CHAPTER 1
INTRICATE PREPARATIONS
“Thank you.”
At the sight of a woman bowing her head as she exited the hospital room, Julis ducked down a nearby corridor to conceal herself.
What’s Ayato’s sister doing here…?
She carefully peered back the way she had come from, watching as the woman dressed in the Asterisk police uniform, Haruka Amagiri, headed for the elevator in the opposite direction. It wasn’t as if Julis had done anything wrong, but she couldn’t shake the feeling that if they were to come face-to-face, their encounter would be an incredibly awkward one. Things had been uncomfortable between her and the others for a while now.
There were a great many examination rooms in this part of the building, but the one Haruka had just left was run by the hospital’s director, Jan Korbel. He had an extremely busy schedule, and it was rare for him to deal directly with everyday sicknesses or injuries. Which meant…
“Why, if it isn’t Julis!”
“Gah?!”
She leaped backward at the sound of a voice right next to her.
The schoolgirl turned around to find Haruka’s carefree smile. “I felt someone watching, so I thought I’d see who it was.”
Julis thought she had made her presence all but invisible, but Haruka was Ayato’s sister, after all. Her senses were sharp.
“Sorry… It’s been a while,” she said, greeting her with a reluctant nod.
“Same here. What brings you…? Ah yes, your arm.”
Julis pressed her left hand against the simple cast that encased her right arm. This was the cost of her victory against Xiaohui Wu in the fifth round of the Lindvolus.
Meteoric engineering had brought many advances to the field of medicine, but there was still no way to immediately heal a broken bone—apart from relying on the abilities of a healer, that was. Nonetheless, with the right medicine, it was possible to dull the pain so that it wouldn’t interfere with her next match. That was why she had come here.
“Are you okay…? I guess not. But you’ve won your next match by default, right?”
“Yes, fortunately.”
“In that case, your next one will be—” Haruka fell silent, suddenly realizing the answer.
Right. Her next match would be against either Ayato or Fuyuka Umenokouji, who were about to face off against each other shortly.
Fuyuka was strong—or more precisely, her strength lay in the shikigami that she summoned, Gigoku. That power, which had defeated Noelle Messmer of Saint Gallardworth Academy, was probably on par with Xiaohui Wu’s. And neither Fuyuka nor that creature had yet to show their full hand. Out of the seven contestants left standing, she was undoubtedly the most unpredictable.
But even so, Julis firmly believed that her next opponent would be Ayato.
No matter how strong the challenger, Ayato had overcome them all. At least when it came to the Festa.
And that was why this was so difficult for her.
At this rate, he would end up—
“Say, Julis. Could I borrow you for a minute?”
“…Huh?”
Haruka’s soft voice brought her back to her senses.
“I should probably tell you everything I can.”
Unsure how to reply, Julis allowed Haruka to guide her to a sofa in a nearby resting area.
“All right. I can’t share anything myself, though.” She wanted to get that out of the way up front.
Haruka, however, simply nodded along, her warm smile never wavering. “That’s fine. There’s something I ought to tell you, that’s all.”
They sat down on the sofa. Soft winter sunlight poured in through the window. Outside was a courtyard lined with small evergreen trees, their leaves undulating in the wind. It was a peaceful, calm, and somehow lonely sight.
“Julis, how much has Ayato told you?”
“…That if he doesn’t win the tournament, then your life will be in danger.”
“Ah… I was afraid that might be the case,” Haruka said with an awkward laugh. “So he hasn’t given you any details?”
“I guess he was worried about dragging me into it.”
He had made that painfully obvious.
Ayato was fighting against something huge, that she knew. If she could, she wanted to be there to help him win that battle.
But right now, there was another war she had to wage, one she had to put above everything else. It was a contest only she could win. She couldn’t give up, no matter what.
“…I see. So you’re in a similar situation.” Haruka let out a slight sigh before turning back to Julis with a smile. “In that case, even if you do go up against Ayato, you’ve still got to put everything you have into beating him.”
“That’s—” she began before biting her tongue. She couldn’t talk back to someone whose life was on the line.
“It’s not like I’ll die right away if Ayato doesn’t win… At least I don’t think I will.”
“…What do you mean?”
“Um… Julis, how much do you know about Lamina Mortis?”
“He’s the one who attacked Ayato the day before the championship match of the Gryps, right? With the Raksha-Nada.”
If Ernest Fairclough hadn’t fought alongside Ayato back then, they probably wouldn’t have been able to hold him off. There was no mistaking that he possessed a terrifying, immeasurable power.
“There’s a fragment of that Raksha-Nada inside me, right around here,” Haruka said, holding a hand to her abdomen.
“What?!” Julis’s eyes opened wide in shock.
It was an extraordinary claim, but she had no reason to doubt her.
Haruka’s skills and abilities were on par with Ayato’s. No ordinary person would be able to use her life as a bargaining chip to blackmail Ayato.
Lamina Mortis, however, was another story.
And the Raksha-Nada was capable of being broken down into countless smaller pieces to attack from multiple directions…
“It’s a tiny fragment. But it stands to reason that it’s the smallest Lamina Mortis can control…right?” Haruka shrugged her shoulders, knowing that Julis would understand.
And she did. No matter how small the fragment was, as part of the blade of an Orga Lux, it would be able to destroy the human body with ease. Lamina Mortis could tear her internal organs to shreds on a whim. There could be no surviving that.
At that moment, Julis was struck with an idea.
“But in that case…couldn’t you use the Ser Veresta to burn that fragment away?”
Since the blade of any Lux was created out of mana, it could be extinguished if it was crushed into a form beyond what its user could control. And the principle applied just as well to Orga Luxes. No matter how many pieces the Raksha-Nada could be divided into, if they weren’t big enough for its wielder to manipulate, they would cease to exist.
On top of that, Haruka and the Ser Veresta had even been able to burn through alterations made to her memories. That being the case, it shouldn’t be impossible for her to destroy a piece of the Raksha-Nada, too.
Haruka, however, shook her head sadly. “The fragment only comes into being when Lamina Mortis activates the Raksha-Nada. In other words, it doesn’t exist until then. Even the Ser Veresta can’t destroy something that isn’t there.”
“…I see.”
As frustrating as it was, that did make sense.
Nonetheless, as there could be no doubt that the fragment was tied not to any fixed spatial coordinates but to Haruka’s body itself, there was still a chance it could be forcibly removed. If a Strega or a Dante were to—
No.
Julis, a Strega herself, stopped there, realizing her error:
It wouldn’t work.
The Raksha-Nada was an Orga Lux. No Strega or Dante would be able to match that. If she were to redefine from the outside that contradictory state in which something that didn’t exist still existed, then…
“But you know, there is a limit to the Raksha-Nada’s power,” Haruka said calmly, interrupting Julis’s thoughts. “It may have the widest range among the Four Colored Runeswords, but at most, it only works at a few dozen yards. So as long as I stay out of that range, I should be safe. Like if I stayed in one of the special rooms here.”
“Is that what you were doing…?”
“Yep. I came to talk it over with Director Korbel. Given the situation, he’s happy to help. So if Ayato doesn’t manage to take the crown, I’ll come here.”
“…” Julis was speechless.
It was true that the hospital had a special underground ward that was off-limits to visitors. But that meant Haruka wouldn’t be able to leave. It would be a shame to have to come back here, giving up her freedom again after finally waking up from her long sleep. And on top of that, there was no telling whether Lamina Mortis might somehow manage to bypass the hospital’s security. After all, he had already attacked Ayato in one of the courtyards outside.
But still…Julis had to admit that Haruka’s resolve gave her a sense of relief.
Even if it was all a deception.
“Well, I need to get back to work,” Haruka said, rising to her feet and patting Julis on the shoulder. “I can’t say I’m not worried, but I know you’re a kind person, Julis, and Ayato’s in your thoughts, too. I hope I’ve been able to make it a bit easier for you.”
“…Why?” Julis asked, staring up at her gentle face. “Ayato is the most important person in the world to you, right? If I end up facing him, I’ll be his enemy. So why would you…?”
“Of course, Ayato is more precious to me than anything. I’d risk my life for him. But he’s important to you, too, right?”
Those words carved mercilessly through Julis’s heart.
“And I’m sure Ayato feels the same way about you. So as his sister, I want to do what I can to help. For him and for you. That’s all.” Haruka finished with a gentle wave as she turned to leave.
“…She’s strong, that’s for sure,” Julis murmured.
Haruka was gentle, kind, and stern—to Julis, to Ayato, and even to herself.
I don’t want to make her suffer…but I have to do what I can.
Julis rose to her feet with newfound resolution, just as her mobile sounded with an incoming message.
As she glanced at the screen, her brow furrowed in suspicion.
“…What on earth?”
“I’m back,” Haruka said with a formal salute as she entered the captain’s room at Stjarnagarm’s headquarters.
Helga Lindwall, sitting at her desk with multiple air-windows open in front of her, glanced up for a split second before turning back to her work. “Excellent. How did it go? Did you get permission?”
“Yes, Director Korbel is happy to cooperate. He’ll leave one of their special rooms free. Although he did want to know more about the situation.”
“Well, he probably feels like he owes you something after he wasn’t able to wake you up for so long. I didn’t think he would refuse our request, even if we do withhold some of the details…” Helga’s fingers tapped restlessly at the keyboard as she continued. “In any event, we’ll have you stand by at the hospital as soon as you’re ready. You shouldn’t have to wait too long. Only until we pin down the whereabouts of Lamina Mortis—or Madiath Mesa, rather.”
At this, Haruka found herself leaning forward. “Has there been any progress?”
Helga’s typing finally came to a stop. She grinned broadly and opened another air-window for Haruka to see.
“Just as you suspected. Looking back over the details of the last incident was the right call.”
Displayed in the air-window was a report from the investigation into the accident that had destroyed the Space Research and Development Agency’s new rocket engine design several years back. Haruka had already read it.
The report determined that the cause of the incident was a problem in the new engine, with the resulting explosion scattering its pieces in a wide area over the sea. Only small parts of it had been recovered. It was clear, however, that the conclusions were poorly substantiated. It was obvious that the writers of the report—or people connected to them—had sought to draw the curtain on the investigation as quickly as possible, no matter how brazenly inadequate their efforts.
“And this… This is from Minato Wakamiya. It’s her father’s diary.” Helga pointed to a worn paper-bound diary, a rare sight in the modern age.
When she opened it, Haruka found it filled with meticulously tidy entries.
“September 3. Sunny. Took a nighttime stroll along the coast with my daughter. The usual question. The usual answer. The essence of a dream. Will she follow it one day?”
They were short, straightforward, almost clinical sentences.
It was more like a collection of notes than a diary. The entries for some days noted no more than the date and the weather; the author, Minato’s father, looked to have recorded only those things that caught his attention.
Haruka and Ayato had first learned about the diary the other day when they had asked Minato about the incident. “I don’t really remember much about it, but… Ah! I still have my dad’s diary!” Minato had announced, bringing it out for them.
“Minato treasures this as a memory of her father,” Haruka murmured.
“He must have been very important to her,” Helga agreed.
They had been looking for a way—any possible way—to corner Madiath for some time. There was no doubting that, under his guise as Lamina Mortis, he and the other members of his Golden Bough Alliance were involved in all kinds of criminal activities. But no matter which line of inquiry they took, those pursuing him had yet to find any definitive evidence. With the Varda-Vaos, an Orga Lux with the ability of mental interference, Madiath and his associates were capable of covering up practically everything they did.
And while there may have been enough evidence to arrest Lamina Mortis for kidnapping Haruka and attacking Ayato, so long as they couldn’t prove that Lamina Mortis and Madiath Mesa were one and the same, it would be difficult to make a move. What they needed was proof of crimes that Madiath had committed using his own identity.
And so Haruka had turned her attention to his past.
They had already learned secondhand of the Varda-Vaos’s abilities through Claudia’s mother, Isabella. According to her, the only person the Orga Lux was capable of taking complete control over was its user—whose body it effectively usurped. When it came to altering or deleting the memories of others, whether Genestella or not, it required considerable time to fully complete its task.
On top of that, especially when it came to Genestellas, who were naturally more resistant to mental interference than regular people, it was difficult for the Varda-Vaos to completely rewrite their personalities. Any changes had to be in line with their existing individual traits and qualities.
In other words, even the Varda-Vaos couldn’t mass-produce blind loyalty. At best, it could have only increased the number of its followers under its control gradually, over a great deal of time.
What that meant was the further back you looked into the past, the smaller the number of people involved in covering up the activities of Madiath and his associates was. It wasn’t clear how long the Golden Bough Alliance had been operating, but from what Haruka had inferred from Madiath, his motives bore some deep connection to her mother.
That being the case, it must have begun no more than maybe twenty years ago—meaning there were still plenty of potential avenues to explore. Moreover, Madiath was an employee of Galaxy, at least on paper, so there should still have been considerable data on him in the foundation’s database.
Accessing that data, however, wouldn’t be an easy task.
As chairman of the Festa Executive Committee, he was an extremely talented and diligent individual, simultaneously taking on a great and diverse range of tasks. There wasn’t time to scrutinize each and every one of them. On top of that, there were a great many instances where the data seemed to have been tampered with. Most likely he had collaborators inside Galaxy itself.
“At the very least, I wanted to link that incident to him somehow…,” Helga murmured.
“Ah, that reminds me,” Haruka began. “Ayato—I mean, my brother—he had a thought, or maybe a piece of advice…”
“By the way, Haruka, when Lamina Mortis kidnapped you, he mentioned the incident with the rocket, right?”
Haruka had gone to congratulate Ayato after his fourth-round Lindvolus match, when he broached the topic out of the blue.
That incident was what had resulted in her going into her long sleep. Lamina Mortis and the others had attempted to bring about a second Invertia by sending one of their associates to the moon to awaken a slumbering mass of urm-manadite, though Haruka had managed to thwart their plan with only moments to spare. The rocket they had prepared used the engine stolen from the Space Research and Development Agency. No doubt the incident involving the engine explosion was their work, too.
“The thing is, my opponent seems to be connected to it all…”
And so Ayato led her to that person—to Minato. Haruka couldn’t conceal her pride at his astuteness for having connected the dots.
“I see. I’ll have to thank him myself… Well then, so long as you’re looking at the diary, turn to the tenth of February, back in ’61.”
“February 10. Rain. Had an inspection by the IEF. There was a Genestella in the inspection team. Asked a lot of questions. I thought I recognized him, and it turned out he won the Phoenix Tournament a few years back. He was certainly well-mannered and enthusiastic about the work, but something struck me as off. I suppose it takes a certain kind of person to survive at an IEF, though.”
“This man…that’s Madiath Mesa, right?”
“It sounds that way. They may not have been many in number, but there were a few Genestella working for the IEFs ten years ago. Only Madiath Mesa was a champion of the Phoenix, though,” Helga responded, rubbing her chin with her hand. “Galaxy played a hand in financing the manned lunar mission. It isn’t unusual that they would want to keep an eye on it. What is unusual is Madiath Mesa’s involvement.”
“Why is that?”
“Madiath’s wish after winning the Festa was to be made part of the Executive Committee, and so he was. The Executive Committee is comprised of representatives from each of the integrated enterprise foundations, and so as part of that process, he also became an executive at Galaxy—on paper anyway. That arrangement is little more than a formality. I very much doubt he would be involved in any substantial work. So anything that he’s officially involved in should be related to the Festa in some way.”
Haruka found herself nodding along in realization.
Helga’s many years protecting and keeping order inside Asterisk had given her a keen understanding of the dynamics between the foundations.
The main threat constantly facing Asterisk wasn’t quarrels between students or the usual forms of crime but rather the six giant, devouring monsters that were those organizations, constantly fighting among themselves for influence and power.
“So does the manned lunar mission have any connection to the Festa…?”
“That’s just it. Strictly speaking, one private company did. But have a look at this.” Helga entered a command into her terminal, opening an air-window displaying the official site of a company called PVA Enterprises.
“So they develop shock-absorbing materials…,” Haruka said as she glanced over it. “And they’re part of Galaxy.”
“According to our data from Galaxy, Madiath Mesa was once an external director at this PVA Enterprises.”
“…What does that mean?” Haruka couldn’t understand the connection.
“Now then, let’s go home, Percival. If you resist, I’ll have to exercise my authority as student council president,” Elliot said, pointing the tip of his Orga Lux toward her.
His eyes positively gleamed with determination.
Percival, on the other hand, hid her face in her hand, muttering something under her breath.
“It’s always the same with you. Why are you always getting in my way…? It’s no good, no good. I can’t destroy her. I can’t carry out my orders. I can’t redeem myself. And that means…”
Percival’s eyes clouded over, her gaze losing its focus.
At that moment, the Amalthean Goat, floating in the air behind her, started to lose its shape. It began to elongate, like a cup lying on its side, stretching long and wide as light poured out, engulfing the thorns strewn around it.
“No!” Elliot’s eyes had opened wide in shock. “The Holy Grail’s second form?! But that’s…!”
A terrible chill coursed down Julis’s spine.
This was bad. Whatever it was, her intuition told her the situation had suddenly become far more dangerous.
But while her instincts were sounding in alarm, she had no idea how to respond.
There’s no way I can get past that light…! Should I fall back? But if I do that…
In the meantime, the Holy Grail had transformed into a spear. The space around it was engulfed in a dazzling light, no doubt just as potent at knocking its target out cold as it was before.
Percival raised her left hand into the air, her fingers tightening around it, when—
“Good grief. You make a few modifications and then this happens…,” came yet another voice as a new figure grabbed her arm.
As soon as the hooded, robed woman touched her arm, Percival fell to the ground as if losing consciousness.
“It won’t do to use the Holy Grail here. If handled poorly, it could end up damaging the city. I don’t want any unnecessary trouble.”
Not only Julis but Elliot and Noelle kept their gazes fixed on the woman. She had practically appeared out of thin air.
“Julis-Alexia von Riessfeld,” the woman called out to her as she lifted Percival over her shoulder. “We’re out of time. If Gallardworth’s intelligence network has caught on to us, there can be no more fooling around. You needn’t hold your silence any longer. But be sure to honor your agreement with Orphelia. If you break your word…”
“I don’t need you to tell me that. If I was going to talk, I would have done it a long time ago. I don’t know who you are, but are you with Orphelia? And what exactly are you doing? I expect an answer!”
The woman, however, turned her back on Julis, ignoring her defiant glare. “You’re too much for even us to handle. Unpredictable when you feign obedience. Rushing into action when you should keep your head down. You creatures are impossible to control. Human nature is beyond comprehension.” And with that, the woman vanished, Percival in tow.
The next moment, the bodies of the remaining Valiants exploded, engulfing the ruins in flames.
“Ugh! Destroying the evidence…!”
But it was too late to do anything about it now.
As Julis turned to leave, Elliot thrust the tip of the Lei-Glems toward her.
“Hold on a moment, if you would. I have questions for you, too.”
“I’m afraid I can’t break my silence. Not that I’m going to stop you from looking into things yourself.”
“Not so fast!” Elliot moved to block her path, his voice turning dark. It didn’t look like he was about to relent. “Who was that woman in the robe? No, first things first, what did Gardner want with you? And Orphelia… I don’t suppose you mean Orphelia Landlufen? What does she have to do with this…?!”
Julis shook her head slightly. “I’d like to know the answers to those questions just as much as you do. I suppose you’re acting on information from your esteemed Sinodomius?”
“That’s…” At this, Elliot paused for a moment, averting his gaze. “That was mostly a bluff. Yes, Sinodomius managed to locate her, but that was truly a coincidence. She just happened to get caught up in the usual information gathering. We don’t know anything about the group backing her,” he admitted grudgingly, biting his lip.
“You’re telling me that you, a student council president, barged into this mess based on nothing more than that?” Julis asked incredulously.
Elliot let out a self-deprecating chuckle. “I’ve been branded pretty much useless as student council president anyway. This is the least I could do.”
That reminded her. Julis had heard that Elliot received a lot of criticism from both within Gallardworth and from elsewhere over what had happened with the Black Knight. And the pressure of being Ernest Fairclough’s successor was no doubt immense.
“Th-that’s not true! You came here because you’re worried about Percival! You’ve kept up the story about her having an official leave of absence, and you said you wanted to work everything out with her behind closed doors, to resolve it all as easily as possible! And if…if I hadn’t insisted on joining you, you would have come here all by yourself!” Noelle’s face had turned bright red.
“That, too, was a reckless course of action…”
No doubt, Julis thought, Sinodomius was already monitoring them.
It sounded as if Elliot had merely inherited the Runesword and had yet to truly fill the shoes of the student council president role. It was hard to say if he was really suited to the position, but his blind sense of justice and honesty looked genuine.
Huh…? Hold on, the Runesword…?
At that moment, a piece of the puzzle clicked into place inside her mind.
If she was right, she might just have a solution.
“Very well. I’ll tell you what I know.”
If, as Orphelia liked to claim, there was such a thing in this world as fate, then it was nothing short of destiny that had brought them together like this now.
“R-really?!” Noelle beamed, her eyes sparkling.
“Why the sudden change of heart…?” Elliot asked dubiously.
Julis raised two fingers. “But I have two conditions. First, I’ll tell you once the Lindvolus is over. I’ve still got a way to go. I don’t want any distractions.”
Her promise with Orphelia would be meaningless after the conclusion of the finals. There would be no problem revealing everything once the tournament was over.
“…And the other one?” Elliot, no doubt suspecting that she would make some unreasonable request, looked visibly nervous.
“I want you to go to the rescue of a princess in need. That’s what knights do, isn’t it?”
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