“…There’s neow one in my life close enough to call a real friend. I’ve fergotten all my family’s faces, too. I’ve slept with plenty of women, whenever I’m in the mood, but I’ve neowver fallen in love. Sorry, Tgurneu, but my face ain’t gonna be much fun fer ya,” Hans said, smiling back.
“…You really are quite boring. Die already. Once I’ve killed you, I’ll go somewhere safe to await the death of the Braves,” Tgurneu said, and the fiends resumed their attack on Hans.
Hans had gotten enough of a break to catch his breath, but now the fiends assaulted him with even more ferocity. Bounding around, ahead, then back, Hans avoided being encircled. Unfortunately, he couldn’t afford to die yet. There was still a chance of beating Tgurneu.
Chamo would still be searching for him. She would have unleashed dozens of her slave-fiends over the whole ruins area. At least one would have to come near the square. And if she found him, the situation would turn around immediately.
It didn’t have to be Chamo, either. There were Fremy and Nashetania, too. Dozzu and Rolonia could be out there. So Hans couldn’t die until they found him. He had to survive and keep Tgurneu here.
“Unfortunately, Hans, your wish will not come true. Help is not coming.”
✦ ✦ ✦
Meanwhile, Chamo was dashing through the southern area of the ruins, still searching for Hans as she fought off the fiends descending on her from all directions. The fiends’ sporadic attacks wouldn’t slow her down.
“Wh-why? Why can’t Chamo find them?” But she couldn’t find any clues. She couldn’t find Hans. “Damn it! At this rate, Chamo won’t be able to kill him,” she muttered as she continued her search.
✦ ✦ ✦
Mora was still with Goldof, contending with the fiends that surrounded her barrier. She was nearing the limits of her stamina, and Goldof couldn’t hide signs of exhaustion, either. At first, they’d figured they just had to hold out until the others could execute the plan. They hadn’t anticipated this skirmish would drag on for so long.
“Did you…find…anything, Mora?” Goldof asked after slaying an enemy. Under his protection, Mora was focusing on combing the area with her clairvoyance.
Mora’s suspicion that Tgurneu was plotting something that would kill her and Goldof—or even all six Braves—had become a certainty. But none of the three hundred fiends she observed around them seemed to be preparing anything.
There were just too few clues. Even so, Mora kept her clairvoyant eye vigilant.
✦ ✦ ✦
“Please, Fremy! Open your eyes!” Rolonia’s whip danced. Fremy dodged it with a roll to the side, taking on the advancing Braves alongside the fiends of the fake command center.
The wolf-fiend was smirking in the rear, behind Fremy’s protection. It seemed convinced of her betrayal. Most likely, Tgurneu, listening in on things from afar, believed as much, too.
“Please give it up already! Fremy’s our enemy now! We must kill her!” Nashetania yelled.
Rolonia shook her head. “I can’t! I couldn’t kill her!” The two maintained their charade to hide their intentions. Thanks to them, the enemies believed in Fremy’s betrayal.
“Ngh!” Fremy deliberately let Nashetania’s blade slice her, and blood spurted from her side. The fiends immediately hurried in front of her to drive back Nashetania. Then the healing fiend panicked and rushed to Fremy’s side to heal her wound.
Its healing powers were as incredible as ever. It took not even a few seconds for her wound to disappear. Fremy was certain—this would work. Even if her heart was carved out, the fiend would heal her right away. She could survive. She didn’t know if the healing fiend’s power could cure the red mark, but still, she had no choice.
Fremy thought, Adlet, wait just a little longer. We’ll execute the plan and come save you.
✦ ✦ ✦
Hans believed Tgurneu’s confidence was no act. Everything it said was probably true, and help would not come. Its plan to kill all the Braves of the Six Flowers would likely soon be complete.
“Meearow!” But Hans blocked an attack with his sword. Crawling like a cat, he wove around the fiends’ legs.
“…You’re stubborn, Hans,” commented Tgurneu.
Hans had never really wished for a long life, but he wasn’t exactly enthusiastic about dying right now. He recalled a certain idiot who’d said As long as you’re alive, we’re sure to find a way out of this , or something similar.
“This ain’t meowch like me to say, but…”
“What?”
“We ain’t that easy,” Hans declared with a swipe at a fiend.
Then it happened. Hans suddenly smelled something strange. Something was rising from the earth, and it didn’t take long for him to realize it was poison.
Immediately, he jumped away, defending himself from the fiends within the narrow confines of the silk cocoon as he moved. But even over here, the same strange smell wafted around him.
“No? I doubt that.”
✦ ✦ ✦
“Öne…möre mïnute.”
Meanwhile, specialist number thirteen was hidden underground, in the deepest part of a waterway used by the humans of this land in ancient times.
Number thirteen’s power was to generate a vast quantity of very small units from itself. These units, smaller than insects, had already spread through the water veins and waterways under the ruins.
The units had two abilities: The first was to produce poison that affected the nerves, paralyzing the body until ultimately stopping its victim’s heart and ending their life. The poison had no effect on fiends. The water underground was already teeming with so much poison that a drop into a human’s mouth would kill them instantly.
The other power these units had was to heat up water. The moment number thirteen gave the order, the units would emit heat—enough to boil the subterranean pools. It would turn into steam and waft aboveground.
The place where the Braves squared off against the fiends would instantly be transformed into hell.
“…Zëro.”
Number thirteen ordered the units filling the passages to bring the water to a boil.
✦ ✦ ✦
Meanwhile, Fremy also smelled something strange. Rolonia, Nashetania, and Dozzu all went pale, too.
“Poison… It’s poison!” Rolonia yelled. Behind Fremy, the wolf-fiend roared in victory.
Tgurneu had not simply been waiting. It had been arranging to kill them all.
The moment after Fremy realized they had lost, something strange happened. The whole of the ruins shook with a great rumble. The earth moaned. Is this part of Tgurneu’s plan, too? Fremy wondered.
But the wolf-fiend was also looking down in confusion. Fremy turned her head toward the soaring mountains. It couldn’t be , she thought.
✦ ✦ ✦
Mora’s hair stood on end as a steam-like mist rose from her gauntlets. Her eyes flashed like fire.
She had poured all her power as a Saint, honed over many years, into the single focus of her fist.
She had used her power of clairvoyance to search and search all over the mountain but hadn’t found anything aboveground. There was nothing unusual in the sky, either. So then, it had to be underground.
In the waterways, Mora found the cadaver of a mouse. Fish corpses floated in the water veins. That was when Mora finally realized what the enemy was going to do—unleash poison from underground.
With her clairvoyance, Mora dove into the water and found just one surviving water snake clinging to the deepest pit of the water vein, spouting bubbles from its mouth. There was a very small protrusion on its forehead.
Anyone who found it would be helpless to stop it—except Mora.
“This will consume all my power, Goldof. I entrust the rest to you!” Mora cried, slamming her gauntlet into the ground. That one strike made the mountains rattle. She was the Saint of Mountains, the master of the stone.
The water snake–fiend’s underground hiding place rocked. The ceiling crumbled, and boulders fell into the water. The water snake fled, but the whole network collapsed: rocks, earth, everything. It all sank to the depths to flatten the water snake–fiend. With no means of escape, number thirteen was helplessly crushed.
The heated water failed to boil and quietly cooled.
Nevertheless, some of the poison vapor still puffed up toward the surface through wells, waterways, and the slightest cracks in the earth’s surface.