Had he intended to eat the rat, he would have first cut its head off and hung it upside down to drain the blood. According to the information he was given, though, forest octopuses were drawn to the smell, so he purposefully left the blood in. After chopping it up, a raw smell began to drift from the dismembered chunks. The scent of blood might attract more than just forest octopuses, but he decided that if any other monsters showed up, he’d just chop them up for money too, so he left the smell alone.
Next, he looked in his inventory and took out the shovel he bought in town. He walked over to the very edge of the swamp and began digging a hole in the ground. When Shion and Rona saw what Renya was up to, they figured that they probably weren’t going to get anything else done that day, so they started setting up camp nearby. They picked a place that was reasonably far from the swamp. Being too close ran the risk of being disturbed by something that popped out of the water. The wetness itself was also uncomfortable.
Renya’s digging proceeded smoothly. The earth near the water was soft, and he was soon standing in a waist-deep hole. He reached into his inventory again, pulled out a tall pot, and buried it in the ground so that only the opening was exposed. The pieces of the giant rat went in, along with a scoop of swamp water. That was all it took to create a land version of the classic trap — the octopus pot.
Gauging his distance from the camp, he chose positions where the light of a campfire would not reach to dig more holes, eventually finishing with a total of ten. Normally, octopus pots were placed horizontally and provided a hiding spot for octopuses. Once an octopus settled in, the pot would be retrieved with the prey in tow. The original process did not actually involve any bait, but Renya was working on limited knowledge, so he made it up as he went along.
If he failed, then so be it. He wouldn’t be too upset.
“If we don’t catch any forest octopuses, we’ll have to do some real hunting tomorrow,” murmured Renya to himself. Even if he did catch some, he still needed to hunt down a good number of monsters. Otherwise, he wouldn’t make enough from this mission to cover the costs of the equipment he bought. Problems, problems. He put them out of his mind.
The surface of the swamp shimmered faintly, and orange light danced among the swaying leaves. He looked up at the reddening glow of the evening sky.
If life was a song, this was his coda. Just a long epilogue. An extra chapter. A bonus end. He had nothing to prove, and no one to prove it to. Why put in effort? Where was the need?
Shion and Rona were invested in him, and he felt a little sorry for them. But, if the day came when they found their hopes in him thoroughly betrayed, they could simply leave. He would not keep them.
It would be a pity, though.
Hiding in the shadows of the trees, Renya smiled thinly to himself.
Night had fallen over their camp.
A soft noise outside their tent woke Renya, and he opened his eyes. His sleeping bag was warm and comfortable. His eyelids drooped. He almost drifted away into sleep again before he forced his eyes open and kept himself awake.
The campfire crackled outside. The shadows of its flame danced on the fabric of the tent.
The tent.
Once again, they put up only one, and once again, they bickered over it. It was almost the exact same argument they had as when they went on the dungeon mission. In a fit of desperation, he made his “one of these days, I really am going to take you for a spin” threat again. Like last time, Rona smiled confidently and beckoned him with her hand. Shion blushed, but made no obvious attempt to refuse.
He loudly decried their terrible taste in men, but to no avail. It was little more than bluff and bluster — the pitiful baying of a fangless wolf. The only thing he managed to do was expose his own helplessness.
Their patrol rotation was Renya, Rona, then Shion. Renya opposed this on the grounds that it was harsh on Rona, but Rona insisted. Her reasoning was that Shion was probably going to latch onto him anyway, and this order allowed her to pull Shion off him when they switched shifts. It also meant she could respond quickly to any emergencies. Finding that he had no counter-arguments, Renya looked at Shion, who was scratching her head with the stupidest of smiles on her face, looking not the least bit repentant. Apparently, the Shion sleep-hug was already a confirmed event on their overnight itinerary.
He clenched his fist with the intent of giving Shion a nice solid one across the jaw. His resolve evaporated, however, when Rona enviously said that he got all the perks, and the order was finalized.
Renya pulled himself halfway out of his sleeping bag and looked to the side. The blurry image of Rona slumbering peacefully in her sleeping bag found its way into his sleepy eyes. If Rona was beside him, that meant Shion was on patrol duty right now. He crawled out of his sleeping bag, put his outerwear and sword belt back on, and pulled the tent’s door flap open slightly. Shion’s head popped in.
“Are you being a good boy in there?” she asked, trying to suppress a laugh.
He closed his eyes and allowed the feeling of “I’m going to kill you” to pass.
“Don’t make me hurt you… What’s the matter?”
He unsheathed his katana slightly in an intimidating manner. Shion either didn’t get the message or was well aware it was an empty threat. She grinned, completely unaffected.
“Leaving the jokes aside for a minute, I think something’s going on in the forest.”
“Those jokes of yours are going to be the end of you one day, you know? Anyway, what do you mean, something’s going on?”
“I don’t know. It’s just a feeling. Something doesn’t feel right.”
It must have been a very vague feeling. Shion didn’t seem entirely confident in her own perception. Regardless, Renya immediately shook Rona awake. She yawned a little and opened her eyes.
“What seems to be the matter?”
Her sleepy countenance was betrayed by the clarity in her voice. Renya noted it, treating it as a reminder that former knights were not to be taken lightly.
“Shion feels that something is wrong. It’s not certain, but it’s worth checking out.”
“Understood.”
Rona gave a curt answer and quickly sat up, pulling her sleeping bag down to her waist. Having taken off her priest robes to sleep, she was currently in her underwear. Her sudden rise caused a pair of objects to jump out in front of them. There was a weightiness to the way they swayed. The voluminous presence demanded the gazes of Renya and Shion, giving neither of them any say in the matter.
“Wait, it’s one thing for me to be staring, but why are you staring too?”
“Oh, um,” stammered Shion, “I’m just, you know… sort of impressed.”