Editing City Series:Volume6b Chapter3 (section)

===Part 5===

A battle began in front of Hazel.

Berger sent a leftward roundhouse kick sweeping up toward Jeanne as she tried to turn around and stand up.

<The Fatherland’s winds never cease blowing.>

Jeanne stood behind Berger.

“An Erklärung!?”

Before his question was done, Hazel saw Jeanne pull out a handgun. The powerful red light emerging from the muzzle was the Ton of killer of intent and it extended toward Berger’s back.

“You actually showed up, Wild Hund? I honestly expected the dog to abandon the cat.”

[[Image:City_v06b_113.jpg|thumb]]

“I ran into some Geheimnis Agents while picking up the package. After punching out the three of them, I came back here.” He smiled bitterly. “Based on that black dress, I take it you’re ‘Eisen Blume’ 
Jeanne Schmitt. …Middle-aged, just like the rumors said.”

After a gunshot, Berger was blasted to the side and slammed into the wall as if from a blow to the side.

A beat later, his black-cloaked form crumbled to the bottom of the wall. Hazel’s heart skipped a beat.

“B-Berger!?”

Her question was cut off by a series of gunshots.

Each shot caused his body to jerk as if kicked.

<Destiny cannot be pierced.>

Darkness burst out.

His black coat flew toward Jeanne as she fired her handgun. The metal hand emerging from the left sleeve thrust toward her neck. It was prepared to rip her throat out.

“!”

The bullets pierced the black coat, but they passed right on out the other side.

The coat had nothing inside it other than the left arm.

“I said it can’t be pierced, didn’t I?”

He burst from behind the flying coat as if tearing himself away from it.

He had removed his prosthetic left arm and he held the Eingeweide sword Gelegenheit with its shadowy blade active.

The blade emerging from the golden hilt was more than 8 yards long.

Eight objects similar to black flowers were attached midway up the hilt.

They were crushed bullets.

The black blossoms scattered when he swung Gelegenheit, slicing from ceiling to floor as if drawing out a 
diagonal circle.

<Destiny tears people apart.>

He shouted that Erklärung and the room was split in two. No, the entire inn was bisected. One half included Jeanne and her subordinate by the window and the other half contained Berger and Hazel by the hallway.

The diagonal cut caused Jeanne’s half to sink down for a moment.

And it did not stop there. That half of the inn fully collapsed.

“–––––!”

Jeanne growled in anger and Berger held Gelegenheit in his mouth to pull a small boxy device from his pocket. He pushed two of the red buttons on it.

Immediately, the collapsing half of the inn neatly exploded, scattering dust and splinters more than fire.

He grabbed a chair that had just barely avoided being caught in the bisection and threw it into the rising smoke as if to be extra sure he got them.

“That’s three times now I’ve had to do that bit for you.”

The collapsing half of the inn could not support its own weight, so it broke apart and scattered along the ground.

Even if it was only half, that was a three-story building standing nearly 12 yards tall that had collapsed, so it caused an impressive amount of noise and smoke. It was not quite a roar, but a dusty sound surrounded them.

Hazel listened to that for a few seconds before peeling herself away from the wall.

“…”

She silently approached him and then the words spilled out of her.

“Why?” She hung her head. “Why did you come? Like they said, didn’t you have a reason to…”

She could not bring herself to say the rest, so she said something else instead.

“You aren’t the type to come back, but I still waited. And yet…”

“Say that in English, just like when you called my name.”

“Eh?”

She looked up at that and saw him using his right hand to wipe away the blood dripping down his brow.

His face was not smiling, angry, or tense.

“Things have changed. The Geheimnis Agency is serious about this, so I’ll be taking you myself.”

“T-taking me where?”

“I read the letter in your bag on the way back here. I have to reach the German Army’s Base #8 in the Black Forest by tomorrow midday to destroy the warship about to be commissioned from there. That’s my AIF mission.”

And…

“A skilled courier will be arriving there to take you back to America.”

She nodded at that, but then she recalled something she could not afford to forget.

“U-um, is the innkeeper okay? Don’t tell me they-”

“He’s alive. He can’t stay here anymore, though.”

Berger smiled bitterly for the first time since arriving. The expression looked somewhat troubled.

She tilted her head at that and he explained.

“Worry about yourself before others, silly girl. You have a lot to learn.”

“You have a point.”

She tried to force a smile and failed.

“Yes, you have…”

The rest of the words broke apart as her lips went loose and refused to take the proper shape.

A scratchy voice escaped her throat and the tears soon followed. She could not speak, her breaths seemed to crash into the bottom of her lungs, and she started to sob.

“Don’t cry.”

She shook her head over and over to ignore those words.

“Wh-why…why,” she choked. “Why did you come back?”

She let the tears flow and clung to his right arm as she wept.

The night breeze swept across them.