Chapter 72

Ch 72 — Bloody Horn Bulls

We arrived at a wide area of open grassland on the west side of the city, ready to subjugate the Bloody Horn Bull herd which was grazing there .

The Guild Master had told us all about the monster known as the Bloody Horn Bull . Each Bull was about the size of a rhinoceros with a temper to match . On top of that their cattle-herd instincts of clustering together and facing threats like a well-drilled military formation increased their danger level compared with attempting to subjugate an individual Bloody Horn Bull .

Fer wasn't bothered by that kind of threat of course . For me, I just decided to stay out of his way while he dealt with them . But where were they?

"Fer, do you know where the Bloody Horn Bull herd is?"

"Yeah, I can see them, they're not far off . Let's get closer and then I'll deal with them . " Following Fer's gaze I made out some small black dots off in the distance .

"If that's the Bloody Horn Bull over there then Sui and me will wait here . " Safety first, after all .

"Do that . I'll head over there right now and I'll contact you by telepathy when I've killed them all . "

"Gotcha . "

Fer slunk off towards the Bloody Horn Bulls, staying low to hide himself from their sight in the long grass .

I lay down and hid in the long grass too . After all I wouldn't want to spook the Bloody Horn Bulls and make Fer's job harder, would I? It's not like I was scared of them or anything . Just playing my part .

Sui crawled out of the bag that I had placed next to my head .

"Where did Fer-ojichan go?-"

"He went off to defeat the big cow-sans . " I explained .

"No fair- . Sui wants to defeat the cow-sans too-"

"Eh? There's a lot of big really scary big cow-sans out there so just wait here with me, Sui . "

"No way no way . Sui is going to help defeat the cow-sans . " Saying that Sui crawled away quickly .

"Hey, come back!" Wow, she's so fast . "Oh shit!" I chased after Sui through the meadow as fast as I could (crawling) . Hurrying frantically (crawling), I finally came to an opening where I could catch sight of Fer . Sui was also there, jumping up and down .

"Huff, huff, finally . . . . . . " I tried to catch my breath while not attracting the attention of any stray Bloody Horn Bulls . Fer leisurely approached me where I lay concealed in the grass .

"Hey you, what are you doing?" he called in a loud voice .

What am I doing? Well, I crawled all the way here to make sure I wasn't spotted by the Bloody Horn Bulls but your shouting will bring them here . . .

"All the Bloody Horn Bulls have been wiped out . " Fer said . . . . ? What, have you finished already? It's only been a few minutes . . .

I got up on my feet again and stretched and twisted my body . My back hurt from all that hurried crawling . As I looked out over the blood-drenched meadow before me I felt my breath catch in my throat .

…………What's this .

A huge black cow lay in a pool of blood . There was another one over there, and another . . . how many more are there like this? The scenic grasslands have been turned into an abattoir . A soft breeze blew sweetly across the meadow but it couldn't distract from the horrific vision before me .

"Aruji, you're here- . Sui knocked down a big cow-san-" Sui bounced towards me excitedly, poing poing . "Aruji, aruji, Sui and Fer-ojichan defeated all the big cow-sans . Fer-ojichan used his magic first and the wind blew and lots of big cow-sans fell down . But some big cow-sans didn't fall down so Sui pew-pewed them and beat them good . Amazing, isn't it?-" Sui told me in a rush while jumping around Fer and me .

So Fer probably used wind magic to deal with most of the herd and Sui killed the remaining Bloody Horn Bulls by shooting them with acid bullets .

"Umuu, Sui really helped out this time . " Fer confirmed . Heh, of course she did . I looked over the field of slaughtered Bloody Horn Bulls again . The threat they posed to the strong tag-team of Fer and Sui was negligible, it turned out . I guess they all went to heaven without being able to defend themselves in any way .

So, you guys are going to be our food . Is it time to tuck all the Bloody Horn Bulls in my Item Box? I took a really close look . Wow, a Bloody Horn Bull is a really big cow . I counted them – there are one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, more and more and some Bloody Horn Bulls were still hidden by the long grass . I gave up and started collecting them instead, counting them as I deposited them in my Item Box . One, two, three . . .

I had agreed with the Guild Master that we'd wholesale half of the herd to the Guild but it might be an idea to sell them a few more than that . Each Bloody Horn Bull really was about the size of a rhinoceros, it turned out . Thinking about how much Fer and Sui ate at a sitting it would take even them several days to eat just one Bloody Horn Bull . Besides, eating beef all the time would get tedious so I'd be serving up other kinds of meat for variety . If we held on to the meat from even half the herd then Fer wouldn't have to hunt any beef for a loooong time .

I hoped Fer and Sui don't get tired of beef quickly . I'll have to work hard there, too, serving up different recipes involving beef so they don't get bored with the same dishes too often . While thinking about this I was busy packing away the Bloody Horn Bull carcasses in my Item Box . I finally got all of them stored . There were 58 Bloody Horn Bulls in all . Half of that would be . . . 29 Bloody Horn Bulls we'd keep for the meat? That's a huge amount of beef .