I write an Isekai about communist revolution until an anime is made out of it

In the Shadow of Giants

With that episode behind me, I was finally on the move again, imagining the spirits of old cowboys and western stars watching over me as I rode alone with a revolver on my belt and a bandanna pulled over my face.  I still didn't know if there was even any risk of being recognized, but given how many of the passing adventurers covered their faces, I figured it couldn't hurt to follow suit myself, just in case. I didn't know. That was the root of all my problems, wasn't it? No idea where to go, no idea how to get there, no idea if I even needed to be running so far in the first place.  There was that assassin, but he could have been sent by that "dark lord", or any lord that figured they'd be more powerful with me out of the picture, instead of that city whose sacred glade I intruded on. Considering that everyone I tried to ask for directions outright refused to tell me anything useful (some even drew weapons, or ran away), I was left to navigate with nothing but the sun and the assumption that if I followed the biggest road I could find it would eventually lead me to a city. There, hopefully I could sell all the trinkets - and that dead assassin's weapons - and then buy some useful information; a guide, or a map, or anything.

Traffic along Elgea's roads was largely what I had expected: adventurer parties, peasants headed to market, "proper" merchant caravans passing with encouragingly increasing frequency the more I followed the path to larger roads, and enough lone wanderers that I didn't feel out of place. What I hadn't anticipated, though, was the refugees - alarming numbers of them, and headed in every direction. Some lumbered along with all their worldly possessions packed in wagons alongside anyone too weak to walk, some carried only the clothes on their backs, there was even one group with practically nothing at all. I had no clue what they were running from, and all I could decipher was that it was no single event at a single location, or they'd be headed predominantly in one direction instead of all of them. The unbothered confidence of all the other parties on the roads was my only assurance that there wasn't some huge disaster like a plague or famine sweeping the land.

As the hours dragged by and I started getting saddle-sore, I finally noticed that the winding paths of tracks punctuated by enough horseshit to be glad I was mounted myself told a story far more interesting than any of the hovels and hamlets and odd blast marks I'd passed. The weirdest traveler I'd actually seen all day was some idiot riding a bull in full plate armor, but the tracks beneath me told the tale of increasingly stranger things passing with increasing rarity. Unremarkable shoe prints and hoof prints and wagon ruts were visible almost everywhere, but I also made out the distinct footprints of at least twenty different animals - paws, claws, talons, and one that seemingly walked on ice skates, and apparently left behind solid, monolithic blocks of feces which had yet to fully decompose.  There was even the occasional tire track, leaving a trail far wider than the ruts left by wagon wheels, and one stretch of road was dented by what I could only assume was caterpillar treads.

The realization that these people probably invented tanks without me was more frustrating than anything else, and the question of how the hell they could possibly maintain something like that if the other 99.9% of people didn't even know what it was kept tossing through my mind as the sun started to sink below the horizon. It was just out of sight when I made out a lone tavern along the road in the twilight, and finally decided to call it a night. I left "Honse" (recalling that name still triggered a burst of cry-laughing in me) hitched outside alongside several other horses and what was hopefully a different heavily-armored bull than the one I'd seen earlier that day, and stepped inside.

Besides lacking the swinging doors and creaky floorboards my cowboy instincts hungered for, the tavern was also not nearly as lively as I'd expected. I mean, I'd never gone to a bar or anything before that, so I didn't really know what they were "supposed" to be like, but I can at least confirm that place was unlike any tavern in any book or movie or video game I'd ever seen. There was no loud drunken babbling or party games; instead, the tavern was filled with small groups of travelers (the majority of which hid their faces) slouched over their tables with hushed tones like they were in an old spy movie, occasionally finishing their meals and leaving to rooms upstairs as quietly as they had entered, along with a couple of lone patrons apparently drinking away their sorrows. At the very least, that meant that my walking in, ordering and promptly devouring whatever plain meal the innkeeper could give me, and heading up to my own room, wasn't nearly as weird as it would have been considered back home.

I did actually fall asleep the second I lay in bed for the first time I could remember, though, so that's something positive I guess.