He searched for any surrounding presences, and called out to Schnee after confirming that there was no one around. He had something to discuss with her that couldn’t be heard in the neighborhood, though he only now remembered it.
“I completely forgot about it. What was Kagerou’s position on the sacred mountain?”
So, he had forgotten to ask this because he was surprised at the appearance of the divine beast, since Kagerou had been found by chance and was brought along, he felt uneasy with its presence.
Basically, for divine beasts, most of them had their own territory, and rarely came out from there. In addition, each of them were followed by their underlings. It was different in the game, but in reality, he couldn’t just bring it along like that.
“Let’s see. If I am to say it nicely, it would be symbiosis, but if I must say it in a negative way, it would be freeloader.”
“Hah?”
Due to the anticipation ahead of the unusual answer, Shin couldn’t be helped to have a stupid expression on his face.
A freeloader.
It was not a word he imagined would describe a divine beast.
That symbiosis she mentioned earlier, there might be a another divine beast in this case.
“Is it that? Kagerou was allowed to live in another divine beast’s territory?”
“Yes. There is a monster called Mist Garuda that leads on the sacred mountain, near the summit. Because of that, there are not many ways for Kagerou to be helpful. And Kagerou didn’t appear to have either followers or its own territory.”
The story seemed to have taken a quite special turn. Normally, in the territory of a divine beast, other divine beasts didn’t emerge. Since it was not a game any more, it was possible, but if that was the case, Shin felt a strong sense that something was very wrong.
“I understand this much as we came to a mutual understanding over the Mind Chat. I don’t understand Kagerou as clearly as Yuzuha, but we can compare the information I know.”
“I see. Yuzuha, can you ask?”
“Kuu, leave it to me.”
Yuzuha, who was able to communicate clearly, asked about its circumstances. The conversation that sounded like “Guruguru”, “Kuukuu” continued for a few minutes.
Was she interested in that conversation? Tiera also sat near the coachman’s seat. Before long, Yuzuha returned to Shin.
“I got it.”
“Yosh, let’s hear it right away.”
“Let me see. Was it the Mist Garuda, now? Though it rules the sacred mountain, originally half of it belonged to Kagerou’s mother. However, its mother was killed by adventurers, and only Kagerou survived.”
“Adventurers, huh?”
Shin had done similar things in the game era, so he felt ashamed.
Of course, he didn’t intend to hunt divine beasts thoughtlessly in this world.
“It desperately ran for its life, and then, it was helped by an elf girl. After that, it tried its best and became strong, though when it returned to the sacred mountain, it could only help in battles, because its mother’s territory was already lost.”
“Elf, huh? Indeed, when I met it, there was a little hostility against me.”
Did she recall the time she met Kagerou for the first time? Schnee nodded as she understood.
“Did it surrender without fighting?”
“Though we did have a contest, if anything, it was a slight degree of testing each other’s ability.”
Apparently, without showing their whole power, they seemed to understand each other’s strength.
“Schnee is very strong and had a nostalgic scent attached to her, that’s the reason it accompanied her.”
“Nostalgic scent?”
“It said that it was the same scent as Tiera.”
“Eh?”
An unexpected answer returned. Shin, who heard it, had an idea pop up by chance.
“The elf girl who helped… was probably Tiera?”
“Kuu, looks like it.”
It was totally like a development from a manga, but such a thing was really unexpected in reality. If Shin hadn’t arrived, it seemed like their destinies wouldn’t intertwine.
“Errr, I wonder when such a thing happened…”
Tiera said as she closed her eyes to search for the memory where she helped Kagerou. She didn’t seem to be able to remember it right away.
“Guru”
“It said it was more than 100 years ago.”
“That was when I was still a child… Now that I think about it, I did save an injured puppy.”
The information of Tiera’s age could be guessed, but because circumstances were circumstances, Shin didn’t dig deeper.
Though it was difficult to associate the puppy from back then with Kagerou’s current real figure, it probably didn’t have a brutal appearance when it was a baby. She could understand because it reduced its size to pull the wagon furthermore.
“If I’m not mistaken, there was a severe injury. It was hopeless for me alone, so I asked for mother’s help.”
“Guru”
“Benefactor, it said.”
“And you chose to be tamed? Even if you might not end up meeting Tiera?”
Shin pointed out that doing so was hasty; even if it followed the scent, it might not have met Tiera again.
According to Yuzuha, it seemed to understand that it couldn’t win, even if it fought against Schnee. Th