The next day, Ver went out again with Victor, leaving Norm alone with his dad.
When he asked if he could come with them, Victor told him that they would probably be killing stuff all day, so Norm changed his mind.
He didn’t find any enjoyment in fighting. It wasn’t because he was scared or anything; it was just boring to him.
Besides, he was too busy doing something far more important.
“Wooohooo! Faster, Jeb! Hahahahahaha.”
The goats, satisfied from running around, were already back on the pasture with the cows.
His dad was there watching them both, so Norm could ride Jeb for a few hours.
It was an important job, and Norm was not at all just playing around.
Because Victor was not here, there was no one to play with Jeb.
Bulls didn’t need to move around all that much, but Norm knew that Jeb was bored, maybe.
Jeb didn’t say it, but it was because he was a bull. He couldn’t talk.
He also seemed satisfied lazing around, but it couldn’t be good for him… right?
Norm’s thoughts were cut off when Jeb jumped off a cliff, forcing Norm to hold on tight unless he wanted to fall.
A smile appeared on his face.
Jeb might enjoy lazing around all day and it might not have any negative effect on him, but right now, Norm was one hundred percent sure Jeb was enjoying himself.
That was why neither of them had realized they’d wandered too far.
When Norm saw the road in the distance, his heart sank.
Oh, no.
His village didn’t have a road leading up to it, and he was pretty sure that the nearest road was quite far.
I’m screwed.
Norm told Jeb to stop, and after a second, he could tell Jeb also realized they’d messed up.
Victor was going to be so mad at them.
If they could go back before Victor realized they screwed up, then everything would be okay.
The problem was, Norm didn’t know the way back. He didn’t pay attention to where they were going.
“Jeb, do you know the way back?”
Jeb didn’t answer him. He just stood there.
Norm knew that Jeb understood him, so the fact that Jeb wasn’t doing anything meant that he also didn’t know.
“Let’s just follow the road and hope that there is someone who could show us the way.”
After ten minutes, he heard the sound of fighting ahead and immediately told Jeb to move faster in case someone needed their help.
In the distance, he saw a male orc, a male human, a female human, and a male hobgoblin being surrounded by figures clad in black.
Norm didn’t know the context of the situation, so he didn’t know whom he should help.
However, when he got closer, he saw that the hobgoblin looked like a kid.
He immediately made his decision when an arrow almost hit the kid’s head before being deflected by the human man. There was no way the group who were trying to kill a kid were the good ones.
“Jeb! Go full speed towards that guy!”
Norm was pointing to where the group of [Archer] and [Mage] were.
It was quite far away from where the action was, but Victor always told him that if he was ever in a fight, always kill the [Mage] first. They had way more firepower and were much more troublesome than a [Warrior] at the same level.
Jeb was fast and heavy, but none of them even noticed Jeb charging towards them until it was too late.
All of them except for two people exploded into a shower of blood, dead in an instant.
Both of the ones who managed to dodge already had an arrow nocked in their bows, but Jeb was still one step ahead of them.
From each horn, lightning shot out and struck each of them; stunning both of them long enough for Jeb to run them over.
Norm looked back to see the devastation he created.
Organs and limbs were scattered everywhere, and he couldn’t see anyone whose body was intact. But some of them still looked like they were alive. They were still moving even though they were missing the lower half of their body and had their intestines spilled onto the ground.
The weird thing was, none of them screamed or even let out a single noise.
It looked painful, so Norm couldn't help but be impressed by their pain tolerance.
But there was no reason to prolong their suffering. So, he told Jeb to crush the heads of everyone who was still alive.
When he looked back to where the main action was, he found that it was already over.
The four people that Norm saw were already moving away from where all the dead bodies were.
None of them were dead, which was a relief for Norm.
As Norm got closer to them, the orc man and the human woman instantly put their guards up, but the human man stopped them before they could attack.
The human man walked up to Norm. He looked like the oldest of the group, so it made sense for him to be the leader.
“I’m really grateful for your help, but can you please clean up all the… ‘stuff’ that’s on your bull? My little brother is only nine years old, you see.”
When he looked down at Jeb, he found that his front half was almost completely red and had a few questionable things on it.
So that is what makes them so tense. Makes sense.
The hobgoblin was closing his eyes. Judging by the frown on his face, it was probably because someone told him to.
Which was reasonable.
Jeb right now was definitely not meant for a child to see.
“Sorry. I don't know how to clean him up though.”
“I can cast Clean. May I?”
“Sure.”
The human man walked closer to Jeb, pointed at him, and spoke the spell’s name.
“Clean.”
The blood and organs on Jeb flew off towards where their battle took place.
Victor had told him that if you practiced a spell enough, you could skip some of the gestures and incantation and eventually be able to cast it just by saying the spell’s name in your head.
But even a simple spell still took ages to shorten even half of the incantation.
“Cool.”
“My name is Kairos. This is my little brother, Lucks. The orc is Ursag and the one carrying a bow there is Bow.”
“Can I open my eyes now?”
“No, Lucks. We’re not done yet.”
The hobgoblin pouted, which Norm thought was kinda cute.
“Hello, I’m Norm.”
The human man, Kairos, turned his attention to Norm, which made him a bit uncomfortable.
He couldn’t help but think that the stranger in front of him was his big brother, which was strange, since Norm was pretty sure he’d only just met him.
It was impossible.
His parents had never mentioned a big brother, and the man was tall. There was no way they were related.
Norm had [Mental Immunity] so his mind was definitely not being messed with.
It was just the way he moved, his voice, his appearance, everything about him looked like a big brother.
Just like he knew Jeb was a bull, Norm knew the man in front of him was a big brother. But maybe not his big brother.
So he felt nervous, like he’d done something wrong, when Kairos looked at him. Norm was pretty sure he didn’t steal a cookie from the cookie jar.
“Are you part halfling by any chance?”
“Yeah, how do you know?”
Norm was relieved and a bit impressed.
Impressed because no one had ever guessed what he was just by looking at him. Everyone always thought that he was just a kid. And he was relieved because he might have taken more cookies than what his parents allowed. Good thing that wasn't why Kairos had been looking at him so intensely.
“Experience.”
Their leather armor and clothes were torn up a bit, but Norm couldn’t see any injuries on any of them. It was obviously the work of a healing potion, which was a shame.
Victor made him wear a backpack full of milk in case Norm needed it, and if he arrived sooner, he could have given it to them. Healing potions were expensive and his milk only cost like twenty bronze coins.
Now that he thought about it, Norm got off of Jeb, opened his backpack and started feeding Jeb milk.
Jeb didn’t look like he was injured, but it was better safe than sorry.
Norm also drank the milk, not because he thought he was injured or something, the milk just looked delicious, so he drank it.
Then he realized something, these guys might know where his village was.
“Can you point me towards where River Village is? I’m kinda lost.”
“Sure. But let us bury the dead bodies first.”
“Oh, yeah. I kinda forgot about that.”
It didn’t matter whether they were demons or someone you really hated. Defiling a dead body was wrong. If you got the chance, you had to bury them, whoever they were.
Looking at where Ursag and Bow were, Norm could see them digging using a shovel.
“About that, can I entrust my little brother to you while we take care of the dead bodies? I couldn’t let Lucks go unsupervised especially after an ambush. Who knows if there is still someone out there who still wants to kill us?”
“I mean, I don’t mind. But why me?”
It was a bit weird.
Norm had only just met them, so entrusting Lucks—who was a literal kid—to him felt odd.
“I don’t want Lucks to see all the dead bodies and you also looked a bit… young.”
“Brother! I told you I’m fine. Don’t be dramatic.”
Norm was so shocked that he forgot to say anything for a minute.
Young?! Did he make that suggestion because he thought I would be too young to be taking care of dead bodies? I’m not young, I’m 17! That’s practically an adult! I might look young on the outside but on the inside I’m a wise old man. He knew I’m part halfling so why—
“Hello. What’s the bull’s name?”
“Huh?”
The hobgoblin was sitting on top of Jeb and Kairos was already gone, helping bury all the corpses.
A Skill? That's annoying.
There was no way he would zone out like that when talking to someone. So Kairos had to have used a Skill on him.
I have [Mental Immunity] though—
Before he could zone out again, Norm saw Lucks fall from Jeb and ran to catch him.
Thankfully, he made it in time, and Lucks didn’t look like he was injured.
“Thank you, but you haven’t answered my question.”
“His name is Jeb, and be careful.”
“A fall like that won’t hurt me, I’m strong. And can you tell Jeb to move? It looked so much fun when you were riding him when he was moving so fast. Why are you shorter than me? Are you younger than me? How did you meet Jeb? Is the milk delicious? Can I try it?”
“Ehhh...”
His annoyance was replaced by dread. Norm never had to take care of a kid. So, he didn’t know what to do.
Norm tried his best to answer Lucks’s questions, and after a while, Lucks looked bored.
For some reason, it really hurt his pride so he tried his best to make Lucks think he was cool and fun.
It would haunt him for the rest of his life if Lucks said that he was boring.
Norm never felt like this for anyone, but just like Kairos felt like a big brother, Lucks felt like his cute little brother that he wanted to always spoil.
At least Lucks thought his milk was delicious, which made Norm really happy.
“This is suspicious as shit! What in the abyss is going on here?”
Bow was frustrated, and a bit creeped out.
The mystery of why none of them uttered a single sound was answered when she took off the clothes covering their faces.
Every single one of them had their mouth stitched shut with a string, and for some reason, all of them had blue skin.
All the ones they kept alive for questioning killed themselves, so they didn’t have a single idea what was going on.
“This is the work of a demon.”
Bow rolled her eyes and went back to digging.
“Everybody could tell you that. What we need to figure out is why they attack us.”
“I’m just talking to myself, grandma. You don’t have to be so grumpy, geez.”
Bow ignored Ursag’s comment. There was a better use of her time than fighting with her brother.
“The only thing I could think of is that there was something around here that a demon didn’t want people to see.”
“So what? It’s not like we are strong enough to handle whatever was out there. We’re both only silver-rank adventurers. The only reason we’re still alive was because our employer was strong and we got lucky that someone strong was nearby to help us.”
She was a bit mad at what Ursag was saying, but she knew he was right.
They were both too weak to handle whatever was out there. The only thing they would accomplish searching for the demon was killing themselves.
But it just felt wrong to leave the demon be, when she knew there was probably one close by.
“The only thing we could do is tell the Adventurer’s Guild that there is a demon here. Don’t be a hero, Bow.”
“Yeah, you’re right.”
It was frustrating, but it was the smart thing to do. It also would be more useful than trying to kill the demon herself.
“Is setting up the Dome of Silence really necessary?”
Bow stopped digging and looked back to see her employer with a shovel in his hands before he started to join them.
“There is no such thing as being too careful in our line of work.”
That was also why she asked Pips, her owl companion, to fly around them and make sure nothing else would ambush them.
Honestly, she felt that she and her brother were pretty useless.
Their job was to protect a [Merchant] in his travels. But it was obvious from the first day that the [Merchant] was stronger than both of them combined.
The only reason the fight was so long was because the [Merchant], Kairos, was protecting his little brother.
The [Archer] and [Mage] were targeting Lucks, limiting Kairos’s movements.
When they were dead, it didn’t even take a minute before the rest followed.
The reason she and Ursag got the job in the first place was because they were siblings, and that seemed to make them more trustworthy in Kairos’s eyes for some reason.
“What were you two talking about anyway?”
When she recounted their entire conversation, Kairos took on a thoughtful expression.
“There is something you’re both missing. I don’t think these guys are even alive in the first place. How they fight seems too rigid, and I don’t think they even used a single Skill.”
Thinking about it, she realized that Kairos was right. She was so busy trying to stay alive that she didn’t even realize something so obvious.
“And isn’t it weird how weak they are? Sure, there are like twenty of them, but I could kill all of them if I was alone. So why make them guard this road in the first place? The only thing it achieved was telling people that there is a demon here.”
After creating twenty holes, they started placing the bodies one by one before closing them with dirt.
“So, you’re saying that this was a red herring?”
It seemed pointless to her, but demons were all weird, who knew what they were thinking.
“No, what would be the point of that? There has to be something I’m missing here.”
Even though Kairos was thinking out loud, he didn’t stop working. Which was pretty impressive.
Most employers didn’t bother helping because it wasn’t their ‘job.’ It was as if basic decency stopped existing because they were supposedly above some no-name adventurer.
“Why were they so weak? What even was their purpose? They had to have a purpose. An early warning system? Maybe the one behind them was just gathering data? Or maybe they thought that it was more than enough to deter anyone? From my estimation, a single gold-rank adventurer could take care of all of them.”
Kairos stopped and stared at the corpse in his hands for a few seconds. The corpse with its mouth stitched shut. The corpse with blue skin.
“Unless their combat capabilities… didn’t… really… matter—Shit! Get away from the corpse!”
Bow and Ursag immediately followed the order.
They didn’t exactly know what was going on, but an adventurer who hesitated was a dead adventurer.
Bow managed to get over a hundred meters from the corpse, but she was suddenly on the ground. Blood spilled from her nose, mouth, ears, and even her eyes.
She couldn’t move, and after a few seconds, it was starting to feel really painful, but she couldn’t even scream.
Her vision started to blur, and she knew that she was going to die. But she wasn’t afraid, the only thing she felt right now was regret.
She was a [Scout]; it was her job to find traps and make sure her allies didn’t fall into them.
I hope Pips is alright.
But even in her dying moment, she didn’t believe it.
It was obvious now that whatever they were fighting, released poison when they died. Maybe even when they were alive.
Tears started coming out of her eyes.
Her brother and her animal companion were going to die because of her incompetence.
It was all her fault.
Sorry, I forgot to upload the chapter here.