clown.”

How could you not be funny? Your appearance now is like a cornered beast, a far cry from your initial entrance overflowing with confidence.

“…This is crazy. Really.”

Belita twisted her mouth as if her insides had been scraped.

She glanced at me and Friede, Kikel and Amy, and finally her own shoulder, then slightly bent her waist and firmly clenched her left hand.

“Alright, let’s have a go then. You adventurer bastards.”

A clear combat stance.

At that sight, just as I was about to kick off the ground and charge toward her―

“I’ll rip all your heads off-!”

Belita, who shouted fiercely, sharply bent her knee and struck the ground with her left hand.

With strength almost equal to mine with Iron Arm activated…

In other words, at a troll-like level of strength.

Boom!

The surrounding earth shook for an instant and shattered rocks spurted up like a fountain. Along with dust rising like a fog.

“A smoke screen?!”

Belita’s figure couldn’t be seen due to the thick dust that had risen.

Is she planning to hide in the dust and surprise attack with an accelerated charge?

“Kikel, protect Amy!”

If she’s planning a surprise attack, Amy would be in the most danger.

Having judged so, I shouted at Kikel to protect her and leaped unhesitatingly into the dust cloud.

“Where are you trying to pull tricks!”

I swung my grasped longsword widely toward Belita’s position that I roughly sensed.

Whoosh!

The black iron blade split the brown fog in two with a fierce sound of cutting air. The dust caught in the wind pressure created by the blade scattered like smoke.

However, there was no feeling of hitting anything.

“Did she dodge?!”

It meant I had missed.

“Damn, she’s quick…!”

Just as I was hurriedly turning my head to confirm Belita’s figure.

“No! Hilde! Look there! That’s escaping!”

Amy shouted, pointing in the direction the wagon had fled.

“What?! At this point?”

When I quickly turned my head to look in that direction… indeed.

The red-haired vicious criminal woman, who until just now had been ready to fight to the death, was now running away hard with her back turned to us.

She was so quick that the distance had already widened to about seventy meters.

“Where do you think you’re going! Stop right there!”

“You slow bastards! Do you think you can catch me? See you later!”

Belita was moving away in an instant, without even needing to be chased.

She wasn’t just running with her two legs, but seemed to be leaping forward using the rebound from striking the ground with her left hand, making her bouncing speed as fast as lightning.

Each time she did so, pieces of metal presumed to be pauldrons and gauntlets would fly up, suggesting that she was willing to injure her left arm as well…

Anyway, it wasn’t a speed we could pursue.

“…We lost her.”

Friede gritted her teeth with a face that looked like she was about to go crazy with regret.

“That, rabbit human? First time see beastkin.”

Kikel watched Belita’s escape with admiration, his hand raised to his brow, asking if that was the beastkin race he had only heard about.

“What a shame… But, what happens to our compensation in this case?”

Amy sighed as if disappointed, then suddenly turned to me and asked a question as if it had just occurred to her.

The client turned out to be a scammer and ran away, so the request is considered failed, and it looks like we won’t be able to receive Belita’s bounty either.

So doesn’t that mean we won’t get a single coin in the end, she said.

“Uh…”

I don’t know either.

If we explain the situation to the guild, we might be able to receive the basic compensation that was deposited as an advance payment…

But even then, it would only amount to a few silver coins. It would be impossible to receive the additional compensation that had been accumulating each time we defeated attackers.

That reward money probably wasn’t even deposited with the guild in the first place.

In other words, we ended up defeating all those many bandits without any compensation.

“―So, let’s try to at least get the basic compensation later.”

When I explained this to Amy, she shook her head with a deep sigh.

“Haah… Hey, Hilde. If it’s not too unpleasant, can I ask something? From now on… when choosing requests, could I choose them instead?”

Then, she asked if she could decide on the requests to take on instead of me from now on, saying that the requests I pick always seem to go to hell like dogs.

“…”

I had no words to refute.

“U-Um… ah, uh…! Ms. Hilde…? I-I’m sorry, but I also think that might not be not good, should I say…?”

Even Friede, who dislikes Amy, agreed with her opinion to the extent of carefully choosing her words over and over.

“Ah, of course! It’s not that there’s anything wrong with Ms. Hilde, but, but still…!”

“…Alright, let’s do that.”

In the end, I had no choice but to sigh and agree to their words.

Even I could see that the requests I’ve been picking lately have all had serious flaws.