Chapter 282
“Kailum Empire? I’ve never heard of it before.”
A group of beast people who disembarked from the ship that soon docked at the island said. There were chattering sounds about it being a long time since they had seen humans, and how they smelled fragrant, but they soon curled their tails at Jason’s fierce expression.
“You’ve… never heard of it before.”
“Yeah. I’ve never even heard of the title ’empire’ itself. What is that? Is it a country name?”
The dog-type beast person who was talking to Roina scratched his head and said that. Roina became lost in thought and closed her mouth, then spoke again.
“Then, do you happen to know about the Golden Dragon?”
It was about the mural she had seen last before falling here. At the word ‘Golden Dragon,’ the dog-type beast person who had been talking suddenly perked up his ears.
“It’s… it’s best not to talk about that.”
“Huh? Why on earth…”
“Oops, I have a lot of work to do. I have to go now!”
With that, the beast person ran away awkwardly, no matter who saw it.
Roina, caught off guard, couldn’t stop that beast person and let him go.
“No, you should at least answer me.”
Even with that thought, it was useless to say to the person who had already disappeared. Roina sighed.
In any case, they had fallen into the past, and whether it was further back than they had thought or an unexplored region that even the Empire didn’t know, the people here didn’t know about the Kailum Empire. It was quite difficult not to know an empire that had existed for a thousand years, so it probably wasn’t the latter, but the former.
She saw Jason, who had been threatening them earlier, now mingling with the people. Roina looked at them with a troubled mind.
‘Come to think of it, Jason doesn’t have ears and a tail, but these people do.’
I’ll have to ask him later. She vaguely thought that.
“Ah, this? The forms of the beast people are all different. The closer they are to humans, the higher their status.”
“They had status?”
“Of course.”
At a temporary campsite where flames flickered, Jason and Roina sat side by side. In their hands were a bit of hard flour bread, obtained by helping the group of beast people merchants they had seen earlier, and a bowl of stew. Jason took another sip of the stew, hap, swallowed it, and continued explaining.
Jason’s explanation was this: The lower the beast person, the closer their appearance was to a mix of beast and human, and the higher the status, the more freely they could transform into human and beast forms.
“Then can Jason transform into a wolf-dog?”
“Ah, well…”
“Can I maybe see it?”
“W, well. Later! That’s not what’s important right now.”
That was true. But Roina, who had been secretly looking forward to it, had to neatly fold away her excited heart. Considering Jason’s red and bushy hair, she had expected it to be fluffy fur.
“Come to think of it, everyone was reluctant to talk when I asked about the Golden Dragon. Does Jason happen to know anything?”
“Hmm.”
Jason made a slightly ambiguous expression and said,
“I’m not sure, either.”
Could he know something? Roina looked at Jason with sparkling eyes. He made a keuung sound at that look.
“Everyone seems to be afraid of the Golden Dragon.”
“Huh? They’re afraid of the Golden Dragon?”
“Yeah. I think I know why.”
“Why?”
“I didn’t know at first, but as time goes by, my body feels tingly.”
Roina blinked. She was thinking for a moment about what that meant. Seeing that, Jason put a piece of bread soaked in stew into Roina’s mouth. She took the bread, ah.
“This whole island is filled with malice. And it’s the malice of a very strong being.”
“…Are you saying that’s the Golden Dragon?”
“To think it might not be, the energy I encountered from that guy is very similar.”
Even those merchants from earlier said they would only replenish their supplies to a minimum and leave right away. Jason muttered. Because they were nearby, Roina could hear him quite well.
“I think that maybe…”
Roina looked at Jason, who was saying that, with trembling eyes. The words coming from his mouth were making her heart be tossed about in a rough storm.
“This island is where the Golden Dragon lives.”
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