Lunaère hadn’t told me about that aspect of her past. She did tell me that the religious beliefs at the time meant she couldn’t be accepted for what she was, and though she was worried about her mother, her mother rejected her. But this was the first time I’d heard anything about being tricked and tortured.
“And you haven’t even learned from your experiences. You’re trying to defeat me with no regard for your own life in an effort to protect the world. Is this some sort of joke? I have to be honest, I find this desire of yours a little bit odd, and even a little scary. I don’t understand it at all. Perhaps you aren’t even thinking, you simply assumed, like some sort of automaton, that this was good. Is that it? No matter how much you are scorned, you go off and sacrifice yourself for this world time and time again. It’s like you’re trying to be some kind of saint. It’s disgusting.”
Zoras delivered his monologue with overexaggerated movements and gestures. In contrast, Lunaère remained emotionless as she stared back at him.
“Zoras…you are a sad, empty man,” she said. It wasn’t a counterargument, and it wasn’t an attempt to agitate him either. That’s all she said, and his expression went blank.
“I had wanted to speak with you directly after hearing your story…but you’re surprisingly boring. You’re a disappointment, Lunaère,” he said. “Let’s end playtime now. I was right to assume Locklore was a far too bland and constricting toy box for me. I’ll finish it off quickly, then play with the higher beings.”
Zoras narrowed his eyes and raised his staff.
My reaching finger finally touched my magic bag and a recovery potion, a Nine Lives Elixir, appeared by my mouth.
I gulped the whole thing down. My wounds closed, and my mind became clear. I leapt to my feet, steadied my breathing, and pointed my sword at Zoras’s back.
“So…you had something like that with you? Hm, I trounced you that badly and yet you really want to come back for more?” he said, looking at me from the corner of his eye.
“I’m sorry, Lunaère-san, for making you listen to this bore so you could buy time for me,” I said.
“…That is a poor attempt at getting under my skin, Kanata,” said Zoras with irritation.
Lunaère had kept striking violently at Zoras even when he was untouchable to keep him from finishing me off. She probably let him talk for so long just to buy time for me. She might not have been able to heal me, but she at least gave me the chance to do it myself.
-4-
THE TWO OF US glared at Zoras. He looked at us in turn, then held his hands up in feigned resignation. “More two-against-one? Well, this is bothersome. If I had known you’d be this stubborn, I would have killed Kanata when he was down. We don’t even have the time for this.”
“What do you mean?” I asked, a bad feeling coming over me.
“I am still bound by the higher beings’ magic. This plan of mine incorporates things they wanted, not me, really. I told you earlier, didn’t I? We’ll both lose if you two don’t die soon.”
He swept his arms up, showing the chains of blue-white light. Reniement and Lucifer had those.
“What is this about…?” I asked, then a gigantic magic circle appeared over the castle where we stood. The light from the magic circle morphed into dragons which then escaped out into the capital.
“Groooaaar!”
It was the magic that Zoras was using Zero’s curse to make, still happening at regular intervals, even while we fought Zoras. But there was something else that caught my attention.
“The chaos dragons are getting bigger… Their level is going up…” I said.
It felt like we were running out of time. And worse…the rate their levels were going up was accelerating. It had been since we got here, and the gap between their appearances was shortening.
“This isn’t just fun and games,” said Zoras. “The spell I activated using Zero, the Silent Void, doesn’t create these dragons. They’re actually more of a side effect. The main use of Zero’s curse is to destroy all of Locklore. The longer this drags out, the more likely I’m going to get caught in the fallout when it activates. Which would be…inconvenient.” Zoras stroked his chin, speaking like these were all minor details he was still sorting out. Lunaère and I couldn’t even keep up with what he was getting at.
“Wh-why would you activate the curse before the fight?!” I asked. “I thought you were trying to kill us and get taken back to the Upper Realm. You must have realized you could get caught in it too if you activated it while we were fighting!”
“I explained this to you several times already. The higher beings wanted some insurance. Besides, they would find it very convenient if I died with Locklore. And I can’t act against their will,” he said.
I hung my head.
Was that why Zoras was so oddly against the possibility we’d take each other out?
We had no idea when the curse would activate. Zoras probably knew, but to us, it was like fighting with a bomb we couldn’t see tied to our backs. And more importantly, it didn’t matter what happened because if the dragons kept getting stronger, the world was done for.
To top it all off, no matter how hard we fought, the battle against Zoras looked like it would turn into a drawn-out affair. As long as he had Garden of the Muse running, he could never get hurt. It would take us a long time to take down his defenses and land a decisive blow.
And while Zoras might be capable of defeating us quickly and fleeing back to the Upper Realm, there was only a slim chance we would be able to defeat him.
The worst thing of all, though, was that the curse was clearly independent of Zoras. Killing him wouldn’t stop Zero’s curse. Even now it was growing in influence, getting more out of control…turning into something that couldn’t be stopped.
I closed my eyes, flipping back and forth between the options, but I made up my mind quickly. Our only choice here was to save Locklore.
“Lunaère-san…go stop Zero’s curse. He’s got to be in the castle, that’s where all this is centered. It shouldn’t be hard to find him,” I said.