"The Witch Cult!" Rem spat through gritted teeth, glaring at the newcomer. Her gaze flicked once to Subaru.
The tale of the "flattened grass and the blood-soaked little girl" had spread through every merchant caravan and across all of Lugunica. For a Sin Archbishop of Gluttony, tracking down her trail had only ever been a matter of time.
Sin Archbishops of the Witch Cult tended to run a few degrees short of sane, however—and somewhere along the way, Lye had clashed with his Greed companion and parted ways. Greed had even suspected the wound on his hand was from Lye biting him.
More immediately: the moment Lye noticed Natsuki Subaru, he had categorized him as one of his own kind. The thick Witch's Scent rolling off the man had been unmistakable—yet this person refused to cooperate at all.
"Now that I look closely—aren't you the one traveling with the brat who killed our little pet? Wonderful. Splendid. So very splendid. Just wonderful! Absolutely wonderful!"
Lye rattled off words in a slightly unhinged voice, those unlovely eyes fixed on Subaru. "A fully ripened delicacy~"
Ice spears coalesced around Rem, bone-cold, and launched themselves straight at Lye—tearing apart the trees behind where he had been standing.
Lye sidestepped and fixed his gaze on Rem. "And who are you?"
In Rem's hands appeared the Morning Star—the very weapon she had once used to kill Natsuki Subaru. "The one about to take you down. First maidservant of Margrave Roswaal L. Mathers—Rem!"
An introduction as direct as a hammer blow. Lye grinned with delight and flung himself forward.
"Very good! Very good!"
At a speed the eye simply couldn't track, the short blade bound to his forearm deflected the swinging chain of Rem's Morning Star with precision—and his hand shot straight for her.
"Onee-san!"
"Rem!"
Before his brain could catch up, Subaru shoved Rem clear—but his new position was no longer a question of whether he'd get grabbed. The short blade on that filthy hand was aimed directly at his throat.
"You?"
Ah. This is it, isn't it. And when he reset, all of this would mean nothing. Still—he really didn't want to watch someone he'd gotten along so well with (so he told himself) die in front of him.
Subaru shut his eyes.
But Lye lost his smile.
"You—no—you filthy, rotten, cheating—what is this? What is this?!"
His blade was at Subaru's throat. He pushed with everything he had. He couldn't advance a single inch.
Subaru opened his eyes in equal bewilderment, pressed his fingers against his own neck, and experimentally poked at Lye's blade.
The bizarre protection alone hadn't changed Lye's expression by a hair—but the scent on this man made it very difficult not to think of the companion he had parted ways with just a short while ago.
Thoroughly baffled, Lye stared at Subaru. "Then—your name?"
Subaru, hand at his own throat, legs still faintly trembling: "Just someone pathetically weak who refuses to stop trying to play hero."
"Kitty Yimi!"
Beatrice moved through the Manor calling her name.
"Honestly—where did she disappear to first thing in the morning? This is exactly why a contract is non-negotiable."
"So Betty understands the hardships of fatherhood now. As your nii-chan, I'm deeply moved." Puck drifted beside Emilia-sama, front paws folded, delivering the line in his most theatrically solemn voice.
"Nii-chan, please spare Betty your commentary—she has neither the mood nor the patience for it right now. As much as she doesn't want to check this—if that little gremlin didn't just walk out without a word, there's only one place left." Beatrice headed for the basement.
That little troublemaker wouldn't really...
"Face me, foul dragon! Once I defeat you, I shall marry the princess you've kidnapped!"
"Raawr, raawr—I ate your sword."
"Hmph—pointless! Even without my blade, as long as my will remains—"
"Raawr, I ate your will."
The voices drifting up from the dungeon belonged to Meili and Yimi.
"?"
Beatrice snapped the lock off the basement door with a burst of magic and looked toward the corner. Two girls—one bigger, one smaller—sat cross-legged on the bed facing each other, each holding a piece of paper.
Yimi's drawing was extremely abstract: a creature whose head vaguely suggested a hamburger, otherwise indeterminate in form, clearly intended to represent the most terrifying being she could imagine—a dinosaur. Meili's drawings were marginally better, produced in lieu of toys she didn't have.
For Yimi, who had never played make-believe in her life, this kind of game was genuinely interesting.
"The two of you were trying to kill each other yesterday. Today you're suddenly best friends." Beatrice stood in the doorway, experiencing a very specific kind of speechlessness.
"Oh, it's the sadistic Great Spirit lady~—urp!"
Meili waved a greeting at Beatrice, then clapped a hand over her mouth as her stomach lurched. She had, in a certain sense, already been put through something like torture.
"How rude."
Waking to find the small cat in her arms replaced by the girl who had killed Elsa, Meili hadn't panicked. She had, with complete naturalness, started teaching her a game. Having spent her whole life imitating other people's surfaces, she could mask her own just as easily when the moment called for it.
Beatrice crossed her arms and looked down at Meili. "Be grateful to my nii-chan. Thanks to him, you get to stay somewhere comfortable. But you're too dangerous to be let out—at least not right now."
With Roswaal away, the one who held authority here wasn't Natsuki Subaru, who hadn't earned most people's trust—but rather Emilia-sama, whom Subaru supported.
Beatrice's reason for following Emilia-sama's lead was simple: if Emilia-sama was distressed, Puck would be distressed. And even setting that aside, she didn't particularly want to lay hands on children. She had pushed Yimi out the door more than once when the mood struck her—if Subaru had been standing in that spot instead, she would have blasted him straight through the second floor.
She had taken Meili down before the Divine Protection could be put to use. If Meili had been allowed to summon a large-scale Witchbeast swarm first, things would have gotten very complicated.
"I won't try to escape~. If I go back after failing this mission, I'll have to face Mama's rage—Meili doesn't even want to think about what that means. Honestly, right now is easier." Meili sat on the edge of the bed swinging her legs, voice breezy and light—wholly at odds with the situation.
The unease was showing through the seams.
Yimi patted her on the head. Given that you played with this cat and we had a good time—consider your life spared for now.
She trotted over to Beatrice's side, ready to follow her to breakfast.
Watching them go, Meili stopped swinging her legs.
"Weird cat."
"I've finally found you, little miss~"
But the moment they stepped out, Yimi heard a voice that didn't belong to this Manor—coming from somewhere behind them.
"Who's there!" Beatrice snapped her fingers and sent a volley of purple Mana arrows toward the source.
"Too bad, missed~"
The Sin Archbishop of Gluttony. The role was shared between three siblings.