Chapter 72
The blonde woman called Veronica aimed her two pistols at Melissa and pulled the triggers.
Melissa used the chairs and desks ensnared by thorns as shields, fending off the gunfire. Fortunately, the bullets apparently weren't powerful enough to penetrate the desks and chairs.
But Melissa narrowed her eyes at something that felt wrong.
(...There aren't any gunshots? And I don't smell gunpowder...)
Veronica continued firing without hesitation.
Every time a bullet struck a desk or chair, it made a sharp crack, but Melissa still couldn't hear any gunshots.
Suddenly, Melissa noticed a transparent pellet rolling around at her feet. It looked like a piece of candy, but on closer inspection, it was slowly melting and leaving a stain on the floor... It was an ice bullet.
(So that thing is a magic tool that fires ice bullets?)
While Melissa's attention was drawn to the ice bullets, the moving chairs and desks attacked her.
Sloth did nothing but control the chairs and desks; he showed no sign of using attack magic or any sort of offensive magic tool. He was probably the type who specialized in enchantment magic and was poor at other forms of magic.
(That woman's gun is the only offensive magic tool... Well, of course. It's not like you can just whip up offensive magic tools whenever you feel like it.)
Of all magic tools, offensive ones were especially difficult to make.
They required money, time, and talent to create, and there weren't many people capable of making them even in the Kingdom of Ridill.
Melissa took another rose from her hair ornament and imbued it with magic. A large rose blossomed from the vine as it smoothly uncoiled and stretched out.
Melissa manipulated the vine like a whip to keep Veronica at bay, while sending one vine snaking through the gaps like a serpent.
"Pointless."
Veronica shot through the rose with an ice bullet. The rose scattered a powerful fragrance around Veronica along with its petals.
Melissa had imbued that rose with a paralyzing effect. She had made the enchantment a little stronger than usual, so this should have rendered Veronica helpless... or so Melissa thought.
"What the—why isn't it working?!"
Ignoring Melissa's shriek, Veronica continued firing.
Unlike ordinary guns, the ice bullets showed no sign of running out.
(No, wait, this is weird! Offensive magic tools are supposed to have a limit on the number of times they can be used, right?! I've never heard of an offensive magic tool that can fire that ridiculously fast! And paralysis doesn't work on her, either. What the hell is going on?!)
The ice bullets weren't particularly powerful, but they had a high rate of fire.
Melissa began to be slowly driven back as she grew frantic.
Sloth was one thing, but something about this woman named Veronica was deeply wrong.
Just as Melissa gritted her teeth, unable to identify what felt wrong, the desk she had been using as a shield finally split apart. At this rate, it wouldn't be able to stop the bullets.
"Oh, crap..."
Melissa instinctively gathered thorns around herself, but there weren't enough to make a wall.
The ice bullets slipped through gaps in the thorns and should have shredded Melissa's body to pieces... but—
(...Huh? It doesn't hurt?)
Melissa had been shielding her face with a raised arm, but now she cautiously lowered it.
Every ice bullet had fallen at Melissa's feet.
A defensive barrier had been erected around Melissa. It had stopped every one of the ice bullets.
Who could have...? As Melissa shifted her gaze, she caught sight of two figures running toward her from the far end of the corridor.
"Ah, I knew it was you, Sis."
The one in front was a handsome young man with rose-colored curls—Melissa's younger brother, Raul.
The one running, or rather waddling and lumbering, far behind Raul was Monica, who was supposed to be on the first floor.
Melissa wanted to demand why Raul was here, but more importantly, it was a serious problem that an ordinary civilian like Monica was here.
"You idiot, Raul! Why did you bring the little one here?!"
Fighting while protecting the obviously clumsy Monica would be far too difficult in this situation.
Melissa shot Raul a withering glare. When Raul reached her, he said with an utterly serious expression,
"Sis, I don't think you should use magic in a lovers' quarrel."
"From today on, your name is 〈Witch of Gaping Holes〉."
Apparently, through the eyes of her clueless little brother, the situation looked like a battle between Melissa and Veronica—two women fighting over Sloth.
It was such an infuriating misunderstanding that she felt an urge to smack that airheaded head.
"I only came here to punish the idiot who ruined the product I sold. That pathetic-looking man over there is the idiot, and that blonde woman is his underling. Got it?"
"...Um, so what does that mean?"
Glaring at her slow-witted younger brother, Melissa pointed back and forth at Sloth and Veronica.
"They're the enemy! So wipe them out! The woman attacks with a magic-tool gun, so watch out for her. The man is a weakling, so you can basically ignore him. I'll beat him up later, though."
Veronica fired again.
Before Melissa could block the shots with her thorns, a defensive barrier appeared in front of the thorns and deflected every ice bullet.
It was the same defensive barrier she had seen earlier. But who was putting it up? Raul couldn't use defensive barriers, and besides, there was no way he could activate one without chanting.
As Melissa stood there in confusion, Monica arrived a little later, panting as she spoke.
"S... Si...s..."
"Little one! Why did you come up here?! I told you to wait downstairs...!"
"That isn't a magic-tool gun..."
Melissa frowned and looked down at Monica.
"Little one?"
"If you use a detection spell, you can tell right away. That isn't a magic tool. It isn't even a gun. It's just a prop."
Melissa was confused by Monica's words.
Those guns were props? Then how had Veronica been firing ice bullets? Veronica hadn't chanted even once.
...It was only when she thought that far that Melissa realized. There was one being who could use magic without chanting. That was...
"No way... her!"
Melissa instinctively poured magic into her thorns and sent an extremely thin thorn racing toward Veronica.
The thorn lashed like a whip, scratching Veronica's cheek... but no blood flowed from the wound. Instead, particles of white light spilled out.
"She's... a high-ranking spirit?!"
Melissa quickly scanned Sloth from head to toe.
Among the finery Sloth wore, one piece stood out: a silver-work bracelet set with a violet stone. That was a contract stone for a spirit.
Sloth grinned and raised his right arm, showing off the bracelet.
"You figured it out. Yeah, that's right. Veronica is my contracted spirit... Now that your secret's out, there's no need to keep hiding, is there? Veronica, it's time to stop holding back."
"...I will."
Veronica returned the prop guns to their holsters and held both hands out in front of her. Pale-blue motes of light gently appeared around her.
The light gradually changed shape, shimmering with the glint of ice.
They were bird feathers—beautiful icy feathers, each delicate barb reproduced in exquisite detail.
──About a hundred of them appeared around Veronica.
"This will finish things."
Veronica swept her hand, and the icy feathers rained down all at once upon Melissa and the others.
The icy feathers weren't merely beautiful. The amount of magic imbued in them was on an entirely different level from that in the bullets.
Melissa hurriedly gathered the thorns she had left, but they probably wouldn't be enough to stop them. Those icy feathers would slice through every last thorn. A spirit's magical power was on a completely different scale from a human's.
There was no way a human could fight a high-ranking spirit head-on and win──
...Huh?
Melissa involuntarily opened her eyes wide.
Fiery sparks began to float around Melissa's thorns.
The sparks gathered in one place, forming a gigantic serpent.
The enormous flaming snake, large enough to swallow a human head in one gulp, writhed and knocked every last icy feather out of the air.
...What is this?
Humans chant and use magic in the form of spells. That's why they can't use magic without chanting.
...But there was one, and only one, genius who had made that impossibility possible.
About four years ago, a genius girl was chosen as one of the Seven Sages at the tender age of fifteen. Her name was...
"MoniMoni, why don't you introduce yourself one more time?"
"Um..."
Just as when they first met, Monica made the same little movements with her mouth, but then she suddenly looked up and began patting her cheeks. Apparently, she had remembered that her initial stammer had earned her an unfortunate nickname.
Then Monica snorted and introduced herself with a crisp, determined expression.
"〈Silent Witch〉 Monica Everett, at your ser—th!"
She bit her tongue.