Dozens of arrows skewered the three wolves. Only a faint cry could be heard as they were still restrained inside the magic array. Ein, who saw this from the corner of his eyes, quickly shouted in a plea.
"N-No!!! Please stop!!!"
However, despite blood flowing out of his mouth from forcing himself to shout, the pig noble only sneered at Ein.
"Gah ha ha! That's what you get when you go against someone as noble as I!" The pig noble laughed as he enjoyed the scene.
With another wave of his hand, the next volley of arrows went flying. The wolves got hit by another set of dozens of arrows but didn't even have the energy to let out a groan anymore. The pool of blood under the three wolves slowly spread wide.
"S-Stop!" Ein cried. "L-let the wolves g-go, t-they did not-thing wrong!"
"Shut up, you vermin! If not for you and those damned mutts, I wouldn't be humiliated in front of the masses!" The pig noble shouted in an outburst. "You and your mutts deserve a thousand deaths!!!"
With the third wave of his hand, three waves of magical wind flew from the pig noble's guards toward the wolves. The wind was as sharp as razor blades, sending three heads rolling on the ground in an instant.
"...!"
Ein let out a silent cry. Tears of blood flowed down his face as he forced himself to move under pressure. Unlike Nayta and Melina, who couldn't move at all, Ein, as a dungeon master, was able to move, albeit slightly.
Ein couldn't believe what he was seeing for a second. The three wolves who spent days with him were lying in a pool of blood. Their heads were a few steps away. The time he spent with them flashed before his mind.
'The three of them weren't supposed to die like this,' Ein thought.
Without the notice of anyone, Ein included, his magic power started rising to unprecedented levels.
"Gah! That's what you get for messing with me!" The pig noble cheered after seeing the three wolves lose their lives. "Now, kill this vermin before I take these two trophies to my bed!"
The pig noble confidently commanded.
At that moment, something inside Ein snapped. The magic power that was more than what an individual should be able to possess surged like raging water. Nayta and Melina, as elves who are more sensitive to magic, shuddered in fright after feeling Ein's magic outburst.
After bathing in the chaotic and almost immeasurable magic power of Ein, the magic array binding them down shattered like glass. At that moment, the two elves gasped for air before they instinctively moved to the wolves' still-warm corpses.
The pig noble took a step back from his surprise.
"Y-You! What did you do?!" The pig noble asked in confusion.
The magic array was something that was made to hold even the strongest of dragons down. There should be nothing in the world that could destroy it. However, the orb-shaped artifact held by one of his subordinates cracked and shattered into dust. A priceless artifact was destroyed just like that.
Ein, still in a trance, walked toward his companions. With each step he took, the atmosphere around everyone else but the area around the three wolves became heavier.
When Ein reached the wolves' side, he touched the fur of the wolf he always rode. Despite them looking the same, he accurately identified which one he always picked.
Ein's expression turned from an expressionless face to a painful frown before turning into a tearful cry of pain. He knelt on the ground and hugged the headless body of his familiar. He wailed like a small child.
Melina and Nayta, through the magic in the air, were affected by Ein's pure sadness. The two quietly shed tears for their departed comrades.
"shttp ths nstnt! (Stop this instant!)"
The pig noble mumbled. Since he was forced down by the heavy atmosphere created by Ein's magic power, he couldn't open his mouth properly.
The guards all around him, however, were getting flattened like pancakes. Not a single one of them lasted for a few seconds before getting turned into a mushy mess of blood and meat.
Ein, who did all this unconsciously, was still crying his eyes out.
When all of the guards finally turned into mush and only the pig noble was left alive, albeit unconscious, Ein abruptly blacked out. The magic power covering the whole area vanished like a lie.
""Ein!""
Nayta and Melina shouted in worry as the two of them supported Ein's body. He was breathing and had a pulse, so they sighed in relief.
A moment later, the space near Ein warped, and an extremely breathtaking beauty appeared. It was none other than Lilith.
"I noticed master's magic energy swell up abnormally. What happened?" Lilith asked Nayta with a serious expression.
Nayta, despite wanting to ask how Lilith popped beside Ein in an instant, explained the events that happened. Lilith frowned as she looked at the three wolves that were once their steeds.
"I see... To think that master was this emotionally invested in his summoned monsters..." Lilith sighed. Her eyes longingly stared at Ein's sleeping figure.
'Rather than that, master's magic power surpassed even mine for an instant. This is definitely not normal, even provided he had mana at the level of a dungeon master.' Lilith thought to herself.
"First of all, we should return to the city," Melina suggested. "We also need to hand over that pig to Lady Sophia."
On the way to the forest, Ein explained everything to the two of them. Nayta and Melina, therefore, knew that they were supposed to be tracking the mastermind of Sophia's attempted assassinations.
Hearing this, Lilith tilted her head in thought before she snapped her fingers. The multitude of disfigured corpses were instantly removed from the scene. She then moved to the three wolves' corpses and magically reconnected their heads and bodies.
However, even Lilith couldn't revive the dead. That's a feat only available to someone at the seat of a God. Instead, Lilith froze the three wolves inside transparent ice cubes. The three looked as if they were just peacefully sleeping. She silently placed the large block of ice inside her extradimensional storage.
"Alright, we can go now," Lilith said as she nodded her head.
...
Sometime later, Ein woke up.
The first thing he saw was the familiar ceiling that he had been staring at for a few days already.
"I'm in my room at the inn?" Ein muttered absentmindedly.
"Good morning, master," Lilith greeted as soon as she noticed Ein waking up. "It had been a while."
Ein stared at Lilith's face, seemingly still half asleep.
"Lilith? Why are you here?" Ein asked, confused. "And where are Nayta and Melina?"
Ein tried to sit up on the bed, but as he did so, a wave of dizziness assaulted his mind. Lilith quickly supported his body until he was lying down on the bed once more.
"Don't move yet, master," Lilith said with a wry smile. "You used up all your mana last night and fainted. Given your mana capacity, it would take about half a day more to recover."
Ein obediently laid down. Slowly, he moved his gaze from Lilith back to the ceiling.
"So, why are you here?" Ein finally asked. "And how did you even get here?"
Lilith sat back down on the stool beside the bed. Her expression turned serious.
"Last night, I felt master's magic power rampaging. Fearing the worst, I used my teleportation spell and moved to your location."
Lilith reported without a shred of lies.
"Last night...?" Ein pondered. "... What happened last night... Ah!"
As if he just remembered, his expression turned a little pained. Lilith kept her silence for a moment, waiting for Ein to come to terms with his emotions.
A few minutes later, with a large sigh, Ein returned to his usual state. To Lilith, who could see the inner thoughts of a person, she could still see the large amount of sadness inside his heart.
"I froze the three wolves' corpses. Later, we could return their bodies to the dungeon," Lilith said.
Although a summoned monster's soul gets reused, their bodies are only turned into the dungeon's energy. Despite that, Lilith still felt that letting the dungeon consume the dead wolves' bodies would be the correct choice.
"Right..." Ein muttered. "Let's do a simple ceremony for them later."
Ein closed his eyes, slowly drifting back to sleep.