The Butcher of Sargon (Renekton, The Butcher of The Sand in Arknight)

The ancient tribe born deep in the yellow sands, known as the Caprinae, lived in a place that wasn’t exactly advanced but couldn’t be called ignorant either.

In their tribe, when young men and women reached a certain age, they were driven out by their elders to travel the world, learn from their experiences, and eventually return home, bringing with them the knowledge they gained.

As a result, the Caprinae had a habit of collecting things they fancied during their travels.

Sometimes it was books, other times it was small trinkets, music, or knowledge. Occasionally, a Caprinian who had wandered far and wide would return home with a spouse they had found on their journey, bringing a good partner back to the tribe—a fact they took pride in.

When Carnelian was a child, her favorite thing was listening to the messengers who brought letters from the tribe members living outside, recounting their experiences.

Watching the messengers deliver all sorts of strange and exotic items from their sand vehicles, Carnelian often thought to herself that when she grew up and ventured out, she too would send back a large collection of things.

Oh, and I forgot to mention—Carnelian had a younger sister.

Her sister loved music, so Carnelian planned that her final destination would be Leithanien, a place where people cherished music as they would a lover or partner. Carnelian intended to buy a lot of music-related gifts to send back to her sister.

However, after leaving the tribe, Carnelian quickly realized that studying abroad was much more troublesome than she had imagined.

There was so much to learn, and most importantly, there was the language barrier.

In Sargon alone, there were several different languages.

Even within the tribe, few had ventured to places like Columbia or Leithanien, let alone farther lands.

So, after leaving her tribe, Carnelian had to save money while searching for a suitable language teacher.

Her original destination was actually one of Sargon’s mobile cities, where she was sure to find many language experts.

In her dreams, Carnelian envisioned entering the mobile city, only to be tricked into working due to the language barrier, eventually signing a contract of servitude.

When she attempted to escape, she was chased by dozens of sand vehicles.

If not for a crocodile man dropping from the sky to save her, Carnelian would have thought she was destined to live a tragic life on the run—though when she woke up, she realized that what she dreamed was just a story the messengers used to scare her when she was a child.

Later in the dream, the crocodile man took her to many places.

Several times, Carnelian wanted to ask him to teach her a foreign language, but she realized she couldn’t remember anything.

Eventually, she decided it would be easier to have Garde as her personal translator!

When this thought occurred to her, Carnelian was startled, as she wondered what kind of compensation she would have to offer to make the crocodile man work for her indefinitely.

Carnelian’s approach was always to buy what she liked; if she couldn’t buy it, she would take it.

As for the cost, she would worry about that later.

Since the crocodile man had already agreed to teach her a language, she would keep him by her side and figure out what he wanted later.

But when Carnelian opened her eyes, she saw her crocodile man getting close to another woman, which made her very unhappy—especially since she couldn’t speak the woman’s language.

Finally, Carnelian watched as Garde said something to the woman named Saria.

Saria glanced at Carnelian, nodded, and then left.

Carnelian couldn’t help but ask, “What did you just say to her?”

“You mean Saria? She asked if you needed something from me. I said ‘yes,’ so she let us talk first,” Garde explained.

“If you came to me because of what happened in your dream, there’s no need. You’re not the only one I’ve saved. As your guide, it was my responsibility to ensure you didn’t rest in the wrong place—”

“I didn’t come to you for that!”

“Then what is it?” Garde scratched his head, puzzled as to why Carnelian had sought him out so urgently.

“Don’t forget what you said before,” Carnelian said, crossing her arms and looking down at Garde, who was sitting in the corner.

“You said you would teach me Columbian!”

“Do you want me to teach you now?”

“Exactly!” Carnelian nodded, her gaze briefly scanning over Garde’s wounds. “You don’t have anything else to do right now, anyway.”

“But I’m injured!” Garde complained.

Who makes an injured person work?

Despite his complaint, Garde didn’t refuse Carnelian.

He really didn’t have anything else to do at the moment.

Though the Rhine Lab operators were not advancing further and were instead guarding the Nightzmora’s Graveyard, Garde knew that the Nightzmora’s bones had already been dug up.

What remained were the corpses of the disaster beast he had slain, deterring other nearby disaster beast.

Once those creatures figured things out, the area would become unsafe.

Garde was also worried about the ancient robots.

Since he had lost consciousness at that time, he couldn’t be sure he had dealt with all of them.

But there was still some distance between their current location and the heart of the Hotlands.

Their destination wasn’t the heart of the Hotlands, so they had a bit of time.

Thanks to his strong physical resilience, Garde healed quickly.

By the day after he woke up, all his bandages were removed, and his wounds were mostly scabbed over.

Apart from a portion of the flesh on his left hand that had been torn off, with the scales not yet fully regrown, he was largely recovered.

The only thing that really bothered Garde was his tail.

The tip hadn’t grown back yet, looking like someone had bitten a chunk off, leaving it somewhat unsightly.

By the second day, apart from his tail, Garde was fully recovered.

Though the Rhine Lab operators wanted him to rest a bit longer, Garde refused.

He couldn’t shake the feeling that Saria was giving him odd looks, especially when he was teaching Carnelian the foreign language.

Saria would frequently pass by, but with her inscrutable expression, Garde couldn’t figure out what she was thinking.

“Let’s get moving, then.”

In any case, when Garde suggested departing, Saria was the only one who agreed.

But before they set out, there was a small incident.

“Mr. Garde, it seems there’s a Savra looking for you outside.”

A Savra? How could there be a Savra in the Hotlands?

Could it be…

When Garde stepped outside, he saw a figure that looked like a lizard but stood upright like a human, staring back at him.

However, this wasn’t a Savra, but a native of the Hotlands.

The moment he saw the lizard person, Garde enthusiastically greeted them.

“Oh, is that Raya? My dear little Raya, long time no see!”

Dear? Little?

Trailing behind, Saria and Carnelian silently observed the lizard person, who was just slightly shorter than Garde, and fell into silence.

What stood out the most was that this lizard person appeared to be female.