Chapter 10. What I Can Do (4)
Leaving aside the torrent of curses pouring out of James—mostly squeak squeak—the sad truth was that my method of attack didn't amount to a complete solution. The kaijin was slow, sure, but its whole body seemed squishy through and through, so even landed blows didn't sink in that easily.
Besides, everything lying around here was metal and nothing else. I'd considered smashing up the ground and hurling rocks, but that came with its own risks—I couldn't be sure I could control my strength properly.
"Hold on."
I turned the problem over as I shaped my sixth steel ball. Scattered all around, besides the wire, were heaps of half-melted lead bullets. In raw energy, a bullet was obviously mightier than the steel balls I batted around—strong enough to deal damage even to a body sheathed in mana like mine.
And against a squishy body, it would be pure poison. Far more vulnerable to penetration than to blunt impact, naturally.
There's a gel-like material used to study how a bullet's trajectory behaves. It's a far squishier substance than you'd expect—hitting it normally just mashes it out of shape—but a bullet will usually lodge in it or punch straight through. Of course it does. Between pushing with a fingertip and pressing a knife against that fingertip with the same force, the latter is how you cut flesh.
"……Or maybe I've got it backwards."
Right. What if the truth were the opposite? Gel has nothing inside it, and for all its resilience, once a hole opens, it never repairs itself. But for a living creature with a 'body' like that, the story might be different.
I looked the kaijin's head dead in the eye. It was beyond squishy—it looked for all the world like liquid holding itself in shape. There was hardly anything resembling a mouth. Something like internal organs did seem to sit inside, but those 'spikes' looked as though they were fired straight from the head itself, no mouth involved.
If it was throwing pieces of its own body, then naturally it couldn't keep that up forever. Like pinching tiny fragments off a lump of clay over and over, its head would keep shrinking, growing weaker. But that thing was also a living creature. If kaijin mutation had quickened its regeneration—if whatever that thing sustaining its head actually was could rapidly fill in what it lost—then 'a little of it dripping away' wouldn't concern it in the slightest. A bullet that pierced clean through might actually be the better bet. Considering a bullet's rotation and the force of its push, that seemed implausible too—but for now, the thing was just standing there.
Which meant exactly that.
For a start, I smacked a ball at it. The kaijin took it on the head. The instant it made contact, the ball melted and dripped away. But at the very least, I clearly saw the ball change shape for a split second as it struck. So did the several 'spikes' that burst out sideways—not, of course, because the thing had wanted to spit them.
It had been helpless—like the saliva that flies from a boxer's mouth when he eats a right hook.
"That's what I thought."
I murmured it, and moved at once.
"Buy me just a little more time!"
"Squeak!"
I was certain all over again: that was swearing. For all I knew, he'd deliberately left the swear words out of his translator so he could squeak to his heart's content in front of other people.
I wheeled away from the kaijin. The cops who met my eyes recoiled in horror, then jammed up against the officers behind them. I'm not interested in you people. Beating down a few low-level grunts wouldn't ease my mind anyway—that would be every bit as pointless as brawling with Noir Corporation's combatants. If I was going to crush anyone, it ought to be the bastards at the very top, ground underfoot nice and slow.
"……Found it."
I murmured it, and reshaped the hammer. Threw open the propulsion unit, vaulted high—
—and brought the hammer crashing down on the thing that looked like an old-fashioned cannon, right in the middle of the police line.
BAM!
Everyone nearby recoiled in shock. The way I saw it, this thing wasn't gunpowder-based—the sound it made on firing was no shell being launched. And if it really had fired shells, my body would have been shredded across that hunk of metal. No one packs that kind of firepower into a 'non-lethal' weapon.
Something burst with a pop, but I paid it no mind and kept hammering. The rig itself stood taller than me—nearly the size of a car—with wire nets coiled up like balls beside it. Every bit of it probably cost a fortune.
I spread the propulsion units out in all directions. Under the extreme heat, part of the rig turned glowing red. Ordinarily, steel doesn't melt so easily—but there was even a generator inside the thing, and above all, I was the one wielding it.
As for despair, I'd had my fill of it last night. All I wanted was to sleep a little in my tent, and people went and woke me before dawn. Come to think of it, I hadn't had a proper breakfast either—not that 'breakfast' meant anything but the remains of a can. And there wasn't much of that left, either.
……
So that was why the circuit refused to stop, even while I fought this leisurely.
With a sigh, I hefted the hammer. What a mess. James would be aghast if he saw it. Melted scraps of steel had fused onto it every which way. What I'd used mostly was wire—iron wire processed thin enough to melt even the kaijin, yet worked heavy enough to pin down a human body. Perfect material for me to work with. Best of all, there had been several coils of it rolled up like balls of steel, so with the propulsion units running fore and aft and slam after slam, the stuff had mashed itself onto the hammerhead well enough.
When I raised the hammerhead—now at least twice its usual size—every cop in the vicinity backed away. Even knowing I wouldn't hurt them. So image really did matter to these people. A little late to start worrying about that now.
I turned around. The hammer was heavy. I'd shut the propulsion down, but the surface I'd welded on still glowed red-hot. The propulsion was shot—whatever. That thing was slow anyway.
With the police all cleared off to the sides, the kaijin and I stood facing each other. The creature, harried by James darting around it like a mosquito firing lasers, turned my way—and saw the hammer in my hand. For just one instant, I thought I saw those bulging eyes waver.
I ran forward. Spikes came flying at me, spraying like from an aerosol, same as before. I thrust the widened, rounded hammerhead forward to block them. With each particle smaller now, they couldn't melt the vast, absurdly oversized mass of steel all at once.
WHAM!
Then, like a bulldozer, I simply shoved the kaijin's body along with the hammer. It bounced up a little, then rolled across the ground. So its body wasn't pure liquid after all, huh? If needle-jabs did nothing, then obviously, next up was the meat-tenderizer hammer.
Sizzle.
The hammer's surface melted a little, but it still had a long way to go before reaching the core—the round steel balls, squashed out of all shape, clung to it in layers.
The kaijin staggered upright and looked up at me. If my guess was right—
that expression on its face would be 'despair.'
"You're suddenly in quite a hurry, aren't you?"
As Rose needled him, the official's face went deathly pale.
"Ah—yes, well, it's just that the situation seems to be developing somewhat differently……"
"You weren't in such a hurry when we asked for them a moment ago."
"That's—this is simply my job……"
"It was 'simply your job' then, so it didn't matter—and now?"
……
"And what happens if we're barred from going out for personal reasons?"
"Then…… the circuits……"
"You could have them recalled for good, in other words? You certainly arrived at that guess quickly, from where you're sitting?"
"……Seohee-unni."
At Hayun's words, spoken as she lightly took hold of Rose's arm, Rose let out a long breath. Then she took her circuit from the box the official offered and strapped it around her wrist.
"May I ask how the situation is developing?"
When Hayun asked, looking a little apologetic, the low-ranking official exhaled a small sigh of relief.
"Well, it's……"
"What else could it be?"
Jua—rather, Iris—said listlessly as she clipped her own circuit around her wrist. "Probably because that person is fighting better than anyone expected. Kaijin are supposed to be ours to handle—that's what the system's authority rests on. If she solves one all on her own, then from that moment on, that authority starts to crumble."
"……Plenty of people already believe what she says. If they start thinking she could take the magical girls' place……"
As Delphinium added her explanation to Iris's words, Dalia's expression darkened. Hayun's face, on the other hand, was shining.
Click. She fastened the circuit to her wrist and confirmed it was running. It was turning with real vigor.
"Hayun……"
Cherry's reaction carried a touch of bewilderment, but Hayun only smiled at her.
……
Iris glanced at the circuit running on her own wrist, then looked at Hayun with an unreadable expression.
"Jua? Do you think you could manage a warp?"
"……Yeah. This much, I can. Besides, we can't go warping the kaijin off somewhere else anyway."
She meant that even if they arrived and found themselves unable to warp again, it wouldn't matter—and at that, Hayun broke into a wide, delighted smile.
"Then, may I ask you to?"
Iris considered it for a moment, then finally nodded. She closed her eyes. Hayun and the other magical girls closed theirs as well. And then she felt the mana begin to move.
The other girls' circuits weren't turning with the liveliness they'd had before—but Hayun's alone was running full tilt. Everything from right after Jieun vanished was now playing out in perfect reverse. Only the energy was different from back then. What poured out of Hayun's circuit was more than enough to resonate with the others'. It flowed out from her circuit and toward the girls. Slowly, they moved into a circle. At its center stood Iris.
"I'm off."
The moment she said it, a storm of mana came tearing through—so intense that even ordinary people with little sensitivity to it would have felt it. And in the very next instant, the air around Hayun changed.
She opened her eyes to chaos. Dust whirled wildly, and broken fragments lay scattered across the ground. The police had fallen back far farther than last time. Judging by the melted equipment, things were clearly not going easily—
Thud.
Someone dropped down near Hayun. The ground cracked beneath the landing, and the girl's legs sank partway in. Gripped in her hand was something far larger than usual, its surface studded haphazardly with half-melted balls of steel. Had she improvised a modification or something?
Barely managing to stop, the girl raised her head—and her eyes met Hayun's. The faint smile still on her lips, as though she'd been smiling only a moment ago, faded away.
"Oh. You're here."
Hayun, for a moment unable to think of anything to say, could only manage a vague "Uh—yeah……"
"You helping? Then standing over there like that is a problem."
Before Hayun could even answer—
Hiss.
Such a sound rang out. The magical girls scattered in an instant.
"Quick at times like this, at least."
"Well, we have been coordinating for a long while."
"For all you were slow getting here."
Rose, with nothing to rebut, shut her mouth.
"Planning to cooperate? Or here to steal the credit?"
"……I came to help."
That was Hayun's answer to Jieun's words, in a voice that crept along the ground. Because—though it was no lie—the mission itself really was the latter. Move in when the kaijin was nearly down, subdue Jieun, take the credit. Then hand Jieun over to the Federation.
Of course, she had no intention of doing any of it.
Jieun stared at her for a long moment. Then—
"Hey, you bastards! How long are you going to stand there! You came, so help! Help, I said!"
It was the drone, bellowing with squeaks mixed in between the words.
"God, it squeaks so damn much."
"It's melting……! Melting!"
"Here I go, then."
Jieun heaved a deep sigh and dove straight toward it.
Nothing in this world ever comes easy. The moment I actually landed a hit, the kaijin changed its shape. Even that wasn't all bad news, though—the fact that it had to dodge meant, conversely, that this attack method was working.
The kaijin, which until now had been merely human-sized, swelled up lumpy and huge in an instant. The clothes it wore tore apart. What showed beneath was a translucent body. Chitinous plating clung here and there, but even that had split into jagged cracks, transparent flesh bulging through the gaps. What drooled out from inside—some kind of blood? Chik, chik. Sizzling and boiling, making that sound each time it struck the ground—deeply grotesque.
The hammer didn't melt easily, but my body, unfortunately, was a material that did. Mana might hold it off, but there'd be a limit. If that enormous body swallowed me whole.
I sprang backward in alarm. James shot upward, and I grabbed his drone roughly from below. Mana propulsion ran hot enough to melt iron, yet it couldn't burn my body—the very body that same mana protected. With James snarling something up a storm, I let go and dropped to the ground. And met eyes with the magical girls who had just arrived.
……Well, they did time it right. Honestly, with it transformed that far, I'd been wondering what on earth to do next. The body had liquid-like properties—and it could stretch itself to grow larger. If even a thin coat of that highly acidic liquid spread over my skin…… dreadful, just to imagine.
At the same time, I was a little irritated. Good that they'd come at a dangerous moment—but honestly, the timing was a little too convenient. Getting the circuits released and traveling here took time, and somehow that timing seemed suspiciously close to the moment I'd found my solution. Well, if they couldn't come without them being handed over, there was nothing to be done about it.
So I made a point of grumbling a few times, then leapt forward. And beside me— a pink streak shot past. Hayun, her brightly glowing magic wand gripped tight in her hand.
"The enemy's body is highly acidic!" I shouted in alarm.
"Yeah!"
……Would it be strange to say that voice sounded bright? Had to be my imagination. We were in the middle of a fight, after all. Answering on the run, a voice can easily come out a little giddy.
The kaijin swung its hand at Hayun. That thin, wide hand— it looked exactly like transparent candy. You know, those palm-shaped ones. The problem was that the jelly-like thing was almost certainly acidic through and through. Blocked with mana, it wouldn't be fatal—but still.
I sprinted with everything I had, to reach it with my hammer before it touched Hayun's body— —before I could smash it down, Hayun moved first.
However thin, the hand was still a blob of jelly. Hayun's silhouette showed through the transparent body, warped as if seen through a lens. Then the distortion vanished in an instant.
Shwak!
A vivid pink blade split the palm dead center. The hand—liquid, but not quite liquid—turned to liquid the moment it was cut and burst apart.
Hayun didn't dodge. She moved her sword faster instead. Thanks to my senses, expanded to their utmost by mana, I could clearly watch her softly slicing apart every single droplet flying toward her. It was less a matter of cutting each one down with precision than of dancing—one unbroken line flowing gently on, painting a picture in the empty air. Whether Hayun's wand ran hotter than that furiously boiling acid, any liquid that met it midair vaporized on the spot. White smoke blossomed into the air, and the sight of her blade cleaving through it was beautiful. A completely different mood from me violently swinging a hammer and hurling something heavy.
Right. That was it. That was what made Hayun so frightening. She resolved everything with elegance, with unbearable softness—movements so beautiful that even I, who'd been on the receiving end of them, could only admire. Ha. And here I'd been the one worrying about her.
But the hammer I'd already swung up overhead would have been awkward to stop midway, so I simply brought it down with all my strength. The arm was crushed partway through. A little liquid spattered, but I swung the hammer—still half-buried in the ground—wildly in every direction. Dust billowed up around me, and the liquid drank in that dry dust greedily. Making it react with something else before it could harm my body. That was the solution I'd come up with.
Hayun looked at me and smiled. Did she think we'd pulled off some kind of combo? This was coincidence. We hadn't each taken an arm; we'd just inefficiently blown away a single arm between the two of us. If anything, 'cooperation' fit better with Iris, keeping the thing in check with gunfire from behind.
I deliberately turned my gaze away and ran a circle to the side. Hayun ran the opposite way. Perhaps unable to decide which of us to attack first, the kaijin swung its head vigorously left and right.
……
Not a combo. It wasn't, anyway. It had simply happened to turn out this way.
Telling myself that, I moved the hammer at the very same moment Hayun swung her sword.