Click!

The sound of a trigger being pulled cracked out behind Merka, and a shiver ran straight down his spine.

“Heart of the Furnace!”

Merka whipped around in a rush, flinging up a wall of rocky mud behind him.

But the cultist that had appeared at his back was already there, Judgment in hand. The weapon spewed a blazing tongue of fire, surging toward Merka with unstoppable force.

By reflex he thrust his hand toward the gun’s muzzle to block it. Descent of the Holy Son, Heart of the Furnace, every recovery spell he had—Merka pushed his magic to the limit to stop the blow.

How could Abdiel’s punishment be something normal spells could block?

Three fingers and half his palm were sliced clean off in a burst of dazzling fire.

“Damn it… Bastet, thunder—ugh!”

“The holy relic of Mulan is already out of mana?!”

Pain shot up his arm. Merka tried to split off a clone to counterattack, but a wave of weakness rushed over him. The half-formed clone flickered and vanished.

Even though she’d just watched this delicate pretty boy get wrecked, the cultist showed not a shred of mercy. She gathered herself, swung Judgment in a full arc, and smashed it down toward Merka’s head.

Merka dropped into a squat, then kicked back fast, slipping just outside the arc of the blow.

“Flocks at the edge of the sky…”

“Scurry and scatter.”

He whispered the chant. A thick, heavy cloud of smoke exploded out around them. Wrapped in it, Merka was like a gray fish diving into a muddy pond—he vanished in an instant.

“Trying to run? I won’t let you!”

The cultist’s bloodlust was at its peak. To people who saw the Child of Heaven as supreme, they all carried a bit of Mira’s madness.

She drew the Verdict at her waist and, without hesitating, charged straight into the black smoke, reaching for Merka.

She never expected he’d be hiding right at the outer edge, in the thinnest layer of smoke. The moment she stepped in, she slammed into him chest first.

“I’m not running at all!”

Catching her off guard, Merka slammed her to the floor. He wrapped his bare hands tight around the right arm holding the Verdict, then bound wind-ropes around her body in several loops, locking her sword arm in place.

“Don’t move! I won’t kill you… just rip your clothes off for me.”

“My spells hit hard. If you don’t want to die ugly, do exactly what I say.”

Merka snarled the warning at her, glancing up with the corner of his eye. The massive Blood Sakura Dragon was still circling above with eyes open, watching them, showing no sign of coming down.

It clearly didn’t want its attacks to hit the cultist. Merka guessed Oedipus had put some kind of curse on it, forbidding it from attacking its own.

“You caught me? Don’t make me laugh—I caught you.”

“For the true cause, we’ve never feared death.”

“Death’s just a new beginning. The great work Her Majesty, Daughter of Heaven, is about to complete will bind us all as one… even those already dead.”

“Walk into the fire, break on the blade, and never flinch, right?”

The cultist cackled, eyes twisting with cruelty. She hooked her hand back, snagged Merka’s belt, and began chanting at high speed. A sinister red light exploded in her eyes.

“Last Verse of the First Vow… Fire God, open the way!”

“Watch out! She’s gonna blow herself up!”

A black shadow surged out from beside Merka, shouting in panic. From his tone, if he’d had sweat glands, he would’ve been drenched.

“W–what?!”

Merka released her in a hurry. He tried to scramble to his feet, but his calf trembled and gave out, and he instead went sprawling.

“Heart of the… crap, I’m out of mud!”

“Flame Train…!”

He tried to summon flame to wrap around his limbs, to boost his speed—but it was already too late.

The Flame Train needed a warmup before it could accelerate.

Merka had nothing left that could stop this killing blow.

He lifted an arm, instinctively shielding his head, trying to squeeze one last shred of Joan’s power out to soak the damage.

The terrible explosion never came.

Merka lowered his arm and looked toward the cultist. Her entire head had been sawn brutally in half.

The spell she’d been casting had cut off right there.

“Seriously, what the hell is wrong with you… why didn’t you just attack earlier?”

“Being this ‘kind’ is basically fake.”

“How are you supposed to get anything done like that?”

The black shadow stood beside him, grumbling furiously.

“So… there was no explosion?”

Merka asked, baffled.

“Nope. Look.”

“I turned the only piece of machinery on you—a walkie-talkie—into a little saw-bot and had it cut her head off.”

The shadow pointed to the little circular-saw robot perched on the cultist’s corpse.

“Enough talk. She’s dead, which means that dragon’s coming for us.”

“You were gonna use her clothes to dodge the angel’s senses, right?”

“But they’re all zealot types. Touch one and they self-destruct, you’re never getting their clothes.”

“So what’s your plan now?”

The shadow loped after Merka as he bolted away.

Sure enough, the words had barely left his mouth when the red dragon slammed down onto the ground, the impact caving in hundreds of meters of concrete around it.

Its plunging jaws missed Merka, but smashed into the pavement behind him.

The blast hit his back like a cannon shell, hurling him far into the distance.

“We split up!”

“Only the Shepherd’s relic’s got mana left. I can’t make clones. Take my coat, it’s soaked in my scent—it won’t be able to tell us apart for a bit!”

Merka shrugged off his coat and threw it to the shadow. At the same time, he belched out thick smoke, spread wings of magic, and split away from the shadow, fleeing in opposite directions.

The shadow might only be a projection of a high-tier mechanical lifeform, but it could still interfere with reality to some extent.

He caught the coat Merka had thrown and slipped into a dusty side alley.

Behind them, the Blood Sakura Dragon stared at the smoke with clear impatience. After a moment of hesitation, it picked the shadow’s direction and went after him.

Merka ducked into the first store he could find that wasn’t completely trashed.

“Teammate down… can’t get the clothes… mana’s almost gone…”

“Damn it… why is she that strong?”

“What strategy can I possibly use to win…?”

He leaned against a rack of products, gasping for breath. Continuous running and blood loss were pushing his heart and lungs toward real, irreversible damage.

The three fingers that had been blasted off still hadn’t been healed; he couldn’t quite bring himself to spend magic on them. Fresh blood was still trickling down in steady streams.

At this point, Merka really was out of tricks.

The twisted staff still held plenty of magic, but without the ability to make clones, he had no way to actually use it properly.

“Wait…”

He focused and raised his magic sight upward. On the shelves, row after row of pen-like objects stood in formation.

He reached up, fingers feeling for the braille on the shelf label. They were all colored markers.

“…Heaven’s on my side. Sis, I owe you for this one.”

Merka dumped the entire box of markers off the shelf in one sweep. Grabbing as many as he could, he began sketching wildly, strokes flying.

He’d barely started when a thunderous crash shook the shop—the Blood Sakura Dragon had arrived.

And it wasn’t alone. Mira walked in with it.

“I told you. You’re not getting away.”

“With what Lady Daughter of Heaven has gifted me, I can calculate your exact position no matter where you run.”

Mira stood on the shop’s roof, smiling down with an easy calm.

The Blood Sakura Dragon simply tore the roof off. Its sharp, angular head thrust down into the store, glaring down at Merka with regal contempt.

“But I’m a little curious. The Prophecy Window actually told me you still have a chance to turn this around.”

“So I stepped out for a bit and brought a few friends to play.”

“You don’t mind, right?”

As she spoke, two hulking figures slowly stepped out behind her, boxing the shop in.

A Mania, a Havoc. Together with the Blood Sakura Dragon, the three of them loomed like nightmare gate guardians, stationed at the doorway.

The air itself felt frozen. In front of three angels this strong, nobody could come and go “like the wind.”

Mira looked down at Merka, sitting cross-legged in a pile of markers, shoulders slumped like he’d given up. She let out a soft, mocking laugh and hopped lightly down from the roof.

“Come with me. You’re not worthy of the Daughter of Heaven’s child.”

“And you dare meddle in their family affairs? Know your place.”

She reached down to haul Merka up, but he slapped her hand away.

“Lunatic… you think you’re worthy to even say Turing’s name?”

“You butchered so many of Bocity’s working people… I’ll have your life for that.”

Merka shot to his feet, summoning three tiny cat paws that clamped tight around the twisted staff, pointing it straight at Mira.

“I don’t care if you’re an angel or a half-angel. Today I’m going to erase you, body and soul.”

“Wave-Opening…”

“You still dare posture, you idiot!”

“Mania, Havoc—kill him!”

Maybe she felt the sudden surge in his aura. Mira’s Prophecy Window screamed a maximum danger warning.

She didn’t have time to think. She barked her orders to the angels around them on instinct.

Merka only bit down on the last syllable of his incantation and gave her a faintly mocking smile.

Mira stared in disbelief at the angels around her, frozen in place, and felt her mind go blank.

She spun around—and saw Merka’s body covered in crude red carp.

“What?! With just… that? You think those sloppy doodles can compare to the patterns on our missionary uniforms?”

She realized why the angels hadn’t moved: they’d pegged Merka, dressed in red carp, as one of their own.

“Doesn’t matter if you accept it. They already did.”

“Sorry, this is Mammon Church style.”

“Ever heard of the ‘Dome Artist’?”

Merka pressed the twisted staff to Mira’s throat, the corner of his mouth lifting slightly. Filthy, battered, he still managed a ragged grin.

“Tch… just a guy who lives on cheap tricks.”

“Fine. Call it me spotting you a round.”

Blue light flashed at the corners of Mira’s eyes. Several ghostly azure chains lashed out from her back, trying to yank her into the void.

Merka thrust out his still-bleeding stump, aimed at Mira, and shouted to the side.

“Shadow, now!”

Barely recovered, the shadow shot three vicious azure chains forward at Mira.

Merka’s chains were outnumbered by Mira’s, but just those three were enough to lock her in place and draw cold sweat from her brow.

If she dared pull her own chains back even a little harder, the imbalance in force would tear her to pieces.

“Checkmate, Mira!”

“Wave-Opening… Staff!”

With the ultimate killing intent of a swordmaster, Merka shifted his grip, raised the twisted staff high above him, and swung it down toward Mira with all he had.