The Disappearance Case (2)
Clang!
The tip of the halberd punched straight through the last Hound Wolf’s body. The beast jerked once, let out a final death rattle, and went still.
“Haa… stubborn little bastards…”
“Looks like there aren’t any more of them left,” Schwarz answered, wiping the sweat from his brow as he scanned the surroundings.
Just in case something was still lurking. But all that remained around them were the lifeless carcasses of Hound Wolves sprawled across the ground. Once he was certain nothing else moved, Schwarz flicked the blood from his hands and walked over to Milia.
“Still… this is strange. Hound Wolves aren’t usually this tenacious.”
Milia, studying the corpses, prodded one with the tip of her halberd, her voice laced with doubt. For monsters, Hound Wolves were fairly clever. They knew how to use numbers, how to exploit an enemy’s weak points. The fact that not a single one had fled while being slaughtered was anything but normal.
“And their eyes weren’t glowing purple, either.”
Every last one of them had been flashing that violet light from their eyes. Nothing about it had looked natural.
“Do you think this is connected to the disappearances?”
“I can’t say for certain yet, My Lady.”
The odds were low, but not low enough to dismiss. Schwarz rose and checked her over carefully.
“Oh, come on. As if I’d get hurt fighting these things.”
“That’s not what I meant. There’s blood on your face, My Lady. Once it dries, it’s a nightmare to get off.”
Milia waved him off as if it were nothing, but Schwarz simply pulled a handkerchief from his breast pocket and began gently wiping the blood from her cheek. The sudden closeness made her flinch and stare up at him, but Schwarz never noticed; he just kept cleaning the smear from her skin.
“There. All done.”
“Th-thank you…”
A faint heat bloomed across her cheek. Milia forced herself to ignore it, answering while carefully avoiding his gaze.
“Shall we keep going, then?”
“Y-yeah!!”
And so the two of them pressed deeper into the forest.
“What… the hell is that?”
“This is…”
What met their eyes after pushing through the undergrowth was a mass of unidentifiable flesh. Mangled scraps of meat had been packed together into the rough shape of a heart, swelling and contracting in a slow, rhythmic pulse as though it were breathing. Faint violet light shimmered across its surface like bulging veins.
The thing’s form alone was enough to turn the stomach, but that wasn’t what mattered right now. The ominous power seeping from the cocoon was something they had felt before—a heavy, clinging mana that felt like an endless, bottomless mire.
“No way…”
“Schwarz? What’s wrong?”
Milia tilted her head at the way Schwarz’s eyes had gone wide, the words slipping out under his breath.
“The mana coming off that lump of flesh… I’ve felt it before.”
“You’ve felt it? Where?”
“On your fifteenth birthday, My Lady.”
“What…?”
When Schwarz answered in a trembling voice, Milia’s face went blank for a moment. It was only natural. A cocoon radiating the same mana as the assassin who had once tried to take her life—no matter how hard she thought, she couldn’t find a single thread connecting the two.
“Are you sure? You couldn’t be mistaken?”
“I’m certain… This filthy mana—it’s exactly the same as back then.”
“Mmm…”
Schwarz shook his head, refusing to entertain any other possibility. A low sound of frustration escaped Milia as her thoughts tangled. Just what was going on here…? She was still trying to make sense of it when her gaze swept the area—
“Schwarz! Look over there!”
Milia’s shout snapped his head around. What he saw made his blood run cold: people trapped inside pillars of the same meaty mass.
“We get the people out first!”
“Yes, My Lady!”
Schwarz nodded and sprinted with her toward the pillars. Together they hauled the captives free. Sticky slime dripped with a sickening sound as the people slid out one after another.
“Cough! Cough!”
“Can you hear us?”
Milia and Schwarz watched a man slowly open his eyes between fits of coughing.
“Wh-who are you…?”
The man blinked hard, still struggling to grasp the situation. Then his eyes landed on Milia. They went round as saucers; he scrambled upright and bowed deeply.
“You’re the Count’s daughter!”
“Save the greetings for later. Help us get the rest of them out first.”
“Ah! Yes! Right away!”
There were still plenty of people trapped inside the pillars. Instead of answering further, Milia simply moved on to the next one. The man nodded and joined her, pulling free the remaining captives.
“Waaaaaah—!! I was so scared!!”
The last child tumbled out and immediately burst into tears.
“Thank you so much…!! If it hadn’t been for you, My Lady, who knows what would have become of us…”
“Save the thanks until we’re out of this place. You know the area, so you should at least know how to get out of the forest, right?”
“Hmm… yes. I think I have a rough idea of where we are.”
The hunters nodded after glancing around at Milia’s question.
“Good… Then take the children and get out of here as fast as—”
She was still speaking when a sharp cracking sound split the air. Brilliant light erupted from the cocoon.
“What the—?”
“From this moment on, don’t stop running.”
The children and hunters stared, baffled by the sudden change. Milia and Schwarz, already piecing it together, stepped in front of them.
“Ah! Yes! Understood! Come on, kids, let’s go!”
The hunters finally grasped the danger and herded the children away. At the same moment, something began to drag itself free of the cocoon with a lurching, unsteady motion. A shape slid down through the thick slime. For a moment it simply trembled, then slowly pushed itself upright.
Its build was like a massive, muscle-bound ape. The skin looked as though it were made of tar that still quivered and oozed. Enormous arms ended in claws like blades. Where a head should have been there was only a hollow cavity filled with clacking, razor-sharp teeth, and a low growl leaked from that empty hole.
“What the hell is that…?”
“Ugly as sin…”
Milia and Schwarz muttered as they stared at the thing that looked like nothing of this world. Then the unknown abomination turned its empty “face” toward them. Headless as it was, they still felt the weight of its attention.
And in the next instant—
—the creature charged straight at Milia, swinging a forelimb bristling with razor claws.
“Hup…!!”
With a sharp shout Milia raised her halberd and caught the blow. Metal screeched against claw; sparks showered the ground as the two weapons locked.
“Schwarz!”
“Hyaaaaah!!”
At her call Schwarz lunged in and drove a mana-charged fist into the monster’s gut. The impact staggered it; Milia seized the opening and smashed her halberd across its torso.
The creature’s body went flying with another unearthly scream, slamming into a tree. The trunk shattered under the force and buried the monster beneath a rain of splinters. With a heavy crash the broken tree toppled.
“Are you all right, My Lady?”
“Yeah. I can handle this.”
Milia nodded and tightened her grip on the halberd. At the same moment the monster clawed its way free of the fallen branches once more.
“Oh? Regeneration?”
The wound her halberd had carved closed in an instant. Milia’s eyes widened with interest. Super-regeneration—the same ability trolls and hydras possessed. Apparently this thing had it too.
“I’ll take care of it. Stay out of this.”
“B-but…”
“Sometimes I just want to move my body a little. And this doesn’t look like something I can’t handle.”
She gave the troubled Schwarz a faint smile. Ever since the martial arts tournament she had barely had a chance to fight; he could understand the urge. Even so, he couldn’t shake the unease. There was no such thing as absolute safety in this world.
Whether she sensed his worry or not, Milia’s competitive spirit was already burning as she slowly closed the distance.
“You weren’t seriously thinking I’d lose to something this pathetic, were you?”
“That’s not it, but…”
“Then just sit back and watch.”
She flashed him another small smile, settled into her stance, and with a short battle cry charged. At the same instant the monster let out a hideous shriek and lunged to meet her.