Chapter 34

The Demon Hunting Method Of The Regressed Inquisitor 34

The City Waiting for the Sun (2)

“What are you doing! Lost! Fly! Spread your wings!”

Titan harshly whipped me as I fell to the ground after being suddenly thrown.

There’s no one crazier than him. He threw me before I could even make an excuse.

“Get up, Lost, try again! You can fly!”

“This crazy b*stard…”

The problem was that it was so sudden that I couldn’t prepare enough holy magic to protect my body.

I took the impact of falling from that high sky directly.

While my whole body ached, Titan urged me as if he couldn’t understand.

If he had the energy to stand there and shout, it would be nice if he could help me up, but Titan didn’t budge from his spot, cheering me on like a guardian watching a child practice walking.

I genuinely want to kill him.

I feel like uncontrollable malice is consuming my body.

This is why humanity can’t conquer Melis.

Crack!

While lying down and letting out a faint groan, I deploy holy magic towards the approaching wyverns.

This time, the divine power I borrowed was the thunder of Indra, the god of thunder.

Its destructive power is slightly less than Jupiter’s lightning, but the accompanying thunder is even more intense.

Boom!!

At the sound of thunder spreading with the flashing lightning, the wyverns that were sneaking up to devour me started to flee in panic.

In fact, there was even one that got scorched near me. This was enough to achieve a significant effect with a small cost.

“Ugh.”

When I barely managed to get up with the healing through holy magic, Titan approached with a displeased expression.

“Why didn’t you fly?”

“Shouldn’t you ask if I can fly first?”

“Didn’t you fly last time?”

“I must have explained countless times that it was a power only for that time.”

Yes, I had already explained about the power I had back then.

Before this crazy beast asked me to fight.

“I said it was the power, not the wings. Do your limbs grow and disappear?”

“…Humans can’t originally fly. That was only temporarily possible with holy magic…”

“Don’t make excuses!”

This crazy guy, seriously.

“A bird must eventually fly in the sky. The journey until then will surely be painful, but the moment it can freely fly in the sky, it will think it was worth it.”

“No, I mean, I’m not a bird…”

“I told you not to make excuses!”

I don’t know how he got this crazy.

He wasn’t like this before.

“You already flew once. So, just try a little harder.”

“Humans can’t fly, you crazy guy!”

“Then what about that guy!”

Titan pointed angrily to a muscular giant sitting at the end of the carriage.

Of course, compared to Titan, his muscles were insignificant. But by human standards, he was definitely a monster.

“Ah, sorry. It looked so damn fun watching. I’m not a suspicious person, um… No, does saying I’m not suspicious make me more suspicious? Nice to meet you all. I’m a suspicious person.”

“Can you fly?”

“Huh? Of course I can fly. You saw me flying earlier, didn’t you? When I waved, you waved back, right?”

“Yes, I did.”

A man with a somewhat nonchalant attitude waves his hand towards this side.

Part of his skin is covered with scales and his eyes are eerie. Moreover, he has wings made of membrane.

At least it’s certain that the other party is not a mere human.

“Did you see that, Rost? If you try hard enough, you can fly like that too. It’s a fact since you’ve already succeeded once.”

“Yes, yes. If you try hard enough, you can fly. The reason you haven’t been able to fly until now is definitely because you haven’t tried hard enough, right?”

And Titan’s view on humans is twisted to a horrifying degree.

Titan is a madman.

That’s for sure, but he had his own reasons when he did crazy things.

This crazy act also had a reason.

He was a guy who had little opportunity to interact with humans, being holed up in his own kingdom.

If such a guy saw two people flying in a short period, he might believe it.

Who is the man in front of me? Why is he doing such a vicious thing?

“First of all, let’s stop spreading false knowledge to our idiot.”

After rummaging through the information in my head, I finally recall a matching figure.

The other party’s race is a dragonkin.

A race rarer than orcs, who are fewer in number than beastmen.

And even rarer than that.

A race you might see once in a lifetime. But even if I’ve never met one, there are a few people I can guess.

“More importantly, weren’t you unfazed by seeing that?”

Clearly a strong person.

Yet, Titan did nothing when he approached this close?

Isn’t that strange? Normally, he would have immediately challenged him to a duel.

“Rost, let me explain since you seem to not understand. That means he wants to duel after the conversation is over.”

“Did dragonkin have such a custom?”

“No, they don’t have such a custom? So, I don’t intend to duel.”

“No, you have to.”

“This guy’s head is weird.”

This is stubbornness at its finest. Now he’s even resorting to absurd logic.

Still, it’s a relief that it doesn’t mean they’ll cause trouble right away.

“Did you come here personally to hunt the wyverns? Guild Master.”

“Huh? Oh, yes! That’s exactly it!”

From noble mtl dot com

Exactly it, my foot.

Does he think appearing at such an absurd timing is a coincidence?

It’s laughable.

The opponent is probably the Guild Master of the Hunters’ Guild in ＜The City Waiting for the Sun＞, Rubia.

Kurud.

A strong man on par with Allen Wise.

He doesn’t seem to be hostile towards us, but it’s still unsettling.

“Well, since there aren’t many hunters in our city, I, the master, have to move personally in such unusual situations. This path is supposed to be safe… well, as you can see.”

Kurud grinned and pointed his thumb towards the sky.

There, in the distance, was a group of wyverns observing us.

I thought they were driven away by Indra’s thunder, but it seems they are still keeping their distance and staying alert.

“Oh dear, it was an opportunity when they were gathered, but they flew away far.”

“Oh my, it seems the master of the Hunters’ Guild, who should protect travelers from beasts, hasn’t been doing his job properly. We’ve been attacked like this, after all.”

“Hmm…”

“Hah!”

Trying to shift the blame, are we?

Who would fall for such an obvious trick?

“Why don’t you help us out? We’ll share the loot with you.”

“If we catch them, the loot is ours to begin with. How generous of you to share it with us. The gods would lament your shameless tongue, brother.”

“Which religion do you belong to? The priests I know always speak of mercy and good deeds. Are you worshipping some evil god?”

“Oh my, have you never met a priest of the Pantheon? Judging by how recklessly you run your mouth.”

“What… Pantheon?!”

“Do you realize you just insulted all the gods of the Pantheon?”

“No, I didn’t mean to go that far…”

If it’s about flaunting ranks, I won’t lose anywhere. Trying to pin the blame on me because I’m a priest?

Being a priest of the Pantheon means being a priest of all the orders.

In other words, unless you want to make enemies of all the orders, you should watch your mouth.

“Do you even need help in the first place? You seem to be doing just fine on your own.”

No matter how remote the place, the position of a master cannot be obtained through mere land grabbing.

Every master must first be certified at the Hunter Guild Headquarters in the imperial capital, Koinur.

In other words, this guy is one of the strongest in the empire.

Considering the race of the dragonkin, it makes no sense otherwise.

In terms of sheer strength, they may be lower than titans, but dragonkin are monsters with unparalleled mana affinity.

They sense mana as naturally as breathing.

They can manipulate mana as if moving a part of their own body. They can condense aura into a perfect form.

At that point, we must call such a person a master.

And the dragonkin before us is at the starting point of that mastery.

“Or are you interested in seeing our skills? Are you curious because there are orcs you’ve never seen before? Or do you want to confirm if we are a threat? Please make it clear.”

“……”

And Kurud is asking for cooperation?

Just because of a group of wyverns living together?

It’s laughable.

There are quite a few of them to say they came to subdue the wyverns.

If they hadn’t figured out the wyvern group until it got to this point, it’s beyond incompetence.

This is neglect. Letting them naturally nest at the crossroads.

Why did they do that?

“If someone saw this, they might think you released the wyverns on purpose to test the skills of passersby.”

“No way.”

“If you just want to say the timing was perfect, then fine.”

“Perfect timing indeed! But why are you here?”

“Tourism.”

“Then how about going back? As you can see, it’s a bit dangerous here.”

“It’s fine. Isn’t this also part of the charm of traveling?”

In ＜The City Waiting for the Sun＞, there is no lord. Instead, it is a free city that elects a representative every three years.

And as I recall, Kurud was not the representative.

At this point, the representative was the master of the Merchant Guild.

And that merchant was the last master of Rubia. Rubia was completely uprooted by ＜The Corruptor＞ without leaving a trace.

“It’s not really something I should say about where I live, but right now, it’s not the kind of atmosphere where you can enjoy sightseeing.”

“You should explain that first. You keep leaving things out and giving orders abruptly. Don’t your subordinates complain about that?”

“…They do.”

I knew it. Seeing how his way of speaking is just like a dog’s, it makes me angry too.

“Alright, then after you hear my explanation, you’ll have to make a choice.”

“Explanation.”

“Yes, yes, I’ll explain.”

Tell me what the choice is. Why does he keep using that dog-like way of speaking even after I pointed it out?

“…It’s either show that you have the skills to survive in that city or go back.”

“Understood.”

“Alright, then let’s start with the explanation. Right now, Rubia is in the midst of a power struggle between roughly three groups.”

Kurud sat down on the ground as if he didn’t care about the wyverns circling in the sky.

Then he grabbed the front part of his spear and drew three circles.

What a pitiful sight.

“This is the Merchant Guild. They are practically the rulers of this city.”

“Money always wields strong power wherever you go.”

“Even more so here. It’s almost impossible for this city to be self-sufficient.”

“Indeed.”

As the name suggests, ＜The City Waiting for the Sun＞ Rubia is a place where it rains incessantly throughout the year.

It’s no exaggeration to say that there’s a rumor that 30% of the capital’s water flows from Rubia.

“Crops don’t grow. There’s no livestock that can be raised. The only specialty we have is the moss that researchers and pharmacists seek.”

Fortunately, in this environment, there is something we can cultivate. With the rain pouring down every day, what else can we do?

“But even that is reaching its limit. The supply has always been less than the demand, so the price was high, but now most researchers have given up, and pharmacists are trying to buy it cheaply.”

“So, you’re saying the merchants’ lives depend on it.”

“Exactly, if they leave, this city is finished. You understand quickly without needing an explanation. Why don’t you settle here? I’ll prepare a high position for you.”

“No, thank you. If I have to face you and talk every day, I’ll die of stress.”

He was talking about leaving, but now that he understands the situation, he’s being friendly.

“Anyway, the most powerful group is the Merchant Guild. And the second group is us.”

“Why are hunters fighting with the Merchant Guild?”

“Because we also support this city in our own way. Even if it’s just moss, we’re the only ones who can get materials from the beasts, right? So we have some influence too.”

The hunters usually roam outside the city and bring back their spoils.

And then they trade them with the merchants.

It’s clear that they are trying to maintain the economic foundation somehow.

“We’re doing our own work too. We didn’t care even if the merchants treated us as uneducated.”

“Why did you do that?”

“Huh…?”

“You should have gotten angry then. Isn’t that why they are now trying to exploit you with the emergence of this third force?”

“That’s… No, but how do you know that?”

“Isn’t it obvious?”

They said they didn’t care about being treated as uneducated. That means that perception had already taken hold.

Perhaps it’s the result of the city’s natives trying to save the city somehow.

But suddenly, the relationship broke down. Those who didn’t care about all the disregard until now?

Isn’t it obvious? The safety of the city they were trying to protect was at stake.

“The emergence of the third force. The resulting discord, the merchants probably tried to lure the hunters they despised with gold coins to hire them as guards.”

“That’s right.”

“If they refused, they would have threatened not to trade hunting materials anymore. The hunters had to choose whether to protect the merchants’ safety instead of the city’s, or to assert their value now after being disregarded.”

“That’s also right.”

Kurud had only those two choices. It seems they chose the latter.

“You handled the initial response poorly.”

It’s a job where force equals value. If you appear weak, it’s over.

The merchants, who originally treated them as inferiors, wouldn’t acknowledge the hunters’ protests now.

The long-standing discord in the relationship inevitably led to conflict.

And because of that, the city’s economic foundation gradually dried up.

The merchants didn’t buy materials, so money didn’t circulate.

Even if the hunters didn’t gather materials and instead guarded the merchants, the result would be the same.

Originally, a negotiation through appropriate lines should have been made, but it was impossible to see those they had always regarded as inferiors as equals now.

It’s obvious that the merchants didn’t want to make any compromise.

What’s the problem?

They were the ones trading in the first place. If it didn’t work out, they could just close their business in Rubia and leave.

There’s no solution. Without accepting the proposal from the hunters’ guild, it became impossible to maintain the city.

“It’s already too late. We have to accept the merchants’ proposal.”

“…Then we’ll just be pushed further down.”

“Isn’t it the Hunters’ Guild that’s in a hurry? It seems like you’re the only ones trying to save the city.”

“No, there’s another way.”

“You mean to strike down the third faction that’s been stirring things up. Do you think resolving the root cause of the conflict will fill the deep emotional rift that’s already formed?”

I told you.

We handled the initial response poorly. The Hunters’ Guild shouldn’t have bowed down.

We should have shown respect to the merchants who trade for the city’s sake, but we shouldn’t have let ourselves be taken advantage of.

“…So you’re saying we should bow down completely?”

“We have to strike down the third faction. But how we respond afterward is up to us.”

It will take considerable effort to reverse the already entrenched perception.

“Now, let’s hear about the third faction that’s the root of the problem.”

“Something feels off… Weren’t we discussing whether or not to enter the city?”

“That’s right. So spill all the information about this dangerous third faction. We need to know to make a decision.”

“Something… feels off…”

Kurud began to spill the information, albeit hesitantly.

I don’t have much information about Rubia either. It’s a free city that the Empire doesn’t heavily involve itself in.

A city that was destroyed without leaving a single blade of grass behind.

The only thing I know is this:

Another “Eroder” presumed to be the daughter of the “Untouchable” Eroder, whose existence was unknown.

“There’s a strange kid. The third faction is essentially just that one kid.”

The fact that she was killed by someone in this city. This led to the catastrophic result of the monster that had been lurking in my domain starting to move.