Twilight Alchemist 53

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53. Talking About How True Best Friends Don't Need Words, Isn't It?

The sound of water splashing echoed in the dark underground passage.

"Craft-kun! Turn right there! There's a staircase after the bend. Go down there!"

"Roger that! Hyaa! Black Dragon, go!"

In the underground of Golden Dawn, a maze-like sewer system was being traversed by a horse.

It's my Black Dragon.

Despite being a sewer, thanks to its recent construction, the design allowing for the flow of large amounts of water, and simple purification, there was hardly any smell.

Without any difficulty, Black Dragon cut through the water, flowing up to the horse's knees, and ran as if it were nothing.

It would have been difficult for an ordinary horse to advance.

Riding through the three-dimensional underground sewer at full speed.

Riding the horse are me, Leifan, and Ed.

Luckily, Leafan and Ed are small, so riding three people wasn't a problem.

Without Leafan's guidance, who designed the sewer, we couldn't navigate through this maze-like underground passage.

However, since Leafan claims to have memorized all the routes, it's unbelievable.

"When you go up the stairs ahead, turn left!"

"Got it!"

"Craft-oniichan... I..."

"Shut up! You'll bite your tongue!"

"U-Understood..."

"Don't worry! Leave it all to me! I'll guide us once we're out."

"Yeah!"

The black horse dashed through the darkness, and we aimed straight for our destination.

◆

Meanwhile, it seems Raidoc and the others were in this situation.

"Hey hey hey... Seriously?"

"What on earth is that?"

"There's no way to know."

"Hmm..."

"I guess it just means the Forest of Magic is indeed magical."

Raidoc and the others were venturing deeper into the forest to investigate the situation with the Cockatrices, trying not to be found.

They hadn't encountered any Cockatrices due to taking quite a detour, but they were questioning the fact that they hadn't encountered any at all.

In the poorly visible forest, they continued to peer into the bushes with maximum vigilance.

In the depths of the forest, where the Cockatrices seemed to have multiplied significantly, stood peculiar trees.

Normally, having trees in the forest wouldn't seem strange. But these trees clearly emitted an eerie atmosphere.

The long, twisting branches of the large trees were all pitch black, emitting a black mist-like substance around them.

While not over a wide area, the peculiarity spread around the trees.

"Maybe..."

Bardock the sorcerer muttered.

"I heard from my master a long time ago that there are plants that drive monsters insane. We don't know the details, but perhaps..."

"Wait! Quiet!"

Sorrel the ranger issued a sharp warning.

Out of habit, everyone suppressed their killing intent and crouched down.

Several Cockatrices emerged from the depths of the forest.

"I don't want to fight here... Let's try to avoid being noticed."

"Understood."

"And the mist-like aura around these black trees is concerning. Everyone, drink Craft's universal potion just in case."

"Hmm."

Raidoc and the others held their breath, observing the Cockatrices.

The giant birds roamed the black forest for a while, but soon they began to nibble on the surrounding vegetation.

Upon closer inspection, not only the trees but also the undergrowth was pitch black.

The Cockatrices were eagerly eating these eerie branches and grasses.

"They're... eating...?"

"It seems so."

"Why would they want to eat something like that?"

"Rather, it's more like they're not even looking at the surrounding grass."

A sense of foreboding emerged.

It was a common understanding among them all.

As time passed, causing discomfort, the behavior of the Cockatrices gradually became strange. The once relatively calm giant birds suddenly began to scream or thrash around.

"Hey hey hey..."

The excited Cockatrices ran around for a while before suddenly sprinting straight away.

"Is that the direction of the town?"

"What's going on?"

Confirming there were no monsters around, they cautiously entered the black forest.

Upon closer inspection, most of the trees had snapped and disappeared from their trunks.

"What's going on?"

"...This!"

Sorrel picked up something green that had fallen to the ground.

About the size of a small shield, emitting a beautiful green sheen, Raidoc, and the others were familiar with it.

"That's!"

"A dragon scale!?"

"Could it be!?"

Sorrel and Bardock rushed to a nearby trunk.

"Look at this, there are marks as if it was shaved with thick fangs. It's unmistakably scraped by dragon fangs. In other words, it's evidence that a dragon was eating here!"

"Which means?"

"That's right. We don't know the frequency, but this black giant tree was, in some way, food for dragons!"

"And the reason the Cockatrices multiplied...?"

"Ah, it's because the dragons disappeared, making this area safe, and on top of that, these black giant trees became their favorite food!"

"Moreover, this giant tree seems to affect the Cockatrices strangely. Which means..."

"Is this the cause of the stampede?"

"Damn! We don't have confirmation, but let's burn it! Hurry!"

"""Oh!!"""

Raidoc and the others collected dry branches and dead trees from the surroundings, carefully ensuring they wouldn't spread, and set fire to the black forest.

After a day of work, they returned to their base camp.

Thanks to stamina potions, they weren't physically tired, but mentally, they were exhausted.

Raidoc and the others gathered around the campfire to discuss their next steps.

"So, what do we do now?"

"We burned that eerie forest, but was that the only place?"

"We might need to thoroughly search the forest once."

The party's brains, the sorcerer Bardock and the leader Raidoc were pondering.

"In any case, we should return to town for now. We need to keep an eye on the Cockatrices' movements."

"Indeed, given their behavior, it wouldn't be surprising if a stampede started."

"Plus, we've discovered the habits of the Cockatrices that could be useful. Craft might make good use of it."

"Yeah, I've been facing Cockatrices for the past few days and realized they have such weaknesses."

"While not definitive weaknesses, we can incorporate them into our extermination strategy."

"Yeah, for a while now, Raidoc and the others, who have been confronting Cockatrices, accidentally discovered some of their habits.

Although not very useful in the forest, if we use those habits, it might make it easier to exterminate the Cockatrices.

"Wait a moment!"

Suddenly, Sorrel shouted. When she raised her voice like this, something abnormal usually happened.

Everyone grabbed their weapons and stood up, alert to their surroundings.

"What's wrong!?"

"I hear something! Over there!"

From the darkness pointed out by Sorrel, they soon heard it.

Thud! Thud! Thud!

"This sound..."

"Raidoc!"

What burst into their base camp with a heavy thud that didn't sound like hooves was undoubtedly Craft and the others.

◆

"Craft!?"

Of course, it was Raidoc and the others who had their swords ready.

Thanks to Ed, we could find their location without hesitation after coming out of the underground.

There was a possibility they weren't at the camp, so I breathed a sigh of relief.

"I'm glad you're here!"

"From the looks of it, things seem pretty serious. Tell us what's going on."

"Yeah. Just a moment."

I placed my hand on Ed's head, who was feeling dizzy from the intense movements of Black Dragon.

"You did well, Ed. Thanks to you, we could reunite with Raidoc and the others quickly. Take a rest for a while."

"Y-Yeah..."

Rather than being surprised by Ed's presence, Sorrel, who noticed his condition immediately, lent him a hand, so I left Ed in her care.

Sitting around the fire, Raidoc spoke up immediately.

"It's a Stampede, right?"

"You've got it. It's pretty bad."

"People said that it would take another one to two weeks to gather all the petrification-related medicines, but is the town safe?"

"That's been resolved."

"As expected of Craft."

"I've got various stories, but forget about that for now. I want to ask you guys for something reckless. Although you have the right to refuse, I've brought a request from the guild."

I handed them the designated request letter I received from the Adventurer's Guild.

Upon seeing it, all of Raidoc's group smiled wryly.

"I think you and I have known each other for quite a long time, don't we?"

"Y-Yeah."

Raidoc directed a serious look at me.

But to his following words, I burst into laughter.

"In that case, instead of listening to such useless talk, tell us the plan."

I trembled at Raidoc's grin.

After that, I briefly explained the events leading up to now while refining the plan with Raidoc.

"So Ed and the others came all the way to this place. I'm not hiding anything, but I didn't expect them to know about this base camp."

"Sorry. I underestimated it. It's only natural for a child to end up like this when they possess the power of an adventurer."

Even I, if I had gained such power when I was a child, would have rushed into adventure without listening to the words of the priest who had taken care of me.

"That's right. In that case, we're also responsible. We overtrained them because I asked for it."

"Even so, we should have taught them more than just strength. Adventurers may be responsible for their own actions, but they're still children."

An adventurer would investigate what is right and what is wrong by themselves.

But Ed and the others are children. They have the ability, but they lack the knowledge, experience, and judgment. It was up to us to make up for that.

"Yeah. I feel like I understand why Kyle emphasizes the importance of education so much."

In this town, Kyle has made morning schools compulsory.

It was a development of the Sunday schools that churches and others had been conducting.

There was some resistance to taking away valuable labor force children. But by quickly enacting policies to supplement it, the concept of schools was beginning to take root in Golden Dawn Town.

"Children's education is a difficult thing."

"Yeah."

"Come on, you two, why so gloomy? Leafan-san's preparations are all done!"

"Sorry for the wait!"

Leifan had now put on the armor he had been storing in the spatial storage.

"All right! Let's go! Craft, are you okay?"

"Yeah. Leave it to me! We can also use the Cockatrice's habits you guys noticed."

"We may have missed the festival, but we'll still take the good parts."

"Haha. We'll leave that role to you guys."

The Raidoc party and Leafan led the way, followed by me and Ed riding on Black Dragon a little behind.

Everyone had already taken the universal petrification potion.

"Ed, you just need to relax and get caught. I'll definitely protect you."

"Y-Yeah, got it."

"If the battle starts, don't open your mouth and bite down on your molars."

"Got it."

"It seems like you're feeling a bit better. All right! Let's go!"

We dashed through the sunset-dyed fields, aiming to ambush the flock of Cockatrices from the side.