The Tutorial Is Too Hard

People usually experience at least one presentiment in their lives.

The presentiment could forebode failing an exam, losing a bet, or that today’s fortune will be outrageously bad for no reason.

Anyways, everyone would.

Some believe it’s just bad luck and disregard it.

Some think that awful things happen because of presentiment.

Some think it’s not a big premonition.

In such a case, people don’t believe in the premonition, but the ominous feeling lingers regardless.

However, once you’ve experienced life-and-death crises repeatedly that was present with an ominous premonition for hundreds of times, you catch onto this feeling instinctively.

My experiences is such a case.

Having been gone through fire and water for countless times, spoiling the doorsill of the hell,  I unconsciously began to get used to it.

Every time before something challenging occurs, I feel as if I have my ankles in the Jordan River.

At worst, I feel as if I bathe in the Jordan River to the point that I could see my Grandpa on the other side.

As this kind of premonition happens frequently, sometimes I even feel that it is not bad to take a foot bath in the river and that it is not bad to meet my Grandpa once in a while. Soon, nerves would begin to relax, but the sense of unknowing haunts me.

Sometimes, I wished that my presentiments were not true, even though I’m accustomed to the monthly death crises.

If I continue hanging around, I would drown in the Jordan River rather be simply being soaked.

This time, I feel like I wouldn’t be able to return from the opposite bank.

That is what the current ominous premonition warns me.

I can’t sense the enemy, but the atmosphere is uneasy. That uneasiness that warns me that if I act rashly, I will die here.

I have often experienced this before I reached the level of strength where I easily cleared the tutorial’s stages without any great danger.

I quickly checked my condition as the agitation swept through my mind.

My mind is stable.

My reaction speed and directionality are stable.

I wondered if the fear born from my excessive premonition had affected my judgment, but it didn‘t seem to be so.

The feeling of death would intensify when neither the fear nor the enemy’s existence is felt.

Such a situation would be a perfect chance for sudden death.

I had to swiftly decide whether to escape or locate the adversary.

At that moment, the lake quaked violently.

The ripples that appeared at the center of the lake quickly turned into huge waves.

It seemed like something was struggling in the depths of the lake, trying to jump out of the water.

[The survivor of the research team repeatedly told the absurd story that lava beneath the lake would explode and swallow the continent.]

I thought again of the message about the lake.

In this case, there is only one choice for me.

[Clear Condition]

-Investigate the abnormalities in Irai Lake.

– Protect the summoned contractors in your team from injury or death. The summoned contractors you have to protect are (2/2)

-?

-?

-?

-?

-?

-?

The clear condition of the stage clearly required the protection of the other summoned contractors.

It wouldn’t be too late to investigate anomalies of the lake after making sure the safety of the other two magicians.

Instead of watching the wave that came to us, I turned around, grabbed the shivering Sicia and Yata, and rushed into the forest.

* * *

Within minutes, we arrived at the village where we had stayed on the first day.

The whole village was empty.

To be precise, there was no one here.

The furniture and clothes in the houses were intact.

I searched every corner, but there wasn’t even a dog, let alone people.

The village remained unharmed even though anomalies had occurred in the woods.

Therefore, I had thought the village was safe, but that turned out to be wrong.

There are two possibilities I could think of.

One is that the villagers predicted that there would be an abnormal phenomenon and left.

I don’t think these ordinary people could perceive what I wasn’t able to notice in advance though. However, they have indeed experienced such abnormalities many times and have been familiar with that.

Perhaps this occurred periodically.

If not, then there must be some sign that only they know.

The other possibility is that they’ve already died before we arrived.

But the village is completely preserved as if it was never attacked.

Just the people have disappeared. The buildings and gates in the village are still undamaged and the scent of blood is absent too.

Even the weakest people would do their best to resist an approaching crisis.

At least, the villagers would have raised some chairs to struggle, which is the normal response of a human.

Even if their resistance is futile, with the overwhelming fear lingering over, a desperate villager should have struggled to grab everything within reach.

But no traces of struggles could be seen.

That cannot be unless the mishap was too fast to be perceived.

After looking around the village, I took Sicia and Yata to the place where we lived the first day.

“Yata, please try to communicate with other teams as well as the temple.”

Sicia, who cheers up a little, asked Yata to communicate with others.

Both Sicia and Yata cheered up quickly.

I asked Sicia, who was looking at Yata.

“Is this a usual task for summoned contractors?”

“No. This is my first time encountering such a situation.”

So this was abnormal.

When things got to this point, I knew that my approach was wrong.

Sicia kept saying that we didn’t have to go to the lake.

The message clearly put that we can stay in the village for one or two days before we leave.

Thus, we should have stayed in the village and collected as much information as possible about previous anomalies.

The message’s information and the information from other summoned contractors were based on the words of panic-stricken survivors, so no one could vouch for its accuracy.

Instead, it’s likely that the villagers hold the most information.

But after the first day, there was no communication between the summoned contractors and the villagers.

What’s more, the food we ate before was prepared in advance so we didn’t interact with the villagers since then.

The reason was simple.

This is one of the stages of the tutorial after all.

So, if I didn’t ask anyone about anything, no one would gather the necessary information for me.

I should have gone out and collected some information from the villagers.