Rune Troopers

Chapter 6.3

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Chapter 6.3
RUNE TROOPERS VOLUME 1 PART 3 OF CHAPTER 6

“Did the intercepting missiles. .h.i.t the meteorite!?”

Seeing the Aegis war vessel’s missiles fire and seeing the lightning like flicker afterward let Kuze know the answer. For a moment, he thought he could see hope, but normal vessels cannot fire enough missiles against such a giant meteorite. That the fragments would fall here was told to him earlier by Katou.

“…Even with the Aegis cla.s.s warship, it is impossible!”

Kuze yelled out of regret, his angered voice rose very far. Upon seeing this, the soldiers in the middle of the courtyard gathered.

“Th-this darn apparition!?”

“Where did you come from?!”

The soldiers of Mariisua tried to attack the strange black ma.s.s. Next to the body of the enemy shougun, out of a mysterious figure was a black mist of sorts. The thing squirming around and growing giant couldn’t be thought of as a living being. If one had to venture to call it something—darkness.

Kuze scowled at that monster. Just what is it? Does it have some sort of connection with the falling meteorite? To such strangeness, 50 Mariisua soldiers attacked at once with their swords. But, before they could get too close, they were all repealed. The head of the Mariisua soldiers was shocked.

“I-is this…barrier magic!?”

It was that moment. From the black tentacles like the splinters of a sea urchin stretched toward the soldiers. Then, it pierced their hearts and again moved to strangle them, wiping them out. Seeing this scene, Kuze yelled.

“It has been decided that this target is hostile… Begin firing on it!”

He decided that if they didn’t stop the monster, it could reach out and hurt the refugees. At Kuze’s orders, the SDF members took the spot of the annihilated Mariisua soldiers and added the shots of their type 89 a.s.sault rifle from the back.

But the bullets did not appear to be hurting them by penetrating the black mist’s black body. The attack reached a stalemate. Kuze ordered that subordinates stop at once. The SDF could not make any a.s.sumptions with their attacks against such an existence beyond human understanding.

“Kuze-dono…”

When she got there, she placed her hand on Kuze’s shoulder.

“If you don’t go now, you won’t make it in time.”

Kuze saw her gentle smile.

“Karuda-san…?”

“Ride that iron flying object. If you run away in that, you might be spared.”

But, somewhere, she was lonesome. Exactly what was her intent?

Kuze felt a moment of confusion, but immediately realized something. She was trying to save Kuze. But, why go so far? He couldn’t understand the reason for her courtesy.

“Thank you… But, it’s already fine.”

Karuda made an expression of feeling a sense of resignation. She had paid the greatest respect one can give a soldier: Grat.i.tude.

Kuze felt a lump in his throat.

“If it ends like this… All of that was meaningless.”

He couldn’t look at her face. Let’s explain what him boarding the helicopter here means to him. That means he would be abandoning those refugees he had been putting his whole power into protecting. It means only his men could run from the destruction of the meteorite.

Everything he had done to help those there now had been made worthless. Yes, he was no brave hero. In the end, he wouldn’t be able to protect a single person. Filled with regret, he was consumed with a desire to strike himself down.

——And, it was at that moment.

“Sorry to interr

upt you since you’re busy, but are you ready for the next plan? We don’t have enough time.”

A man wearing a white marine uniform for the SDF abruptly said that to Karuda and Kuze, who had become sentimental, were dumbfounded at such naïve utterance. But he entirely would not admit shock or despair. Kuze stared at the man—Commander Katou’s—face. Katou laughed from inside of his gla.s.ses.

“This is still not game over. Lately, the boss fight being a time-limit event in games has not been rare, right?”

“Lieutenant Colonel Katou…”

“Don’t give up. You’re a commander, aren’t you?”

(EN: Go, Megane-senpai! Show him the dignity of us megane-kyoudai tachi!)

Katou gave him a wink.

Kuze felt that in the midst of his despair, a faint amount of hope welled up. This man is such an oddball. There was still a reason to fight. He shouldn’t give up. So, he seemed dependable. Kuze strangely nodded. Katou also returned a nod to Kuze.

“First, let’s sort out the situation. Karuda-san,”

“What?”

Katou gazed at the wiggling black monster squirming into the red sky above and on the Earth.

“Karuda-san, care to briefly tell us, about that object, what do you think about it…?”

“A… Ah, there’s no definitive proof, but…”

Karuda groaned.

“Isn’t that meteorite from that monster using ‘falling star?’ I’m guessing.”

“Eh?! ‘Falling Star’?”

“Yes. About that…”

Karuda started to explain what she knew about it. The ‘Falling Star’ is a one-use weapon that may really exist according to researchers. Though it is a myth and a fairytale, there have been descriptions here and there that tell us about it taking a sacrifice. In other words, “Falling Star” takes the user and the target with it, in destruction.

Now, this is only written in unclear terms. It seems as though those who relayed this throughout history have tried to conceal the truth about it. Again, the “Eye of the Fallen Star”, a controller of the ‘Falling Star’ is described in many different ways despite being one single object.

They didn’t leave out the form as having a “universe” inside it, but said such things such as that it was precisely a crystal or a cane with a crystal in it or that it had a ring inside it. The researchers erected the hypothesis that, rather than controlling the ‘Falling Star’, the life of the user would be burned up to created a sort of gravity device to bring the meteorite in. Upon hearing her explanation, Kuze said what flitted through his mind.

“In short, it would be fine if we could do something about the controller that black monster is holding?”

He thought maybe they could evade the meteorite if they destroyed the gravity equipment. Karuda also was dubious about it, but she nodded her head as if to say “Probably.”

“But, the user described must not have a small reason for them doing it… After you use it you become like that, it is probably more painful than death.”

The info on this was kept fuzzy to protect the people. In other words, in the ancient civilizations, this information about the technique was kept under tyrannical regulation.

“Well, that’s the way it is. Let’s get right to the point. There are tactical tomahawks aboard the ‘Ibuki’.”

Katou said hurriedly. Kuze thought back to where he heard such a simple term.

“By tomahawk, do you mean the cruiser missiles? Eh…well, if we are able to use that in a counterattack against that thing, will we deploy it?”

Katou consented with a meek expression. The tomahawk cruise missile. It was the latest model of effective shooting distance missiles, with a range of an approximated 3,000 kilometers as a long-range grounded anti-warship missile.

It is a famous weapon suddenly made in the Gulf War and is a synonym from a pinpoint attack which has become a symbol for high-tech warfare. On the other hand, it is a weapon not allowed to be used by the SDF as it has an inviolable rule to be strictly on the self defense and is not allowed to use weapons particularly made to attack other countries.

“But, the times are changing. No, they seem like they will change, so here we have a preliminary test for our navy. A certain country is pointing its newest ballistic missiles at j.a.pan while its own peoples are starving.

“Even if we defend against the first round, the second, and third rounds of attacks, no matter how many Aegis cla.s.s warships with intercepting missiles or above-ground deployed PAC 3s we have, even if we try our best, our defense will fail. So…”

“Wouldn’t destroying that enemy organization’s missile launch base via pinpoint be an action within the bounds of the policy of absolute non aggression?”

To Kuze’s interpretation, Katou sarcastically laughed.

“Ah. That’s why the ‘Ibuki’ was added in for this PKF deployment. There were plans to practice using the new model tomahawks in Africa before the deployment.

In a complicated environment, without much media coverage, we could launch the largest scale of attack. We could also practice with the American military. There weren’t more favorable conditions than these.”

“That must have been the reason why the land forces certainly did hold a lot of new makes of weapons, to be sure.”

“Correct. That was the condition for the marines.”

“… But didn’t you announce it? I didn’t know any of tomahawk despite being in the SDF like you.”

“As a political decision, only a portion of people know. Of course, this was kept private from the media. Commander Kaburagi was flown there along with I, the weirdo, along with other commander types, in the off chance that some sort of bad situation erupt; the higher-ups decided to give us the responsibility to pretend to know nothing to lead the dispatch.”

Kuze was amazed.

“But that sounds terrible…”

“No, it is because of this that we may be saved, no?”

“Let’s listen to the whole story.”

“It is a good thing you are one to understand such a story.”

At some point, Katou realized that the people around him looked at him with eyes full of expectation. It was no different whether it was his fellow SDF or the people of this world. Everyone looking for some living hope looked his way.

“For whatever plan we have to succeed, first I will say this. That black monster will get blazed up very soon.”

“Blazed up? And very soon?”

Everyone returned the words like a parrot and tilted their heads.

“Yes, blazed up. We need a large amount of infrared lasers and… maybe a strong heat as well. This is all to ensure that we use our weapon that is powerful enough to defeat that monster.”

“That weapon would be the tomahawk?”

“Yes. Originally, the tomahawk had to be guided to hit the target by artificial satellites, but what we’ve got on board is the new model which can fire many shots, the tactical tomahawk. This new version is guided by infrared lasers detecting the target.”

The upper commandment of the SDF understood the need to be sure to hit the heat source of the nuclear missile launch base of a certain country. If they used some sort of movable system to launch their nuclear missiles, there would be danger in using the wrong coordinates.

Karuda and her group, though vaguely, understood that this discussion was about using the weapons used to destroy the dragons and the empire’s military on the monster.

“So, this plan depends on lighting that monster on fire.”

At Katou’s words, everyone made a conflicted expressions on their faces. There was a reason for that. The arrows and bullets that would go through would become like a mist in the monster’s real body. And if you’d challenge it with swords and lances to an up-close battle, it would use barrier magic to keep everyone away and not let anyone get near.

Somehow, it seemed it “intentionally” uses barrier magic as a reaction against them. Arrows and bullets, things you’d attack with that would leave your hand, didn’t seem to cause the same reaction.

The range was wide; if you got close enough to throw a grenade to reach the monster, it would probably react. And, it would be activated automatically: if you divert its attention to something else, the reaction would still happen and not become invalid.

What would be good enough to tear through the barrier magic, light the monster on fire, and get a direct hit on the monster with a missile? It was in that time of worry.

“We will also help.”

From beside them came a clear voice.

“Ryumi-san?”

From where the voice came from stood ten girls, who were priest soldiers for the G.o.ds in full armament. Ryumi’s figure was among them.

“Would we be of a.s.sistance in this battle?”

She asked with an expression full of determination. And, before Kuze and company could respond, she continued.

“If it is weakened, the barrier magic will stop. From what I’ve seen, that monster seems to be an undead type. Holy magic might be effective. We, the unit of priest soldiers, for the G.o.ds of the Church of the Mother of Light, though we are but apprentices, shall join this battle.”

Those girls who had seen the desperate fighting of the SDF up until this point made up their minds to join in the fight. Seeing the state of affairs, Karuda made a face as though she were taken aback.

“I have a proposal.”

Katou, upon seeing her, nodded.

“Go ahead.”

“What about this plan? First, we will put our full power into an attack, and avert the monster’s power.”

Karuda fixed her gaze on Ryumi and company.

“There, without wasting a moment, you guys. .h.i.t it with your holy magic, and weaken the monster. When he can’t use his barrier magic, you guys get close and use the thing you used to defeat that dragon, that… uh—“

“The 84 mm recoilless rifle?”

“Yes, with that, you attack it and create an opening. And I’ll surround it at the flank and use this.”
Karuda raised the sword next to her. It was an ominously beautiful sword with a jewel buried into it.

“What’s that?”

“Earlier, the monster flung this outward, and it was recovered by my subordinates. This is the magic sword Balmanx. This is what the enemy shougun held. It is a sword invested with unparallelled, ferocious magic power.”

“What shall we do to use that sword to catch that monster on fire?”

Katou had a dubious face. To that man’s question, Karuda boldly laughed.

“I can more or less use this magical sword. Using the magic power of this sword, we will attack the monster with flame magic. If we do that—“

Oooh, those watching let out together.

“We will light him up good! Using the infrared lasers, we’ll thrust that tomahawk into it.”

Kuze screamed and at once, Katou wrinkled his brow.

“Karuda-san, can I ask something?”

“What’s the issue?”

“Oh it’s not like that, just, when you say flame magic, do you mean you’d throw a fireball at the enemy?”

“Yes, that exactly.”

“Then, if it leaves the technique caster’s hand, then would it lack the power to break through the barrier magic? If so, I think we should look for the minimum amount of risk.”

Karuda shook her head.

“Magic is affected by the intention of the caster, wherein the intention is reflected back into the real world. Even if it leaves the caster’s hand, it is the embodiment of intention, but beyond that, it probably can’t break through the barrier magic.”

“I understand. Well, the holy magic isn’t the flame type? If we can make it weaker at the same time as we attack, wouldn’t the conversation be quick?”

The one to answer that was Ryumi.

“It may be regrettable, but holy magic is borrowing the power of the G.o.ds. There is no magic like that for your idea. I also agree with Karuda-sama’s plan.”

“I see… If it is as you say, then Karuda-san’s plan seems like the only viable option…”

Katou whispered. Suddenly, he super-seriously believed in magic, and though he remembered his original discomfort with the plan, he didn’t pay much attention to that.

“After that is our bout with the thing. We can just try and see what happens.”

Katou said as he worked himself up.

“There is no way the G.o.ds would abandon those who don’t give up. Surely, we have divine protection.”

A meek smile appeared on Ryumi’s face.

“Then, let’s go. Even if there’s no positive proof that things will go well, I want to do what we can.”

With a serious expression, Karuda looked over everyone.

She and Kuze locked gazes.

“Karuda-san, it’s dangerous for just one person. You should probably have some support. I’ll go with you.”

“This is my nation’s problem. You who have no connection to this should…”

“No, it’s not as though there is no connection to it. And now, if this plan should fail, we’ll be connected when we go to the next world of the afterlife.”

For a moment, Karuda’s eyes popped with astonishment at the unexpected words. Kuze made a small laugh. It spread to her and made her smile. No, she thought of something unusual. When was the last time she smiled and laughed so honestly like this?

Could it be… Never has such a thing been done since that person’s death? Karuda stared at Kuze, who was in front of her. And, she made up her mind. That she would not let anyone else die.

“Then, I’m counting on you. I entrust to you this duty, knight from another world.”

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