NOVEL WEB Book 6: Epilogue
[Support by] A Circle Like an Uroboros [Delta Brain]
…That Archenemy slithered deep underground.
The walls and ceiling wriggled weakly around her. Scales colored the light brown of dried grass continually appeared and disappeared.
Outward discrimination against immortals was frowned upon, but how people actually felt about them was obvious enough from the public reaction to the Colosseum. Elves and Dwarves who looked just like humans were one thing, but someone with the lower body of a snake could not boldly move around in public. Or to be more accurate, she would never consider exposing herself to humans while she was weakened.
There was no one in this wide world she could comfortably reveal her weaknesses to.
That was like a symbol of the path she had walked.
Archenemy Echidna.
Charlotte Fregula.
She had used the chaos to escape Absolute Noah, slithered across the mountain, and entered the vast network of tunnels below the city. The Bright Cross did come in handy occasionally. She was using those tunnels to escape Kukyou City without letting anyone see her in her weakened state. Once she crossed the entire city to reach the ocean side, she could board a cargo ship moored at the harbor block and get a fresh start.
By regrouping with the organization.
This had been a failure, but if she reported on the details and thought of it as data to be used for next time, it was not that bad a thing. And this meant letting go of Absolute Noah, but losing the ark would still be a major blow to humanity. If they launched a second and third attack before humanity recovered, the stress within human society would skyrocket. The global depression from Wild@Hunt’s collapse would seem like nothing compared to the ultimate moral hazard of the true Calamity.
The Echidna’s brain was another piece of her lab. She used it for artificial life evolution experiments and it had grown to rival a giant planetary simulator. Like a kodoku jar, her brain was already refining a poison that would bring ruin to humanity.
(I swear…)
The Echidna pressed both her snake lower body and her beautiful upper body against the floor and grabbed at any bumps there to drag herself ever onward.
Even as her decadence reached its extremes and she was forced to crawl, the rainbow-colored light decorating her body and the force of will in her eyes remained as bright as ever.
(I swear I will get back at those gods who let the heroes kill my adorable children as trials and tests of strength…)
She only had to get back to the organization.
Once the idea in her head was realized, she could achieve her goal.
But before she could.
Something else arrived.
“Hm, hm, hm, hm, hm, hmm☆”
It came from the depths of the darkness.
The humming seemed far too out of place, but the Echidna, with her sweet milk tea hair plastered to her white cheek, understood what it meant to give away your location on a deadly battlefield.
Yes.
It meant you intended to execute your opponent with an overwhelming difference in power.
“…”
A hopeless ending arrived far too suddenly. It was like a frog running into a snake as it hopped through the bushes or like that snake being snatched away by a hawk.
That ending wore blue armor.
It held a spear and shield that glittered with a gold light.
It showed no concern for the crawling serpent’s circumstances. A heavenly ruler cared not whether it was a home or away game. They would stroll along like they owned the place.
This was an Archenemy, another immortal.
But what exactly was it?
“Who…are you?”
“Oh, come on now. Don’t tell me you’re surprised I showed up after you rang the doorbell so loudly.”
The Echidna had her hands full simply getting her ruinous egg back to the organization, so she was not armed with submachineguns or anything else. But even if she had brought out her lab components and prepared everything she needed, could she have defeated this figure in blue armor?
After all, this being had descended to the dry surface as if in response to an age of disaster.
“Valkyrie Karen is back!! I’m a specialist the gods use to eliminate people like you, so let’s get that over with, shall we?☆”
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