Volume 1 – Following the Maze Drawn With Lines of Blood
Mary leaped into almost certain death in order to save Tinny.
The glass marble was already right in front of Tinny’s eyes.
The ground opened.
A hole suddenly opened up under her feet and her body fell in.
Waiting below her was a pile of sharp needles.
Her expression warped with fear.
“Miss. Tinny, take my hand!”
“Princeeeess!”
Both extended their hands, but the distance was too far. Then, the hand of the dead poked out from inside Mary’s arm.
The white fingers firmly grabbed Tinny’s arm and pulled her closer.
Then Mary moved past the ‘hole’, kicked the wall and tried to change directions.
But the moment she stepped on the wall, the wall twisted and her feet were swallowed.
(So they’re trying to kill me like this!)
Massive arms grew out of her back along with a splash of blood.
Their sharp claws grabbed the wall and the two managed to escape.
But the invisible enemy’s attack continued.
The glass marbles spread all around and the obscure trap on the former ‘wall’ was still active.
The wall Mary’s claws had grabbed melted away and Mary was thrown off balance.
The next wall she extended her arms to exploded, and the flying pieces assaulted the two.
Mary guarded Tinny with one arm as her shoulders and arm were gouged and landed on the floor.
Then, a sharp boulder shot out of the floor aiming for her lower jaw.
She evaded with a backstep.
Immediately afterwards, the wall behind her swelled out as if it had been waiting for this, and……
“Mary, behind you!”
Cutie’s desperate voice echoed.
But Mary didn’t try to evade.
She stopped the sharp edge coming at her with her back.
She used strong bones to protect the part of her body that was hit.
Thunk, a strong shock assailed Mary’s back, and she groaned, ‘Ugh!’
“She flew!?”
She used that momentum to launch herself as her body gained speed like it was shot out of something.
Then, she quickly approached the door of the doctor’s office Cutie was waiting in.
Her strategy to move through the air as much as possible seemed to be effective.
Thanks to this, the walls and the floor exploding and shooting pieces everywhere did not effectively damage her.
(I can leap into the doctor’s office like this!)
Mary had to make every second count, but then she heard a noise above her head.
It was a ventilation opening meant to maintain the air in the facility.
Shining glass marbles coated its metal mesh.
(This is a trap that was set in advance!)
Mary clenched her teeth and further believed that this was an inside job.
Wanting at least to save Tinny, she shouted:
“Take Miss. Tinny!”
“Huuh? Are you telling me to catch her!?”
Mary tossed Tinny’s body in the air.
Then, she formed a protective wall made of bones to block the glass marble attack.
“Fnggh!”
Cutie safely caught Tinny and the two’s bodies rolled into the doctor’s office.
Then, danger quickly followed this momentary safety.
The bones melted away without touching the glass marbles which rained down directly on Mary.
(I used so much mana, but it didn’t work! Is it a power that allows the user to manipulate objects in an area around the spheres? No, that doesn’t explain the transformation in the walls!)
She twisted her body in the air while thinking about how this power worked and repeatedly kicked.
She kicked to clear away the glass marbles, but the first one she touched made her foot bounce back like a water balloon.
“Ugh!”
Mary’s ankles danced in the air and her face twisted with pain.
But as her body contorted, the shock changed her direction and she evaded a direct hit from the glass marbles.
She barely grabbed the ceiling with claws growing from her back and took more distance.
(……The ceiling isn’t melting away. Is it because the required condition isn’t fulfilled?)
She felt reassured that she would not be attacked there.
Many glass marbles fell to the floor.
They bounced, jumped, and scattered around.
She saw this happen and felt uneasy: ‘Something is happening again.’
She felt a stinging pain on the wounds on her legs.
Blood started seeping out and staining the glass marbles on the floor.
Her scraped ankles had already transformed into thin pieces of meat because of her power.
Mary thought about the next move she should make, and looked at the doctor’s office.
The only place she could escape to was the room where Cutie was in.
She put strength into her right leg to launch herself from the ceiling.
However, as expected, something strange occurred.
The floor started making waves as if its surface was water.
No, to be more precise, it was more like ‘rubber’ or a ‘spring’.
The glass marbles were launched by these waves and scattered into the air.
The spacing and density were even, so the entire space was within the enemy’s ‘range’.
A turning, sparkling murderous urge surrounded Mary.
“This is bad, get away, Mary! It’s all over if you die!”
Cutie shouted while sitting in the doctor’s office.
It would be over if the glass marbles touched Mary.
She could not intercept the attack either, as the trajectory was warped.
She thought about how she could evade, and……
(What would my sister do at a time like this?)
She prayed and thought about how she wanted to talk to her again, but that didn’t seem like it would happen.
She had to handle it on her own.
In the end, there was only one thing the Death God could do here.
(Hundred Corpse Burial Scythe!)
A large amount of mana taken from the many corpses she had absorbed – she transformed it into an overwhelming violent power.
Bones started sliding out of her body.
Then, they formed a sharp white blade.
Mary swung it at the ceiling.
“Haaaaaaaaaah!”
She slashed many times at once, carving and breaking the ceiling.
The rubble falling down bounced and broke away when they touched the glass marbles.
The broken pieces touched other glass marbles and further broke apart.
This repeated until all the pieces turned into dust, and the area was surrounded in smoke in the blink of an eye.
Cutie couldn’t help but cover her ears because of the violent noise that sounded like a gunfight was happening.
“Mary, what are you trying to……”
A few seconds after she frantically muttered to herself and heard more bursting noises, she heard a calm voice from behind her.
“Please close the door, Miss. Cutie.”
“Mary!?”
Mary, who was supposed to be outside, was suddenly standing right behind Cutie.
She was supporting her severed legs with bones she grew out of her body.
Cutie quickly closed the door as she was told to, and rushed towards Mary.
“How did you get in!?”
“I made a hole in the ceiling and connected it here.”
Mary pointed up above her head.
Indeed, there was a hole big enough for a person to go through.
It was too quick, but she had managed to carve a hole with that speed.
It wasn’t a hard thing to do for her.
“That was absurd…… So, was all the smoke a part of your plan too?”
“I figured that the enemy couldn’t attack if I blocked their sight.”
“What do you mean?”
“The attacks are too accurate. Leaving aside just automatically killing people, the walls I grabbed melted away, or exploded. The enemy is definitely observing us from somewhere.”
“That’s how they…… Yeah, there are observation cameras in this facility, right?”
Tinny answered Cutie’s doubts:
“Yes, they could be watching from the monitor room.”
“So they might be in there.”
“So there are cameras in this room as well. Mary, you should break the one in that corner of the room.”
Saying that, Cutie pointed to the device on the ceiling.
Mary quickly grew bones from her body and broke it.
She then looked at the destroyed device, and felt relief for a moment, but then started thinking about another possibility.
(I can’t let my guard down just because I broke the camera. They might be observing us directly.)
The enemy would use any means necessary.
With that in mind, Mary looked at Cutie and Tinny, and squinted.