BBYW Vol. 3 Chapter 42 (WN)
Chapter 42 – Rotten Humanity
“Sue, don’t look.”
“Ah…”
Sue was on her knees, in complete dismay. I covered her eyes with my hands, to not let her see the sisters’ corpses.
In the square, about 10 sisters had been affixed, arms wide, on crosses.
A considerable amount of time seemed to have passed since their death: the bodies had dried up to the point they looked like black mummies.
Crows had gathered around the crosses, attracted by the stench of dead meat, but the sisters’ bodies were so dehydrated that there was not much to pluck anymore.
When we arrived, the crows hurriedly flew off to the sky.
“Mas…ter….that…every…one…”
“Don’t think. Don’t speak. This is an order.”
“Aaah…”
Sue grabbed onto me, and I held her tight in return, as I looked at the sisters’ corpses with disdain.
“Damn infuriating sight…who the hell did this?”
It was an unbelievably cruel, blasphemous end for maidens in the service of god.
Their bodies did not show any external wounds. They were probably crucified alive, and left until they starved to death.
Thinking about how they must have suffered, deprived of food and water, was infuriating even for a non-believer like me.
“I don’t care much about gods…but treating women like this is…!! If you have to kill a woman, do it in bed…!!”
Filled with hatred for the people responsible for this repulsive act, I raised my voice.
“Sakuya.”
“At your service.”
“You know what to do.”
Sakuya should have been gathering information, yet she was right next to me — but I wasn’t going to waste time with such trivial things. I pushed Sue’s body onto her.
“I’m an atheist, but they deserve to be paid some respect. I might have ignored them if they were men, though.”
I walked closer to the crosses and offered a quick prayer. There were some young women among the sisters — they were surely beautiful creatures, when still alive.
“I would have loved to meet you earlier. I always thought it’d be fun to pay a nightly visit to a maiden in the service of god. May you rest in peace. If we meet in the next world, let me do it just once, all right?”
After a prayer that would send a god — assuming they existed — in a fit of fury, I drew my sword and cut the ropes that still bound the sisters.
“Do not let them down!!”
“What?”
Someone, however, yelled at me to stop.
I turned around, and found an old man glaring at me. Other people also came out of the houses around the square, maybe because they heard him.
“Hey, so there are people living here. No one’s gonna notice if you stay shut in your lairs all day.”
“Do not let those women down!! Lord Drake will be furious!”
“Drake…so that’s the man behind this?”
I glared back at the man, who was intimidated and stepped backward. He was the people beginning to gather around, however, and spoke again.
“Yes!! Our governor, Lord Drake, has personally ordered this!! Their sacrifice has allowed this city to be exempt from the heavy taxation put in place everywhere else by the Lion Kingdom!! Do not get involved in matters that do not concern you, stranger!!”
“That’s right!! If Lord Drake is angered, we will end up like that too!!”
“Get out, foreigners!!”
The residents followed suit and started insulting us.
Increasingly annoyed, I asked him a question.
“That’s some impressive loyalty you have to this Lord Drake. So, was it you people that ‘followed orders’ and put these sisters up on the cross?”
“T-That’s…”
The man turned visibly pale. My guess turned out to be right.
“How terrible…if you do such cruel things, you’ll get punished. You know that?”
I glared again at the man, with a gaze sharper than before.