Side Story: Insurrection, and Then Civil War

[Tier-Group 3, 10th Floor Reception Room]?

"Unfortunately, the Nakayama Racecourse turned out to be a half-dead dungeon. It had little energy, and while it destroyed Kōnodai, the human casualties were almost nil. With Sōja, rather than laying siege we only built a dam downstream, so the enemy all managed to flee. And Fuchū didn't collapse all at once either, so it seems they had time to escape."

"Marie-san, in the end you just wasted the racecourse for nothing. This way of doing things isn't good."

"Master, no, former Master, being soft on the enemy only emboldens them. They must be thoroughly crushed. By rights it would be seppuku followed by the punishment of the shamisen, but since one doesn't have nine lives, I'll let them off with imprisonment."

"Aide-de-camp scribe, the residents are demanding the war be called off. Many of them have relatives in the neighboring countries."

"Residents or not, traitors are to be put to death. Strike off every last one of their heads with the guillotine."

"Even the various warrior bands would balk at beheading residents, however much they'd manage it against an enemy."

"No problem. In anticipation of just such a situation, I selected Asura from among the pirates we've tamed and assembled the Sea-Dew Squad."

"Though the genus Mannenrō is now included within the genus Asagiri."

"Naturally I'm aware of that. 'Exiled from the family for not being a true Lily on account of a revision to the classification system…' What a tiresomely hackneyed premise. In any case, the enemy is to be rooted out, reasons be damned. Just as when one clears a thicket of moso bamboo: deal with it repeatedly and exhaustively."

[Tier-Group 3, 10th Floor Reception Room]?

"The Senba and Ōi houses are opposing the attack on Musashi and have gone on strike."

"True enough, their main houses are in Musashi. It can't be helped. We'll destroy them, villages and all."

"I'm afraid I can no longer go along with such utter madness."

"You're dismissed. That said, watching an Asura's blood spill is unpleasant, and Named monsters can't be dismissed under the constraints of the dungeon system, and even if I executed you, you'd eventually revive, so it's a life sentence. Eriocalyx, Tomentosus, Palaui, take this traitor to the cells."

Three of the Sea-Dew Squad lead away the Named monsters who had refused to obey Marie's order, and they depart.

"There's still Sumō, but they're so far off that there's nothing they can do."

Alone now in a reception room with no one else left, Marie talks to herself.

[Tier-Group 3, Rooftop Observation Deck]?

The tower, a slapdash stacking of three thousand libraries (counting community-center reading rooms and the like), rises past sixty kilometers in height, and the view from the rooftop extends beyond eight hundred kilometers. Even so, however little water vapor there is in desert air, seeing eight hundred kilometers off is difficult.

Above even the rooftop garden, at the very highest point, stands an observation deck about thirty meters to a side, where the World Tree is planted.

"Just getting up here is a struggle. My stamina has fallen off considerably, it seems."

Marie totters up onto the observation deck. Below her, several of the rebellious villages burn, smoke rising from them. The villages are electrified, so when she had last looked, no smoke had been visible.

"So this must be what the smoke from the villages was that Emperor Nintoku gazed upon."

It was entirely different, his being a matter of tax cuts and large-scale public works.

"Humans really cannot be trusted. There were too many humans in the dungeon, and even the Asura came to be affected by it. Next time I must establish a proper, orderly class system, centered on the Asura."

So saying, Marie went to descend the stairs to return to her room… and fell.