Thursday, April 26. Inside a cabinet, commuting to school, Tatsuya, who had been checking the news in his usual manner with his information terminal in his hand, suddenly looked mildly surprised.

“Brother, has something in the news caught your eye?”

His change in expression was subtle, like always, but Miyuki didn’t miss this one, like always.

In the seat across from Miyuki, Minami also looked up. Her emotional expressiveness was restrained, but was by no means a constant poker face. The gaze she directed toward Tatsuya indicated that she felt an interest in the question Miyuki had asked him.

“It’s the experiment I had you two help me with yesterday,” answered Tatsuya in a volume such that everyone could hear him, even though Minami was sitting diagonally across from him. He shifted to face his sister. “Some of the articles are friendly, and others hostile, as we expected. But what I didn’t expect…was this many friendly ones.”

Miyuki encouraged him to continue, asking the question with her expression.

“Diet members know which way the wind blows, but I doubt journalists from big media outlets would put up the white flag at a gimmick like this. I expected more of them to grow stubborn and write more categorical articles in spite of reality. To tell the truth, I was going to use it as a foothold to make a counterattack and manipulate public opinion my own way.”

After hearing Tatsuya’s confession, Miyuki’s eyes went wide. “This may be late in coming, but…you sure have a mean streak, Brother.”

Miyuki wasn’t seriously criticizing him, but all Tatsuya could do in response was give her a pained grin—though Minami, on the other hand, seemed genuinely appalled.

“Like I figured, there are some fairly hysterical articles, but…,” Tatsuya went on, showing his portable information terminal to Miyuki. It showed a sensationalist title more suited to a tabloid site than a big news site. “I hadn’t expected this,” he finished, getting rid of the article and calling up a longer column on his terminal screen.

“‘A challenge from the young people to the twenty-second century’? This newspaper is doing a recurring column on what we did yesterday?” asked Miyuki, tilting her head, perhaps feeling the same dubiousness as Tatsuya. Given the title of the column series, it was a critical piece that treated this revolutionary test by the young people in a favorable way. It was fundamentally at odds with the anti-magic activists’ agitations.

“Yeah. Someone from this newspaper was there yesterday, so it’s not strange the person wrote an article on it. But this paper had been distributing aggressively anti-magician articles until yesterday…”

“Then your stellar reactor must have quite impressed them, right?”

Contrary to Tatsuya, who looked like it was incomprehensible, Miyuki spoke as though that were the natural way of things.

“…If the journalist was one of the ones who liked going after new stories, it’s possible they felt an individual sense of sympathy. It is a column, so I suppose there is a chance the entire editorial department is the curious sort.”

Organizations were never monolithic. As they grew larger, their tendency to break apart grew stronger, which was something Tatsuya understood—maybe on an intuitive level. Sometimes one section would do its own thing outside the aims of the company. For the moment, Tatsuya took that as convincing enough.

In actuality, the situation wasn’t that simple. The previous day’s experiment had certainly been part of what suddenly caused a pro-magician-leaning tone to appear within big media outlets that had been completely anti-magic until today. Several more members of the media acknowledging the newsworthiness of high school students had frustrated a Diet member’s plans, but those things, of course, weren’t all there was to it.

Kanda’s remarks, recorded by Tsuzura, had been delivered into the hands of the Diet member himself through connections from Tsuzura’s Magic University days—along with a demand that, in a roundabout way, suggested he somewhat scale back his political activities on this front. That was one major reason the reports from his journalists had been limited in page space and their videos hadn’t been run.

There was a fierce complaint from Principal Momoyama to the higher-ups in the opposition party, the Civil Rights party, about putting journalists on school property without prior discussion. With that, not only Kanda, but also the other members of the anti-magic camp, were forced to curtail their activities temporarily. From a certain perspective, the principal had very skillfully taken advantage of Tatsuya’s plot.

And support fire had come blasting out of the industrial world, too.

“Hey, check that out, Tatsuya. They’re doing this interview again.”

The cafeteria during lunch. Leo was pointing at the video news pop-ups displayed on a wall-mounted screen. Tatsuya didn’t even glance in the direction his index finger was pointed, continuing to eat his food in silence.

“It’s rare for the Rosen family to appear on Japanese news, isn’t it, Brother?”

However, while he might have gotten away with ignoring Leo, it was impossible for him to ignore Miyuki.

“Maybe there’s been some sort of major change in their policies, including people with the Rosen name coming to Japan for new positions,” he replied carefully, tellingly avoiding a chance glance at Erika or Mikihiko.

The large-format display screen was split into sixteen sections, and the interview with Ernst Rosen, Japanese branch president of Rosen Magicraft, was taking up four of them. Ernst Rosen was answering the newscaster’s questions using fluent Japanese.

“We hadn’t expected high school students to be able to use such advanced magical skills. The high skill standards of Japan have surprised me.”

“Hey, that’s a compliment.”

“…”

Erika had been uncharacteristically maintaining silence for a while now. In her place—well, not really—Leo talked, sounding entertained, but Tatsuya turned a deaf ear again.

“The First High students’ successful experiment showed us the possibility that magic can become a technology that will bring further prosperity to human civilization.”

“Wow,” breathed Shizuku, straightforwardly impressed, no strings attached. “‘Prosperity to human civilization,’ huh?”

Tatsuya once again gave an inoffensive answer: “And we all worked very hard for it.”

“Yeah. Miyuki and Honoka did great.”

“I-I didn’t really…”

As he watched Shizuku and Honoka start their routine, Tatsuya began to feel a question—what was Rosen after, exactly?—and something approaching surprise—they’d had the good sense to respect high school students’ privacy.

The variety of unexpectedly friendly media responses to the fixed-reactor experiment had the First High students at an emotional peak. Some may not have been personally involved, but the fact that students at their school were being recognized by society, even if it was only on the surface, fulfilled their collective young desires for acknowledgement.

But there were, perhaps naturally, exceptions.

It was right after the final afternoon class, fifth period, had ended. As Takuma in Class 1-A was getting ready to head out for club activities, he was attacked again by unpleasant chatter for what seemed like the hundredth time that day. His female classmates were discussing the Rosen Japanese branch president’s interview and the events of the previous day. Voices were extolling the girls in other classes who had been part of the experiment. Takuma abruptly stood up. He didn’t bother trying to hide his irritation. The waves of peril coming off him shut the mouths of his chattering neighbors.

His attitude stood out among those of the others in the class. Nobody from Class A had been directly involved with the previous day’s experiment. Kasumi and Minami were in Class C, and Izumi was in Class B. Class A hadn’t even provided any of the support members handling the electronics. But most of the students—no, all the students except him—were as excited over the high praise coming from a world-famous corporation as though it had been directed at them.

Damn it, he thought to himself, but right now, he couldn’t control his emotions very well. Praise for something the Saegusa family had done—that he believed they’d done, anyway—was unendurable for him. In the end, without a word to smooth it over, he left the classroom as though escaping.

The pent-up gloominess stuck with him during club activities, too. His spells were slipshod as a result of his lack of focus, and he failed several times at things he could usually do without difficulty, which built up his frustration even more. When it was time to leave, his ire had reached its peak.

For Takuma, today had been an utterly awful day.

While he was going home from school after getting his CAD from the office, he ran straight into Kasumi, her disciplinary committee armband on, in the front yard.

Now that club recruitment week was over, the disciplinary committee had gone back to its shift system. Patrols were generally a single-person affair, and that went for new freshmen, too. Kasumi was one of them. Considering the time, she must have been about to return to headquarters. So it wasn’t the least bit strange when she gave him only a passing glance and tried to walk by him without saying anything.

It was probably all due to his persecution complex…

“That was a real nice job, Saegusa.”

…him thinking she’d smirked down her nose at him.

“…What are you talking about?” asked Kasumi dubiously, stopping.

But ever since two evenings ago, when his father had given him the warning, the stress had been building up. To Takuma it looked like she was feigning ignorance.

Still under misapprehensions, Takuma vented his anger on her: “That little demonstration yesterday. Incredible—you even got Rosen’s branch president to pay attention.”

“Demonstration? Shippou, are you misunderstanding something?”

Kasumi was by no means a mild-mannered girl. She could put on friendliness, but for all intents and purposes, she was quick to get into a fight. She wasn’t underhanded, but straightforward and blunt. Even now, she wasn’t trying to hide her displeasure with the malice in Takuma’s words.

“Don’t play dumb with me. You knew a Diet member hostile toward magicians was coming yesterday, and that’s why you put it together, isn’t it? Very clever how you used Shiba to steal some prestige.”

“Used him? That’s a weird way to accuse someone.”

Kasumi’s objection turned slightly evasive—Takuma’s remark that they’d known of Kanda’s visit beforehand was right on the mark. But he’d decided that all his deductions were actual proof.

“That was careless. He’s kind of a big deal—not just here, but at all nine magic high schools. I have to give credit to the Saegusa for your shrewdness. Did you use your looks to coax him into it, just like your older sister? After all, if nothing else, you’re both first-class attention whores.”

“That’s bullshit!”

Kasumi suddenly erupted, and her countenance was fierce enough that Takuma was momentarily speechless. But she was only beside herself for that instant.

“…Coaxing him? You have some pretty classless ideas, you know that? The Saegusa never even consider using their looks to gain an advantage. You know, you’ve got a pretty cute face—maybe you should give up on being a magician and start courting older women or something. Although, the only people actively looking for young swallows these days are probably creepy celebrities.”

Takuma’s face, this time, grew indignant.

Kasumi’s raillery about birds lacked any deep meaning. Recently there had been an incident wherein a certain veteran actress, much talked about on yellow journalism sites, had been hiring boys as prostitutes, and that had left an impression, that was all. The old term young swallows referred to a man who was an older woman’s lover and unequal in the relationship. She didn’t know its actual meaning; she’d probably just picked it up from some gossip article.

But to Takuma, it sounded like an insinuation regarding his connection to Maki Sawamura.

“…Are you picking a fight with me, Saegusa?”

“You’re the one who picked it first, Shippou. Besides, didn’t I already say I’d beat you down so easy you’d never think of picking a fight again?”

They stared each other down. Their right hands were both on their left sleeves. The CADs they used were bracelet types. Both of them had already stepped over the line to make this a touch-and-go situation.

“You there! What are you doing?!”

“Both of you, put your hands down!”

But at the exact moment they were about to use them, voices from behind stopped them.

A male student’s voice from behind Takuma.

A female student’s voice from behind Kasumi.

Takuma rolled his left sleeve up with his right hand as he turned around, and Kasumi put her right hand down before turning around.

In Takuma’s vision, a familiar male upperclassman with a severe look on his face had his right hand in his left breast pocket.

Takuma judged that he was trying to take his handgun-shaped CAD from his shoulder holster.

His counterattack was a reflexive one.

His left hand touched his CAD’s switch.

The upperclassman still hadn’t finished taking out his CAD.

I win, thought Takuma.

Then his body was rattled front-to-back, and he was concussed. Overcome with vertigo, he dropped to his knees.

Sensing the indications of magic activation behind her, Kasumi involuntarily turned around. She knew it was a bad move considering her position, but any activation of combat-use magic, even if it wasn’t aimed at her, was something she couldn’t ignore.

The two who had tried to use magic were Takuma Shippou, who had just been having a standoff with her, and her senior in the disciplinary committee, Morisaki—and just as Kasumi recognized that, the spell went off.

Morisaki’s came first. Its impact was considerably weakened, blocked by Takuma’s Information Boost, but his spell rattled the opponent’s body forward and backward, which gave it more than enough effectiveness to cut off Takuma’s attack.

“Drawless…” breathed Kasumi.

She’d been hit with no small shock. Takuma had clearly had the lead in readying CADs. Specialized types excelled over multipurpose types in the speed department, but even with that difference, Takuma should have been faster in that situation. That is, if Morisaki had been following the normal procedure: draw, then take aim.

But Morisaki had taken aim with only his senses and fired his spell while his CAD was still resting in its holster. It was a high-level technique called Drawless that was used with handgun-shaped CADs. Considering these CADs had assistance features that aimed in the direction they were pointed, it was difficult to fire one without drawing it. Morisaki, though, had done it without sacrificing the quick activation time that specialized CADs boasted.

Frankly, Kasumi hadn’t thought Morisaki was that great. His magic program scope and event influence strength were both only average, and though his construction speed was high, it wasn’t that high. She’d even had doubts as to why he’d been chosen as a disciplinary committee member with his level of skill, but now, she admitted honestly to herself that she hadn’t been seeing the important part.

He was the same as always—she couldn’t feel any more than average magic power from him. She was surprised. Upperclassmen could pull off stunts like this without having to rely on inborn magic power.

Looks like I’ll have to keep on getting better, she thought, mentally making an enthusiastic fist.

“Kasumi.”

But when her name was spoken by a relatively monotonous voice from behind, she popped up straight. “Kitayama…?”

As she turned around awkwardly, she saw Shizuku staring at her with a grimace on her face.

Escorted to the disciplinary committee headquarters by Morisaki and Shizuku, Kasumi and Takuma got a taste of what it probably felt like to rest on a bed of nails. The ones present right now were Kanon, chairwoman of the disciplinary committee; the two who had brought them there (Shizuku wasn’t on shift; she’d just happened to be passing by and gotten dragged into it); Hattori, chairman of the club committee; Tomitsuka, representing the executives; and Tatsuya, representing the student council for whatever reason.

“Kasumi, you’re a disciplinary committee member. What were you doing? And you were on patrol, too…”

Kanon breathed a heavy sigh, and Kasumi looked away awkwardly.

“Shippou, I know you’re aware that unpermitted magic usage is against school rules. Using it to pick a fight is a serious offense on its own, but to attack a committee member who came to stop you?”

Tomitsuka’s laments caused Takuma to stiffen in place and lock his eyes dead ahead.

“In any case, I think learning the situation comes first,” said Hattori.

Kanon nodded unhappily, looking down. “Seriously… Just when you think club recruitment week is over, we get even more trouble…” She impolitely scratched her head and set a sharp glare on Kasumi and Takuma. “I’ll say this first. Kasumi, your offense stops at attempted. You won’t be expelled, but you could be suspended. Shippou, you may not have been able to do anything, either, but you were starting to use your CAD, which means that in the worst case, you could be expelled.”

Takuma took Kanon’s declaration without moving a muscle. He was straining every part of his body not to start shaking.

“I want you to keep that in mind while you explain what on earth caused this.”

Kanon’s eyes went to Kasumi.

“Shippou insulted the Saegusa family.”

Kanon’s gaze shifted to Takuma.

“I was the target of an unforgivable insult from Saegusa.”

Kasumi and Takuma knew better than to look at one another.

Kanon sighed. “Hattori, how do you think we should handle this?”

Hattori opened his closed eyes. “Shippou is part of the club committee. I’m not confident I can pass fair judgment.”

“Yeah, but Kasumi is part of the disciplinary committee, too.”

“Then we’ll have a third party, one who isn’t a member of either committee—the student council—decide.”

As Kanon and Hattori looked at him, Tatsuya inwardly heaved a sigh. Things had turned out exactly as he’d expected them to. He’d only been sent here as student council representative because Azusa had sensed all the trouble and run away. Isori, too, had smiled and said that the student council president’s proxy was the vice president, and then run away. There was a second vice president, but he couldn’t exactly force this on his little sister, so Tatsuya had come ready to pull some chestnuts out of the fire. He’d been mentally prepared to deal with a troubling situation since the moment he’d entered the room.

“Can we not just have them fight in a match?”

Hattori’s eyebrow twitched.

“Wait, you mean you’re letting them off the hook?” asked Kanon dubiously.

Hattori didn’t say anything, though. Tatsuya had an idea of what he was feeling right now, but that wasn’t something worth talking about.

“If they can’t solve their problems through talking, they can solve it through ability. The previous disciplinary committee chairwoman has said that’s the recommended way at our school.”

Tomitsuka was clearly surprised at Tatsuya’s remark. But Kanon and Hattori’s expressions implied they thought it was reasonable. Shizuku, for her part, was looking elsewhere sleepily, as though hoping this would be over soon.

“Unpermitted usage of magic is a serious offense, but I don’t think we need to punish the ones who were stopped before they even did it. It happens a lot with freshmen anyway.”

This time, Morisaki turned his face away, expression bitter. Fortunately, there was nobody here to drive that point home.

“If pride is on the line for both of them, I think letting their abilities do the talking so they can settle the score for good will keep this from dragging on forever.”

“I think the vice president’s opinion is fine. What about you, Hattori?” asked Kanon, without even pretending to think about his opinion.

“I have no objections. Shiba, could you do the paperwork?”

“Of course.”

After agreeing to Hattori’s request, Tatsuya headed directly for the stairs to get the approval paperwork from Azusa.

“Shiba?”

From behind him he heard Takuma’s voice.

“Shippou, are you not happy with this?” rebuked Tomitsuka.

“No, sir! If you’ll allow this match between me and Saegusa, I have a request.”

Takuma was in no position to levy conditions. He would be aware of that himself.

“Go ahead.”

Which was probably why Kanon told him to go on—driven by interest in what he might say.

“I’d like to fight not only against Kasumi Saegusa, but against Izumi Saegusa as well.”

“Are you making fun of me, Shippou?!”

Leaving aside whether Kasumi’s inquiry was polite given that she was surrounded by upperclassmen, it was still a reasonable one.

“Your reason?”

But Tatsuya’s question to Takuma made her shut her mouth for now and listen.

“This is a match with our respective families’ pride on the line. And everyone knows the Saegusa twins only show their true worth when they’re together.”

“In other words, it won’t be a real victory unless you win against both of them at once?”

“That’s right.”

Tatsuya paused for a moment, then looked at Kasumi. “You heard him—is that agreeable to you, Kasumi?”

“I don’t mind. I’ll make him regret how egotistical he is.”

“Then that’s how we’ll set it up,” said Tatsuya, going up the stairs to the student council room.

When Tatsuya returned with written permission stamped with the student council president’s final seal of sanction, Izumi was behind him, along with Miyuki and Honoka for some reason.

“Chairwoman, this just needs your seal of approval now.”

“Uh, the seal? …Where did I put that thing…?” said Kanon, flustered.

Behind her, Shizuku took a small, important-looking box out of a cabinet. Managing a smile that was clearly meant to hide her embarrassment, Kanon took the box and stamped the permission slip with the seal of approval.

Hattori cleared his throat loudly, as if to drive away the strange mood. “Where should we go for this?”

“Please use seminar room two.”

The one who answered Hattori’s question was Honoka. She’d come bearing the code to unlock seminar room two’s doors, which everyone understood without being told.

“Will you be judging, Shiba?”

That question was from Tomitsuka. He’d been beside himself this whole time wondering why Miyuki was here.

“No, I will be an observer.”

Miyuki smiled and refuted his assumption.

“In that case, Tatsuya?”

Shizuku’s question had been directed at Tatsuya. But before he could answer, Kanon interrupted.

“That will be fine.”

“I don’t mind, either.”

Hattori continued after Kanon. Neither of them seemed to have any plans to ask Tatsuya his opinion on the matter.

“…Then let’s go. There’s not much time left until closing.”

Tatsuya had been the one to propose the duel. They wouldn’t let him say no at this point. Suppressing a sigh, he urged everyone to get moving.

Moving to seminar room two were the combatants in this so-called “match”—Takuma, Kasumi, and Izumi; the judge, Tatsuya; the observer, Miyuki; the one with the door codes (to lock and unlock), Honoka; Tomitsuka from the club committee; and Shizuku from the disciplinary committee. There were eight in all. Considering the disciplinary committee’s shift system, Morisaki should have been the one observing, but Shizuku had volunteered to stand in for him, so here she was.

Takuma felt like he’d been put in a difficult position with the members of this group. In his mind, Tatsuya and Miyuki were on the Saegusa side. With even the judge and the observer being enemies, he’d go into this match with a handicap—no, this was a fixed match.

On the other hand, Honoka and Shizuku were very much people he wanted to be allies with in order for the Shippou family to retake its rightful position. His belief was naive—that if he showed them his strength right now, he’d be able to talk them into it more easily. Still, he was a fifteen-year-old boy, so you couldn’t blame him; his mentality matched his age. When you thought about it, Tatsuya and the others were the ones acting unlike their ages.

The situation had him at an absolute disadvantage—but the rewards he stood to reap for overcoming that and winning would be sweet.

By the time he finally confronted the Saegusa sisters, he didn’t feel like he was in a difficult position anymore. It was all fighting spirit now.

Kasumi and Izumi couldn’t be as aggressive as Takuma. Kasumi genuinely believed Takuma had randomly come along and forced this little relationship, while Izumi simply felt like she’d been wrapped up in something that was not her business. They didn’t have any particular feelings toward the Shippou family. Him antagonizing them was just an annoyance. If he’d just settle down, he could get better grades on exams than they and get chosen as class representative for all they cared.

The two of them never had much interest in status or honor in the secular world. They liked being praised and loathed being insulted, but they never wanted to gain anything from others’ esteem. In a sense, their lack of avarice came from their having been born with silver spoons in their mouths, but that hadn’t been their choice.

Their desire was one and the same: They wanted to put this nuisance behind them, here and now. For that purpose, they’d thoroughly beat that nuisance down so that he’d never mess with them again. With that determination, they confronted Takuma.

Seminar room two was longer than seminar room three, where Tatsuya and Hattori had faced off a year ago, being designed for middle-range magic. The floor was split into blue on the near side and yellow on the far side, with a one-meter block on the front and back walls painted in red.

The blue area was Takuma’s, and the yellow area was Kasumi and Izumi’s.

Takuma had stayed in his school uniform, and was holding a large, thick hardcover at his left side.

Kasumi and Izumi had changed into training clothes that were easier to move in. The clothes were long-sleeved, ankle-length coveralls made of a thick fabric. If they’d been doing outdoor exercises in the artificial woods in the back of the school, they’d be wearing sleeveless outerwear that doubled as storage on top of that, but neither of them wore any now. The tight women’s coveralls made their slender body lines stand out. The only one actively concerned about where to look, though, was Tomitsuka.

“This match will be conducted under no-contact rules,” announced Tatsuya, standing on the border between blue and yellow. No-contact rules were applied to matches between people of different genders, as long as there was nothing crazy going on. (These rules were normally selected for matches between women as well.)

“I’m sure you all know this already, but I’ll explain the rules just in case. You may not leave your colored area. Going into your opponent’s area or into the red area constitutes a disqualification. Direct contact with the opponent’s body is also forbidden. Touching their weapon will also disqualify you. However…”

Tatsuya spared a glance at Takuma.

“Weapons controlled remotely via magic are not against the rules.”

He immediately returned his gaze to a position where he could see both parties equally.

“Lastly, any lethal attacks or attacks that can cause incurable wounds are forbidden. If I decide it’s too dangerous, I will stop the match, so please keep that in mind.”

For a moment, Takuma made a scornful expression that looked a lot like Go ahead and try. Tatsuya and Miyuki, as well as Honoka and Shizuku, all noticed it, but nobody criticized Takuma for the brazen attitude.

“Both of you, get set.”

Kasumi and Izumi moved to the center of the blue area.

Takuma, without moving away from his spot close to the borderline, dropped the book he was carrying to the floor with a thud.

Tatsuya looked at all three of their faces in turn. They all nodded in the same way back to him.

After moving to the wall, Tatsuya held his right hand over his head, then quickly brought it down.

Psionic light sparkled, and magic fired.

Takuma and Kasumi were the ones exchanging magical fire, while Izumi deployed Area Interference and focused on defense.

One had to master both offense and defense by himself, and another could focus solely on offense.

The conditions were clearly advantageous for Kasumi.

“What do you think?” Shizuku asked Honoka softly.

“I guess they’re about equal, for now…” Honoka whispered back, a little shaky.

Kasumi was mainly using movement-type magic, targeting Takuma directly or moving air masses to create gusts to hit him with. The method of fighting specifically for a ring-out. Takuma was protecting against it using Information Boost and a physical barrier.

Meanwhile Takuma, though he’d conducted direct attacks based on oscillation-type magic at first, had switched to creating pressurized air bullets and firing them as soon as he realized his way wasn’t going to break through Izumi’s Area Interference. Air Bullet was a popular spell, but its popularity only served to underscore its effectiveness. Izumi’s Area Interference, however, was broader than he’d thought, and as soon as the bullet of air entered the territory she controlled, it dispersed. He was having trouble dealing any effective blows.

“Kasumi seems like she’s trying to avoid hurting Shippou. That’s why her attacks are so narrowly aimed.”

“Yeah.”

“Shippou…doesn’t seem to know how to use Air Bullet yet.”

“The same goes for Izumi, doesn’t it?”

“Yep. If she can’t place this entire room under her control like Miyuki, she won’t be able to guard against Air Bullet with just Area Interference. Maybe they’re both so talented that they never practiced refining how to use the spells.”

“Well, they are freshmen.”

“Mm-hmm, I suppose. We were kind of like that until the Nines, too, huh?”

Though not because he heard Honoka and Shizuku’s conversation, Takuma felt strongly that he couldn’t keep this up. He fought his impatience down, and while he wove his spells, he rallied his knowledge in search of a way to break through.

He didn’t feel as though his magic power was less than theirs. He’d never lose, even two on one, and he was confident he’d win if he used his trump card. His trump card, though, carried a high risk of seriously injuring his opponents. He didn’t think Tatsuya could stop his spell—he may be a year above him, but he wasn’t even part of the Twenty-Eight—though he might disqualify Takuma for breaking the rules afterward.

That was Takuma’s misgiving. However…

Damn!

Magic-manipulating combat actions performed while thinking. That likewise wouldn’t get him far.

He overwrote the mass of air hurtling at him from behind with a Disperse spell. The firefight had given Takuma a near-perfect grasp on their difference in strength. Kasumi had the edge in scope, rapidity, and versatility of magic. Takuma had higher influence than she did, but Izumi and Takuma were nearly equals.

Takuma’s Disperse—its power of influence won out, and the make of its magic program was simple and thus quick to activate—just barely disabled Kasumi’s Wind Hammer. But upon being released from its compressed state, the air turned into a gale and shoved him forward. Wind Hammer’s compression level was significantly lower than Air Bullet’s. The released air didn’t have the force to harm Takuma’s physical body, but it was enough to cause him to lose his balance. He tilted forward, and his spell’s aim angled down and away.

Of the factors that comprised Air Bullet, the bullet’s size, the compression of the air, and the bullet’s acceleration were constant values built into the activation sequence, while its firing direction and maximum range were variables input by the magician. There was no actual need to be looking in the direction you indicated, but it was easier to put your eyes that way, and that method was the most common one.

His bullet of air fired off downward. When the Area Interference net caught it, the bullet’s compression released; it slammed into the floor quite a bit in front of where Izumi was standing, then slid the rest of the way to her feet.

With a short yelp, Izumi staggered. The unexpectedly strong wind current had blown past her feet and ruined her balance. When Takuma saw that, he caught on to his misunderstanding. What Area Interference had nullified was the air’s compression and the acceleration being continuously granted to it—it hadn’t been nullifying the kinetic energy that the air already possessed.

The air that was still up off the ground when the compression was released dispersed in all directions in the shape of a sphere. But the air that had expanded closer to the floor met with the floor’s resistance, which limited the directions it could disperse in. Kinetic energy was added to the downward-facing flow’s forward direction, turning into a strong airstream that had reached his opponent.

Essentially, I just have to fire it so that the attack doesn’t get canceled out even if the spell does!

Takuma positioned seven air bullets in the space in front of him—six at the points of a regular hexagon and one in the middle. He fired the bullet at the center point, then the other six with almost no time between them.

The magic developed for the Shippou—at Lab Seven—was colony control. Colony, in this case, was not a group of biological organisms; it was an aggregate with no physical laws tying it together. It controlled several independent objects or phenomena individually as though they were a single creature. The technique of collecting hundreds of dry-ice bullets on a target rather than just raining them down was also an application of this colony control. Firing seven Air Bullet shots in tandem was a cakewalk for the heir to the Shippou name.

The first bullet’s convergence broke against Izumi’s Area Interference and dispersed. But the expansion of the six air masses that flew in a moment later surrounded it, blocking the air’s dispersal, and pushed it forward since they were slightly behind it. As a result, the Air Bullet’s density dropped, but it turned into a stone made of wind that attacked Izumi.

“Kyah?!”

Izumi’s cry wasn’t due to the stone hitting her. She cried out because she’d been suddenly pushed to the ground. Kasumi had jumped over to her; her speed was clearly reinforced by magic. She’d probably switched the movement spell she was about to aim at Takuma over to herself.

Movement spells that ignored the acceleration process placed a heavy burden on the body, and its being her own spell didn’t change that. Plus, the one who had been pushed down would have taken equal damage. Now’s my chance, thought Takuma.

He struck his hands together in front of his chest. The properties of sound in that area were reorganized. His clap’s volume was amplified and its sound wave was narrowly confined before being fired toward Kasumi.

Even if the Area Interference disabled the spell, the volume would remain amplified. Even if the focused sound wave dispersed somewhat, it would strike the girl with the violence of sound equivalent to an acoustic grenade going off at point-blank range. It had enough punch to knock her out cold.

At least it should have.

But instead, Takuma’s sound-wave assault was blocked by a vacuum gap Izumi had expanded.

The air was sucked into the vacuum gap. The gusts whipped up amid the shrill noise blew the sisters’ hair around. Kasumi’s hair was short, but Izumi’s was somewhat long, and it turned into a very unsightly display, but a simple finger-comb through her hair was enough.

“Kasumi, are you all right?” asked her sister after sitting up. The other girl was still leaning over her.

“Thanks, Izumi. That was a close one,” answered Kasumi, moving off.

Takuma’s attacks continued. By alternating their activation of defensive spells, the twins were managing to hold out.

But there was no haste or panic on their faces.

“It looks like we were makin’ light of this guy a little.”

“Leaving aside your choice of words, it would appear so.”

“Things are gonna get worse and worse.”

“But we aren’t about to lose, are we?”

“Course not. Izumi, let’s do the thing.”

“Yes, Kasumi. The same as we always do.”

“I’ll shoot.”

“And I’ll boost.”

“Then here comes the countdown.”

“Three!” “Two!” “One!”

“Cast!”

A moment after Kasumi gave the cry, the force of their magic sailing toward Takuma shot up several times over.

From behind him, from above him, from the sides—there came an event-influencing force like a whirlwind. This spell would be incomparably more powerful than anything thus far, and as soon as Takuma detected it coming, he switched his full-powered offense to a full-powered defense.

The spell he’d sensed was a combination of convergence and movement with gas as its target—gas flow–controlling magic. He didn’t have time to read any further into it.

Expanding an omnidirectional airtight shield was almost entirely instinctual. The shield completed first for no other reason than that it had a simpler magic program structure than the spell Kasumi and Izumi had been about to activate.

A vicious wind blazed about within the room’s narrow limits. No sooner had he felt a wind blowing from overhead to hold him down than he was smashed by gusts from both behind and the side. They threatened to blow him away along with the airtight shield he’d formed around him. Because its surface area was so far expanded, it was hit by more of the wind, receiving greater pressure. However, that didn’t mean he could lower the degree of airtightness or shrink the shield. As the wind assailed him, his magician’s senses had realized its composition was very heavily skewed toward nitrogen.

One spell to raise the nitrogen density in the air, and another to move the air where it collected. A compound convergence/movement spell: Nitrogen Storm. If he breathed in any of the air now that its oxygen concentration had been lowered so much, the hypoxia would knock him out immediately. If he shrank the shield so the airflow didn’t carry him away, his body would quickly run out of oxygen.

He dug in, and at his feet, the pages of his book turned wildly. The book itself wasn’t blown away because the magic wind was blowing around at knee height and above.

The large, thick hardcover he’d brought here… He dropped his gaze to its pages, each one imprinted with the same exact geometric pattern, and resolved to play his ace in the hole.

“Is that…Nitrogen Storm?”

“Yeah.”

When Miyuki asked the question, her voice a mix of surprise and admiration, Tatsuya came back with a short affirmative.

“I suppose I should have known Saegusa’s family would be able to master such advanced spells.”

“They haven’t mastered it, but still, it’s really something.”

In the sense that it was a spell that disabled an opponent by hypoxia, it fell into the same category as Mayumi’s personal-combat trump card, Dry Meteor. She’d probably had something to do with Kasumi and Izumi pulling it out as a secret weapon. But in terms of spell difficulty, Nitrogen Storm was higher than Dry Meteor. It was hard to gather a large amount of carbon dioxide in one place for Dry Meteor, given how little there was in the air, but the skilled control it took to maintain a certain gas makeup while directing its flow made Nitrogen Storm an incredibly difficult magic.

The twins’ Nitrogen Storm, understandably, was conspicuous in its roughness of airflow control, which is why Tatsuya said they hadn’t mastered it yet. But it was still definitely an advanced spell you’d almost never see on a high school level.

“So this is a multiplicative cast… The idea that the Saegusa twins only show their true worth when together isn’t unfounded.”

It was an advanced spell Kasumi and Izumi unleashed after having used relatively novice-level spells theretofore. It wasn’t because Kasumi, in charge of offense, had held anything back on purpose; Nitrogen Storm was so difficult that Kasumi by herself couldn’t activate it.

Kasumi and Izumi Saegusa were frequently referred to as the Saegusa twins, a normal name with a special meaning, because of a unique trait only they possessed. By combining their strength, they could use high-power, high-difficulty spells that would be impossible for them to use individually.

That may not have seemed very strange to someone who wasn’t a magician, but this was an abnormal phenomenon. Certainly there were techniques whereby multiple magicians would perform a single ritual to execute wide-scale, high-level magic impossible to cast alone. With ancient magic in particular, while actual examples of its being used were few and far between, it wasn’t unusual as a traditional method of casting. However, magic rituals of this variety always required a medium or process that could be shared with the five senses—something like an incantation, an altar, or a dance.

Multiple magicians merely activating the same spell at the same time wouldn’t add their magic power together or amplify it in any way; only the spell from the magician with the strongest magic power would manifest its effects—the other magicians’ magic power would actually just get in the way of the event alteration. Ritual magic performed by more than one person used complex or gigantic magic programs by splitting the work between the magicians involved so that they wouldn’t stray from their particular section of the magic program. Chanting and symbols were guideposts that allocated each magician’s magic power, or they served as circuits.

But Kasumi and Izumi amplified their magic power just by getting support from their CADs, in the same way one would activate normal magic. Plus, they didn’t divide the magic program into parts—they combined their very magic power into one.

Kasumi aimed the magic program at the target and fired, while Izumi gave it event-influencing force. They didn’t add their magic powers together but multiplied them to use the spell. They could do this because not only did they share the same genes physically, they were perfectly matched in mind, right down to the characteristics of their magic calculation regions. Takuma’s analysis had decided Kasumi excelled in activation speed and magic program construction scope and Izumi in influence, but that had been a miscalculation. He’d thought that because that was how they’d been using their magic power. But their roles could have been switched, and they’d have been able to use the same spells in exactly the same way.

Not even genetic engineering could cause this—they were irregulars, and their irregularity was completely coincidental. And it was the secret to the Saegusa twins’ power.

Takuma, who had been digging in and holding his breath, suddenly dropped to a knee, squatting to close the book whose wind-whipped pages seemed about ready to tear apart. A moment later, he opened its hard cover again. In that moment, all the pages turned into one big blizzard of paper and scattered.

The book he’d brought here was hardcover, not quite B5 size, and had 720 pages—it was thick and large. The pages were 182 millimeters horizontally by 256 millimeters vertically. All the pages had been shredded into pieces four millimeters square, leaving two millimeters still on the binding. The shredded pieces numbered 2,880 per two pages (or one sheet). With 720 pages and 360 sheets, the total number was 1,036,810.

Over a million tiny scraps of paper formed a tempest, going against the gales and pushing toward the twins. Obviously, these tiny scraps weren’t just ripped pieces of paper. If someone had the kinetic vision to capture each individual piece as it danced and twirled in a complicated manner, they would notice that none of them bent or folded—and maybe that they’d turned into thin, square blades as though made of glass or some other hard material. As the million blades danced around, seemingly at random, they all moved to wrap themselves around the girls.

Kasumi and Izumi, as well as Tatsuya and Miyuki, were aware this paper storm was actually made of countless sharp blades. They knew the magic of the Shippou, too, and knew what this spell was.

Million Edge—one of the Shippou family’s trump cards. Manipulating a million scraps of paper through colony control, turning them into bladed clouds to carve up an enemy.

The twins, while controlling Nitrogen Storm, activated a different spell. They took air that was filled with oxygen and rammed it into the paper blizzard from many directions, creating a scirocco hotter than the ignition point of paper through adiabatic compression, trying to burn the paper blades to cinders.

It was an arrangement of the Heat Storm spell. It was one difficulty rank higher than simply creating an adiabatically compressed air mass, and they activated it at the same time as Nitrogen Storm, but for now, it was well within the scope of the girls’ abilities. Lab Three’s research theme had been control of multiple spells of different types. The range of versatility of the magic they could activate and control at once, and the raising of that limit to its extreme, was the magician-strengthening program Lab Three had adopted. Lab Three was unusually open-minded among the magician development laboratories, and its fruits were used by Lab Ten as well. For Saegusa magicians, who had mastered the results of the multitype, multimagic control also used in the Juumonji family’s Phalanx and then transferred to Lab Seven, it was a skill that let them cast double or even triple, no matter how advanced the magic, without it even being difficult.

A suffocating storm swallowed up Takuma, and the air mass, over five hundred degrees centigrade, threatened to burn away all the paper scraps.

As the million blades were bathed in heat past their ignition point, they pressed farther toward Kasumi and Izumi, wanting blood, following Takuma’s will as he was protected by the spell that had created them.

At this rate, Takuma would succumb to hypoxia, and Kasumi and Izumi would be riddled with countless wounds from the blades they couldn’t reduce to ash. It was clear lasting effects would be a concern for both sides when this was over.

“That’s enough!”

Tatsuya’s right hand moved.

In his outstretched hand was a glittering silver CAD. A handgun-shaped specialized CAD called Silver Horn.

Nitrogen Storm.

Million Edge.

Heat Storm.

Three magic programs shattered, and a torrent of psions blew their shards apart.

Had Tatsuya’s command to stop reached the three combatants’ minds?

Amid the silence, with all the offensive spells blown away, Takuma, Kasumi, and Izumi all stood idly, dazed, unable to comprehend what had just happened. But not everyone was standing around wondering what had just gone on. The only ones stricken speechless were the three freshman combatants.

Tomitsuka’s eyes were wide, too, but his expression didn’t betray much shock. He was surprised, for sure, but it was more like he knew what had happened and thought it was incredible. The other three—Miyuki, Honoka, and Shizuku—merely looked mildly impressed.

Miyuki was actually the only one who properly understood what had happened, but the freshman trio couldn’t even figure out the surface-level phenomenon: the fact that Tatsuya had used anti-magic to disable all their spells instantaneously.

“I declare both sides disqualified.”

Tatsuya handed down his decision as the judge. Only then did the frozen freshmen reboot.

“What is that supposed to mean?!”

The first one to yell at Tatsuya was Kasumi.

“I said this before the match. Any lethal attacks or ones that could cause incurable wounds are forbidden, and that if I decided it was too dangerous, I would stop the match myself.”

“Then what would the match’s result be otherwise?” asked Izumi in a calmer tone than her older twin, but a firmer one than usual.

“Both sides are disqualified. In other words, both sides lost.”

It wasn’t a draw—it was a mutual loss. Tatsuya had purposely said it like that to imply that he wouldn’t let them have a rematch, but he doubted whether Izumi or the others understood that.

“But if I may, Shiba, Nitrogen Storm is unlike Million Edge. It may possess a degree of lethality, but it wouldn’t leave lingering aftereffects.”

Izumi was essentially insisting that Shippou should have lost because he broke the rules. Takuma understood that right away, too. Almost without any time between them, he tried to voice an objection, but Tatsuya was quicker.

“Yes, Nitrogen Storm’s power can be controlled to the point where it won’t leave serious aftereffects on the opponent. But I don’t think either of you had the time to think about that, Izumi.”

Faced with Tatsuya’s look of Am I wrong? the twins clammed up.

“That wasn’t the case!”

In their place—well, not really—this time Takuma yelled at Tatsuya.

“It would have been finished before that happened!”

An amused—not the happy kind, but the interested kind—light went on in Tatsuya’s eyes. “Are you trying to say you won?”

“Yes,” declared Takuma proudly without flinching away from Tatsuya’s cold stare. “Saegusa’s Heat Storm wouldn’t have been able to stop Million Edge. My attack would have reached Saegusa before Nitrogen Storm broke through my airtight shield!”

A sardonic hue found its way into the chill in Tatsuya’s gaze. “In other words, you insist that if I hadn’t stepped in, a million highly heated paper scraps would have completely ruined the soft skin of two freshman girls?”

He heard someone muffle a laugh. Actually, he heard at least two.

Blood rose to Takuma’s face. It got red enough that everyone could see it clearly.

“In that case, Shippou, I declare that you lost by breaking the rules.”

Before the excited Takuma could explode, Tatsuya made his assertion in a calm, even cruel, tone—that Takuma had lost. His voice was like cold steel, and it made Takuma hesitate to argue.

“I won’t allow you to say you didn’t know what would happen if they took the brunt of that spell.” Takuma was on the verge of saying something, but Tatsuya had no intention of letting him make excuses. “Excessive attacks are only allowed in death matches. Not in a game with rules.”

“But!”

Takuma raised his voice in opposition, more energetically than he needed to, as though clearing the pressure from Tatsuya that was entangling him. That one word alone made it clear that he was spent.

“Wouldn’t that mean it was a foregone conclusion that if I used Million Edge, I would have lost?!”

“As long as you couldn’t control its attack power, it would always be against the rules.”

“But that’s crazy!”

Tatsuya kept his cool as the freshman blew his top, and that only enraged Takuma more. His temper was so bad that it made not only Tomitsuka, his senior in the club committee, but also Kasumi, who had just been arguing with him, feel anxious.

“That would mean my trump card was restricted before the match even started! That’s a hell of a handicap, don’t you think?!”

“The conditions are the same for both of you. Highly lethal spells were equally forbidden for the Saegusa sisters.”

For now, though, those two were the only ones concerned with where this argument was leading. The junior girls—Miyuki, Shizuku, and Honoka—simply watched Takuma with lukewarm eyes.

“That’s cheap! They don’t even have magic lethal enough to be restricted!”

“Nitrogen Storm is lethal enough in its own right. I didn’t stop it at first because its power had been controlled to within the rules’ limits.”

Tatsuya’s tone was clearly far from pleased. Takuma choked on his next words as cold stares descended upon him. Not only Tatsuya, either—he felt like the three upperclassman girls were sneering at him, too. Desperately, he searched for a thread to argue on.

“You, however, didn’t have Million Edge’s power under your control.”

“That’s a false accusation! I was in full control of the spell!”

His objection had no grounds whatsoever—it was reactive, emotional, and simplistic. Every junior in the room could clearly tell that Takuma’s Million Edge hadn’t been modified enough.

If Tatsuya hadn’t just used his own judgment, but asked for everyone else’s—Miyuki’s, Honoka’s, Shizuku’s, and Tomitsuka’s—Takuma probably would have had to back down. The members of Tatsuya’s in-group aside, if even Tomitsuka supported his judgment, it definitely would have been too hard for Takuma to force the issue on emotion.

“I was the judge of this match. I decide the outcome. I said that at the start.”

But Tatsuya didn’t do that. He was the one who made the judgment, a fundamental rule he didn’t feel the need to bend.

“…Fine, I get it! Million Edge is the same as an overly aggressive attack! Why couldn’t you have just said that at the start?! There were plenty of other ways I could have fought if I’d known it was against the rules!”

Takuma didn’t realize that his remarks were the ones that sounded like childish excuses.

But everyone else did.

Tomitsuka’s eyes as he looked at Takuma had gone from anxious to helpless.

Miyuki’s had changed from lukewarm to sharp.

However, Tatsuya responded by pointing out Takuma’s failings in his usual dispassionate manner. “Don’t be a child, Shippou. You couldn’t control its power because you lack experience. If you knew the conditions beforehand and still couldn’t meet them, your level of skill is the only thing at fault.”

“I don’t want a Weed like you telling me that!”

The room fell deathly quiet. A tension, sharp enough to prick skin, filled the silence.

Takuma’s face, dyed crimson, drained of blood and paled a little. He probably hadn’t meant to take it that far. He seemed to realize he’d said something he couldn’t take back in his rage.

Honoka and Shizuku paled, too, but for a different reason. They were afraid a blizzard was about to start raging right here in this room. Thankfully, however, Tatsuya spoke before that happened.

“So you’re unhappy that it’s coming from me?”

Takuma realized that his remark had been inappropriate on two different levels. The term Weed was not one he should have used in this situation at the very least, and Tatsuya was an exception who had risen in rank from Course 2 student to magical engineering student through his abilities. Takuma worked his mind, desperately trying to come up with a way to recover from this error. But he was cornered and his calm was gone; he was having a hard time thinking of anything that would help. Nevertheless, he couldn’t keep his mouth closed.

“I… What I’m unhappy with is the biased judgement! It was only your subjective point of view that Saegusa could control Nitrogen Storm and I couldn’t control Million Edge, isn’t it? I was completely in control! Your decision is clearly biased toward Saegusa!”

“Shippou…you’re being incoherent.”

It wasn’t Tatsuya who chided him, appalled, as he relied on emotional excuses like a child throwing a temper tantrum. Instead, it was Tomitsuka.

“You just said that if it had kept going, your spell would have done damage to the Saegusas that exceeded the limits of the match.”

“That’s because they used Heat Storm!”

Takuma’s excuse wasn’t wholly without logic. Unfortunately, though, it just sounded like he was passing the buck right now.

“Give it a rest, Shippou.”

A lax voice interrupted Takuma and Tomitsuka. It had come from the mouth of Kasumi.

“If you really wanted to win that badly, then you can have it.”

“Kasumi, are you okay with that?”

Amid the line of faces that looked shocked, though the intensity of the shock varied, the one who’d asked Kasumi that question was the one who probably knew her best: Izumi.

“Yeah. If you really think about it, we shouldn’t have gotten that riled up. It was just an unofficial high school match, but we used a multiplicative cast, and then used it to multi-cast Nitrogen Storm and Heat Storm. That’s going too far, no matter how you look at it. Shiba’s right.”

As her words implied, Kasumi looked as though she’d completely cooled off. Even her eyes when she looked at Takuma had waned from a look of hostility to one of disinterest.

“…If you say so, Kasumi.”

Izumi accepted her sister’s excuse pretty easily. She’d planned to be her twin’s assistant for this in the first place. If Kasumi said it was fine with her, then there was nothing for Izumi to argue against.

Takuma was about to shout something, but used all his might to close his mouth. The angry words That’s bullshit came very close to escaping his throat, but he realized saying them would be utterly unseemly. Thanks to the interval where everyone was too stunned to speak, he’d recovered enough of his ability to reason logically.

Kasumi walked over to Tatsuya, with Izumi following behind.

“Shiba, I’m sorry for the trouble.”

Kasumi and Izumi bowed their heads to Tatsuya. Of course, Izumi’s mind was 70 percent on Miyuki, which should perhaps be called amusing.

…Meanwhile, Takuma gritted his teeth and watched.

“But can I say one thing?” she asked.

Nevertheless, it wasn’t like Kasumi to apologize and leave. At least, in this case, not when it came to Tatsuya.

“What?”

Tatsuya’s expression had changed completely as well from when he’d been facing Takuma, and it now wore a slight pained grin.

“I—no, we didn’t lose control of the spells. Stopping the match there was a mistaken decision on your part.”

Kasumi jabbered at him quickly, her eyes strong, before leaving the seminar room without waiting for Tatsuya to answer.

“I, umm…”

Izumi, switching between Kasumi’s back and Tatsuya’s face over and over, seemed to be seriously disturbed, which was rare for her.

“Izumi?”

“Yes?!”

It couldn’t have come as unexpected, but when Tatsuya said her name, Izumi’s spine immediately straightened up. A moment later, she looked down, embarrassed she’d let herself get tongue-tied.

Without grinning at her, but without any harshness, either, Tatsuya, his face serene, continued. “Would you mind telling Kasumi that if she’s unhappy with this, I would be happy to take her on anytime?”

Izumi’s eyes widened—perhaps out of surprise. She immediately realized he’d spoken out of consideration for Kasumi, and it was seriously at odds with the image of him she had in her head.

“…I understand. Thank you very much,” she answered, bowing deeply. After her bow, which was neither too long nor too short, she looked back up, then stopped in place for some reason.

“What is it?”

After Tatsuya prodded her, Izumi gave Tatsuya an honest smile for the first time.

“My opinion of you has very slightly gone up. I see you have a bit of what I would expect Big Sister’s older brother to have.”

Her sarcasm was so overloaded all the cargo could have fallen off it, but perhaps taken aback by the excessive bluntness, Tatsuya watched Izumi excuse herself and leave without saying a word.

In the seminar room after Kasumi and Izumi left, Takuma was still standing around in silence doing nothing. The juniors couldn’t deny it seemed like he’d been left behind, but Takuma himself didn’t think that way.

“Shiba.”

He had wanted to speak with Tatsuya after the “nuisances”—at least in his mind—were gone. That was why he’d remained.

“Is there still something you want to say?”

Tatsuya’s voice was still cold. There was nobody here to criticize that as childish behavior. As far as the conversations had gone in this room, at least, everyone had probably decided the blame lay with Takuma. In fact, even Takuma himself thought so now that he’d regained a degree of reason. But at the same time, he’d given up hope of apologizing, because it was too late at this point. He was stuck thinking that he needed to make up lost ground in a way other than by being courteous.

“I’m still not convinced.”

“Of what?”

“That I lost by breaking the rules.”

“Shippou!”

Sounding like he couldn’t hold it in any longer, Tomitsuka raised his voice. But Takuma’s gaze remained fixed on Tatsuya, and didn’t move toward Tomitsuka.

“What is it you want?”

Tatsuya could have silenced Takuma’s protests. From the outset, this match had been a relief measure for Takuma and Kasumi after they’d committed a serious infraction of school rules. In particular, it had been intended to rescue Takuma, who in the worst case would have been expelled. Whether it was partiality or outright cheating, Takuma wasn’t in a position to quibble.

And yet Tatsuya was asking for his excuse. This wasn’t him being kind; he just didn’t want this trouble to drag on for a long time.

“Please, let me prove it to you.”

“Prove what?”

“Prove that I was in control of Million Edge.”

“How?”

“Please stay here with me—I’ll use Million Edge and force you to surrender without harming you!”

Miyuki’s slender eyebrows shot up at Takuma’s words. But a white darkness had not covered the room.

Before her emotions could explode, the sound of a harsh blow and the sound of something hitting the floor went off one after another. The unexpected sight interrupted Miyuki’s anger.

The one who had fallen to the floor was Takuma.

The one who had punched him down was Tomitsuka.

“…Tomitsuka?”

Takuma, his hands on the floor, looked up, his face looking like he didn’t know what had just happened.

“Give it a rest, Shippou!” yelled Tomitsuka, growing red in the face. Expressions like demonic or enraged were altogether inapplicable—perhaps because he had unhandsome features to begin with—but it was clear that he was seriously angry.

“I’ve been listening to you as you do nothing but spout self-satisfied, incredibly rude things… Who the hell do you think you are?! Are you trying to say the Twenty-Eight are that far above everyone else?!”

“I…I didn’t mean…” muttered Takuma from the floor, almost to himself. He had only sat up in place, doubtless because the shock had made him forget to actually stand all the way up.

Takuma truly hadn’t noticed. He truly hadn’t been aware. He was so insistent on the Ten Master Clans’ position that he only ever looked up—he never bothered to look down. Actually, he might face downward, but he never looked that way. He didn’t acknowledge the worth of the Shippou family because they couldn’t become one of the Ten Master Clans. Unconsciously, he’d been looking down on magicians without the right to be in one of the Clans the same way he looked down on his own father.

“Shippou. If you want to prove your own strength, then you’ll be with me! Or are you not satisfied with me? Not satisfied going up against the worthless Range Zero of the Tomitsuka of the Hundred?”

Overpowered by his friend’s spirit, Takuma, still on his rear, backed away. Whether Tomitsuka pressed an attack or Takuma played the cornered rat finding courage in desperation, a precarious mood that foreshadowed a battle’s start at any moment floated through the seminar room.

“Tomitsuka, please, calm down.”

It was Miyuki’s clear voice that cooled the flames about to ignite.

“As long as you don’t have permission from the student council president and the disciplinary committee chairwoman, no matches will be allowed. And perhaps Shippou needs time to think anyway? He would also require time to prepare the Million Edge’s activation medium.”

“…You’re right. I’m sorry.”

Tomitsuka flushed at how even he’d been letting his temper get the better of him.

“Shippou, can you stand?”

In place of Tomitsuka, who retreated to the wall, Honoka went out in front of Takuma. She was truthfully indignant that Takuma had treated Tatsuya so rudely, but she was too nice a person at heart to leave an underclassman sitting on the floor.

“I’m fine!”

Takuma energetically got to his feet. His face was a little red because a girl he was trying to recruit for his own faction had seen him in such a sorry state—at least that was what he decided to think.

Tatsuya, who had been keeping quiet until now in the belief that interrupting would ruin the situation beyond repair, saw it was a good time and spoke.

“Shippou, I don’t plan on fighting you. Tomitsuka, if you want to fight him, you should explain what’s happening to Chairman Hattori.”

“Er, I, yeah.”

It was Tomitsuka who answered awkwardly. Takuma was staring wordlessly at Tatsuya.

“Honoka, would you mind closing up?”

“Of course, Tatsuya.”

Tatsuya left the room briskly, as though saying he didn’t want anything to do with any further quarrels.

Taking only Miyuki with him.

Unfortunately, however, Tatsuya wouldn’t be escaping this incident that easily.

It happened about fifteen minutes after Honoka returned to the student council room after locking up, right as Tatsuya was getting up to go home for the day: The student council room doorbell rang.

“You can come in.”

“Excuse me.”

The one who entered through the door was the club committee chairman, Hattori.

Having a bad feeling about this—no, a firm belief about it—Tatsuya sat back in his chair.

Hattori walked over to Azusa, who had remotely unlocked the door in the first place, with a truly bitter, or maybe pained, look on his face.

It was a surprise to Tatsuya that Azusa, sitting at the desk, didn’t seem frightened at all.

“Nakajou, this is really hard for me to say, and I’m ashamed to say it, but…”

“What’s wrong, Hattori?”

Azusa probably couldn’t do anything but answer like that.

“I’m sorry. I’d like permission for a match again.”

“Again?! Who could it be this time?”

One could call the fact that he didn’t make excuses about this or that right now a virtue that reflected his serious nature.

One could also say he felt more responsibility for what had happened than Tatsuya, at least, who had predicted this turn of events and hadn’t reported anything because he didn’t want to get involved with it.

“Tomitsuka and Shippou.”

“Shippou again…?”

Hattori and Azusa were of one mind, a fact the deep wrinkles in their furrowed brows attested to.

“…I foresaw he’d have some personality issues when he spurned the invitation to the student council. Maybe I should be scolding him for it and making him reflect on his behavior for this, too.”

Miyuki and Honoka both nodded, but neither was visible to Hattori.

“But his talent is valuable. I think if he learned how to be a little humbler, he’d grow by leaps and bounds.”

Miyuki and Honoka traded glances, using their eyes to say What do you think? and Probably not, but that conversation wasn’t visible to Hattori, either.

“I decided a defeat would be better than a harsh reprimand to take him down a peg.”

“Which is why the match… But is Tomitsuka all right with it? If that’s the reason, wouldn’t Sawaki be more certain to win—or you, for that matter?”

Now that Katsuto, Mayumi, and Mari had graduated, Hattori and Sawaki were currently considered the strongest at First High. (“Considered” because it was what the students thought; they hadn’t had a tournament to prove it or anything.)

“I considered giving him the lesson myself, but Tomitsuka was very adamant. I’ve left Shippou’s education to Tomitsuka until now, and he’s not lacking in the strength department. That’s why I’d like to trust him with this.”

“Well, that’s fine, then, right?” Isori, who had been listening quietly to Hattori’s explanation thus far, gave Azusa a push. “Tomitsuka is strong. Like Hattori says, we won’t have to worry about his skills.”

The relationship between the Tomitsuka and Isori families was not a shallow one that was due only to each family’s field of specialty. It wasn’t strange that Kei Isori would know Hagane Tomitsuka’s true strength.

“And Tomitsuka is serious, too. His disposition hasn’t changed despite the way he was treated. I don’t think letting him have a match against Shippou would turn out badly.”

Azusa knew that, so she accepted Isori’s advice without issue. “What day would they like, then? It’s close to closing time, so without much time left, I can’t permit it for today, but…”

Hattori already had an answer for Azusa’s question: “Can it be the day after tomorrow?”

“Why not tomorrow?”

“I don’t want to let him use the successive-fight excuse. I think we should leave a day in between for him to rest.”

“The day after tomorrow is Saturday, so I’m not sure whether the seminar room will be free after school…” said Azusa, calling up the facility reservations herself. “Oh, seminar room three is usable after three. Is one hour okay?”

“Would you be able to make it two hours?”

“Well, it should be fine.” Despite feeling dubious about Hattori’s request, Azusa made the reservation for the seminar room. “I’ll issue the permission slip.”

“Sorry, and thanks for doing all this work,” said Hattori, lowering his head in apology. His display provoked a little laugh from Azusa.

“…Did I say something weird?”

“Hattori, you’re kind of starting to remind me of Juumonji.”

Coming from her, that was beyond the shadow of a doubt a compliment. But Hattori, who considered himself clearly a different type from Katsuto, felt like she’d told him that he was trying to make up for his lack of ability by pretending to be someone else, leaving him in a fairly delicate mood.

Miyuki watched with concern from the living room as her brother relaxed on the sofa, having gotten changed in his room before her.

On the way from school to their house, Tatsuya had seemed deep in thought about something. Still, that was only how Miyuki felt, and no differences from his normal routines were apparent. When she spoke to him, she got actual responses. And he didn’t remain passive in the conversation—he’d asked what Minami thought of school life, and gathered information about whether what had happened today was already a rumor among the freshmen.

But no matter how same-as-always he seemed, he was definitely worried about something, Miyuki was sure of it. It wasn’t about whether she had excellent powers of insight or not; her gut just told her that her brother wasn’t sure what to do.

Maybe it would be better to express it by saying their hearts were connected.

It was only recently that she’d become this strongly aware of it. Sometimes she wondered if it was some kind of telepathy. Whatever the real cause was, it was a joyful thing for her—simply being able to really feel like her heart was connected with his made her blissful.

She could notice her brother’s worries like this. That, too, was a happy fact. Because of that, she grew unnecessarily curious as to what it was he was worried about. She couldn’t find it within herself to look the other way when she knew he was worried.

“Brother?”

In the end, she decided to be straightforward and ask. Maybe their hearts were linked, but this was no telepathy—she couldn’t read his mind. And even if it were a telepathic ability, looking into her brother’s thoughts was something she would never, ever be rude enough to do. Even if there was something she could do for him, if she didn’t know what that thing was, then she couldn’t help him. (Incidentally, according to current, late-twenty-first-century research, telepathy could only read surface-level, verbalized thoughts.)

Receiving his permission, she sat down directly in front of him, and asked her question with (though she didn’t realize it) a very serious expression.

“Brother, what are you worried about?”

Even if she intended to be straightforward, that may have been a little too direct. Tatsuya looked at his sister, seeming taken aback, but maybe that was why he didn’t feel like evading the question.

“I’m a little concerned about Shippou.”

“…Brother. If you ever consider his insolent attitude too much to tolerate, you need only tell me.”

“No, no, Miyuki, don’t be hasty.” Seeing a dangerous light in her eyes that was one step from murderous, Tatsuya quickly waved his hands to the sides. “His attitude isn’t what I’d call praiseworthy, but that wasn’t exactly what I was concerned with. Besides, I don’t have much room to talk about the attitude others take toward their elders to begin with.”

“That is not true. You are an admirable person at all times.”

He knew this argument was practically reflex for Miyuki, so Tatsuya decided not to comment on it. “What I’m concerned about is how Shippou can remain so aggressive. He turns down an invitation to the student council, jumps down the Saegusa family’s throat, and doesn’t care if he makes enemies out of upperclassmen.”

“Perhaps he simply isn’t thinking at all.”

Tatsuya accidentally let a grin slip out at his sister’s scathing opinion. “No, that’s not how it looks to me. He has a very strong ambition to rise up in the world. When I watch him, I feel like maybe he’s mad that he can’t be in the Ten.”

“…But if that was the case, I would think one would normally join the student council and try to build personal relationships.”

“I think that would be normal, too.”

Miyuki, suddenly surprised, put a hand to her mouth. “Then are you saying something abnormal is happening? Is that what you’ve been thinking about?”

“Well, yes, but…”

As Tatsuya was fumbling over his words, Minami entered the living room with an “Excuse me.”

In her hands she held a tray with coffee cups on it.

Miyuki directed a resentful look at Minami, but Minami casually averted her eyes and pretended not to notice it.

“I’ve brought you some coffee.”

“Right, thanks.”

Tatsuya noticed the battle in their eyes, too, but he wasn’t foolish enough to remark on it.

“Hey, Minami, I’d like your opinion, too. Would you take a seat?”

Tatsuya hadn’t said this because he considered Minami’s deductive prowess more helpful than Miyuki’s.

Miyuki was too easily influenced by Tatsuya’s thinking style. She had a tendency to look at everything from the same viewpoint as he. Tatsuya valued that as a way to complement his own analysis, but right now he decided he wanted ideas from a different viewpoint.

“Yes?” said Minami, not moving to sit down. She just stood next to the table, waiting. Glimpsing a firm sense of professionalism in that, Tatsuya stopped wasting time.

“What sort of impression does Takuma Shippou give you?”

“He’s a fool who does not know his place.”

There wasn’t a moment’s hesitation in Minami’s answer.

Miyuki nodded deeply in the seat across from him. Seeing her out of the corner of his eye, Tatsuya regretted asking the question that way. He dismissed the pounding in his head as just his imagination. (And, in fact, it wasn’t a physical occurrence.)

“…What is your reason for thinking that way?”

For now, Tatsuya decided to ask the reason why. Minami also answered that one without pretending to hesitate.

“He is like a wild dog. He snaps at everyone without thinking of interests or differences in strength. His indiscriminate offensive nature seems to indicate not that he believes he is the strongest, but that he believes he must be.”

Takuma seemed to have considerably angered Minami as well, and before she knew it, her own thoughts were leaping off her tongue.

“That he needs to be the strongest…” Tatsuya didn’t know how deeply Minami had thought about this, but her impressions felt oddly on the mark. “I wonder who could have riled him up like that.”

That comment hadn’t been directed at Miyuki, nor had it been directed at Minami. He was basically muttering to himself, trying to organize his own thoughts, but Miyuki didn’t take it that way.

“Rile him up… Could this be how the Shippou family is raising him? Telling him that the Shippou’s heir needs to be stronger than anyone else, perhaps?”

Miyuki’s speculation was, if one had to judge, more appropriate for the Yotsuba family. But none of the three here realized that, because they were all up to their necks in this Yotsuba-esque principle already.

“No, I hear the Shippou family head, Takumi Shippou, is so discreet he’s almost timid. He would exercise some caution in directing the family, regardless of what his true intentions are.”

“Big Brother Tatsuya, it seems to me that this is not the result of someone riling him up but of someone inciting him or flattering him.”

Miyuki was the one to respond to Minami. “You mean that someone is trying to take advantage of him rather than align their interests with his?”

“I hadn’t thought that far…but I feel you are correct, Big Sister Miyuki.”

As Minami nodded, Tatsuya mentally agreed with her. Yes—to put it in an ugly way, Takuma was being made to dance like a puppet. That was the expression that came to Tatsuya’s mind when he watched the string of disturbances Takuma had caused.

“That’s interesting. What could be their purpose…? Should I do a little digging?”

“Will you ask Sensei about it?” asked Miyuki, wondering if he’d inquire with Yakumo.

“Shall I connect you to Master Kuroba?” suggested Minami, wondering the same thing.

“No,” said Tatsuya, disagreeing with them both. “This is all too vague to bother Master with, and I can’t let myself ask for Aunt Maya’s help. Still, by myself, this is…” He paused before shaking his head to clear his hesitation. “I feel like nothing good will happen if we leave him alone, but…there’s no choice. I’ll just have to watch him for a while.”

A backward-looking conclusion, but he couldn’t think of any other way to deal with it. If violent behavior was happening right in front of them, he could solve it through muscle by himself, but time and manpower were necessary for investigations. Maybe they weren’t necessary with hacking skills like Sanada or Fujibayashi had, but with his current abilities, that was asking too much. He decided to be quiet about it and give up.

However, the god of trouble (or the devil?) seemed to want to sweat him to the last.

Just as Tatsuya had finished his coffee and was about to get up, the telephone rang. Seeing the call source, Tatsuya frowned in doubt. The one who had called was Kyouko Fujibayashi.

“Yes, this is Shiba.”

Taking his response as a signal, the living-room display began to function as a videophone monitor.

“Good evening, Tatsuya. You weren’t having dinner yet, were you? Can you spare a moment to talk?”

“I can, ma’am,” answered Tatsuya, glancing to his side.

“Oh, they can hear this—both Miyuki and Minami.”

The glance had indeed been a signal for them to excuse themselves, but Fujibayashi preempted him and stopped them. A thought crossed Tatsuya’s mind—did she mean to get them involved? But more importantly, she spoke as though she knew all about Minami, which set Tatsuya heavily on guard.

“I actually wanted to talk about the disturbance the Shippou family’s eldest son caused today.”

“Could you wait a moment, ma’am?” interrupted Tatsuya. The topic she was trying to broach wasn’t the kind he could just listen to without saying anything. “How do you know about that, ma’am? Unlike the Nine School Competition representative selections, that incident was off the books. You don’t have an informant in our midst, do you?”

Fujibayashi looked like she was trying to stop herself from laughing. “I’ll have to give them a bonus. Not letting you notice that they’ve been watching you, of all people.”

“Watching me…?” asked Tatsuya, erasing his expression.

“Hmm… Well, not quite. They weren’t watching you—they were watching anyone getting close to you. I instructed them not to pay direct attention to you or Miyuki, and it seems they’ve kept to that faithfully. Maybe that’s why your senses didn’t catch them.”

“Why—it’s because I’m a strategic-class magician, right?”

“Well, of course. The military can’t exactly leave a strategic magician defenseless, can they?”

With a completely guilt-free smile, Fujibayashi revealed that she’d been eavesdropping and spying on them.

“I suppose you wouldn’t answer me if I asked who it is.”

“Obviously I can’t tell you that.”

Tatsuya sighed and gave up on the subject. Tatsuya and the Independent Magic Battalion had never been allies unconditionally. Besides, the logic of keeping a watchful eye on a strategic magician’s movements, even coming from an ally, was logic he could understand.

“All right, ma’am… What did you want to discuss regarding Shippou?” asked Tatsuya, shelving the prior conversation for the moment and making an expression like nothing had happened.

Fujibayashi answered him with the same look she’d had when he picked up the phone. “Just wondering if you wanted to know who’s supporting him.”

It was as though she’d been eavesdropping on the very conversation Tatsuya and the others had just been having. “…Why would you think that?”

But Tatsuya knew he wasn’t senile enough that someone could plant a bug in his own home, even Fujibayashi. And besides, if they had been listening to all their conversations at home, neither she nor her superiors would have done anything so careless as to let him know about it.

The Shippou family was one of the Eighteen Support Clans acting as assistants to the Ten Master Clans. Someone was exerting no small influence on its eldest son and heir. Doubtless that person’s existence was a worrying element that a force like the Independent Magic Battalion, which saw magic as a crucial element of Japan’s defense forces, couldn’t ignore. Did it already have detailed intel?

The answer to Tatsuya’s question was one of the two responses he’d expected.

“Because I was curious.”

It would be dangerous to take that answer at face value. It wasn’t fully a lie—but it couldn’t have been fully the truth.

“I wanted to propose we work together on a little investigation.”

But it was also true that her proposition was a life raft for Tatsuya. “What exactly should I do, then, ma’am?”

“I’ll handle the home surveillance. I want you to come here when Shippou visits his supporter.”

“That’s something I would have liked to request myself, but…for what purpose?”

“We have the whole nonintervention thing when it comes to domestic incidents. Not our territory, and all that. But if it were you, you could just say you were worried about a younger student as their senior, right? Though I can’t force a respectable student to do anything dangerous, of course.”

The retort But it’s okay if it’s me?! didn’t even come up in Tatsuya’s mind. “Understood, ma’am. In that case, I accept.”

“If he makes a move, I’ll contact you. Miyuki, I’ll be borrowing Tatsuya for a short while when that happens.”

After hearing Miyuki comply with a taken-aback voice, Fujibayashi winked and hung up.