“Back in our era…”

“The land withered, and the human heart became impossible to read.”

“A murky haze hung everywhere. No one knew whether it was smog or the fog of despair rising from the people’s hearts, but it shrouded the heads of the city’s children all day long.”

“A terrifying system of surveillance, like a pair of omnipresent eyes, watched the people every moment of every day, leaving everyone unable to speak.”

“Despotism, domination, and oppression—they seeped into every aspect of everyone’s lives, blocking their eyes, their noses, their mouths, and every door in the human heart through which love could be felt.”

“The Ice Bees were one of the many systems that made up this agonizing cycle.”

“A killing intent from ancient times.”

“Let me give you a taste of it, too…”

The mechanical monster spoke as it extended its tentacles and viciously spun the wheel at the end of the room once around.

In an instant, the entire room began to rumble violently. Countless fleshy globes were spat out from the hexagonal hives in the walls and crashed onto the floor. Accompanied by sticky fluids, the disgusting balls squirmed and rolled across the ground several times. One of them had even nearly reached Turing’s feet.

With several crack-crack sounds, the “creature” that had rolled closest to Turing suddenly broke free of its fleshy casing.

A slender insect leg pierced through the outer wall of the fleshy globe. A monstrous insect with a wrinkled, distorted human face burst out of its cocoon. It flapped its butterfly-like wings, as beautiful as blue crystal, and came streaking toward Turing at tremendous speed.

【So this is an Ice Bee…?】

【It’s much slower than I imagined.】

【It doesn’t look very strong, either, but…】

Although the Ice Bee’s flight lasted only two or three fleeting seconds, it was still far too slow in Turing’s eyes.

To keep it from hitting Merka behind him, Turing chose not to dodge. Instead, he reached out and caught it head-on.

But Turing regretted it the very next second.

【Damn it! I shouldn’t have caught it head-on!】

【That girl’s memories contain information about them. I remember that their bodies store…】

The Ice Bee leading the charge slammed straight into Turing’s hand.

Turing’s palm instantly went numb, as if it had been broken.

A massive wave of pain immediately drowned Turing’s sensory nerves. The instant the Ice Bee’s body shattered on impact, a huge ice crystal exploded across Turing’s hand.

An indescribably frigid storm poured out before Turing like a waterfall flying through the air.

All in all, Turing only felt as if a bee had stung him viciously. Then the magic power within his body vanished in a chunk, as if a bear that had spotted a plump fruit by the roadside had taken a savage bite out of it—nearly 5%!

Turing suddenly realized that this was the effect of the coolant.

The superfreezing coolant was one of the laboratory’s successful treasures. It contained components with a deus-ex-machina-like effect, capable of suppressing an angel’s power and drastically weakening the amount of magic power an angel possessed.

But now that things had come this far and he’d already been hit, realizing it only now was too late.

Merka was swept straight out the door by the violent freezing wind, while poor Turing remained fixed in place by the ice crystal that continued swelling over his palm.

“Damn it! Power Angel!”

Merka immediately climbed to his feet and steadied himself, pointing with one hand toward the distant aside.

The Power Angel appeared at once. Its savage form surged forward as it charged furiously at aside, slamming into the entire doorway so hard that it caved inward, the dent expanding in every direction.

“Merka, don’t!!!”

Turing reached out with his other hand, trying to stop Merka, but it was already too late.

“May you cross over to the pain-free shore amid this frozen wasteland.”

“On behalf of the people of Acadia, who will continue barely scraping by for the next thirty years, I sincerely thank you both for your sacrifice.”

aside bowed slightly.

Then countless Ice Bees broke free from the cocoons on its back. They flew into the air one after another, stirring up freezing winds that almost seemed to solidify in midair. Like missiles, they pierced through aside and came streaking toward them.

Terrifying blocks of ice formed a massive wave like the sea and came crashing down toward Turing.

The raging glacier swallowed everything in the room in an instant. Turing, the Power Angel, and aside were all annihilated within that blue aurora.