Chapter 79: Forest Wave Epilogue: Afterstory①

Four days after the Forest Wave.

I woke up in the bed in my room at the hideout.

Just then, the door opened, and my eyes met Pakira’s as she came in.

After that, everything became a huge mess, and it took several hours for things to finally settle down.

Then I ended up hearing what had happened over those four days.

In other words, the afterstory.

First, the dungeon anomaly.

After the octopus tentacles saved Nabel and I fell, the giant spider collapsed.

It turned into a pile of sand, and apparently they had a bit of trouble searching for me inside it.

Mineha was found at the edge of the destruction trail, on the outskirts of the Great Forest of Heizen.

Spiral Dawn was stuck into a rock, and Mineha herself was unconscious.

For some reason, she had gotten caught on a tree branch and ended up in a “fairial” state.

She was uninjured and woke up after a little while.

Apparently, even she had not expected that much power.

They said she was burning with rage, saying she was going to give the witch a serious talking-to.

Gwyne disappeared.

That meant all the specified daughters of the Sword Goddess were now gone.

Because she had been using the body of one of the giant spider’s servants, it seems she crumbled away at the same time the giant spider died.

I also heard that she handed the sword she had been holding to Thousand Faces.

That’s… well, fine.

Thousand Faces turned into someone else again and went after Biggs, the man in the red mask.

Apparently, he’s going to the place I told him about. But there was nothing there, right?

If he finds a clue and discovers Biggs, kill him.

No need to hold back. Kill him.

Now, the important Forest Wave.

Four days ago, while we were fighting, the Last Wave had occurred.

An unbelievable swarm of spiders.

Apparently, there were over one hundred thousand of them.

And only around ten thousand subjugators had to face them.

What kind of impossible game is that?

However, the majority of those spiders, nearly a hundred thousand of them, were apparently defeated by a strange elven woman.

More precisely, a beautiful elf with blue hair and dark skin, along with a large pale-blue dog carrying a greatsword.

That’s… well, of course they won.

“Actually, actually, the Forest Wave has all sorts of defensive measures. Among them, the secret agreement can be called the final resort.”

“Secret agreement?”

I had been made to lie in bed to rest.

The witch was sitting on a chair beside me, peeling an apple with a knife as she spoke.

Part of the chair’s backrest was open, allowing her three tails to stick out.

Sometimes I wonder whether the witch ever finds those three tails troublesome.

Though they are pretty big, they’re mostly fluff, so maybe not.

Also, apparently, apples for nursing the sick are common sense in this world too.

“A secret agreement with the Explorers’ Grand Guild.”

“…I thought the Explorers’ Guild and Subjugators’ Guild didn’t get along.”

They were like cats and dogs.

The witch skillfully peeled the skin.

Ah, a rabbit.

“Well, well. Nothing is ever completely unified. That old man has participated in the Forest Wave as a subjugator before too.”

“Come to think of it, I’ve heard that. So what is this secret agreement?”

“Hehe, hehe. The participation of a First-Class Explorer. They join the Forest Wave as a subjugator, but they do not actively stand out. They only enter the battle when things become truly dangerous. That is the secret agreement.”

“Ah, I see.”

“Obviously, obviously, it would be a problem if Heizen were destroyed.”

“Well, yes.”

It was a trade city.

The economic damage would be massive.

In the witch’s hands, one apple had splendidly turned into a herd of rabbits.

She had even rounded the peels into little red eyes.

Sparkling red eyes… cute.

When someone goes this far, it becomes hard to eat.

“Also, also, there is history between explorers and subjugators. Even if they dislike each other, this is this and that is that.”

“Was Thousand Faces also there because of that secret agreement?”

“Well now, well now. Even Kon does not know that much.”

The witch laughed and bit into one of the rabbit-shaped apple pieces.

She went for the head…

After chewing, she handed me one.

I took it and ate it.

“About Luma…”

“Mm-hmm. The curse was safely broken.”

“I’m glad.”

“Also, also, we found out afterward that her curse and the curse on the Poor Man Club girl were the same curse-poison, planted by the same person. Yes, Raada.”

“I heard the daughter was cursed when the Poor Man Club entered the forbidden land.”

“Hmm, hmm. Oh, oh. That was a lie.”

A lie.

No wonder it had felt off.

“It seems, it seems they wanted to hide their connection to Raada.”

“Ah… so that’s what it was. Could the curse have been the spider’s curse-poison?”

The spider had a relic like that.

The one where receiving a claw attack inflicted a curse-poison.

“Yes, yes. The curse-poison of the dungeon anomaly spider. Raada obtained and used the curse-poison of the sealed spider.”

“But it’s a relic, right?”

A relic should only activate when its owner uses it.

If it was sealed, then naturally it should not activate.

“Hmm, hmm. Normally, yes. But as you know, the effect was clearly active. Curses are rare and taboo to many people… truly forbidden relics, you could say. That is why almost no research has been done on them, and they remain full of mysteries.”

Well, it is a curse.

Even now, many people still do not know curses are relics.

And in this world, powers other than relics exist too.

Not everything is a relic, legendary, or legacy.

“Well then, Wof-boy. Shall we get to the main subject?”

“The main subject?”

“Mm-hmm. Tell me everything about the witch water in detail.”

“Ah…”

She was smiling so brightly it was almost mesmerizing.