Grimgal of Ashes and Illusion - Volume 11 - Chapter 1

1. Now

He took a deep breath, then exhaled.

It seemed that, for a while, he’d forgotten to breathe.

A while?

How long was a while?

He didn’t know. The noise—

There were noises off in the distance. An awful lot of different ones.

The distance?

No, maybe that wasn’t it. The noises might be echoing inside his head. Deep inside. If so, they weren’t far off at all. It was the opposite. They were close. Very close.

So very close that, as a result, he couldn’t hear them?

His hands were on the ground.

Where was this again?

Not outside. Indoors. But the ground wasn’t covered. It was a dirt floor.

Her face was between his hands. Why was it like this? Even as he wondered that, he had no idea, but from where he was looking down on her from a position like he had stopped in the middle of a push-up, he could see that her eyes were mostly closed, and her lips slightly parted. Like her whole body was limp.

Despite that, if he were to talk to her, it felt like she’d respond. So why didn’t he? It was such a simple thing. He had only to call her name, that was all, and yet for some reason he couldn’t do it.

Why?

Am I... scared?

But scared of what?

I don’t understand it. I don’t know.

I’m not going to understand anyway, so maybe things are fine this way. Yeah.

Things are fine this way.

I’ll leave her be. That’s for the best. Yeah. That’s what I’ll do.

How did things turn out like this? It doesn’t matter. Get your act together. You’re the leader, aren’t you? Not much of one, but the leader nonetheless. This is no time for spacing out. Don’t think about anything unnecessary. Right now, there must be things you ought to be doing. Do them. If you have time to think, use it to do them.

He stood up and looked to the entrance. Shihoru was sitting with her back leaned against the bars to his left. Her eyes were wide, her teeth gritted, and her jaw trembling as she looked at him.

Shihoru tried to say something. But her voice didn’t seem to come out.

Haruhiro cocked his head to the side. What could it be?

Shihoru had an incredible look on her face. Like she had just witnessed something terrible.

“It’s okay,” he said to Shihoru and smiled. Then Haruhiro breathed out.

It was okay. Everything was okay.

Okay.

Okay.

Okay.

No, wait. Now wasn’t the time to be saying things were okay. He had things he needed to do.

Come to think of it, where was his stiletto?

Oh.

Right next to him.

When he tried to pick up his stiletto, the guorella’s corpse caught his eye and the blood rushed to his head. He wanted to stomp on the already-dead guorella’s head until it was no more than a bloody pulp. He wanted to kill it. Kill it dead.

It was already dead. This one, that is. This male guorella. But there were others.

Yeah. I still have more to kill, don’t I? Kill them.

I’ll kill them.

I should kill them. That’s right. I’ll wipe them all out.

Yeah. That’s it.

That was exactly what I should be doing, isn’t it? Kill them. Kill them. Kill them. Kill them. Kill them. Kill them. Kill them. Kill them. Kill. Kill. Kill. Kill. Kill. Kill, kill, kill, kill, kill, kill, kill, kill, kill, kill, kill, kill, kill.

You can’t.

He heard a voice.

It was her voice.

When he saw the guorella’s dead body, she came into his vision, too. He tried not to see.

No, that wasn’t it. He should have been able to see, but he tried to convince himself he couldn’t.

Even though she was right there.

He didn’t want to see.

“...That’s right, huh.”

Snapping and plunging in desperately... that wasn’t his style. If he had above average strength, or some sort of special ability, it might be valid to throw safety to the wind and take a gamble, but unfortunately Haruhiro was a plain and mediocre person. Even if there wasn’t a lot he could do, he had to do it to the best of his ability. Like always. Using his tools to their utmost, he’d find a way to survive. If he lost himself, he’d only self-destruct.

That might be fine, though.

If he self-destructed.

It didn’t matter what happened. What did he care?

No.

Didn’t she just tell him that he couldn’t? Yeah. There was no way that was okay. But why had he heard her voice?

There was no way he should have.

He couldn’t have—

Why...? That’s right, her voice... Was I imagining it? It was an illusion... No, I mean, I definitely heard it—but there’s no way... No—this is no good. Don’t think. It’s no good—I can’t think about it. Pick it up. Pick the stiletto up. Then do what I have to—do the things I have to do. Do them.

He gritted his teeth. He braced both his legs. They were full of strength. He could do this.

The jail. This was the jail where Setora was being held. The guorellas were outside. They’d rushed the jail, and Yume and Kuzaku were barely holding the guorellas off as they tried to swarm in.

“Shihoru, use magic!” he shouted and tried to take off running.

But his knee bent and his hips sank. He clicked his tongue.

What was this? What the hell was this?

His body wouldn’t move the way he wanted it to. Why? That was beyond obvious. He was spent. He’d killed guorella after guorella and, though he hadn’t meant to, he’d gotten carried away. He’d lost too much blood, and he must have exceeded his stamina at some point, too. This was the result.

This... No... Forget about it. I have to forget.

Running in an incredibly awkward and unbalanced way, he rushed to the entrance. Setora, who was standing in the doorway, looked back to him.

“Haru!” She called his name, and their eyes met. Without responding, he went out.

Kuzaku was about two meters from the jail, letting out short battle cries as he swung his large katana around and went on a rampage. He probably was caught up in it and not thinking. Kuzaku was being supported by his power of will. If he stopped, he’d surely collapse.

Yume was moving quickly, her posture low, keeping any guorella that came close in check. Obviously, she had no extra strength to spare, but she didn’t look like she was desperate. That was Yume for you.

Unfaltering and without fear, she constantly changed her positions left and right, occasionally passing behind Kuzaku, and supported him in a way that suited her. But it was a lot of moving. Yume couldn’t last like that.

“Yume! I’ll take the left side!” Haruhiro called.

“Meow!”

“I can still keep going!” he added.

Honestly, he didn’t know if he could or not. Even so, he had to assume he could. To believe in it, and make his comrades believe, too.

Haruhiro drew his knife with the hand guard using his left hand. He moved up to Kuzaku’s left, used Swat on the right arm of a guorella that happened to be leaping at him at the time, and then stabbed it in the face with his stiletto. When he immediately went for the eyes with his knife, it backed off.

On to the next one. It would be coming soon. Or rather, it was already here.

Haruhiro spun around to avoid an onrushing guorella.

Kuzaku cried, “Ngah!” and hit it with his large katana.

The dark brown shell skin that was like a hard exoskeleton shattered, and fragments flew everywhere. What destructive power.

The guorella backed away, unable to take it, and another guorella charged in. It was a young male, but if Haruhiro took it head-on, he’d be at a disadvantage. Even so, there was no room for retreat.

And so, rather than retreat, rather than stand his ground, he moved up. Taking the risk to close the distance, he decided to land a stiletto-and-knife combo on its face before it could hit him.

Unlike Kuzaku, Haruhiro lacked the power to break their shell-like skin, so while that wouldn’t be much damage, it would be enough to crack it.

When that one retreated, the next, and then the next, and then the next... the guorellas kept pushing in, but they didn’t attack in unison.

Even with humans, it was harder than it seemed to gang up on a single person and beat on them as a group. One guy had to grab the enemy from behind, another had to punch him in the face, another in the stomach, and if they couldn’t divide the work like that, it wouldn’t go well. Even if it was just two people whaling on one, their ally would get in the way more than it might be expected. In that case, the thing to do was make the enemy trip, or hold them down, and prevent them from moving. Naturally, their target—which was to say Haruhiro—was more than aware of that, so he didn’t stay put.

Move.

He couldn’t move as swiftly as usual.

I don’t care. Move.

He kept moving, and struck the enemies that came out. He just kept on repeating that. For as long as he could. Until his strength ran out.

Do it. Keep doing it. Soon enough, Shihoru will support us with magic. Even Setora will try to do something. Believe in my comrades, and do what I can. Get through this. That’s all I can do. Now.