Chapter 3

As it turns out she wasn’t grateful at all and had one of the goblin spears pointed at me when I woke up. I asked her " What do you think you are doing? I just saved your life if you hadn't noticed. " She answered rather hotly " I bet you thought you'd play the hero. That you'd save the poor damsel in distress and then claim me for yourself. You've got another thing coming, human." I sputtered out " No you've got the wrong idea. I just happened to be coming to the steam to get a drink of water and perhaps find a bit of food. I never imagined I'd run into a group of goblins with a prisoner." She said “ Truly? You have no desires for my noble self?” I said “ Don’t get me wrong you are beautiful, but I really don't have any intention of harming you. I also didn't save you with the intention of abusing you. Why would I cut your bonds if I wanted to hurt you.?”

She slowly lowered her spear but still looked at me warily. I tried to put her at ease by not looking too aggressive. That was pretty easy since I was very wounded and really didn't want to hurt her. I said “ Let's start with introductions. My name is Alex. I am from the nearby city of Lancia. What is your name if you don't mind me asking?” She said “ My name is Sora. I am from the Sakura Empire.” I said “ What is someone from the Sakura Empire doing in Lucinia?” She said “That is no business of yours. I am here for my own reasons and do not need a human to help me.” I said “ Why are you saying the word human like that?” She said “ Because I am Kitsune and I am obviously above you human.” I said “ That's news to me. Especially since I just saved you from getting killed and probably worse by those goblins. You know what? I’ll just leave you out here to be killed and eaten by whatever finds you.”

With that I started walking away from her. I grabbed a goblin spear and one of the daggers and started walking back the way I had come. I heard her say “ Stop human.” I continued walking away. She said “ I said stop right now.” I still kept walking. I had no time for such a rude fox no matter how gorgeous she was. She raised her voice once again and said “ Stop now.” I didn’t. I just kept on walking till I was about fifty yards away from her. Then I heard what sounded like it might have been a sob and she said “ Please stop.” I didn't want to turn around especially since she had been so rude to me and even put down my entire race. Though I wouldn't be able to sleep at night if I just left her here to possibly be kidnapped by goblins or eaten by a wild animal. So with a heavy sigh I turned around and walked back to her.

Once I got back to her I thought I saw her release a held breath. She looked like she really did need my help, and I would help her at least for a little while. She mumbled a “ Thank you” and I said “ You’re welcome, but why do you need me? You are a superior Kitsune can't you figure everything out by yourself?” She said “ While I may be Kitsune I have no idea where I am. The goblins took me from a small group of bandits that were traveling many miles away from here. I have never even heard of this Lancia before. I came from Sakura for my own reasons, but I never meant to get this far into a foreign country.” I said “ I could help you get back if you want.” She said “ No. I don't want to go back, at least not directly back home, but I would like to be inside the borders of my home empire.” I said “ Well I’ve got nowhere else to be so we can go there and then I can continue my journey some other time.” She said “ Will you really help me?” I said, “ Yes. I will help you. I have just left home and am looking for an adventure. This seems like just the thing I was looking for.” With that our party of two was formed and we began our journey towards the Sakura Empire.

We started our journey back through the forest to the road I had left in search of food. Though as circumstances unfolded I had found no food, but instead a woman in distress. I did manage to drink some water from the stream but I had found no food. We got back on the road and continued the way I had been heading in the first place. I knew that I was heading west and that we wanted to be going east, but we needed to get to the capital so that we could buy mounts and I could register as an adventurer. I had also not forgotten to take the goblins ears as proof of my kills to present to the guild so that I could receive payment after joining.

As we headed further into the forest we talked about where we were from and how we had both gotten here. I told her about being an orphan and my escape from the city. I left the part out about killing Sloan. She didn't need to know that I was a murderer, at least not until I knew more about her. From what Sora told me while we walked she was from a lesser noble family in the Sakura Empire. She said she escaped her boring life as a pampered noble to search for adventure. I believed that she was a noble, but not the lesser part. I also didn't trust her reason for leaving. As a poor and abused orphan I didn’t trust anyone on principle, but she hasn't given me any reason to distrust her. So I would believe her for now and if she gave me a reason to no longer trust her I would drop her off at the nearest town and wish her the best of luck.

It was getting later into the evening and we were both getting tired. Neither of us had a tent or even a blanket. So it seemed as if we would be roughing it under the stars. That wasn't a problem for me. The beds at the temple were just wooden slats with no padding and the floor was hardly any worse. My main concern was with Sora. As a noble I didn't think she would have had much experience sleeping in hard conditions. Though she would have to get used to it for the time being. I asked “ Are you going to be alright sleeping outside?” She said “ Of course I will be fine. I may not be used to this, but I am stronger than I look. I will adjust to this until we can find a town with an inn.”

“ Alright I just wanted to make sure you were going to be alright with these arrangements. We should probably stop for the night.” I said. She said “ I agree. I am very tired and would like to rest for the night. I just wish we had something to eat.” I replied “ I too wish we had some food. Maybe tomorrow we will be able to find something.” She said “Yes, I hope so as well let us find a place to settle down and try to get some sleep for the night.” I said “ Alright. That sounds good to me as well, but one of us will need to stay up for half the night to keep a lookout.” She said “ I agree to that as well. You will stay up first and I will do the second half.” I said “ Alright that's fine with me. I don't need that much sleep. Especially since I already had a nap earlier to recover from my injuries. They are fine now thanks for asking. I will have scars, but they were not as bad as they looked. I probably won't even get an infection, but I will need to clean it out when we get to a place where we can do that.”

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

The sun slowly went behind the horizon and I found a log to sit on to wait through the night until it was time to switch watches. I wanted to set up a night watch because I didn't know if there were any more goblins or any other monsters for that matter. I knew that I could probably stay up all night to watch the forest around us, but I wanted Sora to get a chance at taking a watch to see if she had what it took to survive out here. If she was up when I woke up I would be really surprised, but for now I needed to watch the night for monsters and bandits. I stayed up for a little more than five hours while Sora slept and I figured it was time to switch. I went over and woke up the fox girl. She mumbled some protest, but she did get up and took the spot on the log I had been using.

I found a good spot to curl up on and go to sleep. I felt like I had just drifted off to sleep, but the sun was already cresting the horizon so I knew it was time for me to get up and for us to continue our journey. I heard the sound of soft snoring close by and saw Sora curled up next to the log where she was supposed to be standing watch. I had figured that this would happen, but it was good to have proof at least that she really wasn't cut out for this. I went over to her and lightly touched her shoulder and gave her a light shake.

She woke with a fright and acted like she was going to attack me. I said “ Settle down little fox I’m not going to attack you”. She seemed to realize where she was and settled down. I was going to say something about her being asleep and not doing a proper watch. I decided that would cause more problems than it would solve. She did look upset that I had caught her sleeping on the job, or maybe she was just mad that I called her little fox. It did seem that phrase may be derogatory for her race. I didn't care much about that. I had saved her life from those goblins and now I was on a quest to take her back home. I could afford to be a little rude at least sometimes. It wasn’t that I thought less of her because of her race, it was the way she had treated me after I had saved her that rubbed me the wrong way. I knew it had to be hard going from being a captive to being rescued by some stranger but she could have at least been grateful I had saved her and not just left her there tied up. From what I could gather we were both uncertain about the whole adventuring thing and we both had a lot to learn about staying alive. That could only come from experience and working together.

I decided we should go ahead and start out on the road early. We didn’t have any food to eat for breakfast or anything to drink so there wasn’t much of a point just sitting around when we could be making progress. So we headed out again on the road. We walked in a slightly awkward silence. We didn’t know much about each other and it felt weird for me to bring up subjects to talk about. The walking was a little tough with my wounds but I was used to being injured and chose to ignore the pain and just continue on. So we plodded along down the road making good time. After a few hours of walking I started to catch a foul smell in the air. It was a mixture of blood and smoke. After a few more minutes of walking we came across a couple flipped over carts.

Next to the carts were the bodies of men and women of multiple races and ages. They were dressed as merchants. In a semicircle around the merchants were six men in armor. They must have been guards hired to protect the merchants through the forest. They looked to have all died in an attempt to save the merchants. Most of the time the guards were not needed but every once in a while a few bandits or a group of goblins would attack and a small group of guards could quickly dispatch their enemies. I knew that it was bandits and not goblins because they had left the women there. If it had been those little beasts they would have taken the women away to do the unspeakable. It wasn't often that a group of bandits would kill so wantonly. They usually kept to just intimidation and threats to get what they wanted out of the merchants that didn’t think that they needed the protection of a guard. They would leave the more well guarded merchant groups alone because the groups didn’t want to risk death over the goods a few merchants were carrying.

This however looked like a huge group of bandits had acted together to kill the merchants and steal their wares. There hadn’t been bandit activity like this in a long while. It was unusual for this many bandits to act together. The carts had been looted and all of the merchants had undoubtedly died violent deaths. Sora and I started the grim work of seeing if anyone had survived, but it was all for nothing. They were all dead. We also searched the bodies for anything that we could use or if we could find any information about who these merchants were. We found nothing on the bodies so we turned our attention to the carts. Again there was nothing to be found, the bandits had stripped it of every copper coin and bread crumb.

I had hoped that we would find something of use to us somewhere in the wreckage, but it apparently was not meant to be. After searching the carts and the bodies we decided we would search the area around the wreckage. We looked through the forest in the area directly around the carts. We searched for half an hour with no luck, but as I was walking back towards the carts I thought I saw something. It looked like the flash of metal in the light. I walked over to where I thought I had seen the glint of metal. There was a leather satchel lying in the grass. I picked it up and opened it. The flash of metal that I saw was a silver necklace that had a black gem inset into it. It didn’t look like anything too special. I decided that since I was the one who had found it that it was now my necklace so I put it on. I had heard of magic necklaces that granted power to the wearer, but this didn't seem to be one. Oh well. It was worth a try at any rate. At least it looked nice so I would keep it to remember my escape and my subsequent survival of running into the goblins.

The bag also contained a full water skin and some food for about three days for one person. This was a great find for us since neither of us had eaten in days. I went over to Sora and told her about my find. I left out the necklace that I had found. I had tucked it under my shirt to hide it. Sora seemed happy that we had found a little food and water. At least we wouldn't starve to death now. We munched on our bread and drank some of the water. After a little rest we decided to move on. There was nothing we could do for these people. We had no way to bury them and it was best to leave before anyone else came along and saw us rummaging through the wreckage. We would report this and the goblin attack once we got to a town so that they could send an adventuring party out in pursuit of the bandits and to look into the goblin activity in the area. It was very strange to have a goblin attack and a bandit attack so close together. To my knowledge as limited as it is, monsters and humans never had any positive relationships. Though, it almost made you wonder if these events are somehow connected. It was a very far-fetched theory and I had nothing to back it up but something about the closeness of the attacks didn't sit well with me. I was no adventurer or a scholar so I didn't know enough about the world to say for certain but I figured this kind of activity in this close proximity was very rare. Alas, this was not something for a poor orphan to ponder on so we headed west down the road in search of whatever lay ahead.