Chapter 17

Chapter 17

At his words, the little boy visibly froze for a moment, his face paling. He abandoned any pretense of winning Pelan’s sympathy and dashed forward.

The slender, small figure was swiftly swallowed by the crowd. Lou Guanyue turned to Pelan. “Shall I chase after that little liar?”

Pelan shook his head. He had lost no property, and there was no need to apprehend the boy again.

“You truly are a tolerant and benevolent person—your character is admirable,” the male elf said with a smile, his gaze flicking toward the direction the boy had fled, tinged with sympathy and pity.

“The Tooka River brings prosperity and vitality to this upstream city, yet it also divides Gorro City into two distinct worlds. The West District teems with chaos and poverty: gangs collude with constables; the destitute congregate; wherever crowds gather, thieves lurk. Here, many unemployed poor eke out a living through temporary labor, and hungry children wander the streets. Even the Church cannot accurately estimate how many vagrants and orphans reside in the West District.”

Pelan listened quietly, picked up the money pouch the boy had dropped on the ground, and asked the elf, “Do you know that boy?”

The handsome man gave a slight nod and sighed softly. “Not well—I’ve only seen him a few times. My name is Arnold Olifrek. I run a clinic in the West District and occasionally volunteer, offering free medical care to workers and children there.”

Arnold paused briefly before continuing. “That boy is shunned by the others. After learning his circumstances from other children, I considered offering him some assistance—but he refused me outright. To this day, he remains unwilling to speak much with me.”

Lou Guanyue’s expression grew solemn, a flicker of pity surfacing in his eyes. “You are truly kind. May the gods watch over you.”

As he spoke, he deftly traced a sun symbol over his chest.

The conversation should have ended there—but Lou Guanyue was unwilling to miss the chance to glean further information from the elf and steered the discussion toward a new topic.

“We’re planning to head into the hot, humid forest—the southern rainy-season jungles are always crawling with all manner of insects. I’d like to prepare some medicine in advance. Does your clinic carry the appropriate potions?”

Arnold nodded. “Of course—but I don’t carry them on me. You’ll need to accompany me to the clinic to collect them.”

Lou Guanyue readily agreed. Sensing Pelan’s faintly probing gaze, the corner of his mouth lifted slightly—and the two followed Arnold out of the Rhine Guild Hall in silent understanding.

En route to the clinic, Arnold described Gorro City with warmth but without undue enthusiasm—skipping over bustling street scenes and intricate political dynamics, instead focusing on the children and sanitation conditions in the West District.

It was clear Arnold was indeed a compassionate physician.

Thanks to Arnold’s tactful warnings, Pelan had mentally braced himself for the appalling conditions he might encounter upon entering the West District. Yet he was still genuinely shocked when he actually stepped into the neighborhood.

The sanitation in the West District was simply filthy and chaotic—beyond terrible.

No—“terrible” wasn’t even adequate.

The air reeked of rot and decay. In places, sewage ran freely along the streets; trash littered the ground; the earth was muddy and pockmarked with stagnant puddles; grimy walls bore crude graffiti, jarringly out of place amid the squalor.

Pelan passed one ragged pedestrian after another—clothed in tattered, threadbare garments, their faces etched with resentment and despair. They were vagrants driven back into the West District by constables—among them, numerous gaunt, undernourished children.

Since entering this area, Lou Guanyue’s brows had remained tightly furrowed. He carefully sidestepped revolting feces and decaying matter, warily scrutinizing every inch of ground beneath his feet.

Pelan suspected that, had Arnold not been beside them, Lou Guanyue might have immediately asked whether he possessed magic capable of instantly purifying filth—of sweeping away all garbage and stagnant water from this land.

Or perhaps magic that could isolate one from the outside world—like a transparent bubble for breathing underwater—to avoid contact with the foul air altogether.

Of course, the most likely scenario was that his fastidious apprentice, spotting this squalid district from afar, would have turned and left at the first opportunity.

Fortunately, they didn’t need to walk far—the clinic stood at the border between the West District and the rest of the city. From Arnold’s tone, the deeper one ventured inward, the worse the environment became.

Arnold’s clinic was a modest, freestanding building—a typical Hoplar-style structure. It wasn’t particularly beautiful, but it was clean and tidy—already a luxury among the surrounding low, crumbling dwellings.

A ragged old man was rummaging through the clinic’s trash bin. He appeared to have found something—joy lighting up his hollow, sallow face as he stuffed a blackened, grime-encrusted fruit pit into his mouth.

From the corner of his eye, Pelan saw Lou Guanyue pause and silently observe the old vagrant for several moments.

The clinic seemed closed today—empty inside. Pelan wondered: did anyone ever actually come here for treatment?

He also doubted whether Arnold could sustain the clinic’s operation given its location in the West District.

Watching the old man’s retreating back through the window, Arnold let out a long sigh and offered a bitter smile. “The Church has established poorhouses here, distributing food daily—but their numbers are limited. Not everyone gets a chance to receive a meal.”

Poverty, hunger, and crime defined the West District.

Pelan pressed his lips together. “Don’t the city lord and constables of Gorro City oversee this?”

Unlike the Anbesal Empire of the northern continent, the Hoplar royal family had enacted reforms a decade earlier—reclaiming most lands from the nobility and appointing officials to administer cities under royal jurisdiction.

Arnold sneered coldly. “Those vermin do nothing but intensify their exploitation of dockworkers’ wages and siphon funds from the poor-relief foundation’s charity coffers.”

Neither Pelan nor Lou Guanyue spoke. Compared to Sade Town—where life, though monotonous and dull, could be deemed prosperous—at least residents there were allotted plots of land and wouldn’t starve to death.

Arnold excused himself with a “Wait a few minutes” and headed upstairs into a room.

Lou Guanyue withdrew his compass, fiddled with it briefly, then said to Pelan, “The gray mist hasn’t changed. It seems he’s unlikely to be the elf who departed with Mr. Sipo.”

Pelan had anticipated this outcome and felt no particular disappointment.

Though the elven race had rarely engaged with the outside world since the Holy War, not all elves resided in the Elven Forest. One might occasionally encounter elven mages in human cities.

“We can ask him if there’s a way to locate the Elven Forest.”

The Elven Forest was the ancestral homeland of all elves. It did not appear on any map of the Yakalanst continent—only known to lie at the continent’s southernmost tip, beyond the Melod Mountains. Only those elves who emerged from there knew how to reach it.

Since the gray mist failed to point toward Sipo’s direction, Pelan surmised he had most likely already arrived at the Elven Forest—thereby interfering with the tracking.

Perhaps elves possessed special means of communication. He could also ask Arnold whether he’d seen Sipo and the others.

Lou Guanyue agreed. He put away the compass, then asked, “Is this your first time in Gorro City, Teacher?”

Pelan shook his head. “No—but it’s my first time in the West District.”

Had he not followed Arnold into the West District today, he could scarcely have imagined that, in peacetime, so many people could live in such a daze of hunger and destitution.

Yue was probably witnessing such a scene for the first time, too.

“Not really,” Lou Guanyue suddenly interjected. Pelan realized, startled, that he’d inadvertently voiced his earlier thought aloud.

“I grew up in a place like this,” Lou Guanyue said, his tone as calm as if commenting on pleasant weather—even carrying a hint of wry amusement.

Pelan was momentarily stunned, as if only just registering the words. He sat in silence, a complex emotion welling up within him.

Before he could reflect further, Arnold emerged holding several vials of potion.

“These are insect-repellent powders. If bitten areas become painful or itchy, gently apply this ointment—it effectively alleviates wound symptoms,” Arnold explained in detail, holding up the medicines in his hand. “That will be twenty copper coins total.”

Lou Guanyue promptly paid him two silver coins.

Having helped Pelan avoid a financial loss, he had thus smoothly assumed responsibility for part of the funds—though the amount was strictly limited to what had nearly been stolen from the pouch that day.

Lou Guanyue cast a subtle glance at Arnold’s pointed ears—unconcealed and unhidden—and remarked casually, “I hadn’t expected potions brewed by an elven mage to be so affordable. I almost regret not buying more.”

Arnold smiled at the comment. “I only know a little about potion-making—I’m no alchemist versed in countless secret formulas. And I’m not an elven mage.”

To set themselves apart from human mages, the proud elves prefer to call themselves spellcasters.

Most elves are proficient in both magic and physical combat, making them closer to "battle mages" than mages who focus solely on arcane study.

Lou Guanyue took the insect repellent potion handed to him and said with a polite smile, "You flatter yourself. We bought the insect repellent powder precisely to head to the Melod Mountains in search of the legendary Forest of the Elves."

"Why are you looking for the Forest of the Elves?" Arnold asked, following up on the topic.

Pelan's lips twitched, and he resisted the urge to cover his face with his hand.

Arnold's expression also became quite animated. He opened his mouth, his tone a bit wistful as he remarked, "That is indeed a particularly urgent quest."

At this point, Arnold smiled and said, "Truth be told, I wasn't born from the embrace of the Elven Mother Tree. I'm a half-breed half-elf, and my mother was an ordinary laundry worker in the West District."

His seemingly self-deprecating smile made Pelan instinctively turn to look at Lou Guanyue, a weirder and weirder look in his eyes.

Seeing Lou Guanyue's unchanged expression, Arnold fell silent for a few seconds before letting out a sigh: "...However, I did see the three elves you mentioned."

"They didn't use the Rhine Guild's teleportation array but left Goro City through a hidden Spatial Magic array."

Author's note:

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