Hyouka Kazakiri.
The girl had abnormally large wings coming from her back, but this was the first time she’d actually flown in the sky. In fact, she hadn’t even known whether these wings had such a commonplace function. But they weren’t giving her any problems. It wasn’t that she’d “remembered” how to use them or that she’d learned it anew. It was as though the countless lightning-scattering wings were being remade to bring out the effects she desired—giving her buoyancy just as she wanted.
She’d protect her friends.
That was the feeling with which she’d come all this way, but then she’d found something. A being much like her. And one trying to kill the one on the monorail car, the one she owed her life to.
In the skies, over fifteen thousand feet in the air, she glared at the enemy before her.
They resembled each other.
They weren’t humanlike, but they still looked feminine. Giant wings sprouted from their backs. A small halo hovered above their heads. They possessed immense strength, which carried the risk of collateral damage. In other words, their existences were supported by a kind of power.
As they faced off, and as she thought about how they were alike, she realized something.
✦ ✦ ✦
I see.
Almost like an angel.
✦ ✦ ✦
Was that her impression of the enemy before her or an impression of herself? Hyouka Kazakiri didn’t strictly make a distinction. She didn’t need to. Any impressions she had of her applied to herself as well—as all impressions she had of herself applied to her. She had the vague notion that’s just how they were.
What was the other one thinking and feeling?
Did she have the ability to think and feel at all?
Did that apply to herself, too?
Was she herself truly succeeding at thinking and feeling from her heart?
In this situation, where starting to consider it too deeply seemed like it would lock her into an endless loop, the two monsters, paused in midair, eventually began to slowly move.
Hyouka Kazakiri tightened her grip on the “sword” made of the same essence as her wings.
In contrast, the angel of water gently waved its empty right hand and produced an icy blade from midair.
They didn’t need a signal.
By the time one had moved, the other had already begun as well.
That was their connection as they clashed head-to-head.
✦ ✦ ✦
Boom!!
A spherical shock wave fired out and spread—endlessly.
✦ ✦ ✦
The air tingled and shook.
The shock wave had the density of a physical wall, and it even rattled the floating stone fortress. Several rooms caved in, but their fragments, instead of raining down on the surface, hung suspended as though liquid in a zero-gravity space, before being reabsorbed into the fortress.
There was no time to idly watch.
Even as that happened, the battle continued.
As the monsters’ swords locked together, the giant wings on their backs wriggled like living creatures.
✦ ✦ ✦
✦ ✦ ✦
They howled.
And then they crashed into each other.
Ba-bang!! Ba-ga-zk-zk-gak-gak-gak-greeee!! With momentum exceeding the speed of sound, dozens of blades attacked their targets, each at its own angle. But victory was not decided. The reason was that as both of them continued their fierce offensive, they kept enough power in store to deal with the other’s.
Icy wings swung, icy wings tore apart; lightning wings attacked, lightning wings broke. The fragments, severed from their masters, turned into fine particles in midair and scattered, becoming an all-encompassing snowstorm of lights that took on color. They looked like small feathers, left behind in the wake of a white bird soaring away.
Still flapping its innumerable wings, the angel of water also swung the watery sword in its hand horizontally in an attempt to decapitate Kazakiri. Kazakiri repelled the assault with her own sword before preparing for a new attack.
The face of the angel so close to her was blank.
It was like an incomplete doll, and while its face possessed alluring irregularity, it didn’t have any isolated parts, like eyes, a nose, or a mouth. It looked like a smooth mask—and the valley corresponding to its mouth was writhing.
It sounded like quiet mutterings.
The words didn’t belong to any nation. Maybe it was in a range unperceivable by human ears.
But Kazakiri could hear. She could understand. She could feel.
She couldn’t comprehend every little thing perfectly, of course. She probably couldn’t tell it to speak her language, either. But she could manage to pick out words in the sentences here and there.
“hbo…RETURN…fbyuo…”
At first, it was the color of an emotion.
When she realized what the color was, the words creating that color, too, began rising to the surface.
“RETURN. frPOSITION. CORRECT. SEAT. uj. HEAVENLY PLANE. ORIGINAL. MUST BE. gePLACE.”
Something was blurred.
The contours of the angel of water, whom she’d thought was a single being, swayed slightly.
It wasn’t that something was overlapping it. Nor was something trying to burst out. Kazakiri didn’t possess a body made of physical matter—and that was how she penetrated its identity.
“…Someone is forcing in power of a different format…?”
She could see fire.
Its presence was like oil to water.
The two kinds of energy had been poured into a cup and stirred up, creating what must have once been a properly blended angel. However, as time passed, they separated, and the two energies were now trying to create a line of demarcation in the single container.
Two powers must not be placed into one container.
One could have called that purity the polar opposite of Kazakiri, who was an aggregate of every single AIM dispersion field. They seemed the same at first, but in reality, they were based on two entirely different things. Two who could have been alike precisely because they stood at opposite ends. Perhaps that was the relationship between Kazakiri and the angel.
Did that amount to blasphemy, for her?
A color of anger was in the angel as it formed words.
“go back. necessary. workt. conduct. fiamma. advantage. interest. alignment. yplan. cooperate”
“…If that is the reason you would harm my precious friends, then I’ll use all the power I can muster to stop you.”
“damage. ignore. prioritize. return. correct. position. necessary. obstruction. evil. synonymy. decision. everything”
Zzzaa!! An enormous vortex of energy began to roil about from inside the angel of water.
Its watery sword swung in an even wider arc, colliding with Kazakiri’s feather sword, and both gained a small amount of distance.
The angel of water raised its sword overhead.
And then it happened: The angel of water’s halo gave a slight jerk. Its focus diverted away from Kazakiri to something else.
“capture”
Its mouth opened.
The mouth of the archangel who could now see naught but its own objective.
“necessary. information. parchment. acquire”