And like thatー,
The fighting ended.
“A complete annihilation without a single shred of mercy! Isn’t that right, Kino?”
Hermes, who had fallen onto his left side, spoke while shuddering a little.
Having said that, he began to raise himself up from that dirt. Soil and pebbles streamed down from his handlebars as he slowly separated himself from the ground.
Now fully upright, Hermes turned on his own engine. He let his engine idle briefly with a dorodoro sound and, without a passenger, Hermes set off at a leisurely pace.
Around 50 meters in front of Hermes, wearing tattered jeans and a white T-shirt covered in dust and sweat was Kino, who had her back turned towards him.
“Good grief, it’s already over!”
Kino sighed.
“Jeez, that’s not satisfying at all!”
She had a tall and thin figure. Rolling her shoulders, she stretched her arms towards the sky, as if showing off her well toned muscles.
“I still have bullets left, you know?”
Kino, speaking in a bored tone, returned the .45 caliber automatic Persuader to its holster on her right thigh.
The holster, which had been strengthened with a black, industrial plastic, made a satisfying click as the Persuader locked into place.
On the main street of an abandoned town. Apart from Kino and Hermes, everything else was utterly motionless.
Scattered at intersections of the road were filthy corpses of humans and Persuaders. Each corpse was riddled with .45 caliber bullet holes, from which blood seeped out into the cracked asphalt.
Their bodies lay stretched out. Some wore an expression of shock, as if they couldn’t believe that they had died. Others wore an expression of instant regret, as if they had realized that they were facing the devil. And others still wore an expression of pure terror, as if the idea of dying had dawned upon them and they were reduced to crying like children.
No changes would ever occur on the expressions of these men every again, apart from those caused by decay and rotting.
“One, two, three, four, fiveー uh, there’s a lot of them.”
Hermes said while jokingly counting and skillfully navigating around the rivers of blood until he reached Kino’s side. Kino let out a breath and shook her long ponytail.
“It’s been a long time since I’ve had a workout like thatー I’m hungry. Also, it’s going to get chilly soon.”
Kino approached one of the corpses, and kicked it hard, flipping it face down. For a man, the corpse was rather slim. Both the thighs had been pierced by bullets, and he had died of blood loss.
She fastened her hand around the collar of the leather jacket.
“I’ll be taking this.”
With a forceful tug, the jacket came loose, dangling in Kino’s hand.
“Oh, are you a mugger?”
“Don’t make me seem like a bad person, Hermes. This is simply what they call ‘effective resource utilization.’ At any rate, dead people can’t feel cold anymore. Don’t worry, I’ll put this jacket to good use.”
Kino shook it once to remove the dust before putting it on. Both the sleeves the jacket itself fit perfectly, as if tailored for her, and she unhurriedly pulled up the zipper.
“Ha…”
Letting out a dissatisfied noise, she stopped moving her hand.
At that moment, Hermes made his way over to Kino’s side. He braked, cut the engine, and with a gashan sound, he let down his left kickstand.
Letting his body tilt a little to the left, he stood motionless. Then, he saw.
Kino’s abundant chest, which was generously displayed by her T-shirt, had prevented the jacket from zipping all the way.
“Ahahaha! It’s futile, Kino!”
Kino’s irked face snapped toward Hermes, causing her ponytail to fly around. But Hermes ignored her.
“You know what they say, impossible things are impossible. My gosh, what did you eat to make them grow so big?”
“Keh! I didn’t want this you know!”
Giving up on the zipper, she violently unzipped the jacket, wearing it open instead.
The sun began to set on the ruined town.
As the wind blew, Kino and Hermes, walking quietly along the road filled with corpses, looked up at the sky.
“You sure killed quite a lot, huh? Kino.”
At Hermes’s frivolous words, Kino shrugged.
“If an enemy refuses to listen to me, then the only other choice is complete annihilation. This is simply another form of negotiation. One that I performed exceedingly well. That’s all there is to it.”
“That’s true.”
“Thanks to me, the people of this country will be able to live peacefully from here on out. Since I saved more people than I killed, they’ll smile and forgive me. Scratch that, they’ll certainly praise and admire me.”
“Even though you get paid for your kills, right?”
“Ah? Is that so?”
“Uwa! Don’t play dumb! There’s no way you forgot. ―Then, should we return to collect the money? If we stay here too long you’ll catch a cold, Kino.”
“Ah. Return for the money huh? Then we’d see everyone’s blissful faces. What could be more therapeutic?”
“Then, should we refuse the money?”
“Like hell I will.”
Kino moved closer to Hermes and opened the box fastened above his rear wheel. Taking out a pair of sunglasses, she put them on. From there, she quickly straddled the seat. Shifting the vehicle slightly towards the right, she kicked up the kickstand.
Hermes looked at Kino curiously.
“Aren’t you tired? It’s fine to sleep without doing anything more, you know.”
Kino smiled softy under her sunglasses.
A fierce, ferocious smile.
“This much is nothing! Besides, I want to feel your vibrations, Hermes.”
“Mm. Got it. This is why you’ll never get a boyfriend.”
“Shut up! Come on, go already!”
With her right thumb, Kino turned on the engine. It hummed to life, and they headed back towards the corpses.
“I was thinking about it before, but that tone of yours is way too crude. Isn’t it better to do something about it already? At the very least, you could try to be a little polite in front of men. At the rate you’re going, you’ll to be single for life.”
While listening to Hermes’s scolding, Kino pressed the automatic transmission switch.
“I’ll think about it, okay?!”
She stepped hard on the accelerator, and the two took off.
A single motorrad travelling under the twilight sky, growing smaller and smaller until it seemed to melt into the wilderness.
A remarkable lady named Kino, and a motorrad of ten thousand abilities.
Their journey continued.
Their destination―
Well, only the wind would know.
SomewhatOkay Translations 
!?!?!?
There’s no way this is future Kino, so maybe this is a theatrical adaptation of her?
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I had already given up on reading the latest volumes of this great work, thank you so much for continuing the translation!
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Thank you very much
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OMGGG, ever since I was a kid I thought… I really thought that Kino was as flat as a washboard. The recent art seemed to feminize Kino.
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