Sad, happy, and crazy

I didn't feel like testing out the new form I acquired at that moment but out of curiosity I looked at my adventurer card. The fact that my level rose by 3 making me level 6 didn't make me any happier at that moment either but at least I knew that I finished the job properly.

I transformed into my trusty owl form and took flight towards the buildings in the distance. It seemed that my destination was only a few kilometers away.

After flying some distance away from the pond I noticed many animals warily looking in the direction I was coming from. The 'mother' Griffin must have scared them away.

I kept flying straight without looking around too much. In a few minutes, I started seeing clearly where was I headed to. There was a pretty big village full of wooden houses beside one big church made of stone and beyond it ... a small castle stood on the hill?

Was that the noble's 'mansion' or did I make a wrong turn? No matter how you looked that was a castle.

I decided to ask some villagers first before I knocked on the wrong noble's door so I descended on some road and transformed into my human form when I was sure no one was looking.

After a two minute long treck I arrived at random house's doorstep and knocked while loudly saying:

"Excuse me, can I ask a few questions?"

"Comin'!"

A male voice answered my call. Soon there was a thud, the door opened and I could see a very muscular man come from behind it.

"Who are you lad? You a traveler?" The guy asked with a hint of suspicion in his voice seeing me wearing a mask. His hand hovered to the side of the door, probably preparing to take some weapon from behind it.

Before he got any weird ideas I raised my hands up and quickly answered:

"I am looking for the mansion of Baron Vessecc's. I got a package-"

I couldn't even finish my sentence before the guy looked like he lost a light in his eyes and he automatically answered:

"Ehhh… yes, this is the place you lookin' for. Just go up the hill to the castle 'mansion'."

Then he just he unceremoniously walked inside of his house and closed the door behind him.

Well, that was… weird.

There was no point in looking at the closed door in confusion so I set out towards the 'mansion'.

Contrary to the muscular guy's reaction I got surprised by how warmly was I greeted when I entered the center of the village.

"Oooh, a new face. Good day!" "Oh, a cool mask, lad!" "Welcome to the village!" "If you think of staying then there's a place in our house!" "Or you can stay at mine!"

I could only wave my hand in answer, not used to being the center of attention.

But not everyone was in such a great mood. I even dare say that the majority of the villagers looked kinda listless like that first gut I met. They walked and talked normally but there was something that made me think that that they weren't happy.

The fact that every male seemed to be extremely buffed was kinda weirding me out as well. Women were all very fit too.

More than half of the houses seemed empty though. Did something happen recently and if so, why some people are extremely happy and some people... not?

Not knowing the answer to these questions I proceeded to head towards the 'mansion'.

When I got close to it someone on the top of the gate noticed me getting near and shouted an order to open the gate. The sight of a steel gate five times the size of myself was very awe-inspiring.

When I told another muscular guard at the gate that I was sent from the guild in Axel with some packages I got promptly taken to the most important looking part of the castle-'mansion'. On the way, the guy kept merrily talking with me about various subjects varying from how Axel is doing, the weather on the way, to the monsters I've seen, etc.

Soon we reached another set of awe-inspiring doors but before we went in I got stopped, the door opened slightly and a woman in maid attire walked out.

"Thank you, adventurer-san, for making this difficult delivery. You will meet lord Vessec in a moment but could you hand over the packages so I can check the contents?"

There was some kind of meeting? I was probably running late because of this matter with Griffons. Because of them, my journey wasn't as efficient as I thought it would be.

"Can't I just give you those and be on my way? I got some stuff to do later today." I tried explaining my hurry but maid just 'gently' brushed off my question with:

"Please, the lord really wants to speak with you and express his gratitude. By the way,adventurer-san, what is your name?"

With no easy way out in sight, I handed over the packages and introduced myself normally to the maid. She made an elegant curtsy and walked back behind the door.

The guard standing by me started talking with me excitedly again while we waited. I only answered with half-sentences because I was trying to listen to what was going on behind the door. Some of the noises were worrying me.

Like really loud laughter and woman's sobbing sound a few seconds later?

I was about to try my chances of fitting through the little window on the side in my owl form but right then the door finally opened and I was greeted with a sight of a splendid long hall filled with armor stands and weapons.

At the back of it, there were two rows of people with three men on one side and three women on the other. Behind them stood two maids beside one man in pretty simple clothing that was sitting on a slightly decorated chair. All these people continued the muscular and fit fashion as the rest of the village.

The most important looking guy beckoned me to come so I unsteadily moved forwards.

"Adventurer Satou Kazuki-san, I welcome you to the house of the second-best farmer tribe in the world!"

Wait, what?

Farmer tribe? Did I hear incorrectly?

"We are second only to the farmers of this accursed Crimson Demon Clan! But they are just a magic freaks while we are pure, natural warriors capable of handling the land and its dangers with the power of our bodies!"

Crimson Demon farmers? Every sentence he made gave me more and more questions.

"But we did not gather here to boast to you about power…"

Haven't you done it just now?

"... but to thank you for your valiant deed of traversing vast distances in order to help us! Your contribution might be the reason why our tribe will still stand one hundred years in the future!"

I only delivered three letter-sized packages to them. How would that help them so much?

Lord Vessec didn't seem to notice the constant confusion I had on my face and merrily continued.

"We haven't heard of any merchant caravans nearby so that means you must've traveled the great distance alone or you took the Death Trail by yourself! Which is it, hmm?"

"By Death Trail you mean-"

"The path through the harsh marshland where death awaits at every corner. After leaving the muddy road it then transforms into rocky climb teeming with poisonous spiders and their sticky webs where at each second another gargantuan creature can jump out at any moment and using its herculean strength to break every bone of your body. Lastly, all throughout the journey, there's a constant threat of Death from Air!"

That sounded about right. A little bit hyped up description but close enough for me to nod affirmatively. This erected a round of gasps from everyone besides the two maids.

By the way...Luna-san… now that I thought about it… how was I supposed to make it here with my team? There's no way we could've completed that journey. Did she not know how it actually looks like? I will definitely ask when I come back to the guild.

Unknowingly to my mental struggles the Lord continued.

"Then please, pray tell, how did you come out alive! We had to stop sending our own teams of first-grade farmers because they never came back!"

If you were sending farmers then what did you expect - was what my brain wanted to say but judging by what the guy was saying the farmers here weren't the same as in my old world.

"We also couldn't send a larger force because more than half of our tribe is currently contributing to the war with Demon King!"

Farmers were definitely something else in this world.

Lord stopped talking, expecting me to finally answer my question but I didn't know if I wanted to divulge my secrets to a complete stranger.

"Please, tell us how!" The Lord seemed to lose his patience with me not saying anything.

I didn't see how I could fool my way out of this one and I was kinda pressed on time so I just said:

"I flew."

Then I transformed into an owl form and gave a presentation of quick aerial movement after which I came down and transformed back into a human again.

They all seemed surprised and gave a round of applause to my moves. The people gathered around were all in awe but they didn't speak themselves. The Lord guy, on the other hand, seemed to slump down immediately, probably thinking that this won't solve his problem indefinitely but he quickly bounced back and said:

"That is an amazing ability, Satou Kazuki-san! Can you, by any chance, teach it to someone? For a price of course."

I just truthfully shook my head in answer and thankfully Lord took my 'word' at the face value. I couldn't teach someone the power that I got from the gods.

"Then, would you consider making this delivery every day? The reward can be slightly higher, but with half the village on the battlefield we can't handle all the fields and our profits plummeted. We started to have financial problems ever since that route to Axel got devastated by monsters and merchants deemed the route to our village to be too long to profit from. The war situation also harmed our village greatly."

Even with my flight ability, there were two Griffins to think about in the way. But there was no reason to reject it outright.

"I will think about it but under one condition."

The audience gulped while waiting for the rest of the sentence.

"I want to know what is inside those packages."

…

I couldn't believe what I just heard.

The Lord said that he needed to provide some background story and started describing the situation in the village from the day that half of the villagers got sent to the front lines.

That day the entire population gathered in the middle of the village and held a giant rock-paper-scissors tournament. Random pairs were called out and they had a match.

Whoever won got conscripted and sent to the frontlines.

What baffled my mind was the fact that the people that lost got extremely upset because they wanted to go for the war.

Shouldn't that be an exact opposite?!

But that wasn't even the beginning.

After half of the village departed to the front line, some of the villagers deserted. But not from the army, but the village itself and went straight to the battlefield!

The people that stayed behind had to destroy half of the fields because they couldn't handle the vicious attacks of vegetables.

Yes, he told me that vegetables attack people!

I was about to laugh about his joke I realized they had an extremely serious face at that moment so I couldn't!

Then he said that there were even some major casualties both in the village and on the battlefront so the Lord started worrying about the future of the tribe.

It came out that the remaining villagers were so depressed about not being able to fight Demon King that not a single child was conceived during the last two years.

A priest in a local church was worried too and departed with a merchant caravan to Axel and recently came back with a prophecy he heard from the higher-ranked archpriest.

Supposedly a goddess descended to the land of the living and the answer to all children-making related problems was a charm taken directly from that goddess now walking among the living

And then Lord has shown me the contents of one package.

...

It was a pair of panties with a hole in the middle so "one can wear them during the 'process'" and it greatly increases the desire to do 'the deed'.

My mind was blown at that point but the Lord continued with a smile that since they received a few 'charms' there had been three confirmed pregnancies. Out of 22 'charms', they got so far. Though all of them worked fine as far as the 'desire' part of the charm went.

The reason why some people were so merry in this village was that they went at it like wild rabbits each night!

The Lord even commented on why they want daily deliveries. He 'discovered' that the 3 successful deeds happened when the 'charm' was 'fresh' and the reason why can't he buy more of them at once is that the 'goddess' can handle creating only one 'charm' per day. They have already bought a few months' worth of 'charm subscription' but needed to pay for each individual delivery.

…

This entire story sounded like a giant load of bullcrap. I suspected a heavy involvement of Axis Cult and asked for the name of the goddess that was supplying the 'charms'.

I almost immediately flew out of the window at the highest speed possible when I heard the answer.

"Goddess Eris."