“Kimihiko Kimizuka. Nagisa Natsunagi. Charlotte Arisaka Anderson. We’ve been waiting for you.”
Ice Doll, the high-level Federation Government dignitary, turned her masked face toward us.
Technically, it wasn’t just her. A row of a dozen or so officials was looking our way.
“Please, have a seat. The footing’s rather unsteady.”
No sooner had she spoken than I staggered a little.
We were moving across the surface of the water in a yakatabune—practically a floating dining room—that they had chartered. Inside the tatami-floored cabin, a sumptuous meal had been set out for everyone present. Outside, the sun had set, and the light of the boat’s red lanterns swayed.
“I never imagined so many people would show up just to see me,” I told the gathered members.
We’d received the invitation from the Federation Government in late November, when winter was drawing near.
“Board this boat at six PM three days from now. You may bring a maximum of two companions.” That was all the letter I’d been given by a Man in Black had said.
I didn’t know what they wanted, which was business as usual, but this time I could make a pretty good guess. Charlie and I exchanged looks.
“Go on, Charlie. Apologize properly. Use your words.”
“H-huhn?!” Charlie glared at me. “Why is this my fault?! Don’t sell me out with no warning!”
“Well, you’re the one who suggested it back then, right?”
“L-liar! With the way you showed up that time, it just felt like, you know, the right thing to say! That means it’s your fault the Akashic records got broken— Ah!” Charlie hastily clapped a hand over her mouth. She really was a proper idiot.
The other day, our pursuit of Abel A. Schoenberg, enemy of the world, had taken Charlie and I to the control tower where the Akashic records slept. While we were there, we’d fired two bullets into the System.
Of course, we’d done it because we decided breaking them would be better than letting Abel steal the records. However, that didn’t change the fact that we’d busted the secret the Federation Government had tirelessly tried to protect. That was why I’d been prepared for a dressing down from them. And yet…
“It was Kimizuka! It’s his fault! He’s the reason the Akashic records got broken and why the mood between us got a little strange for a second!”
“Oh, man. And after you were so honest back then. You asked me to save you and everything. If you were like that all the time, even I’d be more—”
“! Bringing that up is against the rules! …Oh, come on! Back then, you were more, like, how do I put it? You know what I mean…and now you’re so, so… Why?!”
Just as Charlie was launching into an angry, pretty incomprehensible tirade, Nagisa stopped her. “Hang on. This is starting to feel like a romcom.” She gave me and Charlie a cold, steady look, then promptly switched gears, turning to face the government officials. “Neither of them was to blame for that.” She spread her arms wide, as if shielding us. “Kimihiko and Charlie only broke the System to protect the world from Abel. If you won’t forgive them for that… If you plan to hurt my precious friends, then I won’t forgive you.”
That got a reaction out of Ice Doll. “You’re saying that you, a Tuner, would defy the Federation Government?”
“Well, I’m being a hero because I want to protect my friends. If I can’t do that, I don’t mind being an enemy of the world instead.”
Natsunagi’s words made my breath catch for a second.
I was sure she meant it at face value. However, her remark reminded me of a conversation I’d had with Abel. According to him, the Tuners were sure to turn evil someday—to become enemies of the world. He’d said it was their fate.
“I see,” Ice Doll murmured, and a silence settled over the room. “However, we have no intention of blaming you. The System was damaged, yes, but it isn’t the sort of thing that could be destroyed completely with two bullets. Besides…” Ice Doll got to her feet, and the other dignitaries stood up with her. “Singularity, we owe you an apology. We’re terribly sorry.”
The entire group bowed their heads.
“Wh-what’s going on?” Charlie didn’t seem to know where to look. They weren’t scolding us but apologizing? Why in the world were they—?
“—Oh, I get it.” The officials’ attitudes had brought one answer to mind. “Is this about how a government faction was working with Abel?”
That was the group of hard-liners who were trying to erase the Singularity. Since their interests had aligned with Abel’s, they’d conspired to get rid of me. In fact, Abel had hit me with his code of loss, and I’d spent three weeks basically dead.
“So what’s happened in your organization between then and now?” Nagisa asked.
The group finally raised their heads again. “Some of the hard-liners have been assigned new duties.”
“You mean they’ve been demoted?” Apparently, they hadn’t been stripped of their positions in the government entirely.
“At this point, we moderates are in power, and we’re searching for a way to coexist with the Singularity. You have no enemies here,” Ice Doll told me. “Be at ease.”
The other government officials sat back down, and the three of us followed suit. Extravagant food and liquor were spread out all across the table. Was this supposed to be part of the apology? Encouraging underage drinking, though? Were they aware that they were supposed to be an organization working on the side of the law?
“Lot’s not here?” Charlie asked. She took another look around at the masked group. “He didn’t seem to be a hard-liner.”
“……”
Ice Doll didn’t answer. What did that silence mean?
If memory served me right, Lot had been the bureaucrat who’d shown Charlie how to get to the control tower. Had something about him caught her attention?
“What do you think, Kimihiko?” Nagisa whispered to me. I couldn’t figure out what she was getting at.
“I mean, you’re the one who took the most damage from that.”
Oh. She was asking whether we should accept the bureaucrats’ explanation and their apology.
“You really are kind. You’re getting mad on my account?”
“…Dummy. Don’t tease me.” Nagisa shoved me lightly.
“Well, for now, let’s accept their apology or whatever they want. Setting aside the question of whether or not we trust them, Abel’s a threat to them, too. Isn’t that right, Ice Doll?”
“Yes. The world’s worst criminal, the Phantom Thief, Abel Arsene Schoenberg—we can no longer allow him to roam at large.”
Yeah, it was enough if they acknowledged that. At this point, making peace with them and cooperating to a certain degree would be the best move.
“In exchange, tell me, Ice Doll: You dignitaries knew what the Akashic records really were, didn’t you? Why did you keep that a secret from the Tuners? How long has the world had a thing like that?”
If they meant to cooperate with the Tuners, it seemed like they could have told them about something like the records.
Or so I thought, but…
“Ice Doll does not have the authority to answer questions about the Akashic records.”
A mechanical answer—quite literally—slipped from Ice Doll’s lips. It was like listening to a robot.
The response seemed like a total joke, and Charlie started forward. “Would you people just—”
But Nagisa stopped her. “No, Charlie, that’s not it. I’m pretty sure Ice Doll genuinely can’t tell us.”
“What do you mean? Are you saying someone’s put her under a gag order or…?” But before Charlie even finished the sentence, something seemed to dawn on her. Her eyes widened. “You can’t mean—are you saying the System that runs the world is keeping her from talking, too?”
Natsunagi nodded.
The System managed the world from outside, like a program. Sometimes it caused phenomena that actively ignored the laws of physics, and we couldn’t escape its influence. Apparently, its core, the Akashic records, called all the shots.
“Why are the Akashic records able to decide a thing like that in the first place?” Charlie asked with a frown.
Why did the Akashic records get to determine everything? What sort of logic had brought them into being, and why were they still considered the standard for what was correct?
Abel had said that the world had another secret. There must be something we still needed to learn.
“If the government can’t tell us, I guess we’ll just have to ask Abel.”
We would have to meet with our enemy, who’d vanished from the face of the Earth, one more time.
“There is one more thing we must tell you,” Ice Doll said. But just then, the sliding door at the back of the room opened.
“—Mia?”
Mia Whitlock entered dressed in her Oracle outfit. I seriously hadn’t expected her to be on the boat. Had she come all the way to Japan from her clock tower in England?
“Wow, good for you. Are you finally getting over being a shut-in?”
“I—I told you not to call me that… Ugh, I feel sick…” The boat rocked very slightly, and Mia clapped a hand over her mouth.
I’d thought she looked pale. So she was seasick, huh? No one with a heart would ask what she’d been up to while she was waiting. As always, the word “pathetic” seemed to suit her.
A few minutes later, after Mia had managed to regain her composure, she came to stand in front of us again. “The truth is, there’s been a new prophecy.”
The Oracle had foreseen a new future crisis.
“It’s clearly different from any previous global crisis, though. I didn’t get any specifics, but the meaning behind it was, without a doubt, that the world was falling to pieces and scattering. That it was ending. It’s as if the vague sense of wrongness I’ve had for the past six months has finally taken shape…”
Even as she spoke, Mia seemed to be grasping for words, as if she wasn’t quite sure how to describe it.
“If even the Oracle doesn’t know, does that mean it’s deeply connected to the Akashic records?”
“Considering the timing, I think there’s a very good possibility. That secret of the world is something neither we Tuners nor the Federation Government can control.”
Mia shot a glance at the bureaucrats she’d just taken a jab at. However, none of them were about to react to a barb like that with how things stood.
Instead, Ice Doll said, “We invited your group here after hearing what the Oracle had to say on this matter.” Her mask faced us squarely. “We have decided to call this crisis the Great Cataclysm.”
The Great Cataclysm. That name reflected the fact that they were on their highest possible alert.
“It is extremely likely that Phantom Thief Abel A. Schoenberg will contribute to the Great Cataclysm. Having decided to coexist with you, Singularity, we have no choice but to rely on you and the Ace Detective. Please help us save the human race.”
Phrasing her request in a way the detective could never refuse, the icy official bowed her head one last time.