Zeros stood beside him—
motionless,
steam rising from evaporated water,
head lowered like someone had switched off his will.
Blindy looked at him, almost begging:
“Y-you MORON—!
You-you’re gonna—
gonna MISS IT—!
THE WHOLE—THE WHOLE FIGHT—!W-WAKE THE HELL UP—!”
Zeros didn’t move.
Not a sound.
Not a reaction.
Only a faint golden glow around his head.
The Architect slowly turned away from the chaos ahead.
His voice was even—
like the air itself was calculating formulas:
“Constant—damaged.
His function is nearing termination.
Exponent—removed from the system.”
Geometric lines around his fingers flared with golden light.
“Chaos has reached a critical value.”
He raised his hand—
and the space around it warped,
like reality itself held its breath.
“No matter… we will correct it.”
Meanwhile, Taichō—
indistinguishable from the other SHIRŌ–KAGE
except for his glowing orange eyes—
stood below, on one of the hills—
like a commander
who already knew how this battle ends.
He muttered quietly:
“Sorosoro kono tatakai o owaraseru toki da…”
Then raised his plasma blade and shouted:
“Aneue, sonaeyo!”
He leaned forward, pulled his arms back—
and launched.
So fast the humid air started evaporating around him,
leaving behind a shimmering haze, a thin vapor trail.
Taichō leapt off the edge of the island, cutting a wide arc through the air—
and grabbed onto his swarm,
still clinging to the colossus’s body,
carving through its plates,
already close to breaking the outer armor.
They caught him by the arms and started throwing him upward—
one after another—like acrobats passing momentum between them.
Higher. Higher. And HIGHER.
Until Taichō rose above Constant’s head…
…where Airi caught him.
Soft. Precise. One hand.
No pause—
they spun together,
dropping back down
like twin war comets.
Then split.
Airi—to the left, blade in her right hand.
Taichō—to the right, blade in his left.
And in perfect sync—
they carved across Constant’s faceplate,
cutting a clean vertical panel—
like two tools of the same machine.
A heartbeat later— a dozen more SHIRŌ–KAGE leapt from the colossus’s shoulders, flipping through the air and struck along the cut, widening it, deepening it, tearing through the last connections.
The faceplate split open, like the doors of a safe—
and the cockpit light burst outward.
Inside—
the real Constant sat.
Not a giant—
but an android, about six feet tall,
a perfect scaled-down replica of the colossus itself,
wired into a pilot interface.
He froze—
realizing he’d been found.
Raised his hands—
too late.
SHIRŌ–KAGE flooded in,
grabbed him,
and literally threw him out—
like a lifeless doll.
Airi caught the second “prince” midair:
“Mou… dame da yo, Konsutanta-kun~ [ ᴗ͈ˬᴗ͈]
onee-chan’s gonna… cool you down a little~”
And hurled him straight into Z-P-N-E-S 2.0—right next to Exponent,
where the first captive already lay.
Phoenix reported immediately:
“Score: 2–0.
Both secured. Contained in energy fields.
One remaining.”