The day before the fifth match.
Despite the sun being high in the sky that morning, a thick, gloomy cloud cast a shadow over the almshouse.
Rique the Misfortune and Tu the Magic had visited this almshouse in Aureatia's Western Outer Ward, but along their path that day, Tu may have been deliberately more talkative with Rique than usual.
"Aigi's short but apparently really, really good at using a spear. They said that they've even beaten kids two years above them in practice matches before. Also… I thought Leisha maybe didn't like me very much at first, but you know, she's got a really, really good memory, and no matter what I say, she'll remember it all. Mie knows a whole lot about machines, and they showed me that they could dissemble a radzio and put it back together again…"
"Yeah."
Rique's reply was brief.
"...I wonder what'll happen to everyone." "That's the one thing I just don't know."
As Rique and Tu approached the almshouse, three young men, lingering in front of the gate and idly looking up at the structure, came into view.
Tu thought that she felt like she had seen people like them before. "…What're you guys doing?"
Rique let out a low voice. Today he had his bow with him. He had insisted that he needed to be by Tu's side and take precautions to absolutely ensure against a worst-case scenario befalling her the day before her match.
"Oh, great, Rique the Misfortune." "Piece of shit."
"What're you doing here, asshole?"
The men all equally shared a boorish, rough air about them, and each hurled curses at Rique. It was there that Tu realized the truth behind her sense of déjà vu. The coats they sported were the same ones that Jivlart the Ash Border had worn when they came across him before.
However, Rique wasn't as angered or upset as he had been then.
"We came to visit the kids. The priest in training who was fostering and looking after them died yesterday."
"Erm, I'm uh, Tu the Magic."
The priest in training, Naijy, was dead. The young man who had come to greet Tu and Rique on their first visit.
He had seemed like an unreliable young man, but nevertheless, he would have been a dear figure to the children there. That was why, even as Tu had her match looming the next day, she had hastened with Rique to come visit.
"Seriously?" "Naijy, too, huh…"
Rique opened his mouth to speak.
"...I heard Jivlart the Ash Border died." "Huh? That ain't any of your damn business."
The various incidents that had accompanied the fourth match days prior were still causing an uproar among the Aureatia citizens. The death of Jivlart the Ash Border, scheduled to fight in the match. It was announced that Elea the Red Tag, who had substituted her candidate and attempted to murder Second General Rosclay with foul play, had gone missing.
Jivlart's corpse was discovered inside Elea's residence. The cause of death hadn't been released to the public.
"…A little while back. The talk around a kid getting adopted from here got canceled. Naijy wasn't given a detailed reason why, but… He asked me for advice, wondering if maybe if the whole proposition had been involved with the slave trade."
"Quit yer yapping and kick rocks."
"Heh. What, are you interested in selling and buying kids, is that it?" "Enough. I want answers."
Rique flatly cut them off.
"Jivlart the Ash Border was supporting this almshouse. Given his ample
contributions, he should have had some voice in where the kids would be taken in. Was there some link with a slave organization behind the scenes? Assuming so, then the reason behind Naijy's apparent suicide…"
One of the young men grabbed Rique's collar. "What the hell did you say?"
He scowled at Rique with bloodshot eyes. Theirs were eyes of hatred, of anger, and of bewilderment.
"G-go ahead. Say that one more time."
"…So you three… Why have you come here? Just what sort of reason do outlaws like you have for getting involved with these kids? You understand? I'm looking for a convincing explanation here. If you can do that, then…"
Rique reached a hand out to his quiver, his collar still gripped in the young man's hands.
The experienced bow hand, more than capable of putting down the three simultaneously with his bow, even within range of their fists.
"Rique. Stop… Don't fight."
"…Sorry, Tu. But you can say that because you don't know." The color of anger equally showed on Rique's face as well.
He fixed his eyes on the three members of Sun's Conifer and threatened them.
"Time for some serious self-awareness. You guys… What have you been doing up until now? How many clients have you betrayed; how much did you exploit the weak? After pretending to be heroes and getting into Aureatia, what were you trying to do next? I should've crushed Jivlart on the spot when I first saw him. I could've done it, and I even knew what to expect from Sun's Conifer, but despite it all, I… I was too soft, and now there's yet another victim!"
"Bullshit!"
The young man grabbing Rique's collar replied with a shrieking cry of anger. "Piss off! Who the hell do you think you are, huh?! Jivlart… Jivlart selflessly provided for orphaned kids, and you have the gall to say that?! Always dredging up stories from the past and always treating us like garbage! You… You don't know what our homeland was like… What were we supposed to do?! You saying we can't try to live an honest life?! It was supposed to happen! The Sixways Exhibition…was the hope that even guys like us could rise to the top!
During the Sixways Exhibition… Aureatia'd recognize Jivlart, and then we'd all…all of us…all of Sun's Conifer—"
"Rique…!"
Tu cut in and forcefully tore them away from each other.
She didn't know what sort of suffering Rique the Misfortune had endured in the past, nor the type of life the Sun's Conifer members had lived up until now. She didn't understand either of their circumstances.
However, she thought that this hatred needed to be stopped by somebody. "Ha-ha-ha… Honest? You guys? Honest?"
Rique spat as he covered his head once again with his hood.
"You really were just giving money to poor children without any sort of schemes up your sleeves? Don't tell me, did you want to be seen as the good guys or something? Just from doing the sort of superficial good deeds a child would think up…?! Were you seriously thinking that'd be able to write off all your crimes?"
"Rique!"
"Fine, so you thought of something, did ya?! You able to think up a way for idiots like Jivlart, idiots like us, to make it out there, huh?! What've any of ya done for us, huh?! What the hell do you know?!"
Sun's Conifer. Poor, uneducated young men who had climbed up from the frontier solely through violence.
Those who involved themselves with the guild would always get hurt. That was the character of their group.
"…Yeah, right."
This time, before Tu had any time to stop him, Rique instantly dragged the young man from Sun's Conifer to the ground.
"Enough crap! Don't think that sort of cheap…worthless talk about your rough life is enough to get the world to sympathize with you guys! You were just helping kids, huh…without anything in return? Bastards like you, all of a sudden outta the goodness of your hearts? How 'bout, if you got the time to play the hero, you go apologize to all those people you ruined to get here, huh?! People living honest lives to begin with, and you bastards crushed them underfoot! Give back everything you stole to rise up to where you are now!"
Rique shouted as he thrust with an arrowhead.
"Apologize to her…to that bride whom I wasn't able to protect! The Sun's Conifer!"
"Hic, mrrrm…bweeeh…!"
He was crying. The young man of Sun's Conifer, exuding an air of violence and brawn, was crying.
Unsightly—and unable to offer any rebuttal to Rique's sound logic.
Almost like a child, Tu thought.
Forsaken by this world, without any education or social status to their name…yet possessing only brute force as their way to resist that world. They had thought with such strength they would be able to obtain their wishes.
Violent and rough: children.
It's the same with me.
In that Land of the End, Tu the Magic had always been the Demon King's Bastard. She hadn't had any other means at her disposal to protect someone.
She thought that the men of Sun's Conifer were villains. They had, of their own free will, hurt those weaker than themselves solely for their own benefit. However, things were sure the same for Tu, too.
Exactly who would teach her the imagination to realize such sins?
For those who realized long after all the many crimes they had committed, how exactly were they supposed to make up for it?
The almshouse courtyard. There was an ominous shadow lingering in a position to witness Rique the Misfortune's argument with Sun's Conifer in front of the gate.
The man was wearing long black clothes, similar to a priest's vestments though with a slightly different design.
…I can aim at Tu from here.
He was Kuze the Passing Disaster. The sole being capable of spurring the angel Nastique, bringer of absolute death, into action. An assassin's fight was not a face-to-face brawl with his enemy in an arena.
Naijy was dead. He died in despair at his, and the children's, future.
Learning of Naijy's death, Tu had come to check up on the children. He knew that she would be the type to do so.
I've heard all about you, Tu the Magic.
Kuze captured Tu in his sights from under the shade of a tree.
So they said your sprint's faster than a carriage. C'mon now, you can't be going all out like that when you're up against a kid.
Now, while she was bickering with Sun's Conifer, was his golden opportunity. He could lay the blame for Tu the Magic's sudden death on the hands of Sun's Conifer.
It was the reason Nastique the Quiet Singer was truly the strongest assassin
of all. On top of the absoluteness of her lethality, the method was impossible to prove. Even supposing Kuze was amid a crowd at midday and faced off with another hero candidate and killed them, there wasn't anyone in the world who could produce evidence that Kuze was the cause of their sudden death.
Although everyone would understand it was inconceivable that a petty thug would be able to stab Tu the Magic to death, it was also possible to create a situation where there was no choice but to accept that explanation.
It's actually thanks to you that Leeno really started talking to everyone else, you know.
When an opponent went to kill Kuze, Nastique would kill that opponent. However, there existed one other condition he had not told his collaborator,
Hiroto the Paradox.
Heck, that even got Leisha to become attached to you. So that's why…
In order to make sure he didn't show that condition to anyone else, he had to stop the fifth match from happening.
Thus, Kuze would kill Tu. He went to do so.
"This is…your first warning."
Voices, innumerable and inhuman, reverberated from the surrounding bushes.
The owner of the voice was nowhere to be found.
"Kuze the Passing Disaster. Leave until you are far enough away for Tu to be out of sight. At once."
No, that wasn't it. The voice's owner had long been visible. The gaps in the leaves of the trees. The spaces in the lawn at his feet.
Unnatural winged insects with a metallic luster were amassed in a swarm, enclosing around Kuze's feet.
"…Bweh-heh-heh. I've heard all about you… Didn't expect you to be such an overprotective guy."
The one who discovered the world's fifth system of Word Arts.
Now, with Izick the Chromatic's death, the person said to be this generation's greatest wielder of constructs.
"Krafnir the Hatch of Truth…!"
"I ALREADY HAVE A GRASP OF YOUR MYSTERIOUS ATTACKS. IF YOU IGNORE MY WARNING AND STUBBORNLY REMAIN HERE… I WILL INTERPRET THAT AS AN ACT OF AGGRESSION."
A former hero candidate who boasted a tremendous range of perception
through his construct terminals.
Krafnir the Hatch of Truth. Even after he had relinquished his hero candidate spot to Tu, her sponsor, Flinsuda the Portent, would never sever her relationship with a man as powerful as him.
Flinsuda had always let Tu the Magic move as she pleased in order to uncover anyone who went after her life and attacked her. From the very beginning, Rique the Misfortune hadn't been the only one guarding the girl.
Kuze raised both his arms. The stance of surrender. "If I say I won't do anything, would you believe me?"
"Let's believe you. Though, let me make one thing clear. Until the beginning of the match tomorrow, we will not bring Tu out into public."
"..."
"You won't get any more opportunities to go through with your assassination."
"…And what if you disappear right now?" "Want to try it?"
Turning aside his overcoat, he produced a small shield from inside. The bladelike insects didn't let the opening from his movement go by, and they rushed at him in untold numbers. Metallic revenant insects. Kuze smacked them down with his shield's breadth, but the swarm slipped through his defenses and tried to rend Kuze's eyeballs. All of them died and fell to the ground, without reaching their targets.
Are you okay—? Sure was.
"Naaah, let's go ahead and stop… This here's a church. Can't do this here, now can we?"
"AS LONG AS YOU ARE TAKING AGGRESSIVE ACTION, YOU CAN SIMULTANEOUSLY DEAL WITH MULTIPLE TARGETS AT ONCE. NOT LIMITED ONLY TO LETHAL WOUNDS, YOU REACT TO NONLETHAL ATTACKS PURPOSEFULLY AIMED AT YOUR EYES OR ARMS."
Krafnir dispassionately analyzed Kuze's attacks. He was pressuring Kuze by showing him that as long as he continued to fight, Kuze would grow more and more disadvantaged.
"Dammit, since when can members of a candidate's entourage attack other hero candidates?! Krafnir…!"
"YOU HAVE NO RIGHT TO SAY THAT RIGHT NOW… AND I WILL WARN YOU, KUZE THE PASSING DISASTER. COMPLAINING TO THE AUREATIA ASSEMBLY ABOUT OUR INFRINGEMENT WILL BE MEANINGLESS."
An ophidian revenant tangled around Kuze's right leg. Faster than it could
sink its poisonous fangs into his shin, he slammed it, still wrapped around his leg, into a rat revenant. Using the edge of the shield, he severed the snake's head.
Krafnir was exactly right. The categories of participants in the Sixways Exhibition from the very start were not fair and balanced. There were those who would be criticized for foul play and those would be doing the criticizing.
Kuze the Passing Disaster was also a hero candidate whose purpose was to lose. To the point that his own sponsor was sending assassins against him.
There was buzzing to his rear. The winged insects were firing needles at him. Spinning around, he flashed his shield and blocked the needles. He had let some of them slip through, but they didn't hit him. He still had the leftover stamina to dodge.
"You're a surprisingly...swell guy, huh, Krafnir the Hatch of Truth." "WHAT?"
"Forget it. Doesn't concern you."
The angel would kill those who tried to kill Kuze. There were no exceptions, even when up against a construct user whose true form was far away.
…Nastique's just killing constructs that're attacking me automatically. In other words, you yourself still aren't seriously trying to kill me.
There was the sound of wings above him. Kuze looked at the sky. A strange- looking flock melded into the clouds. Avian revenants.
Maybe he just doesn't have to.
The children couldn't see him, could they? Tu the Magic hadn't noticed him, had she? He took a defensive stance.
Curving in complex lines, the bird flock swooped down on him. He used the tree as a shield. It couldn't fully defend him. The thick tree trunk was instantly shredded and scattered everywhere. The birds circled back many times, and their slashing attacks kicked up a storm. One bird. Two. Three. Four. Five.
Five of the birds were killed by Nastique before he readjusted his stance and parried the next assault.
There were still three birds remaining. The insects encircled Kuze yet again.
Rat revenants sprang forth, too.
Krafnir was purposefully only utilizing small-size revenants. He was trying to force Kuze to constantly deal with them and exhaust his stamina. It wasn't only Kuze's side who was trying to wrap up the fifth match without a fight.
"This isn't Word Arts or any type of magic item. Just what is this counterattacking ability of yours…?"
"WH-WHO'S TO SAY…? MAYBE I'VE GOT AN ANGEL WATCHING OVER ME?"
"Spare me the nonsense."
An arachnid revenant tried to slit Kuze's throat. It was intercepted and fell to the ground.
"...!"
Nastique wasn't the one who protected him. A chestnut-colored braid fluttered along behind her like a tail.
The young girl, her shoulder turned, looked at Kuze with one green eye and shouted.
"Kuze the Passing Disaster!"
He didn't want to kill. He didn't want to make Nastique kill. If the wish was enough, then it would have all been so simple.
Kuze the Passing Disaster's power wouldn't let him do such a thing.
Thus…
"Bweh-heh-heh… You found me, huh."
The spear of absolute death and the shield of absolute arrest.
In this Sixways Exhibition to determine the strongest in the land, there was no fifth match.
Their battle would ultimately be settled the day before their match. Kuze the Passing Disaster versus Tu the Magic.