Perhaps my complaints got through to him this time, as Kurou’s behavior of randomly getting irritated had quietened down, and the arrogant Kurou who gave off the feeling that he was looking down on people was back.

Amelia was of the opinion that unlike the irritated Kurou, this Kurou gave off a sense of security.

At this, I gave a wry smile, but it seems that Ria too, who was nodding in agreement, had been bewildered by Kurou’s good-for-nothing-ness when she saw it for the first time.

Amaryllis, who was the only one who rarely came into contact with Kurou, although we were traveling together, looked at us and tilted her head in confusion as she was decocting something.

Every time we stopped to rest, she was decocting something, but I wonder just what she was doing.

As usual, Kurou was silently thinking about something, but we steadily advanced with him, who had clearly gone back to normal, as the vanguard, and we finally found the remains of a camp site that did not belong to us.

For a group to come to such a place, it couldn’t be anyone else except for the members of the hero party.

「Did they all survive?」

Amelia, who had developed a friendship with the girls of the hero party, anxiously asked me this while looking at the place where the campfire had been burning.

I surveyed the surroundings, and nodded after thinking about it a little.

「Still, I only have a rough guess, but there are traces of spilled food here. Over there, is the place where they put the bed. It seems that they had been attacked by monsters while they were eating, or even before that. At least, from what I can see from the amount of spilled food and the number of beds, they were all together before they were attacked. Their luggage was left behind in a hurry as well, and their footprints hadn’t disappeared either, so we can chase after them.」

Though I didn’t know what happened after they had been attacked by the monster.

It seems that they had abandoned everything except for the necessities like their weapons when they escaped.

They might need it in the future, so we decided to pick them up.

The hero, Kyousuke, Zeal-san, Hosoyama, Ueno, Waki, Tsuda, and Nanase.

Un, they were all here.

「…even so, they were able to properly find this much food.」

Looking at the spilled food, I muttered this.

I think the monster meat came from a monster that attacked them, but the other things, I wonder if there was someone who had a skill that sorted out medicinal herbs that were harmless to humans.

I didn’t think Zeal-san had much survival ability though.

「There is nothing that is harmful to humans, so it seems that someone acquired a skill like『Appraisal』or『Poison Testing』. The poisonous medicinal herbs are all over here.」

Looking at the food that had soaked into the ground just like I was, Amaryllis muttered a few words, and pointed at the weeds that had piled up into a mountain.

According to what I had seen before, I did not remember that anyone in the hero party possessing that type of skill. 

It was likely that someone had obtained a new skill.

「I want to meet up with them soon.」

Looking at the sunken parts of the ground that hinted of a battle, Ria softly muttered this.

Because of those words, I became aware of my own feelings, and gulped.

From the bottom of my heart, I wanted to as well.

It seems that I was more worried about the hero party than I thought I was.

Enough that I had properly remembered their names that I never bothered to remember before.

「The closer you get to the demon territory, the stronger the monsters become. It’s fine to entertain hope, but don’t hold any expectations.」

Hearing the words that Kurou said in a cold voice, they resounded violently in my head.