Capítulo 23: Tia in Distress
*trigger warning: violent act and profanity*
Realizing it was the burdensome red-haired girl, I wondered what kind of thing she's stirring up right now.
She's cornered by a muscular young man in crook-like clothing in that small alleyway filled with crates blocking their view. Their voices were hushed, unheard by inattentive townsfolk. In addition to that, noises from the rolling wheels of carts and wagons prevented them more from being noticed.
Too bad my eyes caught sight of them.
Asfi, too, found out it was the red-haired girl, "(It appears that is the same human girl from the dungeon, Zal.)"
"(Yeah, you're right. It's hard to not notice her when I saw that annoying face of hers.)"
"(She seemed to be in a predicament. What are you going to do? I suggest we step away from them to avoid unnecessary troubles.)"
"(I agree. But let me eavesdrop to what they're talking about a bit, and then we'll stride off.)"
"(You are a curious ex-human, are you not? Very well. Please keep yourself out of sight.)"
"(Heh. Roooger.)"
I decided to crouch and hide behind a stack of five crates, enough to hide me and the coffin bag. And then I crept my ears by the edge of the wooden box to listen to their conversation.
"….ittle b*tch!"
Whoa. I just got here and he's swearing already? So much for the hushed voices. He's literally screaming now.
The red-haired girl begged mercy, "I'm sorry! Please… forgive me!"
"Forgive you? Hah! More like forget it! How come you forget where you put your borrowed spear, ah?"
Ahh… so, the topic was about that spear of hers. I wondered what's going on here… that dude seemed so angry about it.
The adventurer girl cornered herself to the stone wall while covering her face, "Eeeep! I'm so sorry… I really forgot where I put it! I swear! I can't find it anywhere!"
"Bullsh*t!" The guy enclosed his face to hers while pointing aggressively, "I didn't believe a word you say, you little brat! I had lent you that spear and you forgot where you put it and you can't find it? That's more like you lost the spear, you hopeless rapscallion idiot!"
"Eeep… I'm so sorry… it's… uhh, yeah… it's lost…"
"So, it IS LOST! A'ight. You know what? I don't care how you lost it. I lent you that spear so that you can grow up through the ranks faster. And now what happened? You f***ing lost it. I can't believe you made my collection disappear!"
"It can't be helped, you know! There's a scary and strong monster, I can't fight it, either!" the red-haired girl foolishly defended herself. While that angry guy… I believed he had his judgment clouded, as he couldn't see her as anything but a villain.
And so, the revelation about that pole weapon… That spear was not hers. It belonged to this spiky-haired man. From the looks of it, he was furious that she lost it… well, kind of.
"P-Please… can't we—"
"SHUT YOUR TRAPS! I bought that spear for one gold and five silver coins. Add that with the breastplate you're wearing, that makes them two gold coins in total! You think money grew out of tree? I fought hard and well to get them you know!?"
"I'm sooorrrryyyy!!!"
I could feel a murderous aura emanating from that raging punk. I saw him grabbing her by her collars and lifted her in midair aggressively.
"Eeegh…"
"Sorry? Sorry, you say!? Apology isn't going to work, you little b*tch! I want my money back! Now! RIGHT F***ING NOW!"
"I… ack… I don't have any coins to spare… please forgive me…"
The guy's taking it too far. She had her legs dangling in midair like that obviously showed that she's suffocating. That dude was seriously going to kill her if this continues.
"You know what, kid? If you don't have anything to pay me with, you'll just have to pay me with your—"
"Stop right there, buddy."
I stepped in and tapped his shoulder. I could feel his body seething in enormous flaming fury. His forehead when he glanced at me revealed his veins as if they're going to pop out.
I had prepared to take the risk of being hit in the face by doing this, but surprisingly… he responded calmly.
"…who are you? What do you want?"
I kept my alarm high, though. I told him to let her go, "Release her, man."
"Huh…?"
The angry man had a mix of confused feeling like wondering who the f**k this guy doing out of the blue. I dared say this muscular man probably going to erupt a violent volcano out of his head if I didn't reason well.
And so, I kept myself careful as I deal with him.
"I'll compensate for your losses. Three gold coins. Let her go. Now."
"O-Oh…"
His anger instantly subsided as I showed him three shiny gold coins in my other hand. He just dropped the poor young lady to the ground like that and focused all his attention on me.
"It's really… gold coins…"
"Yeah. Is it not enough?"
His eyes were sparkling as those golden coins were passed to his hand. The suddenness made him spoke like a flustered man.
"N-No… This is even more than enough… t-thanks, I guess…"
I simply told him to knock it off and scram.
"Yeah, yeah. You're welcome. Now beat it, buddy."
"H-Heh… fine. I'll go."
The brigand-like guy turned around to the collapsed girl and yelled, "You're lucky that someone backed you up this time, Tia! Next time, you won't be so lucky. Mark my words."
He spat on her and walked away.
Before leaving, he patted my shoulders, thanking and warning me in whispering voice to my ears, "I'm grateful you saved my wallet, mate. But let me warn you this… for the sake of your own good, never approach that little b*tch. She's going to be a parasite to you if you try help her."
Keeping a still expression, I whispered back to him, "I'll keep that in mind. Thanks for the warning."
"Good. I bid you adieu, bro."
And with that, he left us both.
I believed he had a terrible wave of emotions running down from face to toe. One that he was angry, one that he was badly confused to see some random dude with a coffin on his back telling him to stop, and ultimately, he felt happy that he got his money back.
The reason I gave him three of my stolen gold coins was because I felt a bit responsible for disarming the girl that time. I took her spear for a spin once and left it to rust in that forsaken dungeon. I didn't know that could literally lead her to a death flag.
And yeah…
That man took it too far. I understood this girl was annoyingly troublesome but treating her like that was way beyond acceptable. Well, I guessed he had an anger management issue. He did a number to the poor girl, psychologically, and in a way, physically. Those big hands could've killed her by suffocation.
Money can be replaced, but life could not.
"You okay?" I walked in closer to reach her hands. She's coughing for a few seconds before finally giving me her hand.
"Y-Yes… *cough* thank you… *cough* for saving me… aaAAaaaAAAHHH!!??!"
Holy molly, why the heck she suddenly screamed out of nowhere!?
"Y-You…!" The red-haired girl forced her hand off mine and crawled to the stone wall with her butt. "I remember you… that face… that weird coffin thing on your back… how… how did you manage to get out… you, you homun—"
"Cut it with the homunculus crap, will you? I am NOT one of them."
I just remembered she had a one-sided issue with me back at that dungeon. She had a problem with my face so bad that she wanted to pierce it with the "borrowed" spear.
Good god… Remembering that made me want to retract my words. Maybe she deserved that treatment…
The female adventurer denied further, "That's impossible… I can't sense any life force from your body…"
"Oh, shush. I saved your ass, girl. If you continue to act like this, I'll just send you straight down to hell, eh?"
"Eep…"
I understood she's devastated in many ways. But if she kept seeing me as some villainous guy, I can't help but unable to feel bad for her. In fact, I was annoyed right now.
Eventually, she calmed down and stopped calling me a homunculus.
"I'm… I'm sorry… and uhh… thank you for saving me…"
My face expression hadn't shifted yet. The accumulation of me being annoyed had amounted to a hill to the point that shifting my face to smile seemed impossible.
Sighingly, I asked her, "…So, are you going to stop calling me a homunculus now?"
"Y-Yes… I'm sorry. I'm terribly sorry! Just a moment ago, I remembered that homunculus had a life force… The one that didn't have it was undead and… well, mechanical creatures," she iterated.
Huh, I didn't like where this was going.
"Uh-huh. Go on."
"And umm… you don't look like an undead, so… that makes you a… um… a mechanical creature?"
Oh, okay. She didn't call me an undead creature. That would make things far worse than it already had if she said it.
"Right you are, missy. I am an automaton. My name is Zal."
After series of encounters with her, I eventually unveiled my name to her. I had a reason not to tell her my full name.
"I, I see… you're an automaton… no wonder there's no life force coming from you. You even have a name…"
"That's right. I hope you'll stop calling me weird stuffs too."
"Ahaha… that was... uh... stupid of me to say that. I'm sorry."
"If you learnt your lesson, then fine. Come on."
I gave her my hand for her to stand up. She was reluctant at first but eventually grabbed my hand and stood before me. I wasn't really paying attention before, but man, she's short.
"I'm sorry for being rude to you previously. Thank you for saving me, err…"
"Hey, hey… don't tell me you forgot it already. It's Zal."
"Ah, right, sorry. Hehe."
She politely bowed to me, "Once again I thank you for saving me, Mr. Zal. I don't know what'll happen if you didn't come and stop him."
Huh… in spite of her annoying behavior in the past, she's actually quite a nice person. And ultimately… she introduced herself.
"I'm Tia. Tia Petunia. You can call me Tia, Mr. Zal."
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