Ossan Saikyō Chapter 8 Part 15
After everyone had fallen asleep, I quietly slipped out of the inn alone.
My destination was the village chief's mansion.
Apparently, the female adventurer from Ozu was being held there.
The only illumination came from the moon.
Streetlights supposedly existed in cities on the level of the royal capital, but this village had nothing of the sort.
Concealing my presence in the shadow of a house near the chief's residence, I continued observing the surroundings with【Presence Detection】.
About an hour passed like that.
Then suddenly, two presences appeared, moving from shadow to shadow as they approached.
Their presence was extremely faint.
They likely possessed some sort of concealment skill of higher level.
The two figures headed directly toward the chief's mansion without hesitation and began examining the front entrance.
They seemed to be using some kind of tool to destroy the area around the door bar.
Ordinarily, one might assume they were thieves.
However, both had longswords hanging at their waists.
There was no way theft was their objective.
I sprang from the shadows and rushed straight toward them.
The distance was around one hundred meters.
Unfortunately, I had no concealment skills, so they noticed my presence and turned around.
Their faces were hidden beneath hoods.
Judging from their builds, they were probably men.
Their movements identified them as Awakened.
If my guess was correct, they were the remaining members of that Ozu girl's party.
“Damn it, were we discovered?!”
“It's only one guy. We just need to kill him.”
After the brief exchange, they drew their swords.
One of them blurred instantly.
A user of【Dash】.
I raised my shield and charged straight ahead.
Thanks to watching Rani fight, I already knew that【Dash】only allowed straight-line movement.
(E/N: Reminds me of Sage Sorijeyro's showdown against Satou 🤣! That blow to the stomach was crazy hilarious!)
The man's blade struck my shield with a sharp metallic clang.
But the thick shield, said to be something only a limited number of B-Rank adventurers could even wield, suffered no damage whatsoever.
I continued forward and slammed the shield into him.
In games, I think they called this a shield bash.
Empowered by overwhelming brute-force skills like【Strength】,【Might】,【Stability】,【Steadfast】, and【Heavy Burst】, the attack sent the man flying roughly twenty meters before he stopped moving.
Honestly, it was impressive that there was enough of him left to recognize.
“What?!”
The second man recoiled in shock and moved sideways to widen the distance between us.
As he moved, he swung his sword.
The attack was obviously out of range, but I instinctively raised my shield.
The next instant, an impact struck it.
I see.
A skill that launched flying slashes.
Good thing I had already seen Anatolia use something similar.
“Damn it, is this the guy who killed the golems?!”
The man showed signs of retreating.
Not happening.
I swung my mace.
An explosive【Shockwave】slammed into his back and sent him flying about 5 meters.
I had deliberately held back, so he should still be alive.
Keeping my shield raised, I approached the fallen man.
He was groaning on the road, so he was definitely breathing.
There were things I needed to ask him.
KSHHH!
Suddenly, a sharp whistling sound cut through the air.
I hid behind my shield, but the attack wasn't aimed at me.
An arrow had pierced the fallen man's forehead.
A third man.
Silencing him to prevent him from talking.
They had been thorough.
But...
“Gahh?!”
A man's cry echoed in the distance.
Looks like our second member had done her job.
No matter how skilled he was at concealing himself, he couldn't completely hide his presence at the exact moment he attacked.
“Village Chief, it's over.”
As soon as I called out, the mansion's front door opened and the village chief stepped outside.
He held a lantern-like light source in his hand, and the expression illuminated by its glow was unmistakably grim.
“Soushi-dono, you have my deepest gratitude once again. But to think the plot went this far... How truly frightening.”
I felt exactly the same.
Though what frightened me most was my own【Bad Luck】skill, which kept throwing these troublesome events at a rookie adventurer.
◇◆◇
“Sorry, Soushi. I thought I'd captured him, but he bit down on poison and died.”
Rani dragged the third man in front of the mansion and spoke with a dejected expression.
Blood trickled from the corner of the man's mouth.
He was already dead.
Choosing suicide the moment his mission failed was terrifying from the perspective of an ordinary person like me.
Professionalism, I suppose.
Though I had always thought people like that only existed in fiction.
“More importantly, Soushi, what exactly is going on?”
“Didn't I just explain it?”
“Explain it again. I didn't really get it.”
“Honestly... Fine. These guys were trying to pin the blame on the Ozu adventurer. They spread zombies to create an epidemic and then attacked the village with golems.
…
That's the crime they wanted to saddle her with. Following so far?”
“Yeah, that part I understand.”
“But as long as she remained alive, a truth-detecting magic tool would eventually prove she wasn't the culprit. That would be a problem for them.”
“So they tried to kill her?”
“Exactly. If she dies, only the information that she was probably the culprit remains behind. Nobody would ever know whether it was true or false. People would simply assume it was true.”
“I see... But if that happened, what do these guys gain?”
“The adventurer is from Ozu. If an Ozu citizen committed crimes on this scale in this country, relations between the two nations would worsen. That's probably the objective.”
“So if those two countries start fighting, these guys benefit?”
“If they're really connected to slave traders like you suspected, which means they're citizens of Mekalinan, then Mekalinan must have something to gain. That's political territory though. Beyond our level.”
That said, it wasn't hard to imagine they were hoping to profit as a third party while the other two countries clashed.
From what I had gathered, this world had only recently emerged from something akin to a Warring States period.
“Huh... Soushi, you're actually pretty smart. Everything happened exactly the way you predicted. I think I respect you a little now.”
“Anyone could come to the same conclusion with enough information. Whether they'd actually show up to kill her was basically a gamble.”
When I said that, the village chief, who had been listening nearby, shook his head.
“No, no. The insight you possess is not something ordinary people acquire. Only nobles or exceptionally talented merchants would think that way.
…
But if your theory is correct, this is beyond what I or this village can handle. We will need to carefully consider how to proceed, including what to do with the Ozu adventurer.”
He had a point.
Things had escalated far beyond what I expected.
As an adventurer, I probably wouldn't have any involvement in whatever came next.
Still, it was an unsettlingly suspicious affair.
Honestly, life felt much simpler when all I had to do was hunt monsters.
Though the fact that I was thinking that was probably strange in its own way.
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E/N:
The musclehead part of Ossan is what gives us action but his strategist part is cool in its own way!
Stay tuned!
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