Editing Sorcery Hacker:Volume4 Phase03 (section)

===Part 22===

It was over.

All that remained was a pool of blood and burning flames, but he couldn’t have asked for anything more.

There would be no further tragedy.

(Even so…)

Ayato looked down.

Queen Astaroth Revolver lay unmoving on her back.

Parchment documents were scattered around her.

Those described the Combined Royal Family’s forbidden art.

It could be used to remake a living human’s organs into biological gems which, with a great sorcery cost, could provide overwhelming combat strength and a nigh immortal body.

She had been an illegally leaked model.

Forcibly applying that technique onto a very humanoid demon had been the source of that blonde devil.

(What did she go to such lengths to find here? She was far head of me and even had her chance to research all she liked in the Academy Towers, so what was hidden deep within the palace?)

His time at the Academy Towers allowed him to read it.

He gathered up the many parchment pages and arrived at a summation of their contents.

*A single life can evolve in any number of ways.

*But once a life evolves along a certain path, it takes an immense amount of time and effort for it to return down that path and switch to a different evolutionary path.

*For example, a land animal returning to the sea, or a bird giving up its wings and racing swiftly along the ground.

*There are cases where it would be faster to abandon the unneeded body and redo evolution from scratch.

*In fact, sorcery techniques make it possible to preserve a soul while abandoning the body to redo evolution in that sort of reset process.



''Abandoning the body.

''Intentionally dying to evolve in a desired direction as quickly as possible.



“It can’t be.”

A chill ran down Ayato’s spine as he read through the parchment documents.

No, perhaps this tremor came from his soul.

A great presence grew behind him.

“It can’t be!?”

Something exploded.

Ayato Criminaltrophy was thrown all the way to the wall.

“Gah!?”

It was supposed to be over.

What more could there be?

Even that Sorcery Hacker couldn’t keep up with the changing situation.

“I guard my sorcery revolver by switching between two forms: human and bat. Why should I be bound by a single, unchanging body?”

He heard a voice.

A voice he had thought he would never hear again.

The endless tragedy still refused to end!!

“Which means I can cast off my old body and redo my evolution. Ayato, all I needed was for you to kill me.”

“Queen!?”

“Ah ha ha!! Didn’t I tell you I would ''see you soon''? So we could play again!? You really need to listen to what people tell you.”

She had changed shape.

Size too.

Queen Astaroth Revolver had the body of a beautiful girl, but her wings and tail had been broken down and replaced with tentacles. Each one was transparent and grew thicker as it went, ultimately swelling out further than a human torso. They were more like giant jellyfish tentacles than an octopus or squid’s sucker-covered ones. That meant they might be covered in microscopic venom needles.

And it didn’t end there.

Unpleasant straining sounds continued to leave the Queen’s body. As her evolution and enlargement continued on and on.

“But thanks to you, I can finally be myself.”

She had to be more than 100 esoule<ref>Approximately 120 meters.</ref> tall now.

Supported by the countless tentacles, she stared down at him from far above.

Transparent tentacles covered all. For Ayato, the beautiful face and body were the one ray of sunshine on the otherwise twisted and enlarged body. But for the Queen herself, they appeared to bring nothing but hatred.

“But even after all this, the old shell remains. I want to fully rid myself of it. Ha ha ha. I still have more evolving to do.”

“Out of the way, Sorcery Hacker!! I will buy you time, so go rely on your healer!!”

Hemylina stepped forward with Wall Staff Ablatia in hand.

Queen Astaroth Revolver’s smile did not waver.

She swept a tentacle horizontally.

Mamilis and Henrietta immediately got down and Ayato leaped at Teleria to push her to the ground. Hemylina did not react in time.

A dull crash followed.

Wall Staff Ablatia was supposedly specialized for defense, but it was entirely ignored. The glowing barrier was shattered by the attack and something struck the dark elf’s torso. The force of the blow wasn’t redirected in the slightest.

The resultant sound was unpleasant.

The transparent thing was thicker than a large tree.

If it was covered in countless venom needles like jellyfish tentacle, then what had they injected and how much?

Hemylina wasn’t moving anymore.

“Hee hee hee☆”

Queen Astaroth Revolver scoffed.

No, she was now a pure devil who had cast off her revolver form.

“I am no longer an illegally leaked model! I am not the evolutionary dead-end of a revolver!! Ah ha ha! I am something new and one-of-a-kind, found beyond the cutting edge!! I am the ultimate military might that no one else can ever reach!!!”

This was bad.

She was easily an order of magnitude or two greater than before.

The closer you got to her, the closer you were to death.

The Queen could no longer be dealt with in a joint battle of brute force!!

“You look like you’re viewing a monster, Ayato.”

True immortality.

That extreme villain doomed people as easily as blinking and intoxicated them on the red color of slaughter, so nothing could be more obvious than what happened with true immortality in her grasp.

The Static Continent’s fate was no longer the only thing at stake.

“But are you sure you want to reflexively and heroically insist you will stop me at all costs?”

The devil who had cast off the body she was born with seemed to have read his mind.

“This is your last hope. Do you really not get it? You stand to gain from this too, Ayato.”

She laughed.

The Queen spoke from the heavens above after taking on this bizarre new form.

“You have a human lifespan and that demon does not. The passage of time will tragically tear you apart eventually. Hey, girl. Can you really sit idly by and watch Ayato grow old and decrepit as his lifespan runs out? Will you really do nothing, knowing he will die first and decompose into bones within his grave? The only path to happiness for the two of you is for you, Ayato, to use the same method I have. You must follow in my success and remake your own frail human body!!”

That was an absolute barrier.

For those who could cross it, the crossing was so easy they barely even noticed it was there. But for those who couldn’t cross it, it was truly impassable.

Time.

The cruel definition of one’s lifespan was guaranteed to tear lovers apart.

But.

Someone quietly stepped forward.

It was Teleria Nereid Aquamarine.

“I…”

There was no hesitation in her eyes as she looked up.

Sweet temptation would not sway the demon princess as she stood by the human boy’s side and aimed her handguns.

“I love everything about Ayato who will eventually grow old and lose his life to time.”

She wasn’t ashamed anymore.

She had the face of a girl who had chosen her path.

“I love everything about him, including the flaws, inconveniences, sorrows, and weaknesses that make him a whole person! The differences between human and demon don’t matter. In fact, we don’t even need the separate words. However short his life may be, I will make him happy until the very last moment. Did you really think I could choose to walk by his side if I couldn’t promise that much!?”

To put it another way, this was a critique.

A roaring critique of how shallow Queen Astaroth Revolver’s thinking was – no, how shallow her love was if she could only accept Ayato if he was the strongest and that she would reject him the instant he grew too old to hold onto the position of strongest.

“We didn’t ask for your help, you damn devil. What kind of half-baked love can’t embrace every last part of the person they love? I am not going to take the one person in the world I love and remake him into a stuffed version of himself that can’t even move around or talk for himself!!!”



Thus, it was also a final parting and declaration of war.

It signaled the start of the final battle.

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