Monster Attack

“Master, the sky looks a bit ominous. It might start raining while we’re crossing the mountains.”

We’d just passed over the county border in the mountains when Lulu gave a report from the driver’s seat.

She was right. Without my noticing, dark clouds had gathered above us. It was nearly lunchtime, but we’d likely have to eat in the carriage.

I took a waterproof cloak out of the Garage Bag and put it on. The girls would probably be fine inside the carriage, but I gave everyone their rain gear anyway and told them to wear it.

“Lulu, I’ll take over.”

“Yes, sir. The road is narrow here, so please stay close to the side of the mountain if possible.”

“All right.”

I took the reins from Lulu.

The road certainly had narrowed since we’d entered the mountains, and now there was barely enough room for two carriages to pass each other. Perhaps out of consideration, the slope of the road was very gentle. Still, due to the path’s numerous twist and turns, visibility far ahead was poor.

Farther into the mountains, I could see four horses and a carriage rushing around. Of course, “rushing” for a horse-drawn carriage was still slower than the average motorbike, but I wondered if something had happened.

I selected Search Entire Map from my magic menu and gathered information about Kuhanou County.

There were three people on horseback following the carriage—I’d guessed they were robbers at first, but they were escorts. The carriage was indeed under attack, though, by nearly thirty red points on the radar. I couldn’t see them from here, but once I selected one dot, I discovered that it was a pack of wolves.

I caught a glimpse of one of the mounted guards fighting off the wolves with a short bow.

The escort captain was around Liza’s level. The other two were level 6 or 7—about the same strength as an average soldier, I’d say. The wolves were only levels 3 to 5, so as long as they didn’t overtake and surround the carriage, the riders would probably be fine.

Nevertheless, we were well on our way to a head-on collision with the fleeing carriage, which prompted me to check the map for a place to escape.

Over the next ridge was an apparent rest area with a hut where we could get out of the way, so I spurred the coach toward it.

“Dooogs?”

“Lots of them, sir!”

Clad in their rain gear, Pochi and Tama clambered up to the front to report that they’d spotted the pack through the trees.

“Those are wolves. They’re chasing a carriage.”

I corrected the two of them, then conveyed the situation to the rest of the group inside once they’d finished changing clothes.

“Wolves after a carriage? Why, that sounds to me like a flag for saving a princess or a noble!”

Arisa sounded thrilled about what she believed was a scripted encounter, but I told her not to be ridiculous. Besides, I’d already cleared both a princess rescue mission and a noble rescue mission.

As if some god of fate had heard this joke and taken offense, a giant wolf the size of a cart itself attacked the mounted escorts. I must have blinked or glanced away for a second, because I could have sworn it teleported in front of the horseman.

The cavalry captain defended himself against the giant beast’s attack, but three more wolves of the same size leaped at him. Unable to defend against the pack, he quickly fell. The other two horsemen saw this, dropped their bows, and tried to flee. A sensible decision.

I wanted to help them, but a short bow wouldn’t reach from this distance. The Magic Gun was out, too, since it had about the same range.

But a spear or a throwing stone might reach.

I stopped our carriage and threw a rock at one of the huge wolves. Ignoring air resistance and gravitational acceleration, the missile rocketed at subsonic speed and smashed through the giant wolf’s head.

I got ready for a second shot, but just as suddenly as they’d appeared, the other giant wolves vanished on the spot. The dots on my radar suggested they were going after the horse-drawn carriage.

I investigated the details of the giant wolves on the map. They were rocket wolves, monsters with levels in the late teens, with the Unique Skills “Jet Propulsion” and “Kin Control.”

…So they were the same species as the pup that Tama had caught before.

“We’ll ambush the wolves in the open area coming up. Get ready for battle, everyone.”

A chorus of confirmations sounded in reply. Even the horses answered with snorts full of fighting spirit.

“Do your best, Rye, sir!”

“You toooo, Effie!”

Pochi and Tama encouraged the horses before readying their bucklers and short swords. Rye was the horse on the right, and Effie was the horse on the left. Needless to say, the inspiration for their names came from their respective sides of the carriage.

“Lulu, drive for me, please. I’m going to go on ahead to the plaza.”

Lulu hurried into the coachman’s stand to take the reins from me, and I broke into a run down the road alone. Of course, I couldn’t sprint at full force or I’d wreck the road, so I limited myself to the speed of an average car.

As I ran, I checked on the map.

In that short period of time, the remaining two escorts had become the rocket wolves’ prey, men and horses alike.

But the escorts had bought time, and the carriage was still safe. The archers riding in the back were hard at work keeping the pursuing wolves at bay.

The smaller ones were just ordinary brown wolves. The rocket wolves’ Kin Control ability was probably controlling them.

I arrived at the plaza. It was bigger than I’d thought. There were trees along the side of the valley to shield from the wind and enough space for three or so horse-drawn carriages to park. A bit higher up on the mountainside was a little log cabin.

The first drops of rain finally fell from the heavy clouds.

I looked farther up the mountainside, past the flat area with the hut. I should be able to snipe the wolves on the mountain pass from there.

Moving quickly, I took a short bow and some arrows out of Storage.

…Crap, I only have ten arrows.

Clicking my tongue, I kept my eyes on the brown wolves and the carriage as they slid in and out of sight, sniping one and then another. I aimed for their vitals, so most of my shots were one-hit kills.

The rapid-fire rate of the bow was even faster than that of the Magic Gun.

I caught sight of one of the rocket wolves and disposed of it. My last arrow wasn’t enough to take it out, so I pulled out my Magic Gun from Storage for the finishing shot.

Since the power of the short bow depended on how strongly the bowstring was pulled, the level of the user had little effect.

After this, I defeated a few more brown wolves with the Magic Gun, but the road took a wide curve along the side of another mountain, making me lose sight of them.

Below me, the carriage with the rest of my group arrived, and I went down to join them.

“I got rid of about half the wolves. There are two more of the giant ones—those are called rocket wolves. They’re really strong, so we’ll take them out one at a time together.”

Even the beastfolk girls would have difficulty beating those monsters one-on-one without injury.

I had Lulu hide inside the hut and tied the horses to a tree obscured in the shadows behind it.

Arisa was rolling up her sleeves and pinwheeling her arms in the air, but I had to have a quiet word with her and burst her bubble.

“Arisa. Don’t use your Unique Skills.”

“What? Master, could it be that you’ve finally fallen for the amazing Arisa and all of her—”

“That’s an order.”

“Fiiine.”

Arisa dropped to her hands and knees in a dramatic display of disappointment. I felt bad, but I wanted to heed the advice Zen had given me on the verge of his death. I had to make sure we didn’t carelessly use Unique Skills like Arisa’s One-Shot Cannon move.

Under the shadow of the mountain, the carriage came into view on the hill, about a hundred feet away.

White steam rose from the horse’s rain-soaked body.

“The carriaaage!”

“All right, time to attack.”

At Tama’s report, I gave the go-ahead to start the battle.

Mia’s bow and arrow, Pochi’s and Tama’s stones, and Nana’s Magic Arrows all descended upon the wolves pursuing the carriage. Since Arisa’s Psychic Magic could potentially affect the carriage, we didn’t use it here.

I fired at the wolves, too, with one Magic Gun in each hand.

“Whoa, dual-wielded guns? Now, that’s hot! Ahh, I wish digital cameras existed in this world!”

I paid no attention to Arisa’s comments and took out one brown wolf after another.

As the workhorse reached the top of the hill and started down, I caught a good look at the carriage. Below the torn-up canopy, I saw a rocket wolf just seconds away from eating the coachman. There was no sign of the guards who had been in the back.

“Monsters! You have to run!”

The coachman spotted us and screamed out. He must not have heard the rocket wolf breathing down his neck because he didn’t look back at all.

The rocket wolf triumphantly opened its mouth above the coachman’s head.

That’s as far as you go.

I turned the Magic Gun to its highest setting and blew off its head. With a fountain of blood, the giant wolf tumbled off the vehicle.

Now the carriage was passing through the plaza.

“Arisa!”

In response to my call, Arisa sent her Shock Wave spell into the crowd of wolves chasing the carriage, catching all of them head-on.

The regular wolves stumbled and fell, bleeding from the eyes and ears. At least half of them were dead.

I wanted the beastfolk girls to take out the rest of the weaker animals, but there were two more rocket wolves to take care of first.

At that moment, a point of light appeared on my radar, coming straight toward us from the summit of the mountain.

I tried to find it but didn’t see anything.

It seemed to be after the other carriage, not us. I went out into the road, peering after the fleeing cart.

A giant creature descended from the sky and landed on top of the carriage, demolishing the damaged top carrier.

It was a dragon-like beast with three snakelike heads and two wings: a hydra.

It was level 39, which seemed appropriate for a monster roughly the size of a single-family house. That’s on par with the Undead King Zen.

Trying to save the coachman, I aimed my gun at the hydra.

“Master, behind you!”

I heard Arisa cry out behind me. My “Sense Danger” skill reacted at the same time.

A red point was hurtling toward me on the radar—a rocket wolf.

“Shield Tate!”

Before I could turn my head, Nana’s magic shield halted the rocket wolf’s charge.

It didn’t fully stop the momentum, though, as the wolf pushed the transparent shield toward me. I stored the Magic Gun away and stopped the shield with my newly freed hand.

Alas, the coachman’s dot had already disappeared from the radar.

In a burst of rage, I kicked the shield and the wolf into the air.

My attack shattered the spell into shards of light and smashed the jaw of the rocket wolf behind it. The blow took almost 90 percent of its health, and its HP gauge was rapidly decreasing.

Pochi and Tama rushed up and slashed the tendons of its hind legs, and Liza’s spear pierced through its flank right into its heart.

Finally, Nana’s Foundation Magic created three Magic Arrows that ran through the wolf’s head, finishing it off.

Leaving the last remnants of the wolf pack to Liza and the others, I turned back toward the hydra. It was carrying the horse in its mouth in a leisurely escape to the other side of the mountain.

I knew attacking the hydra now wouldn’t change anyone’s fate, but I could at least take revenge for them. The thing was already out of range of the Magic Gun, so I took a short spear out of Storage, aimed at the hydra, and hurled it with all my might.

The spear broke the speed of sound as it flew and skewered all three of the hydra’s heads.

My weapon had pierced right through the first two heads and put a decent dent in the third, but that wasn’t enough to defeat it. Losing height rapidly, the hydra disappeared behind the mountain.

My Fire Shot spell probably would have finished it off, but considering the forest fires that might result, it was too dangerous. I really needed some user-friendly long-range magic, like Freeze Bullet or Magic Arrow.

Just to be safe, I marked the hydra on my map.

I considered indicating all the strong monsters in the county, but a search quickly revealed that there were too many.

The dots for monsters and hell demons on the radar were white unless they were hostile, the same color as people and animals, so I changed the default color for them to yellow.

While I did, I noticed that unlike Seiryuu County, this territory contained several blank areas. Most likely, Count Kuhanou didn’t control these areas.

The majority was near the southern border of the Muno Barony, but the blank space south of the nearby town of Noukee sat right near our location.

Hopefully it was just an undeveloped or autonomous region, but if it was a den of dangerous beasts like the hydra, I’d rather find that out as soon as possible.

Once we locate an inn in the town tonight and everyone’s safely settled in, I’ll have to sneak out and investigate. They’ll think I’ve been out in the red-light district again, but ensuring our safety is the most important thing.

By the time the battle was over, the sky had opened into a torrential downpour.

I felt guilty about leaving the bodies to get soaked in the rain, but landslides were a risk now, so we all evacuated into the mountain hut.

Because everyone was cold and soaked from the rain, I asked Liza to prepare lunch to warm us up.