[Side Story] Not A Shrimp’s Back, But The Whale That Burst (2)

“Huh?”

As she walked, a wide plain came into view. Rurin figured something had to be here, so she ran toward it.

As long as it had four legs, Rurin figured she could grill it somehow.

But there were no animals in the plain either. Not a single one—just an endless ocean of flowers.

A wave of yellow flowers stretched out, and every breeze tickled her nose with floral scents.

Something glowing was flying around. Usually, flowers meant bees—but these weren’t bees.

They glowed like fireflies, but they weren’t that either.

They landed all over Rurin’s head and body. But the moment she shook them off—countless flowers suddenly opened their mouths and lunged at her, flinging their stems high and stabbing down like spears.

“GYAAAH?!”

Startled, Rurin fired her breath—and the approaching flowers all exploded.

But hilariously, the slime didn’t disappear—it splattered upward. She was far enough to avoid it, but just a little closer and she would’ve been slimed again.

To Rurin, that was terrifying. So she started weighing her options.

If exploding or melting them still splashed slime… Wouldn’t running away just be smarter?

It’s not fear. It’s disgust.

And when she saw flowers spitting slime from their mouths, Rurin screamed and backed off.

“GYAAAH! Stay away!”

That’s how much she hated slime. Dodging a rain of flowers, she had no choice but to teleport out.

“Rurin? What happened to you?!”

Rurin looked like a total disaster after teleporting back. What the hell happened? I told her to bring back ingredients, not show up like this.

I couldn’t make sense of it. One of the mightiest dragons in existence, now looking like a drenched mouse.

Other than the time I pushed her into a hot spring, this might be the first time anything else has managed to do this to her.

Still stunned, I grabbed a towel from our bag and ran over to her.

“Are you okay?”

Nod nod.

She nodded, but her expression was dark. Really dark. Just nodding silently like that? Not a good sign.

I figured I’d ask slowly, so I started drying her hair, then her body.

She was soaked enough to need a change of clothes too. As I reached for her spare outfit, she mumbled:

“My love…”

“Yeah?”

“There are too many weirdos here. And that sticky stuff… Ugh, I hate it…”

Right as she said that, another person teleported in from the other side.

This one didn’t wait to shout.

“HEY YOUUUU!”

The voice was furious—so I turned to look. And this one was somehow in worse shape than Rurin.

What the hell was wrong with these dragons today?

“What happened to you? Weren’t you the confident one?”

Rurin was just wet. Sereina, on the other hand, was absolutely drenched in slime.

Every time she moved, the slime ballooned like bubblegum, then popped and stretched like taffy.

“Pwahahahaha!”

That laugh came from Rurin. Her rival’s downfall finally brought a smile to her face.

Up until now, she’d looked completely depressed. Must’ve been because she came back empty-handed.

But seeing that Sereina was not only empty-handed, but in worse shape? That clearly cheered her up.

Naturally, Sereina wasn’t about to take that lying down.

“Shut up. They just kept coming. Kill one—it explodes. Kill another—explodes. Freaking annoying!”

Muttering, Sereina started casting water spray magic on herself to clean off.

“I figured it out in one go and ran. That slime? Absolutely disgusting. You stayed? Hah!”

Rurin mocked her again, grinning.

“SHUT UP!”

As she rinsed off more slime, Sereina snapped again.

What was that slime, anyway? Their whole conversation kept coming back to it, so I had to ask.

“No but seriously, how did both of you end up like this? What the hell happened?”

“You!”

“Hey!”

And then both Sereina and Rurin turned to glare at me. Faces full of pure indignation, like I was the criminal here.

“Um? Why am I suddenly on trial?”

“You! This place is weird! The flowers attack! Every single one of them! They pretend to be cute, then grow huge and open their mouths!”

“Same here. I got fed up and started burning them, but the more I burned, the more showed up. I had to teleport out. Almost nuked the whole island, but remembered it was yours, so I held back.”

“What? Plants?”

Nod nod.

“I actually agree with the Red one. Those things are…ugh.”

Rurin stuck out her tongue in disgust. The fact that she agreed with Sereina? That alone was shocking.

So the flowers were going berserk?

So we’re talking weak monsters, but super annoying thanks to all the sticky slime?

“Only the coastline’s safe. Everything inland is crawling with them.”

“Exactly. She’s right.”

When Rurin spoke up, Sereina nodded in fierce agreement. A rare moment of unity. And then—I suddenly remembered Elena.

“Wait, what about Elena?”

“She’ll probably come back on her own. The monsters are gross, not dangerous. Elena can handle herself.”

“Yeah but—Elena can’t teleport. If something went wrong, she might take a while to get back. We should go look for her.”

“Oh. Right.”

Sereina seemed to remember how bad it got—teleport-level bad—and nodded.

Just as we were about to head south to find her, Elena appeared from that very path—casually, like nothing had happened.

“Oh? You’re both back already?”

“Huh?”

Unlike the two dragons, Elena looked completely fine. Rurin was dumbfounded, and Sereina just stared in disbelief.

“Lady Rurin, Lady Sereina! Why are you both soaking wet? Were you trying to find ingredients in the water?”

Elena asked the question with pure innocence, gazing at the two drenched dragons.

“Oh! You were fishing!”

She was still locked in cooking-contest mode. Rurin, completely exasperated, shouted back:

“You—you didn’t run into those flowers?! You weird thing!”

“Seriously. You don’t even look damp. Not a single drop on you.”

Why were they acting like this? What the heck was that weird flower?

“Huh? I didn’t see anything weird!”

Naturally, Elena just smiled brightly.

“Anyway, I found some ingredients! Mr. El, I’m going to use this for my salad…”

But Elena couldn’t finish her sentence—because the two dragons shouted over her, unwilling to accept their defeat.

“WHY?!”

“Wait, does this mean we lost?!”

“No way! That can’t be right!”

At this point, I started to wonder if they just didn’t want to gather ingredients and were making excuses.

Which meant… This was Elena’s win.

“If she’s the only one who actually found food, then Miss Elena wins. Come on, let’s see what you’ve got.”

I walked toward Elena as I declared her victory.

“This one!”

Elena held out a flower resting in her palm.

“It smelled sweet, so I thought I’d try using it as an ingredient!”

“This pink flower bud?”

“Yes.”

Elena handed it to me. It definitely had a sweet aroma—not the artificial sugar kind, but something naturally fragrant and earthy.

This was more than enough for Elena to win. The other two had nothing. Just as I was about to declare her victory—Rurin suddenly screamed.

“GYYAAAAAAAAAAAH!”

Then Sereina screamed too.

“KYAAAAAAAAAAAAH!”

Then Rurin flailed at me wildly and shouted:

“Love, that! THAT’S IT! R-run away!”

Then she and Sereina bolted, completely panicked.

“This little flower? Why?”

“Right? What’s wrong with it?”

Elena and I tilted our heads. What the hell was going on?

The flower Elena handed me just drooped in my hand. Didn’t seem dangerous at all…

…or so I thought.

The bud suddenly ballooned in size, opened a massive mouth—and CHOMP, bit me.

“Eh?”

It happened in an instant. Before I could react, I was surrounded by darkness, and that same sticky slime from Sereina’s body stretched toward me.

Ah.

This was what they were talking about?

It was definitely disgusting. It kind of smelled weird, too. And the stickiness? Horrible. Almost felt like it was burning my skin.

That was enough—I blasted a spell right into the bud’s base.

BOOOOOM—!

I slipped out, hit the ground, and the ruptured bud withered instantly.

“Hehehe! See? Told you!”

Sereina cackled at my miserable state. Of course she did. Typical dragon.

“You didn’t believe us—serves you right! Bwahahahahaha!”

Sereina was now fully unhinged, hopping with joy. I was this close to smacking her with magic, but someone else got there first.

“Shut up!”

WHAAAM—!

Rurin delivered a flying kick right to Sereina’s face. It had been a while since I’d seen one of those.

“You little braaaaat!”

While Sereina went flying, Rurin grabbed a towel and ran straight to me.

“That flower’s the bad guy. Not you, my love.”

“R-right?”

Nod nod.

Rurin nodded fiercely. I guess all that teamwork with Sereina went out the window the moment she started laughing at me.

“You’re sticky. Eugh. Let’s get that off you. I’ll clean you.”

“Oh? Well…yeah, thanks.”

“I had to dive into a river because of that crap, so yeah.”

Rurin used magic to rinse me off, then started scrubbing me with a towel.

It wasn’t the gentlest touch, but it was thorough.

As Rurin rubbed my head with the towel, Elena looked completely lost—like she had no idea what the hell was going on anymore.

“Wh-what?! I was totally fine though…”

“Maybe it doesn’t react to elves? Thinks they’re kin?”

“Maybe it’s a forest-species thing?”

Sereina and I tossed out theories. It probably had something to do with Elena being an elf.

“So… What happens to the contest?”

Elena asked, looking genuinely bummed.

“Well… What you brought… Unfortunately, no one else can eat it, so I think it’s disqualified.”

“Yeah. Void it!”

All three of us shook our heads. It had been an extremely damp day—except for Elena.

They say when whales fight, the shrimp gets crushed.

But in this fight between two whales, it was Rurin and Sereina—the whales themselves—who got wrecked.