Hidden behind Eren, Liselotte looked around in confusion.
She couldn’t hear a single sound, yet even Ferento was scanning the surroundings with a noticeably serious gaze.
“It appears to be one.”
In Gelloa Village, where not even a single ant was visible, they held their breath as if something were standing right before them.
Eren walked without hesitation, as though he were following something.
When they entered an alley, a space filled with ashes appeared.
So much so that it was almost embarrassing to even call it a building, that spot alone had been intensely burned.
Without anyone needing to say it, it was clear that this was the place Valen had mentioned.
Following closely behind Eren in a state of tension, Liselotte’s footing suddenly slipped with a scrape.
Staggering, she was just about to slam her face into Eren’s back—
As if he had predicted it in advance, Eren caught her with one arm.
“Be careful.”
“Ah, sorry. There was something under my foot…”
When she glanced down, she saw numerous small metal pellets rolling around.
She seemed to have stepped on them unknowingly, as they were hidden beneath the ash.
Each metal pellet, barely half the size of a fingernail, was too small to be a toy, yet too ambiguous in shape to clearly serve any other purpose.
“What is this?”
Picking up one of the metal pellets, Liselotte blew on it with a soft huff and roughly brushed off the ash.
Seeing this, Ferento spoke up as if he recognized it.
“It is a bead used for counting numbers. The frame is made of wood, but it seems it all burned away.”
“I have never seen it before. Is it something commonly used?”
“It is hardly used anymore! About twenty years ago, you could often see them in places with lots of people or goods, like poorhouses or merchant guilds.”
Then this place was highly likely to have been a location where many people or goods gathered.
As Liselotte quietly rolled the metal pellet in her palm with her thumb.
Clatter, a sound came from the only place where the skeletal frame of a building remained.
“Ferento.”
Eren gestured with his chin toward the direction the sound came from.
Meeting his gaze to show he understood, Ferento heightened his guard and slowly moved toward that spot.
As he approached what seemed to be a doorway, something pitch-black suddenly burst out and lunged toward Eren.
“Kyaaak!”
When Eren blocked it with his sword and knocked it away, the thing that had charged at him collapsed limply into the ashes.
Pressed tightly against Eren’s back, Liselotte’s heart thudded wildly from the shock.
‘Right. Since we took his control rights, there’s no way Duke Gloria would stay still. Did he even release a monster?’
According to Valen’s investigation, the area around Gelloa Village was a region where monsters had completely disappeared.
Taebon, the former commander mercenary, had said the same thing, so there was a high likelihood that it was true.
If that pitch-black presence had suddenly appeared, it made no sense unless it was a monster deliberately released.
Meanwhile, Ferento, who had been about to swing his sword to finish off the thing that had attacked, suddenly hesitated.
“Your Highness. This is a person.”
When he lifted the long, matted hair clumped together with the tip of his sword, the man bared his teeth with a screech.
Long fingernails and toenails that looked as if they had never been cut, and rag-like clothes that looked as though they had been scavenged from somewhere.
With even his hair grown long like fur, it was understandable to mistake him for a monster.
Perhaps realizing he was already no match, the beast-like man only glared at Eren with blazing eyes.
“You bastard, how dare you bare your teeth at My Lord!”
Clang. When Ferento struck his head with the scabbard, the man sniffled and teared up.
Because of his gaunt frame, it was hard to clearly estimate his age.
Without letting down his guard, Ferento pressed him with questions.
“Who sent you?”
“Kyaaak!”
“What is your name?”
“Kyak!”
“If you don’t answer, I’ll kill you right here.”
When the sword was brought up near his neck, he whimpered and his aggression subsided.
After roughly checking the surroundings, Ferento scratched his head as if troubled.
“He doesn’t seem to have any intelligence. He looks like a man in his early to mid-twenties… maybe he went mad and settled in an abandoned village. What should we do?”
“Just in case, search the area thoroughly.”
At Eren’s order, Ferento shouted energetically.
“Understood!”
While Ferento examined the beast-like man, Eren searched the area.
Liselotte followed closely behind him, and then Eren suddenly came to a stop.
Standing in front of a doorway, he blocked the view inside with his massive frame.
“It would be better not to look.”
“Why?”
“It is not a pleasant sight.”
Through the slight gap at his side, the scene inside the room came into view.
The room, as large as an average noble household’s bedroom, was filled entirely with ash. What was strange was that the ash had taken on human shapes.
As if pleading to be saved, ash was piled especially thick near the doors and windows, while most of the figures nearer the center of the room were crouched or sprawled face-down.
“…So they really burned the place with people inside.”
It was exactly as Valen had told her.
But seeing it with her own eyes was far more horrific.
Letting out a sigh, Eren stepped inside and stirred through the ash with his sword.
The human-shaped ash mostly scattered into the air, but at times, green threads were caught and pulled out.
Fiddling with a thread that looked almost new, Eren frowned and muttered.
“It seems green threads were used here.”
“Given that there are so many, they must have been made for some collective purpose… but after putting in all that effort, why burn them?”
It was a thread that could only be obtained by subjugating monsters.
In truth, for a village this small, hiring mercenaries would have been quite a burden financially.
Even Lergo Village, similarly small, seemed to have kept its distance from subjugation work despite having the Magic Tower nearby.
“The fact that this place alone was burned so thoroughly that not even debris remains suggests there was something they needed to hide.”
As Eren was roughly estimating the number of the dead, Ferento called out to them loudly.
“Your Highness! You should come take a look at this!”
When they rushed outside, Ferento was standing there, lifting the man’s chin with the tip of his sword.
And around the man’s neck, green threads were tightly wound like a trap that had strangled his flesh for a long time.
“This looks like the thread you were looking for.”
The thread that had already dug into his flesh for a long time was tightly bound to the point that it looked suffocating.
The man, who had been docile until now, bared his teeth again as Eren approached.
Suddenly, he lunged forward, and a startled Ferento tried to swing his sword.
Eren raised one hand and stopped him.
“Leave him.”
The man, who had seemed about to attack, instead darted back inside the room and stood guarding the pile of ashes.
“Kiiing, kng…”
He let out a mournful whine as he circled the room.
When Eren slowly approached, he stood on all fours as if protecting the room, baring his teeth with a snarl.
Watching the entire sequence, Liselotte whispered quietly.
“Eren. He seems to be someone connected to this place.”
“It seems so. Let’s take him to the North. We will have to investigate.”
***
“Your Highnesses, please listen without being alarmed.”
The Grand Duke’s estate.
After bringing the man to the North like a captured beast, Ail took charge of the investigation.
It seemed he had spent several nights without sleep, as Ail appeared with a haggard look.
Liselotte, who was having breakfast alongside Eren in the dining room, set down her knife and asked.
“You worked hard. I was worried we wouldn’t hear anything before entering the Imperial Palace.”
“That isn’t the problem. It’s just that…”
With a brittle, crumbling smile, Ail handed documents to Eren and Liselotte.
Quietly, he delivered the shocking news.
“It seems he has about ten percent nomad blood.”
His words didn’t immediately register in her mind.
Liselotte tilted her head and asked again.
“So, you are saying he has mixed blood?”
“No. If that were the case, his eye color would be gold. Nomad hybrids are always born with golden eyes.”
“Did you check for the Word of Command?”
“He cannot speak. It seems his mind has broken, leaving only instinct behind. He only eats meat if it’s given raw.”
Ail, who usually stated facts briskly, hesitated for once.
After a long pause, he quietly reported the shocking conclusion.
“This is only my speculation, but… I suspect that nomad blood may have been transfused into an ordinary person.”
