Chapter 1045: There Are Sea Creatures in the Sea (10)

“How dare they. These bastards are unforgivable.”

Qing lifted her foot at once.

Just before that flimsy kitchen door could be blown apart with a single kick, the foot she had started to drive forward stopped dead.

Wait. But was kicking the door in really the right move here?

To sum it up, astonishingly enough, these bastards were cannibals. Then again, now that she thought about it, maybe it was not all that astonishing, but still.

And judging by the line, Is that bastard still alive? there might already be at least one victim besides their group—someone they had already caught and were keeping around as emergency rations, or preserved food.

But if she went in right now and started questioning them—

If these cannibal bastards simply denied it and said she had heard wrong, what could she really do?

Searching the whole village would be difficult, and if they disposed of the evidence first, could she guarantee the life of whoever had already been captured?

In that case, would it not make more sense to pretend not to know for now and rescue the captive first?

At that, Qing reined in her killing intent and turned away.

One step. Two.

Then she paused.

Come to think of it, why bother?

She could just beat them until they talked.

How much grit could a couple of backwater cannibals possibly have? One good hit and they would be crying rivers and spilling everything they knew out of their mouths.

And the timing was perfect. Rain was pouring down in sheets. Even if there was noise, the sound of the storm would swallow it.

There was a saying that on rainy days, you could beat someone hard enough to knock the dust out of them. Qing liked that saying very much...

Qing turned and walked into the kitchen.

The two villagers saw her, gasped, and then, apparently so startled they had gone blank, simply stood there with their mouths hanging open, staring at her without saying a word.

“...” “...” “...”

The two villagers stared at Qing in stunned confusion, while Qing held a heavy silence.

Only the sound of the rain filled the space for a moment.

Then the two villagers abruptly shifted their manner.

“Ah—what a fright. It’s our guest. You’re up early?”

“Uh, are you hungry, by any chance? Just wait a little, and we’ll boil you up some scorched-rice porridge.”

They were pretending to be calm, but they could not meet her eyes. The way they kept sneaking glances at her face was suspicious beyond belief.

Qing turned and slid the kitchen bolt shut.

If she could have done it with a stylish click-click-click timed to Manners maketh man, that would have been nice, but unfortunately kitchens in the Central Plains were not places secured well enough to warrant triple locking, so quiet and simple would have to do.

“Guest?”

“Why are you locking the kitchen door...?”

Qing turned back with a bright smile.

But for some reason, that smile carried a vicious air as she spoke in a gentle voice.

“I happened to pass by out front and overheard what you two were saying. It was some extraordinarily vicious talk, so I think I’ll need to hear the whole story.”

“What are you talking about? Uh, hey, um, what did we say?”

“Yeah. What did we say?”

These bastards were going to deny it?

Qing let her hand slide toward her waist—ah, right, she had not come out wearing a sword.

So, as if that had been the plan from the start, she planted a hand on her hip.

Okay. That looked natural enough, right?

Then she shifted her weight onto one leg and stood there.

“Funny. Because when I walked in, you both looked awfully startled.”

“Well, that was because you’re just too beautiful, miss. I thought a fairy had descended from heaven.”

Qing had come to the kitchen in the first place because she woke up hungry and wondered if there was anything to eat.

To claim that they had seen her bare face without the face veil and been so overwhelmed by how pretty she was that they froze on the spot—even to Qing, it sounded like a rather pathetic excuse.

“I distinctly heard talk about catching something today, when to kill it, wanting to taste the meat, and things like that.”

At that, the two villagers both went, “Ah.”

“Oh, that! I thought it was something serious.”

“Oh, guest. We were talking about a pig. A pig.”

“We were going to roast a whole pig for you guests. We wanted to prepare it in secret, but looks like the surprise is ruined now.”

These bastards had read Romance of the Three Kingdoms.

Well, for people in the Central Plains, it was not so much that everyone had read it—many could not read at all—but there was hardly anyone who had not at least heard the stories.

There was a story in Romance of the Three Kingdoms involving the slaughter of a pig: the incident of Lü Boshe.

After Cao Cao failed in his attempt to assassinate Dong Zhuo and fled, he stopped at the house of a man named Lü Boshe to rest for the night.

Then, in the middle of the night, he heard the servants whispering among themselves.

Cut his throat.

No, beat him to death.

Were they not conspiring over how to kill him?

Enraged, Cao Cao went on a massacre.

Only afterward did he discover that there had been a pig tied up there.

Only then did Cao Cao realize he had misunderstood.

But what could he do? The deed was already done.

Hey, sorry, I got the wrong idea and slaughtered your whole family. It was not as though they would graciously accept an apology. If anything, they would become mortal enemies and come after him, would they not?

So, since he had already killed people, he decided he might as well kill everyone.

That was the story of Cao Cao and Lü Boshe.

And now these cannibal bastards were borrowing that exact story and trying to claim it was all a misunderstanding—that they had only been talking about slaughtering a pig for their guests.

“I see. Fine, let’s say that’s true. Then what does slaughtering a pig have to do with when our group leaves? If the downpour means we can’t leave yet, what reason would there be to delay slaughtering it?”

“Th-that—” “Well, that—”

Their tongues seemed tied. They just rolled their eyes around and mumbled.

Then, about five beats too late, both of them went, “Ah!”

“W-we were going to serve it at your farewell feast when you left...”

“Yes! Exactly! That’s it!”

It was the kind of agreement that would have been better left unsaid.

“All right. Let’s say that too. Then what about ‘that bastard’? You were saying some pretty vicious things about whether to kill him or not.”

“Hk.” “Hk!”

The two villagers looked openly startled.

“W-w-w-w-what are you talking about? What was it I said—something like, do we really need to keep that bastard alive? Shouldn’t we just kill him and bury him already?”

At that, one villager let out a long sigh.

Then he whirled and smacked the other one across the back.

SMACK!

“You idiot. I knew from the moment you started flapping your mouth without thinking. Always yap yap yapping.”

“No, it’s just, I was only curious...”

So this was it. Were they finally showing their true colors?

But what were they counting on? Had they looked at her—a woman alone—and figured they could handle her somehow?

Unfortunately for them, she was the strongest one in the entire party.

The moment Qing’s eyes narrowed, one of the villagers dropped heavily to his knees.

A cold smile spread across Qing’s face.

Ah. So this was the angle they were taking?

“Guest, forgive us. The truth is, not long ago we captured one of the Japanese pirates—”

“Ha. Begging won’t help. You bastards are going to release him at once, and—”

Qing and the villager spoke over one another.

“What?” / “Huh?”

The mismatch of context left both of them with stupid expressions.

More precisely, Qing was the one who looked stupid.

Japanese pirates? What was this all of a sudden?

“What are you talking about? Japanese pirates?”

“Well, a few days ago some Japanese pirates attacked us, didn’t they? But we had traps, and we’re good with bows, so somehow we managed to hold them off and even captured one alive. That one looked like a pretty important man among the Japanese, so we kept him alive for the time being...”

“Why? Couldn’t you just kill him and bury him?”

“Well, if he really is important, then wouldn’t those Japanese bastards come looking for him? And when they do, if we’ve got a hostage, maybe we can somehow avoid being slaughtered...”

So they had kept him alive to use as a meat shield later if the Japanese came back.

“Wait. Then...”

Suddenly, everything clicked neatly into place inside Qing’s head.

The villagers had been trembling in fear that Japanese pirates might descend on them, and then her group happened to arrive.

The carriage was expensive, and several of them wore swords. To villagers like these, they must have looked like very capable martial artists.

At a time when the threat of Japanese pirates hung over them, Qing’s party had appeared like a single ray of hope, a lifeline dropped down from above. Naturally, the villagers had wanted to win their favor somehow and place them under an obligation.

Why, the heroes in chivalric tales were always the sort to draw their swords gladly over a single bowl of cold rice.

Of course, the only people naïve enough to believe such tales entirely were children, or a very small number of fools.

So that excessive kindness had probably been their attempt to put Qing’s group in their debt.

That had to be where all that suspiciously eager hospitality came from.

“Wait. Then putting off slaughtering the pig too...?”

“Well, if you said you were leaving, we were going to slaughter it and drain the blood, and then beg you to at least stay long enough to eat before going...”

Because if the guests who might defend the village against Japanese pirates left too soon, that would be a disaster. It had been their own little scheme to keep them around as long as possible.

“And if the Japanese pirates never showed up even after we ate the pig?”

“Well, then... honestly, all we could do was tell you the truth and beg for forgiveness...”

“Hm.”

At that, the villager threw himself down—well, he had already been prostrating himself for some time—and now came scrambling forward on his knees and grabbed Qing around the ankle.

“Oh, honored warrior, please help us. I know it’s a shameless thing to ask, but if those Japanese pirates come at us, how could we possibly endure it? I’ll beg you like this, I will, please...!”

“No, let go first.”

Somehow, this felt awfully familiar.

Though back then it had been a lofty general, and this time it was only a villager from a tiny settlement.

“Wait, wait, don’t do this. Ah, right—what about asking the government office for help?”

“The government office? We’ll be lucky if they don’t just beat us for making salt without permission. More likely they’ll say we were told not to live on the coast in the first place and drive us out.”

“Hm. I can’t decide this on my own. I think I need to talk it over with my friends first.”

After somehow calming the two men down and peeling them off her, Qing returned and told the others what had happened.

At that, Peng Daesan wore the kind of rotten grin that said he had expected exactly this.

“I knew they were too friendly.”

“So? What do we do? Help them?”

“I understand how you feel, but I’m against it.”

Peng Daesan opposed the idea at once.

“Huh? Why?”

“For one thing, we have no idea how many of them there are. Japanese pirates can mean anything from a dozen men to several thousand. But you said it yourself, didn’t you? The villagers think they captured someone important. If a man like that was among them, then there’s a good chance these are not just petty raiders, but a proper Japanese pirate force.”

“Hmm. One vote against. Yoye?”

Gongsun Yoye thought for a moment, then offered her opinion carefully.

“Um, then... couldn’t we tell the government office and have the government troops suppress them together?”

“The government office won’t move.”

Peng Daesan cut her off flatly.

“But isn’t protecting the people the government’s duty? What do you mean they won’t move?”

“The people also pay taxes. If not that, then they at least owe state service. These villagers pay no taxes and have no household registration, so to the government office they do not even count as the people.”

“That’s... but even so—”

“On top of that, salt is state business, and national law also says people are not to live on the coast. If anything, the officials would charge them with those crimes. They would not step in to help.”

“That’s... that’s too cruel!”

Gongsun Yoye, who had spent her life training and knew little of how the world actually worked, looked genuinely upset.

But Peng Daesan only shook his head coolly.

“And what of the government troops? If they move to suppress Japanese pirates, then the troops will obviously die and be wounded. The larger the pirate force, the more certain that becomes. Are you saying the government troops should bleed for people who pay no taxes, have no household registration, and choose to live on a dangerous coast in violation of national law?”

Qing had been about to take Gongsun Yoye’s side.

But after hearing that, Peng Daesan’s argument made sense too.

The villagers paid no taxes from the start and lived in isolation. Beyond that, they contributed nothing to the country in any other way either.

Should government troops really have to bleed to save such people?

That was... not quite right either.

Still, judging from her expression, Gongsun Yoye clearly wanted to help the people of this village.

“Iri?”

“I’m against it too.”

“Huh? You’re talking completely normally?”

“I’m serious. It’s too dangerous. And Jayeo is here too. If it’s something dangerous for you and Jayeo, then I’ll oppose it no matter what.”

That made two against, and one uncertain vote in favor.

And on top of that, Jayeo was here...

Qing scrubbed at the back of her head.

Whenever she ran into something difficult, or things refused to go smoothly, she had a habit of raking furiously at the back of her head just like that.

Should she help these villagers?

And if she did, why?

They certainly had been kind to her group, and last night’s feast had been wonderful. Given the villagers’ circumstances, it must have been a considerable expense for them.

But could kindness offered in hopes of repayment really be called kindness?

Shit, this is hard...

Still, for now at least—

“Then how about this? Why don’t we look into these Japanese pirates a little first, and decide after that? If it turns out there are only a few of them, we can just wipe them out. And if not, um...”

That, she decided, could be thought about when the time came.