“What the heck is going on?!” Tomochika shouted, voicing a confusion very similar to Yogiri’s.
They had been waiting in the Antechamber Area after the fourth round had finished when a line had suddenly cut through space. Yogiri hadn’t felt any danger from it, but in the next moment he found the scenery around them had completely changed. The sudden change had confused him, but once he had a chance to calm down and look around, he recognized this place.
The grass, the trees, even the buildings of what looked like some sort of settlement all seemed to be made of crystal. He remembered passing through this place before—the Meld Plains, also known as the Crystal Plains. After their trial in the tower, they had passed through here on their way to the capital.
The difference was that now the netlike thing hanging in the sky had disappeared, to be replaced by creatures that looked like people woven together out of some kind of ivy wandering the plains.
“Is that the Seyla?”
When the Seyla had first fallen from the sky, it had mostly been in the form of plants, so it had moved quite slowly. Now, however, it was much more monsterlike, and was clearly quite mobile. Looking closely, it almost seemed to be taking the form of a human girl.
Yogiri had heard that Seyla was the younger sister of Sage Lain. A divine relic had given her immortality, but Yogiri didn’t know the details beyond that. When he had encountered the Seyla on the floating continent, it had taken the form of a virus that infected all living things it came into contact with.
Back then, things infected by the Seyla had retained their original shape and personality, but here it was attacking anything that moved on sight. Even now it was chasing something. After observing for a time, they could see the Seyla was chasing a crystalline dog.
“Wait, didn’t we see that dog the last time we were here?” Tomochika said.
Though there were creatures living here, the Meld Plains had been a melancholy place on their last visit. It seemed much more lively now with the countless pieces of Seyla writhing around. Each piece seemed to have a human face, all identical. Maybe that was how Seyla had looked when she was alive.
“Wait, is it heading towards us?!” Tomochika exclaimed.
The dog was running in their direction, bringing the Seyla along with it. The expressions on the Seyla’s faces clearly showed they were hunting prey. But rather than triumphant and victorious, they were twisted with anguish.
I guess she did ask me to kill Seyla, Yogiri thought to himself. Risley had asked him to do so, having inherited Lain’s will. He had replied that he couldn’t do so without knowing why, to which she said he would know why when he met her.
Yogiri could sort of understand now. The Seyla didn’t act like this because it wanted to. Tormented by what could only be called a curse of immortality, it continued to spread with no understanding of its situation. If it could die, that was no doubt what it would ask for. Maybe that was just Yogiri making assumptions, but he could finally agree with Lain’s point of view.
Yogiri used his power. The Seyla chasing the crystalline dog toppled, collapsing around them and all over the world.
“Wait, didn’t you say dealing with the Seyla was going to be difficult?” Tomochika asked.
“I said killing the Seyla separate from the people it infected would be difficult. I didn’t bother to distinguish between them just now. I killed them all together.”
It does not appear the infected possessed any hints of their former selves, Mokomoko observed. I cannot imagine there was much one could do for them, even were they to be cured.
“Okay! So we just killed them because they attacked us! No problem, then!” Maybe out of concern for Yogiri, Tomochika seemed to force herself to agree.
“We’re out of immediate danger, but now what do we do? Oh, we’ve been to that station before, right?”
Looking around, they saw a familiar structure. Yogiri remembered the army of some foreign nation having attacked it.
“Ah! That means we’re pretty close to the capital of Manii, aren’t we?”
“True. But that means we’re back on the surface. I wonder why?”
Is that not exactly what we wished for? That was why we were attempting to beat the game, Mokomoko pointed out.
“I’m curious about why we got moved, though.”
“Not like we’ll figure it out just by thinking about it,” Tomochika said.
It is like one of those situations where some occurrence during the tournament arc or the exam arc throws things into chaos! her guardian spirit replied.
“That’s annoyingly vague, but I guess we have no choice but to act as if Cavern Quest is over.” The current situation was entirely beyond his understanding, but Yogiri had no desire to dive back into Cavern Quest. Their only option was to keep moving forward.
“If we’re going anywhere, I guess we should start with the capital, huh?” Tomochika said. “There’s nothing here but cold.”
“It’s still pretty far from us...and I guess there won’t be any trains running?”
“Should we at least check?” Tomochika asked.
“I guess it’s better than standing around here doing nothing—”
As he made to start walking, a huge roar shook the air. The vibration caused the crystallized trees around them to shake to the point of cracking and breaking. Yogiri looked up to see countless huge spheres filling the sky.
“What are those, star forts?!” Tomochika exclaimed.
We saw something similar before the reset. Are these perhaps their allies? Mokomoko suggested, recalling the streamlined spaceships they had encountered near the ruins in the elven forest. Those ships had shown a clear killing intent aimed at Yogiri, so he had wiped them out, but they had never figured out who they were or what their attackers wanted.
“They don’t seem to be trying to kill us,” Yogiri said.
Even so, they couldn’t casually start walking to the train station now. As they watched, the star forts began to shine. A huge cannon emerged from each one, light condensing at the tip of their barrels.
“What is that, some kind of wave cannon?! And is that Alexia and the Great Sage over there?!”
“Your eyes are still as good as ever,” Yogiri commented.
Impressed she could see anything, he followed her gaze but saw nothing but a couple of specks in the distance, though it did seem the cannons were aimed at them.
“What on earth is going on here?!” Tomochika cried.
It was clear the star forts were going for the Great Sage. Their killing intent was very obviously aimed in that direction, but the damage from the cannons was also clearly overlapping Yogiri and Tomochika’s location. To Yogiri’s eyes, the whole world had grown dark.
“It doesn’t seem like they care about us either way, but I don’t want to get wrapped up in this...”
Yogiri made the decision to act around the same time his power activated automatically.