Chapter 8: Childhood Friend
The pioneer village is located about three kilometers from Soderholm Castle.
The road connecting the castle and the village has been maintained by the late Baron Ixel, and no wild dogs or wolves appear. Passing the three-way intersection of the road leading to the port and the road leading to the pioneer village, they saw the campsite of the mercenary band at the end of the field.
After passing by, they could see the camp of the mercenaries beyond the wilderness.
"It might be the campsite of the [Band of the Great Hawk of Salvation]."
"A blue flag with a sacred tree and a hawk on it... It's definitely the Great Hawk Band's campsite."
"Is it possible to know which corps it is by looking at the crest? I have to learn heraldry as well."
Otherwise, he's likely to expose his ignorance in social situations.
Christo is no longer a nobleman, but he is the "Hero of the North'' and a student at the prestigious Yggdrasil Holy Sword Academy. There is a possibility that he will be invited to a party in the royal capital, and participation in the dance party held for each event at Holy Sword Academy is compulsory.
It would be fine if Christo alone was embarrassed, but he couldn't afford to embarrass his partners, Melvina and Patricia.
"That's right. I don't think it's necessary to memorize the crests of the mercenary group one by one, but there is no loss in remembering the crests of the main nobles."
"At the Holy Sword Academy party venue, If I asked [Who are you?] and he was actually the eldest son of a count, it was very embarrassing."
"In that case, let's just laugh it off!"
"I can only imagine how pathetic that would be..."
"If only Patricia-sama is by your side, she will follow up each time. So it's fine."
"But if I were talking to other schoolmates, it would be a dead end."
"Please stay next to sister-in-law Patricia, Christo-san.”
"I guess so. Now that I think about it, what's going on with Patricia's friendships? It seems like I've never seen Patricia with someone other than the three idiots and you.――Ah."
He noticed something he shouldn't have noticed, and took a deep breath.
Patricia is beautiful and an excellent student, but maybe that's why.......
"And... I guess the next party will be for the new re-entry group."
"Or maybe it's a party to celebrate the martial arts competition between the three races proposed by Duke Leopoldo Salvatori!"
"I'll study some heraldry before then."
"That's right. That's a good idea."
This topic is not a good one.
So, Christo hurriedly started looking for another topic, but the awkward silence disappeared as the appearance of the village began to appear beyond the wilderness.
It's the pioneer village.
When had it been since?
The last time he and Gwendolyn had come here to hunt the werewolf, they had only seen the village in the distance and never approached it. The same was true when they were summoned from the monastery to Soderholm Castle to defeat Ixel.
For today, they will only go up the river behind the village to the spring, so they will not enter the village.
However, he felt nostalgic when he heard the voices of children and the cries of livestock coming from the village.
"Would you like to stop by the village?"
"Blaise-san, who had gone to mediate the food problem of the [Band of the Great Hawk of Salvation], had not returned yet. He is probably still struggling in the village. It would be better to stay away."
They walked along the road and detoured around the village.
There is a small hill in front of the village, but they kept their distance from the village by choosing the road on the front side across the hill.
They went around the hill and crossed a bank of farmland with black dirt dug in toward the forest. Then they stepped into a wooded area where oak and cedar trees grew.
In winter, it's a place where pigs graze, and in spring, it's a place where villagers come to pick wild grass and other things, but now it was deadly quiet.
It seems that it was well maintained until the previous winter, and it is incomparably easier to walk in than the area where he and Gwendolyn hunted the werewolf.
The dark orange sunlight slanted through the trees, which stretched skyward at equal intervals, and the Demon Christo's vision was more restricted than in the darkness. Christo and Melvina walked up a narrow river that split the thicket in two, and eventually came to a hut with beautiful blue paint.
It was one of several saunas in the pioneer village that Ixel had built and was open to all.
Travelers and peddlers visiting the pioneer village were instructed to use this sauna.
An incense burner to ward off monsters hung from the eaves of the building, but it appeared that no new incense had been put in, at least not this morning, and there was no scent or smoldering embers.
Of course, there is no sign of people in the sauna.
"From this position, even if you raise your voice, it won't reach the pioneer village..."
Melvina lowers her eyebrows.
"If it is a quiet night, the soldiers stationed in the pioneer village can hear you. The only thing I know is that I don't know if there are soldiers stationed in the pioneer village right now, and if they hear the screams, they won't be able to help you in time at this distance. If the defenders were as quick as Setanta or Gwendolyn, they would be able to get here in time......"
If there were people of their caliber to begin with, all the monsters in the area would have been hunted down.
"Sharp claw marks"
Melvina puts her hand on the trunk of an oak tree and narrows her eyes.
"It's a werewolf. The claw marks are less than five centimeters deep and about the height of my head. If it was a being that walked on fours, it would be a rather large being....... However, the tracks are old. There's no body hair on the ground, so it's been a long time since it passed through here."
"So there were werewolves here long ago. We're trying to get into a bathing suit in a place like that."
They came to the sauna on the spur of the moment, but it could have been a very dangerous choice.
Melvina put her hand under her chin.
"Now that we are here now if you don't mind me saying. A young couple who went into the forest to test their courage and never came back.”
"It's okay, it's okay, I'm with you. Don't worry, honey."
"Even the lines are corny! It's totally that one, isn't it? I'll be the first one to be sacrificed!"
Melvina who says so does not show any fear.
In Christo's plan, he was supposed to show his bravery by holding Melvina's shoulders, who was frightened by the monster's attack, but it was different from what he thought.
"Speaking of which, what happened to that self-defense saber you're always having?"
"I left it at home."
"Did you chip the blade?"
"No."
Melvina shook her head and looked sad.
"That thing was given to me by Onii-sama a long time ago. Sister-in-law told me to buy a new one, but I couldn’t throw it away…. When I realized it was like a relic of Onii-sama's, I couldn't take it out."
"Then you have to buy a new weapon."
"That's right. I want high-performance weapon at this point. I need to save up some money for that."
"Is that why you applied for a license to operate a stall?”
"Well, that's one of the reasons."
Melvina's weapon is fine, but Patricia's weapon must also be prepared.
Christo also thought about trying a stall.
The question is what he can expect to make money selling at the stall...... Since it is Patricia's weapon that he is buying, he should ask her about it when she comes over here. He thinks she might kick him and say that a stall can't possibly make any money.
(Hmm? Wait. Come to think of it, Patricia was good at drawing. How about selling the painting? It's not just a painting. It's a naughty painting. I can expect a certain amount of demand.)
He'd like to see Patricia's spring pictures more than sales.
(TN: "Shunga", literally “spring pictures”, is an erotic artistic tradition that emerged from early modern Japan, featuring graphic images of sexual activity.)
He'd love to see Patricia sell erotic paintings to noble customers.
He wants to penetrate Patricia from behind as she sells her erotic paintings!
"I might be a genius."
"Christo-san."
"Yes"
"Someone is coming"
"Eh?"
Melvina's words made him look toward the sauna, and he saw a small figure walking slowly toward them.
The figure grows larger and larger under the orange sunlight.
Christo squinted to see the figure, and sure enough, it was a woman with a familiar face.
"Ulrika"
× × ×
"……? …………! C-Christo!? Is it Christo!?"
The figure belongs to a woman in her early twenties.
As soon as the woman on the other side of the sunlight saw Christo's face, she lifted up her long skirt and came running with a rustling sound.
What appeared in front of Christo and Melvina was a young woman with black hair, dark eyes and freckles.
She wears a white hood, simple clothes in the color of autumn leaves, and a monster-repellent incense burner hanging from her waist belt.
She was carrying an empty basket.
"It's been a long time, Christo! How long has it been? You look as handsome as ever, I recognized you at once!"
"Hahaha, it seems you haven't changed your strange way of speaking. You are definitely [Ulrika the old hag]."
"Who's an old hag? You idiot."
"Um, Christo-san, who is this person?”
Melvina interrupts discreetly.
Christo pointed to the freckled woman.
"She's Ulrika. A girl who lives in the pioneer village ―― or is she too old to be a girl? She lives with her grandmother, an herbalist. Her old-fashioned way of speaking was influenced by her grandmother. Ulrika, this is Melvina Lou. This is my fiancé."
"Nice to meet you, Ulrika-san. My name is Melvina Lou."
"Fiance!"
Ulrika opened her black eyes.
"Christo got a wife! I didn't expect this! I'm so happy for you! Did you come back here to tell your father about it?"
"No"
Christo shook his head.
"Baron Ixel has been declared a heretic by the Church of the Holy Tree and has been defeated. Didn't you hear?"
"……Ah."
Ulrika lowered her eyebrows.
"I thought that story was just a rumor. I heard something about a change in the castle's leadership...... I'm sorry. That was insensitive of me."
"I don't mind. But you didn't know about the castle three kilometers away?"
"No....... Everyone said that Baron Ixel was a devil. So he was killed by the church's army. But Baron Ixel is a kind man. He gave my grandmother medicine for her back pain, and on cold winter days, he invited the villagers to his castle and served them food. Some people said that such a man could not be a devil. I believed them."
Ulrika looked up at Christo.
"I thought the rumors were false, now that you have returned."
"I'm not lying. I was the one who defeated Ixel."
"――――! I-I see......... I see...... I don't know what to say."
Ulrika is not beautiful and has a strange way of speaking, but she was a naive and kind girl.
It seemed that that part hadn't changed even after months and days had passed.
"Why is Ulrika-san in this forest?"
Melvina asked in an innocent tone when the air was heavy.
Ulrika seemed to want to change the subject, and answered in an unnaturally bright voice.
"I was out picking medicinal herbs!"
"Well, the basket seems empty for that......"
In addition, the basket had the good smell of baked wheat flour.
"Ah, t-this is."
She quickly hid the basket behind her back.
"...That's right. I went to pick medicinal herbs, but I can't find them at all."
"This forest is a dangerous zone. The village has been attacked by magical beasts recently, hasn't it? Don't you know that?"
"No, I know that. That's why I burn incense to repel the monsters."
"Better go back to the village."
When Christo said that, a loud male voice resounded from behind.
"Ullrika!"
"Ah... Pontus."
Ulrika says.
When Christo turned around, he saw a young man with a shaggy head coming toward them from the direction of the road.
Pontus.
Another name that Christo remembered.
"Ulrika! You're in the forest again... who are they?"
"It's Christo."
"Christo?"
The young man with a shaggy head comes closer to him.
After a moment, he opened his mouth.
"It's Christo."
"It's been a long time, Pontus."
Pontus, like Ulrika, was Christo's childhood friend.
The three of them used to play together until he went to the monastery.
Pontus liked Ulrika, who was kind and charming.
However, he has a rather shy personality, and only three people, including Christo, could be with Ulrika.
That doesn't seem to be the case now――.
"Christo, what are you here for? Didn't you go to the monastery?"
Pontus asks with a look of caution in his timid-looking eyes.
His eyes shifted to Melvina standing next to Christo.
Melvina grabs the edge of her skirt and gracefully bows.
She is wearing makeup, perfume, and fine clothes. Pontus blushed at the sight of this beautiful blonde girl with a hint of urbanity rarely seen in these parts, but when he glanced at Ulrika, she shook his head and frowned again.
"I'm currently attending the Yggdrasil Holy Sword Academy in the royal capital. I came here to introduce my fiance to my hometown."
"Eh... This person, is it your fiancé?"
"That's right."
"Nice to meet you, my name is Melvina Lou.”
Melvina smiled modestly, and Pontus frowned again.
Soon a look of jealousy comes over his face.
"I-Is that so? ……Congratulations."
"Thank you. What about you guys? As I recall, Pontus liked Ulrika....... Are you guys together?"
"――――" "――――"
At Christo's words, the two darkened their expressions and quickly turned their gaze away.
Is it a denial?
He doesn't know why, but it seems he shouldn't have asked this question.
"Ah, I'm sorry. I asked something unnecessary."
"No, don't worry about it."
"Did Pontus come to pick up Ulrika?"
"That's right"
Pontus crossed his thick arms that seemed to have been forged through farm work.
"She's going into the woods, even though I told her it was dangerous."
"No, I was just picking medicinal herbs. This morning, a man from the castle came and told Grandmother that they needed some medicinal herbs."
"Where's the herb? Isn't the basket empty?"
"That's... I couldn't find any medicinal herbs."
"Stop lying!"
Pontus slipped past Christo and approached Ulrika.
"That person...... did you go to see him?”
"N-no..."
"Don't lie to me. I know you've been sneaking out to see him. If you don't tell me the truth, I'll tell the whole village."
"D-don't!"
Ulrika screamed.
Pontus flinched.
Ulrika raised her brows and glared at Pontus, pushing his chest away with her shoulder.
As it is, she went in the direction of the road with rough steps.
"Ah, hey, Ulrika! ......Damn it. Hey, Christo. I know you're on a trip with your fiancé, but don't go into the forest. There are monsters out there and it's dangerous."
"I know"
"You know that and you want to take a girl into the forest!"
Pontus is very upset.
From Christo's point of view, it was nothing more than an extra help, but Pontus doesn't know that Christo is a powerful demon.
If a castle-bred lad was about to enter the forest with a girl to test their courage, it was a natural reaction to get angry at the stupidity.
"Are you still acting stupid at that age? It's fine for you to die foolishly, but that girl will become a monster's food without knowing anything! Don't drag your fiancé into your foolishness."
"I’m sorry. I understand ......let's get back, Melvina."
"That's right. I enjoyed the walk."
"Hurry back. If you're going to come to the village, stop that too."
"Why?"
"An army went there. They were hired by the people of the castle to subjugate the monsters or something. But they've been arguing with the village chief since this morning. They are asking for food. If we give food to such a large group of mercenaries, the village will dry up just after the winter."
"That's tough."
"That's right, no, you're a noble, aren't you? If you're a noble, wouldn't you be able to turn away the people who have come to the village?"
"I'm no longer a noble. When Ixel died, I didn't take over his position. All the wealth and territory were taken away by Frontier Count Netzel."
"This is no time for carefree travel!"
Pontus grabbed Christo by the shoulder.
"You're kidding. Then what are you going to do now? Where is your house?"
"The house is in royal capital. I'm renting a room. I honestly don't know about my future life. After I graduate from the academy, I'll have to do my best to somehow make ends meet and eat. If I can't do that, I'll either end up on the street or Melvina's pimp."
"Don’t say things like being a pimp in front of your fiancé!”
"Isn't it fine with me? Rather than that, is the village in a crisis situation?"
"More importantly, you..."
Pontus sighed.
"Worry about yourself rather than the village."
"That's true, too. Well, it's going to be hard, but do your best."
"You too"
Pontus turned back and walked away.
Christo and Melvina watched his back,
"Now the distraction is gone." "Well, let's go to the sauna."
Christo and Melvina said at almost the same time.
"Oops."
"Ara... fufufu"
Recently, he gets along well with Melvina.
He doesn't know if it's just that she's adjusting to him or something.
"It seems that monsters will appear and it's dangerous."
"I'm sure that Christo-san will protect me, right? Then I'm sure I'll be fine."
"Do you trust me, or do you not know the fear of monsters?"
"I’m sure it’s both. And while we're at it, it would be nice if we could get some ingredients for dinner tonight."
Melvina said and walked lightly to the sauna.
Christo set up a rune magic that automatically fired [light arrows] in the area around the sauna and followed her. He was more worried about accidentally killing a villager than a monster.
× × ×
At midnight, Christo was holed up in Ixel's study room again today, sorting through paperwork.
But today he wasn't alone, Melvina was with him.
Administrator Caspar is still asleep.
Yattrud's body in the dungeon was recovered by the people of the Adventurers' Guild.
The castle building is guarded by three adventurers, one of the few C-class equivalent adventurers.
One of them is Laira, a woman he had met at the port and had known since his days at the monastery.
Christo thought that, although there had been some trouble with Yattrud, the trip had been safe and secure so far.
"Christo-san, these documents over here are in this file, aren't they?"
"Yeah"
Melvina, who tied her glamorous blond hair with a dry leaf-colored ribbon, briskly put together the documents. She was a great help where Christo alone would have gotten bored halfway through and tossed it aside.
More than just being skillful herself, Christo's ability to worry about Melvina's eyes and not being lazy led to a dramatic improvement in work efficiency.
"The old man seems to have loved that pioneer village.”
Christo muttered as he checked the detailed account book.
"It didn't matter if they were demons or people. When the villagers were hungry, he helped them, and when they were happy with a good harvest, he was happy too. For the old man, the pioneer village was like a son."
It was a form of coexistence.
Humans are ruled by a demon with superior brains.
But that's what vampires have been doing since prehistoric times.
Vampires controlled and ruled humans.
It was another way of coexistence.
If there is a difference, whether there is freedom on the human side.
In the pioneer villages of Ixel, self-determination and a certain degree of self-rule were possible. In contrast, humans in the ancient "Night Empire" were nothing more than talking livestock.
However, there must have been some people who felt comfortable with being managed.
They did not have to think about anything difficult, and if they had a problem, they could usually solve it by relying on a vampire with strong powers.
If everyone has his or her own standard of happiness, it would be arrogant and presumptuous to judge the ancient human race as unhappy people.
"Cristo-san, can I have a minute?"
As Christo was reading from the village records about Ixel's nation-building efforts, Melvina, who had been filing the documents, looked up.
"What's up?"
"In that pioneer village, one to three babies always die every year."
"What about it? A frail baby would be the one to die."
"Baron Ixel cures sick babies with magic. Or gives them elixirs to save them from death. But for the one to three babies who die each year, there is no record of any cure or elixir that alleviates their symptoms."
As a demon, Ixel does not make mistakes in his bookkeeping.
It is not that he forgot to record it, but he didn't dare.
Or, he did not save the babies.
They left them to die.
"Hmm... Maybe they threw them in the forest because they didn't have anything to eat. Baron Ixel tolerated it. Maybe that's why he didn't help them. In a village of potatoes and beer, it's no wonder they're so hungry."
"The only people who subsist on potatoes and beer are Blaise-san and the other people in the administration. The village is quite wealthy. The forests are full of acorns, fruits, rabbits and deer. Even if they can't have a drinking fountain, the yield from an acre of land is one and a half times what the average village produces."
"The taxes are so heavy that they don't leave any money on hand. If you look at the books, you will see that the tax collectors are embezzling all the money."
"If you believe the numbers in the ledger, then maybe so. But even so, both Ulrika and Pontus were very fair and their clothes were simple but beautiful. They seem too well nourished and their clothes too new for having barely made it through the winter after the heavy taxation that lasted until March―― the beginning of last month."
"――――"
Christo got up from the sofa.
"Are you saying the villagers weren't starving?"
"No, I think there was some hunger. Because of the long winter period, they can't sow seeds twice, and they don't seem to have the agricultural technology to dig up the wet, heavy soil. But at least they don't seem to be so impoverished that they have to abandon their babies every year, who can be an important source of labor."
"...One baby died last year. The harvest is... enough to feed fifty-eight families."
"Three years ago, three babies died. The harvest is enough to feed ninety families. In addition, there are seventeen families living in the village."
Christo frowned.
"The harvest is higher in the year when three babies died than in the year when one baby died...... hmm."
"Isn’t it possible that Baron Ixel used black magic to increase the harvest in exchange for the baby’s life?"
"Such magic exists, but it is kept secret by the native gods. Giving magic that acts on the land itself, such as tampering with the yield of the land, means handing over complete control of the land. I don't know when the devil took Ixel's place, but I don't think the native gods would have given such authority to Baron Ixel, a newcomer of a few decades or so."
"Native gods...? Do gods exist?"
"A very philosophical question. I don't know if they are gods or not, but old beings who ruled the land and were worshipped as gods exist everywhere in this world. Though their presence is becoming less and less as the ashes of the holy tree are scattered and beliefs die out."
Christo thought for a moment, then picked up one side of the desk in the study room.
"Let's lift this desk and move it."
"What are you doing out of the blue?"
"There is a hidden door underneath. I didn't notice it before, but after going up and down the stairs a few times, I found out that there is a small room hidden under here in the structure of the building."
"Yes!?"
It was easy to figure out by using a devil's ability to grasp space (Christo didn't notice it at first).
After he and Melvina moved the desk away, Christo removed the floorboard and pulled the rope of the mechanical device.
Then there was a loud noise, and the stone under the floorboards tilted, transforming into a staircase.
"Uooohh! It's amazing!"
"Uooohh, huh, that's..."
"Uoooohh!"
(Cute)
When the stone staircase was all the way down, Christo peeled off every remaining board.
" ᚲ "
Christo's chanting causes the rune stones to light up like bright torches and float away.
The hidden room was extremely small, only big enough for two adults.
It may have originally been temporary food storage.
Shelves that could hold bottles of preserved food surrounded the four sides of the small room.
"It seems that Baron Ixel, the devil, has made some sort of pact with an old native god."
Amidst the mysterious treasure chests and magic book, Christo pulled out a dusty book.
It had a black cover, and in Ixel's old-fashioned handwriting, he had written, "Record of the Contract with the God of the Swamp.".
"God of the swamp?"
"I think Laira mentioned that there is a forest ahead, north of the pioneer village. I heard there's a vast swampy area. I've never been there, but I've heard Baron Ixel talk about it."
Christo continued.
"At that time, the old man may have already been taken over by the devil. So, the devil who took the place of the old man went to the swamp to make a contract with the god to rule this land. Maybe. That's why he knew that there was a swamp beyond the forest."
"[The fact that you are holding this book in your hand means that I must be gone from this land by now. I think it was either an unfortunate accident or something else I had to do that caused me to throw away what I had started]."
Melvina reads the beginning of the book.
"[That village is a precious village that I have built with great care. I hope you will take good care of it and help it grow. For the sake of that village, for the sake of the land as a whole, and for the sake of yourself, the new ruler.]"
"[The old god lives in the marshes beyond the forest to the north, where the miasma fills the air. I leave this record here so that you may get along well with the old god]."
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