Chapter 167 - The Price of Life

There was a procedure when leaving the town through the eastern gate. Still, it was simple, as all they did was scan your status card. These things really were useful.

When that was done, we decided to head to the north. We would be traveling upstream of the river, and I had the idea that we might find something interesting over there.

“What do you think we’ll see?”

“This is a very large river. I doubt there will be much change no matter how far we walk…”

We discussed other things as we walked together. It had been a while since we were able to just relax like this. Daniela had picked up a stick now and was swinging it in the air. It was a childlike gesture and made me feel somehow nostalgic. Our current quest was really just exploration.

Thirty minutes must have passed now. Here, the river branched out. A narrow river curved out away from the main current and winded through the plains on the opposite side. We decided to follow it.

“Daniela. There are fish inside.”

“Hmm, so small. They will hardly make a satisfying meal.”

“Yeah. I guess we’ll leave. They’ll grow big one day.”

We muttered while gazing into the water. Just then, something entered our Presence Detection parameter. We caught each other’s eyes and drew out our swords. It felt like goblins. But they seemed to be in an unusually large group.

“Perhaps they are multiple packs who have joined together.”

“Oh, that makes sense. The direction is… Over there. Maybe they’re just here for the water.”

“Then we should hide near those rocks.”

I nodded at this suggestion, and we moved away in order to spy on them while being hidden. Eventually, we could see glimpses of the small goblins through the swaying blades of grass. They cried loudly as they waved their rusted swords, cutting the grass as they advanced.

After a while, they reached the small river. There was no grass by the river’s edge, and the goblins came into full view as they stepped on the bare soil.

Two of the goblins carried weapons. Four others seemed to be searching through their surroundings. And then there were five small ones. Were they a family…? It almost looked like the adults were keeping watch while the children drank from the river.

However, we could not leave them. They would eventually attack humans. There was a sense of guilt in taking this precaution, but it was according to the rules of this world. Cruel, but necessary. There were things I couldn’t defy if I wanted to be an Adventurer and live as a resident in this world.

“Asagi, could you not freeze them in the water?”

“Ah. I think I could do it to those that are close to it.”

“Then freeze the small ones first. They will be hard to find if they get away.”

“Got it.”

I followed her order and quietly sent a current of blue magic into the river. When the crackling of the ice on the water’s surface reached the young goblins, I increased the power all at once, freezing their heads. The suddenness of this caused a panic, and they flailed their arms and tried to pull their faces out from the ice. The adult goblins turned to see what was happening. That’s when we attacked.

Daniela ran like the wind as she pulled out a short sword and threw it. The weapon flew straight into the first weapon-wielding goblin’s back, throwing him off of his feet and into the dirt. All eyes turned to the body. Daniela wasted no time in unsheathing her rapier and stabbing it into the back of another goblin.

The young goblins were frozen. The adults died one after another. With the situation now deafeningly clear, the remaining goblins scrambled to pick up the fallen weapons or tree branches. They were not difficult to deal with. Sword hands were severed, open chests pierced, and legs cut out from under them before our swords plunged down into their backs. When they were all dead, we turned to the frozen goblin children.

“Now, it’s just them…”

“Yes.”

And so Daniela and I stabbed them with our swords. The blades slid through their backs without resistance, and the lives were snuffed out. While I knew this would happen, it did not feel good.

“I can tell what you are thinking, just by looking at your face.”

“Sorry… I can be pretty pathetic.”

“I would not say that. It is important to feel affection towards life. It is what makes us human.”

“It’s what we do. And we sort of have to.”

“Indeed. Both humans and monsters have this ability to choose.”

As a human who was a thrall to a forest wolf, I often felt that it was hard to fight them. It made me wonder if I would have started to side with goblins, if I had just so happened to have received an enchantment from one instead of Beowulf. It was an interesting thought. But none of it would matter had I accepted Rachel’s offer.

I felt like a very weak creature for even telling this to Daniela.

“…I see. I do have my reservations about fighting other elves. You have certain feelings based on your own situation. It may not be easy to resolve it.”

“You think? Even if I became Rachel’s thrall?”

“I think you reject the notion because you use the word ‘thrall.’ Why not ‘ally’?”

“Ally…”

Yes, the fact that Rachel had used the word had bothered me in a way. Thinking of the arrangement as an ‘alliance’ did make it sound better.

“A God Wolf ally. I do not think it a bad thing.”

“When you put it that way, no, it’s too terrible.”

And being friends with a fenrir would certainly make me more confident.

And if I accepted it, would I then be able to kill forest wolves without regret?

“Sometimes I feel like we are going around in circles.”

“Emotions are incredibly annoying…”

“Do not say that, Asagi. You would not like me very much if you did not have the ability to feel.”

“That’s the best argument I’ve ever heard.”

“Grr…”

“Did you just growl at me…”

“Oh, that was only my stomach. Come on, it is time to eat.”

We had a short lunch break before collecting the proof of the hunt. Daniela had said something about it before, but I had double-checked at the library. For goblins, it was the left ear. And so eleven ears went into a leather pouch. I put it away in the hollow bag and turned to Daniela. She seemed to be looking far off into the distance. But at what?

“Can you see anything?”

I stood next to her. She had her right hand above her eyes, blocking the sunlight as she stared.

“No, I was just thinking about life. Much as you were.”

“Really?”

“Aye… I am one who lost their family to monsters. And so I never had much reason to care about killing them. If anything, I harbored hatred.”

“I can imagine…”

“But things have a way of fading… It is mostly a way of life for me now. A part of my everyday work, you might say. I think the significance of their lives has plummeted. Faded.”

She said as she looked off into the distance.

“Still, meeting Rachel yesterday was a great shock. In spite of appearances, words and emotions. She used to be a monster. I have lived for many years, but have yet to see another monster like that. She was clearly human.”

“Well, yes, Rachel is human. But Daniela, she is a very rare case. She has a soul that came from the same world, the same country as me. Even if her body was a monster, she was a human inside.”

“I suppose… Surely a monster could not become human without a human soul. They would not even want to.”

I had been stabbed by a thief and been sent to this world on the brink of death.

So, what if I had actually died and reincarnated as a goblin?

Hell, I would still feel lucky to be a monster. But if I had been a bug or a tree?

What would have happened to me then?

“It is not as if I did not have questions after meeting Beowulf or Arthur. An evolved forest wolf and an evolved orc. But it is not so simple as that. It made me wonder what monsters really are.”

“And…?”

Daniela’s eyes left the distant sky and turned to me.

“We are the same. That is what I thought.”

Then she looked past me and at the fallen corpses.

“It is all the same life. We are all living creatures. Humans put a price on the lives of each other. It is no different with monsters. No life can just be taken from one side alone. But I still believe that there is some life that must be taken.”

“Yeah, there are humans that seem to have an infinite capacity for good and for evil.”

“Aye… These things that I now think or feel, they will not change the way that I act. But I feel that perhaps I am able to see a clearer reason behind things now.”

Daniela seemed a little renewed by this.

A reason why some must not be killed. A reason why some had to be.

Moral values tend to change depending on the people, places, and situations. Killing is justified during wars.

So, how were things then?

This was a different world, with different values. The lives of monsters were set below humans. The lives of even humans were quite cheap compared to what I had known.

However, it still had value. It wasn’t something to be taken without thought. But then again, my own life was something that could easily be taken away.

So, how should I live?

There was nothing to it. You had to kill. Before they kill you. Before they kill someone you care about.

It was a world where things had to be taken into your own hands. But I did not think it was wrong to at least do it in a way that you did not accidentally hurt a bystander.

I too felt like I had a new reason to kill monsters. It was not excessive killing, but a way of preventing damage in the future… It was the way to live in this world.