CH 106

Chapter 106 – What Lurks In The Abyss

I tilt my head back in my mind at Myrril’s unexpectedly serious comment.

“…Cursed? Does that mean that the white snake is going to use some kind of sorcery on us?”

“Not exactly, but it’s not far off the mark. And they are not snakes but newts or salamanders that live in swamps. I’ve heard that deep down, where the sun doesn’t shine, their eyes and legs degenerated into that… But that’s not the problem; it’s the disaster that happens when you kill them.”

“Um, Myrril-san. I appreciate your concern, but the salamanders are already approaching the city walls…”

“Hey, everybody! Take shelter inside the city walls! Those who can’t make it in time flee to the trees or onto the wagons! Do not attack!”

The soldiers were frozen in place in the face of the sudden appearance of a large number of monsters, but they soon screamed and took refuge within the city walls.

They managed to close the gates, but as expected, not everyone was able to take immediate action to evacuate. Some soldiers were seen here and there on the plain, but they seemed to have escaped by climbing trees or horse-drawn wagons in accordance with Myrril’s instructions.

The swarms of deep-dwelling salamanders were wriggling and slamming into the city walls. There is no moat in Meteora, so the slimy white worm-like creatures are accumulating under the wall.

So far, there seems to be no direct damage, but it is disgusting. I can’t decide if I should shoot… or not until I hear what Myrril-san has to say.

“It’s okay. It’s not very strong for its size, and its only attacks are clamping and biting… Hey, don’t kill it!”

I don’t know what the warning was for, but it was too late.

They were soldiers on the edge of the forest who had failed to escape. Whether or not they heard Myrril-san’s voice, they saw what looked like a giant slimy white snake-like creature crawling toward them and swinging their swords and battle axes at it.

The head was split open, or the neck was cut off, and the deep-dwelling salamander spurted blood and died in a daze. It seems that they are neither as tough nor as ferocious as the legless dragons and sea wolves.

“…Oh, you fool.”

“Eh? What do you mean? What’s wrong?”

“Look.”

The soldiers who had killed the deep-dwelling salamander screamed into the empty space and began brandishing their weapons.

Panic gradually spread, and the soldiers who had only been watching around them joined in. Soldiers on the wall side of the city began to murmur at the sight of them.

The soldiers within the city walls didn’t know what they were doing, and neither did I.

“I don’t know all the details. Some say they hallucinate, others say they revive past fears, but whatever the case, the one who kills the deep-dwelling salamander loses his sanity. It will be a quarter of an hour before they return to their senses, and usually… before that time.”

A battle-axe wielded by one of the soldiers smashed into the head of a fellow soldier, a spear thrust out by another pierced another, and a sword reaped from a fall cut the head off a soldier who was still alive.

In the blink of an eye, the four soldiers had killed each other.

“Oh, it’s already happened!”

“If we kill the magical beast user, won’t the hallucination disappear?”

“No, the mage is only using the beast to move. It is said that the panic is caused by the poison contained in the bodily fluids… or the breath of the deep-dwelling salamander itself.”

“Then why don’t we just use a gun and kill it from outside the poison’s range of effect?”

Myrril looked at me, a little lost.

“The only information we have about its ecology is based on hearsay. It is rare for such a creature to appear on the ground.”

Rare monsters, huh? I’m not happy about it. If there were an option to sell them to the Adventurers’ Guild, that would be one thing.

Poisonous or not, it has just proven to be dangerous and ineffective from a distance of two to thirty meters.

I point to the scattered remains of soldiers and white snakes-like creatures.

“We can try it from this distance.”

“I think you’re probably right. The swarm is already close. Yoshua, is it really necessary to take the risk in this situation?”

No, but. It is someone else’s war, to begin with. But will we leave them bobbing around under the walls all the time? I’m fine with that, though.

“Even if we don’t touch them, they will attack us, won’t they? Not so much at us, but at this white snake. Will they go away if we wait a while?”

“I hear they don’t like the sunlight and go back underground.”

“It’s still late in the evening, so we’d have to wait more than half a day.”

I’ve got an idea.

“Myrril, will you keep an eye on that magical beast user to ensure he doesn’t do anything unnecessary?”

“Roger that.”

I went down inside the walls and stored the dirt vertically, just a few feet away from the wall.

Storage, storage, storage… and then. Don’t let it yaw and crumble askew. I should have brought a shovel to shape it.

The soil was only on the surface layer due to the proximity to the ocean, and after digging for 5m, stones, gravel, and hard bedrock appeared, and the seawater started to overflow more violently. After storing the materials at random to create a vertical hole three meters in diameter and 30 meters deep, I was teleported back to the surface and flew to the top of the ramparts.

“Sorry to keep you waiting.”

“That mage, maybe he ran away. He’s still in the forest and hasn’t shown up.”

“…Hmm, did he think they could win if he just left them alone already?”

The ground surface along the outside of the wall is scraped with storage to create a wide funnel-shaped slope about 10 meters wide. The deep-dwelling salamander slides down the slope. The destination is the vertical hole I mentioned earlier. If it hits the bottom, it might spit out poison, but if it’s done quickly, it won’t be a problem.

“Do you want me to drive them into that hole?”

“Yeah, just try not to fall in yourselves.”

The soldiers watching from the top of the ramparts offered to help, and with ladders, fences, and torches, they drove the remaining salamanders into the slope.

“Okay, that’s enough.”

When the last one was dropped, I asked the soldiers to stand back and throw in the stored dirt and chunks of bedrock to bury it. For some reason, what I dug out wasn’t enough, so there remained a vertical hole about five meters deep, but I guess the poison wouldn’t have any effect under such deep soil.

“Fumu, good work, Yoshua. I hope this will do the trick. But… that’s it.”

Myrril-san looked back at me, brushing my wet hair out of my face.

“It was the last big job, and yet it’s so plain.”

“RIght. I know, so don’t go into that.”

Now the only thing left is for the humans to kill each other. We’ll just sit back and wait for the rest as outsiders.