Gacha Kingdom Building-Chapter 296: Execution In Detail (02)

I walked towards Mia, but before I could open my mouth to have a word with her, she shouted for us to run. 𝐟𝗿𝐞𝚎𝚠𝐞𝚋𝕟𝐨𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝕔𝕠𝚖

She had heard multiple steps encroaching on the garage.

Licia and I focused our mana outside the building, and sure enough, we sensed an overwhelming ocean of mana around us, no doubt the result of multiple people infected by the fungi.

Before making our escape, I told Lily to return to the Kingdom. Her worry for Mia made her hesitate, but ultimately, she knew how much of a liability she would be in a fight and trusted us to see it through.

With tears in her eyes, she waved us goodbye.

Anna opened the doors of our car and escorted the mayor inside. Mia took her seat after them. James and I followed.

The driver was already waiting for us, anxiously hitting the pedal, roaring the engine. Once Licia and Claire took their spots on the roof, we drove away.

Even with Claire and Licia doing their best, it was a bumpy road all the way through.

There were just too many zombies. Despite covering each other, they had no breaks to work with.

Licia's ice magic also wasn't suited for this.

While Claire's flames reduced the enemies to ashes, Licia's ice became obstacles to drive around, see-through edges that could at any time pop a tire.

It was thanks to immense luck and driving skill that we didn't stop, but still, we slowed down.

A crushing silence permeated inside the car.

I had already threatened the mayor's life to his face before, and now, Mia refused to meet my eyes.

She stared at the street through the window, occasionally glancing my way, only to realize I still had my eyes on her before looking away.

Mia: "What is it...?"

She spoke fast, annoyed.

Just like she had done to me before, I kept tapping her legs with my feet. Lightly, only to get her attention.

Miwen: "How are you feeling?"

Despite Lily's panic, Mia's situation wasn't critical.

The fungus pod had already drilled its main body into her nervous system, but it didn't have time to grow and mature.

Lily and James managed to drain the absurd green magic poured into the pods, and the fungus returned to its normal state.

Since the fungus couldn't infect humans naturally, and Mia, as a beastman, had an even stronger body, it was just a matter of time before it died.

Still, just to be sure, Lily instructed Mia to lower her body's temperature as much as she could.

In a cold environment, the fungus should die faster.

Mia: "..."

She blushed a little, and to hide it, she turned her head even further away from me.

Cheekily, she wrapped her legs around mine, trying to bother me with her ice-cold skin.

Mia: "You don't have to worry about me."

Hands on her cheeks, she mumbled out words she didn't mean.

Then, a face pressed against the window from above, causing her to jump in place.

Claire: "You sure? The air must be unbearable for you right now."

Mia: "It's not so bad. The [Heat Resistance] skill Miwen gave me that time at the beach is actually being useful now."

She lowered the window to push Claire's head back to the roof.

No matter what, she needed the window free, so that she had somewhere to turn and look away from me.

Claire, of course, was well aware of this and did everything she could to provoke Mia, resisting her hands for as long as she could.

Mia: "Look, I'm being honest, alright!? I feel slightly tired, maybe a little duller than usual, but that's it. I'm not gonna return to the Kingdom. I wanna fight."

She started angry, but by the end, she was pleading.

To her, returning to the Kingdom was the same as admitting defeat, and she couldn't accept that.

Not without facing the person who attacked her, at least.

I knew better than to butt heads against a determined Mia, so I quietly accepted the pride of the Snow White Wolves' Chieftainess.

After a few minutes of silence, only a couple of street blocks stood between us and the cemetery.

Most of the zombies still alive were left behind, and the few who stood in our way were made quick work of.

We parked the cars, and after the cemetery's gates were opened for us, more guards joined us.

The vivid green grass stood in sharp contrast to the whiteness of the tombstones, which spoke much of its caretaker's attention.

Miwen: "Something bothering you?"

James: "It's too bright. They should add some trees here. The place needs shadows."

Almost as if mocking us, the moon rose. The darkness James looked for slowly swallowed the green and painted the once white tombstones gray.

Miwen: "Well, if you ask me... A cemetery is implicitly dark, even when it's bright. You know? Hard to think of a darker place."

James: "The atmosphere, huh? That's true..."

Undisturbed by our conversation behind him, Richard walked until he found the tombstone he was looking for. In it, the name "Tania Blake" was sculpted.

Beautiful yellow flowers already adorned it, but the mayor took a single, small budding rose and added it to one of the pots.

Richard: "...I visit this grave every year. It's been sixteen years today."

I thought it was strange.

His house was secure. The AOTG hadn't taken territory inside the city yet. However, it would still be better for him to move into a more easily protected building, like the city office.

It was our final destination, even.

But I guess this is why he had to wait.

They wouldn't let him leave the office for something like this.

Miwen: "I'm sorry for your loss."

Despite everything, I meant these words.

The mayor didn't respond immediately.

Instead, he walked towards another grave, a resting place just beside the one he left the rose in.

In this tombstone, above the words 'Adored son', the name 'Clark Blake' was written.

Richard: "It was an accident. The fire spread quickly. My wife and my children were stuck."

Miwen: "...Children?"

Richard: "My son and my little girl. She was born a few weeks before the First Contact. The smartest four-year-old I'd seen."

He fell to his knees, hands closed in prayer.

After a minute of silence, he continued.

Richard: "The flames never reached them. They were deprived of oxygen."

I looked at the other tombstones around us.

There wasn't another female of the Blake family resting in the cemetery.

Miwen: "...Did your daughter survive?"

Richard: "...She learned from a cartoon that the flames needed oxygen. She thought that, if she strengthened the plants, they'd need more oxygen, and the fire would die down."

Strengthening plants...

As Lily said, it was the basics of green magic.

And a decent green mage could even modify their behavior, just like with the fungi.

Richard: "The strengthened plants protected her from the fire, at the cost of... Theirs."

Miwen: "...That's not fair."

Richard: "It isn't."

We meant it in different ways.

But before I could clear the misunderstanding, I sensed another astonishing surge of mana near us.

However, unlike with the fungi-infested waves from before, I could only sense two sources.

They moved in perfect sync, too.

Slow steps, completely different from the mindless charges we had faced so far.

And from between them, a voice echoed.

??????: "I knew you'd come."

A tall young woman stood there, her own mana dim against the immense reserves of the zombies accompanying her.

Like a planet hidden behind a star, I could barely sense the small thread connecting her to them.

The thread didn't only feed the zombies.

It controlled them.

Miwen: "Bianca Graves, I imagine?"

Bianca: "...Graves?"

Oh, right.

That was a lie.

Miwen: "Sorry. I meant Blake."

I extended my arm sideways. The pencil-sized knife I had under my sleeve suddenly turned into two arm-sized daggers.

Cassandra knew I wanted to finish Bianca off as fast as possible, so instead of the training cutlasses from before, she transformed into my preferred weapons.

Mia and Anna stood by my side, Claire and Licia behind us, preparing ice and fire artillery.

Miwen: "...Can you remove the fungi from them?"

Bianca: "Why would I?"

Fair.

We had to give her an incentive.

So, Mia charged forward.

Even with her senses dulled and her body sluggish, she closed the distance in the blink of an eye.

Had she been at peak condition, the battle would've ended there and then.

Instead, one of the zombies managed to catch her fist before it could reach Bianca.

For a moment.

Using her Gift to take away the zombie's strength stat, Mia easily overpowered it.

Her entire arm pierced through the zombie's, and after kicking it away, the zombie found itself one limb short.

She jumped back. Eyes filled with disgust, she shook her arms, trying to get rid of the arm stuck to hers.

Licia: "Here... Save your mana for your body..."

Seeing her struggle, Licia froze the zombie's arm, allowing Mia to break it into pieces.

Miwen: "...Alright. I guess you got two last chances?"

Bianca: "You should count again."

The zombie Mia had kicked rose from its back.

From the shoulder, where the detached arm should be, roots began to spread uncontrollably.

Something akin to flesh, but not quite, grew from the roots.

On top of them, a weird texture.

Using my skills to have a better view, I quickly identified what caused the texture: Countless pods, just like the ones that had infected Mia.

Barely a second after acquiring its new, monstrous arm, pods were launched into the air.

Like a dark cloud, they were carried by the air...

I worried she was trying to infect all of us, but the cloud had a clear direction.

Or rather, a clear target.

Miwen: "She really doesn't like you, huh?"

Using my [Wind Magic], I took control of the cloud's direction, gathering all the pods in one spot, away from the mayor.

There, they met Claire's flames, crackling like fireworks.

Bianca: "Oh, don't worry. It's mutual. Right, Dad?"

Leaves fell from her sleeves.

The green ones were fired like bullets from a machine gun.

Sharp like swords, they clashed against Cassandra's edge as I swung to protect the mayor.

Meanwhile, the yellow ones were expandable shields, protecting her from magic.

Anna and Mia also got busy dealing with the regenerative, increasingly hideous zombies.

For a level 70 to hold her own against us...

She was quite something.

Miwen: "Alright, Miss Daddy Issues. If that's how you wanna play... Mighty wind, carry it away..."

I started chanting a quick spell.

With its power, I sent Bianca and the zombies flying into the sky.

This way, no matter how much power my little pyromaniac used, she wouldn't cause any problems.

Claire:"Fuh... Spark and burn, so that nothing remains..."

Copying me, she also used a short-chant spell.

However, hers was made up on the spot.

Regardless, Claire's magic remained a sight to see.

The flame storm launched from her arms illuminated the dark sky like a second, third, and fourth sun.

One after the other, a flurry of flame spirals seemed to defy the heavens.

After the tenth or so spiral, she was finally satisfied, and we released our spells.

Bianca, falling from the sky, created a flower bed to soften her landing.

However, standing before her was Mia.

A very unhappy Mia...

Somewhere during the justified, but slightly unnecessary beating, Bianca surrendered.

By the time more guards came, and we could cuff her, she was already unconscious.

Still, Richard whispered something into his daughter's ear before we departed from the cemetery.

Once again inside the car, I discovered the many identities of Bianca Graves, or Bianca Blake, or how her file shows up in the AOTG, Bianca Berns, one of Neptune's most trusted.

After the accident that killed her mother and brother, she was taken and raised by her grandmother.

Richard never once visited her.

One day, when she was around ten, she vanished.

Right as his political career took off…

Miwen: "You've built an entire career on regulating Gifts..."

Richard: "Children need to be taught how and when to use them. It's too dangerous otherwise."

I was surprised.

Not only by Richard, but also by James.

I had expected him to say something to that, considering his own views on the matter and his experience during the First Contact, yet...

He remained quiet.

Not a single shred of judgment in his eyes.

If anything, he seemed more sorrowful for Bianca than Richard.

During the entire fight, he stood still, paralyzed.

Even now, I could tell he had conflicted feelings...

Miwen: "...There are many ways to extinguish a fire. Maybe these policies feel too... suffocating..."

Perhaps that was cruel.

But I thought that a man like him should be well aware of how his and his daughter's actions rhymed.

And if not, then...

That was the real tragedy.

However, to my surprise...

Richard: "...I'll keep that in mind."

He barely showed any reaction.

And it didn't seem like he was telling the truth.

This made me rethink what I thought I'd understood about Richard, and soon, I realized that there was a missing piece in this puzzle.

Miwen: "...Why did you burn down your house?"

I could maybe understand it if the mansion was being attacked, but there were no zombies there. They only started to show up once we were on the road.

Maybe it was meant as a distraction?

In that case, the mayor must've known his daughter was going to come after him...

But if he had not burned the mansion, she would've probably have attacked him there, so...

Richard: "...We were attacked there. The zombies exploded into flames, remember?"

Miwen: "No, we weren't-"

I noticed something strange.

The mayor's case, the one he prepared at the mansion, was nowhere to be seen.

He had held onto it for dear life, even when attacked by waves of zombies.

Even when he visited his family's graves, Bianca attacked.

So where did he-

Just like that, I heard another explosion.

This time, the cemetery was caught up in flames.

Richard barely paid it any mind, as if he had already expected it.

Whatever he wanted to hide, or to make disappear...

It was no more.

In the end, I had underestimated him.

This time, I was the puppet, playing in his big, confusing theater of lies.