The Asterisk War, Vol. 6: The Triumphal Homecoming Battle

by Yuu Miyazaki

  “Yes!”

  The Hydra let loose additional bursts of light toward the ground directly in front of him, but Ayato had already taken that into account, rebounding off a nearby wall in midair when—

  “Huh?”

  Something completely beyond his expectations occurred.

  The gaping hole at the creature’s neck where he had chopped off the first of its heads began to seethe, swelling and burbling as it started to retake its prior shape.

  “It’s this accurate?”

  If his memory served him right, the Hydra from Greek mythology could, from all but its main neck, regrow two heads where one had been dismembered. And it was no simple regeneration—rather, the monster grew stronger the more damage it sustained—but according to the myths, at least, the regrowth could be stopped by burning the wound. In that case, the Ser Veresta should have been enough to stop it, but—

  “I guess I don’t have a choice…”

  Now that it had come to this, he would have to change his tactics.

  “If I go for the central head, the others will just try to protect it. I’ll have to take care of them first.”

  Fortunately, the regeneration didn’t seem to be instantaneous, so he would have time to make another attack.

  He returned to the rooftop, estimating his distance from the monster and preparing his footing to launch another strike with the Ser Veresta. If his timing was off even by a fraction of a second, he could end up getting blown away by one of its beams of light, or even swallowed whole by one of those vicious heads.

  “Okay…,” he said to himself, channeling prana through every corner of his body, and shuffling across the rooftop to close the distance.

  At that moment, his senses, magnified through the state of shiki, detected something moving at the edge of the area where he was about to attack. He spun around to see a young woman hiding behind a pile of debris. She was probably paralyzed with terror, unable to bring herself to move.

  And to make matters worse, the pile of wreckage she was hiding behind looked like it might collapse at any moment.

  This is bad!

  As if by reflex, he leaped down, kicking away the debris to protect her.

  The woman stared at him wide-eyed in surprise, but he didn’t have time to say anything. He could already feel the Hydra’s murderous gaze being directed at him.

  He tried to move out of the way to draw the monster’s attention away from the woman, but one of its heads, one step ahead, began to lash out at him from the corner of his vision.

  “Tch…!”

  He began to retake his fighting stance with the Ser Veresta, but he knew he would be too late.

  The huge jaw opened wide, its sword-like fangs directed straight at him, its bloodred tongue flittering ravenously, when—

  “Grrraaagiiiiiiiiiiii!”

  —there was a terrible shriek, and the head fell to the ground, writhing around in circles.

  At that moment, his mobile began to ring.

  He opened an air-window at once, and Saya’s impassive face, covered by a heads-up display for her weapon’s aiming device, popped up before him.

  “…Looks like I was just in time.”

  “Saya! You saved me!”

  “My preparations are complete. Is that snake-like thing the target?”

  “Yeah, we’ve got another monster to get rid of. Can you cover me?”

  Saya was on the far shore of the lake, near the Royal Palace. She had just hit it with a long-range sniping shot. She was easily more than three kilometers away, but that was Saya, all right. There was no denying her skill.

  “Understood. I want to be sure of the situation, so keep the air-window open.”

  “Got it.” He nodded.

  He pointed the woman toward safety. He probably should have accompanied her, but he didn’t have time.

  “Saya, I don’t think we can stop this thing unless we cut off the main head. So can you—?”

  “I’ll take care of the others.”

  “Right. They’ll regenerate before long, though, so keep an eye on it.”

  “Understood. Is there anything else?”

  “That’s all, I think.”

  “Okay. In that case… Now.”

  At Saya’s signal, Ayato leaped toward the hydra.

  The nine heads swung to meet his attack, preparing to launch beams of light in his direction.

  But just before the first head could release a counterattack, it exploded right in front of him.

  The nine heads were perfectly coordinated, without leaving so much as an inch of an opening—but on the other hand, once one was taken out, it left a gaping hole in the creature’s defenses. Saya’s attack might not have been enough to completely incapacitate that head, but it was enough to give him just such a window.

  He twisted around the bursts of light that the remaining heads continued to launch at him, bringing the Ser Veresta down as hard as he could, slicing through first one head, then the next.

  “That makes two!”

  He jumped from rooftop to rooftop, preparing to launch another, more reckless attack. He couldn’t afford to give it time to regenerate. It would leave him open to attack, but—

  “…Behind you, diagonally, to your right.”

  “Got it!”

  Saya was covering those openings perfectly.

  Without him saying anything, and with perfect timing, she took care of the head that he was lining up to attack. Even if he did try to tell her, she would no doubt already know, intuitively, which head he was planning to aim for next.

  “That’s four!” he cried out as he sheared off another two.

  There was a soft chuckle from the other side of the air-window. “It’s been a while since I’ve been able to back you up,” Saya said.

  “Ha-ha. It has, hasn’t it?” Ayato laughed as he continued to dodge the monster’s unending attacks.

  He had fought alongside Julis all throughout the Phoenix, and he’d had to fight alongside Kirin, too, on occasion, but he must have still been a child the last time he and Saya had fought together.

  “Amazing, Ayato. You move as if you’re reading my mind.”

  “That goes for you, too!” he answered, launching another slice with the Ser Veresta. “Six down!” Only three more to go.

  However, the first two heads were almost completely regenerated. He would have to hurry.

  “Saya, let’s finish it now!”

  “…Understood.”

  He tried to calm his breathing, pouring his prana into the Ser Veresta.

  The black pattern that wrapped around the sword began to swell, the blade of pure, searing white growing longer than Ayato’s height.

  It was Meteor Arts.

  The Orga Lux wasn’t particularly flexible in this state, nor fast for that matter, but with only three heads left he should be able to handle it, he thought.

  He leaped through the air, mowing down two of the three remaining heads with a downward stroke of the Ser Veresta.

  The central head had managed to dodge the attack, but he had prepared for that possibility.

  As it prepared to attack the defenseless Ayato, a ball of light building up in its gaping maw, Saya landed another long-distance strike.

  Now I just need to line up my attack, and then—

  But before he could finish his thought, a chill ran down his back.

  The first head that Saya had blasted away had already regenerated, its huge jaw opening directly above him.

  “Wha—?!”

  He should have still had a little time, given its rate of regrowth.

  Only then did he realize it.

  The other heads had stopped regenerating.

  So it put all its energy into just the one?!

  He wouldn’t be able to avoid it now.

  “If that’s how it is…!” he cried out, tightening his grip on the Ser Veresta and leaving himself open in an all-or-nothing attack. At best, he would only be able to deliver the blow
while receiving one himself, but there was no going back now.

  “Haaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!”

  “Grrraaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrr!”

  He swung the Ser Veresta in a wide arc, cutting through both its blast of light directed at him and the creature’s regenerated head—but probably because he hadn’t lined himself up properly, his attack swung wide of the central head.

  By meeting that burst of light head-on with the Ser Veresta, he had succeeded in reducing its power somewhat, but it was still strong enough to throw him across the street, sending him crashing against a partially collapsed building.

  “Agh…!” He gasped in pain as his bones creaked from the impact, but he could still move.

  “Ayato!” Saya cried out.

  “D-don’t worry about me…!” he answered, raising his hand. “We have to take care of it before it regenerates!” He adjusted his grip on the Ser Veresta, when—

  “No! You’ve done enough, you two. I’ll take it from here!” Julis’s voice boomed down from above.

  Ayato looked up to see her floating in the air, her fiery wings beating fiercely, both arms raised high.

  “Blossom—Rafflesia Duo Flos!”

  With that, a huge multi-layered magic square appeared below the Hydra’s feet, erupting in a massive explosion that enveloped it whole.

  “!”

  The Hydra, consumed by those fulminating flames, let out an ear-splitting shriek of agony, before falling silent, its throat burned to a cinder. It continued to writhe and thrash around for a few seconds, before falling to the ground, motionless.

  The explosion had dug out a huge crater in the middle of the street, the snow piled up around it melting from the roiling heat. The change in temperature made it feel like they had passed from midwinter to midsummer in just a few seconds.

  “Wow…,” Ayato murmured in astonishment.

  Judging from the attack’s name, it had to be a much stronger version of Julis’s Rafflesia attack—and unbelievably powerful.

  “Just so you know, this is a new technique. It’s probably too powerful to ever use in a tournament, though.”

  “…It looks like it.”

  If she ever used it in one of the tournament stages, they would probably end up getting caught in the explosion themselves.

  “…Hold on,” Saya interrupted. “It isn’t over.”

  “What?!” Julis gasped.

  Ayato strained his eyes, and noticed some white mass convulsing amid the subsiding flames.

  It was the Hydra’s skeleton.

  “What?! Don’t tell me that thing can regenerate from nothing but its bones!” Julis whispered, turning pale in alarm.

  “…Ayato.”

  “Right, I’ll handle it,” he answered, breaking into a run. He set the Ser Veresta up to make the final blow, and leaped into the crater.

  As the skull of the creature’s central head came into view, he felt a pang of pity for its undying suffering, and wordlessly swung the Ser Veresta in what was partly an act of mercy.

  The blade glistened in the starlight, cleanly removing the final head without so much as a sound.

  “…It’s over,” he murmured, his eyes closed, as the Hydra’s bones melted away into the wind.

  “Good grief. This is turning into a bigger hassle than I thought.” Gustave sighed from the vantage point where he had been watching the battle.

  He put his retractable telescope into his pocket and smoothed down his mustache.

  He had expected the Hydra to make short work of them, but in his line of work, things didn’t always go according to plan.

  “I guess I’ll have to look for another opportunity…,” he muttered, but before he could leave, he noticed someone standing behind him in the shadows. “Now this is a surprise,” he called out. “How did you find me?”

  “You’re not the kind of person to get involved in a fight directly. But you have to confirm the outcome, after all, due to the nature of your work. So even if you don’t take part in a battle yourself, you wouldn’t be far away from it. That’s what Julis thought.” Kirin Toudou stepped out of the shadows, the moonlight illuminating her face. “There aren’t a lot of places around here where someone might get a full view of the town. All I had to do was check them out.”

  “Process of elimination? I see, I see.” Gustave nodded, beginning to channel his prana.

  Kirin, noticing that, put her hand on her katana. “There’s no need to keep fighting. Surrender. To be perfectly honest, you’ve already exhausted yourself. You don’t have any hope of defeating me.”

  “Hmm… You’re right about that.”

  Summoning the Hydra had used up most of his prana, and he had already exhausted more than he should have when summoning the Colchian dragons to use as decoys. He didn’t have much left.

  “Be that as it may, I still have a few tricks up my sleeve. Do you know what these are?” he asked as he pulled a small sachet out of his pocket, poured the contents into his cupped hand, and threw them onto the ground in front of him.

  “…Fangs from some kind of animal…?” Kirin answered uncertainly. It was hard to see them properly against the white snow.

  “Exactly. Dragon’s teeth, to be precise.”

  “Dragon’s teeth?”

  “Indeed. You’ve heard the story about Jason’s quest for the Golden Fleece, I assume? How he planted those dragon’s teeth, from which a band of ferocious warriors, the Spartoi, emerged?”

  “—!” Kirin looked back at him.

  Gustave broke out into a grin as magic squares spread open, one after another, on the ground where he had thrown the teeth, and then six skeletal soldiers, armed with swords and shields, began to emerge.

  “I might have had to use prana to make the teeth, but they can be stored indefinitely, and used later without expending any prana at all, you see. They might not be particularly strong given the limitations, but if I understand correctly…” He had been backing away from her little by little, when he paused for a second, meeting her gaze. “The Toudou style focuses on one-to-one combat. Even if my friends here can’t stop you, they should at least buy me enough time to escape.”

  Blue flames flickered in the Spartoi skulls’ eye sockets as the warriors slowly encircled her, their bones making a dry, rasping sound.

  Kirin let out a slow, deep sigh, shaking her head. “You’re right—the Toudou style doesn’t have as many techniques for group combat as, say, the Amagiri Shinmei style. Certainly not the kind suitable for actual combat,” she said, unsheathing her Japanese sword. “For me personally, though, it’s a different matter.”

  “What…?” Gustave frowned.

  “In my daily training, especially since I met Ayato, I’ve come to understand the necessity of diversity in one’s fighting techniques,” she said, gripping the sword in her right hand, and the scabbard in her left, adopting a fighting position.

  “A dual-sword style…?” Gustave whispered in disbelief, taking a step back. There was an aura around the girl, not even half his age, that he had never seen before, and a shiver of uncertainty ran down his back. “N-now!” he stammered, ordering the skeletal soldiers to attack.

  The Spartoi spread out to surround her—

  And shattered where they stood, falling to the ground.

  “I-impossible…!”

  She had moved so fast that he had hardly seen it, but she had spun around to face the two Spartoi about to lunge at her from behind, her sword extended at an angle to deflect their attacks. She held its sheath in her other hand, smashing through the creatures to her sides as she swung around, before delivering the finishing blow to the pair that had first tried to sneak up on her.

  Gustave, petrified with shock, quickly came to his senses and started running toward the forest.

  But Kirin was faster, leaping ahead of him and driving her sword down without mercy.

  He let out a dull cry, his eyes rolling back in his head as he crumpled into the snow.

  “Don’t worry,” Kir
in murmured as she sheathed her sword. “I hit you with the blunt side.”

  CHAPTER 7

  REUNION

  Ayato, Julis, and Saya joined up with Kirin before handing Gustave over to the police.

  He was quickly dosed with a drug to restrain his prana. As long as he couldn’t concentrate his prana, he wouldn’t be able to use his abilities to try to escape. However, its effects weren’t long-lasting, so he would have to be sent to a facility designed for detaining Genestella long-term, somewhere equipped with an isolation space that negated the effects of mana.

  By the time the students had fully explained the situation and arrived back at the Royal Palace, dawn was beginning to break.

  They found Jolbert sitting on the grand staircase, chin in hand, appearing troubled. Maria, leaning against him, was breathing peacefully, sound asleep.

  They seemed to have been waiting there all night.

  “Well now, it looks like you’ve been busy. I’m just glad to see you’re all safe and sound.”

  “…Mm?” Maria snapped awake at the sound of her husband’s voice, and rubbed her sleepy eyes.

  Jolbert glanced at her with a gentle expression before turning back to the students with a shrug. “But you know…this will only end up making you even more popular.”

  “Is that a bad thing?” Julis asked, stepping forward grimly.

  “Well, I’ll end up losing my position at this rate, won’t I?”

  “I see…” Julis let out a deep sigh, before looking her brother in the eyes. “In that case, brother, let me ask you something.”

  “Hmm? What?”

  “Won’t you help me?”

  At this question, Jolbert’s eyes opened wide. It was quite rare for the king, who was normally remarkably noncommittal, to exhibit such unfeigned surprise. “Julis… What are you saying?” he asked nervously.

  But her gaze was unwavering. “Everything that’s happened lately has just made me even more sure of it. Things can’t keep going the way they are. I might have been able to save the orphanage, but that was just treating one of the symptoms of the problem. To change this country, we’re going to have to address the root cause.”

  “That sounds good in theory, but what exactly do you mean?”