Chapter 122
Chapter 23 Survivors (4)
While digging the soil, he thought of the bunker he had found near Vicheta Castle.
Are there any other places like that?
Are there still survivors here without ruin?
Then why is the footprint so small?
Do dwarves really live underground?
After many questions, the result of digging, digging, and digging a hole the size of an adult male.
‘That’s a lot.’
Other magical powers other than the search party were applied to the map.
The dots that are huddled together in one place are all blue.
‘It’s a Bihar.’
Are they on the side of the sub-species, or are they renegades who went over to the enemy?
Although I was nervous in many ways to enter in a situation where I didn’t know anything.
‘I can’t come to the end and lose the ball.’
Isn’t there an old saying about making porridge and giving it to a dog?
If I started, I must see the end.
There was no hesitation because he had prepared everything he could in case of danger.
With a barrier stone in one hand, Tae-ho Tae-ho, a tank in front, and Yul Kim, a serve and ranged dealer behind him.
We passed through the cave with the most stable position in the 3-person party system.
In the process of expanding the cave, they had already come to the conclusion that there was no bunker here.
Because the small tunnels continued at a certain depth with a certain width and then headed to the ground.
‘Let’s not panic no matter what.’
It’s been awhile since I’ve calmed down and moved forward step by step.
Gossips, hums, and faint voices were heard from afar.
Eventually, when we arrived at the place where the blue dots were close to each other.
Yang Tae-ho was the first to get out of the cave, implementing rock-type magic.
“… … What else is this?”
Soon after, a bewildered murmur was heard, followed by a shallow scream and tumult.
I quickly followed Yang Tae-ho out of the cave.
The place we arrived was inside a rocky mountain, an empty space like an empty lot.
Huddled there were children dressed in roughly cut and patched rags.
Perhaps surprised by the sudden situation, the number of children who retreated away from me and Yang Tae-ho approached dozens.
Unlike Yang Tae-ho, who was taken aback by the sight, I immediately understood the situation.
Because I recognized the stigma on the children’s bodies.
The shape, which seemed to embody the teeth of a beast, was something I knew for sure.
‘It’s a farm stigma.’
A food warehouse for monsters made by collecting sub-species who could not escape.
That sentence was a stigma applied to the sub-species raised there.
The sight of the sentences I had seen and learned through the paper actually stamped on a person’s body was not very pleasant.
Is it because most of the children under the age of 10 are stigmatized?
Something unknown rose up inside.
That time when I almost vomited something I couldn’t tell if it was nausea or bloat.
“Fa, Mr. Palao?”
A dangerous voice reached me like a candle about to be extinguished.
When I forced my motionless body to turn my head, I found the little boy.
He is slightly taller than Belta.
The eyes of a child who was only five or six years old were trembling relentlessly.
When I asked where I was looking, the child’s gaze was fixed on my head.
Right after that, a really unexpected answer came out.
“Sah, are you an apostle?”
can’t it be
I was just a stranger entering and leaving this world with the guarantee of the Palao, not an apostle chosen by the gods.
But the child didn’t even know the difference that a Bihar would know.
The children’s misunderstandings did not end with me.
“Themoria… … .”
“Well, that’s Miss Pinelpenia.”
buzz buzz.
After a short fuss, the frightened and withdrawn children began to gather around us.
Among them was the little boy who talked to me.
“Sa, Apostle, save us. Please, save me.”
In front of the child who reached out his trembling hands while crying, I was certain of what I could say.
“… … It will be fine now.”
I answered in a slightly subdued voice and held the child’s hand.
“Ah, my God!”
In an instant, the surroundings turned into a sea of crying.
* * *
Around the time Tae-ho and Tae-ho finally comforted the crying children, Kim Yul, who had gone to deliver the news to the battalion, returned.
Among those who came with him was Baron Volbita.
“What is this… … .”
After gazing at the sight of the empty lot, what appeared on his face was a sense of misery.
All the Biharis who arrived at the scene with him had similar expressions.
Like me, he understood the situation right away.
On the other hand, Yul Kim and Yang Tae-ho did not seem to understand the situation itself.
‘Because I don’t know about the farm.’
There’s no way the Bihars bothered to explain that to the player.
I wouldn’t have thought of it if I hadn’t seen Rashar’s records with the power of Pinelpenia.
As much as that, it was difficult to think of a farm as common sense for ordinary people.
Classifying intelligent beings, including humans, as food is itself an unfamiliar concept.
‘It’s strange to apply the concept of breeding to the human species in the first place.’
It is natural that Kim Yul and Yang Tae-ho do not know about the farm.
I was holding back my sighs and maintaining a calm expression when I suddenly heard a clear laugh.
Kim Yul was playing with the children who had gathered around him after seeing the Pinelpenia pattern.
When I looked into the smiling faces of the children, the shadow that had been prevalent until a moment ago had disappeared.
‘A little while ago, he cried as if the world would collapse.’
Is it because you guess what happened before that smile?
The sight I saw with my own eyes was so bizarre.
My expression almost became distorted without even realizing it.
As I forced my mouth to hold on, Tae-ho approached me.
“You need to loosen up your expression.”
It was a face that was black and blue, and life was flowing.
Thanks to Yang Tae-ho, who lightly tapped my shoulder with a tuk-tuk, I was able to relax my mouth.
“Whoa.”
I took a long breath to clear my complicated feelings.
“Bonnie, does the statue know if things are going well?”
“… … roughly.”
“I’m so curious… … .”
He said that it is not a situation to solve his curiosity.
Yang Tae-ho, who added a low voice, chinned his side.
Baron Volbita was approaching.
“They said I’d be with Yul and come over after work.”
“yes.”
Baron Bolbita, who arrived as soon as Yang Tae-ho left, spoke without hesitation.
“Are you the first stranger to find the trail?”
“Yes, my name is Kay.”
“I have heard a lot about you from Jerome. I’ve been through a lot If it wasn’t for you, I would have passed by without being able to save these many children.”
To be honest, I wasn’t in a condition to deal with someone.
Maybe it was because I was emotionally agitated, but I wanted to take time to catch up by myself.
But he wasn’t foolish enough to reveal it.
“I did what I had to do.”
“It is reassuring to think so. The strangers were full of thoughts of acquiring magical powers, so they were unreliable… … .”
Momentarily, ridicule almost leaked out.
“Can you believe it? I guess Jerome didn’t compliment me for nothing.”
There must be a reason why you dare to compare me with others and praise me.
“I don’t know if you know it, but it seems that the children feel secure in the symbols of the strangers.”
Sure enough, the baron laid out his purpose without much encouragement.
“It seems that they attach great importance to being able to see the traces of God directly.”
So let the children’s guard down, stand by my side like an ornament.
It didn’t look very nice to say it roughly like that.
I didn’t want to be taken advantage of.
But I was also curious about the inside story of those children.
So, for now, I just nodded my head.
“If I can help, I should help.”
Baron Volbita moved with me.
The baron’s aides, including Jerome, were already talking with some children.
Of course, the results didn’t look good.
Maybe they were wary of unfamiliar adults, but the children kept their mouths shut while holding each other tightly.
‘So he must have called me.’
After exchanging light eye contact with Jerome, I lowered my gaze.
Then, the little boy who had been spying on me immediately met his eyes.
He was about the height of my waist, estimated to be around ten years old.
It will be easier to communicate than an infant whose thinking is less developed.
I lowered my posture and sat down to match the height of my gaze to relieve the child’s vigilance.
“hi.”
When I greeted her in the softest voice possible, the child’s face flushed red when our eyes met.
On the other hand, the eyes of Baron Volbita, who had brought me, wrinkled slightly.
‘It wouldn’t be nice for me to actively intervene first.’
In the first place, he intended to use me as an ornament to relieve the children’s vigilance.
But I had no intention of moving it the way I wanted.
‘I can’t stop it anyway.’
It was a decided result from the moment the children thought of God through the player’s symbol.
‘To the children, I think I’m closer to God than they are.’
The world tree engraved on the chests of the knights was created by humans, and the symbol I am wearing was created by human powers.
If they step out and stop me, the children’s vigilance may become stronger.
In fact, the baron didn’t actively try to dissuade me.
Rather than stopping them, they crossed their arms and went into spectator mode, as if asking them to do whatever they wanted.
‘Because I’ll be able to calm myself down when I fail or things go wrong when I’m on the sidelines without intervening.’
It seemed that the thought that I would wait and see what I did was clearly felt through my skin.
I passed his gaze lightly and focused on the child.
“I want to hear what happened to you, can you tell me?”
The child who had pursed his lips and avoided his gaze glanced over my head.
Maybe this symbol is not simply a stigma that means a stranger.
It was the first time I had such a thought, but it was not the time to ponder it deeply.
Because the child who hesitated for a while started to explain.
“Three, there was a rumor that an army with the pattern of the world tree was coming… … .”
It was a messy story, but it wasn’t difficult to put it together.
As the church forces moved in earnest to recapture Kalom Castle, the monsters seemed to talk about withdrawing.
The rumor spread to the subhumans on the farm through the renegades in Calom Castle, and soon after, the movement to organize the farm began.
“I said that they would eat us all, that they would catch and eat us. I will dispose of it… … .”
The renegade who sorted the sub-species on the farm and put them in different cages laughed loudly.
The child who explained that started to cry.
I held my hand tightly behind my back so the child couldn’t see it.
Even while I was hiding my agitation, the child babbled and explained what had happened to him.
He was separated from the adults and locked in another cage, where he found a crack in the rock.
“I’ve heard that when wind blows in from a cave, the other side is also open… … .”
The child, who was trembling and continued talking, wrapped his arms around me and hugged me.
“If you’re going to die even if you stay there, and if you’re going to die even if you get caught running away, try running away, Ju, I didn’t want to die. So I got out.”
It seemed that the older children were comforting the smaller children and had escaped through the narrow gap.
But it wasn’t long before the escape was discovered.
“All the children of our village were gathered there… … The kids behind me didn’t come out… … .”
By the time the leader got out, the cliff connected to the exit had completely collapsed.
‘The children who couldn’t get out must have been buried.’
The children who managed to escape ran blindly into the mountains.
Some of them were eaten by monsters wandering in the polluted area, while others hid here because they couldn’t dare to go further.
After that, the children who could not overcome their hunger after enduring and enduring began to gather courage and go out.
In the process, we used the tunnels we discovered.
The moment when the whole story of the incident was grasped through the child’s explanation.
“Then are you the only ones out? What about other personnel? Didn’t the adults escape?”
The child’s complexion turned white at the question of Baron Volbita, who suddenly intervened.