We were moving now. I sat on Zeref's scaly hide, close to the back of his head as he slithered across the ground, Yin and Yang sitting a little behind me. The goblin riders and the wolves they rode moved around us, with Rimuru and Ranga leading the way. Honestly, I was a little surprised that Zeref could actually keep up with Ranga and the other tempest wolves; he was somewhat slower than them, of course, but the fact that he could still follow along at all was commendable to put it mildly.
Of course, the kijin also rode with us, each riding the wolf they had been given for this little outing. Well, to be more precise, only Benimaru, Hakurou, and Shion were currently present; Souei had vanished completely and was nowhere to be seen. Of course, he hadn't run off for no reason, in fact Rimuru had sent him off to stealthily scout ahead, something the blue-haired kijin was incredibly good at.
"I'm sssure it will all be fine in the end; numbersss are not everything after all," Zeref rumbled, slithering along as our conversation progressed.
"That's right, we just need to work together as a team." Yang nodded in agreement.
"Still, it's rather nerve-wracking knowing that there are thousands of cannibalistic orcs waiting for us," I muttered, trying to suppress my anxiety.
"Don't worry, Lady Suu, I'll protect you," a certain black-haired catgirl said from behind me.
"Thanks, Yin." I chuckled, reaching over to pat her head.
"Hehe." She purred happily.
(It's not myself I'm worried about, though.) I sighed inwardly, trying not to let my concern show on my face.
"Guys, we have some trouble up ahead." Rimuru's sudden announcement pulled my attention back to the present.
"What is it?" I asked, shouting over to him.
His answer was simple and straight to the point. "Souei just contacted me; he's found a group of orcs attacking a lizardman up ahead."
"We need to hurry and get over there to help out," he added, and I nodded in agreement.
"Zeref, do you think you can go a bit faster?" I asked, getting an immediate response.
"Leave it to me, my lady."
We traveled for minutes afterward, moving as fast as possible to reach the area where the battle was apparently taking place. We could smell it long before it came into view, the blood I mean. At first I panicked a little, thinking maybe we were too late, but then they came into view. Scattered across the ground were dozens upon dozens of corpses: dismantled pig-like creatures covered in brown fur and sliced armor. It seemed that Souei had taken care of things personally.
"So these are orcs?" I muttered, glancing over the various cut-apart bodies littering the ground before sliding off of Zeref's back.
"There are so many of them," Yang mused as she dropped down next to me, followed quickly by Yin.
(Looks like Souei really decided to cut loose.) I thought as I walked over to get a better look.
To call the scene gruesome would be an understatement, and yet… (Honestly, this scene should be getting some kind of reaction from me, but it's not; in fact, it is rather concerning how calm I am while seeing all of this.) I hummed, the thought echoing in my head for a moment before I took a closer look at the orcs themselves.
"Benimaru wasn't kidding when he described them as bipedal pigs, although they look more like hogs or boars than your average domestic pigs," I muttered to myself.
(It's kind of morbid, but I wonder what would happen if I absorbed them with Deconstruction and Integration? I mean, would I get skills from them even though they've been dead for a bit now?) I thought grimly. (That brings up another question: can I still get skills from a corpse that has already rotted and decayed?)
Before I could test anything, Rimuru's voice suddenly called out to me. "Guys, over here."
"What is it?" I asked as I turned to look.
Not far away were Rimuru and Souei; they were standing at the center of where the majority of the slaughter had taken place, the large number of mangled corpses around them making that clear enough. What caught my attention, however, was that Souei was crouched down, holding an unfamiliar figure in his arms. The figure was that of a female lizardman who was wounded and bleeding rather heavily, to say the least.
She looked similar to the lizardmen I had seen before, with a few differences. Her green scales were far smoother, and her head was slightly more rounded compared to the more angular heads of the males of the species. She wore mainly a black-and-brown outfit made of hide and fabric with a yellowish scarf wrapped around her neck; the most bizarre thing was that she had short brown hair covering the top of her head.
(Why does a reptilian have hair?) I mused internally as I walked over, but quickly shook that thought away to ask, "How is she?"
"She's been injured quite badly, but it's nothing a full potion can't fix," Rimuru explained as he pulled out one of said potions and poured it into her mouth.
She weakly swallowed the blue liquid, her body visibly glowing slightly as she did so. Almost instantly her wounds began to rapidly close, the torn flesh knitting itself back together at a rather rapid speed. I had seen this before, back when I used potions to heal Yin, Yang, and Zeref; however, it was still a fascinating process to watch.
A second later she gasped, her body lurching upward as she began shaking from the shock of her injury, shock clear on her face. "H-how? My wound… it… it should have been fatal."
"Who are you?" she asked, looking up at us with wide eyes.
"I'm Rimuru Tempest," the slime in human form said before gesturing over at me. "And this is Suu."
The moment she processed our names she suddenly bowed her head to the ground, much to my confusion. Before any of us could ask what she was doing, she abruptly spoke up.
"Please, I need your help."
"Will you save my father, the lizardmen chieftain, as well as my brother, Gabiru?" She begged, pressing her head harder against the ground as she pleaded. "They, as well as my people, are in grave danger."
(Wait a second, she's that idiot's sister.) I thought as I stepped forward slightly.
"What happened? Didn't you say you'd wait for us?" I asked gently.
"We did, and I'm sorry for breaking our deal, but my brother led a rebellion and overthrew my father," she explained, desperation clear in her voice. "He's planning to fight the orcs alone with only the forces we had on hand, but he doesn't know he is leading his own men to their doom."
"Please save them, please save my people…"
Looking at her on the ground, begging like that… it bothered me. I understood that she needed help; it made sense that she would do anything to save her people, but it still made me shift uncomfortably. It brought back memories I'd rather forget, memories of asking someone to save me only to realize there was no one listening. It was honestly made worse by the fact that I could feel her emotions, they were so frantic, so dense that I almost stepped away on reflex. Fortunately, I stopped myself before I could.
"Sure…" I mumbled, a complicated expression spreading across my face.
"Huh." She looked up at me, a momentary look of confusion crossing her face.
"You asked for help, you even got down and begged like that; it wouldn't be right for us not to lend you a hand," I muttered, reaching down to help her to her feet.
"As expected of Lady Suu!" Shion popped up out of nowhere and smiled while nodding vigorously. "Of course we will help you."
As Shion began bragging to the lizard girl while making promises on her boss's behalf like a true secretary, Rimuru moved up next to me and asked, "Are you okay?"
"Yeah… yeah, I'm fine…"