ch81-ch100 · 084-ch83

Chapter 83

A two-and-a-half-meter giant moving more agilely than a dog or a cat and lunging at you was, to put it plainly, terror itself.

— Hah!

Even so, Shirazawa Kana worked her chain whip, timing the instant the whip tip hit maximum speed to the face of the thing-that-had-been-Seno Kyohei, slipping aside, flipping backward, and landing.

Before becoming an explorer, she couldn't have pulled off anything like that.

Even fresh after getting her license, she probably couldn't have.

Now she could. To take mana into your body meant this.

And — even such an inhuman explorer, against the beast in front of her, was effectively powerless. That much she could feel.

She repeated the move several times.

Bait the beast with a half-hearted charge, snap the whip, backstep. Back, back. When she hit a dead end, slip right or left, and retreat again.

"Keh, kah, hahaha — you're pretty good, Shirazawaa!"

Rumbling a laugh in his throat, Seno rubbed his face. As if mocking Kana for keeping her distance, he closed in slowly.

The whip, swung well, can have its tip exceed the speed of sound — but it was also a tricky weapon to use to actually hit an enemy at supersonic speed. Just swinging it doesn't generate the velocity; the return energy has to transmit to the tip in the instant it grazes the sound barrier.

Honestly, she'd only gotten decent at handling the chain whip recently. At maximum concentration like now, seven out of ten swings hit at supersonic speed.

The chain whip Kana used was made of an alloy called magic iron that conducted mana well, and she channeled mana all the way to the chain's tip to break through the enemy's mana barrier. Putting mana into your weapon was an explorer's basic.

"...You've gotten pretty crazy yourself, Seno-kun."

Facing the beast, who hadn't taken a single point of damage, Kana nonetheless put up a front and let out a hollow laugh.

"Kahah! Right?! If there was a mirror, even I'd back away. Didn't think I'd end up like this — but once you're like this, it feels pretty good, you know?"

"Why did you end up like that?"

Partly to buy time, but mostly because she genuinely didn't understand, she voiced the question. To begin with — why was Seno Kyohei in this state?

With the half-hearted pace of an adult playing tag at half speed, Seno raised both arms, chuckled wetly, and approached. A boulder-skinned giant closing in like a springtime pervert was, to put it bluntly, grotesque — but she didn't feel much threat to her virtue.

He'd said he'd violate her and kill her.

But she felt something close to conviction. This man didn't want to violate her. She'd explored labyrinths with him countless times in the same club, and Seno had never directed sexual desire at her. Now she could understand, could be sure.

What this man had been seeing through Shirazawa Kana — was Hayasaka Toru.

"Who knows! But now that I'm like this, I'm gonna do whatever I please!"

Whum — an arm swung.

A strike Kana could see, could dodge — a clearly held-back one. And yet the force felt like heavy machinery moving.

"Are you really that hung up on Hayasaka-kun?"

Exaggerated backstep, putting distance, swinging the chain whip. Paan — striking Seno's face at the speed of sound, to no effect whatsoever.

The reaction was about the level of a gnat flying too close to his face being annoying — Seno rubbed his cheek and walked slowly toward her again.

"Hayasaka, huh... I wanna make that shit-for-brains delusional bastard get it."

A low growl in his throat.

The words were skimming the surface, barely forming meaning — Kana could tell. Because he wasn't speaking his real feelings.

"Ever since getting your nose broken, you've been obsessed with him the whole time, haven't you. Hayasaka-kun."

The moment she said it, Seno's massive body moved at a speed she couldn't track.

By the time she registered it, she'd already been sent flying, her consciousness flickering light-dark-light-dark for about two-tenths of a second. The crash of her back against the wall was because she'd been retreating and retreating and had hit another T-junction.

"...!"

Injury — her left shoulder wouldn't move. Hit carelessly, her left collarbone was broken. Frantically looking up, the boulder-skinned beast stood with both arms spread, rumbling in his throat.

"Fun, isn't it, Shirazawa. You're the one who's been obsessed with him this whole time. A woman who got dumped because she couldn't even support her boyfriend when he lost everyone in the 'Dungeon Rampage' — you don't have any right to talk about me, do you?"

"I know I'm clinging. I'm aware. Because I love him. You can't help not being able to forget the person you love. So what, you love Hayasaka-kun?"

The moment she said it with a smile, a fist with the speed and force to punch through Kana's stomach — slammed into the labyrinth wall. She'd been absolutely sure he'd snap, so she'd dodged pre-emptively without even seeing it, and it just happened to work out.

She tumbled along the floor, grimacing at the pain in her left shoulder, and with her right hand — still gripping the whip — she pounded the floor and used the rebound to haul herself up.

"Don't fuck with me, Shirazawaa!"

"I'm not fucking with you. I get it. Hayasaka-kun's strong. You're weak, Seno-kun. You're weak. You can't understand yourself unless you compare yourself to the people around you. You can't feel confident unless you confirm you're better than everyone else. Hayasaka-kun doesn't have to do any of that."

"SHADDAPPPP!"

He charged — so she met him with the whip.

Bashan. The chain shattered with that sound. Like a beaded accessory yanked hard. She'd thought the relative velocity would multiply the force — but it turned out the gap in raw strength was on a totally different level. That was all.

Almost simultaneously, an impact like being hit by a car.

This time she took Seno's charge dead-on, senseless, sent flying. She had to grab hold of her fading consciousness by force and drag it back, or she'd black out and it'd be too late. Seno probably didn't want to violate her — but if he concluded that violating her would enrage Hayasaka Toru, he might do it anyway.

Hang time — probably more than two seconds.

Thrown to one side of the T-junction, falling back-first onto the floor. Sliding across it like a curling stone, by the time she stopped she could feel that several ribs were broken. She didn't even know how she'd been hit — but probably, he'd held back.

"You're weaaaak! Just small fry who couldn't even become an explorer, like Hayasaka! Calling someone like that strong — your eyes are rotten! He only doesn't look weak because he's got nothing! Screw what people around think, right!? I'm better than everyone! I'm amazing compared to other guys! I'm worth more than you! That's the kind of place we're in! And he's the only one who stepped down from a place like that, with this 'none of my business' look on his face! He's small fry who ran from what normal people have to deal with!"

His tone shifted partway back to that of a normal human.

Looking, the rocky skin around his throat and mouth was starting to crumble, exposing something nauseatingly like skinned flesh underneath.

Kana dragged her reeling consciousness back by force, hauled her screaming body upright. It took about five seconds to stand, but Seno didn't follow up — just approached slowly.

"He's weak because he's not in the group? That's exactly why he's not even in Hayasaka-kun's field of vision. He didn't ignore school rules. Group stuff didn't seem to be his strength, but he didn't disrupt the harmony either. Even when he lost everyone, he didn't become a criminal — he properly paid his taxes and lived. He stood alone — within everyone!"

"That's bottom-tier trash! So what! Holy Sword, Cursed Blade, what!? Why does only that coward get to be special! Me! It should've been me!"

"Impossible. You're weak, Seno-kun. You know why you're weak?"

Weapons. She had no weapons. The chain whip was torn and broken. The short whip — probably lost when her collarbone got broken. Spare knife in the magic bag, but no time to pull it out. No choice — just move her mouth and buy time.

She was probably going to die. By any reckoning, she wasn't going to make it. She was sorry that Hayasaka-kun would find her body. But that would surely become a wound on his heart. He'd never forget.

Truly unsalvageable — but if she became his wound and he never forgot her, then that wasn't such a bad way to die, she thought.

"Trying to one-up people — I'm more amazing, I'm higher, I'm cooler. He's weaker, more pathetic, lamer... in the end, that's all just reading the room, having to change how you act based on which way the wind blows. You're a slave to other people."

A mother who'd kept apologizing even as she was hit, cursed, emotionally abused by her father.

Because she'd lacked the confidence to take Kana and live on her own after leaving him.

Probably — she'd been trying to protect Kana by enduring.

Even though she had to have known it was wounding Kana's heart all along.

In this world, you have to stand on your own, alone.

You have to draw lines, and slug anyone who crosses them.

The one I fell for —

"— I look up to Hayasaka-kun."

Weak, alone, without explorer talent. Not the conspicuous type in class. Doesn't laugh with a big voice. Not the type who finds joy in entertaining others. Doesn't puff himself up to raise his standing above anyone. Halting of speech except when he's being sarcastic or complaining, kind but terrible at showing it, a bit of a slacker.

But — he stood, alone, for sure.

Even when shaken by something else, without blaming anyone.

"So you can't do it, Seno-kun. You know that yourself, don't you. Holy Sword and Cursed Blade? Even if you had them, you'd get full of yourself and flame out somewhere. You could never be Hayasaka Toru. Because you're weak. That's why I look up to him."

He vanished from her field of vision.

Without another word, Seno closed on Kana with teleport-like speed, and the moment she thought he'd disappeared, her right shoulder was wrecked. She didn't know what he'd done, but the fact that he hadn't finished her in one hit meant some reason still held.

He couldn't throw it away.

A man who couldn't even truly snap.

No sooner had she groaned in pain than Seno's hand reached for Kana's throat. Gripped, hoisted into the air. Lifted by a two-and-a-half-meter giant, she found herself strung up higher than she'd expected — such a pointless thought crossed her mind.

It hurt. But not enough to die.

"Bet I hit a nerve... huh. You went to college, became an explorer, I thought you were doing it really seriously — but in the end, you just wanted to stand above Hayasaka-kun. Even though Hayasaka-kun probably never thinks of you even once."

"...But he'll think of you."

He said it quietly.

The end of a pointless exchange. The end of an argument. The border between life and death. Once you're here, you can only do it. That's where things had gotten to. But from Kana's perspective, that was idiotic. The moment he became a beast, he should've already passed the point of no return.

To still think of yourself as a decent human being.

To think that killing Kana might let you step outside of that.

"You really are an idiot. You should've just asked to be friends. Stopped reading the room, hung out with friends and done fun stuff."

The rocky beast's hand crushed her throat.

It'd probably crush in under two seconds.

Ahh — I wanted to see you one more time.

I won't ask to be lovers again. I just wanted to sit next to you once more, and talk about nothing. I wanted you to give a small shrug at some pointless thing I said. I wanted you to deliver some sarcasm I never could've predicted.

If this is what I'm thinking at the very end, it's not so bad.

So thinking, she closed her eyes. No — she couldn't keep them open anymore. Strangled, oxygen no longer reaching her brain. Another second before her neck was crushed? Or less?

———— Znchuri,

And.

A strange sound, and she fell.

Her body hit the floor, and the pain in her arms and collarbone and ribs yanked her consciousness back by force. She was supposed to die like falling asleep, but the pain shook her awake, and her brain couldn't process the information fast enough — conversely, she could think of nothing.

Gunk, a heavy sound — that was the arm that had been hoisting Kana, falling to the labyrinth floor. Why Kana had fallen first, she didn't really understand.

Anyway, look forward.

The back of the person she loved most.

The person she loved most in this world — holding the crimson-black Cursed Blade, more abhorrent than anything else in this world, stood between Seno and Kana, and murmured.

"Ah... sorry. Bit late."

Don't say it like we're meeting at some ordinary spot.

Because I'll start crying.