Usually there would be travelers and merchants.
The gatekeepers who would stop and inspect them before letting them in.
It was the first time Loren had gone through a gate with no one there at all, and the eeriness he felt was something he never felt before on the battlefield.
Lapis, who was sitting next to him, was looking around the area in a relaxed manner. Every now and then she would whip the horse but instead hit Klaus, and watching him twitch spurred the eeriness Loren was feeling even more.
“Shouldn’t we let that down?”
Putting aside the eeriness, Klaus, who was unconscious on top of the horse, in a sense was an injured person as well.
That meant Lapis was the one who injured him, but Loren decided to ignore that and gave the suggestion, but Lapis bluntly made a disgusted face.
“I don’t want to touch that thing you know?”
“I don’t want to if I could either.”
Klaus was hanging onto the rear end of the horse, and for the horse, having something twitching on its back wouldn’t be the best feeling, but Loren didn’t feel like stopping the caravan and getting him down.
That was how disgusting a person twitching while having his eyes rolled back into his head was.
“Still, there really isn’t anyone in here.”
They pa.s.sed through the gate and into the city, and now the caravan was strolling down the main street, but there was no one there, and it was completely silent.
It was like a ghost town, but it wasn’t roughed up at all but instead everything looked in order.
“Doesn’t look like it’s been attacked by undead either.”
If that was the case, there should be traces of it, but as far as Loren could see there were no signs of the citizens fighting anything in the streets.
He couldn’t see any broken windows or buildings, or even bloodstains anywhere.
“I never thought a clean city with no one in it would be so eerie.”
“Walking through an empty city with you. Doesn’t it sound very romantic?”
Compared to Loren, who was cautiously looking around with narrowed eyes, Lapis, who was holding the reins, said that with a smile on her face.
Loren couldn’t understand her sensibility, but decided that there was no need to point that out and hurt her feelings, and end up adding coldness to the eeriness he was feeling.
“Before we do anything, we should search for a hospital. You haven’t forgotten we have four people dying back there, right?”
“That’s true. Shayna, do you know where we could find a hospital?”
Asking a resident about the city was the quickest way to find out.
At Lapis’ question, Shayna poked her head out of the caravan, took a look around, and pointed in a direction.
“I think there was one over there.”
“Then let’s go in that direction.”
Lapis turned the horse towards the direction Shayna pointed out.
The caravan rolled down the ordinary looking street, minus the fact that no one was there.
The hospital Shayna had pointed to that they arrived at a while later looked like a clinic run by an individual.
There were hospitals that were run by the state itself, but the only hospital Shayna knew of was the one they were currently at.
“My father said that there was a really good doctor and brought me here.”
“Is it mistaken to think that that sounds kind of strange?”
A city doctor being more skilled than doctors in hospitals run by the state wasn’t the most unusual, but Loren wasn’t sure about the president of the state bringing his daughter to a clinic instead of a state-run hospital.
“In our current situation, I believe this is actually the better choice.”
Lapis said as she looked at Shayna, who was clinging onto Loren’s waist, while she parked the caravan near the clinic and untied the horse from it.
“I don’t want to go near a large facility while we don’t know what’s going on with the city.”
“What do you mean?”
“Nothing in particular. Rather than that, can you carry everyone out of the caravan? Come one, you should help too.”
Lapis called Klaus, who had been lowered down from the horse.
Although he had taken many blows to the back, he was still in way better shape than the others.
He regained consciousness as soon as he got off and sunk to the ground as if all the strength was sapped out of him.
“Can’t you let me rest for a bit? It’s pretty much thanks to me we got away from that dragon.”
“You haven’t forgotten that Loren was the one who saved Ange from the dragon, right?”
“Ugh…”
As Loren was exasperated that Klaus barely remembered after being told so, Klaus stood up and faced him, with his gaze pointed downwards, muttered in a voice that Loren could barely make out.
“U-umm, well…Thanks…for saving Ange…”
“We haven’t saved her just yet. If you have time to be saying that, use it to carry everyone inside instead.”
“Alright.”
Loren smiled at Klaus, who looked crest-fallen but replied to him honestly.
“Now that I think about it, you were whipped by my priest the whole night…Did it open any kind of new doors inside of you?”
“Wha!? No way!”
“You’re not thinking it’s not too bad or anything right?”
“Of course not! I’m normal!”
“…So you understand that awakening to that kind of thing is abnormal.”
Klaus was red and looked like he wanted to say something, but thought for a moment, glaring at Loren, and eventually said nothing as he turned away from Loren and started walking towards the caravan to help carry the others out.
Lapis whispered teasingly to Loren, who was watching Klaus walk away.
“You didn’t have to provoke him to get him back to his usual self you know?”
“It’s nothing like that. I was just teasing him.”
After brushing her away with a wave of his hand, Loren walked over to the caravan as well to carry the others out.
He decided to carry Broas and leave the other three to Klaus.
He wasn’t trying to let Klaus do all the work, but it was because the other three were all girls as well as members of Klaus’ party, so he was just trying to be considerate.
He wasn’t sure how Klaus interpreted it, but instead started unloading what little they were able to take from the camp.
They couldn’t take what was already unloaded, but they were able to bring with them what they had decided wasn’t needed for setting up camp and left inside the caravan. Inside were food and some medical supplies.
This was barely enough for first aid, and Loren was worried that it wasn’t nearly enough to treat the three who were unconscious and one who was greatly injured, but Lapis soon found something better.
“As expected of a medical facility, even if it’s personally run. There’s so much medicine left.”
There was also a hospital ward with beds, and as Loren and Klaus moved Broas and the girls in there, Lapis and Shayna came in with armfuls of medicine.
They had been searching the clinic while Loren and Klaus were carrying the wounded.
“If we have this much I think I’ll be able to handle most things.”
“Alright. Then can you get on to it quickly? I won’t be able to sleep well if they end up dying after we managed to get them all the way here.”
Loren had no experience or knowledge in medicine.
When he asked Klaus, he replied that he did not have any either and told him it was Ange was the one that had that kind of knowledge, but right now she was the one who needed treatment.
“I understand. I have a lot to do so Loren can you take Shayna and stay outside?”
“Are you telling me to go out too!? They’re my party members you know!?”
Klaus complained at Lapis’ suggestion as expected, but Lapis gave him a despising look, and he stammered at its intensity.
“I’m going to start treating them, so I’ll have to loosen as well as take off their clothes…Are you saying you want to watch me do that?”
“Ugh, well, no…”
“I’ll also be taking Broas’ clothes off as well, and I believe that wanting to watch the bare body of a middle-aged man is quite a high-level taste.”
“I never said I have that sort of taste!”
Lapis silently pointed at Ange and the girls as Klaus shouted out, his face completely red, and he immediately covered his mouth. Lapis then pointed towards the door, telling him to get out.
This time he followed her instructions and left the room, and as Loren was about to follow him Lapis called him back.
“Loren, can you let Klaus handle keeping watch around the perimeter, and can you take Shayna and explore the area around us?”
“Me? With Shayna?”
While Loren stood there questioning the pairing, Lapis continued.
“I feel like Klaus wouldn’t be able to find much, and I don’t want to entrust Shayna to him.”
“Is it a bother if I leave her?”
Loren wasn’t against exploring the area, but taking Shayna was a whole different story.
There was no telling what they would encounter out there, and Loren didn’t want to put a young girl in danger, so he couldn’t understand Lapis’ suggestion.
“I’ve mentioned this before, but to treat them I’ll have to take off their clothes. The girls wouldn’t be too bad, but I think that Broas’ naked body would be too much of a bad influence on her.”
“You’re going to strip him naked?”
Loren thought that going that far wouldn’t be necessary, but since Lapis knew what she was doing, he guessed that it was necessary. Showing Shayna something like that would not be a good thing.
“A walk around the area should be fine. Shayna is from this city, so she should know her way around as well.”
“I guess that’s true.”
If she was a princess of sort, Loren thought she wouldn’t know too much about the city itself, but up until this point, it seemed like she knew some things about it.
“Can you do that for me?”
Unlike when dealing with Klaus, Lapis’ face was serious, and since she had a proper reason behind it, Loren didn’t feel like setting up an argument, so he nodded.
“I’m bringing her back as soon as I think it’s dangerous.”
“Of course. I’m counting on you.”
Since she had asked him to do it, the only thing he could do is start acting.
Even though she explained logic after logic, Loren still wasn’t comfortable with the idea, but took Shayna, told Klaus to keep watch, and slowly walked out the building.
