In front of the Tabernacle, where he was currently being treated, Ilyce stopped as he felt the creeping noise of every cell in his body.
　Ilyce could accurately recognize herself as a monster.
　That means she doesn't have to worry about her death. None of them could give her the fear that made her whole body bubble up, except for Ars.

　Not because of strength, but because it was practically impossible to do so, her danger sensors remained broken. It would be nice if this wasn't a false alarm, however, her accumulated experience as a mage appealed to her that false alarms were impossible.

　Ilyce turns her head only to raise her gaze.
　A gentle breeze ruffled her hair and made her vision better.

(--!　(What's going on?!)

　His eyes widened, and his gaze was pointed far up in the sky. It was the place where the line of light had passed through earlier.
　Even now, only white smoke was left behind, and a faint sliver of light that could be seen was drawn like a tail. It looked like a crack in the sky.

　But when Ilyce saw it - the light that had been running to split the sky was eroding away from the edges.
　The darkness ate away at the light from the front, which would not be the first thing to happen on a clear day. It enveloped the light and swallowed it up.

　A pitch-black fog swallowed up the edges of Ilyce's vision at a tremendous speed. As if to trace the source from which the light was released, it eroded the light in reverse, finally hiding behind the deposit.

　The black mist, it seemed to be actively swallowing the light rather than passively.
　It's as if it was doing its best to remove the threat from the light, or rather to trace back to the source. It's not something that can be called magic.
　It's a phenomenon beyond description and beyond human understanding. It's an inexplicable disaster.

　But..........
　But............

　In Ilyce's mind, I can think of someone who is capable of dealing with this inexplicable event. Ilyce knows of a power similar to that one. He has seen it firsthand. That's why he was able to arrive at the person he could think of.

(If.....

　Her eyes reflected far more anger than astonishment.
　It was as if he was spitting at the sky, and Ilyce's expression had a deep crease between his eyebrows.

''d*mn it, d*mn it!　Ars, I'm coming in. Things have been going in two or three different directions over here too.


　♢♢　


　It wasn't until more than an hour had passed since they entered that Ilyce came out of the Tabernacle.

　Ars, who was sweating to the point of wetting his entire body, was fanning himself with his hands and sending a breeze into his clothes as he emerged from the Tabernacle. And his shoulders were dropped as if he could not even lift his arms.

　Behind her, Ilyce came out with a tired look on her face, as if she hadn't slept in days. A terrible change from when he entered.
　Not to mention the fact that he was obviously helping.

　One of Ilyce's eyes was twitching slightly, though not in a resentful way.

　And the last one to emerge was Flynn with her young grass-colored hair tied back. Of all of these, she looked like she was about to fall over, her heavy eyelids barely open as she stepped forward. Her body was shaking wildly and her vitality was no longer at the bottom.

　I'm sure you'll be able to find out more about this, and you'll have to sit down with Ars to come up with a treatment plan.

''No, I'm terribly sleepy........''
Get some rest, Flynn.

　Even Flynn, rubbing his eyes, was sweating freakishly, as if after an all-out run. But even more than that, the sleepiness was overwhelming her. Healing magic reigned at the top of all possible tasks in terms of fraying the nerves.
　Als's words were nothing short of gratifying as he worked on Flynn, who had nearly passed out on more than one occasion.

　He lends his shoulder to Flynn, who is about to fall over with an "oops," and Ars carries him on his back. It doesn't bother me for as much or as many hours as this. I can't thank her enough for that.
　Even if he linked his arms with hers, he would never be able to get over Flynn's head for the rest of his life.

　Flynn quickly fell asleep on Ars's back. It would be uncomfortable to get her clothes wet, but that wasn't the point, her brain probably needed the rest right now.

'Hey, Ars. I'm not listening to you. Do you have any idea what you've done? No, I'm done.

　The resentful Ilyce immediately dismissed the question and answer himself. There is no point in continuing to blame him, as he feels that he has done the same thing himself anyway.
　Ilyce let out a great sigh as he helped Felinella to heal inside.

'At any rate, huh? But no, no... hmmm, stop, stop.'
Quiet. What do you have to say for yourself?
'You're in the wrong place, though. You're going to get in trouble if anyone hears you, Ars.

　At Ilyce's piercing gaze, which blew away his exhaustion, Ars only shifted his eyes to the one next to him.

'There's no such thing as trouble. I finally got to do something wizardly. I gave it my all, this guy and I did too.
Me too.
Oh, that's right. Well, we'll just have to leave the rest to them.
And now you're here and you're getting lucky.
You can't leave it to chance. It's all in Feri's hands.
'If you say so, I've given you the power too. You're going to have to connect with me. You're going to have to do that, all right.

　Ilyce throws in some light words of desperation.
　Her words are less serious and more comforting. It's not in Ars's nature to put his hands together and pray after he's done everything he can. It may be different if there is a god, but if there is, humanity has been treated very badly.

　I don't want a god like that.

Are we leaving?

　Suddenly, Ars saw the state of the base and interpreted it as such. There was a sense of surprise at the signs of withdrawal, but it was doubtful if they were really in a position to withdraw soon.

''Ah, that's best. Ars, you've served your purpose, you have no use for me now. Or do you want to get greedy?'

　Do you want to maintain your base of operations, but destroy the demons inside the deposit and maintain it so that you can mine the mithril?
　When asked that, Ars replied with an obvious "No way".

　With so many single mages, no one would be stupid enough to make a mistake in the drawdown. As long as there is no reason for it, I have a definite feeling that any more will only cause unexpected damage. That's just the way it is. You could say it's made that way.
　It's like playing a race of chicken until you die.

　There is no point in staying unless you're really stupid or you want to die.
　If you want to find a reason to stay, you should.

But there are wounded men. It's gonna take a lot of work to get them out of here. If we don't get some rest, we're going to have a pile of bodies. Even if we do stay, there's always something wrong with the demons in the deposit.
'You don't think I have any idea what I'm talking about, do you? We have a transfer gate, so we're not that far away from each other in terms of distance. I'm sure you'll be happy to know that I'm not the only one. We've made plans to keep some of them, but it's not the stage to push it.
'I'm not going to interfere because it's Ilyce at the top. We've got Feri out. That's all I ask. Now, you're in such a hurry, what's going on?

　A ray of light split the sky above them earlier.
　That was enough for Ilyce to tell it as he saw it. But the story doesn't end there. This time a darkness that devoured the light from the opposite direction split the sky in two. It's like a fight between light and darkness.
　And the army rose to the darkness.

　If it was offensive magic, that light would annihilate several kilometers around. It was well beyond the highest output a magician could produce.
　What's more, it was the jet black shade that exceeded it. I can't even tell if it's magic for that matter.

　In addition, Ilyce tells the two single wizards who came to reinforce, that he even revealed the connection between the deposit and Babel.
　Even Ars, as expected, showed some difficulty about that.
　But, if anything, it's more of a hassle, as opposed to the hassle of increased hassle.

I'm sure that will be the case. It's obvious by looking at the demons inside. And I didn't think you were so insensitive that you wouldn't notice it from the get-go.
'And you know, that little single wizard girl said something interesting.

　It's not that I don't want to call her by her name. You can't help but feel bad for the "little girl" who stubbornly refuses to call you by your name.
　It's not that I don't like the idea of it.

"I suspect the deposit was used as a testing facility.
I never thought of that. It doesn't matter now, one way or the other.
I agree, but not the bosses. And even for the wizards on the ground, if this were true, the area around the deposit would be more dangerous.

　Although he chose his words carefully, Ars told him what Ilyce was trying to say with that name.

''The Abomination of Disobedience (Demi Azure)?''
How did you feel about that one coming out of the woodwork?　Not to mention the fact that there is always an S-rate class of hydride inside the deposit at every level.
No doubt about it. Isn't that what Ilyce is trying to say?
'Oh, and if Demi Azure is the monster in the deposit, how many of them have been unleashed?
''There won't be that many monsters out there, but it's possible that they could mutate in the outside world. Honestly, [bad food] is out of our control.

　You don't want to deal with SS rates like [Abomination of Disobedience (Demi Azure)] as you like. If there was a stock in life, it would be good to test your skills, but as long as you're a human, that's not going to happen.

　It's a strange thing for the person who defeated them to say, but the explosion of magic power at the end of the game is at a level where it's not funny.
　But yes, it doesn't sound as pessimistic as it sounds.
　If there was a rematch, I was confident that we could win without worrying anyone anymore. Not to mention the countermeasure, Ars, who had returned from the mineral deposit, had risen to a height that seemed to have nothing to do with fear.

''Even if it's not an S-rate class demon, there might be some individuals that will evolve in a nasty way.

　The demons of the deposit differ from the types that are usually found in the outside world. There is a small part of them that is human. Their goals and desires. Rather than thinking in a complex way, they are bound by a single emotion.
　It is very likely that a very high level of research was done at Babel.

　Ars's hypothesis is that the specimens from the research done at Babel, and the place where they were discarded, was the deposit.
　Even if it wasn't discarded, and even then it was an experiment, it's unknown what effect the confusion among the demons would have if they were to go out into the outside world.

　As a practical matter, it is impossible to ascertain the total number of demons, so in the end there is nothing that can be done.

　However, Ars optimistically blows off such future problems.

''This is fine for this time. We'll figure out what to do in the future.......you.
Woah!

　Ilyce's tweak didn't stop Ars from going ahead.
　The voice of a girl who had accumulated years echoing hollowly.

　In order to give Flynn a break, even if only for a short time, Ars heads to the area where the therapeutic tabernacle is gathered.
　But along the way.

　Fanon and Garginis were waiting in front of the three of them. Exeles was nowhere to be seen, and Loki, who was supposed to be covered in wounds all over his body, was greeted in front of them, standing more perfectly than anyone else.
　The sight of his hands clasped together in front of his body was a standing gesture that even the best maids would be proud of.

'Thank you for your work, Al.'

　Loki's eyes darted down lightly as a cheery smile played across his mouth.
　The two men behind him would have to explain later, but Ars would only tell them the results for now. Perhaps both Fanon and Garginis had come to hear it.

　They had been instrumental in doing so. If we take a hard look at it, there will be no deaths and no questions about the operation of the Association. Once the Association is up and running in earnest, the military could even reduce the number of personnel it devotes to defense.
　Still, that's fine. No one would complain if there were people who could be saved, even if it was a miscalculation to help people.

　So one of the best healers he knows tells him the result of his best efforts.

'No problem. Felli's healing is a success.