Zeldryn simply looked at Pertaz and gave a slight nod.
“...”
Pertaz seemed to immediately understand what the nod meant.
Without saying anything else, he returned to the front of the carriage and sat down in the driver's seat.
CTAK!
The reins moved.
The horses started walking again.
The carriage wheels resumed rolling through the muddy roads of Lerta Village.
CREAK...
CREAK...
Zeldryn looked outside through the window again.
But only a few moments later...
!!??
‘Hmm?’
The people around them were still watching their carriage.
Some stood in front of their houses.
Some had stopped walking.
A few even deliberately turned around after the carriage had already passed them.
‘Well... I guess that's normal.’
An old man had just suddenly approached a noble's carriage.
He kept begging even after Pertaz repeatedly told him to leave.
Eventually, Pertaz drew his sword and the old man fell to the ground.
If something like that happened right in the middle of a village road...
Of course it would attract attention.
However...
“...”
Zeldryn was still thinking about something.
Not about the villagers watching them.
But about what the old man had said earlier.
The words he had spoken rather quietly while standing close to the carriage window.
‘But still, that's weird as hell...’
‘Why did he offer me his daughter?’
Zeldryn frowned.
If his goal was to get food...
Wouldn't it make more sense to offer his son as a worker?
Or even himself.
The old man was thin, but he could still move.
He could still carry things.
Work in the fields.
Clean stables.
Or do some other kind of manual labor.
‘So why his daughter?’
“Hadeh...”
Zeldryn was about to assume the man had simply been desperate and wasn't thinking clearly.
But then...
!!
‘Wait.’
An answer immediately appeared in his mind.
“...”
‘No.’
‘This actually makes sense.’
Zeldryn had almost forgotten something extremely important.
That old man hadn't offered his daughter to just any noble.
He had offered her to...
Zeldryn Giorry.
“...”
‘Fuck.’
With the previous owner's reputation...
Wasn't the answer obvious?
A drunk.
Someone who frequently visited brothels.
A pervert.
Someone who treated female servants however he pleased.
And who knew how many other things Zeldryn still hadn't found out about.
This story originates from NovelPhoenix. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
‘This bastard must be infamous even in the village.’
The old man probably knew what the old Zeldryn was like.
That was why he hadn't offered his son.
Or himself.
He offered his daughter.
“...”
‘Damn it.’
Zeldryn rubbed his face.
‘And he's only twelve years old.’
Twelve years old.
Yet his reputation had already reached the point where a starving old man believed his daughter would have value in Zeldryn's eyes.
‘Just how fucked up was this kid's life before I got here?’
Zeldryn looked outside again.
The villagers were still glancing at the carriage from time to time.
But now...
He started noticing something about the way they were looking.
They were definitely curious.
Yet their gazes never lasted very long.
Whenever Zeldryn accidentally looked directly at someone...
That person almost always immediately looked away.
Some lowered their heads.
Some pretended to be busy.
Others quickly went back inside their houses.
‘Hmm?’
‘They're curious... but scared.’
As if they wanted to know what was happening...
But were afraid of being caught watching.
‘Afraid they'll get punished or something?’
Zeldryn didn't know whether it was because he was a noble...
Or because he was Zeldryn Giorry.
Maybe both.
“...”
‘Hadeh.’
He had only been in Lerta Village for a few minutes, yet he was already discovering more consequences of the previous owner's reputation.
Zeldryn finally shifted his gaze away from the window.
Then...
His eyes landed on Hera.
“...”
‘And another thing...’
‘She's still looking down.’
Ever since they left the Mansion...
Hera had been like this almost the entire time.
Sitting quietly.
Her head slightly lowered.
Her gaze constantly directed downward.
Even after what happened with the old man earlier...
She had gone right back to doing the same thing.
Zeldryn finally started finding it a little strange.
“Oi, Hera.”
!!
Hera immediately raised her head.
“Look outside once in a while. Why have you been staring down ever since we left?”
Hera remained silent for a moment.
“M-My apologies, Lord...”
Her gaze briefly shifted to the side.
“I'm just feeling a little unwell...”
“...”
‘Huh?’
Zeldryn stared at her for a few seconds.
‘Feeling unwell?’
Classic excuse.
For some reason, he felt like Hera had something on her mind.
Maybe it was about this village.
Gerald.
Her family.
Or perhaps something else Zeldryn knew absolutely nothing about.
But...
‘Hah, whatever.’
If Hera didn't want to talk about it, he wasn't going to force her.
“Fine, do whatever you want,” Zeldryn said.
“Y-Yes, Lord...”
Hera lowered her head again.
Zeldryn returned his attention outside.
The carriage continued deeper into Lerta Village.
And the farther they went...
“...”
‘This place is gloomy as hell.’
The scenery barely changed.
Old wooden houses.
Muddy dirt roads.
People wearing simple clothes.
Occasionally, a beggar sitting by the roadside.
And that strange smell that had been drifting through the window this entire time.
Zeldryn was even starting to feel like his nose was slowly getting used to it.
‘I don't know whether that's a good thing or just depressing.’
Zeldryn's gaze continued moving from one building to another.
Until eventually...
!!
He noticed a place that looked slightly different.
Several people were coming and going.
The building also seemed busier than the houses surrounding it.
Zeldryn watched it for a moment.
‘A tavern?’
He slightly raised an eyebrow.
‘Even a place like this has somewhere to drink?’
But after thinking about it...
‘Well, I guess that makes sense.’
If anything, a place like this might be even more necessary in a village like Lerta.
Life was difficult.
There wasn't always enough food.
The work was exhausting.
No television.
No internet.
No games.
None of the countless entertainment options available in the modern world.
‘If your everyday life is this miserable, getting drunk probably really is one of the easiest ways to escape from it.’
Zeldryn continued looking around.
But not long afterward...
!!
His eyes caught something in the distance.
A crowd.
A large number of people had gathered in one part of the village.
‘Huh?’
Zeldryn leaned slightly closer to the window.
‘What's going on over there?’
At first, he assumed their carriage would simply pass by the crowd.
But...
The longer they continued...
The more directly the carriage seemed to be heading toward it.
“...”
‘Don't tell me this carriage is going over there?’
Several seconds passed.
They didn't turn.
They kept getting closer.
‘WTF?’
‘Don't tell me Gerald's family is there?’
The crowd was becoming clearer now.
The people standing at the front began noticing their arrival.
One person moved aside.
Then another.
Slowly...
The crowd opened a path.
The carriage continued forward.
And finally...
!!
Zeldryn could see what the people had been blocking from view.
In the middle of the crowd stood a simple wooden platform.
It wasn't very high.
Two guards wearing full armor stood on top of it.
And between those two guards...
There were three people.
An adult woman wearing clothes that looked fairly luxurious.
A young man who was already fairly grown, wearing relatively nice clothes.
And another adult woman.
However, the last woman's clothes were much simpler than those of the first woman.
“...”
Zeldryn immediately understood the most likely explanation for what he was seeing.
‘Don't tell me...’
‘That's a platform for punishing them?’
If that was true...
Then those three people standing up there...
‘Gerald's family?’
The carriage continued moving into the crowd.
The people around them made the path even wider.
And the farther they went...
The more whispers Zeldryn began to hear.
Quiet.
Indistinct.
He couldn't make out what anyone was saying.
But almost every gaze followed the carriage.
“...”
‘This atmosphere is weird as hell.’
Not long afterward...
The carriage stopped.
Pertaz climbed down from the driver's seat.
He walked toward the side of the carriage and opened the door.
CLICK.
Zeldryn looked at the open door.
‘Oh.’
‘Guess we're here.’
He stood up and stepped outside.
His shoes immediately sank slightly into the muddy ground.
“...”
Honestly, Zeldryn didn't really care about the mud.
A little dirt could be cleaned off.
What really bothered him was...
‘The smell, damn it.’
Outside the carriage...
It was even stronger.
The smell of soil.
Animals.
Smoke.
Garbage.
And something that reminded him suspiciously of shit.
‘Don't tell me there's actually shit everywhere, damn it.’
Zeldryn didn't want to find out.
Hera climbed down after him.
Pertaz closed the carriage door.
CLICK.
And immediately after that...
“...”
Zeldryn slowly noticed something.
All the whispers he had been hearing...
Seemed to grow quieter.
His eyes moved forward.
Then left.
Then right.
!!??
‘Huh?’
Almost everyone was looking at him.
Not the carriage anymore.
Not Pertaz.
Not Hera.
Him.
“...”
‘HUH? WHAT THE HELL IS THIS... everyone's staring at me??’
A chill immediately ran through Zeldryn's body.
The sensation was strange.
Dozens of pairs of eyes were focused on him all at once.
It wasn't like he was an introvert who was always afraid of being surrounded by people.
But this was different.
There were no normal conversations.
No one was busy minding their own business.
They were all just...
Watching.
As if they were waiting to see what he would do next.
‘Even though I'm not an introvert, having everyone stare at me all at once is still weird as hell.’