Chapter 62

The scream came from nearby.

"Is it behind the house!?"

Aldis circled around the house in front of him and went to the back.

Kirill silently followed him.

Behind the house, there was another house, and a purple creature was about to break through the wall made of wooden planks.

The purple creature floated in the air with a body like a soft-bodied animal, and had more than ten tentacles hanging down below.

Its body length was about three meters. It was probably the monster known as the "Heterosaint."

Each time the tentacles were raised and struck the wall, the wooden wall creaked and was broken.

"Ah! Someone help me!"

A woman's voice calling for help could be heard from inside the house.

"Kirill! Hide behind something! If anything happens, scream!"

"Y-Yes!"

Kirill immediately ran to a wooden box by the roadside and hid behind it.

Embarrassingly, the only thing Kirill could do was to stay quiet within Aldis's line of sight.

After giving Kirill instructions, Aldis drew a white-bladed short sword from his waist and charged straight at the Heterosaint.

He himself drew a sky-blue broadsword and approached the monster's back like a gust of wind.

The white short sword cut through the tentacle that was about to destroy the house.

Until that moment, the monster had probably seen Aldis as nothing more than an insignificant intruder.

By the time it recognized him as a dangerous enemy, it was too late, and death was already approaching from behind.

A blue, mineral-like sphere, which may have been its eye, caught sight of Aldis.

"Die."

Murmuring the words to the dying, Aldis cut the monster in half with his sky-blue broadsword, including the blue sphere. The monster, now severed, fell to the ground with a thud, losing its strength.

The whole process took less than ten seconds.

Kirill looked at Aldis with admiration, who had so effortlessly slain the monster with fluid movements.

"Amazing..."

Judging that the danger had passed, Kirill tried to stand up and run to Aldis.

However, the next moment, he noticed that Aldis was still on guard and quickly looked around.

"Damn, it's a pair."

Aldis spat and looked up into the sky.

Following his gaze, Kirill saw another Heterosaint floating higher than the roof of the house.

The emotions of the floating Heterosaint were incomprehensible to humans.

However, the sound coming from its purple body, similar to the sound of a rope being whipped at high speed, seemed to be more agitated.

"Since it's a pair... as I thought."

As if waiting for Aldis's words, countless purple objects appeared from the shadows around them.

They were identical in color and shape to the Heterosaint in the sky.

The difference was in size.

The Heterosaint in the sky was about the same size as the one Aldis had just defeated, but the ones appearing from the shadows were small, about twenty to thirty centimeters in length.

But their numbers were incomparable.

Kirill could see at least thirty of them.

"Are these... the larvae of the monster?"

Even Kirill, who was not well-versed in the ecology of monsters, could guess as much if there were a pair of monsters and smaller versions of them.

"Kirill! Come here!"

As Aldis called out, a white-bladed short sword flew to Kirill.

The short sword stopped in front of Kirill and easily cut down the approaching larvae of the Heterosaint.

"Y-Yes!"

Kirill, who had hesitated for a moment, realized that hesitating would only be a hindrance and started running to Aldis.

The larvae of the Heterosaint, sensing the movement of their prey, rushed to attack.

The short sword floating beside Kirill intercepted them.

Despite the cold sweat on his forehead as the larvae's tentacles grazed his head, Kirill managed to reach Aldis.

"Stay still with your back to the house."

Leaving the white short sword to protect Kirill and the villagers, Aldis threw another short sword at the swarm of larvae and began to chant a spell.

"The cutting wind is the melody played by the white lady—Wind Slash!"

A single swing of the sword dispatched one larva, and the wind magic simultaneously cut through two or three more.

However, the number of larvae did not seem to decrease.

How many were there? They kept appearing from the shadows, no matter how many were defeated.

"Damn, if we weren't in the middle of the village..."

Aldis probably intended to use a large-scale annihilation spell that would affect the entire area.

However, he couldn't do that without knowing where the villagers were hiding, and he couldn't recklessly destroy the houses.

Despite these constraints, Aldis continued to dispatch the larvae one by one.

Naturally, the parent Heterosaint, which had already begun to attack Aldis with its tentacles from a closer range, could not remain idle.

In coordination with the parent, the larvae of the Heterosaint attacked Aldis from all directions.

Aldis wielded a short sword with a yellow-green blade and held a sky-blue broadsword in his other hand, cutting down the larvae one after another.

"There's no end to this!"

Aldis cursed, succinctly summarizing the situation.

Even as he spoke, more larvae fell to the ground.

Kirill watched in amazement as the monsters were systematically dispatched by the sword, as if it were a preordained sequence.

*What would you call that person? Their strength is so overwhelming that it makes our standards seem ridiculous.*

The words of a man Kirill had met on the morning of their departure from the capital came to mind.

At a tavern where he had gone to meet a man named Jean, Kirill had waited idly while Aldis listened to the request. A man had approached Kirill and struck up a conversation.

The man showed interest in Kirill's name, where he came from, and why he was traveling with Aldis.

Normally, one should avoid revealing personal information to strangers.

However, Kirill, lacking life experience, had been drawn in by the man's gentle smile and polite manner, and had inadvertently revealed information.

After extracting all the information from Kirill, the man laughed and said, "You're lucky. Normally, it would cost ten gold coins a day to hire that person."

When Kirill's eyes widened at the amount, the man added with a self-deprecating smile, "He's an incredibly reassuring presence as a bodyguard. On the other hand, he's a terrifying person if he's your enemy. At least, no one in the capital who works as a mercenary would even consider making him an enemy."

According to the man, Aldis had defeated the three major strong monsters that mercenaries and the national army had failed to defeat for decades in just one day.

He was now one of the most famous mercenaries in the capital.

"Hey, Cesare. Don't bother other people's companions."

Aldis, who had finished listening to the request, returned.

"Just chatting... right? Right?"

The man tried to defend himself and sought Kirill's agreement.

For some reason, Kirill sensed a hint of fear in the man's expression.

"You're going to the City-State Union, right? Do you need information?"

"I don't need it. I've already heard what I need from Jean."

"You're so cold."

Despite his words, the man did not look disappointed.

"Kirill, let's go."

Without even glancing at the man, Aldis called to Kirill and walked towards the entrance of the tavern.

"If you hear any interesting stories, tell me when you get back."

With those words from the man, Kirill followed Aldis out of the tavern.

Kirill, who was not a resident of Gran, did not know how formidable the three major strong monsters were.

However, if what the man said was true, Kirill could understand the overwhelming strength of Aldis, who was now fighting a swarm of monsters alone.

Each time Aldis swung his sword, the number of larvae decreased.

Occasionally, he would raise his left hand and cast ice or wind spells at the clusters of larvae, dispatching them with precision.

Kirill had thought that casting spells always required incantations, but it seemed that a master like Aldis could do it with just a gesture.

Kirill could hardly keep up with the combination of sword and magic that Aldis unleashed.

Eventually, the number of larvae, which seemed endless, began to decrease.

When their numbers dropped below twenty, the larvae started to retreat.

Aldis relentlessly pursued them.

"The shining blue dances in the eternal silence of the colorless land—Arctic Storm!"

After confirming that the houses were at a safe distance, Aldis used a blizzard spell that affected a wide area to annihilate the larvae and finished off the remaining adult Heterosaint with two flying swords.

"Phew, that was quite a hassle."

Aldis's sigh marked the end of the battle.

2019/07/30 Error correction: "one piece" → "one house"

2019/07/30 Error correction: "hide in the shadow" → "hide in the shade"

2019/07/30 Error correction: "knock down" → "shoot down"

*Thank you for reporting the errors.