COTBC 11

 Chapter 11

“They tell you they’ll take you to a better life in the southern territories, and then sell you off to slavers. That’s the business.”

“Why not just go south on your own? What’s the point of using middlemen like that?”

“You don’t understand, sir. Traveling south requires quite a bit of support. Who in their right mind would serve as a coachman all the way from the northern frontier to the southern edge?”

Bill continued his explanation.

“You’d need to hire capable mercenaries to guard against bandits. Could women manage all that on their own? If they hired mercenaries without knowing better, they’d be stripped of everything they had, possessions and bodies alike. Though looking at it now, they ended up in the same state anyway.”

“I see. That sounds plausible.”

Isaac nodded.

Bill had once been part of a bandit gang.

When Margrave Goethe began his crackdown on outlaws in earnest, Bill had betrayed his group, exposing all their hideouts in exchange for his life. That was how he became a servant in the household.

Because of that, he had a broad understanding of how the black-market underworld operated.

Isaac hadn’t known of Bill’s background until several years later, when he witnessed Bill’s execution.

A clearing in the forest, just beyond the manor grounds.
A private execution site, hidden from the eyes of the domain’s common folk.

Bill had been caught by chamberlain Schiller while trying to sell confidential grimoires to a criminal syndicate.
The Margrave had summoned Isaac, as the heir of Goethe, to witness the execution.
Schiller read the charges, and with the famed blade Valeriche, he struck off Bill’s head.

Isaac could still vividly recall the clean slice, the stunned blink in Bill’s eyes—
As though he hadn’t yet realized what had just happened.

“He would’ve been useful… if only he’d been a little less greedy.”

Schiller had clicked his tongue while wiping blood off Valeriche.

That was the first time Isaac had ever witnessed an execution up close.

And the group Bill had tried to sell the grimoires to…
They were the very same organization responsible for the recent maid abductions.

The slavers had expanded their power through human trafficking, spreading across the Goethe domain like mold, plaguing its people.

Isaac’s reason for trying to rescue the missing maids wasn’t only gratitude to Enette for staying by his side.

It was also this — to eliminate the seed of a threat to the house before it could take root.

“Young master?”

“Hm?”

Bill’s voice broke through Isaac’s thoughts.

“What were you saying?”

“I paid off a few beggars who hang around the roads nearby. Sounds like she did meet with that middleman. When I asked them to describe him, the details matched exactly.”

“Is that so.”

“And, uh… everyone was pretty cautious, so it took some convincing to get them talking.
The travel money you gave me, it’s all gone, sir.”

Bill rolled his eyes as he spoke.

The money Isaac had given him was twenty silver coins.

It was a sum Bill would have to work half a year without spending a single penny to earn.

Clearly, he should have had some left over, but Isaac didn’t press him about it.

“Money doesn’t matter. What I want is to find them as soon as possible.”

“Oh, I was a fool. Not realizing how generous you are. Anything else you’d like me to do?”

Bill rubbed his hands together.

A natural gesture stemming from his judgment that he could profit from Isaac.

“There is something. This time, I’ll make sure you get a solid share too. Want to do it?”

“Of course!”

Bill nodded enthusiastically.

“Then, I’d like you to sign a simple contract.”

𝄞 𝄢 𝄞 𝄢 𝄞 𝄢

“Why? If you have something to say, just say it.”

“Is this really right?”

“What is?”

“Why has it come to this?”

“Don’t worry. Everything’s going according to plan.”

“This is?”

“Yeah.”

Isaac replied as if it were the most natural thing in the world to Bill’s voice full of suspicion.

“Really… this?”

“Yeah.”

Bill looked utterly dumbfounded.

They were in prison.

Not even the underground prison in Bern, but a metal cage set up in a sewage tunnel.

Half-naked people were crammed into cages like animals.

Bill knew this place well.

Because back in the day, he had done “deliveries” to this place.

It was where the bandits in the sewers kept people they planned to sell to slave traders.

“I must be crazy.”

Bill gave Isaac a sideways glare and rubbed his forehead against the bars.

How had it come to this?

Until he snuck out of the mansion with Hans’s help, things had been fine.

Even getting a wagon ride to Bern had been fine.

Because Isaac had given him a ten-silver coin advance.

But when he followed Isaac’s orders and introduced him to the middleman, everything was already too late.

Isaac explained to the middleman that Bill was his servant and that he himself was a child from an exiled noble family.

The middleman’s eyes gleamed as if he had found a delicious prey.

Isaac’s handsome face and young age made him incredibly popular among rich clients with peculiar tastes, and the “exiled noble” background meant less trouble afterward.

It was basically like Isaac was saying, “Please kidnap and sell me.”

“Shit, why me…!”

Bill screamed in despair.

And Isaac’s terrifying way with words didn’t end there.

He made up nonsense about having a rare disease and that if Bill wasn’t nearby, his condition would worsen and he might die.

Fearing the product might be damaged, the bandits locked Bill up in a cage too.

What was even more absurd was that Isaac was left in his fancy clothes to look good for the buyers, while Bill had everything stripped from him, including the ten silver coins, down to his underwear.

And in this ridiculous situation, Isaac calmly fiddled with a stone, muttering to himself.

“Hmm, this isn’t quite like what I read in the books.”

“Maybe I need to condense the mana more.”

“I should adjust the figures.”

Bill felt like he was about to vomit from frustration.

“Why me? Huh? There’s Hans, there’s the nanny — why me?”

“You were going to die soon anyway. I’m just trying to make you live a little longer.”

Isaac replied casually while still playing with the stone.

“Ha, now you’re playing fortune teller?”

“Have you given up on calling me ‘young master’?”

“Would I call you ‘young master’ in this situation? When you’re about to get killed?”

Bill wanted to beat the crap out of this little brat.

But since they were trapped separately in tiny cages barely big enough for one person, there was nothing he could do.

Even when he was caught by the Margrave’s soldiers, Bill thought he would never face such a crisis again.

Throwing away his life for just ten silver coins.

Stupid Bill, stupid Bill.

It was like trying to warm his frozen hands and accidentally burning down the forest.

Regardless of Bill’s lamentations.

Isaac was still muttering incomprehensible words while holding the stone.

The middleman and bandits had taken all of Isaac’s silver coins but left the stone behind.

It had a slightly unusual shape and was smooth, but they must have thought it was just something he picked up by the river.

Though the stone was chillingly cold, they assumed it was because of the weather.

Bill thought no differently.

“So, what are you going to do now? You have a brain in that little head of yours, right!? Stop talking to the stone already, are you possessed by a demon or something!?”

Bill shouted as if his frustration was about to explode.

“I’m getting out. I’m going to find Enette and the other maids.”

Unlike Bill, whose voice was filled with rage, Isaac’s voice remained calm and ordinary.

That only infuriated Bill even more.

“Of course, you will! If you have a way to break this iron cage, that is. Have you completely lost your mind?”

At that moment.

Screeech—!!!

Clang—!!!

“!?”

Isaac grabbed the iron bars and literally shattered them into pieces.

Bill wondered if he was hallucinating after hoping for a miracle too much.

He blinked several times, but nothing changed.

Isaac had already broken another cage.

Now there was enough space for Isaac to get out.

“Uh… Young master?”

“…………..?”

Isaac glanced at Bill, who was still trapped in a cage.

“You’re not going to leave me behind, right?”

“…Do you know me?”

“Well, uh, when a person is pushed to the edge, sometimes, you know, things happen, right?”

“People may behave like that, but I don’t keep such people by my side.”

“Oh, young master, if you leave me here, I’ll die. I’ll die working as a slave for the rest of my life.”

“Seems like a fitting life for you.”

“Please don’t do this. This place is like a maze. You might get lost trying to find the girls and end up surrounded by bandits.”

“Do you think I can’t handle that much?”

Isaac narrowed his eyes at Bill.

“No, no, of course not. Someone who can smash iron cages with bare hands wouldn’t have any trouble dealing with mere bandits.”

“Then, there’s no reason to let you out.”

“But! But if you take me, we can avoid unnecessary fights, reduce risks, rescue the girls via the shortest route, and get out safely!”

“Not necessary.”

Isaac turned his back coldly.

“You bastard!”

“What did you just call me?”

At Bill’s desperate cry, Isaac turned his head again.

“Please save me! I’ll do anything, anything!”

Inside the cramped cage, Bill bowed down low in desperation.

Perhaps his sincerity worked.

Isaac turned back toward him.

“You’ll do anything?”

“Yes! Damn it, anything.”

“Then, here.”

Isaac thrust a piece of parchment in front of Bill.

“What’s this?”

“What else? It’s the contract you refused to sign earlier. You said you wouldn’t sign unless I explained the ancient text, right? I’ll explain it now.”

“…………?”

“One: The signee, Bill, will unconditionally obey all commands from the contractor, Isaac.

Two: The signee, Bill, will not leak any information about the contractor, Isaac.

Three: If the signee, Bill, violates the contract, he dies.”

“I die?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s it?”

“That’s it.”

“There’s too little detail in the third part, don’t you think? What kind of death? Is there a curse or something?”

“Oh, that. That’ll depend on my mood at the time.”

“Fuck.”

“Hmm, maybe I should’ve included a clause about swearing too.”

“You seriously want me to sign this?”

“Yeah. With your blood. That’s how the magic effect activates.”

“Are you insane?”

“I’m perfectly sane. Your life is on the line, take it seriously.”

Only then did Bill realize.

He had gotten involved with the wrong person — a very, very wrong.

𝄞 𝄢 𝄞 𝄢 𝄞 𝄢

‘Am I under some kind of spell? Or did the Count’s tobacco I used to sneak have drugs in it?’

Bill felt like he was under a spell.
Isaac had shattered the iron bars of his cell—
With his bare hands.

Whatever trick he had used, the metal crumbled like bread crust.
As though it were nothing.

“It’s impure iron. Too many foreign elements, unstable grain structure. When you shift between extreme heat and cold, fractures appear quickly.”

And then he started speaking, words that technically shared the same language, but may as well have been from a different world.

But that alone wasn’t enough to solve their problems.

“I hear you caught a noble brat this time?”

“Yeah. Pretty boys like that sell faster than we can supply. We’ll make a killing.”

Bandits stood guard at every turn of the sewer tunnels.
Bill might have been able to take on one of them.
But by the sound of footsteps, coughs, and voices, there were at least five or six.

He looked at Isaac.

Surely… surely he wasn’t expecting Bill to take them all on alone.
Bill clung to that hope.

“You take the one on the left. I’ll handle the two on the right.”

“Can you really—?”

“I can. Go.”

Isaac replied curtly.

It was insane.
Absolutely mad.
And yet, perhaps because of the contract that bound them, Bill couldn’t disobey.

With no other choice, he picked up a broken brick near the sewer wall and crept up behind the bandit Isaac had pointed to.

Thwack—!!!

A heavy thud, and the bandit crumpled, struck on the back of the head.
Almost at the same moment, the two standing on the other side collapsed as well.

Neither Bill nor Isaac had touched them.

“What the—?”

Another bandit, a few steps away, turned to approach.

He, too, staggered, head snapping backward, before collapsing like a puppet whose strings had been cut.

Even after seeing it with his own eyes, Bill couldn’t believe it.

It had happened so fast.

Something had flashed through the air and struck the bandit square in the forehead.

“…What the hell did you just do?”

Bill approached the fallen man.
A large, angry red welt had risen on his brow.

“Guess.”

Isaac raised his hand.

Crackle—!!!

Tiny shards of glittering ice clustered at his fingertips, suspended in the air.

“—!”

Bill sucked in a breath, stunned.

There was no doubt about it.

That—
That was magic.

Bill had been through more than his fair share of madness and seen plenty of rare things in his time.
But this…
This was the first time he’d ever witnessed ice magic in his life.