“You made sure they saw you, the administrator, getting killed, and closed the gate to Nod, making sure the Beast Vassal Warheads you left behind couldn’t be used by anyone.”
Kojou turned a glance toward Avrora, standing still and baffled.
“It takes the power of the Star Beast Vassals to open the sealed gate again. That’s why you and the Fourth Primogenitor made him rip his own body apart to hide the Beast Vassals. You forced twelve Beast Vassals onto twelve girls who didn’t know a thing.”
“For the record, that’s somethin’ Mizen did all on his own. I didn’t order him to do it.”
Mogwai justified himself with a slightly sulky tone. Apparently even Cain hadn’t expected his friend the Fourth Primogenitor to choose to end his own existence.
“Mizen’s the one who made that Order of the End thing, then?”
Yeah, nodded Mogwai, in response to Kojou’s question.
“That bastard The Blood got things kinda wrong, but the point of instilling fear about the Fourth Primogenitor into people to stop the Fourth Primogenitor from bein’ revived was the Order of the End’s original role. It would have sucked for the gate to Nod to open before preparations were ready.”
“…Preparations?”
“I mean preparations to neutralize the Beast Vassal Warheads and free the icon girls. It took two indispensable things to carry that out. One, humankind had to have enough technology to at least revive me. The other is the arrival of peace. From the bottom of my heart, I want the icon girls freed from the Beast Vassal Warheads to live well, and they need happy, everyday lives for that.”
“So by chance, Itogami Island fulfilled those two conditions.”
“By chance, huh… I suppose you’re right. If the day you met Lil’ Dodekatos was by chance, then I guess you’re right, Bro.
“Keh-keh,” said Mogwai with a sardonic smile.
Cain, revived inside Itogami Island’s main computer as an emulated personality, had been working under the radar, preparing to neutralize the Beast Vassal Warheads. Asagi Aiba, Priestess of Cain, and Avrora, excavated from an island in the Mediterranean Sea, had been assembled in a Demon Sanctuary, a boxed garden in which humankind and demonkind could peacefully coexist. He probably had something to do with that, plus choosing Itogami Island as the site of the Blazing Banquet so that the Fourth primogenitor might be revived.
“Gotta say, Bro, havin’ a supposed mere human like you getting’ the power of the Fourth Primogenitor had even me clutching my head. Well, it worked out pretty well in the end so I ain’t complaining.”
“I have a whole mountain of things I’d like to say to you, though… Hey, you can’t pull the ‘I’m just a teddy bear’ card out now!”
Kojou shouted in anger when Mogwai stopped moving completely on purpose. Mogwai circled around Avrora’s back in an effort to escape from Kojou’s follow-ups.
Yukina and the others gazed at the earnest exchanges between Kojou and stuffed animal with incredulous looks on their faces. Their minds didn’t seem to have caught up with what Mogwai had said just yet.
“—None of that crap matters, so could you put it off until later?”
Kojou was locked in difficult combat to peel Mogwai off Avrora’s back when Kiriha interrupted with a furious voice. Her glacial tone threw Kojou for a loop as he looked back.
“Er, it kinda does matter but… Wait, aren’t you hurt real bad yourself…?!”
“Be quiet or I’ll kill you. If you don’t like it, drink my blood. As in, right this second!”
Kiriha stripped off the scarf of her sailor suit and showed him her slender, exposed neck. Setting her personality to one side, in terms of looks alone, she was quite a beauty.
Kojou put every shred of his rationality to work as he tore his eyes away from Kiriha’s pale skin.
“Drink your blood… Wait, what do you want that for?!”
“If I become your Blood Servant, I will regain regenerative ability on par with a vampire, yes? I will be able to properly heal these wounds so that I can fight again. Then I can go murder that piece-of-shit dragon!”
Kiriha unloaded a barrage of words. Cowed by her fury, Avrora stiffened like a little animal in the throes of despair. Kojou was a little taken aback by Kiriha’s forcefulness himself.
“Er, ah, I get the logic, but that’s weird, right? You shouldn’t be fighting a dragon; you should get your butt back to the surface and go to a hospital.”
“That dragon hurt me! I’m supposed to let it go? Don’t toy with me; I’ll kill you! Stop complaining and Drink! My! Blood! We’re bath-mates who’ve immersed in the same hot water, are we not?!”
“Hey, that’s got nothing to do with this?! It’s not like I went into the bath with you; you’re the one who showed up uninvited to the guys’ bath after the fact, right?!”
When Kiriha stubbornly grabbed him, Kojou tried to fling her away in annoyance.
At the corner of Kojou’s gaze, Shio began loosening her own necktie. Without a word, she undid her buttons one after another, greatly opening her collar.
“—Er, why is even Miss Hikawa beginning to strip?!”
Noticing Shio’s actions, Yukina swiftly tried to stop her, but Shio had a completely serious look on her face as she walked in front of Kojou.
“I hate to admit it, but Kiriha Kisaki is right. Please, Kojou Akatsuki. Do whatever you want with me. If you tell me to take my clothes off, I’ll strip. I don’t mind if you put me through humiliating things just like Himeragi. Please, heal Yuiri’s wounds…!”
“Um…has he done any such things to me…?”
Yukina froze, seemingly shocked by Shio’s words. In her place, Yuiri rushed over to Shio.
“W-wait, Shio…you don’t need to do anything embarrassing for my sake…! If Kojou tells me to strip, I’ll strip for him…!”
“Er, why is this premised on me telling one of you to strip exactly…?!”
Yuiri and Shio were working each other up when Kojou objected with a weary voice.
Glancing between Kojou and the girls, Glenda blinked hard and tilted her head.
“Dah…should Glenda strip, too?”
“No, you should not!”
“Keh-keh, you sure are popular, My Bro.”
Mogwai poked his head out from behind Avrora’s back and sarcastically pointed that out.
“How does this situation look like popularity to you?!”
“So whose blood are you gonna go for, Bro?”
“Whose blood… Sheesh, when you put it like that…”
Kojou’s words died in his throat as he felt powerful gazes from Shio and company on his cheeks.
A vampire’s Blood Servant meant a semi-eternal existence living alongside one’s master. Even if this was provisional, he keenly understood the reasoning that servants were not something to create lightly.
On the other hand, the fact remained that this would be an effective means of healing Yuiri and the others’ wounds. If I can save the girls with my actions, shouldn’t I drink their blood without hesitating? anguished Kojou.
Kojou’s clouded thoughts were swept away by the explosion that occurred without the slightest warning.
“—Wha?!”
Enveloped by crimson flames, the little tower standing on the floating bridge crumbled. It was an incandescent beam not reliant on demonic energy—dragon breath.
“The control tower…!”
“The Flame Dragon?!”
Blown down by the blast winds, Yuiri and Shio shouted at the same time. Kiriha and Yukina were sent flying but regained their balance right after, raising their respective spears.
Kojou, Avrora, and Glenda rolled on the ground as one tangled pile. Kojou tried to shield the two, but he’d been sent rolling, unable to withstand the impact.
Something strange happened to Mogwai’s body inside the fallen Avrora’s arms. Faint static ran throughout his body as he rapidly faded.
“The connection to Itogami Island’s been cut, huh…”
Gazing at his own hands as they crumbled further, Mogwai mumbled like it was no big deal.
“Cain…!”
Kojou called out to Mogwai. The badly sewn teddy bear looked back at the unnerved Kojou, making what felt like a smile of satisfaction as he raised his voice.
“Later, Bro. We’ll meet again…soon enough.”
“Uuu… aaa…!”
Avrora tried to hold Mogwai tight, but her arms managed only to futilely pass through him. Watching Mogwai vanish without a sound, Kojou stopped moving, his thoughts completely blank.
The next moment—
“Senpai!!”
Silver-colored sparks ferociously scattered in the corner of Kojou’s vision. Yukina had used Snowdrift Wolf to shoot down a silvery bolt flying amid the flames.
“Wha…?!”
Kojou looked down in shock at the remnants of the bolt impaling the ground.
It was a fully metallic bow gun bolt. It was short and thick, resembling a stake more than a bolt.
It was a silver-colored stake imbued with spiritual energy. It was just like the purging stake for destroying vampires that Kojou had once used to slay Avrora.
If that stake had been made by the Devas, it wasn’t strange if Shahryar Ren had one of his own, but the sudden return of memories of an abominable past left Kojou frozen stiff for a second. This was a fatal opening.
“Eh…?”
Warm droplets fell onto Kojou’s cheeks. They were glossy, crimson droplets, seductive in their beauty.
Yukina’s body wobbled. Bereft of strength, she dropped to one knee.
Yukina’s shoulder was dyed a deep red from the fresh blood gushing from it. Kojou didn’t know what had happened. All he could do was stare in a daze as the fresh color spread through Yukina’s uniform.
“Hime…ragi…?”
Behind the wobbling Yukina, he spotted Shahryar Ren clad in a combat suit.
He’d unleashed an invisible slicing attack—but Yukina took the unseen blade about to slice Kojou and Avrora apart in their stead. Yukina had no time to reposition Snowdrift Wolf right after batting down the purging stake. That was why she had no choice but to use her own body to shield them.
“I am sorry, senpai…I…”
Yukina smiled weakly. Fresh blood spilled from those lips. The slicing attack unleashed by Shahryar Ren had sliced through her shoulder blade all the way to her lungs. It was so grave a wound, she could have died instantaneously.
The instant he realized this, Kojou’s simmering anger was blotted out with white-hot rage.
“Uwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa—!”
With that scream, the bloody mist gushing out of him turned the sky of Nod pitch-black.