The town that we arrived by riding a large four-wheeled stagecoach, which still has an old-fashioned mercenary guild, is called Chester - small towns with the same name can be seen everywhere where the Lamanites have left their footprints, because this word is in ancient times. It means "small town" in the Man language.
The principle that things are rare can be reflected in all aspects. When a "country" only has a few cities, each place will be given a cherished and meaningful name. But under the rule of the Laman Empire, which was at its peak and covered almost the entire coast of the inland sea of Mobigas, small towns with a population of several thousand to ten or twenty thousand were as numerous as stars. Although the locals still had some unique names, official records always said that It’s “Chester, Chester and Chester.”
The civilian population has come and gone through wars, decline and reconstruction. This mobility has meant that the people living here today are no longer the descendants of the residents who lived thousands of years ago.
Those names from ancient times have long been lost to time, and naturally only the official history that has been carefully preserved remains. And if there are no memorable events or memorable characters here, they will naturally have to use the ordinary "Chester" as their name.
Small town, narrow streets.
The old and low city wall is made of stone and covered with moss, but is only three or four meters high. There are soldiers holding halberds standing guard on the wooden plank road above, but on his head, the Imperial infantry-standard Morion helmet with a large brim is worn crookedly and low, blocking the upper half of his face, and he has his hands wrapped around the halberd. On the handle, it looks like he is taking a nap while leaning on the weapon.
Just as lacking in motivation as the soldiers was the city wall itself. This old and short city wall only covered a small section of the low, flat terrain on the south side. The slightly higher part is only protected by a higher slope - but the slope is not too steep, and it takes a little effort to climb it completely.
This Chester, built on a small hill, was originally the camp of the Gulaman Legion, and was used together with several legions in other directions to protect the nearby silver mines. But as time went by, the camps in other places disappeared, leaving it alone as a transportation hub, gradually developing into a small town with a small population.
But because it is not considered a strategic location, and even the only valuable silver mine is gradually drying up, it has gradually evolved into a situation where neither high nor low can be achieved.
The carriage staggered into the city gate, and the drowsy guards naturally did not come to check. After that, it stopped at a station with a pavilion. The coachman got down from his seat and quickly opened the flap, and the passengers, including Henry and others, got off the tall carriage one after another.
The Luoan girl who held Miltia in hand when she entered the door ran to the side alone to inquire about the location of the Adventurer's Guild. In order to save money, she planned to store Miltia in the guild instead of the small town stables where money was needed.
Bricks and dirt roads are intertwined on the ground. In many places, pits have appeared due to horse-drawn carriages passing by all year round. Pedestrians skillfully avoid them when passing by. Unlike wealthy Parnilla, where regular slates and bricks are everywhere, this mixed look is what most imperial towns should have.
The small town with a population of less than 10,000 people has no road signs and no serious route planning. Both sides of the winding and narrow roads are almost filled with ordinary families living in the local area. In addition to daisies, there are dead and wilted flowers in the terracotta flowerpots at the door of the white-dusted house. Most of the pedestrians on the road are wearing hats or hoods made of wool.
It's getting cold.
The group of armed people walking with horses attracted a lot of attention. Although Henry and Mira were eye-catching enough, the two Crescent Island natives with exotic clothes and faces attracted even more attention. .
Both Ling, who is from a reserved cultural background, and Lu Lu, who is habitually vigilant, are a little unaccustomed to the direct and intense gaze in the Laman culture, as if looking at goods - even if they have been here for a while - But fortunately, because the group of people seemed not to be trifled with, there were no pretentious young people who wanted to strike up a conversation to see if they could have a strange, exotic relationship.
When they finally arrived at their destination, they found that the mercenary guild here was quite deserted.
Because they heard the news from other mercenaries, the group was originally worried that the place would be overcrowded if not many guilds were willing to accept it, but the reality was that there were only a few other than them who smelled of alcohol and were dirty. A handsome middle-aged green-label mercenary.
One of them muttered something and opened the door and passed by them. The sage took one look and quickly understood the reason.
Still existing and still able to run, and being able to provide reliable and efficient services as before are two different concepts.
Without the support of the entire mercenary guild's behind-the-scenes system, the guild members here can only manage on their own.
What is this concept?
In the past, mercenary guilds accepted tasks in two ways: one was that the client personally or sent an agent to the door to entrust the task. This method was usually carried out by nobles or regional officials, because the journey required funds, and the guild could only To the town-level strongholds, the demands of some remote villages often cannot be conveyed due to the long distance.
Therefore, most of the inexhaustible commissions that allow low-level adventurers to make a living are actually obtained by guild commissioners who go to the countryside to look for rewards.
However, such commissioners are usually dispatched regularly by guilds in larger cities in an organized and large-scale manner, and then the tasks are distributed downwards according to the jurisdiction of each regional branch.
Now that the upper echelon has disappeared, the remaining regional branches that no longer have such huge manpower and material resources to mobilize can only rely on the first form, and the number of tasks they can accept has naturally shrunk in a large area.
And the difficulty of the task has also been greatly increased.
"After all, I came here for help when I was desperate." Henry said calmly as he looked at the few commission instructions on the bulletin board and the low-level mercenaries around him who were lying down and resting in the guild as a tavern.
Even the waiter looked listless. When he saw the sage taking down a commission from the bulletin board and walking over, he was somewhat shocked by his tall figure, but he still said this .
"Are you sure you want to accept it? Although the reward is very high, several guys who overestimated their capabilities have already died." He looked at their team. Although the equipment looked good, 3 of the 5 people were girls. The two were small and unarmed, and they looked like they were not very capable of fighting. And they all looked young, so it was obvious that they were already regarded as a bunch of weird and self-righteous young people in their hearts.
"Well." The sage didn't mean to waste any more words, and the unmotivated receptionist waved his hand when he saw him reading the content quietly: "Then you can read it yourself if you understand it. There will be a handling fee after all." 30%.”
Obviously these remaining branches have also made some changes based on the situation. They can no longer provide endless commissions and logistical support, so the commissions have been reduced a bit to avoid dissatisfaction among adventurers.
The current era is not easy for both low-level adventurers and these old guilds. The cold, decadent and indifferent attitude permeates the air as if it were real. He is the only receptionist, and he has no idea about the gangsters in the hall. The green-label mercenary who dozed off every day also turned a blind eye.
The reward for the mission was quite high, and it seemed that the price had been repeatedly raised to recruit brave men for large sums of money. There were a total of two standard purses of imperial gold coins, which was a reward of 100 pieces.
This was already a remuneration that would allow ordinary people to live and drink without worries for several years, so Henry chose it immediately.
But this mission as a whole does have an air of danger.
"Hunting ferocious beasts, regardless of life or death. It has caused the death of 25 people, including several soldiers. The number of failed expeditions by adventurers is 9."
"The victim's internal organs were eaten and he was wandering around the abandoned silver mine. No further details are available."
The Luoan girl who stood on tiptoe and looked at the mission briefing from Henry's hand frowned as she read: "What kind of thing is this? There is no detailed explanation, and it doesn't even require a crusade certificate?"
"Maybe they have some other means to verify it." When Henry said this in a calm tone, his eyes glanced at the drunken low-level mercenaries in the guild.
————
The silver mine near Chester is in the woodland about two kilometers away. It can be reached by walking out of the unwalled road on the other side of the town and following the dirt track that has been walked for many years.
Because the guild notices lacked information, the group made inquiries among the people of Chester on the way here.
Since the mineral resources have been exhausted, few nearby residents will come here. Therefore, only a few people know the detailed structure and path.
At the entrance of the mine, there was a building that was once built to store ore and for miners to rest, but it has been reduced to ruins over the long years. The only new buildings around are the cabins built by hunters in the town for processing game pelts. They are also the few people who go deep into this mountain forest.
In addition, only newborn calves who are not afraid of tigers will come here to "adventure".
The hunters were the first to be killed. The three people who went into the mountains to check the traps more than a month ago at night have not returned yet, and their families disappeared after going to search.
Finally, the remaining family members reported the town guard, and a five-man infantry team went to explore. Except for the torn corpse, there was no trace of the murderer. Because they were not good at tracking in the forest, they spent the whole day searching for survivors and then planned to return to the city. It was on their way back in the evening that they were attacked by a murderer.
When the passing townspeople noticed the sole survivor dying at the edge of the forest, the other party just handed over a brief search report and died.
Afterwards, the nobles who managed the town were unwilling to devote more manpower to deal with such dangerous things, so they left the task to the Adventurer's Guild - which is why the reward was so high.
And after hearing that a group of people were also adventurers who had taken on the mission - "I have known for a long time that there must be something wrong with that forest." The old man who narrated all this said vowedly: "Everyone in Chester knows that there used to be a dead place there. Extraordinary."
It seems that every place has its own mysterious forbidden area, and the conditions for the formation of legends are similar: mysterious, inaccessible but actually within reach, and some kind of disaster has happened or is rumored to have happened.
Although after learning about the existence of another world, they also understood that some of these things were real, but more often than not, this forbidden area was just a story simply used to scare children.
Only this time that was clearly not the case.
"The smell of corpses." said the hunter girl who was an excellent wilderness guide.
The odor wafting downwind from the woodland ahead is not very strong, but it can still be picked up by the human sense of smell. The group of people looked for it and saw a human skeleton with only the upper body left leaning on a tree and covered with insects and ants.
Ling's face turned a little livid, and the sage winked and asked Kaleva to take her back a little.
The flesh on the skeleton has been chewed up almost completely by the hard-working animals in this vibrant forest, but it can still be seen from the thick, blood-stained soft armor on his body and the cortical reinforcements on his shoulders and other parts. Is an adventurer.
"Multi-layered linen quilted soft armor. The quality is average but it can stop blunt swords." Ignoring the insects that were still climbing, Henry squatted down and pinched the gap in the soft armor, turned it over and looked at the cross-section. .
The broken flax fibers appeared to be of different lengths. This was obviously not caused by sharp objects, but torn apart by brute force.
"Is it really a wild beast, or a magical beast?" Mira asked. With the sensitive Mitya on guard around her, and because this person was obviously deceased some time ago, they could safely conduct the inspection.
"That must be a big one." Henry put his hand on the dead corpse's skull, because the corpse had decomposed for too long and was stuck to the bark of the tree. When he opened the head forward with an expressionless expression, the torn part made a "squeaking" sound that made Mira feel a little numb, but the sage even followed the hair that crawled out of his mouth and climbed to his hand. Centipede ignored it and looked straight at the real cause of the adventurer's death.
"A heavy blow to the back of the head." There were two huge symmetrical holes in the skull of the adventurer whose brain had been eaten clean by insects. This was obviously the cause of his death. Most adventurers don't like to wear steel helmets when doing commissions in the wilderness because of their vision and weight. I'm afraid he will regret it before he dies, although it may not make a big difference to the enemy this time whether he wears it or not.
"Teeth mark?" Lu Lu looked closely at it: "It doesn't look like a bear. I don't know what kind of creature it is."
"The collarbone is also broken." The sage opened his collar, and a carnivorous insect with wings similar to a locust flew out with a snap. Mira stepped back and planned to draw the sword, but Lu Lu had already grabbed it with quick eyes and hands. Lived its wings.
The insect with long stinging legs struggled and kept opening and closing its mouthparts that were good at cutting. The hunter girl looked at it for a while and seemed to find it unpalatable, so she threw it aside.
The predatory insects that buzzed and flew short distances quickly disappeared into the bushes.
"Click." The Luoan girl, who was retreating because of the predatory insects, stepped on something hard in the bushes. She knelt down and picked up a piece of wood that was about the same size as her boots.
There are still remnants of linen skin on it, and judging from the cross section, the wooden boards are three-layered, arranged horizontally, vertically and horizontally and fixed with glue - this kind of structure is rarely used in buildings. The purpose of this is to keep the thickness from being too high and not too heavy. In large cases, the strength of the board is increased, so it is generally used for protective equipment.
"The broken shield looks like it has no curvature."
The bottom and most common straight round shield. Most adventurers like to use this kind of shield, especially those who often move in forest areas, because while their protective area is acceptable, they do not have the long and pointed bottom of the kite shield that is easy to catch on bushes and make noise.
"The shield was smashed, and then he was held down on the shoulders and bitten on the head?" With so many clues, even Mira could summarize what happened, but she frowned because of this conclusion: "Here Is it a headed earth dragon or something?"
It is not difficult to kill an adult human adventurer, even a Goblin who is only a little over one meter tall can do it if he seizes the opportunity to sneak up and wipe his neck. After all, many people in this industry have no professional training and just want to make a living. They lack vigilance and necessary knowledge and tend to act blindly and recklessly.
But being able to tear apart soft armor with basic defense and shattering a solid shield is a completely different concept.
"Bring it over and let me take a look." Henry noticed something, he said, and the Luoan girl handed over the shield fragment in her hand.
"Hair?" There was a small amount of brown hair in the broken area, which was obviously left by the attacker when he broke the shield.
It's just that this hair is different from most common creatures. It is not fluffy and looks thicker.
The sage tried to pinch both ends and stretch it. It was pulled out to more than double its original length before breaking.
"This kind of resilience..." Mira frowned.
"It's human." Henry stood up, plucked the leaves of the bush from the side, crushed them and washed his hands, and then glanced at the increasingly darkening sky.
"We may be dealing with orcs."
