◎ Trade City Uumin, Feudal Lord's Mansion, Courtyard, Kazane Cottage
「Haaah」
A heavy sigh leaked. It was from Kazane. Naoki's expression also wasn't very good, but likely because he had been in this world longer, he was more accustomed to people dying. The same was true for the inhabitants of this city.
The day after they defeated the Brutuzas and returned to Uumin. Since 10 days had passed, Naoki was able to summon Heroic Spirit Fuune, so he performed treatment on the Hirukos.
As a result, about half of the Hirukos who were exposed to『Light from Heaven』successfully turned back into humans. That was more than Louise initially expected, but conversely, half were dead.
The Hirukos who didn't return to normal retained their black tar-like appearances as they disappeared, so in the end, who died was unknown. The residents had also been notified that it was difficult to treat the Hirukos who had been preserved by Crystallization, so the people who hadn't been seen since the incident were considered dead for the time being. All of that follow-up was in place, but as was a matter of course, some people broke down crying when the people they were searching for weren't among the rescued, and both Kazane and Naoki witnessed them.
(... This is draining)
Kazane thought. It wasn't Kazane and the others' fault. Kazane and the others had dealt with the incident so well that it could be asserted that there was nothing more they could have done. In the first place, if Kazane and the others hadn't been there, the city would have been destroyed. However, no matter how many details like that were listed in her head, the thorns piercing her heart wouldn't come out. The feeling of regret continued to remain.
「Nya」
Yuuko-nee licked Kazane's cheek.
「Yeah, thank you. I know.」
After Yuuko-nee comforted her, Kazane nodded. Tatsuo also looked worried. Kazane also understood. She was doing the best she could. Blaming herself any further would be conceited.
Above all,『who was most at fault』?
Everything was caused by『devils』. Kazane understood that this tragedy happened because of their existence. But there was also something else she was worried about.
(Since Yuuko-nee extracted Shippuu's soul from me, it's already definite, isn't it?)
They discovered it when making the cocoon of Jinrai's partner Shippuu. After Yuuko-nee synchronized with Kazane, she noticed the soul of her underling inside Kazane and pulled it out to create Shippuu.
(Players are probably similar to devils. Or perhaps a devil dwells inside them.)
Kazane tightly squeezed her hand.
The explanation of the level-up mechanism in the game『Zexiaharts』was as follows:
The players who appeared in Zexiaharts were called Foreigners inside the game. And Foreigners improved their abilities by battling monsters and absorbing their life force when they killed them. The reason Foreigners had such a power was because a devil dwelled in their bodies, and they offered souls to that devil to gain power.
Kazane talked about that with Yumika when she first came to this world.
If this world was in accordance with that explanation, Kazane and the others had a devil inside their bodies. Since the soul of Yuuko-nee's underling had been inside Kazane, there was no doubt that she had the ability to absorb the life force of monsters when she killed them. In that case, it could be inferred that Kazane's ability to acquire Skills when she defeated monsters was related to this soul-stealing specification.
Though everything up to that point was fine. No, it wasn't fine, but she had heard from Yuuko-nee that there were records of players up until now passing away due to normal lifespan; there were also records of some players reviving after death like Yohan and even people that seemed to be reincarnators later on.
In other words, it seemed their souls wouldn't be stolen by a devil after death. Also, Yuuko-nee was Level 96 and didn't seem to be having any problems at present. Since there were also no stories about former players having any such problems, there shouldn't be any difficulties with continuing to fight from now on.
Therefore, Kazane and Yuuko-nee thought there was no problem setting aside the issue of the devils inside players for now. So then, one problem was...
(Why did the devils refuse to fight us?)
When she had fallen over due to Age's magic in Uumin, Kazane had certainly heard.
『It's dangerous for devils like us to kill players, and Kazane is especially irregular, don't you think? So I think I'll have this dispose of her for us.』
So Age said. It was dangerous for a devil to kill a player, so he tried to use Yuuko-nee to dispose of Kazane. In other words, a devil couldn't directly make a move on players like Kazane and the others. In the first place, it was strange that they had the chance to kill Yuuko-nee but simply sealed her consciousness and left her alone instead.
(The souls of players surpass devils... is that what that means? According to Louise-san's words, if a soul eaten by a devil is a higher-ranking soul, the control of the souls inside that devil will be usurped and switched to that soul. With the examples of Yukito and Age, it may be the case that players usurp devils.)
Kazane thought that if that was the case, a devil wouldn't directly attack Kazane and the others as long as they knew that they were players. Since killing a player was meaningless if they would be immediately usurped afterwards. Of course, since there were indirect methods like Age attempted in Uumin, they couldn't be relieved.
However, with all that in mind, another question arose. If Kazane and the others were killed by a devil, they would be able to usurp the devil. Conversely, what would happen if Kazane and the others『killed a devil』?
As a matter of fact, Kazane had already repelled Diablo, the Genzo/devil Hiruko, and Gore. However, in each case, the ways she had killed them couldn't be called normal.
No Comments Yet
Post a new comment
Register or Login