Surviving a Cruel Fairy Tale

25 – Act 1. Red Riding Hood’s Forest – Evidence of Humanity (1)

The hunter who fell into the pit barely came to his senses and turned his head to the ground.

The ground is far away.

In the vicinity, fine hairs of jagged roots were visible on the walls of the earth in a cavity that seemed to have been naturally created underground.

At the thick soil smell, the hunter frowned.

He blamed himself, saying that he should have suspected that Little Red Riding Hood, which had been avoiding him for so long, suddenly rushed forward, but nothing has changed yet.

“…… That, damn b*tch.”

It’s not enough to just bully me in moderation.

The most beautiful girl in the forest.

Before she was her own daughter, she was the most attractive female left in the forest, so she tried to treat her like that, but it was a long way beyond her line.

I fell to the bottom of the basement, but there is no variable.

Little Red Riding Hood is dying.

I shot just enough to not die, so if I went back to the ground and dealt with it well, I could have captured it without killing it.

“It’s bothering me.”

If you estimate the distance from the ground, it seemed that it would be difficult to climb only by leaping.

That doesn’t mean there isn’t a way out.

This is the realm of trouble.

If you put your mind to it, getting out of this pit is no big deal. The only question is why Little Red Riding Hood did such a troublesome thing.

Little Red Riding Hood knows the power of a hunter.

I don’t know the detailed abilities, but I’m sure you know that just throwing them into this pit can’t be a shackle.

“This is…… ?”

The hunter, who was about to jump off the ground, felt a heavy weight on him.

“…… This.”

My body is heavy.

A sensation I’ve never felt before. As if the whole body, starting with the shoulders, was being crushed, the feeling of heavy tightening made one lose strength.

No, I haven’t felt it before.

But it was also a sense that I had forgotten about for a long time.

“…… Ha ha ha.”

The protection of the forest.

My status as a hunter has just disappeared.

I don’t think that’s possible, but it’s true that the power that actually dwells in the body is drained all the time. But it’s strange that he got out of the forest just because he fell into an underground pit.

A car that felt something was wrong.

A heavy iron giant came down from a height with a huge vibration.

“A vile beast.”

“…… Under.”

When a hunter is at his most difficult, the opponent he least wants to meet appears in front of him.

The Tin Woodman.

Like him, a monster that has been cursed by the forest.

A hunter used it to clear the forest and discarded it in the depths of the forest, but it soon reactivated and became a disaster in the forest.

The iron giant was looking down at the hunter with red eyes.

“Do you remember me?”

“…… I didn’t expect to see the old tin doll here again.”

I knew he was wandering deep in the forest.

But he knew that he didn’t move outside a certain area, and he didn’t even need to touch the Tin Woodman, so he’s been neglecting it for a long time.

But I thought the Tin Woodman would appear in a place like this.

The hunter clenched his teeth and raised his shotgun.

“Are you going to fight me?”

“Fight? That’s wrong. It cannot be defined by just fighting.”

At this, the Tin Woodman also aimed at the huge axe.

“As a machine, I am accustomed to being used and discarded. An emotionless machine can’t be blamed for that, but it’s different now.”

“What, are you going to claim to have feelings?”

“I have a heart. A heart that can think and feel. And that heart wishes me.”

Your death.

After those words, the iron giant moved his heavy steps and charged at the hunter, and the hunter responded by pulling the trigger right away.

* * *

Under the pit, the tones of destruction intertwined with the shrill gunfire, and a ferocious tone echoed.

Since I was guarding Little Red Riding Hood’s side, I couldn’t watch the scene, but just hearing the sound coming from afar, I knew it wasn’t my domain.

The two claim to be the strongest in this forest.

The Hunter and the Tin Woodman.

Each of them has a different fairy tale, but both are characters related to the forest and have unbelievable strength.

If the Hunter has strength based on fairy tales, the Tin Woodman has pure natural strength.

I don’t know which of the two will win, but personally I hope that the Tin Woodman will defeat the Hunter and end the distortion in this forest.

“Sigh…… !!”

Think about it for a while.

She turned her head again at Little Red Riding Hood’s groan, but she was still frowning with a pale complexion.

“Spirit, …… It’s nothing.”

Is it just an unconscious moan?

But there are signs of recovery. First of all, the blood was definitely stopping, and above all, I could see that the dying complexion was getting brighter little by little.

I think I need a little more treatment, but I’m also concerned about what’s going on down there.

Destruction is still heard without having to listen.

After a few piercing gunshots, there was the sound of iron banging immediately after, followed by a loud slicing of wind, followed by the sound of collapsing soil.

I’m worried, but I can’t take my hands off her treatment right now.

I just hoped the woodcutter would take care of me, and focused on Little Red Riding Hood, turning my head away from the explosions and gunshots and crumbling destruction that came from below.

More than mysteries, Quick controls the mysteries that have spread densely around me and absorbs them into my body.

Replenishment is bigger than consumption, but as before, I didn’t know how to look cool and didn’t accept all of it, so the burden on my body wasn’t that great.

That’s how she focused her consciousness as much as possible on her for a while.

“…… Oops.”

She slowly opens her eyes, revealing those golden eyes.

“Can you come to your senses?”

“Uh, how… ….”

“Don’t move yet.”

The wound was sutured, but not completely healed.

This is just a stopgap.

I couldn’t expect a drastically fast healing because I only thought of the body’s natural healing speed.

“…… What is the situation?”

But Little Red Riding Hood, as if she was in a hurry, grabbed my arm and opened her mouth.

“The woodcutter has appeared. I said I’d help, and now I’m dealing with the hunter down there.”

“…… Okay.”

“Did you know?”

At my question, she nodded her head.

“Last. Before she fell, she saw a red light. I wasn’t sure.”

If you think about it, the area near the Mother Tree is the domain of the Tin Woodman.

Considering the turmoil here, it’s not surprising that he appears, but it was just a coincidence that he offered to help us.

Little Red Riding Hood must have noticed this as well, so she lowered her head and spoke in a very small voice.

“…… Sorry.”

“What?”

“I said I would.”

Our plan failed.

If the Tin Woodman hadn’t shown up, we’d have faced the worst, but there’s no point thinking about it now.

Little Red Riding Hood has succeeded in breaking down the ground she had previously promised.

As a result, I was able to keep him and the Tin Woodman in the same place, so I wouldn’t call it a complete failure.

“You did your job.”

“…… Sorry.”

“I am resting. I will come to see the situation.”

She has just regained consciousness, but it seems that she still has a hard time moving, so by the time she got up from her seat alone, she flicked her fingers and took her own axe.

“Because you don’t know. Take it.”

She nodded at that and put her hatchet in her hand.

It felt strangely heavier than it looked, but this weight was just right for me to hold and wield.

Gathering her things, I watched her with her eyes closed as she leaned against her tree, then slowly moved her steps towards the pit that was deeply carved into her.

I still couldn’t stop hearing the sound coming from the basement.

How long has it been since I focused on Little Red Riding Hood?

I couldn’t figure out the exact time because it was unlikely there would be a clock in the forest, but I’m guessing the fight between the two would have lasted quite a while.

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The pupil at the bottom of the pit looked down like that.

Even though they fought for a long time, the battle between the two showed no sign of ending, and they were still close to each other.

“This, dog-like tin bastard!!”

Gunshots rang out again and again, each time bullets pierced the Tin Woodman’s body.

However, the woodcutter rushes in without taking any damage and swings his ax wide, and the hunter avoids it and aims his gun again.

A human body and an iron body.

The hunter who still moves normally after fighting for such a long time is also a monster, but looking at it like this, I had no choice but to predict the woodcutter’s advantage.

A body made of iron, bullets do not cause much damage.

Unlike hunters, it is not a living body, so even if you fight for a long time, you will not be physically challenged.

The same is true of forcibly dropping it from the stage of the forest.

The tradition of hunters is limited to the forest.

Hunters in fairy tales always fought in the forest, and especially in the story of Little Red Riding Hood, the hunter brought the end of the story by killing the wolf in the forest.

I dropped such a man into a place other than the forest.

The Tin Woodman’s tradition must have been related to the forest as much as he was a woodcutter, but I didn’t think it would be as strongly restricted as that hunter.

If the battle continues like this, it seems that the Tin Woodman will one day end in victory.

In fact, the hunter continued to avoid the woodcutter, but it was visible that he was gradually driven into a corner without delivering a decisive blow.

“Doesn’t it run away more?”

“A monster. What are you doing with that body? Emotion? Human? It’s funny. Look at your body It’s ridiculous that you want to become a human being, even though you’re just a tin can that can survive getting hit by several bullets.”

“The body is irrelevant. As long as I have a heart, I can become a human being.”

“Stupid!!”

The hunter frowned and shouted, then fired several shots at the Tin Woodman who was coming toward him.

“You monster! Know the subject! Human? Do you think life is so ridiculous that a monster like you is claiming it!!”

Does the hunter discuss the preciousness of life?

He listened, but he doubted his ears.

Is it right for a monster to claim to be a human just because it was created by slaughtering those who wandered into the forest for food?

An iron giant and a demon with a pharynx.

If you ask which one is more human, I would say that the former is more human.

The woodcutter stopped moving for a moment at those words and stared intently at the hunter.

“You mean man, beast.”

“In this forest, who dares to discuss humans other than me!”

The hunter stared straight at the woodcutter with a straight gaze, as if he had no remorse at all, and continued his words.

“I survived as a human even in the midst of monsters like you. I loved people like me and embraced them, so I was able to survive like a human being.”

“Are you discussing love? You?”

“Nothing! I love humans so much they always help me There’s no way you wouldn’t love them as human beings!”

With a confident cry, the hunter fired five more bullets.

But it doesn’t work.

In the first place, a gun was not an effective weapon against a woodcutter with a body made of tin. There is no way that his body would be injured by piercing through iron.

It should have been.

“…… Big.”

But the Tin Woodman, when he was pierced in the chest, grabbed hold of it and had to bend one knee.

“Ohhh?”

It was also a signal to the hunter to counterattack.