A Certain Magical Index, Vol. 22

by Kazuma Kamachi

  “…”

  “I realized it during that battle between the angel of water and the angel of science before. But that’s not exactly right. I should have physically known it before that—way before that.”

  Accelerator spoke as if remembering something.

  “Yeah.”

  Just talking about his past defeats was something he’d have never done before.

  But his priorities were different now.

  If he could protect one small life by throwing away a part of his pride, he’d do it without hesitation.

  “I couldn’t actually reflect it. An unknown attack made it right through and cut me in half. I couldn’t think of a single way to counter it. I was completely broken back then.”

  Now, he even had the leeway to give a grin.

  He gave himself a push to walk one more step, to walk forward without fail.

  “…But that didn’t mean the vectors didn’t exist. That unknown rule set Aiwass gave me should be inside my body right now.”

  When he thought about it again, that had to be it.

  Aiwass hadn’t canceled his ability itself like that Level Zero had.

  Aiwass hadn’t taken advantage of his ability like Amata Kihara and Teitoku Kakine had.

  Aiwass had attacked him directly, sending vectors straight for him, and had crushed Accelerator. That meant its information should have been conveyed to him along with that blow.

  The hint had been in his mind all along. The answer had been inside him. Aiwass had told him to go to Russia, but he never said the solution to save Last Order would be left right there in the open. What that monster had offered was no more than the key to the safe.

  Don’t write it off as unknown.

  Don’t throw it inside a black box.

  You can process the error as is. Set up a fictional vector axis. Think of numbers that don’t exist in the real world that are only for solving impractical equations, like imaginary numbers. Reverse-calculate the values from the vectors you see, then bring rules for creating them into focus. Aiwass’s existence alone isn’t enough to understand. That thing’s an irregular monster. Fragments of asteroids transformed by immense heat are nothing more than boulders on their own. But by plugging in advanced numerical formulas, they become the key to inferring the entire expansion of space since the Big Bang.

  You might not get a perfect image, of course. But you can put together an extrapolation limitlessly close to the truth.

  Even with the Big Bang, said to be the beginning of the universe, the great explosion itself still hasn’t been proven. Experts have only re-created and proven several physical phenomena assumed to have happened right after the explosion using giant ring-shaped accelerators.

  Physicists calculated backward from them, and went through the work of imagining the reality of the primordial explosion as well as they could, filling in the minor details little by little.

  He just needed to do the same.

  The skill to centrally control energy vectors and convert them into attack power was nothing more than an added benefit. This was where the core of his reason for existence probably slept.

  And that ability’s name…

  At the time it naturally came to him, he’d probably already known, instinctively. Accelerator had only felt that keenly again.

  “I can envision the parchment’s contents by inputting a single line of a singular physical formula, mixed in with fictional values similar to imaginary numbers. But that stuff’s not important. Now that I’ve solved the puzzle using rules I made for myself, I was able to whittle down the mysterious Aiwass vectors inside my head to a theory extremely close to the real thing, on the same level as the Big Bang theory. Meaning…”

  Accelerator paused.

  “I’ve gotten the parameters I need to save the kid. This is where I turn the tables.”

  He turned to face her.

  To the little girl who even now suffered for no good reason.

  To the true battlefield on which he needed to fight.

  September 30—when he’d confronted Amata Kihara, leader of the Hound Dogs, a doctor named Heaven Canceler had pushed buttons on him that he didn’t like. But now, he thought, he could stick out his chest and stand on the same playing field. He understood the value of fighting to protect a single life, the nobleness of struggling to keep her flame alive.

  Brawls weren’t the only kind of battles.

  Victories didn’t only mean taking from others.

  Before now, he’d vowed to reign as the paragon of villainy to protect those important to him from the unjust darkness. In bloodstained back alleys, he’d massacred one shithead after another—trash like himself—and lost many things in exchange for winning those death matches, continuing to be swallowed into even deeper darkness.

  But this battle was different.

  As he was now, he no longer needed to be a villain…!!

  “…Hmph.”

  Accelerator looked down and mulled over that thought for a moment.

  He thought it over very deeply.

  When his face came up again, his eyes held none of the hesitation from when he’d been wandering Russia.

  “I’m starting.”

  He kept it short.

  He didn’t need any particularly flashy action.

  He just had to close his eyes and give voice to the “answer” in his mind.

  Then it would end.

  It would all end.

  Brwwaaaahhh!! Enormous numerical formulas began to flow into the world in the form of song.

  Was Misaka Worst, watching beside him, surprised? This wasn’t anything special. Accelerator already had experience removing a virus with his own strength—the one from Ao Amai. The system was just different, that was all. Which meant he should be able to do this. He had everything he needed. If he maintained himself in the best condition possible until the end, and produced results like a machine would, that would be enough.

  That should have been enough.

  But he felt a slight tug in the mechanisms that were supposed to be running smoothly.

  An ominous micro-vibration, like one portending a train’s complete derailment.

  The golden sky…?!

  The pressure weighing down from directly overhead possessed the same sort of mysterious vectors as Aiwass. Yes—with this, he figured, it wasn’t strange there had been slight interference with him and Last Order. Anyone standing close to power lines with high-tension currents in them would be able to hear white noise like on a television or radio. It was the same thing. Having figured it out instantly, Accelerator worked slight corrections into his calculations.

  He imagined a ball rolling down a hilly road.

  Down the hill was a cliff.

  If he continued to correct his calculations like this, he’d cross some sort of ultimate line. No matter what he’d deciphered, Accelerator was currently a being who lived in the normal, physical world. He only happened to know about this mysterious rule set. He wasn’t steeped in it himself.

  He’d have to cross that line.

  He’d be swallowed up by that mysterious rule set.

  He knew it—but he didn’t stop. He plunged forward. He shot straight down the hilly road. The cliff was already in sight. Accelerator took the deep hole beyond as a gate. He faced forward, without hesitation, flying into that bottomless darkness.

  He passed through it within an instant.

  And then, immediately after, something went wrong.

  “…???!!!”

  Crkkk. Something inside him screamed. The blood vessels on the back of his hand swelled abnormally. He keenly felt the thick pipes of blood running from his fingertips to his shoulders. Right after realizing that, the rupture occurred. His skin broke from the inside, and a dark-red fluid rushed out all at once.

  Had he realized it?

  The voice was too unique, using breathing impossible for normal humans, wildly flailing around the vibrations of sound not only in his throat but t
hrough his whole body, then producing it from his mouth—he was refining mana from his life force, building a spell, and outputting it onto this real, actual world…Did he realize he was performing true, genuine sorcery?

  Espers couldn’t use magic. If they tried to anyway, what waited for them was an intense physical rejection.

  The damage didn’t stop in that one spot. The flow of his arteries and veins and nerves strung out through him like a spiderweb rose to the surface of his mind with eerie throbbing and anguish. They were making their locations plainly known due to the compression his internal organs felt. A huge amount of sweat burst out all over him, more than if he’d suddenly entered a sauna. That clear, disgusting liquid mixed with something else, something red. Accelerator felt like little parts of his body were exploding.

  And that sensation wasn’t inaccurate.

  But he still continued.

  Because he couldn’t stop now.

  “Oooooooooooooooooooooohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhwwwwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!”

  A gruff but sublime voice, similar to primordial dancing songs of indigenous peoples, spread through the white lands. Even with every part of his body soaked in blood and countless wounds pushing apart from within, those notes never broke for a moment. It was the strength of his will that kept him going—he wanted to save this one little girl, and those feelings alone overcame the real-world pain, allowing him to do advanced mental operations without even tiny errors.

  There was a story like this, once.

  In the days when Crossists were still persecuted by the Romans, many disciples going through horrific torture had, apparently, sometimes seen the shadows of angels.

  The more boring types believed these were illusions caused by an oversecretion of brain matter to escape the worst, most terrible pain. After all, an angel appearing would be far too convenient. If a creature called an angel really existed, if such a grand being would side with them, then they would have massacred the Romans on the spot to begin with.

  And maybe part of that was right.

  But what if the disciples, who had passed into the extremities of the mind, had unconsciously gone through the mental labor to elaborately conduct huge and complex spells, temporarily controlling telesma to perform advanced acts of summoning? Couldn’t one have an opposing viewpoint, one a little more fantastical? Couldn’t one interpret it as actual angels coming for them, if only for a moment, in response to their mental voices and through the momentary spells they wove?

  Yes:

  Accelerator was praying.

  With all his heart. Without asking for anything else. Without even paying attention to his own pain. Academy City’s strongest monster kept on praying—to save something more precious to him than his own life.

  When that white angel, who had fallen to the depths of the earth through immense malice, had tried to crawl back up in search of light, its wings had been broken by another monster.

  But could anyone think he was still forsaken after looking at his blood-covered face?

  Wouldn’t they have to think that, even if he had fallen to the bottom of hell, his radiance had never clouded?

  For example:

  The many devout who had been physically abused, thrown into jails or brothels, and yet turned those horrifying places into shining places of faith.

  The soul was not sullied merely by where it stood.

  When sinners confronted their sins and risked their lives to make up for it, it washed away that black darkness.

  It wasn’t just any performance.

  Nobody was forcing him to do this.

  This world was not so cold that it would refuse to grant salvation to those who truly and sincerely repented for their sins, kept on the struggle to change their hearts, and tried to break the shackles of their fate. Among the historically important figures in Crossism were some who were originally Roman and caused Crossist disciples to suffer. But they regretted their actions for their entire lives, and when they continued fighting to make up for their unatonable sins if only by a little, they forged a path to salvation alongside their suffering.

  Who was Accelerator right now?

  Was he a good or a bad person?

  A human or a monster?

  Science or sorcery?

  If one had asked him, he’d probably have said this without hesitation.

  It’s obvious: The only word for who I am is me.

  “Gaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!”

  At the end of the bloodstained path he walked, Accelerator severed every chain he’d bound himself with.

  Nothing remained to fetter him.

  He could go as far as he wanted.

  He would forge down this path he believed in, to save that small life called Last Order.

  Bloodying himself to do it.

  Continuing the song.

  And…

  2

  Where had Rikou Takitsubo gone?

  With his battle against Mugino over, plus confirmation of additional attackers’ descent from a bomber, what Shiage Hamazura needed to do was meet up with Takitsubo as fast as possible. Even if they put together a plan, he didn’t want to stay separated.

  “Damn it!! Where are you?! Takitsubo! Where are you?!”

  As he shouted her name, Hamazura was grabbing a thick branch. He was digging on and on, scraping away at all the snow at the foot of the mountain the avalanche had caused. He’d been separated from her around when his fight with Mugino had started. If he wasn’t getting any answer even after searching every nook and cranny of his surroundings and shouting in a loud voice, it was possible she was actually buried under snow.

  Even in extremely cold regions, when doing manual labor, it was natural to sweat and get thirsty. Hamazura took a gulp of some carbonated water from an aluminum can. It remained water because he’d had it inside his parka the whole time. If he’d left it out, it would have quickly frozen.

  Meanwhile, from a short distance away, Shizuri Mugino watched Hamazura in his confusion, seemingly bored.

  “Hey!! Help me look for her, Mugino!! I can’t find her anywhere! I don’t have any clue where she could be!! Help me out here! I need as many hands as I can get!!”

  “Why should I?”

  “Crap, what now? Takitsubo is still far from fit even with the Crystals’ strain reduced and leaving her out in the cold like this would be unthinkable and I have to warm her up soon because she’s weak she’s a weak girl she’s a girl in a lot of trouble because of those Crystals!”

  “…”

  Academy City’s fourth-strongest Level Five, Shizuri Mugino, Meltdown, lost it.

  With a boom, a lump of snow right next to Hamazura vaporized along a straight line. The intense force caused a water vapor explosion to go off, sending Hamazura’s body into the air.

  “Whoa—crap. My head is spinning. It might be the Crystals…the Crystals, do you hear me…? …affecting me. I think there are a bunch of other ways to propel a body—but no, I might just take the most beautiful fall you’ve ever seen.”

  “What did you do that for, Muginoooooooo!! Who knows where the frail little bunny-type Takitsubo could be buried, come onnnnn!!”

  Face-first on the ground, Hamazura’s voice as he shouted was a girlish falsetto.

  “…You’re such a damn pain. I just helped you dig.”

  “Noooo!! Please draw a line between gags and serious stuff next time!! This is awful—I knew it! A completely harmless healing-type character is all I need!!”

  Mugino gave him an incredibly unenthusiastic look and pointed behind him. “You mean the one sneaking up on you right now?”

  “Uwaahh?!” screamed Hamazura, without meaning to, at the ghostly girl, Rikou Takitsubo, who had quietly approached him.

  In any case, now they were all together.

  With Mugino and Takitsubo, he confirmed the situation.

  T
hen he looked up at the golden skies.

  Amid the psychedelic scenery, he could see a dropped Academy City assailant about to land on the ground a short distance away. They wore a black combat uniform that didn’t match the white snowfield—the kind of thing that might be supplied to urban special forces. He couldn’t spot any sort of firearm.

  “…”

  She seemed to have fired it by momentum before, but Shizuri Mugino’s Meltdown would be useless in battle at this point.

  She might be able to “fire” a few shots, but that would be as much as her Crystal-ravaged body could take. And firing at stationary targets was one thing—he didn’t know if she could hit a real enemy moving quickly and irregularly. However he looked at it, it wouldn’t be possible to wipe out the enemies about to approach with nothing but an attack that had such a harsh usage limit.

  Rikou Takitsubo wouldn’t be able to provide any combat power in the first place. They’d been able to relieve the adverse effects of the Crystals to a certain degree but not so much that it fundamentally cured her. Besides, even if she was at full strength, she was meant more for rear support. She couldn’t use her ability for battle, and she certainly didn’t give the impression of being especially skilled in limb-based melee combat.

  The attackers would know that.

  That was why they’d made such an obvious approach by dropping out of the bomber. Otherwise, they would have been a little more careful.

  Hamazura jumped into the conifer forest. A few dozen meters ahead…

  He held his breath and watched the shadows as they moved without haste over the snow, slowly but surely getting closer.

  They weren’t normal soldiers.

  Only the gold and white of the flat masks covering their faces departed from their fully black uniforms; the masks were strange, looking over twice as wide as their faces. They didn’t feature any holes for the eyes or mouth. The entirety of their masks glistened with artificial light, like LED decorations for a cell phone, evidently able to depict patterns using several colors of light. Sometimes they would produce faint, indecipherable lights; Hamazura didn’t know what they meant. Judging from their constitution and the parts of their head and jawbones not covered up by their mask, the attacker was probably male.