-What...What did you do ! Why am I sleeping here !

Scar freaked out immediately throwing a tantrum in the morning as she shouted out at me her face crimson red,covering herself into a blanket even though she wasn't even nude to begin with.

It was day already,the sun was out and the birds were chirping it was pretty breezy outside.

(Crackle)

The fire crackled and made small whistles as I poked it with a stick to keep it going properly.

-I carried you there because it looked like you were cold,don't worry I didn't do anything weird to you,your clothes are still on aren't they?

I asked eating a piece of dry meat to keep myself full for a bit,scar also didn't waste a second and immediately checked whether or not I was telling the truth,but in all reality it actually didn't really matter if she had clothes on or not...not that I gonna tell her of course.

From a small distance I could hear scar sighing out of relief she seemed to have calmed down moderately and only glared at me for a bit until she realized that she was hungry herself and slowly walked beside me to get some of the food.

The place she sat at was oddly distanced from me,glancing at her I could see a complicated light in her eyes she had never looked away from me this whole time as if watching me to do something strange to her or even daring me to...it was sort of funny I gotta admit.

-How long would it take for us to reach the capital ?

I asked changing the topic entirely,I felt that discussing this now with her being like this wouldn't work her guard was just too high to cross so instead I wanted to talk business.

Scar also stopped her glaring for a moment and turned mellow for a second,she seemed to have a small idea of what I was doing,but she didn't say anything against it and simply replied.

-We traveled a pretty long way...I guess that it would take another half day to arrive at the capital enough time for you to register to the tournament...

-I see...thats good...

I replied taking another bite from my dry meat as I continued to eat under scar's surveillance,it wasn't very tasty really and meat wasn't my favorite kind of food,at the end I couldn't make myself swallow the rest of the meat so I fed it to the giant lizard who took it with cheerful grace from me eating it in a single bite.

-Wahahah..

Just as I threw the small piece of meat towards the lizard,scar suddenly started to laugh at me faintly,her laughter was confusing me since I couldn't understand the reason behind it and after a few seconds she also noticed how odd she looked and shut her mouth getting embarrassed by her sudden laughter.

-Your,pretty childish instead of throwing the piece of meat away you could have just pocketed it,food is precious don't you know ? Even though we don't lack any right now it is always smart to keep it instead of throwing it away...

She said it almost seemed as if she took pride in lecturing me about the importance of food,I could only smile wryly at her,Out of all people in this world I looked at myself as the one person who valued food the most,I had experienced countless times the feeling of starvation when both me and stella were in a single room I would always give the majority of my food to her secretly so she wouldn't be malnourished its also a reason why I am this skinny really,I still had a habit of keeping every single crumb of food with me and I am still doing it since its beneficial to me with me time ability which allows me to rewind items meaning that I could always get a identical dried piece of meat or even a fresh piece of meat if I rewind it even further.

-Are you speaking from personal experience ?

I asked,my question didn't seem to have gone pretty well since she frowned at me not really angry or anything,but rather remorseful as if she just remembered something.

-Maybe...(Sigh) anyways lets leave already we don't have much time and I don't want you to miss the date and not get paid because of it

I nodded,quickly standing up from my seat and kicking the sand into the fire extinguishing it on the spot,scar also moved pretty fast and reassembled the tent stowing it back into the backpack,while doing this she would sometimes glance at me from behind her eyes always showing that complicated feeling in them as if she was trying to judge me or something,at times I would look back at her to meet her gaze by that point scar would always turn red all over again and swiftly look away and act as if she didn't even stare at me.

In my mind scar was already my friend,the friendship we shared was very weird from the other ones I had experience so far,she seemed awfully distanced from me no she was trying to be distanced,but she wasn't able to make the distance with me and it seemed like she herself also acknowledged this strange friendship which made me happy.

-We should move a bit slower today if we aren't careful the stormrunner could trip or step onto a trap,what the grandmaster in the city said is true bandits and magical beasts are numerous inside the forest even though caravans don't seem to travel here often we still should be careful

Scar suggested looking at me as she finished setting up the saddle to the giant lizard,I didn't comment or ask anything and just smiled at her nodding my head,my smile seemed to have momentarily entranced her as she stood still for a moment staring at me,but quickly snapping back as she mumbled something under her breath scolding herself,it was incredibly quiet a normal person wouldn't hear her words,but I wasn't a normal person.

-Don't stare at him...don't stare at him nothing good will come to this if you continue staring at him...just bring him to the place he wants to go and give him directions after that we will get paid and we never see each other again...

After chanting that for a bit she finally got back to herself and met face to face with me,her demeanor had obviously changed after the small motivation speech she didn't quiver or blush when meeting me,but it also only served to make me smile even more because of the cute way she was doing it,being a bit considered I didn't show her my smiling face and quickly mounted the lizard with her as we started to once again move towards the capital.

The speed in which we traveled was already pretty fast,but comparing this to a car was like comparing a snail to a rocket the bumpiness of the creature was also uncomfortable as it shook numerous times making my calves hurt somewhat,I also couldn't help,but hug onto scar the whole way I wasn't touching her anywhere immoral though and only hugged her stomach which already seemed very uncomfortable towards scar.

The path we were on was straight it wasn't paved,but it looked very straight and stamped indicating that it was actually used very much,the trees surrounded us everywhere,I could sometimes even spot some wild creatures at the back or inside the forest looking our way,their eyes only ever met us for a few seconds until they looked away,with the current speed we were traveling in they couldn't possibly catch up to us which is why they gave up immediately in the eyes of the creatures in this forest we may be a pretty easy snack for them only now did I realize how many there were making me also thankful that scar had bought that repellent herb to scare off the beasts,if anything comes to shove though I could always kill them without a problem so I wasn't worried either way.

As we continued to move I also noticed another strange thing...the trees,the trees we were passing by some of them had cuts on their barks it wasn't just a single tree,but numerous others every 20 trees we past actually it made me sort of confused,but soon enough something else happened my senses acted up at the time as I sensed another being right in front of us after a minute scar also seemed to have noticed.

-There...there is a woman laying on the ground !

She said,her words seemed a bit alarmed for some reason,I also got curious and quickly moved my head to the side to see what was going on...looking to the path in front of us I saw the woman scar talked about and sure enough she was laying on the ground looking as if she was unconscious she had a few scratches here and there and was bandaged too heavily looking very hurt,this wasn't all either a broken caravan was present too blocking the path too...my eyes constricted for a few seconds...this was suspicious.

Either way we had no other choice but to stop for a moment we needed to move the broken caraven so we could continue our path going around it wasn't a option since the trees were snuggled tightly in place the lizard couldn't possibly squeeze through the trees nor could it jump over the caravan so we needed to remove it first to move on.

This whole situation seemed incredibly suspicious to me,but I held it in for now and simply observed,scar also didn't waist a minute and jumped off the lizard the moment we stopped running towards the what seemed to be injured woman...I followed closely after keeping my senses high and my eyes sharp,even I wanted to know what happened here.

-Hey !...you come on are you awake say something !

Scar spoke lightly shaking the woman in her hands as she tried to wake her up,looking at her expression I could see that she seemed to be incredibly worried or rather frantic about something...it surprised me really since I didn't think she would really care about a stranger,but at the same time I predicted as much since she is indeed a good person at heart who is forced to do bad things...I had countless thoughts of simply asking her why she became like this,but each time I concluded that she wouldn't tell me no matter what this incident also seemed to have stirred her up emotionally meaning that she was somehow relating to this victim.

-Ughh...who ? Mom ? Is that you ?

The woman finally spoke her voice sounded weak,looking at her I also started reading her heart rate...strangely enough it was very calm for some reason and when she opened her eyes I could see a hidden cloudy side that was resurfacing there was small amount of joy in those eyes and that hoy didn't seem to be related to the fact that she found rather that she had someone who found her...well I could always be mistaken right...

Still though I kept my eyes sharp listening to the woman that scar was taking care of.

-No,lady I am sorry I am not your mother,I am a traveler that found you can you tell me what happened around here ? Did you get attacked by a beast ? Bandits ?

Scar quickly asked trying to find an answer out of the girl...looking at her bandages I could smell the distinctive oder of blood,the amount was not low either,but the state it was in was pretty dry she had been here for a while now...

I deduced looking at the broken down caravan analyzing it while scar questioned her.

-Yes...yes beasts they attacked me and my friends...I don't know what happened next we were traveling back to our village and suddenly beasts attacked...I...I survived for some reason and fixed myself,but...(Hic)...my friends they were nowhere to be seen again when I woke up previously...

The woman started crying,I avoided looking at her since I already had made a lot of woman cry the past few days I didn't want to make it even more and instead tried to make sense of what she was saying...

The sides of the caravans sure had a lot of blood on them,the smell was different the detail was fine as I figured out that there were another 4 people here it seemed...the caravan itself was damaged clawed and smashed apart from the side the wheel crushed into bits it almost seemed very believable,but at the same time I knew.

This woman here she was lying.

This whole thing here is staged...

The ground we were currently in showed that it was only recently been stepped on,the footprints were many and normally you wouldn't be able to discern such a fact,just by looking,but my eyes were different I could judge of how deep the steps were and how fresh they were to see how much time had past from the last one.

On top of that the woman herself seemed to be very suspicious herself,her heart rate was abnormally calm and her wounds just didn't seem very right to me the blood on her bandages were also very mixed it had the blood of another 2 different people on it which couldn't be found on the caravan itself...making the possibility of the beasts dragging the corpses away impossible since the chances of her surviving was slim if this was really the case.

But then again what was she planning ? I couldn't feel any other people around other then us here...

The thought only lingered for a few seconds until the woman revealed her intentions to us directly...at least for me.

-Can...can you please take me to my village ? I..I beg you kind travelers I don't think I can make it and it won't be far I promise I will also reward you handsomely my father is the current village chief after all !

I looked at the woman...my eyes ice cold,she was intending on luring us towards somewhere...maybe a quiet place to kill us without anyone noticing...I was already considering to simply go forward and expose her lies and then move on again with scar,but there again arose another problem.

-Of course ! We'll help you it won't be a bother just hang tight alright?

Scar said her voice full of believe and worry...

====================================================

I edit and write other stories !

https://kakemonoko.wordpress.com/