“Miss Hibiki, are you all right?” Suzuran asked as she ran along beside her.
Though she was once a homunculus, Suzuran was a normal human now. She couldn’t run any faster than Hibiki could, so the other two girls were quickly leaving them behind.
“I’m not out of breath or anything.”
“No, I merely mean to say that my mistress doesn’t take orders from others often.”
“...Well, that’s true, isn’t it?”
It seemed that Suzuran was worried about her mental state rather than her physical condition. Really, Hibiki wasn’t used to being in a leadership position. She’d been caught up in lots of stories before just like Rekka had, but she’d never had to rely on others like he did.
In that sense, maybe Rekka has a special talent...
Even Rosalind would do exactly what he told her to. Her romantic attraction to him was probably to thank for that, but that wasn’t all it was about. What it really boiled down to was that people relied on Rekka the same way he relied on them. That was Rekka’s true power. People trusted him. They trusted him to help them, and he could trust in their help in return.
Even me... I keep thinking that he’ll come up with some way to solve all this.
Hibiki didn’t personally know if that was a good or a bad thing, but there was something else she was afraid of.
What will happen to Rekka when he gets involved in a story he can’t save?
Both the Namidare and the Banjo bloodlines were more or less last resorts. With the way things worked, they only got caught up in stories that still had the possibility of a happy ending. Hibiki wanted to have faith in their team and embrace that possibility... but what was she to think in a situation like this? Rekka was in another world while his heroine was being chased down by some kind of psychic mafia.
Of course, the reason Rekka had taken off to go hide Mio in another world was because he trusted Hibiki’s team to save Ellicia for him. If it weren’t for that, he would’ve come up with some other plan. But even then, Rekka Namidare was just a normal teenage boy. He could only be in one place at one time, and there was a limit to what a normal boy like him could do. One day, he might...
...No, there’s no point in thinking about what might happen.
Perhaps it was just Hibiki’s naturally defensive instincts getting the better of her. She was used to working alone, but Rekka had friends to help him. Hibiki was even one of them.
I just need to take care of this myself. That way I won’t have anything to worry about.
Since Rekka wasn’t here, she’d have to save Ellicia for him.
Eventually, Hibiki and Suzuran reached the department store.
“I don’t see Iris or Rosalind...”
“Did they go in ahead of us?”
That seemed to be the case. Hibiki sighed and called Satsuki.
“I’m here. Is Ellicia still inside?”
“Hold on... Yes, she is. She’s on the fifth floor.”
“Got it. I’m not going to hang up, so just stay on the line and keep me posted. Do you have enough magical power left?”
“I’ve got about 30 minutes left.”
“That should be plenty. Where’s Yang now?”
“Hold on... This isn’t good. He’s inside... on the second floor and going upwards.”
Hearing that her enemy was closing in on her target, Hibiki knew that they needed to act swiftly.
“Suzuran, let’s go!”
“Right!”
The two of them dashed in through the door to the department store. Since it was the first day of summer break, it was rather busy. Hibiki and Suzuran darted their way through the crowds, dodging people left and right.
Yang is reading people’s minds as he tracks her down, so it’s best if we avoid him. Which means...
Hibiki ignored the stairs and the elevator, and instead ran up the escalator. What floor were Iris and Rosalind on? They might just be running around the department store searching on their own, but Hibiki didn’t have time to track them down.
First, I need to make contact with Ellicia.
When she made it to the fifth floor, Hibiki grabbed her phone again.
“Where is she?”
“Still on the fifth floor. On your left... in the toy department.”
Hibiki let Suzuran know what was happening, and they proceeded to the toy department on Satsuki’s instructions. The aisles there were filled with children browsing the shelves of toys and dolls. Hibiki didn’t want to trip over any of them, so she was forced to slow down in this part of the store. Proceeding carefully through the area, she spotted a girl who matched the description she’d been given of Ellicia.
“Ellicia Otto?”
“Who are you?!”
The girl, who had a windmill-shaped mark under her left eye, looked up at Hibiki in fright. Someone she’d never met before had just called her by her full name. It only made sense that she’d be surprised.
“Don’t worry. Do you remember the name Rekka Namidare?”
“...Rekka?” Ellicia’s brow furrowed. She hadn’t expected to hear that name.
“He told us you were being chased, so we came to save you.”
“You came to help me?”
“That’s right.”
“...Even if that’s true, how do you know my full name?”
Crap... Did Rekka only get her first name?
Hibiki was kicking herself for making that mistake, but she had no time to dwell on it. She quickly had to come up with a way to get Ellicia to trust her. She was a psychic, so maybe she’d be willing to believe something that was a little out of the ordinary.
“I know how this is going to sound, but the truth is that we learned your name and location via magic.”
“Magic?! Are you pursuers from the Margaret clan?!”
“Margaret...?”
Hibiki knew that name. She’d dealt with someone from the Margaret clan once before.
Chelsea... Her last name was Margaret, I think.
But Chelsea had left home at an early age, and she’d never really talked much about her family with Hibiki. All she really knew was that they were supposedly known for being powerful mages.
Maybe it’s not really Yang and his group she’s running from, then... Why would she be worried about the Margarets, though?
It suddenly seemed like there was more to this than they’d first suspected. Hibiki grabbed her phone and lifted it up to her ear to ask Satsuki about it, but when she did...
“Hibiki! Behind you!” a panicked voice cried from the other end of the line.
When Hibiki heard that, she immediately jumped forward. She could feel something pass through the air right behind her head not a second later. She turned around to see a man dressed in black now tangling with Suzuran. Suzuran dodged his punches, then moved in to strike him in the head and knock him out. But...
“Suzuran, no!” Hibiki screamed, but it was too late.
The man almost seemed to know that her attack was coming. He blocked it with hardly any effort, then countered with a hard punch to Suzuran’s solar plexus.
“Gah...!”
Suzuran doubled over, then backed away to keep her distance. The children around them screamed and scattered.
“Yang!” Ellicia screamed.
That’s right! He can read minds. We’ll never beat him in a close-range fight...
Yang’s gaze suddenly shifted from Ellicia to Hibiki.
“How did you know that?”
“Tch!”
Realizing she was outmatched, Hibiki turned around, grabbed Ellicia’s hand, and started to run.
“H-Hey!”
“Just come with me! You don’t want to get caught, right?!”
Hibiki glanced back over her shoulder as she ran with Ellicia in tow. Yang was currently stepping over a collapsed Suzuran as he followed after them.
Suzuran should be fine. The question is whether we can escape.
“Ellicia, does your wall walki
ng work on floors?!”
“How do you know about all this stuff?!”
“If it does, then use it!”
“...!”
Hibiki then suddenly felt like she was floating. Her field of vision began dropping rapidly as she passed through the floor and then the ceiling below it.
“Damn it!” Hibiki hit the floor and rolled. “Ellicia!”
“...Are you really trying to help me escape?”
“You still doubt me? If I was with the Margaret clan, why would I have asked you about Rekka Namidare first?!”
Hibiki and Rekka both knew Chelsea personally, but they didn’t exactly have anything to do with the Margarets.
“If anything, I’d appreciate you telling me how the Margarets fit in to all this!”
“...I guess that really means you don’t know, doesn’t it?”
“Good. I’m glad we’re on the same page now. But for the time being, we just need to get out of here,” Hibiki said as she got up and made to start running again. “...Huh?”
What is this? I can’t move!
It was like she was suddenly paralyzed.
“Stun?! So, you’re here, too...”
Ellicia was frozen, too, but she was shouting at the hooded man coming up the escalator.
Some kind of telekinesis? This guy must be with Yang’s organization... Did they gather here because Yang found Ellicia?
But he wasn’t the only one Hibiki had to worry about. Suddenly, a girl she didn’t recognize appeared out of thin air along with Yang. It happened in the blink of an eye, much like the way Iris’s warp watch worked.
No, this isn’t alien technology... It’s magical teleportation. But if they have that kind of power, they should have been able to catch up to her sooner. Does it have distance limitations like the warp watch?
Hibiki’s mind had no trouble keeping up with what was going on, but her body wouldn’t respond.
“Lucy...”
“Ellicia, I’ve finally caught up with you.” The girl called Lucy looked at Ellicia with a mixture of relief and uncertainty. “Ellicia... why did you leave us?”
“To stop Yang’s plan.”
Hibiki’s ears perked up at the word “plan.”
Yang’s plan? That’s why she’s on the run?
Hibiki tried as best as she could to follow their conversation.
“Lucy, Stun, how can you go along with this?! If he goes through with it, it’ll mess up the whole world!”
The man in the hood—the one Ellicia called Stun—said nothing.
“Just come back with us. We’ll talk things through, and then you’ll see for yourself.” Lucy looked a little sad as she turned to Yang. “Yang?”
“No, wait. Before we go, I’m going to read this girl and figure out who she is,” Yang said as he put his hand on Hibiki’s head.
Hibiki felt an awful feeling in her stomach when she heard him say the word “read.” Yang’s psychic powers allowed him to read people’s thoughts and memories like a book.
“Banjo? Namidare? Who are you people?”
“Get out of my mind!” Hibiki yelled, knowing there was nothing else she could do.
But he put his hand on me to do it... So even if he can read minds from a distance, it seems he has to make direct contact to read people’s memories...
“You’re smart, girl,” Yang said with a smirk as he made a fist.
Now that he knew about the Banjo and Namidare families, he wasn’t going to make the mistake of underestimating Hibiki as a normal teenager. He decided to eliminate the potential threat right here and now.
“...Gah!”
Hibiki’s body was still paralyzed by Stun’s telekinesis, so she had no way to defend against Yang’s attack. Her eyes flitted about, searching for anything that might help her. That was when she saw two figures running up the escalator, but that would work against her. Since Yang was reading her thoughts, he was alerted to the ambush from Iris and Rosalind coming at him from behind and dodged accordingly.
“Huh?!”
“Tch!”
Iris and Rosalind both came in with flying kicks, but once they missed, they spun around in mid-air and landed on the other side of Yang.
“Hibiki!”
Iris picked up Hibiki and started to run. Rosalind followed.
“It looks like that telekinesis hold isn’t perfect. External force can break it, apparently.”
It might be unique to Iris because her strength was out of this world, but either way, Hibiki could move again. Now she just had to figure out what to do next. Neither side had planned it, but Hibiki’s team was facing off against Yang’s organization.
The problem is that they’ve got Ellicia. And they’ve also got someone who can teleport...
But she had Satsuki and Iris on her side. And that wasn’t all.
“Rosalind, can you use your charm?”
“It would be difficult. I need to stare into someone’s eyes for several seconds, but if they know what I’m doing...”
“I see.”
But Rosalind’s charm would work instantly on someone who was passed out. If they could take down even one opponent, they would be able to form a strategy around that. With all these cards in their hand, it wouldn’t be easy for their foes to get away.
“...”
Since Yang could read her thoughts, however, he seemed to be weighing whether or not it was worth it to try and defeat them here. But then something strange happened...
“?!”
“?!”
Suddenly, both Rosalind and Yang reacted violently to something.
“What is this?!”
“Rosalind, what is...?”
Hibiki knew something was wrong, but she couldn’t tell what. With little else to go on, she followed Rosalind’s gaze across the room. A girl dressed in crimson had emerged from one of the aisles.
“Hmm, you finally caught up with her?”
The girl had bronze hair and was wearing a bright red dress. It was closed, but she was also carrying a parasol in the same red. She approached the group, eyeing everyone with a grin. She looked to be hardly more than a child, but there was nothing to compare her to. All the children in the store had fled with the adults when the fight broke out. Only the police or an idiot would approach a group willing to brawl like this in a department store in the middle of the day. That, or someone who was involved somehow.
“Lucy!”
“Right!”
Yang quickly made his move. He called to the girl with the teleportation powers, who responded immediately. In the blink of an eye, they were gone with Ellicia.
“Oh, no! They’re leaving, Hibiki! What do we do?” Iris shouted.
But Hibiki didn’t know the answer. The simple assumption was that it was time to go after them, but...
“Hmm? They left again, huh?”
Was it okay to ignore the girl in red?
It’s obvious she’s got something to do with Ellicia’s story. And things between Yang and Ellicia don’t seem to be as bad as I thought. Being caught by him probably doesn’t mean an immediate bad ending...
The more important matter at hand seemed to be finding out about Yang’s plan and what his group was after. Hibiki figured that before going after Ellicia, it would be a good idea to get some information from a new source. One, in fact, had just presented itself.
“You there.”
“Hmm?”
The girl in crimson tilted her head at Hibiki’s question. The people she’d caught up with had vanished, though it didn’t seem to concern her at all. It was a bit creepy, but Hibiki took a deep breath to steel herself.
“Are you with the Margaret clan?” she asked.
“Why, yes. My name is Nartessia Margaret... And it seems you have something to do with that group,” the girl said with a haughty tone as the corners of her lips curled up into a grin.
Chapter 3: Valley of the Undead (July 20th-21st)
Once we were out of the labyrinth, we went i
n search of civilization to try and find a doctor. We looked for a while, but the sun set earlier than we expected, so we were forced to make camp. Harissa used her magic to start a fire, and we all sat around it.
“How’s Corona looking?” I asked as I nibbled on some food.
“She’s still unconscious...”
“I see.”
Corona’s condition hadn’t improved even after we’d escaped the labyrinth. We needed to find a village or a town and get her help as soon as possible.
“Okay, let’s get some rest for now. I’ll take first watch.”
“Good night, Sir Rekka.”
“Good night.”
“Wake me up in two hours.”
Harissa, Tsumiki, and Lea all turned in for the night. They were using the extra clothes they’d brought for blankets and pillows. We were lucky that Lea’s water magic made it easy to do laundry... It was pretty dispiriting to have to wear dirty clothes. I mean, I was fine, but it must’ve been hard for the girls.
“Mio, you get some sleep, too.”
“Okay...”
Mio, who looked as young as Harissa or maybe even younger, came over and laid down next to me.
“...”
Once I could tell everyone was asleep, I started to stare into the crackling fire to think. We’d spent the whole day riding around on Lea’s back (in Leviathan form, of course), and we hadn’t come across anything that looked like civilization. Considering the state she was in, we couldn’t ask Corona for help. And considering how long she’d been sealed up, there was a chance she wouldn’t know anyway. But in the few hours we’d spend up in the sky, we’d learned a few things about this world.
First, the environment here was incredible. There were untouched mountains, rivers, and forests stretching as far as the eye could see. It made it easy enough to gather water and plants for food, but since we hadn’t seen any signs of people yet, I was on the fence about whether or not it was a good thing.
Next, despite all the greenery around us, we hadn’t laid eyes on a single wild animal. We’d gone into the forests and down the rivers several times to get food, but there wasn’t a single bird or fish to be had. It seemed safe enough to assume there just weren’t animals in these parts. It was nice that we didn’t have to worry about getting attacked by wildlife at night, but Lea was a little upset that there was no meat to eat. It was hard to say if that was good or bad, either... But I guess it played out in our favor. The real question at hand was when we’d be able to head back to Earth.
I Saved Too Many Girls and Caused the Apocalypse: Volume 7 Page 8