“But Miss—!”
“I hate to say it, but it doesn’t matter how much you struggle against him with a Raging Bear—he’s got you outpowered!” Meddié replied. “But it’s a different story with my Agile Gazelle!”
Without even waiting for her subordinates’ response, Agile Gazelle leaped into action. Dodging the fist the Tyrant Rhino tried slamming down on it, Agile Gazelle broke into a dash at a speed the Raging Bears could never hope to match.
“Hrm?! You impudent little—”
“Doesn’t matter how strong you are if you can’t hit me!”
Agile Gazelle dashed through the street, kicking off the wall to run along the roof of a building. Darting around without any constraints, Agile Gazelle made its way behind the Tyrant Rhino, who’d been unable to follow Meddié’s movements, before landing a mighty dropkick with all its might.
That same moment, the Tyrant Rhino spun around and grabbed Agile Gazelle’s foot.
“Heh heh heh... How unfortunate. You know how to move, but I could see where you were aiming from a mile away!”
“Ngh... Let me...go!”
Once it had grabbed her, all of Agile Gazelle’s speed meant nothing. The Tyrant Rhino spun her around before throwing her off. Cutting a U-shaped arc in the air, Agile Gazelle wasn’t even able to brace itself before blasting into a building.
The Tyrant Rhino took a thunderous step forward. Agile Gazelle was still stuck in the building, completely motionless, and the Tyrant Rhino was just about to finish the job.
“Protect Miss Meddié!”
With their minds made up, the remaining Raging Bears desperately flung themselves into the fray. They were determined to retaliate even if it meant they all lost their lives. With their Mech-Hearts boiling hot, they burned through their magicyte at full power. In an attempt to cool their rapidly heating frames, the Mechsteels belted out puffs of steam.
“Hmph! You’re as foolish as they come if you think you can stop me! You weak little knightlings! I’ll show you how stupid it is to stand against me!”
The difference in power between the Raging Bears and the Tyrant Rhino was painfully obvious, however. He plucked up the enormous Mechsteels as if they weighed nothing before throwing them off to the side one by one. The baron’s forces had been obliterated in face of the Mechsteel’s overwhelming might. There wasn’t a soul left on the spot to put an end to the Tyrant Rhino’s cruelty.
Except for one.
“That’s quite enough!”
A dignified voice pierced through the street. The Tyrant Rhino abruptly stopped the hand it had been wreaking destruction with. It slowly turned its neck around before its eyes found a small figure before it.
“Well, now! It looks like we’ve finally smoked out our little mouse!”
Anna stood firmly in the middle of the freshly ravaged main street. She clutched herself to stop from shaking, before resolutely staring back at the violent titan before her.
“It’s me you’re after, isn’t it? Then stop all this needless destruction at once, and capture me instead!”
“Hmph! We never would’ve had to waste all that effort if you’d just done that right from the start!”
The Tyrant Rhino began walking toward her with an especially menacing gait. The sound of its footsteps echoed in her chest, but Anna refused to look away.
“An...na! You can’t...! Trust a word this lowlife says...!” Anna heard Meddié’s feeble voice echo out from Agile Gazelle. It seemed she was alive—but she was almost certainly injured to some degree. Anna didn’t know if Meddié could see her, but nonetheless, she smiled at her friend reassuringly.
“It’s okay. Just leave the rest to me!”
“No... Stop...!”
The Tyrant Rhino now stood right before Anna’s eyes, peering down at her.
“Listening’s a good thing—for yourself, and for this city.”
The Tyrant Rhino extended its gigantic hand before carelessly grabbing her and lifting her into the air. While it was likely holding back, Anna couldn’t contain the moan of agony that escaped her small lips.
“You can rest easy. We’ve received strict orders to capture you alive...but in other words, that means that as long as you’re fine, nothing else matters one bit!”
As soon as the man spoke, he plunged the Tyrant Rhino’s other arm that wasn’t holding Anna into a building. The stone building fell apart far too easily, sending fragments flying through the air. The inhabitants that had been hiding away inside screamed and scrambled to run away.
“B... But why?! This isn’t what you promised!”
“A promise?” the man replied. “Let’s be clear here: That’s what you said. And besides, these filthy hicks made fools out of us. Don’t you think they could stand to learn their place just a bit?”
Raising the hand clutching Anna far into the sky, the man roared with laughter as he gave himself over to destruction. The store that always gave Anna freebies, the restaurant she’d eaten at alongside her father... It all turned to rubble. Anna’s vision blurred as a tear slid down her cheek and onto the Tyrant Rhino’s fist.
“I’m so sorry, everyone... All this is because I was here. I’m so sorry...for dragging you into this!”
The massive metal fist that the Tyrant Rhino brought slamming down suddenly stopped in place. Suspicious, the Tyrant Rhino flexed its arm, but it didn’t budge.
“Sorry ’bout that! Getting off work took a little longer than I wanted!”
Anna’s eyes burst wide open the moment she heard that voice.
The Tyrant Rhino had crushed everything with its fist of steel, but there, holding that same fist, was a small-framed working machine Mechsteel.
“Your old man’s here to save the day!”
A burst of steam erupted from the Mild Bull’s whole frame.