The Nusselack Hunt
The golden weekend morning after the midterm exams.
The main gate of Kizen was swarming with students heading down to Rochest. Along one side of the gate, carriages that had taken advance bookings waited in a long line, while students hoping to picnic in the valleys or on the beaches haggled with the drivers over prices.
And while some students buzzed with excitement at the prospect of a happy holiday ahead—
"Agh, come ON! What is this?!"
Others were clinging to the backs of galloping wild hippos on a weekend morning.
Meilin's face had crumpled into a full-on crying expression.
"I must have lost my mind! Monster cooking secrets, of all things…!"
To think this was how she was spending the golden weekend. Meilin was in exactly the mood of someone who wanted to turn back time, just as someone had said, and smack herself once across the head.
It had all started simply enough. Meilin and Camibarez had whined at Simon until he agreed to beg Professor Hong Peng for her monster cooking recipes, and Simon had sent her a letter. Hong Peng had graciously replied, telling them the time and the meeting place. And when Simon's group, fully prepared, had arrived at the rendezvous point, there were four hippos grazing contentedly in the grass.
……That was the whole story.
"Hey, Meilin! Isn't that position of yours kind of dangerous in a lot of ways?"
Dick, hanging off the hippo behind her, teased her as usual, but Meilin shot back with a look of pure contempt.
"Shut it, you lunatic!"
"Oh, so you didn't catch that one."
"Get down here and say that to my face."
Growling, she glared Dick into submission, then glanced subtly to the side.
Camibarez clung on with the resigned expression of someone who had fully accepted her fate. And Simon—
……Infuriatingly, HE's the only one riding like it's nothing.
Simon was cruising along, legs wrapped firmly around the hippo's barrel of a body, his balance perfectly upright. It was the kind of riding only teaching assistants managed, apparently—his stability was on another level entirely.
After that grueling stretch of time, the four of them finally arrived at their destination.
"Haaah! Whew! Wow, that was brutal! Now that we're here, I've got nothing left."
Dick doubled over with his hands on his knees, gasping for air. Meilin and Camibarez had already collapsed onto the grass. Simon alone stood perfectly straight, reading over Hong Peng's letter.
"Let's rest a bit, then head out."
Hong Peng had written that teaching them her monster recipes was no trouble at all—but they'd need to provide the game themselves. Her suggestion: hunt down a monster called the Nusselack.
Essentially, it was a mission.
According to her, Nusselacks were an invasive species, currently throwing the forests of Roc Island into chaos. Originally an inland monster, they had somehow found their way onto the island, and thanks to a monstrous appetite and an equally monstrous breeding rate, their population had exploded.
Hong Peng's mission was simple: capture the leader of the Nusselack pack.
And since the plan was to butcher and eat the monster once the hunt was over, the boss had to be taken with as few wounds as possible.
"Hnngh, no matter how I think about it, I feel like we've been set up."
Meilin muttered as she pushed herself up. Simon spoke to her in a gentle, soothing voice.
"Professor Hong Peng must have her reasons. Besides, it's good monster-hunting practice for us too, right?"
"……I suppose that's true."
"Simon!"
Camibarez came scampering over to him.
"What is it, Kami?"
She ducked behind his back, thrusting out a hand, her face taut with alarm.
"Th-there!"
Simon's head turned.
Catching the scent of humans, three Nusselacks were lumbering their way toward the group. They had short, squat bodies covered in teal fur, and faces that looked like a gorilla and a pig blended half and half.
"I can't believe this. WE have to eat THAT today?"
Meilin grimaced, and Dick smirked.
"Might be better than it looks. Monkey meat sounds pretty tasty, honestly."
"You've never even had it!"
-Grrrulk!
The Nusselacks began to charge.
Ah, now that I think of it.
Simon turned his head and looked back at his teammates.
The members of Group 7, busily preparing their dark magic, looked back at him with wide, questioning eyes.
This is the first time we've all really fought together, properly.
The Cyclops performance assessment had come with the constraint of set positions—but today was different. This was a stage where every one of them could fight at full strength, together.
A strange thrill ran through Simon at the thought, and he turned his head back to face the enemy head-on.
"Let's begin."
Simon pulled an invisible lever.
From his subspace, he drew out a skeleton armed with a spear and another bearing a shield. The shield skeleton surged forward at once and crashed into the charging Nusselacks.
Krak-krak!
The Nusselack's weapons were its sharp claws and teeth. While the shield-bearer blunted its attacks, the spear skeleton circled around behind and thrust hard.
With a puk!, the spearhead sank into the monster's body—but the dense muscle stopped it from punching all the way through.
"Pardon me."
Then Dick slipped in with a lithe movement and lightly touched the skeleton's spear.
Enchant.
The spear turned pitch-black—and drove straight through the Nusselack's body and out the other side. The monster's eyes rolled back and it slumped to the ground.
"Heads up~ more coming from both sides."
"We KNOW!"
Fwoooosh!
As Meilin swept her arm, black flames leapt onto the Nusselacks' bodies. The monsters thrashed in agony, scrambling in every direction.
"Haah!"
On Simon's left, Camibarez dropped into a kneeling firing stance and launched a Blood Bullet.
The instant it struck the Nusselack's body, the projectile detonated with a bang! in a crimson burst—force powerful enough to blow the monster's entire upper half apart in a single hit.
Simon moved as well.
He pulled three Skeleton Archers from his subspace and, with them, drew out the one-gold bow he'd received free from the weapons shop.
Load.
Shhhk.
Simon and his skeletons nocked arrows in perfect unison, drawing their bowstrings taut.
Fire!
The moment Simon gave the command, he released the tension in his right hand—and not one, but four arrows flew at once.
Thud-thud-thud!
They buried themselves in the body of a Nusselack still mid-charge. Two in the head, two in the chest. The monster dropped dead where it stood.
Reload.
Chk. Chk-chk.
Simon and the Skeleton Archers reloaded with flawless precision.
Fire!
This time the arrows flew in different directions, each finding its own mark. The Nusselacks creeping toward them through the brush dropped one by one, a monster per arrow.
"Front! More pouring in from the front!"
Dick shouted. Six or more Nusselacks were charging out of the grass all at once.
Meilin saw them coming and called out.
"Simon! Kami and I have the firepower covered—focus on holding the line!"
"Got it."
One of the summoner's greatest strengths was the freedom to adapt fluidly to the flow of battle.
Simon tucked the archers back into subspace and summoned ordinary skeletons in their place. Then, using cross-control, he arranged six shield-bearing skeletons into a single row.
"Enchant coming in!"
Dick pulled a shield from his own subspace, laid an enchantment on it, and hung it on a bare skeleton. In the blink of an eye, a defensive line stood complete.
Kuu-ung!
Kuuu-ung!
The Nusselacks crashed headlong into the shield wall with their whole bodies. Simon gritted his teeth and held the formation.
Hold!
He connected to the mental echoes of skeletons number one, three, and five, then immediately switched to two, four, and six, then back again—over and over.
Because the defense wavered in every single second the mental link was severed, he had no choice but to keep the alternating control running without pause.
"……Ngh! I can't hold this forever!"
"Dip 'em, Simon!"
Simon looked up. Meilin, somehow already high in the air, was clutching a searing mass of black flame in her palm. She spun once through the air and swept her arm down.
⟨ Dark Flare ⟩
FWOOOOOOSH!
The black flames fell upon the Nusselacks' heads and erupted in a massive explosion. The skeletons, untouched by the blast, withdrew safely to the rear.
Control that was near-perfect. Charred heaps of ash crumbled down before the shield wall.
"Nice one, Meilin!"
"That's just the basics."
She alighted lightly on the ground, brushing her hair back behind her ear with a smile.
-Grrrulk!
At that moment, a Nusselack lunged at her from behind. She whirled around, her sky-blue hair fanning out.
BOOOOOM!
A crimson explosion instantly burst across the monster's body and it crumpled to its knees. In the distance, Camibarez could be seen lowering her hand.
"Thanks, Kami!"
"You're welcome!"
Having weathered that close call, Simon's group began to advance. They cut down the Nusselacks that popped out one at a time, isolating and destroying each in turn, pressing deeper into the forest.
Perhaps thanks to their performance in the Cyclops assessment, the four of them fell into a rhythm that was close to perfect.
"Hoo, that's no joke."
Dick cleaved through a Nusselack's torso and glanced back.
An entire swath of forest had been painted pitch-black by Meilin's firepower.
"By the way, Meilin—is it okay to be throwing fire-type dark magic around in a forest this dense? What if you start a wildfire?"
"Idiot."
Meilin scrunched her face as she drew a magic circle.
"Jet-black elemental fire is artificially manifested flame. It snuffs itself out on its own after a while."
"Ah— got it."
"So take a hint and extinguish yourself too."
"Well, well~ excellent point!"
"Ugh."
Meanwhile, Camibarez was breathing hard, having used perhaps a bit too much blood. A touch of anemia was setting in, and her head was starting to spin.
"Kami. You okay?"
Simon rushed over and checked on her condition.
And in that instant, her gaze dropped to the smooth nape of his neck just below his jaw.
Her heart suddenly pounded like mad, and a fierce thirst seized her. Her nose tingled, and her mouth opened on its own.
Just once.
Just once would be enough—she could sink her fangs right there and drink her fill, and……
"Kami?"
"……Ha!"
Jolted out of it, she scrambled backward on the spot, hands flying to cover her mouth. Simon tilted his head.
"What's wrong?"
"N-no, no, nothing at all! I'm just a little dizzy, that's all."
"Then let's rest a bit before we move on."
Simon waved to Dick and Meilin, who were pushing ahead, signaling a break. The two had been feeling the need for a rest themselves, and nodded.
Ugh…… what is WRONG with me.
Camibarez buried her face in her palms.
It had been almost five years since she'd last felt her vampire instinct stir. She'd thought she had it suppressed completely by now. And yet Simon kept shaking that certainty loose, again and again.
"Kami! You okay?"
Meilin ran over. Camibarez forced a smile and told her she was fine.
"Hm."
Dick, meanwhile, was examining the tracks on the ground.
"Odds are good that the leader Nusselack is somewhere around here. There are a lot of tracks much bigger than a regular Nusselack's. Looks like it was here until just recently."
"Really?"
Simon pulled something enormous out of his subspace and dropped it to the ground.
None other than the Golem Core.
"Then while we're resting, I'll get a golem ready. We'll punch straight through the forest with it in one go."
"Ooh, nice idea!"
Simon dug a shallow hollow in the dirt with his hands and set the Golem Core on top of it. Before long he had linked his mental echo to the core and begun raising Jet-Black.
Grind. Grinnd-grind.
Earth began clinging to the Golem Core like iron filings to a magnet. None of them had ever watched a golem being built before, and they all looked on with wide, wondering eyes.
Kuu-ung! Kuu-ung!
Just as a third of the golem's body had taken shape, an exceptionally heavy footstep rang out.
Dick drew his sword and shouted.
"Everyone, careful! Something's coming this way!"