It was no coincidence that Vihera, Byune, and Deetz arrived at that location.
They had been advancing through the forest on horseback from the start. Deetz had predicted which direction Mirene and Yohanna would move and guided the group accordingly.
Whether it was fortune or not, his prediction proved correct—the sounds of battle reaching them as they wove between the trees on horseback confirmed it.
"It sounds like they're already in combat. I can't tell if the Cyclops found them or if they saw an opening and struck... or perhaps it's Rei and Set?"
"Nn!"
Byune let out a small sound of protest at Vihera's murmured words.
Unable to ride a horse on her own, she sat in front of Vihera, cradled against her.
At the sound of that adorable protest, Vihera let a faint smile cross her lips.
"Relax. It's not like I'm going to leave them be. Besides... I've fought Cyclops a few times before, and they're reasonably worthwhile opponents. What's good about them is that massive body and high regeneration. It means I can attack to my heart's content."
Vihera wore a smile that seemed to thirst for battle—something utterly unimaginable for a former imperial princess.
Deetz, riding behind her on horseback, was seized by a strange sensation. He wanted to see the expression on her face, yet at the same time found it frightening.
But before that feeling could surface, Vihera spoke.
"Right, I'm going ahead. Look after the horses for me."
She leaped from the running horse, still holding Byune.
Releasing the reins of the spare horse as well, Vihera landed on the ground without the slightest trouble.
Leaving Deetz scrambling to recover the riderless horse, she stroked Byune's head and spoke.
"Byune, I'm heading to where the fighting is. Support me from here, okay?"
"Nn."
Seeing Byune nod, Vihera threaded her way through the trees like a needle through cloth and pressed onward.
She emerged into what looked like a clearing.
Two Cyclops stood there.
But Vihera faintly furrowed her brow at the sight.
According to what she had heard from Deetz, there should have been five Cyclops, yet only two were before her.
Moreover, one of them had its single eye slashed open—by a longsword or a spear, she couldn't tell—and its vision sealed. It was flailing wildly at everything around it.
For a moment she thought the remaining three might have already been defeated, but no corpses lay on the ground.
The only bodies were those of horses. Not even a scrap of Cyclops flesh remained.
If Rei had been the one fighting, there was a chance they had been burned to ash by Flame Magic or Flame Emperor's Crimson Armor, but the figure her eyes landed on didn't seem capable of such a thing.
"There's a mage here, but expecting the same level of skill as Rei would be a mistake."
She muttered inwardly as she observed the mage, who was considerably older than her.
The moment you specified a mage who could perform at Rei's level, the conditions became extreme—no, extraordinarily strict.
"If so, thinking about it normally, they must have scattered the Cyclops. Cyclops are fundamentally solitary creatures, so considering that, it makes sense. In that case, I should finish off these two wounded ones quickly and then deal with the remaining three..."
Events continued to unfold before Vihera, who had been thinking this through.
A roar echoed from behind the mage.
Judging that the remaining Cyclops had arrived as well, Vihera kicked off the ground, closed in behind the Cyclops that Mirene and Yohanna were fighting, and drove her gauntleted fist toward the back of its right knee.
The strike itself was not particularly powerful.
It carried only enough force to feel like the knee being pushed from behind. But that was more than enough to break the Cyclops's balance.
As its right leg buckled against its will and it dropped its hips to the ground, Vihera touched its back and unleashed a strike charged with magic.
"Hah!"
A short kiai escaped her lips as Magic Impact Palm was released from her hand. The shockwave generated by magic was driven directly into the body, destroying vital organs including the heart.
No matter how high a Cyclops's regeneration was, having its heart and internal organs thoroughly destroyed was not something it could shrug off. It died instantly, bleeding from its eye, ears, nose, and mouth.
"Vihera-sama!?"
Startled by the Cyclops that suddenly collapsed to the ground bleeding from all over its face, Yohanna cried out upon seeing the figure standing behind it.
"You're Yohanna, aren't you? I'd love to say it's been a while, but it seems we don't have time to chat."
Vihera turned her gaze toward Surnin—more precisely, behind him—as she spoke.
Mirene and Surnin hurriedly followed her line of sight. There, five Cyclops were just emerging from the forest.
They bore minor wounds from arrows Ekril had fired, but those wounds were nearly healed. The faces of Mirene and Surnin stiffened at the sight of five Cyclops in near-pristine condition.
Yohanna, unlike the other two, showed no great anxiety. She had seen Vihera's strength with her own eyes and knew exactly what she was capable of.
Vihera, receiving Yohanna's expectant gaze, floated a melting smile that would captivate any man—and perhaps even a woman—and spoke.
"I heard there were five Cyclops... well, it doesn't matter. I'll take on the five coming this way. You handle the wounded ones over there."
With only those words, she kicked off the ground and charged toward the five Cyclops that had finally emerged from the forest.
Mirene, watching her retreating back, turned a questioning gaze toward Yohanna, who had shown signs of recognizing the woman.
Did this stranger who had appeared out of nowhere truly have the strength to handle five Cyclops alone?
Yohanna, receiving that look, nodded with absolute trust, then turned her attention toward the Cyclops still flailing wildly with its eye wounded, rather than the ones approaching from behind. That was not a concern.
The enemy they needed to defeat was that wounded Cyclops.
Of course, wounded did not mean easy. It went without saying when facing an injured C-Rank monster.
If Ekril had been here, they could have managed somehow, but the fact that their only ranged support was Surnin's magic was hardly a reassuring situation.
"Ekril, if you're safe, you should come back soon."
Mirene worried about Ekril inwardly even as she gripped the hilt of her longsword firmly.
Since the enemy couldn't see, its attack accuracy would plummet dramatically regardless of its brute strength. The only thing to watch out for was an accidental strike.
Yohanna must have reached the same conclusion. They exchanged glances and charged together toward the rampaging Cyclops.
"It looks like they'll manage over there."
Vihera glanced toward the two's retreating backs, but it was no ordinary glance. She cast the look while evading the concentrated attacks of five Cyclops.
Even a concentrated assault from five meant that only two, or at most three, could attack at once.
From time to time, a Cyclops lingering in the rear fired a magical shockwave from its single eye, but Vihera evaded every one—and even turned the Cyclops trying to attack her into living shields.
The Cyclops's massive bodies required a certain amount of space to attack, which worked in Vihera's favor and to the monsters' detriment.
"GAAaaAAaaH!"
A club swung with a roar struck the arm of another Cyclops nearby even as it was swung at Vihera.
"Gyak!"
The Cyclops struck by the club let out a scream, but naturally, no one paid it any mind.
Vihera lightly leaped backward. As she did, her thin garments fluttered, further stealing the Cyclops's attention.
This was the chief reason the five Cyclops ignored Mirene's group and focused solely on Vihera.
Under normal circumstances, there would have been no need for all five to concentrate their attacks on a single target. Since only about three could attack simultaneously, the remaining two would have been idle and could have turned toward Mirene's group.
But the dancer-like thin garments Vihera wore fluttered provocatively through the air, goading the Cyclops.
Beyond mere provocation, glimpses of soft limbs beneath those garments made Vihera nothing less than a feast dangled before the eyes of the ravenous monsters.
Desperately trying to claim that feast for themselves, they focused entirely on it and completely forgot their surroundings.
It went further than that. The Cyclops struck by a club during the earlier wild horizontal swing now brought its own club down on the one that had lost its balance after missing Vihera.
"GYAGAAH!"
The blow to the head didn't quite kill the Cyclops, but it still dealt significant damage.
At the scream from their companion, the Cyclops's gazes gathered on the source for just a moment.
"Fools, taking your eyes off me."
Those words came from right beside the Cyclops that had been struck in the head and was crouching in pain.
Vihera, who should have been far away a moment ago, was now standing right next to it, placing her hand on the chest of the writhing monster.
"Die!"
With a short cry, a strike from Magic Impact Palm was unleashed, and the next instant, the Cyclops's Flame of Life was snuffed out as blood poured from all over its face.
"Gah!?"
What had just happened was completely incomprehensible to the other Cyclops.
A being far smaller than themselves—one they had seen only as premium prey—had killed their companion with nothing more than a touch.
Had they possessed greater intelligence, they might have recognized the danger. Unfortunately, Cyclops were by no means clever monsters.
"Four left... oh?"
The moment she murmured that, a sound of cutting wind reached her ears. Simultaneously, one of the Cyclops screamed and threw away its club, clutching its eye.
"Honestly, if you're going to help, you should help out over there instead."
The other Cyclops, unable to comprehend what had happened, could only stare blankly in that direction.
"Fools."
"GYAGAAH!"
Against one of the dumbfounded Cyclops, Vihera slipped behind it, struck the back of its knee to break its balance, and destroyed its internal organs including its heart with Magic Impact Palm from behind.
If she had simply attacked normally, she would not have been able to target the heart with Magic Impact Palm. That was why she needed to force it to place at least one knee on the ground, just as she had with the first one.
Having felled the second Cyclops, Vihera created distance from the remaining three.
With two companions killed in the blink of an eye, the Cyclops must have developed strong wariness toward her. Rather than the eyes of a creature pursuing food, they now directed the gaze of one viewing an enemy at her.
"Byune, I don't need your support. If anything, I'd like to fight them head-on."
Vihera spoke without taking her eyes off the Cyclops.
There was no audible response, but it was easy to imagine that attacks on the Cyclops would cease.
A long, thin needle was an ideal weapon for Byune, who was also a bandit. Especially in a forest battle like this, it was her domain—her small stature allowed her to hide in all manner of places.
Even facing five Cyclops, while she might not be able to kill them, she could at least pin them down.
It proved that the words Rei had spoken were true.
"Come. You want to eat me, don't you? Then show me your full power!"
Triggered by Vihera's words, the two Cyclops whose eyes had not been wounded by Byune's needle simultaneously charged at her.
The fact that two had died, one had lost its sight, and the remaining two had attacked simultaneously without striking any of their companions probably played a part as well.
"GAAAAAAaaaaAAAH!"
"GAaaaAaaaH!"
"GYAAAaH!"
The two roared as they each swung down the clubs in their hands toward her. The scream of the Cyclops clutching its eye also echoed through the air, but there was no one to hear it.
From the right diagonal front and the left diagonal front.
Facing opponents attacking simultaneously from two directions, what appeared on Vihera's face was joy.
If anyone had seen those moist eyes at that moment, they would have been spellbound as if their very soul had been stolen, whether they were man or woman.
Wearing that expression, Vihera kicked off the ground and closed the distance to the Cyclops.