The Guide (1)
From that day on, Lawrence shut himself away in his room and threw himself into magic.
He couldn’t afford to forget the stir witchcraft had given him.
Control and command over magic. And beyond that, outright mastery.
There was no better spell for practice than Shadow.
Ever since he had taken on commissions, he had focused so heavily on offensive magic that he had neglected it somewhat.
But in the end, one always returned to the technique most familiar to hand.
After so long, practicing Shadow was simply fun.
He played with it like a child with a doll.
Letting the Shadow circle lightly around the room once, he opened the window, then slipped through the narrow gap.
Through Shadow, his senses stretched outward.
The view beyond the window seemed to beckon to him.
Even before, when he had sent Shadow up a tree, he had been able to feel the surrounding environment—but now that power seemed to have grown stronger.
It probably wasn’t Shadow’s ability alone.
It was likely the power of the Seeing Eye, one of the Cognitive Concepts.
The Cognitive Concept that had grown under Acheron’s instruction in Dragon Valley seemed to have been further awakened through his meeting with Arwen.
He no longer needed to keep Shadow shaped like a doll.
As if sinking into the darkness itself, he moved down the corridor and into the parched front yard.
There were plenty of places to hide out there.
He hopped from shadow to shadow among the withered plants the sisters had tended, stepping lightly from one patch of shade to the next.
By the time he had crossed roughly half the yard, the mana needed to sustain Shadow no longer reached that far.
The distance had been stretching little by little each time he used Shadow, but only by a step or two at most; in practical terms, this seemed to be the limit of his control.
After working Shadow, he would walk the front yard.
It was a kind of check.
Had the sensations he felt through Shadow been accurate?
Had he missed anything? It was important to gauge just how far his control extended.
How many days had passed since he’d started practicing Shadow?
One day, Ignatius and Irene were speaking with visitors to the monastery.
“—!?”
A shout rang out.
A voice that seemed to bear down on the two of them, despite how calm they were.
It was so loud he couldn’t ignore it.
In the end, Lawrence had no choice but to give up his morning practice, unable to focus on Shadow at all.
He left his room and headed for the dining hall.
Going to find out what was happening was not an option he chose.
As a guest staying at the monastery, he had his own position to consider.
Getting involved in the monastery’s troubles didn’t seem wise.
Lawrence would be leaving soon.
There was no need to poke his nose into things he couldn’t take responsibility for.
And yet, even as time passed, the commotion did not die down.
* * *
The uproar continued even after a week had gone by.
No one could say what grievances they had in such abundance, but the complaints pouring into the monastery showed no sign of ending.
It naturally interfered with his magic practice as well.
It wasn’t a matter of concentration being good or bad.
Everything had its proper limit.
However much he might grit his teeth and endure for a day or two, even Lawrence had to get up and move when the noise kept hounding him.
When he finally followed the trouble to the chief priest’s room, he found a crowd of people already gathered outside.
“I’m sorry. My own inadequacy has caused you all inconvenience.”
“Not at all, Father. If anything, we’re the ones who should apologize.”
They were all believers visiting the monastery.
Lawrence had wondered why so many had gathered here, only to realize they too had been driven to Ignatius by the noise, just as he had.
Then again, even the guest rooms, far from the disturbance, had been noisy.
The chapel, which was even closer, needn’t be mentioned at all.
“Still, the harm has been done. This is serious. If we fail to resolve the matter as quickly as possible, more and more people will suffer. May the Goddess’s grace be with them.”
Ignatius pressed his palms together.
After watching him for a moment, Lawrence spoke once the believers had departed.
“May the Goddess’s blessing be with you. Chief Priest.”
“And may the Goddess’s blessing be with you as well, Brother Lawrence. So you’ve come too.”
As if he already knew why Lawrence had come, a bitter smile appeared at the corners of his mouth.
“The monastery has been rather unsettled lately, and I truly have no words of apology to offer.”
“There’s no need to apologize. This mess wasn’t your fault, was it?”
“That isn’t true. The root of all this trouble lies with me, for failing to lead the villagers onto the path of faith. This, too, is a trial sent by the Goddess, and I am prepared to meet it with steadfastness.”
My fault, my fault.
Ignatius struck his own chest.
“May I ask what you mean by that?”
“…It’s not something I’d be proud to speak of. Once you know the circumstances, Brother, you may find it uncomfortable as well.”
“If you’re saying that much, then the matter must be more serious than I thought.”
“To my shame, ever since I was placed in charge of Saint Dominic Monastery, it’s been something I experience every year.”
Every year? In other words, they had gone through this uproar annually and still hadn’t resolved it.
“As you know, the swamp during the wet season sees heavy rain, which makes the domains of wild animals and monsters more clearly bounded. The villagers know, at least in broad strokes, where to go to avoid what, and where to find what.”
He’d heard something similar during the commission.
In contrast to the wet season, during the dry season there was so little water and food that the domains of wild animals and monsters became tangled together.
In fact, near the end of that job, he had encountered a Bugbear.
After everything was over, the Ulbaniers had told him that it was supposed to be a safe area where not even Bugbears, let alone jaguars, usually appeared.
“So the problem is likely the Bugbear.”
He could still imagine handling wild animals somehow.
But once the story shifted to monsters, the situation became far more troublesome.
It was the same even if it wasn’t a Bugbear.
Even jaguars or goblins, the sort one might encounter along the road, were dangerous enough to the villagers.
Suddenly he thought of Neil, the man he’d first met when he came to the swamp.
That trick of disguising himself as a mound of earth might have been one of the villagers’ own ways of surviving in this swamp.
“That’s right. During the dry season, even the Bugbear’s territory becomes unstable. There’s the matter of water, of course, but they also leave their dens more often in search of prey.”
He understood now.
Just as the Ulbaniers moved through the swamp with their pasture cattle, the Bugbears had left their dens in search of a way to live.
“But what does that have to do with the monastery?”
He couldn’t help asking.
The expansion of the Bugbear’s activity range was due to the swamp.
No matter how he looked at it, they were blaming the wrong place.
“The villagers say the local spirits are angry.”
“The spirits?”
“I’m sure you’ve heard of them. The faith in the spirit gods runs deep throughout Ulbazar Swamp.”
Lawrence nodded.
“To them, we must seem like unwelcome outsiders. Even without that, they’d already have little reason to welcome us. Then the increase in damage during the dry season happened to coincide with the date I took office at the monastery. It’s no wonder they would misunderstand.”
“But it’s all a coincidence, isn’t it? They’re just making trouble for the sake of it.”
It was absurd.
What possible connection could there be between the church’s arrival in the swamp and the ecology of the Bugbear?
It might have made more sense to blame the mercenaries who came to hunt the Bugbears instead.
“What matters is that the damage increased.”
From the villagers’ perspective, who worshipped the spirit gods, there was no easier target to direct their anger at than outsiders.
He didn’t seem unaware of that.
This inept chief priest seemed to know it, and yet still accepted every bit of the resentment that had nowhere else to go.
That was probably why the villagers came all the way to the monastery every year to complain.
“This isn’t something that can be handled lightly. We have no choice but to work hard, over time, with sincerity and devotion. After all, everyone has their own earnest wish.”
“I wonder whether they’ll ever understand your feelings, Chief Priest.”
“Even if my feelings never reach them, that’s fine. The Goddess is one who embraces all with love and mercy. Please keep that in mind. The believers who come to the monastery now are residents of Remington as well.”
“……”
Ignatius’s expression remained serene.
There was not a trace of falsehood in his sincerity. Lawrence suddenly understood why he had always respected the clergy of the church.
Anyone can speak the right words.
But very few people can carry them out.
“Then this isn’t something that will be solved anytime soon.”
Perhaps with more time, it might be different.
But it wasn’t a problem that could be tied off right now.
“I have no words to offer.”
“No, not at all. I’d been feeling cooped up in my room anyway.”
He had never intended to stay in his room forever.
He’d only been devoting himself to training because there were a few things he wanted to test.
Now he also needed to find a guide who could take him deep into the swamp, and it was time to go out and gather information about what the swamp during the wet season was really like.
“I’m sorry if I seem to be rushing you, but has anyone agreed to serve as my guide?”
“I’m sorry. We haven’t found anyone yet.”
He had suspected as much.
If they had found a guide, they would have told him first.
“No need to apologize. I’m grateful simply that you’ve been looking into it for me. I’m going down to the village myself from today, so if possible, I’ll try finding a guide too.”
In the end, this was Lawrence’s own matter.
Whatever help Ignatius offered, the boy had to see it through himself.
There was much to prepare.
Before setting out, he needed to buy new equipment.
He also wanted to pick up a few potions for treating wounds, just in case.
As for a weapon, he would use the spear he was already accustomed to.
He also needed a leather cuirass to wear beneath his robe.
If there happened to be a magic shop—though he wasn’t sure there would be—he wanted to learn new spells there as well.
When he had first arrived in Remington, he had no money to his name, so he had taken on the commission first. Acting without thought suited Lawrence poorly.
Before accepting a job, he gathered information thoroughly.
What monsters usually appeared.
Their strengths and weaknesses.
What kind of reward was worth the danger.
He needed to weigh all of it on the scales and compare.
This was work he would carry out with his life on the line.
No amount of preparation was too much.
After thanking him once more, Lawrence left the chapel behind.
* * *
Lawrence headed first for the mercenary guild.
There was still time before nightfall.
If he wanted to see the liveliness of Remington, he would have to wait until the sun began to set.
The clerk at the counter was not the familiar one.
The middle-aged clerk, who looked a little older, answered Lawrence’s questions calmly.
“The swamp in the dry season is full of jaguars every year. At this time of year, it’s hard to even run into an Under Wolf or a goblin; mostly you only meet starving wild animals. Because of that, the bulletin board becomes filled with low-grade commissions—it’s the off-season, in a sense.”
The encounter with the Bugbear at the end of the commission had been an accident.
And not only the Bugbear. Once the territories became a complete mess, it became hard to predict how the monsters would behave.
The Bugbears appearing near the village now were also being treated as part of that same accident.
There was nothing more frightening than a situation beyond control.
In many ways, it wasn’t a pleasant season for mercenaries.
“Then what about the wet season?”
There was no need to dig through ledgers.
The clerk continued without hesitation.
“In the wet season, other monsters appear in the swamp instead of jaguars. Among them, many mercenaries knock on the door of our Remington branch guild in hopes of hunting the Eligator.”
“The Eligator?”
It was a name he’d heard now and then during the commission.
“The Eligator is a beast that lives in the river. Its body is like a giant lizard that walks on two legs, but its jaws are so powerful that its teeth can chew through steel. And its tail, which sometimes lashes out, can even take the head clean off a helmet, so you have to stay on guard at all times.”
It was hard to picture clearly.
When he heard “a lizard walking on two legs,” the only thing that came to mind was a Lizardman.
“How does it compare to a Forest Spider?”
“A Forest Spider, hmm… It’s been a long time since I’ve heard that name. There’s an old saying: if you meet a Forest Spider in the woods, run without looking back. The same goes for the Eligator. If you run into one in the water… you should assume you’re already dead.”
“That sounds like you’re saying there’s no way to fight it while you’re in the water.”
“Exactly. That’s why the chance to hunt them comes when they come out of the river.”
“……”
As if even talking about it was tiring, the clerk gave a bitter smile.
“Is it prey worth taking on that much risk? The fact that so many mercenaries come to the swamp just to hunt an Eligator alone makes it sound as though the byproducts are pretty lucrative.”
“They are. Eligator hide sells for an enormous price. In particular, flawless top-grade hides are considered rare even among nobles.”
At the mention of nobles liking it too, Lawrence’s ears perked up.
“Could you tell me roughly how much it goes for?”
“Prices vary depending on the season, but flawless top-grade hide starts at a minimum of one gold. The price changes wildly depending on size. In the past, the tail hide of an Eligator hunted by a Silver Plate mercenary sold for more than five gold.”
Five gold.
It was the kind of sum that would make anyone’s eyes spin.
If he could lay hands on that much money, buying a spellbook from a magic shop would be nothing.
“That’s a tempting story.”
“And that’s how a great many people die. More than anything, Eligator territory only lies deep in the swamp. A veteran guide has to go with you, and you need a party as well, so the actual money you walk away with isn’t all that much. Hauling the hide from the depths back to the village is work in itself.”
It wasn’t over once you got the byproduct.
Tanning. Transport. Disposal.
Only after all of that did the money finally reach your hands.
Still, if he could get a top-grade hide…
Wasn’t it worth dreaming of a windfall?
“Oh, right. Does the village have a magic shop by any chance?”