The wyvern’s entire bulk lifted into the air.
I brought it crashing back down onto the fountain, long since broken and spraying water in all directions. The earth shook again, but I kept my arms firmly clutched around its neck. I wasn’t going to let go.
“A... A headlock throw...?!” someone asked.
Yes, a headlock throw, I thought. I’m grabbing it by its head and throwing it, of course it’s a headlock throw. Isn’t it obvious?
I threw myself on top of the downed wyvern, continuing to throttle it as hard as I could. Behind me, the monster’s body struggled wildly, kicking and convulsing. It was desperately trying to stop me from strangling it. I roared and put all my strength into my muscles. This was now a contest of physical strength against a wyvern, with all the power I had. I held it from resisting and getting up; in fact, I pressed the wyvern down, shoving it hard into the ground.
You’re not getting away, pal. I won’t let you run. I won’t let you breathe any more fire from that throat.
I won’t let you use those wings to fly anymore. I won’t let you use those fangs or those claws to hurt anyone anymore!
As the crowd watched, hardly breathing, there was a snap as finally, the wyvern’s neck made a sound it was never meant to make.
The wyvern’s neck went limp in my arms. To be extra cautious and make absolutely certain it was dead, I continued to strangle it for a little while longer, and then I noticed that silence had fallen all around me.
The people who had been in the temple to begin with, the people who had evacuated here from elsewhere in the city—so many people were looking at me. The emotions in their eyes were complex, and I suddenly realized I was in trouble.
I had broken the neck of what must have been a two-ton wyvern (I seemed to remember that six-meter-long saltwater crocodiles weighed about a ton), and I’d done it in front of them. I had been only moments away from the wyvern’s fire breath burning me and everyone else nearby to a crisp, so in order to win without anyone getting killed, I’d had no choice but to choke the monster to death. That said, even I recognized that what I’d done had been completely crazy. If they decided I was someone to be feared—
“Spectacular! Marvellous!” The sound of applause rang out. Confused, I turned and... there was Tonio. “Thank the gods that they sent a hero like you to this place!”
Clapping in an exaggerated fashion, Tonio stepped towards me like he didn’t know who I was. Then, he flashed me a little smile and a mischievous wink that the people couldn’t see from where they stood. I let go of the wyvern’s neck and got to my feet. Tonio held both my hands together and shook them while telling me how grateful he was.
It was only then that I finally realized what he was trying to do.
“No problem,” I said with a smile, and shook his hands up and down.
Bee must have guessed his intention as well. Strumming her instrument, she shouted, “The Wyvern Killer! Today, a new hero has been born!” Her voice carried well. “Let’s have a round of applause for our hero!”
She led, and a few odd claps followed her cue—then the clapping got louder. It was joined by cheering, and soon enough I was being mobbed by people. They touched my arms and asked to shake my hand, saying “Thank you” over and over.
I got the feeling that I’d just survived a pretty dangerous situation. Menel and I probably wouldn’t have been able to figure a way out of it on our own. Only the savvy Tonio and Bee, with all their experience in navigating society, could have defused that so well. I felt very grateful.
After the accolades had died down, I raised my voice and called out to the crowd. “There must be people still buried under the rubble, and others with injuries! Let’s all do our part to help and rescue everyone!”
A cheer of assent rose from the crowd. As one, they headed to the hall and worked together to remove the rubble and care for and treat the injured. A strange sense of solidarity had formed among all these disparate people.
While everyone was busy, I found a moment to quietly thank Bee and Tonio.
“Oh, not at all,” Tonio replied. “I look at it as an investment.”
“Hehe.” Bee laughed teasingly. “I’m going to make a song about this later, okay?”
While helping lever away some boulders, I also exchanged a few words with Menel.
“Seriously, is there anything you can’t do, you freak of nature?” he said.
“Surprised?” I asked.
“I’ve gotten used to you being ridiculous.”
“Well, for me, it was a painful reminder of how far I still have to go.”
“The hell?”
That wyvern had black veins covering its whole body and spewed eerie, noxious gas. I didn’t know what had happened to it. Perhaps it had mutated somehow, or been cursed after activating a trap in some ruin, or someone had subjected it to some evil procedure. But in any case, I couldn’t help speculating that its abnormal appearance and the reason it had attacked might have been related.
Of course, I couldn’t deny the possibility that it was completely unrelated, and the wyvern’s actions had been purely instinctual in some way. However, as violent as wyverns were said to be, I couldn’t see attacking a human city of this size as anything but suicidal. The wyvern had been overpowering to begin with, but that was simply because taking the city by surprise had given it an advantage. It hadn’t gotten to that point, but once the city had started to plan instead of panic, and sent out legions of proper soldiers, sorcerers, and priests, the wyvern would have been done for.
So it had been an abnormal, and most likely stronger wyvern than usual, but even so, it had been far too messy a battle. If Menel hadn’t been there, I could well have died. Furthermore, if not for Tonio and Bee, I couldn’t deny that I might have suffered social death.
A roundtable of criticism was in progress in my head, scrutinizing all the ways I’d been naïve, all the mistakes I’d made, and all the ways I didn’t measure up.
“Will. Brother.” Menel called to me. I snapped out of my thoughts and looked at him. “I don’t know how high a bar you’re setting for yourself, but come on. You just brought down a monster. It’s good to be self-critical, but give yourself some credit. I’m trying to be happy for you here.”
I hadn’t thought about it that way. And although there were a lot of things I wish I’d done differently, I was now a “Wyvern Killer,” just as those three had once been.
“Yeah...” He was right. I was happy about that. “Yeah... Yeah. Thanks, Menel! I couldn’t have done it without you!”
“Ya. Good job. And you were the one who did most of it, dummy!” He gave me a fist bump. That simple gesture really made me feel like we’d connected with one another in a lot of ways.
How many hours did we work after that?
We had left the corpse of the wyvern to the soldiers who came running to the scene afterwards. My greater concern was whether we’d managed to get all the injured people out of the rubble. I was just at the point of thinking we might have gotten everyone we could find, when I heard a lot of commotion around the temple’s front gate.
Several priests came running up to us. “Wyvern Killer! Is the Wyvern Killer here?!”
“Oh! That’s me, what is it?!” I waved my hand to them.
They looked like they were in a real hurry. They told me between short breaths that they would take care of the rest of the work and it was urgent that I followed them.