Editing Sorcery Hacker:Volume1 Phase1 (section)

===Part 7===

Settling everything while looking cool was great and all, but Ayato and Teleria were not sorcery technicians authorized by the Selected Kingdoms. No matter how skilled they were and no matter what their objective, a Sorcery Hacker was a Sorcery Hacker and there was only one thing they had to do after their job was complete.

Simply put…

“Run away!”

“Ah, ahh, ahhhhh!! Wait, wait, please wait!!”

A panicking Teleria followed after him.

They were leaving the Dark Elf girl behind, but if the Zootoxin Mk. IIIs had truly returned to the original functionality her grandmother had wanted, then they would never allow any harm to come to her. The beaten-up human traffickers and Sorcery Hacker Funny Snatch would likely be arrested by Fire Castle Town Flared’s knights. And if the criminals did wake up and try to escape, the scorpions might actually kill them.

Ayato did make sure to retrieve that large bowgun-style Linkage Plug that was a Sorcery Hacker’s primary tool.

But instead of robbing his enemy of a weapon, he was more interested in the data contained inside.

A gondola was still floating calmly in the boiling mana-conducting silver river.

The same Gondolier as before called out to them while apparently sensing no danger at all from the shells being fired in the starry sky like a fireworks festival.

“Oh? What’s the rush? Was that the wrong place to invite your girlfriend after all?”

“Nice hiding spot!”

He was not pulled over to their side of the river, so this required a bit of athletic ability. Teleria looked hesitant, so Ayato swept her feet out from under her to princess carry her.

“Kyah.”

“Hold onto the bowgun.”

She shrunk down inside that cradle.

Then he took a running start and leaped to the gondola floating in the red river.

“Gyaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!”

The blonde girl screamed as they landed inside the boat.

The dragon must have given up under the heavy barrage from the humans because a brief moment of relative silence fell with only his beloved partner’s voice echoing around them.

A somewhat troubled cloud came over his face.

“From ‘kyah’ to ‘gyah’, huh? You shouldn’t force yourself, but it still saddens me to hear that kind of yell from a girl. Maybe I still need more training.”

“Ayato, were you aware my skirt has two layers and the outer long skirt is floating Expansion Armor?”

“?”

“That means I can control it with magic and use it to trap rude boys!”

The cloth around her waist wriggled like a living creature and swallowed up the Sorcery Hacker in a surprise attack.

Seeing the boy pathetically captured must have helped calm her down because Teleria put her hands on her hips.

“Use this time to reflect on what you did. Hmph.”

“Hgh, mgh.”

“No. I am not letting you out no matter how sad you sound.”

“Miss Teleria, was this supposed to be a punishment? Because all you have done is surround me with your scent.”

“!!!???”

Teleria blushed and started pummeling the makeshift bag from the outside so the Gondolier spoke up in exasperation.

“Flirt if you like, but could you at least tell me your destination?”

Ayato managed to extract his head from the warm and sweet-smelling skirt and instructed the man to take them to the inn their luggage had been taken to.

The scorpions were apparently still pursuing them, but those things specialized in smoothly moving along the ground or walls. The molten metal rivers must have been outside their jurisdiction because their pursuit came to a stop when the faint tracks on the ground – in other words, footprints that could not be seen with the naked eye – arrived at the edge of the river. Assuming their coordination with the giant killer bees that flew through the air or the great serpents that swam through the scorching rivers did not go smoothly, Ayato and Teleria had lost them.

Looking around cautiously would have only made him look suspicious, so Ayato ignored them and messed with the Linkage Cable bowgun instead.

The Gondolier seemed worried about Teleria who was looking pale from the heat and the rocking of the boat, but at the same time…

“What’s that, a souvenir? Probably not the gift most girls are looking for on a date.”

“I am aware.”

Ayato responded to the man’s on-the-job chatting while he checked over the bowgun and peered down the scope on the top. The lens was made of crystal, but it was made dark like sunglasses to block out light.

The giant dragon must have taken a break because there was little cannon fire in the starry sky as he peered up at it.

(I see. It’s based on a fortunetelling tool that views the sunspots.)

A giant form moved in to block his view, so he removed his eye from the scope. The gondola was moving along the orange river, so they had come across one of the osmosis blast furnaces that looked like a vacuum tube or giant tower of crystal.

Either way, it was now time to visualize the mana used for Sorcery Hacking.

“Now, let’s give this whole affair a better aftertaste.”

“What?”

Teleria looked confused as Ayato pulled out the crystal tarot cards he used as a Linkage Monitor.

“Let’s draw out the data inside here and identify everyone who bought the girls who have gone missing already. Once we have the list, we can submit it to Sky City Celedileka’s government. Then those macho knights with too much time on their hands can take care of the rest. I imagine they volunteered for the knights based on what they saw in the movies because they do love their rescue operations.”

And while they discussed that, something else arrived.

It truly came without warning. A woman touched one of the crystal tarot cards with her fingertip.

Ayato, Teleria, and the Gondolier had of course been the only people in the gondola rowing down the molten metal river. Given the width of the river, there was no way anyone else could board it now.

But it happened anyway.

That young woman really was there. She had long purple hair that looked like a condensed form of the night and her body’s alluring curves were evident even through her non-revealing clothing. She must have been proud of her job because she wore a classic maid uniform. She bent over alongside Ayato and indicated one of his cards with a slender fingertip.

She acted like her presence there was perfectly normal.

“Our ''client'', huh? Don’t scare me like that!”

“Here.”

She ignored the complaint from this acquaintance and dropped a small but heavy leather bag into Ayato’s palm. It contained an assortment of gold<ref>Approximately 200,000 yen.</ref>. Was that a lot for a day’s work, or was it too little for risking one’s life in battle? The answer to that depended a lot on the individual’s values.

This payment for their work had seemingly materialized out of the ether.

Then she poked at the crystal card once more.

“There is an oddity in the data. Check the list carefully.”

“?”

He operated the Linkage Monitor crystal cards as instructed and visualized the list from the manaflow. He converted it into something like a newspaper or textbook so it could be read with human eyes.

He soon realized what their client was saying.

“What the hell? That’s weird.”

“Urp, ugh. Wh-what is it? Oh, I couldn’t possibly read such small print and illustrations right now.”

To those who did not know how to use the cards, the complex arrangement of arcana images looked mystical and incomprehensible. Now that magic could be activated at the pull of a trigger, the people who simply wanted to use magic did not need to understand how everything worked thanks to the advancements made in the fields of gem and mana use.

That was why Ayato explained it for her.

“The human traffickers were generally targeting teenage girls like that Dark Elf, but there’s one ''old man'' in the list who clearly doesn’t fit the pattern.”

“Human traff-…eh? What were you two doing???”

The Gondolier looked shocked, but Ayato did not bother responding.

“Jorbe Alphoverin, a man of 65. Now, I can’t deny the possibility that someone with very peculiar tastes put in a request, but it sure sounds like there’s something else going on, right?”

“Hold on there.”

The Gondolier persistently cut in.

But this proved to be a good thing for Ayato and Teleria.

“Alphoverin? There’s only one family with that weird name. Isn’t Jorbe Alphoverin the urban design manager for Sky City Celedileka? There’s even a statue of him in the city square.”

“Urban…design?”

“Well, the actual sky city plan started so long ago no one even knows how many hundreds of combo-years ago it even was, but he’s definitely the one who took over the old design theory during this generation and successfully got things off the ground…literally. He manages everything from the basic floating principle to the individual mist mana wiring, so the newspapers have called him a multitool of a genius. Yeah, and I think he was involved in the city infrastructure and defense system as well. Y’know, that aurora-like unbreakable wall that protects Brightio Castle. The Free Audience…whatever it is. That’s apparently considered his crowning achievement.”

“…”

“Um, ugh, how should I put this?”

“Yes, I know. I have a really bad feeling about this.”

This meant someone out there had used the human traffickers as cover for abducting the sky city’s urban planning manager. It was unclear what information they wanted from him, but they could do most anything with the classified information Jorbe Alphoverin was bound to know. They could even find a way to bring down the Free Audience Restriction barrier protecting Light Castle Brightio. In fact, they might be able to cause Sky City Celedileka itself to come crashing down.

“The sky has grown cloudy,” said their calm-faced client as she looked up into the starry sky that was barely visible thanks to the orange-glowing river and the osmosis blast furnaces that towered up like giant vacuum tubes. “This is an ominous aurora. You erred in your final move, Sorcery Hacker.”

She whispered softly in his ear yet her voice squeezed tightly at his heart. Her voice seemed to manifest the unique fearsomeness of a beautiful woman.

And then it happened.

A beam of light just as powerful as the previous dragon breath was launched toward the ground from an elevated position.

“Wha-?”

Even Ayato Criminaltrophy was left speechless.

This unforeseen blast overturned the game board he had set up as a Sorcery Hacker.

The brutal beam appeared to have been launched from the top of one of the osmosis blast furnaces that stood up from this fiery town like great crystal towers. It passed by above their heads and accurately struck an area nearby.

That location was only 500 esoule<ref>Approximately 600 meters.</ref> away.

It was the supposedly safe area where the dark elf and scorpions were waiting for the knights to arrive.

“What the hell was that!? What’s happening now!?”

He did not receive a response.

He suddenly realized the young woman in a classic maid uniform was gone. Something fluttered by in front of him and he saw ''a purple butterfly'' flying above the scorching river. That night butterfly was decorated with alluring lace and gems and was not found anywhere in nature.

A client was only a client. They were paying to have the job done, so they would not kindly provide assistance at times like this.

That meant he had to figure this out on his own.

That had been a sniper shot.

No, at that level, it was more like a cannon blast.

That extraordinary shot must have come from a large-caliber, long-range weapon that relied on an enormous disintegrating lead bullet and lots of mist mana. It was probably an anti-dragon rifle longer than a human was tall that had been thoroughly customized for use with unbelievably large bullets.

He had a decision to make: launch point or hit point?

Which would he investigate? He wanted to start gathering information to get as good a grasp of the changing situation before the traces disappeared. He did not even have time to wait for the gondola to approach the side of the river.

The Sorcery Hacker softly grabbed the blonde girl’s shoulders to support her since she was woozy from the heat.

“Oh, goddammit!!”

“Sir! Just two coppers<ref>Approximately 2000 yen.</ref> this time!?”

He had given him a middle silver<ref>Approximately 5000 yen.</ref> last time, so it averaged out to the standard rate when the (tourist-priced) drinks were included. Ayato ignored the man as he swept Teleria’s legs out from under her and jumped to the bank while princess carrying her.

“Wahyah!?”

“Miss Teleria, just keep hugging me and bear with it!!”

He was curious who the sniper was, but he needed to focus on what had happened where the blast had hit. That would determine whether or not their job had been a success or a failure.

He clenched his teeth as he ran.

“Goddamn them! What moron decided to sully our work like this!?”

“W-w-wait, wait! Put me down, put me down! I can walk!!”

Teleria was blushing and flailing her arms and legs, but when running full speed, this was honestly faster. He slipped between some panicked salesmen and ran right back the way they had come.

“Everyone is watching! We can do these embarrassing things when no one else is arou-…ah!? Why am I compromising on this?”

Of course, if the scorpions were still functioning, they would be pursuing those two. If they found them, they would attack. Returning to that area was nothing but a risk.

But he could not ignore this.

And when he arrived next to that collapsed house…

“Dammit.”

The smell of a rusty liquid was mixed with the stench of burned hair and flesh.

This was nothing like the smell of a kitchen while cooking some meat that had been drained of blood and prepared with salt and spices. This was the odor of unaltered lives being burned away and there was no comparison.

“I was right. That was meant to silence them!!”

He held his head in his hands.

A blast even more powerful than the dragon’s had been fired down from the top of one of those crystal towers that resembled vacuum tubes. The destruction had left a large hole in the floating ground, so a gust of wind blew in from below. The stone pavement and the ground below were heated to an orange glow along the edge of the hole and the high temperatures had transformed them into glass.

He did not want to think about what happened to Funny Snatch and the other human traffickers.

They had been annihilated.

There were not even any grotesque corpses to inspire normal terror. The only thing remaining of them was the smell of burning flesh lingering in the air. That was the stench of death. That odor told him they had not simply faked their death to make a getaway.

But aside from that…

“Oh, it looks like the Dark Elf girl is okay,” said Teleria. “She’s still breathing!!”

“…”

The many scorpions must have quickly moved to defend her. The brown girl with the long ears of a Dark Elf had her long straight hair spread out on the ground around her, but there was not a burn on her. However, Ayato did not consider that to be good luck. This was no coincidence; it was the result of the sniper’s skill. They had carefully calculated out the effects of the direct hit and the side effects on the surrounding area to take only the lives they intended to take.

“Who the hell was it?”

He doubted the average human could pull off that kind of magic.

Anyone could use magic with the pull of a trigger these days, but using magic that powerful could easily smash your body to pieces from the recoil alone. This seemed like a superhuman feat to him.

And…

“Huh?”

A large silhouette and the buzzing of wings arrived in the sunny and starry sky overhead.

Teleria had been crouched down to help up the unconscious dark elf, but she looked up to see what it was.

It was one of the sorcery devices used to protect Sky City Celedileka. That giant mass of mana-conducting silver was designed to resemble a killer bee and was packed full of homing rounds that used a wide variety of curses.

It spoke with a smooth female voice.

“Intruders detected. Locking on. Please swiftly disarm yourselves and surrender. You will not be given a second chance. The government security and proper knights of Celedileka will show no mercy to Sorcery Hackers who practice vigilante justice and even kill their targets, so if you show any sign of resistance, you will be immediately shot in accordance with Selected Kingdoms law.”

He could only click his tongue.

After all, fighting Funny Snatch’s group had come back to bite them.

It seemed too well played. Was this an adlibbed method of cutting off the lizard’s tail, or had this always been the plan to set them up? It had worked so perfectly he could not figure out which it was.

He did not know what idiot had done this, but they had been set up to take the blame for the sniper’s crimes.

“Wh-wh-what do we do!?”

“That should be obvious. Yeah, we need to get that girl medical care as soon as possible. Hold onto her and don’t drop her.”

He breathed out and gathered his resolve.

…Somewhere in this world, a hero with legendary blood might be battling an evil god, or the knights who defended their king’s honor may have been gathering together for some decisive battle.

But none of that had anything to do with this boy.

What good was relying on formless concepts like “protecting the world” or “making history”? He would rather keep his feet planted solidly on the ground, focus on the incidents occurring in the real world, and do everything he could to reach his hand out to someone he could save right then and there.

Something like that was happening here in Sky City Celedileka and it was showing signs of being connected to a much greater tragedy.

So.

They had been set up quite masterfully, but that was the fate of those who worked outside the law. He was quick to change gears.

Sorcery Hacker Ayato Criminaltrophy coolly explained his plan.

“It’s time to run away.”