Editing Godhorn Tech:Volume2 Chapter4 (section)

===Chapter 4 Section 1===

People’s fear led to doubt. The have-nots doubted the haves while the haves doubted themselves.

And they all chose the same method of finding peace: to attack.



Moebius Entrance.

Confronting that man required turning back from the snow-covered Arsenal Kingdom and returning to the first village. The Schwarz Schütze had taken them the majority of the way there, but they would have to trek through the cold on the way back. That meant taking time to prepare for the journey in the Arsenal Kingdom.

But the 15-year-old redhead boy with sawdust goggles on his forehead did not remember any of it.

He knew he and the others had walked around the fortress city surrounded by those thick walls, but he did not remember how he had spent his time there.

“S-sorry,” he vaguely recalled a puppy-like chosen knight saying. “Tours of the castle are currently canceled due to all the confusion. But only because everyone is working so hard to fix our current situation instead of insisting someone else do it. In that sense, this is a step in the right direction.”

She wore gorgeous armor, including fine silverwork, a feather headdress, and a miniskirt, but it also possessed excellent magical defenses. She was one of the elite White Seidr Chosen Knights, but she was now running around fixing up the castle town with the ordinary soldiers.

The heat of the riot had faded from the icy city, so everyone was working to gather up the trash and repair the crumbling wall.

“Sorry, but no tours today,” he half-remembered a chosen knight saying with a condescending look. “Nothing good comes of the commoners seeing chaos in the castle. You should leave now.”

The icicles and frozen waterways were likely an intentional part of the city’s design in this snowy land.

“Sigh, the place is finally looking like a city again,” he partially remembered a tomboyish chosen knight commenting. “I have more strength than I know what to do with, so I really wish they would send some jobs my way. I’ll do anything – even lay bricks or paint walls!”

“Eh? You were wondering if all the Arsenal Kingdom’s knights are women?” He must have asked a knowledgeable chosen knight that at some point. “It’s not a requirement, but it is true most are. Hee hee. But we do have male knights. Look around and you might just find one.”

But.

He felt like he was wandering through a dream.

He must have left the Arsenal Kingdom at some point, but he didn’t remember doing it. He would not have questioned it if someone told him the memories were merely implanted in his head.

The shock had left him feeling utterly pathetic.

Betrayals did not just leave the victim brimming with rage toward the traitor. It was more complicated than just hating an enemy. They found themselves unable to trust themselves after trusting the traitor like that. It left a deep emotional scar.

“Moebius.”

“Hold on, boy. I thought you were shopping around to prepare for our journey.”

He did not even hear Alicia Blueforest, an elf who looked 13 or 14.

Instead, he stabbed his thick blade into the deep snow.

That control sword had a short blade for a two-handed sword, but who would believe it had originally been a machete? It was in fact a special control device used to send commands to the Lucifer Horn.

He let his anger take control of his voice.

He felt like he had lost all other emotions.

He shouted the name like he was preparing to tear the man’s throat out with his teeth.

“Moebius Entrance!”

“Wait!! Summoning that thing in this blizzard accomplishes nothing. Snatching yourself up with its wire will only throw you out into the sky!!”

The short elf’s white dress fluttered as she grabbed at Miyabi to stop him. Concluding that was not enough, Helen Clockgear, a young black-haired woman in a tight skirt and glasses, struck the back of the boy’s neck with the pommel of her knife. He collapsed into the snow, and Eliza Silverstorm, a professional fighter of the White Seidr Chosen Knights, grew flustered.

“But why?” shouted blonde Alicia, scooping the boy up from the snow. “Why would he be pulling the strings!?”

None of them had the answer.

Nor would they until they returned to where this journey had begun.

They knew the answer awaiting them would please none of them, but they had to return to the first village. They had arrived comfortably enough in the Schwarz Schütze armored train, but the way back would be on foot, meaning the white snowscape would bear its fangs.

Just one step outside of the gate transformed their surroundings into one of biting cold.

“Are we really headed in the right direction?” groaned Celina Bodenburg, whose black dress left her shoulders bared even in the frigid temperatures. “We aren’t going to end up stranded out here, are we?”

They could not continue traveling through the night.

As impatient as they were, a night blizzard would be fatal. When they spotted a village along the way, they would take a short detour to find an inn. If they did not, they had to camp out in a cave or some other shelter.

Today, they were in a rocky mountain cave.

“Ugh, how many days has it been now?” asked Alicia. “How I miss stretching out in a nice bath.”

“Why is this forest elf only interested in burning trees for warmth?” added Helen. “But to be fair, I’m just as sick of this snowy land as she is.”

Helen was soaking a towel in boiled water. When they couldn’t find an inn, even that was a luxury. She had loosened her jacket and tied up her black hair to rub the wet towel against her nape, breathing an alluring sigh. The towel really was their replacement for a bath. Not only did it clean them off, it warmed them and helped them relax, albeit to a limited extent.

“Koo,” cried the stuffed animal creature called Alma.

That juvenile Wicked God was currently in a red phoenix form. It was only the size of a slipper, but its own warmth kept it nice and cozy. It looked a little sleepy.

Celina was passing water through a portable filter the size of a beer mug and using the purified water to cast Aqua Wash magic on her hands, eliciting an exasperated comment from Alicia.

“When did you humans forget how to play in the dirt and vegetation? We are surrounded by water out there. Just fill a pot with snow and place it over the fire. You aren’t going to sterilize our dinner with ethanol and formaldehyde, are you?”

“This may be difficult to understand for a nature-loving elf who thinks bathing in the same natural springs as an elephant or hippo will actually get her clean, but a cute and elegant lady must be ever vigilant when it comes to cleanliness. You should thank me for this kind gift – have some deodorant.”

The wild elf, whose long hair and nape gave off a sweet feminine scent, fled as she was sprayed with a disinfectant magic that used purifying silver as a catalyst.

Miyabi was curled up by the rocky wall and did not join in the horseplay.

His shell was shut tight around him.

Even in the freezing cave, the gloomy-eyed boy only ever brought up one topic.

The passage of time did nothing to remove the roiling mass within his heart.

“I don’t know why he did it.”

Throughout their break, he had been staring out from the cave entrance into the thick curtain of snow while muttering fragments of a conversation with himself.

He seemed to be releasing his doubts in advance in order to escape the nightmare. The pressure building in his heart was so painful he refused to eat.

He felt bad doing this to Eliza.

Starting a journey with this hanging over their heads had to be rough, but he could do nothing to break free of the weight bearing down on him.

“But from the beginning, I only ever did what he told me. He told me to take his Godhorn Tech and he told me to search for the 11th’s sorcery bombs.”

He felt used.

His own words threatened to tear him apart.

“He was even the one who told me to contact Celina and send the armored train to the Arsenal Kingdom!”

He had no real motivation. There was no treasure waiting at the finishing line. But he had to push on. Like it was his penance for being so gullible.

Still, each step brought him closer. If nothing else, the path he took would not betray him.

And before he knew it…

“Wow,” gasped Eliza, her silver ponytail swishing behind her.

The snow had vanished from the ground.

That proved they had left the northern lands where the Arsenal Kingdom held sway and that they were approaching the first village. Their feet trod on dark soil and their eyes fell on sparse green undergrowth. They saw the occasional wooden fence, suggesting this area had once been a ranch.

To the chosen knight in miniskirt armor, the white of snow was the natural color for the landscape, so this must have been an unusual sight for her.

But Miyabi only felt gloom.

He was approaching the person he most wanted to see but least wanted to hear from.

Moebius Entrance was waiting. The better one of them knew him, the more keenly aware of that fact they were.

Celina Bodenburg, only child of a massive company, was the first to address it.

“He was the one who chose that forest for our battlefield and injured himself protecting Miyabi.”

She had known the man before even Miyabi.

It had been a hostile relationship, but still.

“Are you saying he did all that to set this up?”

“You mean he dragged Miyabi into this in order to attack the Schwarz Schütze?” Helen placed a finger on the side of her glasses. “So he could send Miyabi after you, use that letter to have Eliza attack, and then lie in wait in the snowy forest so he could replace a portion of the derailed train with a sorcery bomb!?”



How many times had they discussed it now?

How many times had he seen it in his nightmares?

“Pant, gasp. We’ve finally – finally! – made it back,” said Alicia, her shoulders rising and falling. “I’m taking a bath and sleeping for three days straight.”

Yes.

Miyabi Blackgarden had returned to the first village.

That logging village was half enveloped by the Blue Forest. The rhythmic pounding and sawing of tools on trees was unchanged. The small village of log houses seemed cut off from the world’s changes.

Small.

Miyabi was a little surprised to find that adjective in his head. Had the journey really changed him that much? The place had felt so comfortable and complete when he was living here, but now its peace looked fragile and undefended.

“Oh, you’re back, Miyabi?”

“Your parents just went back home a bit ago. You barely miss each other an inordinate amount of the time.”

Some of the neighborhood workers called out to him, but the redhead boy did not respond.

“Is…?”

“Hm?”

“Is Moebius Entrance still here?”

He threw open the door to the clinic, but the place was empty. The wheelchair was gone too. He only found the stillness unique to an empty space.

No…

“Yikes!?” cried Helen after casually peeking below the bed, a habit she had picked up as a “government official”. “That’s Iris, the dancer who was looking after Moebius. …Good, she’s still breathing.”

Miyabi checked too and saw a silver sparkle. It was the dancer’s braid. She had been laid on her side and shoved under the bed in a pose that could not have been comfortable.

If Moebius had nothing to hide, he wouldn’t have had to run off or harm the person so kindly nursing him back to health.

Miyabi tried to fight the dizziness as anger swelled out within him. He now knew that bastard had done more than just trick a gullible fool like him. Moebius had even attacked someone doing him a favor.

“Goddamn it! It really was him.”

He had to shout.

If he did not use that as an outlet for his anger, he was certain he would collapse on the spot.

This new revelation weighed on him that heavily.

“Moebius really was the 11th!!”

“…”

“He set up the sorcery bombs, he had us pit our Godhorn Techs against each other, and he made sure Celina’s was destroyed. Why would that scumbag do all that!?”

Just then, Alma started hopping up and down on the windowsill.

“Koo? Koo, koo!!”

“What is it, Alma?” asked Alicia. “Oh…boy, set your wailing aside and take a look out the window. I see a wheelchair out there, so this is your last chance to catch him!!”

He seriously considered breaking through the wall to get at Moebius faster.

But he stopped himself at the last second and used the door instead. Maybe he wanted to prove that he, unlike that man, was still human.

He had already drawn his control sword and readied it in both hands.

He wanted to vomit remembering that this power was borrowed from that man.

“Moebius!!”

He spotted the distinctive wheelchair in the middle of a public square where anyone could see it. He also saw the man seated in it. He saw the long red hair and the thick coat that could have belonged to a noble or a pirate. He could not see the man’s face, but his mind’s eyes still saw the grin he knew would be plastered on the man’s face.

He could no longer view that smile the same way. Even if the movement of the eyes and lips was identical, it would only look cruel and mocking now.

But Moebius had his back turned.

He had to have heard Miyabi shout his name, but he said nothing.

A powerful tremor shook the entire village.

“Whoa!? Wh-what is that!?”

Celina had seen something while struggling to keep her footing.

Something had just stepped in from outside the village.

But what was it?

It almost looked like a thick castle wall, but…no. It appeared to be a colossal suit of bipedal armor, but its excessively wide torso was more reminiscent of a stretched accordion than realistic body proportions. It could likely create a crater in the ground with a single punch, but its size was not the only unusual thing about it. Its shoulders and chest appeared to be crammed full of as many projectile weapons as the Schwarz Schütze and the Lucifer Horn. It leisurely crossed the village’s border, crushing the fields and fences underfoot, and ignored all the surrounding chaos and confusion. It never hesitated, even when a house stood in the way.

No one could remain standing.

The boy heard piles of logs crashing to the ground.

His party and all the villagers struggling with the logs could only stay on all fours as they bore with the terrible shaking. Attempting to flee may have actually increased the risk of injury.

“Is that…a Godhorn Tech!?”

[[Image:Godhorn_Tech_v02_bw1.png|thumb]]

Helen’s eyes bugged. The Republic had no Godhorn Tech of its own, so not many people there had seen as many as she now had.

Moebius did not so much as glance back at them.

Were Miyabi and his control sword not even worth his attention?

“Took you long enough, Number 8.”

Was that someone’s name?

“So what’s the plan? Hoping to take me away with you?”

Someone stood at the feet of the giant armor.

He looked like a young man with half his face covered by black hair. He wore a tailcoat the color of the night, making him look like a butler. The source of the tremors had to be even more badly shaken, but he used motions as precise as clockwork to negate it, allowing him to stand tall without the slightest waver. He seemed cold and unfeeling, making him seem just as unshakeable as ever-grinning Moebius, but in a different way.

“…”

“Is the Divine Doll hard to operate even for one of you?”

The young butler never responded.

The Divine Doll crouched down and then its massive hand approached the wheelchair. It could have crushed Miyabi’s house with those fingers, but it instead grabbed and lifted just the one person. The butler also hopped onto the giant hand.

Miyabi immediately squeezed his control sword tight.

“Wait, Moebius!!”

“You mustn’t, Miyabi!!” Eliza stepped forward to stop him. “Think of the damage a Godhorn Tech battle would cause this village!!”

“Kh!!”

They were not the only ones in the village. The loggers and hunters who made their living in the forest had yet to get back up from the ground.

Meanwhile, the Divine Doll turned 180 degrees.

Almost like the worms crawling on the ground meant nothing to it.

Moebius did not look back even once. Miyabi could imagine the man’s look of scorn for Miyabi’s inability to actually fight.

The tremors resumed.

The Divine Doll made the ground quake when it walked. It leisurely left the village with Miyabi’s party pinned by the shaking. Its slow movements made one wonder if it even saw this as “running away”, but each step covered a great distance.

“Hm? It’s headed south,” commented Alicia, sounded exasperated. “That leads to the ruined Magic Empire.”

“Come to think of it, I had heard of an automaton that continues to protect those ruins,” said Eliza.

“Koo?” groaned Alma with a head tilt.

The creature may have been responding to the word “automaton”.

Miyabi felt a fire lit inside him as he listened to them speak.

He squeezed the control sword’s grip tight and muttered under his breath.

“Moebius and Number 8.”

But his power was borrowed.

And it was so insignificant that Moebius had not even tried to retrieve it.

Miyabi understood that, but he still could not bring himself to abandon it.

“He toys with us all without ever wiping that damn grin off his face!”