Danmachi : Strongest Supporter

"Akame!"

Najenda hurriedly called the girl's name.

This time, the girl no longer hesitated.

"Eliminate!"

The black-haired girl swung the long blade in her hand, her figure vanishing from where she stood and appearing before Noah in an instant.

Seeing the blade slash horizontally toward him, Noah raised one finger, reinforced it with mana, and directly met the sharp edge.

The effect of the anti-barrier was still active.

Right now, his finger was more reliable than steel.

With the addition of mana reinforcement, Noah's finger collided with Akame's long blade and actually locked it in place.

Seeing that her blade could not even cut through his skin, Akame began doubting reality a little.

Not long ago, the two of them had also fought.

At that time, her blade had been caught by him and she had been unable to pull it back, but this time was even more exaggerated.

He had not used the slightest trick and had simply blocked the blade directly with his hand.

How could a human finger be stronger than steel?

Akame gritted her teeth and pressed her left hand against the back of the blade, trying to apply even greater downward pressure.

Noah felt his finger being pushed back slightly and said in surprise, "You've gotten much stronger, Akame."

In this place, under these circumstances, with those words... Could that really count as praise?

Akame felt that at least he was not mocking her.

If she could not cut through his skin, then what about his eyes?

The girl abruptly lifted the blade, then struck the base of the hilt with her knee.

The entire long blade accelerated toward Noah's eyeball.

It was an unexpected attack.

For this, the girl had given up her weapon, making it a gamble where she either succeeded or lost everything.

Noah did not move.

Akame anxiously wanted to see the result, but what she saw was an incomprehensible scene.

The tip of the blade stopped less than one centimeter from Noah's eyeball. The entire sword froze in midair as if time itself had stopped.

At once, a certain memory inside Akame's mind was awakened.

She remembered secretly hearing it before from that woman named Merraid.

This was probably what Merraid had mentioned back then...

"The power to manipulate metal?"

Akame looked in shock at her long blade floating in front of Noah.

Without Noah touching it at all, the blade retreated slightly, then changed direction, aiming its edge at its own master.

After that, he reached out and grasped the hilt, asking calmly, "Akame, have you joined the Revolutionary Army?"

"Yes."

"Even if that means becoming enemies with your father, Tsukushi, and the others?"

"..."

Faced with this question, Akame immediately hesitated.

Although Gozuki was not her biological father, he had truly raised her for seven long years.

Almost everything she possessed now had been given to her by Gozuki, the man who was her "father."

Tsukushi and the others had grown up with her.

Although they were not family by blood, they were friends she could never abandon.

Cornelia-nee was the same.

Akame had always seen her as her own older sister, the only person she could act spoiled with.

Becoming enemies with them.

As a member of the Revolutionary Army, that was inevitable.

Rather, the current her had already stood on the opposite side from them and had become one of their primary targets for elimination.

"But Father lied to us," Akame said as if trying to convince herself. "The Empire is the source that created all this suffering. We were only deceived and used by the Empire. If everyone knew the truth, they would definitely leave the Empire with me!"

"Akame..." Najenda narrowed her eyes at the girl from behind.

Too naive.

The girl's thoughts could not be called mature at all.

Not everyone could make the correct decision between good and evil.

Family, friends—the more important things someone had, the more they would affect the strength of that person's judgment.

Every one of the girl's qualities matched Najenda's definition of talent, but this "pure" personality alone had to be "dealt with" somehow.

Noah reminded her, "Akame, maybe you're underestimating those children. Gozuki may have lied to you, but a lie is still a lie. It won't last long before it gets exposed. That is, assuming the people being deceived are willing to expose it. Some people would rather sink into the lie and never wake up. If that happens, what will you do?"

"At that time..."

At that moment, Akame suddenly covered her face and dropped to one knee, looking somewhat pained.

It was not because she was injured, she was very healthy.

But her instincts had been provoked.

Because when she faced that question, the first thought that had appeared in her mind was, 'Then I can only cut them down.'

Cut them down?

Cut down who?

Father?

Tsukushi?

Cornelia-nee?

Guy?

All of them...?

"Is this... my own thought?" Akame's hands trembled slightly.

She held her hands before her eyes, and in a daze, she saw them covered in blood, with broken corpses scattered across the ground.

How many people had she killed until now?

Under the Empire's control, how many innocent people had she killed?

And now, she might have to kill her former companions as a member of the Revolutionary Army.

When Noah laid all of this bare, she grew so tense that even her breathing became sluggish, as painful as if she were drowning.

"Shut up already! You're so annoying!"

A young girl's shout rang out.

Noah sensed danger and tilted his head.

A beam of light grazed past his cheek and struck the ground, blasting a hole into it.

Several more lasers fell immediately afterward. Noah dodged continuously, avoiding all of them.

While dodging, he judged that these were shockwaves fired by Roman Artillery: Pumpkin.

This Teigu should have belonged to Najenda.

Had its user been changed?

He looked toward the other end of the passage, then saw a girl with an arrogant expression.

She had long pink hair tied into twin tails, and her petite figure formed a contrast with the rather bulky Teigu.

A sword-like weapon was strapped to her back, and she was carrying a weakened man over her shoulder.

'There are more of them.'

"Hmph."

The pink twin-tailed girl carried the artillery on her shoulder and shouted at Akame, who looked utterly lost.

"Hey, Akame, what are you doing? Don't let yourself waver just because of a few words! We're going to change this Empire!"

She transformed the Teigu's shape and pulled the trigger, instantly firing dozens of rounds.

Noah condensed snowflake-like ice crystals along the flight paths of those bullets, blocking them one by one.

Seeing this, Mine muttered with an unfriendly expression, "This guy's pretty good."

No longer intending to continue the fight, she shouted at Najenda, "Boss, mission complete!"

Seeing the man Mine was carrying, Najenda nodded heavily and called out, "Retreat!"

They were the intruders, their purpose was rescue.

Now that the target had been rescued, they had to retreat quickly to prevent Imperial reinforcements from arriving.

"But what about this guy?" Mine still kept her muzzle pointed at Noah.

Noah tilted his head.

He was just about to say, "Do as you like," when the man being carried over Mine's shoulder suddenly moved.

He pulled out the sword-shaped weapon from Mine's back and erupted with powerful strength, reaching the intersection in an instant and blocking Noah's path.

"Although I don't know who you people are, since you risked your lives to rescue me, then I owe you a debt. Let me hold this enemy back."

The man tightened his grip on the sword and raised his head to look straight at Noah.

At the same time, he revealed a firm and handsome face.

"NO!"

Najenda shouted, "Bulat, we are members of the Revolutionary Army. I am the former Imperial general Najenda. I know you were falsely accused, and I believe you also know that the Empire is beyond saving. We came to find you today so that you could join us, so we will not abandon you!"

"The Revolutionary Army?" Bulat was startled.

He had already expected that anyone daring to break into the Imperial Capital's Great Prison would not be ordinary, but they were actually the Revolutionary Army.

And that woman was the renowned General Najenda?

Even she had joined the Revolutionary Army?

At that moment, Noah raised both hands and interrupted, "Excuse me, but if you're going to leave, you can leave right now. I already said long ago that I'm not interested in what you're doing. You're the ones who kept pestering me, and I'm more or less starting to get tired of it."

"You?" Bulat looked surprised.

Just now, he had seen Noah's dodging movements and felt that he was extraordinary.

According to his observation, Noah should be stronger than anyone present, which was why he had stepped forward, fully prepared for a hard fight.

He had not expected the other party to have this kind of attitude.

"I see. Then thanks. Looks like you're a pretty good guy."

Bulat found Noah rather likable, so he smiled and released his stance.

But those words pierced Najenda's heart like a thorn.

Bulat did not know the full story, so she could not blame him.

"Hey, Boss, we need to retreat!"

Leone ran in from the entrance and hurriedly shouted.

Looking at the strange scene before her, her gaze stopped on Noah.

This guy was...

Najenda gritted her teeth and said, "Retreat!"

Although she hated Noah, she cared more about the bigger picture.

With their current strength, defeating this man would be extremely difficult, and she understood that clearly.

More importantly, this place was still the Imperial Capital's Great Prison, the enemy's home ground.

If they were surrounded, then both revenge and the greater plan would vanish into nothing.

She had to preserve this force and let it grow.

After thinking it through, she took the lead and ran outside.

Akame also stood up, her brows tightly furrowed, intending to follow the others and leave.

At that moment, Noah suddenly called out to her.

"Akame, wait. How has Kurome been lately?"

Akame turned back to look at him, her gaze somewhat uncertain.

In truth, even without her answer, Noah knew Kurome's condition.

Without medicine to sustain her, her body would soon collapse, and before that, her mind would collapse first.

Noah took out a bottle of recovery potion and tossed it toward Akame.

The girl raised her hand and caught it, somewhat confused.

"It's for Kurome. Let her drink it. It can ease her symptoms quite a bit, though it won't last forever."

Akame opened her eyes in surprise and looked at Noah with some suspicion.

"Go. Remember to take good care of your sister."

Noah waved at her.

After pausing for two or three seconds, the girl quickly disappeared at the end of the passage.

Looking in the direction they had left, Noah thought that the anti-Empire forces were growing stronger and stronger.

These people all had decent strength and quite good potential. In the future, they would probably cause the Empire considerable trouble.

But that had nothing to do with him.

Only, Akame...

After all, he had spent quite a bit of time with her.

They could not be called friends, but to him, she was like a child from the neighborhood who often came over to play.

Although this child had now grown up, he still had a little affection for her.

Judging from her appearance, she must be suffering a great deal right now.

What he had said to Akame had not come from malice. He had simply placed the pros and cons in front of her.

But it seemed that facing these questions was still too difficult for a sixteen-year-old girl.

She still had not clearly understood what consequences her choices would bring. Perhaps only after she experienced loss would she be able to grow.

'Should I help her?'

The thought flashed through Noah's mind.

But he immediately began weighing it, because this was not something as simple as helping an old woman cross the road or saving a drowning child.

The situation with those sisters was far too complicated.

The problems involved were not even problems of their own, but problems of this society.

Helping them for a moment might make what came afterward even worse.

At that time, he would inevitably wonder whether things had become worse because of him.

Perhaps there would originally have been a good ending, only for it to be ruined by his momentary whim.

And if he helped them for life... then the entire Empire would be turned upside down.

In that process, people who originally would not have been dragged in might lose their families and homes because of him, an "outsider from another world."

Perhaps their original fates would not have been like that.

Dragging so many people in this world into things just because of a single thought—who could say that was correct?

With great power comes great responsibility.

Sometimes, he really envied those hot-blooded fools and ambitious schemers.

The former ignored consequences and regretted things afterward, while the latter had hearts of stone and could carry out their ideas without wavering as long as it benefited them.

'The reason I'm having this kind of trouble is because my power has become too great, isn't it?'

In the Blazer world, he had only been a student.

His power had also been insignificant, and he could hardly affect that world at all.

But in this world, he already possessed enough power to overturn the entire Empire and influence the life and death of tens of millions.

"Tch. This is exactly why I ended up being led around by that bastard Hermes! That trash god completely ignored how I felt and dumped a whole pile of trouble on me."

If Noah were made to govern the Empire, this thousand-year-old Empire would probably be finished within a few months.

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