“As you wish, Lady Alexa. It shall be done.”

  Ten golden magic circles appeared in front of Phoebe, and a beam of light suddenly sliced through the pinkish skies. The force of her attack was so great, that it almost seemed like it illuminated the whole city more than the setting sun.

  Blood fell like a geyser from the Archdemon’s body, as she fell, her eyes bleeding tearfully.

  “Is this the work of his diligence?! This is unfathomable. It has been…rewarded? How? Why? Why? Why? Why?!”

  As she fell from the skies, one of the strands of her hair suddenly struck the amplification tower, causing both Alexa and Adele to tumble…then, the top part of the tower fell as well, causing both girls to follow suit.

  “Mwahahaha! This is most satisfying!” Alexa shouted. “Have you seen that? Phoebe—she’s going to save both of us! We won!”

  “Your Highness, why are you celebrating already? We’re both falling to our deaths!” Adele screamed, as she grabbed Alexa, who was still caught up in her victorious delight.

  “Kill her, Phoebe! You’re the main character, so I know you can do it!”

  “Main character? What are you even saying, princess? Don’t tell me you’re imagining that we’re in a fairytale story!” Adele said, tears coming out of her eyes again, utterly mindbroken by everything happening around her.

  “Maybe we are, in fact, look! The happy ending we deserve is in sight!” On the other hand, Alexa was transfixed by the fruits of her struggles finally blossoming.

  Why she became a cheerleader of her mortal rival now, Alexa didn’t know, but it felt good. She had been a part of this great mission, and in doing so, she ensured that Wilhelm would easily activate Phoebe. In proxy, she just saved all of humanity.

  “L-levitate!” Adele shouted nervously while hugging Alexa, pointing with one of her hands at the ground. Right then a gust of wind blew upwards, causing them to land lightly, though they both still rolled like ragdolls on the road.

  Alexa lay down on the ground with her back, staring at the sky with the wildest smile she had ever had as she watched Phoebe fly above her.

  That’s right.

  She nodded to herself. This nightmare was about to end. She stood up and extended her hand to Adele, who was still lying on the ground.

  “Stand up,” Alexa commanded. “We can’t just let our good friend do all the work now, can we?”

  “What do you mean? I’m out of mana, and so are you—”

  Adele realized that Alexa wasn’t looking at her. Instead, she was looking at what was behind Adele. There, a crate, abandoned by the soldiers, lay. It still had vials of mana replenishment potions on it. Alongside that, there were two preset combat staves, both marked with the insignia of fire magic.

  “We can still fight,” Alexa cheerfully said. “So please, if you wish to keep going, come with me.”

  Alexa gripped Adele’s hand harder, pulling her up, then the two picked up the potions and got to work. Drinking them was quite annoying, as they didn’t taste as good as the ones available at the academy. But, hey…military-issued provisions. Alexa couldn’t complain.

  When she was fully reinvigorated, she went for one of the staves. Taking it in her hand, she grinned to herself. These things were quite simple to operate. You channeled your magic on it as if it were a normal wand or staff, and it would automatically fire a highly optimized spell.

  In true combat, these things were said to be the best anti-personnel weapons. Most mid-level mages at the formation stage of their mana heart could consistently overcome these weapons. Such magicians had five magic circles or more.

  “Two bars,” Adele muttered as she inspected the combat stave she held. “Its fireballs should be as strong as my fire magic then. Just slightly optimized due to these glyph enchantments…”

  “Then that’s good enough for our purposes,” Alexa declared, before taking Adele’s hand and dragging her. “Let’s go. We have a battle to finish!”

  “This is not lady-like behavior at all,” Adele groaned as she followed Alexa. “I swear, I can barely recognize you now.”

  “That’s good,” Alexa said, still smiling. “I want to be the finest Empress of this realm, and I can’t do that if I stay the same.”

  +++

  As the battle raged on for more than ten minutes, soon, the ragged duo finally reached the place where the Sin Archdemon of Sloth made her desperate last stand. Earlier, Alexa saw something as Sloth tried to run from Phoebe.

  Someone suddenly sliced Sloth’s hair out of nowhere with magic that only Alexa and Adele recognized. It was Sir Alfred’s sword arts, a magical sword attack combining all elements at once, creating a rainbow-like wave that could cut through anything.

  “There he is!” Alexa pointed, as Adele panted behind her. “Alfred and Phoebe, they’re fighting Sloth.”

  “S-Sir Alfred?!” Adele suddenly seemed to have a burst of energy after she heard that, scurrying up the rubble just to get a look. “He’s…oh thank goodness, he’s still alive. I was so worried.”

  “Heh. That worry is quite misplaced. Even if that knight’s brain only works when he’s fighting or doing magic, he’s still quite the powerful and smart one.”

  “We wouldn’t be in this position if he truly is intelligent,” Adele scoffed, her face red. “I’ll give him a piece of my mind later.”

  “Anyway,” Alexa readied her staff, watching as Alfred circled Sloth, slicing through metric tons of her hair with his sword as he seemed like he was flying through the battlefield.

  Then, she aimed it at Sloth, who was so focused on defending herself, that when Alexa let loose a barrage of fireballs, it struck her directly.

  “Eat this!” Alexa laughed maniacally. “You’re but a bag of XP now. Tell me, who’s the silly brat now?”

  “Princess?!” Alfred stopped, landing on one of the buildings. “Why are you…get out of here—!”

  Before he could finish that, a spike made of hair pierced his torso. Blood spurted out of his mouth before he sliced the bundle of hair to dislodge it.

  All eyes turned back to Sloth.

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  “I’m surrounded,” Sloth said, as she was hit again and again by the fireballs from the staves held by Adele and Alexa. “This cannot be…”

  “Phoebe!” Alexa called out, as she tried to stop the next set of sharp hair headed for her knight. “I change my orders. Heal Sir Alfred. He’s bleeding profusely!”

  “At once,” Phoebe seemed to be charging another powerful attack behind Sloth, but she stopped, flying instead to Alfred’s direction.

  “Keep preparing your main attack, Your Holiness!” Alfred shouted as he cut through more of the hair protecting Sloth. “I’m not the priority here. Sloth is. We have to win now or there’s no next chance!”

  Did he just call Phoebe ‘Your Holiness’?

  The last fireball from Alexa’s staff missed, and she collapsed as she felt herself turning slightly dizzy. Immediately, Adele gave up her weapon, and picked up Alexa, supporting her to stand up.

  “Princess, are you okay?” Adele asked, but Alexa lightly shoved her off.

  “Don’t drop your weapon. Keep fighting!”

  Alexa’s pink eyes glowed again, as she activated ‘Rose Eyes’ at once.

  “To all defenders of Perlenstadt!” Alexa shouted, straining herself as she tried to speak to the minds of thousands around the city. “Converge into the center of the city. Our chance of victory is slim, but we finally trapped Sloth. So I urge you all…”

  She took a deep breath.

  “Please take her out! Make all of our effort and sacrifices worth it!”

  Just as she finished that, Alfred and Phoebe backed off. Sloth, landing on the rooftop of a restaurant, could only look up at the sky blankly.

  “Oh…” Sloth said, as forty fireballs from the skies seemed to be diving down in her direction. “I wish I had my land dragons to counter that—”

  She couldn’t even finish her words when a torrent of explosions wiped everything around her. Her attempt to use her remaining hair to stop it barely worked, and by the time the smoke dissipated, her body was a mess, parts of her scalp practically charred, and her remaining hair was mostly eliminated.

  Alexa smiled again, knowing that this demon had now reached her durability limits. As Wilhelm said, when this point was reached, even an Archdemon would be forced to retreat to recover for weeks or months. Weakened and dying, without her main ability, she was done for.

  Sloth looked at Alexa angrily. Right then, Alexa saw Phoebe readying another spell attack behind the Archdemon, so in response, Alexa puffed her cheeks and stuck her tongue out.

  This should distract this fool long enough!

  “You lose!” Alexa mocked. “I win!”

  “Why you…you cheeky pipsqueak…?”

  “I wonder what losing feels like? Say, does it feel that bad—eek!”

  Alexa was almost stabbed by the last of Sloth’s hair, only for it to be cut at the last second by Alfred. He too seemed badly wounded, with multiple slices, lacerations, and stab wounds in his body. He landed in front of Sloth, breathing deeply.

  “Get out of here now, Your Highness,” Alfred said as he aimed his sword at the demon. “I…I don’t know what more this freak can do. Better safe than sorry.”

  “Don’t teach her that,” Sloth coldly said, as she stared with dead eyes at Alfred. “She could be my finest disciple. To be that sloppy is a great virtue—”

  “Die,” Phoebe coldly said, finishing her final attack. A beam of light once again struck Sloth’s body, piercing and burning Sloth completely. She collapsed, wide-eyed, as more of her blood spurted out of her mouth.

  “It…it can’t be…” Sloth said, turning her head to Phoebe. “Traitor…you…dirty traitor…you’ll regret this…”

  The demon didn’t manage to finish her words, as she collapsed lifelessly on the rubble. Phoebe landed gently behind Sloth’s corpse, before speaking.

  “Finally. She’s dead,” Phoebe declared, as her knees trembled. “We…we did it.”

  Right then, Alexa crossed the distance and squeezed her friend to death, celebrating their victory.

  “Don’t cry now!” Alexa smiled. “You have just conducted the finest display of strength I’ve seen. Not even Mr. Scary Face and his team can do this!”

  “I-is that so?”

  “Yes! You’ve truly become a saintess now,” Alexa said, squeezing Phoebe more. “I’m so proud of you.”

  “L-Lady Alexa,” Phoebe teared up, dropping her staff. “I don’t know if I can accept those praises. So many people died because I’m too slow to wake up…”

  “Tsk. Don’t play such games on me now. We just won, so please don’t ruin it!”

  “Perfect. There’s still useful stuff to retrieve. But her left lung is ruined. At least the heart’s fine…”

  A dead-tired voice distracted the two. Behind them, Wilhelm, his coat in tatters and his body filled with wounds both major and minor, was holding a vial, syringes, and surgical tools.

  The absolute gall of this man, he was already desecrating Sloth’s corpse!

  Alexa couldn’t believe what she was seeing. He was harvesting her blood, while dissecting her organs, right at this instant. It was…

  “You truly have not even an ounce of honor, huh?” Alexa asked, looking down condescendingly at Wilhelm.

  “Can you blame me? Since I failed to die again, I’m gonna have to keep fighting then,” he took Sloth’s heart, and began squeezing it for every blood he could get. “Besides, I’m just taking my rightful spoils of war. See? Lots of useful Archdemon blood. Have I ever told you that Archdemon blood is so perfect that it doesn’t harden? We can even come to an agreement, fifty-fifty, you in?”

  Alexa scoffed.

  “Will you stand up, please?” Alexa asked. “That’s an order, Major von Eisen.”

  “Fine…” Wilhelm begrudgingly stood up, facing Alexa. “What is it, Lady Alexa—?”

  A kick from one of Alexa’s shoes connected straight to his…unfortunate part. Wilhelm seemed not to have reacted to it. Instead, he kept himself composed, standing there, with his usual calm coolness.

  “...What was that for?” Wilhelm asked.

  “A mutt who decided to endanger so many people’s lives for a dangerous stunt is standing in front of me,” Alexa huffed. “I merely did what anyone would do to a person like you.”

  “I see…” Wilhelm twitched. Alexa was truly shocked. Was his pain tolerance this ridiculously high? “That’s…a very dishonorable and unladylike move you did there, you know?”

  “Please. You’re one to talk. You want honor now after doing all this?”

  Behind Wilhelm, the wounded Alfred, already being attended by Adele, watched with a smile.

  “Serves him right,” Alfred said, as Adele poured a healing potion directly on one of his wounds. “Ouch! You’re not supposed to pour it directly on the wound!”

  “Shut your trap and let Lady Alexa discipline her subjects on her own,” Adele chastised.

  Alexa ignored those two, as Wilhelm remained standing. She began tapping her feet impatiently.

  “Come on. You can’t be seriously this unflinching,” Alexa said, frowning. Phoebe, her cheeks slightly reddened after Alexa’s ‘kick’, muttered something behind her.

  “They say he didn’t even flinch while facing the Archdemon, so maybe that’s why?”

  “No way. He can’t be that strong. How will I make him feel remorseful in that case? Tsk, tsk…this is quite the conundrum.”

  “Fine…it did hurt…a bit,” Wilhelm’s voice was now finally shaky, as he pulled out a metal flask from his tattered coat. He sipped it till it was empty, before placing it back in.

  Then, he knelt with one of his knees. Then it was both, and his hands were on his legs.

  Soon, he was in a fetal position.

  Alexa grinned, satisfied. He was now in the perfect pose to be schooled about the basics of human decency.

  “That angle of attack…I should have seen it coming…”

  “Now, now, Major Wilhelm von Eisen. I’d like to finally have a little chat about why my ‘simple formation ritual’ ended up like this.”