Hero or Villain, Both
Chapter 97: Paying them back (3)

Chapter 97: Paying them back (3)

"Good work." I said as I strolled into the village.

The eyes of the guards all lit up when they heard this and it seemed like they wanted to bow to me, but I stopped them by raising my hand before they could.

Instead of making this matter bigger, I turned to look at the raiders that had been tied up and presented in front of me.

This wasn’t all of the raiders that had attacked the village, this was just the small part that had survived the attack on their village. Many of them hadn’t survived since they had fallen under the weapons of the guards.

Since they had pointed their weapons at us, it wasn’t as if we had a reason to let them live.

But the ones that survived or surrendered were captured in the end.

There was something else that had to be done with them.

When I walked over, the leader of the raiders who had been caught looked at me with a surprised look before revealing looks of wariness.

It was clear that they recognized me from the way that they looked at me.

Though it wasn’t as if it was a bad thing that they recognized me.

In fact, it even made things easier for me that they recognized me.

"So who told you to attack our town?"

The raider leaders all revealed grim looks on their faces when they heard this. But at the same time, I could see that there was a trace of fear that was also in their eyes.

It was as if they were afraid of whoever it was that I was referring to.

This at least confirmed that there was indeed someone that was behind all of this.

This was the one thing that I had been certain of since I didn’t think that these village raiders would suddenly have the courage to attack like this. There had to be something that gave them the courage to do this.

I didn’t bother getting an answer from them as I said to the guards, "Pack them up, we’re heading home."

The guards quickly nodded before picking up the tied up raiders on the ground and leading the way back to the town.

When we arrived, I found that the people of the town had been waiting for us. With the way that they gathered around the center of the town, it seemed as if they had been waiting a long time for us to come back.

But since they were all here...

"Bring out the stuff that I had you prepare before we left." I said to Vanessa.

She seemed a bit hesitant, but she still arranged for the stuff to be brought out.

When the raiders saw this, they couldn’t help panicking.

That was because the item that had been prepared was a guillotine.

"What are you doing? We surrender, we’ll join you!"

The raiders tried appealing to me by saying this, but I didn’t even acknowledge them as I waited for the guillotine to be set up. With how efficient the people Vanessa brought to help were, it only took a few minutes to be set up.

I lifted up one of the leaders of the raiders and brought him over to the guillotine myself.

During this time, this person kept trying to break free of my grasp. He did all that he could to try and free himself, but I was just too strong for him to do anything.

Then I pushed him down and locked him into the guillotine, but I didn’t let the blade fall right away.

Instead, I said to everyone, "This is one of the offenders that attacked our home today. To let others know that they can’t just step all over us, I will now publicly execute him."

"No! I want to live! I’ll tell you everything that you want to know!" The person inside the guillotine said this, but I didn’t bother listening to him.

In fact, he was even drowned out by the cheers that came from the crowd.

The people of the town fully supported this execution and it seemed like they really wanted to see it happen as soon as possible.

This was the wilderness where deaths like this came on a daily basis, so it wasn’t strange that they were acting this way.

Without hesitation, I pulled the lever of the guillotine and sent the blade down.

Even in death, the person in the guillotine couldn’t believe that he had actually been killed. It was clear that he thought that it was a bluff, but I wouldn’t bluff like this.

They had damaged our home and hurt our people, so they had to pay.

It was the only way to establish ourselves in this wilderness.

Once I finished executing that first person, I said to the guards, "Take care of the rest of them."

They all gave firm nods before turning to the rest of the prisoners.

The prisoners looked like they were on the edge of collapse with how they were begging to be freed. They even said things like we were barbarians who didn’t respect human lives at all.

But I just simply said to them, "You’re the ones that came for us first and now you’re complaining like this? These are just the seeds that you have sown."

Though I did grab one of the leaders and pulled him aside to say, "Tell me what you know."

He was so afraid that he told me everything that he knew, but it really wasn’t anything useful.

"You said that you would let me go if I told you!" He complained as he was being dragged to the guillotine.

But I didn’t have any regrets as I said, "I lied."

There was no need for honour with these people.

This was a dog eat dog world when it came to living in this wilderness.

They had already proved this with how they had tried to destroy our town.

In that case, there was no need to show them mercy.