Free Web Novel“Miss Luna, welcome back...”
Once she had finished handing over the things Vieya needed, the receptionist turned toward the adventurer party Fairy’s Wings. Her brown eyes swept across them, her voice warm and polite, her smile gentle enough not to offend.
“Did you... perhaps run into a lava slime during your expedition?”
“Can this commission be delayed for a while?”
Luna stormed up to the counter, snatched the cup of tea offered by the receptionist, drank it down to moisten her throat, then raised her blue eyes to fix the receptionist with a stare as sharp as a knife. If she weren’t a woman, she might have been mistaken for a rejected suitor back to demand answers. freeweɓnovēl.coɱ
“And I want to know—who exactly was the initiator of this commission?” Luna ground her teeth.
Hearing her severity, unease pricked at the receptionist’s heart.
She lowered her head and quickly flipped through the ledgers as if searching for something. After a long while she finally looked back up, her face dark.
“Miss Luna, this commission came down from the Royal Capital. But the patron’s information is encrypted. My authority doesn’t permit me to see it.”
The receptionist closed the book with a sigh, glancing at the adventurers in the hall whispering among themselves, their eyes flicking toward the counter, and at the Fairy’s Wings members trying to find a place to rest.
“Forgive me... could you tell me what happened out there? It seems like something needs to be reported above.”
Luna fell silent for a moment, then downed the rest of her tea, wiped the moisture from her lips.
“The request was to investigate the place where the First Hero fell—Mount Aisa, the mining town deep in the Monster Forest—and, ⊛ Nоvеlιght ⊛ (Read the full story) if possible, to seek any traces connected to the First Hero.”
“And... what then? Did something terrible happen?” The receptionist’s brows drew together.
Leaning against the counter, Luna turned her back on her, looking instead at her teammates.
“When we first entered Mount Aisa, everything seemed normal. There were fewer monsters than we expected. Everyone thought maybe the Hero’s battle had drawn most of them away, leaving us with the scraps.”
“But the heart of the commission was finding traces of the First Hero. So even so, we didn’t let our guard down. After clearing the few monsters nearby, we split up to go deeper into the town.”
“The strange part was this: that place was where the Hero and the Demon King fought three years ago. Yet Mount Aisa’s buildings were almost untouched. Not heavily damaged at all. But... we didn’t find a single living soul in the town.”
“No destruction?” The receptionist blinked. “But our guild still preserves records of the Forest after that battle. More than half of it was destroyed. How could that be?”
A town that should have been leveled, preserved perfectly?
“We noticed it too, so we raised our alert. We regrouped in the town, confirmed each other’s conditions.” Luna paused, then continued. “No one was affected by any abnormal status, I can say that for sure. Otherwise I wouldn’t be standing here before you.”
She spread her hands.
“Still, for safety we decided to move as one. And to withdraw before nightfall, return to the outer edge, and resume in the morning.”
“A thoughtful choice. Truly the mark of an experienced veteran party,” the receptionist said, professional instinct prompting her to praise.
Luna looked at her deeply. Instead of being pleased, she only gave a bitter smile.
“If only things were so simple. When we prepared to withdraw from Mount Aisa and return to the outer edge to reconsider our plan... that’s when it happened.”
“Do you know what we saw before leaving?”
Suddenly she grew agitated. Though she tried to keep calm, her trembling hands betrayed her.
The entire hall was listening now. Even Vieya felt a flicker of curiosity. What could shake a seventh-tier adventurer like this?
And most importantly—three years ago, Vieya herself had awakened in that very town.
Back then it had been in ruins, pocked with countless pools of stagnant water.
The town had been destroyed only recently, yet when she woke the broken walls were already covered in moss, slick as if aged for years.
Later, when she left the Forest and reached a human village, she read in the papers that less than three months had passed since the First Hero’s death.
Meanwhile, Fairy’s Wings had failed to find a free table. In the end they had no choice but to sit at Vieya’s, where there were fewest people.
“Sorry, miss. Could we rest here a bit?” asked a polite golden-haired girl.
“...”
Vieya didn’t speak, only nodded slightly.
Maybe it was Flaviel’s lingering influence, but she tended to be gentler toward golden-haired girls now.
It was a feeling hard to explain. Like raising a puppy by your side all through childhood. One day it grows old and dies. You grieve, your heart aches. Afterward, you might think of it from time to time, but you don’t raise another—because you know it won’t come back. Yet when you see a starving stray in the street, where once you would have walked past without a thought, now you stop, sharing a piece of your food.
With Vieya’s consent, the golden-haired girl whispered thanks and beckoned her companions over.
Vieya held Jasmine. Jasmine held the black cat. The cat yawned.
They gave off a casual, languid air, a beauty to envy—completely at odds with the tense, heavy atmosphere of the hall. Two extremes, side by side.
“Perhaps you won’t believe it,” Luna said quietly. “But I saw the Hero who was supposed to be dead. In Mount Aisa.”
The entire hall went silent. Nothing but breathing could be heard.
Even the receptionist’s face froze. Her professionalism was carved into her bones, but confronted with such news, it still felt absurd, unreal.
“Miss Luna... could it be you were mistaken? Or perhaps it was a monster skilled in disguise?”
“At first, I thought the same. But the dead Hero walked toward us of her own accord. Our hearts nearly stopped.” Luna drew a deep breath, pointing at her chest.
“She attacked us. With her broken holy sword, she drew a boundary on the ground, creating a domain—”
“Wait!”
Vieya, silent until now, suddenly spoke. She set Jasmine down on a chair and stepped toward Luna, her eyes strange.
“You mean... you saw the dead Hero attacking you?”
