Chapter 14: Sudden

Chapter 14:
Sudden

 

WHEN FILIA RETURNED, she told me Elgis and Fira had agreed to help her get her abilities back.

“This is it!” shouted an enthusiastic Filia. “This is the day. I’ve made up my mind—let’s all go to the village chief’s place!”

We accompanied her, all four of us making our way to the village chief Elfeit. A massive moon cast the night in a faint white glow.

We weren’t going to a house, but to somewhere in the forest. The chief had immediately increased the number of people put on guard duty when we told him about Misery Mosery, and he himself had taken the lead in guarding the area.

“Dad, Mom, I’m going be magnificent!” said a rather fired-up Filia. Her two parents, following behind her, smiled and nodded.

Oh, hey—Filia wasn’t speaking so formally with her parents, was she? I didn’t really have any way of knowing what kind of conversation they’d had, but I was glad to see them getting closer again, like they were in the old days.

“Oooh, and I’m going to show Yuri the magnificence of my rebirth too. Eh he he he!”

“What is up with you?”

She’d been strangely super excited since she opened up about her abilities.

“Lia sure is cute, isn’t she?”

“Yes, Lia is adorable!”

“Eh he he! I am, huh?”

Ohhh. Her clueless parents were gonna build Filia up till she got carried away with just about anything. I needed to reel her back in a bit before she started causing trouble. Mission…begin!

I walked up alongside her. “Hey, Filia.”

“Ah, hello there, my good sir. What is it?”

“I was just looking at you, thinking about how you’re always sleeping like a kid,” I said in a gentle voice, looking down at my palms. “And I thought of something. See, I’ve always received incredible blessings from my muscles by training them, so I was just wondering, how much of that can I give back…you know?”

“Muscle…blessings? But that doesn’t have anything to do with me, does it?”

“If you’re really asking, then, no, it doesn’t. But: muscle.”

“What do you mean ‘but?’”

Huh? Didn’t she understand sentence structure? “Wow, okay, that’s unexpected. ‘But’ is a word that you use when you follow with something that negates the clause that came previously.” What an accurate and easy to understand explanation, as is the great talent of an intellectual muscle man. I was sure even Filia could understand. “Did you learn a lot?”

“No, um, it’s not that I don’t understand the meaning of the words themselves, but…”

“If there’s anything else you don’t understand, just ask me. I’m your partner, so I’m always available if you’re in trouble.”

“I sincerely appreciate the kind gesture, but I don’t know how you’re supposed to help anybody in trouble when you have absolutely no sense of direction.”

“Hold on, aren’t you the one with no sense of direction? The only reason we met was because you got lost in the forest, Filia.”

Filia sighed. “How long are you going to keep saying that?! Just forget about it already!”

Fira, watching us from behind, had a gentle look on her face. “You two get along so well. Don’t they, Elgis?”

“Hrm. It’s too soon for them to get married, though! Lia, it’s far too soon!”

When had anybody brought that up? It seemed a little early for Elgis to be going senile!

 

***

 

Soon enough, we found Elfeit at his post in the forest, wearing the same robes he wore during the day. He looked to us and spoke, his voice calm and flat. “I see the Windia family is here, and the human is with them. What business do you have?”

“Noble village chief, I’ll be blunt: It’s about my abilities. We—”

“Breeeeeee!” A high-pitched whistling cut through the air, cutting Filia off. Everyone in the group paled—except for me.

Fira glanced about. “Th-that’s the emergency signal?!”

So that’s what it was. But what was the emergency?

“We’ll talk later, all right?” said Elfeit, looking in the direction of the signal.

Filia nodded. “Yuri, let’s go!”

“Of course!” I was already running. What if Misery Mosery had appeared? I wasn’t gonna miss an opportunity to fight an opponent like that. I didn’t know how strong he was, but he had to really be something.

I ran through the forest as fast as I could, not caring if anyone was following behind. Whatever was going on, whoever had made that sound was in a pretty dangerous situation right now, and I wanted to help if I could. With that in mind, I went at full speed.

And there it was, this grotesque monster the likes of which I’d never seen before, attacking a crowd of elves. The monster’s black body stood in contrast to its six white limbs. It tried to swallow an elf with a sharp, toothy mouth.

“Hooah!”

No point in a “Hi.” I just rushed in and punched the monster. I glanced back the way I’d come, but there were still no signs of Filia and the others. Oops—by running at full speed, I’d pulled way far ahead. I’d have to defend these elves on my own for a tick. Not exactly my specialty, but it wasn’t like I could complain to anybody about it right now.

“Hey, you okay?!” In the meantime, I checked to see if the nearly swallowed elf was conscious.

The elf responded to my call, his eyes fluttering weakly. “Y-yes…” Still conscious, then. “Be careful…” he continued, “…the poison…it…”

“I understand. You just concentrate on staying conscious. As for him… He’s mine.” I fixed my gaze on the monster.

“Huarrghhhhssssh…” The monster repositioned and let out a bizarre roar. Its white legs stood out eerily in the night-cloaked night. I tried to get a sense of the monster’s strength, make sure it couldn’t get the jump on me. Seemed like a nasty fella; there were no signs of any other monsters in the area—maybe he’d scared them off.

“So it’s one-on-one, huh? Should be fun. Let’s have a go!”

“Hhooarrgh!”

I ran at the monster. It skittered in close with its six legs. Was it faster than me? Hrm. I guess it’d come down to power—I clenched my fist and took a swing.

Our two shadows flew past one another—and one of them burst open.

I sighed and glanced down at the monster’s ruptured corpse. It was strong—maybe even Rank B in terms of power—but it wasn’t hard to deal with mano a mano. Two or three of ’em, now that might’ve been something to worry about.

The poison pouch in the monster’s body had ruptured as well. I was now covered from the head down in dripping purple liquid. “So, this is the poison, huh?”

The elf that had collapsed called out to me. “Hey, you okay?! The poison…”

He didn’t need to worry. “Eh, don’t worry ’bout it. I’ve trained, so I’m fine. Worry about yourself, my guy.”

His wounds weren’t deep, but it seemed like the poison had already seeped in. We’d have to get him treated fast.

Just then, Filia and the others caught up.

“Yuri, are you okay?!”

“I’m fine, Filia. Don’t worry about me. Help this poor fella. Seems like he’s been poisoned.”

“Got it!”

Filia set about curing the collapsed elf with her recovery magic. White light surrounded him, and in the blink of an eye, the elf’s complexion improved. He’d be fine.

As Filia treated the elf, Elfeit stared down at the tattered remains of the monster. “This is the same kind of monster from back then…”

“You know it?”

“This one here is about two or three times smaller, but I’m sure of it. A monster like this nearly destroyed our village a few years ago.”

Right, Filia had mentioned something like that before—the one the traveling adventurer had taken care of, who’d inspired her to go adventuring herself.

“Most likely,” Elfeit continued, “this is the spawn of that beast, left behind after its death. It only just so happened to come by now.”

“I see. So this had nothing to do with Misery Mosery then, yeah?”

“Exactly.”

Hm. I guess I could accept that, but…it still wasn’t good. I ground my teeth, keeping my mouth closed so no one could see. The battle had been over so fast, my body was starting to throb all weird. I couldn’t help it!

“Gather the injured,” said Elfeit in a commanding voice. “Let’s return to the village at once.”

Aw man, but—if I could’ve fought Elfeit right then, that would have been tons of fun. Maybe if I just—wait, nope, I had to be patient, for Filia’s sake! Had to…be…patient…

 

***

 

“Noble village chief, what was the sound earlier?!”

“Nothing to worry about anymore, I assure you.”

When we returned to the village, and people flocked around us—or rather, around Elfeit.

“Calm yourselves, everyone.” Just a wave of his hand seemed to ease the nervous crowd. “Yes, the alarm you heard earlier signaled a monster attack. It was the spawn of the monster that attacked the village all those years ago, but there is no need to worry. It has been slain at the hands of this human. The wounded have been fully healed thanks to Filia’s recovery magic.”

With the explanation out of the way, Elfeit turned to me. “As village chief, I must offer you my thanks.”

“Nah, no need to thank me. What I’d like is for you to listen to Filia.” Filia had been interrupted before, after all, after hyping herself all day for this. I was sure she wanted to get everything out of the way as soon as possible.

The village leader nodded. “Very well… Let’s talk.”

Filia, facing Elfeit directly, full of resolve, bowed and opened her mouth to speak. “Noble village chief…please restore my abilities.”

But maybe she bowed too quick, because Elfeit replied at once. “Unacceptable. Are you trying to sully the name of our Almighty Wind God?”

Filia choked up, falling silent. In her place, Elgis and Fira stepped in and bowed to Elfeit.

“Please, noble village chief!” said Elgis.

“Please, restore this girl’s abilities to her!” said Fira.

The people of the village looked shaken when Filia’s parents joined in. The very idea of defying the village chief shocked them. Even Elfeit looked down at them with a slightly surprised look. “Surely…surely you two understand what you’re asking me, don’t you?”

They didn’t answer. They simply kept their heads down.

“Dad, Mom…oh, noble village chief, please listen to us!” Filia bowed once again.

But Elfeit was firm. He didn’t even move. A stalemate.

“Come on, isn’t it all right to just give them back?” said a voice in the crowd. Just a villager, someone who’d gathered in response to the emergency. But at his words, a ripple ran through the crowd, like a stone had been tossed into the water.

“Yeah,” said another. “they saved the village. If she asks you a favor…”

Another: “She helped us working in the fields. Besides, those abilities are hers, right? We should let Filia do what she wants!”

“Yeah! If Filia says she wants them back, wouldn’t it be good to give them to her? My husband was on guard—she saved his life with her recovery magic!”

The stream of support became a great river, and now no one could stop it. Everyone—everyone in the entire village—spoke up, voicing their agreement.

“All of you…” muttered Elfeit.

The village leader shook his head.

“Well, I suppose that even if I refused, no one would listen. Very well,” said Elfeit, sounding defeated. Then he turned away from us and declared to everyone in the village: “Filia Windia. I will permit you to regain your ‘Wind God’ and ‘Clairvoyance’ abilities.”

That was it, then: In that moment, Filia had accomplished what she’d set out to do by returning to this village.

Good for her! I felt a little useless, but that was fine. I really just wanted to congratulate her for settling this on her own.

“Th-thank you very much!” Filia stammered.

Elfeit nodded, still standing with his back to her. “The magical tool we used to seal away your abilities has been kept at the shrine. Elgis knows where it is. He can accompany you.”

Filia nodded. She and Elgis readied to go amidst a joyous crowd. Everyone raised their voices to congratulate Filia, when suddenly—

“Huh?!” Elfeit roared. “What in the world is that?!”

I scanned the surroundings, but I couldn’t sense anything particularly unusual. “What’s going on?”

“I don’t—?!” Elfeit shook his head. “Something’s coming!”

“What?” And finally, I felt it too. “I see!”

About a hundred meters away, an unusually concentrated power blazed like a sun to my senses—probably someone’s magical energy. And it was getting closer and closer to the village. It was strong, probably even stronger than that majin I’d faced.

It didn’t feel natural, not like a monster. It gave off this kind of thick, murky aura, emanating with the meaningless slaughter of countless innocents. It was him. It had to be.

The man of Sinmarch. “Crazy Face” Misery Mosery.

“I’m going. Filia, get your folks out of here and take shelter.” Talk about bad timing. Ugh, couldn’t he have waited till after Filia’s big moment? “All of you, scram! He’s coming!”

The elves ran, taking refuge from the oncoming presence. Elfeit and I ran through the crowd, against the flow, until at last we were confronted with the source of this enormous mass of power, the slaughtering presence.

“Nice to meet you, heathens,” said the tall man. A revolting mask adorned his face. It was a deep, scarlet red, carved with an expression of perfect agony. A scent wafted through the air from the mask, and I knew it wasn’t dye, but blood. The blood of dozens. Maybe hundreds.

“Who are you?” demanded Elfeit.

“Oh? I suppose an elf who chooses such a remote little hidey-hole wouldn’t know of me. Please allow me to introduce myself: I am Misery Mosery, a humble follower of the Great Dark God. Some charming people call me ‘Crazy Face.’”

“Irrelevant. What is your business in this village?”

“Hm? That should be obvious. You see, I am here to slaughter heathens. My dogma demands my hatred, you see, of those with pale skin and long ears. I speak of a purge. I speak of a purification of filthy blood, stained by your heretical religion. Oh, what’s wrong? You aren’t worried, are you? Come now, won’t you respect my doctrines? Petty, meaningless slaughter is the creed of my Great Dark God, and I am but a good little sheep.”

“Silence, young fool. You’ve insulted the Almighty Wind God. Do you expect to live? Your life will be cut short before you can offer a word of repentance.”

Tension hung and grew as the two glared sharply at one another.

Which, come on! What was I, chopped liver?