Infinite Dendrogram: Volume 14

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Color Illustrations

  Interlude: First Contact

  Chapter Ten: Guardian-Jaguarman Theory

  Chapter Eleven: The Black Mirror

  Chapter Twelve: A Dear Friend

  Chapter Thirteen: Trails in the Sky

  Chapter From the Past: The First SUBM

  Chapter Fourteen: Soaring and Indomitable

  Chapter Fifteen: The Final Choice

  Chapter Sixteen: The Conclusion

  Chapter Seventeen: Aftermath

  Interlude: Another Story

  Afterword

  About J-Novel Club

  Copyright

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  Interlude: First Contact

  August, 2043, Vandelheim

  Not long had passed since the release of Infinite Dendrogram on Earth.

  The capitals of the seven major Dendrogram countries were swarming with players who’d been lucky enough to acquire the necessary hardware before it sold out, and most of them were beaming with excitement and wonder.

  The imperium’s capital was no different in that regard, and although the people here found these new entities — marked with gems or crests on their left hands — rather strange, they had no trouble accepting them. After all, these “Masters” had long been attested to within their recorded history, and had even played a major part in it.

  Still, they were enough of a curiosity to attract a lot of attention.

  There were some exceptions, though. Particularly, one little creature that had the build of a hedgehog, but the features of a porcupine.

  It was wearing a cloak far too big for it, which dragged behind it.

  There was no name above its head, so people knew it wasn’t a monster. Most just assumed it was a tame creature and paid it no mind.

  The few stares it did draw caused the creature to make a quiet, annoyed sound as it walked, keeping its distance from the road.

  None of the passersby noticed, but the tiny body hidden by the cloak — specifically, the shoulder — had a gem on it... an Embryo in its zeroth form.

  Indeed, it... or rather, she was not a monster, but a Master. She’d merely chosen the appearance of an animal and picked Vandelheim as her starting point.

  “Hmm...” As she walked, she suddenly heard a lady’s voice. At first, she thought that this was irrelevant to her, but then...

  “Why are you pretending to be an animal?”

  “Ah?!”

  ...The lady addressed her directly, making her gasp. After that, there was no question that the woman was definitely talking to her.

  She quickly looked in the direction of the voice and saw a lady with golden hair in curls.

  “Aha. So I was right,” the lady said, her tone analytical. She had no gem or crest on her left hand. This person was supposed to be an NPC... but she had trouble seeing her that way.

  “...Who are you?” she unwittingly asked the lady, going against her intention to avoid using normal words at all.

  Without showing a hint of surprise, the blonde woman answered, “My name is Claudiah. And yours is...?”

  After a moment of hesitation, she gave her her avatar’s name: “...Behemot.”

  “Can I call you ‘Betty,’ then?”

  “...Please don’t.” She didn’t want to hear her real-life nickname here; for it would only remind her that the people who’d called her that were gone.

  Behemot had come to Infinite Dendrogram in order to take a walk outside without having to actually interact with people. She’d thought that taking up the appearance of a harmless animal would make people ignore her, but Claudiah had seen right through her.

  “Would you like some tea? You’ve certainly caught my attention,” the lady offered.

  Behemot had found Claudiah very curious, and it didn’t take her long to accept. “...I can’t hold tea cups, though,” she added.

  “We have small tea cups meant for the fairy folk of Legendaria.”

  This conversation was likely the point where Behemot had stopped seeing Infinite Dendrogram as a game.

  While they were having tea, Claudiah talked about herself before Behemot could really ask any questions.

  She said that she was part of the imperial family, that she was among the strongest combatants in the country, and she was out in town to investigate these Masters that had begun appearing so suddenly.

  She also said that she called out to Behemot because she was simply very curious about her.

  “...Was it because I was the strangest one?” Behemot asked.

  “Appearance-wise, yes,” Claudiah replied. “But that is not the reason why I called out to you.”

  “Hm?”

  “May I ask you a question now?”

  “What is it?”

  “Why did you choose this country? According to the other Masters, there were six others you could have appeared in, so why did you choose the imperium?”

  Behemot was silent for a long moment. She didn’t know whether her honest answer would be something she could say to a member of the imperial family, but ultimately decided that it didn’t matter.

  “...Because the city looked like it’d be really refreshing to destroy.”

  “I thought as much. I saw it in your face,” Claudiah said without much surprise.

  Hearing that, Behemot understood the reason behind this meeting. Claudiah had singled her out because, to her, she looked like the most dangerous of the new Masters.

  “...You can tell by this face?”

  “I can. I myself feel the way you do sometimes.”

  “You? A princess?” Behemot asked, somewhat surprised. Claudiah smiled at her, but then spoke with no joy in her voice.

  “The burden I bear sometimes starts to feel like a nuisance. Even though I want to focus on the one thing that really matters to me, my circumstances force me to constantly hold myself back. Every now and then, I feel like just breaking everything that ties me down.”

  With those words, she let out a somewhat gloomy sigh.

  “To destroy everything that troubles me... to create an environment where I can focus entirely on one single thing... I wonder if the previous one... the King of Kings felt the same way.”

  Behemot didn’t understand what Claudiah meant by those words. All she knew was that she was being completely honest — which meant that they were alike.

  “Though, I really cannot afford to be as irresponsible as he was,” Claudiah added.

  “You seem to have it pretty tough.”

  “Indeed I do. Tough enough to want a friend who will help me.”

  “Hm?” Behemot tilted her head as Claudiah took her little paw.

  “Behemot,” she said. “Would you be my friend? Grow strong and help me.”

  Behemot was shocked to hear that. She hadn’t come to Infinite Dendrogram to interact with people. In real life, people just annoyed her; merely seeing large groups made her want to crush them.

  She’d only come to this world because she wanted to remember what walking outside was like.

  Going by her original intention, the only real option for her was to refuse Claudiah’s offer.

  “...There’s no guarantee that I’ll actually become that strong, though.”

  However, that wasn’t what Behemot did.

  For some reason, she didn’t find interacting with Claudiah irritating in any way.

  Behemot hadn’t known her for long, but she felt almost as close to her as she had to her late father. Perhaps Behemot felt some instinctive affinity towards Claudiah the same way the princess had easily seen Behemot’s true desire.

  “My Embr
yo isn’t born yet. What if it’s really weak?”

  “I am sure you will become stronger than anyone else,” Claudiah said as she gently caressed the Embryo on Behemot’s shoulder. “I can see it in your face.”

  Those words sounded like they were spoken by someone else.

  ◇◆

  That day, the two girls became friends.

  This was the birth of the Master who would eventually be called “The Physical Apex.”

  Chapter Ten: Guardian-Jaguarman Theory

  Paladin, Ray Starling

  The peace talks had failed, and a battle had broken out.

  Fortunately, the kingdom had considered the possibility that we’d end up fighting the imperium here.

  King of Beasts, Behemot — the one we had to be most wary of.

  Hell General, Logan Goddhart — another Dryfean Superior.

  The Rabbit, Chrono Crown — the one who’d assaulted Riser and the others.

  The Ram, Claudiah R. Dryfe — the Dryfean representative.

  We’d considered their fighting prowess, and also come up with a way to deal with any unknown variables — namely, Tsukuyo Fuso’s Lunar Divider Field: Faint Light and Fatal Field combo.

  No one below level 601 could survive it. Anyone who wasn’t a Superior Job didn’t even have a chance, so this move instantly wiped out all the Dryfean high-ranks with Embryos we weren’t aware of. We actually didn’t expect that the Hell General would be affected by this combo too, so that was a really lucky break for our side.

  King of Beasts’ Leviathan had also been lured away from the battlefield by Shu.

  And The Rabbit, whom we were pretty concerned about, showed no sign launching an attack. Tom had said that he had business with him, so perhaps he was keeping him occupied.

  Regardless of what was going on elsewhere, right now the only Dryfeans we had to worry about were Claudiah and King of Beasts.

  In other words, we were up against the most terrifying tian and Master the imperium had to offer.

  The tremors caused by Shu and Leviathan’s battle off in the distance shook the hall as both sides stood facing one another. One sudden movement would be enough to escalate things into an all-out battle. The lines had been drawn, and either side could make their move at any moment.

  I was the one who challenged King of Beasts, so I could be the one to die first once the fight commenced in earnest.

  “I won’t allow that,” Nemesis said telepathically. “Apex or not, I won’t allow her to kill you.”

  Nemesis’ words were reassuring.

  The Death Period and Lunar Society members around me were preparing for KoB’s next move.

  Rook had already used his Union Jack to become the Liz-based Metal-Devil-Man, which ignored all physical attacks.

  Marie had transformed Arc-en-Ciel into its ultimate skill form and loaded it.

  B3 donned Magnum Colossus and prepared to use Heaven’s Weight, or her ultimate skill if necessary.

  Tsukikage had vanished into the shadows, and the other Lunar Society members I didn’t recognize were also readying themselves for battle. A few of them were casting AoE buffs, so our stats were significantly boosted.

  And finally, without so much as a word, Fuso herself had already made a move.

  Using my Reveal skill, I could see that she’d switched her Lunar Divider Field: Faint Light from level to AGI.

  Faint Light only affected stats, so it couldn’t limit bodily functions like the standard Lunar Divide Field had done to me or K&R... but dividing AGI by six still had a huge effect.

  Between that and everything else, we were fully prepared for this.

  As for myself, I was ready to use my fourth form and Shining Despair.

  Our side couldn’t possibly be in better shape for this fight.

  “Ugh...” And despite all of that... I still found myself breaking out in a cold sweat.

  I’d fought many creatures a lot stronger than myself — Gardranda, Gouz-Maise, RSK, Monochrome, Gigaknight, and the pre-ancient civilization’s whale, to name a few. But despite that, I could tell that King of Beasts, even though she looked like nothing more than a cute little critter, was stronger than any of them.

  Only a few seconds passed, but they felt like minutes as chills ran through my body and I looked for a chance to make my move.

  These long seconds made me wonder about something: why wasn’t KoB doing anything?

  The answer to that question probably didn’t have anything to do with her, but instead...

  “Altimia! I have an idea!” Claudiah clapped her hands and said, breaking the tense silence of this 2 vs 87 face-off.

  I almost launched into an attack at the sound of that clap, but I managed to stop myself.

  “...What is it?” Azurite asked.

  “If we stay here, we will only get in Behemot’s way. Your Altarian Masters will also find it difficult to fight while protecting you, will they not? In addition, this will be our first fight in quite a while, and I do not want anyone to interfere. With all that in mind, how about the two of us take our battle elsewhere?”

  She said all of this with a smile, leaving me almost completely flabbergasted for a moment.

  I considered the possibility that this was nothing but a distraction to shift our attention away from KoB, but she herself was looking at Claudiah and barely moving.

  Fuso shook her head and spoke against Claudiah’s idea, “...No no no. Hold on. That’s no good. You’ll just lead her somewhere you can call in reinforcements and take her prisoner. It’s such an obvious trap.”

  Her assumption was reasonable. We knew the extent of the Dryfean forces present here, but they also had two more Superiors — that Franklin and another one I’d never met before, Murdoch Martinez.

  If either of them was lying in wait for Altimia, Altar would instantly lose.

  “I did not solicit your opinion on the matter, but your concern is not unreasonable. Regardless, you need not worry,” Claudiah said as she reached into her inventory and took out a large machine. “The stage of our battle will be visible to all, yet beyond their reach.”

  The object she’d removed from her inventory was a jade green artificial horse.

  “That’s...” Upon seeing that color, I recalled a certain name that Mario had mentioned back in Quartierlatin.

  It was one of Grand Artificer Flagman’s five Prism Steeds — the one that had been discovered in Dryfe.

  The bicorn of the wind... Jade Storm.

  “Let us fight to our hearts’ content up in the sky, Altimia,” Claudiah said, mounting the Prism Steed and spurring it high into the air.

  Marie, B3, and Tsukikage tried to stop her, but King of Beasts blocked their way.

  However, she didn’t use this chance to attack us. Instead, she only looked at Azurite to see how she would respond.

  “So that’s her plan...!” I said as I gazed up at Claudiah. I immediately realized that she likely wanted to fight Azurite over 10,000 metels in the sky — the height at which I’d fought Monochrome. That was a height few living creatures could reach.

  They definitely wouldn’t be interrupted there.

  Franklin’s monsters wouldn’t be able to go that high, King of Chariots fought with land-based tanks, and no matter how strong she was, I was pretty sure that King of Beasts wasn’t capable of flying around freely. Well, maybe Franklin could conjure up some monster suited for high altitudes, but Azurite would likely make short work of any creature whose abilities were all focused on that one thing. No one said that their Truth Discernment was going off, so Claudiah had to have been completely honest about just wanting a real one-on-one with Azurite.

  She obviously knew about the kingdom’s SMPS production, too, since she’d assumed that Azurite was perfectly capable of fighting her all the way up there.

  Though, she’d probably also considered the gap in power between Jade Storm — an original — and the mass-produced SMPS units.

  “Kh...!” The worst thing about this
was that if we didn’t go after her, we would lose our only means of stopping the acts of terror currently happening at the capital. Since Claudiah was the only one with the power to call it off, we simply had to capture her.

  If we didn’t go after her, she would merely watch us from on high and wait for King of Beasts to defeat us. And if by some chance we emerged victorious, Claudiah could just make her escape back to Dryfe. Seeing how fast she flew upwards, it seemed like it would be difficult to catch up to her.

  That meant that if we didn’t chase her down, we would be unable to stop the terrorism at the capital regardless if we won against KoB or not.

  “How cunning,” said Nemesis telepathically. “Also, while fighting at that height, a single mistake could mean plummeting to your death. That almost happened to us when we fought Monochrome, after all.”

  I wondered if that was part of Claudiah’s plan too, but I couldn’t come to a conclusion about that. I’d managed to see through her manipulation once, but I couldn’t keep up with her thought process all the time.

  To me, Claudiah seemed more like some inhuman creature that merely looked like a human being.

  This whole thing might’ve been a trap, but...

  “...It seems I am left with no other choice.”

  ...Azurite had already gathered her resolve.

  Even if this was a trap, she had to follow. This was the only path left. To protect the kingdom and save her sisters back at the capital from deadly danger, she would face her dear friend at a precarious altitude few could survive.

  “Azurite...”

  There were only two things I could do for her now. First was to stay here and fight KoB. The second was...

  “Silver!” My steed responded to my call and leaped out of my inventory.

  “Ray?” said Azurite, turning towards me.

  “If you’re gonna go there, ride Silver. You can’t really fight an original with an SMPS, right?”

  Like Jade Storm, Zephyrus Silver was a proper Prism Steed. Although he wasn’t one of the five famous originals, according to Mario, Flagman himself had worked on this one as well. He was either an unofficial prototype or an experimental model, but if Azurite was going to have a mounted battle against someone riding Jade Storm, Silver was no doubt a better pick than the obviously inferior SMPS.