Starbreaker · Vikrant (4K)

Inside Koma Village's arcade.

At that moment, quite a few spectators had gathered around a pachinko machine, all of them staring at the white-haired girl in the middle.

Especially when they noticed the piles upon piles of steel balls stacked beside her.

Pachinko, an Island Nation pastime as popular as mahjong was in Shenzhou, could be found in nearly every part of the country, and Koma Village was naturally no exception.

You launched small steel balls, let them travel through the track and strike the pins inside the machine, then watched them fall into the holes to earn rewards.

It sounded simple, and it was incredibly addictive.

Island Nation players spent more than 200 billion dollars on it every year. For a long time, the pachinko industry's annual revenue had been twice that of the Island Nation's automobile exports, thirty times Las Vegas's annual gambling revenue, and accounted for four percent of the Island Nation's GDP. That alone showed just how wildly popular it was.

After Miss Moonlit left Kuoh Academy, she happened to pass by the place and became interested. She just had not expected her luck to be so good that she would win so much in such a short time.

With that luck, combined with the bonus of being a beautiful girl, the people around her simply stopped playing and watched her instead...

"Wasn't this easy?"

"Next time, I'll bring humans here to play!"

Looking at the steel balls piled beside her, which were nearly overflowing the space, Miss Moonlit beamed happily.

Watching the winning probability rise on the machine, Miss Moonlit did not hesitate to launch another steel ball. Draw, launch, draw... an endless cycle.

Before she knew it, several hours had passed. Miss Moonlit's excitement had faded away, and she no longer found it all that interesting.

The balls could not be exchanged directly for cash and required a series of procedures. Miss Moonlit took all her winnings and traded them for "token plaques."

She then left the pachinko parlor and found a "prize exchange shop" nearby, where the token plaques could be exchanged for the corresponding amount of cash or other items.

Miss Moonlit did not want money, since she was not short on it. Instead, she took a liking to the latest handheld console and a rabbit plush nearly a meter tall.

The token plaques in her hand were almost exactly enough to exchange for those two items, so she simply took the console and the plush.

After putting away the handheld console, Miss Moonlit hugged the soft rabbit plush and prepared to go home. However, there were barely any pedestrians on the streets now. The road was completely empty.

A trace of loneliness welled up in her heart.

Hugging the plush, Miss Moonlit buried her face in the rabbit's fluffy fur and rubbed her little head against it. Only after it seemed to offer her a sliver of comfort did she continue onward.

Perhaps she was not nearly as strong as she had imagined herself to be.

Not long after, Miss Moonlit suddenly stopped. Her crimson eyes swept across her surroundings, and she clearly noticed something wrong.

"There's a problem..."

It was obviously still early. Why had she not seen a single pedestrian all the way here? No matter how she thought about it, something was wrong.

The girl lightly sniffed the air. Even its scent had changed.

Someone had their eyes on her!

She placed the rabbit plush into the system storage, lest it get damaged in what was about to happen. Miss Moonlit then raised her head to look at the sky, a trace of the sinister light unique to Sacred Gears flashing through her gaze.

"It's a barrier."

At some unknown point, she had entered a barrier that someone else had prepared. No wonder the streets had felt wrong and there had been no one around.

Was it demons?

Instinctively, Miss Moonlit thought of Rias and Sona Sitri. After all, this was their territory, demon territory...

The girl did not doubt the demons' capabilities. Perhaps they had been watching her ever since she entered Koma Village. As for why they would attack her, there was nothing strange about that.

In the eyes of many factions, she was a dangerous individual. Countless demons, Fallen Angels, church members, and warriors from other pantheons had died by her hand...

As long as they were bounty targets, she either killed them or stripped them of their Sacred Gears. Only when facing innocent or kind targets would Miss Moonlit offer other compensation after taking their Sacred Gears.

On the other hand, there was no need to show mercy to the wicked in her eyes!

Yet most bounty targets in this world were not human. They were vicious and deceitful by nature.

Especially the demons and Fallen Angels in Europe and America. They were far less kind than demons like Rias were portrayed to be in the story.

Thinking about it that way, she really had offended quite a few people!

There was no helping it. To obtain Crystals, she could only keep completing commissions. That was the only way to raise her Valkyrie rank beyond SS.

She did not want to remain in this world forever. So many worlds were waiting for her to explore and travel through. How boring would it be to stay in only one world?

But exploring new worlds and traveling to new worlds required enough strength to protect herself, which meant she needed to work hard to earn Crystals.

And so the cycle continued...

"They're here!"

Since Miss Moonlit had sensed something, a chainsaw instantly appeared in her hands. Its teeth spun rapidly, producing a terrifying sound.

Gripping the chainsaw's handle with both hands, the girl suddenly slashed toward her side. A ball of pitch-black demonic energy was easily cut apart by the chainsaw. Even demonic power could be sliced through by it!

However, that was only the true beginning. A tiger's roar rang out from her side, and a three- to four-meter monster appeared out of nowhere, pouncing at the girl like a tiger.

The monster had a tiger's head, a snake's tail, and a pair of enormous demonic wings. No matter how one looked at it, it was a strange creature.

Yet its strength was anything but ordinary. At the very least, it possessed high-ranking strength.

"Is that a magical beast?"

Miss Moonlit raised her chainsaw to meet the monster's attack. Feeling the dense demonic power on its body, she formed a suspicion.

She had encountered similar monsters before: magical beasts summoned from the Underworld by someone.

The Underworld was demon territory, but it was far too vast. Even demons could not fully explore or occupy it, and some regions were controlled by those magical beasts.

There were even magical beasts above Demon King Class there, creatures even Demon Kings did not dare provoke lightly. To a certain extent, the Evil Dragons that were more terrifying than the Five Dragon Kings also fell within the category of magical beasts—Dragon Species Magical Beasts.

But why would magical beasts be here?

Someone had definitely arranged this to deal with her!

And that barrier as well—it was probably meant to avoid attracting attention or causing other disturbances.

Could this really be Rias's doing?

Countless thoughts flashed through Miss Moonlit's mind in an instant, but her movements were not affected at all. She increased her strength, a glimmer flashing through her eyes. The magical beast before her was affected by the power of her Evil Eye, and the next second... a crimson saw-shadow flashed past, directly cutting the terrifying magical beast apart!

However, before Miss Moonlit could inspect the magical beast's corpse, an ethereal flute melody sounded. The music was filled with strange magical power, as though it were influencing something...

Following the direction of the flute, Miss Moonlit transformed into a swarm of bats and flew rapidly over. She soon discovered an unfamiliar man dressed as a priest.

The priest seemed to notice Miss Moonlit's arrival. His eyes filled with mockery, as though he had been waiting for the girl to come.

Miss Moonlit frowned slightly. This was not Rias's arrangement. From what she knew of her, Rias would not join forces with the church and Lost Priests.

That only made her more confused!

Then, as though she had thought of something, the girl's gaze became firm. Whatever schemes or masterminds were behind this, as long as she was strong enough, she could just charge straight through them.

Even if she could not win, Miss Moonlit still had a backup plan to escape!

"Disappear!"

Clenching the chainsaw tightly, Miss Moonlit leaped into the air and smashed it down at the priest before her with all her strength.

Yet in the next moment, several bizarre magical beasts suddenly appeared before the priest and charged at Miss Moonlit without fear of death.

Miss Moonlit mercilessly slaughtered them with the chainsaw in her hand. Just as she was about to approach the priest, she suddenly sensed something and quickly retreated.

Sure enough, after Miss Moonlit withdrew some distance, an enormous Spear of Light was hurled into that spot, causing massive destruction!

"Oh? You actually dodged it. As expected of the Blood Moon Princess!"

A figure appeared in midair and spoke with faint surprise. Clearly, he was the one who had thrown the Spear of Light.

"A Fallen Angel..."

Looking at the figure who had appeared, Miss Moonlit felt somewhat surprised.

He was no ordinary Fallen Angel, because three pairs of black wings spread from his back. A Six-Winged Fallen Angel. He was the strongest Fallen Angel Miss Moonlit had encountered so far!

Previously, she had mostly faced two-winged Fallen Angels, and only occasionally encountered four-winged ones.

A Six-Winged Fallen Angel could barely be considered an officer. Compared to the angel faction, the Fallen Angels had only one twelve-winged governor at present.

His deputies were merely ten-winged or eight-winged Fallen Angels.

Although the number of wings did not absolutely represent strength, Fallen Angels and angels with more wings certainly would not be weak.

Besides that Fallen Angel, Miss Moonlit also noticed that magical beasts had appeared all around her at some unknown point.

None of them were weak. Even the weakest were mid-ranking magical beasts!

These magical beasts were clearly abnormal. Miss Moonlit thoughtfully looked toward the flute in the priest's hand. Those magical beasts had been summoned by that flute...

"Lord Fallen Angel!"

The priest stopped playing his flute and looked at the Fallen Angel in the air like a fanatic. His burning faith made it impossible to doubt that he would give his life for him.

Most Lost Priests who followed Fallen Angels had betrayed the church and defected to them. They were traitors, though a very small number had other reasons.

Fallen Angels themselves were much the same. They had fallen from angels, so Lost Priests and Fallen Angels naturally belonged to the same camp.

This priest had originally been a church fanatic, but after accidentally learning something he should not have known, his faith had collapsed. It was the Fallen Angel's appearance that allowed him to rebuild his faith and transfer his belief in "God" to the Fallen Angels.

In his eyes, Fallen Angels and angels were the same. Both were gods he worshipped!

More importantly, the Fallen Angel had bestowed such a powerful Sacred Gear upon him, allowing him to display his value before his "god."

"Not bad. You all, come out as well!"

The Fallen Angel nodded to the Lost Priest, then looked to the other side and continued speaking.

It turned out that this was not the only Lost Priest here. There were others as well. To ensure that he could capture this troublesome opponent who had given the Fallen Angels headaches for so long, he had prepared everything perfectly.

Starbreaker - Vikrant

Following the Six-Winged Fallen Angel's command, several more Lost Priests emerged from the nearby area. Each of them held Artificial Artifacts in their hands.

They were not ordinary artifacts, either. They had been copied from Sacred Gears and the most powerful artifacts. Although they had side effects and the replication had failed, they still possessed abilities comparable to top-tier artifacts.

Even within the Divine Child Overseer research facility, there were only a small number of such fully equipped Artificial Artifacts.

But in order to deal with this vampire girl, he had used his authority and other means to bring out so many of them.

"You ruined so many of the Divine Child Overseer's plans and targets, causing us heavy losses. Let's see how you escape this time."

The Divine Child Overseer, Grigori, was the Fallen Angels' core research institution and their most important department. It had been established by the Governor himself, and all the Fallen Angels' primary upper ranks held positions within it.

The purpose of this department was to research existing Sacred Gears and create Artificial Artifacts. Although their performance was inferior to the original Sacred Gears, under certain circumstances they could rival them.

However, high-end, fully equipped Artificial Artifacts still could not be mass-produced and existed in extremely limited numbers. Only the more common Sacred Gears could be mass-produced as Artificial Artifacts.

But Fallen Angels simply did not care for such Artificial Artifacts. They were almost always handed out as rewards to Lost Priests, Lost Pastors, nuns, and exorcists who had defected to them.

The reason they had targeted the Blood Moon Princess before them was that this beautiful vampire had not only killed many of their people in Europe and America, but had also destroyed several research facilities and forces supported by them.

For example, when high-ranking church members defected to the Fallen Angels with the results of church laboratories, the Fallen Angels would not refuse them. Instead, they would provide substantial funding and allow them to continue their research.

The most direct example was the church's Holy Sword Project. That Archbishop had defected to the Fallen Angels, and the Holy Sword Project and other research continued as before.

Yet over the years, this vampire had destroyed more than one research facility under the Fallen Angels' control. That was not even the worst of it. What was more infuriating were those Artifact Wielders.

The Divine Child Overseer existed to research those Artifact Wielders, strip their Sacred Gears, and study those Sacred Gears!

Many outstanding targets watched by the Divine Child Overseer had been beaten to the punch by this vampire. She either stripped away the target's Sacred Gear or directly killed their targets.

To a certain extent, the Fallen Angels hated this Blood Moon Princess even more than the church and demons did.

Yet every time the Fallen Angel upper ranks wanted to deal with her, they were always one step too late. This vampire never stayed in one region for long.

But this time was different.

The Six-Winged Fallen Angel's original target had been an Artifact Wielder in the Tokyo area. He suspected that person possessed a powerful Sacred Gear second only to a Sacred Gear. He had originally planned to strip it away, only to discover the Blood Moon Princess's presence first.

Compared to this beautiful vampire, his original target had become irrelevant.

For that reason, he returned to the Fallen Angels' base and made thorough preparations before deciding to capture her alone.

That way, all the credit would belong to him alone.

He recalled the last time they had reported information about the Blood Moon Princess to Governor Azazel. Although Lord Azazel had not shown any anger, he had seemed very interested in her.

And that was enough!