Clôture of Yellow: The Daughter Of Evil

CHAPTER 3, SECTION 2-THE CONCLUSION OF THEIR WISH; SCENE 8

♠ Germaine ~Once Again, In the Lucifenian Palace, "The Hall of Mirrors"~

The life or death struggle with the royal guard continued.

One by one, my allies were falling. But our opponents' numbers were actually diminishing too. If things continued this way, perhaps...we would win!

The problem was that man...Gast Venom. He was a monster beyond any imagining. Mariam had been like that too, but the speed of his sword was unusual. In actuality, the majority of the casualties we'd sustained were by his hand.

"You lot are useless, all of you."

Gast trampled over the bodies of fallen royal guards.

"I can see hesitation in your blades...She might be a beautiful swordswoman, and like an old friend, but faltering in your swordsmanship over your emotions like this...Is this the standard of the Lucifenian royal guard?"

"...You horrible man. I will not forgive your slander of the royal guard!"

Hearing my cry, Gast once again turned to face me.

"Ho ho, you're lukewarm at this yourself. Aren't they your enemies now? ...Ah well, once I kill you, their hesitations will vanish."

Gast pointed his sword towards me.

Before now I too had improved upon my swordsmanship, under the instruction of my father. Dad would only use a real sword when teaching Allen, and for me he would only let me learn enough to defend myself. I was so frustrated with that, I studied on my own, in secret.

But I hadn't had a lot of opportunities to test my skills with another person. This revolution is the first time I've pointed a real sword at other people-and I could tell that my skills weren't to be outdone even against the kingdom's legitimate soldiers.

Would Dad be pleased?

Or would he be angry?

I didn't know. That was something I would never know, now.

-Dad wasn't in this world anymore.

I had to win. For him, and for this country.

But...Was I winning? Against this monster.

For a moment I doubted I was.

-Shing!-

There was the sound of his blade flying through the air. I brought my body back immediately.

Something was fluttering in front of my eyes. My bangs.

"Ho...dodged, did you? Seems you're a little more motivated."

That was close. If I had been just a moment later, my head would have been separated from my body.

"Look here, I'll go more rapidly."

-Shing!-

-Scrape!-

Gast's blade swiped at me several times in quick succession. I continued to dodge...More than that, dodging at all was taking all my might. I didn't have any time to put in a counterattack.

Each time I dodged by a hair, my red armor gained a scratch. Dad, if you were here, what would you do?

In that moment, I remembered a conversation I'd had with Dad at the bar, where he told me about a duel he'd had with a particularly strong opponent. The toughest challenger that he'd ever faced in his battles up until that point...

He was real strong, this one. The speed of his blade was unusual, at any rate. On top of that, he used some mysterious style in his swordplay.

Gast swung his sword in succession, a small smile coming to his face. Was he playing with me? No, little by little he was backing me up to the wall.