Tamed Monster - Chapter 81

Clang!

Screech—!

Splatter, squelch.

The sharp clash of weapons, the messy sounds of flesh being gouged and mud splashing—each noise struck Sylvia’s eardrums like a blow.

The sounds of their fight were growing more distinct.

‘I can hear even their breathing… Am I imagining things?’

It didn’t make sense. How could she hear them panting from this distance? She was just an ordinary human. Maybe an animal with keen hearing could pick up such distant sounds, but for someone with nothing more than average human senses, it was impossible.

The monsters stood exactly where they’d stopped earlier, not taking a single step closer, silently observing the fight.

Because of the thick fog, Sylvia hadn’t really seen what they looked like until now. On a whim, she narrowed her eyes and looked back.

The monsters standing far behind—the ones even farther from her than the head monster and her husband—should have been impossible to make out, no matter how much she strained her eyes.

But strangely, their shapes were becoming clearer.

Its blunt fangs protruding from its maw, huge eyes slashed across its face, a nose heavily wrinkled. Its eyeballs shimmered with both violet and blue hues, the whites and irises blending together in a corpse-like pallor.

‘What is going on?’

Since setting foot in the swamp, nothing made sense—almost as if she’d been under a spell. It had been odd from the start: forming a subjugation party with only a dozen people, entering the monsters’ territory without a strategy, wandering exposed along open paths, being ambushed… all of it was strange.

Why did the monsters only attack when it suited her husband’s situation?

Could monsters really be this considerate? In the beginning, when Sylvia and the group had moved together, the monsters had attacked fiercely.

But after all the knights and servants were gone, the attacks had become more like half-hearted skirmishes, only about five or six times at most. If she wanted to read too much into it, that’s how it looked.

Furthermore, Sylvia and Lancart only have one weapon. And, even more bizarre, throughout the past two days, while she and Lancart had mated—none of the monsters had ever come close to them. If they came in droves, they could have killed them instantly.

….Not a single monster had brushed past their surroundings. That was just… far too odd.

Splatter—!

She heard the unmistakable sound of blood splashing. Unless someone had lost a huge chunk of flesh, blood wouldn’t have sprayed so loudly.

Turning her gaze back to the fight, Sylvia stifled a silent scream, pressing her hands over her mouth.

“……!”

It was her husband, not the monster, whose flesh had been torn and blood spilled.

With a click of his tongue, he gripped his wounded right arm tightly with his left hand to stop the bleeding.

[Well, isn’t that a sight.]

Hector taunted him, and, as usual, Lancart couldn’t respond in the monster’s language.

“Damn bastard.”

Kuinan muttered, having learned to pretend he was talking to himself rather than answer directly. He was constantly nagging at Hector.

When Hector barked something in his incomprehensible tongue, Sylvia tried to seize the opportunity to run to her husband, but both he and Hector growled at her, making her freeze on the spot.

“Don’t interfere.”

[Don’t interfere.]

The warnings came at once. Sylvia could only understand Kuinan’s imperial tongue; Hector had never uttered a word she could recognize as language. Sylvia’s gaze lingered on the dagger in Kuinan’s grip.

Did it still have enough power to kill a monster?

It had already been used to slay more than five monsters by force—would it even be able to pierce a creature this big and strong? Worry gnawed at her as her gaze drifted to the scattered weapons around the monsters.

She had no idea how the weapons they’d brought had ended up stuck upside-down in the mud like bamboo shoots. But if she could just get her hands on even one of those, their odds of survival might double.

If she joined the fight and struck the monster by surprise, maybe—just maybe—they could at least wound it enough to escape.