While he was thinking about this matter, he looked at the type of place he was in.
‘There must be thousands of people here. If there are already so many people just on this side of the city, how large must the total population living outside the walls be? Millions, perhaps.’
With this observation, he developed a new idea about the thoughts of the city's lord.
Tristan continued walking through the crooked and narrow streets. His first point of investigation would be the woods, where the nearest corpses had been found. But suddenly, he heard the sound of screams.
The sounds came from far away, and a crowd of people was desperately moving away from the direction of their origin.
He frowned and waited a few more seconds. He decided to avoid running towards the unknown threat and waited while analyzing the situation.
The screams stopped, but the crowd of citizens was still agitated.
‘If it were a monster attacking the city, the screams would have continued. It seems there’s no immediate threat for me there.’
After assuming he could handle whatever was in that direction, he ran and jumped high onto a small, old wooden house. In this situation, it would take too long to cross the crowded streets of desperate people, so he decided to take an alternative route.
He ran and jumped over the houses, hoping the wooden boards wouldn’t break under him. Sometimes, when there were multi-story houses in his way, he would enter through holes that were supposed to be windows, briefly startling the residents. At his speed, he was just a blur to them.
After leaving many people confused with his unexpected appearance, he finally neared the place he was looking for and quickly noticed what had happened.
He saw severed limbs, pieces of flesh scattered across the ground, and a bloody mess everywhere.
‘Have the beasts already arrived here?’ He was surprised at how quickly the beasts had managed to get inside the city.
‘And why didn’t anyone notice when they reached the slums?’ He found the situation a bit strange.
He examined the disgusting scene in front of him. From the number of limbs, he assumed only one person had died. The white hair and wrinkled skin indicated to him that it was someone of advanced age.
[Tyrannical Eye]
Tristan used his diagnostic ability and a golden light spread across the ground.
Stolen story; please report.
‘Sharp, thin, curved claws.’
The light moved away from the pieces of flesh and began heading toward the ground.
He quickly noticed the creature’s footprints. A three-dimensional image appeared in his mind as he studied the shape of the paw and the depth to which the ground had been deformed. This allowed him to estimate the weight and height of the creature.
'It looks like cat paws.’
He began walking around the place, but he couldn’t figure out where the creature had come from, so he looked up.
‘Did it come from the rooftops? If that’s the case, then it must be an agile, light creature with good stealth skills since no one noticed a monster crossing the city.’
After investigating for a while, he heard footsteps. He was alone in this area since everyone else had fled.
‘Who would have the courage to come here?’
He noticed a teenage boy with brown eyes and hair, about 15 or 16 years old. He was wearing yellow clothes that were very familiar to Tristan.
“Dusk! What happened here?”
“Jaeng? Hi.”
He recognized the other sect member who had decided to leave the walls.
When Jaeng approached and saw the scene in front of him, he stopped and put his hand over his mouth, his face turning pale.
Tristan looked at Jaeng, who seemed like he was going to vomit at any moment, and said in a monotone voice:
“A monster invaded the city.”
Jaeng turned his face away and took a deep breath for a few seconds.
“What? How did no one notice? Why didn’t the patrollers in the woods warn us?” After recovering a bit, he asked Tristan.
“This monster seems to have good stealth skills, and from the footprints I found, it looks like only one entered the city for now.”
“I don’t know where it went.”
‘Hmm, strange. The monster entered the city, killed only one person, and left.’ The creature's behavior raised some questions in Tristan’s mind.
“And now, what should we do?”
“We need to warn the guards. That beast might have returned to its tribe. It might lead the others here.”
They walked in silence back to the southwestern gate of the city.
After a while, to Tristan's surprise, Jaeng decided to speak to him.
“What do you think the city lord will do about the people outside the walls?” he asked, with notable concern in his voice.
“Nothing,” Tristan replied, shrugging.
“Those people will probably have to rely on their own luck.”
Hearing this, Jaeng spoke with a bit of anger in his voice:
“But why? The lord definitely needs the people outside the city walls. Who else would do the manual labor, like cutting wood, mining, or tending the crops? The nobles would never do that, and the city lord should know that!”
Tristan let out a sigh and said:
“Look around you. What do you see?”
Jaeng’s eyebrows raised in confusion. He looked around, not understanding the reason for Tristan's question.
“Uh, houses, dirt, people...” Tristan interrupted him and said,
“That’s right, people. Look how many people there are in this place.”
He noticed his companion hadn’t understood what he was saying, so he decided to explain further.
“There are more people outside the walls than anything else. The city lord does need these people, but he doesn’t need all of them. Even if 70% of the people out here die, a few hundred thousand would still remain. The lord would still have more than enough people to keep the city center stable.”
“Besides, a single tribe of monsters couldn’t kill that many people, or if it could, it would take many months. Why would he risk the lives of his guards while the place he actually cares about isn’t threatened? For now, he has no reason to worry about the people outside the walls. He can simply wait and see if the beast group migrates elsewhere while reinforcing the protection in the city center, in case any beast decides to go where it shouldn’t.”