Master’s Smile

C101 – Artificial Monster

Several snakes with heads still intact could be seen on its tail, glaring at their enemies, Neena and the others, with a menacing hiss.

The body of a goat, the head of a lion.

Eyes blazed bright red, teeth as sharp as canine’s.

This irregularity was called a “Chimera”.

It was not a naturally occurring monster, but an artificial one that mankind had had magically created as a biological weapon during the long period of wartime era.

“Y-You…!!!”h

Neena was intimidated by the appearance of such a monster, yet she managed to raise her voice after seeing what it was chewing in its mouth.

It was a knight, with his solid armor pierced and his strength drained from his entire body.

“You bastard…!!! Let him go!!”

Neena drew her sword and attacked the chimera.

She was the first princess of Evans Kingdom, but she was not merely a quiet princess who would stay in her castle.

Neena was a knight who wielded her sword and went to the front lines to fight wars and defeat monsters on her own.

Furthermore, she was also merciful to the weak and to her own people.

Due to this, she was quite a popular member of royalty in the Evans Kingdom.

Even now, for the sake of her knights, who had joined her side based on their adoration, Neena stood up against the powerful monster called chimera as she regarded them as her valued subordinates.

“Tch!!!”

Unfortunately, even with her sharp sword that no one could expect a princess would have, it still did not manage to injure the chimera.

The chimera then spitted the knight out of its mouth, and with tremendous physical strength, it leaped away with power.

Neena, who was not satisfied that she had failed to land a strike, was able to retrieve her main objective, the knight, and retreated with him in her arms.

“Kuh…! This person is already….”

Having been on the battlefield and seen lots of people perish, Neena realized that the knight had already ceased breathing.

Once bitten by a sharp fang and bleeding profusely, even a well-trained royal knight could not escape death.

Neena tried to take her anger at the loss of her precious subordinate out on the chimera, but….

“Wha-…!? I-It disappeared…!?”

Just a few moments after she took her eyes off it, it had vanished without a trace.

Nevertheless, Neena, with her extensive combat experience, could find out where her enemies were by searching for their presence, even if her sight betrayed her.

That was why she tried to search for signs this time as well, however….

“Damn it! I can’t find it after all….”

Neena cursed and gave up trying to search for the monster.

The reason why she could not trace its signs was not because she was inexperienced.

Certainly, compared to the member of a dark guild, Ritter, the range in which she could search for signs was much narrower.

However, the monster titled Chimera was able to hide its presence considerably.

This was not due to it being a strong monster, but because it was a biological weapon and a man-made monster created with the purpose of winning the war.

Thus, there were a lot of chimeras that had been equipped with such special abilities and were released into the wild.

Knowing this, Neena could not expect much, but then she would have no way to counter it.

“…….”

She held her sword in front of her waist with its tip pointed upwards and examined her surroundings.

She kept her eyes peeled and was ready to respond no matter where it attacked her, but….

“Grooooaaarr!!!”

“Kuh!?”

The speed with which the chimera attacked was far beyond Neena’s expectations.

It rushed like the wind to attack her, perhaps due to it being an artificial being and having great physical prowess.

She readied her sword, but wondered how effective it would be against the chimera’s sharp fangs.

As she thought so….

“Ei.”

“Gyaah!?”

Ritter’s toes dug into the side of the chimera’s lion face.

With a gouging yet heavy kick, she blew away the chimera that had attacked Neena.

“R-Ritter!”

“Neena, get away.”

Ritter then looked at the chimera.

She wasn’t actually thinking in the bottom of her heart that she wanted to help Neena.

However, in order for Yelquchira to extend their influence in the kingdom… as well as to offer the kingdom to her master, she couldn’t let Neena die here.

…Also, because of Anat’s explanation, Ritter was determined to protect Neena after her master.

“Grrrrrrrrr…!!!”

Blown away, the chimera quickly rose and glared at the intruder, Ritter.

A normal lion would have had enough impact to have its neck broken with that attack, but the chimera, an artificial being, had superior vitality.

With fury, it hurled an intense pressure toward both Ritter and Neena.

Neena’s face grew tense as she held up her sword, but Ritter looked at the Chimera with her usual blank expression.

“Grroooooooaarr!!!”

Then, the chimera, using its strong leg, pounced towards Ritter in an instant.

It had decided that Ritter was the strongest of all, even stronger than Neena and Master.

The speed at which it approached was tremendous, and it was no wonder that the knights escorting them were helplessly knocked out when they were hit by this surprise attack.

However, for Ritter, a member of the first princess’s entourage as well as a member of the strongest dark guild in both name and reality after defeating “Iron Queen (Inicken)”, “Salvation Army (Yelquchira)”, it was so slow that it made her yawned.

In fact, she even managed to avoid the chimera’s lunge attack at ease.

Its fangs clashed with each other, creating a metallic sound, missing the prey it was supposed to eat.

“Ritter!!!”

One could generally say that it’s a lion if it was simply avoided like so and moved on.

But not only did it have a lion’s head, the chimera also had snakes as tails.

Even if one could slip past an attack from its head, it could still launch an attack with its tail.

Alas, several snakes started aiming at Ritter’s eyes.