Draklim hoped that fear did not have a scent, for he would reek of it like a corpse smelled of death… The hand he was holding onto was cold like stone, and he couldn’t help but notice that whoever that… Person was grasping his hand strongly, not because they were afraid, they were clearly holding onto him with the intent of not letting go–Of not letting him go away.

  Many thoughts floated around in his head as he and the absolute stranger made their way out of the pit and back onto the trail. Everything was completely silent. Not too long ago, Draklim had been hearing the sound of the people in his group, but there was none of it now.

  This did not make sense. He had been at the front of the group. He should have heard them passing over the obstacle after he fell into the pit, but from the moment he had fallen and momentarily been disorientated, quietness had taken over the world.

  He breathed in and out to calm his heart and clear his mind. He didn’t know what the deal was about his companions, but the instructor had been clear that the ghosts inhabiting Louwoods were not directly dangerous. The only deaths that occurred in this forest were due to wild beasts and accidents.

  And being fairly confident that he was currently holding hands with a ghost, this should mean that he shouldn’t get hurt badly even if he angered it. With his limited knowledge about spirits, he assumed that as long as he played along, she wouldn’t get mad.

  “I know the way, just hold on, alright?”

  He made sure to take the lead lest the spectre decided to lead him into the wilderness away from the trail. Even if this ghost girl might not seem like a threat, it was best to exert caution, for all he knew, one wrong word and she might just decide to harm him, and if he got hurt in the middle of the woods, it wouldn’t be ideal in the least.

  “You are an… Aspiring knight… Right?”

  He could just hear the mask slipping as the spirit spoke, and moreover, the question was a strange one to ask.

  “Yes”

  He simply replied, and the ghost clenched her hand around his harder. It didn’t exactly hurt, but it was getting rather uncomfortable.

  “You are… In… Luck… Then”

  “How… How so?”

  Draklim had a bad feeling about this.

  “Our… Big… Sister… Is… Stronger… Than… A… Knight…”

  “You… Should… Ask… Her… For… Advice”

  The young trainee swallowed his saliva. First of all, she said ‘Our’, which made him realise that he was probably surrounded by several more ghosts hiding in the dark, and secondly, if that so-called ‘Big Sister’ was really stronger than a knight, he definitely did not want to get anywhere close to her!

  “Oh, really? I guess I’ll come back another day to ask her-”

  He emitted a low groan as the ghost squeezed his hand harder. She was stronger than he had imagined, and more importantly, she was fully intending on bringing him to her big sister regardless of whether he agreed to or not.

  Since diplomacy had failed him, the trainee did not hesitate any longer and unsheathed the simple iron sword he had been granted upon being accepted into the knight establishment, striking right at the ghost.

  Although using a sword against a spirit sounded silly, since she was holding onto him, it should mean that she was, at least currently, corporeal, and should thus be vulnerable to physical damage.

  At least, that made sense inside of Draklim’s mind, so he struck and… Hit only air.

  The hold on his hand vanished alongside any traces of the spectres, the sudden shift nearly caused his own swing to make him fall over, but he managed to stay standing, momentarily confused.

  He wasn’t certain what had just happened. Had she just popped out of existence, or had she just moved away, her movements covered by the darkness? He couldn’t tell at all, but it frankly didn’t matter right now. Draklim just took off running, ignoring the trail and instead running beside the obstacles.

  He hoped to run into some of the other trainees, but he heard nothing, seeing not even the faintest traces of movement in the dark. What he sometimes believed to be motion was merely the trees in the corner of his vision.

  This little expedition turned out to be a terrible idea. Something wasn’t right about Louwoods. It wasn’t like the instructors had claimed it was, or at least, it wasn’t the same at night.

  “Shit…”

  He cursed amidst panting, running by following the trail was safest, but it was much longer than simply running in a straight line… The trail took many turns, winding through the forest, but if he tried to go in a single direction, Draklim took the risk of getting lost entirely.

  The knight trainee took a break to catch his breath, but almost immediately, he heard something sprinting straight at him. The young man tensed up, ready to fight, but just as he did so, the sound of running stopped completely.

  A girl giggled at him in the distance, and just as he turned to face that noise, the sound of someone choking rang right in his left ear. He could almost feel the movements of lips right next to him.

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  He swung blindly, but once again, nothing was struck.

  The spectres were messing with him. In the distance, he saw the outline of what looked like a young woman, perfectly positioned for her silhouette to be visible thanks to nearby moonlight that fell right behind her.

  She didn’t say anything. The girl merely pointed at Draklim, or rather… She was pointing at something behind him.

  A soft melody began playing right behind his back.

  Never had Draklim experienced such a crushing, paralysing fear in his entire life. Terror gripped his whole being, scared to discover what it was that stood behind him, but despite it all, with a pulse of something within him, he spun around and lashed out with his sword.

  He doesn’t know if his attack hit, for he was struck in the head, sending him to the depths of unconsciousness…

  The darkness that clouded his mind only seemed to last a moment, but when his body jolted back into consciousness, Draklim, still believing himself to be in a fight, found himself blinded by light. After having peered through the dark for so long, illumination left him without sight for several long seconds, and even afterwards, dark spots drifted through his vision.

  Being in a sitting position, he tried to rise immediately, but he could not. His wrists were tightly tied to armrests, his ankles to the front feet of the chair he sat upon, and ropes even went right around his chest, wrapped around both him and the back of the chair.

  He was essentially stuck in place, especially since the chair he was forced to sit upon was seemingly bolted to the ground.

  Were Draklim a genuine knight, he would probably be able to break free through brute force, but that wasn’t an option for him, so he could only watch his surroundings, something he could have done from the start, but his mind had decided to ignore until now.

  The reason why was simple. Every single trainee who had followed him into the night was here, tied up to chairs in the same manner as him. Blood covered the heads of some of them, and he realised that his own was also bloodied from the strike he had received.

  Whatever had hit him had not been kind in the least, and it had to be powerful considering how instantaneous the knockout had been. The angle of the strike, and the area targeted by the strike… Landing such a hit with so little luminosity wasn’t easy.

  “A big sister, huh?”

  He muttered to himself, he guessed that he had run into the big sister the ghost had mentioned, who was apparently stronger than a knight.

  Someone grunted to his right.

  “Why… Why are we around a table?”

  The other trainee looked like he had been hit especially hard. In fact, it looked as though he had been struck several times in the face.

  “I don’t know, but what happened to you?”

  “A redheaded ghost beat the crap out of me… Even after joining a knight establishment, I am still getting hit by a tomboy… My life sucks”

  One by one, the trainees began to wake up. Everyone was dazed and confused, but no one was dead, which made Draklim sigh in relief. Now, they needed to figure out where they were.

  Lanterns hung from the ceiling, hanging from a wooden beam that went across the whole room, and in fact, such beams were to be seen everywhere, supporting the rocky ceiling above their heads.

  Indeed, despite the few pieces of furniture around and the pelts that served as carpets and wall decoration, this place was clearly somewhere underground or in a cave. Despite this, they were all breathing just fine, so clearly, air wasn’t a scarce resource wherever they had ended up.

  “Ah… I see–SEE that everyone is final–finally awake”

  A bizarre, feminine voice rang out, and soon, a tall creature appeared in the room.

  Dot-like eyes, a horribly oversized maw in the form of a beartrap, exaggeratedly large feet and hands, long limbs, and wearing garbs one would expect from either a shaman or druid, wearing an ensemble of animals together to form a large coat alongside a headwear bearing what looked like goat horns.

  “I am–am glad that you all–all–all accepted my courteous invitation to dinner”

  The monster walked in a strangely refined and expressive way, if not for the fact that it was seemingly a lump of steel whose every step seemed like it could crush skulls, it would, in fact, appear very much feminine.

  Even the way in which it sat down on the opposite end of the table from Draklim was full of noble-like refinement. Clearly, this wasn’t your run-of-the-mill wild monster. Not only could it talk, but it also had human-like mannerisms.

  “D-Dinner?”

  One of the trainees stuttered.

  “Yes, did you–you not hear me the first time?”

  Just as the creature said this, five more figures entered the room and took seats beside the shaman-looking monster.

  “N–Now that everyone is here…”

  The monster clapped its palms together, resulting in a loud clank as steel impacted steel, and translucent, featureless spirits entered the room carrying rudimentary trays that had seemingly been carved out of wood.

  The ghostly entities served food to everyone except for the five corpse-like girls, soon pulling the cloches up, bringing out a large amount of steam alongside the reveal that the food they were being served was the disembodied, cooked heads of goblins.

  “Don’t be–be S–H–Y and E–A–T to your heart–heart’s content”

  Saying this, the monster picked the goblin head up and threw it whole into its open maw, shutting its jaw shut powerfully, reducing the food to mush, and yet, a few moments later, the skull it had just devoured seemed entirely gone despite the creature showing no signs of further chewing or swallowing.

  Naturally, no one wanted to eat a goblin, and certainly not the head of all parts, but the trainees were all restrained, and they weren’t the ones in charge of feeding themselves. The spirits cut pieces of food and forcefully shoved them into their mouths, even grabbing their faces to force them to chew and swallow.

  “Wait, wait, wait! May I… May I ask what you desire to do with us after… After dinner, Milady?”

  Draklim spoke up, and the monster across the table tilted its head.

  “Dinner still”

  “Oh…”

  “But you are on the m–menu”

  The trainees all had chills course through their spines.

  Threatened with death, Draklim could only resort to the one thing he had hoped not to when he secretly joined the knight establishment…

  “My… My real name is Milkard Vomhargon! I am the first son of Lord Vomhargon, known to have produced several heroes throughout the history of Rootriska! Might you… Might you perhaps reconsider? I can certainly ensure that you get something of better taste! And besides, killing me would land you in hot water, so might I ask that you let me and my fellows go? We won’t intrude upon your territory at night anymore!”

  The monster tapped its lower jaw for a total of three seconds.

  “No”