Editing City Series:Volume4a Chapter 10 (section)

===Part 3===

'''2:45 PM

The battle began with both sides working to protect a single girl.

The siren known as the Fourth Alarm rang and two boy-girl pairs began moving at the center of the quickly emptying shopping district.

A single girl watched them.

Shoui was worried about her.

“I can’t believe this.”

He saw Takada holding Taromaru in her arms, but Taromaru’s size had changed.

Instead of mouse-sized, he was now the size of a puppy.

Sensing her fear, he had grown to confront the situation she was facing. Shoui now understood what had happened at that scene when he had first met her.

The fleeing students had been attacked by the grown Taromaru.

He had a feeling he understood her fear.

“Is she afraid that her own fear will hurt others?”

He saw her desperately petting Taromaru’s head to calm him.

But Taromaru kept his fangs bared and produced a low growling from deep in his throat.

The Dog God was no longer reading her thoughts.

The fear of this battle that resided deep in her heart was more powerful than her thoughts.

She was both trying to calm Taromaru and to calm her own emotions. Without speaking a word, she was trying to calm her own fear of hurting others.

“…”

Shoui recalled the past.

Yuuki had once said something to him when visiting his room.

“ ‘Protect me from myself’, hm?”

He muttered that while facing forward.

Taeko and the enemy were glaring at each other from a distance.

The enemy had named themselves and Taeko had responded in kind.

The enemies were Tokyo’s Vice Chancellor and Special Duty Officer.

The night before, Shoui had met and lost to a boy claiming to be Tokyo’s Chancellor.

That meant the main force of Tokyo’s Chancellor’s Officers was in Osaka.

Shoui did not know what was going on, but he could tell Takada knew them and that she was afraid of this battle.

“…”

He walked forward and the two from Tokyo reacted.

They had been entirely focused on Taeko, but now they began to focus on Shoui too.

—''Taeko – Mind Tech – Take – Detect Presence – Hit.

As soon as Shoui arrived alongside Taeko, she took off running.

“!”

She ran forward.

She had won the initiative.

Her Dragon Emperor gave a roar.

With that roar to summon the Lightning High, lightning enveloped her metal arm.

The enemy moved back, but Taeko did not care.

She continued forward with the Dragon Emperor at the ready.

“Yer still in range!”

As a Steel Master, she was an all-rounder who could make long-distance attacks too.

The Dragon Emperor gave its thunderous roar and her attack range spread.

—''Taeko – Shot Tech – Take – Prepare to Fire – Hit.

:—''Taeko – Lightning High/Steel/Shot Tech – Multi-Take – Electro Cannon – Hit!

“!”

She held forward the Dragon Emperor arm and the lightning wrapping around it was instantly fired forward.

The electric attack was wide enough to fill the road and flew toward her opponents more like a pillar than a net.

The wide-range attack of white light raced through the air, but…

“Leave it to me.”

With a refreshing voice, Aoi Hijiri stepped forward with her hexagonal rod in hand.

She stood in front of Ikemaru and raised the rod with awfully slow movements.

She raised her head and looked to Taeko through the electric attack.

She gave a slight smile just as the lightning struck her.

A great roar burst out, but the result was not at all what Taeko had expected.

“!?”

The white light fired by the Dragon Emperor scattered in every direction like a shattered plate.

The explosion of light slammed noisily into the shops on either side of the road.

The shopping district shattered from the heat and impact.

After a series of explosions and a chorus of solid impacts, only Aoi remained standing.

She was unscathed.

“…It missed!?”

Aoi spoke without answering Taeko’s question.

“Like that would work, you idiot. …If this is all you’ve got, I don’t see how you can claim Nagoya won’t surrender.”

“…Damn ya.”

“Don’t panic. We’ll take our time finishing you off. …Once you go down, Nagoya is ours.”

Shoui ignored Aoi’s mocking comment and looked behind the girl.

The man who had been standing there was gone.

—''Shoui – Sight Tech – Take – Detect Enemy – Hit!

“Boss!”

He saw Ikemaru Takahiro walking up the sidewalk.

Several bicycles were lined up there.

As he walked along, he traced his bare hand along those bicycles.

“Peck at your prey, you birds.”

The group of bicycles flew up into the sky as if something had kicked at them.

It happened suddenly.

With a harmony of light metallic sounds, the bicycles flew along a gentle slope no matter which way they were pointed and no matter how they were oriented.

They filled the sky just like a flock of birds.

“!”

They then dropped down toward Shoui and Taeko.

“Dragon Emperor!”

Taeko raised her voice and a hemisphere of lightning was released from the exhaust port on the Dragon Emperor’s shoulder.

—''Shoui – Dodge/Savate Tech – Multi-Take – Leaping Dodge – Hit!

Just as he escaped the range of the lightning, the wheeled birds crashed down into the lightning light.

With a scorching smell, their metal and plastic melted and scattered.

“Th-that was close!”

“Just stay quiet and get outta the way! The next one’s comin’!”

He looked up to see Aoi raising her hexagonal rod.

Those two had incredible coordination, so they did not give Shoui and Taeko a chance to act.

There was a distance of over ten steps between Aoi and Taeko, so this attack would presumably fill that gap.

—''Shoui – Mind Tech – Auto-Take – Detect Killer Intent – Hit!

For some reason, Shoui recognized the aura emitted by that pose.

“But I’ve never met her before.”

Confused, he raised his defenses and glanced behind him.

Takada was no longer holding Taromaru in her arms.

The light brown Dog God had grown to the size of a large dog and now stood on the ground.

Takada said nothing as she embraced his neck and desperately tried to hold him back. Without that, he almost certainly would have rushed in to join the battle.

The slightest opening could settle everything here, so who would her fear attack?

The question sent a shudder down his spine, but no one could answer it.

Meanwhile, Aoi made her move.

She attached Words to the hexagonal rod simply by swinging it down in front of her.

''Ah.

“Kusanagi!?”

Shoui understood everything when he heard what Taeko said.

Two days before, that shockwave attack had stopped the confrontation between him and Saki in the schoolyard.

Aoi’s attack contained the same presence and killer intent as that.

If the equation was the same, the answer would also be the same.

She swung the rod down until it hit the ground and shattered the asphalt.

The shock broke the rod’s central bolt, but the Rhythm activated.

First, it created a wind.

“!?”
The air shook and a shimmering of heat pierced through Taeko and Shoui.

“It can’t be…!”

Before Taeko could take evasive action, the air cutting across the road exploded.

A powerful tearing raced by.

The chorus of tearing sounds sounded like an echo.

The tearing wind and shockwave slammed into the ground and scattered.

—''Taeko – Savate/Gym/Steel/Dodge Tech – Multi-Take – Great Dodge – …Hit!

Taeko avoided the power rushing toward her.

Shoui tried to do the same, but something stopped him: a beast’s roar.

Taromaru was unable to bear the killer intent of Kusanagi that Aoi was emitting.

“…!”

—''Shoui – Mind Tech – Take – Detect Killer Intent – Hit.

The killer intent growing behind him grew all the larger in response to the attack approaching from the front.

He heard Takada’s voiceless scream within the din, so he did not dodge.

The Dis-Worder released the most powerful Rhythm he could use: the Break High.

—''Shoui – Gym/Savate Tech – Multi-Take – Fix Stance – Hit!

He filled his entire body with strength and held his fist forward.

He did not know if he could break Kusanagi, but if he failed, Takada’s fear would explode.

“Shoui!?” shouted Taeko.

But it was too late.

—''Shoui – Break High/Boxing/Dodge Tech – Multi-Take – Intercept – Hit!

His aim was true and his fist contacted the great power.

A moment later…

“What are you doing!?”

A deep voice gave a shout and the power of Kusanagi vanished before Shoui’s eyes.