======[ Hilde ]======
The next dawn.
It was a bit too early for the morning sun to rise; I woke up earlier than anyone in the party and got out of bed.
“Ugh….”
Carefully, I pulled away Friede, who was sleeping soundly, hugging one of my arms, and Amy, who was pressed against my other arm.
They both must have been tucked inside their sleeping bags, but when I woke up, they were snugly attached to me.
Well, given how cold it was, it made sense. A human arm is definitely warmer than a shabby sleeping bag.
They probably instinctively clung to me in their sleep.
“Yawn….”
I stretched widely, adjusted my helmet on my head, put on my gauntlet, and opened the tent flap.
I figured I’d warm up a bit before the party members woke up.
“Yawn… Ah, Hilde?”
Was the rustling sound what woke Gerda up? She lifted her upper body, bobbing her head side to side, and looked at me with half-closed eyes.
“Are you already up…? You don’t seem to need much morning sleep.”
Her voice was groggy.
“Oh, did I wake you? I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to disturb your sleep.”
I slightly bowed my head and offered a customary apology.
“…It’s fine. I usually wake up around this time anyway.”
Gerda shook her head slightly to shake off the sleepiness as she replied.
“Is that so?”
I’m glad to hear it. I would’ve felt a little bad if I woke someone who was sound asleep.
I smiled freely and stepped out of the tent.
◆◆
Stars twinkled like a school of fish, swimming in the deep navy sky.
“Ha….”
I exhaled white breath like smoke and lowered my head to sneak a glance around the camp.
It was still before the sun had risen.
Between the makeshift fence wrapped around the camp, the torches stood tall, faintly illuminating the dark of dawn.
Next to the torches were a few adventurers armed with bows and spears standing watch while a couple of men, presumed to be paladins, patrolled the perimeter, giving various orders to the adventurers.
Well, “orders” was a stretched meaning—it was mostly just a recommendation not to doze off or get too engrossed in casual conversation and to be thoroughly vigilant for any suspicious movements outside the fence.
I walked about twenty steps away from the tent where Amy and Friede were sleeping, drew my sword, and began to warm up, stabbing and swinging it through the air.
“Ha! Ha!”
I instinctively unleashed movements, recalling the situation I was in at the time, the slightest movements of my fingers, and the strength of my breaths.
I mimicked them with my sword, hoping to internalize the swordsmanship perfectly, so I could freely reproduce it.
This was my way of training.
If I could thoroughly master Brunhilde’s swordsmanship, at least I wouldn’t be outmatched anywhere.
“Phew….”
After about an hour of swinging my sword, I took a short break to hydrate and then did some strength training.
Things like doing a handstand in armor with one arm and repeatedly bending and straightening my arm… you know, stuff like that.
The base strength of Brunhilde alone was enough to easily surpass modern fitness enthusiasts, so if I didn’t put on some strain, I wouldn’t be able to train at all.
Even this was just to barely prevent muscle loss without increasing the weight.
Anyway, after about two hours of casual training, the surroundings were noticeably brighter.
“Ha…. Ha….”
I sat on a tree stump, resting and waiting for Amy and Friede to wake up.
My body was hot and soaked with sweat. White steam wafted out between my clothes and armor. I felt like I had a steam engine in my belly.
“Are you done? It’s rare to see such dedication to training so early among adventurers.”
Gerda, who had already come out of the tent, spoke to me.
She was sitting cross-legged on the ground with a cloak spread out, busy grinding various plants with small makeshift tools laid out in front of her.
Things like some bright red mushrooms and purple flower petals.
She was packing the powder she made into small cloth pouches or pouring it into little potion vials to shake them up…
“What are those?”
They looked suspicious right off the bat; it did not seem like they were nutritious supplements at all.
“Poison. It won’t work on undead, but it won’t hurt to prepare it anyway.”
As expected.
The scout class can manage a bit of everything, but that also means they’re somewhat mediocre in every aspect.
That said, as I mentioned before, scouts actively utilized various tools and skills to overcome their shortcomings.
Gerda probably chose poison to supplement her somewhat mediocre lethality with this concoction of deadly toxins she gathered and mixed herself.
Since our target was undead, it was rare for poison to work, but it would have been quite useful against ordinary monsters.
◆◆
About ten minutes later.
“Yawn… I overslept. I usually don’t do this….”
Friede, wearing her cloak and hood, rubbed her half-closed eyes and dragged her greatsword as she walked out of the tent.
“Yawn… What’s this, everyone’s up early…”
Following her, Amy also stretched widely, walking out as well.
“Oh, you’re awake? Perfect timing. I was just about to wake you up.”
“I slept well… um, good morning, Hilde! Uh… nice, nice morning!”
“Yeah, good morning.”
I sat next to the campfire lit by Gerda and waved my right hand slightly towards Friede and Amy to greet them.
“Once you’re awake, come over here. Gerda prepared breakfast, so let’s eat before it gets cold. And wash your faces a bit.”
A stew made by boiling water with salt and herbs, along with preserved rations and dried meat.
It was crude cooking, but surprisingly quite tasty. The herb aroma completely eliminated the stench of the meat.
“Wow, this is delicious…! Um, uh, can I have just one more bowl? Just one more?”
“Hmm… it’s not bad. I guess I was a bit hungry…?”
Friede and Amy also expressed their satisfaction with the stew. Amy’s praise was a bit twisted but typical of her.
To make this level of flavor with ingredients that are basically a mishmash of everything—truly, scouts are quite resourceful.
After filling our bellies with the warm stew and washing up with lukewarm water, we donned our gear and ventured into the forest.
Thus, the second day of our search started with a slightly different atmosphere than the first day.
While the encounters with undead had decreased to less than three times that of the previous day, the number of undead we faced at one time increased nearly fourfold.
Not only that, but their intelligence seemed to have risen as well.
There were even cases where three or four revenants served as bait, while ten wights hiding underground launched a surprise encirclement attack.
“Over there, I think we have one more hiding.”
Of course, we had a reliable scout, so we didn’t have to worry about such ambushes.
Even if the undead perfectly concealed themselves, they couldn’t eliminate the faint scents or traces of the ground dug up.
We simply remained still as Gerda directed us and unleashed a deadly pre-emptive strike in the direction she pointed.
However…
“…This isn’t good.”
“Yeah.”
While we could handle it this way without much issue, it was a significant concern overall for the search party.
The fact that the undead had started to cluster together was one thing; the tactics they employed had progressed to an astonishing degree. What did that imply?
“It seems the Abyss Priest is nearby. Given that they’ve already implemented strategies within a day of our search.”
Amy muttered intently.
That’s right.
The behavior patterns of the undead we encountered today clearly indicated that they aimed to dismantle the scattered search parties.
Thanks to Gerda, we could avoid ambushes, and with Friede and my combat skills being among the best in the party, plus having a mage with us, we could fight comfortably.
“Um, well… weak… I mean, clumsy parties. Um, those parties might find themselves in a bit of danger.”
As Friede pointed out, it wouldn’t be surprising for those mediocre adventuring parties to get surrounded and perish in an instant.
– Puff-burp-blee!
In fact, today, we saw almost five times the number of signal flares compared to yesterday, something we hadn’t witnessed even once.
Although we didn’t go searching for the locations since they were too far away.
“Yeah, we need to head back and discuss this.”
Thus, I decided to return much earlier than the previous day.
If the situation changed, our strategies would need to change as well.
◆◆
Back at the temporary camp, the atmosphere was as expected; it was a bit restless.
“Oh, you’re back! Uh… Hilde, was it? I’m glad to see you.”
The paladin who remained in the camp was so relieved to see our party return that he spoke to us first.
“Glad to see means you know what’s going on in the forest right now.”
“Yes. The search party that returned earlier reported it. It seems we’ve run into difficulties…”
The paladin let out a faint sigh and began to relay the details, almost complaining.
He told us that a significant number of today’s search party had not returned and were killed.
In fact, that was just the minimum reported casualties.
This number was just based on the reports of those who returned barely alive, having lost party members.
We couldn’t even ascertain how many more parties remained unreturned.
Plans had been made to prepare signal flares in case of such a situation, but the number of soldiers was limited, so they couldn’t rescue everyone?
Spreading out the adventurers had turned out to be a bad move.
While exterminating the undead widely spread throughout the forest and finding the Abyss Priest hiding somewhere was the only method, at this rate, it felt like our search parties would be annihilated before ever confronting the Abyss Priest.
