I Became the Main Character’s Demon Sword

8

And these incidents started occurring every other day. They tried reinforcing the fence to make it higher and improving the locks on the doors, but it had no effect.

Eventually, Seid handed this matter over to the Mercenary Guild. After submitting the request, many mercenaries came, but they all gave up and left.

“Did they leave because of the ‘monster’?”

“Yes… I don’t know the details, but since it mainly attacked at night, each mercenary who came would hide and observe the situation all night. But when the day changed, they’d claim they saw a monster and run away.”

Arpel, who had been listening silently for a while, asked:

“You said you supply to the lord’s castle, so if animals died, it must have been difficult to operate. Did you ask the lord’s castle for help separately?”

“No, well… You know how supply is all about trust, right? I was afraid they might switch suppliers, so I didn’t mention it…”

Haha. Seid laughed awkwardly. As Arpel stared at him, it seemed like he was sweating even more.

“…Then I’d like to look around the farm.”

“I’d be delighted! I’ll guide you.”

As Arpel slowly changed the subject, Seid’s withering face brightened. Narrowing his eyes at this strange reaction, Arpel picked up Rohan, who was tilting his head, not quite understanding the conversation.

Following Seid’s guidance deep into the breeding grounds, they found it full of animals that formed the core of the business – pigs, cows, sheep, and so on. Rohan, now accustomed to being in Arpel’s arms, looked at each passing scene, his eyes wiggling with excitement.

“I’ve seen that animal before. They milk it later, right?”

Arpel glanced at the cow Rohan was pointing at. It wasn’t a dairy cow, but a male cow. Later, it wouldn’t be milked, but… Remembering that Seid supplied quality meat to the lord’s castle, Arpel held his tongue.

“Yes. They’ll milk it later.”

He decided to keep quiet about the cow’s fate, since Rohan seemed quite fond of it.

The inside of the breeding ground was ordinary. As they almost completed a full circuit, Arpel stopped and quietly watched Rohan, who was offering hay to a cow while waiting for him.

“There doesn’t seem to be anything particularly special.”

“Others have said the same thing.”

Seid nodded vigorously.

As Seid had said he was running quite a large supply business, even though the number of animals should have decreased considerably after weeks of continuous attacks by wild animals, the breeding ground still felt crowded.

Arpel, who had been watching Rohan with warm eyes, asked sharply:

“Where did you put the animal carcasses that accumulated during this time?”

“C-carcasses? Well… I supplied them, I supplied them!”

“…The carcasses?”

Although he didn’t know the details of the slaughter and supply process, it didn’t make sense to supply carcasses that had been attacked and killed by an unidentified creature overnight. As Arpel stared at Seid without turning his head, Seid’s face began to turn pale.

“…Fine. I’m giving up on the request.”

“What? What do you mean?!”

“I don’t want to work for someone who keeps hiding things.”

Arpel approached Rohan, gently took the hay from his hand, and picked him up again.

“Are we leaving now?”

“Yes. We’re going.”

“W-wait!!”

As Arpel really turned to leave, the restless Seid shouted. Yet, Arpel’s steps didn’t slow down.

Finally, Seid ran up and knelt right in front of them, only then did Arpel stop. He frowned, looking at Seid as if he were a nuisance.

“Step aside.”

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry. This is related to my livelihood…”

“Find someone else.”

“Please, just this once! Please!”

The light returned to Arpel’s indifferent eyes when Rohan’s fingertips carefully grasped the hem of his clothes. Looking down, he saw beautiful, trembling eyes.

“Can’t we… help them…?”

Rohan realized anew that this child in his arms had a kind nature. And with that one sentence, his unwavering resolve just moments ago completely changed.

Sensing this shift, Seid’s eyes fervently gazed at Rohan, his only hope. Naturally, Arpel’s mood began to sour rapidly. He covered Rohan’s eyes with his palm to avoid eye contact with the shameless Seid.

“If you tell me everything without hiding anything.”

“I promise…!”

Seid, after quickly gauging Arpel’s cold gaze, stood up, dusted off his pants, and carefully began to speak about what he had been hiding.

It was about the animal carcasses he had earlier claimed to have supplied.

“The animal carcasses… I didn’t supply them. I buried them.”

Seid led the two away from the center of the breeding ground and into the forest on the outskirts. Their attention was drawn to the only place that was bulging out compared to the otherwise flat surroundings.

“What are you doing? Start digging.”

“Yes, yes!”

Guilty of lying, Seid grabbed a shovel at Arpel’s words and began digging earnestly. Perhaps because the area had been dug up and covered multiple times recently, the soil gave way more easily than expected, and the stench of decay wafted out.

“Rohan. Close your eyes for a moment.”

“Strange smell…”

“Cover your nose too.”

After setting Rohan down, Arpel earnestly instructed him. Rohan, who never complained, immediately closed his eyes tightly and covered his nose with his hands. The sight was oddly cute given the situation, and Arpel’s usually straight lips trembled slightly.

“I’ve finished digging!”

Of course, even that expression returned to normal when Seid’s voice was heard.

Leaving Rohan behind, Arpel approached the pit and stared at the pig carcass on top. It seemed to be the most recently deceased, as it was the least decayed, allowing the cause of death to be observed.

The carcass had wounds that looked as if something had eaten into it. The area around the wound was not red but completely black, and the skin was shriveled.

What remained at the edges of the wound were traces of black bubbles that hadn’t quite burst. Apart from the smell of the decaying carcass, a nauseating yet somehow familiar scent invaded his nostrils.

With the anxious Seid beside him, Arpel silently examined the carcass and then looked up.

“You hid the carcasses because of these wounds, right?”

“Ahem… That’s correct.”

“And the reason for hiding the wounds?”

“……”

Seid’s lips quivered for a moment. Seeing his hesitation, Arpel decided to let him be rather than pressuring him as before.

“…It might be a bit of a long story. Could we move somewhere else?”

After quickly covering the freshly dug earth, they returned to the reception room with the comfortable sofa from earlier.

Although he had been covering his nose, the smell seemed to have seeped in, as Rohan’s cheeks were a bit pale. Arpel gently caressed his cheeks and put a candy he had bought from a store before coming here into Rohan’s mouth. The sweet taste finally eased the child’s expression.

“Those wounds… They’re also the reason I didn’t ask the lord’s castle for help. There have been some hushed rumors lately.”

“Are these rumors well-known?”

“No. I know about them because I frequently visit the lord’s castle to make deliveries, but most people who don’t work in the castle are unaware of this.”

Seid’s expression turned cold, as if recalling the incident.

“A maid disappeared from inside the castle. Some said she might have run away, but… she was a maid favored by the young lady, and there were traces of her returning to the castle after completing an errand, so the claim that she ran away was quickly dismissed.”

“It must have been treated as a disappearance then.”

“Yes. And about a month ago, the missing maid returned. There were no wounds, and she herself said she was fine. But the strange thing was that the maid couldn’t recall any memories from the time she was missing.”

For four days after that, everything seemed completely normal. Even those who had been suspicious were starting to let it go when the incident occurred.

“The maid who was attending to the young lady suddenly foamed at the mouth with black foam and vomited black blood.”

“…Black blood?”

“Of course, the place turned into a mess, and the maid eventually died right there after convulsing. The problem was that a drop of the black blood the maid vomited splattered onto the young lady’s arm.”

Starting from where the blood had splattered, black rashes appeared on the young lady’s fair skin, and she began to fall ill. The lady of the house collapsed upon witnessing her daughter caught up in an inexplicable accident and hovering between life and death. The lord, instead of seeking someone who could treat his daughter’s condition, isolated her in a separate annex and merely observed her condition.

“It’s strange, isn’t it? They said the lord cherished his daughter quite a bit.”

“So the reason you didn’t ask the lord’s castle for help was because of the similarity of the wounds.”

“Yes… They said there were also traces of black bubbles left on the maid’s corpse. I heard about it by chance from a friend who worked at the lord’s castle and dismissed it, but when the same thing happened in my breeding ground… I thought if this became known, I might be unjustly accused and dragged away.”

While it didn’t justify the deception, it was an understandable reason.

Similar wounds, the young lady falling ill with black spots, the lord hiding his daughter instead of seeking treatment for her.

After listening to Seid’s explanation and organizing his thoughts, Arpel nodded.

“I think I have a general idea about the animal that attacked this place. I’ll take care of this matter.”

“R-really?!”

“Yes. Because I was asked to.”

“Thank you…!”

Arpel’s gaze remained indifferent as he watched Seid bowing repeatedly. The reason Arpel agreed to handle the job so readily was because of Rohan. Because he had asked to help that man.

Originally, regardless of the circumstances, he would have left this place the moment he knew there was a hidden fact, without caring about the situation.