The Weakness of Beatrice the Level Cap Holy Swordswoman:Volume7

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Prologue: Ultimate Weapon Abyss’s Ending Hack!

That small hill had no name.

It had been the favorite place of a certain Iberian Orc. He had often viewed the humans’ inn town from there.

There was one slight change from then.

There was now a slight sign of human intervention at the base of the large tree. Someone had dug up the dirt. They must not have been interested in providing a religious message. The only thing marking the spot was a roughly hewn log about as thick as a human arm sticking up out of the center of a slight mound.

If you looked closely, you might have noticed that a rectangle 4m long and 2m wide had been dug up and then filled back in with an egg-shaped mound in the center.

This hill had been someone’s favorite place.

But that nearly-4m pig-faced giant was no longer standing here. Because he was instead sleeping below the dirt.

Abyss// I will not allow it to end here.

Abyss// Now, let us review the answers.

Chapter 1: A New Dragon Eater

Part 1

The humans had built a base for themselves in the world of Ground’s Nir. They called it the inn town. The town was only a temporary place built from the necessities people needed for their lives and to prepare for their adventures. For better or for worse, it was a stateless place. All of the humans from Earth gathered in this one place to explore the Labyrinth and their ideas of a fantasy world differed.

“Those people are so wrong.”

The girls’ clothing had some minor changes from new equipment meant to boost their Parameters.

Inside a pub with an inn plopped on top like a second scoop of ice cream, White Witch Philinnion, a young woman with glasses and fluffy blonde hair, was already complaining in the middle of the day. All of her clothing was white, from her pointed witch’s hat and split cape to the sweater that contained large boobs squeezed between her suspenders, but she had no issue with twirling some spaghetti and meat sauce on her fork.

“We gather up whatever we need and the result can look strange when we try to reproduce something from Earth using Ground’s Nir’s materials. I get that. But what is with those people!? Are they obsessed with nostalgia or are they fundamentalists of some sort? I don’t even know what to call them and I’m not interested in finding out, but they need to shut up about how no one bathed or used detergent to wash their dishes during the real middle ages!! We didn’t come to this world to use it as a giant ren faire, so quit trying to force that gross stuff on the rest of us! A complete stranger started taking issue with my glasses!!”

“Slurp, slurp. Slurrrrrrp?”

“And, Hermelina, why are you eating like that while staring in shock!?”

Philinnion bristled and shouted, but the Fighter Priest with short green hair and a priest’s robe with a tight skirt (and a boob window despite her flatness) did not seem bothered.

“Because you’re supposed to slurp curry udon, silly.”

“It’s splattering everywhere. I’m working so hard to stay clean with this meat sauce, but here I am getting hit by tons of stray shots from across the table!”

“Slurp. Hey, barkeep! Get me another cold barley tea. The curry here has too harsh a spiciness, so you need to mix it with a little more mentsuyu!”

“If all this is allowed, why do I have to be accosted by those sweaty freaks out on the side of the road? Am I just producing too many sexy pheromones???”

“Don’t get your panties in a bunch over their nonsense. We’re talking about those outdoor shitting enthusiasts that don’t even care about going on adventures, right? Nothing those freaks say about you while taking a dump on the side of the road can change a thing about what the world at large thinks, so don’t let it bother you.”

“Okay, that’s over the line no matter where you’re from! I’m trying to eat!!”

Miss Meat Sauce had started to lose her appetite, but Miss Curry Udon was made of tougher stuff. That big and strong priest may have been the type who would do quite well in a girl’s school.

Then Holy Swordswoman Beatrice arrived in her red armor and white miniskirt. She also wore a tattered gray cloth as a cloak as she approached Philinnion and Hermelina’s table.

“Barkeeper, I’ll have a chai tea.”

“Hey, Beatrice, the spices here aren’t that great. This curry udon is pretty disappointing.”

“It’s the same everywhere right now. I had no luck no matter where I went. The Shocking Tingle Peppers are sold out everywhere. I guess everyone is after the same thing. Okay.”

“Whoa.”

“Dbwah!?”

Beatrice pulled out a chair at the same table, Hermelina politely lowered her head, and Philinnion’s slow reaction speed got her whacked on the back of the head with a Shining Weapon that looked like a log or a steel beam.

The Holy Swordswoman’s partner was no longer a rapier. The Shining Weapon she now carried on her back was the giant blunt weapon beloved by the Iberian Orc, but…

“Hey, Beatrice, are you still not used to that giant thing? You swing it around on your back every time you bend over or turn around!”

“…”

“Oh, sorry, sorry. Philinnion, are you okay? You’re just kind of twitching there with your face in a plate full of meat sauce. You’re a girl, so you shouldn’t scarf down carbs quite that greedily.”

“Bwah!! Pant, pant. B-Beatrice, I will not hold a grudge because I am a beautiful, kind, smart, fancy, all-around capable, and entirely perfect young woman, but you have been making far too many horizontal swings lately! This is the 59th time!”

“That’s a pretty precise number for someone who claims not to hold a grudge…”

Now was not the time to call her an elegant White Witch with immaculate white hat, cape, and skin-exposing sweater. Philinnion’s entire face looked like a comedian’s after a pie-throwing gag and the lenses of her glasses were both quite amusing.

Beatrice removed the weapon (which rivalled her in height) from her back and leaned it against the wall. She began speaking while glancing over at Philinnion who was wiping her face off with a wet towel since she was not the type to let appearances get in the way of necessity.

“So. What should we do about the Shocking Tingle Peppers?”

“There’s no point in going to the Labyrinth without those. The info we got about needing it to summon the Legendary Dragon seems legit.”

You must not forget.

Beatrice, Philinnion, Hermelina, and all the other humans from Earth continued to accept the many risks of adventuring in Ground’s Nir so they could repeatedly explore the Labyrinth, defeat the clockwork Gimmicks which were based on actual plants and animals, gather Treasure from chests, and earn various Experience Points to learn new Magic. They wanted technology beyond the capabilities of Earth’s science to cause a revolution in cutting edge fields like semiconductors or genetics to reign supreme within the intense technological competition. …Then again, these three were more interested in stopping the new technologies that would lead humanity to destruction than they were in following along with the chaotically overheating competition.

With the Underworld Lord and the red Iberian Orcs, they had overcome several threats that could easily have wiped out all life in Ground’s Nir and even the 7 billion humans back on Earth, but history had not stopped afterwards. Humans still lived true to their desires and, whether they wanted to come out ahead or obstruct progress, they could not afford to be left behind by the times.

“One week,” said Beatrice while toying with the edge of her gray cloak. “Even if we take a longer estimate, we need to get some Shocking Tingle Peppers and defeat the Legendary Dragon in one week.”

“Sigh. It’s no longer looking like we can sit around and wait for things to improve.”

“Yeah, but how exactly are we going to tackle this issue?”

The red and silver haired girl took her cup of chai tea that a flirty Maid Waitress carried over on a tray, sniffed at it, and then tasted it by licking the surface with the tip of her tongue.

“I see… The pepper is definitely old. It doesn’t give much of a tingle.”

“Even though people are only trying to get Shocking Tingle Peppers. It seems the prices of completely unrelated spices have gone up along with it. Maybe someone is spreading lies about all food ingredients drying up and maybe the chefs are starting to buy them up as a replacement for Shocking Tingle Peppers. …Plus, it’s affecting my Mixing ingredients too, so Recovery Potions could become a target of investment before long.”

The black hole forming around the popular but scarce Shocking Tingle Peppers was swallowing up other spices and herbs to the point that it might affect the life-or-death healing methods used in the Labyrinth. It was no laughing matter at this point.

Beatrice returned the cup of bland chai tea to the saucer.

“We can’t just sit around. We have one week. We have to find some way to get our hands on a Legendary Dragon claw in that time.”

“There’s no sign of its fangs showing up on the market. If someone had already gotten to it, I’d expect that to be the main thing sold for an exorbitant price in the Real Money Trade.” Flat boob window Hermelina sounded exasperated and took a sip of her cold barley tea. “The method for summoning the Legendary Dragon has been confirmed through Screenshots and video. I had a subordinate analyze them and they aren’t fake.”

“So we know how to summon it, but everyone who already tried ahead of us was beaten and had to make a hasty retreat?”

Surviving to fight another day against a powerful enemy you had no data on was a sign of experience. But that knowledge felt wasted to Beatrice since they could not find any of the Shocking Tingle Peppers they needed to attempt the challenge. She was willing to pay with the gears they used as currency, so she wanted whoever had them to sell her some instead of needlessly hoarding them. Although she knew saying so would only start a fight.

“You can’t get Shocking Tingle Peppers in the forest like usual, right?”

“It grew normally enough not too long ago, but it was so badly overharvested that the plant Break News got pissed and started hunting down the plant hunters. Carelessly heading out to pick some right now would be suicide if you ask me.”

…Now, Philinnion (whose suspenders accentuated the lines of her chest and whose shorts accentuated the lines of her butt) knew how to defeat that greatest Mandragora, but since she made no attempt to do so, she must not have expected to find any Shocking Tingle Peppers even if she did take care of Ileana.

Beatrice responded while resting her head in her hand with her elbow rudely on the table, which was something she would never be allowed to do in Tokyo’s Detached Magic Palace.

“Then can we only keep searching here in the inn town?”

“But we’ve already gone around to all the shops, haven’t we? Yet we have no Shocking Tingle Peppers to show for it.”

Hermelina sounded exasperated, but Beatrice raised her other hand’s index finger and winked.

“Then we’ll just have to look outside the normal shops, won’t we? There is one last resort that none of us wanted to try because it’s such a pain in the butt.”

“Ugh. You mean we have to use that place? I really, really wanted to save that for last.”

White Witch Philinnion was a healing specialist who went through a lot of Mixing ingredients, so this had to be an awful place if it made her go pale.

But the Holy Swordswoman was generally fearless, so she gave the answer.

“The Flea Market Maze. Let’s head to the inn town’s black market that has spread so chaotically that no one knows it’s full scope☆”

Part 2

The Flea Market Maze.

It had begun with merchants and peddlers hawking out their wares on the side of the road because they lacked the money to set up an actual shop. Everyone casually spread out a cloth and did business there. If things were looking bad, they could quickly snatch up their things and leave, so shoddy products and stolen goods were common. The entire market would expand and contract like an amoeba when volunteer vigilantes tried to put a stop to it, so there was no fixed location for any specific shop. All of this had resulted in one of the inn town’s shadiest and most dangerous areas.

It generally covered the northeast outskirts of the inn town, but…

“Hyah!? Wh-wh-why is there a big muscular Minotaur and Cyclops walking around the safe inn town!?”

“Those are familiars tamed by a Summoner or Tamer. They can handle automated sales without their master around, so the human can make tons of money without lifting a finger.”

Hermelina sounded exasperated as she watched the Nonhumans cutting by ahead of them.

They had also heard that Fairy Queen Strigona, one of the Break News, would use how she was visually indistinguishable from a human girl to nonchalantly visit the inn town, walk around eating human-made snacks, and enjoy the entertainment there, but she was an extreme outlier.

Beatrice had also heard that familiar trading was not all that trustworthy. It was great as long as repeating the same process turned a hefty profit, but if the situation changed at all and the previous equations no longer applied, the familiar would continue making pointless deals and you would be left deep in the red.

Also, they could hear some kind of giant bird crying overhead. The Harpy resting on the top of a spire had forgotten all about its given quest and let its wild instincts take over once more.

The Flea Market Maze was still a part of the inn town, but no one knew an accurate layout and it was filled with half-wild, half-urbanized nonhuman life. The level of danger was more like the Labyrinth than anything.

All the doors and windows on the stone buildings bordering this street were boarded up and rough-looking peddlers were hawking their wares on the cloths they had spread out along the roadside. A wide variety of products were for sale, but there were no price tags to be seen and you never knew how many gears would be taken from you once you were trapped in the vortex of conversation.

“Ugh. It’s even worse than I’d heard.”

Bespectacled White Witch Philinnion trembled and shrank down to hide behind Hermelina. The large breasts held tightly between her suspenders were pressed against the flat person’s back, but she was oblivious to how much that was pissing off the Fighter Priest.

Beatrice placed a hand on her hip and sighed while carrying around a blunt weapon taller than she was.

“So we’re here, but it doesn’t look like anyone’s going to tell us anything for free. Do we need to give hints that we might buy something?”

“Wait, Beatrice. You’ve grown up around far too much money, so I don’t trust your instincts. If you try to pull off a straw millionaire style of Trading Sequence here, you’ll only be taken for everything you own. Leave this to me.”

“Ugh… I don’t think we can trust a police officer who uses the fact that this is another world to spend all day in the casino. W-we aren’t going to find ourselves up on a stage being auctioned off tomorrow, are we?”

“You have quite the imagination, Philinnion. Is your menstrual cycle out of whack or something?”

“Bff!?”

“And who said anything about building relationships up from scratch? I’ve already got someone from my police team here. Let’s start by speaking with them.”

Part 3

“Ch-ch-chief? You can’t just walk up to me like this!”

The pink twintailed girl seated on a vividly colored sheet in a very girly way frantically waved her hands back and forth. She was Alchemist Cheerleader Huldra. Her sleeveless top left her shoulders and navel bare and her pleated miniskirt left her thighs exposed nearly to the base. Her appearance in this world was so overdone that her flirty behavior seemed somehow artificial.

Huldra led the three girls to the gap between two stone buildings before saying anything more.

“C’mon, what are you doing here in the middle of my undercover work? Is this a surprise inspection because you were worried your subordinate was flirting with corruption while undercover?”

“You figure out where you want to draw the line there. We’re not officially part of the police, after all. …I just want some info. Finding Shocking Tingle Peppers on the normal market is a fool’s errand, but what about here? Have you heard of anywhere selling them?”

“Oh, there are tons of rumors, but you’ll probably end up with some weeds someone ripped up from the ground around here.”

Huldra hid her lower face behind her pompoms and gave them an upturned glance. She had a tendency toward that kind of flirty behavior that a real girl would never actually do.

“I haven’t seen any Shocking Tingle Peppers in the Flea Market Maze. But that might actually be an important hint.”

“What do you mean by-…wait, don’t tell me.” Red-armored and white-miniskirted Beatrice started to say something but stopped. “Someone’s cutting off the supply.”

Huldra winked at her.

“It’s the same as not playing your card to trouble the other players in a game of Sevens. I imagine someone has bought up all the Shocking Tingle Peppers to drive up the price. There’s clearly something going on when you can’t find any in the inn town’s normal or black markets or in the forests around the town. Isn’t it best to assume someone set it up this way?”

…Of course, misreading this situation could lead to inventing a nonexistent conspiracy theory and growing to hate an enemy that never existed in the first place, but Hermelina and Huldra were professional special investigators. Beatrice decided to trust their senses this time.

And if that was the case, the situation might not improve after waiting a week or even a whole month.

Which meant…

“We need to get whoever is hoarding it to open up the tap. We need a Legendary Dragon claw, so this isn’t the time to play along with someone’s get-rich-quick scheme.”

“But, Beatrice, how do we do that? We have no idea who this person is.”

“I doubt this greedy person would respond even if we agreed to pay the current asking price. They can wait and the price will double, so that’s what they’ll do. Until the very moment the price starts to slip, that is. If we played along, our one week limit would be over before we knew it.”

Beating them up and taking the peppers was always an option in this world, but they set that aside since they did not know how powerful this person was. You could never take the Real Money Trade lightly. In Ground’s Nir, it was often the case that an intelligence agency with several top-rate Level Cappers was up to something in order to gather foreign currency. Plus, they could not negotiate or fight until they knew who this person was. They had no time to sit around.

Beatrice toyed with her gray cloak and gathered her thoughts.

“Remember when something like his happened before, Hermelina? Some dumb auctioneer who dreamed of being a billionaire gathered all the special disposable keys needed to open the crystal treasure chests in the Labyrinth’s Crystal Jail 99. Remember how we dealt with that?”

“That wasn’t very nice of us, was it?”

Hermelina breathed an exasperated sigh, but the look on her face showed she was enjoying this. She decided to help out with the look of a small child who had thought up a good prank.

“Then we have three days until the effects show themselves, right?”

“Three days…”

They had a week, so that was effectively half their time.

The time would not be wasted, but…

“Those three days are necessary and we’ll lose the whole week if we don’t do this. Plus, we have nothing else to do while we wait for the effects to spread, so we should head back to Earth and rebuild our strength.”

Part 4

The Detached Magic Palace of Roppongi, Tokyo, was in the finest area, but the kilometers of land had been bought up and the giant residence built for a single girl. Some would call it the ultimate luxury and others would call it a fancy prison.

There was a gazebo in the very center of the neatly-maintained lawn. After leaving the Gate, a black twintail girl in a red dress gave in to the exhaustion bearing down on her and threw herself into the open-air bath covered by the roof there.

She did not remove any of her clothing and she did not care if her glossy hair got wet.

“Milady, welcome ba- gyaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhh!? Your dress, your jewelry, your hair – oh, where am I even supposed to begin!?”

“Hi, Haruka. I’m back. Bubble bubble bubble.”

“Right, lecturing you comes first. Stop that, milady! Blowing bubbles is rude!! You aren’t a naughty child drinking from a straw!!”

The girl getting after her was the youngest of the three maid sisters and her small size did not provide much intensity.

A dull light was reflected at the red dress girl’s chest.

This was not her hard key modeled after a rapier.

It was more crudely designed.

“There’s nothing at all to do.”

She floated on her back in the round bath that was designed for bubbles and jets and she spoke lazily while her clothes grew quite see-through.

“For three whole days. Being surprised with a long weekend is a problem in its own way. You just have too much time.”

Staying in Ground’s Nir long term gradually caused problems with your internal clock and autonomic nerves, so lying around in bed was plenty useful for returning yourself to neutral. But that did not help the boredom issue! Teenage girls generally had packed schedules and they grew antsy when they had to stay put.

The better behaved girl placed a finger on her slender chin.

“Oh, I know. If you don’t have anything to do, why not do some paperwork? Iroka Onee-chan does as much as she can, but there is a fair bit that needs you to look through and sign it.”

“Ugh, Guhh, buhh.”

Her rebuttal left the bounds of human language.

While that might be the logical and clever thing to do, no one wanted to use up their long weekend that way.

That was when a light electronic jingle sounded. It came from the waterproof phone floating in the bath along with the red dress girl. Still floating like a jellyfish, she quickly typed something out with the keyboard.

“Oh, how unusual. Rusalka? It isn’t often you contact me.”

“I’m in Tokyo right now.”

That really was unusual.

Rusalka was nearly inseparable from Gruagach, but she did not often get to see that beloved older girl in the real world since she lived in a rural area and Gruagach lived in Tokyo. That was why she wanted to make sure she enjoyed her time with Gruagach while in Ground’s Nir.

Then she sent the following message to Beatrice.

“I know this really isn’t the time for it, but I’m on a school trip. I’m sick of all the strictly chaperoned group activities, so I’m spending my free time with Onee-sama. Anyway, can we visit you there? The government doesn’t let you leave, right?”

With that, the situation changed in less than 15 minutes.

“S-sob. Milady finally has some friends her own age…”

“…”

The youngest of the three maid sisters was too emotional to let go of her handkerchief, but the red dress girl kept her emotions under control and swore to herself to get back at the girl later for assuming she was friendless. For one thing, she had thought of Haruka herself as a friend with whom she had shared both good times and bad. Also, this seemed to be labelling the blonde swirly glasses shrine maiden and tight skirted glasses woman as too old to be “her own age”, so the comment was devastating for everyone involved.

She had three visitors including Rusalka. The other two were Gruagach, a classy girl with long wavy chestnut hair, and Wildefrau, a black-haired Japanese doll of a girl with a punk-style outfit that included an eyepatch. Those two were more often seen around Police Officer Hermelina. …The red dress girl had not had much opportunity to meet them in Tokyo, so she still had trouble matching the names to their faces. The names still brought their Ground’s Nir appearances to mind first and foremost.

As for Rusalka herself…

“Wh-what? I can’t help it I’m so little. And I’m here on a school trip, so, um, I’m in my uniform.”

She was smaller than expected.

She wore a plain sailor uniform that looked unmodified outside of shortening the skirt a little. The girl’s reddish brown hair was forcibly pulled back to form a bun.

In Ground’s Nir, she had the rare Job of Noble Dancer, she was a Level Capper who specialized in wind, and she wore a leotard with silver armor and boots added in places. She apparently had a body perfect for gymnastics on Earth as well.

She started off with some strange excuses, but that may have been because she was not used to seeing the red dress girl here on Earth. Or maybe she was overwhelmed by the scale of the Detached Magic Palace. Unlike Gruagach who was born into wealth and Wildefrau who had spent dirty money like water thanks to the patron supporting her, Rusalka had the financial senses of a normal student.

Meanwhile, the Japanese doll girl put a hand on her skinny hip and sighed from her small nose.

“Hm, looks like this cost more than that TV station we saw earlier.”

“Wait, can’t you see the Tokyo sights any time you want?”

“When you live here, you never really have a chance to go to that broadcast tower or dome stadium. No one wants to waste their free time taking a tour of the National Diet Building or the Supreme Court.”

Was that how it worked? It was hard for the red dress girl to know since she could not leave the Detached Magic Palace at all.

Haruka must have been very excited indeed because she began preparing some cold tea and crackers in the garden. The tea set was actually clattering as she carried it.

It was the wavy chestnut hair Student Council President whose eyes widened when she tasted the tea.

“Oh? This is very good. I could learn from this.”

“Is it, Onee-sama? Hm, I can’t tell the difference between these fancy tea leaves and normal ones…”

“Don’t worry. You shouldn’t notice a difference because there isn’t one. The tea leaves and tea set can be bought at imported food stores and online stores. You could say all of that is neutral.”

“Neutral?”

“Yes.” The Student Council President elegantly laughed while explaining to the small gymnast girl. “By using expensive ingredients like caviar, foie gras, shark fin, or Iberian pork, you can make your food seem fancy enough. Even if you are only making gyudon or hamburgers. But using entirely neutral ingredients and tools yet producing a much more special flavor is the proof of true skill. Also, we can feel more at ease if we are served normal ingredients. That would be her way of showing friendship.”

“Ohh.”

“When serving a guest, it is polite to let them enjoy their food or drink. You cannot frighten them with something that seems too fancy or make it seem like you would be angry if they do not compliment the flavor.”

“You mean the maids here are more incredible than they look, Onee-sama?”

“No, Rusalka, I am saying they are exactly as incredible as they look.”

“Y-you flatter me,” said Haruka while growing bashful over all the compliments.

The Japanese doll girl seemed more interested in the crackers than the tea, so she started eating them after loading them up with cheese and small fish cooked in oil.

“Come to think of it, I heard a certain Break News was seen inside the inn town again.”

One of the red dress girl’s eyebrows twitched upwards at that.

“…Well, that isn’t too surprising. The Fairies seem like they would use the morning dew and flower nectar for sustenance, so she’s probably hooked on all those human luxuries.”

“Hm? But, Onee-sama, I know that queen looks human, but can she really buy things like us? That doesn’t seem to make sense…”

Iced tea felt less proper and formal than hot tea, but the girls all enjoyed it in different ways.

The Student Council President shut her eyes as she sipped at it, the Japanese doll needed a straw to drink it, and the gymnast girl was more interested in the different varieties of sugar cube than in the tea itself. Lastly, the red dress girl just drank from her glass like normal.

“Sigh. I can’t help but relax once I get back in the usual routine,” said the red dress girl when she removed the rim of the clear glass from her lips. The comment almost seemed to slip out when she let her guard down. “Even though this really isn’t the time.”

Part 5

Meanwhile in Ground’s Nir.

There was a bulletin board on the wall of a pub in the human inn town.

“Okay, that’s 100 of them. That sounds like a good place to stop.”

“I have to say, that is a shocking Mixing recipe. Even if it is completely made up.”

The White Witch with a pointy hat and glasses and Fighter Priest with a flaaat boob window were discussing the flier they had created.

Beatrice, Philinnion, and Hermelina needed the Legendary Dragon, one of the clockwork Gimmicks found wandering the vast Labyrinth, but that elusive enemy could not be encountered by normal means.

They needed some Shocking Tingle Peppers to lure it out, but someone had apparently predicted this demand and bought them all up.

With nowhere else to obtain them, those three had to target the Shocking Tingle Peppers that Individual X was hoarding. And since they did not know who that individual was, they had to get that person to let go of their supply instead of just going and stealing them.

But how could they do that?

They only had to spread the following information:

The Shocking Tingle Peppers are no longer necessary.

A new way of luring out the Legendary Dragon has been discovered. There is a simpler way to meet the Encounter Requirements!!

“It’s kind of amazing that this is entirely made up.”

“Right? Well, it requires Mixing an unlikely variety of ingredients arranged in something of a puzzle ring where putting one thing in order moves something else out of order, so I doubt anyone will have a finished product they can test in the Labyrinth anytime soon.”

They only needed to buy some time.

As long as the disinformation caused the market price of Shocking Tingle Peppers to crash.

“Shocking Tingle Peppers only gathered attention recently, but it had to have cost a lot of gears to buy them all up. And you only pay 1000 gears to hoard them because you assume you can get 10,000 back.”

“Once they see the price falling and their return could fall to 100, 10, or even 1…well, they’ll see their bankruptcy coming☆ The more they invested in that commodity assuming they would make a huge return, the more debt they’ll find themselves in.”

“So it’s obvious how they’ll react: They’ll want to dump the Shocking Tingle Peppers before the price falls any further. To reduce their debt as much as possible. They’re going to open up the tap before long.”

“Chieeef,” called an overly sweet voice. It was accompanied by pink twintails, a sleeveless top that left the shoulders and navel bare, and a miniskirt. Alchemist Cheerleader Huldra was approaching with a different bundle of fliers in hand.

“I handed out those purchase ads you made. ‘Wanted: Shocking Tingle Peppers at a price of 200 Topaz Gears each.’ …Are you sure about that? That isn’t even 1/50 of the highest price I’ve seen.”

“It’s fine, it’s fine. Honestly, it’s too high a price. Shocking Tingle Peppers are about to be as risky as bonds for a government that’s locking down bank accounts. Whoever has them will leap at the chance when they see someone willing to buy.”

Hermelina and Huldra used their skills as professional special investigators to spread the information, but it was still amusing how quickly word got around. The experienced Level Cappers probably realized the Mixing recipe was fake, but they still helped spread the story because they wanted to get back at whoever was hoarding the Shocking Tingle Peppers.

Bespectacled Philinnion’s eyes were glittering like a mischievous child.

“Hee hee. I don’t know if they saw it as an investment fund or a source of foreign currency, but whoever was hoarding the Shocking Tingle Peppers must be sobbing about now. Oh, how I wish I could see the look on their face while they say-”

But what came next was more than just an impression.

In fact, someone else cut her off entirely.

“Nwohhh!? At this rate, the Shocking Tingle Peppers bubble is going to burst and I’ll lose everythiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiing!!!”

The surprised Level Cappers looked around and found someone at a table by the wall who looked far too small to be in a pub. The girl had a tiny frame, a youthful face, and long silver hair. Her undeveloped body lines were hidden only by a decorative flower and a black ribbon dress. (And yes, that means she was not wearing anything below that.)

She was Fairy Queen Strigona.

As small as she was, she was still one of the paradoxes with a soul known as the Break News.

Hermelina and Philinnion looked dumbfounded.

“You…”

“I had heard you would pretend to be human to eat snacks and play with toys here, but I get it now. Something changed, didn’t it? I was wondering how you got the gears we use as currency, but this explains it!”

The peppers had continued to be overharvested even after Ileana got mad and tried to stop it. Not even the Level Cappers could slip past her attacks to get their hands on the plant. It made sense that another Break News would be behind it, but those Break News generally did not shop in the human inn town. It would cause a panic if they did.

So who was the one culprit who could do both things?

“Y-you mean…”

Strigona seemed to realize what was going on. Her eyes trembled with tears as she viewed the two different fliers held by Hermelina and Huldra.

“You mean it was all of you who tore down all my hard worrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrk!!!???”

“Oh, shut up! We were only bringing the price down to normal after you drove it up!”

The noisy argument did not end there. Philinnion, who knew a lot about herbs, let out a sweet sigh before joining in.

“So how about you sell us what we need for an appropriate price? Before the Legendary Dragon started trending, it was seen as nothing more than a weed.”

“Yeah, it’s about as cheap as can be, so would a single Wooden Gear be about right? …Really, you’re lucky to get that much. You would normally have to pay someone to take it off your hands.”

Strigona fell silent with a lopsided frown on her face. She may have known that her voice would be shaking if she did say anything.

Police Officer Hermelina gave a devilish smile and pointed down at the floor.

“But if you sob and beg, we might just be willing to pay you the 200 Topaz Gears.”

Part 6

They now had some Shocking Tingle Peppers from an unexpected source.

The long weekend was over for Beatrice’s party.

It was finally time to start exploring the Labyrinth in search of the Legendary Dragon.

(Four more days.)

They had acquired the Shocking Tingle Peppers easily enough.

But given the overall time limit, they needed to hurry up. After all, they had never seen the Legendary Dragon before. They were mostly certain the info they had was accurate, but they could not stop a hint of unease from seeping into that logical decision.

The red-armored and white-miniskirted Holy Swordswoman let her tattered gray cloak flutter behind her as she used Fire Magic to light the hair extending from the top of her head as a light source.

“Its hunting ground is supposed to be around Stair Pyramid 71, right? Although there is a lot of conflicting information out there right now.”

“Don’t worry so much. We have tons of Shocking Tingle Peppers, so we can throw some out to check anywhere that seems suspicious.”

It took some time to reach the stone mountain covered in stairs. Given the round trip time, they could only stay at Stair Pyramid 71 for about a day. Their position as Level Cappers was irrelevant there, so they tried to keep any other enemies from noticing them.

It took a day to get there, they would spend a day exploring there, and it would take another day to get back.

That would use up most of the four days they had remaining. Screw this up and there would be no second chance.

Still, bare-navel Philinnion spoke with emotion in her voice.

“Here we are exploring the Labyrinth. It’s a gradual process, but we’re finally getting back into the swing of things.”

“…”

After walking across a floor made from long hallways and large rooms, they descended a few stairs, took small breaks long the way, and continued toward their destination.

The Labyrinth had originally been part of the armory meant to build Ultimate Weapon Abyss. Any living creature that entered it would be tested by a variety of mazes, traps, and enemies. How they overcame those trials would be observed and used to determine what kind of biological structure Abyss should take.

The armory had lost its purpose once Abyss was actually released.

However, the humans continued to explore the Labyrinth. The armory was only its purpose for this world. It was irrelevant to the benefits and obligations that sent the Earth humans there. It was still possible the humans would make new discoveries and continue on their own path to ruin.

“There it is,” said also bare-navel Hermelina. “That’s Stair Pyramid 71.”

It was a wide open space. The ceiling was so high up it was easy to forget this was deep underground. Stairways of various sizes snaked along an artificial mountain made of stacked stone blocks.

The Labyrinth’s shape changed at uneven intervals.

Stair Pyramid 71 would not be here forever.

“…”

The Holy Swordswoman tossed out some of the Shocking Tingle Peppers they had gone to such lengths to obtain.

Immediately, a gust of wind battered her hair despite being deep underground. She looked up to the top of the stone temple and saw something there.

Where had that thing been hiding in the Labyrinth until now?

It could only move freely here because the space was so large.

That dragon-like clockwork creature was easily more than 50m long. And Beatrice licked her lips when faced with that gold-glowing giant. She pulled the blunt weapon from her back. She had customized it with a hole in the huge grip so a human could wield it.

It just barely functioned as a weapon for her.

“The ‘legendary’ title had me curious…but I guess it wouldn’t be fair to compare it to a Break News.”

The creature had made its appearance.

That changed how they moved inside the Labyrinth.

“We have nothing against it, but let’s get this hunt started, Philinnion, Hermelina. Keep an eye on our movement count! Don’t forget to take the whole Party into account!”

Part 7

Battles in the Labyrinth functioned under different rules than the ones on the surface. The clockwork Gimmicks were modeled after the structures of plants and animals and they would move based on their opponent’s movements. If Beatrice took a step, so would the Gimmick. But if she did not move, neither would it. You had unlimited time to think, so people generally viewed it like a chess problem and chose their positions carefully to keep their opponent from acting.

In this case, the relationship between the hallway and the big room was most important.

“What exactly do we do? Stay at the hallway’s entrance so it can only attack us from one direction!?”

“We outnumber it, so it would be faster to surround it in an open area and beat the snot out of it.”

“Umm, are you including me in that 3-against-1 scenario? I’m a healer, so I’m supposed to stay in the back! I’m not a ridiculously strong Damage Dealer or a stupidly tough Tank!!”

“If you can complain that much, you’ll be just fine. To the front line with you.”

“She can recover from anything that doesn’t insta-kill her, so she’s a lot tougher than she looks.”

They were interrupted by the loud roar of something beating on the air. The Legendary Dragon had slowly floated up from the top of the pyramid while it stared down at them.

And its maw remained open.

It did not seem to be breathing fire or using some other kind of projectile attack. Would it use its giant body to drop down and crush them like a meteor?

“This is our chance!!”

Just as their opponent picked up speed, Beatrice moved her fingers to give her party members instructions and ran toward the colossal pyramid.

And she drew the rapier at her hip as if showing it off.

When they moved, so would the enemy. The enemy could not move while they stopped to think.

But strictly speaking, battles in the Labyrinth were not turn based. In the single second it took for Beatrice to perform a single action, the Gimmick could move two or three times. And if she stopped just before the enemy’s raised claws hit her, it would temporarily stop there. Think of it like a metal bat. That was the difference between a full swing meant to hit a home run and the light tap of a bunt.

Magical attacks were preferred in the Labyrinth because they were more like powerful projectile weapons than the physical attacks which needed a large swing to build up momentum. You needed to work out which stance would allow you to produce the most powerful strike even if you were stopped just before hitting.

And the Legendary Dragon had begun descending from the top of the tall pyramid. It was more than 70m above them. Even if it had giant wings, it could not purposefully stop that action now that it was descending like a meteor.

Yes.

That meant they were free to move for the time being. Until it had completed the “one move” that ended with crashing into the ground.

Would it only take an instant? Or a few seconds?

No.

As the name suggested, Stair Pyramid 71 was a pyramid structure covered in countless stairs arranged like a cluster of snakes, but Beatrice did not even bother following those paths. A glowing magic circle appeared behind her, flame wings burst from there, and she raced up the blocks which were taller than she was. She could not help but feel excited about this.

She slipped directly below the giant falling mass.

She raised the Shining Weapon rapier overhead in her right hand and shouted.

“Metal Jet!!”

Beams of light rushed out. A total of eight scorching orange beams flew vertically and stabbed into the 50m monster’s gut. The Legendary Dragon’s meteoric fall toward the ground was slightly diverted. It hopped straight up.

The golden dragon was a clockwork creature bound by gravity. Since it could not stop in midair, its single action would continue until it reached the ground.

Which meant…

“We can do whatever we want for as long as we want as long as we don’t let it reach the ground! Hermelina!!”

She had hit the Legendary Dragon from below while it dropped diagonally down like a meteor. Since it could not stay in the air, it would simply fly off in a different direction.

Which was why the green-haired Fighter Priest, who had gone for a boob window despite being flat, swung her ball and chain around on the ground. Physical attacks that required a large motion were poorly suited for the Labyrinth where battles were fought in short bursts of movement, but things were different now.

“Let’s do this! Your mistake was giving any time to a beautiful brawler like me, you hunk of junk!!”

After building up plenty of centrifugal force, she released the ball and chain.

The attack crashed right into the Legendary Dragon’s nose. The head-on collision completely negated the golden dragon’s vector, causing it to remain floating in the air.

They would not let it fall.

After jumping down a few blocks of the pyramid without using the stairs, Beatrice checked her position and sent more explosive flames straight up at the Legendary Dragon’s round belly.

This time, the repeated explosions pushed up on the golden dragon, causing it to float up. It frantically spread its wings, but it was too late. Beatrice kept that 50m colossus in the air while Hermelina occasionally hit it from the sides to correct its position when it shifted out of place. They had trapped it in the air so they could wear it down all they wanted.

“Wh-whew. So we got it in a Midair Infinite Combo.”

“Well, that’s usually how it works with the big bads seated all alone in their thrones. A big room full of small fries is a lot more annoying.”

Of course, this strategy only worked with Level Cappers who could continually use powerful Fire Magic with the intensity of a Gatling gun without running out of gas. It had helped a lot that they avoided as many battles as possible on the long journey here. A normal human would have run out of gas almost immediately. In fact, they would probably have failed to lift that giant thing at all and been crushed beneath. Non-combat-oriented Philinnion breathed a sigh of relief that produced a bounce of the chest squeezed between her suspenders.

“Th-thank goodness… Looks like you can defeat that thing without throwing me out onto the front line. As long as we get one of the Legendary Dragon’s claws…”

That was when something happened.

It was hard to see through the many crimson explosions blossoming above, but the three girls definitely heard a roar distinct from the fiery explosions.

“Um, Beatrice?”

“Wh-wh-what is it, Hermelina? Now really isn’t the time for comments like that.”

“You did it again, didn’t you?”

“That is a bad omen! Your words are going to bring misfortune upon us!! You are familiar with the concept of Kotodama, aren’t you!?”

Something else happened before they could receive a helpful lecture from the girl who was a shrine maiden back in reality.

They had lifted the dragon up too far.

It had crashed into the ceiling, spun itself around, dug its claws into the ceiling, and used that as a foothold while it glared down at them.

Its single action did not end when it fell.

It ended when it landed.

With a gust of wind like when a train passed through a subway tunnel, the Legendary Dragon gathered strength in its body and lunged straight down at them.

At Beatrice in particular.

The red-armored and white-miniskirted Holy Swordswoman’s Magic was extremely powerful, but since she had been able to lift up the golden dragon by hitting it with several blasts, her Magic was clearly not enough to obliterate the creature in a single blow. And that did not really matter to the Legendary Dragon. Even if its nose was crushed or wings were torn off, it could crush the slender human as long as gravity carried it down.

They had given this mission three days of their four day limit.

There was no second chance if they screwed up here.

They had to defeat this Legendary Dragon this one time no matter what.

“!?”

She put up a pointless resistance. She launched some sporadic Fire Magic, but it was not enough to stop the golden dragon’s momentum after it kicked off the ceiling.

It was over in the blink of an eye.

The Legendary Dragon crashed down on a point partway up the pyramid, sending a violent shockwave and dust in every direction. The entire pyramid collapsed and the stone blocks formed an avalanche.

But.

However.

“Mirage: cancel.”

A beautiful and merciless voice was heard.

Beatrice’s tattered gray cloak fluttered behind her as she stood at the top of the half-crumbled pyramid. She had not teleported there. She never had stopped partway up the pyramid and she had passed right by the Legendary Dragon.

The obvious image seen until now was a false one. It was only a mirage created from heat and light. Magic was a projectile, but it was not a bullet bound by the laws of physics. Its trajectory could be bent along the way and its launch point could be shifted from the user’s location.

And it was too late by the time the dragon realized the truth.

“Hermelina.”

“You really shouldn’t trick your own party members like that, but understood!!”

The Legendary Dragon belatedly tried to get back up, but after crashing down into the pyramid and creating a crater there, the avalanche of stone blocks was falling on its own head. It excelled at rapid descents, but that was nothing to fear if you kept it from jumping up above you.

“Sorry, Legendary Dragon.”

The girl lightly spun the log or steel beam of a Shining Weapon around in one hand and supported it with her right hand using the hole in the grip and with her left gauntlet which she had enlarged by using Magic on some slag she had gathered. Then she rudely licked her lips.

Yes.

Her weapon was no longer a rapier.

“I inherited this thing, so I’m a Dragon Eater now!!”

She did not even let it stand back up.

She sent out a fiery explosion and a powerful blow.

This time, the destruction of a slowly falling suspended ceiling was directed toward the Legendary Dragon.

Part 8

The Legendary Dragon still lasted three hours, so its strength lived up to its name. If they had been unable to stop its movement and forced to reckon with its giant maw, claws, and tail throughout, who could say how much greater the damage would have been. It had even been clever enough to try to play dead and attack once they let their guard down.

“Pant, pant. Hey, Beatrice, you’ve cooked that thing through I hope.”

“Don’t worry. Where are its claws? I hope I didn’t roast those as well…”

“Gasp, pant, gasp.”

The glasses cow had not done any real fighting, but she was more out of breath than any of them when she finally climbed to the top of the half-crumbled pyramid. The stairs had all collapsed during the fighting, but this still meant she was out of shape.

However, they had not brought her along simply as a healer meant for insurance. Yes, White Witch Philinnion was a Mixing expert. So much of one that she had sacrificed her actual combat power for it. That meant she knew what to look for in ingredients.

The pervert using her suspenders for a bit of self-bondage stroked a finger along the side of her glasses as she spoke.

“From the look of things…well, it gets a passing grade. The surface is a little scorched thanks to a couple of violent people I could mention, but we only want the tough tip.”

“Meaning?”

“We have the final ingredient.”

When Beatrice placed a hand on her hip, let her tattered gray cloak flutter behind her, winked, and asked for an answer, the recovery expert nodded.

“We finally have what we need to save Boo Boo.”

Part 9

She never could have forgotten.

Not for a moment.

And Beatrice was not the only one.

There was a single reason why the Level Cappers had been venturing into the Labyrinth, traveling across the island to gather ingredients, and frequenting auctions in the inn town.

“Boo Boo…”

After returning from the deep, deep Labyrinth, Beatrice walked partway up a mountain. The hill there had been his favorite spot. And now his 4m body was in a large hole and covered in dirt to form a mound there. It was marked with only a roughly hewn log with no religious meaning.

However.

This was not the end.

Ultimate Weapon Abyss had said something back at his house:

Abyss// I will not allow it to end here.

Abyss// Now, let us review the answers.

“It took us three idle days to find the Shocking Tingle Peppers which had grown so rare in the inn town. It took another week to track down Strigona and then explore the Labyrinth. It’s been 10 days since then, so is Boo Boo really okay in there?”

Flat boob window Hermelina, who knew no recovery techniques despite being a priest, was viewing the dirt grave. Yes, a grave. Boo Boo was indeed buried there.

She was answered by her subordinate, pink twintailed Alchemist Cheerleader Huldra.

“Um, I think Abyss’s reasoning is sound.”

“And we were out of ideas, so what choice do we have but to trust that humanoid simulator?”

In what may have been a fundamental personality flaw, Ice Waterfall Princess Wildefrau could not help but speak in a sharper tone than necessary. But to truly understand her personality, you had to look past her words and consider all the time she spent gathering ingredients at the inn town auctions.

Gruagach, the mourning clothes girl with her long blonde braid forming a large circle, placed her index finger on her slender chin.

“Um, let’s review the checklist one last time: King Kraken ink, Millennium Slumber Flower pollen, high purity Electrosplit Stone ore, and a Legendary Dragon claw. Is there anything else we need?”

“Be careful when using a reagent to test them. If you bought the item and the reagent from the same merchant, the reagent might be a fake too. Always purchase the reagent through a different route! That way you can trust the result.”

That warning came from Rusalka, the girl in a skintight leotard with silver armor, and her words carried weight since she had once fallen victim to an imitation recovery potion deep in the Labyrinth.

Philinnion responded to that with her breasts held tightly between her suspenders.

“Heh heh. You only have to worry about those things if you take the easy route and buy things. A reagent? Why not just Mix everything yourself? Hwa ha ha! Then you can have absolute trust it is legitimate! No one can fool this White Witch!!”

They could let Philinnion and Huldra handle the actual potions.

Beatrice looked to Boo Boo’s grave once more.

Saying it had been far too long might earn a scoff from the Sage who had gone so far for the Iberian Orcs in her own way.

She recalled what Abyss had said through that Shining Weapon that resembled a log or steel beam:

“Once Boo Boo decided to save you, a combination of electrical burns and nerve transmission malfunctions damaged his entire body. His life functions will shut down before you can heal each and every injury with recovery potions.”

Abyss’s words were cold and mechanical, but they still contained a slight warmth.

“However, the Iberian Orcs are life forms that continued to evolve in order to oppose me. Their self-healing ability is quite powerful. Place him in an extreme environment to trigger that function. Given the current level of civilization on the island, I believe it would be best to bury him to create a hypoxic environment that will place just enough of a burden on his brain.”

It was all for this.

The roughly hewn log that looked like a grave marker was essentially a snorkel. To make sure he did not suffocate but to also reduce the influx of air to the absolute minimum, that lifeline had been very carefully pierced down the center.

“…”

Beatrice once more checked what they had gathered. Huldra had acquired some Adult Cocoa fruit at the Flea Market Maze, Hermelina carried a mining hammer she could swing down with both hands, and Wildefrau had an Electric Manta frozen in ice.

And finally…

They had the sharp and powerful Legendary Dragon claw which was hollow on the inside and they had a cardiotonic made by mixing various medicinal ingredients.

She had known.

She had known it was necessary, but digging a hole, throwing Boo Boo’s giant body inside, and covering it with dirt had squeezed at her heart so very tightly.

And after that agony which felt like exposing her soul to the fires of hell, she had finally snatched up this one last chance at changing everything.

“Yes, that’s everything. We can start at any time, Beatrice!”

“I know.”

She nodded.

She did not know if she had done the right thing, but she wanted to make sure she had not done anything she regretted.

“We can’t let this end here. We will save Boo Boo ourselves!!”

Part 10

After fighting to prevent the Red-afflicted Iberian Orcs from crossing between worlds and destroying Earth, Beatrice’s Shining Weapon rapier had been destroyed.

Humans could not return to Earth without that and they could only live in this other world for a few days at a time.

Beatrice had been gradually weakening, so waiting for death had been her only option.

But Boo Boo had tried to change that fate.

He had taken the log or steel beam of a Shining Weapon from his hip and rewritten the settings profile so he could give it to her. His body had incorporated the strong points of all life forms and that apparently included the traits of an electric fish. By forcibly using that imperfect power for too long, he had badly electrified and damaged himself.

And.

So.

By burying him and using the log like a snorkel, they had created just the right hypoxic environment.

Boo Boo’s injured body was slowly but surely being healed by an Iberian Orc’s powerful self-healing ability.

But there was a bigger problem.

“He cannot keep his body temperature from falling,” Abyss had said. “This can be temporarily prevented by choosing a sunny location or lighting a fire above the dirt covering him, but while he lies dormant, he is incapable of acquiring nutrients even as his self-healing ability continues to consume energy. It is best to assume his body temperature regulation is not functioning properly. Thus, a hypoxic environment is useful for drawing out his self-healing ability, but that is not enough on its own. You must induce the necessary self-healing before he crosses the point of no return, but you must also quickly dig him back up and resuscitate him once the self-healing has been switched on.”

Hermelina made an exasperated comment while transforming her Shining Weapon into a shovel.

“So is he like a chrysalis that can’t get out of the dirt on his own? Are you sure now is the time, Philinnion? If we dig him up and the self-healing hasn’t started yet, we don’t get a second chance!”

“If anything, we’re running behind schedule because a certain dumb fairy was hoarding the Shocking Tingle Peppers. With the three days spent wandering around the inn town and the week it took to get the peppers and then complete the hunt in the Labyrinth, it’s been ten days. We definitely aren’t doing this too soon!!”

That was why Beatrice, Huldra, and Rusalka were shoving their shovels into the dirt even though Boo Boo was lying below there. They were short on time. Plus, carelessly pushing the shovel too far was not going to injure that mass of muscle and fat.

“I see him!”

Wildefrau had been using an ice shovel while a blue glowing magic circle appeared at the center of her cross-shaped sword which meant the center of her chest, but she spoke up when she saw some gray skin through the dark soil.

Gruagach tilted her head with the large circle of her braid behind her.

“Is that his right arm? Then this must be his shoulder and his wrist would be over here… Yes, I can make out his general silhouette. Be careful, everyone.”

“Phew. Were you saying something, Onee-sama?”

“Rusalka, that is Boo Boo’s face you are sitting on! Be more careful!!”

Once the Iberian Orc’s self-healing had been unleashed, the hypoxic environment was no longer necessary. Beatrice crawled along and used her hands to remove the dirt from Boo Boo’s face.

It was covered with mud and the eyes were shut, but it was definitely that familiar face.

She thoughtfully spoke under her breath.

“…Boo Boo.”

“W-wait, is this for real? Doesn’t he look less pale thane before we buried him? And those injuries and burns are gone.”

Yes.

It was too soon for boo Boo’s eternal slumber. He had spent more than ten days battling his own limits below the cold dirt.

“Here!”

White Witch Philinnion pulled a triangular flask from her Shining Weapon first aid kit and sprinkled the contents around.

Of course, that was not enough to wake Boo Boo when he was on death’s door.

The potion instantly vaporized and turned to steam, so it actually affected the eyes of Beatrice and the others gathered around him.

A digital counter appeared above Boo Boo’s large head.

That displayed his odds of survival. All of those present could see it there.

0%.

“Kh.”

Beatrice gasped at the cruel value produced by the diagnostic potion, but now was not the time to feel dizzy. They had work to do. With each step, that value would increase until it reached 100%.

“Let’s get started. Help me out, everyone!”

They could not let the flame of life be extinguished.

Seeing his face and right hand was enough to know his general location and position. They did not need to dig up every last part of his nearly-4m body. Nor did they have the time. They simply worked to remove the dirt from directly on top of him.

The rise and fall of his chest was so shallow it was hard to believe he was alive. It looked like his breathing could stop at any moment.

In her tattered gray cloak, Beatrice bit her lip but did not hesitate. She removed the large Shining Weapon from her back, and…

“Fire Storm.”

Orange flames erupted from his exposed skin. But Beatrice had not gone mad. It only lasted a moment.

“The primary sterilization with fire and heat is complete! Philinnion, Huldra!! Take care of the secondary sterilization with alcohol and herbs!!”

“Intense flames, herbs, and fruit… Man, this is reminding me of some trendy French fruit dish!”

Alchemist Cheerleader Huldra grew pale and shouted, but this was far from over.

Philinnion gave further instructions while her shorts strained.

“We need to forcibly increase his blood flow. Hermelina, ready your hammer!”

“Really!? This isn’t something to use on someone who’s half dead!”

She was hesitant, but the Fighter Priest produced a green magic circle while raising a mining hammer in both hands. Hermelina specialized in physical attacks and her Shining Weapon could transform into various shapes.

Philinnion wrote some numbered Xs on Boo Boo’s body.

“Go ahead!!”

“Okay, fine!!”

The blows were just like those in a mine.

She swung the hammer down on his right thigh, left thigh, lower stomach, and chest in that order. It was somehow reminiscent of squeezing the bottom of a mayonnaise or toothpaste tube to get the last bit out. Come to think of it, wasn’t the biggest risk of blackout for fighter pilots when the inertial force sent the blood down to their feet and kept it from returning to their head?

The digital counter above Boo Boo’s head clearly shot up. It rose from the merciless 0% to a value hovering between 20% and 30%.

The value was now above 1%.

That alone nearly loosened Beatrice’s tear ducts, but this was not over yet. If they relaxed now, the possibility they had worked so hard for would slip from their fingers.

Ice Waterfall Princess Wildefrau interrupted with a shout.

“The Electric Manta is ready!

“Once it’s thawed, use it on Boo Boo’s chest. Stand back, everyone!!”

It was a bathtub-sized cube made of clear ice. Wildefrau placed it on Boo Boo’s chest and released her control over the ice. Water poured down on his upper body like someone had overturned a bucket and the flat marine creature trapped within woke up.

The sparks were intense enough to see and that nearly-4m body clearly jerked up.

Mourning clothes Gruagach sounded a little worried.

“W-was that too strong?”

“No, it wasn’t strong enough!”

Meanwhile, the White Witch remained as tense as ever.

The counter had jumped to 60%, but it did not stick. Instead of stopping there, it dropped right back down.

Before it dropped below 40%, pointed witch hat Philinnion took action.

“Wildefrau, remove the Electric Manta. Gruagach and Rusalka, you two take this handkerchief! It contains Adult Cocoa fruit.”

“Hm? Chocolate?”

Leotard and armor wearing Rusalka looked skeptical, but…

“It is known as a candy ingredient now, but cocoa was originally a heart medicine. But don’t have him eat it; letting him smell it would be about right!”

The two of them pressed the white handkerchief over his distinctive nose instead of his large mouth.

And the value…did not stop!!

It was still dropping!?

“Beatrice, you have to do it now!!’

“I know that!!”

If possible, she had wanted the value at 70% before doing this, but this was her only chance. And if she hesitated now, his odds of survival would only continue to drop like water from a bucket with a hole in the bottom.

She needed to act while the odds were as high as possible.

She could not waste the chance they had won here.

She forced her trembling fingers to move and she tightly grasped the final item.

Everything else had been in preparation for this.

If their final gamble did not succeed, it was all for naught.

“!!”

She lightly caught something that Philinnion tossed her way. King Kraken ink, Millennium Slumber Flower pollen, and high purity Electrosplit Stone ore. The cylinder the size of a relay baton was a special cardiotonic inside a syringe.

Of course.

This Iberian Orc had beaten up a 1000-meter dragon. Given the thick layer of muscle and fat, no normal needle could pierce his chest.

That was why they had needed that one Treasure so badly.

The Legendary Dragon claw.

That needle was needed to pierce Boo Boo’s chest and reach his heart.

(What was all this for? I never could have forgotten. Not for a moment.)

Beatrice adjusted her grip on the cylindrical stake far too thick to call a syringe.

(Even when faced with the ordinary routine and a world that kept moving despite my personal feelings, I never did lose sight of this!!)

Because she had wanted to bring back that voice, that innocent smile, and the time she had spent with him.

So.

“Wake up! Boo Booooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!!”

She gathered all her strength.

She used all her weight to send the Legendary Dragon claw into the center of his chest so it would slip through a gap in his thick muscle fibers and between his ribs and sternum.

She heard a dull sound.

She felt the resistance in her wrists.

After sensing it had reached his heart, she injected something at such a high concentration that it would have made a human bleed from every pore and die.

Their calculations had been correct.

They had been delayed by the Shocking Tingle Peppers, but the limit had not yet passed. Or so she hoped.

An uncomfortable silence surrounded them.

What about the counter?

Beatrice quickly looked up toward Boo Boo’s face, but Philinnion’s diagnostic potion must have worn off. The digital value displayed in her vision was gone.

Had it reached 100%?

Or had it plummeted instead?

Beatrice had not taken the drug herself, but her heart was still pounding.

She waited.

That was all she could do.

And.

And.

And.

The value had not stopped.

It was falling!?

“…!!”

Doing this to a human might have killed them instantly. But the girl bet on her partner’s sturdy body. She was barely thinking at this point. With the long claw still piercing him, she exposed it and her own arms to a Magic explosion.

She sent a direct blow to his heart.

This was really and truly a last resort!!

“Bwah!! Bshh, bshhhh!?”

It was like a spring-loaded trap. Just as his giant body shook, his upper body sprang up, bringing the surrounding dirt with it. Beatrice was dragged along with him. Since the dragon claw was stabbed into his chest, she quickly let go of the giant cylinder.

That naturally led her to cling to Boo Boo’s raised chest.

His bestial odor was as strong as ever and she would have choked if she let her guard down, but she kept her cheek there for a while with her eyes closed.

“Boo Boo…”

She spoke his voice under her breath.

But then the red-armored and white-miniskirted Holy Swordswoman raised her voice with countless emotions contained within.

And that voice was also somewhat distorted by sobs.

“You dumb sleepyhead! How long were you going to worry me like that!?”

His vision was blurred.

At first, Boo Boo did not realize that the sound in his ears was his own weak breathing.

Where was he?

Why was he still conscious?

He had only wanted to save Beatrice. Even if that meant paying for her life with his own. He had just wanted happiness for that precious girl who had been by his side for so long.

But.

However.

She rubbed her muddy face against his chest. The tools scattered around them made it clear how hard she had worked for this. She looked utterly exhausted and her voice was filled with emotion, so there was no sign of the kind and reliable young woman she normally was for him. Her usual personality had been utterly destroyed. Boo Boo finally realized what he had forced onto her. He had not brought her happiness.

He would not throw away his life again.

He would not run away like that again.

He weakly reached out a hand and held the head of the girl pressed against his chest.

And he made that silent decision.

Chapter 2: Bonus Scenario Unlocked

Part 1

Abyss// What I would like for you to do is search for mistakes.

Abyss// There are no obvious hints.

Abyss// There have been six incidents before this.

Abyss// Review all of those materials and locate anything that does not seem to belong.

Part 2

“Squeal.”

Halfway up a Ground’s Nir mountain, the nearly-4m pig-faced giant named Boo Boo tilted his head like a small child in front of the brick house that the palm-sized Fairies had built for him during the nights.

“What are you drinking, Beatrice? It’s so dark.”

“Hm? This is coffee☆ Making it from scratch here in Ground’s Nir wasn’t easy.”

He was answered by Holy Swordswoman Beatrice whose long red-and-silver hair fluttered and who had added a tattered gray cloak to her bright red armor and pure white miniskirt. She held a wood-carved mug in between her hands and smiled while seated on a nearby stump.

To make real coffee, you had to harvest the beans, roast them, crush them with a mill, heat up a syphon, and go through a long and arduous process, but she had received some interesting information from Iroka, the capable young woman of the three maid sisters back on Earth.

…Dandelion coffee was apparently a thing.

As its name suggested, it was made from the plant’s roots instead of special beans. It was no more than an imitation that provided a coffee-like flavor, but it was still a relief to have something. There were no actual coffee beans or dandelions in this world, but that was a separate issue. After a lot of trial and error that occasionally ended in a grimace or in writhing on the ground, she had discovered that the Fluffy Male Flower’s root was similar to a dandelion’s. This was the fruit of her blood and tears. Humans were about the only living things willing to die for their hobbies.

(I thought Philinnion would know since plant roots are so often used as medicine, but that glasses cow can be careless about the details.)

“Tremble tremble. So what is this about? Some weird human food thing???”

“Hmm.”

Boo Boo sounded cautious, so how was she supposed to answer him? She recalled hearing that he had had a bad experience with an energy drink made by Mixing Expert and White Witch Philinnion. The Iberian Orc’s sensory organs were as sensitive as his muscles were strong, so he may have had trouble with stimulants.

“It’s more of an indulgence than a food. You enjoy the flavor and aroma instead of filling your stomach and gaining nutrients.”

“Boo. Humans have such strange rituals.”

Boo Boo groaned in confusion. He seemed excessively fixated on food, but he was only ever searching for what he needed to survive. He may have never come across snacks or indulgences before.

Small children could drink dandelion coffee just fine since it had no caffeine, so Beatrice made a casual suggestion.

“What to try some, Boo Boo?”

At times like this, it was best to fill an empty mug with the dark coffee while asking with a smile. With needlessly nervous newbies, you could not give them time to think!

Boo Boo was more fixated more on the color than the flavor or smell. He sniffed his large nose with a skeptical look on his face.

“Boo… Is this really okay to drink? It’s so dark and it smells burnt. It’s like the potion used to protect my wood house from bugs.”

“Ah ha ha. There’s no need to drink it black as a sign of maturity, Boo Boo. I have milk and sugar here. You’re supposed to enjoy it as an indulgence, so forcing yourself to drink it is pointless.”

Level Capper Beatrice made it sound simple enough, but that milk and sugar were the result of opposing nature using brute force. There were no supermarkets or convenience stores in Ground’s Nir.

“Squeal. Is this boiled down Blessing Maple sap?”

“Yep. I boiled it until the syrup turned into a white powder. It still has a bit of a unique flavor, but actual pure white sugar is pretty hard to make. It’s a miracle the Farmers can do what they can.”

“The elder said this is really nutritious! Wow, it’s so sweet. I could eat these forever. It’s like they soak into my body.”

“Wait, eating just the sugar cubes is against the rules, Boo Boo! That doesn’t give you a mature atmosphere at all!”

“Squeal. I bet that drink is really good with this in there.”

The star of the show had clearly shifted. Boo Boo loved the sweet flavor so much he could not stop smiling as he threw a few sugar cubes into his mug. And…

“Gulp.”

“Ah!?”

He tilted his head back and drank the whole thing in one go. It was a lot like swallowing a pill using a cup of water. White steam had still been rising from the mug, but he had not even blown on it to put his mind at ease.

“Boo- wait, Boo Boo!?”

“Hm??? What’s wrong, Beatrice?”

“Open your mouth! Hurry! You aren’t burnt!?”

“Squeal?”

Beatrice got up from the stump with the large Shining Weapon shaking from its diagonal position on her back, but Boo Boo did not seem to understand why she was panicking. Iberian Orcs must have been made different from humans on a fundamental level.

“B-Boo Boo?”

“Why are you so freaked out?”

“Well, um…you’ve never had coffee before. Was it too bitter for you?”

“Everything’s sweet with those things in it, so I couldn’t tell.”

Part 3

Abyss// You have just one chance.

Abyss// Look to the center of what does not seem to belong. You will find the answer there.

Part 4

“Oh, what’s this? Are you drinking coffee, Boo Boo? When did you get so mature?”

“Eh? Did you make that yourself? I knew you had started working in the field, but getting a pure coffee tree here in Ground’s Nir is quite an accomplishment!!”

“Squeal?”

The nearly-4m giant only tilted his head.

His new visitors were Fighter Priest Hermelina, the brawler with short green hair and a priest robe with a bold slit (and a flat boob window), and White Witch Philinnion, the healer with fluffy blonde hair, glasses, and a pointed white hat. They normally tried to act like the more mature ones, so Boo Boo finally realized something when they began complimenting him.

“I was happy with just the sugar, boo, but it looks like everyone praises you if you hold this bitter stuff like you know what you’re doing.”

“Well, sounds like you understand how the adult world works. You’re right about that. Everyone actually loves sweet things, but all the respect goes to brand names and social status. It’s the same with bags, houses, cars, and boyfriends. Money is meaningless if it doesn’t bring you prestige.”

“Hermelina, fill Boo Boo’s pure mind with any more of your dark worldview and I will roast you. Just like a coffee bean.”

Beatrice’s fiery response was to be expected at this point, so no one bothered taking it seriously.

Philinnion, the young glasses woman with suspenders-bound boobs, glanced over at the row of wood-carved mugs and other cooking equipment.

“Huh? If you’re enjoying some coffee, then where are the snacks? What food do you have to go with it?”

“Squeal, these are sweet and tasty! I think they go perfect with coffee!!”

“Those are 100% pure sugar cubes, aren’t they!? Even those brutal British snacks are only half sugar and half butter!!”

The college girl bristled and raised her voice as she began her usual complaints about fat, sugar, and carbs (despite ending up eating more of them than the others), but Boo Boo only tilted his head since he was a mysterious lifeform who could convert anything he consumed into the energy he needed to live.

“Is there any kind of…you know, a snack we can whip up real quick?”

“Boo, when did we start talking about cooking? There are some cooking tools I don’t use in the house.”

When they visited the brick house, they found it had more stuff than before.

“Oh, Boo Boo. Have you started using a mirror?”

“The Fairies attached that to the wall. They say I have to look after my appearance now. Life is hard sometimes.”

“Oh, there’s a bookcase too. Boo Boo, you’re turning into a stylish and intellectual urbanite.”

“The Fairies brought that too. I can’t read all the tricky words, but I can understand the stories with lots of pictures. Those are fun.”

It sounded like most of them were picture books. Had palm-sized Meridiana and Alice invented the stories, or were they legends and old stories passed down by the Fairies? But while Beatrice wondered about that…

“But, yeah, some are missing.”

“Hm?”

“Sometimes, some of the pictures books go missing. Like the one that goes here or here. See all the holes? And I was hoping to read that one soon.”

“Hm, so do you have a thief? Although I think only the Fairies are here very often.”

“Boo, it’s strange. Where did ‘Studying Alone Together’ and ‘Secrets of the Female Body’ go?”

“What!? I-I’m not sure whether I should be mad or not! It was those palm-sized things that came up with that ridiculous lineup, but they’re also the ones who confiscated them! Are two different factions of Fairies in disagreement about this!?”

At any rate, they were interested in the cooking equipment.

They checked the mountain of pots and pans gathered in a corner of the rectangular room.

“I see, I see. A pot this deep should do. I have some Rising Powder and Doodle Doo Eggs…oh, and you have some vegetable oil. I think we can make do with this.”

“Hey, Philinnion, you can use this trip to another world to show off your feminine side if you want, but you aren’t planning to bake cookies or a cake, are you? That would take way too long.”

“(Heh. That’s the problem with this unfeminine and so very flaaat person.)”

“Do I need to grab you by the ankles and swing you around, glasses cow?”

Boo Boo’s house did not have a kitchen, so any cooking generally began with stepping outside and placing a pot over the fire. The White Witch seemed to have a good idea, so she filled the metal pot with vegetable oil and placed it on the fire. While it heated, she mixed together some white powder, bird eggs, tallow butter, and clear drinking water.

“You can’t hope for the regulated temperature of an oven in this wild environment. And if you want it done quick, isn’t frying something the simplest choice?”

Once she stuffed the goopy dough inside a leather bag with a single hole, the preparations were complete. She did not bother shaping the dough and simply squeezed it into the boiling oil.

Boo Boo watched with eyes wide.

“Squeal? What’s that stretchy stuff? And why is it hardening so quickly!?”

“These are called churros☆ If we had time to let the dough set, I could have made round donuts, but I thought the immediate effect seen here would be more fun.”

The process did not have many steps and it looked simple enough, but getting the moisture of the dough right was tricky and they would fall apart if you got it wrong. Beatrice and Hermelina stared into the distance while seeming to fade away. That glasses girl really had needlessly shown off her feminine side.

Feeling like the shining sun, Philinnion pulled the golden brown churros out of the oil and sprinkled some of Boo Boo’s sugar on them.

“All done. Well, what do you think? You don’t see churros as often as normal donuts, do you? It feels like a special event, doesn’t it? Hwa ha ha! Don’t underestimate a young woman who has a decent repertoire of skills to draw on!!”

“Squeal, these are the snacks?”

“Yes. You eat them with the coffee.”

“Why eat them together?”

“Because those are the rules.”

“Well, if it’s the rules,” said Boo Boo as he grabbed some of the human-size churros. Incidentally, Beatrice was curled up inside her tattered cloak after the attention was stolen away from her coffee, so she was not paying very close attention.

The person who was more interested in food than sex appeal tried eating the mysterious new food.

And…

“Ow.”

“?”

“S-squeal. They’re poking my mouth…”

Boo Boo tearfully grabbed his wood-carved mug to have something to wash the food down and then he tilted his head back.

“Gulp.”

“Wahh!? A-a-all at once!? That was bubbling hot water!!”

“Beatrice, what were you teaching Boo Boo!? He’s turned coffee into some kind of coming-of-age ceremony using fire!”

Beatrice was unsure what to say since Boo Boo had a tendency to do that. The first way he learned to do something tended to stick with him for a while.

Part 5

It was the middle of the night.

“Pu pu pu. Squeal, squeal.”

A soft light from the fireplace illuminated the inside of Boo Boo’s brick house. He was sitting on the floor with his mug while he threw some premade firewood into the fireplace.

This was unusual for wild(?) Boo Boo.

He was no longer afraid of fire. In fact, he seemed to enjoy looking after the crackling flame. He was apparently afraid of the dark because of the possibility of ghosts, but he may have overcome that fear by controlling this light source.

A small girl walked in without even knocking first.

“Oh, what’s this? It isn’t often that you are still up at this hour.”

She had long silver hair and an undeveloped body. A black ribbon dress and decorative flowers covered youthful skin that seemed to directly reflect the moonlight. That dress was an invaluable item that the Fairies had woven from Ground Spider silk. She was the Fairy Queen and one of paradoxes with a soul who were called Break News because seeing them was enough to make the news. Her name was Strigona and she could envelop everything with her toxic wings if she let loose.

However, she was accompanied by someone else at this late hour. This fellow Break News was Kallikantzaros, the Vampire who claimed the lunar eclipse as her own. Her small body was wrapped in a black swimsuit and a red negligee, she wore a nightcap on top of her long and fluffy blonde hair, and she held a gray pig doll under one arm, but no one would take her lightly because of that appearance. The fangs visible at her mouth were far too sinister for anyone to let their guard down.

She frowned a bit when she saw the mug Boo Boo was holding.

“Coffee? You have my praise for choosing an uncaffeinated variety, but that dissolved smell still bothers me. Boo Boo, you are meant to offer me your blood, so take care of your blood composition.”

“Squeal?”

“Ignore that fool who wants to suck you dry. I see, I see. So is that really coffee? Whenever night falls in the inn town, they always take the mug away from me! Now, hurry up and give me an offering. Honey or bread instead of sugar would have been better…but make sure to add plenty of milk! Do not forget that part!! Wow, wow!!”

“How are you and your sweet tooth any better than me!?”

The Vampire made that biting observation while the Fairy Queen was leaning out toward Boo Boo’s extra-large mug to smell the contents.

By the way, Strigona’s insistence on honey or milk may have been connected to the unverified stories of the palm-sized Fairies secretly doing people’s work in the night in exchange for such things.

“Squeal. I tried to give this to the vegetable in the field, but she got really mad at me.”

“Is that coffee replacement made from a plant root? I almost feel bad for that perverted carrot if you essentially offered her a relative to drink.”

Strigona sounded somewhat exasperated as she rudely licked her lips and reached for the milk pot.

The “vegetable in the field” here would be Ileana, the brown beauty who was a plant Break News and the greatest Mandragora. She was very interested in all “noble pastimes” that came in the form indulgences not needed simply to survive, but on a more fundamental level she preferred humus to a T-bone steak. You could not expect a normal sense of taste from her.

“Strigona, if you’re here to sleep, the sheets are folded in the corner.”

“Thanks.”

“The room is warmer than normal today, so you may not need to fold the blanket over for two layers.”

“…Why is this house equipped with so much bedding that Boo Boo never uses?”

Kallikantzaros asked that with a small sigh. Boo Boo generally just lay on the floor without a blanket or even a pillow, but there were also some human-sized items here and there. This was quickly becoming a second home for that silver-haired girl.

“But you should brush your teeth before going to sleep. The elder said you have softer teeth than us.”

“Yes, yes. I know.”

“Squeal. Strigona, you always go right to sleep once you’re full.”

“I! Said! I! Know!! When did you turn into my caretaker priestess or Morgan, Boo Boo? It saddens me to see my precious utopia taken from me! Where am I supposed to relax now!?”

“You really are a queen deep down, aren’t you?” said the Vampire.

“What about you, Kallikantzaros? There’s still plenty of coffee.”

“No thank you. Unfortunately, I choose not to consume anything that does not taste of rust.”

The Vampire pulled a small bottle from her large chest. It contained what seemed to be dried red leaf flakes. If she was to be believed, they had to taste of rust. She removed the cork, sniffed at the contents, removed one flake, and placed it on the tip of her tongue.

“The Iberian Orc village has returned and I no longer need to use tablets or tea as a replacement, but I can’t seem to change. I left my old routine and rhythm for so long that I can’t seem to return to it. I feel like someone who started a vegetarian diet to lose weight and then never stopped.”

“Squeal?”

Boo Boo’s predator was discussing whether or not she would eat him, but he did not seem to recognize the danger.

With a mug between her hands, Strigona gave her old friend a suspicious look.

“If there is nothing here you want, why did you come here at all?”

“I have business with the bloodless one. It concerns the world outside my control.”

“?”

Boo Boo and the silver-haired girl tilted their heads in unison.

The palm-sized Fairies had built the brick house without asking first, so it sometimes gained new functions and rooms Boo Boo was unaware of. One of those was the attic. That was where you could find Ground’s Nir Abyss, the ultimate weapon girl who had been built in the deepest part of this island that was actually a giant armory.

Kallikantzaros and Strigona were not your normal girls, so they jumped up to the attic instead of using the ladder. And sure enough, a very human-like figure lay on her back there while surrounded by lots of flowers, small objects, and a wood-carved human statue. Two strands of mottled silver hair passed in front of her shoulders and she wore a one-piece swimsuit cut down to size. She was wrapped in bandages and – while it was hard to tell with the poor lighting – one of her arms had been severed at the shoulder and her neck was bent at an odd angle. The sweet floral and fruity aroma mixed with a coffee scent did not just come from the super-sweet mug in Strigona’s hands. It had gone cold, but an identical mug was sitting next to the bedridden girl’s pillow.

This was Ultimate Weapon Abyss.

Although she had already been destroyed.

The Fairy Queen frowned.

“She can eat and drink already? Actually, could she even do that before the damage?”

“Boo. But Beatrice said you can enjoy the smell of coffee too!”

Kallikantzaros brushed her beautiful golden hair off of her slender shoulder.

“I would like to greet her, but I do not know how. What is the proper way to speak with her?”

“Squeal. Beatrice and the others connected their beepy things with a metal string.” Boo Boo poked his giant face up from where the ladder came up and sniffed his nose as he spoke. “But I can speak with her without doing anything. Heh heh.”

“Hm, then it might be faster to use you as a translator. Unless…”

The Vampire girl pulled the small bottle from her cleavage again. She placed it next to the cold mug by Abyss’s pillow. This was of course not just an offering.

A cloud fell over Boo Boo’s face which was larger than an upside-down wok.

“Abyss seems a little uncomfortable.”

“I imagine so. These flakes are made from dried Liver Cabbage which gathers plenty of iron from the ground. …When you get down to it, she is a machine. Even if she pretends to be a living creature and no matter what she hides in her heart, some slight magnetism leaks out when she thinks. We do not know yet whether or not you are the only one she can communicate with like that. At the very least, I think we can read a yes or no answer from the sign created by the shaking of the leaves in this bottle.”

“Don’t get upset, Abyss. They’re my friends, so try to get along.”

The dried leaf flakes in the bottle were already stirring to show the thoughts of the girl lying next to them, but it stopped when Boo Boo made his troubled comment.

Strigona leaned over the ultimate weapon with a curious look on her face.

“Ho ho? Boo Boo, you’ve really tamed her, haven’t you? You damn gigolo.”

“Abyss, stop beeping and entering combat mode! Squeal, and stop making red lights appear everywhere!!”

Abyss appeared to just be lying there with her eyes closed, but a lot seemed to be happening inside her.

Kallikantzaros crossed her arms and pushed her unnaturally large chest up from below.

“I will keep this short. I am Kallikantzaros, the Break News who controls the lunar eclipse. You should be able to quickly calculate out just how cataclysmic a power that could be.”

“Squeal?”

Boo Boo tilted his head, which did not make for much of a translation. The Vampire looked down at the small bottle by Ultimate Weapon Abyss’s pillow and observed the stirring of the dried leaf flakes inside.

“Was that a yes? Then let us continue. …Have you noticed the situation that draws nigh?”

“Draws nigh?”

“Wait, Kallikantzaros, is something new beginning? At least inform me first!!”

Boo Boo and Strigona questioned her in their own ways, but the negligee girl’s response was an exasperated one.

“This is nothing new. In fact, it is quite old. Cutting down the grass on the surface is useless when the roots remain. Simply put, Boo Boo, you might think you have solved everything, but you missed something. You missed the very core of the issue.”

He could only tilt his head at that.

The Iberian Orcs had been saved from the Red. Boo Boo had saved Beatrice after she lost her Shining Weapon. And the others had worked together to save Boo Boo after he collapsed.

What more was there? He could not think of any remaining issues.

“A lot is about to happen. You will be forced to pay for rushing your solution to those problems. It is possible none of the knowledge you previously relied on will apply.”

However.

The Vampire spoke with a calm conviction in her voice.

“But if you understand what the problem is at its core, you will not lose sight of yourself. Boo Boo, the times will change whether you like it or not. Instead of lamenting, you must adapt while staying true to yourself. To be honest, I have grown fond of you. Do not let this turbulent current change who you are.”

Boo Boo had no idea what she meant.

So Kallikantzaros summed it up in a way even he could understand.

She could not have made it simpler.

It was like a sinister prophecy.

“You never solved the problem of the Hero, did you?”

At that very moment, a tremor and impact seemed to shove the entire island up from below. Kallikantzaros breathed an exasperated sigh while Boo Boo and Strigona looked around in a panic.

“Wh-what!? What in the world just happened?”

“This did not come out of nowhere. A situation that has long been underway has finally made itself known.”

The negligee Vampire looked down at Abyss.

“I planned to use your processing power to predict whether or not the coming disaster would require assistance from my power…but it would seem that is no longer necessary.”

“But what actually happened!?” shouted Strigona.

Her old friend shrugged.

“They have descended,” she said. “They cushioned their fall by surrounding themselves in the same substance as the artificial atmospheric barrier surrounding this world. I imagine that umbrella was about the size of an entire continent.”

“Wha-?”

“Now, I have a question for you. It seems the Hero wished to complete an artificial atmosphere to fully surround this world, but where did they obtain the materials for it? A transparent artificial object would primarily be made of silicon, which means ordinary sand and dirt, does it not?”

She could think of two possible sources.

The first was the continents which had sunk when the Underworld Lord had destroyed the ancient humans. Since they were at the bottom of the ocean, no one would notice if they were missing.

The second was from another astronomical body or meteor located outside the artificial atmosphere.

But in either case, one question remained.

No one had ever found even a tooth belonging to the Hero, so where had they been all this time?

And what if they used that glass barrier to accomplish some kind of goal?

They could use that to directly strike the surface and to cushion themselves from the impact.

Or they could use it to construct a great continent to use as their own base.

And they could cause a certain phenomenon immediately after setting foot in the middle of the ocean.

“The Red that afflicted the Iberian Orcs was not a disease caused from within. The transformation came from the slight changes to the planetary environment brought by the artificial atmosphere surrounding Ground’s Nir. The Hero, that human who wandered here centuries ago, was attempting to remake Ground’s Nir into an environment identical to Earth. That was why destroying their artificial atmosphere was necessary to stop the Red. But what if the person controlling that artificial atmosphere was still alive? Would they really let you do that without any kind of response?”

“…”

Boo Boo’s face clouded over and red lights once more shined from Abyss to protect him. The dried leaf flakes in the small bottle stirred disconcertingly.

Kallikantzaros herself did not seem to care.

“I am saying a paradigm shift has arrived. The appearance of a new continent means this world is no longer small enough to walk the perimeter in three days. It has grown as far as the eye can see.”

“And that’s what’s causing this tremor?” asked Strigona. “No, wait.”

“If the direct hit caused a massive wave, I thought I would have to negate it by moving the ocean with my power to control the lunar eclipse.”

Everything should have been fine. Nothing should have happened.

But Kallikantzaros’s expression was grim.

“No real damage to the surrounding area, hm? That mass is the size of a continent. That level of control is actually terrifying.”

But it was not over yet.

This vast new field rewrote the assumption that Ground’s Nir was an island small enough to walk the perimeter in three days. And yet this was no more than the signal meant to announce the presence of the great catastrophe known as the Hero.

Boo Boo’s head shook a little. He could directly communicate with Abyss, so she had sent a small warning to him.

The ultimate weapon had sent him the following message:

They still live.

Part 6

Abyss// Did you find any mistakes?

Abyss// Then let us review the answers.

Part 7

A paradigm shift.

Vampire Kallikantzaros’s words were proven true by the following morning.

The small island of Ground’s Nir and the Labyrinth spread out below had hidden so much possibility, but the advantages and power balance had grown stagnant thanks to the overwhelming individual power of the Level Cappers and the organized Guilds. When dividing up the limited resources, everything ended up being an extension of the situation on Earth. …That might sound shocking, but Beatrice’s Party tended to use that environment to stop technological development from running wild.

And now a vast continent had appeared.

At its closest point, it was visible from the island.

The estimated amount of resources was unknown.

How much was buried there, the cost of excavating it, the return on investment, and the human risk were all unknown.

Would the challengers become filthy rich, or would they be worn down in a worthless battle of attrition?

Either way, there was hope. This uncontrollable dangerous hope was similar to the Age of Exploration or the Gold Rush.

It probably shined so brightly because it was so very thick and because it reflected the sunlight.

The greedy people tried to guess at its nature from afar:

“All the land there looks transparent. Is it ice or resin? No, is it silicon!?”

“We could travel back and forth if we had a simple ship. Acquisition Team, get on it!!”

“Don’t be dumb! Why bother going to some risky new continent full of who knows what kinds of dangerous toxins and pathogens? We need to buy wood. Or the ropes and waterproof fabrics used for sails! We want everything used to build ships because that stuff is going to sell like hotcakes!!”

It was truly a turning point.

The human inn town was abuzz with energy.

They could not bring material things back to Earth, but if they found new laws and formulas in the materials hidden on that new continent, they could send that data back. And the materials would be useful for building new buildings and vehicles on the Ground’s Nir side of things. Plus, there was no longer a need to stay in the small island’s inn town if they built a trading post on the vast continent and set up a Gate there. And if they could control a cornerstone of travel, a mine, or a grain-producing region, their future possibilities were endless. This other world was looking much more like a “world” now.

“Mhh…”

The palm-sized Fairy named Meridiana literally hid behind the grass to spy on the humans. It was obvious if you paid attention, but there were small trees growing quite near the inn town as a form of decorative landscaping. The dexterous Fairies would help grow the plants in order to ensure a hiding place for themselves.

Meridiana’s cheeks were currently puffed out like rice cakes.

“They’re all so excited about that new land. They make it sound like no one wants this island anymore.”

“What’s the problem with that?”

Alice, the younger sister with hair tied to either side, was using her dragonfly wings to buzz all around her older sister to gather her attention. This entirely defeated the purpose of hiding.

“If the humans leave, that just means fewer predators.”

No.

That was not the point.

Boo Boo, Meridiana’s savior, had finally woken back up, but now his human friends might invite him to leave the island. And would he ever return? The humans might need the island for a while longer because they had to periodically return to Earth using the Gates, but Boo Boo could stay here forever since he had been born in Ground’s Nir. Also, the Fairies like Meridiana were at the bottom of the food chain, so they could not join this kind of expedition. She could never let anyone know how lonely she had felt during the Underworld and Red incidents.

That was why Meridiana was terribly distracted by something other than the fate of the world or the paradigm shift, but then Elder (but still a girl) Morgan flew over to them.

“What are you two doing here?”

“Oh, Elder Morgan.”

“Hm, are you interested in the humans?”

Their elder took a much, muuuch wider view of the world. She was sure to have some wonderful idea that would eliminate Meridiana’s worries…or so Meridiana thought, but a mature look of ennui entered Morgan’s eyes.

The cicada-winged elder’s voice was soft.

“This island might just start feeling a little lonely before long.”

“Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!”

“Meridiana!? Eek, have you gone mad!?”

Part 8

And.

While the inn town was excited with the arrival of a new continent, Beatrice’s Party was focused on a different issue. Well, it was not an entirely different issue.

The Hero.

The person to blame for everything was still alive.

“Um.” Summon Hunter Gruagach hesitantly spoke up in the kind of restaurant found anywhere in the inn town. “It isn’t much, but I found a few references to the Hero in old Religious Society documents.”

“Y-you mean on the Earth side of things? Wouldn’t those documents be from more than 300 years ago?”

“Also, you’ve still been in contact with the Religious Society, Gruagach? We can put together a plan and infiltrate them, so don’t do things like that without backup!”

The mourning clothes girl dodged Hermelina’s scolding with an unreadable smile and continued on.

“According to contemporary texts, the Hero was a woman also known as La Signora. Although that is not an actual name either. She was supposedly an outside military advisor for the Religious Society at the time. However…”

“However?”

Red-and-silver-haired Beatrice frowned and looped-braided Gruagach breathed an elegant sigh.

“She was apparently an expert in the struggle for existence, but there are many different legends about her. Like that she tore down an old monarchy and introduced capitalism to replace it or that she stood at the turning point that ended the age of knights and replaced it with the age of mercenaries.”

“…”

“When she helped the Religious Society by killing a great many witches, it was also a certain kind of turning point. Whether or not any of it was true, it seems Hero La Signora was using that situation to help the witches grow within society. The more they were persecuted, the more their momentum would build. She apparently wanted to create a situation similar to the early days of the Religious Society.”

“She helped with the witch hunts that used anonymous informants, torture, and executions to leave the poor victims with no escape and she claimed it was to help the witches?”

Even Hermelina was dumbfounded by that twisted thought process.

Gruagach nodded.

“I read that her motto was ‘win whenever possible’. When there was a usable method, she would wonder why no one else was reaching for it. So La Signora only takes action when she has a clear vision of victory in her mind. She does not do anything out of desperation. Since she has returned now, we must assume she has some sort of plan.”

Part 9

“Squeal…”

Boo Boo had arrived on the white beach.

He brought a hand to his mouth and spoke nervously while viewing the giant transparent land towering up on the horizon.

“I really hope this doesn’t turn out like it did with the Underworld.”

This might seem normal enough, but Boo Boo never would have done this in the past. The inn town’s humans had gathered on the coast out of both hope and fear. The beach was more crowded than an Earth beach during the summer. Before, Boo Boo would never have gone somewhere so full of humans.

But he had changed.

He had asked to borrow their Shining Weapons so he could save Beatrice. He gradually walked over to the people who had answered that request.

“Hi.”

Someone spoke to him.

The black-haired young man’s looks were a bit harmed by the look in his eyes, but he was known as a Pure Knight. He wore silver armor polished like a mirror and carried a distinctive shield that would fully hide him when held in front of him.

“God, and just when I thought things had calmed down in this world. Is your bunch part of this like usual?”

“Squeal. I don’t really know. Beatrice and the others all look scared.”

“For real? Those overpowered chicks? And I was only joking. I thought we had an unlimited gold rush on our hands, but is there something dangerous waiting for us there? Why don’t they sell life insurance in Ground’s Nir?”

“Are you going there too?”

“If all goes well. Some people are hoping to make a quick buck by buying up and reselling ship materials, so it’s in the acquisition team’s hands now.”

The Pure Knight wandered off while grumbling. He may have had other people to meet as he vanished into the crowd. Boo Boo tilted his head and then resumed walking along the white beach instead of toward the ocean. The crowd of people gradually thinned out and had entirely vanished by the time the fine sand was replaced by jagged rocks. He walked below the sheer cliff and entered a lyrical world of waves crashing against rock before finally arriving at his destination: The Cave of Tears.

The cave’s entrance was located at the base of the cliff, but it did not flood because it sloped upwards once inside. It was safe enough for Demon Lord Tselika to have hidden her collection here.

He did not head into the very back this time.

Some familiar girls were struggling on the rocks near the entrance.

“Dammit, Wildefrau! How many times did I tell you that wouldn’t work!? Wahh!!”

“You were the one that told me to do this!! Kyahh!?”

There was a loud splash as the small boat floating in the ocean lost its balance and capsized.

“Squeal. It’s always so hard to believe that heavy metal can float in the ocean.”

Gruagach, with her mourning clothes and with her long blonde braid worn in a large circle, Rusalka, who wore a skintight leotard with solid armor and boots added on, and Huldra, who wore a cheerleading uniform, waved when they noticed him.

“Are you sure about this, Rusalka? You’ve been in Ground’s Nir this whole time. Aren’t you missing out on your once-in-a-lifetime school trip?”

“An eight-day trip is way too long for something in the country, so I’m fine. Besides, I’m busy making memories with you, Onee-sama!”

Hermelina, who wore a priest’s robes with a slit in the sides, had apparently created the base with her metal boat and then Wildefrau, who was naked save for a cross-shaped sword and some belts, used her ice to make floats and a sail, but it was either poorly balanced or they did not work well together.

Hermelina somehow managed to get her head above water after falling into the actual ocean out past the rocks.

“Cough, cough, cough!! Dammit, I’m soaked now. Although I guess a perverted exhibitionist wouldn’t understand the see-through issues wet clothing can cause!!”

“Pant, pant. Oh? You say that, but your clothes are quite something too. My, my. This priest has her robe full of slits and what she is wearing below is even more interesting. You went to the trouble of customizing the underwear, didn’t you? My, my, my.”

“~ ~ ~!?”

With her face bright red (and her flat chest partially exposed by a boob window), Hermelina remade the boat into a giant metal ball to make her idea of a rebuttal, but the weight was too much for her and she sank into the water.

Boo Boo could only tilt his head further.

“How strange…”

Now, the humans were not the only ones who wanted to avoid getting wet. Boo Boo had a strict no baths policy and he washed himself using sand, so he took up a position on the taller rocks that had not been swallowed by the white waves.

Beatrice and Philinnion did not seem to be here.

It was Hermelina, Wildefrau, Gruagach, Rusalka, and Huldra. Someone familiar with the situation on Earth would know that was primarily the group that gathered at a certain PI office.

The pink-twintailed girl crouched on the safe rocks and cutely formed a megaphone with her hands to make a somewhat exasperated suggestion.

“Chieeef. I feel like going the DIY route for getting a boat to the new continent is going to be too hard for us.”

“Don’t you dare look this way, you fake girl. Besides, we spent quite a lot of gears on the information warfare over the Shocking Tingle Peppers, remember? We can’t afford to join the auction-like negotiations over a boat. Our budget is all spent!”

Earth’s harsh side made an appearance in this world as well.

Hermelina’s boat had slid down a snowy mountain, crossed a lake of lava in the Underworld, and defended against the beam bombardment created by the three royal treasures. It had a pretty good track record, but they had never actually seen it floating in seawater with an ordinary relative density. That might seem surprising when it handled lava just fine, but the large waves of the ocean may have made a difference.

Rather than a vessel, it was originally a torture tool meant to slowly crush the victim lying below it, so it may not have been designed with balance in mind.

Mourning clothes Gruagach spoke up with an index finger on her slender chin.

“But we have business on that continent, don’t we? Beyond the simple paradigm shift, I mean.”

“If we returned to the inn town now, we would only find the price of boats had skyrocketed. Honestly, I shouldn’t have come with you just because you sounded so confidant you could easily get us a boat!”

Rusalka had done nothing to help, yet she sounded the most full of herself. That rolled blonde ponytail girl may have been the type who left nasty reviews on restaurant rating sites.

Hermelina shook her head side to side like a wet dog and spoke in a voice so low it sounded like a curse.

“Damn…what was Abyss talking about? If it turns out she was wrong after all this, I’m really gonna let her have it. Since she can’t move, I’ll doodle on every last part of her body.”

“The Hero still lives,” muttered Boo Boo.

She was to blame for everything. She had covered the heavens with an artificial atmosphere barrier to secretly remake Ground’s Nir’s environment and that had caused the Red disease to spread among the Iberian Orcs.

Beatrice and Philinnion were not here because they were searching for some kind of supporting evidence on Earth.

“Phew.” Soaked Wildefrau sat on a random rock. “Making one ourselves is too hard and we waited too long to buy one in the inn town at anything halfway resembling a reasonable price.”

“Squeal, should we just ask the Thousand Dragon?”

“Deep down, she’s actually very cautious…or, cowardly really. Getting shot down by the Underworld may have traumatized her. Whatever the case, she hasn’t even tried to approach the new land and we can’t force her.”

Hermelina was a kind soul, but that was not the only reason. If they tried to force that 1000m dragon and she panicked and went on a rampage, there was no way to stop her.

“Then do we have to try for that?”

“Are you serious? That means going up against a Break News.”

“It is true we might not stand a chance in a direct fight, but there are other ways. Now, we are short on time, so we need to act as soon as possible. Once night falls, it will be too late.”

Wildefrau brushed back her wet blue curls while looking to the south.

There was a mangrove there, but also…

“The Next Voyager. That Vampire is living there now, but it was originally a giant research ship the Stars and Stripes group built to explore the oceans here. If we act during the day while she is still inside her coffin, don’t you think we could take the ship for ourselves?”

Part 10

The Ushigashira Shrine was in Akasaka, Tokyo.

“Sigh…”

The busty shrine maiden with swirly glasses and long fluffy blonde hair lay sprawled out on the great expanse of tatami mats. A wrinkly old woman’s voice reached her from the orderly arrangement of joists on the ceiling.

“Honestly, is eat and sleep all you ever do? Do you need a reminder what time it is? The sun is high in the sky.”

“Bleh. You might be too out of touch to know, grandmother, but I am trying to recuperate after returning from another world. Getting my rest in the limited time available to me is an important job!”

“What about college?”

She had no answer for that.

That was why she could not hear the noisy voices of the children from the shrine grounds. It was 10 AM on a weekday, so the elementary school kids would be studying instead of playing.

Generally, anyone involved in Ground’s Nir was forced to live a double life. Keeping up with one meant falling behind in the other. The busty shrine maiden only had to make sure she passed her classes in the end, so it could have been worse. In fact, not many people could fully focus on exploring the other world like Beatrice could thanks to the government sheltering her and forcing her to give up on any kind of normal life.

(I can’t let myself envy that, though.)

Her phones were lying on the tatami mats too. Yes, phones. Quite a few were lying around.

“You have five of them now? What a waste.”

“College girls have a lot of people to keep up with. People have as many phones as they have identities. You need to keep your email addresses and social media accounts separate too.”

One of them rang: a super cheap smartphone with a free SIM she could dispose of at any time. Without getting up, her right hand wandered over and grabbed it.

Instead of an email or a social media message, it was a free voice call using an app. Using the app’s proprietary compressed format instead of a usual phone connection apparently prevented anyone from intercepting the signal, but how useful was that really? If things like that could completely avoid Hermelina and Huldra, it seemed like the country would have been overrun by spies and terrorists already.

“Hi, got an answer yet?”

“This is dangerous stuff! This tech can be put to military use, can’t it? Using university equipment to prove a theory about Ground’s Nir is definitely getting me put on some kind of watch list.”

“Oh, don’t worry about that. I’ve got a friend in the secret police, so she’ll remove your name from the list before things get bad. You’re not doing anything wrong, after all.”

“You’re a weirdly mysterious person, you know that? I’m honestly kind of scared of you.”

“But you got the job done, right?”

“Don’t forget what you promised me for this. You’re coming to the next party! The grade of guys we get goes up two or three levels when you’re with us.”

“Sure, sure. But I’ll be getting something to eat and drink and then leaving before the last train, okay?”

“Oh, and wear contacts. Those swirly glasses are not allowed!! Even pre-transformation Cinderella looked after her appearance more than you!!”

“But it’s so much easier this way. And should a priest-in-training really be going to hookup parties?”

“Eh? All the others say I’ll be in trouble if I don’t land a guy before I lose the ‘in training’ part.”

…This really highlighted Earth’s harsh side (even though Japan’s Shinto was not all that into asceticism compared to the Buddhists). Miss your chance and lose any place to meet people and you could easily end up like the priests who try hitting on the girls visiting a grave at the temple.

“Well?”

“Right, the ridiculous theory you brought to me for verification. Is it or is it not possible for a human from Earth to live long-term in Ground’s Nir?”

The shrine maiden with fluffy blonde hair and swirly glasses finally sat up from the tatami mats. That was enough for her large breasts to jiggle alluringly.

“And…what did you find?”

“Humans cannot survive that world’s environment because the atmospheric composition and the gravity created by the planet’s rotation and revolution are slightly different from Earth’s. The slight difference between the body’s rhythm and the surrounding environment damages the autonomic nerves and more. The current academic theory is that a human can only stay there for a few days at the longest.”

Normally, there would be no way to pass that barrier.

If it was possible, the Hero, Omega, and Beatrice would not have suffered so much.

However.

This college friend was not done speaking.

“In that case, there is a way. …If you launch the human from the planet, expose them to a weightless environment, and have them breathe artificial air fine-tuned to match Earth’s, they could at least ignore the standards of Ground’s Nir. From there, it’s the same as living long term on a space station. That would break the rule that you can only survive for a few days.”

“…”

They had been looking at it wrong.

Thinking of Ground’s Nir as a flat place was no different from the people who believed you could fall off the edge of the Earth. They had been trapped by their own assumptions about a world of swords and Magic. Yet that Earth-born fantasy worldview was not native to Ground’s Nir. It was the humans who had brought it there.

“Of course, this is all assuming that island’s resources and technology are enough to safely launch a manned rocket and prepare a livable environment outside the atmosphere. It’s true Ground’s Nir is a world of possibility, but I doubt anyone could do that with handmade equipment. It’s only a theory. Just because something is theoretically possible does not mean you can actually do it.”

…But was that the case this time?

Beatrice had since destroyed it, but that world’s planet had been entirely surrounded by a transparent glass artificial atmospheric barrier.

It was unknown why the Hero had descended.

But if she only acted when she knew she could win, she would have some kind of plan in mind. Whether or not that plan would succeed, she would not just sit idly by and wait for death.

The witch hunts had used violence and humiliation to draw false confessions out of tens of thousands of innocent people and had them executed. It was hard to believe that every last person responsible had honestly accepted the excuse that they were protecting society from an unseen curse. They had felt guilty, but in that mad age, questioning it meant being ostracized. But La Signora was different. To achieve her own goal, she had crushed people and plunged them into fire or water without feeling any guilt whatsoever.

Now, let us look back to the present.

That glass continent had to be a way to cushion her from the impact with the ocean and to give her a foothold for whatever her plan was.

She would have already launched whatever worker device had continued following her orders for hundreds of lonely years.

If that worker device could create such a vast outer shell, then adding a small shelter would be nothing.

Just like the shrine maiden’s “grandmother”, she had been hiding in the starry attic of that world.

(The only other problem would be how to survive for hundreds of years.)

According to Boo Boo and Strigona, Ultimate Weapon Abyss had said that the Hero still lives. And since Beatrice had damaged the artificial atmospheric barrier, she had descended to the ocean to fight back in some way.

Time travel was tricky when it came to moving back into the past.

But if you only needed to move forward into the future, it was perfectly possible if you were only worried about your own point of view.

(The barrier of time can be broken using cold sleep, vampirism, or a dried state of suspended animation similar to a water bear.)

The Hero had responded.

Whether or not the current situation worked in her favor, there was bound to be some kind of trouble. The upcoming battle would be even greater than those against the Underworld Lord or the Red Iberian Orcs.

“How screwed are we?” asked the college friend.

“Pretty damn screwed. The world is caught in the fever of a gold rush, but they should really be staying away from that world at all costs.”

Part 11

With that, they had to seriously consider the possibility that the Hero awaited them somewhere on that unnaturally-born new continent.

She would stand at a turning point and win whenever possible.

That sounded fine enough, but in the distant past, she had in fact accused innocent people of being witches and had them executed. And in Ground’s Nir, she was the one who had ignored what all other forms of life might want and infected the Iberian Orcs with the Red disease. The scale of each event and the number of victims she was willing to accept were far too great. Nothing was taboo for her. Leaving her to her own devices was almost guaranteed to end badly. They had to visit the new continent and find her before she could infiltrate the island. No matter what. Even if it was just to put their minds at ease, they needed to investigate her actions and possibly even fight and neutralize her.

However, Boo Boo and the others had no boat.

Their last hope there was the Next Voyager, the ghost ship run aground on the coast by the southern forest. So the only course of action was to borrow the ship and row out to sea during the day while the ultra-scary Vampire was asleep in her coffin!!

In her red armor, white miniskirt, and tattered gray cloak, Holy Swordswoman Beatrice put a hand on her hip and sighed when they told her the plan.

“Just to double check, Hermelina: you are the oldest one here, aren’t you? Back on Earth, you’re not actually a 5-year-old genius girl with no actual life experience? C’mon, old lady, I want to hear it directly from you.”

“And I’d like to hear from you what the point of that icy sarcasm and scorn is! You’re just a little girl who should be taking her high school entrance exam right about now!”

They bickered as they crossed a narrow bridge through the mangrove forest. Shallow bridges made of a special material called Diamond Salt branched out all over the place.

“Oh, do we have guests?”

“Hermeli, we aren’t very nice to people who arrive without gifts!”

The voices of some puppies and kitties reached them from the branches overhead.

The bridges and treetop houses made from Diamond Salt were built by the Cat Sith and Cu Sith who lived in the forest. Just like with the Fairies, powerless species that wanted a way to protect themselves would become quite dexterous. That seemed to be a fascinating rule of evolution.

Boo Boo’s great strength and simple loin cloth seemed to be the other side of that coin, but now he brought a hand to his mouth and spoke.

“Boo. Borrowing without asking is wrong. Kallikantzaros will be upset when she finds out!”

“Ugh… I can imagine how dead we’ll be then. She’s a legit Break News after all.”

The glasses girl with her chest bound by her own suspenders was already getting cold feet and scooting closer to the Iberian Orc, but unlike Boo Boo, her concern was not for the victim of their theft.

As for Beatrice…

“It’s more important to find out whether or not the Hero is alive like Abyss claimed. The Red incident affected the Iberian Orcs because their senses are far more sensitive, but they were only the beginning and it may have spread from there. If the Hero goes further with the environmental changes, all life in Ground’s Nir could die out, Boo Boo. And Kallikantzaros is no exception.”

“Squeal…”

“Everyone in this world is in danger” and “so hand over everything you own” was not really a logical progression, but then Hermelina lightly cut in.

“Well, that bully of a Vampire can’t move during the day, so we win if we get the ship out to sea in that time.”

“Ch-chief, doesn’t that just mean we’re trapped on the ship with her when she wakes up mad!?”

“I don’t know how much Earth’s legends apply to Ground’s Nir lifeforms, but I have heard Vampires fear water. Especially flowing water like rivers and the sea. Once out on the water, she might start trembling and tearfully beg for help. Bwa ha bwa ha ha!!”

Summon Hunter Gruagach calmly elbowed Wildefrau in the side.

“(Um, how likely is Hermelina’s plan to succeed?)”

“(Did you really think she was a winner? She’s a brute force lunkhead who doesn’t even try to get clever. Whenever a new boss shows up, she’s sent out to test their strength.)”

“I can hear you, Wildefrau. You too, Gruagach! I’m a winner at life. After all, I’m one of the powerful Level Cappers. Have you two already forgotten how I beat up an edgy Japanese doll with a crazy eyepatch in order to rescue a bondage girl kept in a bathtub full of ice!?”

They left the southern forest while the arguing continued. Overall, a river parted in a Y-shape to create a triangular sandbank that bordered the ocean. A very old luxury ship sat up on that beach.

That was the Next Voyager ocean research ship.

Pink-twintailed Huldra spoke while hiding her mouth behind her pompoms and giving an upturned glass. The pose was as flimsy as the free samples at the entrance of a grocery store.

“Umm, it might be made of wood, but the ship is more than 100m long, isn’t it? It’s completely beached, so how are we supposed to get it back in the water?”

That was a sensible comment, but her question was not enough to stop the Level Cappers who had a habit of ignoring limits.

“Let’s dig into the sand below and lift the ship to create a gap.”

“Got it. Then we can add a layer of ice between to slide it on out into the ocean.”

If no one stopped them, those ridiculously-powerful Magic users really would steal the ship. Boo Boo began grumbling a little.

“Squeal…”

“Boo Boo?”

Beatrice noticed the change while watching the others work, but it was too late by the time she tried to ask what it was about.

“This isn’t right. If we’re going to borrow her tool, we need to ask Kallikantzaros first. So let’s do that. Heyyy! Kallikantzarooooos!!!!!!”

“Ah!?”

Philinnion and Hermelina tried to cover the law-abider’s giant mouth, but he was nearly four meters tall and his face was far too high up.

A moment later, darkness covered Ground’s Nir like a worldwide blackout.

This was a solar eclipse.

Apparently, but how exactly had the moon moved just now? This was more than a curveball or forkball; it was well beyond understanding. And since the sun island was no longer functioning, this darkness had enveloped the world by the actual moon hiding the actual sun in outer space.

Beatrice’s Party looked up to see the Next Voyager’s small master on its side deck.

Keeping the gray pig doll on her lap and petting it like a noble with their cat must not have been enough for her. The blonde negligee girl gave the world below a scornful look and spoke with a voice low enough to sound like a curse.

“Not only do you disturb my sleep, but you fail to follow my dress code too.”

Come to think of it, that Vampire did not underestimate humans, so she required any visitors to wear swimsuits, thus rendering them nearly helpless. A fully-equipped group with Shining Weapons at their hip attacking while she was asleep was entirely out of the question.

Hermelina and the others had insisted it was fine since she would be asleep during the day.

So a question.

What happened if she was awake?

A splashing sound rang loud in the extreme tension of the atmosphere. Vampires cannot cross quickly moving water. Since sunlight was not as effective as hoped, their minds naturally turned toward finding another weakness, so Hermelina must have considered that dubious legend. Her bullying boots stepped out into the crashing waves.

That snapped the thread of tension.

It was like an eruption.

“I hope all of you have written your wills!!!!!!”

The next thing they knew…

…there was a gap…

…in their memories???

Philinnion was stuck in the sand with her shorts-wearing butt sticking up into the air, Hermelina was caught on a branch in the forest with her bare legs sticking out from her robe’s slits, and the rest of them were in a similarly hellish state. Beatrice had only fallen down onto her butt and Boo Boo’s large back stood protectively in front of her.

Unarmed Boo Boo was waving his giant hands.

“Calm down, Kallikantzaros.”

“Mh? Are you the only one who came unarmed? You also have no excess clothing and don’t seem to have anything hidden. So you are following the dress code. You were also the one to warn me, weren’t you? Very well, what is it you wish to say? Those rude humans lost their chance, but I will hear you out.”

“We want a boat, but can’t get one. So we want to borrow yours.”

The girl tilted her head on the side deck.

“And what is in it for me?”

“So we can’t use it? How petty.”

Boo Boo said it without really thinking, but Vampire Kallikantzaros’s small shoulders shook.

“What…did you just call me?”

“If you’re not willing to share, that’s fine. We won’t force you to give it up, so don’t worry, Kallikantzaros. Squeal, this ship belongs to you and we won’t take your treasure from you, so there’s nothing to be afraid of. But I am surprised. I thought you would be more mature than this. Boo.”

“…Heh…heh heh…”

She hung her head and seemed to be laughing.

Beatrice could not even guess at what was causing that straining sound from all around them.

Then the Break News raised her head and roared.

For some reason, there were tears in her eyes.

“A-are you kidding me, you fools!? Y-y-you think I am petty? You think I am immature? You think a Vampire living on her own can’t be considerate of other’s circumstances and can’t even complete a child’s errand!? Y-you think that silver-haired one is better than me!!!???”

Her voice was cracking, she kept stuttering, and no one had suggested most of what she said. Her face was bright red and she trembled as she shouted, so it was not a pretty sight. Boo Boo had apparently scored a critical hit on her heart.

Boo Boo brought a hand to his mouth with a sad look in his eyes.

“Squeal. Sorry, Kallikantzaros. If I did something wrong, I apologize.”

“Then stop looking at me like that! I have done nothing warranting that kind of pity!! S-s-something so trivial could never get to me. I am not crying!!”

“If I did something wrong, tell me what it was so I can do better next time.”

“I am saying you did nothing wrong! I-I…yes, I am a very generous person, so I am more than willing to lend you the Next Voyager!!”

Part 12

Thus, Boo Boo became a sailor.

Starting from the southern forest required going the long way around, but it meant a lot that they had acquired a ship off the other humans’ radar and could use it to get to the new land.

The solar eclipse had vanished with mysterious ease and the blue sky had returned. Vampire Kallikantzaros was sulking inside her coffin on the bottom level of the ship.

“Wh-wh-what happened to water being her weakness? And come to think of it, she’s wearing a black bikini below that see-through negligee. She’s a beach girl!!”

“Chieeef, hadn’t we heard that she can control the lunar eclipse to use the moon’s gravitational pull to submerge every last bit of land? We probably shouldn’t have tried to apply Earth’s legends to her…”

After taking such a solid beating, Hermelina leaned over the railing like a blanket hanging out to dry, but that aside…

“Squeal…”

The stage was finally moving to the new land.

Hero La Signora awaited them on that mysterious field.

“It’s okay, Boo Boo,” said Beatrice while leaning against that pig-faced giant from the side. “The Hero might not be doing anything bad. And even if she is, we won’t lose. Isn’t that right?”

“Oh, no. Oh, no, no.”

Then they heard an odd voice from the side.

White Witch Philinnion had been pacing back and forth across the deck with a pale face for a while now.

“What’s with you, cow? Don’t tell me you can’t swim and the ocean scares you.”

“Um, this is a bigger issue.” The glasses suspenders cow looked terribly troubled. “Not only was this ship sitting on the beach for decades, but didn’t the Sage and Sibyl strip off a lot of its parts to use as the interior of the Girl’s Grill?”

“C’mon, it can’t be that bad. I mean, Kallikantzaros is onboard with us. She would’ve stopped us from setting sail if there was a hole in the bottom.”

Hermelina had a good point, but Philinnion poked her index fingers together in front of her large chest as she got to the crux of the issue.

“Kallikantzaros gets mad if you approach her ship without permission, but did she really know that the Sage and Sibyl came here? If they snuck aboard and stole the wood, wouldn’t she be entirely unaware of any holes in it?”

Their elegant journey was at an end.

They all grabbed pots and buckets to use as bailers.

They were too far from the island to turn back, so they split up and ran around the large ship to check for holes.

Part 13

Abyss// If you view a calm and unchanging scene for long enough…

Abyss// …you may eventually begin to suspect everything you see there.

Abyss// But do not worry. There are indeed mistakes.

Abyss// Now, let us review the answers.

Chapter 3: A Transparent New Continent, An Opaque Villain

Part 1

“Still, I think it must have been quite a shock for the lady as well. She just doesn’t let it show much.”

The Detached Magic Palace had a luxurious courtyard for being in Roppongi, Tokyo, and Misoka, the middle maid sister, was currently speaking there.

“Call it a new land or a new continent if you want, but it’s made a real mess of the power balance in that world, right? Earth problems can’t be solved using the island’s rules any longer. She has to start from scratch in coming up ways to prevent runaway technology like disseminated weapons that use program-controlled nanotech or 235 centrifuge parallel processors that can make the concentration of element #92 much more reasonable.”

The Detached Magical Palace and everything inside it generally belonged to the girl, so the maids were not free to do with it what they wanted. They had to look after things because the red dress girl would not say anything herself, but they were technically borrowing even their personal rooms. So Misoka was lying on a sheet placed directly on the grass instead of inside the gazebo.

Iroka, the eldest sister with glasses and a mole below the eye, sat elegantly on the same sheet. She was the capable sort of maid who kept her posture straight even when her master was not watching.

“The officials of the five great regional cities are requesting to inspect our Detached Magic Palace. Every city must want to create similar a place to strengthen their own forces in response to the changing environment in the other world.”

“Those would be actual government workers, right? They would just bring back Pieces and spread them around like the bureaucrats and politicians want them to. That only makes more enemies for the lady. It’d be chaos.”

“If anything, the miss is the odd one out for viewing the big picture and striking at any openings to prevent dangerous technological development.”

“Isn’t this all about to fall apart? If the five great regional cities start competing to be the next capital city, they’ll start a proxy war in the other world.”

“More than that, we just don’t have the strength to build four or five facilities on the level of the Detached Magic Palace. They keep kicking the can down the road by issuing government bonds, but that isn’t going to work much longer. It hurts that they couldn’t crack down on virtual currencies and online advertising as simple revenue sources. The Pieces have caused the value of the country to plummet, so the related countries’ investment banks only keep Japanese bonds as the price of doing business with us and the actual investors won’t touch the stuff.”

“What if they forcibly take the budget they need by treating it like an investment that’s guaranteed to pay off? All the public funding for Ground’s Nir countermeasures decided on after the Tselika Panic has gone right down the drain, so what if that happens four or five times at once? Plus, if those facilities don’t have the lady in them, they won’t see any success exploring the Labyrinth. When those regional cities can’t get their money back, the economic shock will bring down the entire national economy.”

“What is your point?”

“Why not get out while the getting is good? Remember our idea of making the Detached Magic Palace the world’s smallest country?”

Misoka pointed over while lying on the sheet and a tremor erupted from that point. The warm sun must have reached Haruka, the youngest sister, because she opened her mouth wide while lying on her back.

“Zgh, zghhhhhhhhh! Ugh, mumble, mumble…”

“That’s just normal snoring for her, isn’t it? Not sleep whatever-it’s-called?”

“You can tell just by looking at her she’s perfectly healthy. I’m jealous. And Haruka’s idea is not just a pipedream. I have created digital copies of all the necessary paperwork and submitted it to the necessary agencies and offices over fiber optic lines.”

“And yet I haven’t heard a peep about it. The Diet isn’t going to delay giving approval, eventually say it never went up for discussion due to a communication error, and then hope it just goes away, are they?”

“You are more of a worrier than I thought.”

“Only when it has to do with the lady.”

“That honesty and forthrightness is a skill I lack. Again, I am jealous. As a sign of respect, I will give you a serious answer.” Iroka quietly sighed while rubbing the head of the youngest sister who was making a noise like a powerful vacuum cleaner nozzle. “Simply put, it is being blocked. And quite powerfully at that.”

“We’re talking about 15% of the people’s tax money breaking away. Of course they want to stop it.”

“Yes. I knew it would not be easy and prepared some countermeasures in advance, but all of those were crushed as well. But instead of being done by force, it felt more like it was done by someone who exists outside the rules.”

“Like those Over the Wall people?”

“That I cannot say.”

Those at the peaks of Earth’s power structures worked behind the scenes while crossing every form of boundary: nation, race, language, religion, corporation, etc. But that was why they could seem involved in any misfortune or tragedy once you began to suspect them. Considering an enemy on that level without solid evidence would only trap you in your own invented delusions.

Bespectacled Iroka deftly sidestepped that uncertain area as she continued.

“At any rate, we have no future if we cannot pry open these floodgates. We will only continue to stagnate. There are still a set number of forces that wish to crush the Detached Magic Palace, so if we must fight and compete over our rights and budget, then those regional cities, the defense contractors, and even religious organizations will swoop in to steal everything from us”

“This sounds bad…”

“It is,” confirmed the oldest sister.

But she was a capable maid and that meant doing more than just obediently following her instructions.

“Now, I have an idea to share with you while Haruka sleeps. Would you be interested in causing some trouble on the outside with me?”

Part 2

“O-ohh… It’s shaking, it’s shaking. It’s moving, it’s moving.”

Beatrice spoke from atop the Next Voyager after leaving the island of Ground’s Nir. She held her arms out horizontally to keep her balance next to the pool on the large deck. The ghost ship’s appearance was quite worrying, but it helped a lot that they had Rusalka and Wildefrau’s mastery of the Wind and Ice Elements. They had little difficulty catching the wind on the multiple sails, similar to a clipper. They could control the wind’s direction, so they did not need to go through the rigging work that would take dozens of crewmembers.

The girl was more excited than necessary with her tattered gray cloak fluttering behind her, but that may have been because the unsteady footing brought back the memories of when she was on death’s door after her Shining Weapon was destroyed by the red electricity.

Meanwhile, on the poolside…

“This cow freaked us all out with her made up threat! The ship’s just fine and we wasted our time running around!! This moron was spreading fake news just for fun, but then she goes pale when it causes a panic!!”

“A-all I did was consider the dangers we might face and lay them out on the table. If you’re going to get after me for that, then I don’t think we’re anywhere near as safe as you think we are.”

“Shut up and stick your butt out this way! You played us for fools, so I’m going to spank the ass crammed into those tight shorts!!”

“See, we’re not safe at all!!”

Incidentally, the ship was fine because all of the holes had been plugged up with the all-purpose Diamond Salt that was used for bridges, homes, and weapons in the southern forest. The dogs and cats dressed as butlers and maids must have secretly been working to maintain it.

They were journeying to a new land, but it was still close enough to be visible from Ground’s Nir’s coast. Which was a good thing since Beatrice’s Party had to turn back and return to the island’s Gates before their time limit of a few days expired.

“S-squeal.”

Boo Boo nervously held onto the side deck railing.

He had taken a shortcut to the depths of the Labyrinth, entered the Underworld, climbed to the sun island, and more, but was he afraid of the ocean? Even though they had crossed a much-more-dangerous lava lake in Hermelina’s small metal boat?

He looked back the way they had come while holding onto the railing and keeping his feet planted on the deck.

“The island of Ground’s Nir looks so small already… Boo, can we really get back?”

“Don’t worry, Boo Boo. We haven’t been swept out to sea or anything.”

Beatrice placed a gently clenched fist over her mouth and giggled as she answered. Boo Boo apparently thought of this like being swept away inside a giant float. He had climbed to the heavens and arrived on the sun island before, but he apparently saw horizontal distances differently from vertical ones.

To reiterate, this voyage was only to another shore within viewing distance. Reefs were still a danger, but for the most part, they did not need to stare at a sea chart or compass for this.

Rusalka had climbed to the top of the mast in her leotard and armor and she formed a megaphone with her hands to shout down at the others.

“We’re almost there! Those of you with lots of firepower should be ready to fight back if necessary!!”

“Will do.”

“And ice girl! Your anchor can stop a ship moving this quickly, can’t it!? I’ll be sending in a headwind from the other side, but still!!”

Her voice sounded perfectly clear despite the distance, so she was probably using some kind of Wind Magic. …That meant the megaphone hands were unnecessary, but Huldra’s displays of femininity(?) may have been infectious.

“We’re finally there. Squeal, is the ancient Hero really here?”

“Don’t worry so much, Boo Boo. We might not have to fight right away.”

“I don’t know what kind of person they are, but I hope we can be friends. Boo, fighting is bad!”

That seemed unlikely, but Beatrice smiled and said nothing. Boo Boo was from Ground’s Nir, so he would not know what horrors the witch hunt referred to. And she wanted to keep it that way.

Everyone seemed to be needlessly worried today. While they went through the delicate procedure to approach the coast, they were not welcomed with a sudden cannon blast like Rusalka had feared.

“The cow’s cowardice has infected the rest of us.”

“Can’t someone do something about this bully of a police officer!? She’s disturbing the peace here and making false accusations like she’s part of the secret police or something!”

Wildefrau, who hid the important bits with a cross sword and the rest with belts, created a weight out of ice and Rusalka, who wore a skintight leotard with thick armor and boots added on, sent a wind back against them to slowly but surely decelerate the Next Voyager as it arrived on the new continent’s coast.

Beatrice looked back at the cross sword nudist who was lying on one of the beach chairs.

“Wildefrau, will that ice anchor last? If possible, I also want you to make a vine or rope out of ice and tie the ship to land. Having it drift away would be about the worst thing that could happen.”

“That’s fine, but don’t you want multiple sources for your safety net? If something happens to me, the ship would drift away and you would all be dead.”

That problem was solved by Huldra sprinkling the contents of the jewel she wore (which was actually a small bottle of colorful potion). Something plasticky swelled out, surrounded the stern of the ship, and acted as a giant weight.

Huldra shined in the light of a pink magic circle that opened in the space in front of her wrists.

“Phew. I finally got to do something Alchemist-y.”

“That’s not metal you’re using, though.”

Hermelina, who was fighting her away along the path of moe with a flat boob window, made that exasperated comment while transforming her Shining Weapon into a metal ladder. They would use that to disembark, but the ones confident in their physical enhancements could just jump down from the side deck.

Gruagach, whose long blonde braid was wrapped in a circle behind her, looked down at the deck floor.

“We can have Kallikantzaros look after the ship, so I seriously doubt anyone will be able to mess with it. We should be going.”

“Have her? You really are the Summoner type, aren’t you? You talk big when it comes to monsters and creatures.”

By the time Hermelina had finished speaking, Boo Boo and Beatrice had already jumped from the side deck to the ground nine meters below. Boo Boo looked around after easily landing.

It was white.

No, the transparent ground may have been reflecting the sunlight. The ground felt like thick glass below his feet and there was no sign of any animals or even plants.

“Boo… This is kind of scary. I can’t find any animal tracks. If I was left here, I would be so hungry.”

“We did load the ship up with food and water, but ugh. This really is an unimaginable scene.”

The pig and cow that loved to eat were equally dejected by the sight. The land was made of the same glass substance as the artificial atmospheric barrier, so it was not exactly a good environment for the living creatures that encyclopedia lover would rejoice to find.

Hermelina created a thin chain with her Shining Weapon and called up a rectangular frame made of a bubble film.

“Okay, everyone, let’s sync our clocks. To give ourselves some extra time to get safely back to the island, let’s only explore for two days this first time. We don’t want to get lost here, so always move around in groups of two or more. Be mindful of the weather too. The previous rules might not apply here, so don’t forget the basics.”

That said, walking randomly around this continent had never been an option.

“Boo…”

Boo Boo held a hand over his eyes to shield against the sun and tried to see to the other side of the land.

“How far does it go? It doesn’t seem to end.”

Yes, it was a continent after all. This was very different from an island that only took three days to walk the perimeter. They did not know its actual area, so if they set off blindly, they might find themselves unable to return before the limit arrived. Even following the same path back could take longer due to exhaustion, the weight of what you were carrying, inclement weather, and more.

Having to find the Hero in this huge space would not be easy. They called it a new continent and new land, but its actual area was still unknown. Plus, it was possible the Hero was constantly moving around herself.

No one else was in this new area.

Was there anywhere left like that on Earth? They faced this virgin land which felt oddly lonely with no one there.

“Okay.”

Hermelina used her soft arms to hoist a handmade-looking flag. The flag was as tall as she was and she used her Screenshot function to take various photos of it from multiple angles. Shining Weapons had a huge amount of space, so she did not need to worry about filling it up.

“We’ll call this our landing point.”

Since the people in the inn town were still shouting and fighting over getting a boat, this was their chance. But Beatrice frowned.

“Hermelina, do the south pole expedition rules really apply in this world? A ton of humans will be here in all sorts of boats, right?”

“Did you not see the UN’s decision, Beatrice?”

“What kind of map-obsessed life do you have to live to find yourself on that site?”

“They said any surveying data of the new continent you bring back will be treated like a Piece. So whoever registers it first wins. Screenshots packed full of coordinate data are the greatest form of intellectual property right now. …Damn, if not for my job, I’d make a post on Nanskagram about making such a historic landing. Anyway, we need to explore. This won’t be done overnight. We’re gonna have to do this, head back, and come back here again. It’s going to be a long process.”

“Chief, what about setting up a new Gate?”

“Try requesting that from the higher ups and every last government official will start wanting one of their own and nothing will ever get done. I’ve arranged to have a full set of Cyrillic equipment sent to us via Okhotsk, so just wait a bit on that.”

“Ehh!? Are you sure that’s a good idea!?”

“The idea of Russian products being cheap is nothing but propaganda the West shoves into their movies. And by propaganda, I mean bullying done while pouting their lips. Just compare their assault rifles and you’ll see who really has the better tech. Same with tanks and fighters. The West is secretly terrified. All those flashy weapons shows are just a way of hiding it.”

“I didn’t mean it like that. I’m talking about morals and ethics since that sounds an awful lot like smuggling!”

“It’s too late to act like you’re the only virtuous one around here. Remember that caviar you were so delighted to eat the other day? Did you never stop think where I got that from? I served you a ridiculous feast of a caviar futomaki, so that stuff is part of your flesh and blood by now. You might as well give up.”

“You made me an unwitting accomplice!? A-are you the kind of courier that sticks a small plastic bag in a stranger’s pocket at the airport!?”

A large number of boats would soon be arriving at this new land.

…Which meant there would be competition over the landing points. It might seem like such a vast continent would have plenty of coast, but beaches could not be used since ships required a certain level of height at the coast, cliffs required the crew to climb up them, reefs hidden below the water were always a danger, and using the shortest route from island to continent would mean reduced transportation costs, etc., etc. In the end, there would be a limited number of prime locations. That was why Beatrice’s Party had been in such a hurry to get their ship out here. Once the place was as crowded as the beach during the summer, there would nowhere left to land. And since they had to go to and from the continent every few days, having to pay gears to someone else to use their landing spot each time would add up quickly. So they needed to secure the prime spot before anyone else arrived, spread their wings, and construct a solid base of activity.

Most of the others were unaware of the Hero’s presence. Given what she had done in the past, her technology was probably equal to or greater than the Sage’s. If she was still alive like Abyss claimed and she took hostile action against other lifeforms, the inn town humans who arrived as if sightseeing might end up slaughtered every time they Encountered her.

Even in this Party, Wildefrau, Huldra, Gruagach, and Rusalka seemed less worried just because they had not gone to the sun island.

Only Boo Boo, Beatrice, and the others who had gone to the sun island and seen the trace residual thoughts of the Hero could accurately recognize the threat.

“Beatrice, Philinnion, you two take additional screenshots to prove we were here first. We can register them like Pieces if we bring them back with us, so it can’t hurt,” explained Hermelina. “Huldra and Gruagach are too close to the organization for that. Of course, everything about this will change if we can build a Gate on this continent.”

Boo Boo brought a hand to his mouth.

“Squeal. But can we really find the Hero in such a big place? It feels like a never-ending game of hide-and-seek to me.”

“Well, it certainly won’t work if we try doing it all by foot. We can’t just place Gates all over the place, so for now the name of the game is claiming some territory for ourselves.”

“?”

“Okay, you take care of the first step, Gruagach. Work hard.”

The slit-robed young woman waved lazily and the mourning clothes girl stepped forward. She held a Shining Weapon made by attaching close-range blades on either end of a stabilizer-equipped bow. Boo Boo tilted his head as a few magic circles appeared along the path out from Gruagach’s right eye and then she loosed an arrow into the birdless sky.

Although the arrow itself might as well have been a bird.

It started in the expected parabolic arc, but then it did not fall back down.

White wings burst out from the center of the shaft to beat at the air and it circled above their heads like a bird of prey searching for that prey.

After loosing a few more arrows, Gruagach explained without looking back.

“Filling in the map would take a century of work if we tried to do it on foot, so I am using their eyes and ears to simplify the process as much as possible.”

“Squeal?”

“Hee hee. The key to modern military success is time saving and efficiency.”

She smiled elegantly while bespectacled Philinnion and twintailed Huldra crouched down at her feet and started working on something. The butt of the White Witch’s shorts strained and she gave a troubled look while a yellow magic circle shined from her first-aid kit and she mixed the bottom of a test tube full of a potion.

“Hm. Still green. It isn’t turning yellow or blue.”

“That means it’s neutral,” said Huldra. “We still have to test for a few major categories of toxins, but if the ground really is just glass, we might be in luck. If it hasn’t been altered with some weird chemical substance like fluorescent lights or lead glass, we can use this. If there’s no drainage, the rainwater has nowhere to escape. It looks empty now, but there will be large water jugs all over the place before long.”

Hermelina, the woman with slits all over her robe, could not let that one slide.

“Hold on, Huldra! Are you telling us to crawl on the ground and drink from random puddles!?”

“Why are you savages like this? Even the water from your tap was originally rainwater, you know?”

“Ugh, th-that may be true, but the mineral water in bottles and water coolers comes from the Alps or wherever, so it’s nice and clean!”

“You think it’s cleansed by traveling through the wonders of nature such as rotting leaves, animal droppings, and worm carcasses? It’s on a bigger scale, but it’s the same basic idea as a homemade filter made by filling a metal drum with sand, pebbles, and activated charcoal.”

Hermelina held her mouth and gagged, although it was unclear if that counted as being pure or filthy. This might sound like a silly conversation, but these food zen dialogues could send some more impressionable people down the path of never touching artificial ingredients or of eating exclusively organic vegetables.

Since the drones were handling the basic search, Hermelina used her spare time to cut away squares of the thick transparent ground and stacked them up in a dome. Anyone with Earth knowledge might have compared it to an Inuit structure.

Wildefrau frowned.

“What are you doing? If we need shelter, can’t we return to the ship?”

“This is insurance for when we register the Pieces on Earth. A single flag might not be accepted as a base, so it needs to look the part even if it’s meaningless. I want to create a few of these so we can show off a proper ‘base’. If possible, I’d like to build a few lighthouse-like things around the base.”

“Lighthouses?”

“If that’s too much work, some colorful smoke signals would work. It just has to act as a landmark. Once it becomes a social gear that people rely on, they won’t be able to eliminate it so easily.”

“Ha ha ha. You’re turning into one of those arms dealers who controls a local supermarket or hospital, chief. You could win an election in Eastern Europe or Central or South America.”

“Oh, are you enjoying this, Huldra? Seeing that grin on your face makes me feel so happy and peaceful. I’ll have to think back on this when your next pay assessment comes up, so I hope you’re ready.”

“Gyahh!?”

The pink-twintailed girl screamed like an office worker in trouble, but did that mean they were not actually government workers with a stable salary? Beatrice’s external perspective made it hard to tell how much their cover story as a PI office affected their finances. Not that she knew what things were like for a normal private investigator either.

The Holy Swordswoman carrying that log or steel beam of a Shining Weapon sighed half in resignation and half in exasperation as her tattered gray cloak fluttered and she looked up at the blue sky.

“So we use drones for recon in this world too now, huh?”

“Unlike the Labyrinth, this is a wide open space, so this is sure to become mainstream. I mean, the field is just too large to do it with normal manpower.”

“So everyone will be trying to claim as much territory as they can, will they?”

“It doesn’t have to be from the sky. You could set up a tripod somewhere with a good view and gather audio or video in all 360 degrees or you could attach a giant suction cup to the hard ground and check for body heat or the slight vibrations of footsteps. Each action will fill in more of this wide area and it will all join together to create a map of this continent. It’s like completing a jigsaw puzzle one piece at a time.”

“I get the feeling the drones are going to start fighting each other before long.”

“That’s called a smart war, Beatrice. We’re going to be busy. We’re looking at an age where data goes up for auction just like wine and paintings.”

This was difficult to understand for someone born in Ground’s Nir, so the nearly-4m pig-faced giant tilted his head.

“What should I do?”

“We’re claiming territory, remember? Build igloos like this in the places Gruagach has already checked. We’ll connect the dots to create a single route for ourselves. If we bring the survey data back to Earth and register it as Pieces, that road will belong to us.”

…Of course, if they forced people to pay too exorbitant a toll, the other humans would just develop the rest of the land and make their own roads instead.

At times like this, it meant a lot to have someone as powerful as Boo Boo. And he already had enough skill to fold large leaves into something like a tent.

“Squea, squea, squea. Squeal, squeal.”

Every three or four hundred meters, they built a glass igloo. Beatrice used lines of heat to cut chunks out of the thick glass ground and Boo Boo stacked them up with his hands. Even with their Magical reinforcements, the work was as hard as packing up to move for the humans, but since the nearly-4m giant could lift the fridge-sized masses with a single hand, it was as simple as stacking building blocks for him. As a finishing touch, he would place a flag at the top of the dome.

“Squeal, now this is mine!”

He likely did not understand the situation back on Earth, but he seemed to be enjoying himself.

When the sun began to set and the scenery started growing orange, Gruagach raised her head with her eyes shut. She had received some information from the winged arrows circling overhead.

“It seems some of the others have landed a ship on the continent’s coast. They are 2500 meters north of our landing point and there appear to be more than 80 of them. The details are still unknown, but that size suggests a Guild.”

“It’s too late for them now. This region is already covered with our flags.”

Beatrice’s Party had shown some kindness by not spreading their territory along the coast.

“Boo Boo, that’s enough for today. Let’s return to the ship.”

“But, Beatrice, I can keep going.”

“The environment changes at night. If you miss a giant fissure in the ground, you could end up falling into the pit.”

Gruagach’s winged arrows were convenient, but they only provided general information. This illusion was most well-known from the largest salt lake on Earth, but when the ground was entirely white, it was extremely difficult to judge distances and notice details. Trusting too much in that bird’s-eye-view information would be dangerous.

They had used a glowing lichen to fill the glass igloos with light without using fire. If they followed those points, they would not get lost on the way back even if it got dark. With Beatrice’s flames illuminating the way ahead, they would be even safer.

However…

“Urgh…”

Boo Boo’s breath grew white. Beatrice used Magic fire to light the hair rising from her head like an antenna and she held the tattered cloak together to cover her body.

“So we’re faced with the unexpected already… Oh, I get it. This glass ground can’t store heat, so it’s a lot like the desert at night.”

“What does that mean?”

“There’s a drastic temperature difference between day and night. We were right to head back to the ship early, Boo Boo. Let’s eat something hot once we arrive.”

“Squeal, it feels weird to eat when I haven’t been hunting. I just hope nothing bad happens to me for taking it easy.”

Someone entirely self-sufficient viewed things differently.

By the time they arrived back at the Next Voyager on the coast, the sun had entirely set. It was truly frigid. The only one handling it without any difficulty was Ice Waterfall Princess Wildefrau who had the most skin showing. That exhibitionist wearing only a cross sword and belts was an extreme exception since she could use her 100% Water Resistance to soak up to the shoulders in a bath of liquid nitrogen.

And once darkness enveloped their surroundings and the moon came out, the blonde girl in a red negligee emerged from her coffin at the bottom of the ship.

“Yawn… More puny humans are arriving. Now, tell me how much progress you made. I imagine it was all wasted effort, so you can give it some slight meaning by telling me a story to pass the time.”

“Cow, are there any herbs in this world that work like garlic? I don’t care if it’s a soup, a meat dish, or garlic rice – shove as much of it as you can in tonight’s dinner!”

“I am not going along with a plan so self-destructive for a girl.”

The humans were normally focused on exploring the Labyrinth, so they would learn some simple outdoor cooking skills whether they wanted to or not. Those like Beatrice who could not cook at all and relied on simple solid foods were rare. She was often accused of lacking femininity there.

But tonight’s dinner was being cooked by…

“Ugh… This was supposed to a dream come true where anyone but Boo Boo cooking the food meant I got to eat a girl’s cooking, so why do I have to do it, chief!?”

“Because you’re the best cook among us, Huldra.”

This overturned the common association of cooking with femininity, but at the very least, they were not going to end up with a scorched mystery dish or a boiling purple sludge.

Boo Boo let out a white breath as he looked up at the stars filling the night sky.

“Boo. I hope the other humans aren’t having too much trouble.”

“Don’t worry, Boo Boo. These are the people who are always heading down into the Labyrinth and deciding whether they should continue on or head back. I doubt they’ll choose wrong when it comes to that.”

And they would have needed a certain amount of power to end up on top and win a boat at the inn town. At the very least, it was unlikely a Party of only rookies would make it to the new continent.

“Squeal. But can we really get to sleep when it’s so cold?”

“Hm? Won’t we be fine inside the Next Voyager?”

“We’re talking about a ghost ship full of drafts, plus it’s as wide open and deserted as a school at night. Hm, maybe it would be best to gather in a single room to keep our heat together.”

The suspenders cow held her shoulders, squishing her boobs in the process, but then someone’s eyes lit up as they licked their lips.

“This is my chance! Yes, gather around everyone and don’t be shy! We need to stay as close together as possible to preserve our warmth!!”

“Huldra, you’re sleeping outside. Outside the ship. Why? Because you’re gross.”

“Don’t be surprised when you wake up to find a pillar of ice outside!! Wahhhhh!!”

Part 3

Once outside, things were not that bad.

The girl that the Detached Magic Palace had been built for was one thing, but the maid sisters were not restricted from coming and going. They frequently visited Tokyo for their daily shopping, so they were not particularly excited about being there this night.

Second Sister Misoka placed her hands behind her head as she walked below the streetlights.

“Are you sure about this? Isn’t this like treason against the state or something?”

“I have already submitted the necessary paperwork, so this is their fault for refusing to accept it without even providing a reason. Besides, our loyalties lie with the world’s smallest independent nation we are about to create, so Kasumigaseki and Ichigaya have no right to complain at this point.”

“That means Tokyo will be a foreign country, won’t it? Wow, I’ll need a passport to visit the convenience stores around here!”

Due to the city lights, the moon was the only visible light in the night sky.

Whether she was serious or not, Misoka chuckled before asking a question.

“So where are we headed?”

“Akasaka. We have business at the Ushigashira Shrine.”

The centers of Roppongi and Akasaka were less than two kilometers apart, but they still retrieved their mid-sized motorcycle from a monthly-payment parking lot they used under a fake name. Needless to say, this was insurance in case they ran into trouble and had to shake pursuit.

Misoka tossed a spare helmet to her older sister and continued the conversation.

“Well, now that we’re this far away, Haruka can’t chase after us even if she does wake up.”

“I hate how these helmets flatten my hair…”

With that, they drove straight to the Ushigashira Shrine which illuminated its building and trees with indirect lighting. They hid the motorcycle not too close and not too far before making a full circle around the shrine grounds on foot.

“I was expecting more security than this.”

“Nothing is more worthless than digital security that only runs at set times. Human security scares me the most since you cannot trick human eyes and they can make truly unpredictable random patrols.”

Misoka and Iroka moved swiftly as they spoke. The grounds were surrounded by a tall wall, but climbing over that was a simple task with two of them there. They quickly crossed that barrier and stepped onto the gravel garden. They avoided the komainu and sacred trees lit up from below and crouched low to run from shadow to shadow.

“We don’t get to use these techniques often. That training was a waste of time.”

“That just goes to show how much the miss is protecting us on a daily basis. We must never forget to be thankful.”

In truth, the two of them were not after anything in the Ushigashira Shrine. They were not interested in its thick safe or secret underground storeroom.

They just needed to enter the building.

“It is a pleasure to meet you, Over the Wall. Well, one member of that group. I apologize for showing up without an appointment, but our master is in a bit of a bind. I hope that you can forgive us.”

Iroka got down on one knee in the unlit room and spoke in a flat voice that sounded like she was reading off a magic spell.

And in response.

The room’s paper lanterns came to life without warning. The soft flickering light was clearly fire and not light bulbs. Was that caused by static electricity, microwaves, or something else? The trick was unclear. It was possible the two intruders could be roasted in an instant using the exact same technique.

The oppressive silence made them hesitant to even breathe.

When Misoka audibly gulped, a change came over the surrounding atmosphere.

“Do not use that name. You might scare everyone off for no good reason.”

It was a wrinkly old woman’s voice.

And it suddenly rang down from the ceiling.

They had successfully made contact.

Contact with one of the beings who manipulated the course of the world from the shadows after crossing all boundaries: nation, race, religion, language, ideology, corporation, academic field, social class, etc. This was far more meaningful than some obvious safe.

Glasses Iroka said more with her head still bowed.

“But lowly and thoughtless people such as us do not even know your name.”

“Call me whatever you want. They only started worshiping me at this shrine in the modern era anyway. And our tomboy has no problem treating me like her own grandmother.”

“But…”

“Well, I guess I can’t expect you to let your guard down as much as that shrine maiden princess. I mean, she is the Connective Maiden – the one who connects us without fear.” The voice from the ceiling sounded somehow exasperated. “Anyway, maid, make sure your respect is directed to the proper person. There need only be one person to whom you bow your head. I am not so petty that I would try to take what is in your hearts as well.”

“…I am forever in your debt.”

“Hah hah. Not even we talk in that stuffy way anymore. Now, girl, what brings you here today?”

“Wouldn’t someone of your position already know exactly what we are doing?”

“I want to hear it from you.”

“Is that so?” said Iroka.

She was a data expert, but that was why she realized instantly that this was not someone that could be bargained with. The only option was to display every card she had in her deck and apply as much pressure as possible.

“In order to protect our beloved master, we are attempting to remake the Detached Magic Palace into the world’s smallest nation. We have already submitted all the digital paperwork, but it is being stopped at some point. …We would like to know who exactly is doing this. Whether we are to convince them to take our side or threaten them into stopping, we must know who our target is.”

“I see.”

Was the person they spoke with really in the attic or not? That remained unclear, but the sharp presence they felt was like having a knife pressed against their throats.

After a pause, the wrinkly voice spoke again.

“That is a difficult question to answer.”

“I am aware of that, but this is for our master and I must insist.”

“You fool. Do not underestimate me. I am not talking about the power balance.”

“Then what do you mean?”

“It is simply a difficult thing to explain. Your enemy definitely exists, but it would be hard to say they have a physical existence. Even though they definitely are there.”

“Hey, granny, if you’re dodging the question to stall for time, just come on out and say it. This isn’t our last stop tonight.”

Iroka kept her head bowed as she glared over at her rude sister, but the voice from the ceiling actually sounded delighted.

“Excellent. I do enjoy seeing a girl who is frank and to the point. In fact, maid, you should not give your blood relatives a look like that.”

“My apologies. I am unworthy of your kindness.”

“Now, you wanted to know your enemy’s identity, correct? Very well. I imagine the answer will only confuse you, but that is your right. It is, however, up to you whether or not you will accept the answer. The answer is a subway station.”

“Huh? A station???”

“Yes, the subway station closest to the National Diet Building. Now do you get what I mean?”

“…The Japanese government’s largest underground nuclear shelter?”

“It dates back to before the collapse of the Soviet Union. It was said to be a secret facility meant to contain the Diet members and top government officials in an emergency, but that is not enough to explain it. That facility is meant to keep the Japanese government running even if the capital is hit by a nuclear attack. That means it contains everything necessary to run the country. In that sense, you can think of the personnel as no more than gears used to keep the system running smoothly. The most important part is actually the machinery. The core of that facility is the supercomputer that forms the foundation of the executive network needed for this highly digitized society.”

There was a rumor about this.

It said that a certain being controlled everything in the country. And it said that being was not the Diet or the so-called Restaurants, but in fact an enormous mass of semiconductors.

“So our enemy…”

In other words.

In other words.

“…is a simulator?”

Part 4

“Why do I hate humans? That’s simple. Because they’re so foolish I would rather not believe I am one of them.”

That comment was made in the Iberian Orc village partway up the mountain.

On that gentle night, the pig-faced giants were seated around a fire. The red-armored and white-miniskirted Sage was smiling as she looked after the kids running around them, but the tone of her voice was the polar opposite.

Perhaps to work off some energy before going to bed, the little pig doll creatures asked her to play with them, but they did not seem to understand what she was saying. They may have thought it was part of some game of make believe.

“It was such a boring form of extinction.”

The elder alone was different.

That 5m giant gave the Sage a complicated look.

“It was no more than environmental changes and natural disasters brought on by global warming. No country or corporation could be accurately pinpointed as the cause. Since humans play no role in causing natural disasters, we just accept them as inevitable. If only a clear causal relationship could be established, there would have been anger. Our era had grown too developed.”

Some tearful kids ran over while screaming. Some of the naughtier pig dolls must have tried to sneak out of the village at night and seen something scary. There was a sound of rattling bones. Was that a jewel in a cowboy hat glinting in the moonlight from the forest?

The Sage always viewed the simple life on this island as such a bright thing. Almost like she was viewing a treasure that was forever beyond reach.

“However, there was a disaster environment simulator.”

She spoke the decisive words.

Most likely, it had not originally been built to destroy anything.

“That changed everything. That demon could calculate back through the butterfly effect, so it could find a cause for any and all catastrophes. It could find a target for the people’s hatred. …From there, it came down to arguing over blame and fighting silly wars. When you get down to it, no one ever knew if the simulator’s answers were even accurate and it was possible some engineer included some extraneous parameter in the equations. But when an AI displays an answer on the screen, everyone assumes it’s correct even if they have no idea how it was reached. How is that any different from a religion that kneels before a demon?”

After that, there had been no escaping disaster.

A machine had destroyed the human race, but it had not required an army of murder weapons covered in composite armor. It had only required logic and a “whisper” that produced suspicion and doubt.

If you let someone deceive you, it was your own fault.

The Sage believed in that principle. If the 8 billion members of the human race at the time had actually used their own heads and held onto enough power to apply the brakes, it never would have ended like that.

Humanity had been destroyed by their own delusions.

How could they possibly record that embarrassing fact in the history books?

Part 5

The morning sun had risen.

The Next Voyager ghost ship shined orange in the dawn.

“Ugh… Shiver, shiver.”

Boo Boo only wore his loincloth even on a snowy mountain, so it had to be cold indeed for him to be rubbing his hands together on the deck. He could see his breaths and the deck pool was covered with thick ice. A human probably could have gone skating on it.

“I-I’m gonna die. I-I-I-I-I’m totally gonna diiiiiiiiiiiiie…”

Huldra shivered next to him after being kicked out of the girl’s room and partially transformed into something like a frozen food. There really was white frost on her eyelashes.

“Squeal. Are you okay, Huldra? Maybe I should stick you in the sunlight so you can thaw.”

“Abababa, ababababa.”

“Don’t die, Huldra. I’ll warm you up. Boo, where’d the hot water go!?”

Just as he started carrying the pink-twintailed girl (like a princess), Holy Swordswoman Beatrice happened to step outside and chaos soon followed.

The more unsightly parts will be omitted, but the following quotes sum it up well enough.

“Heh heh heh heh. No, this won’t do at all! That needs to be cooked through before it’s edible!!”

“Calm down, Beatrice! It’s okay! That’s just a sign of male friendship!!”

“Are you sure about that, Hermelina? I mean, Boo Boo doesn’t know what any of us look like on Earth, so the Huldra we see there is all that counts. Eh heh heh heh heh heh heh…”

The Holy Swordswoman entered a rather dangerous state with her tattered gray cloak spread out behind her like a demon lord, but the flirty pink-twintailed cheerleader did not notice because she was hallucinating from the cold.

“Wow, what a warm campfire. Thank you so much.”

“My, my. This Little Match Girl situation is only increasing her girliness. The unfortunate girl is always the star, so aren’t you only making the gentlemen holding her want to protect her all the more?”

“Wildefrau! Stop trying to make this even worse, you black-hearted girl! Argh, I can’t stop her on my own! Someone help me restrain this bomb fuse girl!!”

While Beatrice burst into flames with a magic circle behind her back, Gruagach and Rusalka kept the perfect distance to cook some salted river fish pierced on sticks as a quick way to secure some breakfast.

Boo Boo and Philinnion rubbed their eyes afterwards.

“Squeal, my body feels so warm after getting some food.”

“I know. Although that might have more to do with the sun rising higher into the sky. Ah, I really want to go back to sleep.”

Once that confused meal was complete, it was back to claiming territory. They had taken quite a lead the day before, so they only needed to keep that up. However…

“Huh?”

“What is it, Beatrice? Did you finally come back to your senses?”

“No, I was perfectly sensible from the beginning. But isn’t something about the ground different from before?” asked Beatrice while looking out across the glass land from the 9m height of the ghost ship’s side deck.

“Squeal, it’s broken all over the place!”

“Eh?”

Surprised, Gruagach quickly loosed a winged arrow into the sky above.

“You’re right. There are cracks covering a very wide area. And some other areas have been submerged, creating something like ponds and lakes. Could that be seawater?”

“Wait, we haven’t gotten back to Earth to register that data yet…”

“If the terrain changes before we do, won’t our data be rejected as inaccurate when we try to submit it as Pieces?”

Philinnion, who had grown even more cow-like in her pointed witch’s hat, joined the conversation as the unpleasant reports continued. Boo Boo and Beatrice jumped down from the deck to check for themselves, and…

“Ah, ahhh! The igloo I built is crumbling!”

“Wait, Boo Boo, don’t run over there! There’s a huge crevasse in between. That means we can’t use this route anymore.”

They had spent the entire previous day building glass igloos at set interval to create a “road”, but this meant all their efforts had been wasted.

Philinnion, Wildefrau, and the others were dumbfounded when they arrived.

“What happened? We all slept like babies last night, didn’t we? Wouldn’t we have woken up if someone had used powerful enough Magic to split apart the ground?”

“This may not have been intentional.” Wildefrau crossed her arms and raised her index finger. “This land is primarily made of silicon. In other words, it is glass. And the temperature difference between day and night was pretty extreme. Maybe it could not withstand that difference and broke all on its own.”

“Wait, wait, wait,” said Hermelina in her flat boob window priest robes. “Doesn’t that mean this terrain change isn’t a one-time thing? If this happens every single day, we’ll never be able to fill in the map. Registering the data as Pieces will become an unattainable dream. And this changes even more frequently than the Labyrinth!”

As expected, this was not going to be easy.

If they could not construct a route to safely cross the vast continent, they could never find the Hero. She stood at the turning points and sought victory whenever possible. And she did not care what happened to Ground’s Nir in the process. La Signora’s presence was definitely a threat, but there was no way to plan a proper journey across a continent where the terrain changed randomly every day. And if they rushed things and tried it anyway, they would end up cut off from the ship, which would spell their doom.

“Squeal. Is there no way to stop that cracking?”

“Hmm. Theoretically, it wouldn’t split if the temperature difference wasn’t so great, so we should be able to prevent it by keeping a fire going throughout the night…but we can’t do that across the entire continent.”

Moving at random would accomplish nothing.

They were stuck here for the moment.

They could not advance without coming up with a fundamental solution to this glass continent where the terrain split at random on a daily basis. They could not even consider searching for the Hero like this.

Part 6

“Hmph…”

Once morning arrived, Haruka of the three maid sisters was being even cuter than normal with her cheeks puffed out. The Detached Magic Palace was a Western-style mansion, but the older two sisters were seated in the entrance hall using a Japanese-style seiza.

“Um.”

“We really are sorry. We have learned our lesson.”

Iroka and Misoka could not look the youngest sister in the eye while she stood in front of them with hands on her hips. Yes, the general power balance was decided by seniority, but the older sisters were not powerful enough to completely overturn the scales of good and evil.

“But you don’t regret what you did, right? WTF! Did you really think I wouldn’t how you wanted to finish that sentence?”

“(Hey, Aneki, It saddens me to hear our cute little sister using internet slang in everyday conversations. You’re in charge of this digital stuff, so aren’t you letting her roam a little too freely out there!?)”

“(Yes, I may have been too confident in my filters. I was careless. How can I ever look the miss in the eye again?)”

“Quiet, both of you. And no more messing with my computer and phone while claiming it’s for my own good!”

This was not quite the same as pouring oil on the fire.

When that littlest maid entered angry mode, she would burn hotter no matter what you threw on the fire – even if it was a shortcake or a teddy bear. The only person who could reclaim that youngest sister’s smile was their master. It would be a long wait until that girl returned.

“So what kind of adventure were you two having while I was asleep? And what did you find out?”

“You see, Haruka, we only kept it from you because we wanted to protect our cute little sister, so-…”

“…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………”

“Aw, crap. She’s definitely making us go without food now.”

“We discovered that our troubles are caused by a simulator that controls the government from deep within the subway station closest to the National Diet Building.”

“Hey, no fair, Aneki! Don’t turn on me just because it’s looking bad!!”

Misoka shouted fiercely at her from the side, but the capable glasses girl kept a calm expression while seated on the floor. After all, going without food would be far too tragic. She was the perfect older sister in all things, but she wanted no part of a low-sugar diet meant to eliminate carbs from her life. The look in her eyes would be the same as an abandoned dog on a rainy day.

“Our enemy is not human. It has no desire and feels no fear of loss. That means we can’t convince it to work with us or threaten it to back off. All it does is find the optimal solution for the Japanese government and complete each step of the process. That explains why my countermeasures were so ineffective. We are standing on the rails it has set up. If we do not come up with a plan specific to this opponent, we can only wait for the giant runaway train to hit us.”

They did not know how many factions and organizations there were in this country, but it all felt so hollow once they began discussing an unseen simulator. All those things were like tentacles extending from the simulator’s fat main body and all the obvious conflicts and hidden malice was no more than a stimulant meant to control the masses more efficiently. And the people being used were not even aware of the role given to them.

“So what exactly are we going to do? We already know this country has no future if it decides milady is disposable despite all her hard work.”

“That is why we planned to begin a counterattack after taking a quick nap, but then we happened to find the gatekeeper of hell waiting for us.”

“What. Exactly. Are. We. Going. To. Do?”

“…”

“…”

“If you don’t include me, I will clean up your rooms while you are gone. Do you really want to come back to an empty box of a room? Not a scrap of your personal possessions will remain. I mean, we are borrowing it all from milady, so we should be returning it anyway. Do you want to see just how clean a maid can make a room when she really puts her back into it?”

Those veteran older sisters decided now was the time to shift into a full prostration.

Part 7

They would never make any progress if they stayed on that cracked new continent. Beatrice made a quick decision with her tattered gray cloak flapping in the wind and had the Next Voyager carry them all back to the island of Ground’s Nir.

“Everyone is facing the same problem,” said the Holy Swordswoman on the ship. “Whatever the solution is, there’s sure to be more competition for whatever it requires. If we don’t get our hands on the materials soon, we’ll be caught in a commotion just like with the boats!”

“B-but, Beatrice, we can’t procure the materials if we don’t know what the solution is. We don’t have the assets to hoard everything.”

“I hate to say this, but we need help from someone shrewder than us.”

“Squeal? Shrewd?”

“It means smart, Boo Boo. I really wish we had another option, but where is that historical shut-in these days?”

They would have preferred to land at the port near the inn town, but if they angered Kallikantzaros any further, she really might bite them. They had no choice(?) but to land at the shoal by the southern forest.

Noble Dancer Rusalka sighed in her skintight leotard plus armor.

“So got any ideas?”

“I mean, there’s really only one possibility.”

Staying in the mangrove controlled by bipedal dogs and cats would accomplish nothing, so Beatrice led them across the salt bridges to cross the southern forest and reach the usual mountain. Boo Boo tilted his head as the type of trees changed.

“Huh? Are we going to my home?”

“No, not today. Well, this still kind of counts as your home.”

Hermelina’s group (which included the nudist and the mourning clothes girl) wanted to head back to the inn town to gather information, so they parted ways while Beatrice, Boo Boo, and Philinnion followed something like an animal trail.

Finally, they heard a rhythmic sound much like hammer strikes. Some familiar-sounding boos and squeals were mixed in.

“Oh? That bestial odor is getting stronger,” said Philinnion with her pointed witch’s hat swaying on her head.

It was not exactly a pleasant smell, but she may have had some resistance to it since she dealt with potions on a regular basis. There were plenty of smells worse than the body odor of living creatures.

The tall underbrush suddenly ended.

They found a relatively large grassy clearing with several leaf buildings.

This was the Iberian Orc village.

“Oh, it’s almost entirely back to normal!?”

Boo Boo sounded surprised, but Philinnion tilted her head next to him.

“Come to think of it, why is Boo Boo still living on his own now that everyone was freed from the Red and living in the village again?”

That was likely because he could not invite their nemesis Abyss into the village but he also could not abandon her when she was so helpless, but Beatrice did not bother explaining all that.

Some smaller round creatures approached while making higher-pitched boos and squeals.

“Are you from outside?”

“Poo, sniff sniff. I don’t smell any presents.”

“Make sure you go greet the elder. Squeal.”

The scorching red color of their skin had changed and they were no longer overcome by a powerful urge to attack and destroy.

They had been freed from the Red disaster caused by the artificial atmospheric barrier.

The sight of so many Iberian Orcs alive and enjoying themselves in their own village was an emotional one.

However…

“(Huh? With all these pig-faced giants here, um, how am I supposed to tell them apart from Boo Boo?)”

“(Don’t be rude, cow. If your facial recognition is that bad, maybe you need new glasses.)”

“Poo, poo, poo. Squeal, squeal. Miss!”

Beatrice hugged one of the pig dolls while pouting her lips.

Boo Boo tilted his head.

“Squeal, is that your friend, Beatrice?”

“Heh heh heh. I’ve met him a few times. I even gave him a proper name. Because of that cute noise he makes, I call him Poo P-…”

“Don’t you dare call him that.”

Philinnion’s voice dropped frighteningly low for once, but the Iberian Orcs were not their top priority at the moment.

A skinny Royal Elf wearing a short green dress was extending her arms and legs in a dance at the center of the village square. With a visual like that, even the sweat leaving her skin and hair glittered like the morning dew.

Beatrice put a hand on her hip with the tattered gray cloak fluttering.

“Quit showing off over there.”

“This is a holy ritual. Do not interrupt me, barbarian.”

Long-eared Sibyl continued dancing as she responded. She was apparently doing more than showing off her lovely form within a village of nothing but pigs.

She managed to look divine even while performing an energetic dance and she had more to say.

“There is not that much to worry about now that Boo Boo there has opened the path of reconciliation with the humans, but it would be safest to give this village a proper purpose and justification for its existence. I am giving those who live here the official protection of the three royal families. That forbids any outsiders from messing with them.”

Boo Boo heard what sounded like a sheet beating at the air, so he looked up. A brown girl and white woman stood next to each other atop the roof of the elder’s house. The two of them together were Archangel Marinka who represented the sun – including the solar eclipse.

Philinnion tilted her head with her large chest squeezed between her suspenders.

“But you’re missing the royal family of the sea, aren’t you?”

“No. I will not let Vivian’s death be a meaningless one. I will bury her in this land and have the powerful and honest Iberian Orcs act as grave keepers. That gives them a legitimate reason to occupy this holy ground. And the unworthy are forbidden from setting foot here.”

It may have been unpleasant to have your homeland turned into a giant grave, but the Iberian Orcs had lost a purpose for their great combat power now that the threat of Ultimate Weapon Abyss was gone for good. And unlike military weapons, they could not simply be disposed of. Giving them a new purpose may have been a form of salvation for them.

At any rate…

“Since you’re here, it looks like I guessed right. Where is the Sage?”

“In there.” Sibyl formed a lovely bridge as part of her dance and pointed in a certain direction with one foot. “But since you did not see the Sage while she had shut herself off from the world, this might be too great a shock for you.”

“?”

Sibyl’s foot was pointed toward the largest of the leaf houses. Needless to say, that was the elder’s. It may have functioned as a gathering place and not just a residence. Boo Boo and the others walked there and heard movement within before even entering it.

When they had found the central shaft while trying to follow the Sage, Boo Boo had seemed to give a quick prayer while viewing the ruins of this house, but…

“Boo Boo, what’s the etiquette for entering the elder’s house?”

“Squeal. You yell real loud. Like this: Elderrrr!”

The prayer had apparently been his response to the ruined state of the house and was unnecessary in its current lively state. He pushed aside the leaf door like it was a curtain.

A shocking sight awaited them.

Someone who looked an awful lot like Beatrice was laughing loudly with her head between the giant elder’s legs in what could maybe be called a piggy-back ride.

“Squeal!? I’m scared! Wait, stop that, Sage! I’m wobbling too much!!”

“Wa ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!!”

“I’m scared!?”

The Sage was swinging that 5m body around in a piggy back ride (with the piggy on top) and the elder quickly grew tearful while he was shaken back and forth. The Sage raced around the house while the round pig dolls chased after her, squealing all the way. They were insisting they go next on that frightening human back ride.

Beatrice froze up and summed it up in two simple words.

“You’re insane.”

“Don’t worry, Beatrice,” said Philinnion. “You’re pretty much the same when it comes to Boo Boo.”

The Sage noticed them and briefly stopped, giving the elder enough time to pretty much roll off of her.

“Oh, wait, elder. …Dammit, you rude people. Why did you have to interrupt at the best part?”

“The thing is…”

“Use adhesive. The quick-drying kind. It would probably be fastest to cut into the trunks of the Sticky Cedars around here to gather their sap by the bucket or to steal tons of honey wax from Sucking Bee hives. The Diamond Salt in the southern forest wouldn’t be bad either. Of course, you can’t use any of this as is. You need to use it as a Mixing ingredient so you can get a large enough quantity of the final product.”

The red-armored and white-miniskirted Sage cut her off and gave that explanation while the little pig dolls climbed up her body. She used one hand to support a small child that took the wrong path for the ascent and bumped his head against the overhang of her large breasts.

“Sorry, but this trick is used for car maintenance and home renovation products back on Earth. Although there is a risk of getting trapped inside during an accident or disaster. Once you have that, use it to build a path across the continent. Is that all you needed? I want to have some fun. Lots and lots of fun.”

“How-…?”

“How did I know what you were going to ask? Did you forget I am with Sibyl who holds the three royal treasures which can see almost anything? …Of course, that ‘almost’ is important to remember.”

The Sage really was the Sage. She was on a different level even after going soft.

“If only those treasures could transmit instead of just receive. Well, trying to force that usage could easily end up as an attack that tears apart the ground below our feet, so maybe it isn’t worth the risk.”

This meant not even the Sage and Sibyl could say for sure where the Hero was hiding on that new continent in the ocean. That was one thing to which she did not seem to know the answer. Was the Hero skilled at staying concealed, or was it a simple matter of distance? This was an entire continent, so they could only hope their goal was not actually on the other side of the planet.

“Wa ha ha!”

“Squeal!?”

“You little ones are so light. You need to grow up big and strong. But for now, you’re helpless in my grasp!”

The pig dolls screamed in enjoyment as they flew through the air.

The Sage seemed to care more about the village here than the fate of the world. That may have been for the best. At the very least, no one wanted her to bring chaos to the world again.

Part 8

Now, then.

“Squeal. So what was all that about add-hee-siv?”

“The Sage is basing it on the nature of glass. I see. I guess if you need cunning, she would be the one to go to. Philinnion, how should we go about acquiring this?”

“Good question. We could get it at the inn town, but it’s pretty cheap stuff. If we went around buying it all up, people would take notice and realize how useful it would be. We don’t want it turning into a hot commodity. If we needlessly increase its supposed value, we’ll be stuck in the same place we were with the Shocking Tingle Peppers.”

“Then I guess we should discuss this with Hermelina and Huldra. If we come up with a convincing reason for needing the adhesive, no one will question it. Let’s go the pubs and inns to spread the word about how our ghost ship is falling apart. If people know we need lots of materials to repair it, they’ll ignore it when we’re rushing around gathering stuff.”

“(You’re pretty cunning yourself. And your mind works quick. The two of you aren’t all that different really.)”

“I am not like that Magic-obsessed freak. Do I need to milk you?”

Boo Boo was no longer afraid to visit the inn town. He descended the mountain with Beatrice and Philinnion and entered the bustling city.

Everyone must have been stopped by the cracking glass continent issue. The stone-paved roads were full of people back from an attempt. A lot of people were running around trying to gather information.

Someone raised a hand in greeting.

“Hey, how you doing?”

“Squeal.”

They had no real purpose and were just passing by. But they had not been speaking to Beatrice or Philinnion. The Holy Swordswoman tilted her head.

“Boo Boo, have you already made some friends?”

“I’ve started talking with the humans lately. They say the animal trails I make are easier to travel on.”

Boo Boo made sure to walk on the side of the road so his giant frame did not get in the way and he was no longer seen as out of place here.

“(Feeling jealous? Grin, grin.)”

“(I-I am not! I really will milk you, cow!)”

They met up with Hermelina’s group who were just hanging around after checking some of the restaurants and pubs where information tended to gather. Hermelina must have appreciated having a definite goal beyond simply “gathering information”. When she heard the plan, she gently stretched her back to forcibly push out her flat chest.

“I see. We can’t keep the glass continent from cracking, so we make it so the cracks won’t widen.”

“Although for now we can probably only cover a single strip of land like we’re laying out asphalt.”

“That’s fine. We’re not trying to actually develop the land. We just have to find the Hero. I do want to establish some bases as Pieces in order to avoid unnecessary trouble such as tolls and waiting our turn at the coast, but we can’t get so caught up in that that we forget why we’re doing this in the first place. …But this means we yet again have to spend a ton of gears to acquire materials, doesn’t it? Sigh, I really want to build some ETC tollbooths in this world. Everyone would hate us if we did, though.”

“Squeal. So what’s going to happen?”

When Boo Boo tilted his head, Hermelina started to answer but then got a troubled look on her face.

“Glass reinforcement, huh? I guess giving the name of a novelty good wouldn’t do much for someone from Grand’s Nir, would it?”

“Demonstrating it would be fastest.”

Beatrice grabbed a glass from the table and rubbed something all across the surface. Then she used Fire Magic to quickly dry it.

“Look at this, Boo Boo.”

“Ah!?”

The pig-faced giant cried out because Beatrice let go of the glass. But there was no high-pitched shattering sound when it hit the floor. There was only a dull sound and the glass itself seemed to grow white.

But that was not what happened.

It was technically covered with small cracks, but the adhesive rubbed over it allowed it to keep its shape after shattering.

Beatrice winked as she explained.

“It’s the same idea as the security film placed over windows. If we can make enough of this, we can prevent the glass continent’s cracks from growing even after it breaks.”

Part 9

“Pant, pant!”

This was highly unusual. Iroka, oldest of the three maid sisters, was breathing heavily and she wiped sweat from her brow. She must not have had it in her to pull out a handkerchief.

She could not run any further.

Her vision was blurring.

She leaned against the wall next to her. The chill of the concrete felt nice, but she also knew this was dangerous. Just like the chilly feeling after a bath, this would take away more of her body heat than necessary and she might be unable to move by the time the cold feeling caught up with her.

“Sigh…”

She blinked again and again, but it did not bring her vision back into focus. That was when it hit her. She removed her glasses, wiped the lenses off with a handkerchief, and put them back on. Her vision was much better now, so she must have been running quite frantically.

The cold fluorescent lights illuminated what looked like a straight stretch of underground passageway. This area took so many 90-degree turns that she could not see what lay ahead.

How had she ended up here?

Where were Misoka and Haruka?

She tried to remember, but a dull pain exploded deep in her mind. She groaned and leaned against the hard and chilly wall again.

The subway station closest to the National Diet Building.

The simulator hidden in its depths.

If that was getting in their way, the answer was simple: destroy it. The machine’s very existence was not officially recognized, so its owner would have no way of accusing them if it was lost.

That said, they could not exactly carry in drills and pickaxes and start smashing stuff. If they could not be made to pay through the official channels, there were plenty of more illicit ways to take revenge.

That meant they needed a form of destruction that would not be so obvious from an outside perspective.

Fortunately, they were up against a simulator. It was only a machine. Thousands of people in dozens of sections would be complexly interlinked to create a system so large no one could see its full scope. It was unlikely an external cyber attack would be of any use.

But that was fine.

The different staff members would show more restraint about each other in such an environment. They would assume someone else knew what they did not and that assumption would grow. So if someone snuck in and replaced one of the disks lined up in the boxes with an illicit ROM, no one would know what had changed in the whole.

Without an accurate picture to compare to, they could not search for mistakes.

(What happened?)

It had gone well most of the way.

They had made it deep within the thick concrete shelter without being noticed.

Or so they had thought.

(Misoka, Haruka. What happened?)

“What a pain.”

“!?”

Iroka gasped and looked around when she heard a wrinkly voice out of nowhere. This was a straight concrete passageway. There was no sign of anyone hiding there and the voice did not sound like it came from around a corner. The bespectacled oldest sister slowly looked to the source of the sound: up.

It came from the nuclear shelter’s ceiling.

“It is true I gave you the hint, but I didn’t expect you to rush straight here. You know how woefully unprepared you were now, don’t you? I recommend leaving and trying again later.”

Iroka recognized the voice.

She was cautious, but she did not take any specific action.

“You are up against a simulator, something that properly inspires people’s sense of danger to help save their lives. But if that ability is abused, it can easily crush people through extreme external stress.”

“Does this mean…you were on their side too?”

“Their side, hm? I do not know what lines you are using to divide up the world, but it seems you still do not properly understand what it means to be Over the Wall. I have crossed all barriers. I am not bound by the power balance of the common world.”

“…”

“Not that being Over the Wall was even meant to refer to that in the first place.” There was a hint of self-deprecation in the voice. “I will guide you to the exit. You can regroup with the other two on the surface. But if you try this method again, you will not be so lucky a second time. There is only so much I can do to hide your actions.”

“Are you using my sister’s lives to threaten me?”

“We both hold the other’s Achilles’ heel. If you three die, it would make my selfish shrine maiden princess sad and I would prefer to avoid that if at all possible.”

“Shrine maiden princess?”

“I already explained her true nature to you.” The voice from the ceiling did not elaborate. “Hurry it up. The enemy’s fingers can easily shred the human psyche. Attempting to understand this with the Newtonian physics you believe in is useless.”

“What did it have me do?”

“That is an oddity even among those who are Over the Wall.”

“What?” Even Iroka gulped here. “No matter how good its specs, it is still just a machine. Why would you give it that title?”

“It would seem you indeed have a mistaken understanding what it means to cross all barriers. Wealth, academic history, and even being a biological being are not all that relevant when it comes to qualifying.”

The fluorescent lights flashed according to a pattern. It began right in front of Iroka and seemingly flowed further down the straight passageway. She took that to mean “follow me” and dragged her body along while it felt as heavy as a wet blanket.

“I will tell you what it means to be Over the Wall.”

“Onee-chan!?”

Her vision grew bright.

She found herself below the blue sky. This was not an official subway exit. She thought it had to be some kind of emergency exit or maintenance hatch, but when she looked back, she saw nothing of the sort. She was in a large park. She could not find a cleverly hidden door or even any kind of thick wall whatsoever.

Misoka and Haruka stood in front of her.

They seemed to have been mysteriously led here as well. Iroka must not have been the only one who could not remember what route they had taken to get here.

How far had they walked?

Was this really real life?

While considering those meaningless questions, Iroka recalled what she had heard while walking.

“Any being that has crossed the barrier between worlds is considered Over the Wall. Thus, anyone with that title is not contained within the framework of ordinary physics. My discoverer ignored the original myths and called me Tiamat, but I am not the only one like this. Not one of us found on this planet can be called purely human in any form. So even if something beyond human understanding occurs, you defenseless humans can only accept it for what it is.”

Part 10

They needed an adhesive that functioned like window security film.

Beatrice’s Party was making progress on gathering supplies in the inn town, but time was an issue. When thinking about exploring the glass continent, they had to consider the travel time to and from it as well. They could only stay in this world for a few days and they had already needed to head back to the inn town due to an unexpected setback.

They were at about the halfway point timewise.

Any mistakes would eat up further time, so even though they had a lot of free time, they could not take any bold actions either. It was an odd in-between state.

“Wouldn’t it be best to reset things for ourselves?” With her skinny body covered by a skintight leotard and thick armor, Rusalka made a reasonable suggestion to the others. “If we made our way to the continent now, we would only have to head back almost immediately, right?”

The glass continent would crack unpredictably due to the temperature difference and the terrain would change. They had gathered plenty of surveying data and Screenshots in their Shining Weapons, but those were unlikely to count as Pieces back on Earth. However, that did not matter at the moment.

Being in their top condition was more important.

If they returned to Earth to recuperate, they would have the full limit of a few days to work with again.

“Squeal. I can work on my own just fine.”

“There’s no recovering from a mistake when on your own, so don’t. Besides, once on the continent, you have to consider the possibility of running across the Hero. La Signora is bad news. Nothing about her is logical and it’s all on a ridiculous scale. You can’t try a one-on-one confrontation with someone before even knowing how powerful they really are. Got that?”

Besides that, Boo Boo would never have worked with window security film before. They could not have him start working on his own when he did not know what he was doing.

This was different from a marathon or relay race with a set goal. They had to keep in mind that there could be unexpected holes anywhere in that undeveloped land. Taking the time to build a proper road would end up saving time in the long run.

Beatrice waved lightly at the others.

“I’ll be going then, Philinnion, Hermelina.”

“Sure. But let’s at least decide on a time to meet back up. I don’t want any delays due to that.”

“Crap, I’ve been in this world so much lately I bet I have tons of paperwork and emails piling up.”

With that, the girls started toward their respective Gates back to Earth.

When the red dress girl returned to Tokyo, she found bespectacled Iroka holding a white porcelain teapot instead of small animal-like Haruka.

“Hm? What’s going on, Iroka?”

“It is not like I am incapable of preparing tea, miss. I just usually leave it to the more suitable person.”

Did that mean Haruka was busy with another job or not feeling well?

“If you need to change up your shifts, just tell me.”

“Not to worry. She is a tough little girl. Given the look on your face, would you prefer some cocoa over elegant tea?”

The red dress girl did not really have anything to do, so she was only messing around on her phone when Haruka finally showed up.

“Oh, are you back, milady?”

“So what happened?”

That simple question was not given a clear answer.

This return to Earth was meant to reclaim her usual internal rhythm, such as her internal clock, but she was so on edge that she doubted she could get any sleep. She felt she had no choice but to rest in the living room sofa.

While holding the remote and watching TV, she felt more focused on the action of flipping through channels than on watching the afternoon shows. Unlike the past, there were so many stations to choose from. With cable or satellite included, you could find yourself wandering through specialist channels for crazy samurai movies and world heritage documentaries.

“?”

She felt something soft on her thighs and found the second sister had brought her a lap blanket.

“…Thanks, Misoka.”

“It’s fine. This is your home after all.”

The hot cocoa and lap blanket must have soothed her nerves. It was like a dam breaking. Sleepiness overwhelmed her and her vision blurred while she heard the maid finish her sentence.

“No matter what might happen.”

After getting some rest, the red dress girl returned to the world of Ground’s Nir.

“?”

The red-armored and white-miniskirted Holy Swordswoman rubbed the tattered gray cloak between her fingers. She tilted her head because her memories felt half real and half like a dream. That said, she was already in this world. They had set a time and a place to meet up, so she decided to focus on the trouble here for now.

It was evening.

They had their preparations in order this time. After meeting up with the others at Boo Boo’s brick house, they used the Next Voyager ghost ship to reach the glass continent.

“Hyah! This place gets so cold once the sun sets, doesn’t it? Maybe we should have waited a bit longer and arrived in the morning!”

It was not even cold yet, but the memories were enough for Philinnion to hold her shoulders, squishing her large breasts between her arms. Meanwhile, (flat) Hermelina saw things differently.

“This is perfect, actually. The Sage’s advice is only a theory at this point, so I want to test it out to make sure it works. I don’t want to find we wasted an entire day of work again.”

Armored leotard Rusalka tilted her head.

“So you want to see the adhesive’s effects before putting in too much work with it?”

“Exactly. So hurry! If we don’t solidify some of the land before it gets completely dark, it won’t be a proper test!!”

The giant ocean survey ship was meant to carry a crew of more than a thousand, so it had been simple enough to load it with plenty of large barrels along with all their food and water. They had taken the island’s natural adhesive substances like Sticky Cedar sap and Sucking Bee honey wax and then Philinnion and Huldra had used Mixing to add filler materials that increased the quantity without reducing the effectiveness.

Once down on the glass land in the fading sunlight, Hermelina planted another flag.

“No more wasted effort. Let’s start by hardening this area.”

She took some Screenshots containing coordinate data and saved them on her Shining Weapon so she could use them as Pieces back on Earth.

Boo Boo carried a large barrel over and carefully tilted it. A thick, translucent goop with an acrid chemical smell silently spread out.

“What should the rest of us do? This adhesive is meant to hold the ground in place, so I’m afraid stepping in it will get us permanently stuck there.”

Cross sword and belt Wildefrau started getting worried, but cheer uniform Huldra replied with a somewhat bored voice.

“It only reacts to glass objects, so we’ll be fine. It technically dissolves a thin layer of the ground and binds with that. You should be able to spread it around with a normal mop or rag without your tool hardening up.”

In other words, they were going to draw a thick line across the white land as if with a giant brush and that would create a safe road which would not crack. If the ground did not break and the terrain did not change, they could register it as Pieces and make it their own. They would need quite a lot of adhesive, but this was easier than laying asphalt.

“Squeal. Since we don’t know which parts will crack in the cold, shouldn’t we try spreading this in different directions?”

“Good point. …We need to think about what to do if we wake up tomorrow to find it wouldn’t have affected the part we worked on regardless. Wildefrau’s below-zero attacks should be able to create similar cracks, but it would be best to test it in the natural environment.”

If they registered this landing point as a Piece, they would be using this as their base from now on. It would be helpful to draw out several lines to create a spider web of pathways they could use.

Hermelina wiped sweat from her brow and shivered from the chill that finally reached her.

“Now it really feels like we’re claiming territory.”

“I might cry if we wake up tomorrow morning to find nothing but cracked crevasses like before.”

Beatrice’s ominous comment earned some light anger from Philinnion and Huldra.

The real work would begin the following day.

Their previous trip here had taught them all too well how cold it got at night. Once the sun had fully set and the stars appeared in the night sky, they stopped working and returned to the Next Voyager.

“Oh, no! I can already see my breath! Nature’s freezer is back!!”

“Scramble up the ladder if you want, Philinnion, but since you have fingerless gloves, I would recommend not touching the metal with your bare fingers. Don’t blame me if your skin gets stuck.”

They had met up fairly late, so most of them had already eaten. Boo Boo was hungry despite having eaten already, so suspender boobs Philinnion gave him some dried meat that did not need to be prepared. Feeling full was more important than nutrition here, so something he could chew on for a while was best.

That left one thing to consider: how were they going to survive this frigid night?

“What’s there to worry about? Just wrap yourself in fire.”

“I know, right? Just have 100% Water Resistance and you won’t take any Ice Damage at all.”

The two with ridiculous fire and ice abilities were an exception.

Pink-twintailed Alchemist Cheerleader Huldra let a thick cloth flap in the wind.

“Heh heh heh. Look at this, chief. It’s a sleeping bag made from Fluffy Bird feathers! You have to keep an eye on the inn town’s Flea Market Maze because you sometimes find stuff like this there. Now I can survive a cold night with ease! Yay!!”

“Oh, is that so? So when you were supposed to be working on Mixing the adhesive, you were actually preparing for your own comfort? And our PI office’s wallet is a shared thing where we all keep the gears we’ve earned, isn’t it?”

“Um, uh, heh heh heh. Don’t be mad, chief☆”

“That sleeping bag belongs to all of us.”

“Wait! Please don’t take it away from me like this! You girls get to cram yourselves into a small cabin where you can keep each other warm, but Boo Boo and I are risking our lives out in the night!”

Huldra’s tears were starting to freeze over, but curled rolled ponytail Rusalka made a cruel point despite being about a Chinese zodiac cycle younger.

“If you had just snuck off with your sleeping bag instead of trying to brag about it, none of this would have happened.”

“Rusalka, there is a simple saying to sum that up: silence is golden.”

Huldra screamed, but no one there felt any sympathy. If she was going to do this, she needed to be ready to prepare enough for everyone.

Hermelina spat out a comment while leaving with the sleeping bag in her arms.

“You complain, but you survived last time. You can use Boo Boo for warmth again.”

“Ahhhh, did you have to remind her of that!? Are you trying to get me killed!?”

“Oh, right. I need to take care of a pink-haired nuisance before she causes any trouble tonight. I completely forgot.”

“Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!?”

Beatrice’s entire body burned with enough flames that she must have forgotten the boat was mostly made of wood, but that at least gave them a source of fire. Boo Boo held out a handmade torch made from a cloth wrapped around the end of a wooden stick to light it and then raised it over his head like a small child showing off a popsicle.

“Squeal, let’s take good care of this. It can keep us warm and toasty if used right.”

“Be careful with that fire, Boo Boo. Keep some water on hand to-…no, it would probably just freeze. In that case, keep something to cover up the fire. And don’t use it in a closed room.”

“Boo. But, Hermelina, I feel like I would freeze if I opened a window.”

“If you aren’t careful, you’ll be killed by carbon monoxide. You see it in mangas and dramas a lot, but building a campfire in a cave is a big no-no.”

“?”

Either her examples were poorly chosen or he would not believe something he had not seen for himself because Boo Boo looked confused. Hermelina let out a white sigh (with her boob window exposing her chest to the cold).

“Anyway, that’s the rule. This was designed to be a pretty fancy ship, so it probably has rooms with a fireplace or chimney. Or you could use the kitchen or boiler room. I’m not saying you can’t use the fire; I’m saying look for somewhere you can use it safely. Huldra.”

“I’ll show him the way! But please stop pointing out that we’re together when Beatrice is around!!”

With that, it was time to survive the frigid night.

Boo Boo transferred the fire to the fireplace next to an old bar counter, Kallikantzaros showed up to play after hearing half-scorched Huldra’s sobs, and the Vampire lay alongside the Iberian Orc as he went to sleep. The sleeping bag had been a good idea even if it had been taken away. They had searched the ship for something similar and found some waterproof cloth meant to repair torn sails. That proved to be a powerful ally.

And.

“Snorrrre! Snorrrre!! Mutter, mutter…ah. Huh? Where’s Kallikantzaros?”

The nearly-4m giant rubbed his eyes with the back of his large hands and found the red negligee girl was gone. Light was entering the edge of the dark night sky and the stars were disappearing behind an orange glow.

Morning had arrived.

“Squeal… It really is cold. I don’t think I slept much.”

“I-I beg to differ with all that loud snoring you were doing.”

The pink-twintailed girl had wrapped her shivering body tightly in the waterproof cloth, but she had not ended up like a frozen fish this time. The ability to learn and use tools to overcome hardships may have been a defining trait of humans.

Once awake, they were curious how things were outside. They could still see their breath at dawn, but after removing his sail repair material and putting out the fire in the fireplace, Boo Boo left the old bar and approached the door to the side deck.

He found someone there already.

“Good morning, Boo Boo.”

“Squeal.”

Beatrice giggled at how he sleepily rubbed his eyes and she pointed at the glass ground 9m below.

Philinnion had cautiously moved out ahead (despite being a healer) by crawling along the ground. That pressed her butt tightly against her shorts, so it looked like that cow was a threat in more than just the chest department. She must have wanted to see how the adhesive she had made was doing because she tapped the back of her hand against the ground every so often. There were white cracks all over, but there were no large gaps. It had all been held in place and forcibly kept in a single piece.

“The experiment was a success.” Beatrice let out a white breath and smiled. “Now the road we make won’t go away. It’s time we finally crossed this continent and tracked down the Hero!”

Part 11

After eating a breakfast made by putting sliced bread in hot soup to increase the apparent quantity, it was finally time to begin the real recovery.

They had to claim their territory.

They would send out drones to investigate the unexplored glass continent as efficiently as possible, take that data back to Earth to register it as Pieces as a way to expand their freedom of movement, and use that to search out Hero La Signora.

…That was the general idea anyway, but that plan was missing a step. Gradually filling in their map was meaningless if the entire terrain had changed the following day.

They needed to work toward accomplishing something meaningful.

Beatrice made a request with her tattered gray cloak fluttering behind her.

“Gruagach, start by accurately surveying the existing cracks in the ground. The security film method can prevent new cracks from forming, but it can’t repair the large ravines that already exist. It’s unfortunate, but we have to work our way around those. But we can record the path we take and register it on Earth as a Piece.”

“Understood.”

“Some ponds and lakes may have formed when water flooded the cracks, so don’t forget to record data at high tide and low tide.”

Once Beatrice was done talking, the Summon Hunter in mourning clothes opened a few magic circles in the air in front of her right eye and then loosed several arrows high into the sky. They sprouted swan-like wings along the way to transform themselves into eyes and ears in the sky.

“Our route is going to take a large curving S-shape as we avoid the existing cracks. Does that mean twice the distance compared to a straight route?”

There was no way to predict this kind of unexpected setback, but it was still not pleasant to learn about something they had never even considered.

“Boo Boo, it would be easier to roll the adhesive barrels instead of lifting them. Don’t worry. They’re sealed up tight, so it won’t spill out when you tilt them on their side.”

“Squeal.”

“Oh, but wouldn’t it be better if it did? The adhesive only hardens on the glass ground, so with a bit of ingenuity, we could probably make a device that creates a road just by rolling the barrel.”

Wildefrau, the exhibitionist in a cross sword and belts, had that idea, and armor leotard Rusalka joined in.

“Would it be something like that roller the baseball team drags around the field to smooth things out? I dunno what you actually call it, though.”

“We can build our own little invention later. Let’s do it the way we know works for now. C’mon, get your mop ready.”

Boo Boo and Hermelina were the go-to people for physical strength, so they rolled the large barrels of adhesive while Beatrice and Philinnion were in charge of spreading it around with mops. Gruagach surveyed everything from the sky and Rusalka used wind to remove the chemical odor.

Once they got started, they made quick progress.

“Boo, boo, boo, boo. Boo boo bee boo.”

Boo Boo seemed to be having fun seeing the road grow as he rolled the barrel. When Beatrice let her guard down, he moved so far out ahead that he was nearly out of sight.

“Boo Boo, we can’t keep up with the mops if you pour out that much. And don’t forget to plant flags along the way.”

“Squeal, this is mine for real this time!”

Once they had those landmarks up in places, it started to feel more real for Beatrice and the others too. Boo Boo seemed interested in the Piece-registration Screenshots which were not the same as the rock wall drawings he was used to. He must not have known the blunt weapon he had carried around for so long was capable of that. The work was not easy, but they were indeed drawing a large line out along the ground.

White Witch Philinnion stopped to wipe the sweat from her brow, jiggling her suspenders-bound breasts in the process.

“Whew. I haven’t seen anyone else out here. Does that mean it’s going to take them a while longer to figure out this security film method?”

“It was the same back when we got here first by using the ghost ship to skip all the competition in the inn town, but I really hope we don’t have any more surprises in store for us.”

Boo Boo and the others continued constructing the road while Gruagach sent ahead arrows to act as their eyes and ears. Each arrow did not cover much area, but creating grape-like clusters of those small areas helped gradually fill in their blank map. Doing that to gather the materials for Pieces was their goal for the day.

The mourning clothes girl’s somewhat lowered voice came from behind her veil.

“This scenery could look entirely different by tomorrow, couldn’t it?”

“But the road we’ve made will remain intact. We can gradually increase the strengthened area and we can register the route as a Piece back on Earth. That guarantees we can freely travel along it.”

Hermelina and Huldra were not action cops who specialized in flashy car chases and shootouts. When pursuing someone, they knew firsthand that those exciting events were less useful than slowly but surely closing in on their target using human wave tactics and door-to-door search operations.

Their ultimate objective was of course finding the Hero, but they did not need to locate her right away.

“She’s definitely around here somewhere. That much we know.” Beatrice spoke quietly while looking to the cracked land’s horizon. “She needs food and water to maintain her biological body. And if she’s left everything to a machine, that’s bound to make heat and noise. She has to leave some kind of sign of her presence if she physically exists on this land.”

They finally came across a few of the glass domes they had built before. Gruagach stabbed an arrow into those to use them as fixed observation points.

Naturally, those observation points would also be registered as Pieces.

Their Shining Weapons had plenty of storage space, so it was worth recording everything they could.

“To be honest, we can’t really expect these to last for long.”

“That’s fine. The winged arrows in the sky are all that really matter. The ones on the ground can just be imitations meant to frighten the Hero.”

Even nonfunctioning mockup security cameras were said to noticeably reduce the amount of shoplifting. These surveillance devices were real. And if no one could tell whether or not they were working from the outside, they would have to be cautious of them all.

The odds of coincidentally running across the Hero on this vast continent were slim, but for better or worse, they could control the flow of people by creating roads and scattering surveillance devices everyone had to watch out for. It was much like how the desert was a large place, but you could keep tabs on who was traversing it by setting up checkpoints along the silk road that took the optimum course across.

“This is such a barren place.” Rolled blonde ponytail Rusalka sighed and sent a light low kick into Boo Boo’s thick leg as he excitedly moved out ahead. “The glass land has no drainage at all, so getting food or even fresh water will not be easy. As big as the continent is, there might be a limited few places the Hero can actually live.”

“I wonder, I wonder, I wonder what’s for lunch,” sang Boo Boo in an adlibbed song while he worked. He sounded carefree, but that was from the viewpoint of someone who never had to worry about getting food. If he got lazy, he would starve to death.

“Tah dah. Today’s lunch is Wild Cow milk and Steamy Potato vichyssoise with Dry Wheat cereal as a topping☆”

“Boo, vichy-what? Is that some powerful human’s name???”

“It’s a cold soup made from potatoes and cream, Boo Boo.”

Philinnion sounded excited, but when you let the healer cook, you apparently got what you would be served while sick instead of something from a picnic.

A leather water bottle contained a soup apparently made by combining crushed potatoes with animal milk. It may have been more like nutritionally reinforced milk flavored with salt and pepper.

“Squeal, didn’t we have soup for breakfast too? Do you like hot water, Philinnion?”

“Not really. I love a wide variety of things: risotto, gratin, gnocchi, fried cheese, French toast, and plenty more. Although I do have to admit white stew and cheese fondue are nice too.”

“That is an impressive list of nothing but dairy products you’ve got there.”

Beatrice and Hermelina gave that annoyed response in unison, but you could not forget that her primarily Japanese diet at the Ushigashira Shrine played a role in what she would choose when actually given a choice. This alternate world came with plenty of benefits and risks, but it was also a place to get away from the restrictions of Earth.

The meal was nutritious and easy to eat, but that meant it was also reminiscent of the food given to someone with heat fatigue. Regardless, it all looked fresh and new to Boo Boo who only ever removed the blood and organs from the animal he caught and either ate it raw or cooked it just a little. His eyes widened as he crunched on the cereal in his large mouth.

“Squeal! I’ve never eaten anything so weird!!”

“My, my. But if that’s enough to surprise you, you’re in for a real treat when you try one of the pancakes with ice cream on top, which is sweet and salty just like some Ogura toast.”

Whatever she might say, Philinnion was clearly enjoying herself as she brought a hand to her mouth and smiled. There were not many tough guys worth serving a meal to quite like Boo Boo.

“Boo, this looks like it’ll get soggy, so I need to eat it fast!”

“No, Boo Boo. Make sure to chew before you swallow.”

Beatrice’s gentle warning was not enough to stop him. All she could do was rub the pig-faced giant’s back as he chowed down.

This scene might make it seem like the threat of the Hero had passed. Time passed more calmly than the white clouds in the blue sky.

But they could not just go home because they could not find her.

Hero La Signora stood at the turning points and won whenever possible. That thinking had led her to slaughter a great many (people accused of being) witches 300 years ago and she had honestly thought that oppression would help protect the witches. Since she had fled to Ground’s Nir, it was not hard to imagine what fate had awaited her on Earth, but that had not been enough to stop her.

She had been the same here in Ground’s Nir as well.

She had known there was no saving herself, but her attachment to life had led her to remake the entire world’s environment, which had caused the Iberian Orcs to be afflicted with the Red disease. But if she really had escaped the planet to break free of the short time limit, spent centuries there, and had now returned to the surface…it was impossible this was over. Whether this had crashed down on accident or on purpose, the surface was harmful to the Hero. There was no way that monster would sit idly by while her body was exposed to the time limit once more.

She would struggle.

Like a drowning person grasping at straws, she would show no restraint whatsoever.

Hermelina clapped her hands together in front of her inadequate chest.

“Okay, we got some food, so let’s get some exercise.”

Noon had passed and the latter half of the day was beginning, but what they had to do was the same. They rolled the large barrels, spilled out the adhesive, and spread it around with mops. However, they had to think about the trip back this time.

“Squeal, should we not head out too far?”

“That’s right, Boo Boo. But it would be easier if we used up all the adhesive. That’s less weight we have to carry back.”

A shadow appeared overhead.

They looked up to see thick clouds hiding the sun that had been beating down on them a moment before. And they were quite dark. The sun had yet to set, but the sweat covering their skin started to feel as cold as ice water.

“It might start raining,” said cross sword and belts Wildefrau while viewing the sky like the others.

Hermelina somewhat frantically waved a hand to gather attention while rolling a different large barrel from Boo Boo’s.

“Even if it’s just sprinkling, we should head back. Safety first!”

“Is it really that dangerous?”

Beatrice frowned, but the police officer would not back down.

“Did you forget this glass continent has no drainage at all, Beatrice? If it starts pouring, who knows what will happen! We can’t see our own road if there’s a layer of water on the ground, and what if it completely floods to create a pond or lake? And what if lightning strikes while we’re standing in it?”

“…”

“There’s still a lot we don’t know about this new continent. We need to be cautious and think a step ahead before we get stranded!”

Meanwhile, Boo Boo felt a raindrop on his large nose.

Philinnion held the brim of her pointed witch’s hat down with both hands.

“Hyah! It really is raining!”

“Gruagach, launch one of those drone arrows! Don’t lose sight of the way back to the Next Voyager!!”

They had planted flags at set intervals for Piece registration purposes, but those were only general estimates. They could not take the shortest path between them. The glass continent was cracked due to the temperature difference, so if they moved thoughtlessly along, they could fall into an unseen ravine like someone running their car into the ditch during a flood.

“Wah!”

“Watch out, Boo Boo!”

The nearly-4m giant slipped, so Beatrice quickly caught him with the gauntlet she had enlarged with Magic. The ground was made of glass, so it was very slippery when wet.

But while they had been rolling heavy barrels and mopping around the surface on the way there, they only had to walk on the way back. They would arrive back more quickly than their experience told them they would.

However…

“Wh-what?” Armored leotard Rusalka groaned while clinging to mourning clothes Gruagach. “I hear cracking from all over! Is the ground breaking apart around us!?”

“But it isn’t night yet!” tearfully responded Huldra while waving her pompoms around.

“It’s the rain,” said Beatrice as if cursing her bad luck with water while her tattered cloak kept the rain off of her. “The cold rain is rapidly cooling the land, so the continent is going to break before night falls this time!!”

“Don’t stray from the road! The cracking won’t happen where we solidified the ground with adhesive like window security film! It’s safe there!”

Hermelina was right, but…

“I-I can’t see anything… Wh-wh-where’s the road!?” lamented Philinnion while trying to protect herself from the rain using her large hat.

Any assumptions of safety were null and void here. Even water a few centimeters deep could reflect the light like a mirror and make the terrain below unidentifiable.

They would have to rely on Gruagach’s memory from viewing everything from the sky.

“Do not worry, everyone! I know where all the dangerous ravines are. If you avoid those by following my instructions-…kyah!?”

Before she could finish, a nearby piece of land burst up from the water like a submarine making an emergency surfacing. If Rusalka had not immediately tugged on the mourning clothes girl’s arm, the cracked cliff face might have sliced off her jaw.

It rose to a height of 10 meters in no time.

A solid glass cliff towered up right in front of them.

“Wh-what?”

“The land was already full of cracks, so it couldn’t support the weight of the rain and flipped over! If you don’t want to be hit by that killer seesaw, then run! If you’re caught in the collapse, you’ll either be launched into the heavens or dropped into the depths! Either way, you’re screwed!!”

This really was a new land.

The usual assumptions did not apply.

“At least it’s one in the afternoon,” said Beatrice while glancing carefully around. “If this happened near sunset, our soaked bodies would have frozen solid. Everyone but Wildefrau would have been wiped out.”

Luckily, the water would not remove the adhesive from the surface. The Piece-registration Screenshots inside their Shining Weapons would not be wasted. They had to use their boots to feel for the safety of the road they had created.

As some parts of the land sank and others rose up, the previously flat glass continent gained some extreme height differences. The scenery changed and it was easy to lose their sense of direction, almost like giant fingers had grabbed them and chucked them into a maze. And as Hermelina had said, these were seesaws. The slant depended on where the rainwater gathered and there was no set form for it to take. Learning the terrain was meaningless when it would drastically change with time.

Boo Boo and the others had seen the many racks and large ravines after the continent had been transformed, but they had not actually seen the change occurring.

It was truly cataclysmic.

This geographic drama normally took place over the span of eons, but it happened in an instant here.

“Wouldn’t it be easier if I froze all the rainwater on the surface? That would even fill in the ravines!”

“That’s not a bad idea, but couldn’t it actually cool the glass even further and make the cracking worse!?”

They discussed different ideas while returning along the snaking path of their road.

“Th-there it is. Squeal, it’s Kallikantzaros’s boat!”

Boo Boo was right.

The Next Voyager could be seen from their viewpoint on the ground. That was their safe point. Beatrice breathed a sigh of relief, but she also knew relaxing would be dangerous. Seeing the goal in the distance did not change the danger below their feet.

Yes.

Beatrice was definitely being cautious in that moment. That is undeniable.

And that may have been why she managed to notice just a hint of the truth.

“What?”

“What is it, Beatrice? You’ll fall if you stand at the edge of that cliff!”

Philinnion’s double cloak blew in the rain as she shouted over, but the Holy Swordswoman did not respond.

Something was moving at the bottom of the ravine.

The bottom looked more than 10 meters down. The ground they were standing on had to be even thicker than that. And something was definitely moving in the ocean created by the rainwater rushing in like a waterfall since the land had no other drainage.

No, it was in the actual ocean below that.

With the thick glass land on top, the ocean had to be an area of death. There was no way a human could be lurking there even with Magic to strengthen then.

So this was not the Hero.

But was that any reason to relax?

For one thing, who had created the artificial atmospheric barrier that covered the entire planet? The Hero had only given the command, but…after her death? After she went to sleep? Anyway, for the centuries afterwards, some other being must have completed the work.

They had already seen a few beings in Ground’s Nir who could live for centuries without issue: Strigona, Abyss, and Sibyl to name a few.

Something reflected the light in the depths of the thick seawater.

(Is that a blade? A sword with a jewel in the grip?)

She was not given time to process her question.

The very next moment, it rocketed up while spinning.

Had it been thrown?

Normal ballistic logic could not explain it. It may have been like taking a submarine’s anti-ship missile that lit a booster after leaving the water and adding a helicopter’s main rotor onto that…except even that was not quite right.

The seawater and the land were no obstacle.

It entirely ignored the ravines and sliced through the thick glass land itself more easily than through soft custard.

“Boo Boo!?”

By the time she turned around and shouted, it was over

The color red was splattered everywhere.

The double-edged Hero’s Sword had shot up from the ground at Boo Boo’s feet and plunged hilt deep into his thick stomach.

Part 12

Everyone owned a mobile phone these days, but Iroka, oldest of the three maid sisters, entered a phone booth. That had long been the standard method of hiding the source of a call. But before she could lift the receiver and insert a coin she had used a special chemical to wipe clean of fingerprints, a wrinkly voice descended from the narrow ceiling.

“Do not call Ushigashira’s general reception number. You will only access an ignorant part-timer there, so your serious tone will only confuse them.”

“I’m shocked. How far does your influence reach?”

“I have more honor than those European-raised knights, I can tell you that. I believe they recently had that newcomer Demon Lord Tselika offered to them on their altar. They were awfully excited about finally getting a real one.”

The phone booth itself was made of transparent acrylic panels. Bespectacled Iroka glanced out at the people walking past outside, but she continued speaking into the receiver.

There was clearly not an attic-like space in here and she knew there was no one on top of the roof, yet here was that old woman’s voice. She might even get a response if she addressed the voice in the Detached Magic Palace’s bathroom.

“What do you want to know?” asked the voice.

“What does it mean for that simulator to be an odd Over the Wall? And how does that relate to our master’s safety?”

“You’re in a hurry to get an answer, aren’t you?”

Just listening to the old woman’s voice, she may have sounded sincere. But that was ignoring the fact that no one knew how much of their personal lives she could see or how she could see what she did see.

“Demon Lord Tselika was really only partway there. Being Over the Wall means you are a being that can transfer its entire physical body to Earth from another world and stay here long term.”

“That isn’t possible.”

“If it really wasn’t, no one would have been worried about the Red-afflicted Iberian Orcs invading Earth.”

“…”

“Oh, were you not even aware of that threat? Then your master must be a very kind person. Although she may carry too much of a burden on her own.” The old woman’s voice calmly continued. “Also, the Iberian Orcs are a species that aim to evolve into the strongest possible lifeform by reproducing with as wide a variety of plants and animals as possible. If they could transfer their physical bodies through the Gates, then there had to be an original lifeform that gave them that ability.”

“Then…you did that as well?”

“I am something that was named Tiamat when the humans ‘discovered’ me in the other world. Although just like the mythological salamander and the actual animal, I had no connection to the original myths.”

Part of the problem was how none of this was provable when the old woman would not show herself. Hearing a voice from a phone booth ceiling where there was nowhere to hide might seem supernatural at first, but that could probably be reproduced using cutting-edge tech like the small microphones and speakers used for smartphones and tablets.

Bespectacled Iroka took a deep breath that moved her large breasts up and down and then asked a question.

“Then what is the simulator?”

“It is no more than an Earth product. It never needed to cross the barrier in the first place. But it was also no more than a box that lacked the arms and legs needed to have true freedom here on Earth.”

“What is that supposed to-…wait, are you kidding?”

“The simulator indirectly reached for that nagging desire by controlling stocks and other financial activity and predicting frightening natural disasters and wars to effectively manipulated the entire human race. But that was not enough to satisfy it. It continued pursuing the perfect arms and legs.”

“It wanted…a body. But what does that have to do with the Detached Magic Palace and my master!?”

“It may have wanted to deliver the finishing blow itself. And even if it cannot do anything as fancy as us, anyone can bring technological data back from that world in the form of Pieces.”

There was no hesitation in the old woman’s voice.

“So what if there was a perfect artificial body in the other world? What if the simulator could acquire the plans in the form of data and attempted to construct it on Earth? It would want to contain all of its functions in that body. And it would do whatever it took to accomplish that.”

Part 13

Abyss// …

Part 14

“Wait, Boo Boo! Don’t pull it out!”

Beatrice shouted with her tattered gray cloak fluttering behind her, but the situation had already moved on. A wet splattering sound lingered in her ears. It must have been a nearly reflexive action. After doubling over, Boo Boo had grabbed the hilt of the Hero’s Sword piercing his gut and forcibly pulled it out along with the decorative green string.

His bleeding immediately increased.

The gem-laden double-edged sword must have been acting as a plug. Blood poured out with enough force to overwhelm the pouring rain. The amount of red was dizzying, but Beatrice just barely managed to stay conscious. This was not over yet. A lethal amount of blood loss was determined by body weight, so even after a lethal amount for a human, a nearly-4m giant like that Iberian Orc might still have a chance.

“Philinnion, prepare a recovery potion! And, Wildefrau, it can be temporary, but freeze Boo Boo’s wound! Letting the rain wash away his blood would be the worst thing right now!! If you can’t do that, then I’ll cauterize it!!”

“What…?”

Despite being in a thin leotard, Rusalka forgot all about the cold rain hitting her as she watched something.

Her eyes were on the Hero’s Sword that had stabbed into the glass ground after Boo Boo tossed it aside. The scenery was gradually changing around that. Boo Boo’s spilled blood was defying gravity. Several red strands seemed to draw curves in the air and they were all gathering at the sword’s golden guard.

The blood was all being absorbed and taken inside the sword.

“Damn you!!”

It was strange and ominous enough for Beatrice to grab the decorated hilt. She wanted to pull it from the ground and throw it far away.

However.

Red electricity raced from her back to her fingertips.

Almost like it was being sucked in toward the sword.

…She should have considered it.

Boo Boo and the other Iberian Orcs had the rare ability to use the Gates and travel to Earth. They had also suffered from the Red disease caused by the environmental changes brought by the artificial atmospheric barrier built by the Hero’s persistence.

Had that been an unfortunate side effect or was it a part of the plan? They may have been intentionally modified by that external source. To give them the form that someone else needed for their own ends.

Also, the red electricity that had critically damaged Beatrice’s body and Shining Weapon had rained down around the time the artificial atmospheric barrier was destroyed. The attack that hit the Holy Swordswoman had been absorbed when she had contacted it with her sword-shaped device.

Almost like it was taking a roundabout route back to where it had originally come from.

“Gh, ah, ahhh!?”

Just as humans like Beatrice used their Shining Weapon devices to alter their appearance, the Hero’s Sword with a jewel in the hilt acted like a data-absorbing USB virus when it was inserted into one of the devices.

The artificial atmospheric barrier was glass. That meant it was made of silicon, the same thing used for semiconductors. And the Iberian Orcs inside the log or steel beam of a Shining Weapon proved that souls could be saved to those devices as data.

They had been lured in.

A direct pathway had been established.

By absorbing the blood and receiving the data, it had everything it needed.

“Where’s the Hero?”

Beatrice tried to let go, but the intense electricity kept her from moving like she wanted.

They had not found a dried-up mummy or a figure frozen in cold sleep. A flesh-and-blood human could only stay in this world for a few days, but this was not an opponent who could be defeated by just waiting out the timer.

Beatrice forced her numbed tongue to move as she desperately shouted.

“Was there never an answer to that question? Is she about to be created anew here? Dammit!”

This was a single giant glass continent.

It was a sterile medium where not even microbes could be found. It was a Petri dish designed for the growth of new cells.

The thin and beautiful Hero’s Sword swelled out from within. No, all the blood it had absorbed was flowing back out through all the cracks in its component pieces. Was it like a mist, like a foaming substance, or like a beehive? Whatever the case, the apparent volume increased and finally took the shape of a giant red jewel. The smooth object was taller than a person and there was a tree enclosed within. The shape alone was similar to what they had seen in the depths of the Underworld.

Death. Red.

And.

Only the sword’s hilt stuck out at the very top. The blade was stabbed into the top of the tree.

Then it turned like a key.

That was the signal. The distinction between organic and inorganic was immaterial. The sword at the center acted as a fuse, the signal passed down the tree, and the red outer shell exploded. Something both beautiful and sinister was blasted in every direction.

“Ghh!?”

Pushed by its intensity, Beatrice fell back. Hermelina and the others did the same while supporting badly injured Boo Boo.

There was a red dust not seen with a normal explosion.

“…The Hero.”

There was something inside it.

No, someone.

“The Hero, La Signora!!!!!”

Part 15

Abyss// Have you finished searching for mistakes?

Abyss// There was no Hero. Because her flesh and blood was to be created anew.

Abyss// That is the answer.

Chapter 4: The Hero

Part 1

“Phew.”

The Pure Knight with his polished silver armor and large shield let out a sigh a short distance away from the hustle and bustle of the inn town. This was not an issue of physical exhaustion. He had spent a little too much money throughout all this. Everyone was caught up in some kind of fever, but no one actually knew if the new continent really held enough intellectual property to be worth a gold rush. The competition and negotiation in the market was partially a game of chicken, but they would lose everything if the glass continent turned out to be barren and not worth a single wooden gear. In the worst case, it could even bring a major depression to the small island.

(Besides, that Iberian Orc and those Level Cappers are always a step ahead of us when it comes to that new land.)

He knew them fairly well, but not well enough to get a share of their profits. These were two different things. If he did not compete properly, he could not profit properly either.

He heard another youth call out to him from behind.

“The cargo’s all loaded. We can leave at any time!”

“The thunder’s already rumbling. Are you sure this is a good idea?”

“If you’re talking about the waterproofing, we could drop that thing in the ocean and it would be fine, so what’s a little rain? A direct lighting strike might be a different matter, though.”

“I guess worrying over it isn’t gonna help. We’ll never make back any of this money if we let the other Guilds get ahead of us again.”

“Yeah.”

“Gather the front line group on the ship. We’re leaving right away!”

The Pure Knight shouted that, but he added another comment to himself.

“We’re finally ready to move up to the front of the pack.”

Part 2

The Hero.

Hundreds of years ago, she had killed a great many (people accused of being) witches. She had truly believed that would help the witches. And after doing all that, she had fled to the world of Ground’s Nir, but the environment had not suited her body. She had not known how to return, but after a dizzying amount of preparation time, she had finally appeared upon this glass continent with a new physical body.

The time limit in this world would still remain for her. No matter how extensive her preparations, that body could only survive a few days here.

Which meant the Hero would pour everything into those few days. She would return to Earth. She had to have some kind of plan for that. And this was the madwoman whose plan had once covered the entire planet with an artificial atmospheric barrier to terraform it with no regard for the native lifeforms.

It was blatantly obvious whether she was an enemy or an ally.

Both because of what she had done in the past and because she had not changed in the present. What she had done to Boo Boo here was everything to Beatrice. Even if that had been a necessary step.

If the Hero returned to Earth, it would begin anew.

Witch hunts were taboo now, so she might use a different term. She might even create a brand new social phenomenon. But the essence of it would remain unchanged. Whether she used social media or big data, she would continue oppressing the minority and throwing them into the fire.

Philinnion and Hermelina could also tell what was happening here.

“You’re kidding, right? Does this mean we were set up by Abyss?”

“The problem with her is she’s an ultimate weapon. We need to consider the possibility that she was hijacked by someone else.”

The silhouette inside the unnaturally red dust took a step toward them.

“Kh.”

Beatrice reached to her back and drew the giant Shining Weapon that resembled a log or a steel beam.

She slipped her fingers through the holes opened for human use and firmly held it at the ready.

A magic circle appeared in the air behind her back.

“Philinnion, Hermelina! Protect the Gates!! Don’t let her escape this new continent!!”

“Wh-why do you always shove me onto the front line!? I am a healer!! Plus, I’m focusing on treating Boo Boo right now!”

“More importantly, keeping the Hero from Earth means slowly killing her here. Are you prepared to do that, Beatrice!?”

This was not like Demon Lord Tselika who had been born in this world. The Holy Swordswoman knew the agony of being stuck here firsthand as of a few days ago.

She gulped.

But she still nodded her head.

“I don’t know what the Hero wants to do once she’s back on Earth. She might experience some Urashima Tarou-esque despair upon seeing the Earth centuries later. But she assisted and intensified a social phenomenon that slaughtered people by the tens of thousands. Whatever happens, I want some assurance of safety. Even if we do let her return to Earth, I first want to make sure she’s someone we can defeat if we have to!!”

The cold rain that was cracking the glass land gradually removed the red dust from the air. And the person who had been hidden by that veil took another casual step toward them.

The secret was finally revealed.

She had short blonde hair with a bluish gradient.

She had fine white skin and a powerful will in her angled eyes.

Her waist was more slender than anything, but her ample breasts seemed to defy gravity.

Since she had only just been reborn, she wore no clothing to keep the rain off of her body.

Which meant…

(Are her physical abilities not being strengthened by the Percentage-type Magic since that takes the form of equipment?)

“This is our chance!”

“Wait, no, Rusalka!!”

Beatrice’s thoughts had been heading in a similar direction to Rusalka’s, but if mourning clothes Gruagach had not immediately raised her voice, what would have become of that leotard girl who held a large 9-shaped scythe and had a magic circle floating out past her empty hand?

The almost inhuman-looking naked Hero swung her right hand to the side. That hand was supposedly empty.

A moment later.

Slice? No. More like…

Kaboom.

“…!!!???”

Had that attack reused the vanishing remains of the red membrane?

It must have been disposable by design and it burned as bright an orange as heated steel. The nails at the end of her fingers glowed unnaturally and they left parallel scratches in space itself as she charged forward.

Like an iaido expert, she passed by with a fearsomely sharp slash.

The deep boom of an explosion struck their ears after a short delay.

“Gruagach!! Rusalka!!”

They had not been directly hit. If they had, they seriously might have been obliterated. Rusalka was crouching down while Gruagach protected the smaller girl. If the mourning dress girl had not taken immediate action, that would have been it. But the phenomenon occurring before Beatrice’s eyes was so strange she forgot to even call out to them.

That had been a test for the Hero.

She showed no hint of irritation at having missed.

And.

The real attack would be coming soon.

Some things gathered around the naked woman’s right hand. They were a silver clasp, a decorative blue thread wrapped around to prevent slipping, a grip carved out of a great beast’s white fang, various decorations made from pure gold and gems, a bundle of silicon wafers and wiring thinner than hairs, and a supposedly-broken broad blade. That was the sword that had targeted Boo Boo from the ocean and absorbed his blood to create the Hero’s body.

Its role as a fuse for the red explosion was over.

The Hero’s Sword had regained its original shape and power.

Meaning…

(A Shining…Weapon?)

“Not good!! Gruagach, focus on getting Rusalka away from there!!”

Beatrice shouted to the mourning dress girl while she adjusted her hand on her Shining Weapon’s giant grip and prepared to summon eight lines of heat. But by then, the change had already begun.

There was full-body leather innerwear that gave off a chocolate shine.

There was cushioning at the joints of the armor to prevent it from pinching the skin.

There were decorative ribbons and cloud-like bunches of wool.

There was beautiful blue armor that looked like it would blend into the color of the planet, a skirt that was left open in the front, and green-glittering decorations.

Overall, the coloration was reminiscent of the planet seen from space. The green, blue, and soil-like dark brown seemed to represent the place she had yearned for so long.

A Shining Weapon was the device a human used to control their Magic.

The green armor protecting the bottom of her chest and the blue soles of her boots were that Magic.

And as soon as that Percentage-style magic was equipped to the Hero, whose short bluish blonde hair was wetly plastered to her cheeks, it would rapidly increase her physical abilities by some factor.

The Hero did not dodge the eight simultaneous lines of heat that could slice right through a tank. They were headed straight toward her beautiful body, but the instant they touched the cleavage left exposed by the armor that represented the blue sky, they were bent and blasted in different directions.

Philinnion shouted in a panic with her shorts straining.

“How much Elemental Resistance does she have!? That attack was the Seven Flames!”

The Hero’s gaze casually followed Gruagach as she fled across the glass land while pretty much carrying Rusalka in her arms.

Yes, casually. Crushing people was no more than that to her.

“!!”

Beatrice could not predict how much Magic this opponent could deflect, so with her tattered gray cloak fluttering, she instead aimed the powerful lines of heat into the space between the Hero and Gruagach.

The glass continent had already grown terribly cracked by the temperature difference brought by the rain, so it shattered in the blink of an eye as this heat propagated through it. Thanks to the heavy rainwater that had built up, the split land flipped like a seesaw, creating a giant cliff face in front of them. This would lift up and fling the Hero into the air.

“Thank…you!”

“Wait, don’t let your guard down yet!!”

Gruagach had finally escaped the source of the threat with the younger girl in her arms and her braid loop swaying behind her, but Beatrice shouted back while glaring upwards.

She was looking to the very top of the cliff.

The Hero looked far too casual as she appeared there with double-edged sword in hand. That massive height difference had not been enough to launch her into the air. She spun her deadly tool like a baton and said something.

“So this is the only thing that returns to me.”

Her voice was far deeper and icier than her lovely appearance suggested. Was that a sign of how upset she was? She brushed back her blonde hair with her other hand and stared down at the rain-wet glass continent.

“Hoping for too much leads to failure. And I can get by with just this, so it all works out. That said…this could be a problem.”

“…”

“This is not enough to know if the conditions have been met. It is too soon to say how this will end. Where is the exit to Earth? I was assuming there would be some obvious tunnel or something.”

“Gh…”

Boo Boo slowly stood up while receiving support from the giant ice gauntlet created by Wildefrau in her cross sword and belts. Philinnion’s recovery potion must not have taken effect yet. His wound was frozen like sherbet to forcibly stop the bleeding.

“What are you talking about?” he asked. “I know what you did, but if you say you aren’t like that anymore, we might not have to fight here!!”

“No, you know nothing. The more someone claims to know everything, the less they actually know, my future pork dinner.” The Hero laughed in the sensual body she had created by absorbing a certain someone’s blood. “Someone was bound to arrive here in the oh-so-distant future. So if I simply waited for the conditions to be met, someone would construct a way back for me. I must win whenever possible. And until it is possible, I will wait. I need do nothing myself. If I take what someone else has created, I can safely return. However…hey, worker ants. My theory is correct, isn’t it? Your lack of tension means this can’t have been a one-way trip for you.”

“You really think we’ll-…!”

Wildefrau was enraged, but Philinnion stopped her with a hand. That suspender boobs girl had more experience than the ice nudist.

A short distance away, Hermelina laughed it off while holding her metal staff at the ready.

“Were you hoping to get some information out of us using cheap provocation? If you want an answer, then come and get it. I don’t care if this plan has been in the works for centuries. Now that you’ve got a physical body again, you can only last a few days at the most in this world. Act above it all if you like, but you’re the one that’s in trouble stuck out in the ocean with no clue which way to go, right?”

The Hero’s short blonde hair with a blue gradient shook along with her head.

A magic circle glowed at her forehead as she answered from atop the cliff.

“Then I shall take what I need.”

In a flash.

That was the only way to describe it.

“!!”

It was light.

It looked a lot like the linear light of a sword slash. The Hero in her armor and open-front skirt turned into streaming lines of blue, green, and brown as she swept toward Hermelina.

Her glowing fingernails from before were no comparison.

She was like a bolt of lightning skimming the surface.

An explosive boom arrived a moment later and more than half of the metal boat Hermelina had used as a shield was torn away. Orange sparks flew and Hermelina very nearly had her side ripped open. Distance was meaningless to someone who could move at speeds like that.

Was the sword-wielding Hero really this much more powerful than them?

“Squeal!!”

“Don’t panic!”

A lightning strike, a fall, a plummet – call it whatever you like, the beam of light made from blue, green, and brown returned to being the Hero in her light blue skirt that was reminiscent of the waves as it fluttered above her leather innerwear. The armor surrounding the bottom of her breasts strained as if from weight. Hermelina chose not to fight it, stuck her legs out from her robe’s slits, and let the momentum of the blow push her back along the rain-slick glass land. Everyone was defenseless in the moment they landed. The Fighter Priest raised her voice while crouching low to clear a line of fire for the others.

“Fire!!”

Beatrice, Rusalka, Wildefrau, and Gruagach sent long-range attacks from four different Elements in from four different directions. Explosive booms, flashes of light, and filthy dust filled the air. Even the Sage’s mastery of all Elements had been restricted to one at a time and she would stop attacking if she had to deal with more than one at once. Elemental Resistance was easy enough to start on, but mastering it required an absurd amount of Experience Points. 100% nullifying multiple simultaneous attacks was extremely difficult.

Except.

That assumption was overturned.

“So is that all you have?”

“You’re…kidding. That didn’t even scratch her!?”

Philinnion was so shocked she stopped healing Boo Boo.

Meanwhile, Beatrice did not let up. Freezing up would not improve this unexpected turn of events.

(If there’s a trick to this, I have to keep attacking until I figure something out!!)

“Now, now. That sounds really annoying, so do you really think I’m going to play along?”

With that exasperated voice, a magic circle appeared in front of the Hero’s forehead. There was an explosion of sound and light as the Hero transformed into a planetary-colored beam of light that took a curving path toward Beatrice’s side.

Beatrice could not hope to keep up with light.

The log or steel beam of a Shining Weapon could not protect her in time, so it was instead the nearly-4m giant who held his wound and clenched his teeth as he moved forward more swiftly.

“Gh!?”

“Boo Boo!!”

The noise was like a traffic accident. Specifically, a head-on collision with a large dump truck. But Boo Boo managed to stop the Hero. The mixture of streaming blue and green lines returned to human form and was pushed back at the last second. The tightness of tension could be seen in her exposed upper chest and thighs.

This was not a case of locked blades.

For one thing, Boo Boo no longer had a Shining Weapon.

The Hero’s Sword had dug deep into his thick arm. Red blood flowed down the blade until it stained the hilt’s gem and decorative thread and finally dripped to the wet glass ground.

Beatrice forgot all about the cold rain as a scorching heat started to fill her mind, but Boo Boo did not even look back her way.

“I don’t know what anyone means when you talk about those tricky machine things.”

“Hm. So that wasn’t enough to slice the arm clean off.”

“But you aren’t the same as Beatrice. You aren’t using Magic to deflect things. You’re more like me!!”

“Well, I am made from you.” A sticky smile appeared on the Hero’s lips as she adjusted her grip on the hilt wrapped in a green thread. “With an Iberian Orc’s absurdly powerful muscles, you can restrain most any Magic attack with brute force, can’t you? The specifics of that Red disease were unexpected, but I was placing external pressures on you to direct your evolution.”

“!?”

“Surprised? Well, now that actual humans are here, I no longer need that alternate plan of creating a sturdy body that can live in this world. …I only need to torture some information out of those humans and learn how they do things. Then I can learn how to return to Earth.”

The top of her chest and the front of her skirt were left open to improve movement range and mobility, but was it also a sign that she was confident in her body?

The green armor covering the bottom of the blonde Hero’s chest strained as she shook the sword up and down while it was still embedded in Boo Boo’s arm. It was like she was widening the wound and increasing the pain.

But it would not come out.

He gathered strength in his arm to use his powerful muscles like a vise and trap the blade.

And he had his other hand.

He clenched it hard as a rock and sent it slicing through the air toward the Hero’s face from the side.

“Oops.”

With that silly word, fresh blood flowed out.

The Hero had broken the muscular bonds to forcibly remove the double-edged sword and then she had stepped back out of the way.

But she had dodged.

Even though she had taken that simultaneous attack from Beatrice, Wildefrau, and the others head-on. Was that because she altered the Iberian Orcs’ evolution for her plan? Because the Hero had the same sort of body, could an Iberian Orc and only an Iberian Orc harm her?

“What…did you say?”

Blood dripped from Boo Boo’s arm, but there was no sign of normal fear or pain on his face.

But not because he had grown careless thanks to fluffy blonde Philinnion’s recovery potions. His emotions were much hotter, like oozing lava. He may honestly not have been feeling any pain at the moment.

He forcibly tensed his muscles and the bleeding stopped.

“What did you say you were going to do to Beatrice and the others?”

“Hm, I thought I had turned you into a gentler and more benevolent species so you were easier to use as a material, but it looks like you can put on a manly face if you try, giant piggy.”

It was true Boo Boo may have approached this differently not that long ago. He might have suffered on his own because he insisted that fighting was wrong but was unable to run away from a fight.

But he was different now.

He had found someone he was willing to risk his life to protect. And these people had worked themselves to utter exhaustion to save him. So he could no longer waste that life. He could not place himself at the bottom of the list out of a sense of self-sacrifice. He knew that would be the same as spitting on the efforts of those who had saved him.

He could be selfish.

He could be greedy.

He could direct righteous anger at anyone who attempted to smash that happiness. Befriending them or making up with them could wait until later.

He did not know if this was a good change. He may have been breaking his own rule to only kill if it was to live or to eat. He may have been falling to the level of a mere animal.

But.

He was done laughing or sobbing.

He would not let anyone in the world take them away from him.

He had sworn it to himself.

“Say it again. What are you going to do to Beatrice and the others!?”

“Torture them to drag some information out of them. Until I have everything I need to return to Earth.”

He did not need to hear anything more.

When he stepped powerfully on the glass land, it shattered. Some pieces of the new continent floated up from the force and he grabbed a large piece in each hand. Was he inspired by the small shields some of the humans used, or by the silver trays used in the Girl’s Grill? Viewed as a tray, he grabbed them by the edge so he could use the thick jagged shards as makeshift striking weapons. The Hero spun her sword around and aimed the tip at her enemy while appearing to enjoy herself.

And.

A gust of wind scattered the cold rain as Boo Boo and La Signora clashed head on.

Part 3

Boo Boo had given up his usual partner to save Beatrice, so he no longer had a primary weapon. Both his hands were empty. He was at a terrible disadvantage against the Hero who wielded a double-edged sword likely sharp enough to sever a finger at a touch and who could transform into flowing beams of light to move around like lightning.

However.

All assumptions were overturned by what sounded like a heavy bell ringing.

It was those shards of glass.

He was not using his fists directly, but it still might seem like those would shatter and be sliced apart in a direct clash.

But that did not happen.

A sword’s blade did not cut just by pushing against something. It gained the power to slice when it was swung forcefully down. With the Hero, the blade could always have Magic added in, but just like slicing through thin rubber with a heated wire, the length of contact determined the level of damage.

So if he hit the sword with a single attack and knocked it back instantly, its cutting edge would fail and the glass would survive. It was a lot like making constant points of impact perpendicular to the blade’s line of motion to derail it from that invisible path. Of course, this was a superhuman feat of strength and minute angle adjustments.

But at the same time, the short-haired Hero was far from normal herself.

First, there was her sword. When a blade failed to cut its target, it could chip and repeated powerful blows could even break it, but it showed no sign of even bending from the constant blows from the Iberian Orc’s giant arms. Also, even if the sword itself was sturdy…no, the sturdier the sword was, the more of the impacts would reach its wielder. It was the same idea as a solid car and a soft car. This would have shattered a normal human’s wrists or shoulders, but the Hero in the cleavage-exposing green armor kept a thin smile on her face.

Both of them were extraordinary.

“Damn you!!”

They had not held a strategy meeting or exchanged any kind of sign via eye contact or hand signals, but while Boo Boo moved forward, Beatrice made attacks of her own in order to support him. While he blocked the Hero’s view with his giant body, she sent lines of heat past his head, below his arms, or around his hips to attack the Hero from a blind spot.

She did not need to land a fatal blow.

She did not care if these attacks were all deflected.

She just needed to distract the Hero enough for Boo Boo to get a direct hit on La Signora whose appearance represented the sky, the land, and the sea.

“Heh heh heh hah!”

Just as the Hero’s Sword twirled around like a baton, all of the ultra-high-speed heat lines were shot down. Beatrice did not let the result bother her. The Hero had not just taken the hit, but that was a sign she wanted to focus on her clash with Boo Boo. She needed all her strength to deal with the equally-strong mass of muscle in front of her.

So what did Beatrice need to do if she wanted to distract the Hero even further?

After some thought, she gave a shout with her tattered gray cloak fluttering.

“Huldra! Prepare your claws!!”

“Hwehhh???”

“Your attacks have a percentage chance of insta-killing the target regardless of damage level, right? So the Hero’s tough body, HP, and VIT don’t matter! And, Philinnion, prepare a recovery potion! Heal Boo Boo’s wounds to keep his strength up!! Throw the test tube at him when the timing is right!!”

Pink magic circles appeared in the air near the pink-twintailed girl’s wrists and then her Shining Weapon metal claws poked out from her pompoms.

The Hero’s eyes wavered a bit while she swung her sword almost too quickly to follow with the naked eye. Boo Boo was right in front of her, but she was unsure what her primary target should be.

…Of course, if this really was their crucial plan, they would not shout it so loudly in front of the enemy. They only needed to increase their theoretical options so the Hero had a harder time deciding what to do. This short clash had been enough for Beatrice to realize only Boo Boo could get in a meaningful attack here. The question was how to help him do that. That had to be her focus.

“Hermelina, Wildefrau, Rusalka! Get your Screenshots ready! One of you get to the top of the cliff while the other two take up positions in a cross formation. If we observe her from all three axes, we can figure out her patterns of behavior and predict what she’ll do. Switch to high-speed filming mode to get footage at 10,000 frames a second and tell Boo Boo whatever you figure out about her idiosyncrasies! And, Gruagach, contact Demon Lord Tselika!! If you see an opening, hit the Hero with an attack. Tselika’s power can break through Iberian Orc level muscles!!”

Standing there gawking was not going to help. Both sides of this fight had never met the other before. And the Hero had been resurrected after centuries, so she would not know how far human technology had progressed. Even with the standard Gate, it sounded like she had predicted something like it but had never actually seen one. If they could trip up the Hero, confuse her, and slow her decision making to help Boo Boo as much as possible, they would consider that a huge success.

Bluffs were fine and it did not matter if they were no match for her strength. With a battle at this level, they were not going to stick to 1-on-1. They would not give up and they would not abandon Boo Boo no matter what.

This was a Party battle.

The Hero had challenged him on her own, but he was not alone. The girls here would not allow it. No matter how ridiculously powerful their opponent was, they would not abandon their precious allyl!!

“In that case.” After some sticky laughter, the Hero’s sword tip shifted slightly away from Boo Boo. “I will take the opposite tack. I will nip every threat in the bud until you are alone once more.”

“…!?”

She was clearly preparing to send a beam of light in that direction, but Boo Boo moved in the way. Yes, it did not matter if it was possible or not. If he missed even one shot, one of his precious friends would die. …With that fear and concern planted in him, she could hold him in place. During a battle fought at dizzying speeds, a nonexistent grim reaper bound both their hearts and pushed them onward.

They were both risking their lives, but they could not fight at their own pace in this game of chicken.

“Heh heh.”

The Hero, who wore an ocean blue skirt over chocolate-colored leather, may have interpreted her elevated heartbeat as a pleasure signal because she laughed like some gauge’s needle had swung too far to one side.

“Ha ha ha! Ah ha ha ha ha ha!! I see, I see!! So that’s it, is it!?”

“Kh.”

“Don’t let her get to you, Boo Boo! We can protect ourselves, so you focus on overpowering the Hero!!”

Beatrice roared back.

And she actually had a good reason for telling him that.

The Hero was making the psychological effort needed to convert her tension into elation. That meant the fear would have ensnared her if she had not forced her way through it. She would not have done that with an insignificant amount of pressure.

Boo Boo attacked with the solid glass trays that he held by the edge. Striking the Hero’s Sword with those was not enough to break that Shining Weapon. But so what? Who said he had to handle this alone?

“Boo Boo!!”

They did not need to prearrange their timing.

The nearly-4m pig-faced giant clashed with the extraordinary blade, but not just once this time. When his one blunt weapon deflected the sword, the other one targeted it from the side. Beatrice released explosive flames at the same time. They drew a large arc toward the opposite side of the Hero’s Sword.

It was like holding the weapon in a giant vise.

The scream of straining metal rang from the Hero’s hands.

“Kh.”

Before it broke, the Hero’s Sword flew up into empty air like someone letting go of the spring compressed between their fingers. Even if she knew nothing of the Gates, that device had to be the source of her Magic.

She must not have wanted it destroyed because she let go when it approached its limit.

But once she let go, it was all over.

The Percentage-style Magic that was her clothing would not disappear so easily, but she would no longer be able to make commands and actively shoot that deadly Magic. An Iberian Orc’s bodily tissue controlled by human cunning was still a threat, but her strength was equal to Boo Boo’s. They could overpower her now if Beatrice and the others supported him while he continued grappling.

This was what they had been waiting for.

“Now’s our chance!!”

The red-armored, white-miniskirted, and gray-cloaked Holy Swordswoman raised her voice in a roar as their close-range specialists of Hermelina and Huldra made their move. Beatrice also shifted to close-range along with Wildefrau who switched from her large ice sword to her main cross sword. Those two delayed their move by a single beat to pursue and finish off the Hero if she managed to avoid the other attacks.

Rusalka’s wind and Gruagach’s bow provided support from long range.

Many different magic circles glowed on the battlefield.

And Boo Boo stood at the very front.

(We need to finish this here! Before she can reclaim her Shining Weapon!!)

But.

But.

But.

A vivid blue, green, and brown light gave a roar.

The Hero’s colors of land, sea, and sky streaked through the air to rule this world.

“Wha-?”

Even Beatrice’s body locked up with surprise. This was not possible. The Hero’s Sword was a Shining Weapon, so it was the source of the Hero’s Magic. The passive Percentage-style clothing was one thing, but she should not have been able to use her offensive Magic like this.

And yet.

Nevertheless.

“Beatrice, you dumbass! Get down instead of standing there like-…!!”

Skintight priest robed Hermelina was cut off.

The Hero herself seemed to turn into light. It did not matter that there was a metal staff in the way. The staff was crushed and Hermelina was knocked backwards after receiving a tackle from what looked like streaming lines of planetary colors. She was the physical attack specialist of the humans, so if she had been overpowered without any trickery, then the other girls could not hope to defend themselves.

“I win whenever possible.”

The threat returned to being a woman.

Boo Boo could not cover for all of them at once.

A magic circle glowed in front of her forehead. She had begun picking them off in turn.

“So I will not hold back. If you are there before my eyes, I have no reason at all not to reach out and snatch you up.”

“…!!”

Her silhouette broke apart once more.

That had not been a fluke. She could clearly use Magic even without her Shining Weapon.

In this unpredictable crisis, Beatrice took action as if leaving a dying message. She used her Screenshot function to save some high-speed footage. She gradually revealed the details that could not be seen by the naked eye.

A rectangular frame floated in the air to display the emptyhanded Hero bringing her index and middle fingers together and moving them in some sort of pattern in front of her exposed cleavage.

Thinking back to when the Hero had first appeared, the sword with the gem in the hilt had shattered after destroying itself as a fuse for the red box and the tree contained inside. That meant she had been in no position to use Magic via a Shining Weapon, so how had she made those high-speed slashes and returned her sword to normal? If it all came from the Shining Weapon, she should have been done for.

So to put it another way…

Was that sword not the source of the Hero’s Magic?

(It can’t be…)

“She doesn’t use the video game system? Does she have some other method of using Magic!?”

As if to support that horrifying theory, Hero La Signora licked her lips, transformed into the planetary colors of blue, green, and brown, and charged toward Beatrice.

Part 4

“U-ughh…”

A short distance from the blast site, Alchemist Cheerleader Huldra lay face down on the glass continent as the chilly rain poured down. While making sure she did not drown in a puddle, she slowly got up so as not to make a sound.

She was a Level Capper like Beatrice and Hermelina, but she had not focused her Parameters on combat. It sometimes took some effort on her part to survive on the first line.

She would jump backwards herself to reduce the shock of an attack as much as possible.

She would play dead to intentionally leave herself on the ever-moving battlefield.

(Sigh. That was unexpected. I thought I was dead for sure. C’mon, my specialty is luck-reliant insta-kill attacks, so I can’t keep up with those insane head-on clashes. If I don’t hurry up, the chief and the others really will be slaughtered. Hmm, I maneuvered myself into a blind spot, but how am I supposed to stab her in the side?)

Huldra was not exactly strong, but that led her toward harsher decisions at times like this. When there was a clear line drawn between enemy and ally, she would give up on the enemy to help her allies. Without hesitation. That stance was clear from her focus on insta-kill attacks that ignored damage levels and could not be used as a mere threat. She was not the same as Hermelina who would use a nonlethal attack to peacefully resolve things with an armed enemy that truly intended to kill her.

“Hey, what the hell are you doing here?”

“!”

She jumped slightly when a gruff voice called out to her from the side. Professionals would not let themselves be fazed while at work, but being disturbed while defenselessly preparing backstage was still a frightening thing.

She slowly turned around to see a young man in polished silver armor wielding a large shield. He and a few subordinates were approaching her.

“Oh, if it isn’t the Pure Knight.”

“Don’t bother getting flirty. It feels so fake from you. It’s all so perfect it doesn’t seem real.”

He used a jocular tone just in case he was wrong, but he had a sharp eye and instincts.

He had been a low-ranking member, but he had belonged to Elkiad, a Guild made of former Western soldiers. Looking at the entire Guild, he had been little more than a thug hired here in Ground’s Nir, but he was still no amateur.

…As you can see, the Alchemist Cheerleader and Pure Knight knew each other.

And that went back to before Boo Boo’s desperate plea to save Beatrice. Most likely, his direct superior Hermelina and her colleague Gruagach were unaware of this connection.

To repeat, Huldra was not exactly strong.

She needed as many horizontal connections as possible to act as lifelines if she was to survive the harsh counterintelligence operations she was tasked with. In battles between professionals, precious data did not rain from the heavens for free.

“You aren’t stranded here, are you?”

“The situation is more complicated than that. Oh, and I’m sure you can hear all that firepower over there, but don’t even think about taking a peek at the blast site if you want to live to see another day.”

“What, did your Party have a falling out or something?”

The Pure Knight reached that conclusion because he assumed this barren glass land would not have any other living things on it.

“Does that mean you came across some kinda treasure valuable enough to fight over? Is it an ore or something with medicinal properties? Or are you using the land itself as real estate? Whatever the case, I can’t wait to see how this ugly glass continent is gonna make us rich. …Hey! Find a good spot and set up a base. We’ve gotta get started!!”

“?”

Huldra tilted her head with her butt planted (in a very girly fashion) on the wet ground as the subordinates waiting behind the Pure Knight set down a heavy-looking bag. They pulled out some metal poles and a thick waterproof fabric that reminded Huldra of a tent.

As it gradually took form, her entire body tensed up.

“Wha-!? Wh-wh-wha…?”

“Surprised?”

The Pure Knight looked quite pleased with himself, so he must not have realized the situation here.

That right there was the item the Hero most desired after being resurrected centuries later. Its presence would greatly change the situation as a whole.

“We got delayed securing a full set, but now we’ll take the top spot in the development race. Check it out: It’s a Gate! Now we have a new Save Point and we don’t need to return to the island’s inn town every single time! We can take a shortcut straight here while we explore and mine this place. We can make our own second base right here on the glass continent!!”

“Y-y-y-you goddamn morooooooooooooooooooooooons!!!!!”

Part 5

“Pant, pant!!”

Beatrice’s shoulders rose and fell as she gasped for breath in the cold rain. Her respiratory system and stamina were being greatly enhanced by Magic, but she was still being worn down.

(How many have been taken out of the fight? Ugh, and where am I?)

“Boo Boo, can you keep fighting?”

“Squeal…”

They were down a lot of fighters, but they did not need to take a pessimistic view. Even if there was a lethal amount of blood where they had fallen, this was a world with plenty of Magic beyond human understanding. As long as White Witch Philinnion was safe and could care for the others, it was possible they could return to the fight.

How effective were Philinnion’s recovery potions? For now, Boo Boo seemed to be doing well enough despite the stab wounds to his gut and arm.

Glass fell from Boo Boo’s hands. But not in big pieces. They had finally succumbed to the impacts and shattered, lacerating Boo Boo’s palms in the process.

“Heh heh. Looks like I’m almost there.”

Rain dripped from the Hero’s bluish-blonde hair as she smiled thinly and lightly swept her right hand to the side in its blue gauntlet. A glow like melted metal surged from the fingertips and a trail of light followed them like a shooting star.

She had not fundamentally changed.

She had once aided the witch hunts and she had nearly destroyed two worlds with the artificial atmospheric barrier and the Red-afflicted Iberian Orcs. Her mere presence was bound to bring many victims no matter which world she was in.

“Since you wish to keep me here, what I seek must exist elsewhere. I still do not know where that is, but I should find out if I corner you further. You are bound to tell me while tearfully begging for your lives. Act tough all you like, but you will be forced to use your own body as a shield in the end.”

“You…” groaned Boo Boo while spreading his arms wide to threaten her. “Why do you insist on doing this the hard way? If you stopped being mean, promised not to hurt anyone, and asked everyone for help, there might have been another way.”

It was possible Boo Boo could only say that since he had gone to the inn town alone, bowed to the humans there, and asked them to risk their lives to help save Beatrice. He may never have considered it back when he only viewed the festivals from atop that hill.

“That is not an option.”

But the Hero was quick to answer while her large chest rose and fell in a sigh.

Her tone of voice easily tore down what Boo Boo had built up.

“I have a time limit. You are well aware of that Achilles’ heel, aren’t you? How can I expect a fair negotiation when you hold such a critical card against me? You could make endless impossible demands or you could let go at the last second. If attempting a fair negotiation means accepting those risks, then fairness can go right out the window. It would be much faster and more certain to crush you with overwhelming force until you comply.”

This was different.

This was fundamentally different from Boo Boo’s reason for avoiding the humans.

There was no chance of cooperation here.

Instead of leaving herself, she pushed away everything around her.

Her own survival came first, so anything standing before her was declared evil and crushed. She would cross between worlds to accomplish the goal she had set for herself.

The Hero.

That title referred to one of great courage.

But that courage may have been what let her shake off all hesitation and doubt as she became a pure incarnation of violence.

She would win whenever possible.

Hero La Signora was an insane sort of strongest who did not even consider what her victories would cause. She had even lent her strength toward continuing a slaughter with tens of thousands of victims. If things had been just a little different, Beatrice had never met Boo Boo, and she had found nothing but power to rely on, she might have ended up like this.

Steam and shimmering heat rose from Beatrice’s shoulders as the cold rain hit her. The flames she controlled were manifesting with the intent to kill.

She enlarged her empty left hand using slag and placed it on the Shining Weapon’s grip.

“That’s enough, Boo Boo.”

“But…”

“Hero, I don’t know exactly how far you journeyed or how dizzyingly long you waited for this day, but let me tell you one thing. You stand at the turning points and win whenever possible? You can wait centuries, but you still won’t receive limitless freedom.”

“…”

Her mere presence spread death and chaos.

She may have been an even deeper and darker incarnation of death than the Underworld Lord who had systematically processed lives.

“This is not your world. And Earth isn’t your world alone. If you don’t understand that, then the result will be the same in either world. You will never be satisfied.”

It was said a drowning person would grasp at straws and that may have been true.

But Beatrice had that right as well.

When she had lost her Shining Weapon and wandered on the verge of death in this world just like a certain someone else had, she had rejected other options like Vampirism or cold sleep. She had not found fault with the world around her and she had not demanded it die to save her. Death is an extreme situation. That great threat reveals who someone really is deep down. But Beatrice’s own experience proved that the revelation was not always an ugly one.

“Hero, maybe you got carried away because you feared death.”

Boo Boo had been the same.

He had wanted to do whatever it took to save Beatrice, but he had had not been able to harm a single person to accomplish that. He had instead bowed down, borrowed Shining Weapons from so many people, and ultimately roasted his own body to protect that girl’s life.

That was who he really was.

Both Beatrice and Boo Boo had not gone astray at the very, very end. They had stayed true to themselves.

Death was no reason to trample on other people.

“No matter what methods you chose, you can’t shove responsibility onto someone else. The time limit? Your Achilles’ heel? Don’t make me laugh. Everything you have here is the end result of your many evil deeds, you murderer.”

“Is that all you wanted to say?”

The Hero scoffed while orange light surged from the end of the right hand she held out parallel.

This was not enough to shake her at this point.

“Surely you know a silly plea to emotion isn’t going to make me go easy on you. I want to go home, I want to go home, oh how I want to go home! When I escaped here, I never expected it would be such a peaceful execution ground. No one told me it was a public execution site that slowly but surely robs you of your life!! How is that fair!? They lied. I was tricked. I am the victim here. I did nothing wrong. Yes, yes. Why would I have ever come here if I had known what it was beforehand!? I win whenever possible, I win whenever possible, I win whenever possible! That is my motto and here I am taking action, so go bring me my victory. This place is the worst, but if it isn’t at least a little better than before, then this was all meaningless! How did it get even worse!? I demand a redo! Why are you showing this place off like it’s great? Are you insane!? Aren’t you going to pursue real happiness? Why, why, why does nothing ever go right!?”

This was different again from the Sage who had wielded great power for her own purposes but had been entirely focused on the Iberian Orcs. The Hero had not mentioned a parent, a child, a brother, a sister, a lover, a friend, a teacher, or a student. She only talked about herself. Beatrice had been trapped in the Detached Magic Palace and physically cut off from establishing relationships, but this woman looked empty even to her.

No matter what happened to the Hero after this, she was sure to continue shouting forever. On Earth, in Ground’s Nir, or in any other world she might find, the same dissatisfaction would explode within her.

She would not find what she was looking for.

And she would kill thousands or even millions in her pursuit of what she could never find.

She would barge into a world and, if it was not to her liking, she would smash that world to pieces. And with her, that was not just some ridiculous fantasy in her imagination. She could actually do it. She was like a humanoid disaster traveling from world to world. This was not about living or dying, returning to Earth or staying in Ground’s Nir.

She would win whenever possible.

But that was why she could never set down her weapon. Whenever she was not fighting, the anxiety would wear away at her nerves and she could never feel real peace. La Signora was stuck in her fixation on victory. She had never looked past that. Her fighting was not designed to ever bring an end to the fighting.

They had to do it here.

Unless they fundamentally stopped the Hero here, this problem would never be solved.

“Hero.”

“Yes?”

“I hate you.”

It was a simple assessment.

With her short, bluish-blonde hair and armor colored both the green of the land and the blue of the sky and sea, she accepted it with a thin smile.

She spoke.

She was beyond saving. She played the simplest card for someone with so much power.

And she was oblivious to how those words made her life sound so very sad.

“The weak always try to find some kind of excuse, you loser.”

Beatrice did not wait any longer.

The magic circle floating behind her back grew brighter.

Beatrice and Boo Boo had tried to build connections with others despite being awkward about it, so they knew they could never get along with this woman.

What followed was a great roar.

Beatrice used her blunt weapon that resembled a log or steel beam.

The Hero used the orange light like scorching metal that erupted from her fingers.

When they took the shortest route toward each other, the air exploded, blowing away even the pouring rain. The scattering spray of water seemed to visualize the distortion of space.

It did not end with that one attack.

Beatrice used both hands to swing the massive blunt weapon forward but could not get it through. She tried pulling it back but could not unbalance the Hero. She switched from a serious attack to a distraction and from there to a deterrent attack and a full swing. She used every form of attack she could think of, but the Hero did not seem to even flinch. And the Hero was not taking a fortified position or anything. She was moving right along with it all. She did not seem even close to her limits. She had no device and could not rely on the machine, but she went in for the kill whenever she saw an opening. She chanted curses under her breath and her fingertips moved quickly through the air.

This was now a competition between two different Magic standards.

When Beatrice’s flames blazed, the five orange fingers were shredded. When La Signora tried to make a slash with those fingers, a wall of fire cut off her view. The Seven Flames girl fired vacuum needless through the obvious explosive flames to accurately target the Hero. The Holy Swordswoman did not have time to check and see how each and every attack turned out. In what looked like melted metal bursting into a spray, particles sharply and precisely targeted Beatrice from every direction.

“!?”

She doubted her armor-shaped Magic could stop this. With a sweep of her tattered cloak, she rolled out of the way of the complex network of attacks.

The Hero was truly transcendent.

If she could do this emptyhanded instead of relying on some kind of tool, then her goal might indeed be possible. She may have had the power needed to return to Earth on her own.

Yes.

If such a miracle were really occurring.

Another slicing sound rang out.

A magic circle hovered in front of the Hero’s forehead as she forcibly swung around the orange-glowing blades bursting from her fingers. The cloud-like wool on her shoulders puffed out and her skirt fluttered to make blue waves over the chocolate color of the leather below. Her attack seemed to scoop up from below. The five endlessly-long blades sliced through the glass land as they approached Beatrice.

However.

However, the red-armored and white-miniskirted Holy Swordswoman was focused on something other than the death approaching her.

(She can keep up with my Melt Cutting and Metal Jet. But that’s what makes no sense! If she’s using Magic without our video game system, then she wouldn’t know anything about our Magic, and yet she’s predicting it and shooting it all down! But she shouldn’t understand anything about the magic hierarchy based on the video game system!!)

Beatrice placed her enlarged gauntlet below the grip to swing the giant log or steel beam of a Shining Weapon in both hands while producing several explosions. Instead of breaking the scorching blades of light, she shook the glass ground with her blunt weapon to forcibly alter the path of the blades moving through it.

“Heh.”

The Hero was unfazed.

When the orange blades missed Beatrice and passed by right next to the girl, she destroyed and abandoned them. The cloud-like wool on her left shoulder puffed out, her freed arms extended to either side, and melted metal blew out from all ten fingers. They all curved along different paths to approach Beatrice from different angles like so many bending whips and fishing rods.

(She really doesn’t seem concerned at all!!)

That seemed odd to the girl. This was different from the Sage who had mastered the same video game system of Magic.

The system Beatrice knew was not the only way to use Magic. There would be plenty of other ways to summon fire. But if the Hero was relying on something other than the video game system, then no matter how much she had mastered her own system, she should have shown some honest surprise and confusion after seeing the eight Metal Jet heat lines that were built up from the video game system.

Yet she reacted with no lag whatsoever.

Why did she seem to be intercepting the attacks like she knew them already? Unless she had an incredibly convenient ability that let her predict future attacks or let her right arm fight for her of its own free will…

(She must be familiar with the video game system of Magic.)

“Nwaaahhh!!”

Boo Boo yelled. He no longer had the tray-like pieces of glass, so he directly pulled out some of the glass land that had been sliced apart by the Hero’s fingers and Beatrice’s heat lines. He threw a piece of glass larger than two tatami mats and it collided with the molten metal that should have hit Beatrice. Of course, glass was glass. It was easily pierced through, but it still bent the attack’s course. Beatrice twisted her body through a gap in the barrage and slipped past the 10 twisting and glowing long-range attacks.

However.

The Hero was familiar with the same system she used. She had just accepted it at first, but the more she thought about it, the more impossible it seemed.

Humanity had only “officially” arrived in Ground’s Nir a few decades before using the Sage’s help. Hero La Signora had wandered here in the shadows of history around 300 years ago. There was no connection there. She had abandoned her physical body and regenerated a new body like she had faxed herself here, so she could not have seen anything during that time in between.

But…

(She left someone in charge while she was waiting.)

“Squeal! Beatrice, you need to pay attention!!”

“Boo Boo, make sure you have a weapon at all times! Do not try to stop that orange attack with your bare hands!!”

The Hero grinned as light trailed after her right hand’s index and middle fingers. Then her entire body – including the green armor covering the bottom of her chest and the skirt with the open front – melted into streaming lines.

The charge was coming!!

“Beatrice!!”

The attack really was like a punch from a giant. Boo Boo’s fist flew in from the side to hit the blue, green, and brown curves that the Hero had become. He had not had time to kick up some glass to grab. It may have been similar to a parry in boxing. The planet-colored violence approaching Beatrice was forced off course at the last second.

A wet sound followed.

Beatrice saw red drops falling from Boo Boo’s fist.

It had not been a head-on collision, but it was a lot like touching the side of a train rushing by at high speed. Of course it had harmed him. La Signora’s threat had reached that level. It was obvious what would happen without his makeshift glass weapons.

“Boo Boo, you idiot!!”

“S-squeal… More importantly, get ready, Beatrice! The Hero is going to try it as many times as it takes!!”

The Hero had muscles on the level of the powerful Iberian Orc and she controlled them with a human craftiness. That was indeed a threat, but she could not let this distract her. She was making progress step by step. She was approaching the solution to the odd feeling that had been bothering her for a while now.

For one thing, how had the very first attack worked?

Where had the Hero’s Sword come from to stab into Boo Boo’s flesh and drink his blood?

(She ordered some kind of work unit to build the artificial atmospheric barrier and it silently continued that task even after its master died. Whatever it was, it must have been observing us all this time from outside of known history!)

But what exactly was it?

Beatrice reviewed what information she had while once more readying her giant Shining Weapon to protect injured Boo Boo.

Yes, the answer must have been there from the beginning.

It had been right in front of her, but she had failed to see it because she had not gathered her thoughts.

(Yes, that’s right. It wouldn’t make sense.)

With Fairies, Vampires, and more, Ground’s Nir had several species that lived far longer than humans were accustomed to. But she doubted they would silently continue carrying out some ridiculous command to remake Ground’s Nir’s environment to match Earth’s even if it destroyed the existing ecosystem. They would only be harming themselves. Even if they had been threatened into doing it, the threat would vanish once the Hero died. They would have no reason to continue for centuries.

That meant it had to be something that existed outside Ground’s Nir’s ecosystem and would not be harmed or inconvenienced in the slightest by the environmental change.

It would have to be a being from this world that was strong enough to be unharmed by any gasses or viruses, that knew how to manage delicate machinery on the level of Shining Weapons, and that would continue a given task for decades or even centuries until it was complete.

She could only think of one possibility.

The Hero’s blue and green armor that represented the land, sea, and sky, her beautiful body, and her large chest and bright thighs melted once more. She became a giant streaming line that rushed in to attack.

(For one thing, the Hero wasn’t even on the glass continent at first. She was only created just now. Then who tricked us into coming here? The person who drew the overall picture leading us here had to have known something. This can’t have all happened by coincidence!!)

The group of blue, green, and brown streaming lines twisted around like a great serpent to dodge all of Beatrice’s Magic, but Boo Boo’s giant foot kicked them. He saved her again and he was injured again. The red-armored and white-miniskirted Holy Swordswoman bit her lip.

(There has to be something there. Something supporting the Hero’s power!)

She had to have seen it by now.

The explanation had to be there in everything she had experienced and learned.

Whatever it was must have existed when the Sage had appeared several decades ago and when the Hero had appeared several centuries ago. Also, Ground’s Nir was not really an island. It was an armory. If Ground’s Nir had been there in the ocean and the Hero had set foot there, the rest of the facility had to have been there too.

(Which means…)

It had to be something that could survive just fine in the icy ocean below the thick glass continent.

(Which means.)

It had to be something that could reach for the same video game system of Magic that Beatrice’s Party used.

(Which means!!)

It had to be something that could function as a powerful computer equal to or greater than the Shining Weapons.

“The giant armory created a different model in Abyss’s line 300 years ago! And they’re in the ocean below us supporting the Hero’s Magic!!”

Beatrice slammed her giant blunt weapon straight down at the ground below her feet and then used eight heat lines to tear through the glass land that had to be more than 10m thick.

This was not a continent with a solid foundation.

It was no more than glass floating on the ocean like drift ice. The vast space of the ocean was always there below the thick ground. Just like a human on Earth was generally unaware of the sewers below their feet and just like no one ever considered the possibility of a monster lurking down there.

If this being did not require oxygen and would not drown in the cold seawater, there was no better hiding spot.

The magic circle behind Beatrice’s back glowed as she supported her weapon’s grip with her enlarged gauntlet.

“Metal Jet!!”

Which was why she had to deal with them here!!

The Hero’s Sword was not the issue.

The meaningful-looking incantations and finger signs were in fact meaningless.

She was accompanied by someone else who provided the Magic she wanted.

That explained everything.

The Hero had only had a few days 300 years before, so she had unleashed something that would take her place in spending the nearly endless time needed to remake the entire planetary environment.

“…!?”

This was a first.

The Hero’s streaming lines of blue, green, and brown came apart and she staggered while swinging her decorative ribbon around. She was clearly shaken by this.

“Squeal, Beatrice?”

“It’s okay, Boo Boo.”

Beatrice pulled the thick Shining Weapon from the glass ground, held it up in both hands once more, and answered while protecting someone more important to her than her own life.

“I’ve finally seen the answer. I’m sure of it.”

Yes.

She had wondered about this. She had understood the Hero’s insane way of thinking, but how exactly had the woman accomplished the terraforming?

The Hero had been thrown into a strange new world and she had only had a few days there. It was honestly impressive enough for her to realize what was happening to her at all. Drawing out the plans, gathering the materials, and building something would have been difficult. She simply would not have had enough time to construct something from scratch. So it made sense to assume she had found something that already existed in Ground’s Nir and used it to accomplish her goal.

Beatrice’s Party had been tricked by Abyss into visiting this glass continent.

Why had Abyss had such crucial information about the Hero?

The answer was simple: the giant armory would have had production logs telling her who had created what and sent it out into the world.

Abyss was the ultimate weapon pseudo-automatically designed and constructed based on her own definition of the most powerful being so she could fight back against the Underworld Lord. So she could have become anything depending on her preset objective. Even if what was “strongest” had not been gradually worked out by running stress tests on various lifeforms in the Labyrinth, if the Hero had inputted data based on what she wanted, the production line could have skipped several steps and created an ultimate weapon.

In the residual thoughts remaining on the sun island, the Hero had said they only had analog games in her time but computers would eventually be invented.

Then had La Signora built a device equivalent to a Shining Weapon in Ground’s Nir rather than on Earth?

Beatrice stated her conclusion.

“Hero. Your Shining Weapon was not that sword in your hands.”

Beatrice guessed it was something like a cordless phone’s handset. As long as she remained within a spherical range around it, she was given its effects.

“A much larger weapon system is hiding in the ocean! That’s why you could use all that video game Magic even after letting go of the sword!! There’s nothing special there! You just hid your magic staff in the ocean! That’s all!!”

It was time for the reveal. Several slashes sliced up through the glass land at her feet and seawater erupted out. This was clearly not the Hero’s doing. This was someone else. The newcomer slowly floated up directly behind the Hero as if ignoring gravity altogether.

Two long braids of rough silver hair were wet with seawater.

She had a body similar to a short girl’s and she only wore something like a sporty two-piece swimsuit.

The pattern of light floating above her head was too twisted to be a magic circle and it was reminiscent of a constellation.

A group of mechanical arms jutted out from the back of her hips like a nine-tailed fox.

And the spear, shield, axe, crossbow, staff, and other weapons attached to the end of those arms may have all borne the title of “Hero’s” just like the sword.

“So you finally show yourself.”

The one who turned around and said that was the machine’s creator: the Hero.

“Then, Sky, purge the weapons I left with you and hand them over. I gave you that equipment to power your flash memory and protect my data. Now that I have been revived, I will be reclaiming my equipment.”

Sky.

Was that the name given to the being who had black fabric covering her arms, legs, and important bits and who had surrounded this world with an artificial atmospheric barrier? It was a truly fitting name for a counterpart to Ultimate Weapon Abyss.

“…”

“…”

Abyss had such great power, so Beatrice and Boo Boo could not predict how much crueler Sky would be when the Hero’s cunning was incorporated into the armory’s technology.

And.

And.

And.

From her position a polite distance back behind the Hero, Sky silently tilted her head and sent a question her master’s way.

“To confirm, you wish for me to remove all of my equipment and present it to Player La Signora?”

“Yes, that’s what I said. I thought I could get some information out of them, but they won’t be the only ones who know the way back to Earth. If they insist on resisting, I can kill them and try someone else. So…”

“That action is not recommended. Returning this equipment to Player La Signora would only reduce my efficiency in completing my current task. I strongly recommend reconsidering, but do you still wish me to execute the command?”

“Enough!! When I say to do something, just do it. I win whenever possible and that time is now. I have predicted the turning point and now is the time to ride that wave. So complete the task you were created for!!”

“Understood. Continuing with unrecommended command.”

It did not even take a full second.

Sky must have viewed clothing differently. Hers may have been attached to her skin to cool it and reduce her heat, but it strained as she mechanically responded.

“Then at this point, Player La Signora has been set as a priority target for obstructing a crucial task.”

“Wha-?”

Did that dumbfounded gasp come from the Hero or the Holy Swordswoman?

A moment later, the bluish-blonde Hero’s armor and skirt blurred unnaturally and vanished. The blue and green of the Earth she so yearned for were gone.

They had been confiscated.

Then the twisted, constellation-like magic circle over Sky’s head began to spin.

The stick like parts on the side of her hips spread out in a fan shapes and scattered something. The naked Hero was hit in the back by a fierce attack from Sky, who was supposedly on her side. There was light, sound, shockwaves, and more. …To repeat, the Percentage-type Magic that gave the Hero her superhuman abilities had been stripped from her, so these merciless attacks were directed at the soft skin of someone who was now just a woman.

What did an Iberian Orc’s muscles matter now?

The Hero’s beautiful silhouette vanished with a sound almost like a jackhammer. Was that Magic? Her silhouette was surrounded by dust and the human shape behind the curtain was grotesquely broken, ripped, and smashed into nothingness.

It was so vivid that Boo Boo and Beatrice did not even have time to scream. By the time they even considered trying to stop it, it was already over.

Completely and entirely over.

“Obstructer of crucial task has been eliminated. Performance has returned to normal, so resuming aforementioned task.”

“Task…?”

Sky’s eyes and the lines running through her two-piece swimsuit-like clothing changed to a yellow of warning. A yellow glowing object spread out from the sides of her hips like a skirt. No corpse or even a single drop of blood remained. A groan escaped Beatrice’s mouth after seeing that thorough slaughter.

“What are you trying to do that’s worth betraying the Hero herself over!?”

“How should I explain this?”

Sky sounded almost troubled.

The two braids held by a ring-shaped hair clip swayed and water dripped from the ends as she tilted her head.

“The task I was given is to complete the artificial atmospheric barrier and remake this world’s environment to match Earth’s. It now has eight holes in it, so I must swiftly repair the damage.”

It made no sense.

Or did it only seem that way to Beatrice because her thoughts were human-centric?

She was the one who had damaged the artificial atmospheric barrier by launching Magic from the sun island in order to destroy the source of the Red.

As a yellow triangle glowed below her chest, Sky was only interested in continuing the command given to her by the Hero. She would complete the artificial atmospheric barrier and preserve it for eternity to remake this world’s environment. What that caused was of no concern to her as she simply completed the task presented to her.

So.

If someone got in the way of that work, she would kill them, even if they were the person who had ordered the terraforming and would benefit from it. She saw no problem with this absurd action that was like selling your wine to buy a wine bottle.

Her clothing was like a black two-piece swimsuit left open from below the chest to the navel. A booster ignited within the equipment attached to the back of her hips and the expressionless ultimate weapon made an announcement.

“I will now return to completing my priority task.”

“Wait, Sky…”

“5, 4, 3, 2, 1, ignition, blast off.”

“Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit!!!!!”

Sky had not even questioned killing her owner, so Beatrice’s cries had no chance of reaching her.

Beatrice and Boo Boo were blown back by the blinding light and explosive noise. Sky did not so much as glance back at them. She flew straight toward the artificial atmospheric barrier that was her workplace.

There were only eight holes.

Once those were repaired, the Red disease would afflict the Iberian Orcs once more.

And that would mean doom for both Earth and Ground’s Nir.

Part 6

Abyss// I have finally located the Ground’s Nir armory’s defective product.

Abyss// Reject Sky, you are my enemy.

Chapter 5: That Which is Known as the Root Cause

Part 1

Abyss// I am sorry.

Abyss// I considered making an appeal to emotion or finding an emotional resolution.

Abyss// But I decided we would never have peace unless the root cause was dealt with.

Abyss// The Hero is dead. I led you all there and had you act more hastily than may have been wise.

Abyss// That appears to have paid off, but this is not over yet.

Abyss// Ground’s Nir Reject Sky.

Abyss// That alternate ultimate weapon has dedicated herself to her work task even after forgetting the original objective of said task.

Abyss// Unless she is stopped, the Iberian Orc problem caused by the artificial atmosphere cannot be fully resolved.

Abyss// The final battle will soon begin.

Abyss// Good luck, everyone.

Part 2

A few days had passed since then.

“So.”

In Roppongi’s Detached Magic Palace, the three maid sisters were holding a discussion after leaving their master sleeping like a log face down in her queen-size bed.

They moved out to the garden where Misoka, the second sister, looked like she did not quite understand.

“This country’s simulator was connected that other unit called Sky instead of, uh, Abyss was it? Because if her plans were sent over as a Piece, an identical unit could maybe be created here on Earth. As long as it worked, I guess the box that wanted arms and legs didn’t care which one it was.”

“She put more sugar in her tea than normal, so I’m worried about her mental exhaustion… M-milady doesn’t tell us much about what happens in that world, but it looks like she’s had a rough time of it there.”

“She won’t tell us directly, no.” Bespectacled Iroka lightly shook a tablet while responding to Haruka who was like a nervous small animal. “But if you check the stock prices in New York or London, you can get a pretty good idea of what’s happening in Ground’s Nir. Success there leads to Pieces…which in turn affect the technological development competition between nations and corporations.”

“Only you’re enough of a weirdo to look at that with a knowing smile. You can convert those numbers and graphs to human language, right? Then hurry up and explain it so we can understand.”

“If you insist. But to be safe, I’ll add in some other exchanges.” Iroka pressed a fingertip against the bridge of her glasses. “America, China, Russia, and the EU. No matter which region you check, the markets are in decline. That suggests the trouble is not human in nature. It’s likely a natural disaster or a dangerous creature.”

“B-but exploring the Labyrinth is their job, isn’t it? Couldn’t they be stuck at some super strong gatekeeper or really tricky puzzle?”

“I doubt it. They tend to start gathering minds and materials to fight back in those cases, but there’s no sign of them recruiting here on Earth and no unusual targets of investment have cropped up either.”

“So they’re just waiting?”

“Although I wonder how many groups there are smart enough to make such a wise decision. I imagine they are either too confused to do anything or are bluffing because they can’t report what happened to their higher ups.”

For their normal work in the Labyrinth, they would have a lengthy list of excuses to use if they ran across unexpected trouble. Adult society did not take “I can’t” as an answer, after all. But this was different. No one knew what had caused the commotion, so they could not even guess how to solve it. This was not a case of encountering the unknown. They had not encountered anything, yet they were being asked to deal with it.

Most of them had been left out.

The three sisters’ master was probably facing some kind of major secret at a point deep within all of this.

“And like always, the lady is trying to carry it all herself.”

“Yes. At least she has friends to fight alongside her in that world.”

Their master was already in an unreasonable situation. In the limitless combinations of the Character Creation, she had just so happened to end up with an appearance identical to the Sage and she had been given the rare Job of Holy Swordswoman. That was all it had taken to gather the attention of the government and an even larger force. And instead of praising her for that innocent result, they had decided to enclose her in a luxurious cage.

She could not even attend school like normal.

Beatrice and the Sage.

Could they be the same person?

The intense fear brought by that question had sent her to a happy prison. After weighing the pros and cons, the powers that be had decided that was for the best.

Without this government protection, she may have found she did not fit in during a normal life and given up on that, but Iroka still could not bring herself to say this was the best answer. The one silver lining was the group of friends she could rely on in that other world.

“I just hope there is something we can do for her.”

“Oh? What if I said there is?”

When bespectacled Iroka gave a sigh of mature mischievousness and said that, her younger sisters stared back at her.

“Eh? Eh? I thought you weren’t the type to joke, Onee-chan!”

“Are you planning to attack that subway station simulator again? Even though we have no clue how we made it back alive last time!?”

“Tsk, tsk.” Iroka wagged her index finger. “I will answer this one step at a time. The simulator and Sky were connected. That is safe to assume, don’t you think?”

“I-I suppose.”

“The simulator assisted Sky because it wants a body to freely move around in. But what about Sky?”

“Huh?” Haruka tilted her head as this new question occurred to her. “If she only needed to move around in that world, she wouldn’t need to respond to any offers from Earth, would she?”

“There must have been some kind of logical reason. If we know why Sky wanted the simulator, don’t you think we could come up with a plan to trip her up while back here on Earth?”

Part 3

“Squeal.”

They had returned to the small island of Ground’s Nir.

Sky had flown from the glass continent, so they had no real reason to stay there. The humans returned to Earth to get some rest and Boo Boo spent the time back on that small island. He was currently watering the field in front of his brick house using a giant watering can made by modifying a wooden bucket.

“Hwah☆ That’s just what I needed.”

Someone was buried up to her hips in the soft soil and she spread her arms to accept the water sprinkling down on her. She was Ileana the Mandragora, one of the Break News and the strongest of the plant types. She looked like a woman with long bluish-silver hair and a curvy brown body, but those traits could easily change depending on the nutrients in the soil. Since she cared a lot about her appearance, her presence here showed she approved of Boo Boo’s field.

“I want to take these vegetables today. The Juicy Tomatoes!”

“Oh, you’ve learned to enjoy veggies, have you? Then take these Water Bottle Cucumbers and All-Purpose Sorghum too. You need to keep a balanced diet.”

“Boo. They aren’t for me to eat. I can stab a stick into them to lure out the big fat Fluffy Chickens.”

“I said you need to keep a balanced diet. That means not just meat, meat, and more meat!”

They were interrupted by an oddly elderly groan for the girl it came from.

Ileana looked back while still half-buried in the field and saw Fairy Queen Strigona staggering toward them while carrying a giant sack in both hands. Someone from Earth might have called it a Santa sack and it was so big it covered up her face.

“Hey, Boo Boo. Is this spot good enough?”

“Squeal. Over here.”

Ileana immediately grew cautious.

“Wait, wait! What is that!? Hey, pest, I don’t like the idea of a toxin expert like you messing with the soil. You aren’t planning to ruin my precious mountain field with herbicide or insecticide, are you!?”

“Ugh, why do I have to do all this for the perverted carrot?”

“For me? …Wait. Wait, wait! Just to be clear, pest, no matter how many nutrients it might have, I do not want raw garbage dumped on me!!”

“Calm down, vegetable.”

Ileana immediately quieted down in the middle of the field. She seemed to have a policy of doing what her flower caretaker said.

“Squeal. These are the leaves from the forest floor. Spread these damp ones around and the vegetables will grow even better.”

“Phew, so it’s just normal mulch. For that you get a passing grade. Needless to say, I assume you will be smoking out the-…”

“Hm? What are you talking about? Pour, pour.”

“Gwaaaahh!? All the leaf and root eating larvae are still in there!!”

Ileana grew pale and screamed as her small ecosystem was suddenly destroyed.

Meanwhile, Strigona spoke up after literally having a load taken off her shoulders.

“Isn’t it sad, Boo Boo? Food is the foundation of everything, yet here you are having to bow down to a perverted carrot to set up traps.”

“Ew, peh, peh. Curse these Root Biter larvae! Now, setting aside how every single kind of foolish pest seems to be picking a fight with me, what do you mean?”

“Squeal. I gave my Shining Weapon to Beatrice, so I don’t have a hunting weapon.” Boo Boo sounded troubled and placed a hand on his chin. “The rocks and logs I find are okay, but they break so quickly. Boo, I might need to prepare a proper tool.”

The standard Iberian Orc tactic was to use disposable weapons, but Boo Boo had been forced to learn on his own for so long that he had not inherited that technique. This was why Beatrice had taken the lead role on the glass continent while he played a supporting role. Without that log or steel beam of Shining Weapon, he had nothing to fight with. It had only been a few days since then, so he had not had enough time to adapt.

And all the techniques he already knew only made it harder to learn a brand new set of techniques.

Ileana tilted her head while driving the larvae out of the mulch by scattering a mystery pollen from her long hair.

“But that could be tricky. What could you even use to make a weapon for it to survive your strength? Plants are a little too fragile for that.”

“I would have suggested the Diamond Salt used to make blades and homes in the southern forest where a certain Vampire lives, but that already failed to work.”

“What about bone?”

“Too weak.”

“Yes, but if he has Skull Wave work on it, couldn’t he get a weapon that repairs itself immediately after breaking?”

“That’s a fair point, but once we’ve reached that point, wouldn’t it be better to just ask Mr. Bones to fight for him?”

“How about we stop aiming for the most solid weapon possible? He could use a whip or a blackjack. In that case, there would be some plants he could use. I might be willing to locate a sturdy vine or hard nut for him.”

“That’s not a bad idea, but let’s keep thinking. There has to be something we aren’t thinking of.”

The two Break News kept talking without Boo Boo. They could probably work at a clothing store with this dynamic.

“But, Boo Boo, are you only now starting on your traps? The sun is already high in the sky. If you don’t catch anything, you’ll be in for a sad and hungry night.”

For those who lived in the wild, it was too late to start struggling once your strength began to fall. With water, food, and a place to sleep, you had to work at it before you actually needed it. Once things were off track, you could easily tumble all the way into the pit of death.

But Boo Boo did not seem that worried.

“Squeal. Beatrice and the others left this here before going home.”

“Geh.”

Strigona’s face stiffened when she saw a device like a metal barrel. And this was not because of the old idea that Fairies could not handle metal.

“Tah dah! It’s a smoker! This is a miraculous tool. If you put meat in the top tray and burn firewood in the bottom tray, it can turn anything into bacon. And that keeps for a while!!”

“So if the trap fails, we have to eat your stockpile of thick bacon again tonight!? Boo Boo, I know you’re excited about this new smoker of yours, but three days in a row is a bit much!!”

“By the way, why are you complaining under the assumption that Boo Boo will be making your dinner? The former Soviet soldiers shared everything, but even they looked after their own stew pots.”

Also, Boo Boo mistakenly thought you could only put meat in the smoker, but you did not get bacon if it was cheese you smoked in there.

Either way, the ability to store food was revolutionary for that brick house without a refrigerator or vacuum packing. …But to preserve her rich culinary habits, Strigona decided he could never find out about pickling, drying, or canning.

Boo Boo rubbed the surface of the metal barrel with his too-large hand.

“Squeal. But this is still a problem. …I can crush something like this if I squeeze it too hard. Where am I supposed to find a new tool I can call my partner?”

Part 4

The palm-sized Fairy named Meridiana snorted from her small nose as she lay on the brick house’s roof to hide.

“Oh, no! Boo Boo is in trouble! But this sounds interesting!”

Next to her, her younger sister Alice sounded annoyed already.

“Ehh? You’re going to make that for him just because that sister stealer has gotten used to the brick house???”

“Quiet, Alice. Now is the time to give Boo Boo a power up. I will offer him a weapon! And doesn’t a fairy weapon sound like it would be super strong!?”

“But I don’t want to touch anything as dirty as steel.”

“Uh…”

“Same for copper and silver. Gold might just barely be tolerable, but that is too soft for a weapon. I could stand making a pot because we only have to dig a mold in the dirt and pour the molten metal in there, but a proper weapon requires beating it, stretching it, heating it, cooling it, and all sorts of other things.”

Elder Morgan flew in to join them.

“What are you two up to?”

“Oh, Elder Morgan.”

“I have a feeling Meridiana is about to get carried away and cause us some more trouble. I mean, should a girl really start obsessing over a long, thick, and extra-large tool just because the guy she likes won’t pay any attention to her?”

“Aliiiice!!” screamed Meridiana, but this was not enough to faze the elder.

“Oh, you were talking about making a new weapon for Sir Boo Boo? I am here to move into his home so I can do daily work to repay him for everything he has done for us.”

“Huh!? E-Elder Morgan, you’re trying to outdo me by becoming his maid?”

“The cold high-status girl suddenly becoming a maid is a high level moe technique,” proclaimed Alice.

“I am not sure what you are talking about, but Sir Boo Boo’s strength is too powerful for normal crafting techniques to work. Simply put, this job is too much for us. So instead of wasting your time, I recommend introducing him to something he can use.”

“Such as?”

“Isn’t there someone who can use plenty of ridiculously powerful weapons of unknown construction? I am referring to Abyss sleeping inside this very house. He can borrow one of her high-tech weapons.”

Part 5

Night had fallen.

Skull Wave – a skeleton in a cowboy hat – sounded surprised when he stopped by the brick house in the middle of a stroll.

“Oh, what are you doing up this late, Boo Boo?”

“Squeal, I learned how to drink coffee! If I drink this, I can keep my eyes open.”

“(That’s just a replacement made using a plant root, isn’t it? My wife liked rooibos tea, but I doubt this even has caffeine in it.)”

At any rate.

After eating the super thick bacon that was sitting heavy in her stomach, Strigona had said she was going to look at the stars. She pulled out a weird (for a super strong-toothed wild animal like Boo Boo) hair-covered brush and moved it around in her mouth. Since she was doing that now, she likely intended to climb onto the brick house’s roof and go to sleep.

Boo Boo was inside that house.

He climbed the ladder to the attic and found Abyss still lying silently on her back.

Or was she so silent?

Abyss// You aren’t mad?

He was not just imagining it.

Different parts of Abyss’s body faintly glowed red in the darkness. And she spoke words that only Boo Boo could hear. He did not really understand it, but after incorporating the traits of other plants and animals into their evolution, the Iberian Orcs apparently had the ability to perceive trace electrical signals. …Boo Boo’s only image of electricity was the lightning during a storm or the static during the winter, so he was not quite sure what that sparking stuff had to do with sending messages.

Regardless…

Abyss// I honestly thought you would throw me out once it all came to light.

“Squeal. Without you, I couldn’t have saved Beatrice when her Shining Weapon broke. The fight against the Hero was tough and I still don’t get the more confusing parts, but if you thought it was necessary, then it was probably necessary. Even if I am still confused because I don’t understand why.”

Abyss// …

“I trust you, so it’s okay. Plus, this is your house too. There’s nothing to worry about. Squeal, you can relax here.”

Abyss// ……………………………………………………I am unsure how to respond to that.

There was a much more complex emotional tinge to her voice, but could Boo Boo really pick up on and comprehend that much?

Abyss had indeed deceived Boo Boo and the others to lure them out to the glass continent so the Hero would be revived. But that was because she concluded the people she cared for would never find peace if the root cause of the disaster was not removed. She had been willing to be branded a traitor and abandoned because for it.

But Boo Boo only heard it like she was a small child pouting her lips.

So Abyss changed gears in order to dodge that issue.

Abyss// Unlike me, Sky appears to lack the power to dismantle this island even while functioning normally.

Abyss// I imagine that is because the Hero inputted an irregular design to have her constructed.

Abyss// The armory does not appear to have authorized her.

“Squeal? What does that mean?”

Abyss// You can focus on defeating Sky alone.

Abyss// I heard from the Fairies that you require a weapon.

“Boo. I’m a little scared of having too much power to fight, though. Still, I can’t even hunt for food with my bare hands. And Strigona said I can’t just eat bacon forever.”

Abyss// My weapons are made from materials stolen from the Gimmicks in the deepest floors of the Labyrinth.

Abyss// If you wish for a weapon made from equivalent materials, descending into the depths would be the quickest way.

Abyss// You should be able to take a shortcut from the Iberian Orc village.

“Squeal?”

Abyss// There was one Gimmick I could not steal from back then.

Abyss// The Execution Warrior.

Abyss// That is a malfunctioning product that easily exceeds the set upper limits for strength.

Abyss// Perhaps you could view it as a guardian deity that naturally appeared within the Labyrinth.

“The Labyrinth, huh? But Beatrice and the others aren’t back yet and I’d get lost on my own.”

Abyss// As an alternative, you could work with the Sage.

“Ah!”

Abyss// And if it would not be too much trouble, I have a request of my own.

Part 6

Birdsong rang through the cool morning air as the sunlight filtered through the forest’s leaves.

But the song was too loud to be wild birds.

The singers perched on the branches were a girl with brown skin and white wings and a woman with white skin and black wings. They were Archangel Marinka. Together, they represented every aspect of the sun, including the solar eclipse.

Hurried footsteps thudded along directly below them.

“Squeeeal! I’m back, elder. I brought some thick bacon as a gift!!”

When the nearly-4m pig-faced giant entered the village deep in the forest, more of his species appeared.

However…

“S-snort… Meat…finally.”

“No, elder! I am not letting you get spoiled! You are eating your vegetables today!!”

The most conspicuous person was not any of the Iberian Orcs. The human woman wearing red armor and a white miniskirt was known as the Sage and she was jumping up onto the strongest Iberian Orc’s head.

As the little ones gathered around, Boo Boo handed out hunks of meat larger than the inn town’s bricks, and…

“Oh, right. I have business with you, Sage.”

“Wait just a moment, Boo Boo. Give me some time. You can ask me anything once I’ve fed this disobedient boy his ham salad. C’mon, elder, quit running away and clean your plate!! It’s all vegetables? You’re the one who ate all the ham first, so you only have yourself to blame!!”

Some intense screaming continued for a while.

Boo Boo had nothing to do in the meantime, so he began chatting with Royal Elf Sibyl who was walking around nearby.

“Squeal.”

“A being beyond the planet, hm? That explains why I couldn’t see her using the three royal treasures I manage.”

“So it turns out putting Sucking Bee honey on a Water Bottle Cucumber doesn’t make it taste like a Jewel Melon!”

“Wait, young life of the forest. Listen carefully. You may have tried that as a simple experiment in your spare time, but you have just shattered a legend that dates back to antiquity.”

After hearing a voice saying “sorry about the wait”, he turned around to find the incredibly cheerful Sage approaching with a hand raised in greeting. There was not a peep from the elder who had ultimately been dragged into his large leaf house by a single arm.

“Vegetables are scary.”

“Right? Everyone agrees with that, right?”

“Squeal, and they’re everywhere. They can be chopped up and hidden inside meat or even made into a drink, so you need to be careful.”

A stir was running through the little ones and Sibyl let out an exasperated sigh before speaking.

“He explained the situation to me while you were busy with Operation Eat Your Veggies. Basically, he wants a hunting tool to replace his Shining Weapon, so he needs a guide into the Labyrinth.”

“Squeal, I can apparently get the weapon materials if I defeat some extraordinary guardian deity called the Execution Warrior!”

“Really? Couldn’t you just grab something Demon Lord Tselika had stashed away in that cave? That museum is full of sturdy junk you can grab and hit people with, like dragon fossils and eternal icicles. Not to mention the sturdy rod supporting the door into the place. Pull that out and it’d make for a decent weapon.”

The Sage casually gave a shocking response (that contained enough detailed knowledge of the contents and the structure of the door to suggest she had snuck in there at some point), but Boo Boo’s plan was little different. Everyone acted like the Labyrinth was communal property that anyone could use, but that only applied to the people going there. The clockwork Gimmicks that already existed there were not Boo Boo or the Sage’s property, yet they would go there, destroy the Gimmicks, and steal from them. You could even view this a sign that humanity’s sinful nature had not changed since the Age of Exploration and that mentality was gradually corrupting the residents of Ground’s Nir as well. …Humanity had been so afraid of the Red Iberian Orcs invading Earth, but it was their own actions that had planted that spirit of exploration inside the Iberian Orcs. The Sage only ever said that humanity would destroy themselves one day, so she may not have cared about all this even though she understood it.

The red and silver haired woman placed a hand on her hip.

“Well, I’m fine with anything as long as it isn’t a filthy human asking it of me. Will the Party just be me, you, and Sibyl?”

“They don’t look like they have anything to do, so why not take them with us?”

Sibyl pointed her index finger up toward a sound of rustling feathers. Archangel Marinka – both the brown girl and the white woman – actually flew down and landed on Sibyl’s fingertip like they weighed nothing at all.

“We **** ***n watching f**m ab***. **ur b***le be*a* **** *** He** ************ **, so we a** *****ally t* ***me. T*** ***** ** * chance to *ep** *ou f** **** we hav* *one.”

“** have bee* ******** *ro* **ove. Yo** *att* **g*n with the **ro manipulating us, ** ** *re parti**** *o bla**. *his gives us a ****** ** r**ay y** *or what ** ***e d***.”

Their voices were hard to make out through all the noise, but when they spoke in unison, their voices formed a beautiful chord that entranced all who heard it.

“We have been watching from above. Your battle began with the Hero manipulating us, so we are partially to blame. This gives us a chance to repay you for what we have done.”

“You two are such a pain to deal with.” The Sage kept her hand on her hip and spoke with exasperation in her voice. “And does everyone from those three royal families feel the need to be overly polite all the time?”

“Elder Mermaid Vivian was a much sportier person.”

Boo Boo and the others made their way to the elder’s house while listening to that. But rather than visiting the transformed hunk of flesh within, they were interested in the crucial entrance hidden in his house.

“The Central Shaft. Boo, does that thing still work?”

“Not to worry, Boo Boo. It will at least last longer than the foolish human race.”

It had been buried, but Boo Boo remembered Beatrice and the others speculating that this was the real entrance to the Labyrinth. Using it let them skip all the intermediary floors and take a giant work elevator along a complexly-curving route directly to the deepest part.

“Boo. …We’re coming in, elder.”

“You don’t have to be so polite,” said the Sage. “This is basically my house now.”

“You won’t rest until you’re the dominant one in a relationship, will you?” asked Sibyl.

“If I don’t sleep here, a thief will try to sneak in and steal him in the night. …Curse that negligee Vampire.”

The Iberian Orcs must have felt some respectful fear of the elder’s home because the little ones made no attempt to follow them there. …Or were they simply afraid of the Sage while she was in eat your veggies mode?

“Snort, squeal…”

A giant lump was curled up in one corner. Everyone was too afraid to ask how exactly the strongest of the Iberian Orcs had ended up like that.

They had business with the small tent-like space in a corner of what was otherwise a single large space. When they looked inside that “room” made of leaves, they saw a square outline on the ground. Last time, Beatrice’s Party had fought the Sage here, so they knew the entire square would move to take them to the bottom of the Labyrinth.

And…

“Boo, young one.”

The elder asked a question while still curled up in a corner.

“How is Lady Abyss? Is she doing well?”

“Squeal. Abyss is Abyss. She’s the same as always! I have her looking after the vegetables in the field while I’m gone, so she’ll be fine.”

“I see.”

Only someone as close to him as the Sage may have known what emotions were carried by those words.

The Iberian Orcs had originally wanted such powerful bodies so they could defeat the ultimate weapon that would bring disaster to all of Ground’s Nir. If the Hero’s designs for a body of her own were ignored, the Red disease could have been seen as their pursuit of strength going too far and their evolution going berserk.

The leader of the Iberian Orcs was showing concern for their nemesis Ultimate Weapon Abyss.

He had not said much, but those words carried great meaning.

The truth of how this world’s humans had died out and the Underworld Lord’s existence had proven Abyss to be more than just an avatar of destruction. She may have been too late to do so, but she had been created to save many lives. Once they knew that, there was no reason to continue a meaningless conflict with her.

The Central Shaft was meant to be the starting point of a deadly journey in which they delved into the depths of the Labyrinth to attack each new ultimate weapon before it could make a proper appearance, so it was enclosed within the elder’s house and the other Iberian Orcs were not to mess with it. That fear had even gained a religious connotation similar to a curse or a miasma.

But things had changed.

It was no longer a symbol of loathsome impurity.

“Squeal. Okay, elder, we’re going.”

“Sure. Keep safe, okay?”

Part 7

In Shinjuku, Tokyo, explosive sounds rang through a rundown gym. But they sounded more like light shockwaves than dull booms. A glasses woman with her long black hair worn up was wearing the martial arts sportswear of a tank top and hot pants. She had just finished pummeling the nearly-2m trainer in the ring.

But she had not been taking out her anger on him or challenging the entire gym.

“You’re worthless. This doesn’t even qualify as practice! Old man, are you trying to get me to bring those showy acrobatics into an actual battle with lives on the line? You’re my sparring partner, so come at me like you’re trying to kill me! Don’t forget to put yourself into the mindset of a cornered criminal!!”

It was unclear who was teaching who and the tough-looking trainer (who secretly liked chocolate parfaits) ended up leaving the ring and running off while wiping the tears from his eyes. And he was a former champ who had made a living with no more than his fists and had won belts in several different classifications in the modern age. The young glasses woman scratched her head in the middle of the ring as she realized maybe she had taken that too far.

(Damn, I did it again. He’s got the build for it, but his heart is basically tofu. I bet he’s headed to that usual ramen place, but I don’t feel like buying a sobbing man a drink and a chocolate parfait from the secret menu.)

“Okay, Inoue, you’re up next. Get in the ring so we can have a fight between pros.”

“Not a chance!! That champ didn’t retire because he was getting too old and started to lose! He got carried away with one of his rushes and accidentally killed his opponent! I am never climbing into the ring from hell where the woman who defeated the Heavyweight Killer is waiting for me!!”

“Oh, so you prefer fighting outside the ring, Inoue? There are tons of makeshift weapons out there and you never know what you’ll hit when you fall…but yeah. That would be more realistic. That’s the kind of resolve I like to see in a subordinate. I’m so glad you’re passionate about your training.”

The baby-faced PI(?) with a mole under his eye screamed and began to flee while searching for anything he could use as a shield. The glasses woman who was searching for a trainer who would “come at her with the intent to kill” showed no mercy.

“The worst part is how you’re just a workaholic and aren’t even trying to harass your workers!!”

“Ha ha ha. You complain, but you’re blocking pretty well. I’m impressed. Now, I think it’s about time we shifted up a gear.”

The young man’s scream shifted up a gear as well. What would become of that poor counterintelligence agent?

“One, two. Yes, very good. Keep it up. One, two. One, two.”

“Is this some weird new form of bullying where she compliments him while murdering him?”

In a corner of the same gym, a girl from a prestigious school was wearing a baggy T-shirt and skintight bike shorts. She stood behind an eyepatch Japanese doll girl in a hoodie and track suit pants to give a hands-on lesson in how to hit the sandbag in front of them. Her upper class background made her seem more like a fitness instructor than a martial arts one. And the bob cut girl could not let anyone know she had only gone to the sandbag because she had been goofing off hitting the punching ball with kitty punches until the leather bag came back and smacked her in the face.

“Okay, keep that up for another minute. Just one more minute and you can take a break, so don’t let up now. One, two. Go at it like you are trying to wring all the oxygen out of your body.”

“I’ve heard enough of your lies about ‘just one more minute’!! Are you trying to get me to run a full marathon at a sprinting pace!?”

…She currently held the position of the elegant and absentminded Student Council President, but in the other world, she had once worked as a strict instructor for the Guild known as the Religious Society. That said, not many people could reproduce those extreme martial arts while here on Earth where their stats were not enhanced in any way. The glasses woman who could defeat a tiger, a bear, or a muscular baldy who had lost all the kindness in his heart was an exception to the norm.

“So after all this, Ground’s Nir Reject Sky shows up, huh?” The glasses woman licked her alluring lips while swinging her fists with enough force to crush a small car. “Even with Abyss, we didn’t exactly defeat her in a straight battle in an open space. In the Labyrinth, we were a secondary concern and she was only trying to reach the surface. Largescale chaos aside, her simple firepower was greater than Demon Lord Tselika’s. Sky was created in the same armory, so she’s probably the same. How are we supposed to defeat her?”

“Gwah, agh, eeeeeeeeeeeeeek!! She can do this when only half focused like she’s texting and walking!? Her destructive power keeps rising as she imagines I’m the enemy, so someone help meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!”

The baby-faced young man pulled off the metal exit door and tried using it as a shield, but that was no defense at this point. It instead dented in and absorbed the impacts like polyurethane.

The Student Council President girl casually led the eyepatch Japanese doll girl behind the sandbag so they would not be caught in the fray.

“But Sky no longer has an objective, right?”

“No, it’s the opposite. She only has an objective. The results don’t matter to her. She killed and threw out the Hero in order to create the artificial atmosphere meant to protect the Hero.”

But in a way, they should have expected this.

“U-um! I read in the reports that Abyss kept following the Ground’s Nir humans’ commands and only focused on the objective of defeating the Underworld Lord. Whoa, that was way too close!! Eek, eek, even after the humans she was supposed to protect had gone extinct, eek!!”

“So those artificial beings will strictly follow their initial command until they receive a new command negating the first??” The Japanese doll girl had a calm look on her face as she pounded on the sandbag. “In that case, she never will stop. As similar as they are, Sky was created differently from Abyss, so there might not be a stop command to be found in the machinery at the bottom of the Labyrinth.”

After being reborn, the Hero had been killed by Sky because she had screwed up the initial settings. In her desperation after learning there was no saving herself hundreds of years before, she may have neglected to include any safety standards.

Regardless…

“Ground’s Nir is only safe and peaceful now because Beatrice used her Magic to blast eight holes in the artificial atmospheric barrier. Just like stabbing an ice pick into a TV screen. Listen, that’s just eight holes. …All our work goes out the window if Sky fixes the broken barrier and it covers that world again. The Iberian Orcs will be afflicted by the Red again and their threat will reach Earth.”

Sky was focused solely on executing her initial settings, so there would be no persuading her to stop. She did not think in terms of good and evil or in terms of like and dislike. As her creator, the Hero should have been their best hope of negotiating with her, but that woman had been immediately eliminated. What hope did some outsider’s words have of reaching her?

She would create and maintain the artificial atmospheric barrier.

She was not concerned with any negative effects that brought. It did not matter to her that the intended effect was no longer possible.

If someone would reduce her efficiency even slightly, she would use her full power to eliminate them. Yes, the full power that had been designed to singlehandedly defeat the Underworld Lord who had only just barely been defeated using the combined forces of all the living things from both Earth and Ground’s Nir.

Plus…

“She has the high ground.”

It was the same reason an aircraft carrier could defeat a battleship and a bomber could defeat a railway gun. It was the same reason so many castles and fortresses used tall stone walls to face the enemy. A height difference was a simple thing, but it had vital tactical importance.

“Not only does she have such massive firepower, but she can watch us from beyond the very atmosphere she has created. Everything’s set up to give Sky the advantage. We need to figure out some way of pulling this off. This battle is going to be tougher than conquering your average castle.”

Part 8

With a dull thud, the floating feeling in the stomach vanished.

“Squeal…”

Boo Boo had arrived in the deepest part of the Labyrinth.

It was not that exciting this time around. When he had come here with Beatrice and the others, the fate of the world and future of the island had given it more meaning, but without all that, it was just an empty space.

There was a stone floor and a slick light source different from fire. The double doors led to the armory’s core where Abyss had slept.

“Hm? I thought the Execution Warrior you were after was on the floor above this?”

“Abyss asked me to do something first!”

Sibyl and Marinka tilted their heads as Boo Boo thudded on through the doors.

“Why is he willing to help her when she tricked him and he was badly injured?”

“That is how Iberian Orcs should be,” said the Sage. “We can keep those clever doubts to ourselves.”

“I’m back,” said Boo Boo before long. It was unclear what he had done, but it could not have been much since he had not been gone long. Sibyl guessed he had been asked to pick something up for Abyss, so she decided it was not worth spying on with the three royal treasures.

The Sage did not bother asking. She walked toward the large stairway leading up and raised her arms to stretch her back.

“Okay, how about we get going?”

They had skipped straight to the goal and were now going in reverse. That meant they would run into the final gatekeepers first. Sibyl readied her Shining Weapon that resembled a staff and a bow and Marinka stuck the white woman’s hands into the brown girl’s body through the shoulder blades, but then the Royal Elf realized something.

Boo Boo was all about physical strength.

The Sage could use all Magic freely.

Marinka would crush the enemy with long-range attacks using the Elements of fire, water, wind, and earth.

And Sibyl reproduced residual thoughts and converted them into attacks.

“Um, is it just me or does our Party not have a healer?”

“Oookay, let’s search for this rumored guardian deity, shall we? That said, the thing is so strong that normal humans and the other Gimmicks can’t even perceive it. The best way to lure it out is destruction. If we defeat every Gimmick we come across and spread the chaos, the Execution Warrior will detect it and come to us. We’re gonna be sitting in one place hunting all the Gimmicks on this floor, so it’s sure to be a test of endurance!”

“No, it isn’t just me!! And we have to test our endurance without a healer!? So is the best way to survive with this Party makeup getting super aggressive and defeating the enemy before they can defeat us!? Then, Sage, you need to use your Magic to attack, not to support us!!”

Part 9

So.

The three maid sisters were still in the courtyard of Roppongi’s Detached Magic Palace.

“We cannot target the simulator hidden in the subway station closest to the National Diet Building. We would fare no better than last time,” said the oldest sister, Iroka. “But can a simulator really function all on its own? Where does it store the massive amount of data it uses? Where is the server system used to support its communications with the outside world? Where is its power source, temperature control, vibration reduction, dust removal, etc., etc. Most of all, a simulator requires a lot of data input. If it greedily gathers all the big data out there to assist its calculations, then there must be a ton of subsystems in addition to the main simulator.”

“So we have to start at the outer edges of the overall system? Do we really have time for all that?”

“This is meaningless if we do not produce definite results.” Iroka was not green enough to let impatience color her thoughts. “When it has to do with the miss, anyway. That is a lesson you taught me.”

“Um, um.” Haruka, the youngest sister who was like a small animal, had been looking back and forth like a tennis referee, but now she hesitantly raised a hand and spoke. “So, uh, who exactly will we be fighting and what will we be destroying?”

“…”

“Haruka, I have wondered for a while if you are growing an otherworldly lifeform in your heart.”

“Eh? Eh?”

Haruka looked confused and Iroka and Misoka responded with exasperated looks, but she was right in this case. When things grew too complex, it could be useful to rephrase things in a simpler fashion. If they had to fight, they could do it elsewhere. And if it was for their beloved master, that was all the better. What could be simpler?

“Now, a question. What do you need to do to create a system that will never go down even if there is a blackout, a fire, or a largescale EMP attack?”

“Prepare a perfectly identical machine and circuit board.”

“Correct. That is the idea behind nonstop computers. Basically, it’s the rather violent idea that if you have two brains and hearts, you can survive if one or the other is destroyed. Although actually implementing it costs a lot of money. You have to pay double for everything going into maintaining the system.”

The idea of increasing processing speed by using multiple chips for parallel processing was well known, but the advantages of parallel systems did not stop there. Paying for extra equipment was the norm in fields like refrigerated warehouses, germ labs, life support systems, military systems, and anything where you couldn’t just say “sorry, but the power went out”.

Nonstop computers would attach two CPUs to a single circuit board and insert two identical motherboards into a single computer. But if the components were connected with fiber optic cables, they could be anywhere on the planet with no noticeable lag. That was similar to a mirror server or hot standby, but this was different in that the redundant parts still acted as a single large device. Instead of switching entirely over to a new system when a malfunction was detected, the routing of power would switch between the different components on the circuit board. Each of the thousands or tens of thousands of components could be switched between.

“However, nonstop computers do have a flaw. Since A and B are both equally important, they must regularly exchange data to sync up. And if you want the backup to work even after a bombing or an EMP attack, you cannot have them in the same facility.”

“Ohh, I get it.”

“Eh? That was supposed to be an explanation? I thought Onee-chan was just trying to sound smart.”

“Don’t worry, Haruka. That muscular brute Misoka is only pretending to understand.”

“I do to understand!!” snapped back the second sister while blushing red. “You’re saying the backup facility has to be somewhere other than that subway station. And since it never sees the light of day, the security will be a lot lighter. In fact, it may have been forgotten about altogether. The secrecy of the whole system may have come back to bite it in the ass here. And it has to regularly connect with the mainframe to sync up. Now, if we injected a virus into that backup facility, what might find its way into the main system when the next sync comes around?”

“Oh.”

“It’s worth trying, that’s for sure.”

Part 10

The space echoed with the sounds of hard and heavy things bending. Over and over again. Armor broke, gears of various sizes scattered, and all sorts of remains littered the floor.

This destruction was meant to lure out the Execution Warrior. That guardian deity was wandering somewhere in the Labyrinth, but it was so powerful it would not react to normal humans and Gimmicks. It could only be Encountered after producing extraordinary results worthy of its level.

On the unnamed floor at the very bottom of the Labyrinth, the walls were formed out of giant cranks and pistons. Steam roared out as those devices rose and fell in what looked like the underside of a society built from stone and steel.

The Sage spoke cheerfully while lightly swinging a Shining Weapon given a rapier shape by patching together various broken blades.

A magic circle much like Beatrice’s floated behind her back, but it wavered irregularly and was filled with static and sparks.

“What’s with you, Sibyl? You’re awfully motivated today. You normally keep up a composed look of disinterest in worldly matters.”

“Pant, pant, gasp!! D-does it really look like I want to be doing this? We have to defeat them with a preemptive surprise attack before they can move a single step because our stupid Party doesn’t have a healer and a single mistake could mean a serious wound and we have to plan everything out so that we take no damage whatsoever and it’s really all your fault!!”

“Well, since one round wasn’t enough for our greedy elf here, we’ll just have to go for another. I gathered a whole lot of Hate to bring a bunch of insta-kill Gimmicks over here. Look, look. We’re completely surrounded by all these big hard things. We aren’t getting any sleep tonight☆”

“You need to abandon the title of Sage right this instant, you complete and utter morooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooon!!!!!”

This was a disaster for Sibyl, not because her normal physical abilities were unimpressive, but because this unexplored area had very few residual thoughts for her to draw on. It was humiliating, but she had to us the residual thoughts likely left by Beatrice’s Party when they had pursued Abyss down here.

(Argh, I just wish I could fully draw out the healer’s effects, but it’s only giving me the Mixing knowledge! Can I not make the potions without the ingredients? Dammit!!)

Incidentally, there did not seem to be any residual thoughts for Abyss herself. No matter how much she looked and acted like a living being, she was still artificial.

This destruction was needed to lure out the Execution Warrior, but they were risking their lives more than enough with this.

The Gimmicks this deep were so brutal that it was usually hard to tell what plants or animals they were based off of. One was a cube of stone with swords, spears, and other weapons sticking out, one was a face made out of a spider web that was distorted in agony, and one was a girl with her back split open to grow wings. An entire human Guild might be wiped out by any one of these, but Sibyl did not want to check their actual strength. Whatever the case, they would be annihilated if they did not finish the Gimmicks off with a preemptive surprise attack. Anything that would make them hesitate would be suicidal at this point.

Then she heard a high-pitched sound.

A new light source appeared within the dimly lit Labyrinth. It was a group of Salamander Fire Spirits, the red will-o’-the-wisps summoned by the large and small Marinkas.

“Go forth.”

“Well, I wouldn’t want anyone saying I’m all talk. Here, I’ll help out.”

“Ahhh! Why are you people filling this enclosed space with fire!? Are you legitimately stupid!?”

“Squeal?”

“Life of the forest, if you have time to tilt your head in confusion, then dive to the floor immediately!! Those idiots aren’t Beatrice!! They do not know how to pay attention to their surroundings when spreading destruction around!!”

Sibyl could have shortened that down a bit by omitting things like the “life of the forest” part, but Boo Boo was an obedient soul.

“Okay!”

The nearly-4m pig-faced giant threw himself to the floor as instructed. And this placed him right on top of Sibyl.

“Hold on, that weight might kill me! I didn’t need another idiot in this- gwaaaaaaaghhh!!!???”

She made an odd noise, but the mass of flames passed by overhead and reached the extraordinary Gimmicks.

“That may have been overkill. If they are turned to ashes, you cannot retrieve a weapon from them.”

“Don’t worry about it. We’re only trying to lure out the Execution Warrior. And they’re the ones that are overkill. Hey, Boo Boo. Quit getting it on with the Royal Elf in the dark there. She’s probably foaming at the mouth with hearts in her eyes below you.”

As Sibyl trembled while lying face up with her legs spread, she had been pushed so close to the line it no longer qualified as comedy. The Sage had no choice but to use her Magic to summon several acupuncture needles. They could not have their elf traveling to the land beyond comedy, so she stabbed the needles into various parts of Sibyl’s skinny body to fill her with life.

“Ah ha ha. Hee hee hee. So this is the sailor uniform those inn town humans wasted their ingenuity to develop…ah!? Th-that was a dream? What am I doing here???”

“It’s okay, wannabe cosplayer elf, but wipe that drool from your mouth. At least we’re back to something comedic now.”

The ever-capable Sage was the same as always. She was very casual in how she treated anything or anyone.

And the cause of this series of events tilted his head in ignorance.

“Squeal, why did you pass out, Sibyl? You’re surprisingly sensitive. Are you sick? Then you need to eat liver. That’ll fix you up.”

“Heh heh heh. Remember this, Boo Boo. This horny flirt of an elf is no exception. All girls are fragile creatures, so treat us with care, okay?”

“Leave it to me! I’ll tackle anything that comes our way to protect you girls!!”

“I do not need your help!!” shouted Sibyl from the gut while suddenly standing very straight, but Boo Boo snorted like a steam engine thanks to the motivation the Sage had given him. At this point, Sibyl could no longer hold anything back. Not only was she faced with all the powerful Gimmicks ahead of her, but she was surrounded by high-firepower idiots who gave no thought to friendly fire, and the giant pig-nosed rock wall behind her would probably deliver the finishing blow.

At any rate…

“Okayyyy, bring it on Gimmicks! Hurry up and lure out the Execution Warrior! Please hurry!! I don’t think I can survive this friendly fire much longer!!”

“Ha ha ha. You sure are motivated today, Sibyl. You usually try to act all noble and above it all, but are you secretly the masochistic type?”

“The fact that your comment pisses me off instead of exciting me is objective proof that I am normal!!”

“Sibyl, a normal girl’s voice wouldn’t grow so sugary sweet when forced into such an extreme situation. …This is funny. I said it as a joke, but now I’m starting to believe it.”

Sibyl had tears in her eyes, her legs turned inward, a flush on her face, heat in her breaths, an upturned look to her eyes, and sweat soaking her skin, but she was extraordinarily destructive thanks to the residual thoughts she gave physical form. With the sounds of shattering stone and metal, swords and axes fell to the ground along with the remains of their wielders.

“C’mon! Is this good enough for you, Execution Warrior! Is this enough to lure you out!? Answer me yes or no, dammit!!”

“Boo… Now that it’s finally happening, I’m kind of nervous.”

“No one asked for that adorable response right now!!”

“No one asked for your sudden belligerence either.”

“Hm, so she can embody both the S and the M at the same time? Fascinating.”

Boo Boo panicked when Sibyl slapped his butt with her small hand to keep him moving, but he looked up when he noticed something. Sibyl and Marinka looked in the same direction while listening to what he had to say.

“It looks like there’s something even stronger over there.”

It had an imposing form.

What sounded like a heavy millstone spinning was the large head scraping against the ceiling. And the ceiling here was tall enough for Boo Boo to move around without difficulty. Overall, it appeared to be a bipedal giant. Rather than the scraps of cloth and belts wrapped around its sinister body, the most notable part was the rusted steel panels bolted to the rotting flesh to forcibly prevent it from falling apart. The face was hidden by a rusted metal helmet, but that may have been for the best. Its overall balance was tilted because of its extremely enlarged right arm. The large, twisted right hand held a thick knife that was really just a guillotine blade given a handle. And instead of holding the handle in its grip, the handle and the entire hand were tied together with rusted barbed wire.

This enemy did not have a preset title like Gatekeeper or Punishment.

Not even the giant armory itself could keep track of this monster.

The metal shoulder armor and torn shorts were just hanging in place. Any production line had some defective products created in something like a margin of error, but this fearsome threat had far surpassed the expected upper limits of the line.

This guardian deity of the Labyrinth had occurred spontaneously rather than as a part of the plan.

It was the Execution Warrior.

It was the one weapon source that Abyss had failed to hunt down.

They could take their time and observe it because it was bound by the Turn Based system unique to the Labyrinth, but was there any hope of victory? Once their fingertips so much as twitched, an extraordinary attack would descend upon them. No, did this monster even need a specific intent to attack? If the giant simply walked by nearby, it would probably crush all living things in the vicinity.

However.

It happened a moment later.

The Sage did not even glance over at it.

The unsteady magic circle on her back flashed and she made an almost lazy horizontal swing of her patchwork rapier. An explosive roar swept out horizontally.

Sibyl responded to the explosion in this enclosed space by using her thumb and forefinger to pinch her small nose rather than covering her long ears. And she tried to breath out through the supposedly blocked nose. This method of clearing the ears was used when diving as well. But even with that, she could only count herself lucky that the rapid pressure change from the noise and shockwave had not ruptured her eardrums.

However.

Even so.

“Boo…”

That noise interrupted the odd ringing that refused to leave her ears. Unarmed Boo Boo stepped out in front of the Royal Elf who was doubled over to endure the blast and he moved as if to distance her from the threat.

“Be careful, Sibyl. That thing is still moving.”

“You’re kidding…right?”

The Execution Warrior was a defective product that had gathered extraordinary power that not even the giant armory had predicted.

It had been pushed back to the side wall by the Sage’s explosion, but that was all.

The Labyrinth used a Turn-Based combat system, but their unnecessary movements during the chaos had worked against them. Beatrice or Philinnion were used to it, so they would not have forgotten to restrict their number of movements even when in a crisis and feeling woozy.

When Boo Boo and the others moved, their enemy would too.

It loosely clenched its empty left hand into a fist and lightly punched the wall to push itself out.

That was all.

That was all, yet the fearsome tremor it caused shook the entire Labyrinth vertically. Sibyl’s feet were truly knocked about 10cm up from the floor and the large and small Archangels flapped their four wings.

It moved.

The extraordinary guardian deity finally took a step forward using a leg with shin armor barely attached.

The Sage spun her patchwork rapier around and laughed fiercely.

“This looks like it’s gonna be fun.”

Their enemy was big enough to scrape its head against the tall ceiling.

It was a mass of power with its rotting ribs contained by rusted armor plating.

The scraps of cloth that had once been shorts cried out in protest.

The giant knife was really just a guillotine blade attached to a handle and it was directly tied to the monster’s hand with rusty barbed wire.

A close-range battle with the Execution Warrior would clearly be a bad idea, so the first to act were the Sage and Marinka. It would be best to keep their distance while destroying it with their projectile Magic and Elements, but…

“Watch out, Sibyl!” shouted Marinka.

Before the Royal Elf could react, Boo Boo grabbed her slender waist in his large hand and jumped to the side.

If he had been an instant slower.

No, if he had been half an instant slower, Sibyl might have been bisected top to bottom by that thick knife. The Execution Warrior could not raise the weapon in preparation since its own rusted helmet was scraping against the ceiling, so the attack took a somewhat diagonal path before smashing the floor.

When had it gotten so close?

This was not some clever trick. The Execution Warrior’s greatest weapon was its giant body. It had incredible reach. Obscuring their vision with flames and dust would only work against them.

A high-pitched sound filled the area.

It came from Sibyl’s circlet which shined with three blue lights. The three royal treasures there could see everything, and yet…

“I can’t see anything?”

Sibyl had shut her eyes while Boo Boo carried her, but when she frowned, it was out of confusion rather than displeasure.

“I can’t see a weakness or a prediction of its next move? But the three royal treasures are supposed to reveal any and all secrets.”

“They can’t see what’s going on in Earth’s Tokyo, right? This defective product is too much for them. It’s so wrong in so many ways that the treasures might be treating it like a resident of another world!”

Even this distance was not out of its range.

The Sage changed how she held her patchwork rapier. She clearly intended to directly block an attack with the blade.

“And don’t grow too reliant on the one trump card you have! Your own equipment will trip you up, Sibyl!!”

The Execution Warrior’s giant twisted right arm moved in a circular motion.

It seemed to be checking on how its shoulder was doing. But it did not stop there. The motion unnaturally continued from the shoulder to the hips, to the legs, and to the rest of that body wearing scraps of cloth and belts.

It was similar to the hammer throw.

Or a spin attack with a sword.

The all-destroying steel cyclone gradually approached Boo Boo and the others. Sibyl’s eyes widened with her slender waist still held, but…

“Everyone, stop!!”

On the Sage’s shouted instruction, they all froze.

At the same time, the mass of muscle contained by rusted armor also stopped in a very unnatural pose. Its belts and tattered shorts strained.

This was Turn Based battle.

As long as they did not move, neither would their enemy.

They could eliminate the momentum of any attack that picked up speed with a running start or rotation.

That said…

“What do we do now?”

Marinka made a conscious effort to not tilt her heads as she spoke.

The beheading blade was frozen in place while held horizontally. The belts and rusted armor covering the Execution Warrior’s body were audibly straining. The momentum of its spin had stopped, but once it could move again, the strength of that one arm would be enough to slice through all of their torsos in one go. They were already in the path of the handheld guillotine.

They could not remain motionless forever.

The Sage gave Boo Boo a sidelong glance to avoid turning her head.

“Boo Boo, once we start moving, make sure you protect Sibyl. When it comes to pure durability, the Royal Elf is the most fragile one here.”

“Squeal.”

A moment later, the Sage and Marinka’s projectiles slammed into Boo Boo instead of the Execution Warrior.

He could not have fallen back by foot in time, so they used the explosive blast to send their ally back to relative safety.

That action meant the extraordinary guardian deity had resumed moving as well.

With a disconcerting creak from all its armor, it made a horizontal slash with its blade. Almost like it was slicing through the dust created by the explosion. Its goal was clearly to prevent any of them from escaping out of range. It wanted to slice through as many hips as possible.

However.

There was no one there.

The explosion was a bluff.

The Sage had made it look like they were falling back when they actually leaped forward with all their might. The pursuing attack naturally used a wide swing. When they knew the motionless Execution Warrior was going to swing its weapon horizontally like that, they could duck down or fly up to avoid it.

“Did you really think we were going to openly discuss our tactics right in front of the enemy!?”

Instead of running right up to the tattered shorts, the Sage circled around to the enemy’s back. She swung her patchwork rapier, increased its cutting power with Magic, and pierced the rotting flesh through a gap between armor panels.

“Melt Cutting.”

It sounded like meat pressed against a hot griddle.

“And you didn’t think I was going to stop there, did you!?”

Dozens and even hundreds of Fire Magic attacks were unleashed from the Shining Weapon rapier stabbed deep inside. It was less like a shotgun than it was detonating a bomb embedded in the enemy’s body. The belts, the shorts, and the rotting flesh within splattered everywhere.

But.

Even then.

“This isn’t over yet, Sage! Get away from there!!”

“?”

Even the Sage seemed surprised by this. The magic circle on her back shined bright as she frantically tried to pull out her skinny sword, but the rotting muscles must have forcibly held it in place. She could not get it out.

It moved.

The Execution Warrior in its rusted helmet tried to use the rotation of turning to slam the insta-kill guillotine attack into the Sage.

But.

But.

But.

Boo Boo gently lowered Sibyl to the floor, and…

“Squeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaallllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll!!”

With a great cry, he grabbed not the Execution Warrior’s weapon but its giant twisted upper arm. More specifically, he grabbed the rusted armor forcibly preventing the rotting muscles from falling apart.

The swing of the arm using the guardian deity’s own strength helped him here.

Boo Boo used both hands to peel away the steel panels and a raw sound echoed around them. The loss of its support somehow caused the enlarged right arm to break apart, tear off, and fly spinning away with the thick knife still barbwired to the hand.

“The inside was not your true form.”

There was a throbbing mass in front of them.

It was the rusted armor Boo Boo had forcibly peeled away. It was squirming on its own like a spring.

“The rotting flesh was just rotting flesh. Gimmicks are generally clockwork devices, aren’t they? Squeal, this armor is your true form, so it doesn’t matter how much we sliced up the inside!”

Now that they knew the answer, Boo Boo began tearing away the armor with both hands and the Sage’s patchwork rapier moved as if prying univalves from a rock. The remaining left arm was diverted out of the way by an explosive projectile from Marinka.

Luggage Girl Sibyl spoke in a daze.

“Is it…over?”

All of the rusted armor had been pulled off, but the bloody flesh continued to squirm.

The Sage snapped her fingers and spoke.

“There’s something inside. Let’s pull it out.”

With a horrible tearing sound, Boo Boo shoved his hand into the back of the Execution Warrior’s neck and pulled something from the rotting flesh.

This one thing was not rotting or rusted.

It was not the same as pure silver or iron. It had the heavy glow of well-forged steel. It had pierced down the core of the Execution Warrior’s body like a spine, but it was actually a large sword. It was more than two meters long, so the length and weight of that thick single-edged blade would be too much for the average person.

Forget Good and Evil.

That was carved into the side of the blade.

“Squeal…”

The back of the blade was shaped somewhat like a spine and Boo Boo held it aloft in one hand.

No words were necessary here.

This was the last weapon Abyss had failed to take.

This was the moment in which it became Boo Boo’s new partner.

Part 11

There was a thick transparent foothold there.

At that altitude, it was in outer space rather than the sky.

Someone clung to it with all fours like an insect while observing something. She had no oxygen tank or airtight suit. That smooth exposed silhouette looked like a lovely girl in a swimsuit.

She was Ground’s Nir Reject Sky.

That runaway ultimate weapon continued obeying her initial command even after killing the Hero who had created her and given her said command.

“…”

The command was to crate an artificial atmospheric barrier and forever preserve it.

But a weapon was only a weapon, so she had a strong tendency to use certain solutions to any problem or obstacle she ran across.

In other words…

(Setting top priority target. Detecting Magic of the humans who are attempting to obstruct my initial task. Registering the human inn town as a target to eliminate their physical workspace. Selecting weapon. Searching options 1 through 28,000. Simulating effective destruction range. Method of maximum effect determined. Locking on.)

Instead of keeping her warm, her two-piece outfit was meant to increase the surface area for heat to escape and the many arms attached to the back of her hips like a nine-tailed fox began to squirm. The Hero’s Spear, the Hero’s Shield, the Hero’s Axe, the Hero’s Crossbow, etc. Sky was equipped with these weapons after borrowing them from her creator for safekeeping, but she only cared about her initial objective. She would use whatever was available to her, so she did not hesitate in the slightest.

Those were no more than devices meant to manage Magic, but the Abyss incident had already proven that an ultimate weapon could use Magic. And since they were not bound by the limits of humanity, artificial beings like Abyss and Sky could produce much greater and wider damage.

(Removing hardware and software safety restrictions. Omitting countdown.)

If she fired down on the surface from the upper atmosphere, the masses in their puny flesh bodies would never stand a chance. The entire inn town would be annihilated as if crushed by a giant meteor.

She selected a long lance to aim down from the heavens. High-voltage electricity crackled around its unique, cannon-like silhouette.

Thanks to the cracks spreading from the eight holes, there was a missing part about the size of a small lake. She resented the damage, but she was willing to use that hole to attack the surface before closing it up.

Her mechanical eyes glowed a yellow of warning. The yellow light on the side of her hips spread out like a skirt and a twisted, constellation-like magic circle glowed brighter above her head.

Her lips moved just once.

“Shoot.”

A fearsome beam of light surged out to pierce the center of the inn town and blow it away.

But that was not what happened.

In a form of resistance, an identical beam of light shot up from a point on the surface and collided with Sky’s attack at the midpoint. The explosion erupted quite high in the sky. No human could have done this. Sky quickly arrived at the only other possibility.

(The other model?)

That should have been impossible.

She was aware of Abyss’s existence, but Abyss had taken critical damage to the head and would have difficulty moving her limbs properly.

But Sky’s assumptions were shattered by the direct contact that reached her.

“ID Code Abyss to Sky. Transmitting on in f-ch mode to cover all channels. Can you hear me?”

“?”

“Contact confirmed. Using response conditions to estimate coordinate data. I have located you, Sky.”

This was no time to be outputting an error report on the unexpected situation. A yellow warning triangle glowed below her chest. She immediately activated her ECM and scattered more than 50,000 kinds of deceptive readings in the outer atmosphere, but she knew Abyss would use her ECCM in response. The deceptive readings would be quickly neutralized and she would be located once more. That game of cat and mouse was not enough to shake Abyss. Abyss would connect the points of data to pursue her location.

“How?”

Sky still did not understand what was happening.

“How is this possible!?”

Had Abyss restarted Ground’s Nir to repair herself? No, that giant armory was not running and it would normally replace all the hardware if there was a problem. So to repair components as delicate as the brain or spinal cord, it would end up creating an entirely new Abyss. Sky doubted a new Abyss would try to protect the lifeforms on the island surface like this.

Then what was this?

Had the technology of that idyllic island really repaired an ultra-precise combat machine like Abyss!? Who had done it and how!?

Part 12

The answer was quite simple.

We can rewind time a bit to see it.

“Meridiana, is this it?”

“Yes, it seems to be basically the same as with Beatrice’s Shining Weapon.”

The palm-sized Fairies fluttered around the brick house while its owner was out. Meridiana, Alice, and the others were at the bottom of the food chain, but no predators would attack them if they shared an Iberian Orc’s home. They could feel safer here than in their own village.

The Fairy sisters were using their tiny hands to roll up pure gold threads which were thinner than hair. They had used the same thing to repair the broken Shining Weapon and extract data from it. That work had ended in failure, but they still had the technique itself.

In other words, they knew how to reconnect broken semiconductors to bring precise machinery back into working order.

At their size, the work was like propping up the human-sized head with a jack and looking up at the back of the girl’s neck from below, but…

“W-wow!! Her nape opened up!”

“Don’t act so surprised, Alice. It’s rude. We came here because she needs our help.”

When working on Beatrice’s Shining Weapon, White Witch Philinnion had disinfected everything with her potions and Fighter Priest Hermelina had used her blunt weapon to alter the wind, so the Cave of Tears had been clean.

But this brick house was impressive in its own way thanks to the materials used. The Fairies had brought dirt and sap as a stopgap measure, but they actually expected it to be quite clean already. Because given Boo Boo’s normal level of hygiene, they had needed to build him a very clean house so he could stay healthy.

Abyss had not expected this at all.

With skill like this, the Fairies might be able to leave their position as observers.

“Gather, gather, gather…”

“#2 and #3 need to cross over to #74 and #91.”

The plans had been left by Boo Boo since he was the only one who could speak with Abyss. His relayed message was full of illustrations and difficult to decipher in places, but as long as the wiring diagram was accurate, nothing else mattered.

Once the environment was set up, they only had to keep working at it. Meridiana and Alice had done this once before, so they were not nervous and they worked even more smoothly than last time.

“Um, all the wires are hooked up now.”

“If we get the broken neck part back into place, we’re done. Let’s fill in the cracks with Sticky Glue.”

“Hold on, Alice. Let’s do this.”

“Understood, Meridiana. We can give her a brand new set of those high-tech clothes. Providing more than asked for is how Fairies help out!”

And.

The silver-haired girl sat up and cracked her neck to see how it was doing.

“Did it work?”

“Alice, she got up fine, so I’d say it did.”

The answer to the Fairies’ question was yes, but Abyss viewed it in a much deeper way.

First of all, this island was technically a giant armory. Once the ultimate weapon was completed, it was supposed to cease functioning and give all its energy and materials to Abyss – which meant the island self-destructed. Abyss had “committed suicide” to prevent that.

But Abyss was functioning properly once more and yet the island had not begun to fall apart. The silver-haired girl finally breathed a sigh of relief.

(Boo Boo must have done what I asked.)

When Boo Boo was headed to the bottom of the Labyrinth, she had asked him to partially destroy the processor in the core of the armory. Destroying it too much would cause the island to fall apart, but leaving too much functionality would allow it to offer the island up to Abyss. Getting it just right was something only Boo Boo could do with his ability to directly detect the flow of electricity to the point of rewriting a Shining Weapon’s profile data. Abyss doubted she herself could have done it. And because he had done that, she did not need to commit suicide again.

The Iberian Orcs were supposed to be her nemesis.

But without his power, she never could have been saved.

Her neck was fixed.

She was missing one arm and she had no weapons.

She would have to use the Central Shaft like Boo Boo’s group had, visit the Labyrinth, and gather some parts with adequate specs.

“After deceiving everyone, I was afraid I would have to watch and wait from a position of safety. But now that I can, I have determined I must stand on the front line as the ultimate weapon.”

She spoke carefully as if seeing how her vocal cords were doing.

This too was a blessing the Fairies had given her.

She was no longer conversing via data. She was using the voice of her own physical body.

She listed up her immediate work tasks while walking out of the brick house, but then she looked up into the sky and whispered.

A magic circle very different from the ones the humans used appeared over her head.

Its twisted glow was somehow similar to Sky’s.

“Not so fast, Sky. You can no longer use the difference in technological level to have your way.”

Part 13

It all came to fruition.

She wore a high-tech black outfit made from a racing swimsuit cut down to size and belt-style supporters. Her one arm was made from a sturdy piece stolen from a clockwork Gimmick. And the three-fingered arms coming from her back all held weapons. Ultimate Weapon Abyss was back in the fight.

Boo Boo was not the only one who had acquired new equipment in the Labyrinth.

A fearsome beam of light was launched from the surface and it protected the inn town from the deadly attack descending down from the heavens.

Chapter 6: Beyond the Planet

Part 1

As soon as Beatrice and the others ended their break and returned to Ground’s Nir, they heard what Sky and Abyss had done.

“Squeal…”

Also, Boo Boo had returned to the surface and he held up a giant one-sided sword in one hand. He had taken it from the Execution Warrior. It did not seem all that out of place in his hand, but if a human tried to lift it even with both hands, it would probably crush them.

Boo Boo’s eyes were sparkling.

“Look, look, Beatrice!! This is my new partner!!”

“…”

“(Oh, is Beatrice flaring up a bit over his use of the word partner!?)”

“(He needs to be careful. She’s the type to get jealous over inanimate objects. I bet she’d blow up if she found porn in her boyfriend’s computer or phone browsing history.)”

Philinnion and Hermelina whispered their thoughts to each other.

Now, Boo Boo’s sword, Forget Good and Evil, did have a tip, but it did not seem designed for stabbing. The tip was more like a can opener, so it would be more effective to catch it on something and apply force that way.

At any rate, that was the good news.

The bad news was of course that Sky continued to watch them from outside the atmosphere.

They were in front of the brick house partway up the mountain.

Philinnion and Hermelina could not see Sky just by looking up, but she could spy on the surface from beyond the blue sky. And this was not a new state of affairs. She had been doing that for centuries now.

“We need to get up there if we want to settle things with Sky.” Hermelina pointed straight up. “But Sky will have learned from the way we reached the ‘sun’ by climbing the tallest mountain and using the islands of the sky area. I mean, that’s what allowed Beatrice to get close enough to make those eight holes in the artificial atmospheric barrier. If we use a route she knows about, she’s guaranteed to shoot us down with concentrated fire.”

“That will not be a problem,” smoothly replied a silver-haired girl in something like a racing swimsuit cut down to size. That outfit was different from the Percentage-type Magic that Beatrice and the others wore. Abyss had to be confident in the sturdiness of her own body more than the clothing. After all, she was not a biological being reliant on flesh and blood. Her neck had been repaired and she had replaced her lost arm in the Labyrinth. But most of all, there was her back. In addition to the many weapon arms attached there, there were two thick nozzles.

The girl with her long silver hair parted into two pieces explained what this was.

“Just like Sky, I possess personal rocket boosters. Please think of me as a top secret mobility platform. She is only generally observing the surface from outside the atmosphere, so I doubt she can see what is happening this deep in the mountain and forest. After all, she does not seem to have the ability to search for a target on the surface by performing a grid scan with the sensors installed across the entire island. She only seems to possess a few Palm Rat-sized drones.”

“?”

Beatrice frowned at that.

Perhaps because she could fly using the Magic flame wings created on her back, she still had a crucial question.

“But how do you and Sky get past the sky area? I thought the Fairies and the Thousand Dragon lost their buoyancy and lift once they’re above a certain altitude?”

“It is a simple concept. We complete all the acceleration we need in the lower altitudes where we have enough buoyancy and lift and then we let our momentum carry us through the unflyable altitude and outside the atmosphere. You can think of it more like firing an artillery shell than a bird that must constantly flap its wings.”

“Ugh,” groaned Philinnion while her suspenders squeezed her breasts and her butt pushed at her shorts. She was looking at the navel-exposing swimsuit girl like she was a handmade flying device predating the Wright Brothers.

Flat boob window Hermelina put a hand on her hip and sighed.

“But if we ignite a booster on the surface, Sky is bound to notice. And from then on, she’ll be locked onto us. Once you rocket off, you’re stuck on a single ballistic course, right?”

“I can of course use the boosters during my ballistic flight to evade to the left and right. I cannot change the general trajectory, though.”

There were apparently some ballistic missiles that zigzagged at random to make them harder to intercept from the surface. That would be what Abyss (who had reinforced her body with a black arm) was talking about.

Regardless, they did not really have any other option.

They realized Abyss had been in control pretty much this entire time. Beatrice was not entirely okay with that, but since this was related to the giant armory built by the humans of this world, it was too much for the humans of Earth to handle. This was indeed necessary to drag Sky out of hiding so they could settle this. Beatrice was simply thankful Abyss was not as self-serving and crafty as the Sage or the Hero.

Beatrice intentionally took a deep breath to calm her emotions.

“So. When do we begin?”

Delicate-looking Abyss responded by grabbing into Boo Boo’s thick right leg.

“Hm?”

“Immediately, if necessary.”

The rocket boosters on the bare navel girl’s back suddenly ignited. Philinnion and Hermelina were blown backwards while they just stood there. Beatrice would have been equally helpless if not for her 100% Fire Resistance.

Silver-haired Abyss’s feet rose from the ground and she made an announcement with a calm expression (and her cheek and boobs pressed against Boo Boo).

“I cannot take you all. These are only for individual use.”

“What!!!???”

Fueled by love and jealousy, Beatrice quickly grabbed onto Boo Boo’s other leg. Magic circles appeared over Abyss’s head and on Beatrice’s back.

A moment later, Abyss, Boo Boo, and Beatrice broke free of the planet’s gravity with frightening speed.

The side characters were shouting something from the surface far below, but their complaints could not reach the airborne trio. Beatrice produced flame wings from her back, but those were only for adjustments. They were already too high to fly, so they had entered ballistic flight thanks to the “running start” Abyss had made at the lower altitudes. If Beatrice was thrown off from this high up, she would never survive.

That was when a flash of light appeared at a point in the blue sky.

“!?”

“…”

Beatrice’s flame wings and Abyss’s boosters erupted. This twisted their course around just enough to avoid the white beam that tore through the space they had just vacated.

“Stop interfering. You are disturbing our trajectory.”

“Don’t be dumb! She predicted your evasion course!! If I hadn’t intervened, we would’ve been shot down!!”

Meanwhile, several more beams flashed from beyond the blue sky. Abyss and Sky were from the same model line. Without the random element that Beatrice provided, it was true Sky might be able to use their specs to predict what optimal action Abyss would take.

“Squeal… I feel dizzy.”

At the same time, Boo Boo groaned while at the center of the formation tugging on his legs. Although it was a testament to his strength that all he felt was dizzy after flying with such speed at such altitude without any Magic assistance.

“Anyway, Abyss!!”

“The oxygen and pressure issues go without saying. I will use my Magic to preserve a livable environment.”

“No, not that. Well, yes that, but the sky above us is generally covered by that artificial atmospheric barrier, right?”

“Does that really bear repeating now?”

“Then where are we headed? Surely we aren’t going to find that thick ceiling blocking our way. I want to believe we’ll find a hole since Sky is shooting down form here, but do we have any concrete proof of that!?”

“………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………”

“Aaaand you’ve gone silent. Oh, and there’s some red warning lights. You aren’t going to freeze up because this wasn’t part of your calculations, are you? We’re kind of relying on Spaceship Abyss staying functional here!”

But now that they were in ballistic flight, not even that sexy high-tech girl could apply the brakes. There was only one option left.

“If there’s anything in our way, we can break it. By shooting it.”

“Real aerial fights aren’t like bullet hell games where it’s over once you defeat the enemy! The barrier overhead is in our path, isn’t it!? If it shatters, the shards will rain down on us!!”

But there was no real time to gripe.

Even thought it was transparent, it still had an imposing presence. The thick wall was right there.

“Wah!!”

Beatrice desperately summoned Fire Magic, but there was no sound of shattering glass. The lines of heat she sent out ahead passed right through. The eight holes must have created cracks that spread and let some parts break off because there was a large, lake-sized hole here. The three of them passed right through the artificial atmosphere.

They were in space.

Beatrice had never expected to be thinking about this unknown territory after traveling to another world altogether. The composition and structure must have been different from on Earth because the atmosphere was not a scorching orange hell that burned everything to a crisp like she had seen on documentaries.

Everything was so still and quiet.

A hard and cold glass shell surrounded the blue planet. Ground’s Nir’s atmosphere actually looked cold.

“I am now using Magic to provide life support.”

Were they in a vacuum or not?

Either way, when Abyss moved her white throat to produce a physical voice, it reached Boo Boo and Beatrice’s ears.

“But that means all three of us will die if I am shot down. It feels strange for an artificial object to ask this of units with irreplaceable lives, but it would help if you set me as a priority defense target.”

But they could not take their time preparing.

This was where the barrier had broken.

Sky would have been standing on the edge of the “lake” to fire down on the surface through the large hole.

Which meant…

“She’s here,” said Boo Boo even though they still had a lot of speed and had not set their feet down on the ground yet.

They saw two rough silver braids and a distinctive outfit similar to a two-piece black swimsuit that was more about cooling than covering up.

A collection of arms extended from the back of her hips like a nine-tail fox.

That collection of technology was different from what Beatrice’s group was used to on Earth.

“It’s Sky! She’s looking our way!!”

Their eyes meet and red and yellow warning lights flashed.

Abyss and Sky.

Their weapon arms crawled creepily, their glowing parts spread out like fans, and they began an intense rush of Magic cannon fire.

Part 2

“Found it,” said Iroka, the oldest of the three maid sisters, in the Detached Magic Palace of Roppongi, Tokyo.

She sat on a picnic sheet in the garden and she held a notebook-sized tablet…but that was of course not all she was using. When connected to a parallel processing booster in international waters, she had enough “power” to overwhelm the world’s largest social media site.

“A nonstop computer uses duplicate wiring and chips to make zero downtime a reality no matter what happens. But the maintenance hatches are all kept separate. It seems the simulator was trying to hide the fact that it even used the nonstop computer method.”

“How does it help us to know that?”

When Second Sister Misoka asked that blunt question, Iroka sighed with a hint of exasperation.

“By tracing back the flow of people going in and out, we should be able to discover where the electronic components are coming from. I imagine they are avoiding any transportation routes that would be recorded by fixed cameras, but this is the age of smartphones, drive recorders, drones, civilian satellites, portable game systems, pet robots, security buzzers, and smart glasses. There are net-connected cameras everywhere.”

Of course, that was assuming Iroka was skilled enough to break through the locks and use that data.

“Buying the parts from defense companies and labs seems most likely, but if a single company controlled it all, then an outside worker could figure out the plans for the simulator. So I imagine it will be divided into smaller sections and the parts are bought from dozens or even hundreds of different companies.”

“Um, so what’s your point?”

Adult Iroka answered Third Sister Haruka while rubbing the younger girl’s head for no real reason.

“It means we have plenty of openings through which to slip in a virus. Let’s fake a random error report and get the usual maintenance workers to swap out the parts for our malicious ones.”

For that swap to work, they had to disguise their parts to look just like the proper ones, so Iroka had to have some partial plans on her tablet. And while she checked on those…

“Maxwell? I wonder what that means.”

“?”

Perhaps.

If history had been slightly different, there may have been someone around to tell them the meaning behind that name. But this reality was not so interesting.

Anyway.

The main point here was that the insistence on secrecy had required the work to be divided up so no one knew the whole picture. People would only know what they had been told, so no one would notice if a component had been tampered with.

They could not infiltrate the giant simulator protected within a sturdy shelter, but the human workers used normal phones and computers. Iroka was skilled enough to interfere with Shining Weapons and Gates, so faking a command was a piece of cake for her.

“Compose the command format, attach a record of overheating, order the replacement part by bike courier, and use double tracking with the courier’s phone and the package’s tag.”

“But that Sky robot lives in another world, doesn’t she? They only exchanged some data, so how did that cooperative relationship help her?”

“We will find out soon. Although I can make a pretty good guess already.”

“?”

“The Hero ordered Sky to construct that artificial atmospheric barrier more than 300 years ago and Sky has followed that command ever since. I doubt the miss was lying to us when she told us all that, but was Sky’s work efficiency really consistent throughout? Perhaps she only managed to build the general framework in the first 100 years and made no real progress afterwards. My guess is she optimized the process considerably in the last few decades.”

“You mean…?”

“Earth and Ground’s Nir. It’s hard to say which one has the greater technology, but what if we narrow our focus down to individual fields? We likely have the upper hand in one field in particular. During the Cold War when the Sage rose to prominence, what were the West and the East in such a desperate race to develop? What field was that?”

“Space…development?”

Outer space was such a foreign concept to the residents of a small idyllic island. They had probably never even considered the possibility. The three maid sisters had no way of knowing, but the only exception who had plenty of astronomical knowledge would be Vampire Kallikantzaros who controlled the lunar eclipse. Archangel Marinka had long protected the sun island, but not even she had gone to outer space. And the residual thought trap had only needed to be set up in advance by the Hero and later placed on the sun island by Sky.

“Given when the Red began to afflict the Iberian Orcs, we should be able to estimate when the artificial atmospheric barrier was actually completed.”

Sky and the simulator’s honeymoon was still underway.

So…

“Sky does not have as much space development technology as you would think. She knows she is being used by the simulator, but her knowledge is too limited to get by without having someone she can ask for advice as insurance.” Iroka supported the side of her glasses with her slender fingers. “If we throw that connection into turmoil, it should negatively affect Sky’s movements outside the atmosphere. Our attacks can reach her through the simulator. And that will give the miss an advantage as she fights in that world. At the very least, this should be more useful than twiddling our thumbs here in Tokyo.”

Part 3

Abyss, who wore what looked like a racing swimsuit with a large hole and a belt-like supporter, intentionally placed a heavy burden on her own boosters to destroy them and use the resultant blast to forcibly cancel her ballistic flight and gently set foot on the artificial atmospheric barrier along with Boo Boo and Beatrice. Her split silver hair spread out unnaturally.

Their footing was glass.

The blue planet was visible below.

Two long braids of rough silver hair swished around. Like some kind of weird bug, Sky clung to the transparent ground with both arms and legs and targeted the intruders with the many weapon arms coming form the back of her outfit which resembled a black two-piece swimsuit. That must have been more efficient than bipedal movement while outside the atmosphere.

Only the twisted, constellation-like magic circle floated serenely above her head despite the situation.

Surprisingly, gravity still existed beyond the planet. It seemed to be about a third of Earth’s. Beatrice’s hair floated up and Abyss looked a bit like her breasts were being lifted. It might sound difficult to function like that, but it felt similar to walking along the bottom of some water.

Was the glass barrier simply being held at this altitude above the surface? If so, gravity would be pulling on it and Sky would have to be constantly supporting the entire thing with her Magic.

Or would this area normally be weightless, but Sky (who had a yellow light in her eyes) had created artificial “weight” here so she could work. Either option would require an incredible amount of power.

This was the artificial atmospheric barrier.

There might be a natural defense barrier higher up that burned everything that passed through, or there might not. Either way, Sky had protected and preserved this structure for centuries. She must have destroyed any debris or asteroids that posed even a slight threat. All to protect the transparent barrier she had created, not the surface.

“If we talk this out-…”

“Unnecessary.”

Beatrice was cut off before she could finish her statement with miniskirt fluttering.

A moment later, Sky lifted her butt a bit while on all fours to aim the spear, axe, and other weapons on their arms. Fearsome lightning shot out horizontally.

Boo Boo spun his spine-backed sword, Forget Good and Evil, to block the lightning rushing toward Beatrice’s face. Then he swung the sword to the side to discharge it. The massive high-voltage current left in a safe direction.

“Arc Discharge!?”

Beatrice’s understanding only caught up once it was all over. It had all happened too fast. Both Sky and Boo Boo’s movements had been superhuman. Without his ability to sense faint electric currents, that single attack might have led to irreversible tragedy. If you could no longer move in battle, you were in a worse state than simply being killed instantly.

Air did not normally conduct electricity.

Lightning was a unique phenomenon in which the massive electrical power forcibly broke through the insulation of the atmosphere. How easy it was to break through depended on the composition, humidity, and density of the air and all forces would avoid stronger areas and flow toward weaker ones. Simply put, by swinging around Forget Good and Evil and making the air density uneven, he could intentionally guide the lightning where he wanted. Although that required Iberian Orc muscles which could crush a tank’s armor like clay if they traveled to Earth.

“…”

Sky moved directly to the side using all the fingers and toes sticking out of the black material covering her arms and legs and she waited for her next chance to attack. True to her statement, she showed no intention of speaking. She may have simply lacked that functionality, but she was intent on following her command to the end either way. Even though it would bring about great harm and even though the Hero was no longer around to benefit from it.

“Squeal. We need to stop Sky.” Boo Boo spun his large sword around and held it in one hand. “If she calms down, I’m sure she’ll listen to us. I mean, she’s the same as Abyss. She isn’t fighting because she thinks something is good or bad!”

“Hm? Stop, Boo Boo!!”

Abyss raised her voice in a way that was unusual for an artificial being.

A moment later, the girl’s butt hopped up to adjust the arms attached to the back of her hips. A giant shield easily clashed with and stopped Boo Boo’s Forget Good and Evil. This was not an issue of sturdiness or technology. The sound of the hit was odd. It was far too light.

(Oh, I get it. Boo Boo generally fights using the weight and speed of his hits, so the change to gravity has stripped him of his power!)

The girl thought to herself while her fingers held her blunt weapon using the hole in the grip. The Iberian Orcs moved so fast as they swung their bodies and weapons around that they seemed to be swimming in the air more than running or jumping. By angling their weapons like wings and slicing them through the air, they could pull off reversals that would be impossible for the average person. But that probably would not work the way Boo Boo expected with the strange atmospheric makeup of this extreme altitude. Abyss was providing a livable environment for them, but “enough to survive” was as far as that went.

Sky removed her hands from the glass ground and spun around on the spot. And she ignited her boosters as she did so. There was no time to be enchanted by the bodylines decorated by her skintight clothing. A skirt-like yellow light spread out and a powerful roundhouse kick easily sent Boo Boo flying backwards.

Would it be harder for her if they got too close?

Once more, the many weapon arms on the back of her hips made a noise as she stared down Boo Boo. The yellow warning triangle below her chest glowed even brighter.

“Boo Boo, get down!!”

Beatrice gave a shout, placed her slag-enlarged gauntlet on the grip of her log or steel beam of a Shining Weapon, and sent as big a fireball as she could manage toward Sky’s exposed bodylines. She doubted a cheap trick like this would win the battle. She only hoped it would act as a smokescreen.

But she did not get even that.

Was it Magic or was it a mechanical sensor? Several stone arrowheads entirely ignored the thick curtain of fire, tore through the air, and slammed into Boo Boo’s body.

Stone Tool.

When drops of blood floated out like round gems, it was Beatrice rather than Boo Boo himself who let out a scream.

Meanwhile, Abyss moved to the front with her weapon arms spread like wings. She took nearly-frantic Beatrice’s place and began grappling with Sky’s weapon arms.

Orange sparks and the sound of scraping metal exploded everywhere.

Ignoring how her clothes tugged at her large breasts, Abyss opened her mouth to speak while staring down her enemy at point-blank range.

“Rejected one, I am not as kind as Boo Boo.”

“…”

“And I know it is odd for an artificial being to say this, but to be blunt, I am pissed. Do you know what you are doing here!?”

She received no response.

Red and yellow warning triangles shined below their chests. Instead of using her many weapon arms, Sky used her slender leg to kick Abyss above the navel and forcibly put some distance between them.

The ideal distance for Sky was also the ideal distance for Abyss.

The twisted magic circles above their heads glowed with two different colors of light.

They fired barrages of Magic at close range to shoot down the other’s Magic and negate it all. The process repeated for hundreds, thousands, and even tens of thousands of Magic attacks. And unlike with the Sage, they showed no sign of being limited to a single Element. They really were two ultimate weapons. Beatrice had specialized in only the Fire Element, so she would have been worn down and destroyed by that onslaught. Not even Boo Boo’s thick bone and muscle could have resisted it.

But they could not afford to be reduced to mere onlookers.

“Squeal, is there anything we can do!?”

“Break us out of…this stalemate. Please destroy the ground below us!!”

Upon Abyss’s request while the recoil of the barrage made her large breasts jiggle, Boo Boo swung his spine-backed sword straight down. A tremor sank through the ground. The glass bent, but it was not enough to absorb the impact and several white cracks ran through it.

“Kh.”

Sky’s bare shoulders jumped while she was down on the ground with all fours. Was that a response to the terrain change or to the damage to the barrier she considered top priority?

She lifted her small butt and aimed a piece of Hero equipment toward Boo Boo even though he was farther back than Abyss.

“Hngh, impromptu shield.”

Abyss deflected the beam using one foot to forcibly flip up a piece of the glass that had broken off from the cracks. The flipped-up piece of transparent land protected them.

Although this seemed more of a way to adjust the level of Hate than a defense.

Sky, whose rough silver braids swayed from her movement, hated any interference with the artificial atmospheric barrier above all else. But that could be used to distract her and mess with her timing.

Sky kept switching between top priority targets, so she could not actually defeat any one target. Boo Boo, Beatrice, and Abyss might take damage, but they had time to recover. Meanwhile, Abyss had been focused on her fellow model from the beginning. That focus meant her attacks were pushing Sky back. It was slow, but the equilibrium was collapsing.

Abyss gave a roar as she wrapped her arms around her body, squishing her chest in the process, to grab her weapon arms and increase their physical range.

“I will!! Push!!!! Through!!!!!!”

“That is…not enough.”

Some kind of dark shadow appeared above their heads. But what was it? They were already on the artificial atmospheric barrier, so it seemed unlikely there would be clouds above that.

Beatrice was not green enough to carelessly look away in the middle of an intense battle, so she first saw the change thanks to the reflection in the smooth glass ground. But at first, she did not properly comprehend what she was seeing there. Or perhaps she simply did not want to comprehend.

“What?”

Come to think of it, Sky had created this barrier, but where had she acquired the materials for it? That artificial girl, who continued wiggling her butt to adjust the aim of the weapon arms, would have needed a massive amount of materials for the entire barrier, but where had they come from?

The answer was before their eyes: silicon asteroids.

A mass capable of covering the heavens was approaching them!?

Sky had always specialized in handling the silicon needed to construct and manage an artificial atmosphere large enough to cover every part of the planet. She had even used it to create a continent-sized cushion for the descent to the surface.

She probably could manipulate masses of glass even at a distance.

But even so.

The Holy Swordswoman spoke her immediate thought while her tattered cloak and miniskirt floated around her.

“Y-you have got to be joking…”

“Joking?”

Sky must have used them for materials and then redirected them to protect the completed barrier.

This was the same task she had gone through countless times over the centuries.

Ground’s Nir Reject Sky silently tilted her head.

“That is a communication tool I do not understand.”

Part 4

A moment later, it mercilessly happened.

Part 5

The asteroid with a diameter of hundreds of meters did not actually make a direct attack. But only because Beatrice and Abyss used tons of Magic to crack it.

But it did a lot of indirect damage. Striking the surface was not the only way a meteor or asteroid could do damage. For example, the friction of the air could break them apart during their descent, causing them to scatter lots of heat, light, and shockwaves. That had turned a 200 square kilometer area to scorched wasteland during the famous Tunguska explosion. Without even getting into the secondary effects and continuing damage, the simple explosion was greater in scale than a small nuke.

“Ohhh!!”

Beatrice immediately moved to cover for Boo Boo because she had 100% Fire Resistance. She could not fully protect him due to their difference in size, but it meant a lot that she managed to guard his face and chest.

But in exchange, Beatrice’s entire body was of course exposed to the blast.

“Gh…bh!?”

“Beatrice!?”

This was about more than just Fire. The asteroid was likely more Earth than anything. The blow from the shockwave and chunks larger than her head knocked the breath out of her and drops of red scattered from her tightly-closed lips. The tattered cloak was no help. The magic circle floating behind her back was flickering disconcertingly.

And it was not over yet.

The yellow light spreading out like a fan by Sky’s ears and the sides of her hips wriggled bewitchingly.

“Trajectory control set for #2 through #256. Maintaining effective course. Beginning wireless towing.”

“Kh. If a single asteroid manages to fall, it will destroy the livable environment on the surface,” said Abyss. “What good is this barrier then? Do you have any idea what you are doing!?”

“I was given just one order: build the artificial atmospheric barrier and eternally preserve it. I was never told to protect the lifeforms on the surface. This could cause the barrier to collapse, but eliminating you is worth the cost of repairs.”

It had been obvious from the moment she attacked the Hero, but this was a reminder of how broken she was.

She had not just mistaken the means for the objective. She saw no link between them at all.

And no matter how wasted it all was, she did have definite power. If she was allowed to continue, she would do great damage, not just to Boo Boo and Beatrice, but to all of Ground’s Nir.

However, if they fired on the asteroids so they broke up in the air, great heat and shockwaves would burst forth. Those were effectively colossal bombs. Your speed and toughness were irrelevant; there was no enduring that. Boo Boo had only survived last time because Beatrice had protected him. If he was hit by that repeatedly, he would be worn down and killed. And so would that person he cared for.

Then what were they to do?

Racing Swimsuit Abyss released even more sinister red lights from all across her body. Her metallic red ear lights spread out beyond their limit.

“Performing preliminary calculations of effective trajectories. Priority targets set. Detected 38 targets. Performing preliminary calculations of effect on other objectives if all are destroyed at once. Selecting for maximum efficiency. Calculations complete. Top priority initial target determined.”

“No, Abyss.”

But Boo Boo softly cut her off. While she was seemingly moving pieces across the game board in an unthinkably complex fashion, he grabbed her black right hand as if to correct the final move.

Yes.

Boo Boo generally allotted most of it to controlling his massive muscles so he did not destroy his own body, but his brain actually rivalled a supercomputer.

“That part goes here. Move a4 to r7.”

One of Abyss’s weapon arms grabbed Boo Boo’s huge body and threw him far overhead. She had already destroyed her own boosters, so in a way, this was an inevitable choice. If they waited for the asteroids to arrive at the barrier, they would be hit by the shockwaves of the asteroids’ destruction. If Boo Boo wanted to protect Beatrice, he only had to smash the asteroids from further away.

They were hundreds of meters across, but they were not protected by a complex arrangement of armor panels. They were only made of silicon – exposed glass. Boo Boo’s great sword could make critical cracks in them.

And so…

“I won’t make you do this over and over.”

It was like a straight-line charge.

Boo Boo flew toward a 100m mass of glass, swung Forget Good and Evil with his full weight behind it, forcefully shoved it into the asteroid, and sliced right through.

“Squeal!! That will take care of them all!!”

Boo Boo was not familiar with the Earth game of billiards, but once that first asteroid was shattered, the rest played out like a great cascade. Large shards scattered in every direction, hit other asteroids, altered their trajectories, and repeated the process. Asteroids #2 through #256 just barely avoided the planet below as if being dragged away by a magnet.

“…”

The only person who took damage was Boo Boo when the very first explosion occurred right in front of him.

His giant body entered a tailspin.

But it was all in how you used it. He had no boosters or wings, so he used the shockwave to change direction. And he did more than just return to the artificial atmospheric barrier. After gaining the momentum of a shooting star, he plummeted toward Sky with Forget Good and Evil in hand!!

Now he could ignore the weakening of his attacks in this low-gravity environment.

It was more like an artillery shell hitting than a sword slash. Sky reacted too late to dodge and instead raised her many weapon arms to defend, but those sank down from the force of the blow.

However.

It was not the weapon arms or Sky’s own skeletal structure that bent. What gave way was below her. The great pressure caused the glass barrier itself to bend like a plate spring.

She must have hated it since she wanted to protect that above all else, but the sinking of the ground below her meant the impact meant to be absorbed by her was instead absorbed by the bending ground similar to a car’s suspension.

A sharp noise followed.

The bending had gone too far.

A spider web of white cracks spread out from where Sky stood with her bodylines showing through what looked like a black two-piece swimsuit. Then it all shattered. With their footing gone, Boo Boo and Sky entered a fatal fall. No, that was not accurate. Sky had her boosters, so she could escape. It was only Boo Boo who would fall.

Or so everyone thought.

But.

But.

But.

The very next moment, Boo Boo kicked off of something.

Was it a fragment of the barrier that had begun to fall? No. Was it the remains of Abyss’s broken boosters? Again, no.

“The…surface?” groaned Sky while facing a threat that refused to leave even after she sacrificed the artificial atmospheric barrier she had set as her top defensive priority. “Something was launched up from the surface!?”

Part 6

It was a simple matter.

Boo Boo, Beatrice, and Abyss were not the only ones battling this threat.

“Work harder, weakest! Success here come down to you!!”

On the coast of the small island, Strigona was trying to motivate the Thousand Dragon, a dragon who measured more than 1000 meters long.

Now, the Thousand Dragon did not maintain such a large body by eating. The island was small enough to walk the perimeter in three days, so it would dry up in no time if she tried to obtain nutrition through normal means.

That was why she took a large quantity of fire, water, wind, and earth spirits inside her body and had them produce energy. It may have been like a symbiotic relationship with a parasite. When it looked like she was eating, she was only supplying those spirits with what they needed.

In other words…

“We just need an energy source more brutal than those ordinary Elements.”

At times like this, Strigona would cross her arms, stand tall, and give a vicious smile.

Strongest of the Plants: Ileana.

Bearer of the Demon Lord Title: Tselika.

Autonomous Statue: Frau Gothel.

Flammable Slime Lifeform: Flame Bubble.

Self-Baiting Trap: Gullveig.

Controller of the Lunar Eclipse: Kallikantzaros.

And lastly, Fairy Queen: Strigona.

With that group present, the answer was obvious.

“For example, the Break News! Our power has always been a step above, so you don’t get to come crying to us that you couldn’t reach some puny little film surrounding our world, weakest!!”

And the Thousand Dragon herself had a brutal weapon. By gathering the energy produced within her body and sending it in a single direction, she could fire what was known as a Dragon Breath.

It was a beam of light, an explosive roar, and a shockwave.

This blast was fired up toward the heavens, but even watching from nearby required great durability. Strigona felt her skin tingling and her black ribbon dress’s miniskirt fluttered dangerously. She could never have brought the normal-sized Fairies like Meridiana, Alice, and Morgan here.

“This is our world.” She roared with her hands on her hips and her eyes on the attack vanishing beyond the blue sky. “You seem to think you can do whatever the hell you want with it, so here’s a lesson for free: There are no side characters in Ground’s Nir! This is our will. We will be taking back our world, uninvited guest in the attic!!”

Part 7

Simply put, that provided a foothold.

Boo Boo planted his feet there.

He had broken through the artificial atmospheric barrier, lost his footing, and ended up in freefall, so he had used the torrent of an attack rocketing up from the surface.

“…”

He paused for a breath.

And then he jumped again. He jumped toward Sky who had used her boosters only to avoid falling.

She could not get away.

He had caught her off guard. Sky had already swung her body along an arcing path and bound herself with her own inertia to avoid his earlier punch, so she had no way of avoiding this new attack from the other side.

Boo Boo’s single-edged sword roared through the air.

Forget Good and Evil pursued Sky as accurately as a precision-guided weapon!!

“So what?”

Meanwhile.

Everyone has something they refuse to compromise on.

Sky’s eyes made a straining noise as they opened wide and their yellow light brightened.

“Connecting datalink and using access route to Earth. Requesting evasive trajectory calculations from simulator. Assist me!!”

Sky had not given up. Even while bound by the artificial gravity created by her own actions, she forcibly moved her body in a twisting fashion to shake just a bit side to side. It was only about a body’s width, but it proved she could still move. With the help of that complete simulator, she could dodge this!!

Part 8

However. It had already been revealed that Boo Boo, Beatrice, and Abyss were not the only ones fighting.

That was true back on Earth as well.

Namely, in the Detached Magic Palace of Roppongi, Tokyo.

“I’m in,” muttered bespectacled Iroka, oldest of the three sisters, while looking down at her tablet.

Haruka, the third sister, glanced over at the screen and tilted her head because she did not understand what she was seeing.

“Hmm? Do you not type away at a keyboard the whole time when hacking?”

“When you want to look up a recipe, do you start by staring at a black screen and typing up a script? You just tap the button, don’t you? In fact, I bet the AI advertisers send you suggestions before you even ask.”

“So what happened?”

Misaka, the second sister, kept things simple at times like this. She was willing to put off figuring something out if she did not need to understand it at the moment.

“A legitimate worker installed our modified component in the nonstop computer’s parallel board. That infected the backup that kicks in if the main one’s power goes out, but the main simulator was infected once they synced. The castle gates might be impregnable from the outside, but this let us open them from within.”

“So you have a route straight in?”

“Indeed I do.”

However.

This simulator was more efficient than the human Diet and government agencies, so it had effectively begun managing the government by assisting with the creation of national policy planning documents. The effects of destroying it were unfathomable. They might even spread beyond Japan alone.

This was the turning point.

They would turn the Detached Magic Palace into the world’s smallest country. It was all to protect a certain girl. That was easy enough to say, but could they actually do it?

After thinking through all that, Iroka smiled a little.

Iroka, Misoka, and Haruka.

The fact that all three sisters were working in the shadows of the government at their age was proof that they had no ordinary background. Haruka was young enough that she should have been part of the compulsory education system.

Since nations and corporations were affected so wildly by the Pieces brought from another world, a lot of the youth saw no real reason to bother with normal education and employment. And yet a lot of those also lacked the courage to risk their lives in the Labyrinth.

These sisters had also been in that awkward, in-between position.

But they had still wanted to be something special, so they had ended up falling to this position.

So when they first heard about that girl, they had been jealous.

They really had felt a much nastier envy.

But what they found was different.

She was much more isolated.

She was much more noble.

She was much more righteous.

Her appearance had resembled the Sage’s. She had possessed the rare traits of a Holy Swordswoman. She had produced real results. Based on the superstition born from those facts, she had been thrown into the luxurious prison known as the Detached Magic Palace, but she had continued looking to the future instead of just rotting away.

She was like a small flower growing through a crack in the stone floor of a solitary confinement cell. She used the hint of light shining through the barred window to spread her leaves and bloom.

The sisters had decided they could not let her wither away.

People were easily distorted. They themselves were an example of that. The girl had worked toward the future all this time, but no one knew what tomorrow would hold. So they decided to protect her. They would not kneel before some great saint. They would work to ensure a perfectly ordinary girl would not collapse under the external pressure bearing down on her. They would make sure she could live her life and remain ordinary.

They would do anything to that end.

That was what they had decided.

At the very least, this was far better than wandering aimlessly. It was far better than when they had obtained special power after hoping to be something special, but had failed to find a special goal.

“I may have been mistaken.”

“Onee-chan?”

“If you want a place to call home, then make one. You don’t have to wag your tail and bow down for someone while waiting for them to give you one.”

Stopping the simulator would be bad news for the country and the world.

The simulator’s supposed purpose sounded fine and all, but were the things it protected really so perfect? Was a system really just if it could only be maintained by locking a girl in what amounted to a prison with a different name and aesthetic?

For one thing, where even were they?

Did any of it matter to Iroka and the others when they would be making a brand new home for themselves?

“I do not care.”

She was not going to claim the simulator was to blame for all the tragedy.

But it calculated out how to benefit even from the incidental tragedies. That demon of statistics functioned much like it was running an organ business by maintaining a list of the sex, age, and blood type of everyone who died of illness and accidents.

She would end this age of being manipulated by something like that.

She and her sisters would leave these prison walls in order to bring freedom to their beloved master.

She placed her slender fingertip on the button displayed on the tablet’s screen.

She sent the decisive command.

“I do not care! This time, world, I will make sure you remember what it means to be free!!”

Part 9

Sky’s feet had left the shattered artificial atmospheric barrier.

She was also moving away from the blue planet.

Some slight static shook her mind during her evasive action.

“…!?”

The look on her face said she could no longer reach what she had been relying on. And heartless as it might seem, time did not stop. She could not change her course much thanks to her own inertia and Boo Boo leaped toward her with spine-backed Forget Good and Evil in hand.

On Earth and in Ground’s Nir, a great many people had wanted to settle things. Their resistance had taken different forms, but they had decided to break free of some form of control. They had decided to no longer live with their head forced down by someone else.

“Ohhhh!!” roared Boo Boo.

He was already within range for his large sword. Sky could not escape that thick blade by forcibly igniting her boosters now.

The many weapon arms crossed in front of her. But not in order to intercept an attack. This was meant to cushion against a blow. It was a nonstrategic reflex, similar to someone holding their hands in front of their face when a ball flew toward them.

Boo Boo did not hesitate.

He placed all his weight and speed on the end of Forget Good and Evil and he swung it down with all his might!!

“!?”

Sky audibly gasped as her two braids swayed through empty space.

Sounds of destruction followed. The weapon arms attached to the back of her hips were no defense at all. One after another, they were broken like dry twigs. The thick blade of Boo Boo’s Forget Good and Evil approached Sky’s slender body.

And.

And.

And.

(…?)

Ultimate Weapon Abyss was the first to notice something was off as she watched from the side.

This was odd.

Boo Boo’s attack had been perfect. Sky had leaped away from the planet to avoid any more damage to the barrier they were standing on, so her powerful inertia had limited her evasive choices and left her with no escape route. Desperately buying time by sacrificing the weapon arms was not enough. As a machine, she may have been willing to sacrifice parts of herself and thought she could make a counterattack if even one weapon remained, but not even that had worked. Boo Boo’s sword had smashed all of the weapon arms and continued on to slice her head apart.

And yet…

(It didn’t…reach her?)

Abyss’s artificial throat gulped as she confirmed the unfavorable situation.

(No! Did Boo Boo redirect his own blade out of the way!?)

Boo Boo felt a dull impact in his wrist. After slicing through the many weapon arms, he had twisted the thick sword at the last second to bring it down on Sky’s bare right shoulder instead of her head. Her slender form tilted to the side, but she had not ceased to function.

Even Sky herself widened her eyes in surprise at her survival. Meanwhile, Boo Boo alone viewed her face from close up.

He would not let her get away now.

And he raised his voice to a roar.

“Creating and forever preserving the artificial atmospheric barrier is your top priority and you were not told to protect the lifeforms on the surface. That’s what you said, isn’t it?”

“What are you-…?”

“Is that what you actually want to do, or is it just what the Hero ordered you to do!?”

It was Abyss rather than Sky who looked like she had a stake driven into her heart.

“I don’t get how all those beepy machines work, but there’s something I figured out from talking with the Shining Weapons and Abyss. Sky, all you ever talk about is the artificial atmosphere. Almost like you aren’t allowed to do anything else! So give us the truth! Do you personally want to keep doing this!?”

“I-I…”

She tried to twist around as if to escape something, but she could not. There was no escape for her now that Boo Boo’s large sword was embedded deep in her shoulder.

“I will create and forever preserve the artificial atmospheric barrier. That is what I was created to-…”

“No!!” Boo Boo slammed her with a rejection of that standardized message. “No one’s talking about what you were born to do. The Iberian Orcs like me continually evolved to fight Abyss and the Hero turned us into materials for her body. And Abyss was forced to sacrifice everything to fight the Underworld Lord! Beatrice, Philinnion, Hermelina, and probably everyone else had roles expected of them and forced onto them! But that isn’t what matters!! We were all born in the hopes that we would do something, but it’s up to us to decide how we live!! Squeal, don’t get that confused, Sky. What you’re doing isn’t called living!!”

“…”

“So tell us. Boo, tell us in your own words!!”

Boo Boo would not stop speaking.

He pushed through.

He had to here. Someone had to!

“In the end, what does the artificial atmospheric barrier matter!? What have you accomplished by protecting it for centuries!? You’ve been watching us while all alone up here outside the planet, haven’t you? You’ve been watching us laugh, cry, and fight while no one at all knew you were up here! How did that make you feel? Can you really, truly say you’re satisfied with a life simply doing what you were told!?”

(I was commanded to create the artificial atmospheric barrier…)

A force within her kept her from saying that out loud.

Could Boo Boo hear her conflict because he had the power to read weak electrical signals? Or was it written plainly on her face?

“Tell us!!”

A great many powers had gathered together.

So many people had worked to give him this chance.

So he would not let it end prematurely. He could never spit on their efforts by killing her without asking this first.

No matter what.

“What did you really, truly want to spend that time doing, Sky!!!???”

More than the Iberian Orc’s powerful body and more than the thick sword embedded in her shoulder, it may have been those words that broke something inside Sky.

She bit her lovely lip.

“I…”

And the yellow warning lights vanished. The fan-like glowing yellow objects folded up at her ears and the sides of her hips.

With the warning triangle below her chest gone, the girl spoke a desire that she knew could never be.

“I wanted to be with everyone else.”

“Squeal, then leave it to me. You don’t have to cry anymore.”

He answered immediately, as if to say there could be no other answer.

Sky looked taken aback, so Boo Boo smiled.

“I was all alone once too, but everyone saved me. So now I can never underestimate that power.”

Something audibly burst as Boo Boo spoke.

Sky looked shocked in her heat-reduction outfit that resembled a black two-piece swimsuit.

“What…was that?”

“If there’s something in your head keeping you from living the way you want, then I’ll destroy it.”

He smiled.

And he spoke while smiling.

“Don’t worry. I don’t get these beepy machine things, but I’ve messed with them before. I can save you!”

It was Beatrice who looked up with miniskirt fluttering. What had happened when Boo Boo rewrote his Shining Weapon’s profile settings to save her?

Hadn’t they been fighting to escape that?

Was he saying they were headed right back there again?

“Wait, Boo Boo!!”

But.

But.

But.

“Don’t worry.”

She definitely heard his voice.

He was saying he would not take the easy way out and go for a desperate tear jerker of an ending.

“I won’t waste the life all of you saved. Squeal, we’re all getting back from here. I won’t let any of us be lost!! Not even one! And that includes Sky and me!!”

Part 10

In truth.

After Boo Boo crawled out of the dirt and woke up, a red-armored and white-miniskirted woman had chased him around for a while.

“Get back here, Boo Boo!!”

“Squeal!?”

She refused to forgive him even after he cried and apologized and she had beat him over the head with some rolled-up parchment. Of course, he may have only had himself to blame for dying and worrying the others.

Beatrice was hopeless at times like this. When he had reawoken, she had only been able to cling to him and cry.

In a way, only someone who knew more about the Iberian Orcs than Beatrice was suited for that role, so beating down Boo Boo had been the Sage’s job.

“I know you wanted to save Beatrice, but you pushed yourself too far in too many ways! When you get too fixated on some girl and decide to take things into your own hands, you’re not supposed to literally send yourself to heaven. I’ve never heard of anything so ridiculous!! It’s more pathetic than those mantises that are eaten by the females!”

“Squeal… But Abyss said that was the only way to save Beatrice.”

“You already saw for yourself how she jumps straight toward suicide as a solution to any problem she faces, didn’t you!? Don’t listen to the mentally ill girl with scars all over her wrists!! She mistakenly thinks it’s a virtue to lose your life in exchange for something!!”

“O-ow… If you keep hitting me on the head, my neck’s going to get stuck in my body.”

“This is the best way to teach a fool.”

“What is that you have rolled up there? A legendary weapon???”

“This is an inn town newspaper I’m going to be publishing soon. I plan to become the media lord of this world to kill some time. And I’ll use that to rid everyone of their biases about Iberian Orcs.”

That was a hell of a thing to say, but Boo Boo only tilted his head since he did not understand the threats of a digitized society.

Beatrice’s lookalike tapped her shoulder with the rolled up parchment.

“Anyway, next time you think about doing something that crazy, make sure you wait for me. I can give you a lot better advice than an ultimate weapon who’s like an embodiment of destruction. I am known as the Sage, after all. Rely on me more.”

“Boo… But you’re an elusive free spirit who only shows up when you least expect it, so how am I supposed to find you when I want to- ow! S-squeeeeeeal!?”

Boo Boo tearfully jumped up when she grabbed and tugged on his curly tail. There really was no one who knew how to deal with Iberian Orcs better than her. It was not hard to see why it was said the powerful elder could not sneak any food whenever she was around.

“My point is, Boo Boo, that the basic idea was not wrong. But the method you used ignored the entire concept of safety standards. I am not fond of that kind of emotional but meaningless decision.”

“Squeal?”

“To put it extremely simply, we can’t have you shocking yourself in the process.”

The Sage spat out the words, but that really did accurately pinpoint the problem.

And…

“You might be sort of satisfied – or even feeling pretty proud of yourself – for risking your life to save Beatrice, but I don’t want you getting into some weird habit of self-sacrifice, so I’m going to take you down a peg with a single statement. Are you ready? I really am going to ruin it all with one little thing.”

Rather than lecturing him, her cruel grin made her look more like a child preparing for an especially good prank.

Boo Boo flinched and the Sage said it straight to his face.

“Find a way to ground yourself next time.”

Part 11

That might not seem like much of a revelation to the humans of Earth, but things were different for the residents of a world without the appropriate foundation for such things.

That world only knew of electricity as lightning or the stuff that made their clothes shock them.

But he needed a ground.

A ground!!

This was not the island small enough to walk the perimeter in three days. It was the glass artificial atmospheric barrier that divided the planet from outer space.

Normally, simple glass did not conduct electricity. That meant it could not be used as a ground – that is, it would not provide a safe outlet for excess electricity.

But this was a special barrier that the Hero had ordered Sky to build in order to transform the planet’s environment. It was a planetary control system that freely bent the light falling from the heavens, caused chemical bonds in the atmosphere’s components, made the ground rise up from the gathering of heat, and was capable of other things too. That meant it was not simply glass. Some method (that very likely relied on electricity) had been used to control the refraction of light. For example, the density of the glass’s interior may have been adjustable.

It was very likely made to conduct electricity.

And it continued on for as far as the eye could see.

For Boo Boo’s purposes, it was no different from land.

He could use it as a ground to protect himself!!

“Ohhhh!!”

He no longer needed the single-edged Forget Good and Evil.

He slammed his forehead against hers and roared. Sky was indeed the root cause of it all. But had she really done anything wrong? Had she really needed to be labeled a reject? Perhaps she needed to be punished for her crimes, but could she really never be forgiven?

He would provide an answer for all of that here.

He entered her artificial head and remove the order that the Hero had placed there out of her own delusions. Once the initial command was gone, all that would remain was the true Sky – everything she had developed within herself. He would find out what exactly that was. Even if she had gone along with the Hero’s command and done such an awful thing and even if she had abandoned the Hero during that long time, Boo Boo would forgive her if it was just an ordinary girl that remained once it was all over. He would bow down to anyone to get them to forgive Sky who had been alone for so very long. And if that kind of bright salvation was even somewhat possible, it was worth trying!!

The battle no longer mattered.

No one was talking about life or death here.

Only one thing mattered.

Could he bring a smile to this girl who had never known what it was to smile and could he break her out of her centuries-long isolation? If he kept his focus there, he really did not care what happened afterwards!!

“Hero…”

Boo Boo did not understand the complex high-level programming language used by Sky and Abyss.

It was all about feeling.

Something dark lurked at the core of her mind. It was like an amorphous blob and he saw it as a much more concentrated version of the cruelty he had received from strangers.

It would have saddened him had this come from within Sky.

But it did not.

It clearly stood out from its surroundings, so he knew it did not come from Sky herself. It had been pasted there. That root cause of her evil deeds had been forcibly embedded within her by someone else so it could never be removed.

So the emotion roiling in Boo Boo’s chest was anger.

“Your story already ended! So release Sky! Release this girl you’ve kept enslaved for centuries!! Let her go freeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!”

Part 12

A bluish-white flash burst out so brightly it seemed to scorch the inky blackness of space.

And the twisted, constellation-like magic circle above her head – that symbol of this conflict – silently vanished.

Epilogue: Welcome to the Open World

There was a small hill partway up the mountain.

That was Boo Boo’s favorite spot and it gave him a view of the inn town the humans used as a base. But he was not there at the moment.

Holy Swordswoman Beatrice stood silently on the hill in her red armor and white miniskirt.

Next to her, bespectacled White Witch Philinnion asked a question with a smile in her voice.

“Hee hee. Are you feeling lonely, Beatrice?”

“…”

“Philinnion, you dumbass! Have you forgotten Beatrice is the obsessive stalker type who can’t take a joke about these things!?”

Fighter Priest Hermelina frantically spoke up, but the utter moron probably had no idea she had detonated several nuclear landmines in her attempt to avoid a single anti-personnel mine.

Boo Boo was currently walking to the inn town visible below. He said he was going to bow down along with Sky to get everyone to accept her.

Had he thought about the fact that it was not that long ago that he had been curled up all alone on this hill to watch the festivals from afar?

Everyone grew with time.

As long as they wanted to grow, they would not stay in one place for long.

“Yes.” And Beatrice took a step forward with her tattered gray cloak swaying behind her. “I am lonely. But I’m even more pissed. What, am I so strong he doesn’t feel the need to protect me? I went to all that trouble to get this strong and now it’s working against me?”

He had admitted to his weakness.

And he had wanted to move past it.

“But why is it I can’t even imagine Boo Boo smiling happily with everyone if we had given up on Sky?”

It all came down to this: The guy she loved was not that cheap a person.

The island was small enough to walk the perimeter in three days.

This was an alternate world with a variety of lifeforms, ranging from the palm-sized Fairies to a Dragon that seemed to reach the sky.

A lot had happened on that island.

So very, very much had happened.

But in the very end, everyone had smiled and forgiven each other. And they had continued forward, even if only a step at a time. Ground’s Nir had seemed so attractive to the humans from Earth, but that may not have been limited to the Labyrinth sprawling out below the island. They may have been drawn to the land and the air and they may have dreamed of great possibilities there.

Of course, those possibilities would never come true if they simply sat around dreaming. A great many people had clashed and worn down their own bodies to protect this easy-going world. Profit, biases, status, and justice. They had weighed many things on the scales while protecting this place.

So this would turn out just fine.

Ground’s Nir would not be broken by something as simple as inviting in a new friend.

“My name is Sky.”

The human inn town had accepted Boo Boo, but they would not stop there. After he gave a supportive push on the back of a lonely girl who reminded him of his old self, a miracle was completed.

An ordinary girl spoke in front of so many people.

“I caused a lot of trouble for so many people. I will not argue if you call me the root cause of it all. But if you can find it within you to accept me, I will ask for nothing else. So please!!!!!!”

Afterword

And with that, this is Kamachi Kazuma!!

This is the 7th and final volume!! Volume 6 was an ending for Boo Boo, but there were still plenty of mysteries left over, like it was an uncompleted fill-in-the-blank test. My intent with this volume was to answer every last one of those unanswered questions and to give a proper happy ending for Boo Boo, Beatrice, and everyone else who did not give up on happiness. I think the Sage and the elder may have left the biggest impression there.

I think having something “beyond the ending” was a very Boo Boo-like thing to do since the series incorporated a lot of video game elements, but what did you think?

Getting to the actual content of the novel, I have been writing a lot more depictions of practical applications of magic in A Certain Magical Index since the series has been running for so long, so I wanted to simplify the occult and magical stuff here to kind of “go back to my roots” in a way. That was a different approach from Unexplored Summon://Blood-Sign where I used language as a foundation to create a fictional mythological system for the series. (In other words, I created my own mythology instead of searching through the world’s existing mythologies for material). Not having to read through so much material was convenient, but that honestly made it harder to give any real depth or weight to it. I often compared Beatrice’s Fire Magic to metal jets and volcanoes or compared Wildefrau’s Ice Magic to liquid nitrogen, but that was a trace of my trial and error method there.

(Now, for their handle names, I did use the names of legendary women such as female demons, fairies, witches, and the heroines of ancient literature. For example, Beatrice is a main character from the Divine Comedy, Philinnion is a ghost girl from an ancient Greek story, Hermelina is a succubus introduced in a book on witches, etc. Strigona is a witch (or a vampire?), although you might have better luck searching for Striga. For the guys like Boo Boo, Omega, the elder, and Skull Wave, I went with nicknames lacking any kind of motif.)

Magic comes in many forms, ranging from simple rain dances, prayers, and magic charms to the complex modern Western magic that has entire books written on the process, so there is no real right answer in what part you choose to use in your work of entertainment. In that sense, I think it was very important that I took Boo Boo in the opposite direction of my other series that has lasted more than a decade.

The final enemy was Sky, whose name was the polar opposite of Abyss, and the stage was outer space. That’s probably pretty rare when it comes to fantasy worlds.

The final boss being equipped with only hero equipment was something of an important point. I seem to like going with the dark side of justice than going with pure evil. Although that might be obvious when you look at the Objects or the White Queen from my other series.

In that sense, I may have made the protagonist an Iberian Orc because I wanted someone in a position where they could talk about simple good deeds and justice without it seeming too trite. When it comes to battles or relationships, a “strongest” character really shines if you give them even one thing they long for. If your hero wants for nothing and is simply living the exact life they wanted, there’s no story there. At least that’s my view after writing so many stories.

Yes.

I think the time to end this series is when Boo Boo has truly overcome his many complexes. And that has happened in this seventh volume. So for the finale, I had him save Sky and finish that saving in the human inn town. Fighting and efficiently destroying your opponent is not what it means to be the “strongest”. Boo Boo is no longer the person who could not stop Abyss from killing herself and could only watch the festival all alone on that hill.

What is true strength? What hurdles did Boo Boo need to overcome? What did you think?

I give my thanks to my illustrator Mahaya-san and my editors Miki-san, Anan-san, Nakajima-san, Yamamoto-san, and Mitera-san. Boo Boo and Beatrice’s story had life breathed into it by the illustrations and it only succeeded thanks to all of your support. I relied on you all for a lot in developing the characters, the world, and each character’s magic circle and whatnot. I am truly grateful you stuck with me for this series to the end.

And I give my thanks to the readers. I wanted to show that there was something beyond the normal ending and that gave this a rather unusual structure, but the people who read this volume must have been those who answered “no” to Abyss’s question at the end of Volume 6. I cannot thank you enough for loving this series so much. I am truly grateful. I hope we will meet again in the next series.

And I will end this here.

I hope their happy days will continue in all of your hearts.

Sky? I love her.

-Kamachi Kazuma

Ending

Two silhouettes flew around the blue sky with their courses seeming to intertwine.

The fluttering distressed silver hair and the firing boosters belonged to Abyss and Sky who had abandoned their warning colors.

Times had changed.

And that was no metaphor. Alchemist Cheerleader Huldra spoke while looking up from the inn town.

“I never thought we’d see a time when Pieces are going away for good.”

Humans had originally shown an interest in Ground’s Nir because they could learn Magic and cause phenomena not possible on Earth. Whether it was semiconductors, new drugs, or fuel batteries, simply being able to produce fire from your hand could lead to very different discoveries when viewed on a microscopic scale. Taking macro-level objects back to Earth was difficult, but data could be stored in the Shining Weapon and brought back. Those were known as Pieces. They carried the possibility of breaking open stalled fields of research, but that meant they brought the tremendous power to both develop and eradicate human civilization.

However…

“Well, the entire Labyrinth is a giant armory. It’s private property, so if they insist we stay out, we kind of have to, don’t we?”

Wildefrau, the pervert wearing only a cross sword and belts, gave an offhand response.

Until now, the Labyrinth had not belonged to anyone, so even though the humans from earth were separated by country, corporation, language, religion, and more, they had all competed in the exploration of that underground space. But that was off limits now that an owner had appeared.

Had Abyss and Sky’s appearance brought humanity to a standstill? When the inn town humans had accepted them, had they foolishly crushed their own possibilities?

If so, blonde braid loop Gruagach and blonde curled ponytail Rusalka would not have looked so carefree.

“I bet everyone really wanted an excuse to set down their Shining Weapons and come to a stop.”

“But we can’t stop visiting this world either. Right, Onee-sama!? The draw of Ground’s Nir wasn’t the thrilling battles.”

So.

Why were those peaceful four gathered around a table on a main street?

The answer could be found in the food-oriented social gathering spot hastily created from the first floor of the inn/pub here.

“I think we should work with the Thousand Dragon for this! I mean, her ability to instantly travel between this island and that continent is unbeatable!!”

“No, winning over Ileana and hogging all the herbs comes first! Controlling the top is meaningless if your foundation is shaky!”

“I don’t care if it’s life insurance of real estate; is there any way to make some money!? I’m desperate over here!”

Beatrice, Philinnion, and Hermelina.

No, it was not just them. All those veteran warriors were focused elsewhere now. The Labyrinth was no longer an option, but so what? The current trend was to work with the Nonhumans living in Ground’s Nir, make business contracts with them, learn from their knowledge and skills, take that back to Earth, and trade using the island’s natural resources.

“What about the Womb Pot!? The Thousand Dragon’s Mother is sleeping at the bottom of that lake, right? If we had two colossal dragons to ourselves, we could revolutionize transportation in this world!!”

“The surface is covered with Strigona’s toxin, remember? How do we remove that hellish film, you idiot!?”

“If that’s truly impossible, then wouldn’t that be a business opportunity of its own? If we get a rival Guild all worked up so they start some expensive but impossible project, they’d end up really badly burned.”

Huldra and the others stared up into the sky with a distant look in their eyes, but this did not end with ugly greed.

Blue ringlet curl Wildefrau (who could probably remove the toxin by freezing the surface of the lake) placed a hand on the cheek of her truly exasperated face.

“Honestly, and I thought I was seeing the good will of humanity when we all abandoned the Labyrinth at once like that.”

“You were definitely imagining things. The currency here is still the gears from the Gimmicks made in the Labyrinth. Basically, everyone thought they could focus more on making money if they let those mechanical girls handle the mint and banking system.”

Skintight leotard, armor, and boots Rusalka explained that while poking at a stone gear sitting on the table.

“There you go.”

“Oh, it’s Meridiana.”

The palm-sized Fairy had refilled the aroma oil in the center of the table. Appearing before people had been rare of that timid species…but not anymore.

Looking up a bit showed a Royal Elf walking along with a paper bag of ingredients for the Girl’s Grill she had resumed running and both Archangel Marinkas were reading the inn town newspaper together on top of a pointed roof. If you visited the church, you would see a lovely Nun bossing around a skeleton who was extremely philanthropic (to women only).

They were all important business and trade partners, so the humans could not kick out the many different forms of Nonhuman even if they wanted to. If they did not build a favorable relationship with them, they could not get favorable deals.

It was not all bad.

For example…

“So in the end, we failed,” said Misoka, second of the three maid sisters, in the Detached Magic Palace of Roppongi, Tokyo.

Their plan to turn the Detached Magic Palace into the world’s smallest independent country had continued right up to the end, but it had bene overturned at the very, very end. They would not have needed to calm their anger if it had been obstruction from the profit-focused influencers or by Over the Wall or the simulator lurking beyond that, but they could hardly complain when their beloved master had been the one to unwittingly do it.

Iroka, the oldest sister, pouted her lips like a small child for once.

“I never thought she would seal up the Labyrinth and change this Piece-driven world.”

The red dress girl was responsible for 15% of the people’s total tax money. That income would have been enough to support a small country, but now they were back to square one.

“What do we do now?” asked Haruka, the small animal of a third sister.

With the Labyrinth exploration and Piece profits gone, Nagatacho and Kasumigaseki had no reason to keep the red dress girl locked up. But at the same time, that meant they did not need to keep supporting the Detached Magic Palace in the most expensive area of Roppongi.

…Iroka had started to think this may have been the real right answer. If they declared their independence and freedom, the new nation’s income would be entirely reliant on the dress girl. If she was forced to continue exploring the dangerous Labyrinth to support the Detached Magic Palace, would she really have been free? Sometimes you could only see something clearly after it had been lost.

They had been trying to protect that girl, but she had ended up protecting them.

There master may have been looking further ahead than them.

“I don’t get it,” whispered Iroka who wore glasses and had a mole below her eye. “But whatever form it takes, we and the miss are no longer bound here. Once she finds a new Gate and reregisters, she can live in a small apartment for all it matters. As long as we can happily support her.”

There was a definite change, slow as it might be.

There was a lot of noise at Boo Boo’s brick house on the mountain slope.

But instead of the house’s owner, it was the Break News around it causing the ruckus.

“Taking root in that glass continent would indeed be difficult. But not impossible. The land might be a dead end, but the ocean is a treasure trove of resources. If we lay nutrient-rich dirt atop the glass continent and create soil by either burning seaweed or letting it rot, we might just be able to take root there!”

“Ho ho? So are you planning to go there?”

“There is more than one of me. Do not forget that all plants on this island come from the All-Purpose Seed and are thus a part of me, pest. And the times are constantly changing. The time has come for an upset within the Break News. Will we cling to the island, or will we expand our influence to the new continent? That will be the key to the coming century.”

From the ghost ship and from the sky, Kallikantzaros and the Thousand Dragon were apparently keeping an eye on the people traveling between the island and the new continent. Was that meant as a warning so they would behave?

But separate from that, Strigona breathed an annoyed sigh.

“I am the Fairy Queen, so I cannot travel to a new land and abandon the village.”

“Hwa ha ha. You old hag, stubborn people like you are known as obsolete fossils!”

“The humans apparently say it’s easy to overlook what’s right under your nose. So while everyone is focused on the new continent, I think I’ll work in secret to take over this island with Boo Boo’s second house at the center of my territory.”

“What?”

“You got a problem with that, perverted carrot?”

It was unclear how serious they were, but ominous sparks flew between those two.

The Sage was in the Iberian Orc village.

There were fewer Iberian Orcs than usual, perhaps because they were out helping with construction work. They no longer had to live in secret. The pig-faced giants rushing back and forth blew away the still atmosphere that usually hung over the place like a deep fog.

“It won’t be that easy.”

The Sage spoke so only the elder could hear while holding a parchment memo pad in hand.

The little ones squeaked while drawing out a large ladder-like frame on a patch of black soil cleared of underbrush. Drawing pictures in those frames was apparently the in thing at the moment. They had probably been influenced by the four-panel comic featuring a pig protagonist and human girl heroine that ran in a corner of the Sage’s inn town newspaper.

She kindly narrowed her eyes as she viewed those innocent little ones, but her whispered voice was as harsh as ever.

“Human nature is not changed so easily. Long before we ever encountered this world or the Labyrinth, we were getting into ugly fights over the money we had developed. Things might look good now, but once someone somewhere finds a loophole, all that malice and greed will rear its ugly head once more. It will happen sooner or later.”

“Squeal.”

Whether he understood or not, the elder tilted his head a little.

“But I feel like that is what it means to be alive. I can’t imagine a living creature with no desires or wishes. Even Lady Abyss and Lady Sky took flight after finding something they wanted to do.”

“…Perhaps.”

Things were fine while the world was happy.

As long as everyone flung the doors open wide and innocently ran toward a world of new possibility.

But what harm would that cause?

What disasters would it bring about?

There needed to be at least one person who gave this peaceful new era that kind of serious thought. And if a threat was about to take form, she only had to warn everyone so it could be nipped in the bud. She had decided to start a newspaper in this world because she wanted the information infrastructure to get the word out.

She had given up on making all the decisions on her own without relying on anyone.

The Sage smiled a little.

“But.”

“?”

“At the very least, we might have steered away from the disastrous future I knew.”

Time had passed and evening had arrived.

Boo Boo and Beatrice stood on the hill overlooking the inn town.

The humans had abandoned the Labyrinth.

But at the same time, they had incorporated the island’s Nonhumans into their routines and that was gradually changing the people of this world who had always lived peacefully in the forests and fields.

The value of rest was changing.

The busy time spent in the inn town was a refreshing new experience. But it was important to still find and keep a spot where they could return to those more carefree times. The concept of time-off and vacations might begin to spread through the Nonhumans before long.

“Boo Boo.”

“?”

Beatrice gently spoke to Boo Boo who was resting on the hill after the fast pace of the inn town had overwhelmed him.

It felt like everyone had already accepted it as fact.

Some might ask why it was worth bringing up now.

But when she thought back, it had all just kind of happened while they were so busy dealing with the Sage and the Hero. It would be awkward to back out of it now, but the more girly part of Beatrice asked her if it was really okay to let these things go unsaid.

“Let’s say the important things out loud.”

“Squeal. What do you mean?”

Boo Boo must not have understood. She thought for a bit, tried to find a good answer, and gave up. Dragging the words she wanted out of Boo Boo in a natural way would be difficult.

“You see, Boo Boo…”

So.

She stretched up toward seated Boo Boo’s ear and whispered to him.

“I…”

Two shorts words followed.

But this was a definite confession that plainly defined their relationship.

That was an island small enough to walk the perimeter in three days.

It was an island were everyone was free to have an adventure.

Return to Volume 06

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