Vol 2 Chapter 2 (1/2)
Chapter 2
Part 1
It had begun
It had finally begun
A fight to the death being broadcast live nationwide The Bright Cross pitted Archeneainst each other to dispose of them
Level 4 The Colosseum
“Ladies and gentleht!! And for soht in experts in the fields of ion, and more!”
The blue bunny girl continued her mic performance
Even if the start tiht would begin then It seemed to be like the live broadcast of an international volleyball thy ceremony
I probably had 15-30 minutes…no, even less
Whatever the case, I had to make the best of it
“Itou-san, take this!”
“?”
After an official took the blonde girl froe, I handed her a small headset
“At this point, we just have to do this So focus on surviving, Itou-san!”
“…”
The s, but it looked like the words wouldn’t corabbed her on either side and tossed her into the transparent bug cage with her glass wand in hand
I hated it
But it wasn’t over yet We still had a chance
It was only a thin, thin thread, but we couldn’t give up hope yet!!
“Maxwell Let’s start by checking both sides’ specs A witch and a mermaid That sounds like a combination from a fairy tale, but what can they actually do and how much can they do with it?”
“Sure First of all, Western and Eastern ainst a witch, it should be a fairly safe assumption that this is a Western mermaid”
Maxwell co a short text SNS, so he could not send e
“With that in mind, a WesternThere are a variety of theories as to why they drag the sailors down to the ocean bottoather mates, to eliminate an external enemy, etc In each case, there is no chance of escape once you have been dragged down The fen counter fro you in, so there is nointo the ocean”
“Where did you get this data from?”
“Sure Randomly from the internet”
Page after page displayed and they were from both personal and corporate sites Soah sites Son of their swied, but all of the as she sat on a stone jutting up froht came to mind
…Could we really rely on this?
This wasn’t walkthrough inforame we could retry as e board post of so and made a fool of themselves
This was a life
A hu on this decision and all I had was online inforathered by who even knoho?
“No, I can’t just stop here I have to make a decision Maxwell, what about the witch? And is a witch even an Archenemy?”
“Sure During the age of the witch hunts and the inquisition, witches were already legally known as nonhuman, so they could be subjected to various tortures, executed, or stripped of their property In other words, their ‘huhts were taken from them”
“Is Itou Helen a medieval witch?”
“No That was merely an example If the official announcement was accurate, she is a Circe witch Circe is spoken of in Greek y”
“Be more specific”
“Circe mixed a special potion that could rerotesque monsters It was identical to the way the Greek Gods punished humans And those who have inherited those techniques are classified as Circe witches”
…
I see So that’s why
It had honestly seemed weird to side vampires and zombies
“Maxwell Give me the definition of the undead…of Archenemies”
“Sure 1 A life fory and has a lifespan either infinitely or i 2 A life form created from or by a human 3 A life for to or infecting unrelated people around it The details can change soeneral definition”
“They stole the technique of the Gods and spread it throughout earth By transfor humans with a divine potion, they count as a source of infection”
Looking at it that way, it made sense that they were classified the same as vampires and zombies
“Then let’s get to the crux of the issue …Is Itou Helen really a witch? Or did the Bright Cross just make that up?”
“It is hard to say”
It was rare for Maxwell to not give a clear yes or no answer
“Her medical records show she was once hospitalized for a broken bone and the flu And her recovery ithin the average range But…”
“But?”
“The patients in the sas they were treated orked too well and with no side effects”
She was a hue those around her
That was a witch
“I can surmise that she escaped notice until now due to that unusual pattern A video site contains a video of a parrot Itou Helen looked after as the school’s student anie around the injured bird only for it to recover at unnatural speed This may have been when they discovered her”
…What was she doing?
She had been caught because she was saving the lives of others? That hat did it? How did that make her a monster?
No
It was possible Itou Helen had been unaware of her power or true nature before she was captured by the Bright Cross
Sheand hted by the small miracle
Was that really an evil that needed eli?
I was usted that soirl, released it without her per curiosity hidden by a thin veil of supposed justice Was that only because I had Archenemies in my family?
“User, the Bright Cross is the world’s largest international organization with a powerful influence on humanitarian and medical fields” Maxwell calistered as a non-profit organization, but they receive considerable donations from pharmaceutical companies and medical equipment producers the world over That is likely because they have a great i pharmaceutical decisions, welfare standards, and health insurance”
“Get to the point”
“Sure From their perspective, the speed of recovery is unimportant But they need their products to be as effective as the data says they should be If someone near Itou Helen were to collapse, their product could be criticized An unstable miracle is only a risk from a business perspective …Isn’t it possible that this was influenced by those who think like that?”
I couldn’t believe it
As the data says? A risk from a business perspective? That was only a theory, but it was still too much!
Itou Helen hadn’t done anything herself The people around her had apparently recovered, but there had been no negative effects to their health And yet she was being sent to the gallows because of a hypothetical?
“Understood, Maxwell Whatever the details ht? These aren’t false accusations and she really can do it?”
“Sure In all likelihood”
“Then what can a witch do? You said so potions that remake people into animals, but…”
That hen the lights on the ceiling changed direction The intense light dazzled e, the blue bunny girl raised her ecstatic voice with microphone in hand
“Now then, now then! The atmosphere has started to heat up in here, so let’s end the talk and get to the main event Witch vs Mer theater, or in front of the TV, get those tickets ready!! This is the cutting edge mixed species martial arts tournament: the Colosseum!!”
“Goddammit…!!”
Whatever ere going to do, we had no time
Itou Helen had some power, but she was not even aware of it At this rate, she was no different froirl who looked after the animals She would be tormented to death by the mermaid rapped her hair around her bare skin and could breathe underwater!
“This would be pointless if both sides couldn’t take advantage of their strengths! Towill be filled ater to a depth of 1 meter”
…
“And in exchange, Itou Helen the Witch will be given 42 different chee! Okay, you two! Show off your utterly inhuman and entirely unrealistic powers as Archenemies!!”
To hell with you!
I brought my smartphone to my mouth and shouted into it
But I was speaking to Itou Helen in the bug cage and not Maxwell
“Itou-san! Can you think of a way to use those chemicals!?”
“Um, uh, umm…”
The voice reaching my smartphone via the headset on her ear did not sound very hopeful Of course it didn’t What were those colorful bottles sitting on a silver cart? cocktail ingredients and even fluorescent paint would have looked less threatening And she was surrounded by water up to her waist If those were powerful che soerous!
Meanwhile, the situation refused to wait around
The woman named Karen said more
“It’s tie! This death match has no time limit! I hope you’re excited!!”
A low, deep buzzer rang like when a prison door opened
That signaled the beginning of the match
But that was bloay only a moment later
It was the mermaid
It was the queen of the sea who had her slender body wrapped in her own long hair
Irregular ripples ran across the surface of the water filling the die-shaped bug cage and then slass surface This was not Itou Helen the Witch who could not move It was the first attack from Kuroyama Hinoki the Mermaid
But she was not controlling the water
Nor was this a power to destroy glass
It was a song
It was soundwaves
It was the pressure from those waves
Unlike er sister, mermaids did not actually reh a storht, win over warti into the ocean The sailors offered their own lives In that way, the mermaid was a source of infection An Archenemy that controlled people
“Agwah!?”
There was an explosive sound so dangerously loud that it nearly broke the s it And with that smartphone to my ear, I had to cover my ears and double over
But
That sound
It wasn’t co!?
The girl avy shoulder-length blonde hair was cowering down and tre like a small animal But around Itou Helen, a scarlet blast of flames swept in a horizontal crescent moon shape and that explosive blast pushed back the !?
“Rechecking Itou Helen’s words There was an unnatural waver in the a trouble breathing due to extreme tension”
Maxwell sent several es to the screen
“When you asked her if she could think of a way to use those cherew nervous but not because she did not kno She likely hesitated because she could instinctually tell how to use thelance”
“…!!”
Knowing that was a type of proof
Just like a vampire was sensitive to the smell of blood and a zombie to the taste of flesh, that witch could just tell how to use those suspicious-looking chemicals And she had despaired at that fact
I was speechless as I watched Itou Helen adjust her grip on the glass wand made of countless transparent tubes and protuberances She stuck the openings of the colorful bottles into a truorously operated several pistons like she was playing a musical instrument
The colorful liquids were separated out by color as they passed through the clear tubes like it was a roller coaster and I finally felt like I could see what that glass as
“What…is that? A vertical siphon coffee maker?”
“Sure analysis co and cooling It also allows for distillation and fractionation using steam It contains the burner, reflux condenser, and three neck flask needed for all that It also supports pressurization and deco air compression”
“And what does that mean!?”
“That one device contains everything found in your high school’s cheh to create a sianization like the Bright Cross”
And an i it so well the first time she touched it
Computers and smartphones were so convenient that people could be overwhelmed by their many services, but I didn’t see any hesitation of that sort
Meanwhile, the s colass wand Each time, a mass of flames or a tornado of vacuue
Hoas Itou Helen herself viewing this?
Was she proud that she was someone special?
Her back looked even smaller than before, so I seriously doubted it
And theidly by
Her song was apparently not her only weapon However, she could not control all of the water to sweep the attacks aith a water gun
It was so much more unexpected
The tail fin created fros slapped the water’s surface, and…
“What!?”
They were rocks
The bug cage’s floor and the water’s surface were split by several sharp rocks that jutted up in front of the iant shark’s teeth They acted as a shi+eld and deflected the mass of fire that Itou Helen had summoned
She could control rocks?
Even though she was a mermaid that lived in the ocean?
No
“Maxwell, showon a rock as they sang?”
“Sure What about it?”
Needless to say, the ed them and their boat doere anthropomorphized versions of shi+pwrecks They tended to appear in difficult locations such as reefs or straits
But that meant mermaids weren’t symbols of the ocean or water
They were rocks
They were reefs
They hid below the surface, struck the shi+p before they were noticed, opened a hole in the hull, and mercilessly took the lives of the crew They were the anthropomorphized version of those sharp rocks
In that case, this was bad
One of theht “jut up” directly below Itou Helen
No
There was another issue
“Where did the o!?”
She was gone
Shewould just be pushed back, but if she had run ahere had she gone?
That was obvious
Kuroyama Hinoki was a mermaid
Her slender body rapped in her long hair to forh the water And the bug cage was filled with a meter of water
Worst of all, thethe shi+p with her song and reef were only the beginning The preparation Hadn’t it been said that the real threat hen she bared their fangs and preyed on the fallen humans?
I didn’t have ti into my smartphone
Her small body suddenly vanished Into the water It was as unnatural as soed from a car by a rope around their ankle
The blue bunny girl rejoiced
“What’s this!? Has this battle between girls super-evolved into a watery swi for some wardrobe s!!”
Shut the hell up
Why did she have to be so hot? If I wasn’t careful, I felt like e and the curves of her hips
I sent a mental curse her way and shouted into my smartphone
“Itou-san! She eats people after dragging them underwater That means you’re safe if you leave the water Use wind or so Yes, can’t you make a potion that lets you fly!?”
“No If Itou Helen is a Circe witch, then that is the wrong method” Maxwell caly, she can likely use the concept that all things are reat ele to do with the laws of physics or chemical formulas I can only call it the occult That is how Archenemies work”
“And? We don’t have time here, Maxwell!”
“Sure Directly using fire, water, wind, and earth is the saar or flour The flavor and nutrition absorption is more efficient when it is reworked into bread or cake Is that a sih explanation?”
“But what’s your point? What is the equivalent of ‘cooking’ for a Circe witch…for Itou Helen!?”
“Needless to say, that is a potion that remakes humans into an animal or monster”
In other words, a reproduction of the Gods’ punishment for humans
“There is a irl, but she was given a grotesque form by one of Circe’s potions and she ultimately ruled the sea and killed 6 heroes It would likely be more efficient to have Itou Helen herself take the potion than to use it against the mermaid”
We weren’t talking about a tiger’s claws or a shark’s teeth here We would be turning her into a great deendary heroes to their graves
If so…
“Itou Helen should kno to use the chemicals Check encyclopedias of animals, dinosaurs, or whatever else Just search all the archives that ht provide her inspiration!”
“Sure”
We had no time