Arc 10 Chapter 36: The Utter Fool

Chapter 36: The Utter Fool

—Crusch Karsten's heart had become a seething crucible of impatience and self-reproach.

She did not realize that these impulses had been magnified by an external influence. Yet even had she recognized it, the dark resentment festering within her would scarcely have changed. For magnification was not the same as implantation. Nothing had been placed within her that had not already existed. Something that ought to have grown over the passage of time had merely been deprived of that passage, swelling to monstrous proportions without the years that should have nurtured it. In other words, this regret was a transgression that had been steadily growing within Crusch all along.

'————'

Bearing that ungovernable impulse within her, Crusch ground her teeth in silence. She felt them meet inside her mouth with a sharp click. Yet no sound followed—not beyond her closed lips, not even within the confines of her own skull. A world from which something fundamental had been removed produced a profoundly unsettling sense of incompleteness. And her opponent was terrifyingly adept at thrusting the point of his blade into the openings created by that disorientation.

'————'

Crusch turned the knight's sword in her hand and swept aside a slashing attack that came from the flank, its edge snapping toward her like the fang of a beast. Without a sound. They came to a standstill and exchanged blows.

One.

Two.

Ten.

Steel struck steel, each collision sending fierce sparks flowering through the air like bursts of flame.

All without a sound.

Silence upon silence upon silence.

—No breathing, no heartbeat, no footsteps as they advanced, no clash of swords, not even the sound of her belligerent opponent licking his lips reached her ears.

Such was the abnormal battle into which Crusch had been suddenly plunged while moving alone through the castle.

'————'

—And it was thanks to the Dragon's Eye that Crusch had managed to respond to the attack at all.

When its power was unleashed, the eye could distinguish even the finest particles of dust drifting through the air.

It was this extraordinary vision that had allowed Crusch to instinctively defend against the silent ambush from behind.

And only after defending herself had she realized—

If this enemy was the one who had abducted Ferris, then his present predicament might have been prevented. Had Crusch mastered the use of her Dragon's Eye, they might never have found themselves in this situation.

'If only I'd done that, Ferris would still…'

A fragment of her surging regret escaped her lips. And her eyes widened at the realization that her voice had actually become sound. In that instant, her footwork faltered ever so slightly. Her opponent seized upon the opening, swinging his enormous weapon—a broad blade resembling one half of a pair of dressmaker's shears. Crusch failed to evade it completely, and the edge sliced shallowly across her left shoulder.

'Ngh…!'

'Too slow, Crusch Karsten! Better keep those pretty eyes fixed on me!'

The taunt came from a small man with short blue hair, who thrust his face toward hers with a mocking grin. Though shorter than Crusch herself, he handled the enormous single-bladed shears, nearly as long as his own body, with effortless ease. He bounded through the narrow corridor in every direction, matching Crusch blow for blow despite the power of her Dragon's Eye.

What did he want?

What was his purpose?

A multitude of questions flashed through her mind. Crusch opened her mouth to demand an answer.

'————'

Once again, her voice produced no sound. The noise that had briefly returned was cut off, plunging her back into that incomplete world, like a finished painting from which some essential portion had been scraped away. It had happened repeatedly. Again and again. If the only problem were an absence of sound, Crusch could have relied upon the vision granted by her Dragon's Eye and managed the battle far more effectively. 

But her opponent did not merely remove sound. He restored it at irregular intervals, suddenly flooding her senses with information after moments of absolute silence. And Crusch, as she was now, could not entirely disregard those abrupt changes while continuing to fight.

'Here—here, here! Here! Here! Hah!'

Sound came.

Disappeared.

Returned.

Vanished.

Came.

Went.

Came again.

—The pattern repeated without end.

There were clashes of steel that rang aloud, and acts of destruction that made no sound. Failed attacks announced themselves with noise, while successful strikes fell in silence. A portion of Crusch's awareness was constantly occupied with deciding which sensory information to accept and which to disregard. As a result, she could no longer devote the entirety of her skill to the point of her sword.

The wounds she suffered multiplied. Opportunities for counterattack remained frustratingly beyond her reach. And for the first time since acquiring the Dragon's Eye, Crusch found herself struggling in a battle, forced unmistakably onto the defensive.

'This can't—'

The thin voice that escaped her lips was pitifully weak. Her opponent's power erased the remainder of the sentence before it could become sound. Had she meant to say, This wasn't supposed to happen? 

Or perhaps, I cannot allow this to continue?

Neither her enemy nor Crusch herself could know.

'What a stubborn bitch! You're gonna lose to me and end up bawling your eyes out anyway, so stop wasting my damn time and hurry up and DIE! Everything's so fucking NOISY!'

In a fit of irritation, the man swung his enormous shears wildly, mercilessly cutting apart the surrounding walls and floor. His voice possessed sound. His destruction did not. The dissonance created by that contradiction tore at Crusch's composure. Everything was horribly mismatched, intolerably wrong.

—Including Crusch herself.

'Ferris—'

'—Nooope.'

Her attempt to ask where he had taken Ferris was extinguished before she could finish. The silent exchange of blades resumed. Crusch swept aside the descending shears, struck back, and hammered the weapon downward. Yet beyond the resistance she felt through her sword, there was no sound by which to judge the exchange. All the while, the man clicked his tongue in irritation.

'Tch! Noisy, noisy, every last one of you is noisy! Endlessly fucking noisy! Shut up, you're noisy! Stop breathing, noisy! Stop blinking, noisy! Stop letting your hair flutter, noisy! Stop stamping your feet, noisy! Stop swinging your sword, noisy! Stop making your heart beat, noisy! Stop feeling anything, noisy! Being alive is too fucking noisy!'

'————'

'Don't you DARE laugh like that! NOISY! Don't you dare act like my mother! NOISY! You shouldn't have been born! You shouldn't be alive! NOISY, NOISY, NOISYYYYY!!'

The man's eyes were bloodshot. He raged through the silence like some savage beast, driven by a torrent of hatred and resentment that had nothing whatsoever to do with Crusch. With the aid of her Dragon's Eye, she weathered the storm of his blades. Yet as flashes of malice she could not comprehend descended upon her, frustration gnawed at her heart.

Hostility was acceptable.

Malice was acceptable.

Even murderous intent was perfectly understandable.

—Provided it was directed toward her.

But this was not. She was not even worthy of being the object of his hatred. 

And because she was not worthy even of that, she—

And Ferris—

'————'

Just as the explosion of those emotions threatened to wipe her mind utterly blank, something unexpected occurred.

—A sudden blue light swept across the two combatants as their blades remained locked together in a silent struggle.

'————'

'Huh?'

Crusch's immediate fear that this was another move by her opponent vanished when she saw him react with the same bewilderment. Whatever the light was, the man had not anticipated it either. They were equally surprised. And the same could be said of the voice that reached them immediately afterward, while their faces remained close enough to feel each other's breath.It came from some distance away. A desperate, soul-deep scream, as though its owner were coughing up blood.

'—DON'T YOU DARE DIE, YOU IDIOT!! WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU THINKING!? DON'T SCREW WITH ME!!'

'————'

The instant Crusch heard that familiar voice, one she knew as intimately as any sound in the world, every hair upon her body seemed to stand on end.

First came relief. Immediately after it, an overwhelming sense of duty. Then, following close behind, anxiety and fear. Crusch crushed every one of those surging emotions beneath her resolve.

With all her strength, she shoved the man away. He instinctively leaped backward. Crusch's sword flashed.

—Hundred Man Single Strike.

A blade of wind swept through the corridor, leaving no avenue of escape.

'Tch!'

The man clicked his tongue, raised his enormous shears, and slashed through the ceiling, fleeing upward to avoid the attack. He had evaded it.

—But in doing so, he had given Crusch the opening she needed.

'Ferris—!'

She turned her sword downward and unleashed a furious succession of strikes upon the floor. Her blade became wind. Cuts appeared across the white stonework, tracing a pattern like a star.

—And from overhead, the man who had vanished beyond the broken ceiling suddenly descended with a tremendous vertical slash.

Without a sound.

Crusch raised her sword above her head and caught the blow. His red eyes met her Dragon's Eye.

'Don't interfere—'

The latter half of her command was stolen by silence. It did not matter. The result would be the same.

Crusch raised one foot and stamped down with all her strength. Immediately, the floor beneath them, already carved with deep cuts, gave way. And with their blades still locked together, Crusch and the man plunged into the underground chamber she had cut open.

Without a sound.

'————'

—The space awaiting them below was far larger than Crusch had anticipated. The scars left by the Warlock of Melancholy were clearly visible even underground. It was an immense chamber, large enough to host an evening ball or serve as a training ground for soldiers. Scattered throughout that vast space were a handful of figures.

—And among them were Ferris, his arms fastened to the wall, and Subaru, lying facedown in a pool of blood.

'————'

—In that instant, Crusch could find no words to describe the emotions swelling within her beyond the colors red and black. The storm of feeling erupted so violently that every rational thought and judgment was hurled from her mind. Her opponent seized that opening. Twisting his body, the man drove a kick into her. Crusch instinctively raised her knee to block it, but the impact violently altered the course of her fall, sending her hurtling toward the wall. She extended one foot, planted it against the stone, and slid along the surface to lessen the force of the collision.

Then she landed. Looking straight ahead, Crusch saw the man with the enormous shears standing on the opposite side of the circular chamber. Between them, near the center of the room, stood a woman in a black dress. And for some inexplicable reason, White Sheep was holding that woman's hand. Subaru lay collapsed to the left. Ferris remained pinned against the wall to the right.

—Crusch could make almost no sense of the situation.

Apparently, her opponent was equally confused. He slammed his shears against the floor and shouted.

'Oooi! What the hell is going on, Bellaris!? Why'd the Long Way Around get lifted!?'

'Reborn! You came the moment the Long Way Around was undone… Could it be that you want me that badly? Do you love me? Because I love you too!'

'Goddamn it, woman, you're impossible to talk to! Just shut up and answer the question I asked!'

'But if I shut up, how am I supposed to answer? Someone as careless as Reborn really needs a dependable girl looking after him. Someone like… yes! This Melty, for instance!'

'Mel… ty?'

Whether the woman in the black dress had any intention of answering his question was unclear. She placed her hands upon White Sheep's shoulders and pushed her forward toward the man. Caught between the two who had addressed each other as Reborn and Bellaris, White Sheep's eyes widened slightly. But that expression quickly gave way to a cold smile.

And then—

'A pleasure to meet you, Reborn. My name is Melty. I am one of the Beloved Children chosen by Mama.'

'What the hell's this Beloved Children nonsense? Bellaris, don't tell me you fell for such an obvious—'

'—Mama, thank you for everything. I love you more than anyone in the world.'

The quiet words spoken by White Sheep brought Reborn's accusation to an abrupt halt. He caught his breath. The anger drained from his expression. In its place came profound fear. And then the humiliation of realizing that he had allowed himself to feel that fear. Just as Crusch had been told, the relationship between the Beloved Children and their mother had been cultivated in a profoundly twisted fashion. She would not deny that the distortion of those bonds stirred something within her.

—But at present, with her thoughts consumed by emotions of red and black, Crusch had no room left to extend them the slightest consideration.

She kicked off the floor. The enemy stood directly ahead. Farther back was Reborn. Closer to her was Bellaris.

And beside Bellaris stood White Sheep—

'Melty is one of us! I think she'd be absolutely perfect for Reborn, so I'm going to support them with everything I've got!'

Bellaris had her back turned toward Crusch, smiling radiantly as she addressed Reborn.

—That was true.

There was no falsehood in her words. White Sheep, meanwhile, shook off the arm resting upon her shoulder and spun around to face Crusch. In her hand, she extended a short cylindrical instrument until it became a single fighting staff. Gripping it firmly, she raised the weapon. Determination sharpened her yellow eyes.

'—I am one of the Beloved Children, Emerald Beauty! I am your enemy!'

With movements that spoke of disciplined training, White Sheep adopted a fighting stance and pointed the end of her staff toward the approaching Crusch, making clear her intention to bar the way.

However—

That was false.

'—The wind carries the scent of a lie, Melty.'

'—Yes!'

In the next instant, White Sheep—Melty—twisted at the waist and reversed her stance. Her movement fell perfectly into step with Crusch's advance. Crusch's sword flashed. Melty's staff struck. Together, their attacks traced a diagonal cross through the air. Both blows flew straight toward Bellaris, who stood utterly defenseless before them.

'Oh?'

The combined force of the sword wind and the staff strike struck the woman in the black dress head-on.

And Bellaris was sent flying.

　　　　　　　　　　　　　　                                　　△▼△▼△▼△

—The Divine Protection of Wind Indication distinguished truth from falsehood, exposing the lie in Melty's declaration.

If her words were false, then surely the position she had taken was itself part of some deliberate intention. And indeed, moving in perfect accord with Crusch, Melty had delivered a devastating blow against Bellaris.

'—Still, I must admit, I'm surprised.'

Melty's everyday words and actions had never seemed dishonest, but her hesitant, almost timid manner had suggested a girl who feared becoming involved with others.

—Yet that assessment had been wrong.

Melty was courageous, possessed of a resolve far stronger and more firmly rooted than Crusch had imagined. Far stronger, perhaps, than Crusch's own.

And with that realization—

'Now it is your turn.'

Crusch directed the full force of her sword's murderous intent toward Reborn, who stood beyond the fallen Bellaris. With his enormous single-bladed shears resting upon one shoulder, Reborn regarded her with dangerous eyes and clicked his tongue.

'Bunch of goddamn fools. Don't say I didn't warn ya.'

It was a peculiar remark, one that made little sense if his anger arose merely from seeing an ally struck down. But before Crusch could ascertain his meaning, before their next confrontation could begin—

'—Lady Crusch! Forget the enemy! Subaru comes first!'

The cry jolted Crusch from her thoughts. She turned toward Ferris, still pinned against the wall. The weapon piercing both his raised arms and fastening them above his head was one half of Reborn's enormous shears. Yet even suspended in that agonizing position, his arms impaled and his body helpless, Ferris was not crying out for his own sake.

'Natsuki Subaru… Lord Subaru…'

Of course. 

Subaru lay collapsed upon the floor. He needed treatment.

—No. Surely eliminating the enemy took precedence.

And what could Crusch accomplish by rushing to his side? The treatment he required was Ferris's. Then naturally, freeing Ferris must come first.

How could she fail to make a judgment so obvious?

How foolish, how slow-witted, how terribly inadequate she was.

How could someone like this ever have been called the Valkyrie—

'—!'

A violent eruption of self-loathing exploded within her chest, a mass of emotions blacker than pitch. Her sword threatened to slip from her fingers. Her knees threatened to buckle. A sob rose in her throat.

What was happening?

Why had the inside of her head, the depths of her chest, the most precious parts of her heart, suddenly begun to feel as though they were breaking apart?

'Love always comes with obstacles, doesn't it? —Even being divided into enemies and allies makes the flames burn hotter.'

A murmuring voice reached her. Bellaris lay upon her back, her hands clasped before her chest. The pain of her injuries made her voice hoarse, yet something far stronger than pain filled it with feverish passion. And that voice awakened the dark resentment within Crusch, swelling it beyond anything she could contain.

—I want to die.

I wish I could simply disappear.

A violent desire to curse her own existence, utterly unbecoming of Crusch Karsten.

'THAT'S WHY I TOLD YA!'

'—!'

As Crusch nearly collapsed beneath the crushing impulse to surrender, Reborn's blade descended upon her. Her sword rose reflexively to intercept it, but her weakened stance lacked the strength to withstand the impact. She was hurled sideways.

Without a sound.

'Overflow… It's getting stronger…! Subaru—'

Melty stepped between the enemy and the staggering Crusch, attempting to shield her. But the final syllables of her call vanished. The unnatural absence of sound, intruding midway through her words, was enough to bewilder Melty, who was encountering the phenomenon for the first time. And her enemy showed no mercy toward that momentary confusion. A blade drove straight through the courageous girl's abdomen.

'————'

Her strength deserted her, and Melty collapsed where she stood.

The fighting staff slipped from her hand and rolled across the floor.

Without a sound.

Blood burst from her wound. Her face twisted with pain, and she screamed through her tears.

Without a sound.

Beside the fallen Melty, Reborn raised his enormous blade.

Without a sound.

'————'

Crusch threw herself desperately before the descending killing stroke.

Without a sound.

Following the trajectory revealed by the Dragon's Eye, she swung her sword to protect her companion.

Without a sound.

Blades flashed in every direction, and the exchange of sword strikes continued against the increasingly irritated Reborn.

Without a sound.

'————'

Silence, silence, silence.

Concentrate, concentrate, concentrate.

Unwavering, unwavering, unwavering.

Master yourself, master yourself, master yourself—

'————'

A voice accused her from within.

Once again, you made the wrong choice.

Once again, you failed.

Crusch had heard Ferris's voice and descended underground to rescue him. But before she arrived, Melty had already worked her way into the confidence of the Beloved Children and earned their trust. Some kind of plan had clearly been underway. Melty and her companions must have possessed their own vision of how that plan would succeed.

Then Crusch had intervened unexpectedly, forcing Melty to change her approach. And the result was the girl now lying wounded upon the floor. Subaru, collapsed a short distance away. Ferris, pinned against the wall. And Crusch herself, incapable of doing anything beyond defending against her enemy's attacks.

'————'

Would everything have proceeded smoothly if she had never come? 

The events of these past two months?

The McMahon estate?

The Watergate City of Priestella?

Every failure, every mistake, every disaster brought about by Crusch Karsten?

'————'

The darkness within her spread ever wider.

Even amid the battle, a suffocating sense of helplessness threatened to engulf her heart. Eventually, when it swallowed her completely, she would no longer be capable of holding a sword. Perhaps even before then, the power of the Dragon's Eye would abandon her, and that terrible blade would sever the thread of her life. 

And if the only distinction between those outcomes was whether the end came sooner or later—

'—RAISE YOUR HEAD! CRUSCH KARSTEN!!'

In that instant, a desperate voice pierced the soundless world and set her faltering arm in motion again.

She deflected the blow. Stubbornly refusing to surrender. She forced her blade to turn aside another strike. Without a shred of graceful acceptance.

What had made her do it?

It was—

'THERE'S STILL TIME! NOBODY'S FINISHED YET! NOT A SINGLE ONE OF US! I WON'T LET ANYONE BE FINISHED!'

The one roaring those words, his mouth wide open and anger blazing in his yellow eyes, was Ferris. For some reason, his voice reached her. It vibrated against her eardrums. That sound compelled her sword to move. Yet even as it strengthened her arm, it also fed the black resentment saturating her entire being.

'————'

Of all people, Ferris was the one she could least bear to face. 

She had wounded him with words she should never have spoken.

She had left that transgression unresolved, without any means of atonement, and now the guilt she could not dispel was threatening to crush her.

And yet, to someone as weak and foolish as she was, Ferris continued raising his voice.

'Subaru and White Sheep are still fighting! They haven't given up! So fight! Keep fighting… Please! Let me fight too!'

His words sustained her just enough to resist the savage blade crashing against her own. And as she struggled to withstand each assault, an unspoken response to Ferris's plea became lodged deep within her throat.
Let me fight too.

That was what Ferris had asked.

—And his true meaning had reached her with perfect clarity.

But the instant she understood what he wanted, her heart screamed that it was impossible.

'It's not impossible. There's nothing impossible about it. You can do this. —I know you can, Lady Crusch!'

'————'

Perhaps he had read her hesitation in her expression, or perceived it within her eyes. Whatever the case, his encouragement seemed intended to gather up her breaking spirit and lift it from the depths. Had those words been spoken to someone else, perhaps they would have set that person's soul ablaze with renewed courage.

But for Crusch, the very expectation that she could not fulfill only robbed her of what little strength remained.

Only Crusch Karsten possessed the right to answer Ferris's unwavering loyalty and love—

'—I KNOW THAT ALREADY! YOUR MEMORIES STILL HAVEN'T COME BACK, HAVE THEY!?'

—In that instant, Crusch stopped breathing.

　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　                              △▼△▼△▼△


He had said it.

At long last, he had gone and said it.

Even though he knew that speaking those words would make her wear the expression he least wanted to see.

'————'

Crusch stared at him in utter disbelief, her eyes wide, one amber and the other gold. Felix resisted the urge to turn away from that gaze and twisted his body.

Not to free himself. But to draw his voice from deep within his abdomen.

'I knew! How long do you think I've been by your side!? Of course I knew something like that! I saw through it all from the very beginning!'

A lie.

—He had only realized it because of the past two months.

At first, seeing how genuinely devastated she had been by Felix's decision had been so painful that he could scarcely think clearly. Only after time had passed, after he had regained his composure and spent two months working alongside her in Six Tongues, had he begun to harbor those suspicions.

'But I'm a coward. A deceitful, spineless weakling. I was too frightened to find out whether my suspicions were true.'

Surely that, too, was another of Felix's innumerable sins.

'————'

As Felix continued speaking, Crusch knocked aside the enormous single-bladed shears. No answer came from her. Indeed, for some inexplicable reason, Felix could hear absolutely nothing of the battle between Crusch and the man wielding those shears.

It was silent. Yet he knew his words were reaching her. He could see it in the way her expression grew increasingly clouded with everything he said.

He had no desire to hurt her. Never once had he wanted to drive her into a corner.

—But if such brutal treatment was necessary, then he would accept that even thrusting a finger into an open wound could be an act of healing.

Because otherwise, he would never be able to save the life slipping away from that colossal idiot who had gambled everything on trusting someone like Felix. That colossal idiot for whom no medicine could be prescribed, no healing spell devised.

'When you keep telling yourself you can't do it, your thoughts become an absolute mess, don't they? You convince yourself it's impossible, and everything before your eyes goes dark. —But allow me to correct one misconception, Crusch Karsten.'

It was an expression Crusch herself had often favored when speaking to others. Felix deliberately borrowed those words, fixing his gaze upon the trembling eyes of amber and gold.

'—You can do it. If it's you and me together, we can do it.'

Ah, what an utterly foolish appeal to emotion.

What an unreasonable faith in destiny, unsupported by the slightest shred of logic.

He hated it.

Hated it, hated it.

He truly hated it.

He did not want to look at it.

Did not want to acknowledge it.

Could not bring himself to accept it.

Because this was precisely the same thing that a certain colossal idiot had done.

—He was no different from that fool who arbitrarily decided to believe in someone, placed his expectations upon them without permission, and then wielded that trust like a shield with which to threaten them.

But there was nothing else for it. It could not be helped.

There was no other move left to make.

For that very idiot had, of his own accord, placed himself upon the brink of a precipice where every passing second mattered.

—And so Felix had no choice but to adopt the very method that idiot had used to set his heart ablaze.

'—LADY CRUSCH!'

At Felix's desperate appeal, at the force of his gaze, Crusch's expression twisted violently. Her lips moved. She formed words that could not become sound, struggling to say them.

—I can't.

'—YOU CAN!'

He could not hear her. Therefore, she had not said it.

Felix resolved to carry that utterly unreasonable argument through to the very end. Her grief, her anger, her desperate longing—he would deal with all of it afterward. Before a life hanging in the balance, everything else was insignificant.

She couldn't do it?

And why not?

—Because she was no longer the Crusch Karsten she had once been?

'I'm not asking the woman you used to be! I'm asking Lady Crusch, the woman standing here before me, right now!'

'————'

'Let's save it! Together, you and I! LET'S SAVE THIS KINGDOM THAT HIS HIGHNESS LOVED!!'

At those words, her mismatched eyes turned directly toward Felix.

—And within them, a flame was kindled.

The white blade of her sword rose toward the heavens.

In that soundless world, the wind surged and coiled, gathering itself into the shape of a blade.

It was the signature technique of Crusch Karsten, the Valkyrie.

The stroke of salvation that had once swept aside a horde of Great Rabbits attacking her domain, diverting their course and saving the lives of countless subjects.

—And now, with every ounce of strength she possessed, Crusch unleashed the Hundred Man Single Strike into the depths of Kugelschreiber Castle.

　　　　　　　　　　　　　　                                  　　△▼△▼△▼△


—Until the very last instant, until the final moment when her sword completed its arc, hesitation continued to linger.

'————'

Her breath made no sound. Her voice made no sound. Neither the flash of her blade nor the consequences of its passage produced the slightest noise. Nevertheless, Crusch had witnessed the result of the strike she had unleashed. That much, at least, was her duty as someone who had forgotten Crusch Karsten, yet still dared to lay claim to the name of the Valkyrie.

—The black resentment that tormented and cursed her continued to writhe within her chest.

It had not ceased weighing down her hands and feet. Those negative emotions continued swelling without limit, and by now they ought to have engulfed the entirety of Crusch's being.

And yet—

'Goddamn it! You and that bastard are both out of your fucking minds!'

Amid a world in which footsteps, sword strokes, and every surrounding sound had been extinguished, Reborn's voice rang out. As Crusch swept aside the enormous single-bladed shears in his hands, she recognized that his accusation was one she could hardly refute.

—Would the Crusch Karsten of the past have done what she had just done?

She did not know. And right now, that question no longer mattered.

The person in whom Ferris had placed his expectations, the person he had believed in, and the person who had answered that belief was this Crusch Karsten. The recognition became a surging torrent of positive emotion, filling her heart and body with a vitality fierce enough to withstand the dark resentment festering within her. It was that strength which allowed her to continue resisting Reborn. 

And while Crusch held the enemy's attention—

'Seriously, Subaru, you're such a colossal idiot that maybe you ought to die at least once.'

'Whoa, whoa. Don't say something like that, even as a joke. I don't even want to think about dying.'

Beyond Reborn, with whom Crusch continued exchanging blows, she could hear two voices trading bitter remarks. The boy who had barely been pulled back from the brink of death and the Blue who had saved his life were huddled together in the same pool of blood, almost as though embracing. Subaru had one knee raised, while Ferris held him from behind.

—Yet the expressions of obvious displeasure upon both their faces made it abundantly clear that this embrace was no gesture of affection.

In truth, they had little choice. Ferris's healing magic required him to make physical contact with the person he intended to heal.

'If anything, you're the one who's gone way further overboard than I have.'

'Look who's talking.'

With those words, Ferris gave a derisive snort at Subaru, who still had a knife protruding from his flank.

Ferris himself had ordered Crusch to cut off his arms, leaving both forearms, severed at the elbows, pinned to the wall behind him.

—It was an exchange between two colossal fools, both of whom had done things so outrageously reckless that no one could be blamed for questioning their sanity.

— AshTLs