"Grrrrrr!"
With that cry, Set swung its front leg and shattered a Dragonias's skull.
Rei had separated from Set in midair and positioned himself in front of the Two-Headed Goat, which was still running.
Naturally, the Two-Headed Goat noticed Rei's presence and, judging him as an enemy—or rather, as someone who would obstruct it—opened its mouths.
Knowing what that meant from having watched it fight the Dragonias, Rei immediately leapt away.
The next moment, a Breath of Wind Blades tore through the space he had just vacated.
"Wind!?"
A voice of sheer surprise slipped from Rei's mouth as he dodged.
What he had seen earlier was the creature unleashing an Ice Pillar Breath against the Dragonias. Given that, he had assumed this Breath would also fire ice pillars—but what erupted this time was Wind Breath.
More precisely, a Breath carrying Wind Blades within it.
He had evaded, but even so, words other than astonishment refused to come.
However, kicking off the ground, Rei looked at the Two-Headed Goat and understood.
The mouth currently open and aimed at him was the left head.
The one that had fired the Ice Pillar Breath at the Dragonias earlier was the right head.
In other words, the Breath each head unleashed was likely fixed.
(Or... is it possible it can choose which Breath to fire?)
Even as that thought crossed his mind, Rei kicked off the ground and closed the distance to the Two-Headed Goat.
It was stronger than a Dragonias, but if he had wanted to kill it, Rei could have done so easily enough.
But his goal this time wasn't to kill the Two-Headed Goat—it was to capture it.
Given that, attacking with Death Scythe or the Twilight Spear was out of the question.
All he could do in this situation was subdue it without causing injury.
Cutting off one of its heads would work, wouldn't it? The thought flashed through his mind for a moment, but since it was a Two-Headed Goat, doing so would undoubtedly inflict massive damage.
Which meant Rei had to manage this bare-handed.
He cast his gaze toward the Dragonias and saw Set unilaterally trampling them.
Judging that the Dragonias situation could be left to Set for now, Rei focused on dealing with the Two-Headed Goat in front of him.
Without drawing a weapon, Rei walked toward it.
At his casual approach, the Two-Headed Goat that had unleashed the Wind Blade Breath showed visible bewilderment.
It had fully expected him to come at it with an attack, but instead he was simply walking closer, doing nothing at all.
It would have been unreasonable to expect it not to find that suspicious.
"Veh..."
As he approached the Two-Headed Goat, which was giving off that wary cry, Rei found himself puzzled.
(If it's a goat, wouldn't its cry normally be something like "Meh"? ...Is this because it's a Two-Headed Goat? Or do goats living in this grassland just make this kind of sound...? No, the goats in Zai's settlement had perfectly normal goat cries.)
While approaching, Rei idly wondered about the difference between goat and sheep cries.
Zai's settlement had both goats and sheep, but from what Rei had heard, both made a "Meh" sound.
Thinking such thoughts as he drew closer, the moment he was about three meters away, an Ice Pillar Breath erupted from the Two-Headed Goat's mouth.
Even so, the ice pillars didn't strike Rei—they embedded themselves in the ground a short distance from him. That likely meant the Two-Headed Goat hadn't been trying to seriously attack him.
Considering it had killed a fair number of Dragonias, Rei had wondered whether it might be more aggressive.
But judging from the current situation, it at least didn't seem to possess the kind of ferocity that would make it attack Rei without provocation.
(If I can somehow keep it from getting worked up... all that's left is to bring it back to Zai's settlement.)
From Rei's perspective, this Two-Headed Goat was intelligent.
That it didn't immediately attack, choosing instead to merely issue a warning, was proof enough of that.
Given that, Rei wanted to bring the Two-Headed Goat to Zai's settlement and use it as Combat Power if possible.
And if things worked out well, they might even be able to raise it as livestock.
That said, getting any closer would likely earn him a real attack rather than a warning.
Rei wondered what to do... and right at that moment, Set moved around behind the Two-Headed Goat.
What happened to the Dragonias? The thought made him glance away from the Two-Headed Goat—and he saw that every Dragonias that had been fighting Set behind them was already dead. And then—
"Gruu."
A violent flinch.
The instant it heard Set's cry, the Two-Headed Goat stopped moving entirely, as if its wariness toward Rei had evaporated in a heartbeat.
Whatever was behind it—it recognized that it was an opponent it could never defeat, no matter what it did.
And so it understood: if it made any move here, it would die.
Making that judgment, the Two-Headed Goat went completely still.
After observing the dynamic between Set and the Two-Headed Goat, Rei sprang into action.
That said, capturing the creature wasn't going to be easy.
Wouldn't it be better to rely on Set? He thought so and turned his gaze toward it.
Set, receiving Rei's look, seemed to understand what was wanted from that alone and began approaching the Two-Headed Goat.
"Grrrr..."
"Veeeh..."
When Set growled low behind the Two-Headed Goat, the goat responded immediately.
The voice that came out was a timid, cringing sound—hard to believe it had come from the same creature that had slain several Dragonias while fleeing.
That was how vast the gap in power was between the Two-Headed Goat and Set.
At least, that was how it looked from Rei's perspective.
...Regardless, there was no mistaking that the Two-Headed Goat had stopped moving. If he acted now, he could bring it all the way to Zai's settlement.
Making that judgment, Rei closed the distance and gently reached out his hand.
Contrary to its vicious offensive power, the fur growing on the Two-Headed Goat's body was remarkably soft.
It felt closer to sheep's wool than goat hair, or so it seemed to Rei.
"Veeeh... Veh, Veeeeh..."
Whether because Rei was touching it or not, the Two-Headed Goat's cries grew even quieter.
As if it genuinely believed it would die if things kept going like this.
"Calm down. I'm not going to hurt you. If anything, I'm taking you somewhere safe."
Rei spoke to it, but of course the Two-Headed Goat couldn't possibly understand his words.
...That said, whether it grasped that Rei, who was touching its body, had no intention of harming it, as he stroked it, the creature gradually began to settle down.
Communicating one's intentions through action, even without a shared language.
Is this a kind of body language too? Rei mused as he continued stroking the Two-Headed Goat... and finally, the creature showed every sign of being completely calm.
"Veh..."
The Two-Headed Goat turned both heads toward Rei and let out a cry.
Watching it, he noticed that its eyes had surprisingly round pupils.
Looking at those eyes alone, it was hard to believe this creature had been fighting Dragonias.
Of course, Set had round pupils too, and Set had taken countless Dragonias lives.
"...Want something to eat?"
He had no idea what an ordinary goat ate.
But he knew they were herbivores, so for now Rei pulled some fruit from his Misty Ring.
There was some lingering doubt about whether it was okay to give fruit to a goat—and not just any fruit, but one from the other world of Elgin—but the Two-Headed Goat in front of him clearly wasn't an ordinary goat.
So he figured it would probably be fine eating Elgin's fruit.
He had no particular basis for that assumption; it was pure intuition on his part, but...
"Veh? ...Veeeeeveh!"
Perhaps because it had never seen the fruit before.
Both heads of the Two-Headed Goat sniffed the fruit Rei held out, but judging from the sweet-and-sour scent drifting from it, they apparently concluded it wasn't poisonous.
The right head nibbled on the fruit in Rei's hand... and the next moment, let out a loud cry.
Startled, Rei immediately stopped Set with a glance before it could move.
From Set's perspective, the Two-Headed Goat had suddenly let out a loud cry right after eating the fruit Rei gave it—telling it not to react on instinct would have been unreasonable.
...Still, fortunately—truly fortunately—since Rei had stopped it, Set showed no further signs of moving.
"Looks like it was a hit."
"Veeeh."
The head that hadn't eaten the fruit cried out as if responding to Rei's words.
(I wonder... what's going on with its sense of taste?)
A sudden question popped into his mind.
With two heads, were their senses of taste separate, or did they share one?
Normally, since taste was perceived through the tongue, the flavor one head tasted shouldn't be transmitted to the other.
But in a fantasy world where magic and monsters existed, there were no absolutes.
For some reason, that detail nagged at Rei, but the Two-Headed Goat, having finished the fruit, seemed to have completely discarded its wariness toward him—it was no longer making any growling sounds.
...Of course, the reason it had gone quiet might also have had something to do with its fear of Set behind it.
"Anyway, with that settled, all that's left is to bring it to the settlement. ...The real question is whether we can actually get there in one piece, but... let's trust it'll work out."
Rei muttered as if convincing himself, but in truth, his anxiety was considerable.
After all, both he and Set were somewhat directionally challenged.
What's more, they had gotten here by riding Set and flying through the air—not by walking from the settlement.
And the fatal issue was that the grasslands had no roads or highways, and even packed trails were hidden beneath the growing grass, impossible to find.
"Grru?"
Seeing Rei looking lost, Set gazed at the Dragonias pack's corpses and purred.
Are you going to store them in the Misty Ring? — that was what it seemed to be asking.
Rei nodded at Set and began storing the Dragonias corpses for now.
In this world aside, in Elgin, Dragonias corpses would become unusable within a day or so, but he still thought they might be good for something.
He wondered whether it was okay to also take the Dragonias corpses the Two-Headed Goat had killed, but figured that if it became an issue, he could just offer it another fruit later—and continued storing the corpses. The task, however, proved quite laborious.
The Dragonias corpses Set had killed were gathered in roughly one area and easy enough to store, but the ones the Two-Headed Goat had slain while fleeing were naturally scattered all along its escape route.
And the Two-Headed Goat had covered considerable distance... so those had to be recovered as well.
Rei considered asking Set for help, but the Two-Headed Goat was only staying calm because Set was present.
In other words, Set couldn't be spared to help.
The one stroke of luck was that, due to their size, the Dragonias corpses weren't concealed by the grass.
Thanks to that, at least he didn't have to worry about overlooking any.
In the end, it took about an hour to store all the Dragonias corpses.
...In reality, since he had no way of knowing where the Two-Headed Goat had first started fighting the Dragonias, there was a possibility that more corpses lay elsewhere—in places Rei simply couldn't find—but searching for ones that might not even exist was something Rei had absolutely no desire to do.
"Alright, then... time to head back."
"Grrrrr."
"Veh..."
At Rei's words upon returning, Set and the Two-Headed Goat raised their voices in unison.
Whether they had bonded somewhat while he was away, the Two-Headed Goat seemed to Rei to have somewhat less fear toward Set than before.
Maybe this was what they meant by the ground firming after rain? Rei mused, as he set off toward Zai's settlement with Set and the Two-Headed Goat in tow.