He bent the new wings on his shoulders forward so that he could see them. What had been two pairs of four wings had fused into one pair of two, but they still had the sword shape and filmlike thinness of the old Metatron Wings. And like the original wings, they were elastic, able to stretch out to many times their normal length and as strong as polyamide film.
He stretched the wings out to the ground and pushed down on either side of the large stone perfectly plugging the hole. A thin platinum film forced open, or rather cut out a gap of not even 0.1 millimeters and dug deeper, bit by bit. While he had no feeling in the wings, the shape and hardness of what they touched was communicated to his back.
Just as he’d expected, the stone was an almost perfect sphere with a diameter of sixty centimeters or so. If he had attempted to destroy it with his Laser Sword, the Incarnate blade would likely have pierced the rock and gone on to injure the person beyond it. Pressing the Metatron Wings—his new wings—flat against the underside of the round stone, he carefully extended them, stopping only when the tips overlapped with each other. He set his feet apart to brace himself and took a deep breath.
“…Hngah!” he cried, contracted his wings, and tried to lift the rock straight up.
At first, it wouldn’t budge, but when he pulled a little harder, the stone moved surprisingly smoothly. Not because it hadn’t been wedged in as firmly as it looked, but rather because the output of his new wings was extraordinary. If he let loose their full power, he could very well have tossed the rock high up into the sky. Carefully fine-tuning the amount of strength he used, he slid the stone off the hole.
Zsh, zsh, zsh… The stone came up a few centimeters at a time, resisting just a little at the end before it popped off the hole somewhat anticlimactically.
He looked at it closely and found that the large beach ball of a stone had ten small indentations on its top, lined up symmetrically. Most likely, these were traces of the fingers of both hands, left here by whoever it was who had pushed the stone into the hole.
After Haruyuki set the stone down next to the hole, he returned his new wings to his back. He folded them up together with the other ten, stored them in his armor, and sent another telepathic “thank you” to Metatron.
The almost perfectly round hole was fairly deep, and the light of the sun didn’t reach inside. Even so, he could see some kind of curled-up shadow about a meter down from the ground. Another rock—no, it was maybe the head of a duel avatar.
“Haru!” Chiyuri cried out quietly beside him, apparently noticing this at the same time.
He gave her a wordless nod in return and cloaked his right hand in an Incarnate overlay to illuminate the inside of the hole.
Just as he’d expected, a small avatar was leaning against the side of the hole. The fact that the avatar existed at all meant that her health gauge was not completely depleted, at any rate, but mental exhaustion was something else altogether. Head lolling, she didn’t so much as twitch when he shone the white light on her.
This had to have been the avatar who’d been calling for help. Which meant that during the time it had taken Haruyuki and Chiyuri to run over and push the rock aside, she had fallen asleep—or passed out. Exactly how many hours, how many dozens of hours had she been in this small hole…?
“Haru, we have to hurry and get her out,” Chiyuri murmured.
He glanced over at her. Even though they had proof now that it really wasn’t Cotton Marten locked up in here, she showed no sign of despair as she dropped down and called into the hole.
“Hey, you! Are you okay?! We’re gonna get you outta there. Can you reach out your hands?”
Her voice had a ring to it almost as clear as that of the bell on her right hand, and perhaps it acted as a kind of smelling salts. The avatar stirred slightly before jerking her head up and blinking her lavender eye lenses.
“…Who…are you…?” she asked hoarsely.
“It’s okay,” Chiyuri replied in a quieter voice. “We’re friends. I’m Lime Bell from Nega Nebulus. This is Silver Crow from the same—I mean, no, from Oscillatory Universe.”
“Lime Bell… Silver Crow…” After repeating their names, the avatar in the hole gave her own name. “I’m…Taupe Cape from Gallant Hawks.”
“Oh! I know you. You’re Gallant’s leader, right?” Chiyuri responded and shoved her hand into the hole. “Come on, Crow. You too.”
Urged on, Haruyuki crouched beside her.
The reason he was a little slow to react was because Gallant Hawks was the Zelkova Verger’s Legion, the Burst Linker who had challenged him on his way to school that morning. He knew he’d fought in a way that lacked respect for his duel opponent, maybe because his nerves were frayed, and if she had watched that duel… The thought slipped through his mind, but this was no time to be worrying about that.
Fortunately, Taupe Cape appeared not to hold any grudge against him, and she grabbed the hands he and Chiyuri extended without hesitation.
In sync with Chiyuri, he pulled her up little by little. The slender avatar was surprisingly light, and none of her armor had parts that stuck out in any serious way, so they were able to lift her out smoothly without too much work. Once they’d gotten her out up to her hips, they moved her to one side and sat her on the edge of the hole.
Taupe Cape expanded the chest wrapped in grayish-purple armor as far as it would go and breathed in like she was devouring the fresh air.