Fiesta for the Observers

by Gakuto Mikumo

  2

  The first one to speak was the gentleman wearing the silk hat.

  “Aya Tokoyogi…the Witch of the Notaria, yes? First, let me thank you for prying open that abominable barrier.”

  He seemed around forty years old, give or take, and rather solidly built, too. But he gave off a gentle, intellectual air—perhaps it was the clothes making the man. He wouldn’t have seemed out of place among the customers in a high-class salon or the guests at an opera house.

  However—

  Vivid, manifest hostility emanated from his entire body. His eyes burned with hatred for Kojou and the others concerned over Natsuki Minamiya’s well-being.

  To the inmates in the prison barrier, they were comrades of the Witch of the Void, the one who had captured them and sealed them in another world; the prisoners’ wrath was surely great enough that ripping these interlopers limb from limb didn’t seem quite sufficient.

  Bathed in the jailbreakers’ bloodlust, Aya looked back at them and asked quite calmly, “Only six of you… What happened to the others?”

  The small young man atop the wall replied to Aya’s question crudely:

  “Nothin’ happened! Just look at this bastard!”

  His hair was short dreadlocks, and he wore one lavishly covered shirt over another, paired with baggy jeans. It was behind-the-times street fashion, but by his outward appearance, he seemed no older than Kojou or the others.

  But he, too, was indeed one of the fiendish criminals held in the prison barrier. The proof of this was that, even at that moment, a gray metallic manacle covered his left forearm.

  The young man with dreadlocks shouted fiercely as his right arm lashed out.

  “Look!”

  Kojou couldn’t comprehend what happened at the very next moment. What he did comprehend was the explosive blood spatter that flew from the body of the gentleman who stood in front of the youth.

  “Schtola D, why you—!”

  The gentleman coughed up blood as he turned to the offender, pelting him with a look filled with ire.

  Based on his outfit and the air about him, Kojou guessed the older man was a sorcerer; furthermore, a sorcerous criminal who’d committed crimes so grave that he’d been stuffed into the prison barrier. No half-baked attack could have penetrated the powerful magical wall that protected his physical flesh. That was precisely why such arch criminals were sealed in another world to begin with.

  But the younger man’s attack had sliced through his defenses like they were paper; the gentleman’s defenseless body had suffered grave, near-fatal injuries. His front had been split open from his shoulder all the way down to his belly. He fell to his knees on the spot, unable to fight back.

  “Ha-ha—! Don’t hate me, sorcerer, hate that fragile body of yours!” shouted his adversary excitedly. “…And here it comes!”

  The manacle encasing the young sorcerer’s left forearm began to glow. Countless chains gushed out of the gray manacle like a waterfall, relentlessly wrapping around the critically injured body and dragging it into the air. Its destination was no doubt the prison barrier’s interior.

  The wounded man desperately tried to resist.

  “Guoooooooh—!”

  However, he no longer had the power to weave a spell that could slice through the chains. He was swallowed by the air itself, as if he were sinking into a bottomless swamp. And then, he vanished.

  “…Ah. The prison barrier system is still…functioning,” Aya remarked.

  Neither she nor the other jailbreakers registered a single shred of emotion toward the sorcerer’s disappearance. Naturally, they felt no anger about the dreadlocked youth’s attack, either. They’d just happened to be held in the same prison; they shared not the smallest particle of camaraderie.

  The one called Schtola D merely replied with a dark grin.

  “Looks like we won’t be fully free until we kill the Witch of the Void and the prison barrier’s completely gone,” a young, violet-haired woman said to Aya, picking up where the dreadlocked youth left off. “Tee-hee…if you know, would you tell us where she is? A fellow witch like you should have a clue or two, yes?”

  She was a beautiful woman with a decadent air about her, giving off a sense of corrupt sexuality. She wore very exposing lingerie under a long coat; somehow, she had the air of an old-fashioned harlot.

  But the eyes with which she looked at Aya Tokoyogi were dyed with lurid bloodlust. Aya calmly brushed the hostility aside and slowly shook her head.

  “Unfortunately, I know not. If you wish to kill that woman, by all means, search for her yourselves.”

  Schtola D curled up his lips in a militant smile. “That so. Sounds interestin’, Miss LCO Leader. In that case, no use for you now, either.”

  He glared at Aya and raised his right hand in the same way he had when attacking the gentleman in the silk hat. Clearly, if Aya wouldn’t cooperate, he’d kill her, too. He probably regarded any human being who wasn’t of use to him as his enemy.

  But the little witch had a listless look as she, too, raised her left arm before Schtola D, her long sleeve wrapped around it. She was holding an old tome.

  “Do not be hasty, brash one… I know not Natsuki Minamiya’s location, but I did not refuse to assist you.”

  Schtola D stopped moving, leaving his arm up. “Ahh?”

  He seemed thrown off, unable to grasp the meaning of Aya’s words.

  In Schtola D’s place, a slender-looking young man nodded, eyes narrowed in scrutiny. “Grimoire No. 014…Personal History, yes? I see…very interesting.”

  “Whaddaya mean, Meiga?”

  The young man called Meiga retouched his glasses in apparent displeasure as he glanced over at Schtola D.

  “I would rather you did not address me so casually…but ah well. Bottom line: It’s a curse. Aya Tokoyogi used the power of the grimoire to put a curse on the Witch of the Void. Natsuki Minamiya probably has amnesia this very moment…is that not so, Aya Tokoyogi?”

  “That is…correct. Put more precisely, I have not stolen her memories alone, but the time she experienced.”

  “Robbing another’s flesh and blood of accumulated time…so that is the ability of the grimoire permitted to LCO’s leader alone,” replied the young man thoughtfully. “I see…most fascinating…”

  Schtola D snorted as he butted in.

  “Stealin’ her memory and her time…so, what the hell does that actually mean?”

  A cruel smile came over Meiga’s lips. “It means Natsuki Minamiya cannot currently use magic. She probably cannot employ her Guardian’s power, either.”

  Natsuki Minamiya was a witch who could freely manipulate space. The terrible price of that pact was being the warden of the prison barrier, yet precisely because of that cost, she had been granted enormous magical power far surpassing the norm. And her ten-plus years of combat experience against demons had honed her into a cunning Attack Mage. No doubt all the prison barrier inmates were well aware of how frightening she could be.

  But Aya Tokoyogi’s grimoire had robbed the source of Natsuki’s power from her.

  Finally grasping the situation, Schtola D twisted his lips in obvious delight.

  “That so? The grimoire took her power… No, it took the time and experience she needed to get that power, then…”

  Aya Tokoyogi stroked the pages of her beloved grimoire as she spoke to herself. “It took a plan ten years in the making, using my own daughter’s body as a decoy, to finally get the Witch of the Void to lower her guard for a single moment for one…blow. But that was sufficient to activate my…grimoire.”

  Aya was well aware that there could be no escape from the prison barrier unless Natsuki Minamiya was defeated.

  That was why she’d waited for Natsuki to reveal a single moment of weakness, giving her the time to play her trump card: the effect of her grimoire.

  “It seems Natsuki Minamiya fled just before completely losing her magical energy,” the young man in glasses agreed in a cool,
collected tone, “but she will be unable to use magic again for as long as the grimoire remains active. Meaning all one of us has to do is find her while she’s on the run and deliver the final blow. And you, Aya Tokoyogi?”

  Aya said nothing. Her posture said, Do as you wish.

  The woman with violet hair looked at the manacle on her left forearm and made a coquettish laugh. “If that’s how it is, you should lend us a hand, Aya Tokoyogi. All of us here want to kill her—Or perhaps, the first one to get to her wins?”

  Schtola D, meanwhile, sulked as he ran a hand up his dreadlocks. “Keh, what a pain in the ass, but fine. My body’s gone soft from all that prison life. I bet this’ll be some real good rehab.”

  The other jailbreakers nodded silently, apparently in agreement.

  They’d search for the fleeing Natsuki and eliminate her. It seemed that the consensus among the jailbreakers was that they were on the same side, if only until then.

  Natsuki’s magic was still sealed by Aya Tokoyogi. Even if she’d fled before losing her power, she surely hadn’t gone far. Natsuki was most likely somewhere on Itogami Island. If the escapees all went looking her, finding her was most likely a matter of time.

  In her present amnesiac state, Natsuki had already been pushed nearly to the brink. She couldn’t have been in any state to fight off the convicts.

  You’ve gotta be kiddin’ me, thought Kojou, his lips pursed as he stepped forward. He left the blood-drenched Yuuma to Yukina and glared up at the magical beings.

  “Hold on. You think we’re gonna just let you go after hearin’ all that?”

  Schtola D, as if finally remembering that Kojou even existed, shot him a look of annoyance. “Ah? Did the brat just say somethin’…?”

  Even as he covered his chest wound, Kojou never took his eyes from them.

  The prison barrier hadn’t been completely broken. It was still possible to seal them away once more. But if they were to do so, they had to protect Natsuki, now on the run. They couldn’t let the escapees catch up with her.

  The young man in glasses nodded calmly. “Ah yes, you were here, too, Fourth Primogenitor. Perhaps we should dispose of you first…”

  The woman in the coat narrowed her beautiful eyes as she glared at Kojou.

  The man in armor moved his hand to the sword at his back without a word. The old man, too, spread his seemingly shriveled arms wide as he smiled.

  Not a single one of them feared Kojou. They believed, as a matter of course, that they would win, even against the World’s Mightiest Vampire.

  Even so, Kojou had his own reason why he had to stop them. After all, it was the demonic power of the Fourth Primogenitor that had been used to break the prison barrier to begin with. Kojou couldn’t help but feel responsible for that, all the more so now that he knew just what price Natsuki had paid to protect the prison barrier’s seal.

  Schtola D spoke with scorn as he leaped down off the tower.

  “Geez…d’ya really think a mere primogenitor is gonna stop me?”

  It was over ten meters between him and Kojou. A bare-handed attack wouldn’t possibly reach.

  Regardless, Schtola D swung his right arm down from well above.

  Kojou felt the release of ferocious bloodlust but very little magical energy from Schtola D’s right arm. Judging that it was a mere bluff, Kojou made no move to evade. But—

  “—No, senpai!” cried out Yukina, her expression frantic as she threw herself in front of Kojou as a shield.

  A moment later, a gust of wind so powerful that the earth roared and quivered slammed down onto Yukina. The silver spear she carried took the gale Schtola D had unleashed straight on.

  A metallic roar echoed off the weapon, as if a maul had swung down upon it. Yukina dropped to her knees from an incredible, unseen weight.

  “Himeragi?!” Kojou yelled, as the aftereffects of the shock wave thrust past her and hit him, too.

  It was an invisible slicing attack that could attack opponents over ten meters away. This seemed to be the ability of the young man called Schtola D. The gentleman sorcerer from earlier had probably been gravely wounded by the same technique.

  However, what surprised Kojou was the fact Yukina had been unable to fully block his attack. Her spear should have been able to nullify any magical power in existence. So, Schtola D’s attack was able to breach even Snowdrift Wolf’s defense…

  But the sorcerer above was just as shaken as they were.

  “…What is that spear? It stopped my Thunder Ax?!”

  His face seemed to scream, How dare a powerless little girl like that stop my one-hit-one-kill attack!

  Schtola D howled as he raised his arm once more. “Now you’ve done it. You’ve hurt my pride, dammit! How ’bout I get a li’l serious, then?!”

  The incredible bloodlust, far beyond that of before, told them what he was whipping up.

  Yukina leaned on her spear as she rose. She looked to be at the end of her rope. “Senpai…leave this to me. Please take Yuuma and run.”

  For an instant, Kojou was in shock. Schtola D represented such a menace by himself, but he was only one of the jailbreakers present.

  They didn’t know what the others could do, Aya Tokoyogi included. No matter how excellent of an Attack Mage Yukina was, Kojou didn’t think she could defeat them all unscathed. On top of that, Yukina was worn down from fighting the LCO witches and Yuuma. He wasn’t the only one still injured.

  “No, Yukina! If someone’s stayin’ behind, it’s gonna be—”

  “No, senpai. You mustn’t use your Beast Vassals in a place like this.”

  Kojou had nothing he could say in reply to that calm, composed rebuttal.

  His Beast Vassals were too strong; they’d destroy the prison barrier entirely, even if all they were going after was one sorcerer. Furthermore, his unstable condition made merely controlling the Beast Vassals a chancy thing.

  Yukina turned her back to Kojou. “I will buy you time until you can escape. Please take Yuuma and go!”

  “Himeragi!”

  “Please hurry. Or do you intend to let Yuuma and Ms. Minamiya die?!”

  “That doesn’t mean I can just leave you!” Kojou yelled back without thinking.

  The way Yukina had calmly decided that it was only natural that she should sacrifice herself really pissed him off.

  Yukina’s eyes widened and she froze, as if Kojou’s reaction had truly surprised her.

  It looked at first like Kojou was just being stubborn, but his cheeks were red, like he was blushing a bit. For a single instant, the two silently traded stares—

  But it was at the very next moment that Schtola D laid eyes on Kojou and Yukina and slammed another invisible slice down toward them.

  “Ha-ha! I’ll squish ya’ like a bug, Fourth Primogenitor—!”

  Kojou and Yukina reacted too slowly to dodge Schtola D’s attack. Then—

  As the two held their breath, a dazzling crimson beam filled their fields of vision.

  3

  The explosion that poured down near Kojou left his eardrums numb. He wavered unsteadily as the earth rippled.

  The resulting crater in the ground largely caved in, kicking up enough dust to completely obstruct his vision. Debris blown into the air poured down to the surface like hail.

  However, Schtola D’s attack was not the cause of this. As proof, he too gaped with a dumbfounded expression as debris rained down around him.

  “What the hell was that?!”

  Schtola D lamented as he gazed up at the red evening sky. A giant mass of flame had flown out of thin air to disrupt his attack. It was an attack spell from long range.

  He must have thought it the work of another prisoner, but it was not so. In fact, the audience merely laughed coldly.

  Of course, it had not been Kojou’s doing, either. However, Kojou had some idea who’d unleashed the attack, for he had seen very similar magic before—magic with overwhelming destructive power that rivaled that of a vampire’s Beast Vass
al.

  It was a black magic barrage created via a curse with an intensity far beyond that which human vocal cords and lungs could tolerate. It was a magic bullet fired by the Lion King Agency’s area suppression weapon Der Freischötz.

  “…I, Dancer of the Lion, Archer of the High God, beseech thee.”

  Kojou and Yukina heard a young woman’s solemn chant from behind them. As the mountain of rubble blew apart, Sayaka Kirasaka emerged, a metal Western-style bow in hand.

  Her hair, worn in a ponytail, fluttered as she stood within an unexpected choice of vehicle. It was a chariot reminiscent of those of the ancient steppe peoples, drawn by a giant warhorse. The display was so overwhelmingly nonsensical that even Schtola D ended up doing nothing but stare blankly.

  “Most Brilliant Flaming Horse, Illustrious Kirin, He Who Governs Heavenly Thunder, pierce these evil spirits with thy wrath…!”

  Seizing the opportunity, Sayaka completed her chant and unleashed her arrow toward the heavens.

  The specially constructed whistling arrow sailed, releasing a monstrous sound that shrieked like a curse unleashed. The sound echoed until the arrow finally transformed into incandescent lightning, pouring over and over onto the escaped prisoners from above.

  Giant explosions erupted across the prison barrier.

  Sayaka had little hope of felling such opponents with an attack of that scale, but she trusted it would at least hide Kojou and the others from their sight. Schtola D raged at the intrusion into his battle, but only bits and pieces of his rant could be heard.

  During that time, the chariot Sayaka rode violently rent the surface of the ground in front of Kojou and the others as it screeched to a halt.

  “Yukina, get on! Oh, you too, Kojou Akatsuki!” the archer shouted with a tone that left no room for quibbling as she released more cursed arrows.

  With a certain time lag, countless explosions descended upon the escaped prisoners, obstructing their pursuit.

  Sayaka continued to breathe raggedly as Kojou looked up at her, hesitating on raw instinct.

  “K-Kirasaka…?! Uh, are you sure about this…?”