Chapter 105 – She"s Like a Bright Red Flame That Burns Quietly (5)The smallest Ruten in front of us bent down and spread its wings.
“Kunpei, wait for a bit.”
“O-oh.”
Rouge dropped me from her shoulder next to a thick tree branch.
She treated me gently, being careful of the wounds on my back.
“Lion tribe person, step back.”
She walked over to Gasara, who was crouching and holding his shoulders down, and urged him in a quiet tone.
“But…”
“Step back.”
“Ow!”
She grabbed the collar of Gasara"s down jacket and pulled it.
Gasara was sent flying two meters and landed next to me.
Isn"t that too rough of a treatment?
“Ah, sorry. It"s cause you"re bigger than Kunpei. My mistake.”
Apparently, she judged him to be st.u.r.dy with his physique.
”Hm. Even three of them is not really a big deal, but it"s the first time I"ve had to fight while protecting someone. So just in case.”
Shaking her long, bright red hair, Rouge quickly walked towards the little Ruten.
If I only looked at her back, she had zero caution and was too imposing.
”are you alright?”
Her appearance was so natural that it worried me. When I asked, Rouge turned around a bit and nodded.
”Hm. It looks like I can leave that one to you.”
“Eh?”
“Kuooooooooooooooo!”
That familiar stretched out cry, echoed around the area.
I looked at the sky in a hurry and saw that the airborne middle Ruten was spreading its wings and take a nosedive.
”Whoa!”
“s.h.i.t!”
I put myself on guard, and Gasara readied the magic cannon.
Rouge who was at the edge of my vision turns away from us and continues to face the Little Ruten.
”Kazamachi! It"s coming!
“Kuh!”
There"s nothing we can do about it even if we ready ourselves.
It was already falling straight towards us with sufficient speed.
Gasara shouldered the magic cannon on her shoulder, but the pain caused him to grimace.
There"s nothing we can do, it"s already in front of us!
Along with a strange high-pitched voice, an extremely colorful silhouette pa.s.sed over our heads and collided with the flying Ruten.
“W-what!”
“Sister Nanairo!”
There was a ringing metallic sound.
Colorful feathers danced around us.
The feminine silhouette swung around a large lump of metal that far surpa.s.sed her own height and blew Ruten away.
”What the h.e.l.l! Gasara! Aren"t you enjoying something exciting!”
A bird tribe woman with a huge yellow beak fully open and a silver down jacket of a different color from Gasara shouted out.
“We were bored over here with these small fry wolves! Why don"t you leave this huge guy to me? Huh?! Hey? Oi!”
With an expression of tremendous joy, the woman named Nanairo, who is Gasara"s sister, swung down a lump of metal as she landed.
The "thing" that cracked the asphalt and stuck into the ground was a sword.
A large sword.
The unbelievably large sword acted as a brake and held Nanairo-san"s body in place.
”You did it now, Aneki!”
“Thank you! Hyah!”
She no longer had a maniacal smile plastered on her face as she pulled the huge sword out of the ground with one hand and leapt lightly down to the side.
Hey, where did the weight of the sword go? Don"t swing it around like it"s a plastic bat like that.
What"s with that person.
”G-Gasara! Your nee-chan is scary!”
“Don"t worry! I"m scared sometimes too!”
Is that supposed to be rea.s.suring!
“Gsra.”
“Oh my G.o.d!”
Before I knew it, there was something behind me.
I turned around, startled by the voice, and saw a huge gray beastman spreading something on my back.
I-I didn"t notice at all!
“Seijitsu Aniki!”
“I-n-e-x-p-e-r-i-e-n-c-e-d…”
“S-s-s-s-sorry, Aniki!”
“Gasara lowered his head in a hurry.”
The one who was there was a beastman from the Sloth tribe. Gasara"s Aniki.
He was holding my back tightly with one hand and spreading something on it without any regard for me.
”Eh, no, um! W-what"s your Aniki doing? What is that, guh! Ow!”
Ow! It hurts like h.e.l.l!
Something sticky is being applied to my back and it"s stinging!
What is this menthol-like feeling? It"s amazingly cooling.
“D-i-s-i-n-f…”
“Oww! What did he say?!”
“… hmm. Ah, it"s disinfectant. It"s not much more than simple first-aid, but I"ve applied some magic medicine to stop the bleeding and to protect you. It"ll hurt like death at first, but it"s better than dying later on. There"s a paramedic at the shelter, so get yourself properly checked out, boy. No matter how you look at it, you"re hurt too badly. Hey, Gasara, how did this happen with you here? You lose the qualifications to be a pro hunter if you let an ordinary person be hurt…”
“Eh, ah, no…”
“If you make any excuses, I"ll kick your a.s.s.”
Who is this?
Just a moment ago he had those sleepy, half-open eyes, but now he"s got a look that"s even sharper than mine.
His tone of voice, which used to be irritatingly slow, has changed to a quick, austere tone.
It"s hard to believe that it"s the same person.
“Uwah! Aniki, you don"t have to get so serious!”
Gasara was holding his shoulders down and trembling.
Aren"t you a little too scared?
“Sorry Aniki! It"s flying that way!”
I heard Nanairo"s voice in the distance.
I turned my head to look it, but it was nowhere to be seen.
“Above.”
I looked up at Seijitsu-san"s voice and saw that Ruten was flying in from far above.
It had only one wing, and the remaining wing was torn in half. Its right arm was also missing from the elbow, and its left leg was also missing at the ankle.
Hey, when did it end up like that?
It hasn"t even been five minutes since it started fighting with Nanairo-san!
“It"s not flying, you sent it this way.”
Seijitsu-san stood up shaking his head, took one look at the falling Ruten and disappeared.
”Huh?”
In an instant, he was gone.
I didn"t even blink, but I lost sight of Seijitsu-san who was right in front of me.
Something exploded above us.
No, it sounded as if it had exploded.
I reflexively shielded my head because of the sound, then I looked up.
”You"re kidding…”
I was so shocked that I muttered to myself.
The huge gray sloth had raised its right fist and crushed the lump of rock Ruten into pieces.
A valiant figure floating in the twilight sky.
Seijitsu-san remained airborne in a right uppercut stance with a bothersome expression.
”Hmm. Not bad.”
“R-Rouge!?”
Why do you keep surprising me?
My heart is already hurting and I"m afraid it"s going to stop!
Maybe I"m just a dumb a.s.s! It"s possible, but you know what?
“What about the little Ruten?”
“Hm. There.”
There was a small black hill in the place where she pointed with her white and slender finger.
What is that?
“It"s a hindrance if it"s resurrected. I burned it carefully, then crushed it and burned it again.”
Isn"t that overkill. I mean, that was quick!
“Ahhhh! You"re terrible! My toy!”
“You"re playing too much, idiot.”
Nanairo-san came down while flapping her colorful wings.
“Ah, but there"s another one. But it doesn"t seem like it"s coming.”
Ah, now that you mention it.
I had forgotten all about it because things were so hectic in front of me, but there was still a large Ruten left.
I look again at the large Ruten that was stopped in the distant sky.
”Ah.”
The large Rutens opened its mouth and leaned backwards.
”Its breath is coming! Run!”
At the sound of my voice, everyone, except Rouge, braced themselves.
Rouge, whose expression was still as unreadable as ever, thought of something as she turned around and opened her eyes a bit.
”Ah, Ai.”
“Eh?”
The unexpected name caught me by surprise, and I turned around.
I saw a familiar-looking girl that stood at the entrance of the community center that became an evacuation shelter.
Aoi had a bright red face, her black horns that was growing out of her temples were shining, and she was wearing my junior high school jersey with the words “Kazamachi Kunpei” written in large letters vertically across her right chest. She was looking this way while clad in lightning.
Aoi"s expression looked as if she was enduring something.
The lightning emitted from her body climbs up into the sky and turned into a giant sphere.
”Ah, s.h.i.t.”
Aoi looked up while trembling.
And then.
”What are you doing to my husband!
Along with her voice, the thunder ball, flew straight to Ruten.
The large Ruten, who was about to release a breath, was engulfed by the thunderball while making a dumb noise.
A momentary flash of lightning.
A high-pitched explosion sound pa.s.sed through my ears.
I shut my eyes and protect my face with one hand.
Eventually, when the sound pa.s.sed into the distant sky, I opened my eyes.
The large Ruten was nowhere to be seen.
It was evaporated…