Editing Toaru Majutsu no Index:GT Volume6 Chapter3 (section)

===Part 4===

The entire building containing the capsule hotel shook violently.

The demoness shrieked and clung to Kamijou’s side. He stuck just his head out of the capsule and took a look around, but since the capsule hotel was basically a portion of a sauna or bath, it lacked windows.

“Well, something’s happening, but what do we do about it!?”

“With just you, I could have flown you away from the roof, but I can’t do that with three or four people and a pussy cat. And I couldn’t sleep at night if I coldheartedly abandoned the cat.”

The busty upperclassman and busty god glared at the demoness as if to say “so you could sleep like a baby after abandoning us?”

But the Bologna Succubus had a mind tougher than depleted uranium, so she sat up from the edge of the capsule and winked at only Kamijou.

“So our first job is recon and intel gathering. We can fight, hole up in here, or run away, but we’ll want to see what Aradia is up to before choosing.”

“In other words, you don’t have an actual plan. Got it.”

The capsule’s wonderfully ecofriendly heater had fully dried their clothing.

Aradia could easily break through the concrete wall to get into the building. The Bologna Succubus had already mentioned that flying away wasn’t an option with more than just Kamijou, so she had likely already ruled out staying in the building too.

They needed to get a look outside. Inside a smoking room that had somehow survived into the current day, they found a window covering one of the walls.

Kamijou was dumbfounded by what he saw.

The sidewalks, streets, and every other part of the ground were covered in witches, witches, and more witches!!

“What the hell is this?”

It looked like a riot. Every single person crammed in like on a packed train wore an ankle-length wimple and a modified bikini. Kamijou initially thought she had ''multiplied'', but a closer inspection proved that wrong.

“Blast it, Aradia. Have you started proselytizing?”

“Prosely-what?”

They all stood at different heights, wore different hair styles, and were of different ages. They were all dressed in the same witch outfit as Aradia, but those had to be the ordinary people of Shibuya exposing their skin to the frigid air. Some of the witches were even standing on the roofs of the cars parked on the curb and on the supports for the blue road signs crossing the large road.

“''May…tch…us.''”

There was a good distance between him and them.

“''May the…witch…us.''”

There was a thick layer of tempered glass in between too.

“''May the holy witch guide us.''”

But a great vibration still reached him.

“''May the holy witch guide us!!!!!!''”

It wasn’t just the glass or the building shaking – it was the ground.

Their fearsome chorus may have shown up on a seismograph. Kamijou was pushed beyond dumbfounded. He was terrified. The visual alone had blanked his mind, but his instincts were telling him he would die if he wasted what little time he still had.

“What is going on?”

“Witches never make their presence known. They slowly spread below the surface, silently corrupting a family, a town, a country, or any other community,” explained Index, standing on her toes atop a bench to better see straight down.

The Bologna Succubus bent and stretched her body and flapped her pink wings one at a time to see how her recovery was going.

“This is what Aradia’s dangerous charisma can accomplish when she puts her mind to it. She already has a new coven. The youngins of Shibuya are highly receptive to the latest trends, so that may’ve hastened the spread.”

“Dangerous charisma? Are you saying she started a cult?” groaned Kumokawa Seria.

They could only see one side of the building from here, but they had to assume the other three sides were much the same They were completely surrounded and the disturbing shaking of the building suggested some of the witches were already breaking holes in the walls to get in.

It felt like fleeing inside a rundown shack in the humid jungle to escape a swarm of army ants.

“Um, quick question.”

“Yes, boy?”

“Are ''all of those'' Aradia? That is, can they all do everything she can!?”

“She is the witch goddess who rules the night and the moon. She appears at the secret Sabbats to grant the witches the knowledge they need to escape the cross’s persecution. They can’t do everything she can, but they can easily ''borrow'' a portion of her power temporarily.”

“H-how big a portion!?”

“They should be able to use Triple Reload since that’s built into Wicca itself.”

Sweat poured from Kamijou’s brow.

The Bologna Succubus’s body temperature was a bit elevated after she finished her stretches and she started leaning against him while clearly amused by his reaction.

“With some exceptions like Magic Gods, Saints, and Alice, any spell you see someone use is built from the basics of magic. ''And she is a generous goddess who does not hesitate to grant the witches her greatest techniques.'' I don’t know if they gather their knowledge in a paper notebook or on their phone’s memo app these days, though. Still, the Rule of Three is a double-edged sword with a serious chance of self-destruction, so it takes experience and a certain style to use it at Aradia’s level. Really, it comes down to whether or not you can grasp the boundary lines of that taboo well enough to survive your very first experience with it.”

If that was true, this could hardly get worse. They had barely managed to drive off Aradia alone, but now the witch goddess had abandoned all kindness and carelessness and strengthened herself with an army large enough to cover the ground below. Meanwhile, the injured Bologna Succubus had only been treated with a compress and painkillers. Index and Othinus’s knowledge was a help, but they couldn’t provide direct violence. That went double for Kumokawa Seria who was only an upperclassman at school.

Kamijou’s right hand carried Imagine Breaker, which could negate any supernatural power.

But he was the only one capable of physically fighting against those 10 thousand or even 100 thousand witches. How much could they even do in this situation? A group that big would physically crush him before the supernatural even came into it.

“H-hey, Senpai? Or Index? Forget my fantasies – how much does the average girl actually weigh? 40kg? Maybe 50?”

“…”

“…”

“…”

“…”

For some reason, everyone else there glared at him. Even Othinus and the Bologna Succubus who couldn’t be described as “average” by any stretch of the imagination.

But this time Kamijou wasn’t just being rude.

“There are adults and children out there, so let’s just go with 40kg as a rough estimate for the average female weight. If we also assume there are 100 thousand of them out there, that would be…”

“Sigh. 4000 tons, human.”

“I wish I could disbelieve that number, but this is deadly serious. Even if we hide in here to avoid getting crushed by the group, I get the feeling that flood of bodies could directly tear this building from its foundation.”

However…

“You don’t need to worry about that.”

Kamijou couldn’t believe it, but the Bologna Succubus was actually smiling.

“You might think this can hardly get worse, but only due to your own lack of imagination. I expected this much and there is nothing to fear as long as that holds true. Aradia actually ''takes her work very seriously''. The thing is, that’s what gives her such a short fuse. She can be a pain to deal with, but that’s probably the 1st requirement for becoming a witch. She puts her fears at ease by throwing out the wild, eccentric tricks and sticking with the tried and true fundamentals. Ha ha. She would make a good civil servant, but she could never make it as a gambler. And the thing is, we aren’t doing boring paperwork here.”

The Bologna Succubus stepped away from the window and stabbed the arrowhead of her tail into a device on the opposite wall: a fire alarm.

Afterwards, she took in a deep breath that sent a tremor through her alluring bodylines, spread her wings wide, and shouted at the top of her lungs.

“Watch out for the dust!! They’re tearing down the building walls! Is there no line those freaks won’t cross!? You need to run away before they get you too! Also, I’d rather not mention what’s in that dust hanging in the air, but breathing it in is enough for it to harm you! If you start to feel dizzy or faint, that’s means it already got to you!!”

The clangor of the alarm squeezed at Kamijou’s heart.

But he was also confused.

“What are you talking about?”

“Oh, it’s just a bluff.” The Bologna Succubus grinned. “But the primary enemy of the witch has always been the witch hunt. In psychological terms, that’s known as mass hysteria. With sufficient data, you can trigger one yourself like you’re following a flowchart.”

“You’re pitting mass hysteria against a cult!? So many people are going to die!”

Kumokawa Seria’s eyes widened, but the Bologna Succubus readily nodded.

“Listen. The witch hunts began with the virtuous citizens accusing each other, ''so you could say it was history’s worst neighborhood dispute.'' You don’t know why, but you’re pissed off, nothing is going right, and something must be to blame. And wouldn’t you know it? That one neighbor seems awfully sus, don’t they? Humans love to blame something close by and eliminate it to reclaim peace of mind. And what’s the first thing anyone in Shibuya is going to see or hear about at the moment? Aradia’s witches.”

With a flapping sound, the demon spread her pink bat wings with her hands clasped below her navel.

“And I believe I already showed you my magic. Cold Mistress converts all pleasure signals into pain. But if I adjust its strength, I can create a ''nagging irritation'' that creates a subconscious source of unease. They might be hesitant at first, but there is no avoiding it. They can try drinking some tea or petting their dog, but all attempts to soothe themselves will only make it worse. Before long, that small irritation will rule their mind. Just like with disease, weather, accidents, and recessions, when humans have trouble understanding some large, invisible factor, they try to calm themselves by directing their hate toward a target closer at hand and then they can’t stop themselves.”

“I see,” said Othinus from Kamijou’s shoulder. “But that only works if people can hear you. There weren’t any ordinary people in this entire building. You can’t fill out the ranks of your witch hunt army without anyone to corrupt.”

“True,” agreed the Bologna Succubus. “But who ever said my Cold Mistress is limited to this building?”

A new rumbling reached them.

Kamijou spun back toward the window to find the witches were being overrun. New colors were flooding the unified colors of the witches like muddy water entering a clear river.

“Touma, something’s happening down there!”

“The fire alarm and the lie about the dust were only the ignition needed to get the ball rolling. The actual seed of displeasure that spreads through the people could be anything. Then Cold Mistress amplifies that feeling into a great irritation and they start searching out for any rumors that might give them a reason or a cause for their unease. If there is an obvious outsider nearby, it’s so easy to convince them they can solve everything by attacking that group. That is how witch hunts work.”

No, that “muddy water” was the hair atop people’s heads.

A mixture of blacks, browns, yellows, reds, and even some obviously dyed greens and pinks formed a single mass that attacked the witch army. This group was a mix of genders and they had no uniform. They were less organized, but they were larger in terms of both numbers and momentum.

Kamijou could hear an earth-rattling rumble through the tempered glass.

“It’s you outsiders refusing to obey the rules that give Shibuya a bad name!”

“Ugh, shut up! My head hurts so bad! What the hell did you do to me!? Argh!?”

“I’m calling the police! This is an unauthorized assembly! Scram and quit bothering the rest of us!!”

It scared Kamijou that the rumble came from human voices instead of bombs or gas explosions.

This was the result of Transcendent Bologna Succubus’s Cold Mistress spell.

From the looks of it, that spell’s range covered all of Shibuya if not more.

He could see now why she had said she might be able to fight back against Alice with that power. When you didn’t need to specifically target each individual, you could attack a general group over a large range.

The sexy demon wiggled her tail and smiled scornfully down at the surface.

“100 thousand witches? Don’t make me laugh, Aradia. Today is New Year’s Eve. ''100 thousand is a tiny minority.'' Did you even consider how many people from all across Japan are gathered in Shibuya for the countdown tonight? And what if we include foreign visitors too?”

What was happening down there?

Which side was overwhelming the other? Could it have reached the level of bloodshed?

“And magic will lose to the ordinary crowd. Bodyguards, companions, slaves, a best friend – every Transcendent belonging to the Bridge Builders Cabal seeks it in different forms, but in the end, we all long for the human world. Aleister may have tilted the scales toward science for the general public, but that is still the world we live in. Humans cling to the easily visible and controllable things. They might claim otherwise, but when they find themselves on a sinking ship, do they reach for their holy talisman or for a lifejacket made of petroleum? When their life is on the line, no one ever relies on their capricious and unfathomable god.”

“Bologna Succubus!?”

“Ah ha ha. Yes, I’m the demoness who hates any and all false accusations. The witch hunts are such a perfect example of it that they left their name in history. ''They weren’t even attacking the real supernatural demons at the center of the issue.'' They were lashing out at anyone they found suspect to forcibly stabilize their imperfect society. Really, it was little more than a human sacrifice ceremony. Watching this here isn’t at all fun for me, let me tell you.”

The Bologna Succubus laughed lightly with her mouth hidden behind her large wings.

Perhaps she was redrawing the lines of what she needed to protect after seeing the boy worry about the very witches who were trying to kill him.

“But these casual witches fell for Aradia’s temptation, went to her for easy help, found an excuse for their own weakness, and decided to attack complete strangers like you. ''They were bad people to begin with.'' Don’t kid yourselves, you rioting criminals. Did you think there wouldn’t be any consequences as long as you were just a face in the crowd? Did you think you counted as a victim for letting yourself get agitated into violence? I protect innocent people who have been falsely accused. So, boy, my concern is limited to kind people like you who have a penchant for getting themselves into trouble. We demons haven’t fallen so far we go around saving even despicable villains.”

“But you can’t let this continue! Stop it! No one wants it to end like this!!”

“Ha ha! Yes, ''that’s the look'' that makes me want to help you out so badly. And I’m sorry to say they don’t have that same appeal. Concern for others is undoubtedly the greatest virtue ever discovered, but do remember that being weak does not mean someone is pure of heart.”

Kamijou heard a shattering of glass as the demon’s pink tail swept horizontally like a whip.

A downpour of sharp shards burst out with terrifying force.

The Bologna Succubus had just finished saying not even demons would save the wicked, so she wouldn’t care what happened to the witches on the ground far below.

The Transcendent was indeed transcendent.

He had been caught up in some nerve-wracking rescues when working with Alice Anotherbible. Anna Sprengel’s many misdeeds may have been similar in that they were unpredictable and capricious. These people could not be judged as either good or bad. He was working alongside a Transcendent from the Bridge Builders Cabal, so he should have considered the possibility of her resorting to ''capricious violence based on a desire to help''!!

She flapped her wings, jumped out from the window, and soared into the night sky.

“Wait, Bologna Succubus! Stop those witch hunters! You aren’t running away after all this, are you!? You’re they only one who can switch this off!!”

“Hah hah hah! This is where we say goodbye, sightseer boy. Serious and short-fused Aradia has a difficult time with unexpected trouble and can’t adlib to save her life, so now’s our chance to show her what for. And it’s a Transcendent’s job to clean up this Transcendent mess, so you can rest easy, join that young crowd, and head back to Academy City. That city’s thick wall will protect you from any riots in Shibuya☆”

He wasn’t in the mood for that kind of nonsense, so he reached out his hand on reflex. But…

“Stop, boy!!”

Kumokawa grabbed him around the hips and pulled back with her full body weight.

His momentum died and his grasping fingertips just barely missed the tip of the Bologna Succubus’s tail.

But without that assistance, he wouldn’t have been able to stop himself and would have plummeted from the window.

With a heavy roar of something moving through the air, the Bologna Succubus vanished into the night sky.

“Dammit!!”

“Touma!”

Index called out to him after Kumokawa pulled him onto his back.

She was implicitly asking him what they should do now.

How was that even a question? The Bologna Succubus had helped him so much this entire time. Without her, he quite literally would have died to Aradia’s hand a third and final time. But that didn’t mean he could just let her use the innocent people of Shibuya as disposable shields.

He had to pursue her.

If they didn’t stop Aradia’s witches ''and'' the Bologna Succubus’s witch hunt, Shibuya would be destroyed before the countdown was complete!!