Chapter 132 :

Chapter 132 - Fool or Genius

Once the leader’s meaningless wariness disappeared, there was no longer any need for a forced advance, and the march of three orcs and one human became calmer than before.

There were still occasional short screams from the dimwit whenever he slipped, but compared to before, it was practically a silent march.

However, I could not let down my guard.

After all, on top of an already rough journey, another risk factor had been added: a sudden flood of water.

The water surrounding the island was rampaging however it pleased.

Even though neither Ratel nor I had used any strength while climbing the wall.

Since I could not understand the rule behind it, I could not let my guard down.

No matter how many parts had deviated from the original work, every event still had its own cause.

There would be a cause this time too.

Something that could have an influence….the holy relic.

There was a possibility that something had happened to the holy relic.

I suddenly thought of Jing and Lia, who had fallen away from us, and wondered what they were doing by now.

If it was Jing, he would not have forgotten the order I had given him.

He probably had not carelessly approached the holy relic or touched it.

As long as Ratel was on the island, he would have come to rescue him if anything, not left first for Limis.

But since the power existing in this world as a whole was currently rampaging...

I checked Ratel out of the corner of my eye.

“What?”

Just how wide was his field of vision? The bastard immediately noticed my gaze.

“Kweeek, let’s hurry a little more. Kweeek, so you can perform your ‘role’ as soon as possible.”

“Kweeek, I’ll finally get to see that arrogant human die!”

The leader, who joined the conversation with a look as if his insides had been relieved, glared at Ratel and smiled nastily.

There was no way he knew that the moment Ratel finished his role would be the moment his own life ended.

“Kweeek, I’m already delighted just thinking about watching you die miserably.”

“Right, I’m looking forward to it too.”

The leader, who had been happily provoking him, flinched at Ratel’s answer.

“Kweeek, what do you have to look forward to?”

“Before that, I’ll be able to watch you collapse while struggling to protect that great leader position of yours.”

When Ratel looked straight into his eyes and answered, blood rushed into the leader’s green face.

The bastard, who had started the quarrel first only to suffer a magnificent defeat in the verbal fight, ground his teeth.

“Kweeek, you damned bastard...!”

Growlrrrrrr.

It was a sound that took some of the wind out of the leader’s momentum, just when he had looked ready to charge at Ratel at any moment.

The leader turned his gaze toward the dimwit with an empty expression.

“Kuweek...”

The dimwit, who had been looking down at his stomach as it growled without reading the mood, turned his head away and pretended not to notice when his eyes met mine.

Did he think that would make it not have happened?

Growlrrrrrr.

Once again, thunder rumbled from the dimwit’s stomach.

“Kwee, kweeek...!”

The startled dimwit clutched his stomach, but that was not going to fill his hungry belly.

Well, after playing in the water, hunger does tend to arrive suddenly.

“....Kweeek, we’ll rest for a moment.”

The leader, who had been looking at that dimwit with eyes that had lost all will to fight, eventually declared a break with a sigh.

* * *

Growlrrrrrr.

The thunder rumbling from the dimwit’s stomach never stopped.

Resting did not make hunger disappear, and staying still did not make food fall from the sky.

When no one pointed out the sound coming from his stomach, even the dimwit himself began to leave his growling alone.

Around the time the growls and rumbles were forming a harmony, Ratel, who had been lying down, raised his body.

“Kweeek!”

Perhaps thinking he was about to be hit for the crime of failing to properly manage his stomach muscles, the dimwit flinched and defended his body with both arms.

However, as if he had no interest in the dimwit, Ratel plopped down in front of me.

“Kweeek, what is it?”

Even at my question, the bastard began rummaging through his clothes without answering.

He took something out from an inner pocket of his robe.

It was dried jerky.

There was nothing particularly surprising about it.

Ever since I had become an orc, I had been able to smell the faint scent of smoked meat coming from inside his clothes.

It did not seem like he could fill his stomach with just a few pieces of jerky, but at least it would be better than starving.

Though I had no idea why he was insisting on eating it in front of me.

My expectation that he was doing it to provoke me was wrong.

Because he casually held out one piece of jerky in front of me.

“What are you doing not taking it?”

When I stared blankly down at it, Ratel asked with a furrowed brow.

“Kweeek, no, I just didn’t expect you to share.”

At my honest answer, the crease between his brows deepened.

“What kind of person do you think I am? I don’t act that petty with food.”

“Kweeek, what does petty or not petty have to do with something like this? Kweeek, it must be your last remaining food.”

“....Anyway, I’m not eating it alone, so just eat.”

Perhaps something suddenly bothered him again, because he threw the jerky toward me as if tossing it.

Well, if he was giving it to me, there was no reason not to accept it.

“Kweeek, anyway, thanks.”

After thanking him, I was about to put the dried meat into my mouth when I felt a stinging gaze beside me.

Gulp.

When I turned my gaze at the unusually loud sound of someone swallowing saliva, I met the burdensome eyes of the dimwit, fixed on my hand.

“Turn your eyes away.”

At Ratel’s threat, the dimwit’s pupils turned back toward the floor.

Didn’t you say you did not act petty with food?

When I looked at Ratel, who had changed his words so quickly, the bastard ignored my gaze and mechanically chewed and swallowed the food.

“Kweeek!”

The dimwit, who had been watching him with a sigh, looked at me this time.

There was a trace of expectation in his eyes, but I was not such a good person that I would share provisions either.

It was not as if he looked like he would die from skipping a few meals, so why bother?

There was someone else here who really looked like he might starve to death.

For example, the old orc lying with his back turned behind the dimwit, pretending he could not hear anything.

That one really did look like he might stubbornly starve himself to death.

It also felt like his already short lifespan had been shaved down a little because of my whim at the cliff.

I split the jerky I was holding in half.

“Kweeek!!”

Passing by the dimwit, whose face lit up for some reason, I threw half a piece of jerky in front of the leader.

“....Kweeek, what is this?”

“Kweeek, you heard everything. Kweeek, stop pretending you didn’t and just eat. Kweeek, if you collapse here, there aren’t any hands left to carry you.”

At my warning, the leader snorted.

“Kweeek, I won’t collapse from this much. Kweeek, you can eat all the food given by a human yourself.”

Even though the leader refused, I did not take the dried meat back.

Half of it was out of worry that if he really collapsed from malnutrition, something even more troublesome would happen, and half of it was because I was certain that if he did not want to starve to death like that, he would fold his pride a little on his own.

“Kweeek, I’d rather starve to death than receive help from a filthy human bastard.”

The leader muttered while glancing at the jerky placed in front of him.

That was a stubbornness that made the filthy human listening feel rather unpleasant.

“Then just die.”

“Kweeek, starving to death with food right in front of you. That would be the stupidest death in the world.”

“Kweeek! Who are you calling stupid!”

When Ratel and I muttered, the bastard lost his temper.

What was he so dissatisfied about when he had said it with his own mouth?

“Kweeek, why bother enduring hunger? Kweeek, whether it’s something a human brought or prey your subordinates caught, it’s all the same food.”

If I had to distinguish between them, the only difference was that human food suited my taste a little better.

Getting tired of responding to the bastard’s stubbornness, I tossed the half piece of jerky into my mouth without hesitation, and I could feel the leader quietly looking down at the jerky on the floor.

Perhaps unable to ignore my words, yet unable to bring himself to accept and eat it, conflict flickered across his expression.

“Kweeek!!”

But making the leader’s agony meaningless, there was someone who snatched up the jerky on the floor in one motion.

Needless to say, it was the dimwit.

After blankly following the dried meat as it moved away from his field of vision for a moment, the leader let out a scream-like shout.

“Kweeek!! Did you hear my words with your feet?!”

The one-armed bastard approached to snatch the jerky back from the dimwit’s hand.

However, as if all the dull movements the dimwit had shown until now had been lies, he quickly tore into the jerky and ate it.

The enraged leader shouted again, but the dimwit chewed and swallowed the tough meat, afraid that the food he had put into his mouth might be taken away.

The sound of the food passing down his throat with a gulp was unusually loud.

“Kwee, kweeek...”

After filling his hungry stomach, the bastard belatedly rolled his eyes as if watching the leader’s reaction.

At that pitiful sight, the leader’s eyebrows shot up.

“Kweeek, you damned...”

However, his anger failed to burst out and misfired as it was.

Growlrrrrrr.

Because a sound as pitiful as the dimwit’s face came from his stomach.

“.....”

The leader’s momentum, which had been about to roar at him, lost some of its force.

However, still not fully relieved of his anger, just as the bastard opened his mouth again to scold the dimwit—

The dimwit swiftly shoved the remaining jerky into the leader’s mouth.

Gulp.

It was the sound of the piece of jerky, which he had not even chewed, sliding down the leader’s throat.

The leader, who had swallowed the piece of meat that had entered his mouth without realizing it, looked at the dimwit with a hollow expression.

It was a face that no longer had even anger left.

Since they had ended up eating it together, human food or whatever else, it must have become awkward to get angry any longer.

“....Kweeek, do whatever you want.”

The leader, who stepped back with an empty expression, left the dimwit behind and moved to a corner of the wall.

“Kweeek, if you’ve eaten everything, get lost.”

The leader, who gave the order in a tired voice, sat down with a face full of fatigue.

After shifting around for a moment, the bastard forced his heavy eyelids open and tried to chase away the sleep pouring over him.

In the sudden silence, only the leader’s slightly rough breathing filled the stillness.

Even that did not last very long.

As the bastard’s consciousness blurred, unable to overcome his exhaustion, his rough breathing also began to regain stability.

How long had it been since the rough, wheezing breaths changed into intermittent snores?

“What are you going to do from now on?”

Ratel, who had been sitting motionlessly, spoke first.

“Kweeek, what do you mean, what? Kweeek, we’re heading to the food storage right now.”

“Not that. How long are you going to keep pretending not to notice that dimwit?”

Ratel pointed with his chin at the dimwit, who had curled up and fallen asleep some distance away from us.

“Kweeek, you noticed?”

Well, I had been too openly protecting him.

I straightened my back, which had been leaning against the wall.

“Kweeek, since when did you notice?”

“I suspected it from the moment you stopped me when I tried to kill that dimwit. It also seemed like there was a reason you kept those two together. Most of all, you didn’t use the easiest method to make that one-armed bastard listen.”

Ratel calmly continued, gesturing with his eyes toward the leader, who had fallen asleep as if he had passed out.

“Pressing him down with force.”

You noticed early.

Seeing as he had kept his mouth firmly shut despite that, it seemed that no matter how much he acted like a rascal, he was at least trying to keep a minimum line.

Still, I felt a little relieved by the minimal awareness the bastard had as the protagonist of a novel.

No, wait. If I thought about it that way, then the things he had blurted out however he pleased were really one hundred percent only for the sake of screwing me over, weren’t they?

My mood worsened again.

“There’s only one thing I’m curious about. What use does that dimwit have?”

The bastard, who had been watching my expression change subtly, revealed the purpose for opening his mouth after keeping it shut until now.

The expression on his face as he asked me was strangely grave.

Well, after we reached the food storage before long, the bastard was supposed to leave the island according to the original plan.

“…..”

I still had not heard an answer that he would move according to the plan.

Thinking of the endless-looking back-and-forth that would begin again, I felt my own expression harden.

I took a deep breath and slowly opened my mouth.

“Kweeek, your guess is probably right.”

At my affirmation, the bastard also looked at me with an even more serious face.

Since that displeased-looking expression could never mean he would obediently agree with me, I tried to quickly continue speaking before he started listing words of refusal.

As if he could not see my effort, Ratel opened his mouth at the same time.

In the end, it resulted in both of us blurting out what we wanted to say first.

“Kweeek, I think the one who ate the leader’s neck was the dimwit.”

“Are you really planning to live here?”

The words I had prepared in advance, expecting Ratel’s habit of saying only what he wanted to say, vanished cleanly.

I wondered if it was a joke, but there was no way playfulness, which had not existed in the first place, would suddenly be found on the bastard’s serious face.

What nonsense is that bastard spouting this time?