Chapter 130 - 3.0

My life as a Vorpal E Rank, so far, was barely any different, all considered. Other than for the fact it was that much closer to D Rank, which at the very least would constitute an escape from the proverbial Hell that is the barracks, into a far more preferable co-ed dorm situation. And so, it was likely for this reason that my classmates, at this rank, were decidedly more competitive...

Nowhere has this been more evident than in the Crown Cup Battle scene. Where, across the dozen or so matches I've fought, there've been one or two pretty scary close calls. I've won some, and lost some; but with my overall win rate sitting at a healthy 67% percent, it's looking like I'll be a rank D in no time.

Just to break it down...

I've been fighting crown matches four times a week, throughout the month that has passed since I advanced to E Rank.

4...8...12. That's 12 matches total.

I've heard that some people will go 100s of matches and still not be able to climb the ladder—particularly out of E rank—or so I'm told. Which is why a lot of people have begun jadedly referring to it as the "hardstuck" tier, wherein roughly the highest population of Vorpal Knights are doomed to forever remain in obscurity.

I'm thinking more and more about it as I'm lying in bed with Ms. Alice, one morning. After...let's say, a long night of celebrating my most recent Crown victory…

She, like all of the teaching staff of Irorishiro, has her own apartment on a block shared among all the other staff housing. So it takes a fair bit of stealth and planning to get me in, without any of her neighbors noticing, and then to slip out when I have to leave, but there's a certain thrill to it that only further adds to the experience.

Knowing that what we're doing—this entire relationship—is considered taboo, even by today's warped standards.

And yet we're mating like rabbits.

However, the interspersed moments of quiet we share are just as precious to me; when we're both lying beside each other, in a room with walls and sheets and ceiling all painted in pure unblemished white, without a speck of dirt nor other outside foulness polluting it. Listening to each other's shallow breaths...before I'll then pose a philosophical question, or stray idea worth pondering that comes to mind. Such as:

"It's all a rat race, with no end—but for what?"

"That's just what it means to be alive," she said, trailing her fingers across my chest. "Fighting for the right to survive is the human experience."

"What about having children? I thought, from a biological standpoint, it was every living creature's main priority to procreate before death. But for all the people who have permanently changed into their Charming Forms, where procreation isn't an option—"

"Instead of tending to others, they only look after themselves. Their natural competitive drive never expands to serve anyone beyond their individual self."

"Huh. Sounds like you really know what you're talking about."

She gave a wry smirk. "My history with the Vorpal Knights goes back to the very beginning. Back to when the Charming system first came into being—starting out as little more than a pet product being carried out by the Karma corp technology division; many of its former members later branching off to establish the Cultivators society."

"Karma corp...didn't they develop the sleeper pods? And this division head, just what kind of person are they? What personal project involves turning people into little girls?"

"Originally, the division head's goal with their project was simply to create a virtual reality online multiplayer game, using the sleeper pods. But then, when the pandemic hit, the unfinished technology was rushed out the door by management to satisfy a growing public demand for...I guess you could call it escapism."

Gasp. "Unfinished? So that means they knew it wasn't ready for production. That people would have no way of escaping the pod once they entered into one. A massacre...that could've easily been avoided."

Ms. Alice gave a strained look. "Yes. But even that just accounts for one of two reasons why he chose to leave Karma."

"What was the other reason…?"

She looked me straight in the eyes, her jaw locked in full seriousness. "The other reason is personal: between him and the Vorpal Knights commander." She frowned, partially burying her face into a pillow. "So, it wouldn't be right for me to share."

"That's fine," I said, though my interest was more than sufficiently piqued. "Let's change the subject, then…"

To something related to myself.

"Is it fair to Miki and Miko...what I'm doing right now?"

"Guilty about our little affair, are we?" 

She laughed briefly, which rubbed me as being a bit insensitive.

"I'm serious. Miki says she accepts it, but does she really? And Miko will barely even talk to me anymore, outside of when we're training together."

"Maybe they're best suited for each other, if you know what I mean."

I quickly sat up, facing her sharply.

"W-what? How could you say something so callous…?"

"I'm just being realistic." She reached for her electric cigar on the bedside dresser, and brought it to her lips; breathing deeply of its vapors before continuing:

"Human beings, just like any other creature, must adapt to survive. And it is our intelligence that allows us to bypass having to endure potentially millions of years of evolution to attain better adaptations for a difficult change in our environment."

"So, you were actually being serious…"

She set down the cigar, turning to me with an amused grin. "It might not seem like it sometimes, but I almost always am. A badly placed joke could easily get someone killed."

I touch her on the cheek.

For such a cold person, she's so soft...

"Well, if that's the case...I have a very serious question to ask you, right now."

"Oh...?"

"When are we going to start fulfilling our biological imperative?"

"Oh, Lord!" She broke into laughter, her eyes closed, turning to face the ceiling as she lightly slapped me with her flailing hand.

I'm smiling. "I thought you were always a serious person."

"You didn't even try to make it sound sexy."

"We have an important role to fulfill, don't we? For the prolongation of the human race."

She sighed. "Still not sexy at all, Alex…"

"Gah! You're being a hypocrite! The whole reason we're in a relationship to begin with is so that we can do this! Otherwise, humanity's gonna be totally forever-fucked by little girls!"

Just then, with a stern face she rose from the covers—silencing me by exposing her perfect ample breasts and womanly torso.

I realized I was unconsciously cowering in her presence: deathly afraid of what harsh rebuttal awaited me; knowing, full well, that use of an automatic rifle wasn't beyond the realm of possibilities.

"You talk about wanting to preserve the human race, but it's obviously just an attempt to manipulate me."

"What! I would never—"

"You're a child, still, Alex," she snapped, before her expression then abruptly softened. "I'm only a few years older than you, but I've been fighting in armed conflicts since I was 10 years old—if you can believe it—in Europe, where insurgencies were an everyday occurence. Where I witnessed things that no child should ever have to see. Raised, from the day I was born, to serve Karma corp as a mindless tool of war; no different from the Charming Forms."

She climbed on top of me, pressing her hands down against my chest.

"I refuse to see all of mankind be made into weapons, just as I was. To see the beauty of the world, and that which exists in our hearts be destroyed as a result—as just another adaptation for our continued survival!"

"Ms. Alice…" I was staring, wide-eyed, at the sheer passion she was displaying. Unsure of what to even say. Except:

"I want to understand."

At this, she leaned back, taking her hands from me. Frowned sadly with her head bowed, golden hair falling down in beautiful waves at the sides of her face.

"There's something I need to show you."

Minutes later…

After redressing ourselves in silence, we cleared out of the staff common area without being seen. Then after, she took me aside in the hallway.

"It's lunch period, so let's go get your sister."

I looked at her in surprise. "Where are you going to take us?" Then, I grew suspicious. "You're not planning another one of your surprise tests, are you?"

"Haha, no. Nothing like that, I promise." 

She smiled and laughed, while I remained unconvinced. Then, added with a wink:

"Think of it as...a field trip."

Though still wary, I agreed to bring Blitz along with us—if only because I couldn't bear the thought of her skipping lunch again, and that I know she's more than capable of handling herself in a fight, should the need arise.

My suspicions of Ms. Alice would prove to be unfounded, however. As she then took us to an elevator in the facility that I'd never seen before. One simply labelled—

"Salvation Walk," Blitz read aloud, from the scrolling electronic sign above the doors.

While we waited, listening to the whirring of the elevator as it was rising up from the depths, Ms. Alice explained: "Since the end of the pandemic, efforts have been made to salvage the great works of our predecessors: art pieces that would have otherwise been permanently lost to the chaos and destruction; now displayed, here, in this gallery, as testament to the undying perseverance of the human spirit."

"Wow"—was all I could think to say. As then, the elevator doors slid open.

Ms. Alice walked in first, turning back to Blitz and I with a beckoning smile. "Come on, you two: I've brought you here so that you can see what it is you're really fighting for, as Vorpal Knights."

After briefly exchanging glances, Blitz and I comply; stepping softly into the car.

The ride goes smoothly, as I'm standing in the middle holding hands with both Blitz and Ms. Alice—"like one little happy family."

Although, come to think of it…

"Blitz," I say, to get her attention.

"Hm?" She looks up at me, with her big blue eyes.

"Ms. Alice and I…" I take a deep breath. 

"In a relationship?" she plainly asks, casually blinking. "Isn't it obvious? You're on some kind of date right now, and I'm being brought along to make it less awkward."

Ms. Alice was giggling, as I grew flustered:

"Awkward?!" I whined. "It's not like that at all! Alice and I are perfectly comfortable in each other's company!"

Blitz snickered. "Sure you are, big bro. I know you're crazy into big boobs, so it must be tiring for Ms. Alice to constantly be swatting your pervy hands off her in public."

"Sh-shut it! You can't just go around announcing stuff like that!"

"Oho? A Rank E is giving me orders…?"

"This Rank E also happens to be your big brother!"

Ms. Alice's full blown laughter interrupts our squabbling, as I can't help but smile when I turn to her. Thinking guiltily of how great it is that Blitz, at least, doesn't hold any moral quandaries with my blatant infidelity.

Once the elevator had stopped, the doors opened...and we were greeted with pitch-black darkness.

"Great lighting," Blitz joked. But then, just as the words escaped from her lips, a set of overhead lights flickered on, automatically, with a resounding CLICK: bathing the space in moody fluorescent light.

"Wow"—was all Blitz could say.

"Wow," indeed: the "Salvation Walk"...is a breathtaking marvel to the senses. A single, immensely long corridor paved in gold-colored stone, serving as an exhibit for all kinds of art: Classic oil paintings, done by all the great masters. Grand tapestries, taking up whole long stretches of wall. Intricately carved statues showcasing all manner of subjects in nature. Ancient-looking tomes—most of them holy books for the various antiquated religions—delicately placed upon pedestals in glass display cases. Decorated at intervals by planters containing vibrant and beautiful tree and flower specimens; their shed leaves and petals scattered lightly across the ground.

I was in awe, to behold so much beauty in one place. The results of hundreds—no, thousands—of hours of toil by artists, only for the sake of expressing an idea. Or to capture a fleeting scene of beauty, real or imagined, that would outlast even its own creator by hundreds of years.

A solemn silence, observed all throughout the Walk, lended an air of majesty to the place. Albeit, I found my thoughts were also leaning toward a growing sense of deep-seated tragedy…

"This is...a graveyard," I said; expressing my exact emotions aloud. 

"Not just yet," Ms. Alice was quick to respond. "So long as there are those, like us, who can appreciate these fine works, some humanity is still left in the world."

"Who's left to maintain all of this…?"

Alice frowned. "Nobody. I come here to water the plants, every few days, but the real ones who were responsible for preserving all of what's left of our lost civilization...have long since been swept away—like the others—by the call for us humans to adapt."

"That's...so sad," Blitz said, as she was closely observing a painting of a crowded parkland by a lake. "It's like, to become stronger, we're losing a part of ourselves we can never get back."

Alice touched me on the shoulder.

"So, Alex…do you understand now? What I mean, when I say we have a duty to preserve humanity."

"I do, now," I softly said in reply. Then, I felt a fire grow within me—one that I couldn't simply contain—controlling my lips to say: "And that's all the more reason why we should hurry and have children!"

Blitz glared at me, with an awkward look. "Ew! Hello?! Third wheel here."

Alice crossed her arms.

As she closed her eyes with a serious frown, she appeared to be deep in thought. Until after a few seconds passed, when she opened them: 

"Focus on your training, first. You still have a girl to rescue, right...?"

I nod. "Dusk...yeah."

"So, let's take it one step at a time." She smiled. "It'd be difficult to hide a pregnancy in this place, and it would put your status as a Vorpal Knight at risk if somehow word got out that you're the father. You would have your Charm Ring taken from you, and then you'd never be able to save her."

I...had never thought about it to that extent before.

"You're right," I told her, shaking my head in my hand with a feeling of shame. "I was letting my emotions get the best of me, I guess."

Blitz came behind me, laying her head against my back.

"You big-boob-loving hornball dummy!"

Then Ms. Alice pulled me toward her, as well. So it was like I was being hugged from both sides...with the Mona Lisa there, hanging on the wall behind us...and I couldn't remember the last time I felt so loved, since leaving my parents' house.

"You're a good guy, Alex. Being overly emotional is just our nature, too."