The Weakest Tamer Began a Journey to Pick up Trash - Volume 9 - Chapter 450.1

SIDE:

The Survey Teams in the Forest

SURVEY TEAM OFFICER VIG’S PERSPECTIVE

 “HEY THERE, VIG—any movement on your end?”

This was my fifth year on the survey team. Tabir, a fellow surveyor who’d been in my cohort when I joined and whom I spent a lot of time around, handed me a cup of booze as he asked that question.

“Word is they’ll make their move soon. C’mon, man, day-drinking again?”

Even for somebody with a special amulet, he was being a little too cocky for his own good. Not like I was gonna say no to a drink, though… I took the cup and drank. It was decent enough.

“I’ll be fine, dammit. So hey, it’s been a while since we’ve been in the vanguard, eh?”

“Sure has. Those lucky bastards behind us have it so easy!”

The survey team was split into two groups. The vanguard would arrive first in the village to look around and see what we were dealing with. Our comrades in the rearguard would arrive later; our job was to get everything ready for them so they could get to work straight away. Anyway, being in the vanguard was a lot of extra work, so I didn’t like it.

“Well, it ain’t like we can disobey the captain’s orders,” I grumbled. “We’ve gotta get moving soon. Where’s our gear?”

“Over there.”

I looked where Tabir was pointing and saw that the all the vanguard’s gear had already been packed up.

“That’s my man! You’re such a fast packer, Tabir.”

Tabir downed the rest of the booze in his cup and gave an apathetic shrug. He’d have been perfect if he just laid off the sauce now and then.

“So hey, did our little problem get solved?” Tabir asked.

I looked at him to find his eyes staring earnestly at me. “Yeah, the prince took care of it.”

“Okay, good. Guess it’s same ol’, same ol’.”

This survey team was commanded by the prince. Our current job had come from him directly—it wasn’t an official order from the crown. But even though it wasn’t official, it was still his command. Nobody could stop him. What’s more, the prince couldn’t stop us, either. So that sometimes resulted in a touch of overkill—every once in a while, we’d let loose and get a little too carried away. One time, one of our boys accidentally killed two villagers when he was working on an investigation. As you can imagine, we freaked out over it, but the prince covered our asses. It shook us up real bad at the time, but every single member of the survey team was sincerely grateful to him.

“By the way, are we really investigating a case of serial summoning circles?” I asked Tabir.

“Apparently, yeah.”

“Are you sure? The last rumor was a lie, remember?”

Tabir gulped down the rest of his drink. “No, this time we really are dealing with a bunch of summoning circles. Some people already lost their minds—and some of them died.”

So it actually is true. Kill me now.

“Agh… Then this gig is another bust.”

The prince’s orders were wide-ranging. Most of them were easy—after all, working for him meant we got the intel we needed right away. But when summoning circles came into play, you really needed to do a proper investigation, which was a real pain in the ass.

“Where’re we headed now—Hataka, right? Do they support our prince, or the other guy?”

“I looked into it but couldn’t find out anything.”

In other words, they might be neutral and refuse to cooperate with our investigation.

“Arrrgh, I knew this gig was a bust! Kill me!” I thrust my empty cup at Tabir, willing him to fill it with more booze—which he promptly did.

“Who’s day-drinking now, Vig?”

“I can’t handle this sober.”

We clinked our cups together and drank. As I let the fiery liquor gliding down my throat satisfy me, I caught a glimpse of one of our comrades running toward us, flapping his arms.

“Uh-oh. Looks like something’s wrong.”

“Guys! We’ve got trouble!” It was Walby, one of our juniors.

“What happened?”

Walby gasped for air, looked left and right, then lowered his voice to a whisper. “Chippy and I were searching the forest around here, and we spotted three adventurers.”

Three adventurers? Were they a party from Hataka?

“Chippy said we should watch them for a while, so we did. Then these two village watchmen showed up—they were freaked out—I think they were looking for those adventurers.”

I’ve got a bad feeling about this…and I hope it’s wrong.

“I think they were scared—they kept looking around to see if anybody was watching them while they talked—but they were kinda loud.”

So they were too freaked out to notice or care? Ugh, now I really don’t wanna hear what they had to say.

“So it’s like this: a summoning circle in the village that they missed earlier activated and made some of the villagers riot. The village leaders drove off a bunch of ’em into the forest.”

“Uhhh…really?” I asked nervously.

“Stop, take a breath. Are ya sure it wasn’t just a trick?” Walby asked him calmly.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought at first. But from the way the watchmen were acting, they just didn’t look like they were lying.”

“Where’s Chippy now?”

“He went to fill in the captain. Also…”

“Great, there’s more?!” I snapped. Walby shuddered in terror.

“Cool it, man.” Tabir gave my shoulder a light slap.

Tabir and Walby both had it easy—they were strong. But I wasn’t as strong as either of them. That was why I hated it when we actually had to fight and stuff.

“Was there something else?” Tabir asked Walby.

Walby gave me a cautious glance before he spoke. “The watchmen and adventurers were talking about whether they should keep searching the forest—and then three adventurers came hurtling out of the woods. They said a summoning circle got activated in a cave and the monsters in there might go berserk, so they should all hightail it back to the village.”

“What?!” Tabir and I gasped.

Monsters, berserk from a summoning circle? I already knew that trash made monsters mutate—but summoning circles, too? Wait a minute… I feel like I talked about that with the captain once…

“When they heard what the adventurers were saying, they ran away on the spot. And I think the other guys overheard their little conversation as well. Just before I was gonna come back here, we made eye contact.”

That was a misstep on his part, but he really couldn’t have avoided it. He was freaked out—he’d just heard there were berserk monsters on the loose.

“D-don’t worry, we’ll be safe. We’ve got our amulets,” I said.

He’s right. We need to stay calm. Members of the survey team all received special amulets from the prince that warded off monsters. They were extraordinary magic items that kept every kind of monster away, so we would be okay if we just wore our amulets…

“Uh, no, I heard some of the monsters that went berserk from trash were immune to our amulets.”

What?!

“Are you sure?” I demanded, clutching Tabir’s shoulder.

He looked at me and nodded. “Yeah, it was in a report some other surveyors made. There’ve been many reported cases, so we can’t afford to get too cocky.”

This can’t be happening.

“Oi, you lot, c’mere.” The captain’s voice sent shivers down my spine. “Ya heard Walby’s news, I take it?”

“Yes, sir,” we both answered.

“We’re gonna wait and see what the other guys do.”

What?! Even though there’re berserk monsters in the forest?

“You mean we aren’t going straight to the village, sir?” Tabir quickly sidled up next to the captain. “There’re berserk monsters in the forest, Captain.”

“Allegedly, yeah. We can’t rule out the possibility that it’s a trick.”

Is he right? Yeah, he is…but why would they plant bogus intel like that anyway?

“I agree, Captain, but…”

“Tabir, I know you’re scared, but stay cool.”

Huh? Tabir’s scared? Seriously?

“Sorry, Captain.”

I glanced at Tabir, who had returned to my side. Was he really scared? I’d never seen him afraid before.

“Berserk monsters are powerful beyond our wildest dreams,” Tabir whispered in my ear. The words made me shudder. Now I understood why he was scared.

“We can’t let the other guys see us falter. Our bad actions disgrace our prince—don’t ever forget that.”

We wouldn’t have a chance to disgrace the prince if we died first. Agh… But the captain’s already made up his mind, so I guess we’re standing by for a few hours here? I’m done.

“Say, Tabir?”

“What?”

“Is there anything else unusual about berserk monsters?”

“They have weaker auras,” Chippy said, returning to us after giving the captain his report.

“Weaker auras?” Walby’s face turned green.

“Chippy, are you sure about that?” I asked.

Chippy nodded. What the hell—they’ve got weak auras? How are we supposed to find them?

“Let’s just get our gear sorted for now and check our weapons,” Tabir said calmly.

Everyone nodded and got themselves ready for battle. I looked toward the captain and saw he was in the middle of an intense conversation with his right-hand man, who was blue in the face.

“Argh… I wanna get out of this forest fast.”

The tense atmosphere had lasted a good two hours, and I was reaching my limit.

“You okay?”

I looked toward the voice to see Tabir checking our surroundings. Has he calmed down already? And he was so terrified before…

“How much farther is the village?” I asked.

Tabir gave me a questioning look. Um, why are you confused? I just wanna get to safety as soon as possible.

“Probably two hours away.”

Two hours…

“Hey, maybe it’s time the captain…”

Gee-YAHHH!

A deep roar suddenly rumbled through the forest.

“Aghhh!”

“Wahhh!”

“Eek!”

“Huh?” I looked around, but it was hard to pinpoint the source of the roar.

“What? What was that?”

“We’re going to the village—double-time!”

At the captain’s signal, we fumbled to gather our things. Urk! It’s heavy. I wanna just leave it behind, but I can’t… Faster…faster… We made our way to the village, practically running by that point. After a while, we heard a rustling coming closer and closer. Shuddering in terror, I turned my eyes forward—and noticed the other survey team was just ahead of us.

“Hey!”

“Hey!”

Both teams saw each other at once—then hurried the rest of the way to the village in silence.

“Poor bastards. When they get to the village, there’s just gonna be a lot of other crazy people waiting.” I heard a quiet voice at a seven o’clock angle. It was too quiet for me to understand what it was saying, but my curiosity was sparked, so I looked behind me. “What’s wrong?” Tabir asked, giving me a strange look.

“Uh, didn’t you just say something?”

“I think I sense a monster coming after us.”

“Wha…?! Gee, thanks for the warning!” I searched for auras and did indeed sense one belonging to a monster, coming up fast. “Captain, there’s a monster approaching us.”

“H-hurry, men!” Both captains’ voices overlapped, sending the two survey teams retreating to Hataka at full speed.

“Pu!”

I thought I heard a strange sound, but I was too scared to look back. I had to hurry…there was a berserk monster on the loose!