"The brat's awake now, so get lost."
I was hesitating when the old woman spat those words out.
'I wanted to ask about magic, too.'
I had more questions and was just about to open my mouth, but I stopped when I saw her expression.
It wasn't a face that would entertain any further conversation.
If I said even one more word, there was no telling what she'd do to me.
With no other choice, I turned around and headed toward Bill and Baldik.
Baldik carefully hoisted Bill onto his back, and we dragged our heavy feet out of the hut.
Once we crossed the boundary and emerged outside, the first things that came into view were Aileen's and Sileon's faces.
Behind them, at least ten more people had surrounded the area, maintaining a tense watch.
When they confirmed it was us, their rigid expressions finally eased, and they let out sighs of relief.
"Bill!"
At that moment, someone came striding out from between the people.
It was none other than the innkeeper.
For a moment, the innkeeper couldn't say anything and simply stared at Bill's face.
Then, with reddened eyes, he bowed deeply to us.
"Thank you... truly. I don't know how I could ever repay you."
His voice was trembling, but it was filled with sincerity.
Baldik silently nodded and carefully handed the child over to him.
As I watched the innkeeper return to the village with Bill in his arms, I turned back to the group.
Aileen and Sileon came closer and gathered around us.
Aileen was the first to look at me and speak.
"I'm glad you're safe."
"Yeah. Nothing happened, right?"
"No. What happened inside?"
"Hmm, well... a few complicated things. I'll tell you separately later."
There was too much information to explain right away, and my head was a mess.
When I vaguely brushed it off, Sileon, standing beside us, picked up the conversation.
"Is Bill all right?"
"He's fine for now. I doubt he's completely healed, but at least for the moment."
Sileon let out a breath of relief and said,
"That's good. You two weren't coming out for so long, I was getting worried."
"You weren't thinking of running away on your own, were you?"
At Baldik's words, Sileon's shoulders flinched.
...At least this kid was consistent.
"You little—!"
"Ow!"
Baldik lightly flicked Sileon on the crown of his head, then turned his gaze to me.
"...What were you talking about for so long earlier?"
"I had some important questions."
Baldik sighed and shook his head.
"Impressive. No matter how I looked at her, I couldn't get used to that appearance."
...I couldn't deny that, either.
A hooked nose, rough skin, white hair sticking out in every direction, and a bent back.
She called herself a warlock, but to anyone else, she looked like the very image of a typical "witch."
Suddenly, I wondered whether this world had the word "witch."
So I quietly asked Baldik.
"...Why are you asking? You saw one just now."
He was clearly referring to Mallei, whom we'd just seen.
Then that settled it.
"But she said she wasn't a witch."
"...Did she? I'm not actually a priest, either."
"...Pardon? Somehow, I thought so..."
When I nodded as if that explained everything, Baldik flailed his hands and feet in panic.
"No, damn it. Bad example. What I mean is, even if I say I'm not, it's still true that I'm a priest. Same with that person. Anyone can see she's a witch."
I couldn't really refute that.
In the end, what mattered was how others saw it, no matter what you called it.
So... did that mean that woman was lying?
But was there any reason for her to bother lying?
"...There's no reason for her to do that."
Baldik snorted and said,
"Why wouldn't there be? If you just think about what happened fifteen hundred years ago, it's understandable she'd want to hide it."
"...Fifteen hundred years ago?"
Fifteen hundred years ago, out of nowhere.
What happened back then?
Aileen and Sileon, who had been quietly listening beside us, also seemed to know already.
"Haa, seriously. I've felt this since the dungeon, but you really don't know anything. Are all those Magic Tower bookworms like this?"
I'd just heard the same thing from the old woman moments ago, so it didn't affect me anymore.
I had no image left to tarnish anyway, and pride wasn't going to feed me.
In this world, I had nothing to begin with, so if I needed to ask, I had to ask.
I had to scrape together even one more shred of knowledge if I wanted to survive.
"To put it simply, around fifteen hundred years ago, there was a time when witch hunts were carried out."
Baldik lowered his gaze to the ground and continued.
"At first, it was simple. People in villages who used strange medicines or caused phenomena that couldn't be explained—that sort of person would come under suspicion. They were called heretics, accused of curses, things like that. Some were taken away, but back then, openly killing them was still rare."
"Then why did it spread that far?"
"Because one witch caused a very big incident."
His tone grew slightly heavy.
"Her exact name hasn't been passed down, but there was a rumor that she blew away an entire great city in the heart of the kingdom. It's hard to call it fact, but the records are too clear to dismiss it as legend. That city truly disappeared from the map, and after that, witch hunts spread across the entire kingdom."
"...She blew away a city?"
One person destroyed a city?
It wasn't a nuclear weapon. How was that even possible?
"Some say her mana went berserk, others say she made a pact with a demon... In any case, after that incident, the word 'witch' itself became a symbol of fear. Because of one madwoman's actions, hundreds of heads rolled."
"And after that?"
"The witch hunts spread. For a while, if anyone did even the slightest suspicious thing, it was straight to the stake. No interrogation, no trial. Even just using magic was enough."
They must have really gone overboard.
It was no different from the witch hunts I knew.
"...What about now?"
"Now the kingdom has officially banned it. Witch hunts, I mean. There were far too many innocent victims in the first place. These days, there's even a system for managing such people within the law."
Baldik turned his head and glanced toward the old woman as he added,
"So that person probably avoids the word 'witch' and calls herself a warlock or whatever because of all that. Even among people who use the same magic, if you're called a 'witch,' people still look at you through tinted glasses."
Was that so?
If there was that kind of background, I could understand it to some degree.
But... it didn't feel like she was hiding it for that reason.
What I felt from her was less fear and more plain annoyance.
...Was I imagining things?
"But how do you know so much?"
I knew this man had a fair amount of knowledge, but it was the first time I'd seen him talk at such length.
Baldik shrugged and answered in a tone slightly lower than usual.
"Because the ones who took the lead in witch hunts were originally religious folk like us."
"...Ah."
"Ah, of course. It has nothing to do with the god I believe in. Followers of Ulgran aren't that kind of people. We don't care about purification, heresy, or things like that."
He stopped speaking for a moment and glanced toward the hut.
There was wariness in his eyes, and also a hint of apology for some reason.
"...That's probably why that person didn't say anything to me. If I'd belonged to some other church, things might have turned out differently."
"That's fortunate."
If she'd suddenly lost it and a fight had broken out... I didn't even want to think about it.
"By the way, what was the name of the witch you mentioned earlier? If it was an event that famous, you'd think it would be recorded in history books or something."
"I don't know."
"...Pardon?"
Was this guy the same type as me?
"I really don't know. Because that name was erased even from religious records. Literally wiped from the records. They completely erased her existence."
As Baldik said that, he slowly shook his head.
"That's how major the incident was, and how deep-rooted the fear it left behind is. Even now, I doubt that name remains in any official documents. It might barely remain in old oral traditions, or in banned copies circulated like forbidden books."
"So almost no one knows it."
"Right. Maybe religious people like us or a few mages have heard of it in passing. To ordinary people, it's just a legend. Even the word 'witch' is mostly used in fairy tales now."
Did that mean I'd met someone who should only appear in fairy tales?
At the thought, the back of my neck prickled for no reason.
"Speaking of fairy tales, that reminds me of a story my mother used to tell me when I was young."
"There was a witch in that, too?"
"Yeah. A witch kidnapped a princess, and a hero rescued her... a very common story."
He tilted his head back for a moment as if lost in memory.
"What was the witch's name back then? Hmm... Benir? Vanilla? Something like that, I think."
When I heard that name, I frowned slightly.
...Benir?
It was strangely similar to the name of the old woman who had been drawing a magic circle in front of my eyes just moments ago.
Was that a coincidence?
"A witch?! You really saw a real witch?"
Sileon made a fuss, his eyes round.
"A witch..."
Aileen, on the other hand, quietly murmured the word as if chewing it over.
It was a moment that revealed both of their personalities perfectly.
While we were talking, I heard footsteps approaching from behind.
While we were chatting, I heard footsteps slowly approaching from the rear.
It was a leisurely gait, accompanied by a familiar way of speaking.
"Well now, in the end, you lot found him."
"Ah, Uncle Nas."
When I turned around, Uncle Nas was standing there with disheveled hair and loose-fitting armor.
As I gave a wry smile and raised a hand in greeting, Uncle Nas nodded as if this was all familiar to him.
"We ended up running around for nothing, but I'm glad you found him."
"Still, won't the inn buy everyone a mug of beer?"
"Haha! Of course it should. Right, everyone?"
At Uncle Nas's hearty laugh, the mercenaries standing behind him all burst into laughter at once.
Once the tension eased, everyone started chiming in.
"One mug? I could empty a whole barrel!"
"That Meni bastard was hiding some good liquor, wasn't he? This time, we'll make him open it for sure!"
Meni was the name of the village innkeeper.
"Anyway, where did you find him?"
"Ah, well..."
How was I supposed to explain this?
If I pointed at the empty air over there now and said, "He came out of there," they'd treat me like a lunatic.
Besides, I didn't particularly want to reveal that I was a mage.
In the end, I slightly avoided his gaze and made up something reasonable.
"We just... happened to find him in some nearby bushes. He was sleeping there."
"Really? That brat's got ridiculously good luck."
Fortunately, he didn't press further.
At times like this, it was much better to be vague than to give unnecessary details.
"We just wandered around and picked up some weird stones."
"Haha... Stones?"
...Stones?
"Yeah. Weird-looking stones. We picked up a few and gave them all to Monta back there. Said he was going to make a necklace or something."
"...Weird-looking... Could I possibly see them now?"
My heart sank.
Somehow, a truly bad feeling began creeping up on me.
"Oh? You collect stones too? Hey, Monta! Take out those things we picked up earlier!"
Uncle Nas turned around and shouted.
But there was no answer.
"...Huh? Why's that guy been so out of it? Is he sick or something?"
Uncle Nas's gaze moved to the very back of the formation.
When I followed his gaze, Monta was standing there with his shoulders drooping and his head hanging low.
He was so still that I couldn't even tell whether he was breathing.
"Hey, Monta! Are you sick?"
Another mercenary approached him, sounding worried.
And the moment he reached out his hand,
"Guuuuugh..."
A strange groan leaked out.
Monta, whose body had been trembling, suddenly raised his head.
His eyes were no longer human.
Blood-red pupils, burst capillaries, and black mucus flowing from the corners of his mouth.
"...Get back!"
The moment I shouted, Monta's body began twisting madly.
As if his bones and muscles were being rearranged from the inside, the horrible sound of joints snapping rang out.
"Urgh... Aaaaaaagh!!"
"Damn it, what the hell is that?!"
"Back! Everyone, back!!"
Someone shouted urgently.
But it was already too late.
"Aaargh!"
Crunch, crack.
Screaming, one of the mercenaries standing closest was caught by Monta's arm.
A grotesque mass that could no longer even be called an arm, a mixture of stone and flesh, seized him and slammed him into the ground in an instant.
Along with the sound of a metal helmet being crushed, came the sound of bones shattering.
Muscles swelling as if about to explode, twisted joints, black stone shards jutting out from his body.
That was no longer a human being.
Another monster infected by a demon stone was completing itself before our eyes.
"...Baldik, to the rear!"
"Damn it, what is that thing now?!"
I reflexively shouted to Baldik, and the air around us froze cold.
'So much for peaceful days.'
Water began to churn at my fingertips.