"Master Gen, Aria, slow down. You guys are too fast!" A petite girl holding a blue staff tried to catch up with her friends. She drew her breath hard because she had been running for too long.
She wasn't exactly like her nimble friend, Aria the elf. Nor was she a fighter with great endurance like Gen. And she was still an apprentice mage from a small village, trying to learn how to be a supreme magus in the future. But she had no money or extreme talent to be admitted to the Mage Tower, the magic academy. So she learned everything independently through scrolls and books she found or bought.
But her meeting with Gen Toshifumi, who saved her life from a monster invasion in her village, made her determined to follow his journey as he was doing a mission to find the remnant of Endless Entity.
There was a prophecy that Endless Entity, the Devourer of Existence from centuries ago, had awakened once more to feast on humans. And Gen Toshifumi was their only hope, transmigrated from another world called Japan with a strange device, like a gauntlet in his hand. The gauntlet could speak and called himself Dragun.
Gen and Aria stopped their track from helping their friends, "Mia, why don't you just use some magic of yours to run faster?" Aria asked.
"I don't have that kind of magic yet!" Mia complained. She was an apprentice mage. She could do basic fire magic and healing magic at best.
Aria sighed. She glanced at Gen and said, "Gen, why don't you carry Mia with you?"
"Okay," Gen nodded.
"H—How could I let Master Gen to—"
"We can't wait any longer. There is a sign of a demon spawn near the Tiaji Forest. You know the demons and other monsters became more erratic after the devourer of existence had been awakened," Gen said.
"B—But…" Mia was embarrassed to be carried by Master Gen. Truthfully, she had a crush on Master Gen since the first time they met, but she knew her limit and wanted to support Master Gen in silence.
"Come on, we don't have much time," Dragun, the gauntlet on Gen's hand, finally spoke. Aria sighed helplessly and patted Mia's back.
"Come on, I know you like Gen. Take this as a chance of getting piggyback from him," Aria said.
"A—Aria!" Mia blushed, but in the end, she hopped on Gen's back, and they rushed to the Tiaji Forest. They were already close to their destination after almost two days.
"Master Gen, we've been killing monsters for almost a month now. We traveled from one land to another. Will we be doing this forever?" Mia asked Gen.
Gen's eyes were still focused on the path. At the same time, he answered Mia that he carried on his back, "Dragun told me that Endless Entity has spawned somewhere, but we're unable to detect him because his power hasn't fully returned yet. The best we can do right now is to kill all demon spawn around the continent, those with shining bramble engraving or eye engraving in their body. They had been brainwashed by that evil."
Mia stared at Master Gen's face from the side. She rested her chin on Master Gen's shoulder. 'As I expected, Master Gen is a serious man with a good heart.'
'I don't know where we will go or whether we will stay like this forever. But… I'm so happy that Master Gen has accepted me. As long as I can stay and support him, then I'm happy,' Mia said in her heart.
They finally reached the entrance of Tiaji Forest in the evening. Tiaji Forest was located far in the east and was the forest for some creatures like the goblins and the orcs.
It was also a place for some beastmen tribe.
The entrance had dome-shaped woods interlinked after two giant trees acting as the gate had fallen long ago and their roots intertwined, turning into a gate for anyone to enter.
Gen put Mia down and then asked his system, "Dragun, did you sense any monster that had turned hostile because of Endless Entity around here?"
Dragun hummed for a moment with his deep and heavy voice, then he replied, "I can sense something inside the forest. There should be few beasts… or maybe goblins and beastmen that have those bramble and eye engraving in their body."
"Okay."
Gen, Mia, and Aria threaded carefully as they entered the Tiaji forest. They didn't know the shape of the enemies and whether the enemies were powerful creatures, like tiger beastmen or great goblins.
"M—Master Gen, may I know how could that evil Endless Entity brainwashed those monsters?" Mia asked.
Gen said nothing, but Dragun was the one who answered, "We don't exactly know. But it seems as The Endless Entity's power restored each day, more and more creatures would get that engraving randomly in their body and would turn rabid or mad."
"So, there is no way for us to know the location of that evil being?"
"We will know once Endless Entity has restored a considerable amount of his original power," Dragun replied.
Mia wanted to ask more. She was especially curious about Dragun, Master Gen's system since she joined the party a month ago. It was only Master Gen and Aria before. So she didn't know what happened before she joined.
One thing for sure, though, Master Gen was a righteous man, albeit a bit too dense and quiet.
"Master Gen, may I know about—"
"HELP!"
The scream of a woman echoed in the forest. They immediately darted their eyes at the source of the voice. They saw a silhouette running towards them. Slowly, the figure of a young lady appeared. Her face was filled with horror, and she was heavily bruised. She was chased by three men behind her.
And those three men had bramble engraving on their heads, like a shiny tattoo.
"Help me! They've gone mad!"