A Certain Magical Index, Vol. 7 (12 page)

Every one of these aspects was disassembled into “characters” and “symbols” as the wriggling flow of people would form a single spell or magic circle. They picked up the few remaining religious practices in everyday life and reassembled them. Amakusa’s techniques wouldn’t leave a single trace of magic having been used. They had inherited all their ancestors’ history—of those who needed to always be on the run from the shogunate’s cruel oppression.

Now then.

Saiji Tatemiya, standing on his own, scythed his own sword horizontally.

The metallic streetlight raining light below was sliced in half, and it fell to the ground.

We’ll show you, Kaori Kanzaki—our priestess. We’ll show you what the diversified religious fusion of Crossism, the Amakusa-Style Crossist Church, has become!
he said quietly to himself, tilting his head up to see the night sky.

Historic ruins, under the veil of a dark night.

That’s what Kamijou thought of Parallel Sweets Park, where the special movement method would be carried out, when he saw it from far away. The man-made amusement center about two hundred meters in front of him was devoid of light. The buildings, normally
adorned with the myriad of vivid colors befitting a theme park, were now smothered in blackness. All of the facilities had been designed for fun and entertainment, of course, but it only made it feel even more out of place. An awful, damp breeze began to wipe the sweat on his cheek.

He looked away from Parallel Sweets Park. Dozens of sisters all clad in black had assembled in the big department store parking lot; that was a bizarre sight on its own.

His eyes casually met with Index’s. She was writing something on her palm with her index finger—some kind of mental preparation, he guessed. She still didn’t seem to want to get him involved in a clash between sorcerers, and she looked more on edge than she had earlier this evening. Maybe her tension was due to the elevated danger; there were significantly fewer Roman Orthodox personnel present now than before.

On the other hand, Stiyl, standing a few steps behind her, was smoking a cigarette like he always did. But he would have been coming up with all kinds of plans to protect her.

Agnes’s platform sandals galloped over to Kamijou and the others.

As one would expect given her age, she was pretty depressed before, during the shower thing and the half-asleep crawling-into-his-blanket thing. Now, though, he couldn’t see any of that on her face. She seemed to be the type who could forget about personal feelings for her job; he didn’t see any of the nervous wobbling from when they first met, either.

“We’ve located Amakusa’s main force in Parallel Sweets Park as we predicted. But we can’t get a read on the
Book of the Law
or Orsola. I don’t believe this to be the case, but this
could
all be a diversion. Therefore, we haven’t loosened the perimeter our other units in the area are deployed in. Only those who are here will be doing combat.” Agnes spoke as if this was already decided, and she was just making sure they knew.

Kamijou mulled over what she said for a moment. “Kinda sucks that we don’t know
who
in Amakusa has the
Book of the Law.
Or whether Orsola’s even in the park. Can we still save her? If it takes
too long to find her, they could run away with her or take her hostage.”

Actually, it would make more sense to use a hostage, since they’re at a disadvantage, wouldn’t it?
he wondered.

He recalled Orsola’s face. Ignorant of the ways of the world and ignoring the words of others—a girl he was pretty sure would wander off if you took your eyes off her for a second. He didn’t want to see blades or guns to her throat or villains using her as a shield.

But Agnes wasn’t about to spend time worrying. “If they escape Parallel Sweets Park, then that’s what our perimeter’s for. As for the hostage bit…meh, I don’t think they’d use her as a shield.”

Kamijou cocked his head to the side in confusion.

“Amakusa’s number-one objective is to get Orsola to tell them how to decode the
Book of the Law
, right? If the worst happened and she died while they were using her as a shield, their whole plan would fall apart. If they’re this attached to the book, then Orsola will be safe.”

Stiyl spoke up, his cigarette moving around as he did so. “Amakusa’s goal is probably to use the
Book of the Law
to fill the hole in their strength left by Kanzaki. The fact they’re being so stubborn here means they’re
that
desperate. If they fail to get their hands on the
Book of the Law
, it’s all over for them. So they should be treating Orsola like an ice sculpture.”

“…Then again, that means we’ll need to find Orsola before Amakusa turns to self-abandonment,” said Kamijou, feeling the scales tipped in an odd direction. If they drove Amakusa’s backs against the wall before they found Orsola, they could self-destruct along with her. But if the Roman Orthodox Church went easy on them, they wouldn’t have the leeway to search for Orsola; given the difference in their forces, there wasn’t much room to hold back.

Agnes, too, seemed to understand how difficult it would be to show mercy. “So I want to split our forces. Eighty percent of the Roman Orthodox Church personnel will be the main force and act as a decoy, smashing into Amakusa from the front. Meanwhile, you three will do a search of Parallel Sweets Park as a commando unit.
If you locate the
Book of the Law
and Orsola, please secure them, got it?” She clapped one of her platform sandals on the ground. “If you can’t find her before the special movement method expires at 12:05, then we’ll have to treat her as not having been here. If that happens, please get yourselves out of Parallel Sweets Park. We’ll do a thorough investigation of the park ourselves after neutralizing Amakusa.”

If they didn’t find Orsola before the time limit, and she also ended up being inside the park, that in itself would end up being dangerous for her. One had only to look at Parallel Sweets Park to realize it wasn’t very good for a manhunt. After all, from what Agnes had said, there were seventy-five stalls sitting in the park.

Kamijou gulped audibly, and Index opened her mouth to speak. “There’s also the eddy itself. If we don’t destroy that, they might be able to run away with Orsola. Touma could easily get rid of it, but we’d need to wait until it opened at midnight in that case. To stop them before that, we could just break the physical items they used to set this up—but Amakusa would have camouflaged everything. Finding all that stuff would be hard.”

“Searching for the book and Orsola,
and
destroying the point…Looks like our schedule’s going to get a little busy,” remarked Stiyl, spitting out his cigarette and crushing it underfoot.

Agnes, having determined that they were ready, raised a hand. All the nuns behind her—seventy strong—hoisted their weapons in the same way, sending the ring of cold steel through the night.

Their weapons weren’t all the same. There were obvious ones like swords or spears in the crowd, then there were those that Kamijou supposed
could
be used, like silver staffs and giant crosses. And then there were some crazy things: a giant cogwheel as tall as him and a pine torch. He couldn’t even take a stab at what they were for. Agnes herself had been given a silver staff by one of the sisters.

“…This can’t be forgiven,” she said odiously into the darkness, resting her staff against her shoulder. “When Crossism first spread, it was with the goal of saving everyone. And they’re using that power for
this
? They wield their violence for something so stupid, and
they’re forcing us to use even more stupid violence against them. Why can’t they realize such a simple chain of events?”

“…” The answer to that was simple—all you had to do was take a step back and think about it—but Kamijou felt like it was a very difficult problem for the people concerned. Of course, he agreed with her opinion as much as the next guy.

“Well, maybe this isn’t the right way of putting it…But it’s not only Amakusa—this is why I don’t like sorcerers. It’s people like this. Especially those modern western sorcerer societies that popped up at the start of the twentieth century. They all use Crossist techniques that are underhanded or split hairs with the ideology. I mean, they even typically use the names of the archangels for their magic circles, like the Likeness of God, Michael, and the Power of God, Gabriel.

“Even besides the twentieth century, like during the witch-hunting days, alchemists contracted to royalty would always make these declarations. ‘This is a secret technique in Crossism, so it isn’t actually witchcraft. I am no more than another one of God’s faithful sheep,’ they said.” Agnes stomped her feet. They made a
clip-clop
noise. “They meticulously comb through the Bible from start to finish, scrutinizing every single word from the mouth of God. They plumb it for contradictions and holes while sipping their sweet honey. Their black magic goes against the will of God. That is the identity of our true enemies—not the terrible ones without, but the abominable ones within. Sorcerers are like the politicians who bring countries to ruin by exploiting loopholes in the law. People like us obey the rules and stand in a single-file line to receive our daily bread—and they cut in front of us in line, acting all innocent and stuff.

“That’s why all this weird trouble keeps happening. I would not tell them not to partake of their bread—I’d tell ’em to get to the back of the line like they’re supposed to, you know?”

Kamijou heard all this and was understandably a little dubious of what sounded like a policy of Crossist supremacy. But the important part was that she couldn’t forgive Amakusa for breaking the rules when everyone else was obeying them (or so Agnes believed).
As a side note, Stiyl Magnus, a sorcerer by trade, was smirking and ignoring Agnes’s indignation; Index looked slightly worried.

Well, Necessarius is full of sorcerers, so they probably feel offended, huh? But still, Agnes
…
Girls can really change their expressions a lot. She was all nervous and wobbling around before. What strange creatures.

When he glanced around him to change the subject, he only saw Roman Orthodox sisters in every direction.

“Still, though. For someone saying all those modest things about not being able to spare all her forces, you got this many people to gather up with a single word,” he remarked in slightly shocked admiration.

Agnes smiled. “It is our privilege to outnumber all. We have comrades in 110 countries around the world, you know. Even in Japan there are plenty of churches. In fact, a new house of the lord is being constructed as we speak—the Church of Orsola. I think it was somewhere around here, actually. Right nearby. I think they were bragging that when it was finished, it would be the largest church in Japan. It was supposedly as big as a baseball stadium.” Agnes’s soles softly
clipped
and
clopped
.

“Orsola?”

“Yes. She has quite a record, you know. She spread the teachings of God to three heretic nations, earning her the special privilege to have a church built in her name. She was very good at speaking, wasn’t she?”

Now that she mentioned it, Kamijou figured she might have been right. It was just that all the Japanese-speaking foreigners coming out of the woodwork tonight lessened that sense for him. He was grateful for it, of course—Japanese was the only language he could speak.

“Once the church is finished, we’ll send you some invitations. But before that, we should settle the issue at hand. Let’s pray for a splendid conclusion with a good aftertaste.”

Agnes gave an intrepid grin, hoisted her heavy-looking silver staff on her shoulders, and clapped the heels of her feet twice on the
ground. The twelve-inch-high platforms slid off and they turned into normal sandals. It seemed that they were made to come on and off at will, just like the fasteners on their habits.

“…Umm. I understand it’s easier to move around like that. But why don’t you keep those off normally?”

“Shut up. It’s called fashion. I’m very particular about it.”

11:27
PM
.

Kamijou, Index, and Stiyl arrived at the chain-link fence near Parallel Sweets Park’s employee entrance.

Though they had yet to set foot on the battlefield, Kamijou could feel electricity tingling his skin. Someone could have been watching them from the vast expanse of darkness beyond this fence, and they wouldn’t know. Their enemies probably had to limit their hiding places to a single part of the park—but the whole thing was already looking like a giant enemy breadbasket.

And she’s in the middle of it
…

How hard must it have been for Orsola to be left behind, alone? He considered what he’d feel like if dozens of villains with swords and spears were surrounding
him. Like shit
, he thought bitterly.
If I knew this was gonna happen, I would have just forced Orsola into Academy City in the first place
…

“Hey, Stiyl.”

“What?”

“Do you think we can really do everything we need to before time runs out? We have to destroy the point, search for the book, and rescue Orsola—all of those things.”

Stiyl remained silent for a moment at his question. Index, too, looked between them nervously. After a pause, the sorcerer answered. “Honestly, it’s going to be tough. We don’t even know where in the park the
Book of the Law
or Orsola is. Plus, there’s actually one piece of information I didn’t tell the Roman Orthodox Church.”

Kamijou tilted his head in confusion.

“Right before this incident occurred, Kaori Kanzaki, who should have been in England, disappeared. She’s probably acting on behalf of her former subor—Her friends. If we try to deal major damage to Amakusa, the saint might attack.”

Kamijou was taken by such surprise and nervousness that he thought his mouth would dry up like a desert.

Kaori Kanzaki was such a strong sorcerer that she could suppress a real angel, as she had during the Angel Fall incident. He hadn’t personally seen her in battle, but he found it easy to imagine how dangerous she would be as their enemy.