EPILOGUE

Those Waiting After the End
Those_Who_Hold_Out_a_Hand.

The sun finally set, and amid the flamboyance of the night parade…

Kamijou, Stiyl, and Tsuchimikado were relatively fatigued, and as soon as Anti-Skill ran over and found them, they decided to just bring them to the hospital. Being taken to a hospital with iron bars wouldn’t have been odd, but for some reason they just ended up at the same old one as usual. It was in a different school district, too. Maybe that meant some other powers were at work. Kamijou didn’t have the time to think about it.

After being contacted, his parents, Touya and Shiina, had been in the hospital waiting room, remaining until he was treated for his injuries. The exhaustion from watching the Daihasei Festival events must have gotten to them, though, because when he was done getting patched up, he found them asleep next to each other on a bench, their shoulders propping each other up. Kamijou got a nurse to bring them a blanket and put it on them.

“…So you didn’t say a word to me about anything, selfishly got yourself into a magic battle with the fate of the world and Academy City on the line, and then you got beaten up and sent to the hospital?”

Index, who had changed back into her usual habit, was glaring daggers at him. Kamijou sat up straight in his bed.

“Miss Index, why might you be demanding that my humble self grovel before you on a hospital bed?”

“Touma, Touma. Can I punch you now?”

“I’m sorry!!” Kamijou’s head was instantly buried against the soft sheets. That combination of her sweet head-tilted expression and her right hand balled up into a serious fist was truly terrifying.

Her cheeks puffed out in exasperation. Kamijou, on the lookout for danger, glanced up and constructed the best smile he could manage. “B-but you know, Tsuchimikado and Stiyl are all right, too. And please don’t jump to conclusions! There is a very good reason you could not take part in the fight, okay?!”

“Then what were all those other times, Touma?”

Now he was digging his own grave. Kamijou groveled as hard as he could.

Index, cheeks puffed in indignant annoyance, said, “Did you really think I wouldn’t be able to do anything just because some search spells were looking for mana around me? I could have at least given you advice with these cell phone thingies or something!!”

“I’m sorry, but I find myself having trouble agreeing with you, Index! You don’t even know how to charge your zero-yen phone! I don’t think you know how to use one, and anyway, if you heard the word sorcery one time, you would just shamble right into the middle of the incident no matter what I said!!”

“Sh-shamble? Touma, it really sounds like you’re making fun of me!”

“Pfft, if you can’t tell, that means you’re already—Wait, I was joking, joking, joookiiing!”

Growl!! The ferocious beast girl Index bared her fangs and attacked. His hair stood on end—for a pretty good reason.

“Index, wait! I thought you had graduated from that childish biting thing and were starting to finally spread your wings as a grown woman in her own right!!”

Touma Kamijou, ever the schemer, purposely appealed to Index’s self-consciousness by using words like child and woman. And, already leaning over the bed and about to bite him in the head, the rampaging sister Index stopped. “…Touma, do you understand why I’m this angry now?”

“What? Aren’t you just offended because I left you alone the whole day—”

“Thank you for the food!!”

What?! That didn’t offend her…?! Kamijou swallowed that desperate cry. Index had taken a new step past her suffering and embarrassment. Her teeth dug into his head with even more force.

Kamijou writhed and squirmed on the bed. “You’re gonna kill me!! I’m sorry I kept thinking you weren’t doing very much! But this is definitely out of bounds!!”

“Maybe you should stop saying strange things and think about what you did! There were people seriously worried about you!!”

As she continued to chomp down on the front of his head, the hospital room door opened and a couple of familiar people strolled through.

It was Mikoto Misaka and Kuroko Shirai.

“W-well…I was visiting Kuroko anyway, and I had extra fruit here, so…Huh?”

“Oh my. It seems we’re witnessing yet another delightful scene.”

From a few feet away, with a girl biting onto a boy’s head on a bed, it probably looked as though the boy was getting his face up close to the girl’s chest. Or so he thought, as though it had nothing to do with him.

Shirai, in her sports wheelchair, put a hand to her cheek. “Ah! Their feelings for each other transcend the bounds of time and place! This couple is incredibly advanced…! Big Sister, what do you think the ones who happen across this sort of thing should do? I find myself feeling rather timid, honestly.”

Kamijou tried to shout, Does this look like that “sort of thing” to you?!

Before he could, Index shouted, “I’m being serious, so stop joking around, Short Hair!”

Miss Index?!

“…” The basket of fruit fell out of Mikoto’s hand. Her face went blank for a moment. Then, “Kurokooo…? Judgment is okay with civilians helping with their peacekeeping activities, right? If I put this down as guarding against illicit sexual activity in advance, would it be all right for me to throw this man out the window…?”

“Well, actually, the most you could do about that foolish gentleman’s nature is—O-oh my?! Big Sister, you’re snapping and crackling quite a bit there! We’re in a hospital!!”

“Oh, that’s right,” Mikoto said, withdrawing her biri biri. Places like these generally prohibited the usage of electrical equipment such as cell phones. She cursed under her breath not being able to use her strongest card. “Anyway, I’ll tell you what you want to hear, nice and slow, once the festival is over. Did you see today’s final results? Tokiwadai got just a little bit past your stupid school. We’re at the top now. Don’t forget about the loser having to do whatever the winner wants, got it?”

“W-well, that punishment game, at this point, it’s…Hey, Index, get off me already! It hurts!!”

Kamijou waved his hands and managed to tear the sister off his head.

Then he looked at Mikoto again. “A-as you can see, a certain incident has left me somewhat injured. I clearly won’t be at full power for the rest of the festival events. How should we decide who wins now?”

“…Hmm, well…”

Mikoto folded her arms, looked at Kamijou half crying, and sighed a little. The anger visible on her face receded a slight amount. Then she slowly relaxed her shoulders, and her lips loosened into a little smile. Kamijou thought he was in the clear now, but…

“You’ll just have to do it like your life depends on it.”

“That’s it?! I can’t do that! I’m already eighty percent dead! If I try any harder, I’m gonna end up going all the way to the grave!! And besides, we’re missing other people, too, like Fukiyose and Himegami and Tsuchimikado!! Maybe canceling the whole thing is too much to ask, but at least give me a handicap—Ah, ahhh! Don’t leave without saying anything!”

The two girls left the hospital room hastily. Index, who was waiting for such an opportunity, latched onto Kamijou’s head with her teeth again. Once hadn’t been enough, which meant this all must have made her really angry.

“So, Touma, what happened to all the people outside Academy City?”

“It hurts! Get off! It really hurts!!…What? Tsuchimikado said Stiyl got out a quick message. They should be looking around for Lidvia now. He said it was more the groups who wanted to snatch the precious Croce di Pietro than allies of Academy City and the English Puritan Church, though.”

“…Then it doesn’t sound like anything’s fixed.”

“Yeah, but…” He paused. “Stiyl was real beat up, and before he went into ICU, he said it would work itself out. He seemed confident. I wonder why?”

Fourteen hours later…

Lidvia Lorenzetti was eight thousand meters in the sky above France.

She was inside a personal jet aircraft. Black leather sofas lined the interior walls. A large table sat in the middle, bolted down to the floor. It was set up for a party. There were lamps near the walls and a small chandelier light fixture on the ceiling. The furnishings featured polished black wood and luxurious rugs. It was like a floating hotel.

A large cross wrapped in white fabric stood against the sofa next to her.

The craft was quite small compared to the big passenger airliners at international airports. Perhaps they were unusual in Japan. On the other hand, countries like the U.S. and Russia had many times the land as Japan, so long-distance flights were common in those places. In Russia, for example, it could take over two weeks to span the nation on a train.

Lidvia, of course, mainly did her jobs in Europe, but airplanes were still valuable for traveling between member nations of the EU. She hated science as a religion, but she felt no choice but to accept science’s technology as a means for achieving an end. For example, it took an immense amount of time and labor to create even a single Bible without the printing press. Even as churches and religious artwork advanced, they couldn’t completely discard science. For the religious, it had been a source of conflict ever since the Renaissance. Even later technology helped: The development of trains and airplanes allowed relatively unfit women and children to make pilgrimages to safe sanctuaries, and the popularization of the Internet gave people more chances to spread the Word to those yet unaware of the Lord.

The problem was the way these things were used. Lidvia sighed. Placing one’s faith in science, a mere puppet with no life, is the very image of the heretics during Ancient Rome. After her light sigh, she abruptly looked somewhere else.

The door leading to the cockpit was open now. Lidvia could see the pilot inside, fiddling with the instruments with calm movements. She wondered what the man believed in. This private jet belonged to Oriana, so it wasn’t under the patronage of the Roman Orthodox Church—but the pilot was likely still one of its disciples. On a much lower level, lower than Oriana or Lidvia.

He brought hunks of metal into the skies every day, but before taking off, he’d cross himself and pray for a safe journey. It may have seemed a strange sight, but Lidvia wouldn’t laugh at it.

Using tools and believing in God—people had been doing each for different purposes since long ago. Even two thousand years ago, when the Son of God lived, they were at the very least using tools with which to bake bread.

The important thing was this. Not to reject all scientific tools outright, nor to forget the authority of the Lord by overusing them. She quietly sighed. She had just failed to demonstrate the Lord’s authority. She had just been bowed by a heap of science.

For all intents and purposes, Lidvia was now running backward. However long she waited for more chances to repeat the same attack while keeping the Croce di Pietro out of enemy hands, they now knew where the belvederes needed to use the Soul Arm were located. It couldn’t be used if the night sky couldn’t be seen. If they constructed simple buildings right on top of the belvederes, it would be much harder to use the cross in or around Academy City. Plus, as though it wouldn’t already be difficult enough, her precious strength—the sinner Oriana Thomson—had been captured.

“Ufu-fu.” Nevertheless, she laughed at it. “How pitiful…Ah, how pitiful you are, Oriana Thomson. Fu…fu-fu. You must be saved, sinner lost and taken prisoner by them, you must be saved by my hands…”

Lidvia Lorenzetti twisted the misfortune and adversity around her, transforming it into a driving force to spur herself forward.

“To set foot inside Academy City, to fight against 2.3 million people, to safely rescue Oriana, to end everything without bloodshed…”

Everything coming from her mouth was a wish that could be called incredibly reckless.

Besides, if she returned to the Vatican now, she would surely be scolded for her selfish actions and her failure. Her own life could be put in danger before even suggesting that she would rescue Oriana.

But.

The more difficult the situation before her was…

The higher her final destination ascended…

Lidvia Lorenzetti thought about defeating all those obstacles herself, and she found the greatest happiness within those thoughts. It was like how an athlete felt when meeting a lifelong rival.

Shrove Tuesday, also known as the Mardi Gras.

It was the name of an exuberant festival the Crossists held just before Lent. The Rio Carnival and the Fasching in Germany were other celebrations of it.

There was one reason Lidvia had been given such a name.

“Fu…fu-fu. Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha!! I will go on. Fortune and misfortune, smooth waves and rough—I will hold back all of it! I will do my name proud, the name of that festival of mastication! I will dine on all reality and live on it as one would bread!!”

Give her candy or give her the cane. Her reaction would be the same.

It meant that ultimately, no matter what kind of person you were, you would never be able to stop her from doing. One who feels nothing but happiness no matter what was given to her would accept it all with a smile and keep on going. The very act of standing in her way spurred Lidvia’s feet onward, making blocking her path a suicidal, futile act.

“First comes dealing with the aftermath within the Roman Orthodox Church. Then comes drawing up a plan to recover Oriana, and finally a second attack against Academy City! Ha-ha! The walls are high!! And how sweet they are!!”

She could tell the pilot in the cockpit jumped a little, startled at her creepy monologue. But even his attitude of suspicion converted into a burning fighting spirit within her.

And then it happened.

“Ah, hello? May I have your attention please?”

Suddenly, she heard a woman’s voice.

Lidvia’s shoulders jumped in surprise. There were no flight attendants here. It was a private jet. She could hear sounds of panic coming from the opened cockpit hatch. The pilot didn’t seem to know anything.

But Lidvia did.

She knew this voice.

“I am Laura Stuart, archbishop of the English Puritan Church. I shan’t allow any cold plays of ignorance, yes? Little Miss Lidvia! ”

The voice was amused.

She had a much more important nickname than the Mardi Gras. Any modern religious history book couldn’t be written without speaking of her. The rumors went that she was a monster who held at least as much influence as the queen herself.

Lidvia sucked in her breath—both in terror and joy.

For her, such strong enemies were the most captivating of lambs.

“…Why this private jet?”

“Hm-hm-hmm! You seem to have transferred its ownership and are trying to land now in France instead of Italy on purpose. Did you think me naive enough to fool with such a parlor trick? I had a little subordinate stuck right to the wall of the plane at the time. ”

“…”

Something was on the outside of the plane—likely a Soul Arm of some sort.

Still, she couldn’t very well remove it now. It would be impossible to cling to the wall of a craft flying at supersonic speed. Besides, just opening the door would create a difference in air pressure, and all the air inside would go rushing out into the wild blue yonder.

Had she found this plane through the efforts of only the English Puritan Church?

If she had, she would have instigated something when she first brought the Croce di Pietro to Japan. But she hadn’t, which probably meant she’d figured out which plane it was only after Lidvia landed.

Which meant there was only one possibility.

Academy City cooperated with her…

Whatever the case, her situation was hopeless.

If she’d placed a communication Soul Arm on the outside, then the United Kingdom knew where this plane was at all times. Lidvia could land right now and change airports, but there would easily be people waiting for her when she got there.

In spite of that, though, she let out a laugh.

“…Unamiable as always, I should say,” came back Laura. “You cackle ever louder the more cornered you become. Can you not possibly do something about that personality of yours?”

“It’s the same as long-distance swimming or diving. The farther the distance, the more pain it gives—and the more happiness you feel when you overcome it all.”

“Your ascetic practice has earned you delight, you filthy freaking masochist. Or, no. You say you delight in making difficulty bow before you, so does that make you a sadist? Speaking of naive. Are you going to drag those feelings to Academy City and attack it again?”

“…” Lidvia fell quiet for a moment at Laura’s exasperated tone. “I have a debt to pay Academy City.”

“I wonder, who was it who said if someone strikes your right cheek, to show them your left? Besides, Oriana Thomson’s custody is to be transferred to London. Even if you return to the Vatican and plot your next move, your beloved little Oriana won’t be in the city anymore.”

“No. What has real meaning is getting Oriana returned by taking over Academy City. The conquest of that land will pave the way for a Roman Orthodox victory. And on that day, the English Puritans will no longer be able to disobey even the simplest of my commands.”

Her face was pulled back—into a smile.

A dark, zealous, beast-like one, filled with the hunger for victory. An expression unbefitting a sister.

“I will forgive. I believe that if Academy City had not resisted so much, everybody would be happier right now. Those inferior sorcerers and that boy who helped them…If not for them, Oriana would be with me on this plane right now!”

Her voice was filled with ardor as it grew even louder.

When she said she would not allow it, her expression slowly became even more ambitious.

“So I will never forgive them. But I am also happy to have encountered a new wall in my path! The more difficult the struggle, the more joyful it will be when I overcome it! Overcome it—and trample it under my feet!!”

Tears even formed in her eyes as she shouted.

Her eyes were wide and unblinking with the immense feeling of competition.

“By not aiming directly for England, and instead going the long way to destroy them, the difficulty of rescuing Oriana will be just as I like it!! I must thank the Lord for His kind preparation of such a feast! The thickest, hardest meat is the sort most worthwhile to eat!! I truly look forward to the next time we meet each other!! Ah-ha-ha, ufu-ah-ha-ha-ha!!”

Given a few more minutes of talking, Lidvia wore an expression that indicated she might actually bite into a thick steel plate.

Her voice had clearly gone off the rails.

“Hm!” Laura giggled. “Heh-heh!”

“…? What is it? This may be a joyful occasion for me, but I don’t understand why you would laugh at this time.”

“Oh, come on. It’s truly simple, you see. The higher the wall, the more difficult the struggle, the more joy it gives when you trample it under your feet, is it?”

The communication spell fell meaningfully silent for a moment.

“I was just thinking you might have a point, you freaking cliff-lover.”

What? Lidvia took a moment to understand what she said.

Then there was a huge bang!!

It came from the side. She quickly turned to look and saw the private jet’s entrance hatch gone, leaving a squared-off window to the outside. And she saw the orange glow of metal being melted by scorching heat.

This…this archbishop…Did she put the Soul Arm on the hatch…?!

It was too late now that she realized it.

The hatch plate had been blown off as though by an explosion, out into the night skies. At the same time, like a hole in a balloon, the air inside the craft all began to rush outside because of the difference in air pressure. It was less of a wind and more of a roaring tempest as the energy stormed out of the plane. Even the sofas and tables, bolted to the floor, were mercilessly torn away and flung into the sky at an altitude of eight thousand meters.

“!!”

Lidvia frantically tried to dig her fingers into a protrusion in the wall, but she wouldn’t last two seconds. Like dust blown up by a breath, her body left the floor—and was immediately flung out of the plane.

She didn’t even have time to squeal.

The sky eight thousand meters above sea level only intensified the darkness of the night. No clouds, a brightly shining moon, and countless stars around it. The cloud layers were below, so there was nothing to hide the heavenly bodies.

Grhghh, ahh…!! I can’t breathe…!!

She kept sucking in the super-high-altitude air, but she couldn’t feel any oxygen being absorbed into her body. Only a below-zero chill seared her chest. She was far too high up; she couldn’t even feel herself falling. It was more like she was being held up by an immensely powerful blast from below.

As her face contorted into sheer surprise and terror, something whizzed past her.

It stopped abruptly in the air in front of her, matching her downward velocity—a single card. It was made of a thin, plastic-like material, with just a few letters written on it in black marker. A Soul Arm to fool children; it had no history, no character. But the magic circle within it was as exquisite as any Persian rug.

“Ha-ha! Lidvia, I do admit it is a darn shame to lose that power you have. You could have just abandoned your Roman teachings and licked my feet. I would have saved you.”

Lidvia knew she must have already had something planned for that. She could have an English Puritan force positioned at her landing point, preparing to capture her and retreat as soon as she got down there.

But Lidvia pushed aside all that. “What…You’re mad!!”

“I see. Then why don’t you and that thing make a nice big crater for me?”

Lidvia saw what she meant.

Only the private jet above her growing smaller was correcting her sense of distance in this world without scale. From the open door of the aircraft, the shape of a cross wrapped in white fabric shot out.

The Croce di Pietro.

The Soul Arm had great magical effects, but its durability was no different from a regular antique. If it dove out of a plane from eight thousand meters up, it would shatter when it got to the bottom, even if it hit water.

“…!! I will not allow it!!” shouted Lidvia, gasping for what little oxygen she could find.

She spread her arms then muttered an incantation. Her body slowed to a gentle, feather-like fall. This was supposed to be a defensive spell, one to slow the acceleration of any object, but when used to cancel gravity, it was like having a parachute.

“If I calculate the Croce di Pietro’s trajectory and face it, with my current speed…I will likely make it. No, I will surely make it! There is barely any time, but that’s why it’s so much fun!!” she yelled, her voice ripe with rebelliousness as she awaited the falling cross.

“Approximately four hundred meters from here to the plane. You have jammed on the brakes, so even if you catch the marble object in free fall, you will be minced meat, Lidvia.”

“Like I said, that’s why it’s fun, Archbishop!! You are correct—at my level of spell casting, catching the Croce di Pietro will be difficult even if I use all my power. But that is why! Standing one step away from such a tight situation—it is the joy of tribulation! Fu-fu-fu-ha-ha!!”

The Mardi Gras would extend her arms to accept even the most desperate of situations.

“Hmm!” murmured the card joyfully as it stopped next to her face. “If you use that spell, you will have your hands full simply catching yourself and the marble cross.”

“Yes, and…?”

“Then how might you be planning to handle that?”

Lidvia’s eyes shot back above her.

A new figure burst out of the destroyed private-jet door.

The pilot.

He was waving his arms and legs violently. It didn’t look like he had a parachute. Flung out of a plane eight thousand meters in the air without preparation—the fact that he hadn’t passed out yet was evidence of his constitution, but he might as well have been completely naked.

The moonlight illuminated his body.

On his face as he fell in a violent path, as though being kneaded by the air, was a scrambled mess of tears and fear at the irrational situation.

Yes.

Exactly as the sinners she had met in the past, estranged from society and civilization, had done.

“!!”

“Now, Lidvia. You can only hold so much. Which will you choose? One of the most powerful Soul Arms in the world, or a lost, pitiful lamb? Ku-ku. If you promise to bury your hands in the dirt and pray for forgiveness, I will gladly lend you a hand, y’know?”

“Y…You…! This is all your doing to begin with!!”

“No time for idle chitchat! Look, the first one is falling to you.”

“Guh!!”

The cloth-wrapped cross hurtled toward her without mercy. The marble object was 150 centimeters tall, 70 wide, and over 10 thick. It had been falling for four hundred meters, so it was essentially a cannonball, capable of taking out a sailboat.

Creating forward defense, with thickness at the maximum amount! If I can slow its fall by having it break through a thick wall first…

A moment later, the marble object fell right down at her.

She thought her shield was thick, but it was crushed instantly. The cross had lost some speed, but it still slammed straight into Lidvia’s chest. She heard dreadful creaking and cracking noises in her brain, from inside her. She coughed, sticky liquid that smelled of iron coming from deep in her throat and out her mouth.

“Grhh, urf! Ahhhrrrgh!!”

As blood spurted from between her teeth, she still grabbed the heavy cross with both hands. She dug ten fingers into the white cloth it was wrapped in with all her might.

“Oh, but look. The second one is coming.”

The voice from the card sounded genuinely entertained.

Her consciousness was fleeing her, hazy with pain, blood loss, oxygen deprivation, and a whole host of other factors. But she shook herself out of it and looked up.

The pilot of the private jet was plunging toward her, the same way the cross had. With Lidvia in her injured state, it was practically a boulder fired from a ballista, meant to break down a castle wall.

I…won’t be able to…catch him like…this…She gripped the cross tighter. If I assume too much burden…we will all fall to the ground and die…If I want to save the Soul Arm, I need to abandon the pilot…But if I discard this, I can save a precious human life…

Lidvia watched.

Watched the pilot’s face, sullied with tears, snot, and anger at the absurd act of violence, as he drew near her.

“Oh? Lidvia, you did say you saved sinners, didn’t you? Are simple victims below you, jerk?”

“How…dare you…?!” She tried to say more, but not much was getting out of her lungs.

She couldn’t possibly catch them both. If she tried, they would all fall. Abandoning what she could would pose the least difficulty.

But that wouldn’t be right.

The more difficult the situation got for her…

N-no…I can’t think…about it! If I do…I will really die…but…but no…urgh…I must endure it! That…that sweet, sweet feeling…I need to discard it…!!

The more she thought, the more the flames of defiance smoldered in her back. As she sweat, there was something, something not pain or tension, something more primal beginning to mix in with it.

She grated her teeth, trying to endure something. Then she heard a voice from next to her.

A slipping voice.

Like water seeping into a wasteland.

Just like the temptation of the bewitching devil himself.

“What’s this? Lidvia, I thought you would say something ridiculous like you’d catch both of them at once or something. The higher the wall, the bigger the obstacles…the bigger the delight when you overcome them and trample over me, the one who made them, right?”

Grrk.

Something inside Lidvia snapped.

Trample…over…?

The only thing she was aware of right then was the taste of blood. She could barely think.

That…arrogance…of yours…Archbishop…I will…trample…

The far-too-primal feeling that came after accomplishing that.

Without realizing her conceited speech was all part of Laura’s plan, Lidvia laughed.

“Ha…ha-ha…”

Her lips parted wide, blood mixed with drool trickling out of her mouth. The pilot, whom she was supposed to be catching, gave a terrified cry. All her defiance, all her ambition was on her face now as she gripped the cross, once again stretching her arms out far.

Like a woman welcoming a lover returned from a distant land.

As if to say how happy she was with the intense pain that came after the direct hit.

“Ha-ha-ha! Ah-ha-ha-ufu-fu-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!!”

With blood, sweat, tears, drool, and snot hanging from her face, Lidvia Lorenzetti beamed.

Then, a moment later…

The pilot’s body slammed into hers, and with the immense impact came an indescribably primal feeling shooting through her entire body.

In Academy City, there was a building with no windows and no doors.

It was the sturdiest fortress in Academy City, made with special materials that could absorb and diffuse the pure heat and shock waves yielded from nuclear blasts. There were no hallways, staircases, or even ventilation inside it, which meant going in and out required the assistance of an esper skilled with teleportation. One “human” was there now, waiting silently.

The chairperson of the Academy City General Board.

The “human,” Aleister Crowley.

“Hmm.”

Aleister was in a dimly lit room. The room was large and chilly to the skin. In the center sat a giant enshrined glass cylinder, and a liquid of bright red filled it. Countless cables and tubes, big and small, connected to the cylindrical container, coiled about the entire floor and connected to the instruments and displays covering the walls on every side. In this room without any real illumination, the red and green lights on the instruments looked like a night sky filled with starlight.

Aleister floated upside down inside that cylinder.

The person’s green surgical garments silently billowed inside the liquid as his long, long silvery hair, perhaps absent of pigment, coiled around.

Aleister could only be described as human: None could tell whether the person was male or female, adult or child, saint or sinner.

“To gain control of Academy City and secure authority over the world by using the Croce di Pietro…,” Aleister muttered.

Whatever Oriana’s and Lidvia’s personal goals had been, it would have been impossible to carry out without the support of the Roman Orthodox Church itself. It was more natural to think the Church had planned the operation and Oriana and Lidvia had insisted on being the ones to do it, in an attempt to use it for their own benefit.

Behind Oriana Thomson and Lidvia Lorenzetti…

…was the Roman Orthodox Church.

“…They certainly have rocked the boat, so to speak.”

Aleister sounded less threatened and more fed up with it.

The Roman Orthodox Church had been shady for a long time. Going back, it had probably begun during the age in which Galileo Galilei lived. When they were unable to stop the world’s foundation shifting away from Crossism and toward natural science, their authority over all the lands had started to waver, subtly but certainly.

On the surface, the Church named itself the largest religious group on the planet, but there was another problem with that.

Right now, the Crossist faction—purely in terms of the sorcery world—was said to consist of three main pillars: the Roman, Russian, and English Churches. Of them, people generally said that Roman Orthodoxy was the largest in scale, embracing two billion followers…but having gathered two billion also meant it was actually in balance with the United Kingdom and its total population of ninety million. And not every citizen of the United Kingdom was part of the English Puritan Church, either.

In the future, if the English Puritan Church were to rise to power and scrape up one or two billion more disciples, what would happen to the Roman Orthodox Church? The problem had always been placed to the side. There was no actual population of that size for them to gain, as had been pointed out many times. Recently, though, the issue was showing other openings.

The first was that the Roman Orthodox Church’s main combat forces had either been destroyed or exiled, with the Gregorian Choir and Agnes’s forces being chief among that list.

The second was that other combat potential, such as Orsola Aquinas and the Amakusa-Style Crossist Church, had been incorporated into the English Puritan Church.

The scales in the magic world were just barely holding their balance, and now these events were about to make everything tip over. The Roman Orthodox Church wanted to protect their seats at the top of the world. They were being extremely cautious of how those scales were moving.

Those things had probably colored the recent events as well.

The pope and his cardinals, leading the Roman Orthodox Church—what would their faces look like right now?

As somebody who had abandoned sorcery, and as someone who now sat at the center of managing its polar opposite—the science side—with perfection, Aleister watched the state of affairs with contempt.

“But now…,” Aleister said, exasperated.

They clung to it in such an unsightly way, so how they clung to it was not likely a consideration for them. They had brought out a Soul Arm on the Croce di Pietro’s level this time, after all. It certainly didn’t seem like they were going to stop attacking because of what happened, either. There was still the possibility, however slim, that they would again use a Soul Arm on the same level.

Despite a certain boy having settled the Croce di Pietro incident, frankly speaking, it hadn’t seemed to be a very good plan. There was no proof the same idea would work in the future.

Which means I may need to accelerate my plans. I swear. This project was not originally supposed to be used for something so trivial…

As Aleister thought, a square screen appeared in the empty void.

On it was a detailed world map, with 9,969 locations marked in red. They showed the world locations of certain mass-produced espers. Aleister would use them, along with School District i, or the Five Elements Society, sleeping in Academy City. They were all carrying out this plan: to put a stop to all magical activity in the world.

However…

The Imagine Breaker is the key, but its growth is still unstable. I wonder if it will be really usable.

Originally, Aleister hadn’t thought to be pressed to implement the project so soon. If I had known then what I know now, thought Aleister. But I didn’t. So…

A new screen appeared as he thought, overlaying itself onto the locations of the mass-produced espers.

The square window showed a rectangular case made of glass.

And the twisting silver staff inside it.

I may need to begin considering the possibility of riding out myself. Hmm. Heh-heh.

The “human” laughed in the darkness.

Was that the laugh of the world’s greatest scientist?

Or was it the laugh of the world’s strongest sorcerer?

What was in the mind of this “human,” who appeared both male and female, both adult and child, both saint and sinner, would never be illuminated by another—but it did make this “human” laugh.

Aisa Himegami awoke in a hospital room in the early morning.

Her room wasn’t a private one like Kamijou’s but one made for six people, with each person’s space cordoned off by curtains. All the patients here were, of course, female, but they were of all ages. One was the same age as she was, too.

“…”

Himegami’s idle gaze wandered to the ceiling, then she abruptly sat up in bed.

“It’s early. What are you doing here?”

She directed her monotone voice toward the edge of the bed. A sister wearing a pure-white habit was sitting on the floor, with her upper body slumped over the bed railing, hovering there mostly limp.

Himegami had just woken up, so she was sleepy, too. But this sister’s eyes looked absolutely exhausted. Her housemate (or, possibly more accurately, the owner of the place she freeloaded at) was injured and brought to the hospital very often, so this girl in white seemed used to staying up all night at hospitals. Apparently the nurses had begun talking about how she would fall asleep in chairs in single-patient rooms and on benches in the waiting room. It had ended with her being thought of as a mysterious girl who showed up at the hospital without rhyme or reason, one who liked TV and snacks and toys.

The eyes of the sister from the United Kingdom, Index, were narrowed into small slits as she yawned. “…They said I can’t use the benches when morning came, so I had to evacuate to your room, Aisa. What a nice, soft bed…”

Her primal instincts seemed to be urging her to find a warm place to sleep.

Unfortunately…

“Stop that. Beds are not for chewing on. They’re for lying on. Also. If you keep drooling on it for no reason. I will be the one they look at coldly.”

“So warm…”

Index didn’t seem to be in the mood for listening as she rubbed her face against the comforter. Her cheek was hitting Himegami’s thigh, so she was feeling impatient with the girl. She was 70 or 80 percent asleep, like she was struggling through an afternoon class in the beginning of spring. Himegami thought for a moment, then he opened the door of the mini fridge beside the bed, about one meter tall.

“I will use the ice in the freezer. To get you to wake up. Take this.”

“It’s cold!!”

Tossing an ice cube against the sister’s forehead made her cry out, which in turn made all the other patients in the room wake up as well. Himegami shrank back in bed and bowed her head in apology to them, then pressed a button on the remote control to automatically close her space’s curtains. She couldn’t bear the others staring at her.

After the ice cube bounced off her forehead, Index skillfully caught it in midair. Then, painfully unaware of Himegami’s state of mind, she plopped it into her mouth and said, “Aisa, are you okay now? I got a report that our sorcerer did some dangerous healing magic just by imitation.”

“I don’t actually know what happened. I was unconscious at the time. I don’t think I understood. But. The frog-faced doctor said. My examination went well. I should be back to normal soon.” Himegami pulled at the collar of her pajamas as she spoke and looked down. Her cross sparkled. Her body was covered in professionally wrapped bandages from her chest to her waist, but apparently all the organs necessary to sustain life had been repaired, without a single blood vessel lost.

For Aisa Himegami, who was still a girl no matter how she acted, the question of whether this would scar her had unsettled her greatly. The frog-faced doctor, though, had smiled creepily (or happily, from his point of view) and said, “Heh-heh, who exactly do you think I am? I may not look like much, but I make it a rule to prepare anything and everything my patients need. Heh-heh-heh. How wonderful it is to have patients relying on you.” So everything seemed all right. And come to think of it, despite a certain boy having had his right arm sliced off, he didn’t have a single mark on him, either.

Himegami stared at the bandages underneath her pajamas and thought, But the wound was so bad you could see bones.

That red-haired priest had only done something hasty that would extend her life for a little longer, but that “spell” had easily repaired a wound that had clearly been beyond saving. She’d given up on the matter as hopeless, but now it had again turned into little thorns prickling her heart.

But…

Right now, more importantly…

“I can leave today or tomorrow. The frog doctor told me. But with my body right now. I don’t think I can be in the events.”

“??? Aisa, you look kind of lonely. Why?” Index asked with a blank look.

Himegami silently shook her head, but that obviously wasn’t enough to make her thoughts disappear. So she told her—about the matter she’d decided to keep quiet about.

“Did he. Do something reckless again?”

“Yeah. Right! I forgot!” Index said in a bright voice, finally looking awake. “He didn’t tell me the details yet, but some Roman Orthodox sorcerers attacked the city using the Dai-ha-sei Festival or whatever as an excuse! And then Touma ran off by himself without talking to me first, and then he did some crazy things, and then he came crawling to me with a report!!”

Index was shouting by the end, and in her anger she’d begun to chew on the end of the comforter.

Himegami didn’t care about her nibbling.

Actually, she wasn’t even paying attention to it.

Sorcerers. From the Roman Orthodox Church.

In the end, that was the reason the boy had clenched his fist and fought.

It was so obvious. Of course that was it. It meant he had been fighting someone, alongside a sorcerer, since before Himegami collapsed. That, along with the boy crying out in anger—it had all been just part of the process, a piece of some bigger goal, and that he’d only just happened to be sidetracked by it.

…

She’d felt the same thing back in the alchemist’s fortress. She started to think about why the boy had even saved her at all. The fact of the matter was that the two of them didn’t have enough of a connection for him to risk his life for her.

Which meant it didn’t matter who it was.

The boy hadn’t saved Aisa Himegami in particular.

He would have saved anyone if they were in her position, wouldn’t he?

If Aisa Himegami hadn’t been there…

…then she wouldn’t have even been in a corner of his mind, would she?

The act of risking his life to save her gave no benefit to Touma Kamijou. Doing so was just part of his daily life. Even during these past couple of months, she’d seen him pounding sense into other people in class and getting them to rethink their lives twice a week on average.

I’m…

Aisa Himegami, sitting up in bed, thought about it.

She didn’t have the strength or knowledge to be of use to anyone, like this girl biting her comforter did. She wasn’t the kind of person to treat everyone equally and worry about others just from being near them, either.

I’m…really…

Himegami’s face fell a little bit as she slowly grasped the comforter near her knees.

She couldn’t think of a single reason to be with him.

She was sure he’d save her whenever she was in trouble. But if Kamijou and Himegami had no good reason to be together, that act probably didn’t mean anything. His taking one action for her sake was like wasting his money on something entirely pointless. Injury, usually.

Am I not really. Worth saving?

She knew those were chilling words.

But in reality, she knew she wasn’t blessed with any special talents or abilities that would make her worth someone risking their life to save. The only power she had was to hurt others and make them fight, and that detestable ability was the only thing unique about her. It wasn’t like she could dominate others in non-esper fields like studying or sports.

It was ridiculous.

So why?

If the fact that she’d been saved…

Why. Did he save me?

…was some sort of mistake or a misunderstanding…

Even back then…

The words they’d exchanged when she was lying in a pool of her own blood in the alley.

He said it very clearly…

The promise he couldn’t keep—his words that he’d return to the hospital before the night parade.

Then what am I worth…?

If even those kind words put pressure on the man named Touma Kamijou…

Is there a point. To my being here…

“…Maybe I. Only cause problems. For everyone else.”

She thought those words would be cold. But they echoed in her heart after she heard them.

Then the girl nibbling on the comforter stopped abruptly.

She probably had both special talents and knowledge that would make her worth saving. And she had a heart that made others happy just by being around her.

“That isn’t true. Touma looks like he’s having fun when he’s with you.”

“Huh?”

For a moment, she didn’t understand what that meant.

And yet, the girl in white, who he was always protecting, puffed out her cheeks and started chewing on the comforter again. “Touma’s right hand. He punched too many people and now the skin on his knuckles is torn.”

Index began to sullenly explain it to Himegami.

“Basically Touma hates doing work. The reason he does all this is pretty obvious. He doesn’t do it because it’s a rule or to save the world. He can’t get serious about that stuff. Anything that seems like work…Like if a bunch of people get in a fight, he’ll run away. And he won’t make me tofu hamburgers. And he doesn’t listen to me when I yell at him. But…” She paused. “When Touma decides something, he does it no matter what. Even if he has to fight hundreds of nuns by himself, even if he has to go into an alchemist’s fortress with thousands of his pawns, he’ll never run away from what he decides. He decided he was going to protect you. I think what he really couldn’t forgive was you being dragged into silly things like Roman Orthodox sorcerers or their trying to conquer Academy City.”

Himegami listened. Silently, she listened.

“Touma protects a lot of people, so it’s kind of hard to understand. But he’ll never hesitate to protect you, Aisa. He would never think you were causing him trouble. If he did, he wouldn’t have all those people around him. He never says anything about that, and neither does anyone else, so it’s sort of hard to figure out his relationships with them. If you did figure them all out, maybe it would seem really amazing.”

Index stopped, allowing a light silence to descend on them.

Himegami tried to tell her something, but she realized she couldn’t talk. Her jaws and her mouth were trembling. For a moment, she thought about where that trembling was coming from.

“Wait, Fukiyose! You walk in the door to visit me, and the first thing you do is freak out at me. If you’re that energetic, why are you even in the hospital?!”

“Sh-shut up, you! Anyone would panic if they suddenly saw a man naked!”

“But you’re the one who suddenly waltzed into the room while I was changing—”

“Touma Kamijou! Just…finish getting changed and if you’re still half-asleep you need theanine to activate your brain cells and there’s a lot of that in green tea so drink some of this!”

“Aghhh, that’s hot!! Hey, idiot Fukiyose! Don’t pour boiling-hot liquid down other people’s throats just to hide your embarrassment!!”

They heard some pretty loud voices coming from the hallway.

Then a series of quick, stomping footsteps, not often heard in a hospital setting.

“So is this one Himegami’s room? Wait, you’re not going to be bothering her with a sudden visit, I hope!”

“Eh? You know, Himegami may not talk much, but she doesn’t necessarily like things quiet. You just have to look closely. When she’s happy she actually smiles a tiny bit. For someone who’s secretly a caring person, you should have realized that.”

“Caring…? Who are we talking about, exactly?”

“Pfft. I mean, you didn’t know where Himegami’s room was, so you came to mine to ask, and then you spent thirty minutes deciding what fruits and flowers to get at the shop, so you’re obviously a heroic soul who cares about her friends and—Hot, hot! I told you to stop pouring that green tea down my throat! I don’t need my brain energized any more, so let’s grab Himegami and go to the rest of our class! We went through all the trouble of borrowing a wheelchair from the doctors!!”

“All the events today are extreme, and first on the list is the all-school boys’ mock cavalry battle, group A competition. Next time, plan to bring injured people to events that they actually want to cheer for!”

Index stopped biting on the comforter and looked up toward the voices. A partition curtain was in the way. Himegami looked over as well, then picked up the remote control that opened it.

“Hey. Do you know why. He fights like that. Even when he gets so badly hurt?”

“Who knows? I don’t think I do,” answered Index, without really thinking about it.

“When I asked him before, he said he did it for himself. Maybe that’s just what makes him happy.”

Himegami pressed the open-close button on the remote.

The curtains opened.

And lying beyond there was the world Aisa Himegami had always wanted.