[V2C19] Lost Colors
Translated by Jodas 2: Daily Lives of a New Teacher and the Apprentice Mages“I shall sing for you, with all my (murderous) heart.”
Folulutia, the Harpy of the Breakneck Gorge who had regained her true form, spread her wings wide and wrapped them around Wren and Sevil.
Then, protecting those two from the formless child of Winter, she shouted.
“AaaaaAAAAAHHH—……”
Her singing voice resounded in the dark cave. This sensation was nostalgic to Tia.
Harpies made their nests in caves along the walls of the Breakneck Gorge, and while they were not as small as this one, their voices definitely echoed.
“AAAaaaaaaaahh!”
By offering her songs, Tia could borrow the strength of wind spirits.
However, the only ones in this area were weak lesser spirits. It would be difficult to drive away a greater Monster with the power of lesser spirits.
And, in this circumstance, it would be impossible to run away like she did with the Werewolf they encountered during the entrance exam.
But more importantly than that, Tia held an intense hatred towards this Monster.
She hated him. She despised him.
(After all, he reminds me of that girl.)
That was why Tia would sing of destruction, with all the clear hostility, hatred, and murderous intent she had.
—On the day of tears, you will learn your worthlessness. (I will tear your skin one piece at a time)
—In the mud, no one will witness your flower. (I will slice your flesh one chunk at a time)
—You will rot, melt, and dissipate. (I will crush your bones one at a time)
Harpies could sing with three voices at once.
At the moment, Tia was using two of those voices to sing different lyrics.
One voice kept in key and rhythm, while second lyrics layered on top of the main lyrics, silently corroding the mind of those who could hear it.
What in the world was this? The Winter Monster, Jack, wondered in befuddlement.
He thought he had chased three humans into a cave, but one of them turned out to be a Harpy, of all things.
Harpies were lesser magical beasts. They did not have the ability to perfectly mimic a human form.
(Is that girl also embedded with a Crystal Rivet? Is that why she was able to come all the way here?)
However, even if she was using a Crystal Rivet, that was no reason for a Harpy to be able to assume a human form.
Crystal Rivets only had the power to allow Monsters to expand their range of action by weakening them. Just by weakening herself, that wouldn’t allow her to turn into a human.
The Harpy’s voice echoed throughout the cave.
Her voice was sweet and comforting, and yet her song filled him with a faint chill.
If he were to describe it, it would be as if, while listening to a beautiful composition, someone were whispering a gruesome story into his ear. And yet, the beautiful music and the whispering voice were not discordant; instead joining together as one musical harmony.
Then, Jack realized.
In gaseous form, Jack could share the feelings of both inside the cave and its surroundings, and watch both. In his vision, something appeared to be off about the wandering Snow Boar.
(The Snow Boar is….. suffering?)
The Snow Boar suddenly stopped moving, and began breathing in anguished gasps, then eventually collapsed to the ground where it stood with a thud.
Its eyes bulged, as if it had ingested poison, and it wheezed, unnaturally hyperventilating, before its immense form eventually stopped moving altogether.
At the same time, the Crystal Rivet embedded into the Snow Boar’s chest shattered into pieces.
That Harpy had just killed the Snow Boar with her song.
(A song that kills Monsters…….More precisely, a song that makes the mana which a Monster is made of go berserk, destroying it from inside.)
That was not simply a song for dispersing her enemies.
It was a deliberate attack, with clear intent to kill.
—Your demise is evident, you shall not see tomorrow. (I will tear, and slice, and crush you)
—Regardless of how much value you wear. (I will tear, and slice you)
—That value is not your own. (I will crush, and melt you)
Even after driving the Snow Boar to death, her song of demise would not cease.
Despite being a lesser Monster, that Harpy intended to kill Jack, a greater Monster.
Ordinarily, the interference of a lesser Monster would be ineffective against a greater Monster. And yet, the mana that composed Jack started to crumble away.
(Why, why……?)
Now, Jack was in a weakened state courtesy of the Crystal Rivet, and with the fireball attack earlier, he was quite weak. Was that why this lesser type’s attack was so effective?
No, that wasn’t all there was to it.
Around the time the Snow Boar died, her song changed.
It wasn’t that the song she was singing itself had changed. However, something about it had.
(It’s directionality……Now, that song is clearly aimed straight at me.)
While at first, the song had been spread over a wide area, it was now focused towards Jack alone.
Jack was in a gaseous form, but there was a part of him that could be thought of as his core, where his consciousness lied. That Harpy clearly knew where it was, and threw her song directly towards it.
“I know where you are.”
He felt as if a soft hand had grabbed his head and a voice was whispering straight into his ear. That sort of illusion.
Jack didn’t have a body at the moment, but he could feel a shiver run down his spine.
It felt as if he was shivering both from the biting cold of terror and from the excitement of bliss at the same time.
(That Harpy is anything but a weak Monster.)
With just a slight change in the tone of her voice, she could manipulate the mana it contained, then aim a song to increase its power at a specific target.
On top of that, her singing voice contained unfathomable quantities of mana. Even if he was weakened, it was still unbelievable she was strong enough to have an effect on a greater type.
“I’ve heard the rumors.”
While desperately trying to hold his gaseous body together, Jack whispered into the cave.
“A Harpy that has unusually high mana and directionality…….a Harpy Queen.”
Occasionally, mutant individuals of a lesser type of Monster would be born with incredible power.
In the case of a Harpy, those were called Harpy Queens.
However, there was one part that did not fit with Jack’s knowledge—the color of her wings.
“Strange…….I heard Harpy Queens were supposed to be rainbow-colored.”
Harpy Queens were said to have huge, distinctive, and colorful wings that could be identified from miles away.
However, the hair and feathers of this Harpy here were both pure white.
“I gave my colors away.”
While maintaining her song that could kill Monsters, the white-winged Harpy answered.
It was said that Harpies could maintain three voices simultaneously. She used two to sing, and one to speak.
—On the final day, you may laugh at your worthlessness. (I will burn your skin)
—You will become a buried corpse without a gravestone (I will char your flesh)
—To whom will you offer your prayers? (I will turn your bones to ash)
This Harpy was making conversation at the same time as she sang.
“In order to get a human body, I had to sacrifice a lot. My color, as well.”
(Sacrifice her color? She gave it away? To whom?)
Countless questions arose in Jack’s mind.
Even without a Crystal Rivet, she could leave the Crystal Territory. Despite being a Harpy, she could take a human form. Both should have been impossible.
Jack only knew of one entity that could turn those impossibilities into reality.
(No way, did this girl…..?)
The moment Jack made a connection in his mind, the Harpy’s song came to a halt.
In the cave, the Harpy bent over, screaming. Her wings slowly shrank away.
Tia’s heart raced, and her wings rustled as they folded into her arms.
She had passed the five minutes that she could return to her original body.
“Agyuu, Oohh……. Uuu!!”
When she turned into a human, her arms and feet hurt tremendously.
She felt all the pain of her flesh tearing apart as the feathers were forced inside, her bones cracked, and the shape of her feet twisted and deformed.
“Uwaaahhh, uuuu, ugyuu!!!”
As Tia groaned and rolled around in pain, she heard a weak murmuring from beside her.
The one who murmured was Wren.
Now that Tia’s feathers had returned to her arms, his body was probably getting cold again. Wren rolled over a bit and opened his eyes.
At the same time, Sevil regained her consciousness, and looked up at Tia with tired eyes.
“Tia, you sounded like you were in pain just now…..Are you hurt, anywhere…..”
Sevil started speaking, then gasped.
Wren was slower to look up.
“Ooh, c- cold…… Hey, Tia, are you wearing the coat prope- ……….Eh?”
In the darkness of the cave, both of them opened their eyes and saw.
The half-transformed form of Tia, in the middle of changing from a Harpy to a human.
And the face of a Monster, who had lost all her charm, with her face twisted and groaning in pain.