CHAPTER 3
WITCH CULT DISASTER RESPONSE HQ
1
—Dong, dong, dong.
The low, weighty percussions of gongs seemed to come from everywhere at once, near and far.
The flow of his blood had slowed—it was an unpleasant feeling akin to having mud coursing in his arteries. His internal organs barely seemed to be working, and his guts felt like they were a rough collection of clay work; these kinds of mismatched sensations dominated his body.
Oxygen wasn’t traveling to his brain properly, either, making it hard to form thoughts, and what thoughts did form were unreliable.
He felt a feeling of loss, as if his body was no longer his own—
“—Ah.”
Abruptly, he felt his fading self being pulled back from the brink as raspy breaths trickled out from his lungs.
Instantly, his hazy consciousness miraculously pieced itself back together, and Subaru Natsuki slowly opened his eyes.
After becoming accustomed to darkness, his eyes were not ready to fully accept the white light now shooting into them. A shadow crossed right and left across his indistinct vision. It took him thirty seconds to realize that these were human silhouettes.
He sensed the presence of hastily moving people, a dirty ceiling, and air that seemed to have a whiff of rust to it—finally, he found that he was lying on something hard and that he was staring at those silhouettes in a daze.
“—Ohh, looks like ya woke up, Bro.”
Just when Subaru returned to reality, someone abruptly peered at him from close-up.
This person was wearing a jet-black steel helm. From that gear alone, some might have taken him for one of the city’s heavily equipped guards, but considering how much skin he exposed from the neck down and his obvious lack of one arm, those characteristics immediately told Subaru this was someone he knew.
“Al…?”
“Yep, it’s Mr. Al. See me once, and you can’t forget me even if you tried. This is still one helluva situation, though.”
The man in the steel helm—Al—shrugged and chuckled at his own words.
As Subaru continued to grasp more and more of the situation, his mind began to whip around chaotically. What was a mercenary in the employ of the Priscilla camp doing there? —No, to begin with, where was he?
Then just as that question occurred to Subaru—
“Aah! Subawu woke up, didn’t he?! I told you to call me if he woke up, meow!”
A loud voice rose as someone rushed over with a swift patter of feet. The newcomer thrust a finger not at Subaru, who was lying down, but at Al, who was standing beside him in his familiar steel helm.
“You need to do as you’re told, meow! Really, you’re useless if you’re just going to stand around, doing nothing helpful!”
“Aren’t you bein’ a bit harsh? I’m the one who did all the work hauling Bro and the young lady over here, y’know.”
Al shrugged at being chewed out so much, but the one lecturing him didn’t pay that the slightest heed. Instead, this person—a lovely girl, or rather, a young man dressed like one—turned to face Subaru.
“Even Ferris…”
“Yes, yes. It’s Ferri, beloved by one and all. Okay, Subawu Natsuki, let me explain. This is a field hospital, and you were brought in with heavy injuries. Still with me?”
Upon speaking those words, Ferris gave him an adorable wink. That cute gesture was very much at odds with the blood splatters that marred his white cheeks and outfit, a sight that conveyed in simple terms that the conditions here were nowhere near normal.
Once he looked around, spurred by Ferris using the term field hospital, Subaru realized that what he first guessed was the scent of rust was actually the heavy odor of blood. He could see a whole slew of faintly moaning casualties. There seemed to be so many that even the gravely injured were lying on nothing more than sheets of cloth. Subaru belatedly found that he was in the exact same state.
“What…is this…? The hell happened…?”
“It seems you’re still a bit confused, meow. Take it slow and remember what went down before you fainted. If you can recall that, then you’ll have your answer.”
Ferris spoke to the confused Subaru in a hard and unkind tone. However, this wasn’t an effort to dismiss Subaru; it was just a sign of how pressed Ferris was.
As healers went, Ferris possessed peerless skill. With such a large number of wounded needing help, it wasn’t hard to imagine just how critical his power was.
In the first place, what kind of terrible incident could have produced such a large number of casualties—?
“!! The Witch Cult!”
“That’s right… Honestly, they’re just the worst, meow. I knew that already, but this made me feel like I didn’t really understand until now. I never imagined they’d go this far.”
Biting his lip with regret, Ferris affirmed what Subaru had realized.
Subaru understood his anger toward the Witch Cult. But as his memories gradually returned, Subaru had something even more important that he absolutely had to know.
“E-Emilia?! What happened to Emilia and Beatrice?”
“ ”
“Both of them were in the square with me, and then…”
Sitting up, Subaru grasped Ferris’s slender shoulder when his words failed him. This was because from the way Ferris averted his eyes, Subaru could tell he was right to be worried.
“Calm down and listen, okay?” said Ferris as a preamble to Subaru. “First, you absolutely need to rest, Subawu. You were badly hurt… As for Lady Emilia, we can’t get in touch with her. From what you said just now, it doesn’t seem like…you got separated because the city’s in chaos, huh.”
Sure enough, Subaru’s energy faded as Ferris gave him what could hardly be called good news.
Emilia’s safety or lack thereof was completely unknown. Paired with his memories from just before fainting, he certainly hadn’t been wrong to think that Emilia had been whisked away by Regulus of Greed. Subaru had been helpless to stop him.
As for Beatrice, if she was in the same place as he—
“Bro, if you’re worried about your partner, she’s sleepin’ soundly over there.”
“!!”
Al sat cross-legged, pointing toward Subaru’s right side as he spoke. When he turned that way on reflex, he saw a curtain covering the space immediately beside him. He rushed over and practically tore it down.
On the other side of that curtain, he spotted a girl wearing a dress, slumbering on a sheet of cloth.
It was Beatrice. She lay faceup with her eyes closed. He couldn’t spot any external injuries. When he took in the familiar sight of her sleeping adorably, Subaru let out a sigh of relief.
“Beako…! Ahh, I’m glad she’s safe. Really, I… Er, gyaaah!”
“Ferri said to rest, yes? Do you understand what ‘absolutely need to rest’ means, meow?”
Ferris was on him in moments, poking at Subaru’s right leg and berating him in a voice that quivered in anger. Instantly, Subaru screamed, feeling as if a thunderbolt had struck the crown of his head.
The back of his eyes flickered from pain that was intense enough to make him taste blood inside his mouth. When he looked down, wondering what was up, he saw that there was a thick bandage wrapped around his right leg.
“Bro, when I found ya, it was so grotesque that I got cold, cold feet. Your leg was hangin’ by the smallest flap of skin. A little bit more, and you would’ve ended up one limb short, just like me.”
Al revealed some information about what transpired after Subaru had passed out, indicating his own missing left arm with a flippant tone of voice for a bit of emphasis. His explanation, plus the thick bandage around his leg, made Subaru’s hazy memories come back with a vengeance.
—Regulus.
That man, the white-haired villain who spirited Emilia away, had launched an attack as he was leaving, gouging and ruining Subaru’s leg as a parting gift. That was the source of the pain that had rendered him unconscious.
“So you see, lovely Beatrice grafted your torn leg back together, and Ferri treated you on top of that. It should be just about healed right up, but you can’t do anything crazy for a while, you hear me?”
Crossing his arms to form an X, Ferris sternly forbade Subaru from straining his body. Subaru nodded listlessly at the instruction, as he was more preoccupied at seeing Beatrice asleep.
“Beatrice…?”
Having spent most of the last year in the same bed as her, he could tell that Beatrice was sleeping very soundly. But he had to wonder if this sleep was a little too deep, even for her.
Though he had shrieked right beside her, she hadn’t stirred in the slightest.
“Is she really…sleeping? She didn’t even twitch, did she?”
“…Sleep might be the wrong word. Her state is closer to a coma than real sleep.”
“A coma?!”
Upon hearing that far more dangerous-sounding term, Subaru hastily touched Beatrice’s sleeping face. It was cold to the touch. Not a single cute reaction stirred her eyelashes or her lips.
The echo of the word coma grew more credible as all traces of blood seemed to drain from Subaru’s head.
“It’s a reaction from using every last bit of mana she had to spare. I told you, didn’t I? Lovely Beatrice desperately grafted Subawu’s leg together using healing magic.”
“That’s… But even if she’s been almost out of gas forever, I never thought she’d slip into a coma.”
“That would be true if Subawu was the only one hurt, right?”
Ferris narrowed his eyes as he watched the pale-faced Subaru inhale sharply. Taking stock of the pair’s conversation, Al used a finger to toy with the metallic parts of his steel helm as he spoke.
“By the time I got to the square, they were all rollin’ on the ground with the same wounds as you, Bro. That moppet managed to treat all of ’em with healing magic. Damn impressive, I gotta say.”
Subaru recognized the faces of the other patients who were lying down on sheets of cloth all around him, just like he was.
The fox-man, the eyepatch woman, blood-drenched Lachins, and more, all of them with wounds on their right legs just like Subaru— No, the wounds weren’t merely in the same locations. They were identical.
—The resonance that came with Sirius’s soulwashing had mauled everyone in the square the same way.
Beatrice had wrung strength out of herself to heal not only him, but also everyone else as well.
“Is Beatrice all right? You think she’ll get better if she keeps resting like this?”
“…To be honest, I think there’s little hope of that. I might be the top healer in the kingdom, but spirits are outside my specialty. I think the best we can hope from letting her rest like this is maintaining her current condition.”
“!”
Ferris’s explanations made Subaru harden his cheeks. If that was the most they could manage, then that meant she would have to remain asleep. When he heard that, the first thing that came to mind was the girl he’d left at the mansion despite how much he’d wanted to keep her near him.
Seeing that remorseful reaction, Ferris realized his own slip of the tongue. “Sorry,” he apologized. “I shouldn’t have spoken like that just now. But I should mention that letting her sleep won’t help her recover, and unlike an injury, it’s not something Ferri can heal. The reason she’s asleep is because she lacks mana, so if she gets supplied with some, she should awaken, but…”
“Supply her with mana? If I could do that, things would be easy…”
His insufficient mana supply was a chronic problem that had plagued him and Beatrice ever since they first forged a pact.
As a special type of spirit, Beatrice could not accept mana unless it was supplied by Subaru, her contractor. And Subaru, the source of that all-important mana supply, was a louse who was incapable of properly storing sufficient amounts of mana.
Subaru’s helplessness was always a burden on Beatrice. He already owed her enough that it’d take a lifetime to pay her back, yet his debt to her seemed to constantly be growing.
“It’s not just about Beatrice, either. Emilia also needs my help…but here I am, stuck like this…!”
His connection to Beatrice ran deeper than one nearly torn-off leg. Beatrice was also Subaru’s connection to the possibilities beyond his reach, to his few fleeting hopes.
Emilia was in peril. The city was in peril. He had to do something. If it was for their sake—
“Am I an idiot? Nah, I’m definitely an idiot. If I have time to cry about it… Mnghhh!”
“Okay, that’s far enough!”
When Subaru tried to ignore the pain in his leg and stand, Ferris clamped both his hands down on his face. Ferris then forced Subaru to turn his head toward him, bringing their faces close, until they were only inches away from each other.
“Why does it always have to be zero or a hundred with you, Subawu? Getting all mopey-dopey is bad, but running around willy-nilly puts everyone in a bind, too. Don’t you get that?”
“Mopey-dopey? Willy-nilly…?”
“It’s true, though, right? You don’t even have little Beatrice to stand by you right now, so what can you do running off all by yourself? You are absolutely not allowed to waste the life you’ve been given.”
The way he said it might have sounded silly, but Ferris’s words were infused with powerful, sincere feelings.
“ ”
After hearing Ferris’s plea, Subaru felt the strength drain from his legs as he stopped trying to forcibly stand up. Then he heaved a great big sigh and decided to stay put while sorting out his feelings some other way.
“Sorry. I got too restless… Come to think of it, I didn’t thank you for the leg, either.”
“I don’t really do this for words of thanks, you know. Though it’s always nicer to hear some than not.”
“Thanks, really. You’re a lifesaver. I owe you.”
“You are very welcome, meow.”
When Subaru piled on the thank-yous, Ferris gave a curt reply and finally took his hands off Subaru’s face.
“Al, you were a huge help, too. You carried me and Beako all the way here, right?”
“Yep. By the way, I wanted you to thank me properly, too. That said, there’s someone else you really oughtta be thankin’ here, Bro.”
When Subaru tilted his head, wondering what that could mean, Al amusedly motioned with the jaw of his steel helm. When Subaru glanced in that direction, he saw a boy holding his knees as he slept in a corner of the room.
“Lusbel…”
“The little guy called me over with tears in his eyes, so I just couldn’t ignore him. I followed him to the square that got painted red, red, red with Bro’s and everyone else’s blood, y’know? Seriously, I wanna praise myself for not blacking out then and there.”
It was in Al’s nature to talk about everything like it was all a long-winded joke, but Subaru really did owe him a great deal. The same went for Lusbel, who had bravely returned with help. Even if he was with an adult, Subaru truly respected the boy for deciding to head back to that terrifying square, knowing full well what awaited him.
It was thanks to Al and Lusbel’s help that Subaru could hold Beatrice’s hand as she slept.
“So Beatrice’s condition isn’t going to deteriorate right this minute or anything, right?”
“That, I can guarantee. All I’m saying is that we can’t help her wake up right this minute.”
“Got it… Please fill me in on what’s been happening. How’s the city right now, and what is the Witch Cult up to?”
Striving to maintain calm, Subaru tried to get a grasp on how things had been developing. When he posed that question, Ferris and Al exchanged looks, wondering where to begin. Before they had a chance—
“—It would seem your timing is very good. I was just about to speak regarding precisely that.”
The new voice carried well and was backed by an undercurrent of strength. When he turned, Subaru caught sight of the speaker now arriving at the entrance to the field hospital. Long, green hair danced around her as the refreshing beauty came to a halt—
“Lady Crusch! This place is full of wounded… You didn’t have to go out of your way to come here.”
“I am sorry, Ferris. I had no intention of invading your battleground. However, I heard that Master Subaru has awakened. How could I possibly ask him to come to me in his state?”
As she explained her thought process, Crusch approached the cloth where Subaru sat. As opposed to what she had worn earlier in the morning, her attire retained vestiges of elegance while prioritizing ease of movement.
He couldn’t help but recall that this was very close to what Crusch looked like before she lost her memory—
“Seems like you’re geared up for a fight, too, Crusch.”
“The circumstances being what they are, I made some preparations. Master Subaru, how is your leg injury?”
“Thanks to your Ferris, me and Beako made it through somehow. If I tried hard, I think I could jump a couple of times without crying.”
“That is good to hear…or is it?”
After hearing Subaru’s irreverent quip, Crusch innocently tilted her head in apparent confusion. Out of the corner of his eye, Subaru could see Ferris silently mouthing the words You have to reeeeest! Subaru donned a proper and serious look.
“So can you tell me what’s going on in Pristella right now?”
“Of course. However, there is something I must ask of you first—Master Subaru, is there no mistaking that you encountered the Witch Cult’s Archbishops of the Seven Deadly Sins?”
“…Yeah, no doubt about that. My leg injury, and Emilia… Her kidnapping was all their doing as well. I saw them with my own eyes, and no one goes around pretending to be those guys.”
Surely, no one would be so suicidal as to falsely claim the title of an Archbishop of the Seven Deadly Sins. Regardless, Subaru had also seen part of Sirius’s and Regulus’s Authorities. And considering their revolting personalities, their identities were almost certain.
After hearing Subaru’s reply, Crusch murmured, “So Lady Emilia really was…” as she lowered the tone of her voice before continuing. “…It would seem we should indeed think of that broadcast as fact.”
“Broadcast?”
Crusch drew herself up as the unexpected term reached Subaru’s ears.
“Well, there was a broadcast about one hour ago. Just like the morning broadcasts, it was conducted by using the metia in Pristella’s city hall.”
“…Wait, it was the Witch Cult that made a broadcast? Did they hijack the metia there?”
When Crusch had trouble picking her words, Subaru asked about the worst case he could think of. Crusch, Ferris, and Al nodded in silence, confirming his suspicions.
“The broadcast was sudden, but the culprit’s identity is clear. They were considerate enough to openly announce who they were, you see.”
“Announce… Right, that’s exactly what they do. They always announce themselves before doing anything.”
Crusch’s words, filled with righteous indignation, drew a deep nod from Subaru.
Thinking back to the Archbishops of the Seven Deadly Sins whom Subaru had encountered to date, all of them had stated their names and titles without fail. It seemed like it was the one rule that was actually observed by these morally bankrupt people who were unable or unwilling to uphold any other societal norms.
Was it Sirius who’d seized the broadcast, compelled by her incoherent delusions and a twisted desire to enter the limelight? Or was it Regulus, who cloaked himself in self-deception like a suit of armor?
“—Capella Emerada Lugunica, the Archbishop of Lust.”
“…Eh?”
When a totally unfamiliar name made a sudden entrance, Subaru was dumbstruck as he looked at Crusch.
She met his gaze head-on, the intensity in her amber eyes only growing stronger.
“The broadcast made this declaration: The Water Gate City of Pristella has fallen into the hands of the Witch Cult.”
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