"Damn you monster!"

"I will never succumb to your tricks!"

What is a human doing here?

Wasn't this place off limits because it's too dangerous?

He gives me no chance to think and jumps at me with his sword again.

I extend the darkness on the ground and try to grip him with it.

However, he twists his body and cuts the darkness with his sword.

What?

How did he do that?

I jump back and gain some distance.

All of the green people are still captured by the darkness, but they are all struggling to force their way out of it.

I sensed some of them preparing to cast some spell from their mouths so I blocked it with the darkness.

"Die!"

Bright mana gathers at the man's sword as he swings it downward.

From the sword, a bright beam of light shoots at me.

I block it with my left arm while reinforcing it with dark mana, but it's still enough for me to stumble back a bit.

And it even burned the skin on my arm as well...

"I-impossible!"

Judging from that yell, that must have been one of his strongest moves.

And well, it was really fast and quite powerful, but something like that won't kill me just by itself.

...I should really put an end to this farce though.

[Shadow's grip]

A hand made out of darkness extends from my right arm and shoots out at the man.

He tries to cut it again, but he is too slow and the hand grips his body.

"Ghrr...!"

But then, his body suddenly starts glowing and he explodes in bright light.

The light completely dissolves my shadow hand.

The man then lands on the ground on his knees and starts panting.

I take this little chance and analyze him with my new magic.

Type: Humanoid

Name: Zarrdos

Gender: Male

Race: Human

Status: Exhausted

Level: 521

Health: 3542/6315

Mana: 134/10310

It's really a human...

But what is he doing here?

According to what I have seen here, he seems to be allied with those green people.

Speaking of which...

Type: Humanoid

Name: Murando

Gender: Male

Race: Jade lizardman

Status: Restrained

Level: 396

Health: 7612/7815

Mana: 8481/8601

Jade lizardman?

Hmm...

The human already stands up and comes slashing his sword at me.

...but he is clearly exhausted now.

It's probably because he ran out of mana.

His swing is visibly slower than before.

I catch his horizontal swing with my left hand and get closer to him.

[Phantom roar]

"RHAAAAAAA!"

I use this on him from point blank range.

His entire body starts trembling as he topples over.

Sitting down on the ground, he looks up at me in fear.

I get a little closer to him and try to communicate.

"So...who are you people?"

The man keeps trembling and looking at me as if he didn't hear anything.

I turn around at the captured lizardmen and hope for some answers there.

But they all just look at me with a mix of anger and fear instead.

...this is pointless, isn't it?

I was hoping I could talk to them...

Killing them all would be quite wasteful.

If I managed to talk to them, they could give me some useful information...

Like the exact location of the lake or...

"Are you not going to kill us all?"

From atop of the hill, another one of those lizardmen emerges.

This one, however, has slightly darker scales and also possesses two small horns on his head.

He is unarmed and is wearing some brown ragged clothes.

"Who are you?"

Before waiting for his reply, I analyze him.

Type: Humanoid

Name: Suddon

Gender: Male

Race: Corrosion lizardman

Status: Vigilant

Level: 812

Health: 15245/15245

Mana: 17572/17572

Corrosion lizardman?

A different race from the others...?

"My name is Suddon."

"I'm the chief of this village."

A village...

So it's really a village?

What is it doing in the middle of nowhere?

"I'm Reiza."

"...I came here for water."

"...water?"

He half opens his mouth for a second.

He then closes his eyes and nods to himself.

"...I see."

"Then...If you aren't hostile, could you release my people?"

...

They won't attack me when I release them, right?

They all still seem very hostile.

Hmm...

I retract the darkness from all the lizardmen and it gradually disappears.

The lizardmen stand up while gripping their weapons and keeping their guard.

None of them attack me though.

"Do you really not plan on attacking our village?"

"...no."

Unless you attack me first, of course...

"Then...let me lead you to our source of water."

Hmm...how nice of him.

I'm lead by him and a few other lizardmen around the hill, where the village is.

The human also joins us.

I really wonder why there is a single human living with lizardmen in the middle of nowhere...

Maybe he got lost and can't return anymore?

...but then he would search for a way back, right?

Oh whatever...

It doesn't concern me anyway.

We go behind the village toward a moderately big hill with a tunnel inside it.

After entering it, we soon arrived at the lake.

There was a big hole in the ceiling, through which I probably saw this place.

The cave was also lit up with some torches on the walls and there were staircases leading down to the lake.

I approached the lake and left the others behind.

Then I collected some water into my palms.

[Cleanse impurities]

...

The water was actually already really clean.

I just did that out of habit...

Well, whatever...

I bring the water to my lips and drink it.

After quenching my thirst, I also store a bit of the water for later.

But then I hear some ruckus behind me.

When I turn around, I spot the chief talking to some of the others.

He seems even more nervous than before.

I stand up and head back up the stairs.

"...something wrong?"

The chief looks at me for a moment before looking away again.

"No...it's nothing."

"Just...a flock of blue dragons was spotted heading this way."

Blue dragons?

I only ever met one dragon before.

And he was really powerful.

Can those people really defeat a dragon?

"...do you need my help?"

"Huh?"

"Well...we could probably handle them."

"But if you are offering your help, there is no reason to refuse."

Could handle them?

Are these dragons weaker than the one I met?

Or maybe these people are experienced in fighting them.

Well, whatever.

We walk outside the cave and I look into the distance, where the dragons are supposedly coming from.

And I spot several of them.

There's about seven in total.

And they really seem to be heading to that village.

I wonder if I can use this even at this long distance...

I squint my eyes and focus on one of the dragons.

Type: Monster

Name: -

Gender: Female

Race: Azure dragon

Status: Hungry

Level: 245

Health: 4451/9953

Mana: 12453/16854

Huh...they are even lower level than the weakest lizardman I have seen.

But their health and mana is much higher...

They still don't really seem strong though.

Hmm...

Since these lizardmen gave me water, I don't mind helping them eliminate the threat.

Well, let's get to it then.

I raise my left hand and gather mana.

"Wa-"

[Fire dart]

My spell shoots through the air at high speed and manages to clip one of the dragon's wings.

They are still too far...

I can't aim properly like this.

"Too far..."

"Need to wait a bit."

"S-sure..."

I was then lead to the village on top of the hill.

There were a lot of these lizardmen.

But they weren't all grown up adults.

Type: Humanoid

Name: Kashia

Gender: Female

Race: Green lizardman

Status: Curious

Level: 21

Health: 382/382

Mana: 501/501

The little kids were a different race again for some reason.

They seemed to be interested in me, but the adults held them from approaching me.

But still, this village is quite different from the towns in Armundis kingdom.

The buildings are short and made of rough stone or wooden sticks.

The atmosphere also seems much darker.

There is fatigue on everybody's faces.

We walked all the way to the watchtower at the edge of the city.

I climbed up the stairs and looked in the direction of the dragons.

They advanced quite a bit closer in the meantime.

Although it has gotten darker already, I might be able to kill them now.

Well, let's try it.

Once again, fire mana starts swirling on my left palm.

[Fire dart]

My spell pierces through the head of one of the dragons and also hits another dragon's wing.

Good, now I can do it.

[Fire dart]

[Fire dart]

[Fire dart]

With just a few more shots, I snipe down the rest of them.

They were really weak...

Comparing them to that nightmare dragon would be like comparing the giant turtle in Henduria to a regular sized turtle.

"It's done..."

The chief seems to be looking into the distance while squinting his eyes.

He then briefly closes them and faces me.

"...Thank you for helping us."

The chief talked to others for a bit while I looked at the village from the watchtower.

And then we headed to the place, where the dragons died.

Up close, they really look like the nightmare dragon.

Except they are blue and they don't have horns.

Why are they so much weaker?

Is it really the color or the horns?

"Do you want all of the dragon corpses?"

The corpses?

What would I need them for...?

Well, food I guess.

But other than the meat, I don't really need them.

"I don't need it..."

"I only want the meat from one of them..."

"You can keep the rest."

Even if they were weak, they were still as big as the nightmare dragon.

All of that meat should last me quite a while.

"Thank you very much."

We then returned back to the village along with the dragon corpses.

Since the sun has already set, I was offered a place to sleep.

It happened to be in the chief's house.

I was a bit skeptical and feared I would be attacked in my sleep, so I did a little something to intimidate him.

[Phantom presence]

"If you try to do something to me when I'm asleep...this village will disappear."

"I have some defensive measures...but it would be a waste to destroy this village..."

"So don't try anything..."

"O-of course..."

Looks like it worked...

But maybe I overdid it a bit...

He really seemed sincere about letting me sleep in peace.

I then laid on the bed I was offered and fell sleep.

Bonus:

Why is almost everyone so respectful and generous toward Reiza?

A village in the middle of wilderness wouldn't offer for water for free to just anyone, would it?

Of course, it might seem unrealistic and too convenient for her.

But you gotta put yourself in those people's shoes.

There is a monster, who can annihilate you and your entire village by just releasing the huge amount of mana she has.

Do you really try to risk denying her request?

Do you really try to oppose her?

Especially because her goal isn't to kill you, you have to respect her desires.

You should be happy you only lose a bit of water by meeting her.

So why did they even attack her?

Well, that's quite simple.

There is a creature with huge amount of mana, running at full speed toward your village with its feet on fire.

Do you think it's friendly?

Especially in this kind of place, where everything is trying to kill you?

Luckily, the village chief realized what it was about after meeting her.

He realized the fact that she was setting her feet ablaze to ward off those invisible things.

Oh hey, it's you again.

What's up?

Well, sure...

But there is still really long until you appear in the main story...

The readers probably don't even know what to think of you.

Well...alright...?

But you gotta say something interesting so they remember you, you know?

...well...that's certainly interesting I guess...