The Archer of Beast Woods

by Kanata Yanagino

  I stabbed it repeatedly with my spear, twisted it in the wounds and making it bleed. I avoided it when it tried to bite me, and deflected its heads with my shield.

  There was no need to win cleanly in a single strike. I just needed to fight normally, and win by being better. I didn’t have any spectacular tricks up my sleeve, or any ultimate moves. I just had what I’d been taught by my parents, which had raised all my abilities to an equally high standard. So I would put them all together, and press forward to victory. Through experience, I was finally beginning to understand that that was the way of fighting that suited me best.

  With the help of the wind elementals, Menel fired off an arrow accelerated to terrific speeds. I didn’t miss the chimera switching its attention for an instant. I swung down Pale Moon with all my might.

  The goat head was crushed. Its teeth smashed together and flew everywhere, and blood squirted out of its broken skull. The chimera screamed in obvious agony.

  “One down!”

  There was just the demidragon and lion heads left, plus the venomous snake tail—no, that was already gone. Menel had found an opening to sever it with a spell. He was quick.

  While Menel was using Stone Fist to crush the head of the snake that had fallen to the ground, I decided to do something about either the lion or the demidragon head. But before I could, the two heads let out a terrible howl, and I sensed something dreadful coming. Menel and I both leaped back and kept our distance.

  “It is an accursed dragon power, but you leave me no choice!”

  Dragon? I thought, but had no more time to think about it. The chimera’s veins turned black. Its muscles swelled, becoming misshapen and even thicker than before, and miasma gushed from its entire body.

  “This guy, too?!” Menel spat out, infuriated.

  “Menel, stand back and stand by.”

  “Got it.”

  Poison didn’t work on me. I’d been raised on Mary’s holy bread, and I had the stigmata of Mater on my arms. So—

  “I’ll beat him down now.”

  Although I’d used this magic spear, Pale Moon, for a long time and felt very comfortable with it, I hadn’t had great results with it against stronger enemies. I thought that it would probably like some glory of its own soon. I held my spear tight by my side and ran toward the chimera once more.

  ◆

  It struck at me with a ferocious swing of its front leg. I ducked under it and swung my spear upwards. The lion neck bent and avoided it. Its right foreleg swiped towards me, trailing miasma. I’d seen it coming; I dodged with a back step. As its right foreleg completed its swing, its demidragon neck stretched towards me. It was about to breathe fire.

  Back when I fought the wyvern, I’d avoided this by choking it just before it got the chance. But this time, I’d only moments ago leaped backwards. With my center of gravity tilted back, I couldn’t just leap forward like I had before. Moreover, its lion head was still alive. If I attempted a strangulation move, I would be snapped up in its jaws.

  So I held my shield firm and pressed my feet into the ground. As the fire belched out, I prepared myself for what was coming. It was possible that I would be burned all over in an instant or my eyeballs would boil. Yeah, it was possible—but surely just an instant of fire would be fine! I was using defensive blessings! That fire was probably only just a little warm anyway, appearances can be deceiving! Don’t hesitate, I told myself, charge in!

  Telling myself anything that came to mind to muster up my courage, I held my shield up in front of my face and charged forward. I closed the distance in less than a second and slammed my shield into the demidragon head’s wide-open mouth.

  I felt the all-too-real sensation of slamming into flesh. Several fangs broke off in different directions, and the fire breath stopped. The chimera stiffened for a moment. Maybe it hadn’t expected me to come straight at it through the flames.

  “‘Gnomes, gnomes, form a fist! Clench your hands and strike the foe!’” Menel cast Stone Fist. There were a lot of small stones scattered all over the ground. They leaped up like a rising fist, and pounded into the chimera’s vast belly.

  The chimera let out a cry of intense anguish. As it writhed in agony, I thrust my spear through its demidragon neck, finishing off its second head. As soon as I felt the spear sink in, I immediately pulled it back into my hands. I stepped in closer, spinning the spear as I did, and flicked the heavy metal end upward, cracking it into the lion head’s jaw.

  The chimera flailed and threw its front legs around me, trying to grab me. My way forward was completely blocked by the lion head, and left and right were closed off by the wide reach of its front legs as they closed in. There was nowhere for me to escape.

  “Acceleratio!”

  Except up.

  I leaped almost directly upwards. The Word of Acceleration was one of my favorites, but I hadn’t used it even once in this chimera battle until now. The ground was just too unsuited for it. If I tripped on one of those stones after speeding myself up, it was very possible the momentum would carry me face-first into rock.

  Unlike Menel, who had completely ignored the problem by using his elemental powers to run everywhere, I hadn’t been using any particularly fast maneuvers this entire time. So this move was one the chimera had no knowledge of.

  It lost sight of me for an instant and then, realizing what had happened, it looked up—and was momentarily blinded by the light of the sun.

  “‘Gnomes, gnomes, take his feet! Harden, bind, and nail him down!’” Simultaneously, Menel cast Hold, with perfect timing.

  I roared, and with the sun at my back and Pale Moon in my hands, I let my fall give me momentum, and drove the spear down into its lion head.

  I felt it sink through skin, muscle, and bone, and then the impact of my landing. I immediately tried to pull the spear out and leap away, but it was stuck. I had an instant of panic, and I released the spear and leaped back without it. Then I realized. The chimera had already expired.

  It was no wonder I couldn’t pull out Pale Moon; it had sunk all the way through the chimera’s lion head, and was stuck in the ground on the other side.

  ◆

  I turned around to see that the beast extermination was almost over as well. Most of the beasts were already sprawled on the ground, and even those that were still running about looked badly wounded. It didn’t look like the others needed any help.

  “We won!”

  “Nice!”

  Menel and I high-fived. It made a satisfying sound.

  This hadn’t been the kind of magnificent victory I’d scored against the god of undeath. It wasn’t a triumph of the underdog against the obvious favorite; it was an ordinary, routine win. But even so, I thought that was fine. If grueling battles like the one I’d fought against the god of undeath were a regular occurrence, that would be unbearable. And besides—we still had enemies ahead of us.

  “Moving on!”

  “Ya!”

  Wary of traps, we stepped inside the ruins of the monastery.

  The inside was being kept illuminated by magic, which had probably come from the demons. The place had been stripped of its former stillness and holiness and transformed into a place of hideous rituals and research. We ran down long corridors, passing room after wide-open room, taking side glances at their contents: blood, meat, guts, beastlings preserved in strange fluid, magic circles in ghastly colors of paint.

  They had to already know about our assault. It was possible that the demons who were controlling this base would choose to flee, and if that happened, the same thing might repeat somewhere else. We had to finish them off here, and both I and Menel were determined to do whatever it took to make it happen.

  We burst out of the corridor. Our view opened up.

  We were in the monastery’s chapel.

  It was a very spacious place where sculptures of the gods were enshrined, and reminded me of the temple in the city of the dead that had once been my home.

  But the
several statues of the gods lined up at the back of the chapel had the details of their faces scraped off, just like the ones I’d seen previously in that village. The text honoring the gods, which should have been on the wall, had been scraped away. In its place were Words of praise for the god of dimensions, written large in darkened blood in a unearthly style that was nauseating to look at. And there was Dyrhygma’s crest, featuring arms grasping the eternal cycle.

  It was a demonic ritual site.

  “Took you long enough.”

  A quiet voice echoed about the chapel.

  When Menel and I heard that voice, our eyes bulged. There was a bearded man there looking at us, wearing a scratched-up cloak and holding a sword. And on his face he was wearing a grin the likes of which I’d never seen.

  No way...

  “Rey...stov...?”

  “Yeah.”

  Unbelievable.

  How on earth—

  How—

  His grin widened as he watched me try to make sense of this.

  “You owe me ten gold coins,” he said cheerily, and pointed to the body of a large demon lying dead on the ground.

  The demon, which was turning slowly to dust before my eyes, looked like a cross between a bat, a wolf, and a person. I had a memory of learning from Gus that these demons, called belalgors, were Commander demons considered to be extremely powerful for their rank. And this belalgor’s chest had been penetrated with a single, beautifully clean strike.

  Yeah... so... in short... what had happened here was...

  “You beat us to it?!”

  “No way! How the hell did you do that?!”

  “Went around. You guys were fighting the chimera. Thanks for that, by the way. Made it nice and easy.”

  Reystov had made his way inside the monastery while we were desperately fighting the chimera. He’d hunted down every last demon here and stuck them all with his sword; and then, here in the chapel, he’d confronted the belalgor who had been the unifying force for this base, and stuck him, too.

  Of course, it couldn’t have been as simple as he’d made it sound.

  “Reystov the Penetrator, my god... You live up to your name.”

  He clearly hadn’t been given it for nothing.

  “No wonder you get all the glory... You are way too good at getting the jump on people.”

  “You need to be to land the real tough ones,” Reystov answered, sounding for once like he was in a good mood.

  From the entrance to the monastery, I heard a jumble of noise and voices.

  “Okay, now watch yourselves! Who knows what traps are in there!”

  “We’ll be first in! Hope you’re all ready!”

  “For honor and glory! And ten gold coins!”

  They sounded pretty pumped up. I laughed weakly.

  It was a pretty unsatisfying conclusion, but for some reason, I felt that was fitting.

  ◆

  Under the brightness of the summer sun, long grass swayed in a pleasant breeze.

  “Yeeeaaahhh!”

  “Here’s to victory!”

  The field was full of adventurers clapping each other on the shoulder and raising their horns in toast.

  There had been a lot to deal with in the immediate aftermath of the battle, but we’d sorted most of it out, and were attempting to head back to Whitesails. However, the enormous number of beast heads and demon dust we were carrying with us caused roars of celebration in each village that we passed through. Casks were brought out, and parties started in middle of the day. The ale poured into the horns tasted refreshing under the early summer sunshine.

  All the villages had that same kind of party mood. The adventurers, too, were enjoying the feeling of release after their life-or-death battle, and raising a racket in every place they went. The trip back was very lively.

  We were soon able to join back up with Bee and Tonio, whom we’d unfortunately left behind some time ago.

  With his usual, soft expression, Tonio congratulated me on a job well done. It was thanks to his help that I was able to provide dozens of adventurers with the supplies they needed, and get them all working together. He was always lending me his subtle and modest support when things began to look shaky, the time after I beat the wyvern being the perfect example. I wanted to find some way to thank him sometime soon.

  Bee jumped at me and Menel with her usual brightness. She pestered us repeatedly to talk more about our adventure, and ran ideas for her tales by us. And then, clenching a fist, she declared, “Looks like I need to get Menel included in this one!”

  “Oh, shit! No!” The look on Menel’s face completely changed as he suddenly realized that he should have been paying attention to this conversation as well.

  “Awww, why not?!”

  “This weirdo might be happy to grin like a goofball while everyone gawks at him, but I’m not!”

  “Meanie pants! I can tell you’re planning to follow your darling Will down the path of heroes anyway, so put up with it, mister grouchy!”

  “Shut up! And he’s not my darling!”

  “He so is! Oh! I know! I’ll make your title Meneldor the Beautiful!”

  “Then all the poets are gonna add some twist, like turning me into a woman!”

  “And then you can be Will’s girlfriend!”

  “Dammit, if you agree with me, don’t do it!”

  Everyone burst out laughing watching the two of them running around. I laughed, too. As usual, Bee was cheerful, spoke her mind, and had a way of making all my worries seem completely stupid. Watching her really made me think: Yeah, there are other ways to go through life! You can be pretty carefree, if you want!

  Incidentally, let me add that as a result of Menel’s fierce objections, his nickname was revised from “Meneldor the Beautiful” to “Meneldor of Swift Wings.”

  The excitement of taking down a powerful enemy seemed to have worn off for Reystov; he had returned to his normal, lethargic self, taking tiny sips of his drink with a sullen, dull look on his face. He was the kind of guy who didn’t make a big thing of himself. He had a kind of subdued coolness.

  The finesse he had with that sword was very impressive, too. He’d killed that demon in a single thrust. I asked him if we could train together sometime, and he gave me a silent nod. I hoped my eyes would be good enough to spot the secret to his stabbing technique. I badly wanted to steal it.

  I looked around at the villagers. Now that the threat from demons and beasts had eased off, their faces were looking a lot sunnier.

  “Everything’s gotten so... lively.”

  Only about half a year had passed since the days when I’d lived in that city of the dead with just me, Blood, Mary, and Gus. What a merry circle of people I’d surrounded myself with in just that short span of time.

  “It’ll get even livelier,” Menel said from beside me. “The beasts and demons are much less of a threat now. More people are gonna come to the south, looking for a new world down here. I bet it’ll cause some problems, too...” He was looking philosophically into the distance. “Gonna have to live with it, I guess.”

  “Yeah. You’re right. Wonder what I’m going to do now.”

  Menel tilted his head when he heard that. “Now?”

  “Yeah, I mean, what next. Of course, if there’s any matters left to sort out on the way to Whitesails, I’ll be helping with those... but I wonder what I’ll do after that.”

  I’d reached a good stopping point for this area. I felt confident saying that I’d achieved the task my god had charged me with here. In order to run what looked a lot like a military campaign in Beast Woods, I’d ended up becoming a knight, but I didn’t have any land and it wasn’t a hereditary knighthood, either. It was pretty much an honorary position. Not only did I have no territory to rule over, I didn’t even hold any real official post.

  I thought it might be an idea to get permission from the Duke of Southmark, if I could, and try going on a journey traveling around places like my parents had. Each d
ay an adventure spent searching for ancient ruins and the like. That sounded fun—

  “Well, you’re gonna be the lord, aren’t you?”

  ...Huh?

  ◆

  “The lord?”

  “The lord.”

  “Of where?”

  “The villages of Beast Woods.”

  “Hahah.” I was worried for a moment, but Menel just had the wrong idea. “Come on, Menel. I’m a knight with no land who can’t pass on his title. It’s kind of like an honor, that’s all. In practice, I’m seriously no different from an adventurer!”

  When I said that, not just Menel, but everyone around me went silent. Wh-What?

  “He doesn’t realize...”

  “You can’t be serious.”

  “Really?”

  “He... hadn’t been thinking about it?”

  “And here I was, thinking he was doing a pretty good job...”

  A small commotion started among the adventurers.

  “This guy’s smart, but sometimes he’s the world’s greatest idiot, isn’t he?”

  “I can’t believe he’s so good at managing what’s under his nose, but he wasn’t even thinking about how it’d end up.”

  “No way...”

  “So he’s clueless...”

  H-Huh?

  As I stood there, puzzled, Menel sighed deeply and began to speak. “Even if you aren’t given land, you have the freedom to conquer unclaimed areas, don’t you?”

  “Conquer? No, I don’t plan on doing anything like that.” Maybe back when I fell into that dark place where I was trying to do everything myself, but certainly not now. I didn’t want to be a ruler...

  “Lemme ask you something.”

  “Okay.”

  “Say you’re someone who wants to start a business in these woods. Who do you go talk to?”

  Well... That would be the person who’s started dealing with large transactions and is already working industriously to help me with just that sort of thing, namely—

  “Tonio.”

  “And the majority of Tonio’s capital is financed by you, right? If you pull your funding, Tonio gets hit hard.”

  Yep... Hm?

  “I don’t plan on doing that.”