Ishura - Volume 3 - Chapter 5

Chapter 5: Kazuki the Black Tone

At that moment, four different things were visible in Milieu the Hemp Drop’s narrow eyes.

First, the mercenary who was quarreling near the counter—from what he could make out, he said something along the lines of “Who cares about a damn contract?” and “I quit.” It wasn’t anything important, but he was eventually shot with a crossbow. A fight within the Free City of Okafu, and especially inside the walls of The Goose, meant that either side was drunk, so the arrows missed their mark by a wide margin, destroying two liquor bottles on the counter. The contents then trickled down to where Milieu and the others were. An all-too-common sight.

The next event came from the chair in the corner. He saw it out of the corner of his eye. A man covered in rags reacted with lightning speed to the stray arrow closing in. He twisted his body slightly. A bolt pierced his chest. The arrow stabbed perfectly through the area near his heart and stuck itself in the pillar behind him.

After it was all over, the waitress near the man in rags finally realized the situation at hand. Together with a high-pitched shriek, she let the water jug slip out of her hands. Milieu could also follow the trajectory of the spray as it scattered in midair.

However, when the jug left the waitress’s hand, the hand of the man in rags caught the bottom of it. With the subtlest of moves, he captured all the water back inside the jug.

“I’m all set on the water, thanks.”

The man, his heart freshly pierced through, handed the water jug back to the waitress.

“Since it looks like my seat’s got a bit of a target on it.”

Milieu also clearly saw the state of the fingers poking out from the gaps in the man’s rags.

“Hey there, you a mercenary as well?”

Milieu was now in a merry mood for the first time in a long time and nearly skipped over to take the seat across from the man. Normally, Milieu would’ve liked to treat the man to a drink, but considering who he was talking to, he knew his kindness would be meaningless.

“I’m Milieu the Hemp Drop. Instead of water, maybe you need some tobacco or something?”

“……Nah. I’ve heard booze and tobacco aren’t great if you want to live a long time, so I abstain.”

“Pfffft, that’s a tasteless joke. In that case, you must be here looking for work.”

The Free City of Okafu was an independent city created by the self-proclaimed demon king Morio, where mercenary services were the city’s main business…

The war between the kingdom and the self-proclaimed demon kings—or possibly the struggle for existence between the minian and monstrous races—raged on. It was fueled by applying military force to conflicts of any size—so much so that these territories were no different than mercenary headquarters.

Now, with the fall of the New Principality, the proficiency and number of soldiers gathered there from the far reaches of the realm surpassed all other nations besides Aureatia. They came due to its specialized logistical support beyond an individual mercenary’s reach—aggregating jobs and information, loaning out cutting-edge weaponry like guns and cannons or peacetime training.

Of course, during the end of the True Demon King era, they were only given jobs that involved getting rid of the Demon King Army, and the mercenaries lost any room to freely choose who were their friends and foes.

This was still true, even now.

“I came here this morning. I have business with the people trying to crush Okafu. Don’t give a damn what happens to this country, but they might be the ones who know something about me.”

“That part about knowing something about you sounds suspicious to me. Right now, at the very least, I don’t know you at all.”

“Sound Slicer.”

The man put his right hand on the table. It had neither muscle nor skin. It was a smoothly polished, jewel-like, skeletal minian hand.

“Shalk the Sound Slicer. But that’s not my real name. I’m just calling myself that.”

“…The lost memories from when you were living, then. Or rather, they say that skeletons are totally different creatures, personality-wise, from their previous living forms… How many years since you came alive?”

“Alive? Don’t be silly. It’ll be two years soon. I’ve been dead for two years. To be honest, I don’t even know much about this world in general, let alone about myself.”

Milieu was already convinced. That stray arrow from earlier that pierced through the man’s chest wasn’t because he hadn’t dodged in time. With minimal movement, he dodged to ensure the arrow would slip through the gaps in his rib cage. He had matched the speed of the arrow’s flight to do so.

Skeletons. Like golems and mimics, their existence was totally different from life birthed in nature, instead of created with Demon Arts. In minian society, they were feared more than the monstrous races; they were abominations to be avoided.

However, given that skeletons and revenants used corpses for their base materials, there was someone living who existed before them. Though they didn’t have memories and souls of their previous forms, it was natural for them to discover things regarding their former lives.

Though realizing it to be an idle endeavor, there were some who pursued the memories of their previous lifetime in order to fill in their vacant selves.

“Sounds to me like you could use a guide, eh? Someone with the same goal in mind, with the know-how and skills, to boot. A guy like me, for example. Though, well…”

Milieu looked over his shoulder toward the counter. A man with a bottle smashed over his head collapsed, covered in blood, and the remaining mercenaries had run off in separate directions.

For the past several days, it was this scene repeated over and over again. Not a rare sight at all.

“Can’t say it looks like a very favorable state of affairs at the moment.”

“…I want to know about my enemy. How many people he’s brought with him, for instance.”

“Go on.”

Milieu shrugged and smiled with his narrow eyes.

“Hasn’t brought anyone. Plans on eradicating all of them by themselves. Ridiculous, huh?”

What was laughable was the fact that their enemy truly did possess the strength to keep their word.

This was still a world where the strength of an individual could sway a battle. Even examples like this, of an inconceivably powerful individual causing the destruction of large military forces, weren’t rare—anyone resolved to the path of the warrior hoped to reach such limits, pouring themselves into polishing their skills, and a small number among those then joined the ranks of the strong. Such examples were called champions.

Okafu currently was under attack from just such a champion. It was said she was a visitor who had a long-standing feud with their lord, Morio the Sentinel, but given their status as mercenaries, they weren’t privy to any more details than that.

“Kazuki the Black Tone is coming.”

In the span of a single big month, and at frightening speed, Okafu’s elite had met their end. Doment the Green Sash. Inezin the Ophidian Measurer. Larky the Hemotidings Bullet. All of them taken out by a single person.

“That’ll make things quick. We’ll figure out which of us is stronger, and that’ll be the end of it.”

“Whoa, whoa, and here I was thinking up until now it’d be all about who’s stronger between Kazuki and me, instead.”

“…You might be right.”

The skeleton’s hollow sight dropped. He was staring at the weapon hanging from Milieu’s waist.

It was a commonplace rapier, if anything an abnormal sight within The Goose’s walls, overflowing with dangerous mechanized or heavy weaponry.

“Is it better if a new recruit like me stays out of it? This is a mercenary’s pride issue, isn’t it?”

“Can you even handle it—is probably the better question. We’ve more or less got our strategy all figured out, but if you come out of nowhere to throw a wrench in the works, I feel like you’re the one who’ll end up having a bad time.”

“Got it. In that case, I’ll just remain on defense…… I’m the new guy, after all.”

“Ah-ha-ha, I love it. You’re real confident, aren’t you? If that’s not enough for you, you could join the other side, if you’d like. After all, we’re heading into a new era. Defending a self-proclaimed demon king’s country is going out of style.”

“Well, as you can see, I’m dead. I exist in the past tense, as it were.”

It was then that the door behind the counter opened, and the pair both turned to look at the same time.

The proprietor drew a simple line across the chalkboard to display a reward sum and announced the gathered men’s new job.

“We got a mission, mercs! Gathering people to fortify the area around Great Bridge Gate! Hold the enemy back until tomorrow morning and keep them outside the second outer wall! Paid in full up front, whether there’s an attack or not! It’s a mission straight from Lord Morio himself! Any ungrateful bastard fixing to challenge him, huh?!”

Six of the men responded to the hoarse shout.

“I’ll take today’s job, too. I still haven’t earned enough for my sister’s treatment.”

The huge man, gigantic two-handed swords strapped to either side of his waist, had deeply tanned skin, like black ink. His name was Hilca the Shadow’s Ship.

“Whoa, hold up here—the pay today’s got an extra damn digit tacked on!! Lord Morio’s gonna spend up all his popularity!”

The elf, wearing a wide-brimmed hat low on his head, hollered while stretched out on the couch. He was said to use a staff in battle, but no one had ever seen him carry one before. Leforgid the Woven Trail.

“I’m in, of course.”

The calm, elderly ogre was a veteran even to the other gathered mercenaries. He answered while making adjustments to the cogwheel on the inside of his round shield, appearing to be some sort of mechanical weapon. Wint the Astonishment.

“…I’d like clarification on some of the conditions. What happens if we put this threat down?”

The tall zmeu woman fiddled with a slender instrument in her hand, resembling a medical bottle. She was Pagireshe the Quivering Toes, former second-formation rear guard in Obsidian Eyes.

“Well, obviously I’m in.”

“I’ll be joining up with you today, Shalk the Sound Slicer.”

Two minia. One elf. One ogre. One zmeu. And one skeleton.

In this town, where power was the measure for everything, no one was treated differently, even monstrous and construct races. Fight, get results, and be rewarded. For Shalk, living as a mercenary, it was a very simple arrangement—and one he was long familiar with.

“Well now, Shalk. My name’s Leforgid. I can tell even with that cloth covering you up. You’re a skeleton, right? How the heck’re you moving if you don’t eat nothing?”

“Sorry, that’s a secret.”

Shalk dealt with the elven mercenary who was first to chat with him.

“I was thinking I could give you that juicy info in exchange for hearing why you can’t move an inch without food, see.”

“Heh, funny guy, huh? Well, how ’bout we have even more fun, eh?”

“…Quit while you can. Shalk’s not just talk. I saw his moves a bit earlier. He could probably dodge your techniques, too.”

“Even without any muscle? Well, I hope so, I guess…”

Milieu arbitrated the situation, and the elf shrugged before stepping back.

Shalk said nothing more, but he did feel a twinge of nostalgia. When he was a mercenary for the New Principality, he recalled someone trying to rile him up like this on his first there day there, too.

A carriage was likely to be along soon to take them to their post. A harsh mission, where from now until the following morning, they’d need to be on constant guard against an attack, completely unsure when it might come.

While each of them prepared for battle, Shalk, too, took his own weapon in his hand. It was a white short spear. The shaft seemed to be made of bone, as white and smooth as Shalk’s own body.

“Are these lot the only fighting power we got? Seemed like there were quite a lot of mercenaries back at the citadel.”

“Each shop is in charge of defending different positions. Morio’s personal troops, well… They’ll probably provide supporting fire from the citadel—but can’t rely on them for much. The enemy’ll attack under the cover of night, so they’ll only be able to fire at random. You’ll get caught up in the fire and shot yourself if you’re not careful.”

“If you’re worried about our fighting power, the plan’s that three of our proudest fighters are returning from Aureatia today, but…”

“Hey, don’t go looking at me, Hilca. I tried to stop ’em.”

“…Wanna take bets on if they’ll make it back alive or not?”

“They must have been wiped out.”

“Yeah, definitely.”

“Not even worth the wager.”

Under the current situation, even coming in and out of the Free City of Okafu was a game of pure luck.

Not only that, but with how it was, the ones who managed to get through the gate unscathed were considerably blessed by fortune.

In Shalk’s particular case, though, entering the city without his carriage coming under attack at all, it had been a considerably misfortunate outcome instead.

“That reminds me, I haven’t asked yet. Have any of you here seen the Hero’s bones before?”

“What’s that question about?”

“Some code or something? What about you, Hilca?”

“I don’t even know their face; how am I supposed to know what their bones look like?”

“Ha-ha, good point!”

Shalk looked at the ogre drinking his booze, the only one yet to answer. He shook his head, just like the others.

It appeared Shalk’s only option to find his answers was to ask their enemy that night.

“I don’t have any proof, but… I’ll take the bet that they’re still alive.”

The setting sun, like a bright flame, cast defined shadows on the ground.

The main road that led them to Okafu had even terrain until, as it approached closer and closer to the city, it changed into a mountain slope. The Free City of Okafu was an impregnable fortress cast into a huge rocky outcropping.

Within the carriage, wrapped in red shadows as it returned home, there were people engaged in conversation.

One zmeu. Two ogres. Including the driver, the three were all Okafu mercenaries—and confident in their skills and prowess.

“From here to Okafu… A bunch of places that menace could be waiting to ambush us.”

With their work in Aureatia finished, they chose to return to the Free City amid its current state of danger. Up until a few days prior, Aureatia itself was facing a similar crisis as the Particle Storm disaster approached their borders. Although they heard that Aureatia had already warded off the threat, there were plenty of people, even beyond other mercenaries like them, who would choose to return to their home city.

“You think Kazuki the Black Tone’s coming this way? A swordsman like you is at a disadvantage against a gunfighter, right?”

“Yeah… I’ve dodged bullets…four times, I think? One time, I didn’t dodge and got a wound in my side. It must’ve just grazed me, because it only took one large month to heal,” the ogre in the passenger carriage replied. The blade he carried was short but as thick as a shield.

Lifting up his clothes, the scar he showed was cut deep into his skin, and if he were minian, it’d likely have been a fatal shot to his inner organs, but for an ogre with extremely thick muscles and fat covering his body, it wasn’t even enough to incapacitate him. They were the most terrifying monster race of all, combining horns, a massive body, and an intellect on par with the minian races.

“I’m intrigued. How’d you manage to dodge ’em? You must’ve caught their look and hand movements, right?”

The zmeu linked both her claws. This reptilian race was counted among the minian races because unlike the monstrous ones, they did not eat minians.

“You think you’ll be able to dodge after your enemy sets their sights on you? Bullets fly at you like this—”

The ogre mercenary slapped both his hands together.

“In the blink of an eye, without any prior warning. I guess if you focus hard enough, you’ll know the second it happens, but that’s it. Your body won’t be able to react.”

“Huh. Well then, what d’you do?”

“Same as always. I move my enemy. If I cover my head, they’ll want to aim for my easier-to-hit torso. If they’re already in motion, then that brief second where they stop moving and drop their sights is the perfect chance. Imagine where your opponent’s sights are set—and manipulate the moment they fire and where they aim.”

“Sheesh, those reflexes you ogres have are absurd. I’d go with a nice, clean bomb, I think.”

When weapons were involved, the zmeu’s were much more large-scale than the ogre’s. The complex mechanical launcher was curiously fitted with a fuse-lit explosive. The functionality allowed them to sync the moment the bomb went off with the moment it hit the ground, by using a cogwheel to rearrange the launch angle and ignition point for the fuse.

“………Hey.”

The ogre driver cut into their conversation. His senses were far more sensitive than the two riding in the passenger carriage.

“I heard it just now. A song.”

The mercenaries in the carriage instantly moved. A finger brushed a sword hilt…and another sat itself on a firearm’s grip, before stopping in its tracks with a spray of blood. It came almost exactly as the stray sound of a gunshot rang out.

“……”

The driver instantly crushed the horse’s neck, toppling the carriage over. It needed to serve as a shield from the gunfire.

A sea of blood flowed from the sideways carriage. The zmeu and ogre pair were already shot dead.

There had been only one gunshot.

Went through the damn eardrum, did ya?

Even while covered with a thick armor of muscle and flesh, the ogres had one spot that was completely defenseless. Nevertheless, the shot came in the middle of a twisting mountain road, through a carriage…and pierced a zmeu’s lungs at the same time?

“Taaaah, tah, taaah. Tah-taaah.”

He could tell the song was getting closer. It was completely irrational behavior and only served to give away their position.

“Dammit. Visitors. Accursed visitor psycho…”

He looked down at his own weapon, thrown out of the carriage and on the ground nearby. Just how much of a fight could he put up with this iron rod? It was impossible think that an ogre would lose to a minia. As long as it was an ordinary, commonplace minia.

“Taaaah, ta-taaah…”

“You’re dead meat.”

He lunged and tried to grab his weapon…and that was as far as he got.

Aiming at the smallest inch of his head bending forward, the bullet circumvented the downed carriage and pierced him through the eye.

“Ta-taaaaah…taaah, tah. Ta-taaah.”

The high-pitched, clear voice spun a melody across the unpopulated wilderness.

Along the mountain road, skirt flapping in the sunset, a single figure twirled the muskets in each of their hands.

The person who had finished up killing the three mercenaries was a woman. In her midtwenties, she wore a girlish skirt that seemed to clash with her boorish military coat.

“Taaah, taaah, ta-taaah, taaah, ta-ta-tah. Finished them off~! What a scene~!”

“…Miss Kazuki Mizumura. Are you always singing that?”

There was one other, sitting on the downed carriage. A young boy, seemingly in his early teens. However, his grizzled hair imparted a bizarrely mature demeanor.

“Before inevitability, tears everythiiiiing away…… Yup. Is it weird? You have a problem with me?”

“Oh no. I just thought you haven’t changed very much from thirty years ago.”

The two conversing people were still young. At the very least, that’s how they looked on the outside.

“That goes for both of us, right? Visitors don’t age, after all.”

“…I suppose you’re right. This is based off the research I’ve had done, but… An ancient royal family in this world also governed for far longer than one generation would conceivably be able to. It lends a lot of credibility to the story that all the first people in this world were visitors.”

“Huh. So then, what’s the reason why we don’t age?”

“Hard to say. This is entirely speculation, but…it might, for example, be to make us leave an impact here.”

The young boy locked his fingers together and looked toward the sky.

The blue-tinged large moon and the red small moon. Several circumstances were the same here; nevertheless, it looked quite different from the Beyond—a reality far off in the distance.

“Take you and me, for example—we may be deviants, and such humans are abandoned here in this world without anything……but to go from that point to leaving some sort of impact on society here takes even longer. Innate natural talent may rust and crumble away over such an extended time. Passing on techniques and knowledge onto others could end up only impacting one generation… But right now, neither you nor your age, nor your skills, at the very least, have withered at all, Kazuki.”

“Hmmm. I don’t really care, to be honest. So basically the whole reason we drifted over here is because the World-Maker or whatever is trying to change this place?”

“…The opposite. I think that it was originally to support and maintain this world. In the beginning, there were only visitors. In order to take root and establish an ecosystem here, their original genetic life span wasn’t enough—in other words, dragons and gigants are races that still possess long life spans because of the mutants they originated from…from the longevity of their visitor ancestors. At the very least, that’s my hypothesis.”

The “visitors” in this world were not only minia.

It wasn’t hard to imagine that the dragons were the offspring of a large reptile deviant far in the distant past that had been sent to this world. It was similar for oozes, creatures that shouldn’t, according to wisdom from the Beyond, have senses or any intellect, as well as mandrakes, plants that behaved like animals—everything must have originated from an original deviant of some kind.

The entities spoken of in the stories of the Beyond must have actually existed in the past, before being banished here.

In this world, which lacked an abundance of written documents or records, the mere search for the truths of history proved difficult.

“Anyway, you didn’t come for a chat, right? Out all this way. Aren’t you supposed to be busy working with those Old Kingdoms’ guys? War’s gonna break out there, too, you know. Heard that Particle Storm thing didn’t even reach Aureatia, so you must have a rough time ahead of you, huh?”

“Once all the preparations are in place, there’s nothing else I can do. Chatting is my job, after all.”

“You’re really impossible to trust. Is that a bit of a fatal flaw for your work?”

“…You really think so?”

The young boy smiled, looking a bit troubled.

“Now then, let’s say I’ve dropped by to check on how the situation’s progressing, then. I need to integrate the period I’ll be backing you up into my schedule, after all.”

“Progressing? It’s basically the same as always. Heck, these three weren’t even that strong.”

Her black boots kicked a corpse. The leather, fully immersed in the pool of blood, was discolored all the way up to the ankle.

“At this point, as far as mercs worth worrying about, Okafu’s pretty down to just Milieu the Hemp Drop, right? Choke them out by blocking the flow of people and goods in and out of the city, and I’d say they have one small month left in them? Maybe less?”

“I’m not asking about the enemy’s limits. Why, right now, it’s amazing in and of itself that you’ve been able to keep up your activity like this without any rest, Kazuki. Fighting nonstop for a whole big month already, six whole days. Even if someone had power rivaling an army, there aren’t many who could fight continuously with unlimited concentration. That’s why armies gather so many numbers together, to compensate for that with an increase in overall endurance and the number of eyes on watch.”

“Really? I mean, that’s what I’m managing to do right now.”

The course she chose to capture Okafu wasn’t a blitzkrieg, but a battle of attrition through unconventional combat. To be able to take that upon oneself with just individual fighting power held an unimaginable strategic mean, beyond just a prodigious strength in combat itself.

“…You know what happened with the New Principality of Lithia’s downfall, yes? A mighty nation that established this world’s only air force, erased in a single night.”

“Hmph. That had to be Aureatia’s doing, too, right? For a long time now, they’ve been getting up to shady nonsense without telling me anything.”

“Suppose, if you will, they utilized outstanding individual fighting skills like yours when they conquered the New Principality, too? That’d mean they would have no need to operate a giant armed force and could conquer all the nations in the world. They could accomplish everything without needing funds for equipment or training, without making logistical considerations, and without anything being revealed to either the enemy or their own citizen, too. A war superiority that never would have existed in that other world.”

“……And you’re saying I have some relationship with Aureatia?”

“Just a few days prior, Aureatia devoted all their might to defending their homeland from the Particle Storm. Given the need to split their military forces up to also engage the Old Kingdoms’ loyalists, if they did see a need to keep the Free City of Okafu in check with as little of a deployment as possible… If I were in their shoes, I’d send such an outstanding individual to do so.”

“I’ve had enough of your baseless conjecture, thanks. Does that story of yours have anything to do with my job here?”

“Don’t you think such outstanding individuals pose the same threat to Aureatia, too?”

“……”

“During the operation on the New Principality, the commander of their wyvern army, Regnejee the Wings of Sunset, died. Another visitor like us, Dakai the Magpie, too. Toroa the Awful, and the almost one-thousand-year-old Vikeon the Smoldering, both killed one right after another… I believe all these incidents should be seen as having circumstances beyond my understanding of them. It’s possible…these champions are purposefully being disposed of.”

Aureatia, too, was utilizing outstanding individuals to suppress hostile forces. It was a type of warfare that made it possible to avoid consuming any of their own national strength.

From a more long-term perspective, they were thinking of erasing such threats from this world as well, as eventually they could easily threaten Aureatia’s destruction. The Gray-Haired Child could understand that. What they wanted, what they feared.

“…For the ones who attacked the New Principality, the assault likely served as preliminaries to the Royal Games. The Royal Games themselves are festivities in order to establish Aureatia’s hegemony, while simultaneously being used before they start as a means to send champions to the battlefield. You’re planning on participating in the Royal Games, too, aren’t you, Kazuki?”

“…”

“In other words, you, too, are in danger. Why would they send one person to conquer Okafu?”

“…I’m not alone, though. That’s why I have you lot here backing me up, right?”

“No, I don’t mean like that. The fact that you’re here keeping up a fight solo like this… I’m wondering if, more so than Aureatia’s military operation, you yourself have a goal you’re after out here where Aureatia’s eyes can’t reach you.”

“You little…… Are you serious?”

She immediately aimed a gun barrel at the young boy. Kazuki wore a faint smile that was visible through her long hair.

“If by any chance…you’re asking me something I’d find inconvenient, you best know I could shoot you dead right where you stand.”

“If you have some goal you’re hiding from Aureatia’s side, I can work with you in secret.”

With the gun barrel pointed at him, the boy raised his hands into the air. In this world where shura ran rampant, he didn’t possess any fighting prowess whatsoever. He was a visitor who’d drifted to this world for a deviancy that existed beyond the battlefield.

“You have business with Mr. Morio Ariyama…rather, the self-proclaimed demon king Morio, yes? This is purely conjecture, but your condition for this operation was being present at the postwar negotiations. Without the backing of Aureatia, it would be difficult to create an opportunity to have a confidential conversation with the ruler of a nation. As a fellow visitor, perhaps you have some business you wish to discuss with him?”

“Hmmmm. You’re certainly well-informed, aren’t you? Even you know that Morio’s a visitor, too.”

Self-proclaimed demon kings. Individuals with excessive systematic, or Word Arts, power. Mutants who try to establish a new species. Visitors who brought heretical political concepts to the world. The ruler of the Free City of Okafu was unquestionably one of such deviants.

“Okafu is supplying military power that includes provisioning weapons, along with peacetime drilling and training. Although they disguise themselves as a mercenary guild, their business structure is clearly that of a private military company. That alone is enough of a factor to surmise that Morio is a visitor.”

“Well then, let’s say my goal here’s this—to bring you in, too, and have the three of us wax nostalgic over our far-off homeland. How’s that sound?”

“Oh yes, when that time comes, I’d love an invite.”

The boy looked up at the Okafu fortress with a face of mixed feelings.

“Do you truly plan to bring down Okafu through force of arms? You’ve demonstrated your strength to them plenty by now. There’s a chance Mr. Morio would be receptive to bargaining with you individually, without waiting to reconcile peace with Aureatia.”

“What a stupid idea. He’d never agree to those kinds of negotiations while he has the food stores prepared for a siege. Besides, aren’t you the one developing new models of guns to kill people like me?”

“Originally, I was making them for you, Miss Kazuki. Reaching production stability was a difficult road.”

“You get that I was being sarcastic with that, right?”

Part of Kazuki’s mission included neutralizing Morio. Even if there was a path to avoid battle, her status as a champion came to her precisely because she continued to produce desired military achievements.

“Your goal is information, right? Mr. Morio’s position allows him to pull and collect all the information from the mercenaries he has stationed across the world.”

“That’s right. But you wouldn’t get anything out of it. Just looking for personal confirmation.”

“That’s…quite intriguing. All the more so if it’s enough to pique your interests, Miss Kazuki.”

“Yugo the Moving Decapitation Blade. Yukiharu the Twilight Diver. Morio the Sentinel. Hiroto the Paradox.”

“……”

“Pfft. That’s a good look for you. Those are the names of all the recent visitors who have shown up here. I’m sure you’ve picked up on it already. They all came from the same country we did.”

It couldn’t have been so in the past. Simply from the naming conventions for the different races and the cultural styles, there had to have been a large number of people arriving here not from their own homeland, but a cultural sphere far off to the west.

At some point, there was a large fluctuation. Kazuki was convinced of the truth behind the change. The mystery that the bulk of those who arrived in this world in its current state were unaware of.

“…True, there may be some bias at play. Though, rather than declare that based on the handful of known examples, I feel it’s necessary to view things long-term and gather data.”

“I have no idea how many hundreds of years long-term is for you.”

Kazuki twirled the muskets in each of her hands, spinning herself around with them. Her coat and skirt fluttered with her.

“Taaah. Ta-taaah. Taah, taaah……”

“I take that to mean you don’t plan on asking for my help yet, then?”

“Beyond paying for your goods anyway. I’m a champion, aren’t I? Even if I’m just a plain old murderer.”

She smiled as she danced in the light of the setting sun.

“Doing things alone is my personal policy. As a champion, I have to fulfill my obligations to this world, don’t I?”

Nine years earlier, when the True Demon King still lived, there was a vivid legend formed amid that age of darkness.

A musketeer, touching down from a different world, deftly wielded a weapon that, at the time, no one had ever seen before, a “gun,” and all by herself, liberated a northern city turned into a labyrinth by a self-proclaimed demon king, called the Great Ice Bastion.

The Free City of Okafu’s assailant was a visitor. Kazuki the Black Tone.

The high outer wall looking down over the mountain ridge. Past it on the other side was another wall. With another wall behind that one, too. The road through the space in between the walls skirted around like a maze, forming the town……and making any spot within the meandering road always exposed to long-range fire from the central citadel.

On top of this, each and every one of the mercenaries stationed there had equipment and training on par with Aureatia’s regular soldiers, making an easy invasion impossible. However, Kazuki the Black Tone was a champion in the shadows, better versed in this type of unconventional warfare than any other.

Kazuki was going to achieve her goal without any meddling from Aureatia. Meanwhile, Aureatia could avoid an all-out war with Okafu while praying for the visitors’ mutual demise.

Kazuki the Black Tone whittled away at Okafu’s military strength, and using relief as a pretext, Aureatia would dispatch their army, negotiating from an advantageous position. That was the plan Aureatia had devised. If possible, after the two visitors involved had been killed.

Kazuki was well aware of Aureatia’s attempts to get rid of all deviant combat powers from the world.

A veteran visitor like Kazuki the Black Tone could also use such world affairs for her own purposes.

She firmly brushed away her long hair. She squinted her eyes in the final brilliance of the setting sun.

Turning his sights on the small carriage that appeared to escort him away, the Gray-Haired Child muttered to her.

“Looks like it’s time to go. Sad to go our separate ways, but be well.”

“When will I get to see you again, then?”

“It might be another ten… No, I’m sure I’ll end up seeing you again before long, Miss Kazuki Mizumura. I’m glad to see you haven’t changed at all.”

“Right. And you were just as shady as always, yourself.”

Kazuki smiled a little. Then she nimbly jumped into the car she had bought from the Gray-Haired Child.

It was called an automobile. A vehicle that was powered by steam. She needed a mode of transport without an expendable life span in order to ensure the day’s strategy for storming the fortress would succeed.

Now that their first meeting in thirty years was finished, the young boy’s carriage grew smaller and smaller in the distance. The horse kicked the earth, running.

Horses. This world had horses, too. There were times when she’d suddenly think back on it nostalgically.

A world that was clearly connected to her homeland yet was unquestionably different.

“Ta-taaah, taaaah, taaah. Ta-taaaah……”

Inside the car, Kazuki hummed to herself as she fiddled with several muskets.

The night would be her time. The many gunners positioned in the citadel would be unable to hit their proper target in the darkness and the light of the kerosene lamps. At the very least, not Kazuki the Black Tone and her perfect understanding of everything involving guns.

The steam engine started up. Currently, her position was on a slope looking down on the drawbridge spanning the ravine. It meant she’d descend an incline so sharp it physically felt like a straight drop, with the speed of the steam-powered automobile.

The car’s mass won’t change. Unlike horses’ legs, the wheel rotations are fixed, too…

It wasn’t equipped with the steering functionality of cars in the Beyond. Kazuki didn’t need it.

If its hit any sudden obstacles, it’ll be repelled and fly back at the appropriate angle—just like a bullet.

She felt the speed increase as she descended the hill. In the driver’s seat, she didn’t do a thing.

Much like how no gunner touched their bullet after setting their line of fire.

The drawbridge closed in. She continued rushing forward. Getting wind of the assault, the bridge was in the middle of being drawn up. She could tell the bows and guns at the citadel all had their sights trained on her.

Steam-powered automobiles felt no fear. Its speed neither accelerated nor slowed. A storm of gunshots. A hail of slaughter relying solely on sheer volume. The metal plating installed around the driver’s seat would guard her against the hail only once. It was accelerating plenty. It didn’t stop. The car collided into a mass of rock. The car body was launched up into the air at exactly the angle Kazuki wanted—tumbling diagonally toward the end of the rising drawbridge. The cargo bed was crushed, and the load of muskets inside scattered out of it like rain.

Similarly launched into the air, she readied her two muskets.

“Impact.”

It was as if she had known her sacrificial gamble would succeed from the very start. She cleared the bottomless ravine and had invaded the Free City. She breached the first outer wall.

In midair, she made out a shield-wielding ogre guarding the tightly shut gate.

A correct judgment to make. Supposing she was able to step inside the second outer wall and could utilize cover and her mobility, the ragtag mercenaries had no hope of winning. For the first three days, she had massacred her enemies to ensure just that.

“…Taaah, ta-ta-tah, finished them off~! What a scene~!”

First, she would kill the ogre guarding the gate. Instantly, as she crossed her arms to unsheathe her guns, two gunpowder flashes occurred at once.

A shrill metallic sound rang out.

“…What?”

Kazuki was puzzled as her lithe knees dulled the impact of her high-speed landing. The ogre didn’t appear to have reacted to her shots at all. Yet her target still lived.

She was certain the previous sound had been both of her bullets being stopped at tremendous speed.

They weren’t normal bullets. The muskets mass-produced in this world had remarkably improved accuracy compared to their historical equivalents in the Beyond—but the bullets had curved at a speed only Kazuki was able to see.

Their trajectory was aimed at the ogre’s carotid artery, wrapping around both flanks of the shield to pierce it. It was no work of Power Arts. Her supreme technique brought the air resistance and rotation of the bullet itself under her willful control. Kazuki the Black Tone was always running through these calculations as she readied her shot.

“You’ve got a lovely voice. You should become a singer.”

“……Fiiingers out of reaaach. One on top of theeeee other… Tah, tah.”

There was another mercenary in hiding. An abnormally thin body, able to hid behind the ogre’s large frame. A skeleton.

Skeletons were fast. Without either muscle or organs, they possessed an extremely lightweight body, lighter than would’ve been possible for any living being, and that was even combined with the physical strength and technical skills they had possessed in life, too.

That being said…

She had never before seen any being like him. Speed on an entirely different level that the simple racial difference couldn’t explain. Even in the darkness, how he had managed to react so deftly?

The two bullets she had fired simultaneously hadn’t been cut nor reflected.

The wide side of his spearhead had knocked them down to the ground.

What kind of speed was that, seriously?

Kazuki grew annoyed.

“…What, you’re just hiding behind the gate?”

“My job’s defense. I have some things I’d like to ask you. I’ll keep you company till you run out of bullets.”

“Oh? Suit yourself.”

A projectile came at her from the side, trying to catch her off guard. She pulled her body back and avoided it like it was nothing.

A thin medicinal vial landed on the ground and exploded in an irritative acrid black smoke.

“Kazuki the Black Tone. You must be sick of being the hunter, right? Today you’re the prey.”

The zmeu’s reptilian face, after launching the medicinal vial from some sort of mechanical device, was gravely solemn.

A correct judgment. Even if she forced her way past the drawbridge, right here, before she could step within boundaries of the second inner wall…it was possible to surround Kazuki with several mastered hands and create this advantageous position—as long as she hadn’t prepared for such a situation.

“Hilca io ocaf. Formia ora. Nel cloza.” (From Hilca to Okafu soil. Power of hoarfrost, cliff face.)

Reinforcements. A black-skinned minian was chanting Word Arts.

Using the momentum from her dodge, she rotated just barely over the ground, catching two of the muskets she had scattered all around, using her finger’s first knuckle joint. The guns that had been fully loaded into the car were the groundwork she laid for the fight. This area had already been turned in her combat domain.

She rotated. Took aim. She wasn’t firing at the zmeu in front of her or the chanting minia. She fired at the latest new reinforcement.

“Enzeham nort! Nazelcthuk!” (Stop heartbeats! Come to pass!)

On her right, she shot the thigh of the elf coming through the smoke screen, slashing at her.

The shot missed the head because their follow-through with their low-positioned iron rod protected their vitals. As proficient as their reputation suggested.

“Hngah… Augh!”

“……She got Leforgid!”

“Damn, how’s she reacting so fast…?!”

In the drug-wielding zmeu’s direction, an abruptly risen stone wall cut off her line of fire. Protective Craft Arts from the black-skinned minia. Supposing she had been shooting at the zmeu, then the elf’s attack, cloaked in the smoke screen, would have split her head in two.

Correct judgments, each and every one of them.

Too bad it’s all meaningless, though.

Taking on several mastered hands and fighting them at once. Fighting continuously.

To Kazuki the Black Tone, it wasn’t anything special at all.

She would admit her opponents had the upper hand. Their judgment had been precise, and she could tell that their coordination was quite high.

Nevertheless, Kazuki had become completely accustomed to such situations and opponents. Even if the mercenaries compiled every possible optimal solution together, they wouldn’t be able to match her talent. Without question.

“Tah, ta-taaah. Taaah, taaah. I don’t believe anymore…… I feeeel, myself, meeeeelting awaaay.”

She spun her muskets in rhythm with her song. With it, she applied centrifugal force to them.

“……Ta-ahn!”

The metallic click came after Kazuki threw the musket in her right hand.

The next vial discharged from the zmeu’s launcher machine was intercepted by the gunstock of the thrown musket long before it landed, and the smoke screen from the explosion enveloped the zmeu and the minia Word Arts user.

She kicked one of the muskets scattered at her feet and broke into a dash. The gun spun on the ground, sliding as it sped into the black smoke cloud. Kazuki’s straight advance came faster than the black-skinned minia could incant the first stanza of their Word Arts.

“Hilca io ocaf.” (From Hilca to Okafu soil.) “…Hng!”

“Taaah, tah.”

She pulled out the left musket from within the smoke. Her gun was simultaneously also a bayonet spear. An enormous amount of blood drenched the bayonet, and the minia’s Word Arts ended incompletely. The intercepting stab from their two-handed sword also failed to reach her.

“Beforeeee, inevitabilityyyy. Tears everything awaaaay.”

She spun the musket she pulled up behind her. The blood scattered in a clean arc.

There was a sound of a shot from behind. Launched from the shield of the ogre defending the gate, the four metal rivets were blocked with her wooden gunstock. She had already picked up that this mechanism in the shield was the ogre’s trump card.

Throwing one away and using the other for defense, now, both of the muskets she’d had in her hands were rendered useless…… Suddenly, the first enemy popped up in the back of her mind.

…That expert fighter. If the spear-wielding skeleton…picked this moment to make his move, then what?

“Shhhaaaaa!”

The vial-launching zmeu was at close quarters. Her claws were threatening to tear out her throat. A deafening boom pierced through the zmeu’s mouth and passed through her skull. Kazuki threw away the small gun she pulled out of her coat. An armament of hers she hadn’t revealed to them up until now.

“Ta-taaah…”

The moment that Kazuki the Black Tone took her hands off all the guns she had, including her hidden weapons—

It was the perfect opportunity he had been aiming for.

A minia wielding a rapier came up from behind Kazuki.

The man was Milieu the Hemp Drop.

He had perfectly hidden his presence during the exchange of blows up until that moment. A silver streak, straight at her heart—

“Aw, close one.”

She kicked up a musket at her feet with the tip of foot. The gun she had sent to this position with a kick before her charge.

The bayonet’s intercepting thrust, digging into his flank, reached out longer than the rapier.

“……!”

Piercing through his abdomen, she then pulled the trigger.

His innards exploding, the rapier wielder went flying from the shock.

“And you had the best chance, too. What a shame.”

She hadn’t read the situation—Kazuki herself simply maintained a position where she was capable of responding to anything.

Kazuki twirled around, moving like a dancer, and smiled down at the people she killed.

Four of them were snuffed out. Her fighting brought everything to a close in an instant.

She kicked two guns up into the air to pick them up. She was unscarred.

During the high-speed battle, she had constantly used her opponents to cut off the line of fire from the citadel. The rain of gunfire was never going to reach her. When it came to both combat and tactical strategy, the mercenaries were no match for the champion.

Left over were the two guarding the gate. A shield-wielding ogre. With him was the skeleton spearman. Even if she assumed there were a number of traps and troops waiting for her behind them, the Free City of Okafu’s military power was definitely growing weaker and weaker.

“I was only just hired by Okafu today, but…”

The skeleton looked at Milieu’s pathetic corpse.

“…This guy said he’d show me around, see. Guess that’s what they call the mercenary problem, but…I shouldn’t have gone and made a promise like that.”

“What? But I had him go on ahead so he could show you around the next life better.”

The skeleton stepped forward. Black rags, reminiscent of a reaper. A full body of bone, treated with some unknown technique to polish them pure white.

“Shalk. Fall back.”

The ogre gave a brief warning to the skeleton mercenary.

“You can tell, right? Anyone that challenges her probably has a death wish.”

“Well, I’ve been dead for a long time now. Got nothing to lose, really.”

Shalk brandished his white spear.

“Kazuki the Black Tone. You the Hero?”

“…Nope. Been mistaken for them before, but it’s not me.”

“Really now. Well then, first off, if I win, I want you to pass your entry for Aureatia’s Royal Games to me.”

“Is that right…?”

She herself hadn’t considered the Royal Games to decide the Hero as anything more than whimsical entertainment. The firm promise that she’d be rewarded for taking down Okafu with the right to enter was, from the very start, nothing but a bonus for making contact with Morio the Sentinel.

However, she never expected anyone out there would challenge her to a duel for such a reward.

“Makes no difference to me. You can have it.”

One-on-one. The prospect of competing against the speed that first stopped her bullets gave her a bit of a thrill.

Or perhaps, maybe this skeleton had hoped for this very situation, and that was why he hadn’t gotten involved in the fight until now.

“Second question. This one I’d like the answer to now.”

“…You know, you’re quite a bit pushier than you look, huh.”

“You’ve visited The Land of The End. As part of that very first search party to confirm the Demon King had disappeared.”

“And?”

Kazuki was looking at Shalk’s center of gravity. He held his spear out straight ahead. He was trying to kill her with a maximum-range thrust.

This skeleton was likely able to dodge faster than her bullets flew, even if he waited until after seeing where she aimed.

Nevertheless, for Kazuki, reacting after seeing her aim was still too slow. She could fire in a completely different direction than where her gun barrel was aimed by using the spin and inertia she gave to the bullet inside the barrel. Even if he compiled together all the optimal solutions to her attacks, he wouldn’t be able to match her talent.

“If the Demon King really was defeated… Did you see the Hero there? And if they happened to be dead, did you see their bones? If you did, then—”

The future up until the final moments was settled. With both guns, she would simultaneously send a bullet straight ahead and an indirect shot to cut off his route of escape. Kazuki’s bullets would land five paces before the spear could reach her.

“Did they look anything like these bones?”

“Sorry, but…”

Kazuki’s long hair waved in the night breeze.

In this world, there was a skeleton who was brought to life without any idea who they were.

Surely it must have been similar to the loneliness felt by visitors, exiled in another world for their deviance.

“I don’t know a damn thing about you.”

“I see.”

Dust and sand flittered in the air. She pulled the trig—

“Huh?”

It was after the spearhead had been pulled out of her windpipe.

Shalk was five paces outside his spear’s range. Exactly as the preternatural champion, Kazuki, had estimated.

The visitor, capable of watching a bullet’s path with her naked eye, was only barely able to capture the exact second that he nigh instantaneously returned his grotesquely extended and rearranged right arm back to normal—it was supernatural speed.

Much more—the speed of his spear thrust.

…Impossible…? What…?

She couldn’t sing.

The strength drained from one of her legs, and her body twisted as it collapsed.

Shalk the Sound Slicer was looking down at her as she writhed. Both in the New Principality of Lithia and here in the Free City of Okafu, he was after the same thing. The truth behind the Hero and the Demon King of this world.

Or a powerful someone who could tell him who he was.

“Aaah, this…wasn’t the one, either.”

The hollow skeleton spat out bitterly, walking off into the wilderness. Who was he? Where did he come from? Why was he as strong as he was?

Even the skeleton himself didn’t understand.

“……Who, am I?”

He possessed a deceased, suprarational physical form, rendering both thrusts and fired shots meaningless.

He knew spear techniques capable of surmounting champions, while being completely ignorant of his own origins.

He voided the perceivable concept of range as meaningless with instantaneous separation and conjugation.

A monstrosity abruptly born into this world. The fastest undead in the land.

Spearhead. Skeleton.

Shalk the Sound Slicer.