Chapter 6.2

The end of Route X

Tentacles sprouted from Seed's back, their pointed tips turned toward us.

Our enemy's face was still blank. As he'd said, he wouldn't waste energy attacking first. When it came to striking back, though, I was sure he wouldn't hesitate.

"Natsunagi and Saikawa, shelter behind the pillars!" I called over my shoulder. Then Charlie and I stepped forward.

"What's our plan?" Charlie glanced at me. "Same as always."

"Meaning we don't have one. Right."

Even as we prepared for battle, we joked with each other. Except for that blank year, this was how we'd always done things.

"Do you think she'll say I did well?" Charlie's murmur sounded just a little younger than usual.

I didn't have to ask who "she" was. Charlie was always focused on the great Ace Detective, a girl who'd let her back do all the talking.

"I think I was jealous of you, Kimizuka." Without sparing me so much as a look, Charlie darted toward the enemy. I tightened my grip on my gun and we split up, running at Seed from different directions.

"I ran after Ma'am, and you walked beside her, Kimizuka," said Charlie. "I got the feeling we'd never be equal as long as I lived…and I envied you. But…I realized it was all right that way. After all…" The agent sprinted across the battlefield, evading the tentacles that closed in on her, her blond ponytail flying. "As long as I was a step behind Ma'am, I could guard her back!" she shouted.

Then her golden sword slashed through the incoming tentacles. She took a big step toward the enemy, and—

"—! Stop!"

Behind us, Saikawa screamed. Her left eye must have picked up on something.

Just then, a violent tremor hit, jolting us vertically and side to side all at once. "…! An earthquake?" Charlie stopped in her tracks.

No. This was no earthquake. This was—

"Surface of the Planet Exploding Seeds— My seeds have already been sown across this world."

As Seed spoke, countless briars grew out of the floor and walls of the parking garage. The building had been under his control all along.

"…Dammit!"

The brambles tangled around me. I shot through them, but there was no end to them. Swarms of briars were targeting Saikawa and Natsunagi as well. Natsunagi had her musket, and she was managing to deal with them somehow. Saikawa wasn't good with weapons, though, and the thorny plants surrounded her easily.

"Yui!"

Charlie, who'd freed herself faster than any of us, headed to Saikawa. Her golden sword mowed down briars right and left, almost in a dance; when she'd cut them all down, Charlie reached in to help the other girl—but that's when it happened.

"! No, Charlie, don't!"

Saikawa had seen something else with that left eye and shoved Charlie away.

And then.

" !"

One of Seed's tentacles darted out of a blind spot and grazed her neck. "Saikawa!"

From this distance, I couldn't tell how deep that wound was, but its location couldn't have been worse. Bright blood flowed from the right side of her neck.

"…Huh? That's weird. I managed to save Bat that way once." Saikawa had a hand to her neck. Her face was pale, but she still tried to force a smile. Her left eye could read combat better than any of us…but that didn't mean she could physically keep up.

"Yui…!"

Just as Charlie tried to run to her again, the floor around Saikawa crumbled

away. A massive tangle of briars shot up from the floor below, swallowing her, and she vanished before she could say a word.

"Saikawa…!" "Yui!"

My voice and Natsunagi's overlapped…but there was no way for us to reach our friend now.

"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!"

Charlie was the first one to act. She ran at Seed, her blond hair disheveled.

"You said that vessel was your friend? It's incredible that you'd call yourselves 'friends' when you can't protect her properly."

Apparently, Seed hadn't intended to hurt Saikawa, either. He turned cold eyes on Charlie. Then a tentacle that grew from a spot near his spine turned silver, like steel, and countered the golden blade Charlie swung at him. The result was

—

"...…Oh."

The next thing I knew, Charlie was in the air.

I heard her sword snap, and then a duller crunch. A brief sob escaped her, the steel tentacle wrapped around her waist like a whip, and—

"Humans really are fragile."

He flung her through the plants that covered the building and out of the parking garage.

"…How far is it from here to the ground?" I felt myself break out in full-body goose bumps as my blood ran cold.

If she slammed into the ground from a height like this, while she couldn't even attempt to break her fall, Charlie would—

"Natsunagi! Go after her!"

The only words that came out of my mouth were predictable. I didn't even know whether I was talking about Saikawa or Charlie. I just tagged the Ace Detective with the simple, all-important request to save our friends. In exchange

—

"Seed!"

Without waiting for Natsunagi's response, I charged Seed alone, Magnum in hand. Thanks to Charlie, all the briars that had blocked the way were gone.

"Two to go, hmm?"

Tentacles swarmed from Seed's back, reaching for me.

Draw on all your past experience, limit yourself to lethal attacks, drill the enemy in the throat with your bullets. That was all I needed to do right now.

I felt no pain. Compared to the pain of losing somebody precious, this was nothing. With Seed right in front of me and my black gun in my right hand, I—

"Yes. That is what it means to hone one's survival instinct."

By the time I heard the enemy say that, I was already lying on cold concrete. Wait, was it the floor that was cold, or was it me? I must have taken a solid hit from one of those tentacles; my body wasn't moving well. Had he hit me in a bad spot, or was it because I'd lost too much blood?

"It doesn't matter."

Nothing was going to happen if I didn't get back on my feet. Then I had to take another run at the primordial seed and destroy it. Even if my body was heavy as lead, I had to move, right now.

"—Move." I knew that.

I knew, but my body wouldn't listen to me anymore. I didn't even feel anxious about it now. That was how hazy my mind had gone.

This was where my story would end.

I wouldn't defeat Seed and wipe out SPES, and I'd never find a future where I reclaimed my dearest partner. I didn't have the strength left to flip this reality in my favor.

"—So this is it, huh?"

Realizing I was about to die, I got back up.

For the first time, Seed's expression twisted slightly.

How was I still able to stand? Even I didn't know. Had swallowing that seed given me astonishing physical powers and recovery abilities? Or had standing on the brink of death simply flooded me with adrenaline?

Or maybe…

"Is it because Siesta promised?"

She'd never let me see her cry. Even so, with tears streaming down her face, she'd sworn she'd come see me again someday. Until I truly reunited with Siesta, I wasn't allowed to die.

"That's my survival instinct."

With trembling hands, I aimed my gun at the enemy.

"It's all right."

Just then, a gentle sensation enfolded my back.

I didn't even need to look to know it was Natsunagi. Nagisa Natsunagi was hugging me from behind.

"There's something you have to do, Kimizuka. Remember? So sleep for a little while."

Her soft voice soaked into my brain like hypnosis. I struggled to respond, but my eyelids were growing heavy, and they wouldn't let me.

"Natsu…nagi…"

I crumpled to the pavement. Just before I fell asleep—I heard the girl with blazing red eyes make a declaration to the supervillain.

"I, the Ace Detective, will defeat this enemy of the world."

 Proxy detective: Nagisa Natsunagi

"That personality is able to make full use of my seed?"

Seed, who was standing just up ahead, looked down at me coldly. He'd realized I'd used Hel's word-soul power.

"So you can tell me apart, then."

Was it because this body was a vessel he'd put a lot of personal time and effort into raising? In that case, he might really resent me for being defective… Well. Not that that had anything to do with anything at this point. I'd be fighting this man either way. After one final look at Kimizuka's sleeping face, I turned my back on him and straightened up.

"Where did you take Yui?"

"Making her into a proper vessel will require preparations."

Seed didn't give me a direct answer. However, it did sound as if Yui was still alive somewhere. If Seed planned to use her as his vessel, he couldn't let her body die—which meant we could still save her.

"Do you intend to obstruct me as well?" Seed asked dispassionately. He'd seen my grip tighten on the musket. "I'm aware that two additional identities sleep inside you. Do you mean to fight without their aid?"

He meant Hel and Siesta. Those two had originally been Seed's best candidate vessels. However, their minds had been condensed into one body, thanks to Siesta—and Seed had lost both of them at once.

Since Hel and Siesta's strong personalities already lay dormant in this body, if he tried to take it by force, I—the outer vessel—would probably shatter. Knowing this, Seed had given up on making this body his vessel. Which was why—

"Yes, I'll be the one to fight you. After all, if I switched with Hel now, you'd try to take this body again, wouldn't you?"

The fact that Hel and Siesta's powerful minds were dormant inside me was what made it possible to keep Seed out. I was sure I wouldn't be able to fill that role. I'd just have to protect this body from the outside.

"Even if it gives you a disadvantage in combat, even if you risk death, you'll never become my vessel. Is that what you're saying?"

No matter what, we couldn't let Seed acquire a vessel. If he conquered the sun, the one weakness we knew about, our chances of defeating him would be nearly nonexistent. That meant I couldn't let him steal this body here. —But.

"You have the wrong idea about one thing." As I spoke, I smiled.

Even at a time like this, that was what the Ace Detective would have done.

"I won't let you make me your vessel, but I don't have the slightest intention of dying, either."

Then I pointed my musket at Seed and pulled the trigger. Predictably, the enemy's tentacles blocked the bullet before it reached him. —But that was exactly what I'd wanted.

"Now your tentacles can never attack me again."

It was the red bullet Siesta had used long ago, the type she'd put her blood into. Anyone shot with those was unable to defy their master. Now Seed couldn't attack me—or Siesta's heart inside me.

"I see. After I defeated that creature, it learned a trick like that?" Seed temporarily lowered the tentacles that extended from his back. "However, I originally created that system by recombining genetics, in order to prevent conflict with my own kind. There are any number of ways to counter it."

Seed sent a tentacle speeding toward a spot above my head. "...!"

The attack struck the ceiling, and a big fluorescent light fell toward me. I managed to dodge it, but shards of broken glass stabbed my legs.

"…So you'll just aim at other objects, not at me." Seed was planning to attack me indirectly.

"As a rule, I prefer not to waste energy. However, I've just secured a new vessel. I'll do my duty as a parent and prune the defective variants before I go," he said indifferently.

Then he sprouted four tentacles from his back. They struck at the walls and ceiling around me, undulating as if they had wills of their own.

"—Just you try and hit me," I hissed, dodging falling fluorescent lights and flying pillar fragments. Maybe it was because Hel had used this body for several years, or maybe she was fighting alongside me even now; I kept evading the enemy's attacks with moves I was sure no normal human could pull off.

"This is for Charlie."

Using the clouds of dust as cover, I slipped through his attacks and fired a bullet. It struck Seed's shoulder squarely, and a green fluid spurted out… But even then, his expression didn't flicker. He tilted his head at an unnatural angle.

"You're avenging the death of your fellow human?"

"It would take more than that to kill Charlie." I leaned against a pillar, catching my breath. "Speaking of vengeance, though…"

I loaded the next attack into the musket; it had been modified to be easier to load than normal. "I'll give you back the pain Alicia felt."

Crouching low again, I raced toward the enemy. "Fundamentally, then, your actions are based in sentiment?" "…Ow...!"

The next thing I knew, briars had grown thickly under me, their thorns stabbing into my feet. While I was pinned down, the enemy's tentacles grabbed a nearby abandoned car and hurled it at me.

"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!"

I shot through the brambles at my feet, freeing myself, and then— "Move, feet!"

Using word-soul to give myself an order, I forced my bloody feet into motion.

The enormous hunk of metal missed me by a hair.

Immediately after that, there was an explosion. The car had been dashed into the wall, and as it crumpled, gasoline leaked out and ignited. The parking garage was overgrown with plants, and in moments, the whole place was in flames.

"…! Who cares?" I wiped away the sweat and blood that ran down my forehead, then loaded my gun again. These were the last of my bullets.

How could I beat him? Up until now, I'd used the surge of passion inside me as my weapon. Kimizuka had counted on my emotions, too. It wouldn't matter what sort of appeal I made to this enemy, though. He didn't even understand the concept of feelings. What could I do against an opponent like that?

"Let me ask you one more time." Just then, as if he'd read my mind, Seed spoke to me coldly on that fiery battlefield. "Why do you humans put so much stock in emotions? Sometimes you choose actions based in emotion over your own survival instinct, even though that should be the most fundamental desire of any living creature."

He didn't even blink, and he wasn't asking out of idle curiosity. Seed was asking me, a human, a question he must have had ever since he fell to this planet.

"—So you didn't notice."

Even though he'd had loads of chances.

I bit my lip, standing in the flames, and then I shouted at Seed. "Alicia tried to protect Siesta and me, ignoring the danger to herself—that's friendship! Hel

always stayed close to you and did her very best at everything—that's sadness! Yui thought of her parents, and her parents constantly put their only daughter first—that's love! Charlie inherited Siesta's last wish after she died and kept carrying out missions all on her own—that's dedication! Albert risked every facet of his own life to save his little sister—that's devotion! Siesta died, entrusting everything to Kimizuka, to me, and to her friends—that's passion! All of that— They're all human emotions. Having them is what makes us human!"

Right now, that was the very best answer I could give.

"I see. I didn't understand that in the slightest. It's probably similar to the way humans can't perceive insect calls as intelligible speech."

In the midst of the flames, Seed's expression didn't change.

"All right. I've finished recombining my genes. I should be able to attack you now."

Even as we fought, Seed had been manipulating his DNA. The tips of his tentacles turned toward me again. Right behind me, Kimizuka lay on the floor, fast asleep. I couldn't run.

"...!"

A minute ago, there was just one person I hadn't told Seed about. My partner and assistant—Kimihiko Kimizuka.

Siesta was more precious to him than anyone else, and he was trying to get her back, even if it meant walking into territory that was taboo to humans. It hadn't seemed right for me to say what sort of emotion that was, here and now. The word that best describes it may not even exist.

That meant Kimizuka would have to find the answer on his own someday. He might resort to forbidden methods and make the whole world his enemy, maybe even end up fighting the Tuners—but he would regain Siesta. He'd get her back someday for sure. I knew he would. After all, I'd already found the route that led to that future.

"Are you sure that's okay?"

Out of nowhere, I felt as if a voice had echoed in my mind.

It was the question I'd been asked two days ago, at the top of the highest clock tower in England, by a girl who could see the future.

After she'd made Kimizuka leave and it was just the two of us, she told me about the distortion that would result if we overturned a predetermined future, attempting the taboo of resurrecting the dead.

Just as there could only ever be one person in the world with the gifts of an

Oracle, it was possible that the world would only allow one Ace Detective. So if we created a future where Siesta came back to life, I'd be—

"Yes, it's fine."

Back then, I hadn't been able to respond to the question immediately, but I had an answer now.

"I mean, it's true, isn't it?" The role I'd been given.

The mission I had to carry out here and now. "—I'm the proxy detective."

I'd decided as much a year ago. "….......... !"

The next moment, Seed's tentacle ran through my stomach. ".........gk, ah,........ kh!"

Pain fiercer than anything I'd ever felt broke over me, and I almost blacked out. When the tentacle retracted, deep-red blood fell in large, noisy spatters. That wound was probably going to be fatal.

—Even so. "Run, legs!"

Using my word-soul power one more time, I gave myself a firm order. Run, run.

The pain doesn't matter. Forget about everything except going forward. "Maybe I'm no match for you!"

I'd spent all my time in a hospital bed, and I hadn't even been able to sprint a hundred meters. Now I had legs that could run, and a reason I needed to. I wouldn't stop.

"But someday, someone will cut you down!"

Facing forward, mustering my last strength, I swore that oath to the enemy of the world. Then, hiding myself in the black smoke and the flames, I crept up on him. I was holding not the musket, but my other weapon.

"Maybe the idol from Japón will talk you down with a song, or the blond agent will dominate you with her fighting skills!"

It was one of my other partner's favorite swords; I'd found it at the test facility

just before we left the SPES hideout yesterday. Lend me strength, I prayed, then squeezed its hilt tightly.

"Or maybe a bland-looking boy in a jacket will change your mind with his clumsy words, or maybe a white-haired Ace Detective will demolish you with an ingenious scheme no one else could ever think up!"

Two meters left between me and the enemy. As I burst out of the black smoke with Hel's borrowed strength—I swung the red saber at my enemy's neck.

"I won't get to see that future play out—but I can say this much! There will never be a future where you rule this planet and conquer mankind!"

At the end of my final battle, what I'd accomplished was… "…Not enough, huh?"

With just a few centimeters left before it severed my enemy's head, the red saber had been blocked by a tentacle shaped like a sword. —And then.

"You too, Hel?"

As my consciousness faded, I heard Seed whisper those words, very faintly. "We're about to be interrupted," he said. Almost immediately, I caught the

distant pulse of a helicopter. It was reinforcements—and, since Seed had already achieved his main objective and secured a vessel, he simply vanished.

"…I guess this is it."

Apparently, I couldn't trick my brain with word-soul any longer. I tottered, then crumpled to the ground.

"Kimi…zuka…"

In the midst of the blazing flames, I crawled toward Kimizuka's prone body.

There wasn't much oxygen. I'd lost too much blood. My grip on my consciousness was slipping, and I couldn't seem to get enough air. Even so, I stretched my hand, my fingertips, toward him.

"Tha…nk…"

I couldn't finish the sentence.

However, at the end, I'd managed to do what I'd always dreamed of: I'd become somebody. Feeling just a little satisfied, I fell asleep.

My name is Nagisa.

Nagisa Natsunagi, proxy detective.

My last wish kept the detective's mission from dying out, and it will be

inherited by the next person to fight.