"Do you know a young man named Marcy?" asked the man standing in the doorway. He curled the beard around his chin with his chapped fingers, curling the white whiskers into small curls and smoothing them out again.

Marcy Barrett searched for the name in his head, "Sorry, I don't remember seeing this guy. Barrett made her voice as polite as possible, "If that man had been to Bay of Pigs, he would probably have used another name, or should I say, a nickname." ”

"Yes, nicknames. Adventurers there love to give nicknames to others. The man nodded, "My old nickname was 'Hydration Bag', which wasn't imposing, but it was appropriate. Because every time the team stopped to rest, it was up to me to go to the stream and fill everyone's water bags. ”

"It's not a good job, you know, every water source in the forest is dangerous, I once saw a big bear in armor drinking from the stream, the monster was less than five meters away from me, and I could even smell the stench coming from it." But the strange thing is that the guy didn't attack me, maybe it's full, maybe it doesn't look down on a few pounds of meat on me, who knows. ”

He looked into the distance, "Trust me, that bear is covered in iron armor, not bone fragments or resin, although the forest is dimly lit, I can't be wrong at that distance." There are traces of artificiality in the armor, and you can't expect a four-legged bear to forge its own armor and put it on itself. There are too many evil things to do in the Misty Forest, but I don't believe that a bear can do this, and even the gnolls can't, although they have the word 'human' in their name, they are just two-legged beasts, just like orcs. ”

"You're not bad, like an orc!" Barry nodded, "but that bear, people call that creature an armored bruiser." Some people believe that it is a magical creature that has escaped the control of the mage, but no one knows exactly how it came about. There are too many things in the Misty Forest that can't be explained, and sometimes when you encounter an accident, it will feel normal. ”

Wouldn't it be better if we could go into the house and sit down and talk," Barrett thought to herself.

The man nodded again, "There are some evil sects in that place, but there are always people who want to go inside. I am, you are, Andrew and Carey too, except that you and I came out alive while Andrew and Carey stayed there. "By the way, the young man named Marcy, the only son of the Reed family at the other end of the village, has also stayed in the forest." ”

"The Misty Forest is a dangerous place, and many people don't get out every year," Barrett echoed, and most of them were young people because they had dreams and were fearless, but that was not a basis for them to walk through the Misty Forest.

"To be honest, I don't like that young man, his laughter is so ugly that if you hear it, you will never forget it. The old man said, "How can anyone laugh like a cat?"

A name popped into Barrett's mind, and he was a little dizzy. This is the hometown of Cat Laugh? Damn, how can it be so coincidental?

Is this old man's kindness a conspiracy? Barrett subconsciously looked around, he suddenly panicked, but he didn't notice anyone with a weapon who wanted revenge.

I didn't kill that young man!!" Barrett cried out inwardly, too far from the campfire, dragged into the darkness by a pair of green paws. I had warned them not to go out of the campfire, even if it was convenient to get up at night, but he was in a daze, and the night watchman did not warn him. Although I was awakened by his shouts and immediately chased after him and chased the monster away, the young man's neck had already been bitten off in half.

If there was anything that made Barrett feel a little guilty, it was the people he had taken to the forest that he hadn't brought back, and the relatives of those people.

The old man seemed to see Barrett's strange appearance, "What, remember?"

Barrett hesitated, but finally decided to tell the truth, "He was on my team, we went to the Misty Forest together, but I didn't bring him out. ”

Maybe I should get out of here and sleep out in the wilderness. He had some regrets about coming to this village.

"I'll just say your name is so familiar, old Reed said that his son died at the hands of a man named Barrett, who used to say it a dozen times a day, but now it's better. The man said indifferently, "You must know that there are not many people who call Barrett here, and this is a Nord name." ”

He turned and entered the house, and beckoned to the "uninvited guest" of the village again, "Come in, don't worry, no one will do anything to you, this village is full of honest farmers, and most of them have only been to Galano at the farthest point, and probably only once in their lives." ”

The man looked back and saw Barrett standing at the door stunned, "Just keep the horse on a leash next to the corral, and my daughter will feed you some fodder when she comes back." When he finished speaking, he turned and walked to the side room, "Do you drink rye beer or green apricot wine?"

Barrett stood in the doorway and sighed, tethered his horse to the corral as the man had commanded, and strode into the house.

Directly facing the door is a large hall with a long oak dining table in the center. Behind the dining table was a fireplace made of stone and clay, and bricks were apparently a rarity in the village.

On the top of the fireplace were two brass candlesticks with butter candles and a trinket made of fishbones, and on the side hung a jet-black iron chisel for fiddling with flames and a shiny spoon with one large and one small handle.

On the right side of the hall is a staircase leading to the second floor, while on the left side appears to be the kitchen. The old man's voice sounded from the kitchen, "I suggest you have some green apricot wine, I brewed it myself." The green apricots were picked from the old apricot tree in front of the door, and to tell the truth, the tree was older than my grandfather, if he lived to this day. ”

The old man walked out of the kitchen with a bottle of green apricot wine with a sealed lid and two ordinary glass glasses, and after placing the wine and wine glasses on the table, he turned around and went into the kitchen.

"My daughter won't be back until a while, so we'll drink and wait. The old man walked out of the kitchen with another plate of food, "Don't look at me, I won't cook anyway." ”

Inside the plate were a few slices of cheese with a little mold, a pile of sliced turnips, a few purple carrots, and a handful of wild plums.

The old man opened the bottle and poured a full glass for everyone, and a fresh, sweet fruity aroma suddenly diffused in the air, instantly waking up people's spirits.

"Sit. The old man placed a cup in front of Barrett, "You are too tall, and if you don't sit down, it will always give people a sense of oppression." ”

Barrett sat down, "Thank you for your hospitality," he said, he raised his glass, took a slight sip, and then took another sip, the taste of the wine was refreshing, sweet and sour, with a hint of bitterness peculiar to green apricots, "I don't know your name......

"Francis. The old man took a sip of wine, picked up another purple carrot and chewed it heavily, "You can call me Frank." My wife preferred to call me 'Fran' when she was alive, but it was a woman's name, ha, God knows what she thought. ”

Barrett didn't know how to take it, so he picked up a piece of turnip, put it in his mouth and chewed it to hide his speechlessness. But Frank was very talkative, and before Barrett could speak, he went on to talk to himself.

"Alas, old Reed's family was also unlucky, and his family used to have a son besides Marcy, but that child fell ill and died when he was 4 or 5 years old. Although the boy was not likable, he had a good personality, but unfortunately he always wanted to go out and see, just like I did back then. And this village is still too close to the Misty Forest, and there are adventurers running to that evil place everywhere, and everyone is repeatedly saying 'gold' and 'fortune', but there are only a few who can really get rich like you. ”

As long as you know a little bit about it, you know that Barrett's equipment is worth a lot of money. If nothing else, the unique color of the petrified cowhide and the fine scaly leather on the surface of the cowhide are a rare good thing that even the farmers who farm the land know are rare and good.

Barrett was a little embarrassed by the topic, and he still didn't know how to pick it up, so he picked up another wild plum and put it in his mouth. Plums, like apricot wine, are cold and should have been kept in a storage room or cellar or something like that.

Thankfully, the conversation didn't go any further, and Frank drank his wine as he recounted his previous adventures to Barrett. There was no shortage of boasting about what he was talking about, because Barrett was a veteran, and he only had to listen to the details to understand what was really going on.

But he was at ease with the subject of adventure, and Barrett echoed the man's words, complimenting them at the right time, and occasionally telling of his extraordinary past in an understated tone. Frank's eyes lit up when he heard those deeds, and he was amazed. It can be seen that this elderly man still misses his previous adventurous life.

After a while, the sky was slightly dark, and the sound of the sheep bleating outside the house sounded, and a crisp female voice was scolding the sheep to return to the pen, and expressing curiosity about the horses tethered outside the corral.

"Daddy, whose horse is this?" the female voice shouted outside the door. Immediately after, the door was pushed open, and a girl with fiery red hair walked in from the outside.

......