Episode 29

“This is… brutal. What happened here?”

While Brink’s unit was subjugating monsters, they’d heard an explosion. They rushed to the slums and saw the ravaged scene.

Perhaps from the blast, scorch marks marred the buildings, and some sections were heavily damaged.

With a scale like this, it was hard to believe it had occurred naturally. Brink’s squad advanced with caution to the blast center, where they found a boy lying face-down and a man slumped against the remains of a building.

The boy seemed to be unconscious, but no major injuries were visible; however, he might have burns. He needed treatment at once.

The man, by contrast, was in critical condition. The robe he must have worn was badly burned, and the exposed skin showed severe burns. It was a wonder he was even conscious.

“Knights, marching around in droves… how diligent.”

He was clearly forcing himself. His breath was ragged, and he coughed blood now and then. In the eyes he turned on the knights burned a color of hatred.

“Just to be sure—what happened?”

“You prattle on about country and people, but what you really care about are kings, nobles, and the rich… aren’t I right?”

The stream of slurs wouldn’t stop even as he spat blood; it could only be called madness.

“…The capital is on high alert. You’ll be placed under the order’s supervision for a while. You need treatment, too.”

“So, he was a brat after all. In the end he couldn’t be ruthless. Botched his control and lost his chance to win.”

Brink and the man might as well have been talking past each other.

“I can’t even move a finger myself… but I’m grateful to the brat. Thanks to him, you stupid knights all gathered nicely.”

As the man suddenly burst into loud laughter, Brink gave the order and the knights shifted into a security posture.

“So I can still use magic even if my body won’t move, huh. What kind of thinking leads to that…? Fine, let me be a fool once too.”

Sigils surfaced across the man’s skin. The heated red glyphs matched what was in their intel.

“That armor’s regimental-commander class, isn’t it? If I can take you with me here, that’s good enough. Die—with the meddling brat as well!”

The sigils flashed rapidly. Heat haze rose under the magic’s effect. But it lasted only a moment.

“Just as the report said. The ability to deploy what we learn, quickly— that too is a strength of an organization… Remember that.”

In an instant, Brink had moved to stand before the man. He drove a softly glowing blade of light into the area of his right abdomen.

“Seal the mana, strike the magic’s starting point—then throw the mana’s flow into disorder. Once you know the setup, it’s nothing.”

The man’s eyes flew wide in shock, but no words followed. As if squeezing out his last strength, he lost consciousness.

“The knack for judging and acting on the spot… might be his special privilege.”

Zeke moved by sprinting over the capital’s rooftops. Each time he spotted monsters, he dove from above, then sprang back up, repeating the cycle as he continued the subjugation.

In a capital packed with buildings, moving on the ground was inefficient—and there were evacuees. Considering the narrow backstreets, having a vantage from above was convenient.

“Tch. Useless lot.”

In his view were three children running desperately from monsters. No adults or knights were nearby. Perhaps they’d been separated by the chaos.

Zeke fixed his target and dropped in a steep dive. The children started, shocked by his sudden appearance ahead of them, but before they could cry out, the situation changed. Remembering the monsters, they pointed behind him—only to see a frozen ogre. The foul brute that had been snorting as it chased them was dead.

“Eh—!? What is this… what’s happening?”

Their exact ages were unclear, but they were close to the age when Hiroto had first begun acting as Zeke. The boy and girl stared wide-eyed, their gaze flitting between Zeke and the monster.

“If you don’t want to die, don’t stop your feet.”

He left just those words and vanished like the wind… in reality, he merely leapt up to the rooftops again.

Without a pause, Zeke moved on. It wasn’t that he was agitated by the capital’s crisis; rather, the presence of Van (the protagonist) in Spirito loomed large.

At least in the game’s story, this incident hadn’t been told. Whether it existed as backstory or a side episode, or whether the scenario had changed—he didn’t know. But right now, there was a chance Van was in the capital. Which meant the odds were high this was an event tied to the protagonist.

Now that he knew that, he couldn’t just sit and watch. If it had been only a guard job, he’d intended to handle it lightly and wrap it up, but with things as they were, he had to move to resolve it. The movements of the protagonist and the main cast were tied to his own life.

“That must be it…”

A narrow passage branching off a main road where no one was around. Beyond it, the gaps between buildings had been cleverly used to form what looked like a small park.

For some reason, many monsters sat there motionless. They filled the space from the passage into the park.

“A rabble, is it…”

“Boy, are you awake?”

“What… happened to me…?”

Thanks to healing from Brink’s unit, Van regained consciousness. He felt a heavy fatigue, but it seemed he could move.

“—! Right, what happened to that guy!? And the people who live here!?”

“Calm yourself, boy. The man has already been restrained.”

The nice middle-aged knight soothed Van. Panicking wouldn’t move things along, Brink said; the gap in experience showed.

Van took a deep breath and explained what had happened thus far.

“I see… Then first let me thank you on behalf of the order. Thank you. Thanks to what you did, there are lives that were saved.”

“All I did was thrash around… In the end, I couldn’t finish him off. …I wound up almost dying again.”

Van looked down. After being shown the overwhelming gap by Zeke, he’d wrestled with himself over and over. He’d fought hard to find an answer and believed this battle had let him take one step forward—but maybe he’d been wrong.

“…Even so, you can’t give up. That’s the air I get from you.”

Brink smiled—not a sneer at another, but something warm, like a parent to a child.

“When I look at you, I see my son’s image overlap. He struggles just like you—stumbling, worrying, but trying his hardest to move forward.”

A dream of becoming a knight—and beside him, a goal too high. Both could be called hard roads, but he kept his eyes forward without breaking.

“Forgive me; at my age I tend to slip into lecturing.”

“No, it’s fine—thank you. Knowing there’s someone like me out there… I feel like I can keep going. …Yeah. I can’t stop.”

Van had recovered a little spirit. He still had doubts, but quietly, his fighting will burned. He wouldn’t snap easily either.

“The next generation seems to be coming along… Now then, boy—we need to investigate what lies ahead.”

“Of course I’m going! I’ve come this far; I want to see with my own eyes what’s going on.”

Van stood with vigor. There was no time to stand still.

“Understood. But if it becomes more than you can handle, you’ll withdraw. From there, it’s the order’s job.”

“Vermin…”

Monsters went flying together under Zeke’s kick. A powerful strike silenced them, but new ones immediately appeared.

Zeke had attacked head-on without flinching. At first he’d been one-shotting them with his specialty, ice magic, but gradually a stalemate set in and he couldn’t push forward. More monsters were spawning than he could kill.

“Annoying…”

The moment they got Zeke in sight, the monsters began to act. At first they’d been a grab bag—goblins, orcs, ogres—without any pattern, but then a change appeared and they became increasingly unified.

“Grrrrrr!”

The monster that charged him with a growl was a Snow Wolf, covered in white fur—a cold-resistant monster that lived in frigid regions. There were also Ice Golems with bodies formed entirely of ice, tundras called ice-fairies, and Ice Ogres, a subspecies of ogre. All were powerful monsters with resistance to ice.

“How insulting…”

The monsters were changing based on his fighting style—clearly taking measures tailored to Zeke.

“qwujbdmj…”

An Ice Golem emitted machine-like sounds as it fired energy bolts. With wave attacks that ignored even nearby monsters, damage to the capital’s buildings mounted.

“This is getting tiresome…”

“Having trouble… my worthy rival!”

Monsters died, pierced by lightning magic unleashed from above. Even those that escaped a direct hit stiffened under the lightning’s effect.

“Thunder Arrow!”

A follow-up shot struck the immobilized monsters and silenced them. As the lightning propagated, its area of electrocution spread further. Using lightning magic’s properties for chain attacks, their numbers fell sharply.

“How’s that? Did I live up to expectations?”

“…What do you want now, loser.”

His opponent from the mock battle—Aaron of the Royal Guard Corps—appeared before Zeke once more.

“No need to be so formal. I’d say we’re close enough to call each other comrades-in-arms.”

“Hah. What’s a royal guard like you doing in a place like this? Did you get fired?”

“It’s true the captain read me the riot act, but I’m ‘convalescing’ right now.”

Aaron had been badly injured in his fight with Zeke. Thanks to treatment from Bart of the Maria Church, he’d recovered, but he’d been left off this guard detail both to be safe and as punishment for causing a stir.

“As you see, I’m not wearing the corps’ uniform. But I couldn’t very well sleep soundly in bed while the capital was in crisis.”

His theatrical delivery was unchanged, but he was carefully watching for monsters. At least he wasn’t here to heckle.

“…They’re changing tactics to match you. Ice is your signature, but that also makes it, turned around, a weak point.”

It was true a stalemate had set in and the monsters’ numbers were inching up. That was only natural when fighting monsters with resistance.

“That’s precisely why I’m here—to be your blade… Now, go! I’ll take this part!”

Aaron swung his rapier like a whip, wreathed in lightning magic, and felled monsters. Piles of monster corpses made the scene grotesque.

“I see… So you’re saying you can clean up these vermin better than I can?”

“Of course! The classic ‘go on ahead, I’ll hold—’ huh?”

A sudden pale light. It spread to envelop all the monsters flooding in anew—and all the corpses Aaron had felled.

The glare and the surge of powerful mana made it impossible to keep his eyes open. All Aaron could do was brace so he wouldn’t get caught in it.

When the light faded, what met his eyes was a world of ice. Every monster had frozen and ceased moving. The buildings and ground caught in the light had frozen as well.

“A magic that ignores resistances and steamrolls…? How can that…?”

“Idiot. In every way, you and I are different.”

Cracks ran through the frozen monsters, and with a clatter they collapsed. The shattered ice crystals swirling through the air looked like a weather phenomenon one would never see in the capital.

“Then why, if you have that much power…?”

“You’re useless. If I go wild here and it prompts a change, then at the very least the enemy is somewhere they can watch this side—or has the means to.”

“So you were facing this many monsters alone to flush the enemy out… I can’t hold a candle to you.”

Even after being shown the gap— like heaven and earth— and even after being insulted, Aaron somehow wore a cheerful look, as if a weight had lifted.

“Hmph. That’s your limit—conveniently used by a ducal house as you are.”

“—!? How do you know…? Ah, right; they say you’re close with that Ciel (the goddess).”

“There’s no such fact. My business is with her stepbrother. Pass along a message: ‘Be ready.’”

The number of monsters flooding in had fallen greatly, but the incursion still hadn’t stopped. Clicking his tongue, Zeke moved to act.

“You really are fascinating… Message received! This time I truly will handle the rest. So… I’m counting on you.”

Aaron plunged back into battle, rapier and lightning magic in concert. Using lightning’s properties, he moved swiftly and toyed with the monsters.

“Unnecessary… but fitting for a commoner.”

Zeke broke off the pursuit and moved on. It seemed he would leave this field to Aaron.

“Still… what is that failure doing? I’m not waiting any longer. Time to end this…”