Hunting a Ternisbefallen

Hunting a Ternisbefallen

Hunting a Ternisbefallen

I accelerated toward the glow of the gathering spot. It was relatively close to the dorm, and amid the snow, the pillar of yellow light was easy to identify. I could see a black trail leading toward the magic mirror-esque barrier, tracing where the ternisbefallen had traveled, but the knights were nowhere to be seen. They must have been inside the gathering area as well.

“Going in!” Cornelius shouted as he plunged into the pillar of light. I did the same in Lessy, following after his fluttering dark-yellow cape.

It took only a moment for us to get through, and in an instant, the world around us went from one with snow to one without. However, the gathering spot was far from how I remembered it. About a quarter of the previously thriving plant life—of the rich brown trees and beautiful green grass—had been corrupted by the ternisbefallen. Even the very earth beneath us was now a swamp of black mud.

“This is awful...”

“Where is everybody?! Knights, respond!” Cornelius called out, the panic in his voice bringing me back to my senses. The ternisbefallen wasn’t here, nor were the apprentice knights who had come to hunt it.

“They must have lured the ternisbefallen elsewhere,” Leonore said calmly, maintaining her cool. “Let us leave and investigate.”

Cornelius nodded and leapt back through the surrounding light. I did the same, still pained by the state of the land.

This is going to need Flutrane’s healing later, for sure. If we leave it like this, there won’t be very much for our students to gather.

As soon as we left the gathering spot, we felt great tremors coming from elsewhere in the forest. It was so deafening that a small shriek escaped me, and I instinctively shrank back into the seat of my Pandabus. I could feel the air trembling against my skin.

“Where?!” Cornelius shouted. We flew up high and eventually spotted a trail leading to a spot deeper in the forest where several trees had just fallen. Highbeasts darted in and out of sight, rising and then flying closer to the ground. The dark-yellow capes of their riders were clear to see.

“There!”

I hurried over to the newly made clearing and finally saw the enlarged ternisbefallen. It looked like a massive dog or wolf, just as Roderick had described it, but while he had said that it was a little taller than an adult while on four legs, it was now two or three times that size.

“It wasn’t this large before!” Roderick cried.

I nodded while eyeing it over. “It must have grown after being attacked with mana. And quite a lot of mana indeed, it seems.”

I wanted to shout that the apprentices really should have noticed what was happening before things reached this point, but I swallowed the urge. They hadn’t participated in a trombe hunt before, let alone encountered a feybeast that stole mana; there was no avoiding this kind of mistake.

Although the situation was now quite dire, it seemed the apprentice knights had at least learned that attacking the beast was dangerous. They were now flying around it, trying to keep it from causing too much more damage to the forest. Their dark-yellow capes left no room for doubt that they were Ehrenfest apprentice knights, but their numbers paled in comparison to how many had departed with Wilfried.

“This is all of them...?” I muttered to myself. “What about the apprentices who had gone gathering with Roderick?”

The ternisbefallen opened its mouth wide in an attempt to eat an apprentice that was flying in front of its face, and just a moment later, its bared yellow teeth made a loud clinking sound.

“Watch out!”

The apprentice knight flourished their cape and suddenly changed direction, avoiding the danger as though they had predicted the ternisbefallen’s movements. I was relieved, but only for the slightest moment, as from the enlarged ternisbefallen’s mouth dribbled an excess of saliva. It dripped onto the ground, morphing the earth into black sludge, causing trees to lose their foundation and collapse as the terrain distorted.

The forest was wounded with each move the ternisbefallen made. It was somewhat similar to a trombe in that regard, but at least trombes were locked in place with their roots. The four swift legs of a ternisbefallen yielded to no such restrictions.

“Lady Rozemyne!” Philine cried. “The ternisbefallen!”

Only then did I realize that, in my contemplation, I had lost sight of the ternisbefallen. I scanned my surroundings at once, but by the time I spotted it again, its massive red eyes were already locked on me. Roderick had said that the eyes on its forehead were black, but that was no longer the case. They were now red, blue, green, and more, as if reflecting the mana the beast had consumed... and they were all looking at me.

A shiver ran down my spine, and cold sweat seeped from my every pore. I knew those eyes well—they were the eyes of a feybeast that viewed me as nothing but prey.

The ternisbefallen snorted, no longer paying any mind to the apprentice knights flitting around it, and rushed straight at me. Whether this was because it could tell who had the most mana or because it had realized the knights weren’t going to attack it again, I had no idea.

“Lady Rozemyne! Go up!” Leonore shouted. “Soar into the air, higher than the ternisbefallen can leap!”

I pulled my steering wheel back and launched into the air, but the ternisbefallen refused to give up so easily. It stood on its two hind legs and then bounded upward, trying to catch me in its mouth. The blood drained from my face. I could see its thick front legs through the window of my highbeast and smell the stench from its wide-open mouth.

“Ahhhhhh!”

“Gaaaaaah!”

As my two passengers screamed, I slammed my foot down on the accelerator and started aimlessly firing my water gun through the open window. My shots all missed their target, and the ternisbefallen hadn’t lost any momentum. Its yellowed teeth were clearly visible. I had never become so well acquainted with the inside of a beast’s mouth before, and its raw breath was more terrifying than I ever could have imagined.

I’m gonna get eaten!

I was so stricken with fear that my skin had gone pallid, but still I continued pouring mana into the steering wheel. And then—

SNAP!

I heard the beast champ its teeth. It must have missed us because its front legs suddenly flipped back, and a beat later, it let out a loud yelp.

“Got it!” Judithe cried energetically.

I turned around, and only then did I realize what had happened. Judithe had struck the ternisbefallen in the face, then Cornelius had assailed it with a full-power blow from the side.

“Lady Rozemyne!” Hartmut shouted as he flew over in a hurry. I had been gripping the steering wheel so desperately that I could no longer move my hands from it.

“It’s okay,” I croaked. “I’m fine.”

Wilfried rushed over as well with his guard knights in tow. “Rozemyne!” he shouted. “You can’t just leap into danger like this!”

“I only came to teach the apprentices a prayer...”

“All we need to do is distract the beast until the professors arrive, and your being here only makes that harder for us. The last thing we need is you getting eaten or collapsing out of nowhere!”

He was correct, so I apologized without hesitation. “At least let me bless everyone’s weapons. Once I’ve done that, I’ll return to the dorm.”

“Alright.”

Cornelius and the others had gathered up in the air as well, and as I looked around, I realized that my initial suspicion was correct—there weren’t enough people here. There were no children of the former Veronica faction, nor were there the other apprentices who had departed with Wilfried.

“Wilfried, what happened to the rest of the apprentice knights?” I asked.

“They’re resting. We figured this was going to be a long fight, so we’re operating on rotation,” Wilfried said before shooting a rott in the direction of the forest. As the red light stretched out, apprentice knights who had apparently been scattered among the trees resting came flying over.

I turned to my retainers. “Cornelius, Leonore, Judithe, Hartmut—the beast is dangerous now that it has grown so large. Please distract it as Wilfried and the others did until I have finished the prayers. I will teach the apprentices here.”

“Understood.”

Cornelius’s group swooped down to the ternisbefallen. I watched them go for a second and then gazed across the gathered apprentice knights. Those who had been resting were divided into two groups—the students belonging to the former Veronica faction were centered around Matthias, while the rest were with Traugott.

“The situation seems to have changed greatly from when Roderick was last here,” I said. “I would like an explanation.”

All those gathered around Traugott turned to look at him, and not with particularly friendly eyes. He had become rather meek late last year, while Justus was serving as his attendant, but he had regained his confidence after learning my mana compression method and increasing his capacity. Now, he was hanging his head in silence. It was enough for me to realize that he was responsible for the ternisbefallen becoming so large.

“Traugott,” Wilfried said. “Explain yourself.”

Traugott froze and then nodded. “It would have destroyed our entire gathering spot if we had let it continue its rampage there,” he said, “which is why we’ve been guiding it deeper into the forest. And, as for its size... It grew so large because I attacked it at full power.”

It seemed that, upon racing to the gathering spot with Wilfried, Traugott had discovered the apprentice knights flying around the ternisbefallen, leading it farther into the forest without engaging it. Matthias had been quick to notice that the beast was stealing mana and ordered all those in his group not to attack it under any circumstance, but Traugott had not been so perceptive. Unsure of the reason for their pacifism, he had decided to save the other knights by killing the ternisbefallen in one mighty blow.

Matthias had of course realized that there was nothing he or the other reinforcements could do to help and shouted for Traugott to wait, but Traugott didn’t hear and launched his full-power attack nonetheless. It was then that the ternisbefallen, which had only been a little bigger than an adult, had swelled even further in size. For a moment, it looked as though it might explode from the pressure of the mana, but its shape soon stabilized, and it ended up over twice as large as before.

“As I reeled in confusion, an ordonnanz arrived from Lady Charlotte’s apprentice guard knight,” Traugott continued. “It explained what the feybeast was and that we needed weapons blessed by Darkness to attack it.”

Around the same time, Wilfried had received an ordonnanz from Rihyarda, saying that I had flown off to teach the blessing and that the professors had been summoned.

“From there, Lord Wilfried took command,” Matthias added, looking at the ternisbefallen. “We lured the beast away from our gathering spot, taking care not to attack it, and started to buy time. We therefore had enough leeway to drink rejuvenation potions and recover in rotation.”

I examined the gathered knights as he spoke and noticed that some were still exhausted and wounded. “We should be fine if we continue to buy time for the professors to arrive,” I said. “Now, I shall reward you all for your efforts with Heilschmerz’s healing.”

My schtappe was already transformed, so I used my ring to heal the apprentice knights instead. I tended to them one by one, each time allowing the green light of a blessing to shoot from my ring’s feystone and rain down upon them.

“We thank you, Lady Rozemyne.”

The pain must have faded, as even the slouched-over knights straightened their backs.

“Now then, please take out your weapons,” I said. “Once the blessing is dispelled, you cannot receive it again that day, so make sure to wait until the ternisbefallen is truly beaten.”

“We don’t even know how to dispel it,” Wilfried said, which made me smile as I repeated the prayer from before.

“O mighty and supreme God of Darkness, who rules the endless skies; O mighty Father who created the world and all things...”

The apprentice knights repeated my words while staring at their weapons. I could see Cornelius and the others restraining the ternisbefallen far beneath us.

“Please hear my prayer and lend your divine strength; bless my weapon with the power to steal mana from the evil, all the mana which is yours by right; grant me your divine protection to purge the unnatural fey...”

I closed my eyes, holding back my urge to speed up the prayer even a little bit. I couldn’t allow my focus to falter even for the slightest moment.

“Grant ephemeral peace to the beings of the land.”

When I opened my eyes, I saw that everyone’s weapons were black with the power of Darkness. Some were balking at the very sight.

“Your attacks will now steal mana from the ternisbefallen,” I explained. “You said that your aim is simply to buy time, but if possible, I would like its feystone. To that end, I would appreciate it if you used wide attacks to sever its limbs.”

“Rozemyne, do you really think we’re in a position to do that?” Wilfried asked with a sigh and shook his head. “Now, as I’m sure you’ve gathered from the fact that we’ve been up here uninterrupted, the ternisbefallen can only reach so high. Stay up here where we can see you, and don’t get close enough for its attacks to reach you.”

“Right.”

Cornelius and the others rejoined us, perhaps having noticed the flash as everyone’s weapons were imbued with Darkness. The ternisbefallen below turned its attention to us and jumped again, as if detecting how much high-quality mana was now gathered in one place, but we were high up enough that not even its front legs could reach us. Still, the sight of a beast with glowing eyes leaping toward us with its mouth wide open was terrifying.

“Leonore is the only one among us to have read about ternisbefallens and their attributes,” I said. “All of you, follow her instructions—especially you, Traugott. Is that understood?”

“Yes...” Traugott muttered, hanging his head.

Wilfried gave a sympathetic exhale. “Don’t be too hard on Traugott. He just didn’t know how ternisbefallens work.”

The problem isn’t that he didn’t know—it’s that he doesn’t follow orders!

As much as I wanted to voice my thoughts on the matter, I decided to keep my mouth shut. Now that I had blessed the apprentice knights’ weapons, they could handle the rest of the fight themselves, and my work here was halfway done. I still needed to heal the earth, although given what was lurking below us, that didn’t have to be done right away.

As I was lost in thought, Leonore was taking command, and she turned to give me my orders next. “Now, Lady Rozemyne...”

“You want me to fight too?” I asked. “I thought I was told to stay here in the sky.”

“You have more mana than any of us and can attack from the greatest distance—is there a reason you should not fight?”

It seemed that she wanted to use all of the manpower available to her. It was a logical decision, and although I was a little surprised to see her so focused on defeating the enemy as efficiently as possible, I was glad to actually be given a job.

That means I’m being of use to everyone.

“Lady Rozemyne, please use your water gun to shoot the ternisbefallen from outside its reach,” Leonore said. “Judithe, Hartmut, stay by her side no matter what.”

“Understood!” I replied enthusiastically as I readied my water gun. Leonore gave a small smile in response and then looked to Traugott.

“Traugott, work with Cornelius to detach the ternisbefallen’s limbs. You know the attack that he and Angelica often use, correct?”

“But I...”

Traugott was about to respond but then fell silent; his failure from earlier must have been weighing on his mind. He shut his eyes tight and shook his head, but Leonore had no intention of permitting him to flee. She continued, in a quiet voice:

“You and Lord Wilfried are the only ones here with enough mana to match Cornelius. If you believe that you have failed, then now is your chance to make up for it and try again.”

Traugott seemed to shrink back with each word, and all eyes were on him—that is, until Wilfried stepped forward protectively. “I can only copy what I’ve seen, but I will join Cornelius,” he said.

Leonore gave Traugott another look, this time seeming more expectant... but he said nothing. Instead, he just lowered his gaze.

Cornelius, who had been watching this exchange in silence, let out a sigh and smiled at Wilfried. “You may put your all into your attacks, Lord Wilfried. I will match your power.”

Our game plan was going to be similar to the one used during the trombe extermination: I would target the ternisbefallen with long-range attacks, and once it was weakened, the apprentice knights would attack all at once. Everyone would then back off, which was my cue to rain arrows upon the beast. I just needed to be careful not to hit any of the apprentice knights in the process.

I’ve been given the position that Ferdinand was in before, so it must be pretty important, right? Like, super important.

It certainly didn’t seem like the kind of position to give someone who had never been through proper training before. Before I even had an opportunity to consider backing out, however, Leonore threw up her fist and the apprentice knights scattered. The ternisbefallen’s eyes circled all over the place, as though it was debating which highbeast to chase after.

Eww! Talk about gross!

I aimed my gun at the ternisbefallen far below, feeling goosebumps rise all over my skin, and pictured Ferdinand obliterating the trombe as clearly as I could.

This is my chance. I’m going to show everyone just how hard-boiled I really am!

“Lady Rozemyne!” Philine called. “Leonore just gave the signal!” She had been keeping an eye out for me.

I turned to Judithe and Hartmut, who were guarding Lessy from either side, and then fired my water gun at the ternisbefallen with a loud, “Hyaaah!” Because I had been visualizing the attack that Ferdinand had used, the mana being shot out of my black water gun turned into equally black arrows, which split apart and rained down on the beast in a massive flurry.

“Grah!” Judithe cried, launching her own attack right after mine. Her black stone flew through the air, but it seemed as though she had made a mistake of some sort; rather than going toward the ternisbefallen—which I had assumed was an easy target, considering its size—the stone looked as though it would miss entirely.

All of a sudden, the feybeast dodged my attack... and moved straight into the path of the stone that Judithe had launched. It struck the beast, which yelped in pain.

“But why...?” I asked.

“I need to be the best when it comes to long-range attacks, Lady Rozemyne. Gotta predict where the enemy will go!” Judithe said proudly before landing a second hit with another black stone. Of course, my attack had missed again.

Hmph!

Senselessly annoyed that none of my attacks were hitting the ternisbefallen, I started firing shot after shot with the best aim I could muster. It dodged each one, as if gloating that it had a perfect read on my technique, while Judithe’s attacks continued to land.

I hate this!

Of course, I wasn’t the only one whose attacks were missing—all the eyes on the ternisbefallen’s forehead allowed it to take in information from every direction, and it was extremely agile. The problem was that everyone else seemed to hit the beast at least on occasion; I was the only person missing every shot.

“Lady Rozemyne, you don’t appear to have landed a single attack,” Philine observed. Her words stuck into my heart like daggers, and while I wanted to shout at her not to remind me, I continued focusing on the ternisbefallen.

“It seems to be because the ternisbefallen is trying to dodge your attacks in particular,” Roderick added quietly. I nodded in agreement; its large red eyes were locked on me and absolutely refused to stray elsewhere. It almost seemed as though the beast believed it would be fine as long as it dodged my attacks.

I’m the only one who keeps missing because it’s focused on me! Look at someone else already!

“If only we could obscure its vision! Then my attacks would land too!” I exclaimed, furious.

“Obscure its vision?” Roderick asked calmly. “How would we do that?”

“Well, um... Er...”

It was such a massive feybeast that no ideas immediately came to mind.

Something to block its eyes, something to block its eyes... If only we had, like, a big piece of cloth with us.

It would only be a temporary solution—there was no way we could wrap the cloth around the ternisbefallen’s eyes and then fasten it behind its head—but a temporary solution was all we needed. Simply dropping the cloth from above would serve that purpose nicely.

A distraction like that would blind the beast for at least a second, which is plenty of time for me to get an attack in. I just need some cloth big enough to cover its entire body...

“Oh!” I exclaimed. “I know a divine instrument that will do just the trick. Rucken !”

“A divine instrument...?” Philine repeated, stunned.

I nodded in response as my water gun returned to being a schtappe. Much to my surprise, this didn’t dispel the blessing as the knights during the trombe hunt had said it would—instead, my schtappe remained black. I closed my eyes. There was a spell that Ferdinand had taught me to use for defensive purposes.

“ Finsumhang !” I said, and my schtappe turned into black cloth decorated with flecks of gold that sparkled like the night sky. Roderick pointed at it, dazed.

“Lady Rozemyne... What is that?”

“The God of Darkness’s cape,” I replied. “With this, we can block the ternisbefallen’s vision.”

This was a cape that had the power to absorb and seize control of mana. It was very likely that the Darkness blessing would result in the mana being sent to the gods instead of me, but that was fine in my eyes; the only thing I cared about was reducing how much mana the ternisbefallen had.

I spread out the cape as if creating a miniature night sky and dropped it above the ternisbefallen’s head. My arrows would only ever shoot where I had initially aimed them, but I could spread and move the cape at will, which was apparently more than the ternisbefallen could dodge. It froze in place once the black cloth had covered its many eyes and started pawing at its face in an attempt to restore its vision.

“Yes! Now it won’t be able to avoid my attacks!” I declared, clenching my fists with enthusiasm.

Philine placed a hand on her cheek and gave me an inquisitive look. “But, Lady Rozemyne... How will you attack when you just turned your schtappe into a cape and threw it at the beast?”

“GAAAH! MY WATER GUUUN!”

As I cradled my head, trying to ease the failure-induced agony, Wilfried and Cornelius shouted words of approval.

“Great job, Rozemyne! You’ve stunned it!”

“Now! Everyone, attack at once! Aim for its hind legs!”

Twenty-some highbeasts soared freely through the air, and their riders launched a barrage of attacks on the ternisbefallen as it struggled to remove the cape from its head. They focused on its hind legs with their Darkness-imbued weapons, and the beast shrieked as blood poured from its wounds and ate into the earth. The ternisbefallen became more and more injured as the fight went on, and as I watched everyone continue their assault, I could barely hold back the urge to cry.

Everyone looks so cool, but no! This is wrong! Give me back my chance to show off!

Wilfried had filled his sword with mana so he could attack whenever he was ready, and now its blade was engulfed in a black cloud. As he raised it high into the air, I noticed the lion crest on the hilt. I could only assume he had fashioned it to match his schtappe.

“Everyone, fall back!” Cornelius called, having already raised his own black, mana-filled sword. The attack looked a little smaller than the one he had launched last year, presumably because he was matching Wilfried’s strength.

The apprentices flew into the air, moved into formation between the ternisbefallen and me, and then readied their shields to protect me from the oncoming shock wave. I turned Lessy around and gripped the steering wheel tight.

“Here we go! HRAAAH!”

Wilfried pumped himself up with a battle cry as he started toward the ground, building up momentum, and then swung his sword down hard. A mana-packed wave of Darkness shot from his blade and closed in on the ternisbefallen’s back right leg.

“HYAAAH!”

Cornelius yelled in unison as he launched a similar wave attack at the beast’s other hind leg. The two waves collided with a resounding boom , sending a rippling shock wave of energy through the air. Some of it reached me in my Pandabus, but because we were so far away and the apprentice knights had absorbed so much of the blow, it wasn’t anything special. It probably helped that I had already experienced far more powerful shock waves from the all-out attacks of Ferdinand and the others.

So? Did they get it?!

Once the shock wave had passed, I squinted down at the ternisbefallen. It seemed that the waves had struck their targets, as the beast was screeching in pain, its back right leg having been blown right off.

“Yes!” I cried just as the ternisbefallen leapt back. It was moving like a feral animal—as was probably expected—but it seemed as though it didn’t feel the pain of having its leg so suddenly removed or the blood that was now gushing from the stump.

The cape over the beast’s face had seemingly been knocked away by the blast. Its now exposed eyes were overwhelmed with anger, and they locked on Wilfried, who just happened to be in its sights. The blood drained from my face; again, those were the eyes of a predator that had found its prey.

“Wilfried! Fly up!” I cried.

Having most likely heard my shout, Wilfried shot up into the air. However, perhaps because he had used too much mana in the attack moments prior, his highbeast moved much too slowly. The apprentice knights moved at once to protect him, but the furious ternisbefallen, hungry for mana to heal itself, was faster than them all. Even with its back leg severed, it was mere moments away from catching up with him.

“Traugott!” Cornelius barked. His blade was glowing once again, indicating that he had refilled it with mana. Meanwhile, Traugott responded to the call and plunged toward the ground, his sword in hand. I could see him filling his own blade with mana during the descent.

A sudden flash came from Cornelius’s Darkness-imbued sword, and the resulting wave burst against the ternisbefallen’s throat. The beast lost its balance, and that was when Traugott swept past Wilfried and unleashed his own swing at its stomach.