Chapter 76

SUB.24 “Ergh, guh!” Marianne leaned against a passage wall, holding her hand to her eye. From between her fingers flowed a dark red fluid. When she coughed, a fluid of the same color came out. Even she didn’t know how far the damage went. That was how badly she’d been hurt. Shuri Oumi. She wasn’t from the science side or the magic side, so Marianne had completely underestimated her. The girl had driven her into a corner. By sheer coincidence, however, she’d ran into some other “human materials” that weren’t affected by the alcohol. Only after she used her golden saw and hammer to modify them did she manage to escape Oumi. “…Damn it. I knew losing my adviser would hurt. But Dáinsleif is too powerful—use it once, and everything will come crumbling down. I told them I wasn’t cut out for combat…” She still didn’t even know who she’d modified or how. That was how chaotic her dramatic escape had been. In fact, she still wasn’t quite sure she’d even gotten away at all. Passing through the underground hallways, she entered a shopping mall. None of its usual patrons or workers were there, probably because the Kiharas and Academy City were still rampaging around. Marianne didn’t know where the civilians had gone or if they were alive, but she didn’t care about them one bit. She headed for the pharmacy section and looked for bandages and disinfectant. Thankfully, her eye still seemed to be somewhat intact. After wiping the blood covering it, her vision returned slightly. The blood had been coming from a wound on her eyelid. Still, she’d probably need to wrap her eye in gauze to stop the bleeding. “…My right leg… Would taping it be enough?” Not only had Maria Kumokawa damaged it in her joint lock, but Marianne had also pushed it past its limits during her flight. Her leg throbbed with dull pain, and it even seemed a little swollen. Marianne took some medical tape out of a box, forced her overall pant leg up, and exposed her knee. She looked at the roll of medical tape, then frowned, tossed it aside, picked up the box again, and read the instructions on the side. “Ugh. How do I do this? Uhh, stabilize the joint that hurts…?” While Marianne could modify fully intact humans into tables and pillars, she was oblivious when it came to her own body. It was just like how a professional chef and a professional food reviewer had different skill sets. Once her knee was mostly stable, she put her pant leg back down and checked to see if the leg worked. The pain had gone down a little—that was all. She couldn’t really tell if it had worked or not. Figuring she may as well look for something to dull the pain, she rummaged around the shelves but didn’t turn up anything. She found wet compresses, but she didn’t know whether to go for the hot ones or the cold ones. …Including me, there are three of us here. But Utgardaloki is already out of the running. And not only is Sigyn useless, we’ll need to purge her—and whatever organization she’s with. No idea how many Kiharas are left, but this is starting to get really bad. Why the heck am I the last one standing when I’m not cut out for battle anyway? And then it happened. She heard a rustling from the entrance to the pharmacy corner. “……” In a flowing motion, Marianne pulled the golden saw out of her overalls, but when she saw the person’s face, she relaxed. Then she smiled and spoke. “Oh, hey, Bersi. What’s up? We getting the party started for real now?”