บท 5: Neighboring Village (Part 1)
It had been a few months ever since I found Yoru and since then, my quality of life had improved quite a bit too.
After saving Yoru, I actually went back to retrieve his parents' bodies and we gave them a proper burial. Even if they were wolves, Yoru was now my companion and it was the least I could do for him.
He had grown quite a bit too, but you could tell he was still a puppy. At night, we slept together, which was nice since Yoru was way more comfortable as a pillow than that fiber and feather trash I was using.
The weather was starting to get a bit cold. It wasn't so much of a problem in my house since I had designed an enchantment using fire and air magic and placed them on the walls of my house. So I had my own method of heating.
Yoru and I had also overhunted a bit, so we were pretty stacked with food too. Still, I didn't want to stop exploring or gathering unless it was absolutely necessary.
I mean, there could have been berries or animals that only came out during winter. If that was the case, I needed to be able to keep going out, even if it was snowing.
It was during those times that I stumbled across a group of bandits crossing the forest. At first, I thought they were just explorers or something, but after following them and listening to them talk, it was pretty clear that they were running away with people's belongings.
From what I heard, there seemed to be a village west of the forest that had a very low population, and since the guards were almost always busy fighting monsters that came from the forest, it was easy prey for these bandits.
I thought about letting them go their way. But a part of me also wanted to test my combat skills against actual people.
These were the first humans that I had seen in this world, and I was curious as to what they did. Besides, if these guys were bandits, then it wasn't even a bad thing for me to beat them up a little.
I waited for them to stop and rest, then jumped from the trees.
'Time to test my Kobudo skill in this world…'
"Hey, who the hell is that kid!?" said one of the bandits as he approached me, raising his club with one hand.
"Did you hear me kid!? Who the hell are y- ARGH!" He couldn't finish his sentence when my "bo" was already hitting the side of his face and knocking him unconscious.
'Oof, did he die?' I pondered, but I could still feel the man's heartbeat, so it was okay.
Just as the first bandit went down, the others surrounded me in a circle. There were 6 of them in total, and after beating the first one, I honestly thought I could beat them all. Even then, I still thought it was kind of unfair.
"Six bandits against one kid? Maybe I should call a friend too." I said to the bandits who were now wary of me, pointing their weapons and murmuring to each other stuff like:
"Is this kid a monster?"
"I mean, this is the End Forest. There could be monsters we don't know about…"
'Huh? These guys seem to know about the geography of this place…' I thought, just before I felt one of them rushing from the back towards me.
"Ah, yeah, that's not going to work…" I muttered.
As soon as the bandit launched himself towards me with his dagger, Yoru came out of my shadow on the ground and tackled the man down before he could ever get to me.
That was Yoru's skill called "Shadow Weaving". It allowed him to merge himself with any shadows, so of course, our strategy was to have him cover my back at all times.
Yoru's appearance must have scared the bandits a lot because they were not moving a muscle. He wasn't even fully grown yet. Honestly, I felt kind of disappointed.
"Let's just do this fast, I guess.." I said.
It took one hit of my "bo" to incapacitate each of the bandits. I tied their hands and feet together, then loaded them on a wooden cart that I made myself a few weeks ago using nature magic and carving trees.
My destination was west, I didn't know exactly how long, but I knew that the people they robbed were that way.
It took me over half a day to reach the village, even when I sprinted part of the way. Thankfully, none of the bandits regained their consciousness on the way back, or that would have been a little awkward.
As I approached the small village, I told Yoru to stay hidden in my shadow.
I noticed two men standing guard outside of the weak-looking fence that surrounded the place.
One of them ran inside the village, calling for someone as soon as they saw me, and the other yelled, "halt!" so I stopped.
Not even a minute later, another man with full plate armor came out from one of the small buildings near the village fence and walked towards me.
"Umm, sorry to bother you guys, but I think these bandits robbed this village not long ago…" I explained as the man in armor kept walking towards me.
'Hopefully they don't think I'm one of them or something…' I thought.
The man stood a few feet away from me, holding his spear tip upwards. He was at least 6 feet tall, with red hair and a ponytail. His face had a few scars, and his armor looked as if it had been used very recently in battle.
"So… you captured the bandit gang that fled to the End Forest two days ago? Asked the man with a very serious face.
"Y-yeah, heh. Anyways, I'll leave them here, take care…" I said as I picked up my "bo" and turned around. 'I should get the hell outta here…'
"Wait!" yelled the man as I was already making my way back into the forest. "Are you not staying the night in the village?"
'I suppose from his perspective, it does look pretty crazy to have a little kid deliver a bunch of bandits then run off to the forest at night…' I thought.
"Umm n-no, it's fine…"
"Come on! Besides, we owe you a reward for taking care of the "Black Snake Gang" and bringing all their stuff back." said the man as he placed a hand on my shoulder.
'Maybe it's not a bad idea… I could get more information about this place too…'
With that in mind, I accepted the man's offer and followed him inside the village.
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