Chapter 2

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Levi stood on the hill with his fists clenched. This was the correct location, as the spent smoke shell attested, but there was no sign of Petra. He spoke quietly, almost to himself.

"If you spotted one from here, why didn't you fire a second round when you reached it? And if you met one here, why is there no blood?"

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"If you spotted one from here, why didn't you fire a second round when you reached it? And if you met one here, why is there no blood?"

"Hoof prints on the ground sir," Eld said. "Heading west. From their depth, she took off at a gallop."

The other squad members breathed a sigh of relief. It didn't mean she was safe, but at least she hadn't died here.

....

"So are you mapping terrain, monsters, or both?" Ainzo asked conversationally.

"Both. Why?"

"Because there's two more of them over there."

Petra halted the horse; this time she did crane her neck to look at the boy. He seemed totally unperturbed. Then she followed his gaze.

"Where? I don't see them."

"One's behind that rock and the other is just below the rise. But they are both coming towards us."

"How do you know they're there if you can't see them?"

"I have a really high Search skill."

A head appeared over the far side of the hill. Ten meters. A second one came out from behind the rock, this one six meters. She wasn't sure her horse could outrun them carrying double, but with no backup, no buildings to use her ODM gear - and the kid having no ODM gear at all - running was their best bet. "Hold on tight!" She spurred the horse into a gallop. The uneven ground, rocks, and shrubs made looking away even for the few seconds it took to load the gas flare a risky proposition. Looking up and down between the broken field and the canister supply caused the first canister to not lock into place firmly and it fell off the gun when she raised it. "Shit!" She said. She didn't have an unlimited supply. For the next one, she took the risk and looked down, jamming the gun onto the shell. She felt it click solidly into place, raised the gun, and fired. She looked back up just in time to see the horse stumble on a half-hidden rock and then almost recover, just to drop its hoof in the rabbit hole. With a sickening crack of its left front leg, the horse went down.

.....

Hange and two of her squad came up the south face of the hill. "What do we have?"

Levi said nothing, just stared with cold fury at the unanswering western horizon.

"We don't know yet," Eld answered for him.

"We don't know yet," Eld answered for him

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