When a Corporate Slave Guy Reincarnated as a Mob Villain (Slave Trader), He Used His Knowledge of the Game to Raise the Heroines to Be the Strongest, Unintentionally Turning Them Into Yanderes, and Before He Knew It, He Was Completely Breaking the Story

Chapter 27: Surrounded by Beast Girls in the Slums

It’s true, my smile is fake.

However, what I’ve said is not a lie.

I don’t have any prejudice against beastfolk.

That much is true.

But, people often judge the truth not by words, but by the attitude and expression of the speaker.

That’s why I’m bad at communication.

Ah, I remember now…

There’s another reason why I find people like these difficult to deal with.

No matter the situation, I’m always seen as the bad guy.

Right now, for instance, I probably look like a suspicious man with a scowl, making a cat-eared little girl cry.

Naturally, that leads to—

“What’s going on here?” someone asks with a suspicious expression, drawing closer.

…This is why I’m bad at this.

In my previous life, when I sat alone on a bench in a park on my days off, I often got wary looks from the families around me.

And when I worked up the courage to help a lost little girl, it immediately turned into a “suspicious incident.”

Just like now—

But here, there’s an even more troublesome problem…

“Hey…What are you doing to this girl? Wait…are you a human?”

A hand rests on my shoulder from behind.

I turn to see a woman standing imposingly. She’s about 10 centimeters taller than me…no, with her fluffy rabbit ears, more like 20 centimeters taller.

The rabbit-eared woman glares at me with sharp eyes.

Yeah…I’m being treated like a total creep.

And yet again, I’m dealing with a bunch of people I’m not good with…

Well, aside from her gaze, her face is quite beautiful, as you’d expect from someone who lives around here…

But more importantly…what should I do?

At this point, sneaking back to the mansion without being noticed by them is impossible.

As I sigh inwardly, the rabbit-eared beauty’s expression grows more severe…no, her face is turning pale.

Ah…she’s noticed.

“L-Linus-sama…I-I’m terribly sorry!” she says, bowing low, her rabbit ears drooping.

The cat-eared girl watches from the side, trembling, and starts crying even louder.

“Waaah…I’m sorryyy…”

Things are starting to get chaotic.

Seeing this, more eyes and ears focus on me.

“Wait…isn’t that…Lord Linus?”

“Oh! It really is Lord Linus!”

Before I know it, people are gathering around me.

I find myself completely surrounded by people…no, by women.

Though not human women, but beastfolk girls…

There are many different types—rabbit ears, cat ears, fox ears, and so on.

But…they’re all women.

Yes, this is exactly what I wanted to avoid, which is why I tried to move unnoticed.

For better or worse, I’m not hated in this slum…at least, not on the surface…

Though because of that, my reputation with the city’s authorities is terribly bad…

To them, the people here aren’t decent citizens, but refugees…and to make it worse, they’re beastfolk.

Now then, why is it that a slave trader like me, usually despised, seems to be admired here?

And why are the residents here all beast girls?

Of course, there’s a reason for that.

The reason I’m not hated is simple—I take care of their livelihood.

Though, “taking care” only means providing them with the bare minimum of food, clothing, and shelter.

And I’m not doing it for free either. In fact, I make them pay a considerable price for it.

Each of the women surrounding me bears a familiar mark on their bodies without exception.

Yes…all the women living in this slum are my slaves.

So, why are my slaves living in this slum?

To explain that, I need to give a bit of background on what the slave trade in this world is like.

In this world, the slave trade operates similarly to any other business, except that the “product” is people.

In other words, slaves are bought, then sold to customers.

The difference between the purchase price and the selling price is the profit for the slave trader.

The source of slaves varies from trader to trader, but in my case, most come from war.

This is largely because of where this city is located.

The city I’m based in lies near the border of the Empire.

And the Empire, with its ambition for territorial expansion, is constantly invading neighboring countries.

For the record, the small kingdom I belong to has already submitted to the Empire. It maintains a pretense of independence but is practically a vassal state.

Because of that, my largest source of slaves has recently been the Empire’s army, which continually invades other nations.

—

Chapter 28: I Guess It’s Normal For Being Hated for Earning Money by Enslaving Beast Girls

Normally, slaves captured in war are used within the Empire. However, the Empire has its own peculiar circumstances.

Since its founding, the Empire has persecuted—no, hated—demi-humans. For that reason, demi-humans are not in demand as slaves within the Empire.

Of course, that’s the official stance. In reality, there are various needs that people don’t like to speak about.

Humans are the type of creatures who can easily desire even those they look down on and despise. Yes, they are truly contradictory beings.

But let’s set that aside. Because of this, there’s no official way to sell the demi-humans captured in war within the Empire.

So, to minimize risk, the demi-human slaves need to be sold outside the Empire.

That’s where I, the slave trader living in this border town near the Empire, come in.

In short, the Empire’s army sells the demi-humans they capture during their raids to me.

Most of the slaves are women because men, even children, are mercilessly killed during the raids.

As for the demi-human women, even though they’re supposed to be exempt from enslavement, the Empire doesn’t enforce this strictly. It’s a case of the infamous “search and destroy” strategy from my previous life being carried out by the Empire’s army.

But no matter how strict the orders from above are, they’re rarely carried out to the last man.

Not because the Imperial soldiers are humanitarians—far from it. They simply do a cost-benefit analysis and realize that selling captives is more profitable than killing them.

The foot soldiers, even in the Empire, get barely enough to live on. But in other countries, young demi-human women fetch high prices as slaves.

Unless the soldiers have an extreme hatred for demi-humans, it’s obvious which choice they’ll make.

Now, up to the point of acquiring slaves, my business is just like any other slave trader’s.

But here’s where it gets a little different.

I don’t sell the slaves I acquire to customers. I keep them.

How can you make money with goods you keep in stock? The answer is simple: I make the slaves work.

However, this world isn’t so kind that young women without any exceptional abilities can easily earn money.

Which is why the usual demand for female slaves is, as you can imagine, only in one specific area.

But I’m not running a brothel. Even though most people around here misunderstand that.

Needless to say, I’m not some kind of saint or philanthropist. I’m just an ordinary person—like the Imperial soldiers. I want to do the right thing, but most of the time, my actions are driven by profit and loss.

In other words, the reason I didn’t make them work as prostitutes wasn’t because of guilt or goodwill. It was simply because there was a better, more profitable way.

I have knowledge about this world—this game—that I used when leveling up Alice.

I used that knowledge to level up these girls as well.

Thanks to the Imperial soldiers’ good eye for valuable slaves, the girls are all young and beautiful. However, they have no remarkable combat talents.

Moreover, when they were brought to me, they were in critical condition, perhaps because of how roughly they’d been treated or because of the harsh conditions they’d endured.

But once the slave marks were engraved on them, their injuries healed.

Even without innate talent, if you raise their levels to the maximum, their combat abilities improve.

In just a few years, these girls changed dramatically.

Yes, this is where my bad habit—over-leveling—came into play again.

The beast girls surrounding me now may look like adorable young girls at first glance.

But in reality, they are far stronger than any wild beasts you might encounter.

And what’s even more of a problem is that, like Alice, they all harbor deep feelings for me.

“Heh heh…Alice, who’s always by your side, isn’t here today…And Linus-sama is all alone…The perfect opportunity…”

“Ah…Linus-sama…Today, I won’t let you escape. Do you know how long I’ve been waiting for this moment…?”

Their eyes, which contrasted sharply with their cute appearances, glimmered with a predatory gleam, as if they had just spotted their finest prey.

I couldn’t help but feel a sense of danger and took a step back.