After saving the children from the Goblins attacking them inside the settlement, Rei was running through the settlement once again.
(Come to think of it, I should have asked that woman where things were dangerous. If I had, I could have headed somewhere that needed reinforcements.)
Realizing in hindsight that he had been rushing without thinking, Rei sighed inwardly.
...Even so, his running speed did not diminish in the slightest.
Inside the settlement, there was almost no one moving about like Lugdus's group had been earlier.
Those capable of fighting had headed outside the settlement, while the rest were either evacuating or tending to the wounded.
From beyond the protective barrier, the sounds of battle echoed from multiple directions.
Voices rising from what seemed like several locations surrounding the settlement.
And besides the shouts of battle...
"Bugih!"
Hearing a familiar cry from a short distance away, Rei changed course.
He headed toward a nearby house.
Upon bursting inside, he found an Orc happily stuffing its mouth with dried fruit that the residents had likely stored away for preservation.
Perhaps because it was so engrossed in the dried fruit—Rei hadn't bothered concealing his presence as he approached, but the Orc showed no sign of noticing him and continued eating blissfully.
(I've heard that feeding cows and pigs fruit makes their meat tastier, but... does that apply to Orcs too? Well, if it had been eating nothing but fruit all along, that'd be one thing, but eating just a little right now probably wouldn't make any difference.)
Wielding Death Scythe, Rei swung it at the Orc that still hadn't noticed him, feeling exasperated.
However, mindful that the Orc was inside a house, what he swung was not the blade of Death Scythe but the handle.
Rather than simply striking with it, he hooked the handle around the Orc's torso with a half-rotation and slammed it down.
"Gyupih!"
Perhaps because it was hit mid-bite, the Orc let out a strange shriek as it was sent flying out through the door.
In the process, the airborne Orc's limbs struck furniture and walls, causing some damage, but Rei rationalized that it was still less destructive than fighting inside the house and followed after it.
"Uwah! W-What!? An Orc, out of nowhere!"
Somewhat startled by the scream coming from the direction the Orc had flown, Rei arrived at the scene.
An Orc clutching its side and shrieking, and a single Dark Elf wearing an expression of shock at the creature that had suddenly come flying at him.
Seeing blood on the Dark Elf's face, Rei wondered for a moment if he had been injured when the Orc crashed into him, but upon noticing that the blood was partially dried, he felt relieved.
Then, standing before the Dark Elf with Death Scythe in hand, Rei sliced off the head of the Orc, which was already in near-critical condition from that single blow.
The severed head flew through the air, and to Rei's eyes it looked almost like a soccer ball.
From the neck of the headless corpse, blood sprayed upward like a fountain.
The Dark Elf who witnessed the scene was struck by the powerful image of the head sailing through the blue sky and the geyser of blood.
The falling head made a sound like a ripe fruit dropping and splattering on the ground.
"Ah... eh?"
"You alright? Looks like you almost got crushed by that Orc... sorry about that."
"Eh? Ah? Yeah."
The Dark Elf standing before Rei couldn't comprehend at all what had just happened.
If this Dark Elf had gone into the forest last night, he might have seen Rei's strength with his own eyes.
Unfortunately, he had absolutely no talent for combat.
That was why he hadn't gone out to fight with the others and was instead doing minor chores inside the settlement.
While on his way to fetch boiling water and clean cloth—absolute necessities for medical treatment—he had the misfortune of encountering the Orc that Rei had sent flying.
Even so, if Rei hadn't passed through this spot, a man with no combat experience might have run into the Orc on his own, so he was clearly fortunate.
"Umm, let's see... you're Rei, right? The one Marina-sama brought for the World Tree's treatment."
"Yeah."
Nodding at the man's words, Rei stored the headless Orc's corpse in his Misty Ring.
The blood had drained quite conveniently, which would make dismantling it later easier, he noted.
"Earlier the protective barrier disappeared, but now it's been deployed again like this. Does that mean the World Tree's treatment is finished?"
The Dark Elf man had meant to ask Rei, but it was the Light Sphere floating beside him that answered.
The Dark Elf man looked at the intensely flickering Light Sphere with puzzlement.
It was clearly an existence he had never seen before, but since Rei showed no concern about it whatsoever, he couldn't imagine it was an enemy.
And seeing it up close like this, he felt no hostility from it. If anything, he felt something warm bloom in his chest.
It was like being watched over since childhood—as if it were another parent.
(No, no, what am I thinking about a ball of light like this?)
Rei watched the Dark Elf shaking his head slightly with curiosity, then eventually nodded and spoke.
"Yeah. You could say the treatment is more or less finished. I managed to eliminate the cause of the World Tree's weakness, too."
"What!? You found out what was causing the World Tree's illness!? What was it?"
Faced with the Dark Elf man's enthusiastic questioning, Rei directed his gaze upward.
A spring sky clear enough to be called perfect.
In that blue expanse, the Giant Cicada and Set were currently locked in fierce aerial combat, darting through the air.
Fire, ice, water, wind... the Dark Elf man was captivated by the sight of various attacks coloring the sky, and opened his mouth timidly.
"W-Wait a moment. Don't tell me..."
To the Dark Elf man asking while staring upward, Rei silently nodded.
That alone must have been enough for him to understand what kind of being was involved in the World Tree incident. His eyes locked onto the Giant Cicada, over twenty meters long, flying through the sky.
No, rather than captivated, it would be more accurate to say he was glaring at it.
As a Dark Elf of this settlement, the man had deep feelings toward the World Tree.
Since it had weakened the World Tree to the point where it could no longer deploy the protective barrier, it was only natural for him to harbor hatred toward the Giant Cicada.
Rei watched the Dark Elf man for about thirty seconds, but eventually, deciding he couldn't waste any more time, he spoke.
"About done?"
"...Eh? Ah, yeah."
He must have realized he had been glaring at the Giant Cicada. At Rei's words, the Dark Elf man hastily turned his gaze toward him.
"So, do you know what the situation is like outside right now?"
"Ah, yeah. From what I heard from the guys who came back injured—"
"Tell me."
"Umm, but what I know is the situation from when the protective barrier was down, so for the current situation where it's been restored..."
"That's fine, just tell me. I have no information right now, so I want whatever I can get."
If Set were here, Rei could have checked the current situation from the sky, but Set was currently locked in fierce combat with the Giant Cicada and was in no position to move freely.
That was why Rei wanted information, even if only a little.
"Umm, apparently the monsters weren't making any sounds at all, like they had no will of their own. No war cries, no screams, nothing. In that state, they were just relentlessly trying to destroy the protective barrier or something."
"The protective barrier?"
"Yeah. Apparently they didn't even react to pain when attacked."
"...That thing's doing, isn't it?"
Rei's gaze shifted once again toward the Giant Cicada battling Set.
Since they were fighting in the sky some distance from the settlement, there was no damage on the ground.
However... the forest was taking considerable damage.
Set's attacks were part of it, but the biggest factor was undoubtedly the Giant Cicada.
Its magic-infused ultrasound didn't seem difficult for Set to evade, but the trees of the forest on the ground had no way of dodging.
The sound blades from the ultrasound were cutting down trees en masse, but Rei and the Dark Elf on the ground had no way of seeing this.
"That thing's? That huge monster?"
"Yeah. I don't have any proof, but the horde of monsters attacking the settlement showed up right when the Giant Cicada appeared. That's too convenient no matter how you look at it."
"Well... yeah, I suppose."
The Dark Elf man had no objection to Rei's words.
Since this situation had occurred in sync with the World Tree's pulse, calling it a coincidence was a stretch.
"In other words, that's the gist of it."
"But... how could it do something like that!? The number of monsters that gathered must be in the hundreds... no, maybe even thousands."
"I don't know the details about that, but..."
Even as he said that, Rei had more or less figured it out.
It was probably done using ultrasound.
However, he had no concrete proof—it was simply his speculation.
"Well, I understand the situation for now. So, where do you think I should head from here?"
"Where...?"
At the Dark Elf's bewildered look, Rei let out a small sigh before speaking again.
"I'm asking where the most dangerous place is right now. Dangerous places need fighting strength, right?"
"Eh? Ah, right. Umm... but I don't really know much..."
"Don't make me say it again. Right now I'm working with zero information. In that case, even something outdated would be better than nothing."
"According to what the injured guys said, the southeast direction... they said that's where they're short on people and it's dangerous."
Looking in the direction the Dark Elf man indicated, Rei nodded.
"Got it. That way, then. I'll head there. It goes without saying, but there's still a chance of monsters inside the settlement. Don't wander around alone."
"Ah, right."
Leaving the nodding Dark Elf man behind, Rei departed.
He continued moving with the Light Sphere in tow... and along the way, he killed several Goblins and Cobolts with Death Scythe as if collecting a toll for passing through, cutting them down like a street slasher.
Upon arriving at the protective barrier, a battle was taking place outside the settlement, just as the Dark Elf man had said.
However, there was one slight discrepancy with the information he'd been given.
According to what he'd heard, the Dark Elves were being overwhelmed and in danger, but in reality, the fighting Dark Elves didn't appear to be taking that much damage.
Of course, the Dark Elves present were fighting desperately, but it still looked like an even match. The reason for that was...
"Looks like there was no need for me to come here..."
Reflected in Rei's gaze through the protective barrier was the figure of Optis, joyfully rampaging among the horde of monsters.
The other Dark Elves were positioned away from the monster horde, firing arrows and using spirit magic to attack from range at monsters trying to head toward the settlement.
But Optis, unlike the others, was engaging the monsters in close combat.
The monsters, knowing a Dark Elf was right nearby, prioritized targeting him over anything else.
Most of the monsters there were Goblins, numerous but individually weak, and Optis swung his staff—a blunt weapon in all but name—one after another, crushing Goblin skulls.
"Fohoho. Come now, try a little harder. Here, here, over this way. Oh, so close. That was a close one."
Even as he taunted them, Optis plucked the lives from the monsters before him.
Despite his elderly appearance, his movements showed no sign of dulling as he continued fighting.
Monsters that approached him had their heads crushed or their hearts destroyed in the next instant.
(He's nimble. Well, maybe any Dark Elf can move like this... no, no way, yeah.)
The image of multiple Optises fighting at once flashed through Rei's mind, and he quickly shook his head to dispel the vision.
He had imagined the nightmarish sight of countless Optises all challenging him to battle at once.
"Hm? You're Rei? What are you doing here?"
One of the Dark Elves shooting arrows near the protective barrier noticed Rei and called out.
"I heard this area was dangerous. Came as reinforcements, but..."
"...Ah..."
The Dark Elf averted his gaze as if understanding something.
Looking at that Dark Elf, Rei decided to at least ask him to let him outside the protective barrier.