They were attacking her. She was about to be killed. The sight instantly ignited the flames in Goldof’s heart. All his mental faculties were extinguished, and all he wanted to do was slaughter Adlet and the rest. Clutching his chest, he desperately attempted to calm the impulse. “I’ll…stop the Braves. I can stop three…or at least two. You restrain Her Highness,” Goldof said, dashing ahead.
Dozzu called after him, “Goldof, watch out for her power.”
“Of course,” Goldof replied.
“Please, come on! Can’t you run any faster?!” Nashetania yelled. It seemed like she might meet a bloody end any moment now. Goldof judged that it would be impossible to resolve this through discussion. He wasn’t good with words like Adlet was. Besides, the others were suspicious of him. They probably wouldn’t listen, anyway.
Goldof removed the chain connecting the spear to his wrist and lobbed it as hard as he could. Meanwhile, Dozzu ran to intercept Nashetania.
Adlet and Rolonia turned to Goldof, while Fremy pursued Nashetania. Goldof had to stop Fremy. He started after her. A bomb formed in Fremy’s palm, and she hurled it at him. He dodged to the side, weathering the subsequent blast. The wounds from his fight with Nashetania throbbed.
“Oh no, you don’t!” Adlet cried, and Goldof just barely avoided his poison needle. But as he darted away, Fremy’s second bomb hit him in the chest. The thickest part of his armor blocked it, but it still sent him soaring backward.
Goldof had to stop all three of them. If he didn’t give this fight everything he had, he was going to lose his life. He had to be prepared to hurt them.
“Fremy! Rolonia!” Adlet yelled. “You follow Nashetania! Let me handle Goldof!”
“…I can’t let you go,” said Goldof.
Fremy and Rolonia were gaining on the fleeing Nashetania. Goldof desperately tried to catch up, but Adlet was approaching from behind to attack him. Goldof managed to block Adlet’s smoke bomb, but Rolonia’s whip and Fremy’s bullets formed a merciless fusillade. He somehow managed to take Adlet and Rolonia down unarmed, but while he was busy with them, Fremy raced off far beyond his reach.
“Fremy! Don’t worry about us! You can’t lose sight of Nashetania!” yelled Adlet.
Goldof was about to run behind them to stop her, but before he could, Adlet and Rolonia blocked his path. He was forced to give up the chase. “You…handle Fremy!” he shouted to Dozzu, who’d gone after Nashetania. Goldof had no choice but to leave Fremy to the fiend. He would stop Adlet and Rolonia. “…You’re in the way,” he declared and spread his arms before the two of them.
Adlet yanked the spear Goldof had thrown out of the ground, pointed it at its owner, and said, “Why, Goldof? You get what’s going on, don’t you? Chamo is about to die. We have no choice but to kill Nashetania to save her. Didn’t you hear Mora’s mountain echo?” Of course Goldof had heard Mora. That’s why he was doing this.
“Please stop, Goldof! We have to defeat Nashetania. We have no choice if we want to save Chamo.” Rolonia, too, urged Goldof to stop.
Goldof believed they were both kind people. Even this late in the game, they hesitated to kill him. He felt a little guilty about fighting them.
“Goldof, talk to us. Who tricked you? And how?”
“It’s the same as what happened with Mora, right? You’ve been coerced to fight us somehow, right? Haven’t you?”
Adlet, then Rolonia, attempted to start a conversation.
Maybe they were right. Maybe Goldof was just being deceived. But still, he couldn’t stop this fight. If he let them go now, they were sure to kill Nashetania. Even if she was the enemy, even if she was a traitor to the human race, Goldof wanted her to live.
Enough hesitation. You can’t beat them if you don’t make up your mind, he told himself. “I can’t let you…go beyond this point.”
“Goldof…” Adlet trailed off.
“If you want to get past me…you have to…kill me first.” Once those words left Goldof’s mouth, the look in Adlet’s eyes changed. The kindness and naïveté vanished. Goldof hardened his resolve. He intends to kill me.
He had to stop both of them right there until Dozzu could excise the fiend controlling Nashetania. That was his only task now. He was at a steep disadvantage here, two-on-one, and Adlet had Goldof’s spear, too. But still, he was not afraid.
The fight began.
Rolonia’s screech rang out across the heated earth:
“Diediedietraitoryougottadieorthesunwon’trisetomorrow!”
Goldof blocked her whip strikes with his armor. If the lash hit his exposed flesh, he wouldn’t survive this. As he defended himself, he reached out toward Adlet for his weapon. Adlet stabbed and kicked at him, trying to keep Goldof from taking it back. A smoke bomb burned Goldof’s eyes, and the blows from Rolonia’s whip stung his wounds. But even then, he kept on struggling.
As the battle raged, Goldof thought to himself—somewhere in their hearts, Adlet and Rolonia were probably still hesitant. They still weren’t sure whether or not they should kill him. As he grappled with them, his eyes darted in the direction Nashetania had gone. Had Dozzu pulled it off? Had it managed to stop Fremy and extract the fiend controlling Nashetania? Dozzu had a difficult task to tackle, too. All Goldof could do now was pray for Dozzu’s success.
“Adlet…don’t kill…Her Highness,” Goldof said during their fight. He knew full well that Adlet was not going to listen.
“Whywhywhywon’tyoudieyouwon’tdiedon’ttouchAddydon’ttouchFremydon’ttouchChamoDIEEE!” Rolonia shrieked as she cracked her whip at him. He dodged, and when he found an opening in her whip’s trajectory, he darted through to steal back his spear.
Adlet took one hand off the spear to pull a tool from his waist. Goldof immediately grabbed Adlet’s hand to snatch the needle away. He threw it at Rolonia’s face as he recovered his own weapon, and as he drove Adlet back, he remembered what Dozzu had said—that Fremy was the seventh and that she was the one who put the
