Like all outer gods, Cartesia was reluctant to receive help from humans.

But what about now?

She certainly hadn't requested rescue. Yet Eidel had appeared on his own, claiming she couldn't be reached, and was now using all his strength to save her.

Even if it meant he would suffer as a result.

Thud!

"Eidel——!!"

"Young Master!"

The moment the two women screamed, Eidel collapsed. Even as he fell, he tried to protect Cartesia. He cradled her head with his hands to absorb the impact with the floor and rolled several times.

An outer god's body is far sturdier and more flexible than a mere human's. A simple fall wouldn't leave even a scratch.

For Cartesia, who had spent her life being attacked only by other outer gods, this was the first time she'd experienced such treatment.

Renatus retracted the mist blade he had extended backward and said, "I read your thoughts long ago. You're stubbornly using such shallow methods."

"You seem to have forgotten what kind of outer gods we are, teacher."

"You may have entered freely, but leaving is another matter."

The mist blade now surged forward and destroyed the portal. With this, Eidel's group had lost their escape route.

But the bigger problem was that Eidel's clothes were beginning to be soaked with dark red blood.

A sticky feeling. A fading heartbeat. Cartesia found herself unconsciously touching Eidel's solar plexus. Her eyes widened.

"Y-youngster."

His heart had been pierced.

From her long observation of humanity, she knew well. A pierced heart meant the death of an animal.

Eidel's pupils were hazy like salted fish. He smiled weakly and whispered in a fading voice.

"Why on earth..."

"...I'm sorry."

Pssst.

Eidel's form turned to dust and scattered.

"He's dead."

Cartesia felt her neural network collapsing.

Dead?

That youngster who played with the Queen and the Iron Fortress? Dead? Really?

Impossible.

Strength surged into Cartesia's limbs. She rose to her knees and extended her fist toward Renatus.

Whoosh!

Renatus didn't dodge. Yet he wasn't knocked back by the attack. Sadly, Cartesia's hand only made the sound of cutting through empty air.

"My daughter, it seems you don't know how to fight among our own kind at all. Don't do it like that... Watch carefully. This is how you use techniques by infusing Pron."

[— "Total Mental Failure"]

Crack!

As Renatus's blade pierced Cartesia's solar plexus, her vision flipped.

***

"Hmm?"

When she opened her eyes again, she was fine.

Cartesia looked down at herself. She was still bound by tentacles as before. At the same time, her injuries had completely healed.

It didn't take long to understand what had happened.

"Time... has been rewound."

"Could it be those Maxwell forces?"

"How troublesome. Where in this universe are these ill-mannered beings who disturb us during our meal?"

"No need to be so angry. They may manipulate time, but don't we handle joy, anger, sorrow, and pleasure? We should control emotions, not be consumed by pointless anger."

"Wise words, teacher."

The two outer gods regrouped and looked at Cartesia.

"Anyway, we've shown him death, so he won't dare come here again. Isn't that the nature of humans?"

"Fragile indeed. Like flower petals that tear when blown upon."

But just then.

Whoosh.

Space distorted and another portal appeared. Those who emerged were, needless to say, Eidel and his two women.

Step.

Landing on the floor, Eidel countered Renatus's verse.

"Every rose has its thorns."

Cartesia's eyebrows arched upward.

"Youngster, what are you doing here again?!"

"I came to save you."

The strategy hadn't changed much. He had simply moved faster. But such reckless actions couldn't stop Renatus and Powehi.

Eidel met his death in a similar way this time too.

And time rewound once more.

"I'm back."

"You keep charging in without getting tired. What a diligent fellow with no sense of fear."

Eidel tried every method. He attempted to bring a quantum gravity resonator into the null space, and sometimes brought other swordsmen.

The conclusion was always the same. Eidel was defeated. Sometimes, instead of him getting hurt, Rustila or Sonia would be severely injured.

Nevertheless, the three continued to appear.

"Teacher, it seems the Iron Fortress has an agent in the lower world. We need to kill that human to escape this loop."

"You said you couldn't manifest in your main body for a while. I'll go kill them quickly. Meanwhile, if that little one appears, block him without delay."

"I'll make sure there are no mistakes."

Powehi declared confidently and ghosted around Cartesia.

"That human is quite peculiar. Not a complete constellation, nor an outer god. Why does such a half-breed keep charging at us?"

Cartesia remained silent. The other's words weren't worth responding to.

But the words that followed were simply unbearable.

"Did you try to defeat us and the Laplace forces by collaborating with that human? Birds of a feather flock together. Fools."

"What?"

"I learned while probing his mind. Just creating useless theories and making pointless inventions? All destined to perish anyway."

Grind. Her teeth clenched.

"...A good-for-nothing who just plays around, daring to belittle the efforts of me and my contractor?"

"That's exactly it! All your efforts are just pieces of destruction! Just as life dies eventually after birth, the universe will contract or evaporate after being created! Even a half-breed like you knows this, so how could we not?"

Powehi raised his voice intensely and kicked Cartesia's abdomen with a mist shaped like a blunt weapon.

Thud! Thud! Thud!

One, two, three hits.

"Ugh, kugh...!"

With each hit, anger boiled within Cartesia. Meanwhile, Powehi, intoxicated with distorted sadism, disparaged her even more.

"Just abandon dreams that can't be achieved and enjoy the present! How beautiful is the back of someone who has let go of everything!"

"After binding me here for hundreds of millions of years, you dare say such things... Aagh!"

She was hit hard and properly. Her vision shook and space distorted. The thought-body forming the neural center of the Cartesian system flickered like a dying light.

Powehi spoke in a low voice.

"Sorry, but whether you're in pain or not doesn't matter. What matters is whether we can enjoy ourselves."

Thud!

After hitting Cartesia once more, Powehi glanced around. There was no sign or trace of a portal being created.

"That idiot is late this time? Has he given up and decided not to come? Hahaha!"

Just as he said this, a portal formed about 100 meters away. Powehi lazily swayed his main body and prepared a preemptive attack.

"You still don't fear outer gods, coming back again."

The extended mist wrapped around the portal like a snake. Powehi flowed the mist into it just as the space was about to open.

He shouldn't kill him right away. If he killed him first, time might rewind again. Powehi intended to torment him until Renatus returned, so he cast a "Paralysis" effect on the mist.

What came flying in return for injecting the mist was a golden bullet.

Bang!

A star-infused bullet wrapped in smoke came and set fire to Powehi's main body. It was flame soaked in Aether. Powehi startled and quickly cut off part of the mist.

"W-what is this?"

What emerged wasn't Eidel, nor the swordswoman or the maid bioroid.

A black-haired woman.

"Haa, haa."

It was Ireh Hazlen.

"You... I'm sure I turned you into a bitch crazed with lust?"

"Don't call me by such words. I'll kill you."

Ireh exhaled heated breaths. To Powehi, she hadn't completely overcome it.

In reality, Ireh had regained some of her sanity through special measures from Zernya. With that small amount of reason, she was suppressing her inflated instincts.

In other words.

'She's enduring through sheer stubbornness.'

When constellations contract with humans, they look at the human's strengths and characteristics. The Altair of the Cowherd Star had keywords like "patience" and "indomitability."

Endure. Never give up.

Though she had lost control and gone berserk at first, as long as she wasn't directly facing Eidel now, she could somehow hold on.

[— Using "Bullet of Restraint."]

Bang! Bang!

Ireh repeatedly sniped at Powehi. This wouldn't kill an outer god, but it could at least restrict his movements.

"What an insolent human. This time I'll truly turn you into a dog with nothing but instincts!"

Powehi gathered Pron and infused it into the resonant mist. He combined two skills: "Surging Lust" and "Mental Collapse."

Ireh didn't respond and threw herself behind the portal.

And from the same portal emerged Sonia.

Clang!

The Calipers of Wisdom blocked the attack filled with madness. Only then did Powehi realize what strategy the humans were employing this time.

"Miss Rustila!"

Indeed, next came the blonde swordswoman with her ponytail flying as she charged at Powehi.

The blonde swordswoman, Rustila. To Powehi, she was the most troublesome existence.

She had abundant Aether and excellent combat sense. It was a level even an outer god would acknowledge.

[— "Surging Lust"]

Crack!

Rustila, who had been trying to dodge through acrobatics until now, this time took Powehi's attack head-on.

Powehi was taken aback. Unlike Ireh, Rustila showed no signs of shrinking back.

Was it thanks to the Virgo constellation she had contracted with?

No.

Rustila provided the answer.

"...I'm always excited."

Slash!

The trajectory of Aether cut through all of Powehi's mists. All but one.

"What a crazier woman...!"

"Now!"

Rustila shouted toward the portal. It was obvious who would emerge from that rift next. Powehi reflexively extended his remaining mist tentacle toward the portal.

But there was nothing to touch.

'A feint.'

By the time he felt the chill and turned around, Eidel had already hoisted Cartesia onto his back.

***

"You fool. Don't you have any learning ability? Did you come here to die again?"

"No, I told you I came to rescue you."

I cut all the tentacles binding Cartesia and carried her on my back. It took a bit longer than holding her in my arms, but this was much more comfortable.

"You cunning one, always scheming...!"

What's there to say? All the processes where I had died were just build-up to make Renatus and Powehi let their guard down.

Someone once said that there was only one portal that could enter the null space.

With understanding of coordinates and measures, one could create portals with the same destination, or even intercept the destination of a portal made by another outer god and exchange it with a different portal.

Renatus, who was probably trying to attack the saint, must be scratching his head in the front yard of Stern by now.

Having Cartesia on my back, there was only one thing left to do.

"Rustila!"

At my call, Rustila returned to the current world through the opposite portal. I also threw myself into the portal that had been created right next to Cartesia as soon as I saw signs of Renatus returning.

[— The true form of the "God of Wisdom and Curiosity" manifests.]

I embraced Cartesia to protect her from injury as we fell through the gap. When I came to my senses, she and I were lying on my bed at home.