Chapter 309: Disaster Descends (Patreon)

"Deputy Section Chief Tsukishiro, we've done everything you asked. I hope you'll keep your end of the bargain."

Anaïs Desmoulins stalked up next to Yanagi Tsukishiro, her face dark with displeasure. She said her piece, then slunk off with her men in tow.

She was NOT about to gamble her own life on this!

"Deputy Section Chief, is it really all right to just let her go?"

"It's fine. Like she said, there's nothing left for her to do here."

Yanagi pushed up her glasses. They had done everything they could. What happened next was beyond their power to influence.

Watching the Hollow keep shrinking, Yanagi felt none of her worry ease. All of this had been achieved on the back of one person's sacrifice.

If that person didn't make it back safely, the operation could never be called a success.

"Still nothing on the detector?"

"Uh, yeah. Still no response."

Asaba Harumasa knew exactly what Yanagi was asking. He pulled out a tablet-like detector, but the screen was as empty as before.

"I've had my eyes on it since the Hollow started collapsing. There hasn't been a single trace of Geno."

"Understood. Please go and get some rest for now. I'll keep watch here."

Yanagi nodded when he finished, then tried to send Asaba Harumasa off to rest while she kept observing the situation herself.

That was only the surface meaning. What she really meant was for him to leave with Koleda and the other ordinary citizens.

After all, Yanagi knew that this place was hardly a good environment for Harumasa's illness.

"What nonsense is that, Deputy Section Chief? Not even I would call in sick at a time like this."

Asaba Harumasa might love slacking off, but when it was time to work, he never ran.

Even if the risk here was considerable, he was a member of the Defense Force and of HAND. He'd long since prepared himself for this.

Seeing how firm he was, Yanagi stopped trying to dissuade him. She took it as tacit permission for him to stay.

Beep beep beep~

"!?"

Barely a moment after they finished talking, the detector that had been silent all this time finally gave a response. Asaba Harumasa snatched up the device, and the moment he saw a small red dot appear at the center of the screen, the tension drained out of him all at once.

"Great! That guy Geno really had us worried sick!"

Asaba Harumasa swung his arms hard, relieved to finally see Geno coming back.

"Don't let your guard down yet. We need to get out there and meet him as soon as possible."

Yanagi sorted through the situation calmly and made her call at once, ordering people to prepare to bring Geno back.

That way, all that remained was facing the Hollow's explosion.

"Wait! Why did he stop?!"

Yanagi froze at his words. What did he mean, stopped?

The comm she had been about to place went unused. She spun around to look at the detector in Harumasa's hands.

"I don't know why, but he's stopped, out on the water about ten nautical miles from us."

Staring at the motionless red dot on the detector, Harumasa couldn't understand why Geno had suddenly halted.

Yanagi couldn't figure it out either. But if they couldn't figure it out, the answer was to go and see for themselves.

Everyone agreed with her suggestion, and in a rush they headed for the lighthouse at Port Elpis. From up there, they could see far and wide, and Geno's position would be plain at a glance.

"There! I see him!"

Through the binoculars, Asaba Harumasa spotted Geno at once, standing on the ice over the open sea. His back was to the harbor, and he showed no sign of coming back.

"Don't tell me he's showing off?"

Koleda scratched her head. Even if he was showing off, would he really pick a place like this?

"No, that's not it. He's trying to...!"

At first Yanagi didn't understand either. But then she saw that Geno was still gripping his weapon, and that his figure, though turned away from the harbor, had never once relaxed. Suddenly she realized what he was trying to do.

The collapse of the small Hollow had made the sea increasingly restless. Geno had formed a floe of ice under his feet to stand on, and it rose and fell with the waves.

But the swaying of his body did nothing to break his focus. His eyes were fixed on the distant Hollow, much smaller now yet still radiating a power that could not be ignored, and a bead of sweat slid slowly down from his temple.

The forced absorption earlier had packed his body with a huge amount of Ether energy.

Right now, he was practically an oversized Ether energy battery. But that also put him in an extremely dangerous state.

Just like the Hollow in the distance, he could leak at any moment.

That was no small matter. If his energy suddenly burst out in the middle of a crowd, then within moments, nothing living for miles around would survive.

And the only solution was exactly what Geno was doing right now.

'Use the energy inside me to cancel out the energy of the Hollow's explosion. That's the most perfect solution.'

That was the best plan Geno had come up with. It kept the Hollow's explosion from wrecking the harbor, and it let him vent his own excess energy in a sensible way.

The only problem was whether the energy inside him would be enough to withstand the aftershock of the explosion.

'After all, a Hollow exploding? This is my first time going through something like this too!'

The more he thought about it, the harder the hand gripping Tailless trembled. Even so, Geno couldn't afford to back down.

Behind him lay a sea of lights from countless homes. Behind him was everything he held dear.

Unaware that Yanagi and the others had already set up their defensive line, Geno stood firm right where he was, to be sure nothing could go wrong.

By now, he was ready to give everything.

Soon, the Hollow in the distance flared with a sudden burst of light. It had finally hit the critical threshold its structure could sustain.

And then…

Boom!

A hum—

The world went silent.

A vast glare flashed before their eyes, and the people at the harbor, stabbed by the sudden light, couldn't keep their eyes open.

No sound reached their ears either. It was as if everything in the world had been swallowed up and ceased to exist.

In the seaside town, the residents watched the explosion bloom on the distant horizon, and fear took hold of them.

"Mommy, I'm scared."

A small child, held in her mother's arms, buried a tiny head against that warm chest, trying to find some comfort.

"Don't be afraid, sweetheart. We'll be fine."

She said it, but the mother herself wasn't very sure.

Even though a crowd of fully armed strangers had suddenly appeared in town and set up a defensive line, she knew nothing about what was really going on, and she couldn't set her mind at ease.

'Don't tell me what happened ten years ago is going to happen all over again.'

That was what she thought, but the noise of the people around her quickly cut her thoughts short.

"Look! What is that?!"