We couldn’t spend all our time lamenting our loss. If it meant that our situation would improve, I would happily dance the Para Para or the Lambada, but that would be totally pointless.
“The former, by the way, is a disco dance born in Japan during the late 1980s; the latter was born in South America. They were both popular around the same time, but many discos at the time banned the dances for being too provocative.”
Thanks for the detailed explanation, Tiamat. But why was she waving me over? I can’t dance the Lambada.
“You just said you would. What a filthy liar you are.”
“Only if it would... Sorry. I lied. I can’t dance the Lambada or the Para Para. Please have mercy on my soul.”
I begged desperately, yet self-deprecatingly. I mean, it kind of felt like Tiamat would pull all sorts of tricks and solve our problem just to make me do the dance. No? Just me?
“Hm. Think about what you did.”
What a generous gesture of forgiveness. Damn it. Just you watch, one of these days I will make her rue this moment!
“Right. Ruety-rue-rue.”
“Errrrkk!”
“Tracks lead in every direction except due west, where we came in from.”
Disregarding our stupid conversation, Ruey was contemplating our next move, holding a map open.
“The discussion as to which tracks are real may be pointless, Lord Ruey. We have no way of discerning whether they plan to rendezvous somewhere or plan for each team to return of their own merit.”
Hieronymus was the one discussing with him. So sorry. I really am the useless one.
“There are the most tracks headed east, out of the bunch. That’s their main party.”
Even Baze sounded more reserved than normal. We couldn’t help but be more trepidatious after falling for their trap once.
“It could be a mislead to make us think so, or it could really be the direction they went in.”
Ruey shrugged. Someone once said that the most effective traps are set on your opponent’s mind. Determined not to fall for it again, we were being timid. Even though we knew that the enemy did this to buy time, we hesitated to take swift action.
“It would be a foolish decision for us to split up, too,” said Tiamat.
“Yep.”
Since I had no combat skills, I would pair up with Tiamat. Ruey would partner with Baze, and Hieronymus, who had smarts and situational awareness, would go solo. We could have split into three, but what was the point of breaking up our already meager force? Once we split up, it wouldn’t be easy to make contact with each other, either.
“Thought Speech can only go about a kilometer, max,” Tiamat added.
Maybe we could use it while we were in a town, but that was about it.
“Oh.”
“Light bulb, Eiji?”
“Let’s go in the direction with the least amount of tracks.”
“How come?”
“Because it’s probably not their biggest party.”
I needed to explain myself. If we try to catch their main party, we would be disappointed if we were wrong. Then, why not go in expecting one of the decoy parties?
“You go down the wrong path first in dungeons too. There could be treasure chests at the end.”
Stick to the correct path, and you might not get a chance to crawl that dungeon again. I wouldn’t want to leave a collectible behind.
“In video games, maybe.”
“Right. There’s no reason to go the long way in real life. But we don’t know the right path, anyway.”
It wasn’t important for us to pick the right path. No matter which set of tracks we followed, there would be monsters at the end of them. And those monsters would eventually return to their home base or meet up with the main party.
“And, maybe if they’re really small in numbers, we could capture them and make them talk, I think.”
A monster put in charge to lead a separate party could be a higher-up in their army. I didn’t want to get ahead of ourselves, but that monster could very well have some information.
“Hm... Not a bad idea, Lord Eiji.”
Hieronymus, who had been pondering my suggestion, cracked a grin. Beside him, Ruey gave a big nod.
With Baze back in Fenrir mode leading the pack, we restarted our tracking. Baze guessed that we were following a group of fifty or so, but couldn’t make out an accurate number since many of the tracks were covered or planted.
“An attempt to throw us for a loop. They have that much intelligence, at least. We mustn’t underestimate them.”
“Indeed.”
Tiamat and Hieronymus poofed out of their human forms. Since we weren’t in a town, there was almost no point in staying human. It seemed more beneficial to be ready to use their full power, rather than be a little more concealed.
We were headed south, generally speaking. Tiamat was beside me, as Ruey led our party and Hieronymus remained rearguard.
“I wonder how much distance they’ve put between us.”
“Not sure. Most likely two or three days’ worth,” Tiamat answered.
With some simple math, that’s about sixty to ninety kilometers. Although, since we weren’t traveling along a road but through the woods with poor visibility and uneven ground, I doubted that said distance was unrecoverable. Especially when there were so many more of them than us. There was no reason for their party to travel faster than us.
“If we keep going in this direction, though, we may be in for a little bit of trouble,” Ruey said, holding the map in his left hand.
We were in the woods as we spoke, but were coming up on a travel road if we kept heading south. Naturally, there were also towns and villages in that direction. I couldn’t predict whether or not the monsters would simply travel past any settlement. Even if they tried to, the residents of those settlements could overreact. Would they choose fight or flight? The latter would be all right, but there would be bloodshed with the former.
“Definitely want to avoid that.”
“When you say things like that...”
“Boss Man. I smell blood in the air.”
Baze gave a sharp warning, interrupting Tiamat.
“See. Nice tee-up.”
“My fault?! Was that my fault?!”
“No time to goof around. Your call, Boss Man.”
Baze was right. I made a snap decision.
“Let’s catch up to the source, quick. Can you go ahead, Tia? Lord Baze?”
“No. It would be too dangerous to divide us here,” said Tiamat.
“But going as fast I can isn’t quick enough.”
“Forget it. Boss Man. Ruey. Hop on.”
“Okay.”
I felt like I would have been scorned for turning him down, so I climbed onto Baze’s back... with Ruey’s help. There was plenty of room on the Fenrir’s back, even with two grown men on it. In fact, his fluffy fur was very comfortable. Tiamat’s scales were cold, and not fluffy at all. And she wasn’t big enough for me to ride on her back.
“Let’s go. Hold on tight.”
With a kick off of the ground, Baze accelerated. It was fast. And scary! There was no way I could sit up anymore. I held on to Baze with all of my limbs. He was sprinting in the woods, weaving through the trees. A roller coaster would have been a little less thrilling than this.
I kept my face down too, to keep any branches from flying into my eyes. Then Ruey covered me, protecting me with his own body. I was grateful, but what did that say about my role in the party?
The air roared passed us. As my vision closed in, I spotted Tiamat and Hieronymus. The dragon princess was flying very low and very fast, while the feline gentleman ran like a predator on the savannah. Right. Being on Baze’s back seemed like the safest option, after all.