Chapter 69: The White Maggot

April 15th, 2023

Beta Reader: My_Own_Worst_NPC

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Sierra used her wind magic to sweep the poisonous powder out to the sea and diffused it.

When Master Elza arrived with her healer, both Cecily and Sierra received treatment. At first, I thought Sierra was unhurt since she looked the same as usual, but I was wrong.

“Are you alright, Sierra? Where does it hurt?”

“Don’t worry. Vampires are quite resistant to poison.”

She’s acting strong, but I’m sure she’s considerably injured. Otherwise, she would’ve never let Porta escape.

“Poppo is still on her tail, right?”

“Yes, I’m sure it’ll get in touch with us soon.”

Once Poppo finds out where Porta is hiding, he’ll quickly return to inform us. As for Sierra’s treatment, it was completed rather quickly, but Cecily’s took far longer. When the treatment started, Cecily was really pale and was holding her chest in pain, but she’s already looking better thanks to the healing magic. Master Elza then approached Cecily once she deemed that she’s relatively fine.

“What a disaster. How is it, do you think you can tell me what happened now?”

“Aah. No problem.”

“So you said it was the White Maggot… but are you certain of this?”

“In the middle of the battle, part of her outfit was torn and I could see the tattoo on her left arm.”

“Is that all you have as a proof?” Master Elza had an indifferent expression on while asking the question.

“You know that the White Maggot has a tattoo, don’t you? The tattoo of the Iron Sheep Corps which was destroyed in the war against the Rurugoa Empire. Almost none of the people with those tattoos have survived…”

“You, are you one of the survivors of the Luwei Kingdom?”

Cecily took her gaze away from Master Elza and stared off into the middle distance.

“That’s a long time ago. I never personally met with the White Maggot, but it fits perfectly with what I’ve heard about her, including her hair color and her use of poison.”

“I see…” Master Elza crossed her arms and appeared deep in thought.

I used that moment to ask Cecily about something I’d been thinking about for awhile.

“Say, what’s this about a white maggot?”

“The White Maggot is a nickname given to that person because of her appearance.”

Ah yeah. Come to think of it, she had a white skin just like a wax.”

“Shirou, don’t tell me you’ve never heard of her?”

How could I? I’m not a person from this world, you know…

“In the past, there was a country called the Luwei Kingdom. It was annexed by the empire four years ago, you see… and White Maggot was a soldier who belonged to that country’s Iron Sheep Corps.”

Cecily then told me about what happened. The Iron Sheep Corps was a unit made up of criminals to counter the shortage of military personnel near the end of the war with the Empire. Naturally, this White Maggot was also recruited into the army.

“Her criminal record began with the brutal murder of her parents.”

There were various rumors about her; some say she was abused by her father since childhood, others that she was the daughter of a wealthy pharmacy owner, but Cecily didn’t know the details for certain.

One thing for sure, her reputation terribly precedes her, in an infamous way.

“I know that as pirates, we’ve done many terrible things, but what we did was nothing compared to the horrors this woman has committed. She killed 128 people within a year, starting with her own parents.”

So on average, she killed one person every three days… I know there’s no use of making such calculations, but I can’t help thinking about it.

“And even that number is only based on what she remembers and confesses to. The actual number is estimated to be much higher.”

“But this White Maggot was caught in the end, wasn’t she?

“Yes, thanks to a special team assembled by the country. I was still a student at the academy at that time… but that’s not important. Anyway, back to the White Maggot.”

She doesn’t seem to want to talk too much about her past…

Cecily then continued, “They managed to assemble some skilled people and capture the Maggot. She was to be publicly executed, but unfortunately the war broke out before it happened.”

She continued that it was not originally a plan to recruit the White Maggot into the Iron Sheep Corps; the execution was merely postponed due to a combination of circumstances. After a turn of events, the decision was made to send her to the front line instead of executing her.

“The country was in a mess. So they made her a deal; if she was able to kill 500 of the Imperial Soldiers, they would forgive all of her previous crimes. Well, I guess it was only an empty promise, and they expected she would die in the heat of battle.”

But the white maggot survived the war. Not only that, she managed to disappear in the confusion of battle.

“It has been four years since then, and yet she’s still managed to survive, huh…”

It seems that the white maggot has been running away from one country to another, leaving a trail of bodies and bounties.

“Anyway, to sum it up, she’s bad news…” Cecily concluded her story with a deep, long sigh. Coincidentally, the process of her healing magic ended at that moment.

Master Elza scratched her head, making no attempt to hide her irritation. “This is really messed up. I don’t know if this Porta is really the white maggot, but whoever she is, she must be really skilled if even the vampire girl is having trouble with her. There’s no way any ordinary adventurer would be able to handle her.”

Even Sierra teaming up with Cecily was still not enough to catch her. She’s really good.

“We’ll have to organize a search party, but we can’t afford to send half-assed adventurers to go after her…” Master Elza were then looking at Sierra…

“Sorry, but I don’t want to have anything to do with troublesome affairs. I only fought her because I was protecting my older brother.”

“And what will you do if she comes after your precious older brother again? She’s a madwoman, I’m telling you, and for some reason unknown to us she’s been targeting males. As long as she’s still roaming around on this island, Okami’s life will always be in danger, you realized that don’t you?”

Master Elza, please don’t say such scary things. I may have a fetish of being peeked on, but it’s another story altogether if it involves a mass murderer on the loose.

*Flapflapflap*

I thought something jumped out of the darkness, but it was Poppo No. 2. I was so surprised I almost wet my pants! I know there’s a restroom just around the corner, but I don’t want to use it since it was a murder scene, so I just held it in until now.

 I’m still okay though, but I really got to take a leak soon. Maybe I can secretly ask Sierra to accompany me later…

Anyway, the one I gave order to follow the white maggot was Poppo No. 1, but the one who return here is Poppo No. 2. Since all of the golems can communicate to some extent, maybe No.2 come here at the request of No.1.

“No.2, did Poppo No.1 told you to come here?”

Poppo started jumping up and down as if wanting me to follow him.

“It seems like they have a clue where she’s heading to.”

Tensions climbed among our group.

“Alright, this is an official request from the guild. Sierra, Cecily, I want the two of you to join in the manhunt.”

Even Master Elza, a living legend, seemed hesitant to chase after the white maggot alone. Even though there are other guild officials, they’re nowhere as skilled as Cecily and Sierra.

“Fine, I’ll do it. But only because my elder brother is in danger.”

“I’ll also come with you. I still have a score to settle with her.”

With the three of them joining hands, I feel assured that the white maggot will be captured soon. However, wouldn’t that leave me with no one to protect…?

“Don’t worry, I’ll protect Okami-san.”

I’m glad that Miina felt that way, but somehow, I was still worried… Perhaps sensing my uneasiness, Cecily began discussing the matter with Sierra.

“What about Shirou? If we add Rouge and the golems, do you think it will be enough…?”

“Yes. I also feel a bit worried leaving it to them.”

In the end, it was decided that I would be evacuating to the sea by using the small sailing ship, escorted by Miina and Rouge.