First, they saw what looked like a bizarre string—thick, white and massive, taller than Kyoto Tower—undulating in the distance. The next moment, more of them rose up one by one, wriggling like worms as they grew steadily taller, until there were nine great squirming strings.
It was only then that Naomi realized they were the tails of an enormous animal. The body of the thing came into view, white with black stripes and clearly made of the same stuff as the “bullet” embedded in the station’s wall... So, a colossal monster made up of the fox-masks.
“Monster” was the only term that felt appropriate. It walked through the city like a living thing, but it was taller than Kyoto Tower. Its arms, or forelegs, grabbed the buildings in its path like they were toy blocks.
It looked like a fox forcing itself to walk on two legs, or maybe a human trying to walk on all fours. It looked wrong. It didn’t belong in this world.
Naomi exhaled sharply. His mind, which had shut down from shock, finally started working again.
“Sensei, are you—”
“I’m fine.”
They were both uninjured, at least. They each gave the other a quick look, then turned back to the enormous monster.
“We’ve got to do something about that thing…”
Naomi looked down at his glove and focused as hard as he could. He needed to create something that could get rid of that behemoth.
For some reason, that was as far as his train of thought would carry him.
Uh…how am I supposed to do that?!
His thoughts ran in circles, but his overwhelmed, panicky mind couldn’t come up with a plan that could work. The God Hand could do anything, in theory. Anything he could imagine would become real in this world. He knew that.
Only problem was, his imagination couldn’t keep up with this.
Suddenly, the world grew dark as a shadow was cast over the area. Naomi and Sensei jerked their heads up toward the sky.
The top of Kyoto Tower was tumbling through the air straight at them.
“Aaaaaah!”
Naomi swung his hand into the air reflexively, unsure what he was even trying to create. An odd, stringy crystal beam shot up off the ground and hit the tower’s observation deck, catching it in midair. But it wasn’t enough to hold it there for long; the deck’s enormous weight bore down on the structure and it began to crumble away.
Naomi threw another support beam at the deck, then another and another in quick succession, fighting to halt its fall. In the end, he just barely got the upper hand—the observation deck came to a halt directly above the Sky Garden. It was a surreal spectacle, but Naomi couldn’t step back to admire it. It took all concentration just to keep the thing where it was.
This is insane. This is insane!
“Naomi!” Sensei shouted from behind him.
Naomi knew they were in trouble the moment he heard that cry. An instant later, the shadow they stood in turned even darker.
Above the suspended observation deck, a foreleg even larger than the top of the tower swung down.
The colossal leg stepped down onto the very top of the broken Kyoto Tower, forcing it downward with impossible force. Naomi’s support beams shuddered.
“Gaaah!”
He fought back with everything he had. His glove groaned with exertion as it brought forth more and more support beams every second. Naomi’s head burned with exhaustion, a sensation he hadn’t felt yet with this new glove. It reminded him of his training sessions, and of creating that black hole on the bridge.
His brain was reaching its limit.
But he couldn’t let up now. If he flinched, it would all be over. That enormous leg would crush him and Sensei into paste in an instant.
He had to do this, but he couldn’t. Those two conflicting facts filled his brain; pure blackness spread across his mind like a pool of ink.
Oh crap. Oh God. Somebody, please—
“Naomi,” said Sensei, “we’re going to beat that thing.”
A ray of light cut through the blackness.
Naomi looked over his shoulder. Sensei was still sitting on the ground, unable to rise, his cane lost somewhere in the chaos. But he had a bold smile on his face. He was suddenly the fearless, cocky man Naomi had spent so much time with back in his world.
If Sensei said they were going to take that monster down, it was all going to be fine. Sensei knew just what to do—he always had the perfect idea ready and waiting.
He was Naomi’s Sensei, after all.
“Use the God Hand to erase me,” Sensei said, “right now.”
“What?”
Naomi stopped. I don’t get it, he told himself. That doesn’t make sense. He tried to convince himself that was true, violently suppressed the part of him that understood.
“You don’t need me to explain, do you?”
“But that’s…that’s just...” No matter how hard he tried to push it down, the truth wormed its way back into his mind.
He didn’t want to understand, but he knew exactly what Sensei was thinking. The fox-masks had been after Ichigyou Ruri. They had wanted to erase her because they’d identified her as a foreign object, something alien to this world.
But now that she’d left it, the masked things were clearly targeting them.
“The System’s highest-priority repair operation is the elimination of duplicate addresses,” Sensei began, explaining the technical aspect on purpose to give Naomi the necessary background. “Any duplicate records have to be trimmed. Two versions of the same object can’t coexist in a single world. In other words…” Sensei pointed at Naomi. “Once one of us is erased, those things will stop.”
And then, he pointed at himself.
“The answer should be obvious.”
“No. No way!” Naomi shouted. He wouldn’t accept this—it was just too horrible. He needed another solution.
Maybe he could just recreate that line of doors. He could go back home, and Sensei wouldn’t be a duplicate anymore. That made sense, right? He just had to take this big thing down first.
“It’ll be all right. I can do this!” Naomi focused his mind and forced more power out of his glove.
Sweat was dripping down his face.
“I’ll just take this thing down real quick.”
He forced more power out. The veins in his arm bulged with the strain. Something fell to the ground with a small plip—it was blood, dripping from his nose.