182: Taming the frontier is a battle against earth, water, stone, and monsters.

Arrived at the swamp’s frontier village, and I get flattened by a pair of enormous breasts.

Right here.

"..."

Wait—?!

Why’s Eva looking down at me with such an ice-cold glare!?

Move your damn self, Shururu—get off me and help me up!

"Envious! So envious!"

"Just shut up and help me! Please, Shururu—get off my chest!"

"Eh? It’s been forever..."

Still straddling my stomach, Shururu pouts.

No one’s helping me. Did god die or something!?

I tilt my head up toward the sky—then a shadow steps in beside me.

"...Shururu. That’s far too much. Get down. And watch your language."

I turn toward the voice—dry, exasperated, with a sigh. There stands a lizardman, one of the fiercest-looking around, hand pressed to his forehead.

"Jurala!"

You’re my savior, right?!

“Good to see you made it, Craft.”

Jurala, a bipedal reptilian humanoid covered in thick muscles and scales, shoved Shururu aside and helped me up.

Shururu looked mostly human. Jurala? Not so much. He looked like a damn lizard. I’d never say that out loud, though. He’d get pissy.

Anyway, I’d been saved by Jurala, a lizardman warrior and Shururu’s older brother.

Damn, I’m in love! Dig me up if you want! What’s the harm?!

Shut up, brain. I forced a smile and faced Jurala.

“Long time no see. You good?”

“Yeah. Feeling peak.”

We gripped hands—solid, man-to-man—when Shururu cut in.

“Hey! Craft-sama! It’s been forever, right?!”

“Language!”

“Eep!”

Jurala glared again, and Shururu jumped back a step. Only after getting the full brotherly stare did he finally calm down.

“Quickly now—fill me in. I’ve heard some from Kyle already.”

“Got it.”

I listened again, and it was basically just what Kyle had told me.

I ran it all through my head, starting from the beginning.

First, the Lizardfolk clan decided to migrate to Goldendown.

Still, since they’re a species that prefers swamps and wetlands, they’re building a village with guards as they clear the marshland—still in progress.

It’s not just for their permanent settlement. It’s also to repay Kyle.

Originally, this vast marshland was the very area where Kyle had made the Hydral Paradise. He’d decided to turn it into a massive rice field.

There were plenty of troubles along the way, but we took down the swamp’s overlord and claimed the land for ourselves.

The land was supposed to be safe now that the overlord was gone. That’s how it should’ve been.

But developing the swamp proved harder than anyone imagined.

First, there was the size. It stretched as far as a regional estate—perfectly sized to make the work a nightmare.

It would’ve been easier if it were grassland or forest. But the swamp itself was the problem.

Then again, that’s exactly why it could be turned into rice paddies.

I recalled Leifan’s words and cut my thoughts short.

“Right, Leifan said something like, ‘Settling the land is a fight against soil, water, stone, and monsters.’”

Eva caught my muttering.

“Precisely. Whenever trouble came, one of those four was always involved.”

“Yeah. At the very least, one of them was always in the mix.”

“We’ve handled every problem so far. We’ll figure this one out too.”

I glanced sideways at Eva.

Realized she was trying to encourage me in her own way, so I smirked—but Eva just gave me a cold look and turned away.

...I’m not actually hated, am I?

I shook it off and restarted my thoughts.

Lots of people want to move to Goldendown, but most of them just want jobs in Leifan Village or Goldendown itself.

Sure, not many want to head out to some remote swamp village far from the main road.

That’s why we’ve had trouble gathering settlers.

The lizardfolk village and the swamp settlement are separate places.

So human settlers got lizardfolk warriors and adventurers assigned to defend them.

So we’d secured safety, and settlers were finally starting to increase—then the swamps started breeding more monsters, and they called for reinforcements. That’s the current situation.

“Ah, I see.”

No contradictions between Julara’s explanation and the report Kyle showed me. This verification was only possible because I trusted the lizardfolk.

Some fool might say, “If you trust them, why bother checking?” But that’s the opposite of how it works. You only trust enough to safely verify, to check things through.

More like… collecting proof of trust, day by day, against those humans who look down on non-humans.

Golden Dawn… in the Elixir territory, xenophobia’s mostly gone. But some still carry unease. And among the new settlers, there are still those who outright hate non-humans at first glance.

Kyle sent us out because of how easily those kinds of people could use the slow progress in the marshlands as an excuse to stir things up.

...Still, most folks’d drop that attitude after six months in Golden Dune, I reckon.

And the lizardfolk know that. That’s why they’re putting everything into the settlement. Even so, if they can’t solve the problem completely, then it must be a damn big one.

“How many monsters are there—”

Before I could ask Julara about the frequency of attacks, dust kicked up in the corner of my vision.

“Damn it! Not again!”

Julara spun around, spear raised.

We all went on alert at once.

““”Scry”””

Eva and I cast the Scry spell at the same time.

Looks like a group of monsters is creeping out from the forest into the open marshlands.

The sandcloud earlier was probably from a huge monster breaking through a giant tree.

Julara grunts.

"Damn it! Another swarm of Armored Bears!?"

I nearly blink, zooming in on the far view, locking onto the monster's form.

"What? I thought they barely even lived in the kingdom!?"

At first glance, it looked like a giant bear wrapped in armor.

But there's no way this is some wild animal bear.

Jutting from its forehead were sharp horns like a pair of swords, and its claws—too monstrous to call claws—were jagged blades.

I’d heard from old tales at the Adventurer’s Guild: stronger than a Cyclops, stronger than a Chimera. One was already hopeless. But if you ran into a whole pack? Dead for sure.

"From how Julara’s talking, this isn’t the first time, huh."

"Yeah. Not just armored bears. Ogres, goblins, orcs, cyclopes, hydralas, chimeras. It's like a damn monster catalog. Given the job of guarding the marshes... pathetic."

Even with lizardmen being top-tier fighters and chugging raw stamina potion like it's water, doing work, fighting, and training nonstop—still not a real match for them.

"Not pathetic at all! If anything, you guys did great holding two villages with just a few lizardmen!"

"But..."

Julara’s face twisted as she tried to speak, but Raidock slapped her shoulder.

"Leave the rest to us. First things first—clean up those bastards."

The armored bear pack numbered about twenty.

If these were regular bears, they’d have spotted us and run off, but no—same old monster reflex. “Find a human, attack.” They caught sight of us and charged straight in, kicking up a spray of water.

N…ngh… fell asleep…orz

Sorry for the weird update time