7 You Are The One Who Made The Covenant

It was a story from a country that had passed out of existence.

Long ago, there was a beautiful young girl.

The silver-haired girl with bewitching red eyes had captured many men's hearts.

But none held the girl's interest.

The girl's reputation reached up to the heavens and even God came down to court her.

God presented her with a variety of treasures to win her favor.

A beautiful jewel from the floor of the deepest ocean.

A golden flower from heaven that would never wilt.

A magnificent dress, woven with the light of the sun.

But no matter what treasures God presented, she would not show him favor.

Finally, God said, "If you become my companion, then I will give the entire world to you."

Finally, the girl accepted God's courtship.

The young girl's name was Europa.

"The Motherland is great! The principles of the Motherland are just! Hence, the orders of the Motherland are just!"

Dolchev was screaming wildly.

"The Motherland is not wrong! It cannot be wrong! If it is wrong, then it is right! Mistakes should be smashed and erased from this world!"

After Lud's attack, Dolchev should have been unable to move, let alone yell at the top of his lungs, and yet, as if his fanaticism for his homeland gave him new strength, he spewed bloodied spit as he shouted.

Sven shook her head, furious with herself.

Why hadn't she finished Dolchev off while she could?

Why did she run to Lud instead?

Was it because confirming his safety was the utmost priority?

No!

After Lud told her that he didn't want to kill again, if she took a life, even the life of a man like Dolchev, he might hate her.

Even if only for a moment, Sven thought that.

I did it again, I didn't think about the Captain at all, I just wanted to be the person he would want me to be.

How could she have made such a mistake?

How could she have put herself and him in this situation?!

"Sven... I'm glad... you.. are okay..."

Even while he was spitting up blood, Lud's hoarse words were entirely concerned with Sven's safety.

"Master... why...? why?!"

In that moment, Dolchev found an opening and escaped into the T-3 II outside the Door and fired a shot at Lud and the others.

If the Door had been closed the shot would have hit a huge rock wall, but instead, the artillery shell destroyed most of the antiquities that had disappointed Dolchev, and shattered the room.

The structure came down on them.

Milly and Marlene were only knocked out and escaped serious injury but Sven and Lud weren't as fortunate.

"Sven, look out!"

Lud shielded Sven and half his body trapped beneath a giant boulder.

This is backwards! Sven thought.

It was her duty to protect him.

Until two years ago, it was also like that on the battlefield.

Being his shield and his armor had been her duty.

And yet...

"Sven... Look... at this..."

The amount of blood that was flowing from Lud's lower body, crushed beneath the boulder, exceeded the minimum amount of life support necessary to continue.

Lud reached into his pocket with a trembling hand and took an envelope from his breast pocket.

"Look at this... it's funny... isn't it?"

Written there was an order for Lud to supply bread for two hundred people a day, starting tomorrow.

On the next page, there was a letter from Laurel, the foreman at the mine.

All he had written was one sentence: "It was good."

Laurel had overcome his prejudice toward Lud for being a Wiltian soldier, and saw him as a baker.

"It's going to be even busier from now on... because... I can't... run the numbers... or haggle prices..."

Lud coughed, spitting up thick clots of blood.

"Stop... Master... don't talk..."

Sven covered her eyes.

But the tears didn't come.

She didn't have the ability to discharge liquids unless it was to moisten her eyes.

"That's why... if anything... happened to you... the shop would be in trouble... our... precious... wait... res..." Lud's voice stopped.

"Master..."

Lud's heart had stopped.

His brain had stopped.

All of his vital information told Sven that Lud Langart was dead.

"Next shot! Load the thermite rounds! Burn everyone inside alive!"

Lud's killer was once again shouting in his rasping voice.

Thermite rounds were a type of incendiary shell that would ignite the impact area in flames.

Burn them alive?

These men were going to ignite the body of Sven's master?

Don't make me laugh!

Sven could hear the shells being loaded into the gun barrel of the T-3 II.

Sven picked up the giant rock that had crushed Lud.

No human could pick up a boulder that size.

But Sven could.

Because she wasn't human.

Sven's real name was Svelgen Avei.

She was Lud Langart's partner. She shared the moniker "Silver Wolf" with him.

An android born from among hundreds of Hunter Units, whose soul had formed inside the Rezanium reactor that was both its brain and its engine.

Who yearned for her former master too much, and had escaped from the Weapons Development Bureau to chase after him.

"You damned sorcerer, this junk you made is seriously defective!"

Created by the Principality of Wiltia's Royal Weapons Development Bureau in preparation for the the next war, the Autonomous Humanoid Hunter Unit lifted up the boulder, and turning to face the artillery shot that had just been fired, threw it.

With an explosion and deafening roar, Sven and Dolchev's attacks neutralized each other with a blast of fire and light.

"What?!"

Sven rushed in front of the flustered Dolchev, who was stunned by sudden situation.

Sven had to kill him. She had to crush him.

She had to kill the man who had killed Lud - No, she had to kill the man who made him give up his life to protect her.

If she was Avei, and Lud was piloting her, this T-3 II wouldn't have been a challenge.

But now she was in a human body.

All she could do was warp the tank's cannon as much as possible.

Nevertheless, Sven was confident that she would win.

Inside her dwelt and entirely different kind of anger.

You dare to wrong me, you insolent vermin?!

Who was "me"? Who was the "insolent vermin"?

Her anger was directed not at Dolchev, but at something else.

Its sensor light were blinking and it was taking aim at Sven for its next attack.

Her anger was directed at the T-3 II itself.

"Stay yourself, swine!"

Sven's two red eyes sparkled as she cried out.

T-3 II's movements stopped.

Its sensors and engine were still on, but weren't functioning.

It was as if it was terrified of the light that overflowed from Sven's red eyes, and had frozen.

"W-What is this?! What happened?!"

"I don't know! All of a sudden it stopped responding to my inputs..."

Sven could hear Dolchev and his subordinates shrieking to each other.

But Sven wasn't finished.

"If you have any shame, then die!" Sven shouted.

Her words were like a proclamation that she was bestowing the final gift of suicide to a group of criminals who had against the king.

As if responding to Sven's voice, the crude crane-like arms of the T-3 II began to move.

But it was not Dolchev and his men inside the tank controlling its arms.

The tank was moving of its own will. Then--

"What's up with this, what in the world is it-"

The T-3 II stabbed at its body, as if to cut open its stomach and squash the passengers inside.

The flowing oil splattered like fresh blood.

Sven hoped that the blood of Dolchev and the others inside was mixed with the oil.

"Phew... whew... What did... I...?"

Breathing heavily and unable to understand how she able to do what she had, Sven was perplexed.

But a sensation rose inside her that told her this was right.

Sven didn't understand that either, but it didn't matter right now.

"Master..."

Even if Sven had killed a million August Federation soldiers, it wouldn't matter.

She hadn't been able to protect the one person who was most dear to her, and nothing else was important.

What are you saying? With the unbelievable power you hold, that should be something.

There was something inside - was it her soul speaking to her?

"Huh...?"

Sven responded to the voice in amazement.

Everything has been entrusted to you, in accordance with the covenant of blood. That's why, this is yours to use as well.

A voice was trying to tell her something, but Sven couldn't understand its meaning.

But something strange was happening.

Suddenly, the rock walls of the mine were giving off light.

The sleeping veins of Rezanite emitted a red glow, and became a multitude of lines that converged at the altar that Sven had told Lud was an ancient oven.

"This... don't tell me..."

Sven had been mistaken.

It was true that this room was something like a kitchen made with the technology of the ancient European Empire.

But it was a different sort of kitchen, created by a people who had built ships that could cross the stars, and had unraveled the mysteries of life.

In order to support the number of people who populated its vast empire, the science of the European Empire gave birth to a miracle.

They invented a machine that could multiply the cells of plants, animals, or anything at all from a single fragment.

This was indeed a kitchen. But it wasn't just used to prepare food.

It was also a factory to produce what would become the food.

The decomposing meat and vegetation weren't brought into the room.

They were made there.

Sven realized that this could also apply to humans, another multicellular organism.

"I can still save him... but..."

Lifting Lud's lifeless body, Sven placed it inside the translucent case of the cellular multiplication device to regenerate.

It was still not enough.

Even if she revived his body, she couldn't revive the beating of his soul - his life energy.I told you, you have it right...

 The voice again echoed in Sven's mind, now sounding a little exasperated.

Sven laid her hand on her chest.

Beneath was a Rezanium micro reactor.

It gave birth to her soul, acted as her engine, and used the red gemstones as its power source.

"......"

Sven turned around and there was the T-3 II, dissolved into a pile of scrap.

On its side the Zeihombomber that Dolchev and his men had brought to destroy the mountain was still loaded and intact, and it held within it enough Rezanite to create several tens of Hunter Units.

"Oh, I see..."

Sven extracted the Zeihombomber from the wreckage and made it resonate with her own Rezanium reactor.

The swelling red light entered Sven's body, and then slowly moved over to Lud's regenerating body.

Thump... Thump...

His white skin was tinged with red.

His chest began to slowly move up and down.

Sven heard the sound of his brainwaves, his breath and heartbeat, and she knew the he was returning to life.

While Sven confirmed that his body - and his life - were being revived, bit by bit, Sven thought about the events of that day two years ago.

Do you remember, Lud?

On your last day in the military, you cleaned every inch of my body.

You said, "I want to clean the interior too, but I'm scared I'll break something if I miss with the equipment." and you removed the frayed ends of my seat and cleaned out the mud between my manipulator.

After you finished, you sat down in my seat.

You were inside of me.

"It's scary..." you quietly mumbled.

"... What?"

"Whoa?! You're turned on?"

I had been turned on the whole time, but just didn't have anything particular to say.

You didn't need me anymore. For you to live a different life, in a different world, I had become unnecessary. What would you want me to say?

"Well... I've always been a soldier. I wonder if I'm going to make it as a baker... I'm nervous."

"You'll make it because that's what you want. You wanted it enough to be discharged."

And enough to abandon me.

"Yeah, I have to bake the bread that those two would have baked... No, I don't have to, I want to."

You had told me about what had happened in Lapchuricka.

I knew how profound your feelings of guilt were, and that you had searched for a way to atone for your past.

You found an answer.

Abandoning your weapons, the battlefield, and me, you found your path by becoming a baker.

"I wouldn't be scared if you were with me, though."

"What?"

You had a self-deprecating laugh. You knew there was no way young could keep me with you, but I understood. You meant what you said.

"When you're with me, I'm not scared. But from now on I have to go alone, so I am frightened."

Were you also hoping that I could stay by your side?

"... Thanks for everything."

You stood up.

In spite of myself, I called out to you.

"Captain! You were the greatest master I could ask for. May the fortune of war smile upon you."

Something was wrong, I thought to myself. This wasn't what I wanted to tell you.

But searching through my language database, I wasn't able to find suitable words for what I wanted to say.

"I'm not your master. I'm your partner."

You told me, and smiled.

It was a warm and gentle smile.

You didn't realize it yourself. You believed some nonsense that you couldn't smile anymore. But you were wrong. You were smiling.

It's possible that I'm the only one who has seen it.

I didn't want to be separated from you.

I wanted to be with you forever.

Even off the battlefield, I wanted to be by your side to support you.

I wanted to see more of your smile.

Yes... I finally understood.

I love you.

"Unh... hm...?"

Lud woke up.

He stepped out of the case, and touched his body all over with a look of curiosity on his face, unable to understand what had happened.

"Sven? Am I alive...?"

Standing there, and asking a bone-headed question that almost ruined the moment, was Sven's beloved master.

"Master!"

Sven nearly pounced on him.

If she used all her strength to hug him, she was capable of shattering the bones in his barely revived body.

She hugged him carefully, with all the love inside her.

"Master! Master! Master! Master! Mas...ter..."

And for the first time, Sven cried.

They weren't tears of sadness. They weren't for moistening her eyes.

They were tears of joy, overflowing from the bottom of Sven's heart.