Archangel of Savage Light

by Reki Kawahara

  “It would feel so good if I could just fly and fly and fly toward that sun with you,” Kuroyukihime murmured.

  “I…guess so. I feel like right now, we could make it to the end of the Accelerated World,” he responded half-consciously, before suddenly coming back to himself and adding, “although my gauge would actually run out somewhere around Shibuya.”

  “What if you used the Incarnate System, I wonder,” Kuroyukihime added after a brief silence.

  “What…?” Haruyuki glanced over, but just like Crow’s, the Black King’s face was hidden by full-cover goggles, and he couldn’t discern her expression. He returned his gaze to the setting sun in the distance and thought a little before replying. “Um. If I kept climbing as high as I could with Light Speed and then gliding, I think we could go pretty far. But that’s the least stable of my Incarnate techniques. I practice sometimes, but there are plenty of times when my imagination’s lacking and I can’t activate it.”

  “I see…No, it was just a random thought. I’m sorry for suggesting something so suspect. The activation of Incarnate techniques is largely connected with your mental state. So it’s not always going to go the way you want in regular training. No need to rush it.”

  “R-right.” Haruyuki nodded, but something still wasn’t quite clicking for him, and he snuck a peek at her face in profile once more. The Incarnate System had a dual nature, light and dark. For instance, even if it was a positive Incarnate technique, taking hope as its energy source, if you misused it, you would be pulled toward the hole in your heart and eventually swallowed up by a bottomless darkness. It was Kuroyukihime herself who had taught him this, and she had barely ever said the word Incarnate without referencing its drawbacks.

  Unable to get the question “What’s wrong?” out of his mouth, Haruyuki sat in silence.

  Abruptly, Kuroyukihime moved her left hand and opened the Instruct menu. She deftly selected commands and categories on a screen that looked invisible to Haruyuki and apparently pulled something out of her storage. White particles of light collected in her hand and came together in the shape of a small rectangle.

  It was a familiar object in the Accelerated World—an item card. They held sealed within them all kinds of consumables, Armaments, burst points, and more, while others still had their own special functions like replay cards or sudden-death duel cards.

  Straining his eyes to see exactly what this particular card was, Haruyuki immediately inhaled sharply beneath his goggles. This thing sitting at the tip of Kuroyukihime’s sword had a string of vivid-red characters on an inky matte-black backdrop. Even from where he was sitting, he could read the English text inscribed there. INCARNATE SYSTEM STUDY KIT. It was the sealed ISS kit card he’d obtained four days earlier in the Setagaya area.

  An F-type Burst Linker by the name of Magenta Scissor had given it to him. She was planning to homogenize the Accelerated World with the ISS kits, and she had tried to get the small, three-member Legion Petit Paquet under her control. But she had given up when Silver Crow and Lime Bell had intervened, and then handed the two now-unnecessary sealed cards to Haruyuki before she’d left.

  It wasn’t that Magenta had abandoned her plan to disseminate the kits. That was clear from the fact that a mere three days later, she had attacked Ash Roller in Setagaya Area No. 1 and forcibly infected him with a kit. But then why had she given the two sealed cards to Haruyuki? She herself said they were tainted with positive Incarnate, so she could no longer use them, but in that case, she could have just destroyed them herself or left them to lie around in storage.

  Of course, there was also the possibility that it was some kind of trap, but Haruyuki just couldn’t believe that. He’d sensed a kind of pride in Magenta Scissor’s back as she left the cards and departed after losing a fierce battle. A strong will that said she definitely wasn’t just being manipulated by the ISS kit—or by its makers, the Acceleration Research Society.

  Thus, Haruyuki had taken the two cards home, and at the meeting the next day, he showed them to Kuroyukihime and Fuko. Naturally, they were both surprised, but the reason for that went beyond anything Haruyuki could have imagined. A single crest was hidden on the jet-black background of the ISS kit card. The crest of the first Red King, the Master Gunsmith, Red Rider.

  Having materialized the sealed card, Kuroyukihime held it above her head as she had three days earlier, up to the setting sun of the Twilight stage. Behind the item name, the crossed-guns crest rose up. The sword tip the card was adhered to shook for an instant. The air grew tense, telling the story of Kuroyukihime’s deep pain.

  Thinking that this time, for sure, he had to say something, Haruyuki opened his mouth in a trance and called to her. “Kuroyukihime…”

  She glanced over at him. But the words that should have followed did not come.

  “Um…Uh…” Panicking slightly, Haruyuki blurted out a question that was definitely inappropriate for the moment, despite the dozens of things he could have said. “H-how do you get items to stick to your sword? Is it like a magnet or something?”

  “Mm…?” This was no doubt outside her expectations, and she blinked her eye lenses a few times before she replied with a wry smile. “No, there aren’t magnets in there or anything. In my perception, I’m definitely holding it with my fingertips, but you just can’t see those fingers…Something like that, I guess…”

  “H-huh…So then, like, typing on a keyboard…”

  “Mm, it’s not impossible. Although it is a trial since I can’t see my fingers. In the Incarnate technique I showed you before, where I turn my sword into a hand, I am the source imagining my fingers becoming one with the sword. Like your Light Speed, though, it won’t really stabilize…”

  She stopped there for a moment, and then continued, sounding as though she were peering into the distant past on the other side of the card.

  “…A long, long time ago, Rider said…‘You couldn’t shoot me even if I did give you one of my guns, Lotus.’ I was a child, I thought he was teasing me, so I took offense…But maybe he was already planning it at that time. The Seven Roads, guns that absolutely could not be fired on the Seven Kings. Giving us those symbols of eternal friendship and peace. And in the end, right up to the last, he never knew this hand actually could shoot a gun…”

  “…Kuroyukihime…” Once again, all Haruyuki could do was call her name.

  But she nodded deeply at him and lowered the card. “…You went to the trouble of bringing this sealed card back for us, but I haven’t been able to uncover the reason why Rider’s crest is inscribed on it. And it goes without saying that I can’t try opening the seal.”

  “O-of course not! Please don’t say something like that, even as a joke.”

  “Yes, right. Nonetheless, we still know nothing about the card itself. But I feel like I can more or less imagine Magenta Scissor’s intention in giving it to you.”

  “Huh? Wh-what do you mean…?”

  “She knows that the crest hidden on the card is Red Rider’s and that I was the one who pushed Rider to total point loss. And she also assumed you would show me the card once you had it. In other words, this is a challenge to me. Magenta is asking me if I’m prepared to face head-on the ISS kit main body and whatever relationship it has with Rider.”

  “…!!” At these utterly unexpected words, Haruyuki’s entire body stiffened again. “Th-that’s— So then I did exactly what Magenta…”

  “No, I’m not reproaching you. It was the right decision to give me the card. Thanks to that, I was able to tell you about the White King, something I haven’t been able to speak about all this time…And I was able to gain some time to ready myself before the attack on Midtown Tower. In that sense, I almost have to thank Magenta.”

  “……”

  Although Kuroyukihime was kind enough to reassure him like this, he couldn’t actually hold his head up high for a while. Whatever Magenta Scissor’s true intent, it was a fact that Haruyuki had given Kuroyukihime an enormous mental shock
. Head hanging deeply, he murmured, I’m sorry, Kuroyukihime in his heart, and then took a deep breath and switched gears. If she was trying to ready herself, then he couldn’t shake her up now.

  “…Kuroyukihime?” Yanking himself up straight, Haruyuki voiced the biggest question that had popped up during their conversation so far. “What do you think the ‘whatever relationship’ you mentioned between Red Rider and the ISS kit main body is? The first Red King left the Accelerated World a long time ago, more than two and a half years ago. I don’t think it’s possible for him to be directly involved…”

  “Mm…I think you’re quite right. If any relationship is possible, then the only thing I can imagine is that some kind of Enhanced Armament generated with Rider’s unique ability—with Arms Creation—is still somewhere in the Accelerated World, and that it’s playing a role in the production of the ISS kits.”

  “Arms…Creation…” As he hoarsely parroted the words, Haruyuki was once again struck by how incredible an ability this power of the first Red King’s actually was.

  Normally, Enhanced Armament could only be obtained through level-up bonuses or purchases at the shop, but Red Rider had been able to make them. The true wonder of this power was in the way it grew in influence the more time passed. Even assuming he could only make one every three days, that was ten weapons in a month. Which worked out to a pile of a hundred twenty guns in a year. He didn’t have to think too hard to see how much these arms would strengthen the Legion.

  So then, rather than stopping at mere guns, did Red Rider go even further and produce some thing that could make new Enhanced Armaments? And then, through whatever set of circumstances, did that thing fall into the hands of the Acceleration Research Society, and was it now being used to manufacture ISS kits?

  “An Enhanced Armament that can generate Enhanced Armaments…” Kuroyukihime nodded slightly, as if Haruyuki had spoken these thoughts out loud. “If you’d asked me four days ago whether something like that could exist, I would have laughed it off. But now that I’ve seen Rider’s crest inscribed on the sealed ISS kit card…I can’t think of any other explanation. And…”

  Kuroyukihime cut herself off there and turned her face mask to the right of the evening sun. Ahead, skyscrapers soared upward, a little shorter than the old Tokyo Tower but several times wider. Two buildings, with the wide main road between them. The curvy building on the left was Roppongi Hills Tower, where Haruyuki had once fought the Green King, Green Grandé. And the perfectly square building to the right was Tokyo Midtown Tower, the ultimate target of their current mission. Kuroyukihime’s eye lenses were naturally turned to the tower on the right. Like the other buildings in the stage, it had been transformed to resemble a chalky temple, but even from twelve hundred meters away, Haruyuki felt a kind of unearthliness shrouding it.

  Encamped at the summit of Midtown Tower was the Legend-class Enemy Archangel Metatron, invisible and impenetrable to all attacks, and its eyes shone with a light that would generally evaporate anyone who came within two hundred meters of the building. And on one of the higher floors hid the ISS kit main body, the core of the Acceleration Research Society’s plans. Unless they succeeded in their task to slip past Metatron’s ferocious attack, charge into the tower, and destroy the kit main body, the Accelerated World would be blanketed in darkness—and Haruyuki would lose his bond with Rin Kusakabe and Ash Roller forever.

  He unconsciously curled his hands into tight fists, and Kuroyukihime began to speak once more as she stared at Midtown Tower. “And I feel it. Like, I’m going to end up facing my past in that place…Although I don’t know yet what form it will take.”

  “Your…past?”

  “Yes. Since becoming a Burst Linker seven years ago, I’ve made a great many mistakes. Driven forward by my endless ambition, I have brandished my swords and spilled much blood. This card is wet with that blood. If I can reach that puddle of it…At the source, my past is most certainly waiting for me.”

  Uttering these bleak words, Kuroyukihime sat up straighter, her eyes still on the massive tower in the distance. “But I won’t forget anymore. I’m not going to try to run from the past. I have Fuko, Utai, Akira, Takumu, Chiyuri, Niko, Leopard…and you. No matter what is waiting there in the tower, I will not take even a single step back. That alone I promise you now.”

  Even after she stopped speaking, Haruyuki couldn’t respond right away. In fact, he couldn’t even turn his head. Because the tears that had built up beneath his silver mask threatened to spill out if he moved even a little.

  Staring hard at the evening sun, blurred into a rainbow, Haruyuki took a deep breath and somehow managed to reply. “I…promise, too. No matter how hard the fight is, I won’t break. I won’t give up. I will fight with you, by your side right up until the last.”

  “Mm.” Kuroyukihime nodded and then, after a second, added, “But if I tell you to run—”

  “I’m not leaving you and everyone and running. Never,” Haruyuki declared resolutely before she could finish.

  In the end, Haruyuki and Kuroyukihime didn’t go back to Fufuan, but rather stayed there, talking on the bench. Ninety percent of their conversation was meaningless chatter, but recently, Kuroyukihime had been busy preparing for the school festival, and they hadn’t really had time to talk, just the two of them, so for Haruyuki, it was a span of time like a dream.

  Eventually, he heard the door opening behind them and looked back to see Niko stepping out on the grass, stretching hard. She froze when she noticed him sitting alongside Kuroyukihime, and her two antennas twitched and shivered before she came over to them at a trot.

  “Morning, Big Brother! ”

  Why angel mode all of a sudden? His guard up, Haruyuki returned the greeting. “M-morning, Niko. You sleep okay?”

  “Yup! But my big brother was supposed to be snuggling me, and when I woke up, he was gone, so I was saaaad.”

  “…Oh?”

  He heard a fairly severe voice beside him, and Haruyuki waved both hands and shook his head frantically from side to side as he leapt off the bench.

  “N-no, no, no, no!” Yelping, he turned back to Niko and hastily retreated several steps—until one of his feet missed the edge of the tower, and he lurched backward.

  “Wh-whoa, whoa, whoa!” He flung out his arms, flailing, before he finally remembered the wings on his back and fluttered them slightly to return to solid ground. He panted heavily before insisting, “I—I wasn’t hugging you! You were using Pard as a pillow the whole time!”

  “Oh my? Waaaas I? Oh, I know! I was getting my memory of last night mixed up with—”

  “Aaaaah!” Haruyuki made an enormous X with his arms to shut Niko up, and then cleared his throat several times, straightened again, and deliberately changed the topic. “A-anyway, is everyone else still asleep, then? Given that we still need time for the strategy meeting, maybe it’s about time we woke them!”

  “Oh, Raker was awake, so she probably woke everyone else up by now. But, like, did you guys actually get any sleep?”

  At this question from Niko—angel mode ended—Kuroyukihime nodded, some suspicion still hanging in the air around her. “Yes, no problems. We woke up a little early, so we were merely examining attack strategies.”

  “Ohhh, attack strategies, hmm?”

  “…What are you trying to say?”

  “Noooothing.”

  Sparks crackled in the air between the two kings—or they did in Haruyuki’s mind anyway. He started to retreat again, but only a fool would step off the edge a second time.

  “Uh, um.” He managed to still his feet and speak. “S-so then, I’ll go call everyone else. I figure it’s probably better to have the meeting looking at Midtown Tower.”

  Taking care to move with the utmost naturalness, he had taken a few steps when he heard Kuroyukihime’s voice behind him.

  “Haruyuki. Once the mission is complete and we return to the other side, I would like to ask you about last night, so stay in the student counci
l office.”

  “……H-hokay,” he replied nervously, then headed for the house at a quick pace somewhere between a fast walk and a trot.

  On the other side of the still-open door, everyone was awake and up just as Niko had guessed. Only Pard and Akira, who were apparently not morning people, were a bit unsteady on their feet, but they came out with Fuko prodding them forward.

  Utai, Chiyuri, and Takumu followed shortly after, and no sooner was the house empty than Fuko was immediately closing the door and locking it.

  She’s really on top of it, Haruyuki thought.

  She looked back, key dangling in her right hand. “We don’t even use this kind of key in the real world, what with long-distance locks for houses and cars. So if I don’t lock it right after I come outside, I forget.”

  “Oh, makes sense. Have you ever actually forgotten?”

  “I have, of course. I went without realizing I’d forgotten to lock it for five days in real time. I left the door wide open for nearly fourteen years on this side.”

  “F-fourteen…Did any robbers or anyone come inside?”

  “It really was quite strange. Although the items I’d put into the storage attached to the house were all fine, the food alone was completely gone. I think it was Ash’s work, but he wouldn’t confess even when I questioned him.”

  Haruyuki started to imagine exactly what form the questioning took before he had an abrupt realization and shook his head violently. “Oh! N-no, it wasn’t me either!”

  “Goodness, you weren’t even asked the question yet. That’s quite the quick reaction, hmm?”

  “I—I—I—I—I—I really didn’t!”

  Ahead of them, Akira and Pard were apparently back to normal blood pressure, awake enough now to both turn at the same time.