Nidome no Yuusha

Translator: "Pink Tea"

Crimson, crimson, crimson.

A room where blood, pieces of meat and hatred were all jumbled together.

To me, with all my memories returned, this was a familiar sight.

And exactly because of that I was sad that this scene was created by those two.

Because the current me knew full well that those two passed the point of no return.

Furthermore, putting Yuuto aside, it looks like Mai is about to break, unable to endure it.

「No, NONONONONO!!! NOOooOOoOOOOO!!!」

「Mai…」

「Don’t, don’t look, Brother! It’s not what it looks like! I just, I… Huh? I was stained, I just tried to cleanse, huh? Eh? Eeeeh? No, no, no!!」

Covering her ears like a child, Mai shook her head.

I could almost see Mai’s heart tearing apart.

「Ma, Mai-chan…?」

Yuuto, perhaps sensing abnormality in Mai’s behavior as well, showed confused expression.

「Yuuto, I know that it’s not your fault and I also know that you didn’t see other options, but let me punch you once later. And also punch me around ten times yourself.」

「Kaito…?」

I just kept making various mistakes.

And in truth, I’m not sure if what I’m about to do is the right thing as well. I’m not sure but I cannot allow Mai to break down like that.

Even though I regained my memories, what I can do is no different from the time I had amnesia.

Before Mai rolls『Worst luck』I should push on her『Bad luck』that I rolled myself.

I remember the person that once called this power of mine『Tame Brainwashing』.

I felt annoyed at the time, because it was like dirt was thrown at the contracts between me, Minnalis and Shuria.

But what I’m about to do right now isn’t a contract or anything.

I’m just going to one-sidedly push it onto her, this is nothing more than brainwashing in the truest sense of it.

「Yes, that’s right, there is no way Brother would be at such a place. So this is a fake.」

Gradually, light disappeared from Mai’s eyes and her way of speaking also got weirder…

「…Make it unhappen, make it unhappen, make it unhappen.」

And with dead eyes, she pointed naginata right at me.

Red drops fall to the ground from the bloodstained blade.

I can feel a tingling bloodlust directed at me.

「Ma, Mai-chan?!」

To those actions, Yuuto exclaimed in surprise.

It seems that Yuuto didn’t realize how pressing was Mai’s mental condition. However, I can’t really blame him for not noticing. For this, you need experience with people on the verge of breaking.

Fighting through many battlefields I have seen a lot of broken people and precisely because of that was I able to see that Mai was standing on the brink of the abyss.

Drinking up an MP potion I restore magic power used in teleportation and materialize【Holy Sword of Vengeance】.

And in turn, I also point the blade at Mai.

「I’m going to rewrite Mai’s mind now. I don’t care if it is brainwashing. It's much better than allowing her to break.」

「Ka, Kaito?!」

Yuuto yells in surprise seeing both of us pointing weapons at each other.

「It’s fine, it is still fine. This Brother is a fake, if I erase him, then everything will be just like before.」

「Treating me like a fake, you hurt my feelings. And also, Mai, in this world there is nothing that can be turned『Like before』. Even if time itself was reversed, even if memories were lost, no matter how you patch it up, nobody can revoke something that has already happened. Even God cannot undo something that already took place.」

「Shut up, shut up, shut up!! My brother would never say such cruel things. My useless brother, my useless big brother, mine and mine only useless brother cherishes me and would not point a blade at me like that!!!」

「Damn, useless brother, useless brother, pipe down you dumb sister.」

「See! Brother would never call me dumb!!」

「Enough talking, come at me. This is probably our first serious sibling quarrel. I’ll give you a lesson, so be grateful.」

I take hanmi stance and provoke Mai, swaying my sword. ¹

「You fake… STOP ACTING LIKE MY BROTHER!!!」

With a powerful step in, naginata’s blade sweeps close to cutting my shin, but I parry it sliding the spirit sword along the blade of naginata, deflecting it upwards.

However, with the momentum from the deflected attack, Mai spins the shaft and tries to hit me with the bladeless end.

A beautiful form that she most likely practiced many times, that’s why it is easy to counter.

「?! Wha…」

Without trying to strike down or parry the attack aimed at my throat I step forward and sliding the blade along the handle of the naginata get right in front of Mai.

「Sorry, I’m not sorry.」

Then, I changed【Holy Sword of Vengeance】to it’s knife form, used for contracts, and I thrusted it into Mai’s heart.

「Kaito?!」

「AAaa, Aaaaaa, AAaAAAAaaaaa?!」

As if that was the signal, the moment Yuuto screamed in fear, the black flame started to circulate between me and Mai.

「Hii, ah, Aaah, uh, huh, Brother…?」

My memories and emotions like a goo pour into the cracked glass of Mai.

A cup that couldn’t hold any water, won’t break were it filled with dense, clingy hatred. And so her mind along with that cracking heart is being stabilized by revenge.

At the same time, her lust for revenge, though somewhat mixed with worldly desires is transmitted to me.

A feeling of strong animosity towards『Transference Applicants』and cruelties they have done to Miyuki-chan and Satomi-chan.

The sight of Satomi-chan being killed by an unknown man.

The sight of the asshole that created this situation, showing photos of Miyuki with all of her limbs severed and various parts all over her body changed to unnatural colors.

The sight of me being caught in the explosion and also the sight of that shithead, that pulls the strings, telling Mai that it was no accident and I was targeted by『Transference Applicants』.

Each of those is indeed filled with the desire for revenge on those who took away what is important to her.

It became warped because I came back alive and thus a fear of loss got mixed in.

That fear linked to her wish for revenge was the same fear that I always felt before I regained my memories.

「…Yea, I see, I kinda suspected this, so you killed a person and was afraid that I will hate you for that. What an idiot, so both siblings together were afraid of a similar thing.」

Brother and sister together were desperately trying to hide from each other their bloodstained hands.

「Well, but now you understand, don’t you? Just because you killed a handful of people… No, even if you became a maniac that killed for fun, it still would not be enough of a reason for me to hate you. Don’t make light of how much of siscon I am.」

With a bitter smile, I pat Mai’s head as usual.

「Eh… Ah, Eeh…?」

However, unlike Minnalis or Shuria who were warned in advance, prepared and voluntarily accepted the blade, Mai was unable to cope with the changes happening in her mind.

For now, it seems that she returned to sanity so I guess it went as intended.

「So, Mai, I’ll confirm, did you wake up?」

「What… Is this? A dream?」

【Holy Sword of Vengeance】struck into the chest, as always turned into particles and dissipated into the air.

「Getting such response after asking whatever or not you woke up makes me a bit worried but… For now, tell me frankly how do you feel?」

「I want to kill Princess Alesia, that hurt brother and destroyed my world, I want to kill her so bad that I might lose my mind, why, why is she tormenting Brother? Don’t mock my Brother. The only one who is allowed to make fun of Brother is Mai. All of them should die.」

In those words was a dark desire for revenge born from seeing my memories.

Her voice made me realize that now I formally dragged my sister onto the path of carnage.

I had no regrets, only a faint residue of sadness.

「Also, I would like to erase my memories of the time when I wasn’t sane. Ah, Aaah, AAAAAAA, Hah, so embarrassing, Brother, please pretend it didn’t happen, that a lot of it never happened.」

「Yup looks like thought process also returned to normal.」

With a bright red face, Mai was staring down in shame. Looking at her, my anger at mastermind that deceived Mai and likely fostered her fears grew even stronger.

「Now then, there is a lot of things I want to talk about but first… Yuuto, tell me something. They were trying to kill people at the school, right? And judging from the video they were using the poison, what happened to that?」

「…No worries. They infiltrated as service personnel and tampered with air conditioning system so it would fill certain rooms with cyanide gas. I switched beforehand one of the chemicals necessary to produce poisonous gas with a normal water, so even if this trap was activated no one would die. 」

Hearing that I feel relieved.

「I see, so that’s why presences are dispersed over several rooms. They planned to kill them with the gas so they put hostages in the locked rooms. The fact that the number of hostages can be equally divided by the number of corpses of those guys is probably related to that score system that they have?」

However, considering the inconsistencies between Mai’s memories and information I was able to get from Onishi, the two were provoked into this so they would trigger this tragedy.

But what the person behind this was planning to do after that? I cannot grasp her aim.

（Onishi said the woman that was calling herself Kawakami was planning to use me to make possible the use of magic in this world as well but… Damn, I don’t understand a thing. ）

「There is an ironclad rule for such situations.」

It’s really not my thing to plan that far ahead. For now, let’s just remove factors that later can get in the way.

It’s okay to just make the person in question confess everything later.

「Kaito… Could it be that your memories are back?」

「Yes, I remembered, a lot of things. Including all the things that I should not have forgotten. ——— Fading ark carrying herd into the faraway.『Teleportation・Brigade Verse 』」

Once again materializing 【Spatial Sword of Heaven】 I use transportation magic on every single hostage in the school.

There is a lot of people, but they seem to be huddling together in their respective rooms and I also finally got a grasp on manipulation of magic power in the world where it is way too dense. Moreover, they have no magic resistance.

If you close your eyes on the heinous difficulty, compared to another world, this world has better MP replenishment and expenditure rates.

Outside of the building turned noisy right away.

With the exception of us, I threw every single person into the schoolyard, so it’s only natural.

And if it’s only the two that are currently here then I certainly can get away while also protecting them no matter what were to happen.

「Now Yuuto. I will start from the part that bothers you the most. I think you already were suspecting this, but there is not a single piece of good news. If you don’t want to hear it then I will just disappear along with Mai.」

「I want to hear it… Please, Kaito.」

Yuuto lowered his head before I even finished my sentence.

「…Understood. I’ll tell you. I will start with the conclusion. If you say that you saw Shiori-san disappearing in a magic circle then she is no more.」

「It cannot, why, I mean didn’t Kaito…」

「That magic circle was indeed the magic that summons a person from this world to another world. But I was the only one who was summoned to another world. All the other people that disappeared in magic circles were sacrifices for the sake of turning me into a hero. If she disappeared in the same way as those on the video of disappearance incident, then that was not teleportation… It was the light of life being used as payment. 」

「…It, it cannot…」

Yuto’s face distorts in despair.

The reason why he isn’t denying it in rage is probably that he himself already guessed it and was somewhat prepared.

「Then it means that I won’t see…」

「However, this is not everything yet. I said that I was summoned, right? Do you understand, Yuuto? There is a person that summoned me and created all this mess.」

「…!」

I saw sparks of dark flame deep inside of his eyes.

「And there is more. There is a person behind the current incident. Don’t go out of gas before the opening stage even ended, didn’t you come here prepared for the worst!」

「…Is this story, real…?」

「Like I would lie, idiot.」

「What are you even saying after making a load of lies just a second ago.」

「Huh?」

「That there is not a single piece of good news, the first one really was the absolute worst of nightmares, but the other two are pretty great news to me.」

Black sparks in Yuuto’s eyes turned into the cold black flame.

「So it turns out that there is an enemy at whom I can throw this hatred, which I was sure I will have to carry until my death without knowing whom to hate and just gradually losing vain hope. Besides, if we just finished here like this without knowing that there is a mastermind behind them, I might have gotten another reason to die. Give it a rest.」

「…I see. Then you are going as well, to that world.」

「Since you are asking like that, I guess you have some ideas on how to get there?」

It wasn’t just a refreshing smile that was there.

That was a splendid sneer of avenger.

「Well, yea.」

「Bro, Brother…? Mai can go together with you as well, right?」

「Of course, since it turned like this there is no way I can go leaving you all here.」

When I pat Mai’s head again her uneasy expression changes showing signs of relief.

And then I materialized【Holy Sword of Vengeance】once again.

「This is one of the abilities I obtained in another world. Use this and form a contract with me. If you do this then hatred, wrath, fury and other such emotions will be shared. Your desire for revenge will be fixated, so unless you fulfill your revenge it will continue to burn you until the day you die. And also, the lives of those bonded by the contract are shared so when we get there I will thoroughly train you so you won’t kick the bucket on me. 」

「Revenge sharing… Hmmm, to be honest even if it’s you Kaito I have a bit of resistance, to be specific, for friends that’s disgusting.」

「It can’t be helped. Even I have mixed feelings about all this. But it is necessary to go to that world. This contract binds souls. If we won’t synchronize our souls like this you probably will turn into a cripple when we arrive there.」

And above all, I continued.

「Even if we are talking about you, I have no intention of involving in revenge someone without the contract.」

「I see, got it. Give me the sword.」

Receiving【Holy Sword of Vengeance】from me, Yuuyo struck it deeply into his chest without any hesitation.

And then Yuuto’s thoughts tainted by pure hatred flow into me.

「…Kuuh, Aah, as expected, doing this twice in a row might make me crazy.」

「Giih, Iieh, Guuuh, this is, harsh… Hahaha, you had it considerably more miserable than me. Indeed, that would make you unable to trust anyone without the contract.」

Eventually, stuck sword turned into particles as well and disappeared as usual.

「But you surely had a tough time. Yea, Princess Alesia, I see, so that’s what she looks like. So she is the very reason why Shiori was stolen from me and she is what triggered the appearance of 『Transference Applicants』. And to think that Kawakami-san was pulling the strings all this time… Hahaha, so we were just dancing in the palm of her hand. 」

Mumbling pointless stuff Yuuto was laughing with his head hanging low.

「Hey, Yuuto, we don’t have much time so if you are going to kill this person then get to it.」

「GynyaaaaAAaaAAaA?!」

Using【Soul Sword of the Beginning】I pin to the floor the swine ringleader that tried to escape from the room using commotion caused by my arrival.

「If you like, I can take it over as a warm-up.」

When I glanced down, I saw the disgusting swine that was letting out moans.

「…No, I’ll do it. We made a contract, though we learned about the person behind them, it’s still was me who started this plan. I will take the last one.」

「I also want to take revenge for Miyuki and Satomi with my own hands.」

In the eyes of the two was dwelling an unyielding will.

After all, those two were just as fitting as Minnalis and Shuria to be made into accomplices.

「Then I will leave it to you two.」

I said and manifested【Severing Sword of Safeguarding】in my hand.

「————I chose you and confined. To protect from those wishing to do you evil I seal you.『Closure』」

The moment I finished the chant the barrier that was producing orange light enveloped the room.

「With this for five hours no one will be able to enter the room. Finish it within that time. I will go out for a bit and annihilate some thieves to retrieve what belongs to me.」

I said, erasing【Severing Sword of Safeguarding】and preparing 【Spatial Sword of Heaven】instead.

「…What can I say, Kaito, it’s really anything goes with you now.」

「Good luck, Brother. Please come back as soon as possible.」

「Gieeeeeii, it hurts, pdease stop!!」

While saying that Mai was stabbing the blade into swine’s left foot and Yuuto was pressing a heel on the wound that I made.

Their image overlapped with the sight of Minnalis and Shuria.

「…Looks like you will become good accomplices.」

After looking at them briefly I left the scene using the power of teleportation and jumped towards the location of『Shroud of Shadow Spirit』.

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1. TL Note: "Hanmi", Is one of the basic stances for a number of martial arts including Aikido and Kendo. Legs in L shape, one bent leg in front and another extended behind. http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-o8oEf8U3wQM/Toz-I1pHusI/AAAAAAAAAxM/pniKPQflXBg/s1600/stances_ai-hanmi.jpeg ↩