NOVEL NEXT Chapter 162
For some reason, Senior is right in front of me.
But it seems I’m not dead.
Since she’s saying it like that.
But… what on earth is this situation?
“…Still the same tone, Senior.”
“Don’t be so stiff~. Or what, have you lost all excitement now that you’ve become a full-grown woman?”
“I was never excited in the first place?!”
“No need to get so angry~.”
“More importantly, I need to kill Pandora. Get me out of here right now.”
“……It’s not me, it’s you who came in. My cute junior.”
“…What?”
What Senior is saying… I don’t get it at all.
That I came here? I don’t remember doing that.
“The thing the Fairy Queen threw, you didn’t look closely, did you? I’ve been asking for it for 20 years~.”
“…What is it?”
“…A medium, created through the corpses of witches and the Crystal Stone, to allow our cute junior to arrive here… and properly fuse.”
“A medium…”
The Fairy Queen… was making something like that?
For some reason, she’s always researching something, but nothing ever comes out of it.
Could it be that…?
…No, right now, it’s Senior.
“So? Why did I end up inside Senior’s Crystal Stone?”
“…? You’re saying weird things again? You didn’t enter my Crystal Stone. You slipped into the space where your Crystal Stone and mine were fusing.”
“……”
What, so Senior didn’t do anything after all?
Then… how did I get here?
“Anyway, let’s set aside the boring stuff! Our lovely, cute junior~.”
“Stop calling me that when you don’t even have feelings of love.”
“……Well, that’s true. The Child of Heo… is always missing one emotion.”
So that’s why… Even though she always calls me cute or whatever, I never felt any warmth from it.
And I was missing the emotion of fear, so I recklessly charged at strong opponents without any brakes, ready to die fighting.
Wait, there’s something more important to talk about, right?
“More importantly, what’s this about ‘Lunatic’ Senior? Where did the ‘Poison’ part go?”
“…I’ll keep it short. Long explanations are~ not very fun, right?”
“True.”
“In short, I was originally Lunatic? Poison was my peer.”
“…Really?”
“But~ Poison died… and I found out that both she and I were ‘Children of Heo.’ So… I asked the Fairy Queen to help us fuse.”
Fusion… So it’s like putting Senior’s Crystal Stone into me.
“But you know what? It failed. Because the Crystal Stones hadn’t fully assimilated yet, they got tangled up, and while the missing emotions were filled, a new hole appeared~.”
Ah~ So like me, she hadn’t fully assimilated with the Crystal Stone yet?
Well, back then, there wasn’t much information, and with just that amount of time, it couldn’t have worked.
So instead of a new 「Concept」, it became a fusion of two 「Concepts」, 「Lunatic Poison」…
No wonder Senior ended up in such a psycho state.
“So that’s… the emotion of ‘love’?”
“Exactly! So… I went looking for a magical girl to succeed in the fusion. And… 21 years ago, you appeared. Our cute junior.”
“Stop calling me that already.”
“So mean~ Our cutest junior~.”
“Shut up.”
Anyway, this Senior of mine…
But I didn’t hear why she asked for the fusion.
There must be a reason, and she didn’t explain how she knew what a Child of Heo is.
“Huh? Oh~ I forgot again~. By the way, the Child of Heo thing, my Responsible Mascot told me~… And I instinctively knew that through fusion, we could escape it.”
“Instinctively…?”
“I may look like this, but I’ve got good instincts, right? Among Children of Heo… only one emotion is randomly missing… Don’t you think that’s funny?”
“That’s true.”
“But there’s a reason for it, right? It’s a hole for the Lord of Heo(虛) to slip through.”
“……”
“So we’re trying to fill it. Got it?”
Senior… knows way more about this than I imagined.
Then that noise I heard earlier, scrambling through my head… Senior must have heard it too.
If that’s where she got her knowledge… can I even understand it…?
“Still~ This time, I stopped the erosion of our cute junior! Be grateful to this gracious Senior!”
“Gracious my ass…”
“So mean~!”
“Seriously…”
Her behavior is annoying as hell, but I guess I should be thankful this time.
I almost died, but I avoided further erosion.
I’m always just receiving from Senior.
“So, what should I do? Go back and… kill Pandora?”
“Just~ stay still, okay?”
“…Stay still?”
“Yeah~ Here… I’ll fuse with you. I wanted to talk and fuse like this at the end, but~ I didn’t have a way to bring you here, so it was a bit of a mess~. I had lingering attachments, so the fusion didn’t go well, and it almost turned into a disaster~.”
“……”
This damn Senior… So the reason I hadn’t fully fused with her Crystal Stone yet was because of something so trivial?
I’m grateful she’s doing this for me, but she shouldn’t mess around like this…
“Still~ It’s a good thing the Fairy Queen and Darkness did as I asked~.”
“That’s true. Especially that one, even though she talks like that, she seems to have done as Senior asked.”
“That’s just how she talks, that one~. She can’t refuse my earnest love!”
“You don’t have that kind of feeling.”
“So mean~!”
“That’s why I told you not to cling like that. I must’ve said it dozens of times when you were alive.”
“So mean~!!”
“……”
Sigh, she’s just like she was back then, and the annoyance from that time hasn’t changed at all, this Senior.
And strangely, she’s burying my head in her chest like Pretty Heart.
Do people with big chests have no awareness of this kind of thing?
“By the way~ It’s almost… time for the fusion.”
“Why, feeling lonely?”
“Hmm~ No! Just a bit regretful~.”
“Regretful about what?”
“That I couldn’t do more… for our cute junior.”
“Come on…”
“Ah, one more thing, before I forget. Once we fuse… you’ll gain the emotion of fear. Don’t let that emotion consume you, and think about how to use it properly. Got it?”
“…Got it.”
“Well~ That’s something our cute junior is best at, so I’m not too worried!”
Ah~ So that’s it… While fighting Pandora, I realized I was missing the emotion of fear.
So if I fuse with Senior’s Crystal Stone, the emotion of fear will grow.
Well, that’s just one more useful sense to have.
“Alright, it’s about time to go back, our cute junior!”
“But, if we fuse, what will I… become?”
“……「Chaos」… No, that’s lame, so I’ll say it in kanji. 「Chaos(混沌)」, specifically 「Primordial Chaos(原初混沌)」. The fusion of 「Rampage(暴走)」 and 「Madness(狂氣)」, don’t you think that’s fitting? Oh, and instead of the lame 「Chaos Blast」, how about a cool four-character technique in kanji?”
“Shut up.”
“And… the rest, you’ll know when you wake up. What techniques to use, what 「Concept」 techniques to use. Originally, there was one more thing you needed to learn from me, but since Sis taught you, it’s fine!”
“What’s that? Emotion control?”
“Exactly. Without that… right after fusion, you’d be consumed by 「Chaos」 and become a greater ‘absolute evil’ than Pandora.”
“……”
“Now, it’s really time to say goodbye. It was fun talking face-to-face like this after so long! Bye-bye~.”
“…Yeah. Goodbye, Senior.”
Senior’s figure… is gradually fading.
At the same time, it’s like she’s turning into dust…
We met after so long, but we didn’t get to talk about what we wanted.
In the end, we just bickered like old times… Really, not like me at all.
…That damn Senior, right before disappearing, she made a face and stuck out her tongue.
Really, should’ve punched her.
Sigh… That’s just like my Senior…
But still, it’s the first time I’ve seen her smile so brightly, so that’s enough.
Well then… this is goodbye, Lunatic Senior.
Thank you for protecting me all this time with [Madness Extreme Poison]… no, 「Madness Extreme Poison」.
Now that’s all gone… but with my 「Chaos」, I’ll destroy everything and protect this world full of beautiful things.
◇
“Haah, haah… Rampage… are we still far…?”
“Older Sister…!”
“I can’t hold on any longer! This is the limit!”
…When I came to, the Fairy Queen, Pretty Heart, and Paladin Senior were still somehow holding off Pandora’s attacks.
That Senior said it was a ‘momentary flow’… Well, whatever.
No one’s dead yet, and now it’s my time.
“…Everyone, good job.”
“Rampage! You’re awake!”
“Older Sister! Are you okay?!”
“Dabin! Are you okay?!”
“Yeah, I’m fine now. And… I’m no longer 「Rampage」.”
“…Huh?”
“What?”
“Eh?”
By the way, my body feels really light.
Maybe it’s because the 「Madness Extreme Poison」 that was always eroding my body instead of ‘that’ is gone, or maybe it’s because the fusion is complete…
And I feel something new filling me.
Probably a sign that the missing emotion has been filled.
“……”
Huu~… Just like Senior said, as soon as I woke up, I knew what to do.
Alright, let’s go.
To crush Pandora.
“…Fourth Ability, 「Chaos」.”
The bloom of the Fourth Ability.
At the same time, my purple color changes to pitch black.
My light sword also changes from purple to a pitch-black light sword, and a black aura rises around me.
“…Rampage?”
“Fairy Queen. Take everyone and leave now. You’ll definitely get caught up in this.”
“……Understood. Let’s go, everyone.”
“Huh, Older Sister?!”
“Pretty Heart. This is her fight. That expression is one of certainty. Let’s go before we get caught up. Take Hatred too.”
“…Okay.”
Everyone’s gone now.
Then… let’s take a look at Pandora’s face.
…She looks pretty shocked.
By the way, it’s time to use it.
My new power… my new technique.
“「Descent of Chaos(混沌降臨)」.”
When I use 「Descent of Chaos」, everything is engulfed in darkness.
Yet, only Pandora and I are clearly visible.
Well, this is the realm of 「Chaos」 I created.
“……”
“Here I come, Pandora.”
I won’t just watch you destroy anymore.
Your destruction of the human world, turning dead magical girls into witches and insulting them… I’ll stop it all.
To do that, I’ll kill you here.
“Die.”
As I swing my sword filled with energy, the energy imbued with the power of 「Chaos」 takes the form of a slash.
It’s on a level that makes all the techniques I’ve used so far seem like child’s play, and it flies toward Pandora with enough force to make me laugh unintentionally.
And Pandora, facing it… smiles with an unprecedented madness.