Chapter 438 – The End of Suffering.
‘Simply like this?’
Sulsien couldn’t keep her mouth shut at the sight of Usher, who had easily dealt with Gigantopithecus as if playing with a child. I already knew he was strong from the time he single-handedly defeated a group of thieves who were trying to steal things.
“Could we possibly get this guy’s hide in its fullest form?”
“I’ve already prepared at least a blanket.”
As she looked down at the collapsed giant ape, Usher asked curiously as he pulled the rapier from the corpse.
“It’s not like that, it’s because of the research.”
Since the investigation report, which was taken in the form of a record like a journal, was unreliable, it was necessary to bring items that could serve as evidence.
“The evolution of Gigantopithecus is a very interesting subject.”
Gigantopithecus was a typical monster that lived in the water source area between Parz and Ragado. If you can find out a significant difference from the guys in the past, it will definitely be of great help to the investigation.
“All right.”
“Thank you!”
Seol Shien was delighted with Usher’s gentle nodding, but was frightened by his actions. After all, Usher twisted the rapier he had stabbed into Gigantopithecus, took out his butcher knife, and started cutting through the fur.
Watching him continue his work despite the blood dripping from his skin cut open by the blade and the terrible smell of metal, I suddenly realized that I had almost forgotten.
“I’d like to take the skull separately…”
Then, he stopped working for a while and looked at Seol Shien. She waited for her answer, worried that Usher might think she was a strange woman.
“Is that because of your studies too?”
“That’s right.”
Fortunately, he didn’t seem to have listened to her story. However, as the work continued, Seol Shien was frightened at the appearance under the fur hide and hid inside the carriage as if running away.
“Take it.”
After waiting for some time, he rolled up a leather covered with white fur and brought it. I was delighted with the appearance, but suddenly his outfit caught my eye.
“Isn’t Mr. Usher cold?”
She was Usher, still clinging to her armor. Sulsien often heard stories of Aidos and Aegeus, who escorted her, complaining that her armor was cold at night.
“You don’t have to worry about me.”
Wouldn’t he be cold outside leading the wagon? Concerned, he asked, but he ruthlessly threw the word away and left.
“Ugh, really.”
The moment Seol Shien was about to sigh, resenting him. There was something like a white stone left in front of the door he opened and went closer.
“Isn’t that a skull?”
It was the skull of Gigantopithecus she had claimed. I quietly took his hand and touched it, and the feeling of smooth yet cold water without a trace of blood reminded me of him breaking ice and washing his skull in water, and Sulli N laughed unconsciously.
“It means that he did everything he had to do while tickling.”
The condition of her skull was neat even for her to see. I was thinking of emptying the inside of my skull myself, even if I had to put up with the upset stomach.
Looking inside, there were no scratches. One of the lower molars in the jaw area was punctured by a sling bullet, but it was not a big enough flaw to be a problem.
“Get up. It’s evening.”
“Huh? Did you fall asleep again?”
When she woke up from her sleep, Usher was watching her. At first, she was embarrassed that she was seen asleep, but that was only for a few days, and now she was used to it.
Even if she tried to stay awake, she had to be alone in the carriage while Usher led the carriage, so there was no way she could endure sleep without anyone to talk to.
“How are you going to do for dinner tonight?”
“It’s safe to say that there’s nothing to eat once you enter Lagado, so let’s eat what’s left in the afternoon.”
What he took out was bread made from flour from willows he had collected in the afternoon, and a creature called tree and bead that he had caught under the ice.
“Ugh, do you often eat something like this in Parz?”
Seolsien had to eat it anyway, so he grabbed the red-ripe tree and bead, but he couldn’t help but feel a sense of rejection whenever he saw this bizarre figure.
“He’s a guy who sells quite expensive in Parz.”
“No matter how you look at it, it looks like a bug.”
A tree wavyd only lives in the water, but its appearance reminded him of a giant cockroach, so he couldn’t help but wonder how frightened he was when he first saw it.
After he tried it with his eyes closed anyway, he realized that it was more delicious than he thought. So he was in the middle of a meal with him.
-Kurreuk
“Uh?”
Hill Dis Beanie, who was resting after receiving grain from Usher, raised her head and looked somewhere. When Sulsien instinctively followed the guy’s vision and turned his head, he saw things approaching this place from afar.
-Puuuuu!
At that moment, Hill Disbiny sounded an alarm, and Usher immediately rose from his seat and drew his sword. Same situation as before.
“Like people.”
However, Seol Shien wondered if it was necessary to be so vigilant. Well, it was the people who rode the Svadil ferries running towards us from there.
“I forgot to tell you one thing.”
“Yes? Something important?”
“In Lagado, the most important thing you can’t trust is people.”
The meaning of the words could be known from the shouts of people, the sound of weapons colliding, and the screams that came after Seol-shien hid in the carriage. It must have been the same class as the thieves I encountered before. Soon after some time had passed.
“Are you done?”
Outside the carriage, which had become quiet before she knew it, she came out, frowning at the smell of her blood that penetrated her nostrils as she cautiously poked her head out.
“There are… How many corpses?”
There were only about three around Usher. I wondered that only three people died because there were dozens of people who had just attacked. Usher checked some items on their bodies and clicked his tongue.
“They are also human hunters.”
“What, what? That’s it.”
When Sulsien asked that bloody name, he showed me something like a necklace he took out from their arms.
“Teeth?!”
At first glance, it looked like a bead necklace, but it was a grotesque object made by punching small holes in human teeth and threading leather threads through them.
“Maljar of the Drati. That’s his name.”
“Why this stuff?”
Sulsien couldn’t understand why the same person’s teeth were gathered in this way to make a necklace, but Usher continued.
“It must be because of the customs of the Drati people.”
“If it’s custom…”
“They collect the teeth of the prey they hunt to make ornaments.”
Being a human hunter really meant hunting humans.
“I don’t even know! How can you be the same human!”
“It’s not that rare.”
“It’s not uncommon.”
“Ragado was originally a place where food was scarce.”
Originally, they were the infamous tribes of Ragado, but they were only selling people’s livers. It is said that when the severe cold wave and winter began to last in the aftermath of Otter’s descent, he began to hunt other humans in earnest.
“Even when Raga came out like this.”
Usher said as he roughly kicked the body away.
“Get on the wagon again. You must avoid the seat.”
Without even having time to ask why, Usher continued with a chin gesture.
“Unless you want to be bothered by them all night.”
Seeing where he pointed, Sulsien barely managed to hold back a scream. That’s because the people who attacked them from not too far away were looking this way. By the time we reached the next island after running on the frozen ice, it was already dark.
“Won’t those people attack again?”
“It’s different depending on the tribe, but I don’t think there’s going to be an attack again.”
“Why do you think so?”
His words were strangely confident, so I asked, but soon regretted it.
“Didn’t you already leave something to eat there?”
He never left any food there. Even if you take their share, what’s good about giving them food in an unstable situation? But if what he says is true, doesn’t that mean he will eat the corpses of his comrades as well?
“I’ll sleep first.”
Not long after, Usher, who was looking outside her, fell asleep, and she knelt down and hugged her, shaking her body.
‘How can I sleep in this situation?’
I still haven’t been able to sleep. Wouldn’t the people called Drati come after them and attack them? In the wake of her anxiety, she couldn’t lie down as usual and had to spend the time hugging her knees.
“Turn it off.”
Then, at the sound of Usher’s usual moaning, Seolshien lifted her head, who had been dozing off. Sure enough, she found Usher sleeping against the wall of her wagon, shaking her body. In the end, Seolshien approached him as usual today, and she tried to wake Usher up.
“You son of a bitch!!!”
“Kyaaaaa?!”
Today he woke her up with more ferocity than usual and tripped her over.
“Aww, Mr. Usher.”
“Ha, jeez. I’m sorry.”
As this had never happened except on her first day, Usher looked at her anxiously, shaking his head and leaving her apologetic words as if to leave her carriage.
“No!”
If Seolshien had tripped over herself, she hadn’t embraced him as he was. Her body trembled at the touch of her cold armor, but she didn’t care and she grabbed him.
“This isn’t a day or two, and I need to know why you’re doing that.”
The only person she could turn to now was Usher. So Sulsien couldn’t stand to see him suffer from strange nightmares every night and tell him not to care.
“…”
Still, as Usher shut her mouth and hid in the darkness in her helm, she bit her lip and blushed as she remembered something. Wasn’t she prepared that she would give up even her body to him anyway?
“Well, if you don’t want to tell me, you can hug me.”
She doesn’t know, but she looks over his helmet, thinking that if she shares her body temperature, she’ll have less nightmares.
Since he hadn’t asked for his body at all since the beginning, I was worried that maybe I should continue this uneasy journey like this.
“Sobbing.”
Soon she was relieved by her presence, which reached between her legs and distorted the cracks in her.
