Chapter 128: The Bear Fights the Black Tiger

Chapter 128:
The Bear Fights the Black Tiger

 

THE GOBLINS RAINED BLOWS on the shed. It was breaking apart in some places, but it still held, if barely. The goblins were so focused on getting into the shed that they didn’t notice Maricks and the others. We were looking at a dozen goblins total.

Maricks, Shia, and Cattleya took down three with their first strike. Needless to say, the other goblins noticed.

Timol blasted flame magic, they scattered—and two of the goblins went right for him.

“Cattleya!” Maricks called. “Cover Timol!”

“If I do that, what about you?”

Right. If Cattleya headed to Timol, Maricks and Shia would have to take on seven goblins by themselves.

“I’ll be fine.” Timol blasted more magic.

“Shia! Cattleya! We’re gonna take them out fast.”

“Roger!”

“All right!”

Maricks swung his sword while Shia and Cattleya used their swords and magic to cut down goblins. Just like he’d said, Timol took on the two goblins—but one of them rushed Garan and me.

“Watch out, Miss!” Garan tried to get in front of me, but I lopped off the goblin’s head with wind magic. Garan seemed shocked.

Another five goblins appeared, but it was no problem: The surprise attack had worked, and the goblins were as good as dust.

“Is that it?”

“Seems to be.”

After Garan confirmed that the goblins were gone, he called out at the shed, “Gewn! Geld!”

Two men came out of the battered shed, bleary and cautious. “That you, Garan?”

“It’s okay now. The students from the capital defeated the goblins. We made it in time.”

The three hugged each other, happy to be safe.

“You saved us. Thank you,” said Gewn to Maricks and the group, the others chiming in with nods.

“But why would goblins appear here?” asked Maricks.

“I don’t know. Maybe something happened to their nest?”

The most likely scenario was that they’d run away from adventurers trying to quash them. That, or an even stronger monster had driven them from their den.

While I thought that over, I heard a howl come from deeper in the woods. Kumayuru and Kumakyu practically howled at the sound of it: “Kwoom!”

At that, Shia looked to me. “Yuna?”

I invoked my detection skill, and—

Huh?! That was fast. The signal had barely entered the range of my detection skill, but it was already coming our way at incredible speed.

“Everyone, we’re running,” I started before catching myself. “No, it’s too late to run.”

In an instant, dozens of wolves surrounded us, and more by the second. But I could deal with them. Key word being “I.” But with so many blind spots in the woods, and so many people to protect…

No time to think. The monsters I could sense with my detection were practically flying at us. About to appear, and—

“Everyone, get away from the shed!” I screamed.

“Yuna?” cried Shia, and—

Before our eyes, the entire shed shattered into splinters.

“What was that?!” Maricks shouted.

It slinked out from behind the destroyed shed with deadly grace: a gargantuan tiger with a jet-black pelt.

“Why would something like that be here?” Shia whispered, her voice breaking.

“There’s no way,” muttered Maricks.

It must’ve been like a nightmare to them. Unreal. This jet-black beast that was even larger than my bears at full size. It leapt onto the fresh goblin corpses, opened its gaping maw, and dug its razor-sharp fangs right in.

“A black tiger…” Shia whispered.

The black tiger tore into the goblins with its sharp claws, howling with its blood-drenched maw.

We were surrounded by wolves. One bad move and they’d be on us—so many of them now, over a hundred in the rustling shadows. And the black tiger was just too fast. It hadn’t even taken a minute to appear after Kumayuru and Kumakyu reacted, and I’d barely seen it on my detection skill before it was here.

“Why’s a brute like that in a place like this?” Maricks whispered hoarsely.

No one could answer that question. Everyone could only watch the black tiger as it devoured the feast we’d prepared for it.

“We, um,” Maricks stammered. “We need to escape now.”

“You can’t move,” I hissed—the moment Maricks shifted even slightly, the black tiger’s nose twitched. It sniffed in our direction.

It was only a matter of time until it decided we were prey.

“Maricks…” Timol whispered.

“What do we do?” Cattleya whimpered.

He was party leader, after all, but, well, it didn’t seem fair to count on him right now. He was a student. They all were.

I didn’t have a choice. It had to be me.

If I didn’t defeat the black tiger and wolves here, there’d be losses at the village. Even if we escaped to the village, we’d bring the black tiger and a hundred wolves with us. There was no telling how many villagers might die. There’d be women and kids who couldn’t fight them off… No, it had to be here.

As I tried to explain that, Maricks gulped. Then he looked like he’d decided something. “I-I’ll be a decoy,” he said with a gulp. “You escape in the meantime.”

“Maricks?!” A whole lot of surprised whispers right then. I was just as surprised as everybody else.

“I’m the one who said we’d come here,” he said. “This is my responsibility.”

“We decided this as a group,” said Shia. “It wasn’t just you.”

Everyone nodded. Maricks winced. “But everyone will die at this rate.” The black tiger was still feasting, but it was monitoring its surroundings. If we made a break for it, I think it would’ve attacked. “I’ll buy you some time. Go.”

“What if we all ran for it?” asked Cattleya.

Maricks shook his head. “You think that thing is going to let us get away?” Everyone looked at the black tiger greedily eating up the goblins. It didn’t look good. “Like I said, take Garan and the others. Get out.”

Yeah, it was finally my time to step in as an adventurer. I needed to step up to my role as their guard.

And just when I was about to say something, Timol beat me to it.

“I’ll stay too, Maricks.”

“Timol…”

“I can’t just let the girls die. If the two of us are decoys, that should buy us more time. Don’t try to get mauled before I do, though.”

“Timol, I know you’re trying to play it cool, but your hands are shaking.”

Not just the hand Timol used to hold his staff, either. He was quivering like jelly all over. “Ha. You should look at yourself, Maricks.”

They smiled at each other, but their grins were weak. Friends to the end.

And now I, the girl in a bear onesie, would have to insert myself into this serious scene and totally kill the drama. Oops.

“When we attack, you run. Got that?” Maricks said to Shia and Cattleya.

“Maricks, Timol…” Cattleya bit her lower lip.

Garan and the others didn’t know what to do. They couldn’t even say anything.

Shia’s trembling hand squeezed mine. “Yuna.” Shia looked at me, petrified. I turned to her and smiled.

“Timol, let’s go,” said Maricks.

“R-right.” The moment the two moved, I grabbed them by their collars with my bear puppets.

“Wh-what are you doing?!” Maricks stared at me blankly.

“Saving your life, doofus. We’re surrounded by more than a hundred wolves. Shia and the others will either end up wolf food or they’ll lead ’em back to the village.”

Maricks let out a long, defeated sigh. “But then…”

“But then I do my job. Right now.”

“What are you saying?”

“The adventurer’s taking over. I’m going to save every one of you, got me?”

“But there’s no way you can win,” he said.

I took a step forward. Maricks grabbed at my bear clothes. I shook him off. “I’ll be fine, man.”

I reverted Kumayuru and Kumakyu to their original size.

“Kumayuru, Kumakyu, protect everyone.”

They replied back with a “kwoom” like they were saying, Leave it to us. Other than me and Shia, everyone else was taken aback when they saw my bears at their full size, but there was no time to explain.

“Okay, guys, please keep close to Kumayuru and Kumakyu at all times. You’ll be safe if you’re with them.”

“Yuna…” Shia looked at me worriedly.

“Shia, take care of everyone.”

“I will. Please give it everything you have.”

I raised my hand in response.

“Shia, you too?” Maricks looked from her to me. “What are you saying? You’re letting that bear—”

“Maricks. Trust Yuna here.”

“There’s no way I can! This was my fault.”

“Maricks? Trust. Yuna.”

For my part, I entrusted Maricks and the others to Shia and faced off with the black tiger on my own.

The black tiger lifted its massive head from the pile of goblin meat. Turned its great eyes to me. Watched.

It was so much bigger up close, a whole size or two greater than the tigerwolves I’d defeated before, and with a blood-drenched, toothy grin.

Looked butt-ugly, honestly. Should’ve taken a page from the book of its fellow beasts Kumayuru and Kumakyu and their adorable mugs.

It seemed the black tiger decided I was prey because, in an instant, it howled and leaped at me, instantly closing the gap between us. Its sharp fangs gnashed.

I took a step to the right to evade it.

It was fast.

Quicker than a tigerwolf and more powerful, but I was stronger than I had been back then. Beating it wouldn’t be an issue. It’d be over if I lobbed a fire bear, but…

See, that black pelt would’ve been singed, and where would I be then? I was dying for a nice black tiger-skin rug for my house, preferably not charred. Also, if I used a sword, that’d poke holes in it, and slicing with wind magic would be a mess too. Even ice magic wouldn’t do. Guess the right way to go was suffocation through water magic?

So many possibilities. Oh, and I guess I was dodging and exchanging blows and stuff. It was very cool.

As an experiment, I tried restricting its movements with earth magic, but it was too fast to catch. It dodged all the attacks coming from the ground.

Maybe…this? I matched the timing of the black tiger’s movements and blew a gust up from the ground with wind magic. The black tiger sensed the force coming from below and leapt up to avoid it, but the wind magic blasted the black tiger into the sky.

Look at that: The big lug was a trendsetter now. He was the world’s first cordless bungee jumper.

The black tiger twirled in the air, soaring pretty high up into the sky. It wasn’t going to walk away unharmed from that height, but it twisted and strained midair, positioning itself perfectly, landing with the grace of a cat.

You’ve got to be joking. It came down without a scratch from that height? No broken bones or anything? Ugh.

Right as the black tiger landed, it dashed toward me. I created an earth wall right away to block its path, but the black tiger wove around it. I judged its timing—there—and landed a bear punch right between its eyes.

The black tiger flew backward, tumbled, slid across the ground, collided with a tree, and came to a stop… And stood up like nothing had happened. Seemed like it’d rolled with the punch right when I hit.

This thing was stronger than I thought.

Hmm, slaying it while keeping the pelt in pristine condition might be rough. Since it was so fast, I wouldn’t be able to pin it down with a golem either. If the Cordless Bungee Strike had at least injured the thing, that would’ve made it easier.

I was getting a little anxious now. How was I gonna keep my tiger rug nice and clean and perfectly symmetrical?