Chapter 31 : Hitchhiking

To Lena, places where people gathered, like villages or cities, were spots easily reached by walking just a little along a road.
Her homeland was small and packed with people, so someone lived everywhere.
People even lived on small neighborhood hills!
That’s why she set off without hesitation as soon as her intuition struck.
Why wait ten nights, twenty nights, or a month?
If I just keep walking, a village will appear, and I’ll meet people.
It was a naive thought that completely disregarded the difference in eras.
In this era, the land was vast, and people were few.
Traveling between villages was a great adventure in itself.
It consumed at least a week’s worth of time, and encountering danger along the way was common.
Moreover, this place was near the Great Forest.
It wasn’t the kind of land where one would find signs of human presence after just ten days of walking.

Lena kept glancing awkwardly at Celine.
“I definitely had a feeling there would be people…”

“Right.”

“I’m telling you, we’re almost there! People will appear just over that hill…”

“I see.”

She almost wished Celine would reprimand her for doing something useless or glare coldly.
Then she could just giggle and act cute, admitting she did something foolish.
But Celine affirming everything like this made her chest ache.
She was the one who dragged Celine along when they could’ve just waited patiently.
And now, there were no results.
Had Celine’s airheadedness rubbed off on her from spending so much time together?
Her intuition, which had pinpointed the correct answer until now, had failed her for the first time.
She thought she’d meet people in a day or two at most; she never imagined it would take ten days.
I didn’t expect this either.

“You don’t need to feel so self-conscious,” Celine said.
It was impossible not to notice when the girl, who usually chattered endlessly regardless of response, kept her mouth shut and glanced sideways.
“How long were you alone in the Great Forest? You must’ve been excited to come out. Even I was incredibly happy to escape that hell. It’s natural not to be able to control your high spirits.”
Celine looked at her with the warm gaze one gives a nephew visiting an amusement park.

“Anyway, there probably isn’t much difference between waiting idly in front of the Great Forest and wandering around. The Knight Order’s patrols cover the entire area near the Great Forest. Even if we strayed a bit, they’ll follow our tracks.”
The meticulous consideration felt strangely uncomfortable.
No, I wasn’t excited.
My gut really told me we could meet people.
It was an excuse she couldn’t voice.
Saying “my gut told me so,” whether true or false, was not something to say after wandering for ten days.

“Then let’s just go over that knoll one last time.”
Lena knew how to admit her mistakes.
Anyone who held onto stocks past the stop-loss line, believing they’d eventually rise, only to lose everything, ends up like this.
Ten days was more than enough stubbornness.
If Celine hadn’t empathized with Lena’s situation and shown consideration with her warm heart, complaints would’ve surfaced long ago.
Since I got my way this time, it’s only fair to follow the group’s opinion next time.
Intuition, you can be wrong too.
Right, how can a person get the answer right every time?
Getting it right many times and wrong once is still good.
I’ll expect the right answer next time.
Lena bravely climbed over the knoll.
And then.

“People!”
She regretted not trusting her gut feeling until the very end.

Morutun, the head of the Cassadine Merchant Caravan, harbored a grand dream.
It was the dream of becoming a millionaire who monopolized the distribution of all goods on the continent.
It was a dream so absurd that even his childhood friend, to whom he was engaged, asked if he was on drugs when he talked about it.
What qualities were necessary to lead a renowned merchant caravan on the continent?
It was the ability to flatter the powerful, represented by the nobles.
After all, buying and selling goods depended on the landowner’s whim.
Unless the land was so barren that the territory’s survival depended on the caravan, the landowner held the upper hand.
“Don’t do business here.”
That single phrase from someone powerful could cut off trade routes.
Thus, merchants, forgetting the principle of supplying necessary goods where needed, busied themselves currying favor with the powerful.
Furthermore, having invested effort, they sought to recoup their investment by kicking away the ladders of newcomers and keeping them in check, disregarding fair competition.

Where, then, were new caravans supposed to do business?
Morutun, the president of a fledgling company established a year ago, faced the same dilemma as other presidents of his vintage.
No money for bribes, no track record to sell credit, and treacherous roads for long-distance trade aimed at striking it rich.
Eventually, most would give up their own caravans and choose to work under someone else.
Morutun did not yield.
Would the stubbornness that led him to run away from his farmer parents, who told him to just farm, elope to another village, save up wages, and start a small caravan, disappear so easily?
Hardship only fueled his contrarian spirit.

Morutun resorted to his last option.
He tried to open trade with Carvalon Castle, a territory so barren that it accepted any caravan without discrimination and bought consumables as soon as they were sold due to shortages.
Carvalon Castle’s location was remote, both on the map and in people’s perception.
Because it was the headquarters of the Red Rose Knights.
A military group burdened with the duty of stopping monsters overflowing from the Great Forest and being the first to respond to abnormal phenomena.
They were money pits.
Knight orders weren’t exactly productive organizations in the first place.
Living off supplies from the borderlands, and supplies, as they often are, were rarely provided properly.
Therefore, Carvalon Castle welcomed arriving caravans and held onto departing ones.
For small caravans, it was a land of opportunity where they could definitely sell their goods.

There was just one problem.
The profit didn’t justify the effort of transporting goods to the borderlands.
On average, they broke even; at best, they made a very small profit.
Nominally, it was because they were military supplies.
That’s why it was the last resort considered by small caravans.
They could sell, but the lack of profit meant the caravan couldn’t grow, only maintain the status quo.
For Morutun, even that was a blessing.
He couldn’t just give up the caravan and return home.
If I hold on, maybe my day will come.

So, after hiring mercenaries (as cheaply as possible since there was no money left) for protection, he was heading toward Carvalon Castle.
Morutun spotted suspicious figures on the hill to the left of the road.
He hired mercenaries precisely to detect and deal with such things first, but “you get what you pay for.”
Expecting them to do their job properly would only lead to frustration, so he had to be careful himself.
Anyway, two small figures, one large figure.
Are they people? But that big one…
Morutun, shielding his eyes from the sun with his hand like a visor, finally saw their true forms.

“M-Monsters! Monsters!”

“What?! Monsters?!”

“Emergency! Emergency!”
The mercenaries, who had been fast asleep, jolted awake.
The few caravan workers stopped the wagons and hastily built makeshift barricades.
When monsters attacked, the caravan’s main strategy was to form a defensive line and fight back.
Even running for dear life, humans couldn’t outrun monsters.
They had horses, but pulling heavy loads slowed them down.
Naturally, escaping required abandoning all the caravan’s trade goods.
How much was all that worth? Would merchants just abandon it?
Dying together clinging onto it was more likely; the option of saving oneself was unthinkable for a small caravan.

“Damn it!”
Morutun nervously bit his lip.
Only three monsters.
Even with cheap mercenaries, they usually wouldn’t need to be this tense.
However, this area was within the Great Forest’s sphere of influence.
If monsters appeared, they must’ve escaped from the Great Forest.
He had heard countless times how strong the monsters of the Great Forest were.
Being only three didn’t mean they could let their guard down.
Those three could potentially wipe out an entire squad of regular soldiers.
Should I run now?
But then I’d have to abandon all the cargo I brought.
Then I’ll be ruined, and how is that different from dying?

While Morutun agonized, the monsters started moving.
They dashed down the sloping hill as if it were flat ground.
They were so fast that half the distance closed in the blink of an eye.
Okay, let’s run.
Those cheap mercenaries can’t handle this size.
Money, no matter how valuable, is cheaper than life.
Just as Morutun let out a shriek, “Hkyaaaak!” and tried to hijack a horse—

“Taxi!”
Screeeech—Two figures screeched to a halt with a strange sound.
Clouds of dust billowed behind them.

“Hitchhiking request!”

“…Hitch, what?”
They weren’t monsters, but people.
People dressed in absolute rags.
People riding on the back of a giant wolf.

“Want to try some of this?”

“What is it?”

“It’s turnips pickled in honey, a specialty of Santrin Village.”

“Oh, this is delicious. How much is it?”

“Haha, why ask the price between us? It’s a gift.”

“But these are all goods for sale.”

“It’s fine, don’t worry about it. Seeing you eat so heartily makes me happy.”

“Thank you, Elder.”

“…Everything’s fine, but could you please just stop calling me Elder?”

Two days later.
Lena was enjoying luxury next to the caravan leader, Morutun.