“Please. Please,” she whimpers, and she was probably about to say something else, but an overhead flock of massive, screeching birds stop her in her tracks. Oh, no, wait, it’s not birds—it’s harpies. Big difference. “No, no,” she whispers in terror, and before I can gather myself to ask her what the big deal is, she backs up to the tree she was previously feeding off, placing her back against it and her wings spread wide. Her eyes bore into me. “Hide!” she whisper-shouts. “Hide before they get here!”

Hide? From what? Those guys up there? I look up. The harpies are circling high above us, their bright, yellow eyes staring down as one. I barely even have time to wonder what they’re trying to accomplish when they suddenly swoop down in one large cluster, descending on me and the other harpy. I look back down at her and her eyes are so urgent that without really thinking about it, I crouch down into the fetal position and roll over to one of the nearby trees. Now that I look closer, this one also has what could maybe be described as a face, but when I cut one of its roots, it won’t bleed. I think it’s dead.

With a mighty flapping, the swarm of harpies descend on us, most of them landing in the nearby trees, perching in the dead, leafless branches. However, one of them, just slightly larger than the others, lands right in the middle of the small clearing, in front of the first harpy and her tree.

“Lilett,” the large harpy greets with a heavy voice. “We’ve come for him. I asked you before and I will ask you again—give him over, or we will take you both to the same grave.”

“Never!” the harpy—apparently named Lilett—cries. “You’ll suck him dry and kill him within days. I cannot give my love to you bloodsuckers!”

“Tut tut,” the large harpy coos. “Nobody loves a hypocrite. If you give him to us, you will join our ambush. Wouldn’t that be nice? It’ll happen sooner or later anyways. Within time, he’ll be nothing but dead bark and dry roots. When that happens, should you not be one of us, we will simply make food out of you, instead. Unlike some, we don’t differentiate between the blood and the flesh.”

“I still won’t let you have him,” Lilett says firmly, her face set in powerful resolve. “I don’t care if I’ll eventually die. When that happens, I will die with him.”

The large harpy gives an exaggerated sigh and the harpies in the treetops lean closer, mouths drooling, feathers furling. “In that case,” the large harpy says, “why not do it now rather than later?”

The harpies all around draw closer. Lilette, in contrast, takes a step back, pressing herself even closer to the painfully groaning tree.

Alright, I guess this is about a good time to step in.

In complete silence, I roll up behind the large harpy.

Fun fact, most creatures have a very big weak spot situated on their back, and it’s called their back. If you attack someone there, they can easily be crit’ed and stunned depending on where you hit them. So, of course, this is what I aimed for.

Popping up behind the harpy, I stab both hands into her lower back. She squawks in pain and surprise, which is an interesting sound considering that she spoke perfectly mere seconds ago, but whatever. Grabbing her spine in one hand, I use the other to push her to the ground. This is a very good position for me to harm her maximally.

This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

Well on the ground, I crush her spine in my hand, and using the other, I tear up her throat. Very effective.

“Release her!” someone screeches and I’m only barely able to swirl around in time to watch one of the many other harpies come barreling into me, her claws digging deep into my bowels. The both of us go flying all rowley-powley, but I’m able to get a good grip on her throat even as we’re rolling around. Tearing it up is no big deal, but the price of it is that while I’m squabbling with this feather-brain, the large harpy has started trying to take to flight, her paralysed legs hanging limply.

Oh no, you don’t!

Running towards her I leap into the air with enough momentum and speed to be able to hook my clawed fingers into her soft belly, tearing up a huge gash through which her organs spill out indiscriminately. It’s actually kind of gross, but with her disembowelled as she is, she won’t get far even by flying.

I let go of her and fall down, right on top of another harpy that was apparently in pursuit. With strange hunger, she instantly starts biting into my bowels, eating and eating like she hasn’t been fed for years or something. Still, her ravenous appetite is only a weakness in this moment, as it gives me ample opportunity to break both her wings and send us both flailing down to the ground. Since I’m on top of her, I can feel very closely how her ribs snap like glowsticks the second we hit the ground, her breath and half of my liver getting choked out of her in equal measure.

Almost casually, I rip up her throat.

Alright, let’s see how many we have le—

Before I’m even able to finish the thought, about five or so harpies descend on me as one, ripping and tearing at my flesh with talons of steel. But their legs are weak and thin and with only one well-placed clutch of the hand, I’m able to completely handicap them. By rolling into the fetal position, I briefly disorient them before leaping at the back of one of them, stabbing my hand through the back of her head and into her skull in one strike.

Stab Lv.1>

That sounds like the kind of skill that only a weapon would be able to use, but if I can get it for this, then I don’t see the problem.

“E—escape! Escape! It’ll kill us all!” one of the random harpies screeches, taking to the air rather than attacking me. Bad move for her though, because while in the air, it was very easy for me to grab one of her legs to pull her back on the ground. And maybe also to bash her head into said ground, too.

Nonetheless, despite my efforts, a few of the harpies are able to escape with their lives intact. Though, of course, not all of them. Counting the corpses, I think I was able to defeat about a dozen and a half of them. Not bad, but I wish I’d been able to kill all of them. Well, I’ve got an entire attempt to do this floor, so it’s no biggie.

I turn towards Lilette and the tree.

She visibly blanches as I look at her. “Wh—what are you?” she asks, her voice trembling. “Do you understand me? Did—did you save me on purpose?...”

Hmmm… Now, what to do with this one? Since I have to be wary of tricks, I’ll need to figure out this floor properly. So far, I have no idea what’s happening, so I kind of need someone to tell me. For some reason, she seems to treasure that weird tree, so if I just take it hostage, she’ll probably tell me whatever I need to know.

Before that, though, her wings are an eyesore. I can’t have her flying off on me, can I?

I casually approach her. She inches herself closer to the tree, her bright yellow eyes trembling in completely unfounded fear.

“P—please,” she says. “Don’t hurt him. I’ll do whatever you ask of me, so, please… Spare him.”

I grab her left wing and bend it in two ways at once, eliciting a nice, loud crack! I had expected Lilette to cry out in pain or something, but instead, she’s just biting her lip hard enough to draw blood. Interesting. I break the other one, too, and the only response she gives is a hissing, nasal breath. Now, she can’t escape.

Hunching my back a little more, I bring my face to the level of her trembling eyes. “If you even think about escaping,” I tell her firmly, “I will remove all the bark off this dumb tree and make you eat it and then I’ll pluck every feather from your bosom to make a new bark for this here tree so it’ll survive the winter without you because you’ll die of unrelated causes still directly linked to the mutilation in store for you. Got it?” Her head jerks up and down and I take that as a yes. “Good! Okay, so, I have a few questions I’d like to ask, and after that, I’ll probably kill you. Is that alright?”