Baka-Tsuki - User contributions [en]

Owari no Chronicle:Volume13 Chapter 38

2015-04-30T22:30:37Z

178.155.187.68: I can't be sure on line 359, but I otherwise fixed what I found needed fixing.

==Chapter 38: City of Destruction==
[[Image:OnC_v13_0409.png|thumb]]
''Let’s make this exciting

Below the midday winter sky, dried leaves blew by an abandoned gate of concrete and steel.

It led to a school and contained a steel panel engraved with the name Taka-Akita Academy.

A motorcycle was stopped in front of the gate.

The 400cc Japanese bike had no driver.

Its driver instead stood before the bulletin board near the gate.

A sheet of imitation vellum decorated with artificial red and white flowers hung on the long board and a boy and several maid automatons stood before it.

The boy listened to the red-haired automaton that stood in front of the others.

“You are the last one here, Hiba-sama.”

“Yeah, well, I didn’t think the others would get moving so quickly.”

“Testament. It is true this has nothing to do with the others. …Did you naturally oversleep?”

“No, um… Are you mad, #8-san?”

“Automatons lack the emotion of anger.” #8 thought for a moment. “But I do wonder why you are a step behind on such an important occasion.”

“I-I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

“Why are you apologizing? How many times must I tell you that I am not angry?”

“You’re clearly really, really angry!!”

The automaton next to #8 whispered something in her ear and #8 nodded before turning back to Hiba.

“That is true. …Someone as delusional as you may be unable to understand our lack of emotions. But none of that really matters, so you had better please hurry up and complete your duty as a representative.”

“Sorry. And was that a command or a request?”

She gave him a cold look, so he averted his gaze to the side.

There, he spotted a festival stand with a hanging banner that said “Concept Core Weapons” and more automatons waiting for him with a smile.

“Would you like play the lottery? Or how about target practice? If you hit, you win some liquid candy with your weapon!!”

“Oh, then I choose strip rock-paper-scissors!”

“…What?”

“D-don’t take it seriously!!”

Meanwhile, a black-haired automaton carried a large silk bag over from the back shelf.

She placed it on the counter and opened it to reveal…

“7th-Gear’s…”

“Testament.” #8 walked over and looked at the four floating spheres. “This is the final Concept Core. The other representatives have taken the others to their battlefields. …You could say this Concept Core has grown accustomed to you after yesterday’s question-and-answer session.”

“…They waited for me?”

“Testament. …Though to be blunt, I think the others avoided them because they seem difficult to use.”

“Then what was that ‘testament’ for!? And that was just rude, even if it’s true!!”

As he shouted back, Hiba put the four spheres back in the silk bag. The white sphere attempted to escape and he had to grab for it several times before catching it, but he finally succeeded and placed the bag over his shoulder.

He took a breath.

After closing and then opening his eyes, his eyebrows were raised.

He then bowed to the automatons.

“I’m going.”

“Where to?”

Hiba thought for a moment and looked toward his motorcycle.

“Maybe taking the train would be safer.”

“I am not interested in your motorcycle or your safety. I am simply curious where you are going.”

“Just generally to the east.”

“Testament. I have determined you have no plan.”

“Y-you were the one that asked! Just because you’re lonely without Ooshiro-san around is no excuse!”

Just as #8 frowned at his words, someone in a lab coat rolled forward out of some bushes to the side.

“#-#8-kun!” he shouted while still rolling. “So you really are lonely without me!?”

The automatons had been using a waterway to wash the dishes they used to make the liquid candy, so they opened the entrance to the waterway and Ooshiro smoothly fell right in like it was an open manhole.

“Ah, what!? I flowed right in as naturally as river water!”

The automatons replaced the metal lattice cover, tied it shut with wire, and began washing the man away with the hose on full blast.

<nowiki>#8</nowiki> monitored the process for about three seconds but then turned back to Hiba.

“Hiba-sama, have you gone to see Mikage-sama?”

“Yes, last night. …But I only got as far as the door to the room. They wouldn’t let me see inside.”

“So she is still…” began #8, but Hiba smiled and nodded.

“Don’t worry. As long as I’m here, she’s sure to wake up eventually.”

“Is that so?” #8 finally smiled, brought her heels together, corrected her posture, and bowed. “Then please get going, final representative. We are waiting for the results…the results for the entire world.”

Starting in the afternoon, the Kinugasa Library had become a used book marketplace.

It was mostly used by third years getting rid of books they no longer needed, but the unneeded textbooks were only the beginning. The books belonging to some popular people would be auctioned off and some clubs used the location to distribute manuals to passing certain classes or maps of the best peeping spots on campus.

The lower parts of the stepped library contained the used book marketplace while the upper half contained the register and a rest area.

In one corner of that rest area, someone in a school uniform sat by the counter. It was Shinjou and, instead of killing time or chatting, she was using the space to type on her laptop.

Her long hair was tied back with a ribbon and she swayed back and forth with a small tempo while typing.

She typed quickly and the words appeared on the screen faster than one could speak them.

And as she typed…

“Heh heh…”

She suddenly laughed quietly and the IME chose the wrong character.

She quickly fixed it, but her loose smile remained.

“I’m like Ooki-sensei, aren’t I?”

''That’s a dangerous thing to say,'' she thought, but she did not stop typing.

She was writing a novel. It was her own private work and it was based on the things she had seen and heard.

The story created a kind of answer for her. She had taken as many of the things she did not understand as she could and included them as mysteries. Through that, the answer was coming into view.

She had come this far like that and today was going to be her last day of writing.

She had spent a month and a half on this and she had reached the blissful last spurt.

This would be her first complete work. She wanted to treat it with care, but her desire to enjoy the process allowed her to type with such great speed.

It seemed contradictory that letting herself have fun with it was allowing her to finish it more quickly, but she still gave into that speed.

The festival music seeped in from outside.

The voices and footsteps of classmates, underclassmen and upperclassmen surrounded her.

She heard a song inside herself.

And lastly, she knew Sayama was nearby.

He had chosen the school as his battlefield. He had made a concept space out of the large schoolyard and he waited there for his opponent.

They did not know who his opponent would be, but…

…''I’ll wait here for him.

''I’ll wait until he comes back,'' she decided.

He always came to her. He was sure to come and be with her.

''So I’ll trust in him and wait,'' she thought while pressing her feet against the ground.

Her legs threatened to tremble if she grew distracted, so she held them down and breathed in.

She straightened her posture, listened to her surroundings, sang in her heart, and moved the story along in her thoughts.

She engraved the story in electrons to store it all here.

The words were a song and the expressions her imagination. Her thoughts would be conveyed, but who would they reach?

With the keyboard as her instrument, she calmly played her story and all it entailed.

She trusted that it would all be okay.

She trusted that her story would get through to him even when they were not together.

The JR Chuo Line cut east to west through Tokyo and it converged with many other lines at Shinjuku Station.

One of those was the JR Yamanote Line which circled the city center as a beltline.

The line circled north and south from Shinjuku, but both directions passed through Ueno, Harajuku, and Ikebukuro before returning to Shinjuku.

The railway formed an infinite loop, the trains were constantly busy, and once evening arrived, it began to fill with men and women in suits leaving work early or students finished with club activities.

As one train approached Shinjuku while circling northward, something in one train car was in everyone’s way.

It was a large boy who carried a surfboard case as tall as he was.

He wore a brown coat and stood by the door, but his wide shoulders reached the pole at the edge of the seats and the top of the surfboard case reached the ceiling.

Those in suits and school uniforms all kept their distance from him.

But suddenly, the boy looked to the surfboard case he carried on his back.

A portion of the case was made from clear plastic. The inside was mostly dark, but a green glowing word was visible inside.

“Lonely.”

“Yeah, Chisato isn’t here.”

Izumo looked out the window and into the sky. Even higher up than the advertisement blimp in the northern Shinjuku sky, he saw a few airplanes.

Those were the information-gathering planes the UCAT automatons had sent out to keep track of the battles.

The radomes were used to detect concepts and gather information from within concept spaces, so the planes were linked with Kanda, the Japanese UCAT underground headquarters, and American UCAT in Yokosuka to provide reports on the progress of the battles.

“So we have an audience as we fight over the world, do we?”

“Excited?”

“Maybe.”

He smiled bitterly as he spoke and the surrounding people backed further away.

Some girls in school uniforms spoke from the edge of a group of office workers.

“That guy’s been talking to his surfboard and grinning.”

“Ugh, he stinks.”

''That doesn’t make sense,'' he thought while remembering that his own partner would still hit him even when it did not make sense.

…''I just don’t get girls.

Just as he thought that, someone pushed their way toward him from behind the group that was attempting to keep its distance.

''Oh, c’mon,'' he thought with a frown.

The people before him thinned out as if being worked apart and the area grew lightly congested.

The source of the wave of congestion came from the entrance to the next train car.

Someone stood there.

It was a slender-faced woman with long black hair and white skin.

She looked human, but Izumo’s discerning eye told him she was a doll.

This was a doll made by Top-Gear. She wore a black maid uniform, including the hair decoration. Also…

“Aren’t you a little tall?”

Izumo crossed his arms as he referenced the fact that the maid doll was just as tall as he was.

Her slender and well-featured form was clearly over a head taller than the surrounding crowd.

Everyone else tried not to look at her, but they could be seen glancing over at her.

The girls behind the office workers spoke again.

“Wow, that’s some real cosplay. …She’s so tall and cool.”

''Oh, c’mon. I’m just as tall as her,'' thought Izumo.

At the same time, a sound reached him inside the shaking train: footsteps.

Rather than stomping or making too much noise, the maid doll walked toward him as quietly as the ticking of a clock.

She walked straight forward and maintained a tip-toed posture that avoided stepping on her heels.

The crowd parted to let her through and the footsteps arrived right in front of Izumo.

''She’s huge,'' he thought while looking farther down than her head.

…''If those breasts were real…

''No, wait. Could you use evolutionary theory to say her breasts grew to match her height? So this is the wonder of Top-Gear bust technology. But wait. The more slender she is below the chest, the bigger any “surface attachments” look and these really shouldn’t just be called “big”. They should be called “BIG!”, so…

“Where do you think you’re looking?”

“Oh, you can talk? I’m having some pretty deep thoughts right now, so check back later.”

“Hold on, little boy. Are you okay?”

Recognizing the voice, Izumo frowned.

“That old factory manager is controlling her remotely? So you’re their replacement representative. What a letdown.”

“Yeah, probably. Anyway, this is the latest model and she can do a lot automatically. It’s a Top-Gear semi-automaton.”

“Top-Gear claims they’ll accommodate all of the Gears, but it looks like you’re out of luck if you don’t like them big.”

“Yeah, thanks to the postwar backlash, I actually like America a fair bit.”

“C’mon, old man. I’m gonna tell your wife you said that.”

Izumo and the maid doll laughed and slapped each other’s shoulders, but soon grew serious and pressed their foreheads together.

“You’re gonna die, old man. What’s this America nonsense? I’ll feed you to a Holstein!”

“Shut up or I’ll have to make you cry, brat. You don’t know how we struggled after the war, so you don’t have the right to talk about plentiful America!”

“The hell did you say? Did you forget that Chisato destroyed your argument and beat you quite spectacularly? …And now you show up as a doll with huge but fake breasts? Are you trying to trick me!?”

“Yes, and I’m pretty damn sure I succeeded earlier.”

The two of them continued pressing their foreheads together.

“This is pretty deep.”

“Yeah… it is.”

They exchanged a glance, nodded, and pulled back from each other.

“How about we get this started in the shopping district?”

“Sure.”

A moment later, the train began to brake to stop at the station.

It shook and the people did as well.

Everyone inside cried out a bit and braced themselves.

At some point, the two people standing by the door had vanished.

In Japanese UCAT’s Kanda Laboratory, an automaton gave a quick report.

“Izumo-sama has made contact with the enemy! Concept space expansion complete.”

As soon as the automaton with short brown hair finished speaking, red dots appeared on the map of Tokyo displayed on the ceiling.

There were two dots: one for Izumo and one other.

They all faced the consoles they had used in the battle against Black Sun and a report arrived via shared memory that one of the surveillance planes flying above Shinjuku had flown into the concept space.

A staticky voice reached them.

“This is #21 of Relay Team 1, positioned above Shinjuku.”

As if in response, movement filled the large room below Kanda.

It came from #8 and Ooshiro who sat at the large console in the center.

After clearing her throat, #8 spoke.

“We will now bring you the series of five battles that Low-Gear and Top-Gear are fighting over the right to use the Concept Cores. Commentary will be provided by me, Japanese UCAT’s automaton #8, and…”

She turned toward Ooshiro.

“Well, just me.”

“#8-kun! Th-that was just mean! And I think your announcement grew a little fuzzy there!!”

She ignored him and turned the microphone back to herself.

“This broadcast is sponsored by American UCAT, ‘The World Police’, and sent from Japanese UCAT, ‘Those who give even the unneeded a chance’. Now…”

She took a breath.

“How are things on the scene?”

The battle began with a slash.

In the empty train, Izumo grabbed the contents of the surfboard case on his back.

“Ohhh!”

He immediately swung it down from overhead.

The blade sliced through the case and the long seat behind him.

With multiple sounds of destruction, the roof split open in a full moon arc and materials scattered everywhere as the attack continued on its way.

The blade approached its enemy.

The maid doll lowered her hips defensively as the sword threatened to slice her in two.

And she fearlessly stepped toward Izumo even as he sent pieces of the surfboard case flying and swung down V-Sw.

Wind blew in through the split in the roof and the evening sky came into view.

The maid doll pulled a thick knife from below her apron and stayed low as she approached.

But at that moment, Izumo stepped toward her with his right foot.

“————!”

The step extended his reach and took the form of a kick straight toward the maid doll’s face.

He would counterattack with the kick and swing down his sword as she was knocked back.

But the maid doll continued forward nonetheless.

She nimbly jumped up onto Izumo’s leg.

“Seriously!?”

She moved a few steps up his leg with lowered hips and the knife was pulled back at the ready in her right hand.

Izumo could not evade. The motion as he swung down his sword would stab himself with the knife.

The knife approached, but Izumo reacted.

He slid his back pivot foot forwards as if forcing himself down into a sitting position.

He took a sliding stance, his front leg fell down to the knee, and he lost sight of the maid doll on that leg.

Still lying on the ground, he used both hands to swing V-Sw down toward his own knee.

This would have hit the maid doll, except she used the instant to jump straight up toward the opened ceiling.

“You’re running!?”

As soon as he shouted, the train passed through the next station without slowing and continued toward Shinjuku.

The maid doll vanished as if passing through the wind. She was now beyond the ceiling and beyond the evening sky.

“Dammit!”

Izumo used V-Sw’s centrifugal force to try to stand up.

“?”

But he realized something had fallen near him.

A light sound came from a red cylinder with sparks flying from one end.

“Hold on. That looks just like cartoon dynamite.”

Immediately following that observation, explosive flames enveloped the train car.

The maid doll stood atop a train in the setting sun.

She was on the front end of the third car.

Black smoke trailed from the car behind her, but she paid it no heed.

The train was approaching Shinjuku Station.

After slipping below the tall station building, the train entered the shadows.

In the darkness, the train passed right by the platform it would normally stop at and reentered the evening sunlight.

From here, the train would travel to the Ikebukuro region.

And just as the train passed that point on the right, the maid doll saw something to the side.

Someone was running along the platform fast enough to keep up with the train.

“You’re still alive, boy?”

It was Izumo.

He had expanded charms around his body as he ran and the maid doll saw V-Sw in his hand.

She looked back to the blown-up car and saw a large hole torn near the door.

“So you broke through with that huge thing just before the explosion, did you?”

“Yeah, that’s right.”

Covered in soot, Izumo ran alongside the train, sped up even further, and grabbed V-Sw in both hands.

“Hey, how about you start taking this seriously? You’ve got a Concept Core, don’t you?”

“You’re gonna regret asking that.”

The maid doll expressionlessly reached for her back, pulled something out, and swung it below the light of the setting sun.

“Gram. I’ll be using 1st-Gear’s power of writing.”

The maid doll held a magic marker in her left hand and raised Gram in her right.

Izumo jumped down from the platform and continued running alongside the train.

As he made his way along the concrete elevated structure, he thought about the traits of his and his opponent’s weapons.

…''Gram can give form to writing.

V-Sw could regenerate and evolve the things it destroyed.

The concept space was set up so both powers could be used to their fullest. Izumo would be able to use Gram’s power to an extent and the maid doll would be able to use his power to an extent.

And on the train’s roof, the maid doll raised Gram and wrote something on it with her marker.

“ ‘Form’? What is that supposed to do!?”

When she heard that question, the maid doll’s expression changed in the wind.

She smiled.

She then adjusted her grip on Gram.

It almost looked like she was going to stab it into her own gut, but she instead let it pass below her arm and toward the western sky.

“Do you know what the western region between Shinjuku and Ikebukuro is called?”

Izumo thought and frowned.

“Hyakunin-cho…”

“Exactly right, boy!!”

The maid doll stabbed Gram into the air.

A sword should not have been able to stab into empty space, but Gram did just that with a roar.

A moment later, white cracks ran through Hyakunin-cho’s sky.

The surveillance plane flying through the concept space attempted to move away from the oddity.

Inside, some automatons were monitoring the situation below.

“If we move away, the accuracy of our scans will drop!!”

“Please try to understand. This is a battle between weapons that support entire worlds. Get too close and we would be destroyed in an instant.”

The pilot automaton gave control instructions by mouth while conversing via shared memory.

However, her thoughts received no response from the surveillance automatons.

She tilted her head when only silent static arrived.

“What is the matter?”

[[Image:OnC_v13_0429.jpg|thumb]]

“Oh, um, well… I think the surveillance equipment may be malfunctioning. From the moment Gram stabbed into the air, the sensors’ meters have maxed out. …But that would mean…”

Some time passed and the pilot determined it to be hesitation.

After hearing a breath, the automaton looking at the surveillance equipment gave a panicked shout.

“Here it comes! Gram is activating!!”

Her voice grew to a scream.

“The world is going crazy!!”

“Come forth, One Hundred Dolls!!”<ref>Hyakunin-cho means “City of One Hundred People”, but adding the character meaning “form” makes it “City of One Hundred Dolls”.</ref>

As soon as the maid doll swung Gram as if pulling it from the air, Izumo looked to the buildings and roads spread out below the elevated train track.

“————”

They all stood up.

Dolls made from the city itself tore themselves from the earth.

A din of destruction filled the air as a literal one hundred of them stood.

Those city dolls had no faces and their arms and legs had no definite form, but they were all about twenty meters tall.

However, the maid doll did not even watch them stand. Instead, she wrote “Bullet Train” on Gram.

“How about you deal with them!?”

As soon as she stabbed the blade into the still-smoking train, its speed increased dramatically.

Its motor sounded loudly, its horn blared, and the bullet train shot forward.

It was now moving much too quickly for Izumo to keep up, even with his charms.

“Dammit!”

As he cursed, he saw the last train car pass by to his side.

The train vanished up ahead and a single sight remained for him.

“…!!”

The hundred giant dolls raised telephone poles and signs as they charged in at him.

The maid doll lowered down atop the accelerating train.

The wind was so strong that even standing up would blow her away.

“How fast have bullet trains gotten these days?”

As she muttered to herself, the maid doll heard something.

The hundred dolls made from the city had crashed into the elevated train track.

That cut off the power lines and the acceleration came to an end, but the train was still moving plenty fast and it was already on the straight line to the Ikebukuro region.

The maid doll saw what she needed to win in Ikebukuro.

She then checked behind her.

The hundred dolls were a material weapon created by combining V-Sw’s destruction and rebirth with Gram’s writing concept.

She saw those dolls forcefully destroying the elevated track and continuing to run.

A few of them had destroyed themselves by running into the track, but over ninety of them still remained.

The sounds of shattering glass, smashed asphalt, and breaking building materials rang loud.

They came together as a tremor of rushing footsteps and created an advancing force of all-around destruction.

It was a great din.

But the maid doll noticed that the hundred dolls had stopped their advance.

…''That means the kid must still be alive.

She made a visual search and indeed found her enemy.

He was no longer on the elevated track. Instead, Izumo flew through the air in his white armored uniform.

He had likely activated a few dozen charms at once to perform a great leap that smashed the elevated track below his feet.

An explosion of water vapor surrounded him in the sky to the east of the track.

The stress this great leap put on his body was apparent even from the outside.

Blood seeped from the base of his clenched teeth and blood spurted from the muscles in his arms that he had torn from overexertion.

All that effort had earned him a brief reprieve at an elevation of one hundred meters.

But the hundred dolls were already running toward his landing spot. They raised their hands toward the sky to seize Izumo’s life and raced through the streets even as their movements destroyed their own bodies.

The maid doll realized it was all over.

Izumo would definitely need to catch his breath once he landed. No matter how tough his body was, a one hundred meter leap would have to do some kind of damage.

The dolls would then rush in and perform countless several hundred ton body presses, effectively ending it.

Just as she decided this was as far as it would go, a voice reached her from the sky.

“Hold on there! This isn’t even close to over!”

She looked up toward Izumo’s voice and saw his white sword had fully opened.

…''He’s going to make a max power strike?

That seemed like a stupid idea to her. The rules of destruction and rebirth were in effect. V-Sw ruled that power, so destroying the dolls with them would only return them to their original urban form and an attack measured in the hundreds of meters could never destroy every last one of the hundred dolls.

A few of the dolls had noticed Izumo’s intention, so they began hopping to the side in repeated feints.

However…

“Hey, I think you’re forgetting something important here!”

Izumo swung his great sword in midair, but not at the hundred dolls.

He swung it at the city itself.

He repeatedly struck at the city between Ikebukuro and Shinjuku.

He carved in lines of light that formed writing.

“Do you know what this part of the city is called!? Do you!?”

Izumo made the final stroke to complete the three characters torn into the group of buildings below.

“Ookubo!!”

A moment later, the five hundred square meter section of the city stood up and became Ookubo.

As he fell, Izumo looked at the giant hand growing up from the earth.

“Come on out, Ookubo!!”

The district of the city known as Ookubo stood up while taking Waseda University’s College of Science along with it. The college’s sports ground formed a giant hand that caught Izumo.

Once Ookubo stood up, he was over two hundred meters tall.

Wind wrapped around him and the speed of his rise created explosions of water vapor at different points on his body. When the maid doll saw him, she cried out.

“Who the hell is Ookubo!?”

“How should I know!? I was really hoping I’d get to do this in Kabuki-cho!”

A moment later, Ookubo struck a triumphant pose with Izumo standing on his right palm.

“———!!”

And he roared.

The hundred dolls crashed into his legs, but Izumo ignored them and yelled.

He let out a rough breath and swung up V-Sw.

“Punch them, Ookubo!!”

Ookubo bent over and struck the ground down below.

The left fist smashed the ground, the next strike split the city, and the following ones sent the dolls scattering.

The overwhelming attack noisily broke the dolls to pieces, but the hundred dolls remained resolute.

Without fearing destruction, they began beating on Ookubo’s shins with telephone pole bats.

“Bear with it, Ookubo!”

But then they began striking his little toe with telephone pole hammers.

“I know what it’s like, Ookubo!! Kick them, Ookubo!”

Ookubo kicked up from below.

The speedy kick had a radius of one hundred meters and the foot at the end easily broke the sound barrier.

The vicinity of Kabuki-cho was thrown into the air in a single strike, the hundred dolls were sent flying by the shockwave, and they destroyed the elevated track or the large buildings around Shinjuku Station as they did. A doll made from an apartment building collided into the Tokyu Building, creating a cascade of broken glass. Another doll flew head-first into the side of the Keio Department Store, sent a café on the upper floors flying out into the air, and broke out the opposite side.

Others rolled along the ground, destroying the city as they did, and turned the entire Shinjuku region into a zone of destruction.

But amid all that noise, the train carrying the maid doll entered Ikebukuro.

Izumo caught his breath on Ookubo’s arm and looked north.

While facing the various buildings of Ikebukuro, he pulled his cellphone from his pocket.

And after a moment…

“It’s me,” said a voice.

“Oh, the idiot, huh? …I’m guessing you’d know better than Chisato, so what kind of land is Ikebukuro?”

“It is my land. It has my name written on it. In my atlas.”

“Try a little harder next time. Anyway, I’m in the Shinjuku area right now.”

“Yes, Hyakunin-cho and Ookubo-cho are there, aren’t they? The dumpling shop in front of Hyakunin-cho’s shrine and the soba shop in front of Ookubo Station are both quite delicious.”

“We’ve already used both of those.”

“What an odd turn of phrase,” said Sayama. “But anyway, Ikebukuro contains Tokyo’s famous Sunshine 60. That giant building was built on the site of Sugamo Prison which held war criminals during World War Two. Sounds like a place our enemies would like, doesn’t it?”

“Yeah.” Izumo nodded. “Sorry, I just found something I need to do.”

He hung up and faced forward.

He had ended the call for a simple reason.

The tallest building in Ikebukuro and all those around it had suddenly started blasting explosive flames from near their base.

“Oh, c’mon. I have no idea what’s going on anymore.”

The maid doll stood on the Sunshine 60’s wall as the setting sun washed over it.

She was supported by her own two legs and Gram which was stabbed into the building’s wall.

The sixty story building was shooting smoke from its large-scale ground floor.

That white smoke was the smoke of a launch.

And this was not restricted to the Sunshine 60.

One hundred of the surrounding buildings, hotels, department stores, etc. were all trembling and shattering at the bottom while blasting smoke toward the earth where it spread out and produced great wind and noise.

The structures of reinforced concrete were producing that explosive smoke for a single reason: the words written on Gram.

“Go! Super-Ultra ICBMs!!”

The Sunshine 60 shook in the light of the setting sun.

It vibrated, produced an even louder roar than the surrounding buildings, and slammed smoke into the earth.

The smoke filled the parks in every direction, blew away the cars stopped in the roads, and collided with nearby buildings.

The tremor shattered the high-rise’s windows, the resonating roar did the same to the surrounding buildings, and the packaged structures like convenience stores were easily knocked over.

Wind blew and the earth trembled.

“Fly!” shouted the maid doll while writing on Gram with her pen. “Willpower!!”

As soon as the extra word was added, the willpower-driven Super-Ultra ICBM began to float.

The sixty-story building was over two hundred meters tall and it briefly stopped in midair as if hesitating, but…

“———!!”

All of the tallest structures in Ikebukuro, a group of buildings with numbers reaching triple digits, tore free from the foundations binding them to the earth.

With a destructive launch, all of the buildings flew up into the sky in perfect synchronization.

A few of the automatons cried out as they viewed their consoles below Kanda.

“Impossible!!”

Dozens of orange lights had appeared on the ceiling map to indicate giant flying objects.

All of them were large missiles made from vertically-rising buildings.

The concrete and glass formed the outer shell and the shops and products inside formed the explosives.

“The city…is flying?” blankly asked one automaton.

<nowiki>#8</nowiki> nodded.

“Originally, this power could make an entire world fly,” she said. “And this is the power of one of the enemies we fought for so long during the Concept War.”

Glass shards scattered like rain at sunset while the buildings loudly accelerated toward the heavens.

They were all wrapped in massive rings of water vapor and they broke through those rings to continue their skyward journey.

An ICBM made its way to extreme high altitude before dropping back to earth.

The maid doll used Gram to stand on the side of the Sunshine 60 as it rose vertically toward the transparent evening sky. With the Prince Hotel, securities building, and other structures accompanying them, it felt like an ascending battleship.

“The weapon that symbolized the Cold War is flying from the place where World War Two ended. Clever, don’t you think?”

The rapidly-moving buildings broke through the clouds.

The massive white and gray objects destroyed the clouds and danced through the sky like a pod of whales leaping from the sea.

The buildings soared up from the clouds and slowly formed their downward-facing trajectories.

They drew parabolic arcs, their hard bodies groaned, and the containers measuring in the hundreds of meters pointed back toward the ground.

They fell straight down.

Their target was Shinjuku, where Izumo was.

To correct their course as they plunged back into the clouds, the maid doll twisted Gram like a joystick.

The buildings responded by surrounding themselves in a thin gust of wind and turning completely upside down.

They faced downwards.

The Sunshine Hotel as well as the Prince Hotel and other buildings began to fall as if eager to continue on.

Crimson light and shimmering heat came from their bases and the tallest building fell with the others joining it.

The elements of one district dropped toward another.

The clouds became a cold mist as they plunged into them.

Once they passed through the other side of the clouds, Shinjuku and the rest of Tokyo came into view.

The tallest missile which took its name from the sun only began to move after seeing the others begin.

And then the massive structure accelerated.

White mist trailed from every corner on the front end as the colossal warhead advanced.

As if pushing on the smaller warheads which had gone on ahead…no, as if greeting them, the representative of Showa era Japan’s architectural technology headed toward Tokyo.

It lined up alongside the Prince Hotel but did not hesitate.

“We’ll be going on ahead.”

The maid doll gave an informal salute and passed the hotel by.

This time, all sixty stories of the giant falling structure were awash with the sunshine for which it was named.

The ground was visible.

Even the distant Imperial Palace could be seen from this height. The cars were stopped, so the exhaust-stained air was washed clean by the wind and the city grew clear.

This city had been firebombed during the war and had grown upwards after the war, so none of its prewar form remained.

On top of that, the Shinjuku region had been destroyed by the previous battle.

''But that will end here,'' thought the maid doll on the side of the building that began to accelerate in its fall.

This one strike would end it all.

He had lost to Kazami during the Army’s attack, but he was stubborn enough to write off what she had said as the ramblings of a child. Those were things he had thought countless times but had never been able to believe.

''But,'' he thought with a small smile of resignation.

“I’ll believe in it a little. …That’ll give what I’m doing here some purpose.”

The fall was truly underway now and the Gs were strong enough to almost blow the maid doll upwards.

But the building continued on.

Pieces of itself, its contents, and smoke scattered from it as the Ikebukuro-launched high-rise building fell toward Shinjuku. It seemed to be announcing that Shinjuku was its rightful place.

Acceleration pushed the fall onward.

The wind blew up from below and produced a deafening roar.

The streets of Shinjuku had already come into view. The setting sun lengthened shadows, but there were no shadows in that torn-up and smashed land.

The maid doll smiled bitterly at the fact that actual dirt was visible.

“There’s nothing wrong with modern days. Cities are the makeup people put on the earth.”

And…

“We were the ones who made all that!!”

They continued down.

The shockwave of impact and the explosion of the massive structure would at least annihilate Shinjuku.

Only the earthen crust would remain.

As long as the maid doll wrote the word “barrier” on Gram just before the explosion, she would be fine.

The building was now less than a kilometer from the surface. Its acceleration continued and would reach its peak in the instant of impact.

…''End it.

''End our war,'' thought the maid doll.

And in that moment, she saw movement through the wind.

A figure was moving toward the point of impact. The figure was running and destroying Shinjuku in the process.

It was Ookubo.

Izumo had Ookubo run to a certain spot.

That was where the ICBMs launched from Ikebukuro would hit.

That spot represented modern Tokyo.

It was Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building.

Izumo had Ookubo come to a rapid stop in front of modern Japan’s tallest building.

A roar filled the air as Ookubo stomped a foot down into an underground mall, gently slid to a stop, and held Izumo out toward the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building.

Izumo lowered his hips to bear with the inertia, but he did not lose sight of his enemy.

The giant shadow was not far above him now.

The shaking of the air was enough to shatter the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building’s windows, but Izumo did not care.

He stared up at the falling object that was so large that it did not seem to be accelerating at all.

“That’s pretty cool.”

He quickly raised his brush. This bladed brush was named V-Sw and held the power of destruction and rebirth.

“But I’m more modern than you!!”

He swung V-Sw again and again.

The front face of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building shattered, concrete and glass flew everywhere, and words took form.

“A real man’s gotta go with one of these!”

A shout from the surveillance plane reached the Kanda Laboratory.

“Izumo-sama has finished writing! It says…”

A pause.

“‘Beam Cannon’!!”

An electrical discharge raced between the twin towers at the top of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building.

The bluish-white electricity linked in the twilight and created a massive incidence of ball lightning.

The discharge suddenly vanished and only the ball lightning remained.

“———!!”

A moment later, the twin towers of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building shattered.

They did so for two reasons.

The enormous structure falling from above had struck them and a ring of bluish-white light had shot from the ball lightning in every direction.

A light sound filled the air and it sounded a lot like an inhalation.

At the same time, the ball lightning floating between the twin towers grew smaller.

“…!!”

And light from the ball lightning pierced straight through the Sunshine 60 from the roof to the first floor.

Meanwhile, the Sunshine 60 crashed into the top of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building.

“!!”

This created explosive pressure.

Instead of an actual explosion, large-scale pressure spread out and pressed down on the air.

The impact and the exploding ICBM created a great flash of light.

The light enveloped everything.

In it, the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building was crushed from above, spread out like a blooming flower, and was swept away by the impact such that not even a fragment remained.

In just an instant, bluish-white light came from all of the Sunshine 60’s windows and then the building was smashed to pieces as if someone had struck it.

The power built up inside exploded which sped up its collapse yet reduced its overall strength.

Nevertheless, it caused wide-scale destruction.

Light instantly covered a radius of several kilometers and everything in range was knocked outward and crushed.

The other falling buildings were hit from below and destroyed, but their midair explosions were swallowed up by the light spreading below which was more than twice as powerful.

There was no sound. The shockwave exceeded the speed of sound.

As that shockwave spread, the dome of light pushed a wave of water vapor ahead.

Before long, the shockwave flew several times farther than the light itself.

The buildings of Shinjuku, Ikebukuro, Shibuya, and the surroundings wards were immediately knocked over, trees flew, and cars and trains blew about as easily as dust.

The clouds above were pushed outward and a wave of luminescence spread through the sky along with a trembling shockwave.

The sound arrived afterwards.

Dozens of loud, deep sounds rumbled together.

“——————”

Light vanished from the blast site and the earth was blown into the air.

The reflected force that crashed into the ground blew away everything there.

This was pure destruction.

Only the earth below remained.

However, something flew through the smoke and dust that had quickly risen to the heavens: two lights.

The surveillance plane had escaped the range of the blast and it now checked on the flying lights while hopping along the high-speed air currents.

Thin trails of light arced through the sky as they flew west, toward the setting sun.

The twin lights flew quickly alongside each other.

They were two swords which had flown from the center of the blast.

They were the Concept Core weapons named Gram and V-Sw.

When the surveillance plane saw the flying lights, an automaton’s voice rang out.

“The battle has ended…”

Some static filled her transmitted voice.

“…in a draw!!”

<noinclude>
===Notes===
<references/>
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| Back to [[Owari_no_Chronicle:Volume13_Chapter_37|Chapter 37]]
| Return to [[Owari_no_Chronicle|Main Page]]
| Forward to [[Owari_no_Chronicle:Volume13_Chapter_39|Chapter 39]]
|-
|}
</noinclude>

Horizon:Volume 3B Chapter 56

2015-04-05T23:20:18Z

178.155.187.68: Two small typos corrected.

==Chapter 56: Soakers in a Purifying Place==
[[Image:Horizon3B_0737.jpg|thumb]]
''What is it-orrrrn?

'''Point Allocation (Criminal)

Mitotsudaira realized she was at a disadvantage.

Once she entered the spring, her sensitive body was enveloped by the water that seemed to remake her and made her all too aware of her own shape.

…''I never thought I would be outnumbered two to one!

She had no one to commiserate with when Adele was gone. Same for Naruze and Suzu.

Nevertheless, the other two ignored how much more water resistance they created. Naito soaked her wings to soothe the heat of her wounds and Mary rubbed the water into her body to receive some Blessings as a portion of the water spirits’ ether.

The two Excaliburs were there, too. One acted as a stand for a plate holding leftover breakfast and sweets. The other floated in the water as their bodyguard. Both of them were converting ether to the English format and storing it, so they would make good defenders even if they could not act as a cannon.

''Everyone is preparing in their own way,'' thought Mitotsudaira as she suddenly felt a stone in the sand below her soaking feet. She reached down toward the bottom that the spring water had mostly turned to sand and she picked up a round stone that had been polished by the sand.

She then recalled the night before.

…''One of my throws during that battle with the automatons was strange, wasn’t it?

One thing still bothered her about that battle. When she had thrown that stone at Mouri-01, she had achieved a much greater speed than expected. It had almost seemed to slip from her fingers and it had seemed like a failure, but it had had even more speed and accuracy than normal.

…''What was that?

There was a chance she would have to face her mother again, so she wanted to understand all of her power. The idea of finding “more power than she expected” was quite attractive.

“…”

But when she threw this stone, it flew with standard speed and inertia before falling into the water.

It was exactly what she expected.

It had none of the speed from the night before and she gained nothing from it. So…

“What was that last night?”

“Hm? What is it, Mito-tsan?”

“Ah.”

She turned around and saw the other two girls tilting their heads.

She realized they were worried about her, so she decided not to hide it.

“Um? I threw a stone during the battle last night, remember?”

“Right, right.”

The large two nodded to urge her on, which made them jiggle. ''Kh!'' she thought as anger filled her heart, but she decided to stay positive, took a breath, and opened her mouth.

“I threw that stone faster than even I expected, so I was trying to figure out the exact timing I used. If I knew, it would help me grow stronger.”

She could not exactly say she was worried about her strength, but the large two exchanged a glance and Mary spoke first.

“You probably won’t know unless you try to throw it with all your might while in a similar state of mind.”

“And wouldn’t it be dangerous if you ''did'' do it here?”

“You’re right about that.”

Mitotsudaira could only smile bitterly, but Naito continued.

“I do remember one pretty amazing throw, but I didn’t realize you didn’t know the trick to it.”

…''That throw looked fast to Margot too?

That meant she was not just imagining things.

Mitotsudaira questioned it while suppressing her impatient desire to learn what that throw had been.

“My pain was cut off, so I should have been weaker than normal. And I’ve never thrown anything like that before.”

“It was a natural stone, so I doubt how you were holding it mattered much. Was there some trick to the swing?”

“Hmm.”

The three of them tilted their heads and Mitotsudaira’s bitter smile grew.

“Well, this isn’t really the time, so I can think about it more later.”

She had definitely pulled off an unusually fast throw.

She only had to investigate it and pursue the answer without rushing things or disturbing her thoughts.

If she could obtain that same kind of speed…

“It would be a powerful weapon for me.”

No one responded to that, but the other two girls did look toward her.

After a while, they smiled and said “judge”.

Mary sat on her sword and Naito spread her wings on the water and lay on them like a bench. Naito looked up at the sky visible between the tree branches and stretched a little.

“I wonder what Ga-chan’s doing right now. We’re having a ton of fun here, but they must be having their own troubles.”

“You and Lady Naruze certainly are close. Did you grow up together?”

“Yeah, but we didn’t use to get along all that well.”

…''Eh? Should you really be telling her that?

Mitotsudaira turned toward Naito and the Technohexen waved toward her so Mary wouldn’t notice.

She was saying not to worry about it and she smiled while staring into the sky and continuing.

“Telling this kind of story is nice every once in a while.”

“It happened during elementary school,” explained Naito.

…''A lot happened even back then.

Mitotsudaira wondered if Naito was remembering the same kind of thing.

“Ga-chan and I didn’t get along too well back then, but we started living in the dorms for middle school. The rooms were chosen by a lottery and we ended up in the same one. Neither of us would talk to the other and we lived completely separately despite being in the same room.”

“Oh, my.” Mary brought a troubled hand to her cheek. “Then how did you start to get along so well?”

''She knows how to listen to a story,'' thought Mitotsudaira while also wondering if Naito should really tell the rest of the story.

Regardless, Naito kicked at the water to turn her wings boat so she faced Mary.

Naito gave Mitotsudaira a look, so she gently moved through the water to approach the other two. Mary slid her butt along Excalibur and nodded her way, but…

…''Tenzou should really make a contract to worship the butt god.

Mitotsudaira smiled bitterly and only rested her elbows on the board.

Was she being a coward to think it was wrong for an English and Hexagone Française girl to sit right next to each other?

Still, she was close enough to sense the girl’s body heat. It felt ticklish. It must have been the same for Mary because she let her hair soak in the sun and warm her up.

Naito pulled the other Excalibur in and grabbed some biscotti from the plate.

“Judge. Anyway, we continued our silence for a while, but it was a stressful enough life that our feathers started coming out. Ga-chan can be stubborn, so she took everything too seriously and we tried to completely ignore each other.”

Mitotsudaira remembered it. It had been during middle school when she had been pretty disobedient herself. Seeing Naito and Malga back then had given her a certain thought.

…''We’ll eventually break apart.

She had thought she was correct and mature to see it that way.

“But for dinner and other meals, we had to eat out separately, right? So one day I was eating dinner at the chancellor’s place… Oh, we were ignoring each other, but we’d made a tacit agreement to take turns eating dinner at the chancellor’s place. Anyway, it was my turn that day and just when I was going to leave, the chancellor, who was working there that day, said ‘take this’ and gave me a strawberry tart.”

Naito made a large circle with her hands.

“The tart was too much for one person to eat and I was thinking it was about time I tried to grow up, so I prepared a table in our dorm room and waited for Ga-chan to get back. And then when she got there…”

“Yes?” urged Mary.

“Judge.” Naito scratched at her head. “At first, she tried to protest, but when I asked her if she wanted to eat some of it, she suddenly started bawling. When I asked her why, she said it was her birthday. Apparently, her family used to always make a strawberry tart to celebrate her birthday.”

And…

“Each year, she would eat a tart on her own at Blue Thunder, but she hadn’t been able to that year since it was my turn. She could have waited until the next day, but she felt celebrating her own birthday both alone ''and'' a day late would just be too sad. But then I asked her if she wanted to eat some of the tart. I apparently reminded her of old times and, yeah. After she told me all that and apologized again and again while crying, I looked and her and, well…”

Yeah.

“It really turned me on.”

…''Th-that’s how you’re telling the story!?

Naito waved a hand to say not to worry about it, but it was possible she just had no sense of morals in that regard.

“Anyway,” she said with a smile. “I ended up pushing her into the bed and didn’t stop until I’d had my fill.”

''Should you really tell her that?'' wondered Mitotsudaira as she glanced over at Mary.

Mary however nodded a few times and smiled.

“Eating a tart in bed is bad manners, but it sounds fun. It’s like something a delinquent would do.”

“Ma-yan, you’re just plain amazing!”

A small chill ran down Mitotsudaira’s spine, but the source of the chill calmly smiled and spoke.

“There sure are a lot of ways for people to get along. I still have so much to learn about all of you.”

Mary turned her usual smile toward Mitotsudaira.

She was really close, neither of them had anything to hide themselves with, and the water had mostly fallen from their skin.

That gave Mitotsudaira a good view of Mary’s scars.

“…”

Staring at someone’s scars was rude, but it was hard to look at Mary without also looking at her scars and they seemed to shine in the dampness of the water. Mitotsudaira viewed them as the girl’s pride, but that was because she knew what had happened in England and because of her own knightly way of thinking.

…''But how does she see them?

Mitotsudaira felt like Mary had grown a lot closer last night. Would they become classmates and friends just like Naito and Naruze had and like everyone else in the class had?

''But,'' she thought. ''That boy who wanted to pursue himself was almost always involved for the rest of us.

He was nearby now too, but would he help here?

Would she end up using his help to build a bond between herself and Mary?

“Is something the matter, Lady Mitotsudaira?”

“Oh, I think Mito-tsan saw her mother in your breasts. Yeah, that’s gotta be it.”

“Th-that is not it.”

As soon as she said that, her mother appeared on the right-side edge of the spring that led to the candy house.

Mitotsudaira looked up in surprise and saw her mother remove her shirt with a smile.

“Oh, dear. Nate, don’t tell me you’re jealous of my body.”

“Oh!”

Naito looked up and saw Mitotsudaira’s mother stroking her body and narrowing her eyes toward her daughter.

“Heh heh. Nate, what do you think? I’ve still got it, don’t I?”

…''Sh-she’s provoking me again!

Then her mother vanished. ''It can’t be,'' she thought, but the woman’s silver hair was indeed already inside the spring.

She had entered the water silently.

…''What was that!?

There was no splash, but nothing strange had happened. Her initial velocity had been high, but she had slowed down just before arriving. It was likely a method of shifting her center of gravity.

But once the woman sank into the spring, she lifted the water with her body and stood up as if carrying it. She then looked down at Mitotsudaira’s hands and feet.

“Nate, you had both a manicure and a pedicure done? But when I did that for you, you said it felt too hot and refused to ever have it done again.”

“I-it helps me fight.”

“I see. Then do you want to know how to make a really good one?”

“Oh,” said Naito with a nod of understanding. She held Excalibur out toward the mother to offer her some food. “I know that one. You make it from the bodily fluids of someone important to you, right? And it gives you the divine protection you need to protect them and be protected by them.”

“Testament. I use my husband’s for mine.”

She stared at her pearly white nails and lightly licked them.

Mary gave an admiring sigh, nodded, and looked to the mother’s nails.

“Loup-Garous have a lot of different spells like that, don’t they?”

“If we have time while travelling, I can teach you how to do it.”

“Um, but mother?”

“What is it, Nate? Not even the family of the Reine des Garous has a way to make breasts grow. I am sorry your chest took after your father so much, though.”

“W-wait. Can you stop making things up!?”

Mitotsudaira put up her guard which caused Excalibur to shake. Mary grabbed the hilt on the other end to keep her balance and her shoulders were shaking. The term “family shame” filled Mitotsudaira’s mind and she blushed.

However…

“Oh?”

Her question came from the left, on the opposite end of the spring from the candy house.

“I hear the underbrush parting! Is someone peeping!?”

She held Excalibur to stand up straight while the others gasped. Naito also gave a cheer, wrapped herself in her wings, and sank into the water. Mary said “oh, my” and only hid her chest.

…''Wh-why do they seem so calm!?

However, her mother was the last one to react. She placed her hands on her cheeks and wiggled back and forth.

“Oh, noooo! A peeping tom!? How embarrassing!”

…''C-curse this mother of mine!!

The fact that her mother had the looks to pull off something like that annoyed her all the more even if she was family.

She considered sending a divine mail to her father, but she remembered how tolerant he could be and that he liked how her mother would get so excited. Simply put, her only choice was to bear with it.

''Wait. Am I the only one losing out in this family?'' she wondered, but she decided not to think about it too much. At any rate, her mother was too busy pretending to be a young girl to be any use, so she would have to deal with this threat herself. She grabbed the empty plate from Excalibur and turned to face the left edge.

“Quit peeping and show yourself, chancellor!!”

She received an immediate response from the forest on the right edge behind her.

“That’s what I’m talking about, Nate! We’ve got permission to look now!!”

She heard the idiot’s voice and the sound of parting underbrush.

…''Eh?

Unexpectedly, they both came from behind her and she did indeed see the two boys when she turned around.

“Oh, Master Tenzou?” said Mary. “Are you here for a bath, too?”

Mitotsudaira screamed.

As the scream stretched into the sky, Tenzou held back the idiot.

“Nwoooh, Toori-dono! Mary-dono is in there, so you can’t look! You can’t!”

“Eh? Master Tenzou, I don’t mind.”

Hearing her say that with her hands on her cheeks was enough to send his excitement rocketing upwards, but he also sensed Mitotsudaira’s presence covering her body with her arms and submerging herself up to her chin.

Tenzou soon finished tying the idiot to a nearby tree.

“Now, then.”

“Wait, wait, wait, wait. Hey, you’re in the way! Completely in the way! I can’t see down there! I can’t see!”

''I would love to look too, you know?'' he silently agreed while keeping his back to the spring and blocking Toori’s view. The idiot’s expression was one of pure despair.

“Kh… A-all I want to do is see some naked girls!”

“That’s a hell of an expression for only wanting to see something.”

But…

“?”

He noticed another presence on the opposite edge of the spring.

…''A beast?

He looked in the spot Mitotsudaira had noticed earlier and saw the underbrush shaking as something walked out from the trees.

“Oh, the transportation I arranged is here,” commented the Reine des Garous.

Tenzou did his best not to look down while checking the northern edge of the spring.

“An oblong manju with legs?”

“No-orrrrn.”

He saw four oblong white things that were two meters tall with a meter and a half of that coming from their body itself. They looked like short daikon radishes, they were supported by four wiry legs, and what seemed to be their head had a single horn.

There were four in all. As Tenzou wondered what kind of creatures they were, the Reine des Garous explained from the spring.

“These are the famous forest spirits known as unicorns.”

“Unicorns?”

Righteousness, a god of war with blue canine armor on the head, spoke to Palais-Cardinal which walked alongside it. Righteousness was holding the Palais-Cardinal’s hand because the silver god of war was still having trouble walking properly, but Anne stood on the Palais-Cardinal’s shoulder while providing information on the city and on Europe.

Anne shook her legs which faded away toward the feet and had the god of war move its hips forward.

“Yes. When unicorns run, the trees move out of the way and the underbrush and earth make sure not to obstruct their feet. They are the fastest creatures…no, spirits to move through a forest.”

“Hexagone Française sure has a lot of spirits and non-humans.”

“All the developing ones, ones from low-ranking families, and savage ones moved over to England. …Although I’m sure England would tell you differently. Most of the nobles, royals, beasts, and spirits chose to live in Hexagone Française’s mountains, forests, and headwaters. And of course, that includes the unicorns. The Reine des Garous rules most of the forested areas and even the unicorns are her prey.”

Anne laughed quietly and the Palais-Cardinal moved forward.

“My friend is powerful. …Now, will you stick with me a little longer for my rehabilitation? If we circle the western fortress, it should raise the morale of the defenders.”

Immediately after that, Yoshiyasu heard a loud sound. The M.H.R.R. warriors on the western bank of the Elbe River had fired a canon.

“It’s only a blank. They fire them every day to scare us. …They do it on a whim to make sure we can’t relax and they’ll probably continue until tomorrow night.”

“Testament. The Far East uses the same sort of threats and restraints. They must be devoted to the basics.”

…''Come to think of it, there are probably Far Eastern warriors in their ranks.

Her god of war’s sight devices detected plenty of Hashiba personnel brought in for support. They were not separated between men and women, but unlike Satomi which did the same due to limited personnel, these warriors simply had no division between the two.

…''There are a lot of female Far Eastern name-inheritors because the sex difference allows for easier intervention and thus easier support from the Testament Union.

But P.A. Oda’s case was a little different. They looked at one’s skill and nothing else, so they had a higher percentage of non-humans in their top-ranking positions than most. That was why their main force was known as the Six Heavenly Demon Armies, but…

“What is it?”

“Testament,” she replied while turning to look at the Palais-Cardinal. “It’s nothing.”

…''This is an unusual situation for me.

Anne of Austria, the girl on the silver god of war’s shoulder, had divine blood, had briefly ruled the great nation of Hexagone Française, and had handed it off to the next generation.

She had been the one to choose Yoshiyasu for this tour/rehabilitation and she had been the one to grab Yoshiyasu’s hand.

Yoshiyasu sensed her own deficiencies, but also found comfort in the fact that there were others above her.

She knew she was still inexperienced as a student council president and she felt she had only been given that position due to her sister’s influence.

But…

“Anne.”

''This may not be something to ask now,'' she knew.

“How difficult was it to prepare for Louis Exiv’s generation?”

“Are you already thinking about passing things off to the next generation, Satomi Student Council President?”

No.

“I can no longer ask my sister that question.”

“What about the chancellor? Wouldn’t he be the best one to ask? Or is there some reason keeping you from doing that?”

She felt like agreeing or answering at all was the same as losing to that man, so she chose silence and Anne spoke with bitter smile in her voice.

“I simply did what I wanted. I wanted to pass things off to my brother, so that’s what I did. And it wasn’t difficult at all. After all, I was only doing what I wanted.”

“Is that how it works?”

“It is. At least for me. …I can’t speak for anyone else.”

With a quiet laugh, the silver god of war took a step down the road. The step was still stronger than necessary, but it no longer wavered when it turned back toward Righteousness.

“Hey, Satomi Student Council President.”

“What?”

“Make sure you remember one thing. You can fight against an action, an attitude, or a situation, but never fight against your own heart.”

…''My own heart?

She was fairly certain her heart was telling her to avoid that man.

…''Is she saying it isn’t?

“…”

She was still confused when Anne extended the Palais-Cardinal’s hand toward her. She reached Righteousness’s hand back and felt a stronger grip than she expected. A groan escaped her throat.

“Testament. Make sure you remember, okay? Remember that I was here and remember this strength I am leaving in your hand.”

“You…”

Yoshiyasu had heard this girl knew she was dying soon, but…

“Just call me Anne, Satomi Student Council President. I am nothing but the previous ruler now. This is your generation and I am happy I can be involved in it at all. So don’t think of us like we’re the same. From now on, I will always be Anne. I will be the Anne of Austria who worries for and roots for my brother, his wife, the Reine des Garous, Luynes, and the rest of Hexagone Française.”

She looked up into the sky as another blast of cannon fire filled it.

“Now, I wonder what the Reine des Garous is doing. She always has things her way, so I’m not worried about her herself. I’m worried that she’s causing too much trouble for the others.”

“How would using unicorns for transportation be a problem?”

“Testament.” Anne brought a hand to her mouth and whispered the rest. “Unicorns won’t let you ride them unless you’re a virgin girl. …I suppose she’ll threaten them.”

As the sun began to set over the forest, people in black uniforms faced some round white lumps.

At the lead of the uniformed people was the silver-haired Reine des Garous who smiled and clapped her hands.

“Okay, everyone. These are the rare spirit beasts known as unicorns and they are going to rush us across the M.H.R.R. border. The unicorns can hide themselves, so M.H.R.R. won’t notice us or even suspect a thing. …In exchange for carrying us, I will agree not to touch their herd for half a year. Is that okay?”

The Musashi group was disguised in M.H.R.R. uniforms and they exchanged a glance. Naito was already hopping up and down in excitement over getting to ride the unicorns and Tenzou stepped forward to view them.

…''But…

The beasts being called unicorns had one fatal flaw.

…''They look nothing like horses.

They looked like short daikon radishes or potatoes with a horn attached and wires stuck into them.

“Excuse me, but you look a lot like the eggplant cows made during the Bon festival and nothing like the unicorns from the stories I’ve heard. …Are you really unicorns?”

“During the destruction of the Harmonic World, we decreased the amount of information making up our spirit forms to survive the ether disturbance-orrrrn.”

“And like this, we don’t need to eat as much and we’re a lot lighter-orrrrn.”

“So this form has been the trendy style ever since-orrrrn.”

“Don’t tell me that ‘orn’ is because you’re unicorns.”

The unicorns exchanged a glance, looked back at Tenzou, and tilted their entire bodies.

“You got a problem with that?”

“That! That was an honest complaint, wasn’t it!?”

“Not at all-orrrrn. All unicorns have pure hearts-orrrrn.”

“Really?” he asked the Reine des Garous who smiled and nodded.

“If they talk back to me, I just hunt them down. I’m a Loup-Garou after all.”

“Is that how it works?” he asked Mitotsudaira who averted her gaze.

''Being her daughter can’t be easy,'' he thought while counting the unicorns.

There were four in all, but…

…''Only a virgin girl can ride them, right?

“Um, what are Toori-dono and I supposed to do?”

“Unicorns only allow pure girls to ride them-orrrrn.”

“After all, unicorns love girls-orrrrn.”

“Th-that was blunt! That was amazingly blunt!”

“Calm down,” said a voice behind him.

Next, a gentle shadow and wind moved from behind him.

“Me first!”

Naito sat sidesaddle on one of the unicorns. ''That was fast,'' thought Tenzou, but a moment later…

“Eh?”

“What is it, Master Tenzou? What’s wrong with Lady Naito?”

“Well, um, didn’t they say only a pure girl could… huh? Ehhhhh!? But, wait. Based on the story I once heard about Naruze-dono’s birthday…ehhh!?”

“Oh? Master Tenzou, are you referring to when Lady Naito and Lady Naruze ate a tart in bed together? What’s wrong with that? Don’t tell me that’s enough to make you impure.”

“Do you have a question-orrrrn? My unicorn senses say she’s pure-orrrrn. There’s no problem here-orrrrn. Pant, pant…”

“I-I’d say that panting at the end there is one hell of a problem!!”

“Calm down,” said Mary as she placed her coat over a unicorn’s back and sat on top of it. “This way, I won’t hurt your back, right? I learned that in England. When riding without a saddle, you can hurt the horse’s back if it isn’t used to carrying people.”

“Wh-what a disappointment-orrrrn.”

Once Mitotsudaira sat on one as well, all of the girls except the Reine des Garous had their steed.

…''I can just run alongside them, so…

He turned around to call for Toori and found the idiot was crossdressing.

“Um, Toori-dono?”

The idiot turned around in an M.H.R.R. girl’s uniform and a blonde wig.

“Do I look good in this!?”

…''How am I supposed to answer when he asks so forcefully?

At any rate, the Reine des Garous, who was dressed the same, brought a hand to her cheek.

“I had those sent here like you asked, but it looks far better on you than I expected.”

“Um… What craziness is this?”

“You really don’t get it, Tenzou!? This is so they’ll carry me as a pure maiden!”

“Perverts are impure at the most fundamental level, so no thank you-orrrrn.”

“Y-your plan has failed already!”

“Calm down,” cut in the Reine des Garous as she looked back and forth between Tenzou and the unicorn. “As vice chancellor of Hexagone Française, I will courteously carry Musashi’s king. If I’m holding him, the boy will not actually be ‘riding’ you, right?”

She picked up the idiot in a princess carry. “Umm,” said Toori as he scratched at his head, but he did not actually protest. Tenzou decided to leave that to the Reine des Garous, but then…

“Over here, my king.”

Mitotsudaira closed her eyes, raised her nose, and turned away before swiping Toori with a piece of divinely-protected ivy she had secretly kept with her. “Oh!” cried Toori as he was swung through the air. With his torso wrapped in the ivy, he lightly landed in her lap as she sat on the unicorn.

“Nate, I really feel like a piece of luggage right now.”

“If I left my king with another nation’s vice chancellor, I would never hear the end of it from Horizon and Kimi.”

“Oh, dear. Musashi’s knight wants her king all to herself, doesn’t she?”

Tenzou saw Mitotsudaira briefly bare her teeth at her mother’s provocation.

He truly wanted to avoid another fight between monsters here and he decided to straight-up ignore Naito’s shouts of “Get her! Get her!”

The Reine des Garous shrugged as if to say there was no helping it.

…''Is she enjoying this?

''I don’t understand women,'' he thought as the Reine des Garous climbed onto the remaining unicorn. The other unicorns shouted “orrrn!” in surprise and the one finally reacted.

“Uuh…”

It began to cry.

“M-my purity has been stolen… I was only ever ridden by little girls before! But now….!”

“Friend! The orrrrn! Don’t forget the orrrrn!”

“Mother, I think this plan was doomed from the start.”

“I-I’ve still got it! I do!”

“And I think they’re looking at the whole purity issue from the wrong angle,” added Tenzou.

After a quick discussion, they compromised by placing her coat over the unicorn’s back as a dividing line.

“Well, that’s everyone. I can just…”

Tenzou trailed off as he noticed Mary staring intently at Mitotsudaira who carried Toori in her lap.

After a few breaths, she slowly turned toward him with her eyebrows a bit raised and her cheeks flushed. She then brought her legs together and spread her arms.

“Now, p-please.”

…''Ehhhhh?

The two Excaliburs floated next to Mary as steps up to her, but he could predict a living hell in the future from how Naito was setting up a recording Magie Figur with a businesslike expression.

“Master Tenzou, this situation demands some sacrifices.”

…''Indeed, those huge breasts are definitely worth some sacrifices. And if my future wife says so, it must be true.

Not even Tenzou entirely understood his reasoning there, but he obeyed the guidance of his faith in large breasts.

Once he stepped on the Excaliburs, they floated up.

“Oh.”

They provided footing for him on either side of the unicorn’s back, so he could stand behind Mary without actually riding the unicorn. It required some balancing, but that was a simple task for a ninja. Also…

“Master Tenzou, I think you have this backwards.”

He lifted Mary in his arms. She smiled as her hips rose from the unicorn and Naito whistled behind them, but he had built up his resolve. He started calculating out just how many stealth techniques he would need to use to weather the storm once he returned to the Musashi, but Mary spoke with a smile in her voice.

“I had always dreamed of this situation since reading it in a story. This is the dashing prince carrying you away on his white horse, isn’t it?”

“That burning passion! I’m going to melt!” shouted the two Loup-Garous and Naito, but he ignored that and their suspicious actions. He had clearly already reached overkill levels, so he had nothing left to lose.

“But I imagine things are getting rough in Magdeburg, Musashi, and K.P.A. Italia right about now.”

“What are we gonna do, Shibata? Don’t you think it’s too much work to get this fixated on Magdeburg?”

On the eastern bank of the Elbe River, Narimasa spoke to Katsuie while letting a fishing line fall into the river near their tent. He sat still, waiting for the fishing rod to move, and Katsuie stood about ten meters upstream with a long fishing rod of his own. Katsuie suddenly raised a hand behind him.

A cannon fired, slight ripples covered the river’s surface, and he tugged on his fishing rod.

“Oh! Here we go! That really does get the fish moving! Let’s make this a thing, Narimasa! Cannon fishing! There’s no way this won’t turn into a big business! You handle the advertisement and I’ll manage all the income!!”

“If you want a fishing net, how about you hand over half the rights to that income!?”

“What!? I was clearly joking, you idiot! There’s no way I’d actually team up with you! If I was starting a business now, it’d be with Lady Oichi!”

“God, you’re annoying.”

A fish struck the side of his face, so Narimasa caught the large salmon before it hit the ground and put it in his basket.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing!?” he shouted back.

“You’re freaking me out by taking this so seriously.”

Katsuie backed away a little and went on to look into the northern sky.

“You can’t see the Musashi anymore.”

“Eh? What? Was it scaring you? …Ah, don’t throw rocks at me, you idiot! That’s dangerous!!”

“They’re not even hitting you, so quit complaining. …Anyway, the Musashi may be gone, but some of their people are in Magdeburg, aren’t they?”

Narimasa looked in the direction Katsuie was pointing. Two gods of war were undergoing combat practice toward Magdeburg’s western wall. One was Satomi’s Righteousness and the other was Hexagone Française’s Palais-Cardinal.

“Neither of those are Musashi’s.”

“Old Tomoe’s there, Anne of Whatever’s there, and that chestnut-headed vacuum hemisphere guy’s there, so someone you hate is probably coming too. And they’ll be meeting with Musashi’s vice president…what was her name?”

“Honda Masazumi.”

“Wow, when it’s a girl’s name, you answer right away! You pervert. …Hm, so what’s this? Is that the kind of girl you’re into? Are you in L-O-V-… Oh? You wanna fight? You wanna fight!?”

“God, could you ''be'' any more annoying?”

“Shut up,” said Katsuie before casting his fishing line back into the river. “Musashi’s vice president’s definitely there. Probably some others too as bodyguards. I bet we could take her out if we attacked now.”

“What would you do about Tomoe Gozen?”

“She can only use that Testamenta Arma once a day, so that doesn’t matter now.”

“No, I meant her attack power.”

“What? I’m vice chancellor of M.H.H.R. and P.A. Oda. …And she’s an old lady. Her stamina’s dropped, so I could beat her now.”

“Could you not before?”

“I fought her two or three times before, but decided I was having a bad day and ran. I was only five at the time, though.”

“Oh, so you were a moron as a little kid, too.”

Katsuie began throwing rocks and Narimasa began throwing rocks back, but they finally took a break once Katsuie’s fishing rod moved.

“Well, there’s Musashi’s vice chancellor too, but I’ve seen most of what she can do. The gods of war will raise morale, but they’d need thirty of them to hunt down our entire siege force before we destroyed the city. At best, they could manage a defensive fight. They would probably try to defend the city, but Magdeburg doesn’t have any walls on the Elbe side to promote trade by river.”

“But they dropped the harbor themselves and set up a defense spell device to deflect any attacks. There’s no easy way of attacking, but the plan given at that strategy meeting was to charge straight in. Are you sure that’ll work?”

“It’ll be fine. If things aren’t looking good, we can use a cannon to fire you into the city!!”

“Please don’t strike a pose when you say that. And you’ve got all that solid armor, so you do it!!”

This time Narimasa began the exchange of thrown stones, but they agreed to a truce once Katsuie’s fishing rod moved again.

“Well, we’ve gotta do this right. If we don’t earn a win for Hashiba here, M.H.R.R. will probably get tougher on her.”

“She really pushes herself too hard.”

“We’ve gotta do this.” Katsuie smiled bitterly and sat next to his fishing rod. “Once our master dies, she and I aren’t going to get along any more. I’ll be driven into my own castle where I kill myself. Earlier, Lady Oichi and I were filling up our schedules so we could enjoy every day until then. I don’t know when that’s going to happen, but I need to make sure Hashiba can continue on in my place.”

“There’s no real reason for you to die, you know? You can always retire.”

“We’ve gotta play along. And it’s not much different for you,” said Katsuie. “After my death, you rebel against Hashiba and end up killing yourself. And at the urging of Hashiba and Toshiie’s warriors. …Toshiie has a way of brooding on things, so keep that in mind when you do it. Or as much as a small fry like you can, anyway.”

“Sometimes it seems like death wouldn’t be so bad.”

So…

“I’ve told Toshi to make things as exciting as possible if he’s gonna come for me. I’ve told him to take me on with the kind of excitement he wouldn’t show Hashiba or any of the others.”

“Kah! Would you look at that youth? I can almost smell how inexperienced you are. …Especially that ‘take me on’ pose!”

“Y-you…!!”

“Hey, you’ve got a bite. …Yay! Just kiiiidding! You really are stupid, aren’t you? Hm? What are you pointing at?”

“You’ve got a bite.”

“Whaaaat!? Why are you lying again? Humans really are the worst, you liar in sunglasses!”

Katsuie’s fishing rod almost seemed to hop up as it was dragged into the river. He could only say “ah” before Narimasa cut in.

“Hah! You idiot!”

“What!? That was your fault for not being convincing enough! Your words lacked sincerity! …Honestly, why was I cursed with such an awful underclassman?”

“Oh, god. You really are annoying.”

But Narimasa quickly changed the subject.

“Anyway, I wonder how Kuki and the others are doing. They should be fighting in K.P.A. Italia right about now.”

“Well, Magoichi’s with them, so they’ll be fine.”

But…

“They’re up against K.P.A. Italia, so it isn’t going to be easy.”

As Katsuie looked to the southern sky, M.H.R.R.’s iron-clad ships were finally beginning to corner K.P.A. Italia’s Murakami Navy in the skies south of M.H.R.R. and west of the Seto Inland Sea.

The Murakami Navy had bought some time by pulling back, but they had not destroyed any of the iron-clad ships commanded by Kuki and they were approaching the critical point for stopping them from approaching Itsukushima.

And at 3:17 PM, the Murakami Navy’s fleet of small ships finally deepened its deployment and began firing repeatedly.

Both sides of the naval battle between K.P.A. Italia and M.H.R.R. had finally begun to fight in earnest.

<noinclude>
{{HorizonNavbar
| [[Horizon:Volume 3B Chapter 55|Chapter 55]]
| [[Horizon:Volume 3B Chapter 57|Chapter 57]]
}}
</noinclude>

Horizon:Volume 3B Chapter 55

2015-04-04T23:16:48Z

178.155.187.68: Typo fix.

==Chapter 55: Viewer of the Interval==
[[Image:Horizon3B_0711.jpg|thumb]]
''It is vast

''And it is cold

''But it is filled with something absurd

''Even as it sweeps you off your feet, you cannot look away

'''Point Allocation (First Step)

A large form moved slowly through the sky.

It was a giant white and black ship made up of eight smaller ships.

It was the Musashi.

As it was towed to the north, it cast a shadow on the forest below and the rivers flowing through the gaps in that forest. Occasionally, it would scare flocks of birds into flight or send beasts running.

However, there was no sound below or around the ship. It was being towed with acoustic primary stealth enabled.

But a great number of sounds could be heard within the stealth barrier.

A festival was underway.

“While also making repairs, we are holding a festival to distract the evacuees and Musashi residents from their worries and complaints. Was this Shirojiro-sama’s idea? I have determined it is proving quite effective, but it also means we could not continue on without doing this. Over.”

“Musashi” spoke quietly on the academy bridge at the back of the rear central ship.

She aligned the pile of documents she held and turned toward someone else.

“Satomi Chancellor Satomi Yoshiyori-sama, thank you for taking care of this. However, Musashi Chancellor and Student Council President Toori-sama is not here and the vice president and vice chancellor are both in Magdeburg, so I called Vicereine Horizon-sama here. Horizon-sama, can you greet home? Over.”

“Judge.”

Horizon was wearing her personal clothes and she raised her right hand vertically toward Yoshiyori.

“Thank you for visiting our shop. Please come again.”

“Um, no, I should be thanking you.”

He bent his narrow eyes but then shrugged.

“It’s looking like I’m not going to meet your chancellor a second time.”

“Toori-sama is currently having fun down below with Mitotsudaira-sama, Mary-sama, and Naito-sama.”

“Horizon-sama, you seem to be forgetting someone. Over.”

“Judge.”

Horizon nodded in understanding.

“There is indeed one more: the Reine des Garous who is currently assisting them. Thank you very much, ‘Musashi’-sama. I can be forgetful.”

“Musashi” stared off into the distance and Horizon looked down below.

“I am impressed we could take this many people onboard,” she said.

Horizon had a thought as she looked across the entirety of the Musashi from the academy bridge.

…''Is all of this liveliness a representation of the lives Guericke-sama and I saved with our decision?

''No, that is not accurate,'' she decided.

If she had not made that decision, Guericke would have gotten someone else’s help or done something himself. She had simply gone along with his desire to save them. And…

…''I see.

She finally understood what Asama had said the night before.

She was splitting up the different roles between everyone in order to accomplish something.

She was not saying anyone should be sacrificed.

“…”

She had not gone down to save him the night before because she had heard the others were better suited to that role. And now she had managed to save others here.

…''Yes.

She was playing her role as vicereine.

She looked down at the festival again.

There were people there.

The schoolyard, the second and third schoolyards that followed the stairs down from the academy, and the streets below were filled with people carrying things or sitting around.

Next to her, “Musashi” calculated the number of people with a sign frame.

“Twenty-five thousand people. It is fortunate we could hold them all with only the deck. They are also permitted to enter the commerce block on the first level down as well as the atrium. Over.”

Satomi Yoshiyori had followed Horizon’s gaze and he crossed his arms and nodded at “Musashi’s” explanation.

“That’s the same as Satomi’s population. Musashi really is a massive presence.”

“Thank you very much,” replied “Musashi” before looking to the white god of war standing in the loading port on the back of Takao. “I have determined Satomi’s technical ability is impressive as well.”

“All we do is gather things from elsewhere. The base of our god of war tech was made by Kantou IZUMO engineers.”

He took a breath and looked at his Yatsufusa.

“We acquired an output device for flight equipment from a certain place, but we only managed to modify it for use with the Eight Dogs and Yatsufusa. And the engines have substitution restrictions applied to increase their power, so the pilots need to display the appropriate virtue.”

Horizon looked to “Musashi” and asked an expressionless question.

“Why do guys get so excited when talking about mechs and the like?”

“Judge. Sakai-sama has the same symptoms, so I have determined it is some kind of illness. Over.”

“It’s nice how you people can say anything without reservation.”

“?”

Horizon looked at him as he smiled.

“Are you having trouble communicating with Yoshy-sama?”

''That’s a good question,'' thought Yoshiyori.

He was keeping silent about several important things and that had led her to act hostilely toward him. Sometimes she would seem to grow closer, but then she would move away as if embarrassed.

But…

“I’m the type that thinks that makes this easier. But at the same time…”

He let out a bitter laugh.

“I also wish it didn’t have to be that way.”

“I have determined it is difficult to hold parallel views within yourself.”

“Are you letting me join your parallel views club?”

“No.” Musashi’s princess shook her head. “Recently, I have come to think that everyone has something like that. In England, the Fairy Queen wanted to keep Mary-sama from leaving while also not wishing for her execution and Chancellor Felipe chose to destroy himself yet ultimately chose to continue fighting. …I also saw a battle in which many other people moved forward while also moving back.”

“I see.”

Yoshiyori nodded, but Musashi’s princess unexpectedly said more.

“I have determined it would be nice if you eventually had a chance to speak with Yoshy-sama.”

“…”

He very nearly asked her if she knew what he was hiding from Yoshiyasu, but she gave him a slight nod.

“I apologize. That was only something I learned from Toori-sama…although through his grandmother, Mitsu-sama.”

“And what was that? What did that chancellor’s grandmother say about him?”

“Judge.”

Some urgency had entered his voice, but she answered calmly.

“He went to meet his great-grandmother before he lost her.”

The princess spoke slowly.

“And his great-grandmother was satisfied because she had ‘lived a life that gave her grandchildren who would come see her before the end’.”

“That…”

Yoshiyori paused to choose his words.

“That must have been a wonderful way to live.”

“Judge. And, Yoshiyori-sama, I want to avoid losing anything or being lost. But if the time does come for that, I would want to feel satisfied with myself up to that point.”

So…

“If you are hiding anything or regretting anything, I have determined it would be best to tell Yoshy-sama. If you do, you should be satisfied with everything else.”

“Then are you living a life like that?”

The princess’s answer was not the one he expected.

She shook her head.

“I am still a child who cannot even determine if I am hiding anything or regretting anything.”

“Testament. So do I look like an adult to you?”

“You do,” she replied. “When you use difficult phrases like ‘without reservation’ in reference to our normal conversations, what could you be except an adult? You have an adult flavor to you.”

“Judge. On the vocabulary test I helped with the other day, Toori-sama shamelessly misspelled it as ‘rezervashon’. Over.”

“It’s an issue of spelling?” he asked.

The princess tilted her head as if to say “You mean it isn’t?”, so he gave a slight smile.

“Well, I suppose that means I was saved by children.”

“Saved?”

“Yes,” he said. “At the very least, I was saved by Musashi’s chancellor.”

“That heroine boy is raising flags with both sexes now?”

“What?”

“Nothing. Just talking to myself. I merely felt a need to punish him later.”

''I’m not sure what that means, but whatever,'' thought Yoshiyori. He remembered the past, when he had often gotten lost in thought and tried not to let it show.

“Thanks to him and to you, I was able to avoid abandoning myself. I thought I would tell you that here.”

“Me too?” Musashi’s princess lowered her head and brought a hand to her chin. “I never thought I was a flag-raiser, too. I have been giving Mitotsudaira-sama so many presents, so I may have been raising her affection stat like crazy. …This is perfect!”

He still did not understand what she was saying, so he simply filed it under “childish talk”.

He then bowed and prepared to leave. He had yet to finish repairs on Yatsufusa’s damaged right arm, so he wanted to do that on the way to the Holland area.

“?”

But he saw a maid climbing the academy stairs. It was an automaton who wore glasses and who he had seen on occasion. “Musashi” addressed the short maid as she moved briskly up the stairs.

“ ‘Okutama’, what is it? Did Sakai-sama do something again? Over.”

“Judge. He is once again forcing me to watch his DVD set of the fashionable drama Topaz Story, but I have put that problem off until later. Currently, I have come with something I wanted to inform you of directly. Over.”

Feeling like he should not be present for this, Yoshiyori began to leave, but Musashi’s princess lightly waved a hand back and forth.

“She is merely setting the mood.”

“Okutama” turned around and frantically shook her head, but the princess was not looking. Instead, she sighed and asked “Okutama” a question.

“What is it?”

“Judge. Um… To put it simply, the Palais-Cardinal has created its link with Anne of Austria-sama in Magdeburg. Masazumi-sama and the others are on their way to greet her.”

'''ANA:''' “Is the link okay? Can I open my eyes?”

'''Dragon Dog:''' “The sight devices are in extremely excellent condition. Try to clench your right hand. That will initialize the reaction setting. …Excellent, Lady Anne. The sensory assistance for your entire body has been set. After visual confirmation, it will be reset, so please begin viewing.”

'''ANA:''' “You’re as forceful as ever.”

'''Dragon Dog:''' “And I have determined you are ignoring me and doing whatever you want just as always, but you cannot leave like that. And…”

'''ANA:''' “And?”

'''Dragon Dog:''' “Due to our relative positions, you will have primary control of the Palais-Cardinal once your connection is complete. I will provide assistance, but I will be unable to move this body. Please keep that in mind.”

'''ANA:''' “So you can no longer do everything for me while I lie in bed? Well, that’s fine. I’ll do my best.”

'''Dragon Dog:''' “That’s the spirit. But do you feel cold even inside the Palais-Cardinal?”

'''ANA:''' “Testament. I do. But it looks like it can be reinterpreted as the actual cold felt by Palais-Cardinal. The sun is shining on the right shoulder right now, isn’t it?”

'''Dragon Dog:''' “Excellent, Lady Anne. The temperature settings have been reset.”

'''ANA:''' “Things are gradually filling in, aren’t they? But Luynes, do I not have to put on any makeup?”

'''Dragon Dog:''' “It is splendid how you do not ask to have everyone cleared from the area. And one thing, Lady Anne. Please do not forget that I have confidence in your decisions.”

'''ANA:''' “You are perfect. As always.”

The first thing Anne felt was a breath.

Feeling that air suddenly enter and reside within her body allowed her to sense her own body’s presence. The next thing she knew, light entered her vision as the color white. Not long later, she could make out the shadows as well.

She was outside.

And not in a ''Lourd de Marionnette'' body.

…''Mouse technology is being used to create an ether image with artificial senses.

She sat at the feet of ''Lourd de Marionnette'' Palais-Cardinal.

However, she still could not move. She was afraid that moving would make her body fall to pieces. But with surprise and hope filling her heart, she focused on her lowered hand.

“…”

She grabbed at empty air.

By clenching her hand, she felt the presence of that hand and was aware of her own existence.

That may have been what it felt like to be born.

''I will not cry,'' she told herself as she moved. She knew telling herself to remain calm meant that she was no longer calm, but she still moved her eyes to look around.

Her vision was divided between light and shadow because this was a large place reliant on the sunlight shining in from a tall window.

She was inside the Maurice Cathedral. It was a twin-steepled cathedral along Magdeburg’s Elbe River. When she had come to Magdeburg to have her body converted to data, this large space had been the last thing she had seen.

…''It’s been a while.

She slowly stood up but lost her balance.

“Do not worry, Lady Anne.”

She was supported by a ''Lourd de Marionnette'' hand that carried the Mouse Luynes.

That was when she realized something.

…''I have no weight.

She found she could stand if she kept the “pressure” on the bottom of her feet even.

So she stood. Several Gallican ''signe cadre'' opened around her to adjust her settings. As she watched them, she looked forward.

She could see it there.

…''Yes.

She had entered the outside world.
[[Image:Horizon3B_0725.jpg|thumb]]

Anne first tried to see who was standing around her.

…''I need to greet them and thank them for everything they have done for me.

She thought that to calm herself down as she set foot in the outside world after so long.

However, she first spotted the letters, piles of documents, and some drawings lying on top of the altar before her. The drawings placed atop decorative cloth had been made by a ''Belle de Marionnette'' copying the scene in its memory and the top contained the signature of of the models instead of the artist.

The one of her brother and his wife had both of their signatures. Another with her friend, the Reine des Garous, had her signature.

“…”

She wanted to say something, but found she could not. She simply picked up the two illustrations that were both about thirty centimeters tall.

She held them up before her eyes so the light from the window shined on them.

They were black and white, but she could sense a definite form within them.

“Brother, you’ve grown so much.”

She had met his wife Terumoto just once, but she had lost a lot of her sharpness since then. Terumoto was smiling and driving her right fist into her husband’s side, but she had not put her hips into it quite as much in the past.

Anne decided to assume that meant they were getting along.

The Reine des Garous’s drawing seemed to be from a stop by the academy while out shopping. She was smiling, but…

…''The child who was with her before isn’t anymore, is she?

She felt apologetic for what she had forced onto her friend, but she also gave a natural smile of relief.

…''I want to see them.

These drawings were not them, but they let her feel how much time had passed for them and for herself as well. But…

…''I want to see them.

She understood she was fortunate enough for Luynes to arrive and to receive these drawings, but one’s understanding and one’s feelings were different. If possible, she wanted to share the same space as them once more and she brushed her ether fingers across the signatures.

The three models of those drawings had made those.

Their given names, their family names, and their handwriting were there. This allowed her to touch them.

“Yes.”

And for them to touch her. Once she realized they had touched the drawings, she rubbed them against her cheek. Using those two objects they had touched, she had them touch her cheek.

…''I want to see them.

''Luynes was too perfect. To make sure I wouldn’t cry, she gave me a Mouse body without that ability.

So…

“Luynes, why won’t you let me cry?”

“That is simple, Lady Anne. If you cry, the water-cooling effect would give you a chill. Lady Anne of Austria must always be full of passionate heat. After all…”

“Testament. I understand.”

She held the two pictures to her chest and looked to the people standing in front of her.

“Magdeburg Provisional Mayor Guericke, thank you for all you have done. And…”

“Long time no see, Anne.”

“You are a difficult person to deal with, but it is lovely that you show up at times like this. …Tomoe.”

“I’m glad you see it that way,” said Tomoe with a bitter smile.

Behind her and the others Anne recognized were some people she did not. However, the black-haired girl in a Far Eastern boy’s uniform and the long-haired girl behind her both bowed.

“I am Musashi Vice President Honda Masazumi and this is Asama Tomo who will be providing divine transmission assistance.”

Masazumi had a thought as she bowed.

…''This is a unique group.

After all, there was a Mouse and god of war treasurer, a hemisphere prostration mayor, Tomoe Gozen aka Luther, and a sickly ether girl with divine blood.

Masazumi silently sighed at how unique her surroundings were.

'''Vice President:''' “England was unique enough and now we have this.”

'''Mal-Ga:''' “How about you look in a mirror? Or maybe get your brain looked at?”

'''Vice President:''' “But I have a reason for wearing a boy’s uniform. Don’t ask me about everyone else, though.”

'''Wise Sister:''' “Heh heh heh. If you have to justify yourself, that means there’s something there needing an excuse.”

'''Asama:''' “Oh, but Naruze aside, I’m glad to see Kimi’s here with us in Magdeburg. I don’t think my mind would last without plenty of other people to play the straight man.”

'''Wise Sister:''' “Did you hear that? This perverted shrine maiden is saying she can’t survive without being surrounded by plenty of ‘men’. …And why are you confessing to me? If you want to get married, I have to be the wife. If I was the husband, I wouldn’t be a sister anymore.”

'''Asama:''' “Wait, stop that! We’re in a Catholic cathedral, so what if you get caught by the sexual security settings!? I’m blocking it for now, but you never know when that won’t work!”

'''Mal-Ga:''' “Try to realize you’re over the line from the moment you have to block it, you idiot. Anyway, I brought a few underclassmen with me, so we can escape if anything happens. I left Weiss Fräulein with Edel Brocken for repairs, but they sent me divine mail saying it would be fully repaired by tomorrow morning.”

Masazumi sent her thanks and took a breath.

The representatives of Hexagone Française and the M.H.R.R. Protestants stood before her, but…

“Last night, Mazarin said that two other VIPs besides Anne would be here.”

One was Tomoe.

“Will someone else be joining us? Who?”

“You can look forward to finding out when they arrive.”

Tomoe crossed her arms and turned around with a smile on her cheeks.

“Yoshitsune forced a lot of stupid things onto you, didn’t she? How about we discuss that to pass the time until everyone arrives? You also have yet to view Magdeburg’s defenses and I’m curious about your team that was sent to meet with Rudolf II.”

“Speaking of that team, is M.H.R.R. interested in the Princess Disappearances as well?”

“Testament. We have our own issues. …And after seeing the situation in other nations, we’re all the more curious.”

“For example?”

Tomoe raised her eyebrows a little.

“An excellent invitation,” she said with a laugh. “Are you familiar with Hexagone Française’s previous treasurer, Prime Minister Richelieu who laid the nation’s current financial foundation?”

“Judge. His policy of expansion created the foundation for Hexagone Française’s development but also created a massive amount of debt. From a simplistic view, you could call him evil, but to his nation and its people, nothing is more reliable than a prime minster who will work for the good of the nation without fearing evil.”

“An excellent assessment. The thing about Richelieu is…”

She pointed her right thumb toward Mazarin, the Mouse sitting on the Palais-Cardinal’s hand.

“While Mazarin there was taking over after him, he vanished. He fell victim to the Princess Disappearances.”

“In other words, Hexagone Française has also lost a leader to the Princess Disappearances. According to your mother anyway, Lady Mitotsudaira.”

Mitotsudaira listened to Mary’s voice over the sound of water.

They were in a forest spring about a minute’s walk east of the candy house.

The area was around three meters lower than the surrounding land and water filled a ten square meter spring from the northern rock face.

“Do not worry. Everyone is saying things can continue as normal even with us here.”

Mary walked waist deep into the water while wearing nothing, scooped the rippling water up in her hand, and turned around. She smiled and called to the others who waited at a slightly higher spot.

“It’s not quite a bath, but your mother was kind enough to offer. We have sweated quite a lot after all the hiking and fighting yesterday.”

“You’re right,” said Naito who had already started removing her clothes and cracking her neck. “Standard cleaning charms aren’t enough to get the oil out of my wings. Nothing beats water. …You’ll be joining us right, Mito-tsan? Want me to strip you down?”

Naito’s spread hands approached and Mitotsudaira backed away when she remembered the previous night. But she realized she only had to remove her clothes, so she hurriedly reached for her shirt.

…''Ah.

That reminded her that her choker was gone, but before she could feel too down…

“You’re mine!”

Naito was already wearing nothing but her shirt and she grabbed Mitotsudaira to strip off all her clothes.

“Hey, is it just me or are things pretty noisy over there? Don’t you want to check it out, Tenzou?”

Toori was tied to the yard’s fruit tree with rope and Tenzou was sitting in the grass checking on the topography.

…''Not even this situation can change that boy.

“Toori-dono, you could have avoided this. When Mary-dono said they were going for a bath and asked what you wanted to do, you could have kept quiet and not announced your plans to peep.”

“Yeah… Unlike you, Mary’s pretty nice, so if I’d said we’d take a bath too, she might’ve let us.”

“M-Mary-dono might very well have said that, but I would have stopped you! And I feel like you slipped an insult in there! But anyway…”

Just as Tenzou said that, the candy house’s door opened and the Reine des Garous stepped out. However, Tenzou immediately looked away.

…''G-going outside in nothing but a shirt!? How shameless can you get!?

He repeatedly shouted “inappropriate!” in his heart, but he sensed her approaching and setting something down. Then she suddenly tapped on his shoulder.

“I wouldn’t be dressed like this if I cared if you saw me. Men decide for themselves that they’re looking too much.”

“Uuh…”

''The wife genre really isn’t for me,'' decided Tenzou before looking to what she had set down next to him.

“These are M.H.R.R. uniforms, aren’t they? And…”

“Hello.”

He saw something a lot like the brown algae creatures except with a little more green. It may have been an indigenous variety and there were five of them.

“Testament. We will be passing through M.H.R.R. territory, so I had a change of clothes brought for my daughter and the others. And if they put their current clothes in this basket, these little guys will clean them. I also had a special program prepared for copying your clothing’s divine protection settings into the M.H.R.R. uniform hard points.”

“I am very grateful, but…”

“?”

He sensed her confusion but still did not turn around.

“Earlier, Mary-dono and the others destroyed the house a little.”

“…Pf. …Ha ha. Wh-where?”

Surprised that she had laughed and not been angry, he pointed at the wall.

“The chocolate around there, I think. When Mary-dono grabbed it, about half a brick came out. When I touched it, about a tenth came out. When Naito-dono did, she could peel off about a fifth of a wafer brick, but…”

“Yeah, when I pulled out one of the popsicles making up the eaves, it said ‘winner, take another’,” said Toori. “That happened four times in a row, but I put the last winner back because I didn’t want to take them all and I’d give myself a chill if I ate any more. That last one fell back down, so I split it with the others.”

“You really are a child, aren’t you?”

“Yes, he is,” agreed Tenzou. “And wait! You didn’t split it with me!!”

“I think Mary saved half for you with a freezing spirit.”

''I see,'' realized Tenzou. ''That’s Mary-dono for you.

“Tenzou, you’ve got a great wife, don’t you? Hm?”

“Eh? Well... Ha ha. Mary-dono makes every day wonderful. Living with someone like her makes every hour, every minute, every second, and every split-second worth it.”

“Hey, Nate Maman. We can ignore that idiot while he wiggles around there. And did Naito’s Magie Figur record that? …All right! Let’s make a new MAD and release it!”

“I can’t believe you! I just can’t believe you!! And what do you mean a ''new'' one!?”

But after checking the things the Reine des Garous had set next to him, Tenzou had something else to focus on.

“There is a fair distance to Rudolf II’s tower. I would like to reach Magdeburg by midnight tonight to prepare for the Sack of Magdeburg tomorrow, so we do not have all that much time.”

He had allowed the girls to bathe so they could take a breather and maintain their motivation.

His ninja hearing sensed distant voices saying “Wow, yours are huge, Ma-yan! They stick out on either side!” and “Really? I think they’re just perfect for resting on Master Tenzou’s back when I lean up against him.”, so his own motivation was rapidly recovering.

However, the Reine des Garous tapped him on the shoulder and walked toward Toori.

“Don’t worry. I’ve prepared us transportation. …I am the ruler of the forest, remember?”

''Eh?'' he thought as she used her fingers to easily tear the rope binding Toori and rubbed his head.

“I’m going to take a bath too, but no peeping, okay?”

“Sure! I won’t peep! I won’t peep at all! Super zoom! You’ve got nothing to worry about there!!”

''You never betray people’s expectations of you, do you?”'' thought Tenzou.

“Good, good,” said the Reine des Garous with a smile in her voice. “It’s been so long since things were this lively around here.”

<noinclude>
{{HorizonNavbar
| [[Horizon:Volume 3B Chapter 54|Chapter 54]]
| [[Horizon:Volume 3B Chapter 56|Chapter 56]]
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</noinclude>

Horizon:Volume 3B Chapter 54

2015-04-04T22:53:58Z

178.155.187.68: More typo fixes.

==Chapter 54: Inexperienced Meeting Participant==
[[Image:Horizon3B_0691.jpg|thumb]]
''Why is no one

''Leading me by the hand

''Like they used to?

'''Point Allocation (Subject and Object)

Satomi Yoshiyasu’s morning started early yet again.

She felt she had been careless the day before, but she was careless again today.

Due to the Musashi Chancellor’s early morning splatter the previous day…

…''Today, I surrounded the bed with spears and such with evil-repelling charms on them, but…

She had thought her defenses were perfect, but she had woken screaming again when the vassal’s mobile shell fell and smashed everything. Half embedded in the floor, the vassal moved the round shell to crawl out.

“Wow, I missed my landing a bit! Another seventy centimeters to the right and I’d have crushed your head! Thank goodness I didn’t! …Ah! Sorry! I have to go flying to Musashino now! See you later!!”

The girl had then left, but it had been Yoshiyasu’s carelessness to not notice the battle on Musashino.

Yoshiyori had apparently noticed, but he had said P.A. Oda’s involvement meant Hashiba might be making a move via Houjou. Yoshiyasu thought that was a little unfair, but…

“Miss Balfette, was it? You don’t need to give me a gift of confections or bow down, so just relax.”

She and Balfette stood in front of the city hall along Magdeburg’s river. M.H.R.R.’s forces looked like a sea of warriors across the river and their aerial ships were waiting overhead.

“The Musashi is evacuating people, so the city’s practically empty. It must be tough for M.H.R.R. to keep up their motivation to attack.”

Chancellor Yoshiyori had stayed on the Musashi because he claimed to have some paperwork to complete with “Musashi”, but Yoshiyasu had remained in Magdeburg because she wanted to view what could be a major turning point for the Far East.

Righteousness stood next to the city hall and she hoped it would help threaten the M.H.R.R. forces across the river.

“Do you know anywhere to get food around here…should I call you Miss Vassal?”

“Sure, for now.”

The vassal opened a sign frame. Hers was a Catholic sign frame, so the nearby Magdeburg residents shrieked and backed away.

“Oh, whoops. I should put on Musashi’s special Protestant camouflage skin. I don’t want unnecessary fear and suspicion when I’m on their side.”

She scrolled through different designs for her sign frame. There were flower, sumo ring, and keyhole kofun designs that Yoshiyasu could not imagine a use for, but the girl finally found the Protestant one.

“There. Pretty well made, isn’t it? It displays a bible verse every morning and the crossword puzzle includes the Ninety-Five Theses.”

“Why is Musashi making things like that?”

“Don’t worry about it.”

The vassal began searching the map, but Yoshiyasu spoke to her again.

“Miss Vassal, shouldn’t you be fixing that armor of yours? At the meeting last night, you decided the Musashi forces would create an escape route for the people taking part in the Sack of Magdeburg, didn’t you?”

“Judge. The Musashi will take in the participants. Once inside, they’ll be in a ‘city other than Magdeburg’, so M.H.R.R. won’t be able to attack them.”

The vassal lowered the ends of her eyebrows and smiled.

“But the disturbance this morning took out the leg actuators of my mobile shell. It’s being looked at on the Musashi, but I’m afraid it’ll be some unique issue.”

She then lifted her eyebrows and sighed.

“We’re in charge of evacuating and securing the people, but the Magdeburg warriors have the harder task of defending the city. Their death is pretty much guaranteed here.”

“I heard Mayor Guericke gathered a bunch of Living Dead, but I doubt that’s enough.”

“Historically, the surviving women were raped, weren’t they?”

“Don’t make me shudder,” muttered Yoshiyasu as she looked around the square in front of the city hall. Rows of muscular men who had chosen to remain in Magdeburg were gathered there.

“Listen up! Tomorrow night, we’re gonna show those M.H.R.R. Catholics and Far Eastern apes what we’re made of! They’re all the pathetic type that’s here for a woman!”

“Testament!”

Yoshiyasu spoke quietly as she watched that main force of a thousand men.

“They sure are full of energy for a crossdressing and legitimately gay army.”

“They were recruited from all of the Protestant cities, weren’t they? Those heroes gathered when they heard they would be counted as women in the official records. Almost makes you feel sorry for the M.H.R.R. army that has to rape them to follow the history recreation.”

The men began training by tackling each other and pinning each other in the north-south position. After a glance toward them, the vassal raised her right hand.

“I found a restaurant that’s open! But there’s a problem. Others from my class are bound to be there. Is that okay with you? There’s no other option.”

“There’s also… Oh, the city hall cafeteria is working as a distribution center for the warriors, isn’t it?”

Men dressed as maids stood with their arms crossed below the customer-less tent of the distribution center at the back of the square.

The vassal looked their way and they walked over when they noticed.

“Oh, dear. Those girls are looking our way.”

“Poor things. Neither of them have anything at all.”

“You’re right… And yet even I have a 121 bust. I wish I could share at least 10 of that with them.”

''That’s your chest measurement, not your bust,'' thought Yoshiyasu, but she managed to endure by reminding herself that she was sure to grow and become more like her sister. ''That’s right! I just have to!

The vassal took a step forward.

“The nearby cathedral is running a food stand, so let’s go check it out.”

Yoshiyasu looked south past the buildings and trees. She saw two steeples there, but she saw something else on one of them.

“That’s Palais-Cardinal, isn’t it?”

Yoshiyasu saw one of the steeples had its roof portion removed and a silver god of war sat on it. The god of war’s upper chest appeared to have slid forward somewhat.

“Anne of Austria is being transferred from the church’s hospital via a wired connection.”

“Judge. She apparently said she wanted to see the outside world and walk around.”

A god of war had a wide range of vision and its accelerated thoughts slowed the passage of time. But was that a good way to view the scenery just before one’s death?

Yoshiyasu briefly thought of her sister and the man who had killed her.

…''The last scenery she saw was…

It had apparently been the water of Edo Bay and the dawning sky. Or so ''he'' had told her.

She wondered if the sky and the sea had been a good final sight for that girl who so loved the land of Satomi.

But…

…''What did she and that man hope for and what did they gain from it?

She clicked her tongue at the annoyance of not having been told anything.

“Want to go? They probably have some snacks there.”

When the vassal turned and smiled at her, Yoshiyasu erased her inner thoughts and closed the lead of a few steps the girl had made.

“You like to keep things positive, don’t you?”

“What makes you say that?”

“This might be rude of me, but that battle this morning more or less ended as Musashi’s loss. If I were in your place, I’d be feeling down.”

“Oh… I’m pretty down, too. It makes me want to curse. I mean, that Sassa guy didn’t see any of my charm as a decoy and I’m too slow to keep up with him.”

“That’s not being down. That’s frustration.”

The vassal laughed behind her glasses and they turned left at a four-way intersection.

“Oh, that was the code calling a meeting of Technohexen. The 3rd special duty officer was right,” said the vassal, but Yoshiyasu had not noticed anything.

But as she walked along the dried dirt…

“I don’t change much when I’m feeling down. I’d only trip up our main fighters if I did. But when you are a main fighter – like a special duty officer or higher – then I think you have a real reason to feel down after your loss. After all, you have to think about how to use your different techniques, weapons, and abilities and how to improve with all of those things. But someone like me only has to give them the time they need to think through all that. I feel like that’s what I can do to have some real impact.”

She gave a bitter smile.

“Oh. Satomi Student Council President, you’re one of those main fighters, aren’t you? Sorry if I insulted you.”

“No, um…”

What was she supposed to think?

Unlike the chancellor’s officers, the student council was usually not expected to fight, but she had been given Righteousness, she had stood alongside her sister and that man, and she had tried to have Yatsufusa accept her after her sister’s death.

…''But Yatsufusa wouldn’t even activate for me.

What was different between her and that man? And…

“I’m…not really a ‘main fighter’.”

There was no real point in telling this to someone from another academy. In the past, she had told her sister and that man that they were not treating her like a main fighter. She had been half complaining and half hopeful.

''What am I really?'' she wondered as she lifted her head. Directly ahead, she saw a large cathedral and Palais-Cardinal was connected to one of the steeples.

…''Did Anne of Austria think any of these things too?

Even on her sickbed, Anne of Austria had been given the authority of chancellor and student council president for the provisional inherited name that would ensure her brother’s inherited name. However, she had gained the Reine des Garous’s trust, laid the groundwork for her brother’s rule, and…

“She went beyond the history recreation to place herself in Magdeburg and drive a wedge into the world.”

“Eh? Oh, you mean Lady Anne of Austria. …Hey, there’s the stand.”

The vassal took a few steps forward as if she had completely forgotten about Yoshiyasu, but she suddenly turned around and followed Yoshiyasu’s upturned eyes.

“From what I’ve heard, Lady Anne sent a request to the Reine des Garous.”

“Should you really be telling me that?”

“The secretary said I could share information with you while you’re working with us.”

The vassal continued.

“There’s a steel tower near Magdeburg but outside the siege. M.H.R.R. Chancellor Rudolf II is imprisoned there and the Reine des Garous is supposed to guide Musashi’s representative there. In other words, it was a request to put together an expedition to visit Rudolf II and obtain a document on the Princess Disappearances. …Apparently, that’s the tower.”

The vassal pointed to the southwest.

Beyond the city walls and past a hill, a black line rose into the sky. Yoshiyasu used the standard abilities of a god of war pilot to judge its distance and size by eye.

“That’s six or seven kilometers away. It’s about thirty meters wide but five hundred meters tall.”

“That’s apparently where the expedition is headed. Yesterday’s enemy can become a reliable ally today, but I hope they can at least wait long enough to give the 5th special duty officer and the Reine des Garous time to talk.”

“Anyway, based on the information I have, the defenses at and around Chancellor Rudolf II’s tower are fairly useless.”

Tenzou spoke from the right side of the table, Mary sat with him, and Mitotsudaira listened from the top end the table.

They were currently holding a meeting, but…

…''Honestly, my mother was acting so hostile just half a day ago, so I can’t believe she’s being so cooperative just because someone ordered her to.

At any rate, Mary had agreed to the suggestion that the chancellor make them breakfast, so they were using that time to hold a simple strategy meeting.

“Anyway, that is the order instructing us to go to Rudolf II’s tower near Magdeburg.”

Tenzou was speaking to Mitotsudaira’s mother who sat on the left side of the table.

She looked down at the letter Tenzou had given her. The surface of the parchment from Hexagone Française displayed a Gallican ''signe cadre'' and she read it while listening to Tenzou.

“Testament. I have heard of it. During the Age of the Gods, the historical Catholic Emperor Rudolf II was imprisoned because he neglected his governmental duties and obsessed with researching Technomagie. The same happened during the history recreation, but the Catholics gave his tower in Prague to Hashiba and moved Rudolf II to a newly-constructed tower southwest of Magdeburg.”

She smiled with the ends of her eyebrows lowered.

“Magdeburg is a city of the Protestant principality of Saxony and yet they placed the Catholic emperor there. …Basically, they were showing off and proving that they did not care what happened to the emperor. That shows that he has no one to rely on even if he wants to stop M.H.R.R. and Hashiba and it proves his brother Matthias and Hashiba have more power than him. …Not to mention that he was emperor before the Thirty Years’ War, so M.H.R.R. likely plans to abandon his tower and declare his history recreation complete during the Sack of Magdeburg.”

“In that case, we need to reach his tower before the Sack begins,” commented Tenzou.

“That’s right,” said Naito who sat toward the entrance across from Mitotsudaira. “But even assuming we do get this…document on the Princess Disappearances? Well, whatever this memo from Chancellor Carlos I is, even if we get it and send it to Hexagone Française, how will we get back to the Musashi?”

“Judge. After the Sack of Magdeburg, the Musashi will fall under the authority of the city of Magdeburg. From there, it will be towed along the river as a transport ship. That will apparently take it all the way to the Seto Inland Sea.”

That had apparently been Horizon, Masazumi, and the others’ decision.

“So,” continued Tenzou. “Once the Sack begins, the battle will spread to the neighboring areas, so we need to move somewhere safe before then. And once it is over, we can have the Musashi pick us up while it’s being towed. Of course, if something happens, we will need to enter Magdeburg itself.”

“Yeah,” said Naito across the table from Mitotsudaira. “Tenzou, are the divine transmissions from the Musashi being intercepted? If not, we could call some underclassmen and Ga-chan to take us back from Rudolf II’s tower.”

“They probably are being intercepted. The Catholics have a connection to Aki’s Itsukushima Shrine through the Pope-Chancellor and they would probably try to use that when faced with Shinto transmissions.”

After listening to all that, Mitotsudaira had a thought.

…''Th-there’s almost nothing for me to say here.

Mitotsudaira suddenly felt left out.

…''Well, there’s no helping that.

She knew they were going to complete their preparations and leave for Rudolf II’s tower.

But Tenzou was in charge of their tactics and route, her mother would check on Tenzou’s ideas, Mary would ask about anything she did not understand, and when Tenzou’s ideas were not enough, Naito could jump in with her knowledge of Technomagie or familiarity with the land as a former M.H.R.R. resident.

Mitotsudaira was usually in charge of combat, but with her mother helping, there was nothing for her to do there either. She felt horribly left out as she nodded and peered at the map on Tenzou’s sign frame.

…''I’m sure I’m only imagining it, but I feel like the kid no one likes who tries to join other people’s groups!

Her mother smiled and turned toward her.

“Nate? If you have any questions, don’t hold back. Just ask.”

''I know that!'' she thought. ''You don’t have to treat me like a child.

She knew her mother could be mean and that saying this would not help, but…

“I am the 1st special duty officer, you know?”

She only noticed how prickly her voice was after the fact. She had been ignoring that her mother was trying to help them. She was not just being treated like a child; she was acting like one too.

…''But, well…

It may have been the location that made her feel left out.

…''I can’t believe we’re holding a strategy meeting in this candy house.

She had never actually been here before. Their home had been far to the west near Paris. Thinking back, she realized her mother had moved to disguise the fact that she was the Reine des Garous.

After hearing her mother’s stories, she had often begged to be brought here. Her mother had smiled bitterly and said that was impossible, so she had called her a liar to provoke her.

…''I tried searching the nearby forest but naturally couldn’t find it.

After getting lost and crying until she fell asleep, her mother had found her and taken her home. She remembered seeing the starry sky from her mother’s gently swaying back.

“…”

But now that she was here, she knew why her mother had never brought her.

…''It smells very strongly of her and father.

The others did not seem to have noticed, but a Loup-Garou would pick up on certain scents. It resembled blood yet had a sweetness to it, so smelled somehow sticky and addictive.

Mitotsudaira realized that her mother’s old stories about what was here and what happened here were all true.

“Ugh…”

The smell and the images it gave her made her feel a little woozy.

''I give up,'' she thought concerning the feeling of being left out.

“Here’s yours, Nate. There’s plenty more, so make sure you eat up, okay?”

Another smell suddenly appeared in front of her.

It was a plate of the chancellor’s cooking.

Mitotsudaira looked at the food on the metal plate in front of her.

“I can really have a ham steak this thick?”

“Well, I don’t get a chance to cut it this thick with anyone but you. I got to have some fun on a bit of a ham adventure or pork adventure.”

He served the vegetables next, but they were stewed in a bowl with butter floating in a cream sauce. The cod mixed in eliminated any complaint about eating only vegetables.

“Oh, I kind of want some of that too,” said Naito.

“Wait just a bit. Nate comes first.”

It concerned her how much that last part improved her mood. He probably just meant she ate the most and he was preparing the most up front, but…

“Nate looks like she’s starving. Her nose has been twitching for a while now.”

…''No, um, that’s because…

She could hardly say she was bothered by her parents’ smell, so she gave a harsh denial without thinking.

“I-I was not doing that.”

“Oh, my. What a disgraceful girl. …You need to take deeper breaths when doing that. That will bring in more of the smell.”

“Is it just me or are you pretty amazing, Nate Mama?” said Naito.

''Was that a compliment?'' wondered Mitotsudaira, but her mother placed her hands on her cheeks and wiggled around. She must have been happy to receive any kind of praise.

The woman could not have missed the smell of her and her husband, but did she understand how Mitotsudaira felt? If so…

…''I can’t tell if she’s partially ignoring me or trying to help.

Mitotsudaira sighed and the chancellor shook a bowl.

“Tenzou, what are you gonna do for food? Do you not need any? Yeah, a ninja can’t eat much. If you get too heavy, you can’t move around fast. There’s no helping that. If you insist the straw here is enough, I guess I’ll leave you with that.”

“W-would you stop giving me that sympathetic look without letting me speak for myself!?”

Mary reacted to Tenzou’s protest by standing up. She pushed her chair in and turned toward Mitotsudaira’s mother with a serious look. The look was enough to make the woman falter.

“I can borrow your kitchen, I assume.”

After Mary requested confirmation instead of asking, Naito began recording and Mitotsudaira’s mother nodded once she realized what was going on.

“Oh, my,” she said with her hands on her cheeks before returning Mary’s look.

“Are you that…um…ninja? Anyway, are you his…well…lover?”

“Judge. We have decided we will be together.”

“Then…you live together? And at night, do you…um, sleep together?”

“Judge. When we sleep together, I am on the bottom and Master Tenzou is on top.”

'''Gold Mar:''' “Victoryyyyy!! I don’t know what just happened, but I just won!! I hit the jackpot!!”

'''Silver Wolf:''' “Well, I suppose that’s better than anything abnormal.”

'''10ZO:''' “Th-this is a misunderstanding! She’s talking about our bunk beds!”

At any rate, they were served a bacon and cabbage soup. Mitotsudaira was served first, followed by Naito. Mitotsudaira felt bad toward Naito, but she also felt a fleeting happiness at being chosen to go first.

She went on to eat some bread with liver paste.

…''Ah.

It made her feel nostalgic.

Mitotsudaira continued eating a few more bites without thinking.

…''This liver paste tastes so nostalgic.

That may have been because it tasted the same as her mother’s homemade paste she had eaten for breakfast back home. She had eaten similar breakfasts on the Musashi, but her mother had not been there.

''Why did I think she was an enemy?'' she started to wonder.

“…”

But she corrected herself: ''She is an enemy. She is only helping for the moment.

She knew her mother would crush someone if that person would eventually oppose her. That was the kind of person she was. So once this cooperative mission was complete, it was possible she would immediately attack once more.

Mitotsudaira wondered if it was wrong of her to be so worried about that future that she could not enjoy herself now.

But…

“Here, Nate. Ham #2.”

“Eh!? Wait! Um, when they’re this thick, a second one would bring my calories up to…”

Her mother raised her hand, placed it on her cheek, and spoke in a reserved tone to the chancellor.

“May I have a third one?”

Mitotsudaira could feel her competitive spirit firing up.

…''Th-that woman!

She was starting to understand what led Horizon to remove walls. However, her mother turned her way and tilted her head.

“Just so you know, Nate, I slept with him last night.”

“Eh?”

Mitotsudaira looked to the chancellor who was cutting the ham.

“Yeah, that’s right. I ended up bleeding a whole lot.”

'''Gold Mar:''' “I’ll delete this part when I hand it over to Ga-chan.”

'''10ZO:''' “Huh? Huh? Why are you handling this so differently than with me?”

'''Silver Wolf:''' “I have a feeling it’s all over regardless from the moment she’s giving it to Malga.”

''Anyway,'' thought Mitotsudaira as she noticed something heavy in her heart.

…''Um, my king was…

''“Eaten” by my mother? Does that mean, in a way, I wasn’t able to protect him?

She briefly pictured Horizon’s face and thought of the word “knight”.

“W-wait! Um, uh…!”

She looked at her mother who smiled back with just the corners of her mouth.

“Oh, my. What a frightening look.”

“Mother!”

“C’mon, Nate. Your hair’s bristling up.”

More plates arrived. First for her and then for her mother.

“When we say ‘slept’, we literally just mean ‘slept’,” said the chancellor. “Unfortunately for me, nothing sexual happened.”

…''Eh?

She did not know what exactly happened and she did not know what he had meant by bleeding, but she breathed a sigh of relief.

“Is that so?”

“Oh, dear. She actually bought it.”

Mitotsudaira did not listen to her mother’s cruel joke. She relaxed her shoulders, sighed again, decided to resume eating, and saw what was on her plate.

“Um, can I have a third one too?”

“Can you manage as much as your maman?”

Her mother gave a triumphant laugh, so her response was obvious.

“Easily!”

<noinclude>
{{HorizonNavbar
| [[Horizon:Volume 3B Chapter 53|Chapter 53]]
| [[Horizon:Volume 3B Chapter 55|Chapter 55]]
}}
</noinclude>

Horizon:Volume 3B Chapter 53

2015-04-04T22:25:42Z

178.155.187.68: Two typos fixed.

==Chapter 53: Neighbor at the Breakfast Table==
[[Image:Horizon3B_0673.jpg|thumb]]
''In terms of time

''What do you call

''Having someone who will say good morning?

'''Point Allocation (Fulfilling)

The Reine des Garous’s morning began when her hunger woke her.

The sunlight and the time were of no consequence. It did not matter how bright it got or how much time had passed.

…''If I’m not hungry, there is no real reason to get up.

She would hear and smell food being prepared. She would also sense the warmth and scent of someone she wanted to eat. It was only once that filled her with desire that she would wake.

Today, it was the scent that came first.

It was a sweet scent that was a bit stuffy yet also stung her nose a little.

…''I know this smell.

With that thought, her mind left its slumber.

She felt the shirt and sheets on her skin and the reliable warmth of the blanket covering her. Her ears moved in the sunlight shining in on her.

“Nn…”

She awoke. She opened her eyes just a bit but then closed them again and slowly crawled along the bed. She drew her knees up below her stomach and stretched her body forward while lifting her butt.

“Yawwwn.”

After a yawn, she inhaled to clear her head. She sniffed at the air and got up once she recognized the smell.

…''Oh?

She found a Far Eastern uniform’s coat draped over the blanket.

“…”

She smelled it.

…''Oh, it smells like my daughter.

''There are other girls’ scents, too. That boy has a lot of them around him. Oh, and boys too. This scent definitely came from someone grabbing him in a chokehold as if dragging him to the police. But who is this one that stinks of dogs?

At any rate, the Reine des Garous savored the brief luxury of draping the coat over her shoulders before walking into the dining room.

She slipped through the door-less entrance and found the scene of their dinner last night. The boy was cooking in the small kitchen. He sensed her approach and turned around to explain what he was making.

“Oh, you’re up? I’m making some jam, but do you want breakfast too?”

“My actual mom’s a samurai who runs a snack shop,” he explained while serving the bread and other foods he had cooked on the stove.

But once he arrived next to the table and looked at her, he froze in place and looked taken aback.

“What’s the matter?”

“Eh!? Oh, um, I just had my breath taken away when I saw a huge-breasted werewolf wife wearing nothing but a shirt this early in the morning!”

“I’m not sure I want you to have your breath taken away by that.”

“Don’t worry about it.” He formed a frame with the thumb and forefinger of both hands and placed it around her. “Zooooom iiiiin! Okay, got it memorized. You can move now.”

He clapped his hands and resumed cooking. Meanwhile, she sat down and sniffed at the cooked ham.

“Um, about this jam…”

“Oh, you know that summer tangerine tree out front? Werewolves have trouble with fruits like that, don’t they? I went out in the yard after waking up, there were a lot of ripe ones, and…”

And…

“A long time ago, Nate told me, ‘I can eat them if the smell is removed by making them into jam.’ ”

His intonation during the quote was oddly similar to her daughter’s, which gave the Reine des Garous an odd feeling. But…

“Then you just now made this?”

He would have only taken the ripe ones, but that still would have been a lot. For citrus jam, the skin had to be washed and finely chopped up, but the smell had not filled the kitchen.

…''He must have done all the work outside for my sake.

“You went to a lot of effort, didn’t you?”

“Ah? It’s fine. I like this kind of thing, and if I don’t act like my ‘normal self’, the others will say I did something wrong.”

“Heh heh. Being the leader sure is tough.”

“Hmm, is it really?”

He passed her a plate.

“Here. It’s thick strips of bacon cooked in the jam sauce.”

That was much like what ''he'' had once made, but she had not told this boy the specifics about that.

She had decided against it because it felt like revealing a weakness of hers, but…

“Nate told me a long time ago. When we all went over to her house once, I was in charge of the food. When I asked what she wanted to eat, she said this.”

''He'' had made it for her at first, she had learned it from him, and she had fed it to that girl. She could not quite reproduce the same flavor as when ''he'' made it, but she remembered that girl rejoicing.

“So you made it for her?”

“No, her instructions were too vague, so it didn’t work well that day. In the end, we got my mom involved and repeatedly tried to reproduce it with feedback from Nate. After about half a month, we got it right. Nate was the most surprised because she hadn’t realized the sauce was from citrus jam. She had always thought it was a type of vegetable teriyaki sauce or something. We started moving in the right direction when I just so happened to use fruit to draw out the sourness and she said it was ‘close’.”

“Is that so?”

She got plenty of the transparent brown sauce on a piece of meat and brought it to her mouth. The jam had not been chilled yet, so it still had some of the sourness of the citrus, but…

“That girl has a sweet tooth, doesn’t she?”

“Oh, you think so too? And sorry about not asking ahead of time, but…”

He took something from the kitchen countertop and held it up for her to see. It was a brick-sized object.

“I pulled on a rock candy brick in the wall out front and it came out, so I used it. That’s fine, right? It’ll fix itself on its own, right?”

“…”

The Reine des Garous was at a loss for words. There was a certain condition for removing the pieces of this candy house.

…''The house will not give you permission unless you are a child.

When she considered what that meant, a light emotion welled up inside her until laughter came from her gut and escaped through her throat. She beat on the table as she laughed.

“Ah ha ha!”

“Oh, damn. Why are you hitting the table and laughi- ohhhh! The table’s transforming the huge tits in that shirt! I can sense a divine presence here! You really are amazing, Nate Maman!”

“Ha ha. …Ahh, I’m crying. At the very least, I really am glad I didn’t eat you here.”

“Here? So it would’ve been fine elsewhere?”

“Well…”

She contemplated how to answer that.

The boy before her eyes would likely become an enemy thanks to the military rule created by her friend, Anne of Austria.

However, that military rule was a public thing and this was a private space. Children lost in the forest could rely on the candy house and it represented the wolf’s one promise that they were not worth hunting.

That meant she would not hunt children here. However…

“It will happen eventually once you leave the forest.”

“When?’

“Well…”

She knew when. She had decided that when she noticed a certain fact about this boy last night.

…''If that girl decides to stick with this king in my presence…

She would hunt them both down if that happened. And she had a feeling it was going to happen before long.

But…

“For now, how about we enjoy ourselves?”

“Sure. Then eat up! I’ve still got plenty more to serve you!”

“Oh, my. But the best part about eating, be it breakfast or anything else, is to share it with someone.”

She indicated the chair next to her and the boy held out his hands.

“Not yet. I can eat once I’ve served everything I’m making. And it can be while you eat, but I want to hear a lot from you.”

“Like what?”

“Judge,” he answered before turning around and getting back to cooking. “What exactly is a king?”

…''A king?

The Reine des Garous could not figure out why he was asking that. After all…

“You are already chancellor and student council president, aren’t you?”

“But I’m not always a king. Like when I’m here, for example.”

“Oh,” she realized before he explained.

“In England, Seijun talked about removing the pro…visual rules? Remove the visual rules? Does that mean no more censorship!?”

“Provisional rule.”

The idiot froze in place for a bit, but suddenly pulled a textbook from his pocket and threw it to the floor.

“D-dammit! This…this always happens! Everyone assumes I’m an idiot and shoves all the unreasonable stuff onto me. Now, just how much has Toori-kun gained from this? (Point Allocation: His Life)”

So what were you saying about the removal of the provisional rule?”

“Curse this wife. She isn’t playing along. …Anyway, um, what was that?”

“I was asking you what you meant. You were talking about England.”

“You sure are nice, Nate Maman!”

She did not hesitate to nod in agreement, but she went on to tilt her head and urge him to speak.

Instead, he served her spinach cooked in egg butter.

“Will this makes the vegetables easier to eat?”

“Did you learn this from my daughter?”

“No?” he replied with a smile.

She was not quite sure what to say, so she took the plate and returned to the previous topic. She mostly wanted to urge him to speak and tried to say what she thought he wanted to.

“In other words, if you removed the provisional rule, you would become a king like our Louis Exiv?”

“Hm… Yeah, maybe.”

“You sure are noncommittal.”

“No, this is why I want to ask. I’m dumb, so I only understood what Seijun said after having her explain it about five times with a diagram and everything. But it’s not my fault. When she sits in a chair, she holds her legs together and the base of her thighs makes a shallow V-line at her crotch…like this. I can’t help but focus on that. …Oh, one quick thing. I’m about to drop this spoon, so can I go under the table to get it?”

“How about you wait until you leave the forest?”

“Oh, c’mon, c’mon.”

He carried over a plate of bread and a jar of jam and sat next to her.

“Time to eat.”

“Anyway, um…about what you were say- …Wait! Don’t eat so fast!”

“Oh, sorry, sorry. I’ve usually got school to get to. So, uh, about what I was saying… What exactly is a king?”

He repeated the question.

“What makes someone a king?”

''That is a good question,'' thought the Reine des Garous.

…''What makes one a king?

She thought about it. As a queen, she could turn the focus toward herself, but this boy was asking how to be a “king” himself.

There could only be the one Reine des Garous, so there was no point in telling him about that. She decided to simply give him some tips as a veteran queen.

“Are you listening?”

“Yes.”

“When you look at the person or the job they do, any king is not that much different from what you are now. They have governmental duties, they determine the direction the academy will take, and they make decisions on any issues brought to them. All of that is-… What is that look for? Don’t tell me you…no, you really are having someone else do all that, aren’t you?”

“But Seijun’s so good at it and she likes it. Sometimes she gets a little too into it. …Ah! But I did make a decision on my own in England! I said we were prepared to go to war if we had to!”

“If you make decisions so rarely, why do they have to be so extreme?”

“Hmm?”

He tilted his head, so she spent a few seconds wondering how to explain this to him.

…''I should probably ask him.

“What kind of king do you want to be?”

“I want to create a kingdom that fulfills everyone’s dreams. Horizon’s and everyone else’s.”

His immediate response made her gasp a little. “That…” she began before swallowing the words.

…''That is impossible. It is nothing but an ideal.

Politics and everything else could not fulfill an individual’s dream. And different individuals’ dreams would conflict with each other. It was utterly impossible to fulfill everyone’s dreams.

“But,” he asked. “What exactly is a king?”

…''What am I supposed to say?

She could only think of “that’s not possible”, so she sighed in her heart.

She could tell him the kind of king he wanted to be was an unrealistic ideal, but that would not answer his question.

She had no answer for him, so she would simply be erasing the question inside him. She would be crushing his dream because she did not want to admit her own failure to answer.

She felt it would be best to tell him to ask someone else, but…

…''How would Anne answer?

Thinking about that gave her a sudden idea.

“Well…”

''I begin like that a lot when speaking with him,'' she realized.

“First, you need to realize that your own desires are a part of those many dreams.”

The Reine des Garous breathed in and continued speaking.

“You too will be a resident of your dream-fulfilling kingdom. You must not forget that.”

“Sure.”

She thought she saw him stiffen nervously, but that may have been from his anticipation of her answer. Or perhaps he was simply distracted by the open gap in the front of her shirt. Either way…

“As the Reine des Garous, it does not matter if a dream is mine, a king’s, a normal person’s, a wild beast’s, a plant’s, or anyone else’s. It also does not matter what that dream is. They can be important, unnecessary, noble, or normal; it makes no difference. …No matter the scale or content, everyone can carry a dream.”

''I’m lecturing him,'' she realized with a bitter smile, but the boy only stared at her with something like a smile on his face. ''What a difficult child. The children who have such high expectations of adults are the hardest to deal with.

But this reminded her of an older time in a number of ways. It reminded her of a time when she was filled with regret.

Thinking she could clear that regret through this boy, she opened her mouth.

“Listen. While everyone can carry a dream, those dreams will all be different. And if my dream, your dream, Nate’s dream, and everyone else’s dreams are all different and all fulfilled in different ways,” she said. “Then you cannot give an all-encompassing answer when you ask what kind of king can fulfill all those dreams. There is no single answer there. …Every individual person has their individual answer.”

So…

“You need to go to each individual person in your kingdom and ask them what kind of king can fulfill their dream. Then you need to make that a reality. And…”

She could not exactly tell him to “become that kind of person”.

But she reached out, placed her hand on his head, rubbed his head with his hair wrapping around her fingers, and poured in some slight strength to convey her thoughts better.

“First, you need to aim to be the kind of person who can fulfill your own dream.”

The boy thought a bit as the Reine des Garous watched him and rubbed his head.

He was not quite convinced, but after a while, he seemed to accept the words. He looked to her and smiled.

“Judge. Thanks.”

“No, there is a lot more you need to think about. You need to ask other people besides me…while also making sure you do not lose sight of what you must do.”

''But it does not seem there’s much to worry about there,'' she thought. However, she wanted him to remember, so she lightly pulled him toward her and kissed his forehead.

She also licked him a bit to check on his flavor.

“Now you have the Reine des Garous’s protection.”

She hoped she would not have to be his enemy, but…

“Ohhh, that massive cleavage is right in front of me! Right in front of me! Ahhhhhh, it’s gone! Goodbye, it looks like the time to part has come! Then again, if you weren’t parted, there wouldn’t be any giant breasts in the first place!”

“Could you calm down a little?”

“Hmm.”

The boy scratched his head and looked to her.

“Nate Maman, as Reine des Garous, did you think about all this at some point?”

“Testament. …Of course, I’m a lot more reserved nowadays.”

She had had nothing back then, but she had been given so much, someone had tried to protect her, and she had wanted to do the same in return. When living alone in the forest, she had never even considered having a child, but now…

…''That is definitely a dream of mine, even if I only realized it after it was fulfilled.

And she was now acting based on that dream. But…

“It must be nice,” said the boy as he looked at her.

He may not have been able to see the path he was moving along.

…''That must be tough.

''I have a feeling his classmates are a little too skilled,'' she thought. ''And those classmates are also not used to having their dreams fulfilled, so they’re doing everything necessary to set him down his path.

But…

“A king needs a lot of help to fulfill dreams. So if you’re having trouble, try asking the people closer to you instead of me.”

“Really? By they’re horrible people, so when I say ‘Hey! Can I ask something!?’, they give me this look of scorn, keep their distance, and say ‘Can you keep it to five words or less?’ or ‘I’m too busy with my manuscript’ or ‘How much will you pay me?’ or ‘What did you do this time? Let’s start with that.’ ”

However, there was one thing she could say.

“Make sure you do not give up on your own dream. There is no need for that and no one can force you to do it.”

“Really? But isn’t it useless to hold onto a hopeless dream?”

“All you are doing is thinking, so how can it be useless?”

He thought for a moment and looked up at her.

“Huh?”

“Do you get it now? Dreaming is not useless. If your dreaming proves fruitless and the dream never comes true, you have to call the dream ‘pointless’ to stop acting on it.”

But…

“Simply holding a dream is not pointless or anything else. If all you are doing is thinking, it never reaches the level of ‘pointless’ or ‘meaningful’.”

“Ohhh.” He gave a slow nod. “Yeah, I think I get it. It’s like in that sex ed program for middle-aged people that insists that ‘You can do it on your own!’ and ‘If it never leaves your imagination, it isn’t a crime! It’s still disgusting, though!’ ”

“I would prefer not to think about that too much, but that’s more or less it.”

“I see.” He chewed on some bread with jam on it and smiled. “Oh, I did a great job on this! Don’t you think!? And I canned the leftovers and put them over there, so eat them whenever you want. Also…”

He turned toward her with a smile.

“Thanks a bunch. Everyone around me is a classmate or someone who’s into the same kind of stuff, so I’m glad I could ask someone like you who’s about ready to eat me.”

“Heh heh. They’re overprotective of you, aren’t they?”

“Hmm,” he thought about that. “I won’t tell them because it would make their heads swell, but I am thankful… I guess. Anyway, what are we going to do today? Aren’t things about to get a lot more fun? I mean, look.”

He pointed toward the front door, indicating something she had vaguely noticed as well.

…''Here they come.

As if to prove her right, a knock came to the chocolate bar door.

“Excuse me! Is this the Reine des Garous’s house?”

They had visitors. And her daughter was with them.

<noinclude>
{{HorizonNavbar
| [[Horizon:Volume 3B Chapter 52|Chapter 52]]
| [[Horizon:Volume 3B Chapter 54|Chapter 54]]
}}
</noinclude>

Owari no Chronicle:Volume13 Chapter 26

2015-04-03T21:02:32Z

178.155.187.68: Three small errors corrected.

==Chapter 26: A Frank Chat About Destruction==
[[Image:OnC_v13_0173.png|thumb]]
''If I am destruction

''Why do you search for me

''When I am only hiding?

Mornings began early for the Tamiya family that ran an influential Akigawa security company.

The house was surrounded by a fence and it was always busy since it doubled as lodgings for the day and night shift security guards.

However, Ryouko was a late riser. Or rather, morning for her began when someone came to wake her.

She was woken to be present for the switch between the day and night shifts, but according to her…

“Why are you always waking me up, Kouji!?”

While according to Kouji…

“Because you never wake up on your own!”

And if you asked Sayama…

“Ha ha ha. This world functions on a give-or-take basis. Just like Shinjou-kun and me.”

But today, Ryouko had woken on her own.

She opened her room’s sliding screen that bordered the central courtyard, yawned, and stepped out in her yukata.

She stood below the eaves to avoid the nearly midday sun and she gathered up her lowered hair in the chilly air.

“Where’s Kouji?”

The wall answered her with a male voice.

“He said he had some business to take care of.”

“Business? Does he have any other daily jobs than waking me up and cooking?”

“Why of course!!”

She pulled a handgun from her pocket, pressed it to the wall, and gave the wall a sleepy smile.

“Again.”

“Ha…ha ha ha. Yeah, I think that’s about all he does!”

“Don’t insult Kouji!!”

She pushed down the hammer and the wall panicked.

“P-please wake up, president!!”

“C’mon, not so loud, Li-san. Walls don’t talk. Talk and I shoot.”

“…”

“Good, good. That’s how a wall should act. …So where’s Kouji? If you don’t answer, I’ll shoot.”

“Ahhhh! But you just told me not to talk! Kouji-san! Kouji-saaaan! Helllllllp meeeeeeee!”

The wall screamed and footsteps ran down the hallway.

Ryouko turned around just as Kouji slid on his socks and came to a stop.

Before she could greet him, he spoke clearly.

“Sister, you’re being unreasonable again, aren’t you!?”

“C’mon, I’m a girl, so you need to smile and forgive a little bit of unreasonableness.”

“Girl?” asked the wall behind her.

She turned around and fired.

“Ah, sister! I only just had that plaster redone! Don’t shoot holes in it!”

“Th-there’s a hole on what’s inside, too!” shouted the wall.

“Now, Kouji, answer me. …Why didn’t you come wake me up?”

“Well…” He briefly hesitated. “Shino-san has vanished. And for some reason, Pes was kneeling down in the yard.”

“Ehhh!? K-Kouji, did you do something perverted again!?”

“No! And what do you mean ‘again’!?”

“What!? You mean you’ve never done it at your age? You awful human being! You living falling birthrate policy!”

“That is not the issue here and quit twisting my words! And Li-san, just because you’re over forty is no reason to start crying inside the wall there.”

Kouji crossed his arms and looked at Ryouko who was lifting her hair with a hair pin in her mouth.

“You don’t seem too surprised,” he said. “Do you know where Shino-san is?”

“Hm? Of course not. I’m not an esper.”

“No one uses the word esper anymore, sister.”

“Sh-shut up. Stop giving me that look of pity. A-ny-way, if Shi-chan left, then that’s fine.”

She stuck the hair pin in her hair.

“It was her decision, right? She isn’t a child anymore, so she had to have a good reason to leave and we would be insulting her resolve if we found her and dragged her back.”

“What if she left because she wanted us to find her?”

“When the injured or sick leave, it’s because they don’t want to be a burden, just like with an old cat. …If the one they’re a burden on approaches, they’ll just run away.”

“Then…”

“There is no ‘then’.” Ryouko gave Kouji a confused look. “Shi-chan can run away if she wants. And if she tries to return, then we really have to take care of her. That would mean this is her only option even though she doesn’t like it.”

She waved a hand to shoo her brother away.

“Go, go. Get back to your work. We can leave the rest up to fate.”

She fired thrice into the wall to drive away the people inside.

She was now alone.

“Okay.”

She breathed in the chilly air and suddenly looked up into the sky.

With her gaze on the blue winter sky, she placed her hands on her hips.

“After I change, I think I’ll go for a walk outside.”

2nd-Gear’s Tsukuyomi asked a question below the library’s light.

She crossed her arms in her lab coat as if trying to defend herself.

“When our Gear was on the verge of destruction, it seems the Low-Gear engineer who should have saved it took too long to make up his mind.”

She spoke plainly and Sayama nodded and crossed his arms as well.

“That is true and I believe we went over all this during the Leviathan Road. Are you digging it back up?”

“Of course not,” she began with a shrug. “There is one thing I want to ask for the sake of the coming new world.”

The witch sitting next to her wrote what she said in glowing words:

“If Low-Gear is faced with the same situation, what would it do?”

She nodded.

“Yes, if the destruction of the world were approaching at overwhelming speed, how would you handle it?”

A pause followed her question.

During that wordless and still pause, the only sounds came from the stenographers, but Tsukuyomi herself finally broke it.

“If you wish to support the world, you must be able to ensure the world will not be destroyed no matter what happens. Surely you aren’t going to tell me you hadn’t given it any thought.”

“To be honest, I hadn’t thought about that at all.”

Sayama’s casual response left Tsukuyomi speechless.

And that was why everyone’s focus turned from her and to him.

With all eyes on him, the boy spread his arms, breathed in, and stared directly at Tsukuyomi.

“Tsukuyomi-kun, you are talking about what we should do when faced with the destruction of the world, but I have a question.”

He held up his left index finger and everyone focused on that single point.

“By any chance, do you happen to know how the world will be destroyed?”

“Well…”

Of course she did not. That was why she had asked what Low-Gear would do. But…

“Not a single person knows, so I have no way of answering your question.”

Sayama peered at her and thought for a moment.

“But you are a worrier, aren’t you? You think the world might very well be destroyed. So…”

He spread his arms again.

“I have a suggestion. If, after this meeting has ended, Low-Gear has been forgiven and allowed to exist, I would like to create a Destruction Information and Countermeasures Research Team.”

“Destruction Information and Countermeasures Research Team?”

“Yes.” Sayama raised his arms. “Or the DIC Research Team for short!!”

“Don’t abbreviate it like that!”

Tsukuyomi reflexively protested Sayama’s abbreviation, but then she frantically looked around.

“Ah!? See! Now that awful term is part of the entire world’s history!”

“Wh-what are you talking about, Tsukuyomi-kun? I merely abbreviated it to DIC! Nothing could be as grand as DIC! DIC is what you call a youthful power! What in the world could be wrong with DIC!?”

[[Image:OnC_v13_0181.jpg|thumb]]

“Stop saying that!! I demand you propose a better name!”

“A better DIC!!”

“Gwah!”

Tsukuyomi collapsed backwards, but Miyako cackled next to her.

“What? You got a problem with DIC? Then go to Ueno and have it cut down to size!”

Tsukuyomi glared at her daughter, but #8 ignored them and spoke.

“Sayama-sama, I believe everyone knows what you are trying to say, so why not leave it at that?”

“Yes, I was getting the same feeling.”

He nodded and turned back toward Tsukuyomi.

She had stopped crossing her arms and had her hands in her lab coat’s pockets instead.

He stuck his hands in his suit pockets to match.

“Well, you get the idea, Tsukuyomi-kun. All we can do is set up an antenna to detect any possible destruction and, in an emergency, gather the humans of every Gear… no.”

He took a breath.

“Gather the residents of what will then be a single Gear and do everything we can do without giving up. At the very least, I can promise the people of Japanese UCAT will not give up.”

“So you’re telling us from 2nd-Gear not to foolishly lose our home for a second time?”

“And to that end, how about you record your history here? Your long history can double as a lesson from the past.”

“Eh?”

Tsukuyomi’s question was immediately followed by Sayama looking up at the unseen sky and opening his mouth.

“The wind carries names, techniques, and a heart that never forgets itself. And that wind blows in the direction you are facing. No matter how often it moves, it will never vanish. And I believe passing on your history is the job of the one with the name of the moon. Also…”

He took a breath.

“We can make more history now, can we not? Tsukuyomi-kun, the history of the past is finite, but the future is – annoyingly enough – infinite. So if you record your history here, that lesson from the past will protect both the present and the future that we will be creating from now on.”

He placed his hands on his desk and leaned forward, but breathed in to cool down his lungs.

“Looking back to the lessons of the past will help prevent the destruction of the world. So… Yes, if you wish to pass on 2nd-Gear’s history, then get to work. We will prepare as much personnel as you need. Everyone has far too much time on their hands anyway.”

He then shouted to the Gear representatives sitting in the darkness.

“The same goes for the other Gears. If you wish to record your history and your world, then bring it on! But…once you finish, join us in this world! The history to come will be much, much longer! After all…”

As he continued, Tsukuyomi dropped exhausted into her seat.

“After all, every Gear will work together against the destruction to ensure we can continue on! And I appoint 2nd-Gear’s development department as the leader of that alliance. Use as much money and personnel as you like. The continuation of the world and of history is on the line!”

Tsukuyomi raised both hands in resignation.

“Fine, fine,” she muttered in exasperation. “Honestly, you cause nothing but trouble.”

As soon as Tsukuyomi sat down, someone else stood up and light washed over them.

However, Miyako was still seated at the desk of 3rd-Gear’s representative.

“Gyes-kun, are you the representative?”

“Yes, sir.”

Gyes nodded and looked to the boy directly ahead of her.

“This is an important time for Lady Miyako. We cannot have her standing for too long.”

“I see. Then you will be saying what you have to say, will you?”

“I will,” agreed Gyes.

The question-and-answer session with the next Gear began.

Everything seemed to click into place as the questions and suggestions continued smoothly.

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