Earth’s Doom Starts with… Me?

Chapter 94: The witch (1)

"Huh? Witches exist here? Are they like, humans with witch power or like, monsters?" I questioned, tilting my head, "but wait, what's the difference between witch power and magic power? Huh?"

Was I the dumb one here, or what?

"This is also the first time I've heard of a witch." General Emilio replied.

"Ooooooooh~ Witchcraftttttt~ Spooooookyy~" General Zhang suddenly peeked from behind me and spoke with an exaggerated ghostly voice while hovering his hands around my shoulders.

"So it really is witchcraft? Dude, that's so cool!" I exclaimed in delight.

"Not so fast, kid. Their definition of a witch is probably different from ours." Luke said as he bonked my head in disapproval.

"Aww, I was kinda hoping to meet a cool witch, but alright..." I sighed, "so, is it another human, then?"

"Most likely so." General Emilio nodded.

"Huh. But why would a human work with them?" I asked while I drew a little stickman with a little witch hat on my note.

"That's none of our business. We came here to get an army and extract the hostages. Remember that." General Emilio replied sternly.

"Right..."

Well, he wasn't wrong. We needed to focus on our main mission. The rest of the problems could wait.

"Alright, moving on, this witch of them seems to know her way around curses." General Emilio continued.

"They call it curses? Is there a possibility that the orcs consider poison as curses? Or maybe, deadly diseases as curses?" I asked as I wrote down the two possible choices I had in mind.

"Could be. We don't know the details yet." General Emilio answered.

"Whatever her power is, she'll die if we kill her anyway." General Zhang answered while yawning.

"Yeah, people die when they're killed, no shot," I rolled my eyes, "but what you said has some truth to it. At least we know how to kill a human."

"On to the next event, they've been keeping their leader inside the armory for extra caution while feeding him all kinds of medicinal herb they could find," General Emilio continued while pointing at another scribble, "but nothing seemed to work."

"Did any of them cause worse symptoms?" I inquired.

"As far as that orc told us, it simply didn't do anything." He replied.

"Huh. Weird. Maybe it wasn't poison or disease, after all," I remarked as I scratched both of those words in my notebook, "because if it was, some herbs should make it a bit better, and some of them should cause worse effect, right? Kinda like if you drink a random pill when you feel sick. You may get better, worse, or also nothing."

"...Good point. But that's still debatable, we have limited information." He replied.

"You two sure get along well when discussing boring stuff." General Zhang groaned.

"It's called planning. I don't want to lose a teammate just because I slacked off in planning." I pouted.

"Sure, sure. Call me when you're done." General Zhang yawned once again, and rummaged through his backpack to pull out a sheet of white cloth, before laying it down on the ground neatly.

"You wanna sleep? Now?" I frowned.

"Of course. It's past midnight. I need my beauty sleep~" He giggled.

"...Okay." I sighed, and continued to chat with general Emilio about the continuation of the story.

It turned out that the orcs were starting to give up on their leader, and just lived their life obediently under the oppressive reign of the elves. But then, a certain Prince entered their life.

One day, while they were out baking clays, a peculiar Prince joined their work, as he usually did. Weird, but okay. I kinda expected that coming from Ioriell.

Anyway, they apparently were able to communicate, even though the other elves couldn't understand the orcs. Perhaps it was due to Ioriell studying languages? If I remember correctly, he mentioned that Erenduill studied languages aside from politics, and Erenduill said that they received roughly the same training.

Due to that, Ioriell got the info about their leader's sickness. And he actually promised them that he would take back his sister's crest and help cure their leader, since his sister was well-known for curing villagers before she died. That answered the mystery regarding Firiell. She had some kind of curing power from her crest, but she also had Monad-type magic from her human part. Dang, she was op.

"But then, why did they kidnap her? Why don't they just, you know, wait?" I wondered.

"Their leader's condition was deteriorating rapidly. They couldn't waste any more time." He answered.

"I see... Too bad for them, huh." I nodded. Yep, too bad that we were going to wreak their base soon enough and vaporize their hope. Uh-huh.

"So, in conclusion. Both of them should be safe for now. They'll be treated nicely as long as they comply, and from this orc's story, they do." General Emilio concluded the story and stood up to tie the orc to a tree.

...Would that tree even be able to hold the orc?

"Stay here. I've set up a trap. The moment you run away just 2 meters from your spot, your body will be filled with needles." General Emilio eerily explained.

Ah, now that would keep the orc at bay. Yep.

"Hngggg--" I stretched my stiff back, and rubbed my tired eyes, "so does that mean we can sleep now? A little bit of rest before we go pick them up?"

"Yeah. We rest here today. Let's take turns to--"

"I'll be on the lookout." Luke immediately volunteered and raised his hand.

"You? But you need sleep too, right?" I inquired. Didn't he also get tired when we went on a 'walk' before?

"I would love to lay down and do nothing, but I don't really need it right now," he explained as he stretched his neck to the left and right, "your mana is overflowing since we got off the forest, I feel like I can't sleep even if I want to."

"...Are you doing drugs using my mana?"

"No! Sheesh, kid, who raised you?" He bonked my head once again, earning a yelp from me.

"Ack! Fine, fine, go ahead, then!" I said as I held my head to protect myself from more bonks.

"Thanks." General Emilio concisely said.

"I'll tell you if something's up," Luke gave him a little nod of approval, "or I can just deal with any threats myself."

"Thank you, big brother." I grinned as I punched him on his chest lightly.

"Go get some sleep. You need enough sleep to grow, kid." He grinned back and patted my head.

"Hehe~" I giggled happily and turned around as I saw him leaving to guard the perimeter. He could be caring sometimes.

Ah, finally! After a long day that felt like months, we got to have some rest. Now where was my cloth, I needed that so I wouldn't be laying down directly on the ground...

"...Huh?" I raised an eyebrow when I couldn't find the cloth that I was looking for. Weird, I was certain that there was an extra inside my backpack. Where did it go?

"Little cub, what are you doing? Come here, let's sleep."

"Yeah?" I turned my head to look at the eel that I thought had been sleeping this whole time, only to found out that he was awake. And comfortably laying on a white cloth without his shirt on.

"Come." He smirked at me.

"The heck!? Why aren't you wearing anything above your waist!?" I freaked out and scooted backwards for quite a distance, messing up some of the scribbles unintentionally. Sorry, orc dude!

"Well, why would I sleep wearing a charred shirt? I don't like smelling roasted fabric and it's kinda itchy." He answered with a shrug.

"But, but... You... Why would you take off your armor? It's dangerous out here." I pressed on.

"Eh. Not dangerous for me."

"Gah! It's useless to talk to you!"

"Yup, exactly. That's why just come here and sleep with me."

"No! Don't say it like that!"

Ack! Couldn't I get a rest, for just 5 minutes!?

"What do you mean, little cub~ I'm just inviting you to sleep beside me, I've laid down your cloth for you~" He said while he gave me a little mischievous wink and a giggle. This little--

"So you're the one who stole my cloth!" I pointed my finger at him.

"Word choice, little cub. I didn't steal it, I took it to prepare your bed~ Look, I even got you a pillow." He grinned while he tapped the spot beside him a few times.

"Don't you lecture me about word choice," I huffed, "and what pillow?"

"Me. I'm the pillow."

'THWACK!'

"Ow, little cub, what gives?" He pouted as he rubbed his head that I had just hit with a stick, the stick that the orc used to scribble, to be exact.

"Don't joke around." I frowned as I felt my face starting to flush. Dang it, I just wanted a nice, cozy sleep!

"Haha! Okay, okay~" He chuckled and raised both of his arms, "I won't tease you anymore, so let's get some sleep before the sun rises, alright?"

"...Fine," I hesitantly agreed and scooted over closer to him, and pulled my cloth a little bit, just before it touched the scribbles on the ground, "but I will sleep here."

I didn't move it too much from its original position. Our cloth was now merely around 30 centimeters apart.

"Sounds good to me. I won't force anything on you." General Zhang giggled happily.

"Excellent. Let's stay in our respective spaces and have some sleep." I said as I warily lied down, with my back facing him. Gah, I could still feel the rocks underneath pricking my back. Kinda expected, though...

"Sure, good night, little cub~" He hummed, and then I heard his voice suddenly got quiet. Had he finally gone to sleep?

'Plop!'

"Huh?" I confusedly chirped when I felt something fluffy fell on top of me.

"A blanket and a jacket. I brought extra." I heard general Zhang's voice, and immediately turned around.

"You brought extra? What for?" I questioned as I examined the things he mentioned.

The blue blanket was quite thick and fluffy, and I could still faintly smell the detergent coming from it, although it was masked by the ash smell from the forest. As for the jacket, it was your typical black bomber jacket, with folding lines still visible, even though he threw it haphazardly at me.

"Just in case. You can use them, I have no need for them." He said while still facing the other way, accompanied by a yawn.

"But you're shirtless."

"Exactly. I'm flexing my shirtless body. Do you like it?"

"... I regret talking to you."

I stared at both the blanket and the jacket for a while. True, it would be nice to have both.

'Plop!'

"Huh?" General Zhang questioned and turned his body around to face me.

"Let's use it together. Don't complain," I said as I threw the blanket to cover us both, "but no crossing over the 30 cm gap."

He stared at me with wide eyes for a while, before finally breaking into laughter, "hahahah! Little cub, this is why you're amusing~"

"Ack! You're too loud! We're trying to sleep here!"

"Sure, sure~" He giggled happily and stared at me with a smile.

As I felt his profound gaze on me, I felt my whole body tensing up.

Ugh, I shouldn't have faced this way!