“This is my triumphant homecoming, you shitheads.”
✦ ✦ ✦
Using one finger to toy with the transport helicopter’s minimum aerodynamic balance, wearing a smile that seemed to split his face in two, Accelerator added:
“And to start, I’ll go rescue that kid and Misaka Worst.”
✦ ✦ ✦
Fiamma of the Right, hand trembling, opened the metal door from the inside.
Because of the damage gnawing away at his whole body, he couldn’t even get up. He rolled outside the escape container.
He was on top of a low mountain.
The Star of Bethlehem he’d built up was nowhere to be found. The skies had returned to their original color, too. And he could no longer hear that constant nearby drumfire. A silent white. As he stared across the Russian scenery expanding out from the escape container, Fiamma came to a vague answer.
It was all over.
He didn’t know what would become of the world after this. He knew he’d picked the best option at the moment. And now that it had been turned away, this world would be continuing its slide down the slope even now. How far would it fall? Or would it veer onto a different course as it fell? He was unable to make any predictions.
That man had instructed him to live in a world like this.
It hadn’t been mere lip service. The man had gone through with it, full force, even giving his only chance to escape to a stranger.
Then now’s when you start getting out there and seeing everything you can.
Those final words rang keenly in his ears. And so Fiamma, without going straight down into the snow, lay atop the ground like this, his objective lost. Needless to say, his path from here on would be a rocky one. He’d thrown the world into chaos, and they’d chase him down as the criminal who caused a war. He wouldn’t have the Roman or Russian Churches’ cooperation. God’s Right Seat was no more. He’d lost the Soul Arm that remotely controlled Index. His arm may have held a special power, but in a restricted situation, if he fought endlessly appearing enemies, it would eventually run out of steam. In this world of the victors, Fiamma would be treated as the one stain remaining.
A life on the run would be like something that whittled away at the surface of his body.
In such a swamp, he doubted he would find what that man had told him about.
“…”
But for some reason, Fiamma couldn’t easily give up the possibility that another had risked his life to leave to him. At the time, that man had certainly seen something Fiamma couldn’t. He hesitated to simply discard it without learning what it was.
He would determine where he was going once he started going, he decided.
Everything lost to him, Fiamma slowly put energy into his whole body once more, with his own feet. Wobbling, he stood up—and took his first step.
And then it happened.
✦ ✦ ✦
Boom!!
Suddenly, Fiamma’s right arm was cut off at the shoulder.