By the Grace of the Gods (LN) - Volume 15 - Chapter 19

Chapter 9, Episode 28: Hunting the Leader Rhino

The morning after the day I spent gathering resources around the village, Glen and I were enjoying a late breakfast, when suddenly, loud hooves thundered outside.

“That’s the leader rhino,” I said. “Shall we?”

“It’ll work off some of that food,” Glen said.

We left the manor and headed to the pond the rhino supposedly frequented. Glen remembered seeing it when he ran around the perimeter of the village, so he led the way. As we approached, I could hear loud crashing and thick huffs of breath.

Concealing ourselves with Hide from a safe distance, I watched a three-meter tall, four-meter wide monster charging into a heartwood tree by the lake over and over. Its rhino horn and long fur marked it as a cannonball rhino, but it was far larger than the average size of the species listed in the document I researched before coming here.

“That’s the leader, huh? Yeah, I’d say it’s acting weird,” Glen said.

“Cannonball rhinos are herbivorous, and they regularly charge heatwood trees to feed on fallen leaves and branches. But that one seems far too excited for just getting a meal.”

“Doesn’t look like it’s eating anything. It’s not fighting anything either. What’s it up to?”

“I don’t know—” I began to say when I noticed a juvenile rhino less than a meter tall hiding in a bush about ten meters away from the larger monster. That had to be the young rhino Korumi was talking about. Just as I cast a Wind spell in its direction, Glen darted their way.

The juvenile let out a shrill trumpet, recklessly readying to charge the large rhino three times its size. Just as the pair were about to make a move, my spell reached them. The tough and magic-resistant rhinos obviously weren’t harmed by the wind, but all I needed was a moment’s distraction.

Glen roared, slamming his hammer into the leader rhino’s face, rocking its massive body with the impact. Yet, the rhino didn’t let out so much as a huff in pain, glaring at Glen with a promise of violence in its eyes. Funny enough, the leader rhino’s thrashing had cleared the area of underbrush enough to provide more visibility. I blinked to Glen’s side with Space magic.

“You all right, Glen?”

“Yeah, I smacked that thing real good, and it basically shrugged it off. This village is full of surprises... Awesome!”

“Awesome?!” I repeated. As reliable of a combat partner as he was, I’d never understand how he could enjoy situations like this. “Can you take care of that for a while?”

“Yeah, the small one’s all yours.” Glen ran, looking for an opening to use his hammer again, while the leader rhino stomped to and fro, trying to knock out Glen with its horn.

Meanwhile, I turned my attention to the juvenile rhino—that immediately trumpeted in an attempt to show its dominance. Behind the little rhino stood an adult rhino—its mother—that must have been hidden from my view before.

Just like Korumi’s “villagers,” the mother rhino looked as if she were still alive, save for the gaping hole in her neck and crushed hind legs. Obviously, she’d been mauled by the leader rhino. Even though her Undead body was gradually regenerating, she wouldn’t be mobile for a while. That’s why the juvenile was trying to fend off the leader rhino and was trying to protect its mother from me now.

“Don’t worry, I’m not going to hurt her... Of course, you don’t understand me without Korumi,” I said. As I was considering whether to tame the rhino just so we could communicate our intentions, the juvenile charged at me with a sharp trumpet. No matter how young, the rhino monster wasn’t to be taken lightly. I’d be seriously hurt if I didn’t dodge it carefully. On top of that, there was no telling when the leader rhino would shift away from Glen. There was only one way I could think of how to keep my promise to Korumi. “This might sting a bit!” I announced pointlessly, pouring all the physical energy I could into my whole body.

The young rhino charged me head-on, poised to stab me through the gut with its budding horn. An instant before the full force of the rhino collided with me, I threw myself backward as I grabbed its neck and horn. “Stay out of it!” I told the rhino, using its momentum to throw the juvenile behind me as I hit the ground, sending it flying through the air and splashing into the shallows of the pond near its mother with a bleating trumpet.

According to my research, a cannonball rhino would sometimes admit defeat in a fight if they were knocked to the ground or tossed aside—as if they were sumo wrestling. I could do one more thing to keep the little one from attacking me again. “Let’s see... Stay.” I cast a Dark spell, willing it to stay by its mother—instilling just the vague instinct would do, similar to how the Fear spell made its target feel a general sense of fear. All I needed was for it to stop attacking me. The improvised strategy worked—the juvenile kept its guard up, but backed up towards its mother.

“One down, and...” I looked towards Glen.

“Let’s go! Bring it on!” Glen bellowed, while the leader trumpeted, ignoring Glen as it ran in and out of the pond, splattering dirt everywhere. Soon, it began tackling the heatwood tree again as if Glen weren’t even there.

What is it doing that for? If we didn’t deal with the leader soon, I was afraid it would charge the calf.

As if it read my thoughts, the leader rhino bellowed and charged straight towards me. Casting Fire on instinct, I dove into a bush in the opposite direction as the calf to avoid its charge. The leader immediately made a sharp turn, its horn still pointed at me. Using Space magic, I jumped to the side of the pond and let the rhino crash into the tree that had stood just behind me. Astonishingly, its trunk nearly cracked in half, causing the massive heatwood tree to lean askew.

“Just like I thought—a direct hit would kill me.”

“Hey, Ryoma. Something’s off about that thing,” Glen called.

“We knew that already,” I countered.

“No, not what it’s doing—how strong it is. With how tough it is, it’s got to be on the same level as the S-rank dragon I fought a long time ago, but it’s not as fun! Like it’s a weakling jacked up on magic that powers it up.”

If Glen felt that, there must have been some truth to it. I watched the leader rhino again, assuming that its strength was being boosted somehow. In stark contrast to its earlier rampage, the rhino was drooling from its slack jaw, wobbling like it was about to fall asleep standing. I no longer felt a hint of the aggression it showed a moment earlier when it charged at me.

Boosted strength, crazed aggression, sudden drowsiness... I listed the rhino’s conditions in my head, and the solution came to me. “Glen, did you see a purple spot on it somewhere?”

“Purple? Look inside its mouth.” He gestured to the rhino’s mouth with his hammer. Sure enough, vibrant purple spots marred its mouth.

“I thought so.”

“What’s that mean?” Glen asked.

“Most likely, it’s been stung by a doping hornet. Its venom acts as a stimulant and sedative, and it also strengthens monsters that are stung by it. When their hive is threatened, doping hornets sting a nearby monster so it’ll be enraged and take out the threat. The purple spots make the sting recognizable,” I explained.

“Another wacky monster.”

“That said, the only proof they’re in the forest is that rhino. Doping hornets weren’t mentioned in the Sea of Trees files I requested from the guild. They’re rare enough as it is, so they might just have been missed in this expansive forest,” I said.

“No one would bat an eye if a monster’s more aggressive than normal here... How’d you know about those bees if they weren’t in your documents?” Glen asked.

“Doping hornet stingers and honey can be used to make medicine. I learned about them in that context.” Knowing the cause of the rhino’s aggression didn’t change our situation—it was going to rampage again any minute. Now was our opening to take it down, but it would take drastic measures to take down a monster that practically walked off taking Glen’s hammer to its head. “Doping hornet venom makes it numb to pain, but not impervious to attacks. We should be able to wear it down if we’re persistent.”

“Don’t feel like doing that. Especially when it’s acting that way.”

“I thought you might say that.” In fact, I was starting to predict what Glen would say with decent accuracy. To play his way, we’d need to hit the rhino in its weak spot, fast and hard. That meant...

“It’s enraged again!” Glen shouted over the rhino’s blaring trumpet.

“Binding Ivy!” Using Wood magic to control the vines wrapped around the nearby heatwood trees, I constricted the bleating leader rhino. Each of those vines was surprisingly durable, so they were an effective restraint—for a few brief moments, at least. The rhino was already shifting its weight, tearing vine after vine.

“Mud Puddle!” Shifting water from the pond to the earth below the rhino, I created a slippery pool of mud that kept the rhino from pushing off the ground with any meaningful force. The remaining vines tying down the rhino were stretched to their limit, but all of them held. I rarely had an opportunity to use this spell because I usually chose to fight in close quarters, but I was glad I’d learned it.

“Glen!” I urged, taking the metal slime sheath off of my belt and asking it to change shape.

“Huh? Oh, got it. Let’s make it count!” Glen darted up a heatwood tree to gain some altitude, catching on to what I was about to do.

I got into position on top of the rhino’s neck by using Space magic. “There.” Using some of the vines, I stabilized myself onto the thrashing rhino. Then, I concentrated on magical energy detection, sharing fields of vision with the metal slime that had been forming my sheath.

A hateful trumpet blared as a torrent of information threatened to drown my thoughts—but I held on. “Right here!” With the same method I used to cast Healing magic, I accurately mapped out where the leader rhino’s brain was, marking it by stabbing the sharpened sheath into its head. The metal slime shifted into a solid metal rod with a flat head at its top—a giant nail.

“Here goes!” Glen announced, leaping off of a branch near the very top of the closest heatwood tree. Without needing to watch him, I focused on bolstering myself and the metal slime with physical energy.

The next moment, a shout and a tremendous impact shook me from my hands to my core.