All the underlings up till now have been weirdly large animals and hideously distorted people.
Underlings were, fundamentally, living creatures who’d undergone terrible transformations. Because of that, no matter how hideous they became, they usually resembled their original forms, more or less. But the thing he was facing now was far too alien to be a mere mutation.
It was simply too inorganic. And it was giving off too much power to be classified as a familiar.
But then what the hell is it?
Kaito found himself at a loss.
Then the thing—which probably resembled a machine more than a work of avant-garde art—began moving.
It immediately became oddly blurry as the chunks of metal making up its body started audibly vibrating. Then, as though it had received some kind of order, it spread its eight legs wide.
It looked almost like a massive silver lily sitting atop a grassy field.
Then it vanished.
“…Huh?”
Kaito lost sight of their foe. At the same time, his arm moved. His beastly left arm practically moved on its own to pursue the path the silver thing had taken. His sharp claws dug into and caught the flying machine.
Sparks flew, as though two swords had just collided.
After taking stock of the situation, he came to the realization that his arm was numb.
It was so very heavy.
Kaito let out a shout from the depths of his diaphragm.
“Hrrragh!”
Using all his strength, he swung down the arm he’d caught the thing’s leg with.
The machine nearly crashed into the ground. Just before it made impact, though, it gave off a clacking noise and rearranged its body. Its previously straightened legs sprang joints. They gently bent, reducing the impact and allowing the machine to make a clean landing.
—Screeeee, scraaaaaw!
It let out a high-pitched, roar-like noise.
Hina frantically rushed over to Kaito’s side. He turned to her, then asked a question.
“Hina, you know what that thing is?”
“I’m very sorry. My Self-Recording Device contains no information on anything resembling that. It isn’t an automaton, and it isn’t the same type of construct as the Church’s communication devices. Whatever could it be?”
“Oh-ho! Now there’s a surprise!”
A deep voice rang out from somewhere rather unexpected. Kaito’s eyes went wide. It was rare for anything to elicit a response from the Kaiser. With his body still hidden, the supreme hound laughed in amusement.
“Why, if it isn’t Deus Ex Machina! I surely didn’t expect to see that in a land such as this!”
“—Wait, what did you just say?”
Kaito frowned at the strange echo. However, he didn’t have time to sit around asking questions.
The shrill noise rang out once more.
—Screeeee, scraaaaaw!
The machine rose to its feet. Its torso didn’t so much as twitch as its eight legs began rapidly revolving. Spraying mud every which way, it drilled its way into the dirt.
Then, in the blink of an eye, the machine disappeared from the surface.
“…It burrowed.”
“Master Kaito, I implore you to stay within a range I can defend you from.”
Their entire party surveyed their surroundings. For a moment, the area was silent. The leaves on the trees rustled ever so slightly.
Then the ground exploded. The machine came flying out, its eight legs gathered to form a spear.
So fast that it seemed to have been shot from a catapult as it hurtled toward Lute.
“Captain!”
“I’m fine!”
Without needing to be told, he’d already anticipated that he might be attacked. As he calmly replied to his subordinate, Lute dropped down low to the ground. As he prepared for the impact, he readied his sword and let out a cry.
“You shall pay for the atrocities you’ve committed on our people! Starting with those legs of yours!”
As he raised his stormy battle cry, Lute brought down his sword. He’d probably assumed already that his weapon wouldn’t pierce it, so instead of trying to cut the machine, he used the whole of his blade to strike it.
A hard noise rang out. His attack had landed cleanly on the machine. But as Kaito watched, he was taken aback. Even though the machine had been caught by Lute’s intense blow, it was just casually floating in the air.
Its legs had grown even more joints, and those appendages coiled around Lute’s sword.
“Rgh!”
“Lute!”
Kaito tried to snap his fingers.
Before he could, though, a graceful, explosive blow landed squarely on the machine’s torso.
“Hiyah!”
The hem of Hina’s maid uniform fluttered in the wind as she lashed out with her ax kick.
The sound of metal scraping echoed out from where the sole of her foot had connected with the machine.
After resisting for a second, the machine was blown away, sword and all. It crashed loudly into a tree. The tree’s trunk bent, creaked, then snapped, crashing to the ground with a thunderous noise amid a pillar of fumes.
Her silver hair swaying, Hina quietly lowered her foot, and her billowed-out skirt came to a gentle rest.
“Please, pull yourself together! You don’t want your wife mourning for you!”
“Ah, how shameful! I vow to return the favor!”
As he replied to Hina’s reprimand, Lute tried to adjust his grip on his sword. However, it had been sent flying along with the machine. His ears flopped limply. But he shook his head vigorously, and they stood right back up. Having regained his dignity, he directed a sharp cry to his troops.
“A spare sword!”
“Here!”
One of them pulled a new sword from their luggage and tossed it to him. Upon catching it, Lute nodded and drew his new weapon from its scabbard in a sweeping motion.
As he did, the machine rose back to its feet. Seemingly stunned, it began joining its silver metal plates together.
—Screeeee, scraaaaaw!
Destroying it with brute force is gonna take a while. If we even can, that is.
Having arrived at that conclusion, Kaito wiped away the sweat clinging to his brow. If they were able to fix it in place, they’d probably be able to pull out a victory. But if worse came to worst and it successfully burrowed its way to the village, another tragedy was bound to unfold.
The question, then, was how to finish the battle quickly and decisively.
Kaito racked his brains for the method that seemed most effective. Then he suddenly recalled a certain entity’s existence.
Wait, that’s right. I have seen something similar to that thing, and it’s not just the avant-garde art.
During the short period he’d attended school for, he’d seen one of the bosses in a video game that his classmate had been playing. It had been composed of a series of planks, and his classmate had used a variety of weapons to tear it apart.
The boss had been powerful. But individually, the planks weren’t anything special.
Abruptly, Kaito spoke.
“Kaiser.”
“…”
“Kaiser!”
“What are you causing that racket for? A master as unworthy as you should take care not to call me so frivolously.”
“I’m gonna stop that thing. Lend me your power.”
With that, Kaito made his plea. The Kaiser scoffed in irritation. Then he let out his humanlike laugh.
“Ha, as if. That thing has nothing to do with demons. And destroying it would do little to exemplify my strength. Why, then, should I go out of my way to lend you my fangs?”
“…It doesn’t have anything to do with demons?”
The Kaiser’s words weren’t just surprising; they came as a legitimate shock.
Put another way, they meant the thing before them was neither an underling nor a familiar. But it wasn’t a human
, beast, or spirit, either.
What, in that case, could it possibly be?
…“Deus Ex Machina”?
That was what the Kaiser had called it.
Kaito couldn’t afford to simply stay in the dark regarding the machine. He needed to find out what it was. But although his instincts were screaming that fact out to him, he temporarily swallowed his questions.
Right now, I gotta focus on taking out the enemy in front of me.
With that objective in mind, he gave voice to a different query.
“Answer me this. That thing is pretty strong, but the chunks of metal it’s made of aren’t all that tough…right?”
“Something to that effect, I suppose. I can make out power residing in each of its pieces, but only by coming together as a colony can they demonstrate their strength. But whether you cut it or strike it, destroying its metal with your own is likely no mean task. And I’ve little desire to eat anything so hard. Now then, what do you intend to do?”
“To be honest, I’m still not all that great at magic. But I’ve got a method that’ll definitely hit it and should be effective, to boot.”
Kaito made his assertion. The Kaiser was silent for a few seconds. Eventually, though, he seemed to understand.
Having guessed at the method Kaito was thinking of, the Kaiser finally took on an interested tone.
“I see. As always, the manner in which you think leaves me unsure as to whether you’re a madman or a fool. So what would you have me do?”
“I’ve just got one request. I need you to bring me over there as accurately as you can.”
“Hmmvery well, I suppose.”
Considering the lengthy time that he’d taken in consideration, his tone was rather indifferent even though he had agreed to help.
All the while, the machine had been determining the new arrangement for its metal plates. Minute changes were taking place atop its arachnoid back. In the blink of an eye, it had gained a set of airplane-like wings.
It looked like Kaito’s hunch had been right on the mark.
The longer the fight went on, the greater its range of attack would grow.
Oscillating its metal plates one by one, the thing flew high into the air. Hina readied herself to hurl her halberd after it. But Kaito stopped her with one hand. With a confused expression, she stood down.
“Master, if I may, why—”
As she was in the middle of asking her question, the Kaiser materialized next to Kaito. The hound could alter his form on a whim, but at the moment, he’d chosen to stand as tall as two adult men.
As he stooped down, the Kaiser uttered a languid murmur.
“I suppose I don’t mind tossing you from my mouth.”
The next moment, he bit down on Kaito’s collar and hurled him into the air.
The machine was silently making its descent from on high when Kaito flew precisely in front of it.
His military uniform fluttered as he blocked the machine’s path. It seemed like it hadn’t anticipated his actions, either, so it didn’t intercept his flight. However, it reached out one of its feeler-like sections and spontaneously ran Kaito through.
Its appendage met little resistance as it pierced through his flesh and bone.
“Master Kaito!”
“My word!”
Hina screamed, and Lute looked up at Kaito in astonishment. A moment later, though, a sliver of relief spread across Hina’s face.
Kaito had given her a nod. The Kaiser would be in trouble if his contractor died. The throw had been highly precise, and the part that had gotten stabbed was Kaito’s right shoulder. Given all those facts, Kaito’s life wasn’t in much danger.
Nice throw, Kaiser!
Then Kaito turned back toward the machine and grabbed on to its feeler with his beastly left arm. Purposefully gouging his wound, he ripped out a chunk of his flesh.
Blood spurted forth, and he dashed the red, mana-rich liquid all over the machine’s body.
When he did, his blood began seeping into the spaces between the sheets of metal.
After verifying that he had done what he needed, he let go of the feeler. He snapped his fingers as he began making his descent.
“La (overflow).”
Instantly, his blood transformed into water. Then, using Kaito’s pain and mana as its fuel, the water began growing.
As it expanded, the water filled up and pressed against the gaps between the metal slabs. The internal pressure proved too much for the machine to bear. The links between the sheets crumbled in an instant.
The water took that opportunity to freeze over.
The machine had been transformed into a spherical chunk of ice. Its metal sheets, separated and in disarray, were imprisoned within. The block of ice collapsed onto the grassy ground with a thunk. It showed no signs that it would ever move again.
At a glance, the individual sheets of metal didn’t individually have enough power to break out of Kaito’s ice after all.
“Got ’em!”
Kaito nodded in satisfaction. Nobody but him had gotten hurt. He’d been able to keep the number of victims to a minimum, just like he’d planned. Hina would probably be livid, though. He turned around, intending to apologize to her.
When he did, he saw Lute charging toward him with the ferocity of a raging bull.
“Youuuuuuuuuuuuuuu!”
“Well, that’s a surprise.”
He was even letting out an enraged cry for some reason. Kaito blinked rapidly.
All the fur on Lute’s body was bristling as he grabbed Kaito’s arm, and it remained that way as he inspected Kaito’s wound. Upon seeing the vast amount of blood gushing out, he spat out orders to his subordinates.
“Bring over the bandages and magical salve! Hurry!”
“I-I’m fine. You really don’t need to go that far. And I can more or less use healing magic myself, so…”
“Even so, just what do you think you’re doing? In front of your wife! I hardly think someone who prides themselves on being a devoted husband should cause their wife such worry!”
Lute shouted at him. Kaito nodded, suddenly understanding. But it looked like that wasn’t the only reason for his anger. Lute scratched violently at his head, as though to demonstrate how irritated he was.
“Damn how feckless I am! To think you would risk your life for us so! How am I ever supposed to repay such kindness?!”
Although he was clearly vexed, Lute seemed to be feeling somewhat ashamed. Kaito was at a loss for what to say. If he told Lute not to worry about it, it would undoubtably have the opposite effect.
For starters, he once again turned down the magical salve that Lute’s subordinates had brought him; the beastfolk had few magicians among their numbers, so it was likely quite valuable to them. Instead, he applied healing magic to his shoulder himself.
The wound closed up without a hitch. But after seeing the way Kaito’s skin had knitted together, Lute put forth a proposal.
“We should pay a visit to our headquarters. You’d best get that looked at by a medical specialist, just to be on the safe side.”
“I appreciate it, but…is it really okay for you to take me there?”
“Please! It pains me that you would think us such unfeeling monsters! Know this, Sir Kaito! Our people place far more pride in repaying debts than humans do!”
Visibly indignant, Lute let out a shout that seemed vaguely rude to humans.
His subordinates hurriedly got to work drawing a teleportation circle atop the grassy earth. Based on how quickly they’d reacted, it didn’t seem like any of them opposed the notion. Apparently, Kaito’s conduct had yielded unforeseen effects.
It looks like they trust me now, I guess… Huh.
As he sat there dumbfounded, a number of empty-handed beastfolk approached the block of ice.
They had no way of knowing if the machine had been alone, so there was no way they could pass up this chance to gather important information on their foe. But after consu
lting with his comrades, a single gray wolf with a sturdy physique broke off from the group and moved away from the ice.
As he approached Kaito, he called out to him worriedly.
“It might be sealed up, but doesn’t your wound still hurt? Here, let me give you a hand.”
“No, no, I can walk on my— Hwah!”
“While we’re grateful for your concern, the two of us will be fine on our own. I shall carry Master Kaito.”
“H-Hina?”
Before he’d had a chance to react, Hina had scooped him up and was carrying him under her arm. As he hung embraced by her slender arm, his eyes darted about.
The gray wolf gave her a sympathetic smile and a short bow. Then, clearly not wanting to get involved in a lover’s quarrel, he quickly left the two of them alone.
Kaito timidly glanced up at Hina’s face. Her shapely lips were tightly pursed.
Not looking toward him, she murmured quietly.
“For now, I shall say nothing. But Master Kaito, do know that I intend to get quite upset at you later.”
“I’m, uh, I’m sorry. Really, I am.”
Kaito reflexively slumped. A human laugh resounded deep in his eardrums.
“You know, I find myself thinking this somewhat frequently, but as far as human males go, you really are quite pathetic.”
Kaito, to his credit, tried to offer a rebuttal. But the moment he opened his mouth, Hina broke into a run toward the men who’d just finished drawing their teleportation circle. After nearly biting his tongue, Kaito decided to shut up.
As his bride carried him at a brisk dash, he cast a sidelong glance at the block of ice.
Then, all of a sudden, he realized something.
Deus Ex Machina.
He had seen something similar to it since coming to this world.
The Boondock Saints.
A titan of blades that only the Torture Princess could create.
…That’s what that thing looked like.
However, as far as figuring out what it all meant, Kaito hadn’t the foggiest.
3
A Brief Reprieve
The Torture Princess had returned once more to her castle atop its hill of craggy stone.
Her sleek black hair was splayed across her sheets as she slept.
Torture Princess: Fremd Torturchen, Vol. 4 Page 6