Chapter 138: Perseus (30)
As expected.
Just as Mimyeong mercenary leader Alexis had said, the four mercenary groups currently on the island were all moving with similar objectives to Mimyeong.
“Hurry up, plant it. We have to finish before those monsters wake up.”
“You guys are the ones who should hurry—betrayers.”
“What? That’s rich coming from you Axion bastards! Do you know how many slaves died because you ran away?!”
“Kekeke, these idiot groups sure talk a lot.”
“…This bastard.”
Interestingly, all four mercenary groups had extremely bad relations with each other yet were still cooperating.
They were all burying something in the ground and slathering sticky liquid all over the slaves they had brought.
“What exactly are they doing?”
Perseus questioned the situation where mercenaries who glared at each other as if ready to kill were working together.
If they had such bad blood, they would normally keep their distance or settle things with a fight to the death.
Yet these people—who were supposedly after parts of the Gorgon sisters’ bodies—were burying things in the ground and doing bizarre things like coating the slaves they brought with sticky yellow liquid.
“Well… it’s not something our mercenary group does, but some do it. It’s embarrassing as a fellow mercenary… but in the end, it’s also a trick to safely escape from the Gorgon sisters.”
Perseus tilted his head even more at Alexis, who shook his head in shame.
He had heard that no one had ever survived encountering the monsters called Gorgons—what kind of method could this be?
The answer came quickly.
Rumble rumble.
The moment the vibration was felt, each mercenary group hurriedly hid themselves.
And then, the creature that appeared was the one known as the King of Serpents — the Basilisk.
The Basilisk had jet-black skin with dark stripes; its body was as thick as ten adult men combined. Its scales looked smooth and hard, and wherever its saliva dripped, the ground melted and caved in.
It was easy to understand why this creature was called the king of serpents and one of the pinnacles of living beings.
Above all, even though Perseus was seeing it through Njord’s magic, his body still tingled.
As if the petrifying gaze was affecting him.
And at this point, Perseus couldn’t help but realize.
“…So what the mercenaries call ‘parts of the Gorgon sisters’ bodies’ were actually parts of the Basilisk.”
They had been deceiving nobles and making a fortune with these tricks.
‘This is a bit…’
“Really pathetic.”
Njord’s sharp criticism while maintaining the magic made Perseus wonder for a moment if he had accidentally spoken his thoughts aloud.
Because that was exactly what he had wanted to say.
“Well… maybe they have some other reason?”
Perseus still tried to give them the benefit of the doubt, but that hope was soon completely shattered.
The Basilisk, smelling the tempting bait, devoured the slaves and leisurely left—while the mercenaries watched from hiding until the very end.
Then, as soon as the Basilisk returned to its cave, they rushed to dig up whatever they had buried.
“What the hell is that…?”
The mercenaries hurriedly excavated the buried items and began collecting the small scales scattered around them.
What on earth…
When Perseus looked at Alexis, he shrugged.
He, too, thought it was pathetic every time he saw such behavior. But what could be done?
Some foolish nobles couldn’t distinguish between Gorgon body parts and Basilisk parts.
***
“So… until now, the mercenaries have been massaging the Basilisk to collect its shed skin…”
“That’s basically the principle. But don’t look at them with such disgust. To perfect this system, over 1,000 mercenaries and slaves have died.”
Perseus’s face widened in shock as he stared at the mercenaries with contempt.
Over 1,000 sacrifices just to complete this pathetic system!
Wasn’t that too cruel to those who died?
Alexis pretended not to notice Perseus’s feelings and made excuses.
“Of course, to someone with power like you, their actions must seem… distasteful. But think about it—this place is so dangerous that just passing through that jungle is nearly impossible. We’re lucky because you destroyed the traps and we caught a sub-adult cockatrice for guidance, but most mercenary groups get annihilated inside that jungle. And no one has ever survived directly confronting the Gorgons. In that light, isn’t a piece of the pet Basilisk or a piece of the Gorgon the same thing?”
Despite Alexis’s long-winded explanation, Perseus shook his head.
No matter what, it was still pathetic and vile.
Above all, buying slaves and sacrificing them to make big money was, in Perseus’s view, a horrific act.
“I can’t see their actions in a good light. I won’t criticize deceiving nobles, but what they’re doing reeks of foul stench. And above all, this means everything the Mimyeong mercenary group told me could be lies.”
Perseus didn’t miss that, after seeing the mercenaries’ behavior, what Alexis had said the day before could all be false.
They weren’t swiftly fighting and retreating from the Gorgon sisters—they were simply feeding the Basilisk and profiting.
Although his senses hadn’t detected any lies from them, even if there were none, he couldn’t join hands with a mercenary group that did such things.
Once they succeeded in subduing the Gorgon sisters, who could guarantee they wouldn’t betray him out of greed?
After a brief moment of contemplation at Perseus’s reaction, Alexis looked him straight in the eyes and answered.
“Though we may be a mercenary band that chases money, we’re still a gathering of those cast out by this world. At the very least, we don’t do business by sacrificing slaves like they do.”
He gestured toward Philomela, who had been hovering near Njord’s side.
“She may not reach the level of your companion mage, but the witches on our side are also quite advanced. The same goes for me. And in truth, we’ve carried out commissions together with other mercenaries — or with the knights and mages who are now statues. We’ve even encountered one of the Gorgon sisters during those jobs and obtained her scales. In short, we may have kept some things hidden, but there was no outright lie.”
At Alexis’s words, Perseus slightly furrowed his brow and scanned the faces of the mercenary band’s executives once more.
Yet none of them averted their eyes.
In fact, most of them met his gaze even more boldly — as if to say they were not the same as those others.
And it was true that, even yesterday, Perseus hadn’t detected any false scent coming from them.
“…All right. Then let’s make one thing perfectly clear. Were you truly planning to follow the strategy you described to me? You just said yourself, Alexis — no living human has ever faced the Gorgon sisters and survived.”
Perseus asked sharply. There was still something in Alexis’s explanation that didn’t quite add up.
But Alexis responded with the same unflinching confidence.
“Of course. I had no intention of deceiving you. The actual commission was to obtain scales from the Gorgon sisters. In Philomela’s case and mine, we assisted from the rear but still witnessed the battles up close. And among the other mercenaries, there are a few who did manage to survive.”
“Then why…?”
“Why is the rumor that everyone dies? Because it’s an undeniable fact that all the famous powerhouses died. And for those who barely escaped with their lives, information about this natural treasure trove is worth more than life itself. In short — the dead tell no tales, and the survivors keep the information under strict control.”
“……”
Perseus fell silent at Alexis’s explanation.
It was true: the Gorgon Garden was a natural treasure trove filled with all kinds of rare and hard-to-obtain resources.
Even Perseus himself had obtained a bezoar from the Cockatrice they had captured here — a material so rare that whenever one appeared, mages, guilds, and nations competed to buy it at exorbitant prices.
And even the Basilisk scales that the mercenaries obtained through such pathetic, foul-smelling methods were not only in demand by nobles — they were powerful alchemical ingredients that drove alchemists wild.
For that reason, Perseus nodded at Alexis’s explanation.
Still, one thing continued to bother him.
The explanation made it sound as though the Gorgon sisters were deliberately allowing some mercenaries to live.
If it were him, he wouldn’t tolerate anyone who had survived in his domain continuing to roam around…
‘That means all the humans here are just bait to lure in prey — if everything they’re saying is true.’
And naturally, it was obvious that the Gorgon sisters, deep inside that cave, were already fully aware of every single mercenary present here.
‘In the end, the conclusion is simple. Can I trust the Mimyeong Mercenary group — these people who are using me as bait — or not?’
The Mimyeong Mercenary group hadn’t told him complete lies, but they also hadn’t told him the full truth.
Of course, since they had personally asked him to help monitor the other mercenary groups, it probably wasn’t a scheme to conspire with them.
Perhaps the cunning-looking leader Alexis’s true goal was to offer both him and Lord Njord as sacrifices to the Gorgon sisters.
But if that were the case, there would have been no reason to deceive them in the first place.
After all, they had walked straight into the serpent’s jaws of their own accord.
“……”
While Perseus was lost in complicated thoughts, a magical signal suddenly came from Njord.
—In-stal-la-tion. Com-plete. Re-a-dy. To. De-to-nate. At. Will.
“Phew… All right. I’ll trust you. After all, my goal has only ever been one thing. Let’s see this through to the end — each of us for our own purpose.”
“Good. That’s enough.”
With faint smiles that revealed nothing of their true thoughts, Perseus and Alexis shook hands.
***
Fwoosh!
A red signal flare shot high into the sky in the distance.
It was the sign that Alexis and his mercenary group were proceeding according to plan — and at the same time, a signal flare designed to lure the Basilisk stationed in the cave where the Gorgon sisters resided.
“Wow. They actually managed to convince some of the other mercenaries? Looks like fighting broke out too, though.”
Poseidon let out an admiring whistle as he watched the flare rise.
According to the plan Perseus and Alexis had agreed upon, Alexis’s role was to either eliminate or absorb any mercenary groups that might attack later — and to hold back the Basilisk.
Since they already knew the power of the Gorgon sisters, if the Basilisk and the Gorgons ever acted together, it would pose a massive threat to both Perseus and the entire mercenary group.
The biggest problem with this plan, however, had been the prerequisite of first subduing or persuading the four other mercenary groups.
Honestly, Poseidon hadn’t believed it would succeed.
Alexis was Arkon-class, and Philomela was Polis-class — strong enough to rule a city-state for mere mercenaries — but the four other groups he had observed were only slightly weaker, or at most one tier below, and there were quite a few of them.
In other words, he had expected them to self-destruct at best.
Yet Alexis’s skill turned out to be far beyond ordinary.
‘To think he actually managed to persuade or absorb some of them… Looks like we’ll have to scrap the backup plans. I’ll have to keep watching to the end, but he might actually turn out to be someone Perseus will need later. A human who’s just cunning enough, and just willing to cross lines when necessary.’
Of course, he still couldn’t fully trust him yet.
If Alexis intended to betray them, the best move would be to fight the Basilisk for a while and then flee midway.
But so far, everything Poseidon could see told him that Alexis was following the plan to the letter.
While Poseidon was quietly reassessing Alexis, the Basilisk inside the cave reacted to the signal.
Normally, after its recent meal, it wouldn’t have bothered to move.
But now, several humans had appeared who were irritating its nerves.
In that case, for the sake of its masters’ plans and comfort, it would have to take care of them personally.
Shhhhhhh!
With a low, thick hiss, the Basilisk moved — faster than before — toward the humans who had dared provoke it.
Normally it had spared the humans who fed it, but this time, it decided to wipe them all out at once!
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