Ishura - Volume 4 - Chapter 14

Chapter 14: The Stable and Treatment Room

Severely wounded in the third match, Ozonezma was resting inside one of the especially large buildings within Yuca the Halation Gaol’s stable block, which had been turned into a medical treatment room.

Even after the match was over, he avoided revealing his aberrant appearance to the public. The hero candidate, gravely wounded in his honorable true duel, had his health ensured by the courteous care of Aureatia’s doctors. Of course, to Ozonezma, possessing superb technical skill as a medic, performing the operations on him himself was a far more certain and reliable form of treatment.

“I brought her, Ozonezma.”

Then, one day, Yuca appeared in his treatment room with a young girl in tow.

Long, firm limbs and a lovely chestnut-colored braid.

“YOU’VE COME, TU.”

“Whoooa, what an incredible animal! So you’re Ozonezma, right? I’m Tu the Magic! Nice to meet you.”

Looking like nothing more than a healthy young girl at first glance, Tu the Magic was, as far as Ozonezma could perceive through his senses, more aberrant than Ozonezma, different not only from the minian races, but every other life-form under the sun.

“Your fur coat’s all stiff… You have eight whole legs? So I guess you’re not a wolf, then.”

Tu the Magic wasn’t intimidated at all, looking at Ozonezma’s terrifying form, getting closer and patting him roughly. Although it wasn’t exactly a pleasing sensation for Ozonezma’s body, still not fully healed of all its wounds, he resignedly accepted the contact.

“I AM A CHIMERA. DID FLINSUDA GIVE YOU PERMISSION TO MEET WITH ME?”

“No worries there! She smiled and said it was okay, just like she usually does. She and Yuca seemed pretty friendly, too!”

“…I SEE. IT DOES SEEM, THEN, THE INTERPRETATION OF THE DISQUALIFICATION TERMS DICTATES NO ISSUE WITH CONTACTING A HERO CANDIDATE WHO HAS ALREADY WITHDRAWN FROM THE COMPETITION.”

“?”

…Nevertheless, contact between a current candidate and a defeated one was still a risky proposition.

Amid the sixteen hero candidates, there existed those who were capable of achieving their goals by manipulating the defeated combatants, too. Zigita Zogi the Thousandth, who Ozonezma shared a cooperative relationship with, was one such individual.

“You don’t look like me at all, huh. Yuca, are you really sure that Ozonezma’s my big brother?”

“Don’t ask me; really, I just repeated what Ozonezma here told me.”

“…IT IS TRUE, TU THE MAGIC. YOU CONSTITUTE WHAT WOULD BE CONSIDERED MY SISTER MODEL.”

He had felt it was a certain kind of destiny that Tu the Magic would appear at the same time as him at the Sixways Exhibition. The question was, though: How much did she understand about her own history and the purpose behind her creation?

Her opponent, Kuze the Passing Disaster, was an assassin who wielded a supernatural power of unequivocal instant death. At the same time, on top of that, she needed to take on the stratagems of Zigita Zogi the Thousandth and Hiroto the Paradox backing him.

IT IS HIGHLY POSSIBLE THAT SHE WILL DIE IN HER MATCH TWO DAYS FROM NOW.

This may very well have been his final opportunity to talk with her, too.

“THERE IS ONE THING I MUST KNOW, FIRST. HOW KNOWLEDGEABLE ARE YOU ABOUT YOUR OWN BODY?”

“Whaaaat? Um… I—I was taught about everything, sure, but…but of course I didn’t remember any of that! I can’t explain it that well.”

“WHAT YOU DO REMEMBER WILL SUFFICE.”

“…Ummm, well… Something about ‘particles’? And al—uh, alignment… And the treatment? Of the heat generated… What was it again? Oh, cells…the next cells, uh… Hmmm…”

“…IN OTHER WORDS, YOU DO NOT REMEMBER THE THEORY BEHIND YOUR OWN CONSTRUCTION.”

“But I know the important stuff, and that’s all that matters. What’s really important isn’t how exactly you were born or whatever, but how you live.”

A big smile spread across Tu’s face, and she clenched both her fists.

It was clear from Ozonezma’s eyes that she did this in an attempt to put an end to her explanation.

“DO YOU REMEMBER THE NAME OF THE PERSON WHO TAUGHT YOU THOSE WORDS?”

“…Yeah, sure.”

Tu was honest. Her expression would rapidly fluctuate with her emotions in the moment.

Right now, her face showed she was trying to process some extremely complicated feelings.

As if she had recalled something she didn’t want to remember, something she still couldn’t fully get rid of.

“He’s a super-awful guy, though.”

“INDEED.”

Seeing Tu’s face, Ozonezma let out a weary chuckle. If a girl like Tu thought of him like that, then it meant the man really hadn’t changed at all.

Even long after Ozonezma had left him behind.

“IZICK THE CHROMATIC IS A NASTY MAN.”

“……! So you know him.”

Izick the Chromatic. Ozonezma and Tu’s creator—and one of the seven members of the First Party. The man referred to as the wickedest demon king of them all, before the appearance of the True Demon King.

Ozonezma raised himself up. Tu the Magic didn’t fully understand her own body, after all. In which case, there might have been a significance behind calling her out to see him like this.

“I AM LIKELY ABLE…TO TEACH YOU ONCE MORE ABOUT YOUR BODY.”

The Demon King’s Bastard who, at some point or another, appeared in the Land of the End. Tu the Magic.

Ozonezma knew. She was stronger than anyone else in the land and, at the same time, more dangerous as well.

“TU THE MAGIC. YOUR TRUE IDENTITY IS…”