BATTLE REPORT

In a hospital in the city of Rome, a single one-person room, was enveloped by a strange air.

Tranquility.

It was a sight as though the image of the one sleeping there had permeated the entire room itself.

The one lying atop the bed was the Roman pope.

An old man, who was supposed to be cloistered away deep within the basilica in the Vatican, had been dressed in an operating gown and had had several tubes attached to his mouth and nose.

A young priest, right after entering the room, shook his head without meaning to.

Perhaps, somewhere in his heart, he’d been hoping: hoping that he would rise like someone from a legend at the chaos now engulfing the world.

“…No one can stop Fiamma’s oppression…,” said the young priest to him, wringing the words from his throat. “After seeing his power firsthand, all the cardinals have either bowed in fear or have chosen to obey out of personal desire. Of all the things, some have even stepped forth to suggest we choose a new pope in the middle of this war.”

Only the young priest’s words continued.

“A large magical battle appears to have broken out between the United Kingdom and France as well. Fiamma is likely the one instigating France…No, that is not the only place. At this very moment, everywhere across the world, many battles are being waged now, all in accordance to Fiamma’s plans.”

In other words, not a single response came back.

The young priest suddenly felt like crumpling at that fact. However, the situation wouldn’t stop there. Another person, a nun, flew into the hospital room, her breathing ragged.

“I-it’s awful!!”

“We are in the presence of His Holiness!!” the young priest scolded.

The nun flinched. However, her face was still pale as she continued to work her mouth like a beached fish. “Th-the people of Rome have begun saying how sick they are of aiding this kind of war!! And they’re beginning to gather in the streets! They may start marching on the Vatican!!”

On the surface, World War III was treated as a war between Russia and Academy City. However, just as Academy City and the United Kingdom were allies, civilians would have indistinctly realized that Russia and the Roman Church were in a friendly relationship as well. In fact, several units from the Italian military had already gone to fight in this war.

The cardinals controlling the Roman Church had been captivated by Fiamma’s power and were now useless. Maybe, just maybe, the normal people acting out of righteous anger held the power to better change the course of history.

However.

“…We must stop them.”

“Father?”

“Historically, several ‘people’s revolutions’ have succeeded. But those great undertakings only succeeded with painstaking advance preparations! This sort of ad hoc riot will not change history! At this rate, it will end with the Roman Church’s security forces massacring them!”

“Th-then what shall we do? What should we do?!”

“They earnestly have the Roman Church’s future at heart. Therefore, we must stop them before they resort to violence. We cannot allow them to die like this.”

The young priest and the nun hurried to rush out of the hospital room. However, the priest stopped once, right near the exit. Casting a short glance at the holy man on the bed, his words seemed to seep out of him.

“If only…If only you would show everyone your face and say a few words to them, we may have been able to cleanse their anxiety…”

The young priest shook his head as if to rid himself of impossibilities. After that, he headed off for the city of Rome, which was close to erupting into riots, in order to deal with the problem presented to him.

The tranquil air once again returned to the room.

And…

Something absolutely impossible happened.

With a twitch, the pope’s fingertips moved.

Nothing but a tiny tremble. And then, as though that were the trigger for everything, the man’s closed eyelids opened. He pulled out the tubes going into his mouth and nose, sat up on the bed, and looked around. The place held no grand papal attire; there was only a habit, both modest and trimmed down to the important elements, hanging up on the wall.

Picking up the remote control on the side table, the pope turned on the television. As he listened to the news playing on it, he removed his surgical gown and changed into the habit.

Tragedies were being reported.

A mother lamenting before unfair cruelty appeared. The commentator’s words continued, almost as if to amplify the anxiety. The profile of a girl praying appeared. The report was that her father hadn’t been seen ever since an explosion had gone off near their house. Somebody, somewhere, was crying, asking why this war had to happen.

For a time, the Roman pope was silent.

Before he took any definite next action, a magical communication came directly into his mind.

“Hiya, Mr. Dandy Gentleman. Should I assume you’re still sitting in the Roman Papal seat?”

“Is that Vasilisa?”

Before, when he had gone for talks in order to strengthen his cooperative relationship with the head of the Russian Church, its patriarch, he’d secretly traded a means of communication with her.

“The cardinals seem to be attempting to carry out a papal conclave. They’ve probably decided already that my authority is lost. The words that come out of my mouth alone cannot stop the war, you know.”

“But you still got up anyway. As long as I know that, everything’s hunky-dory.”

“What are you doing right now?”

“Hmm?”

A loud popping noise grated on the pope’s mind.

He scowled.

That was clearly an explosion. Not one, not two—but many going off, intermittently. He heard angry yells with them. Vasilisa was probably having a magical death match against someone while making small talk.

“Would you like to know? I’m in the middle of making my rebellious subordinates cry. Ah-ha-ha—there’s this perverted sorceress named Skogssnua, and her face is covered in snot right now. Weren’t you the type to burst into tears if you heard about comrades killing each other?”

Vasilisa’s tone didn’t change.

From that alone, he understood just how one-sided the battle actually was.

“…Go easy on them. They are your subordinates.”

“I thought you’d say that,” said Vasilisa with a quiet giggle, in a tone that left it vague how serious she really was. “But if you dislike this sort of thing, how in the world do you plan on ending this war?”

“What? I’ll just do what I need to,” answered the pope simply. “…Not as a pope leading two billion followers, however. I must only do what is needed as one more follower of the Roman Orthodox Church. Which is to work from within to halt any grave distortions that may lead us down the wrong path. I did promise that mercenary, after all.”

After saying all that, the pope whispered the next part to himself alone.

“I contacted God’s Right Seat as well, to save our followers more effectively, but it seems the Lord still intends to give me more trials.”

The pope opened the hospital room window and, without hesitation, jumped out.

The curtain on a new battle was opening—for one old man.

Fiamma of the Right had returned to his base in Russian territory.

“Don’t act so scared, Nikolai,” he said with arrogant indifference as he walked.

An elderly man’s voice came back to him from his communication Soul Arm, which was in the form of a book.

“You started this war.”

“More accurately, I proposed it. You all were the ones who officially pulled the trigger, weren’t you?”

“Depending on how this war between the magic side and the science side progresses, Russia’s standing after it’s over will be unsatisfactory. You told us that, so we agreed to your proposal—and this is the result! I’m sure by now that you’ve heard something about the huge combat force partly composed of Academy City unmanned weapons and how good they’ve been doing!!”

“I keep telling you not to act so scared.”

“If this state of affairs continues, you and I both will lose our bastions. I will not let you lie and say you don’t understand what that means. And if I may, if you have no plan for dealing with this, then we’re through. After we’ve eliminated you, we’ll settle this war we started on our own terms. By searching for a way to end things with the least possible damage.”

“Outlooks aren’t so good on that one. You’ve been going about your preparations for war and keeping it secret from the patriarch—if that happened, the Russian Church would want your head, too.”

Fiamma shrugged a tiny bit and smiled.

“Let’s speak hypothetically. What if I had a card up my sleeve that could reverse everything in an instant?”

“What, have you gotten your hands on nuclear weapons? Unfortunately for you, Russia has those in great quantity.”

Nikolai was speaking quickly, scornfully.

“But as far as we’ve done test firings of ballistic missiles through official routes, we are certain they won’t ever reach Academy City or any of its satellite agencies. Switch out the warhead all you want—if you can’t hit them, what’s the point? With them intercepting one hundred percent of the missiles, bringing out nuclear weaponry won’t lead to stopping them.”

“The archangel Gabriel.”

“?!”

With just those few quietly whispered words, Nikolai stopped talking.

“Or perhaps the name Misha Kreutzev is more familiar to you?”

“You’ve obtained it…?”

“I’ve secured the nun who had acted as its medium. What if I said I would use her as a basis to give form to the archangel and control it as my pawn? Just so you know, it would be ready to use at any moment. Anyway, would this state of the war, or what have you, that you’ve been so worried about not even budge a bit?”

In all likelihood, Nikolai Tolstoj, said to be a person who profiteered whenever some kind of conflict sprang up, had immediately started counting his chickens before they hatched. Fiamma heard him start speaking quickly and excitedly from the communication Soul Arm, but he wasn’t listening much.

Ignoring the book-shaped Soul Arm, he muttered to himself alone, “…Well, my true goal in getting her was something else. The fact that I, of Michael, can make Gabriel’s power my own—that ambiguity of the correspondence of aspects is one that should be detested.”

Cutting off his monologue there, he once again spoke, as though announcing something to the world.

“Now then—it’s time for the fun-filled Project Bethlehem to begin.”

“What was that?”

Ekalielya A. Pronskaya, a Russian Air Force pilot continuing the fight in the skies over the Sea of Japan, frowned. Her communications device, connected with her helmet, delivered the words of the enemy Academy City superlarge fighter jet pilot.

“I said, the Kremlin Report,” the enemy soldier told her, sounding mildly annoyed, as they each flung their own top-of-the-line chunks of metal around. “The most vital, top-priority procedure in the Russian defense forces. Anyone in the military must have at least heard of it.”

“…”

She knew of it, but only by name.

But that hadn’t been something she’d gained official viewing permission to see. It was more like a legend that had spread through those in the military. Nobody knew if it really existed or not. Ekalielya wasn’t surprised by the Report itself, but at how their enemy had even grasped rumors of something that didn’t (purportedly) exist in the public record.

“Do you know what it entails?”

“Do I need to answer that?”

“A wall of bacteria.”

Suddenly, the Academy City pilot veered the conversation elsewhere. That was how Ekalielya thought of the move—but she was wrong. Both thoughts were actually connected.

“A killer virus transmitted through the air. The type that doesn’t only infiltrate your respiratory organs—it can get inside your blood vessels from nothing but skin contact. And it effectively decomposes oils, to boot. It will stop animals from breathing while also poking holes in filters like masks and air ducts designed for use against biochemical weapons. Once they scatter it, the usual countermeasures won’t be usable anymore.”

“What are you trying to say?”

“The Kremlin Report is a defensive procedure for nuclear weapon launch facilities…Should the nation suffer an invasion by an enemy force and those nuclear launch facilities be under threat of capture, the plan entails dispersing this bacterial wall around the facilities, precisely annihilating only the people, leaving the launch facilities unharmed. The procedure on how exactly to carry that out is the Kremlin Report.”

“…”

“Naturally, they’ll never send out an evacuation advisory for the Russian soldiers and civilians working at the facilities, nor the civilians living normal lives nearby. The procedure’s only priority is to guarantee the nuclear launch facilities’ safety. They still haven’t completed a vaccine that can combat this bacterial wall. It has an extreme resistance even to heat treatment. Sure, there are reports saying you can obliterate the bacteria by using incredibly dense ozone, but…You know what would happen if they did something like that to the infected, suffering victims, don’t you?”

Ekalielya’s hands, gripping the flight yoke, quavered slightly.

If that was true, it would change the meaning of this war.

Academy City wouldn’t be fighting to make the Russian people suffer. Russia’s top officials had started this war on their own. They were about to greenlight an operation to cause further suffering to the Russian people they were meant to protect, who were fearful of the war’s trends and saw how the situation had started to get out of hand…Didn’t that mean Academy City would be fighting to stop that?

Ekalielya felt something central to her mind, her core, was about to break.

But she shook her head against it. She couldn’t deny the possibility that this was propaganda designed to sap her fighting spirit.

“Words of an enemy nation. How could I believe something like that?! You’re the ones actually using military force to invade our lands and point your weapons at our people!! Am I supposed to overlook this real invasion happening right now because of some idle chatter with no evidence?!”

“I thought you’d say that,” said the Academy City pilot, seeming somehow amused. “So I brought something with me.”

She heard a bing!

Modern fighter jet instruments had become digital monitors, able to display complex information from multiple angles. One of her many small LCD monitors had suddenly switched to a different screen.

It had forced her communication port open and was squeezing information through.

But that wasn’t what Ekalielya was surprised about.

The values and sentences displayed on the screen almost stopped her heart in its tracks.

“What do you make of that?”

The Academy City pilot’s question came to her.

“Are your leaders really protecting the Russian people?”

Britain’s second princess, Carissa, had also spoken of the Kremlin Report.

The distance between her and the Femme Fatale had closed almost enough that they could ram their noses into each other. Their swords ground against each other, and their heads pushed past the blades.

The sword of light born of the Curtana Second’s fragment and the French sword Durandal: As they pressed their weapons, each in the realm of legend, against each other, they traded words as well:

“…What was that?”

“You’re the brains, aren’t you? Considering Russia’s circumstances and technology, and how Academy City’s invasion is currently going, you should be able to tell whether I speak true or not. Or will you spout some trivial nonsense about not believing it until you see the Kremlin Report with your own eyes?”

A great force exploded between their blades.

Each withdrew by about ten meters.

The Femme Fatale, holding Durandal ready, told her quietly, “No matter how righteous the flag you fly, the fact is you’re using French land as a stepping stone to interfere with Russia. And France, having matured this much under the patronage of the Roman Church, cannot allow itself to disobey their orders now. Even if what you say about the Kremlin Report is true, it isn’t a reason for me to sheathe my blade.”

“Are you being serious?”

“You’re the one who caused a coup d’état to protect her own people and tried to destroy the Europeans, weren’t you?”

“As much as was necessary.”

Carissa didn’t deny it.

She wouldn’t utter only words convenient for her—she easily admitted to her own ugly faults.

And on top of that, she said, “But I don’t plan on killing anyone I don’t need to in order to protect my people. Not a single one.”

“…”

“What connection is there between Russian people being made to suffer from the Kremlin Report’s activation and you defending your French people?”

“It’s…”

“The Roman Church’s patronage? Did you really want that yourselves? Was it really protecting you? Right now, thanks to the pressure they put on you, you’ve caused a needless war and put your own people in a crisis, haven’t you?”

The Femme Fatale stayed quiet for a moment.

Carissa quietly brought the Curtana Second’s fragment, and the sword of light it created, to bear. “France is the only one mounting an actual magical offensive against the UK. Everyone else has figured it out—the Roman Church isn’t behind this war; Fiamma is…And if not for this petty squabble, we could go to Russia, too. You have the chance, right now, to avoid the worst-case scenario.”

She had no doubts.

She had no reason to have any.

“So what will you do? I don’t remember France, the nation I’ve determined to be a long-standing rival, being this worthless.”

Academy City, District 23.

In this school district, a conglomeration of aviation and space-related technology, waited all kinds of aircraft. Normally, passenger planes for transporting people and goods were common, but now, it was dyed in a more martial color. A myriad of fighter jets, bombers, and transport craft were lined up in rows, with staff for maintenance running around among them.

In their midst was one certain bomber.

The HsB-02 supersonic bomber.

Over eighty meters long. A top speed of a blistering seven thousand kilometers per hour—it was an aircraft that seemed to transcend physical limits of the earth’s atmosphere.

A bomber.

However, not a single bomb was loaded inside that vast pile of high-spec machinery. Only an empty hold—but anyone who knew the circumstances would have felt their spine freeze. Something far more terrifying than mere bombs was on board.

“Hm-hm-hmm.”

A woman’s humming could be heard.

Along with the voice, filled with amused-sounding emotion, there was an audible cracking noise. One chair was placed there, and someone was sitting in it. A woman without a left arm and with a pulpy right eye. The edges of her yellow coat were charred black, and a pale-blue arm of flashing light extended from it. Countless medical devices were arrayed around her chair, and several tubes and cords were attached to the woman’s body.

Shizuri Mugino.

Academy City’s fourth-ranked Level Five, known as Meltdown.

The reason they’d decided to send her onto the front lines in Russian territory was a simple one.

“…I caaan’t wait—can you, Haaamazuraaa?”

And another Level Five had boarded a different bomber.

“Wh-whoa! What, what is this?!”

The shout came from the bomber’s pilot. Black-suited men were supposed to be on board this plane—a special force unit they’d be dropping into Russian skies by parachute. The team was ordered to confirm the movements of a Level Zero named Imagine Breaker and to quickly defeat him and knock him out if they could corroborate that he had allied himself with an enemy faction.

They weren’t espers. However, they were a group of professionals, outfitted with the latest firearms and possessing the skill to precisely put down targets with inhuman motions. Supposedly.

But now.

Why was everyone in that massive cargo space unconscious?

And…

Who on earth was this girl, who looked like she was in middle school, standing in the center of them, sparks crackling every which way?

“Hello! You’re gonna have to add another passenger to your list.”

“…?!”

Every part of the pilot’s body sensed danger. He tried to quickly leap outside the plane and raise his voice into a shout to inform others nearby of the crisis.

Before he could, though, sparks flew.

A high-tension current, regulated so that it wouldn’t leave aftereffects, forced the pilot’s muscles to contract, leaving him unable to move a single finger, much less speak.

“Gah…?!”

“Sorry. I’m at the end of my rope at this point, so no guarantees I’ll be able to hold back on the next one,” she told the pilot as he wheezed.

Mikoto Misaka told him thus:

“To Russia, please. Do your original job, and I’ll give you a pat on the back.”

“Now then, what will you do?”

Somewhere in Academy City, someone spoke—Aiwass.

Aiwass was not human.

And the one facing it, as if in concord, was not human, either.

“…”

Long hair, black, with a little bit of brown mixed in. Nervous eyes, visible through glasses. A girl with good proportions. That was how she looked—but in reality, she was an aggregate of AIM dispersion fields.

Hyouka Kazakiri.

Her eyes, as she confronted Aiwass, were not locked in her usual uneasy gaze.

In them was, though slight, a conviction—a will to fight.

To that girl, Aiwass spoke.

“A being similar to you has been confirmed in Russian territory, yes. An archangel—the POWER OF GOD. No, if I were to acknowledge its incompleteness as a trait, I suppose I should call it Misha Kreutzev. Either way, humanity currently does not have the technology or military force to do anything about it. Once the trample begins, tragedy is sure to visit all people of that land.”

“Then you want me to fight it?”

“That is indeed a highly fascinating choice. Of course, you have no responsibility to make it.”

“…”

“You’ve started to consider specific plans? Well, if you say you will, then there is no need for worry. We have a disposition to prefer this village, inundated as it is with AIM dispersion fields, but should we use the Sisters scattered throughout the world as a medium and grant directionality to the AIM dispersion fields, we could extend the belt-shaped field area from Academy City to deep within Russia for you.”

“That would be…” Kazakiri stumbled over her words for a moment. “Would that mean sending a virus into their heads again?”

“If necessary,” answered Aiwass simply. “But it likely will not be. Last Order is not with us, so it may be difficult, but your objective now probably aligns to the Sisters’ benefit. Even without forcing the command tower to give the order, I would think the individual specimens would be cooperative.”

“…”

“Now then, what will you do?”

“What will you do?”

“Nothing.” Not even a second passed before Aiwass answered. “I only do things that I deem fascinating. The movements in Russia seem somewhat interesting, but I don’t feel enough interest or value to fight for it.”

Even if humanity died out and the world disappeared, Aiwass probably wouldn’t bat an eye.

One built up intricate plans one by one for some grand goal, and one who had the power to destroy the world with one fingertip but never acted except on whims and fancies—which one of them was really more terrifying?

“You may go.”

Kazakiri thought for a while, then said, “However, I have a condition.”

“You would ask me? I’m not the one with a bombastic ‘plan’ in mind.”

“Do not lay a hand on my friends, please.”

“If they never whet my interest, then you may name any you like.”

“…If you do, then I will turn against you both, even if we devour each other in the end.”

“Still not enough to be called a threat.” Aiwass smiled faintly. “Those very words could instead draw my interest, you know.”

And the pilot of one of Academy City’s supersonic fighters deployed over the Sea of Japan, for the first time since entering the battle, let out a desperate cry.

“?! E​v​a​d​e​!! T​u​r​n​r​i​g​h​t​n​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​o​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​w​!​!​”

“?”

Ekalielya, of the enemy Russian Air Force, frowned—but realized why a moment later.

Something.

A big hunk of something was hurtling straight through them, between each military’s aircraft.

Roar!!

The explosion and shock wave tearing through the sky came later than the actual object. It shook the top-of-the-line fighter Ekalielya piloted like a tree branch. If it hadn’t been a Russian plane with excellent mobility and stability, it would have stalled and fallen out of the sky. She looked and saw that even the Academy City–made titan, which was over eighty meters long, had almost lost its balance from the impact.

“What…?! What was that just now?!”

The new bogey had come from Academy City. It was probably something they’d developed. Considering the situation, it was highly possible it was another cutting-edge aircraft. But Ekalielya couldn’t believe what she’d just seen. The object she’d witnessed a moment ago, with her own eyes, was clearly something that ignored all extant aviation sensibilities. It wasn’t just a UFO. They were treated as metallic aircraft made of unknown technology—Ekalielya thought of them as mysteries—but mysteries on a level that humans could manage to accept. That was because they were vehicles, controlled on the inside by some sort of creature.

But that thing from earlier had been different.

For just an instant, that which had leaped into Ekalielya’s vision was…

“An…angel…?” she murmured. “What on earth was that…?”

“Fuck, don’t ask me…I’m just as surprised as you.”

Though they had no way of knowing, it was a being called Fuse Kazakiri.

However.

She wasn’t being controlled by a third party this time. Her own will shone clearly in her eyes. As she tore through the skies, something creaked and grew out of her right hand.

It was a sword. A mass of destructive force was created, one that was incredibly unsuitable for how she was normally.

It was almost like her will to fight had taken physical form.

Fuse Kazakiri flew through the Russian skies faster than any other airborne creature.

Her uncontainable desire to protect her “friends” would likely lead to a fierce battle, a direct confrontation between angels.

Yes:

Science and magic.

A battle between two angels created two wholly different ways.

Touma Kamijou was headed to the center of that battle.

He’d boarded one of the Elizalinan vehicles in the motorcade. He’d directed one of them to a different place in order to send off Accelerator, but the other vehicles were smoothly proceeding toward Fiamma’s castle.

He’d found a bundle of parchment on the unconscious Accelerator.

He didn’t carelessly touch it, since it might have been a magical item, but instead, he left him Index’s name. The name of the girl who would tell him the parchment’s meaning.

“…Yeah.”

He smiled a little to himself.

The fight against Academy City’s number one had been unexpected, but he’d gotten a lot out of it.

“I’m the one dawdling about, doing nothing but worrying. I didn’t exactly have the right to talk big in front of Accelerator.”

Lesser, who was sitting next to him, looked at the side of Kamijou’s face.

He still had his eyes set forward, grinning, as he continued to talk to himself with such energy it was like he was beating the pulp out of his former self.

“Reasons? Justifications? I never needed any of those!! Do I have to have a logical motive to stand up for someone?! Index is suffering. And she can’t give that smile she always does. Fight for that!! Isn’t that enough?! Quit thinking up excuses!! Stop hesitating and hesitating and looking for more rational reasons!!”

Yes: Just like during the coup in London, when he’d wasted no time stepping up to the plate against the new queen with Curtana Original in hand, his voice had a strange kind of heart in it.

“Is leaving everything to Fiamma going to solve it all?! What the hell does it matter if you feel guilty toward Index?! No matter what that bastard says, is any of it a reason to stop wanting to rescue her?! It was never enough reason to stop me, was it?! No matter how grandiose he was being!!”

He’d returned.

The motivation granting this boy strength had settled back into its original position.

“I’m not protecting her because it’s right!! I’m not saving her because the rulebook says I have to!! I just want to—me!! You don’t need to stop for anything, asshole!! You don’t need to debate whether it’s right or wrong, and you don’t need to look for clues to figure that out!!”

After letting his voice get loud, Kamijou forced himself to quiet down, until he continued softly, “…Yeah, I am the worst kind of person. I was lying to Index that whole time—I’m a garbage human. Maybe, with the life I’ve led, I can’t proudly claim I’ve been protecting her.”

Touma Kamijou.

Gripping his right fist once again, the boy, still looking ahead, said:

“But even so…that doesn’t mean Fiamma’s the one I need to be apologizing to.”

London.

St. George’s Cathedral had become a crucial and invisible base in this war. Many personnel—read: sorcerers—were moving about within, some to directly tackle the invading forces from France and others to indirectly end this great war itself. But among them, one person stood alone outside the general flow of things: Stiyl Magnus.

While he was one of Necessarius’s combat personnel, he would never go to the battlefield. He wasn’t interested in how this war turned out to begin with. Stiyl was in this cathedral as a bodyguard. For a girl in a large room who continued to sleep on a bed.

Index.

A nun who had 103,000 grimoires memorized and safely tucked away inside her brain.

It was something she’d done long ago, before the boy with the strange right hand had ever shown up.

And that was why…

“Don’t yank my chain,” asserted the sorcerer strongly, a cigarette coming out the corner of his mouth, glaring straight ahead.

A few meters away stood a woman with long blond hair. A woman whose golden locks seemed far too long—almost two and a half times her height.

Laura Stuart.

The archbishop of the English Church and simultaneously the head of Necessarius. Someone who possessed enough authority that, normally, Stiyl would have been forbidden to speak with her on equal footing.

But Stiyl’s expression was dangerous.

It was like he laid eyes on an enemy.

Laura, in the meantime, wasn’t of the inclination to admonish him for his rudeness and simply gave him a grin.

“Oh! This visit is merely to confirm my adorable subordinate’s health, in such miserable suffering as she is. I’ve even come bearing some fruit.”

“…There were two remote-control Soul Arms for her. Fiamma stole the one from the Royals, but the Puritans’ is still in good shape. And it’s obvious who has it.”

Stiyl spoke softly in a low voice.

“You’re using the Puritans’ Soul Arm to interfere with Fiamma so he doesn’t misuse the knowledge in her books, right? Currently, Fiamma has a much stronger connection, since he activated it first. That’s why you went so far as to consider messing around with her body and changing the command priority.”

“A happy idea, a happy idea, indeed! I regret to say I noticed it not. If you are so inclined, would you like to consider the possibility?”

“I said Don’t yank my chain! She’s already tormented by a heavy burden— If you give her any more, you have no idea what could happen!!”

“Well. Even were your spuriousness on the mark…,” teased Laura, “I am the rector of this organization, remember? I have countless personnel I can call upon with merely a flick of my chin or a fingertip. I wonder how long you will be able to hold them back by thyself.”

“In that case…” Stiyl spat the cigarette in his mouth onto the sublime cathedral’s floor.

The next thing she knew, he had several rune cards in his hand.

“…I’ll take out their command tower right now, at the very least.”

“Oh, I see, I see. Quite respectable indeed.”

Laura Stuart shrugged, then removed a Soul Arm, small enough to fit in her palm, from the basket she’d brought the fruit in.

Stiyl’s expression warped in rage, but Laura continued without him.

“But will the present situation last for long, I wonder?”

“Wh…what?”

Stiyl didn’t even have time to repeat what she’d said.

Rustle.

From the bed behind him, someone had slowly gotten up.

Index Librorum Prohibitorum—the index of prohibited books. And the girl Stiyl Magnus wanted to protect most in this world. But she seemed different. She took one look around with emotionless, camera lenslike eyes, then moved her small lips.

“…Warning…zz…Chapter Four ghghgh…verse eight. Remote…user…connection, confirmed. Ghghgee…Data release, permit…Working-state, data…reception will be, blocked…Factors…presenting danger, beginning automatic removal…”

Bwoo!! A strange noise rang out, and several lights danced around Index.

In the blink of an eye, they’d begun drawing an intricate magic circle.

While placing an even greater load on the little girl’s already exhausted body.

“What actions shall you take, Stiyl?” came Laura’s amused voice, as if to further pressure Stiyl, who was already cornered.

While toying with history’s worst Soul Arm in her hand.

“I shall grant you with a chance, so do something about this. If you can’t, then I will.”

“You don’t need to…” Stiyl’s teeth grated. “You don’t need to tell me— This is the job I’ve always done!!”

The girl with machinelike eyes heard his shout and turned her head to face the flame sorcerer.

And so she said:

“Hostility, confirmed. Now…analyzing utilized spells and…commencing construction of a corresponding Local Weapon…”