The Shield of Miracles

by Sakon Kaidou

  Going inside it had been no mistake. It did a good job hiding Louie from Monochrome’s gaze, and it was too far away from the other houses to catch the fire. However, this place was nothing but a dead end for him.

  Though it kept him safe from the immediate danger, he would instantly be burned by the fiend if he went out. The mill was both his shelter and his prison.

  “Ohh...” he cried, all curled up in the corner.

  The resounding cackling of the monster terrified him to no end, and the solitude made him feel helpless, but more than anything, he couldn’t stop worrying about his mother, who, he thought, was still at home.

  “If Dad were here, he’d...”

  He’d save us just like he did back then, he thought.

  This actually wasn’t a situation that Shijima could have handled, but young Louie wasn’t in a state of mind to consider that. Like the child that he was, Louie just wanted his father to save him.

  The boy had adored Shijima ever since they’d met four years ago. Being his savior and an ultra-strong Master, the man was a real hero to him.

  However, Louie’s admiration was the kind you’d direct at superstars or famous sportsmen; Shijima definitely wasn’t a father figure to him.

  Because of that, he didn’t know how to feel about Farica and Shijima getting married.

  The boy’s heart was rejecting the idea that Shijima was his dad now. His love and respect for the man was there there, but not his ability to see anything fatherly about him, which was perfectly normal for a child whose mother had just remarried.

  That sentiment made it hard for the boy to idolize the man like before, and it started to create an awkward distance between them.

  Shijima began living with them, and Louie behaved around him like a stranger, rather than the family they’d now become.

  Neither Farica nor Shijima said anything about that. They believed that, regardless of how the boy went about it, Louie had to find the compromise by himself — by his own will. Because of this, Gringham and Juno were soon acting more worried than the parents.

  After a whole month of awkwardness, the family came across a turning point — a visit to a certain grave at the capital.

  It was the death anniversary of Louie’s biological father, so they went to clean it up and decorate it with flowers.

  The man had been a plain Carpenter who’d lost his life slipping off a roof and falling to the pavement below. The angle at which he’d hit the ground was so unfortunate that he’d died in an instant, not giving any time for healing magic to save him.

  After cleaning the grave, presenting the flowers, and giving a prayer, Louie and Farica left the graveyard and prepared to return home, but that was when the boy realized they’d left their cleaning tools back at the grave.

  “Wait here, Mom, I’ll go get them!” he told Farica before speeding away.

  Back at his father’s grave, Louie found someone he hadn’t expected.

  It was Shijima, the man they’d parted from after traveling together to the capital. The man had told them he had business to attend to.

  He placed some lit incense before Louie’s father’s grave, placed his hands together, and closed his eyes.

  Shijima was so focused on his task that he didn’t even noticed Louie hide behind one of the other graves.

  After a long, silent prayer, the man silently spoke up, saying, “For as long as I draw breath, I will make sure they’re happy.”

  Those were words directed at the person who’d protected Shijima’s most cherished people before he’d come into their lives.

  “So please... watch over us.”

  They were a promise to the man who was no longer with them.

  Louie didn’t come out of hiding and merely watched the scene, but it had a profound effect on him, culminating with a single thought:

  Oh, he... he’s a dad.

  From that day forth, Louie slowly started to warm up to Shijima again, and they went on to become a happy father and son.

  The Windstar Festivals the family visited after that were some of the best memories of Louie’s life so far.

  This one, however, was drastically unlike those.

  “Why is this happening...?” Louie cried.

  He was spending this Windstar Festival curling up, alone, and scared out of his mind.

  Last year, he’d had his father with him, along with Gringham and Juno, but now, they were nowhere in sight.

  He was even separated from his mother, leaving him shivering in solitude on the mill’s cold stone floor while the dreadful cackling from above terrorized his heart.

  “I want my mommy... a-and daddy too...” he continued to cry, with no one there to hear him.

  ◇◇◇

  ???

  You might end up being released. If that happens, I won’t be able to give you any orders. But if you... if the days we spent here are as much of a treasure to you as they are to me... if you see us as your family... then there’s something I want you to do.

  As those important words went through his mind, he slowly opened his eyes to find himself in a highly familiar landscape.

  He’d been asleep for a full two seasons. Much had changed. And upon examining his current state, he realized that he’d lost his bond to someone he deeply adored, which made him profoundly sad.

  “Eh...?” He then noticed that something was wrong with the sky.

  He didn’t feel like it was night, and yet it was strangely dark, not to mention that there was an unpleasant laughter coming from high above.

  Though the sound slightly annoyed him, he didn’t care about it too much.

  However, the cackling was mixed with another sound — one he couldn’t ignore even if he tried.

  After all, how could he disregard the cries of a child who was so precious to him? How could he act like he didn’t hear the weeping of a member of his family?

  “GROAAAAAHHHHHHH!” roared the man as he kicked the ground beneath his four feet. He would give his heart and soul to run towards the voice. To protect his nearest and dearest.

  Chapter Five: B. B. B.

  Paladin, Ray Starling

  “Where will we search for him?” asked B3.

  “We’ll run around the festival plaza and the roads between the buildings!” I replied. “You keep looking around!”

  “All right.”

  We rode Silver as he galloped through the burning village.

  Just an hour ago, it had been overflowing with people enjoying the festivities with bright smiles on their faces, but now, it looked completely deserted, and the only remnants of that fun were the countless windstars with their blades burned off.

  Torne was filled with a blackness much like that of Monochrome itself. Burned and darkened remains were spread out as far as the eye can see. Homes, cattle, and even people had been bathed in fire and reduced to charred shadows of what they once were.

  Hoping that Louie hadn’t ended up like that, I frantically searched for him.

  B3 poked my side.

  “...?” I raised an eyebrow. She seemed to have noticed something.

  “My Killing Intent Perception skill is flaring up,” she whispered into my ear.

  I gasped and asked, “Is it Monochrome?”

  “No, it’s not. There are multiple sources, and all of them are approaching us.”

  “Eh?” It took me a moment to process that.

  Before I could ask her who could attack us now, of all times, I heard an odd set of words.

  “Dreams of Electric Sheep — Gremlin!”

  A moment later, Silver lost control of his legs and collapsed sideways, the running momentum taking him a fair distance forward.

  I was still holding his reins with my prosthetic, so I fell along with him. B3, on the other hand, instantly jumped off and landed beautifully.

  “Gh... what the hell just happened?” I let go of Silver’s reins and stood up. “Silver, what’s wrong?!”

  Still on his side, he wasn’t movin
g. He didn’t even twitch or anything like that. It was as though he was broken, malfunctioning like the machine he was, and I couldn’t make sense of it at all.

  “That thing won’t be moving for half a day,” said someone behind me. I turned around to see a malicious-looking man wearing a bandana with a mark depicting a black circle over a red one.

  He wasn’t alone. B3 and I were now surrounded by a group of ten-odd Masters bearing the same mark.

  “Gremlin’s this guy’s Embryo. It turns off machines and stuff,” the bandana guy said while scratching his chin and pointing at the man next to him, who formed a mean grin.

  “So you’re the ones who stopped Silver,” I said. “What’s your problem?”

  “We’ve got some business with you, Ray Starling the Unbreakable,” the bandana guy said.

  It definitely wasn’t the first time I’d been called by that nickname. That Lang guy I’d met before had used it, too. Unlike him, though, this man here didn’t seem friendly at all.

  “We’re Sol Crisis, the PK clan,” he said. “I’m the leader, Dum-dum Dan. Call me ‘Dum-dum.’ Not like that matters. We won’t know each other for long.”

  Sol Crisis? I thought. Well, now that I think about it, some of them seem familiar.

  They were the ones who’d wrangled with those mohawks at the stalls. The armor guy wasn’t with them, though.

  “Guess there’s no point in asking what you want from me,” I said.

  They were a PK clan, so it was kinda obvious that they wanted to PK me. They’d made it hard for me to escape, and then come out to introduce themselves to make it easy for them to prove they’d defeated the Unbreakable later. There would be no point in killing me in a surprise attack and making it hard to tell who did it.

  Hell, some small man in work clothes was actually filming this, so their motive was all too clear.

  “Can’t you leave it for after Monochrome is taken care of?” I asked. “I’ve got something more important to do.”

  “Not happening,” said Dum-dum. “Now’s the perfect chance.”

  What?

  “Sol Crisis is pretty well-known now, but we don’t have any real achievements to our name, so we wanna do something big and make our name blow up for real.”

  “...Then why don’t you just kill Monochrome?” I demanded.

  “Come on, dude, tons of people have killed UBMs at this point. It ain’t all that special. Not to mention that we can’t even touch the damn thing. Trying to take it out is just stupid. I mean, really, even you ran away.”

  I had no counterargument to that.

  Still, the fact that someone who was doing nothing against Monochrome was making fun of everyone who’d tried to fight it was seriously pissing me off.

  “So yeah, we can’t beat the UBM up there, but it’s all good, since we’ve got some way better game right here. It survived against a goddamn Superior and the self-proclaimed strongest PK clan, despite not even being level 100. If that ain’t top-tier game, I don’t know what is.” The bandana guy named Dum-dum pointed at me and grinned. “I’m talking about you, guy.”

  Well, I got their motive right, at least.

  “Now’s not the time for this, damn it!” I shouted.

  “Kyah ha ha! You dumbass! It’s the perfect time for this!” someone other than Dum-dum replied.

  I looked over at the source of the voice and saw a guy in full armor surpassing three meters in height. The charred buildings at his sides were crumbling. It definitely wasn’t the first time I’d seen that armor. I’d seen it back at the capital’s fountain and here in Torne, during the wrangle between Sol Crisis and Mohawk League.

  Wait, I think I’ve seen it elsewhere, too...

  “When you were in Gideon, we couldn’t take you out ’cause of all the rankers and KoD, but now, that woman’s the only one with ya!” he laughed out loud. “And there’s no one here to bother us, either! You’re a really fucking easy target right now!”

  He seemed pretty pleased about the situation.

  “So yeah, that’s how it is,” said Dum-dum. “We also did our homework and found out you’re not too hot when fighting lots of people and when the fight drags on. Think you can hold out against us?”

  I was silent. He wasn’t wrong about that. My defense had a limited number of uses, so prolonged fights against many people were my bane.

  Damn you, Franklin. I’m too well-known now.

  “Not to mention we’ve got a secret weapon — me!” roared the armor guy. “Name’s Barbaroy! I’m the sub-leader of Sol Crisis and the strongest one here!”

  “Hh?!” I gasped as a sudden chill went down my spine.

  The moment he’d said those words, there was a surge of overwhelming rage and killing intent. However, it didn’t come from the armor guy, but from my side. I turned and saw my only ally on the scene.

  “Heh heh,” she giggled.

  Indeed — B3 was the source of the surge. I didn’t know why, but she was emitting an aura so intimidating, it couldn’t even be compared to the one she’d had when fighting K&R yesterday. It was strong enough to make me shiver, yet she looked as composed as ever.

  ...No, scratch that. I looked and noticed that her shield’s handle was bent.

  For some reason, the armor guy was making her really mad.

  “That armor has a nice design,” she said.

  “Kyah ha ha! I know, right?” laughed the armor guy. “It’s the one and only Gunhammer Plate, Magnum Colossus! A special reward I got from a UBM!”

  “Oh my, that is quite impressive.”

  The armor guy continued to flaunt his gear, completely oblivious to B3’s murderous aura.

  “Now, if I may ask... who are you to be wearing such armor?” she smiled. I hadn’t known her for long, but even I could tell she was faking it.

  “Kyah ha ha ha! I already introduced myself!” he laughed again. “And what, ya can’t tell by my armor? You don’t know much, do ya?”

  “...Perhaps. So, may I have your name?”

  Armor dude, please stop. B3’s murderous aura is turning so strong that she’s scaring me more than the aberration. I don’t know what’s going on here, but you’re clearly walking on a minefield.

  “Kyah ha ha ha! I’m Barbaroy Bad Burn the ‘Crushing Canopy’! I’m the man who used to lead Mad Castle, and now I’m the sub-leader of Sol Crisis! There! Satisfied?!”

  “I see.”

  I have no idea how I am the only one here who feels the aura... I thought. Hm? Wait.

  “Hold on. ‘Barbaroy’?” I muttered to myself. That name seemed familiar...

  “Ah,” I exclaimed as I glanced at B3, then at my party’s stat summary. Suddenly, it all made sense. I understood why B3 was so mad, and what kind of person this armor dude was.

  “Huhh? What’s up, Unbreakable, ya don’t know me, either?” he asked.

  “Oh no, I do,” I replied. “‘Barbaroy Bad Burn,’ huh? Yeah, I know that name very well.”

  “Kyah ha ha! Of course ya do! Try using Reveal or Identification if you want. See for yourself.”

  The fact he mentioned those skills probably meant that you’d see exactly what he claimed you would, but I more or less knew what was happening here, so that didn’t matter to me.

  “Killing you will make my and Sol Crisis’s fame skyrocket even higher! Man, am I glad I saw you back at that fountain yesterday!”

  “Damn, dude, you sure are hyped,” commented Dum-dum. “I gotta say, though, when you told me you’d seen that guy alone at the capital, I thought it was just an early April Fools.”

  “Kyah ha ha! C’mon, leader, you know you can trust me!”

  Oh, yeah, it’s April Fools’ Day in reality right now, I thought. Talk about timing. This whole situation feels like a bad joke.

  “Ray,” B3 spoke up.

  “Yes?”

  “Leave them to me and go search for Louie.”

  “Well, we wouldn’t want him to get hurt while we’re dealing with these guys,” I
conceded. “Is it really a good idea to leave them all to you, though?”

  “Yes. In fact, let me have them,” she said as she lightly pushed me.

  I nodded and went to retrieve Silver, who was still immobile. After putting him back in my inventory, I hurried away from there.

  “Hey! Don’t think you can escape!” shouted the armor guy. The whole of Sol Crisis moved to stop me, but before they could do anything...

  “Heaven’s Weight!” B3 activated the gravity field she’d used on Rosa, pushing the PKers to the ground.

  They were rendered incapable of doing anything to me, so I quickly made my escape.

  I left Sol Crisis to B3 and focused entirely on searching for Louie.

  But man, some people sure have some weird ideas, I thought. I mean, there’s just no way that trick can work for long.

  ◇◇◇

  Torne Village

  “I... I can’t move!”

  “What the hell?! M-My bones are breaking!”

  “Is this a gravity field? Wait, don’t tell me that...”

  None of the people Ray had left behind were moving.

  To be precise, there was one person who didn’t move, while the rest of them just couldn’t move.

  The latter were the Sol Crisis members, bound by a high gravity field, while the former was B3 — its creator.

  She looked down on them as she reached into her inventory and took out a Job Crystal. It was a consumable that allowed the user to switch their main job.

  B3 shattered the Crystal, changing her main job from Shield Giant to something else.

  “Now then,” she said in a cool tone as she leisurely walked up to the armored man. “There are three things I feel I must point out to you, Mister ‘Barbaroy.’”

  She gently touched one of the protrusions on his armor and just tore it off.

  “Huh?! How the fuck are you do—?!”

  “It’s not hard enough,” B3 cut Barbaroy’s words short and forced her fist into his abdomen.

  She wasn’t using her bare hands. While no one was paying attention, she’d equipped a pair of gigantic gauntlets.

  That description really was apt, for they seemed like a pair of metallic gloves a giant would wear. Not only that, but they looked very much like the gauntlets from Barbaroy’s armor set, which, by the way, now had a number of cracks around its abdominal area.