Who Said You Could Die Now?
Who said you could die now?
The instant she finished signing the second contract, the corner of my mouth found its smile again.
Clap, clap, clap!
"Oh my, what an absolutely brilliant choice, young lady!"
The words had barely left my lips when Graul's greatsword tore through the air, hurtling toward us with terrifying speed.
Yet what swallowed the factory interior was not Graul's black mana.
From beneath Beatrice's feet, a fierce and glacial blue mana wave—something of an entirely different order from the crimson that had come before—exploded outward and engulfed the entire abandoned factory.
Blue radiance and black darkness tangled together, blotting out every scrap of vision in a hair-trigger instant.
The blue light swallowed the factory whole.
A-class Skill — Fortitude of the Soul is now active on Contractor Beatrice Conti
There had only ever been one answer.
Gather everything into a single point, short and brutal, and end it.
And the little brat had chosen it with her own hand.
Any option that dragged into a long fight would have done nothing but buy time for Graul's reinforcements to arrive.
"…Not bad at all."
All that remained was to watch the show.
Graul, charging at full tilt, was already right in front of us.
I stepped back.
From here on, it had to be a duel between the two of them alone.
"Kh…!"
Blood burst from between Beatrice's lips.
The soul's output had long since shattered past its limits and was mercilessly burning through her ruptured mana circuits.
But she did not fall.
Instead she crushed that agony down into the tip of her blade and packed it tight.
"Butcher."
Beatrice's purple eyes blazed blue.
"So you were the pack leader of those Bell family dogs who stormed our house that dawn."
Graul's mouth twisted.
"Dogs? Wrong. I'm a wolf. So what do you plan to do to me with that body of yours, you Conti rat?"
Graul stamped the floor hard and launched himself skyward.
The massive greatsword ripped the air as it plummeted toward Beatrice's crown.
—In that instant.
In my eyes, Beatrice's movement stretched into slow motion.
She did not dodge.
She drove straight in.
The treasured sword wreathed in blue light glanced Graul's greatsword aside at an angle and sucked itself in a straight line toward that massive torso.
Graul's pupils shook for the first time.
But he was no opponent who would simply crumble.
In a flash he twisted his blade, offering his shoulder instead and forcing a counter into the opening.
The flat of the greatsword smashed into Beatrice's side.
"Guhk!"
Her body slammed hard into the giant pillar at the fortress's heart.
The broken mana circuits screamed again.
Beatrice spat a clot of blood from her mouth.
Graul closed the distance without missing a beat.
"Did you really think that little firepower could cut me down?"
Yet even fallen, Beatrice never let go of her sword.
On legs that looked ready to snap, she braced against the pillar and forced herself upright again.
"…Not yet."
She coughed up another fistful of blood and, swaying, reset her grip on the blade.
"It's not over yet."
Graul snorted with open mockery.
Then he raised the greatsword once more.
"This… is Conti family swordsmanship. …Do you remember it?"
Beatrice's voice trembled.
"The first person you cut down when you smashed through our front door."
"…Hard to say. I took more than a couple of heads that day."
"It was my father."
Not a flicker of change crossed Graul's face.
"Dozens of muzzles and artifacts ringing a single sword. And you lot called that a hunt."
Blue flame flickered in Beatrice's purple eyes.
"Father stood at the very front, staking his life to protect every last member of the household. And you can't even remember his name."
"Why would I? The weak are meant to be forgotten—"
"Which is why today."
She lifted her sword.
"I will cut you down in the name you forgot. Even in hell, never forget the blade of House Conti."
"The rat talks too much. This ends now."
As Graul sprang, Beatrice drove her sword forward at the same instant.
Two shadows crossed at a single point, just slightly out of phase.
A silver-blue radiance that seemed ready to blind the eyes gathered at the sword tip and then flooded every direction.
For a moment the world sank into silence.
Only one sound remained.
Shhhk—.
It was a sound so quiet it raised goosebumps.
No explosion. No roar.
Just a single thread of blue light slicing the Butcher's body from crown to sole as it passed.
Looking down at his own splitting form, Graul… for the first time…
smiled.
"…That day."
"…?"
"Your old man had the exact same eyes."
"…!"
"Those eyes that stayed wide open till the end, like some weakling playing hero…"
That was the moment Graul's massive frame split cleanly in two.
"Heh heh. Idiots. Who told them to line up for the low odds?"
The reverse mana-transfer gauge in the upper right of the screen filled all the way and flashed.
Debtor ‘Beatrice Conti’ — combat complete. Calculating growth value…
Shopkeeper ‘Celia’’s specs are rising dramatically.
Ahhh, this is the stuff.
That pure thrill of watching my level and mana-stone balance rocket upward in real time without lifting a single finger.
Today's entire betting board belonged to me.
I was happily admiring the settlement report when—
"…I won."
Beatrice murmured in a hollow voice.
"Father… Mother… I finally… paid them back."
Then her knees buckled and she collapsed.
The treasured sword clattered to the floor with a bright metallic ring.
The price of victory was cruel.
Her body, having wrung every last drop from A-class Fortitude of the Soul, was finally presenting the bill.
From her fingertips, life force was blackening and burning away.
Her smile grew fainter by the second.
"…"
I tore my eyes from the settlement report.
What? Why isn't she getting up?
After coughing up that much growth value she ought to be collecting her reward.
Who said you could die now?
Click, click.
As I walked toward the fallen Beatrice I busily ran the numbers in my head.
Growth-value recovery rate: perfect score already.
Market value of my first premium client, box-office potential of the remaining revenge arc, expected return on reinvestment—
…Yet strangely, I couldn't finish the calculation.
Other thoughts kept barging in.
Beatrice lay on the floor, growing cold.
"…Hey. You little brat."
My voice wouldn't come out the usual way.
"Who said you could die this fast? Doing whatever you please, honestly."
Beatrice looked up at me with unfocused eyes.
"Lady Witch… I'm sorry. I couldn't… deliver the full reward…"
"Shut it. The more you babble, the closer death gets."
I yanked open my inventory.
My hands were trembling in a way that was very unlike me.
"Where is it? My potion collection!"
"No, this won't cut it. Where's the good stuff?"
I started violently hammering the inventory list.
Just stay alive. You can't die.
You have to stay alive so there can be more chances to milk golden honey like today, right?
Besides, you're my first VIP customer.
When am I ever going to see another jackpot honey-generator like you?
It's just wasteful. That's the only reason—
In this moment, at least, I honestly hated the thought of this stupid little brat dying.
Over that face turning pale and cold, another face kept overlapping.
"Oppa always looks out for everyone else first."
…Minseo.
My one and only little sister left behind in the world I came from… Minseo…
My hands, still rummaging through the inventory, were shaking hard now.
I seized the EX-class Recovery Potion bottle at the very bottom of the list and reached toward her.
But Beatrice's eyes were already closed.
"Ah… no! Open your eyes, hurry!"
…Was I already too late?
That was when it happened.
Ding!
Debtor ‘Beatrice Conti’ is breaking through her own limits at the threshold of life and death.
Warning: The debtor’s innate potential is awakening.
First Awakening — Conditions Met
What? Awakening?
My hand, mid-slap against Beatrice's cheek, froze in midair.
Because her body was being swallowed by light and beginning to rise into the air.
It was not the crimson of the Murderous Aura I had rented her, nor the glacial blue of Fortitude of the Soul.
It was a pure, solid silver light drawn up from the deepest part of her own soul.
The mana circuits that had been blackening and burning away began to restore themselves in reverse.
No—beyond mere restoration, they were being rewoven into an entirely different grade.
The young lady of House Conti who had been pointed at her whole life as an "unawakened."
That absolute zero who had never pulled a single skill from the skill gacha.
She was kicking open the threshold of death with her own strength and at last…!