Soon after returning to our journey, we encountered a lizard disguised as a flower.
Pauline, who almost stepped into danger, was dejected. Although it was her carelessness, she couldn’t go against her instincts; it was unavoidable.
“It can’t be helped, Pauline. Speaking of which, is it true that there’s a deadly poison at the tip of your tail?”
“Ehehe, that was a lie. Of course, there’s poison, but it only causes pain and swelling.”
Was that a bluff? But that magician was completely fooled. I can’t help but laugh when I remember him yelling “Kiee.”
“Hahaha, I wonder how that clueless magician is doing now. I hope no other reinforcements come.”
Just then, a single raindrop fell on my cheek. Then, in no time at all, it turned into a downpour. Gray, heavy clouds covered the sky. It sounded like a shower from above. We hastily looked for a place to shelter from the rain.
“This way, hide in those rocks!”
Urged by Nina, everyone took shelter under a rocky hollow. The rain grew stronger, and lightning began to thunder. The roar and intense flashes echoed through the deep forest.
“We’ll just have to wait a while for this.”
Philiana set Veronica down and wiped her hair.
“Yes, I hope the river hasn’t flooded.”
Piyo flinched at the rumbling thunder. Since we were blocked by the rain, we decided to rest under the rock until morning.
The next morning, the downpour had passed, and bright sunlight peeked through the gaps in the leaves of the trees again. However, the rain had increased the humidity, making it not a pleasant morning. The already difficult path was soaked, making progress even slower. Just stepping a little into it submerged us up to our knees.
But when we finally reached our destination, we were stunned and disheartened. The bridge that was supposed to lead us ahead had been destroyed by last night’s lightning.
“Ah, honestly, can’t you fix this, Lauren?”
“There’s no way I can! It might be possible if it were slightly damaged, but complete destruction is impossible!”
Lauren got angry at Nina’s unreasonable request. It was broken in half in the middle, completely severed. While everyone was confused, Sharin turned to us.
“What should we do? Should we look for a place to cross and take a detour, or should we head upstream for a shortcut? But that might lead us to encounter beastmen.”
Even though we understood, we couldn’t come up with an answer. We didn’t know how far downstream we would have to go if we detoured, nor did we know how many sentries those beastmen had posted. It might be good to have Piyo scout, but it was too dangerous to send her alone into this deep forest. As we stood there at a loss, Nina spoke.
“It can’t be helped. Let’s go upstream. Move quietly so as not to be found by anyone. And stay alert so we can respond to any attack from any direction.”
In the end, unable to find a better solution, we decided to follow Nina’s suggestion.
