IndexVSDRRR Crossover Academy City Chapter
Status: Incomplete
14/20 parts completed
Academy City Chapter
Translation: botman/Dracoslayer123
Edit/Proofread: Dracoslayer123/Pablusky
Part 1
Heiwajima Shizuo – half his body was submerged in the middle of the river, motionless.
Part 2
…What on earth was he talking about? The fierce blond man wearing a bartender’s suit and sunglasses was thinking along such lines. What, why, and how did it become like this? No matter how much he thought about it, he couldn’t give a reasonable answer. Heiwajima Shizuo knew that he wasn’t good at thinking about things, and besides, his surroundings did not look like Ikebukuro in any way, and to say that this was a regular developed city would be underselling its neatness.
There was an airship with a large screen on it slowly moving over his head, broadcasting some strange news.
“…Flying overhead at 10,000 to 25,000 kilometers in the sky, the high altitude flying SSTO platform “Sky by Fire” has beaten the world record of 152 consecutive days in the air. Before this, it had already claimed the record of being the world’s largest aircraft, having the world’s largest loading capacity, as well as being the mobile platform with the world’s largest launch capacity. This time…”
Even Shizuo, who doesn’t regularly watch the news, could tell that there was something off with this content. Not to mention the obvious flying machine which wasn’t making any noise. This was no longer in the realm of common sense.
“…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… Anyway.”
Still half submerged in the river, Heiwajima Shizuo said this in a frighteningly low voice.
Sometimes, he talked to himself like this.
“This sort of weird and troublesome situation is most likely related to that bastard. Speaking of which, “yesterday” was the same – annoying as fuck. I should first find that damn flea and kill him. Ah fuck, my smokes are all wet! I’m definitely killing Izaya, that bastard!!”
Although that might sound insane, he has somehow always managed to find out the truth through such methods. He was a man whose very existence ran opposite of the saying “let sleeping dogs lie.”
An incomprehensible situation, thinking of Orihara Izaya, and his supply of nicotine running out – Shizuo had ticked off three of those checkboxes…
“Though, to be fair, no matter how much that flea looks like a flea, since he came from his mother’s belly, in the end, he’s still a human. Deciding to kill him on a whim isn’t that good…Argh, why did that bastard have to be born from someone!? If he were a toy or a doll, I would have killed him without saying anything – that guy pisses me off!”
Let’s take a step back.
Calm down.
That’s right, giving way to anger would be the easy way out. Movie heroes always turn that anger into strength and try to beautify such behavior. But that’s something that can be done by any dog you can find on the curb…. Well, he had never had the patience to endure through something so slow paced as a movie. Anyway, one must suppress that anger – the ability to do so was unique to humans. Hadn’t he caused so much trouble for his brother before because of this very issue of patience?
“Haaah….”
Slowly, like steam escaping from a highly pressurized steam engine, Shizuo suppressed his rage.
Essentially, thanks to that, situations such as the Earth being karate chopped in half or half of the Moon being vaporized by a beam of Shizuo’s rage were avoided.
“Hi~, Shizu-chan…. How are you not dead yet?”
He heard something, an auditory hallucination.
This auditory hallucination was accompanied by a visual one.
More than 50 meters away, a grand steel bridge stood, and the illusion of a slender, elegant man with a large smile on his face was leaning against the railing of the bridge, waving his hand.
“…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………”
In addition, there came a loud popping noise from inside Heiwajima Shizuo’s head.
It was the sound of the angry steam engine, one that had been releasing steam slowly, blowing it all away at once.
“Iii!!”
He could not even wait for his shout to fully form.
“Zaa!!”
Shizuo brought the upper half of his body down into the river.
“Yaa!!”
There was a vending machine in the bottom of the river, possibly a nasty joke from a certain someone, and Shizuo silently pulled it up with both hands.
“KUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUN!!!!!!”
There was an explosive sound.
The extra large artillery shell flew through the sky, just like it would have in the streets of Ikebukuro.
Part 3
“Ah, I don’t like this, don’t like this at all.”
The young man named Orihara Izaya was talking in a perfunctory manner while running from alley to alley. However, this wasn’t the commonly seen “distancing oneself from the other” method of running away. Attempting to escape Heiwajima Shizuo, who was so packed with muscle that he could take bullets straight on, by foot, was undoubtedly suicidal. Therefore, Izaya constantly turned from alley to alley to execute maneuvers such as “disappearing from view” or “eliminating clues.”
The fact that he was facing the Shizuo, who could maybe even outrun a cheetah or a leopard, and was still alive today was undeniable proof for the effectiveness of such countermeasures.
“I at least thought “getting caught up in the distortion of space” would have caused you to die; I mean, with this, I don’t even know why I made this deal with “them.”
But.
This method should have only worked in the streets of Ikebukuro. The reason was very simple: if you were not familiar with the area, you couldn’t make use of the intricate system of alleys. He had originally wanted to shake his opponent off, but if he ran into a dead end, or if that sort of thing happened, it would be a real problem. Facing an opponent like Shizuo, there was no doubt he would be made into mincemeat – live.
In spite of this, Orihara Izaya managed to navigate the alleyways easily.
You could maybe say that this was going even smoother than it would have back in the streets of Ikebukuro.
(Well, this city also seems to have some sort of thing going on for itself, but anyway, it’s a lot more convenient since there aren’t any “adults” lurking in the darkness of this city. It’s like arriving on an island that uses shells as currency and has no concept of forgery… Well in any case, I just wish Shizu-chan would die already.)
His strides were like that of this city’s… Academy City’s citizens.
Or would it be better to say it was as if he had already obtained a detailed map of this place beforehand, thus being able to understand every nook and cranny of this city.
Part 4
He casually leaped over the parked SUV on the roadside, slid beneath a hot dog cart, and finally ran straight up a building in just a few seconds. Overall, such actions were similar to a tiger or a lion crossing obstacles to chase its prey.
Despite all this, Heiwajima Shizuo had lost Orihara Izaya.
This place was like an intricate maze of concrete in all directions.
The bartender with sunglasses put his hand on a wall with red letters scrawled everywhere, which were not in English at all, and slowly breathed out.
He was trying to keep himself from “accidentally” destroying the building.
(…No matter how flea-like that flea is, this is too much of a coincidence. No, since a flea is always just a flea, it’s impossible for it to win without any preparation.)
If you stepped on the opponent’s layed-out track without the certainty of being able to destroy it completely, it would be meaningless to chase it heedlessly. He had already learned his lesson about this kind of “smell” countless times in high school. It was the smell of imminent failure.
However, it was at that very moment.
Suddenly, there was an ear-splitting sound. It was like the sound made from scraping a rough piece of rock against metal.
“…That goddamn flea.”
Shizuo didn’t think it was Izaya himself.
Actually, in the case of that Orihara Izaya, it was usually more troublesome if he himself did not appear. In other words, this was the situation he was best in. If he used himself as a decoy and baited his opponent into following him, that opponent, chasing after him without thinking, would be led into a deserted alley in no time. And then an assassin would appear. Wasn’t this “exactly” what that guy did best? It felt like getting in 10 consecutive combos in a trapping game – a trap so obvious, it was oddly satisfying.
But Shizuo wasn’t one to be cowed by something on this level.
Rather, his emotion meter was maxed out by rage right now.
“In other words, I can find out where that flea is just by beating that guy up, right…?”
The monster who could be considered the apex of the human race walked towards the source of the sound without any hint of hesitation.
The only question left was whether Shizuo would be able to beat “that guy” up while making sure his tongue and cheeks were left intact.
Part 5
Then, in a dirty alleyway with red graffiti everywhere, stood a girl who clearly did not belong there.
She had short, black hair and large glasses. She seemed timid, and that shone through not only from her looks but also from all of her small actions, ranging from slightly twitching and shrinking her body to hugging her body as if she were trying to protect herself. The girl, who had a blazer that looked like it was from some school uniform, would’ve seemed attractive to people who were into that sort of thing, yet annoying to people who found such things distasteful. From the air around her, one could tell she did not actively look for a long and eventful life, but however, the needle in her meter spasmed from left to right, always straining further from the “average.”
Sonohara Anri
Although she seemed the type to be reading obscure poetry anthologies in the school library, she was holding the very thing that would completely shatter such an image. Though from her posture, which looked like she was hugging herself, it could have been said that she was in fact embracing “that thing.”
So, what could be “that thing”?
The answer was a katana.
“Hey, you over there, you know that it’s actually the truth!?”
In front of Anri, who was retreating two, three steps backwards, was a pointy-haired high school boy who furrowed his brows as if he were in a conundrum.
His expression was desperate, and his voice carried a sense of unease.
“I have no idea where you came from, but it’s obvious that you’re not familiar with this place, and that you don’t belong here!”
His words weren’t making much sense in the first place, but even without that, Sonohara Anri felt an acute dizziness in her head. She realized that she was losing the ability to recognize the sounds coming from in front of her as words.
This was not simply a matter of speaking to a boy she had never met before.
The real reason lay within the katana she was holding.
Correctly speaking, it should be called a demonic blade.
Saika.
It was shouting loudly in the sweet voice of a woman directly into the mind of Anri, the owner of the blade.
The tone was completely different from her usual whisperings proclaiming her love of humanity.
“What is that; what is that; what is that; what is that; what is that? Wuhuhuhu! Ahh, ahhhh! That’s not good; that can’t be good; no matter how much I think about it, that’s definitely not good! I have no problems with being shattered, dulled, melted, or changed, and I would still be myself, but I have no doubt something terrible will happen if I were to glance off even so much as a fingertip!”
Kirikirikiri!! Anri’s vision was forcibly drawn to a certain place.
It was drawn to the pointy-haired boy, and especially to the part below his right wrist.
(What is… this person?)
Anri was, in a word, terrified.
This was not because of the unusual reaction of Saika nor the “something” hidden within the pointy-haired boy.
She didn’t know what, but something was definitely off.
She sensed danger that raced along her spine, mercilessly fanning the fear in her heart.
It was as if an invisible fishing hook was pulling her soul out to the other side of the “frame” Anri had predefined.
(I know Saika always whispers her love for humanity. Sure, there will be some exceptions whom she hates, but she’s never simply given up to fear like this…)
“It’s not too late yet.”
The pointy-haired boy spoke.
Another step.
Even if a knife was pressed into her neck, even if a gun was pointed straight at her forehead, as long as she was still within her “frame,” Anri would have never been shaken. But even she stepped back from a totally normal step, like a totally normal girl.
This was not good.
The only reason she had been able to stay sane against the whisperings, or the “curse,” of Saika was the existence of her “frame.” Anri could not imagine what would become of herself if she were to forget its existence.
“Anyway, I’m running out of time. Please tell me how many people are with you. And then all of you involved need to go back. There’s no other choice anymore!”
Uu!
And so.
In an instant.
Sonohara Anri drew her katana with a large motion. As if she couldn’t even feel its weight, she swung it around with one hand, creating orange sparks as the blade screeched against the wall, until its end was pointed directly at her opponent.
The action was in no way like one that would have been made by someone who has knowledge of kendo or swordsmanship.
It would be more accurate to say that Anri had merely acted out of self defense, much akin to a person instinctively protecting their face with both of their hands.
However, the pointy-haired boy merely clicked his tongue.
As if in response, he clenched his fist again and took a posture of his own.
“Damn it! Why did it have to come to this!?”
The moment the fist was clenched.
Kirikirikirikirikirikirikirikirikirikirikirikiri!!
Through Saika, an absurd amount of tension and sense of danger ravaged Anri’s consciousness..
Numerous fishing hooks from the other side of her “frame” grabbed onto her exposed soul and tried to forcibly pull her out. An unknown reality was threatening her very personality.
Starting from the edges, her vision began to lose focus.
She reflexively covered her lips with her hands as she could feel her stomach heaving uncomfortably.
(This is… bad)
Saika’s blade started glowing an ominous red.
No, that wasn’t it.
That was just the light reflecting off the blade. It was Anri’s own eyes that were really glowing.
(No…!!)
Her vision became nauseous.
Her consciousness began to fade.
Saika’s “whisperings”, which used to merely be continuous soft mutterings, began to pressure her heart little by little while accompanied by an unfamiliar, sweet smell.
But.
In fact, Anri never turned into a “slasher demon.”
The reason was simple yet difficult to explain.
Bagigokushyaaaaaahhh!!!???
It was because out of nowhere, a flying vending machine launched the pointy-haired boy into the wall.
Well.
It wasn’t as if the vending machine was made of sponge, nor was the wall an old and crumbling, earth wall. It was beyond any doubt that the vending machine was made of metal and the wall was a solid concrete wall.
Even so.
Nevertheless, what in the world just happened?
There wasn’t even a one millimeter gap between the wall and the vending machine, and no matter how you put it, it would have been most accurate to say that the pointy-haired boy was “buried.”
A dry sound followed.
Nobody knew what had happened to the boy.
“Fu fu fu! Ha ha ha!! Ah, that was amazing that was so good that’s what all human beings should be like if there’s a human with the highest specs right in front of me then I shouldn’t be afraid but instead love them love them love them love them!!”
When she came to, Saika was back to normal.
Accordingly, Anri also came up with an appropriate response. She pulled her “self” that was halfway out of her “frame” and began lightening the effects of the “cursed” whisperings.”
The red in her eyes slowly faded.
By the way.
The person who caused such damage spoke aloud.
“Yo, do you know anything about fleas?”
The girl who secretly hid the demonic blade behind her back shook her head gently.
I don’t know.
Part 6
“Hurts….”
Accompanied by a cracking sound.
Kamijou Touma kicked the mangled vending machine out of the crumbling concrete wall. Then he wobbled outside.
Patter patter, the blood spilled from his forehead and dripped onto the ground.
“…That hurts, dammit! Are you from Ikebukuro as well, you bastard!?”
“Huh? What a surprise. I would get it if you had just dodged or blocked my attack, but you’re somehow still standing after taking a direct hit. You must be as solid as Simon, right?”
“…Another name I don’t recognize. Exactly how many people came here..?.”
“Well, anyway, I have just one question for you… Do you know about the flea?”
“Ahhhhhhhh, seriously!! How many people are from Ikebukuro!?”
Shouting, Kamijou suddenly charged towards Heiwajima Shizuo and tried to grab his shirt.
Sadly for him, even though it had been plunged into a river and had gotten wet, that did not change the fact that the shirt was a gift filled with memories from Shizuo’s brother.
And the most deadly thing was that when Kamijou grabbed the shirt, one of the buttons flew off.
Riiiiip.
The pointy-haired boy heard a strange sound.
It sounded like a bundle of steel wires being forcibly stretched on both ends like a rubber band.
However, he would never be able to guess what the sound actually had been.
Indeed.
No one could have thought that the sounds made by the straining of a mere human’s muscles could ring out like that.
“Ah.”
Just.
Blankly, he realized he had messed up.
I guess I’m on the highway to hell now. (TL Note: Or literally, I’ve stepped on the death line – could be translated as “stepped on a landmine,” but that’s technically a different expression)
At that moment.
–––!!!!
All sound disappeared with a flick of his wrist.
“Ah.”
At the same time, strangely enough, Heiwajima Shizuo made a similar sound.
With just one hand, he had grabbed his collar and then threw.
He himself was probably the only one who could grasp what had happened.
The person who had been right in front of him, whose name he did not know, had been blasted away from the alley and made a spectacular sound of something splattering everywhere.
He couldn’t even imagine what happened to the boy – not even where he landed.
The man in a bartender’s suit, who was left all alone, muttered to himself with a face like he had accidentally ripped the paper while scooping goldfish because he had put too much strength into it.
“Shoot, I should’ve asked about the flea before smashing the fly…”
Part 7
Satin dress: [Huhh!? I’ve never heard the name Tanaka Tarou. Are you someone who hasn't used this social media? Well, anyway, nice to meet you.]
Tanaka Tarou: [Nice to meet you too. Anyway, I was really taken aback. It looks basically the same as any other social media, but it turns out to be something completely different on the inside, and it’s filled with technology I’ve never seen before.]
Satin dress: [Ahaha! Everything about the technology is adjusted by the server management side, so it has nothing to do with us!]
Tanaka Tarou: [I see. I was just thinking it would be hard when you host it yourself. So, I’ve heard this is a forum that collects rumors.]
Satin dress: [Yes indeed. If it has anything to do with urban legends, leave it to me! Ask me about anything from the best location for a bravery test to the most nerve-racking workplaces!
Tanaka Tarou: [Um, are there rumors about the demonic blade or the headless rider?]
Satin dress: [Hmm. You’re looking for some really retro stuff, huh.]
Tanaka Tarou: [I’m sorry.”]
Satin dress: [No need to be sorry. But, uhh, oh yes… There was one derived from some other rumor. Have you heard of the subway tunnels story?]
Tanaka Tarou: [I’m sorry.”]
Satin dress: [If you apologize to me one more time, I’ll force you to play FPS games with me for free until tomorrow morning both as punishment and to bring us closer as friends, alright? Anyway, some experiment on neutrinos or the Higgs boson or whatever led to rumors that a strange door opened in an unused subway station. And if you go through that door, you would be teleported to a fantasy world where swords and magic are intertwined. It’s recently become somewhat viral.]
Tanaka Tarou: [So how is that connected to the headless rider?]
Satin dress: [Ahh, yes. Well, if we can go to the other side, it’s logical to think that someone could come to us from the other side. There have also been numerous rumors of strange sightings around the station’s entrances and exits. Should I send you the video URLs?]
Tanaka Tarou: [That would be great. …Wait, numerous rumors?]
Satin dress: [Yeah. You’ll see it in the video, but it seems that there’s more than one of them who came through. Vampiric aristocrats, retro gangs from the Prohibition era, and all sorts of other things. I mean, compared to UFOs and Little Greys, it seemed there were more types of them.]
Tanaka Tarou: [Then, you’re saying one of them was–]
Satin dress: [Exactly. There was a headless rider in a jet black riding suit. Well, I suppose it could just be something a college film student is doing to ease their boredom.]
Part 8
“......”
A headless rider in a black leotard pulled up to the side of the road on a motorcycle. She elegantly typed an ellipsis onto her PDA.
As if there was always some bored, perpetually online guy in the anime forum, a reply soon popped up, saying, "Don't just write meaningless BS."
Once again, without even realizing it, she had become a celebrity.
If there happened to be an "original" in this city whose head had been cut right off by a wire trap, she wouldn't even be able to lift her face to meet theirs. At that point, it would probably be better for her just to serve up some cookies or whatever.
"But like, I can't lift my face because I don't have one. Fufufu."
Right after those words were uttered, the motorcycle that "she" was riding let out a sound similar to that of an upset horse.
The headless rider came back to her senses and hurriedly deleted the text she had typed. If her lover Shinra had seen it, it would have been disastrous. In all seriousness, he might have even made an "I can't lift my face" t-shirt.
Incidentally, this city, which was apparently called Academy City, seemed to be a treasure trove of urban legends, just like Ikebukuro, and there were all sorts of rumors running around, including the headless rider.
For example, the rumor that nobody knows who's writing the "bloody German letters" all over the city or even when they’re written, but a tragedy will occur just as foretold... and so on.
"...The 'Sky by Fire' is the world's largest high-altitude flying SSTO and the pride of Academy City. Unlike a rocket or a space shuttle, a single-stage spaceship separates from an airplane mid-flight to break through the atmosphere. This was a major Academy City project that combined the scattered research and developmental achievements of various private spacecraft companies..."
An airship slowly passed over the headless rider's head, its large screen broadcasting a mass of information to the entire city.
"A spaceship, huh. There are rockets outside of Tanegashima too...? I...I just hope that kind of thing doesn't attract real aliens, shudder shudder."
The headless rider typed furiously on her PDA to turn her mind elsewhere.
Suddenly, she turned her gaze to the side.
As if deliberately spoiling the squeaky clean walls of the building, huge red letters had been scrawled on one side.
Although the letters were from the English alphabet, they were arranged completely differently.
But for the international headless rider, German was not a problem.
Then, after skimming the letters, she entered something onto her PDA.
For some reason, she then turned the screen towards the direction of the graffiti.
This was what had been written on the screen:
"Well, what the hell are you doing there, vampire?"
Part 9
"So that's why 3D printers are like pyramids."
Said a young man who was holding a plastic bag with anime designs on it.
He was Yumasaki Walker. Next to him, a woman named Karisawa, who was also holding a plastic bag, laughed.
"Yumacchi, I'm a cosplayer, so I only know so much about 3-D objects. How do you expect me to understand something as philosophical as that?"
"How should I say this... Whether you're making a battleship or a girl, or a girl in the form of a battleship… It's like building something up with loads of tiny dots to make a smooth outline. Basically, you can only add to it and can never subtract from it. After all, you can't make the tunnel after building the mountain. So in the end, it's like a pyramid–you can only create the internal rooms and pathways by changing the way you stack the dots when you make it at first."
"So what?"
"But this place, Academy City, is just filled with tools that allow one to use the taking away method to dig right through all three dimensions! And it's as easy as using a photocopier in a convenience store! Man, I can't even put into words how awesome this is! It's indescribable! The possibilities, the range of what can be done, are on a totally different level! POGGERS!!!"
"So, Yumacchi, you're a 3-D kinda guy?"
"Up to a purity of about 2.99 dimensions, I'm your guy! An idol made of polygons is not three dimensional! It's just pretending to be so!"
Next to them, there was also one man who actually had some common sense. He made a face like he had eaten a bitter insect after listening to the others' conversation. The man named Kyohei Kadota always had something weighing down his mind.
"...You know what, it's your life, so I won't say anything more about it. But what the hell happened to that Togusa guy?"
"Ah, well, Togusa-san is totally obsessed with 3-D idols. After seeing Meigo Arisa-chan just now, he disappeared into the crowd like a slippery eel."
"That was pretty cool, right!? It's definitely not just a normal cosplay–could it be some kind of promo for a theatrical release!?"
"Hey, what about Hijiribe Ruri...?"
"Tsk, tsk, tsk! That ain't right, Dotachin; this isn't cheating! While idol fans know they'll never be able to touch the real deal, they're free to construct harems and dream teams in their brains!! Of course, this is all confined by the limits of their wallet!!"
They hadn't changed at all. It's as if that group of people had concentrated all of their points in professional baseball into a single parameter.
At that moment, Kadota noticed that Karisawa was looking elsewhere.
In her line of sight, next to the window of a shop of some sort, stood a girl in a pure-white nun's habit and a bespectacled, ample-chested high school girl in an indigo jacket.
Kadota warned them just in case.
"... Don't get involved in that. If that's a religious person, you might accidentally create an international incident!"
"What are you talking about, Dotachin? They're our comrades! Can't you see!?"
"Huh?"
"That's Index and Kazakiri Hyouka from the show A Certain Magical Index! ...You know, that's a lot more difficult than it looks. It always gets heated whenever we discuss how one would portray the safety pins!!!"
"So they're cosplayers, huh...?"
"But really, that's a scarily accurate reproduction. Let's go ask how they did it! Wheee!!"
Saying that, Karisawa stretched her arms out horizontally while holding on to her plastic bag and charged off like a plane taking off.
The cosplay(?) girls were saying some things as they looked through the window.
It looks like they weren't browsing the shop's merchandise.
"Well, it's based in German, but there's a lot of phrases in some sort of dialect, so it's hard to decipher..."
"...I-I don't speak German, so I can't say much."
On one side of the transparent glass window, crimson letters were haphazardly scrawled over it.
It wasn't lipstick or anything like that: it was written in some kind of paint that looked suspiciously like blood and gave an ominous feeling.
Karisawa, who was looking at the window over the shoulders of the girls she had just met, suddenly said,
"Hm? Doesn't that say, 'The Sky by Fire will fall from up high. Three more people, and it'll fall for sure'?"
"Whoa!?"
"Uh, umm, and you are…?"
The two girls, shocked, turned around, shoulders shaking, but Kirasawa only gave them a non-sequitur answer.
"Heh, for the users of the Evil Eye, German is a compulsory subject! Rather than one, two, and three, it should be, eins, zwei, and drei! Schwarz Kreuz, Black Crucifix! But everyone wants to use German, so it's common sense to memorize all sorts of niche words in order to stand out from the rest!!"
"......"
"......"
The conversation died. Maybe it had never been alive in the first place.
The gaze of the girls wandered around, and then fixed on a single point, resting on the face of someone who looked like he could actually communicate properly with them.
As always, Kyohei Kadota had a face like he had eaten a bitter insect.
"... I'll do my best to translate, but even I have my limits."
Part 10
Rumble rumble
In front of the headless rider, the characters written in blood on the wall squirmed.
The characters no longer needed the wall as a canvas. The crimson liquid, as if in a micro-g environment, floated in midair, and then began to form a particular German phrase.
"Either way, I look like this, so even if I wanted to convey an accurate warning to the residents, when they see me like this, they're so scared that I don't even have a chance to communicate. So I had no choice but to use methods that their common sense could accept, like the fact that bloody graffiti has been scribbled everywhere in the streets."
"Wouldn't the fact that this much blood––way more than what one could get by draining an entire human body––was sprayed everywhere go past their threshold of common sense? It wouldn't be surprising if rumors of some unknown murderer were to start circulating."
"Hmm, the human world sure is difficult to understand. While being holed up in your own castle is comfortable, if you surround yourself only with such comfortable things, you’ll be spoiled, and such considerations will only be crude at best."
"A castle?"
"As in the castle of a vampire. Although the lordship has been transferred to my son, I would still be called viscount if I were to return to my country in such a form."
Although she was just a headless rider with no clear memories of her own, as expected, she had a firmer grasp on the occult than most ordinary people. Still, a vampire in the form of a mass of blood could only be described as "exotic."
"I was hoping you would look a bit more... aesthetically pleasing..."
"It's basically the same as assigning parameters in baseball games. Sure, some vampires go all-in for looks, like the immortal queen of internet fairy tales who sings and dances while pretending to be a 3-D model or the diva vampire who, instead of cash, collects blood donations from millions. I wanted to do things a little differently, so I decided to forgo my outward appearance completely and instead further my evolution."
"You know, it would be great if you could come back stronger and stronger every time you were defeated for like three times or something."
"Oh, you'll have to ask the mayor for that kind of thing. He's the expert in powering up after being defeated."
There was an endless amount of questions raised about the vampire made of bodily fluids, but there were more pressing concerns at the moment.
The vampire who called himself(?) viscount had expressed so in bloody letters.
"What do you mean ‘you were trying to convey an accurate warning?’ "
"Well––though I'm sure you're aware of it as well––by nature, we are not supposed to be in this world. While it's thrilling to think of establishing diplomatic relations using such an occurrence, things will most certainly go wrong."
"And more specifically?"
"It's like the butterfly effect. Regardless of whether we have malicious intentions or not, because of the emergence of such outside forces, the great causality in the world here will be gradually skewed, leading to something that should never be allowed to happen… but that's beyond our control. After all, even if a butterfly's flapping wings can cause a storm, that butterfly cannot hope to control said storm."
The bloody text continued to shift.
Having finally met a person(?) who could properly understand German, it seemed the viscount was extremely upbeat.
"Nevertheless, we can't just say that it has nothing to do with us and that the fact that this world will be destroyed is not something we should care about. That would be too irresponsible, right?"
"What do you mean by something that should never be allowed to happen?"
"Well, you're already seeing it."
The viscount began making something other than just words.
A pointer icon, like that of a computer cursor, pointed straight up.
To the sky.
The airship floating slowly in the blue sky was broadcasting such news.
"The ‘Sky by Fire’ is currently sailing over Japan and is preparing numerous SSTO vehicles for gravity-free medical research, high-speed cargo transportation, orbital solar power generation, and personalized space travel."
The headless rider raised her full-face helmet and looked to the sky, typing some text onto the PDA under her shadow.
“That thing?”
“That thing.”
It seemed that the vampire gave only an incomprehensible, cryptic answer.
But that was not the case at all.
“It appears that the ‘Sky by Fire’ isn’t actually something that exists in this world.”
Bullseye.
Only the immense scale of the situation prevented the headless rider from properly understanding what was on hand.
“We don’t know how many foreign entities have broken into this world, but all of the distortions caused by such movements were concentrated into a single point in the sky. And so, the world's largest supergiant aircraft that should never have existed was born. And it will continue to exist until we leave this world. On the other hand, if we foreign entities continue to increase and be active here, then its details will become more and more fine-tuned.”
“...”
"And here's the worst part: it seems to have a self-preservation function inside, so, to put it simply, it's actively working towards the destruction of the factor that we need in order to leave this place."
The bloody text laid out the terrible facts so concisely.
“An SSTO can be transformed into a ballistic missile just by changing its contents. If over 100 shots of them were fired on this city at the same time... To be precise, it would try to shatter the “rumored tunnels” we need in order to return to our original world. If that fails, the ‘Sky by Fire’ itself might fall like a meteorite to shut the door and make us stay here forever."
Part 11
A total length of three hundred and eighty meters.
And a total width of five hundred.
It was an aircraft that looked like a flying wing aircraft shaped like a "<" with another, sharper, V-shaped pair of wings stuck on top. A four-winged flying machine, it looked like a kimono floating on a river. In fact, more than 80% of its giant fuselage was filled with SSTO launch and control devices, and the upper part of the fuselage was covered with countless hatches, which looked like a honeycomb or the vertical launch tubes on a nuclear submarine from which cruise missiles were shot.
The manufacturing technology used could be seen everywhere in Academy City, which, admittedly, could even be mistaken as a Martian base by outsiders.
Or rather,
"This is fourth control; some unidentified cooling system is proliferating around the computing equipment! It is presumed that the object has acquired CIC-class processing power. Currently in the process of self-segmentation!!"
"You can't even remove the parts. Cut cables are rewired in about 30 seconds on average!"
"Warhead formation capability is rising. Unlike until now, when only conventional rocket fuel was injected, it seems that special explosives are being mass-produced in on-board chemical synthesis plants!!!!"
The lamenting cries of young girls could be heard from all over.
Even as they cried out, the ground beneath them writhed, the wires and the pipes in the walls constantly shifted, and rooms and equipment that had never been seen before were constantly created as if it was a matter of course.
It was as if they were inside a living creature, or as if they were watching a timelapse of a plant's growth.
This wasn't the time to talk about modern technology. Rather, the technology itself was becoming more and more complex by the second, right in front of their eyes.
"We're less than a hundred kilometres away from Academy City. Thanks to the altitude, we're already at a point where something can reach the city by simply free-falling without any propulsion!!"
"I still can't get my commands to be received. Maintain an altitude of 25,000 meters!"
"Analyzing the target's position through a radar survey, terrain relief scanning, and concave/convex patterns.... The target is represented as the center of Academy City!! The launch tube hatches on the first and second wings are opening in sequence!"
The girls who were giving those various reports seemed to be middle schoolers.
If one were a native of Academy City, one would have recognized them to be the elite students of the famous Tokiwadai Middle School.
"Sigh, what's going on here…?"
Misaka Mikoto muttered impatiently.
There was no explanation of any kind, and even those girls couldn't explain what had happened.
They had been at school, as usual. Shortly after the bell that signalled the end of the first period had rung, they had all appeared inside this machine, which they had never seen before.
Rather than to say that they had been transported somehow, it was more appropriate to say that the entire landscape around them had been replaced.
"How exactly was the list of names leaked?"
Said the queen of the largest clique at Tokiwadai Middle School, Shokuhou Misaki, as she leaned back against the wall.
One of the monitors that were lined up everywhere was displaying a student register for Tokiwadai Middle School. Each name was assigned to each part of the giant aircraft called the "Sky By Fire."
"Or could there be another reason why the names are known even though they haven't been released…?"
Presumably, they were to be the crew of the ship.
A unified group of people, possessing enough skill to be able to manipulate such an aircraft.
That may have been the reason why the aircraft twisting like an organism had "selected" them.
In order to assume the proper form of an aircraft.
Everything it did was to enrich the details even though it had the ability to grow to completion by itself already.
At some distance from Shokuhou, Misaka Mikoto and Shirai Kuroko were in the middle of a conversation.
"Onee-sama, how is the situation on your side?"
"Wait a minute, here, it's this wire, right…? Should be fine, there's just a bit left... there!!"
Misaka said, hunched over at the console.
Having peeled off the equipment's power distribution panel, she was cutting into the mass of cables inside.
According to previous reports from the girls, even if the power distribution cables were cut, they would automatically be reconnected, but...
"Okay, that's good... Although the severed cables will automatically connect back together, if we add other wires to the mix, they should mix together and be restored as well! Alright, it's starting soon!!"
Misaka Mikoto snapped her fingers.
The terminal held in her other hand showed a red debug screen that she had never seen before.
Although it was based in English, it was totally different from what one would see in everyday conversation. Kuroko, who was watching from the side, could not understand it at all, but that was not the case for Misaka.
Tatatatatatat!! As her fingers quickly moved around, the "Sky by Fire," which had been so stable that you could almost forget it was actually flying, began to shake slightly.
"Local data link, CIC, first through fourth full wing surface, waiting for the command list to be displayed... there it is!! The emergency stop command for all SSTOs about to be launched! Disengage target coordinates!! And now… !!"
There was a noticeable change in the screens piled up everywhere.
One of the underclassmen turned her back.
"Launch preparation successfully lifted!! With this, Academy City is saved!!"
"That was just the first step. If we don't land this thing safely, then..."
Shortly thereafter, Misaka smiled.
Bzzzzt!! The cabin lights immediately turned bright red.
Immediately afterwards, the entire "Sky by Fire" shook tremendously.
In the blink of an eye, all of the girls were thrown up to the ceiling, as if gravity had disappeared. Some turned in the air and landed with their feet on the ceiling, while others held the hands of other girls while floating in the air. If they had not all been high-level Tokiwadai espers, a few head-on collisions and a couple broken bones would not have been surprising at all.
So why did such a gravitational anomaly occur?
The reason was revealed before they even got their feet back on the ground.
"The 'Sky by Fire' is rapidly losing altitude!!"
"Its speed is rising––now it's practically shooting itself straight down to Earth!!"
"The surface analysis on the radar is working again. The target is still the middle of Academy City, but this...this isn't using the SSTOs! It's going to crash the whole aircraft into the city!!"
"Considering that we have 10 minutes before impact and that we reach the target at top speed, we predict a blast diameter of over 8 kilometers!!"
Listening to the depressing report, Misaka gritted her teeth.
Although the gravitational anomaly hadn't been resolved yet, she magnetically forced herself back on the ground and grabbed the still-attached support terminal that was swinging in the air.
"Argh, why is this thing so persistent!! It's almost like a living creature in its tenacity!!"
Part 12
"......"
At the moment, Kamijou Touma was buried inside a passenger car parked on the side of the road.
This was not some exaggerated metaphor. Half of his body was literally sunken within the rolled metal of the car door.
The car itself had skidded all the way to the other side of the road. The dark marks left on the road by the friction from the tires were testimony to the intensity of the impact.
It was that much.
Shizuo Heiwajima's "accident" had caused that much destruction.
Index had told him about the German words written in blood.
At first, he had been dubious. That was until he witnessed certain things like a bronze statue in front of a station toppling over and all of the windows on a building shattering.
Like a snowball rolling down a slope, the significance of the incidents had grown larger until when he looked back, it had grown to the point where it covered the sky itself.
And then he had heard about the disappearance of Misaka Mikoto.
Through his phone, he had heard that the students of Tokiwadai Middle School were locked up in the "Sky by Fire." In addition, he heard that the giant structure was acting all on its own, so the girls didn't know how to land it.
Death. As if he sensed that one word inching closer toward someone he knew, Kamijou couldn't help but tremble.
He also knew that the existence of the "Ikebukuro group,” who had come from the tunnel over to this side, was at the center of all these distorted events.
There was no way of knowing who had written the bloody German text and what their intentions were. However, now that the situation had reached a critical point, there was no longer room for any doubt.
The "Sky by Fire" planned to obliterate Academy City in order to destroy the tunnel.
If that happened, everything would be lost: the students living in the city, the students of Tokiwadai, and the people from Ikebukuro. They would lose everything. There was no time to explain to each and every one of them. Even if he was being stubborn, it was still the only way.
If he gave up here, everything would be lost.
He might never see the smiles that should've been around him.
So.
Crrrrreeeeeaaaaaak!!!!
With a tremendous sound, Kamijou Touma dug himself out of the metal.
It wasn't over yet.
Even if his opponent wasn't a particularly evil person.
Even if his opponent had a power that didn't make sense in "this world."
That was not a reason for not saving the people in the city or the girls on the "Sky by Fire."
Nor was it a reason to nonchalantly admit that the "Ikebukuro group" should be trapped in this world forever.
"Have to save...."
Kamijou said, with a mouth filled with the taste of iron.
Forcing his wobbly vision to look firmly ahead, he steadied himself.
"I have to save everyone."
Just that was enough.
The young man, once again, firmly stepped toward the future.
Sending the entire "Ikebukuro group" back to their original world before any critical damage is done.
There was no other way to smash through the current situation.
Part 13
[This is bad.]
The headless rider was driving a large, black motorcycle while entering some words on her PDA.
[Isn't this a super dangerous situation!?]
She was not human, nor did she didn't feel any special attachment to cities outside of Ikebukuro.
However, perhaps because her life in Ikebukuro had influenced the meaning of her existence, she could not put on a leisurely attitude while bringing useless chaos to human society, at least for now.
[I need to do something… It'd be better to start with something simple and easy to understand and then gradually make everything come together. If Shizuo were here, he would've been found out right away, and Anri might also surface due to her "heterogeneity". I guess it's very possible to find information about them through what's trending on SNS and bulletin boards… So then the problem is with Mikado and Aoba, the "ordinary" people. It would be pretty difficult to find them if they're here.]
Although she wanted to "take action" right away, the headless rider suddenly turned her train of thought around.
She was known as a "transporter" underground, and this time, she had once again been involved in some trouble while working but had somehow come to Academy City.
In other words, she still had "the goods."
Inside the stainless steel case and shock-absorbing resin was a bottle of aged liquor. It probably could be stored at room temperature as there was no special coolant.
“Well..... this isn't the best time to talk about this, but this is this, and that’s that, so… Since I don't know what's happening at Ikebukuro, there's no telling what would affect someone's life. Even though it's kept in a case, the bottle is still scary.”
After reconsidering, the headless rider headed to a nearby station.
She placed "the goods" in a station locker and got back on her large motorcycle.
[Alright, now it's time to deal with this super dangerous situation!!]
Then.
The headless rider tried her best to eliminate "a certain possibility" from her mind.
But it was impossible to ignore.
Even though she knew that it was the worst case scenario, she couldn't help but think about it.
[Orihaya Izaya... If that guy has something to do with this current situation, then only God knows how this will end.]
The viscount, after watching the headless rider leave, moved the clump of blood floating in the air and wrote some particular German words.
[Well, she's gone.]
"Yes, she's gone."
Someone answered back.
You couldn't really describe how a blood clot that didn't even have eyes, ears, a mouth, or a nose would "look back," but the viscount deliberately made a red silhouette to turn around, purely out of courtesy.
Standing there was a beautiful woman surrounded by frigid air and covered in white from head to toe.
Dorothy Nifas.
She had gone down a different evolutionary path from the viscount, but in a sense, she was a vampire that was closer to the viscount than anyone else.
[If you had explained it to the humans, things might not have come to this.]
"Don't be ridiculous. Do you think I could've talked to a ‘human being’ I've never met before?"
[If I had known this, I would've brought the "children" with me. Since they're all part of a new generation, they weren't poisoned by the witch hunts, the exorcisms.... as well as the "eaters."]
"Are you serious? Do you really think that having those siblings lingering here will make the current situation even a tiny bit better?"
[...Ah, yes, well, never mind that. Even though they don't mean any harm, they certainly have the power and the temperament to mess everything up. In that respect, "the children" are probably the top of the top.]
"You spoil your children too much."
Dorothy said with a soft, icy sigh.
"So what do we do now?"
[Hmmm. Since the warning has been accurately delivered, we'll rely on that headless rider to spread it now. There's no need for us to continue sending messages in blood. It's about time we started on something else.]
"Are you going to confront the group from Ikebukuro?"
[I'd like to if I could, but I've got other things to do.]
The viscount said with floating red text.
[Something bad is about to crawl out of the tunnel over there. Now, the fact that it's bad isn't a matter of that thing's consciousness, but rather about its very nature. Anyway, this is far from good. The moment it comes out, it'll probably exceed the capacity for "the world on this side."]
"More specifically?"
[From us vampires, the very ends of the galaxy; from the madness of the liquor of immortality, the deepest secret of alchemy.]
The viscount didn't name the thing openly, probably because of how terrible the situation was.
As if by just uttering a name, one called upon its owner.
Dorothy frowned.
"And if that's true, what can you do?"
[I've never been a vampire who seeks power. However, I'm better than the others at not dying, and above all, I'm confident in my ability to lead a humorous conversation. Even just stalling for time would be enough from me.]
"Really?'
Dorothy's eyes narrowed.
And then, she said.
"I'll go with you."
[There's no need for that, you know?]
"I'm your fiancée."
[Well, in that case, I might just leave it to you.]
"Anyway."
Her gaze, which always gave a cold impression, suddenly turned even sharper.
"Did you know that the headless rider just now was actually a woman?"
[Huh? I didn't notice that... Hey, wait, Dorothy. Why is everything starting to freeze up?]
"What do you think? Hint: female jealousy."
"Your ability to say such things so nonchalantly is part of your charm, you k-k-k-k-kno–?"
The viscount's crimson clot froze over before he could finish.
After freezing everything, the pure white vampire exhaled softly.
"Really, how could I just let you go?"
As if it were absurd.
But there was also a glint of warmth in her eyes.
"The fact that we have Hawking, a black hole vampire, on one hand, and that on the other we have Ronny is the worst XXXX."
That said, if "they" had already come when he woke up, and everything was destroyed before his eyes, the viscount would surely be in a sorrowful state...
Probably not angry, but sad.
That was why.
"Sigh, how could I have fallen in love with such a troublesome man?"
There was nobody listening, so she could rest assured in speaking her true feelings.
Dorothy Nifas, who spoke thus, departed, alone, from the frozen viscount.
After all, that was what he had said.
That even if your strength was not on par with your opponent, you might find a way to stall for time.
Part 14
A mass of screeching, ear-piercing sounds gathered together.
From deep within the darkness of a railroad tunnel, a large number of rats scrambled to escape. It was not unlike the unusual behaviour exhibited by animals just before a storm or a great disaster.
Complete darkness.
True darkness.
No one dared to peek inside. Surely nobody could go in there and come back in one piece.
Nobody knew if whatever was inside carried obvious malice or evil intentions. Maybe it was thinking about completely destroying the Euclidean world as we know it, or it was just dissatisfied with the seasonal chips at the convenience store.
Either way.
While there was no way to peer through the darkness, there was definitely something peering out from the dark.
It was clear.
“It” was interested in this place.
The moment “it” came out, everything would be thrown into disaster.
