" ... Who gave you permission to interfere with me, Quantine?"
Hearing that question come from Reinette, who was struggling to hold back her anger, Quantine merely smiled, folding both hands behind his waist. "I don't need anyone's permission. That said, forgive me for interrupting your business, but I won't tolerate anything excessive. Still ... I suppose I can't really blame you for this. Who would've guessed there'd be a Drifter in a place like this."
Saying that, Quantine glanced toward Kuon, which put him instantly on guard. Kuon took a step back to close the distance with Kanon, and Kanon, understanding his intent, immediately shook her head and whispered, "No, they aren't Drifter."
The statement gave Kuon a moment of relief, but it didn't erase his wariness. How could a native of Lios possibly have information about Drifter? Wasn't that something only fellow Drifter and the gods who'd dragged them here would know?
Kuon narrowed his eyes and leveled the point of his spear at Quantine. The matter of Drifter was a personal one. For now, there was something more pressing he wanted to ask.
"Who are you? Are you the mastermind behind everything happening here?"
From the way Quantine had spoken earlier, Kuon guessed he was the leader of the group harboring him and Reinette. If that were true, then the scale of the problem would be far greater than he'd thought—this had crossed into the territory of terrorism.
Even with the tip of a spear aimed at his face, Quantine didn't so much as flinch. But in the blink of an eye, his figure had already vanished from where he'd been standing.
Kuon followed his instincts and braced himself to meet an attack, but then a pain like being struck by a blunt object suddenly slammed into his arm and abdomen. No wound was left behind, but Kuon's body was sent flying sideways, crashing into a tree that shattered instantly on impact.
By the time everyone registered what had just happened, Quantine was already standing where Kuon had been a moment ago.
"Get away from there! Kanon!"
Vierra, the first to react, immediately hurled her dagger at Quantine, while Kanon wrapped herself in a shell of ice crystal before retreating.
Vierra's dagger was casually swept aside by Quantine's tail, which moved as though it had a will of its own. That alone was enough to send a shiver down Vierra's spine.
Quantine's speed surpassed even Kuon's perception while accelerated by Accel. An ordinary attack would never land on him. That was exactly why Vierra chose the most logical course of action.
In an instant, Vierra manipulated the wind to sweep Felix and the remaining guards away from Quantine's vicinity, while she herself leapt far back, putting a safe distance between herself and the man.
Meanwhile, Kuon rose to his feet. His right arm hung limp, as if it had lost all its strength, but it quickly recovered and returned to normal.
"Oh? Impressive regeneration. But ... aside from that, everything else is still disappointing."
Not bothering to reply, Kuon immediately lunged forward, swinging Glans's clawed blade at Quantine, but Quantine's hand easily stopped the attack by clamping down hard on Kuon's wrist.
Of course, Kuon didn't stop there. Realizing his right hand was pinned, he used his left to swing the spear he still held.
This time, Quantine tilted his head to dodge the strike, but that gave Kuon the opening he needed to break free of the grip. A split second later, Kuon spun his body and swung the spear again, forcing Quantine to step back several times to avoid it.
Every movement was read perfectly by Kuon, who pushed Accel to work harder than ever. In the span of a heartbeat, the spear in his left hand shattered and was replaced by a metal spear, far stronger and much harder to stop.
Kuon aimed the spear's tip straight at Quantine's face, but the strike never landed.
The clash of metal against metal rang out, sending a faint shockwave rippling through the air around them, while Kuon stared in shock at the figure now standing before him.
Reinette was there, having blocked Kuon's attack with a strangely shaped sword—one that resembled a needle—glaring at him with pure hatred.
"The same kind of power as mine," the girl murmured before channeling her strength to shove Kuon back.
Kuon wasn't about to let that go unanswered, striking back with Glans in his right hand. Still, as though she'd already read every one of his lightning-fast movements, Reinette managed to parry each attack with nothing but the sword in her hand.
For a while, their weapons clashed without pause. Until finally, Quantine stepped forward and planted himself squarely between Kuon and Reinette.
"Tell me ... what is it you want?"
Kuon was fully aware that his odds of winning this fight were slim. But from the very start, victory wasn't what he'd been after. What mattered most to him right now was gathering information—trying to understand how these two people standing before him could possibly know anything about Drifter.
Quantine shrugged and answered with a smile, "I've gotten a good enough sense of how strong you Drifter are. But ... honestly, this has been disappointing. Our business here is finished. Let's go, Reinette."
Quantine stepped back to Reinette's side, and with a snap of his fingers, the space behind him split into a crack, before shattering apart and reforming into something resembling a doorway filled with darkness.
The sight made not only Kuon but everyone present widen their eyes.
'A portal?!'
"What the hell is that...."
Kuon glanced back and saw Vierra's face twisted somewhere between confusion and fear.
Just as the two of them were about to step through the portal, Reinette suddenly froze in place. She turned back and raised her hand, her focus locked on a battle-axe spinning rapidly through the air, hurled straight at her.
Another needle formed, stopping the axe dead in its path. No—"stopping" was too modest a word. The moment the two weapons collided, the needle tore through the incoming axe without mercy, shattering it under its full force.
"Don't you dare leave, you bastard!"
Kuon knew exactly whose axe that was, but hearing his voice right now was not a good sign.
Just as expected, Reinette wasn't finished. The same needle that had destroyed the axe began wrapping itself in blue flame, streaking toward Humarc, who was closing in at a run.
"Get out of there! Humarc!"
Ignoring Kuon's warning, Humarc raised his other axe high before swinging it down just as the needle was about to strike his body.
The blue-flame-wrapped needle collided with Humarc's axe, but there was no instant defeat like Kuon had imagined. The two weapons only clashed for a brief moment before Humarc's axe finally deflected the needle's trajectory, sending it veering off course.
'Did he just parry that?!'
Reinette felt the same shock, her eyes widening in confusion. But it didn't take her long to recover. She quickly formed another needle, ready to attack again. But—
"—That's enough."
The voice came from beyond the portal, and Quantine's hand emerged from within, grabbing Reinette by the collar and pulling her through.
By the time Humarc arrived, the portal had already vanished completely. Total silence filled the space, the village head's severed head still lying on the ground.
***
"I came because something felt off about the situation. What actually happened here, Kuon? Was that woman the one everyone's been talking about?"
Anger was plainly written across Humarc's face, though he fought to keep his simmering emotions in check.
"That's right. Her name is Reinette, and she has another associate, a man named Quantine. He's the one who created the portal—the one they used to escape just now."
Humarc now sat facing Kuon, along with the rest of Kuon's team.
The guards who'd witnessed the fight hadn't stayed idle; they'd already begun spreading word that the village head was dead. Even now, the reinforcement commander was expected to arrive shortly to investigate the full situation.
"Forgive me. I might still be able to handle Reinette, but Quantine is an entirely different matter."
Kuon removed his monocle, cleaned it briefly, and set it back over his right eye. As he did, Humarc could only sigh and shake his head.
"No, there's no need to apologize. Even from that one brief clash, I could tell that woman—Reinette—is remarkably strong."
At Humarc's remark, Kuon's mind replayed the earlier scene, where Humarc had gone toe-to-toe with Reinette's needle and even knocked it clean off its original path.
"Oh, right! Hey, old man Humarc, how'd you pull that off? Kuon could only dodge her attacks."
As though all the tension from the situation had drained away, Vierra turned to Humarc with obvious curiosity written on her face. Felix and Kanon wore the same expression.
"There was no Aether in your attack. Was that a Gift?"
At Kanon's question, Humarc nodded immediately. "That's my Gift. It lets me seize the strength and speed of whatever I touch and convert it into my own power. I can only use it on inanimate objects, so I don't get much use out of it fighting monsters that rely purely on their own bodies."
'Seizing and repurposing stored kinetic energy, huh? Impressive ability.'
"You Gift owners really are cheating, huh? What is that ridiculous ability. You're basically impossible to beat in a weapons duel."
Humarc looked bewildered at Vierra's reaction. He waved his hands several times, trying to explain, "No, no. It's only useful in certain situations. And if I'm up against someone with real technique and skill, this Gift won't do much besides chip away a little at their strength."
"Besides ... I have to pay for it with my own stamina, so it's not exactly effective mid-fight."
Compared to other Gifts, Humarc's was, at its core, the kind that could actually work against its own user. As Vierra considered that, her gaze drifted to Kuon. She remembered how he often looked dizzy or nauseated after using Accel intensely, though that expression had grown rarer lately. Probably because Kuon had gotten used to Accel's side effects by now.
'His adaptability is terrifying.'
Just as the mood among them began to lighten, Kuon rose and started to walk off. Humarc and Felix were about to ask where he was headed, but Vierra used her magic to manipulate the air around the two of them, muffling any sound before it could reach anyone.
"Kanon, go after him," Vierra whispered to Kanon, who sat right beside her.
For a moment, Kanon looked puzzled by what Vierra wanted, but she didn't press further, rising from her seat to follow Kuon.
Her steps were slow and careful as she traced the path ahead of her with her white cane, but then the familiar jingle of a bell reached her ears, and Kanon happily followed the sound to its source.
"Alright, you idiots, come with me. We're going to help the others prepare for tomorrow. Humarc, head back to your team and explain the situation to them. Also, tell everyone to brace for the worst tomorrow. Both masterminds behind this incident have shown themselves now—we can't just sit around hoping they won't try anything on our last day."
Still not entirely grasping what Vierra was orchestrating, Felix and Humarc obediently nodded and fell in behind her as she made her way back toward the camp.
***
Kuon arrived at the site where the village head had been killed. The body still lay there untouched, its severed head still resting at the edge of the road.
Kuon suppressed his revulsion and picked up the head, laying it properly beside the body, which likewise remained untouched by anyone else.
In cases like this, preserving the state of the crime scene mattered. But there was no need for that right now.
Kuon let out a deep breath and closed the village head's eyes, then used his own cloak to cover the body.
'May God rest your soul.'
His death was a genuine regret—Kuon had failed to honor the contract, or rather, the promise he'd made to protect him for the duration of the mission. But there was no time to mourn.
Kuon rose and turned around, finding Kanon standing perfectly still where she was, doing nothing at all.
" ... Explain it to me, Kuon." Her lips parted, and she voiced the question with an expression caught somewhere between sorrow and confusion. "You're really a walking contradiction."
" ... What makes you assume that?"
Kanon lowered her head for a moment before lifting it again as she spoke, "I'm someone who doesn't hesitate to take another person's life, and there will come a time when I take yours too with my own hands. That's simply natural to me. But you, Kuon ... there's something about you I genuinely don't understand."
"I know you didn't like that man—the village chief—and I know that, if only a little, you meant to kill him. So ... why did you mourn for him instead?"
Hearing the question, Kuon's eyes widened briefly before he let out a soft huff, a faint smile tugging at his lips—something rarely seen on his face.
"Are you trying to show off your powers of observation and emotional insight? Because if so, you might just earn yourself high marks for it."
"No ... I mean—"
Kanon meant to correct her wording, but she stopped trying the moment she felt Kuon's presence brush past her. Kanon turned, trying to face him, but for some reason, his presence felt strangely faint today.
"Whether on Earth or in Lios, depending on the circumstances, death—tragic or not—tends to be met with nothing more than a shift in expression. So then, is it wrong to hold onto good morals, to value every life? At the very least, I want to keep holding onto that belief."
"You mean...."
Kanon had a vague grasp of it, but she still couldn't fully catch the meaning behind Kuon's every word. In that moment, Kuon's voice—laced with contradictory emotion, cold yet warm, blunt yet somehow gentle—reached Kanon with perfect clarity.
"I wanted to kill him. That's a fact. But ... my intent as a judge has to remain something physical, something that only plays out in the world within my own grasp and power. I've given myself the right to judge people in this world, in the flesh. But I don't have the right to pass judgment on their souls. I believe there's someone far more qualified than me to decide whether a soul deserves judgment or not."
' ... A strange way of thinking.'
As though reading exactly what Kanon was thinking, Kuon could only let out a small laugh as he replied, "I won't deny that it's an irrational way of thinking. But it's the only way I can keep valuing every life—the living and the dead alike. These are the values, the ideology, I've decided to hold onto until the end. The day I let go of it is the day you'll have to kill me, Kanon."
Kuon's voice trembled slightly as he said her name. Kanon could only recall the promise the two of them had made back then.
This was something new. Everything Kuon had said today shattered every image of him that Kanon had held in her mind.
Kuon wasn't someone who prioritized pure logic—he was someone chasing his own ambitions, yet never losing hold of the values he strove to keep. If he truly were a fully logical character, devoid of morals and without any ideology of his own, then Kuon could have moved without emotion, passing unilateral judgment on anyone he deemed 'guilty.'
'Is that really true?'
Kanon still didn't fully understand, but today, she felt her understanding of Kuon had grown just a little clearer.
Kanon said nothing more, walking behind Kuon, following the sound of the bell Kuon rang on purpose.