Chapter 22

The heavy rain continued, and with no money, Al decided to spend the time practicing magic. After three such days, the rain finally stopped.

"Alright, let's go, Orson."

Al started preparing to leave without even finishing breakfast. Beside him, a pair of people were getting ready to leave with large bags on their backs. They were Maddock and Nijella, who, like Al, had been staying at this inn for a long time.

"Big bags. Going somewhere?"

When Al spoke, Maddock approached him.

"Hey, Al. Finally cleared up, huh? We're moving to Parker."

Parker is a border city located to the west after going north to the capital and then further west. It's about a week's walk away. Beyond Parker, to the west, lies the neighboring kingdom of Tempest, and I've heard that skirmishes often occur around Parker.

"Really? A business opportunity?"

"It seems a big war has broken out in the Tempest Kingdom. I don't know the details yet, but there are quite a few mercenary jobs. We're better at rough work than exploration, so we plan to earn some money there for a while."

"I see. Mercenary work can be dangerous, so be careful. If the pay is too high, it might be suspicious."

Orson, dragging his feet, came over.

"Thanks always. Nijella's with us, so we'll be cautious. See you."

They readjusted their large bags, waved, and left for the town with the ferry to the east. Al and Orson watched them go, then met up with Rippi and headed south to hunt the large-mouthed lizards.

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"Wow, this is bad."

When they reached the Holden River, Orson couldn't help but exclaim. The water level had risen significantly compared to four days ago when they last hunted the large-mouthed lizards. The muddy current was roaring, and while the water level had only risen on their side, part of the wetlands on the opposite bank had submerged, widening the river to about 10 meters.

"Ah, looks like we can't hunt today? I even borrowed another cart..."

Rippi looked like she was about to cry. Last time, they made good money, so today she had brought her sister Pippi to help and had added a cart pulled by a lava.

"It seems it rained upstream as well. Has the rainy season started earlier this year?"

Orson crossed his arms, deep in thought. The current was too strong to simply fish; the bait would be swept away immediately.

"Let me check."

Al said and ran off alone. He nimbly climbed a tree on a slight hill.

'Enhanced Perception' - Vision

Al slowly scanned the river. Normally, large-mouthed lizards would wait for prey with only their eyes and noses above the water, but they might have been swept downstream. If any were left, they would likely be in areas where the current was slower.

"Are there any large-mouthed lizards?"

Orson, unable to wait, called out, but Al signaled for him to wait a bit longer as he continued searching. Finally, he found many large-mouthed lizards gathered in a calm area where the current curved and stagnated.

"That's the situation. What do you think? Should we try to target the ones at the edge with magic arrows from a distance?"

Al quickly climbed down and relayed the situation to Orson.

"There are that many? No, attacking them could excite the others and cause them to attack as well, which is too dangerous. The only way would be to lure the one at the edge with bait, but it's not that easy to control the bait. If multiple lizards notice at once, it would be the same as attacking them. Let's call off the hunt..."

"Wait, just let me try."

Al hastily stopped him. He needed to earn money for a leather armor, so he couldn't give up easily.

"What are you going to try? It's hard to control the meat on a fishing rod."

"No, I'll use magic. I'll try to deceive them with an illusion spell."

Al explained to the skeptical Orson that illusion spells can deceive not only vision but also hearing and smell, and can be used on non-humans. Instead of using meat as bait, he proposed to control an illusion of a flying meat mass to lure the large-mouthed lizards, allowing for precise control of the location. This way, he could try to lure out just one.

"Wow, that's clever. But can you deceive a magical beast with an illusion?"

Rippi and Pippi were impressed, but Orson looked uncertain.

"Actually, if I could use telekinesis, I wouldn't need to deceive them with an illusion."

Al said regretfully, but Orson shook his head lightly.

"Well, give it a try. With ingenuity, you can achieve the same thing. It all starts from there."

Al smiled at his words.

Thank you for reading.

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