The Golden Forest - Chapter 1

Part 1: Kuhn (D.Kun)

TRIGGER WARNING: Attempted Rape

“That wench holds death in her hands.”

Renier had heard these words ever since she was young. But she hadn’t understood what they meant at first.

Renier was pretty. She was shorter than other children her age, but she looked nimble and cool because she had long legs, and, though she had been tanned by the sun, her skin was unblemished and smooth. Her thick, shiny hair reached down to her waist like a waterfall. She had always been pretty enough to turn heads ever since she was a child.

Renier’s master was a philanderer, and he was known to assault even the slave girls whom he had raised since they were babes, but he had never been able to do anything to Renier. The cheeky little thing had always subconsciously countered anything that posed a threat to her, and her would-be assailants had always ended up grievously injured.

Once, when Renier was seven, a raven had tried to peck her only to be roasted and eaten after the child had taken fright and thrown a rock at it, cracking its skull. When she was eight, she had killed a hunting dog that had attacked her by accidentally stabbing it through the ear with the meat skewer she had swung in the heat of the moment.

Renier was only average when it came to using a sling (a weapon with a long string used to throw stones), but she had an innate ability to sense bloodlust, and the stones she hurled in fright or the skewers, knives, and branches she brandished in the confusion of the moment always hit a vital point when any beast attacked her.

Renier had good eyesight and was adept at noticing even the smallest changes in her surroundings, and she had an uncanny ability for detecting danger. Furthermore, she could sense it vividly when bloodlust was pointed at her or when she was just about to be attacked, so it was impossible for her to be caught completely off guard. She was nimble and good at running away, and she struggled desperately and always managed to break free whenever she was faced with danger. And everything around her became a terrifying weapon when she was in danger.

Renier’s master was a fisherman with ten fishing boats to his name, and he was considered a wealthy man in their village. He owned a large house with ten rooms that was always bustling with slaves and employees, and the men were always looking at the young slave girl with vulgarity in their eyes.

They didn’t even care that Renier was still a child who had not come of age yet. The slaves who worked in the house, the steward who managed the assets, the master, and the master’s son —they all ogled the girl in similar fashion, and they all roamed around while smacking their chops in similar fashion too.

But no one had ever successfully forced themselves on her. This was because the men were always seriously injured without fail whenever Renier ran away or fought back.

Renier had been ten years old when she had first learned about this strange ability of hers. This was also when she had finally recalled Goddess Inanna’s oracle, which she had forgotten about until then.

It had started with an old slave man who worked inside the house with her. He had often tried to curry Renier’s favor by sneaking her honeycombs dribbling with sweet honey, green apples from the orchard, or chunks of smelly cheese. Renier liked honey, apples, and cheese, but she had never so much as touched anything the old slave tried to give her and had always run away because she found the way he smirked at her with his wrinkly mouth nauseating.

Renier had shaken her head no when the old slave offered her something that day too, but the old slave had drawn closer to her instead of walking away. Renier was frightened, and that was when she noticed that something blackish and reddish that looked like smoke was coming out from around the old slave’s head and shoulders.

Huh, what’s that?

The old slave grabbed Renier by the wrist when she momentarily forget to be afraid because she was shocked. The slave had weakened with age and was no longer strong enough to work on the boats, but he was still strong enough to drag a ten-year-old girl into the warehouse.

It felt disgusting, like bugs or a snake was crawling over her body, when her clothes were ripped off and a large hand began groping her. His gleaming eyes and yellow teeth. The smoke that was circling around him was sticky like dark red mucus now.

Renier couldn’t help but grow nauseated. And a terror took over her that told her that something terrible would happen to her, that she might even die if things went badly, if she didn’t do anything. Renier tried to struggle and break free, but then the old slave grabbed her by the head, slammed her repeatedly against the wall until she nearly lost consciousness, and tied her arms up with rope.

What the old slave didn’t know, however, was that Renier was a lot more flexible than he’d realized. Renier snapped back to her senses, freed one arm by pushing her shoulders back as far as they would go, and fumbled over the ground like crazy until she finally grabbed hold of something and swung it at the back of the old slave’s head.

The thing that Renier had grabbed was a piece of a milk jug that was broken and no longer usable. She had swung it so hard in the heat of the moment that the small piece of porcelain, no larger than the palm of her hand, drove itself moistly into the flesh beneath the old slave’s ear. The thought, ‘He’ll die if I push this all the way through,’ struck her light a bolt of lightning, and she was able to stop herself just before she did.

The old slave, who had been grinning as he assaulted her, wasn’t even able to scream as he collapsed to the ground. Blood began pouring out from him like a waterfall when Renier pulled out the piece of porcelain, but she had no idea what to do. The blood simply kept coming and coming no matter how hard she tried to stop it.

It was only a while later that the other servants opened the warehouse doors to find the naked ten-year-old girl, covered head to toe in blood, breathing heavily as she clung to the old slave’s neck.

More men from the house, from the fields, and from the dark warehouses where the fishing nets were stored, began lusting after her after that, and Renier ended up having to watch them bleed over and over again.

Renier did her best to run away before anything could happen as soon as she saw the dark red haze billowing up from the men as their eyes glistened while they ogled her, but she wasn’t talented enough to escape them from the narrow confines of the slaves’ quarters.

Eventually, Renier began hating men more and more, and she became so sensitive to their gazes that she broke out in goosebumps all over whenever she felt them staring at her.

Time passed, and more and more of the men who smacked their chops whenever they saw Renier got injured. Their heads were cracked open by a stray pestle, or they were choked by a laundry line or stabbed in the eye by a needle, or they had their legs broken whenever they tried to push down the struggling slave girl by force. Their master’s favorite steward had even lost his ability to be a man after the hot ashes from the furnace fell over his flesh.

It had always been common for slaves to be grievously injured and even disabled after doing harsh work, and it wasn’t uncommon for some to even die after being whipped. But the circumstances were different here because large, robust slaves were being taken down one after another because of the desperate struggling of one little slave girl.

Renier kept her life whenever something happened, but she was always whipped at least thirty times afterward. She curled up in a corner of the room and cried all night long one night after she had been whipped. And she recalled what the old woman priestess had told her. A blessing from a god and a curse from a god had the same roots. It was only now that Renier finally understood what she had meant.

Thy possess a fragrance that will allure many men, just like Inanna herself.

Thou who art loved by Inanna. Accept Inanna’s blessing. Else, thy fragrance shalt become a stench, and thy fate shalt turn astray and thou shalt lose the love of the noble and beautiful beings.

Renier was starting to understand what it meant to be blessed by Inanna. No wonder she had never liked it, even back when she had first learned about it. It made the back of her head throb.

“A fragrance that will allure many men? Damnit! When did I ever ask for that? I said I didn’t need it!”

According to the bits and pieces that Renier had heard from here and there, Inanna was the goddess of beauty and fertility, but she was also a terrifying warrior goddess who presided over war. She was also an incorrigible and whimsical philanderer who had been cold-hearted enough to throw her own husband to the underworld.

Renier sniffled in the corner of the room and muttered to herself,

“I knew it. There’s no way that a goddess with such a nasty temper would’ve given me a nice gift.”

But Renier was at her wit’s end because she couldn’t return the gift that had been given to her by the gods. She wiped away her tears on the back of her hands as she stood up. She didn’t have the time to simply lay down and cry while holding her gift, which she couldn’t even throw away, in her arms. Renier hated touching men’s bodies dreadfully, and she had to do everything she could to protect herself.

“I’m not pretty anymore, right, Grandmother? I look ugly, right?”

Renier had asked an old slave woman to shave her head like the slaves from the West. She had also smeared a ton of mud and ash all over her face and head. The old woman turned around and smacked her tongue in the lieu of a reply.

Renier ignored her and went to her master to ask him to let her do fieldwork. Harvesting crops and herding the sheep and goats was hard work even for the burly men, but this was better than being constantly in danger and constantly getting the men hurt. Renier wanted to avoid misfortune as much as possible.

Her master looked like he had eaten shit as he accepted her request.

Renier’s final victim was her master’s youngest son, who had come home for the first time in many years. He had been wearing shabby, worn-our sailors clothes with a rope made from straw tied around his waist, and the bronze, moon-shaped ornament he had been wearing had accidentally been lodged into his wrist while he was trying to assault Renier as she herded the sheep. Renier had accidentally sliced the veins in his wrist when she had grabbed the pointy, bluish ornament and wielded it in the confusion of the moment.

Afterward, Renier was sold as a slave to the Golden Forest Temple for a mere 10 silver shekels (about 114g), and she became a fugitive slave just three months later.

Renier still bore a slave’s brand as she escaped to the Whitesalt Mountains of the Northlands. Slaves of the Temple of the Golden Forest were marked with a brand that activated a spell as soon as the slave escaped the forest’s boundaries, and the Northlands, which were also called the ‘land of the beasts’ where beastmen were said to live, was the only place where the spell would not work. Renier had no other option available to her.

And yet, Inanna’s blessing refused to release her even after she had come all the way to the Whitesalt Mountains.

***

Piiii, pii, swoosh, pii.

Tweeee! Pii!

“Hell, those god-damned whistles are so fucking annoying! And every fucking morning too. Ugh, it’s so cold.”

Renier rubbed her eyes as she woke up to the shrill noise that she could hear from outside.

She was deep inside a divine stone cave. She could see a bunch of people who were still deep asleep and wrapped tightly in old sheepskin as they sat smug against the little hollows they had carved out for themselves. None of them had budged an inch —either because they couldn’t hear the infernal noise or because they had all frozen to death while they slept.

Renier had been rudely awakened at dawn for these past few days because of the shrill whistling, which seemed to start up again just as soon as she was about to forget its existence. Having good hearing had been beneficial to her survival, but having too good hearing had come with its own share of misfortunes. Renier yawned as she pulled aside the leather that was covering the cave entrance and peeked outside.

The sun hadn’t risen yet, and it was snowing like crazy even though everything else was still dark. The blizzard had been raging for five days now. The problem, was that she had no way of knowing how many more weeks this damned blizzard would last.

It had been almost three years since she had started living in this divine stone cave in the Whitesalt Mountains. She had more or less become accustomed to the harsh life she lead here, but she could never seem to get used to the Northlands’ blizzards.

Once started, the damned blizzards wouldn’t stop until they were satisfied —whether that be two or even three weeks later. The people called the blizzards the whips of Enlil, the ruler of the gods and the god who governed the atmosphere, and they sequestered themselves in their caves and didn’t budge until the blizzard was over.

Renier leaned her ear toward the whistling, took one look at the people who were still huddled and sleeping inside the cave, and took a deep breath before she quietly slipped outside. There were presently seventeen people from the Southlands living inside the cave with hopes of digging up some illegal divine stones and selling them for a fortune.

The Whitesalt Mountains were comprised of twelve colossal mountain peaks and a multitude of smaller hills, and each mountain contained numerous naturally-formed caves. The people of the Northlands, who were also the masters of the Whitesalt Mountains, used these caves as graves, but the caves also attracted foreigners who were blinded by money because even a little digging inside them could sometimes yield considerably large divine stones.

Divine stones were used by the priests of the Golden Forest Temple, who were said to be the descendants of the Celestials, and they were filled with a holy power called “nin’ngak” or “ngak.” The Celestial priests could use the power inside the divine stones to manifests special abilities, such as creating fire, summoning the wind, drawing forth water, or making someone beautiful.

The divine stones were in high demand because they were used not only by the Golden Forest Temple but also by royalty, wealthy merchants, and warriors for decoration, so even a divine stone the size of a fingernail sold for an astronomical price. A divine stone half the size of a fist could sell for so much money that you could buy your own slaves and live off the money for the rest of your life.

And so, people from not only the Southlands’ cities that bordered the Northlands but also people from the oasis towns in the West people from the distant East gathered in the mines.

But such people were never properly upright citizens, naturally. Murderers, thieves, rebels, runaway slaves, people who were banished from their cities because they were cursed, male prostitutes, people who parasitized on their parents or their children —the most heinous criminals in the world and people from the lowest caste of society gathered in the mines, making them a lawless place in every sense of the term. Their only desire was to either dig up divine stones or steal them from others to sell them and start new lives.

The atmosphere inside the cave was filled to the brim with distrust and loathing —after all, you never knew when someone might betray you and slit your throat. No sense of familiarity existed inside the cave, let alone the tight bonds of camaraderie, and fists and knives always went flying whenever someone new entered the cave so the people inside could establish their place on the hierarchy.

There were never too many people inside the cave at once. Nine out of ten grave robbers perished or gave up and left within a few months of entering the cave, and many more were murdered by their peers for the meat they had hunted or for their divine stones when the food stores began drying up in winter. It was impossible to tell whether someone who had suddenly up and vanished one day was dead, alive, or escaped.

The only time when the people inside the cave worked together was when wolves, sabretooth tigers, or bears invaded the cave or when they were trying to flee from the Northlanders, the rightful masters of the Whitesalt Mountains —in all honestly, the grave robbers feared the Northlanders, who were also called beastmen, much more than they feared any wild beast.

No one really knew why the Northlanders were called beastmen. The beastmen looked like regular humans and could speak like regular humans too, but they were said to be barbaric, just like beasts, and they were said to be uncivilized, especially in comparison to people from other lands.

The Northlanders regarded the foreigners who tried to dig up divine stones illegally ‘grave robbers’ for digging up their ancestors’ graves and disturbing their ancestors’ repose, and they loathed the grave robbers and hunted them relentlessly.

But nations were always overflowing with people who had nothing left to lose and were willing to test their luck, so the grave robbers simply continued congregating in the Whitesalt Mountains like flies to dung.

Piii, pii, swoosh, pii.

Renier squinted once more. It bothered her that the distant sounds of the whistle were gradually growing fainter.

She had heard that whistles were used by the people who dwelt in Salt Mountain, where her cave was located, to send signals to their brethren who were far away. Renier knew that the whistling was either an SOS or an emergency call because they had used a similar signal back in the Golden Forest, where she had once lived briefly.

The problem here was that the fact that she could hear the whistling even through the blizzard meant that there was a Northlander within one league (~5km) from where she was, which in turn meant that the grave robbers hiding inside the cave would need to hide carefully without even being able to light any proper fires. It was no wonder she was so annoyed.

“Gods damnit, who the fuck crawled all the way here in the middle of a freaking blizzard just to stir up a ruckus with all that whistling? I can’t even go hunting now.”

Renier stood in front of the cave and dithered there for quite some time. There was no way of telling how many weeks a blizzard would last in the Whitesalt Mountains. Refusing to hunt just because it was snowing was basically the same thing as declaring that you’d rather starve to death.

Renier, however, had hunted all autumn long and had a sizeable stash of secret food. Still, there was a reason why she worked so hard to hunt.

She had no choice but to avoid the grave robbers as much as possible during the day. They might figure out that she was a girl if they stared at her face all day long. It was all too obvious what kinds of misfortunes would fall upon her if the men who had gathered here, who were basically human trash, ever learned that she was actually a girl.

“What do I do? —the mood’s been a little off lately too,”

Renier muttered to herself as she scowled. She felt like one of the bastards had figured out that she was a woman. Who was it? —it was probably the sleazy-looking one. The bastard who had raped a royal concubine in Minotos not too long ago. He’d been scrutinizing Renier’s face and figure up and down while sniggering to himself as of late.

Renier looked down at herself and tilted her head to the side.

Did something give me away?

I doubt it. I mean, I look like a twelve-year-old boy no matter how hard I look at myself, right?

……Was it my face?

Renier occasionally studied her reflection in the spring in between washing her face and smearing dirt all over her features. Even she had to agree that the pale and petite features of her face were pretty. She couldn’t help but sigh every time she saw.

It would’ve been so nice if only my face was a little bit uglier.

Who can say? I’m sixteen now, so is it obvious that I’m a woman even if I’m still young?

Renier was sixteen, and she would turn seventeen at the next spring equinox. She was still young, but she had survived for nearly three years inside the divine stone cave, which made her one of its most senior inhabitants.

The grave robbers knew that she was a runaway slave from the Southlands, but they didn’t know that she was a girl. She had already been small for her age when she had first come to the cave when she was fourteen, and she had barely grown at all ever since, possibly because she hadn’t been eating well. Renier looked no older than a twelve-year-old shepherd boy.

She always kept her hair cropped short with a small shard of bronze, and she smeared ashes and dirt over her face and arms wherever she went. She bound her breasts tightly in linen and rawhide so that they wouldn’t grow, and she wore several layers of wool around her body, tied firmly with string, so that no one could see her figure. No one had found her manner of dress strange because the Whitesalt Mountains were so cold that there was snow at every mountain peak all year long.

The grave robbers were happy that the brat who had sensitive ears and good night vision voluntarily took up the night watch. Moreover, Renier was always so appallingly spiteful when it came to hunting that the grave robbers had tacitly agreed amongst themselves to ‘not mess with the brat if at all possible.’

Renier had no interest in the divine stones, unlike the other grave robbers. And so, she spent most of her days procuring food to eat and water to drink.

She usually hunted with stone slings, a small knife, or bows and snares made from animal hamstrings, and she salted the creatures she caught and hid them all over the place. Salt Mountain, where she was currently living, had the tallest peak of the twelves mountains of the Whitesalt Mountains, and it was easy to find salt because there was a lot of rock salt lying around.

She even found fruits and herbs to pack inside leather pouches of rock salt to ferment and turn into wine. Who would’ve thought that the lump of yeast she had once traded with a wine merchant in exchange for a pig leg would end up being so invaluable? It was unfortunate that the merchant had never been able to taste the wonderful wine that resulted because he had passed away just three months after he had started living in the cave.

Renier liked to sit down in a crevasse between the rocks where no one could see her and enjoy her wine when it ripened. She sometimes even grew a little tipsy as she moistened her lips and sipped away. Then, she’d end up singing cheerfully, or crying, or giggling, or staring up blankly at the sky while cursing away fearlessly —and this was one of little Renier’s sole pleasures that she enjoyed while living in the cave.

“Hey, brat! You’re already up so early even though the sun’s not up yet. You sure are diligent,”

she heard someone say from behind her. Four or five young men, whose hair was still disheveled because they’d only just woken up, stumbled outside the cave. Most of them were newcomers who had only started living in the cave last autumn, and one of them was a runaway slave from Minotos. Renier cautiously took a step back as she said,

“You’re up? The whistling was bothering me.”

“Huh? Whistling? What’s that?”

“It sounds like there’s a Northlander in distress somewhere, but I guess his whistle isn’t carrying far enough because of the snow.”

“Huh, that so? Then why not just stay put and let them freeze to death?”

The man smirked when his eyes met Renier’s. Shit. A shiver ran down Renier’s spine. She was very familiar with this sensation. Renier broke out in a cold sweat as she took yet another step backward.

“Whoever it is will probably die soon enough, judging by the whistling. It keeps getting weaker and weak……ack!”

She dodged by jumping backward. The smirking man had reached out like a hook and had tried to grab her by the collar. The man, whose labor had amounted to nothing, smacked his tongue.

“Why’re you running? Just stay put, brat. Didn’t you hear me telling you to stay put?”

A chill ran down Renier’s back. Surely enough, the strange, dark red fog was lingering around the man’s face and shoulders. Renier quickly scurried backward. But she turned around only to find that the other four men had already circled behind her and were blocking her path —it was like they had all formed a gang or something. Their toothy grins suddenly made her want to vomit.

They’ve figured out that I’m a girl!

The men were blocking her way to the path that would’ve allowed her to escape toward the foot of the mountain, and the other side was an unstable cliff made from rock salt. Renier was at a loss for what to do because she was flustered when two burly men came up from behind and grabbed her wrists.

“Ack, l-let go of me! Hey! You pieces of……! Ack!”

Someone kicked her firmly in the stomach. She folded over and collapsed onto the snow, and someone grabbed her by the hair to lift her face up. She continued,

“Ugh! Let go! Let go of me, you asshole!”

Renier struggled desperately, and then a hand slipped into her waist and slid past below her bellybutton. She thought she would faint as she broke out in goosebumps. She could see the men licking their chops and moistening their lips. She just wanted to die.

“Is the brat really a girl?”

“Sure is —there’s nothing down there. Damn, look how nice and soft her flesh is —it feels great to touch. You dickheads really had no idea? Are you all blind or something?”

“The little chick got us good because she’s so damn small. No wonder she was cutting her hair short and smearing mud all over herself no matter how cold it was. Damn.”

The five men grabbed all four of Renier’s limbs as they began to take off her clothes. The men had been starved of women for quite some time now, and they were blinded by greed as they assaulted her.

Renier felt like her soul would leave her body. This wasn’t something she could ever grow accustomed to no matter how many times she had experienced it in the past, and this was also her first time being assaulted by multiple people at once. She couldn’t even feel the cold as her bare flesh touched snow because it felt like hundreds of bugs were crawling all over her everywhere they groped her. Fists came flying for her face and head every time she tried to struggle.

“Stop! Die, damn you! I said stop!”

“S-shit, this…t-this is great —how’d you know that this little brat was actually a girl, Sir?”

“I’ve seduced my fair share of women. I knew it as soon as I took one good look at her. Heh, this is the best!”

“He, hehe, the fact that we get to taste a woman all the way out here almost feels like a dream. You didn’t tell the others, right?”

“Do you think I’m crazy? I might not even get a turn if I tell them. I’ll kill you if any one of you spills…….”

“You fucking bastards! Go and die by yourselves if you wanna die so badly!”

Renier took her chance when one of the men let go of her ever so briefly and moved her arm like lightning. A rock that had been rolling over the ground wedged itself directly inside the bastard’s eye.

“Huh? Ahh! Arghh!”

The man who had been stabbed in the eye out of nowhere clutched his face, shot up to his feet, and began jumping around like crazy. He couldn’t see well because he was covering his eyes. He was hopping all over the place until he tripped over an icy path that dropped directly down below.

“Shit, what the fuck! W-whoa! What the……what the hell?!”

The man began spitting out curses as he tumbled down. Not only was the path in front of the cave heavily sloped but it was also considerably slippery after five consecutive days of snow.

His body, having lost its balance, slid all the way down to the bottom of the path in the blink of an eye. He was still on the ground as he floundered frantically to find something to grab onto. But the icy path was slippery and had nothing to offer, and the grave robbers hadn’t created any handrails or even placed rocks on the path to make it less slippery because they needed to keep the cave hidden. The man slid all the way to the edge of the cliff as he continued to flail.

“H-huh? Arghhh……?”

The man who had been stabbed in the eyes didn’t even have the chance to scream as he fell off the cliff. His large frame slid right off the path and vanished from view in no time at all. All of this had truly happened in the blink of an eye.

“Huh? Huuh?”

The other four men who were pinning Renier down were dazed because they had not registered what had just happened. Even Renier could only stare blankly and blink because she couldn’t believe her eyes.

Huh? This can’t be happening. This can’t be…….

She was so bewildered that she couldn’t even think straight. What just happened? Why did this happen? It had happened before her very eyes, and yet she still couldn’t believe it.

Men had often been hurt whenever she reacted to similar situations such as this one, but no one had ever died before. Renier stiffened up like stone as she took fright.

It was only after a long stretch of silence had passed that the slave man from Minotos trembled as he spat out,

“Huh, f-fuck, w-what just happened?”

“Did he just die? How did that happen so quickly?”

The other men eventually grew bewildered too, and they let go of Renier as they hesitantly climbed up to their feet.

Renier staggered up as well as soon as she was freed. She didn’t have the time to waste by picking up her clothes and putting them back on, so she pushed the large man from Minotos who was blocking her way.

He gasped and lurched forward, but he managed to pull Renier back in by the shoulder when she tried to slip past him. Renier began struggling against him like crazy before she spotted a small dagger the size of her palm dangling at his waist. Renier grabbed hold of it and swung it, and it was only then that she was finally able to break free from his hold.

“H-huh……?”

The man from Minotos opened his eyes so wide they Renier was almost afraid that they might pop out from his head. He looked like he had no idea what had just happened as he stared down at the bright red blood that was pouring out from his lower abdomen before he suddenly collapsed to his knees.

“Kgh! Argh, ahh, h-help me, ahhh!”

He clutched his abdomen and slammed his head into the ground as he started screaming. But the other three men who were watching began closing in on Renier instead of helping the man from Minotos.

“L-look at what that crazy bitch’s done!”

“Shit, no wonder Sedek always kept going on about how spiteful the brat was!”

“Kill her! K-kill the bitch right now!”

Renier tried to run away before she even had the chance to put her clothes back on, but one of the men ultimately grabbed her by the arm. The dagger fell to the ground when he twisted her arm back. Renier kicked the man hard between his legs instead of caring about the dagger. The man she kicked squealed like a slaughtered pig as he began rolling over the snow. The remaining two men grew enraged when they saw what had happened and rushed toward Renier.

“And we were gonna let you live if you were obedient —how dare you, you fucking bitch?!”

Renier retreated to the hill above the cave. She was running out of options. She could hardly even believe what was happening to her. She wanted to cry. What the hell, why is this happening today?! I’ve already come so far, so why now?!

She could see the dark bloodlust that had congealed above the men’s heads gradually spreading out and fading away. Her mouth felt dry, she felt like her exposed skin was freezing as it touched the chilly winds, and her hairs stood at edge. Renier bit down at her lips and glared sharply.

I mustn’t cry, and I mustn’t be scared. Get your act together if you want to live, Renier!

Renier trembled like a leaf and slowly stepped back as she desperately shot glances at the snow-covered path.

Veterans who knew the mountain well didn’t even bother stepping foot on the path that led to the cliff behind her because it was composed of rock salt. Rock salt tended to give way at the slightest impact because it was weaker and softer than other types of rock, and cracks had already formed in various areas of the path. In particular, there was so many cracks and crevasses around the big rock in the middle of the road that the entire area around it was already caved in.

But the grave robbers before her were still approaching fearlessly because they were new and didn’t know about the path. Renier would have no place left to run but straight into the perilous path if she couldn’t slip past them. Her vision steadily became dyed black.

What do I do? How do I break free?

The two men smirked at each other and began walking up to her with knives in hand when Renier stopped moving because she was too afraid to keep going.

“……Please save me. Someone, anyone, please…….”

Renier looked around her surroundings and desperately began begging to anyone who might be nearby.

She had never one been free from the leers ever since she had realized that she had been blessed with Inanna’s gift. I don’t need this stupid gift. Please save me —I don’t care who, so please!

She felt her throat closing up. She knew that she must not take another step backward. The large rock, where the cracks were. Was it around here? What if she took just one more step? What did she do if the ground gave way beneath her feet? If she slipped and fell off the cliff? Renier gritted her teeth and brought her hands together to beg.

“Please just leave me alone. Please spare me, please.”

Tears finally spilled from her eyes. The men snickered when they saw the Renier was crying where she stood.

She couldn’t help but grind her molars and surge with spite when she saw them snickering. Renier glared fiercely and bit down hard on her lip.

I can’t let them take me. It’s only obvious what’ll happen next if I let them take me here. Rumors will spread in the cave, and it’ll be hell for me starting tomorrow. It’s better to die fighting.

The two men suddenly lunged at her like angry bears. Renier made up her mind, and she stooped down low, tackled their legs, and let herself slide forward past them. The men tripped over their own momentum and tumbled onto the ice.

Pow!

Something broke away with a dull thud.

“……Huh?”

Renier opened her eyes wide as she looked behind her.

The two men had fallen together and on top of each other, and the man on the bottom had hit his head hard against a jagged part of the rock. It was the very same rock that had made Renier pause because she had desperately wanted to avoid going near it. The white snow surrounding the rock was dyed red with blood and yellowy with brain matter.

“H-h-huh? Ughh?”

The man began convulsing. Renier covered her mouth and stepped back.

“Eeeek, w-what the……?”

The man whose head had broken started making strange noises and continued to convulse for some time before he finally began frothing at the mouth and his eyes rolled back. The man who had fallen on top of him looked between his comrade, who had died in no time at all, and Renier in turns before the veins on his necks began to bulge as he shouted,

“Hell, w-what the fuck just happened? W-what the fuck did you just do, you she-devil?!”

“Wait, is he really dead? Just like that? I’m gonna lose my mind. Take another look, would you?!”

“Shit, of course he died immediately after his head was bashed in like that!”

The man whom Renier had kicked in the groin staggered up to his feet and began spitting out curses.

“Hey! Get the fuck up and grab the bitch already! I’m gonna rip her to pieces!”

Something that had been piling up inside Renier exploded just then. She quivered as she screamed back,

“Who do you think you are to rip me to pieces, Mister?!”

Why is this my fault?! Don’t you even know what you’ve done? Why the hell is this my fault?! Renier kicked the man in the groin as hard as she could yet again before he could stand up properly and attack her.

“Gaah, aaah! S-stop! Shit! Stooop!”

Renier grit her teeth and ran over to where her clothes were when she saw him crumble down while frothing at the mouth once more. The only thought in her mind was that she had to get away from here. The man she had kicked screamed like a butchered pig and crawled over to the rock where the other two men were like an earthworm while clutching his groin.

“S-shit, h-help me! It, it hurts like hell —I’m gonna kill that bitch!”

“Just hold on a sec. Shit, three people just died —how do we fuck up that bitch?”

The two men who were still unharmed were slowly beginning to take fright. They were only now beginning to understand why the cave veterans had told them not to mess with the brat. They wondered if they had poked a beehive for no reason at all, but they couldn’t just turn back with their tails between their legs now that things had already come to this.

“Fine, bitch. I’m going to catch you and murder you now that things have come to this.”

“We should at least get a taste of her first before we kill her. We would’ve spared your life if you’d just been obedient from the start, you know?”

That was what the men said, but they didn’t dare actually approach Renier. They couldn’t help but tremble when they saw the man with the bashed in head lying dead before them.

“Let’s deal with this first. And wake up the others. It’s a bit of a shame to share, but we can’t just leave perfectly good food lying around.”

“Shit, it’s only morning and my day’s already ruined. Ugh, tch. Anyway, I’m gonna kill that bitch with my bare hands as soon as I get ahold of her.”

The two men dragged their fallen comrade to the edge of the cliff and pushed him over. The corpse landed on the ground softly because there was a lot of snowfall, but that only made it even more eerie. Then, the men began stomping on the cliff as hard as they could while shuddering, like they were trying to shake off their misfortunes.

Then, they heard a loud crack from behind.

“What was that noise?”

“I don’t know. Did something fall?”

The cracking continued beneath their feet only a moment later.

“……What the hell……?”

The blood drained from their faces as they dropped their jaws.

The little brat who had been about to run away while hugging her clothes to her chest turned back around when she heard the noise. Her tear-stained face was pallid. Her lips were moving like she was trying to say something. You’re in danger, you assholes, you’re, you’re in danger…….

“The fuck is that bitch say……?”

The ground beneath the two men’s feet suddenly gave way while they stared blankly at the brat and hesitated.

“Ack, what the fuck?!”

“S-save me! Save……!”

The bodies plummeted down the cliff. They couldn’t even scream for very long before their voices were abruptly cut off.

……Bang.

The bedrock fell after them with a dull thud a moment later, and the two men yelped again —but only very briefly. Their final cry was surprisingly dampened and quiet because they were buried so deeply in the snow.

Renier gasped for air as her legs gave out from beneath her. She couldn’t even register the cold of the snow against her legs or the sharpness of the wind blowing past her body. Tears simply continued to pour down her face, and she couldn’t breathe properly.

Then, she heard a faint voice calling from somewhere next to her.

“H-help me, help……. B-Brat…shit…….”

Renier snapped her head back up. The man from Minotos whose abdomen had been sliced open was still clutching his stomach as he begged for his life. His crimson blood was painting a chaotic picture over the pure-white snow.

Renier hugged her clothes to her chest as she slowly crawled over to the man. His guts were spilling out —the wound was deeper than she’d originally thought—, and he was already beginning to lose consciousness.

She wiped away her tears on the back of her hands before she pressed down against his wound. But he wouldn’t stop bleeding no matter how hard she pressed.

“Oh, shit, ahh, Mister —what do I do? Please pull yourself together, Mister. Don’t die. Please.”

Shit, fuck, why did you have to go and murder the whole lot of us when all you had to do was lie with us just once? You fucking bitch. The man’s rattling voice grew quieter and quieter as he lied down and cursed his heart out.

“I never meant to kill you. I really didn’t mean to!”

Renier gritted her teeth as her tears spilled over again. Something’s wrong today. Why did it come to this? I…I just didn’t want anything bad to happen to me. And I didn’t want to die. That was it.

But…but!

—That wench holds death in her hands.

Thy possess a fragrance that will allure many men.

“No. That’s not true!”

Renier shook her head no like she had lost her mind. Her tears scattered over the reddish snow.

She had simply not wanted to repeat the experiences she had suffered when she had been ten, eleven, twelve, and fourteen years old. But she had truly never wanted anything like this to happen.

The words that she desperately wanted to ask surged up all the way to her throat.

Was I supposed to keep my mouth shut and just let you do those horrible things to me, then?

But she could not bring herself to ask the dying man that question. And only the man’s dirty curses fell onto the cold snow in between Renier’s sobs.

“Shit, we were just trying to have a good time with you, but you decided to kill us just because you didn’t want to……? Get struck by lightning and just die, you…….”

He slowly grew weaker under Renier’s hands. She couldn’t even see the dying man properly through her tears. The man began to froth at his mouth.

“N-no, I, I was wrong……. Please help…….”

And his voice cut away only moments later.

Renier sat in front of him in a stunned daze. The thick layers of snow around her were caked with blood. Goosebumps had broken out like thorns out all over her frozen skin, and she couldn’t form a single thought, as if the insides of her mind had frozen over and turned white too.

But she couldn’t just sit here like this forever. Renier forced herself to get up and put on her clothes even as she trembled like a leaf. She bound her chest with the linen and rawhide so tightly that she barely had any circulation, and she tied the wool over that just as tightly too. Then, she grabbed the man from Minotos by his clothes and dragged him over to the cliff where the other three men had fallen and perished.

Thud.

It still sounded so mild as the corpse buried deeply into the snow below. Unlike his comrades, the man from Minotos —Renier didn’t even know his name— fell with his limbs sprawled out around him. And the white snow from his surroundings poured on top of his corpse.

Renier simply stood there like a fool and looked down. Her throat was beginning to throb horribly. All she could see was the sea of her own tears. What do I do now? Do I jump off and die with them? What am I supposed to do now?

“Ahh…….”

This was not the first time that men had tried to force themselves on her. She had experienced this so many times since she was young that it didn’t even surprise her anymore —she was only sick and tired of it now. And, now that she thought about it, wasn’t it precisely because of this that she had started living in a cave in the land of beasts and with people who were no better than animals?

But she had never actually killed anyone before.

Renier looked down at the corpses, which were now half-buried in snow, and sobbed for a very long time. She had to cover her mouth as she sobbed her heart out because she was afraid that the people who were still inside the cave might hear her.

All I did was pity the poor old woman priestess and share my food with her. All I wanted was to drink milk with honey and try on some pretty clothes, and all I did was to decline a gift that I never even wanted.

And right now, all I wanted was to avoid having something terrible done to me.

So, why did it come to this? Have I done something wrong? Was letting them have their way with me the right thing to do, like he said?

No! They were the ones who did something wrong first!

But they wouldn’t have died if you’d just stayed quiet and not fight back, would they?

No. I hate this, and that’s wrong!

But Renier could no longer tell what was what anymore as she continued to stare at the corpses below whose limbs were twisted in all the wrong directions. She had been able to tell herself that her assailants had simply been punished for their sins when they’d gotten hurt, but she couldn’t even tell herself that anymore now that things had come to this.

If all this bullshit is really Inanna’s gift, then how many more times do I have to experience this?

Please, I’m only sixteen…….

Renier clamped her mouth shut as she pressed down against the wail that threatened to escape her.

What do I do now? Should I really just jump off and kill myself?

What do I do……?

Piiii, piriri, piriri.

Twee, piii.

The faint whistling reached her ears again just then. It was growing quieter. Renier slowly turned her head. And a raspy and languid voice echoed in her ears once more.

Thy possess a fragrance that will allure many men, just like Inanna herself.

Thou who art loved by Inanna. Accept Inanna’s blessing. Else, thy fragrance shalt become a stench, and thy fate shalt turn astray and thou shalt lose the love of the noble and beautiful beings.

So what even is Inanna’s blessing? What’s so great about being a goddess who can decree fate? You make the men around me lunge at me like rabid dogs, and you call that a blessing? And I’m a rebel just because I didn’t want to accept it? Is that why my fate’s in such a mess right now?

Normally, you’re supposed to be able to decline gifts that you don’t want to be given. You’re supposed to be able to decide to not believe in the things you don’t want to believe in.

Renier whipped her head from side to side as she cried.

“No, that’s wrong, I’m just unlucky. ……No, I’m too lucky! I’m incredibly lucky! They died, but I lived. Who knows what they would’ve done to me if they weren’t dead?!”

But her tears wouldn’t stop no matter how many times she tried to repeat this to herself.

The sun was slowly beginning to rise. Renier began to cover the traces of the man from Minotos’ blood with snow. It didn’t take her very long to hide all the blood because so much snow had piled up already.

The corpses at the bottom of the cliff would be fully buried in the snow before long too, and no one would bother trying to look for anyone who was missing. And no one would question it when the snow melted in the spring and the corpses were found either. Most of the grave robbers who knew what they looked like would have died of starvation or cold by then anyway. That was just the kind of place the divine stone cave was.

Piii, pii, swoosh, pii.

Tweee! Pii!

She heard the faint whistling yet again, comically enough. It was still growing quieter, but it hadn’t stopped yet. Some people died so readily, and yet others struggled so desperately just to keep living.

Renier looked blankly down at the corpses that were buried under the snow. The whistling was beginning to sound like someone who was begging for their life, for someone, anyone to help them. It felt like the corpses whose limbs were sprawled out and bent in strange places were pointing their fingers at her and asking,

Look at what you’ve done with your own two hands. What are you planning to tell Ereshkigal, the cold-hearted queen of the underworld? How will you explain yourself as you stand before her scales?

Renier couldn’t help but feel like someone was cackling at her from afar.

Piii, pii, swoosh pii!

The whistling, as slender and pointed as fish bones, slipped in between the cackling once more. The will and desire for life carried within the noise was so strong and thorough that it drowned out all the other noisy voices. The desperate will to live of someone whose name nor face Renier knew felt like a lifeline to her.

And then, the whistling began asking something new of her.

Save them, save them.

Save them, save them. Balance the scales.

Renier grit her teeth and shook her head yet again.

……Why should I? Did I really commit such a terrible sin? I saw all that black bloodlust behind their backs. What the hell was I supposed to do? Answer me!

She couldn’t find an answer inside herself. But the voice that was bellowing at her only continued to grow louder.

Save them, save them.

Save them, and balance the scales.

Then, go to Ereshkigal, the cold-hearted queen of the underworld, and tell her this: I have killed people with these hands of mine, but I’ve saved people too, and I’ve hurt people with these hands of mine, but I’ve healed people too. I was toyed with heartlessly by your sister Inanna’s whims, but I still did my best to balance your scales.

Choose thy fate at the crossroads between all these things.

Renier suddenly realized that she had stopped crying. She roughly wiped away the cold tears that were beginning to freeze on her face with the back of her hand. Then, she shook out her frozen fingers and brushed off the snow from her feet. She tied her shoelaces tight and put on her fur hat once she’d found it in the snow. She even found her bronze knife and sling and secured both around her waist.

Save them, save them.

Save them, and balance the scales.

The strange roaring, mixed into the whistling and the wind, was so loud now that she thought it might burst her eardrums.

And Renier turned toward the direction from which the sound was coming and slowly began to make her way down the mountain.