25. Staggered or not (3)

The Knight of No Man’s Land, Clint Newman, was watching a group of Hexpeds lying around as corpses. In its midst, brandishing a sword and spreading death like a plague, was a knight of the Order of the Ravens whom he despised.

The Knight of the Raven Knights drew the sword from Hexped’s crown. Blood flowed out with the sound of the wind blowing and draining. The wind that blows mixes with the bloody smell and spreads it out. The knight approached with the smell of blood. Riding the sword body, the monster’s blood falls to the ground.

“Are you still going to talk?”

is it sarcastic? No, no. Clint Newman looked at Maxim and thought.

Before leaving the investigation, he received a word from the Marquis. He meant to keep an eye out for a guy who didn’t fit in with the Raven Knights. Clint immediately knew who the object was pointing to.

At first, I was just going to let it slowly stir up anger on the sidelines and let it self-destruct. You can’t hold back your anger and attack. However, Maxim did not show any emotion, let alone get angry. I just look at myself through the eyes of indifference.

Clint’s doubt soon turned into irritation.

Did this man throw away his last remaining pride with his body as a knight?

When he had been roaming the periphery to the bone for 15 years and fighting monsters to the point of exhaustion, did the central government raise these things as knights?

And now, Clint has had to deny all of his assumptions.

The momentum of the knight named Maxim Appart standing in front of him, that sword.

For the first time since Clint’s time in No Man’s Land, he couldn’t help but think that the Marquis’ judgment was wrong.

—

Maxim retrieved the sword from its scabbard and looked in the direction where the Hexpeds were pouring down. Wielding the knife with unnecessary emotions, I felt uncomfortable. Clint and the troops were searching through the pile of corpses, cross-checking the Hexfed’s path and their usual characteristics in their heads.

There was no sarcasm that Maxim showed at first. Now, as knights of the no-man’s-land, their minds were focused only on finding clues to the anomaly.

“Did I originally say that this happens much more often than it does now?”

Maxim asked Clint. Clint rummaged through Hexped’s dismembered body.

“At least 10 times a day, at most 20 times, these guys reached the walls of the castle.”

With a fluff, Hexped’s lower body fell to the floor. Clint narrowed his forehead and pushed the debris away with his foot.

“The fact that you cut them neatly into pieces made it much easier to check the clues. Thank you.”

Maxim neatly ignored Clint’s words of subtly praising him.

“What do you get out of looking into it?”

Clint stabbed the corpse with the sheathed sword.

“The monsters that inhabit the no-man’s land are usually always injured, no matter how big or small. Bitten somewhere, scratched by claws, and cuts while fighting another monster to the death.”

Clint raised his knife and pointed it over the hill.

“What do you think the monsters that live under the cliff at the end will eat? In that demonic realm where not a single insect or even a single moss grows.”

Maxim looked at Clint, who wrinkled his forehead.

“The only way for them to survive is to catch and eat each other. It eats the flesh of other monsters and greedily drinks its blood. No matter how powerful a monster is, there are no exceptions. For those monsters, the natural instinct to not fight the strong has been castrated. If you don’t eat the flesh fluttering in front of your eyes, you’ll die anyway.”

but,

Clint added, and with a swish, turned over Hexped’s corpse.

“These guys are clean. No matter how young and young the individuals are, it is rare to have such a fine body in the no man’s land. There…”

Clint stabbed Hexped in the belly. The thick leather was crushed and blood poured out from the cut surface.

“These guys are almost starving. There was a reason why I ran so ferociously without looking back. In other words, there was no monster to eat. If there had been a little longer, they would have eaten each other.”

“So what is the conclusion?”

Asked by Maxim, Clint scratched his head in embarrassment and then pointed to the hill again.

“It’s clear that something is happening under the cliff at the end. I don’t think the number of monsters has decreased… but I guess I’ll be able to find out the details when I get closer to the cliff at the end.”

Maxim thought about the process of Hexped’s movement again in his head.

“Did they go in groups like this? I’ve never met Hexped before.”

At Maxim’s words, Clint opened his mouth stupidly as if he was at a loss for words again.

“Why?”

“No… I met a bunch of monsters I’d never encountered before, but they slaughtered them so easily? And without an Aura Blade?”

Maxim shrugged casually.

“Why?”

“…no, nothing.”

Clint shook his head excitedly. He realized again that his judgment of Maxim was very wrong.

“Yes, was it the story of Hexped? Actually, it is meaningless to discuss the ecology of monsters living in the no-man’s-land. They are so different that I wonder if someone twisted them on purpose.”

“What about other regions?”

Clint scratched his chin in reply.

“These guys don’t do anything like a group life. It is usually found in flooded areas, but I know that it hunts alone and lives alone. It is only when it is breeding season that it is with its own kind.”

Maxim frowned.

“Anyway, there’s no point in continuing to look at this corpse here.”

“yes. We’d better go to the cliff first.”

Maxim and the others followed Clint’s guidance to the cliff at the end.

—

“It’s been a while since I went directly to the cliff at the end.”

The knight who followed Theodora said. Theodora was looking down at the corpse of the basilisk she had just defeated. During the investigation, the monsters came out as if to greet the party. Theodora took the lead and cut down the sporadic monsters. It felt quite different from the monsters she dealt with in the north.

The monsters living in the mountains of Kips in the north were ferocious. The monsters who had finished adapting to the harsh and cold northern environment had to use their strength to deal with even regular knights.

The monsters in the no man’s land were not as strong as the monsters in Kips. However, the monsters he faced in the no-man’s land were crazy. In those eyes, I couldn’t even see reason or even a fragment of consciousness. That made it difficult to deal with these monsters.

The avoidance of pain and the fear of bodily loss, which should exist in living things, did not exist. Like a lizard’s tail, they wouldn’t grow back, but they were willing to give up their limbs if they could get out.

“Isn’t it very different from the monsters you dealt with in the north?”

Theodora shook her sword and brushed away the blood.

“…it was definitely different. Should I say there is no discernment?”

“I am not afraid.”

It was as the article said. Among the monsters in Kips, there were monsters that felt threatened by Theodora’s energy and ran away, but there were no such monsters to be seen here. However, there were many corners where it was difficult to simply evaluate their actions as fearless. Theodora frowned at the rolling basilisk’s head.

“I think it’s a little different from fear…”

“Yeah?”

the article asked.

“It seemed too urgent to be fearless. It’s like you don’t have time to worry about anything else…”

Theodora turned her head toward the cliff. Traces of the basilisk crawled along the ground.

“…as if running away from something.”

The knight who listened to Theodora’s words burst into laughter.

“Ah, Sir Theodora, there is no such thing. Do you know how hungry these monsters are for life and how much they have lost their fear? This no-man’s land is where Devil Bat, considered a mere low-level monster, rushes in to devour Fenrir’s flesh.”

The knight confidently declared that there would be no such thing. In that tone, I felt the unique confidence of a person who has worked in this wasteland for a long time. However, Theodora did not immediately believe the words of the knight who tried to reassure herself and the investigators.

“First of all, it is not too late to make a decision after investigating the cliff at the end. Didn’t you say that the current anomaly is unprecedented?”

The knight groaned at Deodora’s words, spat out a saliva, and nodded.

“I understand for now. We will hurry and head towards the cliff at the end.”

And Theodora was able to understand why the cliff at the end was called the cliff at the end when he reached it.

“This is…”

Theodora stared at the broken ground. The grey-white earth disappeared, drawing a false horizon. It was the sky that appeared in front of the field where the land could not be seen anymore. It was as if blue paint had been accidentally poured onto a picture of the earth as if the world had perished. The members of the Knights of the Ravens, who had reached the land at the end of the first scene, exclaimed and sighed at the scene where the sky and the ground seemed to be separated.

“It is the cliff of the end.”

The knight next to Theodora said in a tense voice. Theodora hardened her expression on the madness between her eyes that she could feel directly on her skin.

“Monsters are constantly appearing and disappearing from beyond.”

Theodora walked to the edge of the cliff.

“It’s dangerous, don’t get too close.”

The knight followed Theodora and said. where the ground is broken. Theodora lowered her head following the monster’s clamor that she could still hear.

There were many monsters.

At the bottom of the cliff, the corpses of monsters were piled up like an embankment. A monster trying to devour a monster’s corpse, a monster trying to hunt that monster, and even a monster struggling to climb a cliff.

“Originally, it is much more than that. Fifteen years ago, new monsters would climb up the slope created by piled up monster corpses underneath.”

The article said so.

“…but looking down at this cliff now, I can certainly see what Sir Theodora was talking about.”

The cliff was being cut away. The monsters were trying to climb the cliff, driving their teeth and claws into the wall. It even looked rather desperate.

“If I hadn’t checked the cliff at the end, I would have been in big trouble.”

The monsters seen through the eyes of the knight seemed to be fearful.

But from what?

What on earth made those demons fearful? The knight clenched his fists in response to the question that came to his mind. The silence of the no-man’s land pierced their brains terrifyingly.

—

“Sh*t pal.”

Those were the words of Maxim. Clint, who was listening to the sound from the side, frowned.

“Your words are vulgar.”

“At a time like this, let’s use some vulgar language.”

Maxim and Clint, who were investigating the cliff at the end, were surrounded by numerous monsters. New monsters climbed up behind the cliff, and the monsters that succeeded in climbing the cliff were threatening Maxim and Clint’s party.

Maxim sighed as he drew his sword.

“In the first place, the fort didn’t come over much.”

“That’s true, but isn’t that not the case at all?”

Clint also drew his sword as if in response. There was no doubt about Maxim’s ability. But will he be able to stay that way even under these circumstances? As the contempt fades away, other suspicions arise.

“Take the front.”

Clint snorted. At the same time, he faced the monsters who climbed the cliff. Maxim straightened his sword and let out a sigh.

If you get visibly hurt, you’ll hear another one. I think.