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Chapter 18
The mercenaries swallowed the bait whole. As if trying to heighten the fear, they even took out a handkerchief and deliberately soaked it with a sleeping drug.
“H–h, huff. P-please don’t do this… kuh.”
Noah couldn’t seem to hold back his laughter and bowed his head deeply, his shoulders shaking.
Worried he might give us away, I pulled Noah behind me and shielded him. Seeing that, the mercenary group began snickering among themselves, mocking us.
“Oooh, are you that scared? Heh heh, look at you crying after failing to protect your sister!”
Noah whispered quietly from behind me.
“Luisa, I really don’t think they know who we are.”
If they did, could they act like this toward us? No matter how dark the alley was, there was no way they couldn’t see my hair color. Yet they behaved like this, which meant they truly didn’t know me at all.
The mercenaries slowly surrounded us and closed in. Perhaps they wanted to see frightened expressions, because they even urged me to cry.
“Hey, Luisa. Hurry up and cry already.”
…How do you even cry?
It had been so long since I’d cried that I couldn’t remember how. I tried, at least, to put on a terrified expression.
‘No, wait… how do I do that either…?’
Come to think of it, there was nothing I was afraid of. For ten years, people had only been afraid of me. I’d never been afraid of anything myself.
As I blinked, unsure what to do, the mercenaries kindly created a backstory for me on their own.
“Boss, this wench looks like she’s lost her marbles, huh?”
“She’s wearing a ring and all. How could she not be crazy?”
To support that theory, I deliberately pretended to have lost my mind and laughed, heh heh heh.
I thought they’d sneer and laugh like they had with Noah, but unexpectedly, the mercenaries’ expressions stiffened.
“Boss… doesn’t she seem kinda pitiful? I mean… do we really have to take her? Damn, this feels bad.”
“C-cough. What are you talking about? Of course we have to take them! But… hey, they’ve eaten, right? They didn’t run away on an empty stomach, did they?”
…What? What kind of situation is this all of a sudden? Are you guys some kind of K-kidnappers? Why are you worried about whether we ate?
“Can’t you see how skinny they are? Ah, seriously, this is just too sad.”
“Do we really have to take them, boss? Honestly, they remind me of my younger siblings and— sniff!”
One of them even started crying. Noah muttered in disbelief.
“What’s wrong with them? Why are they suddenly growing a conscience?”
Exactly!
I nodded slightly and glanced at the mercenary who looked like he held the highest rank.
Please, just kidnap us already. Please don’t let that man recover his conscience.
“What are you idiots doing? Hurry up and grab the slaves already!”
Thank goodness. That guy was trash to the core.
He even personally handed the sleeping-drug-soaked handkerchief to the mercenary who had been crying.
Unaware that I was sighing in relief inside, the mercenary apologized to me and then firmly covered my mouth.
I inhaled as much as I could through my nose and mouth, and I felt the drug seep into my body.
Noah was in a similar situation. Pretending to struggle, he gradually went limp, and I slowly closed my eyes.
The drug spread quickly, taking over my body…
‘As if.’
…It didn’t.
Of course not. I’m a Sword Master—like that cheap drug would work on me.
The same went for Noah. He was someone who researched curse potions. There was no way something like this would work on him.
Granted, we weren’t great actors and shook a bit while trying to hold back laughter, but fortunately, the stupid mercenaries mistook it for convulsions.
“We don’t have time. Let’s move!”
When the mercenary who had been conscienceless to the end barked the order, another mercenary with a young voice spoke up.
“Y-yes! I’ll prepare the portal right away!”
‘So they did have an artifact.’
It made sense that the guild hadn’t been able to pinpoint the exact location. If they moved only by portal, there would be no traceable route left behind.
Of course, it was possible to track the residual mana after a portal jump, but unless you were a great mage, it was nearly impossible.
After waiting a little longer, I felt the surrounding mana surge violently along with a low humming sound.
The mercenary carrying me seemed to start moving, and my body swayed.
After a few steps, it felt like my whole body—from head to toe—was enveloped in something squishy, and in an instant, the surroundings became noisy.
It seemed we had arrived at an auction house.
Should I open my eyes? No matter what, there had to be at least one person here who recognized me.
“Oh! What’s this first thing in the morning?! They’re all top-grade!”
“Haha, just got lucky, that’s all! We even caught a girl like this!”
“Wow, that hair color’s unusual. The customers will love it. It’s special!”
…Ah. No one recognizes me?
“Throw them in there! They’re top-quality, so handle them carefully. Hmm, toss this one in with her too.”
“Yes, sir.”
It really seemed like no one knew who I was. I couldn’t tell if that was good or bad. For now, I stayed still as I heard the creak of iron bars opening.
“Hope you get sold to a good place this time, Kitty.”
The mercenary who had cried earlier even gave me a nickname and said goodbye. Still, he seemed like a decent kid.
‘But seriously, why Kitty? Kitty?’
That’s not even a cat’s name.
“Ghk!”
“Ah, this brat again. Keeps having convulsions.”
He’s laughing. Noah, that guy is laughing.
Unlike when they set me down, they tossed Noah to the ground with a loud thud. A groan escaped him, but the mercenaries mercilessly shut the door and left.
And five minutes later.
After confirming that all presences were completely gone, I opened my eyes. At the same time, Noah, who had been playing unconscious, cracked one eye open.
“They gone?”
“No presence. Get up.”
“Damn, my back hurts like hell.”
Despite that, Noah sprang up and twisted his back every which way. The other people locked up across from us stared at him blankly.
Ignoring those looks entirely, Noah finished stretching and asked me,
“We heading out right away?”
“Of course.”
What was the point of staying locked up? I stood up slowly and approached the barred door.
The gap between the bars was so narrow that not even two fingers could fit through. On top of that, the moment you touched them, mana scattered on its own, clearly meant to suppress magic.
But neither Noah nor I panicked. Mana suppression was meaningless against someone like me, who possessed an enormous amount of mana. And iron bars at this level—
‘I can just pry them open with strength.’
Who uses magic for something like this? It’s not stylish.
I grabbed the bars and pulled them apart to either side.
Creeeak— a high, thin sound echoed through the corridor as the bars bent.
Once the opening was wide enough, I stepped out and then restored the bars to their original position. That way, they wouldn’t think we’d escaped, but would instead panic, thinking they’d locked us up somewhere else.
Voices from the other side begged us to let them out too, but I silenced them for now. I wasn’t the Pied Piper, and rescuing them right now would only get in the way.
Thankfully, instead of getting angry, they nodded desperately and complied. Their faces held not a shred of doubt, which weighed heavily on my heart.
Judging by the scale of the auction, it seemed to be quite large. In the long corridor, there were people in almost every cell lining both sides.
“Where on earth is that kid?”
But Adele was nowhere to be seen. I checked both ends of the corridor, yet there wasn’t even a trace of him.
As my anxiety grew, to make matters worse, presences began approaching from near the entrance.
I had planned to smash everything the moment I found Adele, but—
I met Noah’s eyes.
“I think it’d be better if we went back into our cell. What do you think? If we go into the auction together, it might actually be easier to snatch him out.”
‘Why are you only saying that now?’
If you’d said that earlier, we wouldn’t have had to go through all this trouble.
Grabbing Noah’s hand, I ran back to our original cell and climbed back in. The people who had been imprisoned across from us stared at us like we were insane.
Since we hadn’t found Adele, there was no choice. The more desperate side had to compromise.
As I forced the bars back into place, mercenaries stopped right in front of our cell.
They weren’t the same ones who had kidnapped us. Without a word, they opened the door and dragged us out. Then they took out rings, intending to put them on us.
“Huh. This girl already has one.”
One mercenary muttered while looking at my hand.
“Boss, should we switch it?”
“Of course we switch it. You think we’re leaving it as is?”
“N-no, sir. Sorry.”
“Use an artifact. It’ll remove most restraints.”
The man called “boss” handed a glove to the one holding my hand.
The man received it reverently, put it on one hand, and grabbed my ring. The ring vibrated faintly, returned to its original size, and popped off.
‘Well, the tracking’s probably already done, so it doesn’t matter.’
They were likely rushing over at full speed by now.
I accepted the ring the mercenary put back on me and moved along. Just in case, at the last moment, I slipped the original ring out of the mercenary’s pocket.
We might end up using a portal again.
Fortunately, we didn’t end up moving by portal again. Still, the distance we were dragged was considerable—Noah even collapsed twice from exhaustion.
After enduring the boredom and walking for a while, a massive prison appeared, on a completely different scale from where we’d been held before.
It seemed to be a place where those suitable for the upcoming auction were gathered.
I carefully scanned the people, wondering if Adele might be here. That was when Noah, who had been slumped over, lightly grabbed my sleeve and whispered,
“Why is that guy over there?”
Yeah. Why are you there of all places…?
The man sitting apart from the bustling crowd wasn’t Adele.
Long dirty-blond hair, and a priest’s robe that was unusually soiled.
‘You’ve got to be kidding me. You said you were doing ascetic training—so that was slave labor?’
It was Rivael.
