Chapter 337: Entering the Gorge

I had forgotten to ask the important thing.

"From earlier you keep saying magical beasts, magical beasts. What kind of things are there? Could you tell me even the look?"

At my question they thought a little.

"For example a wolf that is huge with one horn growing, or a body like a deer but larger, a larger head, horns growing, a wide mouth, what would you call that?"

"Well. You would not know without seeing a picture."

"And an enormously large eagle, a huge monkey, a huge monkey with a bear’s head? A giant’s body with a cow’s head?"

Hearing the talk I could not imagine at all.

"A thing that flies in the sky, no feathers growing, one wing more than ten feet, a pointed mouth with teeth growing, a bird. They say various things, but in the end almost no one has looked hard, so we do not know."

Ten feet? Three meters? Hearing it is no reference at all.

"Understood. I do not understand well. If they come out please tell me."

"Understood." "Understood."

Both of them, from partway my face had filled with questions, so they seemed to have given up explaining. Even if I am told that is a magical beast I cannot necessarily do something. On the premise that I am the strongest in this procession,

"What should I do? Would it not be better if I watch at the head of the procession?"

I asked the two. I do not know where I should protect, or where it is good to face a magical beast.

"If Lord Marie does that there will be no one to protect Her Majesty’s carriage. We will take that duty."

the two of the Eisleben tribe said, but then no one protects your princess? Whether my question got through,

"Lady Agnes will be fine. In the first place she is stronger than we are, so there is no need to worry. More than that, the safety of the procession comes first."

I received that reply. A grateful thing. I want Blueford or Dee to hear this more than me. Truly.

"That is so, but even if you say that to me I cannot quite accept it. And thinking about it, it is not decided that magical beasts will attack from the head of the procession. So I have started to feel it is better to go on as we are."

Yes. When they attack you do not know when or from where. It depends on the magical beasts’ feeling. But when I came from the Marie Kingdom to the Mainz Kingdom the Empire people used flutes that call magical beasts and beasts, so if that is being used there is nothing to be done. What if a scent that draws magical beasts has been put on? Is that thinking too far?

The two guards went to ask Blueford. They will know this gorge and forest better than we. I think that knowledge should be used. That aside, Agnes inside the carriage has been sleeping the whole time. A pyuu hyurururuu sound can be heard. I want to peek inside, but for form a maiden is sleeping, and if Agnes learned I saw her sleeping face I feel I might be told,

"A man who sees a maiden’s sleeping face must marry the maiden. The only one a maiden may show her sleeping face to is her husband!"

Before I knew how Agnes’s guards would act the order to depart was given, so I boarded the driver’s box of Her Majesty’s carriage.

"Did you learn something?"

the driver asked, but I think there is no point in saying extra things and inviting unease, so I answered,

"No. I do not know the details. Only that forest above seems untouched by people. They said it is not a thing people can enter at all, so it seems thieves are not hiding in that forest."

"I see. Indeed I hear that when bandits attack it is not from inside the forest. They hide in the shadows of the winding gorge road. Of course I think the knights are well on alert for such people."

The driver had a face that said that is obvious. But I cannot quite trust those knights.

We entered the gorge and advanced and nothing happened. Now and then a carriage came from the direction we were going, thoroughly friendly, and when they knew it was Her Majesty’s party they yielded the road. Not a scrap of hostility. They also said there was no place ahead where you could feel an obstacle or danger. I had been told it was dangerous, and there had been last night’s thief attack, so I had started to rethink that I had worried too much. When we came to the place the driver said we had passed half the gorge, far above my head birds began to fly in circles. One, two, three, four, five flying.

The driver looked up and shouted!

"Acha. Those are wyverns! To be marked by those! This is bad. Those return to the nest once they take prey, so if we can get through the gorge while five people are sacrificed that would be good."

For some reason he started talking on the premise that five people would be sacrificed. Is it not that they will not necessarily attack? I think, but from my constitution of calling enemies and beasts they will attack for sure. At the driver’s shout the procession began to stir. That traveled, and Anouk and Lily put their faces out of the carriage.

Even so, how can he tell what is flying that high? What kind of eyesight does he have? If they are wyverns they are not birds, so not one bird but one animal? I think extra things.

"Those are called wyverns?"

Inside my chest I was incredibly excited, but I hid that and asked as if I knew nothing. I had thought wyverns were like pterodactyls, and it seems they are different. But they are not birds, right? Reptiles? Mammals, no way?

"Yes. A huge bat with a crocodile’s head. They come down all at once from the sky, take people, carry them to the nest and eat them, I hear. If there are children in the nest, five people’s sacrifice may not be enough. I think it is fine because Lord Marie is beside us, but this has become a serious matter!!"

The driver said it like a shout. Saying he is fine because I am here is a bit much, is it not? The knights hearing that were clearly shaken. Among you, is there not even one who says,

"A thing like that, I will clear them all out!"

There would not be.

The speed of the carriages as a whole grew faster. Only a little, I say. Meaning move even a little faster and run from the wyverns.

"When they come down, would they not take a horse instead of a person? A horse has more meat, I think."

I meant it as a mutter, but,

"Well. There are ones that like people and ones that like horses, no? Look. People have likes and dislikes too, yes? I think it is the same as that."

The driver gave a lost answer. I had never heard that wyverns have likes and dislikes.

I do not think anyone has asked a wyvern, so this and that are all guesses. If we could communicate would they say "put out five people and two horses and we will let you go"?