Seemingly very satisfied with the other party's performance, Ellen raised the corners of her mouth slightly, revealing a mocking look.
"Do you know me? Commander Kotori Itsuka?"
She gently mentioned Kotori's name, saying that she had also investigated Kotori. Contrary to her elegant appearance, she is a competitive woman.
Kotori snorted and glared at Ellen.
"...Yeah, do you have any objections? Does it bother you that a junior high school student like me pretends to be a commander?"
"How could that be? Personal ability has nothing to do with appearance and age. I just respect your ability to hinder our operations in the past. I don't mean to be sarcastic." Ellen answered seriously. Kotori couldn't guess her intention and narrowed her eyes slightly.
"Thank you very much. So, what does the world's strongest wizard, who was frightened by Katsu-nii, want to do with us? If you want to invite us for tea, can you wait a while? We are very busy now. Because it seems that a bad employee of an unethical company is attacking our children."
Even though Kotori said this with a hint of sarcasm, Ellen remained calm. She responded to Kotori's words in a calm tone:
"The [Wizard] is indeed very strong. I admit that I am no match for him... but I have a hostage Shidou."
"What…?! What did you say?! What did you do to Brother Shidou?!" Kotori's eyes widened instantly, and she punched the operating table in front of her, stood up and glared at Ellen.
"Hehe... Did we do anything to him... Well, after all, Tobiichi Origami is one of ours now, so it's not wrong to say that we did something to him."
"In order to make up for it - I can give you three minutes. Those who want to die must leave this ship immediately."
"… Tobiichi Origami…" Hearing what Ellen said, Kotori breathed a sigh of relief. If it was Tobiichi Origami… she probably wouldn't have killed Brother Shidou directly. It's likely that he was trapped.
But recalling Ellen's declaration just now, Kotori exhaled slightly, and then showed a sharp look: "You used despicable means to calculate Shidou brother---so you dare to come here and brazenly plan to shoot down this Fraxinus?"
"I don't deny what you said, but... Fraxinus... is that the name of this ship? I see, it's called the World Tree, which is quite tasteful. It must have been chosen by Elliot, right?"
Kotori's eyes widened slightly when she heard the name mentioned by Eren.
Because that is the name of Elliot Baldwin Woodman, the founder of Ratatoskr and also the decision-maker of Ratatoskr.
However, there are more important things to worry about now. Kotori let out a breath of indignation and glared at the enemy on the screen with a murderous look in her eyes.
"Hmph - are you underestimating Fraxinus? Even if you can trap brother Shidou but clearly don't have him in your possession and you can't easily defeat us…!"
"Excuse me, but you are the one who underestimated the performance of this Goetia──and my power, right?"
Ellen's voice was no longer joking at this moment - she truly believed that her ship was superior to the Fraxinus - an aerial ship that embodied the essence of Asgard's technology.
"You just kidding if I'm afraid of your fighting power." Ellen said this calmly. There was no sign of wavering at all.
This made Kotori somewhat disappointed. She smacked her lips impatiently and continued, "What is your purpose in doing this?"
After Kotori finished speaking, Ellen let out a long breath and then sighed slightly: "Well, I want to ask the person who escaped this battle to pass the message to Elliot."
"A message?"
"Yes." Ellen nodded quietly. Her originally flat tone showed emotion for the first time.
"—Elliot, Elliot, you traitor, you who broke our oath. Wake up. No matter where you hide, I will definitely find you and make you lose your head."
Hearing the fierce tone that was unimaginable from the attitude Ellen had shown before, Kotori narrowed her eyes slightly and hostility rose from her body. Elliot was someone she respected, how could she let this person insult him at will?
However, Ellen felt hostility towards Kotori, and after clearing her throat slightly, she returned to her previous nonchEllent expression and looked at Kotori.
"I'm done. Well, I'll wait for you for three minutes to give you a chance to leave. Please run away."
"...That's what she said." After hearing what Ellen said, Kotori looked at the crew members below the bridge and said:
"The enemy is the strongest of humanity. If you want to escape, just escape. It's okay," Kotori announced seriously without joking.
Then, the crew members shook their shoulders for a moment, and all raised the corners of their mouths to smile awkwardly.
"——How is that possible? If I wanted to escape now, I wouldn't have followed the commander in the first place."
"Yes, abandoning the commander and running away is no different from death."
"That's what I mean. Who cares if she's the strongest human being? Let's show her our strength."
"Please give your instructions, Commander. I have already written the suicide note."
"I have already tampered with the D drive of my computer at home. When I die, the data inside will be deleted."
The crew members said this one after another.
At this time, Kyouhei Kannazuki, who was standing behind the captain's seat, nodded deeply and continued:
"Of course I won't run away. However, the option of deserting the battlefield and being punished by the commander is also hard to give up."
"… …" A black line appeared on Kotori's forehead and she stepped on Kyouhei Kannazuki without saying a word.
A strange and intoxicated sound came from behind: "Ah, Hou!"
Kotori hummed, exhaled lightly, and turned to the screen.
"—That's the result."
"Really? What a pity." Ellen said this, but his expression did not seem to show regret.
Kotori curled her lips, ignoring Ellen's sudden raising of his hand, and gave orders to the ship in a dignified manner:
"Start AR-008 Units 3 to 6 in parallel! Start filling up Maryoku and prepare the Mystletainn! Target at three o'clock direction! DEM airship --- Goetia !"
"Understood!" Following Kotori's order, the crew members immediately operated the control console in unison.
Perhaps seeing their reactions, Ellen narrowed his eyes slightly and lay down on the chair.
No, it's not a chair, but the shape is a little different. It's a tilted device similar to an oxygen chamber, which looks like a sleeping device that appears in science fiction movies, or a metal coffin.
Then, she wore something similar to a headset microphone on his head. Kotori had seen this device before. It was a unit that replaced the airship control type Realizer device with the human brain. Although the shape was different, the same device was also equipped in Fraxinus.
"—Itsuka Kotori, I thought you were someone who could judge the situation more calmly... As expected, being able to hang out with that Wizard for a long time, you will be infected with his few bad habits to some extent."
"Haha... This is the best compliment ever." Kotori sneered and operated the console at hand to forcefully end the communication.
"Deploy the [Leaves of the World Tree] Units 1 to 12! —Kannazuki!"
"Yes!" As soon as Kotori called out his name, the deputy captain of Fraxinus, Kyouhei Kannazuki, who was standing next to the captain's seat on standby, immediately responded.
"Your opponent is the strongest wizard. To be on the safe side, go and prepare first."
"I expected you to say that." Kannazuki answered. Kotori glanced behind her and saw Kyouhei Kannazuki standing there wearing a headset microphone.
Kotori smiled, picked up the Extra Strength candy bar in her mouth with her fingers, and pulled it out of her mouth with a pop.
"We don't have time to accompany you to the end! Let's make a quick decision and rush to Tohka and the others as soon as possible! After that, we have to search and rescue Shidou!"
"Yes!"
"The magic power is fully charged, and the
"The enemy ship Goetia is not making any moves!"
After hearing the crew's report, Kotori smacked her lips. The war had already begun, so why had she not taken any action yet? The enemy was not so optimistic as to wait three minutes after the negotiations had broken down.
If the opponent is not an utterly stupid idiot──it must be an attempt to let us attack first.
If that was the case, then the other side would underestimate her. Kotori pointed the lollipop at the enemy ship on the screen.
"
As Kotori's voice resounded throughout the ship, a dazzling light burst out from the gun port installed in front of Flaxinus.
It was a huge block of magic power generated by the parallel activation of the large-scale manifestation device equipped on the ship, a ray of destructive light that could turn everything it touched into dust.
The timing was perfect. The huge aerial ship would not have been able to completely dodge it with its movements.
Of course, since the opponent's ship was also protected by the Realizer Field, Kotori didn't think this would be the decisive blow. The opponent must be very confident in the strength of the Realizer Field to be able to make such a provocative move as standing still in the air.
However, attacking first and taking the lead is of great significance in the war between air ships. Even if it can slightly reduce the opponent's Territory area, it still has its meaning.
As long as the enemy concentrates their defensive Realizer field in front of the ship to prevent our artillery fire, we can also choose to transform the World Tree Leaves that we just launched into the air into a blasting attack from the rear.
In any case, we can only attack from now on. If Ellen really wanted to shoot down Fraxinus, he would not communicate after the initial assault, but would launch continuous attacks in one go.
—However…
"What...!"
The next moment, Kotori's eyes widened. When the beam of the
The orbit is unimaginable under normal circumstances. It is neither forward, backward, nor rotating, but horizontal movement, an extremely unnatural movement like sliding a chess piece on the chessboard to the next square.
"What happened just now…?"