Everyone Wants Simon Polentia
The tide of battle had turned so violent that no one could predict what would happen next.
One stretch of the fortress wall had crumbled away — and now, from the very heart of the keep, the Mimickers came pouring out.
"Kieeeek!"
The Gahal tribe reacted first. The women and children were hiding in that direction, so the warriors holding the wall scrambled down without a moment's delay.
"Ooooh."
And there, strolling through the enemy ranks as if taking a leisurely walk, was a man swinging an enormous kitchen cleaver.
"Anyone stronger?! Is there nobody stronger out there?!"
Shring!
Every time his cleaver flashed, Gahal heads went tumbling into the air. He lowered his stance, coiled power into his thighs, and exploded forward in a single bound.
The Gahal warriors caught in his technique's radius glanced back — and their heads soared skyward.
"Hahaha! Nothing beats the feel of slicing meat! Hm?"
Far off in the distance, he spotted a girl in a black uniform holding back the flood of monsters. She was manipulating skeletons with practiced ease.
"Found you at last. Kizen!"
He scooped up a few Gahal heads rolling across the ground and strode off, unhurried.
"Which one is it! Which one! Platinum blonde, blue hair, platinum blonde, blue hair."
Muttering to himself as he walked, what drifted into his view was a girl with neither — a head of orange hair. He smacked his lips in disappointment.
"Huh?"
The girl noticed the Butcher too, and pointed a fingertip straight at him.
"It's you, mister!"
"Well, what a coincidence! How was the reindeer meat?"
It was Eshu Arzel.
"If that was tasty, how about some of this meat?"
The Butcher hurled a freshly severed human head. Eshu squeezed her eyes shut at the heads thudding down at her feet and shrieked in genuine horror.
"Thanks for the honest opening."
The Butcher stomped down on his jet-black energy and charged.
"I won't kill you — but I've still got to taste that carving!"
His cleaver flew at both her legs. With a soft shwk, her legs went flying.
"Hahahaha! Hmm?"
The glee on the Butcher's face twisted into something unpleasant.
The sensation traveling up the blade's handle was indescribably repulsive. It was not the feel of carving flesh.
POOF!
Eshu's severed body had transformed into a straw doll.
—I'm genuinely disappointed! And here I thought you were a nice mister!
Her voice echoed out from the ruined doll. A curse magic circle had been inscribed across the straw doll's severed torso.
FWOOOOOOM!
The circle detonated, and black smoke swallowed the Butcher whole.
In the meantime, the real Eshu — hightailing it from a safe distance — fumbled for her communication crystal.
"This is Eshu! This is Eshu! A suspicious person has breached the fortress!"
BOOM—!
A flying cleaver struck the crystal in her hand, and crystal and blade both slammed into the wall together. Eshu froze with a strangled eep!
"Isn't that a bit much? Making me taste such a hideous sensation."
The Butcher stalked closer, seething. He stretched out his arm, and the giant cleaver returned to his hand. Eshu narrowed her eyes in disbelief.
He should definitely have been seized by the convulsion curse...
The curse was clearly taking effect — angry, blotchy welts had broken out across the Butcher's skin.
But that was all. The curse's effects were already fading, bit by bit.
"Kizen really is different, I'll give you that. Figured this was all just a war game — thought if I threw real human heads at you, you'd wet yourselves and bolt. But no, you ran and you counterattacked."
Eshu retreated step by step, scanning her surroundings.
There was nowhere decent to flee, and her opponent was a Battle Arts specialist with curse resistance. Even if she ran, he would catch her.
"Why on earth would I be scared of a few human heads?"
At last she stopped and raised both hands before her.
"All we ever do at school is dissect and reassemble corpses, you know."
"Right. Cornered at last, so now you're thinking of fighting back?"
"What makes you think I'm the one who's cornered?"
Pit-pat. Tik. Tik.
Pit-a-pat. Ti-tik. Pit-pat. Tik.
The Butcher froze mid-stride and looked around. Across the rooftops, walls, and floors of the old buildings, dolls like snow-white infant spirits had appeared, bouncing and bobbing into view.
Their number was beyond counting.
The entire district was blanketed in dolls.
"The one who's cornered, mister, is you."
"Now this is fun."
The Butcher spun the cleaver in his grip and bared his teeth.
"Then this time, show me the finest carving sensation there is."
Black uniform flaring wildly behind him, the boy strode straight through the enemy lines. Every time his limbs moved in a blur of afterimages, Mimickers went rocketing skyward.
-Keeeeeh!
A Mimicker wheeled around and launched a kick at Simon. Without even turning to look, Simon caught it on his joined index and middle fingers.
"Copying me? Sorry, but—"
CRACK!
Simon's body spun once more and his heel smashed into the creature's face.
"—a half-baked imitation is worse than none at all."
CRASH-CRUMBLE!
The Mimicker burst through the wall of a wooden house and tumbled out of sight. Simon lowered his leg and stared straight ahead.
Something's off.
Among that sea of Mimickers, there were ones mixed in who were unnaturally strong.
Just like this one!
Simon wreathed his arm in Jet-Black and blocked a sword thrusting for his chest.
And they're not even trying to kill me.
CLANG!
Simon knocked the blade away. The Mimicker twisted through three full rotations in midair, reset its stance, kicked off the wall, and came charging again.
Simon gritted his teeth and drew Jet-Black up through his right hand.
SHRAAAAAAK!
Lines scored themselves through the air around him, and every Mimicker caught along the blade's contact face spewed green blood and dropped where they stood. The one that had come diving from above twisted its sword mid-fall and deflected the strike anyway.
As expected — its combat technique is on another level... huh?
Simon's eyes went wide.
Red blood was welling up from the shoulder and upper body of the Mimicker his Bayonet had grazed. Every single Mimicker bled green.
-Keeeeeeeh!
Before he could think any further, the Mimickers swarming all around him closed into a ring and leapt. Even the red-blooded one hung back a few paces, keeping Simon in its sights.
Simon tapped the ground twice, lightly, with his left foot.
Open.
SHRRRRRRRNG!
Overlord's blade rose out of the sub-space beneath the floor, lifted the sole of Simon's shoe, and carried him straight upward.
In one motion, Simon punched through the straw thatching covering the ceiling and burst out onto the roof.
And on that roof, the zombies Simon had planted there in advance were shambling about, waiting.
Simon stepped on Overlord and leapt into the air a second time.
"Corpse—"
The zombies tore the roof open and burrowed down, as if they'd been waiting for exactly this. From high above, Simon watched them go and clenched his fist.
"—Explosion."
A thunderous blast split the air like a scream. Every monster in the vicinity was swept clean away.
Simon descended back to the ground and slipped into the crater of the blast.
Among the scattered remains of monsters, he found it — the Mimicker bleeding red.
Half its body was even trying to revert to human form.
So they infiltrated by transforming into a monster.
Simon's expression turned grim. The creature flailed helplessly.
"W-wait...! I can still fight—!"
Its body spasmed and bucked for a while before going limp in a heap.
Simon examined its condition. A curse had evidently triggered deep inside its body.
The Cabal.
Simon crushed his fist shut, rose from where he crouched, and set off at a brisk, deliberate pace.
Toward the spot where an alien energy hung unusually thick in the air.
Before him gaped an enormous tear in space.
A warp gate!
Confirming no one was nearby, Simon thrust out his arm at once.
"Pier!"
"I've been waiting!"
The sub-space yawned open, and Pier's greatsword slid free. Simon seized it and swung with everything he had.
FWAAASH!
The warp gate slammed shut, and the stream of monsters pouring into the fortress from outside was finally severed.
"Hahahahaha!"
The Butcher raged about, swinging cleavers in both hands like a madman. Somewhere along the way, the world had turned white with snow — curse dolls lay strewn everywhere he'd carved through them.
"Where are you! Once I catch you, I'll slice you up nice and painful! Hahaha!"
And behind a building, Eshu pressed a hand to her chest, gasping for breath.
What kind of monster even IS he?
There was not the slightest chance of winning.
She had to get out.
"Found. You."
Her pupils trembled.
Through the window of the house her back was pressed against, the Butcher's head was poking out with a cheerful peekaboo.
SLAM!!
In that same instant, a house-sized teddy bear came barreling in and smashed the Butcher full in the face.
"Whoopsie."
The Butcher, rammed hard against the wall, snickered. There wasn't a trace of tension in his voice.
"Cute dark magic, that."
Eshu's teddy bear charged again, and the Butcher flicked his cleaver in an elegant arc. The doll split into six pieces in a single stroke and scattered.
"Hmm."
The stuffing inside the doll billowed out and enveloped him. The stuffing, naturally, carried its own curse — but red veins surged across the Butcher's body, and he shrugged free of it almost immediately.
"Ugh! What the hell even IS thiiiis! Somebody save me, please!"
Eshu screamed and bolted. The Butcher launched off the ground at once, vaulting across several rooftops.
"I am SICK and TIRED of slicing cotton and straw!"
His eyes flashed.
The moment the Butcher's body came plunging down on Eshu in a straight line—
"?!"
A gray skirt hem fluttered before his eyes, and a shoe slammed into his face.
WHAAAAM!
The Butcher's body shot out in a perfect line and buried itself in a wall.
"AAAAGH!"
From beyond the collapsed house came his scream — the first sound of genuine pain he had made all day.
"Is kicking people's asses the trend at this school or what!"
Thump.
Before Eshu, a girl with black hair streaming behind her touched down. Eshu wailed through tears.
"L-Loraaaaine!"
Lorraine looked back over her shoulder.
"Are you okay, Eshu?"
"Yes! I'm okay!"
"Eshu!"
Toto came running close behind.
"We spotted you from the top of the wall and came after you on the Death Worm right awa—"
Slump.
Toto's face flushed red. Eshu had melted bonelessly into his arms.
"Aaah, my, my legs are cramping. I'm just gonna relax now~"
"Toto."
Lorraine gave her orders in a calm voice.
"Take Eshu and fall back from here. Right now."
"Y-yes!"
At Toto's gesture, a Death Worm erupted from the ground, its enormous maw yawning wide. In an instant it swallowed both of them whole and plunged back into its tunnel.
"Now, let's see here."
Just then, the Butcher rose from the wreckage of the ruined building, dusting himself off.
His face still showed not the slightest hint of damage.
"Platinum blonde, blue hair, platinum blonde, blue hair. Huh. Neither of you, then."
"......"
Lorraine's expression went utterly cold.
"Blue hair?"
"Yeah, uh, I've got business with her, so if you'd just run along—"
GOOOOOOOOOOOOH!
Without a moment's hesitation, she released the seal hanging from her choke collar. Her jet-black hair fluttered upward and blazed like fire.
"Then from this moment on, it seems I'm the one with business with you."
She made a gesture in the air, and space itself yawned open like the maw of a monster — within it, a cluster of crimson eyes, identical to her own, gleamed into view.
"W-whoa."
The Butcher scrambled into a stance at the sight.
"...I get the feeling I've picked the wrong fight here."
"KYAAAAAH!"
"What was that?! What the hell was that just now!"
The students manning the wall recoiled in shock. The pitch-black pool below the wall shifted and swept its gaze across them.
Not him. Not this one either.
It was the One-Eyed Gentleman, who had infiltrated alongside the Butcher.
We've already stirred up far too much commotion. Before the Kizen professors track us down, I must seize Simon Polentia.
His lone eye darted frantically, drinking in the faces of the black-uniformed students one by one.
Nowhere was there any sign of Simon Polentia or Serne Eindark.
First, I'll sweep the entire wall—
CRACK!
Suddenly his face caved in and rocketed into the air.
CRASH-CRUMBLE!
The One-Eyed Gentleman, pulled out of the pool, rolled across the ground in a pathetic tangle of limbs.
What the—?!
A kick delivered with force and speed far beyond his ability to perceive.
He rolled his eye forward. A boy stood there, hands thrust casually into his uniform pockets, one leg still raised, wearing an expression of utter boredom. Dragon scales clung here and there to his skin in glistening patches, and behind him drooped a pair of slack, dragon's wings.
"And who the hell are you."
The boy's eyes looked thoroughly fed up. The One-Eyed Gentleman's lone pupil spun.
Hector Moore. From what we intercepted, they called him a student commander. In that case—
Grrrrrrrk.
The One-Eyed Gentleman righted himself like a puppet on strings.
A vast tide of Jet-Black radiated from his body in needles. Curse-laden dark energy lashed outward, and the students around him stumbled back, faces white with terror.
The curse of fear.
Fear was one of the finest emotions for governing human beings.
"An outsider targeting our students, is it."
Hector lowered his leg and spoke with the same bored tone. He, too, seemed to have grasped the One-Eyed Gentleman's power at a glance.
"I am searching for a boy with blue hair."
Hector's brow twitched.
"Blue hair?"
"Indeed. Hand him over quietly, and I shall withdraw—"
CRUUUUNCH!
He never finished the sentence.
A massive dragon's forepaw slammed the One-Eyed Gentleman's head savagely into the ground.
KUGUGUGUGU!
The ground heaved, and chunks of the ruined wall rained down.
"Fuck. FUCK! Every damn one of them, Simon Polentia! Simon Polentia!!"
Hector's eyes warped with barely contained fury.
"Hold on—!"
"I'm the one who gets to destroy that bastard!"
FWAAAAM!
His other arm crushed the back of the One-Eyed Gentleman's skull into the dirt.