CubexCursedxCurious:Volume10 Chapter4
Chapter 4 - The Pendulum After Four Minutes / "A hand stops, but never reverses"
Part 1
Hinai Elsie.
The Frontline Gathering Knights' Dominion—«Four Minutes».
Haruaki's group swiftly entered defensive positions against her. Staying on high alert, Haruaki stared at her while she approached leisurely, took out his cellphone and was just thinking he should call when—
"...I have already called Kirika just now to wake her. She should be hurrying over soon."
"Himura-sensei."
Hiding somewhere until now, staying on guard for Elsie's arrival, Himura appeared next to Haruaki's group without them noticing. Holding a cellphone in hand, he was watching Elsie cautiously like Haruaki and the others. Just as he claimed, soon after—
"Sorry I'm late!"
Kirika rushed out of the stairwell. She had already extended the «Tragic Black River» from her sleeve, readying herself for battle. Having confirmed her arrival, Haruaki operated his cellphone again—To call someone else rather than Kirika. After a brief report, he hung up.
Elsie did not look like she was in a hurry, walking as though taking a casual stroll, taking large strides towards them. She was still quite far away. Fear glanced to the side.
"No matter what, I really hope to move Amanda far away from here... Hey Himura, your mask can eliminate presences, right? If you push the wheelchair while wearing the mask, what's the result?"
"Regrettably, the won't be much effect. For things I'm holding or transportation I'm traveling on, the only effect is reducing the attention they attract from people. Clothing is fine but even if I wear «Il est dans Bastille» while sitting in a car, it won't cause normal drivers to crash violently from being unable to see the car. The same goes for Amanda's wheelchair. Particularly in these circumstances, the enemy will be staring intently at her wheelchair—"
"In other words, you cannot erase your presence together with the wheelchair. What a useless man. Is there anything else you can do?"
"If I had to say more, «Il est dans Bastille» here is unable to completely mask the wearer's hostility and killing intent. When the wearer actively thinks about harming someone, the enemy will see through where he or she is hiding."
"It can't even be used for a sneak attack? What a completely useless man... Then why don't you just wear that mask and stay far away from getting involved!?"
"...Is this an order?"
"Of course it's an order. Otherwise, you're in the way too much. In an emergency, we have no effort to spare for protecting you!"
"I understand. Then I'll retreat for now. But if something arises that I could help with, I will surely help."
Himura took out the evil-looking and familiar mask from the bag by his feet. His presence was extremely weak to begin with. Now that he put this on, he vanished all at once—By the time they noticed, there was completely no trace of him. In actual fact, this was probably just their impression.
Kirika watched with eyes filled with complicated emotions, glaring at the spot where Himura had disappeared. But she immediately shook her head as though casting away those thoughts.
"Well then—We'll just have to use the same tactics as last time. With relatively lower combat strength, Yachi and I will be in charge of Amanda while using this opportunity to move her to a safe location... Any problems?"
"A huge~ problem. I advise you guys to give up. Because it's a waste of effort. Say, while you guys have your backs turned to me, it's already a great crisis, you're giving me a massive opening~"
Elsie commented nonchalantly while pulling out from her collar the «Clockwork Life» pocket watch and swinging it back and forth.
This is just a bluff—Haruaki thought.
"What bold words... We already know everything about how you fight, your weaknesses and what you've been doing."
"Eh, really?"
Haruaki glanced upwards. Next to the school building's external wall where the large clock was embedded, on a neighboring rooftop, a figure could be seen. This was the person whom Haruaki had just phoned to inform of Elsie's arrival.
"Zenon-san!"
After Haruaki yelled out, the figure nodded lightly and with a flick of her arm, a glimmer of silver light, even fainter than the stars in the far distance, flew towards the clock face. In the next instant, the sound of the protective glass could be heard shattering. Both the long hand and the short hand stopped due to the thrown knife. This was followed by a series of silver flashes as steel knives were repeated thrown to attack the clock's hands, finally—
Accompanied by a crisp cracking sound...
The two hands were severed and their remains fell down in front of the school building. Taking a bow, the figure on the rooftop immediately vanished.
"Ohoh~ I was wondering why all the clocks I found were broken. I see what happened now. Elsie finally UNDERSTAND~"
"That's right. In order to prevent you from breaking clocks, in order to prevent the pocket watch in your possession from storing time—"
"Oh my oh my, oh my oh my, what's this~? You guys really don't understand."
Elsie laughed in derision. This reaction sent chills down Haruaki's spine. What was going on? When she broke large clocks, was she not trying to accumulate more time for her pocket watch to use? Could it be that they had... misunderstood something...?
"What~ a~ shame~ I'm sorry to say this, but Elsie has already stored up the full four minutes already!"
"What—No way, so the three you broke in the beginning, were enough for you to already...?"
Fear groaned, causing Elsie to laugh with abundant mirth.
"So I'll explain, that's not how it works~ The act of breaking clocks is simply a necessary step in prior preparations to allow this «Clockwork Life» to store up time, but it's not the actual process for storing time itself. This tool was created by a certain clockmaker who wanted everyone to understand that 'time and life are equally important.' Hence, 'I never noticed usually but time and clocks turn out to be so important after all' is the kind of feeling this pocket watch gathers from the surrounding people to use as energy. Everyone usually don't notice but once a clock they're used to reading is broken, they will think: 'Oh no, this clock was actually so convenient' before taking out a cellphone from their pocket. In other words, this type of feeling that people develop towards clocks is what I'm gathering. Although a single person's feelings are weak, large clocks are all located where crowds gather, so naturally, it's possible to gather feelings from many people. Like slowly accumulating a tenth of a second, a tenth of a second repeatedly... In this manner, this pocket watch finally begins to define the time known as life."
In that case—
In that case, in other words, what they had been doing all along—
"That's right, you guys ended up helping Elsie. All Elsie only needed to do was run over to stand under a disabled clock in order to collect the feelings from all the surrounding people with inconvenience written on their faces. So I guess I should still thank you all—You saved me a lot of effort, thanks!"
Right before their eyes as they watched in shock—
Elsie slowly reached towards the her pocket watch's stem—
As though showing off to them, the spring of the cursed watch clicked while it was being wound.
Part 2
Hinai Elsie listened with delight to the sound of «Clockwork Life»'s spring being wound.
Surrounding her, the spring was not the only clock sound she was hearing.
Tick tock, tick tock, tick tock, tick tock.
A clock's inorganic noise was calming. Without it, she could not possibly live on—Literally.
These clock ticks were coming from the headphones she was wearing on her ears, the music being played nonstop on repeat by her portable music player.
This was the curse of «Clockwork Life». She must listen to the sound of clocks. As soon as she stopped hearing the sound, her body would be overcome by a sense of extreme discomfort and nausea. Although not to the point of causing immediate death, should the shortage persist, she would probably go insane and die within a day. However, she was never worried at all. Because this was the way things were. She was going to listen to this sound forever. Starting from the moment she first obtained this tool, forever—
Guided by the steady sounds of a clock's, past scenes surfaced in Elsie's mind.
Once upon a time in a certain town, there was an insane clockmaker. He loved clocks and watches zealously and only made bizarre timepieces. As a result, he lived in destitute poverty, finally going mad, unable to win recognition from others. Hence, he started advocating that time ruled over everything; time was precious. To people, time was "life" itself.
Starting from some unknown point in time, he started believing that his mission in life was to spread this truth among the other foolish humans. Hence, he began to take action towards this goal.
Namely, he would lock two people in a cellar and make them kill each other. These two people would be linked by an existing, deep bond such as being family or lovers. Once he prepared the location and the circumstances, all he said was the following.
I'll give you four minutes to kill each other. If one of you succeeds, the survivor shall go free. Once the time limit is reached, I will release poison gas to kill you both.
Finally, to inspire the foolish humans, he gave a single hint—"Time is life."
The cellar contained nothing, except for a pocket watch that merely counted up to four minutes, specially made for this experiment, attached to a long silver chain. One minute to grasp the situation, one minute to hesitate, one minute to understand what needed to be done and commit oneself, one minute to take actual action. Hence, he decided on these four minutes as the time limit.
Everyone locked in the cellar died. Confronted with an order to kill a loved one, everyone was at a loss on what to do. Meanwhile, four minutes passed and the clockmaker released the poison gas. Among the victims, there were some who made their decision to kill the other person, but they either met opposition or failed to kill within four minutes. Barehanded, there was simply not enough time.
However, the clockmaker was not asking for something impossible. He had given a hint.
Only one person understood his hint.
Only one girl, locked into the cellar together with her father, understood the significance in the words "time is precious" and used the only tool present in the cellar, namely, the pocket watch's long silver chain, to strangle her father to death—
In terms of time, this was but a moment's reminiscence.
Tick tock, tick tock, tick tock, tick tock.
Currently, Elsie found the ticking sounds, coming from both her headphones and the pocket watch in her hand, especially nostalgic. In that particular cellar, this pocket watch was making these noises as it mercilessly marched on for four minutes.
In this dream-like state yet not in a dream, she kept staring at the clock hands. The rhythmic movement seemed extremely slow to her. Like eons—yet a brief duration.
Ahhh, the clockmaker's ideas were not wrong—Back then, the time defined by this pocket watch was indeed life itself. The time known as her own life was concentrated in those four minutes.
Click click. Click click. Elsie turned the watch stem. She had already spun it enough for two minutes' worth, probably. But still not done yet, still too early. Click click. Click click.
Time, i.e. life, was gradually injected into the pocket watch. New power was injected into the pocket watch.
Then «Clockwork Life» began to animate.
It was as though it were trying to imitate the answer prepared by that clockmaker back then.
Part 3
While Elsie was winding the spring, the pocket watch's silver chain began to squirm.
The silver chain's tail end shook, jumped and vibrated, flying out of her collar like a living creature. Presumably, Elsie had been keeping the silver chain wrapped around her neck. The silver chain flew out and continued to squirm nonstop. Rattling continuously while it slid, sliding towards Elsie's neck, shoulders and breasts, then wrapping around her many times. Such a long chain could not possibly have been kept concealed beneath her clothing all this time, so—Did the silver chain extend?
Haruaki's group watched in terror as this unusual scene unfolded. Of course, Konoha and the girls were biding their time, looking for an opening to charge forward and attack—Nevertheless, Elsie continued to turn the watch stem, unconcerned with the silver chain that was slithering like a snake, her body giving off a dangerous pressure that made others fearful of making a false move.
"Ooh... I was thinking you guys might come charging to attack me while I was turning the watch stem. How right a decision you made. If you had recklessly entered my attack range, even while I was in the middle of winding, I can still activate the cursed ability and quickly slaughter you."
The silver chain continued to squirm. While extending in length, it wrapped itself around Elsie's entire body, twisting many times around her neck as though treating her like a prisoner, sliding across her cleavage between her breasts, sliding into her skirt and between her thighs, spiraling to tie her arms downwards—
Elsie continued to turn the watch stem. Despite her body being tightly bound by the silver chain, apart from pain, she seemed to be experiencing other sensations as well—
"Ahhh... Coming, coming, coming! Ahhh... Hooh... Mmm... I-It's taking effect... Coming coming, motivation is coming! HIGH TENSION!"
Finally, after Elsie's body shook once, especially violently, she forcefully turned to pocket watch's stem, which then made a crisp "click." For that instant, she seemed to be immersed in some sort of aftertaste, her head hanging low without moving.
"Hmm...!"
Thinking this must be a good chance, Kirika pushed Amanda's wheelchair and tried to move. However—
"...«Clockwork Life»."
"What... the!"
The sound of a concrete wall getting pierced could be heard. No sooner had Kirika taken a single step when a flash of silver light extended from Elsie's hand, preventing Kirika from advancing any further. The object buried into the school building's external wall was undoubtedly—
"Controlling the silver chain... To the point of possessing powers similar to the «Tragic Black River»...!?"
"No no~ Accuracy and extensibility are completely nothing amazing~ Right now, I also missed. This is basically the only type of move I'm capable of using. Besides, swinging a weapon from a distance is not my style, so I usually do things this way."
Shortening the silver chain that had pierced the school building's wall, she pulled it back to her hand. Wrapping the silver chain around the her fingers together on her right hand, she clenched her fist, turning the chain into a fist guard, a tool for increasing the destructive power of punches.
"Then... Are we ready? As soon as Elsie's left hand leaves the watch stem, time will begin. The four minutes with your lives on the line will begin. Ready OKAY?"
"Guh!" Fear and the girls clenched their teeth tightly, exuding a sense of tension from all over them.
"Hmph... We just need to keep Amanda safe and endure for four minutes. Too easy, hahaha."
Fear spoke in a stiff tone of voice that did not match what she was saying. Konoha nodded in turn.
"Our priorities remain the same. Ueno-san, Haruaki-kun, as soon as you find an opportunity, take Amanda-san and leave this place. Although she says the accuracy is not high, given that the enemy possesses a long range weapon—This is probably no easy task."
"...Yes. Originally, I was thinking I might be able to use the «Tragic Black River» to pull us up to the roof, but that looks like it's not going to work. We'll be struck down on our way up. Besides, given that silver chain, she could very well climb up in pursuit as well."
"If only my hair could pin down her movements to some extent. Hmm, what should we do...?"
Elsie slowly raised the pocket watch before her chest.
Her eyes seemed to be expressing enjoyment of the current situation while she swept her gaze over the group in their defensive stances.
Then she extended her tongue to lick her lips, while at the same time—
She released the watch stem.
"Well then... Let's begin. Although time is very short, I hope you'll savor things carefully—bestowed upon you all, the last of your clockwork life!"
Tick tock, tick tock.
In front of her chest, the pocket watch advanced, second by second.
Until the pocket watch stopped—Four minutes still remained.
Part 4
"We'll try to stop her. Even if we can't stop her, we must create an environment easier for engaging her in battle!"
The first to take action was Kuroe. With unprecedentedly serious eyes, she took a step forward.
"Mode: «Sargasso Tsunemori»!"
Kuroe's hair spread out along the surrounding floor in a wide area, forming a black carpet—or a sea of sargasso seaweed. This sea of hair kept bulging upwards in certain places, forming ripples and exhibiting a chaotic form similar to a dense forest of marine flora, waiting for the invader to arrive. As soon as some one stepped into the zone, a great amount of hair would surely entangle the person's ankles without warning, preventing them from taking another step outside. This was an inescapable trap territory.
"I get what you're trying to do, but all she needs is jump across!"
"In that case, I'm counting on you two to intercept her! Compared to her running over, this will be easier to pinpoint her direction!"
"I see! Then leave it to me, Mechanism No.8 crushing type, circular form: «Breaking Wheel of Francia»!"
Fear transformed the Rubik's cube into the torture wheel. Elsie had already started using her compressed time to move at high speed, breaking into a mad dash. As Kuroe predicted, she jumped high just before Kuroe's hair carpet. Discerning her route of advance, Fear was just about to throw the torture wheel at her landing spot when—
"Too naive!"
In midair, Elsie once again extended the silver chain that was wrapped around her fist, looping it around the trunk of a decorative tree then quickly shortening the chain to produce tension—At the same time, she stepped onto the chain, extended straight and taut through the air, then ran along the chain in this manner.
"Th-That's way too unreasonable...!"
Haruaki groaned but the situation still did not improve. Using the wire created by the chain she had shot out, Elsie traversed the sargasso sea of black hair, circling over to their side. Her movements were like a mirage, zigzagging at high speed, meanwhile with a forceful kick, she crushed the paved path underfoot and closed in rapidly. Since this sargasso sea was essentially spread out in the forward direction, the sides were quite weakly defended. Taking a light leap, Elsie swung her fist at Kuroe who was frantically turning her gaze.
"Kuroe! Pull your hair back!"
"Ku... «Cushioning Munemori»!"
Hair, which was originally by Kuroe's feet, instantly gathered and shot up to form a shield to block the impact. Next, Fear's thrown wheel stood further forward, forming a second shield. Nevertheless, even with this double defense, Elsie's destructive might could not be stopped. The wheel creaked from the impact while Kuroe's body was sent flying from the ground, her petite body smashing into the bushes, breaking branches and causing a large amount of leaves to flutter in the air.
"Damn... it...!"
"Ohoh!"
Fear gripped the torture wheel hard then threw it out. Elsie struck it down using her chain-wrapped fist.
"Mechanism No.20 slashing type, great blade form: «A Hatchet of Lingchi»!"
"That's quite some spirit you have there! But it's a little too much spirit! Absolutely the GOODEST!"
The massive hatchet's swing was parried as well. Then a flowing backhanded fist immediately attacked, striking Fear in the head, rendering her petite body instantly unsteady. Nevertheless, Fear gritted her teeth hard and pushed her body, swinging the blade again. This time, Elsie countered with a hook to the gut.
"Gah-hah...!"
Liquid flowed out from the corners of Fear's lips, perhaps saliva or stomach juices, a painful sight to behold nonetheless. She stabbed the hatchet into the ground to serve as support and prevent herself from flying backwards—Even so, the impact still forced Fear's body to slide back a couple meters. Elsie closed in on Fear with lightning speed again, raising her snow-white thigh in a kick towards her chest. Fear was supposed to be quite heavy but in spite of that, her body was effortlessly sent hovering to midair. Fear groaned painfully and swung her hatchet down forcefully while in the air, trying hard to retaliate. However, Elsie turned her body lightly and dodged Fear's attack again. The hatchet embedded itself into the ground. Elsie clenched her fist and laughed:
"Oh my oh my... Aren't you durable? I guess I'll wait until later to destroy you! Because right now, my goal is to quickly kill off that straggler! So it's time for you to stand down!"
"I... re... fuse! Sorry, but I won't hold back, so don't hate me! Mechanism No.12 extinction type, revolving blade form: «Tornado of Souls»!"
Fear left the hatchet stuck in the ground then jumped back herself, transmitting the order to transform through the chain of cubes. Using the momentary opening when she dodged Elsie's fist by the slimmest of margins, she converted the hatchet next to Elsie into the revolving pillar of blades. Without any hesitation, she instantly caused the tornado of blades to spin at top speed—
"Wow! This is such a fun ATTRACTION! THRILLING!"
"Wha—!"
Elsie blocked the blades with the silver chain on her fist then bent down and jumped lightly. Despite being in range of the bladed pillar that was spinning faster than the naked eye could follow, she dodged every single blade. Then weaving past the tornado of blades, closing in on Fear at a certain separation—
"«Clockwork Life»!"
Wrapped around her fist, the silver chain extended its end towards the side, aiming for a decorative rock that stood up from its buried position in the center of a lawn. Within the blink of an eye, the chain wrapped itself around the giant boulder, roughly stout enough for a person to hold in one's arms, uprooting it from the soil. Next, using centrifugal force, Elsie swept the boulder horizontally, tied up by the chain, towards Fear's body—
Fear had probably expected Elsie to charge her directly and reacted half a beat too slow. Unable to recall her torture tool in time, she was mercilessly struck by the thick hammer of rock. Sent flying as though struck by a car, Fear's entire body bounced away. At the same time, accompanied by series of cracking sounds, something breaking could be heard. But when Fear smashed into the wall of the school building, these sounds were instantly covered up by the loud crash from the impact.
"Haha~ How rare for me to have such perfect control. Wonderful, wonderful."
Haruaki could do nothing but watch. No problem. There should be no problem. Absolutely no problem. Surely, Fear and Kuroe were going to stand up soon. How long would it take? A minute? Too long, damn it—!
As though taking over for Fear, Konoha swiftly closed in on Elsie. With an astoundingly savage expression, she chopped with her hands, her legs, using all sorts of martial techniques, she engaged Elsie in direct combat.
"Ahhhhhhhhhh!"
"Looks like you're all fired up too! Five, six, seven... Amazing, that's a new record! EXCELLENT!"
After throwing the rock away, she wrapped the silver chain around her fist again and began to play a song of heavy metal while clashing nonstop with Konoha's knife hand. Before the noise vanished, the next set of noises appeared, followed by another set of noises. Haruaki's eyes could no longer follow the scene before him. Through vague afterimages, he could only see objects moving back and forth at astoundingly high speeds between the two girls.
Smack! Then completely different noises began to creep into the earlier sounds. The sound of skin getting torn open, flesh getting sliced open, bones creaking noisily. Konoha began to bleed from various parts of her body, because she was gradually unable to deflect all of Elsie's attacks.
"I admit you're trying hard. But in this world, there exist things that cannot be solved by mere motivation. Just like the way no one can stop the passage of time."
"Guh... Ahhh... Ahhhhhh—!"
"In other words, what Elsie mean is that time is valuable and it's time for you to stand down—Are you listening? Hmm, you don't actually look like you're listening!"
Elsie suddenly ducked down as though her back had snapped. Then Konoha made a thrust with her knife hand. In the next instant, Elsie stretched her body upwards while her bare knee had already embedded itself deeply into Konoha's chest. To think that she had used her knee in a cross countering strike... Absolutely unbelievable.
"Ga-ah...!"
"You've done very well. Truly very GOODEST. In past tense, I guess it's GOODESTED?"
After Konoha stopped moving, Elsie raised her clasped hands together to deliver a hammering blow to the back of Konoha's head. Konoha crashed down like a mannequin, her head striking the ground hard. Cracks instantly appeared on the pathed path as concrete fragments flew away. Probably through sheer willpower alone, Konoha groaned and attempted to stand up—But of course, she was unable to do so.
...Two minutes.
In the end, in merely two minutes, everyone was down.
But giving up because of that was not an option. Haruaki desperately mustered strength in his legs that were almost about to give way. Glaring at Elsie, he pondered what he should do, what could he do—
"So, so, although it's the same situation as previously, this time, the happy time of life continues to turn. In other words, your time has ended. Hurry and let Elsie finish the job!"
Elsie charged at high speed. Instantly, Haruaki felt someone shove him hard, causing him to roll on the ground.
Naturally, the one who pushed him was the person who was protecting the wheelchair-bound Amanda together with him—
"Come on, at least I can tell what you're thinking... Absolutely ridiculous. Indeed, it's truly and absolutely ridiculous. I'm the one who should be doing this first instead. This is my duty. Just like that time...!"
After pushing Haruaki away, Kirika stepped in front of the wheelchair, the «Tragic Black River» sliding out of her sleeve. In the face of Elsie's intimidating aura, the «Tragic Black River» seemed quite small and powerless in comparison.
"As a sign of respect for Miss Japanese Sword for trying so hard just now, Elsie will use a knifehand strike as well to take care of you! I'll first skewer your body then chop you apart together with your clothes, finally stabbing into Mummy Maker's heart all at once! EXCITING!"
The same scene was about to be replayed, with Kirika planning to use herself as a meat shield, with Kirika planning to use her immortal body as a meat shield, along with Elsie in complete nonchalance, Elsie who possessed the power to completely annihilate Kirika's immortality.
Last time, they were saved only because Elsie had reached her time limit. But now... Currently it was still—
"No... Class Rep!"
Elsie effortlessly dodged the extending «Tragic Black River» and closed in swiftly. Kirika did not move. Because Amanda was right behind her, she could not move.
Hence, Elsie's knife hand was swinging at high speed, slicing through the air faster than the naked eye could follow, to "kill" Kirika—
"—Kirika!"
The body of the man who had suddenly taken off his mask and appeared...
The hand stabbed into Himura's body when he rushed out in front of Kirika to protect her.
Part 5
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Part 6
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Part 7
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Part 8
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Part 9
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Part 10
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Part 11
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Part 12
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Part 13
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Part 14
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Part 15
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