“He’s on the student council…” She thought that if she joined the council, too, she’d have the chance to get to know Ryuunosuke better. “The student council president is that girl from the Calamity Research Institute. I don’t know why she’s posing as a student here, but I bet she already knows about me. She’d probably want to make contact with me anyway, so I’ll ask her to sign me up for this council. It’s up to me to make the first step!” The next day, Mari noticed that her classmates were no longer interested in bullying her. Ryuunosuke wasn’t at school that day—he stayed home with a cold. It didn’t take long for Mari to figure out what she was feeling toward Ryuunosuke. Mari yawned, waking up from that dream. She sleepily turned her head to look around. She was in the living room of a condo—one of the Order’s safe houses in Kokonoe City. It had been about two weeks since the girl with the dragon factor met the boy who possessed a Sacred Sealing Ring. That morning, Mari had been unexpectedly called in to report to her superiors. She had arrived quite a bit early. The room where she was currently waiting was furnished only with a sofa, table, and chairs, arranged without any taste for interior design. There wasn’t even a rug on the floor. She had stretched out on the sofa when she got there early in the morning, then nodded off, dreaming about her first meeting with Ryuunosuke two months earlier. “Tee-hee…” She couldn’t help smiling at the thought of Ryuunosuke. Meeting him was truly life-changing for her. He was her first love. She’d never tried to get anyone to fall in love with her, either. Every day, she went to school excited about what might happen, wishing that things could stay like that forever. “I’m getting sentimental…” Would she be executed after going berserk, or just before it happened? In any case, death awaited her in the not-too-far future. She’d accepted that, but surely, she should be allowed to at least enjoy the brief time she had until then? Ryuunosuke gave her hope. With his power, he might be able to postpone her eventual execution or maybe even save her from it. To any mythical girl, he was the miraculous ray of hope, the coveted chance of salvation. Out of concern for Ryuunosuke, Mari committed an act of treason against her organization—she didn’t report that he was a soul linker with a Sacred Sealing Ring. She supposed he’d happily soul link with her if she asked him, but then the Order might demand his capture. So she didn’t ask. She’d face repercussions once the Order discovered what she’d done, but she didn’t care. “So I’m stuck sitting on this fence… Come on, Mari, you have to commit to one side or the other…” She chuckled wryly, and just then, she heard the front door unlock and open. She sensed the presence of a person and heard one pair of footsteps. Guarded, perhaps unnecessarily, she waited for the visitor to come to the living room. It was the man known as Loki, who spied for the Order by working undercover at the Calamity Research Institute. Mari didn’t really know anything about him besides his fake name. She didn’t really get along with him. In fact, she could barely stand him. “Whew.” Loki plopped down on a chair. “Good morning, Marie.” “Don’t call me that.” She didn’t like just anyone referring to her by that nickname. There were very few people at the Order whom she allowed to use it, and Loki wasn’t one of them. She absolutely hated him calling her “Marie.” “Where are the others?” asked Mari. “Don’t ask me. Maybe they’ll come later.” “Whatever. Why was I asked to report in all of a sudden?” “Because there’s been a change, and you’re required to check in with another research facility. You were assigned here to capture the dragon factor girl, and that task has now been voided.” “Did you do something to her?” “Oh no, no. It seems the CRI is one step ahead of us, based on how they equipped the dragon factor girl with her Valkyrie Suit before transporting her, as if they knew what we were going to try. Well, enough about that. You have new orders.” Loki paused for a moment. “Mari Vlad Abara, you are removed from this operation. Return to Yokone Base.” “What?” Mari shouted in protest. “I’m being ordered to return there?! Why?!” “Because that’s what you’re being ordered to do, simple.” “Who decided this?! I…don’t want leave yet…” Mari riled at the sudden change of assignment, thinking about Ryuunosuke—her first love. “Well, this is funny. You kicked up such a fuss about going undercover as a student. Don’t tell me you started to actually enjoy school life?” “It’s not about that. I just think the reassignment doesn’t make sense…” “Orders are orders. You don’t get to have your say. Be a good girl and do as you’re told.” “I don’t understand the reason for forcing me to abandon this mission!” Loki covered his face with his right hand and sighed loudly. He moved his hair out of the way, spread out his fingers, and peered at Mari from in between them. “Stop yapping, you annoying bitch.” His voice had suddenly changed, becoming cold and filled with hatred. “Are you stupid? I’m not asking you nicely to ‘pretty please’ do this; I’m giving you your orders. You say, ‘Yes, sir, understood,’ not argue with me. The Order owns you, and you do as you’re told. Or do you have trouble comprehending? We’re acting for the greater good of all humanity, and you? You are like a disease plaguing humanity. You don’t even deserve to live. Don’t think for a moment you get to have a say about what happens to you.” “You bastard!” Mari sprang to her feet. “Oh? Want to fight?” “And what if I do?” “You really are mentally challenged. You can’t change your orders by acting up.” “That’s what you say. But maybe this will get the higher-ups to reconsider.” “Have it your way.” Loki stood up from his chair and raised his right hand. “You’re beyond help.” A red ring of light appeared around Loki’s ring finger. Mari had seen one like that before. “You have…a Sacred Sealing Ring?!” The color and position on the finger were slightly different from Ryuunosuke’s, but as a mythical girl, Mari could immediately tell it was a real Sacred Sealing Ring. In response to it, the Stigma on her chest lit up, and she lost all her strength. Loki grabbed her by her hair and pushed her face down onto the floor. “Argh…?! I…can’t…move?!” No ordinary human, no matter how strong, could rival a mythical girl, but Loki was totally overwhelming her thanks to the power of the ring. “How did you…get that ring…?” “Why would I tell you? By the way, I know you didn’t report that brat had one, to protect him.” “…” Surprised both by the sudden orders to return to the base and Loki being in possession of a Sacred Sealing Ring, Mari was struck by realization that at the Order she was just a pawn, oblivious to the greater picture. “Well, anyway, it doesn’t matter. But get it into your thick head that I can kill you anytime. You’re allowed to live only as long as you walk nicely on a leash, and even that wouldn’t be the case if you weren’t third rank.” Still holding her by her hair, Loki pressed her face harder against the floor. “I don’t have patience for disobedient trash like you. The fact that you’re just a stupid kid doesn’t earn you any sympathy points with me when you throw a temper tantrum. Your schoolgirl act is over, so go back to the base and don’t ever talk back to me again.” “…” “There’s less than twenty-four hours remaining. Now that I’ve tested the ring, it’s time to move on to the final step.” Mari had no choice but to obey her orders. She’d always done as the Order commanded. She’d only been faking being a schoolgirl as part of her mission anyway. Orders had to be carried out to the letter. The alternative was most likely death. Going back to the base just meant resuming her normal life. And yet she couldn’t stop thinking about the boy she’d fallen in love with. Loki smiled thinly. “I am the messiah. The world is saved.” Two weeks since meeting Ryuunosuke, Rinne had gotten acclimatized to school life. She made friends and was enjoying the same normal life as her schoolmates. Meanwhile, Ryuunosuke became so used to her being a part of his life that it didn’t even occur to him to imagine it changing. “She did not come to school today,” Rinne said to Ryuunosuke as they were leaving the school building. “Huh?” Ryuunosuke didn’t immediately realize she was talking about Mari. Mari had missed her classes that day, and she didn’t show up in the student council room, either. Without her radiance, the room had seemed darker than usual to Ryuunosuke. “I guess sometimes, she can’t come in. She’s got a lot going on, too,” he said, not really worried. “I suppose so,” Rinne replied stiffly. Recently, Rinne would sometimes fall into a gloomy mood, but Ryuunosuke felt they hadn’t been friends long enough for him to ask her about it outright. They suddenly stopped. Two black armored cars were parked just outside the school gates. Ryuunosuke didn’t know anything about car makes, but he could tell immediately that those were pretty expensive vehicles. Outside the black cars stood men in black suits. Ryuunosuke guessed they were from the Calamity Research Institute’s Section One, which was an experimental but fully operational unit focusing on finding military applications for mythical factor powers. They were the main force deployed for armed conflicts. Tough-looking Section One members would sometimes escort Ryuunosuke and Rinne to their checkups, but Ryuunosuke hadn’t really had much contact with them. “Huh, what’s that about…?” he said. He didn’t find it alarming that the Section One guys were waiting for them but thought it odd that three of them had come to pick them up, bringing two cars. Normally, it was just one person and one car. “You’re out in full force today, Mr. Yanagida?” He greeted a big, bearlike man he recognized. “The plan’s a bit different today. Only Rinne Irako is going in for her medical.” Rinne cocked her head at him. “Why?” “We haven’t been told the details.” “I’m not coming with her?” “No. These two guys will escort you to your house, where you are to wait for Rinne’s return.” “Okay, got it.” Ryuunosuke readily agreed, assuming the Calamity Research Institute had its reasons, but Rinne pouted, unhappy with this arrangement. “Get in the cars, kids.” “No. I refuse to go anywhere without Ryuunosuke.” “Sorry, but this time—” “I am not going anywhere without Ryuunosuke.” “We’ve been ordered to escort him home, though…” “Whose orders are these?” “Deputy Chief Researcher Akeda’s, I’m told.” “Ranko decided this…?” Rinne said quietly to herself. “I cannot conceive why she would give you such orders.” “Come now, don’t make our job difficult.” “Let me speak with Ranko.” “The underground facility is completely cut off to preserve its secrecy. Well, there are ways to get in touch with the staff there, but I’m not authorized to do this.” “Tsk… I do not want to go without speaking to Ranko…” “Rinne, come on. Let’s not drag this out,” Ryuunosuke cut in. Yanagida had given him a look, which he read as a request for help. “Why should I go alone? When you and I are together, we are safe. You should be close to me in case something was to happen to me. This is the basic stipulation of the Dragon Babysitter Project.” “That’s all true, but it looks like this time, Ranko needs only you to come in. I’m sure it’ll be fine.” “No, Ryuunosuke—” “Let’s not make it difficult for everyone—” “Does ‘everyone’ include you?” Rinne snapped at him. She instantly regretted it. “I’m sorry for speaking in anger. I became emotional, because to me, you are…” She fell silent, closing her eyes for a moment. “Tell me, Ryuunosuke, do you not want me to be with you? Am I a bother?” “Whoa, whoa! Where’s this come from?” “I am… I am a bother to you after all, am I not?” she said in a voice trembling from emotion. “That night, when I asked you…” Rinne’s eyes suddenly opened wider as if in sudden realization, and she froze. “What night? Asked me wha—?” “I will go alone,” she cut him off. Ryuunosuke got a ride home, where he was ordered to wait for Rinne. He didn’t really have anything to do that evening, so he just lay down. “Hmm…” Yanagida and another Section One member called Kuroi were standing guard outside his front door. Ryuunosuke had met both during earlier pickups. The boy had tried to convince Rinne to go along with the orders so as not to get her or the Section One guys in trouble, but it was as if they’d been on different wavelengths. “What was she going to say…?” She had asked him something one night, apparently, and it seemed very important to her, but she couldn’t bring herself to talk about it. “Come to think of it…I don’t see a reason why she should go in alone, either.” The ring’s effects weakened the greater the distance between him and Rinne, which was the reason they should stick close. It was strange that Ranko would ask only Rinne to come in, but maybe it was for some experiment. Without knowing the details, all Ryuunosuke could do was guess the reasoning. He did have this funny feeling nagging at him, but he could hardly oppose the grown-ups sent from the facility based on a vague feeling something wasn’t right. He was just a student, after all. He doubted he had any say in what the Calamity Research Institute could do to him and Rinne. “Ranko would’ve explained what was up… Yanagida said she gave the orders, but somehow, I don’t think it was her…” Maybe he was wrong. Or maybe the orders came from someone even higher up than Ranko. He had a feeling someone other than Ranko was behind the change in routine, but at that point, there wasn’t anything he could do anyway. He was growing worried about Rinne. “…I shouldn’t have told her to go.” Ryuunosuke rolled onto his other side. Rinne was single-mindedly in love with him. He used her feelings for him to have her comply with the orders, without hearing out her concerns. I’ll have to apologize to her when she’s back… He took his phone out of his pocket, opened the browser app, and navigated to the news site he’d been checking regularly since stumbling on it two weeks earlier. The headline about the convicted murderer being sentenced to death was still in the hot-topics column. “Oh, wait…” Ryuunosuke made the connection and broke out into a cold sweat, realizing what question had been eating up Rinne. He remembered her asking him, one night… “Do you think some people do not deserve to live?” Yanagida, who’d been in the Japan Self-Defense Force before joining the Calamity Research Institute’s Section One, was also mulling over that night’s orders with growing suspicion. “Hmm…,” he muttered, stroking his chin. “Thinking hard about something, Mr. Yanagida?” asked Kuroi, standing guard next to him. Kuroi was ex-police. He’d joined the Calamity Research Institute only recently, so Yanagida hadn’t gotten much of an insight into his personality yet, but he knew the man was sharp and serious. “Something bugging you about this mission?” Kuroi asked. “You can tell?” “With how much you’ve been groaning under your breath, yeah.” “No matter how much I think about it, it doesn’t make sense.” “Care to explain?” “This kid, he’s participating in some CRI research project. Why would he need us guarding him? If the CRI thought he was in any danger, two of us don’t stand a chance against the Order’s Kampfers or mythical girls. And if it’s not the Order he has to be protected against, that’s a job for the police, not us.” The lower the rank one held in an organization’s hierarchy, the less information was shared—that wasn’t anything unusual. Yanagida didn’t know about Ryuunosuke’s ring, for example. His orders were to guard the boy, without any supplementary information. “And who is this boy, really? The CRI contacted him after the events following the Order’s attack on our transport. Is this high school student really that important? If he is and needs to be guarded from something, he’d be safer just going to the CRI together with Irako. I don’t understand why they’d split up him and the mythical girl.” “The answer’s pretty simple,” Kuroi said, pointing up with his index finger. “If he was with the mythical girl, it’d be that much harder to kill him.” It took a moment for Yanagida to process what he’d just heard. “You’re a spy—” Yanagida reached for his automatic rifle, but Kuroi got him first with his 9mm handgun. Ryuunosuke heard a loud popping sound right outside his house. “Run away!” Yanagida shouted. Then there was another popping sound. This time, Ryuunosuke knew right away it was gunfire. He thought about escape routes. He didn’t have many options in his cramped little house. The bathroom and toilet windows were out of the question—they were close to the front door and too small anyway. The west- and east-facing windows of the living room were also too close to the front of the house. This left the north-facing window in his bedroom—or currently, Ranko’s room—which was on the rear side of the house. Ryuunosuke was simultaneously thinking about the CRI men. Was it them who got shot, or did they shoot someone else? Is Mr. Kuroi okay?! Do I go help them or run away? Ryuunosuke was just a high schooler. There was no way he could do any good in a situation where military-trained men were firing guns at one another. Despite that, he pondered whether to run or get help until it was too late. Kuroi kicked the front door off its hinges and burst into the house. Wait, did Mr. Kuroi shoot Mr. Yanagida?! It didn’t make sense, but it sure seemed that way. The hallway lead straight into the living room. Ryuunosuke was in range. Kuroi raised his weapon and fired. Ryuunosuke rolled to dodge the shot. The bullet flew above his head, piercing the sliding door behind him. Kuroi was now in the living room. “Mr. Kuroi, stop! Why are you—?” But instead of replying, Kuroi took aim at the boy. It was painfully clear that Ryuunosuke’s experience in martial arts, weight training, and victories in fights with other school kids weren’t the least bit helpful in this situation. I’m a hopeless idiot. She was right; we should have stayed together. She was risking getting in trouble to protect me, and I stupidly insisted she should go alone. Forgive me, Rinne… The gun fired with a ruthlessly cold, dry pop, pronouncing the end to the boy’s short life. Meanwhile, Rinne was in Lab Room Number Five at the Underground Kokonoe Factor Research Facility. The room was a sterile white. It was clean, but various research implements were strewed about. Rinne had been in that room many times, and its medical smell was familiar to her. She was sitting in a chair near the automatic door, opposite Suberu Sarashina, who was dressed in his white lab coat. He was carrying out the routine medical checks on her that day. Rinne showed him her arm, and he stuck the needle of a syringe into her vein. When she wasn’t expressing her factor powers, Rinne had normal human skin, which could be easily pierced with a needle. Why did I have to say those things to him…? Rinne deeply regretted her immaturity, shouting emotionally at Ryuunosuke like a little girl having a tantrum. He didn’t say anything wrong. If the orders were for her to come for her checks alone, she should just do that unquestioningly. She wanted to live like any other normal human, so why did she kick up such a fuss over something that was perfectly normal just because of her vague unease? Ryuunosuke was only trying to make her act sensibly, no doubt worried that the childish display would get both her and the Section One men in trouble. She knew that, so why did she make it about something else? One evening, she’d seen a comment about something entirely unrelated to her on Ryuunosuke’s phone. A comment saying some people didn’t deserve to live. It was just a thoughtless message written by some site user, but it stuck with Rinne, constantly sneaking into her thoughts. Even if the whole world thought her existence was unnecessary, she wanted at least Ryuunosuke to need her. When he told her not to make things difficult for everyone, it triggered her internal anxiety about being an unwelcome presence to him, and she desperately wanted him to reassure her that wasn’t the case. She didn’t want to be taken away from him. I will sincerely apologize to him later… “Everything seems within the norm,” Suberu said, entering data on a tablet after giving Rinne the injection. “To think an unstable Third Factor in an autophagic state could be completely restored to normal… It must be the effect of the world-saving light, I suppose.” “What do you mean?” “Light at a very special frequency, which only those qualified to become the messiah are able to absorb.” “…I do not follow.” “The light doesn’t only suppress the devil but can kill it, too.” Rinne felt a growing unease, as Suberu seemed to be talking not to her, but to himself about something really strange. She decided to change the topic. “May I ask you a question?” “What is it?” Sarashina smiled at her broadly. “Why was I asked to come in without Ryuunosuke today? It seems illogical to me.” “I’m afraid I don’t know.” “And why are you examining me today instead of Ranko?” “I’m afraid I don’t know.” “A couple weeks ago, Ryuunosuke slipped and mentioned his Sacred Sealing Ring when you were driving us to the facility. Why did you pretend you did not know about the ring?” “…” “You reacted as if you had no idea what ring Ryuunosuke was talking about. You might not have been told he was a soul linker, but as a mythical factor researcher, you would have certainly known about the Sacred Sealing Rings. Your reaction was very strange.” “Ah, well pointed out.” Sarashina kept smiling just as before. “I will now answer all your questions.” Just as he was saying that, the world spun in front of Rinne’s eyes. “What…?” The floor was approaching her at high speed. She felt her head crash into it. She didn’t immediately understand that she’d fallen off the chair. “I had been setting up the pieces for this project.” Rinne could see Suberu out of the corner of her eye. She couldn’t see his face, though. “I cannot…mo…” She couldn’t move at all. “So as for my reaction to the mention of the ring, I admit I messed up. The dumb vampire failed to report that the boy had a Sacred Sealing Ring, so I was completely thrown and made up that lousy lie on the spot.” “She didn’t report it…,” Rinne whispered in a labored, hoarse voice, breathing shallowly. “Also, sorry—the injection I gave you wasn’t your usual solution for checkups. It was poison. Your Third Factor powers are strong beyond belief. I gave you enough poison to kill thousands of men, but you’re just temporarily paralyzed, it seems.” Rinne finally realized how foolish she’d been. I am a hopeless idiot. Had I truly loved Ryuunosuke with all my heart, I would have never left his side, even if he were to despise me for it. Forgive me… Forgive me, Ryuunosuke… The Order had a spy in the Calamity Research Institute. “The rat is either in the research department or higher up.” Ranko Akeda was walking down the long hallways of the Underground Kokonoe Factor Research Facility in her white lab coat. For a while, she’d had a faint suspicion that there might be a spy in her organization. The attack on the helicopter transporting Rinne proved her suspicion correct. The CRI planned the transport route so it would be extremely difficult to predict and follow, but the enemy knew exactly where the helicopter would be passing through and when. The only way they could have known that was through an informer at the CRI. At first, Ranko’s suspicions fell on Ryuunosuke Dazai, but she quickly ruled him out. His meeting with Rinne was purely coincidental, and he hadn’t had any contact with the CRI before then. There weren’t many people who knew about Rinne’s transport: the higher-ups in the ops team, and a handful of staff from their special forces and the research department. The bosses of the other sections and the higher-ups had been slow to investigate this, so Ranko took the matters into her own hands, short-listing the suspects in her own department and removing them from her team. There was a possibility the spy was among the higher-ups, but if that was the case, there’d be nothing Ranko could do about it. That’s why she chose to act under the assumption that the spy was among the researchers. “Hmm? Why am I the one looking for the spy…? It’s not a job for a researcher, but for Section Two…,” Ranko muttered to herself. She stopped in front of Lab Room Number Five. The screen next to the automatic door showed a record of someone entering the room about half an hour earlier. Ranko guessed it was Rinne and Ryuunosuke. She thought about doing something to surprise them when she entered, but Ryuunosuke didn’t take jokes well, and she didn’t want him to assign her more house chores in retribution. Rinne’s outlook was positive. The stability of her factor was eye-opening for Ranko. Only two weeks earlier, Rinne was at berserk phase one, but she recovered without any trace of abnormalities. Degenerating into berserk status was previously thought irreversible, and the suppressants produced by the lab could only slow down the process. The Sacred Sealing Rings, though, appeared to have the power to cure mythical girls who had gone berserk. To Ranko, who’d long been researching the synthesis of artificial Sacred Sealing Rings, the sudden appearance of Ryuunosuke was a godsend. She didn’t mind devoting her whole life if needed to erase all mythical factors from the world, ending the tragedy of mythical girls. “If only I could ask him to soul link with all mythical girls already…” She was garnering precious data from Ryuunosuke, but much remained unknown about the workings of the Sacred Sealing Rings. If Ryuunosuke could share the dragon factor’s regenerative ability, there was a possibility he’d suffer negative effects by being linked with a mythical girl. Ranko entered the code for the room and pressed her hand to a scanner, which checked her fingerprints. The door slid open. “…Rinne?” The first thing she noticed was that Rinne was on the floor, in the middle of that white-walled lab that resembled a hospital room, with computers and other research devices and implements all around. Ranko was so shocked that she realized after a delay that there was another person in the room—Suberu Sarashina. “What are you do—?” She was cut off by the bang of his gun. He shot her in the stomach. The dull pain from the shot wound didn’t come instantly. Ranko fell backward, hitting the door that had closed behind her. With her back against it, she slowly slid to the floor, leaving a bloody smear. The bullet didn’t hit any vital organs, but she was in a critical condition nonetheless. Ranko pressed her left hand to the wound and glared at Suberu, trying to suppress the pain. “…It was you.” Ranko had considered the possibility Suberu might be the rat. She was planning to temporarily move him to another research facility to test her suspicions—but she’d acted too late. His reassignment had already been registered in the system, which meant he’d lose access to Ranko’s labs, but the security updates took twenty-four hours to be processed. Suberu had used that time to his advantage. “Not only me,” Suberu replied nonchalantly. For some reason, he was wearing a white glove on his right hand, the one that was holding the gun. “There are others in Section One and Section Three. I don’t think of them as allies, though—just bribed pawns to be discarded after use.” Of course he had to have a helper in Section Three, the internal security. Otherwise, it wouldn’t have been possible for him to bring a gun into the facility. “You do realize this is pointless, don’t you? Security will be here soon. You won’t be able to escape,” Ranko said solemnly. “Don’t worry about me, I’ve taken measures.” Suddenly, an alarm sounded. It was the third-degree emergency alert, used for major accidents at the facility. Even during evacuation drills, it was rarely used, and so predictably, it sent everyone into a state of panic. Whether the alarm had been activated by mistake or not, everyone had to leave the facility immediately and head to the shelter. “The traitor in Section Three is behind this, huh… You’ve created a distraction, but it’s only temporary. You won’t leave this facility on your own terms.” “That’s not a problem. I’m not planning on leaving.” “If your plan was to stay here, I’m afraid you’ve already ruined your chances of keeping this job.” But maybe he’d meant that he wasn’t planning on making it out alive. Ranko had something else on her mind than chatting with Suberu, though—she was worried about Rinne. “Rinne, are you alive?” “I…am… Cannot…move… He gave me…a shot…” “He must’ve mixed in factor suppressant…” Of all factors, the dragon factor had the highest resistance to poison. Resistance didn’t equal invulnerability, though. Even though the strongest of poisons might not be deadly to a dragon girl, she would still suffer from some of its effects. Rinne had been injected with a substance able to kill a human many times over, but Ranko reckoned she’d be able to neutralize the toxins in a matter of minutes, recovering from paralysis. Naturally, Suberu must have known that, too. Ranko couldn’t understand his objective, but she hoped to distract him long enough for Rinne to recover before he did something worse. “Where’s Dazai boy?” “At home… Your orders…” Ranko hadn’t issued such orders. It became clear to her that Suberu had orchestrated this very carefully. “What are you trying to achieve here?” she asked him. “Save the world, obviously.” There was no hint of sarcasm in his voice. “What…?” Ranko was thrown by this incongruous declaration. “Sorry?” “I’m going to save the world. This generation of the dragon factor going berserk has the potential to cause cataclysmal damage. The dragon heart’s explosion might well destroy the whole world. To put it simply, my plan is to detonate the bomb known as Rinne Irako and blow the world to pieces.” “I thought you were talking about saving the world, not destroying it. You’re contradicting yourself.” “Not at all. To save it, I must destroy the world.” Ranko had to reevaluate him. Keeping the existence of mythical factors secret and supervising mythical girls to prevent them from destroying the world was a basic principle governing the actions of both the Calamity Research Institute and the Order. The two organizations were hostile to each other, but Ranko trusted the Order not to break that golden rule. She was convinced that the Order would never hatch a plan to use the dragon heart to destroy the planet. Which meant that her suspicions about Suberu were incorrect. “You’re not working for the Order…” “Of course not.” He confirmed her growing fears. Ranko stared at him, bewildered. This was the least probable yet absolutely worst-case scenario. “A pathetic organization like the Order isn’t worthy of carrying out the glorious task of saving the world. That is a task for a true hero of humanity. Meaning me.” “That is what he meant in the car back then, when he said he was saving the world…,” Rinne said quietly. Suberu’s eyes were sparkling. “I’m a member of the Order, too, that’s true. I’ve been making use of them as needed, but they were only a stepping stone for me. Their doctrine simply doesn’t agree with mine.” “You’re not acting on anyone’s orders… You’re executing your own plan…?” “A plan informed by the world savior’s wisdom, yes.” He wasn’t making any sense. What Ranko garnered from his explanation was that he was a madman. “In their arrogance, humans continue to fight among themselves, creating endless cycles of envy and rage… Even understanding this, they’re too apathetic to take any action to break this cycle. Their greed can never be satisfied, only growing the more they consume, foolishly twisting their interpretation of reality to suit their needs. That’s why the mythical girls, the enemies of humanity’s prosperity, have appeared in the world. They’re the mechanism of humanity’s apoptosis; they’re the original sin! But I—I shall free humanity from this sin once and for all!” “If you see salvation in death, why don’t you just kill yourself and spare us all the trouble of having to deal with you?” “Your crude take on what I said is typical of human ignorance. It’s so frustrating that people can’t see the truth even when it’s presented to them on a platter. It can’t be helped, I suppose. I only stumbled on it by pure chance myself.” Suberu spread his arms wide and looked up, as if he could see the sky through the ceiling. “We need not accept the astral plane–born autoimmune disorder of humanity as a curse we must live with. Cells cannot be protected from death by wrapping them in aluminum foil, but there is hope! The liquefied body of a caterpillar inside a chrysalis reconstitutes itself into a butterfly! It is not until an eggshell is cracked that you see whether it contains a chick inside! I know the truth, and so I must save the world! It falls to a human to destroy the mythical factors!” The two girls were taken aback by the depth of Suberu’s insanity. Ranko recovered from her speechlessness first. “It’s a reckless plan you have…and I can tell you it’s also impossible. You can’t force Rinne to go berserk.” “Because she’s protected by the ring she’s linked with, you mean?” “So you know about Dazai boy’s ring…” All information related to Ryuunosuke’s ring was strictly classified, and no staff who was ranked C or lower had access to it. That included Suberu. “Did you get that information from the Order, through Abara…?” “No, she didn’t report it. I found out by a fortunate coincidence.” “What…?” “I haven’t notified the Order, either. Rest assured that they know nothing about you having a soul linker at your disposal.” “In any case, you should give up. Soul linking suppresses the devil inside mythical girls, stopping them from reaching even berserk phase one. Rinne won’t be your world-destroying bomb.” “You’re right in saying that she’s protected from going berserk while she’s soul linked. This is a simple problem to solve, though. She just needs to be unlinked.” “That’s why you separated them… To kill Dazai boy…” “Kill…Ryuunosuke…?” Rinne couldn’t move, but her rage was palpable in the air. “Stay calm, Rinne. If he were dead, you’d have been unlinked and gone berserk already. As long as you have that ring on your finger, you know he’s alive.” He might not be unharmed, but he wasn’t dead, at least. There was hope for him. Ranko had more immediate danger to focus on. “He should be dead by now, actually. I wonder what happened.” Suberu didn’t seem to particularly care. “Sarashina… Your plan is full of holes. You haven’t thought this through properly, have you? You’re relying too much on luck. I reckon your chances of success are close to nil.” “Killing the boy is only a secondary element of my plan. I decided on it to cover all the bases and eliminate the tiniest possibility of him relinking with Rinne.” “Wait, so killing him isn’t how you intend to make Rinne berserk? But there is no other way…” Ranko stopped, as a terrifying idea hit her. But that couldn’t be; it wasn’t realistically possible. But even as she denied it to herself, she saw that it was the answer making all the pieces fall into place. This was a scenario so bad and so improbable, she hadn’t even considered it before. What if Suberu had a Sacred Sealing Ring? “I can read on your face that you finally figured it out. Yes, I have it.” Ranko felt a paralyzing dread. Suberu took off his white glove. “Witness the radiance of the world savior’s wisdom!” At the base of Suberu’s ring finger was a ring of red light. “That…cannot be…” “A Sacred Sealing Ring?!” Rinne and Ranko stared in astonishment. The ring’s color, shape, and position on the finger were a bit different from Ryuunosuke’s. “An inferior version of a Sacred Sealing Ring. You could call it a Synthetic Sealing Ring. I created this artifact not that long ago,” Suberu said triumphantly. “C-rank staff, stealing confidential research data… That’s punishable by memory erasure. But even with my data—” “‘I shouldn’t be able to succeed in producing the ring in a matter of two weeks’—is that what you were going to say?” He forestalled Ranko’s question. Both girls fell silent—they’d been thinking the same thing. “The Order has made quite surprising advancements in their research of artificial factor generation, as well as Sacred Sealing Rings. But you know about this, don’t you?” “…” “I solved the mysteries of the rings by combining my world savior’s wisdom with the data you had on the boy’s ring. With that information, producing the ring was simple enough.” Only staff with B-rank or higher authorization could access the research data on the ring. Ranko made a mental note that Suberu must have roped in someone very high up to aid him. “The rings are composed of mythical ideas interfering with astral receptors, expressing the X factor through Id neuron network singularity. The answer was well within reach once you know what you’re looking for.” Ranko used to consider Suberu a very talented researcher, but she had underestimated him. He was a bona fide genius. He might have become a great man of science, had he channeled his intellectual gifts in another direction. “This Synthetic Sealing Ring is, as I said, an inferior version of the real rings. You might be familiar with the philosophical argument that a human cannot know what it is like to be a bat, because we are only capable of working within the framework of human concepts. This ring does not enable me to soul link with mythical girls to strengthen their factors or neutralize their berserk status. But that is of no importance—I do not need those powers.” “You have overlooked one problem…,” Rinne said, still down on the floor but looking Suberu straight in the eyes. “Oh, you seem to be feeling better. And what is it you believe I overlooked?” “Your plan will not work, because I will kill you!” She sprang up, having recovered from the effects of the poison to an extent, although her movements weren’t as fast as normal. She aimed a brutal kick at Suberu’s face… “Stop.” She didn’t manage to get him. His ring shone, and Rinne collapsed back onto the floor. “My…Stigma…” The Stigma reappeared on her chest, despite her having a Sacred Sealing Ring on her finger. “No wonder mythical girls become so twisted—that’s what happens when you give a kid power they don’t deserve. Violence is wrong; why don’t you understand…? But we will have peace again.” Suberu stared down at Rinne with contemptuous disgust, as if she were a crushed cockroach. “You’ve been hoping to buy yourselves time until she recovered from the poison, haven’t you? But in fact, I was the one who needed time. It seems the activation isn’t immediate. Some conditions must be met first.” His ring and Rinne’s mark were flickering, as if their powers were vying for supremacy. “The synthetic ring is missing some of the functions of the original. What it can do, though, is weaken mythical girls and propel them toward going berserk.” He paused, relishing this slow, sinister reveal. “It can also…cancel soul linking.” Rinne and Ranko went pale, sensing that he wasn’t lying. “The cost of delinking a mythical girl and making her berserk is the life and soul of the ring-wearer. Unfortunately, it is one demerit I could not excise from its functionality…” “You’re going to sacrifice yourself for this?” asked Ranko. “Yes, but since the world will soon be destroyed, what does it matter? I would’ve died regardless. In the past, people would offer sacrifices during their demon-summoning rituals. If my sacrifice can save the world, I will gladly offer up my life… My only regret is that I won’t be there to witness the completion of my project. Well, anyway… While I’m still here, let me tell you something, Third Factor girl. It’s a funny little theory I’ve developed.” His cold smile betrayed a sadistic pleasure. “Your feelings for Dazai are fake.” Rinne’s eyes went wide. “What…?” “The Sacred Sealing Ring’s soul linking mechanism strengthens the bond between mythical girls and the linker. One’s soul and emotions are closely tied, and desire and love are the most powerful feelings bringing one soul closer to another. Based on this, it is highly possible that Dazai’s ring manipulated your psyche to make you fall in love with him.” He paused before teasing Rinne more. “Has this never crossed your mind? Haven’t you thought it strange that you had fallen in love with a broke student in such a short amount of time? What an odd coincidence it would be to fall in love with your soul linker. No, it was the ring that created artificial feelings of love in your heart.” Rinne was staring at the floor, not saying anything. “Well, what do you think? We have no way to test my theory, but hasn’t it made you question your feelings? Doubt them? Your love for that boy is all you have—how sad for it to only be an illusion.” Suberu was clearly saying that just to be mean. A researcher, spinning his baseless theory to mentally torture a young girl—how odious. “Heh…” Rinne’s reaction wasn’t what he’d been expecting, though. “Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!” She laughed as if he’d told a good joke. “…What’s so funny?” “Your ‘little funny theory,’ what else? You shared it with me for amusement, yet you are confused by getting a laugh?” Rinne looked up at him. There were beads of sweat on her forehead, and she seemed to be overheating, but she was smiling defiantly. “A funny theory indeed. My love for Ryuunosuke is a lie, you suggest. Hilarious. Even if it were, that matters not in the least,” she said decisively. “Acting out of empathy to protect others even at the cost of sustaining injury, while having no illusions as to one’s powerlessness… Ryuunosuke possesses qualities of character that make him a suitable mate for me. There is no other man like him. And as for regards my feelings for him, there is nothing artificial about them.” She sucked in air like a dragon preparing to breathe fire. “It is beyond doubt that my love for him is genuine!” Ranko teared up at that. Mythical girls were cursed with a cruel fate, robbed of their youth. Rinne’s short life had been riddled with hardships, yet in a very brief span of time, she had grown so strong. Perhaps she’d always been stronger than Ranko had thought. The mocking smile vanished from Suberu’s face. “Well, unfortunately, the boy you love is going to die.” “No. He is alive, and he is not going to die.” “He may be alive now, but not for long. A schoolkid can’t fight off a trained—” “No. He is not. Going. To. Die,” she interrupted him. “Tsk!” Suberu clicked his tongue with frustration. “Hope is not for you. You don’t belong in this world. You’re cancer. You’re a devil. It would violate the laws of the universe. A destructive factor nobody needs—which everybody wants to be excised from our world—daring to have hope? Preposterous. All mythical girls deserve is bottomless despair and death. There’s no place for a vessel of evil like you. For the sake of humanity, you should all die.” “What you are saying has no relevance to Ryuunosuke.” “Cling to your dumb hope if you want to—it won’t change anything.” “What a pitiful man you are.” Rinne’s voice was filled with sadness. She looked at Suberu with pity, as if he was the most miserable creature she’d seen. “Am I now?” “I can tell you have never been in love.” “…” “Had it not been so, you would not harbor the nonsensical wish to destroy the world. Further, you have already proven that your theory about the Sacred Sealing Rings forcing mythical girls to feel attracted to their wearers is incorrect. All I feel for you with your artificial ring is loathing.” Suberu’s face became emotionless. “That’s enough,” he said impatiently, raising his right hand. “Die. I have already won.” The light of his ring spread out in lines like an electric circuit powering up. “Ha-ha… It’s the world-saving light… Why would he have used this precious light…to aid a devil…?” Suberu stared at the pulsating light vacantly. In response to his ring, Rinne’s Stigma intensified, while the light of her ring weakened. “Do you know why mythical girls appeared in this world?” Neither Rinne nor Ranko knew who he was aiming that question at. Maybe at both of them. Or maybe at no one in particular. Ranko cocked her head. “Well… There are many theories about that, but no explanation is conclusive. I’m guessing you have it all figured out already, though?” “You must know why they exist if you want to solve their problem… Find that answer. Unravel the mystery of the purpose of their existence.” For a moment, the briefest of moments, Ranko thought that Suberu’s eyes seemed lucid, and he was talking to her in earnestness. But madness overtook him again soon enough. Suberu spread his arms wide open and yelled, “Awaken, devil! And perish!” The light of his ring spread farther in circuit-like lines, similar to when Rinne and Ryuunosuke were soul linking, but it went farther than just Suberu’s arm, creeping around his whole body. “Blessed be the wisdom of humanity, which shall triumph over the X factor! I’m the proxy messiah, who will destroy the astral devil hidden in human DNA! I will at last bring peace to humanity, which has foolishly reached a dead end on its path of progress! I will end this passive stopper to our proliferation! Aaah…!” The light engulfed him. “Blessed be the spring of my new wooooorrrrrld!” Suberu’s body burst into countless, red particles of light. The traitor’s death was shockingly vivid. “Sara…shina…” Suberu turned out to be an enemy, but Ranko had worked alongside him for a long time. Witnessing his descent into madness and death had to have an emotional effect on her. “What if what he said was not just a madman’s gibberish…? No, let us not pursue truth in his insanity.” The traitor had died, but the trouble he’d caused wasn’t over. It was only just beginning. “Ryuunosuke…” Rinne’s ring shattered like a fragile loop of glass, its red light scattering until none was left. Suberu’s sacrifice triggered the delinking effect of his synthetic ring, canceling the bond between Ryuunosuke and Rinne. “Ngh… Aaaaaargh!” Rinne groaned in pain. The synthetic ring had caused her factor to begin slipping out of her control. Her Valkyrie Dress and weaponry appeared without her wanting them to. Horns, tail, and wings grew out of her body, and her eyes were no longer human, either. Since she was not able to control them, her dragon features manifested as bigger, sharper, or more intense in color. There was a powerful vibration in the air, like a bass beat. It might have been a pulse of the dragon heart or the quickening before the birth of the devil. “Ran…ko…” Rinne’s Stigma was spreading over her chest like magma filling fissures in the surface of the earth, glowing ominously in the rhythm of her pulse. Rinne pressed her hands to her chest as if desperately trying to contain the power that was overwhelming her. Her dragon heart was radiating so much heat that it triggered the sprinkler system. “I feel that…the rage within me is breaking out… Please…tell Ryuunosuke…to never stop…believing in me.” The water from the sprinklers was turning into steam as soon as it hit Rinne’s body. “You must go… I can’t…hold it in any longer…!” “…Okay. I promise, I’ll pass your message to Ryuunosuke.” Ranko stood up, clutching her wound, and walked out of the lab room to the hallway. She coughed. “Gwah… I’m not in good shape…but I can’t die yet.” Having lost a lot of blood, she was deathly pale. Things could hardly be any worse. The world was threatened with destruction, and she was the only person who knew what was going on. An assassin had been sent to Ryuunosuke, the only person who had a chance of stopping Rinne from going berserk. And Rinne, already at berserk phase one, had to be stopped from progressing to phase two at all costs. Despite all that, Ranko’s lips curved upward in a smile. “You were so sure you won, Sarashina, but this game’s far from over.” This was the least probable, worst-case scenario. But Ranko had prepared for it, too. “Wait and watch from hell, Sarashina, as your sure victory turns to defeat. There’s more than one girl in love with Ryuunosuke.” Love had the power to save the world. Ranko got a smartphone out of her pocket—one tweaked so that it worked even in the underground facility. She had an idea, rooted in the assumption that Suberu’s action until his death followed some logic rather than pure madness. What he’d said earlier might have sounded like gibberish to an ordinary person, but as a mythical girl researcher, Ranko understood it. “Let’s forget about Sarashina for now… Rinne, Dazai boy, don’t you die…” At that moment, the fearsome roar of a dragon shook the research facility to its foundations. Underground Kokonoe Factor Research Facility, Lab Room Number Five. Heat swirled around the dragon, and when it rose, the dragon roared, announcing with that piercing cry its birth into the human world. “Heh…” Rinne’s consciousness had faded into the background as the animalistic demon inside her came to the surface. She was no longer Rinne, but a mythical dragon, albeit in human form. “Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!” The dragon’s laughter sent vibrations through the building. “Now, I have no choice but to annihilate this world. Countless humans will die. It would have been better if I had died instead, but why should I when I have done nothing wrong? I will destroy everything. Rather than I, it will be the world that tried to kill me that shall perish.” Its armor, powered by the factor powers, had also become unstable. The right gauntlet kept morphing until it turned into jaws. The dragon raised them, and it lit up with dark-red light. The next moment, it fired a superheated beam, which was incomparably more powerful than the beam Rinne had used against Mari that night in the park two weeks earlier. It shot straight through the entire research facility, built deep underground, all the way to the surface, creating a wide tunnel that glowed red from the heat of the blast. A hot air current flew upward from the hellishly hot lab room where the dragon was. “I can see the sky.” The dragon gazed up through the tunnel and stood still. Was it because its body hadn’t yet adapted to the second phase of berserk status, or because it was moved by the sight of the sky, which it had never seen before…? After some time had passed, the dragon in human form unfurled its wings and allowed the air current to lift it. The sky at the end of the tunnel grew bigger and bigger, until the dragon was soaring in it. The sky was a mix of red and black, the red more intense than the colors of the setting sun, and the black darker than the darkest hour of the night. It was an exceedingly rare phenomenon caused by a mythical girl descending into berserk phase two. The dragon looked down at the ground. It could see the sprawling research facility and the hills, and in the distance—a city, where people were going about their daily lives without any idea about the approaching apocalypse. The dragon aimed the jaw-gauntlet at the city without showing any emotion. “Let’s set off some fireworks to cheer up my pitiful former self.” The dragon readied to fire a beam powerful enough to burn the whole world to the ground. The smoldering evil within it would not subside until everything had been eaten up by the flames of its rage. But it did not fire that beam. “Take that!” A golden-haired girl dressed in red suddenly attacked the dragon, which had to raise its jaw-gauntlet to block the girl’s weapon. A metallic sound reverberated around them as their weapons collided. The girl had used the momentum of her attack to push the dragon to the ground. “Tsk! A pesky fly.” The dragon glared as the golden-haired girl in a beautiful crimson dress slowly descended from the sky, smiling fearlessly. “Whoa, look at you! You’re a mess. It really doesn’t suit you.” The girl didn’t have a Stigma on her chest. On her ring finger was a hallowed ring. She was the Fifth Factor girl, a vampire. And she wasn’t alone. “Rinne!” The vampire girl set down the boy she’d been carrying. “We’ve come to save you!” the boy said, facing the dragon. The vampire called him. “Ryuunosuke!” She embraced him from behind. “Do it, Marie,” he replied. The way they addressed each other had changed, indicating that they were now closer than before. The vampire girl opened her mouth wide and bit the boy’s neck. “Nnh…” He shuddered, experiencing not pain but mind-blowing pleasure in his entire body. The vampire shot the dragon a provocative look while sucking the boy’s blood, placing her left hand on Ryuunosuke’s chest to show off her ring. The dragon watched this suggestive display without moving an inch. The vampire knew that, even in berserk status, the dragon wouldn’t interfere until she had finished her meal, understanding that it was the vampire’s declaration of war. The vampire withdrew her fangs, briefly remaining connected to the boy by a thread of her saliva mixed with his blood. “This is what real bloodsucking is like. Are you jealous, dragon?” The vampire licked her mouth clean. “Ryuunosuke has wed me, and I’ve drunk real blood. I’ve never felt stronger in my life!” She laughed and conjured an enormous blood weapon. “The dragon hunt begins!” The vampire and her boy engaged the dragon in a battle to save the world.
Chapter 11
47 min read