Alomitsu

Chapter 36: Nightmare (4)

On the roof!

The sound of teeth clashing was mixed with ancient words. I had never heard of this language. It was harsh and like the sound of sawing wood. It was endless, like nonsense.

I didn’t understand most of the words that popped out. I thought it was repeating a few words continuously. In the words, a few Roman words popped out.

Telling me some majestic tunnels, vast seas, strange humans, and dark mountains and river valleys. It wanted to express that it needed to cross a void of abyss and that something terrifying existence tortured him and mocked him.

Fragmented, incomplete. Just like the explanation of a lunatic with dementia, one couldn’t get any useful clues from it.

The sound was getting closer. I didn’t know where it was. The roof? Or did it crawl to the center of the house?

My hand holding the stick trembled slightly. I really didn’t think I could fight again, especially the unknown beasts or monsters.

“You, get out!” When I was too anxious, a rude and unfamiliar voice suddenly sounded. It made a certain creature behind me make a sudden escape sound, like the sound of a rabbit’s limbs running on the dirt.

“You! Only you! Only you came to this house without authorization and stayed for so long. Get out, you damn intruder.” A dirty old man broke in with a hoe in his hand.

His appearance made me very happy, and disappeared from the dark gaze before, as if it had never appeared before.

“I really didn’t expect there to be other people here.” I was surprised. I thought it was just like Bruyer said that everyone had left.

“Close your stinky mouth, now you must leave here. If you don’t want to die, pack your things before sunset and get out.” The old man waved the hoe in his hand and roared. He had dirty white hair on top of his head — alopecia areata — and his lanky face was covered with a rough beard like a ringworm.

“Hey! Calm down, calm down, old sir.” I hurriedly got up from the chair and made a gesture of surrender.

“Get out!” It seemed that the old man couldn’t be talked to at all. I didn’t even have the opportunity to explain.

“Sorry!!!” I roared, which made the old man stunned.

“It is indeed my fault, but my friend is still hunting in the mountains. We are homeless and we don’t even have a penny. My friend doesn’t want to leave. This is the perfect home for him.”

I screamed this in order to calm the old man. When the old man heard this, he put down the hoe in his hand.

“You don’t know anything. This is not a safe place. It will cost you both lives.”

“We have lived here for more than half a month.” I tried to defend.

“That’s because I am protecting you. When I am killed by them, you will also die. You are so stupid that you can’t answer.” The old man sat on a chair in his dirty clothes. He waved his hand to me to let me sit next to him, his anger and rudeness turned into melancholy.

“If you really want to live here, I advise you and your friends not to have unrealistic ideas. Without terrible reasons, will it be your turn to live here?” The old man reached out and wiped the wooden table.

“What the hell happened? I hope you can tell me?”

“Do you really want to know? This needs to be accompanied by extremely high risks.”

“My friend Bruyer, he is a stubborn person. This may have something to do with his experience. He was once treated as a slave. For him, home is more important than life.”

The old man was still wiping the dusty table with his fingertips. He seemed to be remembering, and I started to ask him back.

“This gentleman, you said you have always protected us, but I never mentioned you to my friend. How did you protect us?” With this sentence, the old man stopped wiping the fingertips of the desktop, his blue and somewhat cloudy eyes looked at me, and my instinct was telling me that he was making a certain decision.

“Are you sure you want to live here?”

“I don’t want to live here. It’s mainly my friend, but I can’t abandon him.”

“Then you come with me. I will show you some sights before the sun goes down. They will scare you and run away like a deserter.” The old man seemed to have made up his mind.  Knowing that Bruyer and I will not leave in a while, he also knew that it didn’t matter what he said.

The old man threw the hoe in the house and walked out of the door. I followed him with a stick and cane.

It was the morning when we set off, and he kept mumbling to himself on the road. I repeatedly suspected that I was wrong to follow him because he was like a lunatic.

In the main city of Goning…

I never expected that there was a dog hole under the towering city wall. Around the wall was a low, dry moat. It was covered by weeds. If I didn’t look for it carefully, I couldn’t find it. The old man took me into this dog hole. The magnificent main city.

After drilling in from the dog hole, I did not find the prosperity of the city, except for the dead silence. It seemed that this corner was an extremely remote area in the city.

The old man took me into a dilapidated wooden house, with noises, curses, and amusement. This was the dilapidated workers’ tavern.

Cheap and inferior alcohol was their favorite. Why did the old man bring me here?

“Here, shut your mouth, young man. If you dare to talk to others as much as you want, I will cut off your tongue so that you will never be able to speak.” The old man took me to stand in the corner, like a gloomy mouse.

“What’s the reason we came here?” I feel a little unbearable for the stench emitted here. This old man would not bring me here just to drink at the bar. Let me explain first that I didn’t have any money.

“Before the right angle comes, I will tell you the reason why I am here.” The old man stood up straight, and he was now looking at me like a soldier.

The change in the aura of the old man made me more uneasy. Am I really going to trust this stranger?

“I can see your worry, in order to dispel your hesitation, I’ll tell you. If I wanted to hurt you, I would have done it a long time ago in that hellish environment!”

So he told me his reason for coming here. I did not fully recall the old man’s self-report, but I could still write down the general content:

[In this splendid city, there are the poor and the workers. The workers are not citizens, but are engaged in the lowest level of manual labor. Alcohol is their biggest hobby.

[Tadek’s trading venue is as nondescript as his name, and so is his character. Wine shop? wine cellar? Malt tavern? Wherever there is chaos, Tadek will appear there.

[Here, the warm light of the sun can’t shine through. People with yellow teeth and big lees noses are constantly moving their rough lips. The air in the room is mixed with dozens of flavors, garlic, sweat, and indescribable rancidity.

[If you smell it carefully, there will be a sweet smell that everyone wants to seize. It is a business opportunity. For the uppermost, there is no business opportunity at all except the lowly poor.

[Violent conflicts, beatings, alcoholism, and broken corners often occur here. A few mice squatted in the corners, and soon they got into the dark caves.

[The old man knew Tadek in this chaotic place. Tadek was a fat man, always out of breath. His breathing was like a cow. This proved that his respiratory tract was not very good. His clothes were sloppy and unshaven. Especially his rust-colored clothes that have many folds.

[The old man just scrubbed the floor, cleaned the spittoons and wine glasses in this tavern, and can be used as a mockery of the guests when necessary.

[The guy who was often soaked in alcohol punched and kicked the old man’s poor laughing stock and coolie, and the occasional cold light from the old man’s eyes stopped the group of bastards.

[Tadek is a poorer person than the old man and severely alcoholic. He has to drink a drink every day. All his money is dedicated to alcohol. Alcohol anesthesia is his favorite, more than any beautiful woman.

[When his alcohol addiction certificate appeared, he begged every drinker with dignity, politeness, and his bottom line. Such a person did not seem to have any credibility and backbone. It was his first impression that he was delicious and lazy. This guy can always mess up all kinds of things, even if they are worthless.

[One day, his alcoholism came up. He still knelt down to every alcoholic in the tavern. To his begging alcoholics, he just treated him like a plaything. No, according to the old man’s description, he was better than a dog. It’s still miserable.

[Unable to find the old man, Tadek promised to repay the old man in the future.

[With just a few words, let the old man believe him. Especially when he makes such a bottomless begging, no one but God will believe his nonsense.

[But the old man ordered Tadek a glass of wine that day like a demon. Even though it was the cheapest one, this glass of wine cost the old man half a day’s wages.

[Tadek drank a cup of booze, and his face turned red to express his gratitude to the old man. His gratitude suddenly showed his literary accomplishment. What made this educated person fall to such a point.

[The old man said that if needed, he would invite Tadek for a drink every day. He wanted to know the story of Tadek, but Tadek always shut up his story and never told it.

[Tadek will leave on time after drinking. It is 11 o’clock in the evening, which is also the most chaotic time of the inn.

[One day, Tadek took some money and placed it in front of the old man. The old man was very surprised. He suspected that Tadek was stealing or robbery. But Tadek’s fat body dispelled the old man’s suspicion.

[Every night after that day, Tadek never left on time, he would be drunk until dawn.

[Boom!

[The sudden sound of lifting the table made the old man and I look at the two fighting men. They were drunk and their fists were all weak.

[The wooden cup overturned with the wooden table, and the contents spilled on the ground. It turned into a puddle of fragrant liquid, mixed with the soil under the feet of others.

[A few, no, in a more descriptive way, these guys who were once humans knelt on the ground and lowered their heads to lick the spilled drink, including an obese man in rust-colored clothes.

[“Tadek!” The old man yelled at the fat Tadek, but Tadek didn’t pay attention at all, just licking the drink, including the dirt on the ground.]