Editing Apocalypse Witch:Volume1 Chapter3 (section)

===Part 8===

In that instant, Susannia Evans was closing in on her target using the many pieces of data and guidelines displayed in her biological vision, but she also wondered something beyond the tactical situation directly in front of her.

What had happened to that crystal girl from the reports?

It was obvious the enemy would prioritize the living over the nonliving. And if that girl had been abandoned when they escaped the log cabin, she would have been shattered along with the building.

But based on the fragments of information they had from the broadcast station and London, that was a Crystal Blossom that functioned entirely separately from its user.

It could be stored inside that user’s body.

So which was it?

Was the crystal girl there or not? And how would that influence this battle?

Just as she wondered that, the twintails girl altered how she flew. She rapidly braked to move in close to Susannia. If this was not some kind of tricky close-quarters combat using a sword or spear, then there was no real merit to getting closer. They may have been foolishly hoping she would overshoot them, but she was not about to fly past them and let them take up the offensive position on her tail.

But then something else happened.

Something burst from the back of the boy clinging to the twintails girl.

It was Aine, that deadly weapon with a delicate and slender body and pale skin.

“Wha-?”

The crystal girl took a very simple action.

She did not use her specially-shaped sword. Nor did she participate in the dogfight.

In that highspeed aerial world of dogfighting, she simply separated from her sacrifice boy. She was unleashed. She did not cling to anything, the fierce headwind pummeled her, and her silver hair spread out while reflecting a rainbow-colored light.

She was forcefully launched.

The slender girl flew backwards. Yes, she was slammed straight toward Susannia Evans who was on their tail.

Susannia frantically tried to dodge, but it was too late.

“You goddamn- agh!?”

She collided with a mass of a few dozen kilograms while moving at the speed of an artillery shell. That would normally have shattered both their bodies, but the crystal girl did not so much as crack. The shrill shattering sound that accompanied the impact was likely from the spatial vibration field of her preset barrier. She grabbed onto Susannia from the front. Her soft but cold arms and legs clung to Susannia like an octopus or squid’s tentacles or like a drowning child trapping the would-be rescuer who had jumped into the ocean or river to save them. And she squeezed with a tremendous viselike grip.

She chose bondage as a form of attack.

Susannia’s flight used magical power, but she could not altogether ignore the laws of physics like the brooms or Santa’s sleigh seen in storybooks. Her spread wings were forcibly folded back up and her bottle-sized jet engines were crushed, so she could no longer keep her body airborne.

“Wait, ah!? Dammit, you!!”

“Do not worry.” The cold girl rested her chin on Susannia’s shoulder and whispered in her ear with her legs still tangled around her. “I am not so fragile that I will shatter after a freefall drop from this height at this speed.”

“Persephone, do something!!”

Susannia’s face tensed as she sent a request inside herself to open all the shock-absorbing structures on the surface of her body. But that request was not answered. Aine’s tight hold on her body prevented the hatches from opening.

From there, they were a lot like a shooting star.

The two of them crashed into the snowy surface with their supersonic speed intact.