“Senpai…!”
Staring at the sight of the blood-soaked Kojou, Yukina, as if praying, murmured once more.
2
It was right after sunset when Nagisa and company arrived at the breakwater in the open-top convertible.
With the ominous scarlet dusk in the background, streaks of darkness and light danced about. Two wielders of immense demonic energy were engaged in a vigorous white-knuckle conflict. Their clash made the artificial isle itself tremble, and aftershocks of explosions and raging winds blew over Nagisa and the others.
“Uwaa, they’re really going at it…,” said the girl in the white dress sitting in the driver’s seat in a guileless voice. She dropped the convertible’s speed, driving onto an empty space at the base of the breakwater. They were some forty to fifty meters from where the pair of demons clashed. Any closer and there was a high possibility of being caught in their cross fire.
As a matter of fact, a container placed nearby had already been broken several times over, all semblance of its original shape lost.
“If you like, you can use this.”
The girl in the black dress in the front passenger seat presented something to Nagisa: binoculars, an expensive version that looked like the type used for military purposes.
However, Nagisa shook her head without a word. She didn’t even need the binoculars to make out one of the silhouettes fighting. Even a long distance removed, there was no way she could mistake the sight of him.
“Kojou…”
Nagisa murmured her older brother’s name. Kojou was fighting, his entire body bearing grievous wounds. He was attended by enormous phantom beasts. Kojou was employing masses of demonic energy summoned from another world so dense, they were sentient and could manifest in physical form. In other words, a vampire’s Beast Vassals—
“What is this…? Why is Kojou fighting?! Fighting a vampire… Almost like he’s a vampire, too…”
Still in a daze, Nagisa got out of the car, posing the question to no one in particular.
Nagisa did not know what was happening. Nor did she know why Kojou was fighting. Then, the confused Nagisa heard the soft, gentle voice of another man.
“This is because your brother is the Fourth Primogenitor.”
“…?!”
Nagisa’s gaze shifted in surprise, settling upon a man in a pure-white three-piece suit who’d come to stand behind Nagisa at some point. He was a handsome, blond young man. There was a smile on his lips that could bewitch the unwary. That grin terrified Nagisa.
“Fourth…Primogenitor…?”
“Yes, the Fourth Primogenitor. The World’s Mightiest Vampire.”
The young man nodded in amusement. As a resident of a Demon Sanctuary, Nagisa knew of the existence of a vampire known as the Fourth Primogenitor. She’d heard any number of urban legends about him since arriving on that island.
Supposedly, he was a monster who had annihilated numerous cities in times long past, possessing no kin whatsoever, desiring nothing to rule. Served by twelve Beast Vassals that were calamity incarnate, he drank people’s blood, slaughtered, and destroyed: a cold, heartless vampire who existed beyond all doctrines of the world.
“No way… Kojou can’t be…a vampire…”
Nagisa vehemently shook her head. She was so scared that her breath caught.
Her heart was racing. Her vision darkened. Her body could not stop shaking.
At some point, without her knowledge, the biological older brother she’d trusted to be human had changed into a Demon—and a terrifying, legendary-class vampire at that. But no matter how she might deny it, undeniable spectacles unfolded before her eyes over and over.
She felt like she’d been deceived. A Demon had crept in a place so very close to her, wearing an innocent face. She was struck by the sense that the world she had believed in had crumbled beneath her feet. She felt disgust, distrust, fear, hatred. Her consciousness was blotted out by negative emotions.
But deep inside her heart, a voice echoed, denying it all. Someone inside of Nagisa herself, someone unknown to her, was desperately speaking up for Kojou, saying that nothing about him had changed—
“What are you afraid of, little sister of the primogenitor? Root no longer exists within you,” he whispered in her ear.
Something trembled at the very bottom of Nagisa’s consciousness. A fragment of some assuredly lost memory floated up, like a shadow behind a canvas.
“Root… Root Avrora…,” she murmured, dumbfounded.
“Yes. You destroyed her. Kojou Akatsuki and the other you deep down inside—”
The young blond man smiled. Nagisa let out a yelp. Her thoughts were a mess, and her vision warped. Her body and consciousness could not cope with the torrent of flashbacks. Kanon drew close in concern, shouting something toward Nagisa, but Nagisa could not hear her voice.
“Why is…? This can’t be real…”
Nagisa’s vision was dyed crimson. Inside it, Kojou’s lethal duel continued. Kojou’s expression twisted in agony as a vampire clad in dark armor sliced his body all over.
“Why, to save you, Nagisa Akatsuki. He quarreled with Root and became the Fourth Primogenitor to save you.”
Only the voice of the smiling young man reverberated clearly within Nagisa’s mind. Nagisa covered both ears, vehemently shaking her head like a little girl.
“It’s all my fault… It’s my fault Kojou became a Demon…”
“That’s right. You’re responsible for all this.” His voice rose, still grinning. Long white vampiric fangs were poking out from his lips. “Had he not become the Fourth Primogenitor, Kojou would not be here in a deadly duel. The opponent he fights is Velesh Aradahl, one of the top-five fighters even in the Warlord’s Empire. As he is now, Kojou cannot defeat him. At this rate, your older brother will be consumed…”
“Con…sumed…?”
Nagisa lifted her tear-drenched face. She beheld Vattler, his cruel, snakelike eyes gazing back at her own.
“Yes. Kojou will be consumed. By the very, very scary vampire—”
“No… No…”
Nagisa murmured with hollow eyes. Without realizing it, she began a wobbly gait toward the tip of the breakwater where Kojou and his opponent were fighting.
“Stop it… If I don’t save Kojou…”
“Nagisa—!”
Kanon tried to stop Nagisa. However, before her fingertips could touch her, a powerful and violent blast of wind rushed against her. Kanon was on the verge of being blown away when her bodyguard, Justina, held her tight.
Nagisa’s ponytail danced about, unraveling from the wind.
Nagisa was staring toward ground zero, to a patch of earth that had been clawed out, where Kojou had fallen, lying faceup. She could see countless dark short swords impaling his whole body. Fresh blood was spilling out of his tattered limbs, and a groan of anguish trickled out from his throat.
The instant she saw that, light returned to Nagisa’s ayes.
“NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”
Together with a scream, vast demonic energy was unleashed. Transparent, icy wings spread across the twilight sky, dying the world in merciless, destructive, cold air.
3
His sense of time had muddied.
Kojou no longer knew how long had passed since the battle with Aradahl had begun.
Perhaps it hadn’t even been a minute, but it felt like he’d been fighting for hours. His endurance had already been whittled beyond his limit; in his condition, he was running on willpower alone. Even so, he could not find a way to defeat Aradahl. For the first time since obtaining the power of the Fourth Primogenitor, Kojou rued his own powerlessness.
“…C’mon over, Dabih Crystallus!”
Kojou summoned a new Beast Vassal covered in silver crystals. It was a dragon with a spiral horn and translucent wings that radiated light.
“…?!”
Captivated by the radiance of that horn, Aradahl’s Beast Vassals came to a halt. The ar
mor covering the whole of his body forcibly removed itself, leaving Aradahl, its master and host, defenseless.
The Ability of Dabih Crystallus, tenth Beast Vassal of the Fourth Primogenitor, was mind control—the power of Charm that vampires possessed. That overwhelming power of domination had controlled Aradahl’s armor Beast Vassal.
“Al-Nasl Minium—!”
Now that Aradahl had lost his protective iron wall, the scarlet bicorn roared toward him. The cannonball of compressed air burst against the ground, proceeding to gouge its surface.
Before being enveloped by the explosion, however, Aradahl vanished from sight. He had teleported. He had leaped through a slash through space itself made by a new Beast Vassal.
“…So you seized the control rights of my own Beast Vassal… A troublesome power.”
“Wha—?!”
Hearing Aradahl’s voice from behind him, Kojou turned his head in shock. Kojou didn’t have a chance to catch sight of him; Aradahl had leaped through the void once more.
Kojou’s face contorted with fear. He couldn’t use the power of Charm if he could not see his foe. And as if to toy with Kojou when he was on the verge of fleeing, Aradahl’s sudden attack sent him tumbling. The naked bloodlust that slammed into him made every hair on Kojou’s body stand up.
“Butcher, Spelbia—!”
“Urk— Mesarthim Adamas!”
Kojou deployed a diamond bulwark. Spawning on the inner side of that bulwark was a crack in space itself, severed by a blade. His bulwark, neutralized by an otherworldly slash, could not stop the pitch-black blade that cut across his whole body.
“Gu…ah…!”
Fresh blood spurted out as Kojou fell to the ground. Hovering above his head was the cloud of black-bladed short swords. With Kojou having lost the spare energy to redeploy his bulwark, the tips turned toward him all at once, hungry for blood.
“—Dance, Ghoula!”
Aradahl’s Beast Vassal turned into a hail of meteorites, pinning the wounded Kojou to the concrete surface of the ground. Dozens of blades were impaling Kojou, carving delicate portions of his flesh. Kojou made an incoherent scream.
“Surrender, Kojou Akatsuki. You cannot fight any further.”
Aradahl arrogantly beheld the sight of Kojou below him. The source of a vampire’s demonic power was from the Beast Vassals that dwelled within their own blood. However, the greater part of that blood had already flowed out of him, with Ghoula damming up whatever was left. The wounds were so grave that any normal vampire would have long since lost their life.
“Not…yet…!”
Kojou tried to force himself to sit up, almost ripping his torso free of both his pinned arms in the process. Aradahl heaved a disgusted sigh as he watched this reckless action.
“Ghoula.”
“—?!”
The short swords remaining in midair flew, stabbing Kojou through his chest and shoulders. Kojou coughed up more blood; this time, his movements completely came to a halt.
“Though I do not think the Fourth Primogenitor’s inexhaustible demonic energy can be fully consumed, from the looks of it, you cannot hope to summon a new Beast Vassal. Acknowledge your defeat, Kojou Akatsuki. Or would you rather endure an eternity of suffering?” Aradahl calmly asked.
The Beast Vassal he dubbed Ghoula no doubt possessed the power to rob an impaled opponent of his demonic energy. Just as Aradahl had asserted, Kojou presently lacked the strength with which to summon a fresh Beast Vassal. With even bodily movements sealed off, he was thoroughly backed into a corner.
“A so-called immortal body is a prison for the soul. The peace of death, granted by rights, is something we vampires will never know. Thanks to the continued regeneration of our bodies, our nerves shall never wither. Nor can we lose our sanity to escape from mind-rending pain. How long will you maintain that false courage?”
Aradahl calmly laid out the facts. As a vampire, he understood the drawbacks of having an immortal body better than anyone. Regenerating only to have more mortal wounds inflicted, over and over for the rest of eternity, was the same as unending torture. There was no way for Kojou to escape that limitless pain save acknowledging his defeat.
“Shut…up…!”
From within a consciousness blotted out by anguish, Kojou howled. Glenda’s smiling face floated into the back of his mind. So long as Aradahl sought to dispose of her, there was no way he could acknowledge defeat.
Besides, he’d promised Yukina. He would win and return to her side.
But in that moment, Kojou had no strength with which to fulfill that promise.
“Damn…it…”
Amid biting pain that seemed ready to break his entire body to pieces, Kojou felt an odd sense of déjà vu.
The feeling of powerlessness in the face of impending death—Kojou had tasted that feeling once before, long ago.
That was before Kojou had obtained the power of a vampire. These were the memories of the ruin of The Cleansing that had supposedly been lost. At that time, Kojou had shielded Nagisa, losing his life once as a result.
And what saved him from that was—
“Mist…?”
A questioning look came over Aradahl as white mist began to fill his field of vision.
Among the Beast Vassals of the Fourth Primogenitor was one governing the power to transform into mist. However, at present, Kojou didn’t have the strength to summon a Beast Vassal. Even so, the pure-white mist increased in density, covering the breakwater in the blink of an eye.
The mist that had appeared without any forewarning was purely a natural phenomenon. The water particles in the air had crystalized due to the precipitous drop in the air temperature. It was not the mist that was imbued with demonic energy—it was the freezing cold air itself.
“This demonic energy—?!”
Turning around, Aradahl’s eyes opened wide. The very next moment, he was assaulted by an explosive coldness, enough to freeze even a vampire’s body—a glacial spear made manifest.
The surprise attack from an unexpected direction blew Aradahl’s body away. Half his body froze and shattered, and for the first time, Aradahl’s face twisted in agony. The bright-white freezing mist proceeded to encase him in an enormous pillar of ice.
“What…the…?”
Bathed in even stronger demonic energy, the dark short swords pinning Kojou’s entire body vanished. Left to roll defenselessly on the ground, Kojou slowly shifted his head.
A small-statured girl wearing a Saikai Academy uniform gently crouched right by his side.
Her long, unbound hair seemed to slowly change color in the rays of the setting sun, and her baby-like face was struck with grief.
“Nagisa…what are you doing here…?!” Kojou exclaimed as he forced himself to sit up in midregeneration.
Nagisa Akatsuki was not a human that should have been anywhere near the stage of battle, and she was someone who could not be allowed to be there. Surely it was unthinkable for her, a sufferer of demonophobia, to be where she might be caught up in a duel between two vampires.
However, the girl taking Nagisa’s appearance supported Kojou’s wounded body, gently making a halting smile.
“Thou shouldst blame me, Kojou… For it is I who hath made thee shoulder such a heavy burden, granting thee suffering in the process…”
“You’re…”
Kojou’s eyes widened as he looked up at the girl in a daze.
He remembered her fearful sway, the distinctive tone of her voice. On Itogami Island, she had spent a brief, all too limited amount of time with Kojou, and then, Kojou himself had killed her. It was her—the Twelfth, Avrora.
“Don’t tell me, you’re…Avrora…?”
“I am but a fleeting illusion… One that shall soon vanish…”
She responded to the bewildered Kojou’s question with a vague shake of her head. Then, she quietly lifted her face.
The enormous pillar of ice shattered, and Aradahl emerged from within. Having already recovered
from his shock, he gazed coolly at the girl nestled close to Kojou.
“Dodekatos… The twelfth Kaleid Blood…”
“Surely thou dare not assert this violates thy terms, Aradahl? We, too, are part of the Fourth Primogenitor—”
Replying to Aradahl’s murmur was a new silhouette emerging from within the dense mist.
This was a small girl in a yukata. Kojou deeply drew in his breath at the sight of her. She had golden hair that looked like billowing flames. And she had blue, blazing eyes. She had the same appearance as the Avrora that Kojou knew.
“Hektos… I see. Vattler put you up to this…” A bitter, irritated smile came over Aradahl’s lips.
Dodekatos and the girl in the yukata called Hektos were “dolls”—survivors of the twelve artificial vampires created to seal the Beast Vassals of the Fourth Primogenitor.
Fearful of the revival of the god-killing weapon, the Fourth Primogenitor, the people known as the Devas ripped the twelve Beast Vassals from the Fourth Primogenitor’s body, sealing one in each of the twelve girls.
“The Fourth Primogenitor art served by twelve Beast Vassals—however, Kojou Akatsuki hath inherited but ten. The remaining two stand here before thee.”
The girl in the yukata touched a hand to her own breast as she spoke.
Aradahl was silent for a moment before he broke into a fearsome smile. Behind him, a dark mist gushed forth, materializing into an enormous long sword as supple as a whip.
“Certainly, it is the Fourth Primogenitor with whom I desired a duel. It would be unfair to deny him your aid— Very well. Accordingly, the dolls shall be annihilated with the master!”
“Kojou! Take my hand!”
The girl in the school uniform said this as she grasped the wounded Kojou’s hand. It was not Avrora. It was Nagisa’s voice. Stay back, Kojou’s voice tried to shout, but Aradahl’s surge of demonic energy muted it entirely.
Aradahl’s sword Beast Vassal swung upward as if wielded by a giant, invisible arm. The long sword, its blade reaching several dozen meters in length, bore down to mow Kojou and the others down in one fell swoop.
Nagisa glared at the master of that Beast Vassal and raised her and Kojou’s joined hands to the sky.
A War of Primogenitors Page 12
