A young lady sprinted at Hanzo from the distance, holding a giant bazooka-sized double-barrel shotgun taller than her entire body.

Other than the crazy weapon, she looked like a normal person, except for the fact that she was stunningly beautiful.

She had normal lengthed, bright orange hair that flowed to her shoulders. She wore a white and brown village dress, normal for a village girl.

Her eyes were blue, her complexion pale and without any blemishes.

“Wait!” Hanzo said, unable to move, “He isn’t a slave, Noa!”

The crowd moved aside as the girl addressed as Noa stepped in front of the trio. She seemed to be no older than 19.

“Trust me, he’s a friend. An idiot, who got stuck in a seal. We came here so that you could help him…” Hanzo said, struggling with the tight chains around him.

Noa’s eyes wandered over to Tyr, who akwardly smiled at her.

“Haha… yeah. He’s not lying.” He knew he sounded like an idiot.

But, unexpectedly, Noa’s entire personality changed with her tone: “Oh my god! You should have told me from the beginning! I’ll free you right away, come this way.”

Hanzo rolled his eyes, “I would have told you if you didn’t put me in a seal first.” He whispered under his breath.

Noa spoke immediately afterward, killing intent still fuming from her being: “What was that? I can hear you… you know.”

“Yeah yeah…”

“It seems you want to be in those chains for a couple more days,” Noa exclaimed, her eyes turning red like a demon’s from Hanzo’s viewpoint.

“Wait! Never mind what I said! Please don’t do that, I have important inquireies!”

***

Tyr found it weird how the entire village stared outside of Noa’s small hut as she performed her Aura spells on him.

Nonetheless, he was happy to get this stupid bind off him after so long.

He looked at Noa, who had her eyes closed. It had been 5 minutes by now of Noa placing her hand on Tyr’s chest and unlocking his bind ever so slowly.

She was sweating, and Tyr could see from the concerned look on her face that she was clearly struggling.

Yet, she wasn’t complaining whatsoever about freeing him.

‘Another person with a good heart, I think.’ Tyr said to himself, ‘I feel like those are rare here… especially after what happened with my past friends… now that I think about it, there was never a time where they did anything for me without receiving a benefit themselves.’

Ten more minutes passed.

‘It must be grueling for her… but I’m used to staying in one position for a long time by now.’ Tyr thought to himself, worried as he saw Noa’s bothered face.

Out of nowhere, her eyelids sprang open. A smile appeared on her lips as the blue chains around Tyr obliterated into particles and disappeared into the air.

A small cheer came from the crowd outside.

“Hahaha! That’s our Noa for you!”

“She can always free anyone!”

“She’s truly a prodigy.”

Tyr smiled on hearing this, ‘They clearly love her. Good for her.’ He thought to himself.

“Thanks a bunch!” He grabbed Noa’s hands and dug his forehead into them as a sign of graditude.

He then stood up, jumping around since he was free for the first time in so long!

“Hopefully I don’t end up trapped like that anytime soon!” Tyr laughed, and Noa joined in on the chuckling.

“Haha… its my pleasure. I would never turn away from freeing someone. I feel there’s no better purpose in life!” Noa shared a genuine smile.

Tyr was slightly taken aback, ‘She’s a really nice person.’ He thought to himself.

“Hey…” Hanzo’s voice squeaked from the corner, “What about me?”

Noa turned toward him with an unimpressed look on her face.

Hanzo squinted his eyes, ‘Why do I feel… fear…’

“You didn’t do anything wrong.” Noa said, shifting her attitude, “Im sorry for locking you up, haha!” She laughed, freeing him instantly from her own bind.

“W-what? Don’t give me a scary stare then pretend as if its all okay!” Hanzo exclaimed, throwing his hands out to the side as an exclamation of his freedom.

For a moment, everyone inside of the small shack laughed.

Even the villagers outside couldn’t help but innocently snicker.

“So… how’s the situation with the village?” Hanzo asked at that moment.

Noa’s expression changed. Her eyebrows curled inwards as she looked to the side. Her face was somber as she spoke:

“It’s… gotten worse. The villagers can’t pay their month’s rent. Our crops aren’t growing and our Hunters are practically nonexistent. Our debt has kept increasing for the last year. Soon, it will reach over 1,000 Aura Stones, which is the limit.”

On hearing these words, the villagers quieted down as well.

Tyr’s eyebrows furrowed. ‘Hmm… a person as good as she seemingly is shouldn’t be going through that.’

Malon also didn’t seem amused by the information. He and Tyr looked at each other as he thought to himself: ‘Poor lady. She seems to care a lot as well. It must be heartbreaking.’

Hanzo exhaled before saying: “So… what’s the punishment?”

Noa looked up at him, moisture building up in her genuine eyes.

“Y-” Her voice cracked, “You know… what the punishment is.”

Hanzo exhaled again, gritting his teeth. Malon seemed to understand what Noa meant by this as well quite immediately.

For Tyr, however, it took a few more seconds of thinking. This was because the answer wasn’t something he was used to whatsoever, unlike Hanzo and Malon.

‘Does she mean… everyone here will be sold into slavery?’ He questioned, piecing together the puzzle parts. He couldn’t help but feel a horrible feeling in his gut just thinking about it.

“Don’t you have any way to fix the situation? I know you’ve been working to save your village for your entire life… isn’t there anything you’ve come up with?” Hanzo questioned.

“Hmm… there’s been one thing I have worked on. It was a dream, but now it has become quite likely.” Noa said as the others stayed silent, intrigue in their eyes.

“Its a technique to remove all types of Seals at once.” Noa said, making everyone’s eyes expand slightly.

At that moment, a small dog dashed into the shack through the window and landed on top of Hanzo’s head.

His eyes moved up as Noa couldn’t help but chuckle slightly: “Maybe Spen here will be the hope to our village. He is quite the powerful beast after all.”

“Spen, how’ve you been buddy?” Hanzo reached up to pet the dog that was fully black in color.

*CRUNCH*

Hanzo paused for a second as his finger was devoured by the dog… and then he let out a horrible scream of pain.

“YYYYYEEEEOUCH!!!”

He attempted to grab the small sucker, but Spen suddenly disappeared and appeared back in Noa’s lap.

“You stupid dog! I forgot how much of a pain you were!”

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep