novelWelcome to the End of a Stable World >> Defense of the Chesapeake District (2)
| ← Ch.125 | Ch.127 → |
But that was not the real problem.
"A sunken ship?"
A giant rusted ship was rolled over on its side. Even from here, they could see it had become a fish reef covered in seaweed and surrounded by hundreds or thousands of small fish.
Radio signals did not travel through the ocean well, but that was not an issue when they were right next to each other.
"No, not that. You see those things attached with wires? Those are Information Alliance luxury cars in the parking lot. Those are their submersibles."
Something was wrong with the flow of time.
Those "new products" seemed as out of place as something in a doctored ghost photograph and they never would have ended up here for no reason.
"That's the Information Alliance that fled from New Caribbean Island? Are they holding Katarina Martini there?"
"How did we end up on an ocean mission with no swimsuits and some old woman? After this is over, I'm gonna demand worker's comp from that busty commander. I'll have her personally make up for the lack of swimsuits."
The Nitrogen Mirage may have made an appearance because the diver team had sent out a distress signal when they found themselves pinned below water and unable to move. They had been sitting tight until their Second Generation eliminated the Object and helicopter unit.
"... That leaves one conclusion."
"They might have enough air in there to wait around for quite a while. Attacking them would be worth it."
When Heivia gestured with his thumb, Myonri and the others showed their agreement by beginning to move.
As usual, this was a fight over resources.
Swimming was difficult without dedicated flippers or a lead diving belt, but they still managed a gradual approach. Before long, it grew more obvious that the 100m ship on the ocean floor was actually a transport ship. And not a civilian one. The giant communication antenna and crane-like refueling arm suggested it was a military supply transport ship.
The rusted walls appeared to be broken through in several places, so they thought getting in would be easy.
But just as they were within arm's reach of the brown rusted ship, they heard some odd noises and several straight lines of air bubbles approached them like white spears.
The confusion reached Quenser's mind before the fear.
"Eh?"
"Watch out!!"
But after Heivia shoved him behind some rocks and those rocks were torn away, the situation finally hit home.
"U-underwater rifles!? They're shooting at us!!"
There were a few different ways of creating underwater firearms, but based on the rapid-fire speed seen here, these were likely based on assault rifles. The water would sap their momentum and the ballistic path was anything but stable after only 100 meters, but that did not overturn the Information Alliance's advantage here. Having fireable guns was enough.
"We don't have any underwater firearms!" said Myonri."What do we do!?"
"Damn, where are they? I didn't see any air bubbles from an oxygen tank..."
"Go back to the basics, Quenser. You just have to determine the distance and angle from the bullet holes."
Heivia pointed to where the gunfire had come from.
4 o'clock and 9 o'clock.
As things were, this could develop into an inescapable crossfire.
"We'll be slaughtered before we can do anything..."
"We just have to wipe them out without firing a single bullet. What do we have at our disposal? Knives, a gas-operated pile driver..."
(The current is... what do you call it with water? Anyway, it's like a tailwind from us to them. And I know I saw seaweed torn like this and a crab shell crushed like this in a documentary. If I can just find something to use for bait... )
As he gave this serious thought, Quenser casually reached a hand toward Myonri's small butt.
"Eek!?"
The maiden jumped straight up because she had been completely focused on the enemy in this tense situation, but all Quenser wanted at the moment was her large combat knife. After rudely swiping it from someone else's sheath, he used the thick blade to pry off the univalves attached to the rocks they were using as a shield.
As the many shells followed the currents and flowed out in every direction, something happened.
The Information Alliance soldiers were gradually taking up position for a crossfire, but then something like a giant blanket dropped down on them from above.
No.
"That's a giant squid!! This is pretty shallow for one of them, but you can still find them around!!"
"You look pretty proud of yourself, but don't think I'm ever forgetting what you did!!" protested Myonri.
When their tentacles were extended from their body, they were more than 15 meters long, making them big enough to capsize a small fishing boat when caught in the boat's net. Once captured by one's countless suckers, human strength was not enough to break free.
With the 4 o'clock group eliminated, the enemy could no longer complete their inescapable crossfire.
"You bastards!!"
Heivia leaned out from the rocks and aimed something at the panicking Information Alliance soldiers to 9 o'clock. It was not a gun, but it looked similar. It was a gas-operated underwater pile driver he must have found in the naval rescue helicopter.
It was meant to drive stainless steel hooks into rock so they could support work wires, so it would not function as a projectile weapon. It was even more doubtful it would reach the enemy soldiers with the great resistance of the water.
But its lethality was fairly irrelevant.
Just like the previous univalves, he just had to fire it in their general direction.
Squids and octopuses tended to chase after shiny things.
And that infinitely increased the value of a light. Holding a light source was dangerous, but having it reflect wildly was even more effective.
"... !?"
"!!"
The merciless ocean did not even allow them to cry out in death. Having spotted a new toy, the giant squid charged toward the soldiers to grab them along with the jewel it wanted to claim as its own.
Flavor, smell, and light could all become life-protecting weapons. Bullets were not everything.
Thanks to that, some of the soldiers were discarded once the giant squid grew tired of them. But...
"What? They're holding their throats and writhing around."
"Since we didn't see any air bubbles from an oxygen tank, they're probably using a caustic soda circulation system. The carbon dioxide from their breath is absorbed so they can reuse that air, but if it gets punctured and water contacts the chemical, it produces toxic gas.... Then they've built themselves the world's smallest gas chamber. It's a good candidate for one of the worst ways to die."
"Ehh? I thought the worst was the steamroller???"
"You mean getting crushed by your own side's Object in the safe maintenance area? But I've also heard of a Pilot Elite fighting motion sickness during a long mission and ultimately foaming at the mouth from the pathogens coming from their own barf bag."
"Ah ha ha!"
"Wa ha ha!!"
"Uehhh..." groaned well-behaved Myonri as she listened in and grew pale.
Nevertheless, they had a chance now that they had driven the capricious giant squid toward the Information Alliance soldiers. While shining their handheld lights on the distant pieces of metal, Quenser's group left the rocks and approached the rusted supply transport ship.
"Oh, looks like the others on the helicopters spotted this ship."
"... Isn't this way too few to be all of them?"
While praying that everyone else was working toward some other means of survival, Quenser's group dove into a split in the supply transport ship that was as beat-up as an empty can chewed on by a fierce dog.
"This is a waterproof door."
"Opening it won't cause seawater to pour in, will it?"
"It's marked as an airlock. It's meant for marine rescues, so it should be fine."
Quenser turned the round handle in the center of the rusted door to open it. They found a small door inside. It was of course much darker inside than outside, so they would have to use their lights to continue any further. After entering and closing the door, they used a hand pump to remove the water from the room. Only then did they open the other door leading inside.
"Bwah! Finally, some air. Yes, we were born on earth, weren't we!?"
"This is a really strange sight, isn't it?"
They immediately removed their masks to preserve as much oxygen as possible and they made sure to attach them at their hip instead of discarding them. The supply transport ship itself had rolled onto its side, so the position of the long corridor's walls and floor had greatly changed. The doors lining the wall were now pitfalls, so it felt like wandering into a world of trick art.
And with air surrounding them, they could use their assault rifles and submachineguns again.
"Everyone, make sure you don't have water in your gun's combustible gas pathway. After checking on your partner, let's head on in."
That was when a dry bursting sound rang out down the corridor.
Quenser and Heivia exchanged a glance, but they could not see each other's expression because they immediately shut off their lights.
"... Who was that?"
"It was pretty far away. I don't think they were shooting at us."
A second and third gunshot followed. Someone had clearly run across some kind of trouble. Even if this was a conflict between two groups of the cornered Information Alliance soldiers, Katarina Martini was with them. Quenser's group had to check on the situation immediately.
They switched their lights back on and advanced across the dark and dangerous footing.
"Our feet could easily break through with all this rust, so be careful. Make sure you don't step on any of the doors."
"Do you think I'm an id-... hwah!?"
"You klutz!!"
Driven by the sudden fear of falling, Quenser searched for anything at all to grab onto and ended up wrapping his arms around Myonri's hips, causing her to jump. In the darkness, his face was buried in a fairly scandalous place, but his life really was at risk.
"Phew. That was a close one. We really are at war here, aren't we?"
"... You have no idea how much I want to 'accidentally' shoot you right now..."
Cute Myonri was tearful and trembling. The corridor was difficult to walk down with all the columns and pipes, but the sporadic gunfire came to a stop before long. The gunfire had squeezed their hearts with tension, but its absence brought an eerie sensation crawling up from the darkness.
"I don't like this smell..."
"..."
"This isn't all the rust everywhere. It's similar, but it's stronger."
The corridor led to a long, narrow stairway. And with the ship on its side, it was like a right angle turn. Heivia approached while on the lookout for an enemy attack and he peered up it with his light and gun both at the ready.
There was no reaction.
Puzzled by his awful friend's lack of movement, Quenser approached too.
Then the boy saw the scene past Heivia's shoulder.
So much red covered everything.
And a blonde girl in a black one-piece swimsuit stood calmly in the center of a pile of corpses.
Time stopped.
Heivia's light illuminated a group in thick rubber diving suits who lay unmoving with dark red holes in their foreheads or hearts. They were probably the Information Alliance surprise attack unit. Quenser and Heivia had no reason to sympathize with them after that group targeted their maintenance base, but that was not the issue.
What had Katarina Martini, leader of the genius girl project, feared?
The black swimsuit girl accompanied by a butler-like young man may have been the true threat.
She was Wraith Martini Vermouthspray, the Stopgap Grim Reaper.
Driven by fear, that amateur boy raised his voice without thinking.
"You... !!"
"Stop, Frank. There is no need to kill them. Not those honest perverts."
"... Why a school swimsuit?"
"That's your first question? This Island Nation legend's aura is something else indeed."
The young man took a step forward, but Wraith stopped him with a quick command.
What would have happened if she had not done that? It was not that she killed because she had a reason to. She did not spare them because she had no reason to. That was evident enough from the twenty-odd slaughtered soldiers.
But that was exactly why a question occurred to Quenser.
"... This isn't... an indiscriminate... killing mode... ?"
In her special black one-piece swimsuit, Wraith gave an exasperated snort and snapped her fingers, so the young man pulled something out of the pile of red corpses. No, someone who was desperately trying to blend in with the dead bodies.
It was Katarina Martini.
The instinct to immediately join the dead on the ground may have come from her experience surviving a harsher age.
"I don't know what this cowardly defector was telling you, but, well, she's the one we have business- kyah!?"
Then something strange happened.
Cool and composed Wraith suddenly stopped speaking and jumped in shock. Then she frantically grabbed a nearby sleeve.
She may have thought it belonged to the butler young man, but by some twist of fate it actually belonged to Quenser Barbotage.
"Wh-what is it!? Is the enemy targeting us from somewhere!?"
"Ahem. I-it's nothing. There is no need to make such a big deal about-..."
"Heivia, Myonri, be on your guard! This was enough for Wraith to scream and jump. Something horrific must be lurking in the shadows!!"
"... wharf... on the..."
"What, what? Since this is the Information Alliance we're talking about, is it an amphibious attack drone? You've gotta be kidding me. Their weapons can keep moving around after all the soldiers were killed?"
"I was afraid of a wharf roach crawling in the wall!!!!!"
Swimsuit Wraith could not bear it any longer and raised her voice.
He did not understand.
"... After you created this sea of blood and mountain of corpses?"
"Alive or dead, humans are humans. But they're different."
Wraith blushed but refused to let go of Quenser's sleeve as she got back on topic. Her eyes turned toward her objective.
That person was the only one the grim reaper had allowed to continue breathing in this red-stained world of stopped time.
"Katarina Martini."
"..."
"You must have had a reason to request asylum now. What and how much do you know about the X Day our Information Alliance is facing?"
While supported by the young man, the elegant old woman remained seated and maintained her silence.
Wraith seemed to know more than Quenser and the rest of the Legitimacy Kingdom. In fact, she was looking at it differently.
"What? She must have had a reason to request asylum now?"
"There has to be something that only Katarina can see. Let me ask you this instead: What would you think if an earthquake prediction expert suddenly abandoned their job and left on a trip?"
"Wait a second..."
"And what if that disaster was an artificial earthquake that could be reproduced by human hands? That would seem like more than just abandoning their duties, don't you think?" Wraith did not even look back at Quenser."I don't know if you did it intentionally or if you discovered it by accident, but you know the exact date of X Day, don't you? That's why you frantically contacted the Capitalist Corporations, and then the Legitimacy Kingdom after that submarine screwed up. It was all so you could avoid the bog the Information Alliance is being thrown into."
"..."
Katarina had yet to provide any kind of response.
Was she bound by direct fear, leaving her mind blank? Or was she afraid she would say something to hurt her case if she opened her mouth?
Either way, there was something to this. Something that only Katarina could see.
"What did you embed inside the Martini Series? What is the true identity of these 'deviations' in our heads?"
If necessary, she was willing to use special weapons and drugs.
And with those options on the table, Wraith's raised voice may have been relatively calm and gentlemanly.
"Answer me, Katarina Martini! Why are the other Martinis plotting an attack on the center of the Information Alliance at Manhattan, New York!?"
Quenser thought he was choking.
He flapped his mouth for a bit before realizing that no sound was coming out.
"Man... hattan?"
"Yes."
"That's the Information Alliance home country! The very center of the Chesapeake District! If it falls to a military attack... !!"
"Yes!! One of the four legs supporting the table will break. Clean wars? The age of Objects? The other world powers won't have time to take advantage of the chaos and rise to the top!! The world will collapse and enter an age engulfed in flames!!"
Quenser thought of Lady Monica who had lost her home after her family "collapsed". Arriving at a new age did not necessarily mean a change for the better.
"I don't understand it." Wraith Martini Vermouthspray clenched her teeth."It can't be explained with any kind of economic advantage, but could we really produce enough hatred to want humanity to burn to the ground? After we've become partially embedded in the AI network administration system? What kind of bug remains in the Martini Series? And is it eating away at my own mind as well!? You created me, so tell me!!"
There was no response from the old woman.
Before she could give one, an electronic tone sounded from the radio on one of the corpses.
A radio signal could not reach this deep underwater, so the Information Alliance had likely placed a wired antenna buoy or something on the ocean surface. The communication infrastructure lived on even if its users did not.
"Ah, ah, ahh☆ Master 00 to Slave 21. The Legitimacy Kingdom helicopter unit has been destroyed. Their Generation One is persistent, but the Laser Beam 069 is falling back to draw it to another region of sea. How's your oxygen supply? It'll take a while longer to put together a recovery team, so preserve as much as possible with a proper breathing rhythm☆"
It was a young girl's voice.
It contained something that gave away her youth, but Quenser and his group had also cheated. They had already heard this voice through the wharf roach spy robot they sent to the Flagship 019.
However, someone else spoke softly before the boy could.
It was Katarina, the old woman who had created all of them.
"That is Piranirie Martini Smoky. She is #7. Her administrative role is to smoothly restart work on the warfront when things have stalled due to the restrictions of various treaties, power balances, habitats of protected species, and so on. In other words, she oils the rusted gears and reignites any wars that have spontaneously come to a stop."
"..."
This girl was from the same generation as Wraith.
Knowing that was enough to put a sharp look in the Martini girl's eyes.
"Oh? No response. Hey!!... Did they run out of air and kick the bucket earlier than expected?"
In her school swimsuit, Wraith grabbed the radio in her small hand, took a breath, and started to speak.
"Slave 21 to Master 00. There is nothing to report here."
"Ah ha ha. You're missing the code word, whoever that is. But if you managed to get inside the sunken ship now, I've gotta praise your precision. Are you perhaps one of us?"
"This wasn't as impressive as you make it out to be. A separate group made it here as well."
"It doesn't matter either way. You're a step behind. In fact, I would say you're about three days behind me. There's nothing you can do to catch up now."
"Why are you so intent on bringing ruin?"
"Tsk, tsk, tsk. That doesn't follow at all. If you really are part of the Martini Series, you should know what this is: I'm not doing this because I have a reason to. I'm not sparing them because I have no reason to. That's how we work, isn't it?"
"Did you think you could pull this off by corrupting a local fleet out here? That's an impressive level of foolishness. Do you have any idea how many cutting-edge Objects are protecting Manhattan!?"
"Nya ha ha ha ha!!... It's that way of thinking that tells me you're a step behind."
That was when a dull tremor assaulted the sunken ship.
It had originally been a supply transport ship rolled on its side and it was just sitting there on the unstable ocean floor. It was entirely possible something had coincidentally caused it to collapse and roll, but it was more likely this was no coincidence.
This was something much more ominous.
As Quenser's group shined their lights around, Piranirie's mockery slipped into their ears.
"There were some things I was hoping to discuss with Old Lady Katarina, but, well, if the alternative is having her taken in by the Legitimacy Kingdom or Capitalist Corporations, I should probably send her to oblivion even if it means losing a piece of the truth. What do you think, old lady?"
"What are you-?"
"Nowww, a question: How was the Legitimacy Kingdom's New Caribbean Island created? And are they the only ones capable of messing with submarine volcanoes???"
Another disconcerting tremor reached them.
"This is an artificial eruption!!" exclaimed Quenser."They're using explosives or an Object's cannon to stimulate the buildup of magma on the ocean floor. At this rate, we'll be engulfed by the lava erupting up from below!!"
"Piranirie learned a great variety of techniques for restarting wars that had fallen to a standstill for any number of reasons. She must have learned how to redraw EEZs, territorial waters, and national borders using the appearance of volcanic islands."
"Just to be clear, " said Piranirie herself."You don't get to live happily ever after if you do manage to escape that sunken ship. This is covering a much, muuuuch wider area☆ Ah ha ha ha ha ha!!"
They had no time for this anymore.
Swimsuit Wraith threw aside the radio and lightly snapped her fingers.
"Frank."
That was apparently enough to convey her demand. The butler-like young man grabbed Katarina Martini's arm.
And Heivia finally recalled what their mission was.
"Ah, wait!!"
"I know you're loath to part ways with such a kind young woman in a swimsuit, but don't call out to me every time I take a step. I'm not telling you to leave me just yet. And this is no time to be arguing over who gets to take Katarina. If we want to survive, we'll both be headed to the same place."
"What do you mean by that?"
Since Quenser bothered to ask, the blonde girl in a black swimsuit must have decided he was willing to listen because she turned toward him instead.
"Several submarine volcanoes will soon be erupting in quick succession. We cannot stay in the ocean, but if we head to the surface, we will only fall victim to the Laser Beam 069... oh, excuse me. To use your adorably pathetic naming sense, that would be the Nitrogen Mirage. Or we could be crushed by the Legitimacy Kingdom Object's butt."
"..."
Quenser paled when he was confronted with those facts once more.
In some kind of habit, Wraith's hand wandered through empty air like it was searching for a pen.
"Given the distance, escaping to your New Caribbean Island would be difficult. And in the worst case, the series of eruptions could propagate there as well."
"Then what are we supposed to do... ?"
"There is one safe zone. There is a single paradise in this world which will be unharmed by the submarine volcanoes and not fired on by the Second Generation acting as Piranirie's puppet." Wraith pointed straight up."The Information Alliance maintenance fleet. I don't know which ship Piranirie Martini Smoky is hitching a ride on, but if we join her there, the Object's great firepower will actually work against her and she won't be able to attack us."
That was indeed closer than New Caribbean Island.
And a product of that genius girl project would not be dumb enough to place her own fleet in a position where the artificial eruptions and Object under her control would destroy it.
"Katarina, I would like to ask you, our designer, " said Wraith."Which of those hundred-odd ships is she on?"
"The Flagship 019 in the center. There is no need to look out for trickery, so you can go with the obvious answer. There is no need to go through a profiling process; I made her to be that kind of person."
Katarina made it sound obvious.
Did she not even need to flip through the pages of a file? It was possible she was imagining an isolated aspect of her mother instead of the individual girls.
However...
"Th-this is insane, " said Heivia."Even war has rules. But this is what happens as soon as the Martini Series shows up. And now we're supposed to enter their maintenance base zone!?"
"You can continue following your precious rules to the end if you like, you foolishly well-behaved swine. But anyone who wants a real shot at survival should focus on the number and capacity of the submersibles the Information Alliance divers used.... There might not be enough space for everyone."
An especially powerful tremor shook the sunken ship.
They could not wait any longer.
Just as Quenser and Heivia exchanged a glance and took off running, the rest of the Legitimacy Kingdom soldiers followed suit. They shined their lights around while passing and being passed by each other and they even started grabbing at each other's hair in a race for the submersibles.
"Wait a second! Is no one taking that old woman with them!?"
"Don't ask me! If you care so much, Heivia, you go back for her!!"
Was the problem that she was not a cute girl? Or that she was not an adorable and kindly old woman with a round back?
And the idiots noticed something as soon as they arrived.
"Hey, there's more than enough of these things."
"Dammit. Manipulating the enemy with information is their specialty, isn't it? She tricked us!!"
Nevertheless, they had no choice but to board them.
Wraith had stolen Katarina, the designer needed to predict Piranirie's actions, from right under their noses, but she would still have to escape to the same area of sea in some kind of vehicle if she was to survive. They could always stay right on that girl's ass and demand she come to a stop somewhere. Although they would have to use the Princess as a threat if these things had no weapons.
The submersibles looked like giant double-edged swords made of a chemical materials and Quenser's group split up between a few of them to leave the sunken ship.
A moment later, a large orange explosion erupted.
"Wahh!?"
"Are you kidding me!? That rusted ship suddenly split in two!!"
Once one point ruptured, it happened quickly. More and more large cracks ran through cold ocean floor and passed by the submersibles Quenser's group was riding. They even saw that fearsome giant squid fleeing like a puny fish. Soon after they saw an orange glow in the depths of the earth, the eruption shot up like a reverse guillotine.
"Surface, Myonri! Surface immediately!!"
"I'm trying! But there's something wrong with the rudder! Oh, no! We're going to roll over!!"
That was when they received a transmission over the submersible's communicator rather than their personal equipment.
"Ksshh!! Here is some advice in the hopes that the signal will reach through the ocean at this distance, my hard-working but foolish neighbors. During a submarine volcanic eruption, the obvious lava is accompanied by lots of nitrogen and carbon dioxide. If that dissolves in the seawater, it will create the carbonated water we all know and love. This will surround the submersible in air bubbles, making it difficult to steer, but it will also increase the buoyancy and lift the submersible more than you might expect. So be careful."
"Does she have to be so arrogant about everything!?"
"Oh, I get it. I had thought Wraith seemed awfully calm, but she reached that sunken ship with her own submersible."
"By the way, " added Wraith."While yours are specialized for covert movement, mine is loaded with four short-range torpedoes for self-protection. So try not to anger me. That is rule one of survival."
The idiot duo felt their balls gently shrivel up.
"The maintenance fleet is 20 kilometers north-northwest of here. The carbonation should be affecting you right about now, but do not poke your head above the surface. Not only is this part of the migration course for those giant bluefin tuna, but the artificial eruption has those jewels of the sea in a panic. This is the one rare instance where their picket ships won't notice submersibles of this size in the ocean."
Not only did they have to worry about the erupting lava and volcanic rock, but they could also be hit by a tackle from a large panicked fish. While so many hazards just barely passed them by, Quenser and the other Legitimacy Kingdom potatoes made their way directly below the Information Alliance fleet.
"Piranirie is one thing, " hesitantly began Heivia."But why are the other soldiers going along with this reckless plan? Attacking Manhattan will only make their situation so much worse. It's horrific to contemplate, but they could even find their own families criticizing their actions."
"As part of the Martini Series, that point of view honestly irritates me to no end, but I am beautiful and generous enough to overlook it. Anyway, this may be a unique aspect of the Information Alliance. Did you know this? The more dedicated someone is to justice, the more diligently they will derail when they are led astray by sweet words."
"... Seriously... ?"
"You couldn't work up the courage to stop the bullying? But you took a stand by never actually taking part? That's wrong. Dead wrong. Someone like that was simply pouring all their effort into pretending not to see it. No one was going to praise them for it, but they faithfully stuck with their decision to abandon the victims and prevent the bullying from coming to light. That is where bad deeds come from. It's someone careless who pulls the trigger, but it's the diligent ones that see it through to the end. That's why these things never end in a group. No matter how much they think something is wrong, they never speak up about it. If they did, they would cease to be their diligent self. And the masses have been quite thoroughly taught that their lives will fall apart and they will die if they cease to be diligent."
Using information to control the system was how the Information Alliance's pyramid structure worked.
They wanted a social structure where everyone thought they were free to choose what they wanted, but they were in fact manipulated into choosing what was convenient for someone else.
Just like how even the most niche book imaginable could be described as a best seller if you divided the genre down narrowly enough. And just like how you could manipulate the majority answer on a survey by selecting 1000 respondents from the slums or from the financial district.
When someone only tried to reach for what was popular, you could easily control them by selecting what was displayed as the word of the day.
And in the maintenance fleet built around the Flagship 019, Piranirie Martini Smoky had become the word of the day.
"I thought the Legitimacy Kingdom was bad, but I guess everywhere is hell."
"We can at least promise you a 'happy' life, " said Wraith."Because the masses are not even allowed to question their situation. And the administrator looking down at all of them and laughing? They have no idea someone is laughing at them in the same way. It just repeats like that, so I'm sure there's someone laughing at me too."
Meanwhile, the submarine volcanic eruptions began to weaken.
That was partially due to putting some distance between them and that hellish area of sea, but it had more to do with arriving at their destination coordinates.
An early-warning picket ship was directly above them.
And further in, they could see the gray bellies of the ships like a school of fat and round fish.
"Where's the Flagship 019?"
"Check the propeller shapes, Myonri. You saw what it looked like when getting those spy robots on board, right?"
They saw the especially-large belly of the battlecruiser surrounded by several guard ships.
The small submersibles gradually approached and silently surfaced after confirming it was their target. Heivia grabbed some rope he had found in the submersible, opened the hatch, tied a special kind of knot on the end of the rope, and tossed it straight up.
After it attached to the railing, they began climbing up.
It was a climb of 8 or 9 meters, so it took less than a minute for those who were used to this sort of thing.
"M-Myonri, I'm not used to this kind of thing, so pull me up!"
"Why do I get the feeling you specifically chose me?"
Well-behaved Myonri tilted her head as she pulled up the skinny and unathletic boy. And no matter how much everything had been automated and digitized, there were still guards on the deck, so the rogues were quickly spotted.
It had already begun.
As they exchanged short bursts of gunfire, Heivia killed a few guards with his assault rifle.
"Dammit, they're girls? A warship has a crew of about 200, right? That's the same as a company. I really don't want to fight a small war in this steel ghost house, so what are we supposed to do!?"
"That guard ship is going to respond before it comes to that!!"
After finally climbing over the railing like a stowaway, Quenser tried to flee inside the ship, but something odd happened first.
Close-in defense Gatling guns were installed at even intervals along the side of the battlecruiser like streetlights along a highway, but they all turned in unison like the fan section of a home appliance store.
With an explosive sound somewhat reminiscent of a broken buzzer, the horizontal rain released from the Flagship 019 tore apart the surface of the neighboring guard ship. No distinction was made between personnel and materiel. The sailors on the guard ship had raised their rifles without feeling very threatened themselves, but now they were utterly taken aback and fled inside the ship where the thick armor would protect them.
The electronic simulation division had finally made itself useful. (17-Year-Old ♀) Lilim Gazette (the Vomiter) gave a cruel smile and an OK sign with a mobile device in her other hand.
"Nee hee hee. They might have decent defenses against external cyber attacks, but it looks like they didn't consider the possibility of an infection from inside. These might have been added later on because the close-in defense Gatling guns and missiles are connected just like IoT appliances. Although for the ship's guns and missiles that are used for offense instead of close-in defense, it looks like we would need to directly visit the CIC."
However, the idiots could not hear a word she said thanks to the great din.
"... what... you... !?"
"... punch that smug... off your face... so get inside!!"
"... boobs... !!"
They could have sworn they heard a shocking word from Myonri in the middle of it all, but all the noise left the details unclear. They might have misheard, but they might not have.
Since this could easily deafen them or get them hit by a stray bullet, Quenser and the others opened a watertight door and ran inside the ship.
They did not have time to catch their breath.
They heard pounding footsteps and then some female soldiers in sailor uniforms appeared from around a corner in the surprisingly narrow corridor.
"Shit!!"
Fortunately, thick watertight doors were prepared all over the place to prevent flooding. Heivia and the others opened doors to random cabins and used them as shields as they returned fire.
But...
"Watch out! What is this? There are sparks everywhere!? Are the bullets ricocheting all over the place!?"
"Here comes a shotgun!"
"Ahhh!!"
With the complex layout and the walls and doors made of thick steel, the advantages of an assault rifle were mostly negated. Their range did not matter and they could not penetrate the walls or doors. That meant a short-range but powerful shotgun was the better choice.
At this rate, the enemy would move in and do major damage, but that was not what happened.
For one thing, why were the armed sailor uniform girls exposing themselves to direct fire instead of holding a position at the corner?
Gunshots rang out from a different direction entirely.
It was the same sound they had heard in that sunken ship. And it came from beyond the corner the sailor uniform soldiers had come from. They had not come to attack; they had been on the run.
"Urp. I really hate seeing girls die..."
"What the hell... ? Whatever-that-is is punching through the walls our assault rifles couldn't get through."
One by one, the sailors were picked off.
And then the culprits stepped out from around the corridor. It was Wraith in her black uniform and the butler-like young man. Black-uniformed Wraith held a small handgun in her right hand and Frank held something like a revolving grenade launcher with a shortened barrel.
But Quenser ignored that and shouted about something else.
"What, is school swimsuit time over already!? Why did you change!?"
"This is my proper uniform.... And don't be so blatantly disappointed. It makes me feel like I did something wrong. Am I just too sexy? Is that it? Then I have no choice but to wear it again for you sometime." Wraith shook her head in exasperation."Regardless, you are late, Legitimacy Kingdom. Surely you aren't going to say you will only put in as much work as you are being paid for."
"Are you kidding? Did you use that grenade launcher to get through the wall? I didn't see any explosions."
"You are astonishingly dumb. It is admittedly based on a grenade launcher, but the barrel was replaced with one of tungsten steel and it fires lead bullets that fit perfectly inside. You could call it the world's most powerful magnum."
An anti-materiel rifle would be 12. 7mm while a grenade launcher would be 40mm, so considering both the caliber and the overall mass, the weight of the lead bullet and the amount of powder would be Quenser gave up trying to calculate it and just smiled. Finding the answer would be a bad idea. He would only feel his balls shrivel up again.
(The little Martini tends to gather all the attention, but that handsome guy is a monster in his own right. Oh, but if he relies on that one trick, maybe he's more like me. If he doesn't have the fundamentals down like Heivia does, he might be going for a powerful impact that prevents anyone from noticing how little he can really do. )
It was theoretically possible to refer to the old woman as "little Martini" as well, but Katarina was still being held by the young man. He had to be able to provide as much force as a vise if he needed to, so she would be more secure there than in handcuffs. And even if nothing had been done to her, she might have gone limp from exposure to the loud gunfire in this enclosed space.
"We will now secure this ship and settle things with Piranirie."
"Will you be okay, Wraith? We've seen rats and wharf roaches on this ship. And all I can do is hold you, pat your head, and call you a good girl."
"Try to hold that over me again and I will tear off your limbs and pull out your entrails!!"
As Wraith blushed and shouted back at him, elderly Katarina calmly began to speak.
"Settle this? Given #7's structure, she will be in control of the bridge or the combat command. In other words, the most secure control point."
"Isn't this what you wanted, designer? There are more than 200 sailors on this ship. That's the size of a small company, but you needn't be afraid."
"Huh? Why not?"
Heivia looked skeptical, so Wraith explained while toying with her blonde hair.
"The toxic atmosphere running rampant in this maintenance fleet is coming from Piranirie Martini Smoky, the symbol of an administrative system. But now I have arrived as another Martini and a troubleshooter. By introducing a new order and providing a second control tower, her unilateral control can be fairly easily shaken. Think of it like the class bullies being surrounded by their target's colleagues at work and the rest of the class seeing it." Wraith tossed Quenser a roll of sticky tape."If they surrender, bind and gag them. If they don't, kill them. I have no obligation to worry about the sailors, but as an Information Alliance officer, I will remind you that it can be tempting indeed to know that surrendering gives you a chance at survival. And this is not just some ideal. I have the experience to back it up."
"In other words, this is the perfect chance to legally tie up some sailor uniform girls. (Grin)"
"What part of this looks even remotely legal?"
The discussion was over.
No matter how formidable a foe the Nitrogen Mirage was, the chaos would end if they could stop Piranirie who had sent the entire maintenance fleet out of control in the first place.
"Oh, right. Wraith, you might see what look like squished wharf roaches, but don't worry. Those are probably the remains of our spy robots. But if you are scared, feel free to grab onto me. I can even carry you around and toss you in the air for fun."
"I warned you, didn't I? Now tell me what it was I said I would do to you."
Just then, Quenser happened to look out a window.
A bluish-white nitrogen laser scorched the air and mercilessly tore away the Flagship 019's bridge.
Part 13
There was noise.
That noise arrived at the resolution of a problem and became an unnecessary hurdle of its own.
"Are you insane, Lieutenant Colonel!? You're stimulating submarine volcanoes across the naval battlefield without confirming the death of your allies first!! Listen, just because they are marked 'missing' on the paperwork does not mean they are considered dead like they are after cardiopulmonary arrest. Do not forget that my men could be deemed killed by your friendly fire if their corpses are found within the cooled lava!!"
"Also, the sea around New Caribbean Island is considered internationally protected waters to recover the marine resource of bluefin tuna. We might be able to fight back when the Legitimacy Kingdom sends a maintenance base and Object there on the pretext of protecting that area, but we cannot directly attack the environment there. We have a reputation to maintain."
"Are you sure you did not misinterpret this? We put you in charge of a simple operation in this delicate region of sea, not an all-out attack! For one thing, I am the fleet commander!! You are merely a guest providing external advice, so when did you gain the authority to boss my men around!?"
"I will be reporting this to our superiors."
"I am sure the top brass enjoying the Manhattan scenery will be shocked to hear this! I don't know what this genius girl project is about, but if there are thousands of you, then you are easily replaceable. Do not think you will be protected by your privileged position forever! I will show you your actions have consequences!!"
There was only one answer.
The details were more complicated, but the genius girl project had been meant to provide answers that the stagnant system built by adults could never find.
In a way, she remained true to that.
"Hmm, I guess these people are getting 'rusty' too."
Part 14
The single blast violently shook the 200m battlecruiser and Quenser's group could not stay on their feet. The bridge, which was located a bit to starboard, took a direct hit and the ship as a whole twisted. The walls and pipes that could not stand the stress burst one after another.
"Oh, no. The pipes are bursting! The red ones carry steam, so make sure you don't get scalded!!"
"Wraith, why did you bring that old woman here!?"
"Are you suggesting I should have left her in the submersible? That is an impressively meaningless philanthropic spirit. I will only follow humanitarianism for as long as it is useful to me."
"Ding dong ding donnnng."
Then someone made an obvious call for attention over the ship's speakers.
The surrounding sailors would hear this too, but the girl did not seem to care any longer.
"I can make a pretty good guess based on the chaos in the ship. It's another Martini who's boarded us, isn't it? Well, I guess you had no other way of surviving that situation, did you?"
"Is she crazy? She shot her own ship with her own Object!?"
"It's a very Martini Series kind of thing to do."
What they said here should not have reached her, but she may have predicted their question.
"Don't worry, don't worry. The Laser Beam 069's precision is quite something, so it can whittle away at the ship with its nitrogen lasers without actually sinking the ship. When I solve a problem, I rid myself of every hindrance in order of severity. And that applies to the enemies that have infiltrated the Flagship 019, the senile old man restricting my authority here, and the defeatists who gave up fighting and neutralized themselves."
"Not good! Get away from the windows!!"
Another fearsome beam of light struck the battlecruiser from the side. The bright light blinded Quenser's group, but it had not hit where they were. Had it vaporized another Legitimacy Kingdom unit that had boarded elsewhere, or some Information Alliance sailor uniform girls who had tried to climb over the railing and jump into the sea?
With the young man protecting her, Wraith held her mobile device's microphone to her mouth. She was probably disguising the route taken as she used her Information Alliance officer privileges to access the ship's broadcast system.
"I am Wraith Martini Vermouthspray. I specialize in troubleshooting. Attention everyone!! Piranirie is attempting to bind her allies with fear. She killed the captain in order to leave all authority with herself, so don't be shaken by her sweet words or threats! None of you will need a court martial given the situation!!"
"Nyaaa ha ha!! I was trying to show some respect to a fellow Martini, but what's this? It's only #49? Damn that's low. Can you actually hear me? Oh, and watch out for sudden lightning strikes while you're moving around. And just to be clear, I'm one of the single digit successes of the genius girl project. I'm #7. Even if I can't see any silhouettes out the window, I can still mostly predict the movements of the game pieces. Ah ha ha ha ha!!"
"Sh-she's completely insane... There are pipes and firepower everywhere in here. She's on the same ship, so isn't she afraid of setting fire to the engine room or ammo!?"
Heivia was utterly shocked, but a contrasting voice spoke up in response.
"She is only putting on an act to make negotiation seem impossible. That way you think failing to unconditionally obey her means death. Piranirie's usual trick is to restrict the flow of people and information, divide up the battlefield, and then fill the atmosphere with panic. You could call it the necessary preparations before actually getting to work.... When my mother, Casandra, would target some food reserves, she started by inciting a riot in the surrounding area."
Katarina's gentle but blunt statement received a hostile glare from Wraith who had been built based on that woman and the girl's hand wandered through empty air as if in search of a pen.
"This changes the difficulty of achieving them, but it does not change our plans. With the bridge gone, Piranirie must be in the combat command. I doubt we can stop the Object's lasers without stopping her."
They began to move further into the ship.
And once they let their guard down even a little, female Information Alliance soldiers appeared from the cabin doors all around. After that broadcast and the Nitrogen Mirage's actions, their adoration of Piranirie had probably faded some.
But that did not matter.
"Prepare yourselves! Prepare for battle, everyone!!"
"Please no. We really are going to get shot. What happened to the clean wars? Why are we in danger here?"
"Shut up. If it looks like we aren't going to fight, the Object will fire on us. And I don't want to get vaporized because of you, so if you refuse to do this, I'm shooting you myself. So just get going!!"
Trapped by the fear of death, they attacked with looks on their faces no girl should ever let anyone see.
"Urp. Why are they all girls!? Please, I'm sick of this sailor uniform hell! When I said I wanted to slay 100 girls, I meant in bed!!"
"The gender bias is probably due to all the guys leaving and getting their asses kicked back when they attacked your island. So the world is cruelly fair in this case."
Heivia, Myonri, and Wraith shot more and more of the Information Alliance sailors that pressed in at them. The ship's crew could not take advantage of their normal potential even when they gathered greater numbers. That was because they had been ordered to make an immediate all-out attack instead of waiting for a better opportunity. Just as in poker and boxing, rushing right in every time would only get you badly beaten. It was a lot like firing at the paper targets moving along rails in a shooting range.
"Tch!"
Wraith clicked her tongue when she saw the sailor girls leave red paint-like marks on the walls as they collapsed to the floor. Of all things, she was crouching down and pulling out a tourniquet during this chaos.
"We don't have time to get sidetracked! If we stop shooting them here, we'll be pushed back!!"
"The rules of combat here are different. I will grow as coldhearted as necessary to stop this chaos, but that is not what is needed here. Piranirie's threat didn't make them betray us out of self-interest! They've been driven entirely beyond their own control, so they themselves are blamele-... !!"
Wraith was cut off by a gunshot.
A bullet from Heivia's assault rifle had shot through the head of an injured soldier sitting on the floor. Blood mercilessly splattered across Wraith's white cheek as she tried to keep her allied soldier alive.
She snapped back with the kind of pure emotion that was very unlike the Stopgap Grim Reaper.
"You bastard... !!"
"Look closer. She was holding her sidearm! It isn't over until they're dead and stopping before then will only get you shot at point-blank range!!"
The black-uniformed girl grimaced when faced with an unexpectedly good argument from that idiot.
Heivia had of course not wanted to bring that bloody flower to bloom.
Wraith was overwhelmed by the sight and was close to losing her will to fight, so the delinquent noble dragged her along. He continued the massacre parade, but he could be seen holding a hand to his mouth on occasion.
"Now this is a result-focused tragedy. Urp. I feel sick to the stomach."
Heivia groaned and Wraith held her mobile device to her mouth.
Her own voice exploded from the ship's speakers.
"Piranirie intends to use up all of the personnel and supplies she was given! Just like an officer who doesn't want the higher ups to feel too comfortable and reduce their budget next year!! Do you really want to waste your lives like a frivolous road construction project at the end of the year!? Listen, Piranirie has already left the Information Alliance chain of command. Dutifully obeying her will only get you court martialed!!"
The gears of the all-out attack jammed slightly.
However...
"Ohh? Wraithy, do you want to hold a student council election on this sinking ship? Well, a debate over the school broadcast system is fine by me."
"Everyone, get down!!"
A fearsome beam of light punched through the wall right in front of them.
It was not aimed at Quenser's group. It was clearly targeted elsewhere and the confused Information Alliance sailor uniform girls were vaporized along with the melted steel.
The ship-wide broadcast continued.
"Hey, #49. A democratic decision only really works when the people are at least guaranteed their lives. If you line them up and hold a gun to their heads, do you really think you can call that a proper decision or a free vote?"
"Piranirie!!"
"You too are just using up the soldiers like they're part of your paperwork. Okay, okayyy. Everyone, who do you think will win and survive this: #49 or #7? Those who side with the loser will of course be slaughtered, so make sure you fight good and hard☆ If you don't, I'll provide you with more motivation until you do. Don't worry. Truth can be twisted every which way. As long as there are no witnesses, that is."
She was being ridiculous.
But that ridiculousness once more changed things for the Information Alliance.
After rationally coming to a stop, those soldier girls despaired at the fact that ideals would not protect them and they resumed charging at the enemy.
"Yes, I've seen this before..."
"Quiet."
"It was the same when my mother stole baby food for me. She drove the starving people to action and kept them going by later informing them they would be slaughtered if they failed. And once they could not stop and began fighting for their lives, she used the chaos to ensure that only she could safely escape without being tracked."
"Shut your stinking mouth, you old hag!!"
Wraith snapped back as if in a fit of rage.
But there was no guarantee that every enemy would arrive from a distance.
While Heivia and Wraith used their assault rifle and handgun to push back the charge, a half-open watertight door slowly moved right next to them.
Frank noticed immediately and fired his cannon-like magnum into the cabin, but it did not end there. The enemy's blown-off arm flew through the air with a pin-less grenade still in its grasp.
"!?"
They only had 3 to 5 seconds.
If it detonated like this, everyone in the narrow corridor would be hit by the blast and fragments.
And it was obvious what Wraith Martini Vermouthspray intended when she immediately stepped forward instead of back.
But someone interfered before she could complete her action.
Before Wraith could cover the blast with her own body, Katarina kicked an opened door from where she had fallen to the floor. The movement of the door knocked the grenade into the cabin where it exploded inside the sealed metal box.
"Why did you save me? That was the perfect chance to have one less of the Martini Series you so despise."
"You have likely inherited the side of Casandra Martini that restored order and reconstructed a shelter to provide safe clothing, food, and water. But at the time, my mother was so focused on the overall threat that she was nearly stabbed by a robber who snuck up to her..."
"Not the point. If you know our weaknesses, you could have spread that information and let us die."
The old woman's expression crumpled at the girl's cold questioning.
"I knew that would be the most efficient method. I of course knew what the best choice was."
Katarina looked like she could not believe what she had done.
She shut her eyes in the center of her wrinkled face.
"But once I saw you, I couldn't do it. I couldn't say it was better for you to be dead."
"..."
Wraith gave a quiet snort.
She did not have time to persistently ask what the woman meant. Even now, more and more Information Alliance girls, her supposed allies, were rushing in to shoot them in the back.
There was nothing but harsh gunfire and the colors red and black.
Wraith could not see them as an enemy to be defeated, so even now, she only attempted to neutralize them by aiming her handgun at their arms and legs. But Heivia followed through by firing right between their eyes or into their hearts.
The delinquent noble clicked his tongue and raised his voice.
"This is a waste of ammo! If you're gonna do this, then do it right!!"
"~ ~ ~!!"
"If they can move a single finger, they can pull a trigger or a grenade's pin. Our only option is to cross this minefield in front of us! Myonri, you too! Your submachinegun is firing low-caliber suppression rounds for a PDW, so firing at their arms and legs will still break bones and tear arteries! It won't save them!!"
He was right. But to Quenser, who was irresponsibly avoiding the fight, it looked like Heivia and the others were being drawn into the atmosphere here. He felt like the baseline of morality only continued to drop on both sides of the battle.
This was Piranirie Martini Smoky.
This harshly colorful world had come from within her.
"Are the only options here the whip or the whip!?"
"Oh, honestly. This gun is too powerful... There are other operators in the CIC, aren't there!? Why aren't they trying to restrain that girl!?"
Wraith seemed to enjoy those sensible questions from Quenser and Myonri. They seemed to distance her from Piranirie's extreme rationalism and Heivia's competing logic.
"That's obvious. In this colorful hell, Piranirie's location is the only safe zone. If she dies, it's all over. Even if she's causing it all, who's going to play the hero when it means giving up their own sanctuary?"
But the Information Alliance sailors were clinging to that false hope.
Which side did they most fear being killed by? Faced with that ridiculous choice, they continued rushing in with sweat covering their faces.
"I recognize this..."
"Did you glimpse your mother again?"
"No, this was in a research paper that Piranirie herself wrote. It was titled Free Control of Lifeforms Using External Stimuli. The actual paper was about putting rats in a steel maze and placing a burner below them until they reached the goal, but this is a similar concept."
Quenser heard a quiet squeaking sound.
For this to happen now, it seemed like some kind of curse.
"... A rat?"
It had likely gotten onboard while the ship was at port. He recalled that one of the wharf roach spy robots had been destroyed by a rat.
And more than just the one rat was squeaking.
Several of them were staring out from the space between equipment.
Quenser felt a chill down his spine when he realized what that meant.
"Are they waiting for us to die and become meat for the taking?" asked Katarina.
"More importantly, are the Information Alliance sailors the only ones being monitored? If they have cameras on their uniforms or guns, we're in trouble too! It's about time for that goddamn Object to fire again!!"
"!!"
They had to have made it pretty far down in the ship, but they doubted the Nitrogen Mirage would care. Even if they were below the waterline, the Information Alliance could always shut all the surrounding watertight doors before firing the shot.
A thick beam of bluish-white light pierced the ship nearby and an entire group of hesitant Information Alliance sailors were annihilated.
"Dammit, that thing's got complete control! What is our Princess doing!?"
"Let's just pray she isn't at the bottom of the ocean... wah!?"
Quenser's group immediately ran into a large room.
They waited for a bit... but the nitrogen laser they were expecting never arrived.
A pause was not enough to relax. It felt like being given unexploded ordnance to hold instead of a body pillow. Where was the Nitrogen Mirage and was the Baby Magnum still safe? They knew the answers would not put their minds at ease, but the dearth of information still applied pressure on them from all sides.
"... ? Are we safe here?"
"What is this place? A central computer room? There's a huge-ass supercomputer here."
"The Flagship 019 is an electronic information control ship, right? Piranirie must be plotting something for her attack on Manhattan. And I doubt it's a way of directly sending in the Nitrogen Mirage. So she's probably using this big computer to calculate out all the necessary conditions."
"Since she is hesitant to fire on us here, you might be right." Wraith joined the conversation while bashfully looking down at her mobile device."Still, I doubt destroying this computer would be enough to stop her plan which is as foolish as it is ambitious."
After overcoming that gruesome scene, even the Stopgap Grim Reaper may have been starving for contact with someone capable of a proper conversation.
"Why?"
"If that would be enough, she would be panicking and siccing those sailors on us."
Wraith took a step in front of the young man and narrowed her eyes toward the machines beyond the reinforced glass that looked like large refrigerators.
"Anastasia, hm?"
"What? Did you give it a girl's name like the Capitalist Corporations does with Objects?"
"It's simpler than that. This is a DNA computer made using my biological mother's cancer cells. Instead of using the normal system of 1s and 0s, it uses ATCG combinations to quickly compute complex calculations. When my biological mother learned how long she had to live, she agreed to be a specimen so she could offer something to the world."
Was Wraith emphasizing the "biological" part because it reminded her of the time before she became a Martini? Or was it because Katarina was here?
If that woman had not died, it was possible Wraith's last name would not have changed.
"You mean... ?"
"Yes, no matter what form it takes, this is my biological mother. After all, the chromosome design was completely broken, so you just place it in a Petri dish and it multiples without end. The Anastasia Processor's excellent results led to more and more production, so now there are apparently about 400 tons of her cells around the world."
"I thought this was going to be a moving story, but you just had to give it that Information Alliance twist, didn't you!?"
At any rate, this DNA computer may have been one of the reasons why Wraith Martini Vermouthspray had sought a place for herself in the genius girl project that filled the gaps in their AI culture. This way she could support what her biological mother had created.
"The question is what she's using this Anastasia to calculate. It has to be something related to the attack on Manhattan."
"Can you operate it?"
"Was your mother – our original – a cute technophobe who grew tearful trying to hook up a TV and DVR, designer? I am part of the Martini Series built into the giant administrative system to eliminate any unforeseen errors produced by machines like this one."
A DNA computer sounded strange when you heard how it worked, but the console screen was the same as a normal computer. It felt weird that you only had to move the cursor to the icon and double click.
As Quenser watched over her small shoulder, he grimaced at the many windows she browsed through.
"Wait..."
"?"
"Yes, yes. This is bad. Heivia, do you remember the Nitrogen Mirage's trick? It uses artificial mirages to bend its nitrogen lasers however it wants!"
"What does that matter at this point?"
"Did you ever wonder where the bent lasers went after they missed!?"
"Ah... ???"
Heivia did not seem to get it, so Quenser reached for the console himself. Since he was standing behind short Wraith, he was practically leaning on top of her.
"This is serious... The drones are... yes, they're flying. A water solvent, the first battle was several days ago, a girl's name, a hurricane, the westerlies, ETA, meteorological weapon, and even the conditions needed for dissemination in the air!... You've gotta be kidding. This means that thing's nitrogen lasers may have been no more than the primer. It's electrolytic corrosion. They've been firing that big thing to hide their real goal. It was all so we wouldn't notice they were using optical pumping for excitation of the energy... !!"
"H-hey, how about an actual explanation? Nn, don't breathe in my ear!"
In a rare display, Little Wraithy blushed and struggled in vain while Frank the Butler expressionlessly exuded killer intent, but Quenser was too preoccupied to sniff the nice-smelling girl.
The wolf leaned on the girl with a serious look on his face.
"On the Central and South American line of the Atlantic, the westerlies head north. The giant hurricanes that appear here hit the east coast of North America, so you're probably pretty familiar with that."
"Y-yes. What about it... ?"
Wraith asked while shrinking down and trembling like he was occasionally poking her side, so Quenser continued while focused on the screen.
"So a giant cloud that appears here will reach New York. Assuming you don't have to worry about it maintaining a hurricane shape. Just like a meteorological weapon that messes with the upper atmosphere to alter the amount of rainfall, Piranirie has used this direct combat to mix a specific solvent into the clouds and then excite them using the Object's lasers. This list here is the ingredients for the dye laser. But the dye laser itself uses water – in other words, the primary component of clouds – to amplify the energy."
"What does any of that matter? They're amplifying the electrical energy in the clouds? So are they going to trigger lightning strikes exactly where they want? Or are they going to use an EMP or something to damage the computers over a wide area? Nothing like that can bring down the world-renowned and shockingly well-protected Manhattan!"
"Sorry, but this is much worse than that."
While more or less embracing Wraith's slender shoulders from behind, Quenser placed his hand over her small hand and the console mouse she held. He began searching for and opening a few files.
"Are you familiar with electrolytic corrosion? When a massive amount of electricity flows into the ground from a giant factory or subway line, the ground and moisture function as an electrolytic solution and the buried metal and cables are corroded through electrolysis."
"Wait..."
"Yes. There are a few different conditions necessary for electrolytic corrosion, but only one of them is important here. When a thundercloud approaches, the electric charge in the ground shifts, as if dragged along by the cloud, " explained Quenser."If thunderclouds with more energy than any natural cloud could contain passed directly over a metropolis, it would cause extreme electrolytic corrosion. The underground power lines and communication cables, the foundations of the skyscrapers, the subway tunnels, the gas and water pipes, and everything else buried belowground would fall apart like someone dumped sulfuric acid on them. So if something like that passes over Manhattan..."
"The ground itself will grow soft and all the buildings will collapse... ?"
"If the water flowing from the pipes is broken down, it will become a whole lot of oxygen and hydrogen. And when the gas pipes burst, it'll be more direct. In the worst case, the ground below Manhattan will become a giant bomb."
Of course, normal electrolytic corrosion would not cause anything like this. It would only cause the underground pipes to gradually rust over the years and decades.
That was why Piranirie Martini Smoky was not relying on "normal" thunderclouds. She was using an accelerator pumped full of electricity to create something that did not exist in the natural world. She was using the immense power of an Object to invite in something too extraordinary to naturally exist.
With a tremor in her voice, Wraith once more brought her mobile device to her mouth.
"... What are you trying to do, Piranirie?"
This was beyond the point when she could convince anyone of anything, but she must have felt the need to ask anyway. Her own voice left the speakers across the ship.
"Why are you so intent on firing on the very center of the Information Alliance!?"
"Ohhh? What a strange thing to ask, Wraithy. As a troubleshooter, how many times have you executed one of our own people when they screw up? Y'know, a bullet through the back of a corrupt soldier's head as they beg for their life."
"Kh."
While leaning over her from behind, Quenser thought he felt her firm shoulders shrink down a bit.
Was she afraid of someone knowing about that?
But who? Quenser's group? Or Katarina?
Piranirie had replied over the ship-wide broadcast that was not encrypted and anyone could hear. She did not care who heard this. She was stubbornly doubling down here, but if handled correctly, could that give her a sharp-tongued charisma?
"We are spare personnel meant to use human ingenuity to make up for the vulnerabilities in Capulet, the administrative system forming the AI network at the foundation of our Objects. #49, you must be the type of person who will kill any number of people so long as it will preserve order on the battlefield. I am no different there. When various factors bring the warfront to a standstill, I apply some oil and reignite the fire. To keep war running on schedule."
That was one of the two major families from Romeo and Juliet. Only the Legitimacy Kingdom would choose a name for having a noble ring to it, so why had they chosen that name? Quenser silently thought about that for a bit.
Meanwhile, Wraith groaned a question.
"... What are you talking about... ?"
"New York is the center of the information world, but it is actually the world's most uncooperative city when it comes to information collection. The more information the people are in contact with, the greater their information literacy, so they aren't so easily fooled. They block facial recognition, they reject having their search history saved, they use a decoy server for the internet and email, they hide their IP, they prevent anyone from tapping into their mailbox, and some of them even have multiple social security numbers. But what does that look like to the AI network running everything? The answer is simple: it doesn't look like anything. It seems several Martinis have been sent in to fill in that electronic blind spot, but it would seem none of them were successful. Something which cannot be measured is determined not to exist, so Capulet has dropped New York a long way down the priority list."
"..."
"Yes, yes. Didn't this ship run into some trouble in the Asian... what was it? Oh, right. The Mekong District. I believe it was something about using the tanks' drive-by-light systems for civilian self-driving cars. That was apparently their last chance. If they could have sent those weapons on wheels through the streets and observed New York that way, they could have corrected for the error. But they apparently screwed that one up. And wasn't that what you wanted?"
Quenser and Heivia exchanged a glance.
They would not do anything different even if they could relive that part of their lives, but they had not known this was hidden behind the plot involving Dorothea Martini Naked.... Of course, this was a deeply hidden facet of the whole, so those greedy tank drivers probably had not thought it through that far.
"But in terms of production and consumption, New York is overwhelmingly on the consumption side. And when an error message reports that a supposedly empty ghost town is devouring more resources than anywhere else in Information Alliance territory, it doesn't seem strange at all the administration system would try to plug that hole."
"I'm impressed you could get things so backwards... The people of New York don't exist? Because they don't exist, there's no problem with attacking them? Have you completely forgotten why the Martini Series was given our special privileges!? Our entire purpose is to control things manually when the machines make this kind of mistake!!"
"Is it really? I have given myself the role of ensuring the AI network runs as efficiently as possible. It is true Capulet made a mistake. But if that very mistake is a simulation of how to most efficiently bring prosperity to the whole of the Information Alliance, I will follow that detour."
"AI is not god, Piranirie."
"Of course not. That is why it must be supported by human hands. I must ensure that those myopic fools do not reject Capulet's answer as a mere mistake."
That was the end of it.
Piranirie may have had no real reason to offer up further information and Wraith may have realized nothing she said would get through to the other girl.
The small girl simply looked up toward heaven and groaned a question.
"... Has she abandoned her free will?"
"?"
"We are meant to fill the gaps in the AI network connecting the central servers of our safe countries, so our own opinions are constantly being pitted against Capulet, the administrative system that collects big data from billions of people. Which is right and which is wrong?... If you let it sweep you away, you end up like that. Island Nation shogi players will train using AI software, but they maintain indirect control because they can raise and lower its skill by tweaking the parameters. Piranirie has become a slave to the machine. She has accepted that things are much easier if you just ignore matters of good and evil."
She could not be the same as everyone else.
She could not face in the same direction and feel the same enthusiasm.
Not with the general population and not even with the rest of the Martini Series.
"The entire genius girl project was based on a woman who hid the fact that she was a rational killer..."
"What about it?"
The old woman seemed confused why Quenser was bringing this up now, so he spat out the rest.
"This problem is even more fundamental than that. I can't even imagine the kind of isolation that must be pressing in on Wraith, Piranirie, and the others from all directions..."
Wraith gave a quiet snort.
Was she thankful that someone was worried for her, or did she feel ostracized for being written off as something that could not be understood? Quenser did not know.
No, that was the way it was for people in general. Of course you could not understand someone at a glance.
Far too much simple loyalty had been expected of the Martini Series.
"They're thrown into situations that would break anyone and then criticized when they do break. How is that right? And the adults mass-produced thousands of these created geniuses so there were replacements when they broke."
"Enough.... You are ridiculously kind-hearted." Wraith cleared her throat."We don't know which cloud is the meteorological weapon which will trigger electrolytic corrosion, do we?"
"It might not be just one. Since their balloon bombs are reliant on the natural westerlies, they might have prepared a full barrage."
"I would also like to know how much time until it arrives. That will change how we put together an evacuation plan or even a countermeasure in which we fire our own meteorological weapon to transform the weaponized cloud into harmless rain."
In that case, what did they need to know in order to protect Manhattan?
How many weaponized clouds were there and where were they floating now?
There was only one accurate source for that information.
"Let's get to the combat command. We can drag all of that out of Piranirie Martini Smoky."
"Let's get to the combat command. We can drag all of that out of Piranirie Martini Smoky."
Part 15
Once they left the central computer room, they were again exposed to the threat of the Nitrogen Mirage. They could not predict when a nitrogen laser would blast right through the ship's walls.
The number of attacks from the Information Alliance troops seemed to have reduced quite a bit from before.
"What's this? Did she purge too many of them, so she doesn't have any pawns left?"
They heard the quiet squeaking of an animal.
"..."
"Don't look, old lady. It'll only be unpleasant."
Heivia and the others had already done a detailed search and Quenser made sure not to look in that direction. He could hear the sounds of small animals gathering around what was no more than meat. He could kind of tell why no one was left.
"I can imagine some of them couldn't continue on or turn back, so they ended up in a shootout with the commanding officer that ordered the attack..."
"A normal Martini wouldn't waste this many resources." Wraith quietly clenched her teeth as the silence enveloped her."I refuse to accept that a normal Martini would have such an extreme disregard for human life..."
Wraith's role was the Stopgap Grim Reaper. When various factors had caused the chain of command to fail and a unit had been abandoned on the battlefield, she was sent in to prevent them from being destroyed before the next commander could arrive. At first glance, it looked like she was constantly watching losing battles and coldly ordering them around, but she was actually working to improve their situation and reduce the number of casualties. She could never bear Piranirie's method of wasting her allies' lives like machinegun bullets.
Had that Martini been broken by something inside her or from the external isolation?
Even if they knew the answer, she seemed beyond saving.
The ship was full of melted holes and seawater had flooded some places. While avoiding those areas, they made their way to their destination, mostly following Wraith's lead.
"There it is, " said Myonri."Is that the combat command?"
They approached a giant pair of double doors on the port side.
It bore no fancy decorations, but the walls and door were a lot thicker than elsewhere. The entire room was built to function as an emergency panic room.
They recalled that the destroyed bridge had been on the starboard side. This was not an aircraft carrier that needed space for a runway, so the positions may have been adjusted to balance the ship's weight.
"That's not a door we can pry open with a crowbar. And I'm too afraid of the ricochet to try to shoot it open with my rifle..."
As Heivia grumbled about the problem, Butler Frank casually raised his extra-large magnum created by modifying a revolving grenade launcher.
In the closed space, the cannon-like blast pounded on their eardrums and the lead mass the size of a drink can bounced around like a pinball.
While pathetically curled up on the floor like a pill bug, Heivia tearfully shouted at him.
"Are you trying to get us killed, you son of a bitch!?"
"It's no use, Heivia. He must be the kind of pervert who only responds to blonde little girls who will dominate him."
"Frank, " quietly warned the blond girl.... Oh? Quenser had a feeling that extra-large magnum had been aimed his way.
But regardless, that monstrous magnum could blow a fist-sized hole in the average steel door, but the CIC's door only dented a little. This was not something they could open so easily.
But only a civilian would think that meant to give up. This just meant they had to try harder.
"Quenser, prepare some explosives. Check how many rods the door has and set up the explosives to break them all."
"..."
"Quenser?"
Heivia frowned when his awful friend did not answer.
Instead of reaching for his backpack, Quenser glanced in a completely different direction and spoke quietly.
"I get why the sailor uniform girls aren't showing up. Even if I don't want to think about the answer. But this isn't right. It isn't right for things to be going so smoothly."
"Wait..."
"Why didn't the Nitrogen Mirage fire even a single shot while we took such wide detours? Piranirie has no reason to hold back at this point. That means she wanted to attack but couldn't. I'm sure part of it is the ship barely holding together when it's so riddled with holes, but that's only secondary. There's a more direct reason."
"What? That sounds good and all, but I don't see how it helps us here."
"Piranirie tracked the location of all the game pieces using the cameras on the soldiers. And that goes for both enemy and ally. With all the Information Alliance sailors gone, she no longer has our location as we move through the ship. And she can't exactly fire at random when she's on the ship too. All she can do is sit and wait.... Until now."
Heivia finally arrived at the most basic of conclusions.
He followed Quenser's gaze and saw what the boy was looking at.
A military shotgun with a small lens attached was unnaturally sitting on the floor.
Piranirie had known they would reach this goal line eventually, so she had made sure she would know when they arrived.
"It's coming... The Nitrogen Mirage's nitrogen laser is coming!!"
"Wait, we'll be fine. We're right in front of the CIC!! It's always fired from the side of the ship, so if we stay by this door to port, Piranirie will be in the line of fire too. It can't skewer the ship from the side, so we're safe while we're-... !!"
Quenser cut Heivia off with a weak shake of his head.
The boy pointed not to the side of the ship, but to the front.
When he spoke, it sounded like he desperately wanted someone to tell him he was wrong.
"This is a 200m mass of steel. A shot down the length of the battlecruiser will vaporize us while only grazing the combat command's door."
Part 16
"Hee hee."
How many people remained on the ship outside of this box?
This box lined with computers and partitioned by clear acrylic panels may have been all that remained of the world. The operators were overcome by that delusion while they silently fulfilled their duties in a desperate attempt to avert their eyes from the reality pressing in on them.
Only the small ruler among them was laughing.
That girl with wavy black hair wore a blue and gold parade coat over a sailor uniform and the baggy sleeves hid all but her fingertips.
She was sitting in her seat with her slender legs resting on the console.
"Ah ha ha ha!! Hee hee ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!!"
She had won.
It was over.
Piranirie Martini Smoky applauded her own results. With the number of movable pawns and mobile cameras reduced, she could no longer command an attack anywhere in the ship. But what did that matter? She only had to lay a trap at the one point she knew the intruders would go.
And they had fallen for it.
There was no way they could escape now. Their one hope of survival was entering the combat command and using Piranirie as a shield, but the walls and door were too thick for that. The door would not break from manpower and bullets and they would have to carefully calculate out how to break all of the rods if they wanted to use explosives. There was simply no way they could do that before the Laser Beam 069's attack arrived.
"Farewell, my fellow Martini. This is just how life is."
Her screen showed the Legitimacy Kingdom soldiers rushing for the wall, but that was not going to open the CIC's door.
But then a small warning icon appeared.
Piranirie used the fingertips poking out of her baggy sleeve to skillfully spin a fountain pen.
(The sprinklers?)
The area was already full of holes, but that should have actually prevented a fire from breaking out. Quite a lot of water was being meaninglessly scattered just 30 or 40 meters down a straight corridor from the CIC's door.
It was partly to strike a good balance with damage control, but the sprinklers were relatively high cost equipment on a warship that even had to preserve toilet water. As long as there were no electronics with broken shielding in the area, it was better to pump in seawater. So why here and now? When Piranirie frowned and called up a diagram of the corridor in front of the combat command, a series of ominous data points appeared before her eyes.
There was something here. There had to be something to it.
A pipe extended from the wall. The pipe was colored red as a heat warning and it was actually a dedicated duct that traveled from the kitchen gas burners to the main funnel that carried exhaust from the engine.
What would happen if the sprinkler water hit that source of heat?
(It would produce a lot of steam... no, a temperature difference... )
"W-wait, Laster Beam 069!! Cease firing!! I repeat, cease firing... !!"
She was too late.
Piranirie Martini Smoky should have kept in mind one simple fact: lasers could bend.
And the conditions were more or less the same indoors as outdoors.
Part 17
It was more of a gamble than a split-second decision.
The only data in his mind was the general idea that light was bent from warm air to cold air.
"No hard feelings if anyone gets hit!!"
After noticing one pipe with a high temperature warning label, Quenser immediately activated the sprinkler linked up to the fire alarm, producing lots of white steam.
From there, it was a matter of seconds.
A massive beam wrapped in bluish-white approached from directly ahead.
No, it had to have already passed through by the time he saw it. Quenser and the others were only seeing the afterimage left from scorching the dust and moisture in the air.
But if they could see the afterimage of the laser beam after it passed through, then they could not have been vaporized.
"It... bent!?"
Just as Heivia shouted that, the destruction finally caught up.
After being diverted aside just before reaching them, the nitrogen laser had pierced the combat command right next to them. That was a solid box similar to a panic room and it clearly swelled out from within. The air inside must have explosively expanded. That wall would have been difficult to blow down with plastic explosives, but a force within the room tore through the wall and stabbed into the opposite wall.
"... Bh... !!!???"
"——————!!"
They could no longer hear their own shouting voices.
They feared they would never hear anything more than this ringing in their ears.
But they had survived.
They were actually able to feel fear again.
"Damn... it... I think I'm going to pay for life insurance from now on..."
"Look, things are pretty bad there too."
The inside of the combat command was a complete mess.
The thick walls had been blown out or melted and the computers had all been blown away. The liquid splattered across the floor was probably the melted acrylic panels or glass.
Then there were the people.
"Wow. What is this? Every last operator is piled on top of each other. Can you really get people to work together so perfectly on the verge of death?"
Heivia groaned, but Wraith shook her head as if to cut him off.
"The odds are good Piranirie is at the bottom. They believed she was their ticket to safety. Since they couldn't ensure their own lives if she died, they acted as meat cushions to protect her. Talk about getting the cart before the horse."
"..."
Katarina viewed the scene with a difficult look on her face.
Things were just as bad as she had expected. But since she had acted to protect Wraith when it came down to it, could she really celebrate this attack on Piranirie?
Even if the outcome here could change the overall direction the Martini Series took.
And Quenser's group had to ask her about the weaponized cloud attack on Manhattan.
Just then, a warning icon appeared on one of the few remaining monitors in the shredded and scorched CIC.
"This is bad, " muttered Wraith."The Nitrogen Mirage isn't stopping. This is displaying the predicted line of fire for that shockingly stupid Object's main cannon, and it's aimed right at this combat command!! If it fires now, there really is no saving us!!"
"We'll just have to do something about that, " said Quenser."Myonri, check to see if Piranirie is hiding in that pile of corpses. If she's breathing, treat her injuries! And Lilim! I need the help of the electronic simulation division! The external cases might have melted like cheese, but hook these computers together again and find a way to fire the ship's guns. And if that Anastasia supercomputer in the central computer room is still functioning, connect it to this monitor!!"
"What good is moving a ship that's as full of holes as Swiss cheese!? And a normal ship's guns aren't going to do anything to a nuke-resistant Object!!"
"I don't need direct firepower. I'll be doing the same thing as before."
"?"
"Okay, they use heavy oil for the standard fire smokescreen. They scatter oil on the sea and ignite it to create the smokescreen. That gives us what we need."
Wraith frowned.
"Are you trying to create another mirage using temperature differences? Their Pilot Elite has to be learning. It won't be long before this doesn't work anymore."
"They'll be worried about a mirage, yes. But that's why the odds are good they'll overlook a different method."
"Quenser, the datalink is online! The aft main gun can still turn!!"
"Let Anastasia handle the calculations for auto-aiming. The first shot only needs to be a smokescreen. Fire!!"
The young man and Katarina immediately sheltered young Wraith.
Were they trying to protect her ears?
With an incredible tremor, the supposedly 70, 000-ton ship definitely slid to the side.
Unlike a missile, unguided ship's guns were exposed to a variety of influences: from the wind and the waves to the earth's gravity and rotation. It was a very general form of attack that was meant to hit the enemy just 50 times when firing 100 times. The initial smokescreen was not just to blind the enemy. It was to check the margin of error between the ideal targeting and where the shell actually fell so corrections could be made before firing the next shell.
"Even with automatic loading, it would take too long to prepare a physical shell now!!"
"That's not what I want." Time seemed to flow differently for Quenser as he responded to Heivia's flustered warning."The Nitrogen Mirage creates artificial mirages by producing extreme temperature differences using liquid nitrogen or iron oxide and aluminum. And it uses those to bend its nitrogen laser main cannon however it likes."
"Hm? What about it?"
"But what will happen if a heavy oil-based smokescreen shell is fired into that? The heavy oil is mixed with naphtha, a flammable substance that released a lot of hydrocarbons. That gives us dense nitrogen and hydrocarbons. Now, if a nitrogen laser, which is much further into the ultraviolet realm than natural light, hits that, it will produce a certain optical reaction. Anyone who lives in a safe country metropolis is probably familiar with it." Quenser grinned."Photochemical smog. That's a prism that bends light with a refractive index entirely different to an artificial mirage and that Object won't be expecting it at all."
A fearsome light burst out.
But this was not a mere failure where the laser veered off in the wrong direction. The Anastasia DNA computer could perform complex calculations far faster than the old style of computer, so it had accurately lined the pieces up on the board.
The complex artificial mirages the Nitrogen Mirage had created itself revealed a new side to themselves. The powerful laser it had fired was bent again and again in ways the Object had not expected and it ultimately made a wide U-turn and returned right to its firer.
The Pilot Elite probably could not see it in the final moment.
There was no way to follow the nitrogen laser by eye when it moved at the speed of light.
"Is it... over?" hesitantly asked Heivia.
There was a large hole leading from the front of the ship. It looked like a dark tunnel to them and it gave them a view of a giant pillar of water in the distance.
After some time passed, an incredible tremor shook the already badly damaged Flagship 019. It creaked so much they were amazed it did not just break in half.
It really was over.
The Nitrogen Mirage had sunk into the sea and the resultant waves were crashing against the ship.
Meanwhile, Myonri had found someone within the fallen operators.
"H-here she is. She looks a lot different from the other operators and it's the same girl we saw with the spy robot."
Katarina confirmed it with a deep voice.
"That girl is #7, Piranirie Martini Smoky. She is definitely one of the mothers I created."
"... Oh..."
While lying on her back, a crack seemed to form in the girl's dried lips and her throat trembled.
She probably did not have long.
Quenser was not a medical expert, but he could somehow tell.
He saw Katarina bite her lip.
"Answer our questions." Here, Wraith remained cold."How many weaponized clouds are you using to attack Manhattan? Give me the full list. Your plan has failed."
"Who... who do you think messed with my head?"
Piranirie's eyes were unfocused, so were Wraith's words really reaching her?
That Martini almost seemed to have a smile on her lips as she continued.
"I succumbed to the correctness of the Capulet administrative system in control of the Information Alliance. But in the end, what really was the Martini Series? I could have sworn Katarina Martini was to blame for all this. As our designer, I thought she had set the alarm clock and then tried to escape the Information Alliance on her own so she could safely watch the disaster she had started..."
"That is not what I was asking. Where are the excited clouds that will cause rapid electrolytic corrosion on a citywide scale!?"
"... But it wasn't Katarina Martini..."
"Hey!!"
"Oh, I get it now. It didn't have to be an internal culprit that drove the Martini Series berserk... That's right. It was someone on the outside that did this to us. All so they could do critical damage to the Information Alliance as a whole..."
Their first aid would be too little too late.
Even if they applied a tourniquet over the wounds and injected saline into her veins to keep her blood pressure from dropping, her life would still be lost.
It seemed a dying person did not shut their eyes in the final moment like they did in dramas.
With her eyes still open, their faint focus faded and the girl uttered her final word.
"... Mom..."
That was all.
Piranirie Martini Smoky would never move again.
While applying pressure to her wounds, Myonri checked the girl's pulse and then shook her head. Someone grabbed Myonri's shoulder and pushed her aside.
"Kh."
It was Katarina Martini.
She placed her hands on the girl's shredded chest and pressed down with her own body weight. She did so rhythmically and forcefully. Then she pressed her mouth against the girl's red-stained lips and breathed into them.
Again and again. Over and over.
Piranirie's slight chest rose and fell, but that was not the product of her own will. It was nothing more than her lungs mechanically inflating like a balloon as air was sent into them.
The old woman looked on the verge of tears.
"Katarina..."
"Just a little longer."
"It's no use. This is war."
"I know this isn't the right thing to do!! But just let me keep going a little longer!! Just a little longer!!"
When Myonri gently placed a hand on Katarina's shoulder, it seemed to break something deep inside her. The old woman's hands wandered aimlessly and then she buried her face in the girl's unmoving chest. She shouted something no one could make out. Meanwhile, the air breathed into Piranirie left her mouth and her chest returned to its normal level.
Quenser had done this.
So everyone else could survive.
Katarina finally wiped the blood from her hands, reached for the girl's opened eyelids, and shut them. Then she gently kissed her forehead.
"Rest now, sweet child."
That may have been how her mother Cassandra had put her to bed. Regardless, the rampage of the Martini Series, the story of a single girl, had come to a close.
But what did this mean?
Just how many bomb clouds were on their way to Manhattan?
And who was this person who had driven the Martini Series berserk from outside the Information Alliance?
This was more than an internal conflict. Suspicions would fall on the Legitimacy Kingdom, Capitalist Corporations, and Faith Organization.
"What do we do?" groaned Heivia. And his voice quickly rose to a shout."Is this battle still not over!?"
| ← Ch. 125 | Ch. 127 → |