NOVEL WEB EP.48
The sight of Southport was impressive in a different way.
To put it in modern terms, there were pillar-like structures resembling five or six-story apartments standing in a row, each adorned with several steps and windows.
With such columns sprawling over a wide area, you might wonder why it didn’t evoke pure admiration, right?
“It’s strange.”
“Indeed.”
No matter how you looked at it, the craftsmanship was rather shabby.
Of course, I knew there could be issues with the technology. If Osodox had been around for hundreds of years, Southport must have also been quite old.
At the very least, it had to be over a century old. Such scale cannot be constructed in just a day or two.
However, even accounting for that, something felt off. It was as if it had been built with rudimentary tools far older than what they were claiming. Though, not every structure looked that way; some pillars and a few constructions were somewhat well-maintained.
“This doesn’t seem like it’s just a hundred years old.”
“You have a good eye.”
Mia returned after stashing the corpses out of sight, answering my question.
“I’m not originally from here, so I can’t say for sure, but I suspect Southport was established around the same time as Osodox.”
“That’s… surprising.”
Maria also appeared astonished.
A city as old as Osodox? How on earth did such a place fall into being a den of criminals?
With this scale, even if countless criminal organizations were hiding out from Osodox, it could be written off as just a slum developing in a few areas. Unless it was the kind of organization that boasted thousands of members.
It seemed Mia was speculating about such questions too.
“There are several organizations, but even if you add up their members, it might just exceed a thousand. However…”
“However?”
Mia pointed towards the passage we had just traversed.
“The routes to supply goods have all been taken over by these organizations, so whether they like it or not, the people here must comply with them.”
…That’s wicked.
After all, cities are places of consumption, not production. All the production happening in a city comes from processing supplies brought in from outside; they don’t create something from nothing within the city itself.
Yet, when you think about it, Southport was isolated with no backers. At that scale, even if they couldn’t sustain it from the surface, it could house populations numbering ten thousand at the very least. Considering it’s underground, I’d wager it’s likely less than that, maybe about half.
The issue is, even with five thousand residents, the volume of supplies consumed wouldn’t be small.
Ultimately, the ones in control of the passage were destined to be the strongest players.
“Well, now we have another reason to subjugate the organizations.”
For the sake of these thousands of people, we absolutely needed to fulfill the Holy Kingdom’s request.
With that declared, we pulled out all the supplies we had prepared above. We flipped our hoods up and swapped our masks. It seemed necessary since toxic substances occasionally flowed around here.
“Ugh.”
“What’s that smell…?”
The moment Maria and I removed the anti-bad-smell masks we wore on the upper levels, we nearly vomited.
EP.48
Thanks to the quick change of masks, we rapidly blocked the smell again, but even that brief moment left a lingering, wretched aftertaste.
“Ugh.”
Maria, whose nausea had somewhat subsided, couldn’t hold it this time. I rushed over to her, slightly lifted her mask, and patted her back. I averted my gaze, but I couldn’t afford to cover my ears as I did so.
Finally calming down, Maria, perhaps feeling embarrassed, cast a spell to wipe away the traces of her earlier distress and take care of her hygiene. I had no idea why such spells existed, but she attempted to use one to replace perfume, only to be stopped at the last minute by Mia.
After gagging twice in such a short period, Maria’s energy was halved, but her determination only seemed to multiply.
“…I’ll make sure they all face the law’s judgment.”
“Right, let’s make sure of that…”
Maybe it was that I made her look bad in front of me—Maria’s hatred for criminals was flaring up.
“Lead the way.”
“Yes, please follow me closely.”
With Maria’s guidance, we began to move forward to fulfill our mission.
―――
The request we received was essentially divided into two stages.
The main goal was to subjugate the criminals hiding within the sewage system, but to be precise, this was the Holy Kingdom’s job. They weren’t asking us to do the subjugating ourselves; instead, they wanted us to find the way for them to do so.
Thus, the stages were also split into two.
One was to find the path. However, this had already been achieved. Of course, since bringing Mia on board resolved that issue, it felt a bit too swift.
That said, a single passage wouldn’t suffice for the Holy Kingdom’s subjugation operation. Since Mia acknowledged the existence of other passages, we needed to locate those as well. For now, that was our immediate objective.
So, what was the second task? The scene before us made it clear.
“Ugh! Ugh! Ugh!”
A man bound to the wall groaned with a gag in his mouth.
He was a criminal we caught on the way to Mia’s organization. A sort of biometric key, you could say.
If we removed his gag now, he’d definitely scream, so we had to secure a promise from him to keep quiet first.
“Cut off a finger; that should do the trick.”
“Huh? Huh?”
“I thought you weren’t planning on making noise?”
“Well, true, but…”
Mia was competent. Whenever I thought of something, she had ready-made responses at the ready.
However, the nature of that response was a bit too grim.
“Uh, wouldn’t cutting off a finger just make him yell more?”
“Here, the people will gladly give up a finger as long as they can save their own skin. If they’re sure you won’t kill them, they’ll do whatever you ask.”
Her line of reasoning and logic were undeniably sound. However, the solutions derived from that reasoning were just too brutal to implement.
“If you can’t do it, I will.”
“No, that’s not really it.”
Of course, I wasn’t incapable of such a thing. How many monsters had I sliced through? How many people had I guided to their deaths? Was one little finger too much to deal with?
I stole a glance at Maria.
What worried me was the impact my actions might have on her. She had a strong tendency to align herself with me. Of course, while she didn’t hesitate to override my will to achieve what she wanted, she did strive to adapt to my whims.
When we first met, she was a girl preoccupied with protecting herself and ensuring the safety of those around her. Yet here she was, directly confronting the empress in the capital, influenced by my declaration that there was no paradise to escape to.
If I were to show a disregard for human life in pursuit of my goals, Maria would likely adapt to that as well.
Sure, I refrained from killing those who merely threatened me or deserved to die, but without a clear standard of judgment, my criteria would inevitably waver.
As I looked at her, Maria tilted her head slightly, expressing her curiosity about my thoughts. Meanwhile, she was skillfully using silence magic to ensure the situation remained contained.
I gave her a slight smile before returning my gaze to Mia.
“I’ll do it differently.”
“…As you wish.”
Mia seemed a bit dissatisfied, her eyebrows twitching for a moment, but she quickly returned to her usual expression. If it hadn’t been for me, I might not have caught that rapid shift. It seemed she had a firm stubbornness in this regard.
However, my method wasn’t exactly virtuous either.
I just wouldn’t touch any limbs.
“Water Ball.”
I cast a first-tier spell. Since it was within the spellcaster’s realm, anyone sensitive to magic could use it, as long as they followed the correct incantation method, even if they couldn’t manipulate mana directly.
With a drop of water floating above my finger, I placed the bad-smell-blocking mask on the prisoner’s face.
Then, I let a droplet fall on top.
“Ugh!”
“…Huh?”
Mia probably hadn’t seen anything like it before.
According to her, this place lacked mages, but that seemed highly unlikely. She probably just hadn’t encountered any mage-level figures because she wasn’t a core member of the organization. Every criminal organization worth its salt had at least a mage or, at the very least, a magic user.
But since they wouldn’t have had the need to go outside, it was unlikely Maria had ever witnessed such a scene before.
“Water Ball.”
I created another water ball and let it drop on the mask.
“Hmm, is this enough?”
Then, I received the mask from Maria and adjusted it, adding yet another droplet of the water ball.
It appeared that resources here were scarce, and they tortured by inflicting pain directly, but the world was vast. There were many diverse methods of torture as well.
And this was my choice.
Water always held the answer.
In English, it was ‘Bogle.’