Infinite Dendrogram - Volume 20 - Chapter 5.5

Interlude: Pale Death

Eltram, Cargo Area

Several minutes before Moneygold began fighting Rascal, Isara had separated from Moneygold and gone to the cargo storage area.

Normally, a bodyguard like her would always stay by the side of the person she served, but this wasn’t necessary while Moneygold was using his ultimate. With enough MP restoration, his defensive skill that turned all attacks into money could remain active for about an hour—and almost no one could harm him while it was up. Isara’s role as his bodyguard was focused on preventing surprise attacks and supporting him in other ways. She’d lived as an assassin before, and Moneygold had sought her out and taken her in as a close aide precisely because of the skills she’d developed in that profession.

Her dream had been to create an orphanage in Caldina to save young children from being forced to live the same way she had, and Moneygold had hired her by paying the immense sum of money needed to realize that dream. Isara was deeply thankful for that, since her old job had never been lucrative enough to finance it.

That was why she followed her benefactor’s orders to the letter and went to fulfill her role elsewhere.

Eltram had four important places: the ballroom full of VIPs, the bridge that controlled the ship, the power block that supplied all of its energy, and the cargo hold where countless precious goods were carried.

In Caldina, Dryfe’s Legitimate Government was known to frequently plunder supplies. It was likely that they’d also gone to the cargo area, and that was why Moneygold had sent her there.

There are clear signs that powered suits have been here, she thought—just as Moneygold had predicted she would find.

They had been heading toward the cargo area, and it appeared there were six of them.

People equipped with guns or wearing powered suits were no threat to Isara. She held the metal manipulation magic Superior Job, Fullmetal Princess. With no resistances on them, equipment like that was nothing but another weapon for her to use.

It’s safe to assume they’re already in the cargo area. Preparing to ambush them using her powers, she looked down at the cargo area from the nearby stairs—the very stairs Eldridge had been sitting on recently.

...Huh?

But what she saw left her dumbfounded in spite of her vigilance. She might have even said something out loud if she’d had less experience in combat.

What she saw in the cargo block were items strewn about the floor—specifically, six sets of military clothing and six corresponding armor-type Magingears.

And all of them were covered by piles of white dust—enough dust to make up a whole human body each.

Isara’s instincts told her that those were human remains, and that they belonged to the DLG soldiers who’d come here for the cargo.

Her eyes widened as she exposed the Mythical metal bracelet under her sleeve, and she instantly used her metal magic to turn the bracelet into a thin wire that she controlled using her mind. Then, she directed it into the cargo area, making the wire even thinner and spreading it out in all directions to create a spiderlike web.

She used the web to scan the space within the cargo hold and look for whoever—or whatever—had killed the soldiers.

However, all she learned from this investigation was that there was nobody moving within.

Isara gathered her resolve, stepped into the cargo area, and examined the remains.

“...Bits of ice?” Immediately she realized that the white powder was the result of a flash frozen body being shattered.

They weren’t sapped of just the heat, but also their very life energy, she thought. The effect is similar to the Vital Squeeze skill used by Blood Cavaliers...Legendaria’s vampires...

Vital Squeeze was a type of HP drain skill which was known to turn those it killed into ash, but the victims here had been drained of life far more thoroughly than that.

And it’s just awful inside... Some Inventories within the cargo area had been shattered, and their contents were spread all over. It looked like there were offensive gems among them that had triggered upon hitting the floor and walls, leaving marks on every surface.

“Hm?” While looking around the broken Inventories, Isara discovered something strange. One of them looked like the remains of a common Inventory at first, but a closer look made it clear that it was simply a box designed to look like one—it hadn’t been made with the space expansion feature common to actual Inventories.

Did someone sneak it in with all the other cargo? But for what purpose? Besides that, there was something else among the scattered goods that caught her eye. She reached out to an object next to the fake Inventory and picked it up.

“Ah! This is...!” Isara opened her eyes wide as she realized that the object looked like a shard of shattered glass.

A moment later, she was distracted from it by the sound of a massive machine activating somewhere in a neighboring area.

That’s...the evacuation zone! The cargo area and the evacuation zone were right next to each other to make it easier to rescue cargo in an emergency. The sound coming from there was proof enough that something unexpected was happening.

Isara turned around, left the now-empty cargo area, and followed the strange noise.

When she arrived at the evacuation zone...

“The ramp...is down?”

...she noticed that the ramp meant to deploy evacuation boats had been lowered, and the desert night spread out before her in that direction.

Was that the sound of the ramp being lowered? Since Eltram was still on the move, the dunes visible from the now-open bay were quickly flying by. The ship must’ve traveled a fair distance since the point where the ramp was deployed.

This must’ve been opened by whoever—or whatever—killed the soldiers in the cargo area. It had come from within the cargo hold, killed the soldiers who’d opened the door, and just recently left the ship from this evacuation zone.

Isara took a moment to wonder whether she should follow it, but her duty was to protect Moneygold and remove any enemies within the ship. She didn’t have the authority to abandon that post and chase after some unidentified entity.

Even if that weren’t the case, her instincts were telling her that she would die if she chased it.

And then, the situation suddenly shifted once again.

“The ship...stopped?” Eltram began to shake as it slowed down and finally stopped in place.

What happened at the bridge? Isara thought. Unaware that the DLG had removed the energy core, Isara assumed that something must’ve happened to the ship’s controls.

Considering that and the odd occurance in the cargo area, she decided meeting up with Moneygold would be the best course of action.

With that in mind, she rushed toward the bridge. In her hand, she still held the shard she’d picked up at the cargo area.

Its texture was exactly the same as that of the object Moneygold had bought yesterday—one of the national treasures of Huang He, the Treasurebeast Orb.

There was only one thing, she realized, that could have come out of that cargo hold and exited the ship.