✦ ✦ ✦
Hanakawa had hoped Lute would become a useful ally for them, but it seemed Lute had already completely given up on his revenge.
“Very well! If you help me out of this situation, then I will be satisfied! But he is capable of devouring any attack and spitting it back at you! Is there anything you can do about him?”
“I see. I wonder if he can deal with this then?” Lute knelt down, putting a hand to the ground. The earth began to shake, and Daniel vanished as a rent in the ground opened beneath him. The earth had split apart, starting at Lute’s hand and reaching past the cat beast.
“What did you do?”
“It’s something like a pitfall trap. Being able to eat attacks doesn’t mean anything if you send him somewhere else. Okay, see ya.” Apparently having finished his part, Lute vanished.
“Wait, wait, wait! We have not won the battle yet!”
Victory required one of the sides to be killed, but there was no telling whether Daniel had actually died or not. Hanakawa ran over to where Daniel had disappeared. Looking down the newly formed crevice, he couldn’t see to the bottom. Naturally, Daniel was nowhere in sight either.
“We’re in the sky here, right?” Carol asked, coming up beside Hanakawa. “Maybe he fell all the way down to the surface.”
“In that case, will this decide the fight? There are no rules about leaving the arena, are there?”
“I guess getting out of danger didn’t help us much then.”
“Do not complain to me about it! Sir Lute is the one who suddenly appeared and did that without asking!”
“But if he fell and can’t return, that should effectively be a victory for us, shouldn’t it?” Ryouko asked. “Maybe we should ask?”
The Great Sage should have been watching their fights. Everything seemed to hinge on whether he found the fights interesting or not, so an ambiguous conclusion like this should have been against his wishes. If they called out to him, there was a good chance they’d get a response.
“Very true,” Hanakawa replied. “I suppose we should at least try—”
Looking up to shout at the sky, Hanakawa was stopped by something flying out of the crevice at a tremendous speed. Naturally, it was Daniel, the many-headed cat.
“Well, the crevice was not particularly wide, so it is not entirely unthinkable he could run up the side. Uh, Sir Lute?” Hanakawa tried calling for him, but Lute didn’t reappear. It was hard for him to tell what counted as him being in danger. Maybe no one would appear unless he was clearly about to die.
“So if we hurt Hanakawa until just before he dies, Friendship Counter will activate!” Carol declared.
“Please do not say that as if you have just struck upon a golden idea!”
“Stop joking around,” Ryouko interrupted. “It looks like he’s getting stronger.”
Perhaps out of rage, Daniel’s hair was now standing on end, countless heads sprouting from around his body and now glaring at the trio.
“Looks like it’s about time,” Carol murmured. A few moments later, Daniel exploded.
“What on earth just happened?!” Hanakawa exclaimed.
“That’s my nullification power!”
“I thought you said you had to make physical contact for it to work?”
“I can make an item that seals their power too! It takes a while for it to take effect, so it’s really annoying to use!” Carol explained, sounding strangely proud.
Where the enormous cat beast once stood, there were now four children collapsed on the ground. Just nullifying their abilities shouldn’t have injured them at all, but perhaps from the backlash of their transformation, they were lying motionless for now.
“But when did you place such an item on them?” Hanakawa asked.
“Remember that first kunai I threw? It was before they combined, so they weren’t able to eat it. Since they fused after that, the kunai got mixed in with them!”
“So...it only worked by sheer coincidence then?” Hanakawa said.
“Anyway, what do we do now?” Ryouko said. “Killing them would be like taking candy from a baby.”
“I am not sure about killing a defenseless opponent...” Hanakawa answered, pulling some rope out of his item box. Tying the four children up, he gave the other end of the rope to Carol, whose nullification ability could pass through it to restrain them.
“I suppose I’m the leader, so I’ll try talking to them,” Ryouko said. “If we let Hanakawa do it, he’ll just agitate them further.”
Depending on how the conversation went, the situation could get much, much worse, so Hanakawa left the negotiations to Ryouko.
Daniel looked up at her as she approached. It seemed he was able to talk.
“Admit that you lost or we’ll kill you all right here,” Ryouko declared.
“How direct can you be?!” Hanakawa exclaimed.
“Do we have any other choice?” she replied.
“Well...I suppose there are not really any grounds for negotiation here...”
Without determining a winner, they could never leave this channel, and once they had reached a conclusion, they’d be cut off from each other and so unable to interact at all. This was the only way out for them.
“Fine... I admit it, we lost,” Daniel muttered.
Ryouko Ninomiya Wins!
Words declaring their victory appeared in the sky.
“You beat us, so you definitely have to kill Yogiri Takatou. Then Mireiyu will—”
Before he could finish what he was saying, Daniel and his siblings vanished. Hanakawa and the two girls were now in a room, so it seemed they had been moved somewhere else.
“I see. After being victorious, you are moved to a waiting room, I suppose.”
“So it seems,” Carol replied.
It looked like they’d be able to take a short break.