"...Ugh!"
"So, it seems you're finally awake?"
At the sound coming from the side, 'he' groaned and opened his eyes.
He then looked around, bewildered.
"Where am I?"
"Northern Logging Site of the Dark Forest of the Kingdom Alliance... I wonder if you can make sense of that?"
"Kingdom Alliance?"
"Ha ha ha…"
Saying this, the old man gave a creepy laugh.
With the laughter that seemed to cling to his ears, he frowned and asked the old man.
"Did you save me, old man?"
"Hm, me? Ah, I suppose so. You could say that. I was the one who fed you water and food so you wouldn't die. Well, but the ones who brought you here are those damn women. If you're going to blame someone, blame them."
"Blame? Why would I blame anyone?"
"Hmm? Did you eat something bad while wandering around…"
"Hey, you."
"Yes?"
"What's your name?"
"...Huh?"
"I asked what your name is. Your name, I mean. You're not telling me you don't even know your own name, are you?"
"Ah, yes. That would be Ala—"
He instinctively tried to answer with 'Alaric' but hurriedly retracted his statement.
However, the first two syllables had already slipped out of his mouth.
"Ala? That's a weird name…"
The old man tilted his head in confusion. Seeing his expression, he decided to come up with a name on the spot.
"...It's Alain. I don't have a surname."
"Alain, huh... Better than 'Ala,' but still a strange name. Well, it doesn't matter either way. So, Where are you from?"
"Excuse me?"
"Where are you from? There's no way you don't know where you lived, right?"
The old man, with his sharp eyes, started bombarding him with questions.
Under the onslaught of questions from the old man, Alain couldn't gather his thoughts and stammered.
He couldn't figure out why the old man questioned him like this.
"..."
Alain remained silent. The old man's expression tightened slightly at Alain's demeanour.
As Alain noticed this, he swallowed hard.
'Have I been found out?'
Seeing him unable to answer properly, the old man might think he's a member of the demon race or something suspicious.
'What should I do?'
The old man in front of him didn't seem all that formidable at first glance. He might be able to handle one person. But what to do afterwards… Just then, while Alain was contemplating this, the old man let out a deep sigh as if in exasperation.
"Damn it, amnesia... It's going to be difficult to explain this to those women."
Amnesia?
At that moment, Alain's mind lit up. This might be an opportunity.
"Ugh!"
"Hey, what's wrong? What happened?"
"My head just suddenly..."
"Ugh, damn it. Is it really amnesia? This is troublesome."
Pretending to be in agony with his head in his hands, Alain glanced at the old man.
The old man didn't seem to show any signs of suspicion on his face.
"Damn it... If this keeps up, things are going to get real awkward later... Hey, you!"
"...Yes?"
"If those women come by later and ask what happened, just answer like this 'The village was destroyed due to the monster's invasion. So I got separated from my parents and wandered around homeless until I finally crawled into the Dark Forest. I don't even know the name of the village. It was such a poor slash-and-burn village that it didn't even have a name.' Just say that."
"..."
"Got it?"
"...Understood."
As he nodded in response, the old man frowned slightly, looking somewhat dissatisfied but nodded in return.
Then Alain cautiously asked.
"um..."
"What is it?"
"Um... Can I ask you something? It's about what you were just talking about, but you referred to them as 'women.' Who exactly does that refer to?"
In an instant, the old man's expression twisted into a fierce scowl. Then, as if realizing something, he clicked his tongue and muttered.
"...Damn, that's true. It's clear you're just a country bumpkin and have amnesia... Ugh... What should I do? In the end, am I going to have to explain everything to you...!"
"Sorry?"
"Ugh... I have no idea what you know or don't know, so the conversation isn't progressing. First off, do you… know about the monsters?"
Of course, probably no one understands monsters better than Alain.
The term 'monsters' referred to the artificial beings created during Alain's time as a Demon King.
The demon race was vastly outnumbered compared to humans.
To compensate for the demons' disadvantage, Alain artificially connected beasts from this world with those from the demon realm to create the creatures known as monsters.
So, it was absurd to think that Alain wouldn't know about these monsters. However,
"Monsters? It's the first time I've heard that term…"
Alain's words were a complete denial. Even his expression displayed utter calmness.
Seeing this, the old man furrowed his brow and cursed under his breath.
"Damn! It's as if your head is completely empty... If I had known you were like this, I wouldn't have taken you in... I volunteered thinking I could take a break, but now I've ended up with a headache."
"..."
The old man continued to pour out scathing remarks about Alain. Despite the old man's curses, Alain's true feelings remained calm. He had already braced himself for this to some extent. After all, he had anticipated this situation and claimed he didn't know about the monsters on purpose, aiming to extract as much information about this world as he could.
"Hey, listen closely. The monsters I'm talking about are the creatures created by a mad king who appeared '500 years' ago! Literally monsters! Do you understand? They aren't just wild boars or bears living on the mountain!"
"...!"
At those words, Alain's eyes widened in shock.
And as he reacted, the old man sniffled in annoyance and kept mumbling about how troublesome it all was.
Even so, Alain was shocked for a different reason.
The reason Alain pretended not to know about the monsters was to gather more information about this world.
He had no idea what era he was in, how long it had been since he died, or how the world had changed.
That's why, while pretending not to know, he hoped to gain a bit more information.
However, the information that came out was utterly ridiculous from the start.
The old man just said that 500 years had passed since the Demon King's death.
That was half of a millennium.
"..."
Alain stared at the old man in disbelief. The old man then fished out something from nearby and handed it to Ragna.
"...?"
"Eat this. You need to regain some strength before you do anything."
At those words, Alain looked at the item the old man had offered. It was a bowl. Inside the bowl was a somewhat whitish porridge. Alain accepted it and took a spoonful of the contents.
And he couldn't help but frown immediately.
The contents of the bowl seemed to be oatmeal porridge.
He used the phrase "seemed to be" because he couldn't recall any other food that tasted quite like it.
An unpleasant smell and a fishy taste filled his mouth. The gritty texture combined to make it hardly something anyone would want to eat.
Yet, despite the awful oatmeal porridge, the old man was also scooping it into his own bowl and eating.
Similarly, the old man was grimacing as well, but he was busily moving his utensils, transferring the food into his mouth.
"..."
In this situation, Lagna had no choice but to accept the food.
Moreover, was it due to the food entering his stomach? A growling noise was echoing from his belly. Ultimately, Alain squeezed his eyes shut and began to transfer the contents of the bowl to his mouth, just as the old man did. Thus, the sounds of their meal resonated within the old, ramshackle hut.