by Fujino Omori
“Then…then this key is…?!”
“It’s just a replica. Didn’t you know?”
Anakity disinterestedly pointed out the silver orb in the leader’s hands. It was the replica Finn had shown everyone in the meeting. The man’s eyes bulged past their limits.
If this was what Thanatos was calling a detachment, Anakity’s unit was one, too.
Finn had set out to drag his prey to shore—hook, line, and sinker.
“No way…nowaynowaynoway! Was the monster a lure, too?! Has Loki Familia been working with the monsters?!”
As two people pushed the leader against the ground, his widened eyes quivered, staring at the monster, which had been acting scared the whole time.
The monster spoke. “S-stroke of midnight’s bell.”
In the next instant, the goblin’s body was covered in a film of gray light, and when the light dispersed, a prum girl was left sitting in its place.
“Wh—?!”
“To tell you the truth, we intended to catch the actual monsters and uncover you with that, but…we cut that for time.”
They’d used transformation magic.
The man opened and closed his mouth in total silence as he realized that she’d just been an empty reflection of a monster.
As Anakity continued disinterestedly, she turned her eyes from him to her.
“Thanks for your help. That magic is so convenient.”
“Y-y—…you…”
When Anakity turned around, the prum girl—Hestia Familia’s Lilliluka Erde—was at the peak of her confusion. She’d been discovered and captured a little while ago. Lilliluka had assumed she’d be killed, but Anakity had a demand of her: “Help us.” She’d been brought to this underground path without consent, forced to transform into an armed monster, and run around in circles holding the replica key.
After seeing through her disguise, Anakity, or rather Finn, had changed plans. They had used her power instead of the monsters to draw out the Evils’ detached forces.
“What are you doing?! Aren’t you trying to wipe out all the monsters aboveground…?!”
“Ah, it’s fine. Don’t worry—this is an entirely different thing from your little incident.”
Though she was unable to collect her thoughts, Lilliluka Erde was able to subconsciously guess what was going on from Anakity’s answer.
Maybe. Probably. Surely. Undoubtedly. Loki Familia had—No, Finn Deimne had put the familia at the center of two different conflicts, handling it perfectly fine despite the extreme chaos of the battle in the Labyrinth District.
Huh? That makes no sense.
But even then, it was another story to process it completely.
To think there were several different forces facing off against one another in a huge incident embroiling the city.
She couldn’t keep herself from asking what the hell was going on.
“I think it’s a bit mean to pull in someone unrelated…but,” Anakity started.
Lilly was taken aback. Anakity walked up to her, looking straight down at the prum.
“You see, I’m pretty angry,” Anakity admitted, raising her perfectly shaped eyebrows and bending at the waist so their faces were almost touching.
“You tricked Raul with the worst possible method, of all ways.”
“Huh?!”
“To Raul, Finn Deimne is a symbol, someone who would never betray him. Even if it was a fake Finn, that fool would never fail to obey him…And you pretended to be that Captain and deceived Raul. So yeah, I’m really angry.”
Because Anakity and Finn had been together with him since they entered the familia, she knew him best, and her fury was more serious than anyone else’s.
The thin cat tail that extended from her small backside swayed slowly.
As if boring into Lilliluka, she pressed her pointer finger into the chest of the pale prum locked in place.
“So—this just makes us even.”
And then she smiled sweetly.
Lilly was filled with an unimaginable terror as the black catgirl adventurer put on a broad smile.
“Sorry for using you. You can go now. Even if you’re our enemy for the moment, we didn’t want to get you wrapped up in our problems.”
Anakity Autumn. Her second name was Alsha. A second-tier adventurer.
She was without doubt one of the best among all the Level 4s in the city.
There was a cold fire inside her beautiful figure that first caught Loki’s eye. She was a catgirl gifted with beauty and intelligence, a noble feline recognized by the gods.
“E-eep?!” Lilliluka yelped when Anakity spoke with that smile.
This isn’t funny. I could do without getting involved with her, she thought, rising to her feet and about to scurry away.
“Ah…that’s right. This is from the captain.” Anakity passed along a message to Lilliluka just as she was leaving.
“‘I’m letting you go once out of respect for your bravery. But there won’t be a second time.’ That’s all.”
The prum girl froze in place. This time, she was aghast.
She thought she’d outwitted Loki Familia, outwitted Finn Deimne.
But she was wrong.
She’d been dancing to Braver’s beat.
“Bye now. I won’t let you go next time, either.”
“Uuuuuuuugh?!”
Lilliluka Erde dashed away as fast as she could, not even bothering to soothe her wounded pride.
It might have been demonstrating a loser’s natural disposition, but she wanted to get away from “those crazy people.” She whizzed past, escaping without looking back.
“Is it okay not to find out what all she knows, Miss Aki?”
“We know better than anyone how dangerous a prum’s determination can be. Interrogation or torture would just be a waste of time. This is fine.”
Plus, one of the reasons why Finn had said to let her go was because they were hurting for time. And more than anything, Anakity didn’t have the leeway to be bothering with the prum girl.
“All right, then…We’ve kept you waiting.” Her voice was cold as she looked down at the man pressed against the floor.
“You have a key, right? If you guys didn’t have a means of getting back into Knossos, then you’re not much use moving on your own.”
“Gh?!”
“Trying to steal the key off the monsters was leaving too much to chance. Did you hide it before coming here? Then, I’ll just have to force it out of you.”
The blade of the sword glistened.
The leader twitched, the corners of his eyes flaring as he tried to break free from the people holding him down with all his might.
“My life belongs to Thanatos—!” He managed to get one hand free and reached toward his chest.
“I‘m not going to let you blow yourself up.”
Anakity’s hand flashed, her sword piercing through his hand and pinning it to the ground.
“Guuu—Gyaaaaaaaaaaaaaa?!”
He had an Inferno Stone hidden beneath his equipment. She’d stopped him from igniting the self-destructive device.
With his hand pinned down like an insect specimen, he was overcome by intense pain, trying desperately to remove the bloody sword staking him to the ground, but he couldn’t remove it one inch.
The silver blade remained lodged deep in the ground, refusing to loosen its grip, no matter how many times he tried to yank his hand free. It was as if the sword itself contained her fury.
“Please don’t waste my time. I’m not used to this sort of thing,” she warned with cruel eyes, smiling, but a silent, blazing anger smoldered in her eyes as she remembered Leene and the other comrades who’d been ripped away from her.
“But please don’t take that the wrong way. Cats can be…cruel, or so I’ve heard.”
After that, everything was a blur to the man. He thought he was enduring it, motivated by his sense of purpose, but once the real torture started, the screams came pouring out.
/> After screaming for a while, he gave them everything they wanted before being unceremoniously knocked out.
“Violas are coming!”
“Loose your arrows! Alicia’s group, begin chanting!”
The elves’ song resounded in the underground passage, the southeast of Daedalus Street.
Monsters were streaming out of Knossos with increased fervor, and there were no signs of the flow slowing down.
The elves fought primarily with magic as beads of sweat trickled down their faces. There were untold magic potion test tubes lying broken on the ground at their feet. Farther ahead, there were dunes of ash dotted with vibrantly colored magic stones.
Riveria’s instructions were allowing them to maintain the battle lines several hours after the battle had begun.
Fatigue was visible on the faces of the elves as they fought in a circular formation.
Despite the war of attrition that Thanatos had laughingly foisted on them, the elves hadn’t chosen to withdraw. It was almost as if they were waiting for something.
“Lady Riveria!”
“!”
Alicia’s jubilant shout reached Riveria’s long, slender ears.
When she turned back, Riveria saw Anakity emerge from the depths of the passage, along with some other members of the familia. As she let the elves under her command deal with the monsters, Riveria rushed over.
“Is it finished?”
“Yes, we got it.”
It was a short exchange. But that was more than enough.
Anakity took out a magic item in the shape of an orb. The letter D was engraved in it. It was unmistakably a Daedalus Orb—the key that Loki Familia had been chasing ever since their flight out of Knossos, the key to recovering from their hopeless situation, the key to Knossos that Anakity had acquired after interrogating the leader of Thanatos’s detached force.
It was only one key. But it was a concrete reward.
Behind Anakity, the faces of the other familia members were flushed. They couldn’t contain their excitement.
“Well done. Leave the rest to us.”
“Okay. I believe in you.”
Riveria’s lips curled up as she felt the heft of the Daedalus Orb in her hand. Anakity smiled back one more time.
Riveria’s face quickly tensed again, and she enthusiastically turned back to the elves.
“—Let’s go. We’re done defending against the monsters!”
““Yes, ma’am!””
The elves responded in perfect unison to Riveria’s call. With her eyebrow raised, the high elf spoke with a voice steeped in all her pent-up frustration and anger. As the passage filled with a swirl of battle lust that contradicted her image as a fairy, Riveria singled out one elf hidden away in the middle of the squad.
“Lefiya, are you ready?”
“Yes!…Ready!”
In the midst of the furious battle, there was a single mage who’d been held in reserve, not casting a single spell. She’d been kneeling, holding on to her staff, meditating to increase her magical limit and honing it. As she stood, she opened her eyes.
“Unleashed pillar of light, limbs of the holy tree. You are the master archer!”
Her bright-yellow hair whirled up as she created a magic circle of the same color. Her magic power rose in an instant. This girl with her insurmountable magic power was the elves’ special lance, a battering ram to blow away impregnable defenses.
“Loose your arrows, fairy archers. Pierce, arrow of accuracy!”
The high elf pointed her staff forward as the other elves crouched.
Lefiya glared at the horde of approaching monsters as she spun her chant.
“Arcs Ray!”
The giant ray of light filled the entire corridor, annihilating all the monsters.
And Riveria quietly, sharply thrust her long staff forward.
When the raging roar of the ray quieted, when it had cleared away all the things blocking the path before them, the elves—no, all of Loki Familia—raised the signal to begin the counterattack.
“Charge!!”
The squad composed of eleven elves charged toward Knossos—straight forward in a single line, like a ballista bolt pulled back to its limit being released. The orichalcum door, which had been closed to stop the emission of monsters, opened with the key in Riveria’s right hand.
“Huh?”
Thunk! The door flung open with a crash.
The Evils stationed on the other side cried out in confusion. While the enemy was standing dazed before her, Riveria leaped out to the lead and swung her staff resolutely.
“Gyaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa?!”
The enemy forces were blasted away like leaves from a tree.
The elves didn’t look back as they crossed into the dimly lit labyrinth, advancing without pause.
“E-e-enemy attack!!!” The Evils’ Remnants panicked, sounding their alarm bells.
Arrows flew, swords slashed, magic was unleashed. The fairies ferociously kicked aside all who stood in their way—people and monsters alike. Pushing onward, they changed formation. Riveria now stood at the center of the squad.
She let out a savage order unbefitting a high elf.
“Devour them all!”
“Huh?”
Thanatos was dumbfounded.
“I said it’s an enemy attack!! The members of Loki Familia that have been holding in the passage just charged in!”
Time stopped when he heard the report from his follower who’d rushed into the hall. Snapping back around, he looked at the pedestal in the center of the room, at the watery film displaying images from all around the labyrinth.
Riveria’s elves had entered through the southeast door, advancing into the labyrinth at tremendous speed, destroying the remnants of the Evils and monsters in their path.
“…Gh!!”
Barca had been using the giant crimson orb to operate the doors, and he opened his eyes wide in surprise. Even when he lowered a door to block the elves’ path, Riveria’s key unlocked it immediately, and when he unleashed the monsters from their vaults, the violas and vargs were frozen solid and reduced to ashes.
The fairies were an unstoppable force. Nothing could slow them down.
“They attacked? They attack—? They attacked?” Thanatos felt sick from the shock upon seeing it with his own eyes.
“You’re kidding, right? Why? Isn’t that impossible?”
No one could have predicted that Loki Familia would attack from a position caught between conflicting forces. At the very least, Thanatos the god hadn’t been able to.
They stole a key. It was unfortunate. The worst possible result, actually. But it was fine up to there. He could understand that much.
But instead of holding on to that precious key and taking it back or even using it as a lure or a trap, they were using it to attack.
How did they catch us off guard? It was our arrogant assumption that they wouldn’t attack, even in the worst case. It’s our carelessness for looking down on Loki Familia—
Finn Deimne was someone who could win against all-knowing gods.
It was his experience from leading so many armies. Knowledge and experience were very different things. Thanatos in particular had been a workaholic in heaven, spending all his time purifying souls. He had no knowledge of the subtleties of the battlefield. None but the most battle-hardened warriors who’d crossed countless battlefields could sense the way the wind was going to blow on a battlefield. It would have been impossible for Thanatos to figure out Finn’s seemingly reckless plan.
“D-does he see any chance of winning? Anything other than a gamble?”
Not just a reckless, suicidal charge but a planned surprise attack?
Was there some calculation where he could take on the vast labyrinth and get a valuable result from it?
Deplete our forces, map Knossos, obtain another key, or discover the location of a demi-spirit who’s hidden away in the labyrinth—Thanatos was s
till confused as he systematically went through all the possible strategic conditions for victory against the enemy.
He was being led around by an unknown wonder. His doubts kept piling up.
If Finn’s old enemy Valletta Grede had been alive, she would have said a few things.
“Dumbass! There’s no way Finn would ever just defend!”
“That rotten hero—he’ll keep attacking all the way to the depths of hell itself!”
The next moment, Thanatos’s eyes opened as wide as they could go.
“—Are you kidding me, Braverrrrrrrrrrrrr?!”
It sounded like a shriek or an acclamation. As he sweated with a smile on his face, Thanatos turned to his panicking followers.
“Call Levis for me! This is really bad!” he boomed in half fear and half delight.
Thanatos smiled, displaying his propensity to cave to the unknown, to the undiscovered.
And then he let out a shout.
“We’re going to be swallowed whole!”
“Reporting! Lady Riveria has commenced the raid on Knossos!” shouted the elf, dashing into the room out of breath.
Upon hearing the announcement, Raul and all the other members of the familia froze before unleashing a booming roar.
“““OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”””
Fists were clenched, and the mood of the Loki Familia base was electric.
The wild cry from the center of Daedalus Street was loud enough to make the other adventurers searching for the armed monsters jump out of their skin.
As they were consumed by unprecedented excitement, the prum leader quietly murmured to himself:
“Good.”
He uttered a single word. But it contained a flood of emotions.
It was the first time since this battle had started that Finn had the feeling of “bring it on.”
They’d latched onto the throat of their enemy, shooting out a silver bullet against the monsters hidden away in that hellhole—in place of a greeting. They’d announced the time to counterattack as the fairies wedged themselves into the battle.
Finn raised his voice at this critical moment. “We’re redeploying the defensive squad. Have Gareth turn his team around! Cease pursuit of the armed monsters and secure the door that Riveria opened in the southeast. Defend it to the last! Upon finishing our preparations, we’ll launch a follow-up attack!”
