From atop the roof of a house, Jyrki and the others watched as the Arnian soldiers clashed with the Therbaens.
"Arnia...so weak..." Iina muttered.
"More like, aren't intermediate-tier monsters just super strong?" Jyrki said.
The Arnian platoon was completely helpless in the face of the black, wolflike monster the Therbaen soldiers had brought. Jyrki and the others had been observing the battle since it started, and the monster had already ripped two Arnian soldiers into ribbons.
"So when should we join the fray?" Marx asked Jyrki, his arms crossed.
"Great job, Loura!" one of the Therbaen soldiers yelled excitedly. "Shred the remaining three into pieces!"
They were all so distracted with bullying the Arnian soldiers that none of them noticed Jyrki's team watching them. According to Asura, they almost never looked above their heads. So long as they remembered to conceal their presence, it would be difficult for the soldiers to discover Jyrki and the others.
"You hear that? That black monster's little Loury."
"All right. So? When are we going to jump in? What should we start with?"
"Marx...you're so...serious," Iina said with a theatrical shake of her head.
The Arnian soldiers tried to attack with their swords, but the monster named Loura easily avoided them. There was a very clear difference between their physical capabilities. Then, Loura ripped off an Arnian soldier's head, swallowed the meat, and licked the blood off its maw.
"Isn't it, like, super aggressive on top of being super strong?"
"I wonder if...it thinks humans are snacks...? In my next life...I wanna be a monster too..."
In contrast to Jyrki's grimace, Iina looked genuinely delighted. Watching a person die sparked something like joy within her due to her strong misanthropy. Jyrki was more than familiar with this part of her. After all, it had taken her a long time to open up her heart and trust their old bandit friends, as well as their new comrades in Moon Blossom. If you asked Jyrki though, this behavior was fairly typical for street children.
"If you're gonna eat someone, then eat me first. I'm delish...probably."
"I won't...eat you, Jyr..." When he first met Iina, she had been a terribly twisted child. He had watched her licking an adult's shoes with a bright smile on her face, just for a share of bread. She had been smiling while cursing the world. "I won't...eat my savior...but I might eat you...Marx."
"Why would you eat me?" Marx asked. He tilted his head, though his expression remained impassive. "I consider myself to be your teammate, more or less."
"It was...a joke. I won't eat...people in Moon Blossom."
"Hmm. Why did you call him your 'savior'?"
"You know, people who poke their noses into others' pasts aren't very well-liked." By the time Jyrki finished saying that, only one soldier of the Arnian platoon remained. He seemed to be a fairly strong fighter and, despite his wounds, he didn't even attempt to escape.
"Is it so wrong to want to learn more about someone in the same unit as myself?"
"Well, no, it ain't a big deal, I guess. All I did was invite Iina to join my bandit group."
He'd found her, a ten-year-old girl, trying to sell her own body, and thought to rescue her from her hellish fate. He'd wanted to tell her that she didn't need to smile or curry favors to live anymore.
"'Let's steal everything from the shitstains in this world'... You were so cool..." Jyrki had said that while immolating the overweight lump who'd tried to purchase a skeletal Iina.
"You two lived a life I can hardly even imagine," Marx said.
"It ain't that big a deal. At the end of the day, we were just orphans who got bullied a lot, so we teamed up and fought back. This kinda boring story exists in thousands of places around the world."
Jyrki had already been a bandit when he met Iina. He'd seen her when he visited her city to scout it out and though he'd felt sorry for her at the time, he didn't approach her. But she stayed stuck in his mind, even after sunset, so he'd returned to the city to look for her. That had been when the fatty bought her. He'd been in the middle of stripping Iina out of her clothes in the middle of an alleyway when Jyrki came across them. Ahh, he'd thought, this world is an unfair pile of shit.
"I used to hunt down people like you."
"I bet, considering you used to be a knight." At the request of the local militia, the knights occasionally lent their strength in protecting the peace.
"But now we're brothers-in-arms, fighting side by side. Fate works in strange ways."
"Yeah. Our boss is a crazy little girl, Iina and I were bandits, and you used to be a knight. I don't know what the vice cap'n used to do, but she probably has a few skeletons in her closet, yeah? What a pleasant little mercenary group we make... Ah, jeez, the last guy just croaked. Marx, can you hit little Loury with your Water Prison?"
"If I do it now, yes." Loura was busy devouring the Arnian soldier she'd killed.
"All right. Iina, shoot the enemy commander," Jyrki ordered, holding up three fingers.
Iina slid an arrow out of her quiver and nocked it into her bow. Jyrki lowered one finger and Iina cast Accelerate, a manifestation spell, upon the arrow. It created wind in order to increase the target's speed. Jyrki was down to a single finger, and then he pointed it at a downward angle.
At his command, Marx cast Water Prison at the same time Iina released the arrow. A ball of water enveloped Loura's face and it struggled, panicked and confused. Iina's arrow pierced straight through the enemy commander's head, burying into the dirt next to him.
"It's the enemy!!! Look up!!! They're on the rooftop!!!" one of the enemy soldiers yelled as he unsheathed his sword.
"Now then, I wonder how they're gonna make their way up here," Jyrki murmured to himself as he nocked his own arrow into his bow. He immediately shot it into the soldier's chest, sending him to the ground as the second casualty.
Iina once again released an Accelerated arrow, only to have a soldier deflect it with his sword.
Jyrki, who had been in the middle of pulling out his second arrow, froze. "You gotta be kidding me..."
Iina's arrows, when enhanced by Accelerate, traveled at a speed that was extremely difficult to parry. At the very least, Jyrki found the task impossible. Then, the same enemy soldier leaped into the air. He didn't activate any magic, but in a single bound, he landed on the roof of the house.
From his physical appearance, he looked to be around eighteen years old, which was the same age range as Jyrki. He had shoulder-length silver hair and a fairly attractive face. Heightwise, he was slightly shorter than Jyrki.
Jyrki immediately shouldered his bow and took out his twin daggers. He glanced in Loura's direction to check on her status—still not dead. In that case, the top priority was making sure Marx remained safe. Even if the rest of the monster-hunter platoon escaped, they had to kill the monster. Otherwise, Asura wouldn't let him hear the end of it.
"You're an interesting lot," the silver-haired soldier said. The pattern so far was that people with silver hair all had messed-up personalities. Granted, Jyrki had only met one other person, Asura, with silver hair.
"You're pretty good," he said. If the soldier was willing to talk, then they could buy Marx some time. Their only goal was exterminating the monster, so if worse came to worst, they didn't have to bother with the other soldiers.
"You guys can go back now," the silver-haired soldier said with a cheery smile. "Loura's not gonna make it anyway."
His words had been directed at the remaining two members of the monster-tamer platoon. Unsure of what to do, they had remained rooted to the ground, staring up at them. But upon hearing what the silver-haired soldier said, they ran away without any hesitation. It seemed that they were confident that their silver-haired comrade could handle things.
"Hey, tell me your name," Jyrki said.
"Huh? Me?"
"I'm talkin' to you, aren't I?"
"Why don't you tell me your name first?" The silver-haired soldier laughed, sounding as though he was having the time of his life.
"I'm Jyrki Kuusela of the mercenary group Moon Blossom. That is my surrogate little sister, Iina Kuusela. That big guy using magic there is—"
"Marx Redford from the Knights of the Azure Skies," the silver-haired soldier interrupted. "You participated in the Hero Selection Exam twice, didn't you?"
"At present, I'm a member of Moon Blossom," Marx said, holding up his own dagger.
That meant that Loura was dead. Now then, what should they do? Jyrki and the others had a numerical advantage, but their opponent was clearly skilled.
***
Using nothing more than eye contact, Lumia informed Asura about her plan to use Flashbang. Asura shook her head in response. Using it would make this too boring and, more importantly, she had to let the boy watch the destruction of the Therbaen monster-tamer platoon.
"Don't you dare interfere!" a particularly large man from the monster-tamer platoon yelled at his comrades before he rushed at Asura. He didn't even unsheathe his sword.
"Hmm. There's a monster right there and yet you're not going to use it?"
"Shut up, you brat! How dare you kill my friend?!" He raised his fist high in the air and yelled, "I'm gonna beat you half to death, rape you to death, and then sell you to the pits of Hell!"
The fist he raised was his right. Asura twisted her body to the right and with the back of her own right hand, she redirected his punch. At the same time, she employed a knee-drop technique, utilizing her forward momentum to slip behind the man's back. Then she kicked him right in the balls with the tips of her boots. He screamed bloody murder as he rolled on the ground, clutching at his crotch.
"Ah ha, looks like I crushed them with that one." Asura had been a man in her past life, so she knew from personal experience how vital that spot was. "It wouldn't have been so bad if you'd thought to wear a full suit of armor, but you're barely got anything on, heh heh. I guess you can't indulge in your favorite hobby of raping women on the battlefield anymore. Are you sad about that? So sad that you could just die?"
"I'm...sniff...gonna kill you!" The soldier looked like he was halfway to breaking down in tears as he glared up at Asura, but he still couldn't get up on his feet.
"Ha ha, you only have yourself to blame. You shouldn't have underestimated me, you know? Stop acting coy and use the monster."
"Geete! Kill that brat!" the commander of the monster-tamer platoon ordered.
I see. So that monster's called Geete? Asura thought. Well, whatever. I don't plan on remembering its name.
Geete howled, then got up on two legs and charged at Asura.
"Oh, it's faster than I expected..." Geete raised its right fist into the air and punched down on Asura. Though she guarded herself from the attack with her left arm, the impact still tossed her into the air and sent her crashing on the ground. The attack was powerful enough to have killed a normal person, but Asura sat up immediately. "I thought I'd die, ha ha."
A faint golden glow emanated from Asura's body. It was the effect of Lumia's support spell, Cloak. It created an armor of light that dramatically increased one's defensive power, but its drawback was that it didn't last very long. Even if Lumia put all of her strength behind it, it only remained effective for about two minutes.
"That really hurt." Asura chuckled. Her left arm hung loosely by her side. "Look at that. It's broken. Ahh, it hurts! It's so painful that I'm getting all excited. This is so fun, don't you think? There's nothing better in this world than a fight to the death." The smile on Asura's face was wide with bliss and upon seeing her expression, Geete took a step back. "Are you scared of me, Geete? You must be kidding. You're an intermediate-tier monster, stronger and faster than any human. And yet, you're frightened of me? Why in the world would you be, when I haven't even done anything to you yet?"
All Asura had done was get pummeled into the ground. That was the only thing that had happened during their fight. But when she glanced at the monster-tamer platoon, their expressions were frozen, as if they had encountered a natural disaster on the level of a Demon Lord.
"Oh, come on now," Asura said. "I only managed to survive thanks to Lumia's magic. It's not like I'm immortal, you know? I'm nothing more than an ordinary little girl. You could kill me if you stabbed me with a sword or shot me with an arrow. In fact, you could even punch me to death. There's no reason to be afraid. Now, shall we continue?"
However, Geete still refused to budge.
"It has nothing to do with magic," Lumia said. "Asura, I'm also a little afraid of you sometimes."
Asura wasn't sure what to say to that. "But I haven't done anything yet." She sighed as if to say that the situation was beyond her comprehension. "I don't really feel like fighting anymore."
The excitement of earlier had completely disappeared, but it was fine. Ultimately, this was nothing more than an advanced training session. If this had been a real battlefield, she would've used Flashbang at the very beginning. After she compromised her enemies' sight, she would've quickly slashed their throats. If the blade couldn't cut through Geete's hide, then she would have placed all seven petals of her Mines onto him and blasted him. That would have finished the job.
"Lumia, let's switch positions. I'll defend the kid, so you attack them. Make sure you kill them all, got it? This is a commission, after all."
They'd already received their advance payment of ten thousand dora. Their success fee was fifty thousand per monster, which meant that if they killed all four, they'd earn a total of two hundred ten thousand dora.
Lumia was quiet for a moment before finally saying, "I can't kill that monster with my current equipment."
"Stop joking around, Lumia. Just use an attack spell. You know, the ultimate attack spell you loathe so much."
Attack spells normally weren't particularly powerful no matter what element was used. However, Lumia's element was an exception. She simply camouflaged her spells to look like they were of the light element, but in reality, she was using her Fixed Element. It was one atypically geared for offense: to be more accurate, it could only be used for battle. She had everything that she needed for combat: the support spell Cloak, the manifestation spell Flashbang, and healing magic.
"A-Attack, Geete! Kill them! That brat isn't glowing anymore!" the enemy commander yelled. In truth, Cloak's effect had already worn off.
"Lumia, if you can't obey my orders, then please leave my group. Didn't you promise that you'd listen to my commands during missions? And that in return, you'd have my permission to kill me if I ever crossed the vague lines you set? I'd fight back, of course."
Geete still looked a little unsure, but at the commander's order of "Do it, Geete!" the monster howled in preparation to strike.
"Now then, Lumia, the enemy's about to come at us. They're about to attack, even though they're scared out of their wits. What're you going to do?"
Geete once again charged towards Asura. A pained expression appeared on Lumia's face but she unleashed her magic.
"Divine Retribution."
In an instant, Geete crumbled to the ground, slashed apart into eight pieces of flesh. The one who butchered the monster and turned the battlefield into a sea of blood was a beautiful, broadsword-wielding angel. Her wings were pure white and her skin smooth as silk. Sitting upon her pale-blonde hair was a halo of light.
"I figured you'd use it, Lumia. I knew it. You really are one of us. Your little holier-than-thou attitude is just an act. How can you deny it? Now that you've shown off that spell, the only thing left for you to do is to massacre everyone. After all, it's not as if you can reveal your beautiful yet disgusting true self."
Lumia had been trapped inside darkness. By the time Asura met her, she had already fallen to its corrupting power.
"It looks like you have some strong guilt, but why don't you just forget about the past and enjoy the present with me?" Asura continued. "Let's play the war game, just like you did before."
Asura had never seen that era of Lumia's with her own eyes, only heard about it. But a long time ago, when she watched Lumia fight, she'd understood that the two of them were exactly the same.
"That spell..." the enemy commander said. "That's Divine Retribution...the Angel of Death...? Oh no...don't tell me...you're the mass murde—"
In the next instant, the angel tore through the commander and sliced up the remaining three soldiers. With a gentle expression on her face, the angel disappeared into the air.
"I will never be like that ever again," Lumia said calmly. "And Asura, neither will—"
"Try saying that without the casual murder next time." Asura snorted. "Send the signal."
At Asura's order, Lumia nocked an arrow and shot it into the air. A loud noise sounded out from the arrow as it flew. This type of arrow was called a messenger arrow and for this mission, they used it to signal the defeat of a monster.
"I just hope that one day, you'll be able to go back to being who you really are," Asura said softly so that Lumia couldn't hear her.
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