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Last Embryo Volume 2 Chapter 7 Part 7

Translator: DarkHeartedAlchemist

Glancing back at Ayato over her shoulder, she then directed her gaze straight at Shen Gongbao. She then stretched out her hands towards her, clenched the one that was responsible for pulling things closer to her…

「If we’re looking for a way to stop the train from falling… then that girl has it!」

In the next moment, Suzuka dissapeared from the top deck and reappeared in the air above it, but her freefall lasted for only a short moment, because her entire body has been enveloped by the wind, causing her to stay in the air without falling down.

「H-Huh?!…. EHHHHHHH?!!!!!!」

Guessing that she must be holding onto one of her Paopei, Shen Gongbao began to count all of them in a hurry. She noticed that there was indeed only six of them now instead of seven, but soon aster she finished counting, even that sixth one was gone right as she was looking at it, only to magically pop back up in Suzuka’s hand.

「What the hell is going on in here?! WHY ARE MY PAOPEI BEING STOLEN FROM ME?!!!!!」

Unable to comprehend the situation, she raised a disorderly shout which was directed at no one in particular.

「Damn it! That girl must be the Teleportation user responsible for that mess with the ballistas!」

Remembering how much she got under their skin before, Byakko clicked his tongue in dissatisfaction, but at the same time, he felt that he could finally firmly grasp the nature of Suzuka’s Gift and how it worked. One part of it must have been Asport, a.k.a the ability to transport objects to faraway places. That must have been the power that allowed her to teleport the ballista bolts to them even when they were in the middle of the process of being fired. If she wasn’t able to teleport them while keeping their kinetic force intact, then they wouldn’t have nearly as much problems as they did. That was a powerful Gift in and out of itself, but much to their annoyance she also seemed to possess the one that operated on the exact opposite vector, the ability to bring far-away objects closer to oneself, commonly referred to as Apport. That is one of the absolute worst Gifts to fight against for those who relied of all manner of weaponry instead of the strength of their own bodies, because no matter how hard they tried to prevent that, they would definitely be robbed of their weapons.

However, when Byakko analyzed the current state that Shen Gongbao was in, he concluded that this girl could not only steal items and weapons, but also their user’s right of ownership. If his suspicions were correct, then Shen Gongbao couldn’t allow herselt to carelessly use her jewels anymore unless she wanted to lose all of them.

「What in the world is going on here?! Bull Monster, we’re getting as far away from her as we can! We will be in deep trouble if your 『Proto Keraunos』 gets taken from you!」

「Hey! What do you think you’re doing huh?! What about my Paopei…. Oh what the hell?! The third one got stolen while I was busy screaming at you cowards!!!! REEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!」

Shen Gongbao has been completely overtaken by anger as she sent the remaining jewels at Suzuka in an attempt to eliminate her, but right now she should know that such an action would only have the effect opposite to the intended one. Realizing that if she keeps on acting on her emotions she’s going to make their situation even worse than it already was, byakko pounced towards her, grabbed her by the collar and carried both her and Asterios towards the shadow of the Labyrinth as she continued to raise the voices of protest and swing her fists around.

As far as the batlle was concerned, that particular skirmish ended in Homura & Company’s victory. Not only did they managed to repel a party consisting of not one, not two, but 3 legendary figures who could have probably obliterated the entire Giant Spirit Train if left entirely to their own devices, but Suzuka also managed to obtain three of the enemy’s Gifts for herself, however, it was still too early for celebrations and victory shouts, since the most immediate danger to them all still hasn’t been taken care of.

Even though she only obtained it mere minutes ago, Suzuka could already tell that the Paopei was not a type of Gift that was compatible with the tactics based on improvisation. She tried to slip under the Giant Spirit Train and support it from there with the air current created with the three jewels in an attempt to slow the train’s fall down as much as she could, but there was no way that so little of the air current would ever be able to stop the hulking mass of iron that was the 『Sun Thousand』.

Ayato shouted that to her while clinging onto the top deck.

「Suzuka, you cannot stay there, you hear me, staying there won’t do you any good! Can’t you control those things remotely?!」

「Maybe I could, but the thing is that operating them becomes kinda difficult when the move away from my body… so doing any more than I am already doing might prove to be just a little bit impossible, you know?!」

The storm winds generated by the Paopei began to weaken, indicating that the output of their power began to fall. If this keeps up, then it won’t be long before they won’t be able to keep anything afloat at all. Ayato thought that if worse comes to worst she might just cut the Giant Spirit Train open to make Suzuka’s job that much easier, but she immediately gave up on that, because the 『Sun Thousand』 was made mostly out of Adamantine, so cutting through the armor that was made of it would be impossible even for her.

The way things were going, it looked like they won’t have any other choice but to teleport the entire train just before it hits the ground, just like Suzuka did with herself, Ayato and Homura when the arrived in Little Garden, but there was no telling how that move would end up with an object this large. Suzuka managed to slow it down to some extent thanks to the power of the 3 Paopei released underneath it, but that was not nearly enough to get rid of all the shock resulting from the impact of hitting the ground even if she kept the storms from all of the jewels active the entire time. Breaking the train’s fall like that would be incredibly risky, but there was no other way to go about it now that all of their other options have pretty much been exhausted.

But at that moment, a woman’s voice could be heard calling out to her from one of the Giant Spirit Train’s windows.

「That was a very nice fight you put up there, girl! But it’s okay now, you can sit back and leave the rest to me!」

And soon after that, the entirety of the Spirit Train was slowly engulfed by a mass of sentient shadow that began to coil around the entire structure almost as if it had a will of its own.

「Ehhhh?! W-What is it?! What is going on?!」

After slowly covering the entirety of 『Sun Thousand’s』 space, the shadows stopped its frame mid-air and then lowered it back onto the ground without it sustaining any damage at all, which unfortunately couldn’t be said about the Labyrinth, but that was to be expected, if we are to be honest, since with the train as big as 『Sun Thousand』,it would inevitably cause harm to the dated structures of the ancient maze when its wagons came into contact with them, causing the to subsequently collapse and crumble into piles of dust. The wagon’s however, seemed to be entirely intact even after all they have just been through, which served as a good testament to how tough and sturdy they actually were.

Once they were safely placed on solid ground, Ayato leapt from the top deck back onto the ground, realizing who was the one who saved them from a crash landing after only taking a single glance at the shadows that were still enveloped all around the Giant Spirit Train’s frame.

(Those are the shadows from Scathach-sensei’s 『Dun Scaith』! (TL Note: The Land of Shadows in Celtic mythology and the Celtic Realm of the Dead that Scathach had dominion over. Supposedly it is located on the island of Skye in the northernmost part of Scottish Islands) I had no idea they could be utilized in such a way!)

Even though right now Scathach was referring to herself as Queen Halloween’s Head Butler, she was, in fact, a genuine Divine Spirit, but she was a little bit different than what we usually have in mind when we talk about them.