The Only Way Out
So this was the only way through.
As if the very air before me had been cleaved in two, every sound across the area cut out in an instant.
"Huh?"
At the same moment, Eve and Eva went rigidly stiff. The stun effect of Hollow Slash had kicked in — the skill that inflicted stun regardless of an opponent's rank.
And I could feel it.
Got them.
From the section I had cut, the anti-magic system was collapsing at breakneck speed.
It stood to reason. Even casting a single ordinary spell demanded advanced calculation — so how intricate and precise must a magic circle be when its entire purpose was to stop magic from being used at all?
With an entire portion of that delicate formula sliced clean away, there was no way the anti-mana system could keep functioning properly.
A grin tugged at my lips as I clenched the location-tracking artifact in my pocket and crushed it.
At once, as if it had been waiting for exactly that, a dimensional rift began to open behind me.
"Oppa, where are you going?"
In that brief window, Eve broke free of the stun and came charging at me again.
"Please become one with me, Oppa...!"
Her thin, whip-fast tentacles surged toward me once more.
I'd have to meet this attack head-on...!
— BANG!!!
A deafening blast suddenly roared from behind me, loud enough to leave my ears ringing.
"Kyaah!"
The tentacles rushing at me lost half their form and burst apart.
"What are you doing? Get over here already."
"Charlotte noona...!"
I turned to find Charlotte halfway through the dimensional rift, a heavy shotgun braced in her hands.
"No time to get emotional. Hurry up."
Before I could even get a word of thanks out, she seized me by the scruff of the neck and hauled me bodily through the rift.
The dimensional gap sealed shut the moment we were through.
"Whew. That was genuinely close."
I had made it safely back to Charlotte's dormitory.
"Nice work. What were you doing waiting until things got that dangerous before calling me?"
Charlotte stowed the shotgun in her inventory and frowned at me.
"Eva had set up an anti-magic system. If I hadn't torn through it with my skill, I would've become Eve's daily ration."
"An anti-magic system? It's hard enough to believe one person could install something like that — and you're saying you ripped through it yourself? Does that even make sense?!"
"Haha. Charlotte noona, everyone has at least one ace up their sleeve. In a world where every dog and cow can sling magic around, you've got to be able to do at least this much if you want to put food on the table, don't you?"
"Honestly... I just can't figure you out."
Charlotte looked at me like she'd given up trying.
"By the way, Charlotte noona — you can handle a shotgun too? If you're that good with guns, maybe before the possession you were a military veteran—"
I rubbed my chin thoughtfully as I said it, and Charlotte flushed bright red and shouted.
"I was a woman before the possession too, you know?! That's an incredibly rude thing to say!"
"Well, can you blame me? You're just unnaturally good with firearms."
"I have a marksmanship-related trait, okay? That just makes it a little easier for me to hit things than most people. Of course, I've also snuck back to Earth a lot to practice."
"From what I just saw, you blew Eve's tentacles apart cleanly. Couldn't you get me a gun of my own?"
"Dream on. You don't have a ranged support trait. Think you could even hit something that runs faster than a car? And just now was an exception. Those tentacles didn't have a scrap of mana reinforcing them. If that Eve girl had wrapped them properly in mana, I wouldn't have left so much as a scratch."
In short, Charlotte's guns were a textbook case of strong-against-the-weak, weak-against-the-strong. A shame.
"Anyway, take your shoes off and come in."
"Ah, right. Of course."
I did as she said, slipped off my shoes, and set them in the shoe rack.
"So. Let's hear it. Show me how much that life-risking conversation with your mother was actually worth."
"Gladly."
Charlotte sat down at the table, so I took the seat beside her.
"Charlotte noona. I've got bad news and worse news. Which would you like first?"
"...Normally in that setup, at least one of them is supposed to be good news, isn't it?"
"The fact that I made it out alive is the good news, isn't it? Come on, pick one."
After a stretch of silence, twisting a lock of hair around her finger, Charlotte finally spoke.
"The less bad one first."
"The less bad news is that in four days, Eva Cardena is going to attack Luin Academy with a whole host of her associates."
"If that's the less bad news, I almost don't want to know how awful the worse one is... But why is that person suddenly launching an assault on Luin Academy?"
"My so-called mother despises Megan Astorius with every fiber of her being. And four days from now is the day Megan Astorius visits Luin Academy."
"If Megan Astorius is at Luin Academy... doesn't that basically make the attack a non-issue? I mean, we're talking about Hero Megan. He's an 8-Star."
I shook my head at Charlotte's easygoing assessment.
"Now for the worse news. Luin Academy does not have the forces to suppress this attack."
"Like I said, if Megan is there, it shouldn't be a big—"
"Even counting Megan Astorius among the academy's combat strength, the outcome stays the same."
"You're saying they could still lose even with Megan there?"
I nodded without a word.
"...Don't mess with me. This kind of joke isn't funny at all."
"You know me well enough to know I don't joke about something this serious, Charlotte noona."
"Haa... Do you know the enemy's exact numbers?"
"Yes. I'll list them out. Five 7-Star ability users. Seven 6-Stars. Thirty-three 5-Stars. And everyone below that adds up to roughly fifty."
".......That's practically a war."
Charlotte's face had gone stiff as stone.
"Which is exactly why I told you — even if Megan steps in, it won't change the result."
"Say Megan holds off three of the 7-Stars, Merquin takes one... that still leaves one more we have no idea how to handle... And the forces below that aren't in our favor either. Megan won't be coming alone, but I still don't see that turning the tide of the battle..."
Charlotte clutched her head for a moment and groaned.
"......So everyone pouring in this time has a grudge against Megan Astorius?"
"Miss Shina has quite the fan club already — looks like her big brother is just as popular."
"Ugh...! I knew Megan was trouble from the moment he started killing demons without a second thought, no matter the situation. Even in the novel he was a walking red flag, and now look where we are...!"
"All right, all right — you can trash-talk Miss Shina's family later. Right now we need to put together even the smallest scrap of a plan."
"...Yeah. Sitting here cursing him out only makes that bastard Megan live longer. Haa, what are we supposed to do about this? Even if we tell the academy side, there's nothing they can really do about it... and I'm not even sure they'd believe us in the first place."
I nodded at Charlotte's lament.
"Exactly. Even if we screamed ourselves hoarse that an enemy capable of wiping out a major city was going to hit the academy in four days, no one would believe it."
"Evidence — do we have any kind of proof?"
"If I could submit my memories as evidence, that would be wonderful... but even twenty-first-century Earth's science can't manage that. Truly tragic."
"...I'm going to lose my mind."
It was utterly bleak. No viable option came to mind no matter how hard I searched.
We couldn't stop Megan from coming to Luin Academy either.
Twisting the schedule of Megan Astorius — a man whose time was worth more than diamonds — was next to impossible for a mere academy student. Even if Shina begged him herself, it probably wouldn't change much.
There was only one way to overcome this situation: call in outside help.
But that was a dead end too.
We can't even be sure Luin Academy itself would believe us. Would some other power really take our word for it and pour military support into a matter that has nothing to do with them?
I didn't think so. If the world were beautiful enough to hand out aid that easily, a unified mixed nation of demons and humans would already be ruling the continent in peace.
"......Haa."
In short, breaking this deadlock required a force that satisfied two conditions at once.
First: a power that would take me seriously and listen carefully no matter how absurd my claims sounded.
Second: a power that would gladly pour massive military support into Luin Academy even in the frustrating uncertainty of not knowing whether my claims were true or pure fabrication.
Truly ridiculous conditions. No force in this world could possibly meet both of them.
Honestly, short of being someone's parent, there's no way anyone could satisfy conditions this insane...
Wait. Parents?
A parent, of all people, could absolutely satisfy the insane conditions I'd just laid out.
A being who believed whatever their child said, and who transformed into a superhuman willing to do anything to save that child from danger.
Andres.
My father — Shion's father — was the only key that could break open this impossible situation.