Rumble-
A low rumbling echoed all around.
Pressure gauges, control valves, and the water injector on the other side-every component aboard the speeding train let out shrill blasts like a boiling kettle.
The dull sounds of iron and burning coal rang out incessantly.
"What a nasty piece of work... nothing but pointless little tricks."
Yet even amid this racket of grinding gears, a woman's icy voice rang out, undiminished.
Lorelei Barthomeloi waved her right hand, and a biting gale poured into the compartment, precisely severing the connections between the equipment.
It was an exceedingly reckless act. One misstep, and she could be blown sky-high along with the entire carriage amid the trembling steam pipes.
But if paying that price could stop the train, it would be a very worthwhile bargain.
Unafraid, Lorelei Barthomeloi gathered fierce winds around herself, forming a tangible, pale vortex that twisted the surrounding steel and barriers into a mangled mess.
Yet even then, the hurtling train showed no intention of stopping.
The girl glanced at Leandro and the conductor, Rodin, beside her, their limbs completely twisted and their bodies shackled, and frowned slightly.
This was the locomotive of the Mystic Eyes Collection Train, the only place passengers were forbidden to enter.
It was the train's operational core. Everything from its partially otherworld-transformed space to the commands that drove it originated here; the slightest disturbance here should affect the whole.
Yet despite all this destruction, the train's condition had not changed.
In other words-
"She changed the train's structure in advance and turned it into a disposable tool?"
Lorelei Barthomeloi scoffed.
"It seems she only has the nerve of a Dead Apostle Ancestor when it comes to running for her life."
Hearing this contemptuous mockery of their mistress, Leandro and Rodin clenched their back teeth and glared