Chapter 69: “Fluff”
<Orders from Boss. We kill all enemies in the forest.>
Hakuma conveyed this to Ginka at his side as well as to the pups. This actually did not come directly from Boss—from Rare; it was information passed through Sugaru, but if Boss wanted it done, then whether or not they were orders made little difference.
He didn’t understand the specifics, but they needed a ton of that “XP” stuff. Hunt prey, drive away invaders, do this over and over again until, suddenly, you achieve growth as you desired—“XP” was the power that made this possible. Since all the XP was gathered by the leader of the pack, Rare, even if Hakuma and the other wolves didn’t hunt, they could still get stronger. Truly the power of the gods. Though Hakuma didn’t know what a “god” was, so those were just words he repeated from Kerry. When they had first met, his only impression of her was “a foolish cat who was just a little bit nimble,” but now things were different. Since she looked just a tiny bit like Boss, she was given various kinds of jobs, and now she had turned rather intelligent.
Just recently, Ginka and the cat named Marion formed a tag team, successfully leading Boss to a far-off place. Ice wolves, just like all wolf-type monsters, typically hunted in pairs. Normally, that meant Hakuma would have gone along with them, but they couldn’t take their eyes off the pups. Because of that, ever since fleeing from the north, the two of them would each go out and hunt alone, even though they knew it was more dangerous. They could ask the ants to watch them, but since one pup was generally stronger than one ant, they looked down on them, and it was hard to imagine that they would behave under their care. Not to mention it was already unusual for there to be so many pups in a pack and so few adult wolves. Hakuma knew all this, so he had chosen this path and harbored no regrets.
The pups were starting to get bigger as well. However, they were still only the size of coyotes; their fur was still soft and fluffy, and their bodies were more round than they should be, so it was about time for them to go out and learn to hunt, even if it was just play-hunting.
Thinking on it, perhaps this was a good opportunity. If it was only for training, then there were so many ants that they would be acceptable, but including the goal of obtaining more XP, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to also train the pups at the same time.
He immediately contacted Sugaru about this, and while the ants were going to take care of the large monster farm, in exchange, Hakuma was allowed to deal with the goblin farm. They were not to kill the ones used for breeding, though. Either way, with goblins, Hakuma and Ginka’s participation would only hinder the acquisition of XP. Since they intended only to oversee things, this would not be a problem.
<Now, little ones, hunting practice. You know what goblins are? Small, dirty things. They think they are smart, use weapons like humans, but don’t use well. But, goblins in this forest had weapons taken away.>
The pups responded that “they knew, they already knew.” They could convey their feelings directly to members of the same race, but they were unable to talk to other races. Boss said it had to do with something called “int,” but since Boss didn’t have any particular role for the pups to play at the moment, she also didn’t particularly strengthen them. “It’s fine to just raise them at your own pace,” she had said.