It was unfavorable.
Kult decided to admit it honestly.
Though their overall power output was similar, the difference in combat experience was significant.
Moreover, unlike Kult who relied solely on divine power, Tillis also possessed overwhelming close-combat abilities.
There was absolutely no way he could win in a direct confrontation.
Hmm… Should I start pulling out?
However, Kult could retreat at any time.
Tillis was a burdensome opponent, but Kult’s defensive capabilities were exceptional.
In the first place, the reason Kult who had no close-combat skills had managed to hold out against Tillis so far was precisely because of that difference.
Of course, he couldn’t win by defending alone, so ultimately, Kult would lose…
In terms of forces, we still have the upper hand.
Eden could defeat Lemegeton.
Not to mention unity. The difference in power between the factions was overwhelmingly in Eden’s favor.
Just discovering the identity of the Judge was already a huge gain.
Anything beyond this would be greed.
And so, Kult admitted it was about time to retreat and began to pull back.
And at that moment—
Rumble!
A monster with countless legs suddenly burst out, shattering the mountain.
Pssssshhhhh!!
A massive body floated through the mist it created by emitting steam on its own.
Screeeeech!!
A deafening roar rang out as countless gears interlocked and rotated.
The machine that was wrapped in the heat of the burning forest and filled with steam in its jaws rose up.
“Well, this just got interesting.”
Kult immediately realized this was one of Johan’s tricks and smiled faintly. He had long known those two were in cahoots.
Wasn’t it Ex Machina’s overtechnology that had blatantly snatched Johan from right in front of him?
He had assumed he had fled, but now, some impressive reinforcements had arrived.
Thud-thud-thud.
The centipede, having raised its massive body, began to move its countless legs.
The flames that had engulfed it gradually seeped into its body, and frost began to form over its enormous frame.
“Hmm?”
“Huh?”
Tillis and Kult tilted their heads at the same time in response to the bizarre phenomenon.
Though neither of them were well-versed in science, they could still tell that what was unfolding before them made no sense.
It had been an overwhelming blaze, enough to burn down an entire mountain.
And yet, not only had all that fire suddenly been absorbed into the centipede’s body, but now its surface was starting to freeze over.
It was a scene that defied all logic.
Psssssshhhh!
Then, the giant centipede with its jaws filled with steam suddenly began to move at a speed unthinkable for something of its size.
Thud-thud-thud-thud-thud-thud-thud.
The monster started sprinting across the mountainside and charged straight toward Tillis.
“Oh my.”
Tillis easily dodged it.
Given the creature’s sheer size, the act of evading it required quite a bit of movement, but the machine’s movements were simple and predictable. Just as one would expect from something that massive.
In that case, it was nothing more than a large target.
Tillis immediately swung her sword, aiming to destroy the centipede’s body. But at that moment, one of the centipede’s mid-body segments rotated.
It was the very segment where Tillis had intended to drive her blade.
“Ah…”
Tillis widened her eyes as she looked into the inside of the centipede’s body.
Only then did she notice the glow forming on one side of the machine.
Where had all that fire gone….the fire that had been fierce enough to burn down a mountain?
The answer to that question was right in front of her.
Zzzzzzzing!
Along with a brilliant light, an overwhelming thermal energy flared up. Enough to scorch even the sky.
“That firepower is incredible.”
Kult who was watching from a short distance away clapped his hands and cheered like a child.
“But even that won’t be enough. Mr. Researcher of Ex Machina.”
It was an overwhelming force. But it wasn’t enough to kill Tillis.
Kult who had been directly confronting Tillis could tell.
This wouldn’t be enough to kill her.
If it had been possible, Kult wouldn’t have even considered retreating.
And as if to prove that thought true, the spot where the thermal energy had passed was now covered by wings layered with pulsing veins.
Thump!
The blood smeared on the wings pulsed like veins and spread out.
“I can feel the energy of a spirit…”
Not a single wound.
Though Tillis might have been slightly taken aback, she had effortlessly blocked that thermal energy.
Far from struggling, Tillis was actually smiling.
She had realized she was facing a demon with immense power.
It was a major discovery, the first in a long while.
“This is turning out to be quite the interesting situation.”
Tillis looked at the centipede, which was moving with a deafening roar.
Behind it, she also spotted the smiling figure of the Prophet.
Anyone could see the situation was dire.
The Prophet was already difficult to defeat, and now he had been granted the power of Ex Machina’s machinery.
It was bound to be a tough battle.
But Tillis was actually enjoying the current situation.
“It will be an honor to devour you both right here.”
After making it through this fight, she would undoubtedly become even stronger.
***
While the three-way battle between Coran Lekias, Kult, and Tillis was taking place—
The plan Emily and I had come up with was, in fact, remarkably simple.
“We just need to get Coran Lekias out of there, right?”
“What about your friend, Johan?”
“That bastard? He’s not my friend.”
“Oh.”
Kult would probably manage on his own somehow. And if he could, then so be it. That’s just how the world works. Survival of the fittest.
If he lost to fellow villains, then he simply lost. That’s all there is to it.
“Let’s get one thing straight first. If we get caught in the middle of that, we’re dead.”
“Really?”
“…Well, maybe not you.”
I looked up at the battle of the three beings shaking the mountain.
Seeing that, I could understand how they had the audacity to try and overthrow the Empire.
But there was clearly a difference.
Despite its massive size and overwhelming presence, Coran Lekias’s trump card was getting beaten down.
Maybe it would’ve been useful in a war, but in a fight between superhumans, it was just a giant target.
The outcome was already leaning in one direction.
Tillis was gaining the upper hand against both of them.
Of course, Tillis looked pretty injured and exhausted too, but compared to that mechanical centipede which had already been wrecked and lost more than half its body, her condition seemed relatively minor.
“There’s no way I’m getting anywhere near that. Even if I made it halfway up the mountain, I’d probably get swept up and die.”
“……”
Emily nodded her head.
No scolding, no look of disappointment. She just looked at me as if this were expected, and in a way, I was even grateful for that.
“But if we want to rescue Coran Lekias, we still have to jump into the fray somehow.”
Coran Lekias was probably somewhere with a clear view of the battle.
That meant he’d be up at the summit, looking down over the area.
We had to act before the machine was completely destroyed and Tillis tracked him down and killed him.
This was already a lost cause. Coran Lekias probably knew that too. But the reason he didn’t back down was because he was blinded by hatred.
“Emily, you’re the one who has to convince him. I’m just going to create the opportunity.”
“Yes.”
There was no point in someone like me who didn’t even know him trying to persuade him.
To begin with, I didn’t even want to go that far to save the guy.
Why should I risk my life to save someone I wasn’t even close to?
Even if I was acting out of a contract and a hint of sympathy, I couldn’t fake sincerity.
To convince someone who had staked their life on revenge, it would have to be someone who truly wanted to save him.
I didn’t know if Emily and Coran Lekias were that close, but she was still a better option than me.
“Alright, here’s our plan. We go in through here first.”
I pointed to the narrow tunnel I had come out of.
Coran Lekias’s laboratory, true to its nature as an Ex Machina facility, had an emergency escape route.
A typical setup for criminals who never knew when they’d be caught and killed.
That was how I escaped too.
“This is the fastest shortcut.”
And that meant this escape route would lead us straight to Coran Lekias’s laboratory with ease.
Of course, there was another reason.
The important thing was to avoid drawing the attention of the three monsters fighting above. As a weak shrimp between battling whales, I had to strike when they weren’t looking, just to avoid getting crushed.
How we’d strike was up to me. That was part of the deal, after all.
And that meant—
“You get it, right? Start digging.”
With the mechanical beast tearing up the mountain during the fight, the escape tunnel I used had likely collapsed in several places.
To go back, we’d have to clear it out again. And that wasn’t my job. I was a noble, after all. I didn’t know how to do menial labor like that.
“Alright, get to it.”
“Yes.”
Emily nodded obediently at my words.
And now I could see why she was an executive of Ex Machina.
Strange mechanical appendages extended from her back, clearing a path forward.
Even by the standards of someone familiar with modern Earth like me, her technology looked like something out of an over-technology fantasy.
…I had forgotten because she was so obedient, but yeah, I’d better not mess with her either.
***
“Haa…”
Tillis let out a long sigh.
Her body, stained with blood, swayed as if exhaustion had finally caught up with her.
But that only meant one thing. She had claimed victory.
Coran Lekias’s trump cards, all of them being mechanical devices, had been utterly destroyed and reduced to scattered debris.
As the tide of battle turned, Kult had fled the front lines, retreating in defeat.
Now, only one thing remained.
“Good and evil clash…and perish together.”
It was time to reap the harvest.
Tillis staggered her way toward the summit of the mountain.
Though she often solved problems through force, she wasn’t foolish.
The owner of the machines had to be nearby.
To control such complex and massive devices, someone had to be observing from a hidden vantage point.
And the only place that made sense…. the place with a full view of the battlefield was the mountain peak.
“Good meets good…. and spreads outward.”
Tillis was known as a saintess.
Regardless of her methods, she walked the path of a savior, one who sought to save the world.
She approached the righteous in a righteous way. Her compassion for others was always sincere.
“Evil devours evil…and grows in size.”
Tillis was also known as a judge.
To the evil, she applied the ways of the evil.
And when acting as a villain, even her heart turned cold and ruthless.
“Then I shall become the greatest evil and save the world.”
Tillis stood before Coran Lekias, holding her sword.
The monster born of a twisted and contradictory sense of justice kept making excuses.
“What could a self-righteous monster possibly hope to save?!”
Bang!
Coran Lekias aimed his gun at Tillis who had come right up to him and pulled the trigger.
The mechanical device he had once boasted about had long since been destroyed.
His old, sick body was no longer fit for battle.
But he had no intention of giving up.
He simply couldn’t accept a reality where that monster was called a saintess.
“A monster who defines good and evil by her own standard. How can you judge anyone?!”
Bang!
He had already cast aside his life.
If he could just bring down the monster before him, he was willing to do anything.
Had she been a hypocrite, he might have hesitated for a moment.
But she couldn’t even be called that.
“Maxwell’s Demon !”
Coran Lekias attacked Tillis, burning even his own soul in the process.
Snowflakes scattered around the intense flame that had begun to blaze from the palm of his hand.
A perfect transmutation of thermal energy.
“Mastema.”
In that moment, the demon contracted to Tillis, Mastema, spread its wings wide.
With a single flap of its grotesquely transformed wings, it extinguished the flame.
Tillis who was still smiling asked as if she truly didn’t understand.
“Then who should judge?”
“You…!”
“The right to judge has always belonged to those with power.”
“Urgh!”
Tillis grabbed the neck of Coran Lekias, who resisted despite losing everything, and lifted him into the air.
“And the one with the greatest power here… is me.”
At that moment, Mastema’s wings that were hovering behind Tillis swallowed Coran Lekias whole.
It was the process of breaking the contract with the demon bound to his soul and then devouring the demon entirely.
“A spirit that requires scientific knowledge… not an easy one for me to command.”
Having absorbed the demon with Mastema’s power, Tillis let out a bitter smile.
The Maxwell’s Demon was undoubtedly powerful, but for Tillis who lacked the necessary knowledge, it was a difficult one to use.
Even so, with this, Tillis had taken her sixty-ninth demon into her possession.
“Only one left now.”
Tillis freed herself from Mastema’s wings and placed her sword against the back of Coran Lekias’s neck as he lay collapsed on the ground.
The blade rose high into the air. Tillis smiled brightly.
And then, like a guillotine passing judgment, the sword came down.
The old man who had dreamed of revenge bowed his head, having achieved nothing.
And at that very moment—
Flash!
Something burst forth from the scorched, ashen ground of the wasteland.
***
I know.
I know that someone like me could never defeat Tillis in a fair fight.
That’s why I know—
That my weakness and cowardice are, in fact, my greatest weapons.
Flash!
I crawled through the ashes and finally arrived at my destination.
It didn’t matter that my body was scorched by lingering embers, or that sweat had mixed with the ashes to leave me filthy and disheveled.
Yes, the process didn’t matter.
What mattered was this very moment.
The simple fact that I had seized the opportunity.
“Haah……”
One breath was all I needed.
Just a single breath to drive in a proper strike.
Tillis was a monster, no doubt about it.
Her field of vision was perfect. So much so that even Yuna had been caught.
– If the right conditions had been in place, I could’ve killed her.
And yet, Yuna had shown confidence. Even though she was clearly far beneath Tillis’s level…
– It wasn’t like that woman’s senses were especially sharp or anything.
That hadn’t been an empty boast.
Tillis had her weaknesses.
And if there was even the smallest gap, an assassin could slip through it.
– I only got caught because I didn’t know. Now that I do, it won’t happen again!
She had been caught because she didn’t know.
Yes, Yuna didn’t know.
She didn’t know that spirits served as Tillis’s eyes, and because of that, she had been caught unaware that she was being watched.
But now, things were different.
The eyes of Tillis which usually never took form now revealed themselves after they got soaked in blood.
A total of sixty-eight demons could be seen drifting around Tillis.
“Ghk!”
I avoided their gaze.
Crawling disgracefully along the ground, I held my breath over and over, waiting for the right moment.
If her senses weren’t particularly sharp, then all I needed to do was stay out of sight.
Tillis had many eyes.
But perhaps because she had so many, her own senses were somewhat dulled.
And so, striking at that gap in her perception was a basic yet flawless blow. One I had learned from the world’s greatest assassin.
Crack!
The perfect strike I had learned slammed straight into the center of Tillis’s forehead.
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