Chapter 1: The Maestro’s Miscalculation

“The large lake in the northern part of Isengard was made from the wicked god’s thorn when the worlds fused, but…look here,” Doc Babylon said as she magnified the monitor in the lab.
“Is that a fortress…?”
The image wasn’t clear, but it definitely looked like there was a stronghold to protect from outside attacks built in the middle of the red lake. The most surprising part was that the fortress was shaded by trees—or, no, it was made out of trees. Tree roots tangled together in the vibrant red water, turning the scenery into that of the insides of a living being.
The tree looked slightly red itself, perhaps because it was absorbing the water of the lake… Either way, it was one hell of a creepy construct. There was some pyramid-looking device in the center with a glowing halo above it.
“It almost looks like an altar. Don’t tell me they’re actually trying to revive the wicked god…”
“That fortress is an issue, but the thing over here looks pretty bad too.”
When the camera moved toward the shore of the lake, I saw a bunch of small sesame seed-looking objects lined up.
The hell is this?
What I saw on the blurry screen when the camera zoomed in was a whole army of machine soldiers with all kinds of different animal heads—dogs, birds, even crocodiles. In fact, maybe calling them mechimera soldiers would be more accurate, what with the way it looked like flesh and machine were fused together on them. They were akin to mechanized beastkin, or Egyptian deities mixed with heavy sci-fi elements. I watched a movie like that with my grandpa once ages ago.
Those mechimera soldiers were lined up, wielding spears and swords and staves. It wasn’t a small army either; there had to be at least several hundred thousand of them. They were all arranged into neat rows, not moving a metal muscle. Just looking at them made me feel uneasy. It looked like they were

waiting for the order to sortie… “Huh?”
A sudden light flashed from the fortress at the edge of the screen, then the monitor went black.
“Guess they shot down the drone,” Doc Babylon sighed. “I thought they wouldn’t notice us, but it seems they’re on high alert already.”
“The footage looked pretty staticky.”
“The mana seems to be fairly depleted over there, so it would’ve affected the camera. I imagine you’d struggle to use spirit magic in the area. I wonder if that ‘sinister vortex’ the spirits were talking about is located there?”
Not that I was an expert, but could there have been something like a black hole absorbing all the mana in the area? It was definitely the fallen god’s power that was leaving the spirits so frightened, but…
We just need to get this info out to our allies for now.
I immediately sent out a proposal for an emergency summit to the leaders of each country in the alliance.
◇◇◇
“That fortress might have been made using a crown skill. My crown, Grand Grun, has a similar function.”
The meeting commenced a few days later. The one to begin the discussion was King Ervin of the Kingdom of Rhea, an island nation of elves in the north of the western continent. The green crown that he was contracted with had an ability known as Vegetative Dominion. It was an insane skill that allowed it to control not just vegetation, but even processed wood. Unfortunately, it came with the price of its master entering an extreme state of starvation. If they weren’t careful, he could end up unable to eat and then die.
“Were I to attempt to make a fortress of such size, I would no doubt be unable to eat for at least half a year.”
“The gold crown that they have over there can act as a substitute. It does seem like they have their own limits, though.”
Their gold crown, Gould, was equipped with a frame made out of Gluttony and Orichalcum Slimes that took the price of the skill in its master’s place. The thousands of little Slimes used to construct him probably died in the process, but the most Gould himself would feel was some slight damage to his parts.
According to Doc Babylon, Orichalcum Slimes weren’t exactly easy to make,

so it wouldn’t be feasible to keep swapping out the sacrificial parts in quick succession—that was our one consolation.
“Are you trying to say their gold crown can use other crown skills?” Her Majesty the Queen of Strain voiced what everyone else had been thinking.
It was only speculation, but the answer to her question was likely yes. We saw Gould use the black crown’s Reverse skill. Noir himself confirmed that it was his crown skill, so there was no mistake. It was a skill that allowed its user to turn back the time of a designated object. It couldn’t be used on living creatures, but that didn’t make it any weaker.
Apparently, if Noir were to use Reverse, Norn—his master—would regress about half a year in age. The price was such that using it too many times would de-age her all the way to a fetus…at which point she would die.
Gould had used several Orichalcum Slime feathers to pay the price. While he wouldn’t have an endless supply of them, it was undeniably a threat.
Hang on. If Gould can use other crown skills…
I turned to the king of Panaches, who was sitting diagonally to my right. He seemed to have come to the same conclusion I had, color draining from his face.
“You don’t mean…he can use Blau’s Spatial Distortion?!” he cried out. “Shit!”
Thinking of Blau’s teleportation skill working alongside the army of mechimera soldiers that appeared to be waiting for orders made the puzzle pieces click into place. We’d been naive in thinking that the death of the teleporting wicked devout meant we didn’t have to fear any more sudden assaults.
Are you an absolute buffoon, Touya?! Gould literally used Spatial Distortion to escape right in front of us!
Blau’s master, Robert, could only teleport a handful of people due to the cost, but Gould wouldn’t have any restrictions like that!
“Run search! Location of mechimera soldiers across the world!” “Searching… Search complete. Displaying results.”
Red pins dropped down all over the digital map I had displayed in the meeting room.
We’re too late!
They were currently in five countries: the Kingdom of Rephan, the Gardio Empire, Dauburn, the Regulus Empire, and the Demon Kingdom of Xenoahs. The leaders of each country confirmed that the areas under attack were far from their capitals, but they were still near major towns and cities. Did they target

those areas because they wanted to slow down the spread of information…or was there some other special reason?
“Warning: New matches have appeared. Displaying.” “What?!”
Further red pins were added to the map.
That’s…!
“Here too?! Damn it! [Prison]!”
The second I realized that the pins had dropped on Brunhild, I released a [Prison] with me at the center, covering the whole castle town. I made sure humans and demi-humans were able to pass through—animals too for any pets people had. The strength of a [Prison] barrier dropped the larger the range, but even one of this size still had the strength of [Iron Wall].
“I’ll open a [Gate] for each of you so you can all return home! Those of you in areas under attack need to put out the order to your armies immediately! I’ll head over once I’ve cleaned up here!”
I opened up a personal [Gate] for each visitor, all of them quickly but calmly stepping through it.
“[Teleport]!”
Once everyone had left the meeting room, I teleported straight to the highway leading into Brunhild, arriving just as the mechimera soldiers were swarming through a round distortion in space. There was already a massive army of tens of thousands of them gathered.
There was no mistaking it—Spatial Distortion was absolutely being used.
Talk about cutting it close! If I’d noticed even a few minutes later, the town would’ve been under attack already!
If they’d managed to make it that far, civilian injuries would’ve been unavoidable, not to mention casualties.
“Target lock: Cast [Shining Javelin] on the mechimera soldiers at the front.” “Locking on. Activating [Shining Javelin].”
Several small magic circles materialized in the air before raining down lightning spears. And yet, even when pierced, the mechimera soldiers remained unaffected; they continued their march right toward Brunhild.
“Magic is ineffective? Then let’s try this: Come forth, Ice! Grand Frozen Mass: [Ice Rock]!”
After summoning a truck-sized block of ice above the fusion soldiers, I slammed it right down on top of them. Several of the soldiers were squashed. At least physical attacks seemed to work.

Should I take them all down at once with Meteor Rain? No, wait, then I risk completely altering the terrain. It’s a pain, but guess I’ll just have to take them down one by one!
“Knights of Brunhild, advance! Protect the citizens from these invaders!” “YES, SIR! RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!”
I turned around upon hearing the sudden roars from behind me and was greeted by the sight of Lain—commander of the knights—and Nikola and Norue
—the vice-commanders—arriving through a [Gate], followed by the rest of the knights.
“I’m glad we made it.”
Yakumo was the next to exit the [Gate], and from behind her came the other children and their mothers.
“You’ve got some guts trying to pick a fight with us! Let’s go, Linne!” “Yeah! We’ll beat them all to a pulp!”
Elze and Linne rapped their gauntlet knuckles, then immediately charged toward the mechimera soldiers. Elna and Linze watched on in fond exasperation.
“It would be a disgrace for us to lose here, it would. Let us join them, Yakumo.”
“Yes, mother.”

“We should go too, Frei.” “Of course!”

The mother-daughter pairs of Yae and Yakumo and Hilde and Frei were the next to run in.

“They’re the most reliable reinforcements I could hope for, that’s for sure.”

Even though the opposing army had more than ten times the soldiers as us, I didn’t feel like we could possibly ever lose.

“Let’s get this party started!”

The moment Yoshino began strumming her guitar, Sousuke appeared out of nowhere in that mysterious way he always did to join in on the drums.

This song is…

With the power of [Speaker], Sakura’s voice joined the instruments as it projected throughout the battlefield.

This song was used in a motorbike scene that came at the very start of a certain movie, and even now, it was popularly used as a song to accompany motorbike scenes. While it would be impossible for them to run as wild as the music, the support magic applied through Sakura’s singing enveloped the knights, building morale and giving them the push they needed to fight even more fiercely.

“Come forth, Iron! Barrier of the Dark Metal: [Iron Wall]!”

Leen and Quun called forth two thick iron walls that were about fifteen meters wide and thirty meters tall in the direction of the enemies that the knights weren’t engaging.

C’mon, I know we need defenses, but that’s just a bit much…

“Don’t miss, Quun.” “Not to worry, mother!”

Quun whipped out her spellcaster and fired two shots at the iron walls. The magic bullets struck the top of each wall with two shrill clinks.

I stood there, wondering what in the world they were playing at, until the iron walls began falling over toward the enemies from the impact.

Huh?! Did they not fix the bottoms to the ground?!

The domino-like descent of the iron walls continued, crushing every single mechimera soldier in their path. The massive boom as they thudded heavily into the ground was accompanied by a whole bunch of really disturbing cracks and crunches…

Even I feel a bit freaked out by this… I wasn’t expecting them to go for such a cruel method…

 

While I was left there speechless, a mechimera soldier with a Horus head suddenly appeared in front of me with a spear at the ready.

“Whoops!”

Dodging the thrusts from the spear, I used Brunhild to slash its left arm off at the elbow. What came from the dismembered limb wasn’t blood, though, but some black oil. The feeling when the sword ran through its arm felt just like a real arm…but it was clear that the soldier wasn’t reacting like a living creature.

Despite having its arm cut off, it kept fighting unperturbed, swapping the spear into its right hand and continuing its thrusts.

The thing acted like a robot that existed only to follow orders. It looked alive, yet it somehow felt less alive than a Gollem.

“Hmph!”

I deflected the spear and countered with a beheading. When the falcon head rolled to the ground, its body also stopped functioning, joining its head as it toppled over.

So they can’t fight if they don’t have their heads.

“Father, look.” “Hmm?”

Kuon was pointing at the distortion of space that the mechimera soldiers had stepped through—it was growing bigger. What stepped through next was a wave of Kyklops and some other mech that I’d never seen before. Those new units were made with the same dull gold plating that the Kyklops used, but their frames were slimmer. The shape was odd, looking humanoid yet also distinctly beast-like. They had horns like a goat’s and their hands and feet were equipped with sharp claws. It felt like I was looking at a beastkin turned into a Gollem.

“A new unit? It looks weaker than the Kyklops, though.”

The moment I said that, though, it was like the large goat-head Gollem took offense and suddenly started charging toward the battlefield.

It’s so fast! Maybe not as fast as Ende’s Dragoon, but still clearly much faster than the Kyklops! So they made a lightweight unit too? This isn’t good… It’s heading right to where the knights are fighting!

I moved to put up an [Iron Wall] in order to block its path, but before I could activate the spell, a black lion suddenly—no, a black lion robot suddenly dove into the goat-head’s side and dug its fangs into its stomach.

“It’s rude to make such a commotion in someone else’s garden.” “Most certainly.”

A girl’s disgruntled voice and a flat mechanical one echoed out from the

black lion. It was Chronos Noir, the black crown, and his master, Norn Patolakshe, the younger sister of Doctor Elluka. The two of them drove their Over Gear, Leo Noir, and dug its saber fangs right into the goat-head Gollem until they chomped out a whole piece of its side.

“Sis told me what was going on. I wasn’t expecting to see so many of these weird things all about the place, though… So annoying!”

“Warning: Reinforcements incoming.”

Abandoning their chewed-out ally, the other goat-heads advanced toward Leo Noir. As one of them dashed forward, a large red tiger leaped in and slashed it across the chest.

“Looks like you’re havin’ a blast over here. Let me join in!” “Stop getting overexcited, Master.”

This time, a carefree voice and a calm voice rang out from a red tiger. It was Nia, the leader of the Red Cats, a group of noble thieves, and Rouge, the red crown. Tiger Rouge, their Over Gear, swung its claws at one of the remaining goat-head Gollems, but it managed to swiftly dodge the strike, swinging its own claws at the Tiger Rouge in retaliation.

Tiger Rouge’s shoulder plating got slashed right open, even though its armor was made of phrasium…

Better watch out for those claws.

Seemingly getting cocky now that it had managed to damage its enemy, the goat-head Gollem lunged at Tiger Rouge again…before a blade suddenly stabbed through its back and into its chest, stopping its movement.

“I was gonna go out shopping with Allis today, you know? You’re all gonna pay for daring to interrupt us…”

It was Ende’s Dragoon that pierced the back of the goat-head Gollem with its shortsword, the man grumbling with resentment all the while. When I looked around, I noticed that Allis had joined the fight too at some point. If I were to make a guess, they’d probably made plans to go shopping, but Allis had been much more interested in what was going on over here.

“Ende! Don’t steal my prey like that!” Nia snapped.

“Oh, who cares? I just want to clean up these assholes and go shopping with Allis.”

Ende made a face as if he weren’t listening (I couldn’t see him, but he most likely wasn’t) and swung his sword at the next goat-head Gollem.

“You guys can have your little competition if you want, but don’t get in the way, ’kay?” Norn said as she wiped her hands of the whole affair and went after
the Kyklops instead.

All three of them were famous at the adventurer’s guild, so they probably had a reassuring familiarity with one another.

“We’ll go as well.”

“Yes. We shall protect this area.”

Lu called out Waltraute from her phone’s [Storage] and boarded it with Arcia.

Does she really need to join you…?

Sue also called out her Ortlinde Overlord and stood with its hands on its hips on the road leading to the castle.

I looked back at the warped space as it grew smaller and eventually disappeared entirely. It seemed the wicked devout themselves weren’t going to attack. Were they buying time?

Dammit, I have to hurry and get to the other countries!

“Entwine thus, Ice! Frozen Curse: [Icebind]!”

Linze’s ice magic froze the mechimera soldiers’ feet, restraining their movements. We might not be able to attack them directly with magic, but that didn’t mean using it to hold them down was out of the question.

The knights cut down as many of the immobilized soldiers as they could, but some managed to break free of the ice and make their escape.

Guess we can’t totally trap them…but at least it’s an option.

“Entwine thus, Earth! Cursed Soil: [Earthbind]!”

I chose to try binding them with rocks instead. Bound for a second time, the runaway mechimera soldiers seemed to have no energy left to fight back.

The knights piled on top of the remaining soldiers and took them down. The Kyklops and goat-head Gollems were also thinned down thanks to the adventurer trio. It took a few minutes after that for the rest to be cleaned up. Any further cleanup could come later; for now, we needed to go support the other countries under siege.

I opened up the map and confirmed which locations were being attacked.

They’re all places I’ve never visited…

I could easily use a [Gate] to travel near the areas being attacked in Regulus and Xenoahs. If I then teleported from there… No, it would be easier to use [Recall] on the rulers and see their memories of the areas.

In that case, let’s go directly to the countries that are in danger. I’ll split our forces into five and send them in to support the battles.

I was getting a bad feeling, though. Was this tied to the sinister vortex the spirits had mentioned?

Pushing down the fear bubbling up inside, I opened a [Gate].

◇◇◇

I split Brunhild’s forces up to send them out to the five countries being attacked by the wicked devout. In order, the ones most in danger went from Gardio to Regulus, then Rephan, Xenoahs, and finally Dauburn.

Elze, Linze, and Leen would head to Gardio, Lu and Yae to Regulus, Sue and Yumina to Rephan, Sakura and Hilde to Xenoahs, and then I would go to Dauburn. The kids would go with their mothers, with the exception of Elna and Linne, who were always with their aunts.

I had Norn, Nia, and half the knights remain at Brunhild just in case. Since Allis was complaining, I sent Ende with Yumina—well, Kuon, really—to Rephan.

Babylon would focus on communications. They could use drone transmissions to call in reinforcements if the situation anywhere grew too dire.

Now that I’d gotten a rough idea of the situation, I had some tough decisions to make.

First, I needed to visit each of the countries and receive memories of the locations being attacked from the rulers. Then, I’d need to open a [Gate] to each of the locations and send their domestic knights, the Frame Gears we’d loaned them, and my wives and kids to combat the enemies.

If Yakumo had been able to use [Recall], she would’ve been a huge help… Regardless, I had her travel with me to the five battlefields so she’d be able to use [Gate] herself, just in case the situation called for it. There was no way to predict what would happen, after all.

I ended my rounds by teleporting to the top of a hill in the deserts of Dauburn that overlooked the oasis town of Ishgir. What would have been a bustling town now looked like a scene from hell. Smoke and fire were billowing all around and the townspeople were running aimlessly in a panic. It was mainly mechimera soldiers that were attacking the people. I could see several Kyklops, but no goat- head Gollems.

Did they not have enough of them? Oh well, makes it easier for us.

“Warriors of Dauburn! We must protect Ishgir from these invaders! Charge!”

The young king of Dauburn roared commands to his men through the [Speaker] installed in our mass-produced smartphones. Riding ostrich-like magic beasts, the Dauburn soldiers unsheathed their curved blades and charged across the desert toward Ishgir. Following behind was a mixed force of Dauburn and Brunhild Chevaliers.

What was I doing? I was, well…

Has it finally locked on to all of them? Not being able to use my divinity really makes this take a while, even for just one town…

“[Gate]!”

I opened a large [Gate] beneath the fleeing townspeople and teleported them to the desert. I could’ve teleported the enemies instead, but there were likely people caught in fires or collapsed buildings that needed help evacuating too.

His Majesty had asked me to prioritize the citizens, anyway.

At first, I’d considered opening a [Gate] underneath the town as a whole and just allowing humans to fall through, but then people who’d evacuated to higher floors or rooftops would’ve been left behind, so I decided against it. It took extra time locking on to each and every person, but that was a fine sacrifice if it meant saving more lives.

For now, I teleported only the survivors. I felt guilty about it, but if I’d tried to teleport those who had died as well, it would’ve taken me far longer to lock on to all of them, and that delay could’ve been enough to cause even more deaths.

“Come forth, Light! Neutral Therapy: [Area Heal]!”

I used an area healing spell on all the townspeople that I’d teleported to me.

There were so many of them that it was impossible for me to fully heal every single wound, but I could at least stabilize those in critical condition. Just a few more casts and they’d be fine.

I left the area to His Majesty and entered the fray. “Kohaku!”

《My liege.》

I jumped on the back of Kohaku in her big tiger form and we rode off into the desert. As we made our way into Ishgir, we stumbled upon the Dauburn warriors locked in battle with a mechimera soldier. I sliced its head clean off with Brunhild as we rode past, a metal clunk of the head falling to the ground ringing out behind us as Kohaku continued advancing.

“If only magic had any effect, we could clean this up in two seconds flat…”

《Surely dropping a rock or a big chunk of ice on them all would suffice?》 “We’d end up totaling the town if we did that.”

There was no way that would be okay. There weren’t that many enemies in Dauburn, anyway, so we could likely take them all down if we just pushed a little more. At least, so long as there weren’t any reinforcements…

《Hmm? My liege, over there.》

“What the hell is that…?”

Kohaku came to a stop and looked upward. When I followed her gaze, I saw a strange little whirlpool in space. Using my divine sight, I was able to see a blurry ball of light being sucked into it like water swirling down a plughole.

“Is that…?”

《They appear to be absorbing the spirits of the dead.》

Was this another usage of Gould’s Spatial Distortion? The wicked god gained more power by consuming human souls. Had the wicked devout attacked this town to use the souls of the townspeople as fodder for the wicked god’s revival?

When humans died, their souls would leave their bodies and travel to the Divine Realm. So long as their soul wasn’t too tainted, they would then have their sins cleansed and be reborn. It was the cycle of reincarnation. Souls devoured by the wicked god, however, were destroyed in the truest sense of the word; they would never be reborn again.

That isn’t something I can allow. Quit messing with people’s lives like this!

Before I could use [Prison] to section the vortex off, it disappeared. It must have realized there were no more souls to absorb.

“Dammit! The same thing is probably happening in the other countries too!”

Was their goal to revive the wicked god with the souls of dead humans? Or perhaps it was the fallen god of erosion that they wanted to revive? Gould had already absorbed the fallen god, that was for certain. In which case, was their goal just to strengthen Gould?

Ugh, I can barely organize my thoughts. Let’s just focus on what’s in front of us for now.

“Target lock: Cast [Earthbind] on their feet.” “Locking on. Casting [Earthbind].”

After a short pause, the spell activated. That should’ve bound all the mechimera soldiers in the town. All it took was them breaking the rocks to escape, but I should’ve bought the Dauburn soldiers enough time to take them out.

The Kyklops were much more of an issue. We had to stop them from destroying any more of the town. They were being pushed back, so there probably wouldn’t be much more damage, but…

I dashed through the town, taking out as many mechimera soldiers as I could.

Given their half-robot state, they didn’t go down to weak attacks; even after giving them a solid few shots with phrasium bullets, they still managed to get back up and attack. They were like Zombies. Unless you applied some sort of lethal damage like cutting off their heads or gouging out their stomachs, they just wouldn’t stop.

They were living creatures, technically, so if you crushed their head or their heart, they’d die. Zombies wouldn’t die even if you crushed their hearts, so I suppose these were on the better end? But Zombies were also much slower…and we could use light magic to take them out. Yeah, Zombies were much easier to fight.

“Run search: Active mechimera soldiers.” “Search complete. Displaying results.”

The map showed far fewer of them than before, so I could leave the rest to the Dauburn soldiers. We were winning in the fight against the Kyklops as well. There was a chance the enemy would send reinforcements, but I could return if I had to.

I called the king to inform him I’d be going to a different battlefield and told him to contact me if reinforcements arrived.

“Cesca, where should I go next?” I asked my operator up in Babylon. “Perhaps the Kingdom of Rephan? There are still numerous active

mechimera soldiers. Plus, there are many injured among the citizens.”

The Kingdom of Rephan was where I had sent Yumina, Kuon, Sue, Steph, Ende, and Allis, yet that still wasn’t enough?

I quickly opened a [Gate] and teleported to Mioparade, an economic center of Rephan. It was surrounded by large castle walls and was far bigger in scale than Ishgir. Fires were breaking out all over and a whole section of the wall had been destroyed. Near the broken wall lay several destroyed Kyklops. Behind them was Sue, who was giving the swarming Kyklops a Megaton Punch with the Ortlinde Overlord. She was protecting the city with the wall to her back. I could see the Dragoon and Brunhilde as well, fighting the goat-head Gollems with the Rephan Chevaliers.

There was another creepy vortex above the city, sucking up the souls just as it had done in Ishgir.

“[Prison]!”

This time, I put up a [Prison] around it. Once the souls stopped reaching it, it seemed to believe it had finished its job and disappeared just like that.

“Yumina, I’m here in Mioparade. Can you tell me what’s going on?”

“Touya, you’re here! We’re managing to hold back the Kyklops, but there are just too many mechimera soldiers! I sent Kuon and the other kids into the city, but I’m worried about them!”

I searched with my phone and found Kuon, Allis, and Steph all fighting in some central plaza area.

“Kohaku! To the central plaza!”

《Yes, my liege.》

Kohaku leaped onto a nearby roof and dashed from building to building, hurrying to the plaza along the shortest route possible. Eventually, a bronze statue mounted on a large pedestal that was holding a musical instrument came into view.

That’s gotta be it, right?

Before long, I caught sight of the children fighting the crowd of mechimera soldiers.

“Blow ’em away, Kohaku!” “Yes, my liege!”

Kohaku emitted a large shock wave from her mouth, sending a whole chunk of the soldiers flying.

“Daddy!”

“Father!”

“Are you guys all right?”

From what I could see, none of them were injured. Steph was protecting them all with [Prison] while Kuon and Allis fought off the enemy. Gold was helping take down the mechimera soldiers with his own golden sword.

“These small fry ain’t nothin’ for me and the kiddo here. Problem is, there’s too darn many of ’em! We can’t get to ’em all!” Silver spoke up from Kuon’s hand.

The knights of Rephan were also wearing armed Gollems and participating in the fight, but I could see a lot of bodies strewn around them. Given their clothes, they were likely civilian casualties. I was worried that the kids were feeling shock at having to witness the deaths of innocents, but Kuon seemed to catch on to my worries and reassured me with an awkward smile.

“We’re fine. We’ve already killed plenty of bandits in our time. We’re not squeamish. Steph’s even taken part in a war here in Rephan.”

“Oh, so she has…”

I forgot that Steph had fought rebels at the behest of the queen as a guest commander… Were our kids’ nerves not a bit too steely? Honestly, they barely acted like kids at all…

Oh, future me, where’d you go wrong in raising our kids?

I could feel unease starting to build in my chest, but then I realized it made no sense for me to start overthinking it now. They were royalty, demigods, and had a ton of divine relatives—there was no way they’d grow up normal in an environment with all that around them. No matter how unchildlike they were, they were all still good children. There was no problem. Yup.

That aside, we needed to evacuate the civilians before there were more casualties. I wanted to teleport them with [Gate] as I had done back in Ishgir, but it would take time. I was locking on to the targets right this second.

“Hiyah!”

I heard a dull thud, then a crocodile soldier went flying into the wall. Allis’s roundhouse kick went from one enemy straight onto another.

“Ha ha ha! Come and get some!”

When I saw Allis taking down mechimeras one after another, I glanced at Kuon, silently asking, Is it okay to leave her like this?

“She hasn’t been able to do much training or bounty hunts for the guild recently, so she’s been restless… She’ll calm down once she expends her energy,” Kuon replied.

Well, it’s true that she’s had stress building up from the etiquette lessons, but… Y-You know, I guess if this lets her get it out, it’s fine…I think…?

I couldn’t deny that I was a little bit more worried about how intense Allis’s ruthlessness was this time.

Meanwhile, I finished targeting the remaining citizens.

“[Gate]!”

I transported them outside the city walls, opposite from where everyone else was fighting for now. It used up a lot of my mana, but it was me we were talking about, so it would recover right away. Now I could join the battle without any worries.

“Come forth, Iron! Barrier of the Dark Metal: [Iron Wall]!”

I materialized a metal wall that was about thirty meters in height and ten meters in width, then shot a bullet into the top of it. With the wall not being secured at the bottom, it toppled right over with a large crash, squashing all of the mechimera soldiers caught underneath.

Hmm… I tried to copy Leen and Quun, but as effective as it is, it doesn’t leave a good taste in the mouth.

It was a little odd—it was starting to feel as if this wasn’t a battle, but simply another task on the list. Not that I really needed to feel bad for these guys, anyway. If I didn’t view this like a pest extermination, I’d burn myself out. Any hesitation from us could lead to someone else paying the price.

Once I’d managed to recalibrate my mindset, I fired out a whole bunch of the same metal walls and crushed the soldiers with them. No matter how many times I did it, the soldiers didn’t show an ounce of fear or hesitation. Sure, they were wearing masks, but not even their body language implied anything of the sort.

Were they not capable of emotion, then?

I wonder what’s more human: a half-living creature with no emotions or a Gollem with artificial emotions…

Those useless philosophical questions were running through my mind as I finished off the last of the mechimera soldiers in my field of vision. With the civilians evacuated to safety, I trusted I could leave the rest to the Rephan knights.

I opened up the line to Yumina to get a status report. “Yumina, I’ve cleaned up over here. How’s it going over there?”

“We’ve almost finished with the Kyklops, but we’re struggling with those new Gollems with the goat heads…”

She sounded a little panicked.

They really must be struggling. “Kohaku, mind watching the kids?” “Of course, my liege.” “[Teleport].”

I left Kohaku in the plaza and teleported to the battle that was raging outside of the city. I could see Brunhilde nearby in sniper mode, shooting a crystal round at one of the goat-head Gollems. I was so certain it wouldn’t be able to dodge a shot like that, but then the goat-head Gollem blocked the round with the long claw gauntlets they were equipped with, deflecting it entirely.

Oh, come on! Those bullets are made of phrasium, you know?! What do you mean their frames are even stronger than that?!

Or maybe that wasn’t the right way to think about it. They were deflected…which just meant that it wasn’t taking the shot directly, right? When I paid closer attention, I realized that its arms hadn’t been left unscathed—there were cracks in the plating.

Brunhilde fired a second round, but the goat-head Gollem dodged that one.

The essence of sniping rested in catching one’s enemy by surprise—the reason that being sniped was impossible to avoid was because you were shot from a distance when you weren’t expecting it. If the sniper’s position was exposed, it was easy to account for the incoming shot. Yumina understood that as well, so she had activated Brunhilde’s stealth mode that utilized its mirror armor, changing position and trying again to snipe the goat-head Gollem.

The speed of these things is a pain in the ass.

As the slowest Valkyrie, Ortlinde Overlord would definitely struggle, just as any of the Chevaliers would. The only ones that would stand a chance in an outright battle of speed would be either the Dragoon or the Night Barons.

Maaaan, if only I had Reginleif!

“Huh?”

Activating [Long Sense], I caught sight of Ende fighting with a goat-head Gollem, but that goat-head Gollem was a different color from the rest, and its arms were more like stakes that it was using like Overlord’s Spiral Knuckle. The stakes had chains attached so that the goat-head Gollem could pull them back after deploying them, then fire them back at the Dragoon.

Hang on a second… Is this idea stolen from Gerhilde’s Pile Bunker or Overlord’s Spiral Knuckle?!

“I know they say everything starts from imitation, but that has its limits,” Doc Babylon grouched from my phone.

“The Maestro was best at improving what already existed,” the Professor added.

“Hmph, that’s just a generous way of saying the guy has no originality. Even the Kyklops are just imitations of the Frame Gears,” Doctor Elluka also piped up.

I mean, Frame Gears are just copied from mecha anime, so I don’t think you guys are ones to talk.

Besides, it only made sense to keep integrating proven ideas. If you could make further progress with it, then you’d profit. That wasn’t to say you could just imitate everything and be content with that alone, though.

Ende dodged the incoming stakes and shattered the chains with the Dragoon’s phrasium shortsword, before dashing in and slashing the goat-head Gollem in two. As fast as that unit had been, its frame was weak. Ende’s Dragoon was in the same boat, but I had made it lighter using [Gravity], and it also had a phrasium coating—they didn’t compare whatsoever.

“Detecting spatial distortion. Something is approaching,” Cesca suddenly called out.

“Huh?”

The space in front of Ende began to distort and a strange unit crawled out of the rift. It looked like a spider with a human upper body like an arachne, but the human part had four arms and the head had tons of little shining eyes just like a real spider. In its metallic red grip was a rapier of similar coloring.

“And so the wicked devout make their appearance!” I clicked my tongue and glared at the new fighter.

◇◇◇

I recognized that red sword—it was the wicked vessel that the Maestro wielded back during the fight in Lassei.

“And another flashy one comes to steal the show,” Ende lilted in his usual laid-back manner.

“Ende, watch out. That’s a wicked devout,” I warned him.

“This thing? Then I guess I’ll get to go all out.”

The wheels on the heels of the Dragoon lowered and Ende piloted it forward at high speed. The arachne-like mech reacted by thrusting its sword at the Dragoon. Ende deflected it with his own, but the rapier’s thrusts never stopped coming. After a few successful dodges, the rapier scraped the Dragoon’s shoulder.

“You’re kidding?!”

Surprised by the hit, Ende slid the Dragoon back.

Suddenly, two of the arachne Gollem’s arms were holding red rapiers. “No way… Didn’t it have only one earlier?”

As if responding to Ende’s disbelief, the swords in the upper left and right arms blurred, split into two, and landed in the arms below, giving it rapiers in all four of its hands.

“C’mon, man, that’s just cowardly, don’t you think?!”

The arachne Gollem’s eight legs clacked against the ground as it moved toward Ende. It fired sharp thrusts one after another from its four arms. Even Ende had no choice but to focus completely on dodging, leaving him no space for a counterattack.

“You’re fast, I’ll give you that. But can you dodge this?” a deep, masculine voice rang out from the Gollem before the four swords erupted into flames. He swung those blazing swords around, sending a fire slash straight for Ende.

“Crap!”

Ende fired the verniers on the front of the Dragoon’s chest and legs, retreating from the enemy as swiftly as possible. He just barely managed to avoid the fire, but knowing what the spider Gollem was capable of instantly made Ende far warier about approaching without careful thought. Instead, the Gollem made full use of its arms to close in on Ende for the kill.

“Take this, and this, and this!”

“You piece of…! Don’t think you’ve won this!”

The Dragoon had been pushed further and further back by the endless assault, but Ende boosted his Frame Gear to the side of the Gollem and aimed his sword at its thin leg. Where Ende had assumed it would be slashed in two, it instead withstood the attack, letting off a sharp clang.

Taking advantage of Ende, who was now caught off guard in his surprise, the arachne Gollem retreated, dragging its injured leg back and sending out another fire slash.

I had already assumed these Gollems’ frames were tougher after Yumina’s gunshot had failed to make any worthwhile damage, but this just confirmed it. The Dragoon’s shortswords weren’t just made of phrasium, they had also been enhanced with mana, yet even that barely left a scratch… The one saving grace was that they probably couldn’t regenerate like the Phrase.

Ortlinde Overlord might be able to shatter them, though.

Still in the back, I turned to see the Ortlinde deploying its Stardust Shell over the city walls.

“They’ve got their hands full over there just protecting the city…”

Yumina was still sniping away at the Kyklops. That meant Ende was left completely isolated.

“Guess I’ve gotta step up.”

“Hang on, Touya. Mind waiting a sec?” Doc Babylon spoke up just as I was about to use [Fly].

“At a time like this? For what?”

“Ma’am Babylon! Final checks are complete, ma’am!” “It’s, like, so ready to go!”

Suddenly, I could hear Rosetta and Monica as well.

What are they doing?

“We took far longer than I would’ve liked, but the overhaul is finally complete. Connect a [Gate] to hangar four.”

Overhaul? Hanger four…? Oh!

The moment I realized what the scientist was going on about, I immediately opened a [Gate] as she had instructed.

A Frame Gear with its gravity carefully controlled lowered slowly, feet-first, onto Rephan soil. Golden lines ran across its crystal armor, folded wings glistening in the sunlight. It was my personal multipurpose Frame Gear, Reginleif.

They finally finished upgrading it!

“Hang on, have you changed the design? And some of the parts?” “Yes, sir! We used the existing Frame Gear data to add as many

improvements as possible, including some new gear, and raised its basic specs, sir!”

“Damn… Hey, wait, I knew you guys were making modifications, but no one told me you were equipping it with new stuff. Is that why it took so long for you to finish?”

“Oopsies… I didn’t think that one through, sir…” Rosetta sounded so proud as she answered my question, but then immediately changed tune when I questioned her priorities.

You totally prioritized your own hunger for research over the current situation, didn’t you?!

“For all your hard work, I will reward you with an assistant—Parshe from the storehouse. Isn’t that exciting?”

“NYOOOOOOOOOOOO! Please reconsider, sir! If a klutz like her tries to help, our development will go backward, sir!” her screams echoed out from my phone.

I wasn’t actually intending to have Parshe help; I didn’t even want to think about what would be sacrificed if I dared…

Enough of this fooling around. Gotta go help Ende.

I used [Fly] to get myself into the cockpit, then placed my phone in the pilot seat’s console. There was a low hum as the systems started up, the cockpit filling with the light of the different gauges. The wide monitors pictured what was going on outside. When I flowed mana through the control stick, Reginleif fully activated. I moved the arms a little and did some basic exercises with my hands to check that there were no problems with movement.

“Perfect. Let’s get this party started, Reginleif! Deploy Fragarach!” “Deploying Fragarach.”

The crystal wings on Reginleif’s back spread wide, releasing the twelve phrasium panels.

“Change mode: Sword Mode.” “Changing to Sword Mode.”

The crystal panels changed into sword shapes and created a circle in front of Reginleif before flying straight for the arachne Gollem.

“Go!”

The glittering crystal blades all fired toward the red Gollem like homing missiles.

“What?!”

The arachne Gollem detected the incoming phrasium blades and deflected them with its four swords. It managed to avoid most of them, but one slipped through and stabbed into its stomach.

“Guh!”

The Gollem turned its upper body 180 degrees and pulled out the thin sword by hooking the handguard with one of its rapiers and pulling. I called all the blades back, returning them to Reginleif’s wings. Since the pilot needed to control each sword themself, it was quite taxing to do so for a long time. Perhaps it was a given, considering each sword had to be moved independently. “Not so fast, buddy. This guy’s my prey. Mind not stealing?”

I was a little taken aback when Ende suddenly turned accusingly. “Is this really the time to be competitive?”

I literally just got you out of a bad spot…

“I wasn’t in trouble! I was just struggling a little!”

That’s what it means to be in trouble, you idiot!

If he really didn’t want me to help, though, I’d stop. The Dragoon was installed with the emergency evacuation system like the rest of the Frame Gears, so even if Ende lost, I could take over easily.

How about we see what you’ve got, huh?

“Do what you want, then. I’ll make sure to look after Melle and Allis if anything happens to you.”

“I would appreciate it if you didn’t try to jinx me! I’m not gonna leave Melle a widow, and I have no intentions of letting Allis become anyone’s wife yet!”

“Okay, okay. Then at least use this.”

I removed two of the phrasium panels from Reginleif’s wings, turned them into simple gauntlets, and fired them the Dragoon’s way.

Well, I don’t know if you can call slapping grips onto two spheres making them gauntlets, but I did say they were simple. Maybe I can add some thorns onto them.

The panels could turn into anything so long as it was a programmed shape, but I didn’t have enough time to do anything more complex, so this was the best option at the moment. They were tougher than the Dragoon’s weapons and one of the blades managed to pierce the Gollem, so it wouldn’t be too far-fetched to think it could shatter its body.

Ende flung away his shortsword and put on the gauntlets instead, rapping his knuckles together. It kinda pissed me off a bit seeing him do that—it reminded me of how well he got along with Elze.

“All right, time to pull this back!” Ende yelled enthusiastically. “Don’t underestimate me!”

The arachne Gollem immediately returned to its thrusts, but Ende easily dealt with them with his new gauntlets—he was moving faster now too. In hindsight, it made sense. When an opponent slashed a sword down in front of you and you were also holding a sword, the natural way to deal with it would be to catch it with your sword turned horizontally. No one would try to catch it vertically.

Unfortunately, that change in angle took time, however slight. With gauntlets, you just needed to throw out your arms and that would be enough to block.

In the case of sword thrusts, the only way to block those with a sword would be to take it horizontally and then force it to change its trajectory. Gauntlets were the same, but without the need to alter the angle of the sword, changing to a counter was far faster and smoother…and that slight speed difference was enough to grant Ende an opportunity that made it possible for him to attack.

“Yah!”

“Hmngh?!”

One of the Dragoon’s fists managed to maneuver through the storm of thrusts and burst right into the spider’s cephalothorax and through the bottom of the human’s stomach. A huge crack appeared on the metallic red plating.

“Yeah, these definitely come more naturally to me.”

The Dragoon leaped at the retreating spider Gollem and launched its follow- up attacks. The tables had now turned; the Gollem had no choice but to remain on the defensive, avoiding the Dragoon’s fists.

“Grrrrrr!”

The Gollem crossed its four arms and sent out fire waves one after another from its swords. Ende dodged left and right, finding the first opportunity to step forward and throw a left hook toward the Gollem’s right elbow, completely shattering the lower arm. The moment he did that, the sword dissolved into black miasma and was absorbed into one of the other swords.

That was probably a clone of the original wicked vessel.

Even when down to three arms, the arachne Gollem continued its relentless assault, but the Dragoon fended off all the thrusts with its gauntlets, attacking the moment it created an opening. The repetition of defense into a counter was slowly whittling away the Gollem’s armor.

“It’s, uh…a pretty boring way to go about it, huh…?” “At least call it controlled!”

I’m not saying that descriptor is wrong either, but…

Either way, he was managing to damage the enemy, which was the actual important part.

The Dragoon’s right uppercut slammed into another of the Gollem’s elbows, breaking another arm and turning another sword into miasma that was also absorbed. With the enemy now down to two swords, this would be a far fairer fight… Or at least, I thought it would be, until the stomach of the unit detached and stretched forward like a scorpion tail supported by flex arms. The arachne Gollem was now standing on its four front legs, the remaining back four anchored into the ground. That was when we noticed that where a spider would usually release its thread was instead a gathering light.

Wait, is that…a version of the particle laser that the giant Kyklops fired?!

“Hey, that’s dirty!” Ende complained, dodging at full speed.

If that laser was allowed to fire, there would be more casualties. I released the rest of Reginleif’s crystal panels and flew them straight into the firing line of the Gollem.

“Mode Change: Reflector!”

The panels all lined up and created a gigantic wall. I intended to reflect it straight back, but then I noticed there were still Chevaliers fighting the Kyklops, so I couldn’t just send it in their direction.

The moment I angled the reflective mirrors diagonally to not cause unnecessary casualties, the arachne Gollem let out a huge beam. It looked less powerful than the particle laser that Kyklops shot out, but it would still cause a whole lot of damage if it reached the city.

The reflectors caught the beam and diverted it up to the sky, shooting through the clouds.

That was close…

“Ende! The hell are you doing?!”

“Come on, man! How do you expect me to predict a move like that?!”

The arachne Gollem continued firing beams at Ende, but they were like small arrows this time instead. The Dragoon managed to dodge each of them without ever getting hit.

I guess it can fire the short beams at will. Does that mean the big beam is a charge attack?

“Quit dashing around like an irritating fly! Blow up already!”

The arachne Gollem’s hind legs stabbed into the ground like stakes as light started to gather by its stomach once again.

Is it gonna fire off that beam again?!

The next moment, Ende stopped dashing everywhere, suddenly about-turning and dashing toward the enemy at full speed.

“Oh, sh—!”

“Can’t dodge if you’re anchored down, buddy!”

Before the light could finish converging, the Dragoon was in front of the Gollem, its right fist pulled back to its waist.

“Combat Arts: Crouching Dragon, Piercing Fist!”

The Dragoon’s rotating fist smashed right through the Gollem’s chest. Its chest plating distorted like it was being gouged out, then its upper body suddenly shattered into pieces. With its upper body gone, the bottom half lost all strength and collapsed to the ground, including the part that had been gathering energy.

That strike didn’t use divinity, so we’re safe, right?

Besides, we technically didn’t hit the wicked devout directly, and more than that…

As my unnecessary anxious worrying ran through my head, a battered and bruised man with a plague doctor’s mask crawled his way out of the remains of the shattered upper body.

Yep, he’s alive.

“You fiend! How?! How can that Gollem produce so much power?! What is so different between it and my Kyklops or my Baphomets?!” he yelled. Was Baphomet what he called those goat-head Gollems? Which meant this guy was Maestro, one of the five great gollemancers, right?

“Touya, mind patching both our camera and audio through?”

Doctor Elluka and the Professor popped up on the side monitor in Reginleif’s cockpit. They were both acquainted with the Maestro, so they probably had things they wanted to say.

I simply did as they wished, using [Mirage] to display them in the air above the Maestro.

“It’s been a while, Maestro,” the Professor greeted.

Doctor Elluka greeted him next, saying, “You’ve changed in the time we’ve been apart.”

“What?! The Professor! And the Restoration Queen! Are you the ones behind this?!”

The Maestro couldn’t hide his surprise at seeing his colleagues like this. “We were not the ones who made these Frame Gears,” the Professor clarified. “We simply lent a hand.”

“Frame Gears are completely different from Gollems, you know?”

“I know that! I can tell that the technology used is entirely different! But their parameters should be much worse than the Kyklops, yet they are on equal footing! Why?! Is there some technology I have yet to discover?!”

He pointed at the battling Chevaliers as he continued yelling.

Their parameters should be worse?

I agreed that the Kyklops were more powerful and had great durability, but were they that much better?

On the other side of the monitor was the one person who couldn’t overlook the exact thing I had questioned.

“You know, when I saw those Kyklops for the first time, all I could think was that whoever made them had no taste. Now I’m discovering that the way he thinks is loopy too. In what world would your outdated Gollems ever stand a chance against my constantly evolving Frame Gears?”

Appearing from behind the Professor and Doctor Elluka was the mother of the Frame Gears, sitting smugly on her floating chair: Doctor Regina Babylon herself.

“I see nothing special about the creator coming from the Kyklops. It was like you just built a big Gollem and that was the only thing in your head. Is there an actual reason you made them that size? How does it balance its own weight? Are you fully aware of how much your units can take? Do you honestly think that just adding your own ideas to a preexisting one will make you a better scientist? Well, think again.”

A rain of criticism splashed down on the Maestro, a former Gollem engineer, from the screen hanging above him. The man was stunned speechless for a few moments before he gathered himself and finally managed to squeeze out his gravelly voice from behind the mask.

“I refuse to believe it! Are you telling me a child created a machine like this?!”

“Yup. Pleasure to make your acquaintance, my dear masked engineer. My name is Regina Babylon. I am the creator of the Frame Gears and the lover of the Grand Duke of Brunhild.”

“Okay, wait, that part’s a lie. She’s just my employee!” I denied as desperately as possible. Was this the time to be making such jokes?! Not that employee alone was an accurate description of our relationship, but it would do.

Thankfully, the Maestro couldn’t seem to care less about that part and showed absolutely no reaction.

“You seem awfully upset at the idea that you lost to my Frame Gear, but…truth be told, that Dragoon you just fought? Sure, it’s been modified and upgraded, but it’s still a much older model. It’s far from my magnum opus.”

“Wh-What…? An old model?!”

The Maestro stood there in horror. She was right, though—the Dragoon was old by now. It was one of the Frame Gears originally in Babylon’s Hangar along with the Chevalier and Night Baron. It had been modified various times since then, but it still wasn’t vastly different from its original form.

“Preposterous! You cannot honestly tell me that is an old unit! It absolutely has higher performance than the other Frame Gears!”

“Generally, the performance of a Frame Gear depends heavily on its pilot. If a complete amateur is piloting it, then it’ll move like an amateur. If a hardened veteran pilots it, it’ll perform like a veteran. They’re made in a way that they pull out the pilot’s potential. If you thought it felt strong, well, that’s just ’cause the pilot’s strong.”

“Damn, are pigs gonna start falling from the sky next? Never thought I’d see the day Ende got a compliment.”

“Excuse you, I get plenty of compliments!”

Whoopsies, I forgot Ende was still listening in.

“Sorry, but the image of Uncle Takeru chewing you out every two seconds is burned into my mind.”

“Master’s given me compliments too! Only on occasion, but…”

I personally hadn’t ever seen it happen, but I didn’t think he was lying. Uncle Takeru was good at balancing the carrot and the stick. He didn’t get his title of the god of combat for nothing, after all.

“The pilot?!” Fun times were over as the Maestro began yelling again. “How could you possibly account for such an unreliable factor?!”

“And there’s your problem. Notice how you stopped thinking the moment you hit something unpredictable? You’re completely throwing out human potential. Have you even realized how badly that’s denying you of your own potential? If that’s where your thinking stops, then you have no future.”

The doctor paid the Maestro no mind in her critique of him as her tongue grew even sharper.

“Did you manage to learn even a bit of magic? You had the Ark, so it wasn’t difficult to come to the eastern continent, right? Or were you just completely unable to muster even a shred of interest in a field other than your own? I was taught about Gollems from scratch thanks to these two here, and they were keen to learn about magitech in return. I’m gonna be blunt: You’re way too narrow- minded. You might be able to improve your basic skills by imitating others, but because you box your mind into set ways of doing things, you can’t take anything you learn much further than that.”

I was starting to feel a little bad for the Maestro.

Did you have to be that harsh? Look, he’s practically trembling…

“What would a prissy little girl like you know?! The more I learned about the ancient civilization’s technology, the more I could only despair at the technology we had lost! You have no idea how deeply I wish to have been born in the ancient past! When Gould appeared in front of me, I could only think it a god- given duty! Chrom Ranchesse, the man who knew all of ancient Gollem technology, had appeared before me! I was chosen as Chrom Ranchesse’s successor! And so, I abandoned everything for that purpose!”

“That’s why you became a wicked devout?” “How foolish…”

Faced with their fellow great gollemancer’s monologue, Doctor Elluka and the Professor could feel only disappointment.

The idea of selling one’s body and soul for some unknown technology wasn’t something I could comprehend as a nonscientist. What had happened was the thing he wanted had been dangled in front of his face and he’d bit into it without so much as sparing a second thought… He really was narrow-minded.

“Well, it’s your life to live. If you wanna sell it to the devil, go right ahead,” Doc Babylon said with a shrug. “But I can’t let you drag other people’s souls with you. Right, Kuon?”

“I agree.”

“Hmm?!”

The Maestro rolled out of the way of Kuon’s sudden slash from behind.

When did you get here?!

I could see Steph and Allis riding Kohaku behind him. Gold was there too.

They must have come running from the city.

“You! You’re that wretched child who took down Graphite!”

“Graphite? Sorry, I don’t know who that is,” Kuon replied, tilting his head as he tried to remember.

“Probably that old geezer, kiddo,” Silver supplied for him.

It seemed my worries had been right—the wicked devout had seen the data of Kuon that their bird Gollem had recorded.

The Maestro’s caution was clear as he readied his metallic red rapier. Flames exploded along the thin blade, turning into a slashing wave aimed right at Kuon. Luckily, Kuon seemed to have predicted the attack and very easily dodged.

No, not seemed to. He did predict it.

His right eye was an orange-gold—he’d used his Mystic Eye of Precognition.

Waves of flame were shot out again and again, but Kuon danced from left to right, avoiding them all.

“You slippery little brat!”

The sword in the Maestro’s hand seemed to blur slightly before a second sword appeared underneath that, which he then grabbed with his other hand.

Double the swords meant double the fire slashes.

“This is a bit much even for me…” Kuon muttered. “[Slip].”

Huh?!

Kuon leaped to the side, then suddenly he was sliding along the ground as if he were trying to do a soccer tackle. No, he was spinning around in circles! After he jumped, he’d used [Slip] to remove the friction from the ground, then used that momentum to slide! Thankfully, I didn’t think he would suffer any scrapes due to the friction being gone, but I hadn’t ever considered using the spell like that!

“It looks pretty lame, so I’d rather I didn’t have to do this…”

This was true. Since the friction was completely gone, it was impossible for Kuon to stand up straight or keep his posture. He looked really stupi—er, surreal as he slid around everywhere. I’d rather not have to do that myself.

“Couldn’t ya have used that mighty useful magic-killin’ eye of yours?”

“It wouldn’t remove the fire, and I’ve already used my Mystic Eye too much already. If I could’ve, I would’ve.”

Kuon’s Mystic Eyes were incredibly useful, but using it in quick succession put a real burden on his body. I wish he wouldn’t fight so precariously, honestly…

Kuon canceled his [Slip] magic and stood back up. He suddenly had a little platinum ball floating around him like a satellite.

“Sacred treasure equip.”

The ball separated into threads and took a new form in Kuon’s hand: It was a sacred treasure shaped like a gun-sword that looked similar to my Brunhild, but with a revolver and trigger attached.

Kuon aimed the tip of the blade at the Maestro and pulled the trigger. A bullet of condensed divinity fired from the barrel—the Maestro looked ready to try to deal with it using his wicked vessel, but he suddenly changed his mind and narrowly dodged it instead.

“I remember now. That weapon is the one that prevented Graphite from regenerating and shattered his wicked vessel, isn’t it?”

“Gosh, seems the guy was spoiled, kiddo.”

“That’s fine. We have our own way to deal with this.”

The Maestro had probably watched the battle between Kuon and the scepter- wielding wicked devout on the footage from the bird Gollem. He seemed even more cautious than before. I couldn’t blame him—Kuon was his natural enemy here.

Kuon continued firing shots at the Maestro, but he was able to dodge them all.

Aren’t you a scientist? Why are you so good at this?

His physical body must’ve gotten stronger when he became a wicked devout…

“Those bullets of yours are simple to dodge! If you can’t hit me with them, then there’s no chance you can—”

“Oh, I knew I wouldn’t be able to hit you with them. I was just luring you into a blind spot.”

“You were doing what…?”

The Maestro’s head suddenly whipped up as he checked his surroundings. The arachne Gollem’s legs were sticking out of the ground right beside him, blocking his view. Behind that leg was Mioparade. However, what I could see from my angle was something else, and suddenly, I grew fully aware of what Kuon was planning.

A large boom sounded from afar and then the leg that had been blocking the Maestro’s view was being torn apart, a massive phrasium bullet headed right for the wicked devout.

“Gwblurgh?!”

Not expecting the sudden bullet, the Maestro took Brunhilde’s crystal round straight to the face, his body being sent flying and tumbling across the ground.

“Mother’s aim is as impeccable as always.”

“Eurgh… Kiddo, your mama’s got no mercy, that’s fer sure… Like mother, like son…” Silver mumbled, sounding all too put off by the whole affair. I couldn’t entirely blame him…

Did they plan the surprise attack before Kuon came here?

Even though the Maestro took a direct hit, he was still a wicked devout, so that wouldn’t be enough to kill him. In fact, it would be outright impossible without using divinity or a sacred treasure. His body was falling apart, limbs torn from their sockets, but he was already beginning to regenerate.

Naturally, my son couldn’t just sit and let that happen. Kuon shot another bullet from the sacred treasure and, unable to even move, the Maestro took the shot square in his left arm. Those bullets were just balls of divinity, so the moment it hit, his whole lower arm tore right off, dissolving into sand and dispersing into the wind.

“I can’t regenerate?!”

I couldn’t see under that plague mask, but it was easy to guess that he was shocked. Now that he was in range, Kuon had managed to activate Divinity Neutralization.

Really, the Maestro should’ve known this would happen if he’d seen Kuon fighting the wicked devout with the goat skull, but I suppose there was a difference between watching something and experiencing it for yourself.

Kuon fired another round, likely just a regular mana bullet. Since the neutralization was in effect, he shouldn’t have been able to fire a divine bullet.

“Guh!”

Even with his legs torn to shreds, the Maestro still managed to dodge to the side. No longer was there the calm precision from before, however; there was a clear desperation in his movements.

“I suppose this is all I can do!”

The Maestro pulled a test tube from his waist and smashed it into the ground.

The moment the glass shattered, a raging fire exploded around the scientist.

Did he blow himself up?

“Did the guy get a bit too desperate?” Silver mused. “No, this is…”

As Kuon shielded his eyes from the curtain of flames, a cargo Gollem shaped like a centipede burst out of the flames with the Maestro on its back, charging away from Kuon at an insane speed.

“So fast! Is that mad scientist tryna make his escape now?!”

“I definitely can’t keep up with that,” Kuon said. “Steph, think you can manage?”

“Easy-peasy! [Accel]!”

Steph zoomed ahead like a rocket. Kuon returned the sacred treasure to its sphere form and threw it at his sister as she passed. The platinum sphere began circling Steph this time.

“Sacred treasure equip!”

The sacred treasure separated into threads once more and took another new form: a huge shield. Steph boosting her speed with [Accel] was far faster than the many-legged Gollem crawling away—the distance was constantly closing.

“[Prison]!”

“What in the hells?!” the Maestro exclaimed. “Hiyaaaaaaaaah!”

Steph kicked the ground as hard as she could and charged forward while encased in the [Prison]. The thrust of Steph’s tackle was truly comparable to a rocket as she slammed right into the Maestro and sent him flying.

I feel like I heard a really loud crack just now… Must’ve been a problem with Reginleif’s directional mic.

“Gwah!”

After being slammed into from behind, the Maestro bounced along the ground like a stone skimming across water. Now that the multilegged Gollem was lighter, it sped away into the distance, leaving its owner behind.

“Nrgh! I won’t let things end here!”

Despite having lost his left arm, the beat-up Maestro took out his rapier and slashed at Steph. Steph was standing proud with no signs of attempting to dodge, as if she thought her [Prison] would be more than enough to protect her.

You silly little girl!

“Heh heh, you’ll never hit m—”

The [Prison] suddenly cracked and Steph’s confident expression faltered.

The Maestro’s second slash shattered the barrier completely and Steph frantically dodged.

“Steph! Didn’t I tell you that [Prison] doesn’t work against a wicked vessel?!

Use Divinity Neutralization!” “Oh, right!”

I explained it to you clearly! Either you weren’t listening or you’ve just completely forgotten!

This time, Steph made sure to block with the sacred treasure, the Maestro’s sword colliding with her shield as she activated the neutralization.

Unfortunately, the range of neutralization with Steph’s shield was only about two meters, but at that distance, [Prison] should be effective, so it would probably be fine.

“Grah…!”

The Maestro sent out a wave of angry thrusts, but Steph blocked them all with her shield. She was only five, but after playing with the gods of swords and combat daily, she was able to see all of the attacks coming her way. Although, since Steph’s shield was a curved rectangular shape, she didn’t need to move that much to block any of the incoming thrusts.

“Soon, all of Chrom Ranchesse’s inventions will be mine! I refuse to let children like you get in my way!”

“Grr! I don’t care!”

“You’re all such creepy little brats!”

The Maestro started kicking Steph’s shield, the direct hits enough to knock Steph off-balance; her body was too small to completely take the impact from a physical strike. [Prison] would soak up any damage, but I was still about to lose my temper at the Maestro for daring to try to kick my daughter even through the shield—and then Steph snapped first.

“Stop iiiiiiiiiiiiiiit!” “Gyoooh!”

Right before one of the Maestro’s kicks landed, Steph grabbed the bottom of her shield with both hands and leaped into the air before slamming it down on the Maestro’s head, as if squashing a bug. Having taken a direct hit from the sacred treasure, the Maestro slumped onto the ground, his red rapier rolling out of his grip.

“Girls don’t like annoying crows!”

Face puffed up, Steph slammed her shield into the ground. The next moment, there was the sound of metal cracking.

“Eh?”

“Huh?!”

Underneath the shield that Steph had just slammed down was the red rapier, now broken in two.

She…didn’t mean to do that, did she?

The Maestro’s body began disintegrating into dust. “How could this be?! Gould! No, not yet! I haven’t…!”

The Maestro reached his hand forward, but it too soon turned into dust. On the monitor, I could see Gould hovering from afar—that must have been what the Maestro saw in his final moments. With his body now blowing away in the wind, the man left behind only his clothes, equipment, and plague doctor’s mask.

“This is a great loss…” the Professor said solemnly. “Despite what young Babylon said, he was truly a genius when it came to improving existing works, even if he was not proficient at creating new inventions himself. You could say that he had the ability to make an invention even better than its inventor. He would have reached great heights as someone’s assistant—no, their partner, even.”

“He’d have been too prideful for that. That was part of why I disliked him,” Doctor Elluka spat.

I could see the Professor’s pity and Doctor Elluka’s simmering anger, but Doc Babylon was simply taking a drag from her aroma pipe.

“Almost all exceptional scientists have an insatiable curiosity burning inside them. It’s what allows them to power toward their goal, their beliefs unwavering. Just one wrong turn in life and we might have turned out just like him.”

Those words held significant weight coming from Doc Babylon herself, given she’d made huge humanoid robots and homunculi. Imagining the future had she been on the other side was pretty scary. Though in my mind, all magitech and Gollem engineers were a little messed up in the head.

“Anyway, all that’s left to do is clean up the Kyklops that are left. Dauburn’s safe, so you just need to go to Gardio, Xenoahs, and Regulus… Oh?”

“Touya, we have defeated the Kyklops in Regulus.” “Xenoahs too.”

Just as Doc Babylon was detailing what was left to do, Lu and Sakura sent over their own reports. That meant only Gardio was left, the place that had the most mechimera soldiers and Kyklops. Elze, Linze, and Leen all still appeared to be locked in battle.

We’d better get over there and support them. We can just leave behind enough Frame Gears for each country to finish the cleanup.

I opened up communications to ask Cesca to calculate how many units I’d need to transport.