Cradle of Stars

by Reki Kawahara

  She no longer had the extra power to step back momentarily and then attack again. It had already been a bit of work just to push Graph into using his double-sword cross guard, given that he was a master of evasive footwork. And yet, even in this situation, the face mask that she caught a glimpse of through the transparent hyper diamond had an air of easy nonchalance about it.

  At times like this, Graph’s usual lines were things like “Not too shabby, Lota.” Or “Just a bit more, Lota.” “Nice guts, Lota.” Ever calm and composed, the way he called her Lota as a play on Lotus would only further aggravate her.

  This was likely because Lotus had still been in second grade when they met for the first time, and so he’d had no choice but to treat her like a child. But she was in sixth grade now; she’d be in junior high next spring. And when you considered the Brain Burst installation conditions, Graph had to have been of a similar age in the real, right? Honestly, this double-sword user was really—

  “You’ve gotten strong, Lota—I mean, Lotus.” His voice came suddenly over the squeal of their locked swords.

  Stunned, she wondered if she’d misheard, but the ever-calm voice continued.

  “Seems like there’s nothing left for me to teach you.”

  “—?!”

  He’d never said this to her before, and Lotus stumbled, her concentration faltering. The balance between the attacking and defending forces crumbled, and the pressurized energy concentrated there scattered violently.

  Kreeaahn! That pressure slammed into her like an explosion and knocked her flying backward. She bounced off the cracked marble ground of the Twilight stage several times, tumbling and rolling until she found the right moment to plunge the sword of her right leg into the ground and bring herself to a halt, carving out a rut in the ground. She stood up, shaking her head lightly.

  She had been convinced that Graph had also been knocked flying, given that he was just as close as she was to the explosion’s ground zero, but in a twist, the metallic-gray avatar hadn’t moved so much as a single step from his original position. He had taken the blow from that violent surge of energy with the crossed double swords.

  …Honestly! This guy!

  Cursing him inwardly, Black Lotus—Kuroyukihime—shouted, “Oy, Graph! What was that strategy about?!”

  “That was how I really feel as a teacher.” Graph shrugged lightly as he lowered the swords in both hands, a dozen or so meters away. “If I was going to set a trap to mess up your sword work…Right, I’d talk about flat, black bugs wriggling around or something.”

  “Stop it. I’ll kill you,” she returned in a cold voice—before letting out a long sigh.

  Regrettably, she hadn’t been able to achieve her objective of surpassing her teacher, but she had pushed Graph to a place where he’d had to say something like that, which gave her confidence. And with that in mind, she checked in with the acting referees, watching over the scene together from the left. “Maiden. Curren. May I call this…a draw?”

  The small dual-colored avatar standing on the right side shook her head firmly. “No matter how you look at it, it’s your loss, Lo.”

  This was followed by the avatar on the left, her entire body wrapped in her unique flowing-water armor, similarly shaking her head, sending water droplets scattering. “I think the winner of the battle is the one standing in the end.”

  “…Mm. I see.” Kuroyukihime nodded, her gaze still turned toward the official referees.

  “Hunh!” She brandished the sword of her right arm with a cry. Red light jetted forth in a straight line along the floor—or more precisely, the roof of the large, mixed-use building at the east exit of Shibuya station, Shibuya Hikarie. On this side of the line were Lotus and the two referees; on the other side was Graphite Edge.

  “…Oh.” Graph seemed to catch on that something was afoot and tried to run, still clutching his swords. But the ground on which he stood sank backward with a heavy roar.

  “Lota! N-n-n-no fair!!” Graph shouted, waving both hands to try to keep his balance, but it was too late. Kuroyukihime had launched the long-distance attack technique he’d taught her and sliced through the top of the skyscraper diagonally. Cut free of the rest of the building, the large structure began to slide along the cross section, pulled down by gravity, and Graph was inevitably dragged along with it. “Whoa! …I’m…I’m gonna faaaallllllll…”

  With this, the double-sword user finally disappeared from Kuroyukihime’s field of view. There was only one in Nega Nebulus who could return to the roof of the 180-meter tall building in that situation—the Element with an Enhanced Armament in the form of a high-output booster, who was not currently on the scene. And no Burst Linker in the Accelerated World could fly higher than she could.

  Kuroyukihime stretched gently upward as she pulled her right arm down and looked at the two referees. “Now this is my win, yes?”

  “…That’s against the rules,” said the smaller one.

  “…Super–not fair,” agreed the larger.

  “I’ll take that as a compliment.” Kuroyukihime turned away abruptly and looked to the western sky. Just as the health gauge with the name Graphite Edge to the right dropped dramatically against the backdrop of the orange of the dusk, the heavy thud of destruction reached her from the ground far below.

  Five minutes later.

  Due to bad luck or actual ability or both, Graph just barely managed to avoid his gauge being completely emptied. He returned to the roof via the elevator, and now the four of them sat together in a circle. The chairs were the Grecian temple–style pillars particular to the Twilight stage, cut down to an appropriate height.

  Since Lotus and Graph had generated this field for a regular duel, they were limited to thirty minutes. Half of this had been spent on the confrontation between teacher and student, leaving them around ten minutes now. They were connected not through the global net, but rather through a Legion-exclusive closed net, so there was no audience.

  The first to open her mouth was the shrine maiden avatar clad in crimson and raw muslin, Ardor Maiden. “Lo. Are you ready to advance to level nine?”

  The reason that Maiden called Kuroyukihime, the sixth-grader, Lo—short for Lotus—was extremely simple. As a second grader, she was likely by far the youngest in the Legion. But she had already reached level seven, and she was always extremely calm and collected.

  “Well…” Kuroyukihime nodded at a strange angle, looking back at the younger girl’s rounded, innocent eye lenses. “To be honest, I had intended to have a complete victory over Graph today and level up with a clear heart…” She looked hard at the metallic avatar sitting in front of her.

  He scratched his head in a very un-teacher-like manner. “I—I was thinking the same thing, which is why I said that whole initiation-type stuff.”

  “Then perhaps you could have waited until the end of the match to say such things rather than in the middle of the struggle!” she snapped.

  “Aah, like, that’s not really who I am…Or like, it’s embarrassing…”

  While he was the most powerful swordsman in the Legion and a veteran since the formation of Nega Nebulus, Graph’s lack of solemnity remained unchanged from the old days. The fourth member of the Elements, who could not be there because of reasons related to the time school let out, said he was “basically a sword.”

  And this actually hit pretty close to home. Graphite Edge’s weak point was basically hand-to-hand combat, so in a battle without his swords, he probably couldn’t have won against the long-distance-type Maiden, even. He was a duel avatar of a fixed-point type, that had poured pretty much all his potential into his Enhanced Armament—his swords.

  “It’s all right, Graph. I think your feelings must have been communicated to Lo through your swords,” Maiden said, following up with an air of a smile bleeding through onto her small face mask.

  “Right!” Graph nodded deeply as if he understood just what she was getting at. “That’s pretty much what I was trying to say
, my student. Just like the conscience of Nega Nebulus to say that, Denden.”

  The instant she heard this affectionate nickname, the light that filled Maiden’s eye lenses got just a little scary. Being called Lota herself, Kuroyukihime understood how she felt, but they had to continue talking right now. She cleared her throat. “Whether or not your feelings reached me, I am also satisfied with that session. I didn’t manage a complete victory, but it still wasn’t bad for our last fight as two level eighters…I think.”

  “So then, you’re going to go up a level, yes, Lo?” Her face back to normal, Maiden cocked her head adorably to one side.

  “Yes…Aah, it is frightening to use such an enormous sum of points in one go, but if I’m going to make it to level ten, then this is a road I cannot avoid going down.”

  “While your points are down, we will offer you the perfect protection, Lotus, so you can relax,” came the quiet voice of the slender flowing-water avatar Aqua Current, who had so far simply listened in silence.

  “Thanks, Curren.” Kuroyukihime leaned to the left and bowed her head toward the avatar, ears attuned to the faint babbling sound of her armor. “But there’s no need for you to concern yourself. I will also be taking part in the regular Enemy hunt in the Unlimited Neutral Field soon after I level up.”

  “I thought you’d say that,” Current said. “But…there is something that concerns me.”

  “That rumor?” Kuroyukihime raised an eyebrow. “That once you go up to level nine, some kind of special rules that did not previously exist will be applied?”

  Current nodded, and the part of the water armor that was like hair tied back swung back and forth.

  In the Accelerated World, the rumor of special level-nine rules had started circulating about three months ago. Its origins were unknown, and the details themselves were unclear. The reason for the scarcity of information was that the majority of Burst Linkers ignored it as having nothing to do with themselves.

  And this was no surprise. There were said to be just under a thousand Burst Linkers, but it was an easy thing to count those who had reached level eight, and those in range of level nine were no more than ten. For Kuroyukihime, being the leader of Nega Nebulus had been a huge help in securing this many points. In which case, that was precisely why she had to confirm for herself if there was any kind of risk in ascending to level nine…Or so she thought.

  Aqua Current turned her streamlined face mask to the left and met the pale eye lenses of Graphite Edge. “Graph. If you became level nine before Lotus, I think you could safely confirm the truth of the rumor.”

  Hit so casually with this rather shocking suggestion, the metallic avatar reeled. “Wh-whaaat?! M-me?!”

  “Maiden and I are still level seven, but you’re eight…And I think you’re closest to nine after Lotus. Am I wrong?”

  There was a reason that Current didn’t refer to the remaining member of the Four Elements, who was not present at the moment. She was also level eight like Graph, but she had recently hinted at pulling back from the Legion front lines. It wasn’t that she had grown tired of the game—just the opposite. As a Burst Linker, she was aiming for the heights more purely than anyone else.

  Lotus’s heart started to hurt when she thought about this friend—her closest connection in this world, albeit in a different sense from Graphite Edge—moving away from her, but she pushed this aside and focused on the conversation between Current and Graph.

  “Uh, um. I won’t say you’re wrong, but if you think about a safety margin, too, I’m a little short. And to begin with, someone like me leapfrogging ahead of the Seven Kings of Pure Color to become level nine…”

  “So then you can just call yourself a king, too,” Maiden replied simply.

  “N-no, no, no!” The double-sword user repeatedly alternated between moving his hands and shaking his head. “That burden’s too much for me. And to start with, my color name’s graphite…Even if I did name myself a king, what king would I be? The Graphite King?”

  “That overlaps with Lo’s Black King, so that’s no good.” Maiden rejected the idea bluntly, perhaps as payback for him always calling her Denden, and the swordmaster was at a loss for words.

  “I think the Pencil King is good,” Current remarked mercilessly.

  “Pencil…” Maiden cocked her head to one side. “What’s that, Curren?”

  “Way back when, a lot of people used a writing instrument that had a graphite core,” Current, apparently also in sixth grade like Kuroyukihime, explained. “It was very thin and broke easily, so it suits Graph to a tee.”

  “Wow…,” Graph mused. “Kids these days don’t know what a pencil is— No, wait! Forget that! Cureent! My metal’s not that weak, you know!”

  “Everyone noticed when you were secretly down before when the Purple King totally beat the hell out of you,” Current replied. “And…I’ve said this a million times, but it’s not Cureent, it’s Current.”

  “Aah, um, there’s this sweet where I’m from called reent, so I just…”

  “That’s a total lie!” Current shouted.

  Here, Kuroyukihime burst out laughing at last. Perhaps her friends had noticed that she was feeling a little glum before, so maybe they were purposefully offering up this sunny back-and-forth. But that was just how kind they were.

  “Ha-ha-ha! Well, let’s leave it there, Maiden, Curren. Even if there is some uncertain element in going up to level nine, I can’t exactly make my teacher run a screen for me. And at any rate, it seems like the other kings will be leveling up at basically the same time. So dangerous or not, they’ll be in it with me.”

  A serious look rose up on Graph’s simple yet masculine face mask. “The same time as the other kings, huh? So then, Lota, will all Seven Kings meet or something once you’re all level nine-ish?”

  “Depending on the veracity of the rumor, it’s not out of the question. We’ve had diplomatic relations before on the scale of two or three, or even four of us. So I think of that as the seven-person version, basically.”

  “I see.” Graph folded his arms, appearing to sink into thought. Normally, he was so detached and aloof that there was nowhere to grab hold of him, but since he very rarely displayed a keen power of insight, the other three kept their mouths shut and waited.

  “Lota.” Eventually, the double-sword user lifted his head and offered, “I’ve given you all kinds of advice about your level-up bonuses so far.”

  Kuroyukihime looked at him questioningly. “Yes, and I’m grateful for that…”

  “Oh, I’m not looking for you to thank me,” he went on hurriedly. “Because that was me determining your direction as a Burst Linker. Specializing in offense in one-on-one duels.”

  “…What’s this about all of a sudden? It’s not as though I’ve strengthened this avatar simply as you told me to. It’s because I felt that this direction would allow me to fight in a way that most suited me.” Kuroyukihime moved the swords of both hands slightly.

  Graph nodded slowly. “And I’m not trying to contradict myself or anything now. Rather than an all-purpose build, a singularly specialized build has the power to break through the hard-edge moments of the game at the end of the end…That belief’s not going to change, no matter what happens. Well, I don’t have to tell the three of you that, though.”

  This time, Kuroyukihime, Maiden, and Current all nodded.

  Ever since she was a baby newbie, Kuroyukihime had selected her level-up bonuses based on advice from her teacher. Not taking a single special attack or Enhanced Armament of the long-range or mass-effect type, she had only chosen close-range/single-target special attacks and enhancements to the attack power of her four limbs. She had never once regretted this. She believed it was precisely because she had aimed for this singular specialization that she’d been able to manifest her powerful Terminate Sword ability.

  Ardor Maiden and Aqua Current weren’t Graphite Edge’s students, but their direction of growth was the same, so Maiden had mainly enhanc
ed her long-distance firepower and Aqua her flowing armor.

  So why is Graph suddenly talking about this now?

  The three turned curious eyes on him, and the double-sword user displayed a rare moment of hesitation.

  “I know it’s a bit late for this,” he said finally, in a low voice. “But Lota, even if, like, you get into a group fight with some people as strong as you are in a field where we aren’t…you absolutely can’t give up on yourself. Don’t think of it as many against one; you focus on the one-on-one that’s in front of you. Attack. Attack, attack, cut it down, whatever it is. That’s your strength.”

  3

  “…That’s your strength. That’s what my master said. Perhaps he already knew it then…That I would stain these swords with blood at the meeting of the Seven Kings.” The Black King finished her story almost in a whisper, and Haruyuki stared wordlessly at her fierce yet elegant form.

  Before starting this direct duel, Kuroyukihime had said they would talk with swords, but fortunately, she had not come at him the second they landed in the stage. Instead, she got Haruyuki to help her turn terrain objects into chairs and sat them across from each other before telling him this somewhat long tale.

  She had mentioned no names. But one of the subleaders of the first Nega Nebulus that had been annihilated two years ago in the summer of 2044 was Kuroyukihime’s teacher. And that person had advised her to aim for singular specialization rather than all-purpose style.

  There were plenty of things she didn’t tell him that he thought strange—like, why wasn’t it her parent who had been her teacher, but some other Burst Linker?—but she looked like she was hurting in her heart at that moment, and Haruyuki leaned forward in his impromptu seat.

  “Uh, um, Kuroyukihime? I said this a little while ago, too, but…I think it’s only natural that you would have chosen the path of fighting the other kings. I mean, Brain Burst is a fighting game, and we dive into this world in order to fight…” He managed to push his linguistic abilities to the limit and put this much into words.