Chapter 44

It was late at night the day after Barretta and Ichiryo parted ways in Isteria. In the living room of the mayor's residence in Grisea Village, Barretta was hugging her knees and bowing her head, leaning against the wall.

She had been like this for about four hours. The fire in the hearth had long since gone out, and with the windows closed, no moonlight entered the room, which was enveloped in darkness.

After returning to the mansion, Barretta had unloaded the carriage with a dark expression, prepared Balin's dinner, and then sat hugging her knees without eating anything.

Balin, worried about Barretta's state, had called out to her several times, but just like the day before, she did not give a proper response.

In the end, Balin gave up and went to sleep in the bedroom, leaving Barretta alone in the living room.

After a while, Barretta suddenly raised her head and looked towards the entrance of the mansion.

She thought she heard the creaking sound of the entrance door.

"…Who's there?"

As Barretta murmured, the entrance door slowly opened, and the moonlight illuminated the entrance hall.

Barretta usually locked the wooden bolt on the door before going to bed, but she had not done so today.

"…Kazura?"

The thought crossed her mind that perhaps Ichiryo had returned, and Barretta, with a vacant expression, stood up to go to the entrance.

But in the next moment, Barretta's expression froze in terror.

A man holding a drawn longsword appeared at the entrance.

"…! There's still someone awake! Kill them before they can run!"

As the man who entered the house shouted to those behind him, four more men armed with longswords and daggers rushed in through the entrance. They confirmed Barretta's presence in the living room and approached her with their weapons gleaming.

Startled by the sudden event, Barretta let out a small scream and backed away.

"Huh? It's a woman. And a fine one at that."

The large man who approached Barretta, upon realizing she was a woman, quickly sheathed his longsword and grabbed her.

Barretta, with her wrists caught, was pushed to the ground by the man's momentum.

"Ah! Dad!!"

Barretta, pinned down by the man, tried to call out to her father, who she thought was sleeping in the back room, with all her might.

However, the man, seemingly unconcerned by Barretta's actions, looked at her body with a lecherous gaze.

"I'll have a taste. The rest is up to you."

The man, still looking at Barretta, called out to the other men who had entered the house.

The men, who were called, clicked their tongues but did not try to stop the man who was pinning Barretta, and instead proceeded into the back of the house.

"We don't have much time. I'll finish this quickly, so don't worry."

"Ah, no!"

As the man said this, he moved his face close to Barretta's neck, which was trembling with fear and tears.

However, just as he was about to lick her neck, the man stopped, hearing a roar and the sound of destruction coming from the back of the house.

"…What's that?"

The man, startled by the unusual noise and screams coming from the back of the house, looked up.

At the same time, two of the men who had entered the back room rushed out into the living room in a panic.

"What's going on!?"

"Calm down! We'll attack him together!"

"Hey! What's happening!?"

Seeing the panicked men, the man pinning Barretta called out to his companions.

"The guy in the back…!"

Just as the man was about to answer, something flew out from the back room and hit him, sending him flying to the entrance of the mansion.

"Hey! It's too noisy… Ah!"

Due to the commotion, several men who had been waiting outside the mansion appeared at the entrance.

They were speechless when they saw the body of their comrade, whose neck was half-severed, lying in the entrance hall, and the other comrade groaning in a pool of blood.

"Barretta!"

While the men were distracted by their fallen comrade, Balin, covered in blood and holding a longsword he had taken from one of the men, rushed out from the back of the house.

Seeing Barretta being pinned down by the man, Balin's face turned red with anger.

"You bastards!!"

"Don't move! I'll crush her throat and kill her if you do!"

The man pinning Barretta, trembling with fear at Balin's roar, placed his right hand on Barretta's slender neck.

Barretta, whose neck was being choked, grabbed the man's right wrist with her free left hand.

Biting her teeth, she tightened her grip on the man's wrist.

"Ugh!? What are you…!?"

The moment the man felt intense pain in his right wrist, his eyes widened in shock.

His right hand, using Barretta's left hand as a fulcrum, was bent into a V-shape.

…His wrist had been crushed.

"Gah!"

Barretta released the crushed wrist and punched the man's face with her left fist.

At the same time, a dull sound of bone breaking echoed from the man's face, and he fell unconscious, blood gushing from his nose and mouth.

"You, you monsters!"

The remaining man, who had seen his comrade fall so quickly, screamed and attacked Balin.

Balin, with incredible speed, deflected the man's attack with his own sword and, in one swift motion, slashed the man's shoulder, cutting him from shoulder to mid-abdomen.

The man, his upper body split in two, fell forward with wide eyes.

Balin, placing his foot on the man's abdomen as he fell, kicked him to pull out his sword.

However, the sword had already broken when he cut the man, and only about a third of the blade remained.

"Ugh!"

The men who had been watching the scene at the entrance of the mansion, in a state of shock, panicked and fled when Balin turned his gaze towards them.

"Barretta, are you okay?"

Ignoring the fleeing men, Balin rushed to Barretta, who was sitting on the floor in a daze, and knelt down, placing his hand on her shoulder.

Barretta, who had been trembling, nodded weakly at her father's worried look.

Balin, relieved that Barretta was unharmed, walked over to the unconscious man and, after discarding his broken sword, pulled out the sword from the man's waist and stabbed him in the neck without hesitation.

"Barretta, go bang the pot to wake up the villagers. I'll chase after them."

"What!? Wait! Dad!!"

Without waiting for Barretta to stop him, Balin rushed out of the mansion.

As he left, he kicked the man who was still writhing at the entrance, ensuring he was unconscious.

"What the hell are they? Everyone's dead!"

"They're monsters… We attacked the home of monsters…"

The men, who had fled the mansion and were running towards a carriage they had left at the edge of the village, were in a state of panic.

As they ran, the sound of metal clanging echoed from behind them.

Barretta was banging the bottom of a pot to wake up the villagers.

"Damn! We have to escape before the villagers catch up! We'll be killed if we're caught!!"

The men, anxious about the sound of the metal, ran desperately and finally reached the carriage where their comrades were waiting.

"What the hell happened!? What about the others!?"

Ignoring the angry shouts of the leader, the men quickly climbed into the carriage.

"Hurry up! We have to escape!!"

The other comrades, seeing the men's desperate state, also climbed into the carriage and carts.

"Hey! What happened to the others!?"

"They were killed! They're not human, they're monsters!!"

The leader, seeing the terrified faces of his subordinates, was speechless.

He had sent ten men to the mansion, and now half were dead, and the rest had fled.

The residents of the house they attacked must have been highly skilled.

Just as the leader was thinking this, the carriage came to an abrupt stop.

At the same time, one of his subordinates shouted.

"What's going on!?"

The leader, rushing out of the carriage, saw a middle-aged man with a sword standing about ten meters in front of the carriage in the dark forest.

The five subordinates who had jumped out of the carriage with the leader let out small screams upon seeing the man.

"…Drop your weapons and surrender. Or I'll kill you."

As the middle-aged man with the sword—Balin—spoke, the leader felt as if the temperature around him had dropped drastically.

The intense killing aura emanating from Balin was triggering his survival instinct.

This guy is dangerous.

"Shut up! Surround him!!"

The subordinates, who had been momentarily intimidated by Balin's killing aura, regained their composure at the leader's command and, dismounting from the carts, surrounded Balin with their swords and spears.

Balin stood still, waiting for the men to take their positions.

"Idiot. Do you really think you can win against this many people?"

The leader, having successfully surrounded Balin in a matter of seconds, sneered at him.

Balin, hearing the leader's words, looked puzzled.

"Surrounded? Who exactly is surrounded here?"

"…What? Who else could it be? Have you lost your mind from fear?"

The leader, looking exasperated, regained his composure and smiled cruelly at Balin.

"I won't let you die easily. Go ahead, attack—"

"Wait a moment."

Balin, interrupting the leader's command, looked around.

"…We only need to keep this one and one more."

The moment Balin said this, the head of a subordinate standing next to the leader flew off.

"Wha—!?"

The leader saw the headless body of his subordinate, spewing blood, and then he saw something else.

Multiple villagers, armed with daggers and sickles, had emerged from the darkness and were attacking the subordinates with lightning speed.

The subordinates, caught off guard from behind and attacked at an incredible speed, were unable to react and were all killed with a single strike, collapsing on the spot.

The air was immediately filled with the smell of blood.

"Ah, ah!"

The one lucky subordinate who had been spared, collapsed on the ground, wetting himself in terror.

Balin walked over to the stunned leader and said again,

"Drop your weapons."

"Who's there, stop!"

A guard, standing watch around the tent, shouted at the approaching figure in the darkness.

As the guard shouted, other guards rushed out of the tent, weapons in hand.

"It's Balin from Grisea Village!"

"…Balin?"

The guards looked at each other in surprise at the approaching figure's words.

But the guard on watch quickly lit a torch from the campfire and approached the figure.

"Balin, what—Hey, you're bleeding heavily!"

"No, this is the blood of the bandits I killed. The village was attacked by bandits earlier, and I fought them off."

Seeing Balin's blood-covered figure in the torchlight, the guard was shocked, and Balin quickly explained.

"Bandits!? Are the villagers safe!?"

"Yes, no one was hurt. And we captured three bandits. One might be close to death… Can you please return to the village in the morning and take the bandits with you?"

Hearing Balin's words, the guard looked surprised but quickly regained his composure and turned to his comrades.

"No, let's go now. Everyone, get ready."