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On one side, there was a clear victor.

Yet, he did not celebrate.

"A-ah..."

Saburou could only let out small sounds of exclamation; as if he wanted to say something but the words were trapped at the base of his throat.

At this point, everyone\'s turn to fight had come to an end.

Although I couldn\'t take note of everything that was going on, I did what I could to observe.

For some of them, it was their first real experience of \'fighting\', after all, so I had to use the rare opportunity to make a judgement on how they could improve.

Sophie, for example, possessed the necessary ability without a shadow of a doubt, but she didn\'t quite have the required experience to hurt a person without hesitation or adapt on the fly.

She got flustered easily and the result of that was a great deal of pain.

Fortunately, Selina was here to amend that; if she wasn\'t, then there exists a chance I might\'ve had to give up on her entirely depending on how she reacted to the outcome.

Speaking of Selina, she had a whole heap of issues that needed to be sorted out, but well... At the end of the day, she was able to make a move and restore Sophie\'s hand back to normal. I suppose that\'s all I can ask for at the moment.

On the other hand, the twins, though disappointing in that they couldn\'t eliminate the main pest that was Kiryuuin, were able to successively prevent him from interfering with the others, so that turned out fine.

I did take into account his bizarre Measurement evolution, and with that in mind, it was difficult to realistically expect the twins to beat him when the extent of his power was still unknown.

In any case.

"U-ugh..."

Tarou.

"Cough-!"

Having collapsed to the frosty-tipped grass that veiled the ground beneath our feet, he lay, staring with wide eyes into the cerulean, vast sky above as he choked and spluttered on his own rising blood.

"..."

There were no screams.

There were no cries for help.

And there would be no salvation.

I did not see what had occurred exactly, but I could easily find out after the fact; moving in response to the cornered and abused Saburou who had stretched out his arm, he had jumped to the side.

"Cough-!"

...Evidently, though, he was too slow to act.

Saburou\'s attack―an attack that utilised the full power of a top-rated Concept Measurement―had cleaved his body in two.

No, to be precise, it had simply truncated his body by deleting everything below the waist from this world.

Watching him bleed out profusely upon the cold, open field, no one could utter a syllable.

Whether it was due to the shock of what was happening or not being able to find the right words to use, both were probably apt reasons for the harrowing silence.

The ground behind him was also cratered in a straight line for quite a long distance, showing just how severe of a thing it was.

Erasing space, or perhaps just moving it to a different place?

It was an undeniably formidable power; and not one to be taken lightly.

Even someone like Saburou, who normally possesses an admirable level of self-control, couldn\'t help but rely on its strength to save him when placed under extreme stress.

First, his sister was abducted.

And now, he accidentally killed his own brother.

Wasn\'t it the second person he has unintentionally killed now? The first, being Sophie\'s mother.

How this drama would unfold, I do not know.

I didn\'t think Saburou would use his Measurement of Space today, and I certainly did not expect Tarou to die, but well...

He had about reached the end of his usefulness anyway, and there was no point crying over spilt milk.

I still held Atsuko in my possession, after all, so I could afford one such expenditure of the Fushigimi household.

And, besides, I can still make use of this unexpected situation.

My eyes glanced at Araceli standing beside me.

Whilst everyone was still staring mindlessly, I quickly moved and snatched my handgun back from her loosened grasp and aimed it.

Click-!

Before her brain had time to process what I had done, I pulled the trigger.

Pop-!

"Gah--!?"

One successful hit on Saburou.

Pop pop-!

"Agh--!?"

Two successful hits on Avon Laura.

Ding~!

I then took aim to shoot at Kiryuuin, too, but by the time I had pressed down on the trigger, a magical barrier manifested around him and deflected the bullet like it was nothing.

With an inward sigh, I lowered my hands holding the weapon and turned my gaze towards the culprit.

"H-hey...! What did I say about not shooting anyone?!"

Araceli Arévalo.

"You said it was the condition for shielding me. But, do you see something I need to be shielded from?"

I stared at her, who glared frustratedly at me.

"The fight is over, and so is your role here. I fail to see a reason to comply with your demands when your usefulness has come to an end."

Shifting my gaze to the two I had shot, I found satisfactory results.

Rippp-!!

Saburou had hurriedly escaped through a rift in space, clutching his drooping shoulder with a bloodied hand where my shot had landed.

As for Avon Laura, things didn\'t seem much better.

"Gh-- Agghh...!"

"Von...!"

Rushing over to her side as she fell haplessly was, of course, Kiryuuin.

Both shots had hit and drilled through her central abdomen, penetrating right through her white plate armour like paper mache thanks to the powerful .22 rounds I had used.

Because she naturally valued having a high level of mobility and agility, I knew her armour was thin enough to pierce, and it worked better than I had anticipated.

I wouldn\'t be able to cause any more damage because of the barrier, but I hoped the bullets that perforated her stomach and intestines would wreak enough havoc on her vital organs that the outcome would be lethal.

"Cipher! Do you really take me so lightly?! I can\'t believe it, this isn\'t supposed to happen at all...!"

Her words from my side were strange, and I almost felt like laughing.

"What? Despite knowing who I am, despite possessing knowledge of things even I cannot, you mean to tell me that you, Araceli Arévalo, cannot believe my actions? You mean to tell me that my actions are incomprehensible to you? My, what happened? You appeared so confident earlier, what with your assertions about being my \'fan\' and protecting me, demanding I hand my tool of self-defence over to you, and yet look at you now."

"...!"

"I suppose things didn\'t quite go to plan? What a terrible shame."

Moving my face closer to hers, she seemed to flinch as I lowered my tone.

"I am disappointed, dear Araceli."

Indeed, I was.

"For all you\'ve presented me, I would have thought you hold quite the potential within you to claim with your own hands the very outcome you desire, but what you have instead shown me is a severe, deep disappointment indeed."

Access to various Forbidden Knowledge.

Knowledge of a future different to that of Azaki Kiryuuin.

A deep insight into my own character, which no one aside from a few individuals should be aware of.

You possess all of that, and yet...?

"Hesitating when the slightest mishap occurs or when a single action is made outside of your predictions. Forgetting to realise the aim of the person you are standing beside; the person you are a self-proclaimed \'fan\' of."

I felt a belated sense of pure embarrassment, looking back in hindsight at the time I felt frightened of you.

"Answer me, Araceli: Is this all you amount to?"

In the end, you become less of a scary existence the more I find out about you.

"If that is truly the case, then I am ashamed."

"..."

You may have many mysteries about you, but slowly, I discover something new with every encounter, and every time I do, the need I feel to be wary of you lessens.

But, I suppose that is the nature of the unknown, after all.

"Cough, cough-!"

"Ah, no...!"

Turning my attention away from the silent girl, I observed the kneeling Kiryuuin over Avon Laura\'s recoiling body.

The two bullets had punctured her stomach, causing immense internal bleeding.

I could see some employees on standby rushing over now with a first-aid kit, but something like a bandage and an ice pack was worthless in the face of gastrointestinal perforation.

They would never make it to the hospital on time.

Avon Laura, too, was destined to pass away this day―that was something everyone here could sense instinctively.

...Perhaps, was that the reason she had trouble glimpsing into today\'s future?

It was something to wonder about.

I raised my voice.

"Are you not going to reverse time and save her? Or, is it that you can\'t?"

It was more of a rhetorical question to dig some information of his new Measurement out of him, but it certainly appeared to be the case that time reversal was not something he could do on command.

I suppose I would already be back in the Wardens\' clutches if he could retry as many times as he liked, so it makes sense.

But, it\'s still nice to have the confirmation that my actions would have a permanent impact on this timeline.

Even if he went back now, there was nothing he could do to stop what had already occurred.

"...Why...? Why do you continuously resist and kill...? Cipher... To what end? When will it all stop?"

Staring blankly at me as tears began to break free from the prison of his hollow eyes, he asked something ridiculous.

It was a sentence so nonsensical that I couldn\'t even laugh.

Rather, it was a little infuriating.

"Are you delusional? When did I ever say I wanted to resort to things like this? It is you who has left me no choice. I want to live free, and to accomplish that, I can do nothing but resist."

I spoke the truth to Kiryuuin.

"The fault is none other than yours. If you hadn\'t come after me so adamantly, we never would\'ve come here today; instead, because of you guys\' selfishness, two people are going to die today."

It was all thanks to the Wardens\' egotism and thoughtlessness.

If they never acted the way they did, the situation never would have arrived at this point.

I don\'t understand how you could blame me for Avon Laura\'s death.

In the first place, wasn\'t she the one who wanted me dead multiple times until now?

Right. In fact, wasn\'t I the merciful one?

I already spared her once during the Fighting Festival.

Now that she was only a hindrance to my future, I would not make that mistake again.

"I will not accept any responsibility for what has happened today, because at the end of the day, I was the one who was forced by you to come here. No one can refute this."

It was impossible to argue against because it was simply the truth.

"Anyway. You lot. Come. We\'re leaving."

Without wasting any further time here, I called Sana and Sona, Sophie, and Selina. There was nothing for us to gain by being here from this point onwards, and I knew there was no chance for Avon Laura to survive the gunshot wounds she had sustained.

There was no need for us to stay any longer.

With that thought in mind, I waited for everyone to gather and suddenly felt a buzz in my pocket.

"...?"

Taking out my smartphone, I appeared to have received a notification.

Without hesitation, I opened it.

What I saw was shocking.

[Liam has been hospitalised.]

―It was a text from Ella Chiba-Wallace.