Chapter 142: Prelude to a Long Night

"Pfft! That's one hell of a side effect!"

"Yeah, yeah." Shiro replied disinterestedly to Roman's joke.

Every time Shiro uses up the [Tail Gear], it... transforms him into a young girl. A Tokusatsu-Mahou Shoujo hybrid, to be exact. He doesn't know why the hell it has that kind of function, but he's left with no choice but to use it now that the situation's dire.

Right now, she's quite busy playing with flames. To be more exact, the two new kinds of flames that she got by using the [Tail Gear]. On her right hand, a pure white flame is present. It didn't have any maliciousness in it, only pure gentleness.

On the other hand, a pure black flame is present on her left hand. It emitted an ominous aura, something that will be immediately seen as harmful.

As for their effects, it's simple. The white flame can 'restore' anything it touches, be it living or non-living things. Meanwhile, the black flame can 'corrode' anything that it comes in contact with. It's similar to a DoT (Damage over Time) in RPG games.

Though, what's more interesting is the fact that if they are fused, they'll create endless attraction, which will only strengthen the flames' destructive power. That's right, their fusion will only bring 'destruction', nothing else.

Shiro had suddenly fused the flames on top of her hands before adding in her previous flames into the mix. The crimson red flame from Surtr's flame, the bright white flame from hell... They swirled around the fused white-black flames, integrating with it slowly through the help of Shiro's max-level control stat.

By the time they are fully fused, it remained black and white. Still, it gained the characteristics of Surtr's flame and the hell flames, which is its aggressive and purifying powers, respectively.

Roman, sensing the power of those compressed flames in Shiro's palms, nodded in admiration. He knew how hard it is to fuse different things at once, yet Shiro had done it in a minute. Perhaps, she could even surpass him in his time as the "King of Magus".

After all, control is one of the most crucial factors as a mage.

Pachi-!

Shiro clapped both of her hands that made the flames disappear.

"Hey, Roman. You'll use High-speed Divine Words, right?"

"Yeah?"

"Then... You can penetrate concepts well?"

"Yes, why?"

"I have a feeling... that the thing won't go down in one shot."

Shiro said before she started to activate the arrays one by one.

"You've set up a flag just now."

Hearing this, Shiro replied, "I did. When I fought with Sayaka, I got some hints..."

She told their summarized fight to him, including how Walpurgisnacht is some kind of "Quasi-Demon" or something.

"That one... It's the same as Ars Paulina. We'll need to think of a way against its "Immortality" or... brute-force through it."

"How about using the [Beyond 0th Form] of [Judgement of Shamash] or [Black Abyss]?"

Unlike the original, Roman's [Void Archives] provided him of a way to use the power far beyond a Divine Key's 0th form, something that 'perfectly' replicates a Herscherr's powers unlike the 0th form.

(A/N: The 0th form is the ultimate move of a Divine Form, so as to speak. Though, it's few levels below the original Herscherr's power.)

While this uses every stored energy inside the 1st Herscherr's core, making it unusable for a few weeks to a month, it is extremely worth-while.

"I'll definitely need the help of you two to make sure." Roman replied.

"Mn."

The two silently worked on activating the array circles that spanned more than an entire soccer field (105 meters).

After some time had passed, Kaede and Touka arrived in this place.

"Shiro..? What... No, nevermind. I won't ask anything about it." Touka suddenly said before she continued, "All I have to know is that Shiro is a young girl right now."

On the other hand, Kaede was slightly surprised when she heard it. Though, she didn't dwell on it much since she had indeed sensed Shiro's presence in her.

Shiro's eyelid twitched upon hearing one of her sharp statements. Still, she continued turning on the arrays. Every time she does so, the crystals in the middle shone before an extremely high-level energy began flowing through it.

"Shiro-san."

"Mn?"

Shiro turned her head to look behind, only to see Kaede with a determined expression.

"How can I help?" She asked.

"Ah, that? When time comes, can you activate your plant domain?"

"Un! As long as there's an energy source, I will do it!"

Shiro smiled at her as a show of appreciation. Though, this only looked extremely adorable to Kaede. It's like seeing a cute kid that you want to protect...

*****

A few minutes ago...

"You're here..."

Kyoko saw Mami coming out of her apartment. Everything had occurred in the middle of the night, thus she didn't immediately felt the evil presence whilst unconscious. This is one of [Unbroken Will]'s effect, whereas she's immune to any negative mental effects at a certain level, including fear, bloodlust, malevolence, and the likes.

It was only until the earthquake began did she wake up.

Suddenly, Kyoko felt the evil presence disappear. It became more evident when the natural disasters stopped.

"It's gone..." She muttered softly, but it is loud enough to be heard by Mami.

"What is gone?"

"A Witch... No, it should be Sayaka. She turned into a Witch, and then... Shiro dealt with her." Kyoko explained what happened prior to her arriving here.

"I see. I'll go to that place." Mami said.

"I'll go too!"

It took them a couple of minutes before they arrived. The battle took place in front of Sayaka's home, which is near the road. There, they saw craters with varying depths, rubbles from broken buildings, and vehicles on fire. In particular, there's a crater with a huge trace of blood present in it.

Mami touched it with her hand. She found out that it's still fresh before placing it closer in her face.

"This scent... It's Shiro."

"...How did you know?" Kyoko asked.

To that, she only smiled at her that said "Don't ask further."

Seeing this, she decided not to pry more.

"Anyways... Where do you think is he? He's alive, for sure. There's no labyrinth present here."

"A place where he will go to... I know one."

Having brought her there before, Mami knew about the empty field that they used to fill in their preparations with. Hence, they went there. By the time they arrived, a young girl shorter than them said:

"Kyoko... and Mami-chan?"

Whilst confused, Roman spoke to them.

"This is a good thing. We'll need every help that we can get right now."

Hearing this, Kyoko asked confusedly, "Help? For what?"

Instead, all she got is the young girl saying, "It's here."

Right after that, the sky cracked like a mirror. In fact, it is the barrier that they placed in to stall the Walpurgisnacht and fire off the cannon while it is outside the city.

"It won't hold. We have no choice but to initiate the alternatives."

As Roman had said that, the silver ring embedded with a blue gem in Roman's left middle finger shone. The cracks stopped showing, but an extremely dangerous aura spread out to the entire city.

The clear skies from before are replaced with dark storms once more while the city began experiencing an earthquake of higher magnitude, almost reaching 9.5 magnitude is intensity. This is enough to wreck Mitakihara Town to shambles without their preparations. Though, they alarmed the government here and gathered everyone on evacuation shelters early, just when Shiro saw the countdown go off.

There, a strong Bounded Field is erected.

Strangely, the place where they're in didn't experience any shaking or such.

Once Roman's ring went back to normal, he said, "It's weakened. More than 80% of the weakening functions worked."

"Good thing it didn't have a [Debuff Immunity]." Shiro joked.

(A/N: Debuff Immunity is a mechanic from Fate/Grand Order.)

"You still have time for jokes?"

Roman said while he wore his white gloves back.

"Yeah." She paused for a while before adding, "Because this is going to be a long night."