The violent, endless creaking reverberated in Kojou’s ears. His cheeks were hot. Those were the sensations that roused Kojou’s foggy mind as he realized someone was repeatedly slapping his cheek.
“Oww…”
Moving to get up in apparent protest, Kojou sucked in his breath as his abdomen conveyed an incredibly fierce pain.
This wasn’t an ow, ow, ow kind of pain. It felt like a giant blade had slashed him from his right breast down to his lower abdomen. In fact—it took a minute, but Kojou finally remembered that that was pretty much how it had happened.
The sword of Aya Tokoyogi’s Guardian had impaled him through and through.
Sayaka noticed Kojou’s conscious agony. “Kojou Akatsuki! You’re awake?!”
It was Sayaka who was straddling Kojou and continuously slapping his cheek as he lay on his back. But he couldn’t complain about that—not when he saw the large drops falling from her teary eyes.
When Kojou spoke, his voice was so hoarse that he barely recognized it as his own. “Kira…saka… Where are we…?”
He sounded like an old man on the brink of death. He found it hard to even breathe—having one of your lungs punctured tended to do that.
“A clinic room at the ferry terminal. I brought you here hoping I’d find someone here, but…”
Kojou gave her a frail, strained smile. “…Well, most normal folks would run at the sight of a vampire’s Beast Vassal runnin’ wild.”
The great wharf where Vattler’s ship was moored was practically on the tip of their noses. No doubt everyone working here had headed for the hills out of fear of becoming collateral damage.
Sayaka let out a sob.
“Damage from the fighting cut off the highway, so we can’t get out of the harbor district. Can’t even call an ambulance in… If I could at least use ritual spells…”
She had a shaken look you wouldn’t expect from a professional Attack Mage. She was Yukina’s senior and constantly showed how talented she was, but mentally speaking, she was surprisingly brittle.
Kojou wondered if it was because her personality was gentle by nature.
“Sorry to cause you…so much trouble…”
Sayaka wiped her tears from her eyes as she yelled, “You really do!”
“…Himeragi and Sana?”
Sayaka replied to Kojou’s question with a silent shake of her head. Aya Tokoyogi still had them.
That so, Kojou thought with a sigh. He’d have liked to go rescue her that very moment, but—
“Is it really the time to worry about others? You almost died, you know!”
“Yeah, sure feels that way.”
Kojou offered limply, “Ha-ha-ha.” He didn’t need Sayaka to tell him that. It’d already been some time since the sword had impaled him. His immortal, immutable primogenitor body ought to have completely healed a wound no worse than that by now.
Thanks to the Black Bible that Aya Tokoyogi had activated, all unnatural powers had vanished from the Demon Sanctuary. As a result, Kojou’s powers of a vampire had been stolen. An average human being would normally be dead after sustaining a wound like this. In one sense, it was an entirely natural result.
Sayaka shouted in Kojou’s direction, “—Blood!”
“Eh?”
Sayaka spoke as she undid the ribbon and topmost button of her uniform.
“Here, drink my blood! Yukina and the princess did this to save you when you were on the verge of death before, right?!”
Moonlight shone down upon her slender neck, giving it a pale gleam.
“Er, but,” Kojou protested with a shake of his head.
“This ain’t exactly the same situation… In the first place, if I’m almost dead ’cause I lost my vampire powers, what’s drinking your blood gonna do here?”
“Shut up!” Sayaka shouted, panicked, as she stood up.
Looking straight down at Kojou as she stood right over him, Sayaka bit down on her lip hard in visible defiance and grabbed the edges of her skirt on both sides. She then raised them up.
Sayaka’s cheeks were flushed red with embarrassment and her eyes teary as she demanded, “N-no complaints about this, right?”
Kojou coughed up blood as he audibly cleared his throat. “What the heck do you think you’re doin’?!”
It was lust, not hunger, that triggered a vampire’s craving for blood; so, if you wanted a vampire to suck your blood, sexual seduction was entirely logical.
But why had she settled on exposing her panties as her means to seduce a high school boy? Even girls in grade school could think of higher-class techniques than that. In one sense, though, it suited Sayaka’s naïveté very well.
In the first place, it was true that making a girl with such high-end good looks like Sayaka’s resort to this had an attractiveness all its own. He gave her high points for averting her eyes in embarrassment. On top of that, Sayaka’s exposed panties were unexpectedly thin on the sides. They were side-tie panties held together by a thin ribbon…
“K-Kojou Akatsuki…?”
“Er, well, if I didn’t have a big hole in my gut, I think I’d be givin’ this a big thumbs-up, but… So, ah, Kirasaka, you’re a side-tie kinda girl?”
“Wh-what difference does it make to you?! I have a holster there so it has to be that way!”
Certainly, Sayaka’s pale thigh had a band-type holster holding her cursed arrows on it. They’d get in the way of normal underwear, and apparently made stripping them off more trouble than it was worth. It was an odd source of trouble for a Shamanic War Dancer of the Lion King Agency.
“So what about the vampiric urges?!”
Kojou felt apologetic as he shook his head.
“Sorry, and after all the help you’ve been, too.”
Telling a guy on death’s door to get turned on by the sight of panties was a bit of a hard sell. That said, Sayaka wasn’t willing to give up just from that.
“S…so panties alone won’t cut it?!”
As she spoke, she reached to the side ribbon holding them together. Backed into a corner, she’d completely lost sight of all propriety.
“Hey, wait! Calm down!”
Kojou was going to add, What do you think you’re doin’? and stop her then and there, but he’d lost so much blood that he couldn’t move properly.
Then, a moment after Sayaka undid the ribbon on one side…
“—Hya?!”
Click. They heard the sound of the clinic door opening and sensed someone coming in. Sayaka, standing over Kojou with her skirt raised as he lay on the verge of death, suddenly yelped as she regained her composure.
A slender silhouette entered the room, wearing a white gown.
She had a symmetrical face and a lean, efficient physique. Her hair had curled tips in a short bob style. She had bandages all over her body; thanks to blood loss, her face looked rather pale. Still, her energetic aura remained intact even so.
“Yuuma?!” Kojou yelped.
Kojou couldn’t come close to understanding why Yuuma Tokoyogi, who, last Kojou checked, was being treated at MAR for grave injuries, had appeared here of all places.
Forgetting to put her disheveled clothing in order, Sayaka reached toward her long silver sword.
“Y-you…! How did you get here…?”
Her expression showed that she hadn’t yet decided if Yuuma was currently friend or foe. For her part, Yuuma glanced back at Sayaka with the look of someone sporting a guilty conscience.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t intend to intrude but…oops…”
“Wh-wha—?!”
Sayaka’s cheeks went beet red as her grip on the sword slackened.
Yuuma made labored breaths as she put a hand on the wall beside her. There was a thin coat of sweat on her brow.
“Even beat up like this, I can still use a spell to find where Kojou is. I couldn’t just teleport over in the blink of an eye, though…”
Kojou looked over her pale face with alarm. “Yuuma, your body’s all…”
Th
e white gown covering Yuuma was drenched in fresh blood. She’d opened her previously bandaged wounds from pushing herself so hard.
However, Yuuma shook her head with her usual teasing smile.
“You look closer to buying the farm than I do, Kojou.”
Kojou gave a strained smile without thinking.
“I suppose, now that you mention it…”
Even with both of them in critical condition, Kojou, who could barely move at all, was clearly worse off.
Sayaka glared at Yuuma. “Your mom’s the one who did this. She kidnapped Yukina, the one who tried to save you, too.”
Yuuma’s face was the spitting image of Aya Tokoyogi’s; in the first place, Sayaka hadn’t spoken to Yuuma before, being a witch from the LCO. Sayaka had a frosty look on her as she watched their new companion.
Yuuma stated calmly, gravely, “I know. That’s why we need to begin immediately, Miss Kirasaka.”
Yuuma’s abrupt declaration threw Sayaka off.
“Begin…begin what?”
“Picking up where you and Kojou left off, but this time, with the three of us.”
“Eh?! Th-the three of us…?!”
Sayaka’s face burned bright red, possibly from some kind of highly impure image.
Yuuma looked natural as she drew near to Sayaka’s ear.
“It’s all right. We will not let Kojou die here.”
“R-right.”
“So, that being the case…”
With a soft whisper that echoed in Sayaka’s ear, Yuuma gently put her hands around Sayaka’s hips. Before Sayaka noticed, Yuuma had undone her hook with a practiced hand. Right before the fallen Kojou’s eyes, Sayaka’s unfastened skirt obeyed the law of gravity and fell. All that remained was her half-removed side-tie panties.
“Gyaaaaaaaa—!”
Sayaka’s scream, like silk being ripped apart, echoed in the moonlight.
2
Yukina walked alone in a building illuminated by the setting sun. It was the very familiar Saikai Academy campus building, and there, Yukina was wearing her middle school uniform. It was after classes, with no sign of other students inside the school.
Normally, the grounds would be full of music: voices from athletic clubs and the harmonies from the music clubs. The exception was at a single place—where two silhouettes stood against the shade-covered floor of a classroom.
Two people glared at each other in the empty classroom: a small, doll-like schoolgirl in her uniform and a young woman wearing a monochrome ceremonial robe.
The woman in the robe offered to the schoolgirl, “Come with me, my friend.”
Her eyes were not yet dyed in crimson like that of flame. Thanks to that, she felt far more friendly and sociable, much like Yuuma Tokoyogi.
“You and I are the…same. We are both pureblood witches whose souls were stolen by devils at birth. I shall alter the destinies they cursed. They shall be destroyed along with their despicable world.”
The small girl in the uniform asked in reply, “So that’s what the Black Bible is for?”
A light floated into the girl’s large eyes that rejected the offer from the woman in the ceremonial robe—Aya Tokoyogi.
Aya’s voice grew ragged in apparent sorrow.
“Why do you hesitate? Do you sympathize with the people of this island? Do not forget, the corporation lets you roam free only because you are the tool they designed to administer the prison barrier… Someday, you shall sleep forever and be put in another world all…alone. You will not grow old, no one will ever touch you, while you only dream of this world…”
The girl offered a faint, charming smile to the woman, pitying.
“…You’re very kind to worry about me like that, Aya Tokoyogi.”
It was a gentle, considerate smile for an old friend, and also a farewell.
Aya Tokoyogi produced a book from the sleeve of her ceremonial robe.
“Hand over the Black Bible, Natsuki. I cannot forgive this insane world, and this is for your sake, too!”
This was forbidden sorcery that was the exclusive province of the leader of the criminal organization, LCO—the grimoire that controlled one’s personal history, stealing the time and memories of another.
“So you will steal my memories, Aya?” Natsuki asked with a tone of resignation.
The grimoire known as the Black Bible was already lost. Natsuki Minamiya had burned it to ashes days before. As a result, the experiment Aya Tokoyogi had conducted, the so-called Black Bible Incident, had ended in failure.
However, the knowledge of the Black Bible still lived on in the memories locked away in Natsuki Minamiya’s mind. With that knowledge, the Black Bible could be re-created. Even if Natsuki refused to cooperate, all Aya had to do was rob the girl of her memories.
And so Aya clutched the grimoire for that purpose as she laid down her ultimatum.
“The classmates you are attempting to protect shall someday become adults and leave you behind. Then, they shall forget you—you, who has nowhere else to go.”
“Hmph…that’s fine, too, really.”
Natsuki’s smile seemed desolate somehow. Natsuki Minamiya, the Witch of the Void, and Aya Tokoyogi were enemies because Natsuki was protecting her fellow Saikai Academy classmates. It wasn’t because the Gigafloat Management Corporation employed her as an Attack Mage; it wasn’t because she was a witch—she opposed the leader of a vast criminal organization on the principle of that fickle thing known as friendship.
Natuski stated, neither out of pride or irony, “Maybe I’ll be a teacher here someday and watch new students grow up…”
Aya Tokoyogi glared with a look of rage at the somehow sunny expression Natsuki wore.
To Aya, Natsuki Minamiya’s completely shameless behavior toward those who used and scorned witches was an intolerable charade.
“You fool.”
Aya Tokoyogi’s eyes dyed the color of flames. With a sway, the silhouette of a jet-black knight rose from her back.
Behind the school-uniformed Natsuki, a giant shadow of her own emerged, glittering gold.
Combat between witches was not a head-on confrontation, smashing one’s magical power against another’s. Instead, they were duels of trickery, creating an opening in the other’s defenses; the first one to land an attack on her opponent, even for a single instant, would be the winner, for the body of a witch was far too weak to block the vast magical energy that witches possessed. Victory and defeat were both settled by whoever could get a spell in first.
Yukina didn’t need to watch to know how the fight had ended.
Natsuki Minamiya, not even sweet sixteen at the time, had triumphed; Aya Tokoyogi had been imprisoned in the prison barrier for the last ten years. This memory was from the fight ten years prior.
Yukina interrupted their battle, asking as she stepped into the classroom, “This is Sana’s—Ms. Minamiya’s dream, is it not?”
The two witches, glaring at each other, vanished as if mere illusions. All that remained was the classroom in the light of the setting sun. Just before the images of the witches vanished completely, Yukina wondered if it was her mind playing tricks or if she truly heard the voice of Aya Tokoyogi scornfully stating, “No. Perhaps this is your dream, Sword Shaman.”
Standing all alone in the center of the otherwise empty classroom, Yukina sighed deeply.
It was such a faithful re-creation that Yukina found it hard to believe, but apparently, this school building was on the inside of the barrier Aya Tokoyogi had erected. It was a dense space that might be better described as another world altogether. Apparently, the line between dream and reality was very thin within it.
Even if she wanted to get out, Yukina did not have Snowdrift Wolf in her hands. Surely that spear, able to rend any barrier, could break through this world of illusion, but…
As Yukina stood still, she heard a warm, familiar voice.
“Himeragi!”
When she turned, a schoolboy wearing a parka over his uniform
was just rushing into the classroom in great haste.
A moment later, a tall girl entered after him and bear-hugged her.
“You okay, Yukina?!”
Yukina hesitated; she felt so alive that you wouldn’t think she was an illusion. Perhaps they, too, were captives in the world Aya Tokoyogi had created?
“Senpai? Sayaka? Are your wounds all right?”
“Yeah,” said Kojou, “they’re all right now. Wanna see for yourself?”
Kojou moved his hands as if readying to suddenly yank the top of his uniform off. Seeing this, Sayaka smacked Kojou in the back of his head, hard. As the dull thud reverberated, Kojou clutched his head.
“Yeowch! I was just kidding, geez…!”
Sayaka, rather worked up, strongly embraced Yukina.
“It doesn’t sound like a joke coming from you, pervert! Stay back, I don’t want you corrupting my Yukina!”
Yukina became more and more confused as she vividly felt the warmth of Sayaka’s skin and the squish of her breasts. You wouldn’t think that sensation was an illusion…
Those precious to her were right by her side. Enveloped by a feeling of safety and reassurance, the existence of Aya Tokoyogi and the Black Bible incident felt irrelevant to her.
“Let’s leave this idiot here and go to club, Yukina.”
Yukina shook her head in confusion as Sayaka pulled her by her arm.
“Club…you say? No, I’m senpai’s watcher…”
Kojou tilted his head with a mystified look.
“Whaddaya mean, watcher? You mean you’re comin’ to watch us practice?”
“Eh?”
Yukina’s eyebrows rose as she noticed the sports bag Kojou was carrying. The towels and basketball shoes sticking out of the bag felt wrong to her. But it didn’t feel bad. What felt wrong was how much she wanted to accept it at face value.
“Senpai…did you start playing basketball again?”
“Whaddaya mean, start…? Our club’s pretty weak sauce, but it’s still alive an’ kickin’.”
“But your magical power?”
“Manicle…what?”
What’s that all about? said Kojou’s grimace. Sayaka made a charming and very amused smile as she seized the opportunity.
“Manicle powers, huh? So that’s how you roll, huh? What a perv.”
Fiesta for the Observers Page 18
