The two-headed Black Water Dragon shifted from illusion into reality, appearing in midair and binding the Red Dragon Emperor as he roared madly. Immediately after that…
A lion wreathed in black lightning, a wildebeest burning with pitch-black flames, a black goat that devoured the surrounding light, and a beetle that corrupted the Magical Power protecting the Red Dragon Emperor pierced through his massive dragon body one after another.
"Aaah…"
An agonized scream tore from the giant Dragon's mouth, but it stirred no sympathy in Cid. What fell from the sky next was a pitch-black sword, compressed from a thousand meters down to only a few meters long. Its immense weight, pulled by gravity, tore through space, pierced straight through the giant Dragon's body, and pinned it to the ground.
Instant kill. What else was there to say?
"Crack, crack…"
The precise blows caused several strange runes to appear across the Red Dragon Emperor's body. The treasure fused into him could no longer endure Cid's attacks and was forced to reveal its true form.
"Boost, Boost, Oppai, Oppai, Boost…"
The complete disorder of his Magical Power caused the enormous energy inside the Red Dragon Emperor to burst outward. Magic bullets carrying tremendous power began firing wildly in every direction. He even started compressing the Magical Power inside his body, using himself as fuel to trigger a chain of self-destructions. For a time, the whole of Itogami Island shook under the force of that Magical Power.
"BOOM!!!"
It was an unprecedented attack. There was nothing extra to it, only pure Magical Power. The crimson flames carried no special properties of destruction or annihilation, yet by sheer mass alone, they erased every obstacle in their path. This strike, unleashed far beyond the body's limits, had already surpassed the level of a Heavenly Dragon. Every living thing on this island, no, in this entire sea, should have been beyond saving… or so it should have been.
Like Medusa from Greek mythology, a water spirit with the upper body of a human woman appeared before the wildly expanding fireball. A mercury-like liquid instantly wrapped around the fireball, and everything around it began to reverse in time.
"Whoosh!"
In the blink of an eye, everything that had been destroyed returned to the way it had been five seconds earlier. The only thing that had changed was the huge mass of water in the middle of the sky.
"Pop!"
Like a bubble being burst, the mercury sphere suddenly split open from the center, leaving behind a giant Dragon glowing red from head to tail. At that moment, the red Dragon's body resembled a dividing cell, its flesh pulling apart from the inside toward both sides.
"Kojou, let me make this clear first. This is the last time. If you get caught by someone again after this, I'm not bothering to save you."
Cid walked up to the separated Kojou Akatsuki and glanced at the sea of fire around them, which had also been restored by Sadalmelik-Albus. To keep Kojou Akatsuki from being burned to death several more times in the flames, Cid condensed a drop of blood mixed with soul and spirit at his fingertip. With a slight flick of his index finger, the blood shot into Kojou Akatsuki's soul. Then he twisted his neck, rolled his wrist, and kicked Kojou Akatsuki toward a safer area.
"As for you…"
After dealing with Kojou Akatsuki, Cid turned toward the other boy who had split from the Red Dragon Emperor's body, the Red Dragon Emperor, Issei Hyoudou.
"Personally, I feel like you're probably the same as Kojou, some fusion material captured by a villain. But… we don't know each other, so I'll send you to the police station."
Speaking mercilessly, Cid kicked Issei Hyoudou in the direction of the police station.
Once all of that was taken care of, Cid rose into the sky and flew to a stop in front of Sherry.
"So now you're going to deal with me?"
Looking at the black figure silently watching her, Sherry smiled bleakly.
Cid nodded in silent indifference. Beneath the mask, his gaze was complicated as he looked at Sherry, who seemed to have calmed down.
"More or less."
"Hee… why…"
Sherry opened her mouth in confusion, her dazed eyes watching as she lifted one hand in front of herself.
"Why do you have to exist, Shadow?!"
Cid caught the stone Sherry threw at him and lightly crushed it to powder, but he still said nothing.
"If it weren't for you, if you didn't exist, my adoptive father would still be alive! Cid-kun wouldn't have been killed by me! None of these tragedies would have happened! Why do you have to exist?!"
Cid silently caught all the things the frenzied Sherry threw at him, then raised his head and looked straight at the girl who was nearly hysterical before him.
"It's all your fault!"
"Mm. So… I'm sorry."
Hearing those unexpected words, Sherry froze in the middle of throwing something. She stared blankly at Shadow, who had stopped defending, visible confusion spreading across her face.
"An apology?"
"Yes. An apology for trampling on the rights you should have had because of my own selfish desires."
Bearing all the guilt himself, hiding what she should have known in the name of "for your own good." In a certain sense, he really did owe her an apology, just like this.
"An apology? What good does that do? At this point, what meaning does an apology even have?!"
The force behind it was nothing like what Sherry's body, only a little stronger than an ordinary person's, should have been able to throw. Her eyes were bloodshot as she stared at the throwing knife in her hand. The emotions contained in that strike might have run even deeper than Cid had imagined.
"…I'm sorry, but I don't regret it."
He walked toward Sherry at an unhurried pace. The pitch-black sword in his hand dissolved back into slime and vanished, while regret seemed to hang around Cid.
Cid admitted that he bore most of the responsibility for Sherry becoming like this, and he did feel sorry for the state she was in now. Even so, if he had to do it all over again, he would still make the same choice he had back then.
"Go to sleep. When you wake up, everything will be better."
The low, gentle voice reached Sherry's ears. She looked at the black figure gradually approaching her with an inexplicably sorrowful gaze.
"I don't want to sleep."
"I'm sorry…"
"I don't need your apology!"
With an indifferent expression, neither joyful nor sorrowful, and words filled with suppressed anger, Sherry raised a battered device in her hand. The cover over it was almost falling off, and through the gap in the swaying lid, a badge embedded with a breathtaking ruby could be seen.
"To me, there's nothing in this world worth holding on to anymore."
A self-mocking smile hung on Sherry's face. In truth, right before Cid died, she had still been afraid that her emotions would not be strong enough and the plan would fail.
The device Eta had developed and modified could create miracles, provided it had enough intense emotional power. At first, she had thought she definitely had enough.
But after meeting Cid, Sherry had to admit that, at first, she had become a little… reluctant to die. That tiny bit of reluctance might not have been enough to shake her resolve to carry out the plan, but against the target of her scheme, even maxing out every condition would not guarantee the plan's success one hundred percent. Adding even a little reluctance made it worse.
It was a problem that had troubled her, one she kept avoiding. But now… she did not need to avoid it anymore, because Cid was already dead!
A large mass of black energy-like matter appeared out of nowhere like a ghost, passing through the ground beneath her feet and wrapping around Sherry's entire body.
"Wha!"
Cid's eyes suddenly widened. He strode forward, trying to pull Sherry out of it, but the terrifying Magical Power erupting from that pitch-black energy, which looked evil no matter how one saw it, sent him flying.
"What's going on?!"
After being pressed against the ground by the Magical Power and dragged dozens of meters, Cid looked down at his own body in shock. The Magical Power inside him was draining away in huge amounts. No, more precisely, among the Magical Power interfaces he had extended outward, one was siphoning off his Magical Power at a terrifying speed.
That interface… I remember it. It belongs to Eta!
...
"Munch, munch… Open the champagne!"
Eta grabbed a handful of popcorn and chewed while watching the endless explosions in the direction of the Fallen Angels' base outside the window. A trace of a smile flashed in her eyes as she casually opened the champagne she had prepared beside her in advance.
Master once said that when a plan reached its final step, you had to open the champagne. She did not know what meaning there was in that action, but since Master had said it, she would obediently do as told.
"Oh-ho. Since it arrived this quickly, I can start running away now."
Watching the black energy-like matter fill the glass jar in front of her all at once after she opened the champagne, Eta showed a surprised expression.
Where should this begin… Then let it begin with why she had decided to drug Cid.
The fusion of the three worlds had brought technological and civilizational exchange. It could be said that every faction had witnessed the results of other technology trees, and among those "factions" was Eta herself.
But unlike the others, because she had Master's guidance, she had actually made guesses about the possible development of other technology trees. She could be considered the first to prepare for technological integration and exchange. More importantly, there was a treasure trove beside her that contained the world's highest level of knowledge.
Among the technologies from the other worlds, what she valued most was not some classified technology, but the "Blood Memories" from the world with the Three Primogenitors. That might allow her to obtain the technology inside that treasure trove.
Do not even mention Brain Marrow Sucker-kun. It had already been developed up to No. 40 and was still completely useless.
The idea that human blood contained human memories had inspired her greatly. She immediately emptied out all the books on that technology, studied them diligently until she fully understood the theory, then asked Master for several kilograms of blood. Following the method Vampires used to extract "Blood Memories" from humans, she tried to extract his memories. In the end, she successfully extracted one memory…
What a scam!
Only after investigating did Eta finally understand why the experiment had failed. His spirit and divinity had become one, leaving the amount of memory in his blood negligible. Even if she collected several tons of Cid's blood, she probably would not be able to gather even one minute of memories.
Later, Eta thought it over. If she could not obtain that treasure trove by stealing or taking it by force, then she could only make Master willingly give her his memories.
Eta understood Cid very well. One could say that Cid was her life mentor. Among all his teachings, the one Eta remembered most deeply was the theory of "discarding." To Cid, was lewd desire something that should be discarded? Of course it was!
In that case, Eta chose selective fertilization, causing Master's lewd desires to grow wildly. Once those lewd desires swelled to a certain degree, based on Master's attitude toward "lewdness," Master would definitely discard part of it and keep only the level a normal person should have.
And that would be her chance. The discarded desire might not be a precious thing like spirit or soul, but as a vessel of emotion, it would definitely carry Cid's memories.
When that happened, she would be able to use the method for extracting "Blood Memories" to extract the precious memories attached to the emotions she had cultivated. There was only one problem.
Because Shadow Garden had rather high morals, she, a scientist with zero morals, did not fit in with the others at all. As a result, she did not have many subordinates, and she also lacked the technology to separate excess emotions.
If she went through all that trouble to nurture it properly, only for Master to discard it somewhere at some unknown time or have it automatically decompose, that would be hilarious.
Fortunately, at that moment, her friend came to share her approach for opposing Shadow with her, successfully giving Eta a bold idea. Combine Sherry's technology with her own to obtain Master's memories.
Although she had an idea in mind, she could not possibly reveal her true purpose directly. So she used another excuse: opposing Shadow.
The plan she presented to Sherry was to combine the emotions she extracted with a creature possessing infinite Magical Power and create a terrifying mechanical being capable of defeating Shadow.
Yes, it was a plan full of holes. Putting aside how a soulless mass of emotions was supposed to move, where was she supposed to find a creature with infinite Magical Power? The Infinite Dragon God?
There was no helping it. In order to deceive Sherry successfully, she had no choice but to use the Magical Power interface Master had given her and take that position herself. In any case, Sherry could not dismantle her to verify it. Judging only from the energy on the surface, she was indeed a lifeform with infinite Magical Power.
And since she had an executable plan, the next step was carrying it out. Working hard with an alt to sell junk and save funds, developing Spider-kun to empty the Fallen Angels' treasury through spatial tunnels, trading with the Khaos Brigade to scam them out of money, all of it was for this moment of escape.
That was right. She was going to run away with Master's memories and leave the Garden. Staying in the now scattered Shadow Garden would only waste her life!
She did not want much. She wanted to gain more knowledge through endless experiments, realize her own value, and become the wisest person in the world.
Unfortunately, her idea of taking one-seventh of Shadow Garden and going far away so she could freely conduct experiments alone had been rejected by Gamma… Why could everyone else run away, but not her? Just because she was too dangerous? Was this not a right she should have?
It did not matter anymore. She no longer cared about a mere one-seventh of Shadow Garden. She had emptied the Fallen Angels' treasury, taken all kinds of forbidden materials from Kokabiel, and scammed part of the Khaos Brigade's money. It was enough for her to conduct research alone without restraint for decades.
This felt amazing. From now on, no one would ever be able to restrict her from doing the experiments she wanted to do. The ecosystem trees of other worlds, Diablo's Root Cells, and afterward, she would ask Master for a piece of flesh… All four major ecosystem trees would be in her hands…
Mm-hmm. Next, she only needed to enter the secret base where she stored her treasures, activate the spatial transfer machine, and leave. Then everything would be over.
With that thought, Eta arrived in front of the gate.