Chapter 26: Carol end

In the end, we slowly marched toward the team. I saw Kirika, Shirabe, and Maria decide to use Ignite Modules and begin to sing their superb song, then the others joined in as well. Meanwhile, I saw Carol begin charging her phonic gain to attack. They were surprised by my transformation, but they kept singing.

"S2CA Hexa-Conversion."

"I will use Gungnir to gather the phonic gain together."

"And I will use Airgetlam to control and redistribute it."

I made sure they could carry out their plan without bearing the cost of controlling it. The shields on their backs grew bigger, and I could feel the pain as they tanked Carol's attack head-on to absorb the phonic gain she used. This resulted in a rainbow color spreading out from Hibiki and Maria, covering the rest of us.

"Generator."

"X-DRIVE."

Then, Hibiki proceeded to divert the beam into the sky. I and the rest of us were absorbed and thrown into the sky, dispelling the cloudy sky as the light shone through. We slowly appeared in our X-Drive forms, but something felt different about my usual X-Drive form.

'Congrats, Mamoru, you finally managed to reach your peak power X-Drive Duo Relic form.'

Morgan was clearly happy with what was happening. I realized that in X-Drive form, I could freely use the other Relic functions fully as well. Hibiki's Duo Relic X-Drive form was the same; she could control lightning with ease because of her other Relic.

If I remember correctly, Morgan's Relic can basically copy any Relic Armed Gear and their power as well, but I never tested it.

'You often use a lot of Relics in the past, and sometimes you even used parallel world Relics as well, even though you never saw it in action.'

Damn, just how strong was I in the past then? But Hibiki was talking to the team, and Carol began to explain why she hated miracles because his father saved a village using alchemy, and the village claimed it as a miracle, but funnily enough, they burned him because he had no right working with miracles because of some useless priest.

Though this happened ages ago when the world was still in the Middle Ages, and the population was still rather dumb. While there are still dumb people now, compared to the past, where they burned people just for doing something different, now is better, at least that's what I think.

Well, though Hibiki and the rest hearing this started to pity her, but seriously, they forgot that she killed more than a thousand people for her purpose. Though while not directly, I am responsible for more than a thousand deaths as well, and remembering this group, they will probably put that aside.

Carol's speech seemed like a stall, but knowing she was close to saying what she needed to, she began spawning a large number of Alca-Noise. Hibiki thought she was talking to her father again, but he only mentioned a girl crying nearby, which seemed to strengthen Hibiki's resolve. She stared at Carol, who was on the verge of tears, before glancing at us.

While that was all well and good, minimizing the damage with my shield was difficult. I hoped they would move faster. Tsubasa simply nodded, while Chris lightly complained about getting used to Hibiki's fighting style. Maria told everyone to hurry up and clear the Alca-Noise.

They began to spread out, leaving me behind. The reason was that Carol was gaining Phonic Gain much faster than her body could handle. Since my shield was still connected to her, I could feel the feedback of her body. She probably thought she was fine, so she gathered it more recklessly compared to the anime.

Seeing Carol looking fine, with no blood leaking from her eyes, only confirmed that I was suffering the worst of it. Because the others used their X-Drive forms, the damage they inflicted on the city was ridiculously high. I tried my best to minimize it, but while Morgan's relic was healing my wounds, the mental damage remained, and the pain kept accumulating. I hoped they would finish off the Alca-Noise soon.

Surprisingly, Kanade and Tsubasa worked so well together that you almost forgot Kanade had been gone for almost two years. Their teamwork was excellent. The same went for Maria and Serena, as both of their relics were the same. However, Serena's use of her relic was completely different from Maria's, supporting her older sister so much that I almost thought of her as her older sister's supporter.

Kirika and Shirabe were turning themselves into a pilotable beyblade with scythes, their fangs biting any Alca-Noise nearby. Hibiki was being supported very well by Miku, who diverted any Alca-Noise ranged attacks with her beams. Chris was going all out with her ranged attacks, while I covered her back whenever a ranged attack came. Seriously, she was getting lazy, not even bothering to dodge, knowing I was there protecting her as usual.

After some time, though it felt much faster compared to the anime because there were four extra people besides the six, they finally returned. Hibiki scratched her head, knowing I had been protecting the city from the damage of their attacks.

"Mei, we're back. Thanks for protecting the city."

"Finally. Well, looks like Carol is almost done preparing as well."

"Looks like it. Maria, Serena, we're going."

"Of course, Tsubasa."

"Yes, Tsubasa Onee-chan."

Maria and Serena's relic counted as one sword, but the three of them were close enough that the sword covered their bodies like a drill as they attacked. Carol thought it was a close call, as her alchemy shield was almost broken. She lamented that if they had one more sword relic, maybe they could do it.

However, if he thought about it, Morgan's relic could, in fact, substitute for any relic. So, in theory, he could become the four-sword. But he wanted Carol to spawn that lion alchemy thing, so for now, he watched. Indeed, she used her wire, and the lion spawned. It really looked like it did in the anime, as the physical form was only on the paw, shoulder, and head.

Kirika and Shirabe decided that this was a good time to attack, but it proved useless as the lion was too tough. It only attacked back, though it still looked goofy, just like in the anime. Still, he hoped they had really thought this through because even though he was healed since he was now in duo relic mode, he could still feel the pain.

Then the lion absorbed the thunder falling from the sky as it readied its mouth. Still, he wondered why the team wasn't doing some dodging maneuvers at all, instead just grouping around him while smiling.

"Hah... you all seriously..."

That was all he could say as they giggled. He spawned his huge shield. Now, with duo relic, he combined it with every relic that had a shield on it: Svalinn, Jaivardhan, Ancile, and lastly, Shield of Faith. Funnily enough, he was only thinking of the mythical, historical one from his previous life, but somehow it worked, as his shield now shone in rainbow colors.

'Oh, Mamoru, you finally used that shield, the one you often used in the parallel world: Shield of Finality.'

Damn, what kind of name was that? But seriously, why did Morgan keep popping in and out? While he was sure glad she didn't appear permanently as it would distract him, showing up whenever he used what he thought was a new technique only for her to say it was a technique he used in the past just showed that he basically wasn't changing at all, even though he'd lost his memories.

He noticed that his shield didn't look like it could really protect Carol from burning her memories, so he copied her important ones, which were mainly about her father. It looked like she was preparing for a second attack, but Tsubasa shouted that they would focus their gear in one attack.

It looked like Carol was prepared, as she used the lion's paw as a shield, which was different from the anime where she only tanked it. But because of that, the result in the end was the same, as Carol's position was now exposed on the lion's forehead.

Then the rest of the team, alongside him, sent power to Hibiki as she tried to punch her with the giant knuckle. For him, he only sent Holy Grail. While it looked like he sent it all, he still had some hidden away because he knew how this would end. And just like he thought, Hibiki managed to defeat Carol with that punch, even though Carol fired her beam at her.

Just like in the anime, Hibiki was tied with wires as the lion began to float. From the command room, I could hear that it was going to explode, destroying everything within a 3 km radius, with the impact felt across 12 km. Already expecting this, I clicked my relic three times and ran, ignoring the others.

Hibiki managed to grab Carol, who had already detransformed, and started running away. I used my shield, attaching it to both of them, turning it into a surfing shield to fly them further away.

Then, I gathered all the shields, except for the one protecting the rest of the girls, and trapped the lion inside. Meanwhile, I changed the shield attached to the girls into a surfing shield and flew them away. Though I could hear their shouts, I felt fine, knowing everything would be alright. I was just doing some extra work to avoid a headache later.

Just then, the lion exploded, blinding me for a second as I tried to contain it before sending the excess power into the sky.

At night, Carol slowly appeared beside Elfnein, waking her up. Elfnein gazed at Carol before speaking.

"Carol..."

"You know me? Then please, tell me who I am. I feel like I'm slipping away, like I'm losing myself."

"Amnesia, I see... you've burned away all your memories."

"Not really everything."

The moment they heard that, both of them turned towards the voice. Mei slowly appeared, but what surprised Elfnein was that Mei hadn't transformed. She wondered how she had gotten in there.

"Well, I keep a backup of her memories since she keeps burning them, but are you sure you want to remember?"

"Please."

Carol grabbed Mei's clothes, on the verge of tears. Mei sighed and gazed at Elfnein, who nodded slowly.

"Please, Mei, I want Carol to remember everything."

"Sure, then."

Mei spawned a shield, which didn't surprise Elfnein, but Carol was taken aback. Before Carol could react, Mei placed the shield in front of Carol's face. It began to shine, and the shield slowly dissipated into particles of light. Carol closed her eyes, then slowly opened them and glared at Mei.

"Tch... what do you want? Why did you give me back all these memories? Are you going to mock me now?"

"That's because you're running away from the truth, because it hurts."

"What do you mean by that?"

"Well, for one, you're trying to destroy the miracle because that very miracle killed your father. But what do you think your father would think, the one who created those miracles in the first place?"

Mei's question was met with silence. Carol tried to look away from Mei's gaze, but Mei held her cheek, locking eyes with Carol.

"In the end, even if you run away, it will catch up to you. And whether you like it or not, you will face that miracle. At that point, what will you say to your father when you meet him? 'Oh, I killed the miracle because it was the one who killed you, Father.' Can you say that to your father?"

"Don't lecture me. You have no right to—you... YOU."

Carol grabbed Mei's clothes, but Mei remained silent, staring intently into Carol's eyes. Carol noticed the coldness in her gaze and used alchemy to see Mei's memories. She recoiled, her face paling.

"You... Your planet..."

"Destroyed. Yes. Everyone... everything... gone because I failed. So now I ask you, Carol Malus Dienheim, when will you grow up and protect what matters to you?"

"What matters to me..."

Carol fell silent, slowly turning to face Elfnein. She saw the worry etched on Elfnein's face, and tried to look away, but Mei held her head, forcing her to maintain eye contact.

"What matters to me the most is..."

Mei gently pushed Carol back as Elfnein embraced her. Their similar height made them look like twins hugging. Mei quietly left the room, noticing the rest of the group standing there. She put a finger to her lips.

"Let's leave them alone for a while. They need to speak to each other, heart to heart."

The rest of the team, especially Hibiki, smiled and agreed, following Mei. One thing was certain: the magical girl incident was over.