by Yuu Miyazaki
Madiath offered some closing remarks, then descended from the podium smiling and waving.
The tedious ritual carried on for a fair while longer. It was almost noon before the competitors finally regained their freedom.
“We now conclude the opening ceremonies for the Twenty-fifth Festa and the Twenty-fourth Phoenix. Contestants who are participating today in Blocks A through I should report to their corresponding arenas by the appointed time.” The contestants began to disperse from the stage as the announcement rang out from the speakers.
“We’re fighting here at the main arena, so we don’t really need to go anywhere, right?” Ayato asked. The first round was conducted over four days, but he and Julis were fighting today.
“Yes. Still, we have a lot of time until our match, so we could eat a light lunch before then.”
“Okay, then. Let’s do that.” Ayato agreed readily, since he was already hungry. “Hey, do you want to join—Huh?”
He started to invite Saya and Kirin, then broke off to swivel his head around in confusion. The other two girls were suddenly nowhere to be found.
Their match was tomorrow, so they had no reason to move to another arena.
“Where’d they go…?”
Neither girl was particularly tall, so they would be difficult to find in a crowd of this size.
“Oh, hey!” Ayato spotted a familiar face among the students headed toward the main gate. It didn’t belong to Saya or Kirin, but this was another person he wanted to see. “Hey, Lester. Are you fighting today, too?”
Lester MacPhail stopped in his tracks, answering Ayato’s smile with a frown. “What about it?”
“We’re going to fight today. We were just saying we should get some food, so I thought maybe we could all go together… You too, Randy.”
A chubby student—Lester’s partner, Randy Hooke—stared back blankly.
“Like I said, Amagiri, I’m not interested in getting cozy with you!” Lester growled, jabbing a finger at Ayato.
“No, I’m not trying to… I mean, I still haven’t thanked you for letting me borrow your Lux the other day.”
“Why would I care about that? Besides, we have to get to our arena. We’ll eat there. You coming, Randy?!”
“Ack—Wait for me, Lester!”
Randy rushed to catch up with Lester’s long-legged strides, a familiar pastime.
However, unlike the scene in his memory, this time Lester stopped and turned around.
“I’ll tell you this. The ones I really want to fight in this Phoenix aren’t some chumps from another school. It’s you two. So don’t you dare lose before then!”
With that, Lester marched off.
“He’s always so difficult…,” Julis moaned, but Ayato sensed a tone of sympathy in her voice. Or maybe he had just imagined it.
“…Ayato located.”
“Whoa!” He cried out in surprise as a pair of arms wrapped around him from behind. “Oh, it’s you, Saya. Don’t scare me like that.”
“…Too easy,” Saya said somewhat proudly, clinging at his waist.
Ayato hadn’t exactly let his guard down, but he didn’t stay vigilant 24-7, either. He couldn’t deny that his reaction was a little slower against people who meant him no harm.
“Where’d you go, anyway?” Ayato asked. “I was looking for you.”
“S-sorry. We went back to the locker room to get this.”
Ayato turned to see Kirin hunched behind Saya, holding a sizeable bundle.
“What’s that?” he asked.
Saya stepped away from Ayato, leaning back to stick out her tiny chest. “Ha-ha! Now, this will astound you. Allow us to present…your lunch!”
“Lunch?” Julis regarded Saya with suspicion.
“W-well, Miss Sasamiya and I—I mean, Saya and I—talked about it the other day. We made it to encourage you. Um, we hope you like it!” Kirin said, holding out the stacked lunch boxes, her face bright red.
“Wow, you made lunch just for us?”
Kirin nodded at the floor, while Saya stood beaming with confidence.
“I don’t have much—Well, I hardly have any cooking experience at all, so Saya taught me a lot. It’s very simple, though…!”
“Oh? Sasamiya, are you that good? Can you teach other people?” Julis asked.
Saya boastfully cleared her throat.
As Saya puffed up enough to pop, Ayato opened the lunch box to find it packed full of rice balls. They were terribly shaped, and even in the spirit of encouragement, one could hardly say they looked good. To Ayato, however, the poor appearance said more than anything how hard they had worked.
“I-I’m sorry—I’m really bad at this…”
“No, this is great. Thanks, Kirin,” Ayato said, gently petting her head.
Kirin let out a delighted squeak as she shrunk even further.
Saya jealously tugged on Ayato’s sleeve.
“Ayato, Ayato. Look at mine, too.”
“Oh. Sure.”
Ayato opened the next tier of the lunch box and saw that it, too, was filled with rice balls. They were much more shapely than Kirin’s and looked very tasty indeed.
But there was just one issue.
“They’re pretty, um…big,” Julis said, peering into the lunch box with a conflicted expression.
The rice balls were about three times the normal size, packed in so perfectly that the lack of gaps was more impressive than anything.
“Bigger is better. That’s my motto,” Saya said.
“That’s well and good, but…the whole lunch box isn’t full of rice, is it?” Julis asked.
“It is. What about it?”
“Nothing. I was just impressed that you’re saying you taught someone how to cook.”
Saya coughed again with mock humility.
Julis rubbed her forehead. “Just so we’re clear, that wasn’t a compliment.”
Saya didn’t pay her any mind.
“Well, now we have more than enough food for everyone. Isn’t it perfect?” Ayato said.
“That was the plan all along,” Saya said.
“Hear that, Julis?” Ayato tried to coax out her favor.
Julis nodded, albeit hesitantly. “All right, then. I suppose I’ll take advantage of your generosity.”
“Then it all works out. Now, let’s find a place where we can sit…,” Ayato began, until Saya grabbed his sleeve. “Yeah?”
“…Me too.”
Saya seemed a little embarrassed, which was rare for her. It was no more than a faint glow in her cheeks, perhaps invisible to someone who hadn’t known her for years.
“You too…?” Ayato wondered for a moment what she meant, but as her eyes darted between him and Kirin, he realized.
“Ohh. You mean… You too?”
“Be fair.”
With a tired smile, Ayato gave Saya a pat on the head, too. She was a little shorter than Kirin, which made it easier.
“…Mm. That feels nice.” Saya narrowed her eyes in pleasure, quite satisfied.
The sight reminded Ayato of a cat, strangely endearing.
Beside them, Julis cleared her throat, looking dejected. “Well… Actually, our prep room will be available soon. We should be able to eat in there,” she said, then headed off without waiting for the other three.
“Hey, Julis! Wait up!” Obviously, they couldn’t stand in the passageway like this forever. Ayato beckoned for Saya and Kirin to follow and hurried after Julis with the lunch box in his arms.
“Whew. Thank you for lunch.” In the waiting room, Ayato finished the last rice ball and placed his palms together in appreciation.
“You’re welcome,” said Kirin, whose lunch was already gone. “Oh—Would you like some tea?”
She poured from the thermos bottle she had brought. She was very well prepared.
“Thanks, Kirin.”
“S-so, was it…?”
“Yes, it was delicious.”
Kirin’s face lit up at those words.
“…I ate a little too much,” Saya said, lying on the sofa and rubbing her stomach.
“No wonder. If you had three or four of those giant rice balls,” Julis remarked exasperatedly beside her.
“Oh, hey—I think it’s about to start.” Ayato checked the time and turned on the TV. The prep room was quite large, able to accommodate the four of them with space to spare. Near one of the walls, an air-screen opened up.
“Hi there! I’m here at the Sirius Dome, the stage for the first fight of the Twenty-fourth Phoenix Tournament! This match will be called by yours truly—Mico Yanase, announcer for ABC. Pham Thi Tram, graduate of Jie Long Seventh Institute and current commander of Executive Aladfar, will serve as our commentator!”
“Thanks. Can’t wait to see this fight.”
“Now, not that I think there’s much need, but let’s go over the rules. Victory is decided when both members of a team have lost their school crests or consciousness, or forfeit. The school crest system will announce the outcome.”
“And there you have the main point of difference with the Gryps, where the match is decided when the team leader loses.”
The screen showed one woman with voluminous curls, and another who wore her black hair neat and short. The former seemed to be the play-by-play announcer.
“It’s almost time for the first fight. We’re in the second, so we still have some time,” Julis said.
“Oh, but there are matches going on at other arenas at the same time, right?” Ayato realized. “How do they broadcast them all?”
“There’s a broadcast channel assigned to every arena,” Julis replied tiredly. “The average viewer would choose which fight to watch, but I’ve heard some serious fans watch multiple channels at the same time.”
In the first round, there were eleven stages, and thirty-three matches every day. Although the start times were staggered somewhat, it would not be easy to absorb them all.
“…They broadcast the highlights and summary later, anyway,” Saya said, still lying down, turning to the screen with her eyes only.
“I think fans like that prefer to see everything live,” Kirin replied with a half smile. “Oh—But since you’ve been assigned to the main arena, that means that you’re considered a favorite, doesn’t it?”
“Really? It does?” Ayato said.
“Yes. The contestants who garner the most attention usually fight here,” Julis answered. “It’s only natural for a team with a top-tier student. And look…”
She gestured toward the screen with her chin. It showed the names of the tag partners scheduled to fight at the Sirius Dome.
Ayato recognized a pair of names in the third match. “Oh, so they’re fighting here today, too.”
Ernesta Kühne and Camilla Pareto, the pair from Allekant.
Without a word, Saya raised herself up and glared tersely at the screen. Her fierce resolve was almost tangible. She seemed to have some important reason for wanting to fight them.
Glancing sidelong at Saya, Julis stood and stretched from fingertips to toes. “We should worry less about opponents we may or may not face and more about the ones in front of us.”
Unable to argue with that logic, Ayato nodded in agreement.
“You’re up against knight-cadets of Gallardworth, right, Ayato?” Kirin said.
“Yes. Ranked 31 and 41, I think.”
The Page One fighters of Gallardworth were called the Silverwinged Knights, and those ranked lower in the Named Cult were considered cadets. Gallardworth was the only one of the six schools considered an “elite” institution, and their opponents had to be excellent fighters to have ranked there at all. Indeed, their data and records backed that up.
“How do you feel, Ayato? Do you think we can beat them?” Julis asked.
“Well…I’ll give it all I’ve got,” he replied. The two exchanged a look and quietly laughed.
Kirin watched them curiously. “Do you have some kind of special plan?”
“No,” Julis said, definitively shaking her head. “Just the opposite. Well…you’ll see.”
“And now, it’s time for our second bout of the day—the first match in the first round of Block C!”
The live announcement reverberated through the giant arena.
After a beat, the crowd roared to shake heaven and earth, countless lights danced in every direction, and Julis and Ayato stepped slowly from their gate out onto the stage.
“The first two onstage are Ayato Amagiri, Seidoukan Academy’s number one, and Julis-Alexia von Riessfeld, number five! Now, Amagiri only rose to the top a few weeks ago in a duel against the former top-ranked student! He is a truly brand-new star—so new, in fact, we still don’t have much data on him ourselves! Ah, although we did hear his nickname Murakumo came from Seidoukan’s student council president, Miss Enfield, herself.”
“And he’s the only student in the Phoenix with a number one rank. Lookin’ at the videos going around of his fights, he’s pretty strong, no doubts there. This one’s gonna be interesting.”
“I watched those, too, of course, but they’re all duels, so that does leave some questions. I wish we could’ve seen him in an official match. Oh, that’s right—Amagiri wields the Ser Veresta, an Orga Lux in Seidoukan’s collection… Have you heard of it, Pham?”
“Uh-huh, that’s one of the so-called Four-Colored Runeswords. Pretty famous as weapons go, but I’ve only seen it in action in old videos. They say it’s a real difficult Orga Lux; no one’s been able to use it in the last umpteen years, so. Now the Lei-Glems is the best known of the Runeswords, but the Ser Veresta is also impossible to defend against, or so I’ve heard.”
“Mm-hmm, I see. And not only that, his tag partner is the Witch of the Resplendent Flames, Riessfeld. A team like that has got to be among the favorites!”
“Riessfeld’s diverse powers really stand out, you know. She’s probably one of the best Stregas in active competition. And I think she’ll keep improving, too. Sure would be nice to have someone like her with our organization when she graduates.”
“Well, Riessfeld is a real, actual princess! It might not be easy for her to take on work at a private military company.”
“Man, that’s too bad. Anyway, Amagiri’s the one to watch in this fight.”
“Now, as for the Gallardworth team…”
As the back-and-forth between the announcer and commentator went on, Julis elbowed Ayato in the ribs.
“They’re saying you’re the one to watch, Amagiri,” she whispered with a grin.
“I’m already nervous. You had to go and point that out to me?” Ayato teased back.
Julis leaned in close, amused. “Liar. I don’t see a hint of nerves. You’re as cool and collected as ever.”
“I really am. I don’t like being in the spotlight.”
“He says, standing under the brightest spotlight in the world.” Her shoulders shook with laughter.
“Well, you don’t look worried, either, Julis. Even though it’s your first time at the Festa, too.”
“Well, I am a princess. I’m used to all the attention. Oh—You should get ready.” Her joking attitude vanished, and her focus turned to the contestants ahead.
Two young men had appeared from the opposite gate, their Luxes already activated. One tall and one short, each member of the disparate duo held a sword-type Lux. At Gallardworth, swordsmanship was traditionally considered the one true path, and many students there chose swords for weapons.
Ayato drew the Ser Veresta from its holster but did not activate it.
“Oh, it’s almost time for the match! Who will emerge victorious from this battle? Seidoukan or Gallardworth? Here we go—Our second match of the day!”
As if on cue, the school crest on Ayato’s chest began to shine. Its functions during the Festa w
ere completely automated, so there was no need to declare one’s challenge or consent as in a duel.
“Phoenix Block C, Round One, Match One— Begin!”
No sooner had their school crests announced the start of the match than their two opponents surged forward with swords in hand. According to the data, they were both attack specialists who excelled at fighting in close quarters. They did not make use of a rear attacker. They probably sought to draw Ayato and Julis into close combat and make a swift conclusion to the match. If Ayato engaged with one, the other would go after Julis to prevent her from using long-distance attacks. A simple but effective strategy.
“Well, it’s nothing we didn’t plan for.” Julis nodded confidently with her arms crossed. She had not even drawn her Lux. “I’ll leave it to you, Ayato.”
“Got it.” He focused his prana in an instant. “By the sword within me, I break free of this prison of stars and unchain my power!”
The heightened prana broke the seal placed on him, releasing his explosive power. The Ser Veresta’s enormous blade gleamed.
“Wha…?!”
Startled by the burst of prana, the two Gallardworth students slowed. And then—a gust of wind.
“Huh?”
“Ah…!”
To the two of them, it might have looked as if Ayato simply vanished. But just a moment later, two school crests fell to the ground with a dry ting.
Ayato had dashed past the pair and sliced through their emblems with superhuman speed.
“End of battle! Winners: Ayato Amagiri and Julis-Alexia von Riessfeld!”
The automated announcement sounded over the utter silence that had descended on the arena.
It was as quiet as an empty room.
It did not last, though. Wild cheering erupted like a dam bursting to flood the arena.
“Th-that was amazing! No time for us to get a single word in! What incredible, incredible speed! What strength! An overwhelming victory, I think it’s safe to say!”
“I gotta say, pretty impressive.”
“His sheer power is one thing, but what really surprised me was the showmanship from Amagiri! That tremendous prana shot up like a pillar, and the crowd went crazy!”