The walking corpse who'd picked a fight with me had become an actual corpse.
But thanks to his trolling, every test subject in the danger zone had been set loose — and Liberty, now free to move as she pleased, had come charging straight at me.
I'm genuinely grateful she didn't eat me.
The problem was that Gloria, who'd been with me at the time, was now in a very foul mood. On top of that, she appeared to have figured out the source of the smell she'd been detecting on me all along.
"Wait — this smell is…?"
"Kkeeng?"
Ice cold.
A dagger flies through the air and buries itself in my chest.
The moment Gloria and Liberty registered each other's presence, the atmosphere in the cell dropped to absolute zero.
But this was actually an opportunity.
I'd been planning to bring the two of them face to face eventually.
Telling myself the timing had simply moved up a little, I opened my mouth.
"How convenient. This is someone I've been meaning to introduce to you, Gloria."
"Ha. Why the hell would you try to stick that stinking mutt on me?"
The fact that Gloria was speaking in full sentences rather than her usual one-word answers told me exactly how displeased she was.
Whether it was the smell or the circumstances, the first impression had clearly been a complete disaster.
I had to find a way over this mountain somehow.
But as always, life refused to go according to plan.
"I… not a mutt."
"Liberty?"
Liberty had suddenly stopped making animal sounds and started speaking in human language.
Given how young she still was, I'd assumed some degree of intelligence remained intact — but it seemed Gloria's blunt insult had jolted something awake in her.
And unlike Gloria, whose superpower had given her a dog's nose, Liberty was a full-on wolf mutant.
Slowly climbing down from my body, Liberty continued in halting, clumsy words.
"The bad smell on Papa… it was you…."
"So you really are a mutt."
"Grrrrrrr…."
I don't like you.
— That was the nuance packed into that low, rumbling growl.
Gloria seemed to catch it too, because she climbed down from the bed entirely.
The two girls faced each other, and the situation deteriorated at a frightening pace.
I could see a fight was about to break out and tried to intervene, but neither of these ill-tempered girls had any intention of listening to me.
"Forget it. When have I ever tried to talk things out?"
"Eat… Papa's mine. Hihihihi…."
And just like that, they lunged at each other.
**************
A split second before the two girls collided, Gloria suddenly made a gesture at the empty air.
I had no idea what she was doing —
THUD!!
"Ugh?!"
Some invisible force slammed me into the opposite wall.
My back hit hard, but my body was sturdy enough that I managed to absorb it.
The problem was that Liberty saw me wince.
A deep, murderous light settled into her eyes.
In the next instant, the enraged Liberty swiped her claws at Gloria.
Naturally, Gloria sidestepped the attack with ease and fired back with a counter punch.
A small flash of light connected with Liberty's abdomen, and a tremendous shockwave erupted outward.
But there was a reason I'd gone to see Liberty right after Gloria.
Rather than Liberty's upper body being sent flying, she was completely unharmed — every wound healed in an instant.
She immediately retaliated with her claws, nearly scoring a gash across Gloria's face, which only made Gloria angrier in turn.
"You crazy little mutt!!!"
"GRRRRR!!!"
Liberty possessed the physical capability to overwhelm nearly every close-combat ability user who appeared in the story.
And on top of that, she had that absurd regeneration.
Thanks to that, she didn't just endure Gloria's attacks — an actual fight had taken shape.
Of course, Gloria's combat power was still higher, because Liberty went flying straight into the corridor wall.
The wall crumbled on impact, and the two of them carried their brawl out into the hallway.
And so the magnificent battle of two roughly ten-year-old girls began.
Watching the corridor and walls get pulverized like tofu, I realized not only that I'd miscalculated, but that this might very well be my final destination.
'Well. I've struggled enough, I suppose.'
How was anyone supposed to survive this chaos?
On top of everything, the ability users in the danger zone despised Black Cell researchers.
The moment any of them spotted me, they'd attack without question.
But then something slightly strange unfolded.
"Wh-what the hell?!"
"Is this some new experiment of theirs?"
"What is even happening right now…."
Inmates who hadn't yet escaped came out to see what all the commotion was.
But out in the corridor, Liberty's eyes blazed with golden light as she swept her claws — and the entire hallway was carved open, leaving deep gouges in the walls. Then Gloria hurled a massive chunk of rock to cancel the attack.
Perhaps witnessing the absurd, impossible power of these young girls up close had an effect.
The inmates froze for a moment with blank expressions, then sprinted off down the opposite corridor as fast as their legs would carry them.
Honestly, I'd probably do the same.
Then, inevitably, a brave soul appeared.
"Th-this isn't the time to fight! We should all escape together!! You two, calm down!!"
Gloria and Liberty happened to be blocking the nearest exit.
The inmate tried desperately to reason with the two girls — and had his arm torn clean off for the trouble, getting swept up in their fight and reduced to a bloody wreck.
In the end, no one came anywhere near this area, which meant I had been involuntarily made safe.
*************
Some time passed since Gloria and Liberty had started fighting.
The ten-year-old girls showed no signs of exhaustion whatsoever — if anything, the killing intent radiating off them seemed to be growing stronger.
But it seemed the two of them had been keeping an eye on me this whole time, because the room I was in had suffered no real damage beyond the broken wall on the corridor side.
At least that was something to be grateful for.
With my safety confirmed, I did what I could.
"Director, are you monitoring the situation currently unfolding in the danger zone?"
[ Of course~ It's quite fascinating, isn't it? ]
The CCTV cameras I could see here and there were still running, which meant Black Cell was aware of the situation.
The Director, however, seemed to view this as a golden opportunity to observe the power of Gloria and Liberty — two subjects who were otherwise nearly impossible to approach.
Judging by the voice coming through the phone, she sounded busy crunching on popcorn.
But she issued one order immediately.
[ Maxwell, there's a white rabbit somewhere near you right now. Could you help her out? ]
"A white rabbit?"
A rather out-of-nowhere thing to say.
I glanced in the direction she indicated.
There had definitely been no one there a moment ago.
White hair. Red eyes.
A mutant girl with rabbit ears, trembling and collapsed on the floor.
"Are you referring to that child?"
[ Exactly. Her name is Victory. She's an extremely valuable research asset. ]
Hearing the girl's name from the Director, I recognized her immediately.
"She's the ability user with the Acceleration Ability, isn't she?"
[ You already knew? Anyway, your daughters don't seem to want to touch you, so go ahead and protect her separately. ]
The Director had just referred to Liberty and Gloria — currently pummeling each other with murderous intent — as my daughters.
That cheerful, teasing tone of hers. Remarkably carefree.
"More to the point — if she has the Acceleration Ability, why is Victory just sitting there?"
[ She tried to slip away using her Acceleration Ability, but ended up getting caught in their fight, just like that ability user who just died. Looks like she's taken a serious injury to her leg. ]
"Ah. That would explain it."
[ And there's a specialized treatment kit rolling around nearby, so I'm counting on you. ]
Acceleration Ability typically had a deep connection to the legs, which meant a serious injury there rendered the user almost completely helpless.
To put it another way — this was a far safer encounter than my first meetings with Gloria and Liberty.
Better still, I could put her in my debt.
I'd been planning to meet Victory eventually anyway.
And conveniently, the two of them had drifted further down the corridor in their fight, which meant now was the moment.
I immediately ran to Victory.
But did Victory fear researchers that much?
The instant she saw me coming, her face drained of all color and she began scrambling frantically against the floor.
Still, if she stayed here, she would undoubtedly get caught in the crossfire of those two tempestuous ten-year-olds and die.
"Excuse me for a moment."
"Huh?"
Whether she was frightened or not, I scooped her up without hesitation.
On the way back, I spotted the specialized treatment kit the Director had mentioned lying on the floor.
I managed to return to the cell with a bewildered Victory in my arms —
And now I understood why the Director had mentioned the kit.
'This is worse than I expected.'
Without emergency treatment right now, Victory would be permanently crippled.
First, I tore off the white coat I was wearing and used nearby debris to splint her injured leg so it couldn't move any further.
Then I retrieved the sealed syringe from the treatment kit.
The moment she saw it, Victory panicked and began thrashing wildly.
"Hiiiiieeeek?! N-no!! No no no no no!"
Did she have a phobia of needles?
But I was someone who had spent considerable time with Gloria and Liberty.
I gently stroked Victory's head and spoke in a calm, steady voice.
"Shh… it's all right."
"Nngh…."
It seemed to work well enough — Victory settled down quickly.
Phobias tend to be heavily tied to visual stimuli, so I covered her eyes with my hand and pressed the syringe into her leg.
Prick.
"Ngh?!"
"There, it's already done. Nothing to worry about now."
It was, after all, a powerful treatment drug produced by Black Cell through the grinding expenditure of human lives — the effect was nothing short of dramatic.
If Victory had tried to force her way out of here, things might have gotten complicated.
Perhaps it was the side effect of the drug, which also acted as a narcotic painkiller — fortunately, she simply stared up at me with a dazed, unfocused gaze.
I was in the middle of tending to the injured white rabbit when the outside suddenly grew louder.
"Move in, move in!!"
"If the damage spreads any further, restoration becomes impossible!"
"Brace for impact!"
Had the Director managed to extract nearly all the combat data she needed from Gloria and Liberty?
Or perhaps the other problems that had broken out elsewhere had been mostly resolved — I wasn't sure which, but Black Cell's special agents had been deployed into the danger zone.
And now I could see exactly how this organization had managed to contain powerful ability users and mutants.
BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP!!!!
"Gah!!"
"Grrk?!"
"AAAAAAAAAH!!"
The moment the special unit soldiers pulled the triggers on their toy-looking guns, a strange ringing sound filled the air.
I, being ordinary, felt nothing — but the two girls who'd been fighting, along with Victory beside me, all clutched their ears in obvious agony.
That was the Sonic Gun — the weapon that affected only ability users and mutants, scrambling their minds and neutralizing the majority of their powers.
And since it attacked from the inside using sound waves, physical defensive ability meant nothing against it.
But what exactly were Liberty and Gloria?
They pushed straight through the sonic assault and launched themselves at the special agents.
Though in truth, those agents were ability users raised directly by Black Cell.
The specialized headgear they wore made them immune to the Sonic Guns' effects.
And through sheer numbers and grueling training, even while taking injuries, they managed to hold their ground against Gloria and Liberty's attacks.
On top of that, they hurled dozens of grenades carrying similar force to the Sonic Guns.
They brought to bear every piece of specialized equipment and every tactical doctrine developed over decades specifically for combating ability users.
Gloria and Liberty, still in the midst of their growth, had no choice but to fall to their knees.