He couldn’t say anything more unless White Cosmos gave him the detailed conditions for regeneration, and he did feel bad for Chiyuri. But there was something that had greater priority ahead of reviving Cotton Marten at the moment.
If the BB side lost the war of the worlds, Brain Burst 2039 would in that instant be terminated, and Haruyuki, Chiyuri, Takumu, Kuroyukihime, and even White Cosmos would all cease to be Burst Linkers.
Actually, even if the Accelerated World were lost, she might manage to survive somehow, Haruyuki thought, and then he took a deep breath to switch gears.
First, he had to tell Chiyuri—no, the members of Nega Nebulus—about the start of the interworld war and the conditions for victory. While he was a member of Oscillatory Universe now, the White King had ordered him to do this.
That said, however, the membership of the third Nega Nebulus, an amalgamation with Prominence, totaled forty-nine Burst Linkers. Actually, forty-seven now that Haruyuki and Metatron had left, but Centaurea Sentry had joined, so forty-eight. It would be difficult to have them all meet in the usual normal duel format at this hour, and he had his doubts about whether they would come out for a dive call tonight.
First, he would explain the situation to Kuroyukihime, Fuko, Niko, and Pard, and have them decide how to proceed. He started to compose a message in his mind but was soon interrupted.
“Haru, let’s eat,” Chiyuri said, and his stomach responded with a growl. Giggling, she stood up and reached out for the tote bag.
“Hey?” he asked, on a sudden whim. “Can I ask Taku up?”
“Huh? Taku? Well, yeah, of course,” she said, and then cocked her head to one side. “But he said he has kendo practice until seven thirty, so he’s probably not home yet.”
“I’ll ping him at any rate.” He launched the mailer on his virtual desktop and sent a short message. A mere ten seconds later, the brief reply arrived.
“Oh!” he cried. “He says he just got home now, so he’ll come over as soon as he changes.”
“Perfect timing!” She grinned. “So get three plates out, then. The big ones.”
“Got it!”
Following the instructions of Chiyuri, who knew the state of the Arita kitchen better than Haruyuki himself did, he set the plates out on the dining table.
What came out from the tote bag was a magnificent feast—Chiyuri’s mother’s special Olivier salad, sardines and eggplant stewed with tomatoes, and a shrimp mushroom pilaf. As she dished this out onto the three plates, the doorbell rang, so he checked the front door feed before pressing the unlock button.
A few seconds later, Taku—Takumu Mayuzumi—came into the living room.
“Huh?” Haruyuki cried out unconsciously the instant he saw him. “Taku… Did you grow?”
“What? No, I don’t think I’m any taller.” His childhood friend frowned slightly. He was dressed in a summery style, with a loose pale-blue-green Okinawan shirt and shorts reaching below the knee. He’d already been over ten centimeters taller than the average for boys in their grade, but he looked a little bigger today than Haruyuki remembered.
“And think about it. You just saw me at the send-off party for the Inti attack mission.” Takumu smiled wryly. “That was only five days ago, you know.”
“Hmm.” Chiyuri also stared hard at him. “I maybe feel like you’re taller, too. If you keep growing like this, you’re gonna end up over two meters tall.”
“Th-that’s kind of unlikely,” he protested weakly.
“So then, should I give you a smaller portion?” she teased.
“N-no, I mean, that’s not really…”
She laughed out loud and divided the pilaf up neatly into three portions before scooping them out onto the plates.
While Takumu was in the washroom, washing his hands, Haruyuki poured more oolong tea, and then the three of them sat down around the table. They clapped their hands, said, “Let’s eat!” and picked up their forks at the same time.
In addition to chicken and potatoes, the Olivier salad had zucchini and broccoli, so the texture was a lot of fun. The eggplant practically dissolved in his mouth, having soaked up the fat from the sardines in the garlicky stewed tomato dish, while the shrimp pilaf fried up so fragrantly in Chiyuri’s mom’s pride, a cast-iron frying pan, had an exquisite mouthfeel. After savoring it all, as if in a dream, he took a sip of oolong tea and sighed.
Chiyuri and Takumu also had healthy appetites on full display, their hands in constant motion. It hadn’t been just the three of them around this table since they’d held that spontaneous slumber party in the middle of the whole ISS kit thing. Chiyuri had made them a soup curry with summer vegetables, and when Haruyuki had insisted that the best way to eat eggplant was to deep-fry it, Chiyuri had argued that he was truly a child if he couldn’t see the true deliciousness of grilled eggplant, and Takumu had interjected with the most persuasive argument for traditionally pickled eggplant.
That slumber party was around June 20, so it had only been just over a month since then. But it no doubt felt like a million years ago because of the tumultuous days that had followed one after the other. And now that they had plunged into what could have been called the climax of all of those events, the interworld war, he had no idea when the three of them would come together again.
The instant he had this thought, the words that he’d been carrying around in his heart spilled out of his mouth. “…I’m sorry. To both of you.”
Chiyuri and Takumu blinked vacantly in unison at him. Chiyuri was in the middle of chewing, so Takumu asked, “Sorry for what, Haru?”
“Oh.” He turned his eyes down toward the table. “Because I went and left Negabu and joined Oscillatory…”
Chiyuri turned her fork on him from the other side of the table and gave an angry grunt, while Takumu, to his left, slapped his back.
“Quit it, Haru. You transferred to the White Legion to save the attack team when we were stuck in range of Tezcatlipoca’s attacks—especially me, after I got hit with Level Drain, right?”
“But,” he protested weakly, “the reason you all challenged Tezcatlipoca in the first place was to rescue me.”
“In which case, we’re even. And…the truth is, I’m the one who should be apologizing,” Takumu half said, half muttered, and then abruptly sat up straighter, ran his hands through the layers of his silky hair, and bowed his head. “Sorry, Haru. About our promise to fight for real when we both hit level seven. I’m gonna need you to wait awhile yet.”
“…”
Unable to immediately find words in response to this, Haruyuki could only move his mouth awkwardly.
In the Silver Crow rescue mission, carried out to recover him from where he was held prisoner at Tokyo Grand Castle, the large theme park on Reiwa Island in Tokyo Bay, Takumu—Cyan Pile—had been hit with Tezcatlipoca’s Level Drain, just as he himself said. As a result, he dropped from level six to level four. How many normal duels and Enemy hunts would he have to do to earn enough points again to reach level seven…?
Wait. I can think about if the Accelerated World continues to exist, like the resurrection of Cotton Marten.
Even if it wasn’t possible to get all of the members of Nega Nebulus together, he should at least explain the Drive Linker assault and the war of the worlds to the ones he could assemble.
“Hey, Haru?” Chiyuri said, looking serious, having swallowed the mouthful of pilaf she was working on. “You gotta tell Taku about those guys.”
“Those guys…?” Takumu looked up with a dubious face, and Haruyuki nodded at him before looking at Chiyuri.
“I know,” he said. “I’m going to call an all-hands meeting after we’re done eating, so I’ll explain everything to the Legion members then.”