The Kind Older Sister Is No More

Chapter 104: Fighting Monsters

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Noel’s group had entered the Snow Forest.

“Wow, is this the Snow Forest I have only heard of through words? It’s snowing, but it’s not cold at all.”

Dan, one of the mercenaries murmured as he walked down the path covered in snow. Starting from the border between hard dirt and soft snow at the entrance, the sound of horses’ hooves could provoke the demon, so they got down and went in on foot.

“But is the Snow Forest usually this foggy? I can’t see anything in front of me since it’s a little misty and gloomy.”

“It wasn’t foggy until now, it could be a change in the climate, or it could have something to do with the emergence of the demons. I won’t save you even if you are attacked, so stop babbling or you will trigger the beast.” At Noel’s heartless claim, Dan muttered, kicking his tongue.

“If you treat me half as nice as you do to your wife, I will shed tears of joy…”

“Shh. There’s something ahead.” At that moment, as Noel’s warning, something colossal was approaching them with heavy footsteps.

Thump. Thump.

The mercenary corps and the knights looked around with immense tension at the echo of the horrific sound. Noel stared straight ahead quietly, then pulled out a bow and an arrow from the bow barrel attached to his horse. Noel's composure remained unchanged as the atmosphere was dead silent to the point that none of them dared to breathe heavily. He steadily pulled the bowstring, aiming at a certain point, waiting for the target to make its appearance then let go. Eyes of the mercenaries and the guards followed the direction his arrow was flying. Everything seemed quiet the second later, but how unfortunate, it was just the calm before the storm.

“Screech!”

It ran towards Noel, the monster’s roar sounded as if it was piercing through his ears. What appeared in the mist was a monster with thick fur all over its body. The ground shook from each stamp every time the demon took a step. The things on its fingers were too long and sharp to be called nails. It gave them a hunch that even the slightest touch of its wildly swinging claws would split their body in half. Even with such an intimidating build in front of him, Noel drew his sword without a moment of hesitation.

“Protect the Duke!”

The soldiers screamed and came running, but that was the most useless and redundant act. It was because Noel was handling the fight just fine on his own. Even without their protection, he would still take down the hideous creature without a doubt. He was able to fight on an equal footing with a monster with its five senses working at its utmost in the thick foggy forest because the arrow he shot penetrated through one of the monster’s eyes. Thanks to it, the monster swung its claws in the air aimlessly and unavailingly, while Noel took advantage of that chance to dig in between them and injure the monster’s body.

It’s hard on the outside.

However, its skin was so solid that it only suffered minor wounds, no fatal wounds were applied. Noel avoided the monster’s claws and stood next to his horse. As they were trained for this situation, the horse did not run away and stayed in place even in a sudden break–out battle. Noel grabbed all ten arrows from the bow barrel hanging from his horse and approached the monster fighting in a rage.

“My Lord! Don’t come close! It’s dangerous here!”

“You are more in danger than I am.”

Pushing aside the soldier who almost had his shoulder torn off by the monster’s claws, Noel bolted through the gap to the monster’s front. The knights were anxious to see Noel solely combat the monster and did not know what to do, but the reaction of the mercenaries was different.

“Why not just deal with it quickly and we all go back. Not you people...but the Duke.”

“He can solve this on his own.”

“In the meantime, we will check the condition of the horses.”

Belief was that each monster has a different weight class and strength. But the one of the Snow Forest is bigger and stronger than any others. No matter how great and skilful the Duke was, how could he be that easy-going when confronting such a menacing existence alone? The guards grit their teeth, distressed. They felt disappointed in themselves for lacking the calm and the spirit a knight should have had. Yet, Noel tossed a warning look at them, indicating that no one was permitted to come near him, so they had no choice but to stay put. The surroundings became quiet as the creature began to look around with only one eye open. Then, when it found Noel, it roared and rushed forward. It attempted to kill him, as it recognised the culprit who put the sharp object in its eye. Even though the monster was just a few metres away and with its mouth wide open rushing toward him, Noel did not even budge. He just stared at the demon indifferently, with a bunch of arrows in one hand and a sword in the other. When the monster finally reached Noel’s feet, he leapt and landed on the top of the monster’s nose. Subsequently, he climbed down to the beast’s shoulder and rammed all the ten arrows he was holding into its neck.

“SCREEECH!”

The monster roared and rioted at the arrows that pierced through its skin, but Noel never fell from the monster’s shoulder. Holding on to the hammered arrow and resisting the shaking, Noel gave strength to his legs. He maintained his balance and shoved the sword once more at the point where the arrows had struck.

'Shing.'

Finally, it completely penetrated through the black monster’s hard skin and dug deep into its flesh.

“Now! Attack!”

One of the soldiers, who had been watching the spectacle of slaughtering the huge monster, barely came to his senses and shouted. The fight after that was too smooth to be called a battle. Losing one eye and having a fatal injury at the neck. The wounded monster had to yield its life to the swords of the mercenaries and knights, without having a single minute to recover from its pains. While they were clearing the monster’s corpse, Noel checked for any remaining demons. At that moment, he found another sign. But it was not a sign of a demon.

Shoot.

Neigh!

The horse, writhing in pain, ran away when an arrow from the mist struck its thigh. Noel turned to look at the direction the arrow flew from. A group of mercenaries, unaware of the occurrence just now, approached and talked to him.

“...Your Grace, the monster has stopped breathing for sure. But where is that…”

“The demon isn’t the problem. There is an assassin.”

“What?!”

Following the monster, this time, a group of assassins hiding had jumped out of nowhere, frightening the group. The guards were a little overwhelmed and wary of the number on the nemesis side. It was an estimate that exceeded twenty.

“What is this all of a sudden…th-this time, protect the Duke!” Leaving out the soldier’s shout, countless assassins rushed to Noel at once. At the same time, the knights and mercenaries also lined up around Noel to deal with the assassins. Blocking the swords’ strikes flying from all directions, he slid into their blind spots. He swung his sword at defenceless spots, and lastly beheaded the assassins. Noel bit his lip nervously.

It won’t be a big deal since she has Louiselle and the ring. If a planned massacre occurred here, an attempted assassination must have aimed at Irene as well. Noel wanted to confirm Irene’s position with the ring, but the circumstances did not support him. Because if he looked away even for a moment, that would be the perfect chance for the assassin to end his life immediately.josei

I have no choice but to hurry out of this danger and go to Irene. As soon as he made the decision, a murderous flame arose in his eyes.

The air around him seemed to freeze for a moment, and chills struck. Every single individual, either allies or enemies all got goosebumps. After that, Noel’s one-sided massacre on an extreme scale took place. To the foes, he was like a predator. And from a prey’s perspective, with one blink, a comrade’s neck came flying. Two blinks, his sword came into sight as his blade swung directly in their way, ready to pierce them at any moment. The rest of the crew just stared blankly at the scene, petrified, as if they had buried their feet into the ground. He was the real devil. When there were finally no standing assassins left, Noel’s indiscriminate slaughter came to an end. While it was so quiet that not even breathing could be heard, Noel carelessly wiped the wet blood stain from his cheek.

“...th-that, are you okay? Did you get injured anywhere?”

“Can’t you see?”

“...It doesn’t seem like it.”

“One of the assassins is still alive. Find him and capture him, don’t kill him because we need to find the mastermind behind this.”

“Yes!”

Everyone looked at Noel with a weary face, who had just shown off his brilliant swordsmanship but did not lose his breath. Regardless, Noel checked the location of Irene on the ring. The position of the star was very near him. He could figure out where it was in an instant.

This place is...

“Oh, my Lord! Where are you going? It’s still dangerous...!”

Suddenly, Noel climbed on a horse, and it galloped away with full speed, the startled knight shouted, but his cry only echoed in vain. When Noel disappeared completely into the mist, the soldier muttered with a serious expression.

“I don’t know if it’s okay for him to go alone. Maybe there’s still an assassin left lurking somewhere…”

Then Hex, one of the mercenaries who heard that, replied. “You are worried about him even after having witnessed he took away half of the monster’s life and terminated the whole group of assassins in a wink?”

“That’s true.”

“I was really scared…”

“I was so confused about which one was the real demon.”

“We are so lucky to be on his side, I would rather kill myself if he were my enemy.”

“Same here, same.”

The mercenaries and the Duchy’s knights, who used to hold hatred toward each other, became comrades. They felt a deep sense of sympathy for one another before Noel’s swordsmanship, which was not surprising but rather fearful, to say the least.