Chapter 472: Different Kind Of Freedom
"Wow, you can talk as well!" Victoria said happily.
"A slime without a mouth can even speak. Why can"t I?" the tortoise replied.
"We"re just surprised. Can you explain about this situation?" I asked.
"About how I can speak? I have been surrounded by humans since as far as I could remember. Me and my siblings. That"s how I can speak. Though when I start to be able to speak, they started locking my mouth. They only open it regularly so I can be fed. Though I was only allowed to eat some kind of ore," the tortoise explained.
"Is that the ore growing on your back?" I asked while pointing at the magic ore on its back.
"That"s right. We have the ability to grow any kinds of mineral that we eat on our sh.e.l.l. Even when we eat just a little, we can grow a lot more in our back. That"s why they are locking me here. They want to get as many of this ore as possible," the tortoise said.
"What about your siblings?"
"They were fed different kind of ores and put in different location. I haven"t seen them for years," the tortoise said.
I see. This kind of tortoise can grow a huge amount of ores on their back, with only a little bit of ore for them to consume. They are good for breeding.
But… from what I heard; it doesn"t seem like the tortoise doesn"t hate it. Maybe it"s because it has been raised in confinement since very young for years.
"Hey, what"s your name?" Victoria asked the tortoise.
"The humans that came here keep calling me the tortoise. I don"t have a name."
"Then, is it fine if I give you a name?" Victoria asked.
"Will you? I will be honored. Make it a good name," the tortoise replied.
"First, are you a boy, or a girl?"
"A boy."
"Then… how about Red?" Victoria said excitedly.
"We already have a Red. He"s a werewolf," I said. How come she forgets someone"s name when I was the one who often forget it?
"Oh, right. I rarely talk with him, so I forgot. Then… I don"t know what name to give," Victoria said.
"How come!?"
"It"s a set with are you a boy or a girl question," Victoria said.
"That doesn"t make any sense. Anyway, how about we call him Heavyback or something. Let"s make an easy name to remember," I suggested.
"…I feel like that"s how a Viking named their dragon. Well, if he agrees, that"s fine," Victoria said.
"Heavyback, is it? That"s a cool name! My back is heavy indeed, and it"s an easy name to remember!" the tortoise agreed with the name. I guess that"s good.
"Sigh… what if there are other tortoises as well? How will you name them?" Victoria asked.
"Shinysh.e.l.l, Leggone, Neckgone, Hidelimbs, and other tortoise related name," I said.
"…You two are such a pair. Neither of you have good naming sense," Celestine said to both me and Heavyback.
Is it? But it"s so easy to understand though. Shinysh.e.l.l is if the tortoise has shiny ores on its back. Leggone, Neckgone, and Hidelimbs are because they can do that. What other names I would give?
"Those are cool names! If you meet my siblings, can you give them those names to them?" Heavyback requested.
See? Even Heavyback agree with me.
"Wait, what do you mean by us meet your siblings? What about you? You don"t want to leave this place?" I asked.
"Why do I want to do that? I can stay here without doing anything, and given food to eat. I just need to sleep and let those people come so they can harvest the ores growing on my back. I like it here. Though it"s a shame that they never gave me a name, you have given me a good name," Heavyback replied.
I guess he has been living his whole life without ever experiencing freedom. He thinks that a life in this room is the only thing he needs.
…If it was me, I might do the same. Sometimes, freedom can be poison. Some people don"t need it. And one of them is Heavyback.
"Wait, you don"t want to meet your siblings?" Victoria asked Heavyback.
"Not at all. If they are the same as me, they should be strong as well and can endure their sh.e.l.l being dug. They should be fine," Heavyback replied.
Hmm… now that I think about it, the name Heavyback is too long. I"ll just call him HB.
"Don"t you want freedom?" Victoria asked.
"I"m already free. I can sleep and stay here as much as I want," HB replied.
"But you will be able to taste real freedom outside this place. The group of people who captured you and your siblings, and they locked you up in this room, they will be defeated by us. You can only wait for your death here," Victoria said.
"No, Victoria! That"s not something you should say!" I shouted, but HB already heard everything.
"So, if I kill you all here, I can be free?" HB looked at us with hostility.
Oh, no. Things went wrong. For someone who thinks that he"s already free, one shouldn"t tell him that he will be free when what we do is actually restricting him in his mind. Unless he can experience another kind of freedom that he will enjoy, we won"t be able to persuade him.
HB started inhaling air from the surrounding, and about to let out a breath attack. As an air mage, I can tell that it"s just air. But coming from a monster, it might be really powerful.
So, while HB has his jaw wide open, I kicked it to close it before he can let out his breath attack. The breath attack got canceled, but I managed to get him angrier.
"Sigh… it"s all your fault, Victoria. Celestine, use Blobbies to unlock the chains. I will transport him somewhere else," I said.
But before Celestine released HB, I put three Blobbies somewhere on HB"s body so I can go to where he is to ask some more.
After Celestine released the chains from him, HB still tries to attack me. But I opened a portal to an empty island on Monsters World so he will go there when he"s charging at me.
And as HB entered the Monsters World and experience the blue sky and the sun for the first time, I said something to him.
"I will talk to you again later. For now, taste a real freedom you have never experienced. I might bring your siblings here if I find them. But we will still destroy the group that captured you and locked you in this place. Not because of you. But because they are going to destroy everything if I didn"t destroy them first. I will explain later once we"re done here. Just wait and enjoy the sun!" I said.
"The sun…"
HB said something, but I closed the portal before he finished his words.
"So, we will release the other tortoise?" Celestine asked.
"We will need to find them first. If the others found this place as well, which I think they should be since they are better at investigating, and there are other tortoises, I will ask them to leave a Blobby at the rooms where the tortoises are. I will release them to the same place HB is before we exit this dungeon since there"s a possibility that the Professor and the cult is thinking of destroying this dungeon."
I have given the others several Blobbies to left in any important location that they found. I will ask them after we meet up.
After closing the portal, I grabbed the ore that falls from HB"s back so I can show it to the others.
"Alright. Before we go upstairs, let"s check this place again. Celestine, do you sense anything?"
I have told Sonia to relay a message to the others. And since she hasn"t relayed a message from the others to me, at least I can say that they haven"t found anything worth informing yet. Maybe we took the shortest path.
"There"s nothing here other than the chains. Let"s bring them home since they seem to be very strong," Celestine said.
"They could even hold the giant tortoise, HB. They might be useful if we want to capture the enemies. Since there"s nothing else here, let"s go back upstairs."
I opened a portal to where Albert told us to bring the evidences in the capital, and threw the chains inside. I just told the people in there that it"s a strong chain and might be useful later.
On the way to the upper floor, we didn"t see any monsters.
We encounter several rooms in the dungeon, but there"s nothing inside. Still, we double-checked them so we won"t miss anything.
"There"s not much of stuffs worth taking here as well. I guess they must have taken the really important stuffs somewhere else. Probably the exit of this dungeon," I said.
"…Roy, how long do you think the Professor has waited for us?" Celestine asked.
"Hmm? Well… we did defeat the Mohawk Girl months ago. If the Professor prepared for our raid since then, I guess it"s normal for them to take important items away from here. Also, the back of HB"s sh.e.l.l has a lot of ores already. I guess it has been a while since they were harvested."
Seems like we won"t find something really important in this raid. And the Professor might not be there at the exit.. Still, we can only move forward to know what will happen.