Chapter 76
In the darkness, the rough scrape of skin and the harsh breath against my face made me frown. The gun I’d been holding had long since slipped from my hand under the dwarf’s crushing grip.
“From the moment a human woman walked into the meeting, I thought something was off. I knew it would come to this.”
In the faint moonlight filtering into the carriage, I glimpsed the coarse features unique to dwarves. His hand still pinned my wrist, and once he noticed the window shutter was drawn, he finally seemed reassured, looking down at me with narrowed eyes.
The thick lids buried in flesh parted just enough for his sharp pupils to gleam in the moonlight, glinting with anger as though to measure just how dangerous a human I was.
“You bewitched a divine beast to bring it this far, and now you plan to charm even monsters with nothing more than chicken meat. Sure, orcs and beastfolk are closer to animals—treat them well enough and they’ll follow you around like dogs. But a human woman… Do you know what your kind’s schemes have turned the world into?”
I could feel the blood flow cut off in my wrist. With my gun gone, I had no means of resisting. His heavy weight pressed down on my stomach, leaving me breathless.
“My family, my comrades, my blood—all of them turned into insane monsters. You nobles are the calculating kind, aren’t you? Always weighing profit and loss. So why did you follow us here?”
At this rate, I might die without a sound. Struggling desperately, I realized the only thing I could move was my legs.
“How exactly did you bewitch the divine beast?”
The shadow looming over me tilted its head, as if puzzled. He was still for a moment, and just as I thought of testing a bit of resistance, his thick fingers suddenly clamped around my jaw, threatening to crush it. My breath caught as he jerked my face this way and that.
“I want to know how a mere human woman managed to enthrall the leader of the beastfolk. Hm? Even knights can’t resist you. What’s so different about nobles in human society?”
That sounded more like a question for the real Lemoni.
“You’re the only one who loses by doing this.”
I forced the words out past the painful grip, and his lips curled into a grotesque smile that stretched toward his ears.
“Maybe. Humans will be angry. But in the borderlands, do you really think a handful of humans can stand against dwarves? Will orcs or other races side with you just because you tossed them a few scraps of meat? Foolish noble girl… No, that’s not it.”
He seemed to revel in my silence, as if silencing me could somehow return his bloodline—now crazed monsters—to normal.
But while he was distracted by his own words, I carefully used the heel of my foot to nudge open the carriage door latch.
“The races of the borderlands don’t splinter just because of a few scraps. You wouldn’t know, but before the Khan Alliance, do you know how those tribes treated humans? As prey. Whenever clueless humans wandered past the great walls surrounding the Southern Empire, they went straight into our mouths—”
“Get up.”
His half-mad tirade was cut short by a sudden pounding on the door. The dwarf stiffened. A sharp noise, like the door being struck, and then Kais threw it open, his eyes immediately catching the wrongness inside.
“I said, get up—dwarf.”
That low, rumbling voice echoed behind me. Shock and confusion flickered across the dwarf’s features, but as always, his eyes still burned with rage aimed at me.
“…So, humans really are always ready to help their own, huh…”
His face twisted in fury, and before he could strike me out of spite, he was hurled backward. Air rushed into my lungs again, blood flooding painfully into my wrist until my head spun. I sat up, gasping, only to realize a commotion had already erupted outside.
“Tch. Figures you’d all be standing guard to protect the human woman.”
Beyond the open carriage door, Kais stepped out after throwing the dwarf aside, the crowd outside buzzing with unrest. My wrist throbbed, a strange confirmation that I was feeling pain more clearly now.
But I had no time to dwell on it. I grabbed my gun and followed outside—only to freeze.
Past Kais’s back loomed massive silhouettes. Dwarves. They might be considered the smallest race of the borderlands, but their heights exceeded two meters, and their thick, stone-like builds outclassed even the best-trained humans. Kais stood before them, calm-faced as he pointed his sword, but we both knew the truth.
Humans cannot defeat monsters.
I had learned that bitter truth in Draith Prison, and even under the protection of imperial knights, it hadn’t changed. Even holding my gun now, I felt powerless. What would the real Lemoni do? She wouldn’t hesitate—she’d aim straight at them.
“Well, since one knight’s here, let’s ask: are noble women really that special? Do they taste that different from commoners?”
“No matter how vulgar, there are words you should swallow before your betters. Now I see why your kind is treated as monsters. Watch your tongue. This is Lady Christina, daughter of the Ducal House.”
“Vulgar?”
The dwarf sneered, pulling a deadly axe from his back.
“You’ve got plenty of nerve speaking like that before your master. Maybe I should smash that pretty face of yours to shut you up.”
“What’s going on?”
“Milady, step back for now. And you dwarves—lower your weapons—”
Two Southern Empire knights on patrol hurried to my side, gently pushing me behind them as they joined Kais. But the dwarves, enraged by the humiliation of seeing their leader thrown down, showed no signs of calming.
The real trouble began when one dwarf shoved a knight’s shoulder.
“What do you think you’re doing?”
The sudden affront had the knights unsheathing their swords in unison. The dwarves followed suit. The air, already cold, froze with tension. Other races nearby, keeping to their own groups, seemed oblivious, asleep or standing guard, unaware of what was unfolding.
This was bad. I had sparked conflict during the meeting earlier—and now again, because of me.
“One step closer and we’ll take it as an act of aggression. We’ll overlook the shoulder shove, but withdraw now.”
The knight’s warning only made the dwarf laugh scornfully.
“Overlook? More like you can’t do anything, humans. You think I don’t know your kind?”
“Our enemy right now is the Western Empire. We don’t want to break the alliance, so stop this childishness and return.”
“Our mines are already destroyed. What do we care if the alliance breaks?”
The dwarf who had shoved the knight now smirked and struck his chest with a fist. The knight’s sword flashed, slicing toward his neck with startling speed. I squeezed my eyes shut, bracing for blood—but no sound came. Only the startled shouts of knights.
When I opened my eyes, the dwarf was gripping the blade in his bare hand.
“Pathetic steel.”
Blood trickled between his fingers, but his expression was one of disdain rather than pain.
“What mine did you humans dig this from, to forge such weak swords? Is this really the best you can do?”
“You bastard…”
The knight’s hand strained against the hilt, veins bulging, but the dwarf didn’t budge.
“In the borderlands, weak races are weeded out. That is the law of survival. And weaklings like you—”
His other hand swung his axe, cleaving the sword in two, before seizing the knight’s throat in his massive grip. The knight’s comrades lunged to help, but the other dwarves blocked their way.
The knight’s feet lifted from the ground as his attacker panted, trembling with rage.
“Weakness must be culled. That is the order of the world. Why did that divine beast create the Khan Alliance and stir all this chaos…?”
And then—
“If you’ve got a problem, take it up with the one who made the Khan Alliance.”
The dwarf’s head suddenly snapped back, releasing the knight, who collapsed to the ground gasping.
“Why attack innocent humans instead?”
