Afternoon on the same day, when we're passing through a road near a village populated with 300 people, we're called by a man on the side of the road. There are three thin teenage girls beside him. Their faces are quite alright, but since they look fatigued and disheartened, they don't look their ages.
"Sir, won't you buy these girls?"
"I'm sorry, but I don't need slaves."
"Each of them is just 1 silver coin, if you bring them to a big city they would sell well."
The man is promoting with listless voice.
He probably knew that ones would need to pay tax if they want to bring slaves outside the territory.
"Only if there's no tax, furthermore, I don't deal in slave trading."
"Is that so, then, how about becoming your attendants, for 2 big copper coins."
That's cheap.
I won't buy them though.
"I'm sorry, but they're not comparable."
I point at Arisa and Nana who've showed their face after hearing word, 'attendants'. Although they wear hoods, their good looks should be evident.
After the man saw them, he gave up.
"That so, I'm sorry for taking your time."
"I'd like to talk for a bit."
"What is it?"
"Did your village fall into poverty because of bad harvest?"
"It's not that, it was certainly smaller than usual, but we didn't have bad harvest."
Then, was the tax too high?
If the situation continue and they keep selling humans like this, won't the workers gradually run out and the village disappear?
"Even if the tax is high, we could still barely last through winter with the little crops we have."
Is there some kind of unplanned expenditure.
"Was it because of thieves?"
"They're former farmers, we won't be careless enough to let our winter saving get stolen."
The farmers would fight back to death huh.
"Then, did some monsters appear?"
"If that happen then we'd give up. It was congratulatory gift for the baron's daughter wedding, we had to give 30% of our winter saving."
The man exhales heavily while saying so.
This baron is terrible. Although it might be an arbitrary act of the tax collector official.
"Did you not send petition?"
"If we do that, the whole village would end up as serfs."
"That can't be."
"It's true, do you know Tonza village? Everyone in that village was forced to become a serf, there's no one who lives in that village anymore."
For a moment, I thought that he was talking about Oyu village but when I checked the map, there was a place called Oyu village around 20 kilometers from here.
Certainly, there is no village called Tonza, but there's place called [Ruin of Tonza Village]. Is the baron here a tyrant on top of being a fool?
Since I feel a bit curious, I passingly ask.
"Do you know the partner for the baron's daughter wedding?"
"According to the story of the tax collector, it's the hero-sama."
Hero?
I've searched through the territory, but there is no one who have hero title.
The man who seemingly accept my silence talks as if making an excuse.
"It might be an impostor, but the tax collector really said that. You could ask the village head if you want."
"If she's really marrying the real hero, why would they torment the people?"
"Hah, a lower class man who's nothing but a tax tool like me wouldn't know how the big-shots think."
I can't deny that.
However, if he's really the same hero, [A straightforward altruistic fool], like Arisa has said, then we could just ask about the daughter to resolve this question. If I'm not mistaken, that hero has weird preference right.
"I have one more question, how old is the daughter?"
"I'm sure they're 19 and 24 years old women."
"I see, thank you. It's trifling, but here's a compensation for the talk."
I said so while pushing several silver coins to the man and went away with the wagon.
◇
Arisa comes out to the coachman's seat.
"Hey, you seem to have noticed it."
"Yeah, it's an impostor."
Yes, the hero that Arisa has told me, Hayato Masaki, has awkward fetish. He's a lolicon.
I don't think a man like that would take a 19 or 24 years old woman into his wife.
He might have a change of heart, but then he would be swayed with his beautiful women attendants instead.
"The pervert might has been cured, but that Saga Empire won't make a blunder like letting him marry with a small-time noble from some foreign land."
A shotacon like you probably doesn't have the right to call lolicon a pervert.
Just in case, I try narrowing the search term on the map to check if there's any other hero besides Hayato Masaki.
A person with [Hero] title--Does not exist.
A person with [Unknown] skill--Does not exist.
A person with [Self Status] skill--Does not exist.
A person higher than level 50--Does not exist.
There's no applicable person besides us.
There's no one who could possibly be a reincarnated or transported person either.
There's a fake hero, or there's a hero from another country inside this territory, I wonder which one is it.
I'm guessing that it's a fake hero. I can't help but feel that the demon in Muno city is the one behind this.
However, I don't intend to get involved.
It may be heartless, but I don't want to expose our girls with danger if I try to eliminate the demon and the fake hero.
I decide to circulate anonymous documents if I get a guilty conscience.