Volume 9 - Chapter 46 – Trap (1/2)

09-46 Trap

“Uhh… Where am I?”

The old man opened his eyes and after looking around asked Machina.

“This… seems to be the headquarters of the Unifiers.”

Machina replied, and the old man slowly shook his head.

“The Unifiers. …Ah, I remember. I am the top seat of the Unifiers, Joule Rolan. I somehow feel like I’ve been dreaming for a long time.”

The sock of being hit and lingering between life and death seemed to have cleared his brainwashing, Jin thought through Machina.

“Originally the Unifiers idolized Dinar Kingdom and chased after that ideal. Antagonising fellow countries like this makes me unhappy, it was supposed to be a group about ideological unification.”

As if convincing himself, Joule Rolan uttered.

“Why did it turn to this…”

Joule was very troubled. Seeing him like that, Machina asked him a question.

“Do you remember what you’ve done?”

Joule nodded.

“Yes. But, how should I say this, it’s as if another person had been doing it. Just why did I make those orders….”

After replying Joule was once again troubled.

Jin who was watching the scene through a Magic Screen in Pelican-1 thought that first of all he’d carry onwards, and decided to give orders through Machina.

“Land-71, stay with Joule for a while. Don’t take your eyes off the unconscious Donald either. …Everyone else, be careful of your surroundings. Like Ann said, the ‘Golden Princess of Destruction’ should be hiding somewhere.”

The ‘Golden Princess of Destruction’. Joule had a reaction to the words.

“Ah, you must mean Elena? Ah, oh, Elena. Right, it was at her instructions. That’s right, I remember now. Her orders were absolute. She was our queen…”

“So the Golden Princess of Destruction… Elena really was the true mastermind all along.”

Joule was surprised and looked at Ann who said so.

“You’re an Automata? Blue-haired Automata… We were supposed to have destroyed and scrapped on Elena’s orders all the blue-haired Automata we found from the ruins… So there were still some remaining.”

“Might you know where this Elena has gone?”

Ann asked and Joule pointed behind the top seat’s chair and,

“If she wasn’t here, then behind there is a secret passage. She probably snuck out through there.”

He replied. He seemed to have been completely cleared of the brainwashing.

“Alright, Reiko, Ann, Land-70, let’s go.”

Leaving Land-71 at Joule’s side, the group searched for the secret passage.

They soon found it. They hit the floor and found a hollow spot. Land-70 then found a depression where by putting a finger there and lifting the trapdoor could be easily opened.

Under it were stairs going steeply down. It was nearly totally dark.

“Stairs down, huh. Let’s go in the order with Land-70 first, then Reiko, Ann, and Machina.”

Jin gave the orders and the group went down the stairs. They kept going straight down an unknown distance.

From a bright place the stairs looked pitch black but in fact there was a dim light inside, and group could continue without any problems.

“I wasn’t aware of a hidden passage like this. It must’ve been built later. And so I don’t know what lies after this. Please be very careful.”

While climbing the stairs down Ann cautioned, and at that moment. Suddenly the stairs vanished.

Or more accurately the steps turned to a slope, like a playground slide. Naturally the group slipped and fell.

But while the case may have been different if there were humans, no one panicked. Land-70 who was in the front thrust out his arms to the walls and stopped.

Naturally, the following three people collided with Land-70 and stopped.

“A trap, is it. If we were humans then it would’ve been effective, don’t you think?”

“Mh-hm. Land, can you smoothly go down like that while keeping the speed slow?”

Machina asked and Land-70 nodded.

“Yes, Machina-sama. It’s a simple task.”

The group then left braking to Land and once again began descending. They slid down while Land applied strength to his arms to keep the speed down.

“It’s a long way down, isn’t it. We’ve already gone past the height we climbed, don’t you think we’re in the basement now? ”

On top of that the descent was completely straight. The stairway, no, the slide went down at about a 45 degree angle.

Just when they thought they had gone quite a ways underground, the end finally came to sight.

“Land, stop for now.”

When there was just ten meters left to the end of the stairway, Machina = Jin ordered Land-70 and had him stop for a moment.

“There’s a high chance there’s an another trap. Proceed carefully.”

“Yes, Machina-sama.”

Land-70 then once again went downwards, this time at a third of the speed he had used until now. Meanwhile Reiko, Ann, and Machina were all watchful of their surroundings.

Then suddenly they reached the end of the stairway. A single door was there.

Reiko who had the best hearing tried to listen carefully but heard nothing. Reiko tried changing her vision to the infrared spectrum but there were no heat sources near the door.

“Hmm, if it were me what kind of a trap would I lay?”

Jin pondered inside Pelican-1.

Meanwhile Land-70 touched the door.

At the same time Jin suddenly understood a possibility.