Chapter 28: The Otaku Visits a Town (And Pretends He's Not the Problem)
The road north was… annoyingly normal.
Meliodas had expected cracked stone paths haunted by crows, muddy ruts full of bones, and at least one ominous sign that read *TURN BACK OR DIE* in dramatic medieval lettering.
Instead, he got:
A compact dirt road with trimmed shoulders.
Fence posts that weren't leaning like depressed drunks.
Irrigation channels that looked recently cleared.
And fields that actually looked like people cared if the crops lived.
"…It's clean," Meliodas muttered.
Kaelen glanced at him. "Southval's route is maintained. It feeds three baronies. If the road collapses, trade collapses."
Meliodas blinked.
"…Right. Of course. Logistics. Feudal capitalism."
Kaelen didn't understand half of that, but he understood the tone. "It's also why patrols are common."
The nameless mage—still walking behind them, hood up, expression guarded—kept his distance from Kaelen without being asked. Not fear. Calculation.
Bud stayed palm-sized on Meliodas's shoulder, quiet and recovering, his light dimmer than usual after what he'd done at the village. He wasn't sleeping, exactly.
He was listening.
He was always listening.
Meliodas's {Hyperawareness} stayed slightly open like a half-closed door. Not because he loved paranoia—he didn't—but because he didn't trust the quiet.
The quiet in this world had teeth.
They walked in a steady rhythm for nearly an hour. Wind rolled over the fields. Birds called. Somewhere far away, a farm dog barked like the world still believed in boring problems.
And then—
Everything softened.
Not in a magical way.
In a predator way.
Birds stopped mid-song.
The wind didn't stop, but it stopped feeling like comfort.
Kaelen's posture tightened. His hand drifted toward his sword as if his tutors' lectures had climbed out of his memory and taken control of his spine.
The mage slowed half a step.
Bud's claws pressed lightly into Meliodas's coat.
Meliodas didn't look around quickly. He didn't want to telegraph alert.
Instead, he let {Observation Haki} stretch—thin, careful, like invisible thread.
Shapes.
Multiple.
Moving with purpose.
Not panicking.
Not hunting like starving animals.
Marking space.
"Territory," the mage said quietly, voice like he was afraid of giving the air too much confidence. "We're entering Silverwood Verge."
Kaelen nodded once. "That's where the silver wolves roam."
Meliodas looked at him. "You say that like it's common knowledge."
"It is," Kaelen replied, and then added—because he was a prince, and princes had to justify knowing things—"Traders talk. Knights talk. Tutors talk. And if you're royal, you get taught what can eat you."
Meliodas couldn't argue with that.
He opened his mouth—
Then shut it when a shape stepped onto the road.
A wolf.
But not the kind that belonged in Earth's forests.
This one was the size of a tiger. Lean, muscular, fur a pale silver that caught sunlight like metal dust. Its eyes were pale blue and intelligent in a way that wasn't fully human but also wasn't fully animal.
It didn't snarl.
It didn't bark.
It just watched.
Then another emerged from the treeline.
Then another.
Five wolves total, forming a loose crescent across the road. Not a tight line. Not a wall.
A message.
Kaelen spoke softly, almost respectfully. "Silver wolves… wind-aspected magical beasts."
Meliodas hesitated. "Magical beasts are… like monsters?"
The wolves' ears flicked.
Kaelen's gaze snapped to him—half confusion, half disbelief. "No. Not monsters. Magical beasts are beasts that have absorbed mana. They're part of the world."
The mage gave Meliodas a look like he was trying to decide if Meliodas was genuinely ignorant or performing.
Meliodas felt heat creep up his neck.
'…I talked without thinking.'
He'd just asked a question like someone who hadn't grown up here.
Which he hadn't.
But he'd been trying really hard not to look like that.
He cleared his throat. "Right. So. Not monsters. Just… mana animals."
Kaelen nodded, but his eyes stayed slightly narrowed, as if filing it away for later.
Bud sent a faint pulse through their bond—not words, but the feeling carried meaning.
He's proud.
Meliodas understood anyway.
Then the ground vibrated.
Not an earthquake.
A heavy step.
A sixth wolf emerged.
This one was enormous—horse-sized. Broad shoulders, thick neck, mane-like fur around its head and spine. Its silver coat was darker, streaked with faint lines that looked like wind currents frozen into hair.
The alpha.
Air moved differently around its claws. Grass bent and flattened without being touched. Dust lifted in thin spirals.
The alpha didn't rush them.
It lowered its head slightly, and the wind gathered.
A blade of compressed air snapped forward—clean, sharp—and carved a trench across the road a few paces in front of Meliodas.
Not aimed at flesh.
A warning line.
Kaelen exhaled slowly. "It's telling us to leave."
The mage's eyes stayed on the alpha. "They don't kill travelers unless provoked. If we turn back now, we'll live."
Meliodas stared at the trench and felt something in him spark—something embarrassingly childish.
A horse-sized silver wind wolf.
If this were an anime, this would be the part where the protagonist earned a legendary mount.
Then...he froze for a moment remembering that the system shop also has many mounts he didn't buy yet.
He actually had to fight the urge to grin.
Bud's claws tightened again.
This time the pulse felt like: 'Something's wrong behind them.'
Meliodas's {Danger Sense} didn't scream.
But {Observation Haki} did something subtler.
It caught the alpha's emotion.
Not anger.
Not hunger.
Protectiveness.
Focused past Meliodas. Past the road. Deeper into the trees.
The alpha wasn't guarding territory from them.
It was guarding something from something else.
Meliodas's eyes narrowed.
Then the alpha inhaled and exhaled a gale.
Wind blasted forward—hard enough to bend trees and rip loose leaves into the air like thrown knives.
Kaelen braced, cloak snapping.
The mage stumbled and caught himself.
Meliodas leaned into it and didn't move.
The alpha's pale eyes narrowed further.
Deterrence hadn't worked.
The pack shifted.
Not toward Meliodas.
Toward the treeline behind them.
And then the forest exploded.
Eight shapes burst from the underbrush like living boulders.
Orangutans.
Except wrong.
They were the size of gorillas, arms thick as tree trunks, hands like clubs with claws that didn't belong on primates. Their fur was dark and matted, and their eyes were too bright—too aware.
They moved in coordination, fanning outward with purpose.
The alpha's claws flashed.
Wind blades launched in arcs, slicing bark from trees and cutting deep into the first attacker's shoulder.
The creature barely slowed.
Kaelen's voice went tight. "Those are—"
He stopped.
Because he didn't have a word yet.
The mage's face whitened. "Demonic beasts."
Meliodas's stomach tightened.
Not because he recognized the term.
Because he recognized the feeling—the wrongness in the air.
The same wrong smell that had been under the village smoke.
But he hadn't labeled it then.
He just knew it was wrong.
Now, here, in the open forest, with sunlight still warm on his skin, the wrongness was clearer.
Not animal.
Hungry in a way that wasn't natural.
The alpha lunged into the pack, wind snapping outward in a circular aura—thin blades spinning around it like a defensive storm.
One silver wolf yelped as claws raked its flank.
Meliodas moved.
He didn't draw Siren.
He didn't need a warning.
Moonsing slid free.
He stepped between a tiger-sized wolf and an incoming primate with {Chitin Slayer} speed that made the world stutter.
The primate swung.
Meliodas parried—flat, controlled—then slammed Moonsing's hilt into its jaw.
Bone cracked.
The creature spun sideways into a tree hard enough to make bark explode.
It didn't die.
It should've died.
But it didn't.
Meliodas felt his expression sharpen. "…Okay. Not normal."
Kaelen {Blink}ed to his side, blade flashing. He cut at tendons with clean precision, trying to disable rather than kill—because Kaelen had watched Meliodas do it at the village and assumed this was the correct method.
Meliodas didn't correct him.
He didn't have time.
Bud's aura pushed outward reflexively—faint, tired, but present.
The orangutans recoiled for half a second.
Not fear.
Discomfort.
Like something in them hated light.
Then something else pulsed.
A sharp command.
The orangutans surged again, coordination tightening.
Meliodas felt it.
Not from the beasts.
From somewhere deeper in the trees.
A watcher.
A controller.
Meliodas's {Third Eye} flickered—useless at this distance through trees, too many bodies in motion.
So he did the one thing he'd been avoiding since leaving the village.
He used the perk that turned the world into a manual.
{Knowledge Mage}.
The moment he focused on the wrongness, blue text unfolded at the edge of his vision.
Not dramatic.
Not poetic.
Just information.
And the instant the label settled into his mind, his blood went cold.
Not "demonic beasts" in the vague, folklore sense.
Not "cursed animals."
Not "monsters."
These were beasts with infernal corruption in their mana network.
And behind them—
A separate signature.
Humanoid.
Infernal.
His gaze snapped through the trees like a spear.
There—between two trunks, half-hidden, a thin figure in dark robes.
It wasn't attacking directly.
It was directing.
Blue text sharpened.
[ENTITY SCAN COMPLETE:
Classification: Lesser Demon
Threat Tier: Lesser Demon (Infernal)
Abilities Observed: Command Imprint, Corrosive Mana Projection, Fear Amplification
Sustainment: Requires anchor/contract to remain long-term.]
Meliodas's heart didn't race.
His mind went very still.
Because now he knew—cleanly, absolutely—what the village had been flirting with.
This was real.
This wasn't folklore.
This wasn't "maybe."
And something in him—something old, something from Earth's Marvel paranoia, something from the Birth World's survival logic—made a decision instantly.
Kill it.
Cleanse it.
Now.
He didn't shout.
He didn't announce.
He didn't turn it into a speech.
He just moved.
{Rush activated.}
Time thickened like honey.
Wind blades slowed in midair.
The orangutans' swings became readable.
Kaelen's {Blink} looked like a lazy ripple.
Meliodas crossed the distance to the trees in five long seconds, feet barely touching ground, coat snapping behind him.
The demon's head snapped up.
For a fraction of a second, its eyes flicked toward Bud—
And the demon flinched.
Not because Bud was threatening.
Because something in the demon recognized a type of light it didn't like.
It felt fear for a single heartbeat.
Then—humiliation at that fear.
Then anger.
Meliodas saw the emotional sequence like a comic panel.
Bud didn't feel fear.
Bud felt the demon's attention and responded with something hot and offended through the bond.
'How dare you look at me like that.'
Meliodas ended {Rush} and raised a hand.
A miniature sun formed above his palm.
Dense. Contained. Bright enough to make leaves glow gold.
The demon hissed, mouth opening, hands lifting—
Corrosive mana gathered.
Meliodas didn't let it launch.
He flicked the miniature sun forward.
It struck the demon's chest.
Light detonated inward.
Not an explosion outward.
A collapse.
The demon's form cracked, shadows tearing like burned paper.
It tried to retreat—tried to slip through the world the way the crack had tried to.
But it was too low-tier for that.
It was still bound by location.
Still bound by rules.
Meliodas stepped closer, face calm, voice flat.
"You're not anchoring here."
He pressed a second miniature sun directly into the demon's core.
The demon screamed.
It wasn't a human scream.
It was a sound like reality rejecting something rotten.
Light consumed it.
Then nothing remained but drifting ash that didn't fall so much as dissolve.
Behind him, the orangutans staggered.
Their coordination snapped like strings cut.
They became what they should've been from the beginning:
Animals with too much wrong inside them.
And the silver wolves—
The alpha seized the opening like it had been waiting its entire life.
It exhaled a gale that flattened trees.
Wind blades erupted from its claws in a full ring, shredding two orangutans at once.
The pack tore into the rest with brutal efficiency.
Within seconds, the forest was quiet again.
Quiet in the real way.
Not the predator way.
Meliodas turned back slowly.
Kaelen stood frozen, chest heaving, eyes wide.
The mage looked like he'd forgotten how to breathe.
Bud was still on Meliodas's shoulder, light faintly pulsing with something like satisfaction.
Meliodas walked back toward them, Moonsing lowered, not threatening.
Kaelen finally found his voice. "…That was a demon."
Meliodas nodded once, because lying would be pointless. "Yeah."
The mage swallowed hard. "You killed it with… sunlight?"
Meliodas hesitated, then answered carefully. "Light. Heat. Same family."
Kaelen's hands trembled, not from fear of Meliodas—something else.
A mix of relief and horror.
He'd been raised on stories where demons were catastrophe.
And he'd just watched his master erase one in seconds.
The mage's eyes kept darting to Bud.
To the tiny dragon.
Then to Meliodas again.
His face tightened with a thought he clearly didn't want to voice.
Meliodas recognized it anyway.
Familiar.
Tamed beast.
High-tier light contractor.
Something that explained why demons flinched.
Meliodas didn't correct him.
Not yet.
Not in front of the wolves.
Because the silver wolves were still watching them.
The alpha stood bloodied but upright, fur ruffled, wind still faintly coiling around its claws.
One tiger-sized wolf limped, flank torn open.
The alpha's gaze locked onto Meliodas—steady, evaluating.
Meliodas approached slowly, palms open.
No sword raised.
No aggression.
The alpha didn't move.
It didn't retreat.
It simply watched.
Meliodas crouched near the injured wolf first.
He activated {Scry} lightly—just enough to understand damage.
Torn muscle. No bone break. Heavy bleeding.
He formed a thin {Energy Constructs} lattice—transparent and faint—like a web over the wound.
Then he applied low-intensity heat from {Sun Fruit}, careful not to burn, just enough to sterilize and encourage closure.
The wolf flinched once.
Then steadied.
Kaelen stared like he was watching someone rewrite reality with their fingertips.
The mage's lips parted slightly, then closed. He looked unsettled.
Healing without potions.
Without ritual.
Without a circle.
Meliodas moved to the alpha next. Deeper cuts, but still survivable.
Same method.
No showmanship.
The alpha's breathing evened.
The wind around its claws softened.
Then, slowly, the alpha stepped aside.
Not surrender.
Permission.
A path deeper into the trees.
Meliodas followed.
The queen lay in a shallow hollow behind roots, curled protectively.
Her silver coat was damp with sweat and blood.
Two newborn pups pressed against her belly—tiny, blind, squeaking softly.
They looked ordinary. Fragile.
Just life.
The queen's flank had deep claw marks.
Meliodas repeated the healing. Lattice. Sterilize. Seal.
The queen's eyes—intelligent, exhausted—stayed on him the entire time.
When he finished, her breathing steadied.
The alpha lowered its head slightly.
Acknowledgment.
Respect.
Not submission.
Meliodas stood and exhaled.
"…I'm an otaku," he muttered quietly.
Kaelen blinked. "A what?"
Meliodas waved it off. "Never mind."
He looked at the pups again, then at the silver wolves, and the thought slipped out before he could stop it.
"If I didn't already have Bud, I'd be trying to make friends with you."
The alpha's ears flicked.
Bud sent a pulse of smug warmth through the bond.
Meliodas sighed. "…Yeah, yeah."
They backed away carefully, leaving the wolves to their hollow and their recovering queen.
Only when the forest line thinned behind them did the mage speak again, voice strained.
"That demon… it was controlling those beasts."
Meliodas nodded.
Kaelen's jaw tightened. "Why was it here?"
The mage's eyes slid toward Kaelen. Away. Back. Like he was weighing how much truth was safe.
"It wanted something," the mage said finally.
Meliodas didn't press the question.
Not because he didn't want the answer.
Because the mage couldn't be trusted.
Not yet.
They returned to the road.
And only then did Meliodas realize something that annoyed him almost as much as the demon.
The system hadn't said anything.
No reward.
No shards.
No notification.
He frowned, half expecting blue text to pop up if he stared hard enough.
Nothing.
He walked another few minutes.
Still nothing.
"…Huh," he muttered.
Kaelen looked at him. "What is it?"
Meliodas hesitated. Then answered vaguely. "I expected… confirmation."
Kaelen didn't understand, but he didn't press.
The mage watched Meliodas's face with sharp interest.
Meliodas's mind clicked into place.
…Right. The system doesn't reward actions. It rewards quests.
Or rather—
It doesn't care unless it formalizes potential.
He'd killed a demon because it was the right move.
Not because the system told him to.
So the system observed and stayed silent.
Meliodas let out a quiet breath.
"…I was wrong," he murmured under his breath. "It only pays out when it posts the job."
Kaelen heard the tone, not the words, and nodded as if that made sense.
Bud shifted, still quiet, and pressed closer to Meliodas's neck like a tired cat.
They walked another half hour.
Then the land opened up.
A town rose ahead—stone walls, clean roofs, tidy streets visible even from a distance. There was smoke from chimneys, not fires. People moved at the gate in orderly lines.
Southval.
Meliodas stopped at the crest of a hill and stared.
"…It's still clean," he said, baffled.
Kaelen allowed himself a small smile. "Southval is a trade town. If it looks poor, merchants go elsewhere."
The mage spoke quietly. "Also… Southval is watched. It's on the Baron's road. Bandits don't last."
Meliodas eyed the gate guards.
Then glanced at the mage.
Then at Bud.
Then back at the guards.
…I really don't want to show more cards.
Not in a town.
Not with the mage still with them.
Not with soldiers searching for Kaelen.
He let {Indistinct} settle over him—subtle enough to soften attention without making him invisible.
They approached the gate like ordinary travelers.
No dramatic entrance.
No hero music.
Just tired people on the road.
And then, finally—
Blue text flickered into view.
As if the system had been waiting until Southval was close enough to matter.
[NEW QUEST DETECTED]
[CHAIN QUEST: SHADOWS IN SOUTHVAL]
{The corruption you cut away was not alone. Something has already taken root where people feel safe.}
Primary Objectives:
· Identify the infernal presence within Southval
· Neutralize without civilian casualties
· Avoid revealing full capabilities
Reward: 6 Hero Shards | 2 Destiny Shards
Warning: This will escalate conflict.
Meliodas read it once.
Then again.
Reasonable reward.
Not ridiculous.
Not world-shaking.
Just enough to matter.
He exhaled slowly.
…So that's the rule.
No quest, no payout.
Quest posted, reward tracked.
Kaelen glanced at him. "Master?"
Meliodas forced his expression neutral. "Nothing. Just… confirming a suspicion."
The mage's eyes sharpened slightly. "Suspicion?"
Meliodas didn't answer.
They entered Southval.
The streets were paved. Not everywhere, but in the main arteries. Buildings had fresh paint. A public fountain ran clean. People looked wary of strangers—but not starving.
Meliodas felt tension leave his shoulders despite himself.
He hated that.
Comfort made you stupid.
They moved with the crowd, keeping Kaelen's hood up.
Bud stayed small and quiet, scales faintly luminous in daylight.
The mage kept glancing at Bud like he was re-evaluating his entire worldview.
Finally, as if he couldn't hold it in, he spoke in a low voice near a market stall.
"That creature…" He nodded at Bud without making it obvious. "It's your familiar?"
Bud's head lifted sharply, offended.
Meliodas answered before Bud could telepathically insult a grown man into a nervous breakdown.
"A companion," Meliodas said. "Not a contract."
The mage's eyes narrowed. "A tamed magical beast?"
Bud's tail flicked like a dagger.
Meliodas kept his tone flat. "Something like that."
The mage looked relieved and unsettled at the same time—because "tamed magical beast" was a category his brain could hold without collapsing, but Bud being more than that was clearly scraping at the edges of what he wanted to believe.
Kaelen, walking on Meliodas's other side, leaned in slightly and spoke quietly, like the prince he was.
"If you're looking for a tavern with rooms, Southval has several. But if we want information—"
The mage finished for him. "Lost Foal."
Kaelen's eyes flicked toward him. "You know it."
The mage nodded once. "Info brokers sit there. It's the kind of place where people hear rumors before they become official."
Meliodas kept walking.
His mind was already working.
Find the Lost Foal.
Get rooms.
Get information about Southval's corruption.
Do it without flashing the system.
Do it without letting the mage get too comfortable.
Bud shifted and sent a faint pulse through the bond—not words, not system-related, just a feeling.
Tired.
But alert.
Ready if needed.
Meliodas brushed a thumb lightly against Bud's tiny back—an unconscious reassurance.
Then he looked up at Southval's clean streets and felt the uncomfortable certainty settle in.
Something infernal was here.
Not loud.
Not obvious.
Something that liked clean places because clean places made people stop looking.
Meliodas exhaled slowly.
"…Okay," he murmured. "Let's go meet an info broker."
Kaelen nodded.
The mage's steps quickened slightly, like he was eager to be useful.
And somewhere, under the noise of the market and the comfort of clean stone, the quest warning sat in Meliodas's vision like a blinking red light he refused to acknowledge as fear.
Escalation.
Yeah.
He'd noticed.
---
[END OF CHAPTER 28]