Editing City Series:Volume8b Chapter16 (section)

===Algo’s Sight Mode: In DT Castle===

'''<Algo’s Over Reload>

Algo left through the castle’s main entrance and walked through the courtyard.

Mini Alternative sat on his shoulder as he walked briskly along, but out of nowhere, he looked behind him.

'''<Algo’s Over Zoom>

The castle was there.

It didn’t look the same as it had. A tower was missing from the northern roof. It had collapsed. The collapse of the ceremonial ground in the northern basement and the fall of the northern lift had begun a chain reaction.

The entire castle looked a bit off. There were cracks here and there and some of the stones forming its surface had fallen away where they now sat on the ground like decorations. The castle had originally drawn out the rectangular shape of a fortress, but it now had a trapezoidal shape, like a cake squashed from above. Algo stared at it.

“ ‘Until the cities lie ruined and without inhabitant, until the houses are left deserted and the fields ruined and ravaged.’ Yes, that is exactly what we are accomplishing here. With the boost setting inside this shield set to x1000, we now have ten times as long until our Words Warn day of destruction.”

<We were meant to be destroyed at 3:40 and the setting was changed at 3:00, so we have 400 minutes left.>

Just as Alternative spoke in her window, a different window appeared next to Algo.

It displayed a square-faced man – Mekton.

The dark sky made up the background and the image was redrawn once every second.

“Wh-where is Daikatana?”

“He stayed inside. As a guard to stop Aoe.”

That put a worried look on Mekton’s face. Algo looked away from him.

'''<Algo’s Over Zoom>

He saw the castle gate up ahead.

“Don’t worry. He has spent 400 years cutting down his fellow NPC Bodies as an actor. He has more experience than Aoe, me, or even Master Ungyou.”

“B-but th-that idiot…”

“Yes, Aoe already repelled Daikatana once.”

He walked through the gate. The sky was dark, but the gate still cast a shadow.

Algo coughed within that shadow.

He held his throat and let out a scratchy breath. He used that breath to speak.

“That is because both Daikatana and Aoe want the same thing, even if they hold opposite positions.”

“The strongest power?”

“Do you have something like that as well? Something you can use to test if he is really worth entrusting with Yuo?”

“Yes. I will…disappear soon. I have something…for before that. I want to test the one…who wants to look after Master Yuo.”

Algo responded to Mekton’s affirmation by lowering his eyebrows and nodding.

“Is that something you can’t use to test Yuo herself?”

“Yes,” confirmed Mekton and Algo let out a coughing breath.

Algo finally raised his lowered head to reveal his usual smile.

“Aoe has something like that too. And you can test a Plus person like Aoe even if you can’t do so with Yuo, right? That is what allows the two of you to battle. Because you both have a deep connection to Yuo.”

He left the other side of the gate.

“But Akalabeth told him the strongest Plus power he should seek is a method of learning of and surpassing the Minus anxieties and fears.” He took a breath. “That means he still doesn’t know that method.”

Algo kept walking with his eyes shut and a smile on his lips.

“Learning someone’s anxieties and fears is no easy task.”

<It really isn’t. Everyone’s are different and we can’t read each other’s minds.>

“When we discussed this last night, you said the strongest defense would be to protect against anything, didn’t you? That is because the act of defense makes it easier to learn your opponent’s anxieties and fears. When you defend, your opponent’s attacks tell you those things in place of their words. For a defender, defending against your opponent’s attacks is the very act of learning and surpassing their anxieties and fears. So blocking and defending against their anxieties and fears leads you directly to the strongest defense.

“But,” he said. “It isn’t so simple for attackers like us. We can only learn things through the attacks we send out. We must think about their unique anxieties and fears and then make our attacks accordingly.”

After a few seconds, he opened his smiling eyes and looked out ahead.

“But we cannot read people’s minds, so how are we supposed to learn what our opponent’s anxieties and fears are?”

Alternative tilted her tiny head in thought.

After a few seconds, her eyebrows bent in defeat.

<nowiki><I</nowiki> don’t know.>

“Oh? Are you sure you aren’t overthinking it? The answer is actually extremely simple. Alternative, you asked before how Aoe and Yuo could be together, remember?”

<Yes, but I still don’t have an answer to that.>

“I suppose not.” Algo continued like he was questioning himself. "They feel no anxiety or fear when together…but that requires more than just being together. They must notice each other’s anxieties and eliminate them.

“So,” he said. “How are we to notice and understand each other’s anxieties?”

<If you ask me,> he added silently. <Figuring out that system is the key to reaching the strongest power.>



'''<Algo’s Over Zoom>

After passing through the castle gate, Algo found a surprise where the drawbridge and moat should have been.

Everything was gone.

A long trench had formed from the castle all the way to the amusement park in front of Babel. The trench had filled with rubble, the main road had become a hole 5 yards deep, and the bridge crossing DT’s central lake was missing.

Algo came to a stop and looked into the sky.

Overhead, he saw the double-layered sky flowing toward Babel. One sky layer was inside the defense shield and the other was outside it. Gray clouds swirled through the sky and their movement was slower outside the shield.

Ten times slower to be exact.

And Algo noticed a point of white in the sky.

That was Mekton’s blimp. Algo smiled when he noticed it remained steady against the current of the gray clouds.

He pulled a program trigon from his robe. The yellow tetrahedron was printed with a music note coming from a mouth. He rolled it around in his hand.

“Mekton, I have something for you, so hurry here.”

“What is it?”

“Yuo’s songs. The voice of the girl who stayed by your side and watched your performances back when you were a failure of a jester whose large size scared everyone away.”

Mekton hung his head in the window. He shut his eyes too.

“I-I will hurry.”

“Please do. And then take me to the top of Babel. Fulfill your role as part of the Quartet. Managing the Questron on my own, it should take…probably 6 hours.”

“6 hours. I will work hard. With Daikatana. To stop Aoe.”

“Yes, the two of you need to stop him. Ideally you would defeat him, but slowing him down should be sufficient.”

“Master Algo,” said Mekton.

The window showed him smiling now. He had raised his square face again to show the smile there. But it was a forced smile.

“I will w-win, but Daikatana is the same. The same.”

“The same how?”

“We want to see. See Master Yuo.”

Mekton nodded and the window vanished. He had ended the transmission.

Algo lowered his gaze. His eyebrows drooped a bit and he let out a breath that may have been a sigh.

Hearing the unclear exhalation, Alternative turned to look at him from his shoulder.

He looked over to find her watching him. He noted the angle of her eyebrows.

“Mekton can’t see us now, so you can cry.”

<About dad?>

She lowered her eyebrows a bit and shook her head.

<Sorry. Let me cry alone for this one. I should have some time alone while you prepare the Questron at the top of Babel.>

“Is that so? Then once you finish crying, we can board the blimp and enjoy the view on our way to meet Aoe and Yuo. It isn’t that I don’t trust Mekton, but we cannot focus on working in the Questron if we aren’t certain those two have been defeated.”

<Then you need to get things ready quickly so I can finish crying quicker.>

Alternative formed a small smile with her eyebrows still lowered. Algo smiled back.

“I really didn’t expect that idiot to show up.”

<That’s just how Shouzou is. My sister too. I’m sure those two are having some kind of silly conversation right about now.>

“The two of them have been a constant source of trouble for us, haven’t they?>

<nowiki><I</nowiki> don’t want to hear anything bad about my sister.>

Alternative gave him a displeased look and he smiled bitterly.

“I seem to recall a time when you were constantly lamenting how awkward she was.”

<That was because…>

She paused and nodded.

<Because I hated that she didn’t remember me. Uncle Ungyou had told me they couldn’t contact dad and that my sister had been adopted by DT’s royal family.>

“You knew there had to be more to it, didn’t you? Perhaps things would have been different if you had discussed it with me back then.”

<Yeah. But my uncle and I had decided we weren’t going to tell anyone about it. She didn’t have her memories and we knew she was going return to DT in three years, so I saw it as a temporary dream even if I didn’t know what had happened.>

“Was it a good dream?”

<Yes. Everything is a good dream if you adjust your point of view – even Word’s Warn. I’ve always looked at things that way, even back then. That’s what makes me a Minus person. That unhappiness was very real, but I managed to convince myself it was all fake and that I was happy.>

She nodded.

<The one thing I knew was that dad had taught me that. Algo, you have always been so kind to me. Is that because you thought I looked unhappy?>

“No, not really.”

<nowiki><I</nowiki> see. Then you must be a Minus person too.>

She narrowed her eyes and then looked up into the sky.

<So let’s stay together. Until the ending comes, whatever form it ends up taking.>

“Whatever form? You mean whether you are overwritten by the Great God Lives or Aoe and Yuo stop that and you are destroyed by Words Warn? Either way, we will have our answer in 6 hours.”

<We will,> she said with a nod, her eyes viewing the white blimp approaching with the giant tower behind it.

Algo viewed Babel’s sky as he spoke.

“The Son of God died once, but he was resurrected and ascended into heaven. To take his seat at the right hand of god. And now we are attempting the same. But…”

<But if Shouzou hopes to defeat us…>

Alternative let that thought trail off and Algo nodded.

“Yes, he needs to use his fists to tell us everything will be all right even if we don’t do that.”

Algo looked up into the sky as he continued.

“Can his fists surpass the divine symbolism?”

'''<Algo’s Sight Mode has ended>