I Became a Tin Knight

The Tin Knight’s autonomous combat privileges were revoked after just one day. It was a short-lived dream.

“I’ll just give instructions remotely, so follow them.”

[The ‘Tin Knight’ is flustered by the revocation of his trainer qualification!]

[The ‘Tin Knight’ is shocked that his status has been downgraded to Adel’s level!]

“Um, Sir Knight. I think I’m the one who should be shocked by that comment…”

[The ‘Tin Knight’ claims his courage knows no bounds for informing his pupil of the cruel reality!]

“Indeed, Sir Tin. You certainly know the rule that most statements sound plausible if you just attach the word ‘courage’ to them.”

[The ‘Tin Knight’ shrugs his shoulders!]

“Stop talking nonsense and get to work, you fools.”

The boss’ head, which had boasted an enormous size, shrank down to the size of a baseball and floated.

Dorothea covered one eye with her left hand, let out a small cough, and then opened her mouth.

《”Ah, ah. Good. It seems the voice transmission is working well. The field of vision is also fairly good.”》

Dorothea’s voice and the voice leaking from the mini boss head overlapped in the air.

The Tin Knight marveled at the boss head that had settled smugly on his shoulder with a plop.

[The ‘Tin Knight’ praises the zombie drone system!]

[The ‘Tin Knight’ expresses doubt about whether it really needs to ride on his shoulder!]

《”Shut up. It’s already tricky enough with just sight sharing and voice transmission, it would be too chaotic to add remote control on top of that.”》

After grumbling quietly, Dorothea removed the hand covering her eye.

Simultaneously, the head on the Tin Knight’s shoulder also went limp.

Dorothea admonished the Tin Knight several times as if telling him to keep it in mind.

“Don’t turn corpses into mush. Don’t waste mana unnecessarily. I’ll check periodically. Be prepared if you do anything foolish.”

[The ‘Tin Knight’ emphasizes the autonomy of the field!]

“Should we just forget about hunting and just pull weeds before we leave?”

[The ‘Tin Knight’ changes his tune, saying we should respect the leader’s decision!]

Thinking that if he irritated Dorothea any further, a real hunting ban might be declared, the Tin Knight quickly left the scene.

Watching his retreating figure with a distrustful gaze, Dorothea shook her head.

Although she used the expression of surveillance to intimidate the Tin Knight, in fact, she had no intention of interfering with his actions one by one.

Besides that, Dorothea had many other tasks to attend to.

Collecting tree sap, gathering and processing various herbs, grinding animal bones into powder and more.

Normally, Dorothea would have done all these tasks herself from start to finish, but now that all her existing catalysts had been wiped out, she was in a situation where she needed even the smallest bit of help.

“Adel, we need to extract sap, so make a deep cut on that tree.”

“Yes! Is this enough?”

“Sophia, gather some grass exactly like this.”

“Understood.”

“Adel, clear away these thorny vines.”

“Yes! I’ll cut them down!”

“Sophia, aren’t you done yet? No, how can it take over ten minutes to pull one blade of grass!?”

“I’m carefully extracting it with the roots. It’s a pity I don’t have a brush to dust off the soil from the roots.”

“Aah…! That’s enough, just pull it out roughly! And Adel, dig the ground here a bit!”

“Yes, yes!”

“Sophia! Hey! The acorns you gathered are all spilling out! Pick them up properly!”

“This is a more challenging task than I expected.”

“Sophi—no, Adel!”

“Adel, over here!”

“Adel. After that, do this next!”

“Adel!”

While she was willing to accept even the smallest bit of help, it felt like she was getting exactly that—the smallest bit.

After all, while giving instructions to her two companions, Dorothea herself had to focus on processing various materials.

Occasionally monitoring the Tin Knight remotely was just an additional task.

Dorothea was busy with her hands, mouth, and head, Adelaide was busy with her body, and Sophia wasn’t particularly busy.

Of course, that didn’t mean Adelaide complained about this situation. She was a good lion.

It wasn’t that she closed her mouth after trying to slip in a complaint and seeing Dorothea, with her eyes rolled back, tying Sophia to a rope to use as bait. Maybe.

[The ‘Tin Knight’ announces his return!]

[The ‘Tin Knight’ boasts about his hunting achievements!]

A little past lunchtime, the Tin Knight returned to the base.

In one hand, he dragged a giant wild boar and in the other—an enormous wolf.

Whether Dorothea’s nagging had an effect or not, they looked much more intact than the previous predator corpse.

Sophia, hanging upside down, looked at the sight and spoke.

It was bizarre in a different sense that her complexion didn’t change at all, even though blood should have rushed to her head.

“By the way, Sir Tin. These animals, did you hunt them yourself while they were just standing still?”

[The ‘Tin Knight’ informs that as he was walking around, these guys attacked him first!]

“I see. Did they try to run away while fighting or anything?”

[The ‘Tin Knight’ says that among the minions, there were some that ran away, but none among the boss-level ones!]

“That’s strange.”

Dorothea interjected and asked, “What’s strange about that?”

“Well, they’re wild animals, aren’t they?”

“So what about that?”

“Is there any reason for them to risk fighting?”

Dorothea was about to retort, asking what she meant by that, but suddenly her expression changed as if she had realized something.

Adelaide, with a question mark floating beside her head, asked, “Isn’t it because they’re magic beasts?”

“Most creatures called magic beasts aren’t that different from ordinary animals. They’re stronger and have special abilities, yes, but their behavior patterns don’t change dramatically.”

Hanging in mid-air, Sophia continued with eloquent speech.

The sight of the Tin Knight, Dorothea, and Adelaide with their heads tilted up listening to the story was quite bizarre to see from the side, but there was no one to point that out.

“When bandits look for targets to plunder, why do they aim for private houses or small-scale merchants instead of carriages guarded by armed mercenaries or knights?”

“Is it because the former is dangerous even for the thieves?”

“It’s the same for magic beasts. No, they’re even more thorough in risk management than people who don’t hesitate to take reckless challenges blinded by greed. They don’t touch strong opponents, they don’t touch unfamiliar opponents, and even if the opponent seems weaker than them, they avoid fighting if they think they might get injured in the hunting process. After all, there’s no future for a severely injured beast, even if their hunt succeeded.”

Sophia added, “In that sense, Sir Tin is the worst prey. First of all, he’s very strong, and being an unfamiliar opponent, they don’t know how to deal with him, and decisively, there’s nothing to gain even if they win.”

“That’s true. It’s not like they can eat him even if they win.”

Dorothea looked at the wolf and wild boar corpses.

Picking fights when there was no need to fight and prioritizing repelling external threats over their own survival—such belligerence.

Dorothea took out a small dagger as if to confirm something and tried to skin the wolf, but she frowned as if it wasn’t going as she wanted.

She said to the Tin Knight, “Cut this guy into appropriate sizes. Try not to damage the bones if possible.”

“Eek.”

Adelaide was startled by the ruthless order—befitting of a witch—but the Tin Knight responded immediately.

[The ‘Tin Knight’ says to leave it to him!]

A silver-gray flash of sword light flickered, and the wolf’s corpse was instantly split.

The skill of not letting a single drop of blood splash around was truly artistic.

Dorothea approached the dismembered wolf and rummaged through its contents with an expressionless face.

Then, she frowned.

“What is this?”

Between the red blood and flesh, green stem-like things had burrowed in.

The green was particularly abundant around the heart and head areas.

[The ‘Tin Knight’ marvels at the parasite—no, parasitic plant!]

“I see. Parasites. There were certainly ones that controlled their hosts at will to make them head towards water, or deliberately make them easy for birds to eat. If we’re talking about a plant version of that, the abnormal behavior makes sense.”

“So, did those green stem-like things control the magic beasts to attack Sir Knight?” Adelaide asked while rubbing her arms as if feeling creeped out.

Dorothea shook her head.

“It’s probably not capable of such detailed instructions. At most, it might heighten their fighting spirit or amplify hostility towards outsiders. I think I roughly understand why they created such an environment.”

“You mean the vision of the past that Sir Tin and I saw?”

“Yes. If the local creatures fight to the death against intruders, naturally, the inside will become safer. If the creatures here had gone outside and caused harm, the state would have stepped in to wipe them out, but since they’re just holed up inside…”

Adelaide cautiously asked, “Then what should we do? Shouldn’t we quickly get out of here in case these green stem-like things might also affect us?”

“Only the boss-class ones in the herds showed abnormal behavior. The ordinary animals showed normal appearances. Perhaps, for the infection, or rather parasitism to occur, one would need to spend a considerable amount of time here, or there might be some other conditions. Besides, if it’s urgent, I can purify with holy power, so there’s no need to worry.”

Sophia comforted her, but Adelaide still looked uneasy.

Dorothea scratched her head.

“Well, we didn’t plan to stay long anyway, so it doesn’t matter… But we might need to hurry a bit more.”

[The ‘Tin Knight’ gets excited, asking if it’s a limited-time subjugation quest!]

[The ‘Tin Knight’ promises to quickly catch the next boss!]

“It is limited-time, but it’s a bit different from what you’re thinking.”

[The ‘Tin Knight’ expresses doubt!]

Dorothea held out her left hand.

The wolf’s blood on Dorothea’s hand rose into the air, blended with Dorothea’s black mana, and went back into the wolf’s body.

The wolf, already dead and dismembered, began to twitch and move.

Adelaide’s face turned pale blue, and Sophia’s eyes widened in surprise.

Clatter.

The wolf stood up.

Leaving its skin and flesh chunks on the ground, the wolf, now just bones, approached Dorothea’s side and lowered its head.

Dorothea did the same in front of the wild boar, and it too rose as a skeleton.

“Normally, it would be more efficient to use the blood and flesh too, but we need those as materials.”

[The ‘Tin Knight’ asks if she’s going to use them to monitor him too!]

“The one attached to you is a special one that allows sensory sharing and direct control. These are just souls inserted into their original bodies. They can’t share vision and can only understand simple commands.”

[The ‘Tin Knight’ asks what they’re used for then!]

“Ah, that.”

Dorothea grinned.

The Tin Knight felt an inexplicable sense of foreboding at that smile.

Dorothea snapped her fingers, and the bone wolf and bone wild boar leaped into the forest.

“Well then, shall we have a competition to see who can catch more? Ah, don’t worry. I’ve instructed them not to attack unless the other side attacks first, so if you’re really in a hurry, you can catch those kinds of things.”

[The ‘Tin Knight’ is shocked!]

[The ‘Tin Knight’ cries out that his prey is disappearing!]

[The ‘Tin Knight’ burns with competitive spirit, declaring he won’t lose!]

Clank clank!

The Tin Knight leaped into the forest with the most passionate movement since entering this forest.

“Hehehe, that’s right. In a forest like this, we don’t need to worry about the eyes of others. If we just raze the forest to the ground, regardless of the root cause or whatever, something should come out. And incidentally, we can teach that troublemaker a lesson.”

Although she said “incidentally,” Dorothea’s voice was particularly excited.

No matter how one looked at it, the last part seemed to be the main purpose.

“Well then, shall we continue with our original work?”

Seeing Dorothea smiling brightly, unlike usual, Adelaide gulped.

She thought to herself.

The title of witch isn’t given for nothing, indeed.

***

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