Chapter 194: Say You Want To Live - Finale
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 194: Say You Want To Live - Finale
“Found you.”
Historia muttered chillingly. The moment I heard her, I hastily wrapped the rope around myself and jumped. A freefall, said to be man's greatest fear. I knew I was attached to a rope, but the terrifying speed and the dizzying sensation of the void beneath my feet stirred an instinctual fear...
Still, it had to be less scary than that hysterical voice chasing me from behind.
Thump, thump. A strange vibration emanated from the building I'd just been standing on. The people hiding inside the residential building, unable to overcome their terror, screamed.
And for good reason. Right now, Historia was...
...smashing her way up the building's wall!
“Stop right there—!”
“Would you stop if you were meeee!”
Gravity pulled me toward the ground. The rope was a little shorter than I'd calculated. At the lowest point of the swing, I let go and rolled to break my fall.
“Owowowowowow!”
Breakfalls must have been invented by people who didn't know any better. I did it just like they taught me, but it still hurts! The ‘right way to fall’? Humans aren't birds; we're not supposed to fall in the first place!
Anyway, I got to my feet, clutched my aching left arm, and ran with all my might.
Not that it mattered.
“Found you!!!”
How does one climb a smooth wall with no footholds? Simple. You make your own footholds as you go.
Stomp hard, the wall shatters, and your foot is anchored. Use that as a ledge and just keep walking, step by step, right up the wall.
It sounds like bullshit, but that's exactly what Historia had just done.
Having scaled the residential building's wall like that, Historia stood on the rooftop and locked her eyes right on me.
“Huey! Stop right there! I'll shoot if you don't stop!”
Usually, when they warn you first, it means they don't really intend to shoot. I shouted back without even looking.
“If you shoot, I'll die! Haha! Are you really going to shoot a good, law-abiding citizen who'll die from a mere poke?!”
“You think I won't?”
A dangerous glint appeared in Historia's eyes. She loaded the bullets she held in her hand and aimed at me through her sights.
Ah, damn it. Maybe I shouldn't have provoked her.
‘I'll make sure it's not fatal. Just a clean shot right through the leg.’
What kind of friend offers to put a clean hole in your leg? Just as I was grumbling to myself and about to leap aside...
‘…But what is that?’
Right before pulling the trigger, Historia frowned, spotting a figure running alongside me.
Huh? Who's running next to me?
I turned my head and saw someone keeping pace with me. The girl was wagging her tail from side to side, nonchalantly running at about the same speed as me.
…On all fours.
When our eyes met, Azzy barked, grinning brightly.
“Woof! Good to see you! Good to see you!”
Captain. You said it was a person. This is a dog.
And she's no help, either. Azzy can't fight people!
Still!
“It feels a little weird to say this, but I'm glad to see you too. So glad I could cry.”
“Woof! Crybaby!”
“I'm not crying yet, you know?”
‘Doesn't matter. I'll shoot the leg first.’
Just before Historia pulled the trigger, Azzy's ears twitched. Sensing it with her instincts rather than her ears, Azzy's eyes widened as she ran. In the dim darkness, the light reflecting off Azzy's eyes became a single beam.
Baaaang!
Along with the ensuing gunshot, Azzy, who had leaped behind me at some point, snapped her head back. At the same time, her body was thrown far back, and she landed on her back.
Azzy flailed and shouted.
“Woof! It's hot! It's hard! It hurts!”
So she can't fight humans, but she can fight bullets. More importantly...
“You feel pain when you get shot, too. I'm surprised, honestly.”
For a kid who can catch bullets with her teeth. Still, it must be because it was a Six General's bullet; she seemed to be in pain.
With tears welling in her eyes, Azzy cried out.
“My tooth is loose! It hurts!”
“Lick it better.”
“Woof…! But it still hurts! Woof!”
“Well, who told you to catch it with your teeth? Can't you use something like Qi Deflection?”
“Woof? Side dish? Meat?”
“Never mind. What was I thinking, talking to a dog.”
It seemed even Azzy wouldn't be able to catch Historia's bullets one after another. The only silver lining was that Historia didn't have that many bullets.
“Stooooooop!”
Historia leaped from the rooftop in a single bound and landed on the ground. Her presence was so ferocious that vibrations traveled through the concrete. Landing with enough force to shatter the ground, Historia's eyes gleamed with a feral light.
“Stop right there!”
Click, clack. Four more bullets dropped into her hand. She shoved them into the magazine in one swift motion and aimed her gun again as she charged.
But hey, where there's a dog, there's usually an owner.
“Skyblade Art!”
The Regressor landed lightly in front of me. Literally falling from the sky, she immediately deployed her invisible sword.
“Heavenly Mirror!”
It was different from Qi Deflection. A pure distortion of space, created by unfurling the Sky Blade, Chun-aeng, in all directions. A technique that could even bend light.
Having created a shield in Historia's line of fire, the Regressor spoke urgently.
“Hey! How the hell did you end up being chased by a Six General?!”
I calmly refuted her.
“You're wrong. I was already being chased; the chaser just happened to become a Six General.”
“What's the difference!”
“The order is important, I tell you, the order. If she were a Six General from the start, would I have pissed her off so much?”
“It's not important at all! No, wait, isn't that even worse?! How did your chaser become a Six General in the first place!”
“Tsk. How was I supposed to know she'd get promoted so fast.”
Bang, bang, bang.
Three consecutive shots were deflected by the Heavenly Mirror. Thwack, thwack, thwack. The three stray bullets tore through the concrete floor as if it were tofu.
The sight of the ground shattering on either side of me was terrifying, even knowing the shots would miss.
And we still weren't safe. Both the Regressor and I sensed the danger and remained on high alert.
The Regressor, because of her experience from a previous timeline, and I, thanks to reading Historia's thoughts.
We both knew the next one wouldn't miss.
Historia aimed at me with cold eyes.
‘Zero In.’
Zero in with three shots, and the next one is a guaranteed hit. A Gun Qi Art that only Historia, who fought by infusing Qi into her bullets, her barrel, and her marksmanship, had mastered.
It, too, was the pinnacle of a Qi Art that had touched upon the Axiom.
She's gotten so much stronger. What have I been doing all this time...?
I should skip the next class reunion. Not that I could go anyway, being a wanted man.
Then again, not enough of us are even alive to hold a reunion. Heh.
‘I can't deflect that! I have to block it!’
Perhaps having experienced it in a past timeline, the Regressor gave up on parrying or deflecting it with Qi. Instead, she swung Jizan wide, flipping over the ground itself.
“Terra Firma Arts, Ground Breaker!”
As she slammed Jizan down, the surrounding area sank, and shattered concrete shot up like thorns. The instantly erected wall of concrete separated the Gunmaster and us.
A bullet pierced through it. But having lost its momentum breaking through the concrete, the Regressor easily deflected it. Chun-aeng bent with a ping and sliced the bullet in half.
‘I can block it a few times, but not forever! Unless I'm going to fight her up close…!’
Having made her decision, the Regressor immediately shouted.
“Tyrkanzyaka! Blind her with your darkness!”
“As you wish.”
The moment the gentle voice was heard, the streetlights flickered ominously.
The nights of the Military State knew no darkness. Until she appeared, the shadows on the lamplit streets were no different from a fox that paints stripes on its face and calls itself a tiger.
Night, in its truest sense, had arrived. As if some colossal being had blown out the Military State's candles, a soft whoosh of wind was heard, and in that instant, every streetlight went out, plunging the world into darkness.
A power incomparable to any false shadow, a calamity known as the Queen of Shadow, had descended upon the night of a nation that was ‘merely’ twenty-five years old.
In the pitch-black darkness where I couldn't even see my own hands and feet, the Progenitor Tyrkanzyaka approached gracefully, her parasol resting on her shoulder. Using my mind-reading to locate her, I met a pair of glowing red eyes in the gloom.
Wow. Showing up in a crisis like this, how reassuring. I was about to greet her.
“Congratulations on your marriage, Huey. So there was a reason you wanted to return to this country.”
Her cold words, laced with a subtle hostility, pushed me away. Huh. Not exactly a friendly atmosphere.
As I awkwardly lowered my hand, Tyr looked at me with eyes full of resentment and animosity and spoke.
“Yes. You're of age now, so it's only natural you'd have a fiancée to whom you've promised your future.”
“Sorry, Tyr, but I don't think this is the time to be discussing that.”
“Is that child your bride, perhaps?”
Glance. Tyr glanced past the darkness at Historia charging toward us. Even in the dark, Historia's ferocious charge was perfectly clear to Tyr's red eyes.
“It seems your relationship isn't exactly amicable. How about it? If you wish, I shall make you a vampire. One shouldn't die during a lover's quarrel, after all.”
“We're not married. If she heard you say that, she'd literally kill me.”
“Hmm? Not married, you say?”
It was too much of a hassle to explain the circumstances, as wide and deep as the sea, so I gave the simplest, clearest answer.
“I was trying to pull off a marriage scam, things got weirdly twisted, and now I'm on the run.”
“…So, the marriage?”
“False information.”
The corners of Tyr's eyes softened slightly.
“To think one could use marriage for a scam... how curious. In any case, I understand. But why did you flee from the Abyss?”
“It's a long story, but I figured that if I stuck with you, even ten lives wouldn't be enough.”
“It doesn't seem like one is enough right now, either. How about it, become a vampire so you have at least ten lives...”
“No, come on. Let's not.”
A loud crash came from beyond the darkness. The Regressor blocked Historia as she tried to tear through the shadows. As Historia engaged in close-quarters combat, the Regressor parried her attacks, scattering Chun-aeng's blades.
Wielding Jizan and Chun-aeng, the Regressor wasn't easily pushed back. Historia kicked fiercely at Jizan, then grimaced from the recoil and shouted.
“Get out of the way!”
Haha. If she meekly stepped aside just because you told her to, would she even be the Regressor? Get a taste of her stubbornness!
“…Maybe I should? Is it really worth fighting a Six General to save him…?”
Hey! Regressor! Is this really the time for that?!
As the Regressor seriously contemplated this, something appeared beside her. Sharp claws aimed for Historia's flank. Historia blocked the stealthy shadow's attack with her foot, but the shadow swiped its foreleg powerfully, sending her flying.
“Nyaa... So noisy-nya. Humans change their territory too often-nya...”
Nabi, who had appeared out of nowhere, grumbled as she stood beside the Regressor. Historia scowled at Nabi's sudden entry into the fight.
“The Cat King…! You want to die?!”
“Nyaaa! How dare you ask nya if I want to die-nya?!”
Nabi, baring her fangs, had been a pain as an enemy, but as an ally, she was incredibly reassuring. So this is what a Beast King hostile to one's enemies was like.
Anyway, since my saviors have arrived, I have to seize this chance.
“Hey, Tyr. Shei. And all you other beastkin.”
I raised my voice so everyone could hear.
“I'd like to live, so if you're not busy, could you please save me?”
A straightforward request, with no hidden schemes or strategies.
Azzy and Tyr, seemingly surprised by my words, looked at each other.
Azzy was the first to turn back. She smiled brightly and said.
“Woof! I'll save you! Offer your neck!”
“You're going to grab me by the scruff and run? Sorry, but humans call that an execution.”
I politely declined Azzy's offer. As if.
“I'm already in the middle of saving you... Hyaat!”
“Yes. And I'm already in the middle of being grateful.”
“Say it with a little more sincerity...! Tsk! You're so difficult!”
Over there, the Regressor was engaged in a fierce battle. Historia, apparently out of bullets, was swinging her gun like a club, and the Regressor countered with Chun-aeng.
“Hmph. How impudent of you.”
Tyr snapped her fingers. In that instant, the darkness surged like an ebbing tide and engulfed Historia. Historia immediately blasted Qi from her gun, but it looked like it would take her some time to break free.
“For now, I'll concede to you. Let's get out of here.”
“We're retreating, right?! I'll just fight a bit more and then pull back!”
The Regressor's voice came from within the darkness. And from even deeper inside, Historia's frantic screams could be heard.
“Shut up! This has nothing to do with you! Leave that bastard Huey and go!”
“Sorry, Ria! I've got places to be! I'll buy you a meal later!”
“HUEYYYYYYYY!”
Bidding a vague farewell to my old comrade, I climbed onto the coffin Tyr had brought. The coffin, riding the darkness, sped through the streets faster than I had ever seen it move before.
Goodbye, Amitengrad. City of ordinary people who once held me so dear.
This ordinary petty criminal will take his leave now.
Toward the receding city of Amitengrad, I bowed deeply.