I Became the Commander in a Trash Game Who Copies Skills-Chapter 135 : Chapter 135

Chapter 135. Ear-ling (2)
The pioneer city of Kalisto is located at the southeastern tip of the Empire.
To the north is a swamp.
To the east is a wasteland.
To the south, it borders the Vampire Archduchy, and to the west, an imperial road weathered over many years leads to Wolfskrig through several fortresses and cities.
A characteristic of the southern part of the Empire, including Wolfskrig, is the sweltering heat and the repetition of rainy and dry seasons.
Several merchants mistakenly thought that Kalisto, being in the south of the Empire, would be similar.
Unfortunately, the weather here is quite different from the typical southern part of the Empire.
Kalisto has four distinct seasons.
It's hot in the summer and cold in the winter.
According to Bart, this is because the atmosphere mixes with that of the adjacent eastern wasteland.
The disadvantage is that it's always dry, but the precipitation is slightly higher in the winter.
It is now winter.
The temperature has dropped to below freezing.
There is no thermometer, but you can tell from the thin layer of ice on the puddles of water.
I gestured to the agents exhaling white breath.
“Are you ready? Have you all familiarized yourselves with the operation?”
“Yes, my lord. They have been perfectly trained.”
William answered.
I nodded and looked at our destination.
An old mansion building.
Behind a rusty gate is a garden overgrown with weeds, and it's a typical grand noble mansion built up to three stories on a large plot of land.
Before entering, I checked my armament once more.
Now, let's summarize the situation.
Among the traits obtained from this expedition, there are four related to smuggling.
[Meeting at the Water Mill House]
[Black Hand]
[Black Market Operator]
[Heehee, It's All Mine!]
These four.
Strictly speaking, the last one is a trait that facilitates the flexible operation of the domain's funds, but it has a hidden effect of activating the smuggling market.
Should I say it's a penalty trait if it's attached to an NPC, and a useful trait if it's attached to a veteran player?
Anyway, including the [Smuggling Expert] I already had, that makes five in total.
In this game, traits of the same family tend to become stronger multiplicatively as they are added.
That's probably why underworld dealers and smuggling organizations are already starting to take root even on the undeveloped trade routes.
Honestly, this part was beyond my expectations.
‘Originally, you didn't get a fixed trait just for smuggling. It seems it was added in this update.’
Anyway, what's done is done.
On the journey back from Everlasting Mountains Hold, I had already laid out a plan related to smuggling.
As long as the traits exist, smugglers will continue to appear no matter how many times they are eradicated.
There are two solutions to this.
Either wage a war on crime every time and stimulate the anxiety of the citizens.
Or, have the intelligence department dip one foot into the underworld organization and nurture it.
I chose the latter.
There are many advantages.
First, I can gather rumors and information unique to the underworld that don't circulate in the open.
I can also directly check criminal organizations that lower the domain's security by committing violent crimes like murder or robbery, with the power of a larger organization.
In addition, I would be able to easily entrust and handle tasks that are difficult to carry out with the status of a viscount.
Therefore, it was decided that old man Brol's intelligence department would take over the order of the underworld in Kalisto City, the gateway for land trade with the dwarves.
However, as is common in noir genre movies, it's not easy for a new organization to establish itself.
Problems erupt here and there.
Some of them are difficult to handle with the strength of the organization alone.
At times like that, the backer needs to step in once or twice.
Just like now.
“We're going in.”
The rusty gate opened easily.
The operation personnel numbered twenty-three.
Me, William, old man Brol, and 20 intelligence agents.
The agents who entered the mansion's yard quickly spread out into a formation on both sides.
“Disperse.”
The reason for scattering is because our weapons are special.
The heavy cylinder slung on their backs, the complex device attached below it, and the hose protruding from it are reminiscent of a certain weapon seen in movies.
That's right.
A flamethrower.
The thing the dwarves call the 'Breath of the Subterranean Dragon'.
A weapon developed by the legendary Meister of Everlasting Mountains Hold, Duke Bukrum, and has never been outside until now.
As a reward for this expedition, I received 50 sets of the Breath of the Subterranean Dragon and repair equipment from the Dwarf King, and about 200 units of fuel.
The value of these 50 weapons probably exceeds the total value of all the gold coins I received this time, right?
I stopped at the front.
The agents following me also took their positions.
Footprints are imprinted on the lightly snow-covered garden.
There was almost no sound of footsteps.
Being intelligence agents, their steps are light.
There is no reaction from the mansion.
“Surround.”
As pre-arranged, we scattered in the garden.
Some personnel took the main gate.
Others, the side doors and windows.
The remaining few went around to the backyard and surrounded the mansion.
Today's mission objective is eradication.
The target of the eradication is the swarm of spiders that have made their nest here.
For reference, the spiders mentioned here are not the common orb-weavers or the tarantulas of the jungle.
In this crazy fantasy world, spiders can grow up to several meters in body length.
Apart from its scientific name 'Katolluk Spider', it is a species called by the intuitive name Giant Spider, and they usually live in forests, including the great forests of the northwestern continent, but sometimes they move their habitat to other places.
As their distant relatives, the common spiders do, the candidate group includes human cities.
Some science magazine once exaggeratedly expressed this by saying, 'There is more than one spider within 1 square meter around us.'
I raised my hand.
“Enter.”
Crack!
Crash!
The main gate was torn off and the windows were shattered.
Even the dwarven-made glass that had withstood hundreds of years could not withstand the kick of a trained agent.
I quickly followed the agents inside.
The inside of the house was dark.
I scattered [Halo of Light] everywhere to secure visibility.
Traces of the spiders' life, which were not visible from the outside, could be seen everywhere.
Small, empty cocoons, webs covering the ceiling and floor without distinction, and dried-up animal bones.
The thing to watch out for is the webs.
Although we applied a special oil to our boots and armor to prevent them from sticking, the effect diminishes the more contact we have with the webs.
“Try not to step on them as much as possible until we engage in battle.”
Giving another warning, I turned the corner.
The area I was in charge of was the third floor.
I broke down a half-rotten door and went inside.
The master bedroom.
The one the master of this mansion would have used.
The ownerless bed and furniture were wrapped in webs, which had lost a considerable amount of elasticity and looked as if they had been covered in plastic before being moved by a moving company.
Just then, I heard an agent's voice from the short-range communication crystal sphere in my breast pocket.
[First floor search complete. No enemies.]
[Same for the second floor.]
“Just finished searching the third floor. No spiders.”
[First floor. Found stairs leading down to the basement warehouse. The entrance is blocked by webs.]
“I'm coming down.”
I headed to the first floor with the agents who were searching the third and second floors.
A small side door behind the kitchen was open.
Stairs leading down.
As ed, the stairs were completely blocked with webs.
“You don't think they blocked the path as an obstacle, do you? Did they expect us to attack?”
“They probably didn't expect it. They would have heard the footsteps.”
“Huh? How? Didn't we walk stealthily until we got in?”
“How do you think spiders usually hunt?”
Old man Brol scratched his head.
The giant spiders of this world have grown bigger and smarter.
Retreating to a place optimized for them to fight to block intruders and setting up barricades on the path is a typical tactic of siege defense.
Spiders are fundamentally sensitive to vibrations, so they must have heard our footsteps, grasped our numbers and actions, and quickly moved the battlefield to a place advantageous to them.
Even I am not confident of getting out without sacrifices if I go in with just these personnel.
In the process of breaking the tough webs and entering, sticky webs will stick all over our bodies, and at least a few will be caught one by one in the traps of the enemies lurking inside and become their prey.
“William, stay behind me.”
However, the opponent was unlucky.
A barricade is only useful when the enemy is trying to enter.
No matter how well you prepare for urban warfare in a siege, what's the point if you just wipe it out with a dwarven mortar?
We don't have a cannon, but we have a dwarven weapon.
I opened the safety valve and aimed the end of the rod connected to the hose towards the bottom of the stairs.
I could feel the high-pressure contents from the cylinder on my back flowing into the hose.
If I pull the trigger now.
Kwaaaaaaaah-!
Flames pouring out like a wave burned up the webs and everything ambushing behind them.
Kieeeek-!
“Block it in turns! Be ready to go in right away!”
The eight-legged beasts began to rush out from the hellish heat.
The eradication is as good as over.
* * *
[[Warrior’s Binding] is deployed.]
[The defeated enemy has been bound.]
[Katolluk Queen Spider (1), Katolluk Soldier Spider (8), Katolluk Worker Spider (19), Katolluk Spiderling (448)]
* * *
The eradication was carried out slowly.
Since the spiders had made themselves into rats in a trap, there was no need to rush, but the biggest reason was the lack of oxygen.
Underground spaces are fundamentally low in oxygen.
And if you set fires there, the amount of oxygen drops sharply.
The spiders, who were trying to hold out inside while being wary of the hot flames, would rush out when they felt the lack of oxygen, and we would repeatedly wipe them out with the waiting flamethrowers.
The narrow passage that the spiders had intended to use as a trap had instead become a trap that burned them.
I heard that the flamethrowers developed during World War I were used to conquer enemy trenches and bunkers in this way.
It seems the end is in sight.
The acrid smell of burning stings my nose.
Old man Brol approached.
“Phew, my lord, I think it's all over. These guys don't seem to be coming out anymore.”
“Did you use all the fuel?”
“As you said, we used it all up, leaving only enough for one more spray.”
“Let's wait a bit and then go in.”
When the ventilation was sufficient, we entered.
I descended the stairs, widening my view with [Halo of Light].
Something keeps crunching under my feet.
The charred corpses of the spiders.
Fortunately, the owner of the house hundreds of years ago also made the stairs in the dwarven style.
One of the characteristics of dwarven architecture is that they rarely use wood.
If the stairs had been made of wood, they would have burned up along with the spiders, and we would have had to carefully descend the sloping tunnel with only a rope.
After descending for a while, the stairs ended.
A wide space appeared behind a broken door.
“What kind of person who built this mansion made such a huge basement?”
“They must have had a lot to hide. They might have been involved in smuggling back then.”
The reason we came down this far is different.
Confirming their deaths is important, but there is something I am looking for.
In the vast basement were the spiders that had held out until the end and died.
Their contorted corpses, twisted from lack of oxygen, were turned over with their legs pointing towards the sky, hardened.
I approached the largest one among them.
An individual the size of a house, to exaggerate a little.
The Queen Spider.
I examined the area around its head.
“……Damn it.”
There was a tag-like object made of thin cloth attached to it.
A livestock tag.