Eight years later.

Charon Special District - Dibithe Alliance

“A-52 entering the combat zone. Deploying Factor Barriers.”

“....”

Pollyce gazed out the window. Her blood-red eyes reflected the streaks of fire blooming across the vast sky. At that moment, she was aboard a transport aircraft, cutting through the clouds above the war zone. The anti-aircraft batteries had a range that covered almost the entire sky, and the whole aircraft shuddered under the waves of shock that kept rippling through it.

“Boom—boom—”

The deeper they flew into the combat zone, the more frequently explosions rang out. The fighting grew fiercer, and the voices over the radio grew more frantic and panicked.

“....”

Pollyce looked away from the window and gave her sleeve a light flick, sending a silver Butterfly Knife sliding into her hand. She casually twirled it. Its silver blade blossomed like a flower between her slender fingers.

“....”

It had been 48 hours since Charon, the Academy Federation’s outer-region branch, declared its rebellion. The Academy Federation had now deployed regular troops to the district. Just 48 hours ago, this territory had still belonged to the most powerful polity on the entire Ademir Continent: the Academy Federation. It had faithfully performed its duty as one of the gears in the machine.

It had been decades since anyone had raised a rebel flag against the Federation. So the moment that banner of rebellion was raised over the Charon region, almost half the Ademir Continent was thrown into chaos.

“Boom!”

An explosion rang out, and the transport aircraft lurched violently, as if an enormous invisible fist had just punched it hard.

“Damn it! We’ve been hit!” the pilot roared, gripping the control stick so tightly it was as if he were clinging to a lifeline dangling thousands of miles above the ground.

“Factor Shield at 72%! Execute standard evasive maneuvers and avoid the artillery!”

“....”

Amid the symphony of gunfire, Pollyce gently brushed the white hair from her eyes and turned her gaze to the message screen on the transport aircraft’s wall. A dark-skinned man in military uniform appeared on the screen, his golden eyes—hard as rock—fixed intently on the camera.

That was the mastermind behind the rebellion: Aleph Stello, a former senior officer in the Academy Federation, now suspected of defecting to the Dibithe Unified Government.

Funny. Why did old men always have to keep stirring up trouble, then leave it to the young to go die for them?

Pollyce gently turned her head and looked out the window again. As the aircraft drew closer to Charon Special District, the artillery batteries grew denser. Wave after wave of cannon fire shattered the Factor Shields of countless shuttles, and they plunged to the ground amid screams over the radio.

War was a poisonous fog that devoured the living without restraint. It swallowed the creatures on the land, then stretched its claws toward the sky, dragging one living soul after another into the endless abyss.

“Academy A-52 calling headquarters. Blade of Babel has entered the designated airspace. Requesting authorization to deploy.”

Oh? Is it starting?

Pollyce twirled the Butterfly Knife around her thumb a few times, tossed it into the air, then caught it and tucked it inside her sleeve. She stood and slowly walked to the front of the shuttle’s cabin, facing the hatch as it trembled with each explosion outside. Waves of shock battered the shuttle like surf pounding against a reef, as if they might drag her into their deadly whirlpool at any moment.

Even so, the girl’s expression remained calm. She had long since locked her fear away in the black box of her heart, leaving it behind along with that icy rain from eight years ago.

Eight years already...

“Headquarters calling A-52. Deployment authorized.”

“Miss Pollyce, please get ready!” When the authorization came through, the pilot let out a sigh of relief.

Then he pulled the lever—

“Whoosh—”

The hatch slowly opened, and an icy gale swept into the cabin, slapping Pollyce in the face and scattering her long, silky white hair through the air, where it danced like fireworks. She had to grab the handrail beside her to keep from being swept out into the high-altitude winds.

A canvas of azure sky unfolded before Pollyce. The magnificent, boundless heights were now filled with countless explosions. Flames and shock waves shattered the clouds that had been drifting lazily by, making the whole sky look like hell, steeped in death and destruction.

Looking down at the earth, Pollyce soon spotted Charon Special District. On the plain before the distant, needle-spiked Dibithe Mountains, a massive square city stood in plain view.

The army had surrounded the entire city, but its silvery-white steel walls still stood firm, showing no sign of giving up the fight. The rebels manning the enormous cannons on the walls kept firing shells into the sky and across the land. Explosions erupted in one place after another, and their deafening roar never ceased.

If this had been any other country’s military installation, the Federation could have crushed it in ten minutes. But Aleph Stello’s forces were equipped with Academy weapons and technology too, making a prolonged battle unavoidable.

Still, Pollyce’s arrival meant that it was time for all this to end...

Pollyce lightly tapped the bracelet on her left wrist. The silver bracelet began to turn, slowly splitting into two independently rotating rings. They spun around the blood-red crystal at its center, crossing in an “X” and scraping out faint red sparks. As they spun faster, countless tiny red points of light in the air were drawn into the bracelet, forming a faint red field between the grinding rings.

Slowly, a shield formed invisibly around Pollyce, shimmering with a faint red glow that was barely visible to the naked eye.

This was the Factor Shield, an active defense system that covered the body’s surface and could withstand most conventional kinetic weapons. It represented the highest-grade weaponry available to an individual Federation soldier.

But compared to this high-tech shield, Pollyce’s outfit was far less “soldier-like.” She wore a white shirt with a small bow tie, layered beneath a loose black jacket with a hood and wide sleeves. A skirt covered her lower half, and black stockings hugged her slender legs. There was no way this outfit looked like that of a soldier about to drop into a battlefield. To put it simply, she looked more like a schoolgirl on her way to class.

“...”

“Hatch open! Beginning deployment!” the pilot shouted. The ground’s artillery batteries once again spewed a deadly rain of fire into the sky like hungry dragons, pushing his nerves to the brink of collapse.

Pollyce slowly walked to the very edge of the hatch. At that moment, she stood alone at the boundary of the high sky, her slender legs not trembling in the slightest despite the gale.

“Deploying Pure White Fireworks!”

As the pilot shouted, Pollyce gently closed her eyes. When she opened them again, a haze had veiled the surface of her blood-red gaze.

Let’s begin.

Pollyce spread her arms with effortless ease, leaned forward, and plunged headfirst into the death-lit sky. The cold wind swept through the girl’s white hair, but it couldn’t change her faintly dazed, calm expression in the slightest. She moved through the boundless blue sky with the ease of a master of the heavens, falling freely as if this were a right she had been born with.

“Zzzzz...” As she fell, Pollyce’s bracelet spun at high speed, forming a small red vortex. Countless red Destruction Factors were drawn into it. As the Factor Shield scraped violently against the air, it caught fire, trailing one crimson Factor Energy arc after another.

From the ground, Pollyce became a shining meteor, streaking across this hellish sky with a long, crimson tail of flame.

The Factor Shield greatly reduced the adverse effects of the fierce winds at high altitude, allowing Pollyce to clearly observe what was happening below. Charon Special District’s Iron Curtain had begun to crumble under the Academy’s massive siege engines, and the city’s defenses were starting to collapse. But this wasn’t something that could be settled in a moment. The Federation clearly couldn’t afford to wait any longer. The longer this dragged on, the weaker the Academy’s influence over the continent would become, so its offensive grew more and more intense.

But taking part in the siege wasn’t Pollyce’s mission. She was there to capture the king.

Pollyce’s target was Aleph Stello.

The Tower was directly beneath Pollyce now. If the intelligence was correct, Aleph Stello was directing the battle from the top of that command tower. Pollyce would end the entire war in one move.

“Terminal calling Pure White Fireworks. The artillery batteries are about to enter a lull. Recommend using this window to descend quickly.”

“Understood.” Pollyce didn’t hesitate. She accelerated into a steep dive, plunging straight toward the ground around the command tower. The falling meteor flew against the direction of the artillery fire, conspicuous as could be, making no attempt to hide.

As Pollyce drew closer to the ground, the city’s defenders began to notice the brazen red meteor. The commander of the ground defenses beneath the tower looked up at the sky and watched the meteor flying against the direction of every artillery shell.

“A red meteor...?” The commander gazed up at Pollyce and murmured under his breath. His face slowly turned ashen. “Damn... It’s Blade of Babel... They actually...”

Fear showed on the commander’s face, and the hand holding his gun began to tremble. After a brief moment’s hesitation, he activated the blue Factor Shield around himself. Then he shouted with all his strength at the still-dazed soldiers in the defensive formation:

“Defense formation, target Blade of Babel! Open fire!!!”

The ground batteries swung their anti-aircraft guns toward Pollyce and unleashed a stream of fire. How absurd and ridiculous it was: weapons meant to attack aircraft were now targeting a single soldier.

“Vmmm—vmmm—”

Pollyce nimbly changed course in midair, lightly dodging the large-caliber shells as they whistled past. Her expression remained utterly calm, but her blood-red eyes were fixed on the defensive formation beneath the command tower.

“F-fire! Bring all your firepower to bear!” the commander shouted in a panic, snatching up his rifle and firing again and again at the meteor in the sky.

“Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat!!”

The entire defensive formation concentrated its fire on Pollyce. Dense streams of gunfire filled the sky, but their accuracy was astonishingly poor. The few bullets that hit her Factor Shield were easily stopped by its reliable protection.

200 meters.... 150 meters... 100 meters...

As she plummeted at high speed, Pollyce swept her gaze over the city defenders holding their positions, then quickly picked out the commander at the very back of the enemy formation.

“Concentrate all your fire on her, goddammit!!!” The commander roared out his orders while furiously sweeping his rifle at Pollyce. He clearly knew what the arrival of Blade of Babel meant. He clearly knew...

80 meters..... 60 meters.... 40 meters....

Though the ground rushed closer and closer, Pollyce showed no sign of slowing down. She slowly raised her left hand. The bracelet on it was spinning at high speed....

“Factor Burst fully charged....”

Absorb a massive amount of Destruction Factors from the air with the bracelet during the fall, then use the kinetic energy from the high-altitude descent to trigger the explosion. A move like this.......

20 meters.... 10 meters....

“Get out of the way!!!” the commander roared, taking two steps back. But the crimson meteor was already hanging over the defensive formation. It was too late—

“Factor Burst.”

Pollyce aimed for the formation of city defenders, then charged straight into them without hesitation—

“BOOM!!!!!!!”

Factor Annihilation erupted the instant Pollyce hit the ground. The ground array was instantly engulfed in dazzling scarlet light, and the soldiers caught in the blast were reduced to ash almost in the blink of an eye. The tremendous shockwave kicked up a violent sandstorm in front of the command tower, blocking the commander and his soldiers’ view.

.....

The commander stared blankly at the vast cloud of sand before him. Just moments ago, a scarlet meteor had plunged straight down and, in the blink of an eye, destroyed half his defensive array. His Factor Shield had protected him from the oncoming sandstorm, but it had also left him with an unobstructed view of the terrifying scene that had burst into existence before his eyes.

Then, reflected in his pupils, widened by shock, appeared a figure.

Through the endless sand and dust, a white-haired girl cut through the haze and slowly walked toward the front line. In her blood-red eyes, the commander saw his own reflection—

“Open fire!!!” the city defense commander roared at the top of his lungs. As if suddenly jolted back to their senses, all the soldiers raised their rifles and opened fire wildly.

A dense rain of bullets struck Pollyce’s Factor Shield, only to be deflected one by one. Amid the hail of gunfire, Pollyce calmly clenched her fist. Her wristband came to an abrupt stop with a click. The next second, she shot forward in another streak of scarlet light, leaping upward over the soldiers’ defensive array and landing right in front of the commander—

“Whoosh—”

Time slowed in an instant. The commander stared blankly at the pretty girl before him. Her face was still expressionless, and her long, pure-white hair streamed freely through the air like White Flame.

【Pure White Fireworks】—that was what they called her.

“You...”

The Butterfly Knife, engraved with silver patterns, spun between Pollyce’s slender, pale fingers, like a butterfly proudly displaying its beautiful wings. Blood-red Factor energy gathered at its silver tip, tracing a scarlet arc—

“Shing—”

A swift, vicious slash flashed across the commander’s throat. He didn’t even have time to struggle before his Factor Shield shattered, and blood sprayed into the air—

“Kgh—ahh...”

The standard-issue rifle that had been spitting fire a moment ago hit the ground. The commander was already dead before he fell. The Butterfly Knife, infused with Factor energy, had killed him in an instant.

The overwhelming power of the 【Blade of Babel】.

Pollyce turned around, casually playing with the Butterfly Knife. The silver blade spun between the girl’s pale, slender fingers, tracing all sorts of flashy flourishes. As it turned, countless amounts of Factor energy were drawn into the knife, and the red glow clinging to its silver blade shone brighter and brighter.

Then she slowly walked toward the soldiers, who were staring at her in a daze—

“M-Monster...” The soldiers’ faces twisted as they watched the girl stroll toward them. The 【Blade of Babel】’s power had clearly exceeded anything they could imagine. At that moment, they could barely even hold their rifles steady.

She wasn’t human anymore. She couldn’t possibly be human....

In the soldiers’ line of sight, Pollyce tossed the Butterfly Knife into the air, caught it, and smoothly reversed her grip. The blade, glowing faintly red, radiated danger as it cut through the air—just like the girl’s blood-red eyes.

“Quit standing there like idiots and open fire!!!!!”

......