Magika No Kenshi To Shoukan Maou:Volume 3 Chapter 3

Chapter 3 – The Silver Girl and the Plan of Darkness

Part 1

A scene of two people in a sharp fall. However, Kazuki didn’t regret it at all.

…If he didn’t do this, Koyuki, who currently couldn’t use magic power would simply die for sure.

But as long as the defensive magic power worked, a pure physical impact wouldn’t even be a problem. The impact of the landing would be eradicated in its entirety due to the magic power’s reality distortion.

That was why setting aside his own safety, he embraced Koyuki strongly.

He had to turn himself to be the one that was pinned on the bottom side of this free fall without fail.

And then after they continued to fall for several seconds―Kazuki and Koyuki crashed at the bottom of the hole.

A large blue magic power shined. But the lack of pain that he felt was a normal matter.

The defensive magic power was unperturbed against a mere physical impact that didn’t contain magic power. Without a doubt, this was the reason scientific weapons of this era were powerless.

“Hiakari-san, are you okay?”

Kazuki had embraced Koyuki so tightly he couldn’t feel his own arms.

“H, here is…?”

Koyuki leaked out a frail voice inside Kazuki’s arms.

“I’ll say it from the start, but this is not heaven.”

Koyuki’s awareness had flown away due to the impact, she was blinking her eyes in wonder.

“Hell…?”

“Hiakari-san is not the kind of person who will fall into hell.”

Koyuki’s pupils were regaining their focus gradually, she was staring fixedly at Kazuki. And then perhaps from finally feeling that her life had been saved for real, she gripped Kazuki’s clothes in his chest tightly.

“…Was Kazuki the one who saved me…?”

While confirming nervously with upward glance, a heart mark flew from her chest.

Kazuki continued to embraced Koyuki tightly just like that. They fell into silence together with their bodies laying against each other.

“U, uhmm, I’m fine already so can you release me?”

“I also want to do so, but…because I hugged you too tightly before, my arms are numb and cannot be moved.”

Though of course he didn’t use Enchant Aura, so he didn’t embraced her so strongly that her delicate body would be crushed. But because he felt a strong nervousness in their fall, his muscles had stiffened too much.

“Eh? …Eeeeehh!?”

Koyuki’s face turned bright red while being embraced tightly against his chest like a doll as it were.

“P, please loosen your tension quickly, this makes me troubled!”

“That’s, when I think that I am hugging Hiakari-san so tightly, it makes my heart beat too much, perhaps I should say my body totally cannot calm down, how troubling.”

“Stupid! Being excited by something like me, what kind of lies are you saying!”

“It’s not a lie. Hiakari-san is cute, so no matter what kind of man it is, when embracing Hiakari-san because of an act of god like this, of course he would get excited without fail.”

“What kind of stupid things are you saying with a serious face like that!? Anyway, can you just slacken your arm loose!?”

Koyuki said with a troubled face, so Kazuki felt a little mischievous.

“If Hiakari-san chanted a spell like [Throb throb fly away~, chichin pui-pui nya nya nya nya~n☆] while patting my head gently, I think the strength could be drained from my entire body.”

“Wh, what, that spell sounds so stupid…”

It was the influence of a certain idiot little sister. Because he always set out together with Kanae and messed around.

“Because it sounds so stupid that it could drain the entire strength from the body! Now, hurry!”

Kazuki said strongly making Koyuki’s flustered gaze wander around.

“E, errr I’m sorry, how did you say it again?”

“[Throb throb fly away~, chichin pui-pui nya nya nya nya~n☆] while Hiakari-san also pats my head gently.”

“Thr, Throb throb fly away~, chichin pui-pui nya nya nya nya~n…”

Her small hand was going pat pat on Kazuki’s head with utmost effort, and Koyuki chanted the spell with a blushing red face.

“Uwa―, how calming―”

Kazuki said in monotone while unfastening his hands.

The truth was that his nervousness had already faded a while ago.

While Koyuki raised her body slowly, she watched Kazuki resentfully with some heat still left behind on her cheeks.

“…Recently, you have had no hesitation about toying around with me, haven’t you? For that reason you are telling lies without even batting an eyelid. Are you misunderstanding me as a certain fumbling character?”

“I want to see Hiakari-san’s various faces even against my better judgment.”

“It’s fine for my face to stay just like this. I don’t want to expose any kind of strange face.”

Koyuki turned her face to the side with a ‘puih’. But an angry face like that was also very cute.

“Hiakari-san, there is dirt on you.”

When Kazuki wiped the dust on her white cheek softly, Koyuki’s face turned red again and she looked down.

“…Well then, rather than that kind of thing, this situation is more important. Hiakari-san, by some chance, are you unable to use magic now?”

After joking around a little, they returned to reality once again.

Koyuki’s expression clouded gloomily.

“…Yes. Somehow I cannot knead strong magic power very well right now. I can barely perform the Access, but standard magic and chanting Summoning Magic are…”

When he watched her carefully, her Magic Dress was also different than the usual.

Originally the Diva’s contractor was decorated with appropriate majestic appearance, but her appearance now was lacking in one part, it only looked like a mere white school swimsuit.

Even that minimum part that was covering her body, at times it was wavering like a disordered mirage.

“Since when you were like this?”

“I think it was from when I woke up from the magic intoxication.”

When he thought about it, as expected, perhaps the origin was from that time. Magic intoxication induced a change in the state of the heart. After collapsing for two days from magic intoxication, it was not strange that there was some kind of after-effect that was still left behind.

Everything would be fine if this was only temporary like someone who was just half awake, but….

“Even when I cleaned my body, I couldn’t use magic skillfully, at that time I noticed the abnormality, but….”

“If you noticed it, why were you accompanying us until here then?”

Kazuki didn’t intend to criticize her, but Koyuki’s shoulders jolted in shock, her gaze turned astray like she was trying to find an escape.

―There was no way to escape.

She recognized her own careless action, and that she couldn’t avoid facing Kazuki.

“…I cannot, I who is an elf couldn’t, couldn’t come to believe that I could not use magic. I whose only worth was just my magic…to not be able to use magic and become useless in battle, that….”

Koyuki who talked by straining her voice continued with “I’m sorry.”

Kazuki thought that he could understand that feeling as well. He also relied on his pride of his own kenjutsu. If he lost it out of nowhere, there was no doubt that he would want to run from reality with [I don’t want to believe it]. Then if such an escape became a source of trouble for someone else, for certain he would receive a shock that he could never recover from.

That was why he mustn’t condemn Koyuki. I must protect her till the end!

“It’s okay Hiakari-san. If this is because of magic intoxication’s influence, then surely this is just temporary. A person’s heart is formless after all, it’s not like the flesh body that cannot be healed once it got hurt and wrecked. It only depends on one’s frame of mind, after a little bit of some kind of impetus, it should return back to normal for sure.”

“…You are not angry?”

Koyuki watched Kazuki intently with eyes that looked a bit scared.

“No such thing, I’m not angry. Just thinking that Hiakari-san wanted to help me, just that feeling of yours is enough to make me extremely happy.”

Her sad appearance because of being in the way of others was the proof that she cared about Kazuki. Even more than something like the number of her positivity level, such nonchalant act and appearance made him far happier.

“…Although, we must find some way to escape from here safely somehow.”

Kazuki said while looking around.

They were in the bottom of the trap hole. But the space where they were at was not a closed room, the walls and floor that were made from concrete were organized forming the whole level, a road was continuing ahead in their path.

Even the electric lamp was turned on properly.

When they looked over their head, there was one hole that was opened up in the ceiling from where they fell. If they could ascend through this hole, it looks like they would be able to return to the former level.

The exit and entrance to the surface ground was only located at the upper level, that’s why first they thought about going through this hole rather than advancing forward down the path.

“Couldn’t Kazuki use Blazing Wings to fly through this hole?”

“The hole is too narrow. If there is no space to even flap the wings, we won’t be able to use wings to fly.”

Even for the firebird Phoenix, if he couldn’t flap his wings then he wouldn’t be able to do anything.

Kazuki didn’t only have Mio’s magic, he could also use Lotte’s magic up to level 5.

There was still no chance to use it until now, but Lotte’s level 5 magic made it possible to fly to the sky. But that magic equipped the user with a large armament, so it wouldn’t be able to slip through the width of this hole.

The hole became narrower the deeper it went, it was easy to fall and hard to climb. They could feel the wickedness of this clever disposition from the person who prepared this trap.

It seems it was impossible to escape through this hole with the current magic Kazuki had in hand.

“…If only I can use magic,”

Koyuki whispered in a subdued tone.

“If I summon a tsunami here and manipulate it…no, the amount of the water might not be enough for this depth…”

Filling this space with ocean water and swimming inside it to rise to the surface, was that what she meant?

“What if I use the same magic and the amount of the water is doubled?”

“Now that you mention it, the ability of Kazuki’s Diva is copy magic right? However it looks like you are unable to copy my magic. Is there a condition to that ability?”

It was not exactly copying actually, but he explained it to Koyuki like that before this.

“The condition so I can copy magic is to raise the positivity level of the girl.”

“…Ha? You are lying again, are you planning to toy around with my reaction?”

“No, this is the truth. That’s why I can use Mio’s magic the most, and the next is Lotte, Kaguya-senpai’s magic can also be used a little.”

Kazuki was the strongest at using Mio’s magic in the first place was because Mio’s positivity level was plainly the highest. Koyuki was flustered at feeling the persuasiveness of that fact.

“Is, is that really true? That kind of stupid ability…”

“It’s the truth for real. What do you mean by stupid, it’s not stupid.”

At Kazuki’s side, the one who bestowed the aforementioned stupid ability, Leme appeared and talked.

“You have heard the story between Leme and Futsunushi no Kami, didn’t you? The story that you haven’t been told is something quite hard to swallow but, Leme is the King of Solomon 72 Pillar. In the same way Leme is accompanied by 72 Pillar, if Kazuki also makes the contractor of the 72 Pillar accompany him then he would be able to use that ability skillfully.”

“Accompanied…by that you mean positivity level?”

“That’s right, if the King couldn’t get the hold of human’s hearts in his hand, then he wouldn’t be able to use that authority.”

Koyuki comprehended the explanation with a complicated expression. Kazuki asked Koyuki once again.

“…If we could climb the hole, could Vepar’s magic smash the ceiling? That ceiling was not made from adamantite, but only made from concrete after all.”

While in the middle of falling down, Kazuki had confirmed that the trap hole had been blocked once more.

Not only climbing up the hole, but they also had to smash the ceiling apart to escape.

However Mio and Lotte’s magic were not suited for physical destruction.

If they tried to melt the ceiling with magic flame, the large amount of the melted concrete from the heat of the magic power wouldn’t have any place to escape and it would pour down on themselves, washing them away again until the bottom of the hole.

“If we could climb the hole, we could pulverize something like concrete with Ice Buster.”

“Using ice to destroy concrete, could it be done? It feels somehow absurd trying to imagine it though.”

“Concrete’s hardness diverged depending on the material used, but it’s around 4 until 5. This unit to measure hardness is called Mohs’ hardness. The hardness of ice at 0 °C is around 1.5, but the more the temperature is lowered, the hardness will increase along with its transparency, at minus 100 °C, the hardness will become more than six times.”

“...Ice is really awesome.”

“O Our King, this kind of knowledge that will be useful in battle should be learned more habitually you know.”

Thereupon, it means things like this.

“If Hiakari-san’s power of magic returned, on top of that if I raise Hiakari-san’s positivity level, then we will be able to return to the former level!”

“...A, are you serious? Raising positivity level in this kind of dungeon?”

Until now he had to raise positivity level in order to defeat a strong enemy.

However this time, he had to raise positivity level in order to escape from this closed space!

“Raising positivity level in this kind of situation , moreover while both of us are being aware of each other, even for me, I don’t really know what is a good way to do that, but…well, for the time being let’s just follow down this path.”

But I’m also worried about Mio and Lotte…

Though it was a silver lining in the dark cloud that those two could make a compatible combination with Lotte as the vanguard and Mio as the rearguard.

{Kazuki, I don’t want Hiakari Koyuki to know about this so I’m telling you through telepathy, but if it’s some way to confirm the safety of Amasaki Mio and the others then you have it.}

…Really?

{The first is obvious, but you could check it from the positivity level. The appearance of their name and number are proof that the link between your minds are still preserved.}

Kazuki charged his ring with magic power and it displayed the positivity levels.

Amasaki Mio―134 Lotte―110 Hiakari Koyuki―59

I see, when Leme said it, it’s really obvious. A dead person’s positivity level wouldn’t be displayed.

{Next there is one more…because you also conquered Lotte, Leme has grown considerably, Leme has recovered one more of her powers.}

…Which reminds him, before Leme said that [My ability is by no means only this much]. Does she mean that one part of her power had been liberated?

{Kazuki, charged the Solomon Ring with magic power while thinking about Mio and Lotte strongly, try to grasp their hearts and see.}

Just as he was told, Kazuki held the ring with his hand and pray silently about perceiving Mio and Lotte.

Thereupon…he felt a sensation like his heart was connected with Mio and Lotte’s heart by a line.

About how long the line was and which direction it was going to, he could perceive that line spatially.

A new vision floated up in front of Kazuki’s eyes. This time it was not a graph of the positivity level.

{If until now it was a positivity level of galge, this time it is an action selection map stage. When you see this map, you will understand in a glance who you could meet at where you are going to, see?}

The vision that was floating in front of Kazuki’s eyes was a three dimensional map.

Three lights were blinking on top of that three dimensional coordinates. One is himself. Then on the fairly above direction was two lights that were in moving. There was no doubt that these were Mio and Lotte.

It was not a map of the path of these underground passages. Rather than a map, there were three lights floating inside a cube where he could make a distinction of their position and distance, something like a radar.

{By the way, this light will only appear when the other party are latently wishing for Kazuki. For example if Amasaki Mio enter a toilet, her state of mind will latently work that she doesn’t want Kazuki to perceive her whereabouts, the link of magic power will be cut off and you will become unable to know where she is. Solomon 72 Pillar had even take into consideration the privacy of our contractor, aren’t we a really friendly Diva?}

After informing him until that point, Leme cut off the telepathy.

“…Kazuki, why did you suddenly became quiet?”

Koyuki asked dishearteningly towards Kazuki who had gone quiet for fairly long.

“No, it’s nothing. Leme was telling me various things inside my head. We will go back above for sure, so let’s advance to uncover the secrets of this place!”

Kazuki stood in front of Koyuki, he advanced ahead while looking around with deep caution.

The current Koyuki who couldn’t use magic power was an extremely brittle existence. With only one hit of attack reaching her, she wouldn’t even fall into magic intoxication and might lose her life instantly.

The passage of this level were also long and narrow, it was the most suitable place to protect Koyuki while fighting.

“…Somehow it feels suffocating here.”

Damp moisture and moldy smell mixed in the air, the air conditioning was not working at all making the air hot and humid. Kazuki glanced back for a second.

“What is it?”

“No, Hiakari-san’s atmosphere is refreshing, so.”

Just by seeing the girl in a glance, his chest felt like it became less crowded. A cooling sight.

“…Kazuki, I have a request though.”

“What kind of request?”

“When we are in a time that is really emergency, please abandon me here. The me right now is just baggage. Someone who cannot be useful in the battle has no value whatsoever in being protected.”

…Why is she proposing such a self-torturing thing like that for? (self-destructive?)

“What kind of stupid thing are you saying? I’m not deciding a person’s worth only by how useful they are. Even though Hiakari-san cannot fight, but you are still very valuable. I will protect Hiakari-san’s life!”

Koyuki made a wondering face from Kazuki’s words.

“Please stop it. You are just thinking to raise my positivity level by saying that. Why can’t you focus on your own survival, stupid.”

On the contrary of those dishonest words, relief was mixing inside Koyuki’s tone of voice.

Perhaps she wanted to hear the words of [I will absolutely protect you], maybe that’s why she proposed this kind of thing. Surely she was feeling uneasy with the current situation, it couldn’t be helped.

“…Are you really, planning to raise my positivity level from now on?”

Again, Koyuki asked him with a nervous feeling.

“Regarding that, it’s also not good to put yourself on guard too much, let’s just do it naturally. Rather than that, what’s important is to protect Hiakari-san first.”

After keep walking for a while, the passage was divided into two.

Kazuki peeked out his face from the turning point and examined the situation in the left and right. At that moment, a black shadow leaped out from the corner of passage in an ambush.

Enemy attack!

Kazuki immediately took a back step while a beam of light streaked from the mouth of his sheath. The principle of Iai was originally a counter attack technique in an instant of time. Kazuki’s first and second slash carved up the black shadow roughly into pieces.

‘beshari’, with a wet sound, the thing that was cut by Kazuki fell on the floor.

“…What is this?”

Kazuki spontaneously groaned when he saw the dead body of the thing that attacked him.

The thing that was ceasing to function there was a grotesque organism that was hard to describe.

He couldn’t possibly believe that this kind of organism existed in the ecosystem of earth.

If he expressed it strongly, this organism was a lot of tentacles that were bundled together like a bouquet of flowers. It resembled an octopus. The tentacles were attached with countless suction pads for the sake of capturing its prey. The root of this thing was a bloodshot eyeball, rough breaths were released painfully from its tusked lips.

It resembled an octopus, but it looks slimy in pink color, its size was around the size of one person. It was a disgusting organism that made him feel like he would lose his sanity just by looking at it.

The sliced organism was wriggling about for a while, and then it disappeared by turning into blue light of magic power.

It was a Demon Beast.

“…What kind of Mythology had that kind of Demon Beast, what a bad taste. Come out here the Diva that’s in charge.”

The things called Demon Beast's came in a large variety, they could discover the source of the Demon Beast's among the numerous Mythology out there.

But he didn’t know about the existence of such eerie organism like this in the scope of the Mythology he had learned.

“Cthulhu Mythos…?”

Koyuki whispered in a low tone.

“Cthu…what?”

“Cthulhu Mythos…there is a Mythology that is called that. A monster that grows tentacles is a monster of this Mythology…Or perhaps I should say, it’s thought to be the feature of the evil god.”

“But I never heard about that kind of Mythology.”

“As far as my investigation go, there shouldn’t be any confirmation of the sighting of Demon Beast's and Divas that are derived from the Cthulhu Mythos until now.”

“…In short, this place is an extremely rare Haunted Ground?”

“…Strictly speaking, Cthulhu Mythos is an [original setting] that was created by an author named Lovecraft for the purpose of spinning a story. Lovecraft’s fellow authors also shared this and wrote their work using this setting, the world view of this work was developed rapidly, finally it turned into a large scale systematic world that was fitting to be called a Mythology. However in the end it was supposed to be nothing more than a setting for the purpose of literary creation. It’s rare, or, how should I put it…is this kind of thing even possible?”

“A story setting? That’s different from a Mythology, right? No, maybe Mythology too is something that looks like a story.”

Kazuki didn’t understand how to measure the line between a story and Mythology.

In the first place, the concept of Mythology was still not well-understood. The relation of Demon Beast's and Diva with Mythology still hadn’t came out of the realm of human’s own convenient hypothesis despite all the research that had been done.

In this world that had transformed into a place that overturned science, mankind was living while groping around in the dark, being led around by the nose by grand beings of unknown nature.

While they were talking, ‘zururi’, ‘zururi’, they could hear disgusting sounds from both passages that were diverging to the left and right.

When they turned their heads to the sounds, the eerie tentacle Demon Beasts were forming a group and crawling towards their way.

It was excessively disgusting how the Demon Beasts crawled nearing them in strangely fast movement despite their size.

“Hiakari-san, fall back!”

While removing Koyuki to the back, Kazuki started to chant his spell.

Part 2

“I’m going to melt this concrete floor with Phoenix’s flame! Lotte, step back!!”

After Kazuki fell into the trap hole, Mio insisted in a great panic.

Toward Mio’s insistence, Lotte made an objection carefully.

“But, this concrete floor is quite thick. If this floor is melted and a hole is made, then a large amount of melted concrete will fall desu. Concrete that is melted with magic will be wrapped in the heat of magic power. If the end of this trap hole is a closed space then…”

“…If it’s Kazuki then he will do something or another using defensive magic. Though now that you said it, it certainly will be really scary for a large amount of concrete wrapped in magic power to come falling down.”

“It was only for just an instant, but the moment when Koyuki-oneesan fell into the trap hole, she was in the state that couldn’t use magic desu. I think there will be quite a risk if this floor is melted and fall.”

“Mu―. …Rather than taking an imprudent risk, we should going forward collecting information of this dungeon?”

“It’s really lonely that Kazuki-oniisan is not here desu, but let’s do that. I’ll be the vanguard desu.”

“…Thank you. I’ll also raise the speed of my chant with all my strength, I’ll protect you from behind.”

“Yes, let’s do our best!”

Lotte grasped Mio’s hand tightly. “Ehehe” she laughed.

“We are close friends aren't we desu?”

Lotte sensed Mio’s discouragement through telepathy. That’s why she behaved cheerfully to encourage Mio.

“Stop it already, it’s awkward. Let’s go right away!”

Although her mouth said that, Mio walked forward without releasing Lotte’s hand.

Without knowing what was lurking in their path, they faced toward the darkness of the labyrinth….

Part 3

Several numbers of tentacle Demon Beasts were creeping near from the left and right paths.

The worst case was if they were attacked from both sides and he couldn’t protect Hiakari-san. With that thought, Kazuki returned back to the previous path, for a moment the Demon Beasts converged into one group.

“Hiakari-san, fall back just a little for now.”

It became a fight of one against many, but the disadvantage of number in this narrow passage was not that much of a concern.

Kazuki managed to drew away the Demon Beasts near enough, so he invoked his magic.

“Fire Wall!”

The foremost leading pack of the Demon Beasts that came rushing were swallowed in one go by the flame wall that burst forth from the ground. Blue light that was released when the Demon Beast vanished from this world was flickering in countless number inside the flame.

When the flame wall was extinguished, Kazuki carved up the following Demon Beast group that was still left.

However all the Demon Beasts were not looking at Kazuki, but at Koyuki.

They had completely seen through the opponent that couldn’t fight back instinctively.

One Demon Beast that Kazuki had let slip tried to make its way from his side.

Even in the worst case, he mustn’t allow an attack to Koyuki.

Kazuki threw his body in front of the Demon Beast and covered for Koyuki. The Demon Beast immediately captured Kazuki with its tentacles, then it opened its big mouth with tusks lining inside it against him that whose movement had been sealed. However, at that instant―.

“This hand reach out to the height of Babel, now this hand grasped the thunder of god! In accordance with my life, o lightning, whirl in my command! Collider Field!!”

He broke out a barrier of electricity barely in time. All the Demon Beasts around Kazuki was baked from the inside through the electric shock, their nerves were paralyzed.

Kazuki slipped out from the restraint of the tentacles and cut away all the paralyzed Demon Beasts at once.

The Demon Beasts still hadn’t stopped coming in waves to attack.

“Roar! Civilization grant humans destruction! The howl of wisdom scorch thy body, break, shut all dignity under the rubble!! Mitrailleuse!”

Kazuki used the gatling gun to stop the advance of the Demon Beasts, then,

“Fire Wall!”

The place where all the Demon Beasts had gathered was burned away in a flame wall once again.

“…So it’s really true that you can use other people’s magic skillfully. There is even a remarkable difference in chanting speed compared to the time when you had a duel with Amasaki-san…”

Koyuki’s eyes became wide open seeing Kazuki using Mio and Lotte’s magic so well.

“Fuu, anyway first the wave had been settled…”

“Are you okay, Kazuki? You got hit with an attack because of me just now.”

“The damage is not really significant see? Rather than that, which way should we go, left or right?”

“…Kazuki, the spirit here feel it, this way.”

“Eh? Spirit you say?”

<Spirit>. The existence with many puzzle, it was said that only elves with their altered magic power could sense their existence. They had no flesh body, the being of different dimension.

Kazuki couldn’t sense their existence. As expected, it seems elves had a different sensory organ that was different from a normal person. Though they became the target of discrimination as a consequence of that difference….

“Kazuki too is different from normal, that’s why I thought maybe you too could…as expected, you can’t sense them.”

Koyuki dropped her shoulder in loneliness. She felt a considerable disappointment.

“Sorry…spirit, what kind of existence is it?”

Spirit couldn’t be sensed except by elf, because those elves had received discriminatory treatment for a long time, research and investigation of spirit was not done at all.

Spirit was shrouded in a lot more mystery even compared to Diva and Demon Beast.

“Spirit’s existence could be sensed in the Haunted Ground, there are many cases like that, but it is different with Demon Beast in that it doesn’t bring harm to people. They nearly don’t have any influence in this world. They exist in Astrum, at times they come to talk with use, elves, using telepathy. They are just a whispering existence.”

The aspect where they were residents of Astrum who didn’t have physical body in this world was the same with Diva. But in contrast with Diva who was an existence with large power and will and its own objective, spirit was a really small existence.

“Even though I was saying that they talked to me, the language that they uttered to me was not clear. What they transmitted to me was only vague feelings. If the strength of the telepathy is increased then I could sense more detail, they might explain something.”

“The spirits that is in this place right now, are they telling something to Hiakari-san?”

“Yes. I think they are giving us a warning that it’s better not to follow this path.”

Koyuki quietly pointed to the right path of the diverging route.

“But the thing that we are looking for is located ahead in this path, that’s what I think they are saying.”

“Then we cannot follow their warning after all. Looks like Spirit-san cannot guess too far, that we don’t have any place to go back to from here.”

“…That’s so. Though it makes the situation a little uneasy.”

Kazuki took Koyuki’s hand gently.

“Wh, what is it…?”

“No, because it is quite uneasy, I thought we can walk while holding hands.”

“Are you stupid? Intentionally blocking one of your own hand, what are you going to do if enemy comes suddenly?”

“There is that, but before this we had defeated a fair number of them, so wouldn’t it be fine for a while I wonder―, that’s what I thought.”

“Then, only until the next corner.”

…Eh, she unexpectedly folded so easily?

Koyuki whose face was looking down, her small hand clutched his hand back tightly.

A heart mark was flying to him. It’s only a trivial thing, but it made her happy.

“Which reminds me, I have been thinking of this for a long time but, is it okay for me to call Hiakari-san by your given name?”

Kazuki asked that while feeling her warmth from one hand. When he called Mio and Kaguya-senpai by their first name, he had a feeling that the distance between them shrinked a lot. If he want to suggest this then now is the chance, that was the feeling he got.

“It doesn’t really matter, isn’t it fine to call me whatever you like? As for me about the matter of Kazuki, I have called you Kazuki near from the start.”

“Now that you mention it, that’s true isn’t it? Since when it became that Hiakari-san is calling me by my first name again…?”

At first she called Kazuki as [Rank-E person].

“…You were looked down by everyone in the class, but didn’t you duel with Amasaki-san to protect the honor of your important kenjutsu? Since then, I reconsidered my opinion on you a little…”

Koyuki answered him with some difficulty. For some reason even this side also became feeling a little itchy.

“I see, Hiakari-san had recognized me properly as a human from a long time ago.”

“Not really, I don’t care whatever happened to you anyway…”

While murmuring such thing, Koyuki’s hand that was connected with his hand became a little hot.

“Thank you, then without reservation, Koyuki. This is quite awkward for some reason. Koyuki. Koyuki.”

“I don’t really care even if you call me by my name, but please don’t call me repeatedly without any meaning!”

Koyuki got angry while pulling Kazuki’s hand strongly.

“Something trivial like a name, it’s all the same however way you are using to call me. You are only doing stupid things in this kind of situation.”

From the chest of Koyuki who was saying such things with a sullen face―a key that was shining with light was floating up.

That key was absorbed into Solomon’s ring which was Kazuki’s Magic Dress.

The key that was received from Koyuki, the proof that her positivity level had gone over 65….

The proof that a definite link was formed between their hearts.

Perhaps he ought to call her by her given name far more earlier than this.

“Just now, I became able to use Koyuki’s magic you know?”

“…!?” With a jerk, Koyuki suddenly stopped walking.

It seems she received a terrible shock from the fact that was apparent in the meaning of those words. She hung her head down looking like she was trying to desperately suppress the feeling that was seething inside her heart, she shut her eyes tightly.

She separated their connected hand forcefully.

“Even though…even though I had decided not to get involved with anyone already. Even though I planned not to fall in love with anyone. Why are you getting inside me like this…slithering inside…”

“Koyuki…”

An obstinate solo player. But inside her heart, for a long time she felt the crushing loneliness, this girl named Koyuki.

―She was imposing some kind of restriction against herself, bounding her own heart tightly.

―She was bearing a feeling of guilt toward herself who was thinking that she wanted to get along well with someone.

Kazuki could see all of that from her.

“Why Koyuki, you are trying to continue isolating yourself inside the loneliness of your own making don’t you see? It’s regrettable that you went through a lot of painful thing in the past, but like this you will only reject other people.”

Why was she doing this kind of foolish thing, when he was confronting her like this, he could feel her indignation from her way of life.

“It’s fine already for Koyuki to not live in such a lonely way anymore. Even though something happened in the past, it’s okay to not fear anymore. Because I’m thinking of Koyuki as someone absolutely important to me. It’s fine to forget all the painful things.”

“Forgetting…?”

Koyuki stared at Kazuki with eyes that looked completely like the eyes of a lost child.

When Kazuki thought how frail of an existence this girl was, he hugged her tightly.

Can he became an existence that brought her a peace of mind?

Koyuki’s body stiffened and she was trembling. She was so small that he was afraid he will break her if he hugged her with all his strength. Kazuki embraced like he was wrapping her up inside his hands, he stroked her back that was bare by the design of the magic dress.

“Until Koyuki calmed down, let’s take a rest from walking to the next corner for a while, okay?”

Koyuki returned his embrace tightly while keeping her quiet.

He felt that she finally accepted him. An affectionate feeling was welling up inside him.

“…Kazuki. please call my name one more time.”

“Koyuki.”

“Except for you and Kaguya-senpai, there is nobody else that had call me by my name in this 13 years.”

“13 years ago, that was still a time when Koyuki were a little child wasn’t it?”

The preposterous period before this, this girl was supposed to be still [an existence that had a need to be called by her name and to be loved].

“…Why! Why didn’t I get called by my name!?”

Suddenly Koyuki raised her voice and she pushed her face in Kazuki’s chest. In that chest of his, he gradually felt the tears that soaked his uniform.

The one who was in front of Koyuki right now was not Kazuki, she was facing someone else and cried.

“Papa…, Mama…! Why, why didn’t you look at me!? Why…just because I became an elf!!”

Koyuki clung to Kazuki strongly because of her pain that couldn’t be protected by any defensive magic power. Raising her voice to the limit, Koyuki’s thin arms turned white from all the strength that she pushed into it.

“aAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!”

Koyuki wept.

She decided in his heart that she would live alone, how much tear she endured inside her whole life until this point of time.

All those things she bore inside obstinately for a long time, Kazuki accepted all of those silently in his chest.

But she finally stopped holding all of it alone. He finally became a partner that this girl could spill her heart to, that was what he thought.

The time passed like that for a while, ‘guzu’ Koyuki sounded her nose.

“…I’m sorry to expose my disgraceful figure so suddenly. But, just a little more like this…”

Koyuki finally started to recover her calm. However….

“Koyuki, something with magic power is approaching here.”

“…!”

The feeling of nervousness from being inside a Haunted Ground returned and her whole body stiffen.

“I want to be like this together with Koyuki for a long time and I don’t want to ever arrive to the next corner, but looks like it won’t come true.”

Koyuki separated her body from Kazuki with reluctance. Kazuki too, while feeling the lingering affection toward the fading away warmth, he concentrated his consciousness toward the magic power that was approaching.

The reaction for the magic power was unusual. It was different with the weak wave of magic power that Demon Beast emitted just by existing.

It felt completely like a magician that was chanting a magic, a complex whirlpool that swirled around.

It couldn’t be, that was not a Demon Beast but a human that was approaching…?

Kazuki walked to the passage corner. Even if a Demon Beast came attacking suddenly, possibly even magic could come flying, that would be fine, he chose a defensive magic and prepared to chant the spell.

He finally arrived at the passage corner, there he faced a body in the middle of the path.

―What the hell is this guy!

Something that was even more strange than the Demon Beast from before was standing there.

A living thing that looked like a flesh-colored muddy slime .

Its size was around the size of an adult human, ash colored hair was growing everywhere on it.

There were no eyes and nose, but a large lips was protruding, it was wriggling around like it was trying to mumble something, leaking out a moan that was impossible to decipher.

It looks completely like a human that was melting into undefined muddy form….

“unu, guruo…ugo, ugo, urugua…”

What the large lips was mumbling was a spell. The skin-colored monster that looked like sticky flesh mud was shining with the light of magic power, beside it an avatar of Diva was floating.

…Summoning Magic!?

“URUGUO!”

At the same time with the monster’s voice, a large globe of flame was created and flew to Kazuki.

If he evaded it Koyuki will be hit!

“Fire Wall!”

Kazuki astutely invoked his prepared magic.

The globe of flame was swallowed inside the flame wall and it was negated.

“Mitrailleuse!”

Kazuki equipped the gatling gun and poured on a storm of bullet.

“IGI!? IGI! IGI!”

Even while being protected from the bullet by the blue defensive magic power, the monster’s body was distorted like a jelly ‘gunyagunya’ from the shock of its smashed magic, it raised an eerie scream that he couldn’t bear to hear.

Just from looking at it, just from listening at it, he felt like it would harm his sanity.

Kazuki held a shirking feeling, that he didn’t want to challenge this opponent in close-quarter combat.

“Barrett!”

He shot the monster with a flame bullet. The defensive magic power of the monster was used up, the flame bullet was sinking into the mud-like body. The flame bullet that sank inside its body burn its insides to a crisp.

While the monster writhed around in agony, it….,

“Th, thank…”

After spinning a sound that sounds like a word with its lips for the last time, it stopped moving with a twitch,

…Thank you, is that what it tried to say?

It chilled Kazuki’s spine with its mysterious eeriness.

But even though this thing was so eerie, it didn’t disappear and scatter into the light of magic power even though this monster’s life was already snuffed out.

The skin-colored dead body was clinging to the ground with a splat, it continued to remain in that place.

…It didn’t become a light and disappeared, does this mean this thing was not a Demon Beast…?

No wait, if it was not a Demon Beast, than what in the world was this organism!?

Koyuki who chased him until the passage corner was giving the dead body of the monster a glance, then she came to cling at Kazuki’s arm with a tight squeeze. He thought whether she was scared by the grotesqueness of the monster, but―that was not the case.

“Kazuki...please look.”

She noticed an even more terrifying matter.

“This living thing’s ears…”

In that dead body that ceased to function in the floor with a splat, he overlooked it in the middle of the fight but, it had ears attached even though it didn’t have any eyes and nose. Those ears were, pointed ears that lengthening sharply.

“This is…no, she is, an elf. A thing that was an elf before.”

Part 4

“Barrett!”

Mio released a bullet of flame against the monster that was approaching.

But…the force of the flame was weak. ‘zee zee’ Mio’s breath was becoming rough.

Why can’t I defeat this small fry with one attack!

…The oxygen was thinning.

The place called the underground was not an airtight place. But just as she understood from the damp and humid air, this place by no means did not have a good ventilation.

For a flame to burn fiercely it needed oxygen. The more Mio used her flame magic in this place, the more her neck felt choked.

“Mio-oneesan, please don’t force yourself!”

Lotte stood in front of Mio where she served as the vanguard.

While firing a volley of gatling bullets, she chanted even more spells.

“I reached out my hand toward the height of Babel, becoming the ruler of people! In accordance with my life, O thunder, swirled into spiral in my hand! Electromagnetic Assault SpearBlitzkrieg!!”

That was a magic that was used for the first time in a real battle, Prometheus’ level 4 magic.

Lotte’s left hand was already equipped with an electromagnetic iron gauntlet that was created from her level 3 magic, [Collider Field]. That iron gauntlet was enveloped with light, and she called even more supplement unit to equip on her body.

It was a long lance that was almost twice as tall as Lotte.

“Prometheus…ChargeSchub!!”

Having her lance ready, Lotte charged into the group of monsters.

The electric current that was produced by the gauntlet was flowing into the lance, Lotte transformed into a meteor of lightning.

Everything that was standing in the way was pierced in one go, electrocuted, and turned into ash.

Lotte rushed in a straight line, she arrived up to the backside of the monsters' swarm after a struggle.

“Prometheus, ReapSchneiden!”

When Lotte commanded, the spearhead part transformed, a blade was equipped there.

Transforming from [lance] to [naginata] , Lotte swung it from the back of the monsters' swarm.

The storm of electric blade blew violently, sweeping up the swarm of monsters.

Lotte who was armed with the extensive ranged attack from the new magic she learned was a demon of annihilation.

“…Sorry Lotte, I keep holding you back.”

Mio was hanging her head down while her breath still hadn’t come back.

“It’s only because I am perfectly suited to purge away the small fry enemies desu. Moreover, this place’s environment is not suited for flame magic after all desu….”

Lotte’s encouragement was accurate, but Mio was not comforted with that and she kept her head hung down with no sign of looking up. Mio was also still hung up from the fight with Beatrix where she was not useful.

“…Even though I also want to be useful for Kazu-nii, I only keep holding you all back…”

Through the telepathy magic, Lotte could perceive the feelings of Mio.

Uneasy feeling was spreading completely in the surface of Mio’s heart like a dark sea.

Because of the felling of powerlessness against herself, a cold wind of self-denial was blowing inside her.

“It’s scary…I keep continuing to expose such disgraceful sight in front of Kazu-nii like this…”

Mio who was usually full of confidence in herself was whispering weakly.

The small-statured Lotte tiptoed lightly and hugged Mio, she was tapping Mio’s back lightly.

“Kazuki-oniisan is not someone calculating who will decide to like or hate you from whether you are useful in battle or not, right desu? We are not supposed to be people that Kazuki-oniisan gathered for the purpose of creating a strong party desu. We are connected with Kazuki-oniisan by a Bond, people who gathered because we love each other desu. That’s why we can become a strong party desu.”

“…I know, that kind of thing is obvious. Because I have been together with Kazu-nii for a long time. But…exposing an unsightly appearance when I want to show my good point still made me uneasy…”

“We are comrades who help each other, so let’s do this with the right person in the right place. I will kick around all the small fry. Mio-oneesan just preserve your strength, please launch a large shot to the boss opponent. Come on, please cheer up. Please cheer up~”

Against Mio who talked with a sulking tone, Lotte put on a joking air and clapped Mio’s back.

“…Uuu, don’t get cheeky even though you are younger than me.”

Mio who had a sulky expression on stretched apart Lotte’s cheeks with a ‘munyu’.

“Please stop~”

Even with her cheeks stretched apart, Lotte still raised a happy voice.

“Lotte, thank you. …About Lotte, I like you somewhat.”

“I love Mio-oneesan so much desu! Then if Mio-oneesan has already regrouped your feeling, let’s go forward desu!”

“There are Demon Beasts, this place is being turned into a Haunted Ground isn’t it? But, if it’s true then I wonder why this Haunted Ground is not spreading.”

Both of them were going forward, while slipping through the traps at times, Mio suddenly felt a doubt.

“Haunted Ground is something that spread rapidly, that’s why if left alone it would encroach to the Magic Division’s ground isn’t that right? But the border line of this Haunted Ground is located perfectly in the middle of the stairs descending to this underground.”

“When Mio-oneesan say it, that’s true isn’t it desu?”

“It is controlled by someone’s hand. …The Haunted Ground is not spreading anymore than this. The Haunted Ground is maintained at the appropriate size. In other words the Demon Beasts extermination is being carried out periodically, I wonder. Seeing it carefully, the concrete wall and floor is worn-out, it doesn’t feel old and decaying, it tells the frequency of the fights that were carried out here…”

There were a great number of cracks and ravages of destruction on the pulsing concrete floor and wall that were turned into the Haunted Ground. Those signs were almost not found at all in the vicinity of the entrance, but the more they advanced the more it increased.

“To do such troublesome thing this far, there must be a reason to preserve this place as a Haunted Ground. What in the world are they doing here?”

“…That answer, we don’t know if it might exist beyond this point desu.”

At the end of the passage, Mio and Lotte discovered a door. Thinking about how many traps there were starting from the trap hole, there was no doubt that a big secret was being hidden beyond this door.

“This is not an adamantite door isn’t it desu?”

It seems it would be very hard to carry a super heavy adamantite until this far underground.

Then it would be simple to break this door. Lotte produced a lance in her left hand, then she screwed the spearhead into the keyhole―she entered her strength. The keyhole was easily smashed, the door opened with a loud sound.

There was a computer inside the room. From there, a lot of monitors.

In this fairly cramped room, the notable thing around was only that computer. In here, all the things that was performed in another place were reflected and regulated in the monitors, it seems this was the control room of the whole underground space.

No doubt that this computer was a large clump of clue.

Thought that was only if they could start it up.

“…Sage of Civilization Prometheus. If it’s you, then can you do something about this somehow?”

Toward Lotte’s call, the avatar of the young boy Prometheus appeared, “Ho-ho-, I say I say” he wandered around the computer with a deep interest.

“This is a computer right? Vast electric signals are being inputted, calculated, outputted…hmm hmm I see, this is what is called computer huh. How awesome. How revolutionary this is.”

“Prometheus, use my body, try to operate it please.”

Lotte sat on the computer’s desk while saying, Prometheus’s avatar disappeared.

And then Lotte’s arms moved by itself. Lotte that was being possessed by Prometheus had handed over a partial control of her flesh body.

Power was entered into the computer. The boot sequence scene was displayed in the monitors, but what was reflected in the monitor was something Mio had never seen before. It was not an OS that was used generally, it seems it used a special OS that operated an encryption of the data in the internal memory drive.

In short even if they destroyed this computer and carried out only its memory device, it would be difficult to analyze the encrypted data. They had to break through the security using this place.

Both of Lotte’s arms became the arms of Prometheus, the fingers were running in the keyboard. It was their first time operating a keyboard, that’s why Prometheus’ keyboard touch was clumsy.

However his keyboard strokes were accurate.

“Prometheus, you can hack a computer?”

Towards the sage who was born in this world with the concept of civilization, Mio was being struck with admiration once again.

A Diva was hacking a computer…it sounds completely like a joke of a story.

“Well, somehow I’m using my feeling of, maybe you can say my sixth sense. Release that lock. And it’s open.”

Toward the special OS that was demanding a password, Prometheus was easily releasing the security.

“Oh ho, there is a game here, it’s minesweeper huh. Is it okay to try it a little? The record time of this computer’s owner is 57 second. I want to surpass it without fail.”

“You must not desu, please hurry.”

Lotte scolded Prometheus. Because these two’s conversation were carried out using only Lotte’s one mouth, it looked completely like a soliloquy.

“Not only for booting up the computer, to access the data inside…oh hoh, looks like it was protected with double layer of password. Hahhahha, how impertinent. And, release.”

While the sage of the Greek Mythology laughed loudly, he operated the keyboard with his index fingers poking repeatedly.

His movements was those of a beginner, but he broke through the solid security mercilessly.

“Hmmmm, furthermore, to read this data thoroughly it seems we need something like a dedicated application. That application is not saved inside this computer, looks like it was carried in from the external. Yosh, how about I create that application starting from now?”

“…I don’t get what you are doing at all, but looks like nothing is impossible for you isn’t it?”

“I cannot create that app from zero you know? I’m only comprehending the surface of the data and reproducing the application.”

While Mio was being amazed at the side, Prometheus completed the improvised application with his clumsy typing.

“But I cannot understand why it only asked for password and application without using biometric confirmation. If it asked for that, then it’s all over even for me though. …By any chance, perhaps the owner of this computer even have a plan to reconstruct his own flesh body. It’s only a wild imagination though, I don’t know if there is any other reason.”

Reconstructing the flesh body?

Was that kind of thing possible? If it was possible, for what reason?

Suddenly, Mio was reminded of the moment when Kaya was hijacked by Loki and she shivered.

Surely, at that time Kaya’s body was reconstructed.

“Oh ho, I found an interesting thing.”

Prometheus punched the enter-key with noticeable strength ‘pachin’.

The monitors that were covering one part of the room’s wall surface were lighting up all at once.

It looks like the countless monitors was projecting various different place in this underground area.

A certain terminal screen was showing a room where things that looked like culture fluid were lining up in great amount, another screen was projecting a large hall that was spreading circularly like an arena.

―Inside that circular hall, were Kazuki and Koyuki!

“Prometheus! Can we reach that place!?”

Mio was shaking Prometheus (Lotte)’s shoulder energetically.

“I didn’t find any map of this underground area inside this computer. It seems the owner of this computer memorized all the structure of this underground area in his head so he didn’t need a map. To not have any necessity to share the information, it shows that the character who use this underground area is most likely only one person. However, I found a data file of [experiment result]. Looking at the content, the accomplishments of the experiments were carried out at that place that look like an arena, it seems the tests were using the Demon Beasts as the opponent.”

“Experiment? What kind of experiment? I guess we can understand it if we look at the data?”

The terminal screen was changing in rapidly because of Prometheus’ operating. Mio’s eyes couldn’t follow at all, but Prometheus should be able to naturally read those contents at high speed.

Prometheus’ words became cloudy at Mio’s question.

“That is…how should I say it, it’s an experiment that cannot be described using words at all.”

When Prometheus pushed the enter-key, an URD was ejected from the computer’s disk drive.

All the data of the computer was duplicated inside this high capacity memory media.

Part 5

Kazuki and Koyuki were advancing through the passage while slaughtering who knew how many Demon Beasts.

Luckily they didn’t encounter anymore [skin-colored mud-like enemy] from before.

Koyuki said that ‘that thing’ could possibly be an elf formerly.

If they encountered that one more time, was it a good thing to point his sword to it….

“The spirits say that defeating that thing that was an elf before is a comfort for itself, you’re not wrong to kill it.”

Koyuki received a big shock just now, even now she keep talking listlessly.

Her face that was white even at the best of time had became even paler like her blood was completely drained.

Now that she mentioned it, Kazuki too had a feeling that the monster was saying a word of gratitude immediately after its defeat.

He didn’t kill that thing, merely liberating it from that condition…was such thought merely just a convenient means of escape for him?

However even so, was the spirits speaking as the proxy for that monster’s feeling?

“Spirit, what kind of existence are they?”

“I don’t know…just, I always heard their voice in the Haunted Ground when I were in dangerous situations. They gave me advices, and always gave me some helps. That’s why right now too, I think it’s okay to follow their words accordingly.”

“Spirits protection that is only bestowed to elves, is it? So Koyuki even has that kind of secret that make you able to be a solo player.”

“…Actually just before the trap hole, they told me not to advance forward, but…I didn’t listen to them.”

After advancing through the passage, they finally arrived at an open circular space. Although there was no guest seats, its shape reminded him of an arena. The wall and floor were made from blunt concrete, same with the passages until this point, but this place was worn-out with small scratches and damages.

“What on earth this underground area is being used for?”

“Perhaps, this is only my guess, but…”

Koyuki began to talk nervously while Kazuki was observing the surrounding cautiously.

“There was a barrier raised at the entrance of this place, but that security was by no means secure. Nobody but Magica Stigma could enter, but conversely it’s easy for Magica Stigma to enter here, rather I have a feeling that they would even welcome it.”

Certainly it was so. With the stigmata confirmation, the security had the function to specify the intruder that entered, but it was not a security that rejected the intruders itself.

This underground area rejected the students of the Sword Division, but it didn’t reject the students of the Magic Division.

“And then the thing we encountered not long ago, it was an elf who had inherently strong magic power but [its form was changed]. The conclusion material is only two. Only two but, if we think by putting these two together…”

Koyuki cut off her words there.

Like she was hesitating to place the too repulsive imagination in her mouth.

She clutched Kazuki’s hand strongly and finally talked.

“Elf and Magica Stigma are suited as experiment material. I wonder if this place is not the place where they processed people’s heart, a human experiment site for the sake of strengthening human’s magic power artificially?”

Intruders was welcomed here―as the material for experiment.

“―A correct answer. Welcome, O King of this country and his attendant young lady.”

If this circular space was an arena, from the direction of the passage in the other side where the battle opponent usually came out, a reply that substantiated Koyuki’s frightening guess came.

‘kan’, ‘kan’, ‘kan’, a leather shoes’ well mannered footsteps could be heard approaching

Kazuki and Koyuki caught their breaths, they fixed their eyes on the man that came.

The figure that appeared was a gentleman in his prime of life wearing refined suits on his body.

Otonashi Tsukikurou. The headmaster of the knight academy.

“I welcome the arrival of all of you here from the bottom of my heart. I met some unexpected difficulties in order to capture you and Charlotte with certainty, but all of you come here until this place by yourselves. With this…there is no more need for hesitation to assault the uprising elements from the Sword Division.”

“Are you, the owner of this underground area?”

Kazuki once again confirmed the obvious matter. He couldn’t help but asked that.

The opponent was the headmaster of this academy. And then―the father of Kaguya-senpai.

“Yes, that’s correct.”

That figure of gentlemen that even exuded the sense of reliability as an adult nodded his head calmly. There was not an ounce of shame that appeared on him.

“The thing called magic power is the power of the mind. If this power of the mind could be reinforced artificially, then we could create even stronger magician. For the sake of this country called Japan to acquire the power to overwhelm other countries, that is something indispensable. This is something that other Magic Advanced Countries absolutely cannot achieve seeing as they were forced to be faithful by the Divas. This is the attempt of what we could do with our country’s biggest advantage.”

Regarding those Mythologies that enforced their faith, there were not few of them that saw science technology that was too advanced as the symbol of human’s arrogance.

Something like an experiment on living human was certainly absurd.

“Even if I said human experiment, the perspective of the government at first was that this experiment should be successful even without paying it in something like a considerable numbers of human sacrifices. The mind of human in the end is only something that is created by the brain activity. The works of the brain cells had been elucidated since a long time ago. What kind of organ it is, what kind electric signal it use, what kind of change magic power cause to brain, if we discover and manufacture it ourselves…it was supposed to be a simple matter.”

Headmaster Otonashi keep talking while pushing his index finger to massage his forehead.

“But the problem is not that simple. The Philosopher Stone that was invented by that alchemist, Basileus Basileon, was creating an area in the human brain that cannot be elucidated by science. Operations that were thought to be correct theoretically were failed one after another and the ego of the test subjects were all collapsed. The collapsed mind made their magic power ran wild, that magic power…with power that distorted the reality, their own flesh were distorted and transformed into appropriate meat clay. What a result that make the hair of your whole body stand on its end. With their mind collapsing, their flesh body were also collapsing. Influenced strongly by the magic power. This thing was something that science cannot even hope to anticipate!”

The finger that Headmaster Otonashi used to massage his forehead was pointing at Koyuki this time, and he said.

“The few resulting success of this experiment, was the elf, do you know?”

…What did he say?

Koyuki clutched at Kazuki’s hand with all her strength. Her face complexion had gone straight past white and turned blue.

“…Are you saying that elf was created artificially? They were not something that resulted naturally?”

“This experiment was started immediately soon after the birth of magic. Random sampling were selected from babies that were born in Japan as test subject, the processing were performed secretly inside the hospital. It were mostly failures, turning into something that was buried in the darkness and known as the Infants’ Sudden Death Syndrome to the common mass. The success rate was too low, so in the end this elf project was discontinued. Even the biggest success example of the few successes we had, Hiakari Koyuki, when compared to the child prodigy in the same generation…Amasaki Mio, she was only on par with her, the experiment’s cost performance was too poor.”

“Cost…?” Koyuki’s expression changed toward the words that she couldn’t ignore.

“You’re calling the people that failed…Cost…!”

This man, why, how could he talked about such things so unemotionally and indifferently?

Kazuki was terribly angry, at the same time he also felt a shiver in his whole body from fear.

“It was all for the country’s prosperity. By paying with the sacrifice of the extreme minority, we could welcome a certain prosperity, Hayashizaki Kazuki. That time when a king like you decided to protect Charlotte, I felt disappointment.”

“Even without that strength that was earned by paying with sacrifices, Solomon 72 Pillar had already granted us strength isn’t it!?”

“Stigmata huh. When the elf project ended in failure, what we had our eyes on next was Stigmata. There are two problems in the Summoning Magic from the stigmata. The first problem is that this power is a power that is controlled by mysterious will with secretive doctrine, the Solomon 72 Pillar. For the country’s greatest military power to be dependent on something that is outside the country’s sovereignty, something like that is unacceptable.”

“Solomon 72 Pillar is testing us, whether we would use the power justly or not.”

“That is something to be said by the one who stand above. We, [the mankind], cannot be tested by anyone. If it’s not like that, then it’s impossible to stand as an independent country.”

At that time, Leme materialized at Kazuki’s side.

“That objection of yours…we are not even tying you with the binding of faith, we bestowed strength freely to this country, and this is the outcome?”

“Well, well, the King of Solomon 72 Pillar, Lemegeton-sama.”

“…Leme love the humans. I love each humans one by one. Your story is extremely unpleasant. Tell me, by you…no, by this country’s government, how many people had been sacrificed for the sake of the country’s prosperity?”

The King of Solomon 72 Pillar, Lemegeton asked with her distrust bared. It was a terrifying situation to provoke Leme’s displeasure, but Headmaster Otonashi didn’t even paid any mind about it and played dumb by answering “Who knows?”.

“For all that, compared to the number of the victim, the number of the people who had became happy must be far greater you know?”

“…Why, why does your way of thinking assume right from the start that there will be sacrifice?”

Kazuki spontaneously interjected. That time with Lotte was like that too.

Certainly, there might be a time when they had to sacrifice something no matter what.

However, without even exerting his utmost effort to the limit, calmly throwing away other people as sacrifice, he absolutely didn’t want to recognize that kind of method. If I am to be a King…!

“There is no problem that had already started right!? The figure of the enemy isn’t even visible yet, how could you say that sacrifices are needed!? Why didn’t you dare to even try to fight without sacrificing anything to win our prosperity!? You were choosing the method that created sacrifices easily that abandoned any effort and struggle while you yourself was always in a safe place wielding that authority! However that kind of method won’t earn you any trust whether from your comrade, or whether from Solomon 72 Pillar. If I am said to be a King….then I will become a king that fight together with everyone.”

“Just like Kazuki said. Seeing you, Leme only feel sadness.”

Across the monitor, Mio and Lotte, and also Prometheus too were listening to that conversation.

Prometheus was murmuring dejectedly.

“Just like what that man say, the other Mythologies won’t recognize this kind of experiment that strengthened the magic power by science. It is surely an advantage that only this country can do. That is so, however…using science for this kind of thing is…”

The sage that bestowed and taught the fire of civilization in order for men to protect each other was stricken with grief.

“Strange. Why do you not agree with my logic? This is why, human with his own ego is so…”

Headmaster Otonashi tilted his head while still keeping his expression blank like a doll.

“Well, let’s continue the story. I was beyond redemption if it is not like this. The research of the stigmata bestowed by Solomon 72 Pillar had became my focus. The first thing that I understood was that there is a strong compelling force in the contract. Regarding Solomon 72 Pillar, even if their power are used in a way they are unwilling to, Solomon 72 Pillar are not able to refuse to lend their power. Yes, that too can be understand from the scroll recording the Myth. The majority of Solomon 72 Pillar were people that were considered as demon by the teaching of Christ. The existence called Demon is an existence that is compliance to the contract. If we turn the table in regard of the contract, then we should be able to use the demons skillfully.”

Certainly the Summoning Magic of Kaguya-senpai’s Asmodeus mercilessly bared its fang to Kazuki who was the contractor of Lemegeton. There was a compelling force where they couldn’t say any consent or refusal there.

“Solomon 72 Pillar are obligated to their contractor and their position are to be enslaved by Magica Stigma. Moreover, they couldn’t annul this contract in the middle. But, we cannot say that we are in a superior position against Solomon 72 Pillar because of that. Because Solomon 72 Pillar can choose to not bestow anymore stigmata to the next generation. Human’s magic power will decline after their peak at twenty years of age. Magica Stigma’s period of active duty is short. Only a few years. In the end, our country become dependent to Solomon 72 Pillar.”

“Certainly it is like that, but…you are so distrusting to Leme and the others until that much?”

Leme made an unpleasant face towards such consideration that was so scrupulous towards every corners.

“After that what I researched next was stigmata transplantation operation. If we could transfer the stigmata from declining person to a still young person, then even without having Solomon 72 Pillar renewing their contract with another person there wouldn’t be any problem at all. Using the inherited stigmata, we could draw out the power of the 72 Pillar forcefully. We will be independent form Solomon 72 Pillar, able to rule them. Well, it could be said as being a parasite too.”

What he said made even Lemegeton turned pale.

“…Wh, what do you think Leme and the others of Solomon 72 Pillar are!? The contract that Leme and the others tied in accordance of our trust…you are planning to make us Diva as a simple power source like slaves!”

“But the problem is that the stigmata is connected tightly with the mind. By extracting the stigmata from the knights and the students of the knight academy that had fallen into severe magic intoxication and cannot regain their consciousness, I performed countless human experiments of stigmata transplantation using a great amount of the failure elves that I preserved and cultivated.”

In the period of one year, there were dozens of knights and knight academy’s students that fell into magic intoxication and went missing in the Haunted Ground. However, for some of those victims…to be treated as experiment materials in here!

“The experiment result was…a wretched thing. No matter how many times I repeated it, the mind of the elves that were planted with a stigmata were collapsed with near certainty. You two had seen it on the way here, that lump of meat that used magic. That was an experiment result just so you know. I sent only one body to you two partly for introduction however.”

That being which looked like a skin-colored meat clay…the moment when Kazuki delivered the finishing blow, its lips was saying “Thank you” slightly.

Kazuki’s blood stop flowing and his consciousness felt like flying far away.

“…You’re insane.”

“That’s not true. I am sane. When the result of mind collapse with near certainty came out, the government handed down the decision to cancel this research of stigmata transplantation. However my thinking was different. …There is no need for something like ego in a soldier. Something like ego is unnecessary. Something like a face is unnecessary. Even name is unnecessary. Even will too is unnecessary. When the research was ended, I was given a new appointment as the headmaster of the knight academy, but I secretly continued the research. And then I named this research, Human Pillar ProjectProject - Caryatid.”

“The name of this academy is…!”

The Knight Academy <Caryatid>, that was the name of this academy!

“Of course I entered a different meaning in the formality. I named this academy Caryatid in respect for the girls whose are contracted with Solomon 72 Pillar as [the pillar that supported the society]. However…I think the true nature of my naming of this academy is really fitting. This academy is my research site for the sake of obtaining the glorious future! All the students, are the human sacrificehuman pillar…!”

Underground…. The enjoyable days Kazuki spent in the Witch Mansion, in its underground was―.

“The experiment is doing well. Now it become possible to extract stigmata with comparatively high purity. Then if that stigmata is transferred to [human with diluted ego], an ideal Magica Stigma that maintained its shape as a human as it is and will fight in accordance with the order given to it is born. This me will change the Knight Order of this country. With the strongest magician that I created as its banner. That is…the King of this country is…”

Headmaster Otonashi pointed at Kazuki while still keeping his expressionless face.

“It is not you. It’s my daughter―Kaguya.”

He planned to perform the operation on his own daughter, that was what this man proclaimed.

…Just hearing the story of this man made Kazuki felt like his own sanity was cracking.

Was this guy really Kaguya-senpai’s father?

“I gave the most optimum education to Kaguya. That child is an inferior normal human as a raw material compared to Hiakari Koyuki. However I incited the growth of her posteriori magic power by my imprinted education and hypnotism. I imprinted the sense of duty that [She must be the strongest magician] from the time of her infancy, that sense of duty became the greatest priority matter in her life. Strong will incite the growth of magic power. When I gave her the seat of the student council president, I imprinted the suggestion of [carry out your responsibility as the strongest magician] even further. I speak to her to push aside all emotion with logical judgment, hypnotized her that she must carry out her responsibility as the strongest magician without fail.”

He raised his daughter as a robot, he couldn’t listen to what he said as anything other than that.

Of course the unpainted face of Kaguya-senpai was a really humane and kind person.

However…certainly senpai had some moments when she forced herself to death to do unreasonable things. The senpai at that time, changed into the machine personality that this man constructed.

“When Kaguya received my suggestion, she immediately abandoned her ego. There I will transplant [the King’s stigmata] that will be extracted from you. The collapse of the mind could be curbed to the lowest don’t you see? My daughter is going to be the new King. That child is able to stand at the highest summit. If it is for that reason, then I don’t mind no matter how dirty my hand is. Someone like me is inconsequential. Yes, someone like me.”

Right there, Headmaster Otonashi that was expressionless until now was looking like he suddenly lost the balance of his mind,

“Someone like me, someone like me…” He began calling repeatedly.

Suddenly Kazuki was wrapped with doubt at this late hour.

The human in front of his eyes, was he really sane? Was he normal?

“Headmaster Otonashi…are you illegal magician?”

His personality was eroded and already he experienced some disorder, wasn’t that what’s going on?

“I am…I am…illegal? This me? What are you saying?”

“To enter the entrance to this underground, the person must have a stigmata. You must have a connection to someone. And then that someone, is the one that is driving you mad, isn’t that right?”

“Someone? I did all of this by my own free will. I’m not mad or anything. That’s right, I decide everything myself. But, someone like me is inconsequential. Eh? …I see, so it’s like that huh?”

Suddenly Headmaster Otonashi covered his face with both hands.

“That’s right, I had thrown away my ego a long time ago. But, then who am I? Whoever I am doesn’t matter. I don’t need something like a face. That’s right, something like face is unneeded.”

Headmaster Otonashi suddenly buried his nails, he started to tear off his own face.

“Unneeded, unneeded, unneeded…”

While murmuring like a broken record, with fingers that were filled with abnormal strength, ‘michi’, ‘buchi’, the muscle fibers were torn off. He screwed his fingers into the torn flesh and pulled apart the flesh even further from there, the white of the bone was exposed along with the blood spray.

Kazuki and Koyuki reflexively took a step back seeing his abrupt insane behavior.

Eyeballs fell at Headmaster Otonashi’s feet with a plop. Headmaster Otonashi’s face was scraped over from all its undulations right now, turning into a flat surface.

From there, Headmaster Otonashi started to knead the slight meat that were still clinging on his face like a clay. Like a stain that was spreading, the kneaded meat was rapidly blackening and spreading out.

“Something like face is unneeded…I am the Faceless God…”

Headmaster Otonashi took down his hands from his face.

That face was changed into a flat featureless jet black face.

Without even eyes and nose, only the lip was floating a smile, hanging on the jet black face.

“That’s right, before I know it I had thrown away my own ego, never realizing it until the end. I was already turning into me. My encroachment was already reaching completion. That’s right…I am Naiarlahoteph. The Diva of Cthulhu Mythos.”

“Naiarla…Cthulhu Mythos? I have never heard it.”

In front of the monitors, the Greek Mythology’s Prometheus was whispering while looking suspicious.

Mio too was the same. Despite already learning the outline of all the Mythologies in the Mythology class, her ears never heard of such Diva with that name that sounds random and hard to pronounce.

“I know this Diva desu. I saw it at anime.”

Lotte said.

“Anime…? Not at Mythology but anime?”

“Yes. Though he was called Nyarlathotep at that anime.”

“Well, something like a name is just a series of meaningless sounds. There are also other pronunciation like Nyarlatoteph or Nyarlathotep. People try to be aware of me with fleeting effort and give me various names. However even names, even this form, is nothing more than a torn off part of the ever changing infinite dreams. After all humans are not able to recognize our true essence correctly. Thus the current me is tied to the <human recognition>, however that is an annoying matter. …Rather than hearing my story, let’s talk about Tsukikurou’s story.”

The flat black face man, while nudging around the torn off pieces of meat and eyeballs that were still scattered about at his feet, started to talk with loquacity.

“…You know, this man never realized it until the very end that he was being encroached. He became unable to make a distinction between my wish and his own wish. He thought that my whispering voice was his own inner voice. And then because he didn’t want to take a straight look at his own sins, he even stopped to reflect on himself. And then he lost his own self. O King of human, it seems Loki too boast his own skill to you, but if we are talking about the brilliance of skill, I wonder if my skill is not the one that is several level above don’t you agree? Because in regards of driving human mad, there is none more superior than us of Cthulhu Mythos.”

Naiarlahoteph turned his jet-black face to Kazuki and wriggled his lips.

Kazuki felt a cold sweat of revulsion running down his spine.

For a materialized Diva to await in this place, thing like this…!

He had anticipated that an illegal magician was connected with the ominous magic power that came from this underground.

But he had the wrong impression that the flesh body of the illegal magician hadn’t been taken over yet because no incident had happened until now and he was staying in hiding.

But, for the Diva to easily finished hijacking the body like this…!

“This man is such a pitiful thing. Receiving the appointment from the government for the duty of human experiment research, at first he was holding an extreme feeling of guilt. That’s why he persuaded himself that this experiment was absolutely needed for the sake of this country, And then he started to dream of making his own daughter reigning as the ruler of this country. For the sake of the country, for the sake of his daughter…that sounds really good when put into words don’t you agree? He was intoxicated with the idea that it didn’t matter how dirty his hands became if it was for the sake of that goal, so that he could justify himself. Thus he continued the experiment heartlessly. He was already mad at that time. Really mad. But he himself didn’t even thought that he was mad for even a bit. You guys know that the only madness he didn’t had was to go on rampage carelessly like an illegal magician, but that’s it, that’s the only thing he was not mad of. At that time I was already finish encroaching inside him. Brilliant right?”

Against the fitting suits that Naiarlahoteph wore, “What a suffocating clothes” he loosen the bottom of his neck with unconstrained gesture.

From the gap of the shirts, “ZOWA-!” countless tentacles were spilling out.

“My own wish, before, this Headmaster Otonashi had said it right? What kind of thing is it, do you know?”

Even with all he had done, Headmaster Otonashi had talked righteously that all of this was for [making the Knight Order of Japan strong].

However the Diva in front of his eyes, by no means his objective was supposed to make Japan prosperous.

The process they both took were the same but, this Diva must had a totally different objective.

“Is it the turn for my story? You see, I plan to make an effective use of Otonashi Tsukikurou’s research. His long standing desire of a [New Knight Order]…was to gather artificial magicians that could parasite the power of Solomon 72 Pillar, but that plan will be commandeered by this me. Then the strongest magician that Tsukikurou raised painstakingly…Otonashi Kaguya, I will receive her as my new flesh body. Because with Otonashi Tsukikurou whose magic power was already weakening as my base, my current power is not enough. Tsukikurou had also already finished all the preliminary arrangements to make Otonashi Kaguya forfeit her ego, so it will be easy for me to plunder her body with my characteristic magic next. However everything of those is only after plundering your stigmata. Thus I will obtain the strongest flesh body and the strongest Knight Order―the Game will be my victory.”

“…Game?”

Against the astounding words, Kazuki asked back.

The objective of the Divas that were making appearances in the world, even now it was still shrouded in mystery. But this Naiarlahoteph’s own objective was made obvious.

The objective of Naiarlahoteph was [Game]?

When Kazuki took a stab at arousing his interest, Naiarlahoteph suddenly revealed his fury.

“That’s right, this world’s Mythologies’…annoying Game! Our Cthulhu Mythos is not recognized as a genuine Mythology by this world, our weakening is unavoidable!! What a joke!! The great us that are not even taken notice of by the awareness of the humanity, losing our essence as the Cosmic Horror, many of the evil god was completely sealed! Only me, the <Azathoth able-bodied Messenger> that can obtain divinity! But the influence of a Mythology that has nothing but one Diva…what in the hell I’m going to do with that huh!! This world is centered on human too excessively. The soul of the world is shaped by the magnified human’s mind, only Diva whose existence could possibly be interpreted by human are allowed to exist. Cthulhu Mythos whose true essence are [impossible to be understood by human] was distorted. …So we of Cthulhu Mythos can win through the game, I’m alone is running around, taking secret maneuvers, I had to exhaust myself so we could be victorious against other Mythologies. By making the best use of the fruit of Tsukikurou’s research, leading the Knight Order of artificial magicians, and utilizing the power of Solomon 72 Pillar, I will win through the Game. And then with this hand I will usurp the World’s SoulAstrum that every Mythologies always dreamed of. The Astrum will be dyed with our color and drive the humanity into madness, carrying out the revival of <the universe’s mist of crawling chaos>, Azathoth!”

Astrum…? Governing the world of human’s mind, The Distorted World Astrum in their control was the objective of all Divas? But what was the meaning in doing that?

However Naiarlahoteph didn’t answer Kazuki’s doubt beyond that.

“It’s convenient for you all to come until this far. Then without reservation, I can ruin the Sword Division who goes against ‘my Magic Division’. …Let me introduce you all to one of the fruits of Tsukikurou’s blasphemous research. Come…Four Marks MagicianQuad-core Magica!!”

In respond of Naiarlahoteph’s command, countless footsteps could be heard from the passage at the opposite side. It were the sounds of footstep that were walking staggeringly in unsteady posture like a sleep-walking person. The number was twelve.

What appeared was twelve silver-haired girls covered in masks―they were elves. Black leather binding tools were worn on their bodies, and large number of stigmata were carved on their slender arms and legs.

“The byproduct of the Elf Project that the government once pushed forward, and Tsukikurou’s Project – Caryatid. The disposed elves that were in relatively good condition were transplanted with four extracted stigmatas that had relatively high purity each. Come on, four stigmata combined with elf magic power? Lovely right? Of course their personality had collapsed and they are only barely retaining their human shapes. Tsukikurou’s ideal knight is still far off, but…these children can be summed as the soldiers of the current me. At any rate there is no one other than me in the Cthulhu Mythos anyway. I’ll leave the dealing with you all to one of the body among these. After all I still have things I have to do.”

Naiarlatoteph was suddenly looking at one corner of the ceiling―his jet-black face smiled complacently to the lens of the monitor camera hidden there.

“The humans that know this secret is absolutely cannot let to escape after all. The people who got lost in this taboo place and knew too much are driven mad in front of the disgusting truth….it’s so lovely following that theory isn’t it? No matter how many body there are, it’s still not enough you know? …Well then O still inexperienced King of Human, I’m wishing for you to have a good fight. Although there is no way in hell for you all to survive here and escape from this underground area.”

Naiarlatoteph turned on his heel.

“Do it.”

After leaving a short command to one of the Quad-core Magica, the jet-black Diva’s figure disappeared in the darkness of the passage at the other side along with the eleven people he led.

The stigmata of the one Quad-core Magica left behind began to emit magic power light without even saying any declaration of fight!

“Koyuki, step back! …Koyuki?”

When Kazuki turned back, Koyuki was unable to move like her body and heart were paralyzed, she was trembling.

“Kazuki…I am…”

Those eyes were dyed in despair like a human that was wishing her own death.

Right now, in this situation this girl was not drowning in terror of a degree like [confronting a terrifying enemy]. From some time ago, there were too many terribly shocking truths regarding this elf girl.

“I…now…understood the true identity of the spirits.”

“What did you say? …Spirits?”

The existence full of mysteries even more than the Demon Beast, spirit. An abstract intelligence being that was said could only be perceived by elves….

Why did that name was the one that come out in this kind of situation?

“Those girls true identity is…the destroyed personality of the elves whose magic power were enlarged beyond ordinary person and left behind in Astrum, a residual thought.”

…The ghost of the elves she said!?

“Their emotion are flowing inside me…”

Worn out, Koyuki’s tears started to spill out.

“Wh…why…only me is living like this…”

With a trembling voice, Koyuki let her penitence leaking out. But, don’t say that it is bad for Koyuki to live!

“Koyuki, even though you yourself cannot agree that you still live, I will absolutely not let Koyuki die! I will protect you to the very end!”

“airuaokagurma!!”

From the other side of the Quad-core Magica’s mask, a scream of meaningless human’s speech could be heard.

For that girl whose lost personality was integrated already to her core, that meaningless scream was a spell.

What was invoked―was one of Solomon 72 Pillar’s Summoning Magic!

This girl was supposed to use the Summoning Magic of four different Divas. To fight this kind of opponent he need to Foresight what kind of magic the opponent was going to use, observing the element of the magic, and dealt with the magic.

The one who taught him the importance of observing the opponent was Koyuki.

…From the flow of the magic power, Foresight the detail of the magic that the opponent was going to use!

Kazuki attempted to sense what kind of magic phenomenon the Quad-core Magica requested to the Diva from the flow of the whirling magic power. He somehow sensed it―a physical attack.

“uoamuaoma!”

The magic was invoked. Around the Quad-core Magica, countless giant nails were raising up.

“O wisdom accumulating through the human history, armored my body with layers of armor! Heavily, thickly, reject all the brutality! Seusenhofer!!”

Kazuki covered his body with armor using Prometheus’ magic.

The countless nails came flying like a line of spears. Kazuki came out to the front to cover Koyuki. He couldn’t evade. If he moved then Koyuki would be hit. She wouldn’t even fall into magic intoxication, it was going to be an instant death.

Koyuki was making a face that she was going to accept that kind of fate obediently!

Kazuki blocked the countless nails with his full-armored body. The armor was crumbling just from one hit, but the nails were dispersing before reaching Kazuki’s defensive magic power. The defense was a success!

However, the Quad-core Magician chanted a different spell almost at the same time―a fire element!

“anfkjanfascs!!”

“Self Burning!”

Barely matching the magic invocation of the opponent, Kazuki somehow made it in time. Because the defensive magic’s target was his own body, he didn’t need to go through the Targeting part and the chanting time was short.

Kazuki supplemented the worn-out armor with flame armor on top of it.

The flame bullet came flying with the speed of rifle bullet. That was a magic that Kazuki also knew well, it was Barrett. The flame armor and the flame bullet were offsetting each other and both were extinguished.

“fsdfsdvkdseoda!!”

The Quad-core Magician was not stopping! Even more magic was came flying!

Kazuki failed his Foresight from the overwhelming speed that he couldn’t follow. From the underfoot of the Quad-core Magician, one lump of the concrete floor became unstuck and floated up, then it flew to Kazuki’s direction. The worn-out Seusenhofer was smashed, inflicting a wound in Kazuki’s defensive magic power.

…More still coming. This enemy was firing magic like an automatic firearms to him!

“cvcmiedflao[wfd!!”

The fourth magic was invoked slightly later than the previous three, it was a magic of even more high level compared to the magic until now.

A pure black thunder cloud was created on top of Kazuki’s head. Offense energy of snapping electricity was generated from there, and then a huge lightning was falling at Kazuki!

“Flash! Raikiri!!”

Drawing an Iai slash with the Sacred Treasures that was fortunately at hand, Kazuki slashed apart that lightning. For him to possess Raikiri when the enemy was using a lightning element magic was a paper-thin fortune.

…The cycle of the offense magic was too fast!

The opponent was splitting her consciousness four way at the four stigmata and chanting the spells at the same time!

Defensive magic wouldn’t make it in time. Much less defending with the best of his ability, he couldn’t even defense.

The Quad-core Magician was just standing straight in the spot and firing the Summoning Magic in rapid succession like a machine. Kazuki was standing guard in front of Koyuki, he didn’t even have any allowance whether it was to chant attack magic or entering close-quarter combat.

“a…aa…”

Koyuki leaked out a moaning voice looking at the scene in front of her.

Kazuki was continuously getting struck by magic to protect herself.

Why? Even though she herself wanted to just die…yet why was he still trying to protect herself by volunteering his own body?

She hated herself for a long time. Moreover, she herself had been confirmed that she was born from an experiment that made one want to hold the nausea in the stomach, that she was born due to the countless sacrifices of life.

As I thought, I am a monster!

Furthermore, I am even more filthy than even I had imagined, a blasphemous existence.

Even the strong magic power that I thought as the sole meaning of my existence, was something originating from rotten trash.

I who is like that, right now…is just holding back Kazuki.

Why is he doing that kind of action until this far? Why for something like me….

Koyuki suddenly imagined the moment when he finally abandoned her. Kazuki stopped covering herself and the attack magic pierced her. The flesh of her body was destructed without even leaving her original form intact.

I don’t want that. …It’s scary.

To die itself was not scary. But if she kept dragging Kazuki’s feet like this and he turned to hate her completely was a scary prospect! That’s why she didn’t want to get along well with anyone, despite that…!

“Please, stop it already…”

Koyuki begged to Kazuki’s back. It was scary to be betrayed, so she begged from herself that he stopped protecting her. To die from having her own wish listened to was far more comfortable compared to die while being loathed by Kazuki.

“Stop it already…”

But his back didn’t listen at all of Koyuki’s thin voice.

Koyuki was inside the loneliness called being protected.

{…Don’t throw yourself in self-abandonment.}

Suddenly, there was a woman’s voice coming from Telepathy.

{We are not telling you of our true identity in this place for the sake of hurting you.}

Was it because she had understood their true identity, right now their voice was resounding even clearer than ever, she was able to understand the voice of the spirits. Now at last the voice of the spirits was not a vague feeling, the voice was transmitted as verbal words.

{For the sake of protecting him, stand up.}

Hearing the words of the spirits, Koyuki raised up her bowed head and watched Kazuki’s back once more.

Why…?

{We have keep watching over the surviving elves for a long time.}

{Everyone were isolated. They were lonely. All of that were conveyed to us.}

{But you were able to make important people, right? Even now we could feel that.}

{We are not envying your life or anything. The important people that we couldn’t obtain, please, we want you to protect them.}

Protect…not being protected, but she herself to him….

{Fight.}

{And then defeat the Quad-core Magic with your strength.}

{Her ego had collapsed, but even so she keep being abused for her magic…that is a really painful thing.}

But…the current her didn’t know how to fight. Even though she prayed, even though she thought hard, she still couldn’t knead the magic power. The magic power that she had long thought as the worth of her existence was….

“Do you still not understand the reason why you cannot use magic?”

“…Vepar?”

At Koyuki’s side, an avatar of a mermaid was floating.

“Inside you, the routine of the magic power invocation had changed. For a long time until now, you invoked the magic power only for the sake of proving your own power. The thought of [proving my own power] had became your key for kneading your magic power. That was your routine until now. But the feeling of the current you right now was not like that anymore. At that time when you fell into magic intoxication and faced yourself. Please remember your feeling at that time.”

―I don’t want to give up. I want to be able to live and have an intimate relation with someone, I don’t want to give up!

The me at that time begged for that!

“Using that feeling, you will able to invoke magic, please notice that. That is a way of chanting magic that you have never experience. I like you who was so lonely. I am the mermaid princess. So I can understand you loneliness. That’s why I want to give you a push on the back. Go―change yourself right now.”

Vepar’s avatar vanished after leaving behind those words.

Koyuki faced her own feeling. She had already found the most intense thought she had ever felt throughout the period of this twelve years she had lived.

Kazuki had protected her from countless nails, flame bullet, lump of earth, and lightning without even moving a step.

I understand. I see it. The thing I want to do from the bottom of my heart. The path for the sake of that.

Obtain a more different state of heart than before!

“I…I will redefine myself! My strength is not only for the sake of fighting…it change into the strength for protecting my important people!!”

{We will lend you strength, Koyuki.}

{Whether we are a filthy existence or not, depend on ourselves.}

{Now, you are able to bless your own existence, right?}

{If you could accomplish a meaningful life, then that will become the elves’ new meaning of existence.}

The residual thoughts left behind in the Astrum, the spirits, their form changed into pure magic power and flowed into Koyuki.

Enormous magic power was swirling inside Koyuki. Her incomplete Magic Dress recovered its majestic appearance like a blooming flower bud. She became able to chant the spell with incomparable speed than before.

“…Sinking hundreds of ships, O menace of sea lurking on the ocean depths! Led by my singing voice, surface…show that full story!”

“…Koyuki?”

Kazuki turned back to look at her with eyes that were dyed in shock.

He was looking at her, she felt happiness just from that small thing.

“Stab your fang! Ice―”

She could feel that she had filled this one shot of magic with a never yet seen destructive power until now.

For protecting Kazuki, and that…pitiful Quad-core Magica, to liberate her from her torment!

“―Buster!!”

Their eardrums were deafened with the thunderous roar of the whole world smashed up.

The next moment, the space underfoot of the Quad-core Magica distorted, colossal ice mountain burst forth from there. The sharp point of the ice mountain lunged at the Quad-core Magica, piercing her. Not only from the underfoot, the space was distorting even further from all direction one after another, ice mountains were lunging from all of those point.

From every direction, ice mountains that really could be called ice mountain crashed into the Quad-core Magica.

When Ice mountain crashed into ice mountain and scattering ice fragments everywhere, a new ice mountain was immediately created, pulverizing the Quad-core Magica even further.

The total of the ice mountain Koyuki had summoned using this magic was six. But―

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA―!”

While Koyuki screamed as if to show the proof of her existence, she produced the ice mountains over and over with number of almost double than usual, ten ice mountains. The Quad-core Magica was pierced continuously who knew how many times. Ices were smashed everywhere, reflecting transparent lights irregularly.

When all the ice mountains finished attacking, the Quad-core Magica fell to the floor like a scrapped rags.

“…Koyuki, you can use magic again? On the contrary, the power just now…”

“Kazuki! She is an elf…it’s still not over with just that!”

Toward Kazuki who was staring in wonder, Koyuki scolded him vigilantly.

Just as Koyuki said, the Quad-core Magica got up. Her defensive magic power was still hadn’t used up.

“Kazuki, I am going to liberate that child. That’s why you…please protect me as the vanguard!”

“…Leave it to me!”

While thinking that the recovered Koyuki was reliable, Kazuki faced the Quad-core Magica.

“famfswa!”

The same as ever, just defending from the opponent’s consecutive magic was the best he could do. But this side’s preparedness was different from before. As long as he could just defend, Koyuki would decide it from the back!

“Ice Buster!”

The once again invoked level 6 magic. The ice mountains hit the Quad-core Magica firmly one after another―finally all her defensive magic power was cut off.

The Quad-core Magica was collapsing face up, the lips of the elf girl was shaking.

Was it because the magic power barely holding the life preservation of the remodeled flesh body, at the same time the elf girl’s magic power dried up, she closed her eyes from having used up all her strength, her breath was shut eternally.

In front of the gruesome victim, Kazuki stood stock still from the unbearable feeling.

“Naiarlatoteph have to be defeated, without fail.”

Koyuki’s whisper was filled with strong emotion. Kazuki nodded back his head hearing that.

Translator's Notes and References

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