When I woke up, I was in Leonie’s arms, surrounded by light. It looked like she had blacked out. Since my consciousness had still been faint, I understood what had happened. Leonie had done something really bold for me.
✦ ✦ ✦
“I won’t let you down, Leonie.”
I squeezed my fist and felt power overflowing from within me. There was something different from the times when I had simply eaten mana or aura using Gluttony. Compared with that, the amount of power I had absorbed and was now flowing throughout my body was clearly excessive. What even is this?
Guess there’s just something special about tasting your future bride’s mana.
—An interesting hypothesis indeed. But right now, I believe you should be focusing on the cyclops.
Yeah, I know.
I jumped to my feet and faced down the cyclops. Nor was lying on the ground near the giant.
It can’t be, I thought in shock for a split second, but then I realized she was still breathing. I felt relief and rage welling up within me at the same time.
“What did you do to my friend, you jerk?!”
I put my strength into my fist and leaped at the cyclops. The next moment, its gigantic frame was within my reach.
“Take that!”
I slammed my fist into the side of the giant’s face. Perhaps being taken off guard, the cyclops took the full brunt of the attack and staggered backward. I kept showering it with attacks.
“Haaaaaah!”
Swinging my fists, I aimed my second and third hits at the giant’s humongous eye. Something was clearly different about my strikes from before. They were more effective now. But my enemy still couldn’t be taken lightly. I delivered my fourth blow in a defensive stance, righted my posture, and prepared for its counterattack. I desperately dodged the giant’s fists as they landed with as much force as a massive carriage accident and kept up my own attacks in the meantime.
“Grrr…”
“?!”
Suddenly, the cyclops dropped down to all fours and closed its mouth. I felt a cold chill run down my spine in premonition. I immediately dodged to the side, taking distance from the beast.
“Grrraaaahhh…!”
Destructive breath surged from the cyclops’s mouth. The move had incredible force, immediately ripping up from the ground the portion of the woods in its path. Making everyone else evacuate really had been the right call. There would have been no way to focus on the battle while also keeping them from harm. Just as I was thinking this—
—Ruchika, alert. Approximately eight meters behind you, to your right.
Huh? …Oh man…
There were still some stragglers who hadn’t escaped. Danita and one of her followers specifically. Seriously, what the hell are they still doing here?!
“You guys have to run! You’re in the way!”
Continuing my close-range battle with the Cyclops and being careful not to take any of its breath attacks, I shouted to the two girls. Danita’s follower looked like she had frozen in terror and completely collapsed. Danita, on the other hand, had avoided that fate, but she still seemed to be in some kind of daze.
“Danita, come on!”
“Why…?”
“What?! I can’t hear you!”
“Why can’t you…just give up already…?!”
Danita spoke as if delirious.
“How long are you dropouts gonna keep this up?! Why should you care about us—? You should just leave us to die! So why?!”
This may have been the first time I was really seeing Danita’s true self. She was in tatters. Now even abandoned by her own followers, she had fallen as the poster child for the next generation of heroes and was left powerless and trembling. Regret, turmoil, and frustration at her inability to finish what she’d started—it all swirled around her, and the only thing she could do was ask—“Why?”
“Why do I need a reason…to protect a friend?” I asked.
I didn’t really get what she was asking. Both Danita and her follower were my friends. So I needed to protect them. That was it. There was no place for reasoning or logic in that, but maybe humans thought differently about it.
“A friend…? You mean me…?”
“Am I wrong? At least, I consider you my friend.”
Dodging under the cyclops’s massive arm, which threatened to down us in one hit, I kept talking to Danita. Of course, I probably should have been focusing completely on the battle. But for some reason, I had a feeling that if I cut our conversation short now, I might never get to speak with her again.
“…”
Danita was dumbfounded. I didn’t have the leeway to turn back and look at her, but I guess from her reaction she had never expected to be told that. Y’know, that hurts my feelings a little. Maybe my idea of friendship is just one-sided after all?
“I mean, it’s fine either way, so just get out of here, okay? You’re probably gonna have to carry your flunky there.”
“…Hey.”
“Yeah, what? Can’t you see I’m a little busy right now?!”
Danita was trembling. I thought part of what she was feeling must be fear. She had to be scared of a monster like this. Honestly, even I was afraid of it. But I knew that wasn’t the only reason she was trembling.
“Who d’you think I am…?!”
“Huh? Danita…?”
I felt energy welling up behind me. I knew what it was without even looking back to check. It was a pure, unadulterated battle aura, the color of bright, fresh blood.
“Everyone’s always underestimatin’ me! I’m the daughter of the Battle-Ax Hero, Wolbalter—the one and only Danita Blackburn!!”
It was like her very soul was crying out. As her booming voice shook our surroundings, red meteors of concentrated aura cut through the air.
Danita swung her signature sword from over her head. The trajectory of its beautiful slash cut into the cyclops’s steel-hard right hand and sliced it in half.
“Gyaaaaahhh!”
Even the cyclops seemed surprised by the seriousness of the blow, and it shrank back as if unable to bear the pain. This was our first big opening—and we had to take advantage of it.
“Awesome job, Danita! Maybe I should consider you for my mate, too!”
I concentrated the rest of my remaining power into my right fist, steadied my breathing, and charged energy into my legs. This one attack could decide the fate of the whole battle. I looked over at the cyclops.
“Thank you for fighting for my mama back then. But now it’s time for you to go to bed!”
This monster had been a soldier in the Great Human-Demon War. As a show of respect for its inexhaustible will to keep on fighting, I would send it off with the best attack I could muster.
Growing as dense as it could get, my battle aura corporealized and began to rage. The next moment, a cerberus—a beastly manifestation of Gluttony—appeared around my right hand. Usually, it bore the form of a black dog— No, it was more the color of concentrated darkness. But the beast now residing in my fist was a giant dog of pure white. The change probably had something to do with Leonie’s mana, but I wasn’t sure of the details. However, there was one thing I was sure of—this ended here and now.
“You’re finished! Sic ’em—Cerberus Bite!”
The crystallization of my battle aura burst forth from my fist. The uncontrollable torrent of rampaging, massive power surged toward the cyclops. I plunged my fist into its eyeball, tore it down and out through its jaw, then using that momentum, I carved it out and devoured it.