Editing City Series:Volume3a Chapter 8 (section)

===Part 1===

The white-walled meeting room on Hong Kong Yard’s second story was large enough to fit two hundred people.

It was designed much like a university lecture hall and it was indeed being used for a lecture.

A teacher and assistant stood on the stage up front where their voices could reach everyone else. Rin and Kouga wore their Yard uniforms in front of the large display they were using instead of a blackboard.

And if there was a teacher, there had to be students. About eighty percent of the meeting room’s seats were filled.

The model students did not utter a word or produce any noise at all and, other than the police superintendent acting as the director, they were all from field units. There was a total of one hundred fifty eight from the Tank Force, the Custom Force, the Ninja Force, and the Hounds.

They were all prized members of the Yard and they displayed their diligence by filling the front half of the meeting room’s seats.

On the other hand, Akira, Gunmal, and the General sat on the very back row.

They all silently listened to Rin and they were taking this seriously.

After all, Rin started with this:

“I am mainly here to explain the process by which Hong Kong will be destroyed and sent up to heaven.”

She then began talking about World War Two.

“You are all familiar with Aerial City’s self-sacrifice, I assume. At the end of the war, the Germans fired a Wort Bombe at England. To save England, the bomb was taken to heaven and heaven was utterly destroyed.”

She went on to say that the Nein Engels were attempting to Tune Hong Kong, carry it up to the destroyed heaven, and create a new heaven.

From there, her explanation continued to build.

“If Hong Kong’s Kowloon is seen as the center, then the Tune Emblems in question have been drawn at the northwestern Tsing Yi Island, the southwestern Lamma Island, and the southwestern Beaufort Island. Also, Earth Burns have been seen in the ocean near those islands.”

A map of Hong Kong appeared on the large display behind Rin and red circles expanded from three points on it.

“Based on the size of the Tune Emblems, Earth Burns made from Lives with an Octave of 40 million have already fused with the land within these red circles.”

The three red circles seemed to pin down the map and they were each about ten kilometers across. The three of them covered most of Hong Kong.

If they became dragons and suddenly ascended into the sky, the casualties would be more than just one or two hundred thousand.

Everyone gave a stiff gasp, but a voice broke that tense atmosphere.

“Hey, Rin.”

The casual, questioning tone came from the General.

“There’s somethin’ I don’t get.”

“Yes, I had a feeling you would ask about this.”

“Quit flatterin’ me,” he said before continuing. “Well, I’ll start with just one thing. If someone made these three Earth Burns, then why’d they only have them swim in the ocean and disappear on the night those dragons were spotted?”

“Anything else?”

“Yeah, one more. With Tunin’, the Lives’ll end up back here even if they are taken up to heaven. Tune arrangements are nothin’ but healin’ after all.”

“I see.” Rin gave a deep nod to show she had understood his questions. “The answer to that is found in J-Gun’s Devices that the Nein Engels wanted and in how Huang Daquan died. Why did they create four identical Devices and yet want another device now? And where did Huang Daquan’s blood end up?”

She continued.

“When the Tune Emblems were activated and the Earth Burns appeared, one of those Devices was driven into each of them. The blades must have been soaked in the blood just like the Tune Emblems…and those were J-Gun’s Devices which could withstand an Octave of several dozen million.”

She turned toward the large display just as a new circle appeared.

It was centered on the eastern Kowloon Peninsula, near Hung Hom.

Its position created a square with the previous three circles.

The four red circles covered almost everything.

Rin turned sideways to let everyone see the screen.

“The Earth Burns obeyed the Message of their creator and vanished into the sea before their bodies could fully develop, but that was to use a Bust System.”

“You mean the four elements of wood, fire, earth, and water, plus the element of metal that is created from the combination of the other four?” asked Gunmal. “So my brother’s Devices acted as the key to the three Earth Burns and they will…um, resonate with the ceremony to bring out an Earth Burn in that new circle in Hung Hom, which will Tune all four Earth Burns at once?”

“Yes. The identical Devices will act as a resonating whistle. …But that isn’t all.”

“?”

“You said the element of metal is created when the other four are combined, right? We should assume the ceremonies they’ve completed or will complete correspond to those four elements.”
Lamma Island’s rainforest land made it wood.

Tsing Yi Island’s name meant “blue clothes”, so it was water.

Beaufort Island’s bare volcanic rock made it earth.

And Hung Hom’s thermal power station was fire.

Symbols of the four elements had been gathered.

And that meant…

“If the four dragons are Tuned here, the foundation needed to activate the element of metal will be created at the central point! Look, if these four elements are activated, what land is left!?”

Rin indicated a single point on the large display.

It covered the Kowloon Peninsula from the center to the very end.

“Hong Kong Cave.”

“!”

A stir ran through the audience like a wave.

But…

“Don’t panic!”

Rin’s shout eliminated the stir and silence returned.

But this silence was different. The audience was intentionally suppressing any noise and Rin’s voice soon reached them.

“Look carefully. How much power will the metal Live have as it ascends along the path created by the other four elements?”

As soon as she spoke, an even larger red circle appeared over northern Hong Kong Island on the map.

It encompassed the other four circles and grew even larger.

“Wait, wait, wait,” said some of the Yard members, but the circle only continued to grow.

“The Four Elements Acceleration of the Tune System squares the power of a single element, so some simple math tells us that all land within a one hundred kilometer radius will be Tuned as an Earth Serpent!”

The circle did not just cover Hong Kong Island, the large Lantau Island to the west, and the Kowloon Peninsula. It also included a portion of the ocean and China.

“Using a form of Death Techno, Huang Daquan’s blood was used to fill the dragons with the power of Yang, a heavenly element, so even if the Tuning is dispelled, it will not return to the earth. …Heaven will be restored and Hong Kong will be destroyed.”

Everyone silently listened to her and looked at the screen.

But Rin only lowered her head slightly and smiled.

“Sorry for frightening you,” she began. “This is why I summoned you here today. Do you all understand the nature of the mission given in the documents you hold? Do you understand why we are breaking into Hong Kong Cave when even the governor continues to ignore it and everyone writes it off as ‘nonexistent’ or ‘outside their jurisdiction’ due to the past Divine Punishment Wars?”

She took a breath.

“We are up against two of the three secret Tune Bust techniques. If we don’t seal off the four elements today, the metal dragon will eventually activate. …No, it’s sure to happen before the gate to heaven vanishes from Hong Kong’s sky in two weeks’ time!”

With that said, she once more looked to the meeting room’s back row.

No one had said anything, but the Nein Engel sitting there had stood up.

The girl was Akira.

Akira scratched her head and started to leave the meeting room.

The only ones to notice this were the others in the back row and Rin. No one tried to stop her and Gunmal simply watched her go.

She was part of Cleared, so even as a participant, she wasn’t part of a field unit.

Also, Rin had seen Akira’s Live.

Her Live had contained a difficult color that had stopped Rin from calling out to her.