Part 1
Kamijou ate some dinner in a local burger shop with Thor, a combat member of Gremlin.
"…What is this?"
"It's the new salsa burger meal. Ugh, they tried too hard to make it unique and ended up making the flavor way too strong. And it's spicy!! I can see why the standard large burger never stops being the best seller."
"That's not what I meant, you idiot!! We! Are!! Enemies!! There's something wrong with us eating together like this!!"
"What? Is it that odd for us to have a bit of a chat? Whether I was a member of Gremlin or not, I'm betting you would be treating me differently if I was a short girl with large breasts that clearly wanted you to protect her."
"Are you making fun of me?"
"That's why I tried to make this easier by disguising myself as a girl you know."
"Come to think of it, how did that work?"
"You wouldn't understand me if I got into the details of the magic, so I'll try to keep it simple. In Norse mythology, when the thunder god had his weapon stolen, he disguised himself as the goddess of beauty, Freya, in order to lure out the thief. I put together a disguise spell based on that legend, but that means I can only disguise myself as girls."
"…How did you know about what Misaka and I said back in Hawaii?"
"When that argument happened, the FCE surveillance network that used cameras throughout America was still running. In other words, it all went straight to Gremlin. I've gotta say, Misaka-chan is quite the young lady."
"Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!! My yoooooooooooouuuuuuttttthhhhhhhhh!!"
Thor gave a cheerful smile as Kamijou held his head and wailed.
"Don't worry about it. With the life you live, you can't afford to get embarrassed over every little thing like that."
"How can you say that!? Are you trying to pick a fight after all!?"
"In a way, I suppose I am," said Thor as he lightly shook his blond hair that reached his waist. "But the type of fights you saw in Hawaii and Baggage City are not my type of fight. That kind of thing is no fun. Of course, I suppose I am a villain if I use that as the basis for my decisions."
"…"
"C'mon, eat. Don't just sit there. I'm paying, so you might as well eat as much as you can, right?"
Thor must have not liked spicy foods because he seemed to give his tongue a rest with a bite of salad or sip of soda between each bite of the salsa burger. Since he did not seem to like that kind of food, he may have been won over by the temptation of ordering a new item on the menu.
Kamijou grabbed the wrapper for his hamburger while making sure not to get any red sauce on his fingers.
"…So what did you want to talk about? Are you here to make a declaration of war?"
"This would be a lot simpler if I could. Even without doing that, the situation here is tangled up in a complicated mess. Basically, I want to clean up that mess before getting to the real issue at hand."
"What are you talking about?"
"Ollerus."
Thor spoke a single name.
With that name spoken, Kamijou knew he could no longer remain wholly uninvolved.
"He told you some things without giving you any proof while looking down on you the entire time, didn't he? And now you have grown rather nervous about what crisis is going to occur. Am I wrong?"
"…Without giving any proof? Are you saying he was lying?"
"You are afraid of being made to fight according to someone else's wishes again, aren't you? Like with Leivinia Birdway in Hawaii or Kihara Kagun in Baggage City."
"…"
"Don't glare at me like that. We know we are at the root of it all. But do you truly believe that just because we in Gremlin are the villains that Ollerus is wholly good and just simply by opposing us? Or to go even further, can anyone who resolves his problems with violence truly be considered good and just?"
He was no longer referring only to Ollerus. That last comment denied all the actions Kamijou had taken up to that point.
And even Kamijou was not so sure he was wrong.
For example, there was Tsukuyomi Komoe.
For example, there was Last Order.
For example, there was Oyafune Monaka.
A truly good person and a truly just person may have been someone who was able to choose to not fight even in a crisis and yet was still able to save their enemy with that choice.
That was a territory that lay far, far ahead of Kamijou who would clench his fist without thinking whenever a problem occurred.
"Now, let's talk about Ollerus. Let's talk about that man who relies on violence just as much as we do in Gremlin," said Thor as he put ketchup on a nugget. "He did not come to Academy City alone."
"What?"
"He brought the Saint named Silvia, Fiamma of the Right who was the true leader of God's Right Seat, a Valkyrie named Brunhild Eiktobel, and Leivinia Birdway, the boss of the magic cabal named the Dawn-Colored Sunlight. Every one of them is enough of a monster not to lose to your average member of Gremlin. They go well beyond the level of a normal magician. …Basically, they detected our movements and gathered in Academy City to stop our plan."
Leivinia Birdway.
Kamijou felt an ominous feeling in his chest when he heard that name.
The boss of the Dawn-Colored Sunlight. She had tricked Kamijou and the others when they went to Hawaii to resolve the situation there, creating a large crack between Academy City and its cooperative institutions. She had been one of the root causes behind the disturbance in Baggage City.
But this was no time to get caught up over that.
"What about it? Aren't they here to protect the people of Academy City from the likes of you?"
"If so why did they choose to make Academy City the battlefield?" pointed out Thor in annoyance. He threw a nugget in his mouth and continued, "If they truly wished to protect Academy City from us, it would have been in their best interests to put an end to this before we snuck into Academy City. Simply put, it would have been easy enough to set up a defensive line around Academy City rather than waiting within. The sea around Japan or the mountains around the Kanto district would have worked nicely." Thor licked ketchup and grease from his fingertips before continuing in a lower tone. "So why did they set up this great force within Academy City? They know how dangerous we in Gremlin are. Surely they have taken into consideration the possibility that we have already made our way in by this point. It seems to me that they are intentionally setting things up so Academy City is involved. But what do you think? Does this seem like the work of pacifists?"
"…"
"Just as we have our own objective in Gremlin, Ollerus's group has their own objective. And they will use Academy City to carry it out. That is the meaning behind how they are setting this up. Who knows if it will work or not, but they want a conflict to break out in Academy City so the city's defensive forces target us in Gremlin. I doubt those defenses can actually kill me, but having to fight the science side and Ollerus's group at the same time would make things quite a bit more difficult."
Every individual magician belonging to Gremlin had monstrous powers.
But that was not the most frightening thing.
That would be the fact that those powers were wielded as a group.
"So you're saying Ollerus's group chose this location so events would stray from the standard pattern and interfere with Gremlin's teamwork?"
"That's my theory anyway."
Kamijou put his half-eaten burger down on the tray.
He had suddenly lost his appetite.
They were allowing the fires of war to spread through Academy City to carry out their own objective.
If that was true, the friend/foe chart had suddenly changed.
"…Do you know what Ollerus is after?"
"No. In the end, it really comes down to the antagonism between Ollerus and Othinus. They're both monsters completely immersed in the territory of a Magic God. I have no idea if a mere member like me would be privy to the true intentions behind it all."
"You're telling me to trust you based on that!? That's exactly the kind of thing an enemy would say!!"
"I never said to trust me, you idiot. I'm telling you not to rely too much on information from just one side. I'm sure Ollerus told you all sorts of things. So now hear what our side has to say. Once you've gathered as much information as you can, you can come to your own conclusion. The only way to escape being someone's puppet is to think for yourself. And if you're going to do that, the more information you have, the better. Am I wrong?"
"…Then what are you after? No matter which path I choose, I'm still going to be your enemy."
"Even if we are enemies and we must fight eventually, I think we should have everything settled beforehand so we can fight with no reservations. To be honest, the situation surrounding you is pretty pathetic. Everyone is desperate to lead you around like a trained monkey so they can use your right hand's power for their own benefit. A fight with you under those circumstances wouldn't be any fun. What is your view of the situation?" Thor continued speaking as he battled the salsa burger even though it seemed clear he had already lost. "The thing is, Ollerus has shown off an odd characteristic at times. I don't know if he has always been like this or if he became like this as he approached becoming a Magic God, though."
"…?"
"He is fundamentally a philanthropist. If he sees someone in trouble, he will use any amount of power to help that person. But he loses sight of his surroundings when that happens. To be blunt, he is a man who would slaughter a military force of 1 million to save a single child he had never met before. I do not know what Ollerus is telling himself his actions are saving here, but if it is something outside of Academy City, it is entirely possible he would see no problem with using Academy City to save it."
It was unclear how much of what that boy was saying was true.
However, it was true that Kamijou knew nothing when it came to Ollerus. He had been saved by the man in Baggage City, but that was not enough to say that Ollerus was truly his ally.
It had been the same with Leivinia Birdway, the boss of the Dawn-Colored Sunlight.
Kamijou asked a serious question.
"Let's say for argument's sake that Gremlin is up to no good and Ollerus's group is not being exactly benevolent despite opposing them. What do you gain by explaining all of this to me?"
"Oh, that's simple," said Thor offhandedly. "Gremlin has come to Academy City because there is something here we want. And Ollerus has come to Academy City to stop us. …I happen to know of a way we can completely dumbfound both of those groups as they take their annoyingly careful and hesitant actions. Don't you think that would be fun?"
"?"
"The two of us can rescue the prize they are fighting over."
Part 2
The surgery in Fremea Seivelun's mouth was over.
"O-ohh… Ohhhh…"
The effects of the anesthetic must have still remained to a certain extent because she let out a moan over how odd her mouth felt. She was leaving the dentist's office with Hamazura and Takitsubo who had accompanied her to prevent her from running off.
"In the first place, I want to eat something!" she said to them.
"After all that crying and screaming, you still haven't learned your lesson!?"
The footpath they walked along was enveloped in the restless mood of the Ichihanaransai preparations. As the Ichihanaransai was a giant collection of cultural festivals, the shops were set up on the school grounds, but cheap stands targeting students were set up along the streets and paths during the preparatory period. This helped add to the festive mood during the preparations.
Takitsubo Rikou's gaze blankly wandered around the surroundings.
"…Hamazura, what are we going to do now?"
"We've done everything we need to do, so we head home. First we need to take Fremea back to her dorm."
Hamazura and Takitsubo currently lived together. However, Mugino Shizuri and Kinuhata Saiai were there as well, bringing all of Item together. Simply referring to them as roommates was simple enough, but it put some severe restrictions on Hamazura. He cared enough about appearances that he could not bring himself to flirt with Takitsubo in front of the other girls. In the end, he was forced to calculate things out based on everyone's mysterious schedules to get any time alone with Takitsubo Rikou. (And whenever he did, Takitsubo seemed to get so caught up in popping bubble wrap that she did not pay any attention to him.)
"Hamazura, we need to buy some detergent before going home."
"I see."
"So get some money out at the bank."
"I see."
"Convenience store ATMs have a handling fee, so we need to get to the bank ATM before they close."
"…There's just no sex appeal to that attitude, y'know?"
"Hamazura."
The girl wearing a pink track suit tugged at Hamazura's clothes.
He frowned.
"?"
"Fremea is gone."
Hamazura frantically looked around, but Fremea Seivelun was nowhere to be found.
However, he could hear a familiar soprano voice coming from amid the crowd.
"Nyahh nyahh!! In the first place, this says they have bite-size fruit marshmallows with 30 different types of fruit filling! I'm gonna keep eating them until I've found every kind!!"
"That damn brat!! Why isn't she afraid of having to get more fillings!?" shouted Hamazura as he ran off to go protect the peace inside that girl's mouth.
He couldn't let her get so excited over those black creatures armed with road construction equipment.
Part 3
After finishing most of his burger meal, Thor ordered some hot coffee and cheesecake for some reason.
"By the way, what do you think of fast food coffee? Is it good enough for you?"
"If you don't like it, don't order it… Personally, I don't even have any real problems with canned coffee," replied Kamijou with a disheartened expression.
Thor happily sipped at the cheap coffee and said, "So how far did we get?"
"You said Gremlin led by the Magic God Othinus and the group of monsters led by the almost-Magic-God Ollerus are after some prize, and we can get to it ahead of them." Kamijou wiped the grease off his fingers with a paper napkin. "So what exactly is this prize?"
"What Othinus wants is a person," replied Thor. "A person who has not been dyed in the colors of magic or science and therefore could go either way. But doing that would put a major burden on the person's body, so this person also has to have exceedingly high durability allowing them to undergo modifications that would kill any normal person from the shock."
"…What do you mean?"
"Who knows. To be honest, not even we know the specifics. This specific person's name can be glimpsed in records of the witch hunts from the middle ages. It comes up in accounts of a very strange incident where the holy men who were known for killing anyone they found suspicious, that they were jealous of, or that they simply did not like gave up on killing someone because this person was simply too durable for the holy men to deal with."
"…"
Kamijou could not imagine how what Thor had just mentioned could be connected to the current situation.
Whatever those records were, they had to have been from hundreds of years ago.
He simply did not see how they could be related to Academy City, the headquarters of Japanese science.
When he asked about it, Thor readily replied.
"It still isn't over."
"…What?"
"This woman would continue smiling even when they tried to burn her alive or crush her with weights, and it seems not even the flow of time could do her in. So you see, this is related. Even if her name is seen in records from hundreds of years in the past, she has yet to die. Presumably, she is still smiling somewhere on this earth."
"She's…still alive…?"
"Exactly. Of course, I doubt she's just some especially durable human. Whatever she really is, her core or true nature must lie elsewhere. This durability is likely nothing more than one facet of her special characteristics."
Thor tried to slice the cheesecake with a plastic fork but accidentally squashed it flat.
"And just so you know, the odds are good she is here in Academy City."
"Why? If she was in records of the witch hunts, wouldn't she have a closer connection to the magic side?"
"She only happened to get caught up in the witch hunts that were sweeping society at the time. It is actually unclear which side she truly lies on. It's possible she does not belong to either."
Thor stabbed his fork into the flattened cheesecake, but it fell back to the plate when he tried to lift it to his mouth. He then grabbed it directly with his fingers and brought it to his mouth.
"But we do not think Academy City took her in in order to carry out some kind of scientific experiment. …If that were the case, some simple results of that research would have shown themselves on the surface."
"Then what?"
"A last-ditch effort." Thor gave a thin smile as he licked his fingertips. "Whatever she may be, she has proven in those cruel witch trials that she cannot be killed by any means. She is an existence that goes against the wishes of Academy City's leader, but she cannot be dealt with in a simple assassination. Having her wandering around the world smiling destroys the hopes of the city's leader, and yet she cannot be killed or otherwise disposed of. What do you think the city's leader would do to deal with this problem?"
"He can't kill her to silence her, but he can't have her wandering around freely? Also, you say she is in Academy City but I've never heard of someone like that." Kamijou thought for a bit. "You don't mean…She's being imprisoned somewhere?"
"Exactly." As he had just finished eating the sweet cake, Thor's expression grew grim as he took another sip of his coffee. "If you can't kill someone, the fastest way to isolate them from the world is to rob them of their mobility. Most likely, she is being imprisoned in the most solid building in Academy City. …And that is why the situation has grown even more complicated."
The most solid building in Academy City.
Kamijou frowned as he thought for a bit.
Could it be a shelter in the vast underground area of District 22? Or could it be somewhere in the highly secretive District 2 or District 23?
But Thor shook his head.
He said, "There is an incredibly obvious answer."
"?"
"The windowless building."
With no hesitation, the Lightning God Thor spoke the name of Academy City's "heart".
"That is this city's greatest fortress. Aleister, the chairman of the city's board of directors, uses it as his castle. That woman…Fräulein Kreutune is imprisoned there."