Gazing toward Jody with a proud expression on her face, the world felt far less simple than several moments ago.

Opening and shutting my mouth repeatedly as I tried to think of the appropriate words, I finally spoke. “Listen, I’m really not trying to make any enemies. I appreciate your help, but...”

“No problem! I understand.” Jody nodded repeatedly.

“Good… with that in mind, can you maybe tone down the insults a bit?” I restated my desire in a more polite way. “I really don’t want to attract the hatred of everyone we come across.”

“Absolutely! No problem.” Jody responded with confidence, while smacking her chest with a open fist. Her head had never stopped moved up and down in agreement.

“… Why do none of these reassurances fill me with assurance?” I muttered while stared at the nodding girl across from me with a mild headache.

While it might be my illusion, I felt like I was talking to parrot that could speak enough of the language to reassure me everything would be fine… yet the parrot had zero understanding of what any of the words it said meant when put together.

“You don’t need to care about those idiot gypsies, anyway!” Jody soothed and encouraged, “Come on, I’ll introduce you to my guild!”

Listening to Jody casually insult King’s Prophet in a natural way, I knew my polite request had gone in one ear and out the other. Exactly what I expected from someone in a guild notorious for troublemaking.

Upon determining that Jody was effectively a bundle of trouble, my first thought is to abandon her. While I really did appreciate the consideration and care Jody had put into helping escort me and explain the situation, her acquaintance was going to make my job of finding and successfully warning Kara more troublesome.

“No- no… I’m good.” I shook my arms repeated in front of me, “I really need to find a way to contact Kara.”

Jody grabbed my hand and enthusiastically led the way. “Demon Slayers has plenty of people good at finding and contacting others! We’re experts at hunting down those who don’t want to be found.”

Listening to her ominous sounding words, I felt speechless.

There was definitely a story behind her joyfully spoken yet ominous dialogue. I couldn’t exactly refute her, but… the way she phrased it.

Experts at hunting people down…

Why does she make it sound like they’re a mafia tracking down debtors who’ve skipped town?

“Alright.” I weakly agreed with various worries.

Theoretically it sounded like a good idea, but why did it feel like I’d gotten aboard a thief’s ship?

“Great! I’ll introduce you to everyone!” Jody enthusiastically pulled me along, “It’s dangerous acting alone in this place. You should join Demon Slayers, you’ll love it.”

Suddenly understood why I seemed as though I’d gotten onto a thief’s ship. The main problem with a thieves’ ship isn’t that it’s difficult to get aboard. It that once you are on board, you’re a part of the thieves’ group and it was near impossible to get off.

“I’m fine!” I collected my bearings and refused her offer, “I’m not interest in joining any guilds, I would be grateful if you managed to find Kara’s location and informed me. The message is rather urgent, so I’d rather not waste too much time.”

“No way! It’s too dangerous in the wild.” Jody realized what I meant and stopped moving to scold me, “You don’t understand as you haven’t passed the previous zones, but it’s not something someone can reliably traverse on their own.”

“Relax, I have a sense of proportion and won’t do anything dangerous.” I stated, watching as her expression revealed that her thoughts clearly had not changed. “My ability is stealth-based. Perfect for traveling alone.”

While I didn’t particularly want to reveal the nature of my ability, revealing my level of strength was more troublesome. Without their help in finding Kara’s location, it’ll be difficult.

“That…” Jody was clearly hesitant to agree, but reluctantly nodded. “Okay- but you need to act really carefully.”

I had to forcefully stop myself from rolling my eyes and nodded in quiet agreement to her request.

Act carefully? Here in Hard Difficulty?

The request was completely ridiculous.

Do I seriously give off the impression that I’m that weak? If I cannot survive going off on my own, nobody in this zone would be able to survive even in a group…

“I’ll survive.” I replied without expanding on the topic further, “I would appreciate a location to head, though.”

“That’s easy! Leave it to me.” Jody patted her chest in reassurance.

As we had been chatting, we’d been walking back to Demon Slayer’s guild camp. I left interacting to the various people in the camp to Jody and decided to wait outside.

Getting too familiar with any guild isn’t necessarily a good idea in my position. It’s fine to get along with individuals in a specific guild, but interacting with the guild in an official capacity by entering their camp might be misunderstood.

…especially when the guild has as bad a reputation as the Demon Slayer’s guild does.

Only a short while later, Jody had returned with information. “Apparently, Kara went to hunt a griffin with a group of her elite. Its den is about a day’s walk.”

“What direction?” I quickly inquired.

Jody took out a map and handed it over. “The location is marked on here.”

Looking at the basic map of the surroundings, I quickly realized the value of this map. Specifically the map marked not only the dangerous places of the swamp, but also the location of various temples. On it was a red circle that marked the location needed to go.

“Thank you.” I mentally noted down the kindness.

Regardless of whether I wanted to or not, I owed her favor after this.

The value of a map even without dangerous locations marked and other important information is not to be underestimated. Thus, the value of one that noted down various dangerous locations and treasures is unparalleled. Guilds were constantly competing with one another in this place, this map’s would be worth far more to them than any number of artifacts in this zone.

Don’t underestimate the difficulty of creating maps in an unfamiliar location. It’s near impossible. Most likely, the only reason this map is even possible is the ability of someone in the Demon Slayer’s guild.

“Be careful, okay?” Jody said before pointing in a direction. “That’s the general direction to head.”

“Thank you for all the help, Jody.” I nodded and held out my hand.

Jody’s expression turned to surprise, “You remember my name?”

My outstretched hand was left untouched as she seemed preoccupied with her astonishment.

Ah… I forgot.

Jody hadn’t actually told me her name, nor had I asked for it. I found it with analyze.

I wasn’t sure how to respond to her question and could only cautiously answer, “Was I… not supposed to?”

“No, I’m just surprised.” Jody shook her head.

Relaxing as if I’d been pardoned from execution. It seems that she told me her name whenever we’d met in the past. If she hadn’t, that would’ve been awkward.

Shaking hands and saying goodbye to her, I set off toward the griffin’s den. Only to pause at the entrance to the swamp.

Staring down at the mucky and gunky water, I immediately decided against travel wading through it. Why did this place have to be a swamp? I hate the feeling of traveling through normal water for long periods of time… not to mention mud and gunk in a swamp.

I would make an artifact to try and walk on water or something… but I don’t have any of the tools. Going back to make new tools isn’t really acceptable at this point either.

Ugh… I’m going to have to go walking through this gunky disgusting water aren’t I.

I think I’d rather fight against a dragon.

Gritting my teeth, I stepped into the water and began to wade through it.

Kara! You’d better appreciate this!

After scolding the world to high heaven for the terribleness that was this swamp, I began to wade through it. Occasionally climbing a tree to take a break from the water and confirming my direction was correct, I continued traveling.

Although the map suggested avoiding some dangerous regions, I couldn’t care less about the danger. If it meant getting out this swamp quicker, I’d rather deal with a bit of danger. Although I never actually encountered the danger the map was talking about though. Despite traveling through those marked as dangerous regions. Either I’m powerful enough that the cause of danger knows to avoid me, or my unnoticed passive worked and they didn’t notice my existence.

By the time I reached the griffin’s den, it was nearly sundown.

Fortunately, the griffin’s den had a small incline that meant it was relatively dry… or maybe it was because of the incline that this was the griffin’s den. Regardless, I walked toward the center of the island.

Along the way to the center I found the stripped down remained of what… might be a griffin. Honestly, it’s only a pile of meat and bones and I’m no expert on anatomy of griffins. It’s certainly large enough to be a griffin, though.

As I approached closer to the center of the island, I found traces of battle and determined that Kara had probably already been here and fought with the griffin already.

After a battle, it’s likely they stayed in the area to rest afterward. I’m definitely not that far behind. I should search the area for clues.

The first place I decided to search was the griffin’s den… or maybe it’s an extremely large bird’s nest. It’s probably just an extremely large bird’s nest.

It is at the center of the island, though. So maybe there are some clues around it. I doubt Kara completely ignored it…

Hmmm… If I yelled from here, the entire island could probably hear me. If Kara’s still here, she’ll probably investigate.

“Anybody here?!” I yelled out as I approached the large bird’s nest.

A screech resounded from the air. Looking up toward the sky, a griffin radiating hostility was flying above.

Huh… I guess Kara didn’t successfully kill it then.

Suppose it doesn’t really matter to me.

Hear the griffin screech once again, it dove toward me. The griffin was filled it’s murderous intent.

Oi, I didn’t do anything to you.

Watched as the monster steadily approached in a frontal air-dive, I decided to activate petrifying eyes and deal with it.

I’ll just save Kara the trouble of dealing with it.

The griffin rapidly turned to stone and crashed into the floor beside me.

Whelp, that was underwhelming easy.

As I was celebrating my victory an odd, dangerous sensation rushed over my body. The danger was different than any I’d sensed before.

Who!

I immediately turned toward the sensation and prepared for combat. It felt like I was being watched by something dangerous.

My eyes scanned the surroundings carefully, yet I saw nothing.

The sensation of danger disappeared, but I wasn’t sure why, it could be whatever was watching me had hidden themselves more carefully. They also might’ve stopped watching upon realizing I could sense them.

Regardless, I kept my guard up. I hadn’t expected to feel any sort of dangerous situation in the Hard Difficulty zone.

In fact, I hadn’t fallen into any life threatening situation in awhile. The sensation that had all but completely disappeared from my daily life had reappeared here.

I underestimated this place.

Seems Jody was right, I should be careful here. I completely dismissed the danger due to the fact those weak people were still alive. It might be entirely because they’re weak that they’re still alive, though.

They’re simply not worth the effort for anything actually dangerous to deal with them.

I won’t make that mistake again.