"I know a little," Tata said, holding the dagger in both hands as she offered it to him. "And, Mr. Knight, I was beside you when you were browsing the community."
Fang Heng was a little surprised. He took the dagger and honestly asked, "Then... can you understand our existence?"
"Yes. Though to most people, you are merely strange outsiders," Tata replied. "But your origins, what sort of existence you are in relation to this world, your organizations, and the relationships among yourselves—none of that is actually much of a secret here. This world probably understands you far more deeply than you imagine."
"Why do you say that?"
Tata shook her head. "I don't know either. It is only my own deduction. Because that is what knowledge and memory tell me, and my knowledge and memory come from the Great Silver Library. Every book there has an author. Do you understand?"
Fang Heng understood.
He had to admit that this was quite an impact. He realized that people might have underestimated this world's natives. The people here might be limited by their means and unable to travel to Earth, but that did not stop them from thinking and analyzing, from arriving at an answer infinitely close to the truth.
After all, truly wise people were never lacking anywhere.
He put the walker away, then looked again at the dagger in his hand. "...Trainees. How should I put this? In our world, not everyone has a chance to become a Chosen. Only a few lucky people are selected. They are often reserve Chosen cultivated by Major Guilds and the military for the future. They receive long-term knowledge and training related to Aethelria, which is why they are called trainees."
"Lucky people..."
Fang Heng nodded seriously.
The fairy girl flapped her wings, flew up, and sat on his left shoulder. "That sounds more like vocational apprentices."
"Yes, apprentices." Fang Heng led her toward the Dragon-feather Emu's corpse. He raised the dagger in his left hand and showed her the engraving on it. "See? This is a trainee dagger. The symbol on it was designed on Earth. It is something trainees must carry when entering Aethelria."
"So those people were trainees?"
"Maybe not all of them." Fang Heng stopped beside the Dragon-feather Emu's corpse and replied, "Major Guild trainees usually enter this world as tourists. They undergo a three-month internship here, but tourists have no ability to protect themselves, so they may have hired other adventurers as well."
As he spoke, he turned over the enormous corpse of the strange bird.
Though Aethelria was an information-state world, it was not truly a game. Naturally, absurd things like monsters dropping equipment did not exist. Of course, these magical creatures did possess some valuable materials.
The Dragon-feather Emu's most valuable parts were the glands and fluid sacs that secreted and stored combustible liquid. This liquid could be used to make Level IV Catalysts, explosives and igniters above Grade D, and auxiliary materials for Fire Core Crystals. Unfortunately, they had already been damaged.
A pungent chemical smell filled the air.
The next most valuable thing was its dragon-blooded scaly hide, one of the finest primary materials for leather armor below Tier 2. But it had to be peeled off intact and tanned promptly to have any value, and Fang Heng did not possess that skill.
In the end, Fang Heng only collected some hard feathers: seventeen intact tail feathers in total. He had no use for them himself, but he could sell them to Bow Makers. Dragon-feather Emus were relatively rare creatures, and fire-element hard feathers could still fetch a little money. Besides, even if they were worthless, given Fang Heng's current financial situation, he would not leave anything behind.
Only after watching him put the tail feathers into his pocket did Tata continue asking, "Then this dagger is important to them?"
"This dagger represents a trainee's identity. With it, they can receive whatever help other Chosen are capable of offering."
Fang Heng looked at the dagger. "It is fairly important, I suppose. If it was left here, they may have run into some trouble." He looked ahead again. "In any case, let's go up and take a look first."
The swamp had become extremely deep and secluded here. Tall reeds and cattails blocked the view in every direction, but tracking had instead become easier. Ahead lay a passage through a long swath of flattened grass.
It was obvious at a glance that someone had passed through here—
But strangely, there were many other traces around them, as though many things had chased after them through this place. There also seemed to be an unusual smell in the air. Fang Heng sniffed, then bent down, picked up a broken blade of grass, and smelled it. A more pungent scent lingered on it.
"The smell of sulfur," Tata answered before he could.
Fang Heng nodded. Humans certainly would not leave behind such a smell. He became a little more alert and continued forward. Man and fairy parted the mugwort and entered the depths of the swamp from that direction.
They had not gone far when two Red-brown Elephant-nose Beetles suddenly appeared ahead.
Fang Heng had to exert tremendous effort to kill the two beetles, each the size of a calf, before he understood the source of the sulfur smell. Red-brown Elephant-nose Beetles were typical fire-element creatures. They liked to live in underground caverns, keeping company with lava and sulfur.
"But why would these things appear in a place like this?" Fang Heng could not help finding it strange. He remembered that Red-brown Elephant-nose Beetles rarely left the underground, much less appeared near a water source.
They were naturally averse to water—
"The Dragon-feather Emu is also a fire-element creature, Mr. Knight," Tata reminded him.
"Yes, I was just wondering about that." He looked around in confusion. "Though Dragon-feather Emus do live in swamps, they generally prefer nesting on relatively dry high ground."
Before he had finished speaking, he heard a strange sound from ahead.
"Hm?" Fang Heng stopped and turned back to ask, "Tata, did you hear something?"
Tata shook her head.
But a moment later, a clearer angry shout came from the forest ahead. This time, both of them heard it clearly—it was the sound of fighting. Fang Heng and Tata exchanged a glance, then ran in that direction without another thought.
After only a few steps, he felt solid ground beneath his feet.
The forest became dry again in this direction. In the distance, there were geyser vents and streams of white mist. Only then did Fang Heng understand why so many fire-element creatures had appeared nearby. There were clearly abundant geothermal resources underground here.
But that still did not explain why the elephant-nose beetles had emerged onto the surface.
The sounds of battle were becoming increasingly distinct. Ahead was a lush thicket of fishbone trees. Fang Heng stepped forward, parted the branches, and finally saw the scene beyond the bushes.
Then he sucked in a sharp breath—
"Did these people poke an elephant-nose beetle nest?"
The thought instinctively arose in his mind. Before him was a forest clearing, where seventeen or eighteen Red-brown Elephant-nose Beetles, as though rioting, were besieging five adventurers in the center.
There happened to be a pile of massive boulders there. Though the adventurers had taken the high ground on the rocks, the difference in numbers was too great, and their situation was already perilous.
Not to mention that three of the five adventurers were trainees with no combat ability.
Fang Heng recognized the identities of those three trainees at once—their bodies bore no conspicuous Battle Gear, they wore no armor, and they carried no Magic Furnaces. They were clearly typical tourists.
All three trainees were young: two boys and a girl. The oldest boy might have been even younger than Fang Heng, around sixteen. He had an East Asian face and stood cautiously at the very front, shielding everyone else.
The other boy was extremely thin, also with black hair. His hair was soft and nearly hung limp over his head. He wore a pair of round-rimmed glasses, large and clumsy, with lenses as thick as bottle bottoms. They covered a third of his face, leaving only his pointed little face visible below.
With red lips, white teeth, and delicate brows, he looked almost like a girl. But he was indeed wearing a man's dark brown velvet robe, the hem hanging all the way to the ground and looking almost a size too large. He should have been the youngest of the three, perhaps not even fourteen. He clutched a large book tightly in both hands and was protected at the very back by the other two.
Seeing this, Fang Heng could not help feeling favorably toward the three trainees. In his eyes, people who knew to step forward and protect their companions could not have terribly bad hearts.
As for the last girl—the only one of the three without an East Asian face—she had neat, light golden hair cut to her ears, two pretty earrings, and tiny freckles scattered over the bridge of her nose. Her round face was not exceptionally beautiful, but overall she gave off a friendly, adorable impression, brimming with a young girl's vitality.
The ones fighting desperately before the three trainees were probably the adventurers they had hired.
There were only two of them.
One was a wheat-skinned elven girl, at most seventeen or eighteen years old, dressed like a hunter with a short bow on her back—but she was not using it. Instead, she held a long spear in both hands, lowering her body like a poised female panther.
The elven girl had an extraordinarily beautiful pair of pale green eyes. They were incredibly lively in their depths, as though she could always catch the enemy's exact movements at the final moment and strike at just the right time, sending a charging elephant-nose beetle flying with a thrust of her spear.
Her movements were both cautious and perfect. Her body was supple, allowing her to maximize the strength of her waist and abdomen. She was like a straightened whip, sometimes making Fang Heng feel as though she would snap her slender waist in two.
Yet in the blink of an eye, danger turned to safety. She nimbly shifted backward, dodging an elephant-nose beetle's burst of flame. Between motion and stillness, she displayed the beauty of strength and agility to the fullest.
The girl's level was not high, perhaps not even Tier 2, around level seven or eight. But her combat experience was far richer than that of any Chosen Fang Heng had seen at this level.
They were simply incomparable—
So much so that only three words came to Fang Heng's mind to describe the huntress's brilliant fighting.
Predator.
Yes, in the eyes of others, the elven girl was practically a true jungle predator.
As for the other person, he looked rather comical. He was a Paparal, a type of halfling. Unlike the wandering-loving tall halflings, the Paparal had their own settlements and culture—they were a rather likable race, mainly because of their optimistic, cheerful, yet somewhat earnest nature. Of course, it was also because of their appearance.
A typical Paparal should be like this.
They ate seven meals a day: breakfast, snacks and tea after a morning walk, a proper meal, afternoon tea, dinner, nighttime gatherings, and bedtime snacks.
Yes, the Paparal loved life, but they loved good food, parties, and music even more. A Paparal could not live without music.
Their homeland, Sangshak, was the most festive, song-filled, and dance-filled place in all of the Giant Tree Hills. Paparal law decreed that out of more than three hundred days in a year, one-third were festival celebrations. They loved work too, of course, but when a festival came, they put down whatever they were doing, donned their finest formal wear, and attended all kinds of banquets.
Naturally, this formal attire had to include at least one respectable hat.
A Paparal without a hat was incomplete.
They had large pointed ears, cute round faces with a hint of baby fat, smiling eyes, and tiny noses that were nearly invisible. Even the taller ones were less than half Fang Heng's height, needing to stand on tiptoe just to reach an ordinary person's waist. But Paparal did not like others mocking their shortness—rumor had it that this was one reason they liked wearing tall top hats.
They were gentle children who disliked war and adventure. They were also afraid of the cold—very afraid of the cold, and extremely afraid of the cold. Fang Heng had not expected to see a Paparal in a place like this. It was said that they never appeared anywhere that received snow in winter.
But upon closer inspection, he realized that this one was a Chosen.
The reason was simple.
He was not wearing a proper hat at all. Instead, he had a pair of goggles clipped over his pale silver hair. For a Paparal, that was more than merely improper—it was downright heretical.
His plump little hands held a heavy crossbow nearly as tall as he was. He struggled to drag it onto the top of a rock. Facing the steadily advancing beetles, he continuously cranked the handle, drew the bowstring, squinted one eye to aim, and fired from both sides—but there was not a trace of killing intent about him. Instead, he looked utterly endearing and foolish.
Fang Heng truly could not understand what sort of mindset would lead someone to choose a Paparal as a Combat Profession. Their arms were so short they could not even reach the tops of their own heads, and they only had four fat, stubby fingers.
But that fellow clearly had his own ideas.
He retreated and fired continuously, until his little leather boots finally stepped onto the edge of the boulder.
"Jump," Fang Heng reminded him inwardly. Another huge rock lay not far behind the Paparal. He could have jumped onto it and continued shooting.
But the fellow actually stepped into empty air, flipped backward, let go of his crossbow, and fell separately from it in a double tumble.
He crashed solidly from the two-meter-high rock, landing spread-eagled and immediately losing consciousness—of course, a two-meter-high rock might not have been much to an ordinary person, but for a Paparal, it was perhaps a little too high.
"Parker!" Fang Heng heard the elven huntress cry out anxiously.
So this guy was called Parker, Fang Heng thought. He was about to command his walker to rush over and save him when Miss Tata suddenly flew up, grabbed a fistful of his hair, and yanked him backward.
"Walker, gooooo—"
Fang Heng cried out in pain and lurched sideways, causing the walker to charge forward and slam headfirst into a tree stump.
"T-Tata?"
Fang Heng raised his head, about to ask what had happened, but with his head tilted, he happened to see the other side of the battlefield. Several white feathers were swaying there—there were actually people hiding beneath them.
The moment Fang Heng saw them, anger surged within him.
Jefflitte Redcoats—
What a narrow road for enemies to meet.
Several friends came over yesterday, and we played too late into the night. My sins, my sins. I'll definitely turn in earlier tomorrow.
Also, I forgot: for now, use this group for the new book: 116533817. I occasionally post images related to the work there, including maps and setting art, as well as other material that cannot be posted in the work-related section.
Before you continue