Chapter 16

PROLOGUE An Exchange Student at the School of Magic A single man exited Keizan, a small, dingy BBQ joint tucked away in one corner of a rooftop bar. It was barely past noon, and yet the streets of the bar district were already full of life and the smell of booze. Lights and wires and holographic ads covered the skies, the aether neon colorfully dyeing the surroundings with such saturation, in fact, that it was dizzying to even look at. The sensory overload wasn’t just visual—there was the voice of a half-therian maid beckoning clients to her shop, the latest song by a recently popular five-ogre idol group, the moans and angry yells of nearby drunkards… The blond-haired man was wearing a tattered blue cloak over old military armor and had a naked rusty blade hanging from his waist. He’d just finished eating his offal-only barbecue alone in silence and was now looking utterly satisfied. The cold, cutting wind stroked his face. “Still some time left…,” he whispered after checking his virtual retinal display. He brought his sleeve up to his nose and inhaled the smell that had permeated his clothes after sitting in the restaurant for so long. “I wonder if I’ll get yelled at showing up like this.” Oh well. He decided not to worry about it. The smell, nay, fragrance of barbecue was a most pleasant one, after all. It was no reason to get yelled at. Right then, his Familia—the device implanted into his nape—received a message with a picture attached. The image showed a sea of rabbit-shaped objects, round and pink, and a similar number of open capsules. “‘I haven’t gotten the secret one so please wait a little longer.’ She pulled all of these?” He looked up at the sky, which was covered in thick, wintry clouds from the massive climatological shift eighty years prior. “So much for a triumphant return. How we’ve both changed. Though, I guess it should be no surprise, since it’s been five hundred years…” Then he looked down at the city. “She’s changed, both in name and form…but she’s still here, even now.” He reminisced about everything he left there, in that place, in the long-gone past. Surely she must’ve been worried as well. People pegged her as this kind, loving entity, but truth be told, she was extremely simple and sensitive. And so, his breath coming out in white puffs, he apologized: “Sorry.” His words had no way to reach the past. “I’m sorry.” She heard a voice calling to her from deep within her chest. A voice she had heard since she was a child, or perhaps even since the moment she was born. “I’m sorry.” Why was it apologizing? The girl asked, but no response came back. Who was it apologizing to? The girl was closest to the voice, yet she didn’t know even that. “I’m sorry.” I’d gladly help you find peace, if only I could. Her plea didn’t reach the voice. She heard it again. Something was about to awaken within her. Perhaps the person it was apologizing to was already near. “Haaah…” The girl, Hizuki Reynard-Yamada, sighed. Birdcage-shaped lamps dangled from the ceiling of the wide classroom, the white glow of the artificial will-o’-the-wisps inside them illuminating its interior. Hizuki sat gloomily in a corner, the light reaching her pigtailed blond hair and heterochromatic eyes—one scarlet and one golden. At the front of the classroom was a big holoboard—a holographic blackboard—and the teacher’s desk; tiers of long, pure-white desks were stacked like terraced fields of an era long gone. The girl was dressed in the School of Magic’s characteristic blazer uniform and seated at the very back of the room, at the end of the last desk right beside the window. With her beauty and her melancholic expression as she rested her chin in her hand, she would have made for a fantastic painting. But that wasn’t what was on her mind. She heaved another heavy sigh, already too many to count for the day. “Haaah…” Someone, somewhere, had once said that happiness went away with each sigh, though she couldn’t remember what world that saying was from. The blue sky outside the window was clear, and off in the distance, a sacred mountain peaked out from among the clouds; a thick forest teemed with singing birds and flying wyverns. It made for a fantastical landscape. This was all, of course, a hologram. The actual view outside the unfiltered window would show a cloudy sky and the much-too familiar townscape. Hizuki looked around the classroom. People of various species were passing the time before morning homeroom in their own way. Some were chatting, some were reading, some were studying even before class, and a few were asleep at their desks. Her classmates, whose names she barely remembered, looked the same as always. Suddenly, she met the gaze of one of the noble girls chatting among their clique. The girl whispered something to her friends while glancing at Hizuki, and immediately after, they all turned to look at her and giggled. “Ugh, I made eye contact.” “Hee-hee. Guess she doesn’t let being a deadbeat stop her from coming to class, huh?” “By the way, have you heard? Just the other day…” Hizuki couldn’t hear them. She was sure they were gossiping about her, but that was such a common occurrence that she felt no anger or sadness. No point in reacting so long as they didn’t say those things to her face. “Haaah…” She sighed away some happiness instead of expressing any emotion, putting her in an even gloomier mood. “Life is so boring…” Day in, day out, things were both changing and stagnant. This youthful period of school life was bright and colorful for most students, but to Hizuki, it was all a monotonous gray. “I wanna get out of here already…” The bell rang over her grumbling, signaling the start of the school day. Hizuki stared absentmindedly as her classmates got back to their seats. Then the classroom door opened, and a woman in a cloak—the homeroom instructor and mediumship mentor—came in. She walked up to her desk, then put her hands on it. “Good morning, everyone.” She was a full-borg, and her voice through the artificial processor had a thick elvish accent. “Ehm, today, I’d like to introduce you all to someone. Strange timing, but we have an exchange student.” The classroom was abuzz with whispering, naturally. They didn’t typically get exchange students this time of year. “Ahem. Everyone, silence, please. Come in.” The entire class—even Hizuki—turned to look at the door. Hizuki was the only one who was hit with an indescribable feeling, a premonition of sorts. A feeling that told her this monotonous day-to-day routine would soon be over. The door slowly opened, and the new classmate stepped inside. “…!” Hizuki gasped, frozen in place. For a split second, she thought the new student was a woman—he looked feminine due to his long black hair and shapely face. He was tall, his limbs slender, and his eyes the color of darkness. He walked with pomp and majesty. The school uniform looked strange on him because he didn’t feel like a student in the first place. Yet at the same time, he also looked unbelievably good in it, as though it had been tailored specially for him. “I’m sorry.” She heard that voice again. Someone was calling to her. Her right eye—the golden one—started twitching. It was glued to him, unwilling to look away no matter what. The voice within her chest ceased. “Ehm, allow me to introduce him to you all. He’s here from Shinju—” The man took one step forward, interrupting the instructor. He puffed out his chest, lightly brushed away his bangs with one hand while placing the other on his hip, took a deep breath— “Bwa-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!” —and cackled. “Ladies and gentlemen!” He spoke clearly and resonantly. “I sincerely doubt anyone here is as ignorant as to not know my face…but I am a courteous man! My apologies for wasting your time with introductions! I am merely following school etiquette!” His booming voice seemed to shake the entire room. With a bold smile on his face, his every single move and gesture felt as though they were calculated to charm whomever he faced. “Etch the name into your very souls! I am Veltol Velvet Velsvalt! I’ve come to this Akihabara School of Magic from the faraway lands of Shinjuku for a short-term exchange program!” Hizuki met his gaze. At least, she thought she did. “I look forward to experiencing school with you all in this city with its vestiges of the magic world of old! It is a true pleasure to make your acquaintance, however short it will be in my eyes!” A gust of wind blew past. Or so Hizuki thought, at least. “You should feel honored to have none other than myself leaving his mark on Akihabara!” A black wind gusted through the Cybermagic City’s historic landscape.