Editing Toaru Majutsu no Index:Virtual On Chapter4 (section)

===Part 6===

In that instant, Furashina Ririn smiled thinly while watching Temjin charge straight toward her.

In truth, she had never wanted to win. She had resisted it with all her might. More than just operate her portable device poorly, she had tried to throw it away again and again. That was how much she had tried to obstruct it from within and yet she still “automatically” produced such overwhelming results. The portable device was stuck to her hands and would not leave. Even her attempts at obstruction were incorporated into the fight and the optimal fighting style was built up around the commands she gave. Even if she stood still or jumped in the wrong direction, it would somehow all work together and find a way to produce massive damage. That was just how strange a unit the Second Plajiner was.

So she smiled.

With this, it was finally over. She had been born for someone else’s purposes, she had grown by destroying what was already there, and she was meant to be taken away to bring new possibilities to some other world. But now she was being removed from those rails. She had agonized over this ever since her birth, but she was finally being saved from that.

So she smiled.

She did not have to grow. She was glad someone had stopped her. She was glad a being like her was being returned to oblivion instead of reaching true completion. She was truly, honestly, and utterly glad that everyone would be returned to their peaceful world without any sacrifices.

So she smiled.

He was strong.

Kamijou Touma was strong.

He was not like Academy City’s Level 5s who had simply implanted the special abilities they already had. Nor was he like the Blue Stalker who had mastered the art of Virtuaroid piloting as a severe and optimized tool of war.

His Temjin had nothing special.

He had only used the Material Analyze feature to incorporate the normal scenery of a normal park. But had he realized that by cutting out and gathering together the small world in which he lived, his own presence and essence could show through?

Didn’t Academy City use the term Personal Reality?

On one side was a city that had been dragged into Blue Stalker’s plan and reformed into the Second Plajiner. On the other side was a Virtuaroid that had taken the warm lives they led and made that a portion of its power. Looking at it that way, there was no way she could win. Furashina had forcibly usurped it and Kamijou had naturally made it his. The difference in power was clear.

Of course she could not win.

And she was glad she could not win.

So she smiled.

“Yes…”

Time seemed to have stopped for her.

And as she viewed the death approaching her, she spoke to herself.

“I wanted someone to save me too.”

She knew she could not be allowed to live.

That was certain.

She did not belong and anything she did would destroy Academy City, so she could never have shared a smile with the people who lived there.

But.

Even so.

She had enjoyed watching the boys and girls playing with the Virtuaroids that were not weapons of war. She had wanted to join them. The more she remained conscious, the more Academy City would change and the more it would be remade into the Second Plajiner’s flesh and blood. So she should have remained unconscious as much as possible. But she had failed to do so. It was not the flashing beams of light or the rumbling din of combat that had roused her. It was the heat, joy, unity, and happiness of the people there that had thrown Furashina Ririn from the cradle of apathy.

That was over too.

This was the best possible path she could imagine.

With her defeat, the Second Plajiner’s refinement process would stop and Academy City would return to its original form.


No other path was better.

She could not hope for anything better.

So.

She shut down the transmission so that final line would not reach him.

All alone, everything was swallowed up in that cramped space.

And yet.

And yet!

And yet!!!!!!

''It happened a moment later.

''Something unbelievable occurred before her eyes.



The apparent passage of time had also slowed to a crawl for Kamijou Touma in his Temjin.

He had worked the gears of his mind until he thought his head would fry, but he could not find a way to save Furashina Ririn. He did not know what to do. He was cut off at every turn.

But.

Even so.

He thought about it hard. He considered it deeply.

Absolutely.

No matter what happened.

He did not want to choose a path that ended everything by bloodying this girl. He had to place the melting city, Index, Misaka Mikoto, and Accelerator on the scales and weigh them against sacrificing Furashina Ririn, but that only strengthened his resolve. There was no answer to be found and he was only postponing the problem in this extreme situation, but he ended up relying on that thought however he could.

That was not a happy ending.

He had to save every last person: Index and the others, Academy City, and Furashina Ririn too.

So.

“I’m sorry, Temjin…”

With time seemingly stopped as he charged straight toward the briefly defenseless Second Plajiner, Kamijou Touma spoke.

A scream-like sound reached him from behind. Temjin’s V-Disc had to have heated to its limit. But that was not just because of Kamijou’s reckless actions to reach this point.

It was his right hand.

Imagine Breaker.

Just as Misaka Mikoto had placed her Railgun inside her Raiden and just as Accelerator had sealed the power of the strongest inside his Specineff, what if the unknown within Kamijou Touma were sent inside his Temjin?

His right hand had been powerless against the Apharmd and Grys-Vok weapons, but what if something changed here and it began to function?

Logical thought was useless here.

So the spiky-haired boy obeyed his instincts and roared.

“I want to save Furashina Ririn!! I want to reach out to the girl in front of me who’s curled up and can’t even ask for help! So please! Please!! You clench your teeth too, Temjin!!!!!!”

The portable device in his hand could not be operated by voice. His fingers on the buttons and sticks were the only options. The gauges and switches inside the cocoon-like cockpit were only for show. So did his shout mean anything at all?

It may not have.

But a moment later, the scream from the V-Disc died down. All of the noise grew gentle and even, like a record spinning atop a properly-made record player.

“Don’t worry,” said Lilina.

She spoke on behalf of something that had no voice of its own.

“Everyone has their own way of controlling a Virtuaroid. If this is your way and you define Temjin in that way with a specific goal in mind…then the Virtuaroid will surely do as you wish.”

Those words pushed on his back.

He felt like he had been saved by the support of someone without a voice.

Using the Material Analyze feature, Temjin had made the bugs, birds, and scenery around Kamijou into his power. That would mean this contained everything he believed to be “normal”. It was not a creepy exception or something coldhearted and special. It contained everything needed to naturally maintain Index, Misaka Mikoto, and so many other people’s smiles day by day.

This was not made to defeat.

It was wrong to use it to kill.

With this Virtuaroid…

With this Temjin, he could look at it another way.

He was certain of it.

So he looked straight ahead.

He stared at his enemy. No, at the person he had to save.

He saw a girl there who he would not let anyone refer to as the Second Plajiner.

“Furashinaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!”

He did not need a weapon.

The power to kill her would be of no use to him.

He threw aside the Blitz Saber to make himself as light as possible and moved right up to her as quickly as possible.

Temjin clenched his giant fist.

And a moment later, time sped back up.

The sound of impact seemed to reverberate endlessly outwards.

In the instant of impact, Kamijou viewed it like a clump of snow exploding.

The Second Plajiner and Kamijou’s Temjin were both blasted from the point of impact. The power to destroy supernatural powers and nothing else was propagated from his arm, to his torso, and to every other part of his body. The Virtuaroid crumbled like a shattered ice sculpture.

The same was true of the V-Converter on Temjin’s back. No, of the V-Disc contained inside.

The motor deck cover fell away.

The contents burst out in a twisted form.

As the disc crumbled, flew through the air, and tried to stop spinning, Kamijou Touma’s body slipped out from its surface like a magic trick or like a fairy rising from a spring.

He had not known he could eject like this.

He more or less understood that something…no, some''one'' had helped him. They left everything with him as if saying “go”, “it isn’t over yet”, “don’t swallow the saliva you spat from your mouth”, or “prove your words were more than just for show”.

He thanked them.

And he then looked forward.

He faced the contradictory unit that had shed as much weight as possible and carried no V-Disc. It was clearly not thick enough to hold someone inside, but its ribs pulled back and the small upper body of a familiar form was ejected.

It was Furashina Ririn.

Kamijou reached out his hand without thinking. What good would that do? Would Imagine Breaker not affect her? Even if he did drag her out of the unit, what would happen to the melted Academy City or Index and the others?

He knew nothing.

He found no answers.

But this was a different issue. There was a girl in front of him who wished for death, had decided that was the best possible answer, had given up on tears and asking for help, and was biting her lip while curled up all alone. He believed that was enough of a reason to reach out his hand. He might have no idea what would happen to the world or the others, but he would figure that out after saving the person in front of him. It seemed foolish to abandon someone he could save now because he was worried about what might happen in the distant future. If they had to choose between regaining their everyday life through a sacrifice and regaining their everyday life while rejecting someone’s sacrifice, everyone would prefer the latter. So while it might be somewhat more difficult and it might require a detour, he was willing to accept that.

Some might call it selfish and some might say he was defining people’s feelings for his own purposes.

But he still believed in this.

Kamijou believed in the human heart, in good will, and in justice.

So.

He did not need a second’s hesitation before choosing to grab Furashina Ririn’s hand and to fully pull her from the crumbling Second Plajiner unit.

He held her slender body tightly in his arms.

The Second Plajiner completely shattered and crumbled. What would have happened to her if he had taken even a little longer to pull her out? He could not imagine the answer, but that did not matter.

What mattered was the girl in front of him now.

He knew she had not really wanted to do this, but the role of the world’s destroyer had been forced onto her by someone else.

That was enough for him.

The words naturally left him.

“It’s going to be okay.”

He had lost his unit and been thrown out into space, but he still said it.

He did not know what would happen in the future and he did not know how to solve this, but he said it regardless.

“None of this Tangram and Plajiner stuff matters. If you think anything else is going to be taken from you, I’ll destroy every last one of those illusions. So you don’t need to worry about anything else.”

Furashina Ririn said nothing.

He could not see her expression as he held her in his arms.

But she wrapped her slender arms around his back. Her small hands clutched his clothing.

That was enough. That was more than enough to tell him what she thought.

And yet.

Something moved.

It happened before gravity could pull them down once more and before they could be slammed into the ground.

The sole remaining surface looked like a giant spaceship and like a structure to contain an eerie eyeball, but it began to squirm. Something moved, shaking the air to produce noise.

No, to produce a voice.

“It’s going to be okay? Hardly. You don’t need to worry? Think again.”

He recognized the voice.

He had never met them directly, but he had heard it from the cockpit.

“The Blue Stalker!?”

“Didn’t I tell you it doesn’t matter if I lose once as long as I ultimately gain the Second Plajiner and return to the other world? The Second Plajiner has consumed Academy City as an alternate form of L’Ln Plajiner and it has crystallized. Now Code Phoenix enters its final stage. I will contact the Tangram that links all parallel worlds and return to my world of true Virtuaroids. Harvest has arrived, so it’s time I reaped the true key of Plajiner.”

That slender girl had not been the Second Plajiner.

That skinny unit had not been the Second Plajiner.

“''Under the current rules, the destruction of both sides results in a draw which means a loss for both sides.''”

It had all been the core needed for the crystallization that focused the giant structure of Academy City on a single point. That may have been why that unit had lacked a V-Disc. Furashina Ririn herself had been the core which had accumulated a vast amount of information, so the term “Second Plajiner” referred to the entirety of the vast melted location.

So there was no need to wait until they landed.

The entire scenery grew distorted as thousands and tens of thousands of giant, pitch-black arms burst out and swallowed up Kamijou and Furashina.

Imagine Breaker and the boy’s silly promise were utterly useless in the face of such overwhelming quantity.