The Leaders and the Led

by Ao Jyumonji

  At the very least, the ustrel must be wearing armor on his left arm. The ustrel’s offensive power was just as scary as the keeper of Deadhead Watching Keep, Zoran Zesh’s, had been. However, Zoran Zesh had also protected himself by wearing tough armor and a helmet. The ustrel had nowhere near that much defensive power.

  “Suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu...”

  There it was. That sound. The ustrel’s arms stretched. Kuzaku got scared and tried to back away.

  “Charge in!” Haruhiro yelled at him while rushing in himself. What had Kuzaku done? He didn’t know. He clung to the ustrel, stabbing his dagger into the ustrel’s back. “There!”

  The blade went through. But it was shallow, and—

  Suddenly the ustrel jumped. It was a vertical jump. He lifted into the air, then landed. The shock of the landing was incredible. Haruhiro couldn’t hold on.

  “Wha...!” Haruhiro shouted.

  He was thrown off. He fell. Haruhiro braced himself for the landing.

  Oh, crap, Haruhiro realized. It’s the ustrel.

  The ustrel didn’t use the naginata. He stomped on Haruhiro. On his belly, his chest—that area in general.

  Haruhiro coughed and sputtered in pain.

  “Heyyyyyyyyyy, youuuuuuuuu...!” a voice bellowed.

  Ranta. It was Ranta wreathed in his Dread Aura. He flew in, tackling the ustrel and jamming his longsword into him. The ustrel immediately knocked Ranta away, but there was a tear in the ustrel’s blackish clothing on his side.

  Haruhiro desperately tried to crawl away. From his mouth, his eyes, and his nose, he was dripping vomit, tears, snot, and who-only-knew-what other kind of fluids, but he crawled away.

  “Haru?!” It was Merry’s voice.

  Haruhiro yelled out, “Ahm fahn!” but he was anything but, and thought that, no, he didn’t look fine at all. Well, it showed he still had the composure to be able to think that, at least. Wiping his face off with one arm, he stood up.

  Kuzaku was standing in front of the ustrel, while Ranta was on the ustrel’s right hand side. Neither of them were managing to get in close. But somehow, they were managing to either avoid the ustrel’s naginata and left arm, or to Block them. Were they getting used to it? In long arms mode, the ustrel had long reach, and every one of his attacks was heavy, but he couldn’t maneuver quickly. That seemed like it was probably part of the reason.

  “If this is how it’s gonna be...!” Yume readied her bow and let loose an arrow.

  It looked like it was going to hit. It did. The left shoulder. Then she followed it up with another right after. This time, in the back.

  The ustrel looked displeased.

  “Jess, yeen, sark, fram, dart!” Shihoru slammed what was now her most powerful Falz Magic spell, Thunderstorm, into him. There was an earsplitting rumble, or rather an explosion. It was usually an area of effect spell, but the ustrel was big enough that multiple bolts of lightning struck it. Even the mighty ustrel didn’t get off with just a few convulsions after that. He spasmed wildly, before becoming still. He didn’t move. He had stopped moving.

  “Now?!” Haruhiro shouted and charged.

  Is this okay? he asked himself as he did. Is it a bad idea? I don’t know, but it’s too late to think about it now.

  Kuzaku, Ranta, Yume, and even Merry, they were all rushing towards the ustrel. They had probably all sprung into motion before Haruhiro had shouted the command. Everyone planned to settle this here. They wanted to finish this.

  But that’s not acting based on the situation—it’s more of a wish, isn’t it?

  Haruhiro felt a chill.

  This wasn’t simply intuition. He had something to back it up. On the ustrel’s face, that metallic skull, the part that was probably the mouthpiece of his helmet, slid upwards with a creak and opened.

  “Wait! Hold on! Get away from it for now!” Haruhiro screamed.

  Haruhiro started to fall back, and the ustrel began clicking its tongue.

  Chik, chik, chik, chik, chik, chik, chik, chik, chik, chik, chik, chik, chik, chik, chik, chik, chik.

  I think that’s probably him clicking his tongue, Haruhiro thought. I’ve never heard anything click its tongue so ominously before.

  Deep inside the metallic skull mask, the ustrel was gritting his yellowed teeth and clicking his tongue. He started frothing at the mouth.

  “—Uh?!” Ranta shouted, suddenly flying through the air.

  That was fast! Huh? A flying kick—it got him?! Haruhiro thought. Then the ustrel swung around his naginata using both hands, knocking Kuzaku’s shield flying.

  “Bwuh?!” Kuzaku yelped.

  “Aiee?!” Yume shrieked.

  Yume got kicked like Ranta. For some reason, the ustrel stopped still after that. It clicked its tongue, its shoulders and back heaving up and down. Haruhiro, honestly, was bewildered. Merry just stood there, too. Shihoru was the only one who didn’t.

  “Ohm, rel, e—”

  Shihoru tried to use her magic, but before she could finish the chant, the ustrel began to move again.

  The ustrel leapt up, kicking Shihoru and sending her flying. Without even managing to utter a sound, Shihoru sailed through the air like an inanimate object. Like a soft piece of trash.

  “Shi—” Haruhiro stopped, speechless.

  Why can I see that faint line of light now? What’s going on? Why is my body moving on its own? What the hell? This is bullshit.

  When Haruhiro started running to trace the line, the ustrel turned to face him.

  It’s the legs, he thought. The legs. If we watch his legs, we’ll know when he’s going to start moving.

  The ustrel raised his knee high, kicked hard off the ground, and leapt. The ustrel came flying. Haruhiro could see him. The ustrel stuck his right foot out.

  Haruhiro moved his body to the left, dodging the ustrel’s right foot. He didn’t just avoid the attack, he brought his sap down diagonally on the ustrel’s right knee. Haruhiro rolled of his own will, and when he got back up, he could no longer see the line.

  The ustrel turned to face him. It wasn’t a smooth motion. The ustrel was clearly trying to cover his right leg. That meant he’d done some damage.

  But—dammit, Haruhiro thought. I could see the line, but this is all I did? I couldn’t take it down. Though, that said, I did find a lead. The legs. It’s the legs. Watch the legs. Again. Here he comes.

  The ustrel raised his left knee high, vigorously kicking off of the ground. Given he used his left leg for the jump, it seemed unlikely that the sap attack had had much effect.

  The ustrel came flying. Haruhiro couldn’t see the line, and it was all he could do just to dodge it, but he could dodge it. Haruhiro leapt aside to the left, avoiding the ustrel’s flying kick.

  This is where it gets scary! he thought. He was right. As soon as the ustrel landed, he swung his naginata with both hands. If Haruhiro got hit, that would be the end, but if he could predict it—Haruhiro slid under the naginata, getting away.

  “Merry, how’s Shihoru?!” he called.

  There was no response.

  Haruhiro felt dizzy. This had to be a joke. No way. His brain seethed.

  I’ll kill him. This guy is dead, absolutely dead. But the fact of the matter was, Haruhiro was closer to being killed than killing the ustrel. The ustrel came flying. Haruhiro was watching the ustrel’s legs, so he knew the timing. The course, too. He could evade it. But only barely. That was the best he could manage.

  The naginata swing after a flying kick wasn’t so scary. There was a clear reason for that. The ustrel would kick off of the ground with his left foot, try to kick Haruhiro with his right, and then land on that same right foot. However, with his right knee injured, there was a slight delay before he could move on to his next action.

  My opponent isn’t a monster, Haruhiro thought. Well, the guy’s like a monster, but one that can be hurt. Swords and arrows can stab into him. He’s not invincible. It’s just that defeating him’ll be hard. That’s a proble
m, yes. A major problem. Ahh. Shihoru. Shihoru. Shihoru. I don’t have time to be thinking about Shihoru. I’ve gotta focus on the ustrel.

  “Grahhhhh!” Kuzaku rose to his feet. “Dammiiiiiiiit!”

  “Watch his legs, Kuzaku!” Haruhiro shouted as he dodged a flying kick. “If you watch his legs, you can tell when he’ll be coming!”

  “I live again!” Ranta hopped back up. “I’ll see right through your attacks!”

  Chik, chik, chik, chik, chik, chik, chik, chik, chik, chik, chik, chik, chik, chik, chik, chik, chik.

  As soon as it turned into a three-on-one fight, the ustrel gave up on using his flying kick, and the sound of his tongue clicking echoed loudly through the area. His arms contracted.

  He’s disabled his long arms mode, but what does he plan to do now? Haruhiro wondered. Whatever it is...

  “Don’t get distracted!” he shouted. “So long as we don’t take our eyes off his legs—”

  Haruhiro gulped. He’s coming. Here he comes.

  This time, the ustrel didn’t jump. The ustrel dashed. With his posture incredibly low, the point of his naginata in front of him, charging.

  I’m gonna get run over, realized Haruhiro. I won’t let you run me over.

  Twisting his body, he evaded the naginata by the breadth of a hair. But he couldn’t fully dodge. The ustrel’s body hit him somewhere, and while he wasn’t trampled, Haruhiro was sent flying.

  “Urgh!” “Whoa!” “Gah!”

  After him, Ranta and Kuzaku were knocked flying, too. Haruhiro struck his back and shoulders on the landing, but it was no big deal. The ustrel had raced around, tracing a warped circle as he mowed down the three of them, and now he stopped, his entire body heaving up and down—was he resting?

  Haruhiro sat up, looking over towards Yume. Yume was trying to nock an arrow.

  Then there was Merry. Merry was—sitting next to the collapsed Shihoru, performing a cardiac massage or something, maybe.

  “There it is!” she gasped. “The heart! O Light, may Lumiaris’s divine protection be upon you! Sacrament!”

  Sacrament? She was using the miracle of light, Sacrament?

  Shihoru! Had her heart stopped? Merry had resuscitated her from that state. Then used Sacrament. The spell that, so long as the target was still alive, would heal them instantly. She had already used it once on Ranta, so this was her second time. Her last Sacrament.

  Yume shouted “Mrrow!” and loosed an arrow, which stabbed into the ustrel’s chest.

  The ustrel slowly turned towards Yume, making that ominous chik, chik, chik, chik tongue clicking noise as he did.

  Ranta and Kuzaku both got to their feet, shouting to psyche themselves up. And then...

  “I-It’s okay! I’m fine now! S-S-Sorry!” Shihoru was up, too.

  “Don’t apologize!” Haruhiro felt like he might cry—or rather, he was already shedding tears. But he didn’t have time to wipe them away.

  Haruhiro opened his eyes wide, staring at the ustrel. I’ll watch you. I’ll see through you.

  The ustrel raised his left knee.

  “It’s a flying kick!” Haruhiro shouted. “Yume!”

  “Meow!” Yume curled into a ball like a pit rat and rolled around, making sharp turns to avoid the ustrel’s flying kick. The ustrel landed, then lowered his posture. Had he recovered from the damage to his right leg?

  “Next, it’s a charge!” Haruhiro yelled. “Watch out!”

  Even as he said it, Haruhiro wanted to shoot back at himself, Yeah, and how are we supposed to watch out?

  The ustrel started running. His targets were—Merry and Shihoru. Not good. Shihoru had just finished healing. What if something happened to her again? But he couldn’t stop the ustrel. Not Haruhiro.

  “This...!” Kuzaku jumped in the way. Standing in front of Merry and Shihoru, he was ready for a head on collision with the ustrel if need be. Of course, that was risky. Incredibly risky. Too risky, but...

  “This is why I’m a tank!”

  He was right. As he was running, Haruhiro had silently screamed, Go! at him. He hadn’t needed to say it, because Kuzaku had done it anyway. He’d blocked the ustrel’s charge with his shield.

  Then something terrifying happened. It crumpled. His shield did. Kuzaku pushed on, as if he didn’t care.

  The ustrel kept charging, too. The tip of his naginata which had pierced the shield slid up Kuzaku’s left arm and pierced through his shoulder. Kuzaku twisted his longsword into the ustrel’s flank. Kuzaku in his helmet and the ustrel with his metallic skull butted heads.

  Kuzaku didn’t come out the loser of that clash. He stood strong. Kuzaku tried to pull his longsword free. But it wouldn’t come out.

  The ustrel grabbed Kuzaku’s helmet with his left hand, swinging back his naginata with his right.

  Not that I’ll let him finish, thought Haruhiro.

  Haruhiro hadn’t just been sitting there, gnawing on his fingers in nervous anticipation as he watched. He’d been running. And now, he was here. Right next to the ustrel.

  Haruhiro said nothing. He just silently grabbed onto the ustrel, wrapping himself around the ustrel’s right arm from behind. He had put his sap away, but his dagger was in hand. With a backhand grip, he stabbed the dagger into the ustrel’s right shoulder. He stabbed and twisted, twisted and tore.

  There was a harsh screeching sound. It wasn’t a scream. No, it was the gnashing of teeth. The ustrel foamed at the mouth, grinding his teeth way too violently and flailing his right arm around. He was trying to shake Haruhiro off.

  As if I’m going to let go!

  Haruhiro had been thrown by a vertical jump last time, but with Kuzaku’s longsword sticking out of his flank, the ustrel probably couldn’t do that.

  Kuzaku let out a war cry, slamming his body into the ustrel and shaking his longsword in all directions. Unable to bear it any longer, the ustrel took his hand off Kuzaku’s helmet for a moment and punched him. His left fist clanged into Kuzaku’s helmet repeatedly.

  Kuzaku let out strange grunts—“Fugh! Gwah! Nuh!”—and it sounded like he was in a lot of pain, but he was enduring it. However, at this rate, he might not last long.

  That’s your cue, isn’t it? Haruhiro thought. Right, dread knight?

  “Leap out! Followed by—Hatred!”

  Ranta came at the ustrel from the left, slamming his longsword down on top of the metallic skull helmet—no.

  “That’s what you think I’ll do!” Ranta bellowed. “Instead, it’s Tyrant’s Drive!”

  Yeah, no, there’s no skill like that, Haruhiro thought. Did you just make it up on the spot? Well, either way, it’s not much of a skill.

  When Ranta’s sword was already swinging downwards on the diagonal, he pulled it back in closer to his hands, then swung it again almost horizontally. It wasn’t the top of the ustrel’s helmet he was targeting—it was the mouth. What was more, Ranta didn’t use the blade of his sword—he used the flat of the blade to whack the ustrel’s gnashing teeth hard.

  Grash!

  That wasn’t a voice, it was the longsword bouncing off of the ustrel’s teeth. Anyway, his teeth were unbroken. Just how tough were those things? Still, the ustrel reeled backwards.

  Perhaps thinking, This is my chance, Kuzaku pulled his longsword out of the ustrel’s side. He must have been hoping to stab it in a few more times.

  Haruhiro panicked. “You...! Are you stu—!”

  The ustrel immediately jumped.

  How can you jump that high? That doesn’t even make sense! Haruhiro wanted to protest. That was how incredible of a jump it was. Haruhiro’s body swung upwards.

  Man, the impact when we land is going to bad, he thought. He tried to prepare himself for it, but it was even worse than he imagined.

  It didn’t feel like he’d fallen off, so much as that he was being thrown upwards. His brain shook inside his skull, and he was left disoriented. Even in that state, Haruhiro didn’t let himself get shaken off. However, he might not be able to manage tha
t any longer.

  The ustrel began flailing around erratically. On top of that, he was running around all over.

  It’s no good. I can’t do this anymore, Haruhiro thought as he was finally thrown into the air.

  Will I die? he wondered for a moment. No, no, no, no. I won’t let myself die.

  It was times like this that the countless times he had experienced being thrown by Barbara-sensei came in handy. Haruhiro braced himself for the landing. As he was getting up from it, the ustrel nearly charged into him and sent him flying again, but he somehow avoided it.

  Haruhiro shouted “Get away! Get away!” as he ran. He hurt all over, but for now he needed to put some distance between the ustrel and him.

  Eventually, the ustrel stopped moving.

  There was the sound of labored breathing. The ustrel was leaning on his naginata, his shoulders heaving with each breath.

  I guess even the mighty ustrel gets tired, thought Haruhiro. No. That’s not all.

  The ustrel’s blackish garment was cut and torn, revealing the brown skin and the wounds beneath it. A viscous liquid that looked like spoiled oil poured out of those wounds. Was that the ustrel’s blood? When he looked down, Haruhiro saw that his dagger and his entire body were covered in that liquid.

  It wasn’t just exhaustion. Haruhiro and the party’s attacks were actually having an effect.

  Our formation is broken, Haruhiro thought. Technically we’re surrounding the ustrel, but that’s only a coincidence. Merry and Shihoru are the only ones who’ve stuck together, where the rest of us have split up.

  So... do we run?

  The moment that option crossed his mind, the ustrel raised his left knee. Haruhiro shouted, “It’s a flying kick! Ranta!”

  Instead of replying, Ranta used Leap Out to dodge the incoming ustrel.

  The moment the ustrel lands, he’ll face to the right, and raise his left knee—or not, Haruhiro thought. Will he lower his posture and charge, then? No. He’s not moving.

  The ustrel was wheezing, his breaths heavy and labored.

  Could it be that he’s pretty winded? Haruhiro wondered. Should we all rush him? It’s a hard call. I feel like the ustrel could show off hidden reserves of strength. We don’t have Sacrament anymore, either.