The Weakest Tamer Began a Journey to Pick up Trash - Volume 9 - Chapter 420

Chapter 420:

The Sharmy Cave, Part 2

THE MOMENT I ARRIVED at the mouth of the cave, I spotted the sea of trash. There was obviously quite a lot of it.

“How horrible…” my dad whispered.

And it was horrible. How dare they dump their trash in the sharmy’s home!

Nalgath walked up to my side and gave my father’s shoulder a light tap. My father turned around, and Nalgath pointed upward. We both looked up to see a series of platforms along the cave walls, all filled with sharmy. Each and every one of them was round as a ball. Perhaps that was how they slept. 

With a nod to Nalgath, my father started pointing around and giving orders. Nalgath’s party left Arly behind and quietly moved over to the walls on the opposite side. The mouth and interior of this cave were both quite large, so we were going to split in two to explore it. 

My father turned to Ciel, who was a few paces away. He lowered his fist and pumped it twice as a signal to stand by, and Ciel lay down on the spot. When did Ciel learn that signal? My father was staring at me meaningfully, so I took a quiet breath in and out to steady my nerves. Then I gave him an earnest nod to show I was okay, prompting him to quietly walk into the cave. I followed, and Arly brought up the rear.

We crept along the cave wall. There was so much trash that we couldn’t see Nalgath and his group on the other side. Just how much trash was there, anyway? The further into the cave we walked, the darker it got. Since we couldn’t light a lantern, we stopped in the darkness. I sensed my father looking up, so I followed his gaze to see the sharmy in the gloom. All of them were motionless, so they were clearly still asleep. That was a relief to see, but it also felt wrong. It definitely wasn’t normal behavior. The sharmy should have woken up when people intruded this far into their home, and yet they were asleep. Maybe they couldn’t wake up? 

I looked at my father in front of me and saw he was pulling something out of his bag. If he lights a lantern, that will certainly wake up the sharmy…so what is he getting out? Did he get something ready in advance? Boy, there sure is a lot of trash. We were walking against the walls so the sharmy wouldn’t notice us, but the trash was crammed all the way to the side of the cave. I took a cautious look at it and noticed an unusually large number of magic items. I nudged a large magic item with my foot. What’s this?

A symbol I’d seen somewhere before was on the ground under the trash. The moment I saw it, I felt chilling sweat shoot down my spine. I could only see half of the symbol, so I nudged the magic item a little more with my foot. Just as I was trying to move it without making a sound, my father tapped me on the shoulder. I looked up with a start to see him giving me the signal he’d given Ciel earlier. In other words, he wanted me to stand by. I understood him, but I shook my head no. My father gave me an astonished look, but I ignored it and pointed at the ground. 

Arly, noticing the exchange, moved a little closer and looked at the ground by my feet along with my father. Immediately after, I felt my father tense up with fear. Sensing it all the while, I carefully nudged the magic item off the symbol until the once half-covered design was completely exposed. I knew it… Of course I’ve seen this before. It’s the same symbol from the summoning circle that trapped Snakey. 

My father, noticing it too, creeped closer to the wall. He gave Arly a firm signal to come with him. Arly seemed a bit confused, but he obeyed and pressed himself against the wall. I looked at my father, who looked back at me, nodded reassuringly, and then pointed outside. This time, Arly took the lead as we slowly made our way out of the cave. It was hard to move without waking up the sharmy, but we had to get away from that summoning circle—and fast. We had no idea what might happen otherwise. I wondered how Nalgath’s group was doing.

Once we were out of the cave at a safe distance away, Arly pulled out a tiny magic item and switched it on. “This’ll let Nalgath’s group know that something’s gone wrong. They should be out within seconds.”

We walked Ciel a little away from the cave, and Nalgath’s group emerged in less than a minute.

“What happened? Is something wrong?” Piarre asked us worriedly. Juggy and Nalgath looked equally anxious.

“Boys, you’re elite adventurers. Learn to mask your emotions,” my father said.

Nalgath’s group frowned uncomfortably.

“It’s okay, just remember that moving forward. We’re cutting the cave investigation short because of the summoning circle.”

“A summoning circle, sir?” Nalgath looked bewildered.

“Ivy found a huge summoning circle under all that trash,” my father said.

Nalgath’s group fell silent.

“So is that the cause of the sharmy’s weird behavior?”

“I assume it is. The summoning circle and the magic energy in the trash probably messed them up somehow.”

How horrible… Well, now we know what’s wrong with them, but is there a way to break the spell?

“Hey, Dad, do you think the spell can be broken?”

“It’ll be tough. They’ve also gone berserk from the magic energy in the trash.”

That’s right. They may have been peaceful before, but now they lash out at any human who approaches them.

“Oh, but they’re asleep right now! Could we help them now?”

“You’re right, this might be a chance for us to do something to help them…” But from the look on my father’s face, I got the feeling it wouldn’t work.

“Miss Ivy, let’s go back to the village and ask the captain if there’s a way to break the spell.”

“Good idea, Mr. Piarre. Thanks.” I gave him a little smile and he was obviously relieved. Oh dear, I hope I didn’t look depressed. I need to pull myself together.

“What should we do, Mr. Druid? Could we just go back to the village? Leave them like this, I mean? I assume it’s too dangerous to investigate this cave any further.”

“Correct. We don’t know what kind of summoning circle this is, so we should stay away. Let’s just go straight back to the village.”

Nalgath and his men looked around, then pointed toward Hataka. Piarre nodded and took the lead, while we followed behind. Ciel darted straight to my side, and we silently walked away from the cave for a while.

Once we were a bit away from the cave, I heard Juggy sigh quietly behind me. “Phew… Boy, that was scary. Good job spotting that summoning circle, Ivy!”

“Well, it had the same symbols as the summoning circle I saw before.”

“You’ve seen a summoning circle before? What was it like?” Arly asked, looking between me and my father.

“It was designed to control monsters,” I said. “We happened upon it just as it was activating, so our memories were erased and tampered with.”

“How terrifying! But I’m glad you both knew about it already. If it had just been us out here, we might not have made it out.”

“Yeah, and I’ve already had my memory tampered with more than enough for one lifetime,” Juggy said. Piarre agreed.

We power walked all the way back to the village. When the gate came into view, I could just feel my muscles give out in relief.