The Weakest Tamer Began a Journey to Pick up Trash - Volume 1 - Chapter 59

Chapter 59:

The Unexpected, and Sword of Flames

I SEARCHED FOR AURAS while I filled my canteens with water. Since it was so hot, I was going through water fast, though it was better now that I had more canteens.

“Pu, pu pu!” Sora bounced around me especially energetically. It seemed like my friend was in a good mood today. Had it eaten something weird?

Actually…Sora’s acting like it did when we first found that injured adandara. Huh?! Does Sora like wounds, after all? Is it always going to be happy when we find something half-dead? Okay, calm down…we haven’t proven it yet. I’m probably just misunderstanding…right? Maybe Sora’s just randomly in a good mood today! Right?

There was one thing I hadn’t expected, though.

Purrrr.

It was the adandara. Today was our fourth day out from Ratome Village, and the adandara had followed us ever since we left. I’d heard that animals and monsters had their own territory… Was it okay for it to travel this far? 

I looked at the adandara. It flicked its tail about and rubbed its head against me. Daww. It’s a shame I can’t tame you.

Since the adandara was with us, I’d taken a route through the forest instead of using the village road. We couldn’t just drag a monster along on a civilized road like that, after all. And because I had a good map now, we could keep from getting lost.

“Let’s go,” I called out to Sora and the adandara, checking the map as I pressed on.

When I checked for auras again, I found it kind of strange: In the past four days, monsters and animals had felt really far off. The forest was thick here, so you’d expect to run into a few monsters. I glanced at the adandara—my book said it was a pretty high-level monster. Were they staying away because they were scared? Noticing my eyes on it, the adandara purred.

Too cute! It didn’t look like something animals or monsters should be scared of at all. Still, I couldn’t imagine my book was wrong. Maybe it really wasn’t an adandara? Even if its features were all exactly right…

As we walked through the forest, I felt auras a short distance away and stopped. I called Sora over and put it in its bag. The adandara looked out in the direction of the auras, but it didn’t seem wary.

“I think I sense adventurers. Hide so they don’t kill you, okay?”

Purr. With that, it bounded gallantly off into the woods. I was worried, but I decided to trust it would be safe.

I checked my map for a route to the village road and headed for it. I’d thought the source of the auras were adventurers, but there were a whole lot of them. The auras were moving, too, so I had to keep a close watch. When I reached the road, I searched again—they seemed to have gone into the woods.

Thank goodness.

Not long after, though, I felt more auras. They were faint, so I figured they were adventurers again. The last set had too many people to be just one group of adventurers, and here we had more adventurers…which must’ve meant that they were all working together to hunt a specific animal or monster. That, or a wanted criminal had fled into the forest.

I slowly breathed in and out, searching in a wide range for auras. I found another one that felt like an adventurer. So many faint auras…if they really were all adventurers, then maybe there was a problem in the forest, after all. What do I do? Should I ask them? What if they aren’t adventurers at all? And if they aren’t…

Again, more auras. They were walking this way slowly along the village road. There were only four people this time, so I decided to get closer until I could see them. It wouldn’t be too late to make the call once they came into sight, but I wanted to be ready to run at any moment.

After a while, I saw four men dressed like adventurers. They could probably see me, too. Their auras were faint, like those adventurers from Ratome’s plaza. Nothing felt off about them, either, so they were probably fine. I approached them nervously.

While I was still worrying about how they’d speak to me, one of them piped up. “Hey, boy! Are you alone?” Warily, I nodded.

“Ha ha ha… C’mon, don’t be so scared.”

The four men stopped at a distance, probably to avoid spooking me.

“Kid can’t help it,” another one said. “You look so hideous he must be terrified. Don’t worry, kid! Beneath that mean mug of his, he’s a nice guy!”

“No doubt about it,” another agreed.

“Guys…” their leader groaned.

They don’t look bad. Should I ask them what’s going on?

“Um…is something happening in the forest?” I finally ventured.

“Whoa, you noticed? You’re really perceptive, kid,” the scary one said.

Noticed what? Did he mean the adventurers? I cocked my head a little in puzzlement.

“You’ve gotta be if you noticed things were off,” he continued. “Though I guess we do have a lot of adventurers out today.”

I didn’t know if things were “off” since I had never been here before, but I could tell that there were many more adventurers than I expected. The forest was big; unless it had a famous cave or something, it was rare to run into so many in such a short time. Adventurers actively try to stay out of each other’s way in the forest. If they’re gathering in one place, it’s because there’s trouble afoot.

“It’s monsters,” said the leader. “We got info about pretty dangerous ones, so they put out a request to cull them.”

It’s not the adandara, is it? “What kind of monsters?”

“Bunch of ogres,” said one of them. “They say maybe more than ten.”

Ogres? Thank goodness…

“It’s gonna be dark soon, too,” their quietest member finally spoke up. “There’s a gathering place for adventurers nearby. It’s risky at night. You should come with us.”

Yeah, it was almost sunset. Ogres were terrible monsters that liked to eat people, so it might really be best for me to tag along with this group. Would the adandara be okay, though? All I could do was hope for the best.

“It wouldn’t be a problem if I came along, would it?” I asked uncertainly.

“Not at all!” their leader assured me. “It’s our job to protect young adventurers and merchants when we get requests to take out monsters.”

Actually, I have heard something like that. 

When I asked where they were headed, they offered to lead me there. I’d be fine tagging along, right?

“By the way,” the considerate one looked at me, “our group is called Sword of Flames. Ever heard of us?”

“Sorry. I don’t know much about adventurer groups.”

“Dang. We’re pretty famous over in Otolwa.”

“This is my first time traveling there,” I explained.

“Ah, well, no wonder you don’t know us. My bad!”

“It’s okay!”

I was surprised when we reached a clearing after a short walk. There were fifteen big tents there… This must’ve been a really enormous hunt.