Editing Toaru Majutsu no Index:GT Volume7 Chapter2

==Chapter 2: Which of Them was Caught? – the_Consulate.==

===Part 1===

The holiday didn’t mean Accelerator could take the entire day off.

The statistics were clear: trouble and accidents tended to happen precisely on the days people least wanted them to happen on.

“A consulate in District 12?”

“Let’s see…it’s technically called the Bridge Builders Cabal Academy City Consulate.”

“…”

“Yes, sorry, I know that’s weird! I wasn’t checking thoroughly enough on the diplomatic side of things.”

The response came from Qliphah Puzzle 545 who floated near the ceiling. That artificial demon was acting as the eyes and ears of the board chairman now that he could no longer leave his cell.

A consulate was an extraterritorial area in which Academy City had no real authority.

What is the difference between an embassy and a consulate, you ask?

The biggest difference is that a consulate lacks the authority to represent its country in negotiations with the resident country’s government. A consulate is only meant to provide a link between its home country and that country’s citizens living in the resident country, while an embassy is tasked with battling the resident country at the negotiating table.

That might make a consulate sound like less of a threat than if a country suddenly built an embassy in your country.

But that was inaccurate.

To have a country’s consulate in your country meant it was normal to have that country’s people in your country. That meant Alice’s cabal had gained more than just the consulate’s territory. ''They had created circumstances where magicians could walk freely throughout Academy City.

Something quietly struck the wall.

The walls and ceiling were covered with printed documents. They were all attached directly to the wall with colorful pins and those pins were connected with a spiderweb of colorful strings.

Alice, Academy City’s dark side, the Bridge Builders Cabal, the Shibuya riot outside the city.

Whether or not these things were actually connected was a matter to consider at a later stage.

He only needed to lay out all the information first and visualize all the connections with strings later.

His only information on Alice came from Qliphah Puzzle 545’s reports, but that only made the girl more concerning because it meant someone was strutting through Academy City without any of the city’s security capturing her.

Anna Sprengel had bloodily destroyed the dark side on December 25 and Alice Anotherbible had suddenly appeared on the 29th.

“Qliphah Puzzle 545.”

“Y-yes!?”

“How did you get tangled up in the string? To be blunt, you’re in the way.”

“Heh heh heh heh. Th-the more I try to avoid them, the more tangled I get. You can think of me like the bookish girl who’s terrible at dodgeball.”

Qliphah Puzzle 545 was somewhat tied up in a corner of the ceiling that was quickly becoming her standard spot.

“Umm, I didn’t mind so much when it was just my wings and legs tied up so tight, but now it’s getting to my crotch, which is a lot more- ohh!?”

She seemed to like attention of any sort, so she looked kind of happy about this. Which was why Accelerator chose to ignore the demon who had to be devastatingly bad at jump rope.

Yes.

Accelerator was currently lying on a bed much too nice for a prison cell. There could only be one reason he was back here.

The meeting with his guests had been called off.

Because Alice Anotherbible’s cabal had been detected inside Academy City.

Last Order had not looked disappointed on the other side of the thick glass when he had had to call it off. She had smiled as she watched the board chairman go.

He needed to keep in mind that he was the one who had made her force that smile.

“U-u-umm?”

“What now?”
“Well, you see. Eh heh heh. If you happen to be angry, I would actually find it something of a relief if you would hit me a few times. Just go all out with it.”

Accelerator clicked his tongue.

He knew that wouldn’t solve anything. The artificial demon tangled up in colorful string had only relayed the necessary information to him. He much preferred that to her being too afraid to pass on some important information.

Alice was here.

And several more of those monsters known as Transcendents were with her.

(If only we had a solid definition of this Transcendent term everyone’s started using like it didn’t just appear out of nowhere. Was it in Shibuya on the 31st when that third-rate got himself tangled up in this mess?)

With several of those mysterious Transcendents detected in Academy City, there was a risk of the people living their ordinary lives here encountering them. It could happen to Last Order, to Yomikawa, to Yoshikawa, or to anyone else.

Accelerator wasn’t sitting around doing nothing. He had a few tricks up his sleeve beyond the standard Anti-Skill and Judgment. For example, he had direct fighters like Qliphah Puzzle 545, Fuse Kazakiri, and Misaka Worst.

But not even all that was a guarantee.

The #1 knew all too well that there was no such thing as an absolute assurance of safety.

He couldn’t stop whatever happened outside.

Outside and inside this cell were two different worlds.

And once something happened, he could not protect Last Order. If he wanted to protect her from harm, he had to act before anything happened.

A disturbing mass throbbed at the center of his chest.

He felt like he had a giant egg there in place of a heart.

“…”

There was a reason to act.

But if he left the prison for that reason, he would be causing everything to collapse.

He might feel good about it at first, but the monstrous whispers of reality told him he would only be drowning the world in an ocean of blood if he took that path.

“Qliphah Puzzle 545.”

“Y-yes!? D-d-d-do you need something!?”

Accelerator sighed on the bed while the demon responded more nervously than necessary up in the corner of the ceiling.

“I’m not mad, so lend me a hand. Show me those newspapers you’re wearing.”

“Oh, you mean my dress? Hmm, but I’m not sure what article could tell you more than all these documents covering the walls.”

“It’s not for that,” he replied, feeling annoyed.

For one thing, Qliphah Puzzle 545’s dress was not a collection of actual newspaper articles. It transformed depending on who was reading it, creating articles that pointed out that person’s sins and shames.

In other words…

“Show me my darkness.”

“Um, okay!!”

The demon forced her tangled body to move, placing her hands behind her head.

She showed off her body.

The pattern on her dress writhed. The shocking headlines of those English-language newspapers tore into Accelerator’s old wounds.

Each individual article didn’t matter much.

But altogether, they felt like a great monster.

Yes, there was a monster here.

Everyone had a monster inside them.

It was a fearsome thing that would drag you down the path to death and ruin if you let it, but it could provide great power if you learned to control it.

Accelerator knew that violence came in many different forms.

And he knew there were also nonviolent ways of solving problems.

(Don’t let it take over.)

He felt impatience, tension, anger…and the fear of losing someone close to him.

He took a deep breath and faced his monster.

(I created this monster myself, so I must be able to control it myself.)

If he could start by looking to the destination he needed to reach, then he would reach that goal no matter how much he strayed on the way. He focused on his own immaturity while moving his fingers faster than anyone.

(I don’t know who these people are, but they’ve set up a backdoor into Academy City. The question is what they hope to use it for. A backdoor is a means to an end, not the end itself.)

He lay on the bed, moving various things with his fingers without even glancing in their direction.

The bedside printer spat out paper, he cut those apart with scissors, he tossed the cutouts with his fingers, and he threw a pin to skewer the floating paper. And if necessary, he would swing weightless string like a whip to send it slicing through the air so it could add more color to the display.

He continued organizing his information in a fashion that would be more gruesome than execution by firing squad if someone happened to be standing by the wall.

“You said it was a consulate, right? Then it must belong to some country or another.”

“Yes. Th-they apparently bought a Central American country smaller than a soccer field to gain the qualifications and rights of a country. Eh heh heh. That’s what let them officially use the position of a diplomat or consulate to create an enclave in Academy City.”

“Who the hell gave them permission to do that?”

“Eek!! Diplomacy is handled more by the Japanese government than Academy City, so it was probably one of their bureaucrats. The cabal took advantage of a blind spot we created by focusing so much on what was happening inside the city!!”

A new red pin thwacked into the wall.

It pierced through a point on a map of District 12 floating in the air.

“Still, it bothers me that something so extreme managed to slip by us.”

“No, no!! I assure you this wasn’t anyone’s fault!”

The demon girl frantically shook her head.

She seemed to think she would be left behind if she let the #1’s thoughts turn too far inward. She was in a puppy mode where she craved attention, even if it came in the form of a light slap.

“Things have gotten a lot more complicated after the Crowley’s Hazards because a bunch of artificial islands and ship-towed floats were set up as bases for reconstruction efforts, but now some of them have started declaring independence. Countries are joining together and splitting apart as much as a girl who seems to have a new boyfriend every week, so it can be hard to notice when a country’s system or true ruler has been swapped out. And this is the same area where R&C Occultics tried to set up a massive server center to abuse a legal loophole to gather personal information on people around the globe.”

“R&C…”

“I imagine that connection is how Alice’s group learned about it in the first place.”

A consulate.

Needless to say, that was a special site protected by international law. The laws of the consulate’s country were prioritized over the ordinary laws, so in the most extreme example, a murder case that happened on a consulate’s grounds could be tried in a foreign country’s courts.

And now a magic side consulate had been built inside science’s headquarters.

Nothing could be more dangerous.

They had an enclave.

Or worse, they had a foothold for an invasion. It may have been more like an airfield or bridgehead. The word “consulate” might sound peaceful, but the threat here was closer to the Cuban Missile Crisis when the former Soviet Union attempted to deploy nuclear missiles right at Washington’s throat. Except this time, the deployment had already happened instead of being discovered in advance.

“…”

Accelerator rested back in the large bed and stared up at the ceiling in thought.

He had built a bizarre boxy planetarium made of articles and colorful string. What big picture could he find here?

Could he not see the enemy’s goal because he lacked sufficient information?

Or was he misreading the inciting factor for the attack, such as personal interest, love or hate, sheer coincidence, or simple enjoyment?

The Bridge Builders Cabal had a consulate. That never would have been allowed if they had been honest on their paperwork. Alice and her cabal’s Transcendents must have used some clever trick to gain approval for the consulate. And that approval had come from Japan, not Academy City.

That deception was meant to obtain something here in Academy City.

This was enough to conclude they had some kind of attack planned. Accelerator had already confirmed Anna and Alice were the external factor that had agitated Academy City’s dark side. And as the board chairman, Academy City’s #1 could send the city’s official defenses against them without needing to break out of prison himself. However…

“''I wouldn’t do that if I were you.''”

Accelerator clicked his tongue.

That wasn’t Qliphah Puzzle 545. She remained tangled up in a corner of the ceiling, cowering like a puppy in the rain.

The voice came from the large TV in the wall.

These days, it was unusual for a TV to not be connected to the internet. Of course, it was even more unusual for a prison cell to have a TV at all.

The TV displayed short red hair and white skin.

The strong-willed girl was wearing a fluffy white miniskirt dress.

She was Magician Dion Fortune. Except she technically wasn’t human since she was a magical device created based on that magician who belonged to the Golden cabal. And now she led the Anglican Church as their new Archbishop to fill the vacancy there.

She smiled as a black box twirled with its corner balanced upon her extended finger.

Since she wasn’t human, her thoughts lacked the uncertainty of wishing things would turn out one way or hoping they wouldn’t turn out another way. She cut so directly and accurately to the truth it could seem cruel.

Accelerator didn’t get up from the bed as he flicked two pins into the wall.

He added articles for the Anglican Church and Dion Fortune. Where the string would connect those articles would be determined by the coming conversation.

The magic side leader grinned as she got to it.

“I don’t care what sort of monster you were to begin with. But the Accelerator I’m talking to now is also the board chairman who controls Academy City as a whole, correct? Then don’t lose your cool so easily. You’re only allowed to do that when you’re wielding personal power. The leader of an organization served by lots of people doesn’t have that luxury.”

Accelerator clicked his tongue.

Dion Fortune looked pleased at earning that reaction. She ignored Qliphah Puzzle 545’s flustered stammering near the ceiling and kept going.

“It won’t do you any good to single out and deport the individual Transcendents when you don’t know their names or nationalities. But you should also assume you can’t just shut down the consulate itself,” she said to drive that point home. “You ''could'' do that, but as soon as you did, the 190+ other countries and territories out there would see Academy City as an ''untrustworthy and uncontrollable group'' that shuts down consulates and embassies authorized by the Japanese government the instant they become inconvenient. And once no one trusts any of your promises, diplomacy becomes all but impossible. You might be the headquarters of the science side, but you aren’t designed to survive in complete isolation.”

“…”

“It’s called the Condroniard Republic. The Central American country smaller than a soccer field is very real. As sketchy as it sounds, Alice really did buy an entire country that belongs to the UN and can make use of international law. So if your approach to this consulate doesn’t conform to the relevant laws and treaties, Academy City will be seen as ''a children’s playground'' that doesn’t know the first thing about diplomacy. Once that happens, the war between magic and science will be the least of your worries. Those of us on the magic side will be able to sit back and watch as the science side disintegrates all on its own.”

“Isn’t that exactly what outsiders like you want?”

“Oh, absolutely.”

Dion Fortune made no attempt to hide her interests here.

And with that said…

“But that result alone isn’t good enough. It matters a lot ''who is responsible'' for magic’s victory over science. The Anglican Church doesn’t want Alice’s cabal to be the ones responsible for destroying the science side while leaving the magic side untouched. That would lead to a new magic side that throws out the current main powers of the Anglicans, Roman Catholics, and Russian Orthodox and places the Transcendents of the Bridge Builders Cabal at the top.”

Accelerator could see hints of that being the goal here.

But he threw out that obvious line of reasoning.

“I saw bits of pieces of what Alice did on December 29.”

“Oh? Picking up a new interest in spying to complete your role as faceless dictator? You’re sounding more and more like that pervert Aleister all the time.”

“And based on those observations, this Alice Anotherbible doesn’t seem like the type to jump at bait as simple as the conflict between the science and magic sides or on ruling the magic side herself. What do you say?”

“I haven’t seen her myself, so I wouldn’t know.” Dion Fortune shrugged on the TV. “But Necessarius’s horoscope profile says she’s true to her desires and utterly devoid of patience. Based on that, my guess is she would take anything she can get her hands on, but she wouldn’t be working on multiple tasks at once. To her, a piece of candy and a million yen are the same. So whether or not she would be interested in those goals, it definitely doesn’t sound like her to set a plan in motion and wait for it to bear fruit.”

“…”

“On the other hand, this consulate belongs to the cabal as a whole. Tyrant Alice may be their leader, but it’s still an organization, not just one person.”

“Are you suggesting Alice’s intentions as an individual and the cabal’s objective as a whole are different?”

“It’s probably more accurate to say the rest of the cabal is trying to pull something off without Alice noticing. Think of it like the US president and the lawless CIA, an international corporation’s CEO and a sports team trying to hide how deep in the red it is, or the Russian Orthodox’s pure Patriarch and their perverted torture-loving monster. Really, I expect most organizations have a similar dynamic going on. It’s unusual for the intentions at the very top to work their way down to the very bottom.”

Academy City and the dark side was another example.

The new board chairman had taken action to put a stop to that, but he couldn’t say the process had been bloodless.

“So be careful and watch how this plays out. Attempting a careless confrontation or expulsion will only widen the wound for Academy City.”

The Anglicans had their own interests in all this.

Very few people would reach out a helping hand for nothing at all in return.

And some piece of those interests could be gleaned from the following statement.

“Alice is indeed an extraordinary tyrant, but you will be caught unawares if you focus on her alone. They tend to be overshadowed by Alice’s presence, but keep in mind that ''each and every one of the Transcendents waiting in the wings is an infuriatingly brilliant magician.''”

===Part 2===

It was freezing out.

Kamijou Touma held himself and shivered on the way back to his District 7 dorm room.

It really was midwinter. It was still only around 6 PM, which should have only been evening time, but it was already dark out.

Unusually, there were a few paper postcards in the door’s newspaper slot. Those were New Year’s cards. Specifically, from his parents and a girl who was apparently his cousin. But most people seemed to use their phones these days. He had a whole list of messages from his classmates (probably meant to double as a test message to his new number). And most of those probably weren’t sent to him personally. It would be a lot easier to just send them out en masse. He appreciated the thought, but he knew neglecting to read them all would probably make things extremely awkward once the new term began. Smartphones came with their own annoyances.

“There, Aradia’s all wrapped up in waterproof duct tape.”

“…”

“Index, Othinus. We’re having a hotpot tonight. You’re in luck because I happen to know a secret: make sukiyaki with chicken and you have a dinner that’s both cheap and luxurious!”

“Yay, we get sukiyaki tonight!!”

“Sigh. What’s this about, human? Trying to take revenge on those cooking shows you kept glaring at when you didn’t have any money? Let your feelings dictate your purchases and you won’t notice how much you’re spending.”

“Shut up, Othinus! I don’t need any ominous warnings first thing in the year. I’ll be fine. I set the TV to record all the New Year’s cooking specials they were running, so I have a treasure trove of recipes to try out! I swear I’ll work through them all by the end of winter break. I’m through feeling poor!!!”

“Wait, wait, wait!! I am not letting you forget about me with all this household talk! You have someone lying on your floor in a duct tape cocoon and I am not letting you accept that as normal!!”

The victory prize he wasn’t sure what to do with started thrashing about on the floor.

Alice Anotherbible was back in Academy City. She had said goodbye during the clash with the dark side, but here she was already. Ignoring her verbal promise like that could be seen as the innocence of a child, but he sensed something more concerning there.

Alice’s sudden appearance seemed to link together some unnatural fragments of issues he had noticed.

Kamijou thought back to the bizarre scene at the District 12 shrine where he had run into Misaka Mikoto, Shirai Kuroko, that ringlets girl, and ''someone else.'' He recalled all those emas wishing for personal ruin instead of success. And the ringlets girl who had abandoned all intention to pass her entrance exams even though it was January of her last year in middle school.

The social phenomenon had been dubbed kotatsu syndrome and it was apparently connected to the Winter Cleaning at the end of the year.

Students didn’t want to study and adults wanted to goof off instead of working.

(Could it be?)

Kamijou Touma recalled something else.

Transcendents had directly clashed in Shibuya on December 31. Their spells had been a threat, but something else had carried just as much danger: their powerful charisma as an individual and the crowd manipulated by it.

Aradia had used the witch’s Sabbat and the Bologna Succubus had used the witch hunt.

(Should I assume this kotatsu syndrome comes from one of the Transcendents using something similar?)

Alice, for example.

Hadn’t the Winter Cleaning occurred the exact same day as her first visit to Academy City?

(No, there isn’t any real evidence of a connection there.)

The Transcendents had the dangerous ability to manipulate large groups, but he didn’t know if it was something they consciously used or something that happened on its own. And it was possible there was another self-indulgent Transcendent in the Bridge Builders Cabal.

Could he really point at the obvious suspect and insist she had to be the culprit?

He felt like he was falling into that trap.

“…”

At the same time, could he safely return Aradia to the Bridge Builders Cabal after defeating her once already?

How much could he trust Alice if she accepted Aradia back with a smile and insisted he had nothing to worry about?

He couldn’t handle Aradia on his own, but he was honestly ''afraid'' to return her to Alice and the others.

He asked himself why he felt so much fear and unease about Alice Anotherbible.

Hadn’t she saved him when they first met?

On the way back, they had stopped at a supermarket and bought plenty of ingredients, so now he transferred them from their foam packs to metal or plastic trays and put them away in the different compartments in the fridge. Othinus spoke from his shoulder in the middle of the work.

“You couldn’t do a thing about Alice and her ilk back there.”

“Victory for me means fighting without causing any collateral damage, which wasn’t possible there.”

Of course, something had happened when he ran into Alice without warning. Especially since he was escorting around Aradia after defeating her. Anyone who wanted to prevent Aradia from leaking any cabal secrets would see her as a target.

Kamijou had put his old folk’s smartphone in his pocket. He had no choice but to give up on the GPS tracker.

Alice hadn’t been alone.

She had been flanked by a pair of Transcendents. One was Good, Old Mary who he had seen in Shibuya on the 31st. The other was someone new to him. The magician was a black-haired young man wearing a tailcoat and holding a black cane, making him look like a butler.

Kamijou’s side hadn’t been entirely powerless. They included Grimoire Library Index, the Sisters, and several Tokiwadai elites: the #3 Railgun, the Judgment girl who could teleport, the ringlets 3rd year, and ''someone else.'' Kamijou himself was a Level 0, but those girls belonged to a prestigious esper development school, so they would be able to resolve most any trouble without his help.

But how much did that matter in this case?

He couldn’t stop having a very bad feeling about what could have happened if a battle had broken out there. If the Transcendents flanking Alice hadn’t deterred everyone with ''killer intent so thick it was stifling'' or if that hadn’t been enough to stop the Tokiwadai girls, what might Alice have done on a whim?

Could Kamijou’s hand have stopped that?

In Shibuya, the Bologna Succubus had said he was the only person capable of controlling Alice, but ''was that really true''?

''“I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

That line stuck with him.

The gloomy young butler’s words would not leave Kamijou’s mind.

Strangely, he had trouble remembering ''who'' the young man had been speaking to.

Alice herself had looked confused. He was pretty sure she had spread her arms to welcome them.

However…

''“Peeking inside this girl’s mind will only trap you in a psychedelic world. Alice’s world is like a bottomless pit that can bring only tragedy to those who experience it.”

If the young butler hadn’t casually grabbed Alice’s collar and stopped her, she might have run over to Kamijou.

Alice’s group hadn’t forced Kamijou to do anything.

They hadn’t even demanded he hand over the witch goddess.

That was another way of saying they felt confident they could take her back by force if necessary. Kamijou wasn’t even worthy of a seat at the negotiating table with them.

Most likely, only Alice’s group and any others worthy of the Transcendent title would find a seat there.

What did someone need to do to earn that title?

Kamijou hadn’t a clue, so he doubted he was anywhere close.

“…”

“Touma, where’s the meat?”

“Hold on. Using a knife to remove the small clumps of blood from the jaw is the secret to making good chicken.”

He switched his focus and pulled an earthenware pot and a frying pan from the shelf. For sukiyaki, you couldn’t just place it on the stove. Some ingredients needed to be seasoned first and some needed to be pre-cooked to ensure they weren’t undercooked.

With expensive, thin-cut beef, it was apparently best to cook it in a frying pan, but they were using chicken (which was pretty dangerous if undercooked). That tasted best if you submerged it at the bottom of the pot.

“Alice said something about a consulate, didn’t she?”

“She doesn’t seem like anything more than a kid, so I doubt she came up with that idea on her own. My guess is visiting Academy City every time she wants to play sounded like a pain, so she innocently asked for a secret base here. Then those Transcendents made it a reality. Sweating all the while at the thought of disappointing her.”

Most likely, no one knew how many bases the Bridge Builders Cabal had around the world. To them, this may have only felt like adding one more to the list.

(Come to think of it, Aradia and the Bologna Succubus must have a home country somewhere out there. That’s really hard to imagine.)

“A consulate. Hey, Othinus, how bad is that?”

“A consulate built without mutual trust between the two countries is even more dangerous than a blackhole. Listen, human. No one can investigate inside a consulate. Even if someone steals something from an Academy City museum or steals some kind of information, they’re untouchable if they hide in the consulate until they find a way to escape outside the city. The Transcendents can take whatever they want from the city, load it into their car with a diplomatic license plate, and carry it to the consulate and then stop worrying. Because no one can investigate further.”

“…”

“At the same time, Academy City can no longer refuse to keep people or items from being transported from outside the city and into the consulate. Magicians used to have to nervously sneak over the city walls, but no longer. Now those dangerous magicians can strut on in.”

There was a process for deporting people like that, but that was all there was. Demanding they leave wasn’t the same as trying them for a crime and deportation had to be issued by name. According to Othinus, the entire process was meaningless against Alice’s Transcendents since no one knew their real names and nationalities.

That meant they couldn’t catch these mystery people red-handed and boot them out.

Diplomacy always required paperwork, even when that meant ignoring the reality before your eyes.

So even if Academy City’s leadership said “Alice must leave”, the consulate could point to a part-timer they hired, say “that’s Alice”, and give her some pittance to make up for being deported. All while the real Alice Anotherbible walked freely around Academy City. Everyone would know it wasn’t right, but that was how it went with paperwork. It was powerless against people whose appearance and name weren’t found in any database.

Who was this Transcendent named Alice?

Was that her real name or one of many pseudonyms? Was she human, or was she something else?

Did anyone have a clear answer to these questions?

Anyone at all?

It was nice having something to keep busy with. Without the familiar meal preparations, Kamijou may have been crushed by his worries.

“Hey, Index! The pot is ready to go, so clear off the kotatsu and place down a pot stand.”

“But my job is to eat, eat, sleep, and eat!”

“Just help out some, you freeloader!”

In the Kamijou household, they used an induction cooker instead of a gas-powered portable stove. Why was obvious. With the kind of misfortune Kamijou was accustomed to, he just knew having a portable gas cartridge around could only lead to misfortune.

“Not that the induction cooker is perfectly safe. Use it too horribly wrong and the power cable could start a fire.”

“Could you not, Othinus!? I don’t need any ominous trivia to start off my year!”

Since it was New Year’s, he gave the calico kitty his usual cat food plus a liquid pet treat known as Muru.

Even this sukiyaki was just another variation on his usual cheap cooking. And sukiyaki stock was one of the three great cheap seasonings, right alongside eel sauce and matsutake soup.

“Here are bowls for everyone, here’s an egg, and use these chopsticks for searching through the pot. I’m not making any zosui to finish it off. I have rice and udon separated out, so create your own universe in your bowl, while building up to whatever you want to eat last. Okay, let’s get started!”

“Yay, it’s all you can eat!!”

“No, it’s a hotpot, Index! Don’t go reaching for the rice cooker right away!! How high were planning to pile up your plate!?”

At 15cm, Othinus was shorter than the earthenware pot and reaching inside would mean rock climbing up a hot cliff, so she decided to just steal things from Kamijou’s bowl. He wished she would stop balancing her stomach on the edge of the bowl to lean inside.

But there was still one person unaccounted for.

“…”

Aradia remained a duct tape mummy with her arms bound behind her back and she was glaring hatefully over from the floor. She could sit up on her own using her abs, but she couldn’t do anything about the hands behind her back.

She may have been hungry.

“So, Othinus, what do we do about Aradia?”

“Why ask me? Isn’t solving magical problems that British grimoire library’s job?”

“She’s too busy chowing down on nothing but meat and rice to be any help. Index!! Chicken breasts are admittedly cheaper than pork or beef, but it’s still meat. That’s a luxury item, so make sure you chew thoroughly and actually savor it! How are you swallowing it down so fast!? Chicken isn’t a drink!!!”

The TV was on, but no one was really watching as a comedian made a fool of himself in nothing but briefs. It was a traditional New Year’s act. The popular middle-aged man was being held back by some younger men when he took a hot piece of shabu-shabu meat to the forehead and writhed around on the floor. Apparently that didn’t set Kamijou off because of the note that the staff would eat it later.

But that aside…

“Say ‘ah’, Aradia.”

“!?”

Aradia’s shoulders noticeably jumped and her face grew red, either from anger or something else.

“Y-you must be joking. I am Transcendent Aradia. I will not accept your condescending charity even if I did lose to you.”

“(Hey, you’re free to refuse, but if you keep shaking your head, a miracle could occur and that hot chicken will end up somewhere other than your mouth. Just like with that briefs guy’s expert comedy act on the TV there.)”

“O-okay, fine!!”

Othinus’s whispered voice switched on Aradia’s desperation mode. She shut her eyes in frustration and opened her trembling lips.

Kamijou wanted to know why this mystery woman looked somewhat embarrassed about nothing more than being fed some meat.

He tilted his head as he resumed feeding her the chicken sukiyaki.

She ate it.

She was suddenly much more obedient. It was cute.

She looked like a mysterious beauty, but he was feeding her like a small child, creating an odd dissonance.

After watching her chew a few times and swallow, he grabbed the next bite with the chopsticks.

“Oh, right. Is there anything you can’t or won’t eat? Any allergies?”

“That would’ve been a great thing to ask ''before'' force-feeding me. But no, nothing like that. Besides, witches get their power from searching the forest for anything with medicinal qualities. You can’t do that if you’re picky about what you eat. Munch, munch, gulp. What was that I just ate? Some kind of gelatin?”

“It was shirataki, a type of konjac.”

“Konjac? I’m not sure what that is either. And what is this white rectangular thing? Please tell me it isn’t a hunk of egg white or butter.”

“It’s tofu. It’s made from soybeans, but I would recommend not looking at what the word literally means. A European who doesn’t know how it’s made would probably react badly to that.”

“Tofu???”

That must have been a difficult word to translate into English and other languages. Her common tones didn’t know what to do with it. There was probably a word for it in other Asian languages, but apparently not in the mother tongue of this goddess of witches who flew brooms through a night sky filled with five-pointed stars.

“Munch, munch. Napa cabbage, tofu, and wheat gluten – if it’s soaked up some flavor – are all so good! Yum!”

Kamijou must have assumed it would all be fine since Index devoured it all without issue. But you couldn’t trust that demon lord of gluttony’s tastes because, when she was hungry, she would chew up and eat unpopped popcorn. (Warning: This is a good way to chip your teeth☆)

Aradia had a curious look as she chewed on the food given to her by the chopsticks. Feeding a beautiful young woman a mystery food was one hell of a situation when he actually thought about it. Take that in a cruel direction and it could be foreshadowing for the shocking ending of a SF movie or a psychological horror novel.

She may have trusted him enough to know he wasn’t the type to engage in that sort of deception, even if they had been enemies to begin with.

“Now this I know. It’s an onion.”

“What do you call these long ones in English? I know you just use ‘onion’ for the round ones.”

“I think the closest term is scallion.”

“Why does that sound like the codename for a new surface-to-air missile?”

That may have been one sort of cultural difference.

Like how the English word “carrot” sounded weirdly cute to him.

“Witches use onions a lot. Along with garlic and ginger, they’re one of the standard medicinal plants used as a starting point for a variety of medicines.”

Was she pointing out that real witches didn’t just use plants that had legs and screamed when you pulled them from the ground?

“Onions are medicinal?”

“You can use them for just about anything. For example, you can use onions and tomatoes to create a rare medicine that foolish royals and nobles are willing to buy with a hunk of gold 10 times its size.”

“(You’re talking about a witch’s aphrodisiac, aren’t you? You clearly don’t know how dense this human is if you think that sort of subtle sexual harassment is going to get a reaction.)”

“?”

Kamijou was confused.

He couldn’t keep up with this discussion between a Magic God and a Transcendent.

Aradia fidgeted while still tied up. The pointy-haired boy figured that meant she wanted more food, so he grabbed some more onion from his own bowl instead of the large pot and carried the chopsticks to her mouth.

“Onions as medicine, huh? Weird how you can find these connections anywhere.”

“Onion and ginger is one of the standard medicines for minor things like colds.”

“Ah ha ha. Oh, you mean that thing about sticking a green onion up your ass when you have a cold?”

The instant he mentioned that Japanese tradition, Cocoon Aradia hit him with a drop kick.

She must not have appreciated that particular idea while she was trying to eat.

===Part 3===

It was time to face the biggest problem: bath time.

“So, um, I’m not sure why you think you even need to discuss this?” said Aradia, feeling a headache coming on. “The answer is simple: remove all this duct tape and let me take a bath.”

Kamijou, Index, and Othinus exchanged a glance.

“Yeah, but we all know you’re running away the instant we remove the duct tape from your hands and feet.”

“You might try to fight back.”

“You’re a Transcendent. If we screw this up, you might destroy an entire city or country in retaliation.”

For some reason, Othinus’s comment was a lot more sadistic than the others.

They only had to look at it realistically.

First of all, Aradia was the Transcendent who had caused such a major panic in Shibuya. Removing the duct tape from the hands behind her back and from around her ankles could mean returning her power to her.

“Yet here you are coming up with excuses to get that duct tape off.”

“It’s not an excuse. Am I the only one who thinks this is a perfectly reasonable request?”

“If we do remove them, then I’ll have to suppress your power with Imagine Breaker. Which means you would have to take your bath with me holding your hand throughout.”

“You expect me to share that tiny bathroom with a stranger?”

Othinus was grinning her face off for some reason.

“Close the shower curtain to hide the tub and you’ll be fine. Barring any freak accidents with lewd results, of course.”

“Don’t you dare jinx me like that! Oh, no! I can just imagine the horrific fate that awaits me 10 minutes from now!!”

“Then what are we supposed to do?”

Apparently not letting her take a bath today was simply not an option. She was a young woman after all. Index’s snapping jaws had a hair trigger, but not even she protested that one.

Which meant…

“I guess you’ll have to take a bath with the duct tape still on your hands and feet. It’s the only safe way.”

“Throw me in the tub like that and you’ll have a nasty drowned corpse on your hands!”

“Let me finish.” Kamijou grabbed a random towel. “You stay tied up and someone else washes you off with a wet towel.”

Aradia quaked at that suggestion.

Her face really did pale.

“Don’t tell me you’re volunteering for that job! There is only so far you can push this unintentional sexual harassment bit and make it believable! Please listen to me!”

“We’re only still having this conversation because you nixed the idea of me being in the bath with you, so calm down that overactive imagination, you pervert witch.”

His rational rebuttal led the goddess to start thrashing about on the floor. It wasn’t very frightening when she was in duct tape cocoon, but who knows what she would do if he let his guard down and she broke free of her restraints. He would be dead for sure.

Kamijou handed the towel to someone else: a confused Index.

“Look, she’ll be doing it. Is that acceptable?”

“Yes, I suppose,” Aradia reluctantly grumbled.

Now, was she aware that when presented with two negative options and asked to choose the lesser of two evils, it was common to make sure one of those options was a non-starter? Was she aware it was a negotiating tactic to present someone with something they would never, ever choose and then present them with a less-objectionable option you actually wanted them to accept?

Yes, Aradia lost sight of something important when she focused only on the fact that this option was better than having to bathe with a boy like Kamijou.

It didn’t occur to her that she had just agreed to have someone rub all over her body while she was tied up and unable to do anything about it.

This was the result.

“Ah hya hya hya hya!? Wait! Wait a second! Don’t stick your hand there! Hee, hee hee! Please can’t you be a little gentler!?”

[[Image:GT_Index_v07_BW2.png|thumb]]


“Shut up and sit still.”

Half an hour later, Aradia languidly crawled out of the bathroom with her skin squeaky clean and the full length of her silver hair washed.

“K-kill me,” said the bound Transcendent between gasping breaths. “Someone please kill me.”

“Hey, Othinus. Why did Aradia take so much damage from this?”

“About the last thing a witch wants is to be helpless in the hands of servant of their nemesis – the Christian Church. It made for a very amusing show, though.”

It was past 10 at night.

The TV remained on and it was shifting to the late night programming. In this case, that still meant a New Year’s comedy special, but one for lesser-known comedians who started out on the stage or online videos. Kamijou had basically been awake since the 31st, so he was already sleepy.

Index didn’t need a bath since she had just taken one with Aradia, but…

“I think I’ll only take a shower. I’m too tired for a full bath. What about you, Othinus?”

“I will not be deprived. Fill a washbasin with bathwater so I can relax.”

“Sure, sure. Yawn. Afterwards, we can drink this and then get to sleep.”

Index and Othinus gave him puzzled looks.

“It’s amazake,” he said, sleepily rubbing his eyes. “This is about the only time you get to drink it.”

Now.

Witch Goddess Aradia, the embodiment of Wicca, was a magician who extracted the medicinal properties of all the plants, animals, and minerals found in the forest and converted them into her spells. If she was resistant to medicines, it would reduce the efficacy of her spells. Being highly sensitive to any form of drug was useful both for using your own medicines and for revealing the methods used by enemy witches.

The problem was that Kamijou only learned this fact once it was too late.

A cup of amazake made without sake lees was perfectly fine for a high schooler to drink, but it had a disastrous result for Aradia.

“Hic. Wuhhh?”

“Wait, are you kidding me!? Aradia’s face is bright red!!!” screamed Kamijou when he saw Aradia’s shoulders shaking with each “hic”.

This made no sense. It wasn’t even an issue of a small amount of alcohol having an exaggerated effect on her. This kind was completely nonalcoholic, so why in the world was Aradia losing control of herself!?

Othinus sighed from her spot atop the kotatsu.

“This isn’t about anything real – it’s the placebo effect. In other words, assumptions are more powerful than any of you humans. Although if she could consciously control this, it would be an excellent weapon for a potion-making witch.”

“Looks to me more like Tipsy Aradia-san is the one being controlled!”

“Hence the ‘if she could consciously control this’ part, human. Harnessing assumptions rarely ever works because it’s a lot like tricking yourself into thinking you’ve become a vessel for a god and then losing yourself in it. Be careful here. Her self-hypnosis is strong enough to physically intoxicate her with a nonalcoholic drink, so a false pregnancy is well within her abilities.”

Aradia herself seemed oblivious to their whispered conversation. She remained limply seated on the wooden flooring – with her legs turned to one side in what some call mermaid mode – staring off into empty space and swaying side to side.

“Nya. Nya, nya, nya, nyaaa♪”

“Now she’s singing.”

“Hey, you. If you’re gonna tie me up, at least have the decency to look after me. I’m the goddess of all witches, so you’re supposed to be serving me, dammit. Hic.”

“And now she’s leaning against me!? Gwahhh!!”

“Trying the begging for attention plan, huh?”

“This happened with Alice and the Bologna Succubus too. Is every Transcendent such a free spirit? Now I know for sure Aradia is too dangerous to free from that duct tape!!”

She was causing this much trouble with her hands tied behind her back. All it took was swaying to the side for her to more or less tackle Kamijou onto his back and fall asleep while the two of them drew out a cross on the floor. Body Press Witch Aradia was apparently the kind to gain a lot of energy when she drank but use it all up almost immediately. In other words, she was the most annoying type of person who would cause all sorts of trouble and then have someone else clean up afterwards.

As a nun, Index was having trouble deciding if she should give into her reflexive urge to bite.

“Grr. Touma, where should we let her sleep?”

“Dammit, this is such a royal pain,” groaned Kamijou on his back.

The usual arrangement was Index in the living room and Kamijou in the bathroom, but where was drunk Aradia supposed to go? In her current state, he didn’t want to leave her anywhere.

After crawling out from under her, Kamijou grabbed her under the arms and dragged her along the wooden flooring.

“People are so heavy. Hmm, I’m thinking the closet.”

“I know you want to close her up in a space with walls and a door cutting her off from everyone else, human, but tying a woman up with duct tape and stuffing her in your closet sounds a lot like robbing her of what this world calls human rights.”

As drunk as she was, Aradia didn’t put up any kind of resistance. In her current state, she probably wouldn’t complain if she was placed aboard a slave ship, so he had no trouble shoving her inside the small closet.

“Sigh. Now I can rest easy.”

As soon as the words were out of his mouth, he heard a heavy thud from the closed closet. Followed by the drunk woman groaning.

“Ugh.”

“This is safe, isn’t it? Her mysterious Transcendent magic isn’t going to run wild and squash the entire dorm building while we sleep, is it? Y’know, like mille-feuille when you use your fork wrong.”

“Touma, don’t talk about food before bed. You’ll make me hungry.”

“This is a boy’s dorm, but you have three girls here – including me – plus a cat when pets aren’t allowed. Scary that you can get away with this at a school dorm. What are Academy City’s adults even doing?”

===Part 4===

It had been one hell of a day, so Kamijou had trouble getting to sleep after closing himself in the bathroom. He was tired, but couldn’t sleep. Or to put it another way, his body was exhausted, but his mind wouldn’t settle down. That drowsy state would mean any sleep he did get was shallow and it could lead to the amusing sleep phenomena of weird dreams and sleep paralysis.

He thought he saw Aradia in his dream.

He couldn’t be certain since he didn’t remember the dream. It was possible he had seen someone else who his mind had decided was similar to Aradia. Then he started wondering if that qualified as his first dream of the year.

At any rate, the next thing he knew, his phone’s alarm was ringing to tell him morning had arrived to his windowless bathroom.

Before he realized he could have switched off the alarm since it was winter break, he noticed a strangely soft and smooth sensation. And it came from below the blanket.

“Um!?”

Index or Othinus would never do this. And with the bathroom locked from the inside, the nocturnal calico cat couldn’t have stopped by to play. Besides, Sphinx was the fluffy type.

That left only one possible suspect.

“Aradi-”

“Nope. You’re wrong, teacher☆”

He really did jump.

His entire body trembled a few times and the small girl below the blanket laughed excitedly like she had found a new piece of playground equipment at the park.

This was Alice Anotherbible.

The blonde girl of around 12 looked like she had stepped right out of a children’s book.

What was she doing here!? How had she gotten in!? The front door and the bathroom’s door were both locked! Sure, their first meeting had been similar, but he couldn’t accept something so absurd just because there was a precedent!!!

On January 2, his morning began with a Transcendent who could determine what happened to his life and the fate of the world.

“Eh? What in the world is going on here?”

“Boo. The girl worked hard to get up early to visit you, teacher.”

“Visit me why?”

“For New Year’s money!!

“Noooooo!!!” shouted Kamijou. He shouldn’t have asked. He felt like he had just opened Pandora’s box, but he couldn’t say no when Alice was actually small enough to be the right age to be begging like this. And she was a blonde-haired, blue-eyed foreigner(?), so he couldn’t send her away without letting her experience Japanese culture first.

“Ugh, dammit. Here, Alice. Happy New Year’s. I hope you don’t mind I don’t have a bag to put it in.”

“Yay! This was the girl’s first time!!”

An extremely disconcerting phrase was transmitted from a boy’s dorm bathroom first thing in the morning. And Kamijou was really starting to wonder why a high school boy kept having to give out New Year’s money. Wasn’t he still the age to be receiving it?

The girl wore an apron over a blue dress.

She stuck her head out from the blanket and smiled at him inside the bathtub.

“Everyone was too busy yesterday, but things have settled down enough to invite you over today. Come visit the girl’s secret base!!”

“…”

He wasn’t sure how to react.

The Bridge Builders Cabal Academy City Consulate probably did seem like a fun secret base for Alice who stood at the center of it all, but was going there really safe? According to Othinus, Academy City’s rules didn’t apply inside the consulate – even if a crime was committed.

But he couldn’t let the conversation die here either.

Nothing would get any better if he always chose the safest option.

Kumokawa Seria’s GPS tracker was no longer useful now that Alice had come to Academy City. And she had done so on a whim. If she suddenly got bored and decided to leave, there would be no tracking her down a second time.

Whatever her reasons, it was a miracle to even have Alice with him.

He was also worried about what would happen to Aradia. What would Alice’s cabal do with a defeated Transcendent? The answer to that question would greatly affect how he felt about Alice.

After some thought, Kamijou made a decision.

“Fine. Show me to your secret base.”

“''Boo.''”

Alice’s voice suddenly dropped in tone.

That may have been a dangerous sign.

He hadn’t said anything wrong, but he belatedly realized she hadn’t liked the short pause – less than a second – before he answered. Small children could be sensitive to those subtle clues.

“But whatever.”

“Alice, um, have you had breakfast?”

“The girl has eaten.”

Alice finally crawled out from Kamijou’s blanket.

He left the bathroom with her and checked in the closet. Aradia was still tied up and stuffed in the cramped space and her eyelids fluttered open.

“Ugh? What am I doing in here? Wait, where am I?”

She appeared to still be half asleep. It was probably best not to tell her what had happened last night.

Meanwhile…

“?”

Kamijou looked down at Alice and she tilted her head.

If she were here to silence Aradia, she could have done so at her leisure before entering Kamijou’s bathroom, but she hadn’t. Could he take that as a good sign?

Index and Othinus were waking up now, so he had to fix breakfast for them.

“Touma, are we having bread or rice today?”

“Another one appeared overnight!? Human, explain yourself!”

Unlike last night’s hotpot, their breakfast of toast, fried eggs, and salad didn’t match the New Year’s mood in the slightest, but the next thing he knew, Alice had joined them. She had supposedly already eaten, but there she was spreading chocolate paste on a piece of toast. Like Index, she would eat any food put in front of her.

“The District 2 Firearm Museum has opened a historical weapons exhibit to help us learn from the past,” said the TV. “This is a valuable opportunity to directly touch a real Acht-Acht or PIAT under the supervision of museum personnel.”

“Ooh, wow.”

“Alice, stop leaning toward the TV and look what you’re doing. You’re spreading that chocolate paste all over the kotatsu!”

Unfortunately, this meant Kamijou had to look after someone else too.

“Aradia, do you want butter on your toast? Or would you prefer strawberry jam?”

“…”

“Get ready cause we’re doing this again. Say, ‘ah’.”

“I feel like I’ve woken up to find I’m still living my nightmare…munch.”

While Kamijou took care of Aradia (whose hands were tied behind her back) like her caregiver, he felt a powerful gaze on him.

Alice was moving just her upper body in some warmup exercises while keeping the rest of her under one corner of the kotatsu.

“The girl wants to do that too. Hm, hm.”

“You mean…being duct taped up?”

“No☆”

She smiled and sent a tiny punch toward the clueless boy’s shoulder.

The physical blow hit Kamijou, but it was Aradia’s butt that lifted about 3cm off the floor when she saw it.

“The girl means the food! The girl wants you to feed her! Everything tastes better when you can have fun with it!!”

Kamijou wasn’t sure if she actually wanted this or just wanted to mimic what she saw the others doing, but he had no real reason to refuse her and he ended up feeding Alice her toast.

“Munch, munch. We can go after eating this.”

“…”

“Go to the girl’s secret base – the consulate in District 12!!”

===Part 5===

They were both part of winter break, but January 1 and 2 felt subtly different.

The 2nd was something of an in-between time, where everything was calmer with the shrine visiting over. The 3rd and 4th may have been busier again with people starting to head back home, but that wasn’t here yet. Convenience stores and gyudon shops were open on New Year’s nowadays, but the beginning-of-the-year vacation mood still seemed crammed into January 2 more than any other day. Kamijou couldn’t be sure though, since he didn’t remember any of the previous years.

After making sure the windows were shut and the gas was off, Kamijou, Index (with cat on head), and Alice left the dorm room.

“What did you even eat after leaving last time?”

“Heh heh. Good, Old Mary made the girl the classic: turkey, fries, and a fluffy chiffon cake!!”

“Touma.”

“Stop. Please don’t store up a long list of requests in your perfect memory.”

When Index was given unnecessary ideas like this, she would start demanding he fix it for her. That wasn’t so bad with a cooking show that taught you how to make something an amateur could manage, but she reacted the same way when she watched a gourmet show that introduced some delicious brand-name dish from a fancy restaurant in a big city.

And he just knew the next two days of his relaxing break would be ruined by this.

“(Hey, human.)”

“(I’d like to say I know what you’re getting at, but I doubt I can assess the risk on the level of a war god.)”

To start with, he could not refuse Alice’s invitation. If he explained his reasons why, she might give up on the idea, but who knows what the Transcendents trying to keep her in a good mood would do afterwards.

They might kill someone, take a hostage, or even destroy half of Academy City.

If things got that serious and then every single Transcendent showed up asking him to play with Alice, he would be entirely out of his league.

At the same time, he could not carelessly leave Aradia behind.

Taking her to the Bridge Builders Cabal’s base was a bad idea, but they already knew where his dorm was. If he left her to hold down the fort (in her duct tape cocoon), there was a decent chance of another Transcendent attacking the dorm room.

Was this the right answer?

Had he really not overlooked anything?

Alice’s whims played as big a role as the cabal’s interests and plans, so he doubted any amount of thinking would be enough.

“It is so nice to get some fresh air,” sighed Aradia after they rode the run-down elevator to the ground floor. Then she glared hatefully down at her own left hand. Needless to say, it was still tightly held by Imagine Breaker. “Now I just need to do something about this.”

“Yeah, if only keeping you in your duct tape cocoon and carrying you around bandit style wouldn’t gather so much unwanted attention. I need to research an easier and less conspicuous method of carrying you around. Maybe one of those dollies delivery workers use for bigger packages?”

“You do realize there are better alternatives than carrying me around, don’t you!?”

Aradia bristled, but they must have looked like a couple teasing each other. An old lady walking her dog smiled at them and Kamijou ended up exchanging New Year’s greetings with a stranger.

But…

“Boo. Why does Aradia get all the fun?” said Alice on his other side.

Before he could say a thing, the small girl tackled into him from the side and grabbed at his left arm.

“Hee hee. This hand belongs to the girl!”

“Um, Alice?”

“?”

She looked up and smiled at him like she always did. She didn’t seem to notice Index wandering side to side, unsure where to go. The cat was struggling not to fall off her head.

“Alice…you are Alice, aren’t you?” hesitantly asked Kamijou.

“Eh heh heh☆”

She wiggled ticklishly for some reason. It may have been a bashful response to him saying her name so many times.

Based on that, this did seem to be the Alice he knew.

This was the mysterious but reliable girl who had used her power to protect everyone on December 29 when the dark side threatened to engulf everything. He hadn’t known if he would see her again when she left with Anna Sprengel. If nothing else had happened, he might have hugged her and wept with joy at this reunion.

But…

“…”

He felt a tremor.

It came from the other side than Alice. So from Aradia on his right. Transcendent Aradia had caused so much trouble in Shibuya on December 31, but she was trembling like a small child afraid to go home because she thought her parents would scold her.

It was so unusual and wrong that he couldn’t just ignore it.

Alice Anotherbible.

Even the kind Bologna Succubus had called Alice a tyrant, but what exactly did the girl carry inside her?

“Touma. Are we taking a train again?”

“I can hardly believe it, but yes. And to think I was broke at the end of last year. Hwa ha ha! I can afford normal expenses again!”

The Bridge Builders Cabal had a new headquarters.

The mysterious consulate was in District 12, so they only had to pay 200 yen at the subway to get there.

“Tah dah!! This is the place!” said Alice with a huge smile, hopping in excitement with no concern for her skirt.

The place would have stood out in any other district, but it fit right in among the giant pyramids, five-story pagodas, and other structures that made District 12 feel like an amusement park.

Past a grassy garden larger than a soccer field was a gate leading to a white marble building resembling an amusement park castle. But it wasn’t built according to a specific style like gothic or something-or-other garden. None of it felt real, so the entire space felt like part of an amusement park. If you had to describe it, it was a white mansion similar to the White House but with pointy towers added on without any sort of pattern. It wasn’t even symmetrical.

According to Alice, the white building in the center was called a tower despite not being all that tall. In a castle, that was where the lord’s living area and the administrative functions were concentrated. It was known as the keep, or in French, the donjon.

Were those roses in bloom? It sure looked like a red rose garden at first, but a closer inspection showed them to be white artificial flowers painted red. The place was still being prepared, so some areas had been left incomplete. On that note, castles and temples normally took more than a century to build just by stacking up the stones, so how did they get this built so quickly without anyone noticing?

Roses.

Painted from white to red.

Were the out-of-season honeybees the result of agricultural selective breeding? They were colored black and yellow.

Hadn’t he seen that coloration when fighting in deserted Los Angeles?

“…”

A relevant question came to mind, but Kamijou shook his head. He had directly clashed with R&C Occultics and Anna Sprengel a few times, but the worst thing to do when your life was on the line was assume you knew everything already. For magic expertise, he had Index and Othinus with him. And he had Alice and Aradia from the Bridge Builders Cabal with him too. Instead of making assumptions based on his imagination, he was far better off speaking with them and seeing what useful information they had.

And in fact, Othinus – a god of war, magic, and deception – had noticed something he hadn’t.

“(They call it a consulate, but it’s built like a fortress or like a castle built on the front lines. So did they openly build themselves a bridgehead inside enemy territory?)”

“Oh?”

A young man in the garden noticed them while pointing out where the delivery workers should set up the giant sculptures wrapped in packaging and cushioning.

He had black hair and wore a tailcoat. He even wore an old-fashioned black cloak.

He was still young(?), but he held a smooth, glossy black cane.

The young butler had a somehow gloomy air to him.

“I know you couldn’t exactly escape when Alice came for you personally, but I still can’t believe you showed up. And bringing our own Aradia with you? That I didn’t expect at all.”

“Who are you?”

“H. T. Trismegistus.” The young butler pulled a leather notebook from his pocket. “Come to think of it, I didn’t introduce myself yesterday, did I? As common sense would tell you, I am a Transcendent.”

He did not offer to shake hands. Whether or not that was due to the notebook was unclear.

He too was a member of the Bridge Builders Cabal. That meant he was one of the special magicians who held meetings with the other Transcendents to discuss how to change the world for the better. That meant he would be less than fond of Kamijou who – they believed – was capable of guiding Alice’s whims.

Index frowned and repeated something under her breath.

“''Trismegistus''?”

“Yes!! H. T. Trismegistus is amazing. He makes the best tea in the world. He also folds the girl’s clothes and puts her shoes away!”

“You should really be able to handle that much on your own, Alice.”

Even as he said that, the young butler kneeled and cleaned off some mud that got on Alice’s skirt as she hopped around. He wiped it off with a handkerchief, applied detergent, dried it with a dryer, and even ironed it.

But…wait?

Where did all of that stuff come from???

“(Don’t freak out yet, human. A stage magician could do that. He could have multiple storage cases hidden inside that cloak like a tackle box or a pop-up book.)”

“Um, are you Alice’s tutor?”

“Heavens no. I am no more than one of her servants. I wouldn’t dream of holding that much influence over my beloved master.”

H. T. Trismegistus answered the grimoire library’s gaze with no more than a meaningful smile.

There was one thing Kamijou had wanted to ask the next time he met a Transcendent. He hadn’t wanted to ask Alice because he got the feeling her answer would change based on what she thought he wanted to hear.

“Wh-where is the Bologna Succubus? Is she alright?”

“She is inside. But common sense says she should be allowed to rest for the time being.”

That was a relief…or was it?

Was this H. T. Trismegistus one of the Rescuers or one of the Killers?

The young butler welcomed back Alice while indicating the consulate with a sweep of his arm.

“Everyone is familiar with Alice and her tea party, but in the original story, it is held at a house in the woods. But outside the house, not inside it. But common sense says the real highlight of the setting arrives with the Queen of Hearts shouting to have everyone executed. There is nothing better than the queen’s castle or the courtroom.”

Kamijou felt like a dull, invisible object was slowly stabbing into his chest.

He ended up holding Aradia’s hand tight. She took it as some kind of sign and gave him a wordless, wide-eyed look, but he hadn’t meant it that way.

Executed.

And a courtroom.

What did the Bridge Builders Cabal intend to do with Aradia after her defeat? He still didn’t know why they had come to Academy City. If it was a whim of Alice’s, there might not be any real reason, but that didn’t mean they would ignore a potential information leak like Aradia.

Alice, being Alice, smiled like she wasn’t concerned about any of that.

“H. T. Trismegistus! The girl wants to show her teacher around her secret base! But just looking around would be boring!! Do you know a fun game we could play? You know, like a treasure hunt or something else where everyone can see the whole place while playing!!”

“Ah ha ha,” laughed the young butler as he pulled out several movie pamphlets and TRPG rulebooks. Those paper booklets had to be heavy with so many of them.

“Common sense says you only need to speak this magic phrase: ‘I will grant my whole inheritance to whosoever reveals every one of my secrets.’ ”

“Ohh, that sounds like fun. Then should the girl share her power with the winner? You’re the best, H. T. Trismegistus!”

“Not at all. It is merely my job to gently support my master by granting her every wish.”

“Then I’ll give them a whole half!!”

“Hold on,” interrupted a graceful woman’s voice.

Kamijou realized someone else was already standing next to Alice. The woman wore a maternity dress and a wide-brimmed hat that covered her eyes. That was Good, Old Mary, one of the Transcendents, and she was currently pinching and slightly stretching one of Alice’s small cheeks.

“Alice really would give someone half of the planet while in this sort of mood, so if you see her start on something like that, please stop her even if you have to physically restrain her.”

“Eh? Um, you mean me? You’re telling me to do that?” said Kamijou.

“''Mama is only asking an outsider because none of us can do it.''”

That sent a tension similar to static electricity through them all. The Transcendents, Index, and Othinus all carefully observed Kamijou and Alice.

“?”

Even the cat instinctually sensed something was amiss and put up his guard, but Alice herself tilted her head and then grabbed Kamijou’s arm again.

He was afraid to say anything.

He had temporarily captured Aradia, but he had been helpless against her on the 31st. He had been killed more than once and had only barely pulled off a victory thanks to two Transcendents providing assistance that felt like cheating.

What if he was thrown out onto the battlefield with no assistance this time?

Or what if several Transcendents attacked him at once?

Or what if Alice turned on him???

He had no idea when he would be killed or by whom, but he couldn’t predict what the other Transcendents would do if he turned down Alice’s invitation. He worked to organize what information he had while asking some questions.

“So is this consulate about that stuff the Bologna Succubus was telling me about? You know, about the Transcendents of the Bridge Builders Cabal being split between a group that wants to rescue me and one that wants to kill me?”

“Uh, oh,” gasped H. T. Trismegistus.

The young butler’s gaze lowered to young Alice.

She silently and emotionlessly tilted her head.

And she spoke.

“''What. Is. He. Talking. About?''”



“Gasp!?”

Kamijou opened his eyes.

He shook his head several times and stood up.

Only then did he realize he had been collapsed on the grass.

(What? Eh? Wait. What happened? What in the world just happened!?)

He checked his old folk’s smartphone to find time had skipped forward by about 10 minutes.

No.

''What had happened'' immediately after Alice Anotherbible spoke in such a low voice? Kamijou at least seemed to have lost consciousness at that point.

He took a look around.

H. T. Trismegistus had seemed so above it all, but he had fallen onto his rear with his cane a good distance away from him. Where it had come from was a mystery, but in his panic, he had produced an entirely useless life jacket which he clutched in his arms like a stuffed animal.

For some reason, Good, Old Mary was trying not to look in that direction.

After sensing a tremor shaking and a sweet aroma, Kamijou realized Aradia was holding onto him from the side. Just like a small child afraid to let go of her teddy bear after having a nightmare.

Index and Othinus had to be around there somewhere. Probably doing their best to hide in one of the large garden’s flower beds or shrubberies.

Alice alone remained on her feet.

Her head was still tilted and she spoke in her usual tone again.

“You were saying?”

“Yes! Yes!! We’re all good friends here!! Common sense says we would never be so rude to an important guest!!”

The young butler’s voice was cracking.

The Bologna Succubus had said only Kamijou could guide and control Tyrant Alice. He still didn’t understand what this was all about, but if this was how things worked, he could see why everyone was so afraid of her.

But anyway.

“T-to be clear, our objective is not Kamijou Touma,” said H. T. Trismegistus while trying to catch his breath. “Common sense says we made this direct visit to prevent an information leak. In other words, we are here for ''a fellow Transcendent''.”

“…”

“You heard a lot about us in Shibuya on the 31st, didn’t you? I believe a few Transcendents other than Aradia contacted you. But common sense says this decision cannot be overturned. The Bologna Succubus, Good, Old Mary, and even Alice herself have already agreed that the traitor who left our cabal must be punished accordingly. Because these are not false accusations placed upon an innocent’s head.”

“Punished?”

“Correct.”

Someone walked up next to the young butler.

She was a girl of about 15. She had long, wavy blonde hair, brown skin, and a skinny build decorated with thin belts and pure gold ornaments. She reminded Kamijou of Nephthys, but maybe it was his lack of knowledge that made him think of an Egyptian goddess or a dancer when he saw her.

Alice hopped around proudly.

“This is Mut Thebes! She’s a Transcendent just like the girl!!”

They had finally reached the point where he wasn’t even sure what kind of god they were talking about. He at least recognized names like Alice and Mary – ''whether or not the associations he made were accurate'' – but some of the other names like Aradia and Trismegistus meant nothing at all to him.

Since Alice sounded so proud, the young butler went ahead and introduced her.

“She is an Egyptian mythology Transcendent who specializes in punishment.”

The matter-of-fact way H. T. Trismegistus said it sent a chill down Kamijou’s spine.

Punishment.

He gave Aradia’s hand a squeeze.

“She carries the symbolism of the mother protecting her children – or of the queen protecting her people. She will do whatever it takes to protect what she had decided is her territory. And of course, that is currently defined as the Bridge Builders Cabal.”

That made her sound super powerful, but Kamijou wasn’t sure if it made her an enemy or an ally. He gave the brown girl a nervous look and, for some reason, she bowed. Now, should he feel glad that this assassin or hitman was impeccably polite? He wasn’t sure.

She was a Transcendent who specialized in punishment.

The brown girl stood next to…something not quite the same as a metal fence with spikes jutting out in a giant X. Several sharp spears were contained in the same binder, creating something that looked a bit like a barricade. The spearheads were made of glass and a strange fluorescent pink liquid sloshed around inside. At about 150cm long, they didn’t seem to have much reach for spears. Hold the shaft near the center and they wouldn’t reach much further than a sword.

That meant they were probably javelins.

Notably, they each had the same phrase written on the shaft: Drink Me.

“(Th-this is related to Alice in Wonderland,)” whispered Aradia, unable to hide her trembling.

“…”

Kamijou remained silent.

“I used the word punishment because I have a graceful heart and common sense told me to avoid stating it so directly, but perhaps it would have been simpler to say ‘execution’ instead.”

The young butler’s voice was calm as could be.

Although he was nervously tapping his cane against the ground.

“Transcendents can be killed. Especially when you have an expert in executing them,” he said quite plainly.

The next thing Kamijou knew, there was a long, narrow coffin there. Was it another stage magician tool? It was about the right size to hold an adult woman and it had strange slits all over it, so it may have been a prop for stabbing swords into.

“You should already understand this on some level after what you saw during all that ugly fighting in Shibuya on the 31st. One specific method is to weaken the Transcendent by taking away their power. The spiritual item called the Shrink Drink does just that. In the story, it was a drink that causes the imbiber to physically shrink, but- oh, you should already be familiar with the general idea since one of your companions is a weakened god.”

They had traded one problem for another.

(At least it looks like I don’t have to worry about all the Transcendents attacking me at once. Still, this is bad. I’m not thrilled about their target being Aradia either.)

Kamijou turned to look at someone.

Not Alice who was kind but capricious. He looked to Good, Old Mary who had selflessly helped save him and the Bologna Succubus on the 31st.

Aradia and the Bologna Succubus had both had something they wanted to protect, so Good, Old Mary – who could return a corpse to its state when the heart had stopped – must have had her own reasons for wanting to become a magician.

But she did not return Kamijou’s gaze.

In fact, her large hat shook as she turned her head away from him, but that may have been to avoid Aradia’s eyes more than his.

(Are we out of options?)

Kamijou clenched his teeth.

He was wrapped in an extreme tension that told him he had to avoid letting them notice even that.

(Then what do I do? What good is Imagine Breaker alone against an entire group of Transcendents!?)

But while all this was going on in his head…

“Oh, I think you have the wrong idea,” continued H. T. Trismegistus, to correct the puny boy’s misunderstanding. “It is true Aradia neglected to return to us after her defeat at your hands and the possibility of her revealing critical information does put our cabal at risk, but she already understands and shares in the cabal’s ideology and – more importantly – she understands in her very bones ''what it would mean to make herself an enemy of Alice''. Common sense says no amount of cajolery or torture would get her to talk. That sturdy vault door can be dealt with later. It is the flimsy back door we must deal with first.”

“Back door?”

“Indeed.” The young butler nodded and explained. “Our top priority assassination target is none other than the newest Transcendent, the international information expert who created R&C Occultics, and the traitor who shows insufficient respect for Alice and who got you involved in all this in the first place. I am, of course, referring to ''Anna Sprengel''.”

===Part 6===

Meanwhile, Yomikawa Aiho had business beyond giving a New Year’s greeting to her former roommate. And that business required visiting the same location two days in a row.

It could be confusing since Board Chairman Accelerator had adopted it as his new base, but the place was originally a District 10 prison for adult criminals.

Working for Anti-Skill naturally led to knowing a fair number of convicts, but this particular one was a special case.

Because…

“Hi, Ultimate Evil Demon King Tessou Tsuzuri who’s awoken to the thrill of the dark voltage. Care to share some of your genius inspiration that us ordinary and peaceful Anti-Skill officers could never hope to think up?”

“Eeek!! P-please stop this, Senpai!! Why are you harassing me like this!? You’re teasing me on purpose, aren’t you!? Oh, god, it’s so embarrassing!!!”

[[Image:GT_Index_v07_BW3.png|thumb]]


Trembling on the other side of the visiting room’s thick bulletproof glass was a timid teacher with glasses and curly black hair. She had wounds all over. It was kind of scary that the AI-supported speed trial had her thrown in prison so fast her teaching license hadn’t even officially revoked yet.

(Well, that government paperwork is going to be slow during the holiday anyway.)

In that sense, Yomikawa was a little impressed that the prison was working so fast at the end of the year.

What had happened to the version of Tessou who had strutted through Academy City’s darkness as an Anti-Skill Negotiator? The usual tearful glasses woman was back like she had woken from a dream.

Tessou lay her head on the desk and placed her hands on top of her head.

“Why? Whyyyyy did I do that? I wasn’t wrong to want to protect the children, but why would I choose to do it like that? Am I secretly a sadistic jerk deep down? If I just wanted to feel fear, I should have gone to an amusement park haunted house, but I got fixated on doing everything with violence and I feel like that’s kind of your fault really.”

“(Wow. It’s hard to imagine, but what if Accelerator is like this deep down and he’s just better at hiding it from us?)”

“Umm, Yomikawa-senpai?”

Tessou Tsuzuri tilted her head in confusion.

It at least sounded like she had never stopped wanting to protect the students, but she should have come asked her colleague for advice before doing all that. Yomikawa sighed.

“Whatever. The point is I need to pick your brains, Tessou. It was temporary, but you managed to synchronize with – or even outdo – the dark side, so I want some help thinking like they do.”

“I-I won’t do it. I decided I wasn’t touching that dangerous dark side ever again. I will pay my debt to society, but don’t make me get involved with that again. I don’t even work for you anymore, so you can’t make me.”

“Oh, really?”

“Um, you’re scaring me. Scaring me a lot. Why do I sense an obsession behind that ‘oh, really’? It feels every bit as strong as someone’s unrequited love!!”

“So, Tessou? Care to remind me who it was that put my arm in this sling? Ow, ow, ow, ow. Man the winter chill sure does a number on a broken arm.”

“Kh!? Y-your guilt trip won’t work on me!!”

“Suit yourself. Now, the solitary confinement area is split up by gender, age, and occupation, isn’t it? That means you’re in the teacher section. And if my memory serves, isn’t your cell neighbor named Therestina?”

“Bff!? Why do you know the layout of the cells? And what are you suggesting!? I really don’t like where this is headed! Do you know how creepy it is that she spends all her time cackling in her solitary cell!? She doesn’t even need to snort any white powder!! The brain chemicals produced by her own love, courage, and derangement have completely broken her brain!!!”

“Did you know, Tessou, that this prison can reward model prisoners by transferring them from a solitary cell to a shared cell? Lucky for you, your good friend has your back. Your lonely days will soon be over and you can share a cell with another lewd glasses teacher with a screw loose.”

“You’ve made your point, so please give me a job to do!! What was it you wanted to ask me, you lowly scum!?”

There. Tessou’s cooperation acquired.

Yomikawa Aiho lazily rested her head in her hand and organized her thoughts.

She had more than one thing she wanted to ask.

Fortunately, she knew which one she wanted to get out of the way first.

“''Kumokawa Seria.''”

“…”

“On December 31, the Board’s brain was sighted outside the city in Shibuya. She was focused on, but ultimately never visited, the Miyashita Ark. It’s basically an enormous mall, but I doubt she was there to go shopping. Any ideas?”

“What were you thinking?”

“That girl is the type to pursue something that has already happened, not start something herself. That would mean something was already underway at the Miyashita Ark and she was there to put a stop to-”

“I think you’re wrong.”

Yomikawa’s idea was swiftly shot down.

Tessou Tsuzuri giggled at the way Yomikawa’s eyes widened. Her situation had greatly changed, but it was still amusing to see that look on her former superior’s face.

''Or maybe she had switched modes.

The (supposedly) timid teacher held a hand over her mouth as she laughed and then explained her reasoning.

“You said Kumokawa Seria never actually went there, didn’t you? If she was there to stop something, I would expect her to pay a visit even if she screwed it up. No matter how risky it would be. If the person who called for Anti-Skill is attacked by a criminal before you can get there, you can’t just turn around and head back even if you know it’s too late for them, right?”

There was always a miniscule chance you could save them. Getting the injured caller medical care could at least save their life. And even if they were already dead, you had to search for evidence that could lead to the culprit. A defender would change their objective but still act if they learned it was too late. You could not work law enforcement if you would stop just because the best case scenario was no longer an option.

Which meant…

“So you’re saying Kumokawa ''wasn’t'' going to the Miyashita Ark to stop something?”

“On the other hand, I would feel bad if I used that reasoning to conclude she was the one who set it all up.”

“…Hm.”

“But I could see her wanting to interfere with something already underway ''in order to steer it where she wants it''. So just imagine what would have happened if there had been no accident and she had arrived at the Miyashita Ark as planned. Maybe she couldn’t have done anything herself, but ''someone with her'' may have accomplished something if she had guided them there.”

“But what for?”

“Don’t ask me. Maybe she wanted to eliminate something she was afraid that new board chairman couldn’t handle on his own. Academy City has been on a losing streak of late, so it wouldn’t surprise me to find some people are doubting that new board chairman’s abilities. ''I know I am''.”

“…”

“That said, she isn’t as impatient as me, so she wouldn’t gather the people she needs using blackmail material. I bet she would lay out the rails to guide some great power where she wants it, all while staying just barely within the bounds of legality. Maybe she sees the world differently. If you rely ''solely'' on science, I don’t think you would place your hopes in anything outside of Academy City.”

But then who was it?

The new board chairman was Academy City’s strongest Level 5.

What game piece could be so powerful even he paled in comparison?

===Part 7===

She didn’t go for the cigar or the kiseru.

“Yes, I will be taking that lighter. It will be much simpler if I take your 🔥 instead of all your many 🚬 products.”

“Woof, woof, woof!!”

“Suddenly trying to act like a cute 🐕 is ❌ going to change my 🧠. Using the kiseru helps 😷 how much you’re smoking, but you are matching the pace of a ⛓️ smoker right now. Smoking is bad for your health and there is ❌ possible way you can 🗣️ otherwise.”

The golden retriever lunged at the person forcing her own preferences onto him. Having her face licked by a tongue that reeked of nicotine made Lady Kingsford shriek and fall onto her rear. Was all this really about her not liking the smell?

“Oh, dear. My glasses. Where are my glasses?”

“I have found your weak point now, you gentle teacher. What are you, a living cliché?”

Losing her glasses made that founder of founders get down in a doggy pose. Crybaby Anna Kingsford crawled around feeling about for her glasses until Kihara Noukan sighed and used one of his mechanical arms to hand the glasses to her.

The interaction received a sidelong glance from a woman in a beige habit and blonde hair roughly cut to shoulder length. No, that was actually Magician Aleister who had hijacked a great demon’s body.

He clicked his tongue while walking toward Academy City.

“They’re going to notice this time,” said the golden retriever’s artificial voice. “Our group has gotten too large and we haven’t prepared well enough to sneak in safely.”

“I know that. I did build this city from the ground up, after all.”

For one thing, Anna Kingsford – who was tearfully putting back on her glasses – was not a camouflaged model finetuned for infiltration missions. If they took her with them, Accelerator’s side would notice immediately.

Aleister wasn’t happy about the situation either. He had already handed Academy City over to the next board chairman, so he didn’t want to be making frequent visits.

But things had changed. In a big way.

The Bridge Builders Cabal had a consulate.

They had created a bridgehead enclave inside the headquarters of science.

That secret base would make it impossible to track anything that was stolen and impossible to prevent anyone from getting inside.

(Why would that boy choose to enter their base where they can legally disappear him?)

Of course, this human’s objective was not to solve a riddle. Everything would be for naught if Kamijou Touma wasn’t rescued from the threat of the Bridge Builders Cabal.

He would save that boy even if it meant breaking his word. In a way, it was a very Aleister thing to do since fate never seemed to let him follow his own rules anyway.

So they crossed the outer wall and entered Academy City.

“Your pareo.”

“Hee hee. Thank you very much. Such a gentlemanly 🐕 to hold it down with your 🦾.”

There was no time for getting weirdly emotional or succumbing to self-loathing. The beige habit woman spoke up while they walked through that familiar city.

“H. T. Trismegistus.”

There was a note of annoyance in Aleister’s voice.

He then restated it as if confirming it for himself.

“Hermes ''Thoth'' Trismegistus. That Egyptian secretary god has a strong connection to Holy Guardian Angel Aiwass. And both Hermes and Thoth correspond to each other in Liber 777, an occult dictionary I wrote. That means Alice isn’t the only one. Yet another hint of the Magick system I worked on so long ago. Ugh, why do I always do this!? If only I could go back in time and punch my past self.”

Witch Goddess Aradia was another obvious example.

In fact, the entire framework of Wicca was created by Gerald Gardner, who had interacted with Aleister. Aleister’s influence could be seen in the portion of Gardner’s witchcraft where the practitioners gained power through sex.

Looking relieved now that she had her glasses back, Anna Kingsford whispered in obvious enjoyment.

“Hee hee. By that logic, would the Bologna Succubus and Good, Old Mary be 🔗ed as well?”

“…”

“My, my. I 💭 which Magickal supernatural being they could be. Perhaps the sky goddess from 🇪🇬 mythology? Or maybe the lady in 🟥 spoken of in the 📕 of Revelation?”

Anyone could tell from the teasing tone of voice that Kingsford was only eliminating impossible options. Although she smiled and swiped a portable ashtray from Kihara Noukan while doing so.

There was no point in trying to find a connection in all of them.

It was dreadfully easy to find mistaken interpretations when using Magick. It was a labyrinth of one’s own making that beginners often found themselves trapped inside.

Magic was so complicated because it operated under an orderly set of rules, but questions didn’t necessarily have just the one answer. If you weren’t willing to accept contradictions like two distinct but equally correct answers, then you could never reach the truth. That was a conclusion Crowley himself had reached at a certain temple.

So putting off a question on hold was far more important than you might think.

(I shouldn’t assume the Crowley system ''alone'' is enough to explain all of this.)

Alice Anotherbible, Aradia, H. T. Trismegistus.

Then there was the Bologna Succubus, Good, Old Mary, and the rest.

For the time being, he decided to operate under the assumption that the cabal contained some with Magickal origins and some without. But it didn’t look as simple as the ones who followed the Crowley system being Rescuers and the others being Killers.

“Some come from Crowley and some do not.”

“And some have decided Kamijou Touma should live and others have chosen he should ☠️.”

They had already found a mixture of four different categories within the single cabal. That was unusual since cabals usually followed a unified ideology with their magic.

Furthermore, there was another unique case beyond those four types.

“Why are you staring at me?” asked the face plastered to the film canister he held.

Anna Sprengel.

“Wasn’t she invited to join that Bridge Builders Cabal?” asked Kihara Noukan.

“That suggests the Transcendents aren’t some legendary group with, for example, only 12 spots available. If someone meets certain requirements, they can add new members.”

“Which leads to an obvious ❓☆”

Anna Kingsford’s tone was light.

Was this how she had once spoken with Westcott and Mathers?

“''What conditions did Miss Sprengel meet''? What expectations did they have of her and how did she end up betraying them?”

“I don’t know anything about magic,” said Noukan, “but for someone to betray your organization, you must have placed your trust in them at least temporarily.”

Some followed the Crowley system, others didn’t. Some were Rescuers, others were Killers. Which of those groups had Anna Sprengel joined?

“That line of reasoning doesn’t fit the timeline,” said Miss Sprengel.

“…”

She laughed when Aleister fell into silent thought.

“The split based on what to do with Kamijou Touma only came to be after I betrayed the cabal and messed with Alice. Those groups did not exist originally.”

That left only two groups: Crowley and non-Crowley.

Time to think through it again. When comparing their magic, was there anything linking Aleister and Miss Sprengel?

Eventually, the beige habit woman muttered under her breath.

It didn’t matter if part of the process was flawed as long as you found your way to the correct answer in the end.

“''So that’s it.''”

“Have you grasped the big picture now?” asked Miss Sprengel.

“The Bridge Builders Cabal’s Transcendents seemed awfully confident with their boasting about individually rivalling the entire magic side, but I see where they were coming from now.”

In that sense, Anna Sprengel did indeed qualify.

Aleister brought a hand to his borrowed chin.

“It also explains why Alice’s group did not choose Anna Kingsford when her magic is so much more powerful.”

“Yes. And it means an immature Aleister Crowley might have been accepted as a Transcendent if things had gone differently.”

Not that Aleister Crowley ever would have chosen to obey someone else in that way.

Funnily enough, this meant it was impossible for both Aleister and Miss Sprengel to join the Bridge Builders Cabal at the same time.

Only one or the other could join.

“Every man and every woman is a star,” sang the girl’s voice.

That was a theory Aleister himself had once proposed.

“All people can create a monster and become a god. Of course, doing so would change the very definition of the word ‘god’. With one 2000-year period ended, the world has already entered that age. Isn’t that the Aeon of Horus you proposed? That is the foundation of their strategy. That is what the Transcendents have created by gathering together and what they are attempting to control all on their own.”

Miss Sprengel continued to sing from the surface of the film canister.

“But I am ''not'' talking about Alice here.”

===Between the Lines 2===

The girl was known as a witch.

There was nothing she couldn’t do.

With her newfound power, she could bend anything to her will with a wave of her finger. She scattered stars across the night sky, sent blessed rain falling from that sky, created a potion for the sick, and gave a beautiful dress to a poor woman.

The girl was praised by so many.

The girl was thanked by so many.

The girl became a goal for so many.

She swam through her dreams. There was nothing left that could bring her pain. How could there be when she had the power to remove all sources of pain from her sight and to support and guide those who worshiped her?

There was a smile on every face.

Everyone looked happy.

So the girl was confident she had done the right thing. So the girl did not question any of her actions. It was the right thing to do, after all. Why hold back when her every action was a wonderful thing that would make everyone happy?

She lived in a world void of stress.

From the moment she got up in the morning to the moment she fell asleep at night, her every day shined bright.


But isn’t it strange?

Why, then, was that girl known as ''a witch''?

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