The World Dragon's Heir

Chapter 489: Without Witnesses

Dominic called the patrolmen over, and whispered to the Hunter.

"Send word to the Merchant’s Guild. I want twenty goats sent to the Trollish village as soon as possible. It’s a reward for services rendered. Take the rest of the patrol with you, as I will be searching the caravan, and that part doesn’t need spectators."

The hunter nodded. If Dominic found something, it was better if nobody saw him kill an entire caravan full of teen girls. If he didn’t find anything it was better for their dignity if nobody saw the debutantes being searched.

Either way, he wasn’t lying about that part not needing spectators.

Dominic hadn’t realized that everyone assumed he would actually kill the entire convoy if things went badly. They were not soldiers, he only had a small... moderate grudge against them.

But he wouldn’t kill them. At worst, he would just follow through on his threat to put them under a debt contract as criminals for assisting the Dagos Army in an invasion that violated the peace treaty.

They would probably never be able to afford to buy their way out of it, but it would still be better than starving in Dagos, or being left in a ditch on the edge of Wistover.

Once the patrol was well out of range, Dominic motioned for everyone to exit the trucks.

"Form a single line. Dave will be searching you for contraband, while I inspect the vehicles for weapons, bombs, or other potentially hazardous cargo. I wouldn’t put it past Dagos to send us toxic gas or a fatal virus." He insisted.

The girls looked terrified, and even more terrified when they realized that Dave was a Mountain Troll.

Right, their soldier retinue had been finished off by the Trollish village.

Dominic began to inspect the vehicles with one of the Trolls assisting, while another searched the ladies with surprising gentleness. It reminded him that they were no more than pawns in someone else’s game, and that the game had been all but lost before they had even made it to Wistover.

But that didn’t change his search.

There were camp supplies, food, chests of clothing, and a few hidden valuables. But nothing outstanding.

No signs of rotting meat that might be used to poison wells or any sort of sealed containers that could be hiding toxic gas. As neither Dominic nor Dave could smell anything out of the ordinary, other than the festering wounds of the few remaining soldiers.

Those weren’t bad, and they would heal up quickly enough once the Larry Troll from the healing hut came to see them, according to Dave.

"How many more trucks were lost along the way from Staptontave?" Dominic asked the soldiers once he had cleared the trucks.

"Twenty eight trucks were lost, all cargo transports for the infantry, and each pulling an artillery cannon.

We lost most of the cannons when we were attacked by roaming Ogres, and the last few, as well as most of the trucks, when we were attacked a little over a day ago by Trolls."

That was a big win for the Trollish village.

They needed some trucks that they could hire the carriage makers to convert into tractors for them. But these ones were likely coal powered, so they would need extra conversion, as the Trolls objected to the smell of burning coal for heat.

"Alright. I would offer to go bury the bodies, but they will be taken care of. Now, the question is what we are going to do with you. Unlike the ladies, you are Dagos soldiers. You crossed the border with weapons in Battalion Strength, and you brought artillery.

Any of those should see you executed as war criminals, given that Dagos is officially no longer at war with Cygnia.

However, I might be able to overlook the situation, given your dire condition on arrival. The problem is that I really don’t want to."

The soldiers nodded grimly. "Perhaps we can offer another solution?"

The soldier paused, and Dominic waited patiently as he tried to find the right phrasing.

"If we were deserters, who stole a convoy of military equipment from Dagos, not to invade, but to sell to the Duke of Wistover on arrival, would we not be considered foreign fugitives instead?

As I recall, that’s not a death penalty in Cygnia."

Dave smiled. "He’s a thinking one, he is."

Dominic hummed as he considered the proposal. Either way, he was going to obtain their vehicles and military equipment. But he could accept their status as deserters, given what would happen to their reputations once it was made public.

"You understand what will happen to your families back in Dagos once you are known to have defected to Cygnia, do you not?"

The soldiers laughed. "Families? We’re from common stock, taken by the recruiters, and in all likelihood, our families starved to death years ago. We didn’t even keep our family names once we were at the training camp, so I am not certain that the army would even know who to go after."

The driver, who Dominic noticed was missing a leg, just shrugged. "The village that I grew up in doesn’t even exist anymore. We passed by it during the war, and it’s nothing but desert sands and a dried up well."

The man had a point. Most of Easter Dagos was abandoned at this point, as the decade of drought had put an end to all sorts of farming, and even most of the rivers had stopped flowing.

Parts of it hadn’t had a drop of rain in years.

"Alright. There is a formal procedure for declaring a deserter a defector, but we can skip that. Strip to your skivvies and I will find you different clothes. You can’t step into town dressed as Dagos soldiers. You wouldn’t survive the day, even if you swore to the Gods that you had defected."

"There is that much resentment?" One of the men asked.

"Both from the Cygnia migrants and the lifelong Stansia Province residents, yes. You might have had it rough when the drought hit, but the commoners in the Provinces had the drought plus extra taxes to repay the war effort that was still being used to suppress them.

I will see to it that the ladies are treated properly, all you need to do is keep your past to yourselves and find a quiet spot to move into.

I hope that you know how to farm."