Shh. Keep Your Voice Down
A deep, rolling blast tore through the air.
BWOOOOOOOOOOOOO──────!
The signal for open war set the atmosphere trembling.
It's begun……!
I instinctively widened my field of vision, eyes sweeping every direction.
The elves, each driven by their own hunger for a trophy, began surging forward in a mad rush.
In that case, we weren't about to fall behind.
"Hey! Doc! Let's go."
Ruby snatched my wrist without a second's hesitation and kicked off the ground.
Matching her explosive speed, I ran until my breath burned at the back of my throat.
Whoosh, whoosh!
The sound of air being split gave way to chaos erupting from every corner of the forest.
— Gyaaaaah!
— Kyaak!
— Beeeeeep
Contestant #81 — Eliminated
Contestant #83 — Eliminated
Screams and elimination broadcasts from the very first moments.
Dropouts were already piling up. The air against my skin felt sharp, almost stinging.
Was this an elven festival, or a battlefield?
I kept pace with Ruby Scarlet's tempo while scanning the surroundings with every nerve on edge.
Then, in one corner of my vision, an alien glint caught my eye.
Murderous intent.
I shouted on pure reflex.
"Ruby! Three o'clock!"
"……!"
The instant Ruby turned her head, a pack of ambushing elves revealed themselves.
Their bowstrings were already drawn taut.
"It's that bitch!!"
"Volley fire!!"
As if they had been waiting for this exact moment, killing intent poured in from every side.
Dozens of arrows tore through the air. Fireballs that scorched the atmosphere. Razor-edged ice lances.
The hunting dogs the family head had planted were finally moving.
From the second the match began, every attack concentrated on a single point — Ruby. A focused barrage.
"Ha……? Now this is interesting."
Far from panicking, Ruby narrowed her eyes and wore a cold little smile.
A crimson flash bloomed in her hands as she drew the bow — Phoenix Whisper.
— KRAAAAAAAAAANG!!!
Whoa……
I swallowed a dry breath without meaning to.
What left the string was no mere arrow.
It was a catastrophe wearing the shape of a bow — a straight-line disaster streaking forward.
Power that surpassed even the flames she herself could unleash. The overwhelming sensation of launching a miniature meteor at the ground.
KRAAAAAAAAAANG──────!
Ruby's fire swallowed every incoming arrow and spell and erased them from existence.
And still it wasn't finished. Like a starved beast, it charged the elves with ferocious hunger.
If fire itself had a will, it would look exactly like that.
KRRRRRROOOOM──────!
A eardrum-splitting blast, and a mushroom cloud bloomed upward.
It was nothing less than a sun descended upon the earth.
"Gyaaaaah!!"
"B-block it! Raise the barri——!"
The assassins couldn't even scream properly.
The mana barriers they threw up in panic shredded like paper, and the elves caught in the wave of flame turned to gray ash on the spot — scattered like funeral blossoms.
An overwhelming gap in power.
Even the great trees nearby couldn't endure the heat; they withered and twisted dry.
Beeeeeep─────
Contestant No. 47 — Eliminated
Contestant No. 48 — Eliminated
"How boring……."
Ruby lowered the still-smoking bow and sneered coldly.
A single shot.
With firepower like this, the championship was as good as sealed.
"Hey, Doc."
"Yes?"
"Those bastards just now — they definitely said something like 'it's that bitch' and 'volley fire,' didn't they?"
Ruby narrowed her eyes to sharp slits.
At her keen observation, I let a deliberately lazy smile slip across my face.
"They did, didn't they. Looks like we've become the main target."
"Ha……? Why?"
"Probably…… because there are just too many elves jealous of you?"
"……Hilarious. Pointy-eared bastards."
Ruby snorted and folded her arms beneath her chest.
"So what do we do from here?"
"We move, for starters. If we stay put, we're going to get treated like a raid boss."
Her brow crumpled hard.
The queen who had dominated the battlefield moments ago was gone; what remained was the sulky face of a child whose will had been crossed.
"Haa……? You've got to be kidding me. First they persecute me for being a half-breed, and now it's jealousy? Unbelievable."
Ruby petulantly kicked something at her feet — already a charcoal lump, unrecognizable as anything that had once lived.
It crumbled with a dry crack, black ash scattering into the air.
"Ugh, this is so annoying. My mood's ruined. Hey, Doc. Take responsibility."
The blame landed out of nowhere.
"Excuse me? Why me?"
"I don't know! Just take responsibility. I'm in a bad mood!"
Is her affection rating really sitting at seventy……?
Far from fondness, she was an unpredictable little tyrant.
When someone holding world-class firepower threw a tantrum, it was hard to find it cute.
I gave a short laugh and raised both hands in a gesture of surrender.
"Understood, understood. I'll think of a way to take responsibility while we move, so cool off, my lady."
I gave her back a light, natural push, guiding our direction.
"If we stay here, they'll swarm us from every side like a real hive. That spectacular fireworks display of yours just now made for excellent advertising."
The enormous blast. The heat.
Any contestant in the area with half a brain would be watching this spot right now.
"Hmph. Let them come. I'll just burn them all."
Ruby grumbled, but she obediently fell into step with my lead.
Complaints on her lips, trust in her body — that attitude of hers.
So the affection score was doing something, at least.
We pushed through the thick smoke and slipped deeper into the forest, into a place where the shadows hung heavy.
Even while running, Ruby kept huffing, her temper still not settled.
Between the sway of her crimson hair, a flash of pale nape showed.
The heat radiating from her side still hadn't cooled.
"Next time anyone loiters in front of me, I won't even leave ash. I'll evaporate them completely."
"Yes, yes, I'm sure you will. But Ruby? You should spare a little thought for mana management. It's still early. You'll want enough strength left to lift the championship trophy, won't you?"
At my shameless reply, Ruby whipped her head around mid-run and glared at me.
Even in the dark, her red eyes shone like gemstones.
"Listen. I'm Ruby Scarlet. Mana like this recovers just from breathing."
"My, how impressive."
That was when it happened.
Crunch.
An ominous rupture sounded under my foot.
It wasn't simply a snapped branch.
It was the sound of something cleverly hidden beneath the leaf litter activating.
A trap?
"……Tch. These insects for real!"
Shushushushuk―!
At the same instant, the air plunged cold.
— Target confirmed. Ruby Scarlet.
— Proceed according to the manual.
Emotionless, mechanical voices.
The moment they landed, they deployed magic circles in perfect unison.
KUGUGUGUGU─────!
The forest's moisture froze in an instant, and dozens of razor ice lances filled the air.
A perfect elemental counter for fire-aspected Ruby — a sniper's strike.
Another elite unit planted by the family head had appeared.
"Ha! Ice? How adorable!"
Ruby snorted and swept her hand through the air.
At a single gesture, a massive curtain of flame unfurled and evaporated the charging ice lances on contact.
Ssssssshhhh─────!
A violent burst of steam exploded outward, blotting out vision.
In a pure contest of force, Ruby would never lose.
But their real target wasn't Ruby.
"Aim for his weakness!"
"Kill the man!!"
……Fuck?
They were coming for me this time?
We're screwed.
Arrows and spells came screaming through the smoke on bizarre trajectories, all of them locked solely on me.
A cowardly pincer strike aimed at the blind spot outside Ruby's defensive range.
"Ha? You dare — who the hell do you think you're touching! You pointy-eared bastards!!"
Ruby screamed as she launched herself forward.
She threw her arms around me, yanked me behind her back, and took the full storm of attacks with her own body.
KWAGAGAGAGAK!
"Ugh……!"
"Ruby!"
A short groan tore from her lips.
Forced to focus entirely on defense — on protecting me — she had no room to use her greatest strength: raw destructive power.
Ice magic and arrows hammered in without pause from every direction.
Ruby's flame curtain was being whittled away, piece by piece.
Damn it. This can't go on.
Either Ruby's mana ran dry, or the barrier broke and I turned into a pincushion.
One of the two.
To break this situation, we had to vanish from their sight.
"Ruby! This way!"
I shoved a hand into my pocket and stretched my arm toward her.
"Hey! Stay still! If you move, you'll di——!"
Instead of answering, I snared her slender waist and pulled her into my arms, yanking a scrap of ash-gray cloth from my coat.
The stealth item — Where Am I Robe.
Fwoosh────!
I flung the robe wide open.
Cloth vast enough to cover two full-grown adults cut through the air.
KRAAAAAAAAAANG──────!!
In that same instant, cold and dust erupted like a storm, sealing off all vision.
"……Huh?"
Through the thick smoke came the hunting dogs' panicked voices.
"Th-they vanished?"
"Find them! They can't have gone far!"
But they couldn't see us.
We were right under their noses, hidden behind a tree studded with ice lances.
Inside the robe was pitch-black darkness, cut off from the world.
For perfect concealment, we had no choice but to crush ourselves together — arms locked, bodies pressed flush.
"……Hey."
Ruby's voice reached me through the dark.
Not the roaring, commanding voice that had been chewing out enemies moments ago — a trembling one, small enough to crawl into the ground.
"Th-this is…… way too close."
Her hot breath brushed the tip of my chin.
Looking up, those red eyes glittered with a particularly alluring light in the darkness.
Whether it was the heat of battle still burning in her, or something else entirely.
Through the thin fabric pressed between us, the thud of her heartbeat carried straight into my chest — thump, thump.
A soft, yielding sensation pressed against my entire body.
I set a single finger gently against her lips and whispered low.
"Shh. Keep your voice down. We'll be found."
"Euh……?"