4_Chapter 3_ Angel Fall in the World of Injury

CHAPTER 3 Angel Fall in the World of Injury 1 Kamijou and Kanzaki were silent in the taxi back. He thought about Misha. They were in a car; she was on foot—it went without saying that they would arrive back at the beach house before her. However, Misha might get a ride midway through. “…” He shut his eyes, exhausted. The framed picture, in all its substituted distortion, appeared on the backs of his closed eyelids. It hadn’t just happened to that picture. Somewhere, packed away, there was a precious photo album for which the same could be said, as well as for albums belonging to people all over the world. And perhaps even for all the faded eight-millimeter film passed out at elementary school athletic meets… …and perhaps even for that one Christmas card with the baby photo on it… …and perhaps even for that cell-phone picture where a person huddled up with a lover to fit them both on the tiny screen. They would all be precious memories for those people. They were all memories that should never be sullied, never be distorted, and yet… Why…why did that damn father of mine… Kamijou heaved a long sigh. Even that sound seemed to wear down on his spirit. When they returned to the beach house Wadatsumi, it was engulfed in the orange sunset. It looked like the color of fresh blood or a blazing flame, and it gave Kamijou the creeps. Misha…Has she not returned yet? Now that Touya was the criminal, she, who wanted his life, would surely appear. And not as an agent of the devil, but as a righteous hero. Nevertheless, Kamijou burst into the beach house, fearing for his father’s safety. Good and evil, justice and injustice—these were merely secondary. He was only worried about his father. Above all else, the fact that feeling that way was considered “evil” made him despise this situation. “Huh? Big brother, where have you been?” When he entered the house, Mikoto called out to him. She was lying on her stomach in front of a fan and watching TV while licking an ice pop. Thank goodness, he thought. At the very least, it hadn’t come to the point where the enlightened Misha had taken someone hostage. “You were gone all of a sudden, so we were all really worried, you know? We were playing in the water, but we called it quits and started looking all over for you. If you were going out, you should have told someone or left a note or something—” “What about Dad? Where is he?” Mikoto’s eyes grew wide at his sudden interjection. Kamijou didn’t know what kind of face he was making, but his own voice sounded like it was on the verge of tears. “On the beach, I think? I don’t know where exactly, since everyone is all over the place looking for you, big brother. Oh, and I’m not slacking off; I’m on telephone duty. Seriously, you should go apologize to everyone.” Kamijou nodded and gave a “yeah.” He was about to go and run down his own father. He should apologize to him for that. As he looked over toward the beach, Kanzaki, who was next to him, opened her mouth. “The rest is my job. Please wait here,” she said in a serious voice. “I will ensure Touya’s safety, so—” “Not gonna happen,” he refused bluntly, croaking it out like he’d been standing out in the freezing rain. “I’ll be the one to settle this. I need to be the one to solve this problem.” “But—” Kanzaki started, then hesitated…probably out of kindness. Her kindness didn’t want her to let him stand face-to-face and confront someone so close to him. But that got on his nerves instead. “No buts! Who the hell do you think you are?! Touya Kamijou is my father! My father! The only one in the world! I can’t replace him with anybody! He’s my only father” Kamijou’s sudden shout caused Mikoto to look at him, startled. Kanzaki didn’t say anything. “So…” Touma Kamijou declared, alone… …without knowing what to do, without any answers…and yet, he declared it: “So I’ll be the one to settle this. I won’t let any of you get in my way. I won’t let any of you hurt him. My father, my father is—” And yet he declared it. He said it, each word, one by one. “—I will save Touya Kamijou.” 2 Touya Kamijou was walking on the sunset-tinted beach. Touma could see exhaustion on his father’s face. His body was dripping with sweat, too. He’d probably been running all over the place looking for Kamijou, who had suddenly vanished. Tonya was dog tired, but he wouldn’t allow his feet to stop. He walked across the beach, almost dragging those legs of his, filled with exhaustion. He looked nothing like a sorcerer. He looked nothing like a combat professional, either. “…Dad,” he called out. The moment Touya turned around, his truly drained expression transformed to one that looked relieved and happy. It was the face of a normal person. It was nothing but a father’s expression, given after having finally found his missing child. “Touma” After waiting an ample five seconds, his face finally turned to anger. “Where have you been?! Why didn’t you tell us you were going somewhere?! Your mother is worried sick! In the first place, you said you were resting in the house because you were fatigued from the summer heat. Are you all right? You’re not in any pain or about to throw up or anything, right?” However, not even a second passed before his words of ire shifted into consideration for Kamijou. Of course. Touya wasn’t angry with him because he hated him. His father was angry because he was worried about his son. Kamijou gritted his teeth in frustration. He didn’t want to have to go and interrogate Touya if he could help it. He didn’t want to ask if he was the criminal who caused Angel Fall. He wanted to treat everything like it never happened, to go back into the beach house and enjoy themselves like they had been until now. But he couldn’t do that. He needed to bring the Angel Fall incident to an end. Even if that meant Touya would be his enemy. Even if at the end, he stopped Touya’s wish, and his actual father ended up hating him. Even if after this, his father never talked to him like family again. Because he had made up his mind. He made up his mind that he would save Touya Kamijou. He didn’t know what Touya wished for. But Kamijou still wished he hadn’t gotten mixed up in the bloody world of sorcery. Kamijou knew what sorcerers were really like. He knew how scary they were. He didn’t want to consider that various sorcerers, Misha first on the list, would come for Touya’s life. That was all the more reason to end things before she arrived. He needed to bring Angel Fall to an end. So Kamijou asked, “…Why…?” while taking care not to let any trembling into his voice and not to break out crying. Touya frowned at Kamijou, but he continued. “Why are you here in this abnormal world? You’re one of the normal people. What the hell did you go and get caught up in stupid occult bullshit for, Dad?!” Touya’s smile froze at those words. “What…are you saying, Touma? More importantly—” “Don’t play dumb! I’m asking you why you’re pretending to be a magician!” Touya’s expression vanished like a cord had been cut. It wasn’t the expression of a sorcerer who had sensed that he was in danger. It was the kind of look a father would give his son if he’d been caught guilty. “…Before I answer, just tell me one thing. Touma, I won’t ask you where you’ve been. Do you feel all right? Does it hurt anywhere?” His words were so very unfitting for the situation that Kamijou was taken aback. Even now that it had come to this, he was still worrying about Kamijou’s health. Like a father would. “It doesn’t look like there’re any problems, then.” Touya sighed a small sigh of relief. “Now, then…Where should I start?” Kamijou remained silent. He couldn’t find anything to say to him. There was no reason he could have. But he kept his gaze fixed. He didn’t take his eyes off his father for even a moment. Touya’s face was as blank as a toy with dead batteries. To Kamijou, it looked like the man had suddenly put on ten years. “I knew it, myself…I knew that trying to grant my own wish with those sorts of methods was idiotic.” At last, he began. “Hey, Touma. You probably don’t remember this, since you were sent to Academy City right after you graduated from kindergarten,” recalled Touya, “but when you were still with us, do you remember what people around us used to call you?” Kamijou frowned. He didn’t have any memories from the start and couldn’t even remember anything from before this July. Touya swallowed once, like he actually had something caught in his throat, then continued. “They called you a curse.” He said this looking as if he might bite off his own tongue. His expression belied his unending regret at the fact that he needed to declare that word to his son. “Do you understand, Touma? You’ve certainly been an unlucky human ever since you were born. That’s why you were called by that name. But do you understand, Touma? It wasn’t just benign children’s mocking.” Touya gritted his teeth. “Even fully grown adults called you that. There was no reason. There was no cause for it. They called you that name just because you were unlucky.” Kamijou caught his breath. The expression vanished from Touya’s face. It wasn’t joy, and it wasn’t happiness. There was simply nothing there. “With you nearby, everything around you becomes unlucky. Children believed that rumor and would throw stones at you soon as look at you. The adults didn’t even stop it. When they saw your wounds, Touma, they wouldn’t feel sorry—in fact, they ridiculed you. They would goad you on, asking why you hadn’t suffered even worse wounds.” Kamijou couldn’t figure out the emotion behind the impassive words Touya uttered. That was probably the point. All those emotions twisting and turning inside him, so strong that he couldn’t suppress them. He thought it was a display of his feeling that he absolutely did not want to show them to his son. “If you went away, the misfortune would go away, too. Children believed that rumor and distanced themselves from you. Even the adults believed the story. Do you remember, Touma? You were once even chased around by a man with a debt and stabbed with a kitchen knife. The people at the television station who heard about it made it the pretext for a supernatural-themed episode and showed your face on camera, without asking permission, and treated you like some kind of monster!” The world dyed in orange was like the flames that burn in hell. The single man could do nothing within those flames but stand there with a frozen look. “That’s also the reason I sent you to Academy City. I was scared. Not about good luck, or bad luck, or whatever. I was scared of reality—where people would believe in that and commit violent acts against you like it was the obvious thing to do.” Touya’s face didn’t change one bit as he continued his lament. “I was scared. It seemed like that urban myth would eventually kill you for real, Touma. That’s why I wanted to send you to a world where those sorts of myths didn’t exist.” So Touya had even severed a bond with a family member. He wanted to protect his child, even if it meant their family couldn’t be together. “But even on the cutting edge of science, you still came to be treated like an unfortunate person. I could tell just from the letters you sent. Though it seems like the malicious acts of violence weren’t happening.” He smiled. “I couldn’t be satisfied with just that. I wanted to destroy your misfortune itself. But that was a wish that wouldn’t be granted, either using common sense or the latest scientific methods.” And still…even though he knew it couldn’t be granted… Touya Kamijou never, ever wanted to give up. “Only one option was left. I decided to sully my hands with the occult.” Touya Kamijou cut off there. Kamijou considered it—that Touya had executed Angel Fall in order to erase Kamijou’s misfortune. But what did Touya want to do by summoning an angel? Was it something so stupidly straightforward like wanting to have a direct line to God so that his prayers would reach? And to do that, he caught up so many people in it and even went so far as to substitute their insides and outsides… Then, after having thought that far, Kamijou realized. People’s insides get swapped. In other words, Touma Kamijou’s title of “unfortunate human” would be switched with someone else. Indeed, if that happened, he wouldn’t have to bear that burden anymore. The angel didn’t matter at all. What Touya Kamijou wanted was the interior substitution. “…You moron.” However, it was a double-edged sword. After all, the “existence” known as Touya Kamijou would be switched for somebody else. Touya’s own son would no longer think of him as his father. In fact, a completely random stranger would turn into Touma Kamijou. He would rudely set foot into their family as his own son. But Touya Kamijou still wanted to protect his child. Even if it got the whole world wrapped up in it. Even if his own child would never call him “father” again. Even if they would never be together as a smiling family again. But Touya Kamijou still wanted to protect him. Even if he were to become a criminal, he wanted to protect his own son from the invisible “bad luck.” So Kamijou, unable to endure it, roared: “You freaking moron” Touya looked surprised. Kamijou couldn’t forgive that. “Yeah, I guess I was pretty unlucky,” he spat in response. “I’ve almost died a whole bunch of times already just during summer break. I even had my entire right arm completely cut off. If you compared me to everyone else in my class, I’d probably be the only one who had such an unlucky summer break. “But,” Kamijou continued. “Did I ever once say that I regretted it? Did I say that I didn’t want to have such an unlucky summer break, damn it?! You’ve gotta be joking. Yeah, my summer vacation’s been unlucky, all right. But so what? You think I’d regret something so stupid like that?!” That’s right. The one who rescued Aisa Himegami from Misawa Cram School was Touma Kamijou. That’s right. The one who saved Little Misaka from the experiment was Touma Kamijou. And… The one who protected the smile of the girl in white was probably him, too. Even if those had been situations he’d been dragged into. Even if those opportunities had just been a series of coincidences brought on by his bad luck. He should be proud of them. Instead, he shuddered at the thought that he wouldn’t have gotten dragged into those situations if he had good luck. “Yeah, if I wasn’t so unlucky, I think I could have lived in a more peaceful world. I wouldn’t have nearly died over and over again just this summer.” Kamijou glared at his father. “But would that really be good luck? I would live a relaxed life, and in the shadows, others would be suffering, would be bloodied, would beg for help, and I wouldn’t notice any of it! What part of just floating along through life sounds like good luck to you?!” Touya looked at Kamijou, taken by surprise. Kamijou said, “Don’t force your pathetic good luck on me! Don’t take this beautiful bad luck from me! I will walk this path. I’ve done so until now, and I’ll keep doing it, so that I won’t ever regret it!” So don’t get in my way. I don’t want your good luck. If I’d otherwise be living in a daze without noticing the suffering of everyone right next to me, I’ll get dragged into however much bad luck that suffering people need. So…, said Touma Kamijou. “Don’t look down on my rotten luck! I’m the happiest person in the world right now!” He was probably smiling. A savage smile, a barbaric smile, a rough smile, without a shred of panache. But Touma Kamijou was smiling the best, strongest smile as he declared that. “…” Touya… Words couldn’t find their way out of Touya Kamijou’s mouth. In this world dyed in orange, with only the sound of the waves to fill their ears, Touya smiled. He smiled wider, wider, wider, wider, stretching his grin out thin across his face. He…sighed. At that time, for the first time for real, Touya Kamijou gave a small smile. “What, really?” he said in a relaxed voice. “You were happy from the start, Touma?” Yeah. Kamijou nodded without hesitation. Touya gave an expression like a huge weight had been released from his shoulders. “I’m such an idiot. This would have the exact opposite effect. Was I trying to steal my own child’s happiness from right before his eyes?” He laughed at himself in relief. “Though it’s not like I was able to do anything, I suppose. Boy, am I a moron. I should have known that collecting all those sorts of souvenirs wouldn’t change anything. I should know that occult stuff doesn’t have any power at all.” “Eh?” Kamijou frowned suddenly at his father’s words. Touya didn’t notice his reaction. “Besides, if your bad luck could be cured just by buying up some folk charms for stuff like home safety or scholastic success from souvenir stands, you wouldn’t be proud of it. I’ll stop coming back from business trips having bought strange souvenirs. Your mother would be happier with candy.” “W-wait a second,” Kamijou interrupted. “You triggered Angel Fall, right? Then where is the ritual area? If you don’t want to get rid of my bad luck anymore, then we can put a stop to Angel Fall already, right?” For some reason, Touya made a dubious face at that. “Angel Fall? What’s that, some kind of new lingo? Name of a band?” “…Wait…a second.” Kamijou looked at Touya’s face again. “Hey. Do you know where Mom is right now?” “What are you saying, Touma? She’s gone back into the beach house, hasn’t she?” Kamijou stood there dumbstruck. It didn’t look like his father was lying to him. Touya really believed that Index was his wife. But that was odd, then. If Touya Kamijou was the criminal who pulled off Angel Fall, then he shouldn’t be under its effects. Wait. Think about this. Have we missed something? This situation is clearly weird. Judging by the way Dad’s talking, it sounds like he was just trying to give protective charms to his unlucky kid. Touma Kamijou’s thoughts were suddenly cut off by the crunch of sand being crushed. Kamijou looked up. “…Misha Kreutzev.” Just how long had she been there? There was nowhere to hide on this shoreline, and yet a girl wearing a red inner suit and an equally red mantle atop it was just…standing there. Black belts wrapped around her in various places, and she even wore a collar. Touya looked at her in automatic disbelief. Misha didn’t answer Kamijou’s call, either. She silently watched Touya’s face. They were ten meters or so away from each other. Kamijou remembered the night he was first attacked and it sent a chill up his spine. That power of hers, which was so far above even the fearsome Jinsaku Hino’s that she crushed him as if she were chasing away a stray cat. A distance this short couldn’t be called “distance” for Misha. However, Kamijou still thought that maybe he could talk to her. That was his mistake. He casually stepped in front of Touya, as if to cover him, and said: “Wait, Misha. Something’s wrong. Dad is definitely not substituted with anyone. But he doesn’t realize that other people are, either. Angel Fall is affecting him. I don’t know how, but—?!” He was cut short as his throat froze. He got goose bumps. Something was erupting from Misha Kreutzev’s petite body—something invisible. Kamijou’s feet were glued to the ground, a pressure settled into his stomach, his breathing became ragged, his heartbeat rushed about, and it felt like painful sparks were bursting in the back of his head, and his thoughts stopped. He almost thought it was like there was nerve gas spewing from her pores, but that wasn’t quite right. Misha wasn’t doing anything. She wasn’t doing something in particular—her very presence was constricting Kamijou’s body. Intent to kill. With just that malicious aura, Touma Kamijou felt himself turn to stone. Whump He felt an oppressing fear like the gravity here had ballooned to ten times its normal strength. Misha’s slender hand slowly wavered toward the belt on her waist. What she took out was the L-shaped nail puller. He saw the half-baked sharp tips, and behind him, Touya gulped. Yeah—the wild shape of the tips looked more heinous than a poorly made knife. Despite that, Kamijou managed to call out to her again. “Wa…it.Misha…listen to me!” However, she did not answer. The wind simply blew. Her bangs fluttered. Behind them were glaring, squirming eyes, utterly devoid of all emotion. Kamijou gave a start in spite of himself. Compared to Jinsaku Hino’s eyes, embellished with violent, passionate emotion, Misha’s eyes were the direct opposite. They were no longer human eyes. Human eyes cannot have that sort of color. Two eyeballs, which looked like nothing more than glass or crystal balls, as if they had cut off all psychological phenomena. Misha Kreutzev said nothing. She simply brought the nail puller straight out to the side and looked at Kamijou with eyes like security cameras. He froze. His voice stopped. This small girl in front of him, wearing a red inner suit wrapped in a mantle, did not look human. He felt like it was something completely different, writhing around inside human skin. Misha slowly, slowly readied the nail puller as one would ready a shinai. That torture device she had used to break Jinsaku Hino’s wrist with but a single flick of the hand. Could he possibly keep Touya safe while evading attacks from something like that? Kamijou was trembling, and his palms moistened with a disgusting sweat. Nonetheless, he could not back down. Kamijou finally balled his quivering right hand into a fist— —when suddenly he heard Kanzaki’s angry shout from out of thin air. “Get away from there, Touma Kamijou” Whoosh came the cry of the wind. Something that could be called an invisible slash ran across the sand and glinted between Kamijou and Misha. The earth that was whipped up from the straight cut rose to form a wall of sand. Misha, who was just readying her pliers then, averted her attention for a moment, and in that moment Kanzaki stepped between them. Then, next to the murderously posed Kanzaki, he saw Tsuchimikado. When did he get back? “Good work, Kammy. You really did well. You settled things, right? Back off, then—battle is our job.” He didn’t know what means he had used, but he had been watching from close by? Touya looked at Tsuchimikado and worked his mouth. That was understandable. If he was under the influence of Angel Fall, then he would appear to be a sketchy idol surrounded by rumors to Touya’s eyes. But it didn’t seem like there was any free time to clear up the misunderstanding. Kamijou, still astonished, nonetheless looked toward Misha, who was acting strange. “Hey, Tsuchimikado. What the heck is up with her?” “Well…When we gave it some thought, it was strange before.” Tsuchimikado grinned savagely. “We’d figured someone from a different church would use a fake name to refer to themselves with, but Misha didn’t actually do that. We should have been on our guards right then, nya~.” “?” “You see, ‘Misha’ is, well—” Kanzaki stared at Misha without faltering. “—In Russia, it’s a name given to boys. It’s far too strange to even use as a fake name.” On the other hand, the Misha in question said nothing. She narrowed her eyes and adjusted the aim of her nail puller from Touya to Kanzaki. “What? Why would she do something like that…?” “When we put in an inquiry to the Russian Catholic Church about it, we learned that there’s a Sasha Kreutzev, though. The one she’s substituted with is probably Sasha.” Kamijou looked at Misha’s face. That’s right—if she was under the effects of Angel Fall, she’d have to have been swapped with someone. It would be strange otherwise. But if that was the case, then who was this girl who had substituted in for Kreutzev? “They exist, Kammy—people in this world who can become either a man or a woman. Their genders are always indeterminate, and they are present in the myths as both neither and both. A name, for them, is their objective itself, for which God made them. They would never be able to exchange names.” Kamijou frowned at what Tsuchimikado was saying, but he asked: “Kammy, did you forget? What’s this grand sorcery called again?” In that moment, Misha’s eyes shot wide open. With a roar loud enough to shake the earth— —the sunset, enveloping them in orange, cut to a night with a star-filled sky before he could blink. “Wha…?” Kamijou automatically looked above him. Touya’s breath froze. Night. As if a light switch had been flipped, the sunset transformed into night. An ominously giant, full blue moon loomed overhead. However, that was strange. At this time of the month, the moon should be half full. “Wait…What the hell is this?!” “Can you not tell by looking? That thing has changed twilight into the darkness of night,” Kanzaki responded easily to the awestruck Kamijou. It changed from evening into night. That was simple as wordplay, but that would mean she had freely changed the positional relationships between whole heavenly bodies, of the Earth and the sun. No, looking at the phase of the moon being incorrect, she might even be able to control that and other planets. Celestial manipulation. If that mad term doesn’t give a good picture, then think of it as the power to end the world. For example, if the Earth’s axis were just changed by ten degrees, one-fourth of all creatures would die out. If the Earth’s rotation stopped, the entire world would collapse. Those standing on the planet cannot feel it, but the Earth is a celestial body that revolves at an amazing speed of 1,666 kilometers per second. If that revolution were brought to a sudden halt, then the dreadful power of inertia would work the same way as the inside of a car when the driver slams on the brakes. The entire crust of the planet would be completely blown away. This all meant… …that at a whim, Misha could break this world, whenever she wanted, and from wherever she wanted. “Wait. Hey, wait a minute! Sorcery can do this kind of bullshit?!” “No, not by man.” The cold, sharp, bladed voice belonged to Kanzaki. “So this is a night meant to strengthen her own attributes. Looking at the placement of the moon and its principal axis, yes. I see, I understand. The one that oversees the blue as a symbol of water, and the one who protects the rear as a guardian of the moon. The one who rained down arrows of fire upon the corrupt city of Gomorrah in the Old Testament, and the one who proclaimed the conception of the son of God to the Holy Mother in the New Testament.” After all this, Kamijou finally remembered it. He remembered what this grand sorcery was called. Angel Fall. Because it was called that, a certain existence must surely come falling down. “—Known as the POWER OF GOD. A winged archangel who sits at the right hand of God, was it?” The one who served God answered not the question of the one who slayed gods. As if a shell was broken by an invisible force, as if shedding an invisible skin… Like that, it awoke. 3 The angel didn’t make any movements in particular. As Kanzaki moved into a position to shield Kamijou and Touya, she reached down to the katana on her waist. “An angel is a power that knows neither good nor evil. If it obeys the will of God and saves people, it is respected as an angel, and if it falls to the Earth and is tainted with mud, it is feared as a demon,” Kanzaki explained sourly. “It’s exactly like the legends in the Old Testament. POWER OF GOD…Would you go that far to return to your original place?” Kamijou looked at Misha—no, the angel called the POWER OF GOD—in astonishment. Her reason for trying to stop Angel Fall was likely the simplest of everyone here. Angel Fall is a technique to drop an angel to Earth. So it’s only natural that the dropped angel would feel like it should return to where it came from. The POWER OF GOD said nothing. No longer offering any explanation, she waved her L-shaped nail puller into the air above as if to begin. A shivering chill settled over him like a nail of ice had pierced his heart. The moon overhead radiated a huge, striking blue light. A ring of light appeared around the brilliantly glowing moon, like when a camera lens tries to chase the sun. The lunar corona, with the full moon as its center, expanded in a blink and disappeared past the edges of the horizon in the night sky. Then, various strands of light shot through, as if inscribing complicated symbols on the ring’s inside. It wasn’t simply giant. When Kamijou looked more carefully, he saw that each and every one of those specks of light drawing those lines was a separate magic circle. Like a school of fish swimming through the sea, like a line of ants parading across the ground, the millions, billions of magic circles floated into a regular pattern and constructed one large circle. But. There’s…There’s such an incredible amount of light. Kamijou couldn’t help but be amazed when he stared at the cluster of sparkling lights in the night sky. It would be incorrect to look up at the stars at night and think them frail or transient. Things that are farther away appear smaller—even an elementary school student understands perspective. For example, if one lives in Japan, they’ve probably at least seen an SDF or USFJ jet fighter flying through the air before. However, even if they can see the vapor trail running through the sky, would anyone have ever seen the color of the flames spurting from its engines? That’s how it is. It means that there is enough distance so that one can’t see the level of light from a combat fighter’s jet engines. In fact, artificial light that can be picked out in the stratosphere is probably limited to the rocket propulsion light when sending up a satellite. Even Kamijou, who was not well versed in sorcery, could understand it. This was phenomenal. Bzzt. From inside him came a trembling sensation. A spongy bead of sweat appeared on Kanzaki’s cheek as she looked up at the night sky. “Are you insane, POWER OF GOD?! You would bring out a technique above even the levels recorded in the Old Testament just to aim for one person? Do you plan on purging this world?!” Both her tone of voice and her words were extraordinary. Kamijou couldn’t help but squeeze in a question. “What? Hey, what the hell is that angel about to start…?” “It’s the torrent of fire arrows that once burned an entire corrupt civilization. If something like that is activated, the history of mankind will end right here.” This was so colossal that Kamijou couldn’t get the sense that it was real. However, the words fire and torrent left an unpleasant feeling in his mind. Arrows of fire…are gonna fall? Wait, could that be those lights in the sky? Those billions of clusters of lights that are as bright as a fully fueled rocket…are gonna all come down?! Petrified, Kamijou looked up into the sky. Considering it simply, those billions of sparkling points of light were basically all the rocket flares from missiles aimed at the ground. This wasn’t on the level of a simple carpet bombing. Enough missiles would come raining down on them that even though each one would lock on to a different person, there would still be some left over. He didn’t know the scope of attack. Was it this city? Was it this country? If it were everything under the night sky, then perhaps it would reduce half the planet to rubble. Kanzaki, looking like her heart would stop beating any second, said, “Angels cannot kill humans without an order from God, and yet…have you even forgotten that, POWER OF GOD? The number of souls to be judged during the ‘final judgment’ in the New Testament is decided ahead of time. You would understand that killing people so carelessly now would equate to bringing that judgment to ruin! You told us that!” He felt like he’d heard that from Tsuchimikado before. He said that God would come down to Earth at the end of the world, then decide on a case-by-case basis who would go to heaven and who would go to hell. The results were actually set in stone from the beginning, so if an angel killed people imprudently, then those results would go wrong or something. Leaving religious notions behind, the logic was a sort of time paradox. If it killed someone who was never originally supposed to be killed, their children would never be born. And then their grandchildren and their great-grandchildren—none of them would be born. Just like how someone who uses a time machine is a transcender who can bend history to his will, this angel, who was out of position with the history of mankind, had the power to change mankind’s future and its ultimate end. A transcender. Kanzaki gave a heartrending cry for her to stop this massacre, but the servant of God didn’t budge an inch. It did not go mad with rage, nor did it smile in scorn, nor did it feel any guilt. It simply did not budge. Kamijou shuddered at the sight. Logic likely would no longer work on this angel, on the POWER OF GOD. It was like it had gone off some sort of rails at the very moment Angel Fall activated. The angel before them now had only one directive—to return to heaven. It was not giving the most minute of thoughts to the effect it would have on the world as a result. It was like…all it wanted to do was put something proper back in its proper place. Just like a person who has received another person’s organ during a transfusion, but the organ is unsuitable—even though he knows he’ll die, his body will reject it anyway. Had it only been moving with Kamijou and the others until now just to ascertain its target? After an overwhelming bombing run, it can be difficult to judge whether the target is dead when they’re hidden underneath a mountain of wreckage and corpses. So did she need to know her target’s face beforehand? Kamijou bared his canines and looked skyward. His right hand could erase any abnormal power, even if it was a miracle from God himself. But the magic circle was placed too far away from the start. The stratosphere is too high to be reached even by jet fighters. Therefore, he turned his glare to the POWER OF GOD. If he couldn’t stop that magic circle, then all he could do was stop the one using it. It was the same with Angel Fall. If the sorcery was still incomplete, then if he stopped the practitioner, it should be able to obstruct its activation. “Damn it…” However, presented with the simplest answer before his eyes, Kamijou gritted his teeth. That would make him no different from that angel. “You bastard” The POWER OF GOD just looked intently at Kamijou like that, without adjusting its expression. With eyes that looked like they were staring at an insect wriggling around in the mud from one spot higher up. The archangel who had prepared enough power to destroy the world without moving a single fingertip said nothing. Her gaze had no sense of danger. He couldn’t even feel any compassion. There was no reason to feel pain over squashing one bug, after all. “Damn it! Say something already! Listen up—I’m really mad right now. I’m pissed out of my fuckin’ mind! We’re not negotiating any of this one bit—shut up and stop this damn spell!” yelled Kamijou at the angel shorter than him, but his voice seemed to be trembling. Touya appeared to be shocked by his own child flinging obscenities more than anything else in this situation. Kamijou thought back. He thought about the speed at which she had driven away Jinsaku Hino right before his eyes. Her weight. Her timing. Her construction. That power, though camouflaged. The mere Kamijou could do nothing but be made to dance in her hands, like in the preestablished harmony of a contrived chessboard in the newspaper. That GODLIKE POWER. And now it was even more than that. Her stiff, uncomfortable true character had already been unmasked. “…” A muddy sweat broke out on him. He stepped in front of Touya to cover him. That attitude certainly appeared heroic, but its essence was nothing but rashness. The gap in strength between him and the POWER OF GOD was no longer something that could be closed by human hands. It was like he was being told to fight a nuclear missile with his bare hands. “Touma Kamijou.” Then, Kaori Kanzaki quietly turned around to him. “I will hold back the POWER OF GOD. You take Mr. Touya and flee as soon as possible.” At that moment, Kamijou was unable to understand what it was that Kanzaki had just said. She declared it so simply. She asserted it in a situation like she was being told to fight a nuclear missile with her bare hands. Without any hesitation, nor any reserve, nor any mercy, nor fear, nor exhaustion. Kanzaki turned her back to Kamijou and confronted the angel, who was like a god of death. “Wh…y…?” That was the only question Kamijou could pose. But to that barely squeezed-out question, Kanzaki did not even turn around. “I don’t have a reason. I only stand here because there is something that I can do,” replied her back, in a voice that sounded truly uninterested. “A purge, is it? How worthless. How truly worthless. By such a worthless method, the destination I aim for is far and unreachable,” she spat, taking a step forward. Kamijou couldn’t stop her back. He couldn’t catch up to her back. The distance, not even spanning one meter in length, felt infinitely large. She wasn’t strong, nor frightening, nor sharp, nor heavy, fast, cold, or hot. She was just…different. The back of she who confronted the POWER OF GOD was incredibly different, as is fitting for someone in that role. The god slayer spoke. “The war we are about to conduct now is different. While you flee, please take the utmost caution not to be caught up in it.” He was told to run away, but Kamijou couldn’t understand. Where should he run to at this point? Mars? Then, without turning back to face the confused Kamijou, Kanzaki said: “Think about it and look. This purge of the POWER OF GOD. If it conducts it, it can end things quite easily. Why do you think, then, that the angel watches what we are doing indifferently?” When she said that, Kamijou finally figured it out. If it could perform its “purge,” then it should just do it now. The POWER OF GOD would have no reason to hesitate to do so. After all, it had but one objective. Why in the world would she not carry it out despite that? “It is not that it isn’t carrying it out, but rather it cannot. It may be called the POWER OF GOD, but a technique on this scale will take time to complete. It is nothing unusual. There was, generally speaking, such a wait time for the heavenly judgment that came down upon civilizations in the past, as well.” Kanzaki’s back spoke. “—About thirty minutes or so, in terms of time, I see. He-heh, that’s cutting it a bit close to get all the animals onto the ark.” Kamijou was speechless. Thirty more minutes. After thirty minutes, the purge would bring arrows of fire down on about half of the world. Just at a guess, how many millions of missiles might come down? Kamijou’s Imagine Breaker couldn’t cover the entire world, of course. But on the other hand… If they could stop the POWER OF GOD in thirty minutes… “Well, then, I can’t just run away! I’m in this, too! My right hand can at least do a little against an occult opponent like that, can’t it?!” “Please leave. If a professional were to let an amateur protect her and be wounded, she wouldn’t even have the right to commit seppuku,” answered Kanzaki in a cool voice. “Why are you so calm? That thing can’t tell right from wrong right now. You all kept saying how angels couldn’t kill people and everything, but look at how reliable that was!” Kamijou was shouting as if to stop someone from leaping to their death. “I can’t leave you to fight that thing by yourself! I can fight, too! How can I run away at this point?!” “Listen to me,” Kanzaki’s back said, however, coolly. “That thing exists outside of human standards in the first place. Thinking that you will fight it, or that you will win against it, is already mistaken.” Kamijou caught his breath and fixed his eyes on her back. “Do not get me wrong, though. I have no intention of dying a pointless death. I will not lie and say I will win, but I also will not say I will lose. The only thing I can do is hold it off, equally and evenly. “Touma Kamijou, while I am holding it off, I want you to take Mr. Touya and undo Angel Fall,” she told him quietly. “Wait, hey, what?” “Have you forgotten the POWER OF GOD’s objective? It created this purge in order to stop Angel Fall. In other words, if you stop Angel Fall before the purge is carried out, it will no longer have any necessity to do so. Do you not think so?” Her final phrase sounded like it was directed not at Kamijou but at the archangel. The chilling angel did not respond. The POWER OF GOD didn’t care one way or the other. In any case, the purge that would destroy Angel Fall’s caster, Touya, in thirty minutes would resolve everything. If Kamijou could find another way to stop Angel Fall before that happened, the angel shouldn’t have a problem with it. Therefore, the POWER OF GOD silently stared down its target, Touya. As if to say that whatever they chose, and however the cookie crumbled, they’d get the same result, it didn’t even need to raise an eyebrow. Like it was carefully considering which route to take: its purge or the more brutal stoppage of the Earth’s rotation by means of celestial manipulation. Like it was absentmindedly rolling its options around in its hand. Kamijou shot a glance at Touya. It was certainly far too dangerous to leave him close to the POWER OF GOD. But still… “But what about you? You can’t go up against the POWER OF GOD…” “Who knows? However, this is the most beneficial option. You would not be able to hold that off. Please carry out your own role properly and undo Angel Fall as soon as possible. Your efforts will raise my chances of survival.” Kanzaki took yet another step toward the POWER OF GOD. “And above all, not a hair on my head wishes to make a sacrifice of a civilian in a sorcerer’s battle. I will not let Touya Kamijou die—even if it should cost me my life.” “…Are you seriously okay with that?” “Yes. I apologize for being rude, but I will try trusting you. If you can save my own life in the same way you once saved that child before my eyes, I would appreciate it.” Kanzaki’s back didn’t say anything more than that. Kamijou thought about saying something, but he couldn’t find any words. If he was to try and stop her, they’d lose that much more time. Each and every pointless act surely brought down her chances of survival. He clenched his teeth. “I’ll leave it to you, Kanzaki! I’ll trust you, too” he shouted, grabbing his clueless father’s arm and darting back toward the beach house, half dragging him. Touya cried, “Wait, what’s going on here?” but Kamijou took no notice of it. The POWER OF GOD’s gaze passed through Kanzaki and shifted toward Kamijou. Kanzaki slid in the way to cut it off. “Your opponent is right here. Listen to what I’m saying. The role of an angel, to begin with, also includes delivering messages between God and man, and yet you…” Then, Kanzaki smiled a little. It didn’t match the situation. “But even still, he said he’d trust me. Me, of all people. My word—I can’t make fun of Stiyl’s report for saying how that threw him off during the Misawa Cram School battle. That one utterance was certainly ideal. My chances of survival have doubtlessly been raised because of your words,” she soliloquized, reaching a hand for the hilt of the sword at her waist, the Seven Heavens Sword. The POWER OF GOD, for its part, keeping a silent eye on Kanzaki, finally breathed, in an inhuman voice: “qFOolIshrw.” Kaboom! The angel’s back exploded. What came out of its back was like wings, but they were not the elegant white ones of a swan. They were like the wings of a peacock, as if made from carved ice. The wings were sharp and rough, seeming to have been made from shaved crystal, and there were dozens of them all sticking out like a pincushion. Tons and tons of ocean water rushed against the angel’s back. Its back and the seawater made contact, and they transformed into giant wings of water. Each one of the giant, watery wings protruding from it was anywhere from fifty to seventy meters in length, and they slashed out behind the POWER OF GOD. They appeared to form a wall that no number of people could breach, and they looked like sharp, crystalline fan blades that would cut off your finger if you touched it. The dozens of frozen wings stretched their blades toward the heavens. At the end, a single drop of water appeared over the POWER OF GOD’s head. It drew a small circle and stabilized as a ring floating in the air. Each and every one of those drops looked like the ocean surface in the dead of night—a deathly blue, soiled with black. Those wings, which had Telesma going through them from the ends of the feathers to the beginnings without a single gap, were each a single, divine judgment attack that could blow away entire mountains, rip into the lands, and create valleys. Normally Kanzaki had enough power that her enemies would fear her on the battlefield and open a way for her, but even she found her body tingling with nervousness. A normal person might have forgotten to breathe just from the pure malice radiating in this place. “My, I’ve made quite a rash promise for such an extreme position.” Kanzaki lowered her center of gravity just slightly—and then noticed something. “? Tsuchimikado, where are you? Tsuchimikado?” He wasn’t here. At some point, he had shrewdly vanished from the battlefield. Exasperated at Tsuchimikado’s having upheld his policy of infidelity even in this extreme situation, she muttered, “Well, that’s the kind of person he is. I can throw him away and he’ll still survive. Now then, I must survive through this with my own power. Now, along with the use of my Single Glint, I give one name.” Then, Kaori Kanzaki declared… …her other name, engraved upon her own body and soul. “The hand of salvation for those who cannot be saved—Salvare000.” 4 Meanwhile, Tsuchimikado ran alone, cutting through the dark of night. Now, then…This has gotten pretty bad, yeah, pretty bad. Though it was unavoidable, I should have blasted the whole thing to smithereens sooner. As if distancing himself from the battlefield…as if running from the fight. Many errors should be forgotten—clearing my head with positive thoughts. Aight, Kanzaki is holding it off, and she was getting in the way from a certain point of view, so I should think about how I’m able to move freely now. As if heading to a new battlefield, as if an insect diving into the fire. Heh-heh-heh. Now, then, time to start the captivating betrayal. Sorry, Kammy, it seems like saving this problem is gonna take at least one person to be a sacrifice. Smiling enjoyably, Fallere825—the backstabbing blade, Motoharu Tsuchimikado—dashed through the darkness. 5 Kaori Kanzaki and the POWER OF GOD faced each other with ten meters between them. However, if you knew even a little about Crossism, that sentence would sound reckless. Not on the level of Kanzaki being weak or the archangel being strong, mind you. A more fundamental part, at its very roots, was altogether different. Roughly speaking, this is a rule that applies to mankind’s religions the world over, but… Humans cannot go against God. Aside from heretics who serve different gods, those of Crossism cannot go against angels of the same Crossism. It’s an obvious rule when you think about it. In other words, as soon as Kanzaki aligned herself with the Church, she was absolutely unable to win against the POWER OF GOD. It was like a game of rock-paper-scissors where she could use nothing but scissors—as soon as rock came out, she would lose for sure. That was why this was all absurd. However, the angelic girl didn’t speak a word. It didn’t even show a smile of compassion. The POWER OF GOD simply raised on high one of the water wings coming out of its back. There was close to ten meters distancing them, but that had nothing to do with it. For one of those wings, which were seventy meters in length, it was almost too close. Those water wings, which enclosed Telesma all the way to their tips, just one of them could be said to be divine judgment that would crush a city. With one downward flap, this beach would blow away, and it would be able to dig a crater into the Earth and create a bay. Just like how the gods’ power shaped the lands in the era of myths. The POWER OF GOD did not hesitate. Even knowing what would happen should it unleash that destructive force on a powerless human. The archangel presiding over blue didn’t hesitate for a moment—it swung down that raised seventy-meter-long water wing. It resembled a tower collapsing. The sliced air changed into a windy fist and ravaged the surroundings. Then, suppressing even that, the watery wing came down straight upon Kaori Kanzaki’s head at a terrifying speed. That was it. That should have been it. Slash! came a smart sound as the water wing was severed with a flashing horizontal stroke. Who could have predicted that to happen? The POWER OF GOD abruptly stopped; Kanzaki only inhaled and answered it. The nearly two-meter-long katana hanging at her waist. As soon as it was plucked out, the giant seventy-meter-long water wing was severed like a bamboo shoot. That wasn’t all. The wreckage of the sliced-off wing immediately blasted apart into very small pieces like it had been blown away by an explosion and disappeared off into the nighttime darkness. Kanzaki didn’t try to say a single thing. Her katana’s blade was already resting in its black sheath again. The POWER OF GOD’s bangs flapped in the wind. The glassy eyes behind them writhed, staring at her, as if to search for a weakness. It swung another one of the water wings on its back like it was testing something. This time, a ferocious gale, seeming like it would wipe away everyone standing on the Earth with a single, flashy horizontal stroke, whipped up. However, even that… Slice! Kaori Kanzaki’s single katana easily cut off the fifty-meter-long wing. To add to that, Kanzaki also wasn’t thrown around by the drawn katana’s speed or its weight. The blade, which had been unsheathed a moment ago, was a moment later resting quietly in the sheath again. At a distance of ten meters, Kaori Kanzaki silently fingered the katana’s sheath. The angel’s movements ceased… …as if carefully rewriting its tactics, wondering how best to cook the prey in front of it. “If anything—” she taunted, “I, for one, did not expect you to be surprised at that. Perhaps you have underestimated this Kaori Kanzaki creature a bit, no?” The POWER OF GOD didn’t respond. This time, it crossed two of its watery wings, on the left and right, like scissors. Roar! The two wings delivered a shriek as they assailed her… …but with one attack from Kanzaki, who spun her body like a tornado, they were cleaved at the same time and destroyed. “…” Its bangs waved in the night wind. The eyes behind them rotated at her, as if to confirm a single fact. Not just one or two of them had been sliced—in all, it was four. That wasn’t a coincidence but rather a necessity. And one pregnant with contradiction. A disciple of Crossism shouldn’t be able to go against its angels. To her, Kanzaki said in a cool voice… “Your first mistake was thinking I was just a disciple of Crossism.” She showed calmness enough to go all the way to show her own trump card. “My techniques are of the Amakusa-Style Crossist Church. It is a form of Crossism unique to Japan, created to believe in God even when its believers were being oppressed during the world of Edo.” During an era when oppression was so severe that being in possession of a cross or an image of Mary warranted execution, believers would liken Shinto wooden tags to “crosses” and images of the Buddha to “images of Mary.” Amakusa-Style, which conducted camouflage in this way using Shinto and Buddhism, at some point became too intertwined with these fake faces of Shinto and Buddhism, and it started to get difficult to tell where the actual Crossism started. They had constructed an arranged version of the original. The diverse fusion of religions with Crossist technique—Amakusa-Style Crossism. In other words… If she couldn’t win against an angel with Crossism techniques, she would not use Crossism techniques. She would take the roundabout route of using techniques of a “religion in which angels do not appear,” Buddhism and Shinto, and attack the angel that way—that was all. What can’t be done with Crossist techniques can be dealt with using Buddhist ones. What can’t be done with Buddhist techniques can be dealt with using Shinto ones. What can’t be done with Shinto techniques can be dealt with using Crossist ones. Amakusa-Style covers for the weaknesses of each religion’s techniques by using other ones. In other words, it can break through the major premise that one cannot defeat “angels” in “Crossism.” “…” The POWER OF GOD’s eyes froze. It waved three of its water wings up, one to the left, one to the right, and one straight above. However, they were once again easily cleaved by Kanzaki’s Single Glint. “Also, a large amount of gods appears in Japanese Shinto, even when compared to other polytheistic religions. The Yaoyorozu no Kami, the eight million gods residing in every object in the world; the Tsukumogami, which form even in worthless objects given a long period of time; the man-made Inugami that, though hastily created, are made to protect people’s homes; the saru-kami; the hebi-kami. There is probably not a religion in the world that consists of as many gods as Japanese Shinto. Therefore—” She touched the Seven Heavens Sword at her waist as if to emphasize it. “And this may come as difficult to believe for an angel to a monotheistic religion, but there are ways to interact with the gods of the polytheistic Shinto—in other words, ways to fight against gods. Stories that describe such legends as people killing sorts of evil gods who go berserk, demanding a sacrificial girl and wreaking havoc, with but a normal sword exist in great quantity, you know. There is a restriction in Shinto that says one mustn’t wound a god, but…why do you think they needed to create such a law?” she asked in a singsong voice. She said it so that this one-sided match with the angel would not end. “…” The POWER OF GOD just remained silent and sized up its “enemy.” The severed water wings took in seawater anew and began to return to their original form and size. On the other side, Kanzaki needed no preparation. All she had to do was lightly touch her finger to the hilt of the long katana that hung from her waist. She wove mana within her body using a certain type of unique breathing method, then reconstructed her own body into “the one who kills gods.” Then there was silence. After that silence, which was so short—one-thousandth of a second—that a human couldn’t detect it… The POWER OF GOD and she who slays gods began their bout of life and death. Thud came a powerful bellow. It was the sound of Kanzaki, ten meters away, cleaving through the fifty-meter water wing that the archangel brought down on her head. However, the POWER OF GOD did not move, for it could mend its shorn wings however many times it needed to. Before Kanzaki replaced her katana in the sheath and regained her balance, it waved another wing toward her for a strike from the left side. As soon as Kanzaki cut that one apart, another wing flashed across on the right, aiming for her back. There was a distance of ten meters between the POWER OF GOD and Kanzaki. The angel seemed to be trying to maintain that distance. It repeated its flurry of wing attacks, not letting Kanzaki draw near. Kanzaki twisted her whole body, turned around, and cleaved the wing coming at her back in two. As if aiming for that moment, the servant of God swung three watery wings down on her from directly overhead, leaving time gaps between each. The time gaps, however, were one-hundredth of a second—the realm of godlike speed, a gap undetectable by humans. However, Kanzaki reacted to it. The human body apparently needs 0.18 seconds to deliver a command from the brain to the fingertips, but Kanzaki, having transformed into the god slayer, was temporarily in a state above human domain, and that kind of common sense wouldn’t work. Her blood vessels, muscles, nerves, organs, and skeleton—they were all recomposed so that they were able to kill gods due to the technique she used. Slash! Kanzaki sliced through the first of the three watery wings by unsheathing the katana. Before the next one-hundredth of a second elapsed, Kanzaki already had swung the Seven Heavens Sword back in its sheath and was prepared for the next strike. With time to spare, she thought, giving a smile in that one-hundredth of a second, but at that moment— —the second watery wing spontaneously shattered. Thousands of blade shards, like fine glass fragments, shot directly toward her. “Wha…?!” Kanzaki immediately attempted to deal with this downpour of blades, but at that moment, the third wing unexpectedly overtook the downpour, as if to scatter it. “…Kuh!” She managed to cleave the third surprise one. But she didn’t have time to resheathe her katana. If she did that, she wouldn’t make it in time to deal with the bladed downpour. With no other choice, Kanzaki gave up on her iai attack, and without returning her unsheathed blade, she began to intercept the downpour. However, there was no way a single katana could cut down every last one of the thousands of edges. The mere seventeen fragments that slipped through (the fact that she sliced all of the rest spoke volumes about her own skill) fell to the beach around Kanzaki. Pow came the roar of the explosive shock wave as the sand all launched into the air. It was a wall of sand, blanketing her whole vision like a desert storm. She cut through it like paper, and then more wings came at her from the left, right, and diagonally right. The state of battle stabilized there. There were ten meters between Kanzaki and the POWER OF GOD. In other words, that meant that Kanzaki’s attacks would not reach the angel and the POWER OF GOD’s would one-sidedly storm her. To add to the bargain, because of the angel’s repeated, rapid strikes, Kanzaki wasn’t allowed to even resheathe her katana. Her specialty, the unsheathing skills, had been negated, and she was completely on the defense, wildly swinging her katana. Anyone looking at her wouldn’t have seen anything but the inferior party. Kanzaki gritted her teeth. She was one of the top ten sorcerers, even in London. She could count the number of times she had lost in one-on-one combat in her life on both hands. “One-on-one” wasn’t limited to just “man vs. man,” either, but also “man vs. beast king” and “man vs. weapon.” But it seemed she had come to the moment of the century. Those “records” that she could count on her fingers seemed about to become endless. Of course… It was pretty doubtful as to whether this nonstandard angel should be really counted in that. Sparks from the forty-five slashes per second burst with a ckk-kk-kk-kk-kk-kk It was as if a large war sword of durable make was being steadily chipped away at amid an exchange of blows. The angel made no attempt to move back. Absorbed in this protracted battle, like it was slowly but surely draining away Kanzaki’s stamina, it began to send out rapid strikes with its watery wings at even more incredible speeds. Not allowing Kanzaki even a hundredth of a second’s rest, it worked its dozens of wings like they were each a separate creature and assailed Kanzaki from all different angles, directions, with varying speeds and margins. Then, something in Kanzaki’s hands glistened, bathed in the moonlight. Hyun came an air-splitting sound as seven wires cut through the sky. Seven Glints. Of course, against those watery wings filled to the brim with Telesma, from their tips to their roots, wires wouldn’t be of any use. They were world heritage–class steel cords that a sword smith, inheriting the signature of Samoji, had forged, but nonetheless, they were easily sliced through like silk by a single-winged strike and met their ends. But by cutting those sharp strands, the wings slowed their speed. It was only a minute act of resistance, and though they did slow, it was only by one-tenth of a second. However… In this battle, she could unleash four or five moves in the span it took her to blink an eye. “, lkcURsEs!” The POWER OF GOD’s eyeballs squirmed and rolled. Cutting the wires carelessly had reduced its wings’ speed. Kaori Kanzaki wasn’t one to let those 0.1 seconds escape from her. She readied her lengthy katana at middle guard and pushed off with force— —but when she tried to run, her leg collapsed with a thud underneath her. …? The angel, its drive returned, swung three watery wings down at her, one after another, but Kanzaki still cleaved them all with staggering agility and precision. However, it was then that the POWER OF GOD saw it— —the feverish sweat breaking out all over Kaori Kanzaki’s body. Though god-slaying techniques may exist, the thing is that not everyone is able to use them. And no, it isn’t a matter of talent. More crucial is that the burden they would place on a human body is just too large. It wasn’t that Kanzaki’s unsheathing techniques were her specialty. They were simply techniques that would rack her body to the point of destruction if she did not settle bouts within a moment’s time. As the angel threw out its merciless strikes with its watery wings, it looked at Kanzaki once again. Though she was performing rigorous movements ten times beyond that of a normal person, her face was not flushed, but rather it had gone blue, as if icy water were soaking all the way down to her neck. It could also make out a slight quiver in the hand that gripped her katana. The price for that hard work had already begun to gnaw at her body. The POWER OF GOD continued swinging its water wings around. The results of the protracted battle were finally starting to show. At this point, the angel just needed to draw their duel out and Kanzaki would destroy herself. Kanzaki’s body was finally beginning to waver at its rapid attacks, to which it added even more variation in speed. The angel of blue commanded the watery wings on its back to deliver the killing blow— —but Kanzaki pierced straight through the POWER OF GOD with a sharp sparkle in her eye. “…Too slow” she thundered, batting down that winged attack that would have finished her off. Her motions, so relentless as to be utterly impossible for a human being, raised her body temperature to abnormal levels, disrupted her blood flow, and ate away at her oxygen. Not only her muscles, but her very bones shrieked. Her pain was not that of a fever. It might have been easier on her had she imbibed poison. Despite that, Kanzaki didn’t stop. With the look of a fierce god, she cut down the watery wings without yielding even a step. Though Kaori Kanzaki was overwhelming the angel, she had already been driven to the precipice of death. With every single action she performed, she vividly felt her own body being destroyed. Each time she swung her Seven Heavens Sword, the price for that excessive movement forcefully stretched out her joints; made her arteries squeal; and her organs, which weren’t being properly supplied with oxygen, hit her brain with screams of a fuel shortage in the form of pain. On top of that, she didn’t know how long even that would hold. If just one of her arteries, squealing eerily in some kind of rhythm, was torn, then Kanzaki’s life would surely end from just that. “But—” She gritted her teeth, then sliced two wings coming at her from the left and right out of the sky like a tornado. She moved her lips, which could no longer sense the muddy taste of blood. “—are you saying that matters?” She cut through an even more innumerable amount of wings, swinging her long katana around like a raging storm. I cannot let it break through. If Kanzaki went down here, the POWER OF GOD would doubtlessly set out to destroy the Kamijous, father and son, who would try and stop the purge descending upon the world. I cannot let it break through! Outside, she cut away the watery wings, while on the inside she was exposed to her own collapse, and she was in tatters. Despite that, she clenched her teeth and readied her blade yet again. Against the seemingly unreasonable slicing attacks from the water wings coming dozens of times per second, she sliced away the absurdly rapid attacks coming dozens of times per second, while she again readied herself for its next move. The taste of blood and her fading consciousness stirred memories of days long past. It was back when Kaori Kanzaki was still called the Priestess of Amakusa-Style. It was back when she was adored and referred to with a name far above a young twelve-year-old girl. Kanzaki had always harbored doubts. As she had listened to passages from the Bible before sleeping as if from a picture book, she always harbored doubts. Heaven and hell. When a person dies, God is said to decide whether to raise them to heaven or drop them to hell. Therefore, a human should do many good deeds during their life to prepare for going to heaven. But… If God has the power to save all people, then why would a hell be necessary? If he could save all people, then he should save every one of them. If there are those who have somehow strayed from the path, then he should just lead them back to the correct one. If the hand of salvation really existed, it would be the best if it became something everyone could use to smile with each other equally. Why did only some people become happy? Why must those who were not chosen go to hell? Kanzaki was ever one of those who were chosen. However, because of that, nobody around her was chosen. If a plane she was on were to crash, she alone would survive. No one else would. A bullet from an assassin’s gun would never hit her even when aimed. The stray bullet, however, would shoot down somebody else. When a bomb would blow away an entire room of a building, person after person would fall on her to block the impact. There was even a child not even ten years old among them. And in so doing, those people who were not chosen even at the very end would all look at Kanzaki’s face and smile. Ah, thank goodness, they would say. I’m so glad you’re safe, they would say. As they stroked her head with the last of their strength, trying to caress the young, crying Kanzaki. They would close their eyes happily, and the strength in the hand stroking her head would vanish. They were all her fault. God must have mistaken the distribution of “good luck.” That’s why Kanzaki, someone who wasn’t even strong, was blessed. And that’s why there were people who suffered, caught underneath her. So Kanzaki never thought about using her strength for someone who was chosen. The chosen ones should just live with their own strength. It was wrong that only the chosen ones monopolized the strength. If this undeserved power was something she had stolen from those who were not chosen, then she must have to return it to them. Because those who wish for the hand of salvation… …would be those who were unchosen, coldly looked over by fate. Therefore, Kanzaki could not kill. However vast her power was, she could not kill anyone. There was a time as she chased down the Index of Forbidden Books and confronted a single young man. Obviously a fight between a pro and an amateur was not a real fight. After settling it within some tens of seconds, the wounded young man asked one question of her. Why don’t you kill me? The answer was pretty simple. It wasn’t that she wouldn’t kill him—it was that she couldn’t. Because what Kanzaki was trying to protect were people exactly like that young man, who had gone through such unjust violence and sought salvation. That’s why she felt this way. She would fill her blade with but one conviction and carve out her own path with that one sword. God, if you say you will only save those you choose… …then everyone else you did not choose—I will save every last one of them. “—Ha-aahhhh” Kanzaki let out a long breath and brandished the Seven Heavens Sword high above her head, slicing apart the two watery wings. Then, as she brought the katana back, she cleaved through three wings coming at her from the side, sending them flying sharply. Kanzaki, layering offense over defense, over and over, knew that this equilibrium would shatter soon. Kanzaki would likely lose. Regardless of her god-slaying body, created by assembling the essence of Amakusa-Style techniques, she wouldn’t be able to take one of the angel’s water wings and come out safely. However, she still didn’t quit. The moment her body was sliced apart—in that very moment—the movement of the POWER OF GOD’s watery wings would dull. In that moment, if she unleashed one last, desperate attack, the god-slaying power-filled Seven Heavens Sword might be able to slice through both the external Sasha Kreutzev and the internal archangel all at once. Kanzaki’s face scrunched up bitterly. Not because she had so easily and certainly been able to predict her own defeat. Kanzaki didn’t even wish to slay the POWER OF GOD. She really did want only to hold it off. Unlike her Seven Glints, the steel wire technique she’d used as a feint, she couldn’t hold back the unsheathing technique Single Glint of her Seven Heavens Sword. Just considering the possibility that she might accidentally slip up and the blade’s edge would pierce through the POWER OF GOD nearly made the strength flee from her fingertips. Even though she understood that, however, she could not stop her sword. The moment she ceased using her full power, she’d be shorn in two by the POWER OF GOD. Kanzaki’s defeat equated to the Kamijous’ deaths. In order to help them, she could not take a hand off of this for a second. However, if she let her hand proceed to the end, the blade might reach to the POWER OF GOD. This was another reason for getting Kamijou away from here. If the amateur Kamijou and the POWER OF GOD fought, Kamijou would be instantly killed 99 percent of the time. However, his right hand was the Imagine Breaker, which could negate any and all occult powers. If worse came to worst and Kamijou’s right hand touched the POWER OF GOD, whose very existence was a clump of occult abnormality, it might completely destroy the POWER OF GOD just like that. Kanzaki wanted to save everyone who was not chosen. Since she was saying that already, it wasn’t as if the angel in front of her was standing here before the jaws of death because it wanted to. Because when Angel Fall occurred… …the fact that it ended up being her to fall, rather than any other of the angels, was unmistakably because of bad luck. Therefore— …Other than having Touma Kamijou remove Angel Fall, I cannot bring this battle to an end with no casualties. Please, before this insane duel comes to a close, hurry— With an expression sad and bitter, Kaori Kanzaki swung her Seven Heavens Sword around. As if she, driven one step short of death, was offering a prayer for the sake of the POWER OF GOD, which had driven her there. She whispered the prayer of a trembling child in her mind. —so please, save this angel, Touma Kamijou.