“Hmm.”
Making jars was surprisingly fun, and time flew by. I didn’t have many ingredients, so I couldn’t make many different types, but I made a generous number of them. Perhaps because they were still game items, their appearances differed depending on the type.
I divided the finished jars between my crossbody bag and backpack. I had already confirmed the Purification Jar’s performance on the Druid earlier, so the others seemed likely to be useful as well.
How had I never found time to make jars until now?
After finishing the cleanup, I checked the time.
“It’s time to change shifts.”
I was about five minutes past the scheduled shift change. I stood, looked around, and gathered the clothes I had draped over the tent. The forest was filled with pitch-black darkness. Still, the moon hung in the sky, so it wasn’t so dark that I couldn’t see anything, as it had been on the first night.
It felt about as bright as a dim streetlamp.
When I entered the tent, I saw the Druid sleeping with the wildcat in her arms. Even covered in grime, the green-haired woman was undeniably beautiful.
“Wake up.”
“Mmm.”
She rolled over.
“…….”
Should I mess with her?
“Sergeant Druid, you need to wake up.”
“Ugh.”
She pulled the sleeping bag up and covered half her face.
“Sergeant Druid, you need to report for watch duty.”
“D-Don’t want to…….”
The fact that I could fool around like this meant I was finally feeling somewhat alive again.
Get a grip.
Don’t relax.
I was still inside a hunting ground where monsters roamed. It hadn’t even been a week since carelessness nearly got me killed.
“Wake up.”
I grabbed the shoulder of the still-unconscious woman and forced her upright. Then I shoved the pocket watch and Hand Crossbow into her hands and pushed her out of the tent. The wildcat staggered out after its owner.
I didn’t know the details, but that creature must have suffered during all this as well.
I had wanted to make the Druid a companion and return to the territory with her, but she had refused, so there was nothing I could do. For now, I would conserve as much strength as possible.
It was dangerous, but I would use that method if I had to and reach the territory.
Thinking about various things, I forced my eyes shut.
“HISS! HISS!”
The wildcat’s hissing sounded beside my ear as soon as I closed my eyes.
“You bastard, I just fell asleep.”
GRIP.
A sharp pain ran through the hand I used to push the hissing creature away. The wildcat had bitten me.
“Ah, fuck.”
Its still-growing teeth hadn’t cut or torn my flesh, but the needle-like pain woke me up. This damned wildcat bastard.
I raised my eyes and sat up.
“Hm?”
At that moment, a shadow fell across the tent wall. The silhouette cast by the campfire had a strange build. The Druid was slender, but this shadow belonged to a fat man…….
‘I’m fucked.’
I hurriedly clutched the crossbody bag and wildcat to my chest and threw myself out of the tent.
Idiot.
I should’ve grabbed the machete.
Why the hell had I grabbed the cat instead?
How was that Druid bastard standing watch?!
CRUNCH—!
The moment I threw myself outside, the owner of the shadow crushed the tent. The iron rods supporting the canvas bent, destroying it.
I hurriedly turned my head to assess the situation.
WHIZZ—.
The instant I saw something glint in the darkness, I instinctively flattened myself against the ground.
THUNK.
‘Oh, fuck.’
The arrow grazed my hair and buried itself in an innocent tree. I had only noticed it because the firelight reflected off the arrowhead.
“Tsk.”
A man holding a bow emerged from the darkness and nocked another arrow. He wore a hood and clothes patched together from animal hides.
“You’re right in front of him, and you still couldn’t hit him?”
The fat man who had destroyed the tent swaggered as he rested a single-bladed axe—the kind used for chopping firewood—on his shoulder.
I had heard that voice before.
“Says the bastard who couldn’t deal with one sleeping man.”
They were the hunters I had heard chasing the wildcat during the day.
Was the Druid already dead?
Maybe that arrow had taken her by surprise.
I couldn’t even turn my head properly because I was watching for another shot. It felt as though the instant I looked away, an arrow would bury itself somewhere in my body.
Instead, I slowly stepped backward to widen my field of view.
Crackle. Pop.
I heard sparks snapping from the campfire.
“Hiss-”
The wildcat struggled out of my grip and dropped to the ground. As Miyu ran off, the attackers’ gazes followed her.
Should I run while I had the chance?
I threw my body to the side, but my gaze turned toward the wildcat.
Then I saw the Druid collapsed in front of the campfire. Yellow powder drifted around her. The crackling sound had come from those particles burning whenever they touched the flames.
The Druid’s lips had turned blue.
The Hand Crossbow I had lent her because her own attack power was low still had a bolt loaded. The tip of her staff, which lay on the ground, flickered green.
Apparently, she had sensed something was wrong but realized too late that it was poison.
What skill was that?
It seemed like a Hunter skill.
‘If it’s poison, Paralysis Powder?’
“Tsk.”
I clicked my tongue without realizing it. This was a common hunting method among Hunters from Parque.
Fuck. They used that on a person?
Those sons of bitches.
Killing Poison Moths in the dungeon’s ‘Jungle’ region yielded Paralysis Powder. In the game, you threw a pouch of it at monsters to slow or briefly paralyze them before filling them with arrows.
I didn’t know what method he had used, but the Paralysis Powder circled only around the Druid like moths around a flame.
The wildcat kept licking the fallen Druid’s hands and face.
Stupid cat bastard.
“Cough, cough.”
Each time the wildcat licked her, the Druid let out a dry cough. Fortunately, she didn’t seem to be dead.
Had the effect of the [Purification Jar] I used on her worn off?
Before long, the wildcat’s body also stiffened after inhaling the Paralysis Powder.
Describing it took time, but I understood the situation in an instant.
The archer had used magic or some other method to paralyze the Druid before approaching. The two men who had attacked the campsite were staring lecherously at her as she lay helpless on the ground.
‘Fuck.’
Disgusting sons of bitches.
I slammed on the brakes while trying to flee sideways. I immediately shoved a hand into the crossbody bag and pulled out a jar.
The Purification Jar flew in a fast, straight line.
SMASH—!
Green light burst from the jar as it shattered against the ground and was drawn into the Druid.
“You bastard!”
WHIZZ—.
I twisted my upper body and dodged an arrow fired at close range. The archer looked startled.
The fat man charged at me with his axe raised, seemingly unconcerned about whether I dodged the arrow. The axe cut diagonally from the upper left toward the lower right.
I found myself doing something insane.
More precisely, my body moved on its own.
My hand was already reaching out before the axe could fully descend.
GRAB.
My hand seized the haft directly beneath the axe head.
Compared to the daggers goblins brought down on me after suddenly leaping from trees, or the poisoned arrows archer goblins fired from underground burrows, this was nothing.
THUD.
“Ghk.”
With my free right hand, I punched the man once in the stomach, then followed with an uppercut to his face as he folded at the waist.
“Urgh.”
TWANG.
“Oh, fuck!”
The hastily fired arrow narrowly grazed my ear and disappeared into the darkness.
At that moment, the Druid rose and fired a bolt that punched through the back of the archer’s knee.
‘That has to hurt.’
“That’s one!”
I swung the blunt rear side of the axe at the fat man.
CRACK.
The bones in the arm he hurriedly raised snapped.
“Aaargh-!”
THUD.
When I turned around, the archer lay on the ground with a bolt embedded between his eyebrows. I swung the axe like a baseball bat and struck the fat man’s thigh. Even though I hit him with the blunt back, he couldn’t stand, as though his leg had broken.
I could see the Druid’s hands trembling.
Was that her first kill?
That would be understandable.
Leaving the seated, groaning man alone, I took the archer’s bracer, belt, and other belongings and handed them to her.
“Put these on.”
Fortunately, the Druid didn’t waste time saying anything useless. She quickly equipped them and returned.
“Can you shoot a bow?”
“No.”
The Druid shook her head after picking up her staff again.
“…Then the crossbow is yours from now on.”
The Druid’s atmosphere had changed completely now that she held both her staff and the Hand Crossbow. When she wore only an ocher robe and carried a staff, she had looked like a mage.
Now she looked more like a beast hunter.
Leaving her to pull out the bolt, I turned around.
“How many of you are there? Are you two the only ones who know about us?”
I didn’t ask who they were.
They were simply bad men who had tried to kill me.
That was enough.
I could infer how they had found us from the conversation I overheard earlier. They had probably followed the Tracking Scent smeared on the wildcat.
What mattered now was how many people belonged to their group and whether anyone else knew our faces and identities.
“Ghh, it hurts.”
The man only whimpered repeatedly about the pain.
Finding a person in this medieval fantasy world was like plucking a star from the sky. It was even harder in a city like Parque, where trade was active and outsiders constantly came and went. Dozens of unfamiliar faces probably appeared and disappeared every day.
“S-Spare me.”
“Answer my question first. How many of you are there?”
“T-Ten.”
“How many people can follow the Tracking Scent on Miyu—no, on that wildcat?”
“Three. No, only two now. The captain and Corin, that damned bloodhound.”
“Are you two the only ones who know about us?”
“Y-Yes. We already caught the mother black panther. The captain said he would take that cub to the territory and sell it to a merchant while he was there. He only ordered us to find the one that escaped. I-It was just a way to make a little pocket money.”
So the mother black panther was the real prize, and they had only intended to capture the cub for some extra spending money.
Then they probably wouldn’t care too much if they failed to find it.
I knew the Hunter NPC who led nine mercenary-hunters around the territory of ‘Parque’ and was skilled enough to hunt a black panther.
With his personality, he wouldn’t come searching just because he lost one or two underlings.
He was obsessed with the thrill of the hunt more than money.
“I-If you spare me, I’ll say we simply lost the black panther cub. I’ll say Tommy was killed by goblins. I won’t say a single word about either of you!! S-So please, spare me.”
Should I call it fortunate amid misfortune?
If these two were the only ones who knew who we were, then here…….
Step. Step.
Holding the axe in both hands, I approached the man. He desperately shuffled backward despite dragging his injured leg, then twisted his face.
“Y-You son of a bitch! I said spare me-!”
The man thrust a hand inside his clothes, pulled it back out, and lunged at me.
I brought down the axe.
It buried itself between his neck and shoulder, and he toppled backward.
What he had pulled from his clothes wasn’t a dagger or any other weapon.
I released the axe and headed toward the collapsed tent.
We needed to leave quickly.
HISSSSS. SCREEEE—.
The sound resembled a screaming bird. Startled, I spun around.
The fallen man had stretched a hand toward the sky. A short red rod was clutched in it. Red light and rising smoke burst from the rod, loudly announcing its existence.
The hunt had begun.
***
[Bad Event! A Signal Flare has been fired.]
[The Hunter begins chasing you.]
[Be hunted or fight back to survive.]
.
.
.
[Are you perhaps a Bad Event collector?]
[You have experienced the greatest number of Bad Events in the shortest time of any player in history.]
[Reward: Luck slightly increases whenever a Bad Event occurs. Stackable.]