Rewind to a few minutes earlier: watching the retreating figures of Geno and the others, Twiggy silently made a decision in her heart.
"Belle, you wait here for reinforcements. I'm going to help them."
"What? But your body—!"
Others might not know, but how could Belle not know?
Twiggy's body was already in a terrible state; back when she'd infiltrated the rebel base together with Yanagi Tsukishiro, she'd barely managed it. If she now threw herself into high-intensity combat, it would likely worsen her condition even further.
"I know. But I can't stay standing behind him forever."
All this time, Twiggy had only ever supported Geno quietly from behind, and whenever danger reared its head, the choice Geno made was always to put himself in front of her and shield her.
But Twiggy didn't want it that way—especially after she'd learned of her own condition, this feeling of being protected only made her more anxious.
As she spoke, Twiggy pulled a syringe filled with golden liquid from her waist pouch—this was the fruit of her research.
"As long as I have this, I can be of help to him too."
It was a prototype of a medicine meant to treat Twiggy's own illness.
Although its effects hadn't yet fully reached her standards, it was more than enough for an emergency.
With that, Twiggy injected the syringe's entire dose into her body. "Ngh~"
Feeling the power surging up within her and the warmth coursing through her whole body, Twiggy realized it had been a very long time since she'd felt this at ease.
"Time—I've only got five minutes."
Twiggy clenched her fist. Her body would still need some time to adjust, and after that, the combat time she'd have was only five minutes.
After five minutes, her body would be wracked with agony from the medicine's side effects.
Still, it ought to be enough.
As long as she could stall until Anti-Air Section Six arrived—until that Void Hunter got here...
So thought Twiggy, locked in a struggle with Dagalle—yet she failed entirely to notice that, after the Drowned Dreamers were defeated, Dagalle's power had grown stronger along with it.
Once the dispersed power returned to its main body, Dagalle overturned the situation in which Twiggy had had it pinned down, and instead forced her back.
"Do not obstruct me!"
Dagalle's golden eye flashed, and a beam of light shot out from it without warning, boring straight through Twiggy's shoulder.
"Ngh!"
Twiggy's body went limp from the searing pain, but before she could even collapse to the ground, Dagalle had seized her by the throat.
"Gck—aaahhhh..."
The tremendous force on her neck cut off Twiggy's oxygen, while the blocked flow of blood turned her face an ever deeper red.
"A bothersome thing."
Dagalle said coldly, then applied just a touch of force in its hand—with a single crisp snap, Twiggy's body went slack, and it carelessly flung her to the ground.
"Twiggy!"
Everything had happened far too fast; from Twiggy pinning Dagalle down to Dagalle snapping her neck had been a matter of mere seconds.
Everyone was startled by this sudden turn of events; Anby and Number 11 didn't even want to believe their own eyes, and just stood there frozen, unmoving.
And off to the side, Geno—who had yet to break free of Dagalle's binds—went berserk in an instant at the sight.
"Twiggy!"
Struggling ceaselessly, Geno watched Twiggy lying on the ground, and felt as though a string in his mind had snapped.
His body, which had not a shred of Ether to spare, suddenly erupted, blue flames bursting forth all over him as he tore loose from the Filth Dagalle had used to bind him.
"You bastard! Damn you to hell!"
Summoning his longsword once more, Geno charged at Dagalle and launched a frenzied assault.
Dagalle had assumed that even if Geno broke free of his binds it would be no more than a dying struggle—but only when that blade actually came slashing right before its eyes did it realize something was wrong.
Swish! The flash of the blade swept past, stirring up a ripple of gold—the blood scattering from the severed remnant of Dagalle's body.
"Impossible! This power! So immense!"
Clutching the left hand Geno had severed, Dagalle stared in disbelief at Geno, whose eyes burned crimson and whose whole body radiated blue light.
It couldn't understand—Geno should have been spent of all strength, so how could he stand back up again and even unleash power this overwhelming?
Normally it would be impossible, but within Geno's body, besides his own Ether, there were two other forces.
One was the power of Filth, sharing the same origin as the Dagalle before him; the other was the power of the Night Demon, bestowed upon him by the Night Demon to suppress the power of Filth.
And what Geno was now drawing upon was precisely that power belonging to the Night Demon.
"Burn away all of me! Incinerate my enemies!"
Blue flames blazed fiercely along Geno's blade, and with every swing of his sword, a great surge of fire issued forth alongside the sword's edge.
The parts of Dagalle caught by the flames felt an unbearably scorching agony, while the power of Filth within it was inevitably suppressed as well.
"No! This is impossible! The Lord's power! It is invincible!"
Dagalle's single eye trembled, as if it couldn't believe that the power of the Lord to whom it had devoted its all could actually be suppressed.
But facts speak louder than words; Dagalle had no choice but to likewise coat its spear with Filth, swinging the long spear to do battle with Geno.
And the fierce clash between the two left Anby, Number 11, and the others off to the side unable to draw near.
"No good! There's no getting through at all!"
Number 11 struggled to step into the battlefield between the two, but the collision of blue flame and Filth made it utterly impossible for them to approach.
"A battle on this level leaves no room for us to intervene anymore."
Yanagi Tsukishiro watched the two fierce combatants with a grim expression; this kind of destructive force and oppressive presence, she had only ever witnessed in Hoshimi Miyabi.
And it had been no so-called training session, but for real, inside a Hollow.
The anomalous symbiotic Ethereal of the [Argus Hollow]—[Lerna]—a dangerous Ethereal that had once very nearly triggered another massive Hollow disaster.
Within five minutes—no, within three—all of its false cores, along with its true core, had been wiped out.
That was the first time she came to understand that a single person's power could be strong to such a degree.
The power Geno was displaying now was in no way inferior to Hoshimi Miyabi's back then.
It was just...
how much longer could this power be used...
Just as Yanagi Tsukishiro feared, this power did not, in the end, belong to Geno himself.
He was merely using the Night Demon's power as ammunition, while he himself was the gun that fired the bullets.
"Die! Die! Just die already!!!"
As the Night Demon's power was continuously expended, Geno's sanity, too, gradually evaporated with the passing of time.
This was inevitable; the Night Demon's power was, after all, meant to suppress the Filth within his body.
And since the Night Demon's power was now steadily waning, how could the Filth within Geno's body possibly let slip such a perfect opportunity?
____
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