Chapter 8 [The Divine Punishment Magic]
JJ parted with them at the hotel in Berkeley and left by himself. With his boss's upcoming presidential election in the fall, he doesn't have the time to be directly involved in matters such as this.
After an after-meal teatime, the four of them, Tatsuya, Miyuki, Stuart, and Shaula, split into two cars and headed for the response center established in an area adjacent to Oakland City.
Tatsuya drove his Air Car behind Shaula's car. As they drove through the city, he couldn't find anything particularly unusual. Could it be that the abnormal phenomenon is limited to within the city of Oakland?
"…Everything looks peaceful. It doesn't look like there is any sort of plot going on…?"
Miyuki, in the passenger's seat, seemed to have the same impression.
"I'm getting the same feeling."
Tatsuya replied in agreement.
Before the conversation could go any further, Shaula's car pulled up in front of a house.
It was neither Shaula's nor Stuart's house. It was just a vacant house the military had bought with its own budget for this investigation. The fact they "bought" the house instead of "renting" may be indicative of their national character.
The exterior of the house was that of an ordinary wood-frame house, but the interior was filled with data processing equipment. Exposed cables snaked through the floor everywhere around, the preference likely being to prevent information leakage through wireless intercepts. There might also be the point of deliberately not setting up an OA floor22 for ease of replacing the equipment.
'I'm going to have you look at the data we've gathered so far today, and I'm going to have you accompany me to where the patients are being looked after tomorrow, what do you think?"
Stuart suggested this to Tatsuya as she stood across a table with a touch display on its surface — an operations console.
"That's fine with me. Could you show me the data, then?"
"Okay. Let's start with the area where the outbreak occurred…"
As soon as Stuart began, the surface of the desk displayed a map centered on the city of Oakland.
◇ ◇ ◇
When Tatsuya and Miyuki returned to their hotel in Berkeley, it was after 8:00 P.M. Since it was late in the afternoon, they partook in a modest dinner brought in by room service, and now they were both seated side by side on a sofa.
"What do you think of the data we saw earlier, Tatsuya-sama?"
Miyuki asked Tatsuya as they snacked on clubhouse sandwiches beside each other. With the growing trend toward health-consciousness in the country these days, even Miyuki was able to comfortably enjoy these sandwiches.
"I'm a layman when it comes to medical science, but based on what the specialists had to say, I don't think it's resulted from something like a lesion in the cerebrum or infection by a virus."
"Well, is it as you thought, was it all done by acts of magical terrorism…?"
"Terrorism."
There was a short pause before Tatsuya continued speaking. He, too, seemed still unsure of the answer.
"It may be terrorism in the sense of being indiscriminate, but its purpose is unclear."
"What do you mean by 'purpose'?"
"If their purpose is to make a political statement, then they should have claimed responsibility by now. The same would apply if it were a false flag crime where a Magist has been set-up to be the criminal responsible for all this in order to incite anti-magicism."
"Couldn't they be field testing the effects it has right now?"
As she said this, Miyuki noticed that Tatsuya had stopped eating and brought a clubhouse sandwich to his mouth.
Tatsuya took a bite of the sandwich and ate it without a moment's hesitation. He then concurred with Miyuki's theory, saying, "That could be it."
Tatsuya returned the favor by picking up another sandwich from his plate and holding it up to Miyuki's mouth.
Miyuki shyly took a bite from it.
"In that case, I'm thinking it could be more about confirming the effects themselves, rather than about a preparation for a terrorist attack."
Tatsuya added, still holding the sandwich up to Miyuki.
Miyuki's lips touched Tatsuya's fingers.
He didn't mind, and let Miyuki finish the sandwich.
◇ ◇ ◇
The next morning, Tatsuya and company drove to the hospital specified in an email sent by Stuart. Shaula offered to pick them up, but Tatsuya suggested instead that they meet up at the hospital.
After meeting Stuart and Shaula in the lobby, they all made their way to a patient's room.
The patient's are kept in regular private rooms. Since there is no evidence of any other anomalies than the inability to communicate, it was decided that full nursing care was not necessary. The patient's can't speak, write, or even read choices that are displayed on a panel, but they could still make choices by looking at pictures and photos. They are in a state of barely being able to communicate their needs.
Tatsuya, wearing a white coat provided by the hospital to reassure the patient's, gave a careful "look" at the patient in this room.
The patient, a woman, looked back at Tatsuya with an expression denoting visible anguish. This expression clearly suggests that she still retains normal cognitive faculties, but it's precisely because of this that she is in such a state of great anxiety. The fact that she hasn't fallen apart is probably due to the encouragement of the hospital staff, on top of her own mental fortitude.
"…Unfortunately, it's an effect of magic."
Despite the "unfortunately," Tatsuya didn't seem notably discouraged.
He pointed to an image of the patient's brain scan that was beside where he was standing. The image is of an area in the posterior part of the upper temporal region of the left hemisphere, the area where the language center is considered to be located.
"There is a Psion Information Body, which appears to consist of a Magic Sequence, embedded in this area. It is embedded in the patient's own psionic body in such a way that they have become entangled, making it difficult to differentiate between them."
Shaula's mouth tightened in frustration at Tatsuya's words. She and many other magicians had done all sorts of magical examinations on the patient's, but they had never discovered the Magic Sequence that Tatsuya had just pointed out.
"This is the first time I have seen this magic. It's exceedingly complex, so I don't fully understand it, but I'm sure it's a Mental-Interference Type Magic."
"Not even you can understand it, mister!?"
Stuart exclaimed in surprise. She has not yet been informed about Tatsuya's [Elemental Sight], but she has surmised that he possesses extremely advanced magical analytical skills. She has drawn close enough to the truth of the matter that [Material Burst] is the result of his analytical skills.
"I understand the structure of the Psion Information Body, however, the question is how does the structure operate and cause aphasia? That, I still don't understand."
"…Would it be possible to transcribe the structure? I would very much like to study it."
"It is possible, but let's hold off until we settle this particular case. That aside, is it okay to use magic in this hospital room?"
"Oh, yes. It's fine, but…"
Upon receiving Stuart's acknowledgement, Tatsuya instructed Miyuki to cover the hospital room with a Selective Zone Interference.
Zone Interference is a technique that fills a specific space with an Event Interference Force where no phenomena can be interfered with. In other words, it is a technique whereby an area is created in which no one but the caster who created it is able to use magic.
A Selective Zone Interference is an extension of this technique, which creates a field where only the caster and the magician they designate are able to use magic.
However, as convenient as it is, it's not a technique easily usable by everyone. It is necessary not only to be well accustomed to one's own consciousness but also to the other's consciousness, to the extent where the user can recognize the Event Interference Force of the other person as if it were his or her own. It's only possible to share a Zone Interference with someone you are intimately close to. It is a magical skill that is limited to being used with one's partner, such as a lover or a spouse, for that matter.
Tatsuya filled all these criteria with Miyuki. Therefore, she met his request without any difficulty.
The hospital room was barred from any magical interference from third-parties. It has become impossible to exert magic from the outside, nor is it possible to observe magic being used in the hospital room from the outside. In this, so to speak, magical dark room, sterilized from further unwanted magic, that Tatsuya activated [Gram Dispersion] on the patient.
There were no observable changes on the surface.
However, Tatsuya's "eyes" clearly saw the Magic Sequence that was embedded in the patient's temporal region decompose into Psion particles and dissipate.
"My name is Shiba Tatsuya. Can you tell me your name?"
Tatsuya spoke to the patient.
She widened her eyes and burst into tears.
She introduced herself as tears streamed down her face.
Shaula rushed to call for a nurse.
The patient answered the questions of the nurse who rushed over midst her sobs, but answered them accurately.
Up to that day, sixty-three patients had been confirmed in Oakland.
Of those, Tatsuya successfully treated twenty-seven on that day alone.
◇ ◇ ◇
July 15th, evening local time. At FAIR headquarters in San Francisco.
Three people, one man and two women, are currently gathered in the office of Rocky Dean, the leader of FAIR.
The man is Dean himself, the owner of the aforementioned office. He is sitting behind his desk in a surprisingly simple, utilitarian chair.
The woman who is standing beside him is Laura Simon, the sub-leader.
And there is a young woman kneeling in front of Dean's desk. She appears to be in her mid-twenties and has blonde hair as well as dark brown eyes. If Laura is an alluring beauty, then this woman is a man's fruit of desire.
If Laura is an alluringly beautiful woman, then this woman is an amorous woman.
"Helen, you seem to be doing well."
The woman's name is Helen Schneider. She is one of the newcomers to FAIR, but is highly valued by Dean for her magical powers.
"I am in awe."
Helen answered in admiration with her face cast down, but her voice contained a hint of flirtatiousness that can tempt a man.
Rather than an inherent quality of hers, it's something she's honed through experience. Helen had to learn these kinds of skills in order to make a living.
She was a prostitute. It was by happenstance that she was approached by Dean on a back street, and had she and her magical powers not been discovered by him and recruited as a member of FAIR, she would still be living a life of lying with men, and sometimes women, for money.
Perhaps because of these circumstances, Helen's loyalty to Dean leans towards blind devotion. Though not particularly selfless, she holds a strong attachment to him wanting to be his one priority.
"The [Babel] that my lord has granted me has so far lived up to its name. This magic will surely be a powerful weapon to help bring my lord's great aspirations to fruition."
This blind devotion of hers made her an excellent choice to be the lab rat to test the "Guru's Stone Tablet" artifact unearthed on Mt. Shasta. She has been using the "Guru's Stone Tablet," which even Laura was hesitant to use in fear of any unknown adverse effects it might cause.
Thus, she has managed to master the Ancient Magic [Babel].
The formal name recorded on the stone tablet is [Divine Punishment of the Tower of Babel]. Whether it was a magic used by "God" or a magic created to imitate "God's work" remains unclear. But the effects of the magic holds true to its name. —True to the name written on the stone tablet, that is.
In order to confirm these effects, Dean has had Helen conduct experiments in Oakland.
The results were excellent. [Babel]'s effect is to impair one's language comprehension. It causes symptoms analogous to those with Wernicke's aphasia. Moreover, unlike ordinary magic, it has a sustained operation.
The secret to [Babel]'s sustainability lies in the virus-like nature of its Magic Sequence. The cerebrum is the organ that coordinates between the mind and the body. [Babel]'s Magic Sequence, which is parasitic on the cerebrum, utilizes its communication function to interfere with the patient's mind, in their subconscious, causing the patient to produce Psion and Pushion waves to sustain it. In other words, [Babel] turns the patient into a magician who specializes in self-harm.
The technique used is similar to the Artificial Magic Calculation Area implanted in Tatsuya during the Artificial Magician Experiment. However, its magical abilities are not at the disposal of the patient. [Babel] operates as programmed by its Magic Sequence.
It is due to this virus-like process that the infected can infect others. [Babel]'s Magic Sequence interferes with the patient's subconscious to reproduce itself, which then at random parasitizes the brains of nearby individuals. [Babel] is contagious in the literal sense of the word. The number of secondary infections are not necessarily limited to one patient per case.
However, the furthest this magic can spread is through a secondary infection. The Magic Sequence is reproduced by the patient who has only its original function, which is to impair their language comprehension. Patients who have been infected through a secondary infection can't infect others, meaning that it can't be spread any further. The magical reproduction and infection functions are two separate processes from the function that impairs language comprehension, and only the processes involved in the impairment of a patient's language comprehension are reproduced.
What neither Dean, Laura, nor anyone at this stage knows is that this is a mechanism that [Babel] regulates to ensure the secondary infection, by avoiding an overload of the patient's mind.
To reproduce the Magic Sequence and then infect someone else with it is tantamount to forcing the person to use magic. And the more complex the magic, the greater the strain on the mind.
If the reproduction of the Magic Sequence were to incorporate the magical infection function, then there would be a higher probability that the patient's subconscious would reach its breaking point. Just as when a magician operates magic beyond their limits, their Magic Calculation Area would overheat and, in the worst scenario, they would lose their life.
If the patient dies before they are able to spread the infection, then there wouldn't be as widespread chaos caused by [Babel] as there otherwise could be through secondary infections. Knowing this, the creators of this magic, whose true identities remain unknown, purposely limited the infection to the secondary degree in order to ensure social chaos by impairing the language comprehension of others.
"—It seems that the scope of the auto-diffusion is limited to around five or six people."
Dean's voice, directed at Helen, was laced with a slight note of dissatisfaction.
"In the beginning, the best I could get it to spread was to two other people. As I get more familiar with the magic, I believe I will be able to expand the scope."
Unbeknownst to Dean and Helen herself as yet, degradation occurs when the Magic Sequence is reproduced within the patient's unconscious realm. This degradation is inversely proportional to how fidelity with which the original caster was able to activate [Babel].
The reproduction also stalls as a result of the patient's mind being drained by the enforced task. This depends on how accurately the mechanism that is built into [Babel] can force the patient's mind to reproduce this function.
These are the two main factors that limit the number of infected people. Thus, the upper limit of the number of infected people ultimately hinges on the capacity of the caster who activated the original [Babel] to accurately construct the Magic Sequence and to overcome the target's informational resistance for the Magic Sequence to take root, in other words, their magical power.
Fortunately, with Helen's magical power, even if she were to become proficient in using it, her limit is likely to be around ten people. Nevertheless, using [Babel] on a hundred people can cause a thousand people to be deprived of their words, thus causing even more chaos.
However, if [Babel] were to be used by someone with a magical power on the level of Miyuki or Lina, for example, it could render an entire metropolis dysfunctional. In this sense, [Babel] can be said to have the potential to be as vicious as Strategic-Class Magic.
"—I see. Continue to practice and become more proficient, then."
Dean, who is heedless of the nature of [Babel], seemed to be content with Helen's excuse. At these words, Helen felt she could breathe a sigh of relief.
But it was too early to feel relieved.
"My Lord. There is one more thing I would like to bring to your attention regarding the proliferation of [Babel]."
Laura, who had remained silent until that now, interjected.
Dean turned to the side to look at Laura, and with a glance and a hand gesture, he urged her to continue.
"Since yesterday, the patient's at various hospitals have been recovering one after another."
"Did the doctors find a way to successfully treat them?"
Dean asked back with a tone of surprise.
Laura, at first glance, appeared to be disappointed as she shook her head.
"Medical treatment remains elusive. In all the cases of recovery that we have secretly investigated, the Magic Sequence has been destroyed."
"That's absurd!"
Helen exclaimed. Next she hurriedly took up an apologetic stance.
Dean did not reproach her.
"A Counter Magic that destroys Magic Sequences? Was there ever a magician in the Stars that could do that?"
He asked further questions, disregarding Helen's cries as if they had never occurred.
"There is one such case where a patient had recovered around the time when First Lieutenant Ariana Lee Shaula of Stars was visiting. However, we have no information that First Lieutenant Shaula is capable of Counter Magic of this caliber."
"In short, you have no idea who is interfering?"
"It's as you say, my lord."
Beside Laura, who bowed reverently, Dean was deep in thought.
Left out and ignored, Helen kept her face down, biting her lip.
She had been picked apart in front of Dean, of all people, and by none other than Laura.
This was the most frustrating thing for Helen to experience.
◇ ◇ ◇
Over the course of three days, Tatsuya treated all of the seventy-five patients confirmed so far — twelve additional cases since his arrival in Oakland. But the damage had spread beyond the city of Oakland, and those areas have yet to be dealt with.
"Mister, you really saved the day."
Once he had eliminated the Magic Sequence from the last patient in Oakland, Stuart commended Tatsuya in the hallway of the hospital.
Incidentally, not only Stuart and Shaula, but also Miyuki, were at Tatsuya's side. And yet, they attracted little to no attention. Even though it is not unusual for the general public to not recognize Tatsuya's face, there are very few people, male or female, who would not be mesmerized by Miyuki's beauty.
This is due to the effect of the new magic that Tatsuya had perfected based on Yuuka's research prior to his visit to America.
The name he decided on after consulting with Yuuka was [Aidoneus]. It's named after "Aidoneus" (the unseen one), which is an alias for "Hades," the King of the Underworld in Greek mythology.
Derived from the research of Kimon Tonkou, the effect of this magic is "to use the gaze directed towards the user, to interfere with the minds of the others. It induces a sort of prosopagnosia, making others lose interest in the user." "Prosopagnosia," also known as "face blindness," is a type of neurological disorder in which a person is unable to recognize the faces of other people.
The Magister using [Aidoneus] will be perceived as "unremarkable" to others. Since they are neither invisible, nor has their presence been completely erased, their presence is recognized by the security guards who are on the lookout for suspicious people. However, they just can't recognize who they are.
Furthermore, the effect of prosopagnosia applies only to the caster themselves, and there is virtually no chance that anyone under the influence of the magic will take notice of their presence.
Its weakness is that, while it works through surveillance cameras, it has no effect on video recordings or photographs. But at the very least, the magic makes it possible for anyone to blend in with a crowd, making it useful enough for undercover work.
Tatsuya inputted the Magic Sequence of [Aidoneus] into an Artificial Relic "Magistore" and made it into a magical tool that can continuously activate this magic without needing to be aware of it.
Thanks to this, Tatsuya and Miyuki were able to move about freely on the American West Coast without attracting attention.
◇ ◇ ◇
Since yesterday, Helen Schneider of FAIR has been on the hunt for the magician responsible for nullifying the effects of [Babel] on those whom she used it after having heard about it the day before last.
Helen was using [Babel] for experimental purposes. In order to confirm its effects, FAIR used its connections to track down the hospital where some of the patients had been admitted. By keeping watch on the hospital, she was confident that the magician she was looking for would appear.
Thinking this, Helen asked other members to help her watch the hospital, but as if to ridicule her, the magician went and treated the patient's without anyone from FAIR having ever spotted them.
Although a Counter Magic is believed to have been used to destroy the Magic Sequence, none of the members stationed at the hospital were able to detect the activation of any magic. As Helen and her colleagues pondered this discrepancy, at last there was only one patient remaining, located in Alameda, a neighboring city to the west of Oakland.
Helen rushed to the hospital where the patient was admitted.
The magician meddling with her would no doubt come here. With that in mind, she took the utmost possible cautions in watching for anyone coming in or out of the hospital.
(That's… Ariana Lee Shaula of Stars?)
As a person to be wary of who might be involved in this matter, Helen and her colleagues were given a picture of Shaula.
Shaula was accompanied by three people as she entered the hospital. One man and two women. She recognized one of the women from a photo she had seen, to be a government staff member who had been working on countermeasures against [Babel]. But the other two, the man and the other woman, have no memory of them at all.
Helen surreptitiously spied on them from behind to see where they were going. And sure enough, the four of them headed for the ward where the last patient's private room is located.
While pretending to be a visitor in the waiting room, Helen's senses were primed. But no matter how long she waited, she couldn't sense any sign of magic.
Not long after, Shaula and her companions emerged from the hospital ward. Whether the last patient had been treated or not, it was impossible to tell. There was no sign of a Counter Magic having been activated, but she already knew that was not necessarily akin to failure.
One of the four in Shaula's group was the one who destroyed [Babel]'s Magic Sequence. —Helen focused her attention on them based on this suspicion.
Helen casually followed the four as they walked out of the hospital.
Just after they passed through the entrance of the hospital, she heard,
"Mister, you really saved the day."
She was a little bit behind them, so it was hard to tell who said it.
But the words were clear to whom they were addressed. There is only one man among the four.
(It must be him!)
Helen exclaimed in her mind.
The caster who has been destroying [Babel]'s Magic Sequence left and right.
The magician who is meddling with her.
It was that man, Helen was sure of it.
Impulsively, she unleashed [Babel] at the man. She had mastered [Babel] at the cost of being unable to use any other magic.
◇ ◇ ◇
Suddenly, behind them, there was a sign of magic being activated.
Tatsuya's response was swift. Just as soon as the magic was unleashed at him, he activated the Counter Magic, [Gram Dispersion], that can destroy Magic Sequences, without even employing a CAD.
This magic isn't one of Tatsuya's inherent magics. The theory behind it has been understood for some time, and there are records where activation of it has been observed on an experimental level.
[Gram Dispersion] is a magic that recognizes the structure of a Psion Information Body and breaks it down into disjointed pieces. Recognizing the structure of the target Magic Sequence is the first step. Before Tatsuya, it was regarded as useless in practice (live-combat) given how time consuming this single step is, as the magic could not be nullified in time. To this day, he is the only person who has mastered [Gram Dispersion].
The first time Tatsuya had ever seen this magic was the day before yesterday, and there are still countless elements to it that he doesn't understand yet. Despite this, Tatsuya was able to respond in an instant because of all the experience he has accumulated over the past three days in decomposing this very same Magic Sequence dozens of times.
Turning around, they saw a young woman aghast. It was evident that this woman is the Magister who had just attacked Tatsuya. And that she is also the one who is responsible for using the magic that had been spreading the aphasia.
Tatsuya moved to neutralize the woman.
But he was too late.
Before Tatsuya could cast his magic
Miyuki had already cast hers.
A blizzard of extreme cold blew towards the woman.
An illusion of ice and snow imposed on the world.
The illusion vanished in the next instant beneath the sun that was shining on the city in midsummer.
"Know your place, you insolent person. How dare you try to harm Tatsuya-sama…"
Miyuki softly muttered this in Japanese.
The woman had collapsed.
Shaula rushed over to the fallen woman with an expression of surprise.
The woman was not injured, except for a few scratches and bruises that might've been from her fall.
There was no sign that she had hit her head hard either.
Yet, no matter how much she called out, there was no sign of the woman regaining consciousness.
The magic that Miyuki unleashed is the Mental-Interference Type Magic, [Icy Thorn]. It's a derivation of Miyuki's true trump card, the mind freezing magic [Cocytus], which was downgraded in power for easier use. In contrast to [Cocytus], that freezes the mind and brings about a slumber not unlike death, [Icy Thorn] induces a sleep similar to the fabled curse of thorns, where the subject is unable to wake up on their own.
Those who are struck by [Icy Thorn] will never awaken from this magic unless they are exposed to Psion waves tuned to a specific Non-Systematic Magic, dedicated to awakening them.
Miyuki watched the woman being carried into the hospital in front of her with a gaze of absolute zero.
It is clear that she had no intention of awakening the woman.
But that is not an option in this case.
Even though it was only for a short period of about two weeks, this matter may not have become widely known to the media, thus this woman who has wreaked havoc on the authorities and medical personnel, and caused grief among the victims, their families, and acquaintances, must be thoroughly questioned.
And there was another thing, something Tatsuya "saw" that bothered him.
An unidentified Information Body came out of the woman's body immediately after she collapsed.
(Could that be the "familiar" Minoru was talking about…?)
A very old and sturdy Information Body emerged from the ashes of the FAIR member that Minoru had incinerated when he was attacked during his infiltration of San Francisco.
When Tatsuya "saw" the "thing" that came out of the woman's body, he immediately remembered that conversation.
This "familiar"-like Information Body disappeared from Tatsuya's sight after less than a second.
Rather than flying out of sight, it simply vanished. It gave the impression that it did not disappear, but rather shifted its coordinates in the information dimension.
Tatsuya could not track where it went.
He had to ask the woman about the "familiar" as well.
Fortunately, Tatsuya can also use the Non-Systematic Magic needed to release [Icy Thorn] in order to awaken a subject from their sleep.
Tatsuya let out a small sigh and turned on his heels back to the hospital to wake up the woman who had attacked him.
Also, thanks in part to the intercession of Shaula and Stuart, Miyuki was not charged for the unauthorized use of magic.
◇ ◇ ◇
It was nearly sunset when Laura Simon had noticed what happened. When she went to examine the used "Guru's Stone Tablet," she noticed that it had reverted to its former, unused state.
Laura continued to do research on the artifact even after Helen had used the stone tablet. Through touching the actual object, even if it was an empty husk, she could learn how the "Guru's Stone Tablet" functions.
The stone tablet contains a "daemon"23 within it. When a magician pours power into the stone tablet, the daemon awakens and possesses the person who offered it their power.
The "daemon" then bestows its host with a special magic.
In modern magical terms, it works via the principles of Engravement Magic, in this case recorded on the pigment at the molecular scale, whereby, upon the activation by infusion of psions, the Psion Information Body that is the daemon — a process that operates in the Magic Calculation Area independently of the will of the person — is constructed and sent to the deepest recesses of the unconscious of the person who poured Psions into it.
The daemon functions as a sub-system that builds a specific magic in the Magic Calculation Area, granting the person the magic that had been stored in the stone tablet. However, at the cost of the sub-system occupying a considerable amount of the Magic Calculation Area, the use of other magic that can be used becomes severely limited.
If the capacity of their Calculation Area is too insufficient, not only will they be unable to learn the magic from the stone tablet, but the overload may cause the host to die. If they don't have any spare capacity left, then they won't be able to use any other magic at all. The more advanced and powerful the magic of the stone tablet, the greater the risk.
Once the Engravement Magic on the stone tablet is activated and the daemon is released, the engraved Magic Sequence is rewritten and the stone tablet becomes unusable. But in the event that the Calculation Area of the daemon host ceases to operate — which in many cases implies the death of the magician — then the daemon leaves the host and returns to the stone tablet. The engraved Magic Sequence on the stone tablet restores itself with the daemon's information, and it subsequently waits for a new user = daemon host.
The "Guru's Stone Tablet" here was now in that state.
"So Helen is dead…"
Laura muttered alone in the room. Her voice was neither regretful nor mourning.
"I wish she would have collected a little more data before dying."
No, it might have at least carried some regret.
Regret that the lab rat had become unusable earlier than expected.
"Well, that's fine. It would've been obnoxious to leave this precious magic with that thieving cat for any length of time…"
Besides being the sub-leader of FAIR, Laura is also Rocky Dean's lover.
Helen's blatant attempts at flattery to gain Dean's favor were naturally an eyesore for Laura.
◇ ◇ ◇
July 17th, 7:00 P.M. local time, Berkeley, California. Tatsuya and Miyuki had been invited to dinner.
Although they were invited to dinner, the location was the hotel where they were staying. The host was JJ, who had rushed over from the East Coast. Stuart and Shaula were also invited.
"We did not expect for it all to be resolved so quickly. You never disappoint, Tatsuya. You have my deepest gratitude."
After the toast, JJ sincerely thanked him. His gratitude was genuine, for if this incident had lingered, it would certainly undermine the current ruling party, and by extension, his boss, which would have had a negative impact on the presidential election.
"You're welcome. This case also gave me valuable insight, so I am content as well."
Tatsuya had been allowed to take part in the questioning of Helen Schneider. From her, he was able to learn more about the magic [Babel] that was causing the aphasia and the "Guru's Stone Tablet" artifact that was used to acquire it.
"We were also able to get testimony on FAIR's involvement, of which Commander Canopus said that he would like to bring it to the municipal police as soon as possible."
Shaula is the one who spoke. Stuart in turn nodded her head in affirmation.
Maintaining public order is outside the jurisdiction of Stars, but the possibility of this developing into a large-scale terrorist attack via magic was something that they couldn't ignore. Not only by Stars as an organization, but also by the individual magicians and magic engineers that comprise it, it was not a matter that could be ignored.
FAIR had been under the radar of the police as a potential criminal group for some time. Until now, their actions had been overlooked due to the lack of concrete evidence of any organized criminal involvement, but Helen's testimony was sure to spur the police to launch a mandatory investigation. Together with the case of the "white stone tablet" that had been reported by FEHR, a comprehensive investigation is expected.
"Mister, what are your plans for tomorrow? If you can spare some time, I would appreciate your insight into the analysis of [Babel]."
Stuart invited Tatsuya to do collaborative research.
"I'm honored by the offer, but…"
Tatsuya shook his head apologetically. [Babel] is certainly an interesting magic, but Tatsuya has already "seen" the structure of the Magic Sequence. As a result, he has been able to figure out that the magic uses a different syntax than what is known.
It is not something that can be explained overnight. It would take years of research. There is no chance that he could remain in America for that long, considering the position he is in.
"Right now, I'm more concerned about the cave where the stone tablet was excavated than [Babel]."
He added this as justification for declining Stuart's invitation.
"The cave on Mt. Shasta?"
"Yes, that's right."
This was not an offhand excuse.
"JJ. Could you give me permission to investigate Mt. Shasta?"
Tatsuya was serious about wanting to investigate that mountain.
"It's not that Mt. Shasta is off limits, but… Do you even know where it is?"
JJ expressed puzzlement at this sudden request.
"I will try to contact FEHR, the organization that provided the information to the police about FAIR's illegal digging."
"By the way, isn't that the same organization that Mister sent an emissary to the other day?"
"You knew about that?"
There was no problem with them knowing about the matter involving Mayumi's visit to FEHR. Besides, the scheme against Mayumi was related to the approaching presidential election this fall. Since JJ is deeply involved in the election, it would be much stranger if he didn't know about Mayumi's trip.
"Understood, feel free to do so. Will you be taking your own car to Mt. Shasta?"
"That's the plan."
"I see… Do you need First Lieutenant Shaula to escort you?"
"[Babel]'s caster has been neutralized, so there is no longer a need for such a concern."
Shaula had been assigned to escort Tatsuya and Miyuki, "to guard them from the user of the unknown Mental-Interference Type Magic." This pretext no longer exists.
"Instead, I'd like to fly up there, so could you please arrange it so that I can have your tacit approval?"
"We can charter a light aircraft if you'd like…"
JJ interrupted him after having a sudden realization. He had just remembered that the car Tatsuya had brought with him from Japan was an "Air Car."
"All right. I'll make the arrangements, so take care out there."
JJ wanted to have Shaula accompany him, even if there's no "cat to bell24," but he didn't push the matter any further.
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