Golden Days

by Gakuto Mikumo

  Digital billboards on the streets, domestic televisions sets, tablets, smartphones—the girl’s voice coursed out of every screen there was. Her extravagant outfit and shapely face remained, all emotion removed from the girl’s expression as she turned her voice toward a single boy, conveying to him her message.

  It was like a broken record. Repeat, repeat.

  “Kojou… Save this…island…”

  The people did not understand the meaning of the girl’s words.

  Even so, they understood that something was happening on that artificial isle. And in places unbeknownst to them, there was someone resisting.

  It was not that they forgot the possibility that the phenomenon was someone’s prank, perhaps a sabotaged transmitter.

  Even so, within their hearts, the people quietly added their own calls. “Save our island,” they pleaded.

  They were still residents of that island, after all.

  Yes. This was their Demon Sanctuary—

  8

  Keystone Gate was an enormous building, with the structure itself serving as both the cornerstone for Itogami Island’s four Gigafloats and as a vast district in its own right. Not only was the Gigafloat Management Corporation based there; so, too, did it contain the Itogami Island city hall, the headquarters of the Island Guard, a string of restaurants, City Hotel, even high-class fashion boutiques—all mixed together in the complicated blocks that comprised the wedge-shaped building.

  There was also a tiny museum inside Keystone Gate.

  Its formal, official name was the Demon Sanctuary Museum. It was a facility oriented toward tourists that accumulated historical materials related to the history and exploits of Senra Itogami, the designer of Itogami Island.

  However, at present, there were no tourists to be seen inside the facility. The museum had been closed ever since the Roses of Tartarus incident. Still in the midst of disaster recovery, Itogami Island had few tourists going out of their way to visit out of idle curiosity; and externally, at least, the facility had been a victim of that incident as well.

  An unexpected group could be seen gathered in that very museum’s employee section.

  It was a robust group of armed guardsmen equipped with cutting-edge anti-demon combat suits and firearms—members of the Island Guard’s Sorcerous Suppression Group.

  And escorted by them was a sharp-eyed man in traditional Japanese attire. He was chairman emeritus of the Gigafloat Management Corporation—Akishige Yaze.

  STAFF ONLY was posted on the door they opened, and Akishige and the others descended to the museum’s basement.

  Ahead of them, a room reminiscent of an airport control room spread open, packed to the brim with machines.

  The breadth might have been around that of a midsize theater or music club. The walls were covered in countless monitors and terraced operator booths. The control panels inside the booths were lazily blinking, indicating that they remained in operation.

  However, there was no sign of the operators that should have been sitting in those chairs.

  Someone had put Akishige’s subordinates to sleep, whisking them away to parts unknown. There was no trace remaining of the deed, as if the perpetrator had leaped through space itself.

  And standing in place of the vanished operators was a single, small-statured figure.

  It was a baby-faced witch with long black hair.

  “So I was right. This was where you were—Akishige Yaze.”

  When the man entered the control room, Natsuki Minamiya looked up at him with a cold smile.

  “Natsuki Minamiya…the Witch of the Void, is it?” Akishige replied without any change in his expression.

  Meanwhile, the armed guardsmen swiftly went on the move, the unit deploying to visibly surround her. Maintaining their silence, they trained their gun barrels on Natsuki.

  She snorted, calmly surveying the room.

  “So this is the control room for the Coffin… A safety mechanism prepared in the event your subordinates might betray you. It is very much in keeping with a sly fox like you.”

  “A mere federal officer from the Attack Mage Branch, running her mouth like she knows what she’s talking about.”

  Akishige cast his emotionless gaze downward upon Natsuki.

  “But I shall forgive it, Witch of the Void—you certainly are capable. It would be a pity to kill someone of your caliber.”

  Natsuki listened to Akishige’s threat with a similarly neutral expression.

  It was said that the interior of the submarine Cain’s Coffin was isolated from the outside world, a realm into which only the Priestess of Cain could intrude.

  But she did not think a man with Akishige Yaze’s personality would ever seriously accept the existence of any realm beyond his dominion, to say nothing of a realm that was the key to The Cleansing.

  Akishige Yaze was definitely keeping hidden a way to control Cain’s Coffin from the outside—that was how Natsuki had read the situation. Apparently, her deduction had been right on the money.

  “Even with the intellect of Cain stuffed into it, and boasting computational capability rivaling that of a God, the Coffin itself is nothing more than a simple submarine. If cut off from Itogami Island, it would simply sink to the bottom of the sea.”

  Akishige sounded solemn, not for Natsuki’s benefit, but so that his subordinates of the SSG might take pride in his words.

  “And what of Asagi Aiba left inside it?” Natsuki quietly pressed.

  Akishige let a tiny laugh slip. “The Priestess of Cain? She is an excellent human sacrifice, but that does not make her an irreplaceable component. We would merely need to search for a new candidate.”

  “The Coffin is supposed to be the nucleus of the network controlling Itogami Island. If you were to lose it, Itogami City would fall into a mass panic.”

  “What of it? The residents of this island are nothing more than human sacrifices themselves, gathered so that the might of The Cleansing can be demonstrated to the world. As long as Itogami Island, the altar itself, continues to exist, how many people die upon it is a trifling concern.”

  Akishige sounded exceedingly calm.

  He was asserting that, to nullify the power of The Cleansing stolen by Meiga Itogami, he would cut the Coffin loose. Even if the result was Asagi Aiba losing her life and Itogami Island falling into a panic, that was fine with him.

  “Or would you care to try to stop me with your body in that state, Witch of the Void?”

  The air swayed all around Akishige. The Yaze family was a direct line of Hyper Adapters, generation after generation. Akishige, head of that family, naturally possessed that ability.

  And he had noticed Natsuki’s wounded physical state. Even if she was the Witch of the Void, he would not be defeated—he was doubtlessly sure of this.

  However, Natsuki looked overhead, a mocking smile on her face.

  “No, let’s not, Akishige Yaze. It doesn’t look like I need to lift a finger anyway.”

  “What…?!”

  Following Natsuki’s gaze, Akishige shifted his own overhead.

  It was a moment later that the ceiling of the control room came crashing down. The exterior wall, acting like a stout blast shelter, broke down and collapsed like so much sand. No, it was not sand, but a white, translucent powder—salt.

  In an instant, someone had turned the exterior wall to salt and brought it down.

  “Meiga Itogami?!”

  The light of vermillion particles trickled through the dense mist of salt hovering in midair. Without a sound, Meiga Itogami, black spear in hand, descended into the control room.

  The members of the SSG tried to turn their gun barrels toward Meiga, but Meiga’s attack proved swifter. Shot and felled by vermillion bullets, the members transformed into pillars of salt and crumbled away.

  Then the bullets unleashed by Meiga bore down on Akishige, who stood still without a word.

  However, without Akishige moving a single finger, the many bullets flying at
him from every direction were shot out of the air. He had unleashed invisible blades that had counteracted the vermillion bullets.

  “So you warded off the light of The Cleansing, Elder Akishige. No wonder you style yourselves the descendants of Cain.”

  Meiga smiled with apparent delight as he spoke.

  In contrast, unconcealable unease had come over Akishige’s face. To Akishige, the traitor Meiga knowing of that control room’s existence was an unexpected occurrence.

  “Hell Wolf, errand boy of the dead—what, exactly, are your intentions?”

  “I would prefer that you do not address me by that name, but oh well,” Meiga replied to Akishige’s detestable term for him with a serene expression. “I have but a single objective… The complete revival of Cain, the Sinful God. The Cleansing is a tool toward that end.”

  “Cain’s…complete revival…?” Akishige exclaimed, temple bulging.

  Meiga spread both arms in a theatrical fashion. “Precisely. Just as my father restored me to life from a corpse, I shall revive Cain, the Sinful God, from the Memory of the Sinful God left in the Coffin. His mind, his consciousness! If it is for His sake, I shall offer my very flesh—!”

  “Have you gone mad, Hell Wolf?!”

  Akishige crudely shouted. All the composure in his voice from earlier was nowhere to be found. He thrust an invisible blade in Meiga’s direction, but a dodecagonal bulwark deployed by Meiga obstructed it.

  “All that your grandfather wanted was the Forbidden Ritual of The Cleansing. He did not desire the resurrection of Cain himself. If such a thing becomes a reality, the world itself will be destroyed…!”

  “And what if I were to tell you that is the very thing I desire?” Meiga’s tone was gentle. If anything, it felt like he was enjoying having unnerved Akishige. “With Itogami Island and the computational ability of the Priestess of Abel, the effect of The Cleansing can only affect a radius of dozens of kilometers at the utmost— However, with the abilities of its proper wielder, the Priestess of Cain, The Cleansing would ride the dragon lines, surely covering the entirety of this planet—”

  “So that’s why…”

  Akishige was left speechless. In his place, Natsuki interjected herself into the conversation.

  “So that is why the Priestess of Abel is cooperating with you, Meiga Itogami. The two of you, brought back as corpses, will destroy the world once more. What is your objective—revenge…?”

  “Yes. It is precisely as you say. We cannot forgive the world that betrayed us—or the people who robbed us of warmth. Not the Priestess of Abel—and not I.”

  “You’re insane…,” Akishige spat.

  To him, a prisoner of profit in the material world, Meiga’s thought process was beyond all comprehension—the product of madness. With Akishige’s expression twisted into fear, Meiga shifted his hollow gaze toward him and said:

  “We are simply performing our duties as the dead, nothing more. We require no grand philosophies nor the sweet nothings of justice. We will descend to hell, taking with us each and every one of the living that we can. Is that not what magic, what curses, were originally intended to be—?! This will be our Cleansing!”

  At the same time as he made that smiling declaration, Meiga unleashed his vermillion bullets.

  These did not number ten or twenty. There were a hundred, perhaps two hundred, bearing down upon Akishige Yaze all at once. It was impossible for even the man’s invisible blades to deflect them all.

  “Ngh—?!”

  Surrounded by incredible explosions, Akishige vanished from sight.

  Setting eyes upon that spectacle, it was unfathomable for the few remaining survivors of the SSG to maintain their will to fight. A man seeming like a squad leader shouted “Retreat!” It was every man for himself as the members fled the control room.

  Meiga coolly watched them go. Then he reoriented himself toward Natsuki.

  “—Are you next, Natsuki Minamiya? Or will you leap through space as you always do? Though even if you do run, should this world collapse, it will end the same way for you.”

  As Meiga made that detached statement, his voice carried no hostility toward Natsuki. Now that he controlled the power of The Cleansing, he did not feel threatened by Natsuki any longer.

  However, knowing this full well, Natsuki let out a chuckle, adding a cold smile. “Flee? No, you are mistaken. It is you who needs to flee, not I, Meiga Itogami.”

  “What…?”

  Natsuki’s composure, bizarre to Meiga, made him momentarily knit his brows.

  It was a moment later that the control room was filled with high-density demonic energy, enough to make the very ground quake. The swirling vortex of demonic energy became a dazzling thunderbolt, in turn transforming into a single, enormous summoned beast—a vampire’s Beast Vassal.

  “Regulus Aurum—!”

  Together with a boy’s ferocious roar, the lightning lion swung its front paws.

  Meiga instantly thrust out with his black spear to parry that blow. Meiga’s black spear had nullified the demonic energy, but it could not erase the shock wave created by that explosive demonic energy. Accordingly, Meiga was sent flying backward, colliding against the control room wall.

  Even so, Meiga was unharmed, thanks to the work of the ghostly girl who appeared behind him. A vermillion bulwark created by the Priestess of Abel had enveloped and protected Meiga.

  As he rose to his feet, fresh yet stagnant blood slowly flowed and fell from his forehead. The impact just then had reopened the scar from the wound inflicted by Paper Noise.

  That fact seemed to irritate Meiga.

  And what irritated him even further was the fact that the attack just then had not been aimed at him. That golden Beast Vassal had been summoned for the sole purpose of punching through the control room wall. To reach the control room even a second faster, the offending wall had to be destroyed. That was the true objective behind that Beast Vassal summon. Meiga had merely been caught up in it, nothing more. Meiga, the man who had supposedly obtained the power to destroy the world itself.

  Meiga glared into the darkness with hatred in his eyes.

  Standing there was a teenage vampire with a languid expression on his face.

  “Y’know, I’ve really gotta say, having to trust that shitty dad of mine really burns me, but—”

  As he stepped over the rubble strewn at his feet, the boy murmured as if making excuses for something. A girl at his side gripping a silver spear listened to his words.

  Finally, the boy slowly looked up, narrowing his glimmering, scarlet eyes.

  “We’ve come to put an end to your Cleansing, Meiga Itogami.”

  As Meiga looked back at him, unmoved, the Fourth Primogenitor—Kojou Akatsuki—flashed a ferocious smile.

  9

  Hexagonal vermillion bullets bearing the element of earth went flying, penetrating the cloud of dust, and exploded at Kojou’s feet, making the rubble in the surrounding area vanish without a trace.

  That was just a warning shot. Approach no further, cautioned Meiga’s admonition.

  “What are you trying to do at this point, Fourth Primogenitor? I thought I had made it abundantly clear that you are no threat to me.” Irritation was thick in Meiga’s voice.

  The red particles blanketing the area around him transformed into tiny bullets—more than a hundred, enough to cover an entire wall of the control room. If one were to be struck by all of them, even a vampire’s body would surely be completely annihilated, just like the rubble moments before—

  Meiga’s statement was made in the context of having put such overwhelming might on display.

  “Akishige Yaze meant to destroy you to display the might of The Cleansing, but to me, you are not worth even that. Begone.”

  “Not bluffing, huh? Well, you might have a point…,” Kojou commented, unmoved.

  The sheer lack of drive evident from the boy’s demeanor perplexed Meiga.

  As for the Fourth Primogenitor, he looked ba
ck at Meiga, faintly curling up the corners of his lips as he challenged, “But never mind me. What about Asagi?”

  “What are you getting at…?” Meiga’s brows trembled with impatience. To provoke him further, Kojou took his time surveying the control room.

  “This is the control device for the Coffin, right? If you really had The Cleansing in the palm of your hand, why’d you bother coming here?”

  “I see…,” Meiga said before trailing off into silence.

  Natsuki let out a quiet “Heh,” making a sound of distinct interest as she stared at the side of his face. “To resurrect Cain, you cannot avoid bringing the contents of the Coffin outside. Well, it isn’t hard to guess why; the Coffin is a device to preserve Cain’s memory, after all. But if you truly had the Coffin under your thumb, you could simply enter it directly.”

  “So if you came here, it’s because you don’t have access to the Coffin’s contents. How’s that possible, if the Priestess of Abel jacked the Coffin?”

  Kojou continued after a brief pause.

  “Asagi said ‘Save our island.’ She didn’t say Save me—she was focused on every resident of the island. She could have taken control of the Coffin and come out on her own power any time she wanted. Maybe the reason she hasn’t is to keep the Priestess of Abel tied up.”

  “Silence, Fourth Primogenitor—,” Meiga snarled. Behind him, the sight of the ghostly girl floated up once more. The shapely face of the Priestess of Abel was twisted in vivid hatred.

  Paying neither any heed, Kojou continued.

  “Meiga Itogami, Priestess of Abel—you two don’t have The Cleansing in your grip or anything close. What you have only skims the surface. And that’s because Asagi’s kept the contents of the Coffin—Cain’s intellect—locked down tight. All by herself, she’s been protecting Itogami Island, even now. That’s Itogami Island’s idol for you.”

  Kojou grinned with pride for his friend.

  Meiga Itogami’s power of The Cleansing was certainly strong, but it was a pale shadow of its proper might. At most, it could wipe out a single city—it was nowhere near enough to destroy the world itself.