Chapter 37: Executor

"—Ngh, gaaagh!"

The instant he pulled the knife out of his side, lightning tore through his brain. His vision went red, he forgot how to breathe in and how to breathe out, and his guts writhed. But that lasted only a few seconds. His brain came back online, and he obeyed it, letting out a long, long breath. Just barely, by the skin of his teeth, he'd made it back alive—

"Okay, all according to plan...!"

"I won't let you die, but why don't you go die?"

The curse came from Ferris, close enough to whisper right into Subaru's ear as he confirmed he was still alive. Then again, Subaru knew perfectly well he'd pulled a reckless stunt that deserved every word of it, so the anger was entirely fair.

In fact, Subaru's brush with death aside, Ferris was in pretty sorry shape himself. After all, he'd lost both arms from the elbow down, a painful sight, and he'd still put Subaru's treatment first. Those two forearms, the handicap that had hobbled the treatment, were still pinned to the wall by the single-bladed shears. Honestly, as plans went, a slightly slicker rescue would have been ideal, but—

"Ferris's arms getting pinned and the enemy reinforcements, I didn't see those coming... For me, I'd thought of it as a zero-risk, play-it-safe plan."

"In what way? Subaru-kun and 'White Sheep' both nearly died, you know?"

"But you were here, right? So I figured it was a hundred-percent sure thing."

"...I'm not Reinhard, you know."

"—? I'm not Reinhard either, am I? That's what I mean, we've both got it rough."

Saying "we both" to Ferris, who held the ultimate trump card of healing magic, was quite a stretch on Subaru's part. But there was no use wishing for what he didn't have, so he let it go; Subaru would just play every card he did hold. For starters—

"—Crusch, get Melty over here!"

"Please!"

Like Subaru, the stabbed Melty needed treatment right away. Subaru yelled at the top of his voice, his half-healed side pulling tight, and Crusch answered by raising a wind with magic and tossing the fallen Melty gently into the air. That body traced an arc, and with Ferris still on his back—

"—Invisible Providence."

Making full use of the third arm that sprang into being, he managed to catch the airborne Melty. The stab wound in her stomach looked painful, but when she looked up at Subaru holding her,

"...The plan worked, didn't it?"

"Yeah, that was a Best Actress performance. —Ferris!"

"You don't even have to tell me, you pair of idiots!"

Melty's smile was strained but brave, and Subaru gave her a thumbs-up. Then, watching the treatment of her wound begin over the shoulder of the Subaru holding her, he laid down the card he could still play in this situation.

"—'Cor Leonis,' restart and full throttle!"

It was the reactivation of the Authority he'd had to suspend while ninety-five percent dead. The "Little King" effect, taking on his allies' burdens, kicked back in, and with it, Subaru alone would shoulder the "Breach" of emotions that couldn't be cancelled out: the ability Bellaris called "Ring Finger." —No, Ferris was here too. The load he was taking on didn't stop there.

"—Kh, ah."

"—Huh?! Wait, what did you just do?! You suddenly started dying again!"

"J-just... two people's worth of damage piling on, that's all... yaaay...!"

It hurt, it was agony, but the plan had worked, so he was ultra-happy. The negative and the positive churned together inside Subaru, and even in the middle of treatment for serious wounds, he felt the urge to jump around. Maybe he should give in to it all the way and jump. Melty in his arms and Ferris on his back were both lighter by however much blood they'd lost. He could probably bounce around with them in tow.

"...Don't tell me you're taking on whatever's wrong with Lady Crusch and the others? I don't know how you're doing it... Some wacky magic you and Beatrice cooked up?"

"Wacky's a bit much... Beako's creativity is always prettyish..."

"Shut up, be quiet! —I'm curing that too, right now."

As Subaru was jerked about by his tangled emotions, Ferris rested his chin on his shoulder from behind, closed his eyes, and earnestly began what was probably some kind of Mana-based examination. Doing that alongside treating the serious wounds of both Subaru and Melty seemed like a stunt on the order of pinpointing the cause of a whole separate illness, but Subaru had nothing but faith that Ferris would pull it off. And so, leaving the doubled-up "Ring Finger" he'd taken on in Ferris's hands—

"—Crusch! Fire it up!"

He cheered on Crusch, who kept moving nimbly to hold the enemy back from them. Crusch, who seemed to have joined them through the hole in the basement ceiling, was locked in a fierce clash of blades with the man swinging the single-bladed shears: Reborn, was it? That was what the others had called him. Naturally, until moments ago, her heart should have been eaten away by emotional explosions too, but—

"—Yes, Lord Subaru!"

As she spoke and swung her sword, Crusch had an ease about her, like a taut thread gone slack. Honestly, the change caught him off guard, and his worried side and his nosy side both tried to sit up at once and demand the story, but he somehow forced them back down. Either way, whatever had just happened to Crusch was lending her a forward-looking strength. As proof—

"—Hah! Seyah!"

Crusch drove in with a sharp step and cut. Reborn caught the blow on his single-bladed shears, but his stunted frame couldn't withstand the impact and went flying backward. He spun round and round in midair, planted the soles of his feet on the wall he'd been flung toward, and checked his momentum. Then the blades of wind came at him, one after another. With pinpoint aim and rapid fire, wind blades of outrageous power hammered into him without letup.

Even granting that she had her swordsmanship, and the fuel efficiency the Divine Protection of Wind Reading afforded her, Crusch's power to dominate a battlefield the size of this underground space was in a league of its own. Factor in the short-term combat boost from the "Dragon's Eye," and she would rank solidly near the top of the powerhouses Subaru knew. Caught in an onslaught that was practically an inescapable combo, even this enemy found the tables turning on him—

"Not a chaaance!"

"—!"

With the roar, something tore through the wind blades and came flying: a furiously spinning silver disc. No, the single-bladed shears, thrown. Crusch met the brutal head-on blow with an upward slash. But Reborn slipped into the gap where the barrage of wind blades had stopped, kicked off the wall and took flight, snatched his deflected weapon out of the air, and tore the hole in the ceiling wider still. A rain of rubble came pouring down. Soundlessly.

"Crap—!"

A collapse without a single sound was like a nightmare delivered by someone who forgot to add the realism. A mass that was no joke was coming down, like a building toppling in a massive earthquake, and yet the weight of it didn't come across at all; it almost felt like he was being made fun of.

"..."

Wind blades couldn't intercept a falling ceiling of that size. Crusch dodged the meteor shower of debris with nimble footwork, but once she vanished behind the billowing dust, he was sick with worry over whether she was safe. The swelling emotion, doubled by what he'd taken on, threatened to have Subaru bawling his eyes out right there—

"Something like that isn't going to stop Lady Crusch! Don't you dare underestimate her! —And the same goes for you, Subaru-kun!"

"—Oh."

The moment Ferris said it, the flood of tears that had welled up right behind Subaru's eyeballs hastily retreated. The wave of emotional explosion he'd thought unbearable ebbed away, and a short breath slipped out from deep in his throat. It was his release from Bellaris's "poison," which had been eating away at him. And just as Ferris, having neatly outwitted the "Ring Finger," had declared, his liege, vanished behind the plume of dust, was no flimsy thing to be crushed by falling debris either.

"..."

A soundless leap broke through the smokescreen. Crusch burst out and used the falling rubble as footholds, kicking off chunk after chunk to climb toward the ceiling, as if the collapse were playing in reverse.

Her trajectory took her toward Reborn, who had driven his shears into the ceiling and was crawling upside down like a gecko, using the silence to close in from his blind spot. Then, on the last kick that would carry her to him, Crusch sprang with enough force to blast a large fragment away, and the sound of that kick rang out loud and clear in the silence.

Naturally, that sound gave away her approach from his blind spot—

"Bellaaaris! Set it ablaaaze!"

The instant the order flew, a voice rose from deep within the dust: Bellaris, who had disappeared amid the falling debris, the "Ring Finger" who might even have been crushed. It was a fevered, sultry voice, as if singing of rapture and love—

"When two things that should never touch get to touch, it's so dangerous, isn't it? —That's what makes it good!"

In that instant, Crusch, who should have been closing on Reborn in midair, swung her sword well short of him.

Not a wind blade. It was a magic-cutting stroke, meant to cancel the enemy's attack. A godlike feat only the "Dragon's Eye" made possible: severing the signs of a spell before it activated and keeping it from ever taking shape. It moved to stop whatever was about to happen between Crusch and Reborn, but the hostility that should have been cut was not, and colorful flames blossomed above Subaru and the others' heads. Soundlessly.

"Wha—"

To Subaru's eyes, Crusch's magic cut had looked perfect. But the swordsmanship that had shut down Black Dog's magic completely couldn't stop the absurdly multicolored flames Bellaris unleashed: not red, but blue and green, purple and gold, like fireworks.

"Thiiis is wheeere it eeends—!!"

Crusch fell, flung away by the blast, while Reborn, who had instead added that same wind to the force of his leap, closed in on her. The raised single-bladed shears swept toward Crusch's slender waist to cut her in two. Apart from Reborn's screams, it was like watching a sword fight with the sound muted, and before that unreal sight, Subaru's mind went white-hot and began to spin at full speed.

"—"

He should already have all the cards he needed. If he remembered what Melty had told him, the Beloved Children had one ability apiece. "Silent" and "Detour" were easy enough to grasp, but Bellaris's "Ring Finger" was the only one that had shown anything anomalous so far. A simple power to strip away emotional restraint couldn't account for it. That power, different in flavour even from the Authority of the Sin Archbishop of Wrath, had to share an explanation with whatever had just set off that explosion.

The explosion wasn't magic. There had been no buildup to it at all. If anything, what happened was closer to a trap being sprung, and Reborn had seemed to know what was coming.

There had to be logic to it. There had to be an answer. Think think think, apply apply apply, probe probe probe, crack it crack it crack it—

"—!"

His eyes went bloodshot and a ferocious thirst filled his mouth at the very moment something brushed his nostrils. What faintly grazed Subaru's sense of smell was a stench like rotten eggs, and he could tell its source only because, back in his compulsory-education days, Subaru had been a kid who loved doing experiments.

"Crusch! Don't cut it, make wind!"

How much time had he spent thinking before he shouted that? Before he knew it, Reborn was on the verge of catching Crusch in midair. His blade came within a hair of reaching her, and at the last instant, the wind blew.

It was probably a reflex; Crusch likely hadn't thought it through either. The wind rose from the hand not holding her sword and tore loose without aim, and by sheer chance it pushed the air toward the oncoming Reborn. There, a blast of marigold flame erupted.

"Gwaaaah—!"

Taking the unexpected explosion full on, Reborn went tumbling head over heels across the floor. Watching it happen, Subaru clenched his fist without meaning to, feeling the solid proof that his reasoning had been right.

"Amaz...ing... Subaru, how did you..."

"'Ring Finger'... yeah, 'Ring Finger.' Fitting name!"

Countless explosions blooming wildly, and mixed in with them, a foul smell. It was the scent of sulfur. Catching a smell he hadn't thought about in ages, the fact that the bursting flames weren't limited to red, and on top of that the failure of the magic-cutting: from those, Subaru had worked out what "Ring Finger" did. If it were magic, Crusch would have cut it apart. Which meant it wasn't magic, it was—

"Chemistry, bullseye! A power that scatters stuff into the air that should never be mixed!"

Certain drugs strengthen the brain chemicals that switch a person's mind and body into a state for fighting when they face danger. Bellaris's ability produced a similar effect, forcing her targets into an artificial state of agitation that knocked the hoops off their emotions. As a result, negative feelings grew darker still, and positive feelings gained in force and heat. That was the truth behind the "Breach," and the explosion worked on the same principle.

Bellaris possessed an ability that created chemical substances and made them react to produce whatever effect she wanted—

"An elemental shipper! In other words, she acts like that, but she's a science girl!"

"Sci...ence girl? Is that a pet name for me? If you're giving me a pet name, that means you love me...? I love you too...!"

"Subaru-kun, you're the worst. Cheater."

"Scorching slander!"

Misunderstood by someone hidden behind the soot and dust, and then condemned for it by Ferris. The situation was thoroughly stacked against Subaru, and his bad luck kept on going—

"So you're the one noticing stuff you shouldn't've, huuuh...!"

Hit by friendly fire from his own side, Reborn turned his soot-smeared face toward Subaru. He'd seen it: Subaru had exposed the secret of "Ring Finger," and Subaru was the linchpin holding their formation together. In an instant, Reborn kicked off the floor, and all his killing intent poured their way. Subaru tried to cry out on reflex to stop him, but—

"Shuuut uuup!"

"—"

That one shout sealed their voices, and Subaru, Ferris and Melty alike could no longer make a sound. In a sense, this "Silent" might be the worst possible match for Subaru. After all, toying with an opponent through words was one of his favourite tricks. With that sealed, he was as good as helpless. However—

"—Invisible Providence."

Just this once, though, it might have been better to let Subaru's voice be heard. The black demon hand that shot straight out of Subaru's chest went not for Reborn bearing down on them from the front, but for what lay directly behind the huddled group: the staircase linking the underground to the floors above. It was a place of fond memories, where Subaru had stepped into the underground and promptly been stabbed by Melty, and there stood the door separating the stairwell from the underground. The same door Melty had closed behind them on the way in.

And this was Kugelschreiber Castle, Beatrice's family home, where she had once lived alongside the Witch of Greed. In other words—

"—Huh?"

Reborn's red eyes widened at the sight beyond the door the demon hand had opened. Through it came a masked man, sent by Door Crossing from another part of the castle, a place cut off by space itself, guided here by the link of "Cor Leonis"—

'—I love you, Bea—"Like I'd leeet you saaay iiit!!"

Tactlessly severing his words of love for the partner who, even now, made her reassuring presence felt, Reborn roared and forbade every scrap of information in the place from becoming sound. The "Silent" he unleashed held sway across the whole underground, and Reborn's charging footsteps, the breathing and shouts of Subaru and the others, the newcomer's first words, all of it faded into emptiness. Soundlessly.

But within that "Silent," Subaru raised his hand high—

"—"

Without a word, he pointed at Reborn, then dragged his upturned thumb across his own throat. The next instant, green flames blasted out without the slightest hesitation and swallowed Reborn head-on.

"Gaaaaaaaah—!!"

Cleaving the raging blaze in two, the howling Reborn burst through the curtain of fire. Burned all over, eyes blazing with fury like a wildfire, he charged with his single-bladed shears raised high. Overtaking Subaru and the others, Black Dog met Reborn's torso with a front kick. A violent impact spread without a sound, but the heel had been caught on the haft of his opponent's weapon.

"Pull that as many times as you like—ogah?!"

In that instant, a striking staff swung diagonally and smashed into Reborn's gloating face. It was Melty, springing to her feet for an all-out counterattack.

"Kh—"

Nose broken, front teeth knocked out, Reborn reeled back into a backflip and escaped the follow-up. He swept Melty's legs as he leapt away, and Black Dog, catching her as she fell, couldn't give chase. But the retreat bought only a moment; no respite came for Reborn.

"—Duchess Karsten, Crusch Karsten."

"You..."

The voice came from behind the retreating Reborn: the beautiful battlefield declaration of the Valkyrie, her green hair tied back with a ribbon and neatly gathered. Reborn's head snapped up, and he widened his "Silent" field, dragging her into his domain. But it was futile resistance.

"—"

Needing no sound, the wind swept gallantly past, and a golden gleam of eyes traced an arc through the air. The single-bladed shears raised to meet her were cut aside, and with flowing, economical grace the tip of her sword danced, closing on Reborn without straying from its mark—

"—Lady Crusch really is amazing."

Just as Ferris murmured with deep feeling, that single flash settled the match. His eyes slashed by the blade, Reborn clutched his face, and his scream thundered through the underground. No longer soundless, but loud, loud, as if to proclaim his defeat to the entire castle.

△▼△▼△▼△

"Kuhahahaha! Looks like you lot got thrashed plenty and a whole lot! Battered, blood-soaked, and one of you even lost both hands! Being forgetful has its bounds and limits, y'know!"

"D-don't talk like that, Black Dog! Subaru, Blue Snake, even Jade Beauty, everyone was fighting with all they had..."

"It's fine, really, Melty. He's probably just feeling sheepish. He got careless and taken out, so he showed up late for the important part."

Subaru shrugged at Melty's protest. Hearing that, Black Dog let out a suspicious "Meltyyy?" He swapped his mask for an angry-faced one and looked back and forth between Subaru and Melty.

"What's this, what's going on, aren't you two awfully chummy! Even telling him your name, Melty! Did you go sidling up to him while the dog was away? You wicked woman!"

"W-wicked woman? I'm not..."

"I said cut it out! We just won with teamwork so tight we didn't even need words. Great reaction back there, Black Dog."

"Kuhaha, by pure chance and coincidence, your cute and darling little tyke had drilled it into me! Otherwise how could I handle 'step through the door and off you go, somewhere you've never seen'?"

"...Yeah. I'll never be able to repay Beako."

She had probably been keeping a constant watch on her contract link with Subaru even while she was treating Black Dog, ready to act the instant he reached out. That was why, right after Ferris pulled him back from the brink, she'd been able to find her way through a castle no longer bound by the "Detour," with "Cor Leonis" as her guide, and send in reinforcements via good old Door Crossing.

"Seriously, that saved us. ...When we turned on each other and our whole side fell apart, I didn't know how this was going to end."

"—When you put it that way, much of the fault is mine, and I can only feel ashamed."

Crusch said it with her eyes lowered, and Subaru faltered with an "Ah..." There was something meek and demure in her manner, nothing like the plainspoken, steadfast Crusch Karsten of old she had shown them these past two months. He'd been mostly dead at the time, so he hadn't caught the details, but apparently this hadn't just started now. In other words, what he'd taken for the return of the Crusch from before her Memories were stolen had, it seemed, been Crusch playing that part. And the reason for it was probably—

"—Lady Crusch, you're hurt. Please let me treat you."

That was Ferris, offering to tend to Crusch after her grand display on the battlefield. Whatever she'd been doing, she must have had her own reasons for it when it came to facing him. He surely understood that much, yet Ferris didn't touch on it. Crusch frowned at that, but the state Ferris was in shook her far more, and her breath caught. "You...!"

"Never mind me, your arms...! We have to reattach them right away!"

"Please don't panic so. You're the one who cut them off, Lady Crusch, remember?"

"That's exactly why I'm saying it! The cut should have been clean, but will they reattach?!"

He'd gone out of his way to put them off, so he must have had a plan to heal them later. But Ferris didn't say so, and left Crusch to fret. Things weren't quite right between them yet, but in that moment Subaru thought he could feel something of the warmth the two of them used to share, or at least something close to how they'd been back in Priestella. But then—

"...What're yaaa all gettin' so cozy for, huh?"

A voice like a curse rising from the bottom of the earth poured cold water on the mood of victory. Subaru and the others whipped around, and there before them, staggering to his feet with the single-bladed shears for a cane, was Reborn. Both eyes slashed, his sight gone, a man who should have been well past fighting, his face twisted with hatred, hostility and bloodlust pouring off him.

"Give it up, stop! We've figured out your 'Silent' trick! You can switch sound on and off within your line of sight, right? That's why you couldn't erase a voice from behind you. Now that your eyes are gone..."

"So whaaat?! I ain't in no position to back dooown over that! Bellaris! Kill the paaain! Tornel! Quit draggin' your feet and put the 'Detour' back uuup!"

Spittle flying, Reborn slammed the shears against the floor as he yelled at his allies. In fact, Bellaris's power could probably have blotted out his pain with adrenaline. But she gave no answer. Between the blood loss and the damage she'd taken she had already gone still, unconscious or dead, in no state to grant his demand. And the third one, who had never shown themselves, made no move to answer either.

It was pitiful, but by now Reborn was only waiting for the finishing blow. Even so, his place among the "Beloved Children" and his own nature would never let him surrender. Knowing full well no help was coming, he turned his face, streaming tears of blood, toward them.

"That sooo? Fine by me... I'll kill every last one of you myself and..."

"—No, this is where it ends. You've gone too far as it is, the lot of you."

—In that instant, the voice they heard belonged to no one who had been in the underground until then.

"—"

As Subaru and the others caught their breath in shock, a shadow dropped through the gaping hole in the ceiling. It landed lightly, cutting in between them and Reborn, shielding the bloodied man at its back as it squared off against Subaru's group.

A slender build, a black hat, a curved sword shaped like a crescent moon at the hip. Subaru knew that figure. Not just Subaru; Crusch and Ferris would know it too. He'd thought they might end up facing each other like this one day. But he had never imagined it would be here, now, with him appearing as if to protect the "Beloved Children."

The one who had appeared was a pastor of the Church of the Divine Dragon, the soft-featured man who served as Filore's bodyguard—

"—Tiga."

"—"

At the sound of his name, the soft-featured man, Tiga Rauleon, shut one eye and frowned. There was no doubt the name was his own. So it wasn't the name that had made Tiga look puzzled. It was the person who had called it.

The one who had called his name was neither Subaru, nor Crusch, nor Ferris.

"—Melty?"

Subaru caught his breath at the sight of the one who had blurted out Tiga's name: Melty. She had both hands pressed over her mouth, her big round eyes open wide as she stared at Tiga. In them was shock, and behind it a great joy that the shock couldn't quite hide.

"...?"

Tiga, on the other hand, seemed to have no idea what lay behind that surge of feeling, and looked puzzled that she would look at him that way. For a moment, Tiga's intrusion and the tangled air it brought left a strange silence hanging over them. Then, right after that:

"—Tiga, is that a girl you know, then, eh?"

A small presence leaned out over Tiga's shoulder as it spoke. It was a squirrel-like spirit with its tail curled up, its face both cute and cheeky. Tiga, with this unfamiliar spirit in tow, shook his head at its question. "No."

"She shouldn't be anyone I know."

"...!"

"Well, she sure looks like she knows you, she does. And... no two ways about it, I tell ya. That one over there, the big fella in the goofy getup. —That's my contractor, that is."

"Huuh? What in the whole wide world and all creation is that teeny-weeny little spirit going on about!"

Melty's face clouded at Tiga's answer, and Black Dog bristled at the spirit's words. Arrows of unclear meaning seemed to be flying every which way among them, but the one who could no longer stand it was not Subaru or the others. It was Reborn, the very man being shielded.

"You bastard, 'Executor'! What the hell d'you think you're doooing! This was supposed to be ouuurs to..."

"—Time's up. The situation's changed. Even I didn't plan on barging in like this. But when you lot go making that much of a scene..."

"Mind if I ask what 'that much of a scene' is supposed to mean, My Friend?"

When Subaru cut into his exchange with Reborn, Tiga raised his eyebrows slightly. At that sardonic "My Friend", one corner of his mouth twisted. It looked somehow self-mocking, and Subaru frowned. But before Subaru could put that doubt into words, Tiga answered the question. What had happened that was such a scene? The answer was—

"This castle burst out of its other dimension and over to our side. Right now, the whole Kingdom has its eyes on it."

—The news was that Kugelschreiber Castle had broken four hundred years of silence and taken to the skies.