Chapter 27 : Chapter 27
Chapter 27
After successfully plundering the Centaur Merchant Guild, Ian entrusted the handling of the food and slaves to the Golden Goblin Merchant Guild and returned to Failsafe with his secret weapon.
“Excuse me, Young Lord, I don’t think I’ll be of any help!
I’m weak and have no talent!”
The meticulously prepared secret weapon had many complaints, but Ian didn't pay them much mind.
In fact, he had felt a little sorry at first, but after seeing Rick chanting the exorcism prayer all the way here, even his last shred of conscience disappeared.
“Don’t worry, Rick.
Today, you just need to do what you do best.”
At Ian’s nonchalant words, Rick shouted confidently, as if he had finally found a way out.
“My boss tells me every day!
Not a single day!
He always tells me!
I’m not good at anything!”
“……”
The twenty-plus members of the Black Noble Order stared at him in disbelief, but Rick was a man who could throw away his pride without a second thought for the sake of his life.
“I’m really useless!
I guarantee it!”
As Rick thumped his chest, Ian placed a hand on his shoulder.
“No, Rick.
Everyone has their own precious value and talent.
You just haven’t realized it yet, but you have an immense talent.”
Rick stared at Ian with wide eyes, as if wondering what kind of nonsense he was hearing for the first time in his life.
“I believe in you.”
With those words, Ian walked towards Lina and Reina, and Rick’s eyes, watching his back, trembled faintly.
It seemed the Young Lord of the Moner family was well and truly mad.
* * *
“Does that kid really have talent?”
“Of course, an immense talent you can’t even imagine.”
Lina still looked at Rick, who had a foolish expression, with disbelief.
As the guild’s only worker, he was a man in whom it was hard to find any merits other than his fast feet and his ability to carry luggage well.
“Hmm… is that so?”
However, Lina, who knew well how ridiculously fast the Black Noble Order, which Ian had personally selected, was growing, had no choice but to believe Ian’s words.
Just as she couldn’t have imagined herself wielding a dagger just a month ago, she believed that Rick also had his own talent.
“Are the preparations complete?”
At Ian’s question, Lina took out a sack tied to her waist and showed it to him.
“Yes.
I’ve packed souvenirs with the emblems of the three domains’ knightly orders.
It seems they’re used as charms among the porters.”
“Good.
Let’s look forward to who comes next.
I hope they’re from the Lyt domain, if possible……”
As soon as Ian’s words ended, Puck, who had spotted an approaching merchant guild from a distance, ran over, waving her hands.
“Captain!
Captain!
A merchant guild is coming!
A turtle-shaped flag!”
“Volturtle?
It’s the Merchen domain.”
Ian, excited at the prospect of receiving new recruits, called for his secret weapon.
“Rick!”
“Yes, y-yes, Young Lord!”
Rick, who had been cautiously trying to escape at the sound of the approaching merchant guild, turned around like a cat with its paws raised and looked at Ian.
“Hah, where do you think you can run to from here?”
“Heh, heh… I can’t even use a sword, so I was just going to take refuge in a safe place first……”
Ian, seeing Rick reply with a foolish grin as if he had done nothing wrong, slowly pointed at the merchant guild.
“Go!
Rick!”
“Y-yes?!”
Thinking that the demon was finally going to kill him, Rick’s face turned pale.
* * *
“Y-you baaaastards!
Stop!”
Rick’s voice, which grated on the nerves despite not containing a single drop of mana, spread across the highway as if it were an assault.
“We are the infamous highway’s-”
Rick, with his eyes welling up as if he were about to cry, glanced at Lina once, then squeezed his eyes shut and shouted.
“…the bandits of the highway!
If you leave everything you have and get lost, we won’t kill you!”
His trembling voice and body were not threatening at all, but that wasn't what was important.
In banditry, momentum and voice were half the battle.
“Hand over what you have and get lost!”
Rick’s shout echoed loudly.
…….
And of course, it had no effect.
“What?
Is he crazy?”
“He says he’s a bandit.”
“Where are the mountains here?
Tsk.
He must have been abandoned here and lost his mind.”
Thierre, who was leading the Volt Merchant Guild, looked at the madman who had stopped his guild.
A gaunt body and a voice that grated on the nerves.
“They said the Centaur left in the morning.
Maybe he’s a straggler from there?”
“He doesn’t seem to be in a good condition, so let’s just go.
That’s what you get from Obsol.”
As they tried to ignore Rick and pass by, a flustered Rick shouted with all his might.
“If you want to live, surrender now!
Please!
We’ll put a hole in the thigh of anyone who’s still standing!”
At that desperate cry, the Black Noble Order, with their swords drawn, descended upon the Volt Merchant Guild.
* * *
“Kehehe… so you were a knight from the Obsol domain.”
Thierre let out a hollow laugh, feeling miserable at the thought that he had fallen into a trap.
“To pretend to be a stranded porter and ambush a merchant guild, a great strategy for a horse-lover’s head.”
To subdue them without killing a single porter, it was certainly an unexpected move.
Since there were so many victims, the return journey would be endlessly delayed, and the cowardly attack of the Obsol domain would only be known to the domain after several days.
The bigger problem was.
“Don’t tell me they know about our contract.”
The contract with the newly established Golden Goblin Merchant Guild.
The new merchant guild, which had purchased the food at nearly twice the price, had stuck to a single condition.
To deliver the goods on time, no matter what.
If they failed to deliver the goods on time, they would have to pay a penalty of ten times the amount.
At the time of the contract, he had thought that since they were a new merchant guild, they were unaware of the stability of Failsafe.
“They were aiming for this from the beginning.”
Anger was tinged in Thierre’s voice.
It would be difficult to get out of this alive, but the Merchen domain was not so lenient as to let the death of its child go unanswered.
They would pursue them to the end and repay this grief.
“Volturtle will not fall from something like this.”
As he spoke in a voice filled with solemnity, he heard that familiar grating voice.
“Aigoo, old man.
That’s why I told you to get down quickly!
There are always people who buy trouble for themselves.
Tsk.”
Rick, who had hidden himself as soon as the fight broke out, had somehow approached Thierre and was chattering away.
“So, huh?
Wouldn’t it have been nice if you had just gotten down when I asked you nicely, without getting your thigh stabbed?”
Along with his words, Rick, who was poking his thigh, continued with a mischievous tone.
“And you’re greatly mistaken, but we have no~ connection to the Obsol domain.
We’re just bandits, you know?”
“Are you going to look down on me until the end?!”
Thierre shouted with his veins bulging.
“Where would there be ruffians who would commit robbery in the Moner domain?!”
Startled by the shout, Rick sat down in front of Thierre and slapped his lips.
“Robbery!
We’re clearly bandits, so it’s banditry!”
Inside Rick’s robe as he said that, a brooch in the shape of a centaur shone faintly.
The brooch that Ian had given him as a gift was the symbol of the Centaur Knightly Order of the Obsol family.
“Y-y-you dare to insult me until the end…!”
“It’s really not!
We’re bandits!
Bandits!”
Rick stomped his feet as if he were dying of frustration, but Thierre’s voice, who had already turned his suspicion into conviction, sank coldly.
“It seems you have no intention of letting me live now that I have figured out your identity.
Just kill me.
My revenge will be taken by the Merchen domain.”
As Thierre bowed his head as if he had given up on life, Ian, who had been waiting, knocked him out by hitting him on the back of the head.
“Good work.”
Ian had asked Rick for only one thing.
To make Thierre believe that Ian’s group were bandits, no matter what.
“Young Lord, I told you!
I’m not good at this, you know?
I think he completely misunderstood, what should I do?
Should I wake him up once?
I’ll explain it to him again, step by step.”
Rick, who did not know Ian’s intentions, made a tearful face and expressed his regret, but a clear smile was on Ian’s lips.
“You really are special.”
It was clearly not a trait.
Rylae had said that Rick’s trait was an instinct to detect danger.
However, Rick’s unique way of speaking that grated on people’s nerves and his surprisingly high mission failure rate were undoubtedly shining talents.
“Hehe, that’s right, isn’t it?
The boss doesn’t know, but I’m actually good at the things she tells me to do.
When you go back, please tell my boss…”
Ian patted the shoulder of the chattering Rick and then went to find Reina.
It was time to end his short excursion and return to the castle.
* * *
CRASH!
“Where in the world is the Young Lord?!”
Vergil, the eldest son of the House of Count Sven, which guarded the front line of Front Hold, did not hide his surging anger.
The council of lords, which should have started in the morning, had not even begun by late evening.
The young lord, who was supposed to conduct the council of lords, had not even attended after several hours.
“I apologize.
The Young Lord left his seat so suddenly…”
“So isn’t that the role of the regent!”
As Sven, with a murderous face, berated him, the regent bowed his head and replied.
“I have told the servants to bring the young lord back as soon as possible, so please wait a little longer.”
Vergil, who had been raised as a warrior from the moment he was born, had not liked this suddenly held council of lords from the beginning.
‘How dare that madman!’
On the front lines, every second of every hour was a war.
While this council was in progress, those who had smiled and greeted him just yesterday might have become cold corpses.
The thought of spending this precious time so idly made his resentment unbearable.
“It’s been hours!
Where on earth is the young lord…!”
Just as the impatient Vergil was about to shout again, a giant sitting next to him opened his mouth.
“Let’s wait a little longer.”
As the voice, which exuded a presence as heavy as the giant’s body, spread, the noisy hall instantly became as quiet as a mouse.
“He hasn’t had his succession ceremony yet, but the Young Lord is the only blood relative of the Duke.
Show him the same respect as you would the Duke.”
The unbreakable shield of the Moner family.
At the words of Count Mogul, who was called the knight of the iron wall, he took a step back and suppressed his anger.
“As you know, Count Mogul, every moment on the front lines is a war.
Someone is dying even at this very moment.”
Mogul looked at the son of his friend, who was expressing his frustration by beating his chest.
It was not that he couldn't understand his feelings, as his comrades and subordinates on the battlefield would be on his mind.
“Who in the Moner family would not know the sacrifice of the great warriors?”
But this place was where the young lord would finally break out of his shell and reveal himself.
“Let’s have a lot of talks when the Young Lord arrives, child of Sven.”
After finishing his words, Mogul gripped his beloved axe.
The young lord, who had finally broken his silence and begun to move.
Mogul had no great expectations for the child who was burdened with the infamous reputation of a madman.
A pitiful child who was only bright in his childhood, and who had ruined his body and mind with alcohol and drugs that came with a bout of madness at some point.
As a loyal subject of the Duke, he had to dedicate his loyalty to that child and this domain.
So, this place was an important one to confirm which loyalty was heavier, that to the domain or to the Duke’s son.
If one was a poison that threatened the other, it was to be cut off here.
Mogul’s eyes, who had lightly gripped his beloved axe, shone coldly.