by Aneko Yusagi
“The Spirit Tortoise has crossed the border into Melromarc and appears to be heading for the castle.”
“Oh no . . .”
Inside the carriage, the queen unrolled a parchment map and indicated the current location of the Spirit Tortoise as well as its apparent heading. It was very close to our current position and we would probably be able to see it pretty soon.
“There are already reports of mass casualties in Melromarc,” the queen said pensively.
I understood perfectly well what was happening. After all, I’d spent quite a bit of time wandering around the country. I had probably visited a number of the towns the Spirit Tortoise had destroyed.
“So what were you saying about the proper way to defeat the Spirit Tortoise? You said it could only be defeated a certain way.”
“That’s correct.”
“We cut the damn thing’s head clean off last time.”
“As I have already said, that was clearly not sufficient to prevent it from reawakening.”
“Reports from the area indicate that she speaks the truth. They say that a new head grew from the corpse before the Spirit Tortoise awakened.”
Looking at it from a different perspective, at least we knew that blasting its head off would buy us some time before the monster was able to get back on its feet. We could do it again if we needed to. That would give us time to research the way to defeat it for good.
“What have you heard from the seven star heroes?”
The seven star heroes were legendary heroes like the four holy heroes and they had their own legendary weapons. From what I’d heard, they fought for the sake of the world, just like we did, but because they operated in a different part of the world, I’d never had an occasion to meet them.
“Because they were investigating the lands where the Spirit Tortoise was originally imprisoned, it will take them a little while to reach us here.”
“Useless, as always,” I muttered. We had been on our way to meet with them while we searched for the other missing heroes. At one point we’d been relatively close to where they were supposed to be operating. Maybe I should have taken a trip to meet them myself? With Portal Shield at my disposal, it was easy enough to get back to where I needed to be, after all. But I had never met them, so I didn’t know who I was looking for. Coordinating a meeting would have taken a considerable amount of effort on my part. I didn’t know if they were powerful enough to warrant it. At the very least, I hoped they were more powerful than the other three missing heroes were.
“Hey, queen.”
“Yes, what is it?”
“How strong are the seven star heroes?” I asked. The queen frowned and fell into deep thought. I didn’t think I was asking such a difficult question.
“May I be frank with you?”
“Yeah.”
“From what I have seen, they are not as powerful as you are. Naturally, I don’t claim to have witnessed the full extent of their abilities, so I cannot speak with confidence, however . . .”
“I see.”
“But I believe they may well be able to match Ms. Raphtalia or Ms. Filo in battle.”
Well, I suppose that was better than nothing. If they were only as powerful as Filo and Raphtalia, that wasn’t going to do me much good. I already had those two on my side. I wished I had more people standing with me, but if this was all we had to work with, then it probably made more sense for Raphtalia, Filo, and I to go ahead of the others.
“Then, just like last time, we . . .” I tried to explain my thought process to the queen, but Filo interrupted, screaming.
“Master! Master! Look!”
“What is it, Filo?!”
Filo was pointing to something on the horizon. I followed her finger to see something shooting up into the sky. What was it?
At first glance, I thought it looked like a missile, but there weren’t any missiles in this world, were there? This place was like the middle ages, so how could there be . . .
I was thinking it over when I heard a sound and turned to see thousands of birds fleeing the forests around us. It looks like the very clouds themselves were running away.
A sinking feeling gripped my gut, but I didn’t have time to sit around and think about it. I turned back to see enormous spear-like objects raining down from the sky. They fell straight down on the mountains on the horizon, just where we were heading.
And then, just like a scene out of a war movie, a series of loud explosions echoed off the mountains, followed by strong gusts of wind that rattled the carriage. I squinted to see where the objects had fallen and I saw pillars of fire. No, they converged to form giant domes of fire, many of them.
It looked like the end of the world. The trees were all ablaze, and the earth shook with the concussive force of the explosions. What would happen in my own world if someone were to set off a series of massive explosions so powerful they changed the shape of the ground? It was horrifying to imagine—but it was already happening here.
“What the hell was that?”
Raphtalia and Filo were both staring at the explosions, mouths agape, just as aghast as I was.
“Fehhh . . . How scary!”
“Rishia, get it together.”
“He’s right, girl. I gather we’re on our way to meet those explosions,” the old lady said.
“Fehhh!”
The back of the carriage was in a raucous uproar. What a pain.
“Hey. Do you think the Spirit Tortoise did that?”
That couldn’t be it. We’d already battled the Spirit Tortoise, and it hadn’t used any attacks like that. Its strongest attack had been an electric beam that could shoot through a mountain. It was more likely that we were witnessing some kind of ceremonial magic performed by the coalition army against the Spirit Tortoise.
“Perhaps . . . There is a ceremonial spell called ‘Meteorite’ that groups can perform in concert. I suspect that is the source of what we are seeing.”
“Huh?” Filo chirped, turning her head to the side. She seemed suspicious of the queen, who looked nervous and fidgety as she stumbled through an explanation. What was going on? If the explosions weren’t the work of the coalition army, we were in big trouble.
“Hey, master!”
“What?”
“I don’t think that’s it. Something about it doesn’t feel like magic to me!”
“Oh come on, Filo. If that isn’t magic, then what is it? It looks like heavy artillery from my world!”
“Could it be?” Ost muttered to herself while she watched the explosions. “I believe the Shield Hero’s servant is . . . correct.”
What the . . . Did she mean that the explosions really were an attack by the Spirit Tortoise?
The carriage rounded a bend in the road and emerged from it with a much better view of the distant violence. But I wasn’t ready for what I saw.
“Hey. Wasn’t the Spirit Tortoise the size of a mountain? Didn’t he cause horrible destruction just by walking around?”
“My true body has been taken over. Please, Shield Hero. You must defeat me!”
Finally, the Spirit Tortoise stepped into view. It was different than the last time I’d seen it—it even looked like it had rabies. A long web of drool dangled from its gaping mouth, and its eyes appeared to glow red while the beast stomped the ground.
When I’d last seen the tortoise, the remnants of a town had adorned its shell, but the town was so diminished that it was practically invisible. It may have fallen off while the monster walked across the world, or it might have been thrown off as part of the reawakening. It was hard to tell what had happened, but the whole shell looked different. Now it was covered in towering, wicked spike-like thorns. The Spirit Tortoise had changed. Now it looked like an enormous, crazed, wild beast.
Somehow, the monster had accrued even more power for itself. Because it looked so different, I decided to call it Spirit Tortoise Tyrant. The monster was even walking faster than it had before.
This
was impossible! I couldn’t imagine us winning a battle against such a beast. Just when I was about to wallow in despair, the Spirit Tortoise stopped in its tracks.
“What’s happening?”
I got my answer before I could finish the question. The towering spikes on its back moved back and forth, and then a number of them shot straight up into the air. I followed them with my eyes as they sailed up through the clouds, slowed, turned, and fell back to the earth.
Then, just like we’d just seen, the area around the Spirit Tortoise was filled with towering pillars of fire and smoke.
So . . . It must have been an area-wide attack, right?
What the hell were we up against? How were we supposed to fight something like that?
A nearby town had been completely obliterated. There was nothing left.
I’d seen an attack like that in a game I played once, a long time ago. In the game, the attack destroyed the whole world. And we were supposed to fight this thing? If this were a game, the Spirit Tortoise would definitely be the final boss. But this wasn’t a game. This was a real world. It wouldn’t end, even if we won the battle.
If what Fitoria said could be trusted, then the waves would stop coming and the Spirit Tortoise would go back to sleep—that is, if we let it do what it wanted. But if what Ost said was true, and someone else had taken control of the Spirit Tortoise, then we had to defeat it to make it stop. And judging by the last attack I’d seen, if we left the tortoise alone, it really might destroy the whole world.
I sighed. Facing a battle like this, who would volunteer to fight if a hero didn’t lead the vanguard?
“Alright! Where’s the coalition army?”
We had to get together and strategize. I scanned the area for signs of the army from our vantage point on the road. Where the hell was it? The landscape was covered in a thick blanket of debris, and it was hard to make anything out.
“There it is!” the queen shouted, pointing.
Following her gaze, I saw the army split into many groups, roughly surrounding the tortoise at a distance. They were on the move, and it was actually a good idea. The Spirit Tortoise chose its targets based on the number of people in the group, and therefore damage resulted in greater loss of life. If the army split up and kept moving, the tortoise would have a hard time focusing on anyone in particular.
“We have to get down there and meet up with them. Come on, Filo!”
“Yeah!”
We set our sights on the fractured coalition army and took off running.
Chapter Five: Mass Destruction
Compared to the last time I had seen it, the coalition army was fractured. Still, I assumed it was successful in drawing the Spirit Tortoise’s attacks—there was plenty of destruction. But I didn’t see many casualties.
We decided to have our strategy meeting inside of a carriage and we kept moving.
The queen, Ost, and I all squeezed into a carriage that was already packed with soldiers from the army.
“My apologies for the venue,” a commander of the army said to me. I recognized him from the last battle with the Spirit Tortoise.
“It’s not your fault. That’s just how it is.”
“Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to prepare an airship.”
“I didn’t even know that you had one,” I muttered. I should have expected as much—this was another world, after all.
“Faubrey has an airship that it has agreed to lend us. Unfortunately, it did not arrive in time.”
Considering how suddenly this had all happened, it probably hadn’t even made it to Melromarc yet. I wondered if the seven star heroes were on it.
“Waiting for something that may never come will do us no good. What the hell is going on out there?”
“When the Spirit Tortoise reawakened, it had already taken on this new form. I suppose you were not able to make anything out from here, but the town on its shell is still there.”
“Oh.” The spikes must have obscured it from view.
“This is the information our research division was able to obtain,” the man said as he passed me a thick, substantial stack of papers. I flipped through it and quickly found the report that detailed the rediscovery of the town on the beast’s shell.
But we didn’t have time to flip through reports. I’d have to delegate the reading to a smart person. “Read through it and report back to me. I’ll give a copy of this to Rishia as well. It might be the best way for her to contribute to the battle efforts.”
“Understood.”
“Pardon my intrusion, Shield Hero, but who is this woman behind you?”
“She’s a Spirit Tortoise familiar.”
“What?!”
A look of shock swept over the faces of the assembled army generals.
I couldn’t blame them.
“In another country, she is known as Ost Horai. Please see to it that you become acquainted.”
Ost politely bowed to the army officers, who only answered with pointed fingers and gaping mouths. When everyone had calmed down, we explained all that we had learned about the true aim of the Spirit Tortoise, as well as Ost’s claim that it had been taken over by someone with nefarious intentions.
“So the Spirit Tortoise is an even greater threat than we imagined.”
“Yes, but we must destroy it either way, so I don’t see how this new information affects our plans.”
“Yes, well, that’s true . . .”
“I hope to cooperate with you all,” Ost said.
“How presumptuous of you! Do you have any idea how many people have died because of you and the Spirit Tortoise?”
“Burdened with terrible knowledge, I had no choice but to procure the necessary sacrifices. However, what is now happening is no longer within the purview of my goals, and I condemn it. However, I will not apologize for actions I took on behalf of the greater good.”
The queen intervened in the conversation to mediate the growing hostilities between Ost and the army. “While this woman’s goals may not have been in line with our own, she was still trying to save our world. This is no time for squabbles over the past. She has offered her assistance in the coming battle, and we will need it.”
She tried, but it wasn’t convincing. The generals stood with their arms crossed, doubtful expressions on their faces.
“Originally, they were to be a last defense for the world. They were to save it when the heroes were not strong enough to do so. She was only a representative for the Spirit Tortoise, who required sacrifices to fulfill his mission,” I explained.
But the generals were not interested in hearing it.
“Such a woman should be butchered on the spot!”
Ost quietly shut her eyes and closed a fist around the sleeve of her robe as she endured the insults and shouts of the soldiers.
“Sacrifices . . . right.”
I turned to the army generals and muttered quietly. “Who can save the world without requiring sacrifices? Is that how war works? Who can save anything without sacrifices?”
Everyone looked confused. They turned their heads to the side and stared at me, puzzled. The look on their faces made it clear that they had no idea what I was getting at. But I was at the end of my rope—a guy can only put up with insanity for so long.
The last time we’d fought the Spirit Tortoise, I’d done my best to put on a good face and give a rousing speech, but I was quickly running out of patience with the army generals, and I thought it was about time someone put them in the their place.
“You know what? Whenever anything goes bad around here, what do you do? You summon heroes to fight for you. You think that the heroes will save you. Has it ever occurred to you that you are asking for the heroes to sacrifice themselves?”
“Heroes . . . sacrifice?”
“The heroes exist to solve your problems, right?”
I had to correct their misunderstandings, starting with the basics. These idiots clearly didn’t understand that we might not share the same
perspective.
“Let me be more blunt. There’s no significant difference between what the Spirit Tortoise does and what you do with the heroes—you both sacrifice others to save the world. Get it?”
“How dare you!”
“Am I wrong? Don’t you summon heroes here to save the world for you? How is that different from sacrificing the heroes to save the world? If heroes have to die to secure your own safety, would you even hesitate?”
“Um . . .”
They must have finally begun to understand what I was saying. Half of the generals fell silent, and the other half stood there with their mouths open, unable to process what they were hearing.
“The heroes have a duty to fight on behalf of the world! What’s so strange about that?”
I sighed. The last time I’d been with the army, I’d given a speech where I said things like “heroes are a matter of the heart” and “heroes never give up in the face of adversity—heroes protect people!” Did I need to recant my whole speech?
“Heroes are courageous, and heroes have the strength necessary to fight on behalf of others. But that doesn’t mean I’m your pawn, does it? No matter how much power a hero commands, they are still a human being, aren’t they? We aren’t sacrificial offerings!”
Many people in the crowd looked uncomfortable when they heard “sacrificial offerings.” This was an army that was forced to rely on external power for their own protection, which must have made them feel weak. If I wanted to hurt them, that was the note to hit.
“How is that different from the rest of you here today? You can all be sacrificed to the Spirit Tortoise to save the world, can’t you? Isn’t that obvious?”
The angry generals appeared to come to their senses.
“If you want to say that the heroes are different from the people of this world, so of course they should be treated differently, or something absurd like that, then I am not going to help fight this battle. When you’re dead and gone, I’ll help the remaining ones, the ones that understand what I’m trying to say, defeat the Spirit Tortoise. How does that sound?”
“Damn you.”