Once the duel started, the time flew by, and in the remaining five minutes, both of their health gauges had just 10 percent left. Whoever could deal some serious damage in this charge would be the winner. That said, they had both used up their special-attack gauges, so they could only use regular attacks. And Ash had the advantage there with his V-twin Punch, a special technique he had developed himself.
“Here we goooooooo!!” Ash howled, racing furiously along the cracked main thoroughfare of the Century End stage. “Super! Special! Max V-twin Puuuuuuuuuunch!! Towaaaaah!!” He jumped and stood up on the bike, setting his right foot on the throttle and his left on the tandem seat to ride the metal horse like a surfer.
Once he was about thirty meters from Haruyuki, he used his toes to deftly operate the front brake for an instantaneous full-lock turn. At the same time, he made the back tire power-slide and spun the bike sideways at top speed. Carving out a spiral of flames on the road, he became a mass of kinetic energy to assault Haruyuki.
The instant the double-spinning tire touched him, the remainder of Haruyuki’s health gauge would definitely be knocked flying. The last time he’d had this serious trick used on him, he’d tried to dodge by jumping straight up into the air, but Ash had responded with a wild technique called a Jackknife Guillotine, a handstand with the bike in the spinning state. The rear tire had grazed his stomach and taken over 10 percent of his gauge, so he couldn’t dodge like that again here. Still, if he tried to jump to either side, the bike would have no problems chasing after him.
“Whoa! So this is the end?!”
“A crow that can’t fly’s just a plain old crow!!”
“Can’t a plain old crow fly, though?”
Listening to the voices from the Gallery coming down on them from the buildings on either side of the road, Haruyuki thought hard: Forward’s obviously out of the question. Up/down’s out; the sides are out. So then, the only direction left is back. But running around dodging until time runs out so I can get a draw isn’t exactly the greatest end to the First-Term Final Ash-Crow Fight.
No. I keep getting stuck because I’m only thinking about running. Tight spots are exactly when you hold your ground, go forward. That’s what Kuroyukihime and Fuko would do.
“Go!!” Haruyuki focused on only the motorcycle transformed into a spinning, flaming top charging toward him and kicked off the ground. Not forward nor up nor sideways nor backward; diagonally forward, to the right.
“You’re out, you’re out, you’re abooooooout!!” Ash corrected the trajectory of his charge. Spinning to the left, he turned left and closed in, trying to knock Haruyuki into next week.
“Hngraaaaaaah!” Feeling the scattering sparks bouncing off him, Haruyuki ran with everything he had. To the left to match the bike’s spin, ever left. His special-attack gauge was empty, so he couldn’t fly, but he used his spread wings as a rudder and ran, ran, ran, carving out a circle.
“Nyaaaaaah! Tera poweeeeerrrrr!” Ash opened the throttle all the way, and the V-twin engine roared as the speed of the motorcycle’s spinning increased.
Haruyuki kept dashing around it at unprecedented speed.
Faster…Faster!! As he prayed, Silver Crow moved more and more quickly, particles of light shooting from the armor of his white-hot feet. Eventually, a white circle with a radius of seven meters was beaten into the surface of the road, combining with the red flames jetting from the rear tire of the motorcycle to create overlapping dual rings.
Now that I’m thinking about it, it’s been ages since I ran so seriously like this in a normal duel, Haruyuki suddenly thought, even as he sensed the moment of decision approaching. Lately, he’d been so totally focused on his flying speed that he’d stopped thinking about movement on the ground, a duel fundamental. Even still, at some point, Silver Crow had become extremely fleet of foot.
How about I stop pursuing speed, trying to borrow the system’s power? Can’t I just look for that in my own heart—in the naked body of my duel avatar?
“Ah…Aaaaaaaaaah!!” Letting out a battle cry, Haruyuki pushed himself to run another step faster.
The instant that Silver Crow’s running speed surpassed the spinning speed of Ash Roller, the bike’s front fork—on the receiving end of a massive amount of power for so long—snapped in half. The engine plunged into the ground, followed by a massive explosion.
Blown back by the flames, Ash Roller shot up toward the night sky. “Our fight!! Starts now!! Eternaaaaaaal!!”
And then he blew up like fireworks, flashy particles exploding everywhere.
Once the duel was over, and he woke up on the pedestrian bridge that cut across Ring Road No. 7, Haruyuki stayed where he was to wait for the bus that Ash Roller’s “real self” was probably on.
A minute or so later, an EV bus running southward stopped at the bus stop below him, and several passengers got on before it quietly pulled away again. He started to turn around to see the bus off as it slipped under the bridge, but then he noticed a lone figure remaining at the bus stop after the bus had left, and he hurriedly turned on his heel.
A girl in uniform, short-sleeved blouse with a skirt with the same checked pattern, was waving at him. He didn’t need to see the slightly wavy short hair to know that this was the younger sister of the Century End rider he’d been fighting a few minutes earlier, Rin Kusakabe. She stopped him with both hands when he tried to come down from the pedestrian bridge and raced up the stairs, a shining smile on her face as she dipped her head toward him. “Good morning, Arita.”
“’Morning, Kusakabe,” Haruyuki returned the greeting and then cocked his head to one side. “What’s going on?”
“Right…Uh. Um,” Rin mumbled as she checked the time and then said with an apologetic expression, “I’m sorry to. Bother you before. School…Could we. Talk. A minute?”
“Y-yeah, of course,” he replied, hurriedly looking around. There weren’t that many, but there were still some people on the pedestrian bridge, so it wasn’t really the best place for confidential conversation. Or so he thought.
“I’m sorry,” she said in a small voice. “I have to get on the. Bus that’s coming in ten minutes, so here…” Rin pulled a small disk-shaped object out of her school bag. He stared, wondering what it was for a second, until he finally realized it was an XSB cable cord reel.
“Huh? But. Um…,” Haruyuki stammered, while Rin pulled a small plug from the reel and inserted it into her Neurolinker. With a red face, she offered the other plug to Haruyuki.
A girl and a boy directing in a public space were dating; the shorter the cable, the closer they were—these customs were said to be “unenlightened” among the type of adults who worked hard with the latest Neurolinker models. But in junior high and high school culture, they were still very current. He had to wonder, though, what the cord-reel type meant, when it could change from a maximum length of one meter to a minimum of fifty centimeters. With these thoughts in his mind, Haruyuki connected the plug to his Neurolinker.
The wired connection warning had no sooner disappeared than Rin’s neurospeak voice was echoing in his mind.
“Um, I’m sorry. In a place like this…I have something. Important to discuss. Though.”
“U-uh-uh, I’m totally…” Fine with it? He wasn’t sure if he could really say that, so he let his sentence fade out.
Rin smiled a little and put just a bit of distance between them. The pastel-green cord reel that hung between them sparkled in the light of the summer morning.
“S-so what’s the important thing?” he asked, his heart pounding a little belatedly.
“The truth is…” Rin stared directly at him as she made him hear her voice, with an increased note of seriousness. “I have. A message for you from…My brother…”
“A-a message?! From Ash?!” He very nearly cried out in his real voice and hurried to purse his lips shut tight as he muttered in his mind, “He could’ve just told me himself in the duel before, though.”
“He said it
’s…giga embarrassing.”
“…I-it is? So then, what’s the message?” Haruyuki asked.
Rin gently stroked the Neurolinker on her neck with one hand. This Neurolinker, metallic-gray shell with a lightning-bolt crack running across it, was not originally hers. It belonged to her older brother, Rinta Kusakabe, who had been in a coma in a hospital in Shibuya for the last two years after a motorcycle race accident.
Through whatever logic, Rin could dive into the Accelerated World as the Burst Linker Ash Roller only when she was wearing her brother’s Neurolinker. While accelerated, her brother Rinta fought—for Rin, it apparently felt like she was watching over the fight from the tandem seat of the motorcycle—but it wasn’t clear if that was actually Rinta’s spirit being transferred from the hospital or just a second personality within Rin called Rinta.
The one thing that was certain was that Ash/Rinta adored Rin and would explode in anger if Haruyuki got too close to—or too distant from—her. Ash would definitely remember today’s directing and have a few choice words for Haruyuki in their next duel. Although Haruyuki and Rin were both off for summer holidays starting the following day, so there wouldn’t be the Tuesday-Thursday-Saturday Ash-Crow fight for a while.
His thoughts had made it that far when he suddenly realized something. “I-is Ash’s message maybe about summer vacation? Does he want to decide a day and time and keep having regular fights?”
“No, it’s not— Oh! I’d be happy if. You did that. Though…Oh! No, it’s not that.” Faint color rising up in her cheeks once more, Rin shook her head and pulled herself back together. “The message. Is about…today’s. Territories.”
“……!!”
Haruyuki’s eyes flew wide open. Ash Roller had taken part in the mock Territories with the Green Legion the previous Sunday. Thus, he knew about Nega Nebulus’s planned attack on Minato Area No. 3, but even so, what on earth would he have to say on the very day of the attack?
“Wh-what’s Ash say?”
“Um.” Stammering for a moment, or rather letting her neurospeak lapse, Rin closed the distance between them another five centimeters. Her untucked blouse flapped, and a sweet smell came wafting up. Naturally, Haruyuki couldn’t help but get flustered, but the next words she said knocked even this feeling out of his heart. “Um, my brother. Says he wants. To be at the Legion meeting before the Territories.”
“Huh?”
“Actually, it’s not just him…U and Oli, too…”
“Whaaat?!”
The Legion meeting—did he mean the meeting about the merger with Prominence? Reeling, he saw the brave figures of the Rough Valley Rollers, the three-person team of Ash Roller, Bush Utan, and Olive Grab, in the back of his mind.
Once the closing ceremony ended before lunch that day, all the Legion members, including Fuko, Utai, and Chocolat’s gang, were meeting at Haruyuki’s house. Fortunately, the kendo team was also just having a meeting today, given that the meet was the following day, so Takumu would be able to join up with them around one. They were going to have lunch together, and then at two o’clock, the merger meeting with Prominence would finally start.
They would move to Nakano Central Park, the large commercial facility near the border between Prominence territory, Nakano Area No. 1, and Nega Nebulus territory, Suginami Area No. 1, with their global connections off and then connect using only the local net inside the mall. After first checking the matching list and confirming that there were no Burst Linkers other than the attending members from both sides—which had been agreed upon in advance—they would begin the duel with Sky Raker and Blood Leopard as the starters while the rest of the attendees would dive as members of the Gallery. So it would have been possible to have Rin and the others take part if they came to the mall, but if Nega Nebulus requested additional attendees at this point—and members of Great Wall on top of that—the Prominence side would no doubt be alarmed and on guard.
And then Haruyuki had a sudden realization. “Um, what meeting does Ash want to come to?”
“Uh. The Nega Nebulus meeting. Before the Territories.”
“Th-that one, huh…?” The tension drained from his shoulders, and Rin blinked with a curious expression. Now that he thought about it, there’s no way Rin or Ash would know anything about the Legion merger when they’d only decided on it yesterday. “Sorry, sorry. I was thinking of something else. Uh, so that meeting, we don’t do it full dive or in a duel stage. It’s in the real.”
“Oh. Then. It will be difficult. To attend.” Rin dropped her head.
“Um, if it’s just you, I think it’ll be okay,” Haruyuki hurried to add. “You’ve already met everyone a bunch of times.”
“Thank you, Arita. But if it’s just me, that might not. Achieve my brother’s objective.”
“It won’t, huh? …What’s his objective?” Haruyuki asked casually, but what Rin said next after a slight hesitation was so shocking that if they had been in the Accelerated World, he probably would’ve jumped a meter or so in surprise, flown over the pedestrian bridge guardrail, and fell onto the road headfirst.
“My brother…to participate in today’s Territories. With U and Oli…he wants to leave. Great Wall temporarily and join Nega Nebulus.”
“Whaaaaaaaat?!”
Haruyuki shrieked in his real voice, and a passing businessman turned a doubtful eye on him.
The closing ceremony started at nine that morning, and he sat through first opening remarks from the vice principal, then a speech by the principal, the presentation of club and team awards, an activity report from the student council, several warnings about summer vacation, and the closing remarks from the vice principal. The whole thing was over at 9:50. Chiyuri and Takumu both received certificates at the podium for their various meets—just certificates, although they were real paper—and Haruyuki clapped for them with his heart and soul.
After that, there was an extended homeroom in each classroom, and their homeroom teacher, Sugano, handed out report cards. This was digital data, and he’d always need a fair bit of mental strength to bring himself to click on it, but his test results that term had been all right, so he was able to open the file without having to brace himself too much.
His assessment in every subject except gym was much improved, but what made Haruyuki happy were the comments in the remarks column about his work with the Animal Care Club. Resolving anew to take good care of Hoo over summer vacation, he closed the report card window and listened impatiently to his teacher’s usual lecture on how summer vacation was a critical period for eighth graders blah blah blah.
This rambling speech kept going right up until the last second of long homeroom until, finally, their teacher Sugano wrapped up with the slight pressure of “Okay then, show me your smiling faces in the second term!” The bell rang, and the instant the teacher vanished out the door, an atmosphere of liberation filled the classroom.
Listening to the joyful chatter of his classmates and the clattering of chairs, Haruyuki stayed in his own seat, took a deep breath, and slowly exhaled it.
The first term of eighth grade really had been eventful. In April, Seiji Nomi, aka Dusk Taker, a new student a grade below Haruyuki, suddenly showed up to plunge Haruyuki into a desperate adversity both in the Accelerated World and the real world. At the time, the future had seemed closed off by darkness, but with the help of Niko, Fuko, Chiyuri, Takumu, and Kuroyukihime, he had just barely won the difficult battle against Nomi.
At the beginning of June, there’d been the Hermes’ Cord race, and after the tumult of the race event, Fuko had returned to the Legion.
In the middle of June, still riding on that momentum or perhaps on the spur of the moment, he had stood as a candidate for a member of the Animal Care Club. He’d wondered what would happen to him when he ended up taking over as president, but thanks to that, he’d been able to meet Hoo and Utai. He and his friends had charged the Castle to rescue Utai from a state of Unlimited EK, and inside the Castle, he’d encountered Tri
lead Tetroxide there and made the promise to meet again.
After that, he’d turned into the sixth Chrome Disaster in the middle of the ISS kit incident, but thanks to Rin Kusakabe intently putting herself in his way to pull him back, he’d returned to his own self. The curse of the Armor of Catastrophe had been undone by Utai’s purification ability, and they’d sealed The Destiny and Star Caster away from the world.
At the end of June, he’d met Wolfram Cerberus and Chocolat Puppeter and her friends, and on the day of the school festival at the end of the month, they’d had one mission after another—the rescue of Aqua Current, the attack on the Archangel Metatron, and the return of Niko, who’d been abducted to the Acceleration Research Society’s headquarters. Just before the end of the school festival, the White King had appeared and admitted that she was the president of the Acceleration Research Society, bringing one act to a close.
Even after the start of July, he’d been invited by Mayu Ikuzawa to run for student council election; there’d been the mock Territories with the Green Legion; the last of the Four Elements, Graphite Edge, had reappeared; the three members of Petit Paquet had joined Nega Nebulus—all kinds of things had happened. Two days earlier, Haruyuki had broken into the Castle again with Fuko and been reunited with Trilead. When they got home, Niko and Pard had told them about the Legion merger. And now today, they would finally have their decisive battle with the White Legion, Oscillatory Universe.
Well, as decisive as it was in his mind, in terms of the Brain Burst system, it would be no different from the normal Territories. So even if in the worst case, they were defeated, or he was pushed to total point loss, that wouldn’t spell the annihilation of the Legion. But they wouldn’t be able to use this trick again—stealing the White Legion’s right to block the matching list and pull back the cover on the Acceleration Research Society. The Society had cultivated the Armor of Catastrophe, Mark II, which housed Cerberus, with the Invincible part they stole from Niko, and they would no doubt bring about in the Accelerated World a new—and far greater—catastrophe than the ISS kits.
Pull of the Dark Nebula Page 15
