"Although I had expected it, this village is really too remote to do - even if there are adventurers who come and go, it seems that there is no way to develop. Pen @ fun @ pavilion wWw. ｂｉｑUｇE。 ｉｎｆｏ”

Probably because of the deterioration of the road, the drivers had to slow down, and they arrived at Lemongrass much later than expected. By the time they finally saw the wooden gate, the sun was setting.

As Curator Black provides, this is clearly a relatively poor village and town, and at first glance it is all low wooden bungalows. In an era when railways are open and electric lights are lit up in cities, such villages seem to have changed as much as they did more than 100 years ago.

The village is surrounded by a low wall made of trees and a fence, with only one gate connecting the inside and outside. This is obviously a defense set up to prevent beasts or monsters in the forest and mountains, and I am afraid that there is no way to effectively defend against even slightly organized bandits.

In general, smaller towns will use earthen walls, while larger cities will use stone walls and moats to strengthen their defenses. It is only in remote and impoverished mountain villages such as Lemonglas that wooden walls are still used to protect settlements.

In the past, these walls were also able to defend against enemy armies and barbarians, but in an era when "spears" were far stronger than "shields", this was clearly a story of the old times. In the middle of the Empire, there is little safety for monsters, and most of the old walls have been eradicated and turned into vast roads, and people's living areas can be extended to the periphery despite the restrictions of the walls.

"Who are you?"

As their group's carriage stopped in front of the village gate, a young man who appeared to be a member of the village self-police group walked up to the side of the carriage. His expression was clearly wary of strangers, and he wondered if he had taken Frick and Suval in the carriage for uninvited adventurers again.

"Ah, two scribes from the library. ”

As if he had seen too many of these unfriendly villagers, the coachman skillfully showed a smile and said, "They said that there are some things to be dealt with in the village...... Well, I suppose your village chief or resident scrivener will know what is going on - or maybe you wouldn't mind disturbing their dinner?"

Unlike most officials, scribes usually only worked in libraries, so their work did not communicate closely with the citizens, especially in such remote villages, where there was often only one scribe in charge of tasks such as records and basic education. Yet even as inconspicuous as they were, the scribes were still officials - at least in the eyes of the countrymen, who were probably not much different from the village chiefs.

"Oh, I see...... Then come in. ”

The unfriendly expressions that had just appeared on the faces of the young men of the police regiment finally eased a little after hearing about the identity of the visitor, but the suspicion in their eyes did not subside much. He still looked at the coachman and the two peeking out of the window with that gaze, as if to say, "My people will keep an eye on you."

He then tapped the doorpost with a small wooden hammer attached to the door, and several young men of his age came out of the nearby hut. And when they saw the carriage, they all showed some complicated expressions, not knowing what they were thinking.

But in any case, these not very friendly villagers did not pester them too much, but just took them to the village chief according to the young man's arrangement without saying a word. The coachman, after saying "I'll be waiting for you at the inn over there," drove the cart to the stables of the only inn in the village.

After parting ways with the coachman, the two scribes went with the young men of the vigilante to the village chief's house, which was located in the deepest part of the village. In every village with wooden houses, the village chief's house is a slightly better example...... But that's still too basic compared to the ones in town.

The middle-aged man, known to the young people as the village chief, was the same as the young people in the village, and greeted Frick and Suval with a complicated expression - it was clear that he was bothered by something, so he didn't seem to be able to lift his spirits when he greeted them into the house.

"You've worked hard to get here...... I'm sorry for the attitude of the young people towards you, because the village is in a bit of trouble right now. ”

The village chief introduced himself as Pat to the two of them, and he looked a little haggard in his words: "It was about the same time that those adventurers discovered the ruins, and the monsters around the village seemed to have become active. So they now think it's all their trouble, and their attitude towards outsiders has become very sharp. ”

According to the village chief, they were monsters who didn't know if they were bears or wolves, with huge bodies and black fur, which were a little different from all the monsters they had seen in the past. They have not yet launched an attack and are constantly appearing around the village, as if they are scouting for weaknesses in the defensive line.

It was true that they didn't know what the mobs were aiming for, but the frequent presence of the mobs near the settlements was enough to unsettle the inhabitants. And when he and the resident scrivener led the young men and adventurers of the self-police group to investigate the ruins, they were almost attacked by monsters.

When he said, "Even though they were watching from a distance, they followed them all the way to the vicinity of the village," the firewood in the stove suddenly exploded. The village shuddered for a moment, as if the flames could not dispel the chill in his heart.

It doesn't exist in the records, but it is likely to be a new breed of mutant monster - the resident scrivener came to this conclusion after looking through the records of the science of magic. At least one thing that can be confirmed is that there have been no similar monster communities found in the vicinity in the past.

According to the research of monster scholars, monsters may have been mutated from beasts, and the typical ones are classified as "beast species". These monsters are often ordinary animals before they "change...... It is possible from harmless birds to social carnivorous beasts.

Compared to other types of monsters, there is basically no reproductive isolation between the beast species and the original kind, so the number can easily increase. Although the strength of the monomer may not be very high, it is the most harmful type because of its strong group reproduction ability.

"If it's a newly created beast type monster, it's really a bit troublesome...... But even if they were, they wouldn't be so close to human settlements. After listening to the village chief's description in a nervous tone, Flick quickly fell into thought.

Originally, monsters were similar to beasts, and they would try to avoid large settlements as much as possible, and were unlikely to actively conflict with the local inhabitants. Even if lone monsters sometimes run away to remote villages, it is only an occasional phenomenon, and the target of the attack is often a lone person.

Indeed, the monsters of the beast species are slightly more special than the others, and it is very likely that some relatively violent communities will be formed after they are affected by anomalous magic and turn from beasts to monsters. Although they are only a few cases, these monsters are aggressive, aggressively invading the territory of other beasts in the vicinity, and may even attack settlements and cause serious animal disasters.

Most of the larger animal plagues in the history of the empire occurred more than a hundred years ago, while the rest were concentrated in the fragmented lands of the Great Schism. After the re-establishment of the empire, the government cleared the central region of the threatening monster community through several large-scale campaigns for the stability of the central region.

The monsters have shown no ill will so far, but this is only the "current" state of affairs. These monsters may be a new breed, and there is no record of them, so he can't tell whether they are confirming their sphere of influence or planning an attack.

"Hmm...... If everything is as you say - did you inform the town hall or the garrison of the North Gate before we came?"

If this is the case, it is safest to notify the garrison or the city hall: "Although there is no movement of those monsters yet, it would be better to have the garrison send some personnel to guard against it, just in case...... This is also for the safety of the villagers. ”

The Gate of the End of the North is the northernmost region of the North, and there are many unexplored mountains and forests nearby, and it is also full of many kinds of monsters. In order to prevent monsters from posing danger to the settlements, the garrison and garrison will send people to patrol the villages every once in a while, and when they receive a request for help from the residents of the settlement, they will usually send a team of more than 10 people to assist in the defense.

Frick thinks that according to the village chief's previous description, it is at least enough for the garrison to send one or two teams to Lemongrass to defend it, and that the resident scribe in the village should also be able to ask the librarian to send a team to investigate the natural environment around the village.

However, he had not heard anything from Curator Black before he set off - not only from Curator Black, but not even in the information he provided. Probably the only thing that has something to do with these monsters is the sentence "The adventurer found the ruins while hiding from the dangerous monsters".

If he could, he really didn't want to think that Curator Black deliberately withheld the information from him, on the contrary, it was most likely that these villagers intentionally or unintentionally omitted some of the information when providing it...... Whether it's for the exclusion of strangers or some other reason.

Whatever the reason, this was not a good sign - he set his sights on Chief Pat, waiting for him to respond to his question.