Chapter 203: Everyone Is Kind
It did not take long for Adol to realize that Mona had screwed him over royally.
It also meant he realized how miserable it was to dodge the nuts and trash-like things being thrown into the prison.
Some stones were mixed in among them too.
“You insane bastards! Archie said to starve me!”
Adol shouted while dodging rocks and hard bread that was impossible to distinguish from the stones flying at him.
“Look at this one lying. Why would Mona tell that kind of lie?”
But all that came back was mockery.
Perhaps because Adol, who refused to lose heart, was amusing, more and more of them were gathering around the prison.
“Or maybe he’s sick somewhere?”
“Does that make sense when he’s jumping around like that? He’s just lying. Lying even after coming all the way here, what an insolent bastard.”
“Still, the one who came in this time is lively, so he’s fun to watch. Everyone usually looks like they’re about to piss themselves when we surround them.”
At the sound of their conversation, Adol ground his teeth.
They said they would not kill him, but it was obvious they had captured him just to treat him worse than a beast like this.
“Hey, stop it! Isn’t food precious to you people?!”
Unable to endure it any longer, Adol shouted again.
Annoying laughter burst from among them again.
“What is that stupid thing saying?”
“Why would we eat stuff like this? This is food for you humans!”
“So catch it and eat it properly!”
At the treatment that was worse than even a dog raised at home, shame rose from deep inside Adol’s chest.
Once that feeling reached the top of his head, his head lowered on its own.
“He’s quiet now. Looks like he’s already tired.”
“No, when lively ones like that are quiet, if you hit them in the head once, they start flopping around again.”
At the renewed mutters mixed with ridicule, Adol’s eyes widened.
Acting the way the other side wanted was the path to defeat.
If he wanted to take the upper hand, he had to look down from above their heads.
“I can’t just move how you want me to.”
Muttering that, Adol raised his head.
A stone flying toward the child’s head was visible head-on.
At a speed fast enough to make the wind whistle.
Tak.
Adol snatched it.
“Oh? Look at that?”
“Pretty fast for a human.”
“You idiots, it’s all about controlling your strength. It’s not enough to just throw gently.”
Perhaps Adol’s action provoked their competitiveness, because the most mischievous-looking male werewolf among the monsters stepped forward.
In his hand was a small hand knife about the length of an index finger.
The way he repeatedly tossed it up and caught it was quite threatening compared to the size of the weapon.
“Hey, what are you going to do if he dies?”
Perhaps thinking this was growing out of hand, someone standing beside him warned him.
But many of his companions had already gathered around the prison, and he had already boasted loudly enough for the others to hear.
“It’s fine as long as I don’t kill him, right? I’ll try this time, so watch closely.”
With the desire to torment the small human ahead of all else, he threw what he held in his hand toward Adol.
At the blade flying at a speed clearly different from what the werewolves had been throwing as a joke, someone sighed.
Thwack!
A dull sound rang out, too blunt to be the sound of a blade lodging into flesh.
The monsters’ gazes moved to the one who had been injured.
Not inside the prison, but outside it.
“Kgh......!”
The werewolf who had thrown the hand knife was clutching his nose and glaring at Adol inside the prison.
Adol, who had narrowly dodged the attack, looked at the stone he had thrown rolling across the ground and smiled.
The blade had grazed his cheek and blood was flowing, but he looked less ridiculous than the beast glaring at him.
One drop of blood from the werewolf’s nose ran down his philtrum.
At the unsightly state of the one who had been showing off so much, laughter and mockery burst out here and there.
“What? You couldn’t block one human’s attack?”
The face of the one who had instantly become the laughingstock instead of the small human turned red.
“You insolent little......!”
Adol stepped back from the werewolf charging toward the prison with frightening force.
He stretched his hand through the bars, but only clawed at empty air.
Adol confirmed that the prison that had trapped him was instead protecting him, then looked at the werewolf who was trying to grab him as if he would kill him.
“Why don’t you wipe your nosebleed with that time? What’s the difference between you and a snot-nosed brat?”
“Don’t act insolent just because Archie keeps you humans alive. You’re insignificant things who can die by our hands at any time.”
Adol raised the corners of his mouth as much as he could to sneer at the one chewing out his words like a growl.
When he tried to recall an annoying expression, the first face that floated into his head was Ran’s face, and he imitated it as much as possible.
Surprisingly, the effect was outstanding.
The werewolf started panting and shaking the bars as if he meant to break the prison.
“Hey, calm down!”
Seeing his unusual state, someone tried to stop him.
The problem was that there were also some who treated that chaos as entertainment.
Those who tried to stop the one clinging to the bars mixed together with those joining in to break the prison, and a mess broke out.
Excited by the faint smell of blood, their movements only grew rougher.
Creak.
The ominous sound from the prison, unable to bear the weight, was also a problem if one wanted to call it one.
***
“Archie, what is the matter?”
The female werewolf watched Archie’s expression while hiding the human smaller than herself behind her.
As if she were protecting the human hidden behind her.
“It seems you have grown rather close.”
When Archie murmured that, the werewolf’s face stiffened.
“He has only just reached the point where he accepts the food I give him.”
“Sh-she threatens me frighteningly if I don’t eat......”
When the female werewolf answered, the human man standing behind her quickly chimed in.
Archie stared at that human man without emotion.
“Are you complaining?”
In his words, the human man’s face went white.
“N-no. I am satisfied with life here.”
He hurriedly said that while watching the female werewolf’s reaction.
It was only an answer to avoid Archie’s suspicion.
But as if he had heard something unpleasant, tension entered the corners of Archie’s mouth.
It happened too quickly for me to observe in detail, though.
“Satisfied, is it......”
Archie muttered as if repeating the two’s clumsy lies, then turned his gaze to me.
As if asking whether that was an answer enough.
I nodded and gestured that we should go outside.
If we kept lingering here any longer, it seemed the human man might have a heart attack.
Archie and I, who came out of the tent, said nothing.
There was the reason that many ears were listening, but I also felt I should hold my tongue carelessly before knowing the bastard’s intentions.
After seeing those two just now, Archie too must have noticed.
That affection could form between monster and human.
The problem was that I could not know how he wanted to use that fact, or what his intention was.
***
‘How long has it been since the wagon left?’
Inside the quiet wagon, Ria shifted her body and thought.
She was in the most accurate possible situation to describe the expression, the body is comfortable but the heart is uneasy.
Her body was more comfortable than Ratel’s or Jing’s, who would be walking outside, but this silence was hard to endure.
Careful not to turn her head, she rolled her eyes and examined those sitting quietly on either side.
There was only one person sitting right beside her who seemed older than her.
A woman who looked thirty at most.
The rest were five children who looked around fifteen, and two children who seemed somewhere between thirty and fifteen.
All of them had in common the fact that their heads were lowered enough to dig into the ground.
They were people who had just been separated from their families.
It was only natural that the mood was heavy.
However, in the end, had they not gained a chance to stay close to god?
It was a cruel thing to say, but to people who did not know the truth, this could be seen as a blessing.
Unable to understand why an emotion heavier than regret pressed down inside the cargo wagon, Ria worked her head hard.
Thinking there might be more she could find out, Ria looked around again and ended up meeting the eyes of the woman sitting beside her.
“......”
The woman silently stared at Ria without avoiding her eyes, even as Ria stiffened in embarrassment.
“......Hello?”
In the end, Ria opened her mouth first.
“What have you been looking around at since earlier?”
The woman asked stiffly.
“Ah, that is...... I was wondering why everyone’s faces were so stiff. In the end, we gained the chance to work for the Imperial Family.”
Ria slowly answered while checking whether her answer had strayed from the intention of the question.
At Ria’s appearance, the woman frowned.
“Have you ever worked at the Temple?”
“No. I was dragged here today, so......”
When Ria trailed off, the corners of the woman’s mouth rose.
But no matter how one looked at it, it did not look like a smile that expressed goodwill.
“You’re lucky. Not knowing anything can be a good thing too.”
At the cynical answer, Ria furrowed her brow slightly.
“What is it that I don’t know?”
The woman looked at Ria’s stupidly asking face, sighed, and lowered her voice.
“We’re bait.”
“Bait?”
When the startled Ria raised her voice, the woman hurriedly covered Ria’s mouth.
It was not a force she could not shake off, but Ria let the woman do what she wanted.
“Can’t you lower your voice? Do you want to see the inside of the wagon turn into a sea of tears the whole way there?”
She waited until the attention of the children focused on herself and Ria scattered.
After becoming certain that Ria would no longer make a loud sound, the woman slowly lowered her hand.
“Bait? What does that mean?”
This time, Ria asked in a voice small enough that only the woman could hear.
The woman looked at Ria with a face full of regret for having spoken to her for no reason, then sighed and opened her mouth.
“We’re going to be used as bait to catch monsters. I’ll say this in advance, but this is god’s will, so there’s no need to despair so much.”
Ria had no intention of crying, but she thought she had many things to ask, and her eyes lit up.
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