Earth’s Doom Starts with… Me? - Chapter 100

“…Are you drunk?” I squinted my eyes, “nah, my bad, magic here is kinda wack. Perhaps I’m the drunk one for expecting normal things.”

“Oooh, I’d love to get drunk right now,” general Zhang giggled, “drunk murder spree with me? Just kidding, just kidding… Unless?”

I shot him a glare while he paraded his exaggerated puppy eyes at me, accompanied by a few blinks.

“Too bad, I don’t drink,” I huffed, “except if it’s a sweet liquor. I can’t stand the bitter taste of alcohol.”

“Aww, I’ll get you used to mature taste~” He said with a little chuckle, which soon turned into full-on laughter.

“Shut up, you eel. Focus, will yoouuu!?” I pinched both of his cheeks in frustration while I frowned. Really, we were in the middle of wrecking–ehem, respectfully visiting the orc’s base, and a humanoid ‘magic’ had just vanished in front of us along with useful info, and he joked about alcohol. Great.

“A living magic?” General Emilio inquired, looking just a sliiiightly bit puzzled.

“Well, depends on how you define ‘living’. Tee-hee!” The white-haired man freed himself from my grasp and responded with a grin.

“I think the more pressing thing here is who sent her, and for what reason,” I added, “isn’t it really weird? Now that we’re certain that a human was behind her, it’s even more confusing why those humans contacted the orcs.”

“True. Most likely they’re from the same group as the one who once raided the elves.” Jeanne nodded in approval.

“You humans have such weird relationships. I’m not even sure who’s on our side and who’s not anymore.” Luke sighed with his hands on his hips.

“I don’t like complex stuff. So in my eyes, we’re a team and everyone else is not our team. Simple as that. I fight for my team.” I sighed and plopped myself down on the bed again, sitting on the edge of it.

“It’s okay. We should all calm down,” Jeanne stood up and looked at each one of us, “when it’s starting to get confusing, like how it is now, let’s just calm down and take one step at a time, okay?”

“… Okay,” I pouted and grabbed Jeanne’s arm to hug it tightly, “thanks, that’s nice to hear.”

“Yeah, it is. Someone once told me that, and now it’s stuck inside my head.” She giggled a little, but somehow, a little frown formed on her forehead.

“Well, that being said, I think it’s time to take a step forward and ruin that orc leader’s life, right guys~?” General Zhang clapped his hands together in delight and beamed us with his creepy smile.

“Right. Let’s go.” General Emilio immediately turned around and walked towards the clinic entrance while carelessly stepping on the unconscious orcs. Sometimes I saw him stepping on an arm, sometimes on the face, making a weird squelchy sound, and sometimes on the orc’s hoohoohaha. I hope they didn’t feel pain…

“Time to flex my persuasion skill, then.” I stood up and followed his lead.

——–

‘BANG!’

“Good morning to you, sir! Would you like to hand over your leadership to us or would you like to die?”

After we broke the door hinges to the armory and sent the iron door flying a few meters away, I cocked my rifle and pointed it right at the huge orc in the corner, who was surrounded by 5 other muscular orcs equipped with armors and weapons like a sword, a spear, a mace, a bow, and even a random hoe.

‘Grrrrrr.’

They simultaneously growled at us, but none of them tried to attack first or even responded to my question. So the leader’s guards were more careful than the other orcs.

“Ehem, excuse me, perhaps I was unclear,” I cleared my throat, “hey you, the dying one, would you like to hand over your leadership to us or would you like a slow, painful death?”

‘GRRR!’

One of them stomped its feet on the ground a few times before throwing a nearby axe towards me, which I quickly deflected by grabbing another axe using my psychokinesis and clashing them together. This armory was the perfect terrain for a psychokinesis user like me… Poor them, they had to face us.

“Hey, they don’t seem to be in the mood for talking.” I pointed at the angry orcs who were baring their yellow teeth at us, un-menacingly.

“I don’t think their leader can properly talk or think in his condition…” Jeanne frowned while she adjusted the strap on her waist. We had decided that the best way to bring that unconscious little girl along was to strap her with rope on the back of one of us, and Jeanne volunteered to help, as expected of her.

“Even better. Perfect for persuading.” I whispered to her so the orcs wouldn’t hear.

“Oiiii, do you seriously still need to think about it? Don’t y’all see the pile of bodies outside?” General Zhang laughed loudly, “you’re delusional if you think we’d hesitate to do that to you.”

‘ZAP!’

In a flash, the body of the frontmost orc that was holding a sword and a shield fell on the ground right after a bright white light filled our vision, making a loud ‘thunk’ sound as the metal shield clashed with the fallen sword.

‘GRRR!’

“Not enough? Do you want more? Oohh, kinky~” He grinned and raised his finger again, making a finger gun motion.

‘ZZAP!’

“Pew, pew~ Headshot!” He hummed and pretended to blow the smoke off of his finger gun.

“You and your antics…” I sighed deeply, but wasn’t surprised anymore.

‘Grrr…’

After they saw two of the orc guards fell down with a few convulsions, the three of them stopped trying to be aggressive and instead adopted a defensive posture.

“Are you guys willing to talk now?” Jeanne asked with her usual soft but stern voice.

When we received no response from them after a while, I got impatient and raised a few swords to point at them simultaneously, using my skill.

“Let’s freaking do this the hard way, then, if you guys don’t want to cooperate,” I groaned, “blink twice if yes, blink thrice if no. Answer me, do you guys got it? If you don’t, then off with your heads.”

‘Grrr-grrr!’

The orcs immediately shook their heads and dropped their weapons frantically, while positioning themselves at the front of their leader’s bed to protect him. Good guards, poor fate.

“General Emilio, I think we can start the negotiation now,” I glanced at the stoic general beside me, but I didn’t drop the swords, either, “probably we should stick with the yes or no questions, since Firiell hasn’t woken up yet. None of us could understand their language.”

“Good,” he stepped forward and pointed at the humongous, unconscious orc laying on the bed, “you guys want to save him, right? We can save him.”

‘…Grrrr?’

One of the orcs tilted its head, and they started looking at each other and scratching their heads.

‘Grr-grr, raaah.’

The orc on the right pointed at us a few times, before pointing at its wrist and then at their leader.

“No, we won’t be using that way.” General Emilio shook his head.

Of course we wouldn’t use Firiell’s blood. At this rate, she would be dead soon…And we still kinda needed her for something else. Well, I needed her. I wanted her to do something that only she could do.

“The curse, we will lift it entirely.” The stone-faced general stated firmly.

‘Grr? Grr-grr…’

The orcs’ growls became louder as they seemed to be discussing among themselves, and arguing back and forth. Gah, this was really time-consuming. After a while, they settled down and drew a question mark on the air.

“How? We will kill the witch for you. That will surely lift the curse permanently, right? You guys won’t need to continuously extract blood, either.” General Emilio explained with proficiency, instantly understanding their question.

“A witch hunt! Yay!” General Zhang cheered with happiness.

“No! That’s not how you’re supposed to use the term.” I nudged his chest in disapproval.

As we had discussed earlier, the best and surefire way to end the curse was, of course, to cut its roots. We already knew where and whom the curse came from, and we already know that she was a human, at least. What general Zhang said was correct, that as long as she was human, we roughly knew how to kill her.

We could figure out the details later. It wasn’t like we had never faced unknown enemies before.

‘Grrr.’

They nodded a few times, but they seemed pretty unsure about it.

…Were they doubting our ability? Fine, just wait until we brought you guys her head.

“In return, we want your leader to hand over his leadership for a while,” general Emilio continued once the orcs had agreed, “all of you will have to obey everything we command, no questions asked. It’s only for one trip, so it shouldn’t be a problem, am I clear?”

‘…Grrrrr…’

After giving us a weak nod, they let out a long sigh as their shoulders slumped down, seemingly defeated. Finally, one problem was finished.

“If you dare break our agreement, of course we will annihilate your race, so be prepared.” General Emilio slammed the hilt of his spear on the ground roughly, making the orcs flinch, as he shot a glare towards them.

… Ah yes, that part was also important.

‘Grr, grr!’

The orcs profusely nodded in unison and bowed at us. Although they seemed terrified, it wasn’t long until they started hopping in joy and laughing among themselves, presumably because they were glad that their leader’s curse was finally about to get lifted.

Kinda cute to see, not gonna lie. Hopefully none of them dies during our raid at the minotaur’s kingdom later, or else it would be a sad show.