Infinite Dendrogram: Volume 16 E-Book

Sakon Kaidou

• Herausgeber: J-Novel Club
• Kategorie: Fantasy und Science-Fiction
• Serie: Infinite Dendrogram
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 298

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Beschreibung

Infinite Dendrogram: Volume 16

Leseprobe

Table of Contents

Cover

Color Illustrations

Prologue: Another Started Game

Chapter One: The Poisonous Oasis

Chapter Two: Minus

Chapter Three: The Gaunt Man

Chapter Four: The Chain

Chapter Five: The Machine Knight of Ice and Roses

Chapter Six: The Rebirthing Infestation, De Vermis

Chapter Seven: Standing and Indomitable

Prologue: Another First Choice

Chapter Eight: The Tartarean Possibility

Prologue: Another Starting Point

Epilogue: Two Worlds, Two Mes

Afterword

About J-Novel Club

Copyright

Landmarks

Color Images

Table of Contents

Prologue: Another Started Game

March, 2044, ???

With my exam season over, I finally got the chance to start playing Infinite Dendrogram.

The game came out while I was in my third year of high school. All my friends who really wanted to pass, including me, weren’t exactly crazy about the timing.

To make it worse, all of our friends who’d already given up on exams or were set to inherit their family businesses regardless had picked up the game right away — and they had plenty of fun stories of their time in-game to bother us with.

Determined to play only after I’d passed, I fought the urge. I focused solely on my studies, finished the exams...and then, I finally got the gear I back-ordered and logged in for the first time today.

“It really is realistic... The wind is so hot.”

For my starting point, I chose the country called “Caldina.”

It was a merchant nation in the desert. The dry winds rolling in from the dunes tickled my skin with such detail that it felt real, even though I’d never been to a desert before.

The city I appeared in was a “City of Commerce” called “Cortana.”

The main thoroughfare had many stalls lined up on both sides, all filled with merchants enthusiastically hawking their wares.

As big and populous as this city was, though, it wasn’t actually the capital of the country.

The cat that had helped me with character creation told me that new Caldinian players started in Cortana instead of the capital because the strength of the monsters around the capital tended to fluctuate a lot, for various reasons.

That seemed to make sense. Right now, I was level 0 without a single job. If they dumped me right into an area swarming with powerful monsters, I’d be softlocked.

Speaking of which, I really needed to choose a job and start leveling up already.

The “Embryo” I was told about still hadn’t hatched, though, so I decided to leave the job-picking for later and just enjoy the sights for now.

Cortana had a very Arabian Nights feel to it, reminiscent of various picture books and animated movies I’d watched when I was little.

The bazaar was as lively as it was colorful, and among the goods on display were many magic items that caught my eye. Unfortunately, the five pieces of silver given to me by the receptionist cat — 5,000 lir, apparently — weren’t nearly enough to buy even a single one of those.

All I could afford was the food, so I got myself some skewered meat of unknown origin, along with some fried snacks.

The taste was about as real as it could get, and though I personally would’ve preferred if it was all a bit sweeter, it was perfectly fine for eating while walking.

Doing this made me feel less like I was playing a game and more like I was actually touring a foreign country.

...Honestly, I still had trouble believing that this really was a game — even after being online for a whole hour.

The environment I perceived with all five of my senses and the merchants who sold me that food all seemed like the real thing.

When did technology advance this far?

“...Huh?”

I suddenly realized that I’d wandered into an empty part of the city as I was lost in thought.

Desolate and silent, this place was nothing like the lively road I was just strolling down. Looking around, I saw nothing but decrepit buildings cramped together as close as possible.

It was astounding how different two sections of the same city could be.

“Hm...?” As I walked around, I caught something out of the corner of my eye.

In the tight space between two buildings near the entrance, there was a little girl sitting with her back against the wall.

Just at a glance, I could tell that she was abnormally thin. In fact, even the refugee children I saw on the news some time ago looked healthier than she did.

There was no one nearby — no family or anyone else.

She was just sitting with her back against the wall.

Without a word, without any sound at all, she turned her head slightly to look at me.

No — not at me, but at the bag of snacks in my hand.

I’d found those snacks rather bland... But oh, how the mere sight of them seemed to draw her hungry gaze.

She raised her twiglike arm and reached towards me. But she lacked the strength to even get up, and the way her little hand shook made it clear just how empty that movement was.

That tiny gesture, her fragile little action, made my heart want to burst out of my chest. It was a tight, emotional kind of pain.

“I-I’m so sorry! P-Please, take them!” Those words escaped my mouth as I approached her.

That girl was the most tragic thing I’d ever seen in my life. I tried to think about her, this situation, about what I was doing right now or should’ve been doing — but my thoughts were nowhere, letting my words and body take charge.

I was unable to ignore her, to leave her like this, so I approached and presented the bag of snacks.

She reached for it and tried to put her hand inside, but she missed every time she fumbled for it.

“I’ll feed it to you. Here...” I took a snack and gently brought it close to her face.

She slowly opened her mouth. She tried to chew. And then, she fell still.

“...Huh?” The snack fell out from between my fingers and rolled across the ground.

Sensing that something wasn’t right, I hesitantly reached for her cheek.

And that was enough for her malnourished body to slowly collapse to the side...and she made no attempt to get up again.

“...Huh?” She wasn’t moving. Not an inch.

She’d just fallen asleep, I rationalized. Surely that was it.

But her eyes were open.

The light had just gone out of them.

Grains of sand blew along the ground, but not a single grain near her mouth or nose was moving.

I stood there and stared in disbelief...and before long, an ant crawled along her face, to no reaction whatsoever.

“Ah... Ah...?” I touched her withered wrist...and felt no pulse.

This complete stranger. This innocent little girl... She had starved, faded...and died right before my eyes.

Chapter One: The Poisonous Oasis

Armored Pilot, Hugo Lesseps

Early August, 2045.

A month of Dendro time had passed since I moved away from my sister and friends in my starting country of Dryfe. Three weeks had passed since Teach — Ace, AR-I-CA — got me involved in her quest to find the Treasurebeast Orbs.

Since then, I’d done some desert crossing and ruin raiding; since I’d maxed out High Pilot, I had switched jobs to Armored Pilot.

And now, having retrieved the first Orb in Hermine, we’d moved to the City of Commerce, Cortana, where we would supposedly find the second one.

The title of this city was well deserved. Full of shops and bazaars, it was quite wealthy even by Caldina’s standards. It was as though Gideon’s fourth district had been spread out to the size of a city.

“Well, I suppose it wouldn’t be weird for strange objects like the Orbs to end up in a city like this...but imagine what kind of trouble it’d bring.” I vocalized my worries as I gazed at the street outside the café’s terrace.

Then again, there probably aren’t many places in this world that are free of trouble, I thought.

“You’re not gonna eat that?” asked Cyco.

“Oh, I will. I just had something on my mind.”

Having done some shopping in the morning, we were now taking a lunch break while waiting for Teach.

Cyco was eating vanilla ice cream...or what was left of it.

Here in the desert, ice cream melted extremely fast. She’d tried to finish it before it melted completely, but eventually resigned herself to eating its milkshake-like remains as if it were a soup.

She seemed satisfied, though. I could only guess that the state of the food didn’t bother her as long as it was white.

“Good thing you found the right parts, huh?” Cyco said with a white stain around her mouth.

She was referring to the Magingear parts I’d bought at a store before coming here.

Custom Magingears like my White Rose or Teach’s Blue Opera had two general types of parts.

First were the new, custom parts that my sister had produced specifically for White Rose. They were costly, but they came with an auto-repair function similar to those found on original Prism Steeds.

The other type of parts were the standard, ready-made ones. Those were used in Marshall IIs, and they had to be replaced through maintenance every now and then.

Blue Rose didn’t fully auto-repair, which was probably due to a technical flaw.

It just highlighted the fact that even if you built mechs using real-life knowledge like The Triangle of Wisdom, you’d never reach the level of Flagman, the Grand Artificer of the pre-ancient civilization.

Anyway, I had to replace the parts that I’d lost, but being away from Dryfe had made that rather difficult for most people.

Thankfully, among the grand total of three good things Teach had taught me, one of those had been the means of finding quality Magingear parts in Caldina, so I had no trouble getting what I needed.

The other two good things, by the way, were some piloting tricks and the location of the ruins with a crystal for the pilot job grouping.

I still had part of the money I got for assisting the fight against Gouz-Maise, so I could pay for the parts no problem, but...

“...When Caldina’s stores sell wholesale parts made for the Dryfean army, you know something isn’t right.” Just how did they end up here, I wondered, finding myself a bit awed by Caldina’s distribution channels. That was probably something that bothered every country, not just Dryfe.

“I gotta say, she’s really late,” said Cyco.

“...She is.” Teach was the one who’d told us to wait for her here.

Last evening, she’d said that she was going to search for the Orb and headed straight to the mansion of Cortana’s mayor. And if she didn’t return the same day, we’d agreed to meet up here in the morning or at noon.

Since she was nowhere to be seen in the morning, we’d gone out and bought the parts we needed, but she wasn’t here even now when we returned. It was now noon.

“Is Teach just bad at keeping time or did something happen?”

“Hmm... Both?”

Yeah, knowing her, that’s probably the correct answer, I thought. She was an ace pilot, but you really couldn’t trust her on many things. It probably isn’t even trouble that’s keeping her. I fully expect her to come back and say that she was busy messing around with some girls.

“Heyoo! Yu and Cy! Sorry for the wait!”

“Teach! Oh...”

She came in right as I was thinking about all of that and, well...

“The investigation dragged on a bit,” she said. “Yeah, that’s it.”

“Is that so? By the way, Teach...”

“Yeess?”

“Your neck.”

My words made her flash me an awkward smile and rush to cover a spot on her neck.

The spot, by the way, was clearly a hickey.

“I see you had some fun at the mayor’s place,” I said.

“There was this baby-faced maid with a nice body! I flirted with her a bit and we talked straight until dawn!”

Yeah — pillow-talked, I thought.

“I hope you die.”

“Cy! That’s way too harsh! I actually got the info!” So the little chat with the maid hadn’t distracted her from her job after all.

“So, guilty or not?” I asked.

Teach had gone to the mayor’s place to find out where the Orb might be. At first, I’d thought she’d solicit the mayor’s help directly, but while she was away, I’d realized that probably wasn’t the case.

It had been the same way back at the casino. In situations like these, Teach already knew where the Orb could be, so she’d likely gone to the mayor’s mansion because that was probably the place.

“Heh heh heh. I see you’re startin’ to catch on. And yeah, he’s obviously hidin’ the Orb somewhere. If he wasn’t, he wouldn’t try to assassinate me or get a maid to spike my drink with poison.”

A slight shock came over me as I asked, “...They tried to poison you?”

“Yeah. I didn’t drink any and came on to that same maid instead. She was sooo cute and lewd!”

“Teach, why are you so...?” How could someone be so carefree when they’d almost gotten poisoned...?

Well, Teach’s Superior Embryo, Cassandra, saw not “the future,” but “danger,” so poison was perhaps the most useless method of assassination to employ against her.

Then again, everyone could counter poison with an Elixir, so maybe this “attempted assassination” was nothing but a warning from the mayor.

“I know that he’s hidin’ the Orb,” Teach continued. “If the info I already have on it is true, everyone with wealth and power would want to have it more than anything else!”

“You already know the Orb’s...um, the UBM’s abilities?”

“Yep. Some of the leaked Orbs also had their powers leaked too, and this is one of them. They say that it ‘gives the user a healthy life, and then a new life eternal.’”

A healthy life and a new life eternal.

Well, it was true that those who already had wealth and power might fear death more than other people. They would be afraid of losing their riches to age or illness, so it was no exaggeration to say that they’d want eternal life more than anything else.

“And it seems like it actually works. Hell, the mayor is using it himself!”

“Hm?”

“This is the mayor’s photo from the documents I brought.” She showed me a picture of an obese, jaundiced man with rough skin and bags under his eyes. If intemperance and bad health was a person, this would be him. “And this is a picture I secretly took of him last night. His age, by the way? Seventy years.”

“...Huh?!” This photo clearly showed a middle-aged man no older than fifty. He looked vigorous, his skin was smooth, and overall he seemed to be brimming with life.

I could hardly believe that this was the same person as in the first picture. I’d say he was rejuvenated, but that would feel like an understatement.

“You can see why he’d act like he doesn’t even know about the Orb,” Teach said. “For all we know, he might change back if he loses it.”

“...But you’re Sefirot, aren’t you? Can he really lie to you like that?” Sefirot was a clan that had nine Superiors, making it the strongest clan in all of Infinite Dendrogram.

At the same time, it was the greatest force serving Madam President La Place Phantasma herself.

Teach had told me that Sefirot could only do quests that might lead to international problems — such as this very Orb-hunt — after the president had given them her explicit approval.

Although Teach was officially acting on the request made by the head of a certain company, the person behind this quest was the president herself.

The Orb in Hermine was in the hands of a foreign mafia, so I could understand the lack of cooperation there, but the mayor of Cortana was a member of the congress, so I’d really thought that he’d help us in finishing this quest.

“Ah ha haa! You still don’t really understand Caldina, do you?” Teach said, showing me a map of the country. “This nation is a union of city-states. Some have elections, some have a hereditary system, but each city is its own country, and the mayor is its king.”

The city-state union of Caldina was an assembly of small individual nations, run by a congress where the mayor of every city-state held a seat. This made it the only major country with a “proper” government.

...Yeah, I didn’t count Tenchi. A land of constant civil war seemed less than “proper” to me.

“...So, Caldinian laws don’t fully apply to the cities themselves?” I asked.

“Not exactly,” Teach said. “There are Caldina-wide laws you’d be penalized for breaking, but the mayor of this city thinks he’s above them, and he’s not exactly wrong.”

“Hm?”

“Yu, where did you log in when you started in Dryfe?”

“Well... Vandelheim?” It seemed obvious to me. You picked a country, you appeared in its capital.

“Yeah. Same here. But in Caldina, the starting city is right here in Cortana.”

“Huh?”

“Drag-Nomad, Caldina’s capital and seat of congress, moves from place to place. The level ranges of the monsters around it constantly change, so it’s not a good place for newbies.”

“The capital...moves?” What did she mean by that?

“We’ll visit it someday, so I’ll tell you the details then. It’ll be a surprise!”

“Okay...?”

“Well, anyway, Cortana is Caldina’s second major city, its heart of commerce, and the starting point for its Masters. It’s extremely important... So much so, in fact, that it’s hard to levy any penalties against it.”

“...” The president controlled the actual capital, but the mayor of Cortana held the capital city in every sense but its name. Both cities were actually tiny nations, so if you ignored their stated political roles within the union, they were both essentially kings.

And if anyone tried to do something against this particular king, it could negatively impact the country as a whole.

“So what will you do?” I asked.

“I could just tell the prez that I know he’s hidin’ the Orb somewhere, but that seems lazy...so I’ll obviously go and take it!”

“Huh? But...”

“Listen, Yu. The mayor told me that he ‘doesn’t know about any Orb’ and that ‘there’s no way it’s in this city.’ So...” she said as she cracked a smile. “...He won’t be able to complain if something he ‘doesn’t know of’ and ‘isn’t here’ just disappears. Will he?”

That was basically a declaration that she would steal the Orb.

“Ughh...” a sigh escaped my mouth.

Her face looked just like it had back when we went into the Huang He mafia’s casino in Hermine.

We’d spent enough time together for me to understand that despite having an Embryo that let her sense danger better than anyone else, she definitely had a taste for those exact same dangers.

She was the opposite of my sister, who could never have enough safety nets or secondary plans.

Perhaps those two had become friends exactly because they were so different? They did have a similar vibe, though, even if Fran’s was more RP-oriented.

“Hold on. Yu, are you thinking that I’m gonna do something rough just for the thrill and the laughs?”

“...Am I wrong?”

“Nope! But that’s not all of it.”

“Hm?”

“I mean, we’re on a time limit. If we just report it to the boss, someone else’ll come and take it.”

Time limit? Someone else? I wondered.

“Yu. About this Orb-hunt quest...it’s not just some grand little adventure with just the two of us.”

“...You dragged me into this, you know.”

“Yeah yeah, just accept it already. Anyway, what I’m trying to say is that we have rivals on this quest.”

“Rivals?”

“Remember how I told you that some of the orbs’ powers are already known?”

“Yes.”

“Well, there’s also people in the world who’d love to take these powers for themselves.”

“Those people being...?”

“Well, there’s some evidence that Granvaloa’s makin’ moves to grab the Orb that turns water into land, while Legendaria’s degenerates are comin’ after the one that Anthropomorphizes monsters.”

“Ah!” That meant that this Orb-hunt was also a race...and that Teach probably wouldn’t be the only Superior that would get involved in it.

And, perhaps most importantly...

“So we’re not the only ones after the Orb in this city?” I asked.

“That’s very likely.” Well, an orb that “gives the user a healthy life, and then a new life eternal” certainly did seem like something a lot of people would want. “Whatever’s comin’, you better hope for the best, but expect the worst. Boy, I suuure wouldn’t like to run into anyone like that,” she said, sounding somewhat joyful.

I had a really bad feeling about this.

The chill running down my spine told me that I should prepare for a battle more intense than the one back in Gideon.

◆◆◆

City of Commerce, Cortana

Cortana was the second largest city in Caldina, and it was built around a giant oasis somewhere in the middle of The Great Desert.

Defying the searing heat, the waters flowing up to form the oasis lake were almost unnaturally pure, making the land around it more than fertile enough to support such a city.

With the exception of the capital of Drag-Nomad, all the cities of this desert country were built around these welcoming patches of land in an otherwise treacherous desert. Even the Gambling City of Hermine was no exception.

Many wondered why the vast scorching desert, home to ferocious giant worms, even had such oases of safety.

There were various theories about this phenomenon, but the most popular one proposed that it was due to the influence of save points.

Currently, save points were best known as the points through which Masters moved to and from a different world, but people had been aware of their existence for a long time.

In fact, save points had actually existed before there were any cities built around them.

As strange as it was, the environments around save points were very conducive to human survival, as though someone was intentionally adjusting them to be that way.

But no matter what the reasons for it were, people were attracted by the safety that save points provided. Over the many centuries, grand cities had been built around them.

Even places that weren’t known to be save points at first eventually came to be called that.

The name of whoever had first used the term “save point,” though, had been completely lost to history.

As mentioned earlier, Cortana, the City of Commerce, was Caldina’s second most important city — though some would argue it was the first. This desert jewel of water and coin was notably affluent even for a Caldinian city.

However, that didn’t mean that it was free of the nation’s ever-present heat. The oasis made the city slightly cooler than the barren dunes, but compared to the climate in other countries, the temperatures were still unbearably high. Even those used to it would find themselves sweating, while visitors from other countries were in serious danger of suffering heatstroke.

This applied to one of the two people walking in this searing heat — the little girl trudging through the sands. Clad in a red dress, wearing childish boots, and sporting a large ribbon in her hair, she walked while sweating waterfalls.

“Nnh... It’s sho hot. I’m gonna melt...”

Though she looked at least ten years old, her manner of speaking made her sound several years younger than that. However, most of those hearing her speech from up close would have the impression that this wasn’t an affectation — she simply wasn’t very good at talking.

“I wanna go to Dryfe. There’s lots of snow there... Or maybe to Granvaloa on the sea... Ah...”

Suffering the heat, she looked up at the person walking beside her and holding her hand — a man who seemed to be in his thirties.

“Mr. Zhan, can I swim in that oasis?” the girl asked.

The man shook his head and said, “You’re not allowed to swim in most of Caldina’s oases. People get their drinking water from there.”

“I see... I guess I won’t be swimming then...”

Instead of throwing a tantrum, the girl gave up and continued to trudge along.

“...That café over there sells fruit juice. Want to take a break there?”

“Can I?! Do they have ice scream?”

“They might, but it would melt really fast.”

“Then I’ll eat it fast!” the girl said as she hurried to the café.

Watching her from behind, the man — Great Soul Daoshi, Zhang Zangqi — said, “...It really is so hard to believe it. I know it’s true, but still...”

At that moment, he was reminded of something that happened a week ago, when he had taken on his current job.

◆◆◆

A Week Before, a Certain Place in Caldina

Zhang, the head of the Caldinian branch of the Huang He mafia called “Mirage,” was having a nightmare.

In it, he saw his battle against a flying blue robot.

He saw how it destroyed the five dragons that were his namesake as well as the crystallization of all his power and technique.

Even after giving it everything he had, he was unable to harm the robot — while the robot’s weaponry blew off his right arm.

“...Ah!”

That was when he woke up.

The nightmare had left him sweating all over. He tried to get up and wipe the sweat from his body, but...

“What is this?”

...he found himself bound to the bed he was lying on.

He then examined the state of his body.

His skin was covered in wounds. Most were marks left by his many days of fighting, but some were completely new to him.

And most importantly, his right arm was missing from the elbow down.

“...I see. So that was no dream.” Zhang realized then that he’d somehow survived his staggering defeat against The Blue Sky Songstress.

Most of his newer wounds showed signs of treatment with Potions or healing magic, but it seemed like whoever had taken care of him had no means of restoring his arm.

He then looked around to examine his surroundings.

He was in a small but hygienic room, highly reminiscent of a hospital. If you ignored the fact that he was bound to the bed, it was a fitting place for someone in his current state.

However, he didn’t recognize the room at all.

If this is a sickroom...who is it that helped me? he wondered. At first, Zhang thought it must have been one of his subordinates, but that was impossible. If he had been defeated by AR-I-CA, the others must’ve suffered the same fate.

It also couldn’t be another criminal organization. Zhang had often used his combat-capable status to exercise authority over the other criminal leaders in Hermine. If they found him on the verge of death, they would not have helped him — they would gladly finish him off instead.

A kindly citizen, then...? No, that’s the least likely thing of all, he thought before chuckling in self-derision.

His life was definitely not one of virtue. There was no way fate would grace him with salvation at the hands of a benevolent stranger.

In the end, he failed to guess who saved him, and eventually...

“Yo. You awake, Zhang Zangqi?”

...someone entered the room, calling his name.

It was a man, and at first glance it was obvious that he was part of the societal underworld.

First of all, he was clad in a fashionable gray suit. There was no country in Infinite Dendrogram where such suits were worn by upstanding individuals. This kind of clothing only existed in this world because certain Masters had them custom-made.

Over the suit, he wore a trench coat in a strange style, suggesting to Zhang that it was a UBM MVP reward.

And finally, there was a gangster-like hat on top of his head.

All of this combined would make it obvious that he engaged in illegal acts.

At a glance, he wasn’t very tall — about 160 centimetels — and he had a young face that made him look no older than twenty, but that only made his threatening aura more intense by contrast.

The crest on the back of his left hand, showing interlocking gears, was proof that he was a Master.

As he observed him, Zhang also realized something else about the newcomer.

This man...is far stronger than I...and perhaps even The Blue Sky Songstress.

In his current state, he wasn’t even able to determine the extent of this Master’s power.

“Can ya talk?” he asked.

“...I can,” Zhang answered.

“That so? Let’s start with names, then. I’m Rascal the Bloodonyx. Though, I guess ‘The Weapon’ works better for you.”

“Ah?!” The name filled Zhang with shock.

Everyone in Caldina’s criminal underworld knew this name.

The Weapon, Rascal the Bloodonyx — the Superior who made a living exploring ruins and selling the items he discovered. He was especially well-known for his weapons, with some of his finds having made it into the hands of truly infamous criminal organizations.

He was especially well-known for destroying ruins after he was done with them. That was a crime in every country, and he was already on every wanted list for it...but no one had defeated him so far.

Besides that...

“Now, as ya probably know, I’m the sub-leader of the clan known as ‘IF.’”

...he was also a core member of the clan whose membership consisted solely of wanted Superiors. With the leader, King of Crime, currently in the gaol, Rascal here was functionally at the top of it.

“IF...”

“Yeah. The clan that was supposed to take the UBM treasure Orb from Huang He off ya hands.”

Indeed, that had been the plan. Zhang’s role had been to receive the Orb from the main branch in Huang He and give it to IF to create a bond between their groups.

He wasn’t told what the groups would do afterwards, but...

“...I am sorry.”

“Hm?”

“The Orb was taken from me... I cannot complete the exchange.” Zhang had used the Orb during the battle against The Blue Sky Songstress, but he’d been defeated by her regardless, resulting in the loss of both his arm and the Orb. “But...please! Take my life if you must, but please consider making another deal with Mirage!”

Zhang believed that he couldn’t let his failure be the cause of a conflict between IF and the organization to which he’d dedicated his life. Mirage was the greatest criminal organization in Huang He, but having faced a Superior himself, he now knew too well that Mirage stood no chance against an entire group of them.

Thus, he tried to prevent that by offering up his own life.

“I see... I’ll just get right to the point and say that we can’t make deals with Mirage anymore.”

Rascal’s words almost sent Zhang into despair, but...

“That’s ’cause Mirage doesn’t exist anymore.”

...he then said something Zhang couldn’t even understand.

Rascal then began telling Zhang about what happened over the two weeks he’d spent unconscious.

He told him about how Huang He had gotten serious about dismantling Mirage.

About how Dancing Princess, Huili and her Huili Yuminjun — Huili’s Army of Fools — had destroyed every Mirage base in Huang He.

About how even the strongest among them, including The Fang, had been either killed or arrested, and their leader had been captured as well.

And about how, by this point, the prosecutions and executions must’ve already finished.

Zhang’s first reaction was silence. Then, having been freed from the bed, he covered his face with his still-healthy left arm...and wept.

He wept from sadness over the destruction of the organization he had given his life to, his own powerlessness to do anything about it, and his guilt over the possibility that things might have turned out differently if he hadn’t lost against The Blue Sky Songstress.

“Zhang Zangqi... I know you’re having a moment, but can I keep talking?” Rascal asked.

“...Yes,” Zhang said, looking at him with reddened eyes. “You saved my life. It would be more fitting for me to listen to your words than to lament my foolishness.”

“Actually, I ain’t the one that saved ya. It was the other sub-leader — the one who was gonna make the trade with you. She picked ya up and told me to look after ya.”

The sub-leader in question — King of Thieves, Zeta — was no longer in Caldina. She’d left the country to get involved in the conflict between Altar and Dryfe to the west.

“I see... But that doesn’t change the fact that I am indebted to you,” said Zhang.

“Well, it’s fine if ya think that way. Anyhow, to get to the point, we saved ya because we want ya to join us.”

“...What?” That was so out of the blue that Zhang couldn’t believe his ears.

“Not as an official member, though,” Rascal continued. “In IF, we only take Superiors who are on wanted lists. It’s part of the ‘brand,’ so to speak... Even with that limit, we’ve got dumbasses who misuse their damn powers, though. Haah...” He let out a fatigued sigh as he thought about something.

Zhang didn’t have the slightest idea what it was that Rascal found so draining.

“Sorry about that,” Rascal said. “Anyway, back to the point — I want ya to be a ‘supporting member’ for the clan. You won’t be an official part of it, but you’ll have to assist us with this and that. Most of these supporting members are tians, and we got a pretty good number of them.”

“...But right now, I have nothing. I’ve lost my organization and my subordinates.”

“Your technique and level haven’t gone anywhere. There’s exceptions, sure, but Masters are generally below tians when it comes to technique. We want you, yourself.”

Having been defeated by The Blue Sky Songstress and seen his organization destroyed, Zhang had lost all confidence in his abilities — and yet Rascal sincerely solicited his aid.

“...If you just want my Superior Job, I can take my life. You will know exactly when Great Soul Daoshi can be taken again, giving IF the advantage in the ensuing race to find it.”

“No, that wouldn’t be good for us. We’ve got no one who can take the job, so if ya die, it’ll probably go to some other Master. If that happens, we’ll never have it again. That’ll be no good at all.”

Rascal was basically saying that if they had a Master who could fulfill the job’s conditions, they might’ve already let Zhang die, but that didn’t really bother him.

“So, what will become of me? Should I just be locked up until you find someone who can take Great Soul Daoshi?”

“That’d be a waste of human resources. Like I said, our group wants you. We can always use people.”

“Why? Why would a group made up of Superiors insist on hiring a mere tian?”

“...Yeah. I suppose I should’ve opened up about that,” Rascal said, looking Zhang straight in the eye.

Then, he slowly began revealing the very foundation of the Illegal Frontier.

“Our goal as IF is to...”

◆

Ten minutes later, Rascal finished telling Zhang all about their intentions.

“And that’s what we’re planning to do.” Zhang silently processed what he had been told...and it all added up to him.

He also understood why IF had tried to make a deal with Mirage.

I see. It does make sense. This explains the actions of both Mirage and IF, he thought.

Through his line of work, Zhang had maxed out Truth Discernment, so he knew that Rascal wasn’t lying.

In fact, he didn’t even need the skill to know that. The experience gained from dealing with scores of crooks was enough for him to know that Rascal was saying nothing but the truth.