Chapter 272: The Village Chief and His Son

Chapter 272

The Village Chief and His Son

Luckily, no student from Group 1 was late for the mission. Thus, Groups 1 and 2 departed at almost the same time. Throughout the journey, Medik didn’t pay much attention to others. He merely followed the group of students quietly. Occasionally, he conversed with Ellie about recent events, but for the most part, he spent his time engrossed in his own thoughts about his work.

The students were quickly transported to the city of Erel, but there were no teleportation devices available to reach the villages. Hence, they had to travel on the plains. Carriages provided by the institute awaited them, and they had to ride all day on the first day. However, they still couldn’t reach the village on the first day since the village was located in a highland area. After spending 1 day traversing the plains, they had to disembark and continue on foot.

Group 2 students were still able to use the carriages for a while longer, resulting in the groups parting ways.

Ellie had no issue with climbing steep cliffs, but her small body wasn’t well-suited for long-distance travel. Of course, it wasn’t just Ellie, but many other students also felt weak, so it wasn’t surprising that they had to take frequent breaks throughout the day. Ultimately, it took them 3 days to reach the Village of the Wind Chasm.

In total, they only had 11 days left to complete the mission. They had initially thought they had a comfortable 15 days to complete the mission, whether it was breaking rocks and setting up the stratagems, it shouldn’t have been too challenging, but their initial assessment had been too optimistic.

"Alright, we will start the mission tomorrow. Duchess Ellie and Nadia will handle the installation of the 10 stratagems. So, we will need to split into two groups to assist and protect them. Duchess Vida and I will guard Ellie. We need another 15 volunteers," Aria announced once everyone had rested and recovered from exhaustion. Fortunately, they didn’t have to construct their own accommodations, which saved a lot of time.

Although they had to set up tents, the village was already fenced in, so it only took a few hours to set up the tents. It seemed like everyone had their own tent, so there was no chaos.

When Aria asked for volunteers, everyone eagerly raised their hands, seizing the chance to follow and get closer to Ellie and Vida. Consequently, Aria had the privilege of selecting familiar faces for her group. Naturally, Ellie and Wint didn’t object to this arrangement.

Afterward, several people volunteered to protect Nadia during her mission, and everything seemed to go smoothly. However, Nara was the last to raise her hand, even though everyone had been pretending not to see her. Regardless of whether Nara wanted to cooperate in the mission or not...

"May I ask for some people to help take care of the villagers with me? You all know that many families have suffered losses, and their mental state might not be very good. We could help them in some small way during this time..."

Nara said. Everyone rolled their eyes. Despite wanting to argue, they couldn’t deny that Nara had a point. But in this situation, shouldn’t they prioritize completing the mission first? If splitting more groups to help the villagers while their mission wasn’t yet complete, it might make them seem kind and selfless, but in fact, she was making everyone else suffer the consequences too!

"Oh, what a kind-hearted young lady. Cough, cough, we villagers are very grateful for your assistance from so far away. However, we have lost the key strength of our village. No matter how reluctant we are...Cough, cough. Cough, cough." An elderly voice interrupted from behind, causing everyone to stop talking.

It was the village chief, who was quite old and walked in slowly. Beside him was a strong, muscular young man with sharp, serious eyes. His commanding presence surprised many of the students.

"Father, I told you your health is poor. I can welcome these students myself."

"Cough, cough, how could I do that? I am the village chief. Cough, cough, besides...you should rest more. Aren’t you tired after returning from the war? Now, you go, cough, cough, go rest." The old man pushed his son’s chest as he tried to support him. The sight of the father and son together was quite heartwarming.

That was, if it weren’t for the fleeting look of hatred in the young man’s eyes...

Ellie felt a familiar aura emanating from the young man. Especially when he paused upon seeing her and Nara. She couldn’t place it yet, but she was sure she would recognize that look eventually.

"Village chief, my name is Medik. I am the professor of these students, and we are here to help you with the problem of the recurring rockslides," said Professor Medik politely. The old man acted normal at first, but when he saw the beautiful young woman speaking with a man’s voice, his eyes widened, and he even stepped back two paces.

“Oh, and another thing you should know...I am a man,” Medik frowned, encountering this situation yet again. It wasn’t just the old man who was surprised; even the young man claiming to be his son was taken aback.

Who would have thought that such a beautiful face belonged to a man...?

“U-Uh, I apologize for my rudeness, Professor Medik. Cough, cough, m-my eyesight is failing, so I couldn’t see clearly. Please don’t hold it against an old man.”

“Understood,” Medik nodded. He wasn’t bothered, as this had become a normal occurrence for him.

“Do you already have a place to stay?”.

“We will set up tents around here,” Medik pointed around, and the village chief nodded in approval. They didn’t have the money to build accommodation for so many noble children, so it was a relief that they could manage on their own.

“T-Then, when do you plan to start helping us, sir? Could it be tomorrow? Cough, cough, we have a large rock blocking the wind from the southwest and south. So, these past few days... cough, cough, we’ve been living in such a dry state, it feels unbearably hot every day. Our dried goods are becoming musty. It would be best if that rock were removed quickly. Cough, cough, cough,”

The old man explained the urgent problem they were facing. Professor Medik raised his eyebrows slightly. He intended not to interfere with the students’ decisions. Also, they had already divided the tasks among themselves. If they wanted to change anything, they should decide on their own. Medik believed that one should face the consequences of their own decisions. Letting others decide for them would only lead to blame-shifting and a lack of accountability.

Medik was someone who accepted the outcomes of his choices. It was why he now worked hard as a professor for the kingdom, even though he complained about the exhaustion. It was a path he had chosen himself.

Seeing that Professor Medik neither accepted nor refused, the students understood that they had to make the decision themselves. Some didn’t like this method, from when he said they could gather at any time, it seemed like he had no concern for their fate at all. But others appreciated his teaching style.

“Village chief, we plan to address the root cause first. So, on the first day, we will set up the stratagems, which requires a lot of people for protection during the task. We will certainly help with the large rock blocking the wind, but we need to prioritize the tasks to follow the planned schedule.”

“Or if we have enough time after setting up 1 stratagem, we will handle the rock then. Do you agree?” Aria calmly discussed the matter with the village chief. However, the old man seemed not to understand and showed slight displeasure. But given the noble status of the students, he could only mumble his response.

“Is that so? What kind of stratagems will you be setting up? Cough, cough, why can’t you do that later? Cough, cough, I thought you were here to help remove these large rocks since our village’s young men died in battle. Cough, cough, I was hoping for this assistance, but now, cough, cough, do we have to wait...cough, cough, longer?”

When the old man asked this, Aria’s eyebrow twitched involuntarily. Ellie took a deep breath, no longer surprised why they hadn’t installed a stratagem or found a better way to prevent rocks from falling and causing problems every year.

It seemed that someone lacked the knowledge and understanding that solving a problem effectively means addressing its root cause. Surely, Ellie understood people like this; she had encountered similar thinking while working at her company. Some people preferred to clean up messes rather than solving the root cause of the problems. Her acquaintance didn’t think of preventing issues from occurring in the first place, although it had repeatedly damaged the company.

Those people didn’t ignore preventive measures out of ignorance. Ellie had asked them before and received a laughable response in return. The mindset of her former coworkers was somewhat different from that of the village chief. Her coworkers had told her, “If we solve the root cause, why would our employer keep us around? So let the problem persist; we’ll have job security, and...we won’t have to stress over finding new solutions. It’s easier to solve the same old problem repeatedly than to tackle new ones.”

Ellie remembered feeling exasperated by that answer. However, the village chief’s mindset wasn’t quite the same. His thinking was only shallow; he saw the recurring issues as natural occurrences. Therefore, he believed in leaving things as they were and simply adapting to them.

This kind of thinking comes from someone who has never seen the broader world, never witnessed humans digging tunnels to store water and prevent floods, or countries reclaiming land with waste to expand their territory. In her era...humans not only learned to live with nature but also learned to make nature their home, their ally, and using its resources more effectively...

Still, she wasn’t saying the old man was wrong. He was merely accustomed to thinking this way. However, the real problem lay with the troublesome student accompanying them, not the old man.

“I agree with the village chief. I don’t understand why everyone places so much importance on setting up stratagems. We only have 10 to set up, right? We’re divided into 2 groups, so it should only take 5 days to complete. Meanwhile, why not help the villagers first?” Nara spoke up, clearly siding with the village chief, who smiled happily.

“This young lady truly understands us. Cough, cough, since we’ve been dealing with these problems for so long, we desire quicker assistance. Cough, cough, I hope this request doesn’t inconvenience you all, cough, cough,” the old man seized the opportunity to speak further.

“Setting up stratagems isn’t as easy as you think. Besides, the stratagems need to be installed on high cliffs, requiring us to find paths around. We don’t know what dangers we might encounter. If it takes as little time as you say, you’ll just have to wait another 5 days, won’t you? Think of it as if we haven’t arrived yet.”

“That’s right, our mission is to complete the stratagem installation,” all the students agreed with Aria. However, Nara was not willing to let the matter go.

She didn’t care how complicated setting up the stratagems might be because it was Ellie and the others’ job. She didn’t want everyone to keep focusing on Ellie like this. Therefore, pulling everyone to work with her was more important.

Of course, Nara was confident that, in the end, everyone would help set up the stratagems anyway. There were many of them, and they were all skilled, right? There was nothing to worry about.

“Everyone, please don’t be selfish. Consider this as my plea. Please, seriously help the villagers,” Nara suddenly stood up and knelt, seemingly out of nowhere.

Her actions shocked the village chief and the villagers who were secretly watching. However, this display only put the villagers’ hearts in the girl’s hands.

“You!!” Aria watched everyone’s reactions and understood. It seemed that if they continued to be stubborn, only the villagers’ dissatisfaction would be shown.

“May we also beg of you?”

“Ladies and gentlemen, please help destroy the rocks for us.”

“Everyone, please help.” Following Nara’s example, the surrounding villagers, including the village chief, immediately knelt together. This left the students standing there in stunned silence.