Punishment: Support of the Retreat from Kuvunji Forest 1

“This is bad”

Said Dotta Ruzlas with a serious face.

“I’m tellin ya it’s real bad, I don’t know anymore…this might be it”

Again? I thought to myself.

In the first place Dotta’s been having it real bad with the frequency of once every three days. Nothing new.

As for what’s to blame it’s his intensely compulsive impulse of stealing. And as for how compulsive well, so wickedly compulsive that he’s been charged with [Severe treason to the nation] and is now here having been condemned to being sentenced as a hero.

It’s said that he committed a thousand thefts before he was captured and incarcerated by the Holy Order. Maybe it would be fitting to call him an unparalleled sneak and petty thief in history, after all Dotta Ruzlas will steal absolutely anything.

I was heartily laughing out loud after hearing the story of him stealing a dragon from the royalty yet I was forced to snap out of it when I heard it also ate his left arm in the process. Something’s really not right with this guy’s head. Then again, that’s what all heroes are like.

“Hey Zairo, what you think I should do, I…..”

“Listen”

Pushing away Dotta’s approaching mug I made a point to shut him up.

“Can we do this tomorrow? You might not have noticed but we are so busy we could die”

So busy we could die is not a metaphor or anything of the sort. We are literally risking our lives being on this battlefield.

At the northern edge of the United Kingdom where human habitation ends. Deep in the snow covered forest with the piercing cold wind blowing through our skin. Name’s Kuvanji Forest. A territory that will soon be lost to mankind. Due to various reasons me and Dotta with bated breaths are on standby here from early morning. It’s almost dark and soon, cold as hell night is about to begin which incidentally coincides with the [do or die operation] we have to put up against the demon lord phenomenon.

So considering the above, then comes back Dotta here from scouting and goes with his usual “it’s really bad” giving me a headache and naturally making me want to shut him up.

“Dotta you know the job right?”

“Well….yea more or less”

“Say it”

“Fight the Demon Lord”

From his military coat inner pocket Dotta took out a small bottle with a pale face. It seemed like an expensive liquor native to the east archipelago. An alcohol that’s made from soy beans. No doubt this also must’ve been stolen either from the Holy Order’s storehouse or Verkle Frontier Corporation’s brewery.

“That’s right”

Accepting the bottle from Dotta I slightly gulped it down.

Burning sensation in my throat- And that’s it. I’m not really an expert when it comes to alcohol.

“Even as a demon lord phenomenon the scope is large this time and affected Fairies(aberrations) are 5000. Makes you wanna cry doesn’t it?

Or at least that was the information we got beforehand. It could be possible that their numbers have dwindled- Depending on the efforts of our United Kingdoms oh so great and mighty Holy Order. I’m probably hoping for too much though. In the first place doesn’t change much if there’s 1000 or 2000 of em less, and that’s because-

“Only the two of us have to stall the damn Fairies”

I shoved the bottle back to Dotta.

“mmm……”

Dotta hung his head with a bluish-pale face

“I understand. We’re heroes, our hands are tied.”

In other words that’s how it is. We are criminals serving the sentence that is the hero punishment, not allowed to go against orders nor allowed to die. Even if we die we are revived, forced to fight again- while this may sound as a good thing, even the gods can’t revive a corpse to their previous perfect state.

Coming back to life you lose your memories, humanity, things like that. There are some who have even lost their sense of self entirely, turning them into something similar to living corpses.

We don’t have a choice. Nothing we can do about it other than carry out our missions.

And to put it in a nutshell, mission given to us this time was seemingly pretty simple:

[Support the retreat]

Provide cover for the retreating Holy Order troops and help them escape this forest.

The soon to be advancing horde- [Army] of the Fairies given birth by the demon lord phenomenon should be about 5000. Other reinforcements or backup don’t exist. Mission must be accomplished with only Penal Hero Unit 9004.

And the only ones who could move from Penal Hero Unit 9004 were yours truly Zairo, Dotta and that good for nothing useless “commander”. As for the rest, some were assigned to a different mission while others were still in the middle of mending their torn off hands and heads and whatnot which is why we can expect absolutely nothing from them.

To put it mildly, they have to be fucking kidding me. Really makes me want to pound the guy who thought this shit operation up until they’re dead.

However this plan we have now is still better. Apparently at first there were considerations to assign us a more of a ridiculous task such as eliminating the core of this phenomenon, the demon lord.

In regards to that, our “commander” negotiated and had it changed to the current mission. That guy’s an useless good for nothing coward who’s not able to take command of the unit but as an ex political criminal and a swindler he excels at tricking people.

Rotten personality aside you gotta admit he’s good at that one thing.

“Well…we’ll work out something right?”

Peeped Dotta while taking another gulp from the bottle.

“I mean, there’s you Zairo this time on the mission being in charge of violence and mayhem, and we’re heroes. Even in the worst case scenario if we get turned into minced meat there’s always reviva…”

“You don’t understand after all.”

I felt the need to impose the cold harsh reality on Dotta.

“How well the revival works depends on the condition of the body. If the corpse is in the state of being minced meat or rather if we can’t even retrieve the corpse in the first place, there’s definitely bound to be some pretty ugly consequences afterwards”

There are no prospects of holy knights retrieving our bodies burried under the snow later on. Reason being that very soon this entire forest will be polluted by the demon lord phenomenon.

If that happens even after using the sacred seal of resurrection there’s bound to be severe impact on our memories and ego. In fact as a result of that there were a few heroes who turned into literal walking corpses.

Hearing the above, Dotta felt genuinely shocked.

“Eh, really?”

“Why would I lie?”

“I had no idea. You sure are well informed Zairo”

I didn’t answer. Perhaps, this type of information is the kind that’s not revealed to the public.

“Which is why there’s a need to knock it out of the park in this mission. Got no time for your rambling”

“no wait, but”

“don’t wanna hear it”

“Hear me out please! It could really be bad this time, here what you think of this?”

Pointed Dotta to the ground not far from where he was standing, to the place where I was desperately trying not to look all this time, there was indeed a large solid object there.

“…..the hell is that?”

A coffin, is what I first thought.

Oblong shaped box, size that could probably fit in a human with a small build. Its surface decorated with somewhat intricate ornaments gave the impression that most likely a person with a high social standing was laid to rest inside. I was forced to once more question Dotta’s sanity.

“Dotta…..why did you steal a coffin”

“don’t know….I thought it had this lavish look when I first laid my eyes on it and then I thought ‘I could definitely manage to steal this’ and then before I knew it….”

I didn’t bother answering. After all I have no intention to reprimand Dotta’s habit of stealing after all this time. This guy’s compulsive impulse of theft is incurable even he dies, he’ll steal absolutely anything even things with no worth whatsoever so that’s not the point I was bothered with no. It was something else.

“Hey Dotta, about this coffin”

I decided to place my hand on the lid

“Could it be….that someone’s inside?”

“You got that right-“

Dotta gave a predictable answer, just what is wrong with him.

“while carrying I did feel it was kind of heavy so checking inside afterwards-“

“Check it beforehand. Why the hell would you come back having stolen a corpse? I don’t get it anymore”

“I don’t get that either! You know how am I when I come to my senses the deed is done!”

“Why does it always end up with you pissing me off, I’ll fucking kill you once before the fairies do.”

I somewhat understood now what Dotta meant with ‘it’s real bad’. Since the corpse was laid to rest in such an extravagant coffin it must belong to that of royalty, high noble or someone along those lines. Most likely a very distinguished person who served in the holy knights thus was placed in this coffin after their death.

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Quite plausible that it would cause a shitstorm being stolen. Now that it has come to this I had only one advice for Dotta.

“Return it right this instant, you fool”

Unwittingly I fully opened the lid, checking the corpse inside.

If you were to ask why I opened it, I honestly couldn’t tell you. Maybe it was just that tasteless curiosity. After all if it’s Royalty or Nobles there’s a chance that person would be someone I knew, in fact there’s a whole list of them that I would very much like to slaughter. So I do feel I might’ve harbored an ill-ethical plus devious expectation that it could’ve been one of those people.

However mainly I believe the reason was nothing more than a simple ‘just cause/why not’.

I’m just that kind of careless guy, that’s all there is to it. There was no reason why I should’ve opened it.

On the contrary it was something I definitely never should’ve opened.

“oh crap”

Instant regret.

Indeed there was a human inside- a little girl and a frighteningly beautiful girl at that. Wearing white military uniform of the holy order, fluid golden hair, skin white as snow that of a northerner, facial features as if they were sculptured by an artist-

But what grabbed my attention the most was the carved [seal] starting from her left cheek to her neck. Very likely, that pattern should continue down all the way to her chest arriving near her heart.

I know what that is, a sacred seal.

It looks similar to the ones we have on our necks, but ultimately completely different. Not cursed but a sacred seal of blessing.

“Dotta, this is real bad”

“I know right? This a kid of some royal right?”

“Wrong, to begin with it’s not even a human”

I felt as if my head was about to burst.

“This kid’s a <Goddess>”

“Eh what?”

“Not what but a Goddess”

One of the hopes of mankind. Created by the wisdom of an ancient era, an ultimate lifeform meant to turn the tides of war.

There was indeed such a grandiose propaganda like description of them.

But I know, that description is very appropriate, Goddesses are the greatest and the strongest trump cards humanity has against the demon lords. Holy Order is an organization tasked with protecting these goddesses and employing them as weapons for warfare.

Number of existing goddesses in the entire world right now is just mere twelve, or no that should be eleven now huh. Dotta is something else entirely managing to actually steal one of them. If circumstances weren’t what they are he’d be able to leave his name firmly in the annals of history being dubbed as master thief.

“Return it pronto. This is unprecedentedly bad, come on you’ve heard about the goddesses right!?”

“ehhh no well I’ve seen them you know…really? a goddess this? “

Dotta looked as if he didn’t understand. I see, the public really doesn’t know what kind of form the Goddesses can take.

“are they really something that can be in the shape of a little girl like this? You know, the Goddesses I’ve seen were things like gigantic like a whale, or things like a lump of iron..”

“It’s hard to explain but yea there are guys like that too”

Goddesses are ultimate weapons that were developed in ancient times and are to this day not fully understood. Some of them have forms that are completely incomprehensible to humans while others don’t. Furthermore while some are called “Goddess” for the sake of convenience they don’t always necessarily have a female form.

“Dotta listen well, this ones a-“

Even though it’s a pain in the ass, I tried to explain a bit but right before that I heard a violent sound that broke through the dim tranquility of the dusk.

A blow of the horn and echo of the drums.

“What? So, they’re already here.”

Reflexively I gripped my hands then opened them again.

From my palms, to the wrist, then all the way down to the base of the elbow, is the sacred seal carved all over my skin.

It’s a sacred seal for battle.

Originally this is only given to the holy knights of the united kingdom and which has a long as fuck name: An utra multi purpose Belcoo class mobile thunderbolt sigil. The only thing I wasn’t stripped of after being sentenced to hero punishment. At this point, it’s my one and only “Property”.

“Fairies most likely, can you see them Dotta?”

“yeah”

Dotta opening his eyes wide, gazed into the depths of the darkness brought about by the dusk. His eyes are special, tempered by relentless years of thievery.

“…they’re here and already moving”

“Then it’s our stage”

“s-stop, just a bit I’m not mentally ready”

“We got time for that? Try asking that sacred seal on your neck”

My neck stings, fight this instant, is what the sacred seal is saying.

“It’s time for battle”

“Ba, battle?”

To that abrupt question I shivered, it wasn’t from Dotta. While stammering, it was a crystal clear sound as if a light metal being flicked.

And I noticed.

Goddess was slowly raising her upper body from the coffin, her eyes now open- looking with pupils that glittered with the color of flame, at me.

“A battle….I see”

Muttered the goddess as she calmly stood up.

“You are. my. knight. right?”

She let out, pausing and emphasizing each word, her golden hair giving off sparks dancing in the wind. Her flame colored eyes hawked at me from head to toe.

And after knitting her brows for a few seconds, she nodded.

“Very well”

Her pronunciation slowly turned normal.

“I will give you a passing mark”

“Say what?”

“A battle is about to start isn’t it. As a <Goddess> I shall promise you victory. Therefore”

The goddess brushed up her golden hair, and it’s as if emanated sparks in the air.

“when our enemies are eradicated you shall shower me with unyielding praise, and pat my head.”

I knew.

Goddesses- there are various types and they have their own characteristics. But they all share a few points: strong sense of pride when it comes to battle and a strong need for acknowledgment and validation.

I know very well, because I had prior experience of employing a goddess.

“Dotta…..”

Putting my arm around the neck of the little man beside me, I started strangling Dotta.

“This time everything, absolutely everything is as you say, this might really be it for us”

“Eh? After all?”

“Das right”

Strengthening my grip, I became self-aware that my voice sounded like I was about to cry.

“This here’s a genuine goddess. Not just that but probably an unactivated one. A 13th goddess”

Just as I said that the dimness among the trees around us seemed to move. I can see a number of aberrations, there’s a lot of em.

While I would like to continue expressing my dissatisfaction to Dotta, doesn’t seem like I will have the time. The demon lord phenomenon is about to attack.

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