Though they had only faced each other for a few seconds, the silence felt like hours to Subaru.
"——Nee-sama and… Subaru-kun?"
At her surprised voice, Subaru let out a breath of relief.
"I'm sorry, Nee-sama. I was desperately trying to do something…"
"You didn't have to push yourself so hard. I already found a way to handle things. Just use this Barusu here as bait and it'll be smooth sailing."
"Oh! I see! That's brilliant! Rem is moved to tears!"
The twins rushed together and clasped hands. Communicating with unprecedented synchronization, their eyes fixed on Subaru full of expectation, and he thumped his chest.
"Leave it to me. I'll show you the greatest bait performance of the century!"
"Kyaa, wonderful! Manliness worthy of
Showered with cheers from the two, Subaru swelled with pride and struck a pose.
The long loop of suffering was finally over, the light at the end of the tunnel brilliantly grasped, and
He muttered with a pathetic voice, retreating step by step as he discarded that fantasy.
Looking at Rem before him, there was no trace of the emotions that had danced back in his imagination. All that filled her eyes was the unrelenting, pitch-black intent to kill.
She was clearly not in any mental state where conversation could happen.
Each bead of sweat felt as heavy as lead. His eyelids grew so heavy with perspiration that his vision was about to be sealed off, and Subaru forced himself to keep blinking—one eye at a time.
Blinking both eyes simultaneously and leaving an opening was a lesson learned the hard way from his fight with the mabeasts.
—and the very fact that such thoughts were occurring told Subaru he was treating Rem as an enemy. He let out a bitter laugh. What on earth had he come rushing into this situation for?
"Remurin~. I'm your friend Subarukun, you know~?"
Unconsciously, to break through the wariness building inside himself—and more practically, to break the suffocating silence—Subaru deliberately put on a cheerful tone.
Rem's response to his friendly call— "Stop looking at me with those scorching eyes, I'm gonna get burned!"
—was sharp enough to cut, her head snapping to lock onto him.
Up until now she'd at least been scanning the periphery, but now her gaze was entirely fixed on him. That might have been a mistake.
That was how terrifying the demonic aura emanating from Rem was.
Her familiar maid uniform was drenched in blood splatter—blood that had dried and then been freshly splattered over it—creating a two-tone palette of dark crimson and vivid red that only heightened the horror. Whether it was some transformation from her oni nature, blue-green veins writhed beneath the pale skin visible through her torn sleeves, and the nails on both hands had grown sharp enough to rival a mabeast's.
The iron flail she kept on her right arm—her "self-defense weapon"—was still firmly attached, presumably enjoying ample opportunity to be swung in proportion to her prowess. Caked blood and various other substances caked upon it only made it look even more vicious.
He could say it with certainty.
He'd had some advance preparation for Rem's state, which was why he was holding together something like composure, but if he'd run into current-Rem unexpectedly on a night road, he would have one hundred percent wet himself.
And yet, amidst all this madness, the single white horn extending from her forehead alone maintained its pure white beauty, as though utterly oblivious to the carnage.
It was the most iconic part that made Rem a fearsome "oni"—and yet that horn alone gave Subaru a strangely incongruous impression.
But the situation wasn't about to accommodate his feelings.
Looking around, the mabeasts that had fallen into the valley and scattered were maintaining a distance where they could still observe from behind rocks and within the depths of the forest trees.
They were probably watching the movements of Subaru and Rem. If they judged the situation as easy prey, it wouldn't be hard to imagine them rejoining the fight.
At the very bottom of the power balance, for Subaru, their participation would be the equivalent of a literal life-or-death crisis. All the more reason that Rem's next move was nothing less than his lifeline.
He held his breath, closed his eyes just once, and stared directly back into Rem's gaze.
Her eyes—those twin orbs glaring at him—what flicker of emotion might they gain? He poured every ounce of his soul into his stare, determined not to miss even a sliver.
And then— "Nee-sama…"
It was a hoarse, exhausted voice.
But it was a solid sound that vibrated Subaru's eardrums.
Her lips trembling, bewildered, Rem's eyes were fixed with undivided attention on Ram's profile. There, precisely, was a positive emotion—and Subaru marveled at this.
Even in the depths of losing her reason, surrendering to her fighting instincts, her consciousness had firmly perceived the figure of her beloved sister.
"You really are the quintessential model of a sis-con. I'm glad we've regrouped. From here on—"
"Let go."
Her words cut him off, and the iron flail came hurtling with tremendous force at the same instant.
Dodging his body to the right by sheer miracle was what saved him.
The gash on his right calf had slightly disrupted the stance he'd been about to step forward into, and that was what worked in his favor.
The spikes of the passing flail grazed his left shoulder, and the searing pain of flesh being carved away made his brain boil.
His throat trembled with pain, but there was no time to let it drag his consciousness away.
He stepped forward at an angle— "That freaking hurts!!"
Whipping around from the wounded shoulder side, Subaru sidestepped beneath the chain of the overshooting flail. Immediately after, the sweeping chain smashed into the spot where he'd been, carving a vivid pattern of an iron serpent into the earth.
If his evasion had been even a moment slower, the flesh on Subaru's back would have burst open in the same pattern—easy to imagine.
Shuddering at the thought of his skin being torn, Subaru looked desperately at Rem.
But her posture showed no change in directing her gaze toward him. Her hate-drenched eyes remained as vacant as ever—he could judge with certainty that she had truly lost her senses.
"She's gone full oni, but she can't control it, huh…"
From her current behavior, that was Subaru's read.
If that was the case, then the issue was verifying the difference from last night. Rem had gone oni then as well, but at that point she'd seemed to recover her senses immediately.
The question was whether it was the elapsed time, or some shocking sight that jolted her back to awareness.
If Subaru having shielded her and taken severe injuries right before her eyes had affected her that deeply, then— "Should I take an iron flail to the face? Instant mince meat, but still…"
If the same conditions as last night would work, he thought she'd surely snap back.
The substitute would be Subaru getting ground to hamburger, though.
"Second-best option would be… getting mauled by the dogs."
If he prostrated himself completely, the ones hiding in the rock crevises would probably welcome him with open arms—'Forget served food, let's go for wild game!'—and tear into him. It might even work. But there was no guarantee Rem would ignore the Subaru throwing himself at her mercy, and it would risk becoming a curse-override sale that would back things up even further.
Worst case, Rem abandoning him entirely and letting him get devoured—"dying like a dog" was practically written in neon letters.
Following that pessimistic logic, he truly had no cards left to play.
Ram, who might understand the situation, was still far from consciousness. He'd been shaking her, trying to bring her around, but it looked like it would take time to have any effect.
And neither Rem before him nor the Ulgarm surrounding them seemed willing to wait.
Subaru licked the sweat trickling down his cheek, moistened his lips, and let them slide.
If he couldn't think of a good option, then he'd run through the common patterns of interacting with someone who'd lost their senses. After all, brute-forcing every choice was his only path to a breakthrough.
If that was the case, doing it Subaru-style was the way— "Hey, Rem! For a heartless girl who doesn't even know who I am, listen up! The embarrassing treasure trove of figuring out who I am—that was, if you recall, just three days ago. I, in a weird mood, tackled the laundry and couldn't help but get fired up in front of the assigned hamper—ohhh whoa!!"
He'd tried to stage a comeback through an emotional bonding talk appealing to feelings and memory, but it was instantly derailed by Rem's short patience.
The flail spinning through the air snapped trees like twigs along its path, showering splintered wood as it bore down on him. He dodged with a diving forward roll. The follow-up chain attack, which he dodged with a series of hops, steps, and jumps while carefully keeping hold of Ram, was dispatched with acrobatic grace. He whipped around— "Trying to murder someone mid-sentence isn't very polite, you know!? I'd like to see what your family looks like… oh, here they are!"
"Give… Nee-sama… back!"
At Subaru's shout looking down at Ram in his arms, Rem leaned forward and murmured. But then she yanked back the flail with a mere flick of her wrist, used the momentum to whip her body around— "——!"
—and her back kick slammed directly into the torso of a mabeast that had been lunging from behind. An explosion-like boom erupted, and from a distance you could clearly see the Ulgarm's insides crumpling as it was sent flying.
That was the reward for trying to profit from someone else's fight.
The other mabeasts, who had been planning a wave assault timed to their vanguard's approach, involuntarily stopped in their tracks at the sight of that gruesome death.
Which was, essentially, equivalent to exposing your belly before a hunter.
A lateral swing pulverized the bellies and skulls of two beasts lined up side by side. Without sparing a glance at the scattering chunks of flesh, Rem carried the momentum of that strike one step forward. She stomped the forelegs of a cowering mabeast flat, then her other foot kicked upward at its now-frozen snout—a light sound rang out, and the mabeast's neck bone bent in an impossible direction and shattered.
She then launched herself before the last beast in the wave attack. Grabbing the terrified creature by the scruff of its neck, she did nothing fancy—just hurled it straight up into the sky.
An arc traced through the air, and the mabeast's feeble howl trailed off as it became a fastball. It grew more distant, more distant, then closer, closer, and finally—with a sound like fruit being smashed against hard ground—it cut off abruptly.
Massacre followed by massacre. Butchery for the sake of butchery. Slaughter within slaughter.
No other description came to mind for what was unfolding before him.
It was like children's play, with an overwhelming difference in power.
They were of different caliber as beings. Oni and mabeasts—while matched in malevolence, they could never compete in absolute dominance.
And yet, the mabeasts continued to challenge an unbeatable oni, and Subaru simply couldn't understand it. They trembled in all four limbs with terror, raised grief-stricken howls before death, and even felt sorrow at the corpses of their fallen comrades—yet they would absolutely, never try to flee from the fight.
Perhaps that very thing was the essence of what made them "mabeasts"—beings born of the
Watching that reckless battle cry—that spectacle of proactive suicide in a sense—Subaru furrowed his brow at a doubt that suddenly surfaced.
Rem's figure, crushing the horde of mabeasts with overwhelming brutality.
His doubt was this: her terrifying combat power, as seen from the side, hadn't been fully demonstrated in even the two attacks directed at him so far.
It wasn't arrogance, but Subaru had a certain confidence in his physical abilities.
In gymnastics, he could do back handsprings and flips—there was almost no trick he couldn't perform—and in agility, records showed him well above the national average.
But whether Subaru's physical capabilities were actually superior to wild-living mabeasts in speed, explosive power, or stamina—no, he couldn't honestly say so. At best it was a question of whether he could win a test of strength, and even that, remembering the time he'd been temporarily overpowered by brute force, was dubious.
So with this rather deflating self-assessment, Rem's rampage before his eyes was simply not in any realm he could evade.
A blow that turned mabeasts into mincemeat—he'd naturally take that same hit too. And yet he'd already survived it twice. That contradiction—thinking it through, Subaru found within it an impossibly thin thread to cling to.
"Even after losing her senses, she noticed Ram's presence…"
Looking down at the girl breathing in pained gasps within his arms, he gently brushed the hair from her forehead with a finger.
Every flail that came flying targeted one-hit-kill shots at the area from his neck up. But that, seen from another angle, meant she had no intent of taking down anyone other than Subaru.
Because Subaru was holding Ram, Rem's attacks had restraint.
That was why the mercilessness toward the mabeasts and the ferocity of the attacks aimed at Subaru didn't match up.
Following that reasoning, Subaru held his breath.
If his deduction was correct, he might be able to survive this.
—This overwhelmingly desperate situation. Like crossing a rickety bridge on the verge of collapse, with a perilous method—but he might be able to make it across.
"For that—"
He surveyed his surroundings.
The current layout in the valley: Subaru in the center. Rem to the north with her back to the cliff. Ulgarm scattered widely to the east and west, forming a encirclement.
From the mabeasts' perspective, both Subaru and Rem should be equally prey, but right now they seemed to prioritize Rem based on danger level. Rem, for her part, was paying a certain amount of attention to Subaru, but was too preoccupied dealing with the attacking mabeasts to go on the offensive.
However, if the number of mabeasts hindering that action decreased, it was easy to imagine Rem turning her sights on Subaru to reclaim her sister.
Taking all that into account, there was only one course of action Subaru could take.
Steel himself, plant his feet wide, take a breath, and lock his eyes on Rem.
—Go through with it, man. Men need guts; women need charm.
"Which is why you should stop looking so scary and smile, Rem. —I am going to—"
The world stopped for the second time today. From that stillness, a banquet of screaming erupted through black fog.
Even braced for the agony to come, it was unbearable. And when it wasn't just one hand but accompanied the appearance of the left as well, it was worse still.
Whether intoxicated by completing the right arm, what slid across his breastbone and grazed his innards before Subaru's locked-open eyes had transformed to a width spanning two palms.
One hand on his heart. And the other palm, as though cherishing something, gently touched Subaru's cheek. A chill rose, and immediately after, pain invaded every nerve.
Agony, agony, agony—!
The world flipped upside down, and simultaneously, all the contents of his stomach felt like they were being churned into paste. He stopped being himself. From head to toe, every part felt like it was being replaced. Nerves that couldn't recognize nerves as nerves sent his brain boiling, consciousness gradually muddying. And yet the soft touch of the palm against his cheek was warm, and at its center there was a sense of relief as though both heart and body might melt—but Subaru knew a sensation beyond even that— "…it came… back."
His vision blurred. His soul wore thin. The pain and suffering hadn't brought back anything of substance in reality.
No time had passed. Before his eyes, Rem and the mabeasts were still locked in the same deadlock of mutual hostility—but the moment Subaru returned, that standoff shifted dramatically.
As though something enormous had appeared that could not be ignored, Rem and the entire Ulgarm horde turned their attention toward him.
Just as planned. The witch's aura enveloping Subaru had intensified further.
—Rem howled.
To reclaim her beloved sister from the enemy presence reeking of that terrifying residual witch's scent.
—The Ulgarm all began howling in unison.
To gather every beast in the forest, drawn by instinct at that familiar scent.
—Subaru howled as well.
To dodge the lunging mabeast's claws, to evade the incoming iron flail by a paper-thin margin, and to beg for his life and soul to be set ablaze.
※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ The brawl began.
Amid oni and mabeasts and civilians—and without needing to think calmly to know he was out of place in this arena—Subaru continued dancing in the center of the chaos, exercising the utmost caution.
Subaru's actions were consistently simple.
Maintain a distance of neither too close nor too far from the intensifying fight, and exert full effort only to avoid the sparks falling on him—period.
One more mabeast went from alive to wall stain under an iron flail. But indifferent to the death of their fellows, three mabeasts formed a coordinated group, attacking Rem with the aim of wounding her. Their clever stratagem came to nothing; leaping attacks were deflected by a casual hand motion, and the immobilized beasts were consumed by the weapon swung down upon them in turn.
Watching from the side, Subaru repositioned the slipping Ram in his arms and leaped backward. Evading a lunging mabeast, he threw himself into Rem's attack range.
Then Rem, sharp-eyed to his approach, swung her counterattack. He dodged the thrusting iron handle with an emergency stop, ducked under the chain that came flying late, and the iron flail passing overhead painted a vivid red flower on the head of a mabeast approaching from behind.
Confirming that much, he abandoned all dignity and pride and withdrew at once in a cockroach-like crawl along the ground. Rem, who tried to pursue, was blocked by the mabeasts, and his escape succeeded.
Maintaining a safe distance, praising his own survival instincts with a sigh of relief— "—Ha! Maybe I'm not half bad at this, you know!"
Frantically hopping to avoid being bitten by dogs, shoving the pursuing dog into a maid girl's arms, then crawling away like a cockroach from the angry girl's tantrum.
Put into plain words, that was literally all that had happened, and it made him want to die a little. But since the whole point was not dying, he rationalized it away, even beautifying the disgrace in his mind.
Right now, Subaru's strategy was working. Whether as a time-buy or in terms of reducing the Ulgarm's total numbers, things were going well.
Glancing up, he sensed the presence of mabeast hordes converging on his position from multiple directions leading into the valley.
His body odor, spread across a considerable range of the forest, was ceaselessly acting upon the Ulgarm's instincts. A sinful situation indeed.
And so, a chance of survival had emerged.
That was how he'd leapt ahead to premature joy, even though the situation hadn't actually changed.
"—Huh?"
It came upon him suddenly.
A new pack of Ulgarm entered the valley and threw themselves into the death match with Rem. As Subaru watched that scene and shifted his weight to prepare for evasive action, a dizzying sensation threw his footing into disarray.
His knees buckled, and he nearly fell forward. Instinctively, he twisted around to shield Ram, toppling onto his injured left shoulder. A moan like his throat was sealed by pain escaped him, but what dominated his consciousness even more was— "This chill—"
He knew it. An abnormal cold seeping from his core.
Despite risking his life at every turn, burning his soul to challenge this hellscape, a cold splash was thrown over that passion by this interference.
Receiving it, Subaru cursed his blunder yet again.
The more he gathered numbers, the greater the danger. The existence before him was so overwhelming—if it decided even slightly to gain more power, resuming the curse that had been held in reserve would be the very first option on the table.
He scanned the scene.
One of the Ulgarm that had entered the fray had activated the curse he'd been afflicted with and was siphoning his mana. But no matter how he looked, he couldn't spot the beast responsible. Beyond that, he had no idea what state a mabeast would even be in during curse activation.
And now, when he could barely move a single finger, even if he could identify the source of the curse, there was no way he could fight his way through and stop the sorcery.
"…Is this the end?"
Everything—coming this far only for it to vanish into nothing?
The intensifying cold began to distance his consciousness. He reached out desperately to hold on, reaching and reaching, but his hand only scraped empty air—then suddenly, the cold vanished, and warmth returned to his palms.
—A thunderous boom. It rang out at the exact same moment Subaru's condition returned.
Pushing aside his hazy vision, Subaru let his gaze wander in search of the source. And deep in the forest, he saw Rem—having slammed her iron flail into the bedrock after stomping the ground with tremendous force. Beneath that flail, a mabeast lay in what could only be described as a burst carcass.
Sensing the causal connection between his dramatic recovery and that scene, Subaru rose to his feet.
The mabeast Rem had just crushed had been the one executing the curse on Subaru. With it killed, the curse's execution had been halted.
What a terrifying coincidence—amazing luck, almost intoxicating in its audacity.
"No way that's true, though."
Rem's current position was far removed from where she'd stood moments ago.
There was only one reason she'd ignore every mabeast scattered between that spot and this one to target that single beast.
In the midst of casting everything aside and charging through, she'd taken a claw wound, but Rem had identified and slain the mabeast that had activated the curse.
Subaru wasn't so dense that he didn't understand what that meant.
Even if she'd lost her reason. Even if she was in a mental state where she couldn't recognize who Subaru was.
Rem would never misidentify her beloved sister, and she had never forgotten why she'd rushed into this forest in the first place—her original purpose.
Then, thought Subaru.
He became conscious of what he had to do and rubbed his eyelids.
Rather than using her in this underhanded fashion, he should follow through with the original plan. In short— "The original ideal. Removing the curse together with the maid sisters Ram and Rem."
Only by achieving that, Subaru believed, did he have any chance of surviving this curse-riddled situation.
Therefore, he had to bring Rem back to her senses. The one Subaru needed wasn't the "oni"—it was her, the one who was rude yet servile, quick to misjudge, prone to snap decisions, and always causing trouble.
"——The horn."
Suddenly, that voice vibrated Subaru's eardrums from right beside him.
Looking down, Ram—still cradled in his arms—had cracked her eyes open and was moving her lips through her hazy consciousness.
"You're awake?"
"I thought now was the best… timing…"
"Yeah, good instinct, big sis. —You said the horn, right?"
Ram gave a small smile, and Subaru returned a grin that was half bravado, half resignation as he asked. She pulled her chin back with some difficulty— "The horn is what makes Rem an oni… if you land one, solid hit on it… she should come back…"
"Are you sure?"
"It should work. I think. I hope."
"That's awfully vague!? But fine, I'll believe you."
Having said that, Subaru looked at Rem.
The white horn extending from her forehead was roughly ten centimeters long. Think of it as a patch protruding from her forehead, and the size was about right.
—Right there. One hit.
"Doesn't that seem kind of impossible?"
"Squeeze out every drop of wisdom and courage you have, and find a way."
"Actually, a method that might just work if I squeezed hard enough did come to mind…"
At Subaru's reply, Ram raised her eyebrows in surprise.
He gave her a bitter smile, lips twisting as though the words were hard to say— "But you'll definitely get mad."
"If it brings my sister back to her senses, Ram won't be angry."
"Really?"
"Really, really."
"Swear on Ros-chi?"
"…To think you'd choose that one. Very well—I swear on Roswaal-sama."
Ram said it with such genuinely masculine conviction that Subaru felt inclined to respect her judgment.
Ahead, Rem was slowly turning to face them.
Her core attention was still directed at Subaru, while her expanded vigilance covered the surrounding Ulgarm.
Against Rem in this omnidirectional defensive posture, Subaru moved to strike the horn.
What he did was— "Oooooh, yeah!!"
"—Huh?"
Twisting his body, crouching at the waist, using the recoil to spin his entire frame while swinging his arms—Subaru launched Ram's body in a great arc toward Rem.
Surely she hadn't expected to be thrown.
Ram's stunned face dwindled through the air, drawn toward Rem. Even oni-mode Rem was momentarily struck dumb—but the instant she realized it was her defenseless sister flying toward her, she immediately released the iron flail and extended her arms to catch her.
Moving her clawed fingers with delicate precision, Rem caught her sister in those blood-soaked arms. For a single instant, an expression previously drenched in nothing but killing intent softened with a gentle hue.
—To not miss witnessing that instant, Subaru's body was already in motion.
The very moment he'd thrown Ram, Subaru surged forward in the same direction. With Rem's gaze tracking Ram overhead, he crouched low and sprinted through the blind spot.
Closing the distance, his right hand drew the sword from his waist, and with that same momentum aimed for the horn atop her head. Cutting through the air, a perfect strike landing at the moment of maximum vulnerability.
Even Rem couldn't react to this audacious ploy—however— "—Aah."
The descending blade, chipped at the tip, fell just short. His powerful stride fell one hesitant step short of what was needed, and in a razor's-thin margin, he barely failed to connect with the horn.
At having a once-in-an-everything chance slip through his fingers, Subaru was stunned— "I flinched!! One more step, I was one step short on courage!!"
The whiff sent his momentum spinning him around.
Just before his back was fully turned, at the edge of his vision, he caught sight of Rem's left hand poised in a spear thrust. If that simply drove straight through, it would punch a clean hole through his torso.
Rem's hands again—that was the one thing he couldn't stand. The instant he bit his lip— The ground beneath his feet exploded, and the resulting landslide blew Subaru's body a tremendous distance away.
"Whooooaaa—!!?"
His body pelted by stone shrapnel, skin tearing and bleeding, the airborne Subaru saw the cause of his salvation below.
The ground had erupted from a spot to the south of Subaru's position, where a dog-like mabeast was crouching. He'd thought it had been missing since it fell into the valley, but it had been waiting for the exact moment Subaru and Rem's lines of fire overlapped.
The instant it judged both could be finished off simultaneously, it unleashed its magic power like a surprise assault, delivering a spectacular interference via landslide.
But its scheme— "————!!"
Rem roared, and with a single stomp toward the exploding ground— The nascent landslide was nullified by its force, resulting in nothing more than a vigorous flutter of her blue bangs.
Smashing magic with brute force—it probably wasn't that simple, but it was a close approximation of how to crush spells.
Rem cradled the sister she'd caught, stepping sideways to escape the magic's aftereffects. Meanwhile, from above— —Subaru, completely forgotten, was tumbling down.
Spinning end over end, the rotating world was anything but stable.
But his right hand still firmly gripped the one-handed sword, and the landing spot, by great fortune, cleared the rock wall and hit nothing but hard-packed dirt.
And Rem, unaware of his presence, was directly below with her head exposed.
There could be no better opportunity. There would be no second chance. There would be no better moment ahead.
He raised the sword overhead, gripping it with both hands, channeling every ounce of his being into one decisive strike.
Coincidence built upon coincidence stacked upon coincidence, and only then might it reach.
Blessed be convenience. Miracles are the best. Even God's whimsy, on occasion, does its job.
—Though if it was going to work, it would've been cooler if it had happened during that last flash.
A wry smile. No time. Right there before him—slowly, languorously—was Rem.
The horn was visible. He reversed the raised sword, released the stored power— "Smile, Rem. —Today, I'm more oni than any oni."
The blade was released, arrow-straight, the flash of the sword surging toward the white horn— The shrill ring of steel striking steel pierced through the mabeast forest.
Immediately after, accompanied by Subaru's undignified scream from a botched landing.