A chimera…

The monster made of many monsters. Its green flesh bubbled out as if it was boiling alive. Steam emerged from its body which was littered with many mouths and eyes.

Every time the bubble of flesh burst out, thicker, greener blood spurted to the ground.

Prince Ier was stuck in his place, his feet rooted. An average chimera was already strong, but this crazy monster in front of him…

How could it be… how did it even come here?

Ier knew better than to face it. He also didn’t want to attack it and attract attention.

He took slow breaths.

Very slow breaths.

Ier lifted his feet off the ground and stepped back. His eyes stuck on the chimera.

He stepped further and further back, into the trees.

As soon as he was ready, he turned around on his feet and was about to charge out.

When more of the green flesh and blood wriggled in from the ground. Ier stopped in his tracks. Like slimes mixing, the flesh and blood seemed to have a mind of its own as it slowly inched closer.

“Oh no…”

Ier heard loud thrums and footsteps coming from the back.

He turned around… and saw the giant chimera closer than before.

Its many eyes flitted around and strange groans left its dozens of mouths. Before one of the eyes saw him.

All the eyes stopped moving and fixated on Ier alone.

The chimera raised its bubbling arm and swung it down, straight at Ier.

***

Ier had disappeared.

It seemed he was frustrated. I thought he would be in the thicket that I had trained him in and set off to look for him.

As I left the grounds of Black Rose and toward the north of the academy, casually making my way past the streets, I saw Professor Denadis running around.

It was a good chance to ask her what had happened.

I raised my hands to call her out when something brushed against my feet.

On the ground, the photos that Lumine had clicked and received after development were crawling through the academy campus.

“What in the world…?”

I wiped my eyes and looked again, that damned green photo really was moving.

My gaze shifted away from the photos to the rest of the place. And slowly, in the distance, I noticed many similar green masses of goopy flesh and blood moving through the academy.

Professor Denadis and her lab in the north. The amount of green these last few days. The moving photos. The papers that I had checked with the three stooges. Even the report that I had read when I was sneaking through Gladwin’s office.

All of it pointed at one thing.

A chimera was on the loose.

With widened eyes, I watched as the photographs and the other masses of flesh slowly moved toward the north… toward the thicket.

“Oops…”

***

Ier dived to the ground and rolled ahead as he dodged the swing of the chimera. The trees and the ground hit by its skin evaporated into the air.

It was not just boiling, it was quite literally a moving mass of acid. The trolls’ blood in it made it regenerate, the slime’s made it coagulate, and the orc’s made it wreckful.

Ier rushed to his feet and dashed through the trees. He returned to the clearing in the middle of the thicket and jumped to grab the wooden sword.

More and more of the goop around the monster started to slather on it as it turned back toward Ier.

“Kiee…! Kieee!”

It groaned with its many mouths, its every noise echoed through the thicket.

Ier held the sword in front of him. He had to run, in some way. A single hit from that thing would kill without even letting him struggle.

The chimera suddenly stepped closer. Its speed was faster than before. It ran toward Ier and smashed the ground.

Ier could feel the heat wash up on his back as he ran away.

But the Chimera wasn’t going to let go.

It didn’t turn around. Instead, the eyes on its side saw him. The chimera’s body formed another hand and slammed it down again.

“Whoa!?” Ier kicked himself off with a burst of mana as he narrowly avoided it. Three arms had formed on the Chimera now.

Ier rushed back to go out of its range. That’s when one of the many goopy slimes that were closing in jumped at him.

Ier shuffled and dodged the slimy flesh, cutting through it with his sword.

He couldn’t run too far away, nor could he go too close.

It was terrible.

He was stuck in a limbo between the two places.

And as if the chimera had heard his thoughts and decided to have a laugh, its arms disappeared.

“Oh god… what now?”

Ier was struck by a sense of foreboding.

He raised his sword.

The chimera’s arm shot out of its body like a whip. Its range was greater than the three arms combined as it shot straight for Ier.

It swept through the ground, burned down the trees and the stones in its path, and inched closer to Ier.

“Fuck…. Fuck fuck!”

Ier dashed ahead, but it was futile. The slimes all around gathered even more and formed a wall around them.

He could only run in circles, and that too would end if he stepped on the burning soil.

Ier had to stop the whip.

From a distance, cut it off.

He raised his sword and steadied his breathing. He was about to die. He was going to die.

Unless he managed it.

He closed his eyes. Again, it was like he could hear the professor in his mind.

Ier took in a sharp breath and his mana gathered at the sword. The whip had turned again and was coming straight for him.

Thinner.

Sharper.

He remembered what the professor had said. How foolish were his mistakes?

He was to make a blade. Bringing his mana together was not enough, he had to temper it. Do not emit it, use it.

Ier’s mana smashed against itself as he flattened it closer, and closer. The white hue that used to fill his blade turned transparent as only the edge of the chipped wooden sword was covered with his mana.

Ier opened his eyes.

His mana completely disappeared.

He swung his sword down with all his strength.

A crescent of invisible mana shot out from his blade. It cut through the ground and charged straight ahead. Thin, sharp, tempered, it was the result of hours and hours of honing and learning.

The crescent gouged the soil below as it charged ahead. It met the tumbling whip…

“KRAAAAH!!”

And cut it from the center.