The woman browsed the shop at a leisurely pace.
She gazed at the various OOPArts and Relics displayed on the tables.
Occasionally she'd pick one up, only to set it back down right away.
"What an impressive selection."
"Oh my, oh my. You know your stuff, don't you?"
"Yes. I've rarely come across a collection this impressive."
"Heh heh heh, how lovely to hear that."
What a smug witch.
Though in reality, every last item here was something I'd hauled back from the Junkyard.
And I'd only put out the ones with yellow light—there were almost none with blue.
The woman turned toward the witch.
"Excuse me. I'm actually looking for a sword."
"Hmm hmm. If it's a sword you're after, there are some right over there."
"What I'm looking for is a white sword."
"A white sword?"
I couldn't help but react. A white sword—that could only mean one thing.
The woman turned toward me. Huh? Something about her... felt off.
"Doesn't she remind you of someone?"
Mineha seemed to think so too. But who?
The woman chuckled softly.
"Yes. A white, mysterious sword. It's always in this room."
She said this with absolute certainty.
Then she shifted her gaze to the black coffin sitting in the center of the room.
"Oh ho ho, you've got a sharp eye there. That's merchandise I just brought in, you know."
"So it really is merchandise..."
"What kind of merchandise is it?"
"How much does it cost?"
"Very, very cheap. Only 10 billion oro."
"...Huh?"
"10 billion!?"
"What kind of 'cheap' is that supposed to be..."
"What does 'cheap' mean?"
"...?"
No no, no no, 10 billion oro was a bit much... What could possibly be inside it?
And why did the witch look so smug about it? What on earth was going on here?
"...I have a feeling the sword I'm looking for is inside that coffin."
The woman's gaze changed. The air began to shift.
The witch crossed her arms and laughed, clearly amused.
"Well, well, well, now that's interesting indeed. There is indeed a sword inside that coffin. A pure white, wondrous, mystical sword. How ever did you know?"
What exactly did she mean by that?
The woman's eyes sharpened. Not killing intent—I felt hostility.
"All I can say is that I sense it. All I want tonight is to take that sword."
"That sword—could it be the Sword Goddess's daughter?"
The moment I asked, killing intent spilled from the woman.
In that instant, suddenly… four octopus tentacles emerged from directly beneath the coffin. Huh? Why?
"Different sea's—?!"
The coffin shattered, and a corpse tumbled out from inside. What the heck was that corpse? Bloody and fat.
But more importantly, the sword clutched in that corpse's hand. That white sword—it was unmistakably the Sword Goddess's daughter!
And then a tentacle swallowed it whole.
"Jumiii!"
The woman screamed, her hood falling away. Ah, that face—
"Megadia!? But the voice—!"
No. She wasn't Megadia.
She looked strikingly similar, but her height and features were more mature on this one.
It hit me. Come to think of it, that guy had said something before.
"Haiyaaan…"
When I murmured that, the woman's eyes went wide. She wore an expression of genuine shock.
"How do you know that name—! Damn it, never mind now."
The woman pulled something from inside her coat.
Something felt off, so I used the Blue Saint.
Everything slowed to a crawl as I closed in on the woman.
What she pulled out was—a teleportation stone. She slammed it hard into the floor.
It shattered, releasing a greenish-white light, and she vanished with it.
"She got away?"
"Well, well, well. What a woman that was. Oh my? My, my, where's young Wof?"
"He's not here."
"...?"
"That guy. Could he have—!"
I was hurled out of the void, caught myself, and rolled across the ground.
Gritting through the pain, I got to my feet. I was outside.
"This is..."
"Ugh... something extra followed me."
A little ways off, the woman was on all fours.
Looks like I got swept along with the teleportation after all.
I didn't want her getting away back there.
I couldn't let her slip away. That's how it felt.
I asked.
"Is that really Hayhern's body?"
"...Yes. Hayhern Megalopolis. That's her body."
The woman slowly stood up and turned around.
So this is the one who stuffed Hayhern into a rabbit.
"But several thousand years have passed since then."
"It's the Talisman's eternal egg."
Ah, that thing. As if answering, she drew her sword. A white-and-black blade.
From pommel to crossguard it gleamed pure white, and the blade itself writhed pitch-black, like darkness made solid.
That alone told me she was on a different level from the other goddesses' daughters.
In an instant I realized—that was her true form.
I ask.
"What exactly are you?"
I know she's the daughter of the Sword Goddess.
But she's using Hayhern's original body as a vessel.
That's different from those three.
"---I am Raada. Raada of the Demonic Nature. Boy. And you are?"
"Wof."
The knives of the Different Sea rattled and clamored.
But I readied Woodflash. The knives of the Different Sea quieted down.
They're well-behaved, at least.
Dagaa's not here. I wonder what he's up to. Oh well.
I don't even know where this is.
I look around. Countless stars twinkle across the sky in blue-purple hues, and a full moon and its satellite preside overhead.
Their shimmering light lets me make out that the ground is covered in grass.
Some kind of meadow, then. Great. Not knowing how far I've been teleported is less than reassuring.
"Probably... we're going to fight now, aren't we?"
"Indeed. Keeping you alive doesn't really seem feasible."
She says it with a wry smile. So fighting really is unavoidable after all.
"...Then could you at least explain what's going on? I'd rather not fight without knowing a single thing. Consider it a little something to take to my grave. Is that so much to ask?"
Raada laughed at my words.
"What an interesting way of thinking. Very well. Let me tell you what I know since Yoi came to Heizen. Several months ago, Yoi arrived in Heizen and, through an acquaintance called the Red-Masked Man, was introduced to the Jinryū family, one of the Three Great Houses. Incidentally, after the Red-Masked Man brought the Sword Goddess's daughters from the City of Death and sold them off at the bazaar, he left Heizen, saying he had things to do. Who knows where he is or what he's up to now."
Ugh... the Red-Masked Man. He's behind all of this, isn't he.
What an absolute pain.
"The City of Death?"
"A ruined city where Death itself is sealed away."
"Ah, right."
So those are the ruins where Death Abstract was sealed.
The Sword Goddess's daughters were brought out of there by the Red-Masked Man?
Was the Red-Masked Man a member of the bandit gang?
They're all wiped out now, though.
"After Yoi became a guest of the Jinryū family, she met a young man. His name was Baarou Jinryū—the third son, called a good-for-nothing. He was always cowering in fear, caught between his heroic father and his talented older brothers, and it was pitiful to see. So I thought I'd at least draw out the desire buried deep in his heart. Quite magnanimous of me, don't you think? Fortunately, Yoi's authority Relic [Charm] was capable of doing just that. It opened up Baarou's heart. And then... something incredible happened. Quite the surprise."
"...Something incredible?"
"Lord Baarou's heart was utterly vile. After killing his father and his brothers and becoming the next head of the family, he abducted women, cursed them, toyed with them as he pleased, then killed them when he got bored. He repeated that over and over. And it snowballed—his urges grew beyond his control. Women from outside the family or just from within were no longer enough. He started abducting women connected to the Zenwela and the Gorou families as well. Recently, he even tried to get his hands on a girl named Ruma."
Ruma!?
"He made enemies of both Zenwela and Gorou completely. I was certain the Jinryū family was finished from that point on. So I never told Lord Baarou a single thing about the Zenwela and Gorou families moving against him. And that led him to step on yet another landmine. The woman he abducted together with Ruma was a daughter of the Tassan. No matter how you try to spin it, that was the end. It was already set in stone that he'd be assassinated at the Full Moon Bazaar, so his death couldn't be avoided regardless, but still."
She chuckled softly.
"You're talking as if it's someone else's problem, but aren't you the one who started all of this?"
She was. Every bit of this was her fault.
Raada closed her eyes and gave a small nod.
"I won't deny that."
"You don't feel any guilt?"
"If you pour water into an ant nest, do you feel bad about it?"
"Humans aren't ants."
"To me, it makes no difference. Ants, humans... I do think it's unfortunate. I feel they simply had bad luck. Yes—that's all it was, bad luck. There were plenty of times when opening up someone's heart led to a positive outcome. So it was just bad luck."
"...That's all?"
"Yes. That's all. And to make sure Lord Baarou was assassinated without fail, I had a companion act as the vessel. And just as planned, he was killed. A happy ending, wouldn't you say? How's that? I think you've got the gist of it by now. Consider it a parting gift for your journey to the afterlife, perhaps?"
A companion vessel... Could the corpse in the coffin have been Baarou?
Even so, she really did treat the whole thing as someone else's business to the very end. Not a shred of personal investment.
I got it. Same daughter of a sword goddess, but a clear difference from Gīza.
Now I understood why Gīza loathed her own kind so much.
She didn't think of other people as being the same as her.
So whatever happened to them didn't really matter to her.
You must not be left alive. You'll just keep doing the same thing forever, won't you?
Yes, I will. That's what I've always done, so of course I'll continue. Ah, what a coincidence. I was thinking the same thing earlier. Please die here.
I'm going to take this woman, Laada, down right here and now.