Volume 1 – Following the Maze Drawn With Lines of Blood
Mary immediately closed in on Magrat.
He frantically faced her attack with Hermit’s ball, but because of the overwhelming mana difference, it was cut in half like a soap bubble.
“You’re an arcana user too, but you have no hopes or dreams!”
“Aaaaaagh!”
Mary diagonally slashed with the blade on her left arm.
Magrat backed off and dodged.
But Mary’s blade was far lighter than her scythe, so she could attack again quicker than he withdrew.
Magrat used a ball to intercept Mary’s rotating swing.
He could not stop her attack like this, of course, but he managed to create a gap of a few seconds and evaded instant death.
“Ugggh!”
Magrat was deeply cut in his chest.
“Stubborn!”
Saying that, Mary turned towards Magrat and shot a blade from her chest.
The blade shot in a straight line towards Magrat’s heart, and he barely inclined his body in time to dodge it while the sharp tip stabbed his right breast.
“Gah!…… Geh!…… Guh……!”
Magrat spat blood and staggered backwards.
“Ahh…… Ahh…… You’re so mean…… Just kill me already…… So I can painlessly move on to the next one……”
“It’s your fault for dodging. That’s proof you don’t want to die, isn’t it? Because this is the end.”
“You’re wrong. I’m scared, scared of dying. It’s something instinctual. Even I don’t want to die if possible……”
“You don’t get to say that after possessing the bodies of so many people!”
“I didn’t know. Until you killed me in the Valley of the Death God…… I didn’t know my true form……”
A nothingness visible through a gap in madness.
That was the first humanity he had shown so far.
Mary naturally did not care about something like that, but she felt that she had a guess as to what his true form was, and listened to him for just a little while.
“Ahh…… Pheew…… When I woke up, they were all lined up…… Me, that is. Kehh…… I thought it was a bad dream, until Digi laughed and said, ‘This is real’. I’m a homunculus…… I was born only 2 years ago. All my memories before that were implants…… fakes. That’s why Hemlock treated me like a brother, and sympathized with me. That’s why no one taught me anything about arcana……”
“Two years ago…… Pupa was still making those things?”
“Huh? You don’t seem that surprised. Geh, goh…… Wait, was it actually pretty common? You’re not normal either?”
“But it’s my first time seeing such an unsightly homunculus like you.”
“Aha…… hah, guh…… I’m honored…… But, what are you gonna do……?”
“About what?”
“You heard me. Below us, in a hideout…… My spares…… are sleeping. If you kill me now, it’s just going to activate one of them. Hihehehe, buhuh!…… Ugh…… Slaughtering people is crazy enough, but…… To kill me, you have to go, a little crazier y’know?”
Magrat’s face gradually went paler.
He would soon die from blood loss if he was left like this.
Despite that, he was still keeping his provocative smile.
He knew that he was a homunculus, a mass-produced tool to be used up, but he was still looking forward to the future.
Perhaps he could have lived a proper life if he had used that optimism for something other than killing.
If he was a soul that did not reside in any other bodies, a soul that used to be pure, Mary could have sympathized with him.
But, she had no leeway to sympathize with a developed, and now stagnant man like this.
“The last survivor is in my right arm. You’re not transferring to a spare underground, you’re going inside my arm.”
In other words, Magrat was not going to transfer to a spare in his hideout after he died.
He was going inside Mary’s arm.
Magrat laughed with joy after hearing that.
“Haha, okay, nice crazy. I’ll die in your arm then, bitch.”
Mary crushed his head from above as he smiled while showing his white teeth.
Having transformed into the shape of a dragon’s head, her arm was as powerful as a hammer.
His corpse became unrecognizable after the sounds of his bones breaking and flesh being crushed.
Then, Mary started hearing the groanings of a man inside her arm.
The transformation began. At that moment, Mary started chewing him.
Blood began flowing out from the gaps between her teeth.
After she swallowed and digested him, she sensed a new power residing in her body.
“Hermit, I’ve got you. That means…… I can be at ease, because I’ll never see that face again.”
With that, one more filthy life that took part in her sister’s death was erased from the world.
“Sister, I’ll keep going like this and kill Dugan too. Please watch me.”
Mary put her hand on her chest, informing her sister who was surely watching Mary.
Then Mary headed for the exit.
She turned around once just before going outside and stared at the empty space.
Mary bit her lips and faintly squinted her eyes before turning around for good and heading outside.
◇◇◇
Meanwhile, Cutie and Platy’s fight continued.
Having transformed into an angel, Platy was gradually getting more used to her new body, and Cutie was learning how to use the wings on her back in order not to lose.
However, Platy, whose entire body had transformed into something inhuman, could do a lot more than Cutie.
“Ugh, guh…… Well, how about this!?”
She tore off her own left arm and threw it at Cutie.
“Platy, how far will you go? Hnnnngh!”
Platy’s arm burst open in the air and exploded into countless knives.
They were more spread out than the knives Platy was throwing herself, so the density of the knives swooping down on Cutie was higher.
Cutie frantically tried to get out of their range, but she could not make it in time and crossed her arms before transforming her clothes into an animal to defend herself.
Platy’s attack was too fast to see, so Cutie could not evade it.
“Ugh, uugh……!”
Fortunately, the knives did not hit vital spots like Cutie’s head or her heart, but gouged out her shoulders and calves.
Cutie clenched her teeth and endured the pain running through her body.
“I can’t catch you because I’m still captive to human common sense. But I am no longer human. I have to fight in a way which matches that fact.”
“Hey, I’m gradually losing my chance to win here.”
This time, Platy grew and shot knives from all around her body.
Cutie painfully used her wings to evade while sweat dripped down her forehead.
“Well, I never intended on winning anyway! My job is to buy time!”
The attack seemed to be a setback in terms of tactics, but the ejected knives were drawing a curved line instead of a straight one.
“They’re chasing me!?”
“The will to go after a human being’s life. I simply let out my instincts of metamorphosis.”
Platy’s had slowed down, but the knives were still a lot faster than Cutie.
She bit her lips as the knives approached her.
(Their tracking isn’t flawless. I can dodge right before they hit me!)
Cutie intentionally stopped mid-air, and suddenly flew higher right before the knives hit her.
Half of the knives kept going in a straight line and missed their target.
But the remaining ones kept chasing her and cut her skin.
Cutie turned her body and avoided any vital injuries.
The speed and power of the knives were lower than the ones who went straight ahead, but they still cut Cutie just by grazing her.
Platy was on the ground already getting ready to attack again.
Cutie saw this in the edge of her sight and was about to increase her speed further, but……
“Crap, my wings!?”
Her wings were cut by the knives earlier and she could not fly any more.
Cutie fell down.
“Aaaaaaaaah!”
She instinctively shouted as she fell from a height of a few dozen meters.
“Ugh!”
She transformed her clothes into a cushion right before hitting the ground and avoided slamming against the ground.
But she could not react to Platy’s next attack now.
“Goodbye, Cutie.”
Cutie crawled on the ground as Platy held knives in both hands and prepared to throw again.
(It’s all over. I suppose I’m not good at fighting, after all.)
Sometimes giving up is the key.
She remembered her father telling her that, and gave up.
Platy’s arms moved, then her body was cut in half.
“Huh……?”
“Wha!?”
Cutie was dumbfounded.
Platy was in shock.
After the slash, the figure of the Death God became visible behind the angel.
“Hehe…… Looks like it’s my hard-fought win.”
“Mary Pulsherima!? This timing! But this is my opportunity!”
Platy was surprised, but she immediately went on the attack.
The lower half of her body which was dismembered bulged out like a balloon and exploded after turning towards Mary.
Mary did not try to dodge, and just inclined her body before creating a wall of bones to protect her vital parts like her heart and head.
The other parts of her body were torn to shreds.
“Arcana Installation, Hanged Man.”
As a result, Mary’s mana rapidly increased and temporarily climbed up to nearly 40,000.
She supported herself with bone limbs and grew two massive arms from her back.
Platy was on the ground with only the upper half of her body remaining, and could do nothing but look up at Mary.
“As an inhuman thing, it looks like I’m one step higher than you.”
Mary spoke in a self-mocking manner before raising her arms up high.
“Myriad Corpses, Burial Hammer!”
“Aaah, noooooo!”
She swung downward and crushed Platy from above her head.
Thump! The sound of her hitting the ground echoed in the area.
The stone paving broke and a hole opened.
Mary’s arms disappeared, and all that was left behind were the broken remains of Platy.
Cutie crawled towards the hole and saw the remaining flesh gathering in one spot to transform into a mouth.
“……That’s unfair, Cutie.”
“I told you at the start. I couldn’t win with this much of a mana gap, but I could endure until she joined me.”
“You have no feelings……”
“Unlike my father, I’m a realist.”
“But…… Maybe this is the best outcome for me.”
“Platy, you……”
“I think I can tell him in the afterlife. I can tell his Highness that I want to be his daughter……”
She did not have the strength to keep speaking, and the mouth slowly turned back into a lump of meat.
Platy did not move again after that.
Cutie sorrowfully looked at her before Mary spoke up.
“Was she your friend?”
“I wouldn’t say that. But we passed by each other a few times during my life.”
“Everything is so complicated.”
“Yeah…… This or that, in the end, Platy yearned for something too. To be a daughter and have a father.”
Cutie sighed, ‘Ahh’, and her expression went back to normal.
Still, her body was full of injuries, and she looked like she could collapse any moment.
She looked up and tried to talk to Mary while staggering.
Mary frantically held her up.
“Aah…… Thanks for saving me, Mary.”
Cutie looked embarrassed as her cheeks faintly flushed.
These words were comforting for Mary.
She smiled, and calmly replied, ‘You’re welcome’.