'What’s that?'
At first, Erica thought she had seen it wrong, but there was definitely a person there.
Erica stopped in her tracks and looked around warily.
Having confirmed that there was nothing else particularly visible, she cautiously approached the unconscious person.
The unconscious person was a young man.
Erica blinked and looked down at him with a perplexed expression.
She had good reason to, as there was dried blood around him on the ground.
She brought her ear close to his face.
She could hear faint breathing, which confirmed that he was not a dead body, but a living person.
'...He doesn’t seem to have any wounds?'
Erica examined his body from head to toe with a curious gaze.
It was strange that there were no visible injuries, even though there was so much blood on the ground.
She gave him a light kick, wondering if there might be a wound on his front.
However, there was no visible injury on his front either, only stubborn bloodstains.
Her gaze turned towards the lower half of the man’s body, but then she furrowed her brows and looked away.
'What should I do?'
Erica was lost in thought for a moment.
It was not a particularly favorable situation for a person to be lying naked in the middle of the forest.
Moreover, this was a remote area where few pedestrians passed by. The only outsiders who occasionally visited were the residents of the nearby village.
'He doesn’t look like a resident of the village, no matter how I look at it...'
First of all, it was a face that she had absolutely no recollection of.
With a beautiful face, fair skin, and an appearance that definitely didn’t look like a villager from a rural village, there was even a strange sense of nobility.
Erica reached out and poked the man’s body again.
“Excuse me... can you hear me?”
There was no sign of him coming to his senses or even flinching.
She briefly considered pouring water on his face to see if it would wake him up.
Suddenly, she heard a sound and looked around in surprise.
Rustle, rustle.
A few brown, furry animals appeared through the bushes. They were a pack of wild dogs that lived in the forest.
Did they smell blood and come running? Usually, there were no big predators that ventured this close to the edge of the forest.
She narrowed her eyes and looked around at the ground. She had left her axe behind, so she didn’t have any weapons in her hands.
Fortunately, she soon found a thick wooden stick and quickly grabbed it.
“Why won’t these damn dogs back off?”
She swung the stick around, but the dogs didn’t retreat and continued to approach her cautiously.
So, Erica gave up on threatening them and grabbed the stick with both hands, assuming a defensive stance.
The dogs didn’t seem to show any signs of backing down, even though their eyes seemed to be going crazy from hunger.
As they faced off for a moment, one of the dogs that was behind her suddenly lunged at her.
Erica didn’t panic and quickly turned her body, swinging the stick.
Kehng!
With a lively thud, a wild dog was hit straight on the head, bounced off the ground and rolled over, motionless.
Other wild dogs, whining and barking, gave up on attacking and turned around to run away.
Erica sighed and threw her stick to the ground.
Then, a sound coming from the side was heard and Tom and Heron soon revealed themselves.
“Hey, are you okay?!”
The two hurriedly ran over upon hearing the dog’s howling.
Erica gestured that she was okay and turned her gaze to the side again.
As the two approached, they also discovered the unconscious man beside her, and their eyes widened.
“What, what is he?”
Tom alternated his gaze between Erica and the man, then covered his mouth with his hand.
“Goodness, did he commit a crime? Did you kill someone?”
“Are you kidding me right now?”
Heron slapped Tom on the back of his head and asked.
“What the hell is going on, Erica?”
“I don’t know either. He was just lying in the woods. I checked, and he seems to be breathing, but...”
Heron approached the man with a serious expression.
Then he examined the man’s condition and muttered in a curious voice.
“...It doesn’t seem like he’s injured anywhere, but what’s with all this blood?”
Tom stood next to him, scrutinizing the man from side to side, and said.
“More importantly, why is he lying here naked? There are no clothes nearby. Was he attacked by thieves?”
“Why would thieves appear in this area?”
Erica interjected, “Forget the pointless talk. What are we going to do?”
Tom replied bluntly, “What else can we do? We need to get to the priests quickly.”
Heron shook his head and disagreed, “We can’t just take him there blindly. We need to bring the priests here.”
“Why?” Tom asked.
“He’s an outsider with an unknown identity. Have any of you seen someone like him before among the villagers?”
“No, but...”
“That’s why we need to be careful. Let’s go back to the monastery quickly for now.”
At that moment, Erica quietly stared at the man and said, “Let’s just take him there now.”
“What?” Tom asked.
“With all the blood around and his condition, he could be in critical danger. What if he dies if we waste any more time?”
Then she quickly grabbed the man’s body.
Tom was taken aback and quickly approached her. “Hey, let me carry him.”
“Whatever.”
“Give me something to cover him with, Heron. We can’t just take him like this.”
With a sigh, Heron threw his shirt at Tom.
Thus, they took the unidentified man and hurried back to the monastery.
***
“......”
When I opened my eyes, the first thing in my sight was an unfamiliar ceiling.
I quickly sat up, but was met with a piercing pain throughout my body.
Then I heard a voice next to me.
“Are you awake?”
A knight dressed in armor stood a little away from the bed. He spoke again.
“Please wait a moment. I’ll go get someone.”
Without saying anything else, he immediately left the room.
I looked at the closed door for a moment in confusion, then looked around.
“...What is this place?”
'Where am I?'
I shook off my drowsiness and tried to remember.
The battle with Ditrodemian, the gamble that risked my life to kill him.
And after it was all over, I found myself in this strange place for no apparent reason.
“......”
But I couldn’t make sense of the situation, no matter how hard I tried to remember.
As I sat there in confusion, someone entered the room again after a short while.
It was the knight from before, along with another man who looked like a priest.
The man who approached me with a gentle smile asked,
“You’re up already. That’s a relief.”
“......”
I couldn’t find any words to say, so he spoke again.
“The monastery people found you unconscious in the forest and brought you here.”
“...Monastery?”
“Yes, this is a monastery. Are you feeling alright?”
While wondering what all of this meant, I tried to answer, but once again furrowed my eyebrows.
Pain surged through me like a needle whenever I tried to move my body even a little.
The man raised his head and looked at me.
“You don’t seem to be doing well. Hmm, there are no noticeable external injuries, though...”
“...More importantly, where am I?”
He kindly answered my question.
“As I mentioned earlier, this is a monastery. It’s the Robelgio Monastery.”
“No, not that. I’m asking which area are we.”
“What do you mean?”
“Is this Gardret City?”
He looked at me with an expression that seemed to ask why I was asking something strange.
“If you’re talking about Gardret... are you referring to the city where the Mage Tower in the west of Santea is located?”
“Yes.”
“This is the Poston Territory on the south-eastern frontier of Santea.”
I couldn’t help but look bewildered.
Wasn’t this the complete opposite of Gardret City?
The magic tower and the place where I fought with Detrodemian were clearly near Gardret City, so what the hell happened?
“If you’re feeling confused, would you like to postpone the conversation for a while? You can take as much rest as you need.”
“No, it’s okay.”
I nodded.
As I talked a little more with the man, I was able to roughly piece together the situation. First of all, this place was a monastery called Robelgio, located in the south-eastern frontier of Santea. And apparently, the people at the monastery had found me unconscious in the forest and brought me here.
The man’s name was Tane, and he introduced himself as a priest of the monastery. He also asked for my name.
I was about to say Ron, but I said a different name.
“My name is Ethan.”
“Ah, you’re Mr. Ethan. May I ask how you came to lose consciousness in the forest?”
He was asking what I was doing there.
I tried to come up with an excuse and replied, “I was just a wanderer passing by. I don’t remember why I lost consciousness.”
The man didn’t seem completely convinced, but he nodded without asking any more questions.
He seemed more concerned about my physical condition and asked me various questions. Perhaps it was because he was a priest, but I was surprised at how kind he was to someone he just met for the first time.
“Since I’m feeling okay, can you give me some time alone to rest for a moment?”
“Sure. Then...”
“I really appreciate your help.”
“Don’t mention it. Please thank the children who found you and brought you here, not me.”
'...Children?'
He left with a cheerful smile, telling me to call him anytime if I needed anything, and walked out of the room with the knight.
I sighed and looked out the window.
'What on earth is going on...?'
I couldn’t figure out what had happened.
Why had I suddenly been transported from the west of Santea to a completely different region? It was as if I had been teleported in an instant...
'Teleported?'
Wait a minute.
Didn’t I get caught up in Ditrodemian’s spatial severing at the last moment?
Could it be that it sent me flying to the other side of space instead of breaking through the barrier?
...I didn’t know exactly what happened.
But it seemed like at least being caught in his spatial severing was the cause.
Otherwise, how could I have been teleported to such a far-off place for no reason?
“I’m going crazy, really...”
I scratched my head, feeling perplexed.
On the other hand, I felt relieved that I was still alive.
Considering that I had been engulfed in flames and my body had burned to the point where my bones were exposed, it was a miracle that I hadn’t died in my unconscious state.
It was while I was lost in thought, staring into the empty space, that I felt a presence outside and the door opened once again.
