A Dragonslayer's Peerless Regression

[Translator - Peptobismal]

[Proofreader - Max]

Chapter 29

The merchants and the coachman were startled by the sudden Orc war cry.

"N-no way! How can there be Orcs in a safe zone?!"

The coachman frantically whipped the horses.

"Hurry up! Faster!"

Roar!

The Orcs' war cry rang out once more.

Neigh!

The horses, startled by the cry, reared up in excitement.

Crash!

As the horses thrashed about, the carriage overturned.

Zeke quickly jumped out of the carriage.

Thud!

The carriage completely toppled over, and the horses also fell, their legs getting caught under the luggage.

In this state, reaching the base camp was impossible.

Orc cries could be heard from all directions.

The adventurer who had been bragging in front of Zeke earlier was pale and trembling, holding his sword.

'Draker Academy graduate, my foot.'

Zeke hid behind a tree and observed the situation.

A moment later, something emerged from the forest.

Roar!

A group of Orcs wielding large stone axes appeared and began attacking the people.

"Argh! H-help me!"

An Orc smashed a person's head with its stone axe.

The adventurers with weapons tried to resist the Orcs, but it was no use.

"H-help me!"

The bragging adventurer's head was smashed by an Orc's stone axe.

The ground quickly became a sea of blood.

Zeke, concealing his presence, watched the Orcs collect the bodies and belongings of the dead.

If he intervened, it would leave traces, so he calmly waited for the Orcs to disappear.

'How did Orcs get into the safe zone?'

Argos, with its developed dungeon industry, thoroughly protected the safe zones at the national level to protect the merchants coming and going.

'Something must have happened at the base camp.'

As the Orcs passed, he concealed his presence, entered the forest path, and headed towards the base camp.

The base camp he arrived at was indeed a gruesome sight.

Perhaps swept by monsters, the fences were all broken, and blood-stained luggage was scattered about.

Zeke examined the corpses.

Among them were soldiers dispatched by the Kingdom of Argos.

'They should have been able to stop most monsters with this much force.'

Unable to understand the situation, Zeke examined the traces left at the base camp.

His expression darkened as he checked the traces.

This was because he found traces of 'humans', not monsters, at the attack site.

Although it was disguised as a monster attack, this was clearly a disaster caused by humans.

It was clear that the base camp had been attacked, and then monsters, attracted by the smell of blood, had entered and looted the bodies and supplies.

It seemed that the Orcs, having come down to the mountain path, had attacked the regular carriage.

Zeke dusted off his hands and stood up.

'For now, the important thing is to find Kaisir's ruins.'

Zeke selected only the necessary supplies from the remaining materials in the messy base camp and immediately left.

There was no point in staying here; it would only make him a suspect.

He immediately turned on the minimap and headed towards the barbarian territory.

As he climbed higher, the terrain became more rugged, slowing his progress.

After traveling deep into the mountains for about two days, Zeke discovered something.

'It's been a while since I've seen this.'

Hundreds of skulls hanging on tree branches.

Not only human skulls, but also the skulls of various monsters were hung together.

This was a sign marking the beginning of barbarian territory.

Even monsters rarely entered the area where this sign was present.

But Zeke didn't hesitate and entered the barbarian territory.

Just then, something caught Zeke's senses.

He felt a presence following him.

At first, he thought it was barbarians, but then he shook his head.

Barbarians never secretly chase intruders who enter their territory.

If they saw them, they would immediately capture them and literally 'tear' their limbs apart.

Whoosh!

Zeke leaped onto a tree and concealed himself.

Then he took out a dagger from his pocket.

As he completely erased his presence, the figures chasing him revealed themselves.n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

There were three of them, and they weren't ordinary adventurers.

'They're professionally trained knights.'

However, their movements were stealthy for knights.

They must have been selected from among knight trainees and taught pursuit and assassination techniques.

There was only one place in Zeke's memory where such madness occurred.

'The Hounds... Why are the Imperials in Argos?'

The Hounds were a unit secretly organized by the Rom Emperor to collect ancient artifacts.

In the previous life, these Hounds rose to become the main force of the Rom Empire.

But for now, the Hounds were still veiled in secrecy, and few knew of their existence.

At that moment, Zeke realized that the Hounds were also responsible for the annihilation of the base camp.

It didn't seem like a coincidence that the Hounds, who specialized in pursuing ancient artifacts, were near Kaisir's ruins.

For Zeke, who had been promoted to a Blue Knight, the Hounds were easily dealt with.

'I need to interrogate them and extract information.'

Whoosh!

The situation reversed, and now Zeke was chasing the Hounds.

He erased his presence and followed the Hounds for a long time, observing their range of activity.

The Hounds moved in groups of at least twelve.

Zeke, who had a deep connection with the Hounds in his previous life, knew a lot about them.

He noticed that they were on perimeter security duty.

'At this level, the regular contact cycle would be quite long, so even if I kill them, it will take time for anyone to notice.'

Zeke patiently followed the Hounds.

And finally, he was able to find the cave where they were stationed.

He held his dagger and slowly approached the cave.

Using his Dragon Eyes skill, he could clearly see in the darkness.

Just then, one of them came out of the cave.

Whoosh!

Zeke covered his mouth from behind, stabbed him in the lungs with his dagger, and then slit his carotid artery.

The Hound collapsed without even screaming.

Zeke moved the body to the side and searched his belongings.

Perhaps because of his status, there wasn't anything of note.

Zeke stealthily entered the cave, checking the terrain with the minimap.

The Hounds had modified the inside of the cave to create a base.

'This brings back memories. During my cartel days, I practically lived in jungle camps like this.'

Zeke had once been active as a killer for the infamous McCain Cartel, which ruled the Southern Continent.

After being tricked by a dungeon guide and sold into slavery in the Southern Continent, he received killer training and was deployed on assassination missions.

Though rusty, the skills he had learned at the Cradle and the academy were ingrained in his body, allowing him to somehow survive the harsh assassination missions.

The cartel, finding this intriguing, formally trained him and made him an assassin for the organization.

Thanks to this, Zeke spent five years in the midst of power struggles between cartels in the Southern Continent.

Compared to the brutal cartel bosses, the still-inexperienced Hounds were easy targets.

Zeke put on a mask to hide his face and stored Bahamut in his inventory.

Fully prepared, he entered the cave.

Whoosh!

The dagger Zeke threw lodged itself in the neck of an unsuspecting Hound.

He had already grasped the terrain and the locations of the Hounds with the minimap.

Zeke immediately charged deeper into the cave.

Two Hounds were on guard duty on the railing of a two-story building built against the cave wall.

He took out daggers from his inventory and swiftly threw them with both hands.

Thud!

The two Hounds, struck by Zeke's daggers, fell to the ground below.

Hearing the unusual sound, the Hounds waiting inside rushed out.

Zeke threw the daggers in his hands towards the Hounds running towards him.

Clang!

One of them raised his sword, imbuing it with aura, and deflected Zeke's daggers.

And at that moment, a Hound lunged at Zeke from the side.

Zeke lowered his stance and rolled on the ground.

He took out a dagger and stabbed it into the Hound's foot, then immediately took out another dagger and cut his Achilles tendon.

"Argh!"

Zeke circled behind the Hound and snapped his neck.

It was exactly the way Southern assassins dealt with knights.

"It's a Southerner! Block the escape route and keep your distance! Shoot crossbows from afar!"

Perhaps there were soldiers as well as knights, as soldiers with crossbows emerged from the building.

Zeke ran forward at incredible speed.

Whoosh!

A rain of arrows poured towards Zeke, but as he moved in a zigzag pattern, they couldn't aim properly and missed completely.

Before they knew it, Zeke was right in front of the crossbow-wielding soldiers.

Slash!

Zeke beheaded one of the soldiers with a dagger and snatched his crossbow.

He skillfully handled the crossbow and shot bolts at the other soldiers.

Thud!

The soldiers, with bolts embedded in their chests, collapsed.

While dealing with the soldiers with the crossbow and daggers, the Hounds swarmed around Zeke.

Zeke took a stance with daggers in both hands.

Then, the one who seemed to be the leader stepped forward and said to Zeke,

"What's a Southerner doing here?"

They seemed to have mistaken Zeke for a Southern assassin.

'Let's make things even more chaotic.'

He lowered his voice and spoke with a Southern accent.

"Did you think you could touch McCain's things and get away with it, you damn Imperials?"

The leader of the Hounds said in a flustered voice,

"McCain's things? We haven't touched anything belonging to them."

"Take that up with your damn Emperor after you die."

Zeke suddenly kicked up a stone at his feet.

Whoosh!

The hard stone lodged itself precisely in the leader's left eye.

"Argh!"

Zeke, seizing the opportunity, lunged forward and slashed the Hounds' necks with his daggers.

"Argh!"

There was nothing easier to handle than a knight charging in with excitement.

Zeke picked up the sword of a dead knight and threw it at another knight charging towards him.

The sword, imbued with the will of Penetration, pierced through the knight's body and lodged itself in another knight behind him.

Zeke swiftly annihilated the Hounds, leaving only the leader, who had spoken to Zeke earlier.

"You uncivilized Southern scum, how dare you!"

Whoosh!

Zeke dodged the leader's sword and swung his dagger, severing his arm.

"Ugh!"

Thud!

Zeke's dagger pierced the leader's lungs.

Just before he died, Zeke said to the leader,

"Damn Imperials, Kaisir's ruins belong to our McCain Cartel."

The leader's eyes wavered at his words.

"What nonsense..."

The leader of the Hounds died with a look of confusion on his face.

Zeke realized from the leader's reaction that they weren't after Kaisar's legacy.

"Then why are these bastards here?"

Zeke went up to the second floor of the camp and investigated their traces.

And he found a letter written in code, delivered from their superiors.

The code used by the Imperial Knights was incredibly complex and sophisticated, making it nearly impossible to decipher.

However, Zeke knew how to decipher the Imperial code thanks to his battlefield experience in his previous life.

He quickly scanned the letter and checked its contents.

'These bastards are blindly searching for ancient ruins on the Emperor's orders without even knowing what's here.'

It seemed that the Rom Emperor, obsessed with immortality, was searching every corner of the continent to collect ancient artifacts.

The Hounds were deployed to any place that might have ancient ruins.

Zeke clicked his tongue after reading the letter.

"That Emperor has really lost his mind."

Now that he knew the Hounds didn't know about Kaisir's ruins, there was no need to delay any longer.

Zeke left traces behind and exited the cave.

He turned on the minimap again and was about to head towards the location of the ruins.

That's when it happened.

Whoosh!

A chilling sound echoed from the sky.

Zeke knew this sound all too well.

It was the signal for the Hounds' inescapable net to activate.

[Translator - Peptobismal]

[Proofreader - Max]