Blazing Hot

Roaring flames were now consuming the dense forest. I couldn’t shake the feeling that this wasn’t just any random forest fire.

“Oh… this is bad,” Mana said unnecessarily.

I was afraid to find out the answer, but I still asked, “Is this in the direction of the Crossroads?”

The answer was clear enough from her face, but she still replied. “Yes. Err… more or less. It’s not that accurate, so we might be able to…”

Circumvent the flames and get there? Or get there before the flames? Both options sounded equally dangerous, and Mana must have realized that.

The right thing was probably to find some safe spot and wait out the flames; I doubted they’d burn through our ability to pass between the worlds.

Was there such a place, though? When the forest was being burned, swarming with wild beasts and who knows what else?

Three got us real good.

It might have been a mistake to delay our journey here. We were too slow. Had I been unconsciously underestimating him just because he used to be our class’s resident loner nerd?

“Hey!” called Mana. “Stop looking like that! It’s not over yet.”

“It’s… not over?” I mumbled. I looked at the pink-haired girl. “How can you…”

How was she so sure of this? No, that wasn’t the right question. Hope was not something so easily explainable.

The real question was—how could she still have hope despite everything?

Forced into living forever, she was taken advantage of by Three again and again, suffering imprisonment for a long, long time. I would have expected someone in that position to have gone insane.

Instead, this girl somehow kept on being positive even when everything was against her.

But then I realized I was being silly.

She was clearly like that due to one reason, and one reason alone.

She had me.

Something warm came up to my eyes. It wasn’t tears; it was more like a flame, and one no less hot than the one ravaging the forest.

I didn’t know what to call this feeling. Perhaps it had no name. It was similar to the heat I felt whenever I battled, yet completely different at the same time.

I had no time to dwell on this sensation, however.

“Let’s go,” I said, squeezing back Mana’s hand and pulling her after me. Her hand felt so weak yet her grip was strong at the same time. Somehow, that was reassuring.

We rushed between the trees together, trying to look for the way without running into the fire and smoke.

Perhaps there was a clearing the flames hadn’t consumed? Perhaps the direction of the wind would save us? There were many possibilities. Guided by Mana’s vague sensation of the Crossroads, we made our way forward.

It was not an easy path, especially as the day started growing darker and darker. One time the wind carried a lot of smoke right into our faces, making Mana have a coughing fit and stopping us for some precious moments. Another time a scared beast lashed at us, only to get dispatched by me. We found another beast lying on the ground, completely scorched; perhaps it ran away from the flames, but expired on the way.

At times I could hear screams piercing the air. Perhaps these were other villages eradicated by the flames, but we couldn’t risk getting any closer.

I felt guilty. While I wasn’t intending to let Three have free reign here, our plan was to first retreat to another world, if at all possible. That would mean leaving everyone in Avallux to their fate.

Luckily, or unluckily, it appeared like my wish was going to come true.

After running away from the flames for what felt like hours, we exited into a small clearing—or at least a spot in Harko Forest that looked like it had been burnt or gouged away.

Not unlike where we fought One all those days ago.

Except that this time a different opponent was waiting for us there.

“I am quite angry now,” said the fancily-dressed boy. “Do you realize how much trouble you’re giving me? When will you know your place already?”

Three dark clowns—the robotic clones of Two—also stood there, while their master, Three himself, was floating a few feet above ground.

“Us? Giving you trouble?” asked Mana in shock. “It’s obviously the other way around! What have you done to this place?”

“Hmm? Oh, you mean the fire. Well, I had to have some insurance… I burnt it specifically to lure you here. I didn’t trust those amazons to handle you, either.”

If there ever was any hope in my mind at all that he was someone who could possibly be redeemed or reasoned with, they were now fully and completely shattered.

That ship had already sailed. Burnt down, rather.

“By the way, I don’t suppose any of you has seen One on the way?” he asked conversationally.

“O-One?” muttered Mana.

“Technically, his second prototype—I found it in the castle and brought him here. Should I call him One Two? One point One? Nah, too confusing. Anyway, he’s been kinda malfunctioning and couldn’t control all the animals here properly. It’s so cool though, makes me feel like some kind of mad scientist. Even if most of that work had been done by Two.”

“Master Three is the best!” chirped one of the robots.

“I love Master Three!”

Three laughed. “Hey, don’t look at me like that, it wasn’t me who programmed them to be like that, it was Two. —Ah, poor girl. Too bad she’s dead. She was crazier than a sack full of scorpions but damn, that bitch was hot. Well, I’ll have you now, so it’s alright.”

“—Will you shut up already?” I asked.

My voice lacked any and all emotions. My body did not shake from anger, either.

Even so, I felt them coming up to my eyes—the usual flames. This time, they were flames that called me to take action.

Three did not look pleased at my interruption.

How much did this idiot like the sound of his own voice?

“I’m sick of hearing from you,” I continued.

“How dare you?” Three said, his voice actually shaking. “How dare someone like you speak like that to someone like me? Someone like you, who was special all along, couldn’t possibly know anything about the sort of

struggles that someone like me went through! Do you have any idea how much I suffered during my first incarnation here, when I knew my time is limited? Do you have any idea wh—”

“I said, shut up,” I insisted again, cutting off his diatribe. “Three. There’s no need for talking anymore. Now… it’s time for action. Hah, you’re going to die.”