The horned hare’s fur had fallen out, stained with blood, and not a single usable pelt remained. Hippopotamals had delicious meat, and the hides could be used for carriage tires. They were the kind of monsters that you could use every part of, and yet... Why had he kept cutting it up?! Once the meat hit the air, its freshness would start to dwindle and it would become inedible. With pelts and hides, you needed a certain size. The way he’d left them, they couldn’t be used for food or materials.
Armored boar was used for braised pork belly! Everyone knew that! So why had he cut it from the stomach?! You weren’t supposed to cut it that way until you were draining the blood... The meat was all bad, and even the nose that could have been used for shields was dented. Normally they would have done their best to keep that intact.
William kept looking for anything that could be salvaged, but every last bit was hopeless.
“Ah... Yeah, uh... Emma’s not the only one who would cry over this. Maybe it was for the best that she didn’t come with us... Ah.” George realized as he looked at the king covered in the monsters’ blood... If they came home with the amateur hunter covered completely in blood and no wounds himself, there’s no way Emma wouldn’t figure out what happened. And considering her appetite... This was going to be a huge pain. Emma was definitely about to give him an earful.
“Emma would be...sad about this? Sad enough to cry? But why...? Wait!” Unfortunately, the king couldn’t imagine that Emma would be upset about the monster meat and materials going to waste. After all, the Emma he knew was still a delicate flower. “Emma is still traumatized by that monster attack. If she saw her beloved(?) king come back from a monster hunt covered in blood, then surely it would cause her to panic... That’s what you mean, right, William?!”
People sure were good at coming up with explanations that suited their interests.
“Huh? I mean... She’ll definitely be shocked, that’s for sure...”
“She’s so frail... If I were to show up like this, I’m sure she wouldn’t even be able to eat. She might not even be able to walk! That’s what you’re saying, right, George?”
“I’m pretty sure there’s nothing that could keep her from eating...”
“Oh, you’re right... She would never want anyone to worry about her, so she’d force herself, wouldn’t she? Ooh... Emma, you’re just so brave...”
Apparently, the Fogey’s Fancy’s charms were in full force, even out here.
“Sniff...”
“Oough...”
“Hnngh...”
They then heard the Skyte lord, hunters, and the knights all starting to cry, spurred on by the king’s tears.
“Uh. What’s going on here?” the boys asked.
“I’ll protect Emma!”
“Huh? What’s going on, Your Highness?!”
“Pfffhyah hah hah hah!”
“Lord Arthur?! What’s the matter with all of you?!”
Both the usually coolheaded prince and the collected Arthur seemed completely off.
“Oh no. Eugh... Hey, George? Take a look at this...” William grabbed a small monster by the tail and pulled it out of the pile of monster corpses. It was one that never appeared in Pallas, so it was the first time William had seen one in real life.
“You think this thing has something to do with all this, William?” George didn’t know as much about monsters as William did, so he wasn’t familiar with it.
“This is a mad rat. When it bites bigger monsters, it makes them fly into a frenzy...”
“It can do that? So you think that little rat thing was controlling the monsters the king defeated?” George remembered his dad saying there were a lot of monsters in the Skyte region that used psychological attacks.
“Mad rat. I thought this whole thing was strange... Even for a herd of monsters, there were too many different species roaming together. Normally monsters that don’t already coexist wouldn’t attack in a herd like that...” William felt a cold sweat begin to form.
“That’s, uh...not good, is it?” George could tell something was off by his little brother’s expression.
“Mad rats aren’t all that strong on their own, but...I read in some books that if you get the blood of a monster bitten by one of these guys on you, it can make a person go temporarily crazy too.”
“Crazy? How so?”
“It’s kinda like...a status effect in a video game.”
“Wait, you mean like...going berserk? Or getting charmed? Or hypnotized? Or getting confused?”
“Yeah, exactly that.” Apparently, his video game knowledge from his previous life was helpful here.
“But...how are you supposed to face someone who’s running around all crazy like that? I can’t exactly fight the king, you know.” He didn’t want to hurt the king, obviously, but he didn’t want to hurt the prince, Arthur, the teachers, the hunters, or the knights either.
“Hmm... I still feel ready to move...” Behind George, the king had gone from weeping to suddenly slowly raising his head and brandishing his sword. “Hey, George? You think you could spar with me a bit?” He spun around to face George, but his eyes were entirely unfocused.
This was the middle of a forest. There was no stable footing, and there was no telling when monsters might appear. It was no place to have a sword fight, but none of the knights or hunters even tried to stop it. In fact, some of them were even egging him on, with shouts of, “Get him, Your Majesty!” “You’ve got this!”
Now that the brothers got a closer look, their eyes were entirely unfocused too.
“You’ve gotta be kidding me...”
There really was nothing more dangerous than an amateur on your hunting grounds.