Boom! Crackle—..
"We finally finished everything off... They're not going to make us pay for these drones, are they?"
"It was a justified defense. I'll file it as such in my report."
"Fau... did I ever tell you? You're really, how should I put it... anyway, that... you're awesome!"
Mm. As expected, Faust was the best when it came to official matters. She really was convenient in all sorts of ways.
If she hadn't been here, bus life would have been several times more—
"You are rather slow to realize things."
...If only she didn't have that narcissism, she'd be pretty cool.
And since she was bragging in proportion to her ability, I couldn't even complain.
"...Something's off. This [Abnormality] feels different from usual."
Was it? It just seemed like a tougher, stronger [Abnormality] than usual to me.
"Hmm, I don't think we've encountered enough of them to call anything usual... though I suppose the difference is that there are noisy onlookers around...?"
"What is going on with these [Abnormalities]... Not only did they appear right in the middle of a Nest, but why are they even more... grotesque than the ones we've faced so far?"
""
Right. The bull we'd just been fighting, the one that had been pushed back again by the drones' interference, was definitely an [Abnormality] we'd seen in the Mirror Dungeon.
We'd let it go without fighting back then... so what had changed?
"Come to think of it... what were the [Abnormalities] in the Mirror Dungeon that didn't fight us?"
"What we saw were the [Abnormalities]'s psyche and habitat, glimpsed through the Mirror Dungeon's rifts."
"It was a very small and unstable rift."
"That's right. So only limited interaction was possible."
Oh, so that's how it was. That finally answered the question. I'd just brushed it off as "well, I guess that's how it is," but if the answer was this simple, I should've asked sooner.
"I don't care about any of that... why is this thing so persistent? It's as tenacious as the ones we caught on the railway."
"Indeed."
"And what is this... disgusting liquid dripping off the [Abnormality]?"
Who knows. We'd only been dodging it during the brief fight earlier; we hadn't bothered touching it.
"We don't have time to analyze its composition, so we should avoid letting it touch our bodies as much as possible."
"Ugh, yeah. I'm not planning to go around getting myself covered in it."
While that sort of conversation was going on, Heathcliff was suddenly observed flying off with no dignity whatsoever.
Time...
"Hey! Did these things eat something rotten or what? They're acting like they've got rabies or something..."
"H-hey? Heathcliff, above you!"
Crash—
Before long, a stone flew in and struck Heathcliff, sending him sprawling weakly onto the ground.
Mm, so if I wanted to save him, I'd have to risk my own life too. Unfortunately, I didn't have that kind of loyalty.
Maybe Ishmael would be worth it, but Heathcliff was... well.
"Manager... looks like you're in for some trouble."
Ishmael looked at Dante with a trace of pity.
Come to think of it, the one who always died first was Heathcliff. Not much had changed, huh.
"...Please remember that I did offer my counsel, Manager."
Otis, who had managed to slip in a sycophantic remark even in that tiny gap, calmly issued orders to us.
"All units, prepare for combat!"
...Seriously impressive. What kind of person had she been before coming here?
""
"Oh... Dante, that line was actually pretty cool."
"
It really did feel like Dante had grown as a Manager.
Back then, he'd probably have begged us not to die so much.
Now he'd become a fine Manager who could accept the pain of death in his own way.
Just as I was sinking into that thought,
Moooooo!!!
the [Abnormality] charging in from the other side dragged us into battle before we had time to think about anything else.
*
Zzzzt..
We finished off all the drones we'd thought were already dealt with, then faced that disgustingly tenacious [Abnormality] again.
I thought we'd already crushed the human-side part of it when we fought before... but I had no idea when it regenerated again.
For that reason, we ended up investing far more time than expected before finally managing to bring the thing down.
This time, the fight didn't end in some half-baked mess like before. It was clear.
Haa... seriously, what a pointless pain in the ass.
Thanks to that, we'd nearly been wiped out once during the process, and I'd even made a few insane bets by turning back time in the middle of battle, but in the end, we got it.
I never want to do that again. This isn't the railway, so it's not like we can just retry.
By the way, is the egg something the after-team will handle?
"The [Abnormality] suppression has ended safely. You may return to the bus."
The moment Faust's withdrawal signal came through, we quickly headed back to the bus.
*
Sssshhh...
When the bus doors opened, the first one to greet us, as always, was Vergilius.
"You're later than expected. I was just thinking of taking a nap for a change."
I considered saying, "Well, something far beyond your expectations happened," but figured Faust would explain it immediately anyway, so I didn't bother opening my mouth.
Besides, I didn't exactly have the energy to explain it all one by one.
I was too mentally exhausted...
And not long after, just as expected, Dante explained what had happened earlier to Vergilius.
I thought he might give a cold reply, considering it was Dante speaking, but... surprisingly, a rather decent answer came out of his mouth.
"...Since [Abnormalities] are beings that are scarcely known to the public, I do not possess detailed information on them, Dante."
""
Faust twitched at Dante's words, but I didn't bother passing that along either.
So even that inhuman man could show a bit of humanity, huh.
"Something like that... why don't we expect Faust and the rest of our illustrious Limbus Company departments to clear it all up for us later?"
"...Very well."
Did Faust even have time to research here?
No, wait—there was a facility that could make research possible... ah, the Sinners' private rooms.
If something was there... then it wasn't impossible.
"You there, why do you keep hunching your shoulders like that since earlier? You were already tiny enough, and now you're walking around all hunched over, so I can barely even see you."
Hm? Come to think of it, Don Quixote really was slumped down more than usual.
"...I thought I might be able to meet Sir Siegfried again..."
Ah, right. There was such a person.
...Come to think of it, it really was the sort of event where he might have shown up, yet he hadn't even made an appearance. The suspicion that the instigator behind this incident was K Corp was growing more certain by the minute.
"(Who was Sir Sieg...fried again?)"
No... can this cockroach-looking old man not even remember that?
It had been a pretty huge impression, too.
"Wasn't he the guy who was slicing us apart with one hand while taking a commemorative photo with the other?"
He also had the nice title of a Fixer who had signed a direct contract with K Corp, but... Ishmael must still be holding a grudge from what happened before. Fair enough.
"(Ah... Jackfried...?)"
...Let's not even talk about this man. I'll just have to understand him.
"I wanted to show Sir Siegfried... that I was saving people..."
So that was why she'd been paying so much more attention to people than usual during the fight, and looking around her surroundings so often.
"We even promised to meet again after I became a splendid Fixer..."
"That kind of thing is all the more moving when you reunite after a long time, Don Quixote. Let's just think of it as a good thing."
Even with Gregor's comfort, Don Quixote showed no sign of straightening out from that crumpled state.
"There's no way that man would be absent from an incident with so many spectators."
"Oh ho... was he the celebrity type, then?"
"Something like that. He's specialized in showmanship, so K Corp usually sends him out in situations like this. But... if he didn't appear in an incident that should have drawn every eye..."
""
Maybe the [Abnormality] rampaging itself was the real objective. I'm holding my tongue because this involves a Wing and all, but still.
"Do not belittle Sir Siegfried like that!"
Oh, Don Quixote had straightened up again.
"In his autobiography, 'A Hero Must Fight Until the Very End,' page 42, line 5, it says he would go rescue the weak no matter the time or place!"
"...Hah. Yes, then by all means, keep that conviction close. Believing in something helps one endure the extremes that come later."
Mm...? That was a meaningful thing to say. Not only did he not get angry at Don Quixote's words, but he also suddenly mentioned "the extremes that come later."
...Was that a threat that if we caused trouble again, he'd throw us into some extreme situation later?