My plan in order to make Lunaria cough up all her secrets was not to give her any other way out. To do this, I had to confront her upfront, exactly at the place where she kept her “secret” without her knowing…

It wasn’t as much of an issue, though. Tuilë was, after all, the designer and chief architect of the airship. She even rebuilt almost the entire airship herself, so for her to make Lunaria not notice anything was like flipping her hand.

So here I was, standing before Luna-1 — the drone that Lunaria controlled. The interior of the airship was more modern than ever before, resembling that of a private jet.

“I will speak one more time: out with it, Lunaria; I know you’re keeping this room a secret ever since forever,” I implored. “Did you think I wouldn’t notice after so long?” Well, I didn’t… but I can’t say that here as to make me look convincing.

She went radio silent…

The pause that had been seconds turned into minutes…

I didn’t pressure her further; it was best to give her some room for breathing. “A cornered rat can turn back and bite the chasing cat,” although the use of such a proverb was unintentional here.

“…Fine. Since you insist, I will talk… Have you ever wondered why when you ask things concerning the past and especially about myself, I never answered?”

“Was it because you don’t want to speak up about it?” If she had past traumas, it was normal for her not to talk about it…

“It’s close, but that wasn’t it. Truth be told, my memories are sealed… Some information pertaining to them — me — are locked… more like they were programmed not to be disclosed,” she said flatly.

No wonder. It was no surprise that although she knew a lot, she didn’t know a lot. I mean, there was a gap in her knowledge.

“But why?”

“I don’t know. Perhaps the answer would come if you opened this door… But even if you force me, I won’t open it!” Her usual emotionless tone instantly soared.

Her emotions were clearly unstable. Even if it was me, I feared that she wouldn’t mind attacking me for that would protect her secret.

“Is there no room for discussion?”

“No.” The drone’s mechanical lenses contracted. “However, if you promise not to come here and pry on my secret again, then we can go back as things once were…”

To each their own…

It was a valid and appealing proposition… After all, the last thing I would want was to have Lunaria as my enemy.

However…!

“Hmm… I hate to do this, but I must.” A trust can only be built if there are no more secrets between us… Of course, I only meant secrets that were bound to backfire sooner or later.

After steeling my heart and making up my mind, I breathed in a lungful of air and shouted, “Tuilë!”

“Aye, I’m unlocking the door now.”

A voice came from the surroundings and the large metal door started to split open. Obviously, Tuilë was at the command center right now.

“You… Although I said that this airship previously had no weapons, I never said that this hall is the same. Activate!”

Following Lunaria’s order, on the surrounding walls, there were dozens of neatly aligned rectangular holes that opened up. Then, from those holes, long tube-like pipes, looking to be some kind of gun, emerged and pointed at me.

The pressure from being targeted from all sides gave me goosebumps as a cold wind blew down the back of my neck. How terrifying.

“Uh… Do you have to do this, Lunaria?”

“You forced me!” She yelled, full of indignance as if I had broken her trust. “But I will give you a way out: Reconsider my suggestion, and I’ll let bygones be bygones…”

Before I was able to reconsider my choice, Tuilë made an unexpected move, disabling all the defensive systems, as seen by the guns that retracted inside.

“Y’know, Lunaria,” Tuilë’s voice began, “You can’t ignore my presence even if you’re the controller of the ship.”

“But so what? You may have disabled the defensive systems through some mystical means like magic… but do you think such paltry tricks are enough to completely disable them? Then you cannot be more wrong…”

Although most of the guns were retracted, some were showing no signs of doing the same…

“There’s one more thing I have in store,” she said slowly, enunciating each syllable.

Soon, a whirring sound appeared from behind me, and Alfredo slowly walked toward my location — a black smoke coming out from the two funnels on its back. Obviously, this was what she meant by the “thing” she had prepared.

“You did something to it?”

When and how?

To think that even something that I had participated at making it was turned to be her minion… Just how far ahead Lunaria had planned?

“Him!” Tuilë quickly interjected, breaking my train of thought.

Does it matter if it is a “he” or an “it”? I felt my face wrinkling upon hearing the point that she put up first; we had an elephant in the room here, after all.

“I did. A mechanical construct without the use of a chip… Overwriting the whole thing is supposed to be virtually impossible, but that isn’t much of an issue thanks to how you make the runic inscriptions to be similar to modern programming,” she explained.

Damn!

I inhaled a breath of cold air through my teeth… It was all because of me!

So not only did I have to watch out for the guns on the walls but also for Alfredo behind me — there was no telling if the drone that she controlled would stay still and watch.

Lunaria didn’t give me time to think of a way out as Alfredo rushed in to get me with its giant hands that were thicker than my hips. Facing a three-meter-tall mechanical robot was already terrifying enough, but seeing its incredible speed made me all the more restless.

“Luckily, I’ve prepared for this.” I summoned my source-bound weapon — a badge — and turned it into a pair of gauntlets.

With lightning-fast speed, Alfredo neared the distance of twenty meters in less than two seconds, but I had taken my position, lowered my stance, and threw my strongest punch at its chest.

Clank!

Sparks flew about from our clash… and yet my attack was blocked by a single of its palm.

So! Fucking! Strong?! Was this the difference between a Tier-1 enhancer and a pseudo-Third-Order being?

In haste, I backed away to the corner while I still had the chance. Meanwhile, the guns on the walls started firing at me, barreling bullets at me like raindrops… I was forced to cast {Source Shield} to block the incoming barrage.

“Huh? It’s not lead bullets?” I saw that the bullets bounced on the ground like rubber — they were black like the tip of a whiteboard marker.

It appeared that Lunaria didn’t intend to kill me… Not yet at least.

Nevertheless, there was no time to linger on the reason, and I turned toward Alfredo and quickly used [Identification] to assess the situation.

Alfredo

[…]

Source Level: Third Order
Source Element(s): None
Vocation(s): None

Stats:

• STR: C+ (78 → 79)
• AGI: D (43 → 47)
• VIT: C (73 → 75)
• SRC: C- (59 → 61)
• SPR: D- (44 → 45)

Accumulation Points: 117 [C-]

It was even stronger than ever before, and it was no longer in the pseudo-state it once was… I figured that it wouldn’t get stronger through physical training, but Tuilë must have done lots and lots of tweaking to make it this powerful.

With a thought, the pair of catalyst gauntlets were changed into a large double-edged battleax as tall as me with an all-familiar injector-like part between the blades. Its weight increased, enough to almost overwhelm me and upset my balance.

“Sorry, Tuilë…” I clenched the battleax hard; if I didn’t give it my all, not to mention winning, even staying alive would be extremely difficult.

The difference between our stats was like comparing heaven and earth.

But before I was about to clash with Alfredo again and swing my battleax at it, a rushing footstep emerged from the entrance along with Tuilë’s yelling:

“Maxim, leave Alfredo to me! You go after her and knock her some sense, maybe even down a peg or two!”

As seen from the entrance, Tuilë was holding her newly made electromagnetic gun and aimed it at Alfredo. It appeared that she knew that doing some damage was inevitable.

I nodded at her, transformed the battleax into a kite shield with exquisite patterns and colorful crystals that adorned its front side and vaulted forward, dodging the rubber bullets shot by the guns on the walls. Those that weren’t able to be dodged were blocked by the invisible barrier around me… Those that weakly cut through the shield were blocked by the shield with ease… I was expending source energy in my body like crazy; it was certain that I’d be out long by the time I was at the other side…

“You still haven’t learned yet, haven’t you?”

As soon as she uttered those words, the bullets shot by the guns on the walls changed into penetrating lead bullets, seen by one that put a hole in the floor. Even rubber bullets were enough to cause ripples on the source shield, so you could easily imagine what a real bullet could cause.

A single one of such bullets just so happened to hit and penetrate the source barrier and swished past my scalp. If I was twenty centimeters to the left, it would have blown my face apart… But even the wind pressure alone grazed my left cheek, leaving blood in its trail.

Crap! Have to do something about those annoying things…!

“{Air Pistol}! {Air Pistol}! {Air Pistol}! {Air Pistol}…” I cast continuously, hiding behind my kite shield. About a dozen pebbles were sent out from my backpack, cut through the air, and hit the guns on the walls, incapacitating them from shooting further.

Rejoice I did not, however, since it was only a matter of time before she could utilize the other guns. Regardless, this gave me a chance to get closer.

Seizing that small window of opportunity, I sprinted ahead with all my might, caught Luna-1 in my arms, and arched my way into the secret room, away from the danger behind me.

It was in that split second that I realized I’d made a fatal mistake: Luna-1 could release a high electric current that would fry me into charred meat. Consequently, I waited for the pain to come while circulating the source energy within my body to strengthen myself.

And yet…

No such thing happened… Not even a small tickle.

I held Luna-1 right before my face and asked, “You didn’t electrocute me?”

“Why bother? In fact, I don’t even remember the reason for guarding the place… Since you have beaten me and even get inside the laboratory, then it is only right for you to know.”

“Aah! So, it’s your intention to lose in the end…” Huh, what she said again? Laboratory?

Anyway, all of this finally clicked in my head. The reason why she kept using rubber bullets almost the whole time — except for the last moment — and why she didn’t make a move herself where she could have easily escaped inside and maybe sealed it off with her means…

“I understand not what you’re speaking about,” she denied. “Although it’s true I tried to make it so that no life-threatening danger befall you, I can’t guarantee that a stray bullet won’t shoot you between your eyebrows.”

What was the difference between getting shot in the head and killing me?

Typical Lunaria’s answer…