Magic Academy Bans Harem

Chapter 23, Animal World

At first, the goddess of bathing was still making sarcastic remarks. She said that she had a lot of experience in the game, and had seen people fight slimes, catch house birds, and even kill monsters to the maximum level in the woods at the entrance of the novice village. But she had never seen anyone playing stealth with a group of monsters in the woods at the entrance of the novice village.

However, as Ritas went deeper, the Bathing Goddess gradually became silent, and finally she simply praised Ritas.

"Don't mention it, your method is quite useful."

The reason why the Bathing Goddess's attitude changed so obviously was because Ritas encountered too many monsters along the way.

Ritas no longer cautiously crouched in the bushes, and basically moved in a straight line towards the deeper part of the dense forest. In other words, the number of monsters he could encounter along the way might not even be one or two in a hundred. Even so, the number of those monsters easily reached three digits.

Ritas didn't want to imagine how many monsters were active in the entire dense forest at this moment.

Could it be that there is something like a new labyrinth core here?

As his inner uneasiness grew stronger, Ritas discovered a trivial matter.

That is the vision of the Bathing Goddess, which seems very broad.

It was already nightfall, and the Shadow Mist Forest was filled with thick fog. Ritas was able to ensure that his vision was not restricted by magic. And the Bathing Goddess seemed to have done nothing special, and she could always see places outside of Ritas's vision.

It seems that this is one of the powers possessed by the Goddess of Bathing?

No matter how bad the surrounding environment is, the vision will not be affected.

Such a weak power.

After going forward for a distance, Ritas found a natural large tree hole and hid himself inside.

"Well, I think it's better to turn back. The monsters here are so numerous that you can only see them in a losing battle where the monsters spawn endlessly."

Seeing that Ritas had stopped, the Bathing Goddess, perhaps sensing that he was about to give up, gave a suggestion.

"Indeed, it is too dangerous to continue to move forward blindly into the depths. My magic is only effective for a limited time."

Ritas, or the Horned Rabbit, nodded and said in a muffled voice,

"It's just that I want to collect some important, absolute information before I leave. The only information I have collected now is the number of abnormal monsters."

"Isn't there information that the rabbits have been multiplying in the surrounding area for several months?"

Ritas was silent for a moment, not paying attention to the interruption of the Bathing Goddess, and continued,

"Also, the monsters are showing abnormalities."

"abnormal?"

"Bath Goddess, how many kinds of monsters have you encountered along the way?"

"Uh, who can remember all these, more than ten or twenty kinds?"

"Thirty-seven in total."

Ritas said with certainty,

"Don't you find it strange? Monsters also retain some of the habits of animals. So, under normal circumstances, they will naturally fight for territory and hunt each other. Monsters of the same tribe may not be very friendly to each other, let alone so many different kinds of monsters."

"Well, I haven't seen monsters fighting each other in the game. However, according to the normal ecological environment, what you said does make sense. The real problem here is not that there are too many species, but that they are too dense."

"Besides that, these monsters have one thing in common, which is also very strange. That is, they are all 'animal-type' monsters. Along the way, the Bathing Goddess should not have seen monsters other than insect-type, plant-type, elemental-type, etc., right?"

". Now that you mention it, it's true. Ah, how should I put it, I can usually detect it, but today I'm not in a good state. I just took a shower and I feel a little sleepy."

I'm not blaming him, so why is he trying to make excuses?

Ritas complained in his heart, and then said,

"In this case, I can only think of one possibility. That is, these monsters may have been commanded or controlled by the same will, so they gathered densely in an area in a way that goes against their instincts. Just like the only one who can gather the incompatible knights into the same camp is the lord who governs them."

“Has anyone ever told you that you’re not very good at giving examples?”

".My inclination is the latter, they are being controlled. Because, these monsters look dull, low in aggression, and lack vitality. Therefore, the information obtained from the magic horned rabbit can basically be discarded. Since there is a will that controls the monsters to gather in the Shadow Mist Forest, then, regardless of the habits of the magic horned rabbits and whether they are adults or not, they will be forcibly recruited. There are actually many manifestations of this, such as the fire snakes encountered before. Just think about it and you will know that a monster that can spit out large-scale flames at any time cannot survive in the woods."

".Hey, hey~"

The Bathing Goddess seemed to mutter to herself, "Are we really seeing the same things?", then she cleared her throat and continued,
"Is all this information not enough? Are you surprised that you are the kind of adventurer who will not come out unless he explores the maze 100%?"

What kind of adventurer is that? Sounds like a short-lived one.

Ritas thought so and shook his head.
"It's probably not enough. At this level, the Academy's 'Crown Council' probably won't ask for help from Spring City or the Kingdom."

"Is this true? The administrators of your academy are really careless."

The Bathing Goddess commented sharply.

Although Ritas seemed to have always blamed the dean for all the problems in the academy, in fact, it was just that Levis' presence was too strong, so all the problems in the academy were covered up.

Just as Ritas was staring at the scene outside the tree hole, thinking about whether to turn back or take the risk and continue looking for information that would attract the attention of the academy, an unusual scene caught his attention.

It was a queue of monsters, with dozens of monsters of different kinds gathered in the queue, including those flying in the sky and crawling on the ground.

The monsters in the queue were obviously not in good condition, and they were wobbling a bit, which made the already untidy queue even more chaotic. Moreover, as the monsters moved around the area, new monsters continued to join the queue.

If you look closely, you can see that at the front of the monster queue, acting as the "locomotive" is a cluster of strange, flashing green light.

"Hey, Xiao Li, did you see that green light? Is that the thing you mentioned, the mastermind behind controlling monsters and gathering monsters?"

"."

Ritas continued to observe calmly, while using magic to strengthen his five senses.
"wrong."

After seeing the figure in the green light and hearing its voice, Ritas immediately moved.

I saw that the appearance of the magic horned rabbit of Ritas had shrunk rapidly, becoming a form that was more suitable for movement and closer to the human body. Then, several rays of light of strengthening magic flashed on the rabbit's body one after another.

In the dense forest of shadow fog that night, a cat-like monster named Ghost Claw was wandering aimlessly.

This ghost claw itself was not very intelligent, not to mention that it was being controlled. But even so, it felt that it had seen an incredible scene.

First, a fierce wind suddenly blew up without warning in the forest that was sheltered from the wind, blowing the monsters in the area into pieces.

Immediately afterwards, a long-legged horned rabbit stood upright on its feet, swinging its arms left and right, running very fast in the strong wind.

"Meow!"

As Youzhua couldn't help but scream, the strange magic horned rabbit jumped high in the wind, picked up a green object, and disappeared in a flash. In the new hidden place, Ritas had returned to the appearance of a normal magic horned rabbit.

"Phew, luckily you're back. You may not have seen it yourself, but you looked like you were wearing a bunny tights just now, so disgusting. Especially when you were running, I almost wanted to call the police."

"."

Ritas pretended not to hear and turned his attention to the thing he had "brought" back.

In the green light that flickered from time to time, there was a palm-sized frog. The most distinctive feature of this frog was probably the two pairs of wings on its back.

At this moment, the frog was kowtowed to Ritas repeatedly with extremely human movements.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, please let me go, please let me go, don't eat me, don't eat me, I'm not tasty at all, I'm not tasty at all."

"you"

"If you must eat it, I know where the queen's nectar is hidden. Don't eat me, don't eat me. If you don't like nectar, you can eat the queen. The queen is more delicious than me."

“.”「.”

Ritas and the Bathing Goddess had naturally guessed the identity of the flying frog in front of them. However, they both had the idea of throwing the flying frog back into the monster pile.

"You should be Topa, right? I was commissioned by Ruby, your queen, to come find you."

Fortunately, Ritas's emotions are always so stable.

".Eh? Can the Queen command monsters now? Or are you lying to me? Lying to me won't make me tastier."

Flying Frog, or Topa, raised his head, stared at Ritas blankly, and said vigilantly.

"I am a human mage. For safety reasons, I disguised myself as a monster."

Ritas explained patiently.

"Oh - they are human mages. They love being ordered around by the queen."

"."

"Does a human mage also think it's safe to dress up as a monster? I thought the same as you did. I'm pretty smart after all."

After a few words, Topa, who had completely let down his guard, jumped left and right a few times and said proudly.

"."

For a moment, even the Bathing Goddess felt that there were too many complaints and she didn't know where to start.

This frog with wings is actually pretending to be a monster?

Not to mention how this monster is dressed, the light this guy emits is like a train, okay?
"Are all fairies like this? No, I mean fairies have the ability to transform?"

"The fairy tribe has a special illusion ability. The way it manifests is usually through self-transformation, light emission, and sound. And... they are all like this. Their brains are not even as big as a fingernail, but they think they are very smart. In addition, because fairies are weak, they are generally very timid. Ruby, who will take the initiative to show up in front of others and talk, is an outlier among fairies. This may be one of the reasons why she can call herself the queen."

Ritas said, raising his chin in the direction of Topa, as if silently saying, "Look, this silly girl can't even tell we're talking about her in person."

The Bathing Goddess found it incredible because she seemed to see a silly expression on a frog's face.

"Um, Miss Toppa, can I ask why you are here?"

"It's like this. A few days ago, a tree spirit at the edge of the fairy kingdom said that it found something wrong. The queen asked me to go take a look, and when I saw it, it was a monster! Then I immediately planned to go back and report to the queen. However, no matter how hard I tried to fly back, I couldn't get back. There were more and more monsters along the way. Did the fairy kingdom fall, and did the queen and the others move away?"

Is it possible that you are lost?
On this day, it was as if I was watching a fantasy version of the bathing goddess in the animal world, and I also saw a "horned rabbit" that couldn't help but hold its forehead with its paws.

"You must be in a lot of pain, Professor Lee."

"I will take you to the Queen's new home."

Ritas said in a somewhat weak voice.

Although I was unable to collect more information that the academy could take seriously, finding Toppa was considered a mission accomplished.

So, it's almost time to go back.

"Okay, okay, hurry up, there's a place over there where monsters keep popping up. If you walk too slowly, you might be too late!"

Topa slapped the ground with his flippers and said with lingering fear.

"What.?"

Upon hearing this information, Ritas's "rabbit eyes" widened slightly.

"Um, Xiao Li, are you sure it's okay to follow the path she points to?"

"."

In the Shadow Mist Forest, Ritas, who was galloping along the forest path in the form of a horned rabbit, didn't know how to respond.

Originally, he only planned to let Topa give him a rough indication of the route, and then let Topa go back by himself.

However, seeing that he pointed to the left one second ago and Topa flew to the right the next second, he decided to take Topa with him and go deeper into the Shadow Mist Forest to check the place where "monsters kept popping up".

"The Kind Rabbit"

"what's up?"

Although Ritas introduced himself to Toppa, he didn't expect the fairy to remember his name.

"I'm hungry. I'm hungry. I haven't eaten in two days."

"Really? What a coincidence, I'm hungry too. By the way, Miss Toppa, do you know? Frog meat seems to be a very good ingredient."

For a moment, the atmosphere in the venue became dead silent.

On Ritas's back, Flying Frog seemed to remember his position and lowered his body very low.

The exploration journey, without further ado, lasted for nearly an hour.

Just when Ritas thought that Topa, who seemed to be pointing the way randomly on his back, might really need some warmth and tolerance brought by the pot, Ritas, who passed through another forest path, suddenly saw a bright view in front of him.

"This is."

After being stunned for a few seconds, Ritas suddenly realized the scene happening in the basin-shaped terrain and his scalp went numb.

(End of this chapter)