(*This installment is recommended to be read while listening to JoJo Part 2 OST – "Overdrive.")
In the darkness.
There, the girl stared at a mirror reflecting the scenery outside, the battlefield beyond, and let out a scream.
Within that soundless shriek was only one question.
"What... what on earth is that, An?"
The girl, Liliruca Arde, could not find the words to continue.
Looking at the mirror, she felt an indescribable revulsion crawl up her spine.
In the end, she shouted as if vomiting up that nauseating feeling.
"What did you do to Bell?"
"What did I do, you say..."
At her tearful cry of outrage, the magus fell silent for a moment.
How should he explain it so that the girl before him would be hurt as little as possible?
It was the cat, the perpetrator, worrying about the mouse, the victim.
In a word, it was nothing but hypocritical nonsense.
At the very least, the magus wanted none of that when dealing with her.
So he decided to tell her exactly what was true, without a shred of softening.
After all.
She was already his person.
There was no need for petty lies between them.
"Don't be so angry, Lili. That too is the result he wanted—the boy wanted."
"The result Bell wanted?"
This child would surely overcome even that pain.
From the start, she too had been included among the targets of this staged trial.
Then here, he might as well fulfill the role he had taken on himself.
Silently harboring such arrogant thoughts, the magus continued his explanation.
"There was something Lady Hestia once asked me to do. She wanted me to make a special magic item just for the boy—something that would let him safely return alive if he pushed himself too hard in the Dungeon, or if he ended up in a life-threatening situation like last time."
At the time, the magus had thought about it.
Would Bell survive safely if he were given the strongest weapon in the world?
"No chance."
Then would Bell be safe if he were given the sturdiest armor in the world?
"No chance."
Or maybe if he were given a potion powerful enough to be close to resurrection?
"No chance."
Or perhaps this way... or that way... and so on and so forth.
"I thought long and hard about it."
Then, all at once, he reached one conclusion.
No matter how amazing a magic item the magus made for the boy, his survival rate could never be one hundred percent perfect at all times and in all places, just as the goddess had wished.
In the end, the one who would handle that magic item was the boy, and if the boy himself was weak, then it would mean nothing.
Worse, it might even bury or break his potential for growth before it could bloom.
"Then the answer is simple."
When his life hung by a thread.
The boy himself would have to save himself.
He only needed to give him the "power" to do that.
"So what I made was that mask."
The name of that mask was the mask of "Hollow."
A token of power that materialized the "malice" within the soul—the evil aspect that every human being must surely possess in one or two forms somewhere inside them.
Roughly speaking, it was something you could understand as a mask of an "evil spirit."
"...That was the subject I started the research with, anyway."
In the end, the magus failed to reproduce true Hollowfication.
From the very beginning, the research had been blocked at the point where he tried to materialize the soul's malice as a mask.
If that were possible, then the Third Magic, "materialization of the soul," would also be possible without question.
And if that were possible, then he would not be called a magus, but a "mage," which would be the proper term.
So, with the direct approach blocked, he changed his method.
From the start, what he had wanted was not so much an amplification of power or the soul itself, but simply to wear a bone mask in a cool way.
Because... that was his "romance"!
"So I made the mask itself directly. And then I anchored it into the boy's soul."
"Something like that... why would you make something like that..."
"Let's just call that a matter of taste for now. Besides, this was the most effective and efficient method I could give the boy."
Leaving aside the soul-related part, making the mask itself had been easy.
The production process was, naturally, a secret.
But to introduce its performance in simple terms: first came enhancement magecraft that applied buffs to the body's status.
That alone still wasn't enough, so he directly interfered with the user's brain.
By forcibly and completely unsealing the physical limits normally imposed on the body, he powered it up once more.
To prevent the resulting bodily self-destruction to some extent, a small regeneration buff was standard.
Furthermore, the "thing" used as the mask's material was employed like an internal cast, or an exoskeleton.
It forcibly restored and reassembled damaged flesh, stopping the bleeding while permanently assisting the body so it could keep moving right up until the moment it died and came to a halt.
In addition, the combat data the magus had accumulated until now was forcibly downloaded, at least temporarily, into the memory responsible for movement, minimizing the gap between that and the enhanced physical performance.
Beyond that, it even assisted the user in properly applying the optimal way to use their own body at the proper time and in the proper circumstances—even methods they themselves had never known.
"Well, in the middle of all that, something went wrong and the survival instinct inherent to living beings became the top priority above everything else. Thanks to that, the fighting instinct got maximized too, and it started treating every living thing nearby as an enemy. There were a few little issues like that, but just ignore them."
"That is not little at all!"
After firing off her retort and protest, Lili realized it once again.
As expected, the man before her was the ultimate deviant even the goddess had acknowledged—the source of all this suffering.
If she didn't do something about this human soon...!
"But that's different from what you said before, isn't it? You said you anchored it into Bell's soul? Just now you said that was impossible, didn't you?"
"I know it sounds contradictory. But the opposite is entirely possible. There are ways to get around it."
In short, this was the magus's explanation.
He could not directly touch the soul itself as a target, but indirect interference with the soul was entirely possible.
What was needed there was the divine blessing, [Falna].
And a grimoire.
"A grimoire? Why on earth would that..."
"Ah, I see, Lili. You've already figured it out. As expected of my disciple."
"Th-thank you... no, wait! Then could that mean that's Bell's new magic?!"
"It's closer to a skill than magic, but it does consume quite a bit of Mind, so I suppose you could call it that."
A grimoire that grants magic simply by being read.
That was a grimoire, and the magus had already finished analyzing one.
Although he found its very existence distasteful, he did, in his own way, acknowledge its usefulness.
So this time, he had tried approaching things in that manner.
"In other words, that mask is the same as a grimoire. The difference is that instead of magic, it was registered on the boy's [Falna] as a skill—and right now, it can't be controlled at all, regardless of Bell's will."
"Then that means it's gone berserk! Bell is in danger!"
"Hmm, who knows? Is he, really?"
"An!"
"My ears haven't fallen off yet."
Even in the face of Lili's frantic, angry cry, the magus remained utterly indifferent.
His careless attitude, as if there were no problem at all, made Lili uneasy.
So she thought.
Had the man before her truly made Bell a sacrifice?
Had he used him as nothing more than a test subject for magecraft?
He said he had done it with Bell's consent—was that really true?
'Maybe... maybe An is lying...!'
As soon as that thought reached her, Lili shook her head hard and denied the suspicion she had just formed.
No, that could not be it.
The magus she knew was always someone who lived with confidence in his own abilities.
And his favor toward the goddess Hestia was unquestionably sincere.
There was no way such a man would casually sacrifice Bell Cranel, the one loved by her.
More than that, looking at the current state of the battlefield, perhaps he had something else in mind...
"An, what exactly do you want to see?"
At her serious question, the magus was silent for a moment.
But in the end.
He answered her seriousness with seriousness of his own.
"The possibility of a hero."
And a human miracle.
That much was undeniably his true feeling.
At that heartfelt answer, Lili let out a quiet sigh.
A sigh carrying, in many ways, a great deal of complicated emotion.
And then, with that, she gathered her resolve and looked at him.
No—she declared it.
"I guess I'm never going to become a magus like you, An. I just can't understand or accept your way of thinking."
"If that's all, then there's no need to worry, Lili. That's exactly what I want. Just stay the way you are and grow up straight and right."
"Is that so? Then..."
Clack
"This must be what you wanted too, An!"
Ping!
The arrow from the aimed crossbow was loosed.
She did not tell a single clumsy lie, not even by mistake.
It was a single arrow fired with nothing but her own will.
That was the answer that spoke for her resolve now.
Liliruca Arde's own declaration of war.
"Hmm."
And the magus.
He lightly deflected and blocked the will of the small but resolute girl.
"Hoit~!"
Ting~!
Even though he had done nothing physically, the arrow was clearly stopped by something—some invisible barrier spread out in front of his feet.
If she could not somehow get past that, she would have no chance of victory.
"Tch!"
But Lili had no intention of giving up over something so small.
She quickly nocked another arrow onto the crossbow.
Seeing her, the magus also gave up his one-second hesitation and made up his mind.
Yes, here, taking a firmer stance would be good training for her as well.
"All right. Then let's bring back some old memories for a change."
Snap!
With a slight flick of his finger, multicolored lights burst violently out of the darkness.
That meant this entire space was already his workshop and his bounded field.
In other words, it was the magus's domain alone.
Here, he was nothing less than an absolute ruler.
That was the magus's fear.
The power of a true magus.
"[Flames are...]"
And so fate.
Led "him" here through her.
Because everything has its proper use, in the proper place, at the proper time.
"Now, Bellf!"
For that very reason.
As the saying goes, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.
Then what about cheats?
"Oh! [Burn up, heresy of the outer path!]"
Of course, they had to be answered with cheats of the same kind.
"[...re], huh? Wha—?"
Boom!
"Puh-hew!"
Suddenly losing control, the magus's flames burst apart on their own.
Watching that scene, the young orphan smiled at the corners of her mouth.
This was the true declaration of war of the Pallum girl who was weaker than anyone, yet more resolute than anyone.
Liliruca Arde's real "declaration of war."