CH923

They checked a few more houses from there and found mostly the same.

Mostly.

Nothing looked taken. There was still fresh food to be found and the enchantments around still held a trickle of power, yet occasionally, small things stood out. A knocked-over glass or chair, items and food that looked more like they had been thrown than spilled. While in the cases of houses with opened doors and windows it could be chalked up to animals getting in, that couldn’t explain all of it, painting a subtle yet worrying picture of whatever had happened to the people living there and leaving the two to walk back in silence where most of them had already regrouped, leaving Ben to count heads at the end.

Just one missing then. Abel.

The one among them he needed to worry about the least, he still poked around the rest of their memories to see if any of them had spotted her in their own investigations before speaking up.

“All of you, sit tight. I’ll grab our last member and then from there we’ll get moving and discuss everything we’ve seen here.”

Even if there’s not much to discuss.

He’d found the same scenes in all of their minds and most had come to similar conclusions as he and Thera. Whatever had happened to the town had been recent, and the fact that the shifter had passed through it was on all of their thoughts, each of them drawing different conclusions.

Had whatever captured him done something or had Foast himself? Was it a coincidence he’d passed through an abandoned village, or was there some greater conspiracy at play, a proper reason for him to hide away without contacting the gods and sending them all on their tracking missions? All of their worries and his own swarmed his head as he went, eventually breaking into the other end of the village, seeing Abel there.

Normally expressive, her face had taken on a more neutral mask, her focus so great as she stared out that she didn’t immediately acknowledge him even as he reached her side.

“Abel, you okay here?”

“Of course I am,” she told him, still focusing off in the distance.

“Alright, well that looks like a lie. What did you find?”

“You’re a peeker, check my head yourself.”

“I know you’re not a fan of that and since you’re my friend, I’m asking. If you found something or if you have any thoughts, then tell me.”

“...You know, I don’t really get this world a lot of the time,” she sighed. “Don’t get me wrong, I like it here but you all treat life so heavily, you know? Usually, you can’t even kill a guy for trying to rob you without it being a big thing, but where I grew up, killing each other over food was just how the day would go, you know?”

“Yeah, your old reality… well, from what I can tell, it seemed tough.”

“I guess? I mean, good or bad, I don’t really care about that stuff but it was different and the old perv did a decent job trying to make sure I knew how it was different, the rules you all live by and the common sense and you know, I’m doing great at them. Fitting right in, and I don’t even mind the fact that I can’t just hunt someone that looks tasty enough most of the time, you know? Plus, every now and then I find some pals like you who don’t mind sharing a bit.”

“Well, what can I say, it’s interesting.”

“And I don’t know if I get that either,” she laughed. “But that’s okay. We’re both otherworlders, we’re not always going to fit in perfectly, and there might be things we’re going to have to learn along the way, even all these years later. But Foast, he’s native and at least as far as I can tell, even if he’s a pervert, the guy’s principled. At least, according to this planet’s principles. There’s things he wouldn’t do.”

“...Abel, where is this going?”

“You’re clever, Benny-boy. You must have noticed that everyone here disappeared around the time Foast passed through.”

“I did, yeah. I think most of the group picked up on that.”

“Get the impression your senses are pretty dull though, huh?”

“They're slowly improving, but overall, compared to yours? Yeah, they are.”

“Thought so. Don’t feel too bad about it though, it seems like it was too subtle for anyone else here to pick up either. I’m just too good.”

“Yeah? And what did you find?”

“Blood. Not spilt anywhere and the traces are maybe a day and a half old, but everyone who was here is definitely dead and it could only have been the perv who did it.”

“How sure are you?”

“Completely. No signs of panic around, right? But that makes sense because I can tell from the smell alone. Whenever his shape changes, so does his scent so it can be a bitch to keep track of if you aren’t as good as me, but I can follow it pretty easily. Shrinking and growing across this whole place. Small when he needed to get into places, probably when he wanted to hide too, and big when he wanted a bite.”

“You’re telling me he ate these people? Everyone in the village?”

“I don’t see any bodies, do you? And like I was saying before, the smell of blood…I told you nothing was spilt and that’s true but even without missing a drop, it’s gonna carry on your breath, you know? Only sign at all and even then, it only hung around ‘cause the air in some of these places is stagnant.”

“So a third tier killed and ate an entire village of people,” he said more definitively, rubbing at his eyes from the strain while Abel looked at him.

“But he wouldn’t do that. He may be a pervert, and a loser, and way, way weaker than me, but one of the first things he ever told me about his skill when I asked was that he doesn’t kill people for power. Maybe if he did then he would have been better than me and I was pretty interested in his ability until then, but that’s just not his thing.”

“I know it’s not,” he sighed. “I have been in his head after all, I’ve seen who he is which makes this so, so much worse than I’d wanted to hope.”

“Worse than killing a village?”

“Yeah, because you’re right. He wouldn’t do that, and since you don’t smell anything with him and he hasn’t contacted the gods, all of this really does wrap together to the worst possible option. When you guys fought, I couldn’t control him to make him stop but something else could, meaning there’s a demon on this stupid planet with the power to take over a third tier.”

With a range way greater than I have and the ability to dominate his composite soul.

He’d known it was possible from the start; he’d just spent the entire time hoping there was another answer, but it was time to give up on that belief. Whether it was the power of a demon contender or something that had crossed the threshold to the third tier themselves, they’d gotten control of one of the future gods of that world and one of the most powerful options among them at that.