Golden Days Read online

  8

  Clad in an extravagant dress, the witch’s raw displeasure was palpable.

  She was a small-statured federal Attack Mage with a childlike face—Natsuki Minamiya, the Witch of the Void.

  “Calling me over with a single phone call like I’m some pizza delivery service… You really think you’re hot stuff, huh, Ponytail of the Lion King Agency? And you, Kojou Akatsuki—”

  “Ah… Um… Th-that’s… Wait a— Cut that…”

  Looking ready to break into tears, Sayaka desperately resisted being dragged along by her ponytail.

  They were in front of an event venue near the back entrance to Keystone Gate. Since Sayaka had erected a person-repelling barrier, there was no sight of pedestrians in the surrounding area. Directly below the venue was the chamber known as Stratum Zero. If Lydianne’s deduction was correct, Asagi was confined in a submarine submerged in the sea farther below.

  “Hold on, Natsuki. You have every right to be angry, but the circumstances here— Ow!”

  When Kojou opened his mouth to cover for Sayaka, he suddenly reeled backward, letting out a cry. He had sustained a ferocious blow to the forehead from the tip of the fan Natsuki held in her hand.

  “Don’t call your homeroom teacher by her first name…especially now, when I’m in a particularly sour mood.”

  “Strict corporal punishment is totally messed up in this day and age… Dammit…”

  As Natsuki gave him a pitying look, Kojou glared back with teary eyes, shaking his head a bit.

  Natsuki snorted as she finally released Sayaka.

  “As for why you’ve summoned me here, does it have to do with the little girl who has the airs of an entertainer?”

  “Yeah… It’s not so much that she’s tryin’ to perform. It’s that she’s not the real Asagi…”

  “A forgery created with CGI? Sounds about right.”

  “Wait, you noticed?”

  Natsuki’s calm reply astonished Kojou.

  “The genuine Asagi is more charming than this, after all.”

  Natsuki made the chilly statement as she gazed at a poster of Asagi plastered over the side of a building. Her tone was as haughty as usual, but somehow, Kojou sensed affection for her pupil in her voice.

  “Lady Instructor, dost thou know the location of the genuine Lady Empress?”

  Poking only her head out of the robot tank, Lydianne addressed Natsuki. The fact that she’d called Natsuki instructor reflected the formal side of her typically eccentric personality. Having seen Kojou get smacked in the forehead, she had apparently learned from his mistakes.

  Natsuki must not have minded it, for her gaze went from cruel to gentle as she shifted it Lydianne’s way and said, “Keystone Gate’s Stratum Zero—Cain’s Coffin, yes?”

  “You knew about it?” Kojou asked, surprised.

  “Of course. I am her homeroom teacher.” Natsuki proudly raised her chin. “And the present location of the Coffin?”

  “The bottom of the sea directly below Itogami Island—a depth of some four hundred meters. Currently, I hath dispatched an underwater drone to determineth a more exact location, but…” Lydianne glanced at her cockpit instruments.

  Natsuki, unamused, twisted her lips and said, “And? Are you telling me to bring her out?”

  “I couldn’t think of anyone else I could ask. It ain’t a depth people can dive to.” Kojou frowned in chagrin.

  “Indeed,” said Lydianne in agreement, adding, “I hath heard that Sir Boyfriend doth not know how to swim…”

  “Even if I could, you can’t normally dive four hundred meters down, sheesh!” he retorted, angry without realizing it. “I thought of a way to use my Beast Vassals in a worst-case scenario, but that doesn’t exactly sound like bringing Asagi back safe and sound. Though, with Natsuki’s teleports—”

  Natsuki gazed at Kojou and the others with the unmoved eyes of a doll as they continued their attempts at persuading her. Then she made a very deep sigh, as if genuinely disappointed.

  “Goodness. I had heard Shamanic War Dancers of the Lion King Agency were experts in curses and assassinations—clearly the rumors were exaggerated.”

  “H-huh?!”

  Sayaka’s eyes snapped wide at the insult levied at her title with pinpoint accuracy. Natsuki shot her an expression of contempt as she continued.

  “Did you seriously think that with something as crucial as the Coffin, the device at the core of reviving the Sinful God, they would neglect to deploy a magic repulsion barrier…?”

  “I—I see… A barrier…!”

  Sayaka gasped and covered her mouth. She was a Shamanic War Dancer of the Lion King Agency, yet, she’d let something as basic as that slip her notice. Small wonder Natsuki had treated her like an idiot.

  “Meaning you can’t teleport inside the sub, then?” Kojou let out a groan, his voice catching.

  Natsuki nodded without fanfare and clarified, “Not only teleports. Every manner of scrying magic is also a lost cause. Water considerably dampens magical energy to begin with. From the surface, it is impossible to confirm that Aiba is even inside the submarine.”

  “So that’s why you’ve let Asagi be, Natsuki? You couldn’t save her even if you tried?” Kojou murmured, coming to accept the situation on his own.

  Most likely, Natsuki was worried about Asagi, her student. She, too, desired to save her somehow. However, with Asagi confined beneath the waves, she was out of Natsuki’s reach. Ashamed of her own powerlessness, the Witch of the Void had surely shed tears where none could see—imagining things that far, Kojou sympathized with Natsuki.

  Although, Natsuki seemed to take Kojou’s baseless conclusion as a slight to her self-respect. What? her glare at Kojou challenged.

  “To whom are you speaking? If I was inclined, I would have brought Asagi out long ago.”

  “Er, you don’t need to be all proud and stuff—”

  “It isn’t pride!” pointedly retorted Natsuki. “Even if I had to hurl Astarte into the sea, the barrier of the Coffin is nothing to me!”

  “What kind of devil are you…?! You’re freaking me out. I’m gettin’ chills just thinking about it!”

  The Beast Vassal of the special homunculus named Astarte could nullify physical attacks and possessed the ability to destroy magical barriers. Certainly, she might be able to resist water pressure at a depth of four hundred meters, and she could probably destroy the submarine’s barrier, too.

  That said, the thought of taking a powerless-looking homunculus girl in the flesh and hurling her to the bottom of the sea was kind of—

  With a shudder, Kojou reconfirmed just how frightening Natsuki could be.

  Natsuki returned to a quiet tone of voice as she spoke.

  “Besides, even without going through the trouble of such crude methods, the Coffin will return to Keystone Gate. That is what Stratum Zero is for.”

  Stratum Zero was a submarine base. The thick metal floor was probably an airlock. The part below was directly connected to the sea, and from it, one could enter the submarine directly. Not a single resident of Itogami Island even knew it existed. And therefore, even if Itogami Island incurred such damage that it collapsed, the submarine—Cain’s Coffin—could take refuge at the bottom of the sea, safe and sound.

  “Are you saying that the submarine will come back to take supplies?” Kojou inquired.

  However high spec a submarine, it could not remain submerged forever. It had to require regular replenishment of fuel, food, and air.

  But Natsuki bluntly shook her head.

  “No. Rather, because the preparations are in order.”

  “Preparations?”

  For what? Kojou knit his brows.

  “Oho,” went Natsuki, smiling as she shifted her gaze to behind him. “Preparation for The Cleansing. Is that not right—Hell Wolf?”

  “—?!”

  Kojou lowered his posture in surprise. Sayaka reflexively drew her sword. Lydianne closed her tank’s hatch, shifting to an ale
rt posture.

  Breaking Sayaka’s person-repelling barrier, a black-clothed young man appeared.

  In his left hand, he gripped a bizarre black spear with tips at both ends. This was the former researcher of the Lion King Agency, escapee from the Prison Barrier, and jiangshi—Meiga Itogami.

  “Fourth Primogenitor, where is the Sword Shaman?”

  Somehow, the words spilling from Meiga’s mouth surprised Kojou. After all, he had displayed little interest in Yukina up to that point.

  “Himeragi, you mean…?”

  Kojou replied, wary due to the strange aura he was picking up from Meiga. The man’s current state was clearly different from when they had fought the night before.

  Thanks to having lost his glasses in combat, the hollow eyes characteristic of a jiangshi were all too clear. His black clothing remained charred from where he’d sustained the attack from Kojou’s Beast Vassal. Nor, at that moment, did Kojou sense any power in the spear Meiga held in his left hand.

  Those were not the only changes in Meiga, though. Kojou couldn’t put his finger on it, but even so, he knew one thing: Meiga had undergone a fundamental change.

  “…Yes, her. Yukina Himeragi.”

  If anything, Meiga said Yukina’s name with a gentle expression.

  So he really was displaying a bizarre obsession with Yukina. The fight the night before was probably the trigger for that. Yukina had displayed a fraction of a Faux-Angel’s power—irritating Meiga in the process.

  “She won’t be fighting anymore. You’re never gonna see her again,” Kojou declared almost in a growl.

  Whatever Meiga’s objective, Kojou could not let him and Yukina come into contact with each other. Before that could possibly happen, he had to defeat Meiga then and there—

  Sayaka was probably thinking the same thing. Transforming her silver longsword into a recurve bow, she notched a ritual arrow. This was the true form of Der Freischötz, the Lion King Agency’s prototype area-suppression weapon. She no doubt meant to squish Meiga flat with a maximum-power attack out of the blue.

  “An escapee from the Prison Barrier—I remember him. I just have to capture that man, right?”

  Sayaka aimed her ritual arrow at Meiga. Not only could it serve as the catalyst for the giant shock wave from Der Freischötz that generated large-scale ritual spells, it boasted overwhelming might that could completely flatten its target. Even if Meiga’s black spear nullified the ritual spell, it surely could not block the shock wave itself.

  “Former Lion King Agency researcher, jiangshi, or whatever, whoever lays even one finger on my Yukina, I’ll curse to death, slice to death, shoot to death, chop into pieces, and burn to ash!”

  With a tone that somehow felt unhinged, Sayaka muttered her complaints. Meiga stared at her with wide eyes.

  “So she ran…before being annihilated by the shift to a higher-dimensional being…”

  Meiga’s teeth made an audible grinding noise. A faint, flickering radiance floated upward from his entire body. In truth, this radiance was from the lines of strange symbols blotting out Meiga’s own flesh.

  “Did you think I would accept such a thing…?!”

  Meiga bellowed, his emotions laid bare. That instant, Itogami Island—no, the world itself—trembled. The luminescence enveloping Meiga’s entire body increased, spreading over the land of the artificial isle.

  “Ngh?!”

  As Kojou and company stood dumbfounded amid the unanticipated phenomenon, Lydianne let out a high-pitched sound. With a nervous voice, she reported over the robot tank’s trembling exterior speakers:

  “Sir Boyfriend, Stratum Zero has begun to fill with water! Also, there be unfamiliar data over the netw… What is…this volume of traffic…?!”

  “Meiga Itogami, don’t tell me you’re—?!”

  The fan in Natsuki’s hand flashed forward, and golden chains shot out from the void.

  “C’mon over, Al-Nasl Minium—!”

  Kojou moved in tandem. He instantly summoned his Beast Vassal, forgetting all about collateral damage to the surrounding area.

  “Lustrous Scale!”

  Sayaka unleashed her ritual arrow a second later.

  The countless chains shooting out like bullets, the shock wave created by the ritual arrow, and the blast winds enveloping the bicorn’s hooves—each assaulted the place where Meiga stood.

  The concentrated volley was an overkill of destructive power, seemingly excavating the ground in its wake. It was not an attack on a scale a jiangshi’s body could endure. But…

  “No way…!”

  “You’ve gotta…be kidding me…?!”

  Sayaka and Kojou both murmured in astonishment. Natsuki clicked her tongue.

  Meiga Itogami—no, the being that had once been Meiga, stood there, unharmed.

  Kojou’s and the others’ attacks had not reached his flesh. Rather than being blocked, they had been completely nullified. It was as if their attacks against him had never existed to begin with.

  Meiga Itogami’s being was enveloped by faint particles of light that began to erode Itogami Island itself.

  It was a type of phenomenon Kojou and the others had never seen before. It was neither attack magic, nor ritual magic, and certainly not a normal physical phenomenon. It differed from the encroachment of Nod.

  But with everything that touched that radiance, something fundamental…changed.

  It was just like a supernatural being, albeit the same shape as before, that was neither part of the living nor the dead—

  “If she shall not appear on her own, I shall drag her out of hiding—even if I must alter the world itself to do so!”

  Meiga Itogami, transformed into a supernatural being, made his declaration in a voice full of madness.

  The words served to state that the despair had begun.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  THE CLEANSING

  1

  In a suite of the highest caliber in the City Hotel—constructed on the outer edge of Keystone Gate—Akishige Yaze listened to the report.

  “The Coffin has been released, you say…?”

  “Y-yes. Of the Five Elements, Schedar, Caph, and Ruchbah have exceeded maximum designed activity rate. Tsih and Segin’s activity rates have also climbed. A large-scale Cleansing reading has been measured within the island. The origin point is the external event space on Keystone Gate’s Stratum Three—close to directly above Stratum Zero!”

  Through the monitor, the researchers’ faces spread with the color of unconcealable fear. These were men who had long served Akishige Yaze—chairman emeritus of the Gigafloat Management Corporation—and had been involved in Itogami Island’s construction; in other words, they were trusted subordinates to Akishige, deserving of being called his retainers. That was why they were afraid. They knew the ramifications of the Coffin becoming unmoored. They knew all too well what effect that would have on Itogami Island.

  “Meiga Itogami’s doing, I take it? So the lapdog feels like biting the hand that feeds him… Damned mongrel,” Akishige murmured sourly as he gazed at the reports sent to him one after another.

  The release of the Coffin meant that the submarine, Cain’s Coffin, had docked with Keystone Gate’s Stratum Zero and had connected to Itogami Island’s isle-wide network.

  As a result, the magical program sealing the Coffin had been input into Itogami Island. It was the magic once known as The Cleansing—the forbidden god-killing ritual created by Cain, the Sinful God—reproduced in digital form.

  But it was not the issue of the release of the Coffin that had Akishige in a sour mood.

  After all, even if the Coffin was released, that alone would not initiate The Cleansing.

  There were three conditions required to activate it: one was the existence of Itogami Island, the altar for that purpose; another was the release of the Forbidden Ritual sealed in the Coffin; and the third key was the will of the living sacrifice that served as the control unit and the key to the activation—in other wor
ds, the Priestess. As long as the Priestess of Cain, the genius cyber-mancer surpassing all human limitations, remained untamed, it was impossible to initiate The Cleansing.

  Asagi Aiba was the one and only suitable person to be the Priestess of Cain yet discovered. And both her parents were already under Akishige’s surveillance—as hostages. Akishige himself was the only one who could use a direct line to Asagi Aiba now that she was confined in the Coffin. It was impossible for anyone else to engage in negotiations with her.

  And yet, Meiga Itogami had initiated The Cleansing nonetheless.

  That meant Meiga, through whatever method, had obtained a new priestess.

  This was why Akishige was in a sour mood. It was a situation that his organization should have prevented from arising.

  “—It would seem that you are busy, Chairman Yaze. Should I come back another time?”

  As Akishige furrowed his brows, a foreign man sitting on the guest sofa addressed him. He was in his forties, an Asian man, but the paleness of his skin and his ever-present smile were his defining traits.

  Standing beside the man was a baby-faced woman, her age indeterminate. It wasn’t that she didn’t have an adorable face, but thanks to half-closed eyelids that did not want to open, she somehow gave off a sleepy impression. There was a very fluttery air around her that made her hard to pin down.

  “Forgive my rudeness, President Ren. The ruckus is unfortunate, but it is also a good opportunity. I would like you to behold the power of the reproduced Cleansing with your very own eyes.”

  Akishige Yaze swiveled his chair around to face the man sitting on the sofa. The monitor on the wall was displaying images of the areas surrounding Keystone Gate. Something like an explosion was in the middle of one of them.

  “The Cleansing… The ultimate hidden ritual instigated by Cain, the Sinful God, for the sake of insurrection and vengeance against the gods?” the man called Ren asked in a gentle tone.

  Shahryar Ren, president of MAR—founder and chief stockholder of Magna Ataraxia Research Incorporated, one of the world’s foremost international sorcerous corporate conglomerates.

  “However, just how do you intend to prove that power’s worth?”