Apocalypse Witch:Volume 5

Novel Illustrations

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Prologue

They are no different from humans.

Some people may find hope in this statement, but I say those people must have never once looked in a mirror.

The Threat is just as plentiful as humans.

Which means they could multiply to more than 5.5 billion units under the right conditions and environment.

The Threat can enjoy things just as humans do.

Which means they would not hesitate take away people’s territory and survival zone if they took a liking to them.

The Threat can learn just as humans do.

Which means they could invent more efficient methods and tools for killing.

The Threat can think just as humans do.

Which means they could see a different lifeform and hate that lifeform.

The Threat kills just as humans do.

Which means they do not need any real reason to do so.

Now, does anyone out there still see any possibility of friendship with the Threat after hearing all that? Do not pretend. Finding them disturbing is the normal reaction. It is human nature to reject them and keep as far away from them as possible.

But the Threat is the same us humans.

That means they will want to exterminate us just like we want to exterminate them. Neither side is good or evil. Both sides must accept our nature and put together a countermeasure.

And it goes without saying that we humans are the ones about to be destroyed.

You think there might be some way to get the Threat to end their violence?

Do you think anything could stop us from killing if the situations were reversed?

That is your answer right there.

Needless to say, humanity is an ugly species.

And so are they.

-Chrisbart Firenze, just another weapons researcher

This story is set on Second Grimnoah, a crystal magic academy floating in the sea near the equator.

More specifically, in a dorm room on board.

A black-haired boy wore a summer uniform composed of a short-sleeved button-up shirt, a sports T-shirt, and thin purple slacks. Utagai Karuta sat on his bed with his hands covering his face. The wall across from him was covered with clippings from printed-out reports and online news articles with colorful strings connecting them all together.

This was meant to do more than just visualize the situation.

All of the connections were roughly thrown together, making it look a lot like he was trying his best not to accept something.

The path he had taken to reach this point was laid out on the wall.

The Problem Solvers of the old strongest – Elicia, Yukino, Jessie, Susannia, and Anastasia – had been powerful users of God-Worshiping Magic.

They had destroyed the old Grimnoah using next-gen Crystal Magic and the four survivors – Karuta, Aine, Marika, and Kyouka – had taken revenge.

At first, they had doubted the Threat even existed, but the Threat was later revealed to be very real indeed.

A Second Grimnoah was created, centered on Karuta’s group – the Four Living Gods – who were the new world’s strongest.

On a golden week school trip to Iceland’s Crystal Beach, they had encountered and fought an enemy force they thought to be the Threat.

However, that force turned out to be a decoy Threat created by a human weapons manufacturer and hijacked by Riho, Sanae, and Alice who had infiltrated Second Grimnoah.

Anastasia’s sister Natalena had also infiltrated the school and Karuta and Marika fought over what to do about her.

When Second Grimnoah arrived near the Port of Kobe, it was attacked and occupied by the real Threat, so Karuta and the others worked to take it back.

They assumed the real Threat was attempting to learn how to use Crystal Magic and evolve past anything they could hope to handle. But in truth, they simply admired humans and had wanted to experience a school life. Due to Matsuda Imi and Aine’s actions, Karuta was forced to battle a Threat known as the Warrior Doll.

At the same time, Letnahe from the Indian military fought with Omotesandou Kyouka. Kyouka learned the woman was a scout sent by the human string pullers and successfully converted her into a double agent to extract some information from the string pullers.

Second Grimnoah was reclaimed, but doubt had been cast on the power of the Four Living Gods. As a performance to avoid social unrest on a global scale, the preexisting Catastrophe system was used to hold a martial arts tournament.

Some trickery on the human string pullers’ part forced Karuta to compete on his own, but he defeated a formidable foe named Pendet and emerged victorious. At the same time, they managed to approach the identity of the global community of weapons researchers (including magic weapons) which they had known as the human string pullers. They acquired Chrisbart Firenze as a specific name there.

Meanwhile, 300 million Threats were arriving from space.

When it had looked like the past strongests were going to lose their battle against the Threat, they had been launched into space using a space elevator. The Threat would gather around the abandoned strongests, distracting them long enough to just barely protect humanity for a while longer.

Karuta’s group was up next.

The fact that they were the next living sacrifices – that is, the world’s strongest – had already been proven to the entire world through the media.

“…”

He couldn’t find an answer.

All the information he had was taped up on the wall and a veritable cobweb of colorful strings attached even the most tenuous link he could think up. Yet he still couldn’t find any loophole or way out of this situation.

300 million.

Before, they had hit their limit with fewer than 10 thousand of the real Threat. This was several orders of magnitude greater. The Four Living Gods didn’t stand a chance fighting that many in one place and, if they descended on every part of the Earth at once, not even sending out every single Second Grimnoah teacher and student would be enough to protect everyone. And that was before even considering whether or not they could all win a direct fight with the Threat.

“Sacri-sama,” said a girl in a beautiful bell-like voice.

She had hip-length silver hair and skin that was more pale than white.

That was the crystal girl named Aine.

“It is time. If you intend to meet up with Student Council President Omotesandou Kyouka, you need to get ready and head to the student council room.”

“I don’t want to go. I haven’t found an answer for her yet.”

The bed creaked right next to him.

Aine had been standing up all this time, but now she sat next to him. She peered up at his lowered head covered by his hands and spoke with no emotion in her voice.

“Sacri-sama, I will always prioritize your decisions and assist in carrying them out.”

He was afraid to look her in the eye, so he pulled on the small hand propping up her body.

He felt a soft weight.

Aine was now resting her head on this lap and using that lap pillow to stare up at his face from directly below.

And she spoke her mechanical words.

“If you wish to avoid a discussion with Miss Kyouka and Miss Marika, I will obey. I will respect your decisions and assist you in hiding away or holing up in this room. Is that what you want?”

What would it accomplish if he did that?

Refusing to attend a meeting meant to ensure the Four Living Gods were on the same page would not change the underlying situation.

The Threat was approaching Earth.

Based on the observations, their number was estimated to be more than 300 million. If they arrived all across the Earth, not even Crystal Magic would be able to stop them.

Humanity could not defeat the Threat.

The limited time remaining to them was slipping away, but he couldn’t find anything but complaints.

He placed his hand on Aine’s head for no real reason.

“Why am I the world’s strongest? It never made any sense. There must be something wrong with the very structure of the human race to place me at the top.”

Aine rested her head on his lap and accepted the hand patting her head as she presented the necessary problem to him.

“But the Threat swarm gathering in orbit is already dense enough to influence satellite communications, so you cannot just stand idly by and- nhh.”

“Aine?”

Her slender shoulders clearly shook.

He stopped his hand when she made a weird noise. He had been patting her head since it was in such a convenient location, but he must have hit one of her horns with his finger.

The crystal girl rolled onto her side like she was tossing in her sleep and removed her eyes from him, but she could not fully hide the subtle tremor in her body.

“Y-you aren’t supposed to touch that before marriage, Sacri-sama.”

“?”

Come to think of it, she had said something like that before.

He gave her a puzzled look and dumped out the relevant drawer in his memories.

“But didn’t you start rubbing those horn-like things against me before? Um, yeah, like on the elevator at the Crystal Beach hotel.”

“…”

“It looked like a subconscious reaction back then. You started doing it after I called you weird when you were wearing that white school swimsuit. …Wait. Were you hoping I would compliment your swimsuit then?”

When her body stiffened this time, it was anything but subtle.

“It…”

“?”

“It does not seem fair to dig back up such an old incident, Sacri-sama.”

She was trembling from embarrassment more than he had ever seen.

This was so different from when he had first summoned her with his Crystal Blossom (mostly as a malfunction). She must have learned a lot from her time spent with him.

And on that note…

(Can I really do this?)

She was still letting him rub her head with that head in his lap. She was trembling and unable to look him in the eye from such close range and she moved awkwardly to try and hide the flush of her skin. A bitter thought occurred to him as he silently observed her.

(She’s learned to show such human emotion, so can I really ask her to die with us? Yes, this decision is meant to protect the 5.5 billion other humans out there, but Aine isn’t human. She’s a crystal girl.)

Just then, a low buzzing sound came from a part of the room not far away.

That was his phone.

Aine called out to him from his lap.

“Sacri-sama.”

“I don’t want to answer it.”

“But it is still vibrating. That is unusual, so I doubt this is a classmate asking you to hang out. This is about the Four Living Gods.”

Also, anyone from Second Grimnoah would use their Crystal Blossoms since they could be used to communicate safely, without any chance of the signal being intercepted. Even if both options did the same thing, humans naturally chose the one that was less of a hassle. Unless they were attaching an image or video file, the students almost never used their phones to contact each other.

That meant this wasn’t even Marika or Kyouka.

Karuta breathed a heavy sigh and slowly stood from the bed. With her pillow gone, Aine reverted to her default state, but she did seem to be puffing out her cheeks in displeasure. Why had she convinced him to answer the phone if she was going to react like that?

His phone was making a lot of noise vibrating atop his study desk. He grabbed it to find an unfamiliar number on the screen.

He answered without checking further.

If this was only a telemarketer, at least it would give him something to laugh about.

“You took longer to answer than I had predicted, Living God. Is that a sign of how much reluctance you are feeling?”

“…Who are you?”

“Chrisbart Firenze.”

Karuta gasped.

He knew that name. And he knew what role the man played in the current world.

“The human string pullers is not a centralized group, but since you know my name, you can think of me as a contact point. At any rate, I ordinarily would not play any role on the center stage.”

He had the husky male voice of an elderly man.

That first impression couldn’t be fully trusted since it was happening through a machine…but Karuta smiled at himself for starting to get so paranoid.

What was there to be paranoid about?

The truth was right there laid out on the wall. He had proven there was no escape and no amount of thinking was going to reveal a path to survival.

And Chrisbart (or someone using the name) was not going to wait for Karuta to respond. He continued in a mechanical, businesslike fashion.

“Are you prepared to fulfill your role, world’s strongest?”

“You…”

“We have already searched out the world’s #2 hidden among the 5.5 billion and are preparing her to be the next generation of strongest. Once our stock of Living Gods has run out, Pendet Denpasar will be promoted to world’s strongest. And once she has bought enough time for us to find the next #2, she too will be launched into space when the time comes. Just like you will be soon.”

He didn’t show any of the hostility or malice the Problem Solvers had.

He wasn’t self-destructive like Riho, Sanae, and Alice had been.

He showed no sign of the hatred born from betrayal the armored warrior had shown.

He didn’t have the lust and joy for victory that Pendet Denpasar had.

It was all matter-of-fact.

His lack of emotion hinted at how many times he had done this in the past. Perhaps they had done it with old fashioned rockets before the space elevator was built.

“What will you do?”

Chrisbart Firenze’s voice was as dull as could be.

There was a teacher onboard Second Grimnoah with the Firenze name, but Karuta doubted he could use that as a bargaining chip. If this man learned they needed to sacrifice that puppy-like teacher to save humanity, he would do so without hesitation. He viewed everything through a lens of pure logic and efficiency.

“If you obey, you four will die and the 5.5 billion will survive. But if you refuse, you four will die and the 5.5 billion will die along with you. Neither option allows you to survive, so it seems to me it would leave a better taste in your mouth if you did it in a way the people would appreciate, even if no official records of it will remain.”

“…”

“Or if you are forced to die, would you prefer to take as many people with you as you can? That is one side of human nature, I won’t deny it. If you resist, we are prepared to use every last part of human society to hunt you down, but…if you are unwilling to cooperate, every part of this will be more challenging. That effectively makes this your decision as the Four Living Gods. Your decision will determine how it all ends.”

There was no answer here.

The minimum number of deaths was set at 4 and no choice would save any of those 4.

Those 4 were Karuta, Aine, Marika, and Kyouka.

There wasn’t even a shred of pity in Chrisbart Firenze’s voice.

The protector of humanity spoke more coldly than any machine.

“I give you one day. If you are still unwilling to offer up your lives, then the 5.5 billion are doomed.”

Chapter 1

Part 1

“Senpai, you have a really low life experiences score, don’t you?”

Utagai Karuta was being attacked by a 12-year-old first thing in the morning.

The attacker was Natalena Blast, a Sub Category Regulation 1 with wavy blonde hair cut to shoulder length. Her white short-sleeve blouse didn’t look so crisp because she made sure to wash and iron it with care; this was simply her first time wearing it. This was Karuta’s first time wearing the summer uniform too since the first ship had been sunk so soon, but it was different for her. Her entire summer uniform gave off an aura of innocence. She, however, thought she was all grown up now that she was wearing a summer uniform for the first time, so mentioning that aura was sure to have her puffing out her cheeks even more.

She was more than a head shorter than Karuta and she was currently grabbing bite-sized pieces of French toast from a square plastic container and tossing them into her mouth.

“Munch, munch. I mean, you’re supposed to be this incredible upperclassman who’s been with Grimnoah since the first ship, but, well, you barely know any of the school’s tricks. If you want people to look up to you as an upperclassman, you need to enjoy your school life more. And you need to teach me more tricks for getting by at school.”

“I never asked you to call me ‘senpai’ all the time. And what’s with this rule breaking first thing in the morning, Natalena? If you’re going to eat snacks, don’t do it in the middle of the hallway where the teachers are bound to catch you.”

“Call me Jane Ignition here. And anything you cook yourself in the dorm kitchen and bring with you doesn’t count as a snack. Besides, French toast made from the bread crusts I cut off my sandwiches is a valuable source of carbs.”

Come to think of it, Second Grimnoah ensured the students were free to buy lunch at the cafeteria, buy it at the school store, or bring their own. So if it was handmade, even a donut, biscuit, or bagel might just barely dodge the label of “snack”. And as long as you didn’t do it during class, there was no actual restriction on when you could eat your lunch.

Natalena licked off her honey and sugar covered fingers.

“Yum. The fact that I have to explain to you how to abuse these kinds of loopholes is why you aren’t much of an upperclassman.”

“Well, sorry. So what are you doing here anyway? The Subcategory building is over there.”

“I’m visiting the Main Category library to, um, get some reference material.”

“….”

“Um, Senpai? The fact that self-study isn’t bound by the school year framework is another of those loopholes I was talking about. And I know you’re excited since today is a Port Day, but, uh, you’re the one who can’t afford the blow to your reputation if you get a bad score on the upcoming exams.”

This capable underclassman was on another level entirely from Utagai Karuta.

“(Hm, I see. From now on, I’ll call her Self Conscious Girl.)”

“I can hear you, Not Nearly Self Conscious Enough Senpai.”

With that parting comment, she walked off.

Unlike that perfect Subcategory Regulation 1 who never stopped studying even when she didn’t have class or homework, undisciplined Karuta held his sleepy head and walked straight to his classroom. He found a room so steady it was hard to believe it was on a ship.

The classroom was a mixture of information before morning homeroom. The boys and girls had gathered into a few different groups where they chatted freely. Several were instead focused on their phones or tablets. The paper weekly manga magazines didn’t always show up on the school store’s shelves on the usual release day, so the students had a tendency to buy the digital version they could read on their phones.

“Sup, Karuta. Hirosuke went ahead and bought the digital version even though it’s a Port Day, so watch out for spoilers.”

“This week’s Red Pan is so good. I-it’s the kind of once-in-a-lifetime chapter where anything I could tell you would spoil it for you.”

If Utagai Karuta was going to join a group, it was usually with his awful friends Yamane Deiri and Nekoumi Hirosuke. Seeing the disaster that was those two honestly helped soothe the wounds inflicted by Self Conscious Girl that morning.

The Port Day people kept mentioning referred to a day when Second Grimnoah, a modified triple hull cruise ship, stopped at a port to resupply or receive maintenance. The ship contained more than enough facilities for anything they might want to do, but leaving the ship still brought a sense of freedom.

The Japanese might have trouble picturing what the Southeast Asian equatorial region looks like, but there were plenty of cities rivaling Tokyo or Osaka in size. A chance to visit those cities was exciting.

“(Don’t you two sneak out every night for some low-altitude flying so the ship’s radar won’t notice you?)”

“(It’s not the same thing, Karuta-chan.)”

His childhood friend and fellow worlds strongest Amaashi Marika was also in his class, but similar circumstances did not mean they were always together.

In fact…

“Hey, hey. Welcome to Marika-san’s spot the difference game. So can either of you tell what’s different about me from yesterday? Well, Imi? How about it, Tayori? Heh heh. Ha ha ha. C’mon, c’mon, make a guess!”

“Are you kidding me, Marika!? I’d have to be blind to miss those super long shoujo manga eyelashes! What are you, the Fuji TV logo? Argh, I’m so jealous!!”

“Oh? You got the latest Serene Silent product, didn’t you? All the girls were glued to their screens yesterday trying for that jelly mascara, but of course it was you won the purchase lottery. You have all the luck.”

Those youthful people, whose skin seemed covered in a water-resistant coating, excitedly made plans to all try it out together later. The popular girls were also busy making their own plans for the Port Day.

Their conversations had a different feel to them.

It was like they existed in a bright and sunny zone.

Unlike Karuta’s type who were constantly fighting over who got to be in the secluded corners of the large classroom, the girl’s group formed by the triangle of Marika, Imi, and Tayori were like the yolk of a fried egg. They were the school protagonists. More than just being popular girls, they were the central figures, where it wouldn’t even seem like an egg dish anymore if they were removed. Those were Amaashi Marika’s original specs. Girls who could look cute doing the things she did were so rare Karuta doubted there were even 5 of them in all of Japan.

“Anyway, my friends, wasn’t yesterday’s homework a nightmare? Quantity-wise, I mean.”

“Yeah, so gross!”

“Marika, you’re only agreeing out of habit, aren’t you? I bet you were actually glued to your tablet all day yesterday.”

The summer uniform’s short-sleeved blouse was thin enough that it was pretty bad for Karuta’s heart when curvy Marika stretched her arms and pushed out her chest. He didn’t have any kind of clairvoyance, but he still had a tunnel view right up his childhood friend’s short sleeve to her armpit.

Hashizaki Tayori, who looked like the gyaru type but acted more like the big sister type, seemed bothered by it, but Matsuda Imi was completely unguarded. She had even chosen a bright colored bra, so its striped pattern showed right through her blouse on this pleasant morning. That was probably the top half of a matching set.

Marika seemed to notice Karuta watching from a short distance away while she sat on a desk instead of in a chair.

The girl with her twintails dyed strawberry blonde winked at him and jokingly blew him a kiss.

“I’d say Amaashi scores pretty high,” said Yamane Deiri. “Getting her as a childhood friend is like getting seeded in the tournament of life, Karuta-chan. How the hell are you stuck in the pill bug zone in the corner of the class with us? Port Day’s are the perfect time for a date. Have you completely given up on enjoying your youth?”

“Karuta-kun can never make it in the sunlight! Because he used up his entire life’s allotment of luck getting seeded with such a cute girl as a neighbor. Don’t worry. He’s the kind of guy who gets chosen as a starting member of the team but then gets booed for getting last place in the tournament.”

He was really unsure how to even begin responding to his depressing friends’ discussion, but he found it curious they considered that being seeded. They were so bitter it was unusual for them to compliment Marika who was such an obvious winner at life.

Then again…

“(Of course, she’s 5 years too young to be in my strike zone. Look, I won’t insist on her becoming a schoolteacher, so can she at least grow into a college girl while still being basically the same?)”

“(It’s a shame, really. She has a lot going for her, but no one taller than 145cm is on my menu. She’s bamboo, not the delicious bamboo shoots. Forcing myself to eat that would only make me sick.)”

Or could they only make such a rational assessment because they weren’t interested in her? Karuta updated his opinion of them. By downgrading them to “utterly hopeless”, of course.

Then he felt something on his cheek.

He found Crystal Girl Aine was crawling out from his side. She had grabbed at his cheek with her small fingers and pulled in the process.

“Less than 145cm! A masterpiece of god’s creation!!” shouted Nekoumi Hirosuke with arms spread wide, but Aine ignored that and puffed out her cheeks while grumbling something.

She appeared to be upset.

“Mhh.”

“What is it, Aine? Can you explain it to me?”

“Sacri-sama, have you failed to grasp the situation from Miss Marika’s extremely unnatural eye contact and lip movements? She is asking to see your homework because she forgot to do hers.”

Aine’s warning proved accurate.

Marika must have checked the wall clock and concluded their homeroom teacher would arrive soon. This would be her last chance to copy his homework before morning homeroom. The curly twintails girl, who was willing to throw kisses in an exaggerated and theatrical fashion, approached him. Imi and Tayori sighed and watched her go. Karuta really wished they would prove their friendship by stopping her.

It turned out Marika didn’t care whose seat she sat in.

She dragged over a nearby chair and sat down. She gave off a sweet scent that wasn’t quite shampoo or deodorant. It may have been that makeup her group was talking about.

She leaned forward and grinned, moving her face in real close like a snake eyeing its prey.

“Hey, hey, Karuta. My good buddy, Karuta-kuuuun☆”

“Yeah, yeah. Here’s yesterday’s homework.”

“Eh? You’re being awfully dry today, my withered childhood friend. Don’t hand it over before I’ve even asked for it. Can you read minds now?”

“Why do you look so upset when I gave you what you wanted?”

“The process is important with these things. I mean…”

She childishly pouted her lips and placed one hand at the center of her chest. She wasn’t quite holding her chest. Her slender fingers were toying with the buttons of her thin short-sleeved blouse.

A nice snapping sound came from her fingers.

She winked up at him and pulled the blouse down over her shoulder.

And she whispered in his ear.

“(I was even thinking I could negotiate by giving my thirsty childhood friend the opportunity of a lifetime if he let me copy his homework.)”

The boy’s heart leaped in his chest.

He could feel the tension racing below his skin like electricity.

She had him completely outclassed when it came to things like this.

“Pff.”

The popular girl held her sides.

She nearly started rolling on the floor in laughter and tears formed in her eyes.

“Ah ha ha!! By which I mean I was going to let you give me a shoulder massage. Now, what did you think I meant? …Huh?”

Had she really not noticed until now?

Unbuttoning her blouse to show off her shoulder had also shown off quite a bit of her cleavage. Not to mention he could see her colorful bra strap.

The gloomy bastards who preferred the corners of the classroom hung their heads.

“(G-getting to massage a girl that clueless about what she’s showing off sounds like one hell of a reward to me. Do you think Amaashi-san has a bratty little sister who’s basically that but smaller?)”

“(Why couldn’t she be just a few years older? Her sexiness is wasted on a classmate. Could you maybe introduce me to her mom!?)”

The conversation was taking a turn Marika had not at all expected, so she crossed her arms and held her own body. She covered her exposed shoulder and hid her cleavage. And she pouted her lips and looked up at Karuta.

When she spoke, she made it sound like a joke, but there was also a slight flush in her cheeks.

“Karuta, you perv. Stop staring at my bra.”

“How is it fair to get mad at me for looking at something you showed me? Is this a new kind of scam, Marika?”

She always slept in the nude, but having her decorative bra strap seen when she didn’t expect it got to her. He honestly couldn’t figure out where her threshold for embarrassment was located.

Then he felt something on his cheek again.

The small crystal girl was as expressionless as ever.

“Mhh.”

“Again, what is this about?”

Part 2

Second Grimnoah was a crystal magic academy.

However, that did mean the students there fought magical battles year round. In fact, extreme kinds of action had to be built atop a strong foundation, so more general education could be the difference between life and death.

Just like someone who could not perform a back hip circle on the metal bar at a park wouldn’t be able to perform a giant swing at the gymnastics world championship.

So…

“Pant, pant, gasp. The bell. Kurent-sensei, the bell just rang!!”

“Tch. So you were saved by the bell, Utagai Karuta.”

The silver-haired, brown-skinned gym teacher who didn’t even bother hiding her tongue click was Letnahe Kurent. She wore a tank top and bright-colored leggings. She notably also had a ring and a mobile watch on her left hand.

“Why do your right arm and right leg start working in unison when you dance? It isn’t often I come across a student who can pull off such a cursed dance.”

“Do you realize that’s as cruel a question as asking someone who can’t swim why they sink in the water?”

“It takes talent to be that bad.”

“You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?”

The modern standards for teaching were to point out your student’s failings but to avoid giving them a complex about it, but this strict teacher must not have gotten the memo. She hit him with the competitive culture of “If you don’t want me to make fun of you, then get good.”

It didn’t help that he couldn’t look straight at her when she demonstrated the dance moves. That was due to how the yoga tank top and formfitting leggings showed off her curvy figure even more than a dancer in a fantasy world. Her navel was always exposed and any more intense jumps caused the rare sight that was underboob to greet him from below her tank top. But he knew saying so would only be adding fuel to the fire.

The Indian wife and teacher had worked up a healthy sweat, so she sipped at a bottle of some kind of protein drink.

“This exercise should help keep your weight down, so don’t ruin that by eating a bunch of sweet things during the Port Day.”

“Okay…”

The bell had already rung. If he got changed now, he would be too late for the lunchtime rush, so he chose to begin his quest for lunch while in his track suit.

Aine appeared at his side at some point.

“Sacri-sama, I did not observe you making a lunch today.”

“Because I’m going to the cafeteria today.”

He had shoved his wallet, phone, and other valuables in the locker along with his clothes, but he had made sure to keep a 1000 yen note in his track suit’s pocket. If you didn’t have a plan in place when you had gym for 4th period, you could never survive the high school lunchtime where so many people went hungry and thirsty.

“Aine, why are you keeping your distance all of a sudden?”

“I do not plan to eat anything myself, but I have no desire to be anywhere near someone thoughtless enough to choose curry or a meat sauce dish.”

The expressionless girl was apparently at the age where she worried about her white clothes. She must have been afraid of stray splashes. That said, Karuta had chosen katsu curry which was eaten with a spoon, so there wouldn’t be any hellish shotgun blasts like with curry udon.

“But now that you mention it, I kind of what to share it with you. Should I grab another spoon?”

“Sacri-sama.”

However, an unexpected problem presented itself.

He successfully acquired his katsu curry, but he had been too focused on that specific task. All the seats in the busy cafeteria were filled. He stood there, holding his tray and feeling at a loss. This was another challenge he had failed to consider. And for whatever reason, the cafeteria didn’t allow people to take the food out of the room to eat it.

“Sacri-sama, I see some people giving up and sitting on the floor to eat. See, with their back against the wall.”

“Because they got the set meal that’s divided into a few small plates. It’s not so easy with one big plate of curry. I need both hands just to hold the heavy plate.”

“How is that a problem?”

Karuta tilted his head and Aine made a scooping gesture.

“You can hold the plate in your hand and then I will spoon the curry into your mouth. I believe that solves the problem.”

“Karuta-kun.”

A soft voice interrupted.

He looked over to find Student Council President Omotesandou Kyouka was in the cafeteria too. She had a Japanese sashimi set spread out on the table in front of her and there was a small gap in the crowd around her. Probably because she needed a bit more space than an ordinary chair to maneuver her wheelchair.

The upperclassman with glossy black hair beckoned him over.

“Don’t even think about rudely sitting on the floor with Aine-chan. The spot next to me is open, so pull up a chair.”

“You’re a lifesaver, Omotesandou-san. …What is it, Aine? Why are you poking my cheek?”

“Mhh.”

The crystal girl somehow managed to look displeased and expressionless at the same time, but she was as obedient as ever.

Once Karuta had set his katsu curry on the table to secure his spot, he lugged over a spare chair.

“I’m kind of surprised to find you eat lunch in the cafeteria, Omotesandou-san.”

“Why? Did you think I spent hours leisurely dining on luxury dishes special made by a personal chef?”

That was more or less what he had imagined, so he declined to answer. But this did remind him that she had made (unusually sweet) curry rice when it was her turn to cook during their shared life in an RV while pursuing the Problem Solvers.

“I’m also surprised to see you alone. I thought you were always surrounded by people.”

“Even I want to be alone sometimes.”

“If you say so.”

“And sometimes I want a younger boy to just take care of everything for me.”

“Yeah, right.”

Upper class people apparently knew how to look graceful even with ordinary disposable chopsticks. The beautiful president even folded the long napkin into an origami puppy chopstick rest.

She stared intently at Karuta’s katsu curry.

“That does seem like the kind of thing a growing boy would be eating.”

“I can’t believe you can get through the afternoon eating so little. Even the biggest options here are free, so why would you order such a small lunch? Are you a living embodiment of SDGs?”

“Didn’t your gym teacher tell you not to eat too much?”

“Uh…”

Spartan Letnahe-sensei had told him not to eat a bunch of sweet things.

So a rice dish like this would be fine…probably.

But the black-haired teacher’s pet must have wanted an exciting new experience today because she pointed at the katsu curry she had just criticized.

“Give me a bite.”

“Sure, sure.”

Her “bite” ended up taking one of only seven strips of chicken cutlet he had. When she challenged herself to do something, she would see it through. But she also squeezed her eyes shut, gulped, and stuck out the tip of her tongue like a child.

“Ugh. It’s super spicy.”

“The curry rice you make is far below average spiciness. Most people don’t dump milk in the pot.”

“That was skim milk and maple syrup mixed in hot water.”

There was syrup in there too?

Omotesandou Kyouka trembled with tears in her eyes.

She could seem even more mature than the teachers in the faculty room at times, so the mismatch created by childishly sticking out her tongue with tears in her eyes felt wrong somehow. He knew now she could not be allowed to wear a plain school swimsuit.

“Hoo, hoo. Karuta-kun, how can you eat this challenging dish so easily? Because boy’s bodies are built differently?”

“I really don’t think this has anything to do with gender.”

If anything, he thought of a preference for super-spicy foods as a girl thing since it was commonly thought eating them would make you sweat and that would help detox your body and improve your beauty. It was Marika’s friend group he could imagine attempting some Korean, Thai, or Vietnamese food.

Kyouka was still sticking out the tip of her tongue as she pointed at something else.

She poked her slender finger against a glass full of a white liquid.

“What is this? It doesn’t look like cold water.”

“They were selling a drinkable yogurt. Simply cooling your tongue after eating something spicy only provides temporary relief. It’s more like pain than anything. Kurent-sensei said dairy products are the best palate cleanser for spiciness.”

“Ugh, so it is lassi or something like that?”

The president was so desperate for relief, she took a sip of his drink without asking permission first. Once she was freed from the tension of spiciness, she appeared to enter a light chill-out mode. For a while afterwards, she stared into the distance with the glass still in her hand. The unpredictable lowering of her guard left Karuta restless. It was like watching a beautiful girl sleeping.

Then she noticed the glass in her hand.

“Oh? Doesn’t this count as an indirect kiss?”

“Bff! Do you have to reclaim the upper hand like that, you gremlin!!”

Also, they had already reached the level of indirect kiss when she ate the curry from his spoon.

His yelling only made her place a hand on her cheek and smile. She liked messing with people. Meanwhile, he had a feeling Aine was glaring at him from where she stood next to him.

In fact, she was kind of scaring him.

“A-Aine-san? Why haven’t you said a word this entire time?”

“If you wish me to speak, you need only order me to do so.”

A blunt rejection.

Or maybe his jumpiness only made him interpret it that way and she was as emotionless as ever.

Then Omotesandou Kyouka spoke up like she hadn’t noticed any of that.

“Hmm. Taking food and drink from you for nothing in return would hurt my reputation as president, so I need to give you something as well. Karuta-kun, is there any part of my lunch you want?”

“Then how about the piece of sashimi you’re clearly saving for the very last? By which I mean, the shiny, red, super-rare medium-fat tun-”

“Karuta-kun☆”

She interrupted with a smile, so he decided to choose something else.

The world’s strongest boy turned his thoughts to his own status screen. What could he do to increase his courage stat?

“Then I’ll boldly go for the 2nd best option: that small plate of tatsuta-age.”

“Oh? That I just didn’t want to eat. First your katsu curry and now the tatsuta-age? Bboys really like friend foods, don’t they?”

He couldn’t deny it would be a surprise to receive fried chicken when you were in the mood for fish, but that wasn’t the tatsuta-age’s fault.

It was often said the heart of a gourmet program and an action movie came from the reactions of the opponents, not the actions of the lead, and sure enough, Kyouka made the cafeteria’s 540-yen daily special really shine. She even looked graceful as she lifted the tatsuta-age from the plate with her chopsticks. With movements like that, she could be a hand model. Although with her looks, she would shine even more modeling the rest of her too.

“Okay, let’s complete the trade☆ Hee hee. This feels like we’re real friends.”

“What are you talking about?”

She tilted her head and started blowing on the tatsuta-age held by her chopsticks. She even held her other hand beneath in a super graceful big sister move.

“This was a surprisingly insightful choice, Karuta-kun. They do say to try the chicken rather than the fish if you want to quickly determine the quality of a restaurant.”

That hadn’t been his intention, but his policy was to never correct people when they favorably read too deeply into your actions. Although that was a lesson he had learned while clashing with the Problem Solvers, so he didn’t want to rely on it if he didn’t have to.

“Hoo, hoo. Okay, say ‘ah’…oh?”

In a rare display of clumsiness, she dropped the thing held between her chopsticks. But the small piece of tatsuta-age did not hit he floor. Nor the table. Then where did it end up?

“Oh, dear.”

She sounded troubled.

It was perfectly balanced. In a strange miracle, the tatsuta-age had made a soft landing atop her large chest.

But it took more than this to fluster Student Council President Omotesandou Kyouka.

She giggled with the chicken still sitting there.

“Want to eat it straight from here?”

And…

“…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………Mhh.”

“Hold that thought and take a look here, Omotesandou-san! Aine is pouting her lips and drawing her sword, so could you not make jokes like that!? Wait, why are you grinning!? You aren’t plotting to cause even more trouble, are you, you overgrown gremlin!?”

Part 3

All students looked forward to school being let out.

It felt like freedom.

But that feeling was especially strong on Port Days like today. The excitement may have been similar to a field trip.

“No leaving the ship until the approach and mooring process are complete and the gangway has been lowered. That means no flying off the ship with your flight preset, you stupid kids!! Do you want to be ordered to stay in your room after coming all this way!?”

“Um, we will be in the city too. We will catch you if you get too rowdy, so do be careful!!”

It was unclear how much good Subcategory teachers Kiyosawa Hadome and Sophia Firenze’s warnings would do.

Karuta and Aine were gathered on the orange-dyed deck along with everyone else.

“Sacri-sama, what will we do today?”

“We can figure that out after disembarking. We can carefully plan everything out when that’s necessary. There’s no real need to put that much effort into our everyday life.”

From here, they could see several anchors being lowered and mooring ropes being thrown from the ship. The long, skinny gangway was slowly lowered from the side deck, but that wasn’t enough to handle the nearly 1000 people disembarking Second Grimnoah. In the end, most of the students would jump down from the railing using their flight. That might sound simple enough, but there was a drop of more than 9m from the side deck to the concrete bank below. Without Crystal Magic, that was enough to break a bone if you were lucky and die if you weren’t Aine expressionlessly spread her arms a little by his side.

Then she clenched and unclenched her fists.

“Sacri-sama.”

“Isn’t there any other way you can carry me? I’m serious.”

His complaints fell on deaf ears.

Aine swiftly swept his feet out from under him with her skinny leg and caught him in a princess carry. He could not use flight, so she had to carry him at times like this.

They landed so softly it was like gravity didn’t affect them.

“I do not see any problem with carrying you like this forevermore.”

“Please just put me down now.”

Southeast Asian port cities could look very different from each other, but this island had a lot of signs in English and Chinese. Karuta couldn’t read all of them, but he saw some familiar logos on the ads for phones and cars. He even saw a familiar face on one of the big billboards. It depicted Omotesandou Kyouka playing with the latest in aerial photography drones. Being the world’s strongest was a lot of work. It kind of depressed him thinking there were probably billboards with him on them somewhere out in the world. He just had to pray the kids of that region weren’t drawing a third eye on his forehead.

He noticed the redheaded bob cut girl from the student council staring lovingly at the billboard.

“We’ll get dinner out here tonight. Anything you want to eat, Aine?”

“Pure-”

“No gold. Hey, stop drooling in front of that duty-free store’s window. The clerk inside is terrified.”

“Then I will let you choose.”

“Let me choose and you’ll be stuck eating Manmaru udon. They have restaurants overseas too, after all.”

“I see. I have heard that some countries and regions put ketchup on lukewarm udon, so ordering some because you are homesick for some Japanese food while overseas can lead to a very unpleasant surprise.”

They chatted as they left the port and arrived downtown. The tourist port was directly connected to the city, so there were a lot of duty-free stores with their “tax free” signs in the window. Was that Sophia Firenze running around with a bunch of brand-name boxes in her arms?

“I need one of these, and one of these, ooh, I need to buy these pumps while I have the chance!!”

“Wasn’t she supposed to be out monitoring the students’ behavior?”

She seemed dazzled by the words “tax free” and he was honestly worried. Wasn’t her financial situation so dire that a somewhat expensive cup noodle option was a luxury?

Karuta honestly had no real objective.

He only wanted to leave the ship for a change of pace. And Aine never really thought about anything other than following him around.

In that sense, he had to smile bitterly at sharing the evening coastline view together.

“This isn’t that much different from being on the ship. Not too surprising when everyone’s wearing the same uniforms.”

“Based on my observations, a lot of people have paired off into couples, not counting the teachers on patrol.”

Maybe so.

But did the crystal girl walking next to him understand the implications of that? There were some people putting an arm around their partner’s shoulder and – wow – some were even kissing out in public.

The title of world’s strongest could be a nuisance at times. Since this was a tourist area, there would have been a lot of people out trying to get customers regardless, but it felt like Karuta and Aine gathered more attention than most. They had no objective, but they were invited into a wide variety of shops just walking around aimlessly.

“Eh, why not.”

“Sacri-sama. Shouldn’t we be more careful?”

“Whatever the truth of the matter, we’re officially considered to be half of the Four Living Gods. If someone tried to scam us here, I would honestly praise their audacity.”

The title was like a curse, but when it came in handy, he would make use of it. He didn’t have to worry about any direct harm from extortionists except for the ones who attacked so they could pretend to be helpless victims when you retaliated.

The afterschool evening had only just begun.

It was still too early for dinner, so he decided to visit some kind of store.

“Hm, a clothing store.”

“It appears to be a legitimate boutique and not a counterfeit seller.”

Aine expressionlessly tilted her head while taking a look around the store.

“But based on the lineup, this appears to exclusively sell women’s clothing. I was not aware you had developed an interest in dressing that way.”

“Why would we be here for me? I just have to dress you up in the clothes.”

His exasperated response increased the angle of her head tilt.

“Clothes for me?” asked the still-head-tilting crystal girl.

“That’s probably what the clerk is hoping for too.”

They were both the world’s strongest, but advertising that Karuta shopped there and that Aine shopped there would have very different meanings. Of course, the store just wanted to advertise that one of the Four Living Gods shopped there, so the clerk might just insist the two of them take some souvenirs without asking for any payment.

Aine looked down at her white clothing.

“This is light, sturdy, formfitting enough to prevent an enemy from grabbing it, and contains slits to preserve my range of motion. I have no functional complaints with my current clothing.”

“Probably not. But now that I think about it, you wear those white clothes year-round. How do you wash them? I don’t remember ever washing your underwear.”

“––––”

“Aine, your growth is astounding. You never could have given me that ‘have you no tact?’ look back when we first met.”

Karuta couldn’t stand the pressure of her glare and that small triangle of a mouth, so he looked away and gave that simple comment.

Everything from the tip of her sword to her heart was a part of her, but she must have been taking care of her own laundry. She appeared to have some knowledge there since she had recognized the smell of fabric softener from his sports towel once. If she only had that one pair, it was possible she spent every night naked until the washing and drying process was complete, which kind of scared him. But if she had multiple pairs, it was possible the others were strewn about inside him (which was becoming something of a second home for her), a possibility which disturbed him even more. He could only pray that his stomach hadn’t become the crystal girl’s messy room.

Anyway.

The two of them entered the women’s boutique, but they couldn’t exactly stand blankly in a corner the whole time. The fitting room was free to use, so he could have Aine use that.

(The money I’ve made with the unwanted world’s strongest title does come in handy sometimes.)

“Trying things on is free, Aine, so point out anything you like.”

“I have no requests. You choose something you like.”

“I hope they have things in your size.”

“I can recognize when I am being mocked for no good reason.”

She really had grown, he realized. She could express a wider range of feelings than in the Crystal Beach hotel when she had stripped naked in the room with him to change into her swimsuit.

At some point, she had turned into an ordinary girl.

Maybe Karuta was the only one who hadn’t grown.

“Ooh, how about this?”

“I see. This one casual selection helps bring into focus what it is you want from me.”

He really wished she wouldn’t lay on the pressure after he had already chosen.

He had selected a white sundress and a large hat. He had thought it was a safe choice since it fit his image of her choosing to wear a white dress (even if that one was for combat).

However…

“Ouch.”

“?”

He heard an odd voice from beyond the fitting room’s curtain.

“Ow, ow, ow. An unexpected problem has arisen.”

“Hey, Aine, what’s going on in there?”

That dress was so thin you would be able to see her silhouette through it with any light shining behind her, so he was unsure what she could be doing with it to cause pain. Was her skin extremely sensitive so she couldn’t wear any kind of synthetic material?

Eventually, the curtain parted and Aine poked just her head out.

Karuta realized the problem right away.

The wide-brimmed hat was sitting at an odd angle. In fact, the hat was floating up above her head. He knew why that would be.

“Can’t you do something about those mysterious horns?”

“What are you expecting me to do? If you ask me, the solution should come from the boutique. Like putting a pair of slits at the top of the hat so my horns could stick through.”

“Let’s not get hasty, okay!? You’re only trying it on, so we haven’t bought it yet!!”

The expressionless girl pulled her sword out of thin air, so Karuta had to frantically grab her through the curtain to stop her.

“So do your horns really hurt when something touches them? And that was only a hat.”

“(I wouldn’t really say they hurt, but they react very sensitively to unexpected touching.)”

“?”

Aine lowered her head and muttered something under her breath, but Karuta just accepted that hats, hoods, and anything else that covered the head were off limits when coordinating her outfit. She hadn’t said a word when Susannia of the Problem Solvers cut her arm, so this had to be pretty bad.

In that case…

“Let’s go in the other direction this time. What about something boyish? Even if you don’t seem like the type to choose sportswear.”

“I save your life on a regular basis and you have the nerve to label me unathletic?”

“I didn’t mean it like that.”

He pushed a colorful tank top and bike shorts made of synthetic materials into her arms. This was more like something dance and rhythm lovers like Letnahe and Pendet would wear. Aine tilted her head, but pulled back behind the fitting room curtain.

It was hard to judge her preferences when she was always so expressionless, so Karuta’s plan was to try several different extreme options to work out the extent of what she was willing to wear. From there, he could narrow things down toward something she would really like.

(First a classy dress and now sportswear. What should I use to narrow things down further? I could check her reaction to something more feminine like a knit dress.)

He saw this like the game where you took turns trying to guess each other’s number.

“All done.”

Aine opened the curtain.

She was like a snow fairy and looked so fragile she would break if you held her too tight, so the summery, midriff-baring sportwear didn’t suit her. But that mismatch did make for an interesting combination. It was surprising just to look at.

However.

“Um, Aine.”

“Yes?”

“Why am I seeing that?”

“?”

Her head tilt meant she hadn’t noticed. He was honestly afraid to spell it out for her. Which was why he had kept it vague using “that”.

He could see two little bumps.

A pair of protrusions other than her horns were pushing out the formfitting tank top that stretched tightly across her skin like rubber.

(Wh-wh-where’s her bra? E-even 12-year-old Natalena wears one, so why isn’t she!?)

Thinking back, when that pure white outfit was soaked by the rain, he recalled seeing various things showing through. She had been embarrassed, but she must not have actually enacted any kind of solution.

“A-anyway, let’s get you back in your original clothes, Aine. Hurry!”

“Why are you acting like I am causing you problems? You were the one who chose this outfit.”

“Can you not express your anger by putting your hands on your hips and pushing out your chest!?”

“???”

Aine showed an obvious question mark on her expressionless face as he shoved her back into the fitting room.

He asked a question through the curtain while hearing her move around inside.

“You’ve tried on a few things now, but have you seen anything that stands out to you? I can’t choose everything for you.”

“You want me to choose something?”

“Give me any feedback you have, like what you don’t like or what you want to see more of. The smallest thing can help show me what you want.”

“In that case,” she said while the curtain shook.

She poked her head out, so she must not have been done changing. Her bare shoulders stuck out with her head and she expressionlessly pointed at Karuta.

“That is the only thing I am interested in wearing.”

“?”

“Second Grimnoah’s uniform. I would be lying if I said I have never wanted to wear one.”

Part 4

After leaving the boutique, Karuta and Aine walked back the way they had come to reach Second Grimnoah, the three-hull ship measuring more than 600m long was currently moored at the port.

Since most of the students were out in the city for the Port Day, the giant ship was completely silent. It was the same somewhat guilt-inspiring stillness found when sneaking into school on the weekend.

This was a sort of sanctuary.

But that was why you felt a faint thrill from tiptoeing in when you weren’t supposed to.

“They might have some spare uniforms in the infirmary.”

“They would have them there, Sacri-sama?”

“Only for emergencies, so they won’t be perfectly fitted or anything. It’s probably going to be baggy, but bear with it.”

“On what basis are you predicting that an improperly fitted uniform would be baggy on me rather than too tight?”

The girl, who stood a full head shorter than him even when counting the horns, was expressionlessly puffing out her cheeks. He was mildly surprised by the inner change that led her to worry about things like that.

“Don’t worry. Marika and Omotesandou-san’s size is far from normal. Those are the outliers who have trouble finding bras in a style they like, so you don’t need to compare yourself to them.”

“Why do you not understand that the problem is how you are starting with the assumption that I will lose, you jerk?”

They made their way to the infirmary.

Fortunately, there were no patients (with heatstroke or seasickness) in any of the beds lined up by the wall. This wasn’t a place people came for fun, so they weren’t going to bother anyone. He could humor Aine for a bit.

“Here we go. I found a girl’s uniform, Aine.”

“Come to think of it, why are you so knowledgeable about girl’s uniforms?”

Aine had even learned how to verbally stab people in the flank.

The reason for his knowledge came from having to help the president change or assisting Natalena after her clothes got wet.

But anyway.

He had found a spare uniform, but they were no longer in the boutique and thus there was no fitting room. They had no choice but to have Aine use one of the bed spaces with a curtain drawn around it.

While the crystal girl changed inside one, Karuta tilted his head a bit.

He felt kind of uneasy.

(H-huh? What’s this? With the curtain drawn, this shouldn’t be any different from the boutique’s fitting room, so why is my heart pounding in my ears?)

He blinked a few times and peered into the darkness within him before finally identifying the cause.

He could see through the curtain.

The fitting room curtain had been thick and made to block light, but the curtain used as a divider between infirmary beds was not and he could faintly make out Aine’s silhouette while she changed within!?

Apparently the unguarded girl had switched on the excessively bright LED lamp on the bedside table just because it was somewhat dark while surrounded by curtains.

“Sacri-sama?”

“It’s nothing! Nothing at all!!”

“???”

He hated that he could tell she was tilting her head in confusion.

He honestly couldn’t help but hold his breath until she pulled the curtain open herself.

“This is how it looks. What do you think, Sacri-sama?”

She was wearing a uniform.

A Second Grimnoah summer uniform.

She stood tall and fidgeted her fingers together while dressed in the exact same thing so many girls did every day when attending classes at Second Grimnoah, but it looked entirely different on Aine.

This could have been a possible future.

The powerfully innocent image of her in that uniform brought that sentimental thought to mind. Since the crystal girl was already somewhat transparent, she could take on a subtly different appearance depending on the color of the light around her. The orange of the sunset may have helped make her look like an empty dream at the moment.

Karuta didn’t feel any desire to start discussing where things had gone wrong.

He accepted everything before giving his honest opinion.

“It looks good on you, Aine.”

“I know I requested this, but I am not sure how to process any positive or negative feedback related to it.”

“That’s made for Second Grimnoah, so the stitching is designed to hold up in combat. Couldn’t you wear this all the time?”

“Updating personality profile. I now see that you have a schoolgirl fetish, Sacri-sama.”

She may have meant that as an attack, but it was a meaningless accusation against a schoolboy. Aine might not quite fit the profile since she was always walking around in her casual(?) clothes, but when most every girl around you was a schoolgirl, it was the default, not a fetish.

“Want to go for a walk dressed like that, Aine?”

“So you prefer to show off your ‘prize’ rather than make sure no one else gets to see it?”

She must have sensed her first attack failed, so she went for a follow up attack. But since almost every student would be on land for the Port Day, Second Grimnoah was nearly deserted. He doubted they would run across anyone to be surprised by Aine’s unusual (for her) outfit.

“I see. So you enjoy the thrill of being out in the open but avoiding detection. Does the thought of being in an empty school after hours excite you?”

“Can you stop slinging attacks until one of them lands, Aine?”

He smiled bitterly while stepping out of the infirmary.

Just then, he heard a quiet, soft vibration.

He realized he had bumped into something in the hallway.

And this wasn’t a stranger.

The color of the light was mixing.

Distorting.

Cracks were forming in those colors.

“Marika?”

“I know.”

His childhood friend did not look up when he called her name.

She fell silent again.

She demonstrated a painful amount of vulnerability.

She clutched at the short sleeve of his shirt, pressed her forehead against his chest, and clenched her teeth.

“I know it’s Aine-chan’s turn right now.”

Those words carried an important meaning.

They were a curse powerful enough to tear down the unnaturally cheerful mood that had covered this entire today.

“But this really is our last day.”

When she did look up, her face was a mess.

A lost child may have been the closest comparison.

The usual confident and cheerful girl was nowhere to be found.

“I know we decided to enjoy our school life to the fullest since the human string pullers want their answer soon. I know we’re supposed to cut all ties with out lives so we can face the final battle with no regrets!! I know that!! But I can’t do it. I just can’t do everything the way I’m supposed to when I know this is the end! …Because I love you, Karuta. I didn’t go to Grimnoah or switch to Second Grimnoah after the first one was destroyed because I wanted to master the use of cutting-edge magic!! I only did it because I couldn’t let you go alone! That really was my only reason!!”

What do you want to be when you grow up?

Karuta had chosen to go to a school that specialized in Crystal Magic, but he had not had any clear vision of his future either. They had been overwhelmed with things they had to do once they were propped up as the strongest, but he wasn’t willing to say that was the future he had envisioned when he was suffering through the entrance exam. He felt like his starting point had been even more empty than Marika’s desire to be with the person she loved.

And this conversation had included several very meaningful words.

Including one statement that may have been more important than the fate of the planet for this girl.

But…

“I know,” interrupted the sobbing girl before he could say anything. The premium jelly mascara she had been so proud of was running due to her tears. “I know you’ll choose Aine-chan in the end. Because she’ll be all alone if you don’t. The president and I have our own lives outside of you, but she really does only have you. Sever that tie and she has nothing left, so I know you’ll choose her!!”

“…”

“Why is this the only kind of love I get to have?”

She had already experienced more of the world’s cruelties than any one person should, but she still raised her voice.

“I don’t care about the world’s strongest, the Threat, or the human string pullers!! If I didn’t have all this special stuff, I could have been normal and happy. Maybe even this here could have turned out differently without these complications!”

Maybe it was the way her words flowed, but Karuta sensed something off in what Amaashi Marika was saying in his arms. He had found something that told him he could never roll down this slope no matter what might happen.

Without these complications.

Did that include Aine who was linked to him through Crystal Magic?

He grabbed his childhood friend’s trembling shoulders and pushed her away from his chest.

He kept his distance.

“No, Marika.”

“I know.”

“I doubt I can ever understand how you’re feeling, but I’m still going to insist you take that back. If you don’t, I never want to see you again, Marika!!”

“I said I know!!!”

A high-pitched noise echoed through Second Grimnoah.

Marika looked ready to shed tears of blood and her right hand held…a rapier Device.

“Today – our final 24 hours – are all about ensuring we have no regrets left, right? Well, no one ever said it all had to end happily.”

Karuta also made a decision when he saw that.

Amaashi Marika was probably the fastest person on the planet to make up her mind at times like this. He had to respond immediately or he really would be in trouble.

He shouted the last thing Marika wanted to hear out of his mouth.

“Aine!!”

He pulled his modified military flashlight from his hip.

He shined the powerful IR laser in Marika’s face to dazzle her eyes.

But not so he could fight.

He just needed time to make his move.

He and Aine turned tail and he heard a series of cracking sounds coming from behind them. How many seconds did it take Living God Amaashi Marika to decorate her body with crystal armor? Once that process was complete, she wouldn’t hesitate to wield a level of violence that let her pick a fight with a fighter craft or slice a tank in two.

“What is your plan, Sacri-sama?”

“For now, we go this way!!”

Marika’s Crystal Blossom contained the name of Tezcatlipoca, Aztec god of death, and her Crystal Magic let her use light as a weapon, converting it into any kind of deadly power. Her rapier Device could simply cut down an enemy, but it could also be used for high-precision laser sniping.

(If we want to prevent her from using her top speed that rivals a fighter craft, we have to stay away from spaces with long straightaways. A mazelike space is best, since it also keeps her from using that laser sniping of hers. Aine’s sword might be able to stop a metal shell or a missile, but it can’t deflect laser light or a beam!!)

In that sense, the school was a bad location. Both the standard school building and the special facilities like the gym or cafeteria were given simple, orderly designs so no one would get lost. Which meant…

“Focus on the ship side of things, not the school, Aine. Marika’s speed and long-range attacks don’t help her in the bottom-level engine room full of thick pipes and diesel engines larger than an apartment room!!”

“I have my doubts Miss Marika of all people will have her options restricted so easily.”

“No overestimating her abilities, Aine. If you think of her like a magic bullet that can do anything, then you can’t even begin to put together a plan.”

“She is already furious, so if she starts shooting lasers all over the bottom level of the ship and the ship starts to flood, I might survive, but you would be in a predicament since you need a constant supply of oxygen. Your odds of survival fall even further if she ignites the diesel fuel.”

“I said not to do that, Aine!! It is scary how plausible that sounds with this childhood friend from hell, though!!”

Just then, a door opened and someone emerged into the orange-dyed hallway. Karuta immediately recognized them. Only one person on Second Grimnoah used a wheelchair since the preset of regeneration could heal all non-lethal wounds in 30 seconds.

His face lit up.

He kept running away from overheated Marika and waved his hands to gather Kyouka’s attention.

“Thank goodness you’re here, Omotesandou- !?”

“I can’t…”

He heard a creaking sound, but this wasn’t the wheelchair’s axle or tires.

His body demanded oxygen after running full speed, but the ghastly sense coming from this girl still made him stop breathing. What was that she held in both hands behind her wheelchair? A bow and arrow? One with a sight and stabilizer!?

“I can’t always be the big sister you rely on. That’s no different from deciding I can never be anything other than ‘the hero’ who’s separated from everyone else. Why am I the only one you treat this way? Did you think I did all of this to save my own skin and for the money that comes with being the world’s strongest!?”

This was bad.

But what about it was bad? He could tell she was angry enough to kill, but there was too little context surrounding her statements for him to figure out what exactly she was upset about!!

(If something was bothering her, she could have told me earlier!)

“Come to think of it, this is the first time I have seen Miss Kyouka giving into her anger and shouting at someone. She seems to no longer care about keeping up appearances.”

He realized Aine was right.

But what had led to this?

“Perhaps she feels left out. She is separated from everyone else by being the only Regulation 3 at present. The ordinary students and even the other Living Gods are at most Regulation 1s.”

“…”

“Also, it sounded like you didn’t even know how she normally eats lunch. That means you did not spend your lunch breaks with her. And when she mentioned she wanted to have a younger boy take care of everything for her, didn’t you brush it off with a dismissive ‘yeah, right’?”

“Meaning?”

“You only have yourself to blame, you jerk.”

Karuta grabbed Aine’s hand and changed directions as they ran. He turned a corner. He had to use the terrain if he was going to avoid being killed by Kyouka’s bow and arrow.

“You sure have grown!!”

“Have I? You, on the other hand, have not grown at all.”

Kyouka was a new threat to worry about, but that didn’t decrease the threat presented by Marika one iota. They couldn’t come to a stop no matter what might happen.

Aine ran expressionlessly alongside him with her school uniform skirt fluttering dangerously high, but he thought he saw a hint of a smile on her lips.

She dropped her empty gaze to her hand which was firmly held by Karuta’s hand.

“My, my. Miss Marika and Miss Kyouka are going all out today. They really are trying to kill us. Hee hee.’

“Wh-why – ugh, cough – do you sound like you’re enjoying yourself!?”

“Because I appear to hold the princess position here.”

They didn’t want to leave anything undone.

He understood that, but how much pressure had been building up inside those two? What kind of concerns had they been bottling up all this time?

He wanted to avoid being caught between Marika and Kyouka. There was no chance of survival then. Which meant…

“Let’s pull away from Omotesandou-san, Aine. No matter how dangerous she is, she’s in a wheelchair, so we can keep her from following us by taking the stairs. There are only so many elevators, so she’ll need to take a wide detour to catch up. That won’t do anything to lose Marika since she can use the flight preset, but it lets us keep the odds at 2-against-1.”

“Do you think it would be easier to fight Miss Marika who is always a little bit angry than to fight Miss Kyouka who is showing a rare level of anger?”

“Let’s not think of this as choosing the lesser of two evils, Aine! Imagining either option terrifies me!!!”

A cruise ship might seem longer and shorter than a high-rise tourist hotel, but it was still divided into quite a few floors, starting from the engine room and hold at the bottom and going all the way up to the heliport at the very top. That meant it had some long stairways they could use.

(Now where can I go that will keep Marika from using her high-speed flight and laser sni-)

Karuta’s thought was cut off by a thick guillotine falling to block the path ahead.

It was a fireproof shutter that doubled as flood prevention. He doubted this was a freak malfunction. Not wanting him to escape, the president must have abused her authority to take over Second Grimnoah’s networked devices.

This was now a T-junction. Heading right would take them to the stairs, but he felt like they were being guided that way. There was more to this. Why would Kyouka want to lead him to the stairs she couldn’t use with her wheelchair?

But whatever the reason…

(If I want to betray Omotesandou-san’s expectations, I have to keep heading straight even if it means destroying that shutter!!)

He was somewhat used to fist fighting after the strange martial arts tournament the Catastrophe had been turned into, but he could not break through a composite shutter with his fists.

“Damn. Aine!!”

When the girl swung her right arm down, a cold crystal katana appeared in her hand with a swishing sound.

But she did not obey Karuta’s instructions.

She suddenly swung the blade horizontally and orange sparks flew. Karuta clicked his tongue. She had knocked an aluminum alloy arrow from the air, which now slid to the end of the hallway.

He heard the creaking of wheels.

At the other end of the orange-lit hallway, a black-haired beauty wielded a distinctively-shaped bow in her wheelchair.

And she was not alone.

The sound of rubber soles scraping against the floor came from the other end of the hallway. He didn’t even have to turn around to know, but when he did, he found Amaashi Marika coming from the stairs with crystal armor covering her body and a rapier Device in her dominant hand.

His tension had grown well past the limit, so it felt electric at this point.

He doubted either of them was willing to talk, but he still moved his lips.

“Wai-”

The first to move wasn’t Marika but Kyouka. She must have decided that one half-word meant he had abandoned her. She had the bow and arrow, but she still moved her wheelchair to rush toward him.

Amaashi Marika followed after her. As her ally? No, to kill him herself before Kyouka could take him from her. That was clear from the glint of a hunter’s spirit in her eyes.

Amaashi Marika approached him from the front with her rapier device squeezed tight in her hand and Omotesandou Kyouka approached him from the rear with her bow and arrow aimed and ready. Their eyes were shining bright and he could tell at a glance they wouldn’t respond to conversation.

He didn’t stand a chance.

“Sacri-sama!!”

He heard a shout. Aine had apparently moved to defend him with her sword in both hands, but two different world’s strongests were approaching from two different directions. Aine was reliant on that sharp sword, so she could only defend against one of them. Utagai Karuta could not avoid fighting the other girl.

He readied his modified military flashlight, but how much good would that toy do him?

Aine was his main defense.

His weapon was like the sidearm worn by a fighter pilot. It was better to have it than not, but if you had to rely on it, it meant you had already crashed deep behind enemy lines.

There was no scream.

A loud impact erupted within Second Grimnoah.

Karuta couldn’t even tell who had crashed into who.

He couldn’t stop the momentum transferred to him, so he crashed into Aine while she tried to protect him and all four of them rolled along the floor in a big heap. Heavy metallic sounds rang loud because Omotesandou Kyouka’s wheelchair had toppled over too.

Then silence.

And…

“Ah ha ha!!”

They were still lying there, tangled together.

One of the people in that pile of bodies started laughing loudly. It may have been Karuta himself. That laughter was contagious. Marika and Kyouka were both laughing. The bloody atmosphere from before had vanished without a trace.

Not even Aine was immune.

She was mostly expressionless, but there was the smallest hint of a smile on her lips.

“Heh heh. What was that, Marika-san? Were you really swinging a blade around over a broken heart? You might have the looks of a cutting-edge Gyaru 2.0 or even 3.0, but deep down, you still have the soul of a reserved Edo period girl. Ah ha ha!”

“Oh, shut up. You’re the one that pulled out a bow and arrow. A projectile weapon is cheating. I bet you’re the kind of person who takes a game of tag way too seriously and starts chasing people down on a bike.”

Someone sighed.

Karuta wasn’t sure who with everyone tangled up together, but someone was holding his head between her arms. Like she was holding a beachball to her chest.

Eventually, the president asked a question.

“So is everyone satisfied?”

“Yes,” replied Karuta and neither Aine nor Marika disagreed. It was past the point for that.

“No one has anything left undone?”

“I’m good.”

“If you say you want to run off with Aine-chan, I don’t think either of us would stop you.”

Kyouka may have been hoping for a digression like that, but neither Karuta nor Aine went for it.

Why do all this today?

Why forget their troubles and enjoy their school life?

That was obvious.

To convince them they were making the right choice.

“I have no regrets.”

“I see.”

“This world is shit. We never stood a chance against the Threat, the human string pullers already controlled everything, and even our families will betray us like it’s no big deal. That’s just the world we live in.”

So would they abandon the world?

That may have been a valid option for them.

“But we still love this world and think it’s worth protecting. If we feel we’ve proven that to ourselves, then we need to do this. We didn’t choose to be the world’s strongest, but it was our actions that gave us that title. It wouldn’t be right to run away now.”

Kyouka nodded in agreement and took the conversation further.

“In that case, Karuta-kun. And the rest of you too. I am going to contact the human string pullers. Once I do that, there is no stopping the gears from turning.”

“That’s fine.”

Utagai Karuta breathed in and out.

And he summed it all up for them.

“Then let’s get to the space elevator for our journey into death. If we sacrifice ourselves by ejecting ourselves into space, we can drive away 300 million Threats. We knew this was coming.”

Part 5

However, not everyone would be happy with that result.

For example, what if someone other than the Four Living Gods were to hear about it for the first time?

“Eh?”

Young Natalena Blast forgot to breathe as she pressed her back against the wall. It took everything she had to avoid dropping the library books she held. They were right around the corner, but she could not join them there.

“Eh?”

The decision she made here would determine everything. If she thoughtlessly rushed out and tried to argue with them, she would be defeated 4-against-1. In fact, they didn’t even need to argue. They could forcibly restrain her and head to the space elevator.

For what?

To protect the 5.5 billion non-strongests, including Natalena herself, from the Threat.

How would they do this?

By ejecting themselves into space to divert the Threat’s attention.

“Eh?”

But what did that mean really?

What was going to happen to Utagai Karuta and the other three!?

Chapter 2

Part 1

Natalena Blast couldn’t breathe.

A blank area in her mind expanded to eat away every thought there.

The world looked blurry around her, but was that due to the tears in her eyes?

She shook her head with her back still against the wall. She could tell she would faint if she wasn’t careful. And if that happened, there was no way she could save Karuta’s group.

What was that about?

What did they mean a journey into death!?

“Dang.”

Natalena slapped her small hands against her cheeks to force her mind to face the reality before her eyes. She focused on what she needed to do.

Did she need to directly confront Karuta’s group? Of course not.

They were the Four Living Gods, the world’s strongest. Meanwhile, she was just another Crystal Magician. Remember when they fought at the Crystal Beach. It had been hopeless when it was 1-on-1, so what chance did she stand against all four of them? And who would save them if they forcibly stopped her before heading to their own dooms!?

(Let’s see, the time is…7 at night!)

Natalena checked her phone and clenched her teeth.

Karuta’s group had called this their final day. They had said they were contacting the human string pullers soon. She needed to assume they were dead if no alternative was found before midnight.

That only left 5 hours.

But it also meant there was still a chance to change their destiny!!

Natalena doubted it would be that easy. Karuta’s group wasn’t stupid and they weren’t saints. The world’s strongests had thought through every possibility they could come up with and still chosen self-sacrifice. The answer wouldn’t be simple enough for a Subcategory Regulation 1 to come up with it on her own.

Which meant…

(I can’t keep this to myself. I need to gather as many people as I can so we can all put our heads together!)

They each might not be a match for those four, but there would be so many more of them.

Second Grimnoah was a school. Why wouldn’t they rely on the power of numbers when they needed more?

But who could she get to help her here?

“First the teachers! With the grownups’ approval, the students will be a lot more willing to help out!!”

There was no time to waste, so she took off running.

The view past the side deck and across the dark ocean felt so very wrong.

A line there stuck straight up toward heaven.

That was the space elevator’s silhouette.

“Kh.”

(No.)

It felt like an ominous symbol of death now. The human string pullers were waiting there for the Four Living Gods. In order to sacrifice those four by ejecting them into space to draw the Threat’s attention.

(I won’t let that happen!! I don’t care if it’s selfish and, um, I’m willing to set aside the future of the Earth!! I couldn’t protect my sister…I could only watch helplessly as the worst came to pass. I refuse to let that happen again!!)

“Sophia-sensei!!”

“?”

Young Natalena slammed on the brakes when she spotted that nervous Subcategory teacher. The ship was resupplied on the Port Days, but the teachers must have returned to the ship. Natalena initially thought that was lucky, but she stopped herself. That word didn’t apply as long as the Four Living Gods were marching toward their doom.

She didn’t know how influential Sophia Firenze, who was carrying a lot of brand-name boxes, was in the faculty room. Actually, she could guess it wasn’t much. But the woman was still a teacher. She had to be far more useful than one powerless student. And Natalena had planned to talk to anyone she came across anyway.

As many as possible.

She needed everyone’s help.

“Please help me! Um, Karuta-senpai and the others, well, they said they’re going to contact the human string pullers!!”

Why was she so hesitant to come right out and mention the self-sacrifice and ejection into space?

Perhaps she still hadn’t gotten over the shock of learning of it herself.

(No, don’t do that. You need to face the ugly truth!! We can’t come up with a solution if you don’t mention the most important factor! Um, that’s how Karuta-senpai always does things!!)

And Sophia was far from calm herself.

She had gone pale before being filled in on the details.

“Oh…oh, no.”

“Sensei?”

“Um, Jane-san. I am, uh, in no position to fight the human string pullers.”

“Do you know something? Like, um, how to save Karuta-senpai and the others!?”

The teacher used Natalena’s usual pseudonym and Natalena nearly grabbed at her shoulders and shouted back at her, but then it hit her.

The woman was shaking. It was an unnatural tremor, like someone had dumped a bucket of ice water over her head.

Sophia Firenze.

Wasn’t a weapons researcher named Chrisbart Firenze one of the human string pullers? This was a big deal for her in a different way than it was for Natalena.

“Argh!! That’s not a good reason! If a family member is doing something wrong, shouldn’t you do everything you can to stop them? Um, I will explain everything, but there really is no time. We can’t afford to be delayed because you’re too afraid to act!!”

“B-but…”

The teacher squeezed her eyes shut and spoke in a vanishingly quiet voice, but she threw out all the niceties of being a teacher.

She exposed her feelings to Natalena, no matter how ugly, pathetic, dark, and filthy they were.

“You all might think of the human string pullers as detestable villains, but no matter what the other 5.5 billion people out there might say, all I see is that kind uncle who gave me so many wonderful memories growing up.”

“!!”

Finding out a family member or a friend was a bad person was not fun. Having your suspicions confirmed was unbearable.

All that shopping during today’s Port Day may have been a way of distracting herself from her worries and nerves.

Anyone would feel that way, adult or child. That was why young Natalena did not scorn or insult the much older woman. Anyone who had seen the past battles would know that every person out there was doing everything they could to keep on living. That desire couldn’t be pretty or ugly.

“I don’t want to fight my uncle. In fact, I can only see this going badly whether I do or not. I’ll do anything else, even offer up my own life, so please let me sit this one out. I don’t want anything to do with this!!”

But that wasn’t an option.

That choice wouldn’t save anyone.

Natalena Blast understood better than anyone what failure here felt like. She wasn’t working based on assumptions here. She knew this from firsthand experience.

“I…”

The young girl clenched her teeth hard.

She gathered up what had been stewing inside her for so long – an empty dream that could never come true – and threw it right in the hesitant adult teacher’s face.

In other words…

“I wish I could punch my sister right in the face and stop her from making that mistake!! But Anastasia Blast, world’s strongest, isn’t here anymore, so that isn’t an option anymore and it never will be! But it’s not too late for you! Um, you can still stop Chrisbart Firenze. You can still stop your family member from making a terrible mistake!!!”

The teacher still didn’t know what it felt like to cross that line, but the young girl had crossed it and there was no going back.

Natalena knew how foolish and meaningless it was to try to find peace by turning away from the unbearably cruel reality standing in your way.

“You can still walk that painful path,” said Natalena, sounding thoughtful. Her small hands squeezed hard at the woman’s upper arm. “Nothing I can do can save my sister now, but, um, you’ve been given a free chance to achieve a goal that’s even more unreachable than immortality for me! Look into my eyes! Do you see the darkness there!? This will be you too if you screw this up!! Don’t you want to protect your irreplaceable family member!?”

She didn’t receive a response.

The teacher with the same name as one of the string pullers fell to her knees, clung to the girl, and burst into tears.

“I, sob, I!!”

“Yes.”

“I can really say I want to save him? Even though he’s, sob, one of the human string pullers manipulating the 5.5 billion other people!?”

“You can. I would do the same if my sister was still alive. Even if what she was doing is wrong. And you still have that chance. It’s not too late for you.”

Natalena didn’t think this adult was weak for letting her feelings out like that.

In fact, she felt people only walked to their own doom because they lacked the courage to let out their feelings.

Like Anastasia Blast of the Problem Solvers or Utagai Karuta of the Four Living Gods.

What if they had been able to say they were scared, in pain, and fed up with it all?

What if they had said they didn’t want to die?

What if they had asked for help?

Would things have gone differently for them?

Why couldn’t they do that when they were just as human as everyone else?

“Sensei,” said Natalena Blast, holding Sophia in her arms. She was young, but she was one of the people challenging a great unfairness. “I want to save Karuta-senpai from being thrown into space to draw the Threat’s attention. And, um, this has nothing to do with him being a Living God or the fate of the world. So will you help me?”

Part 2

Subcategory gym teacher Kiyosawa Hadome sighed.

He hadn’t needed to try to overhear those two’s conversation. It may have even been audible off the ship and in the port where the resupplying was still underway.

And he didn’t need to think very hard about this one.

Chrisbart Firenze.

Sophia’s uncle had paid for Kiyosawa Hadome’s tuition. Not everything had to be about the fate of the world or exacting justice. Your reasons could be a lot more personal. And what if someone you cared deeply about was making a terrible mistake? There was only one answer: stop that plan even if it meant marching up to the man and decking him.

Also.

He could never accept a choice that meant trapping those four children with grand reasons like “the future of the Earth” and “protecting humankind” and then throwing them out into space.

That only meant physically keeping so many lives from being lost, but that was not the same thing as saving the world.

Kiyosawa Hadome scratched his head with a big hand and muttered to himself.

There was only ever one path for him here.

“Stop being so stupid, you little brats.”

Letnahe Kurent, the silver-haired, brown-skinned teacher in a white military uniform, used her thumb to operate a special mobile device for operating with military secrets. Anyone with the proper knowledge would have known her uniform said she was a commander in the navy.

She was an Indian naval officer, a temporary teacher at Second Grimnoah, and part of the human string pullers.

She was also a sinful woman who was a mother of two and had yet to get over the pain of her first love.

(Now, then.)

She looked up from the small screen and turned her eyes to the many city lights shining in the night.

(Today is a Port Day. Most of the students will be on the island and will fail to notice what is happening. How can I make this announcement? Natalena-san and Sophia-sensei may think they can gather enough people by running around and shouting, but that won’t be nearly enough.)

The best option was to use the internet.

Second Grimnoah was full of secrets regarding Crystal Magic, but they could not keep people from talking. Letnahe was aware the students had a few unofficial communities set up online. By spreading information on a few of those groups, it would spread to the students in the city.

“And that sounds like a job for me. Leaving it unclear who is betraying who is just how I do things.”

She was a sinful woman who would do anything to achieve her goal, so she had a habit of reminding herself of the core reasons behind her actions. She knew better than anyone that without that core, she would become no more than a disaster shaped like a woman.

Kiyosawa Hadome had decided to do this, so she would support him in secret.

For that, she was willing to betray the human string pullers.

Yamane Deiri nervously peeked down a narrow street filled with toxic neon lights (while carelessly still in his uniform), but he realized something just before deciding to take the next step toward adulthood. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone.

“Yo, Hirosuke.”

“Wh-what? I’m trying to check out all the must-see sights. Like that beach there was the model for the swimsuit episode of Cluster Wars. Yeah, that was the legendary episode where, not only did it give you little girls frolicking on the beach in their swimsuits, but it also put a lot of care into the discrepancy between their swimsuits and their tan lines.”

“What I find impressive is how they can stick a swimsuit episode into a robot anime where they’re always battling out across the solar system and it somehow doesn’t feel out of place. Anyway, Hirosuke, what did you think this Port Day was all about?”

“Eh? A morale boost before the final battle with the Threat?”

“Right?”

Yamane Deiri waved his phone in a skeptical fashion and let his awful friend see the small screen.

“But check this out. That bastard Karuta has decided to do something stupid even though we’re all ready to fight alongside them.”

“You mean he’s fighting to save the world singlehandedly so he can become the idol of every little girl not just on the planet but in the entire solar system? He’s just like that dense Cluster Wars protagonist and his victory harem. K-Karuta, I’m not letting you hog all the little girls to yourself!!”

The Four Living Gods had apparently been searching for an option other than being ejected into space. Deiri and Hirosuke exchanged a nod and turned back toward the port. They saw two other people in school uniforms running in the same direction.

Those two were Matsuda Imi and Hashizaki Tayori, the popular girls from their class.

“Oh, you too?”

“You bet!! I’ll protect you, little girls!!!”

“Take back that ‘you bet’ until you’ve learned how to actually communicate. …So, Yamane, Nekoumi’s complete inability to hold a human conversation has me worried, but, um, the two of us still live in the same spacetime or dimension or whatever, don’t we? We’re not from completely different worlds that just so happen to exist in the same location?”

“Matsuda, where did you pull that fantasy worldbuilding from? You have nothing to worry about. The only hearts I’ll be winning are those of every young woman in the world.”

“Ugh,” groaned Matsuda Imi, giving up.

Gyaru-ish (but motherly) Tayori gave her staggering friend some support and took over the conversation.

“We can’t let Marika go through with this. And this isn’t even about the Four Living Gods. The three of us only just mended our friendship, so it isn’t fair for Marika to leave us again so soon.”

“What she said. …Damn, Tayori stole all the good lines from me.”

Imi sounded like she was teasing her gyaru-ish friend, but she was probably serious.

People generally assumed everything would work out. Since everything had been fine yesterday, they assumed the same would apply to tomorrow. But their past battles had told these students that wasn’t true at all.

But that also meant that, if you took action and put together some kind of plan for dealing with the problem, you could change things.

“God, the problem with those world’s strongests is they’re so strong it makes them fragile.”

“Oh? That’s awfully insightful for you, Yamane-kun.”

“Don’t worry. I’m ready to deal with this. I-it’s time to save Karuta-kun and win the adoration of all the little girls that fawn over him. Like Aine-chan and Jane Ignition-san.”

“Is that all you ever think about, Nekoumi?”

But they had established an important definition here.

The Four Living Gods were a single group of four.

If they were going to save that group and pour all their efforts into that attempt, they needed to count Crystal Girl Aine as part of that group and do everything they could to save her too.

Yamane Deiri, Nekoumi Hirosuke, Matsuda Imi, and Hashizaki Tayori exchanged a silent nod.

She wasn’t just a type of Crystal Magic.

They didn’t even need to get Karuta’s opinion on the matter. Aine herself might define herself that way, but the students who had shared a classroom with her knew better.

Then the student council’s redheaded bob cut girl spoke to them.

“You four.”

She too had to have someone she wanted to protect. Like that student council president who always seemed so perfect because she never let anyone see her vulnerabilities.

It didn’t have to be someone who had shared a classroom with them.

There was an entire world of interconnected people out there.

“It doesn’t really matter, but do you think everyone returning to Second Grimnoah right now is thinking the same thing? I suspect the entire student body agrees with us. I don’t know where whoever started this intends to hold their strategy meeting, but don’t you think that place will end up overcrowded?”

“Are you kidding? So the final battle is going to require a lottery or numbered tickets? Hurry, hurry! We’re already running late!! We can’t give that bastard Karuta any more reason to abandon us than he already has!!!”

The Subcategory and Main Category reacted exactly the same.

Even the teachers joined them for the same reason.

They walked at first, then some of them began running impatiently, and finally some began flying from the city with their Crystal Magic presets, forcing the public morals committee and teachers to blow their warning whistles.

Everyone was already gathering together.

Gathering together and approaching Second Grimnoah.

Part 3

Such a large number of people would never fit in an ordinary classroom. Sophia Firenze, Kiyosawa Hadome, or some other teacher had granted permission to use the gym, but ordinarily, the Subcategory and Main Category students used different gyms.

They were packed in tight and those who couldn’t fit had to use their Crystal Blossom transmissions or watch webcam footage on their phones or tablets.

So many people were willing to go to those lengths so they could help come up with an idea.

(Good.)

Natalena Blast was not the world’s strongest. She had always been a timid girl without the guts to hold a microphone in front of a large crowd.

But things had changed.

She couldn’t let her nerves hold her back. If they didn’t come up with an idea now, Karuta’s group would die in a moving act of self-sacrifice.

So she did not hesitate to stand on the stage at the center of attention.

“Um, to start with, I wanted to ask about something.”

The student council’s redheaded bob cut girl was familiar with the school equipment, so she had handed Natalena a microphone that Natalena now used to gather everyone’s attention.

“Is the Threat situation really that bad? Um, the Four Living Gods aren’t the only ones who can fight. What if we sent out every Crystal Magician here at Second Grimnoah?”

They had in fact fought the Threat, both real and fake, in a group battle before. That meant the Threat could in fact be defeated by human hands.

However…

“That would be difficult.”

This new speaker had to be in the gym, but Natalena couldn’t locate her within the large crowd. Based on the voice, this was Letnahe Kurent holding a microphone somewhere in here. She was the new dance teacher who inexplicably chose to wear a navy uniform.

“You did battle the real Threat to retake Second Grimnoah near the Port of Kobe. The number of Threats there, including the smallest units, was likely somewhere between 10 and 30 thousand.”

A deep mechanical noise sounded.

Someone from the drama club must have finally located Letnahe because a large spotlight affixed to the second-floor railing shined down on her. It wasn’t that dark in the gym, but showing everyone who was talking helped the conversation run more smoothly.

Everyone was here because they wanted to protect someone.

Natalena gave the drama club member operating the spotlight a wave of thanks.

“Th-that’s right. 1000 Crystal Magicians can defeat tens of thousands of the Threat. So, um, i-if we all work together…”

“Meanwhile, the number of Threats gathering outside the atmosphere is more than 300 million.”

“…”

“And that is only that we know of. It may be even more. At that point, it doesn’t even matter how strong each of you are individually. Your numbers are too few to defeat the Threat.”

Plus, there was no rule requiring those 300 million Threats to attack a single place at once.

What if they orbited the Earth while descending upon the entire northern and southern hemispheres at once? The battlefront would be so large that a group of only 1000 could never hope to engage them all.

If they only had to defend Second Grimnoah floating in the ocean, they might be able to hold out for a while.

But that was not the same thing as protecting the world.

Second Grimnoah itself ran on a giant diesel engine The fuel for that and the food, water, and other supplies for the occupants had to be acquired from land. They could not drift endlessly on the ocean without resupplying, so their defeat was only a matter of time if the ordinary world were destroyed.

The situation could hardly be worse.

But they had already known that.

“Um, then let’s get started.”

Natalena Blast gripped the microphone in her small hands.

She calmed her racing heart and raised her voice to protest the world’s unfairness.

“I’m not asking for something guaranteed to work!! Um, just give us any theory you can think of!! We can think about how realistic the ideas are later!! We can’t let the Four Living Gods get away with this. The way they’re throwing away their lives is a mockery of human life including our own! So we need to correct that mistake even if it means attacking our fellow students!! So give me your help!! Give me Second Grimnoah’s help!!!”

Part 4

First and foremost: no one could defeat the 300 million Threats arriving from space.

So what methods remained to save the Four Living Gods?

Part 5

The 7000 Years Theory

“Okay, our top batter is me: everyone’s idol, Imi-san! Let’s start by discussing the Crystal Magic presets we can all use.”

A popular Main Category girl took the microphone in the crowd. Was that Matsuda Imi, who was friend with Karuta’s group?

“More specifically, you know how we won’t die even if we do take a lethal injury? The regeneration preset lets us heal any nonlethal injury in only 30 seconds, but even something that would have killed us only turns us into a crystal statue. And we’ll recover from that after a long period of time.”

“Hold on. You’d better not be saying you’re okay with letting Karuta and the others go off and die because of that. That recovery takes centuries if not millennia. If any of us is lethally injured, none of us will ever see them again.”

The mocking rebuttal came from the delinquent boy named Yamane Deiri.

And Sophia Firenze delivered a further attack.

“W-we also don’t know if the regeneration will work if they have been thrown out into space. They might end up stuck in an endless loop of coming back to life and then immediately dying again because they’re out in the vacuum of space.”

“Yeah, I know☆” Matsuda Imi didn’t seem bothered by their remarks. “But don’t you see a loophole there?”

“Um?”

Natalena gripped the microphone up on the stage, but couldn’t come up with an actual answer.

They didn’t have much time and she wanted as many ideas as they could get, so she wanted to shorten the time spent judging the crowd’s reaction. Imi appeared to understand that because she winked and continued.

“Listen. Sure it might be millennia for the living people waiting for them to recover, but it’s instantaneous for the person who died. It would feel the same as going to sleep at night and waking up in the morning. So what if we had every student and teacher killed with the exact same severity of lethal wound? Whether that takes centuries or millennia to recover from, it would feel like only an instant before we all woke back up together.”

Who was it that gasped in realization?

Matsuda Imi shrugged with the spotlight pointing out her location in the crowd.

“Marika and Karuta-kun seemed pretty attached to the students from the first ship, so if we calculated out what kind of wound would match our recovery time to theirs, we could kill two birds with one stone. For example, that Kazamuki Gekiha guy isn’t supposed to recover for 7000 years, but if we match our timing to that, we could instantly travel to that point 7000 years in the future and everyone from both Grimnoahs could meet each other with no more injuries. How’s that for a happy ending!?”

“I-I think that could actually work,” said Nekoumi Hirosuke.

“Not quite,” interrupted Letnahe Kurent. “What happens to the Threat in that scenario? That is meaningless if all of you Crystal Magicians wake up to find the 300 million Threats swarming the Earth. You would be right back where you started. Worse, really, since all civilization would have been destroyed by that point.”

That problem still remained.

However…

“Then let me ask you this: what do those 300 million Threats use for food or fuel?” asked Imi.

“…I see.”

“With that many of them, keeping them fed or fueled can’t be easy. In our fight against them near the Port of Kobe, we saw signs of them passing supplies on the ocean floor, but they don’t seem to eat or drink the resources already on the Earth. That means they can’t become self-sufficient on this planet. 300 million of them is a devastating force and they will quickly conquer the Earth if nothing is done to stop them. But I get the feeling that wouldn’t last long. Granted, my mind can’t perfectly simulate what the world will be like 7000 years from now, but I doubt the Threat will still be walking around.”

There was actual applause.

Not thunderous, but not scattered either.

However…

“Yes, that is a fair point.”

There was a loud scraping sound as someone roughly scratched his head with a large hand.

The interruption came from Kiyosawa Hadome, the gym teacher who made a point of playing the bad guy when it really mattered.

“So let me tear it down with a dose of reality. Your plan may give the Crystal Magicians of Second Grimnoah a path to survival, but what about the other 5.5 billion people out there.”

No one had a response.

They even swallowed their gasps of realization.

“So we instantly wake up 7000 years in the future and the 300 million Threats can’t survive long term, so we can all live happily ever after in the distant future? That’s an awfully self-centered idea that pretends the intervening time just doesn’t exist. So what happens to the powerless 5.5 billion who we’ve abandoned to their fate? You predict the Threat will die off on their own, but are they really the only group that would go extinct on the planet during those 7000 years? I seriously doubt it.”

“Sensei, I won’t deny it’s self-centered, but I do have a rebuttal.”

“What, that we don’t need to care what happens to the kind of people who let themselves be manipulated by the human string pullers?”

Kiyosawa Hadome shut down the rebuttal by giving it in advance, so Matsuda Imi shrugged.

Those who agreed with that argument would be fine with the idea.

But there would be some who didn’t agree.

“Fine, fine. I withdraw my idea!” Matsuda Imi didn’t seem to mind all that much as she raised the white flag. “I’d be fine with that if it was just me, but Tayori’s got a big family with lots of siblings and there’s no way I could convince that homemaker gyaru to abandon them. Besides, Kurent-sensei, who teaches dance for our Main Category, isn’t even a Crystal Magician, so it would be narrowing ‘us’ down to only ‘the Crystal Magicians’. That means we couldn’t save everyone that way and Second Grimnoah would be missing someone afterwards. And Crystal Magic requires an aptitude, so not everyone in the world can use it. I understood all that already, to be honest.”

The silver-haired, brown-skinned teacher cleared her throat.

That may have been a way of warning the drama club member to not shine the spotlight on her.

“Assuming the Threat cannot teleport or warp, they must have spent a long time traveling through space. That means they can last a very long time without resupplying.”

After listening to Kiyosawa Hadome’s last point, Matsuda Imi winked at him with the mic in hand.

“But it was nice, powerful idea to start us out on, wasn’t it? Feel free to make the next theory even more out there. Now, then! We have to save Marika and the others before they can go off and kill themselves when no one asked them to! Stop worrying if it’s realistic and grab the mic!! You shot down my idea, so show me you’ve got a better one yourself. It doesn’t have to be perfect cause we might be able to combine several rejected ideas to reach a viable one!!!”

Part 6

The Live Among the Threat Theory

“I’ll go this time. Now that Imi’s gotten the ball rolling, I’ll go with something really out there, just like she wanted.”

The next to take the mic was the gyaru-ish girl named Hashizaki Tayori.

“As I’m sure you all know after fighting the Threat yourselves, they tend to be pretty big. And they’re made of metal. The teachers would probably know more since they actually dismantled and looked inside that one called the Armored Warrior, but the point is their corpses don’t rot.”

She did not receive any kind of response.

She didn’t know what the teachers had seen, but it may not have been something they were keen to remember.

“They kill humans on sight. We still don’t know why that is, but we know it’s true. But they seem to have some level of camaraderie among themselves. Well, there are some ants that will resort to cannibalism when they’re mad, so we can’t fully trust in that.”

“You aren’t suggesting what I think you are, are you?” asked Yamada Deiri, but Tayori ignored him.

“We’ve defeated quite a lot of Threats at this point and we would have recovered their corpses too. So we just have to wear those. At the very least, that should reduce the frequency of attacks a lot more than as undisguised humans.”

They would hand Earth over to the Threat.

On the condition that the Threat did not attack them.

Kiyosawa Hadome led the rebuttal.

“There aren’t enough of them for everyone. And like I said, I can’t accept a plan that abandons the other 5.5 billion to die.”

“That’s true, Sensei, but a lot of the Threats are big. What if we look at it more like public transportation, such as buses or trains, instead of anything personal? That introduces the question of where us humans would live most of the time, but as long as we had a largescale hideout, it would work.”

The idea was based on a lot of assumptions, but it did make sense. And even if they couldn’t agree to it immediately, some part of it could be combined with aspects of the other theories proposed later on.

So far, anyway.

“B-but in that case.”

“What is it, Nekoumi-kun?”

“We have no real guarantee that would fool the real Threat. We might look a lot like the Threat with the defeated shells around us, but that’s only from our point of view, isn’t it? I’ve heard that a flower that has evolved to have bugs carry its pollen will show completely different patterns under a blacklight. To know how good a disguise this would be, we would need to know exactly how the Threat views the world.”

“How is that a problem if we’re using real Threat parts?”

“They might change after death like a flower’s colors fading when it withers after being cut from its roots. When humans die, we rot and become something else entirely. Really, it would be unusual if they didn’t change.”

This was not limited to the ordinary five senses.

For one, the Threat wasn’t human. They might have further sensory organs. They could have a sensor that detected radiation or a sixth sense that detected neutrinos. If they had X-rays or terahertz radiation that let them see through objects, they might be able to see right into the giant shells being worn as disguises.

“The Threat strengthens themselves by tearing away the usable parts from the unmoving corpses we create. We saw that with the decoys and the real ones inside Second Grimnoah. Th-that means they have some way of distinguishing between a living Threat and a dead Threat. Wearing a stolen shell sounds really dangerous to me because they’re sure to notice all sorts of things we wouldn’t. From their viewpoint, wouldn’t we look like a monster walking around wearing human skin?”

To avoid that, they would need to know how to distinguish between a living Threat and a dead one. And from a Threat perspective, not a human one.

“Not to mention that the Threat might not be more accepting as we approach the right answer. I mean, we humans think stylized anime figures are cute, but we find hyper realistic mannequins to be creepy.”

“I don’t like you applying that first part to all of humanity, but is that really how it works?”

“I can sleep like a baby and have the sweetest of dreams when I have my favorite body pillow with me, but I would be terrified if I found a strange mannequin in bed with me. I wouldn’t get a wink of sleep.”

“???”

With 300 million Threats pouring down all across the planet, they wouldn’t have time to figure out how the Threat worked.

Especially not to a point that they would know what the Threat liked and what the Threat found to be creepy.

“At the Port of Kobe, we saw the Threat flashing lights on their bodies in a regular pattern, right? What if we set up LED lights to flash in that same way?”

“A-again, we only know what that looked like from a human perspective. What if they actually communicate using chemical scents synthesized using those lights? Our scentless Christmas lights would stand out and get us attacked even faster.”

Part 7

The Dimensional Leap Theory

Letnahe Kurent sighed while watching the students and teachers grabbing for the mic and then debating their various theories.

There was more to it.

That teacher in glasses and a white military uniform clenched her teeth.

(That one idea was based on the assumption that Kazamuki Gekiha and the others from the first ship will wake up in 7000 years, but that isn’t even true.)

That was only the official story.

It was a solid enough story that even Utagai Karuta and Amaashi Marika of the world’s strongests believed it, but it was in fact only a false story released to the public. And the key to survival in this thoroughly rotten world was to always question the major assumptions everyone believed to be true.

Letnahe had discovered the truth after doing some digging from the human string pullers side.

(Omotesandou Kyouka is lying to them. I had my suspicions before. She doesn’t use that wheelchair because of her old wounds; she uses it because she gave up her own recovery to boost the recovery speed of the first ship’s victims.)

Their recovery time of over 7000 years had been reduced to less than a year.

And not just one of them like Kazamuki Gekiha – this was every teacher and student on that ship, which meant hundreds of people.

The fact that the president could accomplish that was frightening, but that opened up a loophole.

What if Omotesandou Kyouka regained her full power?

(She is currently the only Regulation 3 in the world.)

Much of the rest was guesswork on Letnahe’s part.

As part of the human string pullers, she had the special privilege of extracting all sorts of hidden information from around the world, but that also meant she was an outsider when it came to Crystal Magic.

(Supposedly, her full power would let her pass through the dimensional barrier. Assuming that isn’t a bizarre bluff, it shouldn’t matter if she is thrown into space. I am not talking about long-distance movement by breaking the lightspeed barrier. They could instantly leap to another habitable planet and survive there.)

Letnahe did not buy for a second that girl was powerless.

She had seen the girl use a strategy that required slowing the arrival of light and sound while remaining seated in the wheelchair.

Of course, that idea shouldn’t have been feasible either.

Even if they could leave the solar system, how far was it to the nearest star? If they traveled there, would they find a miraculous planet with enough water and air for people to survive? If you had enough resources to travel centuries at the speed of light, it would be a lot easier to build a fully artificial planet rather than search out a habitable one.

But the president could skip past all those problems.

She was the strongest Crystal Magician and she could teleport or warp without any kind of tool. If she had a large radio telescope with parabolic antennae lined up in the desert or a space telescope and she used them to search out a few planets with sufficient water and air, she could ignore the distance between them and arrive in an instant. The Threat might pursue, but that would take a considerable amount of time if they could not break the lightspeed barrier. Karuta’s group might die of old age before the Threat caught up and they could always leap to another planet if necessary.

That meant the Four Living Gods would not die after being ejected into space and the Threat would be redirected from Earth, saving the other 5.5 billion people.

It sounded an awful lot like a happy ending.

“Unfortunately, it isn’t an option.”

A nearby student gave her a puzzled look, so Letnahe cleared her throat. She organized her thoughts in her head from there on.

(That plan requires giving up on the hundreds of teachers and students killed on the first ship. That girl abandoned her power and accepted the inconvenience of life in a wheelchair, so I doubt she would compromise on that. The kind of woman who is willing to do anything will never back down when it comes to the core of her conviction. I know because I am the same.)

Letnahe concluded her idea wouldn’t work.

If the Four Living Gods were willing to let others die as long as it saved them, they would have had plenty of alternative options. For example, the 7000 Years Theory that Matsuda Imi had started with and everyone had concluded wasn’t an option. It would be a problem for Hashizaki Tayori because she had a big family and for Letnahe who wanted to save her husband and children more than herself, but the Four Living Gods could have emotionlessly abandoned everyone if they wanted.

They could be cold.

They could list out each problem they were facing.

They would not get complacent because they were powerful.

The four of them alone had defeated the Problem Solvers.

And that had given them the position of world’s strongest.

With that cunning and talent for finding loopholes, the idea had to have occurred to them. The 7000 Years Theory, the Live Among the Threat Theory, and everything else being debated here would have already been discussed by those four. Letnahe was curious how much that wicked schemer Omotesandou Kyouka had revealed to the others at the end, but she would have at least considered and rejected the Dimensional Leap Theory in her own head. Letnahe would have been surprised if they hadn’t come up with and rejected 100 or even 1000 theories she hadn’t even considered.

The first ship’s victims would die when Omotesandou Kyouka did, but she was apparently still unwilling to pull the trigger herself. That suggested she operated on more than pure logic.

If all four of them hadn’t been working in vain to find an alternative this whole time, they never would have all arrived at a conclusion as ridiculous as self-sacrifice.

A greedy desire for survival was not necessarily a beautiful thing. It always meant forcing death onto others, so that went without saying.

But after so much fighting and being hoisted into the position of strongest, those four had to know better than anyone that this was a cruel world where you could never find victory if you didn’t throw out all your nice-sounding ideals and where you would be devoured the instant you let up on the reins.

(They aren’t focused on their own survival. They aren’t placing that as their top priority.)

Letnahe watched the heated debate with icy eyes.

She already knew what the end result would be.

With an optimistic outlook, there would be options left to explore.

But those four would never choose those options. Not because of their strength and not because of their virtue. They had simply been backed into a corner where that wasn’t on the table.

The human string pullers had set everything up to manipulate the world’s strongests in that manner.

(That would explain why you are stumbling so badly when you normally always win, Four Living Gods.)

Part 8

“Hello, hello! Welcome to the global broadcast!! This is Delane!! It’s time for Gold Medalist, the super popular show where I have intense interviews with all those winners in life! Man, wouldn’t it be great if it was me, Cinderella Queen, being interviewed on this show one day!? Anyway, this here is today’s guest. Say it with me everyone: Peeendet Denpasarrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!!!”

Things on TV were as lively as ever.

Two familiar faces were currently displayed on screen. One was Cinderella Queen, the edgy(?) child star who had done commentary for the Catastrophe. The other was a girl of 16 or 17 seated on the one-person sofa across from the younger girl. She had gorgeous blonde ringlets that clashed with her outfit of a tank top and baggy dance pants. She wore thick basketball shoes on her feet. That was Pendet Denpasar, Karuta’s opponent in the final match of the Catastrophe tournament.

That made her the current #2 in the world.

In other words, she was the next bullet to be loaded as the world’s strongest.

Curly twintailed Marika actually laughed bitterly while lying on the student council room sofa.

“An interview, huh? I bet she’s confused. Ah ha ha. Look at those tears in her eyes. She’s like a scared little mouse. She couldn’t look more uncomfortable on that little sofa☆ God, she’d have looked a lot cuter heading out to the tournament looking like that.”

“She can’t help it. She has no idea why she’s suddenly getting all this attention. She’s probably realized someone has set this up, but as disturbing as it is, she doesn’t know how to fix it. Just like it was for us,” said Karuta, restlessly spinning the modified military flashlight in his hand.

The human string pullers were serious.

They were setting up the next world’s strongest before these four had even chosen death. This TV show was meant to build up Pendet’s image.

Omotesandou Kyouka, the master of this student council room, sighed softly.

Karuta didn’t even need to move behind her large desk and check the computer screen. The adults were clearly delaying their responses to the emails she had sent out. They never would have done that with a world’s strongest before. Everything from Karuta’s group was probably being drowned out by all the requests and reports sent by the many adults.

The center of the world was already shifting.

Karuta’s group was the soon-to-be-abandoned kings, just like the Problem Solvers had been.

Anastasia’s group had seen the writing on the wall, fought against it, and become monsters.

Not even the human string pullers had been able to control that, which was why the human population had fallen to 5.5 billion.

“Thinking back, the Problem Solvers managed to hold onto their position as world’s strongest for nearly a decade.”

“That’s a record. And by a lot,” said Omotesandou Kyouka. She must have seen the actual records and numbers. “Before them, a strongest would last an average of 3 years before being replaced. No strongest was ever meant to last longer than that.”

“And then there’s us.”

“The Problem Solvers died before they could fulfill their role, so we’re being used up right away to pay back their debt.”

The Problem Solvers had attacked the first ship because they had thought they wouldn’t be disposed of if there was no next candidate. Stooping that low to cling to life may have shown a sort of talent. At the very least, Karuta knew he couldn’t do it.

The next strongest would be Pendet Denpasar. How could he kill her and wipe out the magic system at the source of her power for no reason but that?”

“Sacri-sama.”

“Yeah…”

Aine was standing in the corner like a potted plant and she was likely reminding him of the time. Chrisbart Firenze of the human string pullers had demanded a response at precisely midnight.

They only had three hours left.

“Marika. Omotesandou-san too. I’m stepping out for a bit.”

“Feel free to just not come back,” said Marika, lying on the sofa and watching TV.

Her tone was light, but it didn’t sound like a joke.

She didn’t even look his way as she continued.

“That might be one way of saving yourself, right? We know the 300 million Threats are interested in the world’s strongest humans, so they’ll chase after us if we’re ejected into space. That much is certain. But it may not have to be all four of us. Karuta and Aine-chan could make a romantic getaway.”

Karuta waved a hand dismissively as he stepped out into the dark hallway.

On the inside, he was mildly surprised to find that was Amaashi Marika’s theory.

The crystal girl silently followed him like always. Even on this final night.

“Sacri-sama, I will obey whatever decision you make.”

“Yeah.”

“With that in mind, couldn’t you give that option to Miss Marika or Miss Kyouka?”

Karuta laughed quietly at that.

Aine expressionlessly tilted her head while matching his speed to walk alongside him.

“What was so funny?”

“Nothing really. I was just noticing how much we’ve grown.”

If this had happened a few months ago, he felt like they might have fought each other to determine who got to live. But here they were trying to push survival onto each other. Even Crystal Girl Aine, the least human of them, was doing it.

Karuta considered that kind result.

“We can’t do that.”

“Why not?”

“300 million Threats are after the Four Living Gods. If even one of us remains on Earth, the Threat swarm might ignore the group in space and crash down to the surface. That invalidates the choices both groups made.”

Marika probably wasn’t seriously suggesting it.

In fact, if that out-of-control childhood friend was seriously considering something, she wouldn’t suggest it out loud like that. She would increase the odds of success as much as possible by saying nothing, forcibly restraining Karuta and Aine, and preventing them from doing anything else. This was the girl who would burn away her childhood friend’s limb and cover the wound with molten metal to prevent the regeneration.

Karuta’s mild surprise wasn’t with Marika’s idea itself. He was surprised that extremely emotional but harshly realistic girl would indulge in an empty fantasy she knew wasn’t a real possibility.

Death was frightening.

Maybe you couldn’t avoid it, but you still wanted something to save you psychologically.

It wasn’t a surprising turn of events. But he felt like he was getting a glimpse of the vulnerability she had always worked so hard to keep hidden.

What about Omotesandou Kyouka?

Her behavior didn’t seem as obviously out of the ordinary as Marika’s.

“Then again, continuing to check her work emails at this point is unusual.”

“Sacri-sama?”

Tomorrow would never arrive for them, so there was no point in checking on her work.

Supposedly, anyway.

At this point, they should have been writing their wills and purifying their bodies. Or if they were going to die anyway, they could try drinking or smoking just once before the end. But Kyouka’s behavior seemed too ordinary. She may have been preserving her usual routine because she wanted to believe it wasn’t too late.

Anyone would be scared given the circumstances.

And an extreme fear of death was like a giant mirror reflecting your true nature back at you. Utagai Karuta walking through the halls like this was part of that too. He was descending to the bottom level of the central hull that linked Second Grimnoah’s three hull shape together.

The crystal statues that had once been the teachers and students of the first ship were gathered here.

He checked the numbers to locate the correct door and opened it. he slowly pulled out the sliding bed within.

No change.

If it was only going to end like this, maybe it would have been easier to die sooner.

“Hi, Gekiha,” said Utagai Karuta.

No one was listening and there was no response. The greeting was entirely meaningless, but Aine didn’t say anything while standing alongside him. She did not even tilt her expressionless head.

“It turns out humanity can’t defeat the Threat. It’s not about trying harder or anything like that. It was set up that way from the start. Ha ha. Makes me wonder why we even bothered taking revenge on the Problem Solvers. It was going to happen sooner or later. Even if no one had stopped us and we had all graduated from the first ship, we would have been killed as the new world’s strongests anyway. Funny, right?”

He was surrounded by silence.

He looked down at his former friend and spoke all on his own.

“But we’re still going to protect the world.”

Protect.

Perhaps it was arrogant to use that word here.

He already knew that not all the Threat were bad. They had already slaughtered the Armored Warrior and the tadpole Threats who had only wanted to try out studying at a human school. Was he trying to imply the Threat had no reason to kill them?

But he was still afraid to die, so if someone was threatening his life, he would view them as evil no matter the circumstances.

They had done the same thing themselves. They had so strongly denounced the Problem Solvers when they were only acting out of fear as well, so he had set up a double standard for himself.

Was that the ugly and vivid truth of human nature?

After a self-deprecating smile, he went ahead and said it anyway.

“You’re supposed to wake up after about 7000 years, right? I’ll make sure there isn’t a Threat to be seen when you open your eyes. I hope you can accept that as a compromise, Gekiha.”

That ugly nature was something the world had acquired after they had taken revenge and become the Four Living Gods.

Kazamuki Gekiha had died before all that, so he hoped he would be purer than that.

“Sacri-sama.”

“…I know.”

Karuta gave a small nod when Aine called out to him.

They still had some time until midnight.

But…

“We need to act soon to avoid any further trouble. If we wait until midnight, we might run into Deiri, Natalena, and the others.”

Second Grimnoah was a fortress built to make efficient use of the Four Living Gods. Of course they would be aware of everything going on there. They knew all about the meeting Natalena, Letnahe, and so many others were holding in the gym.

And not even the Four Living Gods were confident they could win in a group battle against more than 1000 teachers and students who could use Crystal Magic.

He appreciated the thought.

But he couldn’t have them interfering at this point.

More than 300 million Threats could start pouring down on Earth at any moment. The human string pullers had given a concrete time limit. A single day of hesitation could mean the beginning of an unstoppable invasion of the entire planet and the 5.5 billion people who lived there. And there was no turning back time. Once that happened, it was too late for Karuta’s group to feel regrets.

The Four Living Gods could not survive whether they remained on Earth or were launched into space. That much was certain.

So which was the better choice?

The answer couldn’t have been more obvious.

If they succumbed to that pleasant kindness, they wouldn’t just lose their lives – they would lose everything.

“…”

Utagai Karuta returned his friend to the storage container, shut the door, and walked to the exit. He looked back from the door and quietly bowed. After spending more than 10 seconds like that, he raised his head and slowly walked up the stairs. Aine silently followed him.

“Aine.”

“Yes, Sacri-sama?”

“Sorry for getting you involved in a fight we never could win.”

“I am not sure what you mean.”

They climbed step after step after step.

Once out on the side deck, they found the childhood friend and president waiting.

Those two smiled bitterly.

“I thought I told you to run away.”

“You could’ve run away too, Marika.”

Everyone else would still be fiercely debating what to do in the gym. They were taking this very seriously in order to save the four gathered here. That made Karuta so happy he was afraid he might start crying, but he knew he could not rely on that.

“Karuta-kun, did you not write a will?”

“I decided not to. I’d be embarrassed if I left something behind and people started deifying me.”

“You could have at least written something for your family.”

“You’ve seen how many old authors and Bakumatsu period samurai have their private letters – even love letters – shown off in museums. Besides, anything I wrote would end up being nothing but complaining. I don’t want everyone seeing that.”

“Kee hee hee. But did you use a special tool to wipe your secret hard drive? What about your online storage and browser history? Deleting it the normal way isn’t good enough.”

“Bff!?”

His childhood friend’s teasing laughter made him do a spit take.

Was that really something for a girl to bring up?

The president elegantly placed a hand on her cheek.

“My, my, Karuta-kun. Hee hee. You should have come to your intellectual upperclassman who knows all about computers. Don’t worry. I will permanently delete it all without peeking☆”

“I know better than to trust that smile, you schemer. Plus, that’s more embarrassing than asking for a baby bottle, so no one would ever take you up on that offer!”

The crystal girl didn’t seem to understand (which Karuta’s idealistic view of girls told him was how it should be), so she expressionlessly tilted her head.

“Sacri-sama?”

“It’s nothing. I can handle this myself, so you don’t need to worry about it!”

Marika cackled and held her sides. It was possible those two had planned this to break through the gloomy mood.

But the time had come regardless. They were reluctant to leave, but they also didn’t want to wait too long and have their friends gather around.

“So are you ready?”

“Yes.”

Two of them could not use the flight preset, so Aine picked up Karuta and Marika picked up Kyouka, wheelchair and all. Then the Four Living Gods jumped over the railing.

They flew toward the dark silhouette of the space elevator stretching up toward heaven.

This was the first step on their journey into death.

Part 9

They crossed the dark sea.

Their destination was more than 5km away – which meant it was beyond the horizon – but since it was an elevator that rose vertically into space, they could see it clearly even at this distance.

The space elevator was located on a naval float attached to a small island in the south sea. According to Kyouka, the float would move within certain limits to cancel out the irregular shaking of the wire caused by the wind and other factors.

A light was flashing from there.

Aine and Maika used their flight presets to make a gentle landing on the artificial float that measured more than a kilometer on each side.

Someone stood there.

An old man in a lab coat.

“I was waiting for you.”

“Are you Chrisbart Firenze?” asked Karuta as soon as Aine lowered him from his princess carry position, but the man did not bother confirming it.

Karuta was still suspicious, but he didn’t see any bodyguards or any other fighting force around. The man really was completely alone. The human string pullers seemed awfully defenseless for such a powerful group working from the shadows. It was only natural to suspect the possibility this was a body double or agent.

After all, the man was dealing with the world’s strongests who were doomed to die. And the human string pullers were the ones who had set that up. For one of the bastards who intended to go on living, being attacked in a last-ditch attempt to survive had to be the greatest risk.

But the old man snorted in laughter at Karuta’s doubts.

“The greatest tool of self-defense is information, not power. Bodyguards or a body double would have the opposite effect. People are strongest when alone.”

“…”

“I take it you do not agree. But you should know all too well what fate awaits you four who acquired the world’s strongest power.”

Karuta stepped behind Omotesandou Kyouka and grabbed her wheelchair’s grips.

Aine’s sword and Marika’s rapier Device were more powerful than his modified military flashlight. He wanted to keep their hands free if possible.

The old man turned around and simply said “follow me”.

The lightweight aluminum alloy ground was paved with asphalt and was perfectly sturdy. It did not look all that different from an old-fashioned airport or rocket launch site. Except the massive “smokestack” in the very center made it all look very strange indeed.

Perhaps to prevent aircraft collisions, there was an evenly-spaced vertical line of red lights stretching skyward. Those were slowly flashing. The line of lights stopped tens of thousands of meters high because that that was as high as it was possible for aircraft to fly. However, there was likely an air defense system that would activate if an airplane or helicopter flew too close without permission.

The space elevator looked like an obsolete relic. But on closer inspection, not a single bolt was rusted. It was perfectly maintained. This was the final lifeline for the 5.5 billion people on Earth, so they could not have it lost in an accident or terrorist attack.

Chrisbart spoke without looking back.

“I will not ask if you are ready. The fact that you arrived on time shows you each possess the necessary resolve.”

“Second Grimnoah is less than 10km away. And Crystal Magic flight can exceed Mach 2 if you try. If Natalena and the others have realized what’s happening, they might attack the elevator to prevent us from departing.”

Karuta was pushing the president’s wheelchair while asking about that because the large artificial island did not have any kind of electric cart like you might find at an airport or golf course. Walking the full distance was a real pain.

“I appreciate giving us some more time right at the end, but neither of us can let anything jeopardize this final chance. You yourself said we had the necessary resolve. If you have a shortcut, feel free to use it.”

But the lab coat man did not seem to mind.

He shrugged without looking back.

“We are the human string pullers, remember?”

“…”

“We control everything by providing just the right stimulation to all of those called humans. By providing the right information and the right situation, we can ensure those students’ good will never leads to action. Or we can convince them to swallow their tears and see you off because that is what you wish.”

That was their power.

That was the true malice that not even the Four Living Gods had been able to defeat.

And it did not matter to Chrisbart that one of the teachers he was targeting shared his last name.

Karuta had a harder time understanding those terrifying monsters than he did the Problem Solvers or the real Threat.

“By the way,” said Chrisbart Firenze on the way to the base of the elevator.

“What?”

“Is that it?”

“?”

Karuta was not sure what he meant.

The old man did not look back, but Karuta finally sensed what he must have meant. Chrisbart was focused on Karuta, but not directly. His interest was in Crystal Girl Aine who he had summoned and who obeyed him.

“…”

Aine did not respond in any way. Was she not interested or was she intentionally ignoring the man? It was hard to tell when she was always so expressionless.

They arrived at the base of the space elevator.

It looked a lot like a landmark broadcast tower. Some of the same technology may have been used to construct it. The base was shaped like a giant C that enveloped the space in front of it and was split into a few different floors. Karuta thought that shape looked familiar and realized it was used for malls that surrounded a plaza or park. It may have been intended as a special international airport or tourist attraction before it went out of business and was taken over by the human string pullers.

The restaurants and shops appeared to still be functioning. At the very least, it wasn’t full of empty shops and the mannequins weren’t covered in dust. Perhaps it was the same idea as having shops for soldiers on a military base.

“How many people does it take to run the elevator?” asked Marika, looking up at the giant “smokestack”.

“Around 1000 if you include the air defense operators. The operation is fully handled on the surface, so the space section is empty. But even with that many, most of the work is handled by computers.”

Were all of those thousand part of the human string pullers? Or was a minority sending out falsified orders to manipulate some other larger organization who had no idea what was going on here? It was impossible to tell from here and it honestly didn’t matter either way.

As a relic of when this was either an international airport or a tourist destination, the entrance area contained a row of ticket gates that reacted to either a paper ticket or an annual pass card. Their power appeared to be shut down, so Chrisbart walked right through one gate.

The elevator was past there.

The elevator car was like a train car tilted up on its end. Karuta guessed that was to obscure how many people and materials were being carried up each time, but apparently that was not the case.

Chrisbart explained.

“Your destination is in geosynchronous orbit 36 thousand kilometers from here. The Earth’s gravity, air resistance, the wire’s shaking, and other factors will reduce the elevator’s speed, so even at maximum power, it will take you three days to arrive. The elevator is more cost effective and safer than a rocket, but much, much slower.”

“Three days?”

“That was accounted for when calculating out your time limit, so you need not worry about running out of time.”

Having it happen all at once was a terrifying thought, but could they really spend three full days slowly committing suicide? And once they started, there was no turning back.

Traveling more than 10 thousand kilometers each day was extraordinarily fast. If a truck driver drove at 100km/h all day long without even stopping to sleep, how far could they travel in one day? And traveling vertically was a lot more difficult than traveling horizontally.

“You lived together in an RV when hunting down the Problem Solvers, didn’t you? There is a shower, bathroom, and kitchen stocked with everything you will need for your short stay there. Although they are designed for use in zero-g, so they cannot be used like normal. You have come this far, so we don’t want you to starve to death inside the elevator.”

That explained the size of the elevator car. Taking a plane to the other side of the planet took around half a day, so three days for travel was a major restriction. That may have been the real reason it had never caught on, not the international and technological issues. Ordinary people wouldn’t have anything to do even if they did spend all the money necessary for the long trip into space.

Space was not the only unexplored area. For example, people could spend a mountain of cash to take a deep sea probe thousands of meters underwater. That was enough to see or experience something brand new. But most people didn’t do that. They weren’t interested in a once-in-a-lifetime experience. Why was that? It was like taking an overseas trip where you couldn’t even leave the hotel. Once something became a real possibility, did the realistic inconvenience come into view and cause a journey into a world of dreams to lose its luster?

The Four Living Gods were being abandoned here. They were being crammed into a cramped corner of death that everyone had already lost interest in.

And the process would take days.

They approached the elevator car, Karuta pushing the wheelchair.

“When do we leave? The sooner the better, if you ask me.”

“How rational of you.”

The boy smiled a little at that assessment.

The human string pullers knew how to manipulate humans, but they sure didn’t understand humans. He only wanted to get this over with before the uncertainty inside him could take over.

Part 10

Chrisbart Firenze sighed after seeing those teenagers off to their deaths.

They had only been given three days’ worth of food.

There were no supplies on the space station in orbit. They truly had been given a one-way ticket. After leaving, they would not have enough water, food, or air to stay in the station or even to return to Earth.

But those four had not seemed disturbed.

They may have been drawing on every last ounce of strength to suppress their feelings, but they had managed it.

Just like all the previous world’s strongests he had seen.

(I act like I’m not the one that paved their path to hell and keeps the cycle of death running smoothly.)

The old man in the lab coat shook his head and threw out his sentimentality.

Something else was bothering him.

“That girl.”

Was her name Aine?

Chrisbart Firenze knew that the Original Crystal Embryo was no longer at the center of the Earth. Since Crystal Magic continued to function regardless, the only possible conclusion was that the Embryo had gained the ability to move on its own, had left the center of the Earth, and had moved somewhere near Second Grimnoah.

What if she was it?

Of course, this was only a fantasy with no evidence to back it up.

(Does she call him “Sacri-sama” because he is a “sacrifice” she is using as a stepping stone? Is that title a combination of his function and her respect for how he gave her freedom by summoning her from the center of the Earth, even if it meant becoming one with him?)

Chrisbart was a weapons researcher at heart.

And that included research on Crystal Magic.

(Does Crystal Magic only function on Earth because the Embryo was located at the center of the planet? If so and if it really has broken free of that restriction, then it is possible those four could use Crystal Magic in space.)

He doubted that would allow them to defeat the 300 million Threats.

The difference in numbers was simply too great.

But what if they made full use of Crystal Magic to construct a habitable environment for themselves? They wouldn’t even need to search out a habitable planet if they had the power to create an environment with water, air, and everything else they would need.

Would it be possible for those four to live free even after being launched into space?

“No.”

Chrisbart concluded he was being too optimistic.

Really, that was no more than wishful thinking.

He was surprised to find even he still had the capacity for guilt inside him.

At the very least, Crystal Girl Aine had not told the others what she was.

So no matter what she was, she had no intention of taking things in that direction.

Part 11

They heard a deep rumbling and felt a slight floating sensation.

But while Karuta and Aine looked out the thick, double-pane window, they could tell just how fast they were moving. It had taken them less than a minute to arrive above the clouds.

The transparent outer layer that resembled a smokestack only covered the first 30 thousand meters.

The first.

Yet that was already more than three times the height of Everest.

Since there was very little dust, dirt, or even air past that point, the elevator car was left directly exposed to the atmosphere. They continued on and on, guided by the carbon nanotube wire.

The higher they went, the farther until the horizon and the more they could see. They saw the lights of the city on the coast and a cluster of lights on the ocean with some other smaller clusters gathered around it.

Those were Second Grimnoah and its guard ships.

“…”

Was the debate about how to save them still ongoing on that ship? Or had the others noticed their escape and begun pursuit? But it was too late. Once they were in outer space, Crystal Magic could not catch up to them.

Natalena and the others could not reach them now.

“Ooh, they were generous. The fridge is packed. Is this dry-cured ham? Ah ha ha. There’s even caviar!”

Meanwhile, Marika was more interested in the contents of the elevator car, so she was exploring the kitchen area. She had focused on the ingredients rather than the microwave and oven bolted to shelves, so she was bent over with her butt sticking out his way while searching the fridge.

“Dry-cured ham? Caviar? Isn’t that all space food made to be eaten in zero-g?”

“Don’t ask me. It’s all packed in thick plastic. It looks like you cut open the mouth of the bag, stick that in your mouth, and squeeze the contents out with her hand.”

That explanation only made it sound like a jelly drink made by throwing the ingredients in a juicer and creating a cold goop, but that was just how Marika talked since she was halfway to being a gyaru. The food was probably fine. Space food these days was supposed to be good enough to sell at souvenir shops.

Unlike in a rocket, they weren’t strapped into their seats with sturdy belts. They didn’t need puffy spacesuits or helmets either. The president was still wearing her uniform and she moved around in her wheelchair to grab a magazine. However, the car was tall and you were meant to reach the different levels with a ladder. She would need some help when she needed to reach the shower or bed.

“I’ll be fine,” said Kyouka, flipping through the magazine. Apparently that capable upperclassman girl was still interested in the summer fashions even though she would never return to the surface again. “The gravity will be gone soon and the concepts of up and down will lose all meaning. I should be able to swim through the air by propelling myself with my hands on the walls.”

Karuta was mildly impressed she had thought it through this far.

He decided he needed to give those issues more thought himself. He didn’t want to carelessly remove a drink lid in zero-g and have the liquid floating all around. How did the shower, bathroom, and laundry work? It might seem silly with the bigger issue facing them but he was worried about all of the plumbing.

Their three-day journey would take them to the geosynchronous satellite at an altitude of 36 thousand kilometers. That meant their first day would bring them more than 10 thousand kilometers up. The international space station was about 400km up, so they would be in a complete vacuum by then.

The fact that the first day included so many changes may have been a blessing.

The psychological pressure would be much greater during the 2nd and 3rd days when they traveled through nothingness the entire time.

“How long ago was that ‘the Earth is blue’ quote again?”

Marika joined Karuta by the window.

That modern high school girl loved to snap photos of everything from today’s meal to beautiful scenery, but she didn’t have her phone with her now. Probably because she didn’t want to see the message alerts. And it was unclear how long it would still receive a signal anyway. Would it lose a connection quickly, or would they keep a connection the whole time thanks to a satellite signal or the elevator’s wire itself acting as a communication cable?

“It’s night right now, so the ocean and sky are both black. But will it look blue once we get high enough?”

“No, it will remain black as long as it isn’t facing the sun.”

“You mean we won’t get to see the blue Earth? After launching ourselves into space?”

“The trip takes 3 days, so the Earth’s rotation is going to take us into the sun eventually, won’t it?”

But that meant the 100km space elevator was constantly rotating around with the Earth. That was a strange thought when they were currently traveling up that line. Would the centrifugal force not cause it to snap?

Marika pressed her hands against the thick double-pane window made to block radiation.

“The temperature in space varies a lot based on the presence of sunlight, right? Are carbon nanotubes resistant to heat? I mean, it’s 100 thousand kilometers long in all. And they say the metal rails on railroad tracks change length between summer and winter.”

“Don’t ask me. Maybe they wind it up with a reel to keep it tight.”

There were some specks of light on the otherwise dark surface of the Earth. They gathered to form cities, thick highways connected those cities, and lots of lots were traveling between them. Some trends were noticeable from this distance. People really did settle along the oceans instead of in the treacherous inland mountains and then they connected their settlements with thick roads. The lines of lights located more inland were probably large rivers. It was incredible to think how each one of those lights – whether they belonged to a house or a vehicle – had a person inside.

There were also some red lights. Those were not neon signs. Maybe they were slash-and-burn farming in the Southeast Asian forests, or maybe there was some other reason, but they had to be manmade fires.

“Marika, can you still use Crystal Magic?”

“What, fallen head-over-heels for your mature childhood friend’s cute battle mode?”

Marika casually shattered the Crystal Blossom on her chest to power it up and pulled a rapier Device out of thin air.

Then Karuta turned toward the crystal girl who was always standing by his side.

“?”

Aine tilted her head in response.

If it was true that Crystal Magic only functioned on Earth, he had expected Aine to withdraw into him at some point, but that hadn’t happened. Had that theory been mistaken, or was there something in this space that was allowing Crystal Magic to function? If this would only lengthen Aine’s fear and suffering, he felt kind of bad about doing this to her.

“We should see some shooting stars soon,” said Kyouka.

Come to think of it, didn’t that president girl have an interest in astronomy?

“Tens of thousands of small debris and meteor pieces enter the thermosphere, the top layer of the atmosphere, every single day. The lights are too small to see from the ground, but we are close enough to see them now. A meteor shower pales in comparison to the spectacle we should get to see.”

“Really? So like pouring rain? Or like overturning a bucket?”

“In a way, they kind of are pouring down from space.”

“Karuta-kun? Aine-chan? You two should really learn how to not make it sound so banal.”

Would seeing this make the trip to space worthwhile?

Would it be enough to believe they really did want to keep the Threat away from that planet full of so many beautiful people and things?

“Marika…”

“What do you want?”

Karuta spoke to the childhood friend looking out the same double-pane window.

He said the words none of them had been able to bring themselves to say.

“No one’s watching anymore, so you can cry if you want.”

Those words felt forbidden.

There were no further words. He couldn’t remember what Marika had said while clinging to his chest. He had a vague memory of her unfairly hitting him a few times while she cried. He didn’t remember what he had done either. He knew he must have shouted something. Her tears were contagious, so he knew he must have cried too. They had all cried. None of them tried to stop it. Even Omotesandou Kyouka had transparent tears in the corners of her eyes and yelled something that hadn’t made sense.

They were too far away.

Their voices couldn’t reach anyone.

It would have been the same for the past world’s strongests.

Anastasia’s group had feared this more than anything.

Crystal Girl Aine was the sole exception, only tilting her head with no apparent expression.

The skirt of her white combat dress silently floated up in an unnatural way.

“Hey, Aine? Fix your-”

“Hmph!!”

Marika jabbed her fist into his side with a definite anger that hadn’t been there before. But it was still a light blow for the world’s strongest. Unnaturally so. In fact, Marika was propelled slowly backwards after the hit.

Gravity was gone.

They had moved too far away from the gravity’s source: Earth.

Marika grew red in the face and shouted while holding down her short skirt with both hands and slowly spinning in the air.

“You just had to interrupt that emotional scene by focusing on the little girl panties created from yourself, didn’t you!? Give me back my pure, youthful tears!!!”

“I-I don’t see how this is my fault.”

“My, my,” said Kyouka. “I wonder what the past world’s strongests did here. Is this a trial all of the strongests have passed in secret?”

“And you need to do a much better job of covering up those surprisingly cute ones!!”

“Sacri-sama, you have not given me an oral command. What am I supposed to do?”

“Stop tilting your head and start covering up your underwear!! Aine, you don’t have to be completely naked for human shame to kick in!!!”

Part 12

The zero-g proved to be a bigger problem than expected.

Marika tried to change from her skirt into track pants, but she gave up on that plan when it earned her glares from Kyouka, the fashionable upperclassman, and even from inhuman Aine. She ended up continuing with the “hold down the floaty skirt when necessary” plan, but that was far from perfect. Each time there was a careless mistake, Karuta would get punished for it, which meant a lot of getting hit by the girls.

Omotesandou Kyouka smiled and made a suggestion.

“Hitting doesn’t have the same oomph in zero-g, so I say we switch to electrical punishments. You know, like zapping him with the hair dryer.”

He really wished they would do better at holding their skirts down instead of improving the punishments. In fact, this would only do more damage, which didn’t solve anything for anyone.

And zero-g had other effects as well.

“Ugh.”

“What’s wrong, Aine-chan?”

“Miss Kyouka, your boobs have unfairly increased in size.”

“Have they? No, I don’t think this is their size. It’s probably that gravity is no longer holding them back. That means less strain on my shoulders, so I’m all for it☆”

Being trapped in the same room as a bunch of girls was a problem. Karuta had to do his best to look anywhere but there. That devilish president was sharp (which she seemed to use to tease him as much as possible!!) and she giggled when she noticed how he was acting, but how else was he supposed to react to this!?

In his attempt to look away from Kyouka, he saw Marika sleepily approaching.

“Play with me, Karuta.”

“Oh, no! Another minefield!!”

All his shouting was making him thirsty.

In zero-g, straws were valuable. Except they got sick of using them and were now having fun squeezing out the contents of the drink packs and eating pieces off of each other’s floating globules of colorful liquid. Even a lab water flea could think of that game when out in space, but it was actually quite dangerous since you weren’t guaranteed to get all the small droplets and those could cause mechanical trouble while out in space.

Karuta was stuck catching a few juice globules in his mouth on Aine’s expressionless request and his thoughts shifted a bit toward the belt-covered sports equipment in the next room.

“Come to think of it, you wouldn’t have to worry about your skirts if you had just changed into those bulky spacesuits, would you?”

“For three days in a properly-heated compartment? Don’t underestimate the female body, Karuta-kun. That would lead to a hell of delicate parts getting much too sweaty,” remarked Kyouka.

She normally had to remain seated in her wheelchair at all times, but the tires were useless without any gravity to press them against the floor. She had abandoned the wheelchair and now floated in the air. She had made up some aphorism about space bringing people freedom and stretched.

“The waterless shower is pretty interesting, but space is really inconvenient for sleeping.”

“Yeah, I don’t like having to strap myself down so I don’t float out of bed.”

For once, they were in agreement with Aine who preferred cramped places. She looked uncomfortable floating out in the open. The idea of sleep freeing you from the worries of the day did not exist in space.

Their shared life here would not last forever.

This was the third and final day.

The sunrise and sunset did not exist out here, so the food disappearing from the fridge was the biggest reminder of time’s passage.

“What…is that?” muttered Marika, looking out the window.

Karuta focused that way too and saw something new there. A bunch of artificial objects formed something like a net overhead.

“That would be the Sunny Side Up Project, a network of space stations made from a solid foam material. You know, the one run by Yukino Arakawa of the old strongests.”

Kyouka’s explanation brought it all back to him.

That network covered the entire Earth, didn’t it? The centrifugal force would differ at different points, but that would have all been forcibly dealt with using God-Worshiping Magic. The last he had heard, control had been lost and it was breaking apart with its master gone, but that didn’t mean the entire network would be cleared away immediately.

It looked like there was a gaping hole in the network around the space elevator.

That proved the elevator had been considered a greater priority than Yukino’s secret weapon.

However…

“No, not that.”

“?”

When Marika’s further comment made Karuta take a second look, he saw an object glistening darkly in the powerful sunlight.

That was the Threat.

Specifically, a bunch of giant spider crab ones all tangled together.

That meant the Threat had animal forms even out in space. Did that mean similar lifeforms existed on another planet? Or would they change form further after descending to the surface and cannibalizing their own?

Given the distance, that clearly wasn’t just one of them. A whole lot of them had to be forming a big ball in space like bugs gathering together to survive the winter. That one ball had to contain hundreds, thousands, or even more.

The group that had occupied Second Grimnoah off the Port of Kobe had been in the tens of thousands.

That group alone would be too much for the four of them to defeat.

And there were more than 300 million in all. How big was the enemy force?

“…”

Karuta fell silent, but then another change came over the elevator car. The floating sensation grew. Most likely, it was tugging them in the other direction as it slowly decelerated. Inertia still existed in zero-g.

They were approaching their destination.

“Karuta-kun.” Kyouka brushed her long hair to the sides in zero-g. “We need to get ready soon. Although I doubt we even need to put on those spacesuits.”

“What happens when we reach the space station?”

“We board a separate launch shuttle. The station is 36 thousand kilometers from the surface and the station itself is 10 thousand kilometers to strike a balance with Earth’s gravity. That exceptionally long space elevator is constantly rotating in accordance with Earth’s rotation and revolution. A shuttle’s rocket engine can fly us to the tip in less than an hour.” Kyouka calmly explained. “After that, we don’t even need explosives or fuel. We can use the massive centrifugal force or the force of the wire’s own swaying to launch ourselves with enough speed to leave the solar system once we cut ourselves free of the station.”

However, this was a journey into death with no actual destination. They would divert the 300 million Threats’ attention away from Earth and give the people there even a few years of peace. This was an empty coffin used to preserve that state of peace by using up each new world’s strongest.

Marika looked confused.

“Wait, I thought everything was weightless in space. Won’t the slightest push send you forever in the same direction?”

“There are a lot of things that will decelerate you, like the gravitational pull of other astronomical bodies and solar winds which are clumps of ions. A true vacuum is only a theoretical concept. Even space is a treasure trove of dust and garbage.”

Was that how it worked? It was probably best to trust the beautiful astronomy lover on this one. Given the actual risk to their lives, they probably shouldn’t have been discussing this, but they were likely only distracting themselves like someone starting to clean their room on the day before an exam. Besides, no amount of thinking would reveal a solution to their problem.

They had already made up their minds.

Their deaths were assured whether they remained on Earth or went into space. If they let their resolve falter, it would only mean more people dead.

They were scared, of course.

But more than that, they had had seen how the world’s strongest could abuse their power.

What kind of strongest did they want to be?

At the very least, they did not want be the kind that would put 5.5 billion people at risk just because they feared death. They had defeated the Problem Solvers for that, so they would not take that path themselves.

Their view of the starry scenery vanished.

The elevator car had arrived in the space station’s interior hall.

After one final shake and a metallic thunk, it came to a stop.

Out of habit, Karuta checked the modified military flashlight at his hip. That showed just how nervous he was, but he felt silly as soon as he did it. What was he going to fight at this point? But as ridiculous as it was, he couldn’t even crack a smile. No amount of struggling or fighting would be enough to escape death.

The series of compressed air sounds was likely the two airlocks joining together.

The red lights on the wall all turned green.

That likely meant they could open the airlock.

“…”

This really was the end.

He was briefly tempted to punch Marika and Kyouka in the gut to knock them out. He wanted to leave them here. But that was meaningless. The Living Gods would be the first ones killed by the 300 million Threats even if they did remain on Earth. He was growing uncharacteristically charitable as a way to avoid focusing on his fear of being ejected into the endless expanse of space, but he couldn’t forget the entire reason they were doing this.

Things from here on wouldn’t be like the space elevator. The shuttle ride would be a one-way trip without even a temporary goal.

This really was the end.

He would die.

Without even being to protect these three girls.

He silently cursed the human string pullers for not filling the elevator car with an invisible gas that knocked them all unconscious for some automatic process to load them into the deadly shuttle. Couldn’t those villains be kind enough to rid them of the need to see their doom slowly approaching?

He felt like they were performing sokushinbutsu.

They had chosen to bury themselves alive where they waited for death to finally arrive. And they were wishing for world peace the entire time.

“Let’s get going,” he said, but no one expressed agreement.

All four of them may have had someone they had wanted to protect. Even if it meant leaving that someone here. But none of them did so. Karuta, Aine, Marika, and Kyouka approached the airlock, looking less than pleased about it. The president looked back toward her wheelchair in an uncharacteristically worried way, but she must have decided it was meaningless. She left the device behind and floated toward the exit.

They were scared.

Of course they were, so they wished they could numb their hearts as they continued on.

Because as things were, they would break before they reached death.

Even though this was the right thing to do.

They lowered the large levers on the outside of the door and opened it.

Through the airlock, they found a space larger than a train station concourse. If there had been gravity, the size would have been enough to forget they were in space.

And there was something there.

It came without warning.

“We have been waiting for you, superior terrestrial carbon structures. AKA, the world’s strongest humans.”

“………………………………………………………………………………………………………………”

Utagai Karuta froze.

He didn’t understand.

Why was he hearing someone speaking?

Someone was waiting on the supposedly unmanned space station?

The human string pullers hadn’t mentioned this. Hadn’t Chrisbart Firenze said the space elevator was managed entirely from the surface and there was no one on the station!? Then who was this that had so easily obliterated the seemingly all-knowing human string pullers’ plans and calculations!?

“You’re…kidding.”

But.

Perhaps it wasn’t surprising this had slipped past the human string pullers.

Because the person in front of them was not human.

The black carapace and slimy green light were not any different from the giant spider crab variety.

But this one was clearly different from any that Karuta and the others had ever seen. They had come in many forms, such as a tadpole or a lion. There had even been the Armored Warrior who changed their appearance based on their hatred toward humanity after feeling betrayed.

But this was something else entirely.

“Sacri-sama.”

Something audibly sliced through the artificial air.

Even as she floated in the zero-g space, Crystal Girl Aine moved in front of Karuta and drew her transparent katana out of empty air.

“That is not human, thus it is likely outside the human string pullers’ control. Things are not going according to plan.”

“…”

So Aine saw it that way too?

She agreed this being wasn’t human?

If the human string pullers could control something like this, they never would have gotten their own hands dirty.

Karuta had completely tensed up. He couldn’t even pull the modified military flashlight from his hip.

This was an utter monster.

This was something on another level entirely.

She had transparently white skin, shining eyes, and glossy black hair. A sticky green light crawled along her pitch black metallic clothing that could have been armor or a dress. Without the black “armor” that fused with her soft skin, she might not have seemed so monstrous. If she had walked by in Second Grimnoah wearing a school uniform, he would have just assumed she was another student. That was how human she looked.

She looked to be 20 or maybe older.

Her allure was even stronger than Regulation 3 Kyouka’s.

But this was only based on human assumptions.

No one could actually say how old she was. In fact, a lifeform that didn’t live on a rotating and revolving planet might not even have a compatible concept of “age”. They might even measure their “service life” by distance traveled or number of accesses. She was just that far removed from humanity – and biological life altogether.

“Karuta-kun,” cautioned Omotesandou Kyouka.

She was looking at the wall.

No, she was looking at what should have been a window. The entire wall should have been transparent, like at an airport, but something covered the outside. Enough darkly glistening somethings packed in so tight that there wasn’t a gap left open.

They were shaped like giant spider crabs, water bears, and blue-ringed octopuses.

Needless to say, these were the Threat.

As crazy as it sounded, this space station had functioned as the final trump card protecting 5.5 billion people, but it had been taken over so easily!? How could this happen? Karuta’s group were willing to sacrifice their lives to redirect the Threat’s attention, but they had ended up diving right into a giant creepy cocoon made of thousands or tens of thousands of Threats gathered together.

They couldn’t act as decoys or redirect attention like this.

The human string pullers couldn’t hope to control things anymore. The plan was meaningless if the world’s strongests were captured before leading the 300 million Threats away from Earth! They were really and truly going to die for nothing!!!

“Congratulations.”

And.

They heard one of the last words they had expected.

It was not that this being was failing to communicate. It was more like the mind or feelings behind the word were twisted beyond recognition.

The countless Threats surrounding the station produced creaking noises while the woman with a pitch black sheen spoke.

She smiled as gently as a divine mother and spread her arms wide.

“Congratulations, world’s strongests! You are safe now. You need not fear death now that I, Transline, have collected you!!”

Chapter 3

Part 1

What did she say?

What did that even mean?

Utagai Karuta’s mouth flapped wordlessly for a while. He had completely missed the moment when he should have drawn that puny weapon, his modified military flashlight, from his hip.

Marika and Kyouka were in a similar situation.

And if they didn’t say anything, it remained her turn.

The woman calling herself Transline smiled and continued.

“I am Transline. The central being of what you call the Threat.”

“That we call?”

It was true the humans had come up with that name on their own.

So did they have another, more official name?

“Why would we call ourselves the Threat? In your language, the closest term for us would be Metal-Based Naturally-Occurring Lifeform.”

Metal.

That was clearly different from humans, but some metals were still necessary components of the human body.

“From our perspective, you would be Carbon-Based Naturally-Occurring Lifeforms. Oh, and because you are the world’s strongest, I could add the ‘superior’ qualifier to that.”

Omotesandou Kyouka pressed a hand to her chest and took a slow, deep breath.

After refocusing her mind that way, she made a cautious attempt at making contact.

“Why go out of your way to add ‘naturally-occurring’? Are there other kinds of lifeforms?”

“Yes, there are. Such as most of the ‘Threats’ you have seen so far. Although the difference between natural and mass-produced is a trivial one to us,” replied the dark woman, tilting her head curiously.

The look on her face said she wasn’t sure why they felt the need to ask about that. It was like she had been forced to explain that most fishing line was synthetic these days and you rarely saw natural lines anymore.

“We have put together a factory for such things. And even your Earth has taken the first steps in that direction. You know, cloning and stem cells. Your efforts have stalled, but it is unclear to me if that is because you lack the necessary technology or you have stopped researching it because you find it distasteful.”

What path of evolution had these beings taken?

It was unclear if they had even achieved diversity through reproduction the way humans did.

The Threat did not gather up humans or any of Earth’s resources, but they did strengthen their own power by cannibalizing their fallen and taking their parts. The decoy and real ones had both done that. They might fluidly adapt to changes in their environment by repeatedly tearing away the necessary parts and customizing themselves rather than using the Darwinian theory of evolution.

“Why are you called Transline? In our language, that makes you sound like a power line or a wire or something.”

“That is not inaccurate. I act as a transmitter and a pipeline, so I combined the words in your language.”

She didn’t bother to hide the answer and even smiled as she responded.

Marika had reported that the Threat operating on the ocean during the Port of Kobe battle had periodically received supplies. And Kyouka had convinced Letnahe to tell them the sea anemone ones made fuel by gathering and concentrating the energy that poured down from space and dissolved into the ocean.

In other words…

“You alone provide the power to keep 300 million Threats running?”

“Hee hee!!”

A strange zapping sound made the humans flinch.

It came from the space station wall.

The wall had burst from within and the remnants of a thick cable jutted out.

The dark woman probably hadn’t meant that as an attack. She elegantly placed a hand over her mouth.

“Oh, dear. I apologize. I got a little overexcited there. Hee hee hee. Sigh. I am trying to restrain myself, I promise. Hee hee hee.”

“…” Karuta felt another prickly sensation.

It wasn’t visible, but there was some kind of energy roiling within Transline. She said this was while she worked to restrain it, so if she were to let it go free, would it be enough to fry them until not even the double helixes within their cells remained?

“There. I’ve calmed down☆”

Transline placed a hand on her large chest and took a deep breath. A breath. It was unclear if she needed to do that to live, but she was apparently working to calm herself.

That was how she saw it.

She didn’t even see this as a battle.

She was only making sure she didn’t accidentally kill Karuta and the others.

“I am no more than a power transmitter, so I do not create anything myself.”

Wasn’t Crystal Magic defined as techniques that read the waves similar to high and low pressure fronts which were created by the clash between the energy pouring down from space and the energy of the Original Crystal Embryo found at the center of the earth?

In that case…

“Were we borrowing your power to use magic?” asked Karuta.

“I can’t blame you for failing to notice. We have had very few chances for direct contact since we slowly follow a ‘loop’ separate from your galaxy. But since we were in the neighborhood, we might as well take you in, don’t you think?”

She had the look of someone in the comfortable, open ocean watching a small fish try desperately to survive in a small puddle leftover on the rocks. And from her point of view, that was probably accurate.

Her legitimate sympathy only made it more disturbing.

That thought led Karuta to realize something important: disturbing? He sensed a nagging feeling in the back of his mind. He felt a doubt that made him hesitant to even ask this being standing before him.

Marika asked a different question.

And being Marika, she asked an even more dangerous question than the one Karuta was hesitant to ask.

“Who is this ‘we’ you keep mentioning?”

“The unlimited numbers we can produce in our factory. But I couldn’t look after them properly if there were too many, so I’ve limited them to just 3 cargos.”

Karuta felt faint.

The difference between humans and the Threat was too great. They had no upper limit and all the Threats they had fought were a reduced number to make things easier on Transline?

If that was 3 cargos out there, then a cargo likely meant 100 million. And she made it sound like 3 of those units was keeping the numbers low.

They had never stood a chance. From the very beginning.

Meanwhile, Transline didn’t even seem to consider the possibilities of winning or losing. Even after reducing Earth’s population to 5.5 billion, she didn’t even see it as a battle.

In other words…

“We have come here to take you in. To protect you.”

There it was.

They hadn’t misheard that incomprehensible part after all.

“Some might be happy with constantly keeping our numbers up using the factory and rejoicing in our prosperity as metal lifeforms, but I don’t see it that way. That might bring stability, but it will not lead to evolution. No matter how far we expand the status quo, repeating the same stimuli on and on forever will only lead to gradual decay. Biologically and culturally. Thus, I am constantly seeking out new lifeforms. They don’t need to share our origin. They can be nitrogen, silicon, or carbon-based. I just want to find as many of them as possible and collect the greatest units of each species.”

Carbon-based.

Utagai Karuta kept a cautious eye on Transline while looking to something else. He looked to the back of the crystal girl’s head while she stood protectively in front of him in zero-g.

Crystal Girl Aine.

Did she fall under the silicon-based category?

“So you’re saying you have no reason to fight us?”

“Yes.”

“And we don’t have to worry about dying?”

“Yes, yes! Hee hee. But of course!! I will accept you and the sword-wielding one as a set.”

Transline smiled and promised them their safety. At the same time, several of the artificial lights on the ceiling nearby burst from within.

And still smiling…

“So let’s just clean up the rest, shall we?”

Something about her peaceful face felt wrong.

No, there was some fundamental disconnect here.

Yes, that was it.

If Transline was commanding all of the Threats and she had never intended to fight, then what had all of those Threats been doing? Had they gone berserk while down on Earth? Of course not. The Threat had clearly been acting as a group toward some kind of goal.

“It was not easy searching out the strongest lifeforms among so many. And while flipping over those cards to check, the population of nearly 8 billion dropped to only 5.5 billion.”

“So all of those battles were a test to identify us!?”

Marika shouted without thinking, but Transline’s demeanor did not change.

She continued smiling.

“And whenever I did narrow it down to one or more strongests, they just kept refusing my offer. Some challenged me to a meaningless battle, some inexplicably killed themselves right here, and others panicked and fled right out into the vacuum of space. But that just proved none of them were who I was looking for. And now I have found you and it didn’t even require flipping over half of the cards first, which just goes to show how clever I am☆ So now I will take you in. Do not worry. There is really, truly nothing to worry about.”

The human string pullers down on the surface had only been able to check whether or not the shuttle had launched and the Threat’s invasion speed.

What if the previous strongests had all fought self-destructive battles against Transline after launching the empty shuttle into distant space so no one would feel a need to visit the space station and find out what had happened? And even if there were any doubts, the human string pullers would have to believe it worked when the Threat actually did stop.

Karuta’s throat was trembling.

He tried to speak, but it didn’t work the first few times. He eventually did get the words out.

“Just to be certain. You say you’re taking us in. You mean you’re rescuing us?”

“Yes.”

“So you’re interested in humans and you want to acquire the four of us if you can?”

“Yes! Oh, yes!!”

She had a beaming smile so full of adoration that Karuta was afraid she was going hug him to her chest. Given the energy she contained, that would probably be enough to vaporize him.

And with that established…

“So why target Earth? We’re already here, so you have no reason to attack the surface anymore!!”

“Yes. Because I do not need them anymore.”

Transline did not even tilt her head.

The crackling around her died down. This was apparently a calmer topic for her.

She had no interest in ruling the planet or wiping out humanity. She really did see securing these four as more important.

And with that in mind…

“I am not attacking them because I want anything from them. I am simply cleaning them up so you have no lingering regrets here. We are only interested in the strongest ones. Well, with a species split between male and female, I would like to have a pair of them. But since I already have that with only the strongests here, the rest are not necessary.”

She wasn’t destroying them out of hatred or disgust.

But she would do it anyway.

She was so different. This leader of the metal-based lifeforms known as the Threat could verbally communicate with them, but the foundation of her thoughts was just so different.

She had said the previous world’s strongests had acted suicidally after learning the truth. Which was why she had not yet acquired the world’s strongest humans.

Why had they done that?

Maybe there was no reason and they had simply been unable to handle the truth.

But Karuta thought he knew the answer.

If Transline took someone in and was satisfied, she would then slaughter the rest of humanity. But she would let humanity live until she had accomplished her goal. So had those people chosen to die in order to delay that moment of utter destruction?

They had been exiled from Earth and thrown out into space. They had been pushed out of their ordinary lives and forced to choose death. But they had still wanted to be strong people.

Karuta’s dizzy spell was not going away.

How many layers of hell did this world have waiting for them?

“Karuta-kun,” cautioned Omotesandou Kyouka, floating nearby.

She was looking to the thick double-pane window.

Something was squirming there. The giant spider crabs, water bears, blue-ringed octopuses, and other Threats were moving away from the window. The view opened up. The blue ceiling visible there was in fact their home planet.

A red fireball was soaring toward it.

No, not just one.

There were so many. And each and every one was probably a ball of thousands or tens of thousands of Threats clumped together.

“Wait! Please wait!!”

“Sigh.”

“Why do you have to do this!? You said yourself the rest of humanity doesn’t matter to you! You’ve already accomplished your goal!!”

“Hee hee. The perfect strongest response. You have been through so much, but you still wish to protect the fellow humans who created that hell for you. Oh, how wonderful!”

Something somewhere overloaded and burst.

Even belligerent Marika took a step back when she felt the tingling on her skin. Some small translucent crystals had formed on her cheek. That was the Crystal Magic preset of regeneration. Something similar to a serious sunburn had been identified as an injury. Karuta would probably see something similar if he looked in a mirror.

How long would this giant space station last?

Transline continued with a beaming smile.

“Ah ha ha! Yes, yes! I figured it out this time. Hee hee. You aren’t just mindless violence!! The world’s strongest I want must also have a love for their fellow humans!!!”

Part 2

One fell on a weapons factory in India hidden from satellites by disguising it as a rundown city.

The fireball shined bright while it rapidly rotated like a curveball.

It launched countless laser beams in all directions, like a planetarium’s star projector.

Straight lines of green light streaked out.

And it was rotating.

The deadly storm sliced through what had looked like a fake city built for a movie. The production zone had been built underground to protect it from an exchange of ballistic missiles in an all-out war and there was a nuclear shelter for the leaders built even deeper, but neither was spared. The ground itself was sliced apart. Orange lava erupted out like the earth was hemorrhaging blood from a wound.

The attack was merciless.

The weapons production base was wiped off the face of the earth before the fireball even collided with the ground.

Another fell on a giant artificial float factory found 50km off the coast from Aichi, Japan’s general port for the Chubu region. It claimed to manufacture defensive weapons and intentionally avoided the word “military”, but the Threat must not have cared.

The downpour of laser beams sliced through it all and the giant black mass crashed into the center.

The mass partially submerged itself to sink the entire float, but then the mass broke apart and made its next move. The outer units had been distorted by the heat and impact, but those deeper inside tore away the usable parts and made them their own. They had never expected a safe landing, so emerging from a mountain of their own kind’s corpses was part of the plan.

Yes.

The mass was formed from thousands or tens of thousands of Threats.

The Smart Arms weapons manufacturing plant in North America’s Silicon Valley was no exception.

Susannia Evans of the Problem Solvers had once used the place to look after her cyborg body and Anastasia Blast had ultimately used it as her secret base.

But it only took an instant to destroy.

“…”

Chrisbart Firenze sighed softly as the many reports came in.

The Threat had made their move.

It might look like an indiscriminate attack all across the world, but anyone privy to certain special information would recognize what was happening here. The Threat had excellent aim as they bombed more and more of the human string pullers’ hideouts that had deceived everyone until now.

Or maybe the humans had only thought the deception held. This result suggested it never had fooled the Threat.

Which led to one inevitable conclusion.

(Here too.)

The operators were practically screaming as they gave their reports. Some were ignoring their orders and attempting to run away, but if they did not listen when ordered to stop, they would be shot by security. Or maybe they wanted to be killed by human hands.

The old man in a lab coat looked upwards.

He could only see the sterile ceiling lined with artificial lights.

But he stared into the distance like he could see right through it.

“Perhaps these are our just deserts.”

A moment later, the base of the space elevator was vaporized the carbon nanotube wires lined up like violin strings all snapped.

Part 3

A deep rumbling shook the entire space station.

They were 36 thousand kilometers from the surface, but it didn’t matter. How quickly was that vibration moving up the wire?

It had begun.

That was simple enough to say, but what was actually happening down on Earth?

“Leave those trivialities to me. Now, tell me. What kind of life would you like next?”

Transline smiled.

There was no sign of malice there. She seemed to think she was doing them a favor by taking revenge on humanity for tormenting the four of them for so long.

But had anyone asked her to do that?

“Dammit!! Aine!!”

“What shall I do?”

Karuta called her on reflex, but then he froze.

Right.

5.5 billion people were being slaughtered for no real reason, but what exactly could they do about it? The Four Living Gods already knew they could not defeat the 300 million Threats. If they descended to Earth now, they would only find an uncontrollable hell. They couldn’t protect anyone by returning there and fighting to the death.

Aine tilted her head, awaiting his orders.

The four of them could not survive whether they remained on Earth or were launched into space.

That choice had been heartbreaking, but even that was falling apart. Meanwhile, Transline looked as happy as someone about to open a present wrapped with a ribbon. Her joy was genuine, but she did not look at them like she accepted them as her equals. The idea of going with her scared Karuta. But they could survive a while longer if they obeyed her for now. Unfortunately, that miraculous opportunity meant nothing if they slapped her hand away and refused.

Transline probably would do it.

This was not an agreement between equals for her. The Threat was granting lesser beings mercy. So as soon as she knew she could not have them like she wanted, she would lose interest and kill them. Then she would stick her hand back into human society and make a mess of things in order to search out a strongest she preferred. And if at any time during the process, she lost interest, she would kill every last human, and ride whatever “loop” the Threat followed to reach another planet.

“Karuta.”

The next thing he knew, Marika had a different color scattered across her summer uniform. She had already activated her crystal armor and pulled her rapier Device from thin air.

“I’ll let you choose. What do we do now? I didn’t really follow what she was talking about, but if this Transline is something like their core, we have an extremely rare opportunity while this close to her. Whether we choose to shake her hand or give her one hell of a punch, this is probably our last chance.”

“Since she contacted us directly, she must have taken the possibility of a surprise attack into consideration,” said Omotesandou Kyouka, brushing her black hair off her shoulder. “This Transline is a special Threat unit. We have zero information on her. Don’t forget the lesson we learned all too well when dealing with the Problem Solvers. We know nothing about her power and have nothing prepared. What chance do we actually have of winning if we attack her head on now?”

Aine continued to tilt her head with sword in hand.

She didn’t need to say out loud that she would support whatever decision Karuta made.

The boy focused on the modified military flashlight at his hip. Would he wield it as a weapon, or would he throw it out into the zero-g space? That would make his choice clear to everyone watching.

What would he do?

If they stayed here, they might just barely cling to life. But if they thoughtlessly refused Transline, even that small chance was gone.

Utagai Karuta asked himself the crucial question.

What would they do now!?

Part 4

Thinking back, the world had been an awful place as far back as the Problem Solvers.

The five previous world’s strongests and their God-Worshiping Magic had been overwhelmingly power, so Karuta and the others had been helpless as their ship was destroyed out at sea. It had all begun with that experience. The few students who remained had never even considered making it a fair fight. They had hidden, deceived, and used every trick in the book to kill. That was how they had arrived at the top, so perhaps that was what had created such a depressing world afterwards.

The world had been a terrible place to begin with, but Karuta and the others had clearly made the wrong decision when choosing how to fight back against it.

They had failed to escape the ugly side of humanity on Second Grimnoah.

All hell had broken loose on their school trip to Iceland’s Crystal Beach. In a frigid resort where they could not ask for help, they had been surrounded by what they thought was the Threat and forced to fight with the ordinary tourists over the few livable spaces remaining. They had ultimately discovered the supposed Threat was a military decoy created by humans and they were being controlled by a group who had infiltrated Second Grimnoah in order to seek vengeance.

Near the Port of Kobe, they had been shocked to discover how pure the real Threat was.

Unlike before, the tens of thousands of Threats there had been the real deal. Karuta and the others had worked to retake Second Grimnoah from them, but the Armored Warrior and the other Threats there had only been interested in the schools humans attended and had never intended to fight. It was Karuta’s side that had gotten the wrong idea and slaughtered them.

The human string pullers had taken away everything they had worked so hard for by using the Catastrophe meant to reunite the fracturing human race.

Their own parents and siblings had been working behind the scenes of the martial arts tournament. Of course, they were not trained professionals. The human string pullers hid in the shadows and manipulated information to have the 5.5 billion ordinary people unwittingly do their dirty work. They were so good at what they did that they could have people betray their own family with a smile and truly believe it was in their family’s best interests because “someone important” or “everyone” says so.

The boy asked himself again.

There was no salvation to be found on Earth as it was.

Was that world and the people living there really worth protecting? The current situation was undoubtedly wrong. But could he really find a reason worth returning to that hell when it meant abandoning the only chance at survival he still had?

Say you had the winning lottery ticket.

And then you find out multiple of the same number were printed by mistake and you hadn’t actually been testing your luck at all. Would you really ask for a redo that was completely fair? You didn’t have to. Maybe it was dirty and maybe it was ugly, but if you just held your tongue, you would be set for life.

He thought about it.

He considered it.

Agonized over it.

Part 5

Utagai Karuta made his decision.

Chapter 4

Part 1

Utagai Karuta opened his eyes.

He briefly felt separated from gravity and that wasn’t just his groggy head failing to fully wake up. For one, the bed was too fancy for him.

He felt something soft next to him.

Student Council President Omotesandou Kyouka was curled up in the same silk bedsheets as him. Her head was turned to the side and she was giggling.

“Good morning, Karuta-kun.”

“Were you watching me sleep? Don’t you have anything better to do?”

“Hee hee. I didn’t plan on it, but I found it to be amusing.”

How was that amusing?

She saw the same thing every day.

“Ugh.”

He sensed motion from the other side of the bed. That had to be his childhood friend Marika. Rather than waking up, she appeared to be caught in a light doze and tempted to fully return to sleep. She suddenly grabbed him from behind, bringing a smooth, soft warmth to his back. She held him like a small child with a big stuffed animal, but it was probably a subconscious thing. He heard her breathing settle back into sleep again.

Crystal Girl Aine was staring down at him from above.

His head was resting in her lap.

“Sacri-sama, it is time to wake up.”

“Yawwwn. Aine-chan, do we really need a time to take up?”

“You are the one who said we must follow a schedule and maintain a daily routine or we will grow undisciplined.”

She was right about that.

He extracted himself from Marika’s grasp, rubbed his sleepy eyes, and slowly got up.

He felt a dry wind.

The sea breeze carried a faintly salty scent to his nose.

“Phew.”

He set his feet on the floor.

The wind led him from the bed to the balcony and Crystal Girl Aine followed without a word. She may have wanted attention too.

They were in a seaside cottage that would have fit right in at a tropical resort. There were no walls, giving them direct access to the ocean. The building itself was built over the ocean instead of on the beach. A narrow wooden bridge provided a route back to land.

And the sea was dark.

It was absorbing the colors of the starry sky visible through the reinforced glass dome overhead, so the colors of space were mixed with the bright morning sun.

There was no blue planet here.

They were on an artificial planet in a different planetary system. The 50km enclosed space had been given to them as their world. From the outside, it may have looked a lot like a bunch of grapes. Each transparent dome was a few kilometers across, they each contained a different environment such as a snowy mountain or a jungle, and they could choose whichever kind of resort they wanted. The concepts of up and down existed within and the seawater did not just float up into the air. They had been told that was because the giant star the artificial planet orbited had its gravity intentionally amplified. The gravitons that created gravity still could not be mechanically produced, but increasing the activity of the naturally-produced ones could alter the apparent values. Karuta imagined it as something like how a microwave oven heated food by causing the moisture inside to rapidly vibrate, but he couldn’t say anything for sure when this was all done by the Threat’s mysterious technology.

That said, none of it felt as cold and mechanical as a spaceship. On the white sandy beach, palm trees and hibiscus flowers swayed in the artificial breeze, colorful butterflies and beetles lived there, and plenty of fish and birds ate them.

Remember the silk bedsheets?

All the necessary lifeforms were here, including the silkworms needed to make those sheets. The cycle and pyramid were complete.

Transline had not given them a spaceship or an artificial planet. Even if it was mechanically created, she had given them a proper “world”.

The entire ecosystem humans needed to live was present in this enclosed space.

Something else flowed by outside the dome.

Their orbits were all independent, but it felt like the artificial planets had been clustering together a lot lately. That showed just how many lifeforms Transline was collecting from here and there. All those pure nurseries were positioned around and constantly revolving around the shining star providing the center of their artificial planetary system. There was one each for every category: carbon, sulfur, oxygen, metal, plant, animal, etc.

They still hadn’t interacted, but Karuta’s group had discovered an airlock for docking hidden among the grass and flowers at the very edge of their artificial planet.

This might be an unnatural nursery, but it was also a perfect world with no chance of conflict.

Humanity’s ugly conflicts were nowhere to be found here. Nor the merciless slaughter at the hands of the Threat. Karuta and the others didn’t need to worry about being deceived, lied to, used, or abandoned by anyone.

They didn’t even need to be the Four Living Gods anymore.

They could finally relax and stop forcing themselves to be the world’s strongest.

They may have finally returned to being human.

“Karuta-kun.”

He heard a voice from behind.

He looked back to see Omotesandou Kyouka casually holding a bedsheet up to her chest while walking toward him on her own two legs. But if she had taken the sheet, what would he see if he looked to the bed where Marika had gone back to sleep? He already knew the answer. That childhood friend had a bad habit of stripping naked and crawling into bed when she felt sleepy.

He heard the faint sound of a machine operating.

The older girl’s legs were supported by black metal. That was what they had once called the Threat.

Kyouka had tried and failed to walk using a powered suit while on Earth, but it worked better with their help.

The Threat accurately reproduced her elegant movements.

“Karuta-kun. I’m glad you decided to get up, but what about some breakfast?”

“If someone will make some…”

“Oh, c’mon. Don’t be shy. Just come out and ask me to fix you something.”

“Your cooking is always so sweet it takes real courage to eat it first thing in the morning.”

They could use the phone on the wall to have any food they wanted brought to the seaside cottage. Made by black metal hands, of course. And that wasn’t all. The cottage remained so clean because Threats a bit larger than a backpack were constantly cleaning it for them.

Perhaps it was wrong to continue calling them the Threat.

Not after being taken in and cared for by them.

Part 2

They could have chosen that future.

They only needed to nod their heads in response to Transline’s suggestion.

They would have been given a happy life where they wanted for nothing.

But.

If they could do anything that irresponsible, they never would have avenged their friends and become known as the Four Living Gods.

Karuta swatted aside the outstretched hand.

Transline remained frozen in place with a puzzled look on her face.

He shouted at the top of his lungs before she could think anything at all.

He had made his choice.

He grabbed the modified military flashlight from his hip, gripped it tight, and held it at the ready.

“Back to the fight, Aineeeeeeeee!!!”

“Yes, Sacri-sama.”

The crystal girl produced a high-pitched sound as she readied her sword.

Maybe this would drag a lot more people into the fight.

Everyone might resent the world’s strongest for failing to do their job.

Nevertheless.

He could never choose to let 5.5 billion people die, their complaints silenced forever, while only the four of them survived!!!

Marika and Kyouka smiled a little.

They were implicitly saying this was the only real option they had.

“Oh, dear.”

Finally.

Transline spoke after an obvious delay. But this delay was brimming with a confidence that she would never lose to mere humans even if they got the jump on her.

She had been rejected.

But her face displayed neither displeasure nor anger.

She was smiling.

“Yes, you are the superior humans known as the Four Living Gods. You must have more fight in you than you know what to do with. But perhaps that is what makes you what you are. Hee hee!!”

That was all it took for something invisible to pierce every single one of Utagai Karuta’s cells at superluminal speed.

“Gah?”

He couldn’t breathe.

He floated in the zero-g space, unable to even hold a hand to his chest. His mind was only able to comprehend that he had been hit by something devastating. But even after being hit, he had no idea how to see it coming or how to dodge it.

With a violent zapping sound, sparks erupted from the floor and wall behind him. Something had harmed him and damaged the space station’s delicate equipment just by being emitted. It apparently didn’t matter that this was a large orbital facility designed to defend against the high levels of radiation found in solar winds and cosmic rays.

Even a specialized spacesuit or environmental suit wouldn’t have helped.

(What about my flashlight?)

Still having trouble breathing, he flipped the switch on and off with his thumb.

It was a miracle the device still worked.

Transline.

That monster would slaughter any lifeform or machine that opposed her, except now she was doubled over trying to endure something. But that something was likely a pleasurable or joyful urge rather than anything related to fighting.

Simply put, it was the desire to show off.

Or maybe she simply wanted them to admire her.

“Hee hee. Ee hee hee. Sorry, that was inappropriate of me. It only slipped out, I promise. Hee hee. Oh, dear. I can’t seem to restrain myself. You intend to fight? Against me? Why would you go out of your way to choose something so suicidal? Huff, puff. Oh, no. Not even taking deep breaths is enough!! This is just so amusing I can’t stop laughing. Pff, hee hee. Hee hee hee ha ha gya ha ha ha ha ha!!!”

“Karuta!!”

Amaashi Marika swung her rapier device.

But not at Transline herself. She sliced through a nearby wall, tearing it away. It stuck out to cover Karuta, Aine, and the rest like an umbrella.

Countless sparks burst out like pouring rain.

The wall was made to block radiation, but Karuta still felt the tingling pain in his skin growing at an accelerated rate. They weren’t going to last long.

Then the woman’s ticklish voice arrived from beyond the umbrella.

“Oh, how fun. Pff, hee hee. I would love to join in this game☆”

Several metallic sounds followed.

Karuta had a very bad feeling about this, so he peeked around the edge of the shield to find something unusual. Glass tubes thicker than relay batons were shooting from all over Transline while she remained doubled over in laughter. They were probably some kind of vacuum tube, but it wasn’t clear what they were used for. Karuta had thought of vacuum tubes as outdated tech, but he was pretty sure they were still used to produce microwaves in things like microwave ovens. So were these used to create and send out that kind of energy? Whatever the case, he could tell this indicated some kind of mode change. She had some reason to not keep them out in the open all the time, so she had kept them inside her body until now.

Two transparent horns grew atop her head and she raised that head.

A pair of glass or crystal objects grew from the metal lifeform.

(Are those like Aine’s horns?)

He doubted she would explain it for him right now.

Her cold and beautiful face was distorted by laughter.

“Hee hee hee. Ah ha ha!! Let me join the fun!!!”

Most likely, that was her only reason.

She was not motivated by a vast conspiracy or a nasty grudge.

He heard something slice through the artificial air. Transline’s slender arm did not carry a sword or a spear. To Karuta, it looked like a long, glowing whip.

“Ma-”

That weapon concentrated down all of the energy used to move 300 million Threats.

“Marika!? You need to dodge this!!!”

“?”

Pausing out of confusion was a definite mistake.

The childhood friend’s silhouette suddenly collapsed. Specifically, her empty hand was lopped off at the shoulder. She had been sliced through along with the wall she was using as a shield.

No, Transline hadn’t even done that intentionally.

Let me join the fun.

She was like a small child. She had only innocently wanted to do the same thing the four of them had done a moment before. She was only trying to attack the wall and peel it away.

Immediately afterwards, the space station’s wall was roughly sliced to pieces.

Rather than cut a hole in the wall, it was more like she sliced the entire station in two. There was nothing Karuta and the others could do while floating in the zero-g space. The artificial air flowed out with a sound like air leaving a balloon and they were blown toward the newly created exit.

Karuta felt dizzy.

This wasn’t a perfect vacuum, but the rapid change in pressure was too much for his body to deal with.

“Sacri-sama.”

“Stopping Marika’s bleeding takes top priority!! Apply pressure, tie it up, and do whatever it takes for her to last 30 seconds. The bleeding is going to be weird in zero-g and we can’t let her die before the regeneration is complete!!”

“I will obey, but she is coming.”

“!!”

He heard the air being sliced through.

There wasn’t just one anymore. She wasn’t just wielding them in her hands either. Several glowing whips extended from her lower back. They glowed like lava, so he got the feeling they would blind him if he viewed them for too long. A single hit from one of those had been too much for the giant space station. If she swung them all around at once, they would probably turn the entire location into space debris.

If Karuta hadn’t reflexively aimed his modified military flashlight and activated its dazzling infrared laser, they might have all been sliced through.

“Hee hee hee hee. If you’re willing to boast like that, you must have the strength to back it up, right? I’m happy, happy, so happy!!! I have finally found the superior units I have been looking for – the world’s strongest I have dreamed of!!”

With Marika’s makeshift shield gone, the invisible attack battered all of Karuta’s cells again. The piercing pain was less like a burn and more like a laceration that tore his skin like a stocking. He felt a rough sensation followed by the exposed part of his skin crystallizing.

No matter how beautiful Transline might be, she was still a Threat made of metal, so she did not care at all if she was thrown into the vacuum of space.

“Excellent. Truly excellent!! Now, entertain me more, more, more!! Kee kee ee hee hee. Okay, world’s strongests!?”

She laughed while swinging her glowing whips and filling the air with energy.

The attack…was coming!!!

“Karuta-kun!!” shouted Omotesandou Kyouka.

Karuta still had his injured childhood friend in his arms, so he gave up trying to resist and let the blowing wind carry him. He heard a deafening sound of scattering sparks as the many whips filled the space and forcibly tore through the ceiling and floor.

He would have been burned through too had he stayed where he was.

But simply following the course of the wind would get them thrown out into space.

“Let it…happen,” said Marika, holding her shoulder wound with her remaining hand. She moved her pale lips to speak. “Our barrier preset can forcibly stop an assault rifle bullet. Maybe we can’t handle it alone, but that should change if we gather together and combine our barriers.”

Yes. During their aerial battle against Susannia of the Problem Solvers, Karuta had received the blessing of Marika’s magic while holding onto her hips.

“But we’re in outer space. Will it really work the way we want?”

“Aine-chan can’t use the barrier and yours is really weak, but mine and the 3rd year’s should be enough. Remember, Crystal Magicians can fly through the ordinary atmosphere at Mach 2 or 3. We know the barrier is airtight, so this should…work!!!”

They flew from the station together.

Well, Karuta couldn’t bring himself to commit to that and grabbed onto a metal railing to slow down, but Marika cut it away with a laser.

Transline’s attacks poured in a moment later. The chaotic dance of light filled every part of the sliced space station. They burned through walls and burst outside of the station. They could no longer hear it, but the unrealistic visual of the kilometers long station being sliced apart was overwhelming enough.

Transline placed a hand on the wall and looked out through an opening in the collapsing station to watch them float away.

Her mouth was moving, but her voice didn’t reach them and they weren’t sure what she was saying or laughing about.

Aine must have read her lips, so she relayed it to them.

“She is saying, ‘oh, how wonderful. You are so adorable. I love you so much.’ ”

“I shouldn’t have asked.”

“That’s a haiku. Except no seasonal word.”

She was just messing with them at this point. Except she probably hadn’t done that on purpose.

Karuta, Aine, Marika, and Kyouka were gathered together. If they let go now, they would probably be separated forever.

And even with their barrier active, their air wouldn’t last forever.

There was only one possible destination for them.

The giant blue orb in front of them. The red lights they saw were due to the conflagrations larger than any slash-and-burn farming or forest fire.

“Do we really have to head down there? Do you have any idea how many thousands of degrees the thermosphere is!?”

The barrier alone wasn’t enough to protect them from that. If it was, they never would have needed to fear the light spears that Yukino Arakawa of the Problem Solvers had sent down from orbit.

“Sacri-sama.”

Karuta heard a sharp stabbing sound as Aine jabbed her sword into something black. It was a water bear larger than a car. That was one of the Threats that had been clinging to the outside of the space station. It must have been floating nearby after Transline sliced away its footing.

Aine did not hesitate before moving her sword to peel away its black armor.

“You can see their shells are not all that tough. Given the strength of their armor, I doubt the Threat bunches broke through the thermosphere by force. Even if they were willing to accept some losses, they likely also have an energy field similar to our barriers to protect them.”

“So if we use this?”

“We should have greater odds of surviving reentry than if we attempted it without.”

A few pieces of information immediately appeared in Karuta’s head.

At Iceland’s Crystal Beach, Aine had messed with the decoy Threat’s wiring to make them fire.

The Armored Warrior occupying Second Grimnoah had not originally taken that form. The lion-shaped Sparkle had devoured the corpses of the tadpole ones, taking in the other Threats’ powers and devices to transform.

“We can do this.”

It had all been hell.

But they couldn’t look away. They could make use of all those past experiences.

“We can do this!! We just have to build on what we’ve already seen!!”

“Aine-chan,” said Kyouka. “Karuta-kun may be super excited, but if you really can tear off and reuse Threat parts, try and grab us some rocket and booster parts.”

“If you say so.”

“Remember, this geosynchronous orbit is 36 thousand kilometers from the surface. Crystal Magic flight can only carry us at Mach 2 or 3, so it would take us more than 10 hours to get back. I doubt what little oxygen we have in here would last that long.”

“Yikes,” said Marika. “I get the feeling we would either dry up in space or pop like balloons. And I’m not sure Imi, Tayori, and the others down there could last nearly half a day.”

“So we need something to accelerate us,” continued Kyouka. “Mach 25 to 30 would be best.”

Super excited Karuta felt a chill in his stomach. He quickly asked Aine to do what Kyouka said.

The Four Living Gods held hands and formed a ring like a skydiving team.

Yes, Marika’s arm had already regenerated.

That meant they had been exposed to the vacuum of space for more than 30 seconds and still lived. They weren’t about to trust Transline, but it was very strongest of them. Their hardiness was reaching the level of germs and mold that rode a rocket or shuttle into space.

Could they even be called human anymore?

That thought gave Karuta a self-deprecating smile, but then the crystal girl spoke softly to him.

“Sacri-sama.”

“?”

“Your previous fantasy mode was transmitted into my mind through the Crystal Blossom. Do you really want to be a tropical king living out an explosively adolescent dream without even a swimsuit to be found?”

“I resisted the temptation all on my own, so can we not do this!?”

His childhood friend wasn’t going to overlook this, so she gave him a skeptical look.

“Explain yourself, Karuta.”

“Miss Marika sleeping in the nude is true to life, but Miss Kyouka doing the same and accentuating her chest size with the bed sheet does not seem to match her psychological profile. Were you ignoring everything about her except her chest size so you could use her as an easy source of boobs for your fantasy? Was this at all influenced by seeing them jiggle around when they were freed from gravity onboard the elevator car?”

“Karuta-kun☆”

“Please nooooooo!!!”

The station was in geosynchronous orbit at an altitude of 36 thousand kilometers.

But they had the flight preset plus the rockets and boosters stolen from the Threat. If Aine and Marika went all out, they could set a course in zero-g and travel at high speed.

Their destination was the giant blue planet spread out below them.

Part 3

Natalena Blast clearly saw the moment of impact.

The blue sky grew distorted.

The first thing to hit Second Grimnoah was a massive shockwave. But not because a mass of Threats had struck the surface. The space elevator’s wires were tens of thousands of kilometers long. If they suddenly snapped, they would respond like a stretched rubber band cut by scissors. The two halves would fly up and down. When they tore through Earth’s atmosphere, just how much friction and how great a shockwave would they produce?

The 600m ship sank down a few meters and all of its more than 1000 windows shattered.

“Gahh!?”

Natalena was slammed back first not into the floor or wall but into the ceiling.

But she didn’t have time to groan in pain. She was actually thankful she had been thrown away from the window, sparing her a body full of glass shards. By the time she had activated her crystal armor and used the flight to balance herself and avoid colliding with the floor, the next phase had begun.

The horizon was blurring.

No, that wasn’t it. Something black was wriggling there. But they weren’t approaching the ship. It was more accurate to say they were spreading out from their landing point. It just so happened that a portion of them were heading toward Second Grimnoah.

But even that meant thousands.

The giant spider crab, water bear, and blue-ringed octopus Threats could not be allowed to reach the ordinary people who couldn’t even fight back.

“All Subcategory and Main Category students capable of aerial combat, please gather on the side decks. Do not get too close to the Threat. Maintain a safe altitude and bomb them from above. Their numbers alone will overwhelm us, so the loss of any of our fighters would be too much of a burden for Second Grimnoah to survive.”

Was that Letnahe Kurent’s voice speaking over the ship’s speakers?

The Four Living Gods were gone.

Everyone’s efforts had failed to reach them. The world’s strongest Crystal Magicians had made up their own minds. The Threat pouring down from the sky regardless felt like a mockery of those four’s self-sacrifice.

Sacrifice.

That word was lodged in the back of Natalena’s mind. Her soul refused to let its meaning sink in.

She did her best to ignore the fact that they pushed those four to that decision just as much as anyone else.

She couldn’t muster the strength to fight without letting the anger course through her body.

She flew from the broken window onto the side deck wearing a combination of her summer uniform and crystal armor. A lot of students were already there and she shouted a question after spotting some familiar faces.

“Um! Wh-where do we start!?”

“How should I know!? Everywhere, I guess!?”

They were as confused as she was. Yamane Deiri’s response seemed incoherent at first, but it was the most accurate possible answer. It didn’t matter if the Threat were good or evil. The simple fact was humanity would never have peace unless they exterminated every last Threat.

Normally, Karuta and the others would have instructed everyone here.

Natalena flew from the side deck.

The space elevator’s wire was no longer there in the sky. It had snapped near the bottom, so it had launched skyward like a stretched rubber band cut by scissors. It had flown with such speed it had formed a vertical contrail in its wake.

“Um, is that safe? How many tens of thousands of kilometers was it? And how many tons? Um, what if it falls back to the surface from way up high?”

“I-it’s probably fine. Carbon nanotube wires are thinner than paper, so they should catch the air and float slowly down.”

“Phew. That’s a relief, Nekoumi-”

“Now the smokestack part meant to protect it from the elements is a different story. That was only 30 thousand meters long, but it had to weigh tens of thousands of tons.”

“-senpaiiiiiiiiiii!!?”

Natalena twisted around in midair and dodged falling pieces of rubble, each larger than a school building. She was glad there was only ocean below them.

Yes, ocean.

The open ocean provided no cover for them to take shelter behind. Since they had previously launched so many beams of light it had looked like a planetarium’s star projector, the Threat had to have deadly weapons similar to anti-air lasers.

A Crystal Blossom transmission from Matsuda Imi reached everyone indiscriminately.

“Found them! They’re at the base of the space elevator. The artificial float looks like it’s sinking, but that’s the epicenter of the Threat swarm!!”

“The closest population center is the island we’re stopped at for the Port Day. That’s about 10km away, which might as well be nothing.” Hashizaki Tayori’s voice remained calm even now. “But the Threat might be even more trouble if they dive into the ocean than if they attack an island or city. Our aerial observations and bombings can’t reach the bottom of the ocean and we’ve seen the Threat operate underwater before. If we lose track of them here, we won’t know where they’ll attack and we won’t be able to touch them until they make that attack.”

Natalena heard explosions up ahead.

Imi and Tayori had left ahead of the others and had already started their bombing. Natalena also wanted to concentrate their firepower on any Threats with lasers or other anti-air capabilities.

However…

“Wait a second. The Threat swarm landed at the base of the space elevator, right?”

“The bombing takes priority. We can’t let them escape into the ocean.”

“B-but we need to check for survivors! I know the float is already sinking, but someone might still be alive!!”

“We’ll be taken out if we don’t eliminate the laser beam ones right away!! Besides, anyone there was part of the human string pullers! They’re the ones who sent Karuta and the others into the vacuum of space to die!! Why should we care what happens to monsters like that!?”

Yamane Deiri shook off Natalena’s request and flew even higher. He was preparing to join the bombing. And the divine name sealed inside his Crystal Blossom’s tiny printed circuit was Kagutsuchi. He specialized in flamethrowers and napalm.

The ground or the sky?

Natalena was briefly unsure which to attack.

But she ended up letting it happen. A large quantity of flammable and explosive materials flew right past her on their way down to the surface.

Flames blossomed on the badly damaged artificial float, enveloping the many Threats there. The fiery blossoms covered a strip of the artificial island following Yamane Deiri’s course through the sky.

“Ah, ahh. Ahhhhhhhhhh.”

A wordless voice carrying flat resentment arrived over a Crystal Blossom transmission.

Natalena grimaced.

Was that Sophia Firenze’s voice? The man she had wanted to protect even if it meant making an enemy of the entire world had to be in that burning world below Natalena now.

But she didn’t have time for sentiment. She felt a pull on her hand from the side just before green light streaked through the spot she had just been flying through.

Nekoumi Hirosuke shouted in the young girl’s ear.

“Th-this isn’t over yet!! The Threat’s attacks can reach us at this altitude!! We’re screwed if we don’t take them all out!!”

“Tayori here. I’m going to make an additional bombing run from west to east at an altitude of 3000. On the count of 20, I want everyone who can join in to take a different line!”

Were those the student council members assisting the gyaru? Several Crystal Magicians drew out a large cross and even more explosions blasted the surface, even tearing through the black smoke there. Something must have bent because a last-ditch laser beam flew off in the wrong direction and sliced off the peak of a mountain on a different island.

The Threat’s numbers were falling.

But how many human lives had Second Grimnoah’s bombing taken?

They had done the right thing. But what did that matter?

The Four Living Gods had been holding back the ugliness produced by humankind, but with them gone, it now struck Natalena’s young heart directly.

How had it been for her sister Anastasia?

Had this pressure finally broken her? Or had she found a way to enjoy it?

“…”

Was there any real meaning to this?

If other Threat swarms were falling all across the planet – Northern Hemisphere and Southern Hemisphere, Western Hemisphere and Eastern Hemisphere – then the 1000 Crystal Magicians from Second Grimnoah could never protect all 5.5 billion people no matter how hard they fought. And even if they managed to protect this corner of Southeast Asia where they just so happened to be, the rest of the Threat would approach from every other direction after slaughtering 99.9% of humanity. When hundreds of millions of Threats flooded them, they would eventually find they couldn’t keep up.

“W-we might be lucky we can still focus solely on the Threat.”

“Why’s that, Nekoumi-kun? Afraid someone might launch a nuke?”

The 5.5 billion population was at risk, so it was unusual no nuclear weapons had been used yet.

They doubted they had human good will or good sense to thank for that.

With so many Threats pushing in all at once, the military and governmental chains of command may have collapsed in a panic. Launching a nuclear weapon required an intricate process. The leader of some country out there might be screaming that suicidal command, but the launch process would never complete if the command never reached the nuclear technicians operating the actual machinery. The long fiber optic cables would have already been torn to shreds.

“Nukes, huh? So would you rather be killed by other humans or the Threat?”

“Yamane!! Enough pessimism. If you think your Big Sis Imi enjoys helping you out with stupid problems, you are sorely mistaken!!”

That said, they couldn’t stop either.

Only Crystal Magicians could fight the Threat. Even without a feasible long-term plan, the ordinary people within reach would be slaughtered if they didn’t help them.

For better or for worse, they were not that strong. They would be losing resources and narrowing down their chances, but they couldn’t bear to abandon people they could see needed help.

“Yamane-senpai, and everyone else too!! Look 5km southeast of the float! There’s a fishing boat!”

“Are you kidding me!? The area around the elevator is supposed to be off limits! I bet they’re part of the human string pullers’ defense force disguised as a fishing boat!!”

“No…” muttered Natalena after spotting something.

A different part of the horizon was squirming now. Whether they were the giant spider crab type or the blue-ringed octopus type, another clump of Threats had fallen to the surface and begun to expand in every direction.

In other words…

“Another swarm has fallen in that direction!! And there isn’t just one fishing boat, so I bet they were driven off of the land and tried to escape out at sea!!”

The bombing stopped as if in shock.

That may have been a mistake.

A green laser beam sliced through the sky. It came not from the elevator base below them but from the middle of the residential zone of a different island. A flight group in identical summer uniforms had arms and legs covered by crystal armor blown away and they fell from the sky.

They could have struck back from this distance, but the Threat was in a city this time. This time they wouldn’t be putting the human string pullers at risk. They had no idea how many perfectly ordinary people were in that city.

Matsuda Imi gave some advice.

“Drop to lower altitude!! They’ll keep sniping us if we don’t use the horizon as a shield!!”

Natalena obeyed. They needed to help their shot-down schoolmates regardless.

But descending brought them to the partially-sunk artificial float that had formed the base of the space elevator. It was crawling with all sorts of Threats.

There were a few broken crystal statues there.

Those were the students who had been shot down earlier. Even with an arm or a leg vaporized, they should have been able to avoid death using their regeneration, yet that hadn’t happened.

Natalena grimace when she set foot on the burnt ground to avoid the deadly laser beams.

“Are they playing dead!?”

Some nearby rubble rose up.

The giant shape responsible was a Threat with long legs much like a giant spider crab. The interior edge of their pincers glowed an unnatural orange.

Giving up on the long term and fighting from moment to moment left Natalena and the others with no chance of winning. Their odds would have been 50/50 with just one swarm of tens of thousands. With another swarm in the same aera, the pure numbers were enough to overwhelm them.

Nevertheless.

Natalena Blast had known death was coming eventually, but it had suddenly arrived right in front of her.

(Ah.)

She froze up.

The flow of time seemed to slow. Everything that had happened raced through her mind. It may have been more about recalling her regrets than trying to find a way out of her predicament.

What had she done to Utagai Karuta?

She had shouted about revenge and vengeance, sent violence his way, and vowed to kill him without even trying to learn what a harrowing path he had taken to reach that point.

She hadn’t done any better when they were retaking Second Grimnoah from the real Threat. He had taken the most dangerous path, taken on the dirty work, and emerged both battered and victorious, but she hadn’t managed to carry any of that weight for him.

She had been fully left out of the Catastrophe, so she hadn’t been able to stop that martial arts tournament that might as well have been a public execution.

She had been so selfish and thoughtless.

She had been so narrow-minded and short-tempered and she hadn’t even apologized.

She was always causing him problems.

Even in the very end, she hadn’t been able to save that upperclassman being crushed below such a great weight.

(Maybe I deserve to die.)

That was when the world’s strongest shot down from the heavens and pierced through the giant spider crab more sharply than a lightning strike.

That enormous thing suddenly sank straight down. Its black metal shell shattered and threw off sparks while its long legs sprawled out. The orange light slowly vanished from its motionless pincers.

Natalena doubted her eyes.

She couldn’t believe what she was seeing play out in front of her.

Then the flow of time returned for the small girl.

Everything felt so normal again that she couldn’t help but cry.

“Damn, are you sure you had those calculations right!? The landing obliterated my right leg!!”

“I very kindly decelerated you with my flight preset, so you have no right to complain. That was a freefall from the upper atmosphere, remember? Besides, Karuta, you can regenerate, so tie up the wound and wait 30 seconds. You’ll be fine.”

“Also, Omotesandou-san is kind of heav-”

“I will find a wheelchair somewhere now that we are in gravity’s grasp once more, but any careless comments out of you, Karuta-kun, and I will never forgive you.”

“Mhh.”

“Don’t you get upset too, Aine!! I haven’t caused you any trouble, so can you please act like it!?”

The ugly, oppressive atmosphere from a moment earlier was nowhere to be found.

The Four Living Gods’ presence seemed to give new color to the world.

“Sen…pai?”

She was afraid the slightest move would cause this to break apart.

But she couldn’t just let it pass her by either.

That would be no different from before.

She needed to touch him, push him, hit him, and confirm his presence.

Otherwise she couldn’t believe his warmth was really there.

She could not lean on him without placing a burden on him.

Tears fell from her eyes.

“Karuta-senpai!!!”

The boy slumped atop the squashed Threat looked her way and smiled.

Just like always.

Utagai Karuta had been like this from the very beginning. His stance hadn’t changed since he first fought Natalena aboard Second Grimnoah.

Don’t kill her.

He had stayed true all this time to the thing he had shouted when they first met.

“Ahh.”

“A lot has happened, but don’t you worry. This will all be over once we defeat the Threat. That hasn’t changed.”

“Wahhhh!! Ahhhhhhhhhhh!! AHhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!?”

How?

Not only were they spreading across the entire planet, but it wasn’t clear they could even defeat the Threats in this area.

Could she accept him ignoring those basic facts because he was the world’s strongest? She knew the limits of Crystal Magic, but even she felt like she could rely on him unconditionally.

His words carried that much weight.

Meanwhile, he looked up into the sky and said something more.

Even checking that his broken leg had recovered was secondary to him.

“More importantly, don’t let your guard down, Natalena.”

“?”

“We’ve come to help, but that isn’t the end of it. We’re the world’s strongest Crystal Magicians, so we need to keep fighting until the end!!”

The giant spider crab roared.

Aine’s colder-than-ice sword gave a flash to silence it before it could do anything and the laser attack from a blue-ringed octopus in the distance missed its mark.

Powerful but invisible infrared shined from a modified military flashlight and dazzled the blue-ringed octopus’s vision before it could fire.

Natalena heard a cracking sound.

Aine had stabbed her sword into a water bear’s thick metal armor, peeled it away, and stuck her skinny arm within. She pulled out a giant coiled something. It may have been some kind of linear cannon that magnetically launched shells because she rested it on her shoulder even though it was thicker around than her own torso.

The explosive blast became an invisible wall.

And with the roar of firing, the distant blue-ringed octopus was blown away by a metal shell.

More than that, a horizontal line was torn into the float’s ground between them.

Almost like it was creating an embankment to keep the Threat swarm away.

“Karuta!!”

The Crystal Blossom at his chest vibrated.

He was receiving a Crystal Blossom transmission from Amaashi Marika, also of the Four Living Gods.

“I’m flying above you right now. There are so many Threats they’re blotting out everything else, but what are our priority targets!?”

Karuta looked around, searching for something out of place within the black swarm. The pitch black wave looked like overwhelming numbers pushing in without fear, but keeping your cool and observing them calmly showed the group frequently contacting some specific units.

It helped having some advance information on this.

(Transline is a central figure to them because her job is to transmit power to them as a pipeline. That means they highly value energy and nourishment. They aren’t equipped with perpetual motion machines.)

“Marika, look 3000m to one o’clock from me!! The sea anemone ones serve a supply role where they exchange energy. If you see any more like that from the sky, blast them all with your laser beams!!!”

Several beams shot straight down from the sky. Marika was soaring through the sky faster than Mach 3 and shot the specified unit when she passed above it.

Destruction blossomed 3000m away.

Nevertheless, Karuta felt something hot on his right cheek. The blast must have thrown a sharp Threat shard all the way here.

And this did not end with the destruction of just the one Threat.

As soon as the sea anemone one exploded with a giant flash of light, the swarm around it began to convulse. Aine used her lasers to snipe the giant spider crab and water bear ones when their movements slowed. Some of the convulsing ones stopped moving altogether.

“Ksh!! Destruction confirmed. Ksshh -ooks like you were right! Ksshh!!”

Powerful noise ran through the Crystal Blossom transmission that was supposed to be immune to jamming or interception.

They had already experienced this when fighting the real Threat near the Port of Kobe. After defeating the Armored Warrior, who contained a massive amount of energy, something invisible had been radiated in every direction. That had shorted out the Threats spread out across the ocean nearby and rendered them inoperative like a powerful microwave or EMP attack.

Transline was the same.

Except she seemed to accidentally let it out when she laughed.

In other words…

“We don’t have to fight them all?” said Natalena Blast in a daze.

This was real hope.

With 1000 against 300 million, everyone could tell there was no chance of winning, but this changed all that. The mere presence of the Four Living Gods changed the world around them.

“So if we concentrate our attacks on the units that supply energy and that triggers a chain reaction from supply unit to supply unit, we can eliminate an entire Threat swarm with invisibly-linked destruction, Senpai!?”

Who knows where she found it, but the student council’s bob cut girl brought over a wheelchair.

“You go to so much trouble for me.”

“It is no trouble.”

“You can criticize me, you know?”

“That is not my job.”

Once she was elegantly seated once more, the president asked the girl a question in her usual calm fashion.

“If we send out every member of Second Grimnoah, we will not get a second chance. If we want a chance to recover after a failure, we need to have unnecessary personnel fall back and set up a rotation of fighters. Can you do that?”

“Of course.”

The president brushed the hair from her shoulder and cut right to the chase.

“We need to assume any plan that looks safe has a landmine just waiting for us to step on it. Remember, there are 300 million of them. We cannot win if this stretches out into a long-term battle.”

Those four’s presence had changed the world.

Everything literally looked brighter and more colorful and the previous weight was nowhere to be found.

Second Grimnoah really had been built for them.

Letnahe could not use a Crystal Blossom, so she called them on the phone.

“I have picked up a new reading on sonar. A new Threat group is headed your way. This group is probably distinct from the island and peninsula groups we have already seen. I have reports of a major Threat migration from the coast guard in northern Australia!!”

They already had their hands full. If another Threat army joined in, they wouldn’t just be forced onto the defensive – they would collapse altogether.

But Natalena Blast saw a thin smile on Karuta’s face as that merciless report came in.

Like a war god.

Like a fighter god.

It wasn’t even about the divine name sealed in the Crystal Blossom’s small printed circuit. He may not have felt the need to rely on that anymore.

“Glad to hear it.”

A pointy crystal broke off of his cheek.

Fresh skin appeared below and his smile grew much more aggressive.

“Second Grimnoah only has 1000 Crystal Magicians, but the Threat is sending 300 million down across the entire planet. You seem to think that means we can’t fight this war, but that’s where you’re wrong.”

“Um, Senpai?”

“If one area shows significant success against the Threat, the surrounding Threats have to head there as reinforcements. Which means fewer Threats in the areas we can’t reach.”

“Oh,” gasped Natalena.

He viewed the world differently.

He wasn’t just fighting the enemy in front of him. He wasn’t wasting the small fighting force they had left because he couldn’t bear to sit idly by and watch people be killed. Nor was he trapped by a self-destructive desire to accept death as long as he got a good fight in first.

He was looking at the entire world.

He was looking to the ordinary people who weren’t strongest, weren’t special, and couldn’t fight.

“We just have to avoid losing and remain the world’s strongest! That’s all it takes!! The ripple spreading from this one drop can go on to save the entire planet!!!”

Some might say it wasn’t possible.

Just like the Threat highly valued energy and nourishment, Karuta’s group could only keep fighting for so long. They might be fine now, but if the battle stretched on, the exhaustion would get the better of them and they would fail to push back the 300 million Threats.

“Not necessarily.”

“?”

“The more densely packed the Threat, the easier it is to start a chain reaction. And if we want to defeat all 300 million at once, we just have to focus on the unit managing all of their energy and nourishment. The more we do that, the wider and deeper the damage from that invisible radiation. I’ve already given the answer, Natalena.”

The boy looked up into the blue sky and gave a shout.

“Get down here, Transline! You’re the strongest Threat, so if we defeat you, this all ends!!!”

Part 4

Transline didn’t even need to descend to the surface.

She had easily torn through the kilometers-long space station at the top of the space elevator. The only habitable area was now a pile of debris floating in space, but that didn’t matter to her.

“Hee hee.”

She was laughing the same as always while staring down at the blue planet.

That was enough for invisible energy to leak out of her, which made a nearby Threat spark and cease to function.

There was no air here, so her voice did not reach anyone beyond herself.

“I asked you to let me join the fun, world’s strongests. You didn’t think a mere 36 thousand kilometers was enough to invalidate our promise, did you?”

She reached out her lithe hand.

She was the core of the entire system. She was not designed for direct combat, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t fight.

Her role was to transmit power. So how could she convert that energy into a deadly force?

Crystal Magic was not the only strongest power.

She had one too.

(I could use a laser beam, a linear gun, or a high-frequency guillotine missile. Using a microwave cannon to cook them like they are inside a giant microwave oven could be fun.)

“Well, when you want to know your opponent’s abilities, it is always best to go with the standard choice that comes to mind first.”

Destroying the world was no more than an ordinary benchmark test to her. That was in fact why she had sent all the previous Threats to Earth.

The vacuum tubes across her body filled with heat and glowed with a pale light.

A green glowing orb swirled past her outstretched palm.

A Threat incapacitated earlier (that was shaped like a whip spider, which are so creepy you probably shouldn’t search for an image of them) had its armor glow red from heat before the entire unit began to melt like a piece of hard candy in a flame.

“If something this basic annihilates them, then that’s all they were worth. I can search out another world’s strongest afterwards.”’

Countless vacuum tubes grew from her elbows, knees, back, and head as her smile deepened.

“Hee hee. Ah ha ha!! So prove your worth, Four Living Gods!!!”

Green destruction pierced straight down from heaven to earth.

The attack was designed to reach the planet’s core. If the Original Crystal Embryo had chosen to interfere with her hobby and way of life, she would have eliminated it with this.

It shouldn’t have been possible to dodge.

And their barriers were meaningless against a direct hit from this. The attack would pierce right through the target, the crust, the magma below, and finally reach the center of the planet.

And yet…

“…”

Her smile vanished.

Transline froze in place with arm still outstretched.

Something wasn’t right.

“What is this?”

Part 5

It was true Utagai Karuta could not have defeated Transline.

She could supply enough energy to power a total of 300 million Threats, so her power was immense. No human technique could ever hope to defend against that. Even a combination of all the barriers belonging to every last one of Second Grimnoah’s Crystal Magicians would have been pierced through to slice Utagai Karuta apart.

Fighting the normal way would never work.

But he was the world’s strongest. It was wrong to assume he would only fight the normal way.

“Sacri-sama.”

“I…know!”

There had been hints of this already.

Before atmospheric reentry, Crystal Girl Aine had stolen Threat parts to steal their abilities. She had concluded her barrier wasn’t enough and improvised.

She had done it again once on the surface. She had stolen a water bear’s weapon and used the linear cannon to blast a blue-ringed octopus from a distance.

Aine could steal Threat parts and make them her own. She could expand her own functionality.

But was that all she could do?

What if no such restriction existed?

What if she could steal powers and abilities that didn’t come from the Threat?

Then couldn’t she do this too?

“Omotesandou-san!!”

“Yes, leave it to me. I have the knowledge and techniques of a Regulation 3!!”

Student Council President Omotesandou Kyouka was the only Main Category Regulation 3 still alive. But for some reason, she had lost her ability to use that power after the fall of the first ship.

But that was fine.

Karuta too was a student of the Crystal Magic school.

The older girl smiled thinly.

“We’re both Second Grimnoah Crystal Magicians. I was simply further along in the process, but knowing your skill, I know you would have reached Regulation 3 eventually, Karuta-kun. So what if that happens a little sooner than intended?”

If something could absorb Kyouka’s knowledge and techniques and link them with Karuta’s healthy body, they could reproduce the godlike abilities of a Regulation 3.

They just needed a host to bring together the Four Living Gods.

They just needed to link themselves through Crystal Girl Aine.

“Kh!!”

Karuta felt a hot pain at his chest.

It came from his Crystal Blossom.

He wouldn’t necessarily fully understand just because someone who understood it gave him a quick explanation. To make matters worse, his Crystal Blossom’s original setup had been full of errors. For example, he couldn’t activate any crystal armor and he was forced to share the presets of flight, barrier, and regeneration with Aine. If the way he used his power or the route and strength of that power were well off of average, then what Kyouka taught him might not work.

He grimaced, but another girl stepped up alongside him.

“Don’t worry.”

It was his curly twintails childhood friend – Amaashi Marika.

She lent him the powerful directionality that could send chaotically raging power along a single path.

That was her very nature due to her singlemindedness that could seem downright violent at times.

“I’m the standard version of the strongest, don’t you think? I can help boost your strength, so don’t worry about a thing.”

The pain in his chest vanished.

The power stabilized.

Karuta and Aine stood side by side and shared the same sword like a newlywed couple facing their wedding cake.

They held the sword up toward the heavens.

“Sacri-sama.”

“Right.”

Of course, Aine’s katana was not meant to be used primarily as a laser sniper rifle. The close-range sword was the main weapon and jitte-like branch was only a support device.

They couldn’t expect to hit a target 36 thousand kilometers away in geosynchronous orbit.

But that didn’t matter.

“This is…our…”

Karuta and Aine activated magic so powerful it threatened to shatter the crystal sword from the inside.

It took the reverse route of the blast Transline had launched earlier.

They were the Four Living Gods, so the four of them joined their voices as one.

“…world’s strongesttttttttttttttttttttttttttttt!!!”

Let’s review some definitions.

Regulation 1 could glide over the ground or sea, Regulation 2 could fly high in the sky, and Regulation 3 had the power to manipulate dimensions themselves.

So with the power of a Regulation 3, they could slice through the dimensions to cut down any Threat!!

Part 6

Something flashed from the blue planet.

The battle was probably over from the moment Transline saw it.

“Ha ha.”

As usual, there was a smile on her face at that moment.

She heard a sparking sound.

She looked down to see a hole larger than a fist in the center of her chest. In the vacuum of space, she wouldn’t hadn’t heard a thing even if it happened a centimeter away. The only sounds she could hear were the vibrations traveling through her own body.

That meant the sparking had come from her.

The barrier in between and her own armor hadn’t mattered in the slightest. A Regulation 3 was someone who had mastered Crystal Magic and they could tear through anything, along with the dimension it resided in, and toss it out into an unknown dimension.

“I was right after all.”

She was tearing apart.

The hole in her chest was widening.

The vastness of her power meant it didn’t take long for her to break apart once something got that ball rolling. Not even she could stop it.

“Hee hee. No matter how much you celebrate your own prosperity, there is a limit a single species can never pass. Just like a natural crystal is surprisingly fragile to external impacts!! Ah ha ha! In that sense, I was right! I wasn’t wrong!! It was the combination of the carbon-based humans and the silicon-based…whatever that was. They had to intentionally accept that impurity into their group to achieve this flexibility as a lifeform! In moderation, even a burden or impact can trigger growth. You can’t just focus on perfect cleanliness in your precise factory!! Hee hee hee, gya ha!! This is the form the future must take!!!”

That was as far as she got.

The bright light escaping her began an explosive expansion.

Her beautiful feminine silhouette vanished in the light that soon enveloped everything.

Part 7

Something fell from the sky.

It was a collection of junk. The dragonfly, ladybug, and other winged Threats that had attempted aerial combat had lost power and started dropping.

That wasn’t all.

All the wriggling movement around Karuta’s group ceased like a switch had been thrown. Had they simply lost power, or had they lost all purpose without anyone left to give them orders?

Young Natalena took a nervous look around. The look on her face said the silence scared her more than all the noise had.

“The Threat…has stopped?”

To learn what had happened over a wider area, the blonde girl diverted a portion of her attention to the Crystal Blossom transmissions and then frowned.

She heard only static.

A massive explosion had occurred outside of the atmosphere. The radiated microwave and EMP energy may indeed have been negatively affecting various forms of communication. It would be surprising if Transline’s defeat didn’t cause some sort of problems.

But this had to be more than that.

Karuta glared overhead.

“So Crystal Blossom communications aren’t working either.”

“Senpai? Um…”

“Natalena, use any other method – flashing lights, semaphore, or whatever else you know – and tell everyone flying up there to land immediately. If they don’t, they’ll fall from the sky once they lose their power. I have my doubts even their regeneration will work.”

Meanwhile, Natalena noticed a further change.

It started as a quiet, cracking sound. Marika was the only other one nearby with crystal armor out and Natalena watched as her rapier device blurred, shattered, and disappeared into thin air. But that wasn’t all. The crystal armor itself slowly peeled away from her body and vanished.

The same happened to Natalena. This had never happened before. Not even the broken shards remained.

Something unusual was underway, so she widened her eyes.

“W-wait a minute. What’s happening here!?”

“Crystal Magic comes from the conflict between the power pouring down from space and the power of the Original Crystal Embryo. So what happens when one of those powers goes away?”

Natalena Blast could not answer.

Because she saw the answer before she could give it.

Crystal Girl Aine.

Yes, that was right.

Amaashi Marika’s rapier device, all the students’ crystal armor, and everything else that came from Crystal Magic had disappeared. It didn’t just leave their skin and it didn’t just shatter. They couldn’t use their flight or even communicate with their Crystal Blossoms.

So what would happen to Aine?

No one could answer that.

Natalena Blast had been shouting in alarm before, but now her breath caught in her throat. Saying the words felt like they would turn her suspicions into a horrific truth. Maybe everyone here was imagining it all? They had never seen this phenomenon before, but she still gasped at the conclusion she reached without real proof.

And finally…

It was of course Utagai Karuta who spoke.

“Aine.”

“Yes, Sacri-sama?”

“Let’s go for a walk.”

There was no response.

But that was just coincidence. Aine was still there.

For now.

But for how long?

The cracking sound coming from within the crystal girl was quiet, but it was not stopping. Something was happening inside her. Fear weighed on Karuta’s chest with definite color, shape, and weight. There was no turning back time. Marika, Kyouka, Natalena, Deiri, Hirosuke, Imi, Tayori, and everyone else didn’t stop the two of them.

They had saved the world, but it ended here.

There was nothing beyond this point.

Part 8

Utagai Karuta and Crystal Girl Aine walked side by side.

Anywhere would have worked, so they slowly walked toward the nearby concrete embankment running alongside the ocean.

They said nothing.

That may have been normal for Aine. She generally never said a word unless he spoke to her first.

She stuck to that even now.

Her outlines wavered and blurred as a cracking sound came form her. Someone whose existence relied on Crystal Magic was vanishing as she broke apart from the inside.

“Aine,” called Karuta.

“Yes, Sacri-sama?”

She could still respond. Just like always. That should have made him happy, but he couldn’t help but see it as a final resistance on her part.

“Sorry about all this,” he continued.

“You have done nothing requiring an apology.”

The embankment was not a road.

It would end eventually. It didn’t lead anywhere, so they would eventually reach a dead end. From there, they would only find the sea, which felt like a symbol of death.

There was nowhere to go.

They couldn’t get around this one.

Utagai Karuta bit his lip. He was trembling. Aine’s outlines began to fade, but she tilted her head like she always did.

“Ahhh.”

He couldn’t take it anymore.

Maybe it helped that no one else could see him. All the emotion rushed into his chest at once.

Why did everyone call him the world’s strongest?

He was entirely powerless here.

“Ahhhhhhhhh!! Gahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!”

He clung to her.

He fell to his knees and clung to her flat chest to confirm she hadn’t shattered into nothingness.

But the most desolate sound he had ever heard had not stopped.

“No. How is this fair!?”

“Sacri-sama.”

“We fought the 300 million Threats and defeated Transline even after she offered us a path to an unacceptable peace!! We worked so hard to keep everyone alive, so…so why does it have to end like this!? Why does eliminating the Threat have to take you from us!? The world won’t let us have anything, will it!!?”

The Problem Solvers had trampled everyone in their path as the lonely elites at the top.

Riho, Sanae, and Alice had burned with rage when someone they cared deeply about was taken from them.

The Armored Warrior had its dreams and ideals about humanity shattered.

Even the human string pullers had stooped to such depths because there was something they wanted to protect.

But.

But.

Who said Utagai Karuta’s pain and anger were in any way inferior to theirs?

“Sacri-sama.”

The crystal girl called to him just as briefly but more strongly than before.

“Crystal Magic is a half-baked phenomenon created from the conflict between the energy pouring down from space and the energy of the Original Crystal Embryo. It is like the sparks produced when two electrodes collide. You knew that from the beginning.”

“…”

She was the partner who had stayed by his side this whole time, accepted his weaknesses, and never gave up on him.

Why couldn’t he save her?

Why couldn’t he think up some way?

“I knew this was coming because the Original Crystal Embryo at the center is also supported by magic. But I could not abandon the 5.5 billion remaining on Earth. Wasn’t that our choice as the Four Living Gods? So I fought until the very end. I thought you felt the same.”

Yes, he had.

He had thrown out the fantasy of seeking happiness for just the four of them!!

And he had held some fundamental doubts about their Crystal Magic from the moment they decided to settle things with the Threat!! But still!!

“I thought a miracle would happen.”

“A miracle?”

“No, I had no reason to think one would. No, I didn’t have anything prepared. But. But you worked so hard. There are 5.5 billion people alive now because of your power! So can’t the universe throw us a bone just this once!?”

“All of our battles should have taught you that hoping that things will turn out all right ‘just because’ never solves anything.”

Miracles did not happen.

For better or for worse, if you wanted to win, you needed to find a path to victory yourself.

Nothing remained to support Crystal Girl Aine.

She had been summoned as an error when the Crystal Blossom was activated before a god’s name was sealed inside. Utagai Karuta knew more about her than anyone, but not even he could find a way to support her here.

“Is there anything I can do?”

He raised his mess of a face.

She was as expressionless as ever even as cracking sounds continued to come from her. She remained faithful even now.

He wanted to pull something out of her. Maybe he could only extract her mind, but he wanted to permanently preserve it somewhere.

So.

“No one can deny that you saved this world. 5.5 billion people owe you their lives. So you can ask anything and I mean anything. Is there anything at all I can do for you?”

“Then I do have one meaningless and selfish request before I leave.”

She placed her small hands on his shoulders and whispered something in his ear. He looked surprised at first, but he finally nodded.

He shut his eyes.

She stood up on her toes and stretched upwards just enough to cover the space between their lips.

That was all.

He felt nothing on his lips as her outlines fully vanished from the world.

The Crystal Blossom at his chest shattered and the wind carried it away.

Epilogue

Epilogue

For the above reasons, the organized usage of Crystal Magic has become unfeasible.

Thus, Second Grimnoah has no further reason to exist. The school shall be closed on the personal decision of the Four Living Gods.

“Nhhh.”

Amaashi Marika raised both arms and stretched her back.

She was wearing a casual T-shirt and shorts.

No longer would she wear a school uniform.

Second Grimnoah was gone, but she had grown accustomed to living overseas and had no interest in returning to Japan. She had traveled through a few different countries since. She might never find anywhere she wanted to settle down. Maybe she was really searching for the school life she had enjoyed on that ship.

But that was not coming back.

Building a Third Grimnoah now would be meaningless. It just wouldn’t be the same without them all there.

“America’s West Coast and East Coast feel so different. I wonder if I would like it more in Hollywood or New York?”

She was still indecisive, but she had ultimately chosen New York. Maybe a big city on the West Coast would have reminded her too much of fighting Anastasia Blast in Silicon Valley.

“Marika?” called her friend Matsuda Imi.

Gyaru-ish Hashizaki Tayori was with her and the three of them remained an inseparable trio.

“You put sunscreen on, I hope? The cameraman won’t be happy if you soak up too much UV.”

“I get it with a video, but this is a photoshoot. I don’t see why it matters if my tan is a little different between shots.”

“I think it’s related to the concept of the photoshoot or something? I don’t really know.”

“I bet it doesn’t matter at all and this is just another way of the adults showing off that they’re in charge.”

While Marika was complaining, Tayori was on her phone communicating with her large family. At least she was doing well.

Yes, a phone.

Marika was all too aware of the solid object in her shorts pocket. She was social media friends with Karuta and her friends, so she could still contact them while they were apart.

“Wait, what is your problem, Sophia-sensei? Why do you look more nervous than Japanese people like us!? This is New York! Everyone here speaks English!”

Marika was answered by a quiet groan.

The woman in a suit looked like someone had dumped a bucket of cold water on her.

“Umm, why exactly am I being dragged around the world and visiting New York? Crystal Magic teacher isn’t even a job anymore.”

“Yeah, but the paperwork and coordination is such a pain, so I wanted a manager or assistant who could handle that for me.”

“Ah!!”

“And like you said, you don’t have a job anymore. This is a pretty nice job to have handed to you, so you need to enjoy it!!”

Matsuda Imi and Hashizaki Tayori had their own conversation while watching Marika and Sophia from a short distance away.

“(Why can’t Marika just come out and say she wants to help her out since she feels responsible for the death of that old man related to her.)”

“(She probably thinks saying it out loud would ruin it. Still, drowning her in work might help distract her from her sorrow.)”

“Imi? Tayori?”

“Yes, yes,” said the two girls, rejoining Marika.

“They’re selling some donuts in wild colors on the side of the road there. Pink, sky blue, and…one, two, three, four, five- wow, seven colors! They have a whole rainbow!!”

“Scarf all of those down and the adults carrying those notebooks around will cry, Marika. You’re going to be filming several days in a row.”

“Don’t worry, Imi. Unlike you, my body sends everything I eat straight to my chest.”

“I will literally kill you, Marika.”

“The cameraman won’t like it if your boobs suddenly grow either. People will assume you got implants.”

So what exactly were these three girls doing nowadays?

First of all, the casual T-shirt and shorts Marika wore apparently cost well over 10 thousand dollars. And it was part of an advertisement deal with the luxury brand, so not only did she get to wear it for free, she got paid for it.

Marika wanted to call herself a world-famous supermodel, but it wasn’t clear what exactly was needed to earn the “super” qualifier. It would be most accurate to say she worked getting advertisement deals with famous companies, taking photos and videos, and setting worldwide fashion trends. At the very least, those three were earning looks of jealousy and envy from supermodels the world over.

Amaashi Marika smiled in the bright sun.

“Being the world’s strongest isn’t enough for me. I want a life that constantly makes me smile☆”

Omotesandou Kyouka had returned to Japan.

She was in the deep part of Kyoto that felt entirely cut off from the flow of time. Her home was so full of Japanese tradition people might mistake it for part of a samurai movie set.

But what kind of place was the Omotesandou family home?

They officially ran shogi and go classes, which allowed them to hold gatherings and get-togethers with the upper classes, but it was most accurate to say they used their connections to build up their assets.

They got people to unwittingly reveal the worries they couldn’t let anyone know about and then swiftly and discreetly resolved them. No one gave a thought to the methods they used. The entrance and exit were clear and everyone was willing to put on a blindfold and walk through the dark tunnel as long as they knew safety and security awaited them on the other side. That was the opportunity they provided for the powerful.

They were an ancient advisor family that had been following the motto of “there is no such thing as a free lunch” possibly as far back as the Heian period. There may have been a time when they were known as onmyoji or exorcists. As long as that performance could preserve their influence and repel their enemies, they would have gladly donned the costume and played their tricks.

Had the Omotesandou family ever actually come in contact with real magic?

Perhaps they had, but it didn’t matter in the end.

They were only interested in the end result. There was no need to shine a light in the dark, narrow tunnel.

“Phew.”

She no longer needed her wheelchair.

The kimono girl calmly sat on the floor.

All the Machiavellian scheming in the student council room had been harmless by comparison. Same for the black-haired bob cut girl and red-haired bun girl who had worshiped her like puppies or Letnahe Kurent who had been sent by the human string pullers. They had at least used real magic. Once you won the magical conflict with them, you could breathe a sigh of relief and relax.

(I wonder what that teacher is doing now. She never could choose between her family and her first love.)

Secretly friending Kiyosawa Hadome on social media would be the standard play, but she wouldn’t be foolish enough to screw up and let her husband see that name on her phone screen, causing her happy family to collapse around her. Unless she actually wanted to live out her own foreign-style melodrama with relationship issues as complicated as the Greek gods. But simply saying goodbye to the man was even more impossible for her. With the human string pullers gone, she had returned to her day job (so she could earn enough money to support her family), so hopefully she wasn’t secretly using the Indian navy’s military satellites to stalk him.

Kimono-wearing Kyouka calmly viewed the wind chimes hanging from the eaves.

Her much-younger brother sat awkwardly across from her.

The wordless pressure radiating from her was too much for Shouka and he couldn’t look her in the eye. The lack of a cushion below him seemed to illustrate the tension between them. Kyouka had stolen it away to giver herself the VIP two-cushion treatment.

“Um, sister?”

“Yes?”

“Did I do something wrong? You’ve been acting like this ever since you returned home.”

“Oh, dear. How strange. Hee hee. If you really do not understand, then how do you know I am so angry? Are you a mind reader now?”

Even if he had been manipulated by the human string pullers, he had still betrayed his sister. She needed to settle the score there.

Shouka shrank down even further.

“Sister.”

“Yes, what is it?”

“I can’t stand this any longer. Could you just get it over with and climb on top of me and slap me a few times?”

“No, I am not going to reward you like that. Why must I defile my soul with violence when I am the victim here? I refuse to grow violent and make myself the attacker here. All I will do is view you with pity, so you can rest easy there.”

“Then what’s going to happen?”

“Nothing at all. I will simply never forget.”

“Ugh.”

“And when I say never, I mean I am taking this one to the grave. Listen, Shouka. I will not do anything other than remember this forever.”

“That’s what I can’t bear! I’m willing to say goodbye to my front teeth, so just give me a good punch! I don’t care if you increase your punching power by holding your phone in your hand!! So let’s put this behind us, okay!?”

“Not happening.”

“Eek! Sisterrrrr!!!”

She looked away from her adorable brother who tearfully clung to her and she stuck out her tongue where he couldn’t see her.

(Curious that smartphone culture has made it here as well.)

But it made sense given how useful those devices were for their purposes.

The upper classes had their unique problems. She had returned to a family tied up with lots of old traditions, so her life would be bound by a number of restrictions from now on. But it meant a lot that she would have all the data necessary to blow off some steam if things ever got too bad.

She was connected to Karuta, Marika, and her former student council through social media, but she still wanted someone who shared this space with her.

“Well, I was the one that refused to turn away from this, no matter how messed up it can be.”

Utagai Karuta had remained in a corner of Southeast Asia.

Once it was shut down, Second Grimnoah had been moored at a giant shipyard. The ship had been based on a luxury cruise ship, but no one was willing to buy it because its excessive size would mean sky-high fuel costs and a difficult time filling all the rooms with customers. So it would probably be demolished eventually.

He sat in the summer sun on a concrete embankment, looking up into the sky.

This was the same dead end where he had once stood with Aine.

The Threat swarms that had covered the sky and Transline who had managed them all were no more. The facility she had called a factory was apparently still around, but it was probably too far away to reach in a human lifetime.

So this was the end of an age.

The Age of Crystal Magic was over.

No one in the world needed it anymore.

That was why Second Grimnoah was no longer a school and Karuta sat all alone on the embankment staring at the retired ship day in and day out.

But he couldn’t keep doing this forever.

Everyone else was starting down their own paths.

He was the only one who still hadn’t moved on.

But he had decided to change that.

He wouldn’t be fighting anymore. He didn’t need to hang onto that modified military flashlight.

He needed some way of signaling a change.

“Aine,” he muttered.

And…

“Yes, Sacri-sama? Did you need something?”

She emerged from his body.

The expressionless crystal girl looked the same as always.

He scratched his cheek in the sea breeze.

“It’s been so long and I can still use Crystal Magic. Does this confirm my theory?”

“Perhaps.”

Transline had been a powerful being who controlled 300 million Threats. The noise produced by her explosion had been intense enough to kill all of the Threats on Earth and keep Crystal Magic from working. The presets of flight and regeneration had failed and Crystal Girl Aine’s very existence had grown unstable and nearly vanished.

But the factory and their power source were still somewhere out in space.

Transline had said she was the one who transmitted the power, which suggested something else out there was generating the power. Maybe a red-hot planet and maybe some kind of artificial facility.

Crystal Magic was a new form of magic that used the conflict between the energy pouring down from space and the energy of the Original Crystal Embryo.

So the defeat of the power transmitter had not been enough to keep Crystal Magic from working altogether. Once the invisible wall of noise faded with time, Crystal Magic had stabilized again.

Aine sat next to Karuta and looked to the shipyard.

If they were going to get a new start, it had to happen here.

If they turned away from the ocean dead end and walked back along the embankment, they would find the whole world waiting for them.

He could walk with the crystal girl again like normal.

“Was there any need to shut down Second Grimnoah when Crystal Magic still functions?”

“You’re looking at it backwards.” Karuta sighed. “Why leave behind a facility that mass-produces world’s strongests when we don’t have anyone to fight any more? Do that and some overpowered Crystal Magician would turn into a criminal intent on destroying the world. I never want to fight to the death with another Crystal Magician. And if that happens, everyone will see us as the new Threat.”

“If you say so.”

“On the other hand, it’s hard to let go of the power and status you already have. In the end, someone had to play the villain and create an opportunity for that to happen. And no one could do that other than the Four Living Gods.”

The human string pullers had been destroyed by the Threat.

And they were unlikely to ever see the Threat again either.

Simplifying the state of the world had its pros and its cons. Without anyone else to fight, the world would likely start to notice how frightening it was for people to wield anything as powerful as Crystal Magic.

For example, Aine’s sword was the most reliable weapon Karuta could think of, but it went without saying what would happen if she started swinging it around for no reason in the middle of a peaceful city.

“Come to think of it.”

“?”

“I have been unstable for a time thanks to the noise produced by Transline’s defeat. That has kept us from completing the task we began back then.”

Aine gently shut her eyes.

Karuta was still searching his memory when she moved straight toward him.

Their lips touched.

His mind went blank.

Come to think of it, she had requested that, hadn’t she?

He was so caught off guard that more than three seconds passed before he managed to react.

“Wait, Aine!!?”

“?”

She quizzically tilted her head.

Her emotions were as much of a mystery as ever. Although she at least seemed to find it embarrassing to be seen naked.

“Sacri-sama, your deepest desire was for days like this, not to continue fighting the Threat as the world’s strongest or to depart on journey into the unknown with the four of us, wasn’t it?”

“…Yeah.”

He wasn’t childish enough to try and deny it.

Besides, Aine was a part of him, so she knew all of the weak and ugly parts of him.

She slowly traced her finger along her own lips.

“This was not a one-time thing.”

“Um, it wasn’t?”

"We must keep at it. Now that I have seen the ultra aggressive desires found in your fantasy, I know I have my work cut out for me if I hope to fulfill all of those desires on my own.”

“Please stop bringing that up! And fantasies are only fantasies!! You don’t have to make them come true!!”

Karuta quickly moved to stop her.

Apparently it was a problem to have someone know you too well.

“So what will you do now, Sacri-sama?”

“I’m not sure.”

The phrase “world’s strongest” had lost its value and he had abandoned the Living God title himself. What could he do now that he was only Utagai Karuta?

How big was this world that he had briefly considered giving up on and leaving behind?

“But first, we have one last problem to deal with.”

“?”

“Remember Omotesandou-san’s final secret? About how the people killed on the first ship don’t actually need more than 7000 years to recover? We need to deal with that.”

“Oh, that.”

Aine stared off into the distance.

Someone was running toward them along the long embankment while hopping and waving her hand. That was Natalena.

“So that is why you remained so close to Second Grimnoah.”

Karuta stood up and made a suggestion while viewing that ship.

He smiled.

It was the smile of an ordinary boy – something he had never shown while he was merely the world’s strongest.

“It’s about time for Gekiha and the others to wake up. Aine, let’s go greet them. We can join the new era after that.”

Afterword

Afterword

Apocalypse Witch has reached its 5th volume.

This is Kamachi Kazuma.

This ends the story of Utagai Karuta and the others who started out on a quest for revenge and accidentally ended up the world’s strongest. I hope you enjoyed their final battle as well.

With this series, I tasked myself with creating a new magic system, which is different from Blood Sign where I was creating a new mythology. What did you think of Crystal Magic that uses the conflict between two invisible energies, similar to reading a weather map. With supernatural powers, I think the trick is making something people would want to use themselves with enough room for expansion that they can consider how they would use the power differently if it were them. I hope you felt that here.

I made the final boss a character who manages the energy pouring down from space. The Threat’s supply system was touched on in Volume 3, but I’ve always been fascinated with energy supply networks – including the generation, transfer, transformation, and distribution of power – so I included that idea in the systems used by both Crystal Magic and the Threat. I quite like Transline’s absurd strength that makes her accidentally release deadly energy whenever she laughs. I also think one of the scariest things for people is someone who can’t be reasoned with because the more they like you, the more they want to kill you, but what did you think?

I think Transline’s defeat came from the fact that she didn’t see it as a fight. If she had understood how her opponents viewed her actions, the battle might have ended differently.

Also, I ended this with the protagonist team each going their separate ways toward the future. I think that might be a first for the series I’ve worked on. One defining trait of this series is how Karuta, Marika, and Kyouka each have their own separate world they live in, which I think gave things a unique tension. Because they had somewhere else they could go, you never knew when the strongest team might break apart. You might be able to use that in a death game or gambling series where the characters are placed in the same location but they each have their own unique goals to bet their survival on.

Their growth can really be seen if you compare the extreme tension of Volume 1 to Volume 5. At the very least, they’ve reached a point where they can crack jokes while fighting. That seems like a positive change at first, but take that far enough, and they could end up including inappropriate “games” in their battles like the Problem Solvers did.

Through all his fighting, Karuta settled on the idea that they were only the world’s strongest when all four of them were together. That is why their group never broke apart due to arguments during their battles and why they chose to go their separate ways when they needed to eliminate the strongest from the now peaceful world. I think that ability to freely switch their strongest status on and off is their biggest difference from the Problem Solvers and the Threat. That term “strongest” had been plaguing them like a curse, so they separated themselves from it and found a way to control it. I hope that acts as one possible answer to the series-wide question of what it means to be the world’s strongest.

I give my thanks to my illustrator Mika Pikazo-san and to my editors Anan-san, Nakajima-san, and Hamamura-san. I can never thank you enough for giving such visual color and beauty to such a harsh story. I hope we have a chance to work together again in the future.

And I give my thanks to the readers. This series was meant to dig into the idea of the world’s strongest magicians from the negative side of humanity and I am truly grateful you stuck with it to the end. The series demonstrated the strongest from a number of angles: those taking revenge, those being targeted for revenge, those trying to protect the world, and those trying to destroy the world. What did you think of all that? I hope they will continue to live on your hearts forevermore.

And I will end this here.

…I actually kind of like the fantasy ending too (ha ha).

-Kamachi Kazuma

?

His bangs fluttered in a gentle breeze.

The salty scent suggested this came from an open window, not the air conditioning. It also contained a hint of disinfectant, so this may have been a hospital.

“Ugh,” he groaned, belatedly realizing this meant he could actually say things.

And his bangs could now flutter in a breeze.

He was no longer frozen as a crystal statue. But how was that possible? Hadn’t he, the teachers, and the others students been helplessly slaughtered by those five strongests?

“Hi.”

He heard a voice.

Someone was looking down at him where he lay in a bed.

He recognized the boy.

Except the boy’s face looked a bit older than when he had last seen it.

He couldn’t get up from the bed, so he only stared up in confusion as the boy in a summer school uniform spoke to him.

“Morning, Gekiha. Took you long enough to wake back up, you old bastard.”

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