WeTried Translations
Translator: Goku
Editor: Sty
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ The War Hero in the NTR Game Wants to Die ◈
Chapter 025
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Lingering Light (6)
I thought it would be some grand place, given it was called a base, but what I faced when I pushed open the door and entered was just an ordinary neighborhood tavern.
Oil lamps hanging on the walls, damp wooden floor, the smell of cheap liquor that could be found anywhere.
Slowly, I moved my steps and looked around inside.
Among those sitting at the tables, there were no people who looked like adventurers.
Hands with pickaxe marks, hunched backs as if washing away a day's labor with alcohol… Most seemed to be residents living around here.
Not a single person looked at me.
Their faces looked as if they had traded all their energy for liquor, leaving none to spare a glance at a stranger.
Only the second floor, however, was particularly boisterous.
The proper ones all seemed to be upstairs.
I took a seat at the counter.
I ordered a suitable drink to wet my throat, took out a cigarette from my pocket, and lit it.
Only after the smoke filled my lungs did I feel a certain tightness from the whole day loosen a little.
The alcohol flowed down my esophagus warming my insides.
It was the same on the front lines.
No matter how the day had gone, in the moments my throat grew hot, I felt a real sense of being alive.
Though that feeling was never particularly welcome.
To the bartender wiping glasses, I casually struck up a conversation.
"Business seems to be good. If it's this full at this hour."
"Everyone just comes here because they have nowhere else to go. It's a bit different from actually doing well."
"For that, the liquor isn't bad."
"It's not just not bad, it's good. For that price."
He pretended to be gruff, but he consistently responded to every word.
As I accepted and drank the refills of my empty glass, and merely nodded, by the time the glass was half empty, I could even gather useless information like how lazy the local guards were, or why the bakery in the next alley had closed last week.
Pressing out my cigarette in the ashtray, I asked.
"By the way, what's on the second floor? It's quite boisterous."
"Why, did you come looking because you're interested in Bruno's squad? You look pretty high-class, why don't you just give up?"
"Don't they accept young masters like me?"
"Well, rather than that, the work is quite tough. So they only pick skilled people."
"I guess I don't look skilled."
"Well…it's because you're so clean. You don't even have scars."
"Still, I'd like to meet them once."
I took out a wad of bills from my pocket and placed it on the counter.
The bartender looked down at the wad for a moment, then slung the cloth he was using to wipe glasses over his shoulder and took the money.
Then he poured new alcohol into a much larger glass than before.
"Drink up."
The bartender called one of the waitstaff from the back, whispered something to them, then sent that staff member upstairs to the second floor.
"I don't know if they'll give permission, but if they do, go up and try talking to them. They'll likely be in the innermost room, drinking with their comrades."
Not long after, the staff member who had gone upstairs returned.
As he whispered to the bartender, the man gestured for me to go upstairs.
I emptied about half of the new glass and got up from my seat.
The stairs were inside the tavern.
With each step I took, the old wood creaked, but it was drowned out by the noise spilling down from above.
Laughter.
The clinking of glasses.
The sound of someone pounding on a table.
As I passed the landing, the noise pressed in.
As soon as I came up to the second floor, from the room right next to me, even a woman's moans were leaking out.
Is Arin in a place like this?
In the daytime, before the guild's disorderly reception desk, and at night, amidst this noise and the smell of flesh.
What kind of expression she must have worn as she passed through this corridor, I couldn't imagine.
And the fact that I couldn't imagine it tormented me.
There was too much time I didn't know about.
In front of the innermost room, I stopped.
If I opened the door, what kind of scene would unfold?
What kind of fucked-up sight would I have to see?
I took out a cigarette from my pocket and stuck it in my mouth.
My fingertips were trembling slightly.
Beneath the bandage on my left arm, the wound Rione had left throbbed.
Since the priest had even prayed for it, it would probably heal in a day… but even at a time like this, that thought still came to mind.
That there was no fucking bitch as unhelpful in my life as Rione…….
I lit it, inhaled the smoke deeply once, then exhaled.
And then I opened the door.
What spilled out from inside was the smell, even before the sound.
A sweet yet repulsive smell, a mixture of alcohol, sweat, and perfume.
On the largest and most comfortable-looking sofa, a burly, muscular man was sitting.
Next to him, Arin, her face flushed as if deeply drunk, was sitting.
The man's thick hand was resting on Arin's shoulder.
And Arin's clothes… were quite, rather revealing.
The women sitting on other chairs were also similarly dressed, but perhaps because her breasts were particularly larger, what she wore seemed like mere scraps of cloth.
I don't think even prostitutes would wear clothes like that.
Moreover, Arin wasn't just keeping her distance.
With her hand placed on the man's thigh, she was clinging to his side, with a forced, trembling smile on her face, chattering away.
My vision narrowed.
The noise in the room faded as if sinking beneath the surface, and only the smoke from the cigarette I held in my mouth clearly scratched at my lungs.
Arin's face, visible beyond the smoke, wavered out of focus.
"Are you the guy who said he wanted to join our squad?"
The man, called Bruno, put down his drink and looked up at me.
I didn't answer.
With bloodshot eyes, I only stared at Arin.
Bruno beckoned to an adventurer sitting next to him with his chin, and asked.
"Hey, who's this bastard?"
An adventurer who heard those words stood up from his seat and walked towards me.
He said something. He said two things. No sound could be heard. Only a high-pitched ringing sound filled my ears, giving me no sound at all.
When there was no response, on the third attempt, the opponent pushed my shoulder.
As I was pushed back, my back hit the wall.
The impact traveled up the wound on my left arm.
Over the bandage, I saw a thin stain of blood spreading.
Leaning against the wall, I stubbed out the cigarette I was smoking. A sigh escaped.
"This fucking…."
In a trembling voice, I said, looking at Arin.
"For this, hah, fucking. So… for this, you know."
Arin merely stared at me, frozen.
She didn't open her mouth. Or couldn't she?
Indeed, in a situation like this, she shouldn't open her mouth.
Her eyes, blurred with intoxication, were wavering.
But her lips remained tightly sealed.
I thought it would be better if she just turned her head away.
If she turned her head, buried her face in the arms of the man next to her, and pretended not to know me, I felt like I could just put her away in my mind.
"What, you know each other?"
Bruno asked Arin.
Arin nodded silently.
"Hah… I wondered why she wouldn't open up like this… I thought she was playing hard to get because she was pretty, but she already had someone, huh?"
At that, Bruno's hand gripped Arin's hair and pulled it back.
"You, are you this slut's pimp?"
"C-captain, just a moment…!"
"Don't call me Captain."
Arin, her hair grabbed, struggled, trying to push Bruno away.
She struggled. But perhaps due to the insurmountable difference in physique, it was of no use.
While watching that scene, I tasted blood in my mouth.
It seemed I had been biting the inside of my cheek. I didn't know since when.
"Hey, you fucking dog-shit worm of a bitch, if someone worthless like you was placed in the Academy, instead of just acting coquettishly, you should have stripped naked and sucked me off a long time ago. I thought you were just stiff because you're a country bumpkin… hah."
Bruno gripped Arin's hair even harder.
And meeting the eyes of the other adventurers, he gestured with his chin.
"Anyway, if we get rid of that bastard, then you can spread your legs without a problem, right? Isn't that so? I'll even reduce the interest every time you sleep with me, so keep that in mind."
At the same time, those in the room one by one picked up their weapons.
From under the sofa, on top of tables, those leaning against the wall, they grabbed them and rose from their seats.
"Catch that bastard alive. Let's carve him up in front of this bitch. Then she'll have nowhere else to be but by my side, won't she?"
The adventurers scratched the back of their heads, seemingly reluctant, but since it was the captain's order, they seemed to obey for now.
Step by step, towards me, they narrowed the gap.
It was a scene I'd seen many times. In fact, this might be more familiar.
Among the men, seven were armed.
Perhaps because they were in the middle of drinking, their armament was light.
Six women were dressed like prostitutes, like Arin.
Among them, three were armed.
"There's no supervisor here, so don't feel bad."
The man at the very front said as he approached.
While twirling a crude spiked flail.
The bastard swung it towards me.
One step to the right, I twisted my body.
The flail shattered the wall where I had been standing and embedded itself.
Unfortunately for my opponent, the flail embedded in the wall wouldn't come out.
Wall fragments and dust scattered.
Wood splinters caught on the spikes rained down onto the floor.
After watching him struggle to pull it out for a moment, I approached and drew my dagger.
The sensation of the handle touching my palm was familiar.
Though it had been a long time since I'd plunged this into my own head.
I pushed the blade beneath his chin, and thrust it upwards, letting it emerge from the crown of his head.
As I swirled the blade in his head, the bastard trembled violently before his body went limp.
Only then did the adventurers' eyes change slightly.
From eyes that had looked at an easy imbecile, to eyes filled with murderous intent.
Indeed, this kind of atmosphere was more familiar.
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