episode_0061

The Violets surrounded the foe all at once.

A rapier imbued with white sword aura and a sword imbued with red sword aura clashed. After several sword strikes, the red sword aura broke.

As the sword broke, a spinning kick shattered No. 32’s head. Four spearheads simultaneously stabbed like stakes, one after another. Spear shafts broke one by one. Nos. 56, 27, and 62, who were fighting back, had their necks severed, hearts pierced, and wrists cut off in a moment of carelessness.

“Hang on!”

The Violets who had flanked from behind clung onto Martina. Using the sacrifice of two others as a stepping stone, No. 54 grabbed the foe’s left arm.

“You insect-like bitch! Get off!”

“Argh!”

It backfired. Martina easily peeled off No. 54, who was clinging to her left arm, and threw her away. It was a level of strength comparable to hydraulic machinery.

The thrown No. 54 became an involuntary human projectile, shattering the frontal formation that surrounded Martina.

Martina charged through the gap in the broken formation, and the Violets, swept away by the impact, soared towards the curtained ceiling.

“Shoot! Shoot!”

As the foe disrupted the formation, the Violets immediately scattered in all directions and took out their replicated crossbows again. Allied casualties were ignored.

Indiscriminate crossbow fire rained down, and bolts flew everywhere. The Violets in the bolts’ trajectory braced themselves for friendly fire and rushed at Martina.

They had to impede the foe’s movements as much as possible.

“Ugh!”

It worked! Martina leaped back and retreated. Was it the effect of the bolt barrage?

Large and small grazing wounds appeared on the foe’s cheeks, arms, and legs. Not a single direct hit landed.

They poured so much fire, and not a single hit?

“Hmph… so it’s all about innate abilities, I guess.”

Martina, who was catching her breath, muttered. Sensing a presence, Martina turned her head. No. 18, who had flown away earlier without dying, was whimpering on the floor.

The foe stomped on No. 18’s head. With a crunch, No. 18’s head shattered.

“Ugh, is this really a clone? What kind of clone… has so much blood?”

The foe shook their foot as if displeased by stepping on an insect.

“…Well, clone creation, it’s certainly troublesome. There’s a reason you’re so cocky. Most people would be quickly overwhelmed if you pushed with numbers.”

“Oh? Then why don’t you surrender?”

During the momentary lull, the same number of clones that had died were generated again. Their courage surged.

The foe was strong. Stronger than they imagined. There was also the problem that they hadn’t properly fought in person. However, if they accumulated damage little by little, like before…

“Haha? But what to do? I’m not ‘most people’.”

A malicious smile appeared. The sound of tearing air was heard, and No. 95, who was standing nearby, was cut in half.

“You foolish bitch, haven’t you grasped the situation? With such a shallow trick alone, you can’t beat me.”

Sixty Violets advanced.

Five minutes passed.

They changed tactics. Each held a crossbow in one hand and a spear or sword in the other, engaging in skirmishes. Shields couldn’t block the foe’s attacks and only made them sluggish.

Swords shattered. No. 57 died. When they swung a spear, the foe stepped on it and leaped over. As the foe leaped into the air, they aimed their crossbows like automatons and unleashed a barrage of shots. Fiery red bolts embroidered the air.

-Whizz! Whizz whizz whizz!

They didn’t hit. Some twisted their bodies in mid-air to evade, and some blocked with their swords.

They had so many crossbows, poured so many arrows, why couldn’t they land a hit?!

The foe landed on the ground and charged without rest. They were unilaterally defeated one by one. No. 37 was cut vertically from head to groin. The rapier was abnormally sharp.

Ten minutes passed.

They tried changing tactics again. This time, they clustered defensively once more.

-Boom!

It was wrong. This time, the foe didn’t engage them head-on. No. 75, who was swinging a hammer from a corner, had their arm severed. Even if they felt no pain, the bleeding remained.

Suddenly, they turned their head and looked outside the arena. Beyond the translucent screen, Irene, sitting in the stands, looked like she wanted to rush out at any moment, not knowing what to do.

Looking at the people around them, the atmosphere was far from good, unlike at the beginning. It seemed they weren’t finding their destruction very entertaining.

They continued to summon clones. They gulped down mana replenishment potions. Attacks didn’t land. Swords shattered, and spear shafts broke.

It’s okay, they could win. Push forward. Push!

Before they knew it, the situation had returned to something similar to the initial standoff. Violets lined up in a row, and Martina stood before them. The arena floor had long since turned crimson. It squelched and felt slick with every step.

The foe also seemed to be getting tired. Their clothes were torn in places, and small scratches had appeared. They must be tired, they thought. With how many of them had died, there was no way the foe wasn’t exhausted.

Martina, with a disgusted expression, shook her sword. A short standoff ensued.

Suddenly, the foe broke the silence.

“There used to be an arcade in the neighborhood where I lived.”

“?”

What was with this sudden reminiscence?

“It was a place filled with old arcade machines. I used to go there often and play crane games for dolls or candy. It was fun.”

“What are you suddenly talking about?”

“Sometimes I’d watch other people play games. There were idiots who’d pile up handfuls of coins and immerse themselves in a game. Stupid boys, you know. Their goal was to clear the final boss or something, they said?”

The foe looked at them and sneered. They felt puzzled by the baseless ridicule.

“But I never once saw those idiots make it to the end of a game. They just wasted all their money in the end.

You know what’s funny? When they failed, they’d just keep putting in coins, with dull, glazed-over eyes. Every day.

‘This time I’ll win! This time it’ll work!’ they’d say. But in the end, they’d fail. Just like someone I know.”

They blinked.

“You understand what I’m talking about, don’t you? That’s you. Yes, you. The idiot pouring coins into an arcade machine!

Did you think if you kept summoning clones and pushing, I’d get exhausted and collapse first? Did you think I wouldn’t see through that shallow trick?”

It felt as if their thoughts had been completely seen through. The foe merely laughed off the Violets’ glaring stares.

“Your sword aura strength is terrible, and your body enhancement ability is practically nonexistent. It’s frankly admirable that you managed to last 15 minutes with such shallow skills.

However, considering you made my idiotic sister even more idiotic, I don’t think I can go easy on you.”

The blade of the red rapier pointed at them.

“Let’s end this now.”

Once again, the foe charged into their formation. It was a speed difficult for the eyes to follow, but they gritted their teeth and prepared to attack.

Yes, their intention was to endlessly insert coins, endlessly insert them, and crush the foe. What was the problem with that? The foe would get tired someday. At that moment, they would stomp them out in a single blow. Definitely…!

Once again, the formation collapsed, they charged, they were broken and crushed. Once again, clones were continuously generated. They surrounded. They charged.

At that moment, an unfamiliar reddish-orange flame flashed from Martina’s rapier.

“….!”

-BOOM!

A fierce wave of flame erupted from the rapier’s blade and struck them.

The moment they, I, were engulfed in flames, they belatedly realized what that rapier, which had been vaguely familiar in their memories, truly was.

, a 5-star weapon obtainable in the Polaris Academy region. It has the characteristic of unleashing powerful area-of-effect flame attacks at the cost of a large amount of mana.

“Retreat…!”

Dozens of Violets, who had been enduring repeated sustained attacks, were swept away in a single strike. The formation collapsed.

“Looks like you’re out of coins. So, how are you going to fight now?”

They couldn’t refute those words.

Overwhelming body enhancement ability, sword aura, powerful weapon, area-of-effect attack capability. How on earth were they supposed to contend with all that?

Mana still remained, and mana replenishment potions were still available. But there was no sign of victory.

“Aaaaah…!”

They rushed forward, filled with frustration. There was nothing else they could do but grit their teeth and charge.

***

For the next five minutes, they continued to charge until all their mana was depleted.

They drank all their mana replenishment potions, and not only that, they even recovered mana by reverse-generating most of their clones, leaving only the minimum number required, scraping the barrel for every last bit.

However, the flame attacks embedded within the Blade of Blazing Flame struck a few more times.

If they dispersed, they could avoid the flames. But then, the clones would be defeated one by one by Martina. The moment they grouped up, flames would strike. It was a dilemma with no escape.

The foe was right. They were just senselessly inserting coins and dying.

“…Even if I kill you, there’s no end! Isn’t it polite for you to just fall quickly at this point?”

Martina’s ragged breathing could be heard. The foe clearly seemed very angry. With over a hundred Violets continuously charging, they could certainly inflict wounds and exhaust her.

Perhaps they could have won, perhaps they could have reached it if they just pushed a little further…

But it wasn’t so. There was almost no way to deliver a decisive blow. It felt like one more step would do it, but a wall blocked them.

In the end, it was a matter of their own skill. This was the end for a fool who relied only on clones.

Now, only three clones remained in the arena. No. 1, panting and rising with a sword in hand; No. 4, sprawled on the floor with a severed leg; and No. 7, with a broken back.

There was no pain, but their body wouldn’t obey. Mana was depleted, and their physical body was exhausted. Martina approached. No. Move. Please.

Their vision slowed. It stiffened. From their weakened gaze, color had drained away.

Frustration began to engrave itself in the eyes of all of them. Lose here? No way? They couldn’t lose like this. Please, no. Move!

What had they done all this time? Lose like this?

They gritted their teeth and pushed their body up. The scenery outside their vision slowly decelerated. Had their weakened eyes lost even the power to distinguish colors? The world slowly turned gray.

In a world drained of color, they floundered like someone on the verge of drowning.

In this time of despair, trapped and frozen like an insect caught in tree sap.

“Fool.”

A small girl in a white dress, Mini Violet, appeared.

“Did you really think you could win? At your level? With terrible sword skills, lacking body enhancement abilities, and no experience?”

I know, I know. But I was angry.

She giggled and ran around inside the arena. No one seemed to perceive her presence. More accurately, the world itself felt as if it had stopped.

She pointed at Martina.

“To lose to a B-grade nobody like this. How disappointing. No. 1… no, No. 1 sister?”

Mini Violet walked up to No. 1, with a playful expression.

“What do you want to do?”

“What do you want to do?” Of course I want to win. But I was too foolish. Irene was right. I shouldn’t have just challenged them blindly. I should have trained, practiced, sparred a little more…

“But if you lose here, your academy life is over, isn’t it? And you won’t even get revenge!”

Mini Violet grabbed No. 1’s head and pulled it down.

“So, I’ll let you win. I’ll give you the result, so just enjoy it.

You won’t even remember that we met anyway.”

Mini Violet whispered like a devil, then lightly kissed No. 1’s forehead.

***

As Martina gained a moment of respite, she wiped the sweat from her brow.

She had realized one thing from this duel: it was dangerous.

If she had been even slightly careless, if that Violet girl had just a little more experience in personal combat, she would have been cornered.

Although each individual ability was terrible due to weak sword aura emission and practically nonexistent body enhancement, the endless human wave tactics exhausted her.

‘Like a cockroach or something…’

Clones that kept generating no matter how many she cut down—she sighed in relief once more at the fact that her weapon was a valuable relic artifact.

If it had been an ordinary sword, the outcome of the duel would have been uncertain. She couldn’t even imagine losing to that arrogant girl in her dreams.

What kind of clone could bleed so much the moment it was cut? She even wondered where the main body was. Seriously, she thought it might be hidden outside and controlled remotely.

It was perplexing. Well, the inside of the arena was a virtual reality, so if it shut down, everything would be null and void.

Still, for a while, she probably wouldn’t be able to eat red food.

‘Oh, they haven’t given up?’

Violet swayed and got up like a puppet whose strings had been cut.

The girl slowly looked around with curious eyes, like a young bird hatching from its egg for the first time. Then she carefully raised the sword she was holding and gazed at it.

Martina, raising her sword and approaching to deliver a final blow, stopped unconsciously.

An instinctively sensed chill made her take a step back.

The Violet before her stared at the sword for a long time as if there was something precious inside it. Like looking into a hand mirror. Indeed, that seemed to be the case.

Violet tilted the sword’s blade this way and that, admiring her reflection. She lightly caressed her face and laughed, or tilted her head, sighing in disappointment as if there was something wrong.

At some point, Violet, who had been admiring her reflection on the blade, smiled brightly as if satisfied.

‘Has she gone insane?’

Martina raised her rapier and brought it down on the foe’s head. A single trajectory would cleave the foe’s head in two.

The blade flew.

-Clang!

The ear-splitting sound of metal clashing—Martina recoiled a few steps back in alarm.

The moment she swung her sword, a counterattack came at a speed so fast that even her mana-enhanced eyes couldn’t perceive it.

‘Certainly… wasn’t her mana depleted?’

Violet could be heard grinding her teeth, seemingly annoyed at being interrupted from what she was doing just moments before. Frowning, Violet looked around to find the source of the problem, then spotted Martina in front of her.

The moment she met those blood-soaked red eyes, Martina felt a chill, an invasive feeling as if she was being stripped bare.

They were not the eyes of a student. She questioned whether this was truly the Violet girl she had just been fighting. These were the eyes of a hungry beast.

“Hmm… who… memory… only part of it came… is that it…? Where have I seen this before… Ah.”

Violet, who had been muttering, smiled happily as if something had come to mind.

“That’s right, it’s been so long it took me a while to recall… Hello, Martina. It’s been five years.”

“…What? What did you say?”

The girl smiled brightly. It was filled with the purity of a child. The kind of malicious purity that tears a butterfly’s wings into shreds, stomps ants to a pulp, and throws a puppy into a pond.

With the red eyes of a predator filled with interest, Violet fixed her gaze on the butterfly whose wings she wanted to tear off.

And she smiled broadly, like a child.

“Shall we play?”

From the sword Violet held, turbid red mana surged forth.