Nameless Ones (7)

With a thud! The wagon, which had been almost vertical, landed back on the ground with a tremendous impact.

The monsters shook off the dirt and rocks clinging to their bodies, their eyes gleaming with a sharp light. They had been spinning around for half a day, carrying out various disruption tactics; was this sudden attack part of that? Given that it was obvious we were moving along the river, laying an ambush must have been easy.

The monsters that sprang up from the ground were the very ones that had chased us away from Rilke, the rock bison. As I squinted through the rain, something glimmered in the darkness.

'An arrow.'

A broken arrowhead was embedded in the side of the bison. It was easy to recognize due to its familiar shape and position.

"So we meet again…"

It was one I had used. They had carefully recycled the corpse of the monster that Leonardo killed in Rilke.

'The fact that the ones from Rilke have joined in means…'

Surely, they didn't swallow Baron Roald and his knights.

Damn. Once they group together as the , their information window fuses and disappears, making it impossible to tell who they've consumed.

I'd rather think of it as the lesser of two evils than the worst-case scenario. It's likely that those hiding in Rilke rushed over, disguising themselves from me to claim a tastier meal, too busy to attack anyone else.

Fortunately, since the monster corpses belong to the outer shell, the encyclopedia opened properly. I quickly skimmed through entries on the , the , and several other monsters I had never seen before, etching their weaknesses into my mind.

Inside the swaying wagon, it felt as if someone were grabbing my head and shaking it wildly, making it hard to focus on the floating text. To concentrate, I had to ignore that the monster's claws were sliding toward us, tearing at the wagon's canvas, that the arrows I had stocked up were nearly gone with only one bundle left, and that the rain was becoming more violent.

"Be careful."

A heavy hand pressed down on my shoulder, causing my back to bend. Leonardo's body enveloped mine, and thanks to that, I managed not to be thrown out of the wagon when it bounced high for the second time.

"Ugh!"

Thud! 

As the wagon hit the ground again, the jolt threw my body backward. In the moment my head tilted back, I locked eyes with Leonardo. His deep silver-grey eyes shone in the air, replacing the moon hidden behind the overgrown foliage. In the next instant, he faced forward, swinging his arm in a wide arc, weaving a crescent shape of blade light through the air.

The blade rushed across the dry skin like a fierce wind, carving canyon-like wounds into the split leather. Inside the gaping flesh, black, white, and red liquids swirled chaotically, making it difficult to distinguish which had once been human, which had been monster, and which still might be.

But even that closed up quickly. Was that evolution truly a better leap? Did they grind people down to make materials, shed their human skins, and adopt only a powerful appearance, becoming nothing but more solid without any flaws? Did they at least inherit the monsters' weaknesses, leaving just a couple of weak points, or were they utterly devoid of shortcomings?

'I hope not.'

I secretly wished there was a significant weakness, that their experiments had utterly failed. It seemed there would be no other way to relieve this discomfort. 

'…Wait a second.'

That creature with the arrow embedded in it. The monster's corpse, fused with its monstrous regeneration ability, managed to endure Leonardo's attacks with surprising ease. It healed quickly, flesh filling in rapidly; to kill one of those things, we had to relentlessly pour in attacks without pause.

But how could such a creature not push out that tiny arrowhead from its outer skin? It was just a foreign object a couple of finger lengths long, and yet it couldn't regenerate enough to expel it? 

"Hah."

'Before becoming , the monster's corpse could not heal the wounds it had sustained.'

A memory suddenly surged in my mind. It was one of those memories I had tried to avoid recalling the previous night, a thought I had intended to sweep away and dissolve in the crucible until it left no trace.

I recalled the scene with the cave, the bisected corpse from which they scraped out the monster's innards and bones, stitching the empty skin together as a surgeon might.

'That stitched wound!'

Before less invasive methods were developed, most surgical procedures began with incisions and openings. What they were doing was a traditional surgical practice.

'They said they share memories.'

With little time to spare, those creatures likely embodied their own unique methods of incision. Rather than evolving their techniques, they simply repeated the initial successful cases that had been shared in their consciousness. It was like a factory's production process, observing one example and replicating it identically to produce more. Therefore, I set my sights on the abdomen of the nearby monster.

"Leo, do you remember the incision we saw in the cave?"

"Yeah."

"Do you think we can try it?"

Instead of answering, Leonardo swiftly spun his sword around, gripping it in reverse, and leaped off the wagon. The wooden boards creaked loudly, and once again, the ground beneath us quaked.

"They're coming!"

The attackers surged up from beneath the earth, exposing their bellies, and in the darkness, Leonardo spotted the stitching marks. He raised his sword high. The massive blade sliced through the air with a whoosh. The moon appeared, and a beat later, the sound of something bursting reached my ears.

As Leonardo precisely cut along the incision line with his sword, the monster exploded like a balloon, and the air displaced by the blast pushed the leaves of the forest aside. The green curtain of foliage that surrounded the woods was suddenly torn open, and leaves brushed against each other as unfiltered moonlight poured in.

What fell from the branches was a mix of leaves, blood, and flesh, all of which quickly became ash, swirling wildly in the wind.

For a brief moment, I caught sight of Leonardo, his hair glistening under the silver light, as he swept the rain-soaked strands away. His movements were clear and precise, like a soldier following a predetermined sequence of actions.

Quickly and accurately, he took down a few more of the monsters. The air curtain created by the explosive bursts momentarily halted the rain pouring down. Once it became evident that he had figured out their countermeasures, the nameless creatures hesitated and began to retreat.

Leonardo glanced back briefly before springing back to the wagon, gripping the side tightly. His calloused hand met mine as I reached out. The instant I pulled him, an immense weight followed.

'Too heavy!'

This muscle-bound beast was getting heavier by the day. But I couldn't cut back on his food. My body leaned precariously and toppled backward, crashing down with Leonardo. Luckily, I didn't crack my head open in the fall; everyone's hand managed to catch the back of my skull.

"Are you hurt?"

"No… but I think I might be flattened soon."

"Sorry!"

"Ow, ugh, ah."

"Lift your legs like this… ugh."

After a comical struggle that resembled a farce, we finally managed to get back on our feet. While we were grappling behind the wagon, Vittorio was sitting in the driver's seat, gripping the reins.

"Are you okay, kid?"

He nodded. The speed of the wagon began to slow down slightly, which was natural given that the forest led up into the mountains, creating an incline. The fact that the nameless creatures realized their 'evolution' had a significant weakness made them hesitant to approach, so this slight decrease in speed was a manageable variable.

"Is that… a light?"

As we passed the midpoint of the mountain, Vittorio pointed toward something small shining down from the ridge, visible through the rustling leaves. A sense of relief washed over me.

"Yes. It's a city."

Larger than Sinistra, surrounded by a sturdy fortress, and the outline of a castle sitting on a slightly sloped road with a lake stretching out behind it. There was no doubt it was El Dante. We would reach it in about half a day's travel.

Leonardo whispered, "They're pulling away."

"I didn't think they'd give up that easily."

To the nameless creatures, I must look like a truly appetizing prey. My nature is similar to theirs, but my scenario weight is about 25%. It would be a waste for them to let me go. Yet, the hopeful light shines just below us. The city, the characters, and the stage for Act 2.

"Wait."

The pitch in Leonardo's voice vanished.

"They're all heading to the mountain peak."

"…The peak?"

Rainwater trickled down through the torn tarpaulin.

Flap! 

On a day with heavy rain, birds that usually avoid flying suddenly took off from the branches of the forest. Little creatures that had been hiding, snakes, and insects all crawled out at once, scurrying across the ground in a frenzy. The sight of these small beings scattering in the darkness stirred something primal within me.

Even the donkeys pulling the wagon suddenly became frantic, jumping around and struggling to keep their hooves on the ground.

Rain. The mountain. And the wild animals fleeing in a flurry. 

'Ah.'

Since Leonardo has figured out their countermeasures, it's a strategic choice for the nameless creatures to distance themselves from us. At the same time, they must have needed a way to attack without allowing him to close the gap for a counterstrike. It would be too wasteful to simply give up and go back without me as prey. And they quickly found a method.

"The mountain…"

Thud, thud!

The monsters heading toward the peak were crushing rocks and burrowing into the ground, weakening the earth's bonds. The rain-soaked soil was soft and fragile. The surface of the mountain, softened by continuous rains, had been collapsing in various ways. 

Water was rising underground, causing chunks of the mountain to break off entirely, or the roots connecting the soil had loosened, allowing mudslides to happen. And from up there, a wild wave of green and yellow began to sweep everything away. 

A landslide.