The Great ASIC trial, day 2

"I wouldn't go as far as calling it treason, but I feel we can't-"

"Mina, he is the sole reason behind the chaos that's plaguing Lowee!"

"That is a low blow, Kei. If you truly do believe that, then I'll ask you to also join the defendant's seats!"

I was numb to the world around me. True, I was not a stranger of dropping people from great heights at this point- even with the Uni girl surviving, that meant three peoples fell from more than thrice their height because of me- but this was the first time I have done so while totally aware of my actions.

For a second I was tempted to blame Mina- she was the one that pushed me to do it, I wanted to think. I wouldn't have done that if not for her.

But that would be a lie. I approached Overflow with the intent to harm. The will to kill. From the very moment I laid my hands on him, there would only have been one of us still alive in the end.

Sure, he tried to kill me first, but...

"Gyone."

I stopped my thought process immediately, and turned to look at Mina. Gone was her anger from before- now, she was tired, sad, and almost looked like she wanted to give everything up.

That's when I realised that something had happened- something worse than the sharicite being stolen in front of us. That's also when I realised that as always, someone needed to stay clear headed- and for once, Mina wasn't up to the task.

"What's the matter, Mina?" I asked. My own doubts can wait for now. I owe her at least that much.

She said nothing for a few seconds, as we finally reached the Basilicom's entrance hall. We stopped in front of what was left of the gates, which were blown apart during the assault I guess, and I heard her sigh.

"Rom and Ram are gone."

I waited for a bit, but when she added nothing I felt the need to ask something, anything. "Where have you sent them last? Maybe I can go and get them, or..." I trailed off, trying my best to not think of the other alternative.

"This freak in his dinosaur suit, CFW Trick, did something to the sharicite," she started, trying her best to hide her emotions, "and after that Rom and Ram just... Stopped fighting completely. I don't know how, but they have Rom and Ram- if not in body, then in mind... And there's nothing we can do about it."

And then, she broke down, and started sobbing- at first, quietly, and then louder and louder. I could make out some words in her desperation, something like "I failed them", and "I'm a horrible caretaker".

I've never had someone cry on my shoulders like that. I'm not the kind of guy someone goes to for that kinda things. So I tried to wing it, taking her in my arms and whispering platitudes in her ear. Inside, I was shaking.

I've bit off way more than I could chew. I mean, I knew that from the very beginning; from the moment Chika hired me, hell, from my very first fight against a dogoo I knew I wasn't made for this. How could I? I'm not from here. Prior to my sudden appearance here, I'd never fought anything.

Now, I'm a murderer. A thief. A terrorist, even, if you count my actions in Lastation. I'm also a massive liar, and an opportunist. My entire time in Lowee, all my actions had lead to a single goal: betraying every last one of them, and stealing a sharicite shard.

Even if I was given the opportunity, could I really go home knowing all this?

"... Fuck this."

I felt Mina stiffen in my arms, as I released her. I then turned towards the exit, before speaking again. "They stole and corrupted the Sharicite, so what? Even I could have done that. That shouldn't stop us. And in fact, it won't. I'm heading back to the Labyrinth, and I will kill every last one of them if need be. I'm gonna go there, and destroy their organisation, and maybe even take the Sharicite back. Hell, with luck I'll even get a shot at stabbing that Trick guy."

I waited for Mina to say anything, to protest that I couldn't go or to ask me to be careful. I didn't, however, expect her to chuckle like she did.

"You're right. Wallowing in misery will not help."

She then rose up, and did something with her hands, and suddenly, she was holding a staff, made of crystal and wood. Her sad expression had been replaced by the cold fury from before.

"Let us depart immediately for the Labyrinth, so that we may finally purge ASIC's presence from Lowee!"

I let a tiny smile appear on my face, and grabbed my lance. Because, well. I may be using them, but that doesn't mean I'll refuse to let them use me.

I owe them at least that much.

"I can see the Basilicom! Come, we need to get the Oracle as fast as possible to repair the Mascot!"

Broccoli stiffened, before asking "Umm, is it me, or does the Basilicom looks kind of... Beaten up, nyu?"

"And what's with that... Giant, robot... thing?" Added IF, looking as lost as all of us.

RED. made a pout, before smiling and asking "Hey, is that a tank near the window, here?", pointing at a window near the top of the building.

It took me a second or two to process everything, and that's when I noticed a guard coming in our direction. "Goodness, what-"

"Oh, the Candidate's party!" he yelled, before bowing. "The Oracle has asked us to tell you to go back to Planeptune. As you can see, it seems we are... Unable to house you for any period of time."

"Yeah, no kidding. What happened here?" asked IF.

The guard swallowed, before replying. "Well, we had been infiltrated by ASIC members, and they decided to spring a trap on us and lead an assault on the whole Basilicom. We have suffered immense damage, and a lot of losses. Furthermore, the Candidates seems to have stopped... Well, everything. Apparently, something of importance has been stolen as well, which prompted the Oracle to leave for the World Labyrinth with the mercenary, Gyone!"

RED. gritted her teeth, but before she could do anything, IF assured the guard we would go back to Planeptune, while shutting her up. Once we were further from the Basilicom, we fell into an uncomfortable silence, before Broccoli broke it.

"Can I join you in the World Labyrinth, nyu?"

Mina knew teleportation. And either her anger was powering up her magic, or she was naturally able to transport the two of us across the whole nation just like that.

I looked down, and sure enough, this was the World Labyrinth in all its glory, tetris-like floating structures included. Below our feet was the endless abyss, and on every walkable surfaces of the Labyrinth...

"There's so many ASIC goons..." I muttered, grabbing my gun. At my side, Mina stiffened, and then raised her staff high in the air.

I could see the ASIC members stiffen; some of them took cover behind something or another, while others bravely took a step forward, and some were even already running in our direction. Without a word, Mina slammed her staff on the ground, and several huge thunderbolts burst on the ground, destroying a part of it in the process, and knocking many of our opponents down in one attack.

The few grunts that escaped the initial assault quickly got over their shock, and attempted to flee, but before they could get away I started shooting them down, while Mina just shoot beams of pure energy at them. With the both of us hard at work, it didn't take that long before we finally cleared the area of ASIC trash.

"So, how do we do this?" I asked, unsure of our plan of action. "We can either separate and search more ground, or stay together and cover our blind spots."

She sighed. "I'm more of a ranged and support fighter, and you're definitely weaker than most of our elite soldiers. While the better option would be to each go our own way, should we find that freak of nature, we'll lose and possibly even die. So, we need to stay together."

I nodded. "In that case, we should probably go that way," I said, pointing behind the knocked-out grunts. "There's too many grunts here to guard anything that's not a direct entry point to their main base."

Mina thought about it for a second, before creating a massive bridge of light between our platform and the next. "In that case, lead the way. We have to make haste."

My second adventure in the World Labyrinth was definitely easier and far more pleasant than the first. First off, no jumping between platforms, so I didn't risk dying in the endless void below me. Second, I'm not running behind a dumbass trying to release a swarm of murder machines.

He obviously succeeded, so much so that he released one more than the initial maximum~

With that being said, there's a lot more grunts here than before. And more than that, all of them are equipped and ready to fight, almost as if...

"Hey, Mina. I'm pretty sure we're running straight into a trap right here," I said, not slowing down either way.

She chuckled. "And yet, they are the ones who will-"

Before she could finish what she was saying, I spotted something flying towards us, and grabbed her before throwing the both of us to the ground. An explosion sent us ragdolling away, but we were protected from falling into the void by Mina's bridges of light.

As I rose to my feet, I froze, recognising who exactly was in front of us.

"Master Trick told us that no non-ASIC member can enter the sacred grounds," said Rom, in her transformed state.

"Master Trick told us to burn down anyone that didn't comply to those orders," said Ram, also transformed. The both of them then raised their staves and pointed them at me, while Mina struggled to get up from her spot on the ground.

"If we do good, Master Trick will reward us," Ram continued, and I noticed her eyes were unfocused and her voice barely changing at all. "Master Trick's rewards are worth more than your lives combined. Stand down, or we will cut you down."

Mina rose up, using her staff as a crutch, before healing the both of us. She then turned to look at me.

"Don't worry, I know what to do."

With that, she rose up, and started looking at the twins. And then, her face switched, turned severe, angry, and actually quite terrifying.

"Rom, Ram, you will cease this foolishness at once!" She said, directing her fiercest Mom Glare at them. "I want you to go to a corner and think about your actions, young-"

An explosion pushed her back, and as she fell on the ground, clearly bleeding, I saw something I never expected to see.

Rom, her staff raised against the both of us, a nasty glare on her face.

"Master Trick allowed us to dispose of any intruders as we saw fit."

As she pointed her staff at my face, I barely managed to dodge by jumping backwards, and the explosion still threw me backward. However, I've had a good amount of experiences with being thrown around by explosions, and this time I managed to land on my feet and keep somewhat steady- just enough to grab my lance and parry a strike that intended to break my stomach. Ram's motionless face was staring at me, before she jumped backwards and joined her sister.

I took a better footing, and threw my lance in their direction, ready to call it back as soon as I could. However, instead of dodging like everyone always does, Ram just grabbed the lance as it sailed past her, and threw it as hard as she could on the ground, jamming it inside the platform.

Rom used this opportunity to throw a massive fireball at me, followed by a storm of ice shards. Needless to say, I didn't manage to dodge everything- but I didn't need to. With a few more cuts and bruises than I'd like, I ran toward her, and as she got into a defensive position, I aimed a kick.

At her sister's face.

Caught totally unprepared, the hit was enough to throw Ram away. Before she could recover, I shouted "Callback!", and my lance flew back towards me.

Taking a massive chunk of the platform's ground with it.

Ram couldn't hope to avoid it, and frankly I didn't think I would either, but somehow I managed to grab my lance's handle, and not get splatted on the ground in the process. The platform's pieces stuck on my lance started disintegrating, fading into tiny blue squares that floats up and disappears.

As I looked at Ram's prone body on the ground, I failed to remember in time that I was actually fighting two opponents. As I turned back to look at Rom, a huge pain hit my shoulder, and I staggered a bit before falling on my knees, a shard of ice mixing with my blood, so close to my heart.

"We won't fail Master Trick, even if we need to die for it," Rom said, her face growing a bit more distressed. She summoned another ice shard, which she sent at me directly in the head, but I jumped to the left and got back on my feet.

That's when she started creating a massive amount of ice shards, all of them flying in my direction. But instead of trying to dodge them, I decided to just run towards her, even if I needed to take a few hits to join her.

A shard barely missed my other shoulder. One lodged itself deep in my knee. I tried shooting her with my gun, but as magic attacks, those apparently didn't even faze her, as countless more shards would cut me, or barely miss.

As I stumbled up close and personal, another got stuck in my arm. But she let me get too close, and now she couldn't summon her shards properly. And as I grabbed her to get her closer to me, I quickly asked for forgiveness, as her face morphed into something akin to surprise-

And headbutted her right in the head, as hard as I could bring myself to.

This had the added benefit of knocking her out, joining her sister in a painful, dreaming state. As I tried to wake Mina up, I couldn't help but notice something.

She's stronger than me, even if she's a child, so then... When I tried to grab her...

"Why didn't she hit me first?"

At first, Mina was pissed that I brutalised the Candidates, but she ended up calming down quickly enough. Still, we couldn't just abandon them, lying face first on the ground. So, we decided to finally split up; Mina was still feeling weak from the explosion, as she took the full brunt of the attack, so she healed me as much as she could, and then decided to stay with the twins.

Which meant that, for the first time ever, I had to infiltrate an ASIC base, alone. And not only was it their main one, where they apparently had a lot of massive robots, but it was also where their boss was. Easy.

Far in the distance, I could faintly see a wall shining brightly. Now, that's definitely weak evidence right here, but I have no other lead.

And so, I started running in direction of this light. Who knows, with some luck, those idiots forgot to hide the Primal Sharicite.

I ran, and ran, only ever stopping to catch my breath behind three closed walls, to make sure nothing could ambush me. Paranoid? Yes, but I still didn't see a single ASIC guard, and I couldn't believe this Trick guy to be so arrogant he'd leave security to a pair of brainwashed children. Powerful children, sure, but still.

After a while, I finally reached the shining wall. Turning to look at what was in front of it,a gasp escaped me. It was the Primal Sharicite, alright. Except it just felt wrong.

Gone was the alluring, rainbow-like shimmer. In its stead was a white, corrupted pulse; the crystal itself seemed plagued with several abominations attached to it, some kind of purple, flesh-like material.

I looked around, but once again, I appeared to be alone. Sighing, I grabbed my lance, and gave it a few twirls.

How did I use this flamethrower attack again?

As we reached the spot where we first found the mascot, we were surprised to see that we weren't the first here. And for once, it wasn't even that disgusting wifey-killer.

It was a disgustingly gross fatass in a dinosaut suit, one who was apparently waiting for us.

"Aaaah, Planeptune's CPU Candidate. I am sorry to say, but you are definitely way too old and ugly for my tastes."

Too old? Ooooh, I'll show him! "Then it's a good thing you're positively ancient compared to us, gross dinosaur... Thing!

"Ugh, even more of them. Tell me, is your party composed only of hags, or do you have some prime flesh around... Ooooh, yes, I see a cutie pie!"

Was he talking about Broccoli? No way is he touching her!

I wanted to say something, but was cut off by Iffy. "Arg, shut up already! We're here to put a stop to your robot invasion plans, and if we need to destroy you we won't hesitate!"

It took me a while, but I had finally mastered this thing with my lance where the tip somehow blow fire at things, and was using it to clean the Sharicite. It honestly took way too much time, but now it looked as good as new! Sorta.

This is definitely not usable as an attack, tho. Guess Fire isn't something I'll be using a lot.

I looked carefully around me, and, seeing nobody, I looked again at the Sharicite. My goal is right here. I have spent the last hour or so carefully fixing it.

I mean, it's not really my crime, is it? And I'm doing it for the job... The mission...

This...

Is NOT what you're meant to do. Forget about Chika, she can't reach you! You have an in with Lowee! Just stay there and work with them. After all, the most important is for us- well, you, to stay alive~

... Is my mission.

Wait, did you even listen-

I took the stone-cutting tool, and drowned out the voice in my head. My conscience? Something more sinister?

It doesn't matter. In the end, I made my own choice.

Lowee's Primal Shard joined Lastation's in its special pocket.

After a short while, I heard some noise from further down the road. I looked back at the Primal Sharicite, and decided that, as long as I knew where it was, everything should be okay.

And so, ignoring my conscience once again, I ran towards the noise.

I stepped into a scene of chaos. Two massive robots where throwing everything they had at their opponent, and a bit behind them, I recognised the dinosaur suit dude who stole the Primal Sharicite. Trick, if the twins are to be believed.

And in front of him, battling those robots?

Nepgear and her team.

They seemed to be doing rather well actually, considering they were fighting massive robots of death, demise, and destruction. I'm probably going to let them at it, since they're obviously better prepared for this than I am.

As for me, I hid behind walls, trying to make my way past the robots, and actually, surprisingly, succeeded. Now, all I needed to do was ambush the dinosaur.

This part of the plan, however, unsurprisingly failed instantly.

"Now, come out, Wild Card. I am honestly surprised you managed to escape my cutie pies."

I gulped, and got past my hiding place, facing Trick directly. Nothing was said for a few tense seconds, as we looked at each other's faces. Well, he looked at my face, I myself was looking at its entire body.

Up close and personal, he was even worse than I thought. There were some strange liquids permeating his whole body, sweat or drool or something equally as disgusting. His whole bodysuit was coloured a flashy yellow, that honestly hurt my eyes the longer I gazed at it.

I tensed up, while he looked calmer than anyone who's getting ready to fight should be. Deep down, I knew why; he didn't see me as a threat. Quite frankly, I can't blame him, I don't see myself harming him in any way, shape, or form.

However, he suddenly decides he wants to speak to me, as he yells my title.

"Wildcard! There was no point in coming here, so let's make a deal," he says, opening his arms wide. "Give them to me, and I'll leave this place alone, not even taking the Primal Sharicite with me."

I pause, thinking, and then ask him "what 'them'?", however, I feel something sinking in my gut.

He grins, and in a smug voice, as loudly as he can, say "the two shards of Primal Sharicite you have stolen from both Lastation and Lowee, of course!"

I wince, and close my eyes, as I hear a faint "what the hell?" coming from Nepgear's team. With my voice shaking more than I'd like, I yell back. "I have no idea what you're talking about, Trick!"

"Don't lie!" he roars, and takes a step forward. I hold my ground, despite every parts of my body telling me to flee; I know he'd somehow manage to reach me, however fast I fled. "Our spies caught you! You are not as stealthy as you'd like, Wildcard!"

I look at the ground, for a second or two, before clenching my fists.

Giving them to him would have been the best solution, true, as long as I had a way to live somewhere, far from the consequences of my actions. Free to work for a way Home.

But he's shot that idea in the head, when he yelled about my mission in front of the broads.

"Then," I yell, grabbing my bag, "you'll have to grab them from the Abyss by yourself!"

And I threw my bag into the unending void of the World Labyrinth. As I did that, I looked him in the face, and could see confusion, quickly replaced by anger.

"WILDCARD, I WILL END YOU!"

Scratch that, that's a metric ton of pure, unfiltered wrath right there running towards me, and god he's running towards me!

I try to avoid him, but he somehow manages to change his trajectory, and hits me with all his weight, leaving me on the ground and breathless. As I try to recover, I see him, above me, fists up in the air, ready to get down on my battered body.

I try to accept my fate, but suddenly, a flame lights up inside me, with a single message.

I refuse to die looking at this abomination.

I catch my breath, and as his fists ding down on me, I roll to the side, narrowly avoiding his hit in the process. I get up, take my lance, and attempt to stab him with it, but he proves to be surprisingly nimble as he dodges my hit and tries to knock my lance away from me.

I try to put some distance between us, and he just chuckle, before opening his mouth wide. Suddenly, the largest, most disgusting tongue I've ever had the displeasure to see comes out of it, and attempt to swipe me, to knock me down, or maybe even grab me.

At first, I try to dodge, but it soon becomes obvious it's not effective- I'm spending too much energy on this, while he doesn't seem to get tired. So I do the next best thing.

I take out my gun, and shot him in the tongue.

He yells a bit, and retract his tongue, repeating "Cold! Cold!" over and over. I take this time to shot him again, but this doesn't seem to be effective, so it's probably only his tongue that can be damaged that way.

As he calms down, he looks at me with even more anger than before. He starts to raise his fist, but before he can do anything, a shockwave pushes the both of us to the ground, confused.

I look behind me, and I notice the two robots laying on the ground, with massive cracks on the ground slowly spreading everywhere. Nepgear and her team looks nowhere to be found, so I assume they have already left.

Another shockwave rocks my body, and as I look back to Trick, I see that his fall had started to form more cracks on the ground. I get up, and notices that the ground seems to be moving to the side.

My eyes go wide, as I understand what's happening, and I start to run where the cracks first started spreading, hoping to be in time. But it was for naught, and with a massive bang, the whole platform just disingrated beneath my feet, turning into tiny blue squares.

And Trick and I fell into the void, the both of us screaming... Until something broke my fall, pushing all the air inside my lungs away, as I felt myself going up.

A few seconds later, I was breathless, panting, and trying my best to not throw up, but alive, with solid ground beneath my feet. As I managed to breathe again, I looked up...

"Goodness, are you alright? I almost missed you there!"

... And was faced with my saviour.

"So", began IF, as she sat down in front of me. "I guess I can finally guess your 'mission', huh."

I said nothing, only looking down at the ground. IF sighed, and took a drink from her coat, before drinking it. "That also explains the 'not worth much'. Honestly, what kind of idiot do you work for that would forces you to do something like stealing from all the Basilicoms in Gamindustri?"

"Please stop," I say, as softly as I can. "I know what you want, but there's no point in telling you who hired me. She was right in a way- you wouldn't believe me."

"So what, huh?" She suddenly yells, getting up. "What will you do then? Are you going to Planeptune next? With the entirety of our guards and almost all of ASIC looking for you, you're already dead! Just tell us, and we'll be able to help!"

I sigh, and get up, wincing a bit. "Nope, I give up. I didn't sign up for that. I don't need to tell you who I'm working for, because as soon as I'm back in Leanbox, I'm not working for them anymore."

A mocking laugh takes me by surprise, behind me, and I turn around to look at RED., who's getting patched up by Compa. "Good plan, dumbass. You'll just have to either enter Planeptune's port, or Lastation's. Honestly, just let us knock you out and take you to prison, it'll be easier for anyone involved."

I say nothing for a few seconds, before swiftly turning in the direction of where I left the Primal Sharicite. "I've got one last thing to do, and as much as I don't want to, I have to ask for your help."

After explaining where the Primal Sharicite was, Nepgear decided to split off from us, still in her transformed state, to look for Mina and the twins. It didn't take long before we were gazing at the giant crystal.

"This is so beautiful..." RED. whispered, before shaking her head. "I can understand why someone would want to steal it. I give a shard of this to anyone, and I get a wifey for life~"

I feel a sweat drop appear on my forehead, before leaning closer to the closest person from me- a small child on a sentient cat bouncing ball- before asking her "is she always like this?"

"Always, nyu," said the small child, who then introduced herself as "Broccoli, nyu."

Still, as much as I looked at the Sharicite, I couldn't help but wonder...

"How the hell are we going to transport that back to Lowee?"

The five of us just stood where we were, thinking, before a "whoosh" took us out of our thinking. Nepgear was back, and on her back were Mina and the twins, still unconscious.

RED. turned to look at me, a judgemental look on her face, but Mina was quick to explain that the two had been brainwashed and that, all things considered, they weren't hurt that badly. Which... Didn't help much with RED., but at least the others didn't look like they were ready to hang me. So that's good, I guess.

After doing a bit of catching up, Mina took hold of the Primal Sharicite (read: laid her hand on it) and use dan eject button- and just like that, she disappeared, taking the massive crystal with her.

I went to the twins' side, Mina having left them behind to take care of the Sharicite- she claimed that, once in the city, she would levitate it with her magic, but in turn she couldn't take care of the twins. I laid them close together, grabbed four eject buttons, and gave two to IF, who decided to bring Ram with her. I presses my eject buttons on Rom and I at the same time-

And the four of us were back in Lowee's capital.

After all that, it was over. We took the twins back to the Basilicom, and then I grabbed all my stuff, and bid farewell to Nepgear's gang and Mina.

IF took me aside and asked me how I intended to go to Leanbox, and if I'd be okay because I didn't have anything to bring back, but I just smirked and told her not to worry. And then, I went outside, and hid in a back alley, before waiting until I was sure IF wasn't looking for me.

I patted my pocket, and I felt the recognisable hardness of the two sharicite shards. I took them out, and looked at the both of them.

Lastation's was a bit bigger, and it had a black shine, along with it's rainbow shimmer. In comparison, Lowee's was shining white, and since I took my time to cut it, it was in a better shape, and smaller.

I smiled, pocketed them again, and then took out my old pants, from my old world. I searched through its pockets, and took out a tiny box, before putting the pants away again, stashing them with all my other stuff. I looked at the box; it was green, and had a small logo on the side. An X, with one line being a spear.

My smile turned into a wide grin, as I activated the eject button, to go back to Leanbox.

Author's Footnote:

Here ends the Lowee Arc. Onto Leanbox, now, which is sure to go well- after all, this is familiar territory, right? And he's been working for Chika this whole time.

Quick note, sorry for the time it took, but damn was that hard to write. It took me 10 sessions. TEN. SESSIONS. I came to the uncompleted file ten fucking times, before adding something and leaving it as was because I couldn't write more.

Review Time~

IsekaiFanBoi: More like really fucking pissed off Mina.

Ace-Of-Weeb: Although it hadn't been explained yet, it makes sense that she was filled with murderous intent. The whole Basilicom was being blown up and invaded, the thing that ensure the nation's survival had been stolen, Rom and Ram had been knocked out, and she herself almost died. In the span of an hour, she failed her Goddess, her charges, and her nation, and even to an extent the world. Now I ask you, convince me she'd spare Overflow.

AzuMazu: Because he's always been Lowee's, nay, ASIC's main villain dammit! From the very beginning, his death was a lie, to feed my own narrative! (JK, I fixed it- thanks for telling me.)

I dunno if it's going to lead him anywhere specifically, but most of the actions he takes and the things he'll believe in are/will be a result of him becoming less sane. And his relationship with Linda, even if you disagree, is proof of that- Because at the very least, it shows that he's still clinging to the few things he can. Linda is, despite everything, still his first friend. The first person to genuinely be good to him, to genuinely care. Without her, he'd be dead or alone in this world, so it's understandable he just refuses to see the truth. Warechu gave an excuse "just in case", and it worked only because Gyone wants to believe Linda wouldn't betray him. Her sparing him and conveniently leaving something to heal him "by mistake" comforts him in the idea that yes, she's not with ASIC.

Master Trick is the best man on Gamindustri, that is one of the three absolute truths. ASIC's cause is the only right one, that is another absolute truth. And finally, anyone that was against Master Trick or ASIC was lower than scum. That was the last absolute truth.

Fighting those lesser beings is easy. Sister and I are powerful, and it's not a weak scum like Gyone who will stop us.

Why do I know his name...?

Still, he is crafty, and quick on his feet. He's diligent in his training, and even though he'll never be as strong as the Makers, he'll be one of the top adventurers in no time.

And why do I know that much about him...?

None of that matters, though. He will die, as is willed by Master Trick. Right here and there, I will destroy all evidence of him ever having existed, with a storm of ice as strong as-

"Fufu! It's simple really! I have a three steps plan to ensure the success of this mission!"

What is that?

"Step one! I'll defeat you, who protect those girls! Step two! I'll kidnap these girls!"

Are those...

"... That way I'll hold dominion over even the Failure in the new world, which means I'll be able to-"

"WILL YOU SHUT UP?!"

Is that...

A flash of silver, a messed up body

Two men looking at each others, then down on the ground

Two heads colliding, a broken nose

A resting idiot proud of himself, a future corpse waiting by the fire

This situation... Why is it familiar?

"He did try to help us..."