“I have to admit… that out of everything I thought the human villages would be like from what I’ve heard so far… I had not expected to see this,” said Esperanza quietly, keeping her voice audible only to those right next to her. Resitia and Iryl nodded in agreement with her words, the two similarly in a struggle to keep the surprise from their features. Esperanza had a much easier time with that, though, since her “features” were things she consciously molded out of her form to begin with.

“It all just looks so… normal,” Resitia pointed out the word that was hanging on the tips of all their tongues just as quietly. The six of them – together with Murad, Mora, and Tiara – were currently walking the streets of a village called Farnham’s Hold, one of the larger villages in the vicinity of the mountain where Zikeal was hidden.

Of course, the term “vicinity” was liberally used in this case, as the village would be at least two weeks worth of walking from the mountainous hidden city for most normal people in their second tiers or so. Esperanza’s group easily made the trip in half that time before they split up. The bulk of the group stayed well out of sight of the village, hiding in the forest, while a smaller group of those who could pass for humans headed to the village itself.

Apparently Murad and Mora were known quantities in the village, which made sense, given their cover identity as traveling small-time traders. They had visited most places around the mountain on an irregular schedule, sometimes visiting a couple times within a month, sometimes not showing up for over a year or more. It was nothing unusual for them to show up there at the time.

As for the others, the couple introduced Tiara as a niece – which worked fine as they themselves were second cousins to the matron and there was some noticeable family resemblance – while they portrayed the other three as surviving children of a friend and fellow trader of theirs who met with misfortune. It was an easy way to excuse the scars that riddled Iryl’s body, which made the guards wince in sympathy when she showed some of them.

It was also a very convenient excuse for Iryl and Esperanza to keep themselves covered with a hooded cloak. Such an act was not uncommon amongst those who had visible scars as many considered them blemishes and were embarrassed to show them. Both Iryl and Resitia had visible scars on their skin, though Resitia played the warrior tomboy girl and proudly showed hers off instead.

That had the side effect of practically telling people why Esperanza and Iryl kept themselves covered as she remained close to them at all times. When someone asked Iryl would simply show her scars and the person asking would naturally assume that Esperanza must be worse off and thus refrain from asking her to show herself out of courtesy.

All considered, it was a most simplistic ruse which when combined with the group’s mastery of aura control, which kept their aura – and the fact that they were aligned with the old gods – hidden allowed them entry to the village without much fuss. The presence of known quantities in the form of Murad and Mora vouching for them helped greatly as well.

After all, Ephemera was not a world which was systematic enough to register every person living in a place. There was no form of identification for the most part, other than for those whose occupations lean to the combative side. Those people were the few that the Kingdom bothered to keep a registry of. Even then, it was mostly something only done in bigger cities. In places like Farnham’s Hold where at most you’d get some [Militia] or [Hunter]s around, there was no such thing.

To go with their covered Aura, the group had also learned a general skill from the tribe in Zikeal that would allow them to present a fake class and level to others. The skill itself was barely an uncommon rarity, which meant that any sort of [Analysis] or [Identify] type of skill at the rare rarity or higher would see through it easily.

It was enough for the places that the tribe usually visited, though.

Farnham’s Hold itself was a quaint little village, barely over a hundred households or so. It looked pretty typical for a village, with the one building that stood out the most being the Temple situated in the center of the village, its tall bell tower towering over every other building around it. In fact, it was pretty much as normal as a village could get… other than one thing that Esperanza couldn’t help but notice.

Namely how the locals were extremely subservient to the priests and guards from the temple.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

For what it was worth, the head of the local temple at the village was a kindly looking old priest with a long beard that the locals greeted warmly before they gave the man a respectful bow. The old man clearly had difficulty walking but seemed to favor walking with the aid of a cane rather than having someone help him or let others carry him in a palanquin or the like.

Esperanza and the rest gave a slight bow to the old man as they crossed his path and was greeted with what Esperanza felt was likely a genuine smile. She also discreetly identified the man – her [Gaze Unto the Abyss] skill was absurdly high in rarity and most people would never even notice her using it on them, unlike lower rarity skills of the type – and noticed that his classes were all very low in rarity while not being combat-related, which explained his frailness despite being in the early levels of his fourth tier.

Not all of the members of the temple behaved so nicely, though.

Later on the same day they also saw how a young member of the temple guard nonchalantly grabbed a fruit from a vendor’s cart and walked away without paying, looking all smug and entitled about it. The vendor himself said nothing and only gave a bow despite seeing what happened, which bothered Esperanza quite a bit.

Sure, a short while later she saw an older temple guard smack the young one upside the head before dragging them back to the temple by the ear, tossing a coin to the vendor and a murmured apology as they passed by, but the fact that something like that happened and the locals had no thought of going against or even reporting it bothered her.

The way the locals viewed the temple seemed a bit too worshipful for her liking. They acted as if the people from the temple could do no wrong, no matter what they did.

While the local priests and temple guards seemed like decent people overall, what the young temple guard did earlier was a warning that if they weren’t, then things would likely have gone ugly rather quickly. A quick talk with Murad and Mora confirmed as much once they were safely absconded in their rooms in the village’s only inn.

“I have seen it get ugly like you mentioned, Exalted One,” admitted Mora after Esperanza’s questioning. “It was a smaller village on the other side of the mountain range. There the temple’s priests practically acted like tyrants and worked the locals as if they were their slaves, and none of them raised any objection of any sort… it was a rather eerie place so we had not stayed for long there.”

“The priests and guards would often drag away the more attractive young men and women to have fun with, and their parents would just see them off with smiles on their faces,” added Murad with a scowl. “It was a rather nauseating sight to witness, and we warned our youngsters not to risk going there. It’s better for us old ones to go there as there would be less risk of being noticed.”

“The people here are fortunate. We’ve actually chatted with Father Patrick before. The old man is a genuine kind soul who just wanted the best for everyone. Unfortunately, those like him are rare, and most of the temple’s priesthood tend to be more concerned with how to eradicate everything with a drop of demonic heritage in them over anything else,” Mora continued. “At least that’s been the case in most places we visited.”

“They even developed ways to screen for demon heritage and had lynched innocent people just because one of their distant ancestors was a demon, believe it or not,” added her husband. “Fortunately those skills are rarer and those who have it rarely bothered to visit small villages like these. It was still a sickening sight to witness how some people would willingly kill themselves just because a priest claimed that they had demon heritage.”

“Not like they had much choice, dear,” quipped Mora. “It was either killing themselves quickly or getting lynched by the mob. Incidentally, that’s one of the reasons why our tribe only sent those who had pure or nearly pure human bloodlines out to do this. They risk getting discovered by that sort of skill otherwise, and unlike with our auras, or souls, as you called it, we haven’t found a way to hide from that yet.”

The couple’s words gave Esperanza some things to think about. They had headed to this village because the volunteers from Zikeal had vouched for it as a “rare good place to live in” amongst the places they frequented, and so far it had lived up to that praise. Esperanza had yet to see much of the human lands, but from what she saw in this village, it was obvious just how dependent the locals were on the local temple.

Apparently that was not something unusual, and most smaller villages or towns were either dependent on their local temple or to the local lord, one or the other. As most such places barely had some [Militia] or [Hunter]s to defend themselves in case of danger, they were pretty much dependent on the military force led by the temple or local constables to deal with such cases.

While the village looked peaceful, the fact that the main village itself was fenced up with stakes pointed outward hinted that the local wild beasts and monsters likely paid the village visits from time to time. Other than that, banditry was not a particularly uncommon threat in the Human Kingdom as well, as even during dire times some people would still put their own benefits ahead of everything.

To be fair, such cases weren’t too rare in the demon territories either, though there rather than small bands of outlaws it was more common for a tribe to outright raid a rival tribe for resources and whatever else they needed. The demons were far less homogenous than the humans and their society was more often split along tribe and clan lines, even within the cities.

As for Farnham’s Hold itself, though, much like the volunteer spies had claimed, it was just a nice, quaint little village in what practically counted as the middle of nowhere as even the closest medium-sized town was at least a week away. It was the sort of place where the locals’ biggest worries was perhaps losing a sheep to wolves from the nearby forests while the typical gossip was whose son was going out with whose daughter.

They seemed so far removed from the ongoing war between the humans and demons other than the fact that a few youths from the village had enlisted to the army in an attempt to make a name for themselves and likely paid with their lives in the fighting.

Esperanza and the others had no plans to disturb the little village’s peace. They would stay there for a day – as was normal for Murad and Mora to do – while buying and selling some items before leaving and going elsewhere. If anything their arrival probably helped ensure that the locals would see less animal issues for the near future as some beasts too stupid to make way had ended up dead under the group’s blades.