The Last Day of the Forest Search
“Are you sure, Lady Claire?”
“Yes. I doubt staying any longer in this forest will be much good. We should withdraw before everyone grows too tired to walk.”
“Yes, that is true, but…”
Sebastian had a harsh expression as he listened to Ms. Claire’s decision.
No, it wasn’t just Sebastian. Phillip and the guards and Ms. Lyra also looked deeply troubled.
But there was a reason that Sebastian and Ms. Lyra, who had initially been against coming here, had such expressions.
It was because they had all heard what Ms. Claire and I had talked about while I was on guard duty.
While Ms. Claire didn’t know it, I think she might have sensed something.
As for me, I just kept my mouth shut.
It seemed that the way it had spread was that Phillip had told the other guards, and then Johanna had told Ms. Lyra.
When resting in the tent, and as people changed shifts, they would ask me if it was true that Ms. Claire was troubled over it, and I didn’t know how to respond.
In the end, Sebastian had calmed them all down by declaring that they would get to the root of her troubles by exploring the forest.
All of them seriously wanted to do something to help her.
Ms. Claire really was loved by the servants.
“I can’t just continue to involve all of you in my whims. And so if we don’t find anything tomorrow, we will return to the mansion.”
With Sebastian leading the others, they all nodded with looks of disappointment.
Of course, I felt the same.
Especially since I had heard the words directly from Ms. Claire.
If only we could find something that was connected to the fenrirs or Silver Fenrirs.
But no matter how much I wished for this, we could not find anything.
Regardless, the matter had been settled, and so we went to bed, knowing that tomorrow was the last day.
While the order in which we took the watch changed every day, we were paired up the same as during the first day.
Once, orcs had attacked us in the middle of the night.
Well, it was when Johanna and Ms. Lyra were on guard duty. And Leo, who was supposed to have been asleep, got up quickly and turned them into meat.
And so in preparation for tomorrow, I ate some good sleep herbs and went to bed.
It was the last one that I had saved after sharing the rest with the others.
Now, I hoped that we would find something tomorrow!
The next day, after we finished eating breakfast, we left Ms. Lyra and Johanna at the camp and the rest of us stepped foot into the forest.
We also set the time for returning to the camp later than usual, so that we could search for as long as possible.
In fact, since it would be a waste of time to go back in order to eat lunch, Ms. Lyra had given us some orc meat that had been cooked in herbs that we could carry with us.
And so we would eat that for lunch, and have a proper dinner when we finished our search and returned in the evening.
Unlike previous days, we would enter the forest from an area that was reached after crossing the river.
As the river only went up to your thighs, it wasn’t too hard to cross as long as you were careful so that your feet didn’t slip.
Of course, you still got wet. And that was why we had been avoiding it.
Now that Ms. Claire had decided to return, this was no time to hesitate just because our feet might get wet.
And so even Ms. Claire did not care about getting wet as she crossed and joined us in searching.
Well, it wasn’t as if we had searched everywhere on the other side before crossing the river. However, if this was the last day, we might as well try and step out into completely new territory. That had been Phillip’s opinion.
And so a few hours after crossing the river, we walked through the dense forest.
Sebastian and Phillip used magic to light our path as we advanced.
“…We really can’t find anything…”
“…We should take a rest once. I think that everyone is tired after searching for so many days in a row.”
As Phillip and I confirmed that neither had found anything, Sebastian glanced over to Ms. Claire and suggested that we rest.
As I had eaten the herb the night before, I wasn’t carrying any of the fatigue from yesterday. However, it was a little tiring to walk nonstop.
Besides, I could see the tiredness starting to appear on not just Ms. Claire, but the faces of the others as well.
And so perhaps we should rest and eat lunch.
Though, there were no clearings nearby. So we just sat randomly on the ground and ate the food that Ms. Lyra had prepared for us.
“Are you all right, Ms. Claire?”
“…Yes, I think so. I am indeed tired, but I’ve gotten used to walking in the forest during these past few days.”
“So you can still walk then?”
“Yes, I’m fine. This is the last search. I really must find traces of the fenrirs, no matter what.”
That being said, we had not found anything of the sort yet.
And while she said she was used to it, we had been walking for days now. She could be more tired than she realized.
Hell, even Sebastian was massaging his feet as he ate, as if he was in pain.
And he always put an effort into hiding that he was tired. I assumed that Ms. Claire had been doing the same…
“What should we do, Leo?”
“If we don’t find something soon, we’ll have to return to the mansion without obtaining anything. That would mean Ms. Claire had forced everyone to come here for nothing… I’d really like to prevent that from happening.”
“Wou…wuff? Wuff-wuff!”
“Hmm? What is it, Leo?”
I had been muttering to Leo, who was sitting next to me and eating sausages. And then after a moment of thoughtful silence, she suddenly started barking at me.
What is it…? Monsters?
“Are there monsters about?”
As I asked Leo, Sebastian immediately reacted.
But Leo shook her head to say that it was not the case.
Sebastian and the others sighed with relief, and then they went back to eating their lunch.
“Then what is it, Leo?”
Leo pushed her face towards my hand and licked it once. And then she pointed her nose to the ground.
What…? Weed Cultivation?
Yes, I had Weed Cultivation.
And unlike magic, it did not use up magic energy.
I didn’t understand the details of how it worked at all, but I had never felt tired after using Weed Cultivation.
And there were so many useful things that I could do with it!