The next day, perhaps due to his excitement of adventure, Reinhard only ate his breakfast and then immediately went straight for the barrier with Ddraig, leaving Fraenis tagging behind.

“Are you really going to be fine?”

She asks worriedly as she trails behind Reinhard who’s struggling to balance himself atop of Ddraig’s head.

“Y-yeah… I should be—“

Reinhard tipped a bit to the left and almost fell. Fortunately for him, Ddraig’s quick tail stopped him from being outbalanced and recalibrated his position.

“…fine.”

He added upon repositioning himself.

Fraenis let out a heavy, concerned sigh.

By this time, the villagers and the knights were starting to get used of Ddraig just casually slithering on the streets without a care in the world. Of course, seeing that Reinhard was riding atop of him just left people questioning instead of cautious.

They reached the guardhouse by the barrier. However, Reinhard was too excited on his adventure that he didn’t even stopped by and just went straight outside. When he finally was outside though, he remembered one of the most critical information that he has yet to obtain.

“Ah.”

He quickly re-entered the barrier and unmounted from Ddraig to go inside the guardhouse. He scanned the whole room and saw Sir Velram with his back turned on the door, talking to knights.

“Hey there Sir Velram!”

He exclaims with pleasure.

“My Lord, is there something I can help you with?”

“Yes, actually, I was wondering if you have a map of the way you and your knights took on your expedition here.”

“Apologies, my Lord. I unfortunately do not. However, I can still more or less remember the way.”

“Ah, that’s fine…”

Sir Velram and Reinhard went outside the guardhouse where he drew, to what he remembers, the way that they took from the kingdom to the Garden on the dirt with a stick. He had also highlighted the landmarks and their campsites, and most specifically, the basilisk nest which Sir Velram and the other knights desperately warned him to steer clear of. The path was not a straight north as what Reinhard had expected. There was actually a mountain range at the direct north near the tripoint of the Kingdom, the Alliance and the forest called The Fjallfels. This mountain range extends a little bit further to the east and curves inwards like an inflated and widened “┓”, as if barring passage to Garden. It does not extend to the sea though, as at the eastern end of the mountain range lays the elven city-state of Meir, while at the western end of it, which is to the north-west of the basilisk nest, is the Kingdom’s border city of Resa.

Sir Velram explained that the best path to avoid the basilisk nest was to take a detour towards the base of the mountains, meaning go east of the nest, as merely following the mountains’ path leads you to the city while moving away from the mountain range, to the west of the nest, just unnecessarily lengthens the travel. Sir Velram also notified him that he would be crossing the main river, from which the creek beside the Garden branches off of.

After looking at the knight commander’s amateurish doodles on the soil for about thirty or so seconds, trying to imprint it as much as he can into his memory, particularly the location of the landmarks, he finally nodded a “got it!” to everyone.

He was giving farewell to everyone there and was about to once again mount Ddraig when Sir Velram suddenly spoke.

“My Lord, do you really have to leave right away?”

“Mmm, the faster it gets done the better, right?”

“…”

“Besides, I won’t be that long. Soon as I get the seeds and maybe some other things I take fancy on, I’ll return immediately. This is also a good way for me to scout the kingdom…. well, one of their cities anyway.”

“Won’t you at least make some kind of public departure so the entire Garden could send you off?”

“Eeeh, that’s not really my thing. Once the signboard gets installed in front of my house just post it there that I’ve gone on a journey and would be back soon.”

Sir Velram sighed, finally accepting defeat.

“Understood.”

Meanwhile, Fraenis only looked with concerned eyes as Reinhard and Ddraig rides off into the wilderness.

♦

The sight on top of Ddraig was exciting, yet the mere 3-4 meters of elevation isn’t enough to pierce the thick and blanketing canopy of the forest trees, so Reinhard couldn’t really see the mountain range just yet.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

It was, however, faster than just walking. In fact, Ddraig’s casual slithering was faster than Reinhard’s jogs, which made him slightly unsatisfied. The speed felt like he was taking a casual bike stroll.

“Whatever. Humans are not known for their speed anyway.”

Reinhard’s mind then began drifting to a video he watched on youtube about how ancient humans would hunt using persistence and not by outrunning their prey. He thought how fascinating it was that since they knew they were slower than the animal they’re hunting, they would just stalk the prey, making it flee until it runs out of stamina and is too exhausted to continue running, which then makes it easy pickings for the humans.

As a child, Reinhard was that kid. The nerdy stereotype that would spend most of their time reading books about science and history. Even when he stepped into teenager years he would just continue blabbering to his friends about the things in nature that fascinates him. Looking back at it now, he couldn’t help but laugh at how annoying he must have been back then.

“Well at least they learned things that mostly aren’t taught in school.”

He thought while reminiscing about his high school friends.

*Hisssss*

His revisit in the past took longer than he had expected, however. In what felt like just a blink of an eye, Ddraig informed him that they’re about halfway towards the basilisk nest.

“Hmm. Do you think now’s a good time to start heading north-east?”

*Hisssss*

“But you’re the one that knows where it is!”

*Hisss*

“You’re hungry already? Well, I suppose we’ve already gone quite a long way. Alright, I’ll stay here and you can hunt, but don’t take too long!”

*Hissssss*

Reinhard sat on a gigantic protruding root of a tree while checking his inventory and stats as Ddraig go off to find a creature to eat.

By his estimation, it has been about an hour or so since they left.

“If the distance between the basilisk nest and Resa was roughly as far as what Sir Velram drew, we should be able to get there in at most, a day and a half.”

He materialized both his staves for protection just in case something comes by him.

Yet when he did so, something moved around the bushes not far to his right. The sudden rustle was incredibly hard to miss, and it couldn’t have been the wind either as it was the only bush that moved. He looked at that direction while holding his staves, trying to see what the movement was.

“Ddraig?”

He asked.

No response. He waited for a second or so, until finally deciding to point his staff of venom towards the bush. He was going to spray venom to whatever was behind it. He was in such a dangerous position to take any chances, he thought.

When the magic circle appeared on his staff, ready to spray the venom at any moment, the cause of rustling finally revealed itself.

“W-wait!”

The creature that suddenly jumped out revealed itself and exclaimed. This sudden movement almost made Reinhard release the venom torrent, but thankfully, he was able to stop himself when he saw what the creature looked like.

At first glance it looked like a human girl, however, the name hovering above its head proved otherwise.

Reinhard looked at her closely and soon realized that apart from her face and neck, her entire torso, at least the part that’s not hidden by the bushes, is covered by shiny blue scales. She didn’t have the bodily features that one would expect of a girl, specifically in the chest area. It looked just like a man’s torso, albeit less muscular and fully covered in scales. Her eyes were also serpentine, glowing yellow as it stares at him in shock and desperation.

“Who are you? What do you want?”

“Please don’t kill me! I was just… W-were you just riding that red basilisk from earlier!?”

Reinhard tightened his grip at his staves. He won’t make the first move, of course, but if he even gets a glimpse that his life would be in danger, he’d stop at nothing to preserve his life, even if it means killing her.

“Yeah? What of it?”

“Y-you’re one of them, aren’t you!? You’re the reason why the nest is attacking us!”

Suddenly, the girl grew angry upon Reinhard’s reply. She looked like she didn’t have the intention to attack though, it’s more like she’s just showing Reinhard how she despises him but can’t do anything about it.

“One of them?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, girl. If you’re here to harm me I can assure you, you’d be dead even before you get near.”

“Y-you would dare say that when you’re the reason why we are suffering!?”

She shouted all of a sudden.

“Is this a trap? Is she calling for the attention of her friends? Tsk, I need to get out of here. She’s just stalling time…”

Reinhard began shifting his vision without moving his head all around him, looking for any signs or clue that he may be getting surrounded, and also of paths where he can escape.

“I should run towards where Ddraig went…”

“Please! I beg of you! Stop it whatever you’re doing! We haven’t done anything wrong… please…”

“What is she talking about!?”

“And neither did I. I don’t know what your deal is but I’m pretty sure I have nothing to do with that. This is the first time I’ve come this far from Garden, you know.”

The girl flinched upon hearing Reinhard’s remarks.

“G-garden? Y-you’re with the dryads??”

The look of shock and disbelief paints on her face.

“Crap. Should I have not said that?”

“T-then, please help us! If you’re not really the one causing it you’ve got to help us!”

She unconsciously went closer to Reinhard in desperation, revealing the lower part of her body. It didn’t shocked Reinhard to see that her upper body is human and her lower body is that of a snake since the name “Naga” kind of gave it away to him.

“Stay back! Don’t come any closer.”

He says to her, flaunting his staves.

“I’m not here to hurt you! I was just looking for food when I saw you riding from that red basilisk… come to think of it… that couldn’t have been from the nest as it would be an outcast…”

“…”

“Are you… are you really not our enemy!?”

“So far it doesn’t seem like anyone’s around us. If she’s here alone then I should be the one stalling time for Ddraig to return.”

“No, I’m not.”

He sighed.

“What are you talking about anyway?”

“You really don’t know huh…”

The naga visibly grew sorrowful as she reminisces about her story.

“It was about more than a week ago… Some humans, like, a lot of them just passed by the basilisk nest not too far from here. I was there… I watched them fight those basilisks. A lot of them died, but many of the basilisks died too. But that’s not the problem… The problem was what happened after that. The surviving basilisks grew more aggressive. They began hunting day and night, and at a larger area than before. They were trying to recover their losses as fast as possible. We used to be safe from them and would only be at a dangerous place if we stray too close to their nests, but now, our own nests gets attacked day and night... Many of my friends have *sobs* …”

She started crying in front of Reinhard. Reinhard, on the other hand, didn’t know what to do or how to react.

“Err…”

That was when Ddraig emerged out of the direction that he went to hunt. Despite the crying girl in front of him, Reinhard couldn’t help but laugh internally at what Ddraig’s reaction was when he saw the naga. His bright red eyes widened and his grip of his hunt loosened, causing him to drop it on the ground. His jaw was literally gaped open as he looked at Reinhard in confusion. If Ddraig had facial features like that of a human, his face would be that of “What?”.