We continued our travel for a few days. Only taking a break when the horses were tired or when the humans needed to sleep.
At some point we found the main road. And because we were actually following a path now, we could speedup somewhat.
One of our breaks was by coincidence close to a small lake. Oiwa and I decided to try and get some fresh water from it. I used some of my fire to melt the ice, so that Oiwa could fill our reservoirs. Yorimitsu and Raiko were checking if all the parts of the carriage were still in good chape and if the horses were doing well.
In the distance could a few footsteps be heard that I suspected to belong to humans. Just to be safe I quickly finished my work and entered the carriage. There I sat at the verry back and put on my cloak.
As I feared the humans neared our group. There were five of them, all were men. Each of them carried weapons and leather armour. The smell of sweat and alcohol was clinging to them like a shadow.
I looked at them from inside the carriage. They had short beards and their hair could be compared to that of a scarecrow. Despite their poor selfcare they were all pretty muscular and looked like they had enough to eat, a little too much to be fair.
Their souls contained trace amounts of corruption. Some from the soul itself while others from an outside source. But it wasn't too bad, it seems like the corruption only just started or was just worsening at a really slow page.
When they came close enough, the biggest of them spoke. "Well, what do we have here?"
"I don't know Mark it looks like were getting a pretty nice carriage for free!" the one who was the skinniest replied. He had a wide grin on his disgusting face, which I didn't like at all.
He walked over at Oiwa who was just finished with filling the water reservoirs. "Wow, what a beauty. That scar is such a shame, but I think that she will still make us a good sum of money.
How about this? You're outnumbered, so if you hand over the carriage with all its belongings and the girl, we will let you live."
One of the men walked over to Oiwa and grabbed her by her wrist. She screamed, stepped on his toes, and hit him in the face. Due to her sudden struggle he let go of her wrist and checked if his nose was bleeding or not.
He grinned. "We found a good one today! Do you mind if I use her before we sell her?"
The one who I presumed was called Mark shook his head. "No problem as long as you don't break her."
I used my illusion magic and stepped out of the carriage. "You're talking about her as if she is just an object. Isn't she human in your eyes?"
"Heh, you're right. She is just something were going to sell once we get back to the village. You better hand her over if you wish to live."
I slowly walked over at the human who was careless enough to threatening me.
"Dead men tell no tales. You have no idea what connections we micht have and who might come after you once we get to our destination which you also don't know. You were going to kill us, anyway, weren't you?"
He crossed his arms while his men lined up behind him. "And what are you going to do about that?"
I grinned. No matter how many mice you throw at a cat, it will always just end up having a good meal.
"Considering that the people in that village are corrupt enough to buy a person, I would say I will give you three minutes to run before I chase after you."
I pulled my hood back and slowly let the illusion fade away. This made the faces of the men turn pale. Two were frozen in place while the other three backed away, only to run as fast as they could to get as far away from me as possible. Eventually the last two regained control over their bodies and turned around to follow the example of the others.
I let out a loud hollow laughter when seeing their reactions. "If you can make it back to that village remember to tell them to change tier ways. Because I will come back and slaughter every single one of them if not, and that includes you!"
As I said I waited three minutes before I chased after them. they had no chance to begin with. I only had to make sure two or three made it back to that village.
Flying over the trees I had caught up with the first one in no time. I landed right in front of him to stop him in his tracks.
He screamed and begged for me not to kill him. But I didn't listen. If I let all of them live the people in the village would just think that they ate the wrong mushroom and ignore them. some of them simply had to die. and unfortunately for him, he happened to be the first one that couldn't escape me.
When the man realised that wasn't going to change my mind, he turned around. While running he dropped all the weapons that he was carrying to make himself as light as possible.
I decided to have some fun and chased him on foot to give him the false impression of hope.
The man ran as fast as his legs could carry him. the adrenaline rushed through his veins, driving him to just take the other step.
He was exhausted and had long since surpassed his limits. Yet the fear forced him to keep going. The only false hope that he had was that I would indeed let him live if he reached the village.
But I caught up. I ripped his back open and he fell onto the white snowy ground. Despite the pain he turned around and continued to crawl backwards.
I slowly walked over and placed my foot on his chest.
He could no longer escape.
Then I placed all my weight on that foot and my claws pierced his tender meat before I eventually broke his bones.
When the man died, I took his soul and flew off to kill another one.
I killed this one more swiftly and let the other three escape to tell the tale.
When I felt like I was done I flew back to the small group. They each looked dumbfounded and choked at what I had done.
I walked past Raiko an said in a low voice. "I told you, if I wanted you dead, you would have been by now."
With that I entered the carriage again ad waited for the other to get ready to leave.