City Series:Volume6e Chapter8

Chapter 8: The Promise Arrives

8/24/1943 04:22 – 05:41

It is time to conclude this battle

Does following the past give our actions meaning?

Or does not following it give them meaning?

The choice is ours

Part 1

The eastward acceleration began all at once.

Sylphide pursued the RB-21, flying in its airstream pocket.

Hazel wielded Rein König and Berger wielded Gelegenheit atop Sylphide’s roof.

A half-yard wooden box sat at Hazel’s feet. Its contents were a motley collection.

Rings, short swords, torn-off medals, coins, memos, and more were all thrown inside.

“I asked for anything carrying memory Lives, but I didn’t expect every single one of them to have something.”

“Will you be using that to create the dragon?”

“Yes. I figured using this would allow some of their memories to become a part of this land.”

And…

“I will see them all in my dream. In my dream of standing at the forefront of a thousand years of history.”

She looked up to see the northern sky on her left. A light other than the moon shined near the North Sea there.

That was the North Star.

She recalled when Sylphide had flown up toward that star.

Then Corelle spoke over the exterior speaker.

“We’re approaching our limit here! It’s going to catch up behind us in another 30 seconds!”

Hazel nodded and shouted.

“Sylphide!”

<The Wind races across the sky.>

Sylphide accelerated upwards while keeping itself parallel to the ground. It emerged from the RB-21’s pocket.

The air kept around the ship with inertial control roared as it crashed into the exterior air.

But Sylphide still accelerated. A water vapor explosion instantly passed from the nose to the rear of the ship.

Four shapes lined up alongside Sylphide. They were all Geheimnis Agency fighters that had accelerated along with the RB-21.

The pilots raised a hand in greeting within the moonlit canopies.

Hazel nodded back as a shadow was cast on them all from overhead.

A 100-yard oblong ship flew above them. The steel projectile had no windows and was painted white.

“The ACBS!”

Hazel looked out ahead while also viewing the skinny contrail trailing behind the ACBS’s armor. It was moving faster, so its tail soon came into view.

She could see the ACBS was flying toward the massive collection of dark clouds in the eastern sky.

The light of its rear thrusters was a sharp red that stabbed into the dark clouds.

The four fighters roared as they approached that red. They scattered, ascended along a diagonal trajectory, and began their attack on the ACBS while leaving a clear path in the center for Sylphide.

Hazel was surrounded by the roaring of wind as she kept her eyes dead ahead on the ACBS’s light.

Sylphide accelerated in response.

The streamlined ACBS was 100 yards along and painted in white aerial camouflage.

But its size was nearly meaningless in combat fought at supersonic speed.

The power of the wind couldn’t be sensed as sound and it couldn’t sweep anything away.

This battle would be determined purely by their combined strength.

Four fighters and one ship repeatedly accelerated to catch up to the ACBS.

At half a mile away, the ACBS’s antiair fire control device locked onto each of the approaching enemy crafts. It predicted their courses and directed its interception weapons toward them.

The homing round launchers on the top of the ship all opened at once and released metal bullets.

All 8 launchers fired 8 rounds each for a total of 64.

They fired three waves like that for a grand total of 192 rounds flying toward Sylphide and the fighters.

The first to respond were the two fighters to Sylphide’s right.

“Leave it to us!”

They flew out ahead and continued forward while launching homing rounds of their own.

A third of the enemy shots focused on those two. Around a dozen were shot down by the fighters’ shots, triggering explosions.

The fighters forced their way through a gap in the explosions, drawing the metal bullets toward them.

Their wings broke through the white wind and then turned so sharply to the right it looked like the fighters themselves were bending.

Most of the ACBS’s homing rounds turned right to pursue them.

But the rapid maneuvering slammed the two fighters into a wall of air. They accelerated while hit by the air resistance.

They were instantly dragged back behind Sylphide.

They disappeared from view and two explosions erupted behind the rest of them.

But no one turned to look that way.

The barrage of homing rounds had been thinned out.

Sylphide thrust its glowing blades forward from its front Power Points.

It swung the swords to slice through the barrage and cover for the fighters to its left.

The view ahead opened up. The ACBS’s tail was visible there.

The ACBS immediately fired again.

The armor on the center of its bridgeless deck opened and curving lines of light shot out.

That was a multi-dragon cannon.

The homing rounds had gathered the enemy together in the center so these more direct attacks could hit them.

Sylphide accelerated, its pair of fangs still in the follow through from its previous attack.

It didn’t have time to ready them again. It needed to ascend and move away for the time being.

But something prevented that.

The two black fighters on its left fired their own lights as they flew out ahead.

They shot through the barrage, but it wasn’t enough. They were hit.

Metal snapped, the buffeting wind bent their frames, and they broke with a sound like shattering glass.

At these speeds, destruction was an instantaneous thing.

Sylphide further approached the ACBS in the time it took for the two fighters to be fully destroyed.

The ACBS’s large white shape was already directly below Sylphide.

All the multi-dragon cannons on the ACBS’s upper surface aimed for Sylphide and fired.

Sylphide was much too close to dodge.

The two fighters were breaking apart from the hits they had taken. Their wings were torn away, their ejection devices launched from their canopies, and their wreckage fell atop the ACBS.

Sylphide saw the ACBS preparing to fire its light past the falling wreckage.

Ordinary weapons fire wasn’t going to take down that ship.

Sylphide’s weaponry wasn’t equipped any better than a fighter, so none of its weapons were particularly powerful.

The ACBS was confident in its superiority as it prepared to fire its multi-dragon cannons.

But something happened atop the Sylphide a moment before it could.

The woman standing on the blue ship had her hair whip in the wind while she swung around a certain color.

That color was white and it took the shape of a sword. The tip stabbed into Sylphide’s roof.

She let out an “ah” and…

“Eingeweide aerial ship Sylphide – Ober Beweisen.”

The power that questions the future in the name of the wind is the power that resides within me in the present

The same power is seen in the sky above – the power that brings fear and propels us ever onward

“Panzer Emblem Wind Dragon – activate.”

The transformation power ignited in an instant.

Something like glowing water flowed out from Sylphide’s front armor and instantly covered the rest of it.

The shape slicing through the wind changed with a sound like groaning metal and like splashing water.

A blue dragon appeared in the sky, casting a hostile light on the moonlit ship below it.

The blue dragon grew to more than half a mile long and the ACBS fired its multi-dragon cannons at it.

The wind dragon ignored the bursting sounds as it flew. It soared through the wind and twisted around to arrive behind the ACBS.

The light of the multi-dragon cannons destroyed the falling fighter wreckage.

But it was too late. The majority of the shots lost sight of the dragon and fell to the earth on all sides.

The light exploded, but the sound could not keep up with their speed.

Even the light was left behind.

All that remained were the ACBS and the dragon shining a bluish-white.

The blue dragon opened its maw and roared.

The ACBS fired all of its rear weaponry straight back.

The dragon would have to escape to either the left or right. The woman riding the dragon made the decision.

She stared directly ahead at the incoming barrage and swung her right hand forward to point at it.

“Full speed ahead!”

The dragon responded with a roar and a charge. It slipped through the barrage and crashed into the rear of the ACBS.

The impact knocked the ACBS’s tail upwards and its rear armor split.

But even that only lasted a moment. The dragon accelerated again, roaring as it parted the wind.

The dragon’s light ran from the ACBS’s tail to the nose. The light produced a small explosion as it broke through to the ship’s nose and all the glowing multi-dragon cannons erupted with pillars of fire.

A moment later, the entire ACBS exploded.

The explosion sounded like a crashing waterfall, but even that noise was devoured by the wind dragon.

The explosions’ light and noise were swallowed by the wind dragon’s body.

The blue dragon accelerated and raced forward.

Part 2

The battle had already begun in Germania’s sky.

Turbulence formed a rapid leftward vortex while Geheimnis Agency fighters and attack craft dodged the lightning and flew along with the Neue Silber transport ship.

The dome of dark clouds had formed an 80-mile-radius area of pressurized space within.

A black color floated at the center of the swirling air currents and pressure.

That massive color was covered in bluish-white flashes of lightning and it continued to grow despite already being more than 35 miles long.

The long, twisting body had a vaguely lupine face, but the pair of horns marked it as a dragon’s face instead.

The colossal dragon made large but swift movements. It floated just off the surface, its belly scraping along and tearing up the ground to devour it.

Its movements caused deafening noises as it tore through the air and left white clouds in its wake.

Great cracks ran through the lightning-filled air and dark ground below it.

Space itself shattered like glass and was consumed by the dragon’s surface. Dirt, trees, wind, buildings, and other things with so many different meanings and colors all vanished into the dark color.

Even the slightest movement of that color broke the sound barrier.

Simply raising its head would shatter the wind, cause flashes of light, and produce clouds.

The many fighters and attack craft were buffeted by the wind and forced to match the swirling of the dark clouds to make their attacks.

Neue Silber pushed aside the wind as it flew. Its container portion opened to reveal its trio of 75mm guns that repeatedly fired. The blue and red Grösse Panzers flying behind it used their rifles to fire.

But the size difference was simply too great.

The black dragon’s body was nearly two miles thick.

Each of its scales was larger than a bigger aerial warship.

The wind blew and several beams of light flew from its neck.

Those Drache Kanone were anti-personnel ones only about 5 yards thick.

The black dragon transformed the weapons it consumed and used them for itself.

Six shots flew, one of them toward Neue Silber.

Just before a direct hit, bluish-white threads of light flew from the top of Neue Silber.

The threads raced through the air to form a cube of barriers.

The light entered that cube and was rotated around 180 degrees.

The dragon light came back out the way it had come and crashed into the dragon.

The dragon trembled just a bit and the sharp yellow eyes on its long face moved.

It saw a man and a woman standing atop Neue Silber.

The man had only one arm. His left hand held a wooden staff while he glared at the dragon.

The woman next to him held the left side of her chest while the blanket she wore whipped in the wind. She looked up as if returning the dragon’s gaze and shouted into the wind.

“The Vaterlands remain intact! And I can boost their power some small amount with Neue Erde!”

<The New World is the fatherland’s future!>

Lowenzahn’s pulse rang loud while she frowned and tensed the hand holding her chest.

The fighters and attack craft responded.

Their pilots spoke their Erklärungs, reciting the Vaterland Text as they flew.

They regrouped into two formations and got to work. They pushed through the wind and soared high to approach the dragon. The sounds of their weapons fire echoed across the sky.

Schweitzer listened to the rumble of their divine spell gunpowder while he rotated his staff with his left hand.

The staff roared in the wind and light wrapped around its wooden surface.

“The boosted Tons makes my barrier spells that much easier.”

He struck the space ahead of him with the staff.

The black dragon’s face audibly shattered like glass.

The noise was carried out by the wind escaping a 50-yard square hole in the dragon’s face.

That was small compared to the nearly 2-mile face, but the dragon still narrowed its eyes and shook its head in irritation. The wind blew and the fighter formation left the immediate airspace.

Meanwhile, light gathered on the dragon’s face, healing its wound.

After its face healed, the dragon began to lift itself upwards.

“Eh?”

Lowenzahn braced against the coming impact of air, but then she noticed the dragon’s gaze.

Its sharp yellow eyes were directed to the west.

“That is where Sylphide has activated its Panzer Emblem,” said Bermark in his fussy voice.

Schweitzer spun his staff around with a smile on his lips.

“So Sir Heiliger knows who his true opponent is!”

That shout was answered by sudden movement from the dragon.

It looked up toward the dome of dark clouds overhead.

It opened its mouth.

A sound rumbled out from the throat beyond its long fangs. A series of sounds.

The sounds gathered together and formed light. This was not a Drache Kanone. It was…

“Tristan’s Babel Gewehr!”

An explosion shot skyward.

The clouds were instantly vaporized. Their rotation was pushed outwards.

They rapidly spread out, their electrification intensified, and they swallowed up everything as far as the Hamburg region.

The roar of air and expansion of clouds created a massive dragon’s den. Moonlight shined down among the dark clouds, but even the moonlight was broken down into Tons and absorbed by the dragon.

The air, land, water, and buildings covered by the dark clouds began to crack and split. With a metallic scraping sound, everything within a radius of more than 80 miles broke apart and turned to ether light.

The land around the dragon shattered like glass.

This formed a giant glass flower garden. The moonlit garden of spatial cracking instantly covered the land.

The ether soaring up from the shattered land flew in arcs to be absorbed by the dragon.

Then Schweitzer saw something from atop Neue Silber.

Seven lights flew from the dragon’s belly and into the sky.

“Are those the Erlkönigs!? Are they meant to intercept Sylphide!?”

Lowenzahn nodded and frowned.

“This is a good sign. It means the dragon fears Sylphide.” She returned her eyes to the dragon, her hand still on her chest. “Continue fighting! Our Messiah will reach us!”

Part 3

Hazel scattered sparkling light from the Sylphide dragon’s back.

She took the memory offerings from the box at her feet and threw them into the air one by one.

The rings, coins, and such shined in the moonlight as they danced through the wind and sank into the Panzer Emblem’s ether.

The dragon gradually grew each time.

Hazel pulled some red objects from her pocket: a red ring, a red earring, and the bracelet she had found in Sylphide.

She let them all sink into the roaring dragon as fuel. Not one of the offerings was wasted.

The last things left in the box were a metal plate and a journal.

She picked one up in each hand and offered them to the sky simultaneously.

The journal’s pages audibly flipped as it sank into the wind.

Lastly, she threw the empty box itself.

Sylphide consumed it as well.

“Oh, dear,” she said with a hand on her cheek.

“It’s not a trashcan,” said Berger.

“I didn’t mean it-”

She stopped before saying “like that”. She had noticed Berger was facing the ground rushing by behind them. Gelegenheit had already grown a black blade in preparation to fight.

She knew why. Something was rushing through the dark forest below to pursue them.

She tried to get a better look at it, but Berger stopped her.

“Hazel! Do your Ober Beweisen now!”

“Eh?”

“You can’t do it on a moment’s notice, right? I saw enough of your memories to know that. The Messiah’s Ober Beweisen requires a lot of Aerial Words to see all of the Lives!”

“But,” she said before hearing him laugh.

“Leave the fighting to me and Sylphide. Don’t hog all the best parts for yourself, Hazel.”

She paused but finally nodded at his statement and the raised Gelegenheit.

She felt her eyebrows about to droop and stopped them while sucking in a breath.

She faced forward and saw the dark clouds in the eastern sky had spread out a lot. She also saw a village in the forest.

…Borderson!

She took a breath, choosing to trust that Berger and Sylphide would take care of whatever was pursuing them below.

She raised her sword atop the Wind Dragon’s back. She gripped the hilt of the Device that linked her and Sylphide’s wills.

She opened her mouth to speak. She had seen her Ober Beweisen Text in Berger’s Lives.

…But…

“There is no set form! There is no single answer for the Aerial Words that provides all the answers!”

“Eingeweide eye Messiah – Ober Beweisen.”

In the corner of her eye, she saw something like black serpents burst from the forest below and fly up into the air.

Those serpent dragons were one type of lesser dragon created from the Lives breaking down. Six of them were attacking now.

But she kept her eyes directed forward. She spoke the Text that she felt proved who she was in the present – the Text that had brought her to this point.

<In the deep darkness of the Black Forest>

Berger rapidly swung his black blade every which way behind her.

<Born from the abyss>

<The wheel emerges>

Sylphide accelerated its dragon body.

<It whips up the wind and speaks with the dragon>

They broke through the wind.

<It reads the wind and weeps>

Hazel gripped Rein König’s hilt.

<It carries power in its hand and hesitates>

She shook her head.

“I have no hesitation right now!” she shouted as two serpent dragons rose up out ahead.

They had been lurking in the forest and were preparing to leap up at her.

But she heard a voice from below.

“So you’ve finally made it this far, fellow werecat! I will clear your path as an AIF member!”

The pair of serpent dragons flew into the sky.

Instead of jumping on their own, someone had hit them hard enough to propel them skyward.

Hazel saw several people running through the forest below.

The man in an AIF uniform in the lead was Coolers.

“It’s true there is no set answer and the questions will never end! I’m sure this fight will never end either!”

More serpent dragons attempted to attack from the forest, but the soldiers and Neue Kavaliers in the forest swiftly crushed them.

“But that’s why you need to make what progress you can when you find no hesitation in yourself! Don’t let your strength fade!”

Sylphide raced forward while the serpent dragons were held back.

Then Hazel saw a clearing in the forest. That was where a village had once existed.

The village’s houses had been burned away and some gray smoke continued to rise here and there.

However, several people were gathered in the center of the village.

They weren’t just Glossolalians. The gathered people were likely all the people who had been evacuated from the nearby villages.

“Oh.”

Hazel narrowed her eyes, flipped her skirt around, and bowed toward them as she passed by.

Then she checked her watch. It was 4:28 AM.

“Another 110 miles!”

With those words, they left Borderson and she turned to face Berger.

<The one-armed youth holds the Messiah>

Berger swung his black blade at the pursuing dragons while he viewed the village behind them.

<The moonlit pair returns to the earth>

Sylphide roared and accelerated toward Germania.

<The dragons gather and dance tonight>

<Every last thing returns home>

Part 4

The people taking shelter on a small hill in Borderson watched the dragon flying by in the sky.

The blue dragon consumed the air and forest on its way to the colossal collection of clouds at the center of the destruction.

The people standing in the village center heard a voice that sounded almost imaginary.

<The wind blows / the night blows / the dragon awakes / the people move / the dragon roars>

A pair of young siblings commented on it as they watched the dragon flying away.

“I hear a song.”

Next to them, a woman holding a baby nodded and began singing.

“The wind arrives from the north / a path arrives from the north.”

<The wind arrives from the north / a path arrives from the north>

The wind blew east and the sounds of battle and resistance came from the distance.

<The knight descends as a knight / the dragon soars high as a dragon>

The woman with the baby sang along with the voice coming from somewhere.

And she looked to the northern sky where the dragon had come from.

<All is a path to the north star>

A single star shined in the sky to the north. That cold light was the North Star.

Its weak but unmistakable light shined on the dark clouds covering the eastern sky.

<All is a story of an insurmountable wall>

The woman shook her head while holding her child.

She spoke both to the siblings standing nearby and to the baby in her arms.

“No one will let that happen.”

Part 5

Hazel saw the wall of cloud growing in front of her eyes.

She should have seen the lights of Hamburg up ahead, but they were hidden by the thick clouds.

She kept her eyes on the path ahead and sang while flying above the forest and above the river flowing between the trees.

<Follow the path to a familiar face / while walking side by side>

“Are you doing alright, Berger?”

<Your hand and voice might reach them>

“I’m fine. More importantly, we’re about to enter its territory.”

<But the moon sees it not>

The enemy made its move without warning. A giant shape burst through the clouds up ahead and flew toward them.

The great shadow dragon was more than a mile long and vaguely resembled Sylphide.

“Erlkönig!? But we can’t afford to lose any time here!”

<The Elf King refuses the Messiah’s approach.>

The dragon with a white streak on its black body accelerated until their relative speeds erased the distance between them.

In the instant before they collided, a long shape passed by above their heads.

…Eh?

<The gatherers begin their party>

Hazel looked up to see a familiar dragon. The great water dragon was transparent with its outlines shining bluish-white in the moonlight. A harp note rang from atop the dragon and a woman’s voice joined it.

“I have come to fulfill my promise, Messiah. With my assistance, you can break down the wall and reach your destination.”

The giant water dragon charged ahead.

It opened its maw wide and bit down at the shadow dragon, instantly crushing it with its water pressure.

“Allow me to demonstrate the power of Geheimnis Agency Navy Division Chief ‘Wasser Meister’ Lillie Telmetz.”

With the sound of breaking metal, the shadow dragon’s Lives broke down.

The water dragon flew on ahead, its body scattering shadow Lives for the wind dragon to consume.

<A wall separates the pair>

“Messiah, hurry past those clouds,” said Lillie, pointing forward.

But more shadow dragons burst from the clouds ahead. These were what the remaining 6 Erlkönigs had become.

Lillie strummed Mondnacht’s strings and several water dragons flew up from the river below. Suddenly, two beams of light shot from the forest.

Those were Drache Kanone.

A giant Grösse Panzer was racing down the mountain road through the forest.

Karl Schmitt shot a barrage into the sky with Jeanne on his shoulder.

The Drache Kanone light pierced the Erlkönig dragons and Jeanne raised her voice.

“Finally joined the rest of us, have you, Lillie!?”

<As they follow the same path with the same words>

A new voice came from below.

“Then this must be our post. We must ensure the Messiah can reach Heiliger.”

A two-hull ship was approaching the cloud wall down and to the left.

The voice coming from it was Müller’s.

The fighters following the two-hull ship intercepted the dragons and the two-hull ship launched a Drache Kanone while moving on ahead.

Two of the Erlkönigs turned toward the two-hull ship. They soared upwards before creating a roaring wind and circling back down.

The two of them dodged the weapons fire from below and drew out a fearsome arc to charge toward its deck from either side.

But Hazel saw familiar people on the deck.

The short old man in a white coat on the right deck was Elrich. The tall, bald old man in a three-piece suit on the left deck was Witzmann. They both held weapons.

The one in a white coat had a headphone in his ear and wrapped some kind of cloth around his hand.

“The beast doesn’t seem to understand that a Panzer Emblem is a mass of ether,” he said before reciting his Text and racing toward the incoming fang.

His raised right hand produced a sound like shattering glass and shined bright.

The afterimage of its shining light drew out his fist’s path as the space around him shattered.

He approached and then struck.

“It doesn’t spread as well as fire!”

When his blow caught the fang, the fang of ether shattered.

The Erlkönig dragon’s yellow eyes widened at the suddenness of it. A wire attached to the cloth wrapped around Elrich’s fist connected to the music player in his pocket.

“A beast that does not fear power deserves destruction.”

The second destruction-spreading punch struck the dragon in the cheek.

That single attack caused the shadow dragon’s entire body to explode.

With a glance over at that, Witzmann readied his pen and notepad on the other side of the deck. He showed no concern about the rapidly approaching dragon, sent his pen racing across notepad, and then nodded.

“I’m better at this than Bermark, you know? I just rarely do it because it’s so exhausting.”

He tore off the notepad’s top sheet and held it out toward the dragon.

The soaring dragon’s eyes saw what was written on the paper.

Emblems were drawn on all four corners of the white paper and an intricate pen drawing of a dragon with mouth wide adorned the center.

“Lifelike, isn’t it?”

Witzmann smiled and tore the paper down the center.

The dragon in front of him was torn in two with the sound of tearing paper.

Before it could even scream, he folded the paper and tore it a second, third, fourth, and fifth time.

After seeing the dragon scatter through the sky in 32 pieces, he put his hands on his hip and laughed.

“Messiah! Go deal with Heiliger He can get so sentimental!”

“Since when did you care so much for your superior officer?” asked Hazel, sounding amused.

She looked up into the sky where Lillie was smiling with the moon at her back.

Hazel smiled too. She squeezed Rein König and Sylphide overtook Lillie.

She glanced down at her watch to see the minute’s hand was at 32.

…Another 80 miles to Germania!

When she faced forward again, she saw a tower in front of the cloud wall.

An aerial ship with an extra-long cannon barrel had crashed into a crater-like lake in the forest.

Suddenly, the surface of the lake rippled and several water dragons formed. The transparent dragons bathed in the moonlight and used their great strength to smash the black aerial warship and throw its pieces into the sky.

Sylphide charged in.

Its transformation was instantaneous. The wind dragon swallowed the entire Gard-class aerial warship and grew to nearly a mile long while a single long horn grew from its forehead.

It let loose a long, high-pitched bestial roar and broke through the cloud wall.

Part 6

The battle above Germania had intensified.

The black dragon had already grown more than 40 miles long and was preparing to move outside of its territory centered on Germania.

Its entire body shook in its attempt to move out, but two Grösse Panzers and an aerial squadron fired on it from close range to hold it back.

But the black dragon moved out regardless. Its dragon eyes narrowed and light gathered at its forehead.

Atop Neue Silber, Bermark swapped out Freischütz’s magazine.

“A Drache Kanone is coming. If it were a mechanical one, my incomplete Erklärung would be enough to dismantle it.”

“That won’t work here. All aircraft, take cover behind Neue Silber!”

Schweitzer nodded at Lowenzahn’s command, stood on the edge of the roof, and readied his staff.

The wind blew and the dragon pulled its head back for just a moment in preparation to fire its Drache Kanone.

The fighters and attack craft rode the wind to circle behind Neue Silber. Neue Blau and Neue Zinnobar did the same to take advantage of Schweitzer’s protection.

Just then, something changed with the dragon. The light gathering at its forehead suddenly scattered and vanished.

“What!?” shouted Schweitzer, but he immediately regained a look of tension and swung his staff out even further with his fingertips. Several times as much light as before gathered on the staff just as the dragon made its move.

But this movement would not fire a Drache Kanone. It moved out ahead, opened its mouth, and attempted to eat Neue Silber.

“Are you kidding me!?” shouted Lowenzahn.

Her protest was answered by the color red growing to fill their vision. The wet crimson of the black dragon’s tongue and the inside of its mouth approached while shining in the moonlight. It was so big they actually had a hard time grasping just how big it was.

But Schweitzer spoke to Lowenzahn.

“I shall protect you, Lowenzahn.”

He leaped forward into the empty air – into the dragon’s maw.

He turned around in midair and swung his staff toward Neue Silber.

He instantly created a giant barrier cube. It was around half a mile long on each side and it sliced apart the sky before dropping down with Neue Silber inside. It took them just out of range of the dragon’s jaws.

But while Neue Silber fell, Lowenzahn saw a staff-wielding man in the sky just in front of the dragon’s open jaws. She saw the man about to be devoured.

So she shouted on reflex.

“Someone!” she cried. “Someone please help us!”

Her thoughts became a pure Text that spread across the black dragon’s entire territory.

<The New World desires power!>

Her cry received an answer from within the black dragon itself.

<Power is…>

A Text shook the air as a power burst out of the dragon’s body like a bullet.

<Power is the symbol of the emperor!>

It was a black Grösse Panzer, but it had white wings on its back. The two giant wings spread out while white armor covered its body. That was Neue Schwarz’s Weiss Kaiser.

When Lowenzahn saw it, her Erklärung synced with the Grösse Panzer.

“That Panzer inherited Kaiser’s memory and had its Eingeweide built on that base!”

<The New World recalls the emperor’s majesty.>

The white wings stretched out in the blink of an eye.

The sharp wings caught the jaws snapping shut on the man overhead, but they kept moving from there. The white wings spread out across the sky and roared.

The roar turned west within the dome of clouds.

Then everyone else looked west to see a light.

The clouds were shredded in the distance there, revealing the night sky and a bluish-white point of light shaking the air as it flew straight in.

Its speed reached them all as power and the black dragon roared.

It roared louder and louder.

Part 7

Hazel saw the black dragon in the distance.

There was no village, forest, river, or even mountain or valley below Sylphide now.

Only a flat land that resembled a glass flower garden.

But Sylphide shattered the flowers below with the shockwave of its flight.

The wind dragon had already grown more than 10 miles long.

The dragon could no longer even see as Hazel spread her hands and sang her will atop it.

<The party begins and the village dances / the dragon roars and the knights gather>

“Hey, Berger?”

“Hm? What is it?”

<The bride weeps uncrowned / her words go unsaid and he never arrives>

“I think this country will be split by a wall of sorrow and anger once the war ends.” She shook her head. “But do you think that wall will one day go away?”

“No, I doubt it. I mean…are you going to wait for that wall to go away?”

<Thus she is alone / she weeps and sleeps in this land>

“No, I won’t. I couldn’t wait.”

“That’s what I mean. Walls don’t just go away. Not for people like you anyway.” He smiled. “But I’m sure that fight is a job for the people a few generations after ours.”

“Eh? Um, a few generations after ours? You mean, um?”

Hazel brought a hand to her cheek and felt it was warm.

Noting that heat, she gave a firm nod, and faced forward again.

“When we see each other again, I want to live an indulgent life. After the war, I think I’ll continue doing work for the AIF while working as a teacher in Borderson or somewhere. So…so, um, I should make enough to support someone else too.”

“Then go find someone. I mean, what would your dad say? We’re 8 years apart.”

“Don’t worry. When I return from the past, we will only be 3 years apart. And just so you know, my parents are 12 years apart. You didn’t check that when looking up my information?”

“What the hell!? That’s way more messed up!”

Hazel did not turn back toward his laughter. She only narrowed her eyes and let her shoulders shake in laughter of her own.

“But, Hazel. If you travel to the past, fix the world’s inconsistencies, and leave a riddle for the future you, will the future of this world – and our futures too – be in your hands as you travel to the past, return, and let the loop play out?”

She did turn back this time and saw him hanging his head a little.

“Your role as history’s manager will end on August 24 at 4:42 AM when the next you takes over and the world changes a little more. Actually, I guess the world is always changing.”

“I suppose so. But don’t worry. I’m sure the next me will make a choice much like my own. She will take your hand, call your name, travel to the past as always, be dug up in Sylphide in ’39, and become Lehrer. And if that process repeats itself enough times, surely one of them will find the correct answer. An unstable but unbreakable answer.”

“Sounds pretty idealistic to me.”

“It is, but nothing will ever get better without some idealism.”

She was confident about that, so she faced forward again to find the black dragon was much closer now.

Neue Silber and the white-winged Weiss Kaiser waited in the sky in front of the black dragon.

Weiss Kaiser emitted Lives that Hazel recognized. They had the white tone color of a controlled gale.

“Weiss Kaiser is here too!”

The wind dragon arrived alongside accelerating Neue Silber and Weiss Kaiser.

Weiss Kaiser was on the right.

The wind dragon, Hazel, and Berger with Gelegenheit were in the center.

Neue Silber, Schweitzer, Lowenzahn, and Bermark were on the left.

“We and Kaiser will draw the dragon toward Germania!” shouted Schweitzer.

“Good luck!” shouted back Hazel.

A look of surprise appeared on Schweitzer’s face, but it was soon replaced by a slight smile.

Hazel responded by singing while looking down on the flower garden sky created by the spatial destruction.

Below the wind blowing through our fatherland, the freeshooter feels a tailwind on his back

Below the tragedy, the emperor sings a requiem

Below the moonlit night, the messiah captures destiny

A lone hero marches into a new world

Pushed on by her song, they all readied their weapons and raced forward. The various aircrafts passed through the gap in the split space head.

The black dragon was there. It shot toward them.

It pushed on the air and left countless contrails in its wake.

Hazel checked her watch in front of the dragon.

It was 4:40 AM. Only two minutes until the world changed.

But she remained calm.

She shut her eyes, took a breath, and kept her smile as she spread her hand in the air and sang.

<Urge him on and wait / if you wish for something new>

Weiss Kaiser flew out in front.

Its white wings left behind constant explosions of air as it accelerated.

It held a large white sword in both hands. Light wrapped around the giant Device.

<All hesitation will come to an end up ahead>

The Grösse Panzer gave a shout and a white attack shot out.

The glowing attack was more than 500 yards along, but it was canceled out by the dragon’s dragon breath.

The dragon’s triumphant roar thundered out.

The Grösse Panzer’s entire body was shattered by the shockwave released by the dragon’s body.

Weiss Panzer kept moving even as it came to pieces.

<The Emperor paves the way to a new world!>

Its Device sword flew.

The light-wrapped sword stabbed into the dragon’s jaw, shaking the dragon just a bit.

But that was all.

The Grösse Panzer broke apart in midair and the black dragon smashed it to pieces as it flew toward the others.

<Complete the circle or break it / if you desire something new>

The excited dragon was met by Neue Silber.

Atop the ship, Lowenzahn held the left side of her chest.

<The New World looks tragedy in the eye without fear.>

Her Aerial Words sent several beams of light into the black dragon.

Its forward momentum was slightly slowed and then Schweitzer sent in one of his special destruction barrier cubes.

<Throw out all hesitation and look back>

Bermark spoke his Text and emptied Freischütz’s magazine.

The shots hit, causing the dragon to open its mouth and roar. It was a bestial roar of rage against this resistance.

Even as it roared, all of its injuries were rapidly healed.

Schweitzer noticed the regeneration while Neue Silber was blasted away by the wind.

“So we need a more powerful attack!”

The dragon answered his shout with an even greater roar that seemed to be declaring victory.

But just as that hostile dragon roar rumbled through the air, a small light pierced the dragon’s throat from front to back.

Still singing on the Wind Dragon’s back, Hazel instantly identified what had produced the light stretching up from the ground below.

…A Word Rifle.

Hazel looked to the ground to see a man standing on the moonlit ground of shattered glass.

Part 8

The gray-haired man stood with blood soaking his large body.

He was AIF General Pale Horse.

His prosthetic arms emitted defensive light and he held the Word Rifle abandoned by Neue Schwarz and a Heavy Barrel’s Phlogiston tank.

He had a look of irritation on his face and clicked his tongue when he viewed the glowing afterimage stretching up from the barrel to the sky.

“Less than a minute until 4:42. This is my final goodbye, Heiliger Karlsruhe.” He took a breath. “You refused to accept the future for the sake of the dead, but we choose to honor the dead by…”

Pale stopped there. And instead…

“I’m such a hypocrite.”

A moment later, his air-piercing attack connected the ground to the sky and punched through the black dragon’s armor.

Part 9

The air rumbled from the Word Rifle blast and the black dragon bent backwards.

Its entire body shook and its tail fell into the Germania’s great pit.

Meanwhile, the wind dragon accelerated and Hazel sang on its back.

<The wind is with you, he is with you>

The dragon pulled its head back down in front of them. It had a large hole in the bottom of its jaw and the sky was visible through it.

But it forcibly opened its mouth, causing its muscle fibers to scream in protest.

Sound gathered deep in its mouth. The loud sound converged and changed to light in the blink of an eye.

That was a Babel Gun.

The wind dragon fought back. It opened its jaws, stretched itself forward, and bristled its scales.

<Seek out something new>

A loud sound other than a roar escaped the from deep within the wind dragon’s throat. The sound grew narrower, louder, and sharper before becoming light.

The beam of light that surged from its throat was the Requiem’s Babel Cannon.

The two beams collided and the attack carrying the wind won out.

The black dragon’s light shattered and the bluish-white Babel Cannon attack pierced through its jaw and out the back of its head.

The wind dragon accelerated toward the stopped black dragon.

Hazel looked back from the blue dragon’s back.

She saw a black-clad man standing there.

Berger shoved a Size C Phlogiston Tank into Gelegenheit and looked her in the eye.

“Hazel.”

She didn’t know what he had said at first. It took her a moment to realize he had called her name. By then, he was already saying more.

“Can you hear me, Hazel Mirildorf?”

“Y-yes! I can!”

“You can? Then listen carefully. Once this war is over…I swear I will take your hand and call your name, Hazel Mirildorf.”

“…!?”

She responded in surprise and then he kissed her just once.

“I won’t say it again, so don’t forget it.”

With that, he smiled and walked past her.

She turned around in a hurry to find him facing the colossal black dragon and throwing his 100-yard black blade.

He aimed for the Device that Weiss Kaiser had stabbed into the center of its forehead.

The black blade sliced through the wind, stabbed into the white blade’s hilt, and drove itself halfway through it.

Then the black-clad man jumped down from the wind dragon.

He activated a windshield charm and didn’t even look back while Hazel watched him go.

“Thank you,” she said before facing forward with newfound strength in her gaze.

She took a breath.

And she viewed the black dragon approaching her.

Part 10

Hazel drew Rein König in her right hand and stuck her left hand in her breast pocket.

She slowly pulled out a card.

She saw the card had changed. She narrowed her eyes at the wheel pictured in the center of the card.

“This wheel doesn’t bring ruin!”

Joy ran through her.

So she spread her arms and began to sing. She started with an extended “ah” and continued from there.

Her song was an important Text. It was his extremely short Text she had seen in his memories.

She sang it as the precious thing it was.

<This is how we keep everyone with us.>

And…

<This is how we keep them with us forever and ever.>

Her voice rose to a shout and the Messiah eye accepted its wielder’s will.

Her voice became an endless humming “ah” while her right eye emitted a bright red light and activated its Ober Beweisen power. The Messiah showed her all of the Lives.

It was only for this moment, but she could see all the answers.

She spread her right arm holding the sword and her left arm holding the card and she twirled as she sang.

In the windy night sky, she saw the tone colors and heard the tempos of all the Lives.

The Lives of the moonlit sky.

The Lives of the cloudy night.

The Lives of the flowery ground.

The Lives of the people there and the Lives of time and memory.

…Not one of them are still or silent.

“Yes, that’s right.”

…The world is such a busy place.

When she saw all the sounds and heard all the colors, she saw one more thing.

She saw what lay beyond it all.

…Emptiness.

There was a vast, unreachable emptiness there.

But that scene found past the sound and color was erased in an instant.

And she raised her head.

Her will and her power already knew what it was she needed to do.

…Yes.

She faced forward and raised her voice.

“And I know I can do it now!”

She threw the card forward.

Her smile grew as she placed her left hand on Rein König’s hilt alongside the right and gripped it tight.

She raised it high and swung it down directly in front of her.

She aimed for the black dragon’s forehead where she saw Gelegenheit.

The blade drew out an arc and the tip formed a white tail as it tore the air.

The white path sliced through the card on its way to Gelegenheit’s hilt.

A solid impact rang out, the card turned to glowing dust and vanished, and Gelegenheit also turned to light and shattered.

The blade continued down into the Wind Dragon’s back.

At the same time, Hazel lowered her head to look the black dragon in the eyes.

“Ah,” she sang while tilting her lowered head up toward the sky and extending the note louder and louder from her throat.

Her eyes were on the moon and the world shook in response to the greatest voice she could muster.

The Wind Dragon transformed further, turning to light and scattering Hazel along with it.

The light ruptured and that ended it all.

Part 11

At 4:42 AM, when some purple began to color the night, a massive circular emblem was visible in the sky from the village of Borderson 100 miles west of Germania.

The people gathered in the village center were viewing the distant dark clouds when the emblem drawn in light burst through the clouds and took shape in the distance. It only lasted two seconds, but the light drew out more and more of the emblem while spreading far in every direction. To the west, it spread as far as France.

Then the emblem gathered back in toward the center.

It was instantly sucked back inside the dark clouds and then the change occurred.

All of the clouds covering the eastern sky were blown away from within.

The clouds were erased by a light.

At giant glowing orb floated in the center of the sky where the emblem must have converged.

It had several rings around it while it rapidly rotated and shrank.

The rotating light gave off tiny particles of light that returned to their original form after falling on the ground or sky.

The air, the wind, the earth, the rivers, the buildings, and the people lined up on the horizon.

Like a book opening its pages, everything was built back out from the light at the center.

But that only lasted a short time.

While everyone in the village was watching the world’s restoration, the light disappeared.

But something bright remained where the light had been.

They saw the morning sky dyed white as dawn approached.

There was no dragon flying to the east there.

But the two children in the village asked a question of the werecat woman standing next to them.

“Why do you look so happy?”

“Eh? Oh, I just remembered something that happened a long time ago. So I was just thinking…”

The woman nodded, raised her head, and smiled at the children.

“…that some people I knew had fulfilled their promises.”

Part 12

Below the blue sky of morning, two men sat in the forest outside Berlin.

They sat with their backs leaning against a 4-yard Word Rifle and their legs out on the dirt.

The larger one with gray hair and two prosthetic arms was Pale.

The one wearing all black was Berger. He kept his eyes on the sky and spoke with annoyance in his voice.

“Why aren’t you dead?”

“Well, I hit a wall during the fall and was thrown out, so- hey, are you listening?”

“Forget it,” said Berger, lowering his gaze from the sky. He saw a city through the trees.

That city was not Germania. It was the old Berlin without the giant cross or the underground structures.

“I wonder if the materials used to construct Germania and the Gard-class were returned to the earth. I hear the residents and other people underground were placed in Tiergarten.”

“I didn’t expect the city to be restored like this, though. I guess Germany’s Lives considered that other city to be a mistake.”

“Not necessarily. I mean, we couldn’t have made it this far without the help of the machines.”

After talking with their eyes back on the sky, they heard some footsteps on the dirt. Berger turned just his head to see a blue-uniformed young man approaching while looking around.

He wore a black bag over his shoulder and bowed toward Berger.

“Good morning. Are you Mr. Dog Berger? I am from the post office.”

“What do you need first thing in the morning?”

“My first delivery of the day is for you. This letter.”

The postman pulled out a white envelope.

“Mutual understanding is still hard to find in this world, so it our duty as postal workers to reach the places voices can’t and act as an intermediary for the unseen wills. No matter the time or the place.” He smiled bitterly. “But this one wasn’t easy since your address was only given as ‘just outside Germania’.”

“Sorry about that,” said Berger, accepting the white envelope.

The postman checked his watch.

“Name: Dog Berger. Address: Just outside Germania. Time: the morning of August 24. Another flawless delivery.”

“Thanks. And sorry again.”

“Think of nothing of it. I expect to be serving you a lot more from now on.”

Berger looked up and considered that for a moment before smiling.

“Probably so. I’ve got a lot more Verlsten Briefs addressed to me with awful handwriting, don’t I? Probably one a week, all sent from a thousand years ago.”

The postman said nothing. He simply smiled and bowed.

“I still find you sitting down, I see.”

And he left. His footsteps faded into the distance while Berger tore open the envelope. It was postmarked in Hamburg.

“This date is when I went to save her last month.”

He nodded and read the letter. His eyes ran through a few lines before he chuckled.

“That idiot. What is this black stain?”

But he kept smiling, shut his eyes, and folded the letter.

He sighed and looked up into the sky.

“This is how we keep them with us forever and ever, huh?”

He stuck the envelope in the chest of his coat.

“What’s that?” asked Pale.

Berger smiled and gave a simple answer.

“It’s the Messiah’s blessing.”

Hazel Mirildorf’s Letter: To Dog Berger

I don’t know what I should write here.

I am currently in the Hamburg base and surrounded by kind people. I was told so many different things today. I didn’t know any of it, but maybe you already knew it all.

I have thought about so much and I am writing this letter to help organize those thoughts.

Will the Nibelung really happen on the morning of the 24th? If you are reading this, then either it didn’t happen or you didn’t go to the past with me. If it didn’t happen, then I will be with you when this letter is delivered and I will snatch it away and rip it to pieces. Because having my past thoughts read in front of me would be much too embarrassing. Especially because I know you would read it aloud to me.

But I can only do that if I am with you.

I hope the Nibelung does not happen. But if it doesn’t happen, the world will change and I doubt we would ever meet in the first place.

I don’t want that. But if the Nibelung does happen, we will both be sent to the past because of the German Lives within us and only I will return to the present.

I don’t know what I should do or which option is better.

I don’t even know what it is I can do.

But I also feel like I will find the answer. For example, I don’t know my Ober Beweisen Text. However, that just means I don’t. But how about you?

You are your own person, so would you maybe know the answer?

I want to ask you.

But that requires a future. The best way to make sure you never lose anything is to freeze everything in place, but I believe the true way to never lose anything requires a future.

What do you think? If you are reading this letter, it means you remained in the present and I am not with you.

Can you speak your own Ober Beweisen Text now?

And…

And did I manage to speak mine?

I hope I can hear your answer once the war is over. I swear I will return by then.

So when that happens, I hope you can take my hand and call my name like you always do. I hope to hear you call “Hazel Mirildorf” again.

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