After reaching the center of the destruction taking place, White Heart landed on the street followed by Alex who ran up behind her.
"Okay, who's the dumbass messing up my nation!?" Asked White Heart as she summoned her axe while frowning.
When the smoke from the last explosion cleared out, two people appeared.
One was Underling, and the other was a girl with shorter, messier blue hair similar to White Heart's.
She had a few bangs and side parts with very long strands of hair over her right shoulder that reached down to her chest.
One odd thing was her eyes, as they were bright orange and seemed lifeless. (Couldn't find a photo with orange eyes. This was the best I could do. 😭)
She wore a white suit like outfit resembling a bathing suit with pink on the outer parts and neck, and long gloves with a thick pink line going down the center and at the top.
Her boots were long and white with pink lining and pink bottoms.
"Rom!?" Said White Heart with a tone that seemed more like her human self rather than her HDD one.
Alex looked at her, then at the CPU supposed to be Rom with shock.
"T-That's Rom!?"
"That's it! Keep destroying everything!" Said Underling with excitement.
"Destroy, destroy." Replied Rom with an emotionless tone before raising her staff and causing even more explosions.
White Heart and Alex quickly approached them, causing Underling to notice their presence.
"Ah! It's the CPU and the kid!" She said while taking a step back.
"Rom!?"
When hearing her name, the CPU candidate turned around to face her elder sister, but didn't say a single thing.
"The heck are you doing, you idiot!?"
Rom didn't answer her sister's question as she simply stood silent, looking at her.
"No use you broad, your baby sister is now my lackey." Said Underling with a grin.
"You bastard! What the hell did you to Rom!?"
"Just a little mind control."
"Mind control?" Asked White Heart before realizing what she meant "You brainwashed my sister!?"
"The shares being so low made it real easy to twist her mind around."
After hearing what had been done to her little sister, White Heart clenched her axe so strongly that Alex thought the handle would break at any moment.
"You bitch, I'm gonna kill you!"
"Whoa, not so fast…If you try to attack me, your baby sister here will protect me with her life."
As Underling said that, Rom stood in front of her and aimed her staff at White Heart.
"R-Rom!?"
Seeing the two struggling about how to solve the riddle placed in front of them, the underling began to laugh.
"Ah man, this is so awesome! I get to destroy Lowee AND see the CPUs kill each other!"
"You think this is a joke? Making family fight one another!?" Asked Alex to the underling.
"I'm getting a real laugh outta it, that's for sure!" Said Underling.
This current situation really struck a personal accord with Alex, as he struggled to keep his emotions in check before he took a deep sigh, collecting his thoughts and calming down.
"I see…Then answer me something."
Underling opened her eyes and looked at Alex, whose eyes were closed.
"Rom's stopping Blanc from killing you…" He said as he unsheathed his sword before opening his eyes to look at the underling, pointing his sword at her."But who's stopping me from doing that?"
"Eh?"
Seeing the angered eyes, Underling's expression paled as she took a step back.
She could tell those were the eyes of someone willing to kill her in a way that would definitely hurt like hell without any qualms or regrets.
Truth to be told, even White Heart sweat dropped when seeing Alex's eyes.
She did say she'd kill Underling, but probably would just beat her senseless, then lock her up or something after cooling off.
'Holy crap, this kid's seriously going to kill me if I stay here!' She thought while sweat dropping.
Staying would surely get her killed, and even if she survived, Trick would get her head for losing Rom.
Without much time to think Underling quickly turned her head and looked at Rom, deciding to do what she did best.
"Hey you, we're getting out of here! Move it!"
"Yes."
Underling quickly turned tail and ran away with Rom following her.
"The hell do you think you're going!?" Said White Heart while she and Alex ran after them.
Suddenly, Rom turned around to face them and raised her staff, creating a barrier of ice that blocked their path.
White Heart easily destroyed the barrier with a hit or two but that gave Underling and Rom enough time to gain some distance, disappearing among the smoke and destruction they caused early.
"Damn it! Where did they go!?" Shouted White Heart.
Unfortunately, the two had lost track of them as they decided to return to the castle for now.
[The Next Day]
White Heart flew while holding Alex's arm who, although was hanging at a very high altitude, didn't feel vertigo or fear since he could feel her holding his forearm tightly.
While flying, the young man recalled the conversation they had with Mina after returning to the castle last night.
"Brainwashing a CPU!? That's a capital offense!" She said with indignation after hearing about what happened.
"Those ASIC bastards don't care about laws. They only care about tearing the world apart." Said White Heart, feeling infuriated.
"Why brainwash a CPU tough?" Asked Alex, who now had cooled off a bit.
"Ain't it obvious? To piss me off!" Shouted White Heart.
"Lady Blanc, I think his question makes sense." Said the Oracle "As evil or twisted as their intentions might be, the ASIC is very calculative with their plans and resources. They wouldn't go through the trouble or effort of altering a CPUs memory unless it had some deeper objective behind it."
After hearing her oracle's thoughts, White Heart tried to focus on thinking carefully about why the ASIC would need a CPU.
It was then that she recalled something that required a CPU, something ancient and dangerous.
"The mascot's seal!"
"The what?" Asked Alex while turning his head to look at her.
"The mascot's seal is a seal made using the power of Lowee's mascot many years ago to lock away an army of war machines created by Arfoire herself." Explained the Oracle.
"You mean, like the Killachine from Leanbox?" Said Alex.
"Precisely, but these are said to be far stronger, and there are probably hundreds of them." Said Mina.
"What does Rom have to do with that?"
"To undo the seal, you need the power of a CPU. Even if Rom is still just a Candidate, she's still a CPU capable of breaking the seal."
"Then we need to find her fast!" Said White Heart.
"Wait!"
White Heart and Alex both turned and were about to leave, until the Oracle called out to them.
She approached Alex and gave him a small Plumbob-shaped sapphire colored stone.
"What's this?" He asked while holding it with his fingers.
"It's a Share Crystal." She said.
"T-This small thing is a Share Crystal?" He asked in disbelief.
Alex was surprised, not by the crystal itself, but by the size of it. It was probably slightly larger than a pebble at most.
"Don't let its size fool you. This is the solidification of many Shares."
"What do I do with it?"
"Once you find Rom, use the crystal on her." Explained Mina. "Since the low level of shares in her body were the factor that made her mind easy to manipulate, increasing them should have the opposite effect."
Back to the present time, Alex used his free arm to reach into his pocket and take out the Share Crystal as he looked at it for a moment while his mind began to wander.
"Hey. You better not drop that." Said Lowee's CPU while looking at him.
Unfortunately, the young boy's mind was somewhere else at the moment and hardly paid attention to her.
White Heart looked at him, noticing he was getting lost in thought so she decided to snap him back into reality the only way she knew how, by shouting at him.
"Hey!"
It seemed to work, as Alex quickly reacted to it by snapping out of his train of thought, although this caused the Share Crystal to slip off of his fingers.
"Whoa!" He said as he quickly reached a couple of times out to grab it, and caused White Heart to lose balance.
"H-Hey! Don't move around like that!" She said while trying to regain control. "We're gonna fall!"
After some slight turbulence, Lowee's CPU managed to regain a stable control while Alex caught the share crystal and sighed with relief.
"That was close." He said before raising his head to look up at White Heart. "Hey, don't go shouting like that. I nearly dropped it."
"That's what I was warning you about! You're the one that started wiggling around!" Snarled the angry CPU.
A moment of silence fell between the two of them while Alex both of them looked forward again before White Heart spoke again.
"Hey...Alex."
"What?"
"Last night, you were pretty pissed off. It was the most I've seen you upset, and you emitted a cold aura like that of a killer. Apologies if this a personal question, but are you okay? It seemed like you took a personal offense to what that pale brat had done." She said.
Alex took a moment to respond before taking a deep sigh.
"I'm fine. Sorry about last night. It's just that, just the thought of family members being forced to come to blows against one another doesn't sit right with me. That's all." Said Alex.
White Heart knew that there was probably more that he wasn't explaining but she felt it'd be best to leave it at that.
"This is gonna sound weird coming from me, but you need to keep you cool." She said while looking at him. "Getting fired up is okay, but getting too angry will get you killed."
Alex looked at her for a moment in silence.
What White Heart was saying was true since he knew that constantly being driven by emotions wasn't sustainable and would eventually end in disaster. The fact she wanted to give him that advice was quite kind of her.
"Blanc…"
White Heart lowered her head and looked at Alex again, this time slightly surprised he called her by her name.
"Hm? What?"
"Thank you..."
White Heart's expression was one of shock for a bit before she raised her head to look forward again.
"…You're welcome" She said while trying to keep her slight blush from being seen, as the two approached the last reported sighting of the ASIC.
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Chapter 18: Complete