86 - Volume 9 - Chapter 3

CHAPTER 3

OFF WITH HER HEAD!

“Hmm… Captain? Captain…Nouzen.”

At the time, Kurena still called Shin Captain Nouzen. She’d only just been assigned to his unit, but she’d heard the rumors about him in the previous theater. The Eighty-Sixth Sector’s headless reaper. Anyone who fought beside him, except for the “werewolf” who served as his lieutenant, died. A cursed Processor. She was afraid of those rumors, and his icy demeanor did nothing to make them seem less credible. So she’d hardly spoken to him.

At the time, Shin had only just started to grow, and his body wasn’t so much slim as it was scrawny and fragile-looking. He’d hardly spoken, and his expression rarely seemed to change. He didn’t come across as someone who trusted others. And so he simply answered Kurena’s call by looking at her.

His eyes were red like blood. The color shed by those destined to perish. Staring into his cold gaze made Kurena reflexively tense up. They likely called him a reaper because he seemed to bear the color of death in him. And the names of his dead comrades. Their hearts. And the duty of carrying them all without fail to the final destination.

Our Reaper, they called him.

The only precious salvation left to the Eighty-Six, who had been forsaken by God.

It was only the previous day that Kurena first saw it. The sight of him putting to rest a comrade who’d been fatally injured but couldn’t die. The sight of him delivering the final bullet.

“Hmm… I…”

The combat zone that the Halcyon occupied was, until just a few years ago, a Theocracy frontline base. And prior to that, it was an old city that now lay in ruins. The dim white tiled walls felt like gravestones, and the rectangular high-rise buildings stood around the field of combat like walls of masonry.

There was a row of buildings the same pearl-gray color as the Theocracy’s home front bases, and among them stood an abandoned antiaircraft gun tower. Undertaker landed behind that tower, settling onto the ash-covered ground.

The Mantle of Frigga blew off and caught fire, crumbling in midair into a shower of sparks. The five other units in his platoon landed after him and then silently deployed into a formation. They moved quickly after landing, reducing the amount of time they would be defenseless, and took cover behind the nearby buildings.

“—4th and 5th Platoons, report in.”

“All units of the 5th Platoon have landed successfully, Shin.”

“Same goes for the 4th Platoon. Proceeding to assist other platoons’ units.”

Shin’s call was promptly answered. The 4th Platoon’s captain wasn’t part of the first defensive unit of the first ward, but they were a Name Bearer who survived last year’s large-scale offensive. Their skill and command were a match for Anju, Raiden, Kurena, and any of the other platoon captains. The same held true for the 3rd Platoon’s captain, who was filling in for Theo.

The Nordlicht and Scythe squadrons soon reported their arrival. Following them were the 2nd and 3rd groups. All the airborne battalion’s units had landed successfully. Lastly, Zashya placed Królik at a point of high altitude, so as to serve as their relay for the data link.

“Królik, reporting in. I have visual confirmation of the target. Commencing analysis and transmitting footage.”

“Roger that. All units, remain on standby in your positions and confirm the footage—”

But he didn’t get to finish that sentence. Countless rumbling, deafening roars that weren’t picked up by the audio sensors shook their units. The Halcyon rose to its feet on the other side of the buildings, its massive form filling up the bottom half of Shin’s optical screen.

“N-no way…!”

“Shit, it’s massive…!”

Someone’s gasp of disbelief leaked into the Resonance. Even the Eighty-Six, seasoned veterans that they were, were struck with fear and awe at its unbelievable size. The stout contours of its round, hill-like back were reminiscent of a wild boar or a hedgehog. It stood forty meters tall, and its overall span was roughly seven hundred meters wide. It was like a gigantic, quill-less porcupine.

Even a Dinosauria felt like a gnat compared with this massive form. The Halcyon was originally a Weisel, so every time it touched the earth, it revealed holes in its underbelly. Those were meant for rolling out newly produced Legion units, but they only looked like pinholes now. The Halcyon was dotted with optical sensors, which were there as if to cover for any of its large body’s countless blind spots.

Along the center of its back was a fanlike structure reminiscent of a fighting fish’s dorsal fin or a peacock’s tail—a row of heat sinks, which all the Legion employed. This indicated the unbelievable fact that even this monster wasn’t a simple production plant but an autonomous combat machine capable of movement.

It was like seeing a behemoth resurrected in mechanical, clockwork form. Like the multiheaded dragon of Revelation. But instead of seven heads, it was crowned by five 800 mm railguns, each of them swerving and turning in search of the headless skeletons hiding in the shadow of the ruins’ rubble.

Shin spoke, his voice cautious but calm.

“All units, remember what I told you during briefing. Our objective is destroying and, if possible, seizing the Halcyon. The airborne battalion’s role is to incapacitate it, even temporarily, and keep it occupied until the Trauerschwan reaches its firing position.”

They’d observed as much even during the operation’s drafting stages, but with the enemy right in front of them, it was evident that it would be difficult to damage this opponent with a Reginleif’s 88 mm cannon. A bombardment from the Trauerschwan’s high-caliber railgun would be a necessity in this operation.

“The Spearhead squadron will handle stalling the Halcyon, while the Scythe, Nordlicht, Stinger, Fulminata, and Sarissa squadrons will work on distracting and destroying each of the five railguns. From left to right, the railguns will be designated Frieda, Gisela, Helga, Isidora, and Johanna.”

In addition to serving as a communications relay, Królik also served as a command support unit. The five railguns projected onto his optical screen were overlayed with the names he’d just designated them with. He’d based it on the designations that Yuuto had given the Noctiluca’s railguns, filling in the rest in accordance to phonetic code. Those were designations that weren’t meant to be carried over to concurrent operations.

“The Scythe squadron is to handle Frieda. The Sarissa squadron is to handle Gisela. The Stinger squadron will handle Helga, the Fulminata squadron will handle Isidora, and the Nordlicht squadron will handle Johanna. There are no other active Legion units in the combat area except for the Halcyon, but remain vigilant of attacks from inactive units.”

“Roger that,” the Scythe’s squadron’s captain replied. “Thankfully, this is an urban battlefield with lots of buildings. We can close in on it by drawing the railguns’ attention and letting the buildings take the fire for us.”

“I’ll keep track of the railguns’ sights,” Zashya said. “Given how fast their shots are, it’d be pretty much impossible to dodge them after they shoot. If you receive a warning that you’re in the enemy’s sights, prioritize evasion above all else.”

“And artillery squadrons like our Archer squadron and the Quarrel squadron will be in position to offer covering fire for the melee squadrons. We’ll be hiding behind the buildings, just like how the Spearhead squadron’s going to move…”

Two pairs of butterfly wings that looked like they were woven together from silver thread flapped open imposingly behind each of the railguns. These helped exhaust heat—an omen that the railguns were combat operational. Ten pairs, making for a total of twenty wings, blotted out the sky behind the Halcyon.

The rumbling of several groans and screams surged up from the belly of the beast, emanating from the Halcyon’s core. One of them was a voice Shin had already heard once: the jumble of agonized moans and howls that had resounded from the Noctiluca. Shin narrowed his eyes as he looked upon it.

I hope you get your chance to take revenge on it.

Yes. This is the battlefield where that’ll happen.

And as the five railguns booted up, their own control cores raised their voices in five different screams. Four of them were unfamiliar moans, shrieks, wheezing breaths, and cries of agony… But one of them was a familiar, anguished whisper. The cold, hollow lamentation of a girl who had died a watery death on that cerulean battlefield.

<<…So cold.>>

Shana.

The Para-RAID transmitted that voice dozens of kilometers away, to Lena’s, Frederica’s, and Kurena’s ears.

<So cold—sO coLD. SocoldSOCOLD so COLD.>>

“No…!”

As Kurena waited for the airborne battalion’s cue that they’d opened hostilities with the enemy, she stood atop the Trauerschwan’s frame. Upon hearing that voice, her breath caught in her throat.

During the battle with the Noctiluca, Shana had scaled the Mirage Spire to snipe it down. As a result, she couldn’t escape in time and died in battle. As if perishing in place of Kurena, who, despite being a skilled and designated sniper, was too paralyzed by doubt and fear.

Shana had plummeted into the water along with the collapsing steel tower. The Noctiluca, which had navigated those same depths, likely collected her body and integrated her neural network into one of its railguns.

Not as a Black Sheep, but as a Shepherd.

The dark, frigid waters of the northern sea were cold to the point of near freezing. The decomposition of Shana’s brain tissue following her death had probably taken longer as a result. Shin, who could hear the mechanical ghosts’ voices, had to have known that.

The realization shook her.

It can’t be.

She’d thought that Shin decided against bringing her along to the airborne battalion because he trusted her skill as a sniper. But could it be that wasn’t his real reason? What if it was the opposite? What if he didn’t bring her because he couldn’t trust her to fight Shana, who’d died because of her cowering? Because he’d judged that having her at his side in that condition would be too dangerous…?

As soon as Shana’s weeping had reached them, Undertaker’s radar screen detected one Juggernaut leaping to the fore. He didn’t even need to check its identifier to know who it was. The Nordlicht squadron’s Cyclops.

Shiden.

He’d reflexively thought to reprimand her, but then he reconsidered. This was why he’d assigned the Nordlicht squadron to handle Johanna. Shiden was acting on an impulsive outburst, but so long as she stuck to the mission, he could overlook it.

“Shiden, ‘Shana’ is inside Johanna’s control core. Can you take care of it?”

She didn’t answer his question. He concluded that she probably did hear him, so instead, he directed the question at the Nordlicht squadron’s captain.

“Bernholdt, the idiot’s going feral, like we thought. Keep an eye on her.”

“Ugh. Yeah, everything really went the way we thought it would… Roger that.”

This time, Shiden actually replied, her voice thick with annoyance: “I heard that, Shin! Who you callin’ an idiot?!”—which silenced Shin and Bernholdt’s exchange. She was apparently more collected than they’d anticipated. The fact that she’d called Shin by his name instead of using her usual nickname for him was proof that she wasn’t completely calm, though.

“…It’s almost impressive that you two butt heads even at a time like this,” Bernholdt remarked.

“She ignores transmissions in the middle of an operation. Calling her an idiot works just fine… But I’m counting on you.”

Bernholdt and the Vargus should be able to keep up with Shiden, even if she pulled some reckless trick. That was why he placed her in the Nordlicht squadron to begin with.

He felt Bernholdt crack a small smile.

“Say no more, Captain. All right, let’s get going, boys! We gotta cover for this missy when she starts getting reckless!”

With Cyclops springing forward and acting as their opening shot, the airborne battalion’s eight squadrons moved into action. They sprinted across the ruins, which were covered by the sea of ash, making their way for the imposing behemoth standing above them.

The Spearhead squadron’s objective was to incapacitate the Halcyon. To do that, they first needed to cling to the enemy, and as such, they went around the outer rim of the city ruins, hoping to get behind it.

Two squadrons were equipped with artillery configurations to offer covering fire in the battle against the railguns. To that end, they moved closer to the Halcyon’s flank to assume firing positions. They, as well as Spearhead, traveled in the shadows of the buildings, so as to avoid detection by the enemy.

Meanwhile, the five squadrons in charge of eliminating the railguns deployed throughout the vast urban area, using the city as their cover from the massive turrets’ sights. They neared the Halcyon’s jugular like five talons. They also doubled as a distraction to divert the Halcyon’s attention from the Spearhead squadron’s approach.

The Reginleifs intentionally showed themselves, but they raced about the battlefield so as to not show their total numbers to the enemy. As they moved, the Halcyon’s sensors detected them one by one. The menacing barrels swerved, loudly slashing through the wind as they swung. They switched from a curved position, which marked that they were searching for the enemy, to a linear bearing signaling that they were taking aim.

The volume of their howls pitched up, as if they were beckoning something.

“…!”

Running across the Theocracy’s city road, which had been set up in a pattern resembling a chessboard, Shin suddenly paused. Having heard those howls, he looked up at once. That sound didn’t belong to a hidden unit lying in wait in standby mode. It was another voice that boomed up from within the Halcyon’s depths.

The next moment, slits opened up on the sides of the heat sinks, firing something out. These objects moved through the air in a curve, slow enough for a human’s kinetic vision to handily catch sight of them. There were so many of them, curled up and hugging their knees as they sped through the air…

Self-propelled mines?

But why? Why use self-propelled mines now of all times? Shin didn’t understand the enemy’s intent, but he gave the warning all the same. The experience that had kept him alive for so long told him that the enemy’s plan being unclear only meant they had to be more cautious.

“All units. Self-propelled mines are being fired from the target’s interior. Their intent is unknown, but avoid contact with—”

“—Ugh, the railguns’ sights are fixed!”

A warning had cut into his words. Zashya. She’d positioned herself above them to help with communications support and combat analysis and volunteered to assist with evasive maneuvers.

“Cyclops, Freki Three, Vlkodlak, get away! And be careful of a second volley from Isidora and Gisela—”

But then Olivia swallowed nervously.

“—All units, dodge! Forget its lines of fire; anyone who’s in front of a railgun, get away!”

The next moment, all five railguns roared as one. No one in the airborne battalion could immediately realize what happened just then. They naturally couldn’t, since the railguns’ firing speed was eight thousand meters per second. A human’s dynamic vision couldn’t hope to perceive something moving at that speed.

The scenery of the ruins completely and utterly disappeared.

It wasn’t just a single point on the battlefield. It was as if some invisible, gigantic hands had scooped up the land from above. Five different points, each of them in a fifty-meter radius, were wiped out.

Just as Olivia, with his ability to see three seconds into the future, had warned them, a large-scale storm of destruction had obliterated all the structures in its range, gouging a circular wound into the city ruins.

A moment later, the screeching of the wind repeatedly filled their audio sensors. The 800 mm shells, each weighing a dozen tonnes, had fired at essentially point-blank range, with their initial velocity preserved. Their impact had unleashed vast amounts of kinetic energy that tore the ground apart, but the advance battalion couldn’t even hear the rumbling sound of its blast. Some structures stood oddly, as if they’d been cut clean through. But then they slid along their cross section, as if remembering that gravity applied to them, and crashed into the pulverized earth of the ruins.

That last-second warning came just in time. The Eighty-Six were used to not standing directly opposite their enemies. After all, facing a Löwe or a Dinosauria in those aluminum coffins, with their measly firepower, would be suicidal. None of the Juggernauts had been caught up in the wide radius of destruction. However…

“What the hell…?”

…more explosions roared through several other spots in the city. These were places that couldn’t evade the railguns’ fire and had the self-propelled mines implode on them. The moment Shin saw the railgun turrets turn in the direction of the detonations, he realized why the Halcyon had scattered those self-propelled mines.

Checking the data link, he confirmed that all their units were still intact. None of them had been sunk by the mines. The speedy Reginleifs and the thickly armored Vánagandrs wouldn’t be so easily wrecked by self-propelled mines. In other words, the Halcyon didn’t scatter the self-propelled mines to destroy any Feldreß, but rather…

“Anyone who had a mine detonate on them, get away and assume evasive maneuvers! It’s using the sound of the blasts to track you!”

Since they were fighting in an urban area with poor visibility, the self-destruction’s sound was being used as a signal to quickly inform the Halcyon of the enemy’s positions. The next moment, the railguns roared again. The wind gave a shrill howl as five more iron fists gouged into the ground, turning structures into circular patches of scorched earth.

Shin heard five Processors heave sighs of relief as they narrowly evaded those shots. One of them, Bernholdt, proceeded to click his tongue.

“I guess appropriating the self-propelled mines as a kind of alarm system is one way to use them… And as an added bonus, any place they detonate gets blasted to hell…”

The rubble crumbled down yet again. The buildings stood gouged, as if a knife had cut through them without regard for concrete or metal. And then there was the matter of that shrill sound of the wind, the fact that the kinetic energy’s transmission was overwhelming, and the blast radius being too vast for the diameter of the shells.

All the Juggernauts that had tried to approach the Halcyon, Undertaker included, were too close to follow it with their optical sensors. But Królik, which had hung back, could probably see everything properly.

“Królik, did you catch that with your optical sensor? Can you analyze—?”

“I just barely saw it when it fired a second time. The enemy’s using chain shots!”

Before he could ask anything further, Zashya transmitted the results of her analysis. The footage sent from the Królik’s optical data was slightly low quality, but it narrowly caught the moment prior to impact. As soon as the 800 mm diameter shell hit the ground, it transformed into a massive, fifty-meter form. At first, it looked like a flat silver discus, but it was, in fact, closer to a casting net.

“As soon as the shell leaves the muzzle, it splits and disperses around in a circle. The main warhead in the center and seven other smaller bombs are connected together like a spiderweb by molecular wires. They destroy or just cut through everything in a fifty-meter radius within its line of fire… Back when sailboats were being used, chain shots were made by tying shells together with chains to snap the masts of enemy ships. It’s similar to that.”

Focusing the destructive force in one spot lent it more penetrating force, but if one’s aim was to maximize the range of their destruction, spreading it over a line would be more effective. It made it easier to hit the target when firing at close range, where it was difficult to influence the trajectory. By connecting the seventy-six points into a line, it created a surface of wires.

This marked a new attack method. It wasn’t a long-distance cannon’s fire, which could destroy entire bases or penetrate bunkers, but a short-distance shell that swept through a wide area.

“…This is an anti-Feldreß…an anti-Reginleif countermeasure.”

A countermeasure against the Strike Package, which had successfully defeated two Legion units, the Morpho and the Noctiluca… A countermeasure against them.

The diversionary force had drawn the attention of the grand majority of the Legion forces, but even so, the route that the Trauerschwan and the Federacy Expedition Brigade took was by no means free of enemies. Having received word that the advance battalion had opened hostilities, the main force of the Federacy Expedition Brigade finally engaged the Legion forces twenty kilometers away from their designated firing point.

They’d entered combat with each unit moving in a diamond formation; scout units led the pack, positioned along the front and back of each formation. This consisted of two Reginleif scout battalions and the Myrmecoleo Free Regiment as vanguards.

The three groups were met with a dark cloud—a large force of mechanical ghosts, as numerous as their name implied. And in addition to them, there was also something unique to the blank sector’s battlefield…

“…?!”

Just as Gilwiese fixed his sights on a Löwe’s flank, he’d swallowed nervously as Mock Turtle’s back legs sunk into the ground. There was a cavity hidden under the layer of ash covering the ground, and he’d mistakenly stepped into it.

He operated the control sticks swiftly, paying no heed to Svenja’s yelp. She was seated snugly in the gunner seat behind him. Gilwiese quickly adjusted Mock Turtle’s bearing and pulled the trigger. The Vánagandr’s high-fidelity fire-control system knew to keep its sights fixed on an enemy that was within its firing range. Even if the unit had been tilted or even toppled over, it kept its turret’s sights fixed on the enemies it had locked onto.

The 120 mm turret gave off a truly deafening roar as it fired. Having been pierced through its flank, the Löwe billowed flames and crumpled to the ground. With the intense recoil of the shot flinging it back, Mock Turtle withdrew its legs and fixed its posture. It was only then that Gilwiese finally let out his held breath.

“My apologies, Princess. Are you all right?”

“Y-Yes… This is nothing to me, Brother.”

Apparently, as the shot’s recoil pushed them back, she’d banged her head against the backrest. The Mascot girl tried to rub the pain away from her small head, bravely nodding through tear-filled eyes. She then hurriedly fixed her dress, which was now disheveled. As Archduchess Brantolote’s “daughter,” she stood as the symbol of the Imperial units and wasn’t allowed to have an unsightly appearance, even on the battlefield.

Looking around, Gilwiese could see the other Vánagandrs around him and the scout units’ Reginleifs getting their legs caught and tripped by the brittle ash. On top of that, his optical screen was dotted with an odd, faint muddiness. Each time they moved quickly, the volcanic ash’s sharp edges cleaved small, gradual scratches into their optical sensors’ lenses.

But worst of all…

“Ugh, not again—the range-finder laser…!” an annoyed shout echoed through the company’s radio.

As the wind began to intensify, it kicked up a thick curtain of ash, which interrupted their main armament’s aiming laser. The fire-control system couldn’t calculate the shell’s trajectory to the target properly without it; it used the laser to apply corrections to the shot and couldn’t collect accurate information without it.

He’d held back the urge to click his tongue; he was in the Princess’s presence, after all. Instead, Gilwiese whispered bitterly. He’d thought they’d trained thoroughly in preparation of any development, but…

“We didn’t account for this. The true ruler of the blank sector isn’t the Legion. It’s the ash.”

It wasn’t visible from between the high-rise buildings, but Shin remembered seeing the mountain of rubble piled up behind the Halcyon when they swooped down. It was the remains of all the metallic resources it consumed. This behemoth had likely stopped in this city for the purpose of replenishing supplies…meaning it had plenty of spare ammunition.

This was a problem.

Shin could hear where the self-propelled mines were positioned, of course, but there were simply too many of them. He couldn’t alert all his squad members. An urban battlefield meant there was a lot of cover, and since the self-propelled mines were roughly the size of a human, both the radar and the optical screen could easily overlook them.

Worse yet, since the radar and the optical screen could be impeded by all the cover, the Halcyon opted to use large numbers of self-propelled mines in place of the Ameise, which usually handled reconnaissance.

In such a close-range battlefield, the sound of any blasts would serve as an alarm that couldn’t be hindered, and since the unit producing them was bound to be blown away by the railguns’ bombardment, it would be more economic to use the disposable self-propelled mines.

“All units—I’m sorry, but I can’t individually track every self-propelled mine. But you can hear the Halcyon’s voice, so use that to time your dodge—”

“Yeah. We know, Shin; you don’t have to give us that warning,” the Sarissa squadron’s captain said.

“We’re Resonating with you, so we can hear both the Halcyon’s control core and the railguns. Once they start screaming, we’ll know to dodge,” the Fulminata squadron’s captain said, nodding.

Shin blinked in surprise at them cutting him off. The other captains soon chimed in as well.

“We’ll manage somehow even without you telling us the self-propelled mines’ positions, you know. You might have forgotten, but we survived the Eighty-Sixth Sector and the large-scale offensive just fine even without you around.”

“…” Shin took a deep breath. “You’re right. Sorry.”

“You focus on your share of the work, all right…? Over and out.”

The captain punctuated the conversation with radio code, which was meaningless with the Para-RAID, since they remained connected to the Resonance. Raiden, who was running at his side, swerved his optical sensor in Shin’s direction.

“They all know how to talk for themselves, don’t they…? Anyway, both those chain shots and the self-propelled mines were things we didn’t expect. What do we do? If you’re worried about it, we could send a few of the Spearhead squadron’s people to help mop them up.”

“…No.”

Shin shook his head after pausing for thought for a moment. The other captains trusted him to complete this task, so he ought to answer that trust.

“It’s unexpected, but not something we can’t deal with. We should be fine sticking to the initial plan… Besides, the Halcyon’s not the only one.”

Shin narrowed his eyes coldly as he spoke.

“We’ve come up with our own countermeasures against it.”

“So put simply, we need to watch out and avoid sinking into the ground and slipping over the ash.”

Serving as scouts, the Reginleifs in Rito’s 2nd Battalion and Michihi’s 3rd Battalion led the charge as the Expedition Brigade’s main force battled against the Legion.

Time and again, Rito’s personal unit, Milan, had slipped and nearly toppled over from the ash. But gradually, Rito was learning how to fight on this terrain.

The Reginleifs’ posture was such that it almost seemed like they were crouching and prowling along the ground, making it very easy for their power packs’ intake holes to suck in ash. This would result in their dust filters getting clogged. In which case…

“We just have to sprint without descending to the ground!”

Milan’s white frame took to the air. Grauwolf and Löwe, with their meager sensors, relied on Ameise to serve as their eyes and ears. Using those Ameise as footing, Milan kicked off them, landing and stamping on the Grauwolf units’ rocket launcher as they turned to face it, and then approached a Löwe.

As soon as the Tank type’s turret moved toward him, he evaded it by jumping in the opposite direction. In the moment when the Löwe stiffened in preparation to shoot, he lunged at the top of its turret and bombarded it from point-blank range, destroying it entirely. He didn’t even regard the way it crumpled, instead turning his eyes to the next unit he would use as his footing before leaping away.

His trajectory was greatly limited midjump, and there was no cover to hide him from enemy fire in midair. So he didn’t jump too high or too far. He moved in small hops on top of the Legion units dotting the battlefield, never giving them enough time to focus their sights on him.

“Aaaah…!”

Covering fire from his consort units tore into the Legion’s lines. Owing to their lack of fear, which stemmed from the fact that they weren’t alive, the Legion moved in to protect the more valuable Löwe and stood in Milan’s path. A Grauwolf climbed on top of the Löwe that Rito was heading for. Swinging its high-frequency blade, it thrust its point forward to intercept Milan’s approach…

Seeing this, Rito fired a wire anchor directly beneath him.

“Just because I’m trying not to get down to the ground doesn’t mean I won’t do it at all.”

Reeling the wire in, he changed his trajectory to move downward, landing on the ground. At the same time, he pulled the anchor with him, smashing it onto the Grauwolf’s head in a blow that packed all the kinetic energy of his fall. Its jaw (?) banged hard against the top of the Löwe’s turret, and Rito made sure to kill the Grauwolf by shooting at the rocket launcher on its back. The tracer bullets, which were meant for confirming trajectory, created an induced explosion within the rocket launcher, enveloping both the Grauwolf and the Löwe in a massive blast.

Of course, Rito knew it wouldn’t be realistic to assume this would be enough to destroy the Löwe. Before the flames could clear, he fired his 88 mm turret to finish the job.

Had Shin been there, he could tell him if it was necessary or not.

His lieutenant’s Reginleif screeched to a halt next to his.

“Holy shit, Rito…! What was that?!”

“Cool, right?!” Rito said with a grin. “I just kinda improvised, like the cap’n and Second Lieutenant Rikka!”

“I’m gonna do it, too,” his lieutenant said solemnly.

“I’m glad it’s going well for you, Rito, but don’t overdo it…,” Michihi muttered with a smile as she watched over the 2nd Battalion’s fighting.

Rito being rash and reckless was nothing new, but these stunts were something else entirely. The output of the Reginleif’s actuator and power pack were high in proportion to the unit’s weight, and that was what enabled it to perform those feats. But Michihi’s unit, Hualien, had a firepower-suppression configuration equipped with a 40 mm autocannon. With that in mind, she wasn’t keen on trying to imitate those acrobatics.

That said, the 2nd Battalion seemed to be following Rito’s example. Its vanguards, as well as the fire-suppression units, began charging the Legion’s lines with the same tactic. Like a pack of territorial wolves, they tore into the steely ranks and began eating their way out.

That fervor spread out to Michihi’s 3rd Battalion, and before long, she could hear her squadron’s snipers laughing.

“With the Legion that distracted, sniping them is easy.”

“First, we shoot down the scraps that attack the vanguards, and then we prioritize the Löwe.”

As the surface-suppression units standing at the back of the battalion’s lines joked around, they received requests for support.

“—A new enemy force has arrived from the left and the front. Presumed to be reinforcements.”

“Give us some covering fire before they regroup! Dustin, watch out for friendly fire!”

“You don’t say. Roger that, Sagittarius. Don’t get caught up in my crappy shooting!”

Countless rockets and explosives rained down on the relief units, mowing down Grauwolf and Ameise. The squadron that requested covering fire earlier swooped in on the Löwe from three directions. Without the support of the Ameise to provide them with sensory information, the Tank types were helpless as the Reginleifs charged them like hungry sharks.

“…”

Even a seasoned Name Bearer like Michihi had never seen such high morale and earnestness. This wasn’t desperation. It was…enthusiasm. Fervor, strong enough to overwhelm her.

If the war were to end…

If they were to end the war, it would mean that the Eighty-Six would be letting go of their pride, of their own accord. But despite that…

The sound of Howitzers could be heard rumbling intermittently from the hazy, ash-leaden horizon of the Legion’s frontline forces. This was the work of the artillery battalion, which had fired from the rear under Lena’s command. Standing in the back of the brigade’s main force, they shot ferociously at the enemy. The Alkonost unit had gone to scout ahead, and using the data they brought back, the battalion unleashed a shower of fire and steel. In between shots, Lena’s voice reached the Processors like a silver bell chiming over the Resonance.

“Vanadis to all units. There’s another ash storm approaching. All units that have cut ahead, fall back for now. I’ll transmit the estimated positions of the enemy group. In order to prevent friendly fire, don’t shoot outside the designated range. Attack!”

The curtain of ash obstructed the range-finder lasers and optical sensors for both humanity and the Legion. The following moment, the roaring of 12.8 mm heavy machine guns, 40 mm autocannons, multi-rocket launchers, and 88 mm smoothbore guns filled the air, tearing through the ashen curtain with fire, smoke, and shock waves.

The Eighty-Six’s Bloodstained Queen had predicted the correct positions through this invisible battlefield like an oracle.

“…You’re all amazing, you know that?” one nearby deputy officer uttered from within his personal unit.

Michihi’s response came not from pride or aspiration, but with a tone of reservation.

“Yeah…just a little.”

It applied to Rito, to Dustin, and to Lena, as well as to Shin, Raiden, and Anju, who weren’t on this battlefield. Seeing the fervor of her comrades, who fought as if they sought to end the war with their own hands, made Michihi feel like…she just couldn’t keep up with them. Like they would just run ahead and leave her behind… But Michihi swallowed those words before they could leave her lips.

It had reached Kurena and the Trauerschwan, too. The brigade’s main force consisted of four Reginleif battalions and the Myrmecoleo Regiment. Rito’s 2nd Battalion and Michihi’s 3rd Battalion stood at the head of the formation as scouts and were supported from behind by the Myrmecoleo’s three battalions, loaded as they were with heavy firepower. Their flanks were reinforced by the Strike Package’s two other battalions as a buffer, with a battalion of artillery Reginleifs in the rear.

The Trauerschwan was guarded from every direction as it awaited its role. Like a princess being guarded by her retainers—when she was, in fact, pushed away for being useless. The Trauerschwan was a hurriedly built prototype that wasn’t meant for live combat. A troublesome, unwanted burden of a black swan.

Perhaps, Shin and the rest of her comrades in the Strike Package didn’t need it to begin with. After all, the decision to bring in the Trauerschwan was made after Kurena and the 1st Armored Division had been ordered to go to the Theocracy—when the Halcyon was discovered there, and it was concluded that the Noctiluca might be involved with it.

With the Halcyon, they received orders to prioritize destroying it over collecting its control core, and the research bureau loaned them the Trauerschwan to do it. Shin then entrusted Kurena with being its gunner. And yet to begin with…

…Shin and the Strike Package had already come up with a way of incapacitating gigantic Legion units like the Noctiluca and the Halcyon with nothing more than Reginleifs.

The Noctiluca’s very existence came as an unexpected development during the Mirage Spire operation, but once the Strike Package had encountered it initially, it became a unit they were familiar with. And they weren’t careless enough to embark on another operation without taking countermeasures for it.

There were no supercarriers in the Theocracy. They couldn’t expect the Stella Maris to help them. The Strike Package needed to come up with a way of sinking the Noctiluca while relying only on their 88 mm turrets. This was something the Eighty-Six, and especially the commanders of the group, had to consider.

And so as the Strike Package’s home base of Rüstkammer was buzzing with activity in preparation for their next operation, Shin, Siri, Canaan, and Suiu, as well as the squad captains under them, met to discuss their methods.

The most valid ways of opposing a long-distance gun of that range were artillery of equal caliber or guided aircraft. But the Eighty-Six lacked the authority to decide to use them. That lay in the realm of artillery, arsenal, and military officers. And the higher-ups had already considered that and were working on acquiring these countermeasures.

It was the Strike Package’s role, then, to come up with unconventional ways of tackling the problem.

For starters, a Feldreß had no business trying to shoot down a massive artillery gun that could reach a distance of four-hundred kilometers in a direct face-off. As soon as the railgun fired, they’d have already lost. So the first order of business was to stop it from shooting. They’d need to cross its four hundred kilometers of range before the railgun could even shoot them.

And if they could encroach even closer and remain within the thirty meters of its barrel’s length, it would never be able to shoot them to begin with. So long as they remained within those thirty meters of minimum range, the humongous dragon couldn’t breathe its flames at them, allowing them to slay it.

They had to find a way to do that. And it was at that same time that the three armored divisions would be dispatched simultaneously, allowing them to test their proposals in live combat. Siri and the 2nd Armored Division suggested aiming at the railguns’ waste-heat wings and fins. Canaan and the 3rd Armored Division focused on invading the enemy’s interior through the service entrances and maintenance hatches, which they’d use before to capture the control core of Weisel and Admiral units.

And Shin and his 1st Armored Division…

“We ended up using a railgun to prioritize destroying the enemy. But honestly, we’d prefer to bust through its armor and go crazy on it. We’ve got Nouzen on our side, after all. He could just cut his way in with his high-frequency blades.”

As the 1st Armored Division held a meeting to discuss their way of tackling the Halcyon, Claude spoke up to begin the talks. He was the captain of the Spearhead squadron’s 4th Platoon. A boy with a very distinctive appearance, he had crimson hair and sharp, silver-white eyes hidden behind a pair of glasses.

It had just been decided that each armored division would tackle the situation on its own, and the 1st Armored Division’s captains had met in the base’s fourth meeting room. Visual and combat data on the Morpho and the Noctiluca was being projected over countless holo-screens, along with some estimated stats and…for whatever reason, a giant-monster film.

As everyone focused their gazes on him, Shin simply shrugged.

“I can understand going for a frontal assault over attacking from behind, which invites all sorts of uncertain factors into the equation. But let’s agree that a countermeasure that relies on only one person who could pull it off isn’t much of a countermeasure.”

“You could just teach us how to pull those stunts. And we’d do our best to learn.”

“If it was that easy, this guy wouldn’t be the only one crazy enough to use those blades. Out of everyone, in seven years in the Eighty-Sixth Sector, he was the only person to equip them, y’know?” Tohru, who was serving as the 3rd Platoon’s captain in place of Theo, replied.

Coincidentally, he had blond hair and green eyes just like Theo did, but while being an Aventura, his facial features, stature, and the air about him were all completely different.

“Well, if a small-caliber shot can’t pierce it in one go, how about we fire at the same spot repeatedly? You know, it’s, uh… What do you call it again? If you can’t hit the enemy with one arrow, pelt them with a quiver of arrows…?”

“Do you mean a barrage of arrows?” Michihi asked.

“Right, that. Thanks, Michihi. So yeah, we should go for that. After we hit it once, we can continue shooting at that spot. That way, we’ll eventually break through the crazy-thick armor the Noctiluca and Halcyon have.”

“Kurena’s about the only one accurate enough to pull that off,” Raiden growled. “And if only one person can do it, it’s not a valid countermeasure.”

“I think we’re on the right track, though. I mean, the Stella Maris’s main gun didn’t break through it in one shot, either; it took a few shells to tear a hole into it. It doesn’t have to be the exact same spot. We just need to focus on hitting the same area…”

“I’ve got it!” Rito exclaimed. “Why don’t we get the Halcyon’s railgun to shoot through its own armor?! I mean, a railgun would definitely work in an anti-railgun battle!”

“Great idea, Rito. We’ll go get the special bat we’ve got lying around for knocking back 800 mm shells.”

“Oh, but if the Halcyon’s even larger than the Noctiluca, we might not need to knock any shells back. Depending on the angle that it shoots at, it could knock itself off balance,” Anju suggested.

“Wait, Rito, Anju, hold up,” Raiden cut into the discussion. “This is getting messy. Let’s go over it calmly. We’ll talk about Tohru’s idea first, and then we can consider Rito’s. We need to get everything in order.”

Things were already pretty chaotic. Olivia was present in the room. He didn’t participate in the discussion actively since he wasn’t familiar with the Reginleif, but he would answer if his opinion was needed. Instead, he was sitting down and taking the minutes of the meeting, cracking an amused, sardonic smile at the conversation that developed as he rapidly typed into the information terminal.

Kurena was there, too, standing still and silent as if overwhelmed by the situation. She was desperate to suggest something… Desperate to come up with some way of helping everyone, but they were all so passionate about it, she felt like she couldn’t keep up with them. No words left her lips.

A young man in uniform, affiliated with the base’s dining hall, entered the room and placed down a tray that had some light snacks on it. Apparently, they’d skipped lunch again. They were so absorbed every day in their countermeasure meetings that they often forgot it was mealtime. As such, the supply staff had taken to bringing light meals that the Strike Package could eat with their hands, like sandwiches and mugs full of soup.

As everyone saw the food that was being carried in, the discussion died down, and they eyed the tray fixedly.

“This is good stuff. Mine’s got breaded and fried meat in it,” Raiden said.

Even Shin, who Raiden often said had no sense of taste, picked up a sandwich and looked at it curiously.

“Right, it’s got pickles and…mustard? I hear it’s good.”

“Oh, I’ve got cheese and simmered fig leaves.”

“The soup’s good, too! The flavor of the dried mushrooms is really rich.”

They’d been so caught up with the meeting that they didn’t realize it was well past lunchtime. Their empty stomachs caused them to ignore the meeting and instead focus on stuffing their cheeks. Seeing this, the young soldier scoffed at them.

“I’ll have you know the head cook snapped at you for forgetting to eat the food he had been slaving over. He swore on his chef’s honor that his cooking would get you to stop your meeting today. Feeling humbled yet, kids?”

“Sorry about that.”

“Our bad.”

“We’re sorry.”

Everyone bobbed their heads apologetically, never once putting down their utensils. The young man gave a satisfied nod.

“This is regional cuisine from the head cook’s homeland… There’s actually another variation on it that uses oiled herring, but it’s hard to get herring during wartime. So when the war ends, he’ll let you try that.”

The Federacy’s only port was occupied by the Legion, so naturally, they couldn’t catch herring. But the mention of it made Kurena jolt. When the war ends. That again. Everyone kept saying that, even though such a thing was impossible.

“Oh yeah, I remember eating fish dishes when I was a kid,” Tohru said to no one in particular.

Everyone fixed their eyes on him, to which he simply shrugged.

“I used to live close to the sea, so we’d cook fish a lot. It was my grandpa’s best dish. Oh, he was a fisherman. There was this recipe passed down in the family for cooking them… I don’t really want to go back to the Republic, but remembering that does make me a bit homesick.”

Seeing his thoughtful smile only made Kurena feel more depressed. It didn’t matter how nostalgic he was about it; he’d never get to eat that dish again. Tohru’s grandfather had been killed by the Republic, so they could no longer sit down to a fish dinner together.

But then Claude spoke all too nonchalantly, as if stating the obvious.

“Just make it. Once the war’s over, we can go to the sea whenever we want. So do it then.”

“Oh, right. Okay, then when the war ends, I’ll re-create Grandpa’s dish!”

“Cooking’s your motivation?”

“I mean, might as well, right? We haven’t decided on what we’ll do after the war yet. So I figured, Why not try it?”

“Grandpa’s taste, Mom’s home cooking… Oh yeah, where did my Mom say she was from again? Maybe I’ll take a trip there once the war’s over.”

Kurena opened her eyes wide in shock. She finally realized why Shin, Raiden, and the others could be so earnest about finding a way to stop the Halcyon.

They want to end the Legion War…and free themselves from the battlefield…

Right. Even at that point, Shin had stopped looking back at Kurena. It was like he’d left her behind and started walking off into the distance. He was caught up in ending a war that Kurena thought would never end. Occupied with figuring out how to discard the warrior’s pride that Kurena clung to as her self-identity. As if trying to leave her behind.

The truth was, Shin…might have already abandoned her long ago. And that was why he didn’t bring her with him to his battlefield. Maybe this was why he wouldn’t call out to her now.

Because I’m useless. I couldn’t shoot when I had to. Because I’m powerless, and I couldn’t save Theo and Shana.

He doesn’t need me anymore.

It was absurd logic, so much so that if she was even just a bit calmer, she’d realize how strange she was acting. One could only stretch common sense so far. Shin was on the front lines, facing the Halcyon at that very moment. Of course he didn’t have the leisure to call her.

But Kurena lacked the composure to draw that simple conclusion. She hated feeling useless. She was afraid of being powerless. And having her own helplessness thrust before her eyes frightened her more than anything.

The color of argent hair flashed in her memories. There was a Prussian-blue Republic uniform. Long silvery hair, and eyes of the same color.

Yes. Just like when you sat idly by and watched your parents get shot to death.

…No. That’s a lie. That officer never said anything like that. He said he was sorry. He begged her for forgiveness for not being able to save them. Then who do these eyes belong to?

The white pigs are all scum.

No doubt about it. But then why didn’t you stop them? Why didn’t you cling to them to get in the way…? If you love your mommy and daddy so much, why did you let them get shot instead of standing up to the soldiers?

The same held true for her big sister. Kurena could have clawed at the white pigs when they came to take her to the battlefield. But she stayed quiet and did nothing. She didn’t fight them. She just let them take her away.

But you didn’t do it. You couldn’t do it. After all… After all, you’re…

The silver eyes sneered at her. No…they weren’t silver. Maybe they were gold. Whose eyes were they?

That’s right. After all, you’re…

You’re a helpless child, too powerless to oppose anything that comes your way.

“…!”

She feared people. She cowered in the face of the world. She dreaded the future. And the reason for that was clear. She knew why she was so terrified of taking even a single step forward.

It’s because I’m actually powerless.

Just as she was back then, when she’d learned that she couldn’t do anything.

Even if she tried to move forward, someone would simply direct their malice at her. Even if she tried to hold on to happiness, someone would be there to grab it out of her hands.

And when they did, she wouldn’t be able to resist again. She’d be powerless and would simply let them take everything away again…

Kurena had been acting weird ever since “Shana’s” voice became audible. This was something that had worried Lena as she commanded the brigade from her position in the corps command center.

The Sensory Resonance shared what they were hearing by linking their consciousness together, so Lena could pick up on the emotions that would be conveyed if they were talking face-to-face. And Kurena was connected to her via the Para-RAID, and she was definitely in a restless state. She was scared, confused, and shaken. She sought someone to cling to as she curled up in fear of being abandoned.

Shin seemed to have realized that. He couldn’t spare her any words, but Lena could tell that it was as if he were sneaking glances at her. Shin was in the middle of battle. He couldn’t very well talk to her now. In which case…

Lena parted her lips, but then Gilwiese unexpectedly spoke up.

“Do you mind, Gunslinger? Second Lieutenant Kukumila, I believe?”

While they were both affiliated with the Federacy, this was another unit’s commander and an officer she’d hardly spoken to before. For a young woman of the Eighty-Six like Kurena, this was a surprise. At the spur of the moment, she forgot to respond, but Gilwiese didn’t fault her for it and continued:

“I’ve heard of your reputation, Gunslinger. You’d survived the deadly Eighty-Sixth Sector and supported the Strike Package on its many martial endeavors. An unrivaled Eighty-Six sniper… And it’s because I’ve heard of your reputation that I didn’t want you to serve as the Trauerschwan’s gunner.”

The sound of someone swallowing nervously could be heard through the radio. It was probably Kurena herself, hearing her own voice with startling clarity. She held her breath, not out of fright, but like how a child might react when having his failings pointed out.

“I’ve heard of your failure during the Mirage Spire operation, and I decided you cannot be trusted with this. A warrior who freezes up at the critical moments doesn’t count as a soldier. I couldn’t afford for you to stand still when the time comes to shoot.”

Soldiers, much like weapons, are only seen as effective when they work whenever put to use. And they were dealing with a prototype weapon that wasn’t seen as reliable to begin with. Gilwiese went as far as to ask Shin and Lena to remove Kurena from the operation altogether. But the one to sternly refuse his request…

“But he still insisted that we entrust you with the Trauerschwan. Captain Nouzen insisted on it.”

The Eighty-Sixth Strike Package. The unit made up of the forsaken people of the Republic, the Eighty-Six. Gilwiese heard that it was led by a “Nouzen” of mixed blood. And when he did, he’d felt an odd sense of affinity toward this boy. He hadn’t so much as met him yet, and this emotion was very much one-sided. But he still felt that way.

Had that warrior family acknowledged Shin as one of their own, they wouldn’t have left him to lead a unit of common riffraff. And if so, Gilwiese could see him as the same as the Myrmecoleo Regiment. A crossbreed rejected by his house—a convenient tool to be used, only so that his achievements might be held up in his family’s favor.

A lion head with an ant’s body—a creature fated to starve to death because it could not consume the prey it hunted.

A child without a place to belong to, without anyone to love him.

But Gilwiese was wrong about Shin.

“This weapon was loaned to us by the Senior Research Institute for the sake of this joint operation. And I won’t say that for this reason, the authority to decide which of our subordinates will serve as its gunner falls squarely on me.”

They were in an octagonal, pearl-gray meeting room in one of the Theocracy’s frontline bases. Milky-white tubes that let off a prismatic sheen covered the walls. Shin stood on the other side of this unfamiliarly designed room, gazing back at Gilwiese as he spoke.

“Even so, if you’re saying that we should be giving up on her because of one blunder, I have to say that your attitude as a commander is far too callous. If you were to discard any soldier for a single mistake they made, you wouldn’t be able to maintain a unit. Second Lieutenant Kukumila faltered in the previous operation; that much is true. But I don’t think you have any reason to conclude that she won’t get back on her feet.”

You don’t have the right to assume she won’t recover.

“And if she fails again?” Gilwiese asked, suppressing the bitter emotions bubbling up in his own heart.

The Myrmecoleo Regiment was a newly formed unit. They didn’t have any failures to their name because they had no combat experience to begin with. They were by far the most unreliable ones here. Shin and his group, with their seven years of combat experience, could have thrust that fact in his face, and Gilwiese would not have been in a position to retort.

But they didn’t. And it wasn’t because Shin wasn’t aware of the facts. If he wasn’t that smart, he wouldn’t have survived his battles against the Legion, and the seasoned Eighty-Six wouldn’t follow his orders. In which case, the only reason he didn’t mention it was because he thought doing so would be cowardly. The standard—or perhaps pride—he’d set for himself wouldn’t allow him to do something so despicable.

It was his nobility that prevented him from doing that. And so, he looked up at Gilwiese with the same bloodred eyes as his own.

A mix of Onyx and Pyrope blood—a joining of people that was intensely frowned on in the Empire. And Shin’s appearance was the very picture of Imperial nobility, which had likely led to him being greatly discriminated against among the people of the Eighty-Six Sector as well. Meanwhile, the Republic, which was his motherland, despised him for being a filthy stain of an Eighty-Six.

And yet this noble Imperial half-breed, this Eighty-Six boy, didn’t show any signs of resenting all that hatred as he gazed back at Gilwiese.

“If that happens, I’ll deal with her mistake and regain control of the situation. Taking measures to cover for a subordinate’s failings is the responsibility of a commander.”

His tone was firm, but lacking in venom. It was as if he’d naturally thought that it was his duty to grant his comrades as many chances to redeem themselves as they needed, while covering for them no matter what.

Lena was also present in the conversation, but she remained silent. This, too, was her show of trust. Both for Shin, and for Kurena, who wasn’t present. Both Lena and Shin believed that Kurena would redeem herself—even though she’d made a fatal, pathetic blunder in the previous operation and damaged their trust in her.

Seeing this stirred up odd emotions within Gilwiese. If only he’d had someone like that… Someone who would cover for, protect, and believe in him. Like a brother or a sister…

And after years spent longing for such a healthy, trusting relationship, he could not, in good faith, spit in the face of theirs.

“Understood. If you’d go that far to vouch for her…I’ll respect your decision.”

Gilwiese continued speaking, thinking back to the loneliness and the tinge of shame he’d felt back then. Kurena seemed to be terrified on the other end of the radio. The look in her eyes was that much more familiar than that of Shin, who had the exact same eye color as he did.

“Captain Nouzen left that trump card in your hands because he believed that you’d get back on your feet. He entrusted it with you because he believed that you are not powerless.”

She had the eyes of a child who had been beaten so hard that her will to resist had completely broken. Of an infant who had internalized and etched their powerlessness into the very depths of their heart. He knew that gaze. He’d seen it time and again within the shut-off halls of the Brantolote estate.

She was like a mirror to him. A mirror that he hated—that reflected things he didn’t wish to see.

“And you have a duty to answer that faith. If someone believes in you, and you believe in them, too, you need to answer their faith. People like that… They’re so much harder to come by than you could ever imagine.”

Please answer them. Because you were graced with a rare breed of luck, with the precious privilege of meeting people like them. I had no one like that. No one would believe in me like that or watch out for me like that. No one to wait for me to get back on my feet.

You only ever get one chance at life, and since we missed it before we were ever born, no one spares a passing glance for us. The one thing that we ever wanted, that we ever aspired for, was snatched away before we even had the chance to reach out and grab it.

But that’s not the same for you. You have people who believe in you. If you have a wish, they’ll do their best to grant it. So believe in them. You might not see it right now, but their hands are extended to you even now.

Please. Don’t take that for granted.

“So you have to get back on your feet, Second Lieutenant Kukumila.”

Even though I couldn’t. Even though I still can’t.

“You have people who believe in you, who are waiting for you to get back up. So do it one more time. Do it every single time. Answer their call. You can help them… Get back up.”

So you don’t end up like me.

Without realizing it, the mention of Shin’s name and the sound of those words made a shiver run down Kurena’s spine. She realized that he hadn’t given up on her. And not just that. He had no intention of abandoning her even if she did fail. That in and of itself shook her, but it wasn’t all.

She didn’t want to be powerless. She wanted to fight. To be by his side.

That was how she felt at the very beginning, but it was more than just that now.

“Hmm… Uh…”

Kurena was about to raise an earnest question. They stood on the Eighty-Sixth Sector’s battlefield, in a base surrounded by minefields. It was just after she’d been appointed to the squad under the command of this boy who was called the Reaper.

She looked at his face, which was still unfamiliar at the time. Even as she feared that her feelings might come across, some part of her hoped so very slightly that they would.

“Didn’t it…hurt?”

“…?”

She didn’t specify what she meant, and Shin was understandably taken aback by the question. His surprise was hard to discern from his expression; she could only see it because she was right in front of him. But it was the first time that Kurena saw this stone-faced captain act like a boy his age. And that was enough to let everything really click into place for her.

He was just a boy, only one year her senior, and barely halfway into his teens.

“Didn’t shooting Jute yesterday hurt you, Captain Nouzen?”

As he caressed Jute’s cheeks, his hands stained with the blood and viscera of a friend, he didn’t so much as bat an eye. And just like a heartless reaper, he indifferently, calmly pulled the trigger.

“Are you just hiding it…when it really hurts…?”

For one long moment, Shin fell silent. As if contemplating whether to share what he’d been harboring with this small girl standing before him. But then he said:

“…Just a little.”

“…Right. Right, yeah, I guess it would…”

Of course it hurt. But knowing this made Kurena feel somehow relieved. In that case…

“I could do it for you next time.”

He blinked his bloodred eyes again. But by now, that color didn’t scare her. Looking up into his eyes, Kurena spoke vehemently.

“I’m really good with a gun, you know? If it’s from that close, I’d never miss my mark. So…I could do it for you.”

In your stead.

Remembering them… Carrying them with you is probably something only you can do. Because you’re stronger than any of us. But I can share that pain… I could shoulder a bit of your burden. If you’d only let me.

She felt her fingers begin to shiver, so she clenched her fists hard to hide it. She was afraid. Of shooting those who couldn’t die, those who couldn’t be saved, so they wouldn’t have to be integrated into the Legion. One could call that mercy, but even still, it meant killing another human being. It scared her. She didn’t want to have to do it. But that was exactly why she couldn’t let him carry that burden alone.

Shin looked at her silently, and then he shook his head.

“I’m the one who made that promise with them… So I think I should be the one to do it.”

“…Right…”

Kurena dropped her shoulders. The fact that this gave her a modicum of comfort made her feel ashamed of herself. However, as the Reaper looked back at Kurena…for the first time, he smiled in her presence.

“But…thank you.”

Right… At the time, she didn’t tell him that or polish her skill as a sniper so she could be useful to him or stay by his side. It was so she could fight with him until the very end, even if that “end” was her death. So that when the mantle of Reaper became too heavy to bear, she could pick it up in his stead. So that she could…help him, even the tiniest bit.

He was something like family, like a brother to her, though they weren’t bound by blood. He was her precious…brother in arms.

Captain Nouzen will always be an older brother to you. That will never change.

It was Lieutenant Esther from the Fleet Countries who had told her that. She was someone who had lived holding on to pride—just as they had—and was deprived of even that in the end. And she was right; Kurena’s relationship with Shin didn’t change. Shin didn’t turn his back on her. He’d said it before the operation, too, with his eyes full of concern. He said that he wouldn’t abandon her. That she didn’t have to carry that burden if it ended up becoming a curse.

He had sympathized with her pain. If she were to just focus on it, she could feel his emotions even now, through the Para-RAID.

The Resonance didn’t just transmit words; it let one feel the same vicissitudes of emotion that one might pick up on when talking to another face-to-face. And not just Shin, but Raiden, Anju, and Lena were all worried about her.

And in doubting herself, she’d very nearly hurt them.

“Major Günter, umm… Thank you.”

The Halcyon relied on the self-propelled mines’ trigger in order to align its sights, and it seemed the five diversionary squadrons were beginning to use this to their advantage. The destructive marks of the five railguns’ chain shots were clearly missing the positions the squadrons were occupying.

They’d fought within ruins before because of their experience in the Eighty-Sixth Sector and the Federacy; as such, they knew to pass the self-propelled mines by and shoot them from a safe distance, and in so doing, they diverted the railguns’ aim. Under Zashya’s command from above, the five railguns only ended up creating rubble that offered more cover to hide the Reginleifs from the weapons’ own fire.

At long last, the Halcyon’s black-metal back came into view from beyond the thicket of buildings and the hills of streets. By relying on the five squadrons’ diversion and drawing a wide arc to go around the ruins, the Spearhead squadron finally reached the point behind the Halcyon’s back.

They spread out behind the cover of the many buildings that stood half collapsed around the Halcyon.

“All battalions, come in. The Spearhead squadron is in position.”

“Roger that. Quarrel and Archer are also in position. We’re ready to offer covering fire whenever.”

“The Scythe squadron as well as all diversion squadrons are beginning to approach the enemy. Remaining distance is roughly two thousand. We’re in a tank turret’s range.”

The Scythe squadron’s captain smiled with sweet pride.

“It’s about time, then… Let’s show it what we’re made of!”

“Right.”

The Halcyon may have lorded over this place, like a sovereign sitting upon its throne, but…

“Let’s teach it that this is the Strike Package’s—the Reginleif’s battlefield.”

After their meal, the head cook himself walked in with a smile, carrying mugs of coffee full of cream and sugar. Once the group finished the coffee, they finally resumed the discussion on how to deal with the Halcyon. Maybe it was their heightened blood-sugar levels or the refreshing effects of the break, but they soon realized their discussion was hitting a dead end. After all, they had gotten quite off track.

“Let’s get back to the topic at hand, then,” Shin said, drawing everyone’s gaze to him. “We can’t beat it in an artillery fight. So we’re going to have to close the distance before it prepares to shoot, before it can even notice us. Using the Armée Furieuse should make that part easier… If this turns into another naval battle, we’ll just have to pray there won’t be a storm like last time.”

“…Even during the naval battle, we had to climb up to the bastard before we could even do anything, so we’ll have to figure that out,” Raiden said, nodding. “Reginleifs can’t run on the water, you know.”

Shin nodded back before continuing:

“The next operation should be a surface operation, though, so I don’t think it’ll be any more complicated than fighting the Morpho. At the time, the enemy’s defense unit kept whittling down our forces, so it ended up being a one-on-one in the end. But if we can cross the enemy’s territory through the air, we should be able to reach the railgun without losing our forces. The railgun itself isn’t that agile, so it’s almost a sitting duck. Climbing up on top of it shouldn’t be that difficult.”

The first time they’d faced a railgun-equipped Legion was one year ago, in Kreutzbeck City. Having successfully ambushed Shin and the Nordlicht squadron, the Morpho retreated after firing at them, without paying any heed to how successful its shot was.

At that point, the Nordlicht squadron’s fifteen units were all intact. And within those city ruins, there were plenty of towering buildings around the Morpho. That was why it chose to run. It knew that fighting alone against multiple Feldreß in an urban environment put it at a disadvantage, and that was the reason why the gigantic Legion artillery unit decided to retreat from Kreutzbeck City.

“…Right.”

“Earlier, when you mentioned the barrage… You said that based on the premise of us getting into the thirty-meter range where the railguns wouldn’t be able to shoot us. In other words, you’re saying that we’d be close enough to latch on to it. Not that we’d be trying to shoot at it from afar, right?”

The other Processors raised their voices in realization. They had a weapon like that. A weapon that could hit the same point with laser accuracy, without hurting the Processors.

One of a Reginleif’s fixed armaments, this weapon was only useful when it was attached to the enemy, but so long as it was, it would be able to hit its target accurately and powerfully.

“The pile drivers!”

The five squadrons approached the Halcyon while distracting its railguns. Closing the range to a few hundred meters, they darted between buildings and rubble like arrows as they approached it.

The 800 mm caliber cannons creaked as they turned in place to intercept the targets racing along the ground. In addition, antiair autocannons deployed all over the Halcyon’s body, like a porcupine’s quills standing on end.

“We figured you’d do that, idiot!”

The next moment, pale shadows appeared on top of the nearby high-rise buildings, aiming at the autocannons from their blind spot as if to mock the very idea of using them. Having remained at a location where the Halcyon couldn’t see them, this group of Reginleifs fired their wire anchors near the rooftops and reeled them in, drawing an arc to climb up. These were the Quarrel and Archer platoons, which were equipped with Howitzer configurations for artillery support.

Reginleifs were designed to fight on the Federacy’s battlefields, in forested or urban terrains. Most other mobile weapons struggled on urban ground. Their thick armor and high-caliber, heavy tank turrets made it difficult for them to move. By contrast, Reginleifs excelled at three-dimensional combat while using high buildings for footing.

That was why that army of skeletons was given their agility and high output. They appeared in the city’s peak, in the heart of the one battlefield where they stood unrivaled. And from there, they could aim at the single weak point that all armored weapons shared: their relatively thinly protected top armor.

This was why this group had crawled upon the ground the whole way there, so that they could now attack from above.

“We stayed low to the ground to condition you to fix your eyes on us. That was our plan all along, and you fell for it, hook, line, and sinker!”

And with that sneering remark, they fired. The antiair autocannons that the Halcyon was equipped with for close-range interception were blown away, helpless to resist as they were fixed fruitlessly to the ground.

The five squadrons approaching the Halcyon took advantage of its diverted attention, changing their ammunition and opening fire as well. The rush of high explosives entered the 800 mm aperture between one pair of rails and triggered their timed fuse. This was the same feat that Theo had used in the battle of the Noctiluca to stop it from firing. At that moment, a HEAT projectile accidentally went off as it touched the rails. But this time, the squadrons used high explosives with a larger blast radius and a fuse timed to trigger inside the barrel. By aiming right between the rails at a short range, they were able to produce the same result.

The liquid metal that served as the electrode that powered and propelled the shells splashed into the sky, going off in a blast of fragments that went flying at a velocity of eight thousand meters per second. The huge gun was pushed back, as if retreating. Meanwhile, the remaining platoons of the five squadrons advanced.

Remaining distance: thirty meters.

They’d plunged into the railguns’ blind spot. With their barrels being thirty meters long, they couldn’t possibly fire into this range. Launching their wire anchors to rapidly climb up the nearby buildings and kicking against the Halcyon’s flank, the ivory silhouettes quickly moved toward the five turrets. As their massive enemy shuffled its feet and trembled in a furious attempt to shake them off, they triggered three of their four pile drivers, thrusting them into the Halcyon’s armor in an attempt to hang on.

Like all the last times, the railguns unfurled the conductive wires from their respective pairs of wings, some of them thrusting them from below like geysers in an attempt to intercept the Reginleifs. But the Quarrel and Archer squadrons forestalled this attack, firing high-explosive shells into the air that knocked the wires back with their intense shock waves and clearing the way for their comrades.

Shielded by the invisible pressure of those blasts, the Reginleifs began reaching the top of the five railguns. Thrusting their 88 mm turrets at it at point-blank range, they opened fire.

They shot APFSDS (Armor-Piercing Fin-Stabilized Discarding Sabot) shells with their initial velocity of one thousand six hundred meters per second perfectly retained…which were deflected by the Halcyon’s armor in a shower of sparks. It was hard. Unlike the Löwe or Dinosauria, this wasn’t a model that required much mobility. Even if it meant an increase in weight, its turrets’ armor was reinforced.

This was, however, something the Strike Package anticipated might happen.

They changed their armament selection to their front right leg’s main armament, a 57 mm anti-armor pile bunker. Of the four pile drivers they had on all four legs, they’d kept one unused when climbing up.

They couldn’t develop a new armament from scratch in such a short period of time, but they did manage to cobble up an impromptu new weapon based off an existing one. They were lucky enough to have the spare parts for it. After all, with only one Processor out of the whole unit using this weapon, they had plenty to work with.

Trigger. Their front right leg’s pile driver activated. And immediately after the pile driver went off, the high-frequency blade fixed to the outer side of the pile bunker’s case, facing downward, was blown off by the explosive bolt. It followed a guideline that was also connected to the cover. Its tip slid down toward the turret’s armor.

The red-hot edge of the high-frequency blade dipped into the thick armor like water. It slashed its way in, and without even confirming the damage, the Reginleifs purged the blades and the pile drivers altogether. The moment the Reginleifs jumped off, wires were fired from behind the shield of the blasts, lashing out at the turret. Even with that impact, the blades had dug in too deeply to be dislodged.

Meanwhile, the pile drivers themselves came off as if they’d been flicked away, and without anything to hold them in place, the drivers lurched sideways. It wasn’t unlike the pila used by the soldiers of an ancient empire to render the shields of enemy soldiers useless. The drivers bent much like the pilum, applying pressure to the shank that was holding the high-frequency blade in place and pushing it deeper into the turrets’ armor… That wasn’t something the Processors anticipated, though.

“Maybe we can modify it to intentionally cause this,” Shin wondered aloud.

“It’d be nice if we could do that… The bigger the hole, the easier it is to aim at!”

The high-frequency blades were pushed down to the point of being perpendicular to the ground, until finally, they popped out the other side and fell down, leaving behind long slashes that reached into the turrets’ inner mechanisms. It was as if some gigantic beast had run its claws through each turret.

Once again, the Reginleifs fixed their 88 mm guns onto the turrets. All of them, from those that jumped away, to those that climbed up the Halcyon using their wire anchors, to those that remained on the ground to offer covering fire.

All of them pulled their triggers at once.

Having confirmed that the Halcyon’s autocannons were gone and all five of its railguns had been prevented from firing, the Spearhead squadron lunged forward from its hiding spot. As the Halcyon writhed and shook furiously at the blades that had been thrust into its turrets, Undertaker jumped onto its back, thrusting all four blades into it. Because the Halcyon’s deployment holes were used as exits for self-propelled mines, traps could be easily placed inside them; thus, Shin avoided infiltrating through there.

Swinging the high-frequency blade attached to his grappling arm, he slashed into the behemoth’s thick carapace. The next moment, Olivia’s Anna Maria scaled its way up as well, bringing its high-frequency lance down onto the two cracks that had been carved into the Halcyon’s armor with deadly accuracy. In order to make doubly sure the plan would work, Shin retracted one of his forelegs’ piles and thrust it in again, triggering it.

The armor bent in a distorted, triangular shape and then collapsed inward. As their two units jumped away to make room, Raiden’s Wehrwolf and Claude’s Bandersnatch fired their autocannons into the hole. Tracer bullets, meant for confirming the shots’ trajectory, left a glowing trail as they whizzed through the air, casting a momentary light into the dark reaches of the Halcyon’s internal structure.

Right below the five railguns stood something that looked like a massive tower. It was a magazine, much like the one used by the Stella Maris’s 40 cm cannon. A large recycling furnace accompanied it, consuming wreckage and debris to put them to use again. It had a cultivation tank filled with silver fluid—Liquid Micromachines—as well as a storage tank.

There was also a great number of machines and plumbing inside it. Shin wasn’t knowledgeable about the intricacies of producing ammunition, so he didn’t know what they were supposed to do. To him, it looked indeed like the mechanical bowels of a gigantic animal.

He looked around for something that could be its control core but didn’t find anything that fit the bill. At this close range, Shin could detect it even without his sense of sight—his ability picked up on it, allowing him to hear it.

The overlapping screams of multiple Shepherds were distributed unevenly inside its internal mechanisms. Each scream—no, perhaps entire individuals were divided—emanated from a different spot. A micromachine nerve network spread all throughout the mechanical entrails like a thin curtain.

Unlike the Weisel, which were hidden deep within the Legion’s territories and weren’t built for combat, the Halcyon was a Legion unit made for battle. And being as large as it was, splitting its central processor increased redundancy. The Halcyon was capable of producing Liquid Micromachines on its own, so even if it took some damage to its central processor, it would be capable of repairing it on the spot. What’s more, the Reginleif’s tank turret and Howitzer were relatively weak, and while they could theoretically destroy the nerve network, doing so would prove quite difficult.

In the end, they’d need to rely on the Trauerschwan’s bombardment after all.

And to do that…

“Aim at its legs! Anju, we’re counting on you!”

In preparation for the bombardment of the railguns, the Reginleifs had set their ammunition to HEAT shells. Their high-temperature metal jet billowed mercilessly into the claw marks left by the blade-piles, setting fire to the Liquid Micromachines that made up the massive turrets’ control cores.

Shiden could see some metal butterflies soaring from one of the guns, Johanna. She’d seen it before, even during the Noctiluca’s battle; it was the sight of a control core’s flight in an attempt to escape flames and destruction. The Liquid Micromachines had turned to a flock of countless silvery butterflies.

These were Johanna’s—Shana’s—control core.

“You’re not getting away!”

With a furious roar, she climbed up Johanna’s burning turret. For this battle, she’d exchanged the buckshot cannon on her gun mount arm for an 88 mm tank turret. Setting the timed fuses on her HEAT shells, she fixed her sights on the silvery butterflies spreading out into the ashen sky—

“No good, missy! Get down from there!”

A moment after Bernholdt’s warning reached her, a proximity alert began blaring in her ears. Coming to, she saw an electric wire swing down on her, its five claws moving in a trajectory to slice her unit up. In her fervent attempt to prevent Shana from escaping, she’d neglected to mind her surroundings. And now it was too late for her to dodge.

God dammit. They caught me… It was bait.

Using a comrade’s corpse to draw in its allies was one of the oldest tricks in the book. Far be it from her to guess whether or not the hunks of scrap metal did it intentionally, but the end result was the same. They had lured her in.

Or maybe Shana just wants to take me down with her…

But she snapped out of that bittersweet daydream when a HEAT shell flew in from below, bursting in midair in a rumbling explosion. The blast’s shock waves knocked the wire back, and as Shiden stood dumbfounded for a moment, a Reginleif scrambled up the turret and rammed Cyclops, sending both of them plummeting down.

The Reginleif’s squadron symbol was that of a wolf dog accompanying a war god, and its ID number was 01. Freki One. Bernholdt’s unit.

“I swear, this girl’s such a handful! You’ll be getting some complaints from me when we’re done here, Captain!”

As Cyclops fell, Shiden looked ahead and found the identity of the one who’d fired that HEAT shell. The one rig with brown plating in the airborne unit, shaped like a quadruped animal—a Stollenwurm. Olivia’s Anna Maria. Using his ability to briefly peer into the future, he’d foreseen Shiden’s predicament.

She was suddenly overcome with anger and raised her voice in rage.

Right now, I was so close—this close—to joining Shana, who’d died ahead of me.

“Stay the fuck out of my way, Bernholdt! You too, Captain!”

“We’re the ones who should be saying that, Second Lieutenant.”

Shiden was stunned into silence. That remark cut into her outburst like the cracking of a whip. That casual but somehow firm voice… Was that Olivia?

“Your task is to suppress the railgun. You volunteered for this task, which means you have to see it through to the end. If you’re keener on having a lovers’ suicide with that railgun instead, then you’re an impediment and liability to this operation. Step down.”

Occupied with giving Anju instructions, Shin was too late to act in the heat of the moment. As he made room for Snow Witch, he turned his eyes just as Anna Maria rescued Cyclops.

“Thank you, Captain. You saved her.”

“I keep my ‘eyes’ open to remain wary of unexpected developments, but it’s a good thing I was nearby. I just barely managed to do it.”

Olivia’s ability to see three seconds into the future only extended a few dozen meters around him. It wasn’t very wide. Olivia then cracked a smile.

“With what happened to Second Lieutenant Rikka, I can understand your desire to minimize losses. But you don’t have to shoulder that burden all on your own. Besides, protecting poorly behaved brats is an adult’s responsibility. Let me take care of that, if you will.”

“…Thank you.”

Next to him, Snow Witch rose from its standby position, loaded with the heaviest of the Reginleif’s primary armaments, the missile launcher. It switched places with Bandersnatch and set its targets. As soon as it was finished, it fired all its ammunition at once.

Twenty missiles went flying into the Halcyon’s insides. These were anti-light-armor missiles, meant for Ameise or Grauwolf. They weren’t very effective against Löwe, Dinosauria, or Morpho. Even if the missiles had landed a direct hit, this was a gigantic ammunition factory that produced unusually large 800 mm shells. They wouldn’t deal any crippling damage.

However…

As the missiles scattered inside the factory, they detonated, unleashing a blinding barrage of self-forging fragments. The explosives produced by those fragments burst into countless small eruptions.

The explosives went off, granting the self-forging fragments a speed of three thousand meters per second. Tongues of crimson flame roared to life through the factory’s interior. The tall, airtight walls here didn’t allow the flames any opening to escape outside.

Seeing that one barrage wasn’t enough, Snow Witch gave way to another surface-suppression unit, which promptly fired its own missiles into the Halcyon. Then a third unit fired as well, as if to make doubly sure they got the job done.

Before long, the high temperatures of the flames exceeded what the Halcyon’s massive heat sinks could handle. Even the railguns’ twenty cooling wings couldn’t expel the heat fast enough. All the Halcyon’s parts, from its high-temperature energy packs, to the railguns and their reloading systems, and eventually even the control cores unevenly distributed within began to overheat.

And so did the artificial muscles of its legs, which grew hot whenever the Halcyon moved, supporting its weight and allowing it to walk.

And…

Shiden could only hear the Legion because she was connected to Shin and his ability through the Para-RAID. Now that he was right next to the Halcyon, its howls and screams were exceptionally loud.

Groans, shrieks, whispers of resentment, and screams of terror. And also, Shana’s moans, circling above in their attempt to escape the flames.

With the help of the Archer squadron, the Nordlicht squadron fired blasts all around Shana, funneling the brittle, flammable butterflies into a small area. They were driving it right in front of where Cyclops stood still, so it was clear that they were trying to help her.

The moans rained down on Shiden. Now that Shana had split into butterflies, her voice was less of a loud howl and more of a faint whisper.

So cold.

If she were to shoot Shana now, when the entirety of her being had been reduced to those two words, she really would disappear. Shana would truly be lost forever. And Shiden had nothing left. No family or hometown. No culture to inherit, no ethnic heritage to fall back on. No future to dream of or a clear vision of how the present ought to be.

Many other Eighty-Six were in the same boat. But Shiden had always thought she’d manage somehow, one way or another. So long as she had Shana and the members of the Brísingamen squadron, who had been with her in the Eighty-Sixth Sector and beyond, she would find a way to persevere.

But now that day would never come.

Because it’s not that you think it’s fine to die that way. You want to die that way.

Shin’s voice drifted through her memories. He’d said that back in the Theocracy’s unfamiliar, pearl-gray base. A place that, despite being a military facility, had a sterilized scent to it, as if rejecting the dirty, metallic smell of the army. In that moment, the Reaper really had seen Shiden’s heart, as well as the morbid wish she’d kept hidden.

He was someone who once harbored that same desire. Who had lost sight of how to live for the sake of fulfilling that wish. And so seeing Shiden wish for destruction the same way he had…annoyed him. It was enough to make him want to drag her from the precipice of death, even if she kicked and screamed the whole time.

I won’t take someone with that kind of attitude with me.

Yeah. That’s right. That’s why I threw that attitude away. But what am I supposed to do now? Even if I give up on my wish to die while taking her down with me, how am I supposed to live without her? Without the rest of them?

Those were words she’d never share with Shin. She knew how pathetic they were, and the shame of it all meant she could never let Shin know how she truly felt.

And so she asked. Someone who was present next to her but wasn’t an Eighty-Six. Someone older, who wouldn’t laugh at her or act confused but would answer her question.

“…Hey.”

“…Hey. Captain Olivia. Can I ask you something?”

It was a personal Para-RAID Resonance, which was seen as inappropriate in the middle of an operation. But rather than scold her for it, Olivia simply frowned. The way this brusque young woman seemed to ask the question, as if begging for his assistance, made him realize she really was still a girl in her teens.

“What would you do if you were me? What if you ran into your person on the battlefield? What if you couldn’t defeat her without risking your life…? If you could die together with her?”

For a long moment, Olivia remained silent. His person. In his case, it was his fiancée. She was a victim of the Legion War, and she very well could have been assimilated. She could be wandering still as a Shepherd, somewhere out on the battlefield.

“Well, I’d fight. I’d risk my life, like you said… But I wouldn’t die.”

How sweet it would be if he could die while putting her to rest. If that could be how things ended. It would be such a beautiful, poetic, intoxicating conclusion… As comforting and inviting as corruption.

“…Why wouldn’t you die?”

“Anna’s parents are still waiting for her to come home. In front of her empty grave. I have to let them know how it ends.”

If they were to blame him for not keeping her safe, he wouldn’t be able to fault them for it. But they didn’t. They were happy to see him visit her grave every year, on the anniversary of her death and on her birthday. But they had also asked him to forget about her.

They were too kind to him. He owed it to them to make that report.

“I have to protect the homeland she loved, and I can’t, in good faith, say I’ve done that until all the Legion are gone. I have to reclaim the scenery she loved… And besides…”

And indeed, most importantly.

“…if I defeat her, I’ll finally…be allowed to weep at her grave.”

During his fiancée’s—Anna Maria’s—funeral, Olivia didn’t cry. He wanted to, but he didn’t. He couldn’t shed a single tear. Because she wasn’t there. Those abominable scrap-metal demons took her away. So she hadn’t truly been put to rest, and shedding tears for her now wouldn’t be right.

“I need to offer her flowers and shed my tears appropriately, on every birthday and every memorial. Every year, until my time comes… So I can’t die yet. Not until I’ve done that.”

Would he find a new love in the years to come, as her parents hoped he would? Would he meet someone new? Olivia didn’t know yet. Maybe it would happen. Maybe it wouldn’t.

But he would still bring her flowers every year. He wouldn’t forget Anna Maria for as long as he lived. So for now—at least for her sake, he would live on.

Shiden smiled ever so slightly.

“Right. I getcha.”

Nodding, Shiden fixed the 88 mm smoothbore gun’s sights on Shana.

That’s right, Shana. I haven’t buried you, and I haven’t visited your grave yet, either. So all of us who survived—maybe we could meet up every year on the day of that operation, so we can drink and cheer for you. But right now, we can’t really do that, either.

Would that be enough? Shin couldn’t forgive himself with just that, and that was why he’d stood frozen in place when she saw him on the battlefield one year ago. When he’d wished he could disappear into the battlefield that had consumed someone he held dear.

But the Reaper escaped that hell. So she had to find a way out, too. After all, if that idiot could pull it off, there’s no way in hell she couldn’t do it, too.

“See ya, Shana.”

All her comrades who had died before she did.

Her parents, who’d died in the internment camps.

Her younger sister, whom she’d failed to protect.

She, who had been trapped in the Eighty-Sixth Sector.

See ya.

I’m not gonna forget any of you. You won’t be holding me back anymore.

She pulled the trigger.

With their control cores burned, the five railguns’ turrets slumped to the ground, like animals that’d had their necks snapped. The heat of the flames eating away at the Halcyon from the inside exceeded its temperature limit, forcing its propulsion system into emergency shutdown.

This was their first phase in the plan to destroy the Halcyon. The airborne unit’s task. To break the Halcyon’s legs and crush its fangs—the railguns—before humanity’s trump card, the Trauerschwan, was in position to shoot.

And they did it. Its cannons had been burned away, and its artificial muscles couldn’t support its weight. The gigantic behemoth crumpled to the ground in a loud, thundering quake.