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I closed my open mouth.

I calmly caught my right hand with my tail just before it was pulled down by gravity and hit the ground, held it with my left hand, and pressed it hard against the severed surface where blood was spurting out.

I kept my gaze fixed on the pretty-boy who had ambushed me, stayed silent through the whole sequence, and then let go of the hand that had been holding my right hand in place.

“Monster…!”

To an onlooker, my right hand looked like it was reattached.

But it still did not move.

Having been shown that terrifying regenerative power—even if it was just for show—the spirit-sword wielder muttered bitterly and glared at me.

(It was a surprisingly normal reaction. Well, getting your hand cut off would make anyone scream once or twice, but if I silently stuck it back on, of course they’d be shocked. Still… even in that state, I could forcibly hold back my voice and move on my own will…)

Even I was surprised by how calmly I could move.

For now, my right hand was only “stuck on,” and since it gave no response when I tried to move it, I wanted to use a potion as soon as possible.

But before that, I needed to deal with them.

(I underestimated their fighting strength a little too much. I need to reflect on that.)

The only thing I truly needed to watch was the spirit sword.

And this was the result—but I never expected them to launch an ambush straight at me from the front.

At the tactical level, I had to admit it was a complete defeat.

(But in other words, they also missed their biggest chance.)

They must have planned for what would happen if they failed.

Let’s see how they intended to fight me.

“GRAAAAHHH!”

I raised my voice in an intimidating roar, stepped forward hard, and drew back my left hand.

The spirit-sword wielder reacted—yet I had no intention of charging in honestly from the front.

Their weapon could cut me.

Then the best option was never entering its range.

I kicked up the ground as if gouging it out, blasting a huge spray of dirt and stones.

Because his attention had been drawn to my raised hand, his delayed reaction led to him taking the dirt and gravel head-on.

With his vision blocked and his movement hindered, he could not even properly brace for what should have been the real attack.

A mercenary with a greatsword and a scout stepped forward.

The young mage raised her staff and began chanting.

The young priest took the gravel directly and toppled backward.

And I jumped backward.

Maybe no one there understood what I did, because not a single person chased after me when I retreated.

(Ah… so none of them had even considered why I chose to fight here.)

What lay where I jumped—was a pile of rubble.

Was it too primitive of an attack to cross your mind?

Too bad—I’m operating at the “wild animal” level!

I grabbed rubble with my tail and hurled it, then lightly caught it with my left hand.

“Dodge!”

The mercenary finally understood and shouted, but he was a little too late.

I had practiced throwing endlessly.

The fastball I launched smashed the scout’s left shoulder; his left arm tore off at the root and spun into the air.

Seeing the man roll on the ground while dyeing it red with blood made it obvious he was incapacitated.

That made one… but the young priest still lay there without even twitching.

Then that left three.

As the mercenary advanced, I hopped backward in sync with him.

More rubble was already prepared in my hand and tail, and though he somehow blocked a delayed double-shot with his greatsword, he was shoved far back.

(Did you plan for close-quarters combat? Too bad! I can do ranged combat too! At this distance, you’ve got no way to kill me, right!? How will you close in? How will you attack? You can see I’ve got mountains of ammo! Come on—show me how you’ll turn this around from here!)

Just as I replenished my “ammo,” I heard chanting.

With the situation changed, their first move was magic—but I deliberately ignored it.

My knowledge of magic was not perfect, but it was real.

So from the words I heard, I could tell—more or less—what she was trying to do.

And with the spell she was about to cast, she could not even scratch me, let alone kill me.

The spirit-sword wielder brushed off the dirt and returned to the front line, saw the rubble in my hands, and spat, “Damn it!”

The wielder advanced, and a lump of fire was released in tandem.

Ignoring the approaching flame, I watched the wielder leap toward me atop the rubble pile.

The fire hit me directly, but I showed no sign of caring and threw rubble anyway.

He cut it down and pressed in, but then a flat slab of rubble fired from my tail spun as it flew toward the man who had fully committed to his swing.

It hit—or so I thought for an instant—but the rubble was deflected by something invisible and drifted past him to the rear.

“Oh, right. That was a thing.”

I realized—the same defense the elven wielder had shown before was confirmed to come from the spirit sword’s power.

That let him swing again, forcing me into a choice: meet him head-on or abandon my advantageous position.

The flame that had not even stung me vanished, and the pretty-boy raised the spirit sword and closed in.

The man who had set up that ambush had no reason to throw himself into a suicidal attack.

Facing a charge that felt almost like certainty—“He has a plan”—I lowered my hips and chose to intercept.

In that instant—something yanked my right arm hard, and one of my feet lifted off the ground.

(There was another one!)

If that reckless-looking leap had been meant to set this up, then it made sense.

Now that I thought about it, I had been uneasy that the mage seemed too young to pull off concealment that perfect—but I never expected someone to have stayed hidden until this very moment.

(So the ambush fails and you still aim for another ambush!)

My posture was broken, and the spirit sword was coming—there was no time to evade anymore.

So I leaned my upper body far back, arched until my back nearly touched the rubble, and stretched my tail.

And before the wielder could bring the spirit sword down, I lifted his legs.

By giving myself height with my tail as a foothold, the downward swing only left a thin cut across my chest.

The wielder’s eyes tracked me as I lay on the rubble, even as his body carried him past.

Of course, I was not kind enough to let his landing go—

…but the mercenary provided solid support.

Just as I went to throw rubble, he slashed at me; I reflexively clamped the blade between my right elbow and knee, but when that greatsword did not break, an involuntary “Huh?” slipped out.

(Right—this was that strangely hard, unbreakable sword.)

Even so, there should have been a limit, I grumbled internally at the unfairness of magic swords, then struck with my tail and forced him back.

I praised his decision to let go and withdraw cleanly, and when I knocked the greatsword aside, it flew back toward the mercenary.

(…Ah. So she used magic.)

The female mage I had completely forgotten about had a smug look on her face.

Her face was pretty, but to pull off that outfit, didn’t she need a bit more… volume?

Putting appearances aside, this was a reset.

The situation was: me on top of the rubble pile, flanked by the spirit-sword wielder, the mercenary captain I had been seeing far too often, and the female mage—plus one more capable mage whose position I still could not pinpoint.

By the way, up to now I had not used my severed right hand even once.

Since I dealt with the mercenary’s strike using my elbow and knee, I should assume they had noticed my real condition.

It had been a short exchange, but the information I gained was enough.

(It’s time to pull back.)

Having decided that, I turned my back on the spirit-sword wielder, who was barking some kind of instructions.

If I was going to break through, it was better to choose the safer direction.

That captain could not stop my charge.

I knocked him aside, ignored the mage who had started chanting far too late, and sprinted deep into the forest.

The escape was so easy that I felt something was off, so I stopped and looked back down the path I had come.

“I see. So that’s how it is.”

Now that I could sense magic power, I understood.

A thin, thread-like line of magic power—was extending from me.

It was probably the work of that skilled mage who never showed themselves.

(If they can’t stop me from escaping, they’ll chase me anywhere… huh.)

It wasn’t a bad choice, but it was foolish for humans to try to match me in stamina.

“Or do you still have another plan?”

Muttering with my hand at my chin, I sent my gaze toward the direction of my temporary base.

More than anything, I needed to heal this hand with a potion first.

I returned to my temporary base while being careful not to lose them completely.

I looked back many times along the way, but I could not tell whether they were pursuing me.

Still, as long as that line of magic power was extending from my body, some kind of decisive conclusion was inevitable.

When I reached the temporary base, I immediately took out a potion from my pack and poured it over my right wrist.

I had braced myself for “I might have to pour it directly onto the cut,” but that fear proved unfounded, and I slowly formed a fist with my right hand.

I clenched and opened it again and again.

“…No problem.”

I muttered that softly and let a thin smile rise.

In reality, nothing had changed much—but that was how I felt right now.

I reached into my pack and grabbed the saber attached at my side.

Then I reached for the tower shield too, hesitated for a moment, and took it.

(No carelessness. I’ll fight them as enemies.)

Now then—let’s follow this thread of magic power and announce the start of round two.