A Certain Magical Index, Vol. 19

by Kazuma Kamachi

  Not a strange, unknown power belonging to an angel or a demon or what have you, but a weapon he would wield as a human.

  He’d walked this bloody path in order to save one girl named Last Order. To that end, he was determined to make even Last Order his enemy and reign as a soot-black king of evil.

  He was a villain—and not the kind who would prostrate himself to save his own life in a place like this.

  It was petty and not the type of villain Accelerator presented to the world.

  Therefore, he didn’t hesitate to make the decision.

  No matter how much of his blood spewed, even if he collapsed, even if all his innards were exposed by his enormous wound—in order to save Last Order, he would pull the trigger his finger was already touching. That was his evil.

  “Do what thou wilt. That shall be thy law.”

  Aiwass spoke in a singsong voice. Its hands had already broken apart up to the elbows, and its palely shining wings of white-cored platinum were as still as a device with the cogs removed. Its body was partly transparent, and an object that looked like a triangular prism appeared briefly in the center of its head, only to disappear again. Its surface moved around without end, like a keyboard, clacking and clacking and clacking.

  When it realized the muzzle was suddenly pointed at it, Aiwass spread its arms—which only went down to the elbows—and spoke with a smile as though welcoming him.

  “I see. Then show me thy law.”

  A gunshot rang out.

  It left behind only two sounds: one like a crystal shattering—and another, the dull thud of a person falling.

  4

  Shizuri Mugino jumped down to the next level of walkways. The metal grating clanged, echoing through the jet testing center. Hamazura was there, leaning, wounded, against the outside of the crane operator’s box, glaring at Mugino’s one real eye.

  “One death just wasn’t enough, hmm?” she mocked. The arm of light she’d created in place of her lost limb crackled. “You’re right. It’s nowhere near enough—if you wanted to face me with words, your complaints could use the help of a few more brain cells!!”

  Za-spark!! Her flashing arm swelled explosively.

  But Hamazura moved first.

  His limp hand held the gun, so he could’ve raised it up, taken aim, and fired. If he’d taken that much time, Mugino would have used it to blow off Hamazura’s limbs quite cleanly.

  Instead, he immediately pulled the trigger while his arm still hung low. The bullet naturally flew off in an unexpected direction…and struck a fire extinguisher nearby.

  Ba-bom!! Pressed by the gas, a cloud of white powder closed around his profile.

  … Hiding in the fog, are we?

  “Are you still screwing with me, Hamazuraaa?!”

  Giving the impression of someone in the audience throwing a tomato onto the stage during a poorly written play, Mugino’s Meltdown launched a bright beam. A second pure-white ray, then a third, fired off in sequence, carving fatally into the silhouette beyond the fire extinguisher powder and blasting it away.

  “Damn, I wanted to take my time crushing him. Did I accidentally kill him instantly?” muttered Mugino in spite of herself.

  But the results begged to differ.

  The thing she thought she’d blasted away had been one of the cardboard boxes stacked haphazardly next to him. While Mugino was preoccupied with the dummy, Hamazura had immediately jumped off the grated walkway and onto the lowest floor.

  “Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha. Escaping with a smokescreen and a dummy? …I had no idea you were a goddamn ninja!!”

  She fired light downward, mostly out of irritation, then jumped down to the lower level herself.

  Several jets were lined up in the vast space. Even for testing purposes, they were already completely finished, paint and all. Missiles and bombs of various sizes were even attached to the underside of their wings—maybe they planned to do tests fully equipped to see if they could bear the loads.

  Now, then.

  Mugino looked around with her one remaining eye.

  Shiage Hamazura was probably hiding somewhere, watching, waiting for his chance. He’d at least realized that she’d shoot him in the back if he kept running at this point.

  “…”

  She glanced at a jet and briefly wondered if he would use one to counterattack. If he used its 20mm or 30mm Gatling gun and a variety of missiles, she’d probably have a little trouble.

  … But no, that would be a bit much, she thought, rejecting the idea. She was sure a street thug like Shiage Hamazura wouldn’t know how to control a specialized vehicle like that. And even if he could, that didn’t change the fact that they were in a warehouse. As for any jets that could fight while standing still—with Mugino’s ability, she could vaporize it in one attack.

  She walked slowly down the kilometers-long passage, her soles clicking, and she smirked. This was it, this was it. If he walked up right in front of her, she’d send him to his death in one hit.

  But he had to do his fair share to get there.

  “Wheeere in the wooorld could you beee, Haaamazuraaa?” she sang with a random rhythm, her flashing arm swaying to and fro.

  And then…

  “I’m right here.”

  Suddenly, she got a stupidly honest response.

  “?!”

  It came from right next to her. She’d been on the wrong end of a crazy handgun counterattack last time. She twisted around quickly and fired Meltdown before getting a read on her target. Bra-zakk!! A brilliant flashing light surged out, and the jet in the direction she’d released it melted in an orange color.

  But just before that, she saw it.

  She saw, in the place she’d attacked, a maintenance tractor alongside long and slender bombs loaded like drainpipes at the park…and on top of them, a wireless headset on maximum volume so the sound would leak to its surroundings—plus a wireless LAN-attached fiber scope, probably used for maintaining the planes.

  There was no time to consider her options.

  Before she could think, the single two-hundred-kilo bomb her heated attack had blasted went up in a brilliant explosion—and caused the bombs, missiles, and airplane fuel nearby to ignite instantly.

  Hamazura, who was hiding somewhere far away, didn’t get off scot-free, either.

  He’d been working quietly but swiftly after spotting what looked like an electric-powered tractor for pulling around the fighters, and now he was behind cover about five hundred meters away from the explosion. He’d used a small truck loaded with a complete set of painting supplies for changing a jet’s color and used one of the maintenance crew’s wireless transceivers to project his voice. The huge blast had knocked him to the floor.

  “Guwaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!”

  His eardrums felt like they were going to explode. He felt a strange pressure from within, as though his eyeballs were going to pop out. But what worried him more was Takitsubo. He couldn’t find her. He’d left a radio for guidance somewhere far from where he’d knocked her down and given her a work-use powered suit with the crane, too. It was too heavy to move in normal mode, and its high-mobility mode seemed to require a special electronic key, so she couldn’t use it for battle. It should have given her a little protection against the blast…though he hoped she wasn’t still in the explosion’s radius.

  Whatever the case, Shizuri Mugino must have been caught up in the blast.

  Fortunately for Hamazura, she still tended to look down on all her enemies. It certainly wasn’t a mistake, necessarily speaking, but it gave way to openings and missteps she didn’t need to have.

  … That was a two-hundred-kilo bomb meant for busting pillboxes made of thick concrete. You’re not supposed to use them on unarmed humans. Mugino should be out of the way with that…Now to find Takitsubo and get out of here…

  Hamazura tossed the transceiver and the small fiberscope monitor away, then ran back along the path he’d come.

  Hot gusts blew madly.<
br />
  The floor near the site of the explosion was completely collapsed, having caused a cave-in to a basement space under it. Walkways above them had twisted and fallen. Hamazura walked through their midst. He searched high and low, shouting Takitsubo’s name, mindful that a secondary or tertiary explosion could happen at any moment.

  And then he heard a rustling.

  “Takitsubo?!”

  Hamazura looked in that direction.

  However…

  “Haaamazuraaa…”

  A chill.

  For an instant, all his body warmth left him.

  But by then it was too late.

  From inside the dark smoke reached an arm of glinting lights. Hamazura did his best to twist aside, but an awful noise and smell dispersed from near his ear. A sizzle. Like oil dripped into a well-heated frying pan.

  “Ugahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh?!”

  Mugino stepped through the smoke to look down at the writhing boy. “Did you think this…this mass-produced weapon could defeat the city’s number four, Hamazuraaa?”

  “Shit, shit shit fuck shit!!”

  Hamazura desperately clamped down on the pain devouring his ear, grabbed his gun in both hands, and fired.

  But suddenly, Mugino disappeared.

  She’d unleashed Meltdown like a rocket engine. She’d probably made the same quick maneuver to avoid the two-hundred-kilo bomb. With a muffled whoosh, she escaped outside his field of view and said, “Your counters are all obvious— Do you really think they’ll work?!”

  A massive roar rose up.

  It was the sound of the tip of her boot digging into Hamazura’s back and kicking him several meters into the air.

  He couldn’t even grunt at this point. He’d stopped breathing, and his body fell—but not onto the floor, oh no; it fell through one of the cracks the bomb had made.

  Bam-slam. Ka-bam.

  Several shocks hit him, one after another.

  Intense pain washed over him, so terrible he honestly thought part of his spine had fallen out of place, but he didn’t have the time to cry about anything. He sensed a chilling intent to kill from above him and used all his energy to roll to the side. A moment later, Mugino’s light stabbed toward him, time and time again.

  “Run! Run!! Run away, little piggy!! Let me enjoy this hunt a little longer!!”

  Pieces of the floor were stuck all over him. He started to lose track of whether he was the one rolling, or if the tempest of fragments was rolling him. Nevertheless, he twisted and dove behind cover. Perhaps aggravated she’d lost sight of her target, Mugino immediately jumped into the basement space as well.

  … Where is this? Is there an exit…?

  Hamazura, hiding behind an obstacle, eventually glanced around.

  It was an odd sort of room. It was around a hundred square meters, but there were protrusions in the wall at even intervals. And past those protrusions, he could see what looked like an air conditioner vent covering the entire wall. One of the sides was reinforced glass, and he could spot what looked like a control room for something on the other side.

  This was an airplane-testing facility.

  Which meant…

  … a room where they test durability against air friction…?

  Hamazura was up against a capsule-shaped model of about three meters. It was made to be the same size as a fighter cockpit. Though it was a model, the reinforced-glass canopy moved up and down properly, and it was made out of the same combination of materials as the real planes.

  The stepladder-looking thing had probably kept it in the air, but it had been knocked on its side by the blast. The reinforced-glass canopy covering the cockpit was half-open, too.

  “Haaamazuraaa…”

  He gave a start. Just hearing his name called made his shoulders jerk. He frantically searched for an exit door, then found one. But it was far away. If he jumped out from behind the cockpit model, she’d shoot him five hundred times before he opened that door.

  He couldn’t use that exit.

  He’d have to end things here.

  But the gun in his hand alone didn’t seem able to kill Mugino. She could use her ability like a rocket engine to flee outside the range of a two-hundred-kilo bomb going off. A normal person wouldn’t even be able to aim a 9mm bullet at her.

  He had to use something stronger, something more overwhelming; something that wouldn’t even let her escape. But he wasn’t a powerful esper, and a mere Level Zero like Hamazura couldn’t bring anything like that to the table.

  “I swear, this is all so idiotic. It might have bothered you a lot, but it’s bothering me a hell of a lot, too, I’m telling you.”

  Click-click. Her footsteps drew closer. If she went around his cover, it was over.

  “Anyway, maybe I’m better off than Teitoku Kakine. They picked the number two up in a way worse state than me, apparently. They had to put him in a container with this sticky liquid in it, get all three pieces of his brain back together, hook his side up to this machine bigger than a fridge to make up for his crushed heart—that kind of thing. I hear he’s basically just a big clump of meat they keep around so he can spit out his Level Five ability now.”

  Hamazura desperately looked around.

  “The General Board chairperson must really want to reuse us. I wonder why? Anyway, the only thing I can say for sure is that you’re dying here.”

  He searched for a clue to turn the tables. And…he found a last ray of hope.

  “Hey, Hamazura.”

  And then it happened.

  “Why…?”

  Suddenly, he noticed a change in Mugino’s voice. He thought for a moment, then shook his head. He didn’t want to think about it. If he did, he wouldn’t be able to take action. He would hesitate in a situation where a moment’s delay would be fatal.

  But Shizuri Mugino still said:

  * * *

  “…I wonder why I had to turn into such a horrid monster.”

  Damn it!!! Hamazura was just about to raise his voice.

  The one thing he wanted to think about the least right now: the fact that Shizuri Mugino was both a monster and another human woman. He didn’t know what she meant by “why.” Was it that she’d escaped death with technology unknown to him? Was it starting to work for the shady Item organization? Or was it becoming a Level Five? Whatever the case was, Shiage Hamazura didn’t have an answer for any of those questions. All it presented him with was agony.

  Hamazura, toying with the small clue he now had, thought once more.

  Was it okay to kill her?

  Could he bury her as a simple monster and still deserve a happy, smile-filled ending?

  “Was that what you wanted me to say, Hamazuraaa?”

  An incredible whump rang out.

  Mugino, having come around the cockpit in an instant, whipped a kick into Hamazura’s gut. But her assault didn’t end there—seven or eight fast, sharp strikes later, and Hamazura was in deep pain not only on the surface but down to his internal organs.

  “Gya-ha-ha!! You’re all twitchy now! Hmm? I don’t know, is blood supposed to be coming from your mouth? Do mouths do that? Maybe I’ll get a fun, super-rare scream out of it!!”

  “Guh … gah! Gvbhr … ?!”

  … Damn…it…What the hell just happened to my organs…?

  The inside of his body shook unnaturally. His organs weren’t working right. They were moving like individual creatures packed into a leather bag. It was the first time in his life he realized a human body could work in this way.

  Are they still where they’re supposed to be … ? … They’re not all shuffled around in there, are they … ?

  “Oh, come on, don’t be so down. If I give you a nice, gentle rub, maybe your senses will come back, hmm?”

  Crrrick!! The tip of her toes dug even more deeply into him.

  She tossed him into the half-open cockpit with the force of someone tossing something into a garbage can.

  A cra
ckling came immediately after. Mugino’s flashing arm had swelled larger than he’d ever seen it.

  “I’ll mix you up with the melted metal, cool you, and make you into a neat house decoration.”

  He didn’t have time to think.

  Hamazura fired his gun. But it wouldn’t hit Mugino; instead, the bullet veered away…and shattered the reinforced glass on the one wall. Mugino’s smile became even more vicious, but Hamazura’s expression didn’t change. That had been his goal.

  It would never have hit her anyway. The weighty glass, shattered by the bullet, collapsed inward…Right on top of the control panel. The pieces pressed down on all kinds of buttons, sending unplanned orders to the giant “device.”

  Vwooom. It was a low, dull sound that echoed.

  Mugino looked around in confusion, then located the thing that looked like an air conditioner vent set up on the wall, now squirming. Meanwhile, Hamazura edged deeper into the cockpit. Inside the model, all the instruments but one had been removed. He pressed it, and the half-opened glass canopy shut fully, closing him tightly into the cockpit.

  Shizuri Mugino, realizing something, finally turned back to Hamazura.

  Her lips moved, but he couldn’t hear her through the reinforced glass.

  But.

  It looked to him, at least partly, that her eyes were like that of a girl about to burst into tears.

  A moment later.

  Everything outside the cockpit turned into an orange explosion.

  The room they were in was a room for testing air friction durability. When fighter jets exceeded the speed of sound, they experienced massive air friction. Their surface temperature would rise to hundreds of degrees. This durability testing room was for making sure the jets could withstand such friction. They obviously couldn’t create air moving at supersonic speeds, so instead, they used a large amount of iron filings to create a wind that would artificially increase how much friction there was.

  Hamazura was protected by the model cockpit.

  But Mugino had no such luck.