I Work As A Healer In Another World's Labyrinth City (LN) Chapter 35 — Falling Into the River

Chapter 35: Falling Into the River.

I awaken from the sensation of sothing touching softly. Sothing long and thin is stroking my chest. It feels kinda ticklish. Also there’s sothing heavy.

-When I open my eyes, Yuel is there.

Her ear is poking into my chest as she presses her head into my body. Her expression is sowhat uneasy. Her eyebrows are furrowed, and her eyes are clenched shut.

That sensation just now must have been Yuel’s hair brushing against my skin.

When I’m about to speak out to Yuel, I notice. There was sothing out of the ordinary about that sensation.

Yuel’s hair touched my bare skin. That’s right, my bare skin.

I inspect myself. How did I end up in just my underwear?

…Strange. Where the heck did my habit go? And why is Yuel clinging to my body?

It’s essential to remain calm at a ti like this. One by one, I’ll sort out the circumstances.

First, where are my clothes?

When I glimpse around a little, I soon spot them. They’re folded neatly, next to my head.

Next, where are we?

It appears to be a small cave, a grotto. Our surroundings are dimly lit by a campfire, and I can hear the sound of a river running.

River.

「…Oh right. I fell into the river.」

「Masterrr!」

When I utter those words, Yuel’s eyes snap open.

「Master, are you hurt!?」

「Nah, I’m fine n…ow ow ow.」

When I shift my posture slightly, pain shoots through my entire body. I don’t feel like I have any broken bones, but I’m bruised all over. Also, my head aches. I don’t rember very well, but I may have hit it after I fell into the river. First things first, I’ll give myself dical treatnt.

「Heal! Are you hurt anywhere, Yuel?」

「Errr, I’m…」

She stamrs a bit. I inspect her closer, and there’s blood oozing from her palms.

「You’re bleeding! EX Heal!」

But man, what happened after I fell into the river?

I was laid down in this grotto by the riverside. Yuel and I are currently alone. And I saw a shadow as I was about to be swallowed up by the river. I think I can piece together the general picture.

At the ti I fell into the river, Yuel probably dove in after . But I hit my head or sothing soon afterwards and lost consciousness. Yuel sohow rescued and brought here. Sothing along those lines. And there are tracks along the ground from being dragged in from outside the grotto.

However, I don’t know where this is. I’m unsure how much ti has passed since then, either.

First, it’s important that we share information.

Yuel tells matter-of-factly what happened. To give a brief summary:

It seems that after I fell into the river, Yuel also jumped right in after . She sohow managed to grab a hold of , and clung to so we wouldn’t get separated. Although she did well trying to save , the river current was fast. And I soon lost consciousness as well, so it was difficult for her to rescue by herself. We were swept along by the current for so ti.

During that ti, Yuel frantically thought about ways to save . Then she ca up with one.

She would take out a rope from her item box, tie one end to my hand, and fasten the other end to a knife. Then she would throw the knife at one of the trees along the river. After several failures, she managed to lodge the knife into a tree and pull us onto the riverbank.

So the bleeding on her palms was from the rope burns when she fished out of the river. After that, she dragged into a nearby grotto and laid down there.

As for my clothes, they were soaked so supposedly she stripped them to prevent from catching a cold. And because she couldn’t retrieve a change of clothes from my item box, she decided to dry them by a campfire. And she only had her head on my chest just now in order to listen for my heartbeat.

The more I hear of her story, the more I’m impressed by how hard she struggled.

I an, it takes so serious courage to dive into river rapids. And so real cleverness to improvise a way to save . And so real heart not to bla her pitiful master for falling into a river and losing consciousness right away, but instead to just keep taking caring of .

What’s with this excellent brat.

Yuel herself is disappointed that she dropped one of the knives she received from her master into the water, though. And she seems pretty depressed about it.

But such a thing is truly trivial. Considering that she successfully extricated from the river, she’s already repaid a million tis over.

It makes want to do sothing for Yuel to make her happy, but she’ll probably be happy no matter what I do. Whenever she defeated monsters in the labyrinth, she was happy just with a light head pat, but… if I only pet her head after all this, she might not be entirely satisfied.

But for now, I’ll start with petting her.

「Yuel, you really did a good job. You saved .」

As I thank her while petting her head, Yuel shyly presses her head into my hand. She seems thoroughly pleased.

…I guess this is good enough after all.

While I pet her head, I continue talking.

「By the way, do you have any idea how much ti has passed since then?」

「…Um, including the ti that Master was asleep, I think it’s been about three hours.」

3 hours since then, huh? Then it’s around 7 pm now? I was having quite the power nap, it seems.

「Any idea how far we went downriver?」

「…I’m sorry, I don’t know. But the current was fast, so I think we went quite a long distance.」

Apparently she doesn’t know precisely, but we’ve covered a long distance. Or conversely, it was far enough to make it impossible to tell precisely?

That reminds , a long ti ago I watched a drama with a scene where the protagonist saves a puppy that fell into an overflowing river. In that drama, an adult was able to run in parallel alongside the puppy as it was swept along by the river current. In the present situation, I feel like the river I fell into was flowing at about the sa speed.

By my calculations, if we spent say 20-30 minutes floating in the river, as a rough estimate we would’ve moved around 5km. It might’ve been more, depending on how long we were in the river.

I wonder if we can reunite with the subjugation unit. Visibility is poor, and we’re in the middle of a forest teeming with monsters.

Suddenly, the word that Ruruka used previously at the hospital springs to mind.

-Disaster.

No, no, it’s fine, we should be fine.

It’s obvious because I fell into the river, but rivers are an easily identifiable landmark. If we follow the river upstream, we should be able to et back up with the subjugation unit led by the knight brigade.

…If the subjugation unit hasn’t left the river.

However, if the subjugation unit hasn’t given up on my survival, there’s a possibility that they’ll follow the river downstream and co searching the periter.

Nevertheless, before the battle with the Krankheit Turtle, Sera showed a map. If I recall correctly, this river leaves the forest and follows along the highway that connects to the city of rhatz. If we follow the river downstream, we’ll eventually reach the highway. I don’t rember exactly how far it is, but it probably shouldn’t take an entire day.

What’s our best option?

First we could go upriver and aim to reunite with the subjugation unit. If we don’t et up with them by the ti we reach the location where we fought the Krankheit Turtle, we’ll turn around and follow the river downstream instead, out of the forest and onto the highway. That approach might be better.

「Master?」

As I’m contemplating, Yuel calls out to . I guess I was thinking too hard and stopped moving my hand.

「Yuel, as far as what we’ll do next, I’m thinking of following the river upstream to try and et up with the subjugation unit. It’s possible that they’re searching for us too. What do you think?」

「Yes. I also think it would be better to et up with the knights sooner if possible. It’s very dangerous outside the city.」

「Well then, shall we get going as soon as the night is over?」

「…Master, it might be safer to move at night.」

Yuel makes a serious face as she speaks.

「Inside the forest, the scariest situation is getting surrounded by a large number of monsters. At least at night, the monsters that can’t see in the dark will be sleeping.」

I see.

「No, but, it’ll be dark, right? We can’t see either, so how could we fight with monsters?」

「I can see clearly at night. Since I’m a dark elf.」

Yuel sure is high-spec. She even cos equipped with a night vision mode.

We spend ten-odd minutes ascending upriver. The sky is fairly clear, and moonlight shines along the riverside. There’s moonlight, but this is a forest rampant with monsters. There are truly terrifying things out here.

As Yuel twitches her ears to detect any signs of nearby monsters, we advance little by little. And then, perhaps noticing sothing, she abruptly breaks into a run.

For an instant, a knife glimrs in the moonlight.

I creep closer, and there’s a corpse there of a demihuman-type monster with a doglike face. Its neck is sliced open from a single slash.

Moving discreetly and always attacking preemptively as soon as she spots a monster, it’s an aggressive style. Almost like an assassin. I’m seeing a talent in Yuel that should not be nurtured.

Nah, it may be that in Yuel’s case there was a reason that she had to take up such a style. Her body is tiny, and it’s not like she has any skill with shields like Ruruka does. Her physical features aren’t suited to protecting another person. So she might have had to adopt an offensive style to prevent anything from getting close to and becoming a threat in the first place. It’s perfectly logical now that I think about it.

As I’m rationalizing, Yuel suddenly stops moving. Then, with her ears prickling, she restlessly observes the surroundings.

「Master, up ahead there is most likely a Kobold village.」

「You can tell?」

「Yes. There are indications of many monsters. A very large-scale group… there might be more than a hundred. That Kobold just now was probably a guard for the village.」

「Do you think you can win?」

「…I’m sorry, I think it would most likely be impossible for on my own.」

Of course. That was an absurd suggestion.

「Could we get past them without being noticed?」

「…Kobolds can see in the dark too, so it would be risky. If we go any further, I think there’s a chance that we’ll be surrounded before we know it.」

A large-scale Kobold village, huh. What should we do?

For a mont the thought occurs to of sending Yuel charging in on her own while I continually cast EX Heal on her from the trees, but no, that would be a waste of resources. Or rather I should say, I don’t have the least bit of interest in enacting such a strategy.

So then, a detour? Kobolds can see at night, and from the looks of it their hearing and sense of sll are sharp too. If we’re spotted and have to battle a large number of Kobolds, it’ll beco grueso. We should take a significant detour.

No wait, taking a detour ans moving further away from the river. In this vast forest, losing sight of a landmark such as the river would be painful. And there’s also the chance that we’ll pass by the subjugation unit without noticing.

What to do.

Yuel watches as I think. And then I notice it.

The fact that Yuel is making a slightly tired, sleepy expression.

I feel a cold sweat drip down my back.

-That’s right, what will I do if Yuel falls asleep?

This is bad. I didn’t put in enough thought.

There’s nobody else here but and Yuel. Yuel can both search for enemies and fight, but I can’t do either very well. I can’t perceive any wild animals that approach silently, nor would I be able to protect Yuel from sudden attacks while she sleeps.

…Maybe there’s no need for us to continue upriver.

Even if we do, if we can’t et up with the subjugation unit, getting back to town would take twice as long, or maybe even longer.

Under normal circumstances, just from rescuing from the river and nursing , Yuel would be pretty exhausted. I may have gotten so sleep, but Yuel likely spent that entire ti on high alert keeping an eye out for monsters.

If we take a detour around the Kobold village now, continue upriver and don’t et up with the subjugation unit? I don’t know if Yuel has the stamina for that. No, she may have great combat skill, but her physique isn’t much different from a normal girl’s. She likely couldn’t hold up.

As soon as she hits the limits of her endurance, she’ll fall victim to the monsters.

If we head downriver imdiately, and at least make it out onto the highway, there’s a chance we could et up with a knight patrol or so rchants. In terms of sheer distance, we should be able to return to the city in a shorter ti than if we tried to et up with the subjugation unit. And there’s no guarantee that the subjugation unit is coming downriver in the first place.

For a mont I consider staying in place and waiting patiently to be rescued, but there are monsters in this forest. A prolonged struggle is out of the question.

Fortunately, it hasn’t been 20 minutes since we started heading upriver. The loss is small. We can still turn back.

「Yuel, let’s give up on going upriver. We’ll head downriver and aim for the highway back to town.」