Editing The Unexplored Summon Blood Sign:Volume7 Chapter3 (section)

===Part 4===

Meanwhile, Doctor S was facing his own crisis.

He had ended the search in the caves and moved outside for the time being.

Houbi Village had been reduced to ruins by the extraordinary rocket fire, so even the most intact buildings only had their foundations or walls remaining and created twisted silhouettes visible in the dark night. The objects jutting up and tangled together in places were likely the remnants of the wooden festival towers and electric lanterns. No artificial lights illuminated the night and only some red and green particles flowed irregularly around. Those were embers from the attack and fireflies. Doctor S and the rest of the Bridesmaid summoners and Repliglass soldiers had constructed a base on land to join the missile ships and landing ships out at sea. Tents made of synthetic cloth were spread out across the remains of the original village.

“…”

Doctor S sat atop a broken drum and looked around.

Tents came in a wide variety of types, but modifying those used for circuses allowed one to set up a facility the size of a harbor warehouse in a short period of time. When viewed by satellite, the village would have been transformed like painting a new image on a canvas.

But not everything was about logic and efficiency.

In fact, their timetable was in complete shambles.

“Ohh, ohh. Her Majesty…Her Majesty is here…!!”

“Please forgive me for so insolently sharing the same space as Your Holiness!!”

“She really exists! Yes, it wasn’t just a legend! Her Majesty really does exist!!”

Some kneeled on the spot, some were carried to a far-distant land on a wave of ecstasy, and some fainted and convulsed on the ground. Bridesmaid celebrated their greatest moment as a Queen-worshiping cult.

There was a simple reason for that.

Pure white appeared in the dark shadows like a field of lilies in the moonlight.

And there were uncountably many of them.

In all 360 degrees, no matter where you turned, you would only see more and more White Queens. As her very first researcher, Doctor S understood her nature. The White Queen would show no interest in anything other than Shiroyama Kyousuke. In a way, ''he had set it up that way'', so of course he did.

Because Kyousuke had failed, this roller coaster no longer had a safe guiderail.

Facing just one wild Queen was a disaster in and of itself, so being surrounded by her in every direction was best viewed as being trapped by a crueler fate than being in the path of a giant meteor being pulled down by the tendrils of gravity.

In that case…

“…Umm, I would like to ask a question.”

“Yes, what is it?”

One of the Queens answered him while politely bringing her hands together in front of her and cutely tilting her head. But she was not about to give him such a sweet look just because he was Shiroyama Kyousuke’s father. And being part of Bridesmaid, which served her, was not a guarantee of anything. The Queen’s interest was only in him himself; no other factor would get her to focus on him.

So Doctor S stated his question bluntly from the broken drum he sat on.

“Why am I still alive? I honestly assumed I would be killed instantly once the infection and spread began.”

“Oh? You make it sound like you overcame death all on your own.”

“This isn’t anything that cool.”

While answering, the man used his medical inhaler to adjust the oxygen level while using the air pressure tubes in his riding suit to squeeze his body. Together, these simulated a hyperbaric oxygen environment to externally control his brain activity. It was a lot like fiddling with a dial to dig through his memories.

“It’s just that I saw ''something more frightening than death'' during July of 1999. The rest is an issue of priorities. I’ve already selected the problem I wish to conquer first, so I might seem unconcerned about lower priority issues such as my own death.”

“Well, in that case, your driving force is rooted in phobia rather than philia. …Although you have some serious issues since you get as close as possible to the thing you fear instead of distancing yourself from it.”

“That’s just how humans work. Did you not know why those Toy Dream cities are doing such good business all over the world? We humans are a contradictory lot. We want to get as close as possible to danger while maintaining a front-row seat of absolute safety. No luxury could be greater.”

“Don’t try to pretend you’re not a coward.”

“Oh, my cowardice is the entire point. I will admit it’s pathetic, though. Even now, it could easily explode within me at any time if I didn’t tune my thoughts externally like this.”

“Is that an application of hyperbaric oxygen therapy? That said, I believe I was taught that excess oxygen intake not only leads to hyperventilation but that the reactive oxygen that changes form within your metabolism is one cause of aging.”

“I stopped caring about aging after the fear turned my hair white. You would never know it, but I’m actually a fair bit younger than I look. My hair has been like this ever since I saw you that first time. Although I’m not about to claim I’m exactly young anymore.”

Whatever Doctor S may have thought, the White Queen did not seem to have any real feelings about that.

So the twintail girl readily changed the subject.

To the man, this was like hesitantly walking through a minefield where one misstep would blow him away, but she readily announced a change of destination on a whim.

“What is with that S name?”

“Oh, this? It was originally a pseudonym I used for the long-term project with Kyousuke, but it was convenient enough and I ended up borrowing it ever since. Well, with the later Miniature Garden, it was entirely about inertia or maybe a good luck charm. That was an utter failure that didn’t match the requested specs, but it was definitely a step in the right direction. So from there, I was probably hoping for someone who showed some promise. How that turned out goes without saying.”

“Your project, hm?”

“He is my child. I will not lie about that. I simply used every research tool available to me.”

“But that is not enough to fully explain this.”

“You mean why it had to be a Shiroyama? Not even I know. I can only assume it was a divine revelation.” Doctor S smiled bitterly at his own trauma. “Oh, and it might look like Kyousuke is driven by phobia, but it’s actually philia. You can rest easy about that.”

It sounded like he too was changing the subject on a whim, but he was not actually.

“My, my.”

The White Queen smiled while happily clasping her hands in front of her chest. She looked like a girl who had received information on the boy she liked from a classmate.

''This'' was the only way for Doctor S to access the White Queen. He could not get a single word out of her otherwise. When he was lost, when he could not see the ground below his feet, and when his soul was trapped by the fear of landmines, the only way to course correct was to speak Kyousuke’s name. That would allow him to set down his raised foot.

“I’m scared.”

Was his voice actually reaching the twintailed Queen?

And even if it was, this might not change the fate of this man in a lab coat and riding suit.

“I’m so very, very, very scared. But that is why this shiver down my spine is the one thing I can’t erase by manipulating the oxygen. How much safety can we maintain and how close can we approach danger? Some say it is the ability to control fire that makes humanity special, but I see things otherwise. Our one and only treasure is the ability to not just control fire but approach that danger and enjoy the thrill of it. There are insects that commit suicide and beasts that torment others, but no other living creature holds entirely meaningless values.”

As Doctor S spoke from the broken drum, his words were not directed at anyone in particular.

He was letting himself hear his own thoughts to apply some self-suggestion and encourage himself.

“We conquered ghosts and UFOs. We removed the fear of poetic prophets and the Aztec calendar. We can use our own words to explain the Tunguska Event and the supposed nuclear destruction of an ancient city by an Astra. We have fully researched most every mystery of the universe and the human body. We have turned it all into safe and boring attractions, leaving nothing to fear. …With the one major exception of you.”

“Iiiii seeee. So for you, what happens after death is something you either already understand or a trivial matter you can calculate out if need be. You know the equations, so you just have to leave the massive amount of calculations to a supercomputer which can work out the answer at more than a billion calculations a second.”

“Ha ha. That’s right, that’s right. The White Queen is the one thing where I can’t even find an equation to use as a starting point. No matter how I look at or frame the problem, all I get are unknowns upon unknowns. It could be zero, infinity, an imaginary number, or anything else; if I could see just one value, I could confirm the safety, mark out the danger with a dividing line, and find a way to get as close as possible to that line.”

“Humans feel both hope and fear about the things they do not understand. Once you had made your way all around the earth, the occupation of adventurer died out and the seeds of hope for the entire species were lost. Even with outer space, you could predict the majority of the star map using radio telescopes.”

“So what is your answer?”

“Do you desire your own death that badly?”

“Dying here would be simple. That is no more than an easily predicable result. Queen, surely you can bring people ''a much crueler fate''.”

“Hmm. That is true.” The silver twintailed Queen placed her index finger on her slender chin. “The things you have brought into this world should indeed be called hideous, but without them, brother and I never would have met. Isn’t that enough of a reason to give you a stay of execution?”

“Akura Taisaku from the Queen’s Miniature Garden similarly pulled the selfish trigger when he could no longer bear that freefall with no guarantee of safety, but you didn’t hesitate to smash him into paste. …And I am well aware you allowed his cells to remain active so ''he lived on for more than 300 hours while splattered across the walls and ceiling''. And he was aware the entire time that there was no hope at all of saving him.”

“Oh, you do know your trivia, don’t you? Did the two of you get along because you both have severe phobias? If I recall correctly, you developed the Miniature Garden and he ran it. But I can’t have you acting like that Queen and the Queen before you now are the same.” The White Queen giggled. “There is a simple reason for treating you differently from Akura. The presence of an ordinary sort of man will not change much of anything. So even if the middle point was altered somewhat, that war would have ultimately happened and brother and I would have parted ways. But you were different. That is all this is.”

“Hmm.” The inhaler man slightly adjusted the oxygen level like a tuner. “If you killed me here, disguised it as some kind of error, and ‘returned’ right away, you might just gain Kyousuke’s favor.”

“…”

The White Queen’s shoulders jumped.

But not because some gears had jammed. It was the opposite. The phrase Doctor S had spoken were the magic words to rob the silver twintailed Queen of all of her plans. Without even looking at her face, it was obvious that linking her to Kyousuke had sent pleasure signals coursing through her body.

But the strongest of the strongest suppressed it.

Doctor S calmly viewed that result.

“I see. That is a magician’s trick.” He nodded once. “You are arrogant in all things and everything you do can be judged humble when compared to what you are actually capable of. But you are afraid. You are shockingly cowardly when it comes to Kyousuke. Basically, with the obvious target of Doctor S around, Kyousuke will look elsewhere. So even if you are manipulating things from behind the scenes, you are harder to spot. That’s what this is about, isn’t it?”

Some might call it clever and some might call it cowardly, but they could not forget that this was the White Queen. It was highly irregular for her to even take failure and loss into account when she put together a plan.

“But even before that, the core factor in you and Kyousuke parting ways at the Queen’s Miniature Garden was murder. ''A mere murder caused that''. But I am his father. Whatever he might say, you cannot imagine how much more your relationship will be twisted if you take it a step further and ''kill his parent''. I can see why you would be afra-…”

The White Queen silently tilted her head. 

The pull of gravity caused her silver hair to flow creepily over.

And a moment later, the Queen’s slender arm stabbed into the center of Doctor S’s chest before he could finish his sentence.

It truly only took an instant.

It was as smooth as sticking one’s hand into a mass of custard and yet not a drop of blood was spilt.

The White Queen’s right hand had pierced the researcher’s chest far too deftly. No, that was not simple destruction. It was a type of spiritual healing. While completely ignoring the pectoralis major, diaphragm, ribs, sternum, and various arteries and veins in the way, the White Queen easily pulled something out.

He did not even have time to stand up from the broken drum in surprise.

He was forbidden to take any unpermitted action while in the presence of Her Majesty.

That was simply how the world worked.

“''Father.''”

The mass of muscles in her hand was pulsing. It was someone’s heart.

The Queen’s strongest was not limited to pure physical strength.

She could bring out the greatest skill in ''every single field''.

“''I respect you for bringing brother into this world, but I have no intention of getting to know my in-laws well enough to live in a two-generation household.''”

“…”

The frightening part was not how she removed his heart with no pain or resistance.

It was the fact that she could bring hand-to-hand combat to this level. If she wanted, she could remove all of Doctor S’s organs and rearrange them as she saw fit. It was just like moving a human brain into a pig or sheep developed for organ transplants. No, it need not be organic. If she felt like having some fun, she could create a human-faced dog or even a human-faced train. She could easily create a chimera that would cause anyone who saw it to lose their mind.

“''Please do your very, very, very best not to get between my brother and me. I may not look it, but I can become a tad indiscriminate when it comes to him. Even if you are his father, I might do something inappropriate without thinking.''”

“…Oh, how scary. It would seem this thrill ride still has room for improvement. If not for the experimental guiderail named Kyousuke, I would have been tossed from the roller coaster.”

“Yes, I suppose so. Your unsightly racing heartrate is probably caused by noradrenaline, so it would come from the fear and shock based on your phobia.”

“It really is scary.”

But that was the entire point.

Doctor S’s confidence was renewed after seeing this madness that would have made anyone look away. Not even the god in heaven could restrain this ultimate strongest. And there was but one person in the world who contained the possibility of holding her reins.

Only Shiroyama Kyousuke. Completing that failure was the only option.

“I am a priest, not a shrine maiden. Directly touching you is meaningless; my goal is to approach as close as possible. I wish to safely enjoy the world’s greatest and most dangerous freefall, but I do not actually wish to jump to my death.”

“That is fine then.”

The White Queen grinned and returned the heart in her right hand to Doctor S’s chest. It was a casual action, like someone placing their father’s pocket watch back on the shelf.

There was no red stain on her white glove and that eternally unsullied white spoke.

“Now, then. I think it’s time I got serious about teasing brother. Hee hee hee! Any chance to directly touch him is valuable. …I can’t have him growing accustomed to my appearances. Each and every one of our trysts needs to feel fresh and new! If I am going to show him just how impatiently I have been waiting to make contact with him, I have to make sure I leave an impression: kaboom!!”

“I’m hardly one to talk, but…”

“Yes?”

“You really are cruel.”

The White Queen was entirely unfazed by his great insult.

She placed her hands on her cheeks as her eyes grew damp, her breaths grew heated, and a tremor ran down her spine.

“That is because I love him…!!”