The faint rays of the sun began to rise over the snowy horizon as Alice started on her way home, having just finished a job she’d received from her hometown’s mafia. Because of the time of year, the temperature at dawn was lethal, but even in the air so chilly it felt like needles against the skin, the warm scarf knitted by her little sister was comforting.

“Heya, Alice,” a voice from above suddenly called out to her.

She looked up to the top of a nearby wall to see a familiar redhead walking along it. She chuckled to herself, thinking that the girl was much like a cat.

“Hi there, Yuuri. It’s not every day that we get to walk home together.”

“Yeah.” Yuuri hopped off of the seven-foot-high wall, landing next to Alice. Then, she held her shoulders as she shivered. “Ugh, so cold. That scarf must be real warm.”

“Haha. Are you jealous?” Alice responded, flaunting the scarf ostentatiously after Yuuri shot her a greedy look.

“Here, let me try it on.”

“Absolutely not. You’ll just get it dirty.”

“Wow. No one’ll ever date you if you’re just gonna let them freeze to death, you know.”

“And you can’t be girly only when it’s convenient for you. But…” Alice moved closer to Yuuri and unwrapped her scarf a little, enveloping Yuuri’s neck with it as well. “There. Now we can both use it.”

“H-Hey, this is kinda weird…”

“Don’t worry about it. We’ll be warmer this way.”

Yuuri’s face blushed red, a seldom-seen feminine reaction from her, and Alice grinned at her mischievously. The two walked together like that along the still-empty city’s new street. Along the way, they talked about the rite of passage they attempted before they left for work.

“If those two feel ready to be adults now, they must have grown so much.”

“It’s been two whole years since we took them in,” Yuuri reminded Alice. “But they’re still kids. When we were their age, we were a whole lot tougher.”

“…I’d rather not think about that,” Alice replied, her expression having soured.

“Rude. I’ve still got this scar from when you stabbed me.”

“I’ve got one to match, too. The whole reason I’m under you now is because I lost to you. Don’t start acting like you’re the victim here.”

Pouting, Alice reminisced about the past. Both she and Yuuri were orphaned Blazers. Because of their powers, it had taken a fair amount of time and bloodshed for their relationship to settle into what it was. The number of times they’d nearly killed each other over a little bit of food or a bed was too large to count on one hand.

But the two of them eventually tired of that fruitless existence in which they stole from others for their benefit alone. At the end of those wasted days, they exchanged a promise as they drank liquor together: “With how strong we are, we can protect so many other kids. Instead of using our powers to steal, we’ll use them to give love to others. That’s the kind of ‘cool adults’ we’ll be.”

With renewed determination, the two lived their lives in accordance with the vow they swore on the liquor. They took powerless orphans into their gang and looked after them.

“Come to think of it,” Alice continued, “we nearly killed each other on this road once.”

“Yeah. This place is a lot cleaner than it was when we were kids, though.”

Back when they’d fought, the cobblestone road they walked had been in such poor condition—so broken and gouged out in places—that not even cars were able to traverse it safely. Pedestrians were unsafe as well; any clueless travelers who happened to wander into the area were stripped of their possessions in mere seconds.

That dilapidated road had since been repaved with pristine white stones. The buildings that lined it had been repainted as well. Such renovations were made for reasons related to the posters that lined the walls all over, displaying five overlapping rings.

“It’s a huge event. People come from all over the world, so I guess they don’t want people seeing an ugly place.”

“An ‘ugly place’, huh?”

“The government came again, didn’t they?” Alice asked, having quickly gathered what Yuuri’s meaningful whisper meant.

“Yeah. Yesterday.”

Though she and the others were impoverished, Alice loved life. A modest lifestyle didn’t matter to her as long as she could be with all her friends. With the Olympics approaching and enthusiasm mounting, however, a shadow extended over their lives. The government began hunting the homeless. As a country and as a city, they didn’t want the world to see something so ugly.

Under that pretense, they began chasing homeless and street children out of the towns closest to where the event would be held. Despite that, the hunted weren’t offered protection; they were merely beaten with sticks, kicked while they were down, and chased away like rodents. Alice’s gang was, naturally, not exempt from the hunters’ chase.

“Those jerks,” Yuuri complained. “They said only you and me could be taken in. Just ’cause we have powers.”

“That’s not happening.”

“Right. Without us, what would happen to Annie and the others? The Sister is on our side too, so she told them to go eat dirt. I seriously can’t stand those government jerks.”

“Well, we’re an eyesore to them. They don’t want us begging when there are spectators here.”

They may not have been welcome, but Alice’s gang wasn’t ready to leave just because someone had told them to. Being forced into a place that they knew nothing about during such an intense burst of cold weather would be tantamount to a death sentence.

“If Annie and the others could at least be taken into an orphanage, we’d be free to leave. The two of us can live anywhere we need to.”

“That would be tough. If it were that easy to find a caregiver, the streets wouldn’t be full of kids like us.”

Alice was right. The street children population was a problem the nation as a whole was faced with; they couldn’t all be taken care of. No, perhaps they could have been, but no administrative action was taken to do so. The government was too busy building useless roads and empty museums to care for street children. The children had to live using only their own power, and if they wanted to survive, they couldn’t be chased out during the cold season.

“I think our time is coming soon,” Alice whispered.

“…Yeah.” Yuuri nodded slightly. “We’ve asked too much of the Sister already. It’d be wrong to keep burdening her.”

The nun was a good person, letting the kids take shelter in her storage shed. For so long, she had used her own paltry cash flow—she only owned a church in the slums, where money was scarce—to give the children soup. In their short lives, not yet even ten years long, she was the kindest person they’d ever met, but that made it all the worse for them as they watched her be yelled at and subjected to the city government’s abuses. The children couldn’t bear the sight.

“That’s it, then!” Suddenly, Yuuri jabbed a finger in the direction of the distant rising sun. “Alice. When winter ends and things get a little warmer, we’re all leaving this city. I’m tired of cold places, so I say we go south.”

You’re pointing east, though.

Choosing not to correct her, Alice merely nodded. Yuuri was probably just pointing in the direction that seemed the warmest.

“…Sure. Let’s do it. We’ll find a warmer city.”

Alice had actually been waiting for the right time to suggest that they move to a warmer city. The little siblings they looked after were bigger and stronger now, so if they could survive the winter, they would be able to travel a greater distance.

“Watch out, equator! We’re coming for you!”

“This is our first move, so maybe aim a little closer,” Alice sighed, though her expression showed no dissatisfaction. Her dreams were filled with thoughts of a warm spring journey, along with the hope that everyone would be able to live more easily in a new, warmer city in the south.

Those dreams, however, would never be realized. They would be set upon by abrupt tragedy, their happiness so easily wrenched from their hands. Not even Alice’s modest happiness was safe.

Suddenly, a single black car passed next to Alice and Yuuri. An old man sitting inside the back of that car spoke to the driver, his secretary.

“Reconstruction isn’t progressing much here, I see.”

“Hmm? I think it’s just fine,” the secretary replied. “The main road just had its tiles almost completely redone, and the wall repainting is approaching completion as well.”

“I saw filth hiding in the corner just a moment ago.”

“You mean street children?”

“Even if you cover the place in Persian rugs, having filthy children like them around will sully the whole thing. If there are beggars running around during the Olympics, it’ll hurt the city’s reputation.”

“But street children are a nationwide problem. I’m not sure we alone can do that. Not to mention that Yuuri’s gang, the one that controls this area, is made up of nothing but small children. Its leaders are both Blazers, too, so there are some issues with mere officials like us laying our hands on them…”

“Coward! What do you have to fear from two mere children?!”

“Shall we have the police force them to leave?”

“Don’t be silly. The chief of police is aiming for the mayorship in the next election. If I ordered him to do that, he’d be more than happy to call it inhumane and use it as a negative campaign against me.”

“What would you have me do, then?” the secretary replied to his boss, who spoke with flippant disregard for the suffering in the area, with a bored tone.

“Send garbage to take out the garbage, of course,” the boss replied nonchalantly, as though he were demanding his morning coffee. “It’ll save us the trouble.”

◆◇◆◇◆

On the second-to-last night of Kyomon and Hagun’s joint training camp, the weather was, unfortunately, rainy. It wasn’t strong enough to be considered a storm, but large raindrops were loudly smacking against the windows.

Enjoying the pleasant background noise, Kagami Kusakabe of Hagun’s newspaper club inhabited a room in the facility the campground lent to them, organizing all of the materials she’d gathered during the training camp. The documents scattered under the light of a small desk lamp were both the notes she’d taken during the trip and student information that had been traded between the schools. On her laptop screen was information about other schools’ training camps, gathered by their respective newspaper clubs.

The amount of information available to Kagami gave her a bird’s-eye view of all seven schools’ trends and strengths. All her hard work was for the sake of a special issue of the Hagun Academy Bulletin that was to be published before the Seven Stars, and during the course of her work, she made a discovery. The impetus for that discovery was a phone call from Ikki Kurogane, who had expressed interest in Amane Shinomiya.

Truthfully, Kagami had had very little interest in Amane Shinomiya before Ikki’s call. Indeed, he was a mysterious knight; nobody even knew for sure what his ability was, but that wasn’t altogether surprising when Kagami considered that he hadn’t even joined his middle school league. Beyond that, schools were certain to keep their representative Blazers’ abilities private. Far from benefitting the schools, publicizing their students’ abilities would actually cause trouble for them during the Seven Stars.

With so many first-year representatives who never joined their middle school leagues and those reps’ lack of publicly known Blazer abilities, Amane Shinomiya was even less of a stand-out. Furthermore, to Kagami, Amane wasn’t the kind of knight to stand out as more than just another nameless rookie. He wasn’t someone who spurred her into further investigation by inspiring greater interest within her. There were many other representatives worth focusing on, such as the Gale Sword Emperor, Ouma Kurogane, the Crimson Princess, Stella Vermillion, and the current Seven Stars King, Yuudai Moroboshi.

Still, Ikki’s phone call had sown the seeds of interest somewhere in the corner of Kagami’s mind. That was why, as she organized her information from the seven schools, Kagami decided to indulge in her interest on a whim. The result: Kagami was left completely aghast.

“What… the…? What’s with this kid?”

The mountains of northeast Japan were cool even in the summer, but that didn’t stop a cold sweat from creeping down Kagami’s back. Her eyes were fixed on Amane Shinomiya’s first semester grades, which she had worked very hard to obtain. There, the records of his class-sanctioned mock battles were written. Six wins in six battles—each one a victory by default. Kagami had seen the battle records of a great many students, but never had she seen one so eerie.

Speaking of things I’ve never seen before, there’s never been a Seven Stars with so many nameless freshmen participating. It’s almost like someone’s trying to gather all sorts of unknown knights together.

Perhaps because she’d seen Amane’s bizarre results, Kagami cast her mind back to something she hadn’t thought much of before, realizing just how unnatural it was. Was it mere luck? She had thought as much before, but was such a thing even possible?

In the modern world, if one was strong, they’d catch everyone’s attention whether they wanted to or not. How could so many first-year students have been strong enough to be chosen as representatives without a single one of them having attracted attention in the past?

“…Ah.”

Kagami came to the sudden realization that she was in the process of stumbling upon something huge. To make matters worse, it was something far too outrageous for a student like her to tackle alone.

That doesn’t mean I can just ignore this, though.

She had to pursue her discovery; that was what it meant to be a journalist. As such, Kagami scoured every last one of her notes in pursuit of solving the mystery that was the unknown students. All the information about the seven schools’ representatives, the members of their boards of directors and the Seven Stars Battle Festival’s management committee, and even the list of sponsors who cooperated with the management committee.

Utilizing her boundless information on all the cogs in the Seven Stars machine, Kagami Kusakabe finally, in the dead of night, after several consecutive hours of scouring, reached a conclusion. Her extreme prowess as a journalist, finely honed over time, allowed her to arrive at a truth that was meant to be unknown to her. As she looked over her lists of participants—documents with the names of students from all seven schools—at length, Kagami finally, indubitably cracked the code.

“There’s… an eighth school!” she cried. “…Huh?”

A burning heat immediately pierced Kagami’s back. Still looking down toward her files, she watched as a dark grey blade sprouted from her chest. Kagami knew the shape and color of this blade, as it dimly reflected the light of her desk lamp.

I… knew it…

The dagger-like Device that had stabbed through her back was Darkness Hermit. The owner of that Device was…

“A…lice?”

“…”

Straining the last of her energy, Kagami looked behind her. There, she saw the face of her classmate and friend, colder than she’d ever seen it before. Nagi Alisuin’s lips then parted, and she spoke in a corpse-like voice that harbored not even a shred of emotion.

“You were too clever for your own good.”

After that, there was an audible squelching noise as the blade was removed from Kagami. No longer supported by the dagger, she fell forward, landing in the mountain of documents.

No… She tried to get up and run, but she didn’t have the strength to move a muscle. The fatal wound caused by Alice’s Phantom Form weapon mercilessly stole away Kagami’s consciousness, forcing her to black out. Ikki… Stella… Be careful. This year’s Festival… is teeming with monsters!

Unable to even scream, Kagami Kusakabe prayed that perhaps at least her thoughts could be communicated to her friends, then fell completely unconscious.

◆◇◆◇◆

Alice crouched down to inspect Kagami’s fallen body. She had definitely fainted, and considering the circumstances, it would take at least a full day for her to awaken.

“What a shame. If you were just a little bit dumber, Kagamin, we could’ve still been friends for a few more hours.”

Kagami’s conclusion that there existed an eighth school was right on the money. Just as she had come to find, the upcoming Seven Stars Battle Festival was under the influence of some power working from the shadows—a power calling itself Akatsuki Academy.

A newly created school sponsored by a major organization, Akatsuki Academy existed for the sole purpose of causing the collapse of the Festival. There were only seven students enrolled, but almost all of them were elite members of the international terrorist organization known as the Rebellion. Akatsuki Academy’s seven students had infiltrated the other seven existing schools, each of them securing their place in the Festival.

By conquering the Seven Stars Battle Festival with an external force unrecognized by the International Mage-Knight Federation, they hoped to make a mockery of the event. Kagami had deduced their existence, and as a result, she was dealt with.

“It’s really such a shame.”

As soon as she finished her sentence, the student handbook in Alice’s pocket began to vibrate. She had been getting calls incessantly, but had chosen to ignore them in favor of watching Kagami from the shadows.

Alice removed the handbook, different from Hagun’s, from her pocket. She knew who the caller was without even checking its display, as it only received calls from the one man who handled any and all communication between members of Akatsuki Academy: Reisen Hiraga, also known as Pierrot.

“Yes?”

“Oh, you finally picked up. And here I was starting to think you hated me enough to give me the cold shoulder.”

“Why would you ever think I like you?”

“A scathing rebuke indeed.”

Alice narrowed her eyelids, annoyed by the cackling coming from her handbook. Try as she might, she couldn’t bring herself to feel anything but hatred toward the sound of his voice. It was calm and easy to understand, but it contained a thinly veiled frivolity that made it seem as though he was laughing at all the world.

“So, why didn’t you pick up sooner?” Hiraga asked.

“I ran into some trouble.”

“Oh? What kind of trouble?”

“A girl from Hagun’s newspaper club was starting to figure us out, so I decided to shut her up.”

“…How much does she know?”

The voice on the other end of the line had taken on a slightly yet perceptibly more serious tone. In response, Alice picked up the last document that Kagami had looked at and began reading from it.

“Donrou Academy: Yui Tatara. Kyomon Academy: Amane Shinomiya. Rokuzon Academy: Sara Bloodlily. Bunkyoku Academy: Reisen Hiraga. Rentei Academy: Rinna Kazamatsuri. Bukyoku Academy: Ouma Kurogane. Hagun Academy: Nagi Alisuin. She knows enough that she’s drawn stars next to the names I just gave you, which includes yours and mine.”

“Well then.”

“I wasn’t told about any of the members other than you, The Liaison, and Ouma, The Guest, so I can’t be sure whether or not this list is accurate. Seems that she’s got a vague idea of who we are, though, so I silenced her for the time being. Tell me, was her list correct?”

“My sincerest apologies, but I can’t divulge details about the other members at this point in time. It would create too much risk. That said, the Eve will be carried out tomorrow, so you’ll get to know each other whether you’re ready to or not. Save the introductions until then. Still, though, even if I don’t tell you about the others, you know this girl got at least three out of seven names correct. How do you think she found out?”

“From what I can gather of these documents, it looks like she was probing into the pasts of each representative. All of us have fake backgrounds, barring The Guest, so I suppose the cracks would show through under close scrutiny.”

“I see, I see. All a result of our forgers being clumsy, then. I’ll be sure to press them on that later. But anyway, good job. You did exactly what was needed of you, which is just the reliability I’d expect from the Black Assassin. By the way, how did you dispose of the clever little rat?”

“I just knocked her out for the time being. Oh, but if you want me to kill her, I will.”

There wasn’t an ounce of hesitation in Alice’s voice despite the fact that they were supposedly friends just the day before. Her merciless, cutting voice was met with a flustered one from Hiraga on the other end of the line.

“Oh, heavens no! Covering up the murder would be too much trouble. Our Akatsuki Academy will be known to the world this evening one way or another; locking her away somewhere until then should be more than enough.”

“That’s fine. I was just poking a bit of fun, anyway. So, what business was so important that you had to call me about it?”

Alice rushed Hiraga to get to the point, practically hissing her question. She hated him. There was no point in them chattering away idly.

“Oh, it’s not me that has business with you. There’s someone here who wanted to chat. I’ll put him on now,” Hiraga said, then gave the phone to the “someone” he’d mentioned.

“It’s me, Alice.”

That voice caused Alice’s expression to stiffen. Though she couldn’t see the person speaking to her, she knew who it was. She could never mistake that stern voice, as heavy as lead.

“It’s been a while, Master Wallenstein.”

“That it has. I haven’t seen you since you left for Japan.”

Sir Wallenstein, the One-Armed Sword Master. As one of the Numbers—one of the twelve strongest Apostles within the Rebellion—he noticed the orphaned Alice’s strength and raised her to be the group’s most effective killer, nicknamed the Black Assassin.

“You’re in Japan too, Master?”

“Of course. A supervisor has to be present on the scene.”

Wallenstein was already in Japan. That fact made Alice tense up slightly, likely because she dreaded the man’s strength. If he were a member of the Mage-Knight Federation, he would surely be a Rank A.

There were no weaknesses in his offensive or defensive abilities, and he excelled at swordplay. He was, without a doubt, one of the strongest fighters in the Rebellion. Having someone like him present to lead them in person meant that the Rebellion’s conspiracy against the Seven Stars Battle Festival was of the utmost importance.

“Well then, Master, what business do you have with me today?”

Keeping her greeting short, Alice got right to the point and asked Wallenstein why he had contacted her. In response, his stern voice answered her question with one of his own.

“Alice, you’re the greatest of all the students I’ve taken under my wing. The mafia, cults, terrorists… Every time we’ve used assassination during territory disputes with other organizations, no matter how important the target was or how hard it was to get to them, you’ve gone above and beyond in your work. There may be little point in asking you this now, but you are aware of your role in this, yes?”

Alice remained silent for a moment. Then, she closed her eyes as if coming to terms with impending farewells and spoke resolutely.

“Yes, I’m well aware. To that end, I’ve taken no shortcuts in my preparation. I’ve built a high level of trust between myself and Hagun’s strongest, so at the very least, my first move should go unopposed. Furthermore, my Noble Art, Shadow Bind, has the ability to render an opponent unable to fight with a single strike. You have no reason to fear, Master; I will make the Eve a complete success. I swear it on my name as the Black Assassin.”

“It soothes me to hear you say that,” Wallenstein said encouragingly, the smile evident in his voice. “We’re counting on you, Alice.”

“Of course. I’ll see it done,” she answered, nodding.

Leaving that exchange behind, Wallenstein ended the call. It was quite unusual for him to contact Alice, but perhaps it wasn’t all that surprising. The Eve was an order from the sponsor funding Rebellion. It was essentially a ceremony, a raising of Akatsuki Academy’s flag before their conquering of the Seven Stars. No failure could be permitted. If they botched the job, all of Rebellion and its sponsor’s machinations would go to waste.

Now then, Alice thought, I suppose my first duty is to clean up the mess in front of me.

To carry out the Eve as planned, Alice first had to hide Kagami and all of her documents until at least the evening. To do so, she transferred magic into her shadow, which began to gradually swallow the unconscious Kagami and her papers.

“Don’t think badly of me,” Alice said. “I just can’t have any extra uncertainties getting in the way of the execution of our plan.”

Just like that, every last bit of evidence was spirited away.

◆◇◆◇◆

With Kagami and her findings hidden, Alice returned to the representatives’ lodging. She made a beeline to her room and opened the door to find that the only light was coming from a small lamp. Within that light was Shizuku, lying in bed in her negligee and reading a small book.

“Welcome back, Alice.”

“Oh. Still awake, Shizuku?”

“I was just about to go to sleep.”

Shizuku gently flipped a page of her book. There were very few pages left in it.

“What are you reading?”

“The Mother-in-Law’s Guide: 108 Ways to Torment a Newly Married Woman.” Alice found that rather scary, but Shizuku spoke again after a brief pause. “…Leaving that aside, Alice, you’ve spent a lot of nights out partying recently.”

Alice racked her brain, contemplating how best to respond. She had overheard Ikki and Kagami’s phone call, leading to long outings at night so she could keep watch on Kagami. It was natural that Shizuku would be suspicious after several consecutive nights like that, especially on such a rainy one. Shizuku was a very discerning girl, sensitive to the workings of others’ hearts. Alice had to concoct a good lie, lest she see right through it.

“I’m not partying, silly. The Seven Stars is right around the corner. I have to make my own preparations, you know,” Alice replied in a roundabout way to avoid both lying and being honest.

“Right.”

Shizuku continued to read, giving only a short, disinterested response. Given the situation, Alice was nothing if not grateful for Shizuku’s general apathy toward others; what little interest and concern she had was directed at her brother, Ikki Kurogane.

I can’t help but to be jealous.

Emotion welled up within Alice. The coming day would be her and Shizuku’s last together. Once the Eve was over, she would distance herself from Hagun, never to return again.

“Hey, Shizuku? Mind joining me for a drink?”

Entering the room, Alice pulled a dirty bottle of whiskey from her suitcase in the corner. To remember their last night together, she invited Shizuku to share a drink. Shizuku accepted the offer, slowly sitting up in her bed. She then turned her eyes toward the bottle that Alice held.

“Is that the drink we had when we went to the bar together that one time? The one that stunk like medicine?”

Right. Alice recalled their trip. We went drinking to celebrate us winning our first selection battles.

In reality, “drinking” might not have been the right word to describe what Shizuku had done. The strongest drink she'd had was a small sip of Alice’s whiskey, and that alone had been enough to make her, teary-eyed from its medicine-like stench, down a whole glass of water as a chaser.

“Sorry, I forgot about that. Guess I’ll just drink it mysel—”

“No, it’s fine,” Shizuku said as she moved from her bed to the sofa.

“Are you sure? I thought you didn’t like it.”

“Just this once is fine. Today is a special day, after all.”

“Special”? Why? Did something happen?

Despite her questions, Alice didn’t particularly care about answers as long as she could drink with Shizuku. She got out two glasses took a seat across from her friend, then poured the amber liquid into both glasses. Shizuku accepted the one offered to her and brought it to her nose.

“Ugh.” Her face immediately scrunched up in disgust. There was no way she would have gotten used to such a unique, pungent stench in such a short time. “You’re strange, Alice. There are so many other drinks out there, and most of them are easier to get down.”

“Haha, maybe. But I don’t think there would be any point if it were easy to drink.”

“Why not?”

Shizuku tilted her thin neck. Noticing her confusion, Alice looked toward the dirty-labeled bottle on the desk and spoke.

“It’s an old story, from back when I was a child. The kids in my neighborhood and I would always say, ‘Only adults are happy about drinking this gross stuff. That means anyone who can drink it is an adult.’”

“Teehee!” Shizuku had to stop herself from bursting into laughter. “What in the world? That’s some interesting logic. It’s cute, though.”

“You’re absolutely right. But for us, kids who could drink this became full-fledged adults.”

“I guess that was like a rite of passage for you and your friends, then?”

“It wouldn’t be wrong to see it that way.”

“Someone was a bad little girl. You weren’t even of age yet, were you?”

“Well, my home didn’t have any laws like that,” Alice answered before drinking the whiskey in her glass. The biting, stimulating alcohol in her mouth, the stench of medicine that rose to her nasal cavity. She was definitely drinking hard liquor. Incidentally, the brand she was drinking was so strong that it was controversial even among the whiskey-loving community. “Honestly, even I still can’t stand the taste of this.”

“Why do you drink it so much, then?”

“It’s like tasting my memories. But it’s not often that I drink from this particular bottle.”

“Hmm… Well, I don’t have any memories like that. To me, it’s just a crappy drink,” Shizuku commented, then gulped down the contents of her glass all at once. After that, she made a sour face. “Okay, yeah, I hate it. It hurts my throat, and I’m starting to get a headache from the smell of medicine on my breath.”

“You didn’t have to force yourself to drink it…”

“I’m fine,” Shizuku said, massaging her throat with her fingers. “Like I said, today’s a special day.”

“Special”. There was that word again. Curious about what she meant, Alice decided to ask about it.

“You said that before, too. Why is today special? Did something good happen?”

“I’m not talking about me,” Shizuku replied, shaking her head. “It’s a special day for you, right?”

…Huh?

Shizuku’s claim caused Alice’s heart to skip a beat. She was right; it was their last night together. Once the sun rose and set again, Alice would be known as a member of Akatsuki Academy. Shizuku shouldn’t have known anything about that, though.

“What makes you think that?” Alice asked, shock visible on her face like a deer in headlights.

“Because you’ve never invited me to do something with you before.”

“Never? That can’t be right. After Ikki fought The Hunter, we went drinking together, remember?”

“You were just thinking of me back then, because I was so worried about my big brother. You’ve never approached anyone, including me, for your own sake. You speak so intimately with everyone, you act so motherly, and you’re so approachable, but you never let anyone else do those things for you.”

Alice gulped inadvertently. As Shizuku had claimed, she was intentionally acting that way. She was pleasant toward everyone, as friendly as could be, but she never opened up or allowed anyone to get unnecessarily close to her. It was all an act; she had infiltrated Hagun with ulterior motives. At no point had she thought that someone had caught on to her behavior, but Shizuku had noticed, and it was honestly unexpected.

“I’m surprised. You really pay attention to me, Shizuku.”

“Duh. You’re like a big sister to me, Alice.” Shizuku acted like it was nothing while letting a smile spread across her porcelain doll-like face. “This is the first time you’ve ever said something to me for your own benefit. I don’t know why, but today must be special for you, right? Assuming it is, I’m more than happy to share a glass with you. But only one glass, okay? And next time, maybe bring a drink I can enjoy too.”

Shizuku poked her lip out like she was pouting. Her cute expression naturally made Alice relax a little.

“Heehee. Just one is plenty. Thank you, Shizuku.”

◆◇◆◇◆

Probably fatigued from her many long days at the training camp, Shizuku started dozing off on the sofa shortly after she chugged her first—and only—glass of whiskey. It didn’t take long for her to fall fully asleep.

Come to think of it, she fell asleep back at the bar, too.

Pondering if perhaps she was the kind of person who got drowsy when she drank, Alice lifted Shizuku off of the sofa, bridal-style. It was the summer, so she wasn’t likely to catch a cold from sleeping on the sofa, but it was still poor etiquette to let her sleep there. As such, Alice decided to carry her to her bed.

“Mmn… Big Brother…”

Suddenly, Shizuku stirred in Alice’s arms, talking cutely in her sleep.

“Heehee. I wonder what she’s dreaming about.”

“Stand aside, or I can’t kill… Zzz…”

“Wh-What is she dreaming about?” Her face pale, Alice slowly lowered Shizuku down onto her bed, being careful not to wake her up. She then pulled a comforter over top of Shizuku, which prompted her to smile and curl up under it. “She’s so cute when she’s asleep.”

Looking at Shizuku’s adorable sleeping face, Alice sat on her own bed, next to her friend’s. She then remembered the title she’d been given.

“‘Like a big sister’, huh?”

Whispering to herself, she turned to look toward the sofa they were sitting on earlier. She gazed at the bottle of whiskey on the table, its label soiled and faded, as she cast her slightly lightheaded mind back, her memories a little hazy from the alcohol. Memories connected to that bottle, from before she was picked up by Rebellion as an assassin. Memories of her final day in a foreign land, where she and her friend Yuuri raised street children who thought of her as their big sister.

※ ※ ※

She would never forget the freezing rain that morning. It wasn’t quite snow, but it chilled the body even more than snow could. In that freezing rain, Alice opened a vinyl umbrella while facing a tall man.

That man was her Brigadier—her mafia group’s captain. Alice handed the man the profits from her most recent job, from which he took fees and taxes. He then returned her portion of the earnings. As an underling within the mafia, however, he was not one to keep promises.

“…Hey.” She was given back far less money than she was supposed to receive. “You said I’d get twenty percent—”

Alice’s complaint was cut short by the man spitting on her face. He glared at her as though he was looking at garbage.

“Don’t bitch at me, brat. Be grateful we’re even letting you do business on our turf,” he said before walking away.

“Thbpt!”

Once Alice had confirmed the man was gone, she blew a raspberry after him.

We live in the same city, stupid, she thought as she wiped the spit from her face. She then dug around in a pile of snow, hidden in the shade. There, she found a plastic container wrapped in pink cloth.

“Guess it’s a little cold now.” Inside the container was a meat pie, given to Alice by her client. If that man had known it was there, he definitely would’ve taken it too. To avoid that, Alice hid it before their meeting. “It’s been so long since we’ve had meat. Everyone’s gonna love this.”

I’d better save some for the Sister too. Oh, but she’s leading a congregation today, so she’ll be in the next town over.

Alice hurried home, thinking of how she’d share the meal. She just wanted to see everyone’s smiling faces. When she arrived, however, she found that the door to the storage shed had been kicked in and left barely attached to the frame.

“…Huh?” Well-used to battle, she quickly came to the conclusion that some malicious party had attacked them. “G-Guys?!”

Alice screamed, dropping everything in her hands and dashing into the shed, but there was nobody inside. It was still very early in the morning; her little sisters shouldn’t have woken up yet. Even they were absent, however, having left only their dirty blankets behind.

What in the world happened?! Where did everyone…

The moment Alice lifted one of the blankets, her breath was taken away by what was hidden underneath. It was a bloodstain, still fresh enough that it hadn’t dried. Upon further inspection, she found drops of blood leading out of the shed, in the direction of the main road. They had been diluted by the rain, so much so that Alice wouldn’t have noticed them at all if she hadn’t discovered the horrid scene, but there was no question that they were there.

Alice leaped outside, in such a hurry that she tripped over herself as she followed the drops of blood. She had an awful, terrifying feeling that manifested as cold sweat trickling down her back. Blood meant that someone had been hurt; possibly one of her friends.

It can’t be! Even with nothing to back her claim, she tried to convince herself that it was all a lie. …Ah!

As she walked out into the street in front of the church—the opposite way from where she came—she found that the truth had no compassion for even a child’s wish. A red-haired girl, her stomach soaked with fresh blood, was leaning weakly against a brick wall at the edge of the other side of the road.

“Y-Yuuriii!” Alice screamed her name and ran to her side.

“Nh…” Yuuri reacted clearly to her voice. She slowly opened her eyes, gazing at Alice as she approached. “Oh… You’re safe, Alice… That’s… one good thing, at least.”

“What happened?! T-Tell me!”

In a mixture of pain and outrage, Yuuri’s face distorted.

“I dunno. Sergey and his men attacked us outta nowhere… Said they were ‘cleaning up the garbage’. Dammit… They took everyone with them. Cowards…”

“It was the mafia?! B-But why?! We paid all of their taxes!”

“Dunno… Gah! Ack!”

“Yuuri! D-Don’t say anything else!”

Each time she coughed, Yuuri spewed blood onto the black ice covering the ground. Talking would only make things worse; Yuuri had to see a doctor. Fortunately, the road was reasonably busy, so people walking along had taken notice of what was happening.

“Excuse me! Somebody, please get a doctor!” She screamed in hopes of someone listening. Much to her dismay, however, the people who’d been watching the spectacle unfold all turned to look away from Alice and Yuuri. They then rushed to leave the scene, as if they hadn’t heard a word she’d said. “P-Please! At least let me borrow a phone! I’ll even pay you!”

Alice continued to beg, but they all continued to ignore her. Though they had watched with great interest as the girl bled out, more than anything else, Alice’s voice seemed to scare them away as they separated themselves from the spectacle. It was as if all of them were trying to avoid the inconvenience of dealing with it. The sight was unbelievably cruel.

Huh? Wh-Why…? She’s bleeding so badly, and everyone’s just…

“Hey! You all have ears, right?! My friend is dying!”

“It’s not gonna work…” Yuuri struggled to speak in response to Alice’s heartrending cries. “Nobody’s… gonna help out. There’s no one out there who’d help street children like us… You already know that.”

“Ah…”

Alice was well aware that Yuuri was right. They were abandoned children, with no relatives or money. There was nothing to gain from helping them, and the onlookers knew as much.

“But we’re different, right?”

“Huh…?”

“We’re different from them… We’re cool adults…! Right?”

Alice opened her eyes wide. “Cool adults”. Those silly words held their shared vow and discipline. The day Alice and Yuuri first banded together, they made a promise over that liquor. They would cease living their lives thinking only of themselves; instead, they would help others, love others, the way cool adults were supposed to.

“Yeah. Of course we are! But why does that matter now?”

Yuuri didn’t respond to Alice’s question right away. She simply looked at her in silence for a while.

“Then you have to… go help them…”

When she finally spoke, her words suggested that she wouldn’t be there to help. Alice, feeling an awful, uncomfortable foreboding, seized Yuuri by the shoulders.

“Wh-What are you saying?! Get real! You know I can’t do that all by myself! You beat me, Yuuri!”

“Hehe… Yeah, right… We’ve been together long enough now… I always knew that you were… holding back so that you wouldn’t kill me.”

“Gh…!”

“With your strength… I know you can protect them.”

“Shut up! I don’t wanna hear your excuses!”

Tears poured from Alice’s eyes as she screamed, while Yuuri merely gazed at Alice with a vacant look in her eyes.

“Please… Alice…”

Finally, Yuuri closed her eyes, as if falling into a deep sleep. All the strength seemed to leave her body at once.

“…Yuuri? H-Hey, come on. Answer me, will you?” She shook Yuuri’s shoulders and raised her voice, but Yuuri never awoke, never opened her eyes. “You can’t do this to me, Yuuri. We can’t just sit here. We just promised each other we’d go south… remember…?”

Alice continued to plead, tears dropping from her cheeks. Of course, Yuuri did not answer; Alice knew that she would never wake up again.

It wasn’t the first time Alice had seen such a thing happen, and it wouldn’t be the last. Death was common in her city, but she still didn’t want to accept it. She didn’t want to recognize that even the place she tried so hard to protect had been so thoroughly stomped down. The truth was too painful to accept, but time paid no heed to her wishes in its endless, merciless march forward.

“Ooh, looky here, boys! Alice is back!”

“Good. Go capture the twerp. That one’s worth twenty of them other little shits, though, so make damn sure you don’t get that cute little face scratched up.”

Rough voices were accompanied by footsteps behind Alice. She turned to find that the same mafia members that she associated with were now approaching her, guns and Devices in hand. Before she knew it, they had surrounded her, brandishing their respective weapons.

“Why did you do this?” she asked, the light gone from her apathetic eyes. “We never missed a payment.”

“Heheh. Well, we got an order from some bigwig government guy to clean up the city. They paid us so much, it makes the money you scrounged up for us till now look like chump change. And since they even offered us a bonus to sell you out, what reason did we have to not betray you?”

“It’s eat or be eaten in the world of adults, kid. Give up, and don’t even think about resisting. That is, unless you wanna end up like that dipshit over there.”

One of the men reached out to take Alice by the hair and drag her off. She glared at his arm as it approached and began to think.

“Eat or be eaten”, huh? I suppose so.

The men surrounding her had been alive much longer than she and her friends. Their claim was correct; if it wasn’t, tragedies like the one that had just befallen her wouldn’t happen. Society wasn’t the one in the wrong. What happened was neither illogical nor unfair.

The philosophy of becoming “cool adults” was mistaken. That ideal had manipulated the children and led them to their downfall. It was all too clear, to the point that Alice had become painfully aware of the truth.

I’ll steal everything from you monsters, she decided, just like you stole everything from me.

Right as the man’s hand finally took hold of her hair, her vision was dyed red with the flames of rage.

“Ah… Aaaaahhhhhhhhhh!”

Everything was over in an instant. When color returned to the world, Alice was inside the mafia’s hideout, in a room that seemed as though it had been splashed all over with buckets of red paint. She was atop a pile of human carcasses that resembled minced meat.

Standing stock-still, she was covered from head to toe in blood and bathing in the steam that rose from the scattered entrails. With the color returned to her, she saw the corner of the room. There, her younger siblings trembled in fear, their teeth chattering audibly.

“E-Eep…”

“P-Please, d-don’t kill us…”

“W-Wahhh…”

Their small eyes, clouded by a jumble of fright and despair, were pointed directly at Alice. The reverence they once held for her was nowhere to be seen. Not even shadow remained of their smiles, which had once warmed her heart. The moment she saw her siblings, Alice knew once and for all that she had both protected them and lost them forever.

※ ※ ※

When she came to her senses, Alice was alone in the rain with her umbrella collapsed, walking aimlessly like a wandering soul. She was soaked from head to toe, but she hardly noticed. It would have been silly for her to care about water when she was already drenched in the blood of her victims. Occasionally, passersby would gawk in wide-eyed shock at her bloodstained figure, but they would quickly avert their eyes and move away. It didn’t affect their lives if an orphan was covered in blood or even near-dead.

She had stopped being angry about it, and she experienced neither sadness nor frustration. Every emotion had left her body as the tears that had since run dry, but she decided that was for the best. Her dear friend’s last moments as she lay dying in her arms, and how her siblings had all looked at her with such intense fear—the pain of losing those she loved and was loved by—were still fresh in her mind. She was happy to be rid of her emotions if it meant she wouldn’t hurt the way she had before.

“I never thought a child would beat me to the punch.”

Suddenly, the wandering spirit heard a voice from behind her. Alice turned slowly, sluggishly, toward the source of it, searching with her murky eyes. When they finally stopped, her eyes were fixed on a gentleman dressed in a black robe.

The man was gazing at her, his expression and aura familiar to the girl who had lived her whole life surrounded by violence. By no means was he a decent man. He was something far less human than even the mafia Alice had just slaughtered. Even so, she felt no fear; fear was just one of the emotions that had been washed away by her tears.

“Who are you?” Alice asked, undaunted.

“I’m just a dimwitted assassin who had his prey stolen by a child.”

The gentleman’s answer revealed that he’d been sent by the mayor to clean up the garbage known as the mafia. It was so unbelievably ironic. They had called Alice’s gang “garbage”, but while they had been trying to take out that garbage, they were disposed of themselves.

It’s all such a farce.

“And? Here to complain?” Alice asked the assassin as a sardonic smirk spread across her face.

“I’d never,” the gentleman replied. “I’m only here to give you your cut, since you did my job for me. This is for you.”

The man pulled something like a ball out of his robe and rolled it over toward Alice. That ball-like object was actually an old man’s head—the head of the city’s mayor, the man who had made the decision to dispose of Alice’s gang. She looked down at it, showing no signs of shock.

“What a thoughtful gift. Heheheh… Ahaha…”

She wasted no time in stomping on the head, laughing from the bottom of her heart as she did so. Yuuri was killed by the mafia, the members of which were, in turn, meant to be killed by the machinations of the mayor, who ended up being killed by the self-proclaimed assassin standing in front of her.

This world really is something else. Alice was surer than ever. She’d always thought that hell was somewhere a person went when they died, but what could have possibly been worse than the hell she was already living in? To try to protect something in such a world, to love something, was beyond ridiculous. God. We were all such fools.

“The realization that you’ve just reached is correct.” The gentleman suddenly spoke, interrupting Alice’s hoarse laughter. “Love, money, ethics, morality—the whole world’s full of lies like that. So much deception, so many excuses soil and obscure the truth. There’s really only one hard and fast rule: The strong take everything, while the weak lose everything. The greatest from among us impose their will upon society. That is the world’s sole providence. Now that you’ve come to this realization, you have what it takes to become one of us. We, Rebellion, will convey the truth to this deceitful world. Your talent for killing will be of use to us. Come with me, child.”

“And if I say no?” Alice asked of the invitation to a world yet darker than the one she was already in.

“I already told you that the strong will take everything. That’s the truth of society. If you refuse, then I’ll prove firsthand how true it is and take you by force.”

Bloodlust emanated from the man’s every orifice. Alice, however, was affected by it no more than she would be by a slight breeze. The threat of violence was nothing to her; violence existed to take from others, and she had nothing left to take.

“Heeheehee. Interesting. I love the simplicity of it.” It was precisely because she had nothing that Alice was interested in the offer. “I don’t really mind. I have nowhere left to go and nothing left to protect, after all. So, if you accept one condition, I’ll join you.”

“What’s your condition?”

“A hundred million. Give me a hundred million and I’ll do your dirty work.”

“A hundred million for a kid with no background? That’s a steep price.” The man’s already-severe face hardened yet further. “And if I refuse?”

Alice laughed mockingly at the man who mirrored her question.

“There’s no need for me to explain that to you, is there?”

All she had to do was take it. She desired money, and no paltry sum of it, either. The simultaneous insolence and desperation were enough to make the man take a liking to her.

“…Heheheh. You certainly are an interesting one. All right, I’ll get your money.” He readily assented to Alice’s outlandish demand. “So, kid. What’s your name?”

“Everyone calls me Alice.”

“I’m one of the twelve pillars of the Numbers, the One-Armed Sword Master, Wallenstein. Welcome, Alice.”

Extending an arm from his robe, Wallenstein offered a handshake. Alice responded in kind, sealing their contract. She would take every last bit of the money given to her and give it to the nun in order to cover the cost of rearing her remaining siblings. Then, she would cut all ties with the city and leave once and for all. Just as Wallenstein desired, she would devote the whole of her talent for killing, once suppressed by falsehoods like ethics and morality, to the Rebellion’s cause.

At long last, the first chapter of the life of Nagi Alisuin, the Black Assassin, had come to a close.

◆◇◆◇◆

It truly is an absurd story.

Looking back on her old life, Alice let out a chuckle. Though it was all for the sake of her infiltration, she found it ironic that she was once again playing the role of an older sister to her peers. But that farce was about to end. Soon, those false relationships would be severed. What would be the look on Shizuku’s face when that happened?

Alice recalled the horrified faces of her siblings, the absolute denial and disgust in their eyes as they looked upon a murderer. Shizuku, too, would probably hate and fear her. She wasn’t especially sad about it, though; their relationship existed solely for appearances, to make Alice’s job easier. Lorelei was a Rank B knight, one of the key players of Hagun Academy. Treating her like a younger sister was the most efficient way to close the distance between them. There was nothing more to it.