“Another missing cat…”
Milia read the application slip and hummed to herself before placing it into the inbox for an on-site inspection. She and I were deciding which submitted requests would be approved as actual jobs for adventurers. We’d split the stack of inquiries in half and were working through our respective piles.
“I haven’t seen your cat recently, Mr. Roland. Did something happen to her?” Milia picked up another slip, scanned it, and placed it in the rejection box.
“She’s behaving herself at home.”
“Oh, really? I don’t think she likes me much, but I’d like to hold her next time I see her.”
Come to think of it, Milia still didn’t know the cat was actually Rila.
“It would be nice if she liked you. I don’t want her to scratch you.”
“Aww. She scratches? I wonder what I can do to make her like me…”
I rejected a fight mediator job and took the next slip in my pile.
“…Hmm.”
This one was from a woodcutter. He wanted someone to slay or drive off an unknown monster he’d spotted in the woods while at work. I placed this request in the box for an on-site check-in, then took the next slip. To my surprise, it described a similar kind of situation. Someone else had spotted an unidentified monster in the same forest.
“Mr. Roland, has anything odd happened near the woods lately?”
“Is something wrong?”
“No… It’s just, I’ve seen multiple inquiries about a mystery creature in the same region.”
“I’ve got two stubs describing the same thing.”
Evidently, many people had witnessed this strange beast, and none of them recognized the species. By the time Milia and I finished our stacks, we had a total of eight sightings between us.
“Mr. Roland, can you handle the processing?”
“Sure.”
I took the eight slips to the branch manager’s office.
“Hmm. So you’ve found several requests with the same description… That is worrisome.” Iris scowled as she signed the slips and returned them to me. “We’ll need follow-up interviews and an on-site inspection. I’m counting on you.”
“Of course.”
I gathered the reports together and stored them in my breast pocket, then left the guild. Occasionally, a couple of similar inquiries would come in, but rarely had multiples with such consistent accounts arrived so close together—and there were eight of them.
First, I made my way to the woodcutter’s house.
“Thought that blasted thing was a dream at first. It was thiiiis huge.” The man spread his arms to demonstrate.
“Knowing its size could be very helpful,” I said. “Would you judge it to be larger than your home?”
This was a two-story structure, bigger than the average house.
“Well… It was smaller than that, of course… Actually, maybe it was about the same size.”
I quickly jotted that down.
“And were there any other features of note?”
“The thing definitely traveled on all fours… But it was startled and ran off quickly. Only saw it that one time…”
“Several others have seen the same creature, so it may be living in the woods.”
“I haven’t been able to go to work since that thing showed up…”
“Well, that’s a given, seeing as the monster is as large as a house.”
“I’m counting on you, sir. I’ll pay the reward, even if it costs me a lot.”
“I’m afraid I can’t tell you the exact price for the quest yet, but we’ll look into the matter and speak with the other witnesses. Once that’s done, we’ll formally assign a rank and reward, then consult with you regarding price.”
“Gotcha. I’m counting on you.”
Continuing on that track, I met the other seven individuals and collected their stories. Unfortunately, none of them agreed with the others.
No one but the woodcutter claimed the monster was as large as a house. A few claimed it was closer in size to a horse. One even swore it walked on two legs.
“Why are the reports so different…?”
Upon returning to the guild, I compared all the statements. It seemed we didn’t have one new species of monster on our hands, but a veritable menagerie.
The only common quality was that the monsters were sighted between the evening and dead of night. There were plenty of nocturnal species, so that wasn’t too helpful.
Those who submitted requests for help frequented the woods, whether it was for woodcutting, gathering food, or something else. This mysterious threat put them all out of work; it was a matter of life or death to them. On top of that, there weren’t many quests for that forest, so adventurers didn’t come through the area regularly.
We were nearing closing time when Jita came by the guild. He was a beastperson I once chased through the royal capital. Now he was employed as a guide and kept new adventurers from losing their way in the woods.
“Jita.”
“Hey, Roland. Is something the matter?”
“Have you heard of any strange occurrences in the woods to the northeast of here?”
“Strange stuff? Hunh… I don’t really go up there, even for work… No one really needs a guide for that place.”
“I see.”
“Oh, but sometimes I feel a creepy presence near there when it starts getting dark. But it’s never tempted me to go in there to check it out. I just pass by.”
“Looks like it’ll be fastest for me to take a look for myself, then.”
“Are you sure you’ll be okay? You’ve just got the one arm now.”
“I could throw you all the way to those woods with this single arm, if I wanted to.”
“Urgh… Y-your combat abilities are just as terrifying as ever…”
Jita’s face twitched, then he gave me a summary of the day’s events and headed home not a moment later. After reporting my progress to Iris, I made for the woods with her permission. The workday was over, so I planned to head home once the inspection was over.
When I arrived at the woods, the sky was turning from a shade of red to indigo blue, and tiny stars were emerging.
I found a path that made my trek into the woods easier. Apparently, people were making frequent trips in and out.
A nearby river was likely someone’s source of fresh water, and I spied some stumps and the remnants of edible plants. There were squirrels and rabbits about. Everything seemed like a normal forest.
Suddenly, the chirruping insects went silent, and the small animals made themselves scarce. A heavy thump thundered through the woods. Soon after, the odor of spoiled food assailed my nose. It smelled of fermentation. Something blocked the moonlight filtering through the canopy, plunging everything into darkness.
When I looked in that direction, I saw a monster the size of a house. In all likelihood, this was the one the woodcutter had spoken of.
Its four stumpy legs were thick, and its entire body was covered in what looked like stone. A quartet of four elongated, thread-like eyes extended from what I assumed was a face. It mostly resembled a turtle, but I couldn’t remember any variety like this, much less a monstrous one.
One of its eyes opened wide and swiveled in my direction.
“I had only planned to investigate, but now that you’ve spotted me, I guess I have no choice.”
I grabbed a rock at my feet and lobbed it at the eye. It connected, passing through the monster’s head.
“Graaaaaaw?!”
The woods shook with the monster’s scream.
The creature’s size made it powerful, but it was slower for it, too. I could fight it while walking.
Since it trudged along on four legs, I knew that its limbs couldn’t be fully armored. That would restrict its movements too much. Its joints were undoubtedly exposed.
I took a random branch and headed around to the monster’s back. As I anticipated, the flesh behind what appeared to be its knees was exposed.
I jabbed the branch into the skin there, then did the same to its other three limbs as well.
“Graaaw?! Graaa?!”