Chapter 24: Chapter 24: Sooka

The road stretches on and on across the windswept plain. The only things that could be seen are dead trees and snow-covered shrubs all the way out to the horizon. The sky has been painted a dull gray by great, broad strokes of cloud; there is nothing of interest to look at anywhere.

In this drab world, Clementine's lively, happy voice stands out. Her slim but toned form is cloaked in garb. A mace is slung across her back with a thick string, and her hands are swinging playfully. 

"It's getting cold." Sekrit complains while rubbing her both palms. 

Out of us, only Ivanna seems composed, possibly because she is used to cold weather.

The farther the north they get, the heavier the clouds in the sky becomes, until sunlight couldn't penetrate then. The wind is growing bitter, and sometimes it brings something white with it.

It is winter. That is made obvious enough by the snow that started to pile up along the road.

"I'm chilly." Clementine says.

"Maybe it's my own fault. My gear shows too much skin." That's true. Her daily garment is fighting gear that only covers her breasts and crotch, wholly revealing yellowish skin on her thighs, navel, waist, back, and cleavage. It is  breastplate that is almost like a bikini, but made of metal. 

"That's why slutty get up is no good." Ivanna gives a triumphant chuckle and strucks out her rich but fully covered chest. 

"Red haired woman. Your stuck up garment is only suitable for your slow fighting style." Clementine retorts.

Their friendly argument is just boisterous as ever. 

"I envy their energy to make commotion." Sekrit mutters. She constantly rubbing her palms on her pant. 

Compared to the girls, my clothing which includes a thick jacket, is much better prepared for cold weather. They envy me but they don't know this attire is already with me when I was first transmigrated into this universe.

"Sooka should be slightly further ahead " Ivanna points to a wooden signboard 50 meters from here and strides faster.

There are two routes leading northeast to Sooka. One headed north, and then east along the outskirts of the forest. The other went eastwards, then north via busier lane. We went by the second route, that should be frequented by villagers but we found no one along the way. 

According to Ivanna, Sooka is small town, or more like combination of three villages with a market that consists 5 shops. She came to Sooka several times before by horse. Sooka is ruled by a noble family of baron rank.

We walk past the wooden signboard, with word "Sooka" and the lane leads to wooden arch, that is the entrance to Sooka.

As we reach the wooden arch, it is weird that the is no noise at all.

In any case, we enter into Sooka.

"…this is.."

"How horrible.." 

Sooka is partially destroyed.

Market's walls are crumbling in various places and the feudal lord’s residence, which is located in the center of town near the market, is burning down.

Many other wooden homes were burnt by fire, falling apart, and it is uncertain whether even half of them are undamaged.

"This place was attacked very recently, probably today or yesterday." Clementine comments while squatting and checking several burnt planks. 

"It seems the baron resisted." We discover three corpses in uniform. Their heads and bodies had been plummeted bby burgeoning weapons.

The buildings in the baron's compound have burned down and turned into a pile of rubble.

"Wait. Look.." Sekrit who has already gone deeper to the centre suddenly stops and starts shivering. We quickly stride to her position.

There are over twenty human like corpses, all is muscular, masculine but they only got dirty cloth covering their crotch. In other words, their whole body is naked except the crotch that is covered by something like loose underwear. 

But what terribly shocks us is their heads. These are not human heads. These are pig heads!

"Orc. How rare.. My first time seeing them.." Clementine checks by kicking a corpse.

"Hoi, Hiro. Hiro.." Sekrit grabs my chin. 

I was so shocked that I unconsciously fell down with butt on the ground, then retreating. 

"Wh... what is that?" My words are hard to come out.

"So, you never even heard of it. Orc.. A humanlike creature with a pig's head. Orcs are cannibal, they eat human." Clementine's explanation makes my eyes go wide.

Sekrit gently embraces me from behind with her with my head being sandwiched by her two large boobs. My trembling gradually stops, perhaps due to her nice womanly scent and her elastic boobs. I haven't touch Sekrit and Clementine yet, and haven't even sleep with Ivanna since we escape from Negara's ship last time. Skinship like this releases some of my stress.

Sekrit carefully explains, 

"Orcs are male only creatures, so they have no female. Their only way to breed is by planting their seed into female women. Orcs abduct female women from isolated villages."

I am so shocked that I immediately stand up, which pushes her backward. 

Sekrit continues, 

"But orcs are extremely infertile. Women won't get pregnant no matter how many times orcs inject their seed into women. That's good news but..." 

Sekrit removes snow that covers her pant and stands up.

She continues,

"Orcs will not eat the captured women, but continue raping them for several months until they become pregnant."

"That's fate worse than death. If it is me, I will bite my tongue to kill myself." Clementine mutters as she kicks another orc's corpse. It seems her leg has recovered.

"Can't do that. It's well known fact that when the orc is mating, it emits hallucinating smell. It is like a drug that stops women's brain from functioning properly." Sekrit answers while making disgusted face.

We enter the former mansion of the baron.

"Hopefully, there is a survivor." I pray loudly.

"The baron and his close families had no female. Maybe there are women among their distant relatives but they were married off to other noble family. Probably the baron's family here is totally annihilated." Ivanna says from further as she walks quicker to find out more.

We check the humans' corpses that are scattered everywhere. Their number don't add up. Although humans' corpses are more than orcs', there should be more corpses based on the number of houses. 

"Some are taken alive for orcs' food, some are taken for breeding." Sekrit explains.

Unable to hide my nervousness, I ask,

"Sekrit and Ivanna, have you encountered orcs before?"

"We killed them before.." they answer simultaneously, then look at each other.

"I killed a lot of them. We were commanded by previous king to go on expedition of orc extermination. I was promoted many military ranks in that campaign. The current king, when he  was first crowned, he commanded me to lead an expedition to exterminate orcs. The second campaign was nothing serious like the first one." Ivanna talks while reminiscing about something. 

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"Looks like something happened." Clementine interrogates.

Ivanna shakes her head, "I just what happened to the victims. Like Sekrit says just now."

"Red haired girl. From now onwards, we will call you 'Orc Killer"." Clementine teases that cause Ivanna to glare furiously.

"For me, it happened by chance. When I first infiltrated Federation's land with other men, we lost our way and ended up in a weird forest. There were almost 50 orcs. We were less than 50 men. But we managed to kill all orcs, but we were reduced to half of our original number." Sekrit elaborates.

Clementine leaps and grabs Sekrit's cloak in excited manner,

"Are orcs that dangerous?" 

Sekrit slaps Clementine's wrist away,

"Orc's size and strength varies, some are twice as big as man. But weakest orc has raw strength that is stronger than average man." The more experienced Ivanna answers before Sekrit could say anything.

"But orcs got no martial art skill at all. And orcs wear no armour, naked except the dick and ass. So, if you quick, you can easily cut orcs." Sekrit further clarifies Ivanna's answer.

"Wait. There is human." Clementine points to silhouette of a boy who run between rubbles. We chase after him until a small box shaped structure. He open up something like door from the ground and enter into underground. 

Before he could close down the underground door, we run to it and forcefully pull up the door.

"Aaaaah!"

Sekrit grabs his hand. There is something like stairs going downward. We walk down the stairs. 

"Ooorg!"

"Wooooo!"

"Wait a minute, that is human!"

There are dozens of human in a spacious space with many stuffs such as foods and cloths. At first, they scream panically but gradually calm down after realising we are human.

Lighting inside is bright that we could clearly restless expression of the people. 

"Calm down! Please, calm down!”

Ivanna tries not to raise her voice too high as she calls out to the people. However, the underground warehouse has been packed with a lot of agitated people, so her current volume was completely insufficient to get them to quiet down.

"My child—”

“My wife was taken—”

“Mama, Papa—”

Male, female, young and old voices all blend together, washing over Ivanna like a wave. She could no longer make out what they are saying any more.

The people evacuated into this small warehouse have no idea what is going on outside, and all they could do is whine about how their family members had been taken elsewhere. 

It is a very natural response to the current circumstances, but it is also a very dangerous one. 

Even though we had not encountered any orcs on our way here, that did not mean that there are no orcs present.

If there are orcs, if they hear the cries coming from this warehouse, then it is only a matter of time before the demons arrive here.

"You are the only ones we’ve found so far—”

“Where’s my wife? Go find her!”

“That—”

The townspeople behave like entitled people, expecting Ivanna to help them.

Perhaps if she raises her voice she might be able to shout them down. Ivanna, as a warrior, is far stronger than any mere town guard. If she roars at the man, she could easily seize the hearts of everyone present. But she doesn't do this.

"Hurry up and answer us—”

“My kid’s still young—”

“Papa! Mama—!”

They keep pestering her.

"Shut up, all of you!” 

It felt like the trembling air in the warehouse had suddenly blown all the voices away. Sekrit could no longer tolerate them, and his shout — the anger of a first-rate warrior — had devoured the hearts of all the weaklings present.

"The lot of you are chattering like chickens just because this red haired woman kept quiet. We’re in the territory of orcs, and there’s no way to guarantee your safety. If you don’t behave quietly, the orcs will come and they’ll kill every last one of you. If you understand, shut your mouths.”

Sekrit surveys the now-silent warehouse, then looked straight at Ivanna. The townspeople who are closing in wilted under her fiery gaze and slowly back away.

"Never mind, I’ll do it. First things first, you lot had best get it into your heads, the next time someone speaks when I do, I’ll kill him on the spot. I don't want orcs coming here!"

Clementine exposes a little of her dirk, and the reflected light seems almost blinding.

exposed a little of his katana, and the reflected light seemed almost blinding.

Everyone Clementine turns her attention to nodded, their faces pale.

"Looks like you get it. First up, we’ve searched entire Sooka before this one. However, not only did we not find anyone, all these places were empty."

Sekrit takes a deep breath and resumes.

"A question, then. Why haven’t we found anyone else besides you? Most likely they were transported from the town district to somewhere else. We have no idea where they’ve been taken. But anywhere the orcs take them can’t be good.”

Those who understood raised their heads, and there was also the sound of sobbing. Ivanna has been clenching her fist.

"And you lot were slated to be taken away by the orcs. That means for now, you’ve avoided a nasty fate. But remember, we’re still in the middle of the orcs’ territory. Oi, you look like you have a question. I’ll allow you to speak"

The man who had the dirk pointed at him asked his question in a frightened, small voice.

"What if we stay here?”

"Good for now. But you must stay quiet."

For now, we stay with them as the night is already near.

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