The next thought that crossed my mind was that Verita was, in fact, highly rational. Of course, calling a woman rational felt absurd when she could pluck out her own eyeball or smash a man's skull without hesitation. If I had to name it, she was rationally insane.1

I couldn't explain exactly what that meant, but the image of her crushing Peron's head returned to me. At the time, only the three of us were there. Verita had instantly knocked unconscious the six heroes who had fought her earlier, so no one else had seen what she did. Ultimately, I alone had witnessed her kill Peron.0

That led to a troubling question: if there had been other witnesses, would Verita still have smashed his skull?0

Maybe she would have done it anyway. That was the first thought I had, because she was not the sort to go mad in a gentle way.0

The absence of witnesses was a stroke of luck. If ten people had witnessed the act, she would have killed ten. If a hundred had seen it, a hundred would have died.0

In short, Verita was a walking bomb. That was how I decided to think of her. The only reassuring part was that this dangerous bomb didn't seem primed to explode on me.0

Actually, that wasn't reassuring at all. What made a bomb dangerous wasn't just its target but its range. One careless throw, and even the one who had...0