The sky was gray and overcast.
Cold raindrops beat against the thin windows of a cheap inn in Iron Boot Town, the dull sound grating on the nerves.
Inside the room, which had no soundproofing, the air was filled with the stench of cheap tobacco and damp wood...
And the ceaseless quarreling.
"Do you really have to go? To that... that swamp filled with monsters?!"
Lola's voice was high-pitched with anger and fear. She hugged her two frightened children tightly; the boy hid behind his mother's skirt while the girl sobbed quietly.
"Yano Belmont! Look at you! Look at us! You're a descendant of Knights, not some lowly traveling merchant, and certainly not meat to be fed to the Lizardmen."
Yano had his back to her, stuffing the last few pieces of rough winter clothing into a badly worn leather pack. There was a subtle stiffness to his movements.
"Lola, being a 'descendant of Knights' can't fill their stomachs, much less pay the tuition for the Sol Arcane Academy."
His voice was low, tinged with a suppressed exhaustion. He didn't turn to look at her.
"The Adventurers in Iron Boot Town say that after spring comes, the Lizardmen on the banks of the Reed River will be desperate for grain and salt. The price... is triple what it is in the Kingdom. One trip, just this one trip, will be enough for you to live comfortably for a few years."
"Comfortably? How are we supposed to live comfortably if you're dead?!"
Lola rushed in front of him, her long golden hair slightly disheveled. Her blue eyes, filled with tears, no longer held the adoration of the past, but deep disappointment and confusion.
"You could obviously find a respectable job, even guarding the city gates! Why does it have to be this? Why now? Those Sub-humans... they're barbaric, filthy, and untrustworthy. Everyone in the Kingdom knows that!"
Yano spun around abruptly. Beneath his deep chestnut hair, his light brown eyes flashed with a hint of pain and stubbornness.
"Respectable? The Copper Coins from guarding the gates aren't even enough for rent! Lola, be realistic. I need money, a lot of it, so you and the children won't have to live at the mercy of others."
The lingering, unconscious note of command in his tone stung Lola.
"At the mercy of others? Right now, we're at the mercy of your madness!"
Lola picked up her young daughter and took her son by the hand, her voice cold and resolute.
"Fine, go! Go to your swamp, go deal with those monsters, and trade your 'noble' Belmont life for filthy Gold Coins! Children, let's go. We're going back to Grandma's house in Hawens Stone. Let your father go be his... 'great merchant'!"
She practically spat out the last few words through gritted teeth.
"Lola! Wait!" Yano reached out to stop her.
BANG—!
The door was slammed shut with brutal force, the massive sound shaking dust from the walls.
Yano's outstretched hand froze in mid-air. He listened as his wife's suppressed sobs and his children's confused questions faded into the distance. As if drained of all strength, he leaned back against the cold wall and slowly slid down to the dirty floor.
He lowered his head and shakily raised his right hand.
In the dim light of the oil lamp, he saw that at the joints of his little and ring fingers, the skin had taken on an unnatural, grayish-white hue, like cheap marble. It felt stiff and numb to the touch.
It wasn't dirt. It was the corrosion of the Petrification Disease.
Like a Demon lurking in his blood, it was gnawing away at his life, bit by bit, along with his dignity as a husband, a father, and even as a "man."
He clenched his fist tightly, a sharp, needle-like pain shooting through the stiff knuckles.
"...For you... I have to go..."
He whispered hoarsely to the empty, cold room, to the demonic, spreading stone-like patches on his skin.
A suffocating feeling of darkness and dampness washed over him.
The scene suddenly shattered!
"Ugh... Hah..."
Yano Belmont's eyes shot open. He sucked in a sharp breath, a wheeze like a broken bellows escaping his throat.
The blinding white light instantly brought tears to his eyes, and he reflexively raised a hand to shield them.
'Damn this sunlight!'
He cursed inwardly, feeling the light pierce his aching eyeballs like countless fine needles.
Every time he woke from that nightmare of a shattered farewell, it was accompanied by this nauseating physical reaction and an even deeper mental exhaustion.
This nightmare, along with the damn curse in his body, was like a maggot clinging to his bones, tormenting him with increasing frequency.
He felt the familiar stiffness in his knuckles.
He turned his wrist with difficulty. The grayish-white stone patches were clearly visible at the base of his fingers, like ugly brands.
The Belmont family's "glory"—the Petrification Disease.
A slow and cruel death sentence that first stripped away one's freedom of movement, then froze one's breath, and finally turned a person into a silent gravestone.
The "statues" covered in white cloths and frozen in bizarre poses from his family's history were the deepest fears of his childhood.
And now, that fear was becoming a reality in his own body.
He, Yano Belmont, once a Knight's squire, a devout Believer of the god Cadus, a Warrior who wielded a Longsword to protect the borderlands... was now curled up like a lowly thief amidst the rotting leaves and cold mud of the Swamp Forest, reeking of filth and fear.
All of this was to cast aside his long-worthless "noble glory" and, like the most clumsy peddler, bet his entire fortune and what little life he had left on crossing the dangerous banks of the Reed River to trade with those Green Skin, scaled Sub-humans.
All so that before he turned completely to stone, he could leave Lola and the children enough money to survive, to escape poverty, and perhaps even give the children a chance at a decent education, instead of being burdened by the double shame of being descendants of a bankrupt noble and a "stone man."
"What... great irony..."
He gave a self-deprecating tug at the corner of his mouth, pulling at the dried mud on his face. Then, he struggled to sit up, leaning his back against a massive, dead tree that reeked of decay.
He looked around. The dense canopy obscured most of the sky, casting mottled and strange shadows.
The air was so damp you could wring water from it, a nauseating mix of rotting plants, fermenting silt, and the faint, sweet-and-acrid smell of some animal carcass.
A silence—a silence that felt full of prying eyes—enveloped everything. The only sound was the occasional sharp, short chirp of some unknown insect.
Even though he had luckily escaped the conflict in the Lizardman tribe, he had lost his way and could only flee wretchedly through this place.
His once-decent merchant's coat was torn to shreds, covered in mud and dark brown stains.
His expensive leather boots were stuck in the mire, and one was missing.
He felt at his waist. The money pouch that held his hopes was still there, but inside were only a few cold Silver Coins and some copper coins.
As for the pack animals and cart loaded with grain and salt?
Long gone.
'Those damn Demon-worshipping Gray Scale bastards!'
'They were like fiends crawling out from the depths of the swamp, unnaturally strong. Their gray scales were so hard they could deflect blades!'
The veteran Adventurers he'd hired from Iron Boot Town, who usually boasted to high heaven, were torn apart like paper under the claws of those corrupted monsters!
The shrill screams, the sickening crunch of breaking bones, the feel of warm blood splashing on his face... and those pairs of cloudy, crazed, utterly irrational, dark red eyes!
Fear coiled around his heart like a cold serpent.
How did he escape? He couldn't remember.
He only remembered the captain of his guards pushing him just before he died, roaring, "Run!"
Then, relying on his residual Warrior's instincts, he had scrambled and clawed his way into this even deadlier, dense forest.
The rain... yes, and that damned downpour that lasted for two days, as if it would flood the entire world!
The rain was bone-chilling, washing away the bloodstains from his body but also bringing a piercing cold and a pain so intense it nearly paralyzed him—the Petrification Disease always accelerated its corrosion during rainstorms when Magic Power was active.
He had trudged through mud and despair like a walking corpse, finally collapsing here from exhaustion. It was a miracle he hadn't been found and devoured by the forest's monsters.
'Perhaps even the monsters found a "thing" reeking of death and stone to be completely unappetizing.'
Two days... He had been lost in this damned Swamp Forest, filled with Green Skin brutes and unknown dangers, for two days, wandering around like a headless fly!
"Cadus above..."
Yano panted, trying to summon a sliver of his Warrior's courage.
He fumbled inside his tattered coat and pulled out a dagger that was still mostly intact.
The cold touch of the metal brought a sliver of insignificant security.
He had to find a way out, find the way back to Iron Boot Town, or... find any chance to survive.
For Lola, for the children, he couldn't die here and become a pile of unclaimed bones in the swamp... or stone.
He spat out the muddy taste in his mouth in disgust. Just as he was struggling to his feet, he heard the dying shriek of prey being killed from within the dark woods.
'It's those damn scaly beasts again!'
Yano cursed under his breath, but his heart was filled with terror. He frantically picked a direction, deciding to entrust his fate to the god of fortune, and plunged headlong into the dim forest.