Flight Toward a Blue Sky

by Reki Kawahara

  Totally bound and unable to move, Haruyuki watched the other two duel avatars in the fight walking slowly toward each other.

  From the west: Dusk Taker, arms too long for his small physique dangling at his sides.

  From the east: Cyan Pile, the tip of his Pile Driver right arm glittering sharply.

  They stood in the middle of the white schoolyard and faced each other. The crackle of impending battle abruptly flooded the field, and the air grew thicker. Trembling with a prickly tension, Haruyuki could not speak, nor even pray.

  “Ooh,” Nomi said abruptly, flapping both hands at the wrists. “It seems you came prepared in your own way. Well, maybe I’ll get to have a little fun, then.”

  He lifted both hands and brought his fingertips together in front of his chest. The whine of vibration began to hum through the air, and a fluctuating purple light jetted out into space. It was Nomi’s Incarnate attack, what Haruyuki and Takumu called the Nihilistic Fluctuation. Haruyuki thought he would quickly take to the sky and attack with his long-distance flame power, but Nomi apparently intended to fight on the ground, perhaps to show his disdain for Cyan Pile.

  “Does that technique have a name?” Takumu asked, sounding relaxed.

  “Haa!” Nomi responded with a laugh like a long sigh. “I do not give names to my techniques! I’m told that, without a name, it takes a moment longer to activate, but I’ll have no part of that sort of gamer business! And, really…” He threw his arms out to the sides. The pulsing light left hazy lines lingering in space. “Is there any point in asking something like that? When you’re about to lose Brain Burst?”

  “Of course there is. I at least want to remember the opponent for whom I performed last rites,” Takumu returned coolly, readying the Enhanced Armament of his right arm sideways across his chest.

  Haruyuki knew that under the guidance of Red King Niko, Takumu had spent a week training his Incarnate. However, he hadn’t gone so far as to ask what kind of attack it was or if it had even reached the level where it could be used in a real fight. Pinched between the two lumps, Haruyuki’s avatar squealed, but that couldn’t stop him from staring intently at Takumu.

  Cyan Pile lifted his left arm and moved in a way Haruyuki could not have predicted. With the five fingers of his left hand, he tightly clasped the sharp tip of the stake peeking out of his Enhanced Armament.

  Taku, what the—?! Haruyuki opened his eyes wide.

  That spike—Takumu’s wounded psyche—was born from the memories of the cruel bullying he had been subjected to at his kendo lessons when he was in elementary school. It was the wooden shinai that had been stabbed at his own throat time after time after time, and also a lethal weapon to stab the throats of those who had tortured him.

  Why would he grab the tip of it himself?

  Takumu answered Haruyuki’s question with action.

  “Cyan Blade!!”

  Ga-shk! After an attack call like thunder, the spike was ejected. Haruyuki half expected the tip to blow Takumu’s hand away, but what broke into pieces and flew off was the launcher, the Pile Driver of his right arm itself. Still gripped in his left hand, the spike became a pale light and remained after the Driver was gone. Takumu drew it above his head in a large half circle, and then slapped his liberated right hand into that rod of light before bringing it down with a snap in front of him.

  The light scattered, and appearing from within it was a close-range cutting weapon with a firm and elegant construction.

  A sword.

  A meter and a half long, the single edge of the katana was a perfect straight sword, with a lone deep blue line running along the peak side. The blade was colored a light blue, and the entire thing was enveloped in a faint phosphorescence of the same shade.

  With this beautiful weapon readied before him, Cyan Pile became, in line with the color of his armor, nothing other than a complete close-range duel avatar. So complete, he was more swordsman than avatar.

  …Taku, Haruyuki whispered in a voice that was not a voice.

  Perhaps hearing his thought, Takumu looked at him momentarily and nodded. Facing forward once again, he slid his right foot forward. With this motion, the move of a skilled kendo player, he readied his sword below chest level. From his feet, an even more intense air of battle-readiness surged up from his feet, shaking the aura surrounding Nomi’s hands.

  “I see,” Nomi murmured. He sounded unfazed as he took in this new development, and his contemptuous laugh soon followed. “Heh-heh, I see now. You were really torn up at losing the match to me after all, hmm? So you materialized this shoddy little sword. But, well, if it’s a sword fight you want, I suppose it can’t be helped. I’ll play along with you for a little while.”

  And then Nomi also grabbed at something with both hands and snapped into the standard chudan midlevel ready-posture.

  Haruyuki watched, half understanding, half stunned, as the purple fluctuation slithered out and took on the form of a long sword. Nomi had changed the fluctuation’s previous long talon shape. Haruyuki supposed if your Incarnate was a close-range weapon, you could change it into a variety of forms, depending on the image.

  Although outwardly, they were duel avatars, it was two swordsmen who faced each other, in exactly the same ready positions they had taken in the final match of the kendo team tournament the previous week. Here, however, there was no judge. There was also no defensive gear. And at stake were their lives as Burst Linkers.

  The tips of both players’ toes slid forward, and they began to close the distance between them. Midway between the tips of their two swords, white sparks actually bounced thinly and burned the air. The battle had already started. Takumu and Nomi were fighting each other in a war to overwrite the world with the stronger imagination.

  Taku, believe in yourself!! Haruyuki shouted in his heart.

  “Sehyaaaaa!!”

  “Sheeeeeh!!”

  The two kiai battle cries rang out in the moonlit night of the battlefield, and both avatars kicked at the ground at the same time. Tracing out vivid blue and purple trajectories, the two swords slammed into each other.

  Skreeeenk! The sound of the impact was fierce. Takumu’s will, materialized as the cutting power that was the essential nature of the sword, bounced back from Nomi’s will, which tried to erase all things. The two swords violently repelled each other and their owners swung them downward simultaneously. Once again, thunder and sparks. And then again.

  Here, the two avatars put some distance between them and faced each other once more in the chudan stance.

  A teasing voice slipped out from beneath Dusk Taker’s mask. “My goodness, this is a surprise. For a hasty stopgap, you do fairly well with it, hmm?”

  “Naturally. In a fair kendo match, I am stronger than you, after all.”

  Nomi greeted Takumu’s retort with a throaty laugh. “I wonder about that, Mayuzumi. Do you think I hadn’t noticed? No matter how you try to hide it, it’s blindingly obvious! You…have a fatal weakness!”

  As he shouted, Nomi stepped sharply in. The sword he gripped with both hands stretched out even farther. Adding his own thrust to the extended blade, Dusk Taker released a savage lunge at Cyan Pile’s throat. “Sheeeeeh!!”

  Takumu’s arms sprang up in a convulsion to protect his throat with the blade of the blue sword. But in that instant, Nomi’s sword bent like a fencing foil and the lunge changed its aim.

  Vzzzm! The tip of the purple sword cut into Cyan Pile’s defenseless right arm with an earsplitting noise. Nomi followed through, pushing the sword ahead of him. As if chasing him, a single line of pale sparks arced out from Takumu’s wound.

  “Hngh!” Groaning, Takumu immediately pulled himself back up and went after Nomi. Kote, kote, men: He threw a succession of barely visible blows at Nomi’s forearms and mask. But the purple sword writhed like a living creature to repel each attack.

  “Come now, shouldn’t you be protecting your neck?” Once again, Nomi thrust his howling blade forward. Taking advanta
ge of the very tiny window when Takumu stiffened, this time, the sword ripped into his left side.

  Come on, Taku!! Haruyuki cried in his heart as he resisted the black vise with all his might.

  Takumu’s psychic wound. The memory of the bullying he had endured in his kendo class when he was in elementary school. It had been humiliating to have his arms pinned down, to be used as a practice dummy for lunges, but more than humiliating, it had been incredibly terrifying.

  But Takumu didn’t quit kendo. He said it was because he didn’t even have the willpower to quit, but that couldn’t have been it. He was able to keep going because he loved kendo. His love was greater than his fear. That feeling…

  Believe in it, Taku!!

  There was no way he could hear Haruyuki. But Takumu righted himself as he started to stagger and yanked upward the sword in both hands. Past the chudan position, past the height of his neck, far above his head. An aura bluer than the moonlight enveloped the sword—held ready in something beyond the high jodan position—along with Cyan Pile’s arms, up to his shoulders.

  Nomi glared down at Takumu, taking in this fixed position, the Overlay of his will shimmering. “Quite the transparent bluff, isn’t it? Oh, all right, if you’re that interested in having a giant hole cut out of your windpipe…” Purplish-black light cascaded from Nomi’s sword and arms. “I’ll pierce it right through for you, just as you wish!”

  Dusk Taker’s charge was so fast that Haruyuki’s eyes almost lost him. Moving ahead in a blur, he launched a savage lunge squarely at Takumu’s throat. No feints this time.

  Takumu didn’t dodge or guard. Instead, he stepped forward. The approaching sword tip, and the force of the special attack latent within it, hit him hard in his thick left shoulder, gouging a deep hole from his armor. Narrow trails of pale sparks gushed out.

  “Ngh!” A quiet voice slipped out from under the mask, withstanding the pain. But this was immediately followed by a kiai battle cry that shook the air.

  “Hnnyaaaaah!!” He swung the Cyan Blade straight down.

  Nomi’s reaction was, of course, to jump to the right, but, unable to avoid the blow, he took the sword tip on the left side of his chest. Although the cut was fairly shallow, reddish-purple sparks still bounced and dazzled.

  “Tch!” Nomi clicked his tongue as he tried to put some distance between them, and Takumu rained another blow down on him. The purple sword barely intercepted the blue blade just as it was about to make contact with Nomi’s mask.

  The two moved, swords locked, pushing against each other. Sparks jetted from where their blades met, brightly illuminating their masks.

  The equilibrium was momentary. Cyan Pile had the larger physique and greater physical strength, and he pushed his blade harder and harder. The outcome was not dependent on the Incarnate System. This was a simple power imbalance between a close-range type and one who mixed both close and long.

  Finally, Dusk Taker’s knee crunched into the ground. His blade slipped, and Takumu’s Cyan Blade drew in on Nomi’s left shoulder. Thin cracks caused by the enormous pressure raced through the white tiles covering the schoolyard. The two masks were so close, they were practically touching.

  Abruptly, a certain foreboding shivered through the back of Haruyuki’s brain.

  Taku! Run!

  An instant before he could shout these words, Nomi cried sharply, “Demonic Commandeer!!”

  Zrrt! A concentrated darkness came swirling from Dusk Taker’s lens-shaped visor, hit Cyan Pile’s mask, and penetrated it, shuddering almost like some kind of animal. The blue avatar reeled and stopped.

  Demonic Commandeer.

  The sole fixed special attack Dusk Taker had. Using up the entire gauge when activated, the effect was to steal one of the target duel avatar’s abilities, special attacks, or Enhanced Armament. Nomi let the battle unfold into a close-range fight without using the wings as a trap.

  Cyan Pile didn’t have any systematic abilities. And of his three special attacks, two of them basically came entirely from the Enhanced Armament. Which meant if he got hit with Demonic Commandeer, there was a 75 percent chance that the Pile Driver would be taken. If that happened, the Cyan Blade, the transformation of the spike through his will, would disappear.

  The instant of stillness that blanketed the field felt like an eternity to Haruyuki.

  The darkness that should have flowed back out from Cyan Pile’s mask and returned to Dusk Taker—

  Didn’t.

  Instead…

  “Aaaaah!” With a roar, Takumu brought the sword he gripped with both hands down in a straight line.

  Nomi’s left arm was severed below the shoulder, and the undulating purple light scattered into the night. The avatar was thrown to the ground, bounced violently, and tumbled nearly ten meters backward.

  Of course, he was quick to get back on his feet and ready his sword of nothingness with his right hand alone. However, in perhaps a sign that he was shaken, the tip of that blade shook very slightly.

  “You’re too greedy,” Cyan Pile said, brilliantly shining blue sword readied straight ahead of him. “Way, way too greedy.”

  Haruyuki didn’t get what he meant right away. Takumu probably wasn’t intending to explain himself, though, as he continued quietly.

  “I’ve always thought it was weird. That you didn’t take Lime Bell’s healing ability, I mean. If you had, armed with flight, firepower, and healing, you’d have been the end all and be all, beyond even the kings. But you didn’t because…” His eyes glittered keenly beneath the slits as he declared, “Insufficient capacity. A special attack as ridiculously powerful as stealing other people’s abilities, there’s no way it wouldn’t be restricted somehow. There’s an upper limit to the total abilities, the total potential you can steal and keep with your Demonic Commandeer. Which is why you wouldn’t have enough room to steal both of the super-rare abilities of flight and healing, even if you deleted all your other powers. Isn’t that right?”

  Dusk Taker pressed his right hand over the cross-section of his severed left arm and remained silent. He was no doubt suffering fierce pain, double what players felt in the Normal Duel Field. Was he unable to move? Or maybe he was so angry, he had forgotten the pain?

  Takumu carefully readied his sword and slowly closed the distance between them. His quiet voice once again flowed across the field.

  “The person who guided me in the Incarnate said the majority of Cyan Pile’s potential is taken up by this Pile Driver. I’m sure you figured you had enough empty space right now to be able to take something like my Enhanced Armament. Unfortunately for you, you figured wrong.”

  “Heh-heh-heh, I see now.” Dusk Taker finally uttered his usual contemptuous laugh, but perhaps reflecting his feelings, his voice was tinged with a dark, distorted effect. “I see. I know I said this before, but that flimsy stick of yours must have been made with some quite painful memories, hmm? A metaphor for the shinai maybe? Did something bad happen to you on the kendo team, hmm? Perhaps you, so cool and handsome, were subjected to ugly bullying? Ha-ha! Ridiculous! You’re not the little pig over there or something!!”

  Taku, this chatter’s a trap! Don’t listen to him! Haruyuki cried soundlessly, fighting desperately against the black vise mercilessly crushing him.

  Perhaps because of Takumu’s own surging anger, the light housed in his blade wavered slightly. But he quickly regained control and replied calmly, “My memories are really no big deal. Nothing compared to the wounds you produced that avatar with. You’re a marauder because there’s nothing left inside of you. Because you’ve had everything taken from you, and you’re nothing but an empty hole. You must’ve realized it by now. You can steal other people’s powers—no, other people’s hope, their friendship, their love, but those things will never truly be yours, not in any real sense.”

  Silence once again.

  Bathed in the blue moonlight, the avatar the color of darkness hung his head. Finally, he staggered to his feet feebly. Still cl
utching his left shoulder, he slowly brought his face up. His whole body trembled and shivered violently.

  “Fu-hu-hu.” A choked laugh slipped out from the spherical visor. “Hu-hu, heh-heh-heh…Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha…A-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!!”

  Tossing his head back, Dusk Taker laughed loudly and heartily. “A-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!! Nothing?! Empty?! Ha-ha-ha! That’s…Well, that’s him!!”

  He laughed again for a moment before he started talking, the words bursting out of him. “You two are so clever, you must have had it figured out from the yearbook. My ‘guardian’ is my own brother, three years older than me. He’s the real marauder. With his huge body and his violence, he took my candy and toys when I was little, and then when I got a little older, he took my allowance and my New Year’s money. In the end, he even took the girl who was my only friend. He really was the perfect marauder. Heh-heh-heh.”

  He shook his head two, three times, laughing in a sort of amazement. The gloomy monologue continued.

  “The first thing he ever gave me was, of course, Brain Burst. Foolishly, I was delighted, even moved. Because no sooner had the first lecture ended than he was telling me to come and pay him ten points every week. I was so disappointed. But if I refused, he’d have really let me have it in the real world. I went afar to depopulated areas and dueled desperately, honestly collecting the points to pay to my brother. Like a dog. Oh, and in the process, he stole from me the last thing I had. My pride as a human being.”

  No. I don’t want to hear this. Haruyuki held his breath and tried to shut out the pain he felt just listening to Nomi, almost as if his words themselves were some kind of attack. I don’t want to hear this story. I actually don’t need to hear it.

  Taku, just hit him with the finishing blow. End this. We don’t have to sit here and listen to this story. How are we even supposed to know if it’s true or not? I mean, it has to be a lie. It’s a strategy to shake us up.

  However, Haruyuki couldn’t stop the certain knowledge that what Nomi was saying was true—and that Takumu couldn’t cut into him like this.