By the Grace of the Gods (LN) - Volume 9 - Chapter 8

Chapter 6 Episode 8: Secret Lair

“Did you find him?!”

“No, and I’m guessing you haven’t either.”

“Where’d that little punk go?”

Adults were constantly weaving in and out of the plaza in the center of the village searching for Nikki, with the members of Sikum’s Pier among them.

“Any luck, Ryoma?!”

“No, Thane... There aren’t any boats on the lake which are close to the village. I saw a few fishing boats from other ports, but no children on board any of them. Plus there were no children, nor any carriages that could hide a child, along the road that leads out of the village.”

I had also asked the limour birds to help, sharing our fields of vision so I could search the outskirts of the village from the sky...but the search so far had been to no avail.

“Got it... Oh, Peyron! How’d it go?”

“All of the village boats are accounted for, and there are no boats from outside docked today.”

“So there’s no way he’s out on the lake?”

Nikki had apparently been last seen shortly after throwing the octo at me. He had been caught and scolded, to which he responded by retorting and running away. Four hours had passed since then, and the winter sky was rapidly darkening.

“Maybe he was kidnapped or something...”

“He’s never been out this late before...”

“Never?”

“I know he can be out of hand, but he’d always come home before dark. Even when he knew he was in trouble.”

“He knew the important rules. It’s not like we were all a bunch of goody-two-shoes when we were kids either. When you told him not to do something because it was dangerous, he’d listen. So we’d usually just let him off with a smack on the head and a good talking-to.”

Hopefully, he was just throwing a tantrum and hiding somewhere, but we couldn’t discount the very real possibility that something had happened to him.

“I’m sorry, if I had just kept him with me...”

“My son’s the one to blame. It’s not your fault.”

“That little idiot! He never wants to face the consequences when he does something stupid! I swear, when I get ahold of him, I’ll...!”

I turned towards the direction of that heated exchange to find a relatively young couple whom I assumed to be Nikki’s parents. Concealed behind them was the elderly woman from earlier, putting her hands together in prayer towards an ancient, weathered shrine of the plaza. Tears rolled down her face in clear concern and remorse.

I wanted nothing more than to find Nikki as soon as possible, but if he couldn’t be found in the village, on the travel road, or near the lake, the only place left was the evergreen forest which surrounded the village in nearly all directions. I tried redirecting Sechs and Fünf from searching the road towards the forest, but the dense leaves prevented searching from above and flying safely through the woods; it wasn’t an environment where the limour birds could effectively help me. We needed something, anything to go on.

What about my own childhood experiences?

I thought there might have been a few occasions when I had contemplated running away, especially after dad and I started butting heads, but though I thought it over, I knew I wouldn’t have had anywhere to go. I would have ended up in the neighborhood park or something; a kid could only go so far on his own. Even when I thought I had walked a great distance, I was never that far from home.

I did hear about a kid who ran away from home to sleep at a friend’s place for a while... I didn’t have a friend who did anything like that, but I think kids tended to stick to places they were familiar with. What was a place in the forest that Nikki knew well...?

“Thane, Peyron. About the octo we had for lunch. You said they live in the forest, right?”

“Huh? Yeah, what about it?”

“Where did Nikki get the one he threw at me? I doubt any grown-up would have given it to him, knowing how much of a prankster he is. If he acquired the octo on his own, I think he would have gone into the forest and caught it before coming to us on the street.”

“That makes sense...”

“Now that I think about it, he’s pulled that trick more often than others, but I’ve never heard of him nicking an octo from someone’s kitchen or anything... Let me ask.”

Thane ran over to Nikki’s parents and grandmother, then soon returned with them in tow.

“You’re right, Ryoma! Nikki always catches his own octo.”

“Do you know where he gets them?”

“He usually goes east, I think,” his mother answered. “He’s been volunteering to get firewood whenever we run low, so I think he catches them then.”

“That nimwit’s in the eastern forest?” Concern had overcome the anger in Nikki’s father’s voice.

“I can’t say for sure, but if I were a child—I mean, if I were Nikki, I would hide in a secluded place I was familiar with.”

Speaking from my experience of hunting in the forest of Gana day after day, hunting was not as simple as wandering into a forest willy-nilly and stumbling onto some game. Most animals were quick to run away at the first sight, sound, or scent of a human. You had to approach from downwind, or find their path and set a trap. And experience was the only thing that would let you yield consistent results.

Nikki had caught a good number of octo for his pranks, so I suspected that he was familiar with some sort of octo hotspot in the eastern forest. Of course, this was all based on what I would do in his shoes...

“Good enough. We don’t have any other leads to go on. Beats standing around here.”

“Perfect timing. There’s the rest of the team.”

“All right, let’s go!”

“Huh?”

“What are you talking about?”

“Thane? Care to explain?”

“I’ll explain on the way. We’re going to the eastern forest.”

“I’m coming too!”

We headed to the eastern forest, filling in the remaining three members of Sikum’s Pier as we went.

■ ■ ■

By the time we arrived, the sun had completely set, plunging the forest into complete darkness.

“If there is an octo hotspot, it’s going to be pretty deep in the woods.”

“Makes sense. Octo tend to be secluded from civilization.”

Kei and Shin began narrowing down our search area.

“I see. Is there a boundary in the forest where Nikki isn’t allowed to pass?”

“That’d be Rock Point,” Thane answered.

“It’s a rocky cliff that juts out over the lake,” Peyron explained.

“Let’s start somewhere pretty deep into the woods. Don’t get lost, Ryoma, you can’t see much in here,” Kai said as he led the charge into the forest.

We weaved through the dense woods, somewhat illuminating them with light magic.

“Did you hear that?” I asked.

“What...? Are you sure you heard something?”

“I heard it too. Couldn’t tell if it was Nikki.”

“Could be monsters. Be careful.” We followed Shin’s lead towards the sound until it was loud enough for us to decipher its source.

“Goblins, I’m pretty sure. Sounds like five of them, but they seem rather excited about something.”

Despite the glare of our light magic, it didn’t sound like the goblins were approaching us. In fact, their attention seemed to be drawn to something else.

“Excited...? Do you think he’s there?”

“I can’t hear a kid...”

“Nikki’d better not be with them...”

“We can’t ignore goblins this close to the village anyway. Everyone ready?”

“Good thing we brought our weapons. Never know what could happen.”

The five of them drew their weapons, as I joined them with an iron slime for a shortsword.

We inched forward until we could finally see the goblins surrounding a particularly large tree, and they started approaching with a screech as soon as they saw us.

“Here they come! Stay sharp!”

Alas, the goblins were unarmed and Sikum’s Pier were too experienced to struggle against a gang of goblins... The scuffle lasted no more than a few seconds. Once all goblins had fallen into the pool of their own blood, silence was restored in the woods.

“Well, doesn’t look like there’s any more of ’em.”

“What about Nikki?”

“Hey, Nikki! Are you there?!” Thane called.

Then, we heard a voice in the distance.

“Hey, did you—”

“Yeah, I heard that!”

“Where is it coming from?”

“Come on out...! Where are you?!”

We looked all around us, even up in the trees, but we found no child. The voice, however, had been unmistakable. Nowhere around or above us... Could it be?

“Earth Sonar...!”

I activated a spell I had developed to search underground. The spell struggled to cover as large a distance as it usually did, perhaps due to the muddy soil. Still...

“What is it?”

“What’s wrong, Ryoma?”

“There’s a large, open space in the ground below this tree. I checked with magic.”

“What?!”

“Open space? Is there an entrance to it somewhere?”

“There’s a hole in the ground here!”

“Are you serious?!”

“It’s too tight for me to go in, and I can’t see anything through it...”

Peyron had spotted a gap in the roots of the mangrove-like tree.

“May I? I might be able to squeeze in,” I said.

Amidst the tangled mass of roots, there was an opening showing. I peered into the opening, which resembled some sort of nest, to find that the tight tunnel continued rather far ahead. I barely managed to squeeze into it, even in my child-sized body, and crawled onward.

“This reminds me of the self-defense force experience.”

Back in Japan, there were some companies which had implemented a boot camp experience for new hires. My own company was among them, so naturally, my boss had ordered me to spend a day off experiencing the real thing. To be honest, it was much less grueling than a regular day in the office. I’m sure they had gone easy on us since it wasn’t a real boot camp, but I had more than enough stamina to get through the day, and all of their directions were crystal-clear.

My team lead had always given us unclear directions, so I always had to double-check after the directions were given to figure out what I had to do. He had always irritably demanded that I understand things the first time I was told, and held it against me if my interpretations of his vague orders were not precisely as he had imagined. Worst of all, even though I had done exactly what he wanted me to, his orders had often been incorrect to begin with, making my work useless.

In stark contrast, the drill sergeant’s orders were very precise. Furthermore, no one was ever chastised for following orders; sincerely, I thought it was the best thing ever. At the same time, I realized that no one could tolerate working for my company if they grew accustomed to clear directions like that.

After my boot camp experience, I wrote up a report delicately stating that implementing the boot camp experience for new hires would go against the company’s best interest... Though I certainly didn’t have any qualms with the SDF or anything.

“Wow...” I noted with surprise what came into view at the end of the gently curving tunnel, illuminated by my spell—a door. It was a simple but unmistakably man-made door, which looked like a row of branches tied together.

“I see. This isn’t just a tunnel, it’s Nikki’s secret lair... No wonder we couldn’t find him.”

I called out to him, not bothering to hide my amazement at how he managed to craft a hideout in a place like this. “Hello? It’s Ryoma... Well, I guess you probably don’t know my name, but I’m the Slime Guy. Come on out, Nikki. I know you’re in there.”

There was no response, but then I heard some shifting from across the door. Since the door wasn’t fitted with a lock or anything I carefully pushed it in, and it opened quite easily.

“Nikki!”