Not long after the escort began, the massive cargo trucks rumbled up onto the bridge, their heavy wheels pounding against the road.
At that moment, when the sound of the cold winter wind striking the windows seemed especially loud, a group of villains appeared as if they had been waiting.
“The OOPArt is ours! Kill them all!”
The villains suddenly leaped onto the road, charging in with weapons swinging.
At the sudden attack, the heroes moved quickly, and Nova, too, felt her heartbeat spike as she clenched her fists.
Every nerve in her body stretched taut in anticipation of the coming clash.
Piiiing──.
Right after a sharp sound rang out as if slicing through her eardrums, a red flash cut across her vision and streaked past in an instant.
“……Huh?”
It happened before Nova could even grasp the situation.
Holes appeared all over the bodies of the villains charging toward them, as if they had been pierced by something invisible.
“Aaaagh!”
“Wh-what the hell! From where……!”
With wet bursts, blood sprayed in every direction, and the villains’ desperate screams echoed across the bridge.
“How dare you.”
Wreathed in flames, Flare leisurely descended from the air, her red hair fluttering as she wore a mocking smile.
With a single attack, she had subdued the entire group of villains and brought the situation to an end in an instant, and the tension among the heroes finally eased.
“Waaaah!”
“As expected of Flare! You’re the best!”
Those whose tension had broken burst into cheers, and Spark, standing beside Nova, excitedly tapped her on the shoulder.
“Kyaa, did you see that? S-rank heroes really are on a whole different level! Isn’t she seriously cool?”
“……Yes. She really is amazing.”
Nova, on the other hand, answered in a slightly heavy voice.
The power of an S-rank hero, incomparable to someone like herself, was certainly remarkable—but still, wasn’t that going too far?
“Ghhh… spare me…….”
“My arm…… my arm…….”
The villains who had attacked the cargo just moments ago were in a horrific state.
Because of Flare’s attack, holes had been punched through their bodies, and some had even had an arm or a leg torn off.
A few looked so precarious that it would not have been strange if they stopped breathing at any moment.
Judging by those wounds alone, it would not have been odd for them to die of blood loss.
Chiiik──.
Acrid smoke rose from the wounds where Flare’s flames had pierced through.
At the same time they had been penetrated, the searing heat had cauterized the tissue, forcibly stopping the bleeding.
They would not die, but the pain must have been unimaginable.
Nova understood that Flare was strong enough to subdue this many villains with just a flick of her fingers, but still, wasn’t this too much to do to people?
“Hmph. Filthy insects.”
Flare cast a cold glance at the groaning villains, then brushed her hair back as if nothing had happened.
“We’re seriously lucky we got assigned to the same truck as Flare instead of another cargo vehicle. Right?”
“……I suppose so. It really is… a relief.”
At Spark’s words, Nova forced herself to nod and answer.
“The people following behind will handle the villains, so let’s hurry! We don’t know when they’ll attack again!”
At Flare’s imposing shout, a complicated expression crossed Nova’s face.
‘Right. For now, don’t think about anything else. Just focus on the request.’
That was what Nova told herself, but even so, the image of the villain writhing on the cold ground a moment ago would not leave her mind.
As the enormous cargo truck began to pick up speed again, Spark spoke to her once more.
“See? It’s just like I said earlier, right? There’s no need for even B-ranks like us to step forward.”
“……Haha, I guess so.”
Nova answered with an awkward laugh.
Just as Spark had said, there had been a villain attack, but there had been no need for Nova to act, and the escort was proceeding smoothly.
At this rate, they would soon hand over the container without any trouble and finish the request.
That should have been the case, but Nova’s inexplicable unease refused to fade.
The ominous feeling she had sensed even before departure remained, and if anything, it only grew stronger as time passed.
‘What on earth is the source of this anxiety?’
It was the moment she placed a hand over her pounding chest, trying to calm herself.
──Kwaaaaang!!
With a sound that seemed to tear the sky apart, a massive bombardment fell from overhead.
The impact of the blast sent the vehicle Nova was riding in floating upward, and it staggered before overturning completely.
“Kyaa!”
With a short scream, her vision spun round and round.
Inside the car, now crashed upside down, her head swam as if she had suffered a mild concussion, but fortunately, thanks to her sturdy body-enhancement ability, she had not been seriously injured.
“Ugh… Are you all right, Senior Spark?”
“Oww…… I’m a little dizzy, but more or less okay. What about you, Nova?”
“I’m fine.”
Nova felt relieved to know that Spark had not suffered any major injuries either, but the moment she witnessed the scene unfolding outside, her face turned deathly pale.
The bombardment did not continue, but the scene had become a literal pandemonium from an impact on a completely different level from the earlier attack.
Beyond the broken bridge railing, flames surged upward, and black smoke from vehicles exploding in chain reactions here and there covered the sky.
The sight, filled with screams of pain, was hell itself.
“Wh-what on earth is……!?”
The scene was so shocking she could not close her mouth.
“……First, let’s get out of here.”
At Spark’s calm words, Nova barely managed to come back to her senses.
She kicked open the crumpled car door and crawled outside, but the situation was still chaotic.
Both the heroes and the civilians from the Association were floundering in confusion, thrown into disarray by the unforeseen disaster.
“Everyone, calm down!!”
Flare’s shout rang out clearly through the chaos.
Still wreathed in flames, she floated in the air, taking command of the scene.
“This bombardment may not be the end! Those who can move, evacuate the injured to the nearby safe zone. Heroes who can fight, stay on strict alert! Protecting the wounded and the cargo until reinforcements arrive is our top priority!”
At Flare’s fierce command, the people who had begun to come to their senses one by one started moving in an orderly fashion.
The very presence of an S-rank hero became a focal point that held together the control that had been on the verge of collapse.
“Uuugh…….”
“Please hold on just a little longer. The rescue team will arrive soon.”
Nova, too, carried out the role she had been informed of in advance, moving the injured together with Spark.
Surround the container they were escorting, protect the noncombatants, and endure by any means possible until support arrived. That was the mission given to her now.
But as Nova supported an injured person amid the tension, she felt a strange vibration at the tips of her feet.
Kuung──!
It was no simple vibration.
With a heavy roar, as if something enormous had struck the floor of the bridge, the ground beneath her feet lurched violently.
Nova was not the only one who felt it.
The people moving busily all stopped at once, as if by prior agreement.
Spark beside her, and even Flare, who had been leading the scene, stared beyond the smoke from which the sound had come, their expressions stiff.
Kuung─! Kuung─!
Heavy footsteps that seemed to shake heaven and earth drew closer and closer.
Piercing through the thick exhaust and dust, the enormous being finally began to reveal itself from within the smoke.
“──Found it.”
What emerged from there was a lion of overwhelming size.
“A lion……?”
But it was not an ordinary beast like the ones seen in zoos or videos.
The lion’s entire body was covered in intricate mechanical armor.
Rather than simple armor, it was closer to a kind of high-output reinforcement suit, in which machinery and bodily tissue meshed and moved together organically.
Golden light flashed between its metallic mane, and every time its massive forepaws stepped onto the ground, the asphalt crumbled helplessly into powder.
The four-legged monster armed in steel armor let out a grin as it stared at the container.
No, to be precise, it seemed to be looking at Nova, frozen in front of the container.
‘H-huh? Just now…… was it looking at me?’
At the bizarre sensation that her eyes had met the lion’s, goosebumps rose all over Nova’s body.
Like a herbivore standing before a gigantic predator, an overwhelming fear that would not allow her to move even a fingertip dominated her.
What broke that paralyzing sensation was a sharp shout from the air.
“Was this bombardment your doing, villain?!”
Flare, flames coiling around her entire body, descended toward the lion.
At her shout, the lion slowly turned its gaze away from Nova.
With an indifferent air, as if looking at an annoying fly, the lion opened its mouth as though reciting a line prepared in advance.
“I have no interest in the likes of you, human. My purpose is only one thing: to recover that OOPArt.”
“Nonsense! That is not something a villain like you dares covet!”
When Flare extended her hand, a fireball the size of a house rushed toward the lion.
The heat seemed ready to swallow the bridge whole, but the lion took the attack head-on as if it had no intention of dodging.
Chiiik──.
When the flames cleared, not even soot remained on the lion’s steel armor.
“Hah. Is this all?”
“……What?”
The moment Flare faltered at the sight of it unharmed after taking her attack, the lion swung its forepaw at an unbelievable speed.
Kwajik──!
With a ripping boom that tore through the air, the defensive barrier of the suit protecting Flare shattered like shards of glass.
And so the S-rank hero, whom they had considered a realm beyond reach, was sent flying like a cannonball without even being able to scream, disappearing beyond the bridge.
“F-Flare……!”
“No way! An S-rank hero in a single blow?!”
The scene plunged into panic in an instant.
The strongest hero they had believed in had been defeated so emptily.
They had only a moment to stand aghast at the unbelievable reality.
“Get out of my sight──!!”
At the lion’s roar, the people snapped back to their senses and began fleeing one by one, screaming.
Spark, standing beside her, also went deathly pale and yanked hard on Nova’s arm.
“Nova! Hurry up and run! That thing isn’t someone we can handle!”
“B-but there are still injured people here! If we leave them behind……!”
Nova hesitated, looking at the fallen noncombatants, but Spark was already so terrified she was no longer in her right mind.
“You want to die?! Everyone’s running away! Hurry!”
In the end, Spark shook off Nova’s hand and disappeared into the fleeing crowd.
The bridge, which had been filled with screams and explosions, was swept into silence in an instant.
Now, standing on this ruined battlefield, there remained only the lion with its heavy mechanical armor gleaming—and the B-rank hero Nova, who stayed in place even as her legs trembled violently.