Chapter 72 "Well"

　After leaving the ruins, we returned to town for a meal and entered a nearby restaurant.

　When we entered the restaurant, we found a strangely young female owner and her daughter looking bored. When they saw us, they started to prepare food happily.

　Well, it was not a meal time, so it was natural that the restaurant was empty.

　When we sat down at a table in the back, the daughter came to take our order, so we placed our order appropriately.

　After the daughter left, Heidi opened her mouth.

　"The ruins were amazing, weren't they?"

　"Oh."

　"I wonder what those floors and walls are made of?"

　"I tried to touch them, and they felt good."

　Heidi laughs.

　"I don't mean that way, I mean the material..."

　I know, I know.

　"I have no idea what it's made of, but it's certainly not ordinary stone. It might be hard to scratch, let alone crush, by the feel of it."

　"Is that so?"

　"I tried detecting magic on it, but it was repelled. Maybe even magic can't do it."

　"So you're saying that the fact that the detection was rejected means that there was nothing there?"

"No. I aimed at the wall across the passage, but it didn't work."

　If it had passed through in the first place, the people investigating wouldn't have had such a hard time.

　And if I hear it right, they still haven't reached the deepest part.

I'm rather surprised that this holy sword or whatever it is was found at shallower depths than the deepest.

　I wonder what lies in the deepest part.

　While we were talking about such things, the dishes we had ordered were brought to us one after another.

　The owner of the restaurant was the one who brought them. I thought, "Oh?" I looked for the girl who had just come to take my order.

The owner, perhaps sensing my reaction, told me that she had sent her daughter shopping.

　"It must be hard to run a restaurant with just the two of you."

　"No, it's not. There will be a boy who will come to help us in a little while."

I hear that she and her daughter have been running the store since her husband passed away a while ago, but recently a student from the "Academy" has been staying at the boarding house, so he has been helping out in the store and has been very helpful.

　Heidi was listening to the conversation as if she was impressed, but I was a little taken aback.

　Well, I guess that's why it's so safe here....

　But for now...it doesn't matter.

　By the way, the food here is usually delicious.

　Well, my constitution makes me think it's tasty, but that's all, it's much better than eating bad meat.

　Besides, I'll be busy after this, so I'd like to eat more.

　I ordered more food from the owner who was talking with Heidi.　

　"You've eaten a lot, haven't you?"

　Heidi's voice trembles as she looks at the piles of plates on the table in front of her.

　The plates are literally piled up on top of each other.

The owner of the restaurant looks a little tired as she quickly calculates the price.

　Good. After eating this much, there should be no problem for a while.

I'll do the math first and have the price ready.

　I hand the bag of money to the hostess, who presents the price.

　The hostess says, "What? You already did the math?" and then nods when she confirms the price.

Heidi also mumbled, "Where did that amount of money come from?"

　"Great...I mean, is the money okay?"

　"No problem."

I am currently not at all short of money, as I have quite a bit of money left over from the money I have earned and robbed so far, as well as the road silver I received from Patrick.

I'm more concerned about Heidi's pockets.

She seems to be earning money by taking on requests in my absence, but judging from the amount of money she spends on equipment maintenance and various other expenditures, she must be having a tough time.

　"Oh, yes...at the Shudras we were talking about...wow."

　Heidi was about to leave the restaurant when she almost bumped into a customer who suddenly came in.

　The other customer was in a hurry and had sweat on his forehead.

　No, he wasn't a customer, was he? The man was wearing light armor and had a sword on his waist.

　Oh, is this the student?

　"Oh, I'm sorry. I was in a hurry.

"No, it's all right."

　The student apologized to Heidi and went into the back of the store with his two companions who came in later.

　"Let's go."

　After I called out to Heidi, I took one look at the students and left the restaurant.

　"Well, Heidi. I'm going to go out for a while to do something. You've been targeted once, so you'll have to stay at the inn, because you never know what might happen."

"Huh? Wait a minute..."

　Since it was too much trouble to explain, I said, "Don't leave the inn until I come back," and parted from Heidi.

After confirming that Heidi was not following me, I first opened my detection magic to full blast.

　...So far, no tailing?

　No suspicious reactions.

　Let's just walk around for now.

　I'm walking around in an area that doesn't seem to be popular, but... oh?

　There was movement at some distance.

　I forcefully widen the range of my magic to search for signs.

　The accuracy of this method is reduced, but if you know where it is, it doesn't matter to some extent.

　I kicked the wall, climbed to the roof of the building, and started running as soon as I landed.

　I see seven...eight signs.

　I see four of them moving away. The rest are not moving.

　I chase after the one that's away from me.

　Not so fast that I can't catch up.

　They were heading for the outskirts of town...were they going to go outside?

　After some distance, they came up to the roof of the building.

　As expected, they are in black robes.

　One of them is carrying something.

　Is it a child?

　Did they kidnap him? They're a bunch of unscrupulous people.

Follow them like this...oh, they've noticed me.

The two empty-handed men turn around and come toward me.

　They are in combat stance with their weapons drawn. One with a sword and one with a dagger.

　The sword is closing the gap at once. That's an unusual move.

Are you conscious of striking the opponent's weakness with a slow and steady movement?

A strike aimed at my neck. I uses the back of my hand to block the weapon...too close for that?

　Piercing the heart with a stabbing hand. Harden the fingers before contact.

　Pierce the heart to check the feeling... no foreign body sensation.

　...time is running out.

　I check to see if I can remove the thing that triggered the explosion, but it seems difficult.

　I grab the heart, pull it out, and throw it at the other dagger-bearer.

　The dagger-bearer ducks low and lets it pass.

　The heart explodes behind him.

　The dagger-bearer is about to slash at me, but I throw the corpse with the heart just pulled out at him before he can slash at me.

His body was hit, not dodging. The body folds over.

　Next, the body explodes around the head.

　A scream goes up. The black fog must have hit him hard.

　Another explosion. The dagger wielder also seems to be dead. That fog is amazing. If he was exposed to it, he would have died almost instantly.

　"...... tch."

Unintentionally click my tongue. I must have lost the rest.

　Just to be sure, I did a quick check of the area where I had lost sight of them, but found nothing more than a row of empty houses.

　I was going to check on the people who were fighting with the black robes, but they too had cleared out and I couldn't find anything except the traces of the battle.

　Well, even if I did find them, they were probably holy knights and probably didn't have much information.

After that, I continued to fly around town throughout the night, but without any luck.

　To be honest, I thought that if I moved around in places where I could be easily seen, they would attack me on their own, but the trouble was, nothing came out.

　I thought they might come to Heidi, but that too came up empty.

It hurts that I don't know where I'm going. I can't find a place where they could hide people.

Worst case scenario, I would have to pull out the memories of those who knew the area and get some information from them....

In the end, I searched until morning, but got nothing.

Returning to the inn, I left a message for Heidi that I would not be returning, and resumed my search.

After the sun came up, I decided to change my approach.

　Let's start by understanding the structure of the city.

It's a little smaller than some of the towns I've seen, but still too big to do all the searching.

　For now, it's the standard bar.

　"You want to know where there's no one around?"

　"Yeah, a place where people don't hang out would be even better."

　The place changed to a bar.

　I took a break and asked the owner about it.

　At first, he looked at me like, "What's this guy?" But when I put the gold coins on the counter, his attitude changed and he began to speak eloquently.

　"There are a lot of empty houses on the outskirts of town. There are not many people in that area, you know. However, the holy knights patrol the area regularly, so it's not the place for anyone who wants to do something wrong."

　I've already looked there.

　"Then where's a good place to do something?"

　"Oh, come on. You're not talking about something bad, are you?"

I'll show him the plate on my neck.

"It's related to this."

　The owner looks convinced, "Oh."

"Well... how about... the underground?"　

　"Underground? You mean the ruins?"

　"No, not that way. It's right under the city."

　The owner points down.

　Down there? What's down there?

　"There's a vein of water underground, and it's drawing water into the well, but I hear the inlet is pretty big, you know?"

　Hmm.

"But it's a bit tricky, because if the water source gets flooded by rain or something, the inlet fills up with water, so it can't be accessed at any time."

The owner pondered, "Hmmm."

"The rest is ...... sorry, ....... I don't know if I can come up with any more."

　"No, that's good enough."

At least I didn't see the basement, so there was a harvest.　

"... I get too much gold for all this rubbish. Go eat something."

　"Well, I'll take your word for it and treat myself."

The food was not as good as the food I had yesterday, but it was not bad either in quantity or taste.

　After leaving the restaurant, I looked into the nearest well and found a fair amount of water flowing at the bottom.

　I looked around to make sure no one was watching me and jumped into the well.

　And I landed in the water.

The water was so deep that even I couldn't get my feet to the bottom. Roughly 2.5 to 3 meters?

　I stared at the bottom of the well.

　The bottom of the well looks more like a corridor than an inlet, and the water is flowing.

　I go along the corridor with the current.

I observe the corridor while being swept along by the current.

　Well, it would certainly be a good place to hide if it weren't for the water.　

I sit cross-legged while drifting in the water.

　The corridor was divided along the way, but eventually it seemed to merge into the same stream.

　I vaguely grasped the structure of the corridor, and then I came out into a wider area.

　Oh, shoot.

　At that moment, I felt a tugging sensation and was swept away, and found myself floating in the river.

　I got out of the river and checked my current location.

　I saw Oldia a short distance away.

　...I was swept away quite a bit.

　It seems that I was swept away so much that I went through the corridor and ended up in the water vein.

　After all, the bottom of the well was empty, too.

In the meantime, I should go back to the town and look elsewhere...but where did that black robe go to hide?

　...I thought the bottom of the well was on the right track.

　I tilted my head and turned my feet toward the city.