Don't drop your guard in the farmlands, please! part 4

"What do you want?"

The red headed guy looks at me with a prideful gaze.

"I think we should hunt together and divide the tails equally among ourselves"

"Go catch your own rats you lazy bump"

The red headed guy snickered.

"It's not like that, listen, this isn't a test to see how many rats we can catch... it's about getting us to work together for the sake of the quest"

"Uh, you're speaking nonsense, this is the usual starter quest. You're supposed to hunt as many rats as you can, even if the instructor says you only pass if you hunt 15, If you manage to hunt a few by yourself you'll pass too"

"So you're saying they want us to hunt rats in broad daylight in an open field? if the point of this assignment is to actually hunt rats, they would've asked us to do so in the granary or something"

"Just shut up, my father who's an outstanding adventurer told me this"

As we kept discussing about the matter, the young girl who said hunting rats was below her position came close to us.

"Excuse me, I think what the scrawny guy is saying is true. They already tested our stats and skills, so working as a team surely makes more sense"

I'm glad she's supporting me, but did she really have to call me that? It's not my fault it's hard for me to gain weight! Anyways, as the discussion started to heat up, the shortest guy in the group lined up with us and the other two with the red headed guy and, when it became clear we couldn't reach an agreement, we simply left to do our thing. While only the snob girl and the short guy joined us, it beats trying to do all the work by ourselves.

"My name is Thea, most pleased to make your acquaintance"

"Everyone just calls me shortie and I don't mind if you do so too"

After talking for a few minutes we made a plan for catching as many rats as we could without trampling the crops.

"These rats have all the food they can eat at their disposal so baiting them will be of no use, instead, we need to find a way to catch them without much effort. I think the best way would be to scare them making noise and cornering them into a trap"

"That sounds great and all, but I'm letting you know I'm not willing to touch those things. I'm not scared of them, but they're dirty and disgusting"

Now I see why this girl agreed so easily to join us, there's no way she could have finished the task by herself.

We made a deep hole in the ground and each of us headed to the four corners of the crop patch we chose as our hunting grounds to make noise. Then I took a small cooking pot from my backpack and started hitting it to make as much noise as possible.

As we drew closer to each other I could hear the loud noises everyone was doing, I couldn't see any rat, but as I walked I could sometimes hear the rattling sound of something moving through the plants. It only took us about five minutes to meet up at the place we dug the hole but we couldn't spot a single rat.

Shortie let out a disappointed sigh, but Thea seemed to be relieved. I'm a little surprised this didn't work, but it doesn't mean we should give up.

Just as I was starting to think on other strategies to finish the quest, we heard a squeak coming from inside the hole, it was filled with small rats!

"Quick! use your spears!"

Sera said, but she and I were the only ones with a spear. Shortie used a stick instead and Thea limited herself to look the other side.

It was a bit troublesome to gather the tails, just as Thea said they are disgusting, and to be honest I was a bit scared of them. just looking at them gave me the creeps. We managed to get about six rats in just a few minutes and after doing the same over and over until we got more more than sixty rats we decided it was time to go back.

"Phew! we're finally done! Let's head back now"

"Yeah, in the end it took us more time to set the trap than to catch them"

"My hands are all dirty! what can I do?"

Thea complained about the dirt looking worriedly for a source of water, she was the one who worked the less in our party. Really being a little grateful won't kill you, i thought inwardly.

Just as we headed back to Lorenzo, a rattling sound we were all to familiar with followed us from behind. I knew something was wrong after checking my soulbound card, a new message appeared blinking on it saying 'quest: kill 1 big rat'.

When the creature came into view, instead of a small rat, it was a huge fat rat, almost round in shape, it must be half the size of a wolf but it's still huge for a rat.

"Hey, be careful, this one is dangerous!"

Shortie said as he retreated step by step.

I turned to look at where Thea was standing, but she ran away as soon as she heard the rat coming. I don't think she even thought it could be a big one, she just didn't want to see another rat.

"What can we do, shortie?"

"I don't know, I only have my knife at hand, but if I get close enough to hit it, It will bite me. Why don't you guys use those spears?"

The rat bared its fangs menacingly towards us and stood in two legs making it look even bigger.

"Sera, hold your ground and hit it only when it leaves it's back open, shortie we'll circle the rat baiting its attacks."

Shortie nodded at me and we surrounded the rat cornering it, with each step we gained a little ground, but something on its behavior unsettled me.

Why didn't it try to run away? aren't rats supposed to be scared easily? Also, it seemed as if it was hunting us down.

I've heard from many people say animals are dumb, but they're smart in their own way. They don't usually pick fights they think they can't win without a reason, so there must be a reason why it chased after us.

I lunged the spear forward and hit it right on the back. It squealed, but it didn't hurt it in the slightest, instead, my spear broke in half.

"Hey, you idiot! why did you hit it, you're supposed to use a skill!"

"I don't have a spear skill!"

As we took turns to attack it, the rat turned back to face me and Sera hit it from behind. Only this time the rat wasn't even bothered by this and pounced on me. I tried to swing the sword in my hand but the rat was too fast.

"I... I'm sorry, I can't get close I told you before"

Shortie said as he retreated.

"Get it off me!"

I shouted as the rat made easy work through my clothes and bit me. More like biting me, it was as if it was chewing me. It was way more painful than being bitten by a wolf.

My mind went blank and I completely lost all sense of strategy, the only thing I could do was try to lift the rat keeping it from biting my body. It wasn't heavy, but it moved so quickly it managed to free itself and attacked back at me. Being so close it's hard to move my blade and I do my best to not lose my weapon.

I'm lying in the ground with a rat eating me alive, Sera must be stabbing it over and over but it won't let go of me.

I don't have a second to think what to do and fend off however I can, I feel pain all over my body. There's so much blood on my hands and they became so slippery I can't even hold the rat anymore.

I punch and kick whenever I can, but this thing is just too aggressive.

Because of how much blood I lost and how exhausted I was, I don't have the strength to defend myself anymore.

I can't hear anything anymore and I know if I close my eyes right now I probably won't be able to open them ever again.

Just as I was about to give up, the rat was stabbed through the skull by a sharp sword and its blood fell all over my face.

"Ryu, are you ok, Ryu?"

I feel someone carrying me outside of the wheat field, with my head hanging loose I could catch a glimpse of Sera who is also badly hurt.

Next thing I know is I'm lying on a comfortable bed, completely covered in bandages.

"Seriously Lorenzo, I would expect something like that from Risa, but you? You almost lost an adventurer on the rat quest!"

"I'm deeply sorry boss, It won't happen again"

He lowered his head towards the adventurer's guild leader.

"Anyways, is it true they survived the attack of an E rank monster?"

"Yes, it seems they managed to kill too many rats in a short period of time, you know what happens when the big ones get upset"

"Really? how many did they kill?"

"More than sixty"

"That's too much for a group of six, they were supposed to get fifteen as a group"

"About that... I didn't tell them it was supposed to be a team effort, so only four of them worked as a team"

"If this wasn't you, I would have trouble believing it. I expect a full report by tomorrow morning, don't spare any details"

"Yes boss!"

Lorenzo said as the guild's leader retreated and then he sat on the chair in front of me.