novelOne Need Not be a Protagonist. Girls_Battle_Talk (1)
| ← Ch.075 | Ch.077 → |
Part 1
First, there was a conversation.
Part 2
A certain multilevel overpass in District 7 was known as a bit of a landmark within Academy City. As the 12 boarding areas for a large scale bus roundabout were all connected by the overpass, it looked like an entire sports field created out of concrete. Also, the top level that could be called the "third floor" was made into a giant road and the underground area was filled with a complicated array of underground pathways that doubled as a shopping area. All the complex ups and downs made it commonly used in escape scenes for police dramas and it was well known but really only as being a good place to use as meeting up point.
Due to the large scale cultural festival known as the Ichihanaransai, the bus routes had been greatly changed. So that people could head to the different schools more efficiently, the routes had been specially changed to go directly from school to school. For that reason, the normally crowded bus roundabout was completely empty.
On the second floor of that multilevel overpass, Fräulein Kreutune wandered unsteadily through that concrete structure that somehow looked like a sports field, perhaps due to the plants growing here and there in an attempt to landscape the area.
"..."
A stinging pain ran across the skin of her face. It was not the pain of being scratched by fingernails or pinched on the cheek. It was a pain that felt like an electric shock and it seemed to be coming up from underneath her thin, thin skin. The pain tormented Fräulein Kreutune's consciousness like insect legs were crawling underneath her skin.
Now then.
It was often said that sharks followed the smell of blood to find their prey, but they could not accurately track anything relying on that alone. All living creatures had bioelectricity within them. When that was scattered into the ocean water, dedicated organs could capture those slight changes in the electric current to determine the target's location.
These organs were known as the ampullae of Lorenzini.
Something similar to that had grown within Fräulein Kreutune. Even the king of the sea could only pull it off in the seawater which had exceedingly high conductivity, but she was able to do it through the air.
Technically speaking, she was not pursuing an electric current.
She was pursuing an electromagnetic signal.
She was pursuing the bioelectromagnetic information network that used the identical brainwaves of human clones.
She was pursuing the Misaka Network.
She was unable to read it. She was unable to write to it. She could only perceive the massive amount of signals traveling about as a "pressure". And she could come to a general estimate of the location of a certain special individual on that network by the rise and drop of that pressure.
In other words, she could track her target.
She could track the location of the brain belonging to the friend known as Last Order.
This was a searching method that was impossible even for the monster known as Academy City's #1 who could manipulate any vector.
Fräulein Kreutune's position had already begun to draw closer to that place.
"... Uuh... kh..."
This was of course a function she had not had before.
It was as if the fact that her body had not smelled blood or tasted flesh had led it to urge her on, prod her, and preemptively seal off the idea of giving up because she could not find her target. She wanted it that badly. She wanted that massive amount of information. She wanted the preparations she needed to eclose. She wanted to cast aside all she had been like an empty husk and to become a new life form that did not fit any of the existing categories.
It had truly just been a slight crossing of paths.
That someone had called her a friend.
And now she was going to slip out of it all and cast it aside.
"Uuh... !!"
She staggered.
That was the kind of creature Fräulein Kreutune was. She was a living being that had happened to obtain that function. Just as a plant grew when it had water and sunlight and just like ants gathered around something sweet, Fräulein Kreutune was an existence that grew more complex upon consuming information.
And so...
Was there really anything wrong with consuming it?
Was it okay to toss aside all those who tried to get in her way?
If she asked, her body would surely give her an answer. It would prepare as many functions as necessary to head to the goal point as quickly as possible. And it would then wordlessly tell her, "Give up. This is the type of creature you are, so follow the guidelines and focus solely on acquiring as much information as possible. Become an existence that does nothing but that."
The warmer the thing she held inside of her...
And the more she felt she should focus on protecting that thing...
The more she would feel the desire to cast all of that aside. And her inability to stop herself from doing so violently burned her on the inside.
She was painfully aware that she was a lost cause.
She was exhausted.
She wondered what the point had been of all the time she had spent in the past.
No matter what functions she acquired and no matter how much she could do that others could not, she could not stop herself from doing this one simple thing. What did that make her?
She did not want to continue living.
She just wanted it all to come to an end.
She did not want to continue on in this way. She would prefer for it to just stop here. She did not care if all the meaning behind all the time she had spent and everything she had built up was sent crashing down by some strike from the side.
But it would not end.
She could not end it.
Even if she was cut. Even if she was burned. Even if she was shot or struck or crushed or stabbed or bit or hanged or buried or split or ripped or drowned or thrown into molten lava or dried up or struck by lightning or soaked in a barrel of poison or forced between gears or fed to wild beasts.
None of the countless cruel methods that humans had used their high level of intelligence to come up with had been able to bring an end to the life form known as Fräulein Kreutune. She knew that down to the very core of her being.
"... Do you want me to bring this to an end?"
Suddenly, the monster known as Fräulein Kreutune heard someone call out to her from directly in front of her.
She slowly raised her head.
The eyeballs gazing out through the gaps in her long bangs stared at that person.
It was a girl of about 12 who had blonde hair and blue eyes.
Her blouse, miniskirt, and stockings created a contrast of black and white like a high class piano. The reason that outfit that had a certain type of classical air to it did not look out of place on that girl may have been due to the atmosphere of arrogance surrounding her.
Her name was Leivinia Birdway.
She was the boss of the Dawn-Colored Sunlight, the magic cabal that had the greatest scope and ability even in Western Europe.
"I was pursuing Gremlin, but finding you first works too."
She was a member of the magic side, but she completely ignored the unwritten treaty that existed between magic and science in order to gather information on and research the conditions behind the charismatic people and great leaders that were at the base of each culture regardless of whether they were from the magic side or the science side. She was one portion of the hidden side of the hidden side of the world.
Just by her standing there, the speed of a clock's hands could change and the blowing wind could overcome the age.
In the name of the intelligence and divinity held by her magic cabal, she could destroy basic knowledge and assumptions.
In other words...
She could even destroy the absolute conditions that prevented an end ever coming to Fräulein Kreutune no matter what.
"It seems the science side describes you as a creature that thinks using consecutive simple thoughts on the level of an insect and therefore are like the opposite of a complex AI, but we have something a bit different to say on the magic side. Of course, the fact that both sides are talking about it means neither side has come to an ultimate answer, " said Leivinia Birdway."You are an existence with no starting point and no ending point. Or perhaps it would be better to say you have already gone all the way around an unknown number of times. Christianity is a religion that does not accept reincarnation, so they have a clear starting point and goal set. But at the same time, you can view humanity as beginning with the very first one committing a sin and being cast out of paradise and then achieving supreme happiness upon 'returning' to heaven.... I guess it is something similar to a marathon held in a city. At some point during the long, difficult journey, you turn around and head back to the stadium. Do you understand?" asked Birdway.
Fräulein Kreutune's bangs swayed.
She was tilting her head in confusion.
"Perhaps you are an Adam Kadmon that left its mother's womb before achieving clear individuality. Or perhaps you are an existence that finished learning everything and achieved optimization while inside its mother's womb. Now you are like a Moebius strip with no front or back, but the conclusion is the same no matter what. What makes you so incredibly special as a human comes from your purity."
"Pur... ity?"
This time, Fräulein Kreutune tilted her head at such a sharp angle that it looked like she was about to snap her own neck.
What about her was pure?
Had there ever been a creature as irrational, eerie, and unstable as her?
But Birdway continued.
"There are analogous examples in physics. For example, pure water, H20, is used in the manufacturing of semiconductors. When the water is heated up in a microwave oven, it may look like a stable liquid, but it will boil as soon as its container is shaken even slightly. You are an existence with that same strange balance."
She was like a human that had fallen through the gaps of the theories.
In that way, Fräulein Kreutune did not really fall into the levels of complexity normally spoken of.
What she was could not be obtained at #1 or #100; it could only be obtained at the position she happened to be at.
"But the means to prevent the special behavior of pure water and to prevent it from suddenly boiling when it has been evenly heated are quite simple. Even if you are a being that cannot be fully explained from the perspective of the magic side, the techniques of the magic side are enough as long as I only need to defeat you."
That magic cabal boss smiled.
It was a thin, thin, thin smile.
"Just adding a mere pinch of sand will turn pure water into normal water. That prevents the sudden boiling. And that method is perfect for someone like me."
That may have been why organizations like the Anglican Church and the Roman Catholic Church had been unable to handle her.
They set forth to increase the purity of mankind and viewed anyone who got in their way to be evil and their enemy. And this naturally led to their methods of attack being dyed in the shades of eliminating impurities.
Leivinia Birdway was the opposite.
She was from a modern Western magic cabal.
Those groups attempted to create new ways of valuing seemingly needless additions by taking the knowledge of the past and sublimating it to techniques leading to the future. They viewed the pure white as being nothing but a canvas. In their minds, the impurities that mixed into that were possibilities to take in new colors and create art. They refused to turn back as they attempted to create colors more wonderful than simple white.
She was one of those people, so she could do it.
She could do it using techniques those with different values viewed as being nothing but a sign of temptation and corruption.
With just a pinch of sand...
Fräulein Kreutune could be transformed into a body that could be killed.
(If my assumptions are correct, he should be able to do this too. Perhaps he wanted to avoid definitively revealing his identity even if it would allow him to kill an inconvenience to his plan. )
"What will you do?" asked Leivinia Birdway."Obviously, I am not doing this for free. I have my own reasons. A fair amount of sacrifice was forced onto me to obtain information on that spear, after all. I will be using you as bait to draw out that Magic God. But once that is over, you are free. I will end it all for you if that is what you wish."
Fräulein Kreutune's vision wavered.
That was her reaction to having the very base of her thoughts slip away at that extraordinary possibility.
And at the same time...
It felt like something she had been holding inside came gushing out. Something seemed to run from her cheeks to her ears. A new function allowing her to easily crush a skull between her jaws and efficiently devour the brain within was showing itself on her face.
Even so, she stayed put.
She forced herself to stay put.
She made sure her opponent had a chance to attack.
And that sign displayed how she felt about the situation.
"That was plenty."
She heard the sound of something slicing through the air.
At some point a wand had appeared in Leivinia Birdway's right hand.
"Do not worry. After I blow away your arms and legs, I will freeze you in a coffin at minus 195 degrees. Even if I cannot kill you before you exhibit your special behavior, history has proven that you can be sealed away. I will preserve you like that in order to use you as bait for that Magic God."
After saying that, the magic cabal boss fell silent for a moment.
With the wand held at the ready and enough power stored within it to sever the limbs of the monster that forcibly turned aside even the power of Academy City's #1 Level 5, Birdway finally whispered something more.
Her voice was quiet.
But it was certain.
"Everything is okay now. The situation will not grow any worse."
When she heard that voice, Fräulein Kreutune's face could be seen moving slightly from where it was hidden behind her bangs.
It looked like she was smiling.
Even though she had to be imagining her ultimate fate... no, because she was imagining it.
As Leivinia Birdway looked at her dead on, she cast aside all emotion to carry out this final attack perfectly.
And...
Just before she could...
Some giant object fell right between Fräulein Kreutune and Leivinia Birdway.
As previously explained, the multilevel overpass had several levels between the road on the top level and the underground passageways. If one jumped from the road up top, that phenomenon was possible without needing to fly.
And the person who had done so was someone who had once betrayed Leivinia Birdway.
It was someone who always ended up in the middle of the world's conflicts whether he liked it or not thanks to the special power residing in his right hand.
It was a spiky-haired boy.
It was a small hero who would become anyone's ally.
"Hey, Birdway. How about we fight and make up?"
It was Kamijou Touma.
Even though he was always surrounded by misfortune he would always stand in the way of anyone else's misfortune.
It did not matter how injured he was.
It did not matter if he had been betrayed, deceived, and shot in the side.
He would always raise his right hand to protect someone else.
Part 3
"Why?" muttered Misaka Mikoto as she toyed with her hair on the road at the top level.
It might have been due to the unique population distribution of the Ichihanaransai or it might have been due to someone setting up some kind of trick, but the amount of traffic had disappeared to an unnatural extent.
"Why do I have to go along with what you say? Are you seriously asking a girl to help you in a fight? Come to think of it, I can't think of a single reason I have to go along with this."
The asphalt continued on and on and on like a runway.
Someone stood further down the road.
She had white feathers decorating her hair. She wore a short dress with pants forcibly worn underneath, a bulletproof vest, and protectors covering her elbows and knees. It gave her the silhouette of armor. And on top of it all, she had an unnaturally large sword called a claymore hanging down from her hand. It looked like she was holding one of the steel sheets used in construction.
As she walked, the tip of the sword... or rather, the "corner" audibly scraped across the surface of the asphalt.
Her name was Brunhild Eiktobel.
Without even trying to hide her killer intent or aggression, the blonde-haired, blue-eyed woman asked a question in a flat voice.
"Are you my enemy?"
"It's kind of hard to say."
Mikoto then heard a voice from behind her.
She was standing back to back with the Lightning God Thor who was in charge of direct combat within Gremlin.
He was facing a different enemy.
"C'mon, Miko-chan."
"I told you not to call me that! Who the hell are you anyway!?"
"They have formed a group to beat the shit out of Kamijou Touma, who has already been shot in the side, and then abduct a woman named Fräulein Kreutune before his eyes. And they'll be whispering to Fräulein Kreutune that she'll be happiest if they use her for their purposes and then kill her. So what do you think, Miko-chan? Do you approve of that? Do you oppose it? Or will you take the clever route and just look away? Which side do you want to stand on?"
"..."
Mikoto sighed.
With an annoyed tone in her voice, she said, "So it's the same pattern as always."
"Now you're catching on."
"I guess he hasn't changed at all even after disappearing in Hawaii and heading to that Baggage City place."
"I heard that was a horrible battlefield, but it seems he still managed to save some lives. I have no room to talk... in fact, you could say I'm just as much to blame... but Kamijou Touma is trying to finish things with the person you could call the primary cause of all this. Will you support him? Or will you get in his way?"
"Tch."
There was plenty she wanted to say.
But Mikoto just gave up and lightly clicked her tongue.
She did so because she had seen it. She had seen the look of anguish on a certain boy's face after the incident in Hawaii had come to an end and he had realized he had been made to act for someone else's purposes. He had fought, struggled, had some coincidences work in his favor, and had finally managed to reach a place where he could bring an end to the string of nightmares for which he had pulled the trigger himself. This was a one-of-a-kind situation that would never come again if he let it escape him here.
So now what should Mikoto do?
No, what did she want to do?
She did not even hesitate.
Bluish-white sparks flew from her bangs.
She slowly turned back to face Brunhild Eiktobel who was still approaching.
"You owe me one."
"Shouldn't you be saying that to Kamijou-kun?"
"It's embarrassing, so I'm saying it here where he can't hear me."
With a slight smile, Thor turned around to face his enemy as well.
His enemy was Silvia. She was one of the fewer than 20 Saints in the world as well as an elite who was one of the highest ranked of the royal maids who doubled as shrine maidens and bodyguards for the British Royal Family. She was not wearing a traditional and elegant maid uniform. She wore work pants, a work apron, and goggles in a way that looked "somehow like" a maid uniform. A smile that could be viewed as lively appeared on her face.
"How about we get this started?" she asked.
"Sorry. It looks like I kept you waiting."
"Oh, don't worry about it. I got to see something wonderful, so I'm satisfied.... And it really was wonderful. I wish I had been on your side this time."
"It's not too late."
"Unfortunately, I can't."
The sound of something slicing through the air could be heard.
It was coming from a long, long bundle of rope in Silvia's hand.
"I am jealous, but surely you understand that this is not a situation where I can act based on my own personal desires."
"My enemy certainly is pathetic."
"Hearing that is painful. The sad thing about maids is that we can't fight for honor like a king or a knight."
A conflict could not be avoided.
That battle between the powerful would spread destruction around the area whether they liked it or not.
But if it could be contained to this one area that was nearly deserted, it would at least be better than the worst case scenario where the situation covered multiple areas of the city simultaneously, even those causing the damage had no idea who was getting caught in the middle of it all, and the overall scope was unknown.
"Mjölnir... Perform final connection check. Once it is done, begin supply."
As soon as Thor muttered those words, the color of his eyes changed.
Literally.
His hair and fingertips began emitting a pale bluish-white light. It looked like St. Elmo's fire floating around a ship's mast during a storm at sea. Unlike before, Thor's power was being drastically raised by someone other than himself.
Silvia whistled.
"I see. So you normally use it like that."
"Don't try to say this isn't fair. You also have two sources of power as both a Saint and a royal maid."
As he spoke, Thor lightly waved his right hand.
Beams of light similar to arc fusion blades were emitted from his fingertips.
And they grew to 10 meters right away.
Ignoring the explosive noise of the air being roasted, Thor opened his mouth to speak. He had a look of disinterest on his face despite drawing out enough firepower to level a building just by waving his hand like he was shooing away an insect.
And this was just a fragment of his power.
This was nothing but an experiment to see just how far his power had been raised.
"Let's finish this quickly. I doubt a fight with someone as pathetic as you will be any fun at all."
Part 4
Accelerator and Kakine Teitoku.
Those two were the top ranking monsters created by Academy City and known as the city's #1 and #2. They now faced off in the underground passageways at the bottommost level of the multilevel overpass.
Their conflict did not center on Fräulein Kreutune.
They did not have some grand reason for being there such as protecting the city, protecting world peace, or supporting or stopping someone's conspiracy.
So were they acting based on personal emotions such as hatred?
A woman Accelerator knew had almost been killed thanks to a surprise attack carried out by Kakine Teitoku, and the violence created when Accelerator gave into his anger had crushed Kakine Teitoku's entire body and driven him to the edge of death.
But that was not enough to explain it all.
What was down at the root of it all?
They gazed at each other, stared at each other, and carefully observed each other.
While holding his modern cane, Accelerator spat out, "Pathetic."
"Is that so?" was Kakine Teitoku's surprisingly honest response.
It was a bit unclear if that boy could really be said to be Kakine Teitoku himself since over half of his internal organs had been swapped out and even the color of the skin covering his body had changed to something inhuman.
"It's simple. It really is simple. I was forced to do a lot of things while I was hidden deep underground. It was all humiliating, but I gained quite a bit too. And thanks to that I can use my own power to gather everything I lack. This is something that I did not have before. It is a brand new inspiration. And, well, now I'm curious. I'm so curious I just have to know."
It sounded like he was whispering.
It sounded like he was making an appeal.
"How far have I come?"
Kakine Teitoku asked an honest question with the same look on his face as someone who had been deprived of all their special privileges by dropping out of a dark side organization yet had been freed from all sorts of bonds at the same time.
"How far can my Dark Matter go in this world?"
There were tons of things he wanted to try out. There were more items he wished to attempt than there were stars in the sky. But the one issue he had to take care of first overpowered the rest.
That is, had Kakine Teitoku surpassed Accelerator?
Nothing could begin without resolving that issue and everything would be over once it had been resolved.
But...
That was exactly why the #1 only had that one word to say.
Pathetic.
"If you really had prepared everything you lacked, you wouldn't still be stuck on that issue."
What did one gain by taking an Academy City esper power to its extreme?
What did one gain by defeating someone and claiming their throne for oneself?
Those powers were nothing but a means... nothing but a tool.
He had managed to survive the full brunt of Accelerator's out-of-control attack, searched with all his might for a means of regaining his freedom after being hidden underground, and had ultimately gained a new ability not even Accelerator had that allowed him to regenerate his body and manufacture his own organs.
He had come so far and yet the monster known as Kakine Teitoku had not found anyone he wished to protect.
What if...
What if he had found just one person to protect?
Even if it was pitiable and unsightly, what if he had viewed a wider world and obtained that?
Academy City's #2 monster might have been able to take his overwhelming and sinister violence and turn it into nothing more than a power.
"I've had enough of this, " spat out Accelerator in a tone of disappointment."You may have worked out a strategy, made your preparations, waited for the opportune timing, and accounted for any nightmarish coincidences... but it's no use. The way you are now isn't even worth testing against me. You're just overwhelmingly pathetic."
"Don't say that, " declared Kakine Teitoku with a thin, thin smile on his lips."Those conditions you were talking about didn't mention the location. The location can be very important. I made sure to wait for you here. Yes, that's right. Let me say it again: the location can be very important."
"What?"
"Does this place bring back any memories? Or do you not even remember anymore? I suppose it was just one among many. With how overboard you went back then, it isn't too surprising you wouldn't remember every little one."
Accelerator did not recognize the place.
For one thing, he had only fought Kakine Teitoku that one time during the conflict between the dark side organizations of Group, School, and Item. That had been enough to decide the victor between the #1 and #2. But that battle's stage had not been in an underground passageway.
However, Kakine Teitoku continued speaking.
He spoke clearly and confidently.
"Do you really not remember? You really are a heartless bastard. You took so very many lives yet you don't even bother to remember them?"
Something like a small thorn stabbed into Accelerator's mind.
But it was too late.
Kakine Teitoku who controlled Academy City's #2 Level 5 power of Dark Matter took his next action.
"Ha ha! This was one of those stages! This was one of the stages for those repeated experiments where you massacred human clones while going on about being the strongest or invincible or whatever!!"
"You don't mean... !!" shouted Accelerator as he recalled that Kakine Teitoku had the power to create anything that was lacking.
But the change had already begun.
Some white substance that could not be called a liquid or a solid suddenly spread out in every direction from where Kakine Teitoku stood. The substance's surface undulated, rose up, and took on new form.
Accelerator knew that form very well.
The form was modeled off of the clones who were themselves modeled off of a certain girl.
The Sisters.
The people Accelerator had once killed during those cruel experiments. They symbolized his sins.
He could tell his vision was growing unsteady. He could not stop it.
Several girls with the exact same face tilted their heads in puzzlement, stared at their hands, moved their eyes that held little emotion, and otherwise checked on their situation.
And their lips moved.
They moved.
"Misaka has encountered the food known as ramen. The best type is tonkotsu with thin noodles, analyzes Misaka."
"No, no. Shio ramen with soft noodles is the true delicacy. Does Misaka have to kick your ass? asks Misaka as she grabs your collar."
"Don't you dare confuse shio ramen with shio butter ramen, says Misaka as she joins the fray to prove which is the best."
It was so out of place.
The way those expressionless girls lightly hit at each other while inadvertently revealing their midriffs and flipping up their skirts wore horribly at Accelerator's nerves.
They were not just dolls.
They breathed, had a pulse, and had the warmth of life just like any other person.
And he had...
He had...
"Oh, it isn't like these are actually them."
The innocent scuffle suddenly ended as if some switch had been thrown.
Their heads turned and the emotionless camera lenses of their eyes stared directly at Accelerator.
Something huge had forcibly interfered to make them ignore their individual beliefs.
It was as if...
As if some kind of experiment had begun.
"Not even I can fix someone that has completely died. Nor can I make something completely identical to them, " said Kakine Teitoku with a grin. It was the type of grin that would never have appeared on his face had he obtained what he truly needed."This is why I chose this location. I suppose you could call it 'residual thought'. At any rate, I have taken in all the information remaining in these areas and given them shape. There are plenty of ways to read thoughts, but for me it's like a record or a CD. I run Dark Matter across the tiny ups and downs on the surfaces of materials to obtain the information. The event that once happened here left its mark in ways too tiny for the eye to see. The record of those vibrations allows me to replay their final moments."
They were nothing but imitations.
It was like replaying a recorded scream over and over again.
But the original sound was real.
Ultimately, it was real.
Even if they were being used for someone else's purposes and even if they were being led around in an unsightly fashion. Those girls had not been registered by the government, no notification of death was issued for them, they had no grave or remains, and even the recordings on security devices such as cameras and sensors had been completely eliminated. Not only had they been given an irrational death, but no evidence that they had ever even lived remained. This was truly the very, very last proof of their existence.
Could he really destroy that?
Even if he had the power to do so, was it right for him to do so?
After all, he was Accelerator, the one who had ruthlessly robbed those girls of their lives with his own hands.
Could he really erase the only remaining piece of evidence of them in the entire world?
"Heh heh. Looks like it's actually working."
The #2 smiled, and smiled, and smiled.
He spread violence on a level befitting of one who was still a monster.
"Academy City esper powers are controlled using high level calculation ability. Even if you don't normally think of it that way, you are still carrying out complex calculations without knowing it. Throwing that out of order can be quite useful. There's no harm in starting with that, don't you think?"
"You..."
Even all this was just the "start".
He was merely casually testing it out.
"Now then, will you lose the conditions needed for your reflection? Or will you bring out those much, much more insane wings? However this goes, I'm looking forward to it. I do hope you at least make this worthy of testing out my ability!"
"Why yoooooooooooooooooooooouuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu... !!"
Part 5
Kamijou Touma stared directly at Leivinia Birdway.
But even as he did, the one he was truly "facing" was Fräulein Kreutune.
"Are you going to die to bring it all to an end?"
"I..."
"I don't know who your friend is. I don't know what exactly it is you're dealing with. But you can't be serious. If you can't bear to lose your friend, you can't seriously want to give that same pain to your friend."
"..."
"There is someone who wants to protect you just as much as you want to protect them. There is someone who does not want to see you hurt just as much as you don't want to see them hurt."
His enemy was powerful and he could not take his eyes off her for an instant.
That was why Kamijou spoke with his back to Fräulein Kreutune.
"So don't be so ready to say you want to die!! If you live, struggle, and suffer, then you can find it!! You can find the path to an ending in which everyone is smiling! It can't just be about you. It has to be about this person you want to protect so much, too!!"
He could not continue speaking any longer.
Leivinia Birdway had silently begun to move.
It looked like all she had done was slightly wave the wand she was holding.
But in reality, the wand had turned into a sword at some point and an overwhelming gust of wind was created. It cut in between Kamijou and Fräulein Kreutune, and it completely sliced apart the giant overpass that looked like a sports arena.
With the point of the slice as the edge, the overpass tilted along one of its supports like a seesaw. Kamijou and Birdway slid down to ground level.
"... What a fool, " said Birdway as if spitting out the words."Fräulein Kreutune is not a human like you think she is. I don't know if she was lacking something at birth or if she gained this strange behavior by possessing too much, but everything down to her basic construction is beyond our understanding."
"Is that so?" cut in Kamijou casually. And he continued further."She may work on some complicated theory or some difficult to understand reasoning, but all I see is a girl desperately trying to protect her friend. All I see is a girl who has been putting up with so much pain for so long as she tries to endure and hold on so she is not swept away, and has ultimately decided it is easy to make excuses and just give up on everything."
"..."
"And that's all I need. The conflict between Gremlin and Ollerus's group over her? The final piece to make some kind of special spear?... I don't care about any of that. There is a girl before me who is seriously considering some ridiculous idea of throwing away her own life to save a friend! There is no possible reason to not reach out to help her!!"
As he shouted, Kamijou recalled what Thor had once said in a certain fast food restaurant.
My enemy certainly has become pathetic.
(That's right. )
Kamijou finally understood what he had meant. Not doing even the things he could do out of a fear of failure was not his way of doing things. He may have been deceived, used, and unwittingly led around, but he had still had a small power back then. Even if all he could do was run down the rails someone else had prepared, he could still desperately stretch out his hand to grab hold of someone else's hand.
What did it matter who won in the grand scheme of things?
What good was a decision made while only looking to the distant future?
Did he want to become someone who spent so much time looking at the big picture that he did not even notice that his giant feet were trampling others?
"I heard what she said. She may have been muttering about functions and eating brains, but I distinctly heard it. She said she doesn't want to eat that brain. And so I made my decision. Wanting to lend a helping hand is human nature."
"What if those words were nothing but an imitation?"
Birdway's sharp, coldhearted words seemed to stab into Kamijou.
These were the words of an enemy.
She was truly trying to crush the core of Kamijou Touma's being.
"You are mistaken. You are mistaken about the core of this issue. You are mistaken in your belief that Fräulein Kreutune has a mind like you do and that it functions in the same way as yours."
"What?"
"This is not an issue of good and evil or liking and disliking. Fräulein Kreutune is fundamentally different from us."
Birdway lightly swung her sword.
At some point, it had transformed into a cup.
"She is a creature that only appears to think. That is what she is now and that is what she was when her name was recorded in the historical documents. She has always been like that."
That living creature did not possess the function to carry out complex thoughts or to have deep emotions well up within her chest.
She merely made repeated "thoughts" that were even more simplified than those of an insect. It was similar to the thought processes that a robot not equipped with a complex AI used to control its actions and make decisions.
Cool places were better than hot places.
Warm places were better than cold places.
By repeating those decisions with only two possible answers one after another, she could continue to find the easiest environment to live in even without great intelligence or experience.
Eating sweet things was better than eating bitter things.
Choosing bright places was better than choosing dark places.
Wearing soft cloth was better than wearing hard cloth.
When thousands and tens of thousands of those simple decisions were made, that living creature was able live in the optimal spot, eat the optimal foods, and wear the optimal clothes. As she continually moved farther and farther in the more comfortable direction, the living creature came across a certain decision.
It was related to the living creatures known as humans.
Would she mimic them or not?
The living creature made her decision, but she failed. She went to live in a certain village, but she was too sturdy. This fact harmed no one, but it was enough for the people to treat her as something strange and different.
Even as she was thrown into a cell and treated as a witch, she continued her simple decisions.
Yes.
The living creature decided mimicking the people around her and behaving so that she would gain the benefits of a village was the ideal path to live comfortably.
The kind priest said...
To repeat, that living creature did not possess the function of complex thought or the function for deep emotions to fill her heart.
She only had the function to constantly make simple decisions regarding the phenomena before her eyes in order to advance in the more comfortable direction.
So...
The kind priest said...
Where did that image of the smiling woman in those old documents come from? Where was that woman who smiled and insisted she was but a mere human despite not shedding a single drop of blood while being thoroughly tormented in countless tortures and executions?
The answer was simple.
She had of course done nothing but carry out her simple decisions.
In that cell, she had observed the other women who had been rejected by the village and unreasonably convicted as witches. And she had mimicked their behavior.
I am a normal human.
I am most certainly not an evil witch.
Her surprisingly pure eyes had simply observed the women who had continued to insist that in their final moments.
That was the type of creatures she was.
That was just what Fräulein Kreutune was.
She had not spoken those things because she had thought them.
She had not insisted her uninjured state meant she was human because she had believed in the trials by ordeal.
It was nothing but simple decisions.
Nothing but yes or no.
A chain of zeros and ones.
It just so happened that her behavior had made it appear she thought like other humans and felt emotions like other humans. If it had not been a human village before her back then but a pack of lions, she would likely have tried to obtain the benefits of that group by mimicking those wild beasts.
The truth was much too simple and it was that simplicity that caused a chill to run down the back of those that heard it.
"When you get down to it, " said Birdway as she narrowed her eyes and toyed with the cup in her hand, "there is nothing inside of her. No matter how many words she uses and no matter how much she clenches her teeth and holds back tears, there is no real driving force within her. That is just the kind of creature Fräulein Kreutune is.... How can you believe someone like that? The human heart can seal away 'functions'. But she has no real 'mind' so she is a slave to them. If the pattern of those simple decisions... of those zeros and ones changes just slightly, she will unhesitatingly eat the brain of someone she had previously thought of as a friend. And it is all nothing but her simple thoughts leading her in the more comfortable direction."
But...
"I believe her, " instantly replied Kamijou Touma despite hearing all that.
Even Birdway showed a tinge of surprise at that.
Kamijou continued, "If the ultimate answer a living creature comes to with its simple decisions meant to find the optimal decision is that she doesn't want to hurt her friend, it doesn't matter what process led to that decision. If she is the type of human that can come to such a kind answer, then I can believe in Fräulein Kreutune."
"Are you saying you could even grow emotionally attached to a doll made of metal and plastic that's expressions are controlled by a program!? Are you saying you are going to protect something that only has the appearance of a human even after you have been shot in the side!?"
"Yes. If something that smiles like a human, cries like a human, is considerate of others like a human, and tries to protect others like a human is about to be scrapped, then I will clench my fist. It doesn't matter what she's made of or what the inner workings of her head are. She isn't a monster or something strange and different. I'm much more frightened by people who have a brain that can understand others properly but still enjoy deceiving and hurting others."
"..."
But this was not just a hypothetical issue.
Kamijou had met quite a few people with complex circumstances surrounding them. He had met a girl created from an aggregation of AIM diffusion fields and he had met those who made up a network of human clones where the whole could influence the individual and the individual could influence the whole.
But what did that matter?
Did the fact that they had a different construction or makeup mean there was something fundamentally different about who they were?
How was it human to abandon them for that reason?
"And it was because you feel the same that you did not attack Fräulein Kreutune right away, wasn't it?" said Kamijou as a challenge. His voice held conviction."You stood before her and spoke to her despite knowing the base of her thoughts was fundamentally different from your own. Why did you treat her like an equal? Wasn't that because you were taking Fräulein Kreutune's heart into consideration!?"
"Silence."
A large amount of water appeared around Birdway. It swirled around creating a wall that completely surrounded her.
With cold eyes, that magic cabal boss held out the symbolic weapon controlling water.
"Even if she does have a heart that is just of a different type from our own, that does not change what must be done. To destroy Gremlin, the production of that spear must be stopped. If I prove I can do that, the one looking down from the center of that group will make her move. It took a lot of sacrifice to acquire this information. I must lure out the Magic God Othinus and crush her. That takes top priority."
"So it comes down to that in the end, " muttered Kamijou as he clenched his fist once more."But Birdway, you are probably going about this the wrong way."
"... What do you mean?"
"Even if you defeat Othinus by sacrificing Fräulein Kreutune and even if Gremlin completely falls apart without that mental support, taking this quickest and shortest path by deceiving and hurting everyone will only create mutual distrust and suspicion. There is no point in this if you and your Dawn-Colored Sunlight just become more of a monster than Gremlin. For the world and the people you want to protect, this will only change the name of their enemy. This will never bring about peaceful days. And so, " said Kamijou without allowing his words to come to an end."Let's end this. I will stop you here so your determination does not lead to such a horrible conclusion and so that the role of the ultimate villain is not forced onto you!!"
Part 6
In the underground passageways at the lowest level of the multilevel overpass, girls with the same faces as the ones Accelerator had once killed... or rather, something white that had taken their form... charged towards Accelerator. They moved as quickly as a motorcycle and they occasionally kicked off the walls or pillars to maintain their attack course. This was of course something the original girls could not have done. But it was still something Accelerator could easily imagine.
If the Sisters had gained bodies made of Dark Matter, they very well might have chosen precisely that sort of strategy.
(Goddamn you... !)
His vision wavered. He could feel a prickling pain at the back of his head.
He instantly carried out the calculations to control the necessary vectors in the scene before his eyes. He perfectly grasped the movements of those girls who kept low as if sliding across the floor, circled around outside his vision, or kicked off of a pillar to attack from above.
He managed that, but he was not able to counterattack.
In a move that was truly rare for Academy City's #1 monster, he simply moved his body aside to evade the attacks. He took action to just barely escape the range of those slender arms swinging from various directions at once.
He was not afraid of being hit by their attacks.
As they were made of Dark Matter, it was true that their fists had become blunt weapons heavier than large hammers that could easily destroy a human face. And their fingernails could rip apart their prey more easily than a pair of wire cutters that could easily slice through wires as thick as a finger.
But...
He did not evade because he was afraid of having his own body torn apart.
It was quite the opposite.
He was afraid his own reflection would smash their arms and legs.
Of course, this was not a situation in which he could take such a half-hearted stance.
Kakine Teitoku held his right hand out in front of him from where he stood a bit away.
"You are full of openings."
A great roar exploded out.
Kakine Teitoku's entire pure white arm turned into a giant wing. The countless feathers that made up that wing turned into sharp blades. They shot out explosively. Or more accurately, they stretched out like spears with tremendous force, bent in places, and simultaneously attacked Accelerator from many different angles all around him.
They did not even bother slipping through the gaps between the Sisters.
The spears easily pierced straight through the girls.
Accelerator was unable to evade in time and his shaken thoughts were unable to fully implement his reflection. One of the spears tore a shallow wound along the top of his shoulder. Accelerator's body was thrown through the air in a tailspin. He just barely managed to avoid collapsing to the ground and instead landed on the tips of his toes. Only then did he comprehend the terrible scene before him.
They were like insects.
They were like insects stuck to the wall with long, narrow, and very sharp pins.
"Ah..."
He heard a strange squirming noise.
It was the sound of those things shaped like the Sisters repeatedly carrying out their predetermined actions despite having being held motionlessly in midair thanks to being pierced through the torso, arms, legs, or even neck. They made no cries of pain and their faces were not distorted in fear. They did not even realize they had been disposed of. Those hopeless dolls merely continued to faithfully carry out their master's orders.
Accelerator's face writhed ominously at what he saw.
No matter how hard he tried to suppress it, he could not help but remember. He remembered those girls who had once been treated like experimental animals as Academy City's strongest monster unhesitatingly devoured them.
"You motherfuckeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeerrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!!"
His vision grew dizzied.
If Kakine Teitoku was going to toy with him, Accelerator would do to him what he had once done to them.
But then Accelerator saw Kakine Teitoku draw in the countless spears extending from him. The white girls held in place by them once more regained freedom. As if to hold that monster in check, they moved in to attack while dragging their broken bodies along.
"I did a lot of research on you. After all, I had more than enough time to think, " said the #2 monster with a smile."It's no good. Your method just won't work.... Sure, it looks like you have atoned for what you did. The host model that holds the overall will of the Misaka Network has forgiven you. But that does not mean you have been completely forgiven. And I'm sure you know that fact very well."
"... !!"
As he was unable to defeat or even attack them, Accelerator merely continued to evade.
"After all, you view the Sisters as having an aggregate whole in the Misaka Network but you also seem to think the individual personalities of each terminal must be recognized. So the overall will has accepted you? So what? Only the one who was killed can understand the feelings of the one who was killed. If you think about it, it should be obvious."
He tore at Accelerator with his words.
He dug into him.
He thought he had cut off all forms of airborne vibrations, but whether he liked it or not, that voice that was filled with true malice tugged at him, pried open his mind, forcefully slipped inside, and stabbed into his heart. Those thorns he could not pull out robbed him of his composure bit by bit. The equations that controlled his great power fell into disarray.
"And there is no longer any way for you to determine whether you have truly been forgiven."
Accelerator was surrounded by Kakine Teitoku's trick.
He was trapped in a cage made up of gentle words.
"The final piece that might be able to tell you what those you killed thought is this. These final pieces of personal information to remain in this world. But... does it really matter? If you crush them, destroy them, and send them into eternal darkness, your sins will disappear. Suspicions go unpunished. If it is something no one can ever know, then there's no problem, is there? And then you can return to your peaceful world with all the loose ends tied up."
Accelerator's consciousness had been thrown into such disarray that he could barely grasp the words being spoken.
And Kakine Teitoku's gentle voice tore at his nerves some more.
"But anyway..."
He was so filled with anger that he almost lost his balance. And only when he was truly cornered there did he finally realize something. Not only was he unable to control his power, but he was not even properly carrying out the calculations; he barely even noticed anymore that he needed to stand and walk on his own two feet thanks to his injured brain.
"Be crushed by the symbol of your own sins and die, you worm."
The white girls with the same form as the Sisters rushed in to take advantage of that opportunity. Countless arms that rivaled large hammers and wire cutters shot towards him all at once.
It was all over.
Or it should have been.
However...
A tremendous beam of light suddenly broke through the wall and blew away one of the white girls.
This scene occurred right in front of Accelerator who had hesitated to hurt his opponents despite the great danger he was in.
He looked dumbfounded.
He felt like his thoughts had been roasted with the color white.
A face peered in through the large hole in the wall that was glowing orange around the edge. The face naturally belonged to a monster the city had created with cutting edge technology just like Accelerator and Kakine Teitoku.
She was Mugino Shizuri.
She was Academy City's #4. She was the girl also known as Meltdowner.
The appearance of this new threat caused the white girls to stop their attack and change their formation to deal with an attack from both sides.
Mugino ignored them and spoke in an annoyed tone.
"Come on now, #1. If you want to die, then just get it over with. It pisses me off to have to wait my turn. As you can see, I blew one of them away, but don't get too upset. It's your own fault for taking so long against something like this."
Accelerator felt a scorching pain in his head. It led him to shout out.
"You... !!"
"Don't get pissed at me, little monster. You know you're pointing that in the wrong direction, don't you?" Mugino lightly waved her index finger made from cutting edge technology and continued."Only the one who was killed can understand the feelings of the one who was killed. He's right about that. But residual thought given shape? A phonograph replaying their final moments? Who cares? It isn't actually them. He's just making a human model by putting clay over the bones of a corpse."
"..."
"There may be people out there who can truly imagine how the dead feel and shed tears based on it. There may be people who find something the dead left behind and finish it in their place. There may be people who save the dead in that way, but that is not something people like us who killed others while soaked in evil can do. There is nothing we can do, " said Mugino.
That last comment seemed to stab at Accelerator.
But she did not stop there.
"The dead cannot be brought back to life no matter what technology is used. Just speaking from the viewpoint of CPR, someone whose heart has stopped and someone who is clearly dead are two very different things.... You must live in quite the naïve world if you fell for something as simple as this. Did you think someone you had killed might come back to life? Did you think the crime of killing them might be cancelled out if that happened? Were you living while holding that hope inside?"
It had happened just before dawn.
The dark side of Academy City had attacked Mugino Shizuri using someone who looked exactly like Frenda Seivelun. When that had happened, her emotions had not prevented her from unhesitatingly crushing that enemy with her Meltdowner.
The dead could not be brought back to life.
Only the one who had been killed could speak of the feelings of the one who had been killed. Or at the very least, someone who had sullied their hands in the darkness could never speak of them.
What if...
What if something that looked just like them was set up and someone still living used it to put words in the dead's mouth for their own purposes?
That would be desecrating the dead.
That was the lowest method possible that even a sinner could get angry at.
"I read the reports about you and those clones, " said Mugino readily."It was almost cute compared to me who killed for no reason at all. You still have some room for complicated and convoluted excuses. You're probably still going to hell just as much as I am, but there may be some things you can do before you go there.... So what will you do? If you want to fool yourself into thinking you're actually facing the dead and let them kill you as revenge, that's fine by me. If you want to retrieve the dead's dignity and peaceful rest from the bastard who dug up their bones and added flesh to them for his own amusement, that's fine by me too. It's your pathetic life. Do whatever the hell you want."
"I know..." The words slipped out of Accelerator's clenched teeth as if he was trying to crush them."I know that. I know I'm just licking my own wounds. I know they only look like the real thing because I'm superimposing my own wounds over them. But even so..."
It was as if Accelerator was opening up his own wounds and letting dark blood flow out.
He was choosing to touch his own greatest pain.
"That is... They are the final proof that those I killed ever existed. No matter how horrible a method they are being used for, they are still the final evidence that the lives I stole were ever here!!"
"... That's all the more reason, " spat out Mugino."You say that is all there is left. You say that is the entirety of what lives on of someone. Well, all of that has been stolen and is being used and controlled. If that is acceptable... if you – not the dead – find that to be acceptable, then just let yourself be killed like the loser you are. I'll finish everything afterwards."
She was not saying all this in order to warn him of the path he was taking.
With the path she had walked down, she was certainly not qualified to do that.
"Don't think you can end this without getting your hands dirty."
Even so, something did sit well with her.
And so she spoke.
"You have to dirty your hands to give the dead a clean end. Only the one killed can know how the one killed feels, but only the living can act based on their feelings for the dead.... Rejecting that and running away is not being honest or being a pacifist. It is being a coward."
"... Ah."
In truth, he knew that.
Even if he was injured, collapsed pathetically to the ground, and had his life taken here, the dead no longer existed, so they would think nothing of it one way or the other. The whole reason killing was such a taboo was because it robbed people of even that basic function.
He just needed resolve.
He needed to bring new doubt to what was supporting the very base of his psyche.
Even if the overall will of the Misaka Network had accepted him...
Even if the special unit known as Last Order had forgiven him...
That did not mean it was over.
But...
That was no reason to abandon those dead who were now being used as playthings.
"... I will destroy them, " muttered Accelerator. Great power entered his voice."It'll be all right. If you need something to prove you existed, I will be that remnant. I will dig deeply into this world to leave behind an indelible mark that will prove that you were here as the ones who were sacrificed to the monster that I am. These twisted records are no longer needed. I just have to return you to a place where the dark side of science like me can't reach you. I will end it all!!"
"Oh?"
Finally, Kakine Teitoku opened his mouth after listening in with a thin smile.
He could have violently interfered at any time, but he chose to simply watch.
Like the audience that began speaking amongst themselves as soon as the play ended and the theatre lights came on.
"Is that how you're going to accept it? Only the one killed can know how the one killed feels, so you're just going to claim you don't need to know and stop thinking about it?"
"You would never understand. You are the type who puts words in the dead's mouth for your own benefit and never faces how you feel about the dead yourself. They say not even death can cure an idiot. Well, it looks like nothing can cure you of being pathetic. You're powerful, but you're pathetic. It might have been better for you if you had just died back then. That way you could have ended life as the high level esper that defeated me, the #4. But you didn't know to quit when you were ahead, and now you're going to lose even that."
Mugino's tone was one of disinterest.
An oddly bright light grew from her palm.
"And it isn't like I don't have my own reasons to be here. I was attacked by a false Frenda last night. You were the biggest factor of the darkness active at that time and the interest in playing with the dead was the same. I don't know what your purpose in that was, but I'm going to make you pay for disturbing her grave, you piece of shit."
The #1 and the #4 specialized in destruction.
The #2 had the ability to eternally create.
Those monsters had split into two groups and glared at each other. The battle began in the very next moment.
Part 7
On the road at the top level of the multilevel overpass that had an unnatural absence of cars, Misaka Mikoto and Brunhild Eiktobel faced each other.
This too may have been a historic moment.
On one side was Misaka Mikoto the Railgun, one of the top ranked espers created by the science side.
On the other side was Brunhild Eiktobel who possessed the innate characteristics of a Saint that were exceedingly rare even on the magic side.
They were about to clash.
For a battle that was brought about by coincidence, it threatened to have great effects to both the magic side and science side.
However, the battle was overwhelmingly one-sided.
Academy City espers may have possessed quite a bit of power, but Brunhild Eiktobel possessed the rare qualities of a Christian Saint. And on top of that, she also possessed the rare qualities of a Norse Valkyrie. The two abilities worked against each other and the upper limit of her power changed over a set period like the waxing and waning of the moon. However, she did not currently appear to be having any problems related to that.
And there was a problem that came before trivial differences in power.
Brunhild Eiktobel could reach a top speed that exceeded the speed of sound.
And she brought out that top speed from the very first step.
By the time the explosive noise rang out, it was already too late.
From the perspective of one's bodily senses, Brunhild seemed to just disappear. And since she was moving faster than sound, one could never react in time based on sound.
Brunhild Eiktobel charged up to a point right in front of Mikoto and vigorously swung up the claymore hanging down from one hand.
She also twisted her wrist to lay the giant sword down flat as she swung it.
Normally, this may have been an attempt to not hit one's opponent with the blade of the sword. However, the situation here was different. Brunhild Eiktobel could move at supersonic speeds and the claymore she held was like a giant sword made by attaching a grip to a metal sheet.
By laying the blade flat, she could use it like a giant fan made of steel.
An overwhelmingly violent fan that used the massive shockwave created when an object moved at supersonic speeds.
That would end it.
Not only would it crush the girl's fat and muscles from the outside, but her eardrums, lungs, and trachea would rupture from within.
However...
"Damn you!!"
"!?"
She reacted just before it hit.
A dull noise came from below their feet. The ground below moved. The road at the top of the overpass was made in blocks that included the supports below. The girl controlled one entire block with magnetism to tilt it like a seesaw.
This caused Brunhild's aim to be off with her claymore strike and the sonic boom flew off into the distance. All the glass in one of the buildings alongside the road was smashed to pieces.
(A broad-use electric type? So did she use some kind of radar? No, this is... !!)
Iron sand had been thinly spread all across the road surface.
Even if Brunhild Eiktobel's movements exceeded the limits of the girl's kinetic vision, she could clearly see what path Brunhild had taken thanks to her footprints.
And Misaka Mikoto did not stop there.
She snapped her fingers and shouted, "Be swallowed up!!"
The iron sand rose up in every direction.
It all began vibrating at high speed to create a storm of killer needles and then shot towards Brunhild Eiktobel from all 360 degrees around her.
Brunhild grabbed her giant claymore with both hands and swung it around in a full circle like she was performing a giant swing.
The explosive roar came slightly after the fact.
The air was agitated at tremendous speed and that deadly swarm that was being controlled by great magnetic power was struck by the even more tremendous power of the sonic boom created. The iron sand lost its form and was blown away.
Mikoto escaped the shockwave by controlling the rebar in the overpass road to create a thick wall of concrete in front of her. She used magnetism to once more gather the scattered iron sand and check on her next target.
"That sword!!"
Brunhild Eiktobel was aiming for Mikoto's neck with her claymore, but the sword stopped in midair.
But once again it did not last even a second.
As if it was stuck in a wall and she was pulling it out, Brunhild ignored the great magnetic power and used her tremendous arm strength to forcibly swing the giant sword horizontally.
But...
"One second... is enough!!"
She had taken aim.
Bluish-white sparks flew from Mikoto's bangs.
With the roar of the air bursting, the lightning spear directly struck the steel claymore. Not even Brunhild was able to ignore that. The high voltage current passed from the blade to her wrists and then rushed throughout her entire body.
Meanwhile, Mikoto swung her left hand. It was the same motion as that used in a sidearm throw in baseball.
Something large moved as if following her palm.
It was a giant mass of reinforced concrete. It flew straight for Brunhild to perform a deadly body blow.
Brunhild forcibly recovered from the electric damage in an instant and used her claymore and her physical strength to stop that mass that could likely destroy a building wall.
A struggle began like two opponents with their swords locked together.
"From the looks of you, you have little to do with magic, " said Brunhild finally. It may have been that she had only now recognized her opponent as being worth speaking to."Then why are you participating in this conflict over Fräulein Kreutune? I am not trying to start an argument over which side she belongs to, but approaching her increases the risk of getting wrapped up in the core of Gremlin."
"I don't want to hear that from the person who suddenly rushed in trying to kill me.... At any rate, I don't know or care about any of those big picture issues. To be honest, I have no good reason to be fighting here."
While using her left hand to control the concrete hammer, Mikoto used her right hand to create a sword of iron sand.
And then...
"But I do know one thing."
"And what is that?"
"You don't need a good reason to save a friend. If you want to save them, then save them.... I know someone who kept saying those stupid things even when he was driven to the brink of death, and he really did save over 10, 000 people in the end. And that idiot that saved so many people is trying to save someone today like always. I know I can't stop him. No matter how much I don't want him to do anything dangerous, seeing him off with a push to the back is the sign of a good woman!!"
A loud snapping sound came from the thick concrete.
Something other than simple sharpness of the blade forcibly hacked through the obstacle and secured the claymore's path.
At the same time, Mikoto swung the iron sand sword with all her might before the claymore could pick up speed.
But when it came to a competition of physical strength, she would lose.
In the very first strike, Mikoto saw the vibrating iron sand could not slice through the steel sheet making up the claymore. She immediately released the iron sand sword.
Instead, she took a coin she had taken out at some point and placed it on top of her thumb. She held her hand out towards Brunhild Eiktobel.
This was the technique she was named after.
She was about to fire the Railgun.
"I have my own reason. I want to save that idiot, so I will!!"
A great flash of light exploded out.
On top of the same overpass road, the Lightning God Thor watched the phenomenon behind him that resembled an explosion and felt the stinging vibration on his skin. A smile formed on the corner of his mouth. This was a wild and belligerent smile unlike his previous one.
"Ohh, ohh. Now, they're having some fun. I don't know whether I should praise Academy City for their creations or praise that Valkyrie for keeping up her supersonic speeds even after all that."
"Cut the crap, boy."
Silvia the Saint looked at Thor's right hand with a surprised expression. Arc fusion blades stretched over 20 meters from his five fingers. Even at that level, it was unclear just how powerful an Electromaster of the science side would be needed to duplicate it.
Yet a clear look of astonishment could be seen on Silvia's face.
Of all of Gremlin and all the Saints, she was the woman who was always standing closest to Ollerus. And yet this level of power was enough to make her look astonished.
She had that much power herself.
In fact, if they were not that powerful, neither Thor nor Silvia would have been able to stand where they were standing.
"With your level of power, you should be able to produce 10 times that length. No... It goes beyond that. If you are really named after Thor, then your true nature lies elsewhere. You don't fit in the category of a lightning god."
"Even so, I still feel ashamed." Thor seemed to completely switch over his focus. He switched from watching a distant battle to facing the enemy before him."I wanted to avoid this. This isn't the worst possible turn of events, but it's only two or three from the bottom.... This is no fun. My killing will involve many others and could even reach the level of a war. I didn't start this fight for that to happen."
"So you want to keep the extent of the sacrifices to a bare minimum?"
"If possible, I wanted to avoid having this clash in the first place, " replied Thor honestly."If I and someone with power rivaling mine have a true battle, that alone could blow away half the city. So don't worry, young lady. I will hold back as much of my power as I can. I won't go beyond the lightning god level of Thor. If you die from just that, it's really your own fault."
"Hah hah. You don't need to worry about that."
Silvia laughed at that arrogant announcement.
It was a much too forceful laugh for a maid.
"I am probably the top ranked magician when it comes to that."
The sound of something slicing through the air could be heard. It was coming from the bundle of rope Silvia held. She swung her arm around, swung her upper body around, and then spun around on the spot. By the time she did that, the rope had drawn out a complex shape in the air.
It was a complex collection of loops.
Just as Thor thought it looked like the string used to spin Japanese tops, a very bad feeling rushed through him.
Silvia moved.
She moved faster and faster and entered the supersonic realm of the Saint as she continued her ballroom dance that seemed meant to strangle one's partner. As she did, complex power entered the rope.
The rope was forcefully pulled back and the many loops constricted and provided vectors as if to spin the object held within.
But there appeared to be nothing inside the loops.
Except there was.
There was air.
"Damn you!!" immediately shouted Thor.
There was an explosion.
She had grabbed the air. From the perspective of physics formulas, it was not impossible. After all, even the air had some resistance. It could create friction. And so it should have been possible to grab the air and spin it like a Japanese top.
But could it be done with the physical body of a human?
One needed to grab hold of a mass of air, spin it with tremendous power to turn it into a swirl of shockwaves, and send it after the target from multiple directions. Who could pull off such a wild technique?
Each one was larger than a crane's wrecking ball that could destroy a building and was likely enough to bury even an underground shelter.
The phenomenon was created by overwhelming physical strength.
The tiny resistance of the air that people normally did not even notice was being used to produce such great power.
(But that isn't enough to explain it!!)
Thor immediately swung the arc fusion blades on his right hand.
The air was nothing more than air. He was trying to blow away the swirls of shockwaves by heating up the air to a massive temperature so it expanded explosively.
But it did not work.
After two or three smashing blows, the arc fusion blades suddenly stopped moving. They stopped when their 20 meter length was just about to reach the rope that was still dancing through the air and Silvia who was spinning at high speed.
"My specialty is barriers, " said Silvia as she slowed down her spinning and planted her feet firmly on the ground. Even so, the several dozen meters of rope were still swimming through the air like the ribbon in rhythmic gymnastics."People were always getting mad at me at Buckingham Palace for destroying the palace's equipment too much for a bodyguard. And so I thought long and hard about a way to intercept the assassin without destroying everything around me too. What I came up with was a barrier to suppress my own power."
"A pattern made from a single continuous line with a Christian angel base... So it's a modern Western magic sigil."
"That's right."
That was a method of drawing out Telesma from a different phase that existed on top of this world and sealing it inside an object. The charm was completed by referencing a rose pattern with the letters of the Hebrew alphabet arranged in a set pattern to trace out the name of the angel one wished to call.
In all likelihood, Silvia was not trying to access Telesma. She likely wanted something that functioned as a temple pillar that appropriately guided her great power into itself.
In other words, it was a barrier for a summoning ceremony.
It acted more like the semiconductors in delicate equipment than it did a simple wall. It would complexly switch back and forth between allowing power to pass through and sealing off that power depending on the time and situation in order to provide greater ability and delicacy to what would otherwise be a simple torrent of power. This type of technique was used to give form to "something that (looked like it) could answer any question" using the power flowing into this world from the other phase. It was the same as how sending an even electric current into an integrated circuit allowed complex calculations to be performed.
"I create a wall of Telesma along the rope which makes up a 'hand' that grabs the air."
Silvia once more began spinning around at high speed.
The rope writhed through the air like it was trying to lure something.
That great serpent that swam through the sky then distinctly bared its fangs.
"So... well... don't worry. I am probably one of the most skilled in the world when it comes to not getting others wrapped up in my fights. Just entrust your worries to this maid and go nuts!!"
(Not good. She isn't just using one angel's name. It changes from Gabriel to Raphael, then from Raphael to Michael, then from Michael to Uriel. She's trying to build the power of each consecutive sigil off the power of the previous one!!)
Tarot could be used in many different ways, but in modern Western magic, a reversed card could be used to take advantage of the affinities between the four elements. What card was placed next to the current card could strengthen the useful symbols of the card or the troublesome symbols of the card.
This method was different from those of God's Right Seat who had specialized in a single form of Telesma.
Even if this magic could never compare to them in any one of the four elements, it attempted to outdo them overall with its superior balance.
"Honestly, there really isn't anyone normal around that monster!!"
"Can I take that as a compliment?"
Not even Thor could keep up with the movements of the rope anymore.
But he could see the effects.
The actual movements of the rope did nothing more than create symbols that activated magic. He could see something like a gray dust heading towards the overpass as if it was being guided by the rope.
In the very next instant, one entire block of the overpass road was forcefully spun like a top.
Those gray claws were much too primeval to be referred to as fingers. They had taken that single segment of the road that was several dozen meters long and flipped it over like it was a tea table. But the speed had been so incredible that the road did not simply flip upside down; it continued to spin in place like an electric fan.
It had been ripped off of the support that had held its huge weight.
And both Thor and Silvia herself were still on it.
(You've gotta be kidding me!!)
Thor had been suddenly thrown up into the air with nothing beneath his feet. Those feet swam through the air seeking something to land on. The soles of his shoes finally contacted the side of the road that had already made several full rotations. But it was difficult to call it a "landing". For one thing, if he did manage to stand there, he would have rotated 180 degrees and fallen off after a single second.
But there were some people who could manage it.
Saints.
They could move at supersonic speeds with no assistance.
There was a great difference between the breadth of options available to a normal person in a second and that available to Silvia in a second. Even if the side of the road was only pointing up for 0. 1 seconds, it was simple enough for her to run across that edge like a sprinter and charge at Thor.
While licking her lips and continuing to control the rope that danced through the air drawing out complicated sigils, Silvia headed straight for him. The intense sense of danger Thor felt slowed the speed at which time seemed to pass for him, but that maid's speed still overshadowed his.
"Mjöooooooooooooolniiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiir!!!!!" he shouted.
Thanks to his new supply of power, light explosively surged from Thor's limbs. He did not use those arc fusion blades to slice through anything. He used them as electric boosters by explosively expanding the air to forcibly accelerate the movements of his own body.
Thor's body was forced into a spin.
He managed to actually contact the side of the road.
At the same time Silvia reached him.
Instead of using her rope, she attacked directly with her fists two or three times.
If he tried to block those blows with his arm, the arm would explode. Thor forcibly twisted his body around to avoid the blows. Every one of his actions just about tore the joints of his arms and legs to pieces. He was keeping his movements to the bare minimum, but the human body was not made to function at those speeds.
"Ghhh... !!"
Thor pushed forward his arc fusion blades as if trying to strike Silvia and used the fact that she repelled it with the barrier created by the rope's pattern to send himself flying backwards.
He thought he had escaped.
But it may have been a mistake for him to think that.
With no footing once more, Thor began to fall as he was pulled down by gravity. Thor somehow managed to land on the support that was sitting along on the lower level now that it had lost the road that had sat on top of it like an umbrella.
And then he felt a chill run down his spine.
Silvia was clinging to the road block that was still rotating in midair. She was skillfully running along to match the movements of the road as it continually changed which face pointed up like a rolling die. It was similar to an acrobat balancing on a ball. As she did so, a new movement began in the rope. New sigil after new sigil was created and each angel name was overwritten by a different angel name. As this progressed, a tremendous power gathered around her.
And then Silvia jumped from the midair piece of road.
The rotating block of road made an odd movement that seemed to follow the way Silvia had twisted her body. It was as if she was controlling it via magnetism. As if it was connected to her right foot by something invisible, the giant mass of concrete and asphalt began rotating both horizontally and vertically... and then it suddenly dropped down like a morning star.
Thor's eyes opened wide in shock and he shouted out, "Y-you idiot!!"
"I was called that a lot at Buckingham Palace too."
A tremendous vibration shook the entire area.
It was like some horrid cup-and-ball game. As if she was returning the road she had destroyed, it slammed back down on top of the support that had been left behind. She even made sure the road surface was facing up.
Of course, she slammed it down so that it would catch Thor between the giant weight of the road and the support below.
"Well, that should do it, " muttered Silvia in disinterest as she landed on top of the road she had slammed down and retrieved the rope from the air with nothing but movements of her wrist."If you want to fight a Saint seriously, you need to start by altering some of your basic assumptions. I can extend an instant so much with my speed that my movement options are orders of magnitude greater than normal."
Silvia then turned around in order to deal with the remaining opponent.
In that direction, Brunhild Eiktobel and the Academy City girl's battle was still ongoing. But a two-sided attack from two Saints would finish that quickly enough.
But then...
The ground wobbled. Silvia initially assumed just placing the road back on its support after ripping them apart must not have been enough to keep its balance, but that was not it.
It was not simply wobbling.
She could feel clear intent in the motion.
"Did you forget, you piece of shit... ?"
She heard something from below.
That was when Silvia finally realized what was happening.
"Don't tell me... you're forcibly lifting up the road!?"
"The Lightning God Thor was a god of superhuman strength. Throughout all of Norse mythology only two could use the lightning hammer Mjölnir because of how damn heavy it was. My spiritual items include his belt. I hold the name of the god of war said to be even more powerful than the god that ripped apart Fenrir's jaws. Do you really think a mere bridge is going to be enough to crush me!?"
Silvia's vision rose by about 15 meters in an instant.
No...
Thor had taken the block of road trying to crush him and thrown it straight up into the air.
(So he's the type with strength that he cannot convert into speed. )
Silvia calmly thought while flying through the air.
She was a Saint. Given her athletic ability, she need not fear falling. After all, she could jump over to a nearby building rooftop with such ease she might as well hum as she did so.
But...
(Wait... 15 meters?)
Her eyebrows moved slightly.
She sensed danger.
Fifteen meters in the air was well outside the reach of a normal human. But how long had the arc fusion blades stretching from Thor's right hand been?
"20 meters... shit! He can reach me!!"
Silvia frantically swung her rope to draw out the barrier sigil. The attack came in the next instant.
It was like a terrible cook battling a giant radish with a kitchen knife in hand.
Those five scorching claws moved mercilessly for Silvia and roasted unevenly through the road that was flying through the air.
Part 8
The roar caused by that great mass striking the ground acted as a sign.
Leivinia Birdway was the first to move.
The symbolic weapon in her hand took various forms to match its use and element.
Right now, it was a cup.
That corner of the four directions represented water, the back, the moon, women, and blue. It also controlled one of the suits in the minor arcana of tarot.
The wall of water swirling around her stretched upwards all at once. Once it reached a set height, it stretched out in an even disk. That transparent piece of art that could be mistaken for a giant umbrella or tree grew hundreds and thousands of cold, sharp fruits.
Harvest time was represented by a torrential rain.
A shower of water daggers fell in every direction around Birdway. The umbrella-like silhouette was eaten away from the inside as its entire area was transformed into deadly weapons.
She knew.
She knew that Imagine Breaker could negate any supernatural power but that it was limited to his right wrist and down. And so the optimal answer was not a single absolute attack but a huge mass of normal attacks that overwhelmed him.
He could likely negate one or two of them.
He might be able to evade a third and fourth.
But that would be the end of it.
The thousands, tens of thousands, and hundreds of thousands of daggers were packed in so tightly that they did not leave enough space for a human to hide. Everywhere but the location where that boy held his right hand would be skewered again and again.
Or so it should have been.
However...
"... !!"
A high-pitched noise rang out.
Kamijou Touma had raised his right hand above his head and negated one of the many approaching daggers with his fingertips.
But it did not end there.
As the water dagger shattered like glass, its fragments scattered in every direction and struck the other surrounding daggers. This slightly altered their trajectory. This caused a chain reaction that created a blank spot that should not have been there.
It was a phenomenon that could only occur when the daggers were packed in so tightly that no space for a human was left.
All of the water daggers struck the asphalt and sent orange sparks flying throughout the entire area. Only the area one meter around Kamijou had avoided damage.
Precognition.
After so many battles with both scientific espers and occult magicians that they were commonplace for him, Kamijou had obtained that sense that resembled the instinct of an artisan. When he tried to understand it himself, it only threw off its accuracy.
But Birdway's expression did not change.
"I already worked that into my plan, you idiot, " she quietly spat out.
She had aimed for that moment after Kamijou broke through the shower of water daggers with just his right hand and had switched his thoughts over from defense to offense.
At a point near Kamijou's left side, a small flicker of white light appeared in what should have been empty air.
In the very next moment, a pure white flash of light exploded out. It was a spherical explosion with a diameter of about 10 meters. It tore straight through the road signs and asphalt. She unhesitatingly bared her fangs during that moment when Kamijou was switching gears in his mind.
She called it a summoned explosion.
This supernatural phenomenon was not caused by preparing temples, symbolic weapons, chants, or ceremonies to complexly draw out and use Telesma. She simply called forth the power and let it loose without giving it form. Saying she simplified and sped up the process made it sound nice, but it was the same as firing a rocket without going through any kind of a safety check. If a magician without the proper knowledge tried to use it, they would simply become the stereotypical horror victim as they were swallowed up by the power they themselves had called forth.
"Ghh... !!"
Kamijou forcibly twisted his body and tried to suppress the explosion with his right hand.
This created an even larger opening.
Leivinia Birdway had already transformed her symbolic weapon into the sword that represented wind.
She casually held it up and swung it down.
Her attack would cut straight through one edge of the battlefield.
And through the joint of Kamijou Touma's right shoulder.
The boy was still in the middle of holding out his right hand to deal with the summoned explosion that had appeared near his left side. He did not have time to swing his arm back around and block the wind sword. And because he had forcibly twisted his body around, he was very nearly off balance and therefore could not jump back either.
In other words, this was checkmate.
Birdway was worried about the unknown phenomenon that occurred when his arm was severed, but Kamijou himself could not freely control it either. If that was the end of it, that was fine. If he started going on a rampage, that would simply create many, many more openings for her to attack. Just two or three more swings of her arm would end it even if that happened. There was no way he could turn the situation around. It was that kind of decisive checkmate.
But...
However...
The wind sword Birdway fired was knocked away by something.
That something was a pure white light.
It was the light of the summoned explosion that should have been attacking Kamijou Touma.
"What... !?"
This time, Kamijou's actions had left Birdway's expectations. She immediately transformed her symbolic weapon into a wand and held it out horizontally.
It had been his right hand that had caused it.
Imagine Breaker was nothing more than the power to negate supernatural powers. It could not be used for anything other than that. But he could freely move those five fingers and make various different forms out of his hand. And whether it was fire or water, power would naturally flow in the path of least resistance.
Fire would spread in the direction with more oxygen.
Water would flow down a hill.
And...
There were tons of technologies that took advantage of those properties.
For example, guns used a tube made of a strong material to send the explosive power of gunpowder in a single direction to fire a bullet.
For example, directional landmines attached the explosive on the inside of a bowl-shaped panel to use more of its force to pierce through a tank's armor.
Air ducts, electric cables, gas turbines, a crane's wrecking ball, steam locomotives, skis, smokestacks, pasta makers, fuel pumps... and in a broader sense, even the roads that controlled the flows of people.
It was no different from that.
He had not used Imagine Breaker to negate the supernatural power.
He had brought his five fingers right up to its border to create the ultimate "wall" with his right hand. That had created a sort of guide rail that made the direction he wanted into the "path of least resistance" for the explosive power. He had used that to send the summoned explosion in the direction of the wind sword.
"Did you forget? I directly fought Fiamma of the Right."
The unexpected event created an opening in Birdway.
Kamijou kicked off the asphalt in order to make the most use of it. He ran.
"And so I know there are powers with a pressure great enough that I can't completely negate them with my right hand. You just have too much power, Birdway!!"
For the first time, Birdway clenched her back teeth slightly.
And she spat out, "Is your hand the symbol of petty tricks? You may have gotten one strike in, but you're still out of your league!!"
While still holding her wand out horizontally, Birdway spun it around once like a baton.
Orange flames shot out along its path. The flames grew into a giant wall which pressed towards Kamijou.
"That's just a distraction!!"
Kamijou penetrated the wall without negating it with his right hand.
Instead of trying to destroy it head on, he swung his arm to the side in a pushing motion to divert the scorching wall in a different direction where it simply burned through the scenery.
Immediately after he got rid of that orange curtain, a group of gray daggers that appeared to be made of stone flew towards him like a storm.
Kamijou twisted his body with all his strength to avoid a single blade mixed in with the rest. A trail of red blood ran down from where his cheek was lightly scratched.
But Kamijou smiled.
"That knife alone was real. Isn't that right, Birdway!?"
"Hah. Such interesting behavior!"
If he had simply tried to break through it all with his right hand, that blade would have pierced right through his palm.
While in an awkward position after swinging his upper body around, he forcibly swung his fist and destroyed one of the many remaining blades. The chain reaction of destruction and impacts with fragments opened up a slight safe area just like with the downpour of water blades.
There was now only a few meters between the two of them.
He would reach her with just a bit more effort.
"Well, I suppose there would have been no reason to give you so much focus if you were just a kid who swung his right hand around."
As Kamijou stepped further forward, Birdway reached behind to her back. It was an action similar to pulling a sword from a scabbard on her back, but it was more likely she had something hidden in the back of her blouse.
Kamijou thought she was going to pull out some kind of suspicious card or crystal ball.
But she did not.
"I do not much like modern weapons like missiles and machine guns."
She pulled it out.
She held it out.
"But these flintlock guns are a different matter. I told you that once before, didn't I?"
It was an old-fashioned handgun that could only hold a single bullet. It was colored with black oak and gold, so it looked like something a pirate would have used long, long ago.
All the muscles of Kamijou's body stiffened.
He had a single piece of proof.
That was the hole in his right side. The wound from being shot by Anti-Skill.
In other words...
Kamijou Touma did not have the physical ability needed to evade a bullet that had nothing to do with supernatural powers.
"Birdway... !!"
"I cast aside my pride."
They were just a few meters apart.
He only had to take one more step. Then his fist could reach her. But Birdway's slender finger touched the trigger to make the best use of that definite distance.
She was not aiming at his head. Even at that close range, she was aiming exactly at his lower abdomen that was his center of gravity. That made it near impossible for him to evade. Even if he frantically swung his body out of the way, she could still hit him somewhere on his torso.
With her voice almost in a whisper, she added, "So that I could be certain of victory."
Part 9
The limited space of the underground passageway may not have been spacious or sturdy enough for those three monsters created by Academy City.
The first attack came head on.
The white dolls created based on the residual thoughts of the Sisters charged towards Accelerator, and the hundreds of feathers of the wing that had been Kakine Teitoku's right arm turned into a storm of spears that filled the entire area as they violently attacked without bothering to avoid the girls.
But...
This time, Accelerator's heart and mind did not disturb the equations that controlled his powers.
If he resolved himself and looked straight ahead, he only needed to see them off.
He would see them off to a place where no one could reach them from that shitty city that was forcibly holding them here.
"Use this, " said Mugino from next to him."This is your job."
In the next instant, a beam of light shot from Mugino Shizuri's palm and headed straight for Accelerator. That Particle-Function Waveform High Speed Cannon was powerful enough to slice an Aegis ship in half. If any disturbance had existed in the #1's reflection equations, he might have been turned to ash without even having time to feel pain.
But that did not happen.
He made sure of it.
"..."
Accelerator accurately grasped the vectors of that attack. He adjusted and focused the vectors to give them new form and properties. And then he used it to attack all three of the attacking girls at once.
Sound disappeared.
There was only light.
This went beyond simply piercing through them or roasting them. They disappeared. Not even a single piece or 1 mm fragment remained. They were truly annihilated. He made sure they would never be controlled so unreasonably again. Those girls should not have been there, so he returned them to where they belonged.
The girls' expressions had not changed even up to the very last moment.
He had no idea what they might have been thinking when that moment came.
But that was fine.
It was possible there really was someone in the world who could understand or determine the feelings of the dead and use that to save their hearts. There may have been someone who could honor the dead by helping resolve the things they regretted or had left behind. But that was not a job for Accelerator who had given himself into the darkness and killed too many people. However, before he went to hell, there were things he could do even with his power that was a like an incarnation of violence and destruction.
The feelings of the dead belonged to the dead.
They must not be used for the benefit of others.
To ensure that those feelings were not destroyed, Academy City's #1 would gently seal them away and definitively see them off. And he would stand in the way of anyone trying to disturb them like a grave keeper before grave robbers. Because he reeked too greatly of death, he could not claim that humans were fundamentally good, but he would still work to protect the things he wished to protect.
He was finished chasing after a certain someone and focusing too much on that someone.
He would take a different path.
Even if he could not do what that someone did, he could do things that someone could not.
He would become what only he could be.
"Oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!"
He grabbed at the large number of approaching spears, grabbed ahold of the vectors of something flowing through them, and forcibly reversed that flow. Dark Matter contained no blood, but Accelerator could feel a pulse signal similar to bioelectricity. Just like destroying the center by applying pressure to an extremity, he broke through all the countless spears at once. Kakine Teitoku's body at the center twitched a bit.
"See?"
Mugino fired a Meltdowner beam while Kakine Teitoku's movement was briefly stopped.
The majority of his upper body was blown away.
But...
"In the end..."
Some white substance had spread out around Kakine's remaining legs.
It was on the floor, the wall, and even the ceiling.
"I can create almost anything, but it seems I'm the best at creating myself. The specs are highest with that. The single original is better than 10, 000 clones. It's a miniaturized version of one of Academy City's set rules."
Something stood "up" perpendicularly from the wall.
It was a pale white Kakine Teitoku.
Mugino stared at it like it was some gruesome piece of art.
"Your main body supposedly has a few flesh-and-blood organs left in it. Did you move them away into the floor just before I attacked?"
"Well, what do you think? Did I move my organs out of the way at the last second or did I just remake all of them? Were the organs ever in that body to begin with? Are they in this one now? Maybe they're scattered throughout the city and connected by thin strands of Dark Matter. And of course, would it even do any good to destroy my flesh-and-blood organs now?"
Academy City had espers who could transform their appearance, but this went well beyond that. Was his brain creating his powers or were his powers preserving their existence by creating his brain? Was he alive or dead? Was this a dream or reality? He was a Moebius strip that jumbled all of that together. All they knew was that the existence known as Kakine Teitoku was standing before them in some way.
They could destroy him, but it would be exceedingly difficult to be sure they had killed him.
And if they did not kill him, they could not stop him even if they blew off his arms and legs or crushed his organs.
But...
"Who gives a shit!?"
Accelerator charged directly forward. He stepped into the center of the pure white puddle spreading out over 10 meters, ripped apart the countless spears that shot out, and slammed his palm against the center point.
| ← Ch. 075 | Ch. 077 → |