"Holy crap?!"
In the distance, Beo sensed the impact coming from ahead. Her eyes widened, sharp claws growing from her fair little hands as she drove them viciously into the ground, piercing straight through the hard rock.
Then, in the next moment.
The surging airflow sent her—and the stone she was clinging to—flying, like a soccer ball kicked away, until she disappeared into the endless passageway.
***
"...Beo, are you all right?"
Following the sensation of their contract, Aozaki Touko dug Beo out of a pile of rubble and patted the dust and dirt from her body.
"With magic this powerful, Touko, I think you should have told me to dig a hole and hide."
Beo rubbed her head, still feeling the pain from where the stone had struck her skull.
"I did anticipate it, but I didn't expect the amplification from the Age of Gods' magecraft to be that great."
With an apologetic tone, Aozaki Touko rubbed Beo's battered head. That stone had been nearly a meter across. If Beo had not been the one hit, it would have been far more serious than a slight headache.
After a while, Beo's head seemed to stop hurting. She raised her exquisite, inhuman face, a hint of grievance in her expression and misty tears glimmering in her eyes.
"...Touko, I want to eat Chimera again~"
Hearing that, Aozaki Touko froze briefly. Then she looked at the pitiful Beo, the corners of her lips lifting as she scolded with a laugh, "Well, well. You've learned to take advantage of the situation to make demands."
"..."
Beo turned her head guiltily, avoiding Touko's gaze.
In truth, with the self-healing ability of a Phantasmal Beast, an injury that barely counted as a scratch was nothing serious at all. Even if that stone had been