"Tired. ...Still, there were a lot of them this time."
Muttering to himself, Rei flicked the Dragonias blood from Death Scythe's blade and the Twilight Spear's tip.
Surrounding him were close to thirty Dragonias corpses—corpses upon corpses upon corpses.
Saying the ground was no longer visible beneath the Dragonias Rei had slain in the grove would have been an exaggeration, but only a slight one.
If the Dragonias had been coordinated by a gold, silver, or copper commander, defeating them would have likely taken far longer. Not because coordination made them harder to fight per se, but simply because Rei would have needed to avoid destroying the grove's trees. That meant no Death Scythe—only the Twilight Spear—which was the real reason it would have taken more time.
"Still, will these corpses windage by tomorrow? If not, we'll need to gather and burn them here."
If the spirit egg had still been buried underground, Rei probably would not have been so concerned about the corpses. After all—and he qualified this with a 'probably'—the Dragonias corpses in the grove, and perhaps elsewhere, had been rapidly windaged by the spirit egg's power.
But now the egg had been excavated.
Given that, whether the corpses would windage by the next day as they had before was an open question.
If they had not windaged by tomorrow, they would need to gather as many Dragonias corpses as possible from across the grove and burn them before they rotted.
Rei thought this, though he could not help but feel that collecting the ones Vihera had brought down would be a hassle. The Dragonias Rei had fought had been advancing while snapping through trees, leaving their corpses relatively concentrated. But knowing Vihera's fighting style, she would have been darting all over the grove, meaning her kills could be scattered anywhere. Gathering them one by one would honestly be quite a chore.
If this were a grassland, collecting the corpses would not have been much trouble. But this grove was dense with trees. The trees would get in the way, and even the Centaurs—who had the most numbers—would struggle to gather the dead.
(It would be nice if we could do something with Anastasia's Spirit Magic... but that's probably asking too much.)
During the excavation, Rei had asked Anastasia whether she could help using Spirit Magic. She had told him the spirit power was so dense that using Spirit Magic carelessly here was dangerous—if she forced it, there was no telling what might happen.
The excavation was finished now, but even so, whether it was safe to use Spirit Magic in this grove... Rei could not bring himself to ask so casually.
(Well, it wouldn't hurt to at least ask, right? ...But she's completely focused on the spirit egg right now. I really can't afford to distract her. Yeah, if the corpses haven't windaged by tomorrow, I'll just have the Centaurs do their best.)
Deciding that with no concern whatsoever for how hard tomorrow would be for the Centaurs, Rei moved on to search for Vihera.
Trusting that her skill would keep her from being on the back foot against Dragonias, he showed no hint of worry as he looked. Though that assumed they were ordinary Dragonias; if a commander-class had been among them, she might have been struggling.
After all, the mottled Dragonias could unleash a blood laser—a special ranged attack. Taking such a hit in their current situation would be troublesome, especially for Vihera, who relied entirely on close combat and had no ranged options.
(Well, in this grove, even a blood laser has plenty of cover to hide behind.)
The blood laser was strictly a straight-line attack. As long as it could not curve midair, a tree-dense grove was actually a difficult battlefield for a mottled Dragonias.
...Granted, the assumption that all mottled Dragonias used blood lasers was based solely on the one Rei had fought. Just as some silver-scaled Dragonias were better suited to combat than others, it would not be strange for different mottled individuals to have different attack methods.
"Oh, Rei."
As he wound through the trees, that voice suddenly reached him. Turning toward it, he found Vihera standing over a silver-scaled Dragonias corpse, wearing a satisfied expression.
"Was that silver-scaled one leading this group?"
"If there's no other specimen of this caliber, then probably so."
She sounded satisfied, yet disappointed that no other enemies of comparable strength remained.
"Before, I could've judged based on whether the Dragonias went berserk when another commander was present... but this time they were snapping trees from the start, so that kind of read is hard to make."
"True. Still, from what I can see, it doesn't look like there's anyone else like that."
Vihera surveyed the surroundings with visible regret.
Just like where Rei had fought, many of the nearby trees were broken. The ground was littered not only with shattered timber but also with numerous corpses of the ordinary Dragonias the silver-scaled one had led. It was a scene much like where Rei had been fighting, with one key difference: most of the corpses bore no external wounds.
Vihera's signature skill, Magic Impact Palm, delivered shock directly to an enemy's interior via mana. As a result, many of the dead showed no outward injury at all.
Some corpses, however, had been slashed by claws or had their joints broken, bones protruding through torn flesh and skin. Rei understood immediately what had caused these.
The magic claws extending from Vihera's Hand Gauntlets, and her joint-lock techniques.
Dragonias scales were extremely hard—Centaurs' spears and longswords could not cut through them. But Vihera's magic claws sliced through them with ease. And no matter how sturdy the scales, they did not protect the joints.
...In a sense, for someone like Vihera who excelled at joint locks and throws, Dragonias were opponents perfectly suited to her fighting style.
"I figured, knowing you, you'd have been moving all over while fighting and left corpses scattered everywhere, but that wasn't the case."
"Honestly... what exactly does Rei think I am? There was no need for that, so I didn't bother."
That was practically saying she would have done exactly that if necessary, but she did not seem particularly bothered. In fact, Rei would have done the same in her position, so he had no intention of pressing the point.
"For now, am I right to assume all the Dragonias that attacked you are dealt with?"
"Yes. Under normal circumstances, Dragonias don't run away."
The 'normal circumstances' here meant Dragonias that were not commanders—those driven by hunger. Highly intelligent Dragonias, by contrast, would not hesitate to judge themselves outmatched and flee. The presumed copper-scaled Dragonias had done exactly that, attacking the settlement once before retreating.
"Then I guess we're done here. Let's head to the settlement. Given that the silver-scaled Dragonias was here, even if some headed for the settlement, they'd only be ordinary ones. Nothing to worry about."
Set was there, and a few others had enough skill to fight Dragonias alone. Moreover, this battle was also to protect Anastasia, who was concentrating on the spirit egg. Naturally, Damran and his comrades, who held strong gratitude toward Anastasia and Fana, would fight with lion-like ferocity—or so Rei predicted.
That was precisely why he could talk this casually with Vihera.
"Right. Shall we, then? ...What do you think it's like at the settlement?"
"I'd say it's safe to assume almost no damage. The combat power we left behind was more than sufficient."
Exchanging those words, Rei and Vihera made their way through the grove. Naturally, there were no enemies in sight—all the Dragonias in the grove had been dealt with.
Before long, the settlement came into view. No sounds of battle reached them, so it was immediately clear that either the fighting had ended without issue, or no battle had occurred at all.
"Which do you think?"
"Hmm. Considering the silver-scaled Dragonias came my way, I'd say there was no battle."
Rei had asked offhandedly, but Vihera understood immediately and answered without hesitation. Hearing that, Rei was convinced as well. Given the situation, he certainly could not say her assessment was wrong.
And when they actually arrived at the settlement, they found Anastasia concentrating on moving the spirit egg, guarded by Damran and many other Centaurs. The non-combatants were standing by at a distance.
"Looks like Vihera was right. ...Hey! It's over!"
Calling out to the settlement, which bore no trace of combat, Rei waved.
As if they had heard him, the Centaurs—who had been tense and ready to spring into action at any moment—let their shoulders drop.
"Grrrrrl!"
Seeing Rei return, Set purred happily. From Set's perspective, he had never doubted that Rei or Vihera would lose to the Dragonias, so that happy rumble was not a celebration of victory but simply joy that Rei had come back earlier than expected.
Set bounded toward him, tail wagging. Given that he was over three meters long, his weight was normally far too much for anyone to catch head-on. But fortunately, Rei was not what one would call ordinary. He caught the charging Set and stroked his head.
"Grrrl!"
Calming the happily purring Set, Rei surveyed the settlement once more. He could not see everything from where he stood, but he felt confident that if anything was wrong, someone would tell him.
Then he caught Zai's eye. Zai gave a small nod confirming no problems, and Rei finally felt relieved.
(Now, if we can just do something about the spirit egg before the next Dragonias come...)
His time at this settlement had been short, but they had already been attacked multiple times. Those attacks, however, had generally not come one right after another. That was why, having repelled this one, they should have been able to rest a little easier. But that was only true up until the spirit egg was excavated.
The moment the egg was unearthed, the Dragonias—who had never once damaged the grove's trees before—began snapping them apart as if their restraint had been a lie. Expecting them to behave as they had before would be nothing but wishful thinking.
Be that as it may, as long as they could not predict how the Dragonias would act, the only thing Rei and his companions could do was protect the spirit egg from them.