Rise of the Eromancer

Chapter 39: Maximum Effort

"Are these all the items the new recruits brought?"

"Yes, Ma'am!"

"Zeus, shit! I am right in front of you, you dumb squid. You don't have to shout!"

"Y-yes, Ma'am."

"Where is Rhys Wilder's bag?"

And while the new recruits were fighting for their lives and being gnawed and chased by 2-headed dogs, Commander Ayesha was inside their tent, leisurely examining their bags.

This is not against the constitution, of course, as members of Underworld Corps have already waived their rights as soon as they stepped inside the branch.

"Why are there so many beds here? Where is Rhys Wilder's bag?" Commander Ayesha repeated her words as she dropped a bag full of erotic magazines.

"The Lowborn, Ma'am?"

"Do you want to be born again?" Commander Ayesha snarled at the officer behind her.

"No, Ma'am," the officer stood up straight, "The bed at the end of the tent, Ma'am."

"...Why was he put—Nevermind," Ayesha scoffed as she started walking to the bed assigned to Rhys, "I was told he brought a knife? Why wasn't it confiscated?"

"It wasn't a knife, Ma'am."

"Let me guess, something smaller?" Ayesha crouched on the floor as she reached Rhys's bed and started neatly removing his items. Fortunately for Ayesha, Rhys did not even bring a lot.

"What a boring bag..." Ayesha grabbed something shining within his cloth, "...but the only one actually worth looking through. Private, do you know what this is!?"

"I'm... I'm a captain, Ma'am."

"Gods damn it, did I ask for your rank!?"

"N-no, Ma'am! That seems to be a scalpel, Ma'am!"

"Damn right, it is!"

"Ma'am!? What are you–!!!" The poor officer could really only back away as Ayesha started swinging the scalpel through Rhys's assigned bed, completely shredding it into pieces. Suffice it to say, the officer just chose to shut his mouth from now on.

"Hm. Sharp," Ayesha brushed the tip of her finger on the blade of the scalpel, "Very sharp."

And as blood started trickling from her finger, Ayesha just looked at it before wiping the droplet of blood on the officer's uniform.

"Do you know how many blades can cut through my skin now, Private?"

"N—"

"But do you know what's more interesting?" Ayesha did not let the officer answer as she started returning Rhys's things in his bag, "I heard a report that Rhys was the only survivor in a certain incident. A cafeteria filled with kids mutilated and dismembered, more than 40 of them."

"I heard about that, Ma'am," the officer sighed, "It was... most unfortunate. I heard more than a hundred students died when the arachn—"

"The kids in the cafeteria were not killed by those ugly spiders," Ayesha shook her head and handed Rhys's bag to the officer, "No matter how much one tries to imitate a wound inflicted by monsters, they won't be able to do it with a knife — especially with something so sharp it could even cut my skin."

"Wait..." The officer's eyes widened as he looked Ayesha in the eyes, "...Are you saying he—"

"Am I saying something, Private?" Ayesha glared at the officer.

"No, Ma'am," the officer's voice turned deep as he stood straight.

"Good, bring Rhys's things to a private tent next to mine."

"On the Surface...?"

"No, are you stupid? New recruits are not allowed in the surface."

"...But you live in the Command building here, Ma'am."

"Right. Then just set him up with the Bald and Pervert duo," Ayesha waved her hand as she started walking away, "And clean this up, will you?"

"..." And as Ayesha stepped out of the tent, the officer could really only look around at the mess she made, clothes and other... dubious objects,

"...But I'm a captain already."

***

A few kilometers outside the base of the Underworld corps, a loud bang thundered across the thick forest; rustling the leaves that were just peacefully resting on their branches.

The perpetrator of their disturbance; Rhys shooting at a dozen dogs and missing each one of them. To his credit, he was running for his life.

"!!!"

And as an orthros suddenly leaped out of the tree in front of him, Rhys could really only slide across the moist ground; his gun, however, was pointed straight at the lunging dog's throat — he fired twice on each throat, finally killing another one of them, once again at point blank.

"Phoo..." Rhys let out a long and deep breath as he quickly pushed the dog away, before glancing at the pack that suddenly halted their steps upon seeing Rhys kill another one of them. Rhys looked at the orthros that had hearts floating above its head, before pointing the gun at the dog next to it...

...only for his gun to click and not fire anything.

"..." Rhys batted his eyes a couple of times as he stared back and forth between his gun and the pack of growling two-headed dogs... before just once again suddenly running away again.

He was ordered to lure the dogs back to the base, and that is what he is going to do — but not before trying to figure out how to at least fill one of the hearts of the female orthros.

[...Arise,] Rhys whispered as his exhaustion was completely washed away. Once again, [Arise] proved to be his most useful skill.

But it wasn't his only useful ability. Rhys continued to run for a few more minutes — only to pass by and leap over the 2-headed he just killed. And then, with a breath that almost filled his lungs in an instant, he suddenly crouched down while pulling his hands closer together. He let out a loud roar as the veins on his muscular arms showed themselves.

Rhys seemed to struggle, unable to clasp his hands together as his fingers were slightly bent back.

"Graah!" But soon, with another forceful roar, Rhys was finally able to put his hands together — creating a whistling noise that whispered throughout the sea of trees around him.

"Ho..." Rhys breathed heavily for a couple of seconds before calming down completely and wiping the sweat away from his forehead. He then very slowly turned around...

...only to be welcomed by the view of the red orthroses floating in the air, all of them. All of them were whining and whimpering with their high-pitched voices. And they were not really floating, no.

As Rhys started approaching them, light began reflecting the threads that were latched around their bodies, completely entangling them tight to the point blood started to travel across the threads, the spider's web. Or in this case, Rhys's web.

"I am truly sorry for this," Rhys let out a small sigh as he approached one of the whimpering orthros, "I am just trying to survive."

Rhys then raised his palm, and as he did so, the dust that dirtied his palm rose up as a sharp hint of wind started to form on top of it.

Wind control, the ability he received from Lina.

"Eros deemed my life more worthy than yours," and with a quiet whisper, Rhys formed his hand into a gun, shooting a sharp blast of wind right through one of the two-headed dog's eyes — and then another for its other head.

Several more whistles flew in the air as Rhys started killing the other orthros, leaving the only female in the pack.

"Now..." Rhys stared at the female orthros, not knowing which eye to look at, "...How do I even begin to tame you? Perhaps I should let you go fi—!!!"

And before Rhys could finish his words, he saw both the heads of the orthros explode right in front of him, instantly disappearing as they were replaced by a single fist, a familiar fist and an arm filled with scars.

"..." Rhys blinked a couple of times, before very slowly turning his head toward the owner of the fist, only to see Commander Ayesha shaking her head at him.

"Stop torturing the dogs, Recruit," Commander Ayesha let out a sigh of disapproval.

"I... wasn't," Rhys once again blinked as all of his hard work just... faded away, "I wasn't torturing the dogs, Ma'am."

"Well, can't blame me for suspecting... You have a track record, after all," a smile very slowly crawled on Commander Ayesha's face as she looked at Rhys from head to toe, before looking at the corpses of the other orthroses, "But interesting...

...Wind control, now where did that come from?"