Chapter 100 – A quarrel with the humans | Part 4/4

Sophia had finished her squabble with the humans, and it ended with every single one of them being tortured with darkness magic before she let the entire army faint. The battlefield wasn't the only quiet place, though. Not one sound could be heard from the beastfolk fort, either. Especially the observation platform was in shock, and they were unable to wrap their heads around the events.

"..." The king, Anna, and the commanders only stared in Sophia's direction with their mouths wide open.

"This idiot..." A certain cat-girl didn't stay silent, though, and let out a strained sigh while facepalming. "There's a limit to overdoing it..."

"D-D-Did... Did she really just... kill all of them...?" The princess couldn't believe it.

"E-Eh?" Maya looked at her. "Ahh, no, It's a type of air magic. Sophia can literally control the air itself. She simply got rid of it for a while, letting the humans faint."

"..."

"Well, I have a bit of a mess to clean up..." The cat-girl pointed in the exact direction of Sophia before gesturing at the rest of the battlefield. "I leave that mess to you, your Majesty."

"A-Ah, uh... s-sure..." He was still dazed.

"Alright." She left without saying anything more and slowly made her way towards Sophia, leaving the others behind.

The group around the king needed some time to fully reboot and understand what they saw.

"Uhm... I'm... I'm not dreaming, am I?" Menzor blinked a couple of times. "No, there's no way that just happened, right?"

"I-It sure did." His daughter didn't let him escape from reality.

"My head."

"Y-Your Majesty!" The commanders finally came back to their senses, as well. "W-We said it before, but this person's incredibly dangerous! I-Is it really okay for her to be around you, us?! Our Kingdom might vanish in a fit of anger of hers..."

"W-Well," He needed a moment. "There is some truth to it. She is, uhh, dangerous, but we just have to treat her with care. Sophia's very clearly on our side. As long as we don't anger her, we've found the strongest ally in our history."

"T-That is true... She, well, destroyed the humans because they looked down on us and tried to harm the beastfolk. We're just not sure if it's... worth the risk?" The commanders pointed at the battlefield and all the passed-out humans. "I don't think we can handle something of her caliber."

"It's impossible to handle her. I don't plan on that... anymore, either. I'm just happy she loves our folk, just like any member of the tiger clan should do. It's true that I want her to join the royal family and stay in the capital, but I surely won't force her. She should be introduced to the public, but if she wants to be free, there's nothing any of us could do."

"That's true."

"I'll talk to her once we're back in the castle and find out what her plans are. Though, I most likely already know her answer."

"She's... going to leave, isn't she?" Anna didn't sound happy when she replied to her father.

"Probably, yes."

"..."

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In the meanwhile, Maya had reached the place where Sophia had beaten the human generals, finally reuniting with the girl who had slightly overdone it.

"Good job, is what I want to say, but... uhh..." The cat-girl looked around and didn't know how to react to all the chaos around them. Be it the terraformed ground or the hundreds of unconscious humans in the direct vicinity, ignoring the thousands more in the further distance.

"A-Aha... haa..." Her reply was rather meek and sounded more like a sigh.

"Hmm?" Maya then noticed that her partner was looking ever so slightly pale. "Are you okay...?"

"Urgh..." Before she even gave her time to react, the blonde suddenly sunk on her knees.

"S-Sophia?!" This action caused her to immediately panic. "D-Did you get hurt somewhere?!" Maya frantically patted down the tiger-girl, searching for any injuries.

"No... as if they could've hurt me."

"B-But you're definitely feeling unwell! Don't try to hide it! Ah, could it be you ran out of magic power? That makes me feel sluggish, as well. I still feel it, though."

"No, I only used a little over a third of it... and at least a half of that is already back."

"Seriously?!" Maya was briefly amazed before going back to being concerned again. "T-Then, what is wrong...?"

"W-Well..." Sophia hesitated for a moment. "I feel kinda sick... Actually, it's like I'll throw up any moment now...." She got even paler.

"E-Eh... Why?" The cat-girl looked around to find the source of her unwell being, and her eyes stopped on the three horribly obese, pig-like goblins disguised as commanders of the human army. "Okay, I don't want to look at them, either, but it's that bad...?"

"No. Well, yes... but that's not it... uhh...." She held her stomach while paying no attention to the orcs. "I just now... realized what I did... and that made me feel incredibly sick..."

"Err..." Looking slightly confused, Maya sat down in front of the kneeling girl while gently placing one of her hands on Sophia's.

"I, well... I think my boosted anger ran out the moment I finished things up, and that made me notice just what messed up kinds of things I did."

"A-Ah..." She wasn't sure what to say because she definitely agreed with this point of view.

"Uhhh... Seriously, just what have I become?"

"Do you regret what you've done?"

"Yes! Well, no... Maybe?" She couldn't decide how to feel.

"It's not something I can answer for you."

"I know... just let me complain." Sophia didn't actually want any help. "I'm just surprised how far I'm willing to go. I managed to not kill them, but the darkness magic I used and the effects it's going to cause in them isn't much less messed-up… It's scary. I don't know, some months ago, I was so shy that I could barely interact with anyone. Right now, I'm in the middle of a battlefield filled with thousands of defeated humans, by me no less... It's hard to wrap my head around."

"W-Well,"

"Then again, aside from my family, I never had anyone to get angry for or wanted to protect... Maybe I've always been like that?"

"I'm not so sure about that..." Maya had her doubts about Sophia being able to get this angry in her old life. "Maybe you always had a strong sense of justice, though. It would explain why, with your boosts, you get so angry at humans."

"It sounds logical, yeah. In a way, I'm glad that I now have the power... and mental fortitude to do something and pull through, but uhhh... The way I end up doing things is really bad for my stomach..."

"That is very true." The cat-girl, too, had her fair share of stomach-related problems since meeting her.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"You know exactly what I mean."

"I sure do." Sophia was already able to tease her again.

"I really love how easily you recover. Feeling better now?"

"Urgh, I'm not so sure about that… I'm either way too easygoing, or Maya's too good at cheering me up."

"Yes."

"That's not... Well, whatever." The blonde gave up.

"Hehe. Anyway, now that that's taken care of, how about we leave this place? Our fellow army will most likely survey the area soon. And, most importantly, my mood's starting to turn sour because these things accidentally keep entering my vision all the time." Maya glanced at the unconscious human commanders, who really were no sights for sore eyes.

"Agreed!" The tiger-girl didn't even want to look in the same direction. "Oh, let's go to that nearby city! Nabiko, was it?"

"It's... called Talaga."

"I've heard it both ways."

"It wasn't even close."

"Shut up and help me up~." The tiger-girl raised up her arms while still kneeling on the ground.

"So spoiled. Well, it can't be helped." Saying so, Maya got up first before extending her hands to help Sophia. Without letting go of one of her hands, the couple then finally left the battlefield and all the chaos the tiger-girl made there, behind. Neither of them cared about whether or not the king still had some business with them. In fact, Sophia had completely forgotten about them at the moment. A date with her cat-girl in the nearby city she just saved was the only thing on her mind right now.

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"E-Eh, so they're just leaving…? I really have to deal with cleaning up this mess on my own...?" While the king couldn't listen to the couple back in the fort, he still saw them leaving.

"A-At least she seems okay..." Princess Anna got worried when she saw Sophia going down on her knees for a moment.

After this anticlimactic end, everyone in the beastfolk fort was at a loss.