Three knocks, hands on knees.
René looked down and saw those who were hiding in the small hut.
First, there were four adventurers who looked like bodyguards. Compared to the “Dragon’s Throat”, their equipment was obviously of a lower rank and less intimidating. They were either 2nd class Trainees or at best 3rd class Explorers.
The neat Warriors wearing armor similar to guards or knights were probably the private soldiers of the lord. According to the system of Ciel-Terra, a courtier had no domain and could not have knights under his command, but he could have his own private army as gatekeepers and bodyguards, but it wouldn’t be much in the way of competence.
By all appearances, the man who seemed to be a servant seemed to be … different from the battle butlers often seen in Japan’s two-dimensional worlds. He was probably here purely to provide assistance to the marquis.
What caught my eye was the elderly man dressed in luxurious clothes that didn’t fit in the ramshackle log hut. He was a court nobleman of Hilbert’s faction who had fled to Terra Kaine. Marquis Seebach, whose appearance matched the description left by Revenant Alastair.
And … another strange one.
A dark-haired, pretty maid with a somewhat oriental air about her. She was on all fours, her face covered in bruises, and although the reason was unknown, the circumstances suggested that she was in the middle of being beaten by the Marquis with firewood.
She looked almost human, but on her head were triangular beast ears covered with what looked like baby hair.
She looked up at René with amber eyes with narrowed black pupils.
–I felt some kind of very strong killing intent or hatred just now… Were those the feelings of this Catgirl?
Only the Catgirl (temporary name) had no fear toward René.
Her feelings toward René were closer to faith.
“W-why here…! It shouldn’t be within detectable distance! Surely, Marks said so!”
The Marquis exclaimed.
René had used a wide-area «Life Sensing» with a radius of about 2 or 3 km to clear out ambush soldiers and those hiding around the city.
Even though wide-area search magic was used to grasp the battle situation, it was not usual to use such a wide-area search in consideration of its cost performance. It was enough to use it only around the battlefield.
However, René was not a normal person. This level of magic consumption amounted to drawing a glass of water out of a bathtub filled to the brim. It was a consumption that could not be ignored, yet it left more than enough power to spare. As a result, René’s decision was reasonable, since she was able to find Marquis Seebach.
“Well, first of all, one material…”
René jumped down from the wreckage of the chimney and, ignoring the trembling Marquis, stabbed the magician to death.
The magicia, as well as the three vanguard adventurers and two private soldiers around him, were unable to react to the lightning-fast move.
It seemed that the magician was not so powerful after all. Even if they were killed, they could not be turned into undead. The magician also seemed to be of questionable ability, but even so, he was still a valuable source of lich material.
The magician who was pierced by the cursed red blade fell, and those around him were finally unified.
“Oooh, boys! Defeat that thing! Protect me! Work for your money!!”
The Marquis ranted and raved, but there was no way that René could be defeated by such a bunch of lame-ducks, and he probably knew that. He probably really wanted to buy time for himself to escape.
Well, if he thought he could buy time with just these guys, he was as naive as a fruit dipped in honey, and if he thought he could get away with just buying time, he was as naive as a cup of coffee with two dozen cubes of sugar shoved in it.
“Mmm, it’s impossible ahhh!!”
One of the adventurers, not wanting to be left as a pawn by the marquis, turned his back on René and ran away.
“W-Where are you going? How can I escape if you run away…!”
“I’m not going to chase you, so you can go ahead and run. The rest of the material doesn’t seem too good to let go.”
“”………… Yes?””
Not only the Marquis, but everyone there was stunned with gaping mouths.
“I’m just saying, I’m after the Marquis Seebach, and I don’t care about the others. If you insist on coming at me, I will politely welcome you and kill you, and you will serve me as the undead.”
They would just run away in the wind of cowardice, and killing them would not be of much benefit to either of them…
Killing such an opponent by herself was a heavy burden on René’s soul.
Because of “a certain reason”, if she committed too many atrocities at once, her actions would be constrained by her mental load.
There was a huge task waiting for her to slaughter the citizens and destroy the city, but she couldn’t afford to earn atrocity points at a place like this.
Of course, the enemy had no way of knowing this.
In their eyes, René’s behavior would have appeared arrogant and whimsical. And people who were afraid would run away if an escape route was made available to them.
“Run away! We can’t win like this!”
“I was only hired because you said I would be fighting zombies and skeletons!”
“We can’t fight a named opponent!”
Not only the hired adventurers, but also those who seemed to be the Marquis’ private soldiers, threw away their weapons and ran away.
They were running away from the city of Terra Kaine in the northern direction.
All that remained was the unmoving Marquis. A squire who was sitting on his back. And then there was the Catgirl (temporary name), who was staring at René with ecstatic eyes.
–I’ve been seeing some weird emotions since a while ago… What the…
“Gu, ku, ku, guuuuuuu!! …Buy time, Mialanze!”
Words of anguish that would make one spit out blood.
But René could not read any compassion in the heart of the Marquis for the Catgirl, Mialanze, for that matter.
He was simply regretting the loss of his property.
The Marquis’s order caused Mialanze, aka the Catgirl, to turn pale.
“Oh, no…!”
“You have beastly blood in you! Do something about it!!”
With a desperate look on her face, Mialanze pounced at René.
Things were very strange.
She attacked René even though she could not sense any hostility at all, which should arise when she attacked René.
–Only the body is moving on its own…? That collar, it has a strange magic …
Then she noticed. She was called Mialanze, and she began her attack on René the moment the Marquis called out to that strange magical artifact.
René easily evaded Mialanze’s attempt to tackle her and gently placed her head, which she held in her left hand, on top of her torso.
The adhesive force between the head and torso was about that of a large magnet. If she moved violently or received a slight shock, the head would roll off, but this was probably not a problem. The rest of the group would not even be able to land a single punch on René in Dullahan form, which excelled in close combat.
Then, with a leap, René closed the distance between her and the Marquis, who was about to turn on his heel to flee.
She swung the red blade lightly.
“Hmm? What is this, remote control? That collar looks like a magic item, but you’re controlling it with this? Sounds like an interesting item.”
“Hii…”
In René’s hand was a remote control equipped with a microphone that had a steampunk feel to it.
Along with the Marquis’s right hand gripping it.
“Hiiiii… Gyaaaaaaaaaa!!”
The Marquis screamed as blood spurted from the cut section of his right arm.
René had cut the Marquis’s hand and taken the remote control from him; he must not have even known what had happened.
“Ahhhh! Waaaaahhhhhh! Mialanze!!!”
The Marquis was already separated from the remote control.
However, the earlier order to ‘buy time’ still seemed to be in effect, and Mialanze was chasing after René.
Mialanze’s movements were full of gaps.
Although her physical ability seemed to be a little high, she seemed to have no knowledge of martial arts.
René ducked and dodged the amateurish attacks.
“… Th-that box! Please say ‘Cancel all orders’! Please!”
Mialanze shouted in desperation as she grabbed at René.
“Umm… ‘Cancel all orders’? Is that it?”
“Beeb!?”
The moment René announced the cancellation of the orders, Mialanze changed direction as if she had been repelled and leapt at the Marquis, clawing him across the face with her sharp claws.
“How dare you … do as you please now? I too am an avenger of my father and mother…!”
“Wait! Let’s talk about it! You were a helpless little girl with no power, and I fed you for ten years…”
“Shut up!!”
Pushing the Marquis down and mounting him, Mialanze raised her sharply pointed claws and thrust a hand sword into the Marquis’s chest.
Right hand, left hand, right hand, left hand, right hand…
“Gyaaaa! Uguha! Gohaa!”
“Think of it! You deserve at least three deaths! My father’s life! Mother’s life! And the humiliation I suffered! Now repent, repent, repent, and die for what you have done!”
The Marquis screamed as blood spurted from his mouth and chest in response to Mialanze’s attacks, whose eyes were glowing brightly.
René was completely abandoned.
“…Err… what’s the situation?”
“‘Rose Princess of Hellrage’. Thank you so much for saving me… My name is Mialanze. I have suffered from this man since I was a little girl, and have been his animal, deprived of my freedom by this collar, and toyed with by his never-ending humiliation.”
Mialanze stepped on the Marquis’ face, stood up, and bowed to her in a folded gesture. She looked splattered as her maid’s white apron and hands were stained with returned blood.
“Furthermore, I know this is an impolite request, but … please grant me the happiness of serving you.”
“Eh?”
René could not believe her ears.
How could anyone of all people ask René to serve under her?
René carefully probed Mialanze’s emotions.
There were no evil thoughts or selfishness. She was not trying to curry favor with René for her own benefit, but to devote her entire life to René, just as a religious monk would devote his entire life to God.
–I was just thinking I’d like to get some personnel, but this kind of thing is a bit of a turnoff… Maybe somewhere along the line, she’ll realize her ‘misunderstanding’ and wake up from her infatuation.
Needless to say, René was an avenger.
And it wasn’t something as simple as “target only a few people and leave the innocents alone”. If necessary for revenge, she would build a mountain of corpses the size of Mount Everest or a river of blood the size of the Nile.
No ordinary person would be able to follow René’s path. Somewhere along the way, they were bound to become disgusted and fearful of René’s actions, and rebel against her.
Well, there was a way of thinking that if something came up later, she could just get rid of them then, but she didn’t want to get into any troublesome situations if she could.
“Don’t do it. You have somewhere to go.”
“I have nowhere to go, and I have no place to return to.”
“If you follow me, you will never live or die properly. Shouldn’t you be looking for a place where you can live?”
“There is no place for me in a society that buys and sells me for gold coins just because I am me! Where you are is where I belong!!”
“I hope you don’t think I’m some kind of savior or something!? I’m just a revenge monster. All I do is kill, destroy, and annihilate. In the eyes of the world, I am a villain or a disaster! What makes you so excited to have faith in me? Do you want to believe in the Evil God and destroy the world!?”
“What is it that saved me? It was not the verdict of the government officials. Not the mercy of God and the temple! Was it not your fight, which you say is only for the sake of killing and destroying!”
Mialanze slammed her fist into the Marquis’s stomach. ‘Uoha.’, he shrieked.
“If this world is going to abandon me, then … it’s fine. I don’t want this world either. You are going to destroy this world according to the will of the Evil God, aren’t you? Please show me how it is done. And I want to be a part of your fight!”
Mialanze shouted, putting her hand on her chest.
René took a deep breath.
–Mialanze is also an avenger.
Unlike René, she was not killed.
But she was robbed of everything and denied the same.
She could either fight on with her resentment, or she could disappear with it. Mialanze stood at that crossroads.
And Mialanze did not have the same kind of power as René. She had no choice but to leave the fight to René.
René was beginning to think about whether she should take Mialanze into her service.
“Help me… can you fight?”
“Ah, um… it’s impossible for me right now, but…”
“Then what about infiltration or espionage?”
“I-I’m inexperienced… I can do general work as a servant…”
–Uh~mm…
René was somewhat at a loss to evaluate her.
Not just that she had no power, but that she was completely useless when it came to fighting.
“I can learn whatever I need to know for my work! So, please!”
“All right, all right. …I wonder if I could get some ghouls with Thief skills to train you…”
René was broken by Mialanze’s enthusiasm as she desperately insisted on her willingness.
At least she wouldn’t betray her. That would be good, she thought.
“Thank you!”
Mialanze, moved to the point of tears, groveled deeply and scratched the Marquis across the face.
“Well…, I’d like to take care of that guy too, so let’s just call it a day.”
“Yes!”
“Or is it too late for that?”
Looking down at the convulsing bloody thing, René tilted her head.
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