I'm a Immortal Tavernkeeper, But My S-Rank Daughter Doesn't Know That!

The Evergreen Forest was so named because during the summer and spring it was the most beautiful forest in the entire region around Agocester. With tall, thick and leafy trees, it was the favorite place at all times of the year for local lumberjacks to get good wood.

However, this winter, the lumberjacks were prevented from collecting wood there and, for this reason, the Bonfire Festival might not take place this year.

Victor was genuinely interested in this mission, so he accepted it, even though it didn’t have such great financial potential. For every Blight he killed, he would only receive one silver coin and he needed at least five to pay for another carriage to take him to Klento. Maybe he could, maybe he couldn’t.

Either way, Victor was interested in finding out what was causing such an abnormality in the region that Blights were appearing.

The information the woodcutter gave Victor wasn’t much help, but by coincidence Victor had already dealt with these creatures two or three times.

As far as Victor knew, Blights, even before they became Blights, were nothing more than mocking spirits, the kind that wander around, lost, and these spirits took advantage of any distortion in the veil that separates reality from the supernatural to corrupt plants and make them carriers of the spirits’ rage. For this reason, there were as many variations of Blights as there were different types of plants in this world.

Even so, Victor didn’t make any strenuous preparations to enter the Evergreen Forest. He simply made a torch, mixing a piece of wood, oil and cloth. Apart from his sword, that was all he would need to be able to kill Blights.

The forest was foggy, and although fog was quite common in colder seasons and especially in mountainous regions, like where Agocester was, it could also be a sign that the veil dividing reality from the supernatural was too thin.

"Could this be because of the evil spirit the receptionist mentioned?" Victor wondered as he was enveloped in mist while entering the forest. "Well, if it’s because of that, it won’t be my problem. Another group has already taken the mission."

Victor’s slow steps echoed between the tall trees that seemed to close off the path in front of him. There were no leaves on the trees, because they had all fallen in the fall, so the dry branches of the trees added a bit of terror to this place with such a heavy atmosphere.

The dense fog made visibility poor, giving the forest a mysterious and unsettling air and, to make matters worse, with every step the crunching of branches and dry leaves under Victor’s feet added to the tension in the air.

As he continued forward, Victor kept his senses alert, his eyes scrutinizing the shadows and his keen hearing picking up any unusual sounds. The torch he had prepared illuminated the path ahead of him, but it couldn’t completely dispel the darkness that seemed to lurk between the trees. 𝙛𝒓𝒆𝙚𝒘𝒆𝓫𝙣𝓸𝙫𝓮𝒍.𝒄𝒐𝓶

The woodcutter who had given him the information had mentioned that he had been attacked in a deeper part of the forest, near a clearing, so that was where Victor, an experienced monster hunter, knew he would have to go to find these abominations.

However, as Victor advanced, the sounds of the forest changed. The cawing of crows began to resonate more from the sky and the wind was intense, whispering through the branches of the trees.

After walking for some time, Victor noticed a distant glow between the trees. He squinted his eyes to sharpen his vision and see better, which is how he realized that the glow looked flickering and oscillating like fire.

"Someone with a torch wandering around here?"

The distant glow between the trees aroused Victor’s curiosity, and he decided to head in the direction of the flickering fire. Maybe it was someone lost, or maybe it was the group hunting the evil spirit.

His torch lit the way as he made his way through the forest, and for the time being there was no sign of any Blights.

After some time following the torch that seemed to be about thirty meters ahead of him, Victor noticed that the sounds he had heard so much before had become quieter rather than louder in the stillness of the forest, it was as if the sounds had dissipated into the shadows between the trees, and the sound of creaking branches dominated everything. Still, Victor continued.

As he followed that source of light, Victor noticed that the flickering glow began to act strangely. It seemed to start moving irregularly between the trees all of a sudden, as if the person carrying the torch was running away or staggering around injured. This increased Victor’s sense of urgency to reach out and offer help if necessary.

The torch led Victor along a winding path deeper and deeper into the forest. It wasn’t very different from the one he naturally followed when looking for the clearing mentioned by the woodcutter Clovis. However, the darkness around him became gradually greater, mainly because the clouds that covered the sky that morning were very dark, perhaps indicating the approach of a storm, but the light of the torch served as a beacon in the midst of the impenetrable darkness.

The uneven ground, covered in roots that protruded from the earth, didn’t stop the determined Victor from continuing to walk.

Finally, after a chase that seemed to last an eternity in that dark and silent environment, the glow abruptly stopped. Cautiously, Victor approached and noticed that it was indeed a person he had been following all this time, but the light this person had been carrying had disappeared from one moment to the next.

Even so, there was a person in front of Victor, in the middle of the forest and the fog, and as much as this person was dressed in dark clothes and a hood that obscured its face, Victor couldn’t ignore it. So he raised his torch, shining it on this person’s back, and said:

"Hello?" Victor called out, his voice echoing loudly. "Do you need any help?"

The figure didn’t answer immediately, but just stood there, as still as a statue. Victor realized that something wasn’t right, so he placed his right hand on the hilt of his sheathed sword, and his curiosity drove him even closer.

"Are you lost?" He insisted.

When Victor took a few steps forward, the person finally raised its hands and removed its hood. They turned sideways and looked partially back, revealing themselves to be a dark-skinned man with skin as smooth as a jade vase. However, this was no ordinary man, he was surprisingly familiar to Victor and also to anyone in Agocester Village, after all, there was a statue in his honor in the center of the village square.

"Elban?" muttered Victor, shocked to see that face again.

The man in front of him smiled enigmatically, his dark eyes twinkling. He didn’t say a word, just watched Victor, but Elban’s features were alive.

Suddenly, the air around Victor vibrated subtly, an almost imperceptible hum that Victor felt more than heard something approaching. His survival instincts kicked in and, thanks to reflexes sharpened by his experience, Victor drew his sword at just the right moment to slice through a large vine that whipped towards him.

The sharp metal of the sword met the vine, splitting it into two pieces before it could hit him, and Victor jumped back.

At that moment, Victor aimed to his right, where the whipping vine seemed to come from, and he saw a humanoid creature about his height, but whose skin was shapeless, a clump of vines and plants. It had a head, eyes, a nose and a mouth, but its feet and hands were also made up only of thick tentacles of vines. Victor had no doubts and knew immediately that this was a Blight.

At that moment, Victor finally looked around and realized that, somehow, he was in the center of the clearing he was looking for. He had been drawn there by the light he was following.

It was then that Victor’s eyes returned to the dark-skinned man, but the mysterious-looking man had already disappeared.

Victor was stunned for a few moments, because the man he saw was undoubtedly the Hero Elban, and such an unexpected reunion between Victor and Elban evoked memories of a time that Victor hardly remembered anymore, memories about the fateful day that Victor, Elban and the other heroes were brought into this world, all of them just thirteen years old.

However, before these memories could dominate Victor’s mind and distract him from the battle, he shook his head, momentarily dispelling them.

"There is no time for nostalgia." Victor said to himself and turned his gaze to the Blight in front of him.