Chapter 35 - 69-71

Chapter 69: Making a decision with someone's life in the first village

Following the lead of Kasim's party, Vandalieu was heading towards the village that they were working in, the Seventh Cultivation Village.

"A cultivation village in a place like this?" Vandalieu asked in surprise. There was a city's ruins to the south, and even a mine in beyond that.

Fester was surprised himself at Vandalieu's question. "I've never heard about the city," he said. "If you go south from the village, there's only a rocky mountain with a slave-run mine in it. There is another Duchy when you go past that, though."

"No, I've definitely heard that there was a city, a hundred years or two hundred years ago," said Kasim. "Isn't that the city that Vandalieu is talking about?"

"Ah, I see. He said he had a Vampire parent, right? I suppose it wouldn't be strange for him to be told about that," said Fester.

It seemed that the Hartner Duchy had gone into a decline in the past two hundred years.

"But why on earth would such a thing happen?" Vandalieu asked.

The adventurers gave him puzzled looks in response to his question.

"Sorry, we're not really that well-educated. Each of the duchies is its own state, like a country ruled by noblemen, so people like us don't really learn about the histories of other duchies," said Zeno.

"Are you all from other duchies?" Vandalieu asked.

"Yeah, there's a long story behind that. It's a sad story to both hear and tell -" Fester began.

"I'll tell him, Fester," said Zeno. "First, regarding why the city disappeared, I'll tell you what we know -"

According to Zeno's explanation, the direct cause was Talosheim's ruin after all.

That city had been built as a relay-point for the commercial trade with Talosheim, and when that commercial trade disappeared, the productivity of the city decreased and it became difficult to maintain it.

At the same time, the southern mine's production had fallen as well. Since profits couldn't be made by employing normal workers, slaves were used to carry out the mining.

With the people working at the mine not even having money to spend, the Duke Hartner of the time, who had been newly-appointed several years previously, had ordered that the city be dismantled.

Vandalieu was amazed that they would have been willing to dismantle an entire city. It seemed that feudal societies did anything that had already been decided upon. In Japan, there would definitely be disputes over such an action.

But what happened to the First Princess?

The name of Talosheim's First Princess, Levia, didn't appear in Zeno's story. It might have been omitted because it didn't have anything to do with the city.

It bothers me, but I suppose it would be unnatural for me to ask about it now.

As Vandalieu thought this, Zeno's story skipped to more recent events.

"Actually, five years ago, The Amid Empire came attacking," he said. "Most of the Sauron Duchy to the north was occupied. We're from the Sauron Duchy."

"We're what you'd call refugees," said Fester. "Those guys from the Empire apparently behaved themselves in towns and larger farming villages, but in small villages like ours, they did whatever they liked. My oldest aniki tried to save his fiancé, and both of them -"

"Fester, that's not the kind of story you should let such a small child hear, is it?"

The war between the Amid Empire and the Orbaume Kingdom that Vandalieu had heard of previously. Vandalieu felt that he had suddenly caught up with what had been happening.

"Well, anyway, we're refugees who escaped the Sauron Duchy and came here to the Hartner Duchy," Zeno said in summary. "When the initial conflict was over, the second son of the current Duke, Prince Belton, began a cultivation project to help the refugees. That's why we're able to live with our families in the Seventh Cultivation Village that we're heading to now.

"But the village isn't exactly prospering, so we became adventurers on the third year after it was built and went to the city," said Kasim.

"I see," said Vandalieu. "I'm sure it must have been hard."

Beginning a cultivation project to help the refugees seemed to be not a bad plan in Vandalieu's eyes. Unlike Earth, there was plenty of unoccupied land. The area around here in particular had no Devil's Nests, and even if monsters did appear, they were Rank 2 at most. There was nothing but a slave-run mine at the end of the highway, so there were apparently almost no bandits as well.

… Vandalieu had wiped out a Goblin pack led by a Goblin King just yesterday, but something like that could probably considered similar to a natural disaster.

Kasim and his companions had been confused over the appearance of the Goblin Barbarian, which normally wouldn't appear on the highway. But there was no doubt that the Goblin King had something to do with this. These Goblins had likely been a scouting party who had been sent out hunting.

"I suppose so," said Kasim. "The soldiers took us away, pointed at the open land and said, 'Build a village here,' so we made fields, dug wells, built houses…"

"They protected the village from beasts and monsters until the village was finished, lent us tents and blankets, and although there wasn't much food and it wasn't very tasty, they did give us some," said Fester. "We're also exempt from paying taxes for five years, but it was still hard."

Hearing them talk, Vandalieu realized that they had gone through more hardships than he had imagined. Though land upon which a village could be built had been given to them, and they had been protected and given the necessities to live while building it, they had been made to build all of the houses, fields and infrastructure like wells by hand.

"Hey, it's still better than suffering and looking for work every day in the slums, isn't it? You're going to get punished if you complain too much," said Zeno.

According to his words, the village's circumstances were still on the preferable side.

"And I'm sure this child has been through even harder things than us," Zeno continued. "Sorry about these guys being so inconsiderate."

"Not at all, please don't worry about it," said Vandalieu. "Thanks to my mother and other people, I didn't struggle to eat up until now."

There was one time where he had struggled to eat so much that he had been forced to stave off his hunger by drinking earthworm soup, but that was rather difficult to tell them.

After that, Vandalieu walked for three more hours while hearing about the adventurers' school and Duke Hartner before he arrived at the village.

The Seventh Cultivation Village had a population of around three hundred, a village size that would be considered between small and medium in Lambda.

There were more human villagers than of any other race, as they made up about half of the village population. Among the other half, there were Beast-people, Dwarves and Titans. Elves, Dark Elves and Drakonids have long lifespans and unique cultures, so they often form groups within their own races. Because of this, while they might be found in cities, there are almost none in small villages.

This applied even after becoming refugees, so the Dark Elves and Drakonids of the Sauron Duchy had apparently approached groups of members of their own races.

And the Titans in this village were those who had been living in the Sauron Duchy, so they had no relation to Talosheim.

The houses of the village were all one-story houses and they hadn't been built to be very sturdy, but considering that they had been hand-built by the villagers, they were very good.

In fact, this was apparently the most-populated of the six cultivation villages in this area.

"By the way, why are there only six cultivation villages if this is the Seventh Cultivation Village?" asked Vandalieu.

"The First Cultivation Village couldn't make any profits and turned into a ghost town," Kasim explained.

"They did try pretty hard, too. The nearby spring dried up, and apparently water wouldn't come out even when they dug wells," said Zeno.

Life in human society in this world was truly difficult.

"First, let's hurry and exchange these ears for money."

With that, Kasim's party took Vandalieu to the village's only store… the general store/bar/Adventurers' Guild branch that also acted as an inn for anyone who wanted to stay, commonly known as the jack-of-all-trades store.

It seemed that it was impossible to get by in this village without having multiple options for business.

However, judging by the fact that none of the villagers had paid Vandalieu any attention so far, it was probably surprisingly common for people to come into the village from elsewhere.

Vandalieu had found something that bothered him far more than the villagers' reactions, a small shrine containing a stone with Alda's holy symbol carved on it. He directed his attention towards it, but…

"UWAH! Kasim, there's something behind you!"

The shopkeeper of the jack-of-all-trades store referred to Vandalieu as "something" and pointed his finger at him.

"… Hello." Trying not to be discouraged, Vandalieu greeted him.

"Hyih?! It talked?! Someone call the priest-sama!"

Weren't these words too cruel, even for a secluded village in the countryside?

"Wait, Oyaji-san*. This child isn't a ghost!"

"His presence is lacking, but he's definitely alive!"

"We can explain! Calm down and listen to us!"

Kasim's party hastily grabbed the shopkeeper and dragged him back into the store rather roughly considering that they were trying to calm him down.

The words of Kasim and his companions that made Vandalieu finally realize that his presence was as thin as air to those who weren't affected by his Death-Attribute Charm.

It seemed that the reason the villagers hadn't said anything to Vandalieu was because they simply hadn't noticed him.

"Sorry about my father. He likes to say stupid things," said Lina, employee of this Adventurers' Guild branch and daughter of the jack-of-all-trades store's shopkeeper.

She was a bright, simple, village-girl-like Guild employee… not really. She was a village girl who had taken an examination to become an Adventurers' Guild employee.

Whether adventurers are present or not would greatly influence a small village's longevity, so it had been necessary to build somewhere for them to stay, even if it was a small lodging in the village's only store.

"Not at all. I'm used to it," said Vandalieu.

This was a blatant lie. But even though the shock of being treated like this was still echoing inside Vandalieu, it wouldn't appear in his expression.

"Really? Then I suppose it's fine, but I'm really sorry about that," said Lina as she looked at Vandalieu's doll-like face. Although she was apologizing one more time, she let it go without noticing Vandalieu's feelings.

"Lina, more importantly, exchange these for money," said Fester.

"Yes, yes. Umm… These are Goblin Soldiers and a Goblin Barbarian's?! It's amazing that you managed to exterminate these; aren't you still E-class?!" Lina asked them, dumbfounded.

"No, the one who defeated them was -" Fester began.

"Fester, we can talk about that afterwards," said Kasim. "Just do the exchange first."

"Yes, you're right. Umm…"

Lina made the calculations rather slowly, and then she counted out the bronze and silver coins. It seemed that Guild employees in village branches were more like part-time workers than proper Adventurers' Guild employees, so they weren't expected to be particularly proficient.

In fact, with Kasim's party being the only adventurers in the village, she only worked at the branch once every few days.

But Vandalieu had noticed something else.

I only just noticed this, but how is it that the Adventurers' Guild distinguishes what kind of Goblins have been killed using just their ears?

The ears acted as proof of having exterminated Goblins. Even Vandalieu could tell from their shape and color that they were Goblin ears. But if he were to be asked what kind of Goblins they were from, he would have no hope of answering.

He would be able to understand for cases like Goblin Kings, who possessed such different constitutions from other Goblins that it was difficult to believe that they were members of the same race. But Goblin Soldiers and Goblin Mages, who weren't very different in size or shape from regular Goblins and simply had different equipment and ornaments, would be impossible to tell apart just by looking at their ears.

So how could they be told apart? Was the incantation for Appraisal recited for each one, or were skills like Monster Appraisal or Extermination Proof Appraisal taught at the Guild?

"The extermination proof of fourteen Goblin Soldiers and a Goblin Barbarian comes to 400 Baums. The Magic Stones are 380 Baums, so the total is 780 Baums," said Lina.

Just as Vandalieu was about to ask his questions about the Goblin ears, the monetary exchange finished taking place.

780 Baums. If a single Baum was worth a hundred yen, that would come to 78,000 yen*. To Vandalieu, this amount of money didn't seem worth fighting and risking one's own life for. But he also knew that this was just how he felt as someone from Earth, from Japan.

"Divided between three of us, that's 260 each… Yes!" Fester raised his fist into the air in triumph.

"With this, we can take it easy for a while," said Zeno, breathing a sigh of relief.

Judging from their reactions, Vandalieu could tell that 260 Baums was sufficient pay for them.

"How much is that money worth?" he asked.

"Ah, 260 Baums? Let's see… If you were working in the slums with one of the relatively better jobs, you might be able to earn 260 Baums after about twenty-six days," Zeno explained.

It seemed that one would need to be fortunate enough to find daily work in the slums and work without rest for twenty-six days to earn 260 Baums.

But there probably weren't welfare programs or safety nets like insurance for injuries and illness. And finding work every day wasn't guaranteed. Considering that, being able to earn this much in one day might be worth risking one's own life for.

"But even the fact that we have some leeway with this amount of money is all thanks to the fact that this Oyaji-san lets us stay here for free," Zeno continued.

"Indeed, we'd be in trouble if we didn't have adventurers, even if those adventurers do ogle my daughter," said the aforementioned Oyaji-san, joining in the conversation. "Sorry about earlier," he said to Vandalieu. "If you're staying here, I'll let you stay for free just like these guys, so forgive me, Ojou-chan." He apologized with a gentle expression that made him look like a completely different person from before.

That was fine, but…

"Oyaji-san! I don't really ogle Lina -" Fester began.

"What, Fester?! Are you saying that my daughter doesn't suit your tastes?!" the shopkeeper demanded. "And who are you calling your Oyaji-san!"

"Stop it, Father!" said Lina.

"… Umm, I'm a boy," said Vandalieu.

"Eh?"

For some reason, everyone present was surprised by this news.

Vandalieu did indeed feel something of a culture shock from coming into contact with a society and culture other than his own.

But the shock at the way the human society in Lambda treated me is something else entirely.

Vandalieu couldn't have imagined that he had such a weak, ghost-like presence. And most importantly, this was the first time that he had realized that his appearance was such that he would be mistaken for a girl.

There were times when his gender was mistaken by Ghoul children as well, but he had thought that it was simply because Ghoul men had lion heads.

Vandalieu's other companions had never mistaken his gender before.

The truth was that the Ghouls and Undead Titans had only known because Vandalieu used "俺/ore*" as a pronoun for himself, and because Sam and his daughters referred to him as "Bocchan*." It wasn't like they had thought that he was a boy from the very beginning.

In a similar vein, others had also determined his gender by the fact that his pronoun for himself was "俺/ore", because he was referred to as King, his unfeminine behavior and other things rather than the appearance of his face.

Well, I'm still only seven years old. I'm going to enter my second growth period. Once my voice changes, I grow some facial hair and gain some muscle, nobody is going to be able to make that mistake, Vandalieu told himself to recover from the shock.

If one were to ask what Vandalieu was doing right now, the answer was that he was currently offering topics of conversation.

"Huh, so this child is a Dhampir. It's my first time seeing one."

"Oh my, isn't she just like a doll? Are you eating properly?"

"I touched the Dhampir!"

"Heheh, I'm a lucky guy."

"Hey! You guys are being rude!"

He was being treated just like some kind of rare animal. It seemed that in this cultivation village that offered the inhabitants few ways of entertaining themselves, the "Dhampir that they had seen for the first time" was something of a spectacle to behold. Because of this, the villagers came into the jack-of-all-trades store's dining area, one after another.

It was far better than being treated as a ghost. Vandalieu himself didn't mind this treatment and responded politely when the villagers talked to him, so the villagers didn't hold back.

"I see, so you've had some rough times as well, haven't you?"

"It's going to be hard, but you've got to do your best."

The villagers generally treated Vandalieu favorably. Vandalieu figured that they could sympathize for his phase because as former refugees, they had suffered themselves, and they had the freedom to feel sympathy for others' pasts in this cultivation village. But there were two other reasons.

The first was that the villagers had seen Vandalieu's expressionless, dead eyes and assumed that he had gone through incredibly hard times.

The other was that Vandalieu was someone they could sympathize with at no cost to themselves.

If Vandalieu were a mere powerless orphan, no matter how much sympathy the villagers had for him, the things they could do for him would be limited. Most of the villagers were young and were still capable of doing plenty of work in the future, but even so, they weren't prospering.

For now, they were still exempt from paying taxes, but in two more years, this benefit would cease. The villagers wouldn't be able to take him in and raise him.

But Vandalieu was someone who was hoping to be an adventurer, and if even half of the stories of Kasim and his companions were to be believed, he already possessed at least enough strength to exterminate Goblins. With that being the case, sympathizing with him like this and treating him to a meal was plenty.

Still, this was far better treatment than the complete disinterest that he would get in a city.

"I'm telling you, it's true! This guy came from behind and cut off the Goblin Barbarian's head in one hit!" Fester exclaimed.

"Hmm, it's not like I'm doubting you," said Lina, "but it's just a little too unbelievable…"

"No, you're doubting me, right! Believe me, Lina!"

"Fester, we saw it with our own eyes and still can't believe it, so isn't it too much to ask for Lina to believe it?" Zeno pointed out.

They were talking behind Vandalieu, but considering that he could slay Rank 3 monsters without any effort, it wasn't something worth convincing anyone of, so he stayed silent.

In fact, he had rendered a Rank 4 Goblin King completely helpless without any difficulty, only yesterday. Killing a Goblin Barbarian wasn't a significant achievement compared to that.

Also, Vandalieu couldn't register at the branch that Lina managed on her own.

Apparently, the only thing that could be done here was the exchange of extermination proof parts and other materials. In order to register, Vandalieu would have to go to a proper Guild branch in the city.

Despite Borkus and the others having told him that two hundred years ago, registration had been possible even at branches in small villages.

It seemed that it wasn't only the Hartner Duchy that had gone through a decline in the past two hundred years; the Adventurers' Guild in the Orbaume Kingdom seemed to have gone through a decline as well.

"This child is the Dhampir child who saved Kasim and his friends?"

Two men entered, asking this question.

These two were the rare elderly members in this village of mostly young people; it looked like several years had passed since they were in the primes of their lives. The man at the front was wearing similar clothes to the other villagers, but the one following behind him was dressed in cotton clothes that had been properly colored using dyes, and there was a necklace with an ornament that Vandalieu hated, hanging from his neck.

"Chief, Priest-sama, has your discussion finished?" asked the storekeeper of the jack-of-all-trades store.

"Yes, it is done," the village chief replied. "More importantly, we must thank this child," he said as he took Vandalieu's hand and bowed. "Thank you very much for saving Kasim and his friends. Even if you are someone aspiring to be an adventurer, I am sure it took great courage to attract the Goblins' attention."

It seemed that the story circulating among the villagers was, "Vandalieu attracted the attention of the strong Goblin while Kasim's party made a counterattack to exterminate the Goblins."

Vandalieu was small compared to other children of his age, so for the villagers who didn't know much about Dhampirs, this was probably far easier to believe than the truth of, "Vandalieu cut the head of the Goblin commanding the small unit from behind."

"I am glad to have been of help," replied Vandalieu, not particularly interested in correcting him.

"But you mustn't do such dangerous things," the chief told him. "Adventurers must survive."

Now that I think back, I think the people here are nicer than anyone on Earth.

Vandalieu felt a little moved, thinking that humans aren't that bad. However, there was the "Priest-sama" who was smiling behind this nice village chief, so he couldn't let his guard down.

"To think that I happened to be staying in this village to preach and met such a brave little girl. This must be Alda's guidance." The priest-sama… the priest of Alda spoke in a gentle tone as he touched the cross-like holy symbol of Alda on his chest and offered a short prayer of thanks.

Vandalieu's gender had been mistaken again, but he didn't care about that right now.

"Priest-sama, this child is a -"

"Hahaha, Chief-san, there is nothing to worry about. Alda only punishes the wicked. Those who perform just deeds will not be unjustly punished, even if they are Dhampirs. I heard that you lived in a secluded forest or mountain. You have not yet been baptized, have you? Would you like me to carry out the ceremony?" the priest offered.

He wasn't releasing any intent to kill or making Vandalieu feel unpleasant, but the smile on his face looked shallow in Vandalieu's eyes. The constantly-active Danger Sense: Death gave no reaction, either.

���No thank you. Though it was an informal ceremony, my mother baptized me in Vida's name," Vandalieu replied. Even if it wasn't a trap, he didn't want to be baptized in Alda's name, so he told yet another lie.

"I see. What a good mother she was."

With nothing more to ask regarding the baptism in Vida's name, the priest of Alda stepped back.

The Orbaume Kingdom was a collection of smaller countries that had united in order to protect themselves from the threat of the Amid Empire.

With this being its origin, the religion of Alda, the god of law and fate, the primary religion of the Empire, was… not prohibited. The religion of Vida was allowed, but there were no restrictions placed on the religion of Alda, either. This is because there was a considerable number of people in the smaller nations who believed in Alda and his subordinate gods.

But this religion couldn't be said to be exactly the same as the teachings of Alda in the Empire.

There were multiple groups of people who interpreted Alda's teachings in different ways. Among them was the harmonious faction who believed that "Virtuous individuals who uphold the law should be forgiven, even if they are members of Vida's races." This would be considered heresy by the clergymen of the Amid Empire, but it was this faction who had allowed Dhampirs to be accepted as people in the Orbaume Kingdom.

This wasn't particularly strange or unnatural. Everyone in Lambda knew for certain that gods existed, but those gods had only existed in the world itself a hundred thousand years ago, during the age of the gods.

Now, through Divine Messages and such, they could only convey their will with limited methods to a limited number of people.

Because of this, each god's religion was interpreted in various ways depending on the nation, region and person, and these interpretations often had strange differences between them. The most prime example was the harmonious faction of Alda.

But then, the reason the harmonious faction spread is because there were more members of Vida's races here than in the Amid Empire, including dukes who were Beast-men, and the people's impressions of Alda's religion in the Orbaume Kingdom had worsened following the war, so this was probably a political decision made in order to survive.

Even on Earth, it wasn't unusual for there to be multiple religions despite originating from the same god. I don't know what Alda is thinking, but there's no way that he would descend to the world, send Divine Messages or dispatch Familiar Spirits to all of his believers and point out which of their interpretations are wrong. Well, as long as it doesn't cause me harm, I don't really care.

He didn't really like the condescending way he had been "forgiven," but Vandalieu accepted that he couldn't afford to care about things like that if he wanted to survive in society.

"Priest-sama, about the medicine you gave me… It seems to be rather ineffective."

"That medicine is best taken in large doses, so please take it in double the dose that you have been doing up until now."

"Priest-sama, could you please have a look at our fields?"

"I do not mind. Alda is also the god of life, after all."

One by one, the villagers approached the priest with their troubles and requests. It seemed that the villagers adored him quite a lot, considering how shallow his smile was.

The stories of saints and heroes told by clergymen were probably one of the few sources of entertainment in this cultivation village, and seeing that he was an educated man who could even mix medicine, it made sense that he was adored, even if he was a little suspicious.

Suddenly, there a voice came from outside.

"Priest-sama, please come! Ivan has fallen from a roof!"

It appeared that a villager had accidentally fallen from a roof while doing repairs. Judging from the tone of the voice, it seemed to be quite a serious injury. In fact, when Vandalieu used Detect Life, there was one person with an unnaturally weak reaction.

"That is not good, we must tend to him immediately," the priest said behind Vandalieu, standing up.

Vandalieu quietly left the jack-of-all-trades store. Perhaps because their attention had been drawn to the priest, nobody noticed him leave.

If he's not dead, I think I can do something about it… Ah, it's here.

Using Flight to rush to the place where the spell's reaction had come from, he saw a man in his thirties lying limp on the ground and a woman with a large abdomen, a little younger than the man. There was also a child, smaller than Vandalieu.

"Honey! Hold on, the priest is coming now!"

"Daddy!" Daddy!"

Though his wife and son were clinging onto him, the man let out nothing but a groan in reply. His breathing looked labored. There was a thick shadow of death on his face.

This is a serious injury; it's not his bones, it's his organs… in the worst-case scenario, something might have even happened to his brain.

In such a situation, with Lambda's medical treatment, it was hopeless. Magic might be able to do something about it, but this was the edge of the village. Vandalieu judged that he would likely die before the priest arrived… though that priest would likely be able to do anything other than shake his head unless he was a first-rate practitioner.

Of course, if Vandalieu used death-attribute magic, there was a high chance that he could save the life of this man named Ivan. The wife wouldn't have to lose her husband, nor would the child in her abdomen and the child by the man's side have to lose their father.

However, Vandalieu's current objective was to "register at the Guild without attracting any attention, and then dash back to Talosheim."

A child saving a life that could not be saved without high-level magic. That would attract plenty of attention.

To follow my original plan, or give into my emotions… It can't be helped. I give up.

"Excuse me."

With these words, a child quickly approached Ivan's side and touched his body.

"Hieh?!"

"Uwah! Who are you?!"

The woman and child who hadn't noticed Vandalieu's presence were surprised, so Vandalieu said, "I'm the Dhampir that people are talking about in this village; my name is Vandalieu," to introduce himself as he cast Spirit Form Transformation. In a way that they couldn't see, he produced tentacles from the palms of his hands that were touching Ivan, fusing with Ivan and extending his spirit form into his body.

It was indeed the brain that was the problem. There was intracranial bleeding, and the blood that was pooling inside his head was creating pressure on his brain.

Absorb the accumulated blood with my tentacles. Regenerate the broken blood vessels with Healing Power Enhancement. After that, repair the cracks in his skull… This person has an aneurysm in the blood vessel near his heart. I suppose I'll fix that while I'm at it. Ah, there's a growth in his large intestine. It seems malignant, so I'll remove that. His athlete's foot… I might as well cure that as well.

"Hey, what are you…"

"Mommy, Daddy's face is looking better!"

"You're right. Could it be that you're healing him?"

"Ah, yes. Please wait a little longer," said Vandalieu.

The man called Ivan had been in poor health. The image of a simple, slow life being a healthy one wasn't true, at least in his case.

Vandalieu had done all of the medical treatment he could, so he returned the tentacles back to his body and undid his Spirit Form Transformation.

"Things will be alright now. He'll likely open his eyes soon," said Vandalieu.

Vandalieu had even fused his own stamina and nourishment with Ivan's and expended it in order to heal him, so there was no way that he would stay unconscious. Vandalieu had taken up the blood that had accumulated in Ivan's skull, but he would consider that as the treatment fee.

"Ugh, what… happened to me?" Ivan opened his eyes in the next moment.

"Honey!"

"Daddy!"

The woman and child embraced Ivan. It was a moving sight. This was what a household, a family, should be like.

"What is the meaning of this? Why are you here?" Ivan asked his family.

"I-Ivan?" said a man's voice. "Just a moment ago, you were lying on the ground, looking like you were going to die! How are you looking so lively now?!"

Just as Vandalieu began feeling respect for Ivan for having built such a good household, the priest, village chief and the others had finally arrived.

Now if they could be fooled into thinking that Ivan's condition had actually been nothing serious and that the man who had called for the priest had jumped to the wrong conclusion, everything other than Vandalieu being present could be resolved.

"This child, this child called Vandalieu, healed him! This child saved his life!" Ivan's wife exclaimed.

Madam, honest women are well-liked.

"Now that you mention it, I had a dream. A scary god of death had grabbed my head… but before I knew it, there was a goddess patting my head instead. I see, so that must have been this child," Ivan concluded.

Who are you calling a goddess?

And so, Vandalieu saved the life of a villager he had never met before, attracting a lot of attention to himself.

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Chapter 70: The peculiar, sharp-tongued, flying beast (7 years old)

As a result of saving Ivan's life, having given up on not attracting attention, Vandalieu was warmly welcomed back at the village's only store, the jack-of-all-trades store.

"You saved my life, kid," said Ivan. "A little longer and I would've died a stupid death and not been able to show my second child my face. Now then, go ahead and eat, it's my treat!"

"Don't go acting so high and mighty like treating him a meal is a big deal!" said his wife.

"Not at all. I was just starting to feel hungry," Vandalieu told them as he ate. He was eating rice porridge.

It was something that had been made with long-grained rice similar to the Indica rice of Earth, edible plants, possibly for removing the peculiar smell of the rice, beans to increase the volume of the meal, and a little salt.

It really wasn't a big deal. The taste came from the ingredients… in fact, there was no taste other than the taste of the ingredients.

However, it was currently summer, the time of year just before rice would be harvested. That was probably why they could only offer this much. This Seventh Cultivation Village was blessed for even being able to make rice porridge.

If I add the dried meat and dried fish in my luggage to this porridge, it would probably increase the salty flavor and taste quite good, Vandalieu thought, but he continued eating the rice porridge without putting this idea into practice.

The concept of 'smoked food' apparently didn't exist in this world, so smoked dried meat and dried fish would become products of Talosheim in the future. Thus, he had to keep them secret.

Incidentally, the jack-of-all-trades store's bar space had no menu. The alcohol was unrefined sake that the shopkeeper had made himself (using millet as a base), while drinking snacks were roasted or cooked beans and, occasionally, vegetables.

And the only meals available were what the storekeeper's family was eating. This was only natural, as the family made their food in large quantities and served it to their patrons.

Vandalieu had wondered whether this really worked for business, but looking at it another way, the business wouldn't work in this village unless done this way.

Each household was capable of making its own sake, and their ability to cook wasn't any different from the couple who ran the jack-of-all-trades store. Thus, the only guests who would pay money to eat and drink here were the soldiers, merchants and their escorts who passed through here as they took the highway to the slave-run mine, as well as Kasim's party.

If they set up a system to be able to cook multiple different dishes, their costs would actually increase. As a result, Vandalieu was eating this rice porridge.

"It's not very tasty, is it?" said the shopkeeper in a serious tone, seemingly aware of this.

"… That's not true," said Vandalieu.

"Nah, it's fine. Since you saved Ivan's life, I'd like to give you something that tastes better to eat, but this is the best I can do with the rice we grow here."

"Oyaji-san, we agreed not to say that, didn't we? Still, it's true that the rice we grew in the Sauron Duchy tasted better. It didn't have the smell."

Apparently, they had grown a type of rice similar to Japonica rice* in the Sauron Duchy north of the Hartner Duchy, commonly known as Sauron rice.

But climate and soil of the land of the Hartner Duchy that they had fled to wasn't suited to growing Sauron rice.

With no other choice, they began growing the rice commonly cultivated in the Hartner Duchy, the Indica rice… known as southern rice in the Orbaume Kingdom.

"In other words, it's all the Empire's fault." Vandalieu came to the conclusion that it was the Empire's fault that he couldn't eat rice similar to the Japonica rice that he was used to today.

"Yeah, it's all the godd*mn Empire's fault!"

"That's right, that's right! Everything was caused by the Empire!"

Since this was a cultivation village full of refugees who had been chased from their homelands by the Empire, they were unanimous in their agreement with Vandalieu's words.

"Still, to think that you can use magic."

"It really surprised me. I thought you'd be a Warrior or Unarmed Fighter for sure," said Kasim.

He and his friends were eating the same rice porridge as Vandalieu.

The priest of Alda nodded. "Yes, I was quite surprised to learn that you are so loved by Vida. The fact that you have appeared on this day on which Kasim's party and Ivan's lives were in danger is surely the will of the gods. Though we offer prayers to Alda and Vida, the gods who parted ways in the myths, let us take each other's hands and strive to do good deeds," he said, smiling at Vandalieu while placing his hand on his chest.

His smile still appeared shallow to Vandalieu, but his words seemed honest. At the very least, he was much more like a clergyman than High Priest Gordan had been.

It was possible that he was an unexpectedly virtuous person.

"It makes me happy to hear you say that," said Vandalieu. "I'm not party of any ministry, though."

Come to think of it, what's the Church of Vida in the Hartner Duchy like? I'll visit it once I get to the city.

"By the way… how is it that you are speaking so clearly while eating rice porridge?" the priest asked.

"… It's a special skill," Vandalieu replied.

Vandalieu had used Out-of-body Experience to create a spirit-form face beneath his clothes, and he had been using its mouth to speak this whole time.

"Ah, another helping, please," he requested.

"You're still eating more?! I mean, it's fine, but that's already your third bowl," said the shopkeeper.

"I was quite hungry. I'm sorry."

Vandalieu was smaller and thinner than other children his age, but he ate an amount that was impossible to imagine considering his size. This was because the amount of energy he required was already more than double that of the average adult man.

"First your strength and magic, and now even your appetite is like an adventurer's," Kasim remarked.

Thin people with large appetites weren't rare among adventurers, as they had combat-related Jobs and greater physical abilities than those with creation-related Jobs. Kasim and his friends, who had attended the adventurers' school, weren't as surprised as the shopkeeper.

"Chief!" shouted a man, rushing into the jack-of-all-trades store. "Kyne from the nearby Fifth Cultivation Village is here, looking for the Priest-sama - UWAH?!" He was suddenly thrust aside by another man who had also rushed inside, covered in scratches.

"Priest-sama!" shouted the second man. He had certainly fallen over numerous times on his way here. "Come to our village! There's a disease, an epidemic at our village, and everyone is collapsing! Please, come quickly!"

"An epidemic?!" the shopkeeper repeated.

"How could that be! But the sun has already set," said the priest. "Heading for the Fifth Cultivation Village from now would be…"

The road directly connected the Seventh Cultivation Village and the Fifth Cultivation Village was essentially an animal trail. It would take four hours on foot to travel this animal trail. And night was when wolves and monsters would be active. It didn't need to be said just how dangerous an unmaintained animal trail would be.

It was possible to go to the highway to travel to the Fifth Cultivation Village, but that would take an entire day.

"Kyne, let us leave first thing in the morning. Please rest your body until then," said the priest.

"How can you say that!" said Kyne in protest. "Then everyone in the village, my wife, my daughter!"

"Please understand, Kyne. We cannot travel a dangerous road at night. The Goblins have increased in numbers as of late, and if we are defeated before we reach the village, then it will be meaningless -"

"Ah, how… How…" Kyne's shoulders fell as he began sobbing.

There were some who raised their hands, moved by the ordinary man who had braved the dangers in order to come here for the sake of his friends in his village, his wife and his daughter.

"Alright, we'll be your escorts -"

"Well then, I'll take this Kyne-san and fly there," said Vandalieu.

There were people willing to help, but that didn't mean that all of them could go together.

"The stars are beautiful, aren't they?"

"HYIIIIIH!"

"The moon looks amazing tonight."

"NOOOOOOOO!"

The only ones capable of flying in the world of Lambda are a small portion of mages, wealthy people with expensive Magic Items, those who have tamed monsters capable of flying such as dragon knights, and members of Vida's races who have wings.

Thus, to the average person, the idea of flying through the sky is nothing more than a dream or delusional thought.

Kyne was undergoing this precious experience.

Vandalieu was using Flight to head towards the Fifth Cultivation Village, holding his luggage in his hands while carrying Kyne on his back with a safety rope securely tied between them. But Kyne was clinging to Vandalieu desperately and screaming in fear of falling, so it seemed that he didn't have the time to enjoy this precious experience.

"By the way, it's fine if I just go straight, isn't it?" asked Vandalieu.

"Yeah! There's a small swamp along the way; I think you can use that as a landmark!" Kyne shouted back.

"We passed the swamp a little while earlier, so I think it should be fine if we keep going this way."

Vandalieu and Kyne were flying about thirty meters above the ground. Their speed was about that of a running horse at most, but it seemed that Kyne was too terrified to even open his eyes. But then, since Kyne didn't have the Dark Vision skill, his eyes wouldn't have been able to see anything even if they were open.

"We've already passed the swamp?!" Kyne asked.

"Yes. By the way, you're kind of strangling me," Vandalieu told him.

The speed of Vandalieu's Flight was fast compared to a person running, but the fact that he could ignore terrain and fly in a straight line towards his destination was a big reason for the amount of distance that they had traveled.

They would probably reach the village within the next ten minutes.

He was expending a large amount of Mana to fly like this, however.

Thanks to my Automatic Mana Recovery skill, my Mana expenditure and its recovery cancel each other out if it's just me and my luggage, but with Kyne-san's body weight… I guess I still need more training. No, more importantly, let's ask him about the disease.

"So, about the epidemic… Can you tell me what kind of disease it is one more time?" Vandalieu asked.

Vandalieu was curious about the epidemic that Kyne had spoken of. He had already heard the simple details, but he had thought that there was something very abnormal about it.

"I mean, I came back from hunting and saw that everyone had collapsed," Kyne explained. "They had fevers and nausea, they were struggling to stay conscious… and there were some guys coughing blood…"

"Are there any healthy people other than you, Kyne-san?" Vandalieu asked.

"Other than me… Ah, if I'm not mistaken, Joseph-jiisan still looked alright. Also, the babies haven't become sick yet."

"Who is this Joseph-san?"

"He's an old lumberjack. He's had a terrible cold since yesterday, and he was apparently lying in bed until I got back. Right now, he's pushing himself to nurse everyone else in the village."

"That person isn't sick with the epidemic?"

"Probably not. He has a fever and running nose, but it wasn't nausea and he wasn't coughing blood. That's why I asked him to look after the others. Even if he can move, I couldn't ask an old man to run to the next village, and the babies can't be left alone for half a day, even if they're not sick."

In other words, excluding Kyne-san who had left to go hunting and wasn't in the village, everyone there collapsed in illness, showing the same symptoms, other than the old man who had been sleeping and the babies. And… Kyne-san is healthy.

From the moment Kyne had barged into the jack-of-all-trades store, Vandalieu hadn't seen the shadow of death in him. It was difficult to imagine that he was infected with a dangerous epidemic.

Just in case, Vandalieu had used Spirit Form surreptitiously to examine Kyne's body while he was clinging to Vandalieu in panic, but he was healthy. It seemed that he would live far longer than Ivan.

After hearing the word "epidemic," Vandalieu had used Sterilization to kill all of the harmful bacterial and viruses in the Seventh Cultivation Village before leaving just in case, but… wasn't this a case of poisoning rather than disease?

But this would explain things if only one or two people had fallen ill; what methods could have been used to poison the entire village? And what was the motive to do so in the first place?

"Was anything different today?" asked Vandalieu.

"No, today was normal," replied Kyne. "The only thing was that today was the day that the traveling merchant came."

"Traveling merchant?" Vandalieu repeated.

"Yeah, he's a respectable fellow whose store shut down, and now he's doing his best to make his way back up as a traveling merchant," said Kyne. "Either way, it's helpful that he comes to a small village like ours that's far from the highway, but… Come to think of it, he wasn't at the village. I hope he hasn't collapsed after he left…"

That person is probably the culprit. Well, the motive is still unclear, though.

But saving people came before solving mysteries.

"Could that be the village?"

Vandalieu, who possessed the Dark Vision skill that let him see through the night's darkness like it was the middle of the day, saw a number of wooden houses that had been built on open land.

"I-it probably is!" said Kyne. "Please, the sick people are -"

"Well then, I'll cure them all at once from here," said Vandalieu.

"Eh?"

"The village is from here to there. Well, I guess it'll be fine if I use three thousand or so? Detoxification, Disinfect."

What appeared to be waves of black mist spread across the village.

"HONEEEEY! You were alive!"

"Daaaaddy!"

"I'm so glad! You're cured, I'm so glad!"

The sight before Vandalieu gave him a small sense of déjà vu, but this happy, emotionally-moving scene between Kyne and his family was happening all over the village.

The villagers' pain, fevers and nausea that had come without warning vanished completely, and their hazy minds became clear.

At the same time, Kyne's family had been cured of the disease as well. As they celebrated, they heard voices outside. People came to find Kyne, illuminated by a blue-white flame.

At first, the villagers had thought that Kyne's ghost had created a miracle for them, but once this misunderstanding was cleared up, things turned into a whirlpool of emotions.

"… Phew, what a relief," said Vandalieu.

Using Flight while holding (or being held by) an adult man had consumed a large amount of Mana. It was an inefficient spell to begin with, so it couldn't be helped.

He had spent 70,000,000 Mana. And since it was late in the night, he was sleepy. As a healthy child, he wanted to go to sleep soon, but would he have to return to the Seventh Cultivation Village first?

For now, Vandalieu decided to make Lemures and have them search for the culprit, the traveling merchant, who had disappeared. He wasn't familiar with the geography of this area, so there was a high chance that he wouldn't be able to find the culprit if the culprit had taken a side road away from the highway, though.

Vandalieu was under the assumption that the traveling merchant was the culprit, but as the villagers had been recovered after the use of Detoxification, it was certain that their illness hadn't been caused by a disease. And since the traveling merchant himself wasn't here, the circumstantial evidence was perfect.

"Ah, everyone. The poison has disappeared, but your strength hasn't recovered, so don't get too excited. Please get some rest."

"Honey, who is this child?" Kyne's wife asked.

"This child cured the disease for you guys; he's the one who saved the village! Thank you, thank you!" Kyne held Vandalieu in the air, his face drenched with tears and mucus.

Vandalieu had carelessly let the word "poison" slip, but it seemed that nobody had noticed it.

"What did you say?!"

"Oh, this is the savior of the village!"

"It's a Familiar-Spirit-sama. Al -"

"That should be Vida," said Vandalieu. The villager was about to say something extremely uncomfortable, so he had to at least firmly deny this one thing.

"Vida, the goddess Vida's Familiar Spirit!"

"No, you should be resting instead of doing this -" Vandalieu returned to his senses, but the villagers were all over him. Don't blame me if I can't move my body tomorrow. "I suppose I'll be staying here tonight," he whispered to himself.

The Lemures' search failed and the traveling merchant got away. If there had been casualties, Vandalieu might have been able to find him. But because of Kyne's efforts and Vandalieu's treatment, none of the villagers had died, so he had no clues.

According to the villagers, the traveling merchant apparently followed a religion of a god that they had never heard of before (that they weren't even sure existed), and it was a national holiday for followers of that religion. He had treated everyone by giving them tea that he had prepared himself and confectionary.

The confectionary that Kyne's wife and child had saved for him for when he got back from hunting had contained poison; this was certainly the source of the illness. It seemed that the traveling merchant had told them that the confectionary would go bad quickly and should be immediately eaten by those already present, but now, evidence had been left behind.

Well, Vandalieu had erased the poison with his spell, so he wasn't sure if it would be accepted as evidence. It was difficult to imagine that there would be anyone who could detect the traces of the poison that Vandalieu had erased with death-attribute magic.

It was difficult to imagine that a traveling merchant who would do something like this would be formally registered at the Commerce Guild, too.

Well, there was a chance that he had assumed that all of the villagers were dead and was now foolishly heading to the nearest town.

After comforting the villagers who were shocked to learn that they had been betrayed by the traveling merchant they had trusted, Vandalieu had stayed the night and left Lemures behind to keep watch. And as for what he was doing now…

"Theeey weeere aaall~"

He was flying through the sky while singing in a flat pitch.

He was going around to see if yesterday's traveling merchant was trying to do something in the other cultivation villages.

Of course, he could have ignored the merchant and prioritized his goal of registering at the Adventurers' Guild, but if there were other villages where people had been poisoned like the Fifth Cultivation Village and all of the villagers were on the verge of death, he would have an uneasy conscience.

They do say that even chance meetings are due to fate, and that good you do to others is good that you do to yourself.

Vandalieu felt uncomfortable receiving money as a reward, so he had decided to have the villagers create a shrine for Vida in the village. Though it was a shrine, like the shrine for Alda, it was just a large stone with a holy symbol (a heart, in Vida's case) carved on it and a simple roof built over it. But because it was so simple, it was something that Vandalieu could easily ask for.

He was being treated more and more like an incarnation of Vida's Familiar Spirit as a result, but he didn't really mind.

"Haaated~ … Oh?" Vandalieu was currently on the way to the Sixth Cultivation Village when he noticed that there were several dozen silhouettes on the ground.

When he looked closely, he saw a group of men wearing worn-out leather armor with a grimy air about them, proceeding along the animal trail that led to the Sixth Cultivation Village.

He took out and checked the map that Kyne had drawn for him on some tree bark; there was no mistake.

He called the spirits that were floating around behind them and listened to them. These men were apparently bandits. He asked numerous spirits the same question and they all gave him the same answer. It seemed that these men really were bandits.

It was time to get rid of them.

"Listen up, you bastards," said the man who appeared to be the leader of the bandits. "Once we get to the village, kill all the men, and once you have your fun with them women, kill them as well! But the good-looking ones who look like they can sell, don't you put one scratch on 'em! You good with that?!"

"No, I'm not."

"What?! You bastard, you're going against -?! Who is this brat?!" The bandit leader turned around to see Vandalieu there. Floating silently in the air.

"Boss, this thing is a monster!"

"Suddenly coming down from above… It's definitely a ghost or something!"

"No," said Vandalieu in response to the frightened bandits. "I'm just a flying seven-year-old child who happened to be passing by."

In this world, normal seven-year-old children do not fly.

"Tch, he's underestimating us! Kyne*, use your superhuman strength to dispose of this thing!" the leader ordered.

A skinhead with the best physique among the bandits stepped forward with a smile on his face.

"Boss, can I play with it a little before I kill it?" he asked.

"Still into kids, huh… Do what you want!" said the leader.

"Hihih, I've got permission!" Kyne screamed in delight, his eyes gleaming in anticipation as he swung his war-hammer in an intimidating manner.

"Boss, aren't we supposed to be attacking the village?" another bandit asked.

"It's not a problem," replied the leader. "Kyne's definitely gonna break that kid quickly."

"I suppose you're right."

"Oi, kid, if you stay still, I'll just smash your arms and legs and then play around with you a little," said Kyne. "But if you resist, I'll smash your arms and legs and then turn you into my toy!"

"… Wow, it's an idiot," Vandalieu said in exasperation.

"WHAT?!" screamed Kyne. "Being called an idiot is the thing I hate the most! Don't you know that?!"

"There's no way I could know that, is there?"

"Damn it! You're making me out to be an idiot!" Turning red with anger, now resembling a boiled octopus, the bandit Kyne thrust his war-hammer towards Vandalieu. "One swing from this war-hammer is enough to deal with kids like you!"

I mean, if you were facing anyone who could withstand more than one blow, you wouldn't be able to do anything, would you? From the looks of it, you're just relying on pure strength as you swing it; your movements are those of a person who doesn't have the Club Technique skill.

Instead of voicing all of these retorts, Vandalieu stuck out his tongue. "This tongue is enough to deal with small-fry like you."

"You br -"

Before Kyne could finish screaming his words, Vandalieu's cheeks puffed out. Now that he did this, he could be considered quite cute despite his expressionless face.

But his cheeks returned to normal as he blew something out of his mouth with a small spitting sound.

Kyne stiffened and then toppled backwards like a rotten tree. His left eyeball had turned into a red puddle of blood, no longer a bloodshot eye with a pupil.

"Eh?"

"Kyne? What's wrong?"

As the bandits stood there dumbfounded, a soft, red, snake-like thing emerged from Kyne's left eye.

"Hyih?!"

Right before the terrified bandits' eyes, the red snake slithered out of Kyne's eye socket with blood dripping from it, and then rose into the air, straight into Vandalieu's mouth.

"… This is an original martial skill, Sharp Tongue," said Vandalieu. "It seems to be quite powerful if I fire it while secreting deadly poison. I suppose its flaw is that if I don't retract my tongue or grow another one, I can't talk."

It was a martial skill of the Unarmed Fighting Technique skill where he used the effects of Venom Secretion (Claws, Fangs, Tongue) skill, Spirit Form Transformation on the root of his tongue to separate his tongue from his body and the Long-distance Control skill to fire it as a projectile.

Of course, the only person capable of coming up with and using such a martial skill was Vandalieu.

"Well, I suppose I can use it if I keep it as my last resort?" he said to himself.

"What the hell are you?!"

"Now that the only Kyne left is the Kyne that's a good-willed hunter, I'll dispose of the rest normally," Vandalieu decided.

"Run! This kid is really a mons… What the, my legs won't move…?!"

"My legs are shaking too… Why, WHY WON'T THEY MOOOOVE?!"

Vandalieu glided towards the bandits as they struggled desperately. The claws at the tips of his small fingertips were more than enough to slit their throats.

"I just spread some poison," Vandalieu told them. "Didn't you notice that I'd called out to you from upwind? Now then, you'll answer my questions, won't you? Though I'll ask you one more time after killing you anyway."

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Chapter 71: If there's nothing to eat, you can eat Goblins, can't you?

"… I don't know… I really… don't know…" the bandit leader whispered with the eyes of a dead fish, saliva dripping from the corner of his mouth.

Vandalieu gave a small groan. "You really don't know. Considering that, your timing is quite strange, isn't it?"

The day after the traveling merchant's attempt to poison the villagers, bandits had tried to attack another cultivation village. It was too strange to be a coincidence.

But none of the bandit leader's subordinates had any information that could be clues, either.

The bandits had apparently been moving territories, bought the locations of the cultivation villages for cheap from the information broker in the closest town to this place, a town called Niarki. They had learned that the villages were easy to attack as there were no adventurers in any of the villages other than the Seventh Cultivation Village, so they had come out here.

The information broker that had information on the internal affairs of the cultivation villages that only a small portion of people ever traveled to, such as the traveling merchant in question, seemed suspicious. But nobody had known the bandits' names, and their faces had been concealed by cloths below the eyes.

With this, there would be no way to chase the bandits.

"I suppose I'll try pouring a little more, just in case," said Vandalieu.

"S… stop… please…"

"If you've ever stopped killing, raping and selling innocent people, I'll take that into consideration. So, have you ever quit?" Vandalieu asked.

"N… no…"

"That's what I thought."

Vandalieu placed his claws, which had a liquid dripping from their tips, into the gaping mouth of the bandit leader. The fluid being secreted by the claws dripped out.

That fluid was what is commonly referred to as truth serum, secreted through the Venom Secretion (Claws, Fangs, Tongue) skill.

The Venom Secretion (Claws, Fangs, Tongue) skill that he had acquired with the Venom Fist User Job was a skill that allowed venom secretion, just as its name suggested, but unlike the Ghouls' skill, the poison he could secrete wasn't limited to paralyzing venom.

Before acquiring the Venom Fist User Job, Vandalieu had the idea that he might be able handle poisons and drugs better, so he tested this idea after acquiring the Job. He found that toxicity of the venom he created was weaker than the poison he created using death-attribute magic, but he gained the ability to secrete toxic drugs with various effects from his claws, fangs and tongue.

And so Vandalieu had become a living pharmacy who could create truth serum, antiseptic solution, anesthesia, digestive medicine, sunscreen, eye drops and even vitamin pills.

… But it did have the flaw of using the nutrients in Vandalieu's body rather than Mana, so he couldn't use it consecutively like magic.

One more time, Vandalieu asked the bandit leader the questions he had already asked, but before he could answer, the bandit leader began convulsing and then died.

"So, what's the answer to the question I just asked?" Vandalieu asked the bandit leader's spirit, as if nothing had happened.

"I don't know… I really… don't know…"

Not discouraged by the fact that the answer hadn't changed, Vandalieu grabbed the corpse of the recently-deceased bandit leader's corpse and bit into its neck.

And then he used Bloodsucking. He was also sucking up the truth serum components remaining in the bandit leader's body, but with his Status Effect Resistance skill, these would have no effects on him at all.

"Phew, I've been hungry for animal protein since yesterday, so that was perfect. Now then…"

He quickly searched the bandits' pockets, took their money and collected their weapons while he was at it. He then threw their corpses into a hole he had created with Golem Transmutation and used Decomposition to make their bodies decay into bleached skeletons before burying them.

"All done." Vandalieu used Flight once more to head towards the Sixth Cultivation Village.

There didn't seem to be anything unusual happening at the village. The villagers gathered in surprise to the white-haired Dhampir that had descended from the sky. Vandalieu heard what they had to say and decided to perform some medical treatment on some of them before heading towards the next village.

"Please wait, Familiar Spirit-sama! I cannot let you go without thanking you for healing my father's eye!"

"No, it wasn't a big deal, you know?" Vandalieu told the villager.

All he had done was perform a simple surgery with Spirit Form Transformation, secrete eyedrops and create a small bottle to contain them with Golem Transmutation.

"Thank you for healing my son's burns! Thanks to you, my son's fingers, his fingers!"

All he had done was perform a simple surgery with Spirit Form Transmutation and fuse with him to heal the burned fingers back to normal with Rapid Healing.

Well, in this village without a doctor (village without a healing mage), it was probably a big deal. But Vandalieu still felt awkward about receiving payment. This cultivation village seemed poorer than the Seventh Cultivation Village and even poorer than the Fifth Cultivation Village.

"Well then, please build a shrine to Vida when you're not busy with work. Carving a stone with her holy symbol and building a simple roof over it is enough," Vandalieu told the villagers.

And then he headed for the next cultivation village.

『The level of the Surgery skill has increased!』

Though the next village was poor, it was a good village where the villagers spent every day working as hard as they could.

"Bugyugyugyuh!"

"Bufuuuuh!"

"Bugigigigigih!"

Or at least, it had been until three Orcs broke down the crude wooden walls surrounding the village and made their way inside.

"Run, it's Orcs!"

"Hyiiih!"

The villagers ran for their lives. Orcs, a familiar enemy for adventurers, were great threats for poor villagers who were former refugees.

If it was only one Orc, perhaps the hunters and village's young men would be able to surround it and somehow chase it away, but with three of them together, there was nothing to be done.

If all of the men in the village attacked them together, it might be possible for them to send them back, but including the farmlands, the village was quite large. It was impossible to swiftly gather all of the men from all over the village, arm them with farming tools for weapons and have them attack these Orcs who had appeared without warning.

The Orcs casually lumbered through the village, looking around at the fleeing villagers as if evaluating them.

"Kyah!"

Right in front of them, a young girl fell down. It seemed that it would take her another year or two to reach adulthood, but she was plenty old enough to satisfy the Orcs' twisted lust.

"Bufufuh."

The three Orcs all scrambled towards her.

"Beth! I'm coming!" A Beast-person boy of the same age as the girl, with the ears and tail of a wolf, ran towards her with a hoe in his hands.

"Morris! It's too late, you can't help me! You have to run!" the girl shouted.

"No way! I'm not going to hand you over to those Orcs, Beth!"

The boy had broken free of the grip of the male wolf Beast-person who appeared to be his father in order to run to his childhood friend, who was probably the girl that he loved.

"Morris, you can't come here!" Beth was also trying to stop him.

She knew that he wouldn't be able to defeat Orcs. Of course, Morris knew this as well.

If a child like him could defeat Orcs with a hoe, adventurers wouldn't have trouble against them. He would certainly be beaten to death by the Orcs' clubs, only delaying Beth's violation by a few seconds.

But even so, Morris couldn't stop himself from taking these actions. "You guys, your opponent is me!"

Seeing a boy raising a hoe to face them, the Orcs welcomed him with a derisive laugh. Right next to the female was a young male who looked like he had tender meat.

"Buhohoh!"

An Orcs raised its club, looking to quickly kill the boy and turn him into meat.

"UOOOH!"

Morris's hoe was repelled by the surface of the Orc's body, failing to pierce its thick fat and the muscle beneath it.

Despair appeared on Morris's face.

Suddenly, blood sprayed through the air.

Thinking that this was Morris's blood, Beth shut her eyes. Morris himself thought that he had died.

"That's one. Next, Heavy Fist."

But the villagers saw what had happened. A white child had descended from the sky at an incredible speed and burst the Orc's head with a single attack.

"Bugiiih?!"

An Unarmed Fighting Technique martial skill that was easy to avoid, yet had the power to make up for this weakness, struck the second Orc's head and killed it.

"Bugoh?!"

The third Orc regained its senses and raised its club, but in the eyes of Vandalieu, who had completed training with Braga and the other Black Goblins, this movement was far too slow.

Vandalieu's claws pierced the Orc cleanly, administering more than a lethal dose of neurotoxin.

The Orc convulsed several times before collapsing as its knees gave out.

"H… huh?"

And then Vandalieu turned around to speak to the boy who was staring at him blankly. "That was questionably reckless, but people can be taken over by their emotions, so I can understand your actions. I have memories of doing such things, too. What I'm trying to say is, I'm glad I could save you."

"Yeah, thanks." Morris instinctively thanked the blood-soaked, smoothly-speaking boy floating in the air with his arm bent at an odd angle.

"So, please don't be scared of me." Vandalieu still had no confidence in his luck with interacting with people. He was anxious that even though he had saved people who were being attacked, they would scream and think he was just another monster.

"Umm, your arm…"

As Morris pointed out Vandalieu's arm, which had broken after being unable to endure the speed of his descent and the attacks that he had beaten the Orcs to death with, Vandalieu used his other arm to casually straighten it and used Spirit Form Transformation on the parts that were concealed beneath his clothes. He rearranged his bones and blood vessels into their correct positions so that they would heal quickly.

"It's fixed," said Vandalieu.

"I-it is?" said Beth.

Her eyes were open wide in surprise as well.

"More importantly, won't you take the Orcs apart? With three of them, all of the villagers would be able to eat until they're full." Vandalieu's words caused both Beth and Morris to regain their senses completely.

Though Morris and Beth being nearby was one reason, Vandalieu had avoided using magic in order to kill the Orcs in a way that their meat could be used afterwards. It would have been a waste if they couldn't be eaten.

When Vandalieu asked the Orcs' spirits why they had attacked the village, they replied that their boss had told them to go on a rampage and do what they wanted in this village.

"So, what happened to that boss?" Vandalieu asked.

"He sent us here and then went somewhere."

"The boss is an Orc?"

"No, a human."

"Do you know his name and what his face looks like?"

"He called himself, 'Boss.' His face, his nose looked like a human's."

"His ears weren't pointed. He was blacker than you."

"He didn't have horns or wings."

Turning into spirits hadn't made the Orcs any smarter, so this was all they knew.

From this information, Vandalieu figured that it was probably a human tamer who had sent these three Orcs to this cultivation village for some reason. He sent Lemures to look for signs of any suspicious people in the vicinity, but they didn't find anything.

Isn't there some place that sells information about the terrain? Vandalieu wondered as he dismantled an Orc's body with his claws.

Vandalieu didn't have the Dismantling skill, a skill that most adventurers who worked alone would possess. However, he had the Cooking and Surgery skills instead, so he could accomplish more or less the same thing as with the Dismantling skill.

Finishing the dismantling of his Orc faster than any of the villagers, he decided to start cooking with the organs that would rot the fastest.

But apparently water had been in rather short supply of late, so the villagers had told him that he couldn't use large amounts of water to cook. That would make preparation of the organs impossible. But he didn't want to see the villagers seeing him use death-attribute magic or the Golem Transmutation skill.

That was why Vandalieu went to the back of the house, away from the eyes of the villagers, and used Golem Transmutation to dig a well.

He searched the ground with Out-of-body Experience and found a cave with a source of underground water at a depth that would be difficult to dig by hand. He made Earth Golems and Rock Golems using the earth between the ground surface and the underground water and made the Golems move into the cave to get to the water.

And once Vandalieu had solidified the inner surface of the hole with Rock Golems, the well was complete. Of course, he hadn't checked whether the underground water was suitable to drink yet.

"Huh, there's a well in a place like this~"

Acting like a child playing detective, Vandalieu led the villagers to the well.

"That's impossible, there's no way there would be a well… it's a well! There's a well?!"

"What?! How could this…?!"

"What about the water?! How's the water?!"

The villagers rushed in. Vandalieu took the water he had already drawn and returned to cooking.

And then he carefully prepared the organs.

"No matter how much I use Sterilization and Disinfect, it's not like the contents of the organs physically disappear."

People wouldn't want to eat the organs of an Orc, even if they were harmless to the body. The same applied for Vandalieu.

"Thank you very much, Familiar Spirit-sama! Not only have you saved my sons, but you have given us such an abundant well! How could we ever thank you for this…!"

"Thanks to you, this village can prosper for many years, many decades to come! Thank you, thank you!"

Incidentally, as to be expected, the villagers had realized that the well had been created by Vandalieu.

But then, Vandalieu hadn't expected that he would be able to fool them completely anyway. What was important was that the villagers didn't know that he was using unknown magic and skills. Earth-attribute magic and water-attribute magic alone would be sufficient to dig a well.

"Err, I'm in the middle of cooking… Umm, creating a shrine to Vida would be more than enough repayment," Vandalieu told them.

"Understood! We shall build a Church once the village is prospering!"

"No, a shrine is enough."

The village's water shortage had been more severe than Vandalieu had expected. Apparently they would have had to think about abandoning the village within the next few years if the situation hadn't improved.

"So, Vandalieu-sama, where are you headed now?"

"The last village, the Second Cultivation Village." Vandalieu was using Flight to travel while talking to Eleanora and the others through the communication Magic Item, the shrunken Goblin head.

"Pardon me for asking, but why are you helping the cultivation villages, Vandalieu-sama?" Eleanora asked. "Your objective is to register at the Adventurers' Guild, isn't it?" She seemed to be unable to understand why Vandalieu was going around helping the cultivation villages.

"Don't say that," said Zran. "Helping people is a good thing, isn't it?"

"You're doing great, King," said Braga. "By the way, my encounter -"

"If you stand out too much, you will be noticed by the Vampires who worship Hihiryushukaka," said Eleanora. "I think you shouldn't do anything unnecessary."

Zran had always thought favorably of the people in the Hartner Duchy that had done trade with Talosheim. To be more precise, the people of the cultivation villages were originally refugees from the Sauron Duchy, but he didn't seem to be interested in making this distinction.

But Eleanora was advocating that Vandalieu should quickly register at the Adventurers' Guild.

Vandalieu shouldn't endanger himself to help people who weren't even citizens of Talosheim at no benefit to himself. This was an extremely sensible viewpoint.

In fact, most people passing by would think, "Oh my, how troublesome," and then be on their way. Of course, mages capable of using healing magic might have saved Ivan in the Seventh Cultivation Village.

But would a mere passer-by with no obligations to do anything, who wasn't even an adventurer, have gone to the Fifth Cultivation Village afterwards? And would they have thought about going around to the other cultivation villages after that?

The reality was that Vandalieu gained nothing of use from helping the people of the cultivation villages. He gained the thanks and respect of the poor people, lodging and meals at crude inns, and verbal promises that shrines would be built in Vida's name. None of these contributed towards the accomplishments of his goals at all.

Registration as an adventurer could be done without getting involved with the people of the cultivation villages, and his registration wouldn't be rejected because he hadn't helped the people before registering.

Popularity among the lowest commoners wasn't really taken into account for people becoming noblemen, so not having such popularity wouldn't be a problem at all.

Helping the people wouldn't be of any help for resurrecting Darcia or getting revenge on Heinz and the others, either.

That was why Eleanora thought that rather than gaining anything in return, he was actually simply increasing the chances of being noticed by enemies, the Vampires who worshipped evil gods.

"That's true, but if I am able to help them, it's better to help them, isn't it?" When Vandalieu was asked to explain it, this was what it came down to. "It's said that the good you do to others is good that you do to yourself. If I do good deeds like this, I'm sure it will come back to me and good things will happen for me as well."

"I-is that how it is?" For Eleanora, with her sense of values and previous experiences, Vandalieu's reasoning could be said to be the reasoning of a foolish, softhearted person.

But Vandalieu was firm in his response. "That's how it is."

He believed in the unsightliness, foolishness, evil intentions and wickedness of people. He even thought that these were what made people people, and he couldn't deny that he had these qualities as well.

However, unsightliness had a counterpart in beauty; foolishness in wisdom; evil intentions in good intentions; wickedness in virtue. These concepts came into existence because their counterparts also existed. If the entire world was unsightly, foolish, filled with evil intentions and wicked, words to describe these wouldn't exist. All of these negative qualities could simply be described as, "Normal," "Ordinary," "Common," and "Average."

That was why people having beauty, wisdom, good intentions and virtue was a fact that could not be doubted.

Therefore, it could also be said that Vandalieu believed in the beauty, wisdom, good intentions and virtue of people as well.

"I don't intend to say that it's the responsibility of people with power, or anything like that. I dislike that way of thinking as well. All I want is to become happy, so I'm simply making others a little happier as well."

"But what about the Vampires…?"

After hearing all of this, Eleanora interpreted Vandalieu's way of thinking, the idea that "If everyone is smiling, that will make you smile as well" that a young child might be taught, was something that would only be applied to those other than enemies.

If that was the case, she would be able to understand to some extent. She would still think of Vandalieu as softhearted, but she herself had originally been an assassin sent to kill Vandalieu. She was only alive and present here because of that softhearted way of thinking.

Even so, Eleanora expressed that she would still like Vandalieu to think more about the danger of being noticed by the Vampires, but Vandalieu gave her a carefree response.

"It's still alright. Even Gubamon and the others who worship Hihiryushukaka, the most influential Vampires in this continent, wouldn't have the organizational capability to have informants in recently-constructed cultivation villages. It will be a while before traveling merchants start coming to these villages, and even longer before news of me reaches the towns."

"Then I suppose that's fine, but…"

"Then should we come close to those cultivation villages as well?" asked Zran.

"Hmm, please make sure you aren't seen by the people of the village," said Vandalieu.

"King, my lov-"

"Also, make sure you ask about our descendants and Levia-sama if you can," Zran reminded Vandalieu.

"Okay. But I don't think the people in the villages would know anything about them."

When Vandalieu arrived in the final village, the Second Cultivation Village, there was no traveling merchant trying to poison the villagers, bandits trying to sneak inside, Orcs sent by a tamer or anything of the sort.

However, instead of a sudden crisis, a long-term crisis had apparently been ongoing for a long time.

"The first year was good, but the amount of rice we harvest has been decreasing year after year. We have been improving the land and such, but… At this rate, not only will we be unable to pay taxes in three years' time, but we may even have people die of starvation in this year's winter. O Familiar Spirit-sama of Alda, please save this village."

Following the lead of the Dwarf chief of the village, the masses of villagers lowered their heads towards Vandalieu. Was it really appropriate that they had begun treating him like a Familiar Spirit right away simply because he had descended from the sky just as they were offering prayers for an abundant harvest?

"Well, I'll do what I can, but… Also, I'm a Dhampir who believes in Vida. I'm not a Familiar Spirit of Alda," Vandalieu told them.

Like the other cultivation villages that Vandalieu had visited, there were only shrines to Alda in the Second Cultivation Village. Had that priest of Alda in the Seventh Cultivation Village been particularly zealous with his missionary work?

Leaving that aside, with the problem simply being a poor harvest, the things that Vandalieu could do were limited. First, he went to have a look at the fields. Incidentally, the fields were unflooded, dry fields*.

Having a rough look with the knowledge and instincts from his Farming skill, the rice plants did indeed look weak to Vandalieu.

There was plenty of water, and the plants didn't look like they were affected by disease. As Vandalieu went to lick the soil and examine the soil's composition by taste, there was a weak reaction from his Danger Sense: Death spell.

"Could it be poison?" Vandalieu wondered. "Disinfect."

The reaction disappeared from the soil immediately. It seemed that there were substances harmful to the body present in the dirt. The Detoxification spell worked on the rice plants, so it seemed that this really was the cause of the poor harvest.

"But why is there poison in the soil?"

This was strange. The soil of this village seemed to be the same as the soil of the other cultivation villages. If the poison had mixed into the water used to irrigate the fields, Danger Sense: Death would have reacted to the irrigation channels as well.

"Have you been using a special fertilizer?" Vandalieu asked, but everyone, including the village chief, shook their heads.

"We're using compost made from plant and wood ash and human waste. But the other cultivation villages should be doing the same," said the chief.

"Oyaji, there was one time where the gentlemen from the Knights' Order came to train and brought some insecticide for us as well, wasn't there?" said his son.

"Now that you mention it, you are right. That was the Knights' Order led by the duke's eldest son, Prince Lucas, was it not? But he apparently delivered the same insecticide to the other cultivation villages…"

The conversation between the Dwarf village chief and his son, who couldn't be told apart other than by whether their hair and beards were black or white, didn't make anything clear.

Well, the insecticide was suspicious no matter how Vandalieu thought about it, but he couldn't think of a reason for the Knights' Order spreading poison only on the fields of this cultivation village.

As long as there weren't any strange familial conflicts happening, anyway.

If I recall, the cultivation project was started by the second son, Belton, and the leader of the Knights' Order is the oldest son, Lucas. The traveling merchant, the bandits, the tamer and this village's fields… I have a bad feeling about this.

Even if there was a familial conflict, why were there conspiracies targeting poor people like these on the edge of the region? It would be better off if they would just have bloody conflicts between family members in their own castles and mansions.

"For now, I've erased the poison in the soil of the fields and the rice plants," Vandalieu told the villagers.

He might have erased the evidence as well, but the culprit would likely have the backing of an influential person, so it would probably be pointless to preserve the evidence anyway.

The villagers cheered, but Vandalieu questioned whether this was really a great achievement. Even with the poison erased, if there was a poor harvest due to cold weather, pests or disease, there would be no change to the fact that people would die of starvation in the winter.

Wasn't there some way to improve the food situation of the village? If he spread his Mana into the fields, the beans planted in the ridges between the rice fields might turn into Monster Plants, so some other method.

As Vandalieu thought about it, he suddenly had an idea. Perhaps because there had been a Goblin King, there were more Goblins near the village than usual. And if he looked for Gobubu grass, he could quickly obtain some.

"Now then, everyone, I'll teach you a way to make Goblins not taste terrible, so you can use them as food in emergencies," he announced.

He would create the emergency rations of Ghouls, Gobu-gobu.

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