Chapter 112 - <1>
The ninth volume of The Carefree Adventurers series, 'Blessing of the False Spirit User,' begins now.
It consists of 15 chapters and one bonus short story, for a total of 16 chapters.
This marks the start of the Eneonea Continent arc. With each volume, a journey through a different special autonomous region will begin.
First, please enjoy the journey through the Red Valley Special Autonomous Region of the Luciana Kingdom Federation.
Franz was speechless at the breathtaking view before him.
After a desperate, all-out struggle to push their horses up the cliff that they had been told was the final difficult pass, what spread before them was a grand canyon of indescribable power, where a brilliant blue sky soared above reddish-brown cliffs and mountains.
All that existed there was the contrast between the red of the earth and the blue of the sky. Clouds drifted lazily across the heavens above the canyon, dyed in vivid red earth, casting their shadows as they passed.
What a sight.
In all his life—though it had only been nineteen years or so—Franz, who had hardly ever left his hometown, had of course never seen such a magnificent view.
They had been walking for over a month through an arid, rocky region with only sparse clumps of low-growing plants, relying solely on a single river. Just as he was growing utterly exhausted and truly starting to hate it, the感動 of seeing this magnificent view was immense.
Indeed, the world was far wider than he had imagined.
“Wow… this is amazing.”
Anna, who had appeared beside him at some point, was standing at the very edge of the cliff, looking around with great interest.
“This feels incredible!”
With that, Anna stretched her arms straight up above her head and arched her back. Franz’s palms began to sweat, worried she might fall, but she herself showed no fear. Naturally, Franz stood at a distance from the cliff that was absolutely safe.
“The sky looks so beautiful from here.”
Anna, standing in a clearly dangerous spot, said this as she spun around right at the edge of the cliff to face him. Franz screamed inwardly, ‘Please stop.’ Oblivious to his terror, Anna turned her smile towards Ritz, who was even further back, cooling off in the wind that swept up the cliff and drinking water.
“Hey, it’s beautiful, isn’t it!”
In contrast to Franz, whose palms were sweating over Anna’s dangerous antics, Ritz looked back at Anna with his usual relaxed smile.
“Yeah, it is.”
“Right? It’s beautiful!”
“Can’t call it anything but a spectacular view.”
“It really is spectacular, isn’t it~”
He understood it was spectacular, but he also wanted to grumble, ‘You’re her guardian, so please stop this dangerous behavior.’ But he swallowed the words. If it were truly dangerous, Ritz, who was almost overprotective of Anna, wouldn’t be watching with such composure.
Thinking about it, if Franz were standing in that spot, Ritz would surely say, “It’s dangerous, so stay back.” The reason was simple. If Franz were doing what Anna was doing in that spot, there was a greater than fifty percent chance he would fall.
In other words, as long as Ritz was relaxed, the probability of Anna falling was close to zero. Although he understood this, Franz’s cold sweat did not subside.
But then Anna, to talk to Ritz, stepped back from the cliff’s edge and moved behind Franz. What a relief.
“If I had any artistic talent, I’d want to paint this.”
“Artistic talent, huh. I can manage a doodle, I guess. What about you, Ritz?”
“Don’t expect that kind of thing from me.”
With Ritz and Anna chatting idly behind him as usual, Franz silently sighed.
Ritz, who was talking to Anna with a perfectly relaxed smile, must have been quite tired from having taken on both the luggage and a horse on the way up the cliff. But his face showed no sign of fatigue at all.
Anna was the same. How could she have come this difficult way without even her breathing being disturbed? She was more than ten centimeters shorter than Franz, so her stride must be different, yet he couldn't keep up with her pace.
Franz, who had come up the slope without carrying any luggage or pushing a horse, was too weary to even smile, let alone speak. What was this terrifying difference between himself and those two?
He inwardly cursed the two, who showed not a shred of exhaustion and looked so cheerful, ‘You monsters of stamina.’ But if he were to say that out loud, it would only give them more material to tease him with, so he kept it to himself.
As he watched them resentfully, Edward silently took the water flask from Ritz’s hand. Unfazed by Ritz’s disgruntled glare, Edward drank the water and then smiled warmly at Anna.
“The soil is rich in red clay, so the entire ground turns red. In contrast, the color blue stands out beautifully, doesn't it? That’s why the sky looks so clearly blue. The basic soil here is different from our country’s.”
Edward, though showing signs of fatigue, was remarkably energetic compared to how exhausted Franz was, and he spoke in his usual tone. As the former king of the Yuresla Kingdom, he must be familiar with the geography of neighboring countries from an economic and strategic standpoint.
Unconsciously, Franz looked down at the ground. Now that he mentioned it, the soil in Yuresla wasn’t this red. It should be a bit darker.
Anna, an experienced farmer who knew about soil, bent down slightly and crushed some of the red earth in her hand. The soil crumbled into pieces.
“This doesn’t look like soil you could make a field with.”
She said, nodding deeply. Franz couldn’t tell the composition of the soil by touch, but if Anna said so, it must be true. After all, she had been working in the fields for over twenty years, ever since she could remember.
To that, Edward continued to speak like a teacher.
“Depending on a country’s location, the soil changes. That’s why the things that can be produced change. It’s rare to have an opportunity to see various countries, so you should take a good look.”
“Yes!”
Anna nodded, her eyes sparkling, looking like a good student of Edward’s. Ritz, who had taken his water flask back from Edward, muttered in a tone of exasperation, a stark contrast to the impressed Anna.
“Seriously, a lecture in a place like this?”
Franz generally agreed with that opinion. He certainly understood the importance of knowing the production situation of a neighboring country. But he didn’t think it was something to be done on top of a cliff, exposed to the wind, with an exhausted body.
That lecture could wait until they had decided on a place to stay for the night and taken a break. But Franz didn’t have the energy to say that either. So, wanting to rest soon, he just vaguely watched the exchange between Edward and Ritz.
“Experience and knowledge are weapons.”
“I know that without you telling me.”
“I’m sure you do. You’re the type who came up from experience alone, with no knowledge whatsoever.”
“…Shut up.”
“I think you’ve realized that having knowledge is better, haven’t you?”
It seemed Edward had hit a nerve, as Ritz sulked and looked away. The sight of Ritz, who was taller than the man called the Hero King and usually brazenly confident, pouting like a child was startling the first time he saw it, but now he was quite used to it.
Though he was supposed to be much older than Edward, Ritz was no match for him, just as his appearance suggested. Apparently, in Ritz’s past, there was a weakness of “having been saved when he was on the verge of death,” but he had yet to hear the details.
“Wow, look, look! The river that was flowing next to us until yesterday is way down there!”
Anna, once again standing at the very edge of the cliff and peering down, exclaimed in surprise. The act was so dangerous that Franz felt like he was about to scream. But ignoring him completely, Anna let her single red braid, tied together, sway in the strong wind blowing up from below.
“We’ve climbed so high, haven’t we?”
To Anna, who turned around with a smile, Ritz shrugged with a wry grin.
“Don’t fall.”
To Ritz’s warning, which contained a bit of genuine concern mixed with teasing, Anna nodded with a cheerful smile.
“I won’t fall. I’m not a child.”
“I wonder about that.”
Ignoring Ritz’s wry smile, Anna went right up to the very edge of the cliff and peered down. Seriously, he wished she would stop. Just watching her made him dizzy.
“Hey, hey, Franz, you should take a look too!”
“…I’ll pass.”
“Really? It’s an amazing view. The river and trees look so small, we must be really high up.”
“…R-Right.”
He swallowed the words, ‘Please don’t make me imagine it.’ Did Anna have no fear? If she stood in a place like that and got dizzy and lost her footing, it would be game over. There was no way to survive a fall from this height.
As for Franz, he wasn’t very fond of high places. He sincerely hoped they wouldn’t have to descend a cliff like this. He had no idea why on earth Lef had stopped in such a terrifying place, but he wanted to get out of here as soon as possible.
But reality was harsh. Lef, who had effortlessly climbed the cliff while also handling Edward’s horse and luggage, said with a smile,
“The forest below is the village of us Beastkin.”
“…Below?”
Ritz and Edward, who had been resting comfortably by the horses behind them, now stood beside Franz and the others, peering down the cliff.
“We’re going down this?”
To Ritz’s exasperated question, Lef answered with a smile.
“Yes, Ritz. Look, there’s a path, see?”
So as not to let his companions know he was scared, Franz very slowly peered in the direction Lef was pointing. Noticing this, Lef smiled at Franz and pointed.
“That’s it, Franz.”
There was indeed a path there.
Well, to call it a path was an overstatement. A narrow trail, too small for a horse and a person to descend side by side, snaked diagonally down the cliff.
“If you go down this, you’ll reach the ground. It’s a bit winding and takes some time, but there’s no other way down.”
“Hmm. How long does it take?”
When Ritz asked in a tone that showed no particular interest, Lef answered simply.
“Let’s see. It doesn’t take us long, but people who come to the village with horses seem to take over two hours.”
“Two hours…?”
“Yes. A little over two hours.”
The world went dark at Lef’s firm words.
“Well now…”
Edward said with a wry smile. But there was no fear in his face. Could it be that he was the only one terrified by this situation? He turned around and saw that his thought was correct. Ritz and Anna, of course, had perfectly calm expressions.
“The only problem is how to calm the horses down to get them to descend.”
Ritz said with a serious face. He was about to ask if it wasn’t a problem for people to descend a path that looked like it was plastered to the cliff, but he swallowed the words. Franz’s pride absolutely would not allow him to say something that would make his fear so obvious.
“People who visit the village blindfold their well-trained horses and lead them down the cliff. If they leave their horses behind, they become easy prey for jackals and coyotes.”
“I see, that makes sense…”
Nodding, Ritz returned to the horse he had been leading and took out a piece of cloth from the luggage. He watched as he tied the cloth around the horse’s eyes, blindfolding it. The horse, unaccustomed to such treatment, struggled frantically, but Ritz took his time to calm and coax it.
“Wait a minute, Ritz.”
Anna ran back from the cliff to the horse. She stood beside the agitated and anxious horse, speaking to it gently to calm it down. The horse quickly became docile. It seemed Anna had a special talent for that.
“Thanks.”
“No problem. There’s one more.”
“Right.”
The other horse was also blindfolded by Anna and began to calm down.
As Franz vaguely watched these preparations, he realized that with both horses now calm, he was trapped in a situation he couldn’t escape.
He had no choice but to go down that cliff.
Not that Franz had any other options to begin with, but with all the preparations complete, he felt cornered. He let out a sigh, making sure no one saw, and then Lef, who had been looking up at the sky, turned to everyone with a smile.
“Well, let’s get going. At this time, we can still make it before dark.”
That was a great relief. If he頑張ってd down, he would reach Lef’s hometown. Then he could rest. He encouraged himself with that thought. For Franz, who was not fond of high places, having a place to sleep properly was the greatest reward.
“So, we’ll have a proper meal for the first time in a while for dinner!”
“Not just proper. We’ll get to eat traditional Beastkin cuisine.”
For these two, the greatest reward seemed to be food. There were no words for the baseness of these two, who prioritized food over rest. A sigh escaped him as the two cheerfully started talking about the meal they would have when they got down.
He understood once again that for them, this cliff was no problem at all, just a passing point. For Franz, however, it was a huge problem.
“We can go down from here.”
Lef said with a smile, pointing. He slowly looked in the direction he was pointing and saw that the edge of the cliff sloped down slightly. That must be the entrance. But he was reluctant. Just looking at this entrance gave him a strong sense of unease, as if it was saying, ‘I can’t guarantee you’ll make it down safely.’
Anna and Edward began to move as they were guided, but Franz looked at Lef resentfully with a sigh.
He had no choice but to go. It would be even more troublesome if he were left behind here.
Just as he was about to take a step forward with determination, a hand tapped his shoulder, and he looked up to the side. Ritz, with a cloth in his hand, was looking at the troubled Franz with an amused smile and a teasing tone.
“How about we blindfold you and have Lef lead you by the hand?”
It seemed his fear of heights had been found out. But Franz was not the type to say, “Yes, please.” Ritz, who knew Franz’s pride, added in a clearly amused tone.
“Or would you rather have Anna lead you by the hand?”
He imagined himself being treated like a complete child by Anna, descending the cliff blindfolded, and a shiver ran down his spine.
“I’ll pass on that.”
He’d rather roll down the cliff than be subjected to that.
He couldn’t win against Ritz in a war of words, so he turned on his heel and followed Edward. He couldn’t see his face, but he was sure Ritz had his usual amused expression. That was what made it so frustrating. But even if he had been found out, he wanted to hold on to his pride. He wouldn’t let them see him scared.
As Franz took a step to descend the cliff with that determination, he heard Ritz’s clearly amused mumble.
“So stubborn.”
He didn’t want to be told that by the stubborn Ritz.
“Ritz, Franz. Let’s go~!”
Anna, cheerful even in this situation, waved her hand at the entrance to the cliff path.
Franz sincerely wished he could see something that Anna was afraid of.