A sensation I had not felt in a long time was piercing through my body.
At first, it was the sense of unity I had felt when I fought the chimera with a golem made from rock.
Even though I should have merely been moving the control sticks and making it perform predetermined motions, it felt as if my body, as the golem’s heart and brain, was assisting and reinforcing its movements.
My opponent realized that something had changed as well.
Amid the heat it spewed as it ran wild, the one-eyed giant’s eye was fixed on me.
It had noticed that the opponent it had thought it could defeat had changed, and it was on guard.
Then, twisting its mouth, it charged toward me.
-“Uoooooh!!”
“Yeah, you want to see this through to the end!”
I immediately manipulated the golem, and once more our fists flew toward each other.
Just like before, when I had faced a fist powerful enough to send Cyclops flying, my own fist shot out to meet it.
With a tremendous roar, the two blows struck and rebounded from each other.
I immediately regained my stance and swung the dagger still equipped in my right hand, grazing and slicing the one-eyed giant’s flank.
-Szzzzzzk….
The giant’s side burned.
Even through the golem’s sound collector, I could clearly hear the sound of flesh searing.
Perhaps because too much mana had been infused into it, the dagger’s red glow was anything but ordinary, but—
“Analysis can wait until later…!”
Right now, it was time to bring down the enemy with every last bit of strength I had left.
I moved Cyclops, and the one-eyed giant charged again.
Another exchange of blows erupted, and massive fists and slashes from the dagger dealt fatal strikes to each other.
Perhaps because I felt as though I had synchronized with the golem’s body, pain reached me as well, and at the same time, I could feel the heat.
“About fifty seconds left, maybe!”
This state I had named Overload was never meant to last long in the first place.
In a way, it was a function that used the pilot’s mana to force the golem’s entire body into overdrive, forcibly exceeding the limits set for safe operation.
Naturally, the golem itself would scream, and its fuel would be consumed at a terrifying rate.
There was not much time left.
And that was true for the other side as well.
-Grind….
The enemy had also been continuing a battle beyond its limits for minutes now, so its life was slowly reaching a dangerous point.
Rather, if one considered only time, the enemy had been burning its life away even before I activated Overload, so it was the one at a disadvantage.
Rationally, it should have begun to flee.
I, too, only needed to stall for time.
But perhaps because we each regarded the other as a powerful foe—
The two one-eyed giants had no intention of backing down.
A steel fist twisted its jaw aside, and the muscles of the enemy’s outstretched arm became a terrifying blunt weapon in themselves as they smashed into the cockpit section.
Blood ran down my forehead from the impact, and in time with it, I manipulated the golem and drove the dagger in.
The place I stabbed was the heart.
Blood flowed from the one-eyed giant’s eye and mouth, painting the dented white armor red.
The heating dagger burned the enemy’s body, and the rampaging one-eyed giant sank to its knees.
Then it grabbed me and hurled me away, and as the golem was thrown, it crushed everything around it.
The screams and unpleasant noises coming through the sound collector must have belonged to what had once been small-fry monsters.
As I stopped spinning and got up, the one-eyed giant was swinging its fist wide toward me, and I accelerated the golem’s backpack and charged in.
“I can see that much clear as day!!”
I rammed its chest with my shoulder, wrapped my arm around its outstretched arm, and threw it down.
-Kwa-gwaaaang!!
Since the enemy was already larger than Cyclops to begin with, the explosion of sound at the moment I slammed it down rang out enormously.
And the moment I was about to stomp on its head to finish it—
“…Damn…!”
Overload ended.
The machine screamed and began to smoke. As the mana stones ran wild and sparked, the one-eyed giant rose just like that and struck me with its shoulder, and Cyclops toppled backward and crashed down.
-“Uoooooh!!”
A roar certain of victory.
The enemy had no hope left either.
It had merely resolved to claim one final victory before it died.
Perhaps I had been right to think it was the leader-class individual.
As the leader of the one-eyes, it meant to fight without shame before dying.
The giant charged in.
With that enormous bulk and power, it could easily smash Cyclops’s cockpit.
As if it were its final attack, its speed was terrifying as well.
Knowing that if I made the wrong choice even once, I would die—
I immediately moved the golem’s arm.
And picked up the machine gun the enemy had thrown at me at the beginning.
“Throwing this away was your mistake.”
The enemy was undoubtedly strong.
At the end, I was the one being pushed back.
However, this machine was originally not a close-combat unit, but a general-purpose mass-production model whose main armament was a machine gun.
The enemy’s mistake was fighting wildly enough to let me arrive where my main weapon had fallen.
The enemy’s eye showed confusion, then soon smiled.
A spirit that acknowledged defeat, yet did not stop advancing.
“You were a powerful foe.”
The golem pulled the trigger.
Every remaining round in the machine gun fired, striking the one-eyed giant’s body.
The bullets pierced straight through its body, and smoke no longer flowed out from the one-eyed giant.
And then, after taking several steps toward me, the one-eyed giant—
-“Grrrrrr….”
Let out a sound as if acknowledging defeat, and collapsed to the side.
****
The battle in the warehouse began to intensify.
“I never imagined one of the Empire’s Sword Saints would be reduced to cleaning up after spies!”
“And you’re rolling around with brats in a place called the Academy, aren’t you?!”
Reina, her face fierce, and the Sword Saint swung their blades at each other.
The bold, sweeping slashes belonged to Reina; the exquisitely angled cuts came from the Sword Saint.
In the midst of it, the Sword Saint’s blade nearly touched Reina’s body again and again, only for Reina to strike it away with her knee or elbow.
At a glance, the tide of battle seemed to favor the Sword Saint over Reina.
But the one who was truly at ease was Reina.
“Just a little more and you might cut me, you know? Why not try a bit harder!”
“Where did you learn nothing but petty tricks like this?!”
The Sword Saint’s blade certainly possessed refinement and technique worthy of his title.
In technique alone, he was above Reina.
But Reina filled that gap in skill with her innate physical ability.
Even if she lost track of the Sword Saint’s blade, she used the hard parts of her body to strike it from the side and divert it, disrupting his pace and immediately dragging him into hers.
It was only because he was a Sword Saint that he could be pushed back for a moment and then attempt a counterattack. Any ordinary swordsman would have been bewildered by Reina’s irregular martial arts and lost his head.
“This is exactly why people who start from the bottom are so terrifying!”
A commoner with nothing had taken up a sword, made a name for herself, and earned her current position through achievements on the battlefield.
“Really, back when we had the chance, we should’ve given you treasured swords or whatever else and dragged you over to our side!”
Sword Saint Zweit said with a grin.
Reina’s roots were those of a commoner.
Because of that, the Empire had tried to scout her several times, but had ultimately failed.
At the time, the Empire had thought an appropriate amount of money would suffice. However, the current Count Phoenix, who had then been receiving education as the heir, had outright handed over one of his family heirlooms, and that had become the reason Reina stayed with the Kingdom for good.
After that, as she swiftly swept across enemy lines, the nickname attached to her was Swift Advance.
“Even now, I’ll give you, say, seven famous swords. Any chance you’d consider coming over?”
It was not something he said sincerely, but a joke.
The Sword Saint had no room to spare, yet pretended that he did.
And Reina smiled bitterly and shook her head.
“If you’d been about three years earlier, I might have thought it over.”
That was not sincere.
“But now, swords no longer seem to hold much meaning.”
This was sincere.
The Sword Saint, who had tossed out a joke to catch his breath, narrowed his eyes.
“…That sounds a bit harsh, considering we both make our living with a sword.”
“A fact is a fact. Probably in ten years… no. That’s a bit too soon. If I add a bit of greed, then by the time I’m old and watching my grandchildren, swords will only be used for ceremony.”
“…Because of that one-eyed giant? Because of its creator, Aizen Arclight?”
As expected of the Empire’s spies.
Muttering inwardly that their information-gathering was no ordinary thing, Reina smiled.
“From the moment that boy was born, grew up, and came into his talent, our era, at the very least, came to an end.”
“Isn’t your love for your disciple a little too excessive?”
The Sword Saint sneered.
Reina also shrugged.
“It makes sense. That brat is someone I have to run at full strength to catch. The fact that a chase can even be established against Academy professors should be proof enough that he’s extraordinary.”
The Sword Saint’s expression changed.
A chase could be established against Reina of the Swift Advance?
By a bastard who had supposedly never even held a sword?
“If he had taken up a sword, he would have surpassed me. If he had studied magic, he would have become a court mage. He invested all of that talent into his own dream, but he’s producing results worthy of it.”
Reina said that much and sighed.
“It would be nice if he used his talent in a slightly more normal direction. Honestly, he’s a strange one, moving back and forth between fool, genius, madman, and ordinary person.”
“Do you like him?”
“There’s an age gap. Are you trying to make me a criminal?”
At Reina’s words, Zweit laughed.
And then—
“Then I’ll have to kill him here.”
He spoke coldly.
Reina likewise readjusted her grip on her sword.
“It won’t be easy. I’m here.”
“Then I’ll have to kill you first.”
The Sword Saint’s stance changed.
Seeing him like that, Reina sighed.
“Give up on the idea that some comrade of yours will appear out of nowhere and join forces with you.”
And—
“The Kingdom’s future is brighter than you think.”
With those words, a flash of light struck down.
When the Sword Saint dodged, Noel was there with his hand extended.
Before him was a spy who seemed to have lost consciousness.
Immediately after, a red-haired female swordswoman cut in low from behind the Sword Saint, and as he evaded, his expression twisted.
“No matter how you look at it, they went down way too fast….”
The two spies had already been subdued by Noel and Erika.
‘At the very least, should I take one with me?’
If he resolved himself for mutual destruction, he could take one or two of them down.
The moment the Sword Saint calculated the profit and loss and lowered his stance—
-“I won’t let you.”
A heavy mechanical sound rang out, and a large hand slammed down where the Sword Saint had been.
“Unit Two!”
“Mina, is it?”
Noel shouted joyfully, and Reina grinned.
As soon as Unit Two had become operable, Mina must have climbed into Cyclops.
-“If you want to go all the way, we’re fine with that too.”
A triumphant voice came through.
The Sword Saint looked at them and smiled.
And then—
“I’ll have to run.”
He declared his retreat.