A Secretly Capable Child Is Seeking For Her Dad - Chapter 5

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————

A Powerful Child Searches for Dad Episode 5

Massive question marks were carved one after another in Basto Paerix’s mind.

What are the odds of a child entering a forest that overflows with monsters at night?

And what are the odds of that child getting caught in the very trap he had set?

And then, also….

“Ah, mister, hic! Tie, Tie, hic! is okay! Hic, hic!”

What are the odds of that child not crying, not whining, but rather trying to reassure him that she’s fine?

“…Huh.”

It didn’t make sense.

It wasn’t that he was strange, but this current situation was strange.

Basto, who had been organizing the net he’d lowered to the ground, finally straightened his back with a furrowed brow.

The child sitting on the ground visibly flinched.

“You….”

“I’m okay! Hic! Tie is really, really okay! Hic!”

Basto looked at the child repeating the same words with bewildered eyes.

The child couldn’t even meet his eyes and was clasping both hands tightly together.

Unable to watch any longer, Basto asked.

“Where are your parents?”

The child’s age appeared to be at most three or four years old.

So she couldn’t have come to the forest alone, and must have come with her parents.

“Fa, Father is, hic! ve, very close by…?”

Sure enough, the child answered.

Basto nodded.

“I see. Somewhere around here?”

“Y, yes… If Tie shouts, he’ll, he’ll come running right away, hic! because he’s really close…!”

Of course.

Basto knew what children’s curiosity was like at that age.

No matter how good a parent was, it was difficult to perfectly control a child who would disappear the moment you took your eyes off them.

A short laugh escaped from Basto’s mouth.

‘The little one is quite brave.’

If her parents were nearby, she could have just called for them to find her right away.

Since she was only hiccupping, he couldn’t help but mistake her for some new type of robber or suspicious person.

Basto threw out a joke with a smile.

“Then you should have cried loudly. When you got caught in the net.”

“…Hic.”

“Cry now. Let’s see if your father comes.”

However, the child pressed her lips tightly shut for some reason.

And then,

“Sniff, sniff… I, it’s true though….”

She began to shed pearl-like tears drop by drop.

Basto looked at the child with a surprised expression.

She hadn’t cried when she should have, but now that he was trying to help her find her parents, her crying was bewildering.

“…Why are you crying….”

“Waaaah-! Waah! Kamangpang! Kamangpang! Save me-!!”

He took a step forward to comfort her, but for some reason the child began crying even louder.

Her hiccupping stopped and she looked like she might have a fit, so Basto stopped in place.

“No, why….”

Then he suddenly realized.

It was because he remembered what state he was in when facing the child.

Monster blood from yesterday was dried and stuck to his head, and his unwashed body reeked with a musty smell.

Moreover, hadn’t he made direct eye contact with the child while hiding in the thicket checking his traps?

“Waah, waaaah! Kamangpang! Save me! Help me! Waaaah-!!”

Basto scratched his head with a troubled face and took a step back for now.

He could see the crying child flinch and check his appearance.

Basto moved several more steps backward as if to show her.

After that, he even threw the weapon hanging from his waist over to where the net was.

“Sniff… sniff, Kamangpang….”

The child looked at him while sniffling.

She was tightly hugging a pink bag.

“Mister will stay here, so you go. To your father.”

The child blinked with a wary expression.

“Go to your father quickly. You said your father is nearby.”

The child hesitantly fidgeted with her bag.

Then she asked in a small voice.

“You, you won’t come to catch me…?”

“Why would I catch you?”

“Because you’re a kidnapper….”

Basto swallowed a sigh and answered as calmly as possible.

“I’m not a kidnapper. I was trying to catch and eat rabbits because I’m hungry.”

An even greater shock appeared on the child’s face.

However, before long the child hesitantly got up from her spot.

Basto watched the child fidgeting as she put on her bag and thought.

‘…I should follow her from a reasonable distance.’

From what he could see, he couldn’t directly help her find her parents.

He planned to follow behind until the child met her parents on her own.

Just in case she couldn’t find her parents and the day grew late, it would become troublesome.

“Go find your father quickly. It’s dangerous to be alone in a place like this.”

The child nodded passively.

Then she quietly turned around and began running between the trees.

“…Ow!”

She couldn’t even take three steps before sitting down on the ground.

The child who had fallen sniffled and turned her head.

Basto and the child’s gazes met in mid-air.

“….”

In the silence, Basto stared at the child with a tense face.

The child, who was clutching her left ankle as if she had injured her leg when caught in the net, was pouting her lips.

Before long, a pitiful voice could be heard.

“Mi, mister….”

Basto could only hurriedly start walking after hearing the next words.

“Tie, Tie’s leg hurts….”

“Mister, are rabbits tasty?”

Basto, who had been wrapping a compression bandage around the small ankle, looked up.

“Yeah.”

The child’s eyes widened.

“What do they taste like? Like cows?”

“All meat tastes the same.”

“No! Piggies and cows and chickens all taste different!”

Basto chuckled.

‘Talking about meat makes him seem like a noble.’

But it bothered him that the child was alone in this remote forest.

And the child’s father who was supposedly nearby still hadn’t shown himself.

“Why isn’t your father coming? You cried so loudly earlier.”

He asked carefully in case the child might burst into tears again, but the other side was quiet.

When he looked up, the child was looking at him with a cautious expression.

Basto added to reassure the child.

“If you tell me where your father is, I’m asking because I want to take you to him.”

The child pursed their lips.

He could see the hands holding the bag fidgeting.

“Actually, in Jedo…”

Basto’s brow furrowed.

“Jedo?”

Nod nod.

A short exclamation burst from his mouth.

He thought the parents were nearby, but they were in Jedo.

“Then why did you say earlier that your father was around here?”

“I had to say that so you wouldn’t kidnap Tie…”

“If I was so scary, why did you say it was okay at first?”

“That’s because the preschool teacher said not to provoke kidnappers…”

Silence fell between the two.

The child whispered to the speechless Basto as if telling a secret.

“Mister, if you ever meet a kidnapper, don’t say ‘Please spare me!’ either. That makes things worse.”

“…Why?”

“Because provoking kidnappers makes it more dangerous. You have to slowly figure out the kidnapper’s demands and open up possibilities for negotiation and dialogue.”

Basto was at a loss for words.

He swallowed a sigh before answering.

“That kind of thing, I’m fine with.”

The child made an “Eh?” sound.

“Look at me. Who do you think would kidnap me?”

Then the child’s mouth fell open at Basto’s following words.

The bright green eyes swept over his hair matted with monster blood, his bushy beard, and his imposing appearance in turn.

When the child nodded as if understanding, Basto felt somewhat bitter for some reason.

“…There, all done.”

When he finished wrapping the bandage, the child checked their ankle with curious eyes.

Basto stood up and looked down at the sight.

‘The parents are in Jedo.’

Regardless of the true meaning of those words, the child was injured.

Moreover, the sun was already gradually setting.

Briowood was a forest relatively close to Jedo.

And nowadays, the area near Jedo was swarming with refugees filtered out at the gateway.

With crowds gathering, sometimes there were young children separated from their families at the gateway.

Basto’s gaze fell on the child’s pink leather bag.

Though young, it was without wrinkles.

And it seemed they had attended a proper school that taught behavioral guidelines for when kidnapped.

A child who seemed to have grown up loved in a household that could afford to buy such a bag.

Basto came to a conclusion.

“Come with me to Jedo.”

He had to stop by Jedo anyway to report on the newly conquered magic stone.

“I’ll take you there.”

Seeing the child’s eyes widen, his chest immediately felt tight.

Once, he too had a child he prayed would safely return to his embrace.

Though now that child had gone to an unreachable place.

“How much your father must be waiting for you.”

At Basto’s words, a bright smile spread across Tie’s face.

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————