Work Text:
Goblin Slayer was a man who prepared for everything, or at least everything that had to do with exterminating those accursed goblins and ensuring that they never set a foothold in any part of the world. It used to be his sole mission to slaughter every nest of them he could find before tracking down their armies before they could pillage another village.
More importantly, his self-appointed missions always meant he would be able to keep his home partially in view, ensuring the safety of those he had left after the tragedy that forever marked the man he would become.
Killing goblins and then occasionally returning home to meet his sole surviving friend from childhood, Cow Girl. That used to be his life, and for lack of a better word, he had been accustomed to it.
But that had been some time ago. Goblin Slayer had to admit that circumstances had changed. He was still defined by his title, but it was no longer his sole commitment.
He had allowed himself to become open when a certain Priestess asked to join him on his mission. Since then, more hand joined. He had a party now.
No, this is more what one would consider having "friends".
But with more friends that had lives very separate from Cow Girl, he was faced with new commitments.
There were only so many possibilities he could prepare for. Eventually, he would have to choose between protecingt the friends he had made and the one he grew up with, leaving it up to fate for the ones left behind to survive the days he was gone. The first time it happened, he had chosen to remain by Cow Girl's side, and his new party managed to pull through with their own mission despite some difficulties.
The second time, he decided to accompany his new party. All he could hope was that Cow Girl and her uncle would have the same fortune.
***
The goblins arrived at the farm in the dead of night led by one goblin that had learned the art of stealth. They were not the most numerous, but there were enough of them. It was just two people and the livestock they tended to, the leader had reasoned.
With the presence of the Goblin Slayer in their lives, the goblins had seemingly begun learning new concepts. One of them was the idea of retribution. They did not need to pillage the village. All they needed was to take the one Goblin Slayer was closest to. And their leader discovered that, the fewer of them there were, the quieter they could be as they advanced across the field.
***
Right when Cow Girl was about ready to turn in for the night, her candlelit room was suddenly bathed in an orange glow.
The first thing she saw from out her window was the ring of fire the goblins had made around the field. The first thing she heard was her uncle's shouts as he immediately stomped down the stairs. The door swung open harshly.
Then she heard her uncle practically scream out the one word that made her blood run cold.
"GOBLINS!"
There was that horrific, high-pitched and nasally laughter that dragged up the worst of her memories, of that night when she had watched nearly everything in her home get torn apart, tortured, and violated. Only her uncle was there now, but she swore she could now hear the screams of hundreds.
Then it hit her. Only her uncle was there.
Surely, that wouldn't be the case for too much longer, Cow Girl all but prayed. Surely, the boy she had cherished from childhood would swoop in at any moment, springing a trap of some sort that would see the goblins screaming and scrambling.
There was one garbled high-pitched squeal, one that gave her a spot of hope. Then she heard another scream.
Then there was another scream, one that she was familiar with in a completely different way, and her heart stopped. It only then occurred to her that the goblins were screaming in fear and outrage but annoyance, annoyance that someone didn't submit but tried to harm them.
Her uncle had tried to fight. She just had to exit her room to see that he was losing as he obtained more and more gashes along his body trying to barricade the invading goblins, keeping them at bay with nothing more than a pitchfork. There was only so much he could do. He was not trained to fight.
Neither of them was.
As the realization sunk in, she heard a crashing sound behind her, the sound of her bedroom window shattering. Her legs instantly grew weak when she heard that accursed snickering and jeering behind her.
The goblins had trapped them, and this time, there was no gallant knight in armor to save the day.
Her body's will all but gave way. She could have rushed to grab a nearby chair or anything in the house to defend herself with. Her legs only moved an inch before the goblins were upon her.
She tripped, only causing the goblins to roar with laughter. Her uncle was probably shouting at her, but she couldn't hear him. She felt like nothing more than a weak pathetic mouse as she attempted to scurry away in tears.
There was a wall in the way of that.
Cow Girl wanted so desperately to close her eyes shut and never open them again as the goblins descended upon her, but her body wouldn't listen. Her eyes remained open, forced to watch as the goblins slowed their advance, fingers wriggling with sickening anticipation as their smiling faces turned lecherous.
They slowly crawled up to her, their hands all over her body tugging at her collar, trying to pull it down as more hands went for the straps of her overalls.
All she could do was silently let out a desperate plea towards the sky. Wasn't there anyone who could save them?
Then everything froze. Well, everything with the exception of Cow Girl. However, she was still locked in place despite this seemingly divine way out of her current predicament, only able to stare at the grotesque faces of the goblins that surrounded her, their gnarled fingers still gripping the straps of her overalls.
"So are you just going to sit their gawking?"
Cow Girl hardly registered the voice amidst the horrific primal display she was in the process of becoming a part of. However, the snapping of fingers finally got her to look up.
She nearly banged the back of her head against the wall when she saw the voice's source. Typically, humans didn't just float in the air. Even those who were agents of their respective gods didn't possess such powers, at least not ones they could flaunt so casually.
He was certainly an uncanny individual. His eyes reminded her more of a beast, possessing red irises, narrow pupils and very little visible sclera. The way his sideburns angled upwards by his cheeks were reminiscent of tusks. His spiky locks waved and curled in air seemingly of their own volition.
However, what stood out even more was the fur coat draped over his shoulders. The head of some horned beast Cow Girl had never seen in her life drooped down, its massive clawed paws wrapped loosely around the unknown man's neck. Despite the lack of any motion in the air, it flowed like a strong draft had come in.
"Y-You... Who are you?" she could only utter.
The mysterious man shrugged. "Merely an observer from up high who decided he wanted to satiate his curiosity. You may call me Master of Beasts."
Cow Girl, with her mind in disarray, could only ask one thing. "D-Did you come to save us?"
Master of Beasts unclasped his gloved hands. "Oh, I simply came to talk. Like I said, I come from up high. It isn't like I can just obliterate these monsters with the wave of my hand or anything.
"Th-Then, what is..." Cow Girl started, motioning towards their frozen surroundings.
"Oh, I'm not physically doing anything," Master of Beasts said with a chuckle. "This is just what it looks like when your mind makes contact with someone from a different plain of existence. Time's relative like that."
"I'm the one doing this?" Cow Girl could only stupidly ask. "I-I stopped...them...?"
Her eyes furrowed at being reminded of what surrounded her, what she at the moment was powerless to stop. With their threat basically gone at the moment, she didn't feel quite so fearful towards them. The only thing that stayed consistent was her disgust.
She heard a pleased-sounding hum, drawing her attention back to the being above her.
An unnervingly knowing smile crossed Master of Beasts' face. "Now that's why I'm here. That's how I know you're going to get yourself out of this."
"M-Me?" Cow Girl stammered, feeling the dread abruptly return. "W-What could I possibly do?"
"Accept what I'm about to give you," Master of Beasts said, holding a hand out. He leaned in closer with a wide grin, revealing to her his rows of sharp fangs in the place of teeth. "Will you let go of your weakness and embrace the strength you have locked away for so long?"
Despite feeling something dangerous in this mysterious being's smile, Cow Girl knew what the alternative was. She placed her hand in his.
As soon as she did, she felt something stir within her heart that she couldn't quite explain. It was like the life was being pumped back into it, everything that her horrifying memories had sapped away suddenly returned. The muscles she built through her years of hard work on the farm that her mind had made her forget about in that moment of terror suddenly surged back to life.
However, she wasn't becoming more courageous or really more energized.
Cow Girl felt something much more aggravatingly hot pumping through her veins, something that caused her hands to shake.
"All I need is a promise from your heart," Master of Beasts said. "Promise me you will slaughter them all."
Then he vanished.
However, time was slow to resume. It was resuming to be sure, with the hideous hands of the surrounding goblin horde slowly inching their way back across her body, fingers curling into nasty hooks ready to tear at her clothes once again.
Her mind flashed back to that traumatic day, the horrors she witnessed and villagers she thought she would spend her whole life knowing falling to the earth, unmoving lifeless eyes staring right back at her. She could hear still hear the screams of everyone she loved being either torn apart or violated.
Then she realized there were other voices mixed in. Amidst the screams were the jeers and screeches of the goblins, high off of their triumph.
This time, the memories didn't cause the life to depart from her body, to leave it a husk ready to be picked apart by her attackers, to leave her nothing more than a hapless victim.
Cow Girl was angry.
No, she was beyond that. The sneering, smug faces of the creatures surrounding her set her very blood ablaze. They were so smug in their apparent moment of triumph, seeing her as nothing more than a warm body to use and discard at their leisure. They thought she was weak.
She could no longer be weak. She refused to let herself be weak any longer!
Something deep and guttural rumbled in her throat as her fingers flexed outwards. Her lips peeled back into a snarl. The muscles in her legs and biceps burned. Something akin to a coiling sensation was building in her midsection.
Within the slowed time, she shot a hand out, ready to shed blood for the first time.
A fist wasn't what met the goblin's face.
When time resumed, she was out of the pile the goblins had been attempting to form around her. The goblins screamed in confusion as they tumbled backwards, all except the goblin she had struck.
It wouldn't have been able to, not when its skull had been completely skewered. And it definitely wasn't alive after she crushed a hole into his head when they both landed.
Cow Girl's nose wrinkled in disgust at the rancid smell of the goblin's gore. There was a click in the cartilage of the nose's tip. Then the foul odor suddenly intensified. It was so thick in the air that it nearly made her gag. Her previously small nostrils had widened, taking in far too much of the musk of the goblins that still surrounded her.
Ignoring the moisture growing along the tip's skin, she observed the blood disgustingly glistening against the lines of dark red hair that had sprouted across the back of her hands, passively noting how her previously slim fingers had broadened and the leathery pads that had formed underneath. What were more important to her were the dark claws that had sprouted from where her harmless and lightly worn fingernails once were.
They were hooked, and more importantly, sharp, so sharp that she could practically hear them humming as they cut through the air. Her body was finally becoming the weapon she needed it to be.
If it wasn't for the intense burning that was still coursing through her, she would have almost smirked at how the goblin's sneers had abruptly quieted to mere murmurs. Her ears were growing sharper, both in ability and physical appearance. She could feel the ridges pushing through her hair as they took on more triangular shapes, while her eardrums blared from the multiple frightened heartbeats she could suddenly hear.
The goblins had arrived triumphant, but now they were afraid. Cow Girl needed to capitalize on that.
Heat radiated to her other hand as claws unsheathed from its broadening fingertips. She felt compelled to shift her lower balance to the balls of her feet as she hunched over. Several sharp pops radiated across her spine as her upper back muscles stretched. Suddenly, her blouse and the pant legs of her overalls were feeling rather restrictive, though that was nothing compared to the intense cramping sensation in her boots. Without entirely knowing why, Cow Girl transferred all her focus to her legs, letting the heat wash all the way down to her feet.
There was a resounding tear of hard leather completely tearing apart as though it was mere paper, followed by two loud clicks in her toes as they swelled up to blockier proportions. There was a sensation like wax melting that spread across the skin, muscle, and even bones followed by the sensation she was much more familiar with of claws replacing nails. She was only vaguely aware that the fact that there were now only three scaly toes on each elongating foot flexing and digging their newly-formed claws into the floorboards.
With her altering balance, Cow Girl felt the necessary power pumping through her thighs, muscles practically exploding as they firmed up and broadened.
She was now ready to make the lunge at her prey.
Prey...
It wasn't a word that typically entered her mind, but it was feeling increasingly correct, especially as she felt what she now could identify was fur was beginning to spread down her back, chest and arms, taking time to speckle her triangular ears as the hair that surrounded them began darkening at the roots.
A roar, a sound she hadn't uttered before in her life, escaped her darkening lips as she charged.
The sound of wood splintering mixed with the screams of her targets, her speed tearing apart the floorboards beneath her. Her new claws were as deadly as any sword, perhaps even more with how they easily cut through the flesh of the goblins she managed to catch in them, the blood and entrails coating her body. The force was only intensified by the fact that her palms and forearms had lengthened with a series of cracks during strike, granting her just that bit more reach that she previously lacked.
And that was to say nothing of the impact she made in the floor itself by slamming the whole weight of her upper body down onto it. She hardly registered how much her posture had changed, no longer feeling at ease standing upright despite her legs still being a tad too long to evenly stand on all fours. However, the sharp click in her pelvis and arching of her back was compelling her to remain as she was. Her blouse had only tightened its increasingly aggravating grip over her body, particularly because of how it now hugged the much thicker tufts of fur along the prominent ridge of vertebrae that was pushing against her skin.
What she registered more acutely was the foul taste of goblin blood on her tongue could attest to. She spitefully spat out the goblin corpse in her mouth, his body practically splitting in two when it hit the floor due the massive bite mark in his side. Despite the weight in her jaws being alleviated, she still could not find relief for the cramping. Her gums still ached from how oversized and curved her canines had become, especially her upper ones. That was to say nothing of the room in the back her growing fangs were beginning to take up.
However, not every goblin was taken out during the attack. Cow Girl uttered another sharp growl in annoyance. How dare they try to escape!
Her growl turned into a rough and slightly deep scream as she felt several blades piercing her back, though aside from the pain, she didn't feel her body growing weak in the slightest. Her previously delicate skin had thickened as more fur burst forth from the pores, to say nothing of the layers of muscle that had rippled over, shielding her vitals from any actual harm.
All the goblins succeeded at were making their attacker even angrier.
Cow Girl shook her body violently. She heard the seams of her clothing beginning to tear around her more muscular frame as the attacking goblins were sent flying through the air along with the blades they had used on her. She turned her body around, feeling it curve and bend in ways it formerly couldn't as she reduced the goblins around her sides to viscera with every swat and slam her broad, clawed hands at, though she was now beginning to think of them as "paws" and what were her arms as "forelegs".
It was becoming more appropriate as she used what she was now identifying as her "hind legs" to knock away the goblins that dared to make a second attempt at a sneak attack, hearing the joints of her lower limbs loudly snapping and clicking into new positions. After several slashes of her back claws, her front and back limbs were completely level. Her calves have shrunk in length with the shifting of her joints, knees pressing closer to her narrowing hips as her feet settled into their new elongated proportions.
However, even with this greater balance, Cow Girl felt a presence missing. Her hind legs could only reach so far. She needed something else.
Just as the thought crossed her mind, her tailbone began to tingle unbearably. Her spine let out a cascade of pops in rapid succession as pressure rapidly built in the base of her spine.
Then she felt her tailbone wiggle. Something pressed up against the back of her overalls. She clenched her fangs tightly as she felt a severe cramp intensify in the area, somehow knowing to compel her spine to extend further, far past her rear. Skin stretched and more muscle began to wrap around her spine as it did just that.
Finally, Cow Girl's new appendage became strong enough to finally break through the multiple layers of fabric. With a shake of her backside, what remained of her overalls and underwear slumped to the floor around her hind legs, allowing her tail to fully grow and unfurl in all its six-foot long glory, its dark scales gleaming and tip threateningly pointing towards the threats behind her.
It didn't feel strange at all, sensing every motion of her tail as she swayed and curled it to and fro, slamming it on the ground and coiling it to crush every pathetic goblin that had decided to wander into its grasp.
Her furrier ears swiveled, now more conical than elf-like in shape as they pushed up the sides of her head. They could pick up more goblin cries, equal parts fear and anger. She could sense their exact location now.
Then she remembered she wasn't the only being they had foolishly tried to attack.
Even in her growing haze of rage, she could remember her uncle.
And that only caused the growing tint of red in her vision to deepen further.
However, her vision was changing even further than that, the edges pulsing as her peripheral vision expanded, coinciding with her irises turning a deeper shade of crimson as they expanded over the whites of her eyes, her pupils stretching out into narrow slits. Conversely, her surroundings seemed to grow duller and fuzzier, like a blurry photograph. That was with the exception of every living being around her, all of them instead glowing a vibrant red, the color of heat.
There was a mass of heat slowly surrounding her that she was more than eager to extinguish.
A much stronger ripple passed through her body, causing her muscles to go rigid as they burned. That same burning sensation was building to a particularly unpleasant climax in her lungs with an accompanying faint wave of nausea in her gut. It was like her organs were now threatening to burst out of her body, as the surrounding flesh and bone were struggling to breathe to make the space needed for them to expand.
Combined with how hunched her shoulders had become, practically forming peaks along her upper back, her clothes had only become an obstacle. A much deeper roar exploded out of her as she gripped the collar of her stretched out and torn blouse with her forepaw. Fabric flew everywhere with ease. It was like tearing through raw cotton.
Underneath all that, she didn't have to worry about the shame of being exposed. From neck to toe, with more creeping up her cheeks, fur covered where there had once been only fair skin. Dark red covered her entire backside, wrapping around her bulging flanks and biceps, running down the back of her tail and finishing at the end with a pronounced tuft, becoming particularly long and disheveled near the nape of her neck where it was virtually indistinguishable from the color her shortening head of hair had taken. In contrast, all of her front side and extremities, as well as her limbs all the way down to her shortened calves were covered in a contrasting pure white that only made the goblin blood stains covering them stand out that much more.
With the final limiter gone, any spiritual clamps that had been keeping her body confined to the size of an average girl were completely shattered. Her chest immediately exploded outwards into a broad, barrel-like shape, her previously sizeable buxom firming up as it sank back and stretched out amidst the layers of muscle wrapping over them. Her hind legs tore apart the floorboards completely as they were forced further back by her lengthening midsection, her merely toned and somewhat narrow waist fleshing out.
Then, that expanding sensation hit with full force. She shut her eyes tightly for a moment, feeling her muscles rippling and hearing her bones groan. When her eyes opened again, she saw that the floor was suddenly much farther from her, though it was more accurate to say that her form had grown at least three more feet. She could even feel the ceiling brushing closer to the thickened, disheveled mane that had spread down her back.
Despite the amount of energizing oxygen she could now inhale into her now massive lungs, she still didn't find that her current form was enough. The goblins were still circling her, trying to find one more angle where she could be vulnerable, where they could pin her down
A tight ache spread across her forehead, her hairline specifically. She snarled and spat, flailing her head around with reckless abandon, her animalistic noises turning into deepening chokes as her neck pushed out inch by agonizing inch, broadening with muscle. Her ears, now completely covered in jagged disheveled fur and fully at the top of her head, peeled back in distress.
It didn't take long for her migraine to reach its peak. In desperation, with her new elongated neck, Cow Girl slammed her head into the floor, crushing two goblins that had foolishly decided stand underneath.
Another shudder marking another full growth spurt racked her body as the pain in her head gave way to a sensation of something growing somewhat like what had happened with her tail but much stiffer. As her head rose back up, these growths pushed past her bangs, extending high into the air. The impaled corpses of the two goblins hung off of them.
Though she couldn't fully comprehend how she sensed what they were, she knew she had just grown horns. They were long jagged shapes that jutted forward before bending back into sharp points like the prongs of a pitchfork, nearly the same glossy black like the scales running down her feet and scales if not for the red blood running down them.
With her new immense height, she could survey the entirety of the floor beneath her, able to see the invading goblin horde that now surrounded her, their attacks having ceased. They stopped being a threat to her as soon as that transformative spark passed through her body. They were now completely open to the slaughter.
A deep inhuman sound rumbled through her much longer throat, lacking anything of the high girlish voice she used to have. A longer, flatter tongue with a pointed tip extended out and idly slid across her glistening fangs and now fully black and leathery lips. The tip of her nose twitched at the overwhelming scent of fear that surrounded her, nostrils flaring out further, widening out the previously narrow ridge of her nose, before the tip suddenly flattened back and bulged outwards going from a small point to a wide triangular shape with rounded edges, the skin all along it shimmering black just like her lips.
Cow Girl wasn't a scared farm girl anymore. She was an animal, a beast. She could hardly even remember her name anymore.
The growing fur agreed, enveloping her entire blood-splattered face in white, with the dark red along the cheeks and cascading down the bridge of her nose. She let out another sharp though now much deeper growl as she felt the migraine return, though this time it was her entire skull that felt on fire. The fangs were now truly beginning to crowd her jaws, forcing her to open them.
Her cheeks shunted outwards first, causing the fur along to push out into messy tufts. There was a click then a crunch in her jaws before they jutted outwards, lips stretching along with them and the ridge of her nose only widening further as her stretching face took on a broader shape. Though she was forced to shut her eyes from the pressure, she could feel them moving slightly apart. The bridge of her nose wrinkled hideously as her brow pushed outwards, before her round forehead outright violently compressed into a flattened slope. Her lightly pointed chin all but disappeared as her jaws only continued to lengthen further. Her stretching gums felt like they were being endlessly cut as her fangs rearranged themselves and even more fangs emerged to fill in every bit of empty space.
After what felt like an eternity, the pain ended with one last violent shudder.
The Behemoth clamped her muzzle shut, her eyes snapping open wildly at the same time.
Before a single thought crossed the beast's mind, something bubbled in her throat. It wasn't yet another sharp growl but something much more potent and violent, something that she swore she had been building up for years now, years of impotent rage that she had been forced to bottle up for reasons she could no longer comprehend but now knew she was now allowed to set free.
She roared into the sky, sending waves through the air, shaking the house she was in to its very foundation, shattering every window as her primal sound broke through the surrounding flames outside and echoed into the night sky.
With that, whatever composure the goblins had been attempting to maintain completely broke, feeling down to their very core nothing but pure terror. The Behemoth's catharsis was interrupted by an irritating cacophony of screams. Her eyes immediately shot down towards the floor to see a crowd of pathetic green insects attempting to escape from the openings in the prison they were all stuck in.
However, she wasn't even close to done with them yet. The very thought of any single goblin escaping her caused her blood to positively boil.
The walls of the small wooden structure they were in meant nothing to her strength and size. With just a charge and a swat of her tail, it soon came crashing down, and with that, any hopes of containing her. And with a field so vast surrounding her, there was nowhere else for her prey to hide.
The Behemoth leapt through the air to intercept the first of the retreating crowds. She reveled in the gore that splayed out beneath her paws and the ground shook from the impact.
Seeing one goblin manage to get away with only a minor scratch made her snarl in rage. She quickly shot her head out, snapping the goblin's entire upper body in her jaws. The goblin's lower torso pathetically stumbled around before the beast spat out its top half.
There was more to come. The beast would not stop until the last of the goblins were exterminated. It was all that she knew.
Cow Girl awoke to the sound of birds chirping. Her entire body felt incredibly stiff, aching much more than even the mornings after her longest, most strenuous work days. Her skin must have been raw because her bed felt it was covered in dry straw. That was to say nothing of how bright the light was, like she was directly in front of the sun. There was a foul and sour taste in her mouth that made her throat feel particularly parched, though that might have been because of how raw it felt in general. It was like she had screamed nonstop for hours.
Maybe she had been, in her sleep.
She shivered as faint images came reappeared in her groggy mind. That was definitely a horrifying nightmare, nothing but fire and the sneering faces of all those goblins. And they had been inside her home, pinning her and her uncle down.
And then she desperately screamed out for help.
And then...
Her eyes shot open in shock as the memories fully crystallized, finally registering that she was now completely nude in the middle of the farm's fields, blood and dirt caking her entire body and face. She clutched her head as she was assaulted by the faint recollected sensations of her body twisting and growing, the rage that now felt so foreign to her pulsing through her veins, and the bloody trail of destruction she left in her wake.
Destruction...
Cow Girl immediately jumped to her feet, her heart feeling like it was threatening to leap out of her throat. Her eyes frantically searched her surroundings, only for her to be met with piles of corpses barely recognizable as goblins. Then she spotted what was left of the barn and saw what had formerly been the livestock, now nothing more than scattered bodies missing their midsections, if there were bodies left at all.
She could only clasp her hands over her mouth in shock when she saw the barn itself reduced to a pile of planks. Blood immediately flowed back through her legs as she made a mad sprint back towards her house.
What she was met with were the remains.
Her breathing grew ragged as she desperately yanked the debris away, caring little for the splinters and cuts she was getting. It felt like she hadn't been breathing for an eternity before she finally saw him.
The sight caused her to outright choke as tears rolled down her cheeks. There was no threat in sight, but she felt like she was going to die.
Underneath the piles of rubble was her uncle, his eyes closed in seeming acceptance of his fate and a pool of blood besides his open mouth that was still drying. There was in fact blood all over the floor. And it had all come out of him, from the many wounds that littered his body. While his head had remained intact, his body had been crushed and speared.
Cow Girl remembered her uncle still struggling while she was undergoing her transformation, even with the rage making the exact images hazy.
And even with that haze, she remembered breaking down the entire front of the house with a reckless charge and destroying the rest with her tail.
She remembered that she had felt triumphant when she did.
She had murdered her uncle, and she had not cared.
Cow Girl was not the monster anymore, and now she felt sick to her stomach. The floor seemed to spin as she collapsed onto her knees, the fearful strength that had propelled them now completely gone.
"On your feet, Behemoth."
Cow Girl's ear twitch at the voice, its familiarity rapidly returning to her. Her head rose, realizing that the world had stopped once again.
And lounging on nothing but air, staring down at her with his head leaning lazily against the back of his head, was Master of Beasts.
While she had received him hesitantly before, now he stood before her with a much more sinister light in his gaze. Even in broad daylight, it was obvious.
"B-Behemoth?" Cow Girl echoed, feeling the words practically burning her tongue. That name felt so wrong being applied to her.
"It is what you agreed to become," Master of Beasts said.
Cow Girl bit her lip. If time were not frozen, sweat would have been dripping from her brow. She began to shake.
This time, it wasn't some beast that was angry. It was her human self. And unlike when she was a beast, all that anger felt like it was doing was eat her apart from the inside.
All she could do was scream. "THAT'S NOT WHAT I WANTED! I JUST WANTED TO BE STRONGER! TO BE ABLE TO FIGHT FOR MYSELF! TO SAVE MY UNCLE! INSTEAD I KILLED HIM!"
"No, you were killing goblins," Master of Beasts sighed dispassionately, as though she were merely whining. "The man just happened to be in building when it collapsed."
"I DIDN'T HAVE TO DESTROY IT!" Cow Girl cried, feeling her eyes burning despite there being no way for her tears to break out. "I could have pulled him out! Something! I shook your hand because you said you could give me the power to save him! To protect people!"
"I gave you the power to exterminate the goblins," Master of Beasts said in a clipped tone. "What I asked you to do was the exterminate them all. Those were my exact words. Where in our agreement did I say I was helping you to save anyone?"
A chill pierced Cow Girl's spine as his words sank in. Yes, she remembered their past conversation clearly now. And though she had made the assumption, none of the guarantees she wanted were there. It was all her fault. "S-So, this is all I am now? Just a monster? I-I'm not even a girl anymore?"
Master of Beasts let out a dark chuckle. "Oh please. I would know that a beast cannot be solely driven by the desire to slaughter. When there are no goblins to slay, you will be as you are now, able to talk, able to think, maybe even to find love..."
"But the moment a goblin is nearby..." Cow Girl breathed in horror.
"The moment I spot even a single one," Master of Beasts clarified sharply, "you will be my Behemoth once again. Each and every time."
The being's dangerous smile returned. "And don't think you can just throw yourself into death. The Behemoth will always want to be alive."
Before Cow Girl could respond, time resumed, and the deity that had cursed her vanished in a blink. His last words echoed in her mind as she could do nothing but look once again at the blood and destruction she had left in her wake.
Her tears periodically fell as she scrounged through the mess, only able to find just enough to put into a single traveler's backpack. She couldn't care less baggy, dusty mess she was wearing when she left. It wasn't like there was anyone she could see anymore.
There was that boy from her childhood, her Goblin Slayer, the protector who fate decided couldn't be there for her that night. She wanted to see him more than anyone now more than ever. He would probably be returning eventually. She at least still had the faith that he would.
But she couldn't.
She was no longer Cow Girl, that childhood friend who waited for him back at home.
She was the Behemoth, the monster.
***
Goblin Slayer couldn't find Cow Girl when he returned home and saw the destruction.
The people in the neighboring town hadn't seen her either.
However, over time, murmurings of a girl with red hair began to spread in the towns, cities, and kingdoms beyond. She never stayed long, she was often barefoot, and she always did her best to hide her face underneath her hooded cloak.
The only reason anyone began noticing was that the ground always shook a day or even hours after she left, and there was always that same thunderous roar that accompanied it.
Could these murmurings be enough for Goblin Slayer to find his childhood friend once again? Only time would tell.