We reached the cove on the western island of the archipelago around the time the sun had descended to the horizon.
The pirates’ base was a dark rock face that had shobusuri, a bat monster’s, guano stuck to it; I have absolutely no idea why they’d live in this sort of place. Probably for the atmosphere?
When the boat reached the beach within the cove, an arrow came flying. I caught the arrow mid-flight and looked at it, and there was poison smeared on the tip.
“This looks pretty good.”
I snatched all of the arrows that came flying and stored them in the item bag.
Ayl threw rocks in the direction the arrows are coming from. Looking with my Search Skill, all the pirates hidden in the surrounding shadows of the rock had fainted.
There were many entrances to caves in the rock face, and it seems they’re used as storerooms and living quarters.
I told one of the pirates to go call their captain and waited.
I retrieved the large net set up on the rock face. I think it’s probably a trap to catch invaders. Ayl stabbed the ground with her wooden sword, searching for whether there are traps or not. There were 5 pitfalls, and Ayl filled them with sand.
I intended to enter if the pirate captain didn’t come, but the captain came out leading 30 pirates. I immediately knew which one was the captain. He was the only person among the pirates with scars all over.
All over his face, arms, and scruff of the neck, there were countless scars from monster bites and sword wounds and the like. His muscles were bulging and he didn’t have hair or eyebrows.
“What the hell, at a time like this…”
While looking at the pirates fainted on the rockface and the destroyed traps, the captain came over.
“Hey, hey, you three’ve got guts to come this far!”
“You think? Thanks. Are you the captain?”
“How dare you treat my crew like this! You gigantic c*nts!”
<t/n: actual pun: futee yarou = shameless bastard, futoi yarou = fat guy>
“Ayl, he said you’re fat.”
I said to Ayl, next to me.
“Me!?”
“Don’t think we’ll just let you go for free!”
“So it won’t be for free! You’ll give us money? Alright then, hand it over!”
The captain’s face immediately became bright red, like a boiled octopus.
“Hey you bastards! Surround them!”
The moment the captain said that, I threw the net. The net neatly covered the pirates, and 6 of them, including the captain, were captured. Ayl stuck the point of her sword at the back of the captain’s neck and said,
“No one move.”
And, without caring for her warning,
“Run away!”
The pirate who went to get the captain gave a single command and the pirates not caught in the net abandoned their boss, running to the caves. Seems like they’ve received quite the training.
“Are you unpopular?”
I asked the captain as I took the confusion bell out from my item bag and gave it a ring.
The confusion bell rang throughout the cove and the shobusuri in the area became confused all it once en masse, shrieking and flying around wildly.
We can hear the pirates who had run to the caves screaming, “Help me!” Ayl struck down all the shobusuri in our surroundings. The pirates trapped in the net were frozen in terror.
“Do you know this boy?”
I asked the captain while showing him the portrait.
“L,l,like I know…”
“Captain…!”
One of the pirates caught with him has something to say, it seems.
“Hm? Do you know something?”
I turned to the pirate who looked like he had something to say and questioned him.
“Don’t say it!”
The captain screamed.
“Th,that guy’s the guy who was making a fuss two days ago on the northern island.”
Ignoring the captain, the pirate explained. The captain seems to be taken very lightly. The captain appears to be surprised by the pirate’s words.
“Making a fuss?”
“Yeah, he was naked and screaming something. Like ‘freedom’ or something, I’m not really sure.”
“Naked?”
Ayl and I had dumbfounded faces.
“You lot just don’t get it, do you?”
Within the net, the captain tried to seize the pirate that blabbed, getting tangled in the net.
“Captaaain! This isn’t the time for that, right!? Even though our comrades are calling for help!”
“You weren’t like this in the past!”
“This is why you get betrayed last minute!”
Starting with the pirate that had talked, the pirates within the net began to list their complaints at the captain. Were they in the middle of a disagreement?
“Please. Save those guys!”
One of the pirates pointed at the cave. We could hear screams the entire time from inside the cave. When I looked with my Search Skill, I could tell that there was a large flock of shobusuri a little further inwards from the cave’s entrance surrounding the pirates who fled, flying around. The confusion bell isn’t ringing anymore, so it seems they’re straight up being attacked.
I take the smoke type insect pesticide out of my item bag and put sleeping agents in it and throw it into the cave.
“Ayl, close that up.”
“Roger.”
Ayl sliced at the rocks above the entrance of the cave. The crumbling rocks sealed the cave entrance. There might be another exit, but it should be enough for the sleeping agent to take effect with just the entrance sealed. And in reality, it only took several tens of seconds for both the shobusuri and the pirates to enter an abnormal status condition.
“What did you guys do?”
Seeing this, a pirate with the net questioned us.
“You asked us to save them, so we saved them. The shobusuri and your friends are both sleeping. Will you be able to move the rocks in front of the entrance?”
I asked, turning to face the guys inside the net.
“Yeah, if everyone here helps, I think we won’t have problems but…”
“The sleeping agent will weaken after a little while, so once you move the rocks and rescue your friends, it’ll be fine. And so, what about that island to the north?”
I asked as I showed the map to the pirate who had talked.
“Ah? Aah. A bit north of this island is a small island. There’s a forest and nocturnal monsters, but nothing really in particular. It’s here.”
The pirate stuck his finger out from the net and showed me where the island was.
“Seth! Our destination is determined. Can you get us there?”
I called towards the boat.
“Yes! I had them teach me how to read a sea chart!”
Seth said that he had had the navigator-like pirate we had previously captured teach him how to read a sea chart.
“Then shall we set off?”
Ayl and I took the pirates from the pirate ship, untied them, and tossed them out on the beach.
“Try not fight too much among yourselves~.”
So saying, we moved the boat out.
Leaving the cove, we aimed for the northern island.
The sea at night was quiet, but there were a lot of monsters as usual. Monsters would come swarming if we lit a magic light stone, so using my Search Skill to survey ahead, we slowly headed the boat to the north. Even so, the sky was clear and the moon and stars were out, so it’s not like we couldn’t see at all.
“Seems tough to be a pirate…”
I turned to the moon and muttered somberly.
It seems like the pirates in the cove had some dissatisfaction with their captain, and the captain seems like he had his own thoughts about it. The pirates aren’t just a group of outlaws; it’s unexpected that human relations played such a major role, I thought.
You have to make all sorts of arrangements and the like in order to preserve the group, or else it could fall apart.
“What is it?”
Ayl asked.
“Nah, I was just thinking that the more people you have the more dissatisfaction there will be, and you’ll lose control.”
“There are probably also things that are difficult for subordinates to understand.”
I looked at it from the captain’s point of view, and Ayl looked at it from the pirates’ point of view.
“On that point, our company isn’t at the level where there’s complaints. It’s just that the incomprehensible president and the employees who don’t understand the president are all free to do as they wish.”
Ayl struck her chest as she said that.
“Eh? Is that how it is?”
Is that what they’re thinking?
“Is that true? Seth!”
I tried asking Seth, at the helm.
“Eh? Do I have complaints? Not really.”
“No, it’s just that our company doesn’t really have many rules, so is that okay? You don’t have any thoughts on betraying us one day?”
“Someone who’s going to betray you wouldn’t say he was going to betray you himself, right?”
That’s absolutely right.
“But honestly, there wouldn’t be anyone among us who would betray the company, right? They wouldn’t get any benefits even if they did.”
“Well of course!”
Ayl agreed with Seth’s words.
“Well everyone’s just doing as they please, so there shouldn’t be anything to worry about in our company, right?”
The vice-president, Ayl, told me, the president.
“I see, that’s right. … Hang on, am I really that much of an incomprehensible president!?”
I agreed with her, but I’m stuck on the incomprehensible president part.
“Yeah, I don’t know what kind of things you’ll do, after all.”
“With that, there’s also the fact that experiences you’ll absolutely never have otherwise will happen; it’s interesting.”
Ayl and Seth said.
“Then, well, that’s fine.”
I guess it’s fine if our company is interesting.
I saw a black shadow straight ahead in the sea.
That’s probably the island the prince is on.
As we neared it, I could see the light of a fire. And when we got even closer, I could her someone’s voice kicking up a fuss.
“Don’t come! Shit! Even though I’m finally free! Why!? Am I going to die here!?”
When I looked with my Search Skill, I could see that the person making a fuss was surrounded by monsters.
It seems like he had lit fires around himself to protect him from the monsters. I wonder if that’s the prince.
Ayl leapt and flew off the boat, brandishing her sword , and opened up a large hole on the island’s beach.
Bam-
With that noise, the sand flew up into the air.
Seeing that, the monsters fled into the interior of the island.
The boat reached the island, and Seth and I disembarked. Taking out a magic light lamp, illuminating the area around me, I walked towards the noisy person.
It seems like the noisy person lost his voice when Ayl struck the sandy beach.
“Good evening~.”
I greeted the dumbfounded, naked man who was being illuminated by the fire.
“Um, are you the prince?”
The face of the naked man was pretty much the same as the portrait. He’s a blond, handsome man, but I can’t see the 14-years-old anywhere. Isn’t he over 30 no matter how you look at him? Does he just have an old face?
“Wh,who’s there!? Who are you people?”
“We are people who came searching for the prince. Although I heard you were 14?”
“Do I look 14 to you?”
“No, not at all.”
“Then you’ve got the wrong person.”
“That would sound right. But you’re exactly like the portrait. Well, that’s fine. For now, let’s grab this guy and bring him along.”
I give Ayl and Seth some orders.
“Wait, wait! I’m not a prince or anything. Is there a prince who’d be naked like me?”
“I see, that’s true. By the way, why are you naked?”
“Because I’m free. I have no need of clothes. I have thrown everything away, even the authority worn on top of clothes.”
“- So that means you’re the former prince?”
“Um… maybe. Please! Don’t bring me back to Rocksalt East!”
With his hands and knees on the sandy beach, the prince bowed his head towards us. The prince, or a person who looks like him, is bowing his head, so it seems there’s a strong reason for him to not want to return.
“Do you have some sort of reason?”
We tried asking him.
We reached the cove on the western island of the archipelago around the time the sun had descended to the horizon.
The pirates’ base was a dark rock face that had shobusuri, a bat monster’s, guano stuck to it; I have absolutely no idea why they’d live in this sort of place. Probably for the atmosphere?
When the boat reached the beach within the cove, an arrow came flying. I caught the arrow mid-flight and looked at it, and there was poison smeared on the tip.
“This looks pretty good.”
I snatched all of the arrows that came flying and stored them in the item bag.
Ayl threw rocks in the direction the arrows are coming from. Looking with my Search Skill, all the pirates hidden in the surrounding shadows of the rock had fainted.
There were many entrances to caves in the rock face, and it seems they’re used as storerooms and living quarters.
I told one of the pirates to go call their captain and waited.
I retrieved the large net set up on the rock face. I think it’s probably a trap to catch invaders. Ayl stabbed the ground with her wooden sword, searching for whether there are traps or not. There were 5 pitfalls, and Ayl filled them with sand.
I intended to enter if the pirate captain didn’t come, but the captain came out leading 30 pirates. I immediately knew which one was the captain. He was the only person among the pirates with scars all over.
All over his face, arms, and scruff of the neck, there were countless scars from monster bites and sword wounds and the like. His muscles were bulging and he didn’t have hair or eyebrows.
“What the hell, at a time like this…”
While looking at the pirates fainted on the rockface and the destroyed traps, the captain came over.
“Hey, hey, you three’ve got guts to come this far!”
“You think? Thanks. Are you the captain?”
“How dare you treat my crew like this! You gigantic c*nts!”
<t/n: actual pun: futee yarou = shameless bastard, futoi yarou = fat guy>
“Ayl, he said you’re fat.”
I said to Ayl, next to me.
“Me!?”
“Don’t think we’ll just let you go for free!”
“So it won’t be for free! You’ll give us money? Alright then, hand it over!”
The captain’s face immediately became bright red, like a boiled octopus.
“Hey you bastards! Surround them!”
The moment the captain said that, I threw the net. The net neatly covered the pirates, and 6 of them, including the captain, were captured. Ayl stuck the point of her sword at the back of the captain’s neck and said,
“No one move.”
And, without caring for her warning,
“Run away!”
The pirate who went to get the captain gave a single command and the pirates not caught in the net abandoned their boss, running to the caves. Seems like they’ve received quite the training.
“Are you unpopular?”
I asked the captain as I took the confusion bell out from my item bag and gave it a ring.
The confusion bell rang throughout the cove and the shobusuri in the area became confused all it once en masse, shrieking and flying around wildly.
We can hear the pirates who had run to the caves screaming, “Help me!” Ayl struck down all the shobusuri in our surroundings. The pirates trapped in the net were frozen in terror.
“Do you know this boy?”
I asked the captain while showing him the portrait.
“L,l,like I know…”
“Captain…!”
One of the pirates caught with him has something to say, it seems.
“Hm? Do you know something?”
I turned to the pirate who looked like he had something to say and questioned him.
“Don’t say it!”
The captain screamed.
“Th,that guy’s the guy who was making a fuss two days ago on the northern island.”
Ignoring the captain, the pirate explained. The captain seems to be taken very lightly. The captain appears to be surprised by the pirate’s words.
“Making a fuss?”
“Yeah, he was naked and screaming something. Like ‘freedom’ or something, I’m not really sure.”
“Naked?”
Ayl and I had dumbfounded faces.
“You lot just don’t get it, do you?”
Within the net, the captain tried to seize the pirate that blabbed, getting tangled in the net.
“Captaaain! This isn’t the time for that, right!? Even though our comrades are calling for help!”
“You weren’t like this in the past!”
“This is why you get betrayed last minute!”
Starting with the pirate that had talked, the pirates within the net began to list their complaints at the captain. Were they in the middle of a disagreement?
“Please. Save those guys!”
One of the pirates pointed at the cave. We could hear screams the entire time from inside the cave. When I looked with my Search Skill, I could tell that there was a large flock of shobusuri a little further inwards from the cave’s entrance surrounding the pirates who fled, flying around. The confusion bell isn’t ringing anymore, so it seems they’re straight up being attacked.
I take the smoke type insect pesticide out of my item bag and put sleeping agents in it and throw it into the cave.
“Ayl, close that up.”
“Roger.”
Ayl sliced at the rocks above the entrance of the cave. The crumbling rocks sealed the cave entrance. There might be another exit, but it should be enough for the sleeping agent to take effect with just the entrance sealed. And in reality, it only took several tens of seconds for both the shobusuri and the pirates to enter an abnormal status condition.
“What did you guys do?”
Seeing this, a pirate with the net questioned us.
“You asked us to save them, so we saved them. The shobusuri and your friends are both sleeping. Will you be able to move the rocks in front of the entrance?”
I asked, turning to face the guys inside the net.
“Yeah, if everyone here helps, I think we won’t have problems but…”
“The sleeping agent will weaken after a little while, so once you move the rocks and rescue your friends, it’ll be fine. And so, what about that island to the north?”
I asked as I showed the map to the pirate who had talked.
“Ah? Aah. A bit north of this island is a small island. There’s a forest and nocturnal monsters, but nothing really in particular. It’s here.”
The pirate stuck his finger out from the net and showed me where the island was.
“Seth! Our destination is determined. Can you get us there?”
I called towards the boat.
“Yes! I had them teach me how to read a sea chart!”
Seth said that he had had the navigator-like pirate we had previously captured teach him how to read a sea chart.
“Then shall we set off?”
Ayl and I took the pirates from the pirate ship, untied them, and tossed them out on the beach.
“Try not fight too much among yourselves~.”
So saying, we moved the boat out.
Leaving the cove, we aimed for the northern island.
The sea at night was quiet, but there were a lot of monsters as usual. Monsters would come swarming if we lit a magic light stone, so using my Search Skill to survey ahead, we slowly headed the boat to the north. Even so, the sky was clear and the moon and stars were out, so it’s not like we couldn’t see at all.
“Seems tough to be a pirate…”
I turned to the moon and muttered somberly.
It seems like the pirates in the cove had some dissatisfaction with their captain, and the captain seems like he had his own thoughts about it. The pirates aren’t just a group of outlaws; it’s unexpected that human relations played such a major role, I thought.
You have to make all sorts of arrangements and the like in order to preserve the group, or else it could fall apart.
“What is it?”
Ayl asked.
“Nah, I was just thinking that the more people you have the more dissatisfaction there will be, and you’ll lose control.”
“There are probably also things that are difficult for subordinates to understand.”
I looked at it from the captain’s point of view, and Ayl looked at it from the pirates’ point of view.
“On that point, our company isn’t at the level where there’s complaints. It’s just that the incomprehensible president and the employees who don’t understand the president are all free to do as they wish.”
Ayl struck her chest as she said that.
“Eh? Is that how it is?”
Is that what they’re thinking?
“Is that true? Seth!”
I tried asking Seth, at the helm.
“Eh? Do I have complaints? Not really.”
“No, it’s just that our company doesn’t really have many rules, so is that okay? You don’t have any thoughts on betraying us one day?”
“Someone who’s going to betray you wouldn’t say he was going to betray you himself, right?”
That’s absolutely right.
“But honestly, there wouldn’t be anyone among us who would betray the company, right? They wouldn’t get any benefits even if they did.”
“Well of course!”
Ayl agreed with Seth’s words.
“Well everyone’s just doing as they please, so there shouldn’t be anything to worry about in our company, right?”
The vice-president, Ayl, told me, the president.
“I see, that’s right. … Hang on, am I really that much of an incomprehensible president!?”
I agreed with her, but I’m stuck on the incomprehensible president part.
“Yeah, I don’t know what kind of things you’ll do, after all.”
“With that, there’s also the fact that experiences you’ll absolutely never have otherwise will happen; it’s interesting.”
Ayl and Seth said.
“Then, well, that’s fine.”
I guess it’s fine if our company is interesting.
I saw a black shadow straight ahead in the sea.
That’s probably the island the prince is on.
As we neared it, I could see the light of a fire. And when we got even closer, I could her someone’s voice kicking up a fuss.
“Don’t come! Shit! Even though I’m finally free! Why!? Am I going to die here!?”
When I looked with my Search Skill, I could see that the person making a fuss was surrounded by monsters.
It seems like he had lit fires around himself to protect him from the monsters. I wonder if that’s the prince.
Ayl leapt and flew off the boat, brandishing her sword , and opened up a large hole on the island’s beach.
Bam-
With that noise, the sand flew up into the air.
Seeing that, the monsters fled into the interior of the island.
The boat reached the island, and Seth and I disembarked. Taking out a magic light lamp, illuminating the area around me, I walked towards the noisy person.
It seems like the noisy person lost his voice when Ayl struck the sandy beach.
“Good evening~.”
I greeted the dumbfounded, naked man who was being illuminated by the fire.
“Um, are you the prince?”
The face of the naked man was pretty much the same as the portrait. He’s a blond, handsome man, but I can’t see the 14-years-old anywhere. Isn’t he over 30 no matter how you look at him? Does he just have an old face?
“Wh,who’s there!? Who are you people?”
“We are people who came searching for the prince. Although I heard you were 14?”
“Do I look 14 to you?”
“No, not at all.”
“Then you’ve got the wrong person.”
“That would sound right. But you’re exactly like the portrait. Well, that’s fine. For now, let’s grab this guy and bring him along.”
I give Ayl and Seth some orders.
“Wait, wait! I’m not a prince or anything. Is there a prince who’d be naked like me?”
“I see, that’s true. By the way, why are you naked?”
“Because I’m free. I have no need of clothes. I have thrown everything away, even the authority worn on top of clothes.”
“- So that means you’re the former prince?”
“Um… maybe. Please! Don’t bring me back to Rocksalt East!”
With his hands and knees on the sandy beach, the prince bowed his head towards us. The prince, or a person who looks like him, is bowing his head, so it seems there’s a strong reason for him to not want to return.
“Do you have some sort of reason?”
We tried asking him.
