Chapter 959: Hypotheses
Monica spent a few moments watching the movement of the city through the window before turning her attention back to the room. The reflection of the snow-covered railway tracks could be seen in the distance while one of the trains slowly crossed the industrial district, releasing a long column of white steam that disappeared among the low clouds. Despite everything that had happened over the last few hours, Asgard continued functioning exactly as it should. The workshops remained open, the markets continued receiving goods, and the citizens walked normally through the streets. That routine was precisely why she had no intention of acting impulsively.
"Everyone tends to make the same mistake when they encounter something unknown," she said calmly as she returned to the table. "They rush to solve the problem before they even understand which problem actually needs to be solved. That is how entire armies end up marching into traps."
She placed both hands on the map and resumed analyzing the markings scattered across the southeastern region of the continent. There were several colored points indicating where patrols had encountered groups of beasts, others showing interrupted trade routes, and a few representing small villages that remained inhabited. None of those points, however, showed a pattern consistent enough to state anything with absolute certainty.
"We are assuming that everything began in the desert because that is where we found that creature," Monica continued. "But that is still a conclusion based on a single encounter. It may be correct, or it may not be. Before we move our main forces in that direction, I want to confirm that information."
Mercedes remained looking at the map for a few seconds before agreeing with a slight nod. As a ruler, she understood that line of reasoning perfectly. Many wars were lost because someone mistook coincidence for evidence.
"How do you intend to do that?" she asked.
Monica pulled out another map, this one far more detailed, containing secondary roads, small settlements, and old trade routes that were barely used anymore. The paper already contained several notes made over the last few days, some written by her and others by officers responsible for reconnaissance along the borders.
"I want to divide our investigation into three completely independent fronts. The first will be military. We need to know exactly how many creatures are appearing, where they emerge, where they move, and whether there is any regularity in those movements. I do not want reports merely saying that monsters were killed. I want times, directions, group sizes, behavior, and any detail that may seem irrelevant."
She then looked toward Cassandra.
"You know the patrol commanders well. Create a standardized report format. If every group writes things in its own way, we will lose important information simply because no one recorded it consistently."
Cassandra nodded immediately.
"I can do that today."
"Good."
Monica made a small note and continued.
"The second front will be civilian. Rogue, I need you to use your guild."
The demi-human raised her eyes.
"The adventurers?"
"Yes. They travel more than any army. Many of them accept jobs in regions where soldiers never pass. I want to gather accounts from merchants, hunters, miners, and adventurers who have crossed the southeast during the last few months. Sometimes someone sees something strange and simply does not consider it important."
Rogue crossed her arms while thinking quickly.
"That will generate a great deal of material."
"That is exactly what I want."
"It will take a few days."
"Better to spend a few days reading than a few months rebuilding cities."
The answer made Rogue smile faintly. It was exactly the kind of sentence she expected to hear from Monica.
Frieren, who had remained silent since the beginning of the meeting, slowly approached the table and looked over the map from above the administrator’s shoulder.
"I assume the third front is magical."
Monica smiled for the first time since the conversation began.
"Exactly."
The elf waited for her to continue.
"You understand the behavior of mana on a large scale better than anyone here. I want you to investigate whether there have been any environmental changes during the last few months. Not only in Asgard, but across the entire continent, if possible. Any unusual change may tell us whether something truly different is happening in that region."
Frieren nodded without showing any surprise.
"I will consult my old records as well. I have several maps of mana flows that I drew many years ago. It may be possible to compare them with the current situation."
"Perfect."
Strax remained listening to the entire conversation without interrupting once. The more Monica spoke, the more he realized that her approach was very different from his own. His first impulse had been to find the creature again and destroy it before it could evolve any further. Monica, however, treated the problem like an incomplete equation. Before trying to solve it, she wanted to discover which information was still missing.
He eventually smiled faintly.
"You really are still the same."
Monica looked away from the map.
"Was that a compliment?"
"It was."
She gave him a slight smile in return.
"Then thank you."
There was a brief moment of silence, but this time it did not carry the weight of the previous minutes. Everyone seemed to be simply organizing what they would need to do over the next few hours.
Mercedes was the one who spoke again.
"There is something else bothering me."
Everyone turned their attention toward her.
"If these creatures really are driving all the wildlife out of the desert, why did it take us so long to notice? A phenomenon on that scale should have affected caravans, hunters, and travelers much earlier."
Monica remained thoughtful.
"I considered that as well."
"And?"
"There are two possibilities."
She raised two fingers.
"The first is that this truly began only recently."
Then she lowered one.
"The second is that it began slowly."
Everyone remained attentive.
"If only small groups of animals had been leaving the region for months, no one would have noticed. A hunter would find fewer prey. A merchant would see one or two animals on a different road. Each person would treat it as an isolated occurrence."
Frieren naturally finished the thought.
"Until the numbers increased."
"Exactly."
Monica looked back at the map.
"That is why I need the older records. I am not looking only for recent events. I want to discover when the first signs appeared."
Strax breathed slowly.
"If we find that moment..."
"We may discover what triggered everything."
Monica finished the sentence before him.
The two of them spent a few seconds staring at the map. For the first time since the crisis had begun, they had a concrete direction to follow. They still had no answers, but they now knew which questions needed to be asked.
The meeting began to dissolve naturally. Cassandra left first to reorganize the patrols, Rogue departed for the guild, and Frieren returned to the mansion’s library, where she would probably spend the rest of the day surrounded by old books. Mercedes also said her goodbyes, explaining that she would immediately send messages to the North. The more information they gathered over the next few hours, the better their chances of avoiding a hasty decision.
A short while later, only Strax and Monica remained in the room.
She was still looking at the map.
He remained silently beside her.
"You are worried about something else," Monica said without taking her eyes off the paper.
Strax did not answer immediately.
"Perhaps."
She finally looked at him.
"It was not that creature."
He shook his head.
"It is dangerous."
"But that is not it."
Monica waited.
After a few seconds, Strax answered quietly.
"I have fought much stronger monsters."
She continued listening.
"What bothers me is something else."
"What?"
He looked back at the enormous map of the continent.
"It seemed... incomplete."
Monica arched an eyebrow slightly.
"Incomplete?"
"As though it were still growing."
The administrator remained silent.
Strax placed one hand on the table.
"During the fight, I had the impression that it had not finished changing."
He paused briefly before continuing.
"It did not seem like an adult organism."
The words made Monica think for a few moments.
If that were true...
Then perhaps they truly had not found the real problem.
Perhaps they had found only the beginning of it.
Monica did not answer immediately. She remained looking at the map for several seconds, but her attention was clearly no longer focused on the borders drawn across the paper. Strax’s comment had completely changed the way she viewed the problem. Until that moment, everyone had assumed they had encountered the main enemy. However, if his perception was correct, perhaps that creature was only an intermediate stage of something much larger.
She slowly pulled out a chair and sat at the table, resting one elbow on the wood while bringing her other hand to her chin. It was a posture Strax knew very well. Monica always did that whenever she abandoned the most obvious answers and began analyzing less comfortable possibilities.
"You said it seemed incomplete," she began calmly. "Was that only an impression during the fight, or is there a specific reason for believing it?"
Strax remained silent for a few seconds before answering. He seemed to be organizing the memory of the battle, trying to separate what he had truly seen from what he had merely sensed.
"It did not react like a stabilized creature."
Monica continued listening.
"When a dragon grows, there comes a point when its body stops merely accumulating power and begins refining it. Its structure changes less because it has finally found a balance. That creature did the exact opposite."
He placed both hands on the table.
"Every adaptation seemed improvised."
Frieren had silently returned to the room carrying three old books in her arms. Upon hearing the conversation, she decided to remain near the door instead of heading directly to the library.
"Improvised in what way?"
Strax looked at her.
"The new jaw."
He quickly drew on a blank sheet of paper.
"It appeared because the creature needed to increase its offensive capacity immediately."
Then he drew another structure.
"Its shell thickened because Cassandra nearly pierced its defenses."
A few more lines appeared.
"Its muscles grew because Samira began dominating the physical battle."
He set down the charcoal.
"It changed to survive."
Frieren studied the drawing for a few moments.
"But that is exactly what adaptation is."
"No."
Strax answered immediately.
"Adaptation takes time."
He crossed his arms again.
"That looked like accelerated growth."
Monica began to understand where he was going.
"You are saying it was still... forming."
"Perhaps."
"Or maturing."
"Perhaps."
Mercedes, who had not completely left the room yet, took a few steps back inside.
"Is there a difference?"
Strax nodded.
"A significant one."
Everyone remained attentive.
"An adult predator fights to win."
He paused briefly.
"A young predator fights mainly to stay alive."
The sentence hung over the table for several seconds.
Monica slowly closed the map she had been examining.
"If you are right..."
She took a deep breath.
"...then that creature has not yet reached its final form."
"We do not know."
Strax answered honestly.
"But I would rather proceed under the assumption that it has not."
The administrator agreed immediately.
"So would I."
She spent a few moments staring into the distance before continuing.
"Because if we are wrong, we will waste some resources."
Then she looked back at Strax.
"But if we are right and ignore that possibility..."
She did not need to finish the sentence.
Everyone understood.
The consequences would be incomparably worse.
Frieren finally placed the books on the table.
"While you were talking, I remembered something else."
Monica turned toward her.
"Those bodily changes..."
The elf slowly opened one of the books.
"...do not remind me of magic."
Strax raised an eyebrow.
"I thought they were strange too."
Frieren turned through several pages.
"Magic normally alters structures by using mana as an intermediary."
She found an old illustration.
"But that..."
Her finger stopped on a heavily worn engraving.
"...looked like biological growth."
Mercedes approached.
"What is the practical difference?"
Frieren turned the book so everyone could see it.
"The cost."
She pointed to two drawn figures.
"Magic consumes mana."
Then she pointed to the other.
"Growth consumes matter."
Strax immediately understood.
"The beasts."
Frieren nodded.
"Perhaps."
She did not seem entirely convinced.
"If that creature truly modifies its own body in that manner..."
Her expression became slightly more serious.
"...then it requires an absurd amount of food."
Monica opened the map again.
This time, her attention shifted to another piece of information.
"The migrations."
She began connecting several points with small lines.
"The herds are fleeing."
"The smaller creatures are disappearing."
"The number of predators is decreasing."
She spent a few seconds looking at the notes.
"Perhaps we are interpreting this incorrectly."
Daniela, who had remained leaning near the window, approached.
"What do you mean?"
Monica looked at her.
"What if they are not fleeing only out of fear?"
Silence filled the room again.
Frieren was the first to understand.
"They are being hunted."
Monica nodded.
"That would explain a great deal."
She continued organizing her reasoning.
"A creature of that size could not survive on only a few animals."
She quickly wrote down several rough calculations.
"It would need to consume an enormous amount of matter."
Strax watched everything closely.
Now that hypothesis seemed far more solid.
Mercedes crossed her arms.
"That would also explain why we found so many different species mixed together."
"Yes."
Monica answered.
"If they are all trying to escape the same predator, they will end up abandoning their natural territories."
The administrator placed the charcoal on the table.
For the first time since the meeting began, she seemed to have found a truly consistent point.
"Then we have an objective."
Everyone turned their attention toward her.
"We need to measure it."
Samira frowned.
"Measure it?"
"How much."
She answered.
"How much wildlife has disappeared."
Daniela looked confused.
"And how does that help?"
Monica turned toward her.
"If we know approximately how much food has disappeared from that region..."
She paused briefly.
"...we can estimate how many creatures exist."
The comment made even Strax look at her more closely.
She continued.
"If only one creature is consuming all of it, we will have one scenario."
"If the numbers are incompatible..."
She slowly closed the map.
"...then we will know there is more than one."
No one answered immediately.
Because the conclusion was simple.
Logical.
And, at the same time, extremely troubling.
Strax breathed slowly.
"I like that idea."
Monica smiled faintly.
"It is mathematics."
"Mathematics usually works."
Frieren closed the old book.
"I will look for hunting records from the villages near the desert."
Mercedes also seemed interested.
"My kingdom has wildlife censuses for managing the winter reserves."
Monica turned toward her.
"That would be extremely useful."
"I will have all of them brought here."
The conversation continued for a few more minutes, now much less focused on combat and much more on information. For the first time since the crisis began, they were no longer merely reacting to events. They were trying to understand them in an organized manner.
Strax remained listening to the discussion while once again studying the large map of the continent.
There were still far too many questions.
Far more questions than answers.
But unlike what he had felt a few hours earlier, he no longer had the impression that they were completely blind.
They had finally found a path.
Perhaps a slow one.
Perhaps a laborious one.
But a path nonetheless.
And if Monica was right, they would not need to fight dozens of battles to discover the truth.
They only needed to gather enough information for the problem itself to begin revealing its origin.
In a way, that was far more efficient than simply marching toward the desert and hoping to find answers at the edge of a sword.