Late at night, while Anastasia and Mimir were deep in discussion.
“Yawn.”
Inside Viduron Castle, the guard watching over the prison deep underground stared blankly at the flickering candlelight.
“It sure is quiet these days…”
The guard who turned forty this year had been guarding the prison located in the underground of Viduron Castle for a long time.
Because of this, he was quite familiar with the history of this place. A newly recruited guard reacted to the older guard’s mutterings and asked him,
“Was it not like this before?”
“Huh? Oh. Right. It’s only this empty now because the princess is here… Haha, should I tell you a story?”
“Oh, yes. I’m curious.”
It wasn’t like there were many stories in Arunvida.
The newbie looked at the senior guard with a very curious expression on his face. The senior smiled and held out his hand.
“For free?”
“Come on, of course not. Here is it.”
“Hehe, that’s right. Don’t feel too wronged, alright? You can tell the same story to your juniors in the future.”
“Of course, hehe.”
The senior guard received a cigarette from the newbie. He then licked his lips and began.
“Ah, when was it? Right, I should first tell you about the difference before and after the princess arrived.”
Anastasia.
It had been seven years since the woman who was known as one of the two flowers of the empire came to Arunvida as its lord.
Before that, Arunvida was practically a lawless zone.
Murders happened frequently, and power was the only law.
Various factions existed and they were constantly on edge with one another.
“Among them, this underground prison was known as the Chamber of Truth.”
“Chamber of Truth?”
“Yeah. Once you were tied up and beaten a bit, you’d confess to crimes you didn’t even commit. Every day was nerve-wracking.”
“Wow. So things changed after the princess arrived?”
“Huh? Oh, yeah. That time was amazing.”
While the current residents of Arunvida were friendly towards the second princess, those who survived that time knew.
The second princess was not just a good leader.
“A lot of people died.”
“Huh? Died? Here?”
“That’s right. Nowadays, only those who commit minor offenses like tax evasion survive here. In the past, murderers and rapists were very common.”
“Oh… I think I’ve heard that from the seniors.”
“Exactly. But do you think those kinds of people saw the princess as a princess? To them, she was just a target to kill or rape.”
The senior guard thought about the atmosphere back then.
“There was talk that the empire had abandoned the princess. But surprise, surprise, the flower they sent from the mainland turned out to be a maniac wielding a sword.”
“Huh?”
The newcomer who couldn’t imagine such a thing was left speechless.
“The men who underestimated her just because she was a woman… do you know why this underground prison is so clean now?”
“Uh, no?”
“Seven years ago, this place constantly reeked of blood. There was a variety of blood, from fresh to dried brown.”
“Heh, heh…”
The newcomer who never expected that there would be such a time looked more excited than scared.
“Wow, you seem like just the right kind of talent for this place. Are you already looking forward to it?”
“What’s down there isn’t human.”
“Hehe, exactly. Because of those vile bastards…”
The senior trailed off mid-sentence for some reason.
There were many residents who had been here for a long time, and many of them had returned as cold corpses after being attacked by orcs.
“Tsk. If only I could… hmm?”
“What? What’s wrong?”
“No, it’s nothing. I thought I saw something just now, but I must have been mistaken.”
“Come on, that kind of thing doesn’t work on me.”
“Oh, you cheeky brat? Never mind, I must have seen it wrong.”
For some reason, the senior guard thought he saw a shadow move strangely under the candlelight, but he brushed it off, thinking the night shift was getting to him. Then he continued chatting with his junior.
Shane revealed himself in the darkness of the underground prison. He was looking down at the blue-skinned orc bound tightly with chains processed by special magic.
The orc had a gag in its mouth. Its face was caved in and it was struggling to breathe.
Yet, the fighting spirit in the orc’s eyes as it looked at Shane remained undiminished.
“Your eyes are impressive.”
Shane acknowledged the orc.
He didn’t dislike such warriors.
However, there were times when one had to take on the role of the villain, even if they didn’t dislike the world.
“Maybe I’m no different from them. No, fundamentally, I might be infinitely similar.”
Shane recalled an old knight who had once consoled himself by claiming he was working for the empire, but he quickly shook his head.
“But my malice will not sacrifice goodwill. So, you may hate me, warrior.”
At least you have a cause.
As an enemy of humanity.
I will become the ruthless one who shows no hesitation in severing the necks of those enemies.
Shane awakened his Origin with this resolve. He then watched the orc get swallowed by a giant maw before he closed his eyes.
Deep within Shane’s mind, the orc’s soul was meticulously broken down.
And an orc’s entire life transferred into Shane.
The days of revenge that would come someday.
The bleak future of a race marked by two defeats.
How they were determined to avoid any further failures as they prepared for a holy war.
And then.
– It hurts.
– It’s hard.
– Why am I being treated like this?
– Someone, please save me.
The desperate despair of a girl entirely unrelated to the orc could be heard.
“This is…”
One soul was intertwined with another.
It was just a tiny fragment, barely a speck, but this was by no means a common situation.
The memory of a conversation he had with Priscilla flashed through Shane’s mind like lightning.
Could it be?
An unexpected hypothesis emerged in his head. Shane’s mind began to race.
Perhaps he had just stumbled upon a crucial clue, one far more important than any ordinary information.
When he was about to leave after finishing his business, Shane suddenly looked at the thin and twisted corpse of the orc.
It wasn’t something specific that caught his attention.
He simply wanted to remember the final moments of a strong warrior.
But that coincidence created an opportunity.
“That is…”
A small totem hung around the orc’s neck.
Shane’s attention was drawn to the totem carved with a depiction of the Arunvida mountain range.
It didn’t seem to bear any traces of magical power.
It was just an ordinary wooden carving with no magic at all.
Shane tilted his head in puzzlement.
Shane’s eyes were special.
He could see the souls of beings as well as the traces left on objects by their souls.
This meant he could distinguish the color of the thoughts imbued in objects.
In that sense, the leather armor and other items the orc had possessed were imbued with a strong red color. But one thing was an exception.
The totem alone was different.
He couldn’t distinguish any color from it.
This was unusual.
Every object had the imprint of its creator’s thoughts.
Especially for a totem that was made as a talisman to wish for something, the thoughts should be deeply embedded in it.
Why could he feel nothing from it?
It was like a single colorless object in a world filled with color.
“…….”
Shane had the dark spirit sever the totem from the orc’s neck and grasped it in his hand.
“It seems worth researching.”
Now that his real purpose was complete, Shane then slipped back into the shadows and moved on.
The next day, Mimir received a report about what had occurred in the underground prison.
“Hmm…”
Below the cold prison.
The sight of the blue-skinned orc lying collapsed with only bones and leather remaining was exceedingly gruesome.
“We didn’t know Orcish, so we thought we’d wait and see what happens, but… was it suicide?”
“Well, I don’t know.”
The guard who had been chatting with his junior during the night had a bewildered expression on his face.
There had been no sign of even an ant passing by, but when they checked before the shift change, they found the orc dead in that condition.
The senior guard still looked puzzled.
“It can’t be helped. Perhaps it was a method of suicide unknown to us.”
It had been disappointing, but it didn’t seem like there were any signs of foul play.
Given that the orc who initially couldn’t use magical power had used it, it might have been a side effect.
Mimir concluded this and wrapped up the matter on the spot. He then recalled the conversation he had with Anastasia the previous night.
We should prepare a special scouting party sooner.
They didn’t know what the orcs were planning.
That’s why Mimir and Anastasia planned to create a special scouting party that would enter the deep canyons of Arunvida to find out what the orcs were preparing.
Among this special scouting team, the most significant figure was Shane.
“If we’re only talking about strength, there are many others. But Shane’s intuition is even better than mine.”
These were the words of Anastasia who was once known as the Princess of Knights.
Since she was the best in Arunvida when it came to strength, her judgment was reliable.
Shane’s intuition would undoubtedly be helpful in Arunvida, where monster ambushes could occur at any time.
So the remaining issue was strength which was complicated.
It would be most certain if the princess went herself, but…
Still, it was too dangerous for the commander of this place to go personally.
Moreover, Mimir had to go to the empire himself to prepare the documents to be sent there, and besides Mimir, Anastasia was the only one who could handle the paperwork.
They were inevitably short-handed.
For now… there’s only that person.
Mimir immediately set off to meet the person who came to mind.
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