Chapter 209 - 208 - Rhinoceros.
"Ward?" Luna opened her eyes slowly as she smelled meat being cooked. Her mouth started salivating right away as she looked around searching for the source of the smell.
As she looked to right a little further away, she could see Ward sitting on the ground while looking into a fire.
Above the fire was a large piece of meat being cooked.
"Ward? Where did you get this?" After getting up she immediately walked over to her brother\'s side with a little difficulty. Ward who was a little distracted startled slightly.
"I hunted it. It\'s rabbit meat, here." He picked up one of the rabbits that were on the ground beside him and showed it to Luna.
"How did you hunt it? You\'ve never done this before, have you?" Luna was worried about where that meat came from, but Ward was in no mood to explain everything that had happened.
"Will helped me." He just said that. Luna who heard those words looked at him incredulously.
"Again you are talking to this "Friend". Who is this person? And why have I never seen him before?" Luna looked suspiciously at Ward, but the boy didn\'t seem to mind.
He stood up and took the meat off the fire so it wouldn\'t burn.
"He\'s a friend of mine. He stays only in my head. I\'ve said that before."
"In your head?"
"Yes, he talks to me when I call Him. He\'s the one who helped me."
"How did he help you if he stays only in your head? Isn\'t that strange?" Luna sat down next to Ward and waited anxiously for her piece of meat.
Ward was cutting the rabbit meat into pieces in a bowl.
"That I can\'t say."
"But haven\'t you told me about your friend\'s existence? What\'s wrong with talking about what he did to help you?" Luna received the meat from Ward and soon after began to eat fiercely.
Ward didn\'t mind and also began to eat slowly while looking at the green horizon.
"I shouldn\'t have talked about him with you. I did that and he get upset with me."
"He doesn\'t want anyone to know about him?"
"Yes, he gets mad when I tell him to show up or I talk to someone about him. But he always comes again, he\'s a stubborn kid."
"Hmmm, I understand... But thank your friend for me, that meat is delicious." Luna smiled at Ward, and the boy looked a bit put out. But soon after he went back to eating again and the two of them were silent.
After a few minutes, they had finished eating one of the rabbits.
"That is some of the tastiest meat I have ever eaten." She said as she caressed his belly.
"It was yummy, wasn\'t it?" Ward lay down on the ground and looked up at the sky.
"Yes, but now we need to go. I\'ve rested enough and I\'m properly fed too. I\'m sure we\'ll get there in a few hours."
"Can\'t we stay here for a while?"
"... All right, but just for a little while."
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"Take those two rabbits, we can sell them at the guild when we get to town," Luna said as she prepared to leave towards the city along with Ward.
"Right." Ward took the two remaining rabbits that were still in the stick. Luna asked him to carry the rabbits, but Ward refused to let his sister carry them and wanted to carry them on his own.
And after they put out the fire, the two started walking again towards the city.
It was another few hours of traveling before they could see the city wall in the distance. It was a wall about 20 feet high that was made completely of bricks and concrete.
Very different from their village which had a wooden wall that was easily broken down.
"We\'re almost there, let\'s go." Luna hurried her steps and Ward followed her. Since they were at the back of the town where there was no gate, they had to go around the town to get to the main gate.
Because of this, they had to walk for a while longer.
"Well, what do we have here." As soon as they arrived at the main gate they were greeted by a tall man about two meters tall. With a face very different from all the beast-men, his face closely resembled a rhinoceros face.
His horn on the other hand was not on his nose, but his forehead. His body was muscular and his skin was a light gray color.
\'Hey, this is not a rare breed? what is he doing here?\' Ward whispered this to Luna, but the girl did not answer and just smiled at the guard.
Besides his muscles, he was also wearing a somewhat rusty iron armor and also held a spear that was much bigger than his body.
He was scary.
"May we come in?" Luna asked the man.
"Sure, but what is the purpose for you guys being here? Do you have a reason?" The rhino man asked suspiciously.
"It\'s just that..." Luna was a little reluctant to tell him everything that had happened. If he were told that her village was attacked, what would be done?
Would it help to tell everyone what had happened? Would the culprits be caught?
Would they even believe her?
"Say it fast, young lady. There\'s a line forming back there." Luna looked behind her and noticed a few angry adventurers looking at her. Among them were even some humans.
"It\'s just that our village is three days away from here. It was attacked last night and we fled all the way here."
"What? Your village was attacked? Is that true?" The guard looked even more suspicious.
"Yes, my father and mother were killed. No, everyone in the village was killed." Luna bit her lips as she said this and began to tremble. The guard looked at her for a while and seemed a little worried about it.
He wondered whether he should believe her or not.
The adventurers behind Luna who heard this started to discuss this among themselves, they seemed to believe her.
"All right, you guys can come with me. Jogi, take care of this." The rhino man shouted and soon after a man with dog ears wearing leather armor appeared.
"Okay, leave it to me." He seemed confident that he could control the gate with ease. The rhino man laughed but said nothing.
"Come with me, we\'ll talk about it at the guard post. Depending on the situation I will personally talk to the guild and the mayor to try to find the culprit for this."
"Right."
The rhino man looked at Luna and Ward and noticed that the two were extremely sad and also looked rather pitiful.
Since they hadn\'t bathed for those three days, they were also stinking and their hair, ears, and tails were completely dirty and tangled.
But the rhino man didn\'t say anything. He felt sorry for the two of them, so he didn\'t want to talk to them much in the middle of town where several people were already looking at the two of them with curiosity.
Luna and Ward were quite bothered by this, so their ears drooped and they bowed their heads in shame.
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"So, tell everything that happened in your village. I don\'t know much about your race, but I think you guys like to live in isolation, am I correct? It\'s been a long time since I\'ve seen one like you." The rhino man said as he sat down in a chair.
They were in the guard post room. It was a small room of about 15 square meters where only a table and chair had been placed.
It had only one exit and two windows. One on the left and one on the right side of the room.
Luna calmed Ward down as he had been a little scared because they had suddenly been called to such a place. After Luna had talked to him for a while he seemed to be acting normal.
And now that everything was calm, Luna began to tell in detail everything that had happened and everything she had seen.
Unfortunately, she hadn\'t been able to give many details, so the man of the rhino race don\'t have the slightest idea who might have been responsible for this.
"It could be a group of bandits of some animal race, or maybe it was humans. It has several possibilities. It could even be the work of demons in that case.\'\' The man said thoughtfully.
Luna who heard his words shook her head in denial.
"It\'s impossible, in the village where we live we\'ve never heard of a demon sighting, it\'s been a while since they\'ve been seen, hasn\'t it?"
"Usually they stay well away from all the countries, but sometimes they may visit some other country and cause trouble. Not all of them, but some do."
"Even so I refuse to believe they were demons."
"From what you have told me, I don\'t believe it either. Demons have a limited ability to communicate and they wouldn\'t rape a human like yours either... Sorry."
"Don\'t worry about it."
"But now that you have passed this information on to me, I want you to keep in touch with me, is that okay?"
"Sure, no problem. I think we\'ll stay in this town for now."
"And I\'ll also pay for an inn for you guys for the time being. I wouldn\'t forgive myself for leaving you without a place to stay."
"Really?" Luna raised her ears in surprise.
"Yes, no problem. And I haven\'t introduced myself yet, but my name is Yomu."
"It\'s a pleasure to meet you, my name is Luna and this is my younger brother Ward."
"It\'s a pleasure to meet you," Ward said a little awkwardly.