Editing Toaru Majutsu no Index:Crossover4 (section)

===Part 4===

Cheers!

When young Shinobu raised his glass, the scattered individual conversations finally shifted into a unified event.

It was time for the world’s most bizarre group blind date!!

“No one can eat and drink more than me!”

“Boo. But a challenger has arrived. And what are these crispy things? I’ve never tasted anything like them!”

Index and Boo Boo only seemed interested in the food, so they grabbed at the potato chips and chocolate candies spread out on the table.

Everyone’s Big Brother Kamijou Touma felt weary when he saw them eating.

“How can that small girl keep pace with a 4m pig? That’s what really surprises me.”

“And…wait. Speaking of small people, aren’t the two smallest ones missing?”

The bunny girl was right. He was supposed to be waving the flag in the lead, but Shinobu had vanished.

And they heard voices from below the low table.

“Ahh… These small spaces are so relaxing.”

“Yeah, it feels like a secret base!”

Waltraute cried out and jumped a bit.

There was something at her feet. The Norse boy was apparently under there as well.

“What do you two think you are doing…?”

It seemed innocent enough, but Waltraute and several of the other girls were wearing skirts. That made this a problem! Climbing under the table introduced some defense-related issues!!

“Yeah, but this is just the perfect spot!”

“You should climb under here too, Waltraute.”

When she peeked under the table, the kids were undeterred and would only say things like that.

But the bunny girl decided to drop a bombshell.

“Oh? Are you going to let them off scot-free, goddess?”

“While I am a legit goddess, what are you talking about?”

“Well, there are two boys underneath the table, but if you’re willing to overlook both of them just because they’re little…well, let’s just say it threatens to overshadow your core values. …Poo hoo hoo. It makes it look like you simply like little boys and not him in particular.”

“H-hgh!?”

The warrior woman groaned like she had been stabbed in the back, but…

“Hm? What’s wrong, blonde lady?”

6-year-old Shinobu tilted his head 120% defenselessly under the table.

Waltraute tilted her head as well, but she was sweating profusely at the same time.

“B-but if I beat him with the strength of a goddess, he could end up blossoming like a red flower and there is no real need to punish him so harshly, plus an impartial goddess really shouldn’t base her actions on her personal feelings. Heh heh. Eh heh heh.”

While attempting a Japanese ''seiza'' next to her, Frolaytia spoke up like it was perfectly normal.

“You two, come out from under there. And don’t drag the candy in there. The chocolate and sugar will melt.”

“Okay!” said the two scolded boys as they returned to the boys’ side.

Waltraute’s entire body froze when she saw it.

“Th-the correct answer was to punish them both!? Actually, my mistake was getting so lost in thought over it. What is wrong with me…!?”

“Oh, I can have a lot more fun with her,” said the bunny girl with eyes sparkling, so College Student Higashikawa Mamoru climbed right over the table barrier and tried to grab at her. Only a college-aged master of group blind dates could have pulled off that kind of airspace violation.

“Does messing with a god not scare you!? Have you already forgotten your horrifically dark past where you met a gruesome end after a higher lifeform punished you!?”

“Oh, don’t worry. …I mean, I’ve already been reborn as a Valkyrie in another space-time. Greek or Indian would be one thing, but there’s no reason to hold back when she’s got that Norse connection too. (Grin)”

“What have you been up to!? You’d better not have been hosting some kind of rigged death game again!”

He had to get some details on that out of her, but the bunny girl was called over by someone else and left.

The spiky-haired boy and the white nun were arguing.

“All the snacks in this zone belong to me!”

“I’ve given up on getting after you for your gluttony. But there’s no way I can stay silent about the way you eat those Noreo sandwich cookies, Index!! Why would you take them apart before eating them? Can’t you just eat them the way they are!?”

“Eh? I eat the leftover pieces afterwards, so it’s all the same in my stomach. …And Noreos are from the same line as those Mitz crackers, so they’re meant to be customized. That means they aren’t necessarily best if you eat them as is.”

“Okay, now you’ve angered the dragon, Index. How about we go for a rematch? Now’s the only chance I’m giving you to activate John’s Pen mode.”

“Umm,” said the bunny girl who they had called over. “What did you want me to do?”

“Think up a game! Something we can use to decide a winner!! I must become a raging dragon and prove that Noreos and Mitzes are treasures of the human race that are perfectly good eaten as is!!”

“Eh!?”

In that instant, something invisible gathered in the center of the bunny girl’s chest and she clasped her hands in front of that large chest. She looked like she was praising Kamijou upon the sacrificial altar that would offer him up to god and she leaned forward with her eyes sparkling.

“You really want me to do that!? Th-then l-l-l-l-l-let me grab this idea notebook from my cleavage and open it to the pink label. Um, um, yes, here we are. This is the new and revolutionary version of the king game I thought up using the idea of a group blind date as a starting point! I’ve held it in reserve for so long and, oh dear, what do I do now…!?”

“That sounds great.”

“Yes, it’s my time to shine again!!”

“Let’s settle this with a normal version of the king game.”

“Vwahhh!?”

The bunny girl collapsed straight down with the look of someone who had gotten into a fight with their class’s useless homeroom teacher and had all the interesting parts removed from their cultural festival plan until only the most generic and boring parts remained. It was rare to see Karen turn to ashes quite so spectacularly.

Seeing Karen with her soul escaping her mouth, Higashikawa pulled out his phone and snapped a quick ghost photo. Then Beatrice and Boo Boo joined from their respective wings of the long table.

“Boo. We have chopsticks for the king game. I felt like playing this game with just Beatrice would have been pointless.”

“Ah!? B-but it would have been so much fun like that, Boo Boo. With just the two of us playing, every single order would be directed at just the two of us!!”

It sounded like another schemer had been foiled, but Kamijou tilted his head. The gray pig was one thing, but what category did this red-armored girl belong to? She did not seem very realistic. She looked human enough, but she fit right in next to Waltraute who was apparently a goddess, so he had to be careful. And given Othinus and these two, it seemed like goddesses really liked showing off skin.

(Well, whether they have divine strength or not, your orders are absolute in the king game.)

Without giving it too much though, Kamijou worked at gathering the participants.

“Okay, anyone who wants to play the king game, gather around here.”’

“Oh? This looks like fun. How about we join them, brother?”

The bunny girl liked to include execution rules in anything and everything, but this was an even more sinister omen. The waves of an ocean of blood were crashing on the beach of reality and the tide was quickly rising to swallow up this tea room.

It was the White Queen.

That true monster only smiled and gave no hint at what she was thinking, but now she would gain the absolute command of a king. Knowing her, her orders could easily be as nonsensical as “#5 has to spilt the earth in two☆”

Their only hope was the lightning rod named Shiroyama Kyousuke, but…

“(This is my chance. I don’t have to rely on strength or the supernatural. If all I need is one round of the king game, the odds and probability are actually pretty good. I just have to order the Queen to die and I can save the world. I’ll never have a better chance at this, so I need to put on a smile and keep her going with this…!!)”

Quenser and Higashikawa silently realized he was a goner. He was hanging his head with a dizzy look in his eyes and he had fallen into the thoughts of a gambler who was caught in a spiral of failure and had lost sight of his surroundings. For one thing, even if he was lucky enough to draw the king, how was he supposed to figure out which number the Queen had drawn? It was entirely possible his command to die would reach one of the others.

“I’ll play, I’ll play, I’ll definitely play!!”

“Yes, of course you will, brother. A genius like you should be able to twist everything to your will☆ I’ll be rooting for you from the next stage up.”

“Look down on me while you can, Queen! I’ll drag you down from there!!”

The twintail girl got him so worked up that the others began to suspect she was giving him a high-level education by encouraging him with praise. Relationships between boys and girls were complicated in any world, but it seemed clear he was quite loved.

And so…

“Who is the king!?”

“Who is the king!?”

“Who is the king!?”

Finally.

It had finally begun.

Question: Someone was someone else’s wife. But those relationships meant nothing in the luck-based king game. In that case, what would happen if someone made an order like “#2 and #3 have to kiss☆”?

Answer: The glint of a bared blade could fill the room.

And the first command came from King Quenser as he held aloft the chopstick with a crude crown symbol drawn on it.

“Okay, #3 has to kiss the king.”

Higashikawa nearly yelled at him for having no restraint, but the rules were the rules.

Since he had included the king in his command, Quenser was the type to enjoy himself instead of making things more exciting for everyone else. In a way, that made him extremely honest. But the chopsticks had been distributed at random to both boys and girls here. Higashikawa had to admit the boy had guts to go with this when there was a spiky-haired boy to his right and a 4m pig to his left.

Higashikawa checked the number on the bottom of his chopstick. He was #6, so he was at least not a part of this.

(Well, the god of probability tends to punish people who go all out like that.)

As Higashikawa watched with an observer’s eye to see what would happen, there was movement.

Someone silently raised their hand.

Yes.

The person with a look of extreme displeasure on her face was the busty silver-haired military officer named Frolaytia Capistrano.

“It can’t be…”

The person who nearly rose from their cushion was Gambler Higashikawa Mamoru.

“It can’t be. No, it just can’t! How can you have that kind of luck on your very first try!?”

But when Frolaytia clicked her tongue and revealed the bottom of her chopstick, there was indeed a number 3 written with a thin permanent marker.

“Eh heh heh. See, this is what happens without anyone here to trip me up! I was right to let Heivia have his naptime so early! Ah ha ha ha ha!!”

It was still unbelievable.

Simply drawing the king was hard enough. No, that may have been a complete coincidence, but what were the odds of choosing Frolaytia from his own world? It had to be something to the something power, didn’t it!?

“This isn’t how it’s supposed to work! When you get greedy on your first try, it’s supposed to end with #3 being Boo Boo or something!”

“Hey, you damn college boy! Don’t take Boo Boo’s one-and-only lips so lightly. Do I need to roast you with Magic!?”

But Higashikawa was not even listening to the red Holy Swordswoman.

(Wh-what was this? Some kind of trick? If so, what did he do?)

This Quenser boy was the cute type who could pass for a girl if he wore a skirt, but he would sometimes grin in a way that hinted at something horrific. He had the eyes of someone who had taken people’s lives. And as an everyday sort of thing.

(Thinking time! He ''has'' to have cheated somehow. It’s the only explanation. It’s wrong for everything good to happen to him alone!! …Does he have a way to see everyone’s number? Or did he guide her choice somehow? Or maybe he swapped out the chopsticks after making his command? Th-there has to be something!!)

“Higashikawa-saaan.”

As the college boy just about fried his mind and entered a light meditation mode, the bunny girl across the table poured a glass of oolong tea and spoke to him with a smile.

“I really don’t think there’s anything there.”

“But that can’t be.”

“No matter how much you prepare and no matter how much of a dead end you create, sometimes an unbelievable series of coincidences will cause it all to come crashing down. Aren’t you familiar with something like that happening, Higashikawa-san?”

“But no! It can’t be! It just can’t be!!”

Was he supposed to just let this happen?

Could he really sit idly by while the rules of the king game were used for some other guy to enjoy the lips of that silver-haired busty beauty? Higashikawa just about threw a tantrum over it, but there was no changing it now.

“Shinobu. I know this is sudden, but guess whoooo?”

“Wah! What is it, Nee-chan?”

Just beforehand, the sexy Zashiki Warashi circled around to the boys’ side and covered 6-year-old Shinobu’s eyes from behind. Beatrice grabbed an earthenware pot from the sunken hearth and placed it upside-down over giant Boo Boo’s head.

They were ready now.

“Ah wah, ah wah wah, ah wah wah wah wah…”

Waltraute, on the other hand, was so flustered that she forgot to guard the boy.

With no further objections, it was finally time to begin.

The command: #3 has to kiss the king.

“Yes, Quenser. One thing first.”

“Oh, what might that be? Just so you know, I’m not going to retract the order even if you try using your family as a shield!!”

“I’m not going to fight this now. But give me a chance to freshen up first. For such an important experience, you want to be enveloped by the scent of a real adult, don’t you?”

“Ah! Woof woof!! Yes, yes. I don’t mind at all. I am very interested in how a girl like you freshens up. Gulp. And you’re serious, right? You’re not just saying this to try to get out of it!?”

…Higashikawa seriously considered going to sleep and maybe letting out a fart to ruin the mood, but then something happened.

Someone put it in their mouth.

Who put what in their mouth?

Frolaytia put the long Japanese ''kiseru'' in her mouth after restraining herself this whole time.

“Yes. I’m going to light it, so keep those kids a little further away. They should be safe near the porch window. Sorry, guardians.”

The Zashiki Warashi, Waltraute, and even Beatrice and Kamijou began moving their respective partners away. But what was this?

“Ehhh!? You’re going to make your lips taste like tobacco, Frolaytia?”

“It’s sure to make for a stimulating experience. Yes, perhaps even painfully so. Can you forgive me, Quenser?”

“Gulp. I can live with that. Mwa ha ha. The world is such a wonderful place! Without Heivia screwing everything up, I hold the whole world in the palm of my hand! Ah ha ha ha ha ha!!”

Quenser was getting quite carried away, but he should have made more of use his powers of observation that had allowed him to take on the nuke-resistant colossal weapons known as Objects.,

Specifically, he should have noticed that Frolaytia looked incredibly annoyed and did not have a hint of blush in her cheeks.

“There’s no point in putting this off. Let’s get started, Quenser.”

“Yes!!”

“What’s wrong, Quenser? It’s time to treat yourself to a hot kiss.”

“…Yes?”

A hint of doubt finally entered Quenser’s voice.

Yes, the silver-haired busty commander still had the ''kiseru'' in her mouth. She showed no sign of removing it even with a kiss imminent.

“Um, uh. Frolaytia?”

“What?”

“W-we’re about to press our lips together, so, um, that long ''kiseru'' is going to be in the way…”

“I asked for permission first, didn’t I?”

Gamblers were sensitive to changes in luck. Higashikawa had started to take a sulky nap, but he immediately booted back up. Some kind of major reversal was coming. He could sense it.

As the college boy and bunny girl watched on, Frolaytia spoke coldly.

“Now let’s get started, Quenser. After all, the king’s orders are absolute. Honor and bloodline are everything in the Legitimacy Kingdom, so we can’t just ignore this. Now, do it. Exactly like this. I’m not going to run or hide, Quenser.”

“No, but, if I move my lips in, they’re going to hit the end of the ''kiseru'' before reaching your lips…”

“…”

“Wait, you’re staring at me like I’m an idiot… You planned this out from the beginning, didn’t you!? I won the game fair and square, so this isn’t fair! I didn’t cheat or anything! It was all my incredible luck, so you should be giving me some super manly nickname like The Emperor or something! This was as incredible as getting the thirteen orphans!!”

“Very well, Quenser. You want a super manly nickname, do you? Then I hereby dub thee Megadick. To be honest, this is all very silly, so can we just get it over with?”

“Megadick!? You really are trying to get me killed, aren’t you!? Wait, wait! That’s too hot! You’re going to burn me! I’m serious here, this is too much for a punishment! Wait, wait! Frolaytia, I apologize, so…vwah, byah, byah, ah bah bwahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!?”