“Aha ha ha! Now, let’s go!” the two women cried. The green lizard, easily twice a human’s size, grabbed the lady in an eagle-like grasp. Its front legs were massive, but its hind legs were even larger.
It leaped forward, darted farther back, then leaped down... No, wait. It looked like that was what had happened, but I was sure that slope was steep and led straight down to the coast.
“Wait!” the young lord shouted, dashing out of the barrier. I felt a chill of killing intent brush my neck.
“Wait!” I cried. I had a bad feeling. But just as the word left my mouth, something lunged at him. Startled by the deep, booming roar of a beast, I instinctively covered my ears with my hands and let out a scream.
The beast that had tried to tear the young lord apart with its thick, sharp claws was built like a bear. Though it had a rabbit’s face, its red eyes blazed fiercely as it bared its fangs—it was terrifying. This time, I recognized the name, appearance, and traits of the demon beast.
“You’re within the barrier,” the prince said expressionlessly from where he was standing beside me. “Besides, a bear-rabbit doesn’t stand a chance.” He was looking out for me.
I nervously glanced at the young lord. He was blocking its claws with his magical shield. Why wasn’t he counterattacking? The bear-rabbit kept attacking the barrier protecting us with a force that would normally send us flying, but the young lord didn’t counterattack—it was like he was deep in thought. The barrier didn’t budge at all, so it must be fine, but why?
“...Stew,” the prince muttered beside me. Was he lost in thought too? Stew? Was he hungry?
Just as I was puzzling over it, I suddenly felt a killing intent like needles pricking at my whole body, making me flinch reflexively. The next moment, three black wolves with bat wings flew in at once and howled at the barrier. Though they were clearly wolves, they had upturned noses like those of bats. As they howled, fangs bared, they emitted a visible, wavelike fluctuation from their mouths. Outside the barrier, the shrub right beside me trembled, then burst apart.
“Sonic wolves... What a nuisance,” the prince murmured, gazing at the young lord. Sonic wolves’ attacks didn’t affect the barrier, but would they affect the shield?
It was my first time seeing a sonic wolf, but I recalled hearing about them long ago from Lord Heinz. When someone was hit by the shock wave from their roar, it caused an immense resonance within the body that could damage internal organs. Perhaps because I was safely out of range, though, it just felt incredibly noisy. Why had such a powerful-looking magical beast suddenly appeared?
It bothered me a little that the prince and the young lord, both possessing impeccable magical talent and power, were solely on the defensive.
Just then, a sudden interruption from a new voice—a husky, unmistakable voice—made my thoughts freeze. “Hey, stop it! I came out because it was noisy, and now this? What the hell is going on?!”
“Wait, Master! Don’t just... Wait, Prince Regulus?! Mihail?! Huh? Wait... Mira...” Red hair and sky blue eyes identical to my own appeared beyond the barrier.
“Lord Heinz...”
Lord Heinz, whose presence still stirred my heart. Seeing him face-to-face for the first time in years...
“Hey, stop spacing out!”
“Guh!” After getting his butt kicked by a tall, slender beauty, Heinz rolled across the ground. “Damn it.”
Where Heinz had been standing, a white rabbit with a single horn on its head charged in. Even I was capable of recognizing a unicony. If the beauty hadn’t kicked him in the butt, that horn would’ve definitely stabbed into Heinz.
The beasts roared again, and their attacks kept coming. But wasn’t it strange for them to be this aggressive from the start? I’d understand if we’d done something to disturb them, but this was still a place where people passed through, even if it was the outskirts. That lizard too—multiple different types of magical beasts attacking simultaneously? It was simply bizarre. And both the sonic wolf and the bear-rabbit, once they’d locked onto a target, focused so intensely they ignored everything else. It felt abnormal.
“No! It’s not a bear-rabbit!” cried the beauty excitedly. She was repeatedly charged by the unicorn rabbit, but she looked totally calm, and she dodged with ease each time. Reaching into the slit of her skirt, she drew out a dagger and pulled it free.
The fact that a glimpse of her slender, toned leg, radiating mature allure, had everyone’s gaze glued to it until she swiftly threw the dagger at the bear-rabbit would be best kept secret.
The dagger sank cleanly into the bear-rabbit’s long ear and it let out a yelp of surprise.
“No, that wasn’t me!” Mihail protested.
I couldn’t tell what it was thinking, but the bear-rabbit growled at the young lord, its attacks growing faster. But as expected of a son of one of the Four Great Ducal Houses, he still calmly parried and countered, even though he was still deep in thought.
“Tch, wasn’t that enough? Hey, how long are you gonna lie there?!” The beauty clicked her tongue, grabbed the unicony’s horn mid-leap, and tossed the whole beast...at Heinz?!
“Whoa!” Heinz looked startled, but caught the rabbit with a water sphere conjured by magic. Trapped inside the sphere, the rabbit struggled pitifully, but it had been the rabbit who’d attacked first.
As soon as the rabbit stopped moving, the beauty immediately turned to Heinz. “Now, hurry up and be the decoy!”
“Gah, seriously?! Dammit!” Heinz cursed and scrambled to his feet. Both of them ignored me—I was busy inwardly scolding the woman that all of that had been incredibly dangerous.
Then suddenly, the young lord’s face snapped into alertness. “Wait! Don’t make a clumsy attack!” He was thinking of something after all. “You’ll ruin the meat!”
Huh? Wait, meat?! What were they talking about?! That monster’s meat was tough and didn’t even taste good!
“Oh, you know exactly what I mean,” the beauty said, kicking Heinz in the rear as soon as he stood up. “Now, hurry up and distract it!”
“That’s cruel!” I cried. But that sight touched some bubbling chord within me, and I was surprised by my own reaction.
Just then, one of the sonic wolves, which should have been focused on us, tried to fly toward Heinz—even though all the sonic wolves had been all concentrated on one point up until now.
Using wind and earth magic, I gathered the dust and dirt that had been kicked up when the shrubs beside the barrier exploded, then aimed it precisely at three pairs of red eyes simultaneously.
Good! I could attack them even from inside the barrier!
The sonic wolves let out a cry. It didn’t blind them, but it seemed to inflict pain. They flapped their wings wildly, writhing and twisting in the air.
But the moment was fleeting, and the three wolves focused their fierce attacks on us once more. Of course, the barrier the silent prince had erected remained unshaken. That was good.
Looking back at Heinz, I saw he stood between the bear-rabbit and the prince, drawing the beast’s attention to himself. He seemed to be slowly moving, inch by inch, closer to the beauty.
When had the beauty gotten a new dagger? She threw it at the bear-rabbit again. The dagger sliced cleanly into the space between the bear-rabbit’s eyebrows, as it had been focused on Heinz. Wasn’t that dagger a bit too sharp?
Boom!
What?! The bear-rabbit’s head had exploded?!
“Yes, yes, that’s it. Looks like a hit.”
What kind of hit?! Exploding it?!
“That dagger...” the prince and the young lord both muttered at once. They seemed to recognize the blade.
A third voice overlapped with their voices. “Come on, hurry up and hang it to bleed out!”
“Wait, the sonic wolf is still—” Heinz was flustered by the beautiful woman pointing sharply at the fallen bear-rabbit and barking orders. His manly image seemed to be fading.
The young lord, having removed the barrier, pulled a rope from the bag he’d been carrying and handed it to Heinz.
“You mean...we’re eating that too?” the young lord asked, turning back to the beauty. Why ask about eating it?
“Of course! Those wings are delicious, you know!” the beauty answered enthusiastically. But they weren’t talking about the meat of the sonic wolf, but its wings?!
“Hmm, wings. I suppose it was wise not to kill it first. Will the lady handle the cooking?”
“Huh, you just casually ask like that?” said the beauty in a low voice—I was sure only I heard her. What did she mean by “casually”? “Yes, if you leave it to the lady, it’ll turn into something delicious.”
“Do you know this woman?” Mihail asked. “Is she an acquaintance of my sister?”
“Ah...well, sort of?” Heinz replied evasively. “Master, ah, no, ah, well, you know how it is?”
I felt the same confusion as the young lord did, but I kept my curiosity about that, and his relationship with the beauty, to myself. I had no right to pry into such matters now.
“Let’s talk about it later,” the beauty said. She turned to face me, slipping her hand back into the slit of her dress. “I’m also curious why everyone’s gathered here like this.”
What she was gripping...? No way?! That grip... I couldn’t believe it...
“Call me big sister!” she shouted, completely without shame. What was this all of a sudden? Big sister? It definitely seemed like it meant something else.
A satisfying crack echoed from the supple, purplish blue slapping the ground. So it was a whip, after all!