episode_0105

“Julias, there is a strangling bug on your head. Watch your head.”

“Heung.”

Fu shoot──!

At Julias’ hand gesture, a long, thin water jet like a water jet was launched from the water ball created in the air. The water pressure is so strong that it completely scrapes the front, splitting trees and splashing wet sawdust.

Clap!

Soon the sound of something falling was heard from afar.

After a while, I realized it was something like an inchworm with the front legs of a centipede. That’s a strangler bug.

“Aaaah?!”

Shir clings to me as a shield.

The six legs stretched out in front of the long body look like appendages like the lips of a spider. Like an inchworm, it pretends to be a tree, and when its prey comes down, it grabs its neck with its six strong front legs.

Julias didn’t seem to like the bugs, so he burned them. Strangler insects cannot be roasted until they turn into ashes and scatter away. It had tremendous firepower, comparable to that of an incinerator.

Fortunately, the fire did not spread because there was no sunlight and it was humid. Julia was trembled as she passed the strangler bug that had turned into ashes.

“If a bug catches me, I will burn down this forest.”

I see you hate Julia too.

“If that’s the case, the Lint calligraphy that lives in this forest will pop out.”

“You stopped me back then! Or kill them.”

“The eyes of every dragon in the South are the eyes of a root snake. If you kill the dragon with magic, you will be skewered to death by the southern guardian deity.”

“Can’t you even talk? You idiot.”

···The root snake is the guardian deity of the South?

If you listen to the story, it seems that if you greatly damage the forest, the root snake will punish you. But what they do is exactly the opposite. You roasted an insect so large that it could eat a person in one go, right?

No matter how humid the place was, why did they start the fire?

If there was a forest fire, something terrible would happen.

“Was there a reason why it had to be burned? The fire could spread. If that happens, won’t the Lint call come?”

“No. If you leave it behind, the body keeper will catch up with the smell of blood.”

Corpse keeper?

The name is really creepy.

“What kind of insect is that?”

“An insect that carries a house made of corpses.”

“···Making a house out of corpses?”

Jules let out a groan as if he was thinking about something.

“During the Great War, there was a story about corpses of meat crawling here and there. Everyone thought it was a lie, but someone caught it. That was the corpse keeper.”

······.

“Thanks to dragging corpses around, their bodies always smell bad. There is nothing worse than the odor of rotting and melted flesh. The moment my sense of smell is paralyzed, I become unable to distinguish between danger factors.”

Listening to Jules’ words, it seems like it’s just a smelly animal rather than a dangerous insect. Could this be similar to a bug? It’s disgusting to imagine.

‘A tong made from a corpse.’

If you see it even once, it is certain that the monster will appear in your dreams for the rest of your life. Jules’ head suddenly turns.

“Shir. A stride is coming towards you.”

“――――――?!”

My bones became bitter.

“? Stride?”

Juul turns around and heads into the darkness—— Boom!

The sound of a bowstring being flicked is heard.

who? It looks like Shir hasn’t figured out the situation yet, and I didn’t shoot him.

···It’s Dennis.

Rustling──! Passyuk!

I can’t really guess its size, but just by hearing the rustling sound, it doesn’t seem to be of a normal size. What made no sense was that the stridor was behind a bush.

“···Do you see that?”

Dennis nods.

“Because I am an associate of the Moon Priest. Is it okay if I retrieve the arrow?”

” That’s how it should be.”

Jules and Dennis laughed and went into the bushes.

And───.

“Ugh…!”

I saw Grima stuck in the ground, twisting his body in all directions.

If you add up the length of its legs, it is about the size of an adult woman! The length of his body alone is bigger than mine!

“How did you guess it? These guys are as fast as an arrow.”

Juul let out an exclamation and cut off Grima’s neck with a dagger. But Grima’s legs move as sensitively as a chicken with its head cut off.

“Just predict.”

prediction?

“···Is it possible to hit something running at the speed of an arrow with an arrow?”

Julias tilts his gaze towards me.

“Don’t you know? The moon priest’s collateral can sense the presence of animals.”

Perhaps because he was talking about himself, Dennis glances this way. In hindsight, it was Dennis who sensed Cookie Cutter’s presence the first.

“Really?”

“Diana is the goddess of fertility and a servant who enjoys hunting and communicates with animals. The ability was also inherited from Luna’s blood relatives.”

Elves have that ability?

“What does rapport mean?”

“The Moon Priest can also give orders to animals. Even to wild animals such as cockatrices and sea animals. It seems like direct descendants can even have a conversation.”

······You can control the seawater?

Come to think of it, there was a child stroking the knuckles of Ymir’s grave. So, doesn’t that mean they have the power to dominate the South?

‘But why don’t we live together at Ymir’s tomb?’

“Recovered.”

Soon, with a single gesture from Julias, Grima burned, emitting the smell of grilled squid.

Everyone was sitting together in a cube made of clay, with a lamp in the center, as if telling a horror story.

There were tiny holes in the ceiling, and the sound of something scraping on the wall could be heard nearby.

“Is there any poison with a smell that bugs don’t like?”

Julias looks at Jules with sallow eyes.

“···Do you know what kind of bug that is?”

“Cockroach. I think I smelled something dry.”

Oh my god.

Goosebumps run down my spine. ······Is it only me who is excited, but other people are making faces that say it doesn’t matter anything.

I was so tired that I had no time to think.

“Anything else?”

“Millipede… Damn it.”

The tired gazes of the people who were resting are drawn to Jules’ swearing.

“It’s Snally Gaster! Get down!”

Snally Gaster?

Someone hit the back of my head───.

“Ugh!”

Julia hit my head on the floor!

Jules fell while holding Shir.

Dennis also sticks to the floor.

“Aunt?!”

Patter!

Dirt pours from the ceiling.

The one that broke through the mud wall was Gin───.

‘straw?’

It looked like a cicada’s snout.

“You must never stab that guy in the mouth! If you do that, even your bones will melt, leaving only the skin!”

Soon, something dripped out of the pierced mouth, like a mosquito injecting formic acid into a person’s body.

Cheap profit…!!!

The soil began to melt and acrid gas spread.

It’s a strong acid, not formic acid! If you breathe that gas, you will die!

“Julias! Explode the mud wall!”

Jules’ scream echoes.

Green onions!

The earthen wall exploded at once and flew in all directions like a grenade.

“Sihyeon! Turn on the lights!”

“A few outlines!”

“Everything!”

I lit the oiled torch with a lighter.

I threw them one by one where Jules and Dennis were, then threw my portion on the floor and attached an arrow to the bowstring.

A water ball was created in Julia’s hand, and it seemed like it was going to spray a water jet towards Snally Gaster at any moment. And… Snally Gaster was startled by the torch and disappeared without even showing me.

“······I went.”

Dennis loosened his bowstring.

“We’re still at the beginning of the forest, so why did Snally Gaster appear?”

Jules’ expression was unusually stiff, and Julias tilted her head as if she didn’t know what was going on. Dennis was on guard in all directions and began to supplement his torches with tree resin.

Shir had an anxious face and was looking at the three adults in turn.

When the three of them talk, they speak in Elvish, so Shir will feel uneasy. Perhaps because he thought he had to do something, he eventually came and sat down next to me and started helping me replenish the torch.

‘What are the adults saying?’

I asked quietly, but it’s best not to know.

‘I just heard that’s a very rare seawater.’

“···There is a problem with the Lintcall that rules the forest.”

After a long silence, Jules comes to a conclusion.

“Isn’t it possible that only that individual showed abnormal behavior?”

“Snally Gaster injects dragon blood poison into the body of its prey and then sucks the prey that has melted into water. It takes a few days for it all to melt. That’s why I never abandon my hiding place to hide my prey.”

“···Isn’t there a possibility that they built a nest here?”

Jules shakes his head.

“There is no prey here that Snally Gaster can touch. They only eat animals with red blood, and they are found in the wetlands in the center of the Black Forest.”

“But there is no creature in the Black Forest that can pierce Lindt’s carapace!”

“Yong’s strange events are not necessarily caused by certain sea waters. For example───.”

“Territory fight with other dragons.”

Jules nods at Julias words.

“That’s my opinion too. Because there are dragons that are tolerant of predators around them and dragons that are not. The dragon that took over the new territory must have chased away something that was bothersome.”

Dennis drooled at Jules words.

“It would be better to go back and take the blazed path.”

“No, we have to move on like this.”

“It’s too dangerous. If the animal’s habitat were turned into a mess, there would be no place more hellish than this place. The three of us have been through enough of the South, but those two kids haven’t?”

Dennis got slightly excited and pointed at me and Shir.

Jules, who had been silent while looking at us, continues speaking.

“I have to summon the dragon.”

“···What are you trying to do?”

“I plan to ask Yong for a favor. If it doesn’t work out, let’s go back then.”

Jules looked at Julias with subtle eyes.

“Julias. Burn it all to the cobwebs on the tree.”

“···Huh?”

“You said you wanted to burn it, right? Do whatever you want.”

What kind of bullshit is this all of a sudden?

I’m keeping my mouth shut because I don’t think they’re trying to intervene, but this is unsettling. Why is the spider web 100m above suddenly burning?

Julias looks at Jules with a reluctant expression on his face.

“···Can you handle it?”

“If I couldn’t do it, I didn’t say anything.”

A haze began to rise around Julias.

And finally, he looks intently into Jules eyes as if to ask his opinion.

“Get rid of it. Gorgeously.”

Yulias glanced at Jules, who was expressing groundless confidence, and let out a deep sigh.

“I know that if you blame me for the dragon, you will die.”

Julia closes her eyes and raises her hands to the sky.

However, it wasn’t like fire was shooting out of my hand or anything like that.

The spider web that covered the forest 100 meters above did not burn like hair, but began to melt and drip. Of course, it cooled down enough while it was falling, so it didn’t feel like hot candle wax, but it was sticky.

Like glue.

The joints that forcibly connected the bushes on the trees fell apart, and sunlight began to faintly enter the black forest.

─Bash!

The sound of rummaging through the bushes comes from somewhere. As sunlight entered the black forest, bugs began to run away.

uh?

A human-sized spider comes down from the sky.

As a spider that survives by attacking houses, it descended through spider webs, but without exception, Julia melted even those.

Thanks to this, the spider fell headlong toward the ground from a fairly high place.

Fujijik—!

“Kyaaa?!”

Shir threw away the torch he was replenishing and hid behind me. Crush me. Anne can’t move thanks to Shir. Quite surprised───

Fujik!

“──────?!”

The spider fell and died instantly.

Soon, spiders started raining from the sky.

Fujik! Pop! Boom!

Spiders falling from the 40th floor of an apartment building exploded, scattering their contents everywhere. It is right that animals with many legs should become extinct, but Juul’s true intentions are unknown.

Juul jumped high as if it was a spike and hit the spider that was falling this way, but the spider exploded in Juul’s hand, and I ended up throwing the exploded spider over.

“Kyaaagh?! Aunt────?!”

Like me, Shir was covered in spider fluid.

Anyway, something is caught on my arm. What, spider legs?! When I looked up at Juul, he gave a bitter smile with an embarrassed look.

“···Sorry.”

“That’s it.”

“Phew!”

Julias approached me, mocking Jules subtly.

“Ah, I feel refreshed!”

Bogrrr.

Yulias produced a utensil and came out to clean off the spider fluid and internal organs from Shir’s body.

“···Thank you. But why does spider web melt?”

“There are many species of bugs here that reject even moonlight. It’s extremely sensitive to light. If you melt the spider web like this, there will be space for sunlight to enter. All bugs within the radius will head to a place where there is no sunlight or reflected light.”

···no.

In that case, it would have been better to act like this from the beginning.

But the fact that this method was not adopted───.

“Isn’t this not summoning the dragon, but making the dragon angry?”

Jules shrugs.

“How can you find a dragon when it’s this wide? I have to make them come there first.”

That means you provoked the dragon!

Jules caught my gaze and began to speak while avoiding eye contact.

“I’m going because the root snake called me, I’m not crossing this forest for any other purpose. You will understand the purpose.”

Jules’ ears fluttered as he looked at me, and he looked ahead.

“It’s coming.”

“···What comes?”

I know this, but this question comes from the hope that it isn’t the case.

But Jules just laughed.

“The new master of the Black Forest.”

thud!

It was the sound of stamping feet.

With that alone, I was able to feel the overwhelming difference in mass.

Boom!

The angry dragon is coming…!