Ex-Machina on a Dimensional Journey

Fortunately, the scruffy, drunken old men in the tavern all turned out to be quite nice.

Perhaps it was because she was so young yet traveling alone, or perhaps because of her appearance.

When faced with Xiu Er's questions, they told her everything without holding back.

"Miss, it must be hard traveling alone. Would you like to rest here for a while?"

Looking at the smiling innkeeper, Xiu Er scanned his face and calculated his state of mind.

The result was—

This owner really was a good person.

However, Xiu Er rarely chose the option of "resting."

"Inquiry: where is the nearest city?"

Ignoring the owner's words, Xiu Er merely asked her question coldly.

The owner was puzzled by her strange way of speaking and indifferent demeanor, but he did not think much of it.

Travelers having unusual personalities was perfectly normal. Besides, since this young girl dared to travel alone, she must have had some exceptional abilities.

Thus, the owner told Xiu Er everything he knew.

After leaving the village, she walked along a small path through the woods.

The owner had said that following this road would lead her to the city.

Xiu Er recorded the information she had obtained in her database.

For the Ex-Machina, there was no such thing as "forgetting."

She did not simply open a portal and travel there because she had not obtained the coordinates.

In Date A Live, because it was a world of modern technology, she could locate her target in an instant. But in this world, which spoke of Magic and possessed no technological products whatsoever, the characteristics of the Ex-Machina had no room to function.

As she ventured deeper into the woods and farther from the village,

the number of Monsters around her began to increase.

Xiu Er's Detector remained active at all times. No living creature could evade her detection.

"-Codex Opening—Pseudo-Codex—..."

Golden energy gathered, and a seed-shaped object appeared in Xiu Er's hand.

This "seed" was Mio's third Angel, Ain.

It possessed the ultimate ability to disregard all restrictions of law and erase the very essence of anything from its root.

Unfortunately,

that root was limited to the root of the Date A Live world.

Ain's erasure effect was only effective against things within the Date A Live world.

Every world had its own root.

This Angel could not interfere with the roots of other worlds. In other words, it was completely incapable of displaying any effect in other worlds.

There was no need to mention how much of its effect Xiu Er's Pseudo-Canon: Ain could replicate.

In worlds other than Date A Live, this Ain was nothing more than a decoration.

Back then, Mio had also demonstrated her third Angel. Although she had initially never intended to show Ain to Xiu Er, she changed her mind in the end.

After all, what could she do even if she refused?

If the other party truly wished to destroy everything, he could accomplish it even without Ain.

That was Mio's thought, though Xiu Er knew nothing of it.

In the end, she got what she wanted.

Only after analyzing and copying this Angel did she realize that this supposedly strongest Angel was, to her, the most useless Angel.

She no longer paid attention to the Spirit Series Armament.

She had come to this world with the same objective.

Magic.

It was one of the reasons Xiu Er had come to this world.

But now was not the time to rush into searching for Magic. What she cared about first on this journey was the current point in time.

And going to the city was the fastest way to learn that...

Buy One, Get One Free

Were Demons really this easy to encounter?

Xiu Er looked at the horned creature beneath her feet, its limbs torn off.

The three-meter-tall armored brute was firmly pinned to the ground beneath petite Xiu Er's foot.

The halo above her head emitted a dazzling glow, while her inorganic golden eyes stared coldly at the pitch-black eyes beneath her, eyes without whites.

"You... are not human?"

Demons possessed no capacity for empathy. Even the reason they learned language was merely to lure prey into traps, making them easier to consume.

The creature Xiu Er had underfoot was precisely one such being.

The Demon merely looked calmly at Xiu Er standing atop him, as though he could not feel the pain of having all four limbs torn off.

Looking at Xiu Er, the Demon could not understand why things had turned out like this. Could this human be a powerful warrior?

He had merely gone out to hunt as usual. He had spotted a petite blue-purple human girl with no magical power, intending to make her an appetizer before his meal.

And he had indeed done just that.

But in his memory, he had used Rapid Speed Magic against this girl just as he had against humans in the past. It should have been over in an instant, yet...

"Inquiry: are you a mage?"

What kind of question was that?

"Of course."

Although he did not know what kind of creature stood before him, the male Demon still answered honestly.

After all, no Demon concealed their magical power. Everything was so ordinary.

He looked at the mechanical eyes gazing down at him.

Then, the unknown object shifting between her head and halo seemed to unfold into something.

With his limbs torn off and no chance of escape, the Demon considered his situation.

He did not know what it was, but he vaguely felt that it was definitely something terrible.

Instinctively, he wanted to say a few pleading words, as he had done when deceiving humans in the past. Perhaps she might spare him.

"Please..."

However, before he could finish, Xiu Er interrupted him.

"Announcement: show me everything you possess."

As those words entered the male Demon's ears, his eyes dimmed.

It worked.

Xiu Er looked at the Demon she had successfully controlled beneath her feet. The hypothesis she had just formed had been confirmed.

Pseudo-Canon: Gabriel's control could be used on creatures of this world. Moreover, because the conditions for judgment differed, most creatures in this world were unable to resist its control.

And now, she had used it to control this Demon, allowing her to obtain information and all of his Magic.

Ignoring the Demon's corpse as it gradually crumbled into fragments beside her feet,

Xiu Er organized the information about this world in her database. Though a single weak Demon could not possess much information.

And he barely knew any Magic either. He had truly only studied so-called Rapid Speed Magic, and even its effect was inferior to the speed she could achieve after activating Speed Violation.

Still, it had at least given her a general understanding.

At this point in time, the Demon King was still alive, and there was no information regarding the Hero.

And this place was in the north.

Well, although the intelligence was incomplete, it at least allowed Xiu Er to narrow down the range somewhat.

Having once more used Fake Demoness to disguise herself, Xiu Er prepared to continue with her previous plan.

After all, information from one person alone was not enough for her to confirm its accuracy.

However, some people would not simply let Xiu Er leave like that...

Whoosh----

Blades of wind came flying from afar.

Their density completely sealed off every possible direction of evasion.

Crack, crack, crack—!!

The wind blades struck the barrier before Xiu Er, then changed direction and flew back toward where they had come from.

Trees were cut down one after another, forcing out the figure hiding behind them.

"Oh, Magic that reflects Magic?"

Another horned male appeared before her, holding a slender wooden staff and wearing a mask.

Her disguise collapsed once again as she deployed her Armament. Xiu Er's cold mechanical eyes silently watched him.

Was this some kind of Demon spawn zone? She had encountered two of them in such a short time?

Xiu Er looked at the newly arrived Demon and silently complained inwardly.

In truth, her Detector had detected the second Demon's presence long ago. But Demons were not her primary target right now. Unfortunately, he had chosen the path to death himself.

Still, judging by his attire, he appeared to be a stronger mage than that useless one from before, and he surely knew more as well.

Meanwhile, the Demon who had intended to mock her suddenly felt something strange, causing him to swallow back the words he had wanted to say.

Why was his intuition telling him not to fight?

Clearly, this little human girl did not seem to possess any magical power at all.

At this moment, Xiu Er's clothes still concealed most of her mechanical parts, while the device above her head was regarded by the Demon as an ornament.

Since when did humans have halos on their heads?

No one would be able to answer that question for him.

"Inquiry: are you a mage?"

It was a strange verbal habit, but the Demon did not care. He merely answered in a deliberately relaxed manner, a confident smile on his face.

"Isn't it obvious?"

Why was she asking such a question?

Ever since his intuition had begun warning him, this Demon had been observing Xiu Er across from him.

The longer he observed her, the more he sensed something strange about this human.

This feeling was unlike any human he had encountered before...

At that moment, he saw the ornament above her head had already unfolded.