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WEAPONS echoed against other weapons. Cannons roared. Magic exploded.
My punishment.
Shrieks, screams, groans.
This is my punishment for being born, for living.
Monica had no power of her own. She couldn’t even fight against the evil collar of bondage around her neck. But, just because that’s what the blood she received from her mother was, the Hurricane of Insight did as she commanded. Her will, that wasn’t her own will, wielded an incredible power, snuffing out countless lives.
But I thought that if my life was a crime, I would be the only one punished for it…
She felt something, like just waving her arm crushed a life and sent it away. By now, she was nothing more than a tool for killing.
I didn’t choose whether I wanted to live or not…but I did choose if I would die. I knew it, I should have died a long time ago!
Monica had killed herself several times over in her mind, but her body still lived. And it would continue to live, so long as Julian needed it.
The only thing she had left was the despair of knowing she was just a wellspring of suffering. This wasn’t a problem just for her or her mother. First, it would be put on Setrayu, and then after that…
“I’m sorry I kept you waiting, Monica. You’ve worked so hard.”
Monica heard a voice calling her name. “Who…?”
She looked up and saw a woman, she looked like a magic user.
I don’t know this person.
She spoke to her like they were close, but Monica didn’t know her. But her short, neatly trimmed hair was the same golden color as Monica’s. She took off her glasses, like the bottoms of glass bottles, and looked at Monica with eyes of the same azure that Monica saw in the mirror.
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“Just leave the rest to your big sis!”
She gently laid her hand over Monica, and that alone was enough to make her feel like her body was lighter.
The weapon form of the dracovitae covering her right arm and face peeled off in pieces.
The power from the dracovitae holding her up disappeared and she fell, but a crimson shadow smaller than even Monica caught her firmly.
The Hurricane of Insight, which had come off her, flowed through the air towards the magic user woman, drawn like iron to a magnet as it covered her right arm.
This dracovitae, the Hurricane of Insight, was said to be made during the Human-Dragon War from the bodies of ten blue dragons. Its weapon form looked like a dragon’s scales and carapace, overlapping, taking the form of a staff and armor that covered the right arm and right half of the face.
It looked like that when Monica had it, and its shape didn’t change now, but it was somehow different from before. The scales glittered, the carapace pulsed.
To Monica, it looked like a dragon came back to life.
“My body is chains. My heart is shackles. My hand is the key! Dream, Hurricane of Insight!” cried the woman, now with the dracovitae, in a clear voice that rang across the battlefield. “Fill your sight! Sweep your eyes open! Now, once again! Be once again the bonds on this land of pure flowing water! I, your master, Francesca viol etor Setrayu, command thee!”