"New Main Quest released: Save the elves from the demons."
"Demons?" I couldn't help repeating to myself.
It was a good thing that there was no one else here with me, or else it definitely would have been hard to explain why I just said that.
But I really was confused why the system was telling me to save the elves from the demons.
Could it be that the demons were the reason why magic was being drained from this forest?
If that was the case, it would explain the shape of the area where magic was being drained…
But how did demons sneak all the way here?
The border between the human territory and the demon territory was very far from this place, so it was hard for demons to get this far into the human territory. That is unless they had help from the humans themselves, like with the demon order.
So if there were demons in this forest, where did they come from?
Or…could it be that they were remnants from the demon order that he destroyed?
If that was the case, it would really seem like I was related to this matter since I was the one that destroyed the demon order and sent the demons here.
After thinking about it, I decided to look closely at the quest tab.
[Main Quest] Save the elves from the demons.
The demons have set up special spell arrays that drain away the magic energy of the Spirit Forest and this has put the lives of the elves in danger. Save the elves by stopping these spell arrays and restoring the magic of the Spirit Forest.
Reward: System upgrade.
The moment that I saw what the reward was, I couldn't help being shocked.
The system was already capable of doing many things, but I really couldn't help wondering what it would be capable of if it was upgraded…
It seemed like I really had to take this quest seriously…
But the problem now was how I was supposed to find these special spell arrays that the demons were using to drain the magic energy from the Spirit Forest.
It wasn't as if I had some kind of special ability to do that.
So in the end, I really didn't know what to do…
That is until I heard someone calling out.
"I've found something!"
When I heard this, I immediately followed that voice to where it was coming from.
I saw that it was Haley and she was standing in the middle of some trees. It didn't seem like there was anything special about where she was currently standing.
But for her to say this, she must have found something.
When we gathered together, she waved her hand for us to come over to where she was standing and she pointed down at the ground as she said, "Do you see this?"
When we looked down, all we saw were a few branches and leaves that were there, so we were very confused about what she was pointing at.
Haley could see this, so she said, "Look closely and you can see the marks on the ground."
We were still confused about what she was talking about, but since she was insistent, we looked closely at where she was pointing.
As we looked closely, we were able to find the marks that she was talking about.
There were some small straight marks in the dirt that seemed to be leading in a direction, but there didn't seem to be anything special about them. These could have been marks that were made from anything scratching the ground.
Still seeing the confused looks on our faces, Haley shook her head and said, "These are tracks from a special creature called the Sprinting Bird. It's a rare creature used for transport because of how fast it can run."
While I felt that she was smart, I couldn't help being doubtful when I heard this since this really didn't seem like the tracks of some kind of creature.
No matter how I looked at it, these were just simple marks on the ground.
Still, I decided to trust her in the end.
I just had one thing to ask Haley, "How do you know about all of this?"
She revealed a confident and sly smile, "I'm a merchant and a great one at that. If I didn't know this, then I wouldn't have been able to build up my business, would I?"
As I looked at her, a gentle and pampering look appeared in my eyes.
While others would have been moved by the way that she looked, I couldn't help thinking that she was…cute.
Cecilia on the other hand didn't think too much about it.
Once she heard that these were tracks, she started looking on the ground for the trail. She was looking around the area for marks that were similar to the one that Haley had found.
It didn't take her long to find what she was looking for and she quickly turned back to tell us.
"Over here! There are more tracks over here!"
We quickly went over to where she was calling from.
When we came over, we saw the marks on the ground that she had found.
These marks were like the ones that she had found before and they were leading off into the forest. If we followed them, we should be able to find the ones that made them.
Both of the girls revealed excited looks when they saw this. They both turned back to me with looks that seemed like they wanted to follow these tracks.
However, I shook my head to deny this.
I had two different reasons for this.
One was that this was the territory of the elves, so if we went around it as we wanted, looking for these things, it would certainly offend them. If we wanted to do this, we had to go talk to the elves first.
Second…I knew what was waiting for us at the end of this search.
The demons were anything but weak, so I wouldn't put our lives in danger without some kind of plan first.
So the first thing to do was to regroup and tell everyone what we found.