The jet-black Chasseur had awakened from its slumber, and it now towered in the gloom.
A normal Chasseur’s height exceeded nine meters. Custom models, with their multicore engines, were often even larger than that. However, the Vildhjärta was even more enormous. At a glance, the Chasseur resembled a statue of a beautiful goddess, clad in a flowing dress, but the two units strapped to its back, like wings, made it more resemble an angel of death. Three eyeballs installed into the head flickered like flames in the night, then converged on Ras at once.
“What the…?! It doesn’t need a jockey to act?”
Sensing the Chasseur’s intent as though it were a real person, Ras leaped back. Not a moment later, the Vildhjärta’s left foot came down and crushed the flagstones to dust where he had been standing. The impact showered Ras in shards of broken rock.
“That’s ridiculous!”
There was no mistake; the Vildhjärta had attacked Ras of its own volition. A Chasseur, a mere machine without its rider, had acted aggressively toward a flesh-and-blood human.
“Ras!” Fiarca called out in terror. Her eyes were directed toward the stone pillars holding up the grand arches of the underground chamber. The room was large, but not infinitely so, and humans had built its supports. They weren’t so strong they could weather an attack from a Chasseur. If a pillar fell, the entire ceiling could come crashing down.
If that happened, the cathedral above would not escape harm. The palace and its gardens could be in danger, too. Fon obviously knew that, and she also knew that even her legendary arts wouldn’t save her from a cave-in of that magnitude.
And yet Fon did nothing. The look on her face told Ras he was going to need to fight this battle alone. Just as he suspected all along, he wasn’t going to be able to count on her help.
Instead, it was Fiarca who calmly gave Ras some advice.
“Remember, it’s just a Chasseur, Ras. They’re programmed not to defy their rider.”
“Of course,” Ras muttered to himself. He’d been so blinded by the shock of seeing a Chasseur act autonomously that he’d forgotten one very important point. A Chasseur was a machine, built to respond to the inputs of an auramancer.
In the center of the Vildhjärta’s chest piece, there was a hatch that led to the cockpit. If Ras managed to enter it, he could stop the rampaging unit. That was why Fon seemed so unconcerned; she knew there was that way out.
Ras took a deep breath, composed himself, and called upon the aura within.
Humanity didn’t yet fully understand the nature of aura, but it was thought to be a special kind of energy that grew when filtered through the human body. This energy was capable of interacting with physical matter and naturally occurring aurons in the air to produce various supernatural effects.
For an aura knight, this typically involved altering the chemical makeup of their own body, elevating their physical performance to superhuman levels.
With the muscles in his legs thus enhanced, Ras took a flying leap. His target was, of course, the Vildhjärta’s cockpit hatch.
However, the Vildhjärta didn’t let him reach it so easily. All of a sudden, the jet-black Chasseur ceased its tireless assault and retreated a step, swinging its left arm at Ras to keep him away.
“You’re kidding…!”
Ras used the arm as a springboard, catapulting himself high overhead. The Vildhjärta followed with a second attack, but Ras launched himself off the ceiling to avoid it, barely managing to land back on the ground unharmed.
“Oh dear, Ras. It looks like the Vildhjärta really doesn’t like you,” came the teasing voice of Fon Cigel.
“A Chasseur treating its own jockey like an enemy?” replied Ras, aghast. “I’ve never heard of anything so outrageous!”
The previous exchange of blows had taught Ras all he needed to know. The Vildhjärta was not just blindly reacting to his moves; it had registered Ras as a threat and was actively trying to prevent him from reaching the cockpit. There was little Ras could do to enter a Chasseur that didn’t want to be ridden. It was a humanoid robot over five times his size, and its speed alone eclipsed Ras’s own.
Ras’s physical enhancements were just enough to allow him to dodge the Vildhjärta’s blows. He couldn’t get close to the cockpit without a plan. Ras found himself almost wishing he were fighting a fiend instead.
“I need to find some way to slow the Vildhjärta down,” muttered Ras. But how?
The next moment, he sensed a spike of aura, and a loud, clear voice echoed through the chamber.
“Greater Ice Blast!”
An intricate array of aura pathways appeared in the air, triggering residual aurons to undergo metamorphosis. It was a technique devised to conjure up a sudden flood of supercooled water. Large blue spheres appeared around the Vildhjärta’s legs, freezing them instantly, and a thick layer of ice began to form across the ankle and knee joints of the jet-black Chasseur.
“Thanks, Fiarca!” Ras yelled, breaking into a sprint. Greater Ice Blast was eighth-level advanced auramancy. There weren’t many auramancers who could perform it, even among the army’s top ranks, but with the blessings of the imperial bloodline, Fiarca could do so easily.
With its legs encased in ice, the jet-black Chasseur could no longer take a single step. While it swung both its arms wildly, that was nothing Ras couldn’t avoid, and he soon arrived at the cockpit hatch.
However, the moment he grabbed the manual override lever, he had an overwhelming premonition of dread, and he instinctively leaped back. The next second, an endless flurry of aura blades assailed the spot he had just vacated.
Landing safely back on the ground, Ras turned to his teacher. “Fon!” he shouted. “What the hell are you doing?!” It was none other than her who had fired the technique that stopped Ras from entering the Vildhjärta.
But Fon ignored him. Instead, she walked up to Fiarca.
“Casting advanced auramancy by yourself? Impressive work, Princess. I think you’re starting to grow on me.”
The smile on her face was gone, replaced by a deadly serious stare. She didn’t seem too happy that Fiarca had intervened in Ras’s battle with the Vildhjärta.
“But I’m afraid that’s against the rules,” she said. “Bad little girls have to be punished.”
“I thought I told you that no disturbances were allowed in this place,” Fiarca replied, unflinching in the face of Fon’s aggression. “That goes for you and that Chasseur as well.”
She stared directly into Fon’s eyes, allowing not even a tremor to enter her voice.
“Hmm. You’re a special one, Princess. Is that how you got Ras to fall in love with you?”
Fon grinned fiercely. The anger in her eyes vanished, replaced by a twinkle of curiosity.
“I know,” she said. “If Ras loses this battle, you have to come work for me.”
“Work for you? At the brothel?” replied Fiarca, astonished. The very idea of an imperial princess working at a house of ill repute was laughable, to say nothing of the casual way Fon had imposed her claim. Fiarca had no incentive to take her up on her wager.
“Well, it’s not fair only Ras gets to fool around at my establishment, is it? I bet the men will love you, and I’ll teach you the tricks you need to please them.”
Fon went on as though the outcome were a sure thing and punctuated her words with a cute wink. She really didn’t seem like a woman in her fifties at all.
“What are you telling her, Fon?! Leave her alone!” yelled Ras, furious, but Fon ignored him still. Fiarca shook her head in disbelief, and a combative smile appeared on her face.
“I thank you for your offer,” she said. “But it makes no difference whether I accept your bet. If you once tamed the Vildhjärta, then there is no reason why Ras cannot do the same. My victory is assured.”
“Oh? Does that mean you accept, Princess?”
“If you insist. However, should Ras and I win, then we will require something from you, Fon Cigel. You shall listen to one of my demands; one time only, of course.”
The silver-haired princess directed her piercing eyes upon those of the Black Blade. The Blades had all agreed to refrain from international politics. Fiarca was asking Fon to break that unwritten rule and work for her. If Fon accepted, she could very well risk angering the other Blades and bringing their swords down on her neck.
“Heh-heh,” she chuckled. “That might be fun as well.”
Fon accepted Fiarca’s bet, which meant that Fiarca was sworn to uphold her end, too. She turned to Ras and called out to him.
“So you have it, Ras. Stop playing around with that machine and teach it who is the master, and who the steed.”
Fiarca’s calmness was flabbergasting. Humans and Chasseurs were in such different leagues that it was madness to even imagine a battle between them. But she believed in Ras. She knew that, if he put his mind to it, he could end this battle in an instant.