Chapter 217: Forest of Eternity (1) (1/2)
[It’s alright. I was born to be forgotten anyway.]
“No, that’s not it!”
Cordelia spoke in apology as she held Moonlight, but Melissa remain unmoved.
[Come to think of it, even in the facility of the Snow Queen, I was abandoned by my old masters. I’m used to being abandoned.]
“Why are you saying something so sad… and I didn’t abandon you, okay? I just forgot you for a while, okay? I did come back to you, right?”
[After one day.]
“I’m sorry…”
Cordelia’s words trailed off as she made a long face and sucked in her lips.
Because she was really sorry for what she did to Melissa.
She thought to herself that she had been too indifferent.
She had implanted Melissa in Moonlight and completely forgot about it afterwards.
Cordelia certainly had an excuse.
After Cordelia had inserted her in Moonlight, Melissa did not answer for a while, even though Cordelia kept calling her. The performance of Moonlight did improve, but Cordelia became anxious because Melissa was not answering.
‘And I eventually forgot about her…’
Since there was no answer for more than a month, she got used to Melissa not answering, and in the end, she completely stopped talking to Melissa.
When she began working as Pink Bomb in the royal capital, she never used Moonlight due to various circumstances, so she completely forgot Melissa’s existence.
‘And then I called her again because I needed her help.’
Even Cordelia felt that it was too much.
It was no different to completely treating Melissa as a tool.
If Jude had treated Cordelia this way… she felt terrible from just imagining it.
[Uh, ah… A-are you crying?]
“No… I’m really sorry…”
When Cordelia’s eyes reddened, Melissa was suddenly flustered and nervous, or to be exact, she let out sounds that revealed her restlessness before she quickly said.
[That, uh, um! Okay, just don’t forget about me anymore, okay?]
The coldness in Melissa’s voice before was gone, and her voice had become very gentle. Cordelia then opened her eyes and hurriedly nodded.
“Ye-yes! I will never forget you.”
[Okay. Let’s not talk about this anymore then.]
“T-thank you, Melissa. I’ll treat you well.”
[Yes, I’ll trust in you one more time.]
“Yes!”
Cordelia widely smiled and kissed the gem section of Moonlight. Melissa couldn’t really feel it, but she began to cough for no reason.
And there was one person who was watching their entire exchange.
‘It’s quite heartwarming.’
Jude warmly smiled like a dad watching over the two as he nodded his head. When Cordelia felt Jude’s gaze, she became shy and asked him.
“W-why are you looking at me like that?”
“No, I just thought that it was heartwarming.”
Fufufu.
Jude warmly smiled again, and Cordelia felt like she was getting goosebumps even though she had bean pods in her eyes when she saw Jude.
“Stop laughing like that. You sound like a pervert.”
“Fufufu.”
But Jude laughed again, and Cordelia was filled with a desire to hit Jude.
“Anyway, let’s continue our business before leaving.”
“Huh? What else are we going to do?”
“Because we need to clean up Mount Damos.”
Jude gave an ambiguous answer before he stepped towards the Aggro Generator.
***
The night passed, but traces of the fight still remained.
The villagers were usually reluctant to approach Mount Damos, and they became even more cautious when loud sounds resounded in the mountain because of the nearby monsters that were annihilated from the incident before.
“What about the mountain animals?”
“They’re not coming because they’re scared of the monsters’ smells.”
Naturally, the animals would gather after smelling the rotting corpses some time later, but it was not that time yet.
“Okay, then I’ll leave this here. Cordelia, please.”
“Yes.”
While Jude placed the remains of a fake aggro device made of spare parts in a suitable location, Cordelia stared at the remains of Gamorr Khan’s body, or to be exact, the Vorg’s body that Gamorr Khan had used as his host until now.
Unlike the other corpses, Gamorr Khan’s corpse had completely become powder perhaps because he had left that body.
“Well… If we bury it, no one will be able to tell, right?”
[I think so too.]
As soon as Melissa agreed, Cordelia dug the ground with magic and buried most of the powder in the soil.
“Are you done?”
“Yes, pretty much.”
Cordelia approached Jude after she used magic to fill the hole.
“Is this really going to work?”
“As I said before, we don’t have to create a perfect story. This is a good enough and believable story. Rather, it’s more realistic to have some loopholes.”
At the words of the skilled scammer, the prospective scammer nodded her head, and Melissa was feeling complicated at the scammer couple’s behavior.
Jude’s scam – no, his plan was as simple as always.
On Mount Damos, the Black Hand Mercenaries led by Gamorr Khan were wiped out after a fierce battle against the monsters.
It was true up to this point.
It was true that Gamorr Khan fought against the monsters on Mount Damos.
‘Mix the truth with some lies.’
That was one of the basics in making a compelling story.
And what Jude added to the story was as follows.
“A battle broke out because Gamorr Khan failed to control the monsters of Mount Damos with a monster attracting device.”
The evidence was the half-broken Aggro Generator lying in the middle of the battlefield.
“Jude and Cordelia were passing by and discovered Gamorr Khan’s atrocious plan. Gamorr Khan had already lost his troops in their battle against the monsters, so he fled.”
“Wait, we passed by here?”
We didn’t use a road but passed by Mount Damos itself?
“We can say that we stopped by the mountain to fight the monsters for the sake of our residents.”
“I see.”
And this was also true.
After getting Ultimate One, they had tried to wipe out the monsters to some extent.
“Moving on, in order to pursue the fleeing Gamorr Khan, Jude and Cordelia set out on their way again, leaving only a letter that gave a full account of the events.”
While explaining on what happened in Mount Damos, it was a story that would give Jude and Cordelia a legitimate reason to hurriedly leave the place rather than remaining and cleaning up the fief.
‘Because Gamorr Khan is just an average-sized Vorg if you exclude the necklace and Grand Order.’
Moreover, his body was burned, so even if an acquaintance came, it would be impossible to verify his identity.
“And that would be how we can naturally explain having Ultimate Five.”
“Won’t the Black Hand Mercenaries become hostile to us?”
“It’s an organization that would become hostile to us when we fight Malekith anyway, and they’re also far in the south.”
“That’s true.”
Cordelia clapped her hands and then looked at Moonlight, clearing her throat as she puffed up her chest and said.
“Did you see that? That’s my Jude.”
[Uh… yes.]
He’s an amazing scammer.
While Melissa held back from saying her thoughts, Cordelia read Jude’s letter to the villagers.
“I like it. It feels like we’re telling our residents that we care about them.”
“They’ll really like it. We told them that they could take all the monsters’ parts.”