Elk bears. Bears with horns growing from their head like elk. Monsters.
Having come from Japan, Wataru thought that their horns were similar to the one found on horned rabbits. Heading toward the forest, he also wondered about if they grew new horns every year if they were the same horns as an elk’s.
His companions for this were Shikina Kukkoro and Meat Kuroinu.
Although Shikina was equal to a B-Rank adventurer in her strength alone, she was excessively weak against humanoid monsters. With an extra helping of superficial, lewd knowledge, she was a no-good elf.
Judging by appearances alone, Meat was just a young girl. She was also, however, a beastkin with a good level of flexibility and agility, as well as unexpectedly powerful for how small she was. With the exception of her name, Meat, which was usually a name given to disposable slaves, she was perfect.
Alright then, we’ll be facing the elk bear here soon, but how should we look for it? I figure we should let the person who finds it get the kill.
No way, Wataru-sensei. There’s no way we could take down an elk bear by ourselves, right, Kuroinu-dono?
? First come, first served is fine?
Oh… so you want to fight it one on one too, Kuroinu-dono? I want to go with Wataru-sensei.
Seeing Meat tilt her head to the side, Shikina sighed before she spoke.
Alright, let’s just stick together then.
Kuroinu-dono, could you find it by smell?
I don’t know its smell, so no.
Oh, so you could if you knew how it smelled…? How about we go whatever direction you smell a best in, Kuro-san?
Meat nodded and began leading the other two into the forest.
She occasionally stuck her nose into the air or put it to the ground to take a deep sniff and eventually managed to find something she wasn’t looking for—an orc.
Wataru quickly beheaded it, while Meat severed its tail to serve as proof for its subjugation.
I wonder if we could lure it out with the smell of its blood?
Oh yeah, sounds good. Elk bears are omnivorous, but maybe it knows how people taste?
Huh? It eats people? Were there any victims?
It did almost kill someone but they managed to get away by just losing their arm. They’ll have to retire if they can’t get the temple’s help… oh, Kehma-san’s a Beddhism priest, so maybe he can use recovery magic?
Meat recalled how her Goshujin-sama actually did create an artificial arm with Create Golem a while back after hearing him say that, but it wasn’t something she could talk about so she let it be.
Come to think of it, Master did use [Healing] before!
… I don’t know how much damage Goshujin-sama can heal.
Maybe I should ask Kehma-san about it later~. Well, he probably wouldn’t give me a straighter answer though.
Their chat ended with that.
They found a large mark on the side of a tree nearby the dead orc. It looked like claws had raked across its surface, a bear’s markings.
Putting that information together with what they already knew, this was likely the elk bear’s territory. They decided to leave the orc corpse there and wait in ambush.
A while later, likely smelling blood in the air, a giant, two-meter long great boar came along.
Whoops, looks like we attracted the wrong thing. I’ll go and deal with it real quick.
I will do it, hoh!
Shikina stood before the great boar and unsheathed Magic Sword Seon from its place at her waist.
Meat and Wataru both thought it would’ve been better to take it by surprise, but she was probably just confident in herself. They decided see what happened next.
Meanwhile, the great boar felt like it was being provoked and rushed on to Shikina—which is when she swung her sword down, cutting it in half.
Hyah…!—geh!
… However, although she’d managed to cut clean through it, she didn’t manage to kill the boar’s momentum. It barreled into her, launching her into the tree before finally falling aside in two halves.
The effect of Shikina’s Magic Sword Seon activated, transferring the damage to her clothing. The clothing at her abdomen burst open.
Alriiight! I really did get stronger from Master and everyone’s help!
Shikina-chan, are you alright? Your clothes tore, but they’re just normal cloth.
I’m alright! Wataru-sensei, you already know my clothes tore because of Seon’s effect. I’m not injured at all~
Setting aside Shikina, who was busying herself with being pleased at her exposed belly, Meat took the nose from the now cleanly-bisected boar… It was cut in two, but she figured it should be alright.
There’s so much meat… we could eat it.
Yeah, let’s bring it back when we’re done. We could sell it even if we don’t end up eating it.
Wataru stuffed the remains of the great boar into his [Storage]. His [Storage] had a huge capacity, so he just shoved it all in in one go. He figured he’d probably take the orc and elk bear’s corpses as well once this was over. He confirmed that Shikina and Meat each had [Storage] too, so he figured it might even be a good idea to come out and hunt for something else after they finished.
Hmm, I smell something…
Oh, nice. It’s probably the elk bear.
This time, a bear with elk horns turned up a few minutes after. It would be around three meters tall if it stood up on its hind legs.
Given that a more normally sized elk bear would’ve been one and a half to two meters at most, it was definitely out of the ordinary.
It’s pretty huge.
Shikina-san, did you want to give it a shot?
Alright, let me try an—
Before Shikina had a chance to get out her sword, Meat jumped out.
She ran up to the elk bear and, using the tree and its leg as scaffolding, leapt up to its neck and used the knife golem she’d had at her waist to pierce into its throat. The super-vibrating knife golem easily slipped through its fur, skin, and muscle, destroying its ability to breath. Then, following through, she continued by slicing off its head.
It all happened so fast that the elk bear was unable to react, despite being aware of the three of them. Unable to so much as let out a roar, it fell to the ground so hard the ground shook.
—Kuroinu-donoooo!?
First come first serve, right?
Standing next to the elk bear’s body with blood splattered on her, Meat tilted her head to the side as if to ask if there was a problem.
Ahahaha, that was brilliant! I guess you could call it a straight-on surprise attack huh?
I saw my chance, so I took it.
Meat put the elk bear’s body into her [Storage] as if nothing happened—the elk bear really hadn’t had a chance to do anything, though—while Wataru used [Cleanup] on her… she didn’t seem to see what was so special about it.
Guess we should head back? Shikina-chan, want to bring the orc?
Alright! Here we go—!
Shikina threw the orc corpse into her [Storage]. Like that, their elk bear subjugation commission came to its completion.
… I didn’t know bear meat was that weak.
Kuroinu-dono, you don’t even put dragons in your eyes~
Man, Kuro-chan’s turning into an assassin-type. I didn’t think you’d be able to take it out in one strike with that knife of yours.
The elk bear was delivered in a very clean condition, so Wataru said [This girl’s the one to do it. In one strike no less.] and pointed to Meat, which was followed by someone shouting [As expected of the girl who’s stronger than the man who’s stronger than the Hero!]… but that was a story for another time.
