Chapter 39 : Chapter 39
Chapter 39
I did not inform anyone of the Dark Elves' joining.
I could not appoint a new vassal with the status of a young lord, nor did I want to advertise the asymmetric military power of the Dark Elves.
Instead, I sent a personal letter to Count Mogul, who was in charge of the garrison, ordering him to tighten the security of the western forest.
After that, I summoned all the members of the Black Noble Troop to give the Dark Elves their promised revenge.
“We're changing the plan starting today.”
Until now, the slave trader caravans had been attacked to supplement the Black Noble Troop's new members and the domain's manpower, but from now on, having obtained an outstanding military force, things would be different.
“Lina, how many active slave trader caravans are still left?”
“There are about five or six caravans active, with two or three from each domain.
We didn't touch the caravans that Rick told us to let go.”
Due to the month-long appearance of bandits, most of the slave trader caravans had stopped coming to the three domains.
The remaining caravans had either hired outstanding mercenaries or were accompanied by a few knights with the help of a nearby lord.
“Then let's start with Obsol first.”
Ian said, pointing to the map on the table.
“From now on, leave no room for mercy in your hands.
You have to fight with the mindset that if you don't kill, you will be killed.”
The very fact that they were still active in a domain where the Black Noble Troop, disguised as bandits, roamed meant that the strength of the remaining slave trader caravans was not to be underestimated.
Until now, I had let the merchants go alive as much as possible, but I could not maintain such a soft attitude forever.
As I spoke threateningly with that thought, Lina, standing next to me, asked with a worried face.
“Will it be possible with just us?
If there's a real knightly order hidden in the caravan, with just us……”
“It would be impossible if it were the entire knightly order.
But they don't have the luxury of dispatching the entire knightly order.”
After suspicion arose among the three domains, each domain had deployed most of its troops to the domain's borders.
“Among them, Obsol would have moved almost all of its knightly orders to be wary of Lyt on the left and Merchen on the right at the same time.
No matter how important the slave trader caravans are, they would have at most deployed a few knights.”
Besides, this side had a hidden card that the opponent could never prepare for.
“From now on, our goal is not to rescue more slaves, but to find the location of the elf hunters.”
To slave traders, elves were the most valuable goods that could bring them a fortune.
A caravan large enough to be still active would surely have a network with elf hunters.
“I'll say it again.
From now on, leave no room for mercy in your hands.
No one knows if the knights dispatched from the domain have disguised themselves as soldiers or merchants.”
I turned my head and met the eyes of each and every member of the gathered Black Noble Troop as I continued.
“Never let your guard down.
If you think it's going to be difficult, then just make it so there's no reason to be careless.
Don't feel any petty guilt for slave traders, and kill them when you can.
One or two guys leading the caravan are enough to get information from.”
With those words, Ian and the Black Noble Troop headed to Obsol for their usual banditry.
* * *
“Damn bandit bastards!”
The Obsol knight, Teiner, shouted, unable to contain his frustration.
“How many weeks has it been already!”
It had already been a month since he, a knight, had been living like a damn soldier, wearing leather armor.
In that time, the bandits, who were said to have appeared over a dozen times, had, as if by magic, not touched the caravan he was hiding in.
“I hate the camping, I hate the filthy slaves, I hate it all!
If I just see those bandit bastards!”
When he first received the order to protect the slave trader caravan, the other members of the knightly order had looked at him with envious eyes.
It would be much more fun to protect a slave trader caravan overflowing with toys that could be violated at will than to be on guard duty at the domain border, which was as good as a barren field.
“What toys.”
But the slave trader caravan he actually saw was completely different from what he had expected.
Since no village would welcome a slave trader caravan, they had no choice but to sleep outdoors as a matter of course, and the slaves who were not planned to be sold immediately were covered in filth and locked in iron cages, making it difficult to have any fun.
On the days they stayed in a village, the guild master would have a decent slave washed at least roughly and sent to his room, but other than those days, it was a succession of boring marches and camping, so his annoyance grew day by day.
“Don't you think the word might have gotten out somewhere?”
“I received the order just an hour or two before departure, so how could the bandits possibly know?”
He answered his junior's words coldly, but most of the knights thought that information was leaking from somewhere.
In the first place, there was a widespread rumor that it was not bandits who were attacking the slave trader caravans, but Lyt's scheme, so it was a natural suspicion.
“Stop talking nonsense and go tell the guild master that we'll go to the next village without a break.
If we go for another four hours, there's a village I know, so let's rest there and go.”
“Huh?
Really?!”
He seemed to be already relaxing at the thought of handing over a few slaves in his hometown and getting a good long rest.
“Yeah, you punk.
Hurry up and tell him, and tell him to pick out a few pretty-faced slaves separately.
I liked the one that came last time.”
His junior, whose lust was already boiling, laughed lecherously and quickly ran towards the guild master.
I smirked at the sight and was about to turn to tell the other knights the news when I saw a dark figure in the forest.
“What is that agai……”
The figures in black robes who approached in an instant did not say a single word and just took out black orbs from their bosoms and threw them.
A sight he had heard hundreds of times whenever he heard reports about the bandits.
The moment he thought that it was definitely those damn bandits he had been waiting for for the past month, the dagger of a man in a white mask who had approached at some point pierced his neck.
“K-krrk!”
He tried to shout with all his might to announce the enemy's attack, but only the sound of air escaping echoed from his pierced neck.
Teiner, unable to even close his wide-open eyes in disbelief, dropped his head.
* * *
“Drop your weapons and get down!
Anyone who moves will be killed!”
With Lina's clear shout as a start, the Black Noble Troop, spread out in all directions, quickly began to suppress them.
“Suppress them as quickly as possible!”
In the midst of it all, Ian, who had slit the throat of one soldier, did not stop.
He operated the Ghost Absorption Method to its maximum, found those with mana, approached them stealthily, and stabbed them with a dagger from behind.
Whether they were wearing the clothes of a worker or the attire of a merchant, if they had mana, he stabbed them with a dagger without asking a single question.
They could have been a merchant who had cultivated mana by chance for self-defense, or a porter who had obtained a fortunate encounter, but he did not care and continued to move his dagger.
“You bastards!
Keok!”
He stabbed the dagger into the back of a worker who had drawn his sword at some point, kicked him, and left the clean-up to a nearby member before continuing to move.
‘A total of 7 so far.’
Since he did not know how many knights there were, now, while the opponent was flustered, was the best chance to reduce the number of knights without any damage.
He took up a position behind a merchant who was looking left and right with a dazed expression at the slaughter happening all around, and slit his throat with a dagger.
‘8.’
The mercenaries and knights of the caravan, who had now grasped the situation, began to draw their weapons one by one, but the tide of the battle had already turned drastically.
It might have been different if they had been prepared for a surprise attack, but the knights, who were exhausted from the boring trade route that had continued for a month, were no match for the Black Noble Troop.
“Kuuugh!”
Only after killing 9 hidden knights did Ian stop and look around, searching for traces of mana.
A knight with a sword was not dangerous.
Two or three members of the Black Noble Troop would stick to a sword-wielding opponent and hunt the knight safely.
‘There must be someone hiding.’
Those who had hidden, realizing that the situation could not be reversed, or those who had hidden their identities from the beginning were the most dangerous.
A precious member of the Black Noble Troop could get hurt by approaching a surrendered merchant without a thought.
‘Huh?’
In that instant, Ian's eyes caught a single slave, standing far apart from the other slaves around.
A man in a cage made of iron bars, but unlike the other slaves, he was not wearing shackles.
He was hunched over with his body and head down as if he were terrified, but even at a glance, he had a physique more than twice the size of the other slaves.
And most importantly, the man had mana.
A huge amount of mana, close to the 4th class at that.
“Black Noble Troop!
Stop rescuing the slaves!”
As Ian shouted with mana, the Black Noble Troop in all directions repeated the same command and spread the order.
“Black Noble Troop!
Stop rescuing the slaves!”
And Puck, who was approaching to open the carriage where the man was trapped, also stopped with a repeated command and turned around.
The man's body twitched for a moment.
“You unlucky bastard.”
Ian said as he approached the carriage where the man was.
“Did you hide on purpose, knowing that we were rescuing the slaves?”
He looked around at the slaves who were prostrate and trembling, far away from the man.
“Or did you hide, pretending to be a slave to escape, thinking there was no chance of winning?”
Either way, he was a very cunning bastard.
The man did not even move and maintained his prostrate position even when Ian came right up to the carriage.
“You've already been found out, are you going to pretend you don't know until the end?”
As he asked, looking at the man in front of the carriage, he finally heard the voice of the man who was prostrate without even lifting his head.
“How did you know?”
Judging by his firm voice, which did not flinch even at the screams echoing from all around, he was clearly a skilled person.
“You don't need to know.”
If Ian had not been here, the Black Noble Troop would have rescued the slave without much suspicion.
The man would have either escaped on the way to Moner or infiltrated Moner to gather information.
The fact that Moner was behind the attack would have been exposed.
“To think I'd see Troy in this world.”
It was a plan that could not fail.
If it were not for Ian, who had acquired the secret art of a hero who was called the Ghost King , not only the Black Noble Troop but even the rangers would have been completely fooled.
The man who finally lifted his head looked at Ian and got up.
“A pity.
It was a golden opportunity to identify your backers.”
The man, who stood proudly with his chest puffed out, gave a slight nod as if in greeting and said.
“I am the proud knight of the great Obsol domain, Teion……”
“Yeah.
I'm not interested.”
Ian called Lina and Reina before the man could finish his words.
“Y-you coward!”
Teion, who saw Lina and Reina surrounding the carriage as if to encircle it, glared at Ian and shouted, but Ian just picked his ear and said.
“Hey, there's no such thing as a coward in war, just smart.”
* * *
After the vice-captain of the Centaur, who could not even leave his name behind, lost his life in vain, the merchant guild collapsed much more helplessly than expected.
“Now, I'll give you just one chance.”
Ian asked, grabbing the guild master's hair.
“By any chance, do you know where the elf hunters who were targeting the western forest recently are?”
“I-I!”
Before the guild master could say anything, Ian's dagger pierced the guild master's hand and was embedded in the ground.
“Aaargh!”
“Think carefully.
A person only has one life.”
“Please, please……”
The guild master looked at Ian in the white mask with vacant eyes, shedding endless tears.
“I, I don't kno……”
Just before the guild master could say he did not know, Lina, who had finished cleaning up the remnants, approached with Reina, who was smiling happily, covered in blood.
“It's all cleaned up.
Unfortunately, no one knew about the elf hunters, so we killed them all.”
“Good work.”
As soon as Lina, who had glanced at the guild master, turned around, Ian raised his dagger high.
“Aaaah!
Obsol!
They're in Obsol!”
The guild master, who had instinctively felt that the dagger would aim for his neck, prostrated himself and shouted, covering his neck with both hands.
“Obsol?”
“Yes!
Yes!
About two months ago, I was contacted.
They said they were planning to hunt Dark Elves and to come to the Obsol Lord's Castle if I was interested!”
“Ha… the Lord's Castle?”
“Yes, yes!
They were bragging so much that the lord himself had invited them!”
Ian, who had obtained unexpected information, had a satisfied smile as he moved his hand.
Stab!
“Wh-why……”
The guild master, who was clutching the dagger embedded in his neck as if he could not believe it, looked at Ian.
“Just because I don't like you.”
It was obvious that once the fact that the Black Noble Troop had attacked was known, the security of the other caravans would become even tighter.
He had no intention of letting the slave trader caravan's guild master live in the first place.
“Good work.”
As soon as he wiped the blood off his dagger, Reina, who had been waiting, approached and handed him a towel.
“No, you should wipe yourself first, Reina……”
As I took the pure white towel handed to me by her, who was still covered in blood, and said a word, Reina smiled brightly and said.
“I only brought one towel.
I'll be more careful next time.”
I was sure I had seen six or seven towels in the carriage before we left, but I did not bother to point it out and smiled back at Reina.
“Good work, Reina.”
Now it was time to hunt the hunters who had dared to invade Moner.