Village Massacre (Part 1)

There were around twenty houses which comprised the small village. Most were made up of wood, and a few were of stones. It was a pretty quiet and peaceful village that anyone who lived there would find satisfying.

Because of the frequent patrol of soldiers in the area, they didn't find themselves under the threat of monsters. On the western side of the village was where they planted their crops to sustain themselves.

One particular village girl in her mid teens wearing simple clothing stood at the edge of the field, watching her father taking a look at their crops. Their field was large enough to produce enough food for the entire village and everyone was united in cultivating the farm. Therefore, there should be no problem of shortage.

However, there was another kind of problem. Pests had infested their plants and food had impeded their food production by a significant amount. Seeing the distressed expression on his father's face, she heaved a deep sigh and turned her head to the other villagers who were as frustrated as her.

At this rate, they run the risk of going into a famine within their village. They could just buy grains from the city or passing merchants. However, the issue of money will come along. If they needed to get food for the entire village, then they would need to gather all the money the entire villagers have.

Her father had returned to them.

"Pops, how is it?"

"Meuran, everyone, I don't think we can make enough for the entire village next harvest."

Everyone heaved an exasperated sigh. This was a crisis, they didn't even know where the pests came from, they just all came all of a sudden. That being said, it would seem the pests were not exactly a large swarm, if they were, none would have remained for them to harvest.

They have been trying everything to drive them away, even trying to use smoke. But that wouldn't change the damage, and the pests would also return later on.

"Looks like we'll have to buy some from the city after all. I will have everyone assemble for a meeting tonight," he then looked at one man. "Please call each head of the family."

The man nodded.

Her father was their village chief, and he would be the one to lead on how to mend the situation. Meuran understood this, and was very worried about her father. One could easily see how stressed he was.

Unfortunately, she couldn't do anything about the problem. Those pests just had to come and ruin everything, and was utterly distressing, she feared that it might cause depression to her father.

"Pops," she called her father. "How about you take a rest at home until the time of the meeting?"

Her father massaged his temple as though he was having a headache.

"Yeah, guess I will. Alright everyone, that's it for today, you may go."

Everyone dispersed. Meuran looked at the field once more then her eyes shifted towards the horizon, where the sun was preparing to start setting. She somewhat felt mad that they had to experience this deadly hardship.

Nothing could get worse than a food outage. If it were a money issue, it would not be that big of a deal since as long as they have their crops, they won't die of hunger. But now, it was way more troublesome and dangerous than a lack of money.

It was then that a boy was coming towards them.

"Chief, Gero has come."

Gero was the occasional merchant that would come and visit them, and often bring stuff to sell, even some food.

"Alright, I'll talk to him and see what he has."

Her father walked towards the village plaza and now was stuck with the young man who informed her father.

"Hey, Meuran, looking so haggard already."

She scowled at him.

"Shut it, Yeren. Don't you see that this is a big problem?"

"Sorry sorry, I know. But, you just gotta smile sometimes you know, you look better that way."

Meuran had already realized that he was flirting with her. She was not dense enough to not notice that Yeren liked her. Yeren was a fine young man, that was how she saw him. But, she was just not yet ready to climb up the ladder.

"Stop it, I'm gonna go after Pops."

"Oh, okay, I'll go with you then."

As there was no problem with it, Meuran didn't deny him of that. Thus, the two of them went after the village chief.

"So… it's getting really bad, huh," Yeren said.

"Yes and it's a headache, dammit."

"Hmmmm."

That was the end of the conversation. Yeren couldn't find himself to speak again since Meuran was apparently in a bad mood, and he didn't want it to get worse.

A short while later they arrived and her father had already begun speaking to a middle aged man.

"Is that so… that's very bad. I have a few grains, meat and vegetables. But if you're saving some coins, then I suggest you go and buy directly from the city."

"Of course. I'm sorry Gero, looks like none of us had the luxury to buy any of your products in the meantime."

"That's fine. I wanted to check around these parts anyway."

Meuran heard that Gero's former partner in the travelling business was from here, and thus why he cared about this village. However, that friend of his died because of an accident, a violent accident.

"I wanna know, Gero, how's the crops of the villages you went through?"

"Well, there certainly wasn't any pest problem."

"So it's just on us, huh."

"I guess so," Gero then looked at Meuran. "Hey missy, been a while!"

"Yeah, been a while, so decided to give me some good free stuff yet?"

"Hahahaha! Shamefully missy, I can't give any free stuff yet. Been hard to get money for a while, if I'm being honest. Well, hard for us independent travelling merchants."

"Why? Something up?"

"Yeah, there's this company that, well, hiring merchants to sell all around. So a lot of customers of independent merchants like us had begun buying from merchants belonging to that company. Well, I guess they were cheaper than us sooo…"

"So they would prefer buying there instead," Meuran continued.

"Yeah."

"So have you considered joining them?"

"I've been thinking about it, but I don't know yet."

All of a sudden, a man was rushing towards them, panting as he stopped in front of the village chief.

"Chief, there's something I need to tell you. There's a trio of people coming to the village, they emerged from the forest and are coming in from the eastern road."

Meuran furrowed her brows after she heard his words. If that was the case, then, was there any need to be all frantic about it?

"Uhuh, so what's gotten you all worked out then?" her father asked.

"Yeah, well, there seemed to be two knights, and one young woman. She looked pretty important."

Looked pretty important? Meuran was curious.

"Alright, I'll go check it out."