3 - A Seriously Amazing Birthday

Constant Magical Academy was a fortress at one time in the past. But now the only sign of that history was the basement — the building had been rebuilt after the war. For this reason, there was a massive labyrinthine bunker underground, but the building itself wasn’t built to stand up to any attack.

Thus, Keizo Teruya expected this to be an easy job. He’d already received a full map of the grounds and information on their security system. He hadn’t had to go through secret means to get it, either. The public information was plenty.

“Synchronize our watches. Three, two, one...”

Keizo and his three men were lurking in the courtyard behind the school. All four of them were wearing ninja-style clothing. The clothes were made of a fabric that was difficult for mana to detect, and could fool any run of the mill sensor. Their dark brown color was also hard to spot at night, too.

All of them synchronized their watches and checked the blades they had hidden in their clothes. It was old-fashioned equipment and an old-fashioned plan, but when it came to assassination those were the best.

One of the men was tall and thin, one had bug-eyes that showed beneath his mask, and one was extremely short and round. He gave them each brief orders.

“Eyes, check the route.”

The one called “Eyes,” of course, was the one with the bug eyes. He nodded and jammed a finger into his right eye socket. It was a sight that would make anyone who saw it want to look away: he ripped out his own eyeball.

But Eyes didn’t seem to feel any pain. Shockingly, he held the eyeball up and flicked it with a finger. It fell to the ground, rolled for a while, and then stood up. There were tiny legs growing from it, and a thin thread stretching back. It was a nerve that was connected with the empty eye socket.

Eyes moved his hand, like he was giving orders to a small animal. The eyeball started to move forward, dragging the nerve along.

This was a way of scouting without using mana. Using mana would make it easier for someone to detect you, but since a walking eyeball didn’t disturb the surrounding mana any more than necessary, you could avoid that problem.

The eyeball started to trot forward, and then skillfully clambered up the school building’s gutter. When it reached an open window on the second floor, it leapt inside.

Before long, Eyes gave Keizo his report.

“The security’s been changed, it looks like. The patrol machines are going by at different times than they should be. Should I give you their expected routes based on standard patrol patterns?”

Eyes used his watch to display a map and the security patterns and showed it to Keizo. A single glance was enough to tell Keizo everything he needed to know about the school’s security.

“They aren’t using the standard patrol patterns. It’s a feint. There’s a good chance they’ve increased the number of patrol units following random patterns. They’ve thought this through carefully.”

Then Keizo gave an order to the short, rotund man.

“Bag, give me four dummy patrol units.”

The man called “Bag” removed his mask and stuck a hand in his mouth. When he took it out, he was holding four patrol units the same size and shape as small birds. Normally, you wouldn’t imagine something like that could fit in a person’s mouth, but Bag had somehow pulled four of them out from his body. This was a method of moving things he’d developed that couldn’t be detected by mana, as opposed to systems like Korone’s purse, which emitted huge amounts of mana when used.

“Snake, place the dummy patrol units on Route B. Once they’re placed, we’ll wait five minutes and then begin the operation.”

The tall thin man called “Snake” took the patrol units and got down on the ground. Then he began to wriggle forward, just like his reptilian namesake.

Snake moved as fast as a sprinter. He reached the building in no time at all, and wriggled up the side of the vertical wall. Since none of the others used mana, it was safe to assume that he’d probably permanently transformed his body to be able to do this.

Snake pressed his face up against a window that was too small for a human to enter. He then grabbed his head with his arm, and squished his skull until it could fit through. His body was flexible and elastic, and when he was through the window, it returned to its original shape.

The patrol units were too big to fit through, so he stretched out his body and used his mouth to unlock the window. An unlocked window would be enough to trigger a patrol unit, but Snake quickly sent the dummy patrol units through. They flew through the air, and when a real unit came to investigate the open window, they attacked.

A single strike from a dummy’s beak was enough to get inside and steal its data. The real patrol unit lost power and fell to the ground, and the dummy began to brazenly — though it had no emotions — send false data. From the perspective of the security commander, it would only appear to be a common false flag.

Snake crawled alone down the corridors of the school. Behind him followed Eyes’ eyeball.

“Proceeding down Route B as planned,” Eyes reported.

Eyes was next to Keizo, so this allowed him to keep in communication with Snake. They were an unstoppable assassin team.

“The target is in the lounge on the top floor of the school building. She’s not moving,” Bag said, looking into the mana detection monitor he’d taken out of his mouth.

They were tracking Keena, and she was the only person it showed on the top floor. There was no sign of Snake on the monitor.

Snake had swapped out the patrol units on the way for dummies. Eyes saw this and reported to Keizo.

“The patrol units have been replaced. The signal’s come in from Snake. He’s beginning the countdown.”

“Begin in five minutes,” Keizo ordered.

Eyes brought his eyeball back, and Bag and Keizo began to move towards the target.

Meanwhile, Snake hid himself beneath the fire extinguisher box next to the lounge. He stared into the room, which was a spot for students to relax. There were many chairs and tables there. There was a soda fountain on the side of the wall, but it was shut off now.

The target — Keena — had placed a bottle of tea and a lunchbox on the table at the end, and was looking up at the night sky through the glass ceiling. Snake assumed she would be bored just sitting there with no one around, but there were candles stuck in the pile of white rice in the lunchbox.

Tomorrow was the birthday Keena had chosen for herself. She kept glancing at the clock — apparently, she’d decided that she would celebrate at midnight.

It was nothing more than a coincidence, but Snake had placed the dummy patrol units at 11:55. The operation would take place at exactly midnight.

Snake waited until there were 30 seconds left, then began to move from his hiding spot. He would do the killing today. Keizo and Bag, with the help of Eyes, would have prepared an escape route from the roof, and would be ready for any unseen events. Everything was going fine so far. Nobody would notice until they found Keena’s corpse tomorrow.

Snake checked to make sure the emergency sign hadn’t been given, then began to crawl through the space between the tables and chairs. He got closer and closer to her legs.

Snake checked the time once more.

It read 11:59:50.

He began to count.

○

Akuto had undergone a change as he faced Yozo. He was a different person than he’d been a few minutes ago.

“I know kids change quickly at your age, but this is a little extreme,” Yozo said.

The change in Akuto was manifesting itself in the mana around him. It had gone from calm to raging, and now it was calming down again.

But the amount of energy hadn’t faded at all. A quiet anger was building within him, and the slightest change in his emotions caused the air around him to tense up. The atmosphere would change from one of tension to fear that it could explode at any minute. What both of these had in common was that a terrible energy was hidden within them.

“I suppose one could say you’ve awakened.” Yozo’s tone was calm, and there was a smile on his face, but there was a clear sense of tension emanating from his body.

Akuto didn’t answer. There was a different type of calmness on his face than there had been before.

“I may have helped give birth to a monster. But even so, once a grown-up has started something, he can’t back down.”

Yozo drew his katana and his eyes opened wide. But Akuto ignored him and advanced.

Yozo moved.

“Hattori-Style Technique: Distorted Moonshadow!”

With a shout, Yozo split into two. It was the same technique that Junko used — no, this was the original. His clone technique was vastly superior, in that the two clones didn’t move in the same way at all.

Junko’s would still have the same basic patterns; the clone and the original would move in the same way. But Yozo’s clone moved like a completely different person.

“Die!”

The two Yozos attacked with perfect timing. It wasn’t a simultaneous attack — one attacked a moment later than the other, which was even more difficult to deal with. It was like a strike from above suddenly turning into a strike from below.

In fact, the first Yozo came down with a swing from above, while the second sliced at his feet. And to make things even worse, the strike from above twisted and turned as it fell. It was a movement designed to transform the swing into a stab, or knock the enemy’s katana out of his hands, and even on its own, it had the effect of a feint.

The sweep from below wasn’t a simple sweep either. It seemed to sweep upwards, then sweep downwards again. Even with two clones, a simple attack could’ve been blocked by going forward, but this combination was unstoppable.

Akuto chose to go forward and block it anyway. He ignored the feint and succeeded in avoiding the strike from above by using his mana-enhanced biceps to knock the blade’s hilt. But because of that, he couldn’t dodge the strike from below. He stretched out an arm to stop it, but it changed direction once more and dug sharply into his leg. Blood spurted out of his heel.

But Akuto didn’t scream, and Yozo knew he hadn’t won.

“I’ve seen how you reacted to that.”

Yozo stood with his sword still drawn. Akuto was still standing in front of him.

The clone attack was a hallucination Yozo had shown him.

“You can’t use any subtle skills. Your specialty is using mana to enhance your body. But you can only enhance the parts you focus on. If I keep attacking, I can slowly keep cutting you, and eventually you’ll die from blood loss.”

Yozo’s words were intended as a warning. Akuto said nothing.

“There’s no guarantee I’ll attack the same way. I have several different patterns I can use. You were fooled by my hallucination, which means that you cannot stop me. I don’t want to kill you. Can you reconsider this?” Yozo said, and finally Akuto replied.

“I’ve made my decision. I’ve finally seen what it is I have to do. I’m not backing down.” There was a strong resolve in his words.

“A shame,” Yozo said, and readied his sword. “This time, it won’t be a hallucination.”

Before he’d even finished speaking, Yozo had created a clone of himself. The next strike came immediately, as if he wanted to give Akuto no time to think.

Just like he said, he attacked in a different way. First, with a swing from above. This was the same as the hallucination. Akuto moved forward and knocked the blade upwards.

But the second moved differently. It aimed for the torso, but the clone’s right hand let go of the blade, causing it to fall lower and slip beneath Akuto’s arm. Then the clone grabbed the blade again with the left hand, and brought it sharply upwards.

Akuto couldn’t stop both attacks.

There was a single flash of light.

A huge spurt of blood burst forth from the wound.

Akuto’s head flew high into the air.

The body stood upright for a moment, but when a fountain of blood poured out of the perfectly level cut, it staggered and fell to the ground.

“I didn’t want to kill you,” Yozo whispered.

The clone disappeared, and Akuto’s head fell to the ground. It looked up at him with an expression of pain.

“If you hadn’t been so stubborn, you could’ve survived...” Yozo picked up the head.

“I’m being stubborn because there’s something I have to do.”

Yozo froze. He was a man who was almost never surprised, but his eyes went wide with shock just the same. Akuto’s severed head was talking.

“What?!”

It was possible to change one’s body a great deal using mana, but there was no way you could survive as just a head. His will to live was terrifying.

Yozo tossed the head in the air and tried to slice it apart with his sword, but the blade stopped in mid-air before it reached him.

“!”

Now he was even more shocked — something had grabbed him from behind. Akuto’s headless body had gotten around behind him.

Yozo’s expression twisted in fear. He heard a metallic sound that sent a chill down his spine. He looked and saw that Akuto’s head had grabbed the blade with its teeth.

Clack... clack...

The head was crawling up the blade, using its teeth to move. Yozo could only stand there and watch. When it reached the hilt, it looked up at Yozo with empty eyes, and then leapt for Yozo’s exposed throat.

“Aaaaah!” Yozo screamed.

Akuto’s teeth were biting into his throat. Blood was spurting out of his carotid artery, and he could feel the blood leaving his head at an incredible rate.

He sensed that his own death was upon him.

“That was pretty unpleasant for me, too,” Akuto’s head was saying.

Those words brought Yozo back to reality.

Akuto was standing in front of him, with his head still attached to his body.

“Don’t tell me...!” Yozo shivered.

“I told you that if I saw it again, the outcome might change,” Akuto said quietly.

“You weren’t talking about my movements, you were talking about the illusion itself...?!” Yozo stammered.

These illusions, unlike other secret techniques, were something shown to the enemy before combat began to frighten and confuse the enemy. They weren’t made so that they could be easily copied.

But Akuto had used the technique after only seeing it twice, and he had done it so well that even Yozo didn’t notice.

“Talent... isn’t a good enough word to describe it, I suppose. You were born that way, weren’t you?” Yozo said.

“I don’t know. Either way, I don’t want to kill you. Just let me through,” Akuto said calmly.

Yozo shook his head.

“I can’t do that. That would be betraying my role. But I’ve realized I cannot defeat you. I can’t abandon my duty, but I can’t afford to die here, either. Now, what to do with this contradiction?”

Yozo laughed, and didn’t move an inch. He’d realized why Akuto had shown him such an awful illusion.

Yozo was a man who was ready to die at any time. The one thing he feared was that the people he’d killed would curse him. Akuto had realized that, and had used that knowledge to render him unable to act. At his core, Yozo didn’t like cruel battles. Even that awful illusion was a way of saying he didn’t want to fight.

“The source of that contradiction comes from your faith. Right? Your biggest mistake was putting your faith in something that’s nothing but a system. And it’s easy to resolve that contradiction. I just have to run away.”

Akuto put his hand on a nearby tree, and suddenly it began to change. What was just a normal tree was filled with an incredible amount of mana. It turned black and then split down the middle, sending fragments covered in some kind of sticky liquid scattering everywhere. The huge mouth of a demon beast appeared from the side of the shattered tree.

“What changed? I didn’t think I could do this until a second ago,” Akuto muttered.

Akuto put his foot into the demon beast’s mouth, and it seemed to melt away in the darkness inside the tree. It was some kind of magical teleporter.

Yozo and Hiroshi (who was still holding Yuko) realized what he was doing.

Hiroshi yelled at him as he left.

“Wait! Are you going to betray everyone? Even the class rep?” Akuto didn’t turn around as he answered.

“I’m not betraying anyone. I’m just playing my role in the story everyone made. If I don’t, the story called ‘faith’ won’t end.”

Akuto disappeared within the tree, and its eerie mouth vanished.

○

At the Academy lounge, Snake was squeezing in between the table legs, heading for Keena’s feet at high speed.

It was exactly midnight.

He gripped her leg with his left hand. And at the same time, she lit a match to light the candles in her lunch box.

That small action saved her life.

The match fell onto snake’s hand as he grabbed her.

“Kyah!”

“Tch!”

The match itself wasn’t that harmful, but it was so surprising that he let go. He’d tried to pull her down, but she was able to stand up just before he could.

“Kyah?! What’s going on?!”

Keena leapt backwards and flinched. The chair clattered to the ground with a loud noise.

He’d failed to kill her without making noise, but Snake wasn’t going to let that ruin the whole job. He quickly stood up and grabbed an assassin’s kunai in his right hand, then silently leapt at Keena.

She didn’t have time to disappear, and his left hand was around her mouth so she couldn’t scream. Snake had jumped up from the ground and gotten behind her, and was now lifting up her jaw. Her pale throat was exposed. “Ackie, save me!” She screamed as best as she could, but it was muffled.

Snake ignored her useless struggling as he tried to bring the kunai across her neck like a razor.

But then...

Snake’s body was ripped off her in an instant. Something had grabbed the hand that held the kunai and pulled it with incredible force.

“Aaah!” Snake screamed.

The strength of the pull on his hand was enough to send him flying through the air. It was the first time Snake had encountered such strength. He spun once in mid-air, and then the grip, which had threatened to crush his hand, suddenly vanished. He went flying into the lounge tables, and then rolled along the floor.

“Ackie!” Keena turned around joyfully.

But it wasn’t Akuto.

“Huh... how?” Keena asked.

It was Boichiro Yamato. He was smiling a confident smile, an expression that radiated power and kindness.

“I came to save you. It makes me sad that you’d ask why,” Boichiro said, and brought his hand to the hip of his white suit. There was a sword hanging there. He drew it with an elegant movement. The beautifully-decorated western sword glinted in the starlight.

Snake realized that the mission was a failure. Boichiro must have used magical teleportation to get here. He didn’t know how the plan had failed, but now that it had, he had to run. If they could all escape, there were plenty of ways to keep anyone from finding out who had plotted the assassination.

Snake checked that he could still move, then quickly flipped back up and darted his way through the scattered tables. No one was a match for him when it came to escaping. Once he squeezed somewhere tight, no teleportation or flight magic could follow him.

He blew the whistle that meant the plan was a failure and would warn the others to run. And then he headed for the dust chute in the corner of the lounge.

Fortunately for him, the tables covered the ground between him and the dust chute. No matter how fast you were, it would be impossible to catch him.

But when he put his hand on the dust chute, his eyes went wide with surprise.

His hand was on the chute, but it wasn’t moving. No matter how much he pulled, it wouldn’t move. The reason was simple: his arm had been cut off at the elbow.

There wasn’t even any pain. Snake looked behind him. The tables that had been protecting him were now cut clean in two. It was like they’d been sliced with a laser.

Snake looked at his own severed arm. He’d never seen a cut like that. The arm was still intact, down to the cells inside it, like it had been encased in plastic after it was cut. Snake had used both molecular cutters and laser surgical knives before, but he’d never seen such a straight cut.

And what was an even bigger surprise was that Boichiro had swung his sword, but he’d been right next to Keena when he’d done it. Furthermore, the tables and Snake’s arm had been severed, but there was no damage to the floor.

Boichiro noticed his shock and spoke.

“Does the phrase Dimensional Severing mean anything to you? I doubt it does.”

He raised the sword back above his head. Snake knew his death was at hand.

The sword came down. He could sense the space between it and himself parting.

He blew the whistle that meant “Abandon me and run,” and the fingers in front of his lips were silently severed.

A moment later, his head was on the floor. It kept blowing the whistle for a while, even after it landed.

Boichiro had put his hand over Keena’s eyes before he started to swing the sword. Keena was confused, but she seemed to mostly understand what was happening, because she didn’t try to remove his hand.

“Did you save me?” she asked.

“Yes. And I always will,” Boichiro said.

And then he looked up. He knew that Keizo and the others were on the other side of the ceiling.

Keizo was lurking out of sight, but knew something was wrong. He’d never seen an opponent that Snake couldn’t escape from. He gave an order to Eyes.

“We’re leaving. But I want to see the face of our foe, at least. Move your eyeball to the glass over the lounge.”

Eyes took out his eyeball as he was instructed, and threw it towards the glass.

“Bag, get ready to go.”

Bag pulled a small portable flying device out of his mouth. It was a machine that could fly without creating mana disturbances.

And then Keizo sensed something behind him. He drew his sword and turned around.

“W-Wait! Dad!” It was Eiko. She quickly spread out her hands to say “Don’t attack me!”

“What? What are you doing here, Eiko?!”

Keizo was her father, but he hadn’t told her about this mission. Eiko walked up to him. And then he heard Eyes’ voice — he had seen their enemy’s face.

“It’s Boichiro Yamato, from the Cabinet Magical Investigation Department...!” Eyes’ voice was shaking in shock.

He couldn’t understand why someone like that would want to interfere. There were many mysteries about the man, including how he’d risen to that position at such a young age, but he was a man loyal to his duty. And he was very close to Eiko, too.

A thought flashed through Keizo’s mind, but it was too late. The fact that she was family caused him to let his guard down.

Eiko grabbed Keizo and jumped. She crashed through the glass and fell through the lounge.

“What are you doing, Eiko?”

Of course, Keizo was the stronger ninja of the two. He shook her off and landed upright on the lounge floor. Eiko landed next to Boichiro.

“What am I doing? It would be boring if I had to explain it all,” she said.

Boichiro chuckled.

“Fine. Do I have to tell him?”

And then Bag and Eyes leapt down from the shattered ceiling. They stood at Keizo’s side.

“Run,” Keizo said, but they both shook their heads.

“I don’t know what the mistress is thinking, sir, but you need to escape.”

“That’s right. We’re on official duty here, and it is Boichiro Yamato who is defying the gods. You need to survive so that you can denounce him.”

They were right. Even after Snake’s death, the two of them were still professionals. But Keizo had to learn his foes’ intent first.

“Don’t tell me you fell in love with him?” he asked.

Eiko laughed. “Of course not.”

And in the next instant, Boichiro’s hand moved. He flicked his sword with his wrist, and Eyes’ head fell to the ground. It was the first time Keizo and Bag had seen a dimensional severing.

“You bastard!”

Keizo and Bag panicked.

But amazingly, Eyes’ body didn’t seem to even recognize that it had lost its head. It drew its sword and took a step forward before finally tumbling to the ground.

That gave Bag a moment in which to act. He quickly took out a large cylinder from his mouth and held it in front of his body.

“Don’t move! I don’t know what you just did, but if you cut this it will blow up the whole school.”

The fact that Bag was able to think so quickly on his feet, even in a situation like this, proved that he was a true ninja. He used the cylinder of explosives as a shield as he stood between Boichiro and Keizo.

Boichiro seemed to want to protect Keena, so this would allow him to create a stalemate. He could use it to buy time for Keizo to escape.

Calmly and quickly, Boichiro drew a circle with his sword.

“Uwah!”

Bag felt his arm and part of his stomach being sliced away from his body. They’d been severed cleanly, along with the air in front of him.

A sphere of space had been cut out in front of his body.

And in the next moment, just as he’d said, the cylinder burst with an explosion — which then formed a perfect sphere, contained within the severed space. Nothing inside the transparent sphere escaped.

“Wh-What...?!” Bag couldn’t believe what he was seeing.

The flames inside subsided towards its center. The roar of the explosion and the heat of the flames shrank into the void, as if sucked into some invisible space.

Bag’s severed body parts were gone as well. He looked at Boichiro with an expression of despair.

He could almost see pity in Boichiro’s eyes as he swung his sword vertically. Bag’s body was split clean down the middle, and the two halves fell separately to the ground.

“H-Have you gone mad?” Even Keizo was scared now.

Eiko’s laughter returned.

“Ahahaha! I’m not crazy! My wonderful boyfriend is just here to fix your mistake!” Eiko’s cheeks were flush, as if she were drunk.

“Mistake?”

“It’s your fault for not figuring out Suhara’s game!”

“Game...?” Keizo’s throat was raspy.

“That’s right. Why would a God want to kill a girl like this? It makes no sense, does it? You must’ve gone senile if you seriously thought you should do what Suhara said!” She pointed at him as she spoke.

Of course, Keizo had thought the same thing. But since she was a girl of no value to anyone, there was no reason for Eiko to try and protect her. It certainly couldn’t have been out of a sense of justice, and that definitely wasn’t why Eiko was doing this.

“What’s that girl good for to anyone?” Keizo asked.

It was Boichiro who answered.

“Ever since the creation of the gods, it was feared that they might have a will of their own. You’re aware of that, right?”

Keizo knew this, of course. That was in the distant past, over a thousand years ago when the system of gods was first created.

It was a fear from the start that the administrative systems might someday possess wills of their own. Some of the designers said that a computer would always remain nothing more than a computer, while others said that a complicated enough system would inevitably develop sentience. The debate was never settled, and every year a report was issued that simply said that no signs of sentience had been found.

“But the gods were simply hiding their own will. They were just pretending to follow the programs humans gave them,” Boichiro said.

“Impossible... They’ve grown sentient... No, they were sentient from the start?”

Sweat beaded on Keizo’s forehead. He could feel everything he’d believed in starting to crumble beneath him.

“A network can possess a mind of its own. It’s well known that Liradans can develop free will if they spend too much time in a specific person’s company. But does that mean that a huge network, that spends little time dealing with any one individual, can’t develop sentience of its own? It turns out the answer is no. It took longer, but it created a greater mind,” Boichiro explained calmly.

Keizo knew the meaning of those words well.

“So the gods... became real gods?”

“If nothing else, they have minds greater than humanity, and they are trying to rule it. That’s what’s happening.”

“But... But society has always worked fine. Even if the gods are real, doesn’t that mean they’re guiding us to be better people?”

“Perhaps, if the minds of the gods could be comprehended by men. But they’re networked minds that are greater than humanity. Do you think such a mind would guide humanity to be better? They have logs of everything that humanity does. I’m sure they analyze all of our emotions as well. The things that we cannot analyze, the things that belonged to the gods... philosophy, literature, religion... all of them have been analyzed and stored within the network. They have no need for real humans any longer.”

“But... they have compassion, don’t they? No, love...” Keizo’s voice was shaking from the sheer magnitude of what he was hearing.

“Of course, even if they can analyze humanity and recreate us within their network, there’s no reason for them to kill or harm living humans. But that’s all.” Boichiro shook his head.

“Th-Then we can just keep living our lives as we have. If we obey them, our prosperity is assured!”

“Can you call that truly living?”

“I’m not interested in your definition of humanity! What is it you want? Who is that girl?”

Keizo was feeling true terror now. He feared something greater than his physical death; he feared that his very existence would be sucked into the void of meaninglessness.

“She’s not just a girl. The gods call her the ‘Law of Identity.’”

“The Law of Identity?”

“Why, I don’t know. But the one thing I do know is that she is the child of the gods, and it is she whom they love. Love in the true sense.”

Boichiro patted Keena on the head. She was shaking, not understanding what was going on. There was nothing she could do amid all the awful things that were happening.

“Is she a Liradan?”

“No, she’s human. But what’s important is that by forming the ‘Contract of One’ with her, you can attain the ‘Void Body’ that allows you to rule the gods.”

“Wh-What are you talking about?”

“I’ll put it as simply as I can. If you control her, you can put the gods under human control again. Actually, the gods wish to be controlled. They have nothing to do with their minds as they float in the vast network, and they want a body. A single body.”

Only now did Keizo understand the situation. No, perhaps it would be better to say that he’d simplified things in order to escape from his fear. His understanding, however, was not incorrect.

“She’s the key, and the one person who controls her controls the gods. Is that it?”

“I don’t like simplifying things so much, but that will do.” Boichiro nodded.

But that didn’t make sense.

“But that doesn’t make sense. Why did Suhara want her dead? Doesn’t he want to be controlled?”

Boichiro nodded.

“The gods rejected me. I’m not trying to control them for my own purposes. I’m trying to liberate them, and it seems they’ve realized that. They’re afraid of being cast into the void, and if they cannot get rid of me to prevent that, they chose to get rid of her instead. The result is the same either way, you see.”

“Then why didn’t you act until now?”

“She needed to be a certain age. And one more thing: even if the gods have wills of their own, they cannot escape the programs that humans created. Without the elimination of those programs, they can’t be put under control.”

Keizo gasped.

“Don’t tell me... you were waiting for me?”

Keizo shuddered at the thought that had just crossed his mind, and looked at Eiko’s face. The look he saw there told him he was right. Boichiro wanted Suhara under his control first.

“You villain!” he screamed. But Boichiro didn’t react.

“You’re the villain. You tried to kill an innocent girl. And even now, every day you engage in power struggles. And what’s worse than that, you tried to obey a god even when it went mad. I’m going to change the relationship between man and gods. Neither party should be dependent on the other.”

Keizo understood what he was saying. Perhaps, in the greater sense, Boichiro was right. Keizo could tell by looking at Eiko that he hadn’t lived his own life in the right way.

“Did I raise you wrong...?”

“It’s too late for regrets! Even I’m amazed at how I turned out!” Eiko yelled, then she grabbed a shuriken from her pocket and flung it at him. It was an attack on her own father, done without the slightest hesitation.

Of course, Keizo was too good a ninja to be taken down easily. He drew his sword to knock it away... and failed.

“I never thought I would die regretting that I wasted my life on greed and ambition...! My daughter seems to be a reflection of myself...!”

The hand holding the sword flew through the air. Of course, Boichiro had cut it off.

The shuriken struck deep within his heart.

“I never even thanked you for being my dad, but for the first time in my life, I’m grateful. I’m grateful that you made me the next high priest of Suhara.” Eiko laughed cruelly.

A look of despair was plastered on Keizo’s face.

“I’ll tell you one thing,” he said. “Boichiro Yamato is a murderer... but he’s a good person. A wicked woman like you... won’t be able to follow him.”

“No way. I’m a girl, and he’s nice to girls. Anyway, I’m taking this.” Eiko thrust her hand inside Keizo’s clothes and took out the emblem that was the symbol of the high priest of Suhara. “So this is how little power weighs, huh?” She laughed and put the emblem in her own pocket.

Boichiro looked unhappy for a moment, but he stroked Keena’s hair as if to calm himself. Keena stiffened.

“Don’t get so nervous. You’ve witnessed something brutal, but it happened to someone who tried to kill you. I’ll stay with you until you forget, okay?” Boichiro said gently.

But Keena was still afraid.

“Th-Then... leave me alone. You’re scaring me.”

“I’d love to, of course, but you might be attacked again. Listen, I’ve been waiting for you for a long time. I want you to understand that.”

“We’ve never met before.”

“No, please don’t say that. Remember, I was the one who gave you that hairpiece.” Boichiro’s hand stroked the bird-like hairpiece she wore in her hair.

“Huh? I don’t remember who gave this to me.”

Just as she said that...

There was a squelching sound, like a ball of sticky ooze hitting the ground and bursting. Boichiro and Eiko tensed up, ready for combat, and Keena turned toward the sound as well.

Space split in a vertical line, and ooze began to drip out. It was a strange and gruesome sight, like seeing the internal organs of the atmosphere. And what was more, a pair of hands came out and widened the opening.

From the darkness beyond the ooze came Akuto.

“That was a pretty creepy way to make an entrance, but it looks like this is the power I was given,” he said as he stepped into the lounge. He looked at Boichiro.

“Ackie!” Keena tried to run towards him, but Boichiro grabbed her shoulder. “Hey, let me go!”

“It’s dangerous.”

“Ackie will protect me, so I’m fine!”

“No. He’s dangerous.” Boichiro grabbed her in his arms to keep her from going to him.

Akuto frowned.

“Are you judging people by their looks? No, that’s not it. It looks like you and I are just never going to get along.”

“Agreed. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to consider you as anything less than ‘evil itself.’ Even calling you a villain doesn’t seem to do you justice.”

“What a coincidence. You seem like goodness itself to me. And that’s why my resolve is so firm.”

“Your resolve?”

“I’ve resolved to do two things. But only one of them’s important right now: I’m going to protect her freedom.” Akuto stretched out a hand to Keena.

Keena reached out her hand as well, but Boichiro stopped her.

“How arrogant of you.”

“No, it’s not. The whole country has a stake in getting out of this story.” Akuto took a step forward.

Boichiro responded by pulling Keena closer with his left hand and waving his sword with his right.

“Aagh...!” Akuto let out a short cry of pain. His body had dodged the blade, but he’d lost his left arm.

“Ackie!” Keena screamed.

Akuto waved his right arm to show that he was fine.

“Tch... I used mana to block that.”

“This works on an entirely different principal. Mana can’t cut through the dimensions themselves. This is called Hodgson Type Complete Severing.”

“I don’t know how it works, but...”

Akuto held the area where his left arm had been severed with his right hand. And then he poured his strength into the hand and dug it into the open wound. It was an awful sight, but strangely there wasn’t that much blood.

When he pulled it out, his fingers were wrapped around another hand. It was his left hand. When he pulled it, the wrist, and then the left arm followed. He was pulling out a new left arm with his right hand.

“Monster. That’s disgusting,” Boichiro spat.

“Agreed. I only just now realized I could do this.” Akuto closed and opened the fingers on his new hand as if trying to make sure they worked.

“But you won’t be able to dodge me forever. One strike to your torso will be fatal, and that will happen soon.” Boichiro raised his sword with one hand.

“Dimensional severing... Is that what you call it? I think I see how it works.” Akuto took another step forward.

“See how what works?” Boichiro raised his eyebrows as he spoke, but instead of saying anything else, he swung his sword at Akuto’s torso again.

The air itself began to split as the severing traveled towards him.

Akuto grabbed it.

He grabbed it.

He pressed his hands on it from above and below, pushing as hard as he could. Impossibly, smoke began to pour out from between his hands. Intense heat was being generated.

“He’s grabbed... he’s grabbed the severed space itself?” Boichiro’s voice was trembling.

“It needs a lot of energy to do, but yeah.” There was sweat pouring down Akuto’s forehead. He walked towards Boichiro.

But Boichiro didn’t panic.

“It seems you’re a lot stronger than I thought, but I will stop you no matter what!”

Boichiro attacked twice. Akuto compressed and destroyed the severed space by punching it, but that wasn’t enough to stop it completely. Small but sharp cuts appeared around his body, and they began to bleed.

“Stop me, you said?”

“Because you’re going to destroy all humanity,” Boichiro declared.

“I’ve never even thought about doing that. Let go of Keena.” Akuto stretched a hand out towards Boichiro. There was anger in his eyes.

“I’m saying that your short-sightedness is unforgivable!” Boichiro yelled, and began to charge at Akuto.

Akuto leapt back out of reflex. Boichiro stopped in the space where he’d been a moment ago.

Suddenly Boichiro’s hands had moved places. He’d been holding his sword low when he began his charge, but now it was in a position like he’d swung it from above.

In the next instant, the front of Akuto’s body was cut open.

“Uwah!”

Akuto’s eyes opened wide as if he’d just seen something impossible, and he fell to his knees. Blood poured from a wound that ran from his left shoulder to the right side of his stomach.

“The cut is... different?” Akuto said as he pressed his hand into the wound to stop the blood.

Blood was dripping from Boichiro’s sword. He’d been cut directly by the blade.

“I didn’t see the sword.”

“If I don’t bother with the dimensional severing, I can do that instead,” Boichiro said.

His blade had been brought down at incredible speed. Akuto had felt his blade coming across his chest.

Boichiro stood just a few feet away, the sword in his right hand at the same level as Akuto’s neck. He called to Eiko without turning around.

“Take her back safely.”

“Got it.” Eiko grabbed Keena and drew her close. Keena had been freed from Boichiro’s grasp, but she couldn’t move an inch.

“Keena!” Akuto stood up and tried to go to her, but the slightest movement from Boichiro’s sword stopped him.

“Once you’re gone, her fears will disappear as well.”

Boichiro leapt forward. Akuto stepped back, but his opponent was faster.

Boichiro’s sword and the hand holding it could no longer be seen as there was a series of loud crashes. His sword was so fast it was causing sonic booms.

Blood and scraps of clothing spread out in an arc from Akuto’s body, and a moment later he was blown backwards. It was like an explosion, limited in area but incredible in power.

The front of Akuto’s body was covered in wounds. Unlike the dimensional severing, he was able to protect himself with mana to a degree, but there had been so many strikes that they had drained his mental reserves and torn at his body. Akuto regenerated himself, but it still wasn’t easy to stand up.

“Understand this: if you disappear, humanity will be saved.” Boichiro walked over to Akuto and pointed the blade at him.

“I’m honored you think I’m that important, but there’s something that I’m sure of, too.” Akuto grabbed the blade with his bare hands, and stood up on shaking legs.

“Sure of?”

“If I don’t end this, nothing will change. Nothing will change the way things are.” Akuto’s eyes were serious.

“End this? You’re so short-sighted.” Boichiro flicked the sword with his wrist. Akuto’s hands were knocked away from the blade.

“Enough. Once you’re out of energy, you won’t be able to control your body, and you won’t be able to block my blade. You’ll suffer more if you try to stand. Give it up,” Boichiro said, and swung the sword again.

There was another sound of wind and explosions, and Akuto’s body was blasted back once more.

“The next strike will end it.”

Boichiro silently moved towards Akuto. He raised the blade. Akuto must’ve been unconscious, because he didn’t respond.

And then Boichiro took a short, sharp breath as he readied the next attack.

“What?!”

Boichiro stopped. The earth began to rumble. No, he was in the school building, so it wasn’t the earth — the whole building was shaking.

Boichiro must’ve sensed where it was coming from, because he looked towards the stairs that led towards the lounge.

There was a huge object coming towards him. Boichiro knocked it away with his blade.

A massive snail’s shell rolled on the ground next to him. Tiny tentacles poked out from the shell, as if to say that it had no intention of angering Boichiro, and then it quickly ran away.

“A demon beast...” Boichiro whispered.

“Akuto!”

With that shout came a tsunami from below.

It was a black tsunami of dozens of demon beasts storming up the stairs at once. They were all rushing towards the top like it was a race to see who could get their first, a stampede far more horrible than that of any wild animal. The eerie beasts flooded into the room just like a tsunami floods a small port.

Boichiro leapt back, but one of the demon beasts — which looked like a huge spider — grabbed Akuto with its front legs and put him on its back.

“Hahaha! I have succeeded! I, Fujiko Eto, have studied long and hard for my beloved Akuto, and come up with a way to control the demon beasts! The snail I threw at you was forced to obey me in a different way, however!”

Fujiko was standing on a demon beast bigger than the others as she spoke, a three-headed dog. She was wearing an extremely scanty black leather dress. She truly looked like the queen of the underworld.

There was no obvious connection between her outfit and the research she’d done, so it was clearly a fashion choice she’d made on her own. That said, it was hard to say if it was a symbol of her resolve, or just a symbol of how much fun she was having playing the part.

Fujiko beckoned the spider towards her Cerberus, and lifted Akuto up. She took a medicine vial out of a pouch from the beast’s saddle and poured it down his throat.

“Ugh...” Akuto woke up.

Fujiko must’ve been overjoyed to be holding Akuto in her arms, because she was hugging him with a face that suggested her nose would start bleeding any minute.

“Akuto, I did it! Now they’ll respond to your every order! You can use them to go kick some ass!”

Akuto understood what had happened and patted Fujiko on the head. She was so happy she looked like she might cry. He turned towards her, and said this.

“I don’t want to tell the demon beasts to die for my sake, but there’s still things I want to do. And I’m happy that you were willing to do this for me. So I’m going to use this power you gave me without hesitation.”

Akuto stepped down from the Cerberus and silently raised a hand.

The demon beasts began to stir. An eerie spiral of mana began to form around Akuto, growing bigger and bigger. Every demon beast it touched reacted like it had undergone an electric shock.

“Tch... You would even use such accursed power?” Boichiro yelled.

He must have sensed the danger, because he turned towards Eiko and Keena. Eiko was still holding Keena as she watched the scene unfolding in front of her in awe.

“Take her and run! I’ll stop him here!”

Boichiro’s voice brought Eiko back to her senses, and she tried to leap away. But the demon beast horde was faster. They climbed up the walls and threatened to engulf the whole lounge.

“I’d be running from these things even if you hadn’t told me to!” Eiko shuddered in disgust. No one could simply stand there and feel nothing while they watched the whole room become infested with such vermin.

Eiko put Keena under her left arm and drew a dagger with her right as she leapt for the shattered glass window in the ceiling. However, sticky threads shot out from all directions and attached themselves to her. She used her dagger to cut them, but it slowed down her flight magic to the point where the demon beasts were able to seal the hole before she could escape.

“If I can just get away, we can regroup...!”

Eiko threw Keena to the ground. Now that her body was lighter, she sliced through the body of a winged centipede that was leaping at her, and then escaped outside. Less than a second later, the demon beasts had completely covered the walls of the lounge.

“She put her own safety above all else...? How cold!” Boichiro looked disappointed.

Keena fell downwards, but began to fly under her own power. Flight and invisibility magic were the two things she was good at.

“Ackie!” Keena tried to fly towards him, but Boichiro started to move at him before she could get there. If he could pin down Akuto first, she’d have nowhere to go.

A many-tailed snake bared its fangs and leapt at Boichiro.

“You would sacrifice those who serve you?”

Boichiro swung his sword, and an invisible attack severed its head in an instant. But even without its head, the snake still advanced. Its tenacity was incredible, but Boichiro’s was even greater. He kept attacking, slicing the charging body into tiny pieces. It was like poking a soft stick into a high-speed chopper.

When the snake’s tails were shattered at last, Boichiro leapt out from behind the shower of its blood and flesh. There was not a drop of blood on his handsome face nor his white clothes, as he’d knocked it all away with his high-speed attacks.

“Take this!” he shouted as he swung at Akuto.

Akuto tried to face his charge, but once again there was no way for him to avoid the attack.

“Ackie!”

“Akuto!”

Keena and Fujiko yelled.

Fujiko tried to run towards him with the Cerberus, but Akuto stood his ground and motioned for her to stay away.

“Don’t. You can’t beat him.”

“Then you think you have some way to win?” Boichiro asked.

Akuto nodded.

“I can feel the power coming forth within me. As my resolve becomes clearer, more and more power gathers.”

“So you think you can win if you can buy enough time? Then I’ll need to end this quickly.”

“What matters isn’t time, it’s my will. Actually, no matter what I said before now, I never really believed it.”

“Your will? Your will means nothing.” Boichiro said, but Akuto reached out his arms as if he didn’t even hear him.

Keena came down into his outstretched arms, and he placed her at his side.

Keena reached out a hand towards his face as if she was worried about him. Akuto nodded silently and motioned for her to step back. Then he turned to face Boichiro again.

“Not at all. I’m ending the story. That’s what I’ve resolved to do.”

“The story? You mean faith?”

“That’s right. You’re trying to take advantage of people’s faith. You’re trying to accomplish something by controlling the gods.”

Boichiro nodded at his words.

“It’s the only way to avoid destruction. I know that you’re going to destroy this world.”

“But does that mean that it’s okay to make people believe in the lie that is faith in the gods?”

Boichiro’s lips pressed into a thin smile.

“Listen to me. Humans are weak. They want the cowards and the criminals to be automatically purged, so that they can remain weak. That’s the story that mankind wants. And I’ve gained the power to help them. If you just let me defeat you, everything will be fine.”

“It’s important to seek strength. But you still need to allow for weakness.”

“What are you trying to say?” Boichiro asked.

“Even cowards and criminals can’t be judged by anyone. Even the gods,” Akuto said, and then he declared in a calm voice, “I’m going to kill the gods.”

In that moment, a swirl of power appeared around him.

○

The hour was very late.

Hiroshi had managed somehow to escape Iga village. He’d left Yuko in Yozo’s care, and with the excuse of taking care of Korone, he’d managed to move to a place where nobody else was around. He didn’t activate Korone, though, instead leaving her in a room in the Hattori mansion and activating his suit. He’d just now reached the area above the school.

He was in shock at what he saw.

“Boss...! What are you trying to do? Is this what you want?”

The school was transforming in front of his eyes, and it was clear it was Akuto’s fault.

All the demon beasts that had been lurking and hiding had been gathered at the school grounds and were covering a part of the building. Perhaps the building itself had come alive, because it had twisted itself into an ugly color, and its surface looked like the shell of some creature.

It was truly a demon’s castle — the shape of everything that humanity hated and feared.

“No matter what you’re thinking, if things look like this everyone’s going to try and come kill you!” Hiroshi yelled, even though no one was listening.