Characters

Prologue

PROLOGUE

A car barreled down the freeway in the night, its interior a mess of jumbled radio transmissions.

“This is Squad One! Confirming the sinking of Squad Four!”

“Squad Six is done for. The rest is up to you! Aaaagh.”

Occasionally, the sound of something bursting would echo, causing the radio transmissions to cut out. The man sitting in the passenger seat clicked his tongue as he adjusted the radio channel.

“Dammit. They’ve already taken out half of us,” he muttered, shifting his gaze to the rearview mirror. The girl in the back seat, Holy, felt the man’s eyes on her and grimaced.

This situation was undoubtedly her fault. Even she knew that. But she didn’t have the power to do anything about it now.

Averting her gaze in frustration, Holy stared at her reflection in the cracked glass of the window.

She saw a girl with blue eyes and silver hair done in a half-up style. The girl was so frail that she looked like she might shatter to pieces from a single blow. Light from the streetlamps reflected off her pale face, and her lips were trembling involuntarily.

Holy was scared, no question about it. She was also overcome with guilt, regretting her decision now that so many people had gotten involved upon her request. And she didn’t even know if she’d had any real confidence in her choice to begin with. That was why she was so frightened.

Holy shook her head, dismissing her doubt. At this point, it was far too late to turn back.

The car she was in had its headlights off and was speeding alongside the large river that ran through the northern region of the Balga Empire. Against the pitch-black sky, free from even the glow of the moon and the stars, they could see several rotary-wing aircraft shining spotlights on the river.

The aircraft were chasing high-speed boats running along the surface of the water. The boats’ crew members had just contacted them over the radio. Each time an explosion went off over the river, another batch of people who were trying to help her escape lost their lives.

Unable to bear it, Holy bit down on her lip.

“We’ll be arriving at the scheduled port momentarily. It’ll be do-or-die while our guys divert our pursuers’ attention.”

Between radio transmissions, the men in the vehicle started the final briefing session. As Holy listened to them, she finally realized the urgency of the situation.

“The Informationist aiding us isn’t going to make it in time. We depart as soon as she gets on the boat. Got that?!”

Four men, all with bloodshot eyes, were in the cramped vehicle.

The car crossed lanes and sped into the port. Even as they raced between the stacked shipping containers, flames continued to rise from the large river.

At last, they caught sight of the boat they were seeking. The car moved toward the black high-speed craft bobbing on the waves. However, the driver slammed on the brakes well before they reached the appointed location.

Holy lurched forward, her whole body slamming into the seat in front of her. The inside of the vehicle was in an uproar, and the driver raised his voice.

“Fuck! They got here before us—”

The moment the driver shouted, there came the sound of gunfire, and a crack spread across the windshield. The driver’s head shot up, and something sprayed inside the car.

Fluid dripped from the ceiling onto Holy’s cheek. For a moment, time stood still. She felt like a scream might erupt from her twitching lips, but the angry bellows of the other men in the vehicle rang out before that.

“It’s an ambush! Get out of the car!”

The remaining men crouched as they made their exit, dragging Holy out along with them.

For the briefest of moments, they grimaced at the cold outside air enveloping their bodies. The next instant, they were assailed by a barrage of gunfire.

Holy let out a small scream at the shards of glass raining down from above their heads. The man crouched next to her took her in his arms to protect her, letting out a hearty yell that could be heard over the sound of the gunfire.

“Run to the ship!” he shouted. “She’s gotta get away, no matter what it takes!”

The men exchanged looks to confirm one another’s intentions. The hope to evade death disappeared from their eyes, replaced by a resolve to throw everything away. They were putting their lives on the line. They stood up solely to protect Holy.

The men started running, keeping Holy in the middle to protect her. Although she was terrified, she had no choice but to follow their lead.

The path ahead was obscured by darkness. Her only guideposts were the glow of the flaming corpses on the surface of the river in the distance.

Holy ran frantically, her breath visible in the cold air as she exhaled. She was already parched from the extreme tension, and she couldn’t breathe properly. She felt like she might fall over at any moment.

From an outside perspective, she undoubtedly wasn’t even running correctly. She was leaning forward, her center of gravity swinging from side to side, and exerting herself so much that her vision kept going dark.

But reality betrayed her determination, delivering a cruel twist of fate.

Out of the corner of her eye, Holy saw the man running next to her collapse. He fell flat on his face on the ground, like a marionette whose strings had been cut. Then the man running behind her screamed. The shriek was only half out of his mouth before it was silenced by the sound of gunfire.

The boat they were aiming for was only about 160 feet ahead of her. If they could just board that rugged high-speed craft, they would be saved. So then why did it look so far away? The several dozen feet remaining blurred with Holy’s tears, seeming endlessly distant.

Just then, Holy felt a hand creep up from behind and wrap around her neck. A chill ran through her, her heart practically stopping, and she reached out toward the man running ahead of her to seek help.

“W-wait!”

The man looked back at the sound Holy’s voice, but a bullet grazed past the tips of her fingers, the lead mass piercing the man between his brows like a hot knife through butter.

The moment after Holy saw this, a spatter of blood stole her vision. She quickly wiped her face but not soon enough to avoid stumbling spectacularly over the fallen man’s body.

“Ahhh!”

Her vision went black. The next thing she knew, she was hitting the cold, firm ground. Tumbling hard, as though someone had slammed her onto the pavement, she let out a short scream.

“It’s time to stop running. There’s no point in struggling anymore,” a voice called out to her from behind in the darkness. At the same time, numerous soldiers emerged from the shadows, all wearing identical military uniforms. In the center stood a single captain wearing a beret.

Holy stared firmly at him. He shook his head as if he was astounded.

“You didn’t actually think you’d be able to defect, did you? This is your chance. Give in.”

Holy attempted to pick herself off the ground as she listened to him.

She was trembling with cold, fear, and pain, but she clenched her back teeth and turned to catch a glimpse of the high-speed boat behind her.

The boat was just a stone’s throw away. She tried to stand up, thinking there was still hope if she could find an opening.

However, the captain saw through her half-baked idea and snapped his fingers.

On his cue, white flames suddenly rose in front of Holy’s eyes. The light, overwhelmingly intense in the darkness of the night, appeared to be emanating from the boat itself. What in the world was that?

A moment later, the hot air hitting her cheeks told her everything she needed to know: The boat she was supposed to board had exploded. Her last hope, so close that she felt like she could touch it if she stretched out her hand, had been completely obliterated in an instant.

After a pause, tiny fragments of metal came raining down on them from the sky. The surface of the water rocked violently, drenching the area in splashes. Holy looked up at the smoke rising to the sky and was left speechless.

Debris from the boat, reduced to smithereens, tumbled to the ground by Holy’s feet. She had once dreamed of riding this vessel to freedom.

But now it was meaningless. It had become literal debris, useless trash.

Holy couldn’t tear her eyes from the cruel turn of events. Collapsing to her knees, she sat and whispered faintly through her trembling lips.

“No, it can’t be. Not like this.”

The already dark port slowly turned pitch-black. The sounds in her ears grew distant, and she started feeling groggy. Her spirit broken, Holy looked up at the soldiers inching toward her.

As the captain stared down at the now-helpless girl, a sadistic grin appeared on his face. He gave orders to his troops in a cold tone.

“Restrain her. Don’t worry about being rough.”

Several armed soldiers approached and violently pinned down the fragile girl.

As she was forced against the cold asphalt still covered in snow, Holy cried silently. This was as far as she would get. The tiny sliver of hope she had been desperately clinging to vanished before her eyes.

The landscape was entirely swallowed by darkness, blurry through her tears. This is where she would die. As she faced the end, her feelings dissolved into the night.

She should just give up. She had given her all. Even if she died, she had done everything she could. Trying to console herself, Holy suppressed the sobs welling up from inside. And then, in an attempt to accept the end, she began to slowly close her eyes.

But just before she could shut them entirely, something met her gaze. Two objects, swaying eerily before the despairing girl’s half-shut eyes; in the tear-blurred darkness, they looked like will-o’-the-wisps.

The shining blue lights weren’t a good memory, or anything of the sort. But for some reason, the moment she saw them, a strange hope reappeared in her heart.

She hadn’t come up with a plan, but she instinctively drew in a breath and parted her lips, which now tasted of metal.

“Over here! Help!”

Her abrupt plea was loud, almost a scream. The captain looked up in surprise, then followed her gaze. His expression stiffened.

“It’s an Informationist! Kill him!”

At the captain’s command, the soldiers simultaneously pointed their guns at the dark and blasted away without remorse. Holy covered her ears. The volley of gunfire seemed like it would rupture her eardrums if she didn’t.

So many spent shell casings dropped to the ground that there was nowhere to step. The soldiers had fired thousands of bullets at their target.

But, unbelievably, none of the shots found their mark.

As if there was something between them and their target, the bullets swerved off their trajectories, flying every which way. In the center of the disturbance, the blue lights approached, leaving lingering afterimages as they flickered.

Holy stared intently at the unknown figure. Shining like a flashlight, they grew more visible by the instant, their true form gradually coming into focus as they crept from the darkness.

The captain backed away, afraid of the lone Informationist. Following his lead, the soldiers also started withdrawing. Regardless of how many bullets they shot, the Informationist never slowed. Terror began to overtake the soldiers.

The impulse to retreat spread through the entire troop, eventually reaching the men near Holy. The soldier who had been pinning her down slowly rose to his feet and grabbed her by the hair.

He forced her to her feet, the pain making her snap back to reality. Holy squirmed and twisted around, screaming.

“Stop! Let me go!”

Right after that, the soldier who had grabbed her suddenly burst into flames, releasing an inhuman shriek. Now free, Holy tumbled to the ground half in fear.

She couldn’t make sense of what had just happened.

“Wh-what?”

Shaken, she felt a presence approach her from behind. She nervously lifted her gaze to it.

A man appeared before her, illuminated by the light of the burning soldiers. Two ominously glowing eyes looked down at her.

Despite the bitter cold of winter, he was only wearing a midlength jacket, a wrinkled shirt, and boots.

His purple-tinted black hair was unkempt, with the messy ends falling in front of his eyes. He had a slim face without any excess flesh on his cheeks, and his lips were pale. At first glance, his appearance gave the impression of weakness, but this contrasted sharply with the unusual gleam in his eyes.

“Keep crouching for a bit. It’ll be over soon,” he said bluntly. Not comprehending the meaning of his words, Holy just froze with her mouth hanging opening.

Turning away from Holy, the man faced the soldiers. Despite being at an overwhelming numerical disadvantage, he didn’t seem bothered in the slightest. His absolute confidence was reflected in his posture.

The man stretched out his arm as if he were taking aim, making his eyes glow intensely once again. As he did that, the space around him looked slightly distorted, and then, seemingly out of nowhere, he unleashed upon the soldiers a brilliant white heat ray that seared the air.

The heat ray collided with the soldiers, burning through countless lined-up shipping containers and steel frames in the process. Screams, mayhem, and then shouts rang out. In the last moment, the tides of battle had been reversed in an instant by the lone Informationist.

The flames of torch after torch ignited, lining the previously dark harbor and using the soldiers as fuel. The flames were so intense that other light sources were unnecessary.

This was hell. The blaze was reminiscent of sinners burning in hellfire, and Holy’s breath caught in her throat. The bone-chilling cold she had felt just moments ago had instantly turned to a sweltering heat.

With this surreal sight in front of her, Holy looked up at the man standing beside her.

He had unmistakably saved her from danger, but Holy couldn’t genuinely consider him a hero. Something just felt off about him. Faintly illuminated, he was smiling demonically.

More soldiers appeared one after the other, and he incinerated every last one of them, completely quelling their attack. And yet he was grinning the entire time. No hero looked like this.

The area fell dead quiet, and the man finally dimmed the blue lights in his eyes. With almost all the soldiers dead, he looked out over the harbor, which was now nothing but flames and ash, and pulled a cigarette from his pocket.

“Who are you?” Holy asked the man as she tried to stop her arms from shaking. He struck an old oil lighter, lit the end of his cigarette, and looked at her.

“Tsushima Rindou. I received a request.”

His response made everything click. This man was the Informationist that Storm Hill asked to assist in her defection.

A feeling of relief welled up in her chest alongside a feeling of regret. She wiped her tearstained face and stood up. Then she strengthened the tone of her voice in order to hide her fear and weakness.

“You’re late! Why didn’t you come sooner? Everyone, absolutely everyone is dead!” Holy’s voice trembled as her emotions unconsciously boiled over, but she confronted the Informationist regardless. Tsushima, however, glanced at the corpses she pointed at with eyes completely devoid of emotion.

“But you’re alive. Isn’t that something to be happy about?”

“Uh…” Holy was at a loss for words. A heavy sensation welled up in her heart. The feeling was probably mostly self-loathing, but she couldn’t find the words to adequately express it.

Faced with Tsushima’s indifferent stare, Holy found herself unable to argue further. He clearly had the gaze of someone who lived in and saw a different world than she did.

Tsushima looked down at Holy, eyes teary and fists clenched, and sighed.

“Those men had no choice but to die here. That was what they had to do to protect you. Looking at the results, you could say they did a satisfactory job,” Tsushima stated flatly, exhaling smoke. Although Holy knew she had no right to talk back, she glared at him accusingly.

“Are you suggesting it’s fine they died on the job? They would’ve wanted to live!” As she spoke, Holy’s heart ached at her contradictory statement. She was the one who had let them die. She had no right to say that.

Unable to properly sort through her muddled emotions, Holy looked down as warm tears welled up in her eyes. Tsushima’s next words left her as rattled as if he had struck the top of her head.

“Sometimes people die for their missions. I’m just saying they would have wanted that,” Tsushima said coldly before putting his cigarette in his mouth. Holy clenched her fists tightly at his words.

“Are all Informationists this heartless?”

“Beats me. Ask another Informationist that kind of nonsense,” Tsushima retorted with apparent disinterest. He glanced at Holy before turning his back to her. “Let’s get out of here before more of your pursuers show up. Follow me.”

Watching Tsushima melt into the darkness of night once again, Holy felt an emotion similar to fear. She couldn’t readily believe he was an ally, but there was nobody else she could rely on. Feeling frustrated, Holy had no choice but to follow him.

Chapter 1

CHAPTER1

Along a narrow road still covered in snow, a small car was parked in front of a clothing store in a quiet, sparsely populated area. Tsushima, an air of exhaustion about him, smoked a cigarette under an overcast sky.

The smoke he exhaled was heavier than usual and didn’t rise into the air. It was just like his state of mind.

“To think I’m in this country protecting a brat, of all things!”

His depressed mutterings seeped into the piled snow and faded away. Then he heard the chime of a door opening, as if it were continuing his soliloquy.

Tsushima threw away his cigarette butt and looked at the store entrance. A girl with elegant silver hair and blue eyes was standing there. Holy’s pale skin was a perfect match for the snow. She looked somewhat dissatisfied as she checked out her newly bought clothes.

She was wearing a white secondhand shirt with a worn-out skirt. The outfit definitely wasn’t out of place. The length was a little off, but that was likely due to her slim frame. This was as good as it would get.

As Tsushima inspected her outfit, his gaze met Holy’s, and her expression changed to one of undisguised hostility.

“What? Something wrong?” she demanded. Tsushima lightly shrugged.

“Nope. It’s somewhat better than bloodstained clothes. Get in.”

Tsushima opened the door on the passenger’s side and beckoned her into the car. She got in without making eye contact with him at all. He deliberately closed the door roughly and let out a sigh.

“This is why I hate kids.” Tsushima reaffirmed his perception that he was bad at dealing with young people, then got into the driver’s seat.

After the massive manhunt at the port the previous night, the two of them had driven all night without getting a wink of sleep. Thanks to that, there was no sign of anyone following them, and it appeared they had managed to slip through the security net. Their decision to forgo sleep had also given them time to replace Holy’s clothes, which had been stained with blood, mud, and soot.

Glad to be free of her unpleasant outfit, Holy sighed slightly and looked out the window in the seat next to Tsushima.

As they drove along the snowy road, the car bouncing up and down, Holy finally opened her mouth just as the heater started working.

“Thanks for saving me yesterday,” she said abruptly, keeping her face turned away so her expression was out of view.

“Just doing my job,” Tsushima replied offhandedly, his hands still on the steering wheel.

“Speaking of which, you’re the Informationist that Storm Hill arranged to help me defect, right?”

“Yeah. I’m Tsushima Rindou, a level-seven Informationist from the Free City of Elbar.”

The girl listened to his simple introduction, then peered out of the corners of her eyes at Tsushima once again. Her gaze was clearly not friendly, and it carried a question, which he responded to.

“Dissatisfied with something?” he asked.

“Not particularly,” Holy stated firmly, as if she had no interest in who he was, and she started taking off her shoes. She struggled with her shoelaces for a while, but she lifted her head when she noticed Tsushima’s gaze.

“What?”

“I told you my name. Now it’s your turn.”

His request was quite reasonable, but for some reason, it offended her even more. She puffed out her cheeks and then begrudgingly spat out her response.

“My name is Holy. It’s an alias. I’m the youngest child of a local noble family and wish to defect to Elbar for various reasons. Didn’t you hear about me when you received the request?”

“I was just verifying the facts.”

Partly exasperated by Holy’s defiant attitude, Tsushima took his cigarettes from his pocket. As he pulled one from the brand-new gray pack, Holy screwed up her face.

“Could you not? I can’t stand you smoking when we’re both in this small, enclosed space.”

Tsushima snorted and took out his lighter regardless.

“Deal with it. We won’t be together that long anyway,” he declared, striking his lighter. The inside of the car immediately filled with the smell of cigarette smoke. Holy shook her head as if she had just witnessed something unbelievable.

“You’re an Informationist, right? Aren’t cigarettes supposed to be strictly prohibited for your kind, since they mess with the flow of blood to the brain?”

“I’m glad you seem so knowledgeable. But I’m good at what I do, so a little nicotine isn’t going to dampen my skills.”

Tsushima seemed to savor the sensation of being enveloped in smoke. Holy glared at him as if he were filth.

Informationist was the general term for the small percentage of people in the world who possessed special abilities.

Informationists could generate almost any scientifically feasible phenomenon by executing Codes. They would construct a Code in their brain and send it through their eyeballs to information factors in the atmosphere, producing various phenomena. Typically, their irises would take on a blue glow as a consequence of doing this.

People had once called their powers magic or alchemy, but now their abilities were currently understood to function within the laws of science.

Alcohol and nicotine had adverse effects on their powers, so many Informationists tended to dislike those substances.

But Tsushima, an exception to the rule, continued talking with the cigarette in his mouth.

“They were supposed to hand you over tomorrow. What the hell happened?”

Holy shook her head as she undid her shoelaces.

“I have no idea, either. That was the plan, but the next thing we knew, those guys were chasing us, and before we could do anything about it, they forced us to the port. Then you showed up. That’s all.”

Roughly tossing aside the shoes she had taken off, Holy sat with her feet on the seat, her arms wrapped around her legs. The passenger seat was by no means spacious, but she was easily able to sit with her legs up. Her frame was even more delicate than Tsushima had imagined.

With a quiet sniff, Holy buried her face in her knees, her shoulders trembling slightly. She was probably thinking back to what had happened at the port. No matter how tough she acted, she was still just a young girl at heart.

Tsushima spoke up again, softening his tone just enough to reflect his feelings.

“That group was the Fourth Division. They’re a regular unit of the Balga Imperial Army. What the hell did you do to get those guys on your tail?”

“That doesn’t concern you,” Holy said coldly before clamming up. Tsushima cracked the car window and let out a sigh at the same time he exhaled a plume of cigarette smoke.

The Balga Empire was a massive nation counted among the world’s three great powers. It possessed the largest territory of any existing country and fought for supremacy in all areas, including military and economics.

What did it mean for a country like that to target you? Even Tsushima knew enough to be aware of the implications.

Tsushima cleared his throat in annoyance and resumed the conversation.

“Well, whatever. Getting you out of the country is my job. As for the plan going forward, we’ll proceed according to the prior arrangements and head to Sherun. From there, we’ll use the railroad to go to the international port by Middle Sea, then take an international ship bound for Elbar, and you flee the country. Got it?”

“Uhhh, hang on. I can’t follow if you say it that quickly. Go over it again.”

Holy hastily corrected her posture as Tsushima had suddenly started explaining crucial details. She found a map of the entire empire tucked in the sun visor and pulled it out.

She opened the map, which had been folded multiple times. “We should be here, right?” she muttered.

Even from a distance, Tushima could see Holy had gotten their location wrong from the point of departure. She hadn’t even realized she was holding the map upside down.

And yet she was still frantically searching for place names on the map with a serious expression, which made Tsushima slump. He reached out from the driver’s seat and placed his index finger on the map.

“This is where we are now, the northernmost area of the Balga Empire. And the place we’re heading to is the Free City of Elbar, which is here.”

Tsushima traced his fingertip from the northwest of the Empire’s territory to the distant south, then stopped in the farthest corner of the map, pointing even farther across the sea.

In this world, many nations, the Balga Empire included, were part of a giant continent. In the center of that landmass was a large body of water called the Middle Sea.

There was a small island in the center of the Middle Sea, and it was home to the Free City of Elbar, Holy’s final destination.

“The international port is here. During the departure procedures, you’ll use a fake passport to enter Elbar. After that, your comrades from Storm Hill should have arranged a place to live and an identity for you. At any rate, if everything goes smoothly, this should all be over in about three days.”

Storm Hill was the name of the anti-government organization that had hired Tsushima. The people who had died protecting Holy at the port the previous night were also members of Storm Hill. Normally, he would’ve liked to have exchanged more information with them, but that hadn’t been in the cards, given the circumstances.

Tsushima crammed his cigarette butt into the ashtray and leaned back in his seat. Even though he’d moved away, Holy, with a slightly troubled expression, was still having a staring contest with the map.

Then she looked at him in the seat next to her, as if a question had occurred to her.

“You know a lot about this country’s geography. Are you originally from the Balga Empire, by any chance?”

“Most competent adults can read a map, you know.”

“…You’re real funny, huh?”

Holy frowned, taking Tsushima’s sarcasm head-on. Tsushima took the hint.

“It’s not my first time being in this country,” he replied seriously. “I actually know it quite well. So don’t worry. No chance of us getting lost.”

“Whatever. Just because you can read a map doesn’t mean you won’t get lost sometimes.”

Letting her retort sit with him, Holy let out a big yawn. Noticing her slight carelessness, she hastily covered her mouth and casually glanced at Tsushima to make sure he hadn’t seen her just now.

He hadn’t missed anything, of course. He gave a slight shrug.

“No one should be coming after us for a while. Rest a bit.”

“I’m all right. I can miss a little sleep.”

“You won’t be able to rest if your pursuers come in the night. So I’m telling you to get some now while you have the chance. Don’t think I’m being considerate,” Tsushima said in a clearly detached way. Holy seemed to disapprove of his attitude, but sure enough, she appeared sleepy. She blinked her large eyes several times and obediently reclined her seat.

She was just like any other adolescent girl—annoying. Tsushima suppressed the urge to sigh and adjusted his grip on the steering wheel.

But Tsushima didn’t have Holy entirely figured out. After lying down for only a few seconds, the girl sat back up again.

“What?” Tsushima asked. “I get that it might not be comfortable, but you’re just going to have to deal with it.”

“It’s not that. Well, there is that, too. But this is more serious.”

Tsushima looked wearily at her.

“Can you guarantee I’ll be all right sleeping next to you?” Holy asked with a very matter-of-fact expression.

What in the world was this girl saying? His befuddlement clear on his face, Tsushima gave his retort.

“What does that mean?”

“I mean, think about it. This may be a car, but I’m still alone in a confined space with a man I don’t know. There’s a chance you might do something to me, right?”

Leave it to a well-bred young lady to be so wary. Her using this unusual hypothetical as a pretext was all the more annoying. Tsushima looked up in exasperation, finding her statement absurd.

“Unfortunately, I’m not stupid enough to lust after a little girl like you,” he said, intending to reassure Holy. But this backfired.

Holy seemed to have taken his words as a twofold insult, believing he had called her both unattractive and a child. Her cheeks flushed as she stumbled over her response.

“Th-there’s more to me than you think!”

She seemed like she was about to blurt out something, so Tsushima held up a hand to stop her and shook his head in disbelief.

“That’s enough. Just go to sleep before we both regret what we’ve said.”

Holy rubbed her chest, exuding a strange sense of defeat. Tsushima hadn’t intended to criticize her to that extent, but it was already too late.

Having suffered unnecessary emotional damage, she quietly reclined in her seat. After a brief pause, Tsushima heard her mutter something. He couldn’t make out exactly what she was saying, but she seemed to be grumbling some complaints.

Tsushima decided to quietly put on the radio and pretend he hadn’t heard her. Easygoing country music unsuitable for the situation played in the car, and it was only a few minutes before Tsushima heard the sound of her sleeping.

After driving for a few hours, Tsushima spotted a house nestled behind a pasture. As he headed down the farm road, where sunlight had started to fade, Holy was roused by the changing vibrations of the vehicle.

She sleepily rubbed her eyes as she sat up, then looked around at the empty landscape outside the window.

“What? Where are we going?”

“I’ve found our lodging for tonight.”

“Our lodging?”

Holy looked out over the empty pasture and tilted her head in confusion, but she was dumbfounded when she spotted the abandoned building farther ahead.

“Huh? Surely you don’t mean we’re staying here?”

“I certainly do.”

Tsushima pulled the car up in front of the house and got out, leaving Holy sitting and staring at the building with her mouth open.

Abandoned buildings like this were not uncommon in the northern region, which the Balga Empire had only recently annexed. The area still bore the scars of the Empire’s war of aggression. Tsushima looked up at the tired remnant of the conflict and walked toward it.

Thick grass was growing around the entrance, but despite the building’s appearance, the pillars and other parts of its construction seemed to be intact. That it was still standing up to this region’s heavy snowfall was proof they could stay the night without worrying.

After he finished looking over the house, Tsushima checked for any signs of pursuers. He surveyed the surrounding area, then let Holy know it was safe.

“It’s all right.”

Holy made a face that said she really didn’t want to get out of the passenger’s seat. She looked at the abandoned house in front of them and muttered, “Hey, I don’t mind if it gets late; can’t we spend the night someplace decent?”

“The empire’s regular army is on the move. If we waltz into an inn nearby, they’ll track us down straightaway. Abandoned buildings are the most convenient place to stay when you’re on the run. That’s what I’ve determined.”

“But this isn’t about convenience.”

Holy seemed nervous and was still making no move to get out of the car.

Without hesitation, Tsushima told her, “It’s much better than camping out in the open.”

“Your comparison is weird. Totally weird,” Holy grumbled as she reluctantly got out of the car. She stuck close behind Tsushima as she stepped firmly on the grass.

The inside of the building was nicer than they had anticipated, and it even had some furniture left behind. As they walked along the creaky floorboards, Tsushima scrutinized every nook and cranny of the place, from the ceiling to the floor.

“It’s not as bad as I thought, is it?” Holy said, sounding completely unassured as she walked hiding behind Tsushima, terrified.

Tsushima pointed to the sofa in the living room.

“Rest over there. I’ll go check the other rooms.”

“No way! Don’t leave me alone in such a creepy place,” Holy retorted before Tsushima finished speaking.

While the outside was bathed in the light of the setting sun, the interior of the building was so dim that they had to strain their eyes to see. It was no stretch for her to call the house creepy.

Despite her irritable front, Holy was clearly frightened.

Tsushima reluctantly took her hand and got her to hold on to his back.

“I don’t think there’ll be anything, but don’t wander off.”

“G-got it.”

Holy was so frightened that it felt like they were visiting a haunted house. Tsushima took her along to check the first and second floors. Every time he opened a door, Holy would become a bundle of nerves, closing her eyes and saying, “Give me a signal when you’re going to open it!” She was seriously slowing him down.

When they finally finished checking all the rooms, the pair took a seat in the living room they’d started in. The world outside was now fully immersed in the dark of night.

Tsushima passed Holy a blanket he had found in a bedroom.

“Thanks,” she said as she accepted it. She gave a big shiver and curled up tightly on the sofa. Tsushima positioned himself by the window, where moonlight was shining in, and focused his attention outside.

Gazing at Tsushima’s back, Holy spoke to him, a little concerned.

“Hey, you should sleep, too.”

“I’m all right. I’ll get some shut-eye when I need to.”

“So you say, but you’ve been up for a whole day, right? You’ll do me no good if you collapse in an emergency.”

Perhaps this was Holy’s way of looking out for him. Tsushima noticed this but maintained his posture.

“If our enemies have figured out our position, they’ll attack us at night. They’ve lost once already in a face-to-face fight, so there’s a good chance they’ll switch to a surprise attack next. The darkness of night is perfect for a sneak attack,” said Tsushima.

“You’re vigilant, aren’t you?”

“It’s part of the job,” Tsushima said, speaking as if he were talking about somebody else. Then he turned to Holy. Her face was surprisingly nonhostile. She had a faraway look in her eyes, as if she was remembering something.

Holy’s expression was slightly unguarded and wrapped in a girlish fragility. For some reason, it evoked an image of her in Tsushima’s memory.

Their faces, their personalities—everything was different. Yet, for some reason, the image of the girl he’d been reminded of was overlapping with Holy. Tsushima clicked his tongue slightly.

Unaware of Tsushima’s feelings, Holy spoke to him in a slightly relaxed tone.

“Hey, can I ask you something?” she began, peeking at him.

Tsushima nodded, still looking out the window.

“You said you’re a level-seven Informationist, right?”

“Yeah, I’m a level seven according to the international standard.”

“You’re lying. Level seven should be average for an Informationist. You’re clearly higher than that.”

Holy pouted, looking discontented. For some reason, she seemed to feel she was being lied to. Tsushima replied indifferently, giving only the facts.

“I haven’t been evaluated for any level higher than this, and I don’t plan to. Many Informationists from the Free City of Elbar originally participated in the War of Independence. We’re way more skilled than Informationists who’ve barely found themselves in real combat situations, like the ones in this country.”

“Are you saying you’ve fought in actual battles?”

“That’s right.”

Appearing satisfied with his explanation, Holy nodded with a light “Hmmmm…”

Informationists were ranked by level according to ability. From levels one through ten, they were evaluated independently, with larger numbers indicating higher levels. Levels five to seven were the most common, and Informationists were considered to be powerful if they were higher than level eight.

Recent years, however, had seen the rise of Informationists who couldn’t be ranked on the standard ten-level scale. To address this, the Exceptional Level System had been established to sort extraordinary Informationists from levels eleven to thirteen through relative comparison.

Exceptional Level was an honorific title given only to those Informationists with abilities surpassing human understanding. Level thirteen was the highest rank, and there were currently only two people in the world who held it.

“In my estimation, you have about the ability of a level nine,” Holy said, then continued speaking to elaborate further. She had done a complete one-eighty from when they were in the car and was now quite chatty.

“They say Informationists can accomplish almost anything on their own, so long as it’s something achievable through science, right? That means they shouldn’t be able to do anything science can’t explain. Your ability looked a bit disconnected from reality, so I figure you must be pretty skilled, right…?”

“You’re strangely well-informed. And here I thought Balga was opposed to Informationists…”

“Isn’t that much just basic knowledge? Well, I do have my reasons for knowing that, though,” Holy said, trailing off while speaking vaguely so as not to touch on the crucial details. Taking her hint, Tsushima deliberately refrained from probing further.

“Even Informationists can’t do anything just because there’s a scientific basis for it. To pull something off, we need to be well- trained and have a sense for crafting Codes.”

“Codes?” Holy repeated, looking a little distressed. It seemed likely her knowledge of Informationists was limited to bits and pieces of information she had heard somewhere.

Since he had said the word, he had no choice but to explain it.

“A Code is kind of like a spell we construct in our brain. Once we’ve interpreted the scientific mechanism of a phenomena, we store the method of using it in our heads as a Code. Some Codes are open to the public, but most Informationists have their own unique ones. The simpler the construction, the quicker it’ll be to execute, and the lighter the strain on the user. That’s why having a knack for creating Codes is also important.”

“Huuuh… So that’s what Codes are.”

Was she impressed or making fun of him? She had spoken in a silly voice while nonchalantly stifling a yawn. Tsushima observed her demeanor and frowned.

“Go to sleep already if you’re tired.”

“I’m okay. Let’s talk for just a little longer. I’ll probably have nightmares if I turn in now.”

She squinted as if gazing into the distance and turned over on the sofa.

Not much time had passed since that dreadful night. Perhaps Holy’s excessive chatter was the flip side of her anxiety. Humoring her, at least a little, was part of looking after her emotional well-being.

Tsushima exchanged a glance with Holy, urging her to talk.

“You said this wasn’t your first time in Balga, right?” she asked.

“Yeah, I’ve been here a few times for work.”

“When was that?”

Tsushima’s face tensed at her probing question. Fortunately for him, however, she probably couldn’t see his expression in the dimly lit room. Holy’s eyes were free from ulterior motives and seemed to bore straight through him.

It had been a long time since he had seen such an innocent gaze, and it put Tsushima in a sentimental mood. A sweet smell arose from the memories he had once put a lid on.

He calmly reached for a cigarette to rid himself of his misleading emotions. Yet, contrary to his expectations, the smoke rising from the cigarette only dragged him into the past.

Something about the current situation had to be dredging up those memories. Otherwise, he would never have spoken about the things he started talking about.

“I used to live here, around ten years back. I worked as a so-called mercenary and just did what the empire told me to do, wandering from battlefield to battlefield. In those days, I would sleep in abandoned buildings like this.”

Tsushima drew on memories that were in the back of his mind. He had experienced many things up to now, but they were all built on the life he had lived in Balga.

How to interact with people. How to survive as an Informationist. How to kill enemies.

Those lessons were extremely bloody and graphic for a child, but he’d learned them calmly. If he hadn’t, he wouldn’t have been able to survive in that environment.

“At least ten years ago would make it around the time of the War to Recapture Jabar, yeah?”

“Yup. I fought in that one, too.”

“By any chance, did you participate in Elbar’s War of Independence?”

“Well, I suppose it turned out that way,” Tsushima replied ambiguously.

The War to Recapture Jabar was a large-scale civil war between Informationists and the government within the Balga Empire twelve years prior. Although the Informationist-led rebel army had gained the upper hand for a time, a group of traitors in their ranks ultimately caused an internal schism, leading to their crushing defeat.

The Informationists who survived went into hiding both within the country and abroad, deciding to regroup after four years had passed. That was when they fought against the world for the sovereignty of Informationists in Elbar’s War of Independence.

From that sequence of events, the War to Recapture Jabar would go down in history as a large-scale conflict that preluded the War of Independence.

“So that’s what you meant when you said you had experience in actual battles,” Holy quietly mumbled in the dark room. Tsushima let out a self-deprecating laugh and shrugged.

“It’s not rare for people in my generation.”

“Were you also born here? What about your family?”

“I’m a war orphan. I don’t know my birth parents or the country where I was born. But I did have someone who was kind of like an elder sister to me.”

As Tsushima spoke, he noticed a twinge in his heart. The memories that were surfacing were at once irreplaceably important and something he didn’t want to recall.

Tsushima’s feelings must have shown on his face. Being considerate, Holy spoke to him gently.

“She must be very dear to you,” she murmured, clutching something at her chest. Tsushima glanced at her briefly, then quietly exhaled.

“She might have been. But that’s something I don’t know about anymore.”

“But it’s your own past we’re talking about. How could you not know?”

“I decided to bury those memories. Recalling them is… They’re painful to think back on, is all.”

Holy fell silent. It was slight, but even she noticed the meaning behind Tsushima’s choice of words.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have asked,” she whispered timidly, her gaze appearing uncomfortable from under the blanket. Tsushima broke into a small grin at the usually defiant girl’s meek apology.

“It’s fine. If not for our present situation, I don’t think I would have dug up those memories.”

“I see. But that’s just a little sad, isn’t it?”

“What is?”

“I mean, the memory of someone important gradually fading? It’s kind of heartbreaking,” Holy said, as if this lined up with one of her own memories. Tsushima hated sentimental conversations. He exhaled smoke and responded in an emotionless tone.

“Forgetting is also important. Painful memories affect your future.”

“Is that what they mean when people say, ‘Experience is the best teacher’?”

“Maybe.”

Holy softened her expression at Tsushima’s abrupt response. Then her eyes took on a sorrowful quality as she looked at the ceiling.

“What do you do if you want to quickly forget a painful memory?”

“What? Have you had your heart broken or something?”

“It’s not that.” Holy directed a damp gaze at Tsushima, who had spoken as if he were mocking her. She puffed out her small cheeks before returning her expression to a slightly more serious one. “I have a tough past, you know. Just maybe not to the same extent as you.”

Holy probably didn’t want to speak on what she’d been through. She went under the blanket up to her neck and let out a loud sigh that even Tsushima could hear.

“I wouldn’t be this troubled over one or two heartbreaks anyway.”

“All teenagers tend to fret about being lovesick over someone. I just figured you’d be the same.”

“Isn’t that exactly what people mean when they say, ‘Experience is the best teacher’?”

With his cigarette still in his mouth, Tsushima fixed his gaze out the window for a little while. Then he quietly exhaled a puff of smoke. Holy grinned at the subtle silence.

“Bull’s-eye, right?”

“Everyone goes through that phase.”

Although she’d seemed drowsy just a moment before, Holy abruptly sat up with a brightened expression. The girl was quick to pick up on talk of love.

Tsushima put on an annoyed look at the obvious aura of an infatuated young girl.

“Do you have a partner?” Holy asked.

“Why do you want to know?”

“Just interested. It’s fine, right? I mean, we’re in an abandoned building! Our moods will just keep sinking unless we talk about something a bit lighthearted.”

Considering that day’s events, they did deserve to relax a bit. Tsushima made a bitter face, overpowered by Holy’s argument for once.

“In both work and my personal life, I find it more convenient to be alone. That’s something a kid like you wouldn’t understand.”

“Huuuuh… So you’re single. You have a nice face, though. Well, I guess the issue is probably what’s on the inside. You get it? What’s. On. The. Inside.”

Holy was taking the opportunity to pick a fight. Wordlessly, Tsushima glared at her with the cigarette in his mouth.

“What? I’m saying this out of the kindness of my heart, you know. I’m trying to give you advice—you’d be more popular if you showed a little more kindness.”

“It’s none of your business.”

Tsushima snuffed out the last bit of his cigarette and walked toward Holy. He grabbed the blanket and threw it over her head.

“Go to sleep already. We have an early day tomorrow as well.”

Holy let out a short shriek, then revealed just her eyes through a gap in the blanket, looking up at Tsushima.

As she watched him try to forcefully dodge the subject, she seemed to understand he wasn’t seriously angry. She quietly chuckled under the blanket.

“I feel like I understand you a bit better now. Thank you for talking to me, Tsushima,” Holy said to him as he turned around to prevent her from seeing the look on his face.

Tsushima hadn’t expected to be thanked for what was just idle chatter. Feeling awkward, he grimaced and reached for a new cigarette.

Somewhere outside the deserted house, a bird called out.

Holy had been visited by this nightmare countless times before.

It was a calm day, when nothing seemed likely to happen.

The sounds of gunfire and screams—sounds that normally shouldn’t have existed—echoed throughout the estate. Contrasting with the cheerful sunlight streaming in, a carpet of blood stretched out before her eyes. One after another, the men rushing in turned to corpses on the floor.

The stench of blood and gunpowder was so bad that you’d think the mansion was the center of a battlefield. Amid the chaos, the girl could do nothing but stand there in shock, her entire body stained red as she watched it happen.

The men assigned as her bodyguards had sacrificed their lives to save her, their bodies piled over her. Thanks to their wall of flesh, she was still alive.

But even as she lay submerged in a sea of blood, all she could do was tremble uncontrollably. In front of her crimson eyes stood the Informationist who was behind it all.

That creature could no longer be called human. Even now, the Informationist screamed as if deranged, continuing to slaughter the reinforcements rushing to help. His wavering, pale blue eyes were once proof of justice, of the knight’s vow to protect the girl.

But that was all in the past. Everything had betrayed her, twisting her reason for existence.

The girl reached out for some fingers that had fallen into a pool of blood. There, she found a silver ring her knight had worn as a symbol of their knighthood.

The ring was wet with blood. She clutched it and let out a sob.

“Why would you, my knight, betray me?”

She closed her tear-filled eyes and covered her face with her hands.

She could no longer bear to face such a horrific reality. She shut her eyes and mouth and covered her ears, closing herself off from everything. It was the only way she could cling to sanity as she waited desperately for the storm to pass.

“Someone…someone save me. Please.”

The girl’s prayers reached no one. Yet there was nothing she could do but continue praying. Saving her from the hell of malicious intent and schemes engulfing the world would definitely not be an easy task.

If there was someone capable of doing so, that person would probably be even more sinister than the devil who had created this nightmare. She had no way of knowing whether such an individual could even be called human.

As Holy began to sense herself slowly awakening from the dream, she heard someone’s voice. The voice pulled her out of the depths of her nightmare. She followed its guidance and gradually returned to the world of reality.

It was early morning, the time of day when it had only just begun to grow light on the far side of the horizon, and Tsushima shook Holy awake as she cried out in her sleep.

“Hey, wake up.”

Holy’s eyes snapped open, large beads of sweat dripping from her forehead. She exhaled deeply and looked up at Tsushima. Seeming unsure of the boundaries between her dream and reality, she flitted her eyes left and right.

“You were crying out in your sleep a lot,” Tsushima told her with concern. Holy lifted her upper body as if it were heavy and wiped the sweat from the base of her neck. With a pained expression, she pressed her fingers between her brows and forced out a hoarse response.

“I get nightmares a lot. I’m fine.”

“Seems that way.”

With a dark look on her face, Holy told Tsushima this happened all the time. As he gazed at her, Tsushima decided not to say anything unnecessary.

Knight. Betrayal. Save me.

Those were the words she had cried out in her sleep. It was an unsettling list, no matter how you strung its pieces together. Tsushima noticed the shadows flickering around Holy but thought twice about venturing any further.

It would be better for their relationship to remain strictly one of business. He’d settled on taking this precautionary measure because he sensed it might cross a line at some point otherwise.

“I’m a bit thirsty. I’m going to go get some water,” Holy said, getting up off the sofa. Tsushima noticed something with the creak of the floorboards and stopped her straightaway.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, tilting her head questioningly. Tsushima ignored her and directed his attention outside the residence. He could sense a slight vibration in the information factors. The familiar presence actually gave Tsushima a sense of relief.

“There are signs of people.”

“Pursuers?”

“Ah, probably Informationists.”

“Huh? How do you know?”

“There aren’t enough presences for it to be the Fourth Division. Besides, my instincts as someone in the same profession are telling me so,” Tsushima said, a smile naturally coming to his lips. He likely wasn’t aware of it, but his expression wasn’t exactly praiseworthy.

Holy looked at his face and stiffened her own.

“So what should we do?”

“The front of the building is already surrounded, so we probably can’t take the car. To get to it, I’d have no choice but to confront them. But I can’t keep protecting you if I’m up against Informationists,” he said, scanning the interior of the room. He was looking for a good place to hide Holy.

Then his gaze fell on the ash-filled fireplace.

“No way,” Holy protested, anticipating what Tsushima was about to say. Her objection to his proposal wasn’t trivial; her face made it clear she was completely opposed to the idea.

Tsushima let out a sigh.

“It’s not fit for people in the slightest,” added Holy. “Look, it’s full of ash!”

“It’s surrounded by heat-resistant bricks and is the strongest structure here. Quick, get in,” Tsushima said, grabbing Holy by the scruff of her neck like a cat and forcing her to stand. Holy shot him an icy glare. Tsushima nodded toward the fireplace. “They’re right on top of us. Hurry.”

“Don’t forget I’m here.”

Leaving him with that parting remark, Holy slid herself into the large fireplace, her delicate frame easily fitting inside. Now able to breathe a little better, Tsushima waited for their uninvited guests.

Just as he took out a cigarette from his pocket to start having a morning smoke, he heard the front door open. Then he sensed two people entering the house.

He heard the sound of the floorboards creaking under leather shoes. Tsushima deliberately struck his gas lighter loudly so as to announce his whereabouts.

The footsteps stopped on the other side of the wall separating the entrance and living room. Tsushima slowly made his eyes glow blue and faced the Informationists on the other side of the wall.

“I’m telling you this for your own good: Turn back now,” Tsushima said, giving a final warning to the Informationists. It was both an alert and an act of mercy.

However, his message was also in vain.

Pinpointing Tsushima’s location from his voice, the enemy Informationists executed Codes from the other side of the wall. Just as Tsushima thought he could see some residual blue light, the wall was pulverized. One of the Informationists had used a basic Code to improve his physical capabilities, then charged straight for Tsushima.

Eyes glowing blue, the dust-covered man approached while fixing Tsushima with a glare of hostility.

But despite the man being directly in front of him, Tsushima was looking elsewhere.

That was because Informationists often fought in pairs, with one serving as the vanguard, and the other the rear guard. In those situations, the vanguard would often act as a diversion and shield while the rear guard executed more aggressive Codes.

Just as Tsushima anticipated, there was another person kneeling on the floor on the opposite side of the dust—a female Informationist. She was steadying her body and aiming a handgun. She pulled the trigger without once blinking.

Right after the violent sound of the gunshot, the woman’s Code endowed the bullet she’d fired with an additional effect, giving it extra speed. The accelerated shot generated flames as it tore through the air.

Normally, bullets were too fast for people to react to, but Tsushima had already readied his right hand in line with the projectile’s trajectory, which he had estimated based on the muzzle of the gun.

Tsushima wrapped his hand in enough heat to distort the air, altering the path of the bullet, causing it to merely scratch his left cheek and tear a hole in the wall behind him.

The enemy Informationists had done everything perfectly. However, the situation was still heavily in Tsushima’s favor.

“Nnnngggh!” the male Informationist shouted angrily, trying to banish his fear with his voice. Tsushima immediately switched his focus to him.

Using the fist with which he had deflected the bullet, Tsushima swung at the approaching man. Determined to win, the man returned the punch. Right after their fists crossed, the air in the room trembled.

With a violent thud, Tsushima struck the enemy Informationist, making him bend backward. For his part, the man had managed to land a hit on Tsushima’s cheek.

But to compensate for that, Tsushima had knocked off everything above the man’s neck, leaving nothing behind. His opponent fell to his knees with a thud. Tsushima immediately grabbed his body and used it as a shield.

“Shit! Useless idiot!” the female Informationist shouted angrily, spewing criticism at her fallen comrade after seeing him die. She pulled the trigger of her gun without even executing a Code, but the man’s brawny corpse successfully absorbed the bullets.

“Sorry,” Tsushima muttered, consoling the dead man. Then he made his eyes glow blue and secretly observed the woman.

From what Tsushima could make out from his position, the female Informationist was executing a Code. But when it came to Code activation speeds, Tsushima was faster.

The instant the woman went to pull the trigger of her handgun, the weapon turned red. The barrel of the firearm bent according to an intense gravitational force.

“Boom!”

When Tsushima spoke the sound of an explosion, the handgun in the female Informationist’s hands spontaneously discharged. It was like a timed explosion had been activated.

The violent detonation blew away the woman, who collapsed on the floor and lost the ability to move.

Tsushima slowly stood and confirmed the two Informationists were both unable to continue fighting. The cigarette in his mouth had barely turned to ash.

The whole thing had ended in an instant. Stunned, Holy peeked her face out of the fireplace.

“Tsushima, just who are you really?”

His skill in dispatching the other Informationists, the high level of precision of his Code execution, and his nonchalance over killing two people—everything about Tsushima the Informationist was on a different level.

He answered Holy’s question as he exhaled smoke.

“I’m just a common Informationist. What, do you not like my answer?”

“No, it’s good enough.”

“Then leave it at that. More people might be after us, so let’s hurry and get out of here.”

Holy got out of the fireplace and headed toward the front door, putting as much distance as possible between herself and the corpses lying in the middle of the room. Seeing her reaction, Tsushima muttered with a sigh, “Try not to stare at the dead too long. It’ll make food taste bad.”

Says the person responsible for killing them? Holy conveyed to Tsushima with her gaze. He snorted, and a nihilistic smile appeared on his lips.

The clear sky stretched out above them, a complete departure from the cloudiness of the previous day.

The two of them hadn’t eaten a real meal since the day before, so they decided to fill their stomachs with food they stocked up on at a gas station on the way.

Tsushima had been thinking of eating on the run, but Holy was so insistent in her demand to at least get to relax during mealtimes that he eventually gave in. That was how they wound up stopping the car.

They exited the vehicle, and Holy stretched under the open sky. Next to her, Tsushima put an unlit cigarette in his mouth and took out his lighter.

“You sure love smoking, don’t you?” Holy said, sounding fed up. Tsushima glanced at her for just a moment before answering, his cigarette still in his mouth.

“I’m not smoking because I particularly like it. It’s a kind of curse.”

“Don’t lump in your nicotine dependence with some occult nonsense.”

“No, that’s not what I mean—” Tsushima started to explain himself but gave up partway through. It’s not really worth talking about, he thought.

Holy gave Tsushima a piercing stare after he gave his vague, half-hearted response, but she didn’t pry. She seemed to have concluded this was simply the kind of person he was.

Holding out the groceries she had brought with her, Holy jumped up onto the hood of the car. The bag in her hand seemed disproportionately large, and it wasn’t just his imagination. Tsushima, unaware of what the girl had bought, glanced at her food out of curiosity.

Everything she took out of the paper bag was indistinguishable from snacks or junk food.

Tsushima unconsciously scowled, his eyes accidentally meeting Holy’s. She licked cheese grease off her fingertips with a questioning expression.

“What? Something wrong?”

“Surely they had something a bit more decent to eat?”

“Huh? But I can’t help it; I’ve always wanted to try this stuff.”

Holy seemed to realize from Tsushima’s reaction that her food choices were strange, and she blushed slightly. She put some of her snacks back into her bag, as if trying to make her feast more presentable.

But Tsushima was still staring at her. Pursing her lips, she made excuses.

“I’ve never had the chance to eat junk food due to my status. Wouldn’t it make sense for a girl like me to crave it a little? And since everything was in reach, I wanted to try it all even more!”

“Well, it’s not like I don’t get the feeling.”

After hearing Holy’s excuse, even Tsushima wasn’t up for pressing her any further.

That said, her meal was indeed terrible. Tsushima reluctantly pulled a vegetable-filled sandwich out of his own bag and offered it to her.

“Eat these veggies at least. If you keep eating only crap, you’re gonna get an upset stomach.”

“Huh? Really? That’s no good.”

Holy briefly thanked Tsushima for his concern as she crammed greasy, salty junk food into her mouth.

With ketchup smeared on her cheeks, she happily smacked her lips. Beside her, Tsushima put something other than a cigarette in his mouth for the first time in a while.

Just eating next to each other seemed to mysteriously shrink the sense of distance between the two of them. Perhaps this was why Tsushima, in an unusual move, brought up a topic of conversation.

“You said you were the youngest child of a noble family, right?”

“More or less, yeah. I guess,” Holy answered hesitantly while repeatedly wiping food off her cheeks. Tsushima had known from the start she was hiding something.

But that wasn’t what he wanted to ask about. He smoothly transitioned into the main thrust of the conversation.

“What kind of connection do you have with Storm Hill? It’s a dangerous group for a noble family to be acquainted with.”

For a moment, Holy stopped bringing food to her mouth, lost in thought.

“How much do you know about Storm Hill?” Holy asked with a solemn look. Tsushima gave a concise answer.

“They’re a relatively large anti-government organization in the Balga Empire. That’s about all I’m aware of.”

“That’s not an incorrect interpretation.” In a departure from her previously goofy expression, Holy furrowed her brow in determination and sat up with her knees raised. “My only connection with Storm Hill is my request to defect. They also assist people and organizations within the Balga Empire who have nowhere to go by helping them escape or providing support. Apparently, this is one of the ways they undermine the government’s authority.”

“They have to run a tight ship since they conduct anti-government activities in a nation as strictly controlled as Barga. It’d probably be hard to get in touch with them without significant connections. How did you manage to reach out to them?”

“They approached me,” Holy explained. “An operative had been observing nearby and couldn’t stand by without doing anything. So they came to me with a proposal.”

Holy didn’t seem to be lying, but she was clearly holding back important details. Her voice had tapered off as she spoke, and she eventually buried her mouth against her knees.

“But you know, even though they’re called a rebel organization, they’re not bad people,” she continued. “Of course, sometimes they resort to violence, but it’s always for a justifiable reason. And besides, there are people in the Balga Empire who don’t agree with the way their country does things. That’s a consequence of its repeated invasions and annexations. Storm Hill exists to help those kinds of people.”

“You’re not a member of Storm Hill yourself, are you?”

“Of course not. I’m just someone who made a request of them.”

While Holy’s account contained some falsehoods, there didn’t seem to be any outright lies in the bones of her story. Tsushima considered this as he decided on his next approach.

“I’m not sure if I should say this,” Tsushima prefaced before continuing. “But something really bothers me about the movements of the people chasing you. You, me, and Storm Hill are the only parties who should know about this escape route. And yet there was a large military force waiting for you at the port, almost as though they knew in advance. And it was the country’s regular army at that! But the next people to come after us were just two highly mobile Informationists, even though an organization as big as the military was involved.”

Tsushima might not have been getting his point across. Holy was tilting her head in confusion with eyes open wide. Tsushima had no choice but to elaborate a little further.

“Listen, the fact that the military was able to ambush you at the port means they were certain you would be there. That means they lost our trail after I fought them off. I bet that’s why they deployed Informationists to hunt us down instead.”

“So what’s the significance of that? The enemy knew our movements in advance?”

“Yeah. I hate to consider this possibility, but there could be a mole in Storm Hill. Does anyone come to mind?”

“A mole? That can’t be.” Holy looked anxiously at Tsushima. The color drained from her face, and she looked down at her feet as she fell into thought. Next to her, Tsushima crushed his cigarette butt under his shoe.

“I guess a lot more people want you to disappear than you thought, huh?”

Getting up as if to say mealtime was over, Tsushima came right over to Holy as he cracked his neck.

“To begin with, we cut off information from anywhere suspicious. From now on, we keep going without requesting cooperation from Storm Hill.”

“But would I still be able to flee the country that way?”

“The enemy is definitely organized in their movements. We can’t afford to take our time, but there are options available to us.”

Tsushima understood they’d be left in a precarious position if they lost the backing of Storm Hill and the group’s knowledge about Balga’s internal affairs. It seemed like Tsushima and Holy would have to force their way through the shortest route.

“Fortunately, I have some acquaintances in this country. Let’s see if we can get their help.” Tsushima exchanged another glance with Holy, softening his expression slightly. He had intended it to mean don’t worry, but she still seemed uneasy.

“The people around me always betray me. They all use me, then disappear. Can I really trust you?” Holy asked, her voice seeming like it’d fade away as she clutched something by her chest. Her question was pointless. After all, if he wanted to lie, he could deceive her as much as he liked.

Tsushima gave a long sigh to make this clear to Holy. She glared at him sharply in response.

Faced with her pure and innocent heart, Tsushima made an immature remark.

“You trust people too easily. That’s why you get betrayed. But if there’s one thing I can say for sure, it’s that my job is only to escort you to Elbar. So don’t get any funny ideas about putting your faith in me. That kind of thing gives me the creeps.”

What on earth was he talking about? Appearing unable to understand, Holy stared at Tsushima with her mouth open. His rough words had been his attempt to cheer her up, but evidently, the distance between the two of them hadn’t shrunk enough for him to get that across.

As she watched him awkwardly return to the driver’s seat, Holy seemed to pick up on his thoughtfulness. In the end, she perked up just a little, and a smile played at the corners of her lips.

Chapter 2

CHAPTER2

Balga Capital City. From the elegant reading room, the man could see heavy clouds drifting in the sky outside the window. He smoothed back his golden hair and let out a rough sigh.

“Damn. Storm Hill and the Fourth Division are both useless,” he said, crushing the telegram in his hand. He turned around with a bizarre look in his eyes. His gaze fell on a boy standing there in an exquisite military uniform.

Under the glaringly bright light, the boy raised his eyes—eyes that, like his master’s, gleamed with a thirst for blood.

“In the end, they’re just lowly pawns who know nothing about the situation. Work befitting of vermin, wouldn’t you say?” the boy muttered hatefully, shaking his long blue bangs. His words seemed sincere, not sarcastic or insulting.

His master warned him against such insolence, however. At the boy’s words, the golden-haired man widened his eyes and fixed his crimson gaze on the boy, causing the young man’s expression to falter slightly.

“Yes, I can’t leave this task to dimwitted vermin. So you go,” his master commanded.

“Would that be all right?” the boy asked for confirmation, the corners of his lips lifting upward, as if he was about to bare his teeth. The golden-haired man let out an irritated snort and tossed the crumpled paper into a wastebasket.

“I don’t care. If things proceed as planned, all the better. But it’s also true we have no more time to spare. If they resist, kill them. That result would also suffice.”

Upon hearing his master’s command, the boy bowed deeply on the spot. Then a disturbing, tenacious smirk appeared on his face.

“Understood. Everything will go as you desire.” The boy accepted the order and immediately left the room. Watching his happily retreating figure, the golden-haired man muttered spitefully, “Vermin should kill vermin. That’s what their collars are for.”

The city of Sherun was one of the largest transportation hubs in the empire. It was a modern city where all forms of transit converged, including trains, ships, vehicles, and airplanes.

Finished with the call he had made using one of the public phones along the street, Tsushima returned the receiver to its place. The road was neatly paved, with three lanes in each direction. Modern buildings resembling stone structures lined the sides of the straight street.

The people passing by clearly came from an array of cultural backgrounds, yet most were wearing suits and coats.

“Tsushima, what do you think of this?”

Someone had called out to him in the middle of the bustling street. He slowly took the cigarette that had been dangling from his mouth and returned it to the packet before turning around. Standing there was Holy, dressed in a school uniform–style pleated skirt and a blouse adorned with decorative accents.

“It makes me look a bit like a student. It’s cute, right? I’ve always wanted to try wearing something like this.”

Setting aside whether it looked good on her, she seemed extremely pleased.

It was definitely common for someone Holy’s age to wear a school uniform at least once. Nobles rarely admired commoners, but there had to be a few with those tastes.

Tsushima stared at her intently.

“The outfit is nice, but it makes you stand out too much. Probably because of your pointlessly good looks. What a pain. Put something over it, like a hoodie, or coat, or a cardigan, or something.”

“No way! I went to the trouble of picking something cute. And what do you mean by ‘pointlessly good looks’? Are you complimenting me or insulting me?”

“Neither. I simply said you attract attention.”

Sure enough, Holy was even more beautiful in the sunlight. She had the proportions of a model, her features were well sculpted, and her fair skin gave her blue eyes the clarity of a cloudless sky. She was the very definition of an overly conspicuous, frustrating subject to guard.

“Go to that store and buy an outer garment that can hide your figure, hair, and face. Choose something that’s as unassuming as possible.”

As he added instructions, Tsushima handed her a crumpled banknote from his pocket. Holy took it with a discontented look, but for some reason, she kept standing there with the bill in her hand.

“What’s wrong?” Tsushima asked her.

“If you’re going to make so many demands, you should just come with me. Why do I have to go by myself?”

“I’m clueless when it comes to picking clothes. You can choose what you like as long as it meets the criteria. That’s all.”

“Yeah, you definitely don’t seem to have that kind of know-how, do you, Tsushima?” Holy examined Tsushima’s attire from his head to his toes. She exhaled deeply, then dropped her shoulders, muttering “Oh well, whatever,” as she ran off to the store.

Tsushima shouted a final reminder to her retreating back.

“Hey, you can buy anything that speaks to you, but don’t forget the requirements.”

Holy turned at the sound of his voice, the hem of her skirt fluttering. “You say I can buy another set of the same thing? Yeah, I got it!”

She wasn’t a child. That retort had been her way of telling him not to check every little thing with her. Holy stuck out her tongue a little before dashing into the store.

Feeling indescribable emotions, Tsushima took out the cigarette he had pocketed earlier and put it back into his mouth. When he lit it, the drifting smoke caused several passersby to openly glare at him with disgust.

“Yo. Can’t believe we’re crossing paths in a place like this. Even the higher-ups would be shocked.”

A man with a large build and dark skin called out to Tsushima around the time his cigarette filter had started to burn. In contrast to Tsushima, the man was wearing oversize, casual clothes and was showing a white toothy smile.

“Long time no see, Joe.”

“It’s been a few years since someone’s called me by that name. I’ve more or less retired from underworld gigs.”

“Sorry for dragging you back underground.”

“Don’t say that, bro. It’s so rare for you to get in touch that my undies got soaking wet!”

The cheerfully laughing man went by the alias Joe. He was one of the agents Tsushima had worked with in the past, back when he’d still lived in Balga.

Tsushima returned a nostalgic smile at hearing Joe’s lighthearted banter after so long.

“So you said you were transporting cargo? Where is it?” Joe asked.

“Happily out shopping.”

“Shopping?” Joe followed Tsushima’s gaze toward the store. Then he shook his head in amazement. “So by ‘cargo,’ you mean that li’l lady?”

“That’s right.”

“Looks like this’ll require extra prep.”

“That’s why I asked you. As promised, I’ll pay you half up front. I can add more if you need it to lay the groundwork,” Tsushima said, flashing just a peek of an envelope stuffed with bundles of cash from inside his jacket. Joe whistled teasingly at the sight.

“Who exactly is that li’l lady if you’re able to dish out that much cash?”

“Who knows? Even if we did, it wouldn’t change what we have to do.”

“Just complete the job, huh? You’re such a straight shooter. And you’re telling me you don’t even have the slightest ulterior motive in escorting a hottie like her?”

“Don’t be stupid. Pretty or not, she’s still a kid.” Tsushima snorted, putting a new cigarette in his mouth and lighting it. As he exhaled smoke, he watched Holy put an outfit together in front of the mirror in the store.

“Aaah,” Joe said as he followed Tsushima’s gaze. “We’re old now, huh? You used to be that age back in the day.” His words carried a different, unspoken meaning.

Whenever Tsushima saw a girl that age, he couldn’t help but remember the sight of the girl who had always been beside him.

“Let’s reminisce later. It’s time for business. Now, about those mannequins we talked about on the phone—” Tsushima started to say, but Joe interrupted by sticking his index finger out in front of him.

“Of course everything’s fully ready. But more importantly, don’t be shocked when you hear this,” Joe prefaced with far too much confidence for a lead-in. Then he triumphantly started to explain the tools he was about to show.

In the center of the city of Sherun, there was a massive train station that served as the heart of the railroad network extending throughout the entire Balga Empire. The station had a stunning design that merged the old brick building with a modern building that used a lot of curved lines.

The interior had an impressively high, open ceiling, and lots of people were walking around. At the middle of the train hall, a massive advertisement monitor glowed brightly.

WELCOME TO SHERUN STATION. THIS STATION SERVES AS A CENTRAL HUB FOR ALL RAILROADS EXTENDING ACROSS THE EMPIRE. IF YOU NEED ASSISTANCE, PLEASE APPROACH ONE OF THE STAFF MEMBERS WEARING THIS UNIFORM.

The screen showed a famous Balgan actress. She was wearing a station employee uniform and smiling. She was often used in Balgan propaganda.

Tsushima pulled Holy by the hand in front of the monitor, a hat worn low over her eyes.

“Keep your eyes on the floor. Don’t worry about your surroundings.”

Tsushima walked briskly as he led Holy by the hand, adjusting his pace to match her fastest stride as he scanned their surroundings.

Several men had been standing out to him for a while. Their movements were entirely professional as they tailed them. Tsushima didn’t know at which stage their location had been identified, but it was clear the circle of pursuers was gradually tightening around them.

“Pick up your pace. Watch your step,” Tsushima told Holy, hurrying even more.

They had less than thirty minutes left until the departure time of the train they were planning to catch.

From behind, three groups of pursuers were definitely closing in on them, blending in with the crowds as they cornered the duo.

Someone was undoubtedly observing from an excellent vantage point. Tsushima looked up and glanced around the inside of the station.

His eyes fell on the surveillance cameras mounted on brick pillars and metal beams stretching overhead.

“That must be it. No matter what we do, we’ll be cornered.”

The pursuers he could see were like hunting dogs chasing deer, deliberately making their presence known to Tsushima to push him and Holy ahead. There would undoubtedly be other people whose job it would be to take them down.

When Tsushima led Holy through the ticket gate, some men turned on their heels and disappeared into the crowd.

A switch.

Their pursuers had handed off the chase to their comrades positioned within the station ahead of time.

There had to be another person tailing them nearby. Tsushima quickly scanned his surroundings, and he spotted several individuals in the direction they were headed. Their gazes, which he could see through gaps in the crowd, were fixed directly on Tsushima.

“They’ve also figured out which train we’re taking?”

When they spotted Tsushima, they started coming toward him. He turned away, abandoning the proper route.

He passed by a kiosk and pressed himself against a silver-colored door a cleaner had just emerged from. It led to an employee hallway.

Pushing open the lightweight aluminum door, Tsushima entered the sterile, undecorated space. Sensing a presence from farther down, he stopped momentarily.

Someone emerged from around the corner of the passageway, but it was just a station employee. Tsushima immediately resumed walking at the same pace as before. When the staff member saw him, he walked up to Tsushima with a confused expression.

“Excuse me, but this is for staff use,” the employee said apologetically, but Tsushima closed the distance between them regardless. Faster than the eye could see, he wrestled the man to the ground and knocked him out.

He gently laid the staff member down on the floor and activated the radio attached to the man’s chest.

“Suspicious individuals detected. Employee Hallway 3-4, near the entrance. Requesting backup.”

Hearing responses from several people through the static, Tsushima once again proceeded ahead with Holy in tow. They heard the sound of the door behind them being forced open. It was the people tailing them.

Without looking back, Tsushima turned at the nearest corner, intentionally allowing their pursuers to get a look at him.

With their target in front of them, the men made to draw their guns. At that moment, employee reinforcements rushed in from another hallway, switching places with Tsushima.

“Suspicious people spotted! Securing.”

Tsushima heard the staff members communicating with each other, just as he had expected. They appeared to have spotted one of their colleagues collapsed on the floor and began seriously confronting the pursuers.

That could buy them some time. Following the map of the building he had memorized beforehand, Tsushima stopped in front of a specific room.

It was locked, so he burned through it and forced the door open.

“All right. You board the train I tell you. Use the crowds as much as possible on your way. Got it?” Tsushima instructed Holy, handing her a ticket. It was for a train to Balga Capital City.

Holy accepted the ticket and nodded before running off, the pattering of her footsteps echoing. Tsushima watched her leave, then hid himself inside the room he had just opened.

The men of the Fourth Division were pursuing Tsushima and Holy, who had disappeared down the employee hallway. There weren’t any surveillance cameras installed in the employee hallway, and Tsushima had undoubtedly chosen that route because he was aware of that.

At their headquarters, the command team exchanged radio communications with the on-site pursuit teams while intently monitoring grainy footage of multiple surveillance cameras. After confirming the layout of the employee hallways, they positioned all the pursuit teams at the exits.

Thanks to that decision, an on-site squad quickly spotted Holy.

A report came through the radio along with static.

“Team C here. Target confirmed. In pursuit.”

“Roger that. Don’t kill her yet. Force her into an area where there isn’t anyone else around.”

There was absolutely no hesitation in the men’s cold tones.

“Identify the companion’s position. He should still be in the station,” came the voice of the commander over the radio.

“Team F here. Companion confirmed. He’s moving in a different direction from the target.”

“Roger that. Tail him and don’t let your guard down. If he tries to approach the target, eliminate him.”

Team F responded in the affirmative to the commander’s order, then started chasing Tsushima.

Even though there were only a few minutes left until Tsushima and Holy’s train departed, Tsushima was heading in an entirely different direction. The commander sensed something was off, both in how the two of them had split up and in Tsushima’s movements.

“This isn’t adding up.” The commander raised his head with a doubtful look on his face, his gaze on the station’s security camera footage.

The grainy screen showed a man in a jacket, avoiding crowds as he walked. The commander watched him for a while, then suddenly realized something.

There was a subtle difference in his gait. Tsushima typically moved with a hint of sluggishness while maintaining a strange amount of vigilance.

But the man in the footage wasn’t walking like that. The commander activated his radio and shouted, “Team F, that’s not him!”

At the exact moment the commander raised his voice, the person wearing Tsushima’s clothes suddenly collapsed on the spot. The crowd inside the station became a chorus of commotion, and the sea of people parted, leaving a space large enough to give the security cameras a clear view of the floor. Lying there, in the very center of the opening, was Tsushima. But as the commander continued to observe, he couldn’t believe his eyes.

They had been played. Tsushima’s skin started gradually peeling off with a blue glow, leaving behind a metal doll resembling a human skeleton.

It was a masquerade mannequin—an advanced tool created by combining several Codes. You rarely saw them in public due to their extremely high manufacturing cost.

“Damn Informationist!” the commander yelled in frustration.

Tsushima had undoubtedly planned to pull this off from the very beginning.

The commander barked his next orders over the radio in a frustrated tone.

“Team F, suspend pursuit. Be on alert against surprise attacks while making preparations to withdraw.”

The Fourth Division was supposed to have been getting ready to intercept and attack Tsushima, but it turned out they’d been dancing in the palm of his hand. This caused the commander to panic.

Just then, a report came in from the field that compounded his anxiety.

“The target has boarded the train. What should we do?”

“There’s a high probability the companion is concealed in the area surrounding the target. All pursuit teams, regroup near the target. Board the train together. Do not let them escape under any circumstances.” The commander issued these aggressive instructions as he glared at Holy’s back on the monitor.

In accordance with his orders, the pursuit teams leaped onto the train just before it departed. They numbered twenty people in total, and they instantly surrounded the train car Holy had boarded.

The train departed on schedule, in line with the station announcements. Meanwhile, the commander instructed all pursuit teams to maintain strict vigilance and listened intently to their reports over the radio.

“The train has left the station. We’re starting the operation.”

Giving the go-ahead for his men’s decision, the commander held his breath and watched them get to work.

The train’s interior was separated into private compartments. He could hear the footsteps of the rugged men slowly advancing down the aisle of the communal space. They all gathered in front of one room. There was nowhere left to run.

Immediately after exchanging signals, they all flooded into the compartment at once. A continuous burst of suppressed gunfire rang out.

Eventually, the men stopped shooting, and a brief silence fell. The commander heard what sounded like something being picked up, and a hint of unease stirred in his chest. Soon, his anxieties became reality.

“They tricked us. The companion was also a decoy.”

Picturing a masquerade mannequin collapsed in the passenger compartment, the commander violently slammed the desk.

“All units, prepare for withdrawal. Our work ends here. We leave the rest to him.”

The commander exchanged glances with his colleagues in the same room. Then he bitterly looked up into empty space and muttered, “…Even though this is the last thing I wanted.”

“This train is a sleeper limited express bound for Tansen viaShubiland. A sleeper limited express ticket is required in addition to a regular boarding ticket.”

The conductor’s announcement played throughout the train, which had already left the Sherun metropolitan area and was speeding through the canal-lined countryside. The inside of the train car had a modern design, and its many passengers were each spending their time however they pleased.

An elderly woman sitting in a corner booth large enough for several people spotted a conductor and called out to him.

“Excuse me, I’d like to ask about this ticket.” The elderly lady stopped the conductor, holding up the ticket she had taken out. But the conductor had a somewhat cold look in his eyes. He looked down at the elderly woman and brushed aside her hand.

“Sorry, but ask another employee. I don’t know.”

“Um… What do you mean by that?” the elderly lady politely asked. But the conductor simply took off his hat and shook his bangs out without answering. It was Tsushima.

“Guess I’ll drop being a conductor. Causes weird misunderstandings.”

The elderly lady tilted her head, confused by Tsushima talking to himself. Ignoring her reaction, Tsushima tossed his hat out of a slightly open window. Then he shrugged at her before leaving the train car.

He had put on a stolen train station uniform in order to escape their pursuers. Their other diversions seemed to have done their job, as there was not a single person following him.

Loosening the tie of his uniform, Tsushima headed toward the prearranged train car. When he reached the passageway between cars, an announcement played.

“The next stop is East Sherun Station. We’ll be arriving shortly.”

The sleeper limited express gradually slowed, reaching East Sherun Station, located about twelve miles away from the massive Sherun Station. An exposed platform passed by the window, a sharp contrast from Sherun Station’s indoor departure areas.

Tsushima was relieved to spot two familiar people among the numerous passengers. When the train doors opened, he stuck out his face and gave them a signal.

Holy had left Sherun in Joe’s car earlier. They had arranged for Tsushima to throw off the Fourth Division by himself, then join back up with her at East Sherun Station.

Joe was the first to notice Tsushima. He raised his hand and approached him.

“Yo! How’d it go?”

“The battery life’s way better than it used to be. I’m impressed.”

“Right? I’ve been improving it in the ten years since I last saw you.” Joe grinned happily and puffed out his chest in an exaggerated manner.

Tsushima also smiled slightly, saying, “A decade is a bit of an exaggeration.”

Joe had handcrafted the masquerade mannequins Tsushima had used at the station. The man was a world-class talent in the realm of mannequin making, and he was likely the only one who could produce such sophisticated decoys.

The two men exchanged some friendly banter, but Holy, standing next to them, looked displeased. Only then did Tsushima remember he hadn’t properly explained the details of the operation to her.

Feeling a little awkward, he cleared his throat.

“So everything’s all right?” Holy asked, her eyes meeting Tsushima’s.

“It’s all going according to plan. Now we just have to ride this, and we’ll reach the Middle Sea by tomorrow.” Tsushima patted the blue body of the train and extended a hand to Holy.

“I guess it’s fine in that case.” Still showing some traces of dissatisfaction, Holy took his hand and jumped onto the train.

Joe watched their interaction with a smile and then dramatically clapped his hands when he saw Tsushima’s conductor outfit.

“Oh, that’s right. Almost forgot this—your trademark jacket,” Joe said, taking a coat from the bag he was holding.

“Guess I can’t keep wearing this conductor outfit forever, huh? Thanks.”

“Ah, but that look isn’t bad on you, either,” Joe teased, mixing in one of his favorite jokes. Tsushima looked at him and forced an embarrassed laugh in return. Then he changed his outfit on the spot, taking a cash-filled envelope from his pocket and tossing it to Joe.

“Here’s the money I promised you. Use it to lie low somewhere for a while; I’ll probably need your help again sometime.”

“Hey, whoa! Isn’t this more than I asked for?”

“I just said, didn’t I? That I’ll need your help again.”

“So it’s a deposit, then? I like how you roll! Take care now.”

The train whistle blew, signaling its departure. Left behind on the platform, Joe gave the two of them a final, slightly wistful look.

“Can’t believe you’re going this hard just for a job. I’m kinda relieved to see that old look back in your eyes.”

“Old look?” Tsushima asked. Joe pointed to Holy.

“Protect your client all the way to the end this time. With how you are now—”

Joe’s words were cut off by the door closing, preventing Holy and Tsushima from hearing what he had to say.

On the other side of the closed door, Joe raised his hand slightly to say good-bye. As the train started moving, he turned around and walked off.

As the two watched Joe depart from inside the moving train, Holy looked up at Tsushima.

“What’s up?” he asked.

“When Joe said, ‘this time’ just now, what did he mean?”

“Beats me.”

Way to spoil my mood with those last words. Although Tsushima cursed Joe inwardly, he couldn’t completely deny what the man had pointed out. When it came to girls of that age in the Balga Empire, Tsushima couldn’t help but get emotionally attached.

“Joe was just bringing up something minor from the past. Let’s not stand around. C’mon, get a move on.”

“There you go dodging the question again.”

As Holy directed those words of suspicion at him, Tsushima entered the train car.

He checked his ticket and started walking toward the second-class passenger compartments. Holy followed along like a tourist, looking around as if it were her first time on a sleeper train.

“Hey, these are private compartments, aren’t they? So do they also have baths and toilets?” Holy asked in a truly easygoing way. Then she even added, “Can we take a look at the other passenger rooms?”

Exasperated, Tsushima gestured for her to zip her lip.

“There’s no guarantee this train is perfectly safe. Don’t let your guard down.”

“What?! Didn’t you shake off the people chasing us?”

“We can’t be sure. If Informationists come after us in full force, we’ll have to readjust our plan on the fly.”

Tsushima glanced back at Holy as they moved through the passenger aisle. Seeing the look in his eyes, she also seemed to regain some of her nervousness.

They looked at a map of the train’s layout and saw they would need to pass through the dining car to reach their private compartment. Holy’s eyes lit up when she heard the words dining car. Tsushima led the way ahead.

The dining car was spacious, with no walls or partitions. There were several tables lined up, each covered by a white tablecloth. There were almost no signs of people, and the car was silent, save for the clinking of dishes and the noise of the train.

But Tsushima sensed something—the gaze and bloodlust he had felt when he’d entered Sherun Station.

Tsushima slowly hid Holy behind his back.

“If you’re going to hide, you should do something about that hostility of yours. Even a donkey would notice it.”

In response to Tsushima’s provocation, a boy emerged from behind a counter in the center of the train car. He had blue hair and pale skin, and although small in stature, he was wearing an impressive military uniform. His androgynous features were still childlike, while his sinister eyes hinted at a twisted inner nature.

He wore a blue navy military uniform with crimson embroidery, the kind only permitted for high-ranking military officers. For someone as familiar with the industry as Tsushima, it didn’t take long for him to understand what the boy’s attire signified.

“…The Six Imperial Swords, huh?”

Tsushima frowned and looked at the boy in front of him. He was clapping his hands and smiling arrogantly.

“You know quite a lot for an Elbar country bumpkin. Indeed, I am a member of the empire’s elite group of its strongest Informationists, Canus Miles of the Six Imperial Swords.”

The boy didn’t look any older than about fourteen or fifteen. He stuck out his chest and placed a hand over it, acting like he was making a big show of his importance.

Imperial Sword—an honorable position given to Informationists who held undeniable political power within the Balga Empire. Yet it was also a collar about their necks that forced them into serving the empire.

Although there were only six individuals with the title, at least half of them were Exceptional Level Informationists, and each was said to be comparable in power to an entire military division. They were literally the empire’s strongest war asset.

What was even worse was this boy, Canus. Although he was quite young, he made Tsushima feel more nervous than he’d ever been.

“You’re the one who made a name for himself on the front lines of the Empire’s northern invasion? That Canus Miles?”

“You know that much? Impressive. But information should be accurate. To be precise, I’m Canus Miles, the level-eleven Informationist who, in just three months, single-handedly devastated the front lines of the Balga Empire’s northern invasion after it had been in a deadlock for nearly ten years.”

Canus straightened his back as he spoke, obnoxiously proud of his own deeds. Yet his achievement was undeniable.

An Informationist of that caliber was here. Tsushima knew all too well what this implied.

Namely, that the people going after Holy were the imperial family, the sole beneficiaries of the Balga Empire’s prosperity. That explained why the regular army, the Fourth Division, had been mobilized to stop her from defecting.

Tsushima looked at Holy, who was hiding behind him. She clutched Tsushima’s jacket and lowered her eyes apologetically.

“And you’re, um, Tsushima Rindou, level-seven Informationist from the Free City of Elbar, right, buddy?” Canus said, reading aloud from a scrap of paper pinched between his fingers as he remained completely unguarded. There was no such thing as being careless when you were a level eleven facing off against a level seven; the gap in power was just that huge.

Despite being plenty aware of this, Tsushima responded in his usual tone to reassure Holy, who was standing behind him.

“That’s right. So what?”

“You’ve come a long way. But this is as far as you go, buddy. There would be a whole lot of trouble if you interfered any further. So hand over the girl quietly.” Canus took a seat at a table and pointed at Holy. She met the languid boy’s gaze and bit her lower lip. It seemed they were acquainted.

Tsushima observed both of their demeanors as he took a cigarette from his pocket and put it in his mouth.

“It would cause problems if I kept getting in your way? Is Holy defecting really that disadvantageous to the imperial family?”

“Oh? Judging from the way you talk, I’m guessing you don’t know who she really is, do you, buddy? Wooow…”

“It’s common for clients of bodyguards to tell a lie or two.”

“A lie or two, huh?”

Tsushima brought his lighter to his mouth and lit his cigarette. As Canus watched him exhaling smoke, he broke into a creepy, possessive smile.

“Are you all right? Your hands aren’t quivering in fear, are they? You don’t have to be in such a hurry to smoke. I’ll let you go if you run away now with your tail between your legs. So long as you hand over the girl you’re protecting.”

Tapping some ash to the floor, Tsushima narrowed his eyes. Normally, he’d have a retort ready at this point. But not even he had that luxury in the face of a member of the Six Imperial Swords.

Canus smiled and thrust his chin up, as if enjoying their growing tension.

“Geez, it really seems like she hasn’t told you a thing. Otherwise, there’s no way you could have such a stupid look on your face. How about I just fill you in already?” Canus directed a snakelike gaze at Holy. She hunched her shoulders, shrinking behind Tsushima.

In bodyguard jobs, the hired party could terminate a contract if their client concealed vital information. Knowing this, Canus delivered the earthshattering truth.

“Would you still be up for helping this girl defect if I told you she’s Imperial Princess Lupus Filia, daughter of the emperor of Balga?” Canus asked triumphantly.

Tsushima’s expression changed at the sudden mention of such an important individual’s name. Feeling shaken, he directed a wavering gaze at the girl behind him.

“The emperor’s daughter?” he asked, the words slipping out in disbelief. A devastated look came to Holy’s face at his question. Her body language left no room for doubt that Canus was speaking the truth.

The imperial princess of the empire that dominated the globe. To think he was shouldering the fate of someone like that. Tsushima felt cold sweat run down his back. A grimace came to his face as he realized he was on the brink of death again after such a long time.

“You’re far beyond what I expected. I’ll need to rethink how to handle this.”

Holy’s face jolted at Tsushima’s words, a mixture of sadness and uncertainty in her eyes. She grasped the hem of his clothes as if pleading with him, gripping so hard that her slim, delicate fingers turned white.

Tsushima’s heart wavered at the sight of her desperately clinging to the faintest shred of hope. Memories of the past he had tried to forget came into sharp focus, overlapping with the present. Irrational feelings twisted Tsushima’s judgment.

“Guess this is karma,” he grumbled quietly, catching Holy’s gaze. Then he let out a bigger sigh than he had ever given.

“I’ll get you to tell me the details afterward. For now, hide behind me.”

Holy’s eyes lit up at Tsushima’s words. A single tear slid down her cheek, before she immediately smiled with sincere, heartfelt emotion for the first time.

“Okay!”

Canus’s expression clouded over as he watched their interaction. He shook his head in exasperation.

“You really are an idiot, aren’t you, buddy? You gonna have a go at me?”

“Even I think I’m being stupid. But the thing is: I’ve got a rebellious streak,” Tsushima stated, making a clear declaration of war.

Canus looked at him, then pointed to the ceiling.

“Guess we’re doing this, huh? Other passengers might get harmed if we fight here, and it sure is scary getting an earful from the emperor, so let’s be good and go at it up top, buddy. After I’ve beaten you to death, I’ll make her hold your freshly severed head while I cut off hers, too.” Grinning cruelly, Canus made his eyes glow blue.

Gray limbs resembling spider legs burst from his back. Skillfully moving the eight limbs, Canus pointed at Tsushima and said, “Don’t keep me waiting,” on his way out to the roof.

Left with the disturbing image of his defeat, Tsushima watched Canus depart. He then placed his hand on the window frame.

Holy called out from behind.

“Tsushima! I’m sorry for not telling you the truth.”

Holy clutched the hem of her clothes and fidgeted as she searched for what to say. Tsushima looked at her, then pointed to the floor of the room.

“If you’re reflecting on what’s happened, then come up with an explanation for me by the time I get back from kicking this guy’s ass. Got that?” Tsushima spoke as if disciplining a child. Holy nodded meekly in response.

Once he had confirmation, Tsushima stepped out the window.

The roof of the train would be their battlefield. Feeling the intense wind, Tsushima looked at the sky in annoyance. It was just past noon. Clear skies stretched out above them—perfect for a showdown.

The train tracks ran through a vast field, and they were about to go into a dense forest.

Despite the fierce gales blowing against him, Tsushima looked unconcerned as he stood calmly on the roof of the train. Facing him, Canus also appeared unfazed at the unstable footing. Both of their eyes were already faintly glowing blue.

They had each executed Codes that would allow them to move easily atop the train, where even standing would normally be difficult. For Informationists like Tsushima and Canus, activating Codes like these was as simple as breathing. It was basic knowledge for Informationists.

“My, this late already? I’d like to get this over with quickly and have lunch. So could you hurry up and die?” Canus looked at a pocket watch he had taken out from his uniform, then flashed his white teeth. Every one of his gestures was irritating; such an arrogant brat.

“Don’t worry. We’re both busy people. I don’t intend to drag this out,” Tsushima replied, rolling up the sleeves of his jacket. As if in sync, they both flared their eyes with an intense blue glow.

Canus seemed to have a slight advantage when it came to Code construction speed. Gray particles swirled around him at a breakneck pace, forming an impressive creation in no time at all.

Behind him, Canus brought forth a monster that looked like it had been summoned from another world.

Its four long, thin limbs were similar to a human’s, but their strength and distorted shape brought to mind an insect in some respects. Where its head should have been, countless octopus-like tentacles writhed around, dripping digestive fluids. Its body was more gray than white, and scattered across it were patches of a rusty reddish-brown and shades of crimson reminiscent of the color of human blood.

It was quite the construct. Tsushima was impressed.

The phenomena that Informationists brought about were often linked to one’s particular academic field of expertise. Tsushima’s specialization was physical mechanics. For Canus, it appeared to be a biology-related discipline.

However, the Codes Canus wielded were unfathomable. Most Informationists who specialized in biology only did things like healing wounds or enhancing physical abilities with their Codes. Someone couldn’t even execute a Code unless they thoroughly understood the structure and mechanism of the phenomenon they wanted to implement.

Yet Canus had effortlessly synthesized life. And an imaginary monster that didn’t even exist in the real world at that.

Such was the power of an Exceptional Level Informationist.

Informationists of this distinction included those who had transcended the general requirement of adhering to the bounds of science. Some wielded unobservable phenomena, while others produced phenomena whose mechanisms had yet to be defined. Informationists who used these kinds of supernatural phenomena were deemed “exceptional.”

“Ha-ha! First, let’s see what you’ve got!” Canus shouted confidently, as if he had already won. Using the spider legs extending from his body, he maneuvered behind his monster.

However, even as he faced off against a skill that overshadowed ordinary Informationists, Tsushima’s expression didn’t change. The monster approached with agile movements despite its massive size, yet Tsushima didn’t take a single step.

The creature stepped within killing range and raised its arm. The limb transformed into massive whip, and the monster swept it sideways in an attempt to kill.

Tsushima stepped forward to dodge the enormous arm, narrowly avoiding it. He calmly walked along the train roof as if nothing had happened, his gaze fixed solely on Canus.

The monster, appearing openly enraged, like it had emotions, launched more attacks at Tsushima as he strode around at its feet.

Yet somehow, none of the giant’s attacks hit him. Tsushima was dodging them all by a hair’s breadth.

The monster started to show signs of frustration, unable to comprehend what was happening. At that moment, Tsushima looked up at the head of the creature, which was directly above him.

“What’s your deal? Do you have emotions? Maybe it’s cruel to toy with you, then.”

The monster tilted its head at Tsushima’s words. As it did, a drop of digestive fluid dripped down from the octopus head toward Tsushima. The liquid emitted white smoke as it fell and seemed to boil in midair before instantly evaporating.

A moment later, the air distorted like a mirage. Then a wave of searing heat instantly blasted off the monster’s head.

Smoke rose from the severed stump of its neck. The monster’s quadrupedal body sprang up before gradually falling backward to the ground.

Just as it seemed it would crash into the train car, the remains of the creature reverted to ash-like dust and billowed back down, returning from whence it came, beneath Canus.

The stench of charred flesh choked the area, strong enough to be noticed even on top of the moving train. It was a truly unpleasant odor, but Canus clapped his hands in satisfaction.

“I see. You’ve exceeded my expectations. No wonder the Fourth Division couldn’t handle you,” Canus said, gazing at Tsushima with great interest. Even though they were in killing range of one another, Canus kept his arms folded, showing no sign of executing a Code.

“Are you really a level seven, buddy? Nah, there’s no way. You’re hiding something, aren’t you?”

Tsushima brushed aside his disheveled bangs, revealing glowing blue eyes fixed in a piercing glare.

“I’m sick and tired of you calling me ‘buddy’ like we’re friends. Knock it off, now.”

“Tha—” Canus tried to deliver a retort, but his words were cut short. Before he could finish speaking, Tsushima blasted away his upper jaw. A single heat ray, like the ones he had used the other day, shot from behind Tsushima, turning Canus’s head to ash.

But out from Canus’s body came the same fluttering ash the monster had turned into just before.

Tsushima immediately realized the boy in front of him was a fake.

“What a pain in the ass,” he muttered, sensing something behind him.

He turned around and saw three knights clad in sturdy-looking armor. One held a sword and a shield, another held a halberd, and the third shouldered a massive greatsword. All three wore the same armor.

But their appearance wasn’t their only noteworthy quality.

Although their bodies were clearly smaller than the monster from earlier, the knights dented the roof of the train with their every step, making their weight clear. These humanoid beings had been formed with far greater density than the previous synthesized creature.

Tsushima clicked his tongue at the sight of the three ash-silver knights.

While the Codes Tsushima constructed boasted overwhelming firepower, he had a hard time making fine adjustments to them. His skill worked best against large numbers.

In other words, his abilities weren’t well-suited for hand-to-hand combat, which required delicate, split-second decisions. This was his critical weakness against the Six Imperial Swords. Canus had discerned that peculiarity of Tsushima’s solely from their earlier clash.

Between Tsushima being forced into a style of combat he was lacking in and the girl he was supposed to protect being right underfoot, there was no way he could fight aggressively.

“Ugh, this guy’s playing dirty. This is why I hate brats.”

With the ash-silver knights slowly approaching, Tsushima took out a cigarette. He wouldn’t be able to smell it in the wind, but he felt an irresistible urge to smoke.

He tensed the finger he struck the lighter with. Getting frustrated by its refusal to ignite, he shot a sharp glare at the knights.

“Your faces are pissing me off.”

The knights shifted into combat stances. The one with the sword and shield rushed to close the distance with the other two concealing themselves behind. Tsushima’s eyes glowed fiercely as the battle began.

Several minutes had passed since violent sounds started reverberating from the roof of the speeding train. Holy—no, Lupus—looked up anxiously at the ceiling.

Tsushima certainly seemed to be an excellent Informationist, but there was probably a glaring difference in power between him and one of the Six Imperial Swords. They were the strongest Informationist group in the world. Lupus could count on one hand the number of Informationists who could rival them.

She stared at the ceiling with prayer-like feeling. Someone was watching her and smiling.

“No waaaay. I never thought you’d do something like this, my lady.”

Lupus didn’t even seem surprised as she turned to face the direction the voice had come from.

Canus stood near the door of the train, leaning against the wall. He adjusted his bangs with his fingers, using the train window as a makeshift mirror as he fussed over his appearance.

Lupus steadied her breathing and faced Canus. Even if she was just bluffing, she held her small chest high, pushed back her fear, and showed as much confidence as she could muster.

“You being here means the Second Prince sent you, right? Would you mind telling me what he’s planning?”

“His plans? How amusing. But what would you do if I told you? The number of options you have left is so small, it’s barely even enough to fill up the tip of my little finger. It turns out a girl with impure blood like you is unfit for the royal family. That’s all.”

Canus readjusted his bangs and straightened his posture as if satisfied. Then he looked at Lupus with languid eyes. Although he was still a child, his expression showed signs of arrogance and disdain disproportionate to his age.

Canus Miles, one of the Six Imperial Swords, was also a knight serving Second Prince Ross Ruber of the imperial family.

Second Prince Ross Ruber was a known hothead, considered hawkish even in the imperial family. He held strongly discriminatory views against Informationists and took the initiative in actively working to eliminate any of their kind he had no use for.

Like his master, Canus had a taste for blood. At just ten years old, he was hailed as a genius Informationist, rising to level eleven, one of the Exceptional Levels. He was extremely prideful and tended to hold contempt toward others. He always prioritized his own emotions, making him dangerously unpredictable.

And Lupus was alone with him. She could be killed at any moment.

Holding her breath, she faced Canus. Her fingertips were trembling with fear. She slowly clenched her fists so he wouldn’t notice.

“I’m sorry, but I can’t keep associating with you all. I’m fed up with these pointless power struggles,” she said.

“Even so, defecting is a bad move. Ultimately, if you keep running away, you’ll keep getting used. Having you under our thumb is effortless since you’re so stupidly easy to read.” Canus spread his arms as if he was starting a speech. A faint smile played on his lips, revealing grotesque canine teeth.

As Lupus listened to the boy’s words, something stuck in the back of her mind.

“I get used? What do you mean?” she asked.

Canus’s creepily tenacious smirk became even more pronounced at her question.

“Oh? Don’t tell me you haven’t realized anything…? I see. Damn, you’re so dense,” Canus said with wide-open eyes.

Lupus sensed there was something big happening that she didn’t know. Her mind wandered.

At first, Lupus had thought Ross Ruber had gotten information about her defection and had been trying to kill her. That’s how serious of a crime it was for someone of the imperial family to defect.

But that didn’t explain everything.

Her escape attempt had been arranged by an organization called Storm Hill. The only ones who knew her route to get out of the country were them and Tsushima.

So then, why had the Fourth Division been lying in wait to ambush her at the port? Same with the situation with the lookouts at Sherun Station. And the final nail in the coffin was the appearance of Ross Ruber’s knight, Canus.

Looking at her like he could read her mind, Canus grinned in a truly gleeful way as he continued the conversation.

“Due to your impure blood, Lord Ross wishes to eliminate you by any means possible, my lady. However, it would be taboo of him to kill a member of his own family. That’s why he thought he might as well use you to his advantage before making you disappear. After everything I’ve said, that should be enough for you to figure out why I’m here and why you’ve ended up in this situation, right?”

The arrogant boy twisted his mouth into a spiteful grin, as if he was tormenting a weaker opponent.

Lupus knew she was being led on, but she couldn’t help following these revelations to their logical conclusion.

Unconsciously, she brought a hand to the base of her neck and clutched at something through her coat. Her breathing started becoming shallower.

“Surely you’re not saying you planned all this, starting with getting me to defect?”

Her vision flickered as she hyperventilated. Canus, savoring her distress, pushed a little more in a quiet voice.

“Yeah, that might be what happened. You know Storm Hill, the people you believe are your allies? They’re actually a puppet organization under Lord Ross’s control. They lured you into defecting, and you fell right into their trap.”

Tsushima had warned her of the possibility of there being a mole in storm hill.

However, his prediction was way off. There wasn’t just a traitor in their ranks. The entire organization was working against her and had been intent on using her from the very start.

“And that’s not all,” Canus whispered demonically, as if delivering the final blow. “There was an incident that solidified your resolve to defect, right? You know, that bloodbath at your estate, where your servants and guards were all slaughtered. Why do you think that happened?”

At his words, those nightmarish events came rushing back through her mind. Every time she blinked, images from that day resurfaced. The stench of fresh blood covering her entire body, the dying screams of her servants, the despair of her trust and friendships being shattered in an instant.

Lupus bit her lip. With tears in her eyes, she asked, “Were you the ones who led my knight astray?”

Seeing her distraught expression, Canus opened his eyes wide in delight.

“Do you think all that would’ve happened if we hadn’t?”

That was the last push Canus needed to break Lupus’s mind.

She lost the feeling in her legs below her knees, and her vision darkened. What could possibly be her reason for existing? Every decision she thought she had made herself had been orchestrated by Ross.

And there was more. The despair, the grief, the agony—those feelings had all been fabricated by other people. When she realized this, the next emotions that welled up were of intense regret and anger.

Lupus twisted her face, blue veins popping and deep wrinkles etching into her beautiful complexion.

Then her eyes glowed blue. Silently, she started constructing a self-taught Code.

“Aarrrrrghhhh!” Lupus screamed, hitting Canus with the full weight of her hostility.

Yet his expression remained serene. If anything, it was uplifted, as if he had been waiting for this.

“That’s what I like to see! Those eyes are proof of your tainted blood! You’re an Informationist at your core. And so I’ll kill you as one here and now. That’s what my master and I desire!”

Princess Lupus Filia wouldn’t be recognized as a member of the imperial family. Instead, she would be disposed as a descendent of a dirty Informationist. That was Ross Ruber’s wish, and the only explanation that could justify Canus killing a member of the imperial family.

By threatening Canus as an Informationist, Lupus had effectively granted him permission to kill her. Sucked into a swirling vortex of emotions, she had been unable to see she was playing into his hand.

However, there was one thing that could stop her in her tracks.

At the precise moment Lupus’s Code was about to execute, a heat ray came down on Canus’s head, saving her. The mysterious red-and-white light shot through the roof of the train and struck Canus like an iron hammer.

“Wha—?!”

There were only a handful of level-eleven Informationists in the world, and Canus was one of them. But his insolence and lack of experience had put him in harm’s way.

Canus was a little slow to react to the attack, making his eyes glow and generating ash to create a wall to protect himself. But this just slightly altered the trajectory of the ray. The burning light grazed his soft, flawless face before crashing into the floor.

He had only faltered for a moment, but it was enough for the left side of his face to get burned. Fresh blood spurted from his skin.

“Aghhhh!”

This time, it was Canus’s turn to scream.

As this was happening, Tsushima came crashing through the window. His jacket was covered in a surprising amount of ash. His bangs, which normally fell messily over his face, were swept back, revealing bloodshot eyes glowing blue.

“Tsushima!” Lupus shouted reflexively when she saw him. She was lightheaded, and she felt like she might collapse on the spot.

Tsushima embraced her with the momentum he had from jumping into the train car. It appeared she had reached her limit just from standing. She collapsed into Tsushima as he held her in his arms.

“Sorry for the wait,” Tsushima whispered from closer than he had ever been before. He looked at Lupus. Under the blue glow of his eyes, his irises—dark as a bottomless abyss—met her tear-filled gaze. An indescribable feeling passed between them, and Lupus buried her face in Tsushima’s chest to hide her tears.

As she did, she felt something damp and lukewarm at Tsushima’s abdomen. When she looked down at the palm she had touched him with, her eyes widened. Her pale hand was stained bright red with blood.

“Tsushima…! Isn’t this…?!”

His face was extremely pale up close, but he responded to Lupus with a smile, as if saying the wound was no big deal.

“Does a little blood displease Her Highness?” Even at a time like this, Tsushima responded with his usual sarcasm. He pulled the flustered girl firmly against his chest and fixed his gaze on Canus.

“You bastard!” Canus yelled. “I’ll never forgive you for scarring my face, you lowly insect!”

Canus quivered with pain and rage, hiding his injured face with his hands while directing his wide, glaring eyes at Tsushima.

However, the boy was in no shape to be able to construct or execute Codes correctly. His mind was chaotic with rage. There was no trace of the immense skill he had shown before. That was just how incensed he was.

As Canus shook with fury that bordered on grotesque, Tsushima glanced aimlessly out the window. The train was starting to go over a bridge that crossed a large river flowing through a valley between the mountains.

Tsushima checked the window, then took a cigarette seemingly out of nowhere and put it between his lips.

“Quit huffing and puffing. Squawking over a little scratch. Guess you can’t expect much from a brat whose pubes haven’t even grown in.”

Tsushima put his index finger to the end of his cigarette and lit it with his signature heat generation phenomenon. Canus grew even angrier as he watched the spectacle.

“Don’t think I’ll give you a painless death!” Canus yelled angrily.

Ignoring him, Tsushima flicked his cigarette at the boy.

The cigarette traced a graceful arc through the air. The instant it passed between the two of them, it emanated a blinding light. That ordinary cigarette had been rigged with a Code that converted heat into light.

In the second Canus was distracted, Tsushima shattered the window and flung himself out of the train. Below them was snowmelt from glaciers. If he and Lupus jumped in, they would have an easy time hiding.

Understanding what Tsushima was trying to do, Canus roared with such intensity that he could be heard clearly, even from outside the train.

“TSUSHIMAAAAAAAA!”

Listening to Canus shriek like a beast, Tsushima faced the boy and flipped him off, rubbing in his victory while stifling the pain from the wound in his abdomen.

As they plummeted to the surface of the large river and the sight of Canus leaning out of the train disappeared from view, Tsushima’s face twisted in agony for the first time. Then the two of them sank into the large winter river with a big splash.

It was a day so cold that even their breath seemed to freeze.

Heavy, lead-colored snow clouds stretched out overhead. The snowflakes were so large they looked like they would make sounds each time they hit the ground.

Perhaps regular families were smiling together around the fireplace as they ate soup. At the same time, a once-young boy—still a child—held a girl in his arms under the sky.

“No, Shion! I don’t want you to die.”

The girl, Shion, was about sixteen or seventeen. The boy was only around ten, and to him, Shion was both sister and mother, irreplaceable family.

But now her life hung by a thread.

She had lost half her body. The internal organs spilling out of her abdomen drew pretty vermilion grooves into the surface of the pure white snow.

Faced with this hopeless sight, the boy could do nothing but helplessly hug the upper half of the girl’s body.

Shion gazed up at him with vacant eyes that he doubted worked anymore. She sensed she was going to die soon. With trembling fingers, she took her last cigarette from her breast pocket and put it in her mouth.

“Sorry, it looks like this is as far as I can go. It’s all right. Hurry up and get out of here.”

“No! I don’t want to leave you!”

Unstoppable tears streamed down the boy’s face as he clung to Shion’s blood-covered body. Her blood had stained his clothes so thoroughly that you couldn’t even tell what color they used to be.

“I know you don’t. But look, I don’t even have legs anymore, so what can we do?” Shion laughed in spite of the situation. Then she touched the end of the cigarette with her finger and tried weakly to light it.

However, she no longer had the strength to even spark a cigarette. No smoke rose from it. Her trembling fingers just fumbled in the air.

“It’s okay, I’ll figure something out. So…so don’t die. Please, I’m begging you, don’t leave me alone.”

“You’ll never be alone. Become a great Informationist and keep everyone safe. You’ll find lots of companions, I’m sure of it. So please, escape while you still can.”

Shion gathered the last of her strength to raise her hand and stroke the boy’s head. Beyond her arm, the boy could see a massive ring of light constructed with Codes hovering in the sky.

Thousands of yards up in the sky, the magnificent glowing circle, probably a couple miles in radius, etched a pattern resembling a coat of arms. Dangling from the emblem were countless swaying arrows of light.

It had to be the work of an extremely skilled Informationist.

But to Shion and the boy, that light meant nothing but hatred.

After all, it was unmistakably responsible for her death. The glowing arrows had rained down on the Earth earlier, injuring her.

This was the consequence of her fighting desperately to protect several comrades.

“I’m glad I got to see your face at the end. Thank you.” Shion gave these final words to the boy as he gazed at the sky. The last of her strength gave out, and she left to him the gentle smile he loved.

Her arm dropped to the ground, and the cigarette slowly fell from her lips and tumbled onto her chest.

A life was gone. It was a scene the boy had witnessed many times before on the battlefield, but none of those losses compared to the tremendous grief that assailed the boy now.

He buried his face in Shion’s body, which rapidly cooled. Then he cried with voiceless screams. The boy continued to sob until he had no more tears left to shed, until he had completely used up all the words and sadness in him, expending everything.

Time passed unnoticed. The falling snow blanketed the earth, covering Shion’s blood in its icy embrace. The boy stood up, his face no longer bearing the innocence it once had.

He looked down at Shion’s lifeless body and made a vow.

The boy picked up the blood-soaked cigarette that had fallen onto Shion’s chest and placed it in his mouth. Although he had never smoked before, he lit the cigarette in imitation of her.

When he did so, his mouth filled with the bitter taste of tobacco. As he had a coughing fit, the boy’s final tear fell to his cheek in farewell to Shion.

I will never forget this bitterness. I’ll never feel this way again. Unable to properly mourn the person he loved most, the boy glared at the sky of the anguished land of Jabar.

Anything that stood in his way would become an enemy for him to erase. On that day, the boy found a reason to fight against the world.

He had been dreaming, a rarity for him. He returned to the waking world, opening terribly heavy eyelids.

He was in the middle of a dense forest. Hidden by the leaves, in an abyss without even moonlight, Tsushima strained his eyes and surveyed his surroundings.

How long had he been out? Still not fully conscious, he touched his wound. Along with a faint pain, he felt a soft sensation at his fingertips. At first, he thought his guts might be spilling out, but that didn’t seem to be the case. Intrigued by the strange feeling, Tsushima looked down at his hand.

The surface of the wound showed signs of forced cellular division to promote healing. It didn’t seem to be bleeding, and the injury itself was fully closed.

However, it appeared to have been treated in a great hurry. The scarring was rough and uneven.

“Where’d she go?”

Trying to think with his sleep-addled brain, he turned his head and saw Lupus emerge from the shade of a nearby tree. She was covered in wounds and had mud clinging to her cheeks. She looked utterly exhausted, but she quickly ran over when she saw Tsushima had woken up.

“You’ve regained consciousness. Thank goodness. I was wondering what I’d do if you died.”

“If I bite the dust, just leave me somewhere. The animals will eat my body to clean things up.”

“Don’t say that! It’s bad luck.”

Tsushima had meant it as a joke, but apparently his quip had been inappropriate. Lupus glared angrily and drew closer to him.

“Where are we?” Tsushima asked her, returning his gaze to the forest. Lupus tilted her head curiously.

“You brought us here. Do you not remember?”

“My memory cuts out around the time we jumped out of the train. It’s all fuzzy after that.”

“I see. Things were pretty rough past that point.”

Lupus put down the bundle of twigs she had been carrying under her arm to use for firewood and began to explain.

“After we got off the train, you carried me and walked along the bottom of the river for ages to escape. You kept going like this for hours while generating air using the river water and nitrogen. Canus’s monsters were pursuing us that whole time.”

“Is that what happened?”

Lupus glanced at Tsushima with concern as she arranged the firewood to start a campfire.

“Then about an hour after entering this forest, you suddenly collapsed while we were walking. I thought you were dead!”

“Must have been the blood loss and Code execution overload that got me. Sorry for worrying you.”

Sniffling, Lupus looked up at Tsushima. She must have been feeling hopeless. She didn’t say as much, but she had a forlorn expression.

Tsushima rubbed the poorly treated wound on his abdomen. It had been severe enough that it couldn’t have been healed by normal means, yet now the bleeding had stopped entirely. Based on its appearance, the wound could only have been treated by an Informationist.

Wanting to get things straight, Tsushima posed a question to Lupus.

“You’re an Informationist?”

Lupus lowered her gaze, looking just slightly guilty, before answering his question.

“Yes. I treated your wound as soon as we fell into the river, but we were moving so much that I had to treat it over and over again. It doesn’t look great, but I hope you can look past that.”

“So that’s what happened. That explains the crooked healing,” Tsushima said as he touched his injury.

“Maybe so…,” Lupus muttered with dissatisfaction. She seemed to be sulking a little. Even Tsushima realized he should add something to smooth things over.

“Still, you saved me. Thanks.”

“I should be saying that. To be honest, I didn’t think we’d be able to get away from Canus.”

Canus. One of the Six Imperial Swords. Tsushima wondered if he would cross blades with him again. Protecting his wound, Tsushima brought his hand to the firewood.

The coldness of the night was relatively mild, but since their clothes were wet, they needed to warm themselves. In the shade of the forest, a little firelight would probably go unnoticed.

Executing a simple Code, Tsushima started the small campfire. He took a seat across from Lupus and remembered he had things he needed to reconfirm.

As he rubbed his scar, Tsushima stared intently at Lupus’s face. She noticed his gaze but kept her eyes on the fire out of apparent awkwardness.

“Seems there’s a lot I should go over with you.”

“Yeah. How should I start?” Lupus said, falling silent for a little while. She added more firewood to the small campfire while thinking deeply.

The sound of birdcalls came seemingly out of nowhere, and Lupus took a deep breath, as if she had made up her mind. She turned right to Tsushima, setting honest, unwavering eyes on him.

“I’m Lupus Filia, the daughter of Emperor Balga and Third Princess,” she said, revealing her real name.

Lupus Filia. She was one of the emperor’s many children, a virtuous and compassionate princess who had strong support from the people, even domestically.

Most of the imperial family had golden hair and red eyes, which also served as proof of their lineage. However, the girl in front of him had silver hair and blue eyes—completely different features.

Now that Tsushima was looking at her, it all clicked into place. The Lupus Filia he had seen in images and photographs was indeed sitting right across from him. Frustrated at his own idiocy, Tsushima sighed and put a finger between his brows.

“From what I remember, the Third Princess has golden hair and red eyes. Which is your natural appearance?”

“I executed Codes to make my hair golden. My eyes really are red, but I’m making them blue with Code execution to keep them from standing out. I guess I’ve also done my makeup differently. Without the symbols of the imperial family, nobody noticed my identity, surprisingly.”

Having revealed one of the secrets she had been hiding, Lupus smiled, perhaps feeling that a little weight had been taken off her shoulders.

Looking straight at her, Tsushima returned to the conversation.

“How did a Balga princess wind up trying to defect to Elbar? Depending on the circumstances, your case might be beyond my capabilities.”

Lupus’s face clouded slightly at Tsushima’s cold choice of words. Then she smiled weakly and poked the firewood in the campfire.

“I got tired of the succession battle to decide the next emperor of the Balga Empire. In that world of daily plotting and scheming, I had to keep winning to stave off death. I was sick of that life.”

As she spoke, Lupus clutched something at the base of her neck. A gold necklace had become visible at her disheveled neckline during their intense escape.

That explained the gesture she had repeated several times before; she had been clutching her necklace. Tsushima kept an eye on her as he listened attentively.

“I’m the child of the emperor and an Informationist. In the imperial family, we’re taught the blood of Informationists is impure. I’ve had to live while hiding my true identity. Naturally, I haven’t had many allies, even within my own family. But there was just one person who protected me since I was a child—a knight. He was the only person I trusted. He knew my story yet stood by me as my only ally that entire time.”

As Lupus spoke, she removed her necklace. Hanging at the end were two rings—one gold and one silver—that were designed to form a single shape when put together.

“Do you know what these rings mean?”

Lupus looked at Tsushima with sad eyes. He quietly nodded.

“If I recall correctly, the Balga imperial family members have the authority to appoint knights. These rings symbolize the vow made between a member of the imperial family and their knight, don’t they?”

“Correct. I knew you’d be well-informed.”

The relationship between a member of the imperial family and their knight wasn’t simply one of protector and protected; it was also a partnership in which both people were bound by a shared fate. Knowing this, Tsushima understood the weight of those rings.

However, those two pieces of jewelry should have been split between a member of the imperial family and their knight. So why was Lupus carrying them both? The reason was easy to imagine.

“Your knight betrayed you?”

Tsushima’s words dissolved into the forest enveloped by stygian darkness. Lupus smiled weakly as she gazed at the rings.

“Yes. On the day of a festival, I was attacked. I narrowly managed to escape unharmed, but everyone I knew lost their lives, including my knight. Even though he and I had been together nearly ten years by that point, he betrayed me and tried to kill me. That’s when I realized I would have no hope of surviving as long as I was in Balga.”

Lupus shed tears as she recalled her past. She wiped her cheeks in the darkness, as if she were trying to hide them. But more tears kept coming, one after another, and for a while, they stole the words from her lips.

“Then Storm Hill approached me, claiming to have heard about my situation. They told me I was surrounded by enemies and that defecting was my only shot at escaping death. At first, I thought so, too. But it turns out that wasn’t true. My knight betraying me and Storm Hill reaching out were all part of a scheme. Every time I thought I had found my last hope, it turned out to be a lie. It’s a sick joke, isn’t it?”

Lupus laughed bitterly through her tears. Her face was so overwhelmed by grief that Tsushima instinctively rose to his feet. Closing the distance between them past the campfire, he gently put his arms around her small shoulders.

Surprised for a moment by Tsushima’s embrace, Lupus let out sobs as her emotions and tears overflowed. Feeling human warmth through her clothes, she covered her face and blubbered uncontrollably like a child. Tsushima silently stroked her shoulder.

Lupus was still only a girl, and yet she was burdened with a heavy lot in life that had crushed her spirit. With no one at her side to support her through that pain, her heart had been on the verge of breaking.

She had been left alone in the world to desperately grit her teeth against the pain; her situation reminded Tsushima of his former self. Before long, he found himself empathizing with her feelings as if they were his own.

After letting out her pent-up emotions for a while, Lupus raised her face, sniffling. Regaining some composure, she shyly wiped her cheeks as she turned to the campfire.

“The man who penned this scenario was Ross Ruber, the second prince. I have no doubts he was responsible for getting my knight to turn against me and sending Storm Hill to get close to me.”

Lupus turned her face at the sound of the firewood sparking, her gaze meeting Tsushima’s. She continued staring at him with clear intent in her honest, unwavering eyes.

“So I need to ask: Who sent you here?”

Lupus was adrift in a sea of schemes where she couldn’t tell friend from foe. Her first order of business was to clarify who she could trust.

Understanding her thinking, Tsushima sat down on the spot.

“I’d like to say the Elbar Informationist Guild arranged the job for me… But that isn’t actually the case.”

That one statement was enough to make Lupus’s face freeze. The next thing he knew, her gaze turned hostile. Tsushima raised the corners of his lips in a slight smile and shrugged.

“It was a direct request from Tachibana, the mayor of the Free City of Elbar. Requests for protecting foreign VIPs are fairly common. Though, I never expected the imperial family to be involved. Maybe Tachibana knew you were royalty.”

Tsushima stared at the campfire as he spoke.

Tachibana stood at the top of the Free City of Elba. He was one of the heroes who had fought through to the end of the War of Independence, a master strategist who was skilled in diplomacy.

The Free City of Elbar’s moves drew global attention, and the nation was awash with conflicting interests. The complexity of its political maneuvering was on a whole different level compared to the imperial succession disputes of the Balga Empire. The city had to manage intricate and sophisticated negotiations with long-term strategies. And the man at the forefront of this political battle was Tachibana. It would be no surprise if he knew everything.

“Mayor Tachibana, right? I’ve met him once. You can’t tell what he’s thinking. If I recall correctly, he’s one of the Seven Heroes of the War of Independence, isn’t he?”

“You know a lot, huh?”

“Well yeah, I’m still an Informationist, after all. I at least know the names of the Seven Heroes,” Lupus said, smiling slightly despite her reddened eyes.

Elbar’s War of Independence had been the fiercest conflict in world history, and it produced Informationists who came to be called heroes. They were known as the Seven Heroes, four of whom were still involved in running the Free City of Elbar.

Sniffling, Lupus counted them on her fingers as she showed off her knowledge.

“The Seven Heroes of independence are Mayor Tachibana; Ayman Droog, a level-thirteen Informationist; Kiriya Hina, commander in chief of the City Defense Force; and Tsukumo Kageri, representative director of Tsukumo Heavy Industries. The names of the other three aren’t known, only their titles. There’s the Thunder Informationist, the Ash and Dust Informationist, and the Shadow Informationist. Did I get that wrong?”

“No, that’s correct.” Tsushima nodded, looking at the flickering campfire.

Despite being hailed as Heroes of Independence, half of these Informationists had gone missing. There were rumors the Free City of Elbar had a dark side, to an extent, and these disappearances were part of it. Had Tachibana eliminated these heroes? Had they fled to another country? There were few who knew the truth.

Unaware of that darkness, Lupus gazed at the sky.

“Since Canus from the Six Imperial Swords made an appearance, I’d love it if even one of the Seven Heroes showed up to help us, but that’s impossible, isn’t it?” Lupus laughed at her far-fetched wish as she added more firewood.

Without a doubt, the only Informationists comparable to the Six Imperial Swords were the Seven Heroes from Elbar’s War of Independence and the Four Heavenly Kings of the Kilbis Empire. Tsushima frowned and touched the collar of his wet shirt.

“Well, who knows? If you really want it to happen, you should wish on a shooting star.”

“If I make a wish, will my savior really come?”

“If it follows the superstition,” Tsushima said, half smiling. But Lupus was looking at him earnestly.

Her gaze made Tsushima narrow his eyes for a moment.

“It’s not the Seven Heroes I would wish for,” Lupus said. She took a deep breath, then straightened her posture again and turned to face Tsushima. “This is a selfish thing for me to ask. And you came here on a job, so I can’t force you to accept. But if you’d listen to my request, I’d like to rely on you a little longer. Until we reach Elbar—”

For a moment, Lupus lowered her eyes to her hands and fell silent. The thing she wanted to say was stuck in her throat. After a brief pause, she spoke so quietly that her voice seemed like it would be drowned out by the crackling fire.

“—I want to have you by my side,” Lupus finished, clenching her fists atop her knees. Even in the darkness, Tsushima could tell her cheeks were red. Looking at her, he exhaled quietly.

The problems Lupus faced were significant. It would be extremely reckless of Tsushima to handle them alone. He wouldn’t get paid for it, so there was no longer any reason to continue working as her bodyguard.

It was clearly time for him to quit.

Yet he couldn’t find it in himself to turn down Lupus’s plea. He saw an image of Shion—who appeared even in his nightmares—overlapping with Lupus. The picture of these girls struggling to escape their own hells, separated by more than a decade, once again presented Tsushima with a choice.

Would he save her? Or lose someone again?

Although he had been unable to make this decision previously, now Tsushima felt no hesitation.

“All right.”

“Really?!”

Lupus cut in and leaned forward when she heard his response. Her eyes were round and glistened faintly with tears reflecting light from the campfire. Her guileless expression, free of concern over appearances, was almost blinding to an adult like Tsushima.

He inadvertently averted his gaze.

“But I have a condition,” he said.

“Condition?”

Lupus looked at him with teary eyes and an upward glance that tugged at his heartstrings. The fact that she had done it without any ulterior motives made it even worse for him.

To hide himself from her gaze, Tsushima raised his hand and held up a finger.

“I’ll protect you, but in exchange, you need to learn the bare minimum of Code execution as an Informationist.”

“Like what, for example?” Lupus asked, correcting her posture after leaning forward. She tilted her head questioningly.

“You won’t need to fight. But you knowing how to use a few Codes will give me more ways to protect you. So at least study the ones I’m about to teach you,” Tsushima said, finally facing Lupus directly.

He turned his glowing blue eyes toward the darkness and executed the Code for a heat ray.

This particular Code was smaller and much simpler than the one he usually used, but it still packed plenty of firepower.

Lupus let out a small cheer when she saw it.

Then she realized something.

“But this is a Code you created, isn’t it? Is it all right for you to teach it to me?”

Her question hit the mark perfectly. An Informationist’s unique Codes encompassed both their strengths and weaknesses, and each was an asset in itself. Teaching a Code to someone else would mean literally exposing aspects of oneself.

However, Tsushima gave her an indifferent look, as if telling her not to worry about it.

“It’s easier to teach Codes I’m used to. But more importantly, we’re short on time,” Tsushima said, speaking as though he had simply chosen the most rational course of action. Lupus, however, was moved by his kindness and self-sacrifice.

“You really are a good person, huh? I misjudged you,” Lupus said, her eyes softening with heartfelt kindness. After hearing her say whatever she wanted to him up until then, Tsushima seemed unsure of how he should respond.

“Enough flattery,” he eventually said. “Listen carefully while I teach you these Codes. I’m not going over them again.”

“I got it. I might not look it, but I actually pick up things pretty fast. You can count on me.”

“Says the girl who can’t even read a map,” Tsushima retorted sharply to hide his embarrassment. Lupus leaned closer beside him and shyly listened to his lecture on Codes.

The next morning, they got up early and walked continuously, making steady progress toward their destination. It was just after seven AM, and there were signs that the temperature was rising.

Wiping away the sweat streaming from his forehead, Tsushima finally stopped; he had been moving so nimbly this whole time that it was difficult to believe he was injured. Behind him, Lupus was gasping for breath and struggling to lift her heavy legs.

“You all right?” Tsushima asked her.

“I might need to take a little break.”

“We just rested a moment ago. There’s still a long way to go. We need to gain distance before the temperature rises. Otherwise, the afternoon is going to be tough.”

“I know, I know. But this path is too difficult!” Lupus plopped herself down on a tree stump beside Tsushima as if she were giving up. She was drenched in sweat, with beads streaming down her forehead and dripping down her neck.

Lupus tilted her head back and looked at the sky, gasping for breath in an unguarded pose that made it hard to believe she was a princess. Her shirt collar was wide open, revealing large drops of sweat running down her pale skin.

Tsushima averted his gaze from Lupus and checked the hands of his wristwatch. Considering the journey ahead, it would likely take them longer than anticipated to reach their destination.

“You’re surprisingly out of shape, huh?” Tsushima remarked as he checked the injury on his side. Even compared to his injured state, Lupus’s physical endurance was certainly low. She directed a damp, emotional gaze at Tsushima and gave a sarcastic response.

“Princesses don’t have the strength to walk long distances around here.”

“The fact that you’re a princess is exactly why you should build up your stamina. As you are now, you won’t be able to cope if anything happens.”

“The people around me make sure those emergencies don’t happen. This time is just a fluke.”

“Well then, my apologies for not meeting your expectations.”

“I’m not blaming you. It’s partly due to my own lack of foresight.”

Lupus sighed as she gazed at the ridge of the mountain they would soon have to climb, her eyes filled with various regrets.

Tsushima snorted smugly, laughing at her gaze. In response, she scrunched up her face like a child, baring her teeth and going “Grrrrr!” as if trying to intimidate him.

Once Tsushima confirmed her breathing had returned to normal, he clapped his hands to hurry her.

“Okay, it’s time to go now. Stand up.”

“Whaaat?! Let me rest a bit more.”

“No can do. I want to at least get past this mountain this morning.”

“You’ve got to be kidding. My legs can’t hold me up anymore. And where are we even going? Can’t you at least tell me that?!” Lupus shouted at Tsushima as he walked off ahead of her.

“I have an acquaintance up ahead,” he answered. “The fastest way for us to get out of these mountains is to ask him for help.”

“You have an acquaintance this deep in the wilderness? How in the world do you know him? I’m impressed with how wide your network is.”

“I guess that’s why I’ve also gained an acquaintance in the imperial family. Stop grumbling and pick up the pace. The sun’s going to go down.”

“You really are a demon, Tsushima. What happened to the nice guy from yesterday?” Despite uttering those weak-spirited words, Lupus slowly rose to her feet. Adjusting their pace slightly, the two started walking again.

They continued ahead without having any breakfast or lunch, and the sun was about to set when the two of them finally arrived at their destination.

It was on the side of a narrow, paved road, possibly near a highway. An old house with a garage and a small lodge stood side by side. There were no other residences in the area, but the relatively neat appearance of the exterior suggested it wasn’t abandoned.

From a distance, Tsushima confirmed the lights were on in the lodge, then gestured for Lupus to follow.

“Someone really lives here?”

“That’s right. Unless he’s dead.”

“Is there a chance that might be the case?”

“Yeah. He was already pretty old ten years back, so if he’s still kicking, he’ll be ancient.”

“Wooow… Thanks for that amazing, wonderfully reassuring tale. Anyway, as long as there’s warm soup and a chair to sit on, I don’t care where we are; I just want to rest.”

Lupus squinted at Tsushima as if he were far away, then sniffed and nudged his shoulder with her elbow. She seemed to be telling him to hurry up.

“I don’t think anyone would tail us this far, but don’t let your guard down,” he said.

“I know, I know. Walk one step behind you, using you as a shield at all times, right?” Lupus recited the instructions he’d given her the previous night and shot him a cold look.

“Sheesh, you’re not very endearing,” Tsushima muttered, turning his heavy steps toward the cabin.

As the two crossed the road and entered the premises, the cabin door suddenly opened to reveal a bearded, bearlike old man. Seeing the two of them, he raised his hand in greeting, not seeming particularly surprised.

“Oh. You’re that lad, aren’t you? Tsushima? It’s not often I get visitors. You sure have grown since I last saw you.”

“I’m glad you’re still here. It was a bit of a gamble, but it paid off.”

“Oh my. So you’ve been driven to relying on a secluded old hermit, eh? Well, being relied on doesn’t feel too bad.”

The old man looked at Lupus, who blended into the darkness of the forest at night. Seeing her muddy, sweaty appearance, he seemed to grasp the situation immediately and gestured for the two of them to enter the lodge.

“That young lady looks like she needs some rest. Have you been pushing people too hard again? That won’t do. You should show more consideration, ’specially to those weaker than you. Don’t forget you’re not like most people.”

“I got it. Save the lecture for later. I want to let her rest first.”

After watching their exchange, Lupus gave the old man a polite bow.

“Please forgive us for suddenly visiting so late at night.”

“No, no, never you mind,” the old man replied. “If you’re with the lad, you’re always welcome here.”

“Thank you. I’ll take you up on that offer.”

Forcing her tired legs to move after basically dragging them while walking earlier, Lupus stepped into the lodge.

Tsushima followed behind her.

While the old man showed Lupus around, Tsushima decided to take a load off in the living room.

The inside of the cabin could hardly be called spacious. The living room, connected to the kitchen, consisted of a few chairs and a table. Thankfully, the fire burning in the hearth wrapped the inside of the room in a warmth that invited drowsiness.

After a few minutes, the old man returned to the living room. Putting a pipe in his mouth, he sat down in a rocking chair and gazed at Tsushima, as if asking for an explanation.

Tsushima cleared his throat.

“First, I have to thank you. You’ve really helped us out by taking us in.”

“Looks like you have your reasons. I couldn’t just turn my back on you.”

“Yeah. As for why I’ve come to you…”

“For that young lady’s transport, yeah?” the old man said as if predicting Tsushima’s words. He raised his thick, white-streaked eyebrows and exhaled smoke.

“That’s right. I want you to take both of us close to the Middle Sea. Preferably using a method that doesn’t allow anyone to follow us.”

“I see. Should be fine.”

The old man was someone Tsushima had once relied on back when he lived in the Balga Empire. He worked as a courier. Half a century ago, he had apparently been a fighter pilot. His flying skills were excellent.

The old man puffed on his pipe for a while, seemingly absorbed in thought. Tsushima crossed his arms and perched on the kitchen counter.

“This a high-stakes job?” the old man asked slowly.

“It’s best not to ask too many details. If you get caught up in it, you won’t be able to stay in this country.”

“That serious, huh? Pretty flowers have their thorns, but is that girl really worth all this?”

The old man narrowed his eyes and started staring at an old photograph hanging on the wall. When an old person like him started talking about the past, it rarely led anywhere good. Tsushima silently hoped the conversation wouldn’t veer off course.

“But seeing you with a girl her age makes me remember, you know? About Shion.”

Of course he would bring that up, Tsushima thought, but he couldn’t deny what the old man had pointed out.

Tsushima responded as he reached for a cigarette that was on the counter.

“She doesn’t look anything like her, but for some reason, she reminds me of her. And because of that, here we are.”

“Ha. Men have been easily swayed by women throughout the ages.”

“That’s some wisdom right there.”

Tsushima saw the corners of the old man’s lips curl slightly upward in a smile behind his pipe. At the same time, the man’s eyes got a faraway look, and he blew smoke into thin air.

“I’m glad you’re still alive,” the old man said. “The War of Independence was never one we had much hope of winning. When Shion died, I thought you wouldn’t last long, either, but I’m glad you grew up unharmed.”

“Unharmed, huh?”

Tsushima finally found the small box he’d been looking for. He pulled out a match and lit it, making a relieved sound as he inhaled cigarette smoke for the first time all day. The old man turned his head at Tsushima’s voice.

“What’s this? You’ve taken up smoking, too? That’s strangely similar to Shion.”

“There’s more to it, Gramps. It’s not like I do it because I enjoy it.”

Seeing Tsushima flash his signature spiteful grin, the old man rose from his chair with an expression like he was dealing with an unruly kid.

“Cigarette toxins wear down Informationists, right? You should quit.”

“Technically, it disrupts the brain’s Code construction process. It’s not like smoking causes me any major impairments anyway—if anything, that’s kind of the point.”

“Confident as ever, I see. Want some alcohol to go with your smokes?”

The old man stumbled to the kitchen on unsteady legs, pulling out a bottle filled with light brown liquid from a shelf. Probably whiskey or something similar. Tsushima grimaced and shook his head.

“I’m no good with alcohol. I’ll pass.”

“Oh. So you’re not like Shion in that way. She could handle her liquor as well as I can.”

“I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that. She was technically underage at the time.”

“Ha. Well, it was during the war, so the statute of limitations has surely run out.”

As the old man let out a distinctive cackle, they heard the sound of a door opening at the back of the room. It seemed Lupus had finished her bath.

She appeared with a pattering of footsteps, dressed in an oversize shirt and pants. Her long silver hair spilled out from beneath a towel on her head, and her outfit made her look much younger than she really was.

“I’m done. The water was just the right temperature. It blew away my fatigue,” Lupus said contentedly. She looked at Tsushima and tilted her head in confusion at his weird stare.

“What’s wrong? Do I look weird or something?”

Lupus stretched out her arms to check her appearance, inadvertently revealing the flawless white skin at the top of her chest. Though she seemed unaware of it, it was clearly too tempting a sight.

Unable to figure out the reason for Tsushima’s staring, Lupus looked back at him, tilting her head with a puzzled expression. That was also utterly captivating.

Her carefree demeanor most likely reflected her true self. However, she inspired in Tsushima the strange desire to protect her. Unable to bear it, Tsushima averted his gaze and exhaled smoke.

Through the swirling smoke, his eyes met those of the old man, who shook his head as if saying, Oh, good grief!

Annoying old geezer, Tsushima thought bitterly.

“Hey, what’s with the attitude?” Lupus asked. She approached him unguarded, giving off a squeaky-clean aroma. Tsushima held up his hand to stop her and spoke as if the situation was serious.

“Don’t come near me—I’m smoking.”

“Aren’t you always? But more importantly, what was with that look in your eyes just now? You’re hiding something again, aren’t you?”

“Again?”

“Yes, again!”

Although they were having a conversation, Tsushima never once looked at her, making Lupus feel even more suspicious. As she steadily closed the distance between them, Tsushima found himself backing away from her under the pressure.

Feeling insecure due to his behavior, Lupus sniffed herself.

“Huh? Could it be that I still stink? But I washed myself properly.”

“Nah, you don’t smell.”

“So why are you running awayyyy?”

With her arms crossed and eyes narrowed, Lupus looked up from beside him. But Tsushima stubbornly refused to return her gaze—because from that angle, he could see something he shouldn’t.

As Tsushima desperately endured his exchange with the oblivious Lupus, the old man finally sent in a lifeline.

“Young lady, you’ll get cold after your bath. Here, put this on.” With a warm smile, he handed her a thick cardigan. Lupus likely didn’t pick up on the true meaning of his grin.

Following his advice, Lupus began putting on the cardigan. Tsushima extinguished his cigarette and stood up to get away from her.

“I’ll use the bath as well. Oh yeah, Gramps, don’t let this kid drink anything weird. Especially not alcohol. She’s underage,” Tsushima warned him. Raising his hand to say he understood, the old man tilted the whiskey glass he had poured for himself.

A little uneasy, Tsushima walked quickly to the bathroom, deciding to finish bathing as soon as possible.

After he was done cleaning himself, Tsushima looked at the scene in the living room and regretted his own stupidity.

In the living room, the old man and Lupus were clinking glasses that contained the same brown liquid. Tsushima had half expected this would happen.

However, he couldn’t just say nothing at the sight of Lupus—a minor and a princess—downing cheap liquor.

With his head in his hands, Tsushima walked up to the old man.

“Hey, Gramps, what are you letting her drink?”

“Huh? It’s just alcohol,” the old man replied with a wide grin, showing no sign of remorse. His gentle smile, like that of a grandfather looking at his grandchild, was directed at Lupus, who was happily swirling her glass on the sofa, her face already flushed.

“This drink is pretty tasty. Why don’chu try some?” It didn’t seem to just be his imagination—she was slurring her words slightly. As Lupus spoke, she offered her glass to Tsushima with a dreamy, melty smile. She didn’t seem to be aware she was drinking alcohol.

“If you keep sipping this cheap booze, you’ll end up like this old guy. We have an early morning tomorrow. Hurry and get to bed.”

“Oh, c’mon! I’ll shleep after I hear more about ya past. Right, Grandfather?” Lupus said loudly, smiling at the old man. An awkward look came to the old man’s face for a moment, but the beautiful girl in front of him won him over, and he broke into a smile.

“If it’s stories you want, I’ll tell them myself. So go to bed!” Tsushima said. “We can sleep in the attic, right?”

“Ah, yeah. See that hidden staircase up there? That leads to the attic,” the old man replied hesitantly. He had given an inarticulate answer because he was under Tsushima’s scrutinizing gaze, which was silently asking, What the heck did you tell her? In response to Tsushima’s unvoiced question, the old man reluctantly pointed toward an old black-and-white photograph framed on the wall.

Tsushima looked at the photo, and his eyes went wide. It was extremely nostalgic.

The photo showed a row of comrades standing side by side just before the War to Recapture Jabar. In a corner of the photo was a girl who now existed only in his memories. Next to her was a small boy—Tsushima when he was younger.

The wound in Tsushima’s heart throbbed, and he squinted from the pain. The girl in the photo evoked both nostalgia and anguish as she smiled brightly with a cigarette between her lips. Her exact smile from those days was right there, perfectly preserved.

Unable to bear the feelings of desolation, Tsushima turned away from the photo.

“You also have some flying to do tomorrow, don’t you? Don’t get too plastered,” he said to Lupus.

“Yeah, we geddit. We’re jus’ drinkin’ a little bit before we go to bed.”

Tsushima put the drunkenly mumbling girl over his shoulder and went up to the attic room.

The space at the top of the simple pull-down stairs turned out to be surprisingly well furnished for an attic. The ceiling was so low that Tsushima had to crouch, but everything else was perfect.

When he turned on the small incandescent lamp—their only source of light—he got a full view of the room, which had several mattresses laid out on the floor. Tsushima laid Lupus down on one of them.

“Oh, c’mon! I can still drink.”

“Don’t. It’s a hassle.”

Looking discontented lying on the mattress, Lupus pouted with her cheeks puffed out, but the warmth of the bedding won out, and she wrapped herself in a blanket.

Still feeling warm after his bath, Tsushima pulled a chair from the corner and sat down to cool off in the pleasant briskness of the attic. Then he turned off the light to encourage Lupus to fall asleep.

In the darkened room, moonlight streamed in through a window in the roof. Lit by the pale blue light, the space became dead quiet.

Tsushima gazed up at the moonlight to calm his mind. He listened closely to the sound of Lupus’s breathing; it had a different quality than it did when she was genuinely asleep. He glanced at her.

Lupus had poked her face out from under the blanket and was staring at him with sleepy eyes. She looked like she wanted to talk about something. When Tsushima tilted his head questioningly, she parted her small lips.

“Earlier, I heard about your elder sister. About the War to Recapture Jabar and other things.” In a departure from her previous drunken boldness, Lupus now spoke cautiously, as if she were handling something she ought not to touch. She raised her eyebrows and gazed at Tsushima, observing him.

“I didn’t mean to dig into your past or anything,” she continued. “But, well, things just kind of turned out that way.”

“Gramps probably just felt like reminiscing after so long. Don’t worry about it. I’m not trying to hide it or anything.”

Tsushima leaned against the back of the chair and looked out the window. Bathed in the pale light of the waxing moon, he slowly began to speak.

“Her name was Shion. She was only about sixteen or seventeen. She was an Informationist, too. Did you see the picture in the living room?”

“Yeah. She had a lovely smile. The boy next to her is you, right?”

“That’s unnecessary commentary.”

“Heh-heh. You used to be cute back then.”

Lupus poked her head out of the blanket and looked at the current Tsushima.

The man sitting in the chair had become a mysterious adult with a dark side, completely removed from his former youth—in both good ways and bad.

“I lived with Shion for three, maybe four years. She looked after me quite a lot. We weren’t related by blood, but I thought of her as my real sister. She was strong-willed, kind, and a good person.”

“I see. Was she your first love, by any chance?”

Tsushima smiled wryly at Lupus’s question.

“She might have been. I don’t really remember anymore. She was just an important person to me. That’s all.”

“Yeah. After being with someone for three years or more, they’re practically your family.” Lupus sympathized, clutching the rings hanging from her necklace. Perhaps finding it difficult to delve further into the topic, she changed the course of the conversation slightly.

“I also heard about Elbar’s War of Independence. Gramps said you were involved right from the planning stages, before the war started.”

“Damn, Gramps sure does like to blab with those loose lips of his.”

Tsushima shrugged in exasperation and gave a short nod to confirm. Seeing that, Lupus raised her tone slightly.

“Did you meet the Seven Heroes during the War of Independence?”

“Well, I guess I’ve at least seen them in passing. Why? Do you like the Seven Heroes or something?”

“Of course! All Informationists adore the Seven Heroes of the War of Independence. They were the greatest Informationists of their era, fighting for their rights without any support from authority.” Lupus spoke as if trying to convince Tsushima, who seemed skeptical.

He gave a slightly hesitant scowl in response.

“I don’t think they were all that great in reality.”

“But you fought with them because you at least agreed with their cause, right?”

Tsushima couldn’t bring himself to answer Lupus’s innocent question with a straightforward yes. He tilted his head, looking troubled.

“Hmm, I wonder about that. I don’t know the answer, but at the very least, we had lost a way to back out of fighting. Back then, everyone was looking for a place to die. We needed a purpose and battlefield to fully ignite our ideals and beliefs. The losses we experienced in Jabar were just that devastating—so much that we felt we had nothing left to live for.”

Lupus was left speechless by Tsushima’s heavy, realistic response to her lighthearted question. Learning about war through words on a page and experiencing it firsthand were very different things.

“I see… So that’s how it was. I don’t really know much about that time.”

“Of course not. You were still a child.”

“You say that, but weren’t you still a kid then, too, Tsushima?”

“I was about the same age you are now. Maybe a bit younger. But the whole thing’s just a story from the distant past.” Although he spoke as if he had let go of everything from back then, Tsushima had a somewhat dim, gloomy aura about him. Not even the moonlight shining down on him could dispel his darkness.

Lupus’s face clouded over with unease when she saw that.

“Do you really think that way?”

Tsushima didn’t know what Lupus was asking about. He looked back at her with a questioning expression. Hesitantly, she began to speak.

“Earlier, Grandfather said something… He said he feels a sense of vengeful resentment from you. He thinks the old war was responsible for those feelings, and that they’re buried deep within you. He was really worried.”

“Vengeful resentment… He’s not entirely wrong.”

Tsushima quickly banished the emotions from his face.

“Since I didn’t have any other family, Shion was the most important person in my life. But I couldn’t protect her during the disastrous defeat at the War to Recapture Jabar. She mattered more to me than my own life, yet somehow, I survived while she died. Do you know why?”

Lupus wiped away her earlier smile and silently shook her head. Seeing that, Tsushima gave a self-deprecating smile.

“Because I was weak. Feebler than people who steal from others. That’s why everything was stolen from me. But this time, things will be different.”

“This time?”

“Yeah. I’ll get you to Elbar, even if it kills me. The circumstances are different from how they were in the past, but this might be a chance to settle the score—a battle for vengeance. This time, I’ll protect what I couldn’t back then. It’s that kind of fight.”

Should Lupus be happy to hear this? Conflicted emotions showed vividly on her face. Tsushima’s sentiment was not malicious in the slightest, but the wicked air about him left her feeling bewildered.

“Tsushima, you’re…kind of scary right now,” Lupus said, gripping the edge of her blanket.

Her comment snapped Tsushima out of his spiral of negative emotions, bringing him back to reality. His suffocating, gloomy aura, which had felt like it was melting into the darkness, receded like smoke.

“Sorry, I got a little emotional.”

Tsushima stood up from his chair and took out a cigarette he had swiped earlier. As he placed the familiar object between his lips, he started returning to his usual self.

“I appreciate you telling me how you feel, but don’t push yourself too hard,” Lupus told him.

“I’m fine,” Tsushima muttered—not so much to Lupus but to himself. He took out his gas lighter, but as he was about to strike it, his hand stopped.

“Come to think of it, you’re an Informationist, too, huh? So secondhand smoke is bad for you.”

“If you think that, you should quit smoking altogether. Even if I wasn’t an Informationist—”

“I know, I know. You don’t have to keep saying it.”

Fully back to being his usual self, Tsushima reluctantly put away his lighter. However, the fact that he kept the cigarette in his mouth showed he had lingering feelings of attachment.

“We’re flying to the Middle Sea tomorrow, right?”

“That’s right. If all goes well, we might find a ship heading to Elbar. You should make a list of the things you want to do once you’ve escaped the country.”

“You’re jumping the gun a bit, but thanks.” Lupus giggled quietly under her blanket, then turned over in bed. Within minutes, she fell asleep, her flowing silver hair swaying gently in time with her rhythmic breathing.

Tsushima gazed at her back while jiggling the cigarette in his mouth up and down. Although he felt like he’d said too much, he had realized what he really wanted deep down—to save her.

“Karma comes full circle, I guess.”

As time passed, the heavy emotions he had tried to suppress came to the surface. In the dim corner of the room, Tsushima’s eyes glowed a dull blue.

“Look, Tsushima! Isn’t that Elbar?”

“Nah, we wouldn’t be able to see it yet from this altitude. That’s a small island much closer to us.”

“Really? Awww, that’s no fun.”

Inside the plane cabin, filled with the roar of the propeller, Lupus was bouncing with excitement. Being crammed in such a narrow space had Tsushima in a bad mood, but Lupus’s vibrant smile lifted his spirits slightly.

Since early that morning, the old man had been flying calmly in a plane he normally kept stored in a detached building on his property. It was a small two-seater aircraft, but by squeezing Lupus and Tsushima into the rear seat of the cockpit, they had managed to make it fit three.

Obviously, this meant the rear seat was terribly cramped. Annoyingly, Lupus kept moving her head left and right under Tushima’s chin.

The princess had been awfully excited since waking up, a feeling likely inspired by her desire to flee Balga being on the verge of finally coming true.

“Hey, what kind of ship are we going to board once we reach the Middle Sea?” Lupus asked through her headset, raising her face.

Tsushima frowned in annoyance as he answered.

“If we’re boarding one, it’ll be a smuggling ship. It won’t be a passenger ship or high-speed ferry, so don’t expect much comfort.”

“Wowww… That sounds exciting! Actually, this will be my first time on a ship. Most of my travel has been by plane or car.” Lupus began gesturing as she spoke, her face darkening at recalling just a little of her past.

However, the sparkle quickly returned to her eyes.

“Traveling over the sea must feel amazing! Watching the fish swimming and listening to birds singing…”

“It’s not that elegant, but—well, you’ll find out once you board.”

Tsushima turned and looked outside as he recalled the unpleasantness of riding on smuggling ships, which he had done several times before.

The view from the cockpit was breathtakingly gorgeous. The sea was visible beyond the overlapping blue mountains, and the white clouds sparkled dazzlingly under the sunlight. The scene seemed to perfectly reflect Lupus’s heart, which was full to the brim with hope.

Tsushima’s heart, however, still held a little anxiety. Things had gotten bad enough that a member of the Six Imperial Swords had shown up. Anything could happen.

Taking little notice of Tsushima’s unease, Lupus looked up at him again, her small head bumping directly into his chin in the process. In response to the dull impact, Tsushima directed a stern glare at her, and she gave an apologetic, embarrassed smile.

“Sorry. Am I getting too excited?”

“You finally noticed?”

“Yeah, my bad. But I’m just happy about finally getting to leave this country.”

Lupus restlessly jiggled her knees and looked out the window. To her, the view was the embodiment of freedom itself. With the three of them soaring high above the harsh realities on the ground below, perhaps it was all right for her to momentarily lose her head a little.

Tsushima let out a slight sigh and tapped Lupus on the shoulder.

“So what do you want to do once we arrive in Elbar? I told you to make a list last night, didn’t I?”

“Huh? Well, there’s lots I want to do,” Lupus said with a suddenly serious expression. She started muttering as she counted on her slim fingers. “I want to buy confectionaries at a store, and I want to eat this pastry called a crepe. Also, I’ve heard there’s a pizza this big, so I want to eat that, too. And I want cute clothes, and I want to try going to the movie theater on my way home from school. And also—”

“Hang on, hang on. First, rank things in order of what you want to do the most. Doing everything at once will just be chaos,” Tsushima interrupted, unable to hold back.

Lupus stared at him curiously, then slowly widened her eyes. For some reason, it gave Tsushima a bad feeling.

“By any chance, are you trying to make my dreams come true, Tsushima?”

“…It depends. We’ll be living in the same city anyway. I guess we’ll still spend some time together.”

“Really? Yay! In that case, let’s start with having crepes together.”

“Please don’t make me do that.” Tsushima made a sour face at the image of devouring crepes with Lupus in the streets of Elbar.

“How come?!”

Seeing Tsushima’s reaction, Lupus slammed her head into his chin—intentionally this time. Reeling in pain from having his chin forced up, Tsushima retorted childishly.

“That hurts! Stop it!”

“It wouldn’t hurt for you to hang out with me a little, would it?! You only act like an adult when you want to get out of something!”

“I’m not ‘acting’ like an adult—I am an adult.”

“Hmm? I’m not so sure about that. You’ve got quite a tendency to get irritated, don’t you? I know you do.”

As the two began their strange squabble, the old man sitting in the front seat looked back at them with concern. Realizing their exchange was occurring just between the two of them, he awkwardly opened the communication channel.

“Sorry to interrupt your flirting session, but we’ll begin descending in ten minutes. Please get ready,” the old man said through his headset, shooting a look at Tsushima through a mirror aimed at the rear seat. Tsushima, who had been jostled about in the cramped seat, adjusted his hair with his hand as he tried to save face.

“All right, my body is secured. Proceed as planned.”

“Will do.”

The plane tilted its nose toward their planned landing site in sync with the movements of the old man’s hands on the control stick.

At that moment, Tsushima noticed something shining between the clouds. A dazzling flash of light, like an intense sunray, entered his field of vision just before the plane shook violently.

“What was that?!” the old man yelled.

A part of the aircraft broke into fragments and scattered across the sky. At the same time, the propeller began to give out. The plane started to behave erratically, and the old man hurriedly squeezed the control stick in a panic.

“What on earth is going on?!” Lupus screamed.

“Don’t speak! You’ll bite your tongue!” Tsushima held Lupus’s head down and looked out the canopy.

This wasn’t just some technical trouble—it was clearly an attack. However, there weren’t many ways someone could strike a small plane flying that high up.

It was undoubtedly the work of an Informationist, one who could produce Codes with a substantial amount of precision.

Tsushima shook off the chill running up his spine and shouted.

“Gramps! Eject the canopy!” His voice echoed around the cockpit.

As the old man handled the aircraft controls, he activated the emergency canopy release. While he was doing that, Tsushima prepared for battle by unbuckling his seat belt and standing up.

However, the enemy moved far faster than Tsushima had anticipated.

As soon as the canopy had ejected, a shadowy figure whose approach had been concealed by the sunlight landed on the plane’s nose. The aircraft shook violently, and Tsushima lost his balance, falling to his knees.

Tsushima looked up to find the assailant looming overhead. Standing there was a woman wearing a familiar navy blue military uniform with crimson embroidery.

The Informationist looked down, her skin inhumanly pale, her swaying locks so white it was as if they had absorbed the light. Her golden eyes were tinged with a blue glow—the sign of Code execution.

Lupus shuddered at the sight of the Informationist who had suddenly appeared.

“Finé…Primus? What are you doing up here?”

Hearing Lupus utter the Informationist’s name with despair, Tsushima canceled the Code he had been constructing in his brain.

Finé Primus was the most famous of the Six Imperial Swords. Known as “the Radiant Informationist,” she was a heroic level-eleven Informationist who had created mountains of corpses on countless battlefields. Even Canus, a fellow member of the Six Imperial Swords, was dwarfed by her presence. In both reputation and reality, she was the strongest of the group.

That monster of a woman was now right in front of them. The enemy had seized the initiative, and Tsushima’s client was well within killing range. Even he had no means of countering in this situation.

With no other choice, Tsushima silently raised his hands in a gesture of surrender. “A smart choice,” Finé stated indifferently.

“If you intended to kill us, you could have done so with the first hit. What is your goal?” Tsushima asked, watching to see how she would respond. Finé answered with an emotionless expression.

“On my master’s orders, I will take you all with me. Resist, and I’ll kill you.”

“Understood. We’ll cooperate.”

Once she had confirmed the group wasn’t going to put up a fight, Finé executed some kind of Code without even raising an eyebrow.

A dazzling band of light formed in midair and began encircling the plane, as if squeezing it. The metal body of the aircraft creaked and groaned, and when the light completely surrounded it, the three of them were hit by a strange floating sensation.

What kind of Code would someone have to execute to create this type of phenomenon? It was beyond comprehension. And yet the plane, which had been plummeting a moment ago, was starting to fly again.

As they looked down at their destination and saw that it was tantalizingly close, the plane turned its nose eastward. It appeared they were now heading to Balga Capital City, the last place they wanted to be.

From his position in the plane, now like a rudderless ship, Tsushima noticed Lupus was trembling. She wasn’t just trembling from terror. She was staring at her feet without uttering a single word, her back hunched and her face pale.

For a moment, Lupus had found hope and was on the verge of reaching the world she had longed for, only for one of the Six Imperial Swords to show up and start dragging them back to the capital she feared most. This meant she had given in to despair.

Tsushima clicked his tongue, unable to stand it.

After being engulfed in a light that seemed to be the very embodiment of divine protection from the gods, Lupus and Tsushima were once again on the road to hell. The world, once dyed in the vibrant colors of hope, now appeared monochrome.

Chapter 3

CHAPTER3

Compared to Sherun, Balga Capital City was somewhat low in density for an urban area. Perhaps this was because the city had been built on a vast coastal plain. It was built on an open plan, lined with many historical buildings.

About six miles east of the capital’s center, there stood an old, stately mansion with a sweeping view of the city. In one of its rooms, Tsushima and Lupus were being held prisoner.

After they had disembarked, Finé had let the old man go without harming him but, naturally, escorted Lupus and Tsushima to the mansion. They hadn’t heard anything from their captors since.

Tsushima turned from the window he had been staring out of to ease his boredom and looked at the room.

Lupus was sitting in a large armchair before the lit fireplace, hugging her knees. She had been crying nonstop ever since being brought here, and the skin around her eyes was red and raw.

Defeated by the gloomy atmosphere, Tsushima finally lost his patience and took out a cigarette. As the flames of his lighter touched the tip of the cigarette, his gaze met Lupus’s for the first time in a while. She narrowed her puffy and exhausted eyes even more.

“You’re that much of an addict, huh?” she murmured.

Her words dropped into the spacious room and weighed heavily on Tsushima’s shoulders. He quietly exhaled tasteless smoke.

“Keep your snark to yourself. It would have been almost impossible for us to escape that situation. Besides, Finé’s goal wasn’t to take your life. Knowing that, I chose the option with the highest probability of survival.”

“I wasn’t being snarky. And I’m not blaming you, either, Tsushima. But I just don’t know how to deal with these feelings,” Lupus said with her face buried in her knees, the end of her sentence once again wavering.

However, Tsushima couldn’t afford to feel disheartened in the same way. He went over the information they had in order to figure out his next move.

“Finé mentioned something about ‘her master,’ right? Who does she serve?” Tsushima asked.

Lupus raised her head slightly, tears still in her eyes.

“The leader of the Six Imperial Swords is the emperor, but the person she referred to as ‘master’ is the man who appointed her as his knight—the first prince.”

“The first prince. So that would be Causa Insania?” Tsushima muttered the name with a sour face.

Causa Insania, eldest son of the emperor of the Balga Empire and first in line to the imperial throne, was known as one of the world’s leading strategists. Even Tachibana, mayor of Elbar and an accomplished strategist himself, had said Causa was a formidable foe.

Tsushima had never imagined that the Second Prince would be involved at this point, much less the First Prince. He furrowed his brow, finding the situation increasingly suspicious.

“Why would he interfere with your defection?”

“I don’t know. But he only ever shows interest in things that benefit him. That’s all there is to it.”

“So you fleeing Balga is advantageous for him in some way?”

“Who knows? I have no idea what that man considers beneficial. But there’s definitely something,” she replied, directing her gaze at the door of the room. She sensed someone approaching.

As soon as Lupus raised her head, the thick door opened without so much as a knock, the hinges creaking. There stood Finé, skin so pale she looked like she was faintly glowing.

She glanced at the room and, in a monotone, delivered her message concisely.

“Both of you, follow me.”

Tsushima exhaled another lungful of smoke and stubbed out his barely used cigarette on the window frame.

“So where are you taking us?” Tsushima asked lightheartedly. Finé cast a brief glance at him but didn’t answer.

Tsushima moved his heavy legs with reluctance.

“Not gonna answer? All right, then. Let’s go.”

Lupus weakly stood at Tsushima’s insistence.

The two of them followed Finé as she led them through the mansion. They went down an extremely wide corridor, climbed some stairs, and were guided to a certain room.

The chamber was simple and sparsely decorated, lined with rows of bookcases crammed with countless volumes.

In the center of the room were two sofas facing each other across a coffee table. A man sat on one of them.

He had beautiful, slicked-back golden hair, and his bright-red eyes were as piercing as a snake’s. The white military uniform he had on, crafted from what appeared to be high-quality fabric, was refined in design and free of unnecessary embellishment. His face had a subtle air of confidence, and the charisma he exuded made his presence feel even larger.

Tsushima knew from just a glance this was Causa Insania. There was a clearly visible difference in class.

A moment passed, and then Causa lifted his head as if he had just noticed he had visitors. After taking a long, careful look at Tsushima, he smiled at Lupus behind Tsushima’s back.

“Hey, little sis. Long time no see.”

“It’s been a long time, Causa.”

“I apologize for bringing you here in such an abrupt manner. Please, take a seat.” Causa gestured toward the chair in front of him, showing zero signs of hostility.

However, Lupus hesitated for a moment. She glanced up at Tsushima standing behind her, seeking an answer from him.

“Don’t worry. I’m here with you.” Tsushima kept an intimidating eye on Causa as he placed a hand on Lupus’s shoulder. She still looked uneasy, but she slowly lowered herself onto the sofa.

Tsushima stood behind her, while Finé positioned herself behind Causa as if to counter this.

It was finally starting, Tsushima sensed, bracing himself again. Causa, who had been observing their interaction, slowly got the ball rolling.

“I’ve heard quite a bit about this matter through the grapevine. It seems you’ve completely fallen for Ross Ruber’s scheme, haven’t you, Lupus?”

At Causa’s question, Lupus turned her face away, looking somewhat ashamed.

“I have nothing to blame but my own foolishness.”

“That may be true, but thanks to your capable bodyguard, you’ve survived. I’m glad you’re safe,” Causa said, his gaze naturally shifting to Tsushima as he spoke. “However, if you had landed at Middle Sea as you were about to, you likely wouldn’t have gotten away unscathed. The Fourth Division was already stationed there along with Canus Miles of the Six Imperial Swords. And there’s no denying even Tsushima Rindou lacks the strength to handle both at once, right?”

Causa raised an eyebrow slightly as he casually invoked Tsushima. His demeanor implied he had researched him thoroughly beforehand.

Tsushima tilted his head slightly, maintaining a stern expression.

“So, in other words, you’re saying you saved us?” he asked.

Causa responded cheerfully to Tsushima’s arrogant attitude.

“You could interpret it that way, but it depends on your answer going forward.” Causa moved his hand, which he’d been resting his chin on, and clasped them back together. His tone became slightly forceful. “A member of the imperial family fleeing the country amounts to nothing less than treason. I could have you both arrested right here and now and dragged in front of the emperor.”

“But you’re not doing that. You must have a reason, right?” Tsushima asked, pressing the prince for answers.

Causa let a well-timed silence hang in the air, as if to deliberately irritate Tsushima and keep him in suspense. Then he responded with a tone that could be interpreted as provocative.

“Why are you in such a hurry? Please calm down, Tsushima Rindou.”

Even Tsushima couldn’t hide his irritation at that remark. His eyelid twitched, and he let his anger show on his face.

Feeling like this was going in a dangerous direction, Lupus stepped between the two of them to intervene.

“From the tone of your words, Big Brother Causa, it sounds like you are quite informed on this matter. What is the extent of your involvement?” she asked Causa directly, looking as fragile as glassware. It seemed he hadn’t expected her to interrupt the conversation at that point.

Causa’s eyes widened slightly, and he returned to the previous topic.

“I’ve known for a long time Second Prince Ross Ruber has been trying to eliminate you, of course. There’s no doubt he manipulated your knight into betraying you in order to wear you down mentally, forcing you to walk the path of defection. I had no idea he’d use Storm Hill as a tool to accomplish this, but he’s a wicked man.”

“Canus told me Storm Hill is under Ross’s control.”

“Yes, they are. Storm Hill was originally established on the initiative of His Majesty the Emperor to flush out dissidents within the country. While Storm Hill passes itself off as an anti-government rebel group, this is merely its facade. His Majesty was the original administrator, but it seems he’s handed management of it over to Ross.”

As he stated this matter-of-factly, Causa swept his eyes from Lupus’s feet to her neck, as though assessing her strength.

Then he let out a small sigh.

“There’s no point in minor questions and answers. This may be a little harsh for you to hear, but it would save both our time for me to just reveal everything.” With those words, Causa extended his hand toward Finé behind him without even glancing at her. She handed him some documents, and he placed them on the coffee table.

Lupus swallowed hard and reached for the papers. She gently broke the seal and opened them to find countless photographs and written records.

“This is what I’ve independently unearthed on what Ross Ruber has been using Storm Hill for domestically. The highly confidential documents you hold detail something called the Banner of Hope Operation, which is what you’ve been involved in up until now.”

Canus rested his arms on his crossed legs as he waited for Lupus to find the relevant section. Once he had confirmed that she had, he began speaking again.

“It seems Ross Ruber has been advancing this plan since your early childhood. After verifying the rumor circulating among members of the imperial family of you having Informationist blood, he devised a way to make killing you as advantageous for him as possible.”

Lupus’s hands trembled as she flipped through the documents. Confronted with facts she didn’t want to see, her heart practically creaked under the strain.

This is bad, Tsushima thought. Lupus had already been subjected to so much that any further strain might completely break her spirit.

Tsushima tried to step in and reassure her, but he stopped short when Canus emitted a murderous aura. His bloodthirst was much too sharp and precisely aimed for someone with a sheltered royal upbringing, and it made Tsushima’s hand freeze in place.

Causa shot him a look saying, This is where it gets interesting, so don’t interfere. If Tsushima made any unnecessary moves, Finé would likely spring into action. Only barely sensing her presence, Tsushima had no choice but to remain silent.

“All this was planned…from so long ago. They…they used me.” Lupus’s voice trembled.

The documents contained an intricately crafted plot to assassinate Lupus.

Installing a man loyal to Ross as Lupus’s knight in her early childhood as a means of gaining her trust; isolating her from the rest of the imperial family through assassinating her character; grooming her to push her to defect; even analyzing and executing activities to garner public support. It was all written here.

The plot encompassed the majority of the life Lupus had led so far, and the truth was enough to utterly shatter her sense of self-worth.

She instantly hid her face behind the documents, tears she had been trying to hold back streaming down her cheeks. It was ironic—she was hiding her weakness with the very documents outlining the plan that had pushed her to this moment.

“As written there, the final stage of the Banner of Hope Operation was to use the princess, who would have remained in the country after failing to defect, as a tool to rally all domestic dissidents. Apparently, the plan was then for the Second Prince to lead the Fourth Division to annihilate both Lupus and the dissidents, branding you all as traitors.”

Causa spoke with such detachment and lack of emotion that it made one wonder if he was really describing a plot to ruin someone’s life. Finished with his explanation, the prince uncrossed his legs.

Lupus tried to speak, but she could no longer voice her words. Only hoarse sobs escaped her lips. When she finally managed to speak, her voice was tinged with the wails of a weak, helpless girl.

“This is h-horrible… How could this happen?”

Still covering her face with the tightly gripped bundle of documents, Lupus hunched over and trembled.

She no longer had the strength to even stand. She was thoroughly crushed. Tsushima gently placed his hand on her back.

“But Ross’s scheme didn’t go how he planned,” Tsushima said. “Lupus is neither dead nor failed to defect.”

Causa nodded in agreement.

“Exactly. You weren’t part of Ross’s stage play, Tsushima Rindou, and your appearance completely flipped his script,” Causa said with amusement, pointing straight at him. “You overturned Ross’s entire scheme and even managed to hold off one of the Six Imperial Swords. You nearly succeeded in helping Lupus defect. That seems to have made Ross truly serious. He no longer cares about saving face and will likely use any means necessary to kill you both.”

Causa’s explanation was terribly effective.

By disclosing the cruelest of truths, he had completely shattered Lupus’s spirit. And by painting a picture of their current, inescapable situation, he had laid the groundwork for her despair. All of that was merely a prelude to the negotiations he was about to propose in order to gain the upper hand.

In other words, they had finally hit on the main thrust of the conversation.

Tsushima confronted the monstrous prince on Lupus’s behalf.

“So this is why you decided to stick your nose into all of this?”

“It might look that way from your point of view, but the truth is different,” Causa proudly declared, flashing a unique smile. It wasn’t the kind of expression meant for a young girl like Lupus, but one suited for the adult world, where malice and hatred intertwined. “I’ve always considered Second Prince Ross Ruber to be an obstacle. He certainly has a gift for violence, but simple bloodshed will harm this country’s interests someday. My point is: I’ve been thinking about having him removed from center stage as soon as possible.”

Perhaps feeling exhilarated as he dived into his main point, Causa grew more talkative. He continued without waiting for Tsushima’s response.

“And then this opportunity presented itself. I thought I’d use it to make Ross leave the spotlight.”

Causa gave Tsushima a look, conveying the Informationist should already understand what would come next. The prince was correct. Tsushima was beginning to see where Causa intended to conclude his story.

Feeling repulsed, Tsushima clicked his tongue.

“I see. So you came up with the idea of using me?”

“That’s partially true, but your interpretation is slightly off. There’s no such thing as coincidence. Everything happens for a reason,” Causa said pompously. As if appending his statement, he swapped to a quiet whisper. “When Storm Hill summoned an Informationist from Elbar, I took the liberty of doing some tampering on my end. In other words, I was the one who summoned you to Balga,” he brazenly declared.

Knew it, Tsushima thought bitterly. Something had felt off to him ever since he’d gotten the job from Tachibana. The whole thing smacked of conspiracies and schemes.

Now all his feelings of doubt were rapidly connecting.

Right from the outset, the defection incident had been about more than Lupus. It was a tale of clashing agendas—those of the Second Prince, the First Prince, the Free City of Elbar, the Balga Empire, and all kinds of organizations and individuals, each one stirring and colliding beneath the surface.

It was far too heavy a burden for Lupus to bear alone. It was a matter of strategizing between nations. And more sickeningly, a filthy struggle had unfolded, with adults circling a lone girl as they each tried to seize their own profits and desires. And all without regard for her wishes.

Feeling like he might vomit, Tsushima took a cigarette from his pocket and lit it, making a big show of exhaling the smoke.

“So we were both dancing in the palm of your hand from the start, huh? No wonder you’re in such high spirits. So what is it you want me to do? If you’re an adult, then own up to it.”

Causa smiled with genuine delight at Tsushima’s audacity. He was pleased by the Informationist’s ability to grasp his true intentions without needing them to be spelled out.

“Kill Ross Ruber and his knight Canus Miles. If you do that, I’ll allow Lupus to defect to Elbar.”

“I’ll do it,” Tsushima replied without hesitation, giving an immediate answer. The exchange between Causa and Tsushima completed in mere seconds. Lupus, realizing this fact after a pause, raised her head, forgetting her grim expression.

“Tsushima?!” Lupus asked, parting her lips to say something. But Tsushima silenced her with his hand. He had already made up his mind.

He wasn’t escorting Lupus to Elbar for her sake alone. This had also become his own issue. Now was the time to accomplish what he couldn’t in the past. For that, he couldn’t afford to be selective about his methods.

A cigarette in his mouth, Tsushima looked down at Lupus before turning a confrontational gaze toward Causa.

“Three days. I’ll kill those two in three days. And in return, keep your promise; get Lupus to Elbar within those three days.”

“Very well. It’s a deal,” Causa said, nodding politely and rising from the sofa. Dusting off his trousers, he finished by extending his hand to Tsushima for a handshake, which Tsushima reluctantly accepted.

“Well then, I look forward to hearing your report on the results,” Causa said in parting, then went to leave the room. As he passed by Tsushima, he suddenly clapped his hands as if remembering something.

“Ah, that’s right, I nearly forgot. I have a letter addressed to you from Mayor Tachibana. It seems he foresaw this outcome all along. What a terrifying man,” Causa said, handing Tsushima a black-colored card from inside his military uniform. Just by looking at it, Tsushima could tell that Tachibana had really penned the message.

The note was printed on something known as a Black Card, an object that incorporated mechanisms that only allowed specific Informationists to view its contents. This product was manufactured exclusively by Tsukumo Heavy Industries, which was headquartered in the Free City of Elbar.

As Tsushima accepted the card, Causa leaned in uncomfortably close and whispered into Tsushima’s ear so Lupus wouldn’t hear.

“It seems you’re extremely close with Mayor Tachibana. Who are you exactly?” Causa smiled softly as he spoke, but Tsushima showed no interest as he exhaled cigarette smoke. Looking up at the smoke rising toward the ceiling, Tsushima replied in a casual tone, “Just a level-seven Informationist. What, do you not like my answer?”

Tsushima had responded without any regard for the prince’s status, but for some reason, his remark made Causa smile in delight.

“You’re truly remarkable. A fascinating individual. I hope we meet again.”

Leaving him with those final words, Causa and Finé left the room. Tsushima dropped his cigarette onto the floor and crushed it with the sole of his shoe. Then he relaxed his shoulders.

As soon as Causa and Finé were gone, he sensed Lupus quickly rise to her feet.

Lupus moved faster than expected, not giving Tsushima any time to step aside. The small girl rushed at his chest and grabbed hold of his collar without hesitation.

“Tsushima, do you know what you’ve done? Do you realize you’ve promised to kill a member of the imperial family?!”

“Yeah. That’s what I plan to do.”

“No! I’m asking if you know what it means to kill a member of the imperial family!”

She no longer seemed like the girl who, just moments ago, had been on the verge of collapse, as if her soul had left her. Fire in her eyes, she glared up at Tsushima.

“If you do that, there’s no way the emperor will let you escape. Forget about leaving this country, I don’t even know if you’ll still be alive the next day! And it won’t just be Canus who comes after you—the other Six Imperial Swords will hunt you down, too. Do you have a way of getting away from them?”

“I’m used to adversity. Besides, I’ve already said that I’ll protect you.”

“So you’re willing to die for me? Is that what you’re saying?”

The expression on Lupus’s face suddenly shifted from anger to one of sorrow. Confronted by her unfiltered, genuine emotions, Tsushima responded in a calm tone.

“You don’t need to carry the burden any longer. From this point onward, I’ll take care of everything. You can go to Elbar and start a new life. That will solve everything.”

“No. No, it won’t, Tsushima,” Lupus said in a shaky voice as she shook her head wildly from side to side. “I don’t want you to die. I’ve never asked anyone to give up their life for me. All I asked was for you to take me with you to Elbar.”

Lupus gave him a full view of her emotion-stricken face. Her small mouth opened slightly, twisting awkwardly. Tears streamed from her large eyes and down her flushed cheeks before falling to the floor.

Tsushima gazed at Lupus and felt a heart-wrenching pain in his chest.

But he still firmly pushed back against her plea.

“I lacked resolve before—the kind of resolve that comes at the cost of someone’s life. That’s why I lost someone precious to me…why I lost Shion forever. But I won’t make the same mistake twice. This time, I’ll make sure you reach Elbar. Don’t worry,” Tsushima said, his tone weakening at the end despite his usual self-assurance. Perhaps he couldn’t bring himself to be harsh with Lupus while she was expressing her earnest feelings.

But the princess defied his expectations entirely.

Suddenly, a sharp slap echoed throughout the room. Lupus had struck Tsushima hard across the cheek with her palm. She had swung her hand so abruptly that it caught him completely off guard.

She followed this up by yelling.

“You stubborn blockhead! I’m not your beloved Shion. Stop projecting a woman from your past onto me!”

Touching his slapped cheek, Tsushima looked down at Lupus. Struggling to comprehend what had happened, he gazed with confusion at a girl whose patience had reached its breaking point.

“My life was almost entirely dictated by Ross. I kept hiding my true self and ended up living as a sham, a hollow shell constructed from lies and deceit. But I thought you saw the real me, Tsushima. So what’s the big deal?! Why are you projecting Shion—some woman from your past I don’t even know—on me and turning me into a tragic heroine? I won’t stand for it! Who do you think you are?!”

Her face a mixture of emotions that could no longer be discerned, Lupus once again grabbed Tsushima’s collar. This time, she pulled him toward her with such strength that he couldn’t push her away.

Tsushima, unable to avoid looking at her face even if he wanted to, found himself unconsciously holding his breath due to her intensity.

“Listen to me: I am Lupus Filia. I’m not the girl you couldn’t save. So don’t think you have to die for me.”

Lupus’s words, filled with heartbreaking sentiment, weighed heavier on Tsushima’s heart than any metal in the world ever could.

He had noticed it dimly himself. He was projecting Shion, who he had lost in the past, onto Lupus. Before he knew it, he had lost sight of Lupus’s identity, with Shion’s image overshadowing her so much that it was controlling his emotions.

But the girl who had just slapped him was unmistakably Lupus, not the smiling Shion from his memories.

Tsushima dropped his gaze and closed his eyes.

“Sorry. But an image of Shion haunts me whenever I look at you.”

“I don’t doubt that. I get it. She was very dear to you. But, Tsushima?” With her eyes still full of tears, Lupus, who had been trembling with anger, cupped Tsushima’s cheeks with her hands. Then she brought his face directly in front of hers, bringing him so close that they could feel each other’s breath.

“Don’t turn away. Look at me. I am here. I am still alive. I am standing next to you. So I want you to see the real Lupus Filia.” As she spoke, her blue eyes returned to red. She had stopped executing the Code that changed their color.

Her real eyes bore into Tsushima.

Looks spoke louder than words. Faced with the strong will reflected in her gaze, Tsushima had a realization.

“Hey you, what are you thinking?”

“Not ‘hey you.’ Say my actual name.”

“Lupus, what are you thinking?”

Lupus smiled in satisfaction.

“I finally get to hear you call me by my name. You should use it more often from now on.”

She let go of his face and, a little shyly, clasped her hands and turned away from him. Tsushima took a step toward her.

“Hey, answer my question. What are you thinking?”

At Tsushima’s inquiry, Lupus exhaled deeply and straightened her stance. Her silver hair rippled slowly, emitting light. Then she spoke in a resolute tone.

“I’m thinking…that I’m going to kill Ross.”

For a second, Tsushima couldn’t comprehend what she had said. That option had never even crossed his mind.

“What are you talking about?” he muttered when the meaning finally sunk in. “Don’t be ridiculous. You’ve never killed anyone before, have you? Once you’ve taken a life, there’s no going back. Killing someone changes your entire world. You shouldn’t come to this side, Lupus.”

“Is that because Shion stood by your side? Because you couldn’t protect her when you were in the same place?”

“N-no, that’s not what I’m saying,” Tsushima stammered, looking shaken for a change.

Lupus held her long hair in place as she turned to him, talking back mercilessly while keeping a dignified expression.

“After hearing everything from Brother Causa, I finally understand. This isn’t your fight—it’s mine. I can’t escape from this battle anymore. If I don’t face it head-on, I’ll keep sacrificing others. I would…lose you,” Lupus said, speaking clearly and with determination. The childishness and weakness that had once veiled her were nowhere to be seen. Tsushima found himself captivated by her dignified presence.

“But, you know,” she continued, “the unfortunate truth is: I can’t defeat all my enemies on my own. That’s why I need your help. I’ll leave Canus to you. I’m sure you can take him down. But no matter what happens, Ross is my enemy to defeat. He’s my nemesis, the one who ruined my life and turned it into a sham. I have to settle this with my own two hands.”

There was strong determination in Lupus’s red eyes as she stared directly at him, not budging an inch.

Tsushima quietly asked his final question.

“Are you serious about this?”

“Yes. I can’t just be the weak girl you protect. I don’t want to stand behind you as you defend me. I want to be able to stand next to you. So—”

Lupus paused for a moment, then grabbed the necklace from around her neck. The next moment, she tore apart the delicate gold chain.

She extended her clenched fist toward Tsushima and slowly opened her hand. In her small palm lay two rings: one gold, the other a tarnished silver.

“—I will make us equals. Let’s promise each other we’ll both survive and come back alive.”

A master and their knight were bound by fate. The knight protected their master at all times, and the master respected their knight until the very end. Lupus was saying they should exchange those vows there and then.

“Kneel down on one knee.”

When Tsushima hesitated slightly, Lupus pulled him forward by the arm. As he knelt on one knee before her, Lupus gave a bitter smile.

“You don’t want to be my knight?”

“I’ve always preferred to shy away from status or authority. Besides, I’m a little shaken.”

“It’s all right. I’m a runaway princess—I have no status or authority. This is just a promise between you and me. A secret vow, you might say.”

“A secret vow, huh?” Tsushima murmured, then quietly nodded. Lupus took his response as affirmation and rolled up her sleeves.

“Normally, this would be done with a ceremonial sword, but this is fine, right?” Lupus said, using her hand in place of a blade and placing it on Tsushima’s shoulder. With her thin, supple hand on his shoulder, Tsushima quietly looked down.

Lupus steadied her breath and closed her eyes.

“Thou shalt swear loyalty and fealty to thy liege and vow to remain with her until the end of the ashen age in which no sun shall rise. Thou shalt swear justice and peace to thy liege and vow to remain with her until the end of the age of black mist that sets the earth ablaze. Thou shalt become my shield and protect hope, become my sword and vanquish nightmares.”

It was the knight’s vow that had been handed down in the Balga Empire since ancient times.

“With that, you may no longer choose when to die.”

“You might be right.”

“It’s not that I ‘might’ be right; that’s how it is. So don’t be reckless. No matter how tough a situation is, you have to find a way to come back alive. Got that?”

A bitter expression came to Tsushima’s face as he found himself being reprimanded in what seemed like a complete reversal of roles.

“Isn’t that something we could both say? If anything, I’m more worried about you than myself. Do you have any ways forward in mind?”

“Yeah,” Lupus replied. “I have an idea. Even if it doesn’t seem reliable, I want you to leave things to me. Let me shoulder even an ounce of your burden. So please, focus on what you need to do.”

Lupus looked up at Tsushima with eyes full of confidence.

The members of the imperial family of the Balga Empire typically resided in the center of Balga Capital City, within the grounds of the imperial palace, which they called Gosho. Although eccentrics like Causa established their own private residences in various locations, most members of the imperial family rarely left the palace grounds due to security concerns.

Inside the grounds of the imperial palace, neatly maintained lawns and roads covered the area within the outer stone walls. In one corner of the complex was a modern white-brick mansion. Lupus was standing in front of it.

She took three deep breaths to calm her pounding heart. With her courage mustered, she stepped through the gate of the residence.

Lupus was wearing a brand-new, pure-white dress. It was a luxurious article of clothing befitting royalty, both beautiful and fragile. She had deliberately chosen to wear the dress as proof of her resolve not to avert her gaze from the bloodstained path she was about to go down.

Her outfit, coupled with her pretty features, made her extremely noticeable. As she walked through the mansion, the servants were captivated at the sight of her, staring with expressions of surprise. They whispered to each other as she passed, all struck by the same awe.

“Wasn’t that Lady Lupus just now?”

“But I heard she fled overseas.”

“Why is she here?”

Lupus winced slightly at their whispers.

Within Gosho, rumors had been spreading that Princess Lupus Filia was currently attempting to flee the country. It was all part of Ross’s scheme.

Suppressing her disgust, Lupus addressed a steward she had spotted.

“Where is Ross Ruber?”

Perhaps due to Lupus’s firm tone, the steward stared at her for several seconds before giving a slight bow.

“Lord Ross is currently located in the rear study.”

“I see. Thanks.”

Lupus began walking toward the room, her heels clicking on the floor.

Her path was one she had chosen of her own will, but that didn’t mean she was free from fear or doubt. She noticed her legs were trembling.

With every step closer to the room Ross occupied, the trembling grew stronger. Her nervousness heightened, and the contents of her stomach rose to her throat, threatening to choke her.

If she were still the fainthearted version of herself she once had been, she would have undoubtedly turned back and fled. But Lupus forced her shaking legs forward.

She couldn’t go back now. There was someone willing to risk his life for her. If she did not repay his sentiment and prove her own existence, she would never be able to reclaim her true self.

Lupus finally arrived at the door Ross was waiting behind. Before reaching for the doorknob, she closed her eyes and steadied her breathing. She inhaled deeply three times and looked down at the gold ring on her slim finger.

“Please, grant me courage and strength,” Lupus said to the ring. As she spoke to it, a renewed feeling of might flashed in her eyes.

Then she forcefully pushed open the door.

The interior was filled with the floral aroma of high-quality tea. In the center of the chamber, which was far too spacious to be called a study, stood Ross Ruber, pouring some tea.

The prince had grown out his golden hair, a symbol of the imperial family, and his handsome face was slightly elongated. The combative gleam in his red eyes carried a piercing intensity that seemed to reflect his inner nature.

Ross turned toward the door with undisguised hostility, probably assuming a lowly servant had entered without knocking.

However, the visitor defied his prediction.

Ross was shocked to see Lupus there in her dress. He froze midpour with his mouth agape. Tea overflowed from his cup and trickled to the floor with a sound that snapped him back to reality. He placed the teapot on the table.

“L-Lupus? Why are you here?”

“It’s been a long time, Ross,” Lupus said, lifting the hem of her dress and giving a slight curtsy. Unable to hide how flustered he was, Ross ran a hand through his long hair.

“Rumors have been going around the palace of you attempting to defect abroad. Are you all right?” Ross said shamelessly, despite the high likelihood he had started that story himself.

Keeping the prince in her sights, Lupus stepped forward. There was no hesitation in her stride, and her trembling from earlier mysteriously vanished.

Lupus dragged a luxurious chair from nearby and placed it in front of Ross. Then with a quick “pardon me,” she sat down.

She straightened her posture and gestured to the chair in front of her.

“Would you mind taking a seat?”

Lupus’s tone remained polite but conveyed a sense of risk about what might happen if Ross refused.

He reluctantly sat down.

With the two royals in arm’s length of each other, Lupus smiled gracefully once more.

“Ross, it seems I have caused you to worry on this occasion, and for that, I must humbly apologize.”

“Ah yes. There are unpleasant tales spreading about your supposed defection. Who knows what might happen if such talk were to reach His Majesty the Emperor? It would be best to think of a way to clear up these misunderstandings. Please let me know if there’s anything I can do to help. I’ll stand by you.”

“Thank you so much for your concern. However, you’ve already done so much for me that I don’t think I’ll require any further assistance from you.” Lupus’s words dripped with sarcasm. She never spoke her true feelings, yet her tone carried a distinctive air that made it clear she knew everything.

“I don’t recall helping you that much—to what are you referring?”

Ross desperately worked to hide his panic and caution. Royals were expected to be able to maintain a poker face.

However, his eyes were the most honest she’d ever seen them. It was clear from his gaze he considered her nothing but his enemy. If he had the chance, he would undoubtedly give the saber at his hip a test of blood. He thought he could kill Lupus in the same way he had cut down countless servants he disliked.

Lupus kept on sitting back in her chair, maintaining her forced, masklike smile.

“Shall I explain? There was the matter with Storm Hill, the invitation to defect, the attempted murder along the way… Now that I think about it, there’s quite a lot.”

“What in the world are you talking about? I don’t know anything about what you’ve just brought up, Lupus,” Ross said, feigning ignorance. His childish excuses would be unlikely to hold up in a normal conversation, but Ross clearly regarded Lupus as someone naive enough to fall for such tricks.

The moment Ross uttered his excuse, Lupus’s eyes glowed blue. A slight distortion ran through the thin air and shattered the teacup in the prince’s hands.

Ross’s brow twitched slightly as he watched the pieces of the cap fall to the floor. His fragile pride had cracked. His thin lips trembled as he wiped his wet knees with a handkerchief.

“You appear to be mistaken about something, Lupus. What are you claiming I’ve done?”

“I’m speaking with full knowledge of everything—your manipulation of my knight, the attack on the mansion, and everything else. At this point, I would appreciate it if you did not assume poor excuses or attempts at deception will suffice.” A shadow fell over Lupus’s fake smile. Seeing her expression, Ross realized she wasn’t the weak girl she once was. A serious look came to his own face.

“Is that so? If you’re aware of that much, then surely even you understand. We, who carry the blood of the emperor—the man at the pinnacle of the Balga Empire—cannot allow a princess with tainted blood to roam free. At the very least, I had hoped I could let you contribute to our homeland in a way that would befit someone with the honor of carrying the emperor’s blood. But you turned out to be a defective product.” No longer concerned with keeping up appearances, Ross allowed his emotions to show in his voice. Veins bulged on his temples, and he glared at Lupus with his teeth bared.

Seeing Ross reveal his true nature, Lupus also discarded her own mask.

“A defective product? To whom does that term apply, I wonder? The fact that you lost your temper and sent your knight Canus after me shows just how predictable your future is.”

“I may have given that whelp the title of knight, but in the end, he’s just a hunting dog—nothing more than a tool for killing rabbits like you.”

“Says the man who can’t even leave Gosho without his tool to protect him. Would that make you less than a dog, then?”

“What did you say?! Even without Canus, I—!” Ross raised his voice emotionally, then suddenly realized something was amiss. The bulging veins on his temples were replaced by beads of cold sweat. “Wait, where is Canus?”

“Who knows? You should keep better tabs on your mutt,” Lupus replied sharply, aiming to unsettle the prince.

The boy who should have been protecting Ross was not in the palace. Somewhere down the line, he had gotten too engrossed in chasing some prey.

Ross hadn’t even noticed his knight’s absence until now. He turned his searching gaze toward Lupus, but she was too exasperated to respond.

“You don’t even know where your own knight is? Don’t you think now might not be the best time to be drinking tea?” she quipped sarcastically. Lupus adjusted the hem of her dress and crossed her beautiful white legs with an air of authority.

Not knowing where to direct his gaze, Ross let his eyes wander before placing a hand on his forehead and letting out a groan.

“So that’s how it is. I assumed you’d just try to run away if you found out everything. I never imagined you’d use that Informationist as bait and come here yourself.”

“Indeed. You underestimated me. But you weren’t wrong; I’m sure the old me would have fled after learning the truth. No matter how much people dragged me through the mud or talked about me behind my back, I probably would have run to the ends of the earth. But now things are different.” Lupus spoke frankly about her feelings, resting her chin on her hand. Her display of vulnerability revealed underlying strength. Ross swallowed hard as he faced the clearly transformed girl.

“What changed you so much? What could possibly have caused my scheme to fall apart?”

“You made me take this seriously; for better or worse, that’s all there is to it,” Lupus declared confidently, thrusting her chin forward. Ross ground his teeth in frustration.

He wasn’t going to admit defeat yet, however. He snorted with laughter and leaned back against his chair.

“Well, no matter. I didn’t expect this turn of events, but the real question is what you plan to do next. I’m sure you intend to kill me. But if you do that, you’ll be executed as a traitor. Even if you try to run, your enemy is the Empire itself. His Majesty the Emperor, who holds far more power than I, will come after you, along with the rest of the imperial family. Without an ally on the inside, escaping would be—” As Ross spoke, something dawned on him, and his words caught in his throat.

It seemed unthinkable Lupus would have any allies supporting her in this situation. And yet the image of someone who held more power and status than Ross himself flashed through the prince’s mind for a moment.

As that person’s smirk came to him, Ross’s face turned bright red.

“Don’t tell me Causa is behind this!” he yelled.

Seeing Ross rise from his chair in alarm, Lupus curled her lips into a malicious smile.

“That saves me the trouble of explaining. That’s right, I have Big Brother Causa’s backing. But it didn’t come for free—killing you is the condition for securing my safety. That’s why I’ll seize tomorrow, even if it means getting my own hands dirty. I won’t ask for your forgiveness. But remember, you’re the one who started this war. Give up.”

As Lupus spoke even more emphatically, Ross began reasoning with Lupus to suppress his worked-up emotions.

“Do you truly believe Causa is your ally? Why haven’t you considered he might just be using you? He could be planning to eliminate both of us right here.” Ross’s words sounded plausible.

However, the prince was just buying time. As a seasoned member of the imperial family with ample experience, Ross had spotted the faintest glimmer of hope.

Lupus’s slender fingers, visible beneath the elegant dress, were trembling. She had never killed someone before. At the last moment, she would hesitate to take out Ross. And in that instant, he could turn the tables. Certain of that, Ross began to focus intently on the precise moment of his counterattack.

Tension began to ripple through the air between them. Then Lupus’s words dropped like a bomb.

“I’m sick of listening to your nonsense. Let’s just settle this here already.”

The moment Lupus grew sick of Ross’s prattling, sparks started flying.

Ross swiftly reached for the saber at his waist. Having trained since childhood, he was an exceptional sword fighter. In stark contrast to his earlier demeanor, he moved precisely and efficiently as he drew his blade and slashed at Lupus’s neck.

He had used an instant-draw technique. Lupus, however, threw herself against the back of her chair. The momentum sent her beautiful silver hair up into the air behind her, and the saber only managed to graze her locks and cheek.

A droplet of blood floated in the air. With that bit of blood between them, Lupus’s eyes gleamed intensely. The brilliant blue light in her gaze burned like the most beautiful and noble color of the sky.

“Ross Ruberrrrrr!” Lupus clenched her teeth and executed a Code.

Instinctively, she had selected the heat conversion Code Tsushima had first taught her. As soon as the Code accessed the information factors, a heat ray formed behind her and pierced Ross’s shoulder.

“Aaaagghhhh!” Ross screamed, collapsing to the floor after a single hit from Lupus. His only weapon, the saber, clattered to the ground.

“Haaaah, haaah…” Lupus gasped for breath, large beads of sweat welling up on her forehead as the room was immediately enveloped in the stench of burnt human flesh.

It was her first time executing a Code with the intent to kill a human being. Fear and exhilaration pushed her forward. She felt like she had started rolling down a hill she wouldn’t be able to climb back up.

Looking down at Ross writhing on the floor, Lupus picked up the fallen saber.

“Wait… Stop…,” he groaned, clutching his shoulder. Lupus pointed the tip of the blade at him. It was time for her to dispose of this man.

This is where it all ended.

Lupus swallowed and steadied herself. She raised the heavy sword and took aim.

“May your sins be forgiven in death. Good-bye, you foolish man, Ross Ruber. There is no greater reward than never having to see your face again.”

“Aaaah!”

As Ross let out a final scream, Lupus swung the saber down with all her might. With the force of her slash enhanced by the weight of the blade, Ross’s skull split clean in two. The sword dug deeply into his neck before stopping, spraying Lupus in buckets of blood.

Even in the final moment, Lupus did not close her eyes. She burned into her memory the exact second when she took her opponent’s life.

It was anticlimactic, really, the death of this man who had made her life hell. Lupus looked down at his lifeless body as blood and flesh from his head dripped onto the gorgeous carpet. Then she looked at her own blood-soaked hands.

They were no longer shaking.

“I ended it the right way. With my own hands,” she said to herself as she stood up straight. Then she noticed a servant watching from the other side of the open door, their face going pale.

“Could I ask you to clean this up?” Lupus said with a radiant smile befitting a princess. Then she left the room as though nothing had happened. This time, not a single servant dared whisper behind her back as she passed.

When Lupus briskly left the mansion, she found a black car parked outside. In front of the vehicle stood a driver in a suit, waiting attentively with perfect posture.

He noticed Lupus and opened the rear door without the slightest hint of hesitation.

“Welcome back,” he said. “Right this way, please.”

Lupus gave a short thanks and got into the car.

The interior was designed like a limousine, with two seats facing each other. Sitting across from her, as if it were a matter of course, was Causa, his legs crossed.

“Was it a success?” he asked.

“Yes.”

Lupus feigned calm, but there was no hiding the relentless pounding of her heart.

By no means had it been an easy task. She was used to having things taken from her, but now she was the one doing the taking. Her determination had been nothing short of extraordinary, yet at the same time, dark emotions like fear and regret still lingered within her.

Causa offered Lupus a glass of water with his usual smile.

“Drink this,” he said. “It should help relax you a little.”

“Thank…you.” Although Lupus was hesitant, she accepted the glass from Causa. She drank it in one gulp, trying to suppress the inexplicable nausea rising from deep within her stomach.

“I must say, when you first proposed this plan to me, I didn’t think it would be possible. I never imagined you would actually kill Ross yourself,” Causa said as they sat in the moving car. The smile he showed her now was different from the one she had seen on him before. Clearly, he had also thought of her as a fragile, young girl.

But the princess in front of him was a completely different person than she used to be.

Her eyes still brimming with adrenaline, Lupus looked at Causa.

“Ross is dead, and I am disgraced,” she said. “You’ve simultaneously denied two members of the imperial family a chance at the throne. Now it’s time for you to hold up your end of the bargain.”

“No need to worry,” Causa replied with his characteristic composure. “I agree completely. I’ll fake your execution as promised, and I’ve already completed the arrangements for you to defect to Elbar.”

Right after appointing Tsushima as her knight, Lupus had approached Causa with a deal. The plan was for Lupus to kill Ross herself, throwing away her claim to the throne in the process.

Of course, Lupus had no intention of being killed. With Causa’s cooperation, she planned to fake her execution and defect to Elbar.

Her proposal would have been impossible without Causa’s cooperation, and although it had surprised him, he had gladly agreed to it. This was how Lupus and Tsushima had gained the powerful support of Causa.

“I’m guessing it’ll take about fifteen minutes to get to the airport,” Causa told her. “My private jet will take off from there. Rest assured, no one will stop you like before.”

“That’s what I’m hoping,” Lupus said, placing a hand on her chest as if to check that her heartbeat had calmed down. She gazed out the window at the heavy snow clouds hanging over the northern mountain ridges.

“Are you worried about Tsushima?” Causa asked, reading Lupus’s emotions from her gesture. What Lupus was worried about wasn’t people coming after her. It was Tsushima’s safety.

Ignoring Causa’s question, she narrowed her eyes as she continued staring out the window. Shrugging at her silence, Causa continued speaking.

“Canus didn’t show up when you went to kill Ross. That likely means Tsushima was successful in drawing him away,” he said, directing his gaze toward where Lupus was looking outside.

If Ross and Canus had been together in the same place, there would have been no way for the plan to work. Understanding that, Tsushima had gone alone to the outskirts of the capital to lure away Canus. Tsushima would return after he had killed him. When this would be was anyone’s guess, but Lupus had confidence.

“Knowing Tsushima, I have no doubts he’ll come back alive,” she stated firmly, as if dispelling an unwanted future from her mind. “Even if he’s up against Canus from the Six Imperial Swords, I’m sure he’ll be all right.”

Causa nodded in agreement.

“That may well be true. Since this is Tsushima we’re talking about, that might be possible,” Causa said in a somewhat standoffish tone.

His demeanor gave Lupus a bad feeling. He was speaking while wearing a perfectly composed smile—a mask that revealed nothing of his true thoughts.

“His name is Tsushima Rindou, isn’t it?” Causa continued. “I couldn’t help but be curious about him, so I decided to look into who he really is. At first blush, he seemed to be just an ordinary Informationist with an unremarkable background—too unremarkable. That convinced me to dig deeper, and I uncovered something strange.”

At those words, Causa pulled out a clipboard containing a report. Lupus furrowed her brow, as if putting up her guard.

“I investigated his past, and it was just so unnatural,” Causa informed her. “No matter what I looked into—the War to Recapture Jabar, Elbar’s War of Independence, the records of the Informationist Guild that came after that—I couldn’t turn up even a single photograph of him from that time. The only records about him are written, and those only described his career as utterly ordinary and insignificant.”

“What are you trying to say?” Lupus asked.

Causa rested his fingers on the documents before continuing.

“Could it be possible the Informationist named Tsushima doesn’t actually exist and is someone else entirely? Or could it be that he has to hide his past from view? Otherwise, it’s hard to imagine how someone’s background could be so unnaturally sparse, devoid of even a single photo.”

Lupus couldn’t respond to Causa’s suspicions. The Informationist called Tsushima Rindou definitely existed, but he was wrapped in shadow and secrecy. That much was certain.

Causa closed the clipboard and succinctly laid out the question he had arrived at.

“Who is Tsushima Rindou really? Who is behind him?”

Causa suspected the person known as Tsushima Rindou might have two identities. People’s pasts were not so easily erased. However, even that would be possible if Mayor Tachibana of the Free City of Elbar were to get involved.

So then, who exactly did that make Tsushima, to have drawn the involvement of such an influential figure?

Lupus looked uneasy for a moment, but the light in her eyes didn’t fade. Seeing this, Causa pressed further.

“I’ve seen many things in this world, but I’ve never heard of a level-seven Informationist defeating a level-eleven Informationist. Tsushima is far too unusual. Do you know anything about him?”

As Causa tilted his head questioningly, Lupus shot him a strong-willed look that showed she had no intention of backing down.

“The Tsushima I know has a terrible attitude, smokes wherever he pleases, and is far from a model adult. But no matter the situation or his opponent, he always achieves his goal. Tsushima Rindou is a level-seven Informationist and nothing more,” Lupus declared firmly, holding on to her unwavering belief despite Causa’s shakedown. Imitating Tsushima, she then added one more unnecessary remark: “What, do you not like my answer?”

Causa sighed at her demeanor, as if realizing she wouldn’t have responded any other way.

“I see. I suppose there’s no helping it if you don’t know anything. Still, I at least would have liked to have learned who Tsushima really is.” It was unusual for a good strategist like him give up.

This also gave Lupus a bad feeling. There was no way a man like him would back down on this, or anything, for that matter. The only times he ever showed hints of resignation were when he felt a bit of guilt after having already acted.

Once Lupus processed this, she had a sudden realization. A cold sweat ran down her back as she wondered why it hadn’t occurred to her sooner.

“For you to help me defect, I believe your condition was the successful assassination of Ross and Canus, correct?”

“Indeed, that’s what we agreed.”

“But you don’t know whether Canus is dead yet, do you?”

At Lupus’s words, Causa raised his brows slightly, then smiled. Lupus’s eyes widened; she instantly understood what his expression meant.

“Did you make Tsushima go after Canus while intending to dispose of him from the very beginning?”

“Yes, that’s right. Even at his worst, Canus is still one of the Six Imperial Swords. It would be far too presumptuous of me to kill him at my own discretion. After all, the rightful master of the Six Imperial Swords is His Majesty the Emperor. Besides, even if Canus lives, I won’t be at a disadvantage. As long as Ross is eliminated, everything takes care of itself.”

“In that case, it should have been enough for me to kill Ross. Why are you trying to eliminate Tsushima, too?”

Causa shook his head a little in exasperation at her question. Then he rested his chin on his hand, turning his gaze in a completely different direction.

“You see, I despise outsiders who don’t act according to my plans. And Tsushima clearly falls into that category. Men like him must be eliminated when the opportunity arises. After all, I also live with the knowledge that tomorrow could bring my downfall. Please give up.” Causa actually seemed apologetic, his brows arching in a sorrowful expression. It was like he was legitimately expressing remorse. To Lupus, however, this only fanned the flames.

“How could you do such a thing? Killing someone who has kept their promise? How utterly dishonest. That’s something a villain would do!” Lupus shouted angrily.

Causa responded with a troubled look on his face, as if mortified.

“The only thing I promised was your safety. I never guaranteed his life. Tsushima entered the agreement fully aware of that fact. I haven’t broken any promises,” Causa asserted, stating the brutal facts with a calm expression before smiling cheerfully.

Meanwhile, Lupus froze in horror at the sheer monstrosity of his statement. The man sitting in front of her was an actual devil.

“I’m going to go get Tsushima!” Lupus declared.

“That would be futile. No, actually…perhaps I should say it would be impossible.”

As Lupus instinctively reached for the car door handle, she noticed something strange. The arm she thought she had raised had barely even moved halfway. Just then, she felt a tingling sensation in her fingertips, and an intense drowsiness assailed her.

Pressing her fingers between her brows in an attempt to remain awake, Lupus glared at Causa as her consciousness faded.

“What did you mix into the drink you gave me?”

“There’s no need to worry. When next you wake, you’ll be in the safety of Elbar. The diplomatic arrangements have even been taken care of already. However, you’ll be the only one to get there safely, unfortunately. This, too, is unavoidable. Tsushima simply knows too much.”

Despite her will to resist, Lupus started to lose consciousness as she reached for Causa. She collapsed into the seat and blacked out before she could touch him. Her entire body went limp, and she began breathing softly in a deep sleep.

Causa smiled in satisfaction and crossed his legs.

“I’ll eliminate any obstacles in my path to supremacy, even a pebble. A lion never holds back, not even against a mouse. You’d do well to remember that.”

Thunder rumbled somewhere in the distance. Following the trail of the heavy gray sky, dark clouds gathered ominously over the northern mountain range.

Snow would likely fall before long. Feeling the drop in air pressure, Tsushima raised the collar of his jacket against the cold.

He was standing in the rubble-strewn ruins of what used to be a city area of Jabar. It was a land of bitterness, where a large-scale rebellion that once shook the Balga Empire was crushed by ally betrayals.

The area was still untouched by development. The damage to the land had been so extensive that restoring it would require enormous funds, leading to its abandonment—or so people said.

The truth was different, however. The area had been left deliberately as a kind of warning, showing what happened to those who defied the emperor. It remained designated as an undevelopable zone to this very day.

Just as the emperor wanted, the battlefield from that time was perfectly preserved. Craters from shellfire, abandoned buildings riddled with countless bullet holes, the charred remnants of houses, and even human bones—decayed yet seemingly still speaking of their resentment—all of it was untouched.

Tsushima kicked aside a shattered skull with the tip of his leather boot, jiggling his unlit cigarette.

“It’s like time stopped.”

The Jabar in Tsushima’s memories was an exact match for the Jabar of the present. The only differences were his age and the fact that he had lost the person he’d once wanted to protect.

Crossing the destroyed asphalt road, Tsushima stopped in front of a deserted house.

This place was etched in his nightmares as the site of his trauma. It was where he had fled, leaving behind Shion’s lifeless body. Her remains, exposed to rain and wind without even a single flower offered in remembrance, had long since vanished without a trace.

With pure emotion, Tsushima put his hands together.

“Hey there, Shion. Your incorrigible little brother is still working as an Informationist.”

The dead did not speak back. Yet he felt as if he could hear Shion’s gentle voice.

That was just his imagination, though. The thunder he’d heard in the distance rumbled, now much closer. Tsushima looked up, then directed his gaze toward an ominous presence.

A figure had appeared in the distance on a road stretching through the city ruins. Standing between the charred remains of cars, he wore a navy blue military uniform embroidered with crimson. Shaking his familiar blue hair, he spotted Tsushima and grinned, baring his teeth.

“I’ve finally found you, Tsushima Rindoooooooooou!” roared Canus Miles of the Six Imperial Swords, spreading his arms wide.

“His master’s dead, and he still acts like a rabid dog. What a disgrace of a knight,” Tsushima muttered in annoyance, striking his lighter.

Canus should have been aware that his master had been assassinated; Lupus had killed Ross Ruber the previous day. Yet Canus’s hatred and obsession for Tsushima seemed to far surpass his loyalty to Ross. Instead of returning to the capital, even for a moment, he had relentlessly pursued Tsushima, resulting in their present meeting.

As Tsushima lit his cigarette, he gazed at the boy in front of him. Canus looked like he was already emotionally charged. Sweeping back his long bangs, the boy revealed the burn scar spreading across his youthful face.

“The wound you gave me aches and throbs, keeping me from sleeping. I’ve spent night after night debating how best to kill you, but I’ve got it now. I’ll flay your flesh and use you for taxidermy. I’ll skin you alive and drag you across the ground until you cry and beg for mercy. How’s that for a brilliant idea?”

“Wow, you’re a true visionary. Well, do whatever you like—if you can beat me, that is,” Tsushima replied. He exhaled smoke and flashed a confident smile. Despite the imminent battle, he was calmly enjoying his cigarette. The sight of it made Canus’s veins bulge in anger.

“Eager to die, huh? Fine, there’s no need for me to hold back anymore! I’ll kill you right here and now! No mercy!” Canus roared furiously while simultaneously executing a Code, demonstrating just why he was a member of the Six Imperial Swords. With almost no delay, Canus’s eyes glowed, and he was engulfed by a massive vortex of ash. From within the tornado, his blue afterglow shimmered brightly.

“March of the Undead! Annihilate him!”

Canus’s voice boomed within the vortex as knight after knight began emerging in perfect formation from the swirling ash. These soldiers were far more heavily armored and diverse than the ones Tsushima had encountered on the train; there were mounted cavalry, archers, sword fighters, and spear fighters. An entire division was materializing piece by piece before his eyes.

Even Tsushima was taken aback at the sight. By the time the ash vortex dissipated, tens of thousands of soldiers stood before him. The cigarette in his mouth fell to the ground, and Tsushima let out a deep sigh.

“Your weakness is close combat. Is that intrinsic to the Codes you use, or did you just design them poorly? You might be able to unleash immense firepower over a wide area, but in close quarters, you run the risk of misfiring. That’s why you can’t use your strongest Codes at will. Am I wrong? Hmm? You need to use your head in battle. Isn’t that right, buddy?”

Amid his army, Canus grinned broadly and tapped his head with his finger. The next moment, Tsushima obliterated Canus’s skull with a heat ray.

However, that Canus was naturally a fake. Ash scattered in the double’s place, and the real Canus’s hateful laughter echoed from somewhere unseen.

“Come on! Once someone gets close to you, it’s all over! Show me how you struggle, Tsushimaaaa!”

“Damn brat.” Tsushima clicked his tongue. The next instant, the knights all charged at him. The cavalry was in the lead, followed by the spear fighters, and then the sword fighters. But his priority were the archers.

Tsushima began generating a wave of heat to protect himself. He crouched down to minimize his exposure and looked at the sky.

Thousands of archers lined up at the rear of Canus’s summoned army, nocked their arrows, and fired almost simultaneously. Each projectile, thicker than a human arm, sliced through the air. The barrage of arrows blocked out the sky.

“This is bad.” Tsushima looked up and surrounded himself with his heat wave for defense.

However, the descending arrows shook the earth with an impact far beyond Tsushima’s expectations. It was the equivalent of an aerial shelling; he was getting carpet-bombed.

Tsushima’s Codes literally manipulated heat. It was easy for him to deflect small bullets by altering their trajectory, but arrows akin to cannonballs were an entirely different beast.

To incinerate the projectiles raining down from above, Tsushima switched from using heat waves to heat rays. He focused on burning away only the projectiles directly overhead, but the shock waves from the arrows hitting the ground nearby were too much. Dust and debris generated by the assault flew at him.

The shrapnel—whether from shattered arrows or debris blown off nearby buildings—pierced Tsushima’s flesh.

“Gaaah!”

Although Tsushima somehow managed to avoid a direct hit from the arrows, Canus’s attack had only just begun.

As the rain of projectiles subsided overhead, cavalry immediately emerged from the smokescreen of detritus in front of him, shaking the ground and tearing through dust clouds as they advanced.

“Don’t underestimate me.”

Tsushima lured the cavalry closer, then the glow in his eyes intensified as he swung his arm forward. The Code came together in his mind at an incredible speed, placing immense strain on his head at the same time. Though the pain was enough to make him contort his face, he managed to unleash an attack on a scale unlike anything before.

The air behind Tsushima seemed to distort momentarily, and the very space around him began to burn with the movement of his arm.

The attack could be described as a heat ray, but such a description felt inadequate given how bold and crude the phenomenon was.

Massive chunks of heat, white and red like roaring flames, swept across the division of knights head-on. A column of heat surged forward in a straight line, gouging the ground and incinerating all organic matter in its path. The only things that remained were shapeless masses of high-temperature charcoal and ash.

Tsushima turned his face away from the rising heat. At the same time, he got an intense headache from the strain of executing the Code.

“Damn, I hate getting old. Or maybe this is because of the smoking.”

As Tsushima looked up, his hand pressed to his forehead, his vision filled with the many knights still remaining. They showed no signs of fear. The surviving minions charged forward over the corpses, their shields raised in a true march of the undead.

Though he had mostly dealt with the cavalry, the next problem was the overwhelming number of infantry.

To reduce the strain on his mind, Tsushima intercepted the advancing knights with heat rays weaker than before. Yet knights continued to emerge one after another, steadily closing the distance. For every knight he struck down, a new one seemed to be generated in its place.

If this kept up, the situation would only get worse and worse. Canus’s Code execution—bolstered not only by his superior processing power, but also by his efficient Code structures—surpassed Tsushima’s skills. In a simple head-on battle, Tsushima would likely be overwhelmed.

“I guess even at their worst, the Six Imperial Swords are still the Six Imperial Swords.”

Tsushima surveyed his surroundings while maintaining his position. At this point, his only option was to strike Canus directly.

However, the boy was nowhere to be seen. He had hidden himself, intending to safely deal with his enemy from a distance.

Still, Tsushima had a hunch the boy wouldn’t be satisfied with such tactics.

Tsushima’s counterattacks were eventually overwhelmed, and the knights broke through as if a dam had burst, closing in on him. He had no choice but to switch to close combat, a fighting style he did not excel in. At this range, his only safe option was to envelop himself in heat.

Swords swung at him. He dodged one strike, then another, but in the blink of an eye, he was surrounded. As the knights swarmed and covered the battlefield, Tsushima desperately fought back, sweeping away his foes with his fists.

But that didn’t last long, either.

The knights slashed indiscriminately, cutting through their allies as if they were devouring one another. Struck by a blow from a blind spot, Tsushima staggered right into another knight. Colliding with the heavy armor, Tsushima looked up to see the knight reverse his grip on his sword and reposition it. Aiming to split his abdomen, the knight thrust the tip of the blade at Tsushima.

Tsushima grabbed the tip, desperately trying to protect his body. However, the knight did not give up pushing. Tsushima quickly twisted his body to shift the blade away from vital areas, redirecting it to his side.

The thick blade stabbed both Tsushima and the knight. A searing pain coursed through Tsushima’s body, making him clench his teeth and let out a cry of agony.

Though he’d avoided a fatal wound, the situation was still dire.

He was pinned against the knight as if crucified, unable to move. If he wrenched the sword out of his body, his internal organs would likely spill to the ground.

Things were looking desperate as the other knights surrounded him, moving in to attack. Dozens of swords and spears were aimed at him.

There was a way he could end this fight in an instant, but it would be a gamble. With bloodshot eyes, Tsushima scanned the knights in front of him and spotted something.

“You dumbass,” Tsushima muttered, unleashing a heat wave that engulfed both himself and his surroundings. The knights’ armor ignited in brilliant red flames, releasing a violent shock wave. The closer they were to Tsushima, the more readily their forms melted and disintegrated into nothingness. Among them, only one knight clad in particularly heavy armor retained its shape.

Ignoring his pain, Tsushima pulled the sword from his abdomen. The tip of the blade was red-hot, partially melted, and beginning to warp. Naturally, the hilt in his hand was searingly hot, burning his skin. Even so, he threw the blade, which was steaming with his own blood.

The sword struck the helmet of the heavily armored knight. The helmet’s outer layer peeled off like it was nothing, deteriorated by the heat.

The heavy helmet dropped to the ground, revealing none other than Canus beneath.

Tsushima’s prediction had been correct.

Canus was so abjectly vicious in nature that he would surely want to finish off Tsushima himself. The boy might even force Tsushima to lick the soles of his shoes before he killed him. It came as no surprise to Tsushima that Canus had been lurking nearby.

By contrast, it seemed the boy hadn’t expected Tsushima would uncover his location. Looking shocked, Canus attempted to execute a Code to protect himself.

Without hesitation, Tsushima closed the distance between them. Despite his battered body, he pushed himself forward and swung at Canus’s cheek. Naturally, his fist was imbued with a Code.

Fwooosh!

Tsushima delivered his punch in a composed stance, rather than let his emotions make him sloppy.

Perhaps due to being shaken, Canus was late in executing a Code of his own. Before any of the boy’s creations could protect him, Tsushima had struck him in the face.

A wet, resounding impact echoed as Tsushima’s fist landed. Canus was sent crashing through his armor of ash and tumbled across the battlefield. Blood sprayed into the air, and by the time it fell to earth, Canus had already bounced twice off the ground.

When his momentum slowed, Canus somehow managed to break his fall. But he was unsteady on his feet. As he rose to his feet, his knees were shaking like a newborn fawn’s.

Touching his cheek as if to check whether his face was still there, Canus looked up at Tsushima. His eyes gradually filled with fiery rage.

“You bastard!” Canus yelled, several of his white teeth falling from his wide-open mouth.

Tsushima staggered and dropped to a knee on the ground, chuckling to himself.

“First a burn scar and now missing teeth? This kid should buy himself some dentures.”

Pressing down on the gushing wound on his abdomen, Tsushima cauterized it to stop the bleeding.

Though Tsushima had managed to identify Canus’s true body, he remained at a disadvantage. He had a serious stab wound in his abdomen, while his enemy had only lost a few teeth.

“Damn, this really isn’t worth it.” Tsushima was beyond fed up with the situation. He clenched his blood-soaked fist.

Across from him, Canus’s rage boiled over, his expression now bordering on a daze as his eyes glowed.

“Ah, enough already. I’ll return everything—every last thing—to ash,” Canus declared as he once again executed his Code. This time, it wasn’t just an infinite number of knights that materialized. No, an enormous skeleton had also emerged to conceal Canus. The creature was armored with several additional skeletal structures, and its eyes glowed an ominous red as it let out a ferocious war cry.

The execution of such an aggressive Code seemed to take its toll on Canus, as blood began seeping from his eyes. Even so, he continued summoning an overwhelming number of creations: creepy spiderlike monsters, four-legged abominations, flying winged creatures. As the scene morphed into a landscape straight from hell, Tsushima narrowed his eyes in a smile.

“You’ve lost, and there’s nothing you can do to change that. You sealed your fate the moment you revealed yourself.”

The blue glow in Tsushima’s eyes faded, leaving behind only ominous black irises, like the depths of the abyss. Seeing this, Canus felt a sense of unease and an eerie, foreboding presence.

Behind his boiling rage, Canus calmly considered why his instincts were screaming he was in danger. It was something obvious, yet so minor that he had overlooked it in his frustration and arrogance.

Why had he only now noticed the blackness of Tsushima’s eyes? It was because this was his first time looking directly at them.

For some reason, Tsushima’s eyes had been glowing the entire time up to this point. An Informationist’s eyes glowed while executing a Code and returned to normal when this process was complete. In other words, they only turned blue when an Informationist was producing a Code.

So why had Tsushima’s eyes been glowing nonstop?

Several possibilities came to mind. For instance, perhaps Tsushima had been executing something vast and intricate—a Code that took an extremely long time to complete. That was a possibility.

If that was true, then what kind of Code could take this long to execute for a man capable of unleashing heat rays without delay? The thought sent a chill down Canus’s spine so intense he forgot his anger.

“Giant skeleton! Protect me!”

Acting on instinct, Canus chose to go on the defensive. The massive skeleton he’d summoned shifted with surprising speed for its size, bracing to shield him. Meanwhile, Canus issued commands to his other creations.

“Tear Tsushima to shreds like a ragged cloth! Right now!” he roared, his voice rising as if to drown out his inexplicable sense of dread.

But his decision, though logical, proved foolish.

The moment the skeleton shielded him, Canus noticed Tsushima pointing upward, directing his attention to the sky. Compelled by the gesture, Canus glanced above and froze.

There was a single mass of light overhead. No, it was far too ominous to simply be called a light—it was a malicious glow, as though formed from the compressed heat of the sun. The sphere of heat was so blindingly bright that it appeared reddish-black to the eye, and it looked like it was getting larger.

Indeed, the orb wasn’t getting larger—it was getting closer.

“You asshole! Are you trying to kill us both?!” Canus yelled upon realizing this.

The enormous sphere of heat plummeted straight for Canus, accelerating under the pull of gravity. Tsushima gazed up at it, the hem of his jacket fluttering.

“Wanna see who can last longer?” he taunted spitefully, his tone dripping with either sarcasm or mockery. Hiding his face within his jacket to shield himself from the heat, Tsushima braced for impact.

At that moment, Canus understood. The heat was so intense that he could feel it even with the skeleton sheltering him—it would be impossible for a single jacket to block it. Tsushima must have anticipated this situation and executed a heat-resistant Code to protect himself.

This was undoubtedly the ace up Tsushima’s sleeve. He had been biding his time until he pinpointed Canus’s location, preparing a wide-range attack capable of obliterating everything in one fell swoop. It was the ultimate offensive move, leveraging Tsushima’s abilities to their fullest.

But in that case, Canus’s victory would be assured if he could withstand this attack.

“No way will this pathetic trick beat me!” Canus roared, firing himself up as he once again allowed his rage to take over.

He issued commands to the giant skeleton and assumed a defense stance against the heat sphere approaching from above. The surrounding creatures started to converge, forming a protective wall of flesh around Canus. His ultimate shield was complete in no time flat.

As the glowing sphere approached, its sheer size distorted their perceptions. The heat radiating from it was on an entirely different scale compared to Tsushima’s earlier attacks. Beneath the skeleton, Canus’s hair began to singe, and his eyes started drying out.

When the orb came close enough to fill Canus’s entire view, it collided with the skeleton.

The heavy impact sent cracks rippling across the ground, and the skeleton’s arms crumpled under the force. Faced with the immense energy of both heat and mass, the creature let out an agonized shriek.

However, Canus regenerated the skeleton’s crushed body as quickly as it was destroyed, proving once again why he was a member of the Six Imperial Swords. Struggling to breathe in the scorching air, Canus screamed so intensely it felt as though his throat might tear apart. His eyes glowed as he simultaneously regenerated not just the skeleton, but also the wall of flesh protecting him.

The landscape surrounding Tsushima and Canus was completely transformed. Everything that could be considered organic matter went up in flames, and the earth, stained black and gray, was showered with intense white heat waves.

However, the end was in sight. The heat sphere had started to shrink. Realizing this, Canus began to sense his victory was at hand.

Tsushima’s attack had peaked, yet even now, the heat sphere had failed to destroy or even dent Canus’s ultimate defense. In other words, triumph was in reach. Shielding his eyes from the light with a hand, Canus glared at Tsushima.

Even someone as well prepared as Tsushima wouldn’t escape unscathed from such immense heat. Watching white smoke rise from Tsushima’s clothes, Canus smirked tenaciously. It amused him to see Tsushima burning himself with his own reckless strategy.

Victory was now certain. Firmly convinced of this, Canus spread his arms wide to flaunt his composure.

“Ha-ha-ha! I’ll admit you’re an amazing Informationist! But I’m even more incredible. So just keep on kneeling and wallow in despair as you learn why I’m the strongest of the Six Imperial Swords!”

Canus was fully convinced he had won. Yet he should have known that Tsushima was not the type to give in here.

Amid the storm of light and heat, Canus thought he caught a glimpse of a faint yet ominous blue glow. It was Tsushima’s eyes, peeking out from behind his jacket as if quietly watching him.

That light looked different from the usual glow of Tsushima’s Code execution. Though his eyes shone blue, they seemed to have a heavy hue. Perhaps it was just because their surroundings were too bright, but his eyes appeared to be absorbing the light, their color resembling flames born from the depths of the abyss.

On top of this, Tsushima wore an expressionless face, devoid of any emotion. It only heightened the unease and fear that arose in Canus as he confronted this phenomenon beyond human comprehension.

“What’s happening?” Canus muttered to himself, sensing something indefinable. A few moments later, he realized that Tsushima had executed a Code.

It happened in an instant; a beam of light shone from above Canus’s head, bringing a wave of heat. Instinctively, he looked up.

His massive skeleton silently dissolved and disappeared like mist. The creature’s disappearance was clearly different from it being destroyed by heat or physical trauma. It was more like it was vanishing entirely.

Canus’s eyes widened. There was no doubt one of Tsushima’s Codes had caused this phenomenon.

However, the principles behind the phenomenon were completely incomprehensible to him, leaving him with no way to counteract it.

Having lost his strongest defense against Tsushima’s heat sphere, Canus was exposed to its overwhelmingly high temperature. His military uniform instantly caught fire, and his extremities boiled and burst apart. Engulfed in flames, Canus let out a scream of agony.

Even so, the boy made one last attempt to survive. He deconstructed the wall of flesh surrounding him and encased his body in a densely compressed shell. Curling up as small as he could, he assumed the only defensive stance available to him in the situation.

He wasn’t trying to dictate the outcome of the battle—he was simply making a last-ditch effort to cling to life. Without mustering effort on pointless resistance, he assumed a completely defensive posture.

The heat sphere collided with Canus’s shell, which was only a fraction of its size, crushing the boy and his creations like a meteor.

Then, at last, the mass of light violently exploded.

The ground was gouged out, and smoke from the blast rose so high overhead that it would be visible from even Balga Capital City. The detonation had been just that enormous.

Amid the violent tremors and rain of debris, Tsushima crouched low and waited for things to settle down. Once he felt that the storm had passed, he dusted himself off and stood up.

The entire area had been reduced to scorched earth, save for a small space around Tsushima that had escaped damage thanks to the Code he had executed to protect himself.

“Guess I might have gone a bit overboard,” Tsushima remarked casually as he looked up at the towering plume of smoke. It stretched so high in the dark gray sky that it seemed it might reach the clouds. His neck ached just looking up at it.

Relaxing his shoulders, Tsushima stared at the sky. He closed his eyes, which had been stained red, and pressed firmly against their inner corners, expelling a single streak of blood.

It was the price of repeatedly using Codes with high amounts of strain. He felt a pain in his brain that rivaled the agony racking his body. He had narrowly avoided frying his brain entirely. Reflecting on this, Tsushima adjusted the collar of his dirty jacket and trudged over to check if Canus had survived.

Canus Miles had always used power as a way to fill the void of loneliness. His Informationist parents had been worn down by harsh frontline deployments and had passed away when he was very young.

Having never received parental love in a world where Informationists were treated like objects, Canus bore witness to society’s cruelty.

Even as a young child, adults showed him no mercy. Thrown into the fires of war, he was forced to watch countless comrades die before his eyes.

The weak were discarded, while the strong claimed glory. In this easily understood microcosm, the boy began hating the world. And then he realized there was only one thing one needed in order to survive—strength.

From then on, Canus pursued strength more purely than anyone else. He eliminated weaklings who approached him and aligned himself with the powerful, exploiting them for his own benefit. He lived by turning anything and everything into fuel for his might, no matter the method.

Naturally, his warped thirst for strength drove people away from him. Constant isolation and betrayal followed. Losing trust in both Informationists and ordinary people alike, Canus eventually came to resent and distance himself from everyone. There was no one who hated the world as deeply as he did. And so he chose a solitary path.

That loneliness, however, became the driving force that propelled him to greater heights. As if seeking to fill the void left by his lost parents’ love—and to mend the chasm of his own solitude—Canus honed his expertise into the creation of life.

This pushed his life-form creation Codes to an exceptional level of mastery. Canus rose to such prominence that he became known as the “one-man army” and finally achieved the pinnacle he had once sought—becoming one of the Six Imperial Swords.

However, the thirst and hunger born from his lingering loneliness never disappeared. No matter how many he killed or how high his fame soared, only pain remained.

Why was that? For the moment, at least, his suffering seemed to have abated slightly.

The answer had to be the man in front of him. His consciousness hazy, Canus looked up at the figure covered in dust.

Tsushima Rindou. Gazing down at him with indifference, the Informationist clearly possessed extraordinary strength. He was an embodiment of overwhelming power and unlike any Informationist Canus had ever encountered before.

“Utter defeat. Who…are you…?”

With the shattering of his ultimate shield, Canus had been left in a terrible state. His entire body was burned to a crisp, his arms and legs stumps. His once handsome face was horribly scorched, and his beautiful blue hair had been completely incinerated.

Even in this awful condition, he still clung to life—proof of the formidable power of the Six Imperial Swords.

But he wouldn’t last much longer.

Looking down at the dying boy, Tsushima put a cigarette in his mouth. Without responding to Canus’s question, he quietly lit it and took a puff before giving a shrug.

“I’m just a level-seven Informationist.”

“Fuck… Damn adults… Always…spouting nonsense…right to the end…”

“Sorry. I’ve got my own circumstances, too.”

With Tsushima looking down at him, Canus grimaced in frustration, then coughed painfully.

The boy repeatedly sucked in shallow streams of air, his breathing growing labored.

“Am I…going to…die now?”

“Yeah. You’re going to die.”

At those words, Canus clicked his tongue faintly before his breathing went shallow.

His consciousness seemed to be fading.

As his pupils dilated and his eyes wandered into the void, tears began streaming down his face.

“Ah, Mom, Dad. You’ve been there all along? You’ve been waiting all this time, haven’t you? I’m sorry.”

In his final moments, Canus gave a smile befitting his age and weakly raised the remains of an arm.

Perhaps someone took his hand. With a satisfied smile, Canus quietly left this world.

Tsushima exhaled smoke toward the sky and awkwardly brushed aside his bangs.

“Those were some bitter last words, kid. They sure did hit.”

After witnessing Canus’s final moments, Tsushima knelt beside the boy and gently closed his lifeless eyes, which were staring into the void—a small gesture of respect for the fallen.

Many Informationists had died, caught up in conflicts over rights and status. Canus was one of them. Hoping that, at the very least, the lost could go to a peaceful world free of strife after they died, Tsushima offered flowers to his defeated opponent.

For a few seconds, he bowed his head in prayer before standing up. The next moment, he felt a presence that nearly bowled him over.

“Talk about the worst possible timing,” Tsushima muttered, spitting the words toward the ground before raising his heavy head.

Without his knowing, a second sun had appeared above him. The celestial light illuminated the wastelands of Jabar, blending several colors as it gazed down upon Tsushima. Within the surreal, dazzling shimmer floated an Informationist.

It was the last person Tsushima wanted run into right now. Descending from the sky like a messenger from the heavens was none other than Finé Primus of the Six Imperial Swords.

Chapter 4

CHAPTER4

Finé Primus, true to her title of the Radiant Informationist, descended slowly from the sky as if going down a ladder of light. As she looked at Tsushima’s bloody body, her hair swayed slightly.

“To think you’d come all the way to this godforsaken place. Do all the Six Imperial Swords have this much free time?” Tsushima quipped in his usual tone.

But unlike Canus, Finé did not take the bait. She received his remark with an expressionless face and calmly took control of the conversation.

“Where’s Canus?”

Maintaining a perfect distance, Tsushima and Finé glared at each other. In the rising tension, Tsushima pointed at Canus lying at his feet.

“As you can see, I’ve turned him to cinders. That puts a bow on the job I accepted from your boss. Is Lupus safe?”

Finé nodded slowly and quietly.

“Yes, I delivered her to Elbar yesterday.”

“In that case, the mission is complete. Neither of us should have any regrets. I’ll make arrangements to go home now.”

“That’s not going to happen,” Finé said, her face unchanging.

“Of course not,” Tsushima muttered.

It was unthinkable that Finé, one of the Six Imperial Swords, had followed Tsushima just to deliver a message. Especially in light of the fact that she had just confirmed the deaths of a member of the imperial family and one of the Six Imperial Swords. As an accessory to these crimes, Tsushima was now an enemy of the empire. From Finé’s position, there was no reason to let him escape.

“You’ve come to kill me after all?”

“Yes,” Finé declared assertively, as if she didn’t have anything to hide.

Tsushima looked down at his injuries and let out a heavy sigh.

“Causa sure did go to great lengths for this one. I guess the general plan was to have Canus kill me? And if by some chance I managed to defeat him, you’d step in. That’s how you planned things, right?”

“Correct. But that’s what has me confused. Why didn’t you run if you knew all that?”

Anyone targeted by one of the Six Imperial Swords would certainly go into hiding. Yet not only had Tsushima refused to flee, but he had even been prepared to face them. This stirred a sense of doubt in Finé.

Tsushima provided an answer to her question.

“Well, yeah. If I could’ve run away, I would have. But there’s a reason I can’t,” he complained, pulling a card from his pocket. It was the Black Card from Tachibana that Causa had given him.

Finé tilted her head slightly as she looked at the special, ominously glowing card in his hand.

“A reason?”

“Yeah. Since you came all this way, let me share a little secret with you,” Tsushima said, slowly rotating the card between his fingertips. The sleek black surface glimmered as it reflected the light. In stark contrast to its elegant appearance, however, the information hidden within the small card represented the filth of the world itself.

“Oh no, this has turned into quite the mess, hasn’t it?”

Despite the gravity of the situation, the man spoke with a remarkably leisurely tone, smiling sheepishly. He was dressed simply, in a button-down shirt and suspenders, like a reporter. He held a newspaper in his hand. He was looking at the front page, which featured a bold headline:

TREASONOUS PRINCESS FINALLY EXECUTED

The content was ominous from the article title alone, but it became even more terrifying when he learned the details.

As the struggle for the succession of the throne intensified in the Balga Empire, Princess Lupus Filia had murdered Second Prince Ross Ruber. After learning of this, the emperor had Lupus Filia executed that very same day for the crime of killing a member of the imperial family.

The details outlined in the article were breaking news.

Large photographs accompanied the piece. One showed a young girl said to be Princess Lupus while she was alive, and another showed her standing at the gallows with a burlap sack over her head.

After skimming the contents of the article, the man carefully folded the newspaper and placed it on his desk.

The man’s desk and chair were the only pieces of furniture on this entire level. The vast, empty space had no structures other than its floor, ceiling, and four glass walls. Beyond the glass was a panoramic view of the streets of Elbar, the finest and most technologically advanced city on the planet.

Sitting alone in this bizarre space, the man seemed befitting of this view.

However, despite his status and power, his aura was not intimidating in the slightest.

Resting his elbows on the desk, he smiled and placed his chin on his hands.

“So can I assume your reason for coming here is related to this article?” he asked the girl standing alone in the center of the floor.

The girl had beautiful features, like something out of a painting, with flowing silver locks. Though she had not yet reached adulthood, the look in her blue eyes was not much different from that of a full-grown woman. She appeared to possess strong determination and a powerful will.

The girl cleared her throat.

“First of all, I appreciate you taking time out of your busy schedule to speak with me, Mayor Tachibana.”

“Hah. If a princess who defected from the Balga Empire says she wants to speak with me as soon as she arrives, I’ll make as much time for her as necessary. So what is it you wanted to talk about?”

The man sitting in front of Lupus was Mayor Tachibana, the highest-ranking person in the Free City of Elbar. He was a hero who had secured Elbar’s independence against the great powers of the world.

Even though Lupus had overcome scheme after scheme, she was not as cunning and experienced in the ways of the world as Tachibana was. Yet in spite of this disparity, she had a goal she needed to push ahead with.

Lupus clenched her fists to calm herself. The feeling of the ring on her finger gave her courage.

“I’ve come here with a request.”

“Well, what could that be?”

“I’ll get straight to the point: I would like you to allow Tsushima Rindou to return to Elbar.”

For Lupus, trickery was not an option. Her request was completely devoid of any lies, falsehoods, or ulterior motives, yet Tachibana hardly reacted at all. He slowly crossed his legs under the desk, as if he hadn’t heard a thing.

Lupus found herself adding more words due to his lack of response.

“I owe Tsushima my life. During my defection, he saved me countless times. Originally, he was supposed to come to Elbar alongside me. But due to my own naïveté, he ended up having to stay behind by himself in the Balga Empire. That’s why I want to save him this time. I’ve come here to negotiate with you for this.”

As Tachibana listened to Lupus’s heartfelt words, he blinked slowly.

“To negotiate, you say? I understand your request. So then, what are you offering in exchange for saving Tsushima?”

Lupus swallowed hard, as if this was the moment of truth.

“Now that I’ve fled the Balga Empire, I can say I have almost nothing left to offer. However, ironically enough, there is one thing that remains,” Lupus said, taking a breath before making her bold assertion. “The title of the Treasonous Princess, the tragic royal born of the Balga Empire.”

“Oh?” Tachibana’s interest was clearly piqued. A man of his caliber likely had some ideas of what Lupus might offer.

Among those possibilities, she had chosen the one that would appeal to him the most. Confident in her decision, Lupus pressed forward.

“There are nearly one million Informationists in the Balga Empire, including those recruited from other nations. While their abilities vary, they are people with untapped potential. If someone were capable of leading them, even the empire couldn’t ignore such a force.”

“Are you saying you could you do that?”

“The Treasonous Princess meets a tragic fate and is executed. However, she actually survives and moves to the Free City of Elbar. And on top of that, she turns out to be an Informationist who champions the oppressed! Could you imagine what a tale like that might lead to?”

Tachibana smiled with interest and put his elbows on the desk.

By leaving her statement ambiguous, Lupus had conveyed two things to Tachibana, both of which he immediately grasped. He raised one eyebrow, as if troubled.

“So essentially, what you’re saying is this: Your existence could function as a strategic weapon to incite the largest Balgan civil war in history. At the same time, it could also function as the ultimate destructive force, dragging the Free City of Elbar and the Balga Empire back into all-out conflict. Is that correct?”

“Yes, that’s correct.”

“Ah, that’s a tough one. You’ve put on a cute face and brought me a rather cruel bargain.”

Tachibana seemed to be enjoying the negotiation. He’d been making some truly expressive faces. He pondered things for a while, then began speaking in a lighthearted tone, as if he were discussing neighborhood gossip.

“Certainly, your existence is rare, Lupus Filia, as someone who carries both imperial and Informationist blood. If you raise your banner, Informationists from around the world who resent the Balga Empire will rally under it. That’s one power I’ve always wanted but could never obtain. Truly enviable.”

Tachibana lightly tapped his palms on the desk and, with a teasing expression, pointed at Lupus.

“How you use this power is entirely up to you. That’s what you’re trying to say, isn’t it?” he asked. Lupus had no response to his question. Narrowing the options down to two at this point would not qualify as a negotiation.

If she chose the first option, she wouldn’t be able to secure anything beyond its equivalent value—meaning she might fail to achieve Tsushima’s retrieval. On the other hand, if she chose the second option, Tachibana would likely eliminate her immediately.

Lupus understood that the success of the negotiation hinged on her keeping both options open at all times.

She responded by bringing a charming smile to her lovely face.

“Oh my, how ominous. You show me such a lovely smile, but what you’re doing is nothing short of a threat. Ha-ha-ha.”

Tachibana scratched his head as if troubled, but his reaction wasn’t entirely negative. Perhaps he had been expecting this turn of events all along.

Seeing that Lupus’s words weren’t a bluff, he let out a small sigh.

“However, it seems you’ve misunderstood something. If you were to plot anything to threaten the peace of the Free City of Elbar, I could end your life at a moment’s notice. There are neither shields nor spears here to protect you.”

The casual attitude Tachibana had maintained until that point suddenly vanished. His expression grew serious, and Lupus felt momentarily overwhelmed.

However, she managed to hold her ground.

“That may be true. But you won’t kill me—because I might bring unfathomable benefits to Elbar. You can’t ignore that possibility, can you?”

Even when faced with the threat of death, Lupus did not back down. Showing fear now would make her no different than the girl who had fled in terror from the infighting between the members of the imperial family.

She had already steeled her resolve and crossed a line. No matter who her opponent was, Lupus would not abandon the fight.

Now that a girl twenty years his junior had seen through his true feelings, Tachibana closed his eyes and raised both his hands in a gesture of surrender. It wasn’t entirely genuine, but it was still a significant outcome.

Tachibana lightly clapped his hands and relaxed his shoulders.

“Your method of negotiating has plenty of flaws and is quite forceful, but I like your attitude. I’ll accept your request. However, I will also impose a few conditions on you,” Tachibana said, holding up three fingers. “I’ll ask you to agree to three things. First, you are not to reveal your status as a princess until we instruct or permit you to do so. Second, you must get our approval before you attempt to gather any large group of people or lead any organization. Third, you are not to leave Elbar’s territory without our permission. You must abide by these three conditions. If you break even one of them, we will consider you an enemy and eliminate you.”

The word eliminate unmistakably meant death. If she violated even one of the conditions, Tachibana would likely kill Lupus without hesitation. Fully cognizant of this, Lupus quietly nodded.

“I understand. I accept your conditions.”

“I’m glad to hear that. It’s a relief you’re so reasonable.” Tachibana’s sharp gaze softened slightly and he let out a breath. He took a sip of the cold coffee sitting on the desk and, as if transitioning to casual conversation, continued speaking.

“I’d like to say our negotiation is concluded there, but frankly, there will be difficulties in bringing Tsushima Rindou back immediately. I hope you can understand that, yes?”

“Of course. I’m aware of his situation. Right now, he’s trying to defeat one of the Six Imperial Swords. And that’s not all—Causa Insania’s knight will likely go after Tsushima as well to silence him. No matter how skilled he is, facing two members of the Six Imperial Swords won’t end well. I’d like for you to help him before it’s too late.”

Lupus thought back to the moment just before she had lost consciousness from the drug Causa had given her.

At that time, Finé had been absent, despite her knightly duty requiring her to always be at Causa’s side. Lupus knew it could mean only one thing for a woman as loyal as Finé to leave her master. Without a doubt, Causa had sent her as insurance to kill Tsushima.

As Lupus looked at Tachibana with a sense of urgency and prayer-like hope, he leisurely stifled a yawn.

“Hmm. Causa’s knight… That would be Finé Primus, right? So she’s the other member?” Tachibana recalled what he knew about Finé. After a moment of thought, he nodded once. “Well, I don’t think there’s much to worry about. I factored this into my calculations when selecting who to send.”

“Calculations? What do you mean?”

Lupus couldn’t keep up with what Tachibana was saying. Did he mean he had foreseen everything from the start and had deliberately selected Tsushima as her bodyguard?

That seemed far too detached from reality for her to comprehend. Seeing her confusion, Tachibana began elaborating.

“You see, I actually had a fairly good idea of what Causa might be scheming. I could also predict the general developments, including Ross’s plans and your movements. But apparently, I wasn’t the only one who foresaw this outcome,” Tachibana said, holding up a single envelope with an air of significance. It was dyed a deep purple and sealed with gold-and-crimson wax.

“What’s that?” Lupus asked.

“When you sought to defect, Causa requested I send an exceptional bodyguard to protect you. At the same time, however, I received another request from someone else.”

Tachibana’s lips curled into a mischievous smile, as though he was about to reveal something amusing. Lupus frowned, unable to grasp his true intentions.

Lowering her voice slightly, she leaned forward, pressing him for answers.

“What exactly was written in the contents of that envelope?”

Tachibana swayed the envelope lightly from side to side before letting it drop onto the desk with a small thud. The gesture seemed to suggest the letter wasn’t particularly important to either of them.

Tachibana exhaled lightly through his nose and leaned back in his chair.

“Oh, nothing that would have much of an impact on you. It was simply a request to teach a lesson to some ill-mannered princes of the Balga Empire.”

Though he spoke casually, the request itself was horribly problematic. Just interfering with the imperial family of the Balga Empire—a global superpower—could easily escalate into war.

Yet Tachibana showed no concern as he continued.

“Well, you’ve already killed one of those princes. Should I say it saved me the effort or that it was overkill? Perhaps I should prepare an excuse or two. Ha-ha-ha,” Tachibana chuckled, wearing a troubled smile.

As Lupus listened to him speak, she felt an uncomfortable sensation linger in her throat, like there was a bone stuck there. From Tachibana’s tone, it seemed that Ross wasn’t the only member of the imperial family meant to be “taught a lesson.”

So who else from the imperial family could it be, then? Lupus mulled this over, but astonishingly, only one man came to mind.

Causa Insania.

Lupus felt mental dots connect, and her face twisted in disbelief. Tachibana confirmed her suspicions.

“Tsushima Rindou has already completed his mission of helping you defect to Elbar. The reason he’s still in Balga now is because he’s carrying out this other request. Once he’s done, he can return. If he flees… Well, what happens then is up to fate. But thanks to your negotiations, it looks like he won’t have to die. If, by any chance, he does fail, I’ll take responsibility and rescue him myself.”

With mixed feelings, Lupus chose not to get any more involved. Learning the details would mean stepping into the same web of scheming and plotting as them.

In truth, she wanted to know more about the situation Tsushima was in and what he needed to accomplish to be able to come back.

But she wondered what he would think of her if, when he returned to Elbar, she had once again become entangled in the shadows of conspiracy.

Lupus felt like facing him as a new version of herself—broken free from the bonds of power, status, and all such entanglements—would be the best way to be sincere with him.

Keeping her feelings in her chest, Lupus looked at Tachibana.

“I wonder if I can really believe you?”

“It’s important to be skeptical. But I pride myself on being the kind of adult who keeps his promises. After all, trust is the foundation of any negotiation,” Tachibana cheerfully told Lupus. There were no signs he was lying, but even if he was, she probably wouldn’t be able to tell.

Lupus nodded, as if convincing herself, and offered her a farewell.

“I understand. Thank you for taking the time to speak with me despite your busy schedule. Well then, I’ll be going now.”

As Lupus bowed deeply and turned to depart, Tachibana called her back.

The tone of his voice was as relaxed as it had been at the start.

“Oh, that’s right. Could I ask you one last question?”

Lupus turned back at his question, the look on her face unintentionally asking, There’s still something else?

Tachibana gave a wry smile and posed his question.

“I just can’t see any reason why you’d go to such lengths to help Tsushima Rindou. He’s a skilled Informationist, but that’s all. I don’t get why you’re so invested in him.”

Apparently, even Tachibana didn’t know everything that had happened between Lupus and Tsushima. He didn’t know they had become knight and master, or that a relationship of trust had grown between them. For someone like Tachibana, who saw people as pieces on a board, such things were likely incomprehensible.

“Who knows? I wonder why that could be?” Lupus muttered as if hinting at something, then gave a confident smile.

Tachibana regarded her with a suspicious look, but in the end, he couldn’t decipher her true intentions.

“It seems this is out of my depth. I’d be kicking a hornet’s nest by digging deeper, wouldn’t I? Forget I brought it up.”

“All right. Good-bye, then,” Lupus bid him farewell once more, then vanished into empty space. It was a form of travel wherein one executed a special Code that connected different points in space-time. There was no other way in or out of this room.

After seeing Lupus off and confirming she was gone, Tachibana clapped his hands together.

“She was a pretty confident lady, wasn’t she?”

At his signal, a middle-aged man appeared by Tachibana’s side out of nowhere.

The man, standing as if he had been there all along, was faintly shrouded in the afterglow of information factors. He seemed to have used some kind of Code to appear, but the exact specifics of it were a mystery. The only thing clear was that it was unimaginably advanced.

Tachibana looked up at him with a sigh.

“For some reason, I’m reminded of how my wife used to be. Let me tell you, that woman had me whipped.”

“Well, at least with the princess, it probably won’t hurt too much.”

“Lupus is dainty now, but who knows what she’ll be like in twenty years.”

They exchanged jokes and laughed, but then Tachibana’s expression changed.

“Now then, about that request. How is it progressing?” Tachibana asked.

“Tsushima is doing well,” the middle-aged man replied. “Seems he’s just taken down the first target.”

“So there’s one more person left to go? Looks like it’ll be right away, doesn’t it?”

The middle-aged man let out a deep sigh at Tachibana’s irresponsible remark, clearly exasperated, as if he were thinking, Honestly, this man…

“The Six Imperial Swords are on a completely different level from ordinary Informationists. No matter how skilled Tsushima is, this won’t end quickly. With his brain slowed down from his nicotine addiction, he probably won’t be able pull off the reckless stunts he used to.”

“Huh? He still smokes? Unbelievable.”

“Nicotine and alcohol are effective at disrupting Code construction. For someone who wants to hide their true identity, like Tsushima, they’re a vital tool.” Arms crossed, the middle-aged man seemed to be firmly on Tsushima’s side. Tachibana glanced up at him, then leaned back in his chair.

“I got a little carried away and made an unusual promise against my better judgment. I doubt he’ll be taken out, but please give him a hand, just in case.”

“Understood,” the middle-aged man briefly replied. Then he vanished from that spot faster than the blink of an eye.

Left alone, Tachibana reached for a photo frame on his desk. It was a picture taken just after the end of the War of Independence, showing the seven Informationists who would come to be called heroes, all gathered together.

After that photo was taken, the seven of them had never been in the same place at once again. It was their first and last commemorative photo.

The man in the center, covered in mud and showing his white teeth as he grinned, was Tachibana. And right in the corner was a boy smoking with his back turned to the camera.

Tachibana flicked the picture of the boy with his finger.

“That lady killer’s still going as strong as ever, even while hiding his true identity. I envy him.”

Thunder rumbled across Jabar, the land of fate for Informationists. Heavy snow clouds blanketed the sky overhead, and Tsushima and Finé stood facing each other on the gray wasteland.

Finé closed her eyes firmly for a moment, then turned her glowing golden eyes to Tsushima. The facts he had revealed had left her baffled.

“My assassination, you say?” Finé questioned Tsushima, as if seeking confirmation. Surely, no one even existed who would dare target someone as overwhelmingly powerful as her.

“Ridiculous, isn’t it? It’s not just you. Apparently, I’ve been requested to get rid of both you and Canus.” Tsushima sighed, returning the card to his pocket. “So basically, we were fated to kill each other right from the start. That’s what it means.”

While giving the impression she still didn’t understand, Finé looked at Tsushima coldly.

“Tachibana is a fool for giving you that order. Thinking you could defeat me, baring his fangs at the Balga Empire—all of it is a mistake.”

“Not necessarily. There are things you won’t know unless you try.”

Tsushima tossed his cigarette butt to the ground and planted his feet shoulder width apart. His body creaked, and blood began to seep from the wound in his abdomen. No matter how he struggled, the odds would be against him.

Even so, there was no getting out of the task before him. With his target in sight right in front of him, Tsushima cracked one last joke.

“I guess that makes us mutually infatuated with each other. Not a bad stage for it, eh?”

“It’s impressive for a fool to get this far. All right then, I’ll make you regret challenging me.”

Watching Tsushima’s movements, Finé readied herself as well. The air between them suddenly grew thick with tension.

It was an explosive situation. Amid the strained silence, a single snowflake drifted down. The white flake fell between their fields of vision, landing soundlessly on the ground. As if on cue, Finé’s and Tsushima’s eyes both flashed fiercely at almost the same time.

Finé executed a Code for a blade of light. Tsushima countered by firing a heat ray. Both stood their ground, and a direct contest of strength began.

The phenomena they executed collided with a thunderous roar, scattering shards of light and enormous amounts of heat.

Where the two forces clashed and shattered, either flames erupted or the blade of light pierced through everything in its path.

The impacts were so intense that they lit up the surrounding area, as if it were midday. The powers they used to attack each other seemed to be evenly matched.

However, while Finé’s expression remained unchanged, Tsushima’s twisted in pain.

“Tch, so the odds really are against me.”

Tsushima had already fought Canus of the Six Imperial Swords. No matter how strong he was, the wounds from that battle hadn’t yet healed. Tsushima was the first to be overwhelmed from the strain of his Code execution.

Sensing this, Finé stepped forward, gradually closing the distance between them.

“Shit!”

The balance of power shattered in an instant.

Tsushima abandoned his Code and turned to flee behind the rubble. But Finé would not let him escape. She executed a new Code.

“Lightning Flash,” Finé whispered softly, executing the Code. With a graceful motion, she swept her long, slender hand toward Tsushima. At the same time, a band of light appeared from nowhere, flashing across the world to the horizon.

Not caring how awkward he looked, Tsushima threw himself to the ground just before a burst of light streaked over his head. With that single sweep, the flash had pulverized almost all of Jabar’s rubble.

Tsushima desperately tried to hide as he got covered in debris raining down from above. But his attempt to conceal himself seemed pointless in the face of such overwhelming Code execution. Cold sweat beaded on his forehead.

“God dammit. How the hell did things end up like this?”

Tsushima pressed a hand to his abdomen, where his wound had split wide open and blood had started gushing out. He had already lost a lot of blood. Losing any more would mean death. Looking at his red palm, Tsushima discarded the option of a prolonged fight.

Finé’s Codes most likely granted physical properties to light. Although minuscule, her light particles possessed the force to push things slightly. She had probably maximized that force by compressing her light to its limit.

Tsushima understood the theory.

But he didn’t understand what kind of Code could make such a thing possible. It was completely unclear. It was often said that Exceptional Level Informationists wielded supernatural powers.

“How am I supposed to deal with this monster? Dammit, Tachibana…”

Even after just a brief exchange, he could tell Finé was a monstrously powerful Informationist. But if he tried to run now, he’d only get shot in the back.

Staring out at the dust-filled streets of Jabar, Tsushima began piecing together hypotheses and searching for a strategy.

“I guess I’ll just have to do what I can.”

Half resigned, Tsushima rose from between the rubble.

Even through the haze of dust, Finé—wrapped in light—was clearly visible. She was implying that there was no need for her to hide.

Tsushima executed his own Code and charged at her. She sensed his presence and unleashed a flash of light.

But for some reason, her attack landed just slightly off from where he actually was.

Pushing through the barrage of flashes that grazed his cheek and shoulder, Tsushima finally closed the distance to within arm’s reach of Finé. That’s when she realized he was using heat-induced light refraction.

By applying the principle of a mirage, he had shifted his visible position ever so slightly. Up close, his outline appeared unnaturally distorted—proof of his trick.

Then Tsushima deliberately forced the fight into close quarters, a style he disliked. Judging by her combat methods, Finé shared this weakness with him. Her high-powered, wide-area Code would be difficult to wield at close range without risking self-destruction.

It was a gamble, but Finé boldly accepted the close-quarters fight as Tsushima closed in. She hardened a band of light, gripping it like a sword. Tsushima countered with his heat-charged fists.

True to her reputation as a knight, Finé had superb sword skills. Every movement of her blade was precise, with not a single wasted motion.

Tsushima’s technique was rough by comparison, but he pressed forward with sheer strength. As he batted away her blade and closed in, Finé’s expression darkened slightly.

Tsushima stayed on the attack, not allowing Finé to open up the distance between them. If she could keep him at sword’s length, he would have no chance of winning. So he committed fully to close-quarters combat, closing the gap as much as possible.

His fists grazed her jacket several times, and he began to feel he might be able to overpower her.

That’s when he noticed the shift in her demeanor.

The killing intent that had been so palpable just moments before was now fading away. The reason was obvious from the look on her face.

Finé had lost all interest. She regarded Tsushima with the same indifference one might show a pebble on the ground. Then, in a barely audible voice, she murmured, “Disappointing.”

The moment those words reached Tsushima’s ears, a violent impact struck him before he could even process what was happening.

There were barely a few inches between him and Finé—a distance he had maintained to prevent her from using her specialty Code.

But her abilities far surpassed anything Tsushima had imagined. With pinpoint accuracy, as though she was threading a needle, she unleashed an arrow of light that plunged into Tsushima.

The projectile had followed a perfect trajectory that missed Finé by mere millimeters but struck Tsushima dead-on, stabbing into his side.

Tsushima doubled over and was sent flying, and he crashed into a distant pile of rubble, where he came to a stop.

In just one moment, with just one hit, the tables had turned.

No—that wasn’t it. There had never been a moment when Tsushima was actually pushing back against Finé. To demonstrate that, she flicked her long hair, as if saying she was utterly bored.

“Canus lost to a man like you? For one of the Six Imperial Swords, that’s just pathetic.”

Looking at Tsushima, who now had a spear of light impaled in him like a gravestone, Finé let out a sigh. An expression of disappointment crossed her face for a change.

“But a lion never holds back, not even against a mouse,” Finé continued. “That’s something I learned from my master, and it’s true. I’ll finish this with my full power.”

With that, Finé reached her hand toward the sky and whispered, “Celestial Crown Light Blade.”

She had executed one of the most powerful techniques in her arsenal.

Bands of light formed on the ground, layering over each other and rippling like a dragon as they rose into the sky. The lights climbing into the dull sky shone with a radiance reminiscent of the descent of gods, forming a single, massive ring.

From that glowing ring, countless golden spears hung like a chandelier. So many beams of light formed in an instant that it seemed pointless to even try to count them, all aimed at Tsushima.

“This is the ultimate attack, one that will return everything to nothing. In the next world, take pride in having died from it, Tsushima Rindou.”

To Finé, Tsushima the Informationist was now just another nobody in the crowd. She turned her back to him, saying she had no interest in how her final blow would bring about his death.

Sitting up halfway, his mind hazy, Tsushima gazed at the light from Finé’s Celestial Crown Light Blade technique. That ring of light was the very same spectacle he had seen on that day in his nightmare. That realization jolted his instincts awake.

In that moment, the pitch-black emotions that had lain dormant deep in Tsushima’s gut finally awakened. Shion, growing cold in his arms as he’d held her tightly, giving him one final, gentle smile.

This irreplaceable person had taught him warmth and kindness. An image of her cruel death flashed through his mind, and intense emotions surged up within him.

Resentment, hatred, anger—all the negative feelings he had harbored and refined for over a decade now surfaced as a thirst for blood.

And then a demon awakened within Tsushima and whispered a curse in his ear:

The root of all your suffering…is this person.

“So it was you… You were my sister’s killer all along,” Tsushima murmured, his expression curiously at peace, as if he had finally been saved.

Immediately afterward, countless shards of light rained down on him from the ring of light floating in the sky.

An intense glow—so blinding it was impossible to open his eyes—filled the entire area, followed by a billowing cloud of dust. In the blink of an eye, the spot where Tsushima stood was hit by such overwhelming destruction that the terrain itself warped. The relentless attack struck at the speed of light, erasing Tsushima’s body.

When the thunderous explosions behind her finally ceased, Finé, certain of her victory, made to leave. There was even an air of regret about her, as if she had just had an extremely tedious experience. She was the very image of an absolute victor.

However, this time was different. The moment she took a step forward, she sensed something was wrong. Amid the rising smoke and lingering afterglow, she felt a strange, distorted presence.

Finé turned around to check if she was mistaken. She sensed something moving in the shadow of the swirling smoke. Someone was unsteadily getting to their feet—it was unmistakably the silhouette of a person.

As the north wind swept the smoke away, that person was gradually revealed.

“How are you still standing?”

The man who appeared in her field of vision was Tsushima, battered and broken. Seeing him, Finé showed a hint of being shaken for the first time.

He was covered in mud and blood. After taking Finé’s attack head-on, his body was so torn apart that his organs were spilling out, and tears of blood streamed from his eyes due to the strain of Code execution.

He no longer resembled anything that could be called human. He looked like some kind of wicked monster, like a demon or an evil sorcerer.

And yet what remained disturbingly clear was the sinister gleam of his eyes, visible between the strands of his tousled bangs. Eyes that had surpassed blue and now radiated a deep, dark light brimming with a malice far surpassing mere bloodlust.

He had suffered damage beyond repair. And yet his lips were curved in a smile. What kind of emotion could possibly produce such a grin?

Finé intuitively understood from looking at him.

She didn’t know the reason, but something had snapped inside Tsushima in that moment. It was a horrifying feeling, as though she was slowly getting ensnared in a world one must never enter.

As Finé took a step back on reflex, Tsushima fixed her with a demonic stare.

“Even a shitty god does something good once in a while.”

Standing atop a mountain of rubble, Tsushima took a single step down the rubble and stumbled. Then he looked questioningly down at his own body.

“What’s this? I’m practically dead?” he muttered to himself.

Hearing his words, Finé regained her composure. Tsushima might have looked calm, but in reality, he was hanging on by a thread. One more hit and he would be finished, she determined. Finé constructed a platform of light at her feet and used it to leap high into the sky. Then she began to execute an even more powerful Code.

“I never thought I’d have to use this.”

Finé raised her hand high toward the heavens. Bands of light gathered in her hand, intertwining. The massive bands of light compressed to their limit, flooding the entire area with a radiance more intense than the midday sun.

Gradually, the light amassed in her hand transformed into a single spear.

“Spear of Divine Punishment,” Finé said as she gripped the spear of light.

This was the most powerful attack she could wield. The ultrahigh-density mass of light was so dazzlingly bright that it seemed capable of swallowing everything. This light could probably even be seen from beyond the horizon.

“Your existence should end here. Suffer my master’s divine punishment.”

She looked down at the ground and swung the spear’s tip down toward where Tsushima stood. The mass of light, now possessing real weight, was terrifyingly heavy. Clenching her teeth, Finé hurled the Spear of Divine Punishment from her hand with a furious expression.

The Spear of Divine Punishment collided with Tsushima’s head, scattering the surrounding dust clouds in an instant. It was a single hit beyond human comprehension that could shoot through Tsushima, gouge into the earth, and reach the bedrock layer of the Earth’s crust at worst.

But things didn’t go that easily. Just as the Spear of Divine Punishment was about to hit him, it lost momentum and vanished in an extremely unnatural way. All that remained was the violent wind created by the spear.

The dust that had filled the ruined town was blown away in an instant. With a clear view of his surroundings, Tsushima stood atop the rubble as if nothing had happened.

Despite the overwhelming force of the attack, he was completely unscathed. In fact, there wasn’t even a single groove in the ground where he stood.

Tsushima slowly looked up at Finé with ominously glowing eyes, one of which was completely crushed. His body was even more broken than before, the result of excessive Code execution.

Yet even as tears of blood streamed down his face, Tsushima grinned from ear to ear and raised a hand at Finé.

Something was happening—Tsushima was executing some unknown Code, different from anything Finé had anticipated. She knew this on an instinctive level but couldn’t comprehend it rationally.

Not only had her most powerful attack been neutralized, but her opponent was now launching an unknown assault. She couldn’t run, couldn’t defend, couldn’t move at all.

“What is this? This is nothing!” Finé shouted, trying to summon the Spear of Divine Punishment again, when all of a sudden, she felt a strange sensation run up her right side. It was a warm feeling, as though something were wrapping around her. Looking up, she saw light was shining through her right arm, which was now as transparent as glass.

“Wha—?!”

Finé’s face twisted in shock. Instinctively, she used a band of light to sever her arm at the shoulder.

Her detached arm vanished completely before it could even hit the ground, disappearing soundlessly as if dissolving into the world itself—a strangely beautiful end.

Clutching the wound, which gushed blood like a waterfall, Finé dropped to her knees on the platform of light. The pain was so intense that she couldn’t focus on executing her Code. Gritting her teeth, she struggled to process what had just happened in front of her.

“What is this? What the hell did you do?”

Sweating profusely, Finé glared at Tsushima. He just shrugged on top of the rubble, grinning fearlessly.

“Who knows? I don’t really get the logic behind it. But heat, existence, it’s all just energy, right? If it can increase, then it can disappear. And all I did was wish, harder than anything, for you to vanish from this world.” Tsushima explained the mysterious Code he had created and laughed. Finé, sweat beading on her brow, shook her head in disbelief.

“So you’re saying you erased the energy of existence? There’s no way you could pull off something so absurd. That’s nothing more than an abstract concept. This isn’t science anymore—you’ve crossed into the realm of philosophy.”

“That’s what I’m saying. This isn’t about logic. This Code is, in a sense, a wish. I wished for you to disappear from this world.”

Staring into the void, Tsushima tilted his head with a half smile.

“What, do you not like my answer?”

With that unsettling gesture, Tsushima exuded an aura of dread. Finé was seized by a terror so intense it felt like a brush with death itself, and she suddenly recalled the one other moment in her life when she had felt a similar sensation.

“This ridiculous Code. I do remember seeing it just one time before.”

Finé stood once more on her platform of light and looked down aggressively at Tsushima.

“You’re one of the Seven Heroes of the War of Independence— the Shadow Informationist, aren’t you?” Finé asked.

Tsushima looked at her with blank eyes before giving a vague response.

“What would you do if I was?”

The Shadow Informationist. One of the Seven Heroes of Elbar’s War of Independence. During the war, the allied fleet had gone all out in an attempt to recapture the eastern coast of Elbar Island. The Shadow Informationist was a legendary Informationist who single-handedly defended the coast and annihilated the fleet. But he was also rumored to have been one of those who had died.

And yet here he was, alive and kicking. Still in shock, Finé began to treat her wound.

“I see. So that’s why you’ve been hiding such absurd strength.”

As she wrapped a band of light around her body to stop the bleeding, Finé started thinking.

If what Tsushima said was true, then his Code should be able to erase anything from the world itself. If existence itself was erased, then no Code execution would matter. In other words, he possessed both the ultimate spear and the ultimate shield.

But Finé had one question. If he had such power, why hadn’t he erased her from the start? There must be a reason he hadn’t been able to do it.

That’s when Finé came up with a hypothesis: Perhaps his Code required precise location information to execute. With his vision blurred from the strain of Code execution, he couldn’t know her exact location. That’s why his fatal attack had missed.

Reaching her conclusion, Finé quietly licked her dry lips.

“You’ve slipped up, Tsushima Rindou.”

Now it was Finé’s turn to gloat. She wrapped her entire body in glowing bands. The physical light she generated shone so brightly it erased every shadow in sight.

Swallowed by the dazzling gleam, Finé began to form the Spear of Divine Punishment in her left hand. Tsushima gazed up at the looming premonition and let out a heavy sigh.

“It’s so annoying. You, this light, this place—it’s all an eyesore.”

Finé’s guess had been correct. Tsushima’s eyes, strained by excessive Code execution, were no longer working properly. With what little vision he had left, he couldn’t pinpoint her exact location. If he didn’t finish this with his next attack, he would lose.

Even so, Tsushima risked his life by executing another massive Code.

The path of vengeance he’d embarked on was a one-way road into the murky depths of a dark and stagnant world. If he had any choice left, it was merely who he would drag down with him. That was all there was to it.

“All creation in heaven and earth—vanish entirely.” As Tsushima spoke, the ground around him began to blur. The earth appeared to overlap in countless layers as the energy of existence was erased from it. Finé, poised in the sky, involuntarily gasped at the impossible sight.

At the center of the anomaly, Tsushima looked at the sky and spread his arms wide. Both of his eyes were completely crushed, with dark red blood pooling in his sockets and streaming down. Even so, he shouted with a beaming smile:

“All right, Big Sis. Now I’m going to kill the person who murdered you!”

There was no time to lose, Finé determined. She swung the Spear of Divine Punishment. The spear’s trajectory, carefully aimed, remained invisible to Tsushima, who was bathed in light. She had unleashed a strike meant to deliver certain death.

The spear of light tore through the air, its roar overlapping with the thunder rumbling in the sky. It reached Tsushima in less than the blink of an eye.

But once again, Finé’s most powerful attack was shattered by Tsushima’s monstrous defense. The spear of light vanished as it drew near him.

Still, cracks were showing in Tsushima’s Code execution. A remnant of the spear grazed his neck and disappeared behind him.

Immediately afterward, Tsushima smirked and pointed in the direction the lance had come from.

“See ya,” Tsushima said, blood spilling from his mouth. He’d long surpassed his execution limit. This was truly his final strike.

Watching from above, Finé clicked her tongue. As she saw the bands of light that had protected her body lose their brilliance and dissolve like smoke, she realized what Tsushima had done.

The Code he’d unleashed past his limits was a wide-area attack. There was no need to pinpoint a location. He no longer had any way to determine Finé’s exact location. That’s why he’d let himself be hit once to narrow down her direction and then unleash his move.

A simple plan, but an effective one.

Staring at her disintegrating body, Finé screamed. Those erased by Code normally vanished from the world as if they were falling asleep.

But Tsushima’s weakened execution lacked the power to erase her completely.

Finé’s grotesquely warped body gushed blood from every mutilated crevice. Stripped of her light defenses and faced with death, she shrieked and jumped down from her platform. With no way to protect herself, she crashed unprotected into Jabar’s rubble.

Tsushima sensed from the rising smoke and shock waves that the battle was over. He weakly knelt on the ground.

“Finé… It’s a shame I won’t get to watch you die.”

Facing his imminent death, Tsushima lit a cigarette. This would be the last one of his life. He took out his gas lighter, eager to breathe in the smoke he’d been looking forward to. Just then, Lupus’s face mysteriously surfaced in his darkened vision. Even at the brink of death, why was it Lupus he saw and not Shion?

Tsushima realized what the reason was.

The ring on his pinkie finger, clicking against his lighter, seemed to be speaking to him, even though he couldn’t see anything.

Is it really okay for you to die like this? Don’t you still have promises to keep?

Tsushima had a place to go home to. He had a person he needed to protect. It was a promise he’d failed to keep with Shion in the past, and a promise he’d made to Lupus, who was waiting for him to return.

“Guess I’ve got no choice. I should go home alive,” he muttered, flicking his lighter. As the cigarette caught fire, Tsushima took a step forward in the world he could no longer see. He could barely feel anything in his body, and yet, somehow, he could still clearly feel the cold of the snow that had begun to fall more heavily.

But when that cold was replaced by the chill of the ground as he collapsed, Tsushima didn’t notice at all.

By then, he had already lost consciousness. The price for pushing his Code execution beyond its limits was death. That was a fate even someone of his skill couldn’t escape.

As if the fierce battle from moments before had been nothing but a lie, a deep silence settled over the area. Snow fell and piled up on the land of Jabar, where two heroes had fought their desperate duel and perished.

The snow fell quietly and steadily, as if to cover all the world’s impurities.

Before long, the area was covered in snow, turning the shattered, gouged cityscape into a world of pure white. Not a single blemish marred the scene. Amid this beautiful landscape, a man appeared.

He stood in the land of Jabar as if he had always been there, having materialized out of nowhere. He wore a refined three-piece suit, and a neatly trimmed beard streaked with white was visible beneath his fedora.

The distinguished middle-aged man looked down at Tsushima, who was buried beneath the snow, and muttered something in exasperation.

“Why do young people always have to be so reckless?”

Placing his hands on his hips, he continued staring at the unconscious man, waiting for a reply. But Tsushima said nothing in return, which came as no surprise. Having fought two fierce battles back-to-back, he was as close to death as one could be.

“What are we gonna do with you?” the man murmured, as if he were a parent scolding a child. He reached for Tsushima’s legs.

But then he stopped.

He noticed the presence of a woman who had appeared just as silently as he had.

Straightening up, the man tipped his hat in greeting.

“Well, well, a knight of His Majesty the Emperor. What brings you all this way?”

The woman was dressed in dazzling traditional attire, her hair adorned with many ornaments, and she wore lacquered platform sandals with unusually high soles. From behind a beautifully carved, doll-like mask, she spoke in a voice as delicate as a butterfly.

“I came hither, for I did feel thy presence.”

“Oh? I was trying to arrive quietly enough not to be noticed.”

“There is none other such as thee. Thou wouldst do well to be more mindful of it,” she said smoothly, in a tone almost like singing, then lightly covered her mouth as she laughed. The man in front of her smiled as well.

“Hearing that from you makes me blush.”

Their conversation may have seemed carefree, but these two held the fate of the world in their hands. The man was Ayman Droog, famed as the mightiest person in Elbar, and the woman was Amanomikami, the sole knight of the current emperor. The two strongest people in the world—the only two level-thirteen Informationists on the planet—had crossed paths in this remote place.

“For what purpose hast thou come here today?” Amanomikami asked.

Somewhat hesitantly, Ayman pointed at Tsushima lying at his feet.

“I had to step in to take this guy back with me. I’ve got no intention of fighting—but how about you?”

“I have been beset by tedium as of late.”

“…”

“…”

It took Ayman a moment to process what Amanomikami meant. She’d always had a unique way of perceiving things, so communicating with her was often a challenge.

Even now, he had needed to mentally translate her words to make sense of the exchange.

Apparently, Amanomikami had taken an interest in Tsushima. That was understandable, as he had single-handedly defeated two of the Six Imperial Swords. It made sense someone of her stature would be intrigued by him.

Ayman cleared his throat and held out his palm to keep Amanomikami at bay.

“Sorry, but I can’t hand him over to you. I’m sure that won’t be a surprise to your emperor.”

“Verily, that matter pertaineth not to me.”

Amanomikami gave a slight curtsy, her movements graceful. Ayman continued to explain, his expression troubled.

“The emperor had a hand in how this all turned out, too. I’m sure me coming here to retrieve Tsushima is all part of the plan. And the emperor isn’t a fan of having his schemes go off-script, is he? I’ve got no guarantees about what’ll happen if things get complicated here.”

“Is that so? Then who can say how I’ll be received if I intervene?” Amanomikami murmured in her usual unhurried, gentle tone, catching a snowflake falling from the sky in her palm. She gazed at the flake resting on her unnaturally pale skin, then gently cupped it with both hands.

“Tell me, is that fair youth one who might yet stand on our side?” she asked.

“Maybe, but it’s too soon to say.”

Hearing Ayman’s reply, Amanomikami walked gracefully across the snow toward him, her sandals swaying back and forth with each step. As the pleasant sound of her footsteps closed the distance between them, the air filled with tension.

She came up to the near-dead Tsushima, then released the snowflake.

The bit of snow became a single droplet, shining like a diamond as it fell onto Tsushima.

The droplet melted the snow that had piled up on his back, before it made contact with his body, producing a faint sound as it seeped into him.

After a few seconds of silence, Tsushima’s breathing suddenly increased in volume, as if he were a drowned man who had washed ashore, gasping for air.

“’Tis never amiss to have more men of worth, I say.”

Turning around, Amanomikami glanced over her shoulder at Ayman and fixed him with a bewitching gaze.

She had used some sort of healing ability. Though Tsushima had suffered severe injuries to both his brain and body, he was now recovering, even if he had not yet regained consciousness.

Ayman removed his fedora and gave a slight bow.

“You have my thanks for your consideration.”

“Think nothing of it. ’Twas but a trifle, done whilst I tended to my own affairs.”

With that, Amanomikami moved with her usual languid grace and lifted Finé, who had also been buried under the snow. Like Tsushima, she was terribly wounded, her survival uncertain.

When Ayman saw that Finé was still alive, his expression grew stern.

“She needs to die here. That’s what your emperor wants.”

At what could be taken as a warning from Ayman, Amanomikami tilted her head slightly. It was clear from her demeanor this was of no concern to her.

“Does he now? I comprehend it not. This woman is my dear junior. To let her die would stir my heart with sorrow.”

Beneath her mask, a glimmer of light appeared in Amanomikami’s eyes. Seeing this, Ayman quietly raised both hands—a gesture to show he had no intention of escalating things any further.

Amanomikami gracefully shifted her posture and effortlessly took Finé in her arms, then gave Ayman a meaningful glance.

“Until we meet anon.”

“Yeah. Take care now.”

With their farewells exchanged, she vanished, enveloped in the blue glow of information factors. Ayman relaxed only after confirming she was completely gone, then looked down at Tsushima.

“You’re one lucky bastard,” Ayman muttered with a hint of affection in his voice, despite the grumbling tone.

He roughly turned Tsushima onto his back and grabbed him by one leg, dragging him along.

Like a corpse, Tsushima didn’t move an inch as he was dragged across the snow. Ayman whistled as he walked, executing a Code that tore open space-time to create a new dimension.

Then Ayman and Tsushima passed into the shimmering, mirage-like rift.

After they departed, all that remained were the falling snow and the mountain landscape. No one was there. There had never been anyone there. It was just empty scenery.

The Central Conference Hall in the Free City of Elbar was an eerie place, without a single window—just a vast, domed chamber stretching out endlessly.

At the center of the hall, two imposing men sat across from one another at a round table. In stark contrast to their composed expressions, the bodyguards lurking in the darkness behind them radiated an almost terrifying tension.

And with good reason. The two were rivals who had crossed blades of strategy as they vied for control of the entire world—Causa Insania and Tachibana.

Tachibana’s voice rang out, cutting through the charged atmosphere.

“My, my, I never expected you to grace us with your presence. I’m terribly sorry I could not prepare a more fitting venue.”

Tachibana spoke in a breezy tone that belied the tension in the air.

Causa answered with a pleasant smile.

“I’m grateful just to have my sudden visit accommodated. Officially, we’re supposed to be bitter enemies.”

“Oh? I’m surprised you still refer to our relationship as such.”

The social niceties of adults could be terrifying—especially when those adults bore the weight of nations on their shoulders.

This was a meeting where the interests of both sides were at stake.

“To be honest, we’ve incurred significant losses from this incident. But there are times when one must ignore the pain. That’s the nature of our world, isn’t it?” Causa said, matching Tachibana’s composure despite his tone getting a little sharper.

In truth, the extent to which the princess’s treasonous activities had damaged Balga Empire was too complicated to be summed up in a single sentence.

The news of the princess’s execution, which had spread across the globe overnight, suggested the once-unshakable foundation of the Balga Empire was beginning to tremble.

To make matters worse, word had also spread that two members of the Six Imperial Swords, the empire’s mightiest Informationists, had been defeated. Allegedly, the second prince’s knight had been killed outright, while the first prince’s knight had been gravely wounded.

As a result, the Balga Empire experienced a drop in international standing, incurring losses in both its economic and military sectors.

Rumor had it that several investors and major figures in the business world had withdrawn from Balga and started investing in the nation they anticipated would become the next global superpower. Needless to say, Elbar was behind these maneuvers.

Causa was well aware Elbar had leaked the damaging information. Still, he must have judged there was a better move than confronting Elbar over it and souring relations.

He suppressed his resentment at being outmaneuvered and put on the air of a composed royal. Seeing the younger man’s effort, Tachibana responded with a grin of admiration.

“In the end, it’s true that the Balga Empire has suffered the greater loss, but wasn’t that within your expectations? In fact, His Majesty the Emperor’s power is waning, and I’ve heard you will be picked to succeed him. Your time may be drawing near.”

“Hardly. My role is to serve as His Majesty’s shield and spear. As long as the emperor remains in good health, I have no such ambitions.”

Despite professing his loyalty, there was a clear glint of ambition in Causa’s eyes.

“However, there was one thing in this affair that exceeded my expectations. That’s why I’ve come to consult with you.”

Causa let a hint of severity mar his businesslike smile. Sensing that they were about to get to the heart of the matter, Tachibana straightened his posture.

“It concerns Tsushima Rindou, whom you sent to aid the princess defect. In the course of his mission, he killed my foolish brother’s knight and even fought off my own. After that, I hear he was unfortunately killed by another member of the Six Imperial Swords who arrived as reinforcement. I regret having forced you to expend one of Elbar’s most valuable assets, but there are still aspects of his true identity I cannot accept.”

Still maintaining an insincere smile, Causa gazed sharply at Tachibana.

Though he pretended not to understand on the surface, inwardly, he knew exactly what was going on. Few Informationists were capable of taking down a member of the Six Imperial Swords single-handedly. He was trying to figure out who this man really was, whose intentions he was acting on, and what chain of events had led to this outcome. And he was determined to get to the bottom of it.

Tachibana replied with a gentle expression that seemed to say there was nothing to hide.

“Tsushima Rindou is one of our city’s foremost tactical assets. If requested, we’ll send him anywhere—to an enemy nation or the far side of the world. That’s the kind of operative he is.”

“So you’re saying he’s not just an ordinary level-seven Informationist?”

“Ha-ha-ha, of course not. There’s no way an Informationist of that level could defeat a member of the Six Imperial Swords.”

Causa felt a strong sense of unease at how readily Tachibana admitted the truth.

Tachibana had orchestrated a mission to ensure Lupus could safely defect. Would they really send such an extraordinary agent for that alone? It seemed unlikely Elbar would value Lupus herself so highly.

Countless possibilities raced through Causa’s mind, and the logic of the situation began to fall into place. Among the various scenarios he considered, he arrived at the one he feared most.

His face darkening, he shot Tachibana a hostile glare.

“How deeply was His Majesty the Emperor involved in this affair?”

Tachibana deliberately altered his expression upon hearing Causa’s question. Then he returned to his usual smile.

“Well, who can say?”

His response made no effort to hide the truth. Hearing it, Causa understood everything.

The current emperor of the Balga Empire was fully aware of the conflict among the princes. On top of that, he had taken measures against Causa’s and Ross’s scheme to dethrone him.

When the time came, the emperor’s sons would inherit the throne, so he couldn’t simply have them killed. But as long as the emperor himself lived, he couldn’t allow a rebellion to break out, either.

He’d judged that the princes, with their cunning, power, connections, and willingness to use violence, were too dangerous to leave unchecked. At the very least, he needed to defang them by stripping them of their capacity to wield violence. That was why he had neutralized their knights.

Everything had been orchestrated for that purpose.

Realizing the truth, Causa covered his tense face with his hand.

“How terrifying. So the world is not yet mine after all.”

Faced with Tachibana’s unsettling smile, Causa muttered this as if to himself. His words were an admission of defeat, yet at the same time, a motive that would drive him to rise again.

“This was an invaluable lesson. I suppose we’ll have occasion to cooperate with the Free City of Elbar again in the future,” Causa said, not as gesture of concession, but as an expression of his genuine feelings.

“We of the Free City of Elbar are always on the side of our clients. We would be honored to be of service again.”

For Tachibana, this incident had been occasion for him to demonstrate Elbar’s power not only to Causa, but also to the emperor of Balga himself:

We of Elbar possess hidden military might—personnel unafraid of the Six Imperial Swords and capable of reaching the emperor’s very throat.

Causa, calm and composed despite accepting defeat, almost refreshingly so, rose from his chair.

Still unable to let go, however, he circled back to their earlier conversation.

“Returning to my earlier question about Tsushima Rindou’s true identity—might you finally provide an answer?”

“That’s a state secret—and personal information, at that. If you meet Tsushima again, perhaps you can ask him yourself.”

Tachibana hadn’t outright revealed anything, but he’d deliberately hinted to Causa that Tsushima was still alive. At the same time, he’d subtly promoted Tsushima as a tactical asset.

A threat capable of eliminating even the Six Imperial Swords,slipping back into the shadows with his identity concealed. That is who Tsushima Rindou is.

Causa licked his dry lips, smirked faintly, and turned with a flick of his sleeve.

“Well then, I’m sure you’re also terribly busy, Mayor Tachibana. I think I’ll leave it at that for today and take my leave.”

Even with his back turned, Causa showed no signs of letting down his guard. He was already weaving his next scheme. Though this encounter had ended in something close to defeat, he wasn’t the type to give up so easily.

Tachibana watched the prince go, exhilarated at the prospect of a new rival.

When the spatial distortion caused by the teleportation protocol opened a path, Causa suddenly stopped in his tracks.

“Ah, that’s right. How is she doing here?”

Causa had deliberately avoided using her name. But at this parting moment, there was only one person he could mean by she.

Tachibana understood immediately and gave a cheerful reply.

“She seems to be rather enjoying herself, as a matter of fact. Apparently, she’ll be attending Elbar Academy starting this spring. Things seem to be going well for her.”

“I see. That’s for the best,” Causa murmured, not to anyone in particular but as if letting the words spill into the air. Then he vanished to the other side of the spatial teleportation protocol.

After Causa’s party—including his Informationist bodyguards—had all disappeared into the distortion, Tachibana gave a big stretch.

“Honestly, whenever the Empire gets involved, there’s no end to the trouble you have to go through.” Relaxing at last, Tachibana spoke with apparent annoyance. Yet, despite his words, a smile could be seen on his lips.

Tachibana, one of the world’s foremost strategists, was always seeking worthy opponents to match wits with. No doubt, he welcomed the rise of the younger generation. One day, they would use him as a stepping stone to reach even greater heights. Hoping for the emergence of those new talents, Tachibana left the room.

Epilogue

EPILOGUE

Time had passed, and the headlines about the Treasonous Princess had finally quieted down. Lupus found herself gazing up at a cherry tree beneath a clear sky that still held a lingering chill.

Crowds of students in matching uniforms were passing in front of the main gate of Elbar Academy, the most prestigious learning institution in the Free City of Elbar. Today was a day of new beginnings, filled with hope for many young people. It was the day the school admitted new students, which came around every spring and autumn.

Wearing the school uniform she had admired in secret for so long, Lupus headed to the entrance ceremony with a heart full of excitement, albeit clouded by conflicted feelings.

That was because she still hadn’t found what she’d been searching for since the day she defected from the Balga Empire.

Swinging her bag, she passed through the main gate and made her way to the school building, when all of a sudden, she sensed a distinctive presence and stopped in her tracks. Without turning around, Lupus addressed the man standing in the shade of a tree.

“What do you want?”

“That’s a hostile greeting if I’ve ever heard one. Are you like this with everyone?”

“Maybe you’ve given me reason to be. Isn’t that right, Ayman?”

Even with the arrival of spring, Ayman still wore his three-piece suit. He let out a sigh, arms crossed.

“Don’t give this old man grief.”

“If you’re such a skilled Informationist, you could have brought Tsushima back. But you just let him die.”

“You’re still angry about that?”

“I’m telling you that I still haven’t forgiven you,” Lupus replied firmly, showing not the slightest sign of backing down from Ayman. She harbored deep distrust toward the Elbar administration.

Tachibana, who had promised Tsushima’s return that day, had ultimately done nothing to rescue the man from the Empire and simply watched events unfold. According to reports, after assassinating a member of the Six Imperial Swords, Tsushima was executed on the emperor’s orders.

Lupus had been devastated to learn of his death.

During her days on the run in the Balga Empire, Tsushima had given her not just protection, but also the courage and resolve to start a new life. Thanks to him, she overcame many painful memories and was able to begin anew in Elbar.

But in exchange, she had ended up sacrificing the life of the person who saved hers. That fact gnawed at her conscience. Lupus directed feelings almost like hostility toward Ayman. For his part, he seemed uncomfortable at being the target of such animosity from a girl young enough to be his daughter. Lupus knew this and confronted him all the more forcefully.

“So what’s your business here?” Lupus asked coldly.

Ayman shrugged.

“I heard your entrance ceremony was today.”

“What, are you here to give me a congratulatory gift or something?”

“Yeah, something like that,” Ayman said, taking a letter from his pocket. The envelope he held out to her was completely ordinary, lacking any features of note. Lupus frowned.

“What is that?”

“I was asked to give it to you.”

“By who?”

“You’re going to make me say that as well? Have some tact.”

Ayman smiled, which made Lupus suspect something was up. She snatched the envelope from his hand and quickly pulled the letter out of it, not worrying about what anyone else would think. Ayman watched her with an exasperated look on his face.

Inside the envelope was a single sheet of similarly plain letter paper. There was not much writing on it; just a single sentence. After reading it, Lupus hugged the note to her chest.

“Satisfied?” Ayman asked teasingly.

Lupus shot him a damp-eyed glare, puffing out her cheeks.

“Why did you keep quiet about this until now?”

“A lot of diplomatic complications came up that made it difficult to reveal. To keep up appearances, we had to release some pieces of information and withhold others. We couldn’t say anything until everything was settled. Besides, I thought it best for the important news to come directly from him. And, well, it took longer than we expected for him to wake up; he was more seriously injured than we thought.”

“He’s…hurt?”

Seeing Lupus’s expression suddenly cloud over, Ayman gave a sheepish smile.

“It’s nothing. For him, it’s the usual. He’s always getting himself into trouble and nearly dying. Some people never change, no matter how old they get. If you want the details, ask him yourself. The address should be written on the letter, right?”

As Ayman pointed to the note, Lupus quickly checked the back of the envelope. There, in small, modest letters, was an address—somewhere near the city center of Elbar.

Lupus’s face lit up, and she raised her head with a start. Half exasperated, Ayman called out to prevent her from dashing off at any moment.

“Wait, there’s one more thing he told me to mention. He says to come after your school orientation is over.”

“Then I guess you botched your timing for giving me this letter.”

Holding the message beside her face, Lupus flashed a triumphant grin.

“I’ll choose my own path. That’s what I’ve decided,” she said, breaking into a run toward the main gate, going against the flow of students. Her steps were so light, it was as if she were walking on the moon.

“Looks like I lost the bet. She’s as much of a handful as you predicted.”

After watching Lupus go, Ayman faded into the air.

In his place, a voice called out to the girl as she exited through the main gate.

“Hey, have you finished all the formalities for starting at the Academy?”

In front of the school gate, where cherry blossoms were falling, Lupus turned at the sound of the familiar voice. Breathless and flushed, she spotted him leaning against the gate.

He was wearing the same outfit as the day he first met Lupus. The same insolent look in his eyes, the same arrogant attitude—nothing had changed.

But in Lupus’s estimation, the impression he gave was completely different now.

Seeing Tsushima’s exasperated expression, Lupus was momentarily at a loss for words, as if the breath had been knocked out of her.

She bit her lip, fought back tears, and sniffled before spinning around on the spot.

“Hey, what do you think? Does it look good on me?” Lupus asked, forcing a smile in an attempt to hide her overflowing emotions.

Watching her, Tsushima placed a cigarette to his lips.

“Well, at the very least, I can say I’m glad I made it back alive,” Tsushima said with his usual touch of sarcasm.

Lupus could no longer hold herself back. Not wanting him to see her tears of joy, she threw herself into his arms.

“Hey, give me some space!” Tsushima protested in annoyance as he nearly lost his balance.

But Lupus paid him no mind and pressed her face against his chest, speaking through her tears.

“I thought you had died. I thought you’d never come back.”

“Geez. If the girl who told me to come back had given up, that would’ve been the end of it.”

“That’s not the point,” she said, clinging to him even tighter, while Tsushima, looking put off, lit his cigarette.

Tsushima stared up at the spring sky, now tinged with warmth, then exhaled a plume of smoke that drifted high into the air. Gently patting Lupus’s head while she quietly wept, he felt once again the comfort of having finally found his way home.

Lupus’s sobs gradually faded in Tsushima’s arms. At the same time, Tsushima sensed that something was about to begin. As if to solidify his premonition, Lupus began to speak.

“There was something I wanted to ask of you if you came back alive,” Lupus said in a dainty, girly voice.

“What is it?” Tsushima asked gently.

In response, Lupus slowly lifted her face. Her eyes, still shining with the emotion of their reunion, made Tsushima’s breath catch.

Lupus looked straight at him, speaking slowly and clearly.

“There’s still someone I have to kill. So please, lend me your aid, Tsushima.”

The smoke from his cigarette vanished into the spring sky.

Tsushima felt like he saw the abyss in Lupus’s eyes.

Afterword

AFTERWORD

Thank you for reading Thou, as My Knight. This work is a reboot of the first full-length novel I conceptualized in my second year of high school, back when I was still unfamiliar with the ways of the world.

The story explores karma and fate born from human desires. In a world swirling with uncontrollable forces, how should those of us without power live? From those kind of sensitive emotions of adolescence, I started writing the initial background for this story on the corners of loose-leaf paper during modern Japanese class.

Over time, those notes took shape and evolved into a narrative and occasional source of embarrassment. Before I knew it, they had taken shape into a novel. Though my grades in modern Japanese class often bordered on failing because of this, I suppose it was worth it. In fact, I’m impressed I managed to write a story so well under those circumstances.

What I want to convey is that this work is like a lingering remnant of my youth, and a piece I’ve cherished for over ten years. It could even be said to be my starting point as an author.

And this very story has fulfilled my dream of becoming a novelist—a dream I had once given up on as an adult. Even now, I remain one of the “have-nots,” lacking talent, status, and fame. Yet by continuously taking small steps forward, I’ve managed to come to this point.

Perhaps you, the reader, also have a dream. That dream can certainly come true. As long as you persist and keep moving forward without giving up, it will undoubtedly come to pass. That is the single strongest weapon that “have-nots” have, and it serves as a guide toward your dreams.

And if you achieve your dream someday, please buy my books and help me also fulfill my new dream (I’m begging you). No, I’m genuinely asking (begging for real). After all, I’ve spent over a decade meticulously refining the setting of this story (eyes roll back).

Jokes aside, my hope is that through this novel, I can inspire young people like my former self with dreams and hope. For those who are not young anymore, I hope it can serve as some kind of encouragement.

Finally, let me conclude this afterword with words of gratitude.

To everyone who read and contributed to the selection process of my story; to Mr. Komano from Dengeki Bunko’s editorial team, who championed this narrative; to Hino, whose stunning illustrations breathed life into the work; and to everyone else involved in publishing this book—I extend my heartfelt thanks.

May this piece bring warmth to someone’s heart.

Rintaro Hatake