novelDisaster in the Depths of Fertility. Goddess_of_Fertility (1)
| ← Ch.095 | Ch.097 → |
Part 1
The unrest and tension had spread even to Kanzaki Kaori, Vasilisa, and Sasha Kreutzev, the skilled magicians acting as bodyguards beyond the thick glass.
"Did you read what they were saying inside?"
"More or less." Vasilisa gave a simple shrug and a thin smile as she watched the movements of their lips."It looks like things have gotten a bit crazy. Their base is right in front of Academy City in Tokyo Bay."
"This makes me feel like being here as a bodyguard was part of Gremlin's manipulation as well. Some powerful people had to be sent to protect the VIPs, so they could remove us from the front lines by having an unofficial international conference held."
"We still don't know anything and you're already worrying about everything and doubting everyone? You Anglicans are surprisingly weak to information warfare. Thinking about all that won't help. What matters in an emergency is to do everything as you always would. It's better than panicking and falling into confusion."
Having said that, Vasilisa pulled something from her hair.
It was a small charm made of parchment.
"Okay, did you hear that, everyone? Crush every member of Gremlin hiding in Russia. That should allow the normal military to head to Japan. Protect our precious citizens. You can handle this if we keep things simple, right?"
"Are you sending out soldiers while ignoring the chain of command!?"
Kanzaki's eyes opened wide in shock.
The head of the Russian Orthodox Church was doing everything he could to control the situation beyond the glass. For better or for worse, not many people would be willing to act without his permission while in front of him like that.
But Vasilisa showed no concern.
"His biggest selling point is his purity. I don't have to tell him about all the dirty jobs behind the scenes."
Sasha, who wore binding clothes all over her body, lightly stroked the crowbar at her waist.
"You do have to. A question: do you really think I, a fellow member of the Russian Orthodox Church, will overlook a traitor?"
"Yes, yes. And my answer is the same as always: the results will prove who is-... gbh!?"
Vasilisa was cut off because Sasha unhesitatingly gave the crowbar a full swing toward her head. With a tremendous noise, Vasilisa's upper body bent sideways at a right angle at about the waist. However, she recovered like a metronome and she never stopped smiling.
Even afterwards, Vasilisa continued smiling as if nothing had happened.
"Anyway, everyone go all out to crush Gremlin's diversion team! Teach them that we're the only magicians allowed to use the name of a fairy!!"
"You perverts, " muttered Kanzaki.
"A question: could you at least refer to me as a monster instead?" protested Sasha.
Part 2
Kamijou Touma lay on the top of the train's roof as it rushed through the subway tunnel. He slowly stood up as the car unsteadily shook back and forth.
The train was made up of five different cars.
It was not even 100 meters long.
As Kamijou clenched his right fist, the woman named Freyja who wore a maternity dress took two or three slow steps backwards. However, a smile could be seen on her face thanks to the slight illumination from the fluorescent lights that seemed to flow in the opposite direction of the train.
She was not running away.
She was not being forced back.
Most likely, that was the ideal distance for Freyja. She was preparing to attack. And once she had finished, the girl slowly swung her palm.
"Come forth, Brísingamen."
Kamijou heard the sound of a hard object striking something.
At some point, a glowing jewel had appeared between her fingers.
"Cost 1. Black. Call / / Svaðilfari."
Something occurred immediately afterwards.
As a single jewel shot into the air with a roar, what looked like red thread appeared and wrapped around it. That torrent of thread looked like a red tornado and it quickly compressed and tightened until it was solid. In the blink of an eye, it then twisted into the form of a giant red horse. It was a mass of kinetic energy made entirely out of powerful artificial muscles.
With a glittering jewel on its forehead, the giant horse gave a tremendous neigh and charged toward Kamijou.
Depending on the breed, even normal horses could weigh 400-500 kilograms. This horse was two or three sizes larger than that and it showed no concern over its head scraping against the tunnel ceiling that shot by at such high speed. If that thing struck a flesh-and-blood human, the human could easily be smashed to pieces.
However, Kamijou Touma's right hand held a power called Imagine Breaker.
The strength of his opponent did not matter. All that mattered was that his opponent was supported by the supernatural power known as magic. He could then smash them to pieces with a single fist no matter who or what they were.
"Ohhhhhhh!!"
Kamijou stepped forward while desperately suppressing the desire to surrender to this giant horse that was even destroying the fluorescent lights on the tunnel roof as it advanced. He slammed his fist against the chest of the horse that looked more frightening than the bumper of a large truck.
The aggregation of tightened red thread burst like a balloon and disappeared into thin air.
Kamijou's weapon was his fist, so he had to approach Freyja who was backing away.
However...
"Cost 1. White. Call / / Muninn."
"Cost 1. White. Call / / Huginn."
In the time it took Kamijou to destroy the giant horse, Freyja had already thrown two new jewels into the air. Red thread appeared from somewhere and wrapped around them. They transformed into two giant birds that charged at Kamijou from the right and left.
(Not good!!)
Kamijou had already grasped the overall situation.
But even so, he could not find an effective way out of it.
Freyja could produce monsters faster than Kamijou could destroy them. In the time it took him to defeat one, she would produce two. In the time it took him to smash two, she would bring forth four. In the time it took him to destroy four, she would create thirteen. Her mass production would continue on and on.
Freyja only needed to use the slight time she built up to repeat the same simple task over and over again.
It was similar to the summoners in RPGs, but Freyja had no more attachment to the monsters she used than to a projectile in a barrage.
Being on top of a train also helped her because Kamijou could not work his way around the monsters.
"Cost 1. Black. Call / / Ratatoskr."
"Cost 1. Black. Call / / Hrungnir."
"Cost 1. Black. Call / / Hymir."
"Cost 1. Black. Call / / Þrymr."
"Cost 1. Black. Call / / Svaðilfari."
(My right hand isn't enough. I'm going to be pushed back by this barrage!)
Three large, dark red men stood before him. Another giant horse stood with them. And a mass of muscles that looked like a squirrel chased after the others, causing them to charge in a frenzy toward Kamijou. It was not much different from having the quickly-rotating blades of a lawnmower or shield machine approaching him. They mowed down and cut down everything in their path as they advanced.
If Kamijou did not stop them, he would be smashed to pieces.
If he did stop them, twice as many monsters would rush at him.
Freyja's incantations would continue as long as it took to exceed Kamijou's ability to handle them.
It would continue until the overwhelming violence produced by those masses of muscle crushed that boy's skeleton.
The sound of something soft being squished reverberated loudly throughout the tunnel.
As it did, the fertility goddess Freyja let out a whistle.
She bent over and laughed while showing no concern for the large stomach pushing out her maternity dress.
"Ah ha ha!! Amazing. Simply amazing. I never thought you would crush my surefire method like that!"
"... !"
Kamijou's choice had been simple in concept.
He did not have time to crush each individual monster with Imagine Breaker, so he had given up on defeating all of them.
He had first stomped his foot down on the small squirrel-like animal driving the other monsters into a frenzy.
He then drove his right fist into one of the large men approaching, causing him to burst apart.
The other large men and the large horse had been packed in closely as they rushed forward, so they recoiled from the impact of the man exploding. During that time, Kamijou had slammed his full body weight into one of them with his shoulder. Normally, that giant body would not have budged, but it toppled because it was already off balance.
The rest fell like dominos.
The monsters fell from the quickly moving train and struck the ground rushing by down below.
That impact may not have been enough to destroy them, but it did not matter as long as they could not catch up.
Kamijou ran down the path created between him and Freyja.
Freyja responded by throwing a jewel.
"Cost 1. Black. Call / / Þrymr... Uh, oh."
The pregnant woman with short, wavy hair bent her back and crouched down. Kamijou frowned slightly at that action that put pressure on her large belly, but then...
"Wah!?"
The large man "given birth to" by Freyja collapsed as if his head had been struck by a hammer. Seeing that, Kamijou finally caught on.
(The tunnel ceiling just got a lot lower!!)
He crouched down as quickly as he could.
The top half of the large man's head had been crushed, he lost his balance, and he fell off the train and onto the ground.
Freyja giggled while still bent over.
Despite the darkness, she somehow had an accurate grasp of how high up the ceiling was. She straightened her back once more and scattered a large number of jewels.
(I won't let her recover here!!)
Kamijou sprang up from his crouching position and ran forward.
Meanwhile, Freyja repeated the same incantation.
"Cost 1. Black. Call / / Þrymr."
"Cost 1. Black. Call / / Þrymr."
"Cost 1. Black. Call / / Þrymr."
"Cost 1. Black. Call / / Þrymr."
She sent forth a barrage that seemed to nullify all of Kamijou's efforts thus far.
Multiple large men appeared.
However, the variation from before was gone. That may have shown she did not have the leeway for creativity now that Kamijou had approached.
And when the exact same type of monster charged down a limited route with the exact same movement pattern, Kamijou had a much easier time dealing with them. They did not fly around like birds and ignore the footing. They did not crawl along the walls of the train like snakes and circle around behind him. If they all charged at him at once, he would have an easier time of causing another domino effect.
And if he could break through that wall...
"I can reach her."
Kamijou tightly clenched his right first.
He charged toward the large men himself.
"I will reach you, Freyja!!"
However, Freyja grinned in her maternity dress and flicked a single jewel up with her thumb.
She gave the incantation.
"Cost 1. White. Call / / Hildisvíni."
As she spoke, dark red thread produced a boar behind the men and closer to Freyja. Kamijou was cautious, but it was smaller than the men. And more importantly, the men filled up so much of the limited space on the train that the boar would not be able to move properly. Once he began the domino effect, the boar would be struck by the other monsters before it could reach him. If it fell to the ground, that was the end of it. But even if it remained on the roof, he could destroy it with Imagine Breaker while it could not move. Either way, it would not be much of an obstacle.
Or so he thought.
It turned out he was wrong.
Freyja pointed her index finger forwards and made an announcement.
"Eat them!!"
Kamijou heard an unpleasant sound similar to something wet bursting.
The boar at the back mercilessly bit into one of the large men that had his back turned to it. A crunching chewing sound followed. The aggregation of dark red thread wrapped around the boar and the boar even took in the jewel. The boar's silhouette grew by one size.
"Cost 2. White. Shift / / Hildisvíni."
(Not good. )
Kamijou could instinctually tell this was bad.
He could not let that boar continue to eat those men. He had a feeling the situation would change in some definitive way if it got any larger. He had to eliminate the boar's food before that happened!
"Cost 3. White. Shift / / Hildisvíni!"
"Cost 4. White. Shift / / Hildisvíni!!"
"Cost 5. White. Shift / / Hildisvíni!!!!!!"
But he was too late.
He had miscalculated. Each time the boar known as Hildisvíni grew, its mouth and stomach grew, so the time needed to swallow one of the men lowered. By the time Kamijou tried to defeat one of the giants, all of the "food" was already within the boar's stomach.
"Norse mythology is a mythology of mutual destruction. It was set up from the beginning so over 99% of the gods and their enemies would die while fighting each other. By constructing a spell that accentuates that fact, I can create an attack that allows good and evil, white and black to devour each other!"
And...
The boar had grown so large that it almost crushed the train car below it. It seemed to fill the entire half circle space of the tunnel. Its body was constantly scraping against the walls rushing by at high speed, but it did not seem to be taking damage. In fact, the tunnel was noticeably being destroyed.
Kamijou naturally thrust his right hand forward.
(The number of enemies has decreased. This is my chance! If I can defeat any monster in a single strike, the strength of that monster doesn't matter. I just have to blow away this boar with my right hand and charge for Freyja!!)
"Ah ha ha!!" laughed Freyja. Not even the top of her hair was visible from behind the giant boar."Are you forcibly trying to motivate yourself? That isn't gonna work. After all, this is the child I, fertility goddess Freyja, have given birth to. Now that it's grown up to Cost 5, your mental state isn't going to change anything."
"Child... ?" muttered Kamijou as he felt a great tension from that special phrasing.
One big reason behind his question came from his desire to look away from the very real danger before him.
But Freyja continued speaking.
"Yes. I am not calling these children in from some other place. I am creating them myself. I guide my magic power through the womb to give it a specific directionality of germination, I pour that magic power into a Brísingamen jewel, and I create a completely different design using that jewel as the core☆"
Kamijou then heard a sound similar to rustling silk.
Freyja may have been rubbing at her stomach.
Kamijou may have been able to guess that, but the words she spoke next exceeded anything he had imagined.
"But I suppose this child is the same. Ah ha ha! My own magical sense is hopelessly lacking. I had no choice but to borrow this child's brain and body to use magic."
"Damn you..."
"After being trapped in here for two full years, not even I really know what's going on in here. Ah ha ha. I'm not sure how to say it. Maybe it's like when a leftover has been sitting in the back of fridge for a looooong time and you're afraid to check on it."
"What do you think a human life is!?"
"Or maybe it's just that thinking about it wouldn't do any good."
Just as she said that, the giant boar that filled the entire empty space of the tunnel attacked like an approaching wall.
"Ah..."
No matter how powerful the opponent, Kamijou had assumed he could manage as long as he could slam Imagine Breaker into it before it could attack.
In fact, the larger the target, the easier it was to hit. This could even be called a chance to make a comeback. Even as he forced himself to think positively like that, he tried to stop his trembling body.
He had been completely wrong.
As the boar charged, Kamijou's feet floated up from the train's roof and he was blown backwards.
When a subway train arrived at the platform, an odd gust of wind blew through the station. The large mass of the train passing through that sealed space pushed the air like a piston.
The giant boar named Hildisvíni did the same.
It had grown so large it filled the entire upper portion of the tunnel and scraped against the concrete tunnel walls. What would happen if that giant form charged straight forward with tremendous speed? Naturally, a mass of air with nowhere to escape would be sent straight into Kamijou.
(You're kidding... That can happen even on top of a running train!? Does that boar have some strange ability to draw in the air around it!?)
"Gh... !?"
He subconsciously flailed his arms and legs around, but it had little effect in midair.
In midair with no footing, he could not even change the orientation of his body.
And...
Hildisvíni continued charging toward Kamijou at an even greater speed than he flew backwards. If he continued to be pushed by that explosive gust of wind, he would be knocked off the back of the train. If the giant boar touched him, he would be changed into a pile of flesh more gruesome than if he was hit by a train.
(Is there... )
Kamijou's throat grew dry as that giant form approached.
Even as alarm bells rang in his head like sparks from a short, he tried to think up some way out of this.
(Is there no way to overcome this!?)
Part 3
"Ugh..."
In London at night, a muscular man with a messy beard groaned at a bar on the outskirts of the city.
He was Misaka Tabigake.
He was Misaka Misuzu's husband and Misaka Mikoto's father.
He sat at a table on one end of the dimly-lit bar, opened the kind of unrefined laptop used at public construction sites, and called someone using a satellite phone.
A number of windows were open on the computer, but they all said "transactions suspended" in various languages.
"Hey, hey. I finally get started with that undersea water pipe project connecting the southern tip of Spain to north Africa and everywhere has suspended transactions! How am I supposed to bid for construction contractors now? What's going on!?"
"Preparations for war, president. Iron, copper, rare earths, and jewels. Instead of making proper deals, the influential people have decided to get rich selling everything valuable until the world passes the boiling point. All the contact points have been closed up and they won't open again until this crazed excitement is over."
"Do you have any idea what the self-sufficiency rate for food is!? If both sides stop trading, everyone will dry up before that get rich quick scheme pays off!!"
"Don't look at me. Honestly, I want to get out of Africa. It's only thirty kilometers to Europe. You should be grateful I'm making an effort to stay put."
Despite what the person on the other end of the phone said, he did not seem all that troubled.
That showed just how much experience he had in that continent of hot sand.
"More importantly, Misaka-san, should you really be in London right now? I hear Tokyo, Japan has become a battlefield. What kind of father doesn't rush off to save his family?"
"I tried every method I could think of. All the airlines have shut down and I can't use my connection with the RAF. My calls and emails aren't getting through. I went back to working on this job because nothing worked."
"It scares me how you mentioned the air force so casually there."
"I tried getting a civilian space trip, too. You know, one of those things that gets you in space after only thirty seconds of ballistic flight. But that didn't pan out either. Everyone is in a complete panic over this imaginary war. No matter how much I say I'll pay with my black card in hand, they say they don't want to send anything into the air during these unstable circumstances.... Damn. Maybe I should buy a Soviet warplane from the European mafia. My personal funds should be enough for an unarmed long-distance reconnaissance plane."
"I get it, I get it. You care for your family to a reckless degree! If I wasn't holding your reins, you'd probably split the planet in half. I get it, so let's focus on our work."
Tabigake brought a hand to his forehead when he heard the voice coming from the satellite phone.
He took a long, slow breath and consciously calmed his heart rate.
"Gwaaah!! I can't stand it! I'm returning to Japan right this instant!! There has to be some way. I know! I could buy an old ballistic missile and climb inside as the payload!!"
"You haven't calmed down at all!! You wouldn't survive that even if you wore a spacesuit!"
Part 4
A single small boat floated under the sun in the chilly waters of the Pacific Ocean.
The small boat seemed to be made of wood and might have appeared charming had it been floating in a pond at a park. But with only water visible in all 360 degrees, it gave the more sinister image of being stranded.
A girl in a dress stood in the boat.
The dress may have originally been as pure white as a wedding dress, but more than a third of it was stained red and black as if splattered in her enemies' blood.
And the same was true for the girl herself.
Her skin had stiches running in every direction like a battered stuffed animal that had been repeatedly repaired. And when the skin had been grafted onto her, it appeared there had been little concern over the moisture. Some of her skin had the youthfulness of a young girl's skin, some of it was as wrinkled as an old woman, and some of it was discolored a dark blue. This added to the cobbled together impression she gave off.
"Here they are, " she said as lightly as someone who had spotted the person they were waiting for in front of a train station.
The girl casually pulled out a small kitchen knife and threw it toward the ocean surface.
The change only took a few seconds.
The ocean water for over 100 kilometers around the small boat completely froze into a thick layer of ice.
The girl in the bloody dress took an elegant step onto the ocean surface that looked like a lake during winter. The ice palace reassuringly welcomed the girl with a hard sound. The girl smoothly walked across the ice like she was being escorted by the hand of a well-mannered noble.
Several military ships had their path blocked by the sudden appearance of the ice.
It was as if a special chemical had been used to harden the oil in a wok with scraps of vegetables still inside. And the ice did not stop at the fleet on the ocean. The ocean was likely frozen all the way to nearby Saipan.
"Wars are not only fought by the super heroes wielding machineguns. If one crushes the supply ships and their routes, the super heroes' supply of ammunition will dry up, " muttered the girl in a dress with the lightheartedness of someone reading back their shopping list.
The supply ships had several escort ships with them and were armed with autocannons themselves.
Even if they did not understand the details of magic, they at least understood that the instant large-scale freezing of the ocean had occurred with that small boat in the center.
A deep voice gave a warning in English using the speakers meant to communicate with pirates.
"Stay where you are! Immediately disarm yourself and put your hands up. If we determine you are a threat, we will fire!!"
"You have plenty of weapons to drive off pirates, blow up cruise missiles, and shoot down planes, but you have nothing ideal for killing a delicate maiden, do you? I suppose I should commend you for hesitating to tear me to pieces."
Her voice remained carefree.
And she continued.
"The queen of Niflheimr can draw out a location's causes of death."
Lights appeared.
And not just around the girl in a dress. Small candle-like flames floated up over the entire 100 kilometer area of frozen ocean. They numbered in the hundreds, thousands, or even tens of thousands.
The girl raised her index finger and scooped up one of the candle-like lights.
She brought it to her lips.
And she breathed something in.
"Analyzing the residual information of the death. Arnold Mackenzie, male, 24 at time of death. While taking a trip on a cruiser, an acquaintance aboard questioned him about a romantic relationship. It developed into a fight and he was stuffed head first into the oven in the kitchen space. He died of shock due to the intense pain of burns all over his body.... Oh? I wonder if he had any relation to Freyja."
She tilted her head and reached for the chest of her dress.
She pulled out a shiny black revolver.
The supply ship immediately reacted to this obvious weapon.
"She has a weapon! All crew on deck, stay on your guard!!"
"Throw the gun away within five seconds or we will assume you are hostile and-... !!"
The voice suddenly stopped.
A high-pitched sound similar to feedback came through the speaker and the girl stopped moving for a moment.
Finally, a new female voice spoke over the speaker.
"We quieted down those men who don't know how this works. It was very childish of you to use such a large spell on people who know nothing of magic. How about we actually enjoy a fight between experts?"
"Wait. I'm not the type to enjoy fighting, " said another female voice over the speaker.
The girl in the bloody dress tilted her head so far one began to worry she would snap her neck.
And she spoke.
"Who are you?"
"I am Silvia and this is Brunhild Eiktobel. Simply put, we're your enemies."
"Fine then."
Without hesitating, the patched-together girl pulled the revolver's trigger.
With a dry gunshot, a highly deadly 45 caliber bullet was fired, but it was no match for the mass of steel that was the ship. It would do nothing more than scatter a few orange sparks and make a sound similar to a pot being struck.
That was all it should have done.
That was the common knowledge of the world.
And yet...
With a great roar, the entire steel supply ship was enveloped in crimson flames.
Nothing had been ignited.
Even if all the fuel stockpiled aboard the supply ship had caught fire, the flames would not have spread so evenly. It would have instead exploded at a single point, breaking the ship in two.
The unnatural flames had been caused by the girl in the bloody dress.
"I can draw out causes of death from the residual information of the dead, store them in existing weapons, and swap out the causes of death. I can strangle you with a sword, drown you with a train, crush you with a blowtorch, and burn you with a handgun. That is a suitable reason to bear the name of Hel, the queen of Niflheimr who rules over the dead."
When the ship had been struck by Hel's bullet, it had been heated all over as if it had been "stuffed head first into an oven". Everyone aboard, be they expert or amateur, soldier or magician, would be roasted like turkeys.
However...
A sound like shattering glass exploded out.
The flames enveloping the supply ship were suddenly blown away and the ship appeared unscathed from within.
It was similar to peeling away sunburned skin. The supply ship's exterior was actually a bit shinier than before.
A woman's voice came from the speaker as if nothing had happened.
"Sorry, but barriers are my specialty. If you want to kill the crew of this ship, you'll have to take care of me first."
"I see, " was the girl named Hel's only response.
She spread her arms to show off the candle-like flames scattered as far across the icy ground as the eye could see.
"Ten thousand fifty three causes of death have appeared here in all. As expected of a location deeply related to the world's largest gun nation, many people have died here.... I will use all of these to kill you. And if I kill you, I will use your cause of death somewhere."
"Hel, hm?" said the other female voice. It was a bored-sounding voice."People once called me Hel. I never thought I would run across an idiot who proudly showed off the sinister name of that queen of the underworld."
"Now you have my interest."
"Not mine. Let's just get this over with."
Part 5
Misaka Mikoto held Index who held the calico cat. While in that matryoshka doll-like situation, Academy City's #3 Level 5 used magnetism to jump from wall to wall of the high-rise buildings.
Orange sparks floated down from nowhere shortly after they passed through. A long, long line of those sparks trailed after them.
At first, Mikoto had repelled each and every one of them, but she had quickly learned they could not move quickly enough to pursue her. If she jumped away in the time it took the sparks to transform into pillars of fire and then flame figures, they would lose sight of their target and disappear.
Once she knew that, she saw no point in wasting her time shooting at them.
She manipulated great magnetic power more quickly and precisely in order to jump from building to building.
Either due to the magnetism, the speed, or the height, the cat fiercely struggled. This stabbed at Mikoto's heart.
"Where are we anyway? Is this Sendagaya or Yotsuya? Damn, if only I could use my phone's GPS."
"How am I supposed to know?"
"Are you useful for anything!?"
Academy City was technically a part of Tokyo, but it was surrounded by large walls and one could not come and go freely. That was why Mikoto had a poor sense of the area. She was boldly travelling through the air based on the vague idea that she would reach Tokyo bay as long as she continued east.
"No matter where we go, the surface is covered in people. Is that idiot really trying to break through the center of all that? He could be crushed or..."
She trailed off.
Multiple giant aircraft had flown by quite nearby while clustered together and seemingly competing with each other.
A tremendous blast of air sent Mikoto's body into a harsh spin despite her magnetic support. She concentrated entirely on the bottom of her left foot and focused on controlling her body.
She finally fixed herself in position by pressing her foot against a sign sticking out from a wall.
"What... was that!?"
On one side was a next generation fighter from Academy City. It was clearly different from the fighters people usually thought of that were approximately twenty meters long. This huge fighter was easily seventy or eighty meters long. The maneuverability and turning that was needed for the swift movements of a fighter were all forced through with trajectory alterations carried out by the engine. In fact, it overwhelmed other fighters in those regards. This was the monster that had swept across the battlefields of Russia.
Just that fighter which could achieve a top speed of 7000 kph would have been surprising enough.
(Academy City has finally begun a rampage in the skies of Tokyo!?)
However, a different shadow flew in the sky as well.
It was less than thirty meters long, but it was not made of metal or composite materials.
It looked like an eagle.
It had no feathers. Its entire body was a mass of muscles formed from tightened wet red thread. It flapped its wings to travel at acute angles with supersonic speeds. When one side fired an air-to air missile filled with precision electronics, the other side would complexly move its giant wings to produce a spear-like gust of wind to knock the missile out of the air. It would sometimes use the wind to throw the explosive back at the pursuing fighter.
"That's Hræsvelgr, " said Index while she held the cat and Mikoto held her."That is the great eagle that devours the dead in Norse mythology. It is so large that flapping its wings creates all of the wind throughout the world. Gremlin took portions of that legend to create this."
Mikoto did not understand what that meant, but the sight before her eyes was overwhelming.
Multiple explosions occurred in midair. Two giant forms weaved through the gaps and repeatedly attacked each other and evaded. A spear-like gust of wind was fired and the giant fighter flipped over and just barely avoided it. The fighter then fired a missile but more like it was placing it in the air than aiming and firing.
The surrounding explosive blasts and spear-like gusts of wind knocked the un-ignited missile around like a pinball. It flew through a complex trajectory before dropping down.
And it fell directly in front of the giant eagle known as Hræsvelgr.
The explosive blast was filled with a wet sound that had been absent previously.
The mass of muscles had lost its head and...
"It's falling!!" shouted Mikoto.
Instead of a building-lined street overflowing with people, it fell toward a wide open space that was either a park or a sports field. Thick trees were snapped apart as easily as a bundle of pasta before putting it in the boiling water and a large cloud of dust rose into the air.
The lack of screams led Mikoto to assume no one had been there. The massive flood of people was formed from the people stalled after losing any means of transportation. People were still not trying to evacuate, so they had not yet started to gather in the parks.
Or at least, Mikoto hoped that was the case.
Watching from where she was would change nothing and remaining still would allow the orange sparks to surround her.
Mikoto thought as she once more travelled from building to building with magnetism.
(Academy City and this Gremlin group are both seriously planning to fight here. But do they really understand what that means? If they set up a defensive line in such a densely populated area, who knows how many people will be dragged into this!?)
The situation had developed in an even odder direction.
As Birdway, Lessar, and Kumokawa Maria travelled through the sewer to reach the river, they were forced to walk through the sewer all the way from Shinjuku to the Takadanobaba area. After exiting into a river, they had stolen a small boat as planned. However, the river was only knee deep. They had obtained a dark rubber boat. Kumokawa Maria did not know enough to tell it was a JSDF military landing boat with an engine attached on the back.
"You're going to return it with a message card later, right?"
"I can have a certain president replace it for them. That should make a good memory for most anyone."
The tiller attached to the engine at the back of the rubber boat was being operated by a 12-year-old blonde girl, but no one challenged them. It was obvious to everyone that this was not the time to worry about that.
"That bridge is about to collapse, " commented Kumokawa Maria from the front of the boat as they passed under a small bridge covered in people.
Lessar's nose began to twitch from where she sat next to her.
"I sense an odd presence."
"You too?" said Birdway without turning around."Academy City and Gremlin have finally collided. Everything was limited to the air before, but a few pieces of wreckage have crashed into Tokyo. The looks on the people's faces have changed. They're changing from simple dissatisfaction to panic and fear."
However, there was nothing those three girls could do.
The phone and internet lines were overloaded and they had no way of speaking to all of the people at once. And even if they did, they could not think of anything to say which would calm them down in this situation.
Dissatisfaction held much more energy than people thought it did.
It was more difficult to understand than the more obvious emotions, but that meant it was difficult to defend against. It could cause a real change in people's mental activity.
When a leader controlled a single administration, he needed to detect the quantity and quality of the people's dissatisfaction and establish a means of reducing it before it exceeded the tolerable limits. That showed just how important it was.
And the quality of that dissatisfaction was changing.
The stabbing sensation approaching from every direction was likely anger.
Birdway gave a sneer and spoke.
"Those damn pacifists have turned their anger toward Academy City."
"Why? Gremlin is the one attacking. That dogfight just now only happened because Gremlin targeted a foolish passenger plane that didn't change its course during this emergency situation. Academy City's supersonic fighters may look flashy, but all they're doing is trying to intercept Gremlin's attacks!"
"They aren't observing this so calmly." Lessar dragged over the cooler sitting in one corner of the military rubber boat."The normal people will know some strange creatures had been flying around until now, but they weren't attacking. It was only once Academy City interfered that they started going on a rampage."
"And so Academy City is the villain? That's no different than ignoring the hornet's nest on the eaves of your house."
"This is part of their distribution of what people stand to gain, " readily replied Birdway."Doing the right thing but having the majority mad at you is not fun on the political side of things. I doubt that's enough to break Academy City, but it should at least slightly dull the decision making ability of those on the scene. And Gremlin's plan doesn't end here. They're trying to tangle up hundreds of threads to bind everyone from multiple directions. Understanding even a bit of the structure is enough to know how unpleasant this is."
Part 6
A bubbling sound could be heard.
Sargasso contained the remains of a luxury passenger ship. On the deck of the giant rusted ship was a giant rectangular pool.
It was filled with a thick, transparent liquid. It seemed to be at quite a high temperature because the air bubbles of a boiling liquid floated up here and there. Perhaps due to the stickiness of the original liquid, it looked like a monster's gastric juices or a dark swamp with a corpse submerged in it.
No one would have thought it had originally been pure gold.
In the Norse areas, gold was both a symbol of wealth and the material used for the weapons of the gods. After Gremlin had concentrated all of their techniques into extracting the weapon material side of its meaning, the gold had already lost its chemical properties and meaning. People from the science side would have hesitated to even refer to it as "gold".
Three girls stood on the poolside: Magic God Othinus, Dvergr Marian Slingeneyer, and Mjölnir who took the form of a drum.
They were all central members of Gremlin who were focused on producing Gungnir which could control and stabilize the power of a magic god which was too powerful to use properly. However, they were not constantly and unendingly uttering incantations.
"So this is what it's like once it begins, " said the eyepatch-wearing girl.
"Igniting it is the hard part. This girl here did a good job of taking in and controlling the volcanic energy we acquired in Hawaii. We should only have to wait now."
Marian traced her fingertips across the surface of the black drum and the girl who had been given that form shook happily.
Most people would associate the name Mjölnir with the weapon of the lightning god Thor. It had immense power, it would pursue and directly hit its target when thrown, and it would return to its owner like a boomerang. However, it was exceedingly heavy and could only be used by the "chosen one". That was the standard image.
But just as Thor was originally an almighty god in charge of the weather, terrain, and farming, the hammer that symbolized his power was a convenient tool that could be used for many different tasks. It could be viewed like a magic wand.
Even after Thor's abilities were limited to those of the lightning god, that hammer retained the vestiges of his power over farming. Thor could eat the goats he owned and they would return to normal with just a wave of the hammer.
Mjölnir was a spiritual item that could be used for anything.
It was a joker that let one pass over a single hole in any experiment.
Putting it that way showed just how rare an existence that drum girl was. She was so rare the entire magic side could easily fight a war over that single girl.
"Now that it's started, we only have to watch the process. We only need to interfere if we decide a manual recovery is needed."
"Are you saying I should go take a nap? At the very last, I will not let my guard down until it passes that stage."
"Ha ha. Othinus, I'm surprised a magic god like you can still get nervous."
"This is not an issue with my abilities. This world is unskilled and untrustworthy."
That stage.
There was one obstacle they could not overcome even with a magical joker that let them fill in a single inadequacy.
They knew the lance could never be completed with the existing techniques of the magic side. Mjölnir could fill in any one magical symbol, but only within the field of magic. Mjölnir could do nothing when any kind of magic was useless.
To fill in that deficiency, they had stolen the power of the science side.
Specifically, a holistic esper.
The remnants of Academy City's #2 had been forced to create a specimen in the form of a girl and Kihara Kagun had made some alterations to that specimen. They now had a truly unique disposable item.
Othinus would occasionally use the Einherjar who sat on the line between living and dead, so she knew the truth of the matter. That specimen was not an object created from a living human. It was a human-shaped object that had been altered. It was a soulless existence.
"What we are doing is essentially a magical ceremony, " said Othinus."But it cannot be completed solely with magic. In other words, the automatic work will stall somewhere. To accurately throw in the holistic esper and continue the ceremony with the proper timing, it needs to be switched over manually."
"I remember a toy where you had to rearrange the rails a train was travelling along so it wouldn't derail. I guess this is similar."
A bubbling sound could be heard.
Something was visible at the bottom of the pool.
It was a cylinder as thick as a 500 yen coin and as long as a ballpoint pen.
That was the bottom of a lance.
"How long is it supposed to be?"
"250.... It will grow quickly once it begins."
Part 7
"Chehh... I can only access the disaster message board service. Well, it's not like I could rush there even if I could contact them."
A middle-aged man in a shabby suit and with a slight beard spoke in an exhausted voice.
His name was Kamijou Touya.
He was the father of a certain high school student.
He was a foreign capital salaryman who was on trips to other countries year round.
He was currently in America. Specifically, he was in a characteristic designer's building in the center of Silicon Valley. However, his thoughts were completely focused on Japan.
His wife Shiina lived in the 23 special wards of Tokyo.
His son Touma lived in Academy City.
The area they both lived in had fallen into complete panic. As a father, he could not help but be worried.
From the simple sites he could browse on his phone, it seemed all of the airlines had shut down reservations for flights. It was not that all the flights were full. Instead, they were refusing to send out passenger planes when the safety of the air was not confirmed.
Something was happening in Tokyo.
No, that was only the tip of the iceberg. That was only the part that showed up the most.
Touya's expertise in finances showed him the greater confusion lurking below the surface.
"Sorry about the wait."
A voice as high pitched as a whistle filled the reception space. It belonged to a young girl.
Touya frantically put his phone in his pocket and stood up from his seat. A blonde girl not even ten years old had entered.
Her name was Lindy Blueshake.
After the fall of the Data Queen of the United States, Olay Blueshake, this girl had inherited her "kingdom". She was the new queen that controlled a large pillar supporting the value of the United States and its currency, the dollar, by controlling the world's largest search engine and several other internet services.
During the incident in Hawaii, rumors had spread of the corporation's bankruptcy and dissolution, but it seemed the people had not wanted to see such a convenient service disappear. It was now back in business thanks to the support of several financial investment companies.
For example, Kamijou Touya's parent company.
Lindy trotted over to the table with a gait that made one think she should be wearing colorful rain boots.
"Um, I have looked over the paperwork. I just have to sign here, right?" she asked.
"Well, yes.... Excuse me, but did you read over it at least three times? I know it is odd to say this as the one making the proposal, but this kind of contract usually has some king of cruel wording hidden inside it."
"D-don't worry! I read over it with my lawyers and accountants!"
It seemed she was not giving much thought to the possibility of opposing factions or bought industrial spies within her own company.
Touya suddenly wanted to explain the basic workings of the world to Lindy, but the large man standing behind her lightly cleared his throat.
He was a tanned and muscular man with sunglasses completely hiding his eyes. The black suit did not suit him. In fact, it was the wrong size. It looked like it would rip in places if he started running.
Touya guessed he was a native Hawaiian and the man spoke with a voice as deep as one would expect.
"There is no problem. We have a system for revealing corrupt personnel."
"Very well then.... It is not our problem if your group begins to decline because of this."
"????"
Lindy looked puzzled and Touya exchanged a quick glance with the large man wearing sunglasses.
He watched that young hand sign the documents on top of the reception space table.
As Lindy moved her hand, she spoke.
"Does it bother you?"
"What? Well, um..."
"The situation in Tokyo."
Touya gave a bitter smile at how readily she said that.
Lindy continued her struggle against the many documents.
"Specialists like us can tell right away when communications are overloaded in an area."
"Ha ha. It looks like it is difficult to hide anything from you."
"But it is strange. Using the internet normally should not overload it to such an extreme. Unless everyone in Japan took simultaneous action to overload it, information should not be cut off so cleanly for a localized area."
"Are you saying someone or something is guiding this large flow of events?"
As Touya answered, a different piece of information passed through the back of his mind.
The New York Stock Exchange, the London Stock Exchange, the Shanghai Stock Exchange, the Berlin Stock Exchange, and the Indonesia Stock Exchange. This information dealt with the flow of money and objects.
(Iron, steel, car, and aircraft stock as well as the standard futures in oil and grains. Those hasty people are buying and selling everything like a war is starting. And all of the deals are ones that will pay off if the confusion grows. )
"Does it bother you?" she asked again.
Touya raised his head to find Lindy continuing to battle the paperwork.
He could not tell how much she knew.
The eyes of a child could sometimes see through the deception of adults with a special kind of instinct and logic. Touya viewed her comment as just as dangerous as women's intuition.
"There seem to be a fair number of people who would be happy if this commotion dragged on for a while."
"Um..."
"If one gathers and analyzes search results, SNS posts, and message board posts, one can create a graph of the world's trends. It gives a logical framework for what is known as big data. Anyway, it seems that arrow is pointed in quite a dangerous direction."
(What an unpleasant age we live in. )
Touya kept that thought from showing on his face.
Instead, he spoke.
"In the financial world, there are plenty of people known as traders of death. However, it is more than just the specialists this time. We are catching glimpses of innocent young man and housewife day traders who want this confusion to continue."
"It appears that some hints have been left to ensure those people voluntarily think that way."
"Do you not know who exactly left those hints?"
"Big data does not collect information that would allow us to specify individuals. Once we do that, it becomes a spying and eavesdropping system.... That is what my mother did."
If someone was making posts online to foster this confusion, could their location be used to search out the source behind all of it?
(No... )
Touya rejected his own idea.
(The true agitator will have manipulated complete strangers to make those posts. The true villain does not commit evil deeds where anyone can see them. I doubt they would remain in the kind of location anyone would think to check. )
"By the way, " said Lindy as her fountain pen raced along the final document."If we use the packet pattern file structure of the Japan-America hotline connecting the White House to the prime minister's residence, we should be able to break through the overloaded line network with a top priority VoIP connection. Want to try it?"
"I wouldn't care if it got me arrested, but I can't have my wife charged on some national crime."
Part 8
Repeated sounds of solid objects being destroyed rang out.
Those were the sounds of the giant boar Hildisvíni charging toward the back of the train while destroying the fluorescent lights and other objects on the walls and ceiling of the tunnel. The boar was only a temporary mass of flesh, so it did not possess the standard instincts of a living creature. It ran right off the back of the train and the crash of the track being crushed burst out.
The maternity dress-wearing magician named Freyja gave a long sigh.
Nothing remained on top of the train's roof and Hildisvíni had not been destroyed by Imagine Breaker. After being thrown into the air, Kamijou Touma had either been crushed by the giant boar or thrown to the side and fallen to the ground.
Either way, he was certainly dead.
With her job done, Freyja reached into the pocket of her maternity dress and pulled out a communication spiritual item with several runes burned into it.
"Now then. I've crushed my top priority, so now I can go to the location of the next greatest problem. Let's see, the Muspell destruction report list says..."
Just as she began carelessly muttering to herself, she heard an ominous creaking noise.
"..."
At some point, a glowing jewel had appeared between her five fingers.
She looked toward the source of the sound.
It was quite nearby. It was on the edge of the train's roof. While looking to the front of the train, it was on the right.
She saw what looked like fingers.
No.
They were fingers. There were five of them. Someone was holding onto the quickly-moving train with just the strength of their hand.
She peered over at this person and realized who it was.
It was Kamijou Touma.
"Well done."
Freyja grinned and began to release the jewel in her fingers.
But before she could, Kamijou used his free arm to swing around the coat of his school uniform by the sleeve. He had removed it in advance.
The powerful wind caused the cloth to swell out and it covered Freyja's entire face.
It robbed her of her vision.
She lost her vision while peering down from the edge of the train.
Part 9
There was one more.
A young man named Fenrir walked through a dark snowy plain in Alaska.
During the night in the Arctic, the air was cold enough to feel like a deadly weapon, but the young man showed no sign of caring. He was like a wolf walking through the snow.
"Is this the way to the secret NORAD base known for ballistic missile defense?"
Ultimately, the most effective means of stopping the allied force was to seal off their intelligence network. In the modern age, intelligence killed more people than bullets. It could be military satellites, the internet, or anything else. If all of those communication methods were cut off, the globe that seemed so small would quickly return to being a vast planet. The more countries and people involved, the more area that had to be understood. And the more area that had to be understood, the more serious the effects of losing coordination.
While walking through a conifer forest covered in white snow, Fenrir came across a rope stretched out between the trees. The rope had an upside-down triangular cloth attached and that cloth had a skull mark in the center.
It seemed the area ahead was a minefield, but Fenrir ignored the warning and continued on.
After walking a little further, the forest suddenly ended and he could see a large space surrounded by a chain-link fence.
It was a radar base with a large number of parabolic antennae inside.
"Does the weight of the snow not break the dishes?"
After uttering that surprised comment, Fenrir heard a noise from the surrounding trees.
He narrowed his eyes slightly.
Immediately afterwards, all of the thick trees in the area were sliced in two at waist height.
It seemed to have been a long blade using wind or something similar.
The blade had been several dozen meters long and it had been created by a single card ripped from a set of flashcards held together by a metal ring. The card said "Wind Symbol" in yellow writing.
This was known as Shorthand.
It was a disposable grimoire developed by a certain female courier. The structure that allowed an original grimoire to automatically send out spells had been extracted and weaponized.
However...
"Stop that."
The traces of damage were interrupted around where Fenrir stood.
A different color was mixed into the pure white of the snow. A number of black cracks had appeared as if space itself had been directly torn. One of those had "bitten" the wind blade.
"I don't even need my canine teeth for this. If I release just my central incisors or lateral incisors, I can tear you to pieces right away."
The sound of something breaking rang out.
The wind blade did not disappear or break. It was swallowed.
The cracks disappeared like the surface of clay being smoothed over with water. That long blade was swallowed up by those disappearing black cracks as if it was water being sucked down the drain of a pool.
The young man turned around.
He calmly observed the glamorous blonde courier named Oriana Thomson.
"Don't be so afraid. This is just a trick. It's not like I'm damaging another phase and throwing it into heaven or hell. Not even I can do that."
"Then what are those cracks?"
"It's simple. I distort the flow of power a bit." The young man shrugged."Eastern feng shui is the same. The existence of mountains and rivers changes the flow of energy through ley lines and the like. In that case, you can create a 'ditch' that draws in the surrounding energy by creating a new mountain or river. It's the same as how the rainwater will naturally flow toward an irrigation canal and be swallowed up."
Fenrir was the beast that would devour Odin during the final battle of Ragnarök. The gods had feared him and so bound him and stabbed a sword into his mouth through the lower jaw so he could not close his mouth. When they had, the drool that had flowed from Fenrir's giant maw had created a large river.
He had used that legend.
By incorporating the same symbols as a river into a location, he created a large "ditch" that swallowed up the massive power of the ley lines. It forcibly swallowed up the magic power that constructed magic and swept it away.
In response, Oriana Thomson lightly spun the set of flashcards in her hand.
And she spoke.
"This is not my first time doing it with an enemy of magic. I have yet to use them on that boy, but I have simulated some countermeasures."
"Oh, you mean that right hand? All I do is have the magic swept away. I can't completely annihilate the occult, so I can't take on the exaggerated role of being a reference point for the world."
The space around Fenrir grew distorted.
Several black cracks appeared.
"But with this, I can drag in plenty of other things along with the massive amount of energy. You could say it's like sucking a human down the drain of a pool."
Part 10
Even on Tokyo Bay, repeated earthquake-like rumbling noises could be felt vibrating in one's gut.
A few more Hræsvelgrs that Fertility Goddess Freyja had given birth to ahead of time flew from Gremlin's base of Sargasso.
That base was only a few dozen kilometers from Academy City which was sending out bombers and fighters which could fly at 7000 kph. It was even possible a shell fired from within the city's thick walls could fly in a large parabola and strike Sargasso.
Lightning God Thor (or rather, Ollerus disguised as Thor) stood directly on the ocean, listening to the rumbling.
Technically, he was standing on a large amount of goat fur he had scattered on the ocean surface. Needless to say, this was a spell constructed using the symbols of the goats that pulled Thor's chariot.
A disguise could be a lot of work.
(Now then. Everyone knows Sargasso is in Tokyo Bay, so there is no more need for me to remain within Gremlin. To reduce the danger from Academy City's attack or Magic God Othinus tearing me apart if my cover is blown, I should leave here right away. On the other hand... )
He heard a great roar overhead that was deeper than the distant explosions.
It came from Mökkurkalfe.
That giant was known as "mountain-like" and it really was large enough to fit that description. Despite being made of dried clay, it rose almost 500 meters above the ocean surface, so its great mass alone could function as a weapon. And unlike Ollerus, Mökkurkalfe was not using a spell to float on the surface. It was so overwhelmingly large that one could forget its feet were touching the ocean floor.
Mökkurkalfe had been patrolling around Sargasso at a uniform speed, but it was beginning to focus primarily on the region of the ocean in the direction of Academy City to the west.
A few shadows flying through the air slipped through the net of Hræsvelgr giant eagles and charged toward Sargasso.
They were Academy City bombers.
(Well, that isn't going to work. Even if I leave this to them, there is no guarantee they can do any real damage to Othinus. And if they do not stop the production of the lance, not even fleeing to the other side of the world will be enough to avoid the destruction.... In that case, I should continue this recklessness for a bit longer. )
The force trying to destroy Gremlin approached.
Ollerus calmly calculated that they were not powerful enough and made an immediate announcement.
"Knock them from the air."
Mökkurkalfe mercilessly swung its giant arm which produced a great roar as it tore through the air.
It was because he could do this that he had been able to infiltrate Gremlin.
It was because he could do this that he had grown somehow twisted.
Part 11
Kamijou had been blown toward the back of the train by an artificial blast of wind and the giant boar Hildisvíni had tried to charge at him. However, he had grabbed at the coat of his school uniform.
Even if he flailed his arms and legs around while in midair, he could not move as if swimming through water.
But what if he had something that could fan the air even more?
What if he unbuttoned his coat and spread it out?
"!"
Kamijou intentionally opened up only the right side. He had no guarantee it would work. It was a complete gamble. As soon as he did, his body moved as if being greatly twisted. The gust of wind was powerful enough to easily blast a human into the air, so it was obvious what would happen if he prepared a makeshift sail that increased the air resistance.
As his body spun, he was pushed to the side.
And he fell.
As the giant boar scraped along the top of the tunnel, it ran directly along the roof of the train. By that time, Kamijou had already avoided it by grabbing onto the edge of the roof with both hands and pressing against the wall. Hildisvíni was large enough to fill the empty space, but that was only the area above the roof of the train. The gap next to the train's wall was wide open. The wind produced by its giant form did not reach down there either.
"Gh... Pant, pant."
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