Chapter 59 – Lost Baby Bird (4)

“What is this…”

Haru, who couldn’t see the approaching shadow, opened his mouth anxiously. But before she could speak any further, Mr. Rebecca hurriedly shut her mouth.

“Shh.”

“What…”

“Be quiet, Erica.”

Then I put my finger on Erica’s lips. Seeing this, Saya also swallowed her saliva and covered her own mouth. Silenced by ourselves, we cast our gaze at the harbingers of the coming doom.

Soon, it began to show itself. An unfamiliar chill surged from the tightly gripped sword.

The first thing that caught my eye was the wings that were still immature. Thick slime, whether bodily fluid or amniotic fluid, dripped from the leather, which had only bones left without feathers. It must have been itching, so he struggled with his front legs and tried to scratch his body.

Of course it was to no avail. This is because the front legs are too short compared to the massive hind legs. But he didn’t realize that, and he opened his mouth wide and complained to the world. Each time, weak flames spewed out, and as soon as the heated saliva touched the floor, it emitted gray smoke and slowly ate away at the ground.

No. In fact, this land was suffering enough just by the appearance of the creature. It groaned under the crushing weight, corroded by acidic saliva, and turned to ash in the flames it spewed out. The world was too fragile to accept his body.

But he was just a baby that hadn’t even opened his eyes yet. He was born less than an hour at most, a young individual who deserves protection. Even so, the mother was nowhere to be seen around him. He was born alone in no one’s land and realizes that he can walk alone. He was walking on a land that he would soon rule on his own.

It wakes up the young first on the land where it hasn’t even arrived. It was an audacity that only the top predators of the ecosystem could do. It was an atrocity that they were able to commit because they were confident that no predator in the land could even touch their young.

There was no creature on this earth that could bear to resist it. They become the rulers of this land at the same time as they are born. Even the animals with wrinkly wrinkles all over their bodies because their amniotic fluid had not yet dried were the owners of the food chain that we had to uphold.

…

Hatchling.

The legend named the existence that way.

And that word is always followed by an academic explanation that is not too calm.

Dragon’s offspring. Called.

Tense breathing brushed the tip of his nose. Everyone on the scene was trembling, no matter who it was, so it was impossible to determine whose breath it was. Even I was suppressing my heart, swallowing my saliva.

It’s a hatchling. I didn’t expect it at all. No one would have imagined that traces of dragons would already appear in this land.

That’s why I didn’t even know how threatening that hatchling was. At this moment, I had neither the knowledge nor the experience to refer to. It was only a vague guess given its huge size and hard-looking teeth.

Fortunately, it was the fact that he was a blind child. At least they didn’t seem to have found us yet. If I didn’t make a sound, I could have just passed by like this.

Rebecca seemed to have had the same thought, and she pressed herself against the wall and carefully waved her hand toward us. Fortunately, there was a deep ditch by the side of the road, so I could move about while hiding.

But not everyone on the scene realized that. The moment we were about to move cautiously, a careless voice resounded in the air.

“Honey…? Are you there? Honey…”

“…!”

As soon as we heard the voice, we threw ourselves hastily down the ditch. The earnest call continued until the moment when the muddy pile of dirt hit his knees.

“Honey…Answer me…”

“…”

“Honey…!”

“I…I’m fine…I…”

Did that earnestness work? A weak response came from between the broken wagons. In a world where lies were prevalent, the only true relationship finally raised its head.

And on the other side, the seeds of destruction that had been wandering in the darkness also began to slowly raise their heads.

The boy scanned the air with his blind eyes. He wandered about, swallowing dust with the tip of his nose, shaking himself nervously and baring his teeth, but only in the direction of the sound. In the meantime, the couple moved to find each other.

At that time, the only coachman who came to his senses approached them. Then he whispered in a low voice.

“Shh. Lower your voice. They’re gone. They might be around us.”

“I thought you were just a student…Where’s the young lady?”

“Don’t worry, you’re fine. Damn you, you fucking bastards. Where the hell are you?”

“Rather than that, why did the horses suddenly look like that? What happened?”

“Well. Was there anything in front of you?”

Only then did they cast their eyes over the fallen carriage. I also followed them and scanned the spot where Hetzling was. But the guy wasn’t there. There are only clouds of dust that drift like the wind.

…

Dust cloud…?

As I lowered my gaze in an ominous premonition, a shadow appeared under my feet before I knew it. A pitch-black shadow that draws a round circle and grows bigger like the waves of water. When I realized its source, I and I both raised our heads at the same time.

And at that moment, a huge tongue flew in and pierced the coachman’s body.

“Aaaaagh!”

“Ehe eh eh !!!”

A man’s scream and Hetzling’s shouts mingled at the same time, and a desperate funeral song resounded. The recoil of his great leap caused his body to roll in the opposite direction, his massive hind legs jolting and blood and dust dancing. The cries of those who had their comrades taken away in an instant pierced the sky amidst the heavy noise as if iron bars were clashing.

“This… Such crazy!”

“Oh my god…!”

“Ehe eh eh !!!”

Hetzling let out another victory roar and gleefully gulped down the limp body of the man. Whether you are a prey or a predator, the first thing you learn when you are born is to run for survival. What he learned like an instinct before he even opened his eyes was hunting, not survival.

It was no longer an area that could be evaluated as arrogance. The way we think about life is already different.

The fellow enjoyed the joys of his first hunt for a long time, then turned his head back toward his wagon. And he slowly started moving toward them.

“Damn it…!”

“Even…You have to run away…If you stay here…”

“Damn it, stay still! If you make a noise, they’ll come running again… So…”

They whispered to each other in the lowest possible voice, but that only accelerated Hetzling’s pace. The gnome twisted his head around at the slightest noise and took his heavy steps. Every step, every step, everyone held their breath and watched his movements.

However, at that time, the aristocratic lady, who had not yet reached adulthood, began to awaken. She raised her head, letting out a moan, unaware that her worst nightmare was approaching.

“Uh… Uhm…”

“…!!!”

“What is this… Shit… Ugh…”

“Ah…Lady…!”

Everyone hurriedly approached her and tried to cover her mouth, but she pushed her hand away, frowning at her. Even in that urgent situation, it seems that he didn’t like that someone put a hand on his body.

“What? What’s going on? Talk…”

“My lady, for now…!”

“What. Why? What do you mean?”

“My lady please!”

“…You have to move.”

Rebecca’s low voice interrupted the desperate conversation. We crawled carefully across the floor, hoping that their misfortune would not affect them this far. But Hetzling’s pace was accelerating, and our creeping speed was slow. In the process, Erica almost burst into tears.

“My lady please…!”

“…!”

Fortunately, it was only after we had moved quite a bit away from the scene that Miss Anbert fell silent, and Hetzling stopped right in front of them. We also watched their situation from a distance while freezing our own time.

“…”

“Guuuuu…”

“…”

“Ugh… Ugh…”

Hetzling let out a strange cry for a long time as he stood in front of the carriage. A haze rose from the inside of his throat, as if a fire was bubbling there, even though it was midwinter.

Are you smelling it? Although it was not clear, his behavior was enough to amplify people’s anxiety. If they continued like this, it would only take an instant for their existence to be discovered.

In that vague fear, the woman who was still hiding in the wagon raised the crossbow. The arrow that had almost pierced my head earlier was now aimed at Hetzling. Its target was its eyeballs, which are inevitably sensitive to any creature.

I didn’t know how hard its hide was, so I had to aim right between the eyelids. So she aimed her crossbow carefully. Then, as he held her breath and lowered her head, she fired straight into her eyeballs.

The arrow that flew like that landed exactly between the eyelids of the guy. I covered Saya’s ears in case he cried out.

However, as soon as the arrow hit the eyeball, it was crushed flat and fell to the floor.

“What the fuck.”

She opened her mouth for the first time and let out her curse words. She didn’t even seem to know that Hetzling had been hit by an arrow, let alone felt any pain. The guy who stupidly shook his head opened his mouth blankly as if he didn’t know why.

And she started to drool. The watery saliva dripped onto the floor and began to rapidly corrode the carriage in which her woman was.

“What the fuck… The fuck…”

“Guuuuu…”

“Oh, no…”

“Guuuuu…”

“Aaaaa!!!”

“No!!!”

As her whole body was submerged in the flowing saliva, the woman could not bear it and let out her screams. At that moment, Miss Anbert also screamed and hurriedly rose from her seat. And it was the worst choice of her life.

“Keeeee

“Aaaaa!!!”

Once again, the screams of the bastard and the cries of the victims were mixed in a desperate way. We hid ourselves in the noise and desperately fled the scene.

The breathless flight continued for a long time. As we got further from the scene, our speed increased, but the hatchling’s cries showed no sign of abating. He even cried madly, raising clouds of dust high in the sky, as if he had decided to enjoy the joy of hunting for a longer time this time.

In the process, Erica eventually burst into tears. She felt fear even for a day as she was held in Rebecca’s arms. The only thing she was calm about in that situation was Saya.

Saya surveyed the surroundings with her characteristic silent steps, then returned to me with a sigh of relief. Then we stopped and sat down under the roots of a giant tree to catch our breath. I sat down on the floor, naturally accepting Saya’s arms that were entwined like chains.

I was the only one for her who had lost everything. But even I was so weak that I would disappear at any moment in a world like this. It must have been another despair for Saya that the person she had barely given her heart to was such a weak being.

She wanted to somehow strengthen her fragile heart. But I was still too clumsy at that, so I brought up a cliché instead.

“You worked hard, Saya. The rest is the same.”

“…”

“Let’s catch our breath for a moment and move on.”

“Yes. It’s too open here.”

Only Rebecca answered in a firm voice. The rest of the people slowly opened their mouths to me, but before that, Hetzling’s cries rang out.

“Keeeee!!!

“…”

“Ehe eh eh !!!”

And after that, the cries of the other hatchlings resonated together as if in resonance.

Their sound was never close. But there were too many of them. As if to prove that the owner of this land is not human, their cries continued to follow. One. Two. Three. Four. Even counting the number was too much for me, so I closed my eyes.

The scent of forget-me-nots spread through my blackened vision. Saya rubbed my eyelids with her trembling hands and held my cheeks. Then, in a low voice, he repeated the words to himself.

“This time…”

“…”

“… I will.”

I didn’t know what Saya wanted to say because the voice didn’t continue. While I was alone in my thoughts, her hand pressed firmly against her belly. The tightly clinging palms did not know that they would come off for a long time.