As they walked out of the kitchen the children stared at the pile of ash in the middle of the main room.
The young boy Chronos was taking care of ran forward, digging through the ash pile he brought out a gold chain. That's right he said his father was wearing a gold necklace, this must be the same one as there were no other gold items in the pile.
The boy dusted it off and put it on. The look in his eyes told Chronos that he was determined to fulfil his father's responsibility.
"Lass what can you tell us about what happened here?" Chronos asked as they sat at a table they had brought from the kitchen.
"It's not lass, my name is April." She glared at Chronos, but he didn't know why calling her lass had upset her. "Yesterday afternoon a few men in black robes came and demanded we hand over people to be sacrifices or they would destroy the village, but the chief refused."
Nodding, the young boy said, "My father would never betray the villagers."
"At first they left but they came back this morning with a monster and started attacking the village, following the rules everyone below 14 gathered in the village hall. They were fighting for a long time then we heard the waste buffalo explode and we knew things were getting bad."
Chronos interrupted her, "What do you mean the waste buffalo exploded? We aren't from the wasteland, so we don't know much about the creatures here."
"Oh, well waste buffalo are like big cows. They have short horns and thick fur which gives them great defense but if they take a serious injury, they point their horns at the target and blow up their insides. This makes their head fly off and crush their enemy. The adults say it's even strong enough to injure a noble, but we have... uh... had a druid that helped us control them." April explained.
"So that's why the buffalo corpses were hollowed out but I don't remember seeing their skulls. Were they collected after the battle? And if they had time to collect them, why was there a rogue abomination in the village hall?" Chronos thought.
"What do you mean they can injure a noble?" Sariah asked.
"I'm not sure but my mother always said that they could seriously injure a lord. That means they can protect us from nobles right." Another child said.
Ah, so they could injure a fourth rank being, that was really impressive. From what Chronos had seen, many of those buffaloes had only been in the second rank. Even if they sacrificed their lives, injuring a fourth rank was a great feat.
The creatures of the wasteland might not have great power, but they had their own ways of protecting themselves. Chronos made a mental note not to underestimate them again.
This made more sense than claiming they could injure a noble, many nobles were not as strong as Chronos' parents but now that he thinks about it almost all landed nobles had some level of power. Chronos was sure there was some secret regarding landed nobles, but he would have to wait to find out what it was.
"What happened after the waste buffalo exploded?" He asked.
"After the first explosion the chief came running in and took us to the kitchen. It surprised me when he moved the oven and stuck all of us in the cellar. He said that if anybody survived, they would come to get us, but if nobody was alive that the tunnel at the back would open and let us out after a day.
That was early this morning." She sadly explained.
That still left a lot of questions unanswered.
How many of the black robed priests had died before losing control of the abomination? Where had the surviving priests taken the corpses outside? And why did they leave the buffalo corpses behind?
The corpses inside the hall had all been gathered by the abomination but there just weren't enough corpses in the pile to match the number of houses.
As for whether the abomination had been released, it was a peak third rank creature. Chronos refused to believe that they would leave such a strong combat force behind willingly.
"We should leave soon. The black robed priests might come back to try and collect the abomination again." Chronos stated.
"Can we take some treasures from our houses?" Asked one of the children.
"Sure, but only what you can carry, we have a long walk ahead of us. Our camp is on the edge of the swamp." Lyla said.
The children rushed out of the hall to scavenge what they could from what remained of their homes with Sariah and Gregory following them. The only one left behind was the chief's son.
He had bear ears marking him as a bearfolk and with the sad look on his face it was hard not to try comforting him.
Kneeling down Chronos spoke with him, "What's your name?"
"Birk, sir."
"You don't need to call me sir, is there anything else you want to take with you?"
He shook his head.
Chronos really wasn't good at talking to kids, he'd already run out of ideas about what to say.
"Hey, is there something you want to do in the future?" Asked Lyla.
He thought about it for a long time before answering.
"I want to get stronger. If I'm not strong enough then my friends might die."
She nodded, "I see, that's a noble goal and I know someone who can help you start learning how to grow stronger. Chronos here is very strong and capable in combat, he can teach you how to fight if you ask him nicely."
Birk looked at the big werewolf but seemed hesitant to ask for help. Before he could work up the courage the other children returned with their mementos.
"Thank you for waiting, we've gathered everything we want to take with us." April said.
"Alright let's get going." Lyla said as she led them out of the village in the direction of the swamp.
This time instead of exploring the wasteland they made a straight line for their camp but had to stop several times so the kids could rest. Along the way they saw various animals and beasts that they didn't recognize, but the children were more than happy to give detailed explanations about what they could do.
It really surprised them to find out that nearly every creature in the wasteland had some way to defend itself from stronger beings while those that lacked such strength were either inedible or nearly impossible to catch.
The wasteland really was a land of extremes.
Like this it took them most of the afternoon to reach their camp and had written a thick sheet of notes about the various animals and beasts they had seen on the way.
The kids had also become much happier as they helped out. Having something to distract them seemed to be helping a lot or maybe kids from the wasteland were just more durable than those from the city.
"Whooaa, you live in a tree?" Exclaimed one of the more excitable kids as the tree outpost came into view.
"Yep, unfortunately we don't have enough beds for everyone so some of us will have to sleep on the floor." Lyla was doing a good job of guiding the kids.
"That's okay, we're used to sleeping without bedding. It happens during the summer a lot." one of the older kids explained.
"Oh, what happens in the summer that stops you from sleeping in a bed?" Sariah asked.
"The bugs come out and start eating our cloth when it gets hotter. We have to rub the stinky leaves into our clothes to stop them." Said another child.
"Which leaves are those?" Sariah pressed.
If there were cloth eating bugs coming, then they needed to know how to stop them. April reached into her pocket and took out a few leaves that Chronos recognized.
"Hahaha." He laughed as he saw the fjolleblad. "I guess it does have a use." He said with a chuckle.
As the kids climbed into the tree Chronos realized that the small quarters would be very cramped unless they expanded it. He started taking out the spare tents to expand the shelter when an old woman's voice came from behind him.
"What are you doing with those noisy brats?"
Chronos whipped around drawing his axes as fast as he could. The old woman was standing only 2 meters from him, and he hadn't sensed her at all. That shouldn't be possible as he could sense everything happening around him within 9 meters of himself.
Standing in front of him was a green skinned wrinkly old woman with hair like dried vines. She had leaves woven into her hair and was wearing what looked like old leather, in her hand was a walking stick taller than she was with a bird's skull hanging from it.