(EP-296.2) #5

296 – Fall #5

“Should we take the initiative and defeat them first?”

Though my skills had grown significantly compared to before, I still lacked experience. So, I didn’t have the wisdom to judge what was the best choice to make in any given situation.

In that sense, Stella was a woman with a lot of experience who could fill in for my lack of judgment. There was probably no other woman I knew who had as much experience dealing with monsters as Stella.

“Well, usually in cases like this, it’s better not to touch them rashly. It’s like poking a hornet’s nest for no reason.”

Following her wisdom, we ignored the monsters circling us and continued forward. At our current pace, it would take about a week to reach the eastern citadel.

That, of course, assuming we walked 24 hours non-stop without any interruptions.

But things rarely go that smoothly.

━Keheng-!

“Theo-kun, there’s one left over there!”

“Air Bullet!”

━Kerhung!

The wolf monsters that had been circling us stopped observing at some point and started attacking.

Individually, they weren’t that strong, but there were many of them.

“This one’s the last!”

━Keek!

After we took down the pack of wolves and had a moment to catch our breath, Stella wiped the sweat and blood from her forehead with her sleeve and said.

“Hu, this seems endless. What do you think about going after the master, like we did with Dordor?”

Shhhk.

Stella pulled an arrow from the body of a wolf. Looking closer, I noticed that her once full quiver now held only a handful of arrows.

If we kept fighting like this, we’d run out of arrows soon, which would make things more complicated.

“The master…”

I thought carefully.

It did seem more logical to go after the leader rather than keep fending off these monsters passively.

The problem was figuring out where the master was.

Unlike Dordor, who had sensed our strong presence and sought us out first, this Kubilai of the eastern forest didn’t reveal itself at all.

“It’s a cautious one. It might be waiting for us to wear ourselves out before showing up. There are plenty of beasts and monsters that hunt that way.”

“I see…”

Sending its minions to drain our strength before showing itself—it was quite clever for a monster.

“Theo-kun, you have that interrogation magic, the strange one. Can’t you use it on the wolves?”

Was she talking about the Mero Mero Beam?

“I’ve tried, but it doesn’t work on non-humanoid creatures. It takes a lot of time to modify mind-control magic, so for now….”

It would’ve been better to find Professor Balan. If she were here, communicating with these monsters would be a breeze.

Of course, she was nowhere to be found when we needed her…

I would be deducting 5 points from her vacation score!

In the end, we couldn’t figure out where the master of the eastern forest was. Nevertheless, time passed and we soon welcomed the first night in the eastern forest.

Luckily, we found a beast den nearby. It had originally been occupied by some spiders, but after driving them out, the place was now ours.

━Krrreung…!

Of course, there was some resistance. No one would be happy about losing their home. So I said to the spiders that were raising their front legs threateningly.

“We’ll only be staying for the night. I’ll give you some wolf meat tomorrow morning, so just let it slide. If you agree, go ‘hioooong,’ if not, growl.”

━Hioooong…!

And just like that, I managed to negotiate.

“Unbelievable.”

Negotiating with spiders, of all things.

After falling off the wall, I’d been dealing with monsters non-stop, so maybe I was starting to lose it too.

“Ugh…”

As we settled down and began to rest in the cave, Stella let out a groan.

Wondering what was going on, I glanced over and noticed a bite wound on her right arm.

“Were you bitten by the wolves?”

“I don’t know. I’m not sure what bit me. But it seems like it was poisonous. My head is hot and it feels like my arm is being scraped with a rusty nail…”

Stella was speaking quite calmly.

But when I touched her forehead, it was burning like a boiling cauldron. I didn’t know what to do since I wasn’t skilled in healing or detoxification.

I hadn’t expected Stella, who had been such a reliable ally, to end up in this weakened state. I tried to suck out the poison from her wound, but Stella pushed my head away.

“It’s probably too late for that. We don’t know what kind of poison it is, and it might be dangerous… It feels like the venom of a dragon spine centipede….”

With those words, Stella drifted off into a semiconscious state. Her fever grew worse and her face reddened like an overripe tomato about to burst.

Impatience gnawed at me thinking that something terrible might happen to her if this continued. One by one, scary thoughts started to creep into my mind.

I underestimated what laid beyond the wall.

It was simply too careless of me…

If I had just asked the wolves where their leader was, maybe things wouldn’t have become this urgent. Looking back, I was filled with regret and frustration.

Sukduk, sukduk.

While I was lost in thought, faint murmuring sounds could be heard.

Very soft sounds, like whispers carried by the wind. They were so easy to miss if it weren’t for my half-fairy ears.

━The long-eared fairy looks very sick.

━Seems like she got bitten by a centipede. The bite mark and symptoms are exactly like those from centipedes. Such nasty things love biting people.

━Yeah, they bite with their venomous fangs and leave people in torment. A lot of our friends have fallen victim to them.

Centipede?

What was that?

“Is someone there?”

I looked around.

But the only ones present were me, Stella, and the spiders that I negotiated with earlier, who were now re-spinning their webs at the entrance of the cave.

So I focused on the source of the ‘talking’.

━If you crush evening primrose and feed it to her, it’ll detoxify her. I wonder if they know that… If she doesn’t get it soon, it could get more dangerous!

━I don’t know either!

It was clear now—I could hear the spiders talking to each other!

Edit by: faker