“……!”

She remembered the bastard’s face.

It was the bastard who had stabbed her elder brother in the stomach when he was already half-dead.

This demon! I’ll kill him!

“Aaaaaaaaaaaaargh!”

With a strange sound, the gag in her mouth was torn off.

At the same time fear entered the eyes of the man holding the knife to her, he stepped back. And at that moment, Chloe felt an immense heat exploding inside her and her head spun.

“Argh! It’s a tiger. She turned into a tiger!”

The three men were backing away. Chloe charged at the bastard who had killed her elder brother. She wasn’t even aware that her body had already become a tiger’s. She was only possessed by the single thought of biting that demon to death.

Crunch!

By the time she came to her senses, the demon’s neck was already in her mouth.

“……!”

For a moment, Chloe felt like she had been struck by lightning and released the man’s neck. The man was groaning and writhing, bright red blood gushing from his neck. Seeing that, Chloe started to back away.

What have I done? What did I…? That man, I……!

“That tig…er…, ki…ll…it……”

The man spitting blood glared at her and said something. She couldn’t understand what he was saying. It felt like her mind had completely stopped.

I…… a person……, aah! I……!

The two men she hadn’t attacked yet looked at her like that. There was both fear and murderous intent in their eyes. They started approaching with their knives drawn. She vaguely realized they were trying to kill her.

But she couldn’t back away any further. She couldn’t move an inch. Her body was trembling and she felt like she would cry. The distance between them and her was gradually narrowing.

Now that knife would fly into her tiger body. One step, then another.

“Chloe!”

What is this sound? This is……

The moment she realized it was Hugrey’s voice, she heard the roar of beasts and suddenly appearing black, huge lumps flew at the men who had come right in front of her.

Wolves…… lions?

She couldn’t tell if her mind had gone hazy or her vision had blurred. In the moonlit woods, the sight of the men being mauled by the wolves and lions dimly faded.

Those men already seemed dead……

But the wolves and lions were still mauling them. Even the remaining man who had slumped down after she bit his neck.

Chloe’s eyes slowly closed as she watched the unrealistic and terrifying brutality.

Her elder brother’s battered appearance, the blood coming from the man’s neck where the tiger’s fangs had sunk in, the lions and wolves mauling the already dead men.

Ah…… no, I don’t want to see anymore. It hurts. It hurts. It hurts too much. It hurts, I said it hurts!

“It huuuuurts!”

Chloe screamed and her eyes flew open.

“Chloe!”

Hugrey was in front of her eyes.

“Hugrey?”

“Yes, Chloe. Chloe, it’s okay now.”

Hugrey hugged her.

“What…… what’s okay?”

Chloe asked blankly, tears streaming from her eyes.

“Everything’s okay, I’m glad you’re safe. So don’t worry, Chloe.”

Hugrey held Chloe tightly and muttered as he stroked her back.

“What……”

Nothing is okay. Elder brother is dead, she killed a person, and the wolves and lions kept killing the dead people.

“Chloe, you’re okay.”

Hugrey whispered again.

“What? They’re all dead. They all died……”

“Yes, those bastards are dead. Even the one you let live is the same. They’re all dead. So don’t be afraid.”

He said as he hugged her tighter.

“Who did I let live? I couldn’t even save elder brother. I killed a monster. I…… I mauled a person.”

“Chloe. Get a hold of yourself. If you hadn’t mauled that bastard, you would have died first. And it wasn’t you who killed those bastards.”

“I killed them……”

She saw the blood steadily flowing from that man’s neck. Blood also flowed from the arm her front paw had slashed.

But……

Ah, right, that man was alive. Even while half-dead, he had yelled that he would kill her no matter what.

“We took care of it because you didn’t kill him.”

“……We?”

She remembered the wolves and lions rushing at the man who had collapsed after she mauled him.

“Yes, we.”

So it was like that after all. The wolf was Hugrey, and the lion was Calcus.

“Chloe, go back to sleep now. You’re still recovering.”

Chloe blankly looked at Hugrey laying her back down.

“Chloe Liden, go to sleep now. Quickly. You’re going to sleep now. Don’t think about anything….. You’re sleeping. Sleep deeply and recover quickly.”

Hugrey whispered like he was singing a lullaby and covered her eyes with his large hand.

Feeling the whole world going dark again over her eyelids, Chloe fell back asleep. She couldn’t fight the strangely encroaching sleep.

Hugrey, who watched Chloe fall back asleep, quietly left the room. Although he had given her medicine made from mana cores, her body would suffer to recover and he had even given her anesthetics and sleeping pills to keep her from feeling that pain, so it wouldn’t be easy for her to come to her senses. Now that she had lost consciousness again, she wouldn’t wake up for a while.

Now it was time to meet Calcus. Calcus had moved the broken Chloe close to the Emperor’s room, the very center of the Imperial Palace, and given her mana core medicine. Fortunately, there was enough mana core medicine in the palace to give her.

After that, he handled many things as the Emperor. Due to last night’s commotion, the banquet ended immediately, and people left the palace muttering about the beast sounds coming from the direction of the Moon Garden. Saying things like beasts had entered the Moon Garden, or wondering if extinct magical beasts had come back to life.

On the other hand, the therianthropes stayed until the end and formally protested to Calcus and Hugrey. Asking if they intended to reveal the therianthropes’ secret for the sake of one woman. They even threatened that if they did such a dangerous thing again, the treaty between therianthropes would be broken before they finally left the palace.

This series of commotions was loud enough to be heard all the way to the center of the Imperial Palace where Chloe was lying, but Hugrey had been guarding only Chloe the whole time. Leaving the Emperor to handle things here since this was the Emperor’s Palace.

But from the aftermath to the mana core medicine, he owed the Emperor after all so he should go see him.

The Emperor had been summoning Hugrey for hours now. He had ignored it so far, but now that he had confirmed Chloe regaining consciousness even briefly, he could probably go meet him for a moment.

“Hmm……?”

Leaving the room where Chloe was lying and heading to the Emperor’s room, Hugrey suddenly had a strange thought.

Why have the guards increased so much?

In the corridor leading from the Emperor’s room to Chloe’s room, there was an unnaturally large number of guards standing.

Do they station armed soldiers like this near the Emperor’s private quarters? It didn’t seem like this last night.

Well, since assassins had infiltrated all the way to the Emperor’s main palace, it wasn’t a completely incomprehensible measure.

Because of those bastards yesterday, Chloe had four ribs and her right thigh broken, and even her shoulder was dislocated.

The assassins sent by Staxton seemed to have anesthetized her and then thrown her out over the balcony as is. Otherwise, her body couldn’t have been damaged to that extent.

Bastards not even worth chewing. He had made their corpses into an awful mess not even usable as fish food, but he still wasn’t satisfied. If Chloe hadn’t transformed into a tiger at that moment, she definitely would have died.

But seeing her unable to kill that bastard even after transforming into a tiger, he had only thought she couldn’t fight properly since several of her bones were already broken by then. Her body had been damaged enough that it was commendable she had transformed into a tiger and charged at those bastards.

Although pain would come as the wounds to her organs healed, since mana core medicine was used, the fractures, dislocations, and organ damage would all return to normal within a few days. That’s why he had actually thought until now that Chloe would be completely fine in a few days.

But after seeing Chloe’s words and actions after briefly regaining consciousness, he realized his guess was completely wrong.

To think she could be so hurt by something like that.

It was an emotion he hadn’t even considered, but to that woman who had never experienced killing, the act of killing itself seemed to be frightening and painful. Although she hadn’t actually killed anyone, it was her first time even trying to kill someone.

What could be done for Chloe to overcome the shock and be alright?

As he pondered while recalling the crying Chloe, he had arrived in front of the Emperor’s room before he knew it. He entered the Emperor’s room without knocking. The Emperor would already be expecting him to enter from the sound of his approaching footsteps, so he had no intention of bothering with the formality of knocking.

“Has Chloe woken up?”

“Yes, but she fell back asleep.”

“If you saw her wake, then leave for the Ulpaz Duchy now. That’s what I called you to talk about.”

“What? What are you saying?”

Hugrey asked back, sincerely wondering if he had misheard.

“I’ve already been lenient in keeping you in my palace until now, so why are you so surprised? Despite the request of Chloe’s mother Charlotte Lionel, I was thinking of sending Chloe to you. Since she said she would stay by your side anyway. But what happened? You stupidly fell into Staxton’s trap and let her slip away right in front of you. I no longer think a wolf like you can properly protect Chloe. So I have no intention of sending her to you either.”

“Did you hit your head yesterday?”

Hugrey’s sincere thoughts that couldn’t be hidden at all spilled directly from his mouth.