Chapter 16 — I’m More Obsessed with You Than I Realized. I Love You, So Please Come Back.
Kris hit the floor. The shock of the impact traveled straight through her to Hanakawa, delivering enough force that he thought his neck might snap, before she unceremoniously threw him to the ground.
“Heal! Heal!”
Sprawled on the ground, Hanakawa desperately healed himself. His magical energy was depleted as his injuries vanished. Once the pain subsided, he stood up.
“Could I perhaps bother you to treat me with a little more respect?! You may see me as nothing more than food, but that in itself is rather hurtful!”
“Hmm. I couldn’t really care less. In the end, food is chewed up anyway, so what does its appearance matter?”
“Visuals play an important role in defining taste! Do you not want me to be at my best flavor?!” For some reason, Hanakawa was appealing to improve his own flavor.
“I guess so. I’ll try to be careful, then.”
Everything around them was dark. The amount of light streaming in from the opening above wasn’t much, so Hanakawa could barely see anything. It was no problem for Kris, though, as she just walked on.
“I cannot imagine I will be able to follow you like this.”
Completely blind, he would have to follow her by sound alone, but having never done something like that before, he wasn’t confident that he could actually manage it.
“I guess I have no choice,” Kris sighed, coming to a stop.
Soon after, a light appeared over Hanakawa’s head. Looking up, he saw a glowing sphere hovering a few meters above him. Whatever magic had been used to create seemed to have linked it to his movements, causing it to follow him as he walked.
“I got a skill that lets me do that.”
“You can do more or less anything now, can’t you?”
Hanakawa looked around. They were inside a stone building. Large pillars lined the room, supporting the lofty ceiling. It gave him the impression of an underground labyrinth.
“Now then. Where is the skill bearer?”
“This way.” Kris walked off, and Hanakawa hurried up to walk alongside her.
“Out of curiosity, has your appetite for me begun to sublimate into a state of affection yet? Perhaps you’ve come to feel that eating me is a waste and you would prefer to set me free so that I might find happiness?”
“No. Actually, I’m starting to get even more hungry. My aversion to eating another person is still stronger for the moment, but I’ve begun to salivate whenever I look at you.”
“How repulsive. One of the few times a woman has ever taken interest in me...and it’s as food?”
The situation was as dangerous as ever. He knew it wasn’t safe to simply be swept along and follow her around, but there wasn’t much else he could do.
Considering how things have worked out up until now, the chance that something extremely bizarre will happen to totally transform the situation is rather high. The best he could do was hope that his luck would hold.
Continuing deeper into the labyrinth, the ceiling dropped lower and the corridor grew narrower. It began to fork in multiple places, creating exactly the kind of maze that he had imagined.
“So, where is the person with the rare skill?”
It would be bad for his heart to happen upon them out of nowhere. He asked in hopes of having time to prepare himself for the encounter.
“They’re close. Horizontally, they’re about a hundred meters away, but they also seem to be a floor below us.”
“So...the fight is almost upon us?”
“They’ve just ascended. They’re on the same floor as us now. Seventy meters ahead.”
“How many of them are there?”
“Three.”
“Have you stopped to consider that they may be more powerful than you are? If your opponents have rare skills, is there not a considerable possibility that they are incredibly strong?”
“I’ll cross that bridge when I get to it. There’s always a chance I’ll run into a fight I can’t win, so there’s no point cowering in fear. And in my case, there’s the possibility of a single strike allowing me to steal their skill and turn the tide. My ability to steal skills is perfectly suited to killing extremely powerful foes.”
They continued on in search of the rare skill-holder. If their opponent was moving, they would show up sooner rather than later.
The corridor went straight for a time before turning a corner, so the enemy would likely come from there.
“Here I go.”
Following the principle of “he who strikes first wins,” Kris dashed towards the curve. Three figures appeared from around it, and she was immediately blown away, sent flying straight past Hanakawa.
“Excuse me?!” Hanakawa cried.
There were three people in front of him: a girl who stood as if having just delivered a kick, an arrogant man dressed like a common thug, and a girl with shields floating around her. He didn’t recognize the last one, but the first two were the Sage Yoshifumi and one of his Four Heavenly Kings, Rena.
Hanakawa turned to check on Kris. She was lying motionless on the ground. The huge hole in her stomach would have meant instant death to an ordinary human.
“Hanakawaaaaaaaa!” Yoshifumi yelled. “You bastard! How dare you run away from meeeeeee!”
“I-I’m sorryyyyyyyyy!” He immediately dropped to his hands and knees.
“You’ve got guts to show up in front of me again!” The Sage was furious.
“I’ll explain! Please, allow me to explain! I promise! I definitely did not leave your side of my own free will!”
“Who the hell cares? The point is, you ran away without my permission!”
“Be quiet, Yoshifumi,” Rena interrupted. “At least let him talk. If he was planning on running from you, why would he be wandering around here?”
“Huh? Oh, I guess that’s a good point.”
As the Sage decided to hear him out, Hanakawa immediately took the chance to spill his guts.
“It was Malnarilna! Those damned goddesses made me one of their apostles and tried to force me to do their work! They instructed me to go kill Yogiri Takatou! I had no desire to comply, but they were gods! There was no way for me to resist them! Following their demand that I slay Yogiri Takatou, they summoned me to his side! Even though I had no intention of engaging in combat with him! After that, the lady that Miss Rena kicked away captured me as livestock! She planned on eating me in the future! In truth, you have saved me! Thank you ever so much, Miss Rena! Shall I lick your feet in thanks?”
“Why would you even ask that? That’s disgusting.”
“Oh? Malnarilna, huh?” Yoshifumi said. “I thought they said they’d leave the Sages alone.”
“I know nothing about that arrangement! They appeared to me in a dream!”
“Well, even if you didn’t want to betray me, regardless of the situation, I need to set an example!”
“Umm! Actually, I would like to request that you save me! She still very much intends to eat me!”
“The hell? She’s dead.”
“Killing her isn’t good enough!”
As Hanakawa pointed behind him, Kris was rising to her feet. The hole in her stomach had closed. He never expected such an injury to actually kill her.
“Ugh, does she come back to life after dying too?” Rena groaned.
Yoshifumi snorted. “Well, I guess I can save you.”
“Really?!”
“But rules are rules.”
“What do you mean?”
“You’ll be spinnin’ the turbines under the capital. You’ll be worked so hard that you’ll lose all that disgusting fat in no time.”
“Gah, are you serious?! Could you not show a little mercy? I was just thrown about with no regard to my will!”
“Nope. A crime is a crime.”
Hanakawa contemplated the situation for a moment. In the end, he found the prospect of forced labor more appealing than being eaten. And regardless of the Sage’s words, Yoshifumi had taken an interest in Hanakawa. He didn’t expect things would go that poorly for him.
“Very well! I will accept any punishment, so please save me!” Still on his hands and knees, he scuttled over to the Sage’s group.
“How do you even move like that?” Yoshifumi asked.
“Gross...”
Hanakawa moved quickly behind Yoshifumi. From the Sage’s shadow, he looked back at Kris, who was staring directly at him.
“Ahh...so this is what they mean by ‘You don’t know what you have until it’s gone.’ I’m more obsessed with you than I realized. I love you, so please come back.”
“You only love me as a food! I refuse! Now! Please do something about her!”
“What exactly is going on between you two? Whatever. Rena, deal with her.”
“What? What am I supposed to do against someone who comes back to life?”
“Vivian, do you have any idea how she’s doing that?” Yoshifumi asked the girl with the shields.
“How should I know?!”
“If you’re not useful, I’ll turn you back to stone. Use your Search Shield or whatever to figure it out.”
Vivian paused for a moment before reluctantly replying. “It’s pretty simple. She has a number of spare lives. Beating her is easy; you just need to kill her until she runs out.”
“There you go. Good luck.”
“Whaaaat?! Can’t you turn her to stone?!”
“Listen, I’m the emperor. You get it? EM-PER-OR. Why should I be fighting on the front lines? You should be doing everything you can to protect me, even if I don’t order you to.”
“Except you’re the one who keeps stepping out on the front lines!”
“I’m just doin’ whatever I want. And right now, I don’t wanna fight.”
“In addition, she possesses an ability to steal skills from anyone she cuts with her sword! If she lands a single blow, you will likely be defeated!” Hanakawa would be in a lot of trouble if Yoshifumi didn’t win. He wanted to increase their chances of winning as much as possible.
Vivian clicked her tongue, disappointed. It seemed she had known about Kris’s power and intentionally said nothing.
“Is that so? Good luck.”
“Fine, fine. I just have to not get hit, right?”
Rena stretched out her right hand.
A beam of light erased the top half of Kris’s body. She regenerated in an instant, but Rena continued firing. If getting cut was a problem, she was happy to fight from a distance.
“How many lives does she have?” Yoshifumi asked Vivian.
“About ten thousand?”
“That’s way too many!” Hanakawa exclaimed.
“I dunno, I think she can manage ten thousand.” The Sage shrugged.
“She can?!”
Rena’s strength was overwhelming. Her attacks fired at the speed of light, making avoiding them impossible. When the light struck, it created an explosion that caught everything in the area around it. Kris didn’t seem to have any way to fight back.
Then she suddenly disappeared.
“Oh!”
In that moment, Hanakawa remembered that Kris had the ability to teleport next to him. Appearing in the space between Rena and Hanakawa, she thrust her favorite sword forward.
A strike from a blind spot. Normally, one would have no way to dodge such an attack, but Rena blocked it with a shield.
“Hey! That’s my shield!”
“Thanks for lending it to me.”
Rena had grabbed one of the shields floating in the air around Vivian and used it to defend herself.
“I also forgot to mention, she has the ability to teleport to me!”
“Don’t forget things like that,” Yoshifumi complained. “Get outta here.”
He delivered a swift kick to Hanakawa, who was still on his hands and knees. The kick sent him rolling down the hallway. Rena kicked Kris in the opposite direction. Now at a safe distance from her once again, Rena resumed her fire.
“Huh? If she teleports to me now, will I not be caught in the crossfire?”
“Don’t worry about it. This kid can bring you back to life.”
“No, no, no! Dying is absolutely unacceptable! Miss Kris, if you truly love me, please do not come over here!”
But now that she had shown her hand, she must have known the trick wouldn’t work again.
Actually, Miss Rena is much more powerful than I realized...
Hanakawa had underestimated her quite a bit. She was good enough to keep Kris at a distance despite all the skills Kris had obtained.
“I wondered what was going on, but this looks like fun.”
Hanakawa jumped at the voice coming from behind him. There shouldn’t have been anyone there.
“Huh? Who are you?” Turning around, he saw a young man in a white coat.
“I kind of got lost. I didn’t know what to do, but then I heard you guys being noisy, so I came this way.”
“I see...”
“Oh, don’t mind me. I’m just here to watch.”
The boy sat down beside Hanakawa. Neither the women fighting nor the spectators seemed to notice his presence.
“I don’t know how I feel about that...” This mysterious kid had shown up out of nowhere. Hanakawa couldn’t let his guard down.
But the boy was totally at ease, wasting no time getting friendly with him. “Who do you think will win?”
“I imagine the winner will be Miss Rena. Miss Kris seems unable to fight back. She has already lost her sword, so her ability to steal skills is useless to her.”
Whenever she died, Kris came back to life, but it didn’t restore her equipment. Her sword had been vaporized, and her armor had been blown off, leaving her almost naked.
“That one is Kris, huh? Looks like she has about a thousand lives left.”
“You see? She had ten thousand at the beginning. If she has lost so many already, she is more or less finished.”
“No, Kris hasn’t gotten serious yet.”
“Even after being killed so many times?”
Rena’s beam of light suddenly shot off in a wild direction. Kris had deflected it with her hand.
“The Foundation Eater is starting to take over much faster. Do you think she’ll run out of lives before that happens?”
Kris still wasn’t able to avoid the beams of light. That deflection must have been a coincidence. But eventually, the beams stopped punching through her. Even though they struck her head on, they weren’t blowing her away like before.
She unleashed a bloodcurdling scream. Was that from the pain of Rena’s attacks or her mind being corrupted? Her body began to transform. Her skin turned dark and solid. Something like wings began to grow from her back, and her fingers extended into razor sharp claws.
“Wait! What’s going on?!” Confused, Rena continued firing her beams of light. One struck Kris directly in the face, but she was unharmed. At this point, Rena’s attacks weren’t hurting her in the least.
“I don’t think a human will be able to beat her now.”
“She has turned into an actual monster...”
“HaNaKaWa...WAiT...I’lL KiLl ThEm AlL...AnD gO...to YoU...”
“I thought perhaps she had lost her mind, but she definitely remembers me, doesn’t she?!”
“Oh, so your name is Hanakawa? I’m Takumi. Nice to meet you.”
At this point, Hanakawa could only pray that Yoshifumi’s group would somehow prevail.
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