Chapter 5: Departure / Chance Encounter (Part 1)
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Translator: SFBaka
When I woke up at dawn, I immediately started grilling the rest of the meat. After I finished grilling them, I tore the herbs over them and wrapped them up with the leafy vegetables. I then put the finished pieces inside the makeshift food container made of leaves. With this, my meat-wrap packed meal was complete.
The backpack contains the pouch with the processor modules, my military uniform, and work overalls, the remaining food rations, 3 pet bottles filled with drinking water and the rare material tablet case.
I heaved the backpack onto my back, carried the blankets under each arm, put the laser gun inside a pocket holster and slung the rifle over my shoulder.
Sporting full equipment, I walked away from the lakeshore area and headed towards the river.
(Please highlight them whenever we approach some patches of mock-potatoes.)
This will be useful for quickly discovering mock-potatoes growing along the area since they’d be automatically highlighted in red.
I managed to find some almost right away. I pulled them out and put them inside my backpack’s side pocket. The pockets quickly became full of mock-potatoes, so I stopped gathering them. There’s a long journey ahead, so I can’t spend too much time doing this.
I was able to reach the large river within two hours. I was afraid of bathing in the river tributary near the large lake due to that unknown creature, so let’s look for a place where the water level isn’t so deep.
After about 30 minutes of walking along the riverside, I finally managed to find a spot with a nice, clear view of the surroundings and water depth which felt just right.
The water was deep enough to immerse myself in, but the riverbed still remained fairly visible and there seemed to be no unknown organisms lurking within. I still maintained a level of alertness, but seeing that there were no obvious threats, I finally managed to take a quick bath.
Uh~ya! That’s cold! But I got excited from the joy of being able to thoroughly wash my body after three days. Let’s wash the uniform too while we’re at it.
It was unfortunate that I didn’t have any body soap or shampoo with me, but it was still rather refreshing.
Fu~u, that was great. I put away my freshly washed work clothes after squeezing them dry and pulled out a spare one from my backpack. It was a little wrinkled, but it can’t be helped.
I started walking once more after refilling the pet bottles with water.
Then, after walking along the river for about an hour, I heard a faint gushing sound. I rushed towards the direction of the sound in slight disbelief but really did manage to see a waterfall in the distance. It seemed to have an elevation of more than 30 meters.
I’ve only ever seen waterfalls on the holobit before, so I was quite psyched to see one in person.
But this was a bit troublesome. I didn’t have a way to reach it since there were no available paths leading towards it. After searching for a while, I managed to find something resembling an animal trail.
The trail continued away from the river, but I have no other choice. There’s no time to carve out another route from scratch, and it seemed to be fine since the path was leading downstream.
I’ve already walked for several hours, so I’ve become quite hungry. I decided to eat my lunch.
Mm. The meat-wraps were delicious even when cold! It’s just around noon huh.
After establishing the length of individual days on this planet, it became possible to indicate the current time on a small virtual window display.
After finishing my lunch, I started traveling once more. And just as I thought about finding a good place to sleep while it was still bright outside, I suddenly found myself arriving near an open clearing.
It continued along towards the distance. I thought it somehow felt like it was purposely cleared out, and when I got a closer look, my suspicion was confirmed.
It was an authentic road!
There were traces of wheel tracks running through it. It was a road made by carving out the side of a mountain and seemed to be five meters wide.
I brandished my rifle and scanned the immediate area.
There seem to be no problems for the time being.
But this was really a surprise. Did those green-colored creatures make this? No, they’re definitely not intelligent enough to make something of this scale.
When I looked closer, I found some indents resembling hoofprints of domesticated horses used for transport along with the wheel tracks. Were there actually horses on this planet? Anyway, it was certainly a hoofed creature.
Was this something like a carriage that appears in stories? There were a lot of hoofprints scattered all over. Maybe it was a carriage pulled by multiple horses or something?
The hoofprints were facing forward relative to my location, so the carriage most likely moved from the direction to my right towards my left. The wheel tracks were pretty deep, so it seemed to be quite a large carriage.
I’ll try chasing after it. This is the first clue I’ve obtained about possible intelligent life. Such a chance may not present itself easily next time.
The tracks look relatively new. They should have been made about two days prior at most. Alright, time to get serious!
(Long Distance Sprint Mode)
[Acknowledged.]
I then started running after the carriage.
Humans breathe in oxygen and discharge carbon dioxide from their bodies.
Under the Long Distance Sprint Mode, the nanoms reinforce the lung cells in order to maximize the efficiency of this bodily process and also enhance the maximum oxygen intake capacity of one’s blood. In other words, it would allow you to run without feeling much fatigue.
This makes it possible to continue running at considerable speed for a long time, but it can’t be used often because it puts too much strain on the body.
I’ve been running for quite a while now. I should’ve passed more than a hundred kilometers already. I’ve kept the same speed since I started running but I still haven’t managed to catch up.
It’s almost evening so it might be time to give up on pursuing them for today. But at this point, my enhanced hearing managed to pick up sounds of fighting in the distance. The road bent and twisted around the side of the mountain, so I haven’t been able to see anything yet.
I stopped running and cautiously approached.
I managed to confirm the source of the sound after moving across the road which heavily bent to the left. It was about a hundred and fifty meters ahead.
The carriage had fallen over, and two humanoids were being assaulted by over fifteen creatures resembling really large wolves.
I quickly zoomed in on them.
“Those are—!!”
What appeared before me were lifeforms who looked no different from your average human. It was a man and a woman; each wielding swords. They were fighting while covering each other with the carriage to their backs.
A number of people and horses were lying prone on the ground all around them.
“Damn!”
The moment I tried to brandish my rifle, two of the wolves simultaneously attacked the pair.
(I’m gonna save them. I’ll leave the aiming to you.)
[Acknowledged.]
Nanom promptly replied.
Already expecting their quick response, I immediately began pulling the trigger.
Pulse laser shots burst forth from the pulse rifle. The shots scattered in order not to hit the humans. All the wolves were downed instantly. However, the two humans were already on the verge of collapsing.
Dammit! I started running toward them with my nanom reinforced legs.
I saw how bad they’d had it when I closed in on them. There were ten people in total. Eight men and two women. Each of them was wearing things resembling medieval armor.
Apart from the two who fought until they fell down earlier, all the others had their throats badly mangled and were undoubtedly dead. I hurriedly went towards the two who have already fully collapsed.
The middle-aged man was still barely breathing, but his throat was also similarly mangled. A large amount of blood was spilling out from his wounds. It should be too late for him.
The young woman’s throat wasn’t bitten, but her left hand was ripped off from the elbow down and her right foot just above the ankle was also missing. She was bleeding profusely and had lost consciousness.
The man tried to lean on the carriage in order to support himself up. Then, our eyes met.
The man kept his gaze at me for a few seconds, turned it towards the woman and once again brought it back towards me.
When I nodded in acknowledgment of his implied request to take care of the young woman, he slowly closed his eyes and stopped breathing.
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