Horizon:Volume 1 Chapter 16

Chapter 16: Those Who Prepare in the Courtyard

Will the festival eventually end.

And, will the festival start.

Point Allocation (Density)

●

In the courtyard, you could see the tremors running through the Academy.

The mayhem seemed to have been noticed by others; an audience stood outside the Academy's outer fence.

"Ahh, again...?"

No-one entered the school grounds, though they all spoke.

Azuma, standing in the courtyard, had gathered everyone who had run away from the disturbances happening everywhere in the school. He heaved a sigh as as they all stood there, atop the lawn.

Somehow, it seemed that inside, a fight had broken out between the students and the mercenary groups. From time to time, some white thing, or people in bodysuits, or cosplay that was hard to even describe would be ejected from the emergency exit or windows of the first floor.

...They're really going at it.

He thought. Beside him, Ohiroshiki shoveled the snacks he had brought with him as a late night stack into his mouth.

"Mmm. I am of the humble opinion that we should call the teacher on night duty. Will she be alright?"

"Oriotorai-sensei...? When I went to see her just now, she was sleeping soundly, a sake bottle in her arms."

The person who answered him was Adele. Using her handkerchief, she was fanning Asama, who was lying on the lawn face up.

'So we can't...' Everyone muttered this, Azuma included.

As they muttered this, another person in a black bodysuit fell after being blasted through the wall. He looked this way, thrusting out his chest, on which the word 'Love' was written in red. Afterward, he disappeared to the starboard.

"...Anyone know him?"

Hearing Noriki's voice, Naomasa folded her arms and tilted her head to the side.

"That guy who left just now was prob'bly Koide Ou from Shinagawa's chamber of industry and commerce. That pillar before was wavin' at Asama-chi, so...Asama-chi, your father didn't leave the shrine tonight without tellin' you where he was going, did he?...Hey, why're you glarin' this way. It's time to accept your father's true end."

"T-This isn't over, t-this hasn't been decided!"

Asama said before she collapsed. It was Suzu's duty to lay the handkerchief out under her face.

And looking at everyone, who was doing this, Azuma thought.

...It's just like always, huh.

He nodded in his heart, but today, he felt this way again.

...Everyone's in a good mood?

Tomorrow, Toori will confess to the girl she loves. Everyone's in good spirits because of that, right? Because I came to Musashi after secondary school, I didn't know what they were like before then. It seems like many of them have been with Aoi since elementary school. Because of this, I wasn't excluded, but, the way I feel during these times is different.

He thought this as well.

Hassan took a drink from the curry he kept inside a thermos.

"Ah, it's the Schaeder couple. They're always a big help at our stationery shop."

The skeleton couple ran out of the emergency exit on the first floor, clutching the suspension platform used to hold samples. While they were dashed out, the husband's rib bone fell off. The wife grabbed it out of the air and inserted it back, bowing to the group as she did so.

"It's gradually become the sideshow of a carnival..."

Looking closely, there was a mummy on the roof.

"Ah, that's Mishra the Third. He runs the dried foods restaurant, 'Horus'"

He hung his bandages from the edge of the rooftop and started to rappel down, his movements hurried. As he did so, when he was around the second floor, Aoi's sister ran to the edge of the rooftop. She grabbed the edge of the bandages.

"Teeheehee, there were some nice dried goods here! What do you want me to do with this lifeline, your bandages!? Should I cut it!? Take it off!? If you don't want to fall, then worship me! If you don't, not only will I drop you, I'll spin you around like a handmaiden!"

"That girl really doesn't know how to threaten people. Or rather, Mishra the Third can't talk, can he, since his throat's dry?."

Azuma nodded at those words, which everyone spoke. But really, amongst everyone, it seemed that it was AoiÅfs sister that was devoid of energy.

...If things were normal, she would have definitely said that she'd drop him and still order him to worship her.

Something about her is strange tonight. Well, she's always strange, but the way she's being strange is different, or should I say, not dropping him immediately is in itself strange.

'It's a difficult question to answer,' Azuma thought. As he watched, Mishra the Third, dangling in the air, had put his arms over his head, making a heart shape with them.

Seeing this, Aoi's sister put her hands on her cheeks and shook her head.

"Hehehe, it's wonderful to be so beautiful that even dried goods acknowledge it~!'

Because she had released the bandages, Mishra the Third fell.

However, below them, Nenji had come from behind the school building.

"Hrmph, no-one was behind the school building! It must have been because of the invincibility of my party's majesty!!"

His invincible majesty was blown apart by the dried humanoid that came falling from above.

Everyone watched as Itoken, a refreshing smile on his face came from behind Nenji. He was completely naked.

"Hiiii! Everyone! The back of the school is fi--waitwaitwait, Nenji-kun! Are you alright!?"

While he was speaking, Mishra the Third rose. Wrapping his bandages around himself, he raised a hand to gesture sorry several times before leaving. Nenji, left behind, slowly reformed.

"He, Hehe...that was dangerous."

...He's serious, as usual.

Azuma thought.

It would be perfect if Oriotorai was here, or rather, if she was here the mayhem would be quelled with overwhelming levels of violence. But if that were to happen, it would definitely become a bigger disturbance than it already was, so it was a matter of whether to go with 'quality' or 'duration'.

Suddenly, there was a movement beside him.

Suzu had stood up.

"U-Um, w-water, A-Asama-san...'s b-breath is, r-ragged."

She was going to draw water. The tap that sprinkled water to the school from the waterways was close to the entrance, but it wasn't drinking water, as this was the water that circulated throughout the interior of the ship. The drinking water was inside the school.

"Bell-san, um, if you go there now, you'll get drawn in."

Adele tried to stop her, her tone suggesting that she had no idea what she was doing. At that moment.

A large voice boomed out nearby, coming from the direction Suzu was trying to go.

"--What on Earth is this outrage--! This disturbance in my town!!"

Everyone turned to look up at Yoshinao, who had stood in front of Suzu at some point in time.

He, Yoshinao, seemed to realise that everyone had fallen silent at his shout. He looked around.

"This is completely inexcusable! Who started this! Get out here!"

'He's got a point.' Everyone nodded, but one person reacted differently.

"--Hyaah...!"

That sound, a breath filled with fear, came from directly in front of Yoshinao.

"--Hy...aaa...ah..."

Her arms clutched before her chest, Suzu was trying to keep her trembling back.

'Ah', Azuma thought. 'This is bad'.

If a large voice suddenly comes at you while you're nervous...

Suzu, who was blind, had entered a state akin to one where she had been punched.

Her breath caught, but when she tried to breathe out, she felt like vomiting.

And apparently, Yoshinao had just noticed her.

"--? What is the matter with you? If there is something you want to say, then come right out and say it!"

At his insistence, Suzu opened her mouth wide and screamed.

"Uwaaaaaaaaaaaah!!"

●

Suzu burst into tears.

Everyone reared back at the sound, which seemed to blow away all the noise that had been happening till then. Yoshinao stood there, panicked.

"H-Hey, you, w-what..."

"I-I-I-I d-don't like, t-this guy...!"

'Wow, Suzu-san, you're completely in the right.' Everyone nodded. However, Yoshinao heard this.

"A-All of you! Causing such a disturbance is-"

"Hyaaaaaaan!!"

Her voice rang out. As might be expected, the crowd had started to panic. But despite this, Azuma, in the midst of them, waved his hands about, attracting attention to himself.

"U-Umm, about what we should do now..."

Hassan nodded at Azuma's proposal. Taking a medicinal pouch from his chest, he poured white powder from it and into his magic bottle, which he had only drunk a little curry from. Replacing the lid, he shook the bottle.

"Well, if you drink curry, all your worries will fly away~"

"W-What did you put in there just now!?"

Hearing Naomasa's question, Hassan nodded, his face expressionless.

"Spice."

"That can't be right! That was definitely a drug!"

"You're wrong. Curry is made out of several different spices. So what you put in curry is spice. It's only logical."

"Somebody take a dump in his curry next time!!"

"I am trying to say that you kids have been ignor--"

Yoshinao said. Just as those words left his mouth, all the windows of the school opened at once. The people inside the building thrust their heads outside.

For a moment, they all looked to the left and right, but not long after, they noticed Suzu, who stood there crying.

"Nuuah--! Warning! Warning! Musashi's important system with bangs has been brought to tears!"

"Damn it, how did this happen! Whatever the cause, we seek everyone's opinion concerning the offender's punishment!"

Everyone who had their head sticking out the window stuck their fist out, thumbs facing downward. All of them nodded.

"Alright! Unanimously decided to be the death penalty! No problems, no questions, no mercy! The offender is--"

Toori, who had stuck his head out of a window on the top floor, found Yoshinao.

Yoshinao's eyes met his.

"Y-you! Chancellor Student Council President! The disturbance this time is--"

"Hey, guys, everyone look! There's an idiot who's cosplaying as a king, right over there! He must be the culprit! Seriously, that's a douche move, dressing like the king so he can lower everyone's inhibitions!"

"W-What are you saying!? I am the real thing! I am the true king of Musashi, Lord Yoshinao!!"

"Huh? What did you say? The king's got no friends, so he wouldn't come here. As expected, the fake doesn't know anything about the king. The real king's playing minesweeper on his PC, alright? Didn't you know?"

"You bastaaard--!!"

"Uwaaaaaan!!'

Suzu's voice resounded again.

The instant directly after.

"----"

Suddenly, the sound of Suzu's crying halted.

She fell silent.

Almost as if her voice itself had been stopped.

●

'Eh?' Everyone looked at Suzu, who stood in the middle of them. She softly closed her mouth, which had been wide open.

Suzu touched her ears with her hands.

"Eh...?"

She spoke the question that everyone had been thinking.

As she stood there frowning, a voice came from above her.

"Hey, king, move! And get down! You're getting in Bell-san's way!!"

Hearing these instructions, Yoshinao felt lost. But matching everyone's movements, he lowered himself.

Left in the middle of the crowd, all of whom had knelt down, Suzu tilted her ears to the left and right without even wiping the tears from her cheeks.

After a moment...

"--O-Over there."

She looked towards Musashi's port. The east.

Located there was Kagamihara's mountain range.

However, in the depths of night, all that was there was a pitch black, bottomless space. Beyond the mountains, towards the south, should have been the town of Mikawa, but from Musashi's point of view it lay in the mountain's shadow, so you could not see the light from the town.

Black. It was even unclear whether the mountain itself was there. There was just a darkness that seemed like a black fog, beyond which nothing could be seen.

Despite this, the darkness suddenly shattered. Within the embracing dark, a light shined.

It was the light of a fire starting.

Flames. On the peak of Kagamihara's mountain, an inferno was born.

"Huh..."

Exactly as Suzu spoke, a sound which seemed like distant thunder could be heard.

Hearing that noise, Naomasa muttered, her body still kept low.

"Isn't that an explosion?"

As if responding to her, Neshinbara, whose head was thrust out of the school building's windows, said this.

"Of the watchhouses the Testament Union set up to maintain surveillance of Mikawa, there should be one at the top, around there...It's true that they should be packed with Tres Espana's students now, but what could it be? An accident? Maybe it's just a fire...the watchhouse below it can't be seen from here, but I wonder...hasn't it noticed?

As the flames in the distance became stronger, small voices began to break out from within the crowd.

'What's wrong?' 'What's going on?' People were saying. There were also people who had started trying to make calls with their phones.

"Oookaaaay! We'll have to wait till next time for the continuation!!"

Hearing Toori's voice, everyone besides Yoshinao nodded.

They started to move. Everyone left the windows, exiting the building from the entrance. Everyone stood up and started to walk off.

They started to move.

As they started to move out, Yoshinao gave the crowd a glance before lightly bowing his head to Suzu.

In response, Suzu drew back slightly. However, Yoshinao dropped to one knee, right before her eyes. He did this even as the people in the crowd were headed towards their homes or the places they needed to be. Upon kneeling, he said this.

"I had no intention of scaring you. Please forgive me. Also..."

He stood up and pointed to Toori, who was above them.

"I play solitaire, not minesweeper. Understand?"

He corrected him before turning his back.

He left. Seeing his back start to walk off, everyone in the class heaved a sigh.

Pushing her glasses back up to the bridge of her nose, Adele clutched her practice lance.

"It seems like we managed to cover it up somehow, but...what could those flames be?"

Shirojiro exited from the entrance of the building. He spoke together with Heidi.

"I can't contact the Mikawa's chamber of industry and commerce. There should be automatons there, though."

"Even looking at it now, the light coming from Mikawa isn't increasing...Could it be the town isn't working?"

All around, they could see all the cosplayers and the real monsters had left, following the spectators outside the Academy. Only the people who had gathered on the bridge at the beginning and Azuma were left behind.

Shirojiro cast his gaze upon everyone before folding his arms. He took his Mouse, a white fox, out of the armour by his neck.

"...The phones' circuits are probably scrambled. The effect should be reduced if we use the Mouse's direct Divine Communication or written Divine Communication. If you're a hurry, everyone do it themselves. That's fine, right? In general, the fee for sound Divine Communications are high--"

"Shiro-kun, Shiro-kun, you're starting to lecture."

Hearing Heidi's warning, Shirojiro nodded. After a while, he raised a hand lightly.

"I'll be busy. Heidi, please use use Erimaki to enable the opening of Divine Communications to all of the Far East residential areas in each country. I'm going to pull a step ahead of the other people in Musashi's merchant group. Please prepare the introduction of hard currency for all countries into my finances within Musashi. Not just yen, the common currency."

"Jud. Haha, I think we're going to be glared at after this, but that happens every time...Then, everyone, it's time for us to dispe--"

"P-Please wait..."

Suzu formed that voice.

She had noticed the flames first. Hearing her words, everyone opened their eyes and stopped moving.

Suzu shrank back a little, but she stretched her right hand forward, as if to grasp at something.

"U-Um...Excuse me..."

Everyone looked in the direction Suzu was pointing. At a single boy, who stood there. It was...

"--Me?"

●

Having been pointed out by Suzu, Azuma tilted his head to the side.

...What?

Did something happen? Suzu pays attention to sound. So, if something happened...

"Um."

I'm still wearing my uniform. There's nothing on my head, chest, or my waist. Despite this...

"----"

By the time I realised it, everyone was looking at me. Looking up, I could see that even Toori was.

Azuma leaned his head forward and looked at his feet. Yet, there was nothing there.

'What's going on?' Inclining his neck again, he searched his sides.

Seeing this, everyone spoke.

"You! Not there! Behind you! Behind you!!"

"Behind me?"

Having been told this, Azuma asked this question. He turned to look at the direction the question was directed and his eyes fixed upon the first thing they saw.

It was a small hand holding the hem of his uniform.

There stood a girl. Her long white hair mussed, her skin was white. Azuma didn't know this girl.

Her face was on the brink of tears.

"----"

Her feet stepped onto the lawn, their owner staying silent. Suzu must have noticed those footsteps. Despite this...

"She's transparent...?"

The girl's body, not even one meter tall, was half transparent. Even the ground and the grass looked transparent because of the flickering. The cloth on my hem that she had grabbed could also be seen through.

Everyone held their breath upon seeing this. At that moment, the girl spoke. Her black eyes looked at me.

"Daddy isn't here..."

And looking down...

"I can't find Mommy..."

'Is she lost? Azuma thought. However, before considering that, there was something he had to say.

Instead of Azuma, it was everyone else who shouted the words.

"It's..."

They took a breath.

"It's heeeeeereeeeee!!"

●

He heard a sound.

In the middle of the study in Sakakibara's estate, Sakai had indeed heard a sound.

It was a sound he had become familiar with. A sound that echoed in his gut before dropping. It was the sound of an explosion. That, he knew. In that case, what he now thought was this.

...Why? Why is there an explosion?

I don't know. There's no way I would know. There are so many things that I don't know.

Ii has disappeared. Sakakibara has also disappeared. He told me to chase after the Princesses and the Genesis Project. And now...

...An explosion?

What's going on?

Ten years. I was transferred to Musashi. Even when I disembarked, nobody would face me. But when we met today, we were able to talk, just like we used to.

Why is that changing as the night grows older?

"Damn it..."

Sakai moved. He went. He exited the study, moving into the hallway, and ran to the entrance. Behind him, the maid automaton was asking him where he was going, but there was no point in answering. He just went outside. In order to reconfirm the fact that he knew nothing, in order to just look at what was happening.

He went outside.

Sakai opened the entrance's sliding door by throwing his body against it, simultaneously thrusting his body out.

The garden was formed from stone and pine trees. There were stepping stones lined up to formed a 'Ç≠'. With such momentum that he only touched the first and the last one, he bounded over them.

The gate was open. Beyond it, the streets on which darkness had descended could be seen.

He went. In order to pass through the gate, he leaped. In the air, he lowered his hip, preparing to hit the ground.

That instant. Sakai saw two colours.

The first was the mountains in Kagamihara. The Testament Union's observatories for Mikawa on the mountain were the colour of blazing flame.

The second came at his right leg as if to trap it.

...A butt of a spear!?

His right foot shrank back, but it was too late.

From the out to the in, he was driven to the side, the butt catching his foot. Sakai lost his balance in the air.

●

"--!?"

Sakai forced his body to struggle against the movement which led his right shoulder to fall towards the floor.

By thrusting his left hip up, he added another half of a revolution to his movement.

A full turn. He landed in a crouching position.

His feet touched the ground, stepping onto the sand.

Simultaneously, he drew the dagger kept behind his waist halfway out of the scabbard, preparing for an attack coming from above.

While bringing his left hand inward to restrain any attacks coming from the left, he hauled himself up with the same hand.

He stood. By dropping his hip, he was able to take a stance where his right shoulder was sticking out, his hand holding his knife in a backhand grip.

Sakai swept his gaze through and focused his hearing on his surroundings.

"--Who is it?"

At the place his question was directed, two figures appeared on the street.

They appeared from within the shadows of the buildings, dyed darker than the already dark street.

"Dacchan and..."

"Jud., I am the controller of all automatons linked to the Honda family, Kazuno."

●

As Sakai watched, Kazuno clasped her empty hands in front of her and bowed.

Tadakatsu stood next to her. He held a spear in his hands and was looking at Sakai.

Sakai looked at Tadakatsu before his eyes locked onto the spear. The spear with a blade tipped like a bamboo's leaf.

"...Tonbokiri. A Divine Armament class weapon. A weapon with he power to splice even matter itself..."

"--You've gotten older. You can't avoid it anymore."

Tadakatsu spoke, bringing up Tonbokiri, which he had used to hook Sakai's foot by stretching it outward. Having done this, he shortened it. Tightening the socket which controlled Tonbokiri's lengthening mechanism, he took a straight pipe from his chest.

An instant. As Kazuno stood beside him, her wrist flicked up, flicking the tip of the pipe with enough force to send it jumping up.

Along with a muffled thump, a fire was lit in the crushed leaves stuffed inside the tip of the pipe.

"--I apologise for my discourtesy."

"Don't worry 'bout it...Then, Sakai, about you."

Three noises rang out as Tadakatsu spoke.

The first was the sound of the Testament Union's aerial gods of war taking flight in the skies high above, going from the west to the east in order to maintain air superiority.

The second was the sound of of the Testament Union's escort ships rising from the western continental port and heading towards the flames at Kagamihara.

And the final one was this.

"Hey, Dacchan...This sound is..."

A faint noise, but a noise with real depth. A noise that seemed to soak into and through all that it touched.

"...coming from the ground...no, from even deeper..."

Sakai was able to predict what it was beneath the ground that was causing this noise. However...

...This is reckless...

Despite this, the noise came slowly. An 'oh' here, a 'do' there...these sounds could be heard. This was not because the ground was shaking, but because the crust, the earth above it and the air itself was being shaken.

It was floating up.

"----"

A long, long beat was struck.

It was a pulse.

The periodic pulse that you could feel when pressing down a vein, except stretched out for a long time, for tens of seconds.

The earth pulsed.

...This is...

Gulping down a breath, I directed my gaze forward, and in front of me, next to Kazuno, stood Tadakatsu.

The edge of Tadakatsu's mouth was curled upward.

That crook in his mouth slowly opened.

"It's the earth pulse, Sakai. You remember it, don't you? When we constructed Old Nagoya Castle during our time of service, the earth pulse reactor, which filters fluid, was made badly, and it often would come to the brink of overload. When it did, this sound would fill the air."

I remember. What he's saying is true. This was from more than ten years ago, when I still served as one of the Matsudaira Four Heavenly Kings.

Earth pulse reactors were interdicted by the countries of the Tsirch Testament, but since Mikawa didn't fall under their jurisdiction, it continued to run. Because of this, Mikawa was relied upon by the countries of the Tsirch Testament for the manufacturing of aerial ships and arms, and these countries would then order them from us. We somehow managed to keep the old style earth pulse reactors running and fulfilling their function.

Earth pulse reactors' function is to disaggregate Fluid from the earth pulse, purifying it into Fluid fuel. By spending exorbitant amounts of money on its costs of operation, it is possible to acquire higher levels of Fluid fuel. However, because this drains the earth pulse, the earth pulses in the vicinity will narrow and become unstable.

As such, it is feared that the appearance of the pulsing noise of the earth pulse, which indicates the instability of the earth pulse reactor, calls out monsters and Phenomena.

"We were the ones calmly eating and smoking as this sound boomed out, weren't we, Dacchan?"

"Yeah. But Sakai...you, who were called the Grand Head, have become old."

As he spoke, a thunderous roar ripped through the sky above Tadakatsu, which was already pulsing.

The Testament Union's gods of war. Robotic bodies with four wings, spread in the style of a cross. They had originally come to keep watch on Mikawa, but they had been deployed by the Testament Union, who had seen the flames from the watchhouse.

Each of the three units circled clockwise through Mikawa's airspace, striving to preserve their air superiority.

If anything were to happen, Tres Espana, in charge of Mikawa's surveillance, would be held responsible. The gods of war traversing the sky and the fact that they had even mobilized their aerial ships to control the watchhouse were both shows of force as well as manifestations of their impatience.

However, there were probably people in the Testament Union who had not noticed this heartbeat.

Tres Espana had started to move out. Their attentions were drawn by the diversion by the mountain range. As such, they should not have noticed the real danger, which lay on the ground, at the earth pulse reactor in New Nagoya Castle. Therefore...

"...The gods of war above us aren't armed for anti-surface but anti-air warfare. The ships are filled with infantry armed for mountainous warfare, so they can take over the watchhouse. In other words...they've come into Mikawa unsuitably armed."

"Yeah, that's right. They've made the worst possible adjustments, or in other words...they're entering Mikawa with a disadvantage."

Still, Tadakatsu said this.

"The enemy hasn't taken in the situation yet. They're communicating with New Nagoya Castle in order to inform them of the incident's details. The automatons communicating with them should be delaying it."

"Why?"

"Isn't it obvious? If they just marched right in so simply we'd get rolled."

Tadakatsu puffed out smoke.

"Three of 'em are going, so the balance's slanted, and the pulse's started. It's probably been noticed by now, so they diversion's over. Now, it's time to get inside and hold out till the other two start up."

"Wait."

Sakai spoke. He asked about the numbers that Tadakatsu had told him.

"By three and two, you mean..."

"I'm obviously talking about New Nagoya Castle's earth pulse reactors, right? The four in the rectangle and the unified one in the center. We're carefully making them overload right now."

Hearing Tadakatsu speak, Sakai's thoughts stopped for an instant.

...Overloading the earth pulse reactors?

It's easy to do. All you have to do is run the mechanism that extracts the Fluid at a higher setting. If you do this, the extracted Fluid will be captured in large amounts inside the reactor before heading to the storage and preparation chambers, and it will erode the reactor from the inside.

Unrefined Fluid is able to freely cause variants in space. Because it has no tendencies towards a certain direction, continual accumulation will begin interferences and erode the surroundings. Eventually, they will cause 'alterations' in each other.

When it reaches that stage, it will come to an end. It will devour the reactor, and the 'alterations' will reflux in the earth pulse, expanding at high speed. The effects of erosion will continue to spread until it mixes with other space and its individuality is diluted.

Once, before the Divine States were oppressed, an earth pulse reactor in the Harmonic Divine States' RUS had overloaded and self-destructed. In the same way, eight years ago, directly after his inheritance of the name, Nobunaga of P.A. ODA destroyed all remnants of the Murasai rebellion's military power with the overloading and eventual self-destruction of an earth pulse reactor. They hunted them down until they were gathered in Mount Hiei, where a temple was built, and they annihilated it.

In both of these incidents...

"Everything within a radius of a few kilometers was obliterated...If you start five of them, Mikawa, let alone Nagoya, will be destroyed!"

"That's why I'm saying, you've gotten old."

Tadakatsu told him, a smile on his face.

"There is no-one in Mikawa. Just the automatons and us. Because of this...Hell, I really want to see it. The destruction of Mikawa, caused not by that piece of junk during our time of service, but by the collapse of the earth pulse due to the overloading of the new type of earth pulse reactors."

"----"

"Since you've come from Sakakibara's mansion, you were asking him, weren't you? About why we were doing this?"

"Sakakibara's disappeared...He was spirited away by the Princesses."

'Oh?', Tadakatsu said. He looked up at the shadows of the gods of war flying around in the sky.

"So, you haven't asked why. That's a shame...there were a lot of things I wanted to ask. A disappointment."

"Disappointment...?"

"I'm talking about myself, alright? I've just been following the orders of my lord. Ii and Sakakibara seemed to know something, but I don't really know anything, let alone what's happening. All that the Lord told me was that this..."

A breath.

"That this was the start of the Genesis Project."

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Translator Notes

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