Rayos urged Fatiah to move from their current location in a whisper only Fatiah could hear. Fatiah, however, regarded his suggestion as a devil’s whisper. Her orders from her country were to dispose of enemy corpses. Moving from her post would be a violation of those orders. The punishment for the rumored female soldier was the “nursery” punishment.
“Never!” Fatiah exclaimed.
Rayos ceased his attempts at negotiation and shifted to persuasion. He played on Fatiah’s fear of death and her unwillingness to disobey orders, then proposed a compromise.
To change out of her sleeping clothes, she “borrowed” some chainmail from a dead female soldier whose size seemed appropriate. The chainmail was soiled with blood and mud, but it would make corpse disposal easier. He argued that dealing with the corpses in a place where she wouldn’t be a nuisance to the others, once she was properly equipped, would be more efficient.
Fatiah listened to Knife’s words. Hours later, she would wish she could tear apart the person she had become in that moment.
Fatiah worked diligently, using her spear and a muzzle to handle the foul-smelling enemies. She gathered the decaying corpses in one place, focusing on collecting the bodies and concentrating rot and stench. After several hours, the sun began to set. It was time to return to the campsite.
“…Huh? What the…?”
Fatiah finally noticed her surroundings.
“H-hello? Is anyone there? This is Fatiah from the Seshe Kingdom! Where is our friendly army?”
“… (determined)”
Fatiah called for help in a low voice. Rayos, in his Knife form, his blade glinting, thought he had successfully lured her.
“Wooooo—”
“Eek! Wh-why, enemy! Enemy enemy—!”
The rotting soldiers were alive. Among the defeated corpses, a rotting soldier had feigned death to lull the enemy into a false sense of security and then attacked. To prevent Fatiah from escaping, he attacked her legs with his sword.
“Attacking my legs again. How can you be so clever when your brain is rotting!?”
“It’s your fault! Wh-what a lie…”
“It seems there were others feigning death too.”
“Boee…!”
The rotting soldiers, their limbs torn off, began to stir one after another from the surrounding corpses. Fatiah glanced at the rotting soldier she was dealing with.
“Ooh! Ugh!”
She wanted to time her movements to potentially trip the rotting soldier, but she also had to be aware of the newly awakened enemies around her. She didn’t want to rely on Knife, who had led her to this situation, but her life depended on it.
“Mr. Knife! Please tell me when to trip the enemy in front of me!”
“Leave it to me ♪”
Finally, this girl is relying on me ♪♪
Rayos gave the signal at the perfect moment.
“Teeeey!”
“Go… (thud)”
“Now!”
“Wooo…!”
They fled in the direction where there were no rotting soldiers. She didn’t look back, not knowing when the corpses in front of her might move.
“No more playing dead!”
“Fatiah! The corpse on your left is moving!”
Rayos guided Fatiah’s path, interspersing his directions with falsehoods. She had no destination in mind. It was certain that she wouldn’t be returning to the campsite.
“Hohhh…! Ooh—”
It was a monster train. This was an act that would be appreciated by the soldiers of her homeland.
“They’re increasing—”
This was not a welcome development for Fatiah.
“Look, Fatiah! There’s a rock that looks like a good place to take shelter!”
“I can’t climb that! It’s your fault!”
“Wooooo—”
Fatiah was chased by rotting soldiers under the night sky. She was done for! She thought she was going to die, and she intruded into enemy territory. When she entered her own country’s territory, the rotting soldiers stopped chasing her. It was a measure to prevent friendly fire and friendly casualties from their own side. Thanks to that, Fatiah was saved.
“I’m so done with this…”
“They’re not following? Hmm.”
Rayos detached himself from Knife and surveyed the surroundings. He understood the inexplicable behavior of the rotting soldiers who didn’t pursue into enemy territory. For Fatiah’s safety, he fused with the ground. He assumed the exhausted Fatiah wouldn’t notice. Rayos moved the ground, dragging Fatiah to the woods where she could hide.
Enemy territory.
Rayos had seized a small country after avenging the Hero.
He obtained the Hero’s personnel reinforcement plan.
The King ordered the plan to be executed.
However, his vassals, while looking at a few pages of the plan, stated that they couldn’t execute it due to a lack of magic power.
“Find a way.”
Having just expanded their territory, to have it snatched away by a neighboring country in a short period would be a mark of disqualification for a ruler. The vassals exchanged glances. “We have no choice,” they thought as they accepted the King’s order.
Among them was a “female doctor” known throughout the neighboring countries as a mad scientist, who had devised a method of reusing corpses as soldiers (rotting soldiers) using parasites. However, they couldn’t command the parasites. Her assistants risked their lives daily, developing special medicines, powders, and perfumes that protected them from being attacked. Since then, the achievements of the “female doctor” and her assistants had skyrocketed, and their performance had improved dramatically.
“Chief—!”
A message arrived at the laboratory of such “female doctors” from the rotting army that had been sent to invade the neighboring country.
“Half-destroyed? Invasion failed?! No way.”
“No, it seems to be true.”
The assistant handed over the report, explaining that it was information gathered by those who had risked their lives on reconnaissance.
“We had trouble gathering that many… Is this small country that strong?”
“I don’t know the combat situation. But the bodies of the rotting army that were incapacitated were mangled. They must have had many close-combat professionals.”
“Oh, hmm, I see.”
The “female doctor” decided to create rotting soldiers that even those powerful close-combat professionals couldn’t handle. She would show them.
“If we feed the parasites plenty of food and let them grow, they’ll evolve. I’ll create rotting soldiers with mutated individuals!”
“…Another life-risking research project, isn’t it? (Gloomy mood)”
Because of Rayos, the assistants’ life-threatening research was about to begin again.
Meanwhile, the other vassals, unwilling to let the “female doctor” monopolize all the achievements, pushed their subordinates, their aides, and their prisoners to their limits, driving them to death from overwork.
“That stench-releasing woman… Damn her.”
“Exactly. She’s too pushy.”
“I’m a woman too, you know ♪”
In the Hero’s leftover personnel reinforcement plan, vassals who lacked the outlandish creativity of the “female doctor” to, for instance, replace golems with parasites, would spend their days pouring more alcohol into their glasses and complaining about the “female doctor” and her assistants. They were truly pathetic. The more they grumbled, the more they realized how insignificant they were.
Knock, knock.
“What is it?”
“Who is it?”
The news of the failed invasion reached the “female doctor.”
“Oh.”
“My.”
Everyone present felt a sense of satisfaction. Feeling better, they poured fresh drinks into their empty or nearly empty glasses.
“Cheers ♪”
They toasted to the stain on the “female doctor’s” achievements. The messenger who had delivered the news quietly withdrew, deciding it was best not to get involved.
