Chapter 21: Making the Complaint

Everyone present was startled by the shout. Even Lavell stopped crying. The atmosphere instantly became quiet.

Lord Chanis thought for a moment with a grim face before asking Lavell again,

"What is that commoner's full name?"

"Glen Nibankru," Lavell answered in a low voice.

"Glen Nibankru... Glen Nibankru..." Chanis closed his eyes, as if trying to recall something.

After a quarter of an hour, he opened his eyes. His expression had improved slightly, but traces of concern remained.

"I must... I must write a letter. Yes, write a letter."

Under the bewildered gazes of everyone, Lord Chanis abandoned the messy scene and walked towards his study by himself.

Lady Sophia was the first to regain her composure. She glanced at her son and said to Barber, who stood nearby,

"Barber, go and investigate this Beyek Town."

"Yes, my lady."

Barber saluted and left.

Lavell remained utterly confused. He couldn't understand his father's reaction. He turned to his mother,

"Mother, aren't we going to get revenge for me?"

"Wait a little longer. You will be satisfied, my poor child," Sophia comforted him, stroking his swollen cheek.

Time passed slowly. Outside, the sky had turned completely dark.

Just as Lavell was almost falling asleep, his father, Lord Chanis, finally reappeared. He held a letter in his hand and gave it to a manservant.

"Take this letter to the East District of the main city and give it to the courier there."

"Now?"

"Yes, now! Go quickly!" Chanis's voice rose sharply.

The manservant hesitated no longer and hurried out of the estate into the darkness.

Lady Sophia stepped forward lightly, hesitantly asking,

"What is this all about?"

Chanis met her gaze briefly, then glanced at Lavell again before saying in a low voice,

"Let's speak inside."

He walked into a nearby room.

Naturally, Sophia followed him inside.

"The people living in Beyek Town are almost all madmen and monsters. They are extremely dangerous."

As soon as Sophia closed the door, Chanis spoke.

"Madmen? Monsters?" Sophia was terrified.

"Yes," Chanis took a deep breath. "Originally, I shouldn't know this. Only the high nobility do. But I happen to know a friend who is knowledgeable about such matters. We were chatting idly once, and he mentioned that within the Kingdom of Zenn, there is a special place called Beyek. Almost everyone living there is a terrifying monster. Even a dragon daring to cause trouble there would end up a dead dragon. I don't know if that's an exaggeration, but it speaks volumes about the danger of its residents."

Lady Sophia covered her mouth. There was such a dangerous place near their estate, and she hadn't known!

"And that commoner named Glen..."

"Don't worry for now," Chanis said steadily. "My friend mentioned the monsters and people one needs to be wary of in Beyek. Glen's name wasn't among them. The town also has some weaker residents. Some sell their houses, and ordinary people move in. This Glen might very well be one of those fools."

Hearing this, Sophia relaxed a little.

"Then now..."

"I've written to that friend. We'll decide what to do once we have his reply."

...

Thanks to Glen's enthusiastic service towards customers and the delicious quality of the black pork, business was still good when he pulled the second black pig into town.

However, the number of families in the town with the means to buy meat remained small. Consequently, the second time wasn't as bustling as the first, which Glen had expected.

Even so, he managed to sell all the meat in the end.

Nearby, Im, who was also selling meat, could only stare dryly, furious but not daring to pick a fight.

With Glen as competition, his business was unprecedentedly bad, attracting almost no customers, even after he lowered his prices to match Glen's.

The two black pigs had brought Glen a considerable sum of money. He was now a man of modest wealth.

So, for the next several days, he stopped selling pork. Instead, he used the money he'd earned to thoroughly renovate his home: repainting the walls, replacing the furniture, and so on.

Besides that, he built a simple pigpen in the forest outside Beyek Town. After all, the land there was unclaimed.

Everything went smoothly, without incident, which puzzled Glen.

Why hasn't that noble brat come looking for trouble yet? What happened? It's been almost a week... Glen thought distractedly as he chopped forage grass collected from the forest with a cleaver.

He expertly poured the prepared feed into the trough. Several black pigs quickly crowded forward, grunting and jostling.

It was morning. Glen planned to take another black pig to Dodd Town to sell today. Once he had saved enough money, he wanted to see if he could learn magic at the Mage Tower.

He'd heard that becoming a mage apprentice was extremely expensive, something only wealthy merchants or nobles could afford. Relying solely on selling pigs to earn enough money seemed unrealistic to Glen.

I wonder if my werewolf physiology affects learning magic? Glen dispatched a sturdy black pig and then loaded it onto the cart.

"Watch the pen. Don't wander off," he said to the beast watching him leave.

The beast threw its head back and howled in understanding.

...

Two figures walked slowly along the road in the distance, seemingly conversing with each other.

Them again? Glen paused while pulling the cart, a strange look in his eyes.

Approaching were two puppets. One wore a blue vest, had a round head and body, not much different from a stick figure.

The other was an extremely lifelike female puppet. Her features were three-dimensional and exquisite. She held a parasol and wore a clean, pretty light pink dress. It was hard to tell she was a puppet unless you looked very closely.

This wasn't the first time Glen had encountered them. He'd seen these two frequently over the past few days while traveling between home and the pigpen. He had no idea what they were doing wandering around.

Although not their first meeting, neither side had ever exchanged greetings. This was the unspoken understanding among the residents of Beyek Town.

Of course, greetings were exchanged if people were familiar enough – like Glen did with the black crow and the old man.

The two puppets stopped talking as soon as they saw Glen. As they passed each other, they exchanged sidelong glances.

Once a distance had opened between them, Ena asked, full of curiosity,

"Parindas, where is he taking that thing?"

"Obviously, he's a butcher. He's probably going to sell the meat," Parindas replied flatly.

"Where?"

"How should I know?" Parindas said dismissively.

Ena looked back at the figure about to disappear.

"Let's follow him and see."

"Impossible!" Parindas's tone was stern. "We cannot appear before more people. It puts us in danger!"

Ena opened her mouth to speak but, seeing her brother's serious eyes – or at least, what she interpreted as serious – she chose to obey.