The voice was coming from underground. A fiend resembling a thin snake emerged from the earth. The scales growing from its skin were silvery metal.
The snake-fiend continued. “Oh, I see. The real Nashetania interfered, didn’t she? That woman never knows when to quit, either.” Its tone sounded familiar to him—though he’d only heard it briefly, in the Ravine of Spitten Blood.
“…Tgurneu…huh?”
“Alas, you’ve found me out. Oh, well. Hello, Goldof.” The snake-fiend—Tgurneu—flicked out its tongue and smiled. “What do you think? The fake was rather convincing, don’t you think? It didn’t only fool you—it fooled all the other Braves, too.”
Goldof couldn’t even hear what Tgurneu was saying. The reality that Nashetania was a fake was like ice freezing his spine. The Helm of Allegiance was still ringing its bell, warning him that she was in danger. Goldof understood that the real Nashetania was still captive somewhere. “Where is she?” Goldof pointed his spear at Tgurneu.
“Where is she? Now, where do you think she is, Goldof?” The gaze of the metallic snake felt like a tongue sliding all over his face.
“Where is she, Tgurneu?!” Goldof yelled, stabbing out with the spear.
Wearing a nasty smile, Tgurneu easily evaded the attack. “Now, why would I tell you that? You may be a fool, but you understand that much, don’t you?” said Tgurneu.
Goldof reflected on the events so far. With the voice from the Helm of Allegiance as his guide, he’d headed out to save Nashetania. He’d run into Dozzu and come to the lava region. Then he’d heard that Chamo was dying because of a blade gem. Then Dozzu and a fake Nashetania had attacked him.
He couldn’t comprehend what was going on. He didn’t understand anything—not who was deceiving him, who his allies were, or who his enemies were. His mind was all mixed up. He felt ready to scream.
“…Keh-heh-heh, heh-heh-heh, AHA-HA-HA-HA!” Tgurneu threw back its head and burst into laughter. “You really are stupid! I’ve known as much for quite some time, but I never imagined you were quite this stupid!” Tgurneu’s tongue flicked out as it leaned in toward Goldof, tickling his cheek as if petting a cute little animal. “You’re incompetent. Hopelessly incompetent. I utterly fail to understand how Nashetania could have trusted you.”
“…You vile…”
“Tricking you has been so much fun. It’s been so easy, it actually made me suspect you were plotting something!” Inches from Goldof’s face, Tgurneu’s eyes narrowed. “I almost want to tell you the truth. If I were to simply kill Chamo and Nashetania right now, it wouldn’t be the least bit interesting to me.”
“The truth?”
“You should be grateful. What I’m about to tell you now is the pure and unaltered facts. You know, it’s quite rare that anyone can get something out of me that doesn’t include lies. It only happens once every few years.”
Chapter 6All for His Liege
While Goldof squared off with Tgurneu, Mora was still in the pit of corpses. Blood poured nonstop from Chamo’s mouth as Mora’s hand rested on her back, sending energy into her body. Hans was scrambling all around the pit, killing every enemy that came in after Chamo.
“Auntie…it hurts. Still…?” Chamo gasped, dribbling blood.
“Don’t worry. Adlet and the others will catch Nashetania soon. Those three will have no trouble subduing someone like her.”
“Ah-ha…yeah. I…hope so,” Chamo replied with a laugh.
Mora didn’t know anything. She had no idea of Adlet’s predicament or the threat Goldof faced.
Meanwhile, Adlet was a kilometer and a half away, battling fiends with Fremy and Rolonia. They hadn’t resolved their questions, either. They hadn’t discerned any of the new information—not that the Nashetania they’d been chasing was a fake or who the real mastermind behind this fight was.
And at the same time, Nashetania was trapped inside a fiend’s stomach. She was constricted, suffocating, sweltering. The heat pitilessly choked sweat from her body, while slimy, hot mucus clung all over her. Her wounds were severe. Her left arm had been torn off at the shoulder, and the wound was tied off casually with a rope to stop the bleeding. A tentacle wrapped around her throat had crushed her windpipe and her vocal cords. Her back was gouged open, and a great maggot-fiend had buried its face in the wound.
She tried to scream. But all that came out was a wheeze.
Inside the fiend’s stomach, Nashetania desperately waited for Goldof to come save her, to figure out Tgurneu’s plot, and to find her. If Goldof didn’t make it in time, then her chances of survival were zero.
“The truth is quite simple,” Tgurneu began calmly. “Dozzu and I are fighting each other. Nashetania is Dozzu’s pawn, while the other seventh is mine. Until your battle in the Phantasmal Barrier, I didn’t know about Dozzu’s plan, and neither did Dozzu know about my seventh. This is all true. It’s also factual that we forged a contract two hundred years ago.”
Tgurneu continued its story. After losing in the Phantasmal Barrier fight, Nashetania dove into the sea and swam for a whole day to go meet up with Dozzu on the shore of the Cut-Finger Forest. Meanwhile, Dozzu had been in negotiations with Cargikk. It had offered a ceasefire to Cargikk—this was in case Nashetania failed to kill three of the Braves of the Six Flowers. But Cargikk rejected the proposal and sent its elite fiends out to kill Dozzu instead.
“Dozzu, Nashetania, and their fiends were running around in the Cut-Finger Forest. Their subordinates were killed, Nashetania was injured, and Dozzu had nowhere to run. He was backed into a corner. So then this morning, they came asking for my help.”
That morning, Dozzu had come to tell Tgurneu that they had put a blade gem into Chamo’s stomach. They offered to use its power to kill Chamo and give Tgurneu the point for it, too. In exchange, Dozzu wanted Tgurneu’s protection. Tgurneu had accepted their proposal. It was still struggling with Chamo, so if a point was
