Murder Machine and the Catastrophic Athletic Festival

by Mizuki Mizushiro

  Kurisu praised Kyousuke, while Busujima thanked Renko for her efforts.

  “…Haah, haah…haah…phew. Th-that was close.”

  “……Kksshh.”

  Beside Kyousuke, who was catching his breath with his hands on his knees, Renko lay sprawled on the ground, her abundant chest heaving up and down. Both were at their limit and had no strength left to exchange words.

  While a storm of praise and abusive language swept over them, all the members of first-year Class A ran in.

  “Yeah, that’s our Kyousuke! That was a magnificent run, congratulations!”

  “Ohhh gosh… Wh-what a relief… G-good job, Kyousuke!”

  “…Hey, you guys…did well, too,” Kyousuke replied. “I was…able to finish in first place because of you…thanks.”

  “Heh-heh. Of course! You know, when I give it a serious go, that’s how it is. Eh-heh-heh—”

  “Faaaaaaaaaaaace!”

  “Gah?!”

  Abashiri tried to rush on Shinji in a violent attack but was restrained by his classmates. Shinji, his face still bearing the marks left by Abashiri’s fingers and teeth, cowered behind Maina.

  “Ah-ha-ha…” Maina gave a strained laugh. “You had it tough, Shinji. But…you’re amazing! You had a scary guy like that chasing after you, but you didn’t get shaken and you finished running your lap. Kyousuke and Eiri and everyone was really amazing… I’m the only one who held us back, um…”

  “That’s not the case at all.”

  “…Eh?”

  Surprisingly, it was neither Kyousuke nor Eiri who had refuted Maina’s words. Sighing, Shinji turned to face her. “You were plenty amazing, too, Miss Maina. I thought you might hold us back, but you defied my every expectation. It seems you can do anything if you try.”

  “Sh-Shinji…” Maina’s eyes grew wider at the unexpected compliment. Her cheeks flushed with embarrassment and she hung her head, mumbling, “…Th-thank you v-very much.”

  “Yeah,” Kyousuke agreed, “Maina put in a really good effort for us. I mean, rather—”

  “But the greatest threat wasn’t Maina, it was Kyousuke, right?” Eiri said casually and poked Kyousuke in the side. “…For a second there I really did think we had lost. I thought we were done for…”

  Holding his side, Kyousuke smiled bitterly. “…I know. It was bad. I couldn’t believe it when those upperclassmen ganged up on me—”

  “Not that.” Eiri shrugged her shoulders and pointed to the baton in Kyousuke’s hand. “When you picked up the baton. If the baton isn’t passed directly to the next runner from hand to hand, the team gets disqualified, right?”

  “Ah—”

  When she said that, something dawned on Kyousuke. If it had been determined that they had “passed the baton by throwing,” they would have lost due to a rules violation. In other words, the reason Renko had kicked him back then was…

  “Ohh, is there such a rule? I had no idea, I had no idea!” Renko, the subject of everyone’s gaze, played dumb.

  “Renko, you—”

  “D-don’t get me wrong here, okay?!” Renko became defiant and put some distance between herself and Kyousuke and the others. “I showed you mercy because she was going to completely crush you guys by beating you to death with that pipe! I wasn’t intending to save you, and I wasn’t intending to go easy on you, either! I really wasn’t!”

  “……O-oh.”

  Eiri was shocked at Renko, who was shouting and thrusting her index finger at them. “What’s with that tsundere act…?”

  “You’d better prepare yourselves!” Spitting out that sharp parting remark, Renko ran over to her own classmates.

  Kyousuke moved to follow her, and—

  “…………”

  —was halted by Renji’s gaze. He could feel strong eyes boring into him through the ivory-white gas mask.

  The final event of the athletic festival still lay before them.

  “Aah, what a pity! We were defeated… Such a shame! What a pity that we won’t face Miss Hikawa and the others in the All-Out Knock-Down Brawl! Too bad, oh-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho!”

  As Kyousuke and the rest of first-year Class A stood exchanging glares with Renko and the rest of first-year Class B, Shamaya, covered in blood spatter, threw her arms up in celebration as she crossed the finish line with a smile.

  Behemoth Feat. Leviathan

  CRYBABY OF PURGATORY AND FRENZIED GRUNT

  FIFTH EVENT

  Under a darkening sky, dust clouds danced across the battle-scarred athletic field. In the center of the battleground, marked off with a white line, young men and women stood facing one another, veterans of many life-or-death struggles.

  Red and blue—to the east and west, their leaders carried class flags that fluttered in the wind. The heads of each army were clad in different colored outfits, glaring one another down.

  On one side was a boy without much personality, and with nothing much to set him apart, while on the other side was a girl with plenty of personality, her face hidden by a jet-black gas mask. Including the students lined up in rows behind the two, there were seventeen people—some completely wrapped in bandages or leaning on crutches. However, their eyes all contained ferocity.

  The broadcast rumbled like thunder across the competition grounds turned battlefield.

  “Crazy guuuuuuys aaaaaand bitcheeeeees! This is a finaaaaaaaaal showdown! At last, the final decisive battle of the long-standing trial, the Nineteenth Purgatorium Remedial Academy Athletic Festival! These warriors, who have already overcome fifteen levels of hell, will now do everything they can to completely crush one another in this battle of murderers, the All-Out Knock-Down Brawl! It’s almost time to rummmmmmble! Now, everybody give me a FUUUUUUUUUUUUCK!”

  “““FUUUUUUUUUUCK!”””

  The spectators shouted like an earthquake and thrust their middle fingers toward the MC booth. The background music, which roared like a constant explosion, added fuel to the fire of their frenzy.

  Undaunted, Kurisu raised her voice over the noise. “Oh yeah, I understand how you feel! Fuck and shit and oh my god… Who on earth could have predicted this? Pushing past the ranks of the upperclassmen, sidestepping their strongest opponents, clawing their way up onto the final stage, it’s those rubbishy rascals…the first-years! It’s a preposterous, unprecedented first-year showdoooooown! The second-years and third-years are all gonna hang themselves, those disgraceful bastards!” She stuck out her tongue at them.

  “…You can say what you like, since you didn’t participate in the matches yourself, hmm?” Busujima took a jab at Kurisu, picking up the broadcast as she was showered in booing from the spectators. “The rules of the match are simple and clear. The players will try their hardest to beat the other team down, and the class with the largest number of people still standing after twenty minutes wins overall victory regardless of their final score.”

  The All-Out Knock-Down Brawl didn’t have the slightest veneer of a proper athletic event. It was a straight-up battle, nothing more, nothing less.

  “All right, now let’s have a brief comment from the representative combatant for each class. First up, from the second-place first-year Class A, it’s Kyousuke Kamiya. Tell us how you’re feeling before the start of the battle.”

  “…………”

  Kyousuke handed his flag to a classmate, took the microphone from the mouth of a certain poisonous purple snake that had wound its way underfoot, and inhaled deeply.

  “—We’ll take ’em down,” he spat, pumping his clenched fist. “That is all.”

  His words had been brief but full of feeling, carrying the bloodlust of the opposing class, his own classmates’ excitement, and the jeering mixed with cheering from the spectators’ seats. He felt as if Renko was laughing, “Kksshh…”

  “…All right, thank you. Moving on to first-place first-year Class B. Their representative is Miss Renko Hikawa. Tell us how you’re feeling before the start of the battle.” The poisonous purple sn
ake slithered over to Renko and presented the microphone in its mouth.

  Renko, however, ignored it. Handing her flag to Renji, she moved both hands to the back of her head…

  —Click. The sound of a fastener being undone.

  She tossed aside the black gas mask, revealing her bare face.

  “““”””

  The near-molten atmosphere suddenly froze over. Every person there was transfixed, mouths open in shock, eyes locked on Renko’s beautiful visage.

  Her peach-colored lips slowly curled upward, revealing fang-like canines. True to form, with cold insanity floating in her glacial, ice-blue eyes, Renko smiled.

  “—We’ll take ’em down.” She raised a tattoo-covered arm, mimicking Kyousuke exactly. Even without the microphone, her unamplified voice resonated at an impressive volume. “……Well, that’s what you said. But is that really how you feel, Kyousukeee?”

  Renko’s voice filled the silent grounds. Kyousuke remained quiet. He honestly could not answer her question.

  “Heh-heh.” Renko smiled and opened her raised fist and pressed it to her breast. Her stark eyes pierced Kyousuke—Kyousuke alone. “Because I do.”

  Renko’s voice was bold. It was clear she was not speaking for her class but only for her own sake, and for the sake of Kyousuke, whom she was thinking about. It was as if the athletic festival—and anything else except for Renko and Kyousuke—was of no concern to her.

  “I love you, so I want to defeat you. I love you, so I want to destroy you. I love you, so I want to kill you… I love everything about you, so I want to possess everything about you. Isn’t wanting to do that a very natural feeling? Your heart and your body and your blood and your organs, your smiling face and your angry face and your crying face and your dying face. I want to make them all mine.—How about you? Do you feel like you want all of me? Or do you feel like you want to offer up everything to me? Or do you feel like you want my heart and body, but taking my blood and organs and life would be going too far? Heh-heh… Come on, Kyousuke, I want to know… What do you think about me, how do you feel about me? That’s why I’m going to make you go all out. I want to really fight you, to break open the shell that surrounds your heart and drag your real feelings out into the light. Just like the day when I first told you how I felt, yeah?”

  Most of the audience was bewildered. They had no idea what Renko was talking about. However, her words had a mysterious yet undeniable magnetic force. Even though they didn’t understand, they were drawn in. Her rhapsodizing, her passion—it held their minds in a tight grip, and they were fascinated, whether they wanted to be or not.

  “Renko……”

  “…By the way.” Renko’s smile abruptly disappeared. She raised her beautiful silver-white eyebrows. “…Could you stop this music? The gacha-gacha-gacha-gacha is annoying. I finally have a good melody playing, but it’s getting all messed up! Something so dissonant cannot possibly compare with the elaborate, elegant tune resounding inside me. So you, over there, turn it off.”

  “Eh? Ah, umm…m-me? Little Miss Kurisu Arisugawa?” Kurisu’s eyes darted about in confusion.

  “Yep, you with the gaudy highlights.” Renko pointed. “I don’t really care what your name is, though.”

  “O-oh…it’s just, that kinda thing is a little troubling to hear. I mean, you’re an underclassman, right? You can’t just order an upperclassman around—”

  “—Shut the hell up. Hurry up and turn it off without complaining, or I’ll choke the life outta you!”

  “Ooooookay, stop the music, please.” Kurisu quickly fired off instructions to the staff. The loud grindcore music stopped, and silence fell over the grounds.

  Renko nodded in apparent satisfaction and smiled. “Well done, upperclassman.” She interlaced her fingers over her head and stretched.

  “…Well then, I guess I can MC like this? We’re all set up, so why don’t we get the live show started, everyooone?!”

  Renko’s classmates, lined up behind her, promptly answered, “““Yeaaaaaaahhhhhh!!””” and raised their fists in the air. Enthralled by Renko’s charisma, first-year Class B seemed to completely adore her. Their energy approached a climax.

  The members of first-year Class A flinched at their opponents’ solidarity.

  “What the heck is that, Kamiya… I-is it really Renko?”

  “She’s, like, super cool, and also crazy wicked scary, right?”

  “…Maybe we should play dead or something as soon as it starts. I don’t want to die just yet…”

  “Before I die, I’d at least like to get one—no, two—rubs in though.”

  “““GMK! GMK!”””

  “…Hey, GMK is our enemy, right? You and you and you and you are too fainthearted!”

  Eiri struck her classmates’ heads with the harisen war fan, one of the deadly “weapons” that Kyousuke and the others had acquired during the Calamity Arms Race that morning.

  “Oh, dear me… It can’t be, Renko has taken off her gas mask… Oh no.”

  “Hmm-hmm-hmm. That’s just like Renko…but, we have my big brother! And we have Eiri and Crafty Cat. So we’re gonna win—we’re gonna be all right!”

  “That’s right, that’s riiiiiight! You guys, whaddya worried about?! That big titty monster isn’t worth worrying about! Little boobs reign supreme anyway, hyah-haaaaaa!”

  “A-anyway, leaving boobs aside—if you give in to despair, you’ve already lost!! And I flat out will not surrender to that bitch Renko! Listen, you guys, let’s take her on with everything we’ve goooooot!”

  “““Yeaaaaaaaahhhhhh!”””

  Kyousuke, undaunted, glared at Renko as he also riled up his classmates. Renko smiled slightly as she met Kyousuke’s gaze.

  “E-eeeeeek… Wh-wwwwh-what’s up with her? Gimme a break… You don’t have to stare at me with such scary eyes… Ohh. Shit…shit…” Kurisu crouched under her desk, trembling.

  “…Uh, okay. Thank you for your comment, Miss Renko Hikawa! Now, I’d like to move on to the match,” Busujima announced, ignoring his terrified cohost. He checked the digital clock on the side of the scoreboard.

  “Everyone, are you prepared? Well then, here we go… The final match of the Nineteenth Purgatorium Remedial Academy Athletic Festival, first-year Class A versus first-year Class B in the All-Out Knock-Down Brawl—”

  —As he gave the starting signal, a powerful growl shook the grounds.

  Kyousuke and her other opponents in Class A, and even her allies in Class B, were overwhelmed by Renko’s brutal roar. The ferocious noise didn’t sound as though it possibly could have come from a human throat, much less the throat of a young girl like Renko. The next moment—

  “Well, shall we begin the song, Kyousukeeeeeeeee?!”

  Renko rushed at him with a scream that was less the roar of a wild animal and more a violent death wail. Her approach was jagged, a meandering, undulating advance, and her hair spread out behind her as she swung her arms and swayed like a dancer, weaving to and fro as she attacked. Only Renko could hear the rhythm reverberating through the inside of her mind. To anyone else, her mad motion looked like little more than random flailing. Intense, deadly desire burned in her ice-blue eyes. The music spurring her on was—

  “Tch… Well, you’re certainly full of bloodlust, aren’t you, Renko?!”

  Kyousuke hadn’t felt the withering fixation of Renko’s murderous impulse in a long time, but he forced himself into action, moving to meet his enemy. Around them, the other students also joined the action, raising various battle cries as they rushed in.

  “Hyah-haaaaaaaaa! What color is your bloooooooood?!”

  “…Bring it on! And don’t expect me to go easy on you!”

  “Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhh!”

  “Die! Die-die-die-die—die, you garbaaaaaage!”

  “I’ll keep my eye on the leftovers, I suppose? Heh-heh… If anyone gets killed, I’ll be sure to take excellent care of the corpse.”

&nb
sp; Mohawk launched a suicide attack without a single thought toward the consequences, Eiri threw away her war fan and readied a small sword, Maina rushed onward in a daze, Ayaka shouted foul-mouthed abuse, Shinji picked up the fan and smiled brazenly…

  Their opponents in first-year Class B were—

  “Let us shatter the reality of these pathetic plebeians! Let us rend asunder their banal lives! Punishment-destruction-world! Let’s go, Azrael, the time is nigh for our ultimate secret weapon, Slow-Motion Apocalypse! …Indeed, indeed…”

  “What are you doing, Michirou?! That will end the match, won’t it?!”

  “A twenty-minute all-you-can-eat human-meat buffet…yum. Which one should I eat first?”

  Michirou drew something that looked like a magic square on the ground and started reciting an incantation, Bob stopped to chide him, and Chihiro dashed forward, gripping a fork tightly, and—

  “…………”

  Not to be outdone, an ivory-white gas mask came charging up behind Renko. The person wearing it was silent but for the stamping of his feet over the ground as he followed at her heels.

  The wind blew fiercely. The advance guard of each class collided in the swirling dust cloud.

  Screaming with remarkable intensity, Renko leaped into the air.

  “C’mon, accept my love, Kyousukeeeeeeeee!!”

  —Bwam!

  She swung her right arm with all her strength, targeting the back of Kyousuke’s neck. The blow could have cut through steel.

  “Don’t mess around! Are ya trying to kill me or something?!” Kyousuke ducked, narrowly avoiding her attack. Their paths crossed, and Renko, carried by her momentum, sailed past him, tumbling to the ground.

  Now covered in dust and dirt, Renko leaped at Kyousuke as he turned to look back. She bared her teeth like a wild animal, spreading her tattoo-covered arms playfully. “Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha, it’s obvious, isn’t it?! My feelings are deadly serious, after all! Wouldn’t it be best to accept them without shame and enjoy a quick death?!”