"Curse? It was a curse?"

I nod my head and say.

"Yes. Sonia here is the one noticing it by the smell of the mana in the air."

I pat Sonia's head and hear her humming happily.

"We are lucky that we take care of the curse before it can settle in this place. There will be a lot of casualties if that happens."

"I see. Can you tell me what kind of curse this is? Is the curse deadly?"

"Deadly? Yes. However, the curse is a slow-acting curse that eats away someone's body from the inside out."

I can see a cold fury inside Lord Adrian's eyes. It looks like he is not a person to have explosive anger but rather a cold fury. That makes him even more dangerous. Beware of the person with a few words, or so the saying goes.

"I see. I see. A curse is something that can only be cast, right? Someone dares to attack us, huh?"

"Not really."

I decide to interfere before he decides to go on a wild goose chase.

"Pardon me?"

"A curse can also happen when a massive amount of negative energy is piled in one place, giving birth to a curse. The curse will start weak, but it will grow and spread."

"Just like this curse."

"That's right. However, that doesn't mean the chance of someone cursing this place is zero, no. I have a feeling the chance of this is a human doing is bigger than the first option."

He nods his head and says.

"Heir Gwyndolin, as the Lord of Baxter family, I ask you to help us in this matter."

Lord Adrian kneels in front of me and offers his right hand. This gesture is the most humiliating gesture in the noble society of the Gipan Kingdom. It is saying that you are powerless and need someone else to fix your problem.

A noble society is a proud society. Asking for help can be considered a weakness by some people. The south did not care if someone asked for help, but even then, this gesture was entirely different.

I take his hand and help him stand up. That means I accept his plea and will help him.

"You don't need to do this, you know? I will help you even when you do not do this."

"No. Doing anything else than this is an insult to your effort in helping me and my people. You have done a lot for us and now it is my duty to compensate you."

I release a sigh and say.

"Very well. First thing first, I need to ask something."

"Anything."

"Do you have a magician around here? A curse master is better. I need three of them."

"We did not have a curse master but we have a master magician. My wife is a master magician. As for the other… I have a few people that can be called here. However, they need a couple of days to arrive."

"That is good enough."

I look at Lady Yuliana and say.

"My lady, do you know a spell to detect curses?"

"Yes. I have a few."

"Good. I want you to lead some of my men to search if there is a residue of curse around the city. I want you and the other magicians to check at least three hundred meters away from the wall."

"I can do that."

"Thank you. I need to search for the source of this curse and see if there are more than one of them."

"Are you searching for them alone?"

Silvanna says with a worried tone. I smile at her and say.

"You don't need to worry, heiress Silvanna. Sonia will come with me."

"Just the two of you?"

"No. You don't need to worry. I have a plan and you will see it tomorrow morning."

She looks at me for a few seconds before saying.

"Promise me. Promise me that you will not get hurt by whatever or whoever is causing this. You have done a lot for our family. If you get hurt, I don't think my family can repay the Cunningham family."

I smile at her, take her hand and gently kiss it. I can see her face get red. Cute.

"I promise."

~The next day~

"So, what is your plan? You promise my daughter that you will not go alone, right? Lady Sonia did not count."

"Don't worry, I will not break my promise."

I smile at Lord Adrian while we wait for Lady Yuliana and Heiress Silvanna. When they arrive, I quickly use a summoning spell.

"[Summon Guardian of Forest: Okami] [Summon Guardian of Forest: Fenrir]"

Two 2-meter tall wolves appear in front of me. One of them is a snow-white wolf with a strange red mark on its body, and the other is a pitch-black wolf with a blue flame at the end of its tail. They are the strongest summon [Druid] can call. They are level 180 summoned creatures.

While they are not the strongest summoned creatures, they are fast, can fly, and can deal a lot of damage to a boss-type monster.

I kneel next to them and let them lick my face. I laugh and give them a good petting. After a minute of petting, I get up and say.

"They will be my companion for today's mission. They are strong and have a strong instinct that lets them know if there are people coming to me. They are a perfect guardian for me."

Silvanna nods her head and smiles a little at me.

"Then I'm glad."

"Good. With this out of the way, I will leave you and the others to search if there is something wrong in the area."

"Wait! Me?"

"Yes. Your aura reading can be used not only to guess someone's talent and power, you can also use it to check if there is something going on in the area."

"How?"

"You never use it other than seeing if someone has a talent or not, huh?"

"Yes, that is correct."

I nod my head, take out a low-level magic item, a ring, from my guild base, and then bury it in the ground. After burying the ring in the ground, I walk away from it.

"Activate your talent and look at the ground."

She nods, and I can feel a slight mana spike coming from her eyes. She looks at the ground for a few seconds before she says.

"I see. I can see an aura coming from the ground."

"That's right. I need you to come with Lady Yuliana. She will be the one checking if there is a curse in the air and you will be the one checking if the source of the curse is close to the city or not."

She smiles at me and nods her head in determination.

"Leave it to me."

"Good. I will be leaving now."

I take out two necklaces and give one to Sonia. After a few minutes of teaching her how to activate that item, Sonia and I fly to the north with the two wolves following us from behind.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

|3rd POV|

While Sonia and Gwyn are busy checking if the other village and city get infected with the same curse, the Baxter family is busy checking if the curse is still around the city.

Lady Yuliana is the one leading them around the city wall while casting spell after spell to see if the curse is still in the air. It has been five hours since they start patrolling the city, and so far, they have encountered nothing. However, it changes when Yuliana's spell catches something.

"Wait! I feel something! Silvanna! Activate your talent!"

"Yes, mother!"

Silvanna activates her power and quickly looks around for a few minutes before her eyes catch something.

"There! The aura is coming from the ground that way! Quickly dig it up!"

Gwyn's men quickly dig the ground and find a skull in the ground. They found a human skull, but it was not a regular human skull. On the skull have an engraving of what looks like a runic pattern. Not only that, but the skull also releases a black miasma.

Silvanna releases a growl when she sees the skull.

"We can now tick off the chance it was a curse that was born from nature."

Jullian quickly took out the pouch Gwyn gave to him and put the skull inside. When the skull is stored inside the pouch, the others notice the air quality starts to change.

"What should we do next, my lady?"

Silvanna looks at Jullian and says.

"For now, we need to check if there are more than one skull buried on the ground. After that? I need to know who dares to do this and make sure they feel the consequences."

19.1k words / 20k words

LuxVonDeux

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