Vicente went to the corner of the cave where the books, parchments, and scrolls were kept and quickly searched for anything that might lead him to the basilisk.
The goblins were rational enough to know how to follow a map and even make maps, even when they were only at the 1st stage. As they grew stronger, their mentality developed, something familiar to all magical creatures.
Vicente was sure the dead goblins nearby must have been able to map the region, even if they weren't the strongest of their kind. Considering how mercenary they were, belonging to a race of thieves, there was a high probability that there was something useful there.
But even if there weren't, Vicente would never regret killing the goblins. Whether he liked it or not, he couldn't communicate with creatures of that race, and of course, he wouldn't be able to find out anything by interrogating one of the goblins.
'The Rocky Gorge...' Suddenly, Vicente opened a piece of parchment and saw a relatively small map that showed an area he knew from this forest region.
'If I'm not mistaken, the point marked with an 'o' is where I am. As for the 'x,' that must be the goblins' point of interest... Maybe the basilisk's nest!' Vicente put the map away in his storage item, feeling it would be useful.
But it could be anything but the basilisk's nest. Goblins would be interested in anything that could provide them with resources. As creatures with survival instincts, they could tell when risks were worth taking or not, so it wasn't necessarily what Vicente wanted.
He then continued his quick analysis of the documents while the goblin hostages remained prostrate and treated him like a hero.
But one of the 12 humans soon saw that Vicente didn't care about them and stood up.
"Savior, please, can you tell me your name? I would like to serve the man who rescued me from the horrors of the goblins!" This middle-aged level 2 woman said with tears in her eyes.
Vicente then said while continuing to analyze what was there. "My name is Cesar Mazzanti, I am from Millfall."
"Cesar from Millfall!" Some of the younger women murmured, tears streaming from their eyes as they looked toward their savior, still prostrate on the ground.
"What a beautiful name! As expected from someone so great!" One of the two old men said as he also stood up.
"Sir, please let me serve you. I may be weak and useless, but I'm willing to do anything for you! I have nothing left. Please let me serve you!" A man said pleadingly.
"Oh?" Vicente looked back, finally taking his eyes off the items left by the goblins. "Why don't you keep your freedom? Now you can go anywhere."
"There's nowhere to go, sir. Six months ago, I had a life. Now I'm just an empty body. I breathe, but I'm not really alive." He said, not wanting to remember everything that had happened since his family had encountered a group of goblins.
Vicente couldn't ignore it. He felt the same way when he thought about his powerlessness in the face of the Sovereigns who had killed his mother!
Clenching his fists so tightly that his bones rattled, he said. "Then I accept you as my servant. Your life now belongs to me. If you betray or harm me, I will punish you with death.
Do you accept that?"
"I accept!" He said with a smile, showing Vicente the joy that a person with nothing left in this world could have in gaining a new purpose.
Not everyone would respond to extreme misery in the same way. But there were those who would not be able to end their suffering on their own and would end up living like lost souls without happiness or purpose.
That would be the fate of such a man and some of the other people there. However, some of them were able to escape this cruel fate in time!
"I want to serve you too, master!" The other man and the level 1 woman said simultaneously, more or less in the same situation as the old man, with no family and no place to go.
Vicente looked at the other women there and decided to take anyone who wanted to join him into his family. Of course, he would force them to sign contracts with him because he wasn't pious enough to take risks for strangers.
He needed people anyway, so accepting these extremely dedicated people could be good for him.
"Anyone else interested?" He asked.
Of the seven remaining women, two still had their brothers with them. So they decided to use their freedom to escape this place.
"We thank the savior Cesar and will be forever grateful to you. But we have to take care of our brothers, and we can't follow you." The two women said similar things.
Then, the only one of the two women who didn't want to follow Vicente's family made an unexpected request of him.
"Sir, I want to die. After all that has happened to me, life has no meaning anymore." She said as Vicente looked at the wounds on her body and understood what she had been through...
"Lexi!"
"Don't do it, girl! Life is too precious for you to give up like this!"
The others tried to tell her otherwise.
"There's no way someone like me can recover from all this," Lexi said as she looked at the others who had gone through what she had in the cave. "I really admire your strength, Mira, Lana. But I'd rather die. I won't be able to live with myself after the terror we've experienced here, losing my husband and son and seeing them devoured by beasts..." She said as she intensely cried. "I would rather die."
Vicente looked into the woman's eyes and said. "I can erase your memories and make you forget all that. Would you still rather die?"
She hesitated momentarily as the others watched but didn't change her mind. "Yes. I choose death. It would be easy to forget, but I still wouldn't have my husband or my son. How could I live with that void inside me? If there is something after death, I'd rather be with my family." She said, making the others there feel terrible and cry for her.
"All right." Vicente accepted it. "Do you want some time to say goodbye?"
"No. I can go now." She said as she stood up.
Vicente closed his eyes and made his red pentagram appear, manipulating a piece of metal behind Lexi.
"Goodbye, Lexi. I hope you have better luck in the afterlife if you get another chance." With these words, Vicente struck her vital point at high speed, killing her in a single motion, painlessly, of course.
