Back to battle, and memory.
It was a composition that always left my mind in a haze.
Just when I'd finished a fight and was climbing back up through the boiling blood, it would show me a memory. Just when I'd gotten absorbed in that memory, I'd be dragged back out and thrown into another fight.
I don't know who put this together, but seriously...
The only silver lining was that both the hill and the memory were finally starting to show an end.
If it had shown me a memory while I was fighting Kromer at the summit, I don't think I would have been able to endure it.
...Surely they weren't going to show every single step of Sinclair's journey to Limbus Company.
Anyway, let's get to the point.
As usual, battle. The result: one dead, and three more injured.
It was a fairly standard number for the Inquisitors, so it wasn't too bad.
Though anyone hit by Abnormality corrosion or E.G.O corrosion would be a lot more troublesome.
Anyway, what I saw when I re-entered the memory was...
[When I came to, I was in the middle of a midday alleyway, the ground blazing hot from the sunlight.]
...So it was.
[I was lying there blankly.]
[I could see heat haze rising from the alley by the roadside.]
"Sinclair, your world has cracked."
Damian? Why was he here?
[I thought I understood the source of the unease I often felt when I looked at Damian.]
[Why was it that the boy's footsteps were never audible?]
[Why did everything approach so lonely and quietly, as though it belonged nowhere at all?]
[The death of family, the world of evil, despair...]
[And you, too.]
"Are you afraid, Sinclair?"
[He said to me.]
[As if he could see through everything, and as if all of it were nothing more than a predetermined sequence.]
[As if he already knew, he went on without waiting for an answer.]
"Someday, there will come a day when you break everything and force your way up."
"I want to see you when you've dragged everything out into the open."
[As if he already knew what my unspoken answer would be.]
[And yet his words were full of warmth, while...]
[They left me with a cold feeling, like chewing the chilled insides of an undercooked turkey...]
Ugh, why was that comparison so specific? I'd forgotten it, and now it's back in my head.
[I had no choice but to lose consciousness once more.]
Wait, what?
Before I could even register the situation, my consciousness was yanked outside in an instant.
*
After that, it was battle.
The first was a fight against an enemy whose right arm had swollen grotesquely with muscle, along with several N Corp Inquisitors waiting for us.
Because of the gimmick carried by the enemy afflicted with corrosion, a few of us took light injuries, but thankfully there were no deaths.
The second battle was against two enemies whose right arms had turned into snakes.
We struggled quite a bit, but aside from one death, there were no major losses.
If there had been more battles, fighting with our reduced numbers would have been pretty rough, but for now it wasn't a major problem.
We only had to go a little farther to reach the summit.
Even though a formidable foe named Kromer was still waiting, there were no other Inquisitors in sight along the way.
That had probably been the last battle.
Right before we faced Kromer, a little below the summit, we decided to rewind time once.
We couldn't hear any more Inquisitors coming up from below, and it would be difficult for Kromer to ambush us when she couldn't even see us.
If she were going to do that, she would have come down herself from the start.
And there was no sign that that insane woman would come down at all.
And then.
Before long, the clock turned back.
*
-Squelch, squelch.
With our bodies and minds cleaned up, we stood before Kromer.
And Kromer, looking at us, spoke first.
"How was it? Sinclair. Were you able to find the answer in the path I made inside your heart?"
So showing memories with the Golden Bough was all part of the plan?
At this point, my teeth were grinding. Come to think of it, maybe even our grueling push through the branch on the second floor had been planned by that deranged bitch.
"...Kromer."
"Ahaha, don't look at me like that."
"It's not even time yet..."
"And I want to kill you."
"Oh... no, no. I have to hold back... There are more important things than immediate pleasure."
Crazy bitch.
"Sinclair, to retrieve the Golden Bough that has begun to resonate..."
"I know."
Sinclair cut off Faust's words and answered.
"...Even if it wasn't the Golden Bough."
"I'm going to tear that bastard apart and drink him dry."
"Pfft... Ahahaha!!"
At Sinclair's words, thick with rage, Kromer burst out laughing as if she'd heard something hilarious.
"Kek... Sinclair...! Since when did you learn to talk like that? It doesn't suit you at all... It's ridiculous... Puhut."
She really was a bitch who needed to be torn apart and killed.
"Still... well, it seems you've made a lot of friends."
"This time, you won't run away, will you?"
The moment I heard that, Dante manipulated the device, and our identities received their signal.
There was no reason to resist.
We had to kill that bitch.
After stumbling around in the branch for so long, at last the chance to avenge Epi and Sword had come.
At some point while we were standing off in silence, I had the illusion that a dark red mark had appeared on Sinclair's head.
"Kromer!!!"
Sinclair was the first to charge in boldly.
Whoosh!
And Kromer evaded Sinclair's attack with a few light steps.
"Aha! Try a little harder, Sinclair. Maybe you'll hit me if you do?"
"I'll kill you!!"
I could see Sinclair gradually losing his reason.
This is a little... dangerous.
The ripple effect of one ally losing their reason would never be small.
We might end up in a situation more dangerous than simply dying.
"You little brat! Calm down and get back in formation!"
Even with Otis's shout, Sinclair didn't seem to have any intention of stopping.
...If I just stood here and watched, I'd die.
My instincts flashed a warning, and I could feel the curiosity that had come with my identity going quiet.
At this point, maybe it would be best to try to coordinate somehow.
That said, our situation wasn't good enough to start by abandoning one person.
"I'll join in first!"
After giving the others a quick notice, Sinclair moved toward Kromer, who was attacking wildly.
"Hup!"
Clang!
"Looks like Sinclair's friend came too?"
Kromer lightly blocked the thrust with a nail, then spun the nail around and took a stabbing stance.
Clang——!
Shit, what kind of strength was that...!
I nearly lost my stance.
Maybe because she was a high-ranking executive in a Wing, the body-enhancement procedure she'd received was on a completely different level.
...Unfortunate as it was, with stats like that, two people wouldn't be enough. Then—
Thud!
"Ha! Serves you right!"
"Mr. Heathcliff!"
Support! It seemed Otis had also come prepared with a way to deal with her.
Or maybe this was Heathcliff acting on his own.
Either way, more numbers were better than fewer.
"Sinclair's friends are a little wild, aren't they? They need correcting!"
Then Kromer said that and clenched the air tightly.
What was she trying to do?
"Ugh..."
Suddenly, Heathcliff's stance collapsed.
Not just that—his sense of balance was thrown off for a moment too, leaving him completely disordered.
...Was that Kromer's doing?
From the situation, it was obvious she'd done something, but I couldn't figure out how her ability worked.
No conditions for use? Any limit on the number of targets? Was the activation trigger that gesture of gripping the air?
My head spun as I tried to make sense of this new power, something beyond simple physical ability.
Under my overheated thoughts, my eyes blossomed with a newly acquired ability.
Threads, or lines.
Something like that began to appear everywhere.
It was clearly something I'd never seen before, but it wasn't hard to guess what it was.
Possibility.
That abstract something I'd only vaguely been able to perceive with my eyes for some time now.
It had taken on a definite form and appeared in my field of vision.
It was definitely the first time I'd consciously perceived it, and yet I instinctively understood how to see it.
...No, had I always known?
The feeling was ominous, but there was far too little room in the current situation to dig into it.
Following the instinct my body was demanding, I focused on seeing the manifested possibilities.
At the same time, the nearest possible future that appeared.
A thrust aimed precisely at my heart!
Swoosh——!!
The instant I noticed it, I hurriedly stepped aside to dodge.
Then her possibility appeared again immediately.
Dammit, it was a combo?
I rolled my body hard and got away backward.
Whoosh!
"Tch! It's funny, seeing you flee in such a panic like a rat. Don't you think so, Sinclair?"
That insane bitch had undergone some absurd body-enhancement procedure, and she still had the nerve to say that...!
The situation was bad.
My eyes kept peering at the future's possibilities without pause, but I still couldn't see any possibility of the three of us subduing her.
Wait, that—
"Form an encirclement formation!"
Otis!
Had she refined the plan? She entered the battle sooner than expected, leading the prisoners with her.
Now then, 13 against 1.
At last, the time had come to break through that bitch.
...Though I wasn't sure whether it was even possible.