Strategic Retreat. 23:48

Ambitious stood frozen.

Unable to believe the events that had unfolded before his eyes, he simply stood there, dazed, hiding among the trees of the winter forest overlooking the Saikanan Highway.

The sun had long since set, and overhead spread a sky full of stars.

It was midnight.

All the way until that hour, Ambitious had stood there, frozen, stock-still.

“......Oh.”

A cold winter wind blew with a byuu, shaking Ambitious's body.

Only then did Ambitious come back to himself, and that dopey sound slipped out of him.

Then he looked all around, this way and that.

He could no longer feel the presence of the darkness spirit around him.

That black ball, the witness, had seen the failure of ‘Purple Dual Rings’ through to the end, melted into the forest's shadows, and was already gone from this place.

Ambitious looked down at the Saikanan Highway once more.

The target, the cursed child, was already gone.

......The corpses of his members were gone, too.

The cursed child, who had struck down every last assassin ‘Purple Dual Rings’ sent and laid them all in the ground, had dug into the earth with the baffling giant black arm growing from her shoulder and buried the assassins' bodies there.

Once she had finished burying every last one, the cursed child had wound the black arm around her body with a shuru shuru sound and transformed into her Dark Spiky Rock Man form.

Then, after putting her hands together toward the burial site, she had gone into the forest in a different direction from where Ambitious was, and vanished.

Gasari, gasari. He pushed through the thickets of withered grass and stepped onto the now-empty cobblestones.

Kotsu, kotsu. Ambitious's leather shoes clicked.

These shoes were a custom order, made from the hide of a monster called the Salmondile that lived on the Fantasy Continent, which he had gone out of his way to have shipped in; though they were leather dress shoes, they were a luxury item that could handle combat in the field with ease.

They were Ambitious's pride and joy, made back when ‘Purple Dual Rings’ had started running smoothly and he finally had some money to spare.

In those shoes, he stood on the soil where his members had been buried.

In that spot alone, the withered grass was gone and the soil was exposed.

Hence, even in the dead of night with only starlight, the spot was easy to find.

Gyumu.

Lifting one foot and stamping down on the soil gave that soft feel.

Gyumu, gyumu, gyumu......

Ambitious repeated the motion, lifting and lowering his foot, lifting and lowering.

Gyumu, gyumu, gyumu, gyumu, gyumu, gyumu!

The speed gradually increased, and he continued to stomp on the burial site of his members at ultra-high speed!

With a furrowed brow!

Yet with eyes wide open!

While gritting his teeth!

With a terrifying expression, he continued to stomp with all his might!

“DON'T, FUCK, WITH, MEEEE!!!”

Then, having screamed that, he flopped down on the soil, flailing his arms and legs, and began thrashing about like a child throwing a tantrum!

“Don't fuck with me! Don't fuck with me! Don't fuck with me! What're you doing, dying on me, you small fry! Gathering you bastards, raising you! How much time and money do you think I spent!? UWAAAAAAAAAH!!!”

Ambitious rolled around on the soil in a fit of rage!

He didn't even care that his finest jacket, made of the ‘Ijiwaar Magic Weave’ that had been on the rise in recent years in the Deswaar Duchy of the Teenidys Kingdom, was getting filthy!

“Don't fuck with me! Don't fuck with me! Don't fuck with me! You're nothing but a cursed child, nothing but a cursed child! What do you think you're doing, getting in the way of your betters! You, filthy, MONSTER, MONSTER, MONSTEEEEEEEER!!!”

Then, he dropped to all fours and began punching the ground!

The many silver rings gleaming on the fingers of both his hands lost their shine in the blink of an eye!

Ambitious realized it with a start!

“SOOOOOOOIL! QUIT DIRTYING THEEEEEEEM!!!”

With a byuu, the winter wind blew past once more, shaking the forest's trees and their withered leaves, zawa zawa!

“FOREEEEEEEST! QUIT SHAKIIIIIIING!!!”

Ambitious rolled onto his back!

And there before his eyes, a sky full of stars, shining in breathtaking beauty!

“STAAAAAAARS! QUIT TWINKLIIIIIIING!!!”

◇ ◇ ◇

Ambitious went on cursing in every direction like that, but at last, perhaps worn out, he rolled onto his side and lay still for a while.

A few minutes later, he sat up, and on the surface, he had completely regained his composure.

But the feeling in his eyes was rage.

He brushed the soil off his clothes with a pan pan and looked toward the forest where the cursed child had disappeared.

He had made up his mind that one day, he would pay back this humiliation.

“It's okay. It's not over yet...... My ‘Purple Dual Rings’ isn't over yet......!”

Muttering to himself, he turned toward the west.

Beyond his gaze, far down the Saikanan Highway, lay a country called Ashgo.

A great power where several members of ‘Purple Dual Rings’ were currently posted...... and where all sorts of shady things were stirring behind the scenes.

He would reunite with the surviving members there and plot his comeback.

“............A strategic retreat, it is!”

Of course, it wasn't as if there were no worrying factors.

The biggest problem was that one of the people he had sent to Ashgo was “a relic of the old generation.”

The former ‘Purple Dual Rings’ executive known as the “Strange Monk,” whose purge he had passed over because of the man's great skill, and because he had, outwardly at least, shown he would follow Ambitious.

Could he really keep that old man in hand, now that he had lost so many of his strongest pieces, or not?

“......It's okay. I can do it. I've got it in me. If it's me, I can do it.”

By repeating this over and over, Ambitious brushed away his anxiety.

Anyway, regrouping came first.

He would hurry to meet up with the other members.

He would head for Ashgo.

Ambitious stumbled back onto the cobblestones of the Saikanan Highway and faced west.

And it was then.

The strong winter wind that had been gusting now and then all along blew at him again, byuu.

The wind shook Ambitious's body as it went past, and set the trees of the forest beyond swaying, zawa zawa.

“!!!”

Ambitious reacted sharply to that zawa zawa sound!

He instantly turned back toward the forest and took a combat stance.

Cold sweat broke out in droplets across his face.

......It wasn't as if there was something in the forest.

To put it simply, there was nothing there.

The trees had simply swayed in the wind.

But Ambitious couldn't move.

Until a moment ago...... while he had been venting his rage and taking it out on everything in sight, not a shred of such awareness had crossed his mind.

But right now, at this moment, he had thought it.

(What if a Dark Spiky Rock Man is lurking in that forest......? What if she's poised with that black arm, ready to take my life......!?)

......And then!!

In that instant, he was struck by an emotion he hadn't felt in quite some time!

An emotion he thought he had completely overcome as a first-class assassin!

That emotion was none other than terror!!

“Uuu...... uooo...... ooOOO!!”

He had to get away from here, fast!

So Ambitious thought.

And then, he began to growl!

Then his slender body slowly began to swell.

Muscles bulged as if to tear his jacket apart, and what was more...... his hands and face, bare of clothing...... were being covered in white fur, the same color as his hair!

Even his skeleton began to deform, and his muzzle protruded forward!

Fangs lengthened, and his ears grew and changed shape, moving up to the sides of the top of his head!

“AOOOOOOON!!!”

A few seconds later, what stood there was no longer the man in white-rimmed glasses who came across as almost frivolous...... but a being with the keen, fierce face of a wolf, a figure truly worthy of the name “werewolf”!

This was Ambitious's special ability, 【Battle Beast Transformation】!

He had the blood of beastmen, who lived in great numbers on the Fantasy Continent, mixed into him.

Hence, Ambitious too could use the special ability their race inherited!

In this form, his physical abilities increased dozens of times over.

It was not a special ability he could use frequently due to the severe physical toll, but its power went without saying; this was truly his trump card!

But he had never once shown this 【Battle Beast Transformation】 in front of others.

He had kept this combat form a secret even from Short Warp and Smooth Stan.

This was solely because he was wary of betrayal by his members.

So, having turned into a werewolf now, when it was far too late, Ambitious pushed off hard against the cobblestones and began to run west.

Do! Do! Do! Do!

Crushing the cobblestones with those sounds, Ambitious raced away with the speed of the wind!

“DARK SPIKY ROCK MAN......! JUST YOU, WAAAAAAAIT!!!”

Across the Saikanan Highway, where only the scars of a fierce battle remained, echoed the scream of a sore-losing villain, as clichéd and utterly third-rate as they come.

Arc 13, complete!! (Just kidding)

【Teenidys】

The setting of Arcs 5 and 6.

The Royal Kiralimake Academy is located here.

【Deswaar Duchy】

The territory ruled by the Duke of Deswaar of the Teenidys Kingdom.

Magic ore has been mined at the Zakzak Mine in the territory since long ago (as mentioned in Arc 10, for roughly 300 years).

【Ijiwaar】

Refers to the daughter of the Duke of Deswaar, Ijiwaar Deswaar.

A villainess-type reincarnator guided by a little bird calling itself the Fate Goddess Allofa or some such, and the protagonist of 【I Don't Mind Being Reincarnated as the Villainess in the Least! But Isn't the Name Ijiwaar Deswaar Just a Tad Too Cruel!?】.

So far, only her name has been mentioned, in Arc 5.

The “Ijiwaar Magic Weave” was likely her idea.

【Beastmen】

A race appearing for the first time.

It seems they exist in this world as well, but they will make a full appearance from Part 2 onwards.