Anyhow, I need to understand the situation.

I have to know the reason behind why this place is connected to Apocalypse Alice.

"What on earth do you mean by......?"

I start but do not get the time to finish.

"Yaah yaah, yaah yaah."

I hear voices saying that. I look in their direction. Standing at the entrance that connects the corridor to this hall, is a rabbit.

It"s probably a rabbit conjured by my little sister Saki.

A rabbit wearing a suit that has a heart mark finely woven into it.

Why haven"t I noticed that? Despite the fact that it very much resembles the rabbit appearing in the ill.u.s.trations of "Alice in Wonderland" that Saki and I used to read.

Despite the fact that Saki had appeared in my dream and talked to me.

Even though it"s unbelievable, this place is connected to my little sister"s labyrinth.

To the rank 666 labyrinth --- aka

Apocalypse Alice.

The rabbit takes out a pocket watch with its left hand.

It looks at the watch and says.

"Yaah yaah, human......"

I snap my fingers immediately. Activate my 《Headphone Fuzz》.

The sound from it shakes my brain.

The song shakes my brain matter.

The cursed song shakes my brain matter.

【In an instant ♪   In a flash ♪   In the time of a flash ♪

The flash of time, the flash of an instant ♪   In an instant ♪   In a flash ———】

I look at the Gunjou beside me. Gunjou too has activated her 《Headphone Fuzz》. But her movements are much slower than when she protected me from the rabbits earlier.

I say.

"Gunjou, you weren"t like this when you had the labyrinth disease you know?"

"That"s a given, right!"

"What a useless girl."

"You"re the useless......"

The rabbit attacks Gunjou.

Gunjou yells.

"d.a.m.n, my magic won"t make it in time......"

"Acceleration switch!"

I activate my magic. A switch flips in my body.

My whole body accelerates.

In an instant, for just a second, my speed surpa.s.ses even that of G.o.d.

I kick the head of the rabbit. The rabbit doesn"t even flinch, but stops moving. Its red eyes turn to me. By then, my brain has already been filled with a different curse.

【Sliced, shredded light ♪

Shredded, ripped-up light ♪

Abnormal, ruthless, extraordinary light ———】

"Demon Sword switch ---"

I take out a knife from my pocket. From the center of the knife, a sword with the color of darkness starts extending. This magic will confer its magic to any object touched, and transform it into a demon sword.

And right now, the demon sword special properties conferred onto this knife activate.

The special properties conferred onto this knife number two.

A long blade like that of a normal sword.

And an a.s.sa.s.sination property that can find the place where a fatal blow can be dealt to the opponent with the strength of this sword.

I search for the weakness of the rabbit.

A red target point appears in my field of vision and that point is targeted at the pocket watch of the rabbit.

"So that"s the weak point duh!"

I swing my sword. Splitting the pocket watch apart. The rabbit makes a shocked face. Following that, the rabbit disappears.

Just like before, another rabbit was hiding behind;

"Sea Moon Wheel switch!"

Gunjou conjures magical wheels and attempts to slash its torso apart --- but, it doesn"t have enough power.

The rabbit"s torso can"t be cut.

While she had the labyrinth disease, she could dispose of a rabbit with one blow, and right now, the power of her magic is clearly weaker when she employs it as a human.

"Wha."

Gunjou looks surprised.

But she immediately thrusts both her hands forward,

"Goooooooooooooooooooo!"

Five jellyfish wheels that appear strike the rabbit at the same place as before. On the fourth hit, the rabbit"s body got cut apart and it disappears.

The fifth wheel slices the air.

But with that, the rabbits have been dealt with.

Haah haah, Gunjou pants, her shoulders heaving.

I look down at her, make a small sigh and say.

"Weren"t you better when you were in labyrinth diseased state?"

"Shut up!"

"By the way, the pocket watch is their weak point."

"Eh, is that so? But it"s hard to aim at such a small object with long range offensive magic......"

"As I thought, you"re useless."

"I"ll send you flying."

"Didn"t you load a slot with direct point offense magic?"

Gunjou then looks up at me, then twirls her finger, selecting a song loaded in her 《Headphone Fuzz》. She then says.

"I have one loaded, but its performance is not too good. That"s why I don"t really want to get too close. Besides, I can handle most enemies with Sea Moon Wheel."

But that"s probably a lie.

She"s a daughter of one of the three biggest military conglomerates, Mitsutomo Group, at least on paper. There"s no way a half-a.s.s magic is loaded in the 《Headphone Fuzz》 of a daughter of that kind of family.

I thus say.

"It must be because you didn"t practice it much and suck at it."

"Uwu......"

"Your weakness as a labyrinth-diseased girl is blood. Could it be that you hate getting close because you are weak against blood?"

"Ah-uwuu......"

Seems like it"s a bullseye.

Well of course, since magic is difficult to wield, it"s hard to be proficient in all of the magic in the six different slots equally. Besides, it"s not really efficient to become equally proficient in all of them.

Research has shown that one"s performance would be much higher if he focuses on practicing on the one thing that he"s really good at.

And for me, my forte is close combat.

I"m good at cutting down enemies with both Acceleration switch and Demon Sword switch activated simultaneously.

It"s the opposite for Gunjou.

Staying at a medium-long range distance, she"d have her underlings protect her while she survey the enemy and probe for their weak points and slash at them with her jellyfish wheels; that"s what she"s good at, I suppose. The fighting style of a rich man"s daughter. The fighting style of someone with underlings.

But well, that doesn"t matter for now. What I want to ask about, is information concerning my little sister.

I look around and say.

"Can I ask you something?"

Gunjou replies before I even ask.

"The rabbits come at intervals of 3 to 5 minutes. So we can"t really stay here for long."

"I see."

Then, does that mean that for the past one month while she was down with the labyrinth disease, she had been protecting me without sleeping, from those rabbits that sp.a.w.n within a short interval of 3 to 5 minutes?

I consider that. But I do not ask her any further, If I ask, and that"s really the case, I feel like I"m going to spend my entire life repaying this debt.

Gunjou continues.

"So if we want to talk more, we have to move to another room."

"Well, this labyrinth was conjured by you, you should have the map......"

She then nods.

"The map of my surroundings is inside my head. Once we exit the door behind us, and enter the hidden door down the corridor, the rabbits probably won"t be able to find us."

I look at Gunjou and say.

"Oh, for once, you"re of use."

She then makes a proud face and says,

"Fuh, who do you think I am?"

"Minus vomit cup girl."

"It"s always the same words...... your teasing is like that of an elementary school kid huh."

"That so? I"m the type who likes to make fun of a girl I like."

"Eh......!?"

Gunjou"s face turns slightly red, and she scowls at me.

"Ah, I"m kidding so please don"t make such a reaction, will you?"

"When did I!? I didn"t react or anything!"

"Haah......"

"What"s that sigh for!"

While bantering, we exit the hall. As Gunjou kicks a place on what appears to be a wall, the wall turns. Beyond that, is a small room that"s about 4 tatami mats in size.

I look intently at the room and murmur.

"If we get attacked by the rabbits in such a small room, we"ll be at their mercy."

"It"d be fine. Those rabbits won"t come."

Gunjou enters.

I also enter.

On doing that, the wall turns around shut by itself.

I ask.

"How did you know they won"t come?"

"Because the rabbits will only react to enemies that they can see. And also because, not one of them have noticed the hidden door that I created."

Those are probably memories she got from when she was still labyrinth diseased. This labyrinth belongs to her. That"s why she remembers about the things that happened in this labyrinth.

Just now she said "surroundings" --- which means she doesn"t have a complete grasp of everything that happened in the labyrinth, but,

"Anyway, this is a safety zone huh."

During eternal labyrinth raids, it"s an established tactic to find a safety zone, camp there, embed a coordinate designation magic, and repeatedly invade and escape to slowly clear it.

I lean my back against the corner of the room, and sink down onto the floor.

Gunjou looks down at me.

"...... are you tired?"

"...... yeah. A little. I wonder why. In spite of sleeping for a month."

No, if I have really been sleeping for a month, I won"t be able to move like this normally. Thus, there must be a special reason as to why I had remained unconscious all this while.

Could it be due to the effect of the magic from the sword that Kiri had impaled into me?

That"s not all to what I don"t know.

And, more importantly, why is this labyrinth connected to 《Apocalypse Alice》 right now?

I want to ask those questions.

Even as I turn a number of hypotheses and suppositions in my mind, trying to make sense of them, I can"t figure it out. There"s too little information for me to go on.

Thus, I look at Gunjou.

She then starts talking immediately.

"...... I also don"t know the details though."

"Yeah."

"Erhm, where should I start......"

"From the beginning. Everything from the beginning."

"From the beginning...... you say, is it okay for me to start from when you got stabbed by that j.a.panese sword girl?"

On hearing her question, I recall.

As to when I actually lost consciousness.

The last thing I saw was the leader of the Valor Team, the girl called Mitsutomo Kujaku, stabbing Gunjou with a knife. But that knife couldn"t kill Gunjou. And then the time limit was up. Gunjou then started turning into an eternal labyrinth ---

That was when I lost consciousness.

However, there is something off about what I"m seeing right now.

Because Kujaku clearly killed Gunjou back then.

At that time, blood which was Gunjou"s weakness had been splashed all around her, and on top of that, she had her whole body restrained by the members of the Valor Team.

In that case, it"d be an easy thing to just separate her head from her body or gouge out her intestines. And also, Gunjou was an existence that had to be killed. Since, if she turned into an eternal labyrinth, the streets and people swallowed up by her could no longer be saved.

And even for us, the instant we get swallowed up by an eternal labyrinth, we would become part of the labyrinth.

But Kujaku did not panic in the slightest.

She merely stabbed a small knife into Gunjou"s chest.

And then, Gunjou ended up turning into an eternal labyrinth.

Girl killing failed.

But, that was obviously done on purpose.

"............"

I rewind my memories further back. Searching for the very beginning of what I should recall about this incident.

The leader of the Valor Team called herself

A daughter of the military conglomerate 『Mitsutomo Group』.

And she did refer to Gunjou, who should also be a lady of Mitsutomo Group, as "one of us".

--- we"ll dispose of our own shame ourselves.

Kujaku did said something along that line.

Our own.

As in a fellow daughter of Mitsutomo Group.

But, in the cla.s.s we attended, in the profile of the labyrinth diseased girl 《Mizuiro Gunjou》, the following information, which Gunjou herself is unaware of, was written.

Gunjou is actually an abandoned kid ---

She was an orphan bought by Mitsutomo Group from a children"s home ---

Her parents are not even married, and merely serve as her trainers ---

Mitsutomo Group hid all that from her and made use of her; and without knowing all that, she desperately worked hard, hoping for her parents" recognition ---

I don"t really consider that as the worst kind of situations. In the world of military organizations, labyrinths and magic, you"d often hear these kind of stories.

But, if this is indeed true, then to Kujaku, Gunjou is no kin.

She"s merely a lab rat.

And if this lab rat had ended up turning into a labyrinth and if she was here to dispose of this failing, then she would definitely need to kill her.

But Kujaku did not do that.

In a laid-back fashion, while smiling, she stabbed Gunjou"s chest with a small knife which no one would think capable of dealing a fatal blow to a labyrinth diseased girl.

"............"

I recall that knife.

The knife that Kujaku had.

What on earth was that?

A knife that wasn"t used to behead her, nor to gouge out her gut, but merely used to stab into her chest.

But was that really a knife?

Could it be an article for implanting magic?

Could it be that, what Kujaku used, was a type of magic much like my Holy Sword switch, which could be used to meddle with a labyrinth diseased girl?

I look around my surroundings. In spite of severing Gunjou away, her labyrinth remains.

And about the fact that right now, another eternal labyrinth nearby, 《Apocalypse Alice》, is connected to Gunjou"s labyrinth.

Could it be that that"s the true motive behind Kujaku"s knife?

Then,

"...... the true motive of Mitsutomo Group is the 《Apocalypse Alice》?"

That"s bad. While I"m wasting my time around here, there"s a possibility that the Mitsutomo Group finding a way to making military use of my little sister Saki.

I look at Gunjou and say.

"Hey Gunjou, can I ask you something?"

"What is it?"

"Do you know Kujaku?"

On hearing that, Gunjou"s eyes go wide and she c.o.c.ks her head to the side.

"What kind of question is that? Of course I know...... you"re talking about the bird peac.o.c.k[1] right?"

Seems like Gunjou doesn"t know about Mitsutomo Kujaku.

But that"s to be expected.

There"s no researcher who would tell a lab rat that she"s a lab rat.

And I do not know whether or not I should tell her about her parentage right now. We are inside a labyrinth. It"s not a good thing to learn the truth about one"s parentage out of nowhere and waver because of that inside the labyrinth, I suppose.

Even if I have to tell her, it"d be outside the labyrinth. And it should be at a fun place. The truth about her parents not being her real parents is not something that she should dwell on, so I think it"s best to tell her when she"s singing herself silly at a karaoke box. Maybe it"s better to have Shiro, Yousuke and Himi along with us then.

Thus, I ask another question.

"What happened to Shiro and the rest?"

On hearing that, Gunjou"s eyes narrow slightly.

On seeing that, my pulse quickens for an instant again.

There"s a possibility that Shiro and the rest had died, perhaps.

If that happened, I"d probably be hurt again.

Easily hurt.

Because I"m weak. Terribly weak. That was why I didn"t want to get close to anyone.

"Sorry. We are digressing. Start from the beginning. From the time when I lost consciousness."

I finally recover from my confusion, sort out my thoughts, and prepare to listen to the story.

The information that I"ve sorted out in my mind are as follows:

After sorting out all those thoughts, I ask.

"...... so, what"s the story?"

On hearing that, Gunjou starts recounting what happened since I lost consciousness.