novelThe Sixth Branch in Full Bloom >> Disturbance Intervention in the Soberania District (2)
| ← Ch.082 | Ch.084 → |
Quenser and Nyarlathotep walked along the scorching concrete bank of the glowing orange canal. Their side of the canal was a world of orange lava and the other side was a burning industrial region partially hidden by a tall, broken double fence. The scenery never seemed to change and simply viewing it seemed to wear away one's stamina.
Even so, Quenser kept his feet moving.
This work slowly but surely wore down his life.
For some reason, Nyarlathotep did not seem to like walking in silence, so he kept speaking as he walked alongside Quenser.
"I did quite a lot."
"?"
"The most notable jobs were mostly ways of obstructing an enemy nation's weapons development and manufacturing. I would infiltrate a fighter jet production line and inject some data that would mass produce defective products. Or I would lure them into making a cyber attack where I would let them steal the plans to a decoy reactor. The scientists in lab coats would construct the test reactor and happily blow themselves up on the other side of the planet. They didn't even have time to feel any pain."
"Did you really enjoy tricking people for a living that much?"
"It would be more accurate to say that was the only way I could face society. I didn't become an expert in faking my own death because I wanted to. I screwed up so many times that I had no other way to get by."
Nyarlathotep was an expert spy.
He may have wanted to keep the conversation going so he could keep the mental initiative.
But he may not have had any real goal in mind. It may have been more of a habit, like a squirrel hiding nuts.
"I often worked with Acre Kiss-of-Rose... that is, Azathoth who created an ID with that name."
"What's with those Nyar and Aza names? I don't get it."
"They're nothing more than common pseudonyms. You need to learn more about recreation, boy. He was originally a Capitalist Corporations' spy just like me. Other people often don't accept the things we do for our jobs and it can be difficult getting on everyone's good side or finding a weakness to exploit, so Azathoth decided it would be faster to send someone to the higher ups and have a 'system' created that made it easier for us."
"Just to be clear, he was the CEO of a 7th Core corporation, right?"
"That just shows how well he did for himself. Although it is true he knew how to use the carrot and the stick to control people's hearts like a true spy."
Nyarlathotep stared down the seemingly never-ending path as he continued speaking.
"But once he could command his own Object, a gear seemed to come loose. A change in the earth's crust transformed the equal round table into a distorted pyramid. From there, it became nothing but a series of uninteresting jobs."
"And that's why you took out Acre... I mean, Azathoth?"
"That's skipping a fair bit." The man with the neatly parted hair smiled a little."After my heart was worn down quite a lot, I joined with some others who felt the same and we used my usual method."
"Faking your death?"
"Even as skilled as I am at it, it wasn't easy against that CEO of a major corporation."
While it "wasn't easy", he had managed to pull it off.
That summed up the man's talent and skill.
"Anyway, after erasing all traces of ourselves, we parted ways. I chose my new home in a carefree land near the equator that had plenty of water and a certain level of medical facilities.... In other words, I chose the Soberania District."
"Oh, so was the Soberania Disturbance started because Azathoth was pursuing you?"
"I'm not so sure about that. Personally, I don't think he knew." The man rejected the idea."He was trying to start a new online shopping service known as the Silver Key. It was set to bring in a massive fortune, but that meant it needed a massive amount of jet fuel. That in turn meant he needed a system to safely transport all that fuel by tanker, so he tried to take the Panama Canal while claiming to be wiping out special commandos that would infiltrate large cities and cause largescale damage with detergent, fuel, and other everyday items. That was probably his entire purpose here. Reality isn't always driven by conspiracies or long, drawn-out plans. If it was, I could have cut him off more quickly."
Still, he had killed him.
It did not matter if the man had done it intentionally.
Nyarlathotep raised a finger as spoke.
"There were two tragedies for him. The first was not realizing that I, Nyarlathotep, was here."
He raised a second finger.
"The second was the fact that the self-suggestion I used to seal away my spy skills was broken by the deaths of my wife and son.... If something had been a little different somewhere along the line, I would not have been given that chance to kill him."
"..."
Inside that half-destroyed house, he had claimed he might have walked a different path had a single person in this world been on his side.
This may have been what he had meant.
What if someone had told him ahead of time and he had been given a chance to escape?
What if a hero had appeared and saved his family before his eyes?
What if, when he decided to walk the path of murder, a small hand had remained to grab at the sleeve of his uniform?
Quenser had no reason to support this man.
He understood that, but he still muttered a few words.
"... That is a tragedy."
"Ha ha. What, are you going to believe the words of someone who worked as a spy for over two decades?"
"I believe you."
Nyarlathotep's expression did not change at the blunt admission.
He may have felt a reason to use his ability to fully block any emotion from showing on his face.
"You deceived a lot of people for your work and for your revenge.... But I don't see any reason why you would lie about the story you're leaving behind in the end."
"That's true."
"Even if you're captured by the Legitimacy Kingdom or sent to the international courts via the Blue Cross, you have no future. You're a living corpse. You have no idea if you'll ever come across someone else who won't twist your words to help their organization or for appearances, so you'll take this chance to leave behind what it is you hold inside."
As they spoke, Nyarlathotep suddenly grabbed Quenser's shoulder and tugged him behind a forklift for some kind of maintenance that was so scorched that its paint looked like a blackened banana.
They were hiding, but from what?
The answer was only three hundred meters ahead.
"It's the Legitimacy Kingdom, " whispered Nyarlathotep.
"Dammit!"
Quenser just about clicked his tongue on reflex, but he quickly slammed on the brakes. Fortunately, the soldiers had yet to notice them. Even so, the War Hammer felt extremely heavy hanging from its sling belt.
"Why are they blocking our way? Did they predict where we would go?"
"It wouldn't have been hard since you mentioned the Blue Cross before running off. The safest plan would have been to kill that boy instead of just creating a smokescreen."
Quenser did not have it in him to respond to that.
They were still more than twenty kilometers from the Blue Cross water gate maintenance camp. Even if they slipped past these soldiers, more Legitimacy Kingdom soldiers could easily be patrolling along the rest of the way.
Would they continue on or make a change of plans?
The extreme situation sent sweat pouring down Quenser's face, but something even more ominous approached.
It was a long, deep wing-like sound much like the propellers in an old war movie.
When the student looked up from behind the forklift, his expression crumbled.
The drones that acted as the Miskatonic's anti-personnel eyes in the sky were slowly passing through the dark red sky.
"I can't believe this..."
He spat out the words and stood up from behind the forklift.
It was hard to tell thanks to the hooded cloaks meant to protect against the heat and the sensors, but a close look revealed the soldiers blocking the way (and being observed from the sky) were all boys and girls even younger than Quenser himself.
"Dammit, and that Second Generation's locked onto them! If I don't do something soon, a deadly downpour is gonna fall right on top of them!"
"Can you really save them? They might put a bullet between your eyes the second you show your face."
"Sorry, but while I might be working against them, I'm not their enemy!!"
Loud gunfire rang out as the panicking soldiers started firing their assault rifles into the sky, but Quenser doubted that would help. It would only call in more drones.
Quenser opened a container the size of a vaulting box that sat next to the forklift. There were thick pipes and safety valves inside, but that was not what he was interested in.
Some thick paper was crumpled up inside as cushioning.
"They may be using reciprocating engines, but they can still move at three or four hundred kph, " whispered Nyarlathotep."I doubt you can shoot them down with a bomb launcher."
"Who said that's what I'm doing? Hey, you help too!!"
"Why should I?"
He looked confused, so Quenser clicked his tongue and spoke.
He did not have time for this.
"Was your kid who died a boy or a girl?"
"As I said, he was my son. What about it?"
"Then if he were alive, how old would he be?"
"Isn't that a bit of a cheap shot?"
"How different was he from those kids who are about to be killed over there? Answer me."
"..."
"And this time you can save them. You can make it in time. So think carefully about this."
It was now Nyarlathotep's turn to click his tongue.
They may not have looked anything like him. There may not have been anything in common between the dead boy in his memories and the living people before him. Not their build, not their personality, and not their age.
But the associations made by the human mind were powerful.
Once a connection was made, it was impossible to escape it.
"Fine then... What should I start with?"
"Do you have anything I can tie with? It can be a string, a wire, or whatever else. I need to tie together this paper!"
"And?"
"I'm making a weapon that had its first major debut in the Swedish army's river crossing operation back in 1701!!"
"I see. That does seem like it would be effective."
Quenser worked with Nyarlathotep to tie up the thick paper, stuck a War Hammer fuse inside, and threw each of them into the orange canal one after another.
The loud splashing seemed to have clued the Legitimacy Kingdom boys and girls into their presence, but they could not back off now. Quenser pulled the detonation trigger to set off the fuse inside the paper. With an impact greater than a firecracker, the damp paper burst into flames.
The man with the neatly parted hair faithfully raised both hands but spoke with a thin smile on his face.
"The originals were clumps of straw, so I wonder if these will actually work."
"It doesn't matter if they don't burn perfectly. We already proved this would work back at the Miraflores Water Gate!"
A moment later, black smoke started rising from the paper floating on the water. Just like an octopus or squid would muddy the seawater with ink if they sensed danger, a portion of the scenery was quickly filled with the color black. The heated wind immediately swept the smoke over their heads.
Quenser raised his hands as well and shouted to the soldiers that he still believed where his allies.
"Don't fire! You'll tell them where you are! The heat and smoke will blind their eyes in the sky. All you need is an impromptu smokescreen weapon! If you don't cause a commotion, the Miska-... the Extra Arc's anti-personnel cannons can't target you!!"
A dull metallic sound rang out.
Despite the countless guns aimed his way, Quenser turned just his head toward the sound.
At one or two kilometers away, it was closer than he had expected.
It was the Extra Arc... no, the Miskatonic.
(What happened back at the Miraflores Water Gate? After the drones lost sight of us, what did that monster do once we ran into the forest?)
With a great roar on the opposite bank, the area around the Miskatonic was surrounded in scarlet flames. Its own industrial region crumbled even further. It may have been scattering chemical incendiary rounds at the same time. Not only did the entire area burn indiscriminately, but it seemed to cover even its own surface in a deep red hood.
The eight flower petals on the back of the spherical main body began to wriggle. The main cannons squirmed through the air like the tentacles of a mollusk capturing its prey and they slowly turned toward Quenser and the others.
Those plasma cannons had abnormal power. They contained a disastrous fire that could instantly transform the entire scenery into orange lava.
Heivia must have contacted the others to inform them of that firepower because the Legitimacy Kingdom soldiers started retreating. They were slowly backing away from the canal as if to put as much distance between them and the Object as they could.
But Quenser shouted out as if to tap them on the back.
"No, jump in!!"
As if to demonstrate, Quenser ran full speed toward the Panama Canal, and thus toward the Capitalist Corporations-controlled Azuero District and the Miskatonic itself. Nyarlathotep followed after him with a thin smile on his face.
The Legitimacy Kingdom soldiers aimed their assault rifles at the two, but not a single bullet flew their way.
After a moment of hesitation, several sets of footsteps ran after them.
They all jumped into the water that reflected the orange light. They did not at all feel like they were inside the ocean. It was worse than a hot bath. It was possible all of the fish had long since died.
But they could hardly complain.
They immense quantity of water and the current saved them. The water had an average temperature between sixty and eighty degrees and it would occasionally reach as high as ninety. If the liquid were not being churned up by the current, it might have been the same as boiling water.
Quenser poked just his head from the water and glared at the Miskatonic.
He waited in silence.
And waited in silence.
And waited in silence.
Finally, the Miskatonic's giant form moved. It slowly backed away and accelerated northward.
"It doesn't want to get the Panama Canal's water gates and pumps involved. Looks like those rules are still in effect."
"That's no real reason to relax."
Quenser spat back at Nyarlathotep's comment.
He then shouted at the boys and girls wearing the same uniform he was.
"Do you know why it withdrew? To come up with a countermeasure! Next time, it won't be using drones. They might have to throw something together at the last second, but they'll attach some anti-personnel sensors directly to that thing and resume the hunt. Once that happens, a smokescreen will be useless and we'll be blown away as soon as it locks onto us. You need to get out of here before that happens! Hurry!!"
"Ah... Huh?"
Nyarlathotep ignored the confused boy and asked a question.
"You can worry about others if you like, but what about us? I think we'll be targeted first and foremost."
"Change of plans, " groaned Quenser."We're going to swim across to the Azuero District to the north. We'll slip into their maintenance base and stop them from using what little knowledge they have to find a way to get the anti-personnel sensors they need.... I said I excel at that kind of thing, didn't I?"
"Didn't you say you had to be prepared to die about three times along the way?"
"It doesn't matter. I'm sick of babysitting some kids that I'm not sure have even grown any hair down there yet. Let's destroy the source of the danger so we can safely reach the goal line."
With that decided, Quenser and Nyarlathotep began swimming across the fifty meter wide canal.
There were armed soldiers behind them, but no one fired at them.
The soldiers may have realized that pulling the trigger could lead to something unpleasant dropping down on their heads.
Part 9
An unpleasant tension stung at Quenser's skin.
It had begun the moment he had crossed the canal and entered the Capitalist Corporations' Azuero District. It may have come from his awareness that he was standing in enemy territory.
A double chain-link fence nearly three meters tall blocked the way, but it was not much of an obstacle with so much of it broken and collapsed. There were also guard towers with gun turrets, but they had fallen over.
The entire scenery changed.
The Soberania District had resembled a resort town or forest after a fire, but the Azuero District was covered in asphalt and filled with giant concrete boxes and cylindrical metal tanks. It all looked like an unhealthy industrial sector.
However, the entire place had transformed into a scorching red and black hell with the buildings melted into lava.
Here and there, Quenser saw groups of metal pipes that almost seemed to form a brain. They even passed by overhead like overpasses, so he opened his mouth.
"This is right on the border, so what kind of factory was this?"
"It's too scorched to read properly, but you can just barely make out 'Liquid-N' on the tanks."
"Liquid nitrogen?"
"It's probably officially meant for humanitarian medicine, but I bet it was actually being used in research and development for a new type of night assault cannon."
"Those weapons are meant to silently attack a maintenance base zone and then leave, right?"
"Mortars and multiple rocket launchers are the standard weapons for attacking a base, but they don't have much initial speed and it takes a few seconds before they hit. If people react to the sound of them being fired and jump out of the way or get down on the ground, the number of casualties goes way down, so everyone wants a way to launch a shell without using any powder."
"I know our intelligence division was doing some research by launching a baseball with compressed air... but I think that was a failure because it didn't give the ball much distance for how heavy the unit was."
"Here, they were probably trying to gain even more power by flash vaporizing liquid nitrogen inside the barrel. It might sound difficult to use, but liquid nitrogen can be safely stored in a thermos."
"It still doesn't seem to fit with the 'firepower above all else' ideal of the Object worshippers."
"If the research was actually important, they would never build the factory next to the border, even if it is a border with a blank region. It's probably a dumping ground for anyone who messes up in defending their home country."
The industrial sector burned loudly as Quenser and Nyarlathotep walked through it.
The sky was covered by black smoke as far as the eye could see, but it was not coming from the smokestacks. They could not hear a single sound indicating the facilities here were running.
Similarly, no one else seemed to be around.
"Those main cannons we saw back at the Miraflores Water Gate were insanely powerful."
The facilities were packed in tightly despite how much space there was, so they had poor visibility. Quenser glanced around, but he could not see the giant Object from here.
"Those weren't normal low-stability plasma cannons. How do they get that much power? Are they compressing a huge amount of catalyst, are they sending in a powerful electric current, or does it have something like a circular particle accelerator inside?"
"It's probably simpler than that. That's plasma, but it leaves the category of the low-stability plasma cannon. That's why it can use an unprecedented level of power."
"... ?"
Quenser initially did not seem to know what the man meant, but...
"Wait, you're kidding, right? Is that even possible?"
"All of the energy swirling through the JPlevelMHD reactor is directly retrieved and launched from the tubes.... So that's plasma that can't be called 'low-stability'. It's the overwhelming heat that keeps a two hundred thousand ton giant fighting at speeds in excess of five hundred kph. Do you see now why that would have the destructive power to carve orange paths into the planet?"
"Do you have any proof that's what it's doing?"
"No. But I can't think of any other theory to explain what I saw."
Quenser was not about to take the words of an enemy spy at face value, but he placed it in a corner of his mind as a possibility.
But if that theory was true...
(The explosion of a test reactor has enough power to stop an Object. If all that energy is being directly sent out, even the Princess would be vaporized in a single hit. And it can keep firing it from eight different cannons?)
Those were some frightening specs, but he still had his doubts.
If that was true, they would need a way past a certain problem present in the design of an Object.
Nyarlathotep pointed forward.
"If you have any doubts, check it out for yourself. That's the best course of action in an environment filled with both truth and lies."
After walking around the corner of a giant crumbling factory, Quenser frantically backed up.
The Miskatonic was hidden there.
That nightmarish Object used its eight tentacles to freely fire the energy drawn directly from its reactor.
"Why!? Shouldn't there at least be guards around it if it's undergoing maintenance!?"
"Even with heat-resistant suits, they can't keep soldiers around at all times when it's ninety degrees here. But if they send the Object back to a safer area, the Legitimacy Kingdom will use that as an opportunity to advance. Instead, they send only the bare minimum of equipment into this scorching region to keep the soldiers out of this sauna as much as possible.... After all, an Object can't be damaged by a surprise attack from rank and file soldiers. Or so they believe."
Based on their experience so far, the Miskatonic most likely used the drones for everything but anti-Object targeting. Currently, it was busy having anti-personnel sensors installed because it could not trust its eyes in the sky. It was unlikely it would send out the drones it no longer trusted.
With that in mind, Quenser and Nyarlathotep moved out from the factory wall again. They stayed low and jogged over to the Object.
It used an air cushion propulsion device. The air cushion was shaped like a diagonal "#" with the front two lines stretched out. Overall, it had the silhouette of a double-edged sword. The edges suck out from the Object a little bit and they looked like an aircraft carrier's flight deck.
"Wow... The entire road is covered in a forest of steel beams. How many of them are there? And the Object is sitting on top of that metal forest."
"It's a way of distributing the weight. They do the same thing in shipbuilding. When a seventy thousand ton cruiser is being constructed, it's supported by countless wooden beams before it's allowed to float in the water."
Countless thick wires extended from the surrounding factories and cylindrical tanks and they connected to the Object like it was Gulliver. Maintenance soldiers in fire-resistant suits were traveling up and down those wires. Most of the work was being done overhead, so Quenser and Nyarlathotep rushed into the forest of steel beams so as not to be seen. They were directly below the two hundred thousand ton Miskatonic.
Quenser groaned as he nervously looked overhead.
"That float looks like a sword. It extends so far forward. Wouldn't half... no, a third as much be able to support it?"
"That's just how incredibly powerful its main cannons are. It needs this giant float for the recoil."
They continued to the very back of the metal forest and poked their heads out from below the Object ceiling.
There, they saw the eight flower petals attached to the back of the spherical main body. The eight tentacles attached to those giant reels were far too close.
"They're basically endoscopes. Do you think they use electromagnets to control the plasma?"
"I don't see what else they could use. They basically have a small sun trapped in there, so even if they make the walls thicker, the plasma's heat will still melt the material."
They did not know if it was the tokamak method or the torus method, but the inside of those tubes had to be filled with extremely high power electromagnets. That immense magnetic line would restrain the plasma and fire it by letting it "escape" in the desired direction.
Quenser pulled his head back to hide below the Object ceiling again.
"I have one question about its targeting."
"And that is?"
"Our theory was that the Miskatonic uses its own sensors to target Objects and the drones for soldiers and anything else."
Quenser leaned against one of the steel beams.
"But how? Its main cannons are overwhelming. I'd heard the Legitimacy Kingdom's observation equipment was blinded in the instant it fired because the values grew too high. In that case, how is it targeting the enemy Object from the center of that vortex of plasma?"
"Now that you mention it, that is strange."
"It obviously can't use optical or IR sensors. And all the noise rules out auditory or ultrasonic."
"That much plasma would also render electromagnetic waves unusable. It couldn't be using radar."
Quenser followed up Nyarlathotep's comment by thinking through a human's senses.
"What about smell or taste?"
"Do you know how chemical weapons like poison gas are disposed of? Most of the time, they're incinerated in the high temperature of aluminum of napalm. The particles behind smell can't be relied on in that plasma."
"But the particles aren't wiped out entirely. That would break the conservation of mass. They've only been made harmless and invisible, but they're still floating around, right? The extreme heat simply changes their chemical structure into something else."
"So you're suggesting an olfactory sensor that assumes the indicator has been oxidized? In other words, it has a particle collection device? We should have paid attention to the direction of the wind."
"It doesn't look like it's about to fire. It must use something scattered by the target... like a static electricity model's repellant or an air cushion model's turbine lubricant. It uses that 'smell' to maintain an accurate targeting lock in the middle of this hell of heat and light."
In exchange, the Object's own sensors had not been able to accurately target Quenser and the others when they fled into the forest near the Miraflores Water Gate. Humans did not scatter that much material when they breathed.
That was why it had been forced to attack the general area and create those rivers of lava.
It had only been able to assume it had killed them.
Nyarlathotep accepted the idea before saying more.
"But how does that help us? All that lets us do is divert its aim with chaff or a flare when it targets another Object."
"Not necessarily. We can abuse that method to get it to fire its main cannons wherever we want. And the Miskatonic uses massive plasma cannons. It's possible we could..."
"Get the enemy to fire on its own forces?"
"..."
Quenser fell silent for a while and finally responded.
"No, let's wait until later to get greedy. Right now, we just need to take out its anti-personnel sensors. We need to figure out what they're attaching to it."
"What a pain. Are we going to walk up one of those wires? That would definitely be hard to do without being spotted. It would be easier if we could get our hands on those fire-resistant suits they're wearing."
"All that matters is that we know they aren't done working yet."
Quenser grabbed his War Hammer with both hands.
"If I fire at the tip and base of their crane game, I can interrupt their work."
"I'm all for blowing something up, but wait until after we have an escape route. That has a wireless trigger for remote detonation, right?"
Just as they started discussing their plans, a high-pitched whistle sounded overhead.
It was the same explosive roar as the jet engine hanging down from a large passenger plane's wing. Quenser looked up without thinking and was amazed to find his body still had enough moisture to sweat.
"Oh, no. The air cushion is starting up! We need to get out of here! We'll be crushed by the compressed air!!"
They did not have time to worry about the danger of being spotted by the Capitalist Corporations maintenance soldiers. The two of them ran through the forest of steel beams and out from below the roof formed by the Miskatonic.
A moment later, a tremendous wall of air blew through.
Just as the two hundred thousand ton mass began to float, the excess air scattered in every direction. Their bodies seemed to grow weightless and their toes left the scorching asphalt. Quenser swallowed a scream and focused exclusively on not biting his tongue as he was forced to enjoy an aerial swim at more than five meters up.
He lost his balance, crashed into the road again, and rolled another twenty meters.
"Ah... gah! Gh!? Bghah!!"
Occasionally the news would get worked up over a story of a truck dragging someone behind it, but this may have been similar. If not for the thick helmet meant to fight the flames and sensors, his head might have looked like it had been grated.
Similarly, Nyarlathotep was saved by his firefighter's outfit and he slowly rose to his unsteady feet. Quenser's mouth was still flapping wordlessly, so the man grabbed his arm and forced him to his feet as well.
There was a good reason for doing that.
A sudden flash of light sliced through the industrial sector.
There was a thick orange afterimage through the air and a white flash of light as if from welding at the point of contact.
The giant concrete factory was roasted through. The Miskatonic snapped its many wires and jumped to the right to escape. The maintenance soldiers working up top were vaporized, set on fire, or sent into a freefall.
Yes, the Miskatonic dodged.
The attack had come from somewhere else.
In other words...
"A laser beam!? Was that the Princess!?"
"So they've crossed a line too. I never thought the Legitimacy Kingdom would be the first one to enter the demilitarized zone."
Part 10
Removing rubble would leave one a sweaty mess at the best of times and doing it in an 80+ degree sauna did not help. The word "heatstroke" seriously entered Heivia's mind as a weapon.
While he focused on his surroundings, a rumbling passed him by. A metal bucket on the front of a military tractor was shoving the rubble (and the asphalt below it) away like a snowplow.
Heivia and the rest of an infantry unit followed to make sure there was nothing remaining on the road and finally called in a report over the radio.
"The road has been levelled. I repeat, the road has been levelled! If you blow a tire here, you're either incredibly unlucky or the maintenance soldiers haven't been doing their job. Let's get this over with and leave the rest to the Princess!!"
A response came in the form of an even greater mass of noise approaching from up ahead.
Or rather, it was a tremor running through the ground.
A vehicle two or three times the size of trucks seen on normal roads traveled down the path they had cleared. Lengthwise, it was on the same level as the Princess's Baby Magnum.
The giant vehicle had thirty-two wheels and it was on the way to the Panama Canal that divided the Soberania District and the Azuero District.
The entire chassis was lifted up by fixed legs like with a crane and the creaking of hydraulic cylinders rang out.
The already giant vehicle extended even further like an accordion. It was enough to slowly cross the entire Panama Canal that was made for tankers to pass through.
"This is incredible. We can build a bridge to reach the battlefield in only ten minutes."
Heivia commented out of habit but cleared his throat when he remembered his usual companion was not with him.
Meanwhile, the large bridge vehicle extended its body that was folded up like an accordion. The mountains and valleys flattened out as it extended further and further.
It soon reached the other bank and something like a stake was driven in.
"Can I go now?" asked the Princess.
"Not yet. If we don't attach floats at even intervals down the bridge, it'll snap down the middle. It's just like a girl's ass: being too big can be a problem too."
The Princess did not respond to his joke.
The awkward silence of an elevator ride with a stranger followed, but she used the downtime to say something else.
"Did Quenser not know this would happen?"
"How should I know? What matters is that he made an enemy of the Legitimacy Kingdom. And to protect the guy that caused all of this. He's got a boner for the fact that he holds the fate of mankind and the trigger to war in his hands."
"... Sigh."
The Princess only had secondhand information, so she did not know the exact situation in which Quenser and Heivia had aimed their weapons at each other.
She only knew that she had been ordered to resolve this situation even if it meant killing Quenser.
"But no matter how hard he tries, he can't defeat the Baby Magnum."
She was not simply overestimating her ability. She had seen Quenser and Heivia blow away cutting-edge Second Generations on several occasions, but she could still confidently state that fact.
Her Baby Magnum was an "outdated" First Generation. That meant it was constructed to overwhelm any weapon, including nuclear missiles, instead of just fighting other Objects. Simply put, it contained far more anti-personnel sensors and weapons than those other Objects.
Defeating a Second Generation was no proof that he could defeat a First Generation.
"And apparently he's doing it all to protect some old guy, " she complained."Does it not even have to be a girl anymore?"
"What are you talking about? From what I've heard, he charged right into danger to protect our novice unit from that Object. It scares me how far that suicidal pervert has expanded the range of who he'll protect."
Part 11
"The Baby Magnum has crossed the demilitarized Panama Canal using the bridge vehicle. The invasion of the Capitalist Corporations' Azuero District has begun. As planned, contact with the Extra Arc has been confirmed."
A young female operator read off the report in the operation control room of the giant square megafloat beachhead near the Panama Bay.
The dimly-lit room was kept a little too cool and the operator glanced just once over at Frolaytia.
"Are you sure we should have done this?"
"The situation is urgent enough to warrant it."
An orange glow came from the end of her long, narrow kiseru as the busty silver-haired commander gave her annoyed reply.
She was currently using the laptop sitting next to her to speak with an old man relaxing in a distant safe country.
"Do you think you can manage this?" he asked."I have my hands full dealing with the hard-liners who can barely contain their smiles as they shout shrilly at me. They want you to attack the enemy's valuable weapons manufacturing facilities and resource mines as a preemptive strike to protect the valuable lives of our own people.... And would you look at that? All of the marks they've put on the map are cities with populations of at least a million. Makes you wonder if they even know how to read a map."
"If we do capture Nyarlathotep, is there a chance he'll be silenced before he can be transported to a safe country for a military trial?"
"Of course. And even if he does give his testimony, they'll buy as much time as they can by claiming his confession was forced through torture. Those damn berserkers have forgotten the terror of war after living in peace for so long. It's those kinds of idiots who end up with foolish-looking pictures in the history books."
"If we don't come up with a countermeasure, the entire globe will be sent back to the stone age."
"The Faith Organization might be crying tears of joy since some of them think it's about time humanity was destroyed for a global reset, but we disagree. You're on the beachhead instead of in your usual maintenance base, right? Do you know why that change was made?"
"You can't mean..."
"Open the container marked top secret in the corner of the third bunker. On top of that giant float is everything you need to hold a military trial. It doesn't have to last more than a minute or even half a minute. As soon as Nyarlathotep gets there, begin and end that trial. That will leave the conclusion that this series of events was all his doing and the Legitimacy Kingdom had no part in it.... As long as we have that judgment paper, we can avoid giving the solar system a second star."
"In other words, you aren't giving any thought to what happens to Nyarlathotep afterwards?"
"If the defendant kicks the bucket, there's no risk of an appeal. We won't have to worry about war breaking out during a years-long process or some skilled attorney overturning everything. This is actually the best option for anyone who wants world peace. When the hard-liners' assassin shows up, make sure to pay them a tip."
The smiling old man ended the transmission.
Frolaytia breathed out some sweet smoke and spoke with a bitter look on her face.
"I'm beginning to think it really is time humanity was destroyed for a global reset."
Part 12
Quenser was covered in scrapes, but he could not complain.
His goal had been the destruction of the anti-personnel sensors set to be added to the Miskatonic. That had been meant to reduce the sacrifices among the Legitimacy Kingdom soldiers, but the situation had changed.
The two Objects were fighting now.
Led by Nyarlathotep, Quenser ran from the Miskatonic. The Object moved every which way as it dodged the main cannon shots fired by the Baby Magnum. The orange ruins were destroyed even further like some kind of natural disaster.
Nyarlathotep spoke as he ran.
"Let's find some masks somewhere. There must be some in these specialized factories."
"Masks?"
"Those tanks are filled with liquid nitrogen, right? If they burst and the contents get out, it will vaporize almost immediately. That is not an environment for a human being that inhales oxygen and exhales carbon dioxide."
"This place is going to get even closer to being like the surface of Mars!?"
Quenser shouted in fear as he held his War Hammer in both hands.
Not far away, the Miskatonic began returning fire. It scattered chemical incendiary rounds while its eight tentacle-like main cannons began to wriggle. Pure white beams were released from various angles.
The industrial sector had just barely maintained its scorched form as it was dyed orange, but it quickly melted into the lava now.
It had been enough of a shock to knock him unconscious when he first saw it, but was growing accustomed to this a good thing? Quenser swore in his heart to see an eye doctor once this was over.
The two of them were assaulted by scorching waves of heat and a tremendous shaking below their feet.
Walls collapsed and Object maintenance materials fell from large trucks. A metal sphere several meters across even rolled across an intersection in the work roads.
"Wah!?"
Quenser was nearly crushed, but his surprise did not come from the near miss.
The item was far different from a giant wrecking ball.
"A test reactor!? They carried in one of those as a spare part!?"
"Do you think we could make it go supercritical to blow away the Miskatonic from below?"
"It wouldn't be that easy. Even if we did try to get close, those randomly fired chemical incendiary rounds are too scary. Let's just keep going!"
However, a giant wall blocked their way. It was actually a tube over two meters wide wriggling around the area. It was probably a spare part for the Miskatonic's main cannons.
Quenser clicked his tongue and searched for a way around it.
The clash between the two monsters was underway not far away.
"She's at a disadvantage, " said Nyarlathotep in reference to the Princess."Part of it comes down to the power of her main cannons, but the lava also stops her static electricity propulsion. Plus, her sensors are blinded. And if our theory is correct, the Miskatonic can accurately aim using its high-level olfactory sensors. She has no chance in a head-on battle."
"Fortunately, the Miskatonic's new anti-personnel sensors weren't added in yet. The Princess is one thing, but we don't have to worry about it locating us."
"The fact that you chose to charge in to fight after hearing my explanation tells me they should build a statue to honor you. I sympathize with that partner who must always be following you around like this."
Quenser adjusted his grip on the War Hammer and changed direction with Nyarlathotep. They gave the Miskatonic a wide berth as they ran through a factory.
"Don't forget that the Legitimacy Kingdom is firing on us too, boy. Look, there are foot soldiers deployed in addition to the Object. How are we going to get past them?"
"I know that. Besides, the First Generation Baby Magnum's sensors are enough of a-..."
He trailed off as he heard something explode behind them. He quickly looked back and saw a burst pipe partway down the way they had come.
(Did the heat raise the internal pressure too far!?)
But that was not the only explosion. More and more sounded out and they were getting closer.
"We're going to be swallowed up."
"But if we run out from here... !!"
There was another large building across a large work road. If they made it there, they would find new, safer cover.
But the second Quenser poked his head out, orange sparks flew from the nearby wall.
He ducked down and pulled his head back.
He poked just his survival kit's knife out to check again and could tell someone was wielding an assault rifle seven hundred meters ahead.
Quenser clenched his teeth and shouted the familiar boy's name.
"Heivia!!"
"So we're cornered. He seems to be using a silencer, but I don't see why he would need to avoid telling his comrades where his enemy is."
"That doesn't matter."
The explosions were approaching from behind.
"Without a rifle that has support sensors, they'll have to get closer to shoot. We can make a run for it now. If we can find a way past that idiot, that is."
"But he's proven his skill. Step out there and you'll have your spine shot out before you make it ten steps."
"I have an idea."
"Just tell me what it is."
"If he can shoot at us, that means the line of sight between us is clear."
"But we have no gun. A handgun and your precious War Hammer can't fire seven hundred meters.
"That isn't all I have on hand."
As he spoke, Quenser reached for his bullpup sticky bomb launcher.
With a solid clicking sound, he removed a piece of it.
In the fiery hell of nearly one hundred degrees, Heivia Winchell could not lie down on the asphalt to steady himself.
Instead, he stood upright as held his assault rifle and secretly clicked his tongue.
(Dammit. I would've hit on the first shot if I could do this by the book. )
The young soldier next to him spoke from below a silver cloak.
"What is it, Heivia? Quit firing needlessly. Just because this is an abandoned Capitalist Corporations factory doesn't mean you can blow up all the fuel tanks like this is a video game. Wars have rules, you know?"
"You idiot, that's not the point!!"
Just as he removed his eye from the scope to shout back, a transmission reached his radio.
The frequency and encryption format had long since been changed, but he still had Quenser's bandwidth set in case he could "intercept" something. The reason for that went without saying: intelligence itself was a weapon for the military.
"... Quenser?"
"Yeah, yeah. You've got that right. I never knew you were so heartless."
"What are you talking about? You're the one that blew me away with a bomb! Besides, you still owe me two hundred euros! And when we went to peep on the women's bath the other day, you ran off and abandoned me!!"
"I have a suggestion, Heivia.... By the way, what do you think happened to the photo I took back then?"
"Hm?... Photo?"
Heivia's expression grew incredibly serious.
At the same time, a small piece of paper slowly stuck out from behind a distant wall.
It was a picture of Frolaytia Capistrano in the bath.
"Let's make a deal, Heivia. This will be our little secret."
"Tch!!!!"
Reason and instinct began an all-out battle inside Heivia Winchell.
Killing Quenser would be easy, but if he let go of that photo, the wind would blow it right into that sea of flames. The only way for Heivia to get his hands on this was to accept Quenser's terms.
Blood focused in the soldier's head until he thought he would get a nosebleed, but he finally reached his conclusion.
(Okay, I'll burn it into my memory and then kill him. )
A hopeless guy was only going to reach a hopeless conclusion.
He began staring through his sniper scope so intently he thought the capillaries in his eyes were going to burst.
(This isn't good. I know it's only a photo, but it still looks like red light is shining from her eyes. She's trained me pretty well, hasn't she?)
But the idiot soon rejected that idea.
"No, wait..."
He blinked.
That alluring bathing scene photograph had a tiny, tiny pinprick of a hole in it. It was right on Frolaytia's eye.
And something was aimed Heivia's way from behind the photograph and thus hidden from his sight.
"A laser sight!? What are you, a rude spectator!?"
With the photo in his right hand and the War Hammer's sensor in his left, Quenser's hands were full.
So it was Nyarlathotep who used the boy's survival kit knife as a mirror to observe the situation.
"The sniper looked away. He probably doesn't want to be blinded."
"Now's our chance. Let's go!!"
Quenser and Nyarlathotep both charged out from behind cover.
At the same time, the exploding pipes swallowed up the spot they had been hiding in.
The surrounding soldiers began spraying bullets their way, but reaching them and hitting them were two different things. Without a mid-range sniper unit, an assault rifle's average range was between three and four hundred meters. That was not enough.
They ran across the wide work road and behind the cover provided by the wall of the next building.
"That settles it. They know we're here now. They're going to start a human wave attack soon."
"Either way, we can't escape from the anti-personnel sensors of the Princess's First Generation. Plus, the more of their people are here, the more options we have."
Quenser reattached the laser sight to the War Hammer and poked his head out once more.
A few guns immediately aimed his way, but he fired his War Hammer before they could do anything.
A few of the lenses attached to the Baby Magnum's smaller cannons whirred as it fought the Miskatonic.
Rather than hitting a person, the jelly-like bomb had hit a giant cylindrical tank filled with liquid nitrogen.
Quenser ignored the assault rifles as he brought his radio to his mouth.
"Let's talk this out peacefully, Princess! Call off the soldiers. If that tank bursts here, the heat of the lava will immediately create a cloud of nitrogen and that will kill everyone here like it's a gas chamber."
"Do you want me to kill you?"
"I'll admit I look like a caged bird about to be killed by the fat cat, but are you sure you want to shoot me? Even the smallest of an Object's cannons will cause too much destruction. Ha ha ha! If only you had a way to kill me without destroying the tank."
That was when he heard a muffled explosion and a wave of heat washed over the surface of the earth with enough force to feel like a physical wall.
The Miskatonic was scattering its chemical incendiary rounds while moving at high speed.
Quenser covered his mouth with a hand and crouched down to weather the storm.
He had to peel his dried lips apart to shout into the radio.
"Just have them fall back, you idiot!! It's too late by the time all your adorable little comrades are holding their throats and writhing in pain!!"
"..."
There was a short pause and confused looks covered the faces of all the soldiers aiming their rifles his away.
They all glared at him while moving back without turning around.
Heivia did the same, but he accurately aimed at the center of Quenser's chest as he gave a shout.
"Quenser!! What are you trying to do!?"
"If you want to stand on the same stage as me, you should've been at least a little bit better of a guy, noble!!"
Quenser shouted back while stroking his finger over the War Hammer's wireless trigger.
Even if they shot the boy, he could still blow up the liquid nitrogen tank if he was not killed instantly.
"Are you still gonna use that radio!?"
"What's it to you!?"
"If you're in real trouble, contact me on that frequency. If you kiss the burning asphalt, I'll listen as you beg for your life!"
Heivia clicked his tongue and withdrew with the other soldiers.
Then the Princess spoke over the radio.
"Now what are you going to do? You lost your hostages, so I don't have to worry about your tank shield."
"That just means I need to use a different bargaining chip."
"Such as?"
"Give me your scent, Princess. That will give me everything I need to defeat the Miska-... the Extra Arc."
"Maybe I really should kill this pervert..."
"I'm talking about the repellant for your static electricity propulsion device!! It's divided into small containers you can eject to avoid any trouble if it gets clogged up, right? Eject one of those containers at your feet!!"
Part 13
The Miskatonic was not exactly an easy Object to control.
The Pilot Elite sitting in the cockpit readily admitted that fact.
After all, the main cannons were far too powerful because they took energy directly from the reactor. The extreme recoil needed to be controlled and the brilliant torrent blinded any sensors, whether they used light, heat, sound, or electromagnetic waves. The residual heat could easily set his fellow soldiers on fire and, even if the high-level olfactory sensors could pick up the enemy's location, no other information was known, not even the layout of the terrain. He would often run into buildings or walls and he had often almost plunged right into the rivers of lava he had created.
But he accepted all of that risk.
The great advantage that came with the risk had gathered many people to the Object.
"..."
The monster blinded itself with its own main cannons, so it pursued its enemy by smell.
This was a sightless world.
And this scorching hell gave the advantage to the one accustomed to blindness, even if the other side had greater specs and originality.
Even now, several fluorescent lines were drawn on the pure white screen. Those were the trails from the repellant that supported the enemy Object's static electricity propulsion device. The Elite's prey lay at the end of those trails. With that targeting information in mind, he used a trackball to hold the reins of the eight automatically wriggling tentacles and waited for the enemy to change direction at high speed. In other words, for the instant of motionless when the enemy was controlling their inertia.
In that instant, the leading edge of the "smell" vanished.
A moment later, a new point of light appeared about twenty meters to the left.
But given an Object's size, that was only a "half step".
(The repellant reading jumped? Did they use some kind of booster or is something wrong with the olfactory sensors?)
He clenched his teeth and immediately fired the main cannons.
The surrounding speakers were turned off, but a deafening torrent of noise still reached him.
Regardless, it was over now.
The high energy plasma stabbed accurately at the source of the smell and melted even part of the earth's surface into an orange liquid.
Or it should have.
A moment later, something incomprehensible happened.
An overwhelming heat pierced through the center of the Miskatonic and melted it to the color orange.
Part 14
Quenser and Nyarlathotep's tactics had been simple.
Some spare parts for the Miskatonic had been scattered about. Among them had been the main cannon's giant reel, the tentacle-like tube attached to it, and a sphere several meters in diameter... in other words, a test reactor.
Nyarlathotep had been the one to break the lock on a piece of heavy machinery and then to operate it.
"The setup is simple! Just place it in a giant U-shape near where our Princess is fighting!! Use the War Hammer's laser pointer to get the exact angle of the muzzle more or less right!!"
"Do you really think this will work?"
"It scares me that the test reactor is cold, but it should still work. We don't need to run the entire system. We just need the band of electromagnets inside the main cannon to run, so we should get enough energy even if it isn't in a perfect critical state!!"
The two of them had secretly continued their work while the two Objects continued their intense battle.
Normally, not even a Second Generation specialized for use against other Objects would have overlooked this, but the Miskatonic blinded itself with the flash of its own main cannons and its anti-personnel sensor modification had not been completed. Someone could run right in front of it naked and it would never notice.
Once the preparations were complete, Quenser grabbed the repellant container meant for use with a static electricity propulsion device and placed it near the end of the tentacle main cannon.
He fired one of the War Hammer's jelly explosives on the side of the container and moved far away.
Then he shouted into the radio.
"When I give you the signal, move right past us and switch off your propulsion device! I'll blow up the container to release the repellant! It should look to him like you made a quick reversal!!"
The moment of truth had finally come.
A brilliant flash was released from the Miskatonic's tentacle-like main cannon. It was absorbed into the spare part Quenser and Nyarlathotep had laid in a U-shape and it obediently traveled through the tunnel like a signal down a fiber optic cable. It looped hundreds, thousands, or even tens of thousands of times around the wrapped reel and then shot back out the other end.
Yes.
It was almost like the blast had been reflected by a giant mirror.
The result was obvious.
The Miskatonic's own main cannon blast pierced through its spherical body.
The armor capable of enduring a nuclear blast instantly melted. The air cushion on the bottom and the eight main cannons arranged on the back like a giant flower or straw hat had not melted yet, but those external components and wreckage exploded like a firecracker placed inside the top of some melting ice cream. After a short delay, there was another explosion. The reactor itself had melted and exploded.
Quenser and Nyarlathotep should have been plenty far away, but they were still blasted into the air.
The boy slammed back-first into the ground and entered a fit of damp coughing, but he was still wrapped in a sense of relief.
The greatest enemy had been defeated.
He still had to escape the Legitimacy Kingdom, but the hurdle had just lowered significantly. He grabbed and shook Nyarlathotep's shoulder as the man lay on the ground nearby.
"Hey, let's fake our deaths. That explosion had to have blinded the Baby Magnum's sensors for a while, so how can we make sure they lose our-..."
He trailed off as further terror arrived.
Or perhaps it was more accurate to say the battle was not yet over.
Quenser Barbotage had forgotten something.
The Miskatonic's main cannons gathered and released energy directly from its reactor.
But that also meant the heat built up in the reactor would escape at uneven intervals. Needless to say, that would create extreme irregularities in the energy supply to the entire Object. Normally, it should have lost speed every time it fired its main cannons. In the worst case, the reactor could have even lost its critical state, causing the entire Object to stall.
But it had shown no sign of that whatsoever.
In other words, Quenser's analysis had been half right and half wrong.
Simply put, it had two reactors.
The eight tentacles extending from the eight flower petals on the giant clock face had fallen to the earth, but one of them released a dreadful blast toward the Baby Magnum.
Part 15
"The Baby Magnum has been damaged! I repeat, the Baby Magnum has been damaged!! Her evasive action failed. The reactor is stable, but the propulsion device's output has dropped by more than seventy percent. Keeping the Object afloat is the most it can manage, so I doubt she can avoid the next shot!!"
"Dammit!!"
Frolaytia swore at the shouted report from the young female operator.
"I can't believe that bastard. It has armor that can withstand a nuke, but they still put the cockpit on the outside? That's a nearly suicidal bluff."
But it did not matter how bizarre the trick was if they had fallen for it.
A simple tank or bomber could finish off the Extra Arc now, but it would be difficult for Heivia and the others there to make that theory a reality. The eight main cannons would obviously turn the entire area to a hell of lava before they could do anything.
And what would happen if they could not get the testimony from Nyarlathotep, the "true culprit" and only person who could stop the madness from covering the entire globe?
The countdown to mankind's end had begun.
Part 16
Quenser stood in a daze as he watched the end of the world.
The Miskatonic had had two reactors. Or more accurately, it had been two Objects. Like a bizarre alien attached to the back of someone's head, the cockpit had been attached outside the onion armor.
"... I should have noticed."
The right half of the Baby Magnum looked like melting ice cream. The cannons and armor were all glowing orange. The Miskatonic was forcibly extending and raising its tentacles from the giant flower or giant UFO, but it would be difficult for the Princess to shoot it now.
Nyarlathotep spoke with a thin smile still plastered to his face.
"I don't blame you. I also overlooked it when we found that test reactor. I should have considered the possibility that it was a cartridge and not a spare part. After all, this Object represents a 7th Core corporation and Azathoth spent a massive budget on it. I should have known that it could easily have more than one reactor."
"No, not that."
"What?"
"I should have noticed. Yes, I should have noticed from the very beginning!! How stupid am I!? Was anything I eating sending nutrients to my brain!? I don't have any tits to absorb it all, so where was it all going!?"
"What are you talking about? Are you focusing on something else here?"
"Yes!! The Soberania District across the Panama Canal was getting support from the Legitimacy Kingdom, so I get why it was filled with rivers of lava! But why did the Miskatonic turn its own side into a sea of flames!? That doesn't make any sense!!"
"It can't rely on its anti-personnel sensors, so it was scattering chemical incendiary rounds to keep any foot soldiers away, right?"
"So what if foot soldiers get close? Are they going to fight this two hundred ton monster with their fists? It wouldn't be afraid of that. Even if the cockpit was built on the outside of the onion armor."
"Then why?" Nyarlathotep looked like that question had only now hit him."Why was it using the chemical incendiary rounds?"
"To create fiery hell of ninety degrees... no, it would be far hotter in the danger zone. More like a thousand degrees or more."
"?"
"That shrinks the temperature difference between the interior of the reactor and the outside air. You mentioned before that it doesn't need a thick wall to control the plasma, right? Even if they tried, the wall would just melt, so they used powerful magnetic lines instead."
"I see... So it works like a vacuum coffee maker."
"That's right. It didn't want much of a temperature difference between the outside and inside, so it used the incendiary rounds.... But if liquid nitrogen rapidly cools the air and creates too much of a temperature difference when the valve at the base of the tube-like tunnel opens, the high-energy plasma will be drawn from the high to low temperature and from the high to low pressure. And at a level that it can't control. It might even break the valve too badly to close again."
A vacuum coffee maker functioned by changing the pressure inside a sealed container, but pressure changes did not necessarily have to happen inside a sealed container. Some meteorological weapons used dry ice or liquid nitrogen to cool the air and cause a tornado or downburst.
"Even with both its reactors working, there was a risk of melting itself, so now that it only has one..."
"We can cool the inside enough that it loses its critical state and stalls. No, in the worst case, it might even drown inside that stuff its spewing out itself!!"
As he shouted his idea, Quenser raised his War Hammer at the ready.
The Miskatonic was just beginning to re-aim its tentacle main cannons toward the Baby Magnum.
He fired everything remaining in the thick magazine for 25mm ammunition. The jelly explosives splatted onto the cylindrical tanks around the Miskatonic.
He had no reason to hesitate, so he pulled the wireless trigger and detonated them all.
Explosion after explosion rang out and the thick surfaces of the tanks were blown through. The explosion went beyond what the explosives had been designed for and the entire tanks were blown away. The intense heat of the lava had entered those thermoses and flash vaporized the nitrogen.
A lake of liquid nitrogen quickly formed.
With the sound of stir-frying, the flash vaporization spread and the surrounding fiery hell instantly transformed into an icy hell.
Fortunately, the Miskatonic was barely functioning and did not have the equipment left for a detailed scan of its surroundings.
It released blinding light from its tentacle-like main cannons to eliminate its greatest threat.
A moment later, everything was swallowed up by white light.
This time, every last trace of the Miskatonic was erased from the planet.
Quenser's eyes were nearly fried by the intensity of the explosion, but Nyarlathotep pulled on his hand when he fell to the ground.
"This isn't over yet, " said the spy with the neatly parted hair."You need to punish me to prevent the collapse of the world, don't you? Let's vanish before the Legitimacy Kingdom can recover from this confusion. Fortunately, the cloud of nitrogen is still spreading, so those without any chemical warfare equipment will probably be too afraid to approach. We have a chance of escaping now."
Quenser slowly started to stand up, but another voice stopped him.
"No, this is over, you worm."
A heavy impact ran through the midpoint between the back of Quenser's head and neck. His knees gave out and he collapsed to the scorching ground.
It took him some time to realize he had been hit by the stock of an assault rifle.
"Hei... via... ?"
He received no response.
The most he could do was watch military boots step past his head and toward Nyarlathotep.
The war had ended.
It was truly over and the official records would say the Legitimacy Kingdom had been victorious.
| ← Ch. 082 | Ch. 084 → |