Apocalypse Witch:Volume5 Prologue

Prologue

They are no different from humans.

Some people may find hope in this statement, but I say those people must have never once looked in a mirror.

The Threat is just as plentiful as humans.

Which means they could multiply to more than 5.5 billion units under the right conditions and environment.

The Threat can enjoy things just as humans do.

Which means they would not hesitate take away people’s territory and survival zone if they took a liking to them.

The Threat can learn just as humans do.

Which means they could invent more efficient methods and tools for killing.

The Threat can think just as humans do.

Which means they could see a different lifeform and hate that lifeform.

The Threat kills just as humans do.

Which means they do not need any real reason to do so.

Now, does anyone out there still see any possibility of friendship with the Threat after hearing all that? Do not pretend. Finding them disturbing is the normal reaction. It is human nature to reject them and keep as far away from them as possible.

But the Threat is the same us humans.

That means they will want to exterminate us just like we want to exterminate them. Neither side is good or evil. Both sides must accept our nature and put together a countermeasure.

And it goes without saying that we humans are the ones about to be destroyed.

You think there might be some way to get the Threat to end their violence?

Do you think anything could stop us from killing if the situations were reversed?

That is your answer right there.

Needless to say, humanity is an ugly species.

And so are they.

-Chrisbart Firenze, just another weapons researcher

This story is set on Second Grimnoah, a crystal magic academy floating in the sea near the equator.

More specifically, in a dorm room on board.

A black-haired boy wore a summer uniform composed of a short-sleeved button-up shirt, a sports T-shirt, and thin purple slacks. Utagai Karuta sat on his bed with his hands covering his face. The wall across from him was covered with clippings from printed-out reports and online news articles with colorful strings connecting them all together.

This was meant to do more than just visualize the situation.

All of the connections were roughly thrown together, making it look a lot like he was trying his best not to accept something.

The path he had taken to reach this point was laid out on the wall.

The Problem Solvers of the old strongest – Elicia, Yukino, Jessie, Susannia, and Anastasia – had been powerful users of God-Worshiping Magic.

They had destroyed the old Grimnoah using next-gen Crystal Magic and the four survivors – Karuta, Aine, Marika, and Kyouka – had taken revenge.

At first, they had doubted the Threat even existed, but the Threat was later revealed to be very real indeed.

A Second Grimnoah was created, centered on Karuta’s group – the Four Living Gods – who were the new world’s strongest.

On a golden week school trip to Iceland’s Crystal Beach, they had encountered and fought an enemy force they thought to be the Threat.

However, that force turned out to be a decoy Threat created by a human weapons manufacturer and hijacked by Riho, Sanae, and Alice who had infiltrated Second Grimnoah.

Anastasia’s sister Natalena had also infiltrated the school and Karuta and Marika fought over what to do about her.

When Second Grimnoah arrived near the Port of Kobe, it was attacked and occupied by the real Threat, so Karuta and the others worked to take it back.

They assumed the real Threat was attempting to learn how to use Crystal Magic and evolve past anything they could hope to handle. But in truth, they simply admired humans and had wanted to experience a school life. Due to Matsuda Imi and Aine’s actions, Karuta was forced to battle a Threat known as the Warrior Doll.

At the same time, Letnahe from the Indian military fought with Omotesandou Kyouka. Kyouka learned the woman was a scout sent by the human string pullers and successfully converted her into a double agent to extract some information from the string pullers.

Second Grimnoah was reclaimed, but doubt had been cast on the power of the Four Living Gods. As a performance to avoid social unrest on a global scale, the preexisting Catastrophe system was used to hold a martial arts tournament.

Some trickery on the human string pullers’ part forced Karuta to compete on his own, but he defeated a formidable foe named Pendet and emerged victorious. At the same time, they managed to approach the identity of the global community of weapons researchers (including magic weapons) which they had known as the human string pullers. They acquired Chrisbart Firenze as a specific name there.

Meanwhile, 300 million Threats were arriving from space.

When it had looked like the past strongests were going to lose their battle against the Threat, they had been launched into space using a space elevator. The Threat would gather around the abandoned strongests, distracting them long enough to just barely protect humanity for a while longer.

Karuta’s group was up next.

The fact that they were the next living sacrifices – that is, the world’s strongest – had already been proven to the entire world through the media.

“…”

He couldn’t find an answer.

All the information he had was taped up on the wall and a veritable cobweb of colorful strings attached even the most tenuous link he could think up. Yet he still couldn’t find any loophole or way out of this situation.

300 million.

Before, they had hit their limit with fewer than 10 thousand of the real Threat. This was several orders of magnitude greater. The Four Living Gods didn’t stand a chance fighting that many in one place and, if they descended on every part of the Earth at once, not even sending out every single Second Grimnoah teacher and student would be enough to protect everyone. And that was before even considering whether or not they could all win a direct fight with the Threat.

“Sacri-sama,” said a girl in a beautiful bell-like voice.

She had hip-length silver hair and skin that was more pale than white.

That was the crystal girl named Aine.

“It is time. If you intend to meet up with Student Council President Omotesandou Kyouka, you need to get ready and head to the student council room.”

“I don’t want to go. I haven’t found an answer for her yet.”

The bed creaked right next to him.

Aine had been standing up all this time, but now she sat next to him. She peered up at his lowered head covered by his hands and spoke with no emotion in her voice.

“Sacri-sama, I will always prioritize your decisions and assist in carrying them out.”

He was afraid to look her in the eye, so he pulled on the small hand propping up her body.

He felt a soft weight.

Aine was now resting her head on this lap and using that lap pillow to stare up at his face from directly below.

And she spoke her mechanical words.

“If you wish to avoid a discussion with Miss Kyouka and Miss Marika, I will obey. I will respect your decisions and assist you in hiding away or holing up in this room. Is that what you want?”

What would it accomplish if he did that?

Refusing to attend a meeting meant to ensure the Four Living Gods were on the same page would not change the underlying situation.

The Threat was approaching Earth.

Based on the observations, their number was estimated to be more than 300 million. If they arrived all across the Earth, not even Crystal Magic would be able to stop them.

Humanity could not defeat the Threat.

The limited time remaining to them was slipping away, but he couldn’t find anything but complaints.

He placed his hand on Aine’s head for no real reason.

“Why am I the world’s strongest? It never made any sense. There must be something wrong with the very structure of the human race to place me at the top.”

Aine rested her head on his lap and accepted the hand patting her head as she presented the necessary problem to him.

“But the Threat swarm gathering in orbit is already dense enough to influence satellite communications, so you cannot just stand idly by and- nhh.”

“Aine?”

Her slender shoulders clearly shook.

He stopped his hand when she made a weird noise. He had been patting her head since it was in such a convenient location, but he must have hit one of her horns with his finger.

The crystal girl rolled onto her side like she was tossing in her sleep and removed her eyes from him, but she could not fully hide the subtle tremor in her body.

“Y-you aren’t supposed to touch that before marriage, Sacri-sama.”

“?”

Come to think of it, she had said something like that before.

He gave her a puzzled look and dumped out the relevant drawer in his memories.

“But didn’t you start rubbing those horn-like things against me before? Um, yeah, like on the elevator at the Crystal Beach hotel.”

“…”

“It looked like a subconscious reaction back then. You started doing it after I called you weird when you were wearing that white school swimsuit. …Wait. Were you hoping I would compliment your swimsuit then?”

When her body stiffened this time, it was anything but subtle.

“It…”

“?”

“It does not seem fair to dig back up such an old incident, Sacri-sama.”

She was trembling from embarrassment more than he had ever seen.

This was so different from when he had first summoned her with his Crystal Blossom (mostly as a malfunction). She must have learned a lot from her time spent with him.

And on that note…

(Can I really do this?)

She was still letting him rub her head with that head in his lap. She was trembling and unable to look him in the eye from such close range and she moved awkwardly to try and hide the flush of her skin. A bitter thought occurred to him as he silently observed her.

(She’s learned to show such human emotion, so can I really ask her to die with us? Yes, this decision is meant to protect the 5.5 billion other humans out there, but Aine isn’t human. She’s a crystal girl.)

Just then, a low buzzing sound came from a part of the room not far away.

That was his phone.

Aine called out to him from his lap.

“Sacri-sama.”

“I don’t want to answer it.”

“But it is still vibrating. That is unusual, so I doubt this is a classmate asking you to hang out. This is about the Four Living Gods.”

Also, anyone from Second Grimnoah would use their Crystal Blossoms since they could be used to communicate safely, without any chance of the signal being intercepted. Even if both options did the same thing, humans naturally chose the one that was less of a hassle. Unless they were attaching an image or video file, the students almost never used their phones to contact each other.

That meant this wasn’t even Marika or Kyouka.

Karuta breathed a heavy sigh and slowly stood from the bed. With her pillow gone, Aine reverted to her default state, but she did seem to be puffing out her cheeks in displeasure. Why had she convinced him to answer the phone if she was going to react like that?

His phone was making a lot of noise vibrating atop his study desk. He grabbed it to find an unfamiliar number on the screen.

He answered without checking further.

If this was only a telemarketer, at least it would give him something to laugh about.

“You took longer to answer than I had predicted, Living God. Is that a sign of how much reluctance you are feeling?”

“…Who are you?”

“Chrisbart Firenze.”

Karuta gasped.

He knew that name. And he knew what role the man played in the current world.

“The human string pullers is not a centralized group, but since you know my name, you can think of me as a contact point. At any rate, I ordinarily would not play any role on the center stage.”

He had the husky male voice of an elderly man.

That first impression couldn’t be fully trusted since it was happening through a machine…but Karuta smiled at himself for starting to get so paranoid.

What was there to be paranoid about?

The truth was right there laid out on the wall. He had proven there was no escape and no amount of thinking was going to reveal a path to survival.

And Chrisbart (or someone using the name) was not going to wait for Karuta to respond. He continued in a mechanical, businesslike fashion.

“Are you prepared to fulfill your role, world’s strongest?”

“You…”

“We have already searched out the world’s #2 hidden among the 5.5 billion and are preparing her to be the next generation of strongest. Once our stock of Living Gods has run out, Pendet Denpasar will be promoted to world’s strongest. And once she has bought enough time for us to find the next #2, she too will be launched into space when the time comes. Just like you will be soon.”

He didn’t show any of the hostility or malice the Problem Solvers had.

He wasn’t self-destructive like Riho, Sanae, and Alice had been.

He showed no sign of the hatred born from betrayal the armored warrior had shown.

He didn’t have the lust and joy for victory that Pendet Denpasar had.

It was all matter-of-fact.

His lack of emotion hinted at how many times he had done this in the past. Perhaps they had done it with old fashioned rockets before the space elevator was built.

“What will you do?”

Chrisbart Firenze’s voice was as dull as could be.

There was a teacher onboard Second Grimnoah with the Firenze name, but Karuta doubted he could use that as a bargaining chip. If this man learned they needed to sacrifice that puppy-like teacher to save humanity, he would do so without hesitation. He viewed everything through a lens of pure logic and efficiency.

“If you obey, you four will die and the 5.5 billion will survive. But if you refuse, you four will die and the 5.5 billion will die along with you. Neither option allows you to survive, so it seems to me it would leave a better taste in your mouth if you did it in a way the people would appreciate, even if no official records of it will remain.”

“…”

“Or if you are forced to die, would you prefer to take as many people with you as you can? That is one side of human nature, I won’t deny it. If you resist, we are prepared to use every last part of human society to hunt you down, but…if you are unwilling to cooperate, every part of this will be more challenging. That effectively makes this your decision as the Four Living Gods. Your decision will determine how it all ends.”

There was no answer here.

The minimum number of deaths was set at 4 and no choice would save any of those 4.

Those 4 were Karuta, Aine, Marika, and Kyouka.

There wasn’t even a shred of pity in Chrisbart Firenze’s voice.

The protector of humanity spoke more coldly than any machine.

“I give you one day. If you are still unwilling to offer up your lives, then the 5.5 billion are doomed.”

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