The voices ceased.
A voice that had been mocking one girl as insignificant.
A voice that had boasted that she was no match for them.
A voice that had scorned this maiden who had opposed the pack of beastmen, boldly declaring, “One for all and all for one!”
A voice that had clamored to boil the skin from her bones and drain the blood from her veins.
They all ceased at the sight of the girl without her bloodied cloak. The over two hundred beastfolk had all stopped for a moment.
Her peach-tinted hair shone lustrous in the sun—the god of this land, reigning absolute, yet unable to burn her porcelain skin. Her jade-colored eyes didn’t waver in the slightest before their numbers.
She was beautiful. They had seen men and women with well-formed features such as hers before, of course. But despite her youthful appearance, she was fearless in the face of the oncoming bloodbath, not cowering, not angry, not hateful. She simply stood there, naturally still and graceful, like a rose blooming in the desert. That beauty had them subconsciously enchanted and terrified in equal measure.
From among the slowed pack, one boy stepped forward as though drawn by the rose’s fragrance. A wolf beastman with gray fur, with eyes only for the girl who had stolen his heart with one glance.
He could practically smell it—the sweet scent of her blood, turning his brain to mush. Despite his youth, the boy had already executed many for his pack. He could picture it perfectly: her soft flesh, yielding to the blade of his hatchet.
The boy readied his rusty weapon and charged ahead.
Whoosh.
His hatchet swung powerfully downward, but the girl merely pushed the flat of the blade aside as though it were nothing. The weapon struck air, and the boy staggered, unable to comprehend what had gone wrong. The girl reached for his elbow, and it snapped backward.
Another strike. A scream died in his crushed throat. The arm he extended, pleading for help, shattered. The girl’s pale arm wrapped around his neck, and it twisted in a full semicircle with a sickening crunch, displaying his terrified expression to his packmates.
What skill did this girl have to do such a thing?
How cold was she to do such a thing?
She’d brutally killed the boy without moving an inch, without so much as drawing a blade. Lightly, she pushed his corpse, and as it crumpled to the sandy ground, she quietly drew a black blade.
“Well, Munza pack? Anyone else with a death wish? Come get me.”
✦ ✦ ✦
“Raaaaaaaaaah!”
At my provocation, several of the pack members couldn’t take it any longer and jumped forward, roaring. They were frightened, confused. The rage they used to mask it was meaningless.
I spun my slashing pendulum in a horizontal arc, gouging the eyes of the man pulling ahead of the rest. Blinded and in agony, he screamed, making several others around him flinch. I swung my dagger sideways, stabbing it under the jaw and into the brain of a woman who stood stunned nearby.
Then, I heightened my focus. With Level 4 Detection and honed combat instincts, I could read even the air currents as they brushed against my skin—and thus twisted to avoid a spear coming at me from behind. I grabbed the spear and yanked it toward me, then kicked the face of the catfolk wielding it with my iron-plated heel.
Using specialized footwork, I immediately closed the distance to a middle-aged canine beastman to slash his neck while swinging down my weighted pendulum at the skull of a portly middle-aged woman behind him. Both were dead within seconds, their blood turning the dry soil muddy.
Focusing Boost on my agility, I leaped into the pack, not waiting for them to attack. The swarm, panicked, parted.
That woman’s knowledge mentioned an old military tactic that revolved around brutally making an example of the first enemy to approach in order to instill fear in the others. My strategy was based on that.
If I got caught by that many people, regardless of their ranks, I would be torn apart in an instant. Pushing the instinctive fear of death deep into my heart, I braced my body to face the maelstrom of people, controlling my movements as though walking on a blade’s edge.
My slashing and weighted pendulums spun around me like a bloody barrier as I lunged into the pack, tearing the necks and crushing the skulls of those careless enough to come near. Any who avoided the pendulums met the wrong end of my black knife.
Pack hunting was a survival strategy used against stronger enemies, but fear had dulled their wills. Batil had said they were “one for all and all for one”—but how many individuals would he sacrifice “for all”? And were those who had joined his pack willing to lay down their lives for the group? The few who had been were already dead, having jumped out first.
But I couldn’t make them too afraid either. Excessive fear could drive one to throw caution to the wind out of desperation. No, I had to keep them minimally hopeful—that was the true source of fear.
Conscious of this, I leaped out of the swarm and into a nearby hut, kicking through a wooden window shutter. This wouldn’t have been an option while they had a hostage—trickery would only have prompted Batil to use Chaco as leverage.
But I was no longer shackled by such concerns.
If their survival strategy was to hunt in a pack, mine was to hunt the pack itself.
“G-Get her!” someone shouted.
Their numerical superiority trumped their fear of slaughter. To shatter that illusion, I unleashed my all-purpose pendulum into the forehead of a man trying to climb in through the broken window.
Fear rippled through the pack again as I cut the throats of those who had followed me into the darkness of the hut, killing them instantly. Before the others could surround the building, I leaped out another window and broke into the window of a different hut. A few relatively capable beastmen followed me, and I slashed their throats in the darkness too.
Catfolk had an advantage in the dark, and dogfolk had a sharp sense of smell. But they were still demi-humans, not wild beasts, and relied primarily on their vision. At a high enough rank, their sharpened senses would allow them to detect danger, but with low Aether Manipulation levels, they couldn’t instantly activate Night Vision. Lured from the bright daylight of the battlefield into the unlit indoors, they’d died in the darkness, unable to do anything.
I repeated the process until I lost count of how many I’d killed. Sensing the number of pursuers had decreased, I activated Boost at full capacity and leaped out at the over a hundred beastmen still remaining.
As if on cue, several attack spells danced through the air toward me.
Beastmen were ill-suited for elemental sorcery, instead priding themselves on their physiques, perfect for close combat. But, like Rahda, some of them were still quite skilled. Besides, even unbalanced, slow-to-activate spells could be lethal in some cases.
I had leaped into the air precisely to flush out the sorcerers. With my thoughts accelerated by Boost, I pinpointed their positions. They hadn’t done anything before due to the risk of friendly fire.
Twisting my body and kicking at the air to dodge, I cast a quick, low-power Shield spell to deflect incoming Fire Arrow and Stone Bullet spells. The beastmen grew agitated as they watched me evade what should’ve been a lethal barrage.
At that moment, I used the practical spell Gust to scatter powder into the air, drawing screams from the beastmen who made contact with it. It wasn’t poison but a regional pepper-like spice, finely ground. It was a staple in local cooking and easily purchased—a simple irritant that caused sneezing and tears but was extra effective against beastmen, whose vision and smell were stronger than those of other races.
I used the shawl around my neck to cover my mouth, closed my eyes, and leaped into the pack.
“Shadow.”
Several phantom shades, shaped like me, ran through the crowd of beastmen. Blinded and unable to smell, with many of their comrades dead, they had now crossed the threshold of desperation. Startled by the presence of what appeared to be enemies running past, they began fighting each other. I could’ve used the Level 4 spells Dread or Confusion, but Shadow consumed less aether.