TERNLF Vol. 1 Chapter 3 Part 2

Full title: The Exiled Reincarnated Noble Lives Freely

Note: If you found any typos/mistakes, pls write them in the comment. Thanks.

Translator: Canon

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“Welcome.”

At the back of the junk-filled warehouse, a man in work clothes stood before a wooden crate taller than himself.

He was probably the one in charge of Warehouse No. 3.

When he beckoned us over, I hurried to him and confirmed.

“Hello. This is the box, right?”

“It’s still packed haphazardly, so it hasn’t been sorted yet. I’ll be in the management office by the entrance, call me when you’re finished.”

Leaving only those words, the worker walked off toward the management office, leaving Grassa and me behind.

Even though Lakkra had supposedly given notice, wasn’t he worried we might steal or break something?

No, judging from this place, there didn’t seem to be anything of real value. Even if something went missing, no one would care.

Thinking it was quite a carefree workplace, I placed my hand on the crate.

“So, where do we look inside?”

“From the top, maybe?”

“The top, huh... oh, there’s a ladder propped up in the back. Would’ve been nice if that guy had mentioned it.”

I circled to the rear of the crate, climbed the ladder, and peered into the box.

The very next moment—

“Kyaah!”

Grassa screamed at the same time as—

“Die!”

“【Lightning Arrow】!!”

“【Blessing Freeze】!!”

From the surrounding piles of junk, three attacks were unleashed at me.

Even one of them landing would have meant certain death.

“I expected something like this, but they brought more numbers than I thought.”

They had timed their ambush for the exact moment my attention was diverted while looking into the box.

But I had already suspected such a move.

Ever since hearing Grassa’s account, I had doubted Lakkra.

There was no way a merchant of his stature would hand over jewelry to the daughter of a friend without verifying its nature.

“Haah!”

I twisted my body, narrowly avoiding the first 【Lightning Arrow】.

The unstable footing made my position precarious.

As I stumbled trying to dodge the next bolt, the 【Blessing Freeze】 hurtled straight for me.

“Not bad teamwork... wasted on lackeys of a crooked merchant.”

It had been possible Lakkra had given the pendant away without realizing it was a cursed item. That was why I had probed him in person.

But this ambush settled the matter.

It proved beyond doubt that he had knowingly given Grassa a cursed pendant.

“But this isn’t nearly enough to kill me.”

The incoming 【Blessing Freeze】 suddenly exploded in midair.

“What—”

A sharp blast rang out, and steam filled the warehouse.

I had countered with 【Blessing Tinder】, my fire spell instantly vaporizing the ice into a small explosion.

But that wasn’t the end.

“No way—! Gyaaaaah!”

A scream echoed through the warehouse.

The 【Blessing Tinder】 I had cast carried twice the usual amount of mana.

It was a technique not widely known: by pouring more mana into even a basic spell, its power could match that of intermediate or higher-level magic.

Normally, beginner spells canceled each other out. The enemy mage had assumed the flames would dissipate before reaching him.

But the spell, boosted to intermediate strength, burned right through his 【Blessing Freeze】 and struck his body.

“Hot! Help me! It’s—”

Shrouded in the dense steam, the other attackers couldn’t see what had happened.

I could hear their panic.

“What happened back there?!”

“Rozeqush! Answer me!”

Their shouts grew weaker as the victim’s voice faded.

“Damn it! You bastard!!”

“Clear this smoke, hurry!”

“I’m trying!”

While they flailed, I was already moving.

My eyes were on Grassa.

Just before the steam had risen, I had glimpsed her being grabbed from behind, locked in a chokehold by a man.

And I recognized him.

“So he was in on it too. Now it all makes sense.”

It was the same brute who had accused Nikka and demanded compensation.

I closed the distance under cover of the steam.

But just as I reached for Grassa, a sudden gust swept through the warehouse.

“Click.”

One of the attackers had used wind magic to scatter the steam.

“Whoa, close call.”

The brute noticed me just in time, dragging Grassa backward.

“Stay still, or the girl dies!”

He pressed a blade against Grassa’s throat.

His hand trembled, as if at any moment he might hurt her by mistake.

“Alright, I won’t come any closer.”

I raised both hands in a gesture of surrender.

Of course, that didn’t mean I believed his words.

The fact that they hadn’t even bothered to conceal their faces meant they had intended to kill us from the start.

“Before you kill me, at least tell me your name.”

I bought time with a question while watching for the right moment to counterattack.

“My name’s Zaigo. Zaigo of Deadly.”

I was a little surprised at how readily he gave it away, but I kept the conversation flowing.

“Deadly… that your party’s name?”

“Yeah, that’s right.”

Even with sweat streaming down his face, he must have thought holding a hostage put him at an advantage.

A vile grin twisted his lips as he called out to his allies.

“Hey, Demand! Leave Rozeqush’s treatment to Nikamino and get over here!”

“Y-Yeah! But listen, this one’s in bad shape, we need to get him to a healer soon, or he’s not gonna make it!”

I had held back enough that it shouldn’t have been a fatal hit.

Still, my 【Blessing Tinder】 had struck him directly, so it definitely wasn’t a light wound.

If that woman Nikamino could use light magic, then she should’ve been able to handle at least some healing. That mage wouldn’t die so easily.

“You deaf? If we botch this and let him live, we’ll be the ones sold off at the slave market!”

One word in Zaigo’s rant caught my attention.

“Slave market? There’s such a thing here?”

Slavery was a common trope in fantasy worlds, but in the Kingdom of Preasole it was officially prohibited.

There was a separate provision for war slaves, which allowed it under specific circumstances, but those were essentially prisoners of war—usually released once the conflict ended.

Any such contracts had to be filed with the kingdom, with guarantees for food, shelter, and the prohibition of abuse.

So at least here, slaves weren’t imagined to suffer inhuman treatment...

“I heard you were some noble’s pampered son.”

“No, I…”

“Then you should know. You should know about this kingdom’s darkness.”

Darkness.

True, the attempt on my life through the Adventurer Guild was one form of it. The nobility had always carried out assassinations against rivals and threats.

But what Zaigo spoke of now was a different kind of darkness.

It existed.

It had to exist.

A hidden slave market, kept from the public eye.

“The main clients are nobles, or so I’ve heard. Didn’t your family have some?”

At those words, I thought back to the Kashit household.

Were there people who had been treated as slaves there?

No. Among the butlers and maids, I had no memory of anyone fitting what Zaigo described.

“As far as I know, there were none in the Kashit family. I can say that with certainty.”

“Heh. So your family was one of the rare decent nobles.”

Rare, was it?

I remembered my late father as a strict man.

It was entirely possible he had never dirtied his hands with such things.

But as for my elder brother who had inherited the house—I couldn’t say the same with confidence.

At the very least, when I had confronted him recently, there had been no such indication.

I still couldn’t forgive him for sending assassins after me, but perhaps he still upheld some of the lines a noble ought not to cross.

But the slave market…

Zaigo had said, “we’d be sent to the slave market too.”

That meant they were usually the ones doing the sending.

And come to think of it, the request they’d used to lure Nikka had been an unusually lucrative job: simple work for the absurd reward of a hundred gold coins.

“…I see. So that’s how it is.”

I reached a conclusion.

“You were targeting Nikka from the start, weren’t you?”

“Tch, you finally figured it out. We were this close to drowning another country bumpkin in debt like usual, and you had to ruin it.”

So my suspicion was confirmed.

These people deliberately targeted new adventurers from the countryside, burying them in fabricated debt, then selling them off through the underground slave market.

Pulling the same stunt again and again—using phony damage claims like they had with Nikka—should normally have drawn the Guild’s suspicion.

But this was the royal capital’s Guild.

An organization rotten enough to harbor assassins in its ranks—and with a Guildmaster who openly directed such killings.

There was no way they weren’t connected to the underworld.

“In that case, the one pulling the strings behind all this is the Blackra Trading Company.”

I recalled Lakkra’s kindly face.

“That’s right. And for whatever reason, they want this girl too.”

“Uncle Lakkra… wants me?”

Grassa’s eyes went wide with shock at the betrayal.

It was only natural. Even on our way to this warehouse, she hadn’t been able to doubt Lakkra completely.

There must have been something between him, her father, and herself—enough trust built up over the years that she couldn’t shake it.

“But don’t think I won’t kill her. If bringing her back alive isn’t possible, I’ve been told it’s fine to kill her on the spot.”

And just like that, all that trust had been shattered.

“Well then, I think it’s about time you died.”

The man called Demand advanced from the side, dagger in hand.

I watched him carefully—

“Toa! Forget me, just run!”

“Don’t worry. I promised Nikka I’d protect you.”

I answered Grassa’s desperate cry as I simultaneously unleashed two spells I had prepared, both cast without chanting.

The first was 【Blessing Earth】 magic that controlled soil and stone, shaping them freely.

While stalling with conversation, I had taken note of Zaigo’s grip on the knife and the angle at which it pressed against Grassa’s throat.

The angle that would let me knock it away without harming her.

From what I judged to be Zaigo’s blind spot, a spear of earth erupted from the floor, driving toward his hand.

“Guoh!”

“Kyah!”

My aim was true. The earthen spear, long and sharp like a bamboo shoot, pierced the back of Zaigo’s hand.

The knife was flung away without so much as grazing Grassa’s neck, clattering across the floor into the shadows of the warehouse.

“—Guhah!”

The second spell I had prepared was 【Blessing Wind】.

I unleashed it straight at Demand, who had been about to strike from the side.

Caught at close range, the force of the 【Blessing Wind】 blasted him backwards, sending him crashing into a pile of junk with a tremendous crash.

If he was unlucky, he might have died, but for someone who had just tried to kill me, mercy was unnecessary.

Casting a glance at the heap where Demand had landed, I rushed to Grassa, who still looked dazed, and pulled her away from Zaigo.

“Damn you, how did you cast spells? You didn’t have time to use a magic tool or a scroll!”

In this world, there were two primary methods of invoking magic:

One was spellcasting, using powerful words as a conduit.

The other was activating items such as scrolls or enchanted tools.

Since I hadn’t spoken an incantation, he must have assumed I’d used a magic tool.

But there was a third method.

Magic could be invoked without powerful words, through silent casting.

Silent casting relied on imagination in place of words.

In truth, even spoken spells used imagination, but uttering words made it easier to form and shape that image into reality.

The words themselves were nothing more than a trigger to manifest what one envisioned in their mind.

Reciting them simply allowed magic to be cast more efficiently and more precisely.

Then why not use silent casting exclusively?

Because doing so required tremendous concentration and was notoriously difficult to master.

Think about it: it was far easier to picture a fireball while shouting “Fireball!” than to imagine conjuring one without any words at all.

And above all, people in this world grew up believing that powerful words were the very source of magic.

Because of that ingrained belief, few could ever grasp the sensation of manifesting their imagination without words.

But I was a reincarnated man.

In my previous life, I had read countless stories and played games where magic or powers were activated without spoken spells.

Of course, I had never truly cast anything—but through fantasy, I had become familiar with the very concept of invoking magic without words.

That familiarity had allowed me to free myself from the need for incantations.

Even so, I usually cast with words—it was easier, after all.

But Zaigo didn’t need to know any of that. He was my enemy.

“Now then, I’ve got plenty of questions for you. 【Blessing Earth】.”

I encased Zaigo’s body in earth, leaving only his head exposed.

Pinned down, he couldn’t move a muscle.

“I’ll ask again. It was Lakkra who hired you, wasn’t it?”

“…”

“【Blessing Earth】.”

“Gah! My leg—my leg!!”

From the hardened soil around him, I formed a spear of earth and drove it into his leg.

Bound and immobile, the piercing agony served to amplify his fear.

“Keep silent, and I’ll fill your body with holes.”

“…”

“I was willing to spare your life, but if you won’t talk—”

“W-Wait! I’ll talk! Just don’t kill me!”

Fragile.

These men thought nothing of killing others, yet when it came to their own lives, they were pathetically weak.

They had ruined countless lives for their own greed, and that earlier silence had been nothing but a last scrap of pride.

A little pain was all it took to break them.

“Good. I’m glad you’ve decided to be honest.”

I smiled as I spoke, but my eyes burned with killing intent as I pressed the interrogation further.

“You were right. We were hired by the Blackra Trading Company to ambush you.”

“To kill me?”

“That’s right. And—”

Zaigo’s gaze shifted to Grassa, who sat trembling behind me, and he spat out words she must have dreaded to hear.

“They told us to bring the girl back alive if possible, since someone wanted her as his personal slave!”

Zaigo, having lost the will to resist, began to spill everything.

Once, his group had been an ordinary adventurer party.

But a few years back, they had failed a request from the Blackra Trading Company.

Hidden in the contract’s fine print had been a clause demanding exorbitant compensation in case of failure.

“So there really are swindlers like that in this world too…”

I muttered bitterly and urged him to continue.

The request itself had been absurdly simple for adventurers of their D-rank level; something they should never have failed.

The reward had been unnaturally high for the task, and blinded by greed, they hadn’t read the details carefully.

But unforeseen obstacles piled up, the job failed, and they found themselves saddled with a massive debt to the Trading Company.

From there, the story was a familiar spiral downward.

To repay the debt, they were forced into the Company’s shady dealings.

At first, guilt weighed heavily on them, but before long, they grew numb. Eventually, they stopped feeling guilt at all.

Their work ranged from trapping rookie adventurers like Nikka in debt and selling them off, to assassination contracts like this one, to debt collection and sabotage of rival merchants.

The Blackra Trading Company’s meteoric rise to the upper echelons of the capital’s economy had been propped up by such darkness.

And in exchange for these jobs, Zaigo’s group had been paid far more than any Guild request could ever offer, enough that the enormous debt which had shackled them was cleared within a year.

“Blinded by money… We could have walked away after the debt was paid. But by then…”

Zaigo grimaced. By the time they realized, they were already too deep.

Guild jobs no longer satisfied them.

They were mired in filth; hands and hearts alike stained, unable to turn back.

“Uncle Lakkra… he wasn’t like this before…”

The color drained completely from Grassa’s face as she listened.

From what she had told me, Lakkra had once worked at the same company as her father.

When her father went independent and opened his own store, Lakkra followed suit soon after.

The two had remained in close contact, pushing each other to greater heights as they built their businesses.

When Grassa was still small and her parents couldn’t care for her on certain days, she had often been left in Lakkra’s shop.

To her, back then, he had been a kind uncle.

The man Zaigo described was nothing like the one she had known.

Her expression was heavy with sorrow, as though she could hardly reconcile the two.

Perhaps I shouldn’t have let her hear all this.

Even so, I spoke to her—though my words could hardly be called comfort.

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