Ballet Twins Building.
Having seen Twiggy and Geno off, Zhu Yuan's squad pressed on upward without pause.
Along the way, Zhu Yuan's squad still hadn't run into a single Ethereal - but they soon saw the reason why.
"Are those Rebel Soldiers? Who's that they've got surrounded? Is that one of Geno's people?"
"Nicole?" Unlike Zhu Yuan, who didn't recognize them, Miyabi actually had some impression of the Cunning Hares' members.
After all, back when she'd only just started out as a Void Hunter, Nicole had once swindled her family's heirloom blade right out from under her.
Ahem. Best not to dwell on that.
Luckily, Boss Nicole wasn't really a bad sort - in the end, she'd returned the Tailless to Miyabi, and that was how a bond had first formed between her and this future Void Hunter.
"Someone you know? They're in danger right now - we need to help them, fast!"
"Wait!"
Just as Zhu Yuan was about to give the order to turn the tables and encircle the Rebel Soldiers, Miyabi grabbed her arm and held her back.
"Why are you stopping me?"
"Look closer. Neither side is actually attacking the other. If anything, they both seem wary of something else."
At that, Zhu Yuan looked more closely.
Sure enough, it was just as Miyabi said - Nicole's group and the Rebel Soldiers were wary of each other, yes, but both sides seemed even more on edge about something else entirely, something neither of them could see.
"Everyone, hold position."
Zhu Yuan gave the order, then scanned their surroundings herself - but found nothing.
"Captain, the detector's picked up a single high-Ether-reading target moving at high speed, nonstop."
The Sheriff under her command held the device up before Zhu Yuan; a red dot blinked ceaselessly, marking a shifting position on the screen. Yet to Zhu Yuan and the others' eyes, there was no sign of anyone there at all.
"How is this possible? They're moving around so blatantly, yet we can't sense a trace of them."
Zhu Yuan couldn't make sense of the situation at all, while Miyabi stared intently at the two standoff groups, her thoughts unreadable.
"It's coming."
"What?!"
Miyabi rested her hand on the Tailless's hilt, and a powerful presence began radiating off her.
At the same moment, the standoff between the Cunning Hares and the Rebel Soldiers finally hit its breaking point.
"I can't take this anymore! I'm blowing them all up!"
Nicole was the first to lose her patience, hefting her Ether Cannon in both hands, ready for a fight to the death with the Rebel Soldiers.
"Calm down, Nicole!"
Eous was still off to the side trying to talk her down, but before either of them could act, someone else beat them to it.
"Waugh! What the hell?!"
Billy had meant to speak up and stop Nicole from doing something reckless, but before he could get a word out, something round and squat shot out right between his legs.
It was Perlman.
"What are these two bunches just standing around for? Now's my chance to run!"
Perlman, who'd only just come to, tensed at the sight of the two sides squared off - then squeezed his eyes shut again, playing dead to avoid getting caught in the crossfire.
But after a while, he noticed that the two sides were just standing there facing off with no follow-up whatsoever. Baffled, Perlman also realized this was a perfect chance to make a break for it.
"Ha ha ha, and just like that, they let me slip right out! Once I claw my way back to the top, I'll make every last one of those people who looked down on me pay!"
Perlman pumped his short little legs - not much longer than a Bangboo's - and bolted toward the stairs down. He'd already scoped it out: the building's power seemed to be back on, and if he could just get himself into an elevator, he'd be home free.
What he hadn't noticed, though, was that the instant he made his move, a pair of blood-red eyes had already locked onto him.
Woooo~~~
The music in the hall suddenly swelled to a higher pitch, and the Cunning Hares, who'd still had half an eye on Perlman, tensed up instantly.
What followed was an extremely hair-raising sight.
Woooo~~~
The sound of wind - a howling, hurricane-force gust. But this was indoors. How could there be wind like that here?
Everyone looked up, and there on the hall's ceiling was a ghostly figure, spinning and leaping, darting back and forth between the ornate chandeliers.
So this was the figure that had slaughtered so many of the Rebel Soldiers - it had been right above their heads the whole time.
The ghostly figure suddenly stopped spinning, then, like an elegant ballerina, came to rest atop one of the massive chandeliers.
That brief pause let everyone present finally see its true form.
Its body was pure white, slender and graceful, retaining most of the features of a human form - except for the Ether core set at its waist, which betrayed that it was no human at all.
Blades sharp as daggers, formed from Ether crystal, made up her dancing skirt, while her feet had been replaced with needle-sharp spikes, as if she were a ballerina dancing en pointe.
"What kind of Ethereal is that?!"
Eous cried out, startled - not just by her beautiful appearance, but by the deadly edge with which she could take a life without so much as a sound.
Even as everyone stood there stunned, the figure shot straight toward Perlman, hurtling at him like a cannonball.
By all rights, Perlman should have been dead where he stood - but just as his life was about to end, Miyabi made her move.
"Frost Strike!"
With a sharp cry, she closed the distance in a flurry of frost, catching the Ethereal's incoming spike on the tip of her blade.
"Woooo~~~"
Feeling the force pushing back against its foot, the Ethereal realized it couldn't win a head-on clash and retreated at once, using its incredible agility and speed to put distance between itself and Miyabi.
"S-saved... I'm saved."
Perlman had already crumpled to the floor in terror the moment the Ethereal attacked, and only after Miyabi saved him did he finally find enough strength to speak.
But by then, his face and the front of his pants were already soaked through, a thoroughly undignified mess.
"Miyabi, are you all right?"
Zhu Yuan called for her subordinates to seize Perlman, then hurried to Miyabi's side, worried about her condition.
"I'm fine. Her strength's no match for mine, but she's fast - too fast for me to keep up."
Miyabi calmly admitted her own shortcoming to Zhu Yuan. In truth, her own speed was well beyond ordinary human levels - but by comparison, the other side was still faster, especially in such a cramped space.
What's more, Miyabi had sensed something strange coming off that Ethereal - a sense that something about it was false, somehow.
That made her instinctively wary that it might be some kind of trap, so she hadn't recklessly pressed the pursuit.
But while Miyabi didn't dare rush in, someone else did.
From the moment Perlman made his run for it to the moment Miyabi saved him, barely half a minute had passed.
But that was time enough for certain people to react.
"All units, charge!"
At the sight of Miyabi's arrival, the Rebel Soldiers' wary expressions vanished in an instant. Abandoning their long standoff with the Cunning Hares entirely, they charged fearlessly, headlong toward Miyabi, heedless of death.
____
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🔥 New history: DanMachi: Inheriting the Legacy of Alternate Versions — posted on The_Mikudayo