Chapter 21 – Bull Demon Massacre
"It was going faster than a jet plane!" Devon explained, mimicking the movement of the toast with his hand.
The countess looked a bit confused. "Devon, what's a jet plane?"
"Uh…" he stumbled for a moment, forgetting that he was not talking to another girl from earth. "It's like a really fast bird. Super super fast. Had them in my country."
The countess nodded, as the sounds of confrontation continued outside. "I want to see this 'jet plane' from your country some day."
From outside, the shuffle of feet indicated a development in the combat situation.
"That's the last of 'em, captain!"
"Alright, let's move onto the next burrow," the captain barked. The battalion began to advance over the hill, towards the next goblin burrow they wanted to eliminate.
"They're going quite a ways away, huh…" Devon muttered, noticing that the entire battalion of soldiers was leaving their line of sight.
"It's okay. Father told me to stay in the carriage no matter what, because the soldiers will not go too far."
Devon nodded. "I see."
An awkward silence began as the two simply waited for the soldiers to come back. The sounds of shouts and grunts from the soldiers were still audible but were decreasing in volume as the battalion advanced further.
A few minutes later, the sounds of soldiers disappeared completely, and it was eerily quiet. Devon frowned and watched as the horses drawing the carriages neighed nervously.
Devon chatted and made small talk with the countess for a while longer, but there were still no sounds of soldiers. Countess Ilyana also began to worry, glancing every so often out the window and only giving half hearted answers in their conversation.
"I'm going to step outside for a bit," Devon said. "And see what's going on."
"Wait!" the countess replied. "Father told me to stay inside, since it's not safe."
"You can stay here then," Devon replied. "But he never instructed me to do anything besides keep you company to and from the destination, and to observe the battalion in action. I can't observe if there's nothing to observe, right?"
The young countess thought about it for a moment, and then began getting out of the carriage as well. "I'm coming with you," she said in a determined voice. "I'm starting to have a bad feeling about this, and it will be safe if we stick together."
Devon nodded. "As long as you tell your father that this was your idea, and not mine."
Countess Ilyana smiled. "Of course~"
Grabbing his sheath and sword from inside the carriage, Devon stepped out with the moonlight steel longsword hanging by his side. Maybe he should have paid a bit more attention to that blacksmith from last night, he thought to himself.
Then again, he had zero experience in swordfighting and expected to be killed easily if any fight did happen to occur.
"Just letting you know again, I'm not a good fighter," Devon cautioned the countess. "Don't expect anything, if you see a monster just turn and run immediately."
The countess nodded curtly in agreement and stepped out of the carriage and onto the grass, her elegant side split dress brushing against the grass.
Devon began ascending the hill towards where the earl's battalion headed off towards, making sure that the countess was right behind him. To his surprise, the countess ran in high heels through dirt almost as fast as he could sprint with his shoes. Girls in this world were really built differently, he thought. Or maybe this was unique to the countess, he didn't have enough experience to know.
Once they reached the top of the hill, Devon saw what was going on.
Only a dozen or so of the original battalion's soldiers were still alive in the distance, fighting against a massive black demon-like creature that resembled a bull. The bodies of countless of the earl's soldiers lay on the grass, some of them gored and gravely injured, and others already dead.
One of the soldiers saw the countess at the top of the hill, and shouted at the top of his lungs, waving his arms. "Countess Ilyana, run!!!!"
The countess walked a bit closer to see the fight, her eyes trembling at the sight of so many of her fallen bannermen, but Devon held her back with his arm.
"Go back to the carriage," he instructed her.
"B-but," the white haired aristocratic loli replied.
"No buts, just go."
"What about you?" she replied, concerned.
Devon laughed. "There's a secret I haven't told you about, and I'm about to test it out. Just go."
Hearing the shriek of another soldier who got pierced by the demon bull's horn, the countess turned and ran back to the carriage with a look of fear on her face.
Devon just smirked. This was a perfect time to test out the limits of this joke class, [Dead man walking].
---
[author] Hmmmmmmmm, what's going to happen
Thank you sooooo much Dominick Batista for pledging <3 [/author]
Chapter 22 – Embracing Death With A Smile
Walking with the confidence of a drunken man down the hill, Devon unsheathed his longsword and approached the muscular bull demon.
He felt excitement as he approached the bull demon that spelled certain death, a kind of excitement that combined a sort of childlike wonder with heart pumping adrenaline, the kind that he hadn't felt in many, many years.
The emotion flooding into him was a refreshing break from the numbness he experienced just a while ago, and he felt ready to take on death with a whole new mindset.
"Stay back, it's too dangerous!" a mustached soldier yelled towards Devon, while clutching his bloody and battered left arm that hung limp from the side of his body.
The battlefield stunk of fresh blood and overturned dirt, and the minotaur demon just finished goring another soldier, dropping his blood corpse onto the ground with one muscular hand.
"Why demons, why now??" a short soldier screamed. "This can't be happening!"
"Demons have disappeared for thousands of years," another soldier replied, sprawled on the ground and out of breath. "But my gramps always said that they would return. Looks like he was right."
With the build of a rhinoceros and twice the size of one, the minotaur snorted into the air and turned around, locking eyes with the newcomer.
Devon's heart pounded with excitement. In his last life, he would have peed his pants already at the sight of such a monstrous minotaur, with the remains of soldiers splattered all over its body. But he felt an overwhelming amount of bravery stemming from the fact that he just didn't care all too much about bodily preservation anymore.
Bring it on, he thought, as he brandished the moonlight longsword and charged, yelling a battle cry. Devon never handled a sword in his entire life, and his footwork and stance showed it. They were the mark of a complete amateur, and the mustached soldier cringed while watching the novice run towards the minotaur demon, bracing for Devon to get splatted like a fruit fly.
The sword connected with the minotaur somehow, cutting well into the minotaur's flesh. The damage dealt was not because of the skill of the wielder, but more attributed to the quality of the blade itself.
Laughing with overconfidence at landing a damaging hit, Devon stumbled while trying to pull the sword out of the minotaur's flank.
"Huh?" he said.
The sword was completely lodged into the minotaur's muscular side. With a grunt, the minotaur picked Devon off the ground with one hand, and began squeezing.
Crack.
Devon felt his ribs give way first, and then his organs, as the minotaur's death grip ruptured his internal organs and caused him to cough blood.
[You have suffered a grievous wound.]
[As per your current contract, you cannot be killed. Please collect ten fragments of soulspire to renegotiate your contract.]
Huh. So it seemed like he could not die at all, or something along those lines.
Devon fell to the ground like a lifeless corpse as the minotaur lost interest in him and dropped him like a ragdoll, landing with a dull thud onto the dirt and grass.
"Guh..." he whined in pain.
He decided not to try this again, because the pain was mind numbing. And it was only being made worse, because he could feel his internals squelching and churning, rearranging themselves because he did not have the luxury to die here, until he collected ten of those soulspire things, whatever the hell that meant.
It looked like he'd have to stay in this world for a bit longer, as he figured out how to renegotiate his contract.
"Retreat to the carriages!" the mustached soldier bellowed. Because the captain was dead, he was next in charge. "This is a lost cause, and we need to warn the others. And don't forget, the countess's safety is our first priority!"
The remaining soldiers scrambled to retreat, as a lanky freckled soldier tried to haul one of his dying comrades onto his shoulder while running. The minotaur noticed his hesitancy to leave and charged at him, knocking both him and his injured comrade that he was carrying onto the ground.
Raising its foot, the minotaur stomped downwards, crushing the freckled soldier's head.
Devon was immobilized by pain, and could not do much except watch through his prone position, his face swollen from being dropped face first onto the ground.
Moving with difficulty, Devon shifted his hand several centimeters to the side and picked up a small pebble in his palm.
"Rise," he muttered.
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