Jumping forward quite a bit, the time was now night, and Diana was casually lying down on the grass and watching the stars in the sky.

It’s night now, so her friends were all asleep of course.

The reason why she was even awake right now was because of a hunch she had in her gut. It’s not much to go on, but she just had a premonition that something’s going to go down, precisely at this night.

Even her [Danger Perception] was ringing the bells, and when that happens, it’s usually correct.

Since she didn’t want to bother anyone with their beauty sleeps(especially Crystal, she gets grumpy if she’s suddenly awakened), so she made sure to make some distance between them too.

“…!”

And again, her [Danger Perception] rang, this time much louder and clearer than before. Which means, that whatever’s on her track, was close to her, really close.

“There you are.”

Then, she heard a female voice, calling out to her from behind her. It was a cold, unfeeling voice, one that, if she could take a guess, probably had full intentions on murdering her, or at least, capturing her for some other purpose she didn’t know.

“Ehe~”

Turning around, she made a cute giggle as she looked at who her enemy was. And, as she guessed, it belonged to a woman, whose silver eyes stared piercingly into the depths of her soul.

“Tch, acting cute, despite being a monster.”

“Is something wrong with that~?”

Muu, did this woman have a bone to pick with her or something? Or does she just hate monsters in general?...Probably both.

From her reply, the woman sneered and pulled out a sword from behind her. From the looks of it, it’s a normal knight’s broadsword, but she couldn’t be too sure. It’s too dark to see, so she couldn’t get a good look at who or what she was.

With her sword pointed at Diana, the woman charged at her and sliced off Diana’s neck, which quickly reconnected itself. Her regen speed seems to have caught the woman by surprise, but she quickly recovered to try and attack again!

‘Can’t this woman use magic?’ Was the single question floating in her mind as she was getting slashed and stabbed in the head, multiple times by the woman, before all the wounds disappeared, leaving a perfectly clean Diana.

“W-What the-!?”

“Careful!”

Well, she did say ‘careful’, but the woman didn’t listen, and ended up getting her entire chest area covered in slime, corrosive ones too. Listening closely, Diana could hear the sounds of metal pieces corroding away and falling to the ground, which meant that she was also wearing some kind of armour.

Oh, and there was also some kind of emblem there too, but it was slightly too dark to see it clearly, and it’s getting corroded away anyways.

Not that the armour did anything, because once the armour faded away, the woman’s skin started sizzling as her corrosion went to work. Worried that she might scream and wake everyone else up, she used some neutral slime and plastered it over her mouth.

After the ‘battle’ ended, the woman was left stuck in the slime, her mouth covered, and her skin burnt and damaged. She could even see some of her insides if she squinted enough, not that she minded or anything.

“Now~, mind to speak up?”

“……”

“Ah! I forgot to take of the slime! Sorry~, here you go!” With a bit of force, she put her hands over her mouth, and ripped away the slime on her mouth.

“Buah!? Hah…hah…You…monster…D…”

“D…?”

“D……DIIIEEE!!!” Suddenly, she broke out of her slimy prison, reached her hand down to the collar on her belt, and attempted to place the collar around her neck!

Of course, as if Diana’ll let that happen. Sending a swift kick to her gut, she took the collar away from the woman and put it on her neck instead. She didn’t know what this collar was, but her danger sense was tingling, so she took three steps back and waited.

And waited, and waited, until she finally became bored of counting how many ‘and waiteds’ has been said and walked up to the woman, who wasn’t even moving an inch, except for her silver eyes which were looking around in horror.

Now that she’s close enough, she managed to see what the collar was like. It was a pure, silver collar, one that fit perfectly around the woman’s neck. It wasn’t anything special, aside from that red orb stuck at the centre.

If she’d take a guess, this is…a slave collar? Like the ones she’s seen in so many fantasy light novels. So…uh…what should she do with her now?

First, she’ll quickly apply some mending slime onto her wounds, since those openings on her look nasty man~. No one would like to see those!...Except maybe Rei, since that girl likes human meat in general.

Okay, while she’s waiting for her wound to patch up…now what? This woman was completely docile(hopefully), and it seems like she couldn’t speak. Hmm…

“Uh…Speak…?”

“What should I speak, mistress?”

Woah. Woah~! She actually spoke! And really politely too! Calling her ‘Mistress’ and all that! Iya~, somehow getting called that feels somewhat pleasant~

Ahem, anyways, judging that her eyes were looking even more terrified than before, she probably couldn’t control her own mouth, which is great! Now, time to gather some info about why she’s even here!

“So, why did you come here?”

“I was sent here by the king of [Albion], Grazure the Third. He tasked me with dealing with you, mistress.”

“And…why?”

“I did not know. He said that mistress was a monster, and any further delay would bring chaos to the kingdom. However, he asked me to capture you with this [Slave Collar] and bring you back as a war potential.”

Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.

Yikes. Okay, so, case and point, that king’s a bastard, and he wanted her to become his slave for war. How rude! Instead of trying to capture her, he could have-

“…Diana.”

“Huh? Oh! Rei, you’re awake!”

Suddenly, from beside her, Rei appeared. She seems rather mad though…She didn’t show it face-front, but from her eyes, they just…looked mad. Was it because this woman tried to capture her? Yeah, the answer’s obvious, isn’t it?

“…Educate, her…Need, docile.”

……Eh? Wait, ‘Educate her’? ‘Need Docile?’? Umm…Diana’s purely confused right now, but Rei’s her friend, so she nodded and left it all up to her.

With her confirmation, Rei grabbed the woman by her collar and ran into the darkness.

…Well, that’s it for that woman then. Her danger sense wasn’t ringing anymore, so all the danger’s gone for now. But, still, whoever this ‘Grazure the Third’ is, he’s one asshole to try and capture her.

She’ll share this info with her friends tomorrow. For now, the moon’s high up in the night sky, so some sleep would be nice to have!

…………………

“…Umm…Hello…?”

“……”

…Well, it’s morning now, and everyone’s awake and all that. Rei and that woman who tried to capture her last night’s also here too, but…

‘What’s with those eyes…? They’re, kinda scary~’

The woman looked, relatively the same as yesterday, but her eyes, which were moving and twirling in confusion and fear last night, was now an unmoving, dull and greyed out colour instead of the usual bright silver.

One question then: What kind of ‘Education’ was Rei talking about last night then!?

“Umm~, Rei? What did you do to her?”

“…’Educated’.”

Even Crystal was shocked when she looked up to see this woman, here eyes all greyed and dead. Her clothing had also gone a similar treatment. Her armour was already damaged, because of her corrosive slime, but her remaining clothing was all torn and her pants was all but rags, all barely holding on together with that white panties she’s wearing underneath.

“Oi, what kind of ‘education’ are you talking about here?” Crystal asked as she stared into those soulless eyes. And for some reason, she seems rather excited about it, which is…weird.

“…[Infect].” Rei replied as she lifted the corners of her mouth, showing the sharp teeth she had, which then meant that…

“S-She’s a zombie now!?”

And there ya go. Out of the three, only Anna was surprised and terrified at the zombified woman standing before her. Crystal and Diana were stupefied, but quickly recovered. After all, it’s just zombie, right? They’re nothing but cannon fodder to them now!

For further info, here’s the description on the skill:

[Infect]

Lv 7/10

A typical skill normally used by zombies to turn other living creatures to their kind. Its mechanisms differ slightly for each individual, but it usually requires the user to inject their bodily fluids, usually saliva, into the target’s body to slowly turn them. With enough training, this skill can be used to ‘condition’ enemies by slowly corrupting their mind.

Despite now being classified as a ‘zombie’, the woman’s skin wasn’t rotting like normal zombies and she definitely wasn’t smelling badly. Which then meant that Rei went with the latter option, and ‘conditioned’ this woman by biting her(probably).

Diana still somewhat doubted that her [Infect] skill did all that, but she won’t inquire further.

“Hey hey~, does this girl regenerate like you?”

Crystal asked with expectant eyes. Again, Diana wasn’t too sure what’s on her mind right now, but she won’t ask about it.

“…Yes.”

“Alright!”

Yep, she’s way too excited for this. Well, the questions can be saved for later. For now, she had some information to relay back to her friends.

“Oh, right! I have something to tell to everyone!”

“Huh? What is it?”

“So~, last night, I got attacked by this woman, and she said that she came from this kingdom called [Albion]. The king there, I think his name is…something the third, I forgot, he sent her to capture me and make me his slave.”

And from there, she got three different opinions on what to do now. First, from Anna, since she knew well what this kingdom was, she suggested that they steer clear and away from it.

From her memory, this kingdom was a mercenary kingdom, built up from the remnants of war and the people there spend their days and nights fighting. The hierarchy there is based from an individual’s power, the more power the have, the higher they stand.

Crystal was quite ‘angry?’ at her being attacked by them, and wanted to just take a stroll there and rain down unlimited death with her [Phantom Blades]. She did say she’s ‘angry’, but she looks more excited than anything else.

And Rei wanted them to go there and destroy the kingdom and eat them all, a typical answer from her. Which, now that she thought about it, isn’t that basically the same as Crystal’s?

She’s also quite angry and somewhat wanted to take the fight to them, but let’s not do that yeah? War’s not the answer to everything, or so she convinced herself.

Anyways, that info relay done and over with, it’s onwards with the usual routine! Rei stays put in this camp for now with a small dogoo to accompany her, while Diana and the rest went to the town to sell the monster parts and maybe find a new destination to head to.

And after they got there and sold off all their stuff, she did!

The kingdom’s name was [Gazelle], which was…an odd name to use for a kingdom, but she’s not judging. According to the receptionists, it’ll take 2 weeks to the south to reach it.

But hey! Even Diana could move faster than a horse now, so they should reach it faster than 2 weeks! Well, but someone would have to spend the entire time carrying Anna while running, since her speed’s the slowest out of all of them.

And that’s exactly what they’ll be doing!

After they finished up Anna’s training, they quickly sold off all the monster parts they got, bought some bread and other long-term foods, and went back to the camp to have some dinner and sleep.

The dinner this time is chicken stock by the way!

And by chicken, I mean that giant bird-like monster they encountered in the forest that Diana butchered and put into a small pot and boiled.

Anyways, some nice dreams later, morning arrives, the sun waved hello, and the team finally embarks on their journey to [Gazelle]!

With Crystal carrying her bag of food and cooking utensils, and Anna being carried on Rei’s back, they journeyed on, full-throttle!

Well, Rei still needed to slow herself down, since, one, Crystal and Diana’s speed weren’t as high as hers, and two, Anna fainted once because of the immense speed. Still, even with their speed lowered, they were still movin’ pretty damn fast.

I’d say…as fast as a dirt bike. Or maybe slightly faster than that.

If they kept the pace, which she was sure they won’t, they’ll reach the kingdom in about 5 or 6 days.

Oh, and that woman(whose name she still didn’t know) was keeping up with them, which was a pleasant surprise. She did have quite a nice build, and she was most likely a knight of some sort before this, so it made some sense.

Now, onwards!

……

Or that’s what she wanted to say, but…

It hasn’t even been 2 hours, and they’re already getting side-tracked!

When they were running, Rei smelled something good cooking in the distance. See, it’s getting near to noon, and they haven’t eaten their breakfast yet, so they’re pretty hungry. After spending some time debating the choices, they decided to go and ‘investigate’.

Hiding under a nearby hill, they saw two men sitting around a fire, with something being cooked over it.

They were both wearing clean full-body armour, and they both had a crest on their chest that looked quite similar to the one the woman had back then.

Which meant, that those two were in some way related to this woman or the kingdom of [Albion]. Well, they’re conversation was innocent enough, with them talking about what kind of women they liked the best, and they didn’t seem to be hostile.

That is, until she heard this.

“Hey, I wonder if Lady Paulena is done with killing the ‘monster’ the king told us about.”

“Meh, she probably did. If that ‘monster’ is still alive, we’ll just go and kill ‘em, right?”

“You got that right.”

Okay then, seems like these two were hostile after all. Actually, she wasn’t that sure, they could be talking about something completely different here, but she couldn’t do anything anyways.

Because Rei had already charged in and killed them.

A short scream echoed out through the grassy hills for no one else to hear, as the two men fell limp on the grass with their blood soaking into the grass. And in typical Rei fashion, she immediately tore off the armour they wore and ate them up.

“Ouh~…The meat’s all bloody…”

Sadly, their splash of blood did mean that some of that gooey blood made it onto the fire, which put it out, and onto the meat, which made the taste somewhat sour and salty.

And their problems weren’t even over!

Because suddenly, a ring from her [Danger Perception] came into Diana’s mind, and by reflex, she turned around, to see a young boy, probably around his 18’s, with short dark blue hair and pale yellow eyes, staring fearfully at her with a sword in hand.

“I-I-I’m I-Ilgua! C-C-Come a-and f-f-fight me, m-m-monster!!!”

“…Eh?”