Wherever you could see one caper monkey, there were twenty. Then what if you could see twenty?
OO-EEK-EEK-EEK-EEK! Laughter echoed through the inescapable forest. A human probably would have clicked their tongue. But the trio wasn’t human. So if talking things out didn’t work...
They’d have to settle things with their fists.
∗ ∗ ∗
“Oo-eeeeee-eek-eek-eek!” The caper monkeys took full advantage of their natural agility to jump between the trees.
The forest was their territory. There was no escaping when the branch walls were in place. Whenever Tee spit a fireball, the branches would open a gap where it was aimed and skillfully avoid getting singed, then quickly go back to normal. The monsters, which were also known as tree monkeys, controlled the plants to attack the trio.
The enemy seemed to consider the mini-dragon, which had no combat ability, as a nonissue. They were luckily focusing their attacks on Tee and the boar.
“Kwee, kwee, kwee!” Tee dodged, dodged again, and spit out fire even though it knew it wouldn’t have any effect. It could only hope that doing so would let them find a way to break through.
Tee’s marker for keeping track of the boss monkey that had given them a whole speech was the unfitting shoulder bag. He must have wanted to see the trio’s frustrated faces, because he wasn’t hiding. Instead, he was still shaking his butt at them. Once, Tee had fallen for the taunt and spit fire at him, but he had readily dodged and then bombarded it from above with acorns and spiky chestnuts.
The monkeys had almost no attack power, but they had the overwhelming advantage in a fight. Their condition for victory was making the trio give up on retrieving the bag. It was a hundred against three in a battle of attrition, and they showed no weakness.
“Kwuhhh...”
Beating up the boss monkey was their objective. However, there were other ways to achieve victory in this battle.
Tee had whispered this to the mini-dragon while dodging attacks, but the mini-dragon had vigorously shook its head. Actually, it was hard to tell whether it had shaken its head no in fearful refusal, or if it was just shaking all over. It was impressive that it could even fly like that.
The mini-dragon was probably afraid of Tee. It was thinking that Tee must be angry that it had dragged it into this annoying mess. However, nothing could be farther from the truth. Tee wasn’t fazed by this at all.
In a life-or-death situation, the mini-dragon had far fewer options than Tee, who was able to fight. However, despite its extreme fear, it had come all the way here to protect its “important thing.”
“Nnn...kyew-ohhh!!!”
I’m not demanding that you do the impossible. I’m telling you because I believe you can do it.
The mini-dragon’s round eyes became downcast. However, it now clearly remembered its objective.
∗ ∗ ∗
Stupid monsters, the caper monkey sneered at the red bird. It resembled a cockatrice, but some time after their fight began, he realized that it was the juvenile form of that legendary monster, the phoenix.
At first, the monkey had been annoyed at the mini-dragon and had decided to harass it by stealing the bag that it was treating with such care. He’d wanted to bully it more, but regrettably, it had gotten away. So when he noticed that it had come back to retrieve the bag, he was dancing on air...or well, on branches.
Even more than the mini-dragon, he disliked the phoenix, who was acting friendly toward those stupid humans despite being a legendary monster. The monkey certainly couldn’t win against the phoenix in terms of raw power, nor could it win against the surprisingly nimble feral pig. But it could make them surrender. The hundred monkeys would overrun the three of them. All they needed was time and patience. The caper monkey was confident in his victory.
But his opponent was acting strangely.
“KYEW-OHHHHHH!”
The phoenix’s screech didn’t have any verbal meaning. It was like a cry rousing it to action. It was useless, though. Doing that would just waste its energy.
In response to the phoenix’s call, the feral pig also let out a roar. He mustered his saved energy and repeatedly rammed into the tree trunks in the caper monkey’s vicinity. A few monkeys lost their balance and fell from the shaking trees, but they simply climbed their way back up the trunks. This also seemed to be a meaningless action.
The caper monkey was suspicious of what they were trying to do, but in that moment, the phoenix spit out a humongous, blazing fireball that threatened to swallow him whole. He backed away, but even still, the terrifying, skin-searing heat closed in on him. However...
“Oo-eek-eek-eek-eek!”
I get it, he laughed. The feral pig had made a distraction, and in the meantime, the phoenix shot out a charged-up fireball. But the two of them didn’t understand: the bigger they were, the easier they were to evade. The caper monkey controlled the tree branches and swung his body around. He shook his long tail, acting completely unfazed.
Just then, the caper monkey noticed that something was off. “Oo-eek, eek-eek?!”
The bag that had been slung over his shoulder wasn’t there. What’s going on?! The caper monkey looked around and spotted that the bag that had been in his possession was now in the grasp of the mini-dragon, who was now falling backward toward the ground.
It must have been hiding behind the phoenix’s humongous fireball. When the caper monkey had dodged, the mini-dragon had slashed through the strap with its sharp claws and stolen it back.
“Oo-eek, eek, eek...”