“My brother.”
He felt the presence standing beside him. A possibility. He turned his eyes toward it now.
It was his sister. She extended a hand toward him gently. All he had to do was take it, and he would become a hero. And when he did, the wind would blow. It always did when a person became a hero, without exception.
Azuma made a calculated decision in the back of his head. Even if the wind didn’t get Kaguya and the Goddess back onto their original course, it would likely still be enough for Rindou to make it in time.
“Fine, then…”
Azuma extended his hand without hesitation. But he obviously had no plans of making things easy.
“You can use me this time instead.”
As soon as he took its hand—the wind began to rage. Azuma turned his eyes toward Kaguya as she hurled toward the ground. The trajectory of their fall had changed. He spotted Rindou leaping into the air from the side. Azuma started to speak, as if offering up a prayer to Kaguya, who was prepared to give up on life.
“Kaguya. I believe in you. I believe in you, so come save me. You’re the only one who can bring me back, right?” Just like he was the only one who could save Kaguya. “In that case, don’t you die on us, okay?”
He had to tell her how he really felt.
“But even if it’s too late for me, pass it on to the next person. But in order to do that, you can’t give up on yourself first.”
Because no one else could do what she could do.
Having said everything he needed to say, Azuma allowed himself to be lured of his own volition into his ideal world.
After her trajectory changed and she fell, Kaguya was safely caught in Rindou’s arms. She was now back on solid ground. She had seen Azuma change with her own two eyes—she wanted to run to him immediately, but she suddenly realized that the silver cross, which should have still been in her hand, had been knocked from her grasp at some point.
She went pale and glanced around, eventually spotting it at quite a distance from where she now stood. Its current location, unfortunately, was far from ideal.
Due to the wind that had surfaced after Azuma turned into a hero, Kaguya was now positioned second closest to Azuma, along with Rindou. Koyuki was the closest.
The cross was much farther away. Even worse…
“Oh no… It’s in there!”
Nestled in the rubble of the decimated school building. It was not completely buried—she could still make out a glint of silver—but there was no telling how long the remains would continue to stand. If the rubble collapsed completely, they would all be out of luck.
Kaguya only realized as she tried to run toward the earring that her ankle was broken.
“Why…?!”
She must have hit it when she fell. Either that or she had somehow hurt herself without noticing while wrestling with the Goddess in midair. Either way, she could no longer run.
The hero suddenly roared. Maybe it was because he had taken the Goddess’s hand of his own accord, but Azuma was transforming into a much more fearsome shape than the katana hero he had once transformed into before.
“Ah…”
Kaguya stared at him as she tried to think.
If she tried to crawl all the way to the earring, she would never make it on time. Azuma would attack them first, resulting in an irrevocable outcome.
How was she supposed to save him? How was she supposed to get the one key that worked into his hands? She needed to get to that rubble and dig the cross free. She could always try diving in and saving him again herself, like last time. But who knew if she would be able to come back this time?
“Kaguya!”
Just then, a rough, boorish voice yanked Kaguya back to reality. She caught sight of him out of the corner of her eye, the same person who had just caught her when she fell from the sky. It was Rindou.
“What do we do next? Tell me what you need!”
He was out of breath, but he was staring at Azuma, just like she was.
Kaguya suddenly remembered something that Azuma had told her before. That she needed to rely on everyone more. To trust them a little and not try to handle everything all by herself.
She made up her mind immediately. Charon trusted her. There was no reason not to trust them in return.
“Rindou!! Can you do something about that?!”
She pointed toward the cross buried in the rubble. Rindou was speechless. Doing “something” about it was clearly going to be difficult. But difficult wasn’t the same as impossible. Kaguya knew he could do it. She shouted once more.
“Please!!”
Clicking his tongue softly, Rindou began running toward the rubble without another word. Even Rindou looked ready to drop from exhaustion at this point. After all, he had just fought two heroes in a row. Kaguya knew he was barely standing now.
The rubble looked like it was ready to collapse. They could still see the silver cross but just barely. Once the rubble came falling down, it would be lost entirely. He made it—mere moments before a large chunk of debris that sloughed off from the building would have crushed the cross. However, Rindou took the brunt of the falling rubble in the cross’s place. The debris fell on top of him. Despite this, he grasped the cross firmly in his hand.
He threw his arm backward, tossing it away from the collapsing wreckage. He couldn’t even see where he was throwing.
A pond—the cross was headed straight for water! Just as it was about to hit the surface…
Someone else snatched it out of midair.
A young woman with teal hair and jade-green eyes—it was Haru! She caught the cross and just kept running as fast as she could. She wasn’t as spent from battle as Rindou was and still had plenty of stamina left over. She bought even more distance, but there was a problem.
“Th-the wind…!”
The wind was cloaking Azuma, keeping her from getting any closer. Haru was hardly a flimsy girl, but she wasn’t nearly as strong as the other members of Charon. All she could do was try to dig her heels in so that she wouldn’t be blown away. She reached out, trying to deliver the cross into Kaguya’s hands, but it was blown from her own hand instead!
“Ah!!”
Fortunately, there was someone there to catch it before it could fly away.
“Koyuki…!”
Koyuki tossed her gun aside and held onto the cross as tightly as she could instead. She passed it to Kaguya as Kaguya shouted her name before grabbing Kaguya’s arm tightly with one hand.
“Go get him for us…Kaguya!!”
And then she tossed Kaguya bodily through the air, straight toward Azuma. The counterforce caused Koyuki to lose her footing and be tossed backward into the wind, disappearing from sight.
The wind was even stronger than her. Stronger, colder, and so much fiercer than any wind Kaguya had ever felt before. An implacable barrier. But strangely, the storm seemed to be pointed inward. The wind coming off Azuma’s hero was actually sucking Kaguya in.