Chapter 1, Part 2

Menoh completed the requiem and slowly opened her eyes.

Throughout the sanctuary where the raw reverberations of battle lingered, there echoed a scattering of light applause.

“That’s the reverent, respectful sempai I love. Through those Noblesse knights like a knife through butter.* The way you moved without them laying a finger on you was a blessing just to see.”

What came to Menoh’s ears was a girl’s sweet, melting voice.

It was a uniquely lazy, syrupy tone. When Menoh turned around, there was a beautiful girl of small stature, clad in white vestments that contrasted to her own.

Her softly wavy cherry-blossom-colored hair was bound into two gently swaying tails at the sides of her head. Despite the white gloves that came to her elbows, the hem of her customized vestments’ fluttery culotte skirt fell above the knee, a length hardly befitting one in holy orders.

In contrast to Menoh’s maturity, the sweetly smiling girl’s prettiness was impish.

With a smile whose cheer verged on cunning, she came closer to Menoh and said brightly, “Your number one servant Momo is here.”

“Stop calling yourself my servant.” Heaving a sigh at the inexplicable position the girl called Momo declared for herself, Menoh met her eyes.

Though she was only two years Menoh’s junior her physique was at least one size smaller, exacerbating her charm. The legs that showed beneath the precipitously brief skirt were clad in tights with marks on the thighs that resembled either hearts or adorable tails. No matter how many times Menoh saw them, she had to smile wryly and think, How like her.

Momo was a member of the Faust just as Menoh was, one who served as the Executioner’s assistant. The white of the vestments she wore indicated the difference in rank.

“You’re just in time, Momo. I have something mission-relevant to ask you—”

“Oh, all that can wait.”

“Can it?”

Momo, who had slipped closer with steps aimed to keep from arousing any wariness, let Menoh’s question pass without paying it any attention. She picked up Menoh’s hand in a nonchalant movement and placed it on her own cheek.

“Aaaaaaah, at last we meet again! I can fiiiinally refill my sempai** supply!”

Menoh’s shoulders sank wearily as Momo gripped her hand tight and rubbed it against her cheek with a soft expression.

“Look, Momo… That’s why I wanted to ask you—”

“Oh, sempai, sempai. Listen to me, please. Even on a mission, it’s so hard for Momo to be away from you. It’s been, what, two days now? Even though really I don’t want to be parted from you for one instant in the twenty-four-seven three-sixty-five, even though I want to be together with you more and more and more. Hey, sempai. Whenever I, Momo, am apart from you, it’s alllllways as though I’ve been rent in twain!”

“All right, all right. That’s enough, so get off me.”

“Mmp. Roger that.”

Menoh lightly flicked the forehead of her impetuous, impulsive younger colleague. Though Momo pouted with a dissatisfied mien, she reluctantly let go of Menoh’s hand.

“I told you before, quit calling yourself my servant and all that. What you are is my assistant. …You don’t want to go giving any other priests the wrong idea.”

“The relationship between sempai and her Momo isn’t just a work thing you could put under the assistant name. Momo is her sempai’s servant of love! It’s for love that Momo follows and obeys you! I’d rather shout the truth to the world from the rooftops!”

“Quit being absurd…” The insistence of Momo’s fervent speech was beginning to give Menoh a headache.

Menoh had known the girl acting as backup for this mission since she was young. They had been at the training facility together, and indeed, the relationship between junior and senior was not merely professional.

Though when they had first met, one or the other of them should have fostered a dislike, at some point they had haphazardly taken to one another. Now they were as they were.

“But still, that fight was a sempai charm explosion!” Momo, who had apparently witnessed the entire battle, put her hand to her cheek and twisted her small body. “The judgment of your blade overwhelming the oh-so-proud knights, your silky-smooth Guidance control unfolding sorcery from your scriptures… Ahh, my heart twinges with enchantment. That’s my sempai, the youngest ever to become an Executioner! I love you so!”

The conversation was never going to get anywhere while this excessive praise and flattery was going on. Menoh ignoring it outright and keeping on with her questioning did not dampen Momo’s zeal.

“If you don’t stop fooling around soon I’m going to get angry. That’s enough. Answer me.”

As soon as the knights identified Menoh as an Executioner, they would have tried to inform their superiors. That they’d spoken to Menoh before exchanging blows must have meant they were buying time for that. There should definitely have been someone bearing the information who’d headed for the castle.

“Yes ma’am. Of course, there were no mistakes.” Momo switched over and now answered frankly. They had known each other long enough that she knew exactly where the line for silliness was drawn. “When you went into the church one of those stalker knights ran off to play messenger, but I disposed of him.*** There’s no risk of your identity getting out.”

“Good.” Though she’d had faith from the start, Momo’s reply about their shared mission satisfied her.

Despite her irreverent attitude, Momo was an excellent aide. She would not have left any loose ends.

Those belonging to the rank of knight among the Noblessee underwent specialized training for combat. They were a regulated military force assigned to groups that kept public order. They were not the king’s private army.

Thus, the number of knights that the king of the nation’s Noblesse could trust to receive information from him and to move without drawing the Church’s notice was not large.

“For the time being, I’ll leave the details of the actions here to you. We may as well assume that killing those of the knight rank has in itself revealed that we’re on the move. I’ll work out a strategy for infiltrating the castle before the end of the day.”

“I’ve got it covered. I’ve worked out the change in way the castle’s employees move around in the past few days with the floor plan, and I’ve got an estimation of where the otherworlder is.”

“As expected from you. Good work, Momo.”

“Hehehe.” However she might talk, when it came to what needed doing, she exceeded expectations. She gave a melting smile at the praise and pressed up into the hand that patted her on the head.

“All right, let’s clean up these corpses and go over it.”

“Yes’m.” Though reluctant to have Menoh’s hand withdraw from her, Momo began to attend to the scattered bodies. “But you know, sempai, when you were with that otherworlder, you really were the world’s cutest. It was half real, wasn’t it. It was like you were on vacation.”

“So you were watching… Though I don’t recall ever really being that clumsy.” She smiled sardonically at Momo’s compliment.

Menoh on a mission and her otherwise were interchangeable to some degree, but her real personality was certainly not so outspoken. To lower the otherworlder boy’s guard, she had had herself be outgoing than necessary.

“The trick to a performance that doesn’t arouse suspicion is to let your emotions show in a frank, friendly way. Some of your real personality will come through. Like that about the feeling of fasting for a month with salt.”

“Yeah, of all the things I never understood in our training, that I don’t understand the most.”

“Agreed. I can only think that part of the drills was Master amusing herself…”

The two of them had been raised in the same facility. They didn’t lack for topics where they understood one another’s hardship.

“But then, Momo never thought her sempai would show that true heart of cuteness to a human taboo.”

“Hm? Why not?”

“…no reason. Oh, you’ve worked so hard Momo will quit hiding and put her heart on her sleeve too. I love you more than anybody else!”

“Oh? Does that mean all your flattery is an act to get my guard down?”

“No, no, I don’t mean that! It’s one hundred percent true blue love!”

Teasing one another in voices pitched so as not to carry over the outer wall, the two of them finished disposing of the bodies and returned to the church.

It was peaceful, but they were not careless.

The two began conferring about making a perfect plan to kill the next otherworlder.

---

The meeting that took place with Momo in a room of the church was an extremely serious one.

They set up an infiltration route based on Momo’s prior investigation and ran simulations of unforeseen eventualities. In a short period of time, Menoh had finished making a scrupulous plan based on her exemplary underling’s information and prepared to put it into action, and, as a result, had been stuck changing into a maid’s outfit.

“Hehe, sempai. It looks fantastic on you.”

“You’re welcome…”

Menoh, clad in the prettily-made uniform, held complex feelings toward the smiling Momo.

Her destination was the castle. As sneaking in dressed in her vestments would draw attention, she had put on the infiltration garb that Momo had prepared.

She tested its ease of movement, making the hem of the long skirt flutter lightly. “This is extremely well-crafted.”

“Ehehe. That tactical uniform was made with love and care in every stitch just for you, sempai.” It was excellently cut without any wrinkles in the high-quality fabric, and the cloth’s tailoring would have put a pro to shame. The lining was made uncompromisingly down to the last seam. So uncompromisingly it was scary.

Surprisingly, the maid outfit Menoh now wore was handmade by Momo. The stitching appeared carefully calculated so as not to inhibit movement, and, if she was careless enough to say so, it was more comfortable to wear than her usual vestments.

“Thank you for putting in all this effort, though using Guidance Camouflage would have saved you the trouble of preparing real clothes.”

Guidance Camouflage was a technique for using Guidelight.

A skilled practitioner could shift the color of the light that enveloped one’s body upon using Guiding Strength. There wasn’t much point to shifting it to a single hue, but at an extreme of conscious color-control, it became possible to turn the visual information into an optical illusion and melt into the surrounding scenery, or even to become another person.

If Menoh was standing still, she could reflect someone else’s image. However, moving made the difficulty climb into another league. Thus, if she wanted to go in disguise, there was nothing for it but to have an outfit ready.

For Momo’s part, she showed no sign of minding the trouble she had gone to to prepare Menoh’s guise. On the contrary, she was in exceptionally good spirits in front of her dress-clad elder. “It’s fine, don’t worry about it. Momo was glad to make it for you!”

“Though I could have made do with something off the shelf rather than handmade… Won’t this be unnecessarily suspicious?”

Though it was certainly a maid’s uniform, the skirt’s cloth was extravagant and rife with pleats, and there were frills decorating the hemline. It was made to be more lovely and lavish than anything suited to real work.

She didn’t want to complain about a favor she had asked for, but after having assiduously done the preparations of the castle infiltration, why had Momo scraped together the time to make something of such high quality? Menoh had no idea.

Momo answered her question without missing a beat. “It’s stylish.”

“Does it need to be? Stylishness isn’t exactly something an infiltration disguise requires.”

“On the contrary! If my sempai’s wearing it, it’s got to be fierce!” she insisted with a clenched fist, though she was not the one wearing it. Looking like a passionate and stubborn believer, the powerful will that would never concede was all on her face.

Give me strength to deal with this subordinate, Menoh thought, but this was no time to get involved in a debate over trivial matters. She swiftly gave up on persuasion and moved on to other things. “Well, it’s nothing that will cause trouble on the mission. Anyway, be this time as it may, what if you also learned Guidance Camouflage? It doesn’t need any invocation medium besides the application of Guiding Strength, so it’s quite handy.”

“Don’t make it sound so simple. Aren’t you the only one who’s gotten that to the level you can use it in battle, sempai?”

“Am I? I think you could do it too if you put in the time, Momo. You’re talented.”

“No thanks. The second I heard it was invented by that Master, I knew it was a weird technique.”

While they chatted, Menoh looked down to scrutinize herself and grab the skirt’s hem. The apron even had a thoughtful inner pocket to put her scriptures in.

The invocation of sorcery required a medium. The scriptures were a reliable weapon that could serve as one for many kinds, but walking around in a maid’s uniform clutching a holy book would be suspicious. While there were seals carved into the blade strapped to her thigh that could work simple spells, the problems of materialogy meant it was limited to two. With that in mind, she carried her scriptures concealed.

“You really thought of everything. I can’t say I have any complain— hm?”

“Guidance: Connect — Scripture Chapter 1 Verse 1 — Invoke: That the miracles mine eyes hath seen might be preserved, I hereby transcribe them.“

As Menoh checked the balance of her movements with the book in the inner pocket, a slight Guidelight flashed at the edge of her vision.

It was only for an instant, such quick work she could have thought it was her imagination. The speed of Power construction and concealment of telltale signs were high quality sorcery.

But Menoh’s eyes weren’t fooled. She sought out the source of the slightly leaked indication of sorcery in action and stared hard at Momo.

“…Momo. Answer me honestly.”

“Yeees? What might it be, sempai?”

“Hm. Well.” Though her tone was demanding, suddenly Menoh’s eyes softened and she smiled gently. Allured by her smile, Momo’s expression eased.

Menoh aimed a sharp question straight for the opening provided by the slack in the interrogation. “You took an image of me looking like this and saved it in your scriptures, didn’t you.”

“Whaaatever do you mean?” Without the least shift in expression or a single cloud in her sunny smile, Momo played dumb.

Perhaps befitting an executioner’s aide, there was not a hint of unnaturalness on Momo’s face. She would not be hindered by any mission that required acting skills.

The cross-examination was a failure. However, there was already some circumstantial evidence present.

Momo, the suspect. Menoh, the investigator. Both held their smiles, and a moment of silence passed.

In the next instant, both were wrapped in Guidelight.

With both drawing Power from their souls to enhance their physical abilities, a struggle broke out that an ordinary person’s eye would be hard put to follow.

“All right, tear up the Chapter 1 Verse 1 page and hand it over! You and your paparazzi habit…!”****

“Can’t be done. True believer Momo would never deface the holy writ.”

“A likely story! I know how low your post-training piety score was!”

“I mean, true, the Lord’s word I can take or leave, but isn’t this scripture the holy text where sempai’s picture is? When it comes to you, Momo is a true believer and a true lover to the maximum. I can’t let any damage come to the relic!”

“No more arguments!”

Menoh had more agility, but Momo had the field advantage. Being near to the hole in the church’s wall, she swiftly took her one means of escape outside. She narrowly avoided Menoh’s snatching grasp at the holy book.

“Phew, made it.” Momo went a ways into the garden, perched on top of the wall with catlike grace, and opened her scriptures.

By a function of the high-grade sorcerous text, Guidelight coalesced into a standing image. What it showed was a miniature version of Menoh as she had been a moment before, her apron dress fluttering.

“Hehehe, a nice shot if I do say so myself. Sempai looks lovely in her usual outfit with that daring slit up the side, but fresh looks are important, too. That’s another for the collection!”

“…”

Seeing Momo with her mouth curved into a smile, Menoh went expressionless.

“Guidance: Connect—”

“Ah, ahaha. Well then, sempai. I’ll be seeing you after the mission’s success. Later!” The sight of Menoh wordlessly imbuing Guidance into her scriptures must have told her that the situation was perilous. After saying her piece with a mischievous grin, Momo ran pellmell for the hills.

Menoh ground her teeth at her vanished underling. “As exceptional as that girl is…! Honestly, she’s so…ah.”

She heaved a great sigh and thought over Momo’s behavior.

Certainly her actions themselves had no great difference from the usual. As always, there was far too much reckless flirting and physical contact.

It was just that there was something distinguishing it slightly from the usual fooling around.

Whenever Momo pushed her antics right up to the line of making Menoh angry, it was after a mission that had left a bad taste in her mouth.

Such as when Menoh had just killed a designated taboo boy who had done nothing wrong.

“You were worried about me…”

To tell the truth, Momo had quite lightened her dark mood.

Ever since she had become an Executioner, had there been anyone else who treated her with affection? Though she was not someone who could take kindness from anyone, Momo smiled at her and touched her as a matter of course.

When Menoh’s hand had been freshly dirtied with blood, Momo had placed it on her cheek.

Reflecting on the preciousness of that, Menoh toyed with her ponytail with her fingertips, her eyes half-closed. and thought over how Momo had been.

“Oh, but that’s another story. Really it was half the same as always.”

Her gratitude quickly turned to idle grumbling about her troublesome assistant. The usual habits were the greater issue.

“Anyway, once this mission is done with, I’ll have to check Momo’s scriptures, yep,” Menoh murmured reproachfully as she removed the maid outfit’s apron to make it into a plain black dress.

The lighthearted time where she could let her guard down, as engineered by her assistant, was over and done with.

She left the church by the main gate. Narrowing her eyes at where the western sun was beginning to sink, the executioner melded into the crowd and turned her steps toward the castle where the otherworlder waited.

---

Menoh had no difficulty slipping into the castle.

She had drilled the floor plan into her head beforehand, and had set a path based on Momo’s trade.

Having infiltrated dressed in her maid’s garb, Menoh moved with meticulous care. Momo’s nearly perfect preliminary research included the security patrol routes. She continued, staying out of sight, and just as Momo had predicted, the guards were concentrated around an inner room.

Giving thanks for that bingo and for her aide’s excellence, Menoh first found the room’s surveillance crew in another place at some distance, then surreptitiously stole their consciousness away with sorcery.

“There we are.” Menoh, who had dropped the soldiers she’d put to sleep onto the floor, turned her gaze toward the chamber that was her objective.

The room where she stood now was in a separate building from the one that held the otherworlder. It was in a place within the palace where an inner garden in an open space was surrounded by other structures, with another building constructed inside it. The supervising guards had been properly attending to their duty by watching over the otherworlder from this room that faced the front of the inner garden. As it was for overseeing the movements of the summoned one, it had a good vantage on the room that was Menoh’s objective.

Crossing her arms, Menoh pondered how to get in. She could circle around the halls and go in through the front door, but that would be a bit of a long way around. Speed was paramount, and so Menoh set her eyes on the opposite building’s balcony.

Menoh drew the short sword that was strapped to her thigh. The ornamentations on it were no mere decoration. They were seals that served as an invocation medium for sorcery.

She imbued a flow of Guidance into one of the two seals engraved on the blade.

“Guidance: Connect — Short Sword / Seal — Invoke Guide Thread“

An infinitely fine filament of Guidance arose from the weapon’s hilt.

With one of the two seals carved there, she had created the thread of Guidance.

“Hah.” She let out a brief breath and flung the blade. Right on target, it looped around the handrail of the upper story’s balustrade. Though the Guide Thread cast a faint light, Menoh had set it against the western sun so that there was no chance of its being spotted.

She wrapped the thread around her hand two or three times to anchor it. It was tenacious enough that it would be difficult for even a person under Guiding Strength to tear. It would easily take Menoh’s weight. Menoh gave it a light tug to make sure that the handrail also wouldn’t have any problems supporting her, then augmented her muscles with Guidance and leapt without a moment’s hesitation.

With the balustrade as her fulcrum, Menoh entrusted herself to gravity and swung out into thin air.

---

Akari Tokito was in the room she’d been given, staring into space with her chin on her hands.

The place she’d been led to and told to make herself at home in was shockingly lavish.

Furniture that must have had a lot of history was being used like everyday fixtures. A millennial***** like her didn’t see anything new in things on the cutting edge of technology, but she wasn’t used to stately things with years behind them. She’d been overwhelmed by the imposing grandeur of the palace all through the walk there.

“So this is another world…” She tried murmuring where she was to herself, but it didn’t feel real at all.

She’d been walking to school when she was called away and welcomed with all hospitality to a world she’d never seen. Everyone she’d met here had been kind, but she hadn’t gotten a very good impression of them.

Somehow, she knew.

They had prepared the words she would want to hear, and they were delivering them.

Akari had the sense that they were dodging what she wanted to ask, and that they were hiding the important things. Even while their words got across to each other just fine, it felt like they weren’t really having a conversation. They weren’t exposing even an inkling of their real feelings to her.

She knew something was wrong.

But then, that wasn’t to say she had any regrets left in Japan.

At any rate, she closed her eyes and called up the days up before yesterday.

Whether she was at home or at school, there wasn’t a single person on her side.

“Haah.” She let out a sigh with her reminiscence half-done.

The world had changed, but she hadn’t. It look like there’d be no dramatic meetings for her.

And so, she certainly wasn’t going to have any allies here, either.

Eventually, it grew later. How would she have been spending the time if she were in Japan? She tried rifling through her memories, but possibly due to being worn out from all the hectic things that had happened, everything before yesterday was a blur.

Just as she thought, something was wrong.

The whole time, ever since she’d opened her eyes in this world, something inside Akari had been off. The gears weren’t meshed. There was a creaking of impatience in her chest, sending out a cry of discord.

If only she could meet someone who would change her destiny.

“What’s going to happen, I wonder.” She couldn’t see ahead into the future at all.

Before she knew it it was evening, and the air was stained with sunset. Soon the sun sank, and night had come. This was another world. The daytime sky had been plain blue, but with nightfall there might be differences in the moon and stars.

If there were, maybe the fact of coming to a different world would start to feel real. If she could feel that, maybe something would change.

With her curiosity piqued, Akari went out onto the balcony as though something were guiding her. That was the moment it happened.

“Eh?”

As though she had fallen from the sky, a girl in a maid’s uniform dropped lightly onto the railing.

She was beautiful, with a scarf ribbon binding pale chestnut hair that seemed to melt in the western sun. The instant Akari saw her she felt as though time stopped.

The click of a clock’s gears meshing together rang out in her heart.

---

With full intention, their eyes met at point blank range.

“…” For an instant the unexpected circumstances naturally froze the girl in her tracks, and even Menoh herself as she landed on the balcony’s handrail. That her objective would appear as soon as she made her landing was not in the plan.

“Oh?” The girl, who never could have imagined that Menoh was there to murder her, was an easygoing sort. She blinked with wide eyes at the person who had flown into appearance on her balcony. “Uh, er. Are you someone’s maid, miss…?”

“No.”

The absurd question must have been due to her outfit. Then again, not feeling an immediate sense of danger when faced with an obvious intruder could also be chalked up to foolish complacency.

Menoh quickly pulled herself together and swiveled her head around.

She throttled her voice down even while she pitched it to be strained with impatience in order to convey tension to the still dumbstruck girl. “You? Are you the girl who got summoned from the other world?”

“Huh? Uh, yeah.”

“Right. Good!”

Menoh had already knocked the people monitoring this room unconscious. Without the worry that they’d be overheard, she kept up the conversation to observe her target and analyze her information.

The girl wore a headband.****** Her black hair was well cared for and reached her shoulder blades. She had large, round black eyes and slightly childish features, and her build made her look unlike the major ethnicity of this area.

Most likely, the target was not mistaken. Moreover, she was wearing one of the uniforms particular to Japanese students: a sailor suit.

The bulge that pushed up the suit’s scarf was abundant enough to be characteristic, and outstanding enough to have convincingly left an impression on the otherworlder boy she had made contact with during the day.

But still, a decoy or dodge was not out of the question.

For that precise reason, Menoh peppered the girl with a barrage of questions without giving her time to think.

“What school are you from? What grade, what class!?”

“Aie!? I’m Akari Tokito from Nishicho Academy High School, year one class three!”

There was nothing stilted about her response. Information about Japan was kept under considerable restriction. It was a question that would be difficult to answer off the top of one’s head, even for an actor.

I didn’t ask your name, she thought with an inward click of her tongue. It was fundamental that Menoh, who would be assassinating these people a short time after making contact with them, avoided as much as possible anything that would cause familiarity.

“Got it. Akari Tokito…Akari, then. I’m Menoh.”

Being able to rattle off her school name and even class meant she must be bona fide Japanese. Menoh switched to using first names in order to foster a sense of closeness.

“Ah, yeah. Me, noh? Nice to meet…Eh? Wha? Why…”

She must have found it strange to be asked her school and grade in this world. Menoh came close to stare into Akari’s black and white eyes, and took her hand.

“I’m from the Faust. We have to escape from here, Akari.”

“Fuh, faus…? W, what’s that? You come dropping out of the sky and talk about escaping, why?”

“The Noblesse of this country are deceiving you.”

“Huh!?” Akari’s voice was half shocked and half bewildered.

It wasn’t a bad reaction. Being told she was being tricked hadn’t provoked an immediate denial. Which was to say, the Noblesse who had summoned Akari had not won her trust.

“Look, Akari. I heard about you from someone else.”

“Someone, else..?”

“Like I thought, you haven’t heard… Another besides you was summoned from Japan, a boy. He knew the nation’s Noblesse’s plans, so he ran. He slipped his pursuers and somehow made it to a church. But by then there was nothing we could do about his wounds…”

She turned her face down in a show of sorrow. By now, she did not hesitate to employ lies to fool someone.

“But at the last, he told us about you. I couldn’t save the boy, but at least I can save you!” The story was full of holes, but inconsistencies didn’t matter here and now. Menoh put urgency into her performance and pressed on. “You have some kind of ability too, right? These people here, they’re trying to use it.”

“Y, yeah. They told me about that and I kept trying to use it, but, uh… what it seems like is I can fix other people’s injuries. They could use that…?”

“They could.”

The information Menoh had been seeking came readily from Akari’s mouth. It appeared her power had to do with healing.

Without letting the thought that she’d gotten what she wanted show, Menoh revolved her tongue around her mouth.

“This country’s Noblesse are no upstanding citizens. The upper crust will definitely find a way to make use of even a nice, kindly power like healing people. So we’ve got to get out of here now!”

Akari was short of breath, overwhelmed by Menoh’s words.

While she may not have been entirely convinced, she was caught up in the momentum. Now that she had an accurate grasp of Akari’s state of mind, Menoh smiled gently.

“Hey, Akari. Don’t worry. I’m on your side.”

Redness bloomed on a face that had been full of confusion at the shifting circumstances.

As though something had twinged her heartstrings, Akari’s eyes shone, and she took Menoh’s hand in a strong grasp. “Okay. I trust you!”

Akari, having put her faith in Menoh that easily, turned her back and went back into the room. Menoh released the seal sorcery. At the disappearance of the Guide Thread, the short sword that had been attached to the upper handrail fell into her hand.

“Thanks. All right, I’ll work hard to be worthy of that trust right away!”

Menoh returned her blade to her thigh and followed Akari from the balcony into the room.

That she had used words to deceive Akari was out of caution toward her ability. Unlike the knights, whose strength and skills Menoh could read, an otherworlder could be a rank amateur and still hide a power that could kill instantly. There were too many unknown variables for a head-on attack.

That was why whenever Menoh encountered them, she invariably passed herself off as an ally.

By that method, she had already discovered this one’s power. “Okay, let’s head out through the corridors.”

“Right!”

Menoh, having ensnared Akari through the brief conversation, stood in front of her and proceeded carefully down the hall.

Akari could be said to be rather unsuspecting. Even if Menoh struck to kill her openly, failure would not be a factor. Moreover, now that she knew the girl’s ability was not an offensive type, there was no reason to delay putting the plan into action.

Menoh turned a corner as though leading Akari down the hall, then invoked Guiding Strength and leapt upwards.

When Akari turned the corner after her, she was dismayed at losing sight of her. “Uh, huh!? Menoh… Where did you—bh!?”

From Akari’s vantage point, most likely she wouldn’t have known anything besides that something fell down on her from above.

Menoh had bounded upwards as soon as she left Akari’s field of view, and now her whole body came crashing down knees-first on her shoulders.

There was no way Akari could stand up against Menoh’s full weight coming down on her out of nowhere. She crumpled to the ground with a crash. She must have struck her forehead when she tumbled down, making a painful clunking sound that Menoh paid no mind to. She gripped Akari’s head firmly with her knees. Certain that she couldn’t move a muscle, Menoh thrust her short sword into the nape of her neck.

An ordinary human would die instantly without the time to feel pain, but there had been the previous circumstance. With the possibility that the death might not be immediate in her mind, after the single strike, Menoh immediately leapt away to get her distance.

Guidance: Connect —

As if to confirm her caution, just as with the boy before, she felt the signs of sorcerous invocation.

Keeping to a position where Akari would not be aware of her even if she was mistaken, she stayed alert, kept her scriptures and blade in hand, and observed.

The girl had said her power was healing. She might be trying to restore her own body as it teetered on the brink of death.

Obj?far i?gi??? Pure Concept Time —

Along with the signs of sorcerous construction, Guidelight enveloped Akari.

What was happening? With sharp eyes, Menoh watched the unnaturally emitted light.

As Menoh looked on with held breath, the wildly dancing motes of light gradually formed a shape. The irregular glow constructed a form too precise to be a natural phenomenon.

The Guidelight that sparkled in the darkness took the form of a large grandfather clock.

Its hands pointed at exactly the time it was now.

Before Menoh’s eyes, the clock’s hands clacked and began moving backwards.

Invoke: Turn Back *******

In the next moment, the Guidelight forming the clock burst open.

The afterimages of the instantaneously scattered light faded from Menoh’s retinas, and from the place where the light had been came a voice.

“Ouch…”

It was Akari.

She was groaning, with tears of pain in her eyes. The place she was holding onto was not the nape of her neck where Menoh had stabbed her, but her forehead, where she’d struck it when she was knocked down. It was far too surreal.

“Wh, what was that just now!? Something fell on me! Menoh, where— oh, there you are!” Akari, casting her gaze around the area even as her eyes welled up, caught sight of Menoh and got to her feet.

Menoh could do nothing but stare, lost for words, as the girl rushed over to her.

What had just happened was absolutely not a healing.

There was no sign of an injury at the back of her neck where Menoh had struck. Moreover, even the blood that had stained her sailor suit was gone.

“Are you okay, Menoh!? I felt like something went away just now, but maybe it’s my imagination!? Ugh, it’s awful! Let’s just get out of here quick!”

“Yes, let’s.” Fortunately, it appeared that Akari had not at all grasped the abnormality of the situation.

As far as Menoh could tell, Akari’s awareness continued on from directly after she had died. There was no sign at all that she was lying or putting on a show.

That Akari might be a better actor than Menoh was not impossible, but she wasn’t going to batten onto an outlandish assumption.

A certain hypothesis connecting the flustered Akari with the sorcerous phenomenon just before rose in Menoh’s mind.

Resurrection without a scratch. On top of that, that manifestation of Guidelight in imitation of a clock.

Could it be, she thought, could it be that the girl’s ability was not a healing power but—

“—the Pure Concept of Time?”

“Hm? Did you say something, Menoh?”

“…no, it’s nothing.” It was all Menoh could do to keep her face still.

A Pure Concept with a technique that could meddle with time. Most likely, Akari had Turned Back time to before she had been killed by Menoh. A power of deathlessness that defied common sense.

That had happened before her eyes, and yet, Menoh quickly switched herself over. “Thank goodness you woke up so quick. Are you okay, Akari?”

“Y, yeah. I’m fine. When you say ‘woke up’…did I pass out?”

“You did. You got attacked out of nowhere… I fought the guy off, but I couldn’t protect you. I’m sorry.”

“You don’t have to apologize!” Judging by the care in her expression and words, Menoh had gotten Akari to believe the you were knocked unconscious lie. “Thanks for helping me. …Sorry for bring a burden.”

“The helped party doesn’t apologize. I’m the pro and you’re the victim, you know?” While she talked to Akari and maneuvered the situation to keep suspicion from falling on herself, she considered what to do next. “You got attacked because of my mistake, so I’m the sorry one. But I’m glad you seem all right. Let’s get out of here quick. Oh, does anything hurt? Tell me if it does, don’t hold back.”

“My forehead does!”

“Ahaha, does it.” Keeping a smile on, Menoh held her hand out to Akari. “Okay, let’s get back to getting away from this place, Akari.”

“Right!”

As things were, Menoh lacked the means to kill her.

Therefore, until a means could be discovered, Menoh needed to stay with her. She would have to control this otherworlder girl who possessed a Pure Concept, keep watch so that she did not even mistakenly run amok, and keep contact so that she did not suspect anything.

“Oh, but Menoh. Do you have a sec, before we run?”

“What is it, Akari?”

“You might think I’m a weirdo for saying this all of a sudden, but…I’m. Well. I was really glad to meet you.”

“You were?”

“Uh-huh. I was…so, so glad. Because – I mean, I don’t really get it, but – it was like time’d stopped when I got to this world, and then, it started again.” Though they had just met, Akari displayed surpassing faith in Menoh. With a guileless smile, she gripped Menoh’s hand tightly. “So, Menoh, I’m happy I came here. I don’t know the first thing about this place, but I’m really happy I met you. This is it.”

The hand Akari was holding with uncanny trust had, a moment ago, held a blade stabbing her to death.

“Running into you was definitely fate!”

“…is that right. Well, if you can say that, you must not be feeling too bad!” Menoh laughed. Her heart panged. Ignoring that very small bit of pain, in order to allay any suspicions from Akari, she acted the part of a priest who was pure and upright, and strong, too.

Neither of the two of them knew that their meeting was essential to what was to come.

And so, the two who knew nothing of each other smiled at the other.

“Akari. I’m glad I could help you.”

“I’m glad you did, too.”

There was, as yet, no one who knew the future their meeting would bring.

---

*[She uses the four-kanji idiom 鎧袖一触 ‘gaishuuisshoku,’ “with one touch to their pauldrons.”]

**[Apologies here. I really wanted to avoid leaving in “sempai” and Momo referring to herself in the third person, but there is actually an in-world reason for it that comes up later that’d make it hard to write around.]

***[I also would have liked to use the more natural-sounding ‘dealt with him’ or ‘took care of him,’ but that leaves some ambiguity, while 処理 makes it clear that our cute flirty kouhai here did herself a stone cold murder.]

****[盗撮, sneaky photography. They’ve said before that otherworlders come by often enough that they know a lot of Earth things, so I think it’s justifiable. ‘Creepshot’ was another option, but it didn’t feel like it fit Menoh’s character.]

*****[現代っ子, ‘modern child.’ I couldn’t resist.]

******[カチューシャ, which according to my best friend jisho.org, comes from Russian “Katyusha”, named after a character in Tolstoy’s novel “Resurrection.” That was baffling enough that I went down a Wikipedia rabbit hole to try to figure it out. Apparently in the 1910s the novel was made into a play in Japan, where audiences didn’t care much about the church and Russian economic stuff but went wild for the tragic love story (can’t blame them there). People being people, a bunch of folks started hawking totally unrelated stuff with the characters’ names attached to piggyback off the play’s popularity, and “Katyusha” for the kind of headband stuck.

*******[回帰, ‘regression/recursion.’ To play on Akari’s ability initially being mistaken for a healing power, I like going with something that could go for both ‘turning back’ to normal and ‘turning back’ time. And if I’m going to have that Cher song in my head, so are you.]