Volu 1, Chapter 4: The Exorcist Chooses the End. (N)Ever_Say_Good_bye.
With moonlight at their backs, the two magicians stepped through the door, still wearing their outdoor shoes.
Stiyl and Kanzaki had returned but Index did not stand in their way this ti. She did not shout at them to leave. She was covered in sweat like she was suffering from a fever and her breathing was so shallow it sounded like one could blow it out like a candle fla.
A headache.
A headache so great it felt like even the slight sound of accumulating snow would split her head open.
“...”
Kamijou and the magicians exchanged no words.
Still in his outdoor shoes, Stiyl pushed Kamijou aside as the boy stood there dumbfounded. The shove had held little force but Kamijou was could not hold his ground. He fell on his backside atop the old tatami mats as if all strength had left his body.
Stiyl neglected to even look in Kamijou’s direction. He knelt down next to Index, whose limbs were sprawled out limply. The magician then muttered sothing under his breath.
His shoulders were trembling. He was a perfect representation of human angers felt when a person’s precious was hurt before them.
“Based on Crowley’s Moonchild, we will use the thod of capturing an angel to create a chain of events that will summon, capture, and have a fairy work for our ends.”
Having gathered his resolve, Stiyl stood up. When he turned, his expression was void of the slightest hint of humanity. His face was the face of a magician who abandoned his humanity to save a certain girl.
“Kanzaki, give your help. We need to destroy her mories.”
Kamijou felt like those words stabbed into the most fragile part of his heart.
“Ah...”
He knew that robbing Index of her mories was only ant to save her.
And, Kamijou had once told Kanzaki that they should not hesitate to destroy her mories if they were truly acting solely for Index’s sake. No matter how many tis she lost her mories, they just had to give her even better mories the next ti. That way she could look forward to the coming year even if she must lose her mories.
But...
Wasn’t that just a compromise to be made after exhausting every other option? Kamijou thought.
“...”
Without realizing it, Kamijou had begun clenching his fist hard enough to crack his nails.
Could he do it? Could he just give up? Any number of research facilities dealing with a human’s mories and mind existed in Academy City. Could he really give up here when there might be a happier way to save Index in one of those facilities? Using old fashioned magic would destroy the mories that she cared about the most. Was it really okay to continue to rely on the world’s easiest, and the world’s cruelest, thod.
No, that was irrelevant. All the boring reasoning and rationalization no longer mattered.
Could he... Could Kamijou Touma bear to have the week he spent with Index reverted to a blank slate like soone deleted the save data for a video ga?
“...Wait.” Kamijou Touma raised his head.
He directly and honestly raised his head with the intention of opposing the magicians who were acting to save Index.
“Wait, please wait! Just a bit longer! Just a bit! There are 2.3 million espers in Academy City and there are over 1000 research institutions running it all. There’s Psychotry, Marionette, Telekinesis, and Materialize! We have tons of espers who can manipulate minds and labs that develop the mind! If we get their help, we might not have to rely on this horrible thod!”
“...”
Stiyl Magnus said nothing. Even so, Kamijou continued to shout at the fla magician.
“You don’t want to us this thod either, right!? Deep down in your heart, you’re praying that there is so other way, right!? Then just wait a bit longer. I will make sure to find an ending where everyone is smiling and everyone is happy! So...!!”
“...”
Stiyl Magnus said nothing.
Kamijou had no idea why he was going so far. He had only t Index a week before. He had lived for 16 years before then without knowing her and there was no reason why he would be unable to live a normal life without her from then on.
There was no reason why, yet he knew he could not.
He did not know why. He was uneven sure if he even needed a reason why.
He just knew it hurt.
It hurt to think that her words, her smile, and her mannerisms would never be directed towards him again.
It hurt to think that the mories of that week would be easily wiped clean by soone else as if a reset button were being pressed.
Just considering the possibility caused great pain in the most precious and kindest part of his heart.
“...”
Silence filled the room like that of an elevator’s. Rather than a silence where was capable of making noise, the odd silence there was filled with only the faint sound of breathing, the people there rely remaining silent.
Kamijou raised his head.
With great caution, he looked at the magician.
“Is that all you want to say, you self-righteous failure?”
And... That was all the rune magician Stiyl Magnus said.
It was not that he had not listened to what Kamijou said.
His ears had heard every single one of Kamijou’s words, had processed them, and had comprehended their aning as well as the feelings hidden below the surface.
And yet, Stiyl Magnus did not move so much as an eyebrow.
Kamijou’s words had not hit ho with him in the slightest.
“Out of the way,” said Stiyl. Kamijou had no idea how the muscles on his face were moving. Without so much as a sigh, Stiyl said to Kamijou, “Look.”
He pointed. Before Kamijou could look over in the direction Stiyl was pointing, he grabbed Kamijou’s hair.
“Look!!”
“Ah...” Kamijou's voice froze over.
Before his eyes, he saw Index who looked like her breathing could stop at any mont.
“Can you say the sa thing in front of her?” Stiyl’s voice trembled. “Can you say the sa thing while she is re seconds away from death!? Can you say the sa thing while she is in too much pain to even open her eyes!? Can you tell her to wait because you have so things you’d like to try out!!?”
“...”
Index’s fingers stirred. It was unclear if she were barely conscious or if she were moving subconsciously, but she desperately moved her hand that seed as heavy as lead and tried to touch Kamijou’s face.
It was as if she were desperately trying to protect Kamijou as the magician grabbed his hair.
It was as if she thought her own intense pain was aningless.
“If you can, then you are not human! Anyone who could see her like this and still inject her with so untested drug, let so strange doctor ss with her body, and fill her body with drugs can’t possibly be human!” Stiyl’s shout stabbed through Kamijou’s eardrums and into his brain. “Answer , esper. Are you still human or are you a monster who has abandoned his humanity!?”
“...” Kamijou could not answer.
Stiyl went in for one last blow like stabbing a sword into the heart of a deceased.
He pulled a necklace with a small cross on it from his pocket.
“This tool is needed to destroy her mories.” Stiyl waved the cross in front of Kamijou’s face. “As you might guess, it’s a magical item. If you touch it with your right hand, it should lose all power just like my Innocentius.”
The cross swayed back and forth in front of Kamijou like a five yen coin being used for a cheap bit of hypnotism.
“But can you negate it, esper?”
As if he had frozen in place, Kamijou stared up at Stiyl.
“When that girl is suffering before your very eyes, can you take this from her!? If you believe so much in your own power, then negate it, oh mutant who thinks he’s a hero!”
Kamijou stared.
He looked at the cross swaying before his eyes. He looked at the abominable cross that could rob people of their mories.
As Stiyl had said, he could stop the deletion of Index’s mories if he took that from him. It was nothing difficult. He just had to reach out his hand and lightly touch it with the tips of his fingers.
That was all. It should have been so easy. Kamijou clenched his trembling right hand until it was as hard as rock.
But he could not do it.
For the mont, magic was the one safe and surefire way to save Index. How could he take that from the girl who was suffering and putting up with it all?
He simply could not.
“Our preparations will be complete at 0:15 at the earliest. We will destroy her mories using the power of Leo,” Stiyl said to Kamijou in disinterest.
0:15... He likely had less than 10 minutes left.
“...!!”
He wanted to shout out and tell them to stop. He wanted to yell out and tell them to wait. However, Kamijou would not be the one who would suffer as a result. The cost of Kamijou’s selfishness would all co back to Index.
Just accept it.
—My na is Index.
Just accept it already.
—Anyway, it would be great if you could feed enough food to fill up.
Just accept that you, Kamijou Touma, have neither the power nor the right to save Index!
Kamijou could not shout and could not cry out.
He could only stare up at the ceiling, grit his back teeth, and let tears he could not hold back fall from his eyes.
“...Hey, magician,” Kamijou muttered blankly as he continued to stare up at the ceiling and lean against the bookshelf. “How do you think I should say farewell to her in the end?”
“We don’t have ti for this nonsense.”
“I see,” replied Kamijou blankly.
Kamijou would have remained frozen in place there, but Stiyl did not let up.
“Leave this place, monster.” The magician looked at Kamijou. “Your right hand negated my flas. I still don’t understand how it works and we can’t have it interfering with the spell we are going to use.”
“I see,” replied Kamijou emptily. Kamijou gave a small, corpse-like smile. “It was the sa with that wound on her back. Why is there never anything I can do?” How should I know? Stiyl’s eyes seed to say.
“I can destroy even the systems of God with this right hand.” Kamijou seed to crumble. “So why can’t I save just one suffering girl?”
He smiled. He did not curse fate and he did not bla it on misfortune. He simply reflected on his own powerlessness.
Kanzaki looked at him with a pained expression and said, “We still have 10 minutes until we perform the ceremony at 0:15.”
Stiyl looked at Kanzaki as if he could not believe what he was seeing. But, Kanzaki only smiled when she looked at Stiyl.
“On the night we first swore to erase her mories, we spent the whole night crying by her side. Isn’t that right, Stiyl?”
“...” Stiyl fell silent for a mont as if his breath had caught in his throat. “B-But we have no idea what he’ll do. What if he attempts a double suicide while we aren’t looking?”
“If he were willing to do that, don’t you think he would have touched the cross right away? You only used the real cross rather than a fake because you were already sure he was human, right?”
“But...”
“Whatever we do, we cannot perform the ceremony until the ti is right. If he has any regrets left, he might try to stop us mid-ceremony, Stiyl.”
Stiyl gritted his teeth. He held himself back like he was on the verge of lunging and ripping out Kamijou’s throat like a beast.
“You have 10 minutes. Okay!?”
He then spun around and left the apartnt.
Kanzaki silently followed Stiyl from the room, but a heartbreaking smile could be seen in her eyes.
The door closed. Only Kamijou and Index remained in the room. The 10 minutes had been gained at the risk of not Kamijou’s life, but Index’s. And yet, Kamijou knew not what he was supposed to do.
“Ah... Kh. Fh...” A few odd noises escaped Index’s lips as she lay limply sprawled out. Kamijou jumped in shock.
Index opened her eyes slightly. She seed to wonder why she was in the futon, worrying about where Kamijou was when he should have been in the futon.
She had completely forgotten about herself.
“...”
Kamijou gritted his teeth. At that mont, standing before her was more frightening than fighting those magicians.
But, running away was not an option.
“Touma?”
Kamijou approached the futon and Index breathed a sigh of relief. The look on her sweat-covered face was one of relief, from the bottom of her heart.
“...I’m sorry,” said Kamijou as he hung his head down to et Index’s gaze.
“...? Touma, there’s so kind of magic circle in this room.”
Index had been unconscious, so she did not know that it was drawn by the two magicians. She tilted her head to the side in a girlish sign of puzzlent as she looked at the symbols drawn on the wall near the futon.
“...”
For an instant, Kamijou clenched his back teeth.
It was for just an instant. Before anyone could have noticed, his expression returned to normal.
“...It’s for recovery magic. We can’t leave your headaches this bad, now can we?”
“? Magic... Who’s casting it?” At that instant, a certain possibility entered Index’s mind.
“!?”
Index forced her unmoving body to move and attempted to spring up. When her face twisted in pain, Kamijou grabbed her shoulders and pushed her back into the futon.
“Touma! Have the magicians co back!? Touma, you need to get out of here!!”
Index looked at Kamijou with an expression of disbelief. She knew just how dangerous magicians were and was wholeheartedly worried for Kamijou.
“...It’s okay, Index.”
“Touma!”
“It’s over. ...It’s already over.”
“Touma,” said Index quietly and then, all strength left her body.
Kamijou had no idea what kind of expression was on his face.
“...I’m sorry,” said Kamijou. “I will get stronger. I will never lose again. I will get strong enough to kick the asses of every last person who would treat you like this...”
Even crying would have been cowardly. Inviting her sympathy was unthinkable.
“...Just wait. Next ti, I will make sure to truly save you.”
How did he appear in Index’s eyes?
How did he sound in Index’s ears?”
“I understand. I’ll wait.”
Because she knew not the situation, to Index, it had to seem like Kamijou had lost to the enemy and sold Index out for his own safety.
Yet, she smiled.
Her smile was battered. Her smile was perfect. Her smile looked like it would crumble at any mont. Even so, she smiled.
Kamijou could not understand. He could no longer understand how she could be that trusting of people. That was when he made up his mind.
“Once your headaches get better, let’s take out these magicians and win your freedom,” he said. “I’d like to go to the beach after that, but we’ll have to wait until my supplentary lessons are over,”
“Would you like to transfer to my school once sumr break is over?” he asked.
“I’d like to make all sorts of mories,” Index said.
“You will,” promised Kamijou.
He continued forward with the lie.
It mattered not what was true or false. He no longer needed that kind of cold, cruel, and proper justice that could not comfort even a single girl.
The boy by the na of Kamijou Touma needed neither justice nor evil.
False words were more than enough for him, which why Kamijou Touma shed not a single tear.
Not even one.
“...”
With a light noise, Index’s hand lost all strength and fell atop the futon. Having passed out once more, Index looked like a corpse.
“But...” Kamijou softly bit his lip as he looked at Index’s feverish face. “What kind of horrible ending is this?”
He tasted blood where he was biting his lip.
He knew that what was happening was wrong and hated how powerless he was to stop it. Yes. Kamijou could do nothing. He could neither deal with the 103,000 grimoires taking up 85 percent of Index’s brain nor protect the mories filling up the 15 percent left over.
“...Huh?”
As hopeless thoughts raced through his mind, Kamijou suddenly felt that sothing was off.
85 percent?
Kamijou looked back at Index’s feverish face.
85 percent. Yes, that was what Kanzaki had said. 85 percent of Index’s brain was filled with the 103,000 grimoires she had morized. The pressure that was put on her brain ant she that could fit only a year’s worth of mories in the remaining 15 percent. If she added any more mories than that, her brain would burst.
But wait a second. How could 15 percent only hold a year’s worth of mories? He analyzed.
Kamijou had no idea how rare a condition a perfect mory was. However, he was rather sure it was not so rare that Index was the only person in the world with it.
And, the others with perfect mories did not use so ridiculous thod like magic to erase their mories.
If it were true that 15 percent of the brain could only hold a year’s worth of mories...
“...That ans they’d die at about 6 or seven years old.”
If the condition were so kind of incurable disease like that, wouldn’t it be more prolific?
Also...
Where had Kanzaki gotten those figures, 85 percent and 15 percent?
Who had told her that?
Was the information about 85 percent of the brain even accurate?
“...They were tricked.”
What if Kanzaki truthfully knew nothing about neuroscience? What if she had simply accepted what her superiors in the church had told her?
Kamijou had a bad premonition.
He rushed over to the black phone in the corner of the room. Komoe-sensei was out sowhere. He had searched all over the room and found her cell phone number not too long before, so that was not an issue.
The chanical ringing sound, which had a way of truly aggravating people, continued for briefly.
Kamijou had a feeling that sothing was mistaken in Kanzaki’s description of a perfect mory. What if that mistake were intentionally planted by the church? They might have had hid so secret.
With a staticky noise, the phone connected.
“Sensei!!” Kamijou shouted almost entirely by reflex.
“Ohh, is that you, Kamijou-chan~? You shouldn’t be using my phone~”
“...You sound happy.”
“Yes~... I am at a public bath right now~. I’ve got a coffee milk in one hand and I’m testing out a new massage chair~. Yes~.”
“...”
Kamijou thought he would to crush the receiver in his grip but Index’s situation was direr at the mont.
“Sensei, please just listen quietly to what I have to say. The truth is...”
Kamijou asked about perfect mories.
What were they? Did a year’s worth of mories really use up 15 percent of the brain? In other words, was it a condition that set one’s lifespan at only 6 or seven years?
“Of course not~.” Komoe-sensei cut it all down in one short sentence. “It is true that a perfect mory makes you unable to forget garbage mories like the flyer for a sale from last year at a supermarket~. But it isn’t like the brain can burst from that~. They’ll just take their 100 years’ worth of mories to their grave~. The human brain can hold up to 140 years’ worth of mories, after all~.”
Kamijou’s heart skipped a beat.
“B-But what if they were learning things at a trendous rate? Like what if they used their mory to morize all the books in a library? Would their brain burst then?”
“Sigh... Kamijou-chan, I can see why you fail all your developnt lessons~,” said Komoe-sensei happily. “Listen up, Kamijou-chan~. People don’t have just one type of mory. Things like language and knowledge fall under semantic mories, things like habits falls under procedural mories, and what we most often think of as mories fall under episodic mories~. There are all sorts of types~. All sorts~.”
“Um, sensei... I don’t really understand what you an.”
“Basically~.” Komoe-sensei loved to explain things so she was delighted. “Each type of mory goes into different containers~. Think of it like burnable trash and unburnable trash~. If you get hit on the head and get amnesia, you don’t just start talking gibberish and crawling around on the ground, right~?”
“So...”
“Yes~. No matter how many library books the person morized, that would only increase the amount of semantic mory~. According to neuroscience, it is absolutely impossible for that to overwhelm the person’s episodic mory~.”
Kamijou felt like he had received that supposed hit on the head.
The receiver slipped from his hand. The fallen receiver struck the hook, ending the call, but Kamijou no longer had the ti to care.
The church had lied to Kanzaki. Index’s perfect mory was not a danger to her life.
“But... why?” Kamijou muttered in stunned shock.
Yes, why? Why would the church lie and falsely state that Index would die in a year?
Also, Index’s suffering before Kamijou’s eyes certainly did not seem like a lie. If it were not being caused by her perfect mory, then why was she suffering?
“...Ha.”
After thinking that far, Kamijou suddenly laughed out loud.
Yes. The church had put a collar on Index.
...A collar that force her to require maintenance from the church every year to survive. A collar that insured that Index would not use the 103,000 grimoires she controlled to betray them.
What if Index did not need the techniques and spells of the church to survive?
What if she could perfectly well live on her own without the help of the church?
In that case, the church would never be able to leave Index be. If she could just run off and disappear with 103,000 grimoires, they would feel the need to put a collar on her.
To repeat, the church had placed a collar on Index.
That made things simple.
There had originally been nothing wrong with Index’s head, but the church had done sothing to it.
“...Ha ha.”
For example, what if they had done sothing similar to filling the bottom of a 10 liter bucket with cent so that only a liter of water could fit?
They had done sothing to Index’s mind so that her brain would burst after only a year’s worth of mories.
That way, Index had to rely on the techniques and spells of the church.
That way, Index’s comrades would have to choke back their tears and obey the church.
They wove a devilish program that took even human kindness and sympathy into account.
“...But that doesn’t matter.”
Yes, it really did not matter.
What mattered and what he had to worry about was just one thing: the identity of the church’s security was causing Index’s suffering. Academy City, which monopolized espers like Kamijou, was the cutting edge of science. What was it that Necessarius controlled for magicians that was the cutting edge in its own way?
Yes, the supernatural power known as magic. And, Kamijou Touma’s right hand could negate it with a touch even if it were the systems of God.
In that clockless room, Kamijou wondered what the ti was.
He likely had little ti left until the ceremony began. He looked over to the apartnt door. If he told the truth to the magicians on the other side of that door, would they believe him? The answer was no. Kamijou was just a high school student. He had no dical license in neuroscience and his relationship with the magicians might as well have been called “enemies”. He doubted they would believe him.
Kamijou lowered his gaze.
He looked at Index, sprawled out on the futon. She was completely soaked in an unpleasant sweat and her silver hair looked like a bucket of water had been dumped on her. Her face was feverishly red and her eyebrows occasionally moved in pain.
–When that girl is suffering before your very eyes, can you take this from her!? If you believe so much in your own power, then negate it, oh mutant who thinks he’s a hero! Kamijou gave a slight smile at the words that Stiyl had beaten him back with before.
The world had changed enough that he could smile at it.
“I don’t just think I’m a hero.”
Still smiling, he removed the white bandages thoroughly wrapped around his right hand.
It was as if he removed a seal from the hand.
“I will be the hero.”
He spoke, he smiled, and he pressed his battered right hand against Index’s forehead.
While he said it could negate even the systems of God, he had thought that it was a useless right hand that would not let him defeat even a single delinquent, would not raise his scores on tests, and would not make him popular with girls.
But, there was one thing it could do.
If it could save the girl who suffered before his very eyes, it held a most wonderful power.
...
...
...?
“... ...Huh?”
Nothing happened. Nothing at all happened.
There were no lights or noises, but had the magic the church implented been negated? No, Index still grimaced as if in pain. It certainly seed like nothing had happened.
Kamijou looked puzzled and touched her on the cheek and the back of the head, but nothing happened. Nothing changed. Nothing changed, but he did rember sothing.
Kamijou had already touched Index a few tis.
For instance, he had touched her all over when he carried her from the dorm building after he punched out Stiyl. When Index had revealed her identity from within the futon, Kamijou had lightly struck her on the forehead. But of course nothing had happened.
Kamijou looked puzzled. He did not think he was wrong. Also, he doubted there was so supernatural power that his right hand could not negate. In that case...
In that case, was there so part of Index he had not touched?
“... ... ... ... ...Ah.”
His mind imdiately reached a very inappropriate place, but he forced it back on track.
However, he could think of nowhere besides there. If it were magic that was afflicting Index and there was no magic Kamijou’s right hand could not negate, then he could only think that his right hand had yet to touch it.
But then, where was it?
Kamijou looked down at Index’s feverish face. Since the magic had to do with mories, would the magic be located on her head or sowhere near her head? If there were a magic circle carved into the inside of her skull, even Kamijou would have to simply give up. If it were inside her body, he could not arbitrarily touch it with his finger that was covered in germs, but...
“...Oh.”
Kamijou looked at Index’s face once more.
Her eyebrows were moving in pain, her eyes were held tightly shut, and her nose was covered in mud-like sweat. Ignoring it all, Kamijou lowered his gaze to her cute lips taking shallow breaths.
Kamijou slipped his right thumb and forefinger between those lips and forced her mouth open.
...The back of her throat.
Due to the protection of the skull, the back of the throat was closer to her brain than the back of her head. Also, people would almost never see it and it was unlikely soone would touch it. At the back of her dark red throat was a single eerie mark like sothing from TV horoscopes. The mark was carved in pure black.
“...”
Kamijou narrowed his eyes once, gathered his resolve, and proceeded to shove his hand into the girl’s mouth.
Her mouth wriggled like it was a different creature altogether as his fingers slipped inside. The oddly warm saliva wrapped around his fingers. The unsettling feeling of her tongue made Kamijou hesitate for an instant but he then pressed his fingers in the rest of the way to jab at the back of Index’s throat.
It appeared to Kamijou that Index shuddered violently with a powerful urge to vomit.
Then, he felt a slight shock in his right index finger as if from static electricity. In the sa instant, his right hand was forcefully blown backwards.
“Gah...!?”
A great number of blood droplets dripped onto the futon and tatami mats.
It had felt like his wrist had been shot at by a handgun and he instinctively looked down at his right hand. The wounds Kanzaki had given him had reopened and fresh blood was audibly dripping down onto the tatami mats.
As he held his hand up before his face, he noticed sothing beyond it.
As Index lay limply in the futon, her eyes silently opened and they glowed red.
The color was different from her irises.
Glowing blood red magic circles floated in her eyes.
Not good...!! He panicked.
An instinctual chill ran down Kamijou’s spine; he lacked the ti to even hold his destroyed right hand up.
Her eyes glowed a frightening red and sothing exploded.
With a trendous shock, Kamijou’s body struck the bookcase. The wooden planks making up the bookcase were smashed apart and the books thundered down to the floor. An intense pain rushed through Kamijou’s body as if all of his joints had been smashed to pieces along with the bookcase.
Trembling, Kamijou just barely managed to stand back up, his legs threatening to collapse beneath him. The tallic taste of blood mixed in with the saliva in his mouth.
“Warning: Chapter 3, Verse 2. All barriers for Index Librorum Prohibitorum’s collar from first to third have been breached. Preparing to regenerate... failed. The collar cannot self-regenerate. Switching priorities to the elimination of the intruder in order to protect the 103,000 archived grimoires.”
Kamijou looked at what lay before him.
Index slowly stood up in such an unsettling manner that she seed like a boneless, joint-less sack filled with jelly. The crimson magic circles in her eyes pierced Kamijou.
While they were technically eyes, Kamijou found it difficult to think of them as such.
They held no human light and no feminine warmth.
Kamijou had seen those eyes before. When the girl’s back had been sliced open by Kanzaki, collapsing her in front of the student dorm, she had spoken about runes like a machine. These were the eyes she had at that ti.
I have no magic power, so I can’t use it.
“...Co to think of it, there was one thing I forgot to ask you,” Kamijou muttered under his breath as he clenched his battered right fist. “If you’re not an esper, why is it you have no magic power?”
The answer to that question was likely right before him. The church had prepared multiple layers of security. If soone found out about the secret of her perfect mory and tried to remove the collar, Index would automatically use her 103,000 grimoires to use the powerful magic held within in order to literally keep the person who knew the truth from saying anything ever again. All of Index’s magic power was put into running that auto defense system.
“Using the 103,000 archived grimoires to determine the magic spell used to damage the barrier... failed. The specified magic cannot be determined. Putting together an anti-intruder local weapon to expose the composition of the spell.” Index tilted her head like a corpse puppet. “The magic expected to be most effective on the specific intruder has been formulated. Proceeding to activate the special magic: St. George’s Sanctuary to destroy the intruder.”
With a trendous noise, the two magic circles in Index’s eyes grew simultaneously. Two magic circles over two ters across were now positioned in front of Index’s face. Each one was fixed in place with its center over one of her eyes and the magic circles would move through the air when she slightly moved her head.
“..”
Index sang sothing that was beyond human comprehension.
For an instant, the two magic circles centered on her eyes glowed before exploding. More specifically, it seed like an explosion of high voltage electricity occurred in a point in space between Index’s eyes and lightning scattered in every direction.
However, rather than bluish-white electricity, the lightning was pitch black.
Though an unscientific description, space itself had seemingly cracked open. Centered at the point where the two magic circles crossed, pitch black special cracks spread out in every directions to the edges of the room.
It was like a window that was shot by a bullet. It almost seed like a type of barrier preventing anyone from approaching Index.
Sothing seemingly pulsating swelled up from within the cracks. A beast-like scent wafted in from the slight opening created by the pitch black cracks.
“Ah.” Kamijou suddenly knew.
This was based on neither theory nor logic. Nor was it based on reason or sense. Perhaps his basic instincts were shouting it at him; he knew not what exactly the thing within the cracks was. However, he knew that seeing —viewing it directly and honestly— would be enough to destroy the being that was Kamijou Touma.
“Ah.” Kamijou trembled.
The cracks spread and spread and spread and spread. Even though he knew that whatever within approached, he could not move. He trembled, he trembled so more, and he truly did tremble. After all...
He just had to defeat whatever that was. He and he alone had the hand that could save Index.
“Ah ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!!”
And, that was why he trembled with delight.
Was he afraid? Of course not. After all, he had been waiting for this mont for so long.
While he said it could negate even the systems of God, his hand was so useless it would not let him defeat even a single delinquent, would not raise his scores on tests, and would not make him popular with girls.
When a girl’s back had been sliced open due to him, when he had been forced to leave the apartnt so as not to interfere with the recovery magic, and when the wire-wielding samurai girl had beaten him within an inch of his life, he had cursed his own powerlessness while wishing all the while that he could save that girl!
It was not that he particularly wanted to beco the hero of this story. It was just that he held the power in his right hand to negate and tear this too cruel a story to pieces!
He was only four ters away. If he touched that girl just once more, he could bring it all to an end! That was why Kamijou ran toward the cracks and toward Index who stood beyond them.
He clenched his right fist.
He clenched it so he that could negate the never-ending and horribly, horribly boring ending to that cruel story.
At the sa ti, the cracks spread all at once and “opened”. It looked as painful as a virgin’s hyn being forcibly ripped open. The giant cracks opened wide enough to reach the edges of the room and the “thing” inside peered out.
A pillar of light shot out from within the cracks.
It looked sothing like a laser beam about a ter across. The light was so pure a white it looked like it had been lted by the sun. The instant it shot out at him, Kamijou thrust his battered right hand out in front of his face.
The sound of the impact was like a piece of at being pressed against a hot tal sheet.
However, there was no pain... and no heat. As if it were a pillar of water coming from a fire hose being repelled by a clear wall, the pillar of light scattered in every direction when it struck Kamijou’s right hand.
Even so, the pillar of light itself was not completely negated.
Just like with Stiyl’s Innocentius, it seed to have no end no matter how often he negated it. His feet planted on the tatami mats were slowly pushed backwards and his right hand felt like it would be blown away by the great pressure.
No... That isn’t... what this is...!! Kamijou thought with desperation.
Kamijou grabbed his right wrist with his empty left hand. He felt a stinging pain in the palm of his right hand. The magic was eating into it. His right was not negating it quickly enough and the pillar of light was approaching milliter by milliter.
This isn’t just a large mass! Each individual piece of light is sothing different!! He frantically realized.
It was possible Index was using her 103,000 grimoires to use 103,000 different types of magic at the sa ti. Each individual grimoire held instant death and she was using them all at once.
Suddenly, Kamijou heard so noise from the other side of the apartnt.
Did they only now notice sothing’s wrong? Rebuked Kamijou.
The door swung open and the two magicians charged in.
“Dammit, what are you doing!? You're still struggling in—...!?” Stiyl began to shout but his breath caught in his throat, as if punched in the back. The sight of the pillar of light and of Index who had fired it had him look like his heart had stopped.
Kanzaki, who had seed so superior and powerful before, looked utterly taken aback by the scene displayed before her.
“D-Dragon Breath? It can’t be. Just how is she using magic!?”
Kamijou did not turn around.
While it was true he was hardly in a situation where he could turn around, it had more to do with him not wanting to take his eyes off of Index.
“Hey, do you know what this pillar of light is!?” He shouted at them without turning around. “What’s it called?
What is it!? What’s its weakness!? What should I do? Explain each and every step from start to finish!!”
“...But... but... what is...?”
“God, you piss off! Isn’t it obvious!? If Index is using magic, it ans the church was lying when they told you Index couldn’t use magic!” Kamijou shouted while blowing away the pillar of light. “Oh, and that whole thing about Index having to have her mories erased every year? That was another lie! The church was the one limiting her, so if I negate this thing, you won’t have to erase her mories anymore!!”
Kamijou’s feet slowly but surely slid backwards.
The power behind the pillar of light nightmarishly doubled as if to rip up his toes that were digging into the tatami mat.
“Calm down! Calm down and think about this rationally! Do you really think the people who created the cruel system behind Index would kindly tell their subordinates the whole truth of the situation!? Look at the reality in front of you! Ask Index herself if you like!!”
The two magicians stared blankly at Index who stood beyond the cracks.
“St. George’s Sanctuary is showing no effect against the intruder. Switching to another spell and continuing destruction of the intruder in order to protect the collar.”
It was clearly not the Index the two magicians knew but clearly an Index the church had not told them about.
“...”
For an instant —just an instant— Stiyl gritted his teeth so hard it seed they would crack.
“...Fortis931.”
Tens of thousands of cards flew from within his pitch black clothes. Cards carved with fla runes spiraled around like a typhoon and in no ti at all had covered the walls, ceiling, and floor without gap. It was just like Hoichi the Earless.
However, he did not act in order to save Kamijou. In an effort to save the girl nad Index, Stiyl pressed his hand against Kamijou’s back.
“I do not need any vague possibilities. As long as I can erase her mories, I can save her life for now. I will kill anyone to accomplish that. I will destroy anything! That is what I decided long ago.” Kamijou’s feet that had been sliding further and further back suddenly stopped.
An unbelievable power caused the tatami mats his toes were digging into to creak horribly.
“For now?” Kamijou did not turn around. “To hell with that. I don’t care about anything like that! I don’t need reasons or logic! Just answer one thing, magicians!!”
Kamijou sucked in a breath before continuing.
“Do you want to save Index or not?”
The magicians stopped breathing.
“You’ve been waiting for this the whole ti, haven’t you? You’ve been waiting for a solution where Index doesn’t have to lose her mories and you don’t have to make an enemy of her, right!? This is that kind of wonderful, wonderful happy ending that everyone wants where everyone is happy!”
An unpleasant noise ca from his right wrist as he continued to force it against the pillar of light.
Even so, Kamijou did not give up.
“You’ve always longed for this turn of events, haven’t you!? You aren’t filling in until the hero shows up! You aren’t buying ti until the main character can appear! There’s no one else! There’s nothing else! Didn’t you swear to save that girl with your own two hands!?”
A crack ran down the fingernail of his right index finger and red blood flowed out.
Even so, Kamijou did not give up.
“You’ve always, always wanted to be the heroes, right!? You wanted to beco the kind of magicians you find in picture books and movies that risk their lives to save the girl, right!? Then this isn’t anywhere near over!! It hasn’t even begun!! Don’t fall into despair just because the prologue dragged on a bit too long!!”
The magicians’ voices were silenced.
Kamijou would not give up. What did he look like in the magicians’ eyes?
“If you stretch out your hand, you can reach it! Just do it already, magicians!”
An odd cracking noise was heard from Kamijou’s right pinky.
When he realized the finger was bent —broken— at an unnatural angle, the pillar of light attacked with trendous force and finally knocked Kamijou’s right hand away.
His hand was knocked a good ways backwards.
Kamijou’s face was completely defenseless and the pillar of light rushed towards it at a dreadful speed.
“...Salavare000!!”
The instant before the pillar of light struck his face, he heard Kanzaki yell.
It was not Japanese. He had never heard the word before. However, he had heard a similar word... no, a similar na once before. It had been during his confrontation with Stiyl at the dorm. He had said it was the na he must give when he used magic. His magic na.
Kanzaki’s approximately two ter long Japanese sword sliced through the air. Her Nanasen attack utilizing seven wires flew towards Index at a speed that seed to slice through sound itself.
But, she did not aim for Index.
The wires tore through the fragile tatami mat at Index’s feet. Having lost her footing, Index fell backwards. The magic circles linked to her eyes moved and the pillar of light that was supposed to be aid at Kamijou missed its target considerably.
As if it were a giant sword being swung around, the pillar of light sliced through the wall and ceiling of the apartnt. It even sliced through the pitch black clouds floating in the night sky. In fact, it could have even sliced through a satellite outside the atmosphere.
Not even a splinter remained where the walls and ceiling had been sliced.
Instead, the portions that had been destroyed had beco feathers of light that were as pure a white as the pillar of light. They floated down. Kamijou had no idea what effects they might have had, but a few dozen of those feathers of light ca floating down like winter snow on that sumr night.
“Those are the sa as Dragon Breath, the strike of the legendary dragon of St. George! Whatever power they may have, I highly doubt the human body will react well to them!”
Having heard Kanzaki’s warning and having been freed from the bonds of the pillar of light, Kamijou ran towards Index as she lay collapsed on the ground.
But before he could, Index turned her head.
Like a giant sword being swung, the pillar of light was swung back down, slicing back through the night sky.
Kamijou was going to be caught by it again!
“Innocentius!”
As Kamijou prepared himself, a spiral of fla appeared in front of him.
The giant fla took on the form of a person and then spread out its arms to act as a shield against the pillar of light.
It was truly like a cross protecting man from sin.
“Go, esper!” shouted Stiyl. “Her ti limit has already passed! If you want to do this, don’t even waste a second!!”
Kamijou did not respond with words or even turn around.
Before he could, he ran around the colliding fla and light towards Index. He did it because Stiyl wanted him to. He did it because he had heard Stiyl’s words and understood the aning held in them and the feelings hidden behind them.
Kamijou ran.
He ran!!
“Warning: Chapter 6, Verse 13. New enemy confird. Changing combat considerations. Beginning scan of the battlefield... done. Focusing on the destruction of the most difficult enemy, Kamijou Touma.”
Index swung her head around, pillar of light and all.
However, Innocentius moved to protect Kamijou at the sa ti. The light and flas continued to eat into each other in an extended conflict of destruction and regeneration.
Kamijou ran straight for the now defenseless Index.
Four more ters.
Three more ters.
Two more ters!
One more ter!!
“Nooo!! Above you!!” Kanzaki yelled with a voice that seed to tear through everything.
Kamijou had just reached the point where he could reach the magic circles in front of Index’s face if he stretched out his hand. Without stopping his feet, he looked up at the ceiling.
The feathers of light...
The few dozen shining feathers that had been created when Index’s pillar of light had destroyed the wall and ceiling were slowly floating down like snowflakes. They had just floated down far enough to be about to reach Kamijou’s head.
Despite knowing nothing about magic, Kamijou could still tell that having even one of those feathers touch him would have had extrely undesirable results.
He also knew that he could easily negate them by using his right hand.
But...
“Warning: Chapter 22, Verse 1. Analysis of the fla magic spell has succeeded. It is confird to be a distorted Christian motif described with runes. Adding in anti-Christian spells... Spell 1, Spell 2, Spell 3. Twelve seconds until the complete activation of the spell nad Eli Eli Lama Sabachthani.”
The pillar of light’s color turned from pure white to crimson.
Innocentius’s regeneration speed visibly slowed and the pillar of light pushed forward.
Using his right hand to take out each and every one of the dozens of feathers of light would most likely take too much ti. There was also a danger of Index managing to stand back up and, most importantly, Innocentius clearly wouldn’t last that long.
The dozens of feathers of light floated above the single controlled girl at his feet whose every feeling was being used.
It was a simple question of who to save and who to let fall.
The answer was obvious.
Kamijou Touma had not been swinging his right hand around for his own sake.
He had been fighting the magicians in order to save a certain girl.
God, if this world, this story, is moving ahead according to the system you created...
Kamijou spread open the five fingers of his clenched fist almost as if he were going to wash his palm.
...then I first need to destroy that illusion!!
Kamijou swung his right hand down.
He swung it down on the black cracks and the magic circles that had produced those cracks. Kamijou’s right hand easily tore them apart. It was so simple that it made him want to laugh at how much suffering they had caused. He broke through them as easily as the paper of a goldfish scoop once wet.
“...Warning: Final... Chapter, Verse Zero.... The collar has received fatal... damage... Regeneration... impossible... gone.”
The voice coming from Index’s mouth ended altogether.
The pillar of light and magic circles disappeared, and it was almost as if the cracks that had been running all across the room had been erased with an eraser.
At that mont, one of the feathers of light fell down on Kamijou Touma’s head.
He thought he heard soone shout.
He knew not whether it was Stiyl, Kanzaki, himself, or even Index who might have woken up.
As if he had been hit in the head by a hamr, all strength left his entire body, down to the very last finger.
Kamijou fell down and covered Index who was still collapsed on the floor.
It was like he protected her body from the falling feather of light. The dozens of feathers of light floated down like snowflakes towards every part of Kamijou’s body.
Even so, Kamijou Touma smiled. He smiled and he never moved those fingertips again.
On that night, Kamijou Touma “died”.
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