Chapter Twelve: Intelligence Operative
“Lyno . . . why . . .” Bitch breathed, an incredulous expression on her face. It sounded like Woman B II’s name was Lyno. It was rare for me to learn the name of anyone in her position . . . and I still didn’t understand exactly what was going on. Some kind of internal conflict? From the situation that had just been playing out, though, that hadn’t really been the moment to turn on Bitch. These gaggling annoyances would do so, certainly, but only when they felt real danger to themselves.
“Why? Because your back was wide open, that’s why,” Woman B II—Lyno—said, twisting her blade even as it was still stuck through Bitch. That got a scream. Lyno’s words and her face displayed a powerful resentment and hate that had clearly been festering for a long time. I was sensitive to it due to the rage curse I was currently under. “Can you fly, Bitch?” Lyno proceeded to extract her sword and then kicked Bitch off the flying ship altogether. Her stomach wound probably stopped her from reacting, and Bitch plummeted head-first to crash into the ground. It looked terrible. Falling from that height without any preventative measures on her part had surely caused massive damage, but the whip seven star weapon had kept her alive.
What the hell was going on?
The other groups of fighters were continuing to fight, but were also aware of the situation with Bitch and Lyno. Our enemies, in particular, couldn’t really believe what they were seeing.
“Where did . . . that come from?” Bitch said.
“Is this such a surprise, really?” Lyno countered.
“You won’t . . . you won’t get away with—” Bitch started to shout.
“That’s my line, Bitch!” Lyno cut her off.
“What’s going on? Why did you do that?!” The ofuda guy finally snapped back to himself and shouted at Lyno.
“Why? Because this woman knows my real name and still doesn’t know who I am!” With that, the woman called Lyno leapt from the flying ship, plunged down through the air with her sword at the ready, and landed right on top of Bitch. That got another impressive scream, her sword piercing Bitch’s body a second time as she landed.
I’d heard Bitch screaming a lot in my time, but this was different. There was real desperation this time.
“To you it might be nothing more than a vague recollection, like a meal you ate one night a year ago. But to me, it’s something that I’ll never forget! I’ve been waiting for this moment, longing for it to come for so long now!” Lyno dragged her sword out from Bitch’s stomach and then plunged it back in again. She repeated this over and over and over, eliciting more screams from Bitch.
“Does that hurt? I’m glad, so glad it hurts. This is nothing compared to the pain you have caused me!” Lyno broke down into maniacal laughter, her crazed peals of joy ringing out across the general vicinity. Bitch spluttered and squealed under the vicious assault, the blade plunging and twisting over and over. It was a product of pure hatred.
“Oh my. That’s some serious anger,” the Demon Dragon said, looking very pleased with this development. I had to agree with her. This was rage on my own level.
“Ah, of course . . . you aren’t worthy of the whip seven star weapon. I’m going to take it from you,” Lyno said. She stabbed Bitch in the hand and stole the weapon from her. Then she beat Bitch’s face with the whip before shredding the accessories on her clothing.
“Look at all this junk . . . You just love to dress up, don’t you? Do you really love accessories so much? The only people they attract are greedy money-grubbers. You’re such an idiot,” Lyno spat. That comment made me think of Therese for a moment, but she wasn’t a money-grubber, just a hardcore, high-quality accessory enthusiast. “Look in the mirror, Bitch! I’m messing up your precious face for you! Suffer, suffer, suffer!” Even as Lyno shouted, Bitch’s face started to swell. I could tell Lyno was holding back. Her entire attitude shouted that she wasn’t going to let Bitch die easily.
Bitch, however, looked like she had already passed out from the pain, or maybe a loss of blood. Her eyes were rolled back in her head and she was twitching.
“Huh? It’s too soon for you to die! Zweite Heal V!” Lyno still didn’t stop cracking her whip, however. Using her accessories to nullify the effect preventing the use of magic, she repeatedly healed Bitch and kept attacking her.
“With the delay on healing, it surely can’t keep up with the damage I’m doing—but so what! More pain, more pain for you!” Lyno added black fire to the whip and continued to beat on Bitch. It looked like she was using something like the Whip of Wrath. It had to have some effect to delay healing itself.
The level of violence, of hatred, on display . . . this was not just a falling out among allies. This Lyno woman clearly had hatred close—maybe even equal—to my own for Bitch. Bitch had given hell to so many people by now; there had to be some she had left alive who hated her for it. Lyno must have been a person marked forever by Bitch’s actions but whom Bitch herself had completely forgotten. And here she was, enacting retribution—and then I got it.
“You’re the spy!” I said. The report from our world had mentioned that someone with a desire for revenge on Bitch was working as a spy. No contact had been made with them since Bitch changed worlds, but the anger we were seeing here definitely suggested that we had found her.
“That’s right. That saves a lot of explanation!” she said. It seemed like Lyno really was the spy. Even as she nodded, she was still attacking Bitch—or more like grinding her heel into her face.
“We’ve got your back! You just carry on beating Bitch into a pulp!” I told her.
“I will! Shield Hero!” Lyno turned her attention back to Bitch. “Suffer! Suffer more!” As she cackled with laughter again, I threw up glass shields all around her, preparing for the enemy attack. Lyno needed to snuff Bitch out as quickly as possible!
“I’m sorry, what?” Raphtalia wasn’t keeping up with everything. This was our chance though. We’d never had Bitch on the ropes like this at all.
Then Lyno pointed at the harpoon vassal weapon holder and ofuda guy and said, “Don’t worry about their accessories being enhanced either. I switched them out.”
“What?!” the harpoon guy shouted.
“What did you say?!” the ofuda guy exclaimed, both of them shouting at the same time. Looking at the way they reacted, it sounded like she was telling the truth.
“Oh my, is that so?” Sadeena said and then quickly smashed her weapon into the harpoon guy’s accessory. It shattered into pieces at once, prompting the harpoon guy to give a mighty roar.
“Stop it! Stop fighting me! You are mine! I am the true hero!” he raged. The harpoon vassal weapon was having none of it. It seemed like the accessory really had been the old one.
“Master! No! How dare you resist my master with a mere vassal weapon!” the metal magic dragon shouted.
“I think you’re forgetting about me again! Take another one of these!” The Demon Dragon sucked in a big breath and then bathed the metal magic dragon in a second wave of rage fire.
“You stay out of this!” the metal magic dragon screamed back, filled with rage herself even as she lost ground. I clearly needed to get involved in this. The two biggest threats below were S’yne’s sister and the metal magic dragon, both of whom could turn the tide back if we let them.
“Kizuna!” I created some Boosted Mirror Fragments and pointed them at the metal magic dragon.
“Okay! Double Lure!” Kizuna’s lure struck the metal magic dragon in the same moment as my Boosted Mirror Fragments. I hoped the Demon Dragon didn’t waste the chance we were giving her.
“What are you doing?!” the ofuda guy shouted, cowed by Lyon’s rage and trying to keep his own wriggling weapon under control. “Hurry up and recover her!” The ship vassal weapon hovering above Bitch moved forward and fired something down at her like a beam from a UFO.
“I’m not letting you get away! You could have lived a little longer, Bitch, but now your allies have caused your premature death! Curse them as you go into the void, Bitch! Gigantic Star X!” Lyno turned the whip into a morning star and brought it crashing down. I guess any close-combat weapon with a string on it counted as a whip.
With a heavy impact and the horrible sound of flesh being packed violently down, blood splattered out from around the head of the weapon. Lyon laughed.
“I’ve done it! I’ve finally done it! I’ve been waiting for this day, for this moment, for so long!” she crowed. I felt like cheering too. Had we finally managed to kill Bitch? Mirth welled up inside me. We’d done it! The Bitch was dead!
There was a dumb grin all over my face, and I felt something hot in my eyes. That resolved my own anger and should help the fallen queen rest in peace.
Then I noticed that the beam of light from the ship was still going.
“We still have time! Protect her soul! We can still save her!” someone was shouting. She’s dead, but there’s still time? What does that mean? Then I recalled that S’yne’s sworn enemies had the ability to come back to life so long as their souls remained intact. It sounded like that blessing had been bestowed upon Bitch too!
“Hey! Can you see souls?” I shouted to Lyno, who shook her head with a wild, slightly panicked look on her face. “Dammit! Raphtalia! Anyone who can! Destroy Bitch’s soul and end her! Lyno, use cursed gear, whatever you have that’s evil, and just attack all around you! You might hit it!”
“Okay!” she replied. Raphtalia and the others also all snapped back to themselves and started attacking wherever Bitch’s soul might be.
“Ah!” Lyno had been standing on Bitch’s body to get a leg up. She suddenly tumbled to the ground. I looked down to see that Bitch’s body was gone. The ship had recovered it . . . along with her soul!
“You can’t get away!” Lyno knew where the body had gone and leapt into the air. Then she swung the whip at the ship above her. It avoided the attack and then opened up with wide-range cannon fire, targeting us all, but it especially focused on Lyno.
“Filo! Get down there! Once we’ve got Lyno, get up to the ship!” I shouted.
“Okay!” Filo replied. She dropped down at high speed, and I deployed mirrors in front of us to protect Lyno and the others. The incoming volley of fire washed over me. It was powerful, but nothing I couldn’t handle.
“Shield Hero! Thank you!” Lyno said.
“No need for that! We have to stop her from getting away!” I shouted.
“Okay! Let’s bind her soul and make her suffer even more,” Lyno suggested.
“I like the way you think!” We both started to laugh. It looked like we were going to get along just fine. Maybe we should put together a support group for people Bitch had worked over.
“Someone is quickly becoming friendly with Mr. Naofumi! That feels dangerous to me!” I understood where Raphtalia was coming from. She was worried that, rather than overcoming my anger, I would let it consume me.
Still, it really felt like I was going to get along with Lyno. That might also be because of both the rage and compassion inside me.
“The operation has failed! Retreat, retreat at once!” the ofuda guy was shouting.
“Hey! You shut your mouth! If we run away now, what happens to Kuflika? I’m about to lose my weapon too! Help me!” the harpoon guy said.
“What are you talking about?” the ofuda guy replied. “It doesn’t matter what happens to you or your little followers. Do not get your priorities confused, understand? You need to protect your weapon for yourself!”
“What?!” the harpoon guy shouted back.
“Now! We must run—stop that!” The ofuda guy tried to escape but was unable to keep the ofuda holy weapon under control.
“You can’t escape! Let me show you something else that ofuda can do that’s fun!” Shildina and Glass threw four ofuda at the ofuda guy, who was still struggling with the ofuda holy weapon. I saw some kind of black image on them.
“We’ve named this attack Moon Cards!” Shildina shouted. The four ofuda started to grow larger in front of the eyes of the ofuda guy, showing images of what looked like the home of Glass’s style. Then lights like floating souls appeared around the ofuda guy and all exploded apart. He screamed as he was caught up in the explosion. But the ofuda bound his hands and held him in place so that he couldn’t get blown clear. He was little more than a sandbag now.
“What’s going on there?” Kizuna asked.
“I linked together some of the ofuda made from the Demon Dragon’s blood and turned them into game cards,” Shildina explained. It seemed like a cunning way to create magic. Even if you understood the basics of how magic was created, reaching such a high level could still produce some confusing stuff.
“Well, whatever! Here I go! Yaah!” Kizuna turned the hunting tool into a bow and shot through the accessory on the ofuda, which seemed to be begging for Kizuna to shoot it.
“No, no! Not that, no!” the ofuda guy screamed. That was all it took, however, for a soft light to flare up. Then the ofuda holy weapon left his hands, turned into light, and moved over to us.
“Hey! It looks like the corrupted holy weapon has been released with one shot from Kizuna!” I said. Then light started to swirl around Shildina. Could that be . . . the light that Itsuki said he saw around Shildina when Ethnobalt transported us to this world?
Shildina gasped as her combination with Glass abruptly ended, leaving the two of them looking perplexed. Then Shildina suddenly disappeared completely . . . and reappeared in the spot where the ofuda holy weapon was, now a ball of light itself. In her hand there was a simple object, much like the shield had been for me when I was summoned: just a box for holding ofuda.
“What is this?” Shildina asked.
“Oh my!” said Sadeena. Things were really getting crazy now as a shout rang out from the harpoon guy and the harpoon vassal weapon flew into Sadeena’s hand. It looked like it had finally had enough too.
They had been possessing the harpoon by illegitimate means, after all. The weapon seemed to have learned all it needed about the one holding it. But those who had lost the weapons were still going to cry for them back. Both the holy weapons and the vassal weapons had intent of their own from the spirits living inside them. Getting those spirits to accept you as the owner was no easy feat. Considering the current situation, it was perhaps unsurprising that the weapon would seek a new owner. In terms of skill with a harpoon, Sadeena was clearly superior. Sadeena spun the glittering harpoon vassal weapon around and struck a pose, but it felt a little anticlimactic following Shildina getting there first.
“I think Shildina stole my thunder a little there,” Sadeena said.
“Don’t worry about it. In your case, the vassal weapon definitely came to you, but with Shildina . . . it looked more like the ofuda summoned her,” I commented. The holy weapon had pretty clearly selected Shildina and called her over to it. Rather than going into her hand, it had called her to it.
In any case, this meant that we had suddenly obtained two weapons from our enemies—no, three, including the whip taken from Bitch. Shildina took the ofuda out from the box, still looking puzzled about everything that was going on.
“I received that from the greatest authority in existence! It is not something for unworthy hands. It’s not for filthy hands like yours to touch! Give it back!” the ofuda guy shouted, trembling with rage. Then he snatched out a sword from . . . somewhere . . . and leapt at Shildina.
Shildina sidestepped the (former) ofuda guy, avoiding his sword by a hair’s breadth and then sticking an ofuda on him.
“Formation One: Gale Tag?” she said, the name coming out almost as a question. The response was immediate, however, and the ofuda guy was sent flying away by an incredible impact.
“The holy weapons never actually belonged to you anyway! Stop taking possession of things that aren’t yours!” Kizuna shouted, finding just the moment to put the boot in.
“No one is as full of himself as a guilty man,” I said, bringing a touch of sage wisdom to the proceedings—so I thought, anyway.
“Our technical department screwed up again. They said the holy weapons were so corrupted there was no way we could lose them. How are they going to explain this?” S’yne’s sister said pitifully, still swinging her chain at S’yne. Looking at Shildina, now in possession of the ofuda holy weapon, I recalled the words from the shining tablet in the treasure trove. “—born from—and given life to replace one with duties to perform; who can recreate any technique. You who have run from that role, swimming beyond the worlds in pursuit of freedom. The ofuda holy weapon will surely come to you.” While the very start had been illegible, the part about “given life to replace one with duties to perform; who can recreate any technique” was now ringing some bells—Shildina had been born to basically replace Sadeena, after all. “Who can recreate any technique” referred to her oracle powers letting her recreate others’ techniques. “You who have run from that role, swimming beyond the worlds in pursuit of freedom” referred to her leaving her role as miko priestess to the water dragon and coming to my village in Melromarc.
“Shildina, if you had left Q’ten Lo before the waves started, I think you would have been summoned to this world then,” I said.
“Huh? What do you mean?” she asked. It reminded me of something Atla and Ost had told me in the shield world. It seemed there was a list of possible candidates for holy weapon heroes.
“So they don’t only draw from modern Japan,” I commented.
“Yes, good point,” Kizuna replied. “But from my perspective, the worlds that you and Itsuki came from are different from the Japan that I know,” Kizuna said. I mean, it was simply “being summoned to another world.” That meant residents of the world to which I had been summoned could themselves be summoned to a world separate from that one.
“Do you think the reason Shildina got dragged along with us, even though she was intending to stay behind, is because of all this?” Sadeena said.
“She got caught up in it because she was a candidate for the Ofuda Hero. Once she started using her powers close to the ofuda holy weapon, it awoke. That sounds likely,” I said. Like a special exception to the rule that no more heroes could be summoned until all four current ones had died.
“Oh dear,” Shildina said. There was a perplexed look on her face as she checked over the ofuda in her hands. It was true; Shildina might be suited to be the Ofuda Hero. Just like Kizuna and her fishing suited her to her own role. In any case, these angry idiots had now lost the option to run away.
“We’ve got the momentum now! Time to finish this! Hurry and capture Bitch’s soul!” I shouted.
“Isn’t there a better way to phrase that?” Raphtalia complained. It didn’t matter—we just needed to pile on!
“You scum! How dare you steal my harpoon! That belongs to me! You’ve taken everything from me now! I’ll never forgive you!” the (former) harpoon guy raged. This guy was getting on my last nerve. Takt and Miyaji had said the same kind of things. These guys were all the same. Inexperience, that was the problem.
The former harpoon guy turned to look at the metal magic dragon for aid—
“Gyah—” she barely managed.
“What’s this? You expect something from this pathetic copy? It’s too late to find any aid from her,” the Demon Dragon said—because she had already crushed the metal magic dragon’s head in her jaws. The continued attacks by rage fire, the lingering debuffs even though they had been nominally nullified, and the double-damage dealing skills Kizuna and I had unleashed all combined to allow the Demon Dragon to crush her head completely, metal and all. The metal magic dragon’s body was jerking and twitching.
“I just thought I’d give it a try and see if it worked. I was surprised by how soft it was!” the Demon Dragon said, as twisted as ever. As blood spilled from the metal magic dragon, a black chunk from her chest was ejected away and flew toward the ship vassal weapon.
“I don’t think so!” the Demon Dragon said as she reached out with her claws to grab the black mass—the corrupted holy weapon—and cling onto it. But even though she tried to use magic, it continued to move away from her.
“This can’t be . . . You’ve taken Kuflika from me and now my Demon Dragon too!” the former harpoon guy screamed.
“I could never belong to worthless scum like you!” the Demon Dragon spat vehemently. “My heart belongs to the Shield Hero!” I just decided to ignore that last part. Instead, I took a closer look at the face of the former harpoon guy. He had pretty good features. He was also glaring at me with the exact same look that Takt, Kyo, and Miyaji had given me when all their silly stuff came crumbling down, and that made me feel good. I could get hooked on people looking at me like that.
“Why do you look so happy, Naofumi?” Kizuna asked.
“You can’t tell?” I replied.
“I don’t think I want to know,” she concluded. She didn’t seem to understand what I was feeling.
“That’s the right idea,” Raphtalia told her.
“You certainly don’t want to know,” Glass agreed. Business as usual with all the banter then.
“Huh? Is it something nasty? Master was smiling because we’re about to win, right?” Filo asked in puzzlement. Filo had been behaving herself recently, but this naive comment hit me right in the feels.
It was wrong. I should accept that . . . and yet I just couldn’t stop. I loved to taunt losers like this poor fool here. When I gave it some rational thought . . . I was pretty far gone.
“Enough joking around! Bitch will get away!” Lyno shouted. I looked up at the ship vassal weapon.
“Raphtalia, Filo! Let’s see this through to the end! Ignore the rest of these weaklings!” I commanded. They both shouted their agreement. Filo sounded more cheerful she had in a while.
That gave me an idea. The ship was a vassal weapon, meaning Kizuna—and now Shildina—could use their holy weapons to strip the user of their authority to use it or at least maybe slow it down. It looked like the ship was about to make a run for it, but there were still a lot of their allies down on the ground. It was going to take a while for them to retreat. We could use that time to capture Bitch’s soul.
Putting that plan in place in my head, I was just about to move into action when . . . the ship vassal weapon blasted away quite literally at light speed.
“Hey! It ran away!” Kizuna was perplexed—and rightly so. It had left a lot of people behind. For Kizuna, fleeing while leaving allies behind was simply not an option.
“Damn! It left all their friends behind!” I couldn’t believe it would leave quite so many to an unknown fate facing us. The former harpoon guy was one thing, but I certainly hadn’t expected it to leave S’yne’s sister and the ofuda guy behind as well.
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