Level Eater

After eliminating the nearby traps that had been set, the two of them were quite sleepy, so they informed the other three that they would discuss details tomorrow and dedicated the remaining time to sleep.

A few hours later, when Tatsuro woke up, it was already eleven o'clock. As expected, they had overslept. After waking up Ai, getting ready, and going outside, the other three were already waiting for them.

If their relationship had been more casual, they might have complained about being late, but it seemed like they could not wake them up because the two who had woken up in the middle of the night had been doing something, and they didn't seem to have been of any help.

After roasting some meat and eating together, they informed the others that someone had set traps yesterday.

"Could it be the work of thieves, after all?" (Salva)

"It seems unlikely that it's anything else." (Tatsuro)

"Ugh, those cowardly bastards setting traps!" (Salva)

"Well, calm down. We know the location of the traps." (Ai)

Ai calmed down the agitated Salva, and finally, they set off. Unlike yesterday, the journey was bright, so they wanted to go faster, but they had to advance while eliminating traps, so it was impossible.

Moving at about 20 kilometres per hour, they relied on Cardina to pinpoint their location. Tatsuro used earth magic to crush the traps in the ground, rendering them powerless as they advanced.

Ai held Tatsuro's hand beside him, so he hardly consumed any magical power, but he was becoming mentally exhausted from the repetitive work.

During one of their breaks, Cardina was the first to notice something placed in the middle of a three-way intersection around noon.

Upon investigation, it turned out to be three lifeless humanoid figures. As soon as they understood what it was, Tatsuro made a bitter face and stopped the carriage within view.

"What's wrong?" (Ai)

"There are three bodies placed in the middle of the road. Furthermore, if you approach those bodies, numerous traps will be triggered." (Tatsuro)

"……" (Ai)

Unable to find the right words to say, Ai held her breath. Tatsuro, deeming this a reasonable response, stroked Ai's head and tried to go outside alone. However, Ai grabbed his arm and shook her head.

"I'm coming too. Tatsuro, I do not want to leave you alone when you're going through something difficult. I might not be able to do much, but at least I can be there by your side." (Ai)

"I see. Then come with me." (Tatsuro)

"Okay." (Ai)

With that, the two of them disembarked from the carriage. The three above hurriedly descended and approached them.

"Wait. Those bodies over there are probably… probably our comrades," (Catherine)

"You had other comrades?" Tatsuro reacted with a mix of surprise and acceptance upon hearing the words "Catherine's comrades."

At the same time, he couldn't make a calm judgment when confronted with the sight of their comrades' bodies, which were rigged with traps that could kill anyone who approached.

As he thought about who might have set up those traps, anger welled up against the thieves who seemed to care nothing for human lives and feelings.

"Those are traps, right?" (Jema)

"Yeah, from this distance, we should be able to discern if it's a trap or not using Dispel Magic, right?" Tatsuro responded to Jemma's question and then looked at Catherine, the Dispel Magic user.

However, it seemed Catherine could not bear to use Dispel Magic to gather information about their comrades' bodies, and she couldn't use it. Seeing the pained expression on her face, both of them understood, and they turned to Salva, who had a disgruntled look on his face, to confirm what they were going to do next.

"I plan to disable the traps over there and then proceed to cremate the bodies. Is that okay?" (Tatsuro)

"Yeah. Please. But, big bro, can I stay close and watch?" (Salva)

"Sure, go ahead." (Tatsuro)

"Thank you." (Salva)

While Jemma and Catherine broke down in tears and sat down, Salva remained with a stiff expression and followed behind them until the end. Tatsuro and Ai approached the place where the faces of the three bodies could be clearly seen and asked Salva if they were their comrades.

The one in the middle was a human with a body that was about three meters tall, and it was clear that it had served as an ally's shield with its robust physique until the end, as it was covered in wounds.

The two on both sides were in a difficult condition to put into words. In the face of such a grim scene, without averting his gaze, Salva nodded quietly with clenched teeth.

After confirming this, he used earth magic to crush and deactivate the traps set around the area before they could be triggered. At that moment, Cardina, who had been flying overhead, screeched urgently in their direction.

With a sense of foreboding, Tatsuro boosted his Water Wall, Fire Wall, Earth Wall, and Wind Wall with [Light Magic], creating a quadruple wall to surround himself, Ai, and Salva.

As Cardina descended and entered the barrier, a loud explosion echoed from the location of the corpses.

Tatsuro held Ai's hand and endured it with single-minded determination to prevent the shockwave from reaching them. Then, a piercing ringing sound filled their ears, and their hearing was distorted. Tatsuro used [Life Magic] on Ai first and then on himself and Salva.

The [Life Magic] was of low level, leaving a slight discomfort, but it seemed to be acceptable for the time being. They used Cardina's reconnaissance magic to confirm complete safety before removing the quadruple wall.

"This is… terrible." (Tatsuro)

"Ugh…" (Ai)

"Huh!?" (Salva)

The stone-paved road was destroyed in the open field of view, surrounded by spilt blood and scattered flesh. Something had been so damaged that its original form was unrecognizable.

Tatsuro had an idea of the gruesome scene thanks to Cardina's reconnaissance magic, so he could handle it. Nevertheless, Ai, shown the scene suddenly, felt nauseous, and Salva dropped to his knees, looking utterly lost and wide-eyed.

Tatsuro immediately used earth magic to move the ground, gathering as many scattered pieces of flesh and bones as possible, and compacted them into a sphere made of earth. He then heated the inside of the sphere to extremely high temperatures with fire magic. To prevent the smell from spreading, he used wind magic to create a breeze, used dark magic to reinforce the earth sphere to keep it intact, and reshaped it to look like an urn.

"Tatsuro, what exactly happened?" (Ai)

"All the traps underground were set to explode or be triggered, or they were destroyed or removed, so I think something like a bomb was embedded in the bodies. I didn't examine the bodies closely, so I'm sorry I endangered us." (Tatsuro)

"No, it can't be helped." (Ai)

Ai still felt a bit nauseous, but she clung to Tatsuro, comforting him that she did not mind.

As they were doing this, the two behind and Jeanne also came over, worried by the recent explosion. Although there were no bodies, they understood roughly what had happened, considering the destruction and the earlier explosion. They rushed to Salva, who had remained motionless.

Seeing the two, Salva finally regained himself and punched the ground with a feeling of powerlessness and hatred towards himself. Salva let out a howl like a wolf, filled with these emotions.

Afterwards, for about thirty minutes, while they rested the three of them on the carriage deck at the side of the road to calm down, Tatsuro and the others repaired the road and remained vigilant for any sign of the thieves.

"That explosion was so big. Even if they were far away, they should have heard it. We could go check, but there's no sign of them coming." (Tatsuro)

"It was quite a sophisticated setup, and they might have thought we were dead because it was triggered, right?" (Ai)

"However, we shouldn't know for sure if the intended target got caught in the trap. Are there other traps that we haven't noticed?" (Tatsuro)

These traps, far beyond the norm, fueled their paranoia. Their thoughts looped, wondering if that was the thieves' intent.

They had never experienced such malice from others during their time in Japan, which was taking a toll on their mental well-being. Even in such circumstances, the two companions who tried to cheer them up lifted their spirits. After recovering, they once again boarded the rhinoceros beetle to continue forward.

"Let's go!" (Tatsuro)

"Yes, please!" (Jema)

Usually, Salva responded, but this time, it was his sister, Jemma. Regretting that he should not have brought Salva with them, Tatsuro asked Jeanne to set off.

Before long, even though they had no appetite, they stopped on the side of the road to have lunch because they did not know when an emergency might occur. The three above seemed to be in no condition to eat, so they declined the offer. Tatsuro and Ai were currently grilling meat for two.

Having seen a real splatter scene, Tatsuro and Ai did not particularly want to eat meat, but they had no choice, so they endured and ate it. Strangely, forcing themselves to eat once seemed to boost their mood and restore their energy.

Considering whether they should also make the three people on the rhinoceros beetle eat by force, they consulted with Ai and decided against it. They felt that it would be different for them, who had seen the bodies of people they did not know and people they were close to.

With their energy restored, Tatsuro and Ai refrained from coddling themselves and instead provided magical energy to Jeanne and Cardina before setting off again.

"We're running later than I thought." (Tatsuro)

"Is that so?" (Ai)

Tatsuro sighed as he checked their current location on the map, crushing the scattered traps as if recalling something.

"Yeah, the main reason we're running late is because we've been slowing down to crush the traps." (Tatsuro)

"We can't afford to leave them. If we don't deal with them, that merchant from before might get caught, and it's not something we can ignore, especially when we've decided to take the three people to the town." (Ai)

While they could fly if it were just the two of them, they had committed to take the three people to the town, and they could not ignore the potential harm to people unrelated to their situation.

"I hope some weak monsters would come so we could earn SP." (Tatsuro)

"But we haven't heard anything from that front." (Ai)

"Oh, I haven't used the SP I earned from the moles the other day." (Tatsuro)

"Are you going to get [Dark Magic] again?" (Ai)

"I've relied on [Light Magic] and [Life Magic] quite a bit, and it's appealing to be able to fix things quickly in unforeseen situations like today… Yeah, I think I'll go for [Dark Magic]." (Tatsuro)

"Rather than thinking about getting injured, it's more like us to prevent getting injured." (Ai)

Tatsuro, holding Ai, raised his Dark Magic to Level 7 from his current SP (40) using 34 SP.

After upgrading dark magic, he considered raising Cardina and Jeanne to higher levels. However, there was a possibility of the three above observing them if they did that. Even though he had already demonstrated the four-element walls in front of Salva and was currently using earth magic to destroy traps, he felt there was no need to worry; he still felt that magic-based life forms might be considered peculiar.

Time passed, and the sun started to set, casting a reddish glow on the rhinoceros beetle. They were supposed to have entered Lyadas by this time according to their original plan, so Tatsuro wondered how things had gone wrong. He designated a location about a hundred meters off the road and had the carriage park there.

"We've parked quite far off the road." (Ai)

"Yeah, it's Dark Day tonight. It is also the New Moon Day. It's perfect for a nighttime ambush, don't you think?" (Tatsuro)

"Dark magic allows us to hide, so it's perfect" (Ai)

"We can hide and pass through unnoticed, and if it comes to combat, we can easily subdue them with Cardina's dispel magic and my dark magic. So, I thought maintaining some distance would be a good idea." (Tatsuro)

"Being close to the road would make it easy to spot us, even with just a bit of light. You're right; it might be difficult to find us at this distance unless they use detection or light magic to illuminate the area." (Ai)

With this in mind, the two of them set about preparing for their nighttime ordeal. By that time, except for Salva, the two had calmed down, and they asked to join in for the meal. Salva, who had a sturdy physique and had already eaten breakfast, could skip two meals without any problem. They all shared a meal together.

Tatsuro and Ai then told the two about the likelihood of an attack tonight and recommended that they sleep on top of the carriage. They were considering a possible forced breakthrough with the rhinoceros beetle if necessary, so it would be more convenient for the three to already be on board. The two agreed and returned to the top of the rhinoceros beetle.

"Well, let's see what tonight brings." (Tatsuro)

"We'd like it to be peaceful, but…" (Ai)

Tatsuro and Ai, who didn't believe for a moment that those treacherous thieves had finished with just those traps, left the vigilance to Cardina and took a brief nap in preparation for the night ahead.

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