Editing Mushi Uta:Volume 14 Chapter 3 (section)

== 3.02 Arisu ==

''She'' watched a part of the end.

Through her Mushi, the butterfly.

Landing atop her sleeping body, the butterfly—a Morpho butterfly with its vivid silver glow—twitched as it raised its antenna.

“—There’s no fucking way we can escape that!”

The one who shouted this was Kasuou, the girl who held her while running.

She embraced her body clad in a thick jacket and further supported her using her own ability of mist. She was also using vast amounts of mist to carry dozens of wounded.

“We have too many enemies and allies…! Do we even have somewhere to escape to?!”

Kasuou’s voice was drowned by the angry roars of battle.

They only just escaped from the domed facility that served as their headquarters for the C annihilation operation.

Even so—the mixed forces of the SEPB and Mushibane were soon surrounded by the Revived assassins as they reached the wide national road.

Most of these Mushitsuki were running away, not having yet recovered from the damages incurred during the failed operations.

It was there that C’s assassin Mushitsuki appeared in endless numbers.

If that wasn’t enough, even the JSDF gathered to block their path.

Their retreat soon turned into a chaotic battle—and their path was finally blocked.

“Let me borrow that, Kasuou.”

“Ah, you bastard!”

A suited youth snatched away Kasuou’s goggles.

He was Haji Keigo. His complexion was sickly, but he was even paler due to running so much.

“Why have you stopped? Report the situation in the frontlines, Yotsuba!”

Haji operated the goggles and turned on the speaker function. They could hear the rebuke from Terasu, their commander, as well as the exchanges between other Mushitsuki.

“I know you’re tired, but if our vanguard stops, we’ll all get wiped out!”

“Poison Mist Punch! —We’re outnumbered by soldiers! Neutralizing them without killing them is too hard for me alone! Send me some high-ranked members, even a single one! If possible, with a mental pollution-type ability!”

“Yakugami! How’s the rear guard? If you think you can leave it to Kaguya then go provide support to the frontlines!”

“That’s asking for a bit much… I have my hands full with some tough guys, are they ex-Annihilators?”

“Then… North Central Branch! How’s the right flank? If you can split your forces, then send even one person from Team A—”

“No can do, no can do. After all, with you missing from the usual team it’s all falling apart.”

“Kh… Tamamo! Stop preserving your stamina for the barrier! To the front!”

“Goootcha!”

“Wait…! The wounded and support members in the middle aren’t going to last! If you keep going ahead, they won’t make it…! I’ll heal them up even just a little, so wait a bit!”

“This is Himiko! Enemy forces are approaching from the left…!”

“Kabuto here. Mushibane has relatively little fatigued and damaged members. I’ll stop these new attackers with them.”

All news that came from the speaker spoke of their inferiority against their enemies.

Many people were shouting.

Gunfire echoed from time to time.

As well as the healer Nene’s beautiful singing voice, completely unfitting the circumstances.

In this battlefield of Mushitsuki who fought for their lives, the silver Morpho butterfly shook its feelers.

“Then—fifteen minutes!”

In these dire straits, Terasu struck out a painful plan in order to survive.

“Let’s stop in place for just fifteen minutes! All hands, focus on preserving our position! Tamamo, you should preserve yourself after all! —Rinrin, gather as many vehicles as you can, even army ones! Get all the support members and wounded boarded to lessen the load, and have Kasuou join the vanguard! Fifteen minutes later, we break through by force!”

It was a hefty gamble, but there were no other choices.

In this battlefield engulfed by anxiety, a completely calm voice then sounded.

“Test, test, can you hear me? Hiya, this is Shiohara Shachito. I borrowed a SEPB goggle. What should I do?”

“You…! Geez, what’re you doing!”

“I watched over this beauty called Lady at the dome. Once she’s finished knocking out C—C will probably be heading here.”

For a moment, all shouts passing through the battlefield vanished.

Although they were already fighting from an inferior position, C was coming along as though to seal the deal.

Perhaps afraid that this announcement would lower morale, Terasu immediately strained her voice.

“Let’s make it ten minutes, then! I’ll join the vanguard! —Once we break through the encirclement, Tamamo will create as large a barrier as possible! It’s already proven that your barrier can work even on C and other sensors, so buy us as much distance as possible and find a place to hide!”

“H-hum… I’m not really feeling confident about being able to control a lot of cars in ten minutes…”

“I-I’ll reaaally do my best, but the stamina needed just to stretch the barrier so much…”

“Stop complaining!”

Terasu’s lone shout echoed throughout the battlefield.

“If we fail, we die. —Wasn’t it always like this?!”

Hearing their commander, the battlefield fell into silence again.

“…You’re just like Kakkou.”

“S-shuddup, idiot!”

It was unknown who mumbled this, but it agitated Terasu.

Haji Keigo, who apparently finally managed to catch his breath, brought his mouth to the goggles.

“Kasuou, how do you switch the Central Headquarters goggles to the private channel?”

“Just work it out for yourself! It’s not so different from the East Branch’s!”

They seemed to have a bad relationship; the Morpho butterfly could see Kasuou shouting at Haji.

“Thank you. Oh, there it is. —Terasu, come to me for a moment.”

“…I’ll let the Director go over our current strategy! Shachito! Take over command for me for a bit!”

“Eh, me? Is it fine for a newbie like me?”

“Obviously not! But you can use your mobility to check the entire battlefield, and since you’re Asagi’s final disciple, you seem to have been trained on how to handle Mushitsuki, so we’ll just go for it! It’s just for a few minutes so obey him, you guys!”

“Ahaha, how horrible. Then apologies in advance if I do it better than you, Terasu-chan.”

While hearing a symphony of tongue clicking from the entire battlefield, Haji kept speaking.

“Kabuto. Can you tell Akasegawa Nanana to come to us?”

“Roger that.”

Not even two minutes later, Terasu and Akasegawa Nanana appeared in front of Haji Keigo.

However, there was another person there.

“And you are?”

She was a girl in her early teens. Since she was fidgeting all over, Nanana spoke instead.

“Recall. She’s my guard, so don’t mind her.”

“Oh, I don’t know her. —Hmm?”

The girl called Recall stepped forward silently.

And she approached—''her''. While looking up through the Morpho butterfly, the girl put a cellphone on top of her.

“Recall? What’s that?”

Returning to the confused-looking Nanana, Recall whispered in a low voice.

“Lucifera-san said to…”

“Lucifera told you to pass that to Arisu?”

As the girl nodded, Haji Keigo stared at her.

While the youth seemed to be trying to understand the girl’s mysterious action, Terasu called out to him.

“Director Haji. Do you have any issue with my orders?”

“—Oh, no, you’ve done well. North Central Branch really has some good members.”

As Haji said this and turned his gaze, he saw Branch Head Takemi. The man who looked like a gentleman (only outwardly) shrugged.

“I’ll start with you, Akasegawa Nanana-kun. I have a favor to ask you, as the Chairman of Akasegawa Group as well as a member of the Round Table.”

As Haji turned around, Akasegawa Nanana spun her stick, her face looking suspicious.

“A favor?”

“Can you use your connections to prepare a large ship for us? If possible, a fast ship that’s already ready to sail.”

Terasu and Akasegawa Nanana both raised their brows.

“For us to also recover our forces, we need to escape C for the time being. If so, it means we need a place she couldn’t reach—the Revived as well, but a place where C, who exists in the digital network, can’t reach.”

Terasu was the one who gasped.

“The sea—”

Haji wore a thin smile and fixed the position of his glasses with his index finger.

“Right, we will escape to sea and reorganize. Even C shouldn’t be able to pursue us there.”

“What a coincidence. I also thought that and was about to prepare a ship to carry something.”

Akasegawa Nanana said, returning Haji Keigo’s gaze.

“Of course, there’s also a shipping company affiliated with my Group in the nearest port to here.”

“So that’ll be our destination for now.”

The place where Haji and the rest were, several vehicles appeared.

There weren’t any drivers inside. The branch heads as well as the wounded carried by Kasuou were loaded into the cars. Inside there was also the East Central Branch Assistant, the anxious-faced Goroumaru Touko.

Nanana spoke.

“The ship I have ready to transport a certain something is planned to go someplace far and keep a low profile until the heat’s down. —Are we just going to wait in the middle of the sea until we recover? If so, we will need to gather some foods and daily necessities, so that’ll take time.”

“No, I have a destination in mind.”

“You have? I apologize, Director… but if you have a goal, isn’t that a problem? If it’s somewhere we can stay, our enemy might also reason out that location…”

“It’s fine. That place—no longer exists.”

“Hah?”

“Or to be more precise, I should say that no one knows about it anymore.”

While the youth wore his thin smile, Terasu and Nanana turned suspicious glances at him.

“That place—is a small island.”

Twitch.

Above her, the Morpho butterfly raised its antenna.

“I already left this message to Lady. She’s probably going to head there, too.”

“…Well, as long as we have a destination. Still, taking so many people to the same place is going to take time, though.”

“There’s no need to worry about that. The fewer ships, the better.”

As Terasu tilted her head, Haji spoke.

“Terasu. Once we escape from here, we need to split into several independent units. If we gather up so many people in one place, we’ll just end up surrounded like now and decimated.”

“Eh… b-but, isn’t it dangerous to split our forces like this? If our high-ranking members go all over the place, even our means of defense—”

“I said nothing about splitting our forces like that.”

As Haji narrowed his eyes, Terasu made a confused face—

But she soon gasped and grimaced.

Haji gave calm orders to Terasu who glared daggers into him.

“It’s impossible to protect everyone here anyway. So the high-ranked Mushitsuki should focus on protecting the minimal amount of important people, and we’ll let all other Mushitsuki split from our main forces for a little while.”

“—Meaning, they’ll act as decoys.”

Terasu’s blood-smeared visor was locked in a gaze with Haji Keigo’s glasses.

“I’ll obviously tell the people getting cut off about some goal. It’s fine for them to try heading somewhere far from our actual destination. —Akasegawa-kun. That’s how things are, so you can just bring us small ships. Hurry up with them.”

Akasegawa Nanana said nothing. She neither gave Haji a cold gaze, nor voices any oppositions to his strategy, but merely left along with Recall.

“If you have any other ideas how we can get away I’m all ears, Terasu.”

“…”

“Allow me to say this just in case, but it’s not like I hate Mushitsuki. In that sense, I might resemble Director Miguruma. —But there are also ways I differ from her.”

Haji Keigo spoke while looking at the fighting Mushitsuki.

“Unlike Miguruma, who wants to play with Mushitsuki forever… I want to finish up the fight already. For that I will protect what I need and cut off what’s unneeded. —It goes without saying that the most important person right now is Sleeping Beauty, Arisu.”

On top of her, the silver Morpho butterfly raised its feelers.

“…I will now mobilize.”

Terasu gritted her teeth and mumbled in a stifled voice. She turned around.

“Terasu here, I’m heading back to command. It’s about time, are we all ready?”

Haji Keigo got on the large transport truck used by the JSDF members. It was one of those stolen by Rinrin. Kasuou also carried her along with the Morpho butterfly and got on into the same cargo box as Haji.

“Me and Kasuou and Yotsuba are going to open a path ahead! After that, Tamamo, you’re going to create as large a consciousness-camouflaging barrier as you can! Shachito, reduce everyone’s masses on the way! We’ll all become lighter and break through!”

There, the tone of Terasu’s voice dropped.

“After we manage to breakthrough, the orders will be given directly to each team. —Just to make sure C doesn’t eavesdrop on us.”

“A nice excuse.”

The Morpho butterfly stared at Haji Keigo who was smiling in the luggage.

Noticing its stare, he mumbled toward the Morpho butterfly.

“Please don’t retire midway through, alright?”

“We’re doing this, Kasuou! Yotsuba!”

“Let’s go!”

“Alright!”

“—There’s a sudden powerful ‘flame’ approaching from the west!”

However, Himiko’s voice cut into Terasu and others’ warcries.

“It’s C!”

In the very center of the entire forces, golden light scattered around concentrations of Mushitsuki.

These were golden C-butterflies.

These countless fluttering forms melted into the ground and focused in a single point.

“I’ll intercept them.”

Along with a husky female voice, the ground shook.

Instantly appearing on the surface with a tremor was a spire made of metallic water pipes, wires, lights and the like entangled together. 

Golden lightning pierced through the surface to the heavens.

Trying to catch the entire forces of Mushitsuki with one blow, C unleashed her lightning strike—but it was sucked into this suddenly created lightning rod, so it ended up discharged into the sky and vanished without hurting anyone.

“You’ve saved us, Sakura! Now, let’s break through—Sensation Isolation!”

“ORAAAAH!”

“Poison Mist Punch!!!”

Sounds of destruction echoed from the frontlines.

“Lemme lighten you.”

Along with Shachito’s voice, everyone on the battlefield was wrapped in an orange light. From the bodies of Mushitsuki rose faintly glowing dragonflies—a swarm of Autumn Darters.

“All hands, charge forward!”

By Terasu’s orders, the Mushitsuki began moving simultaneously.

“Let’s go, then.”

Inside the truck that rumbled as it moved, Haji Keigo mumbled.

The youth’s eyes narrowed as though he was looking to the great distance.

“To the land of our counterattack—to Aoharima Island.”

She saw it.

Through her Mushi, the Morpho butterfly.

The Mushitsuki who took her in, were all fighting while literally puking blood.

After failing in the operation to annihilate C and then constantly repeating this desperate retreat—

They fought, got hurt, and collapsed.

Even to the Morpho butterfly’s eyes, it looked like their numbers were quickly going down. Some were struck by the enemy attacks, some split into individual teams, and at times they collapsed powerless and were left behind.

She knew that hellish sight.

She too had ended up losing like that in the past.

Why had she lost?

She didn’t know.

“—”

Only the reason she came down to this hell.

Although she was forgotten long ago and most humans had no way to know of her, she knew the reason for her get woken up again well. Only that.

“…To fight, huh.”

This small mumble leaked from her mouth.

How many hours passed since they left their base in the dome?

How many Mushitsuki fought and depleted?

By the time even those sensations felt unclear—she noticed that the space she inhabited was cut off from reality.

Furious Mushitsuki and the Revived were engaged in hurting each other.

Inside this hell where they cannibalized on each other, she stood up.

“What you want from me—is the power to end this fight, right?”

At some point a lone ghost came standing outside the parked truck.

It wore a pitch-dark coat—no.

Wearing a long coat stained with fresh blood, it was a person with hair that stood up like horns, with a large automatic pistol dangling from one hand.

He was covered in wounds as though he already went through the border between life and death once—no, not only once but countless times, with how many wounds he was covered by.

“—Not at all.”

The ghost with broken goggles hanging from his neck appeared tentatively like a boy. His face smeared with dried up blood was stuck with sorrowful expression.

She knew him.

However, she didn’t know why he was making this kind of face.

“I wanted to entrust you with… no, to apologize to you. But—”

Wearing a weak-looking face, the boy hesitating to speak.

This was the mere shell of the Mushitsuki that had once been called a demon. She sneered at him.

''She then reached out into the other lying girl’s'' jacket, pulling out a metallic rod. Extending in her hand, the rod fused with the Morpho butterfly and transformed into a large spear that shone silver. At the same time, silver patterns rose to her four limbs.

Seeing her transform so grotesquely, the boy grasped his blood-stained gun.

“She said that she separated from ‘you’. —That’s why you’re still bothered about turning into her.”

[[File:Mushi Uta 14 p349.jpg|thumb]]

“I don’t understand what you’re saying. Does that have anything to do with the present?”

The scales gushing out from the spear wrapped around her neck, making her long scarf float.

“As long as I’m strong—isn’t that enough?”

She felt a strong power inside her.

This power was about to overflow at any moment.

She wanted to quickly unleash it.

In order to make her dream come true.

For the one who constantly consoled her during her long slumber.

All for the sake of the girl still sleeping next to her—her other self—her best friend.

That friend’s name was Arisu.

Splitting from Arisu and appearing here, her name was—

“Stop pretending…”

The boy in front of her eyes should know her name.

However, the blood-smeared demon that looked ready to fall at any moment made no attempt to name her.

“Right now—you’re not Arisu.”

He said this.

Then reequipped the broken goggles to his face.


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==Notes==

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