CH 231

Leaving the village of Dansas first thing in the morning the day after receiving the request, Tauro and his party decided to head straight to the requested village.

Since it was an urgent request, it was a forced march through the night in the wild.

Except for sleeping and eating, we kept on walking, but no one complained.

Everyone had that much stamina.

I was worried about Aeris because she seemed to have the least stamina, but she didn’t complain at all.

“Something might have happened to the children, right? Then we have to hurry.”

Aeris said, rejecting Tauro’s suggestion of taking a break and suggesting that they continue walking.

“The road’s getting steeper, but did that peddler really walk all this way to the village with a big load? He had a lot of guts.”

Ankh was impressed with the peddler client.

“I guess so. Merchants are said to go to even the remotest places when there is a profit to be made, so I guess they are not afraid of this kind of thing.”

Ragune agreed with Ankh.

The road was narrow, undulating, steep, and rugged.

Of course, it wasn’t paved, so walking on it was a challenge.

“It’s interesting to gather children and live in a place like this.”

Ankh climbed up the slope with dismay.

“…Yeah. It’s strange to live with children in a place with nothing but steep paths…”

Aeris was prioritizing the children, but she questioned the incomprehensibility.

“Yes, I agree. There’s a reason for that village, that’s for sure.”

The group continued walking with Tauro in the lead, till a cliff appeared before them.

There remained the remnants of what appeared to be a bridge.

“…As the client said, the bridge is down. I guess this was the right path after all.”

The distance to the opposite cliff was about 10m, and there was a cliff in between that was so deep that if you fell, you would die instantly.

“Well then, let’s go.”

Tauro tied the end of a rope to a thick tree near the cliff and let it down to the bottom of the cliff, then used his “levitation” ability to lose his weight and descend down the cliff.

It would be faster if he jumped down, but even though he had experienced it before, he did not want to bungee without a cord again.

When he reached the bottom of the cliff, there was a skeleton.

It was a person’s skeleton, too.

Looking at the scattered baggage, they might have fallen off the bridge.

From the scattered baggage, I was able to determine that it might have been a peddler.

Judging from the condition of the skeleton, it must have been someone who had come here to do business before the client, but Tauro was a little caught off guard.

While still having doubts, Tauro lost his weight and climbed the opposite cliff with “levitation”..

After quickly climbing the cliff, Tauro tied a rope to a nearby thick tree.

And at the same time, signaled to everyone on the other side of the cliff,

“I’m going to scout out the village while you guys are crossing! When you’ve crossed over, take a break!”

I called out to them.

“Okay! Be careful!”

Aeris responded.

Tauro, just to be safe, used his “presence blocker” to erase his presence, and then proceeded along the steep path, checking his surroundings as best he could with his “presence detection”. He sensed a person with his “presence detection”.

He also saw a small silhouette of what appeared to be a child lying down with his “true eye”.

“One…only one person?”

Tauro’s vigilance grew with doubt, and as he continued on his way, he saw a village surrounded by fences.

There was indeed a village.

However, it was obviously strange that there was no sign of anyone but that one child.

Where had all the other villagers gone?

He entered the village through the entrance, wondering where the other villagers had gone.

He looked around the area with great caution, but did not see a single shadow of a person.

Tauro heads toward the house where he sensed the child’s presence.

It was the largest house in the center of the village, so it must have been the chief’s house.

“Sorry, please. Excuse me, is anyone there? I… I’m coming in.”

Tauro said hello and entered the room, aiming for the silhouette of the child reflected in his “true eye” and went into the back of the room.

There was a boy lying on the floor, breathing hard.

“are you OK!?”

Tauro called out to the boy before running up to him.

Tauro looked around to see if there was anything unnatural, and then looked at the boy.

“…Who are you…?”

The boy woke up when he noticed Tauro, and asked him with heavy breaths.

“My name is Tauro. I was asked by a peddler who comes and goes here to check on you.”

“…Yes. So you’re Tauro…”

“…? Do you know me?”

He felt suspicious as the boy who was in pain confirmed him out.

“…This used to be a facility that was meant for one thing. But a good instructor who went out on a mission from here was captured after he failed his mission, so they pulled him out…”

“Why are you telling me, an outsider, something so important?”

Tauro’s back was beginning to sweat.

“…Because it seems that you are the cause of it. You have interfered with our assassination guild many times, and this is the guild’s retaliation against you….”

The boy speaks breathlessly and says something shocking.

Tauro gasped, and then raised the boy’s body sideways.

Underneath the boy’s body, buried in the ground, was a large, processed magic stone, along with a cursed stone.

“Oh, no! This is a trap!”

Tauro’s intuition had raised the alarm to the maximum, so he moved away from the boy and ran to rush out of the house.

“…You can’t escape the curse of instant death at this distance…”

At the moment the boy mumbled this, a black haze erupted all at once from the magic stone and the cursed stone, and Tauro was swallowed by the black death-causing curse, and the haze swallowed the entire village up as well.

Tauro ran out of the house, but the moment he was engulfed by the haze, he ran out of strength and collapsed on the spot, dying at the doorstep of the house.