Danmachi: Westward Cloud [Complete]

Quest 56- On The Hunt

Traveling on a road down to the South-Western part of the continent, Cirrus and Nox ride on horseback.

Caw!

Caw!

With crows cawing in the surrounding distance, the trees barely have any leaves on them.

“Hey, did they say the monster was terrorizing people in the west?” Nox said, holding onto Cirrus as he rides a horse.

“They did, but I want to know how the Nuckelavee was freed. Right now its trail is cold, but if I can piece together the places it hit, I can find a pattern and meet it before it causes any more damage.”

“Well, let's hurry. We’ve been riding for hours now today, plus this scenery is dreary.

“Fine, there should be a town up ahead… if it’s not a ghost town.”

Quickly riding into town, they found it in a similar state as the way up to it. The buildings were fine, if not unmaintained, and the people all had a look of hunger in their eyes.

“Ah… a traveler… we have no food or water…” said a townsfolk, slowly walking away.

“Hey wait, what happened?” Cirrus said, getting off his horse.

“… Are you an adventure?” he asked.

“I am. I was sent to find and kill the monster who, judging by the looks of this place, came by?”

His face slightly lit up and his eyes watered.

“Y-you can save our village right!! Right!!”

He desperately held onto Cirrus’s clothes.

Everyone else overhearing the conversation came towards Cirrus and beg him for his help.

“Hey! Come on! Look!” Cirrus said, pulling him off. “We’ll see what we can do alright, but can you tell me what happened?”

“Y-yes um… well, about 2 weeks ago, everything was fine and normal, but then this black water came in down the river. We all quickly got scared as we saw the fish float up dead and then off in the distance, we could see green fire… we all quickly left the town and made it across a bridge to the next town over but then… we could see a hideous monster… an affront to nature with a human top forged into a horses back with no skin at all, its green pulsating eye of the fire remained across the river, it simply watched as we stood by. Soon it simply burned things and left, we remained in the town for a while before returning to our own to see the damage but… everything was practically poisonous… our water and food… we sent our children away to the other town while we work to fix ours but… we have no luck.”

“… Seems it came here…”

‘I need to see the bridge….’

“Nox, can you possibly purify the poison?”

“Hmm… I can, but this town will be leveled. You sure you want this town gone off the face of the earth?”

“W-we can rebuild… please… this is our home, our homeland.” He cried as well as the other townsfolk.

“Nox….”

“Yeah, yeah, I’ll do it at night. It’ll be easier than.”

“So go to the other town for now and we’ll catch up alright.”

“T-thank you!” he said.

“Thank you!”

“Thank you!!”

Everyone thanked them as they slowly left.

“… Nox, will this village really be razed to be clean of the poison?”

“Yeah, well, I’m the Spirit of the White Night.”

“… I never asked you about that, huh? I just assumed it was a cool name you got. So you have what purity attributes or what?”

“Hmm, somewhat, my attributes are fire, light, darkness, and purity.”

“Ah, so fire and light cause stars, right? And the purity and darkness are because you’re the Spirit of the White Night, right?”

“Right on the money! Normally one wouldn’t have such contradictory titles such as I, but you can find them rather common amongst the first generation like Blazing Ice or Fragile Mountain.”

“Huh… well, that’s something new I learned today. Well, I should see what clues I can find on where it went next or where it came before.”

“They said the river turned black, so why not check upstream?”

“Alright, are you gonna stay or come with me?”

“I’ll go put the horse in the other town for now and find a place for us.”

“Hm, very well.”

Cirrus and Nox took their leave.

Finding the river still black, Cirrus quickly went upstream to find more of the land decayed and eventually found remains of another town but one now in ruins.

Its buildings were burnt to the ground with only charred bones.

“… Shit.”

Cirrus looked around and found nothing aside from charred remains and some horse tracks, along with two dragging lines.

“…Hmm .”

Retracing the steps, Cirrus found its tracks coming from a tainted river.

“… Fuck me, is this going to be a pain in the ass?”

Cirrus returned and told Nox of what he found; the townsfolk had informed Nox that the monster went West.

When night came, Cirrus and the other people stood outside as they could see just a few blocks away a white night encapsulating their home in pure nothingness. It was as if the sun had returned and lit up the world before it quickly died down.

Cirrus, watching it, could feel his magic quickly taking a nosedive as the magic was cast.

"Guh! Goddammit... She is really takes a lot of mana."

Once the magic faded, the townspeople came to find it completely gone, as if the buildings and nature were never there but a circular barren land.

Nox told them that their well is clean but will need to rebuild it and also that the soil is now fertile again.

The people thanked Nox for her help in purifying the land but found the water still black. She informed them that for that she and Cirrus will have to go to the source and fix it there, but for now, they have to rely on the river near the other town for water.