I scanned my surroundings, analysing the elevated positions that should have sight upon the bandit camp, and there really was only one place that could be used as an observation outpost for this purpose around here…

  But who am I kidding? I am thinking like I don’t already know that one person is watching from afar. I obviously know, they are shitting bricks in fear after witnessing the murders, and that fear is telling me exactly where they are standing.

  I am merely pretending not to actually realise where they are, so instead of making a beeline right at them, I rushed into the nearby woods and disappeared from their sight, but took a direction that would imply that I was leaving the area.

  Instantly, I could feel them calm down a bit, but the thread of fear wasn’t going to disappear so easily. Using the trees as cover, I looped around right back onto them. It seems like they were busy gathering their stuff, or perhaps they had simply decided to stay in place for a little while before reporting.

  Hopefully, they don’t have one of those magic items that lets you project your voice through another item. It would be pretty bad if my identity as ‘The Silent Knightess’ were blown in this manner.

  Unfortunately, I couldn’t tell by gauging their nervousness, as this negative emotion wouldn’t be directed at me, especially after making them believe that I had left. Otherwise, I would probably be able to tell if they were extremely nervous. Then it would be clear that their mission wasn’t done, and thus, that they probably didn’t have that wretched tool available.

  I don’t know how available or common those things are nowadays… With some luck, the guys who make them kept the monopoly and maintained the prices ridiculously high…

  I peered my head from behind a tree, getting a direct line of sight on a young-looking man who was dressed in some sort of camouflage attire, featuring twigs, leaves, and grass. He was putting stuff inside a bag with shaky arms and a pale face. He looked like he was going to puke.

  Looking closer, I was able to tell that this fellow still had a soft face and probably couldn’t grow anything close to a proper beard.

  Mmh… A young guard trainee? And they made him take care of surveying the area? I guess they thought that it was risk-free…

  The small hill he and I were currently upon was a fair distance away from the bandit camp. It was reasonable to assume that the vast majority of people wouldn’t notice a thing. I wasn’t the vast majority of people, though. I am Mara Maeve Maya Nebulo! And I do not like being watched and observed like this…

  If you were admiring my physical qualities at least, I would understand… This was just surveillance in the view of snitching on my murders. How ungentlemanly.

  I quietly walked up to the youthful guard. His spatial awareness was laughably nonexistent, probably because he was more focused on keeping his last meal inside his stomach… What did I even do that could cause such an exaggerated response anyway? A little bit of dismembering, disembowelling, or decapitating is nothing.

  I tapped my foot against the ground, getting the young man’s attention.

  “Wh-”

  I grabbed him by the throat and lifted his feet off the ground.

  He tried punching me in the face, but all that did was hurt his knuckles. I squeezed his neck until he passed out.

  I’ll have some questions for him later… For now, let me check if he had the dreaded items amongst his stuff…

  It would seem that the local authorities are either unwilling to invest in one, or that they were not willing to hand such an item to a soft-faced trainee

  Indeed, that’s good news.

  The contents of the backpack lay spread out on the ground. Turns out the observer had only had a spyglass and other miscellaneous items, so my secret identity was at no risk whatsoever. Sure, some people would wonder what happened to the adventurers I had been with, but good thing I literally couldn’t speak.

  Once the battlefield was cleaned up, there would be no evidence of wrongdoing anywhere to be found…

  ___

  “Ah!”

  With a frightened shout, the young trainee awoke. His neck was aching from having been brutally compressed, and try as he might, he was stuck in place. His body was tied up with some chains to a tree.

  Some time had passed since he had lost consciousness. The sky was a bright orange. The sun was setting, and night was rolling over the horizon…

  “You slept–slept well? I didn’t ch–choke you that hard–d…”

  An ignoble, abject creature suddenly appeared within the young man’s vision. It’s piercing purple eyes like beacons amidst its shadow-covered face… Its maw was so absurdly large that it seemed like it would be capable of swallowing him whole.

  “W-What are you?”

  He stuttered, but the monster wasn’t alone. What looked like the corpses of young women appeared alongside the creature, and one of them immediately punched him in the stomach hard enough to make him puke.

  “Now, Elowen… Pu–Punch him when I tell you–you to”

  The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  “But… Big… Sis… He… Asked… What… You… Were… Like… You… Are… A… Creature… That’s… Disrespectful…”

  The ‘Big Sis’ patted the redheaded corpse girl’s head with her monstrously large hand.

  “Now… N–Now… Ou–Our friend over her–re is merely a bit confused, isn’t he–he?”

  The trainee coughed as he still reeled from the gut punch. He hadn’t been expecting so much strength to be behind it, and he could only nod to go along with what the monster was saying.

  “I kn–know you’re lying, b–but let’s get on with it. What were you do–doing here?”

  “I… I was here to observe and report on a fight between a bandit leader who calls himself ‘The Dragon’ and a group of adventurers… There… There is a dangerous man who gives himself the same title but… But this guy clearly wasn’t the real deal! The real one is said to be able to turn into a dragon and to be a match for the likes of Salael Vomhargon!”

  “I–Is that ri–right? So–o–o–o… You were using the adventurers as bait to check whether it was the re–real guy?”

  “W-Well… Yes… But everyone sort of already knew that it was a fraud, so they sent me–A trainee, to check… It’s more of a punishment for me, rather than a genuine job…”

  The young man did his best to explain, but the monster’s mood was completely unreadable, putting him on edge the entire time. Especially as it slightly moved its murderous maw every once in a while.

  Moreover, he was rather confused. He had been attacked by the knightess and was now being interrogated by an abomination accompanied by corpse-looking girls. Where had the knightess gone?

  “Ah, I se–see. So no one else is nearby, heh?”

  He swallowed his saliva upon hearing the more than ominous sentence.

  Why did it sound like the monster was a bit disappointed about that, though? Had it been hoping for reinforcements to show up? What kind of lunatic would want to deal with such a problem?

  “W–W–Well… Since there won’t be fun that way–ay. Why don’t you t–tell me what you th–think of the knightess?”

  “Pardon?”

  “You he–heard me correctly. What do you think of her? Did you find it exciting to s–see her fight? A–rou–sing perhaps?”

  “Huh…”

  “ANSWER. If you l–lie or tr–try to evade the questions… Elowen will start turning your man-pouch into mashed po–potatoes”

  The trainee visibly paled under the threat. He glanced at the redhead and could already see her practising her kicks. He could only wonder what he had done to deserve this.

  “I…I mean… I guess strong women are quite attractive… And- And… The Silent Knightess has… Oh gods… She has very alluring shapes even in her armour…”

  The monster was just nodding along whilst one of its fingers tapped against its chin, creating a low ringing with every tap.

  “Go in–into more details”

  “More?”

  “More. Tell me what you like specifically”

  “I… I barely saw her! I really don’t really know what I-”

  The redhead stepped forward.

  “-Wait, wait, wait, wait! Her hips! It's her hips, alright?! Like… Her silhouette is great, but it all comes together exceptionally nicely because of her hips! The hips-to-waist ratio is just perfect for her height and body type! I don’t know what she looks like without armour, but it looks like the plates are fairly close to the body, so I like… She’s… She’s super sexy! Is that what you wanted to hear me say?!”

  “I admit it, I am into it! Please… Could you just let me live? I beg of you!”

  ___

  Heh… I knew it, but it’s always good to hear it from someone else’s mouth! Just as I thought, the hips are what seal the deal, just like when I was a human, that’s where the magic happens.

  For some reason, forcing this young man to admit to that feels worse than if you had tortured him in an excruciating manner…

  Listen, Nara. I don’t know why it’s so hard for him to just come out and admit that he likes attractive women. I swear, have people become prudes or something? They are always happy to tell everyone that they are having a baby, but explaining why you find a woman attractive is too much? One of those options is literally advertising that you’ve mated!

  It’s just like when a couple says they’re trying to have a baby. Oh wow, how great! Now I know that you’re doing it like rabbits, very interesting, I really needed to know that! Damned bastards.

  Anyway… As I was saying, it’s always good to hear that you are, in fact, incredibly attractive. You know, Nara, as a human, I also used to have very nice hips. It is a bit hard to see inside my mindscape since I am always wearing that long coat.

  I do have full knowledge of your physiology as a human, I can confirm

  But you see, I also had rather wide shoulders, which were very helpful for showing off my muscles and beating people unconscious, but when standing normally with my arms along the sides of my body, my shoulders would sort of make it seem like my hips weren’t as impressive as they were, get what I am saying?

  I do

  So to really show off, I would have to raise and really extend my arms as much as possible to make my shoulders look smaller, and then you would really be able to see just how glorious my hips-to-waist ratio was.

  That makes perfect sense, but why are you telling me this?

  It’s just small talk, Nara. And I believe that beauty is of tremendous importance, which is why I care a lot about it. So you see, my knightly form is attractive to men because the body type that I have is slim, but with proportionally wide hips. Nothing is detracting from it in this form, unlike when I was a human. Their gaze instantly locks onto my lower body and hypnotises them even though I am not even swinging them from side to side when walking.

  So, if you ever get the occasion to create yourself a physical body, do keep this in mind.

  Anyway…

  I grabbed the trainee’s head and twisted it like I was trying to open a bottle of wine. Since it seemed like no more food would show up, it was time to go back to the city. I had already cleaned up the bandit camp whilst this guy was asleep.

  There should be nothing left behind. I had been meticulous in not leaving even a drop of blood.

  A new upgrade is available, Mara. This guy was just enough experience

  Fantastic.

  “Big sis! Why did you kill him? Was he a bad guy?”

  Ophelie could speak far more clearly than the others and was quite the curious little gal.

  “I t–tell you, it isn’t a ma-matter of being bad. It is a matter–er of being against us… But you can think they are bad if you w–want, Ophelie”

  “Alright! Then he was very bad”

  I pinched her face slightly.

  “Let’s go-go back, girls”