Chapter 91

AFTERWORD Hello again to those buying one at a time and pleased to meet you to those who bought them all at once. I’m Kazuma Kamachi. Volume 4! With the main story this time being what it is, I removed the usual chaptering scheme. I used this gimmick to keep you guessing about what would happen next and who was going to live or die, as well as to incorporate the discussion on “rules” revealed in the last part into the structure of the entire narrative. The theme this time around has to do with the relationship between micro and macro, but without proper chapters, I wouldn’t be able to talk about anything if I tried to comment on much smaller episodes one at a time. So as a departure from the norm, I’d like to talk about the major characters. By telling you more about the characters driving the story, I hope to be able to summarize this story. Ransuu Kihara. A scientist of chemical substances that affect the brain. I created this character when I thought about what sort of technology would be needed to make a Five Over based on Number Five. While the techniques he uses are themselves tricky, I think he’s an easy-to-understand character, since on an internal level, he’s the most standard among the Kiharas that appeared in this volume. His ranking within the clan is probably middling, skewed toward the lower end. If you look at him as someone who had gotten his ideas from watching sports festivals around the world, you should be able to understand what his Kihara quality is. In the main story, he used an extremely realistic illusion, but he’s primarily a specialist at manipulating certain emotions. For example, he might restrict a target’s range of activity with a command like “For some reason, that doorknob is weirdly terrifying, so you can’t exit the room,” then finish them off with a knife. In his own words, realistic illusions are for his own amusement, since taking control over someone that quickly would be too boring. …Of course, as a result, he ended up clashing with an enemy who used a similar power, then got trapped in an illusory loop, just like mirrors facing each other. Enshuu Kihara. The failure of the Kihara clan—or so she seems at first, but her intelligence alone is enough to put her in the top rankers. There’s one scene where every single one of the monitors around her starts displaying graphs, and that’s because the smartphone hanging from her neck hacked into them semiautomatically. My original idea was to have a Kihara AI, but I wasn’t sure about using an AI that could speak perfectly like a human, so I changed things around. (Though in this world, a microorganism on Mars would probably talk to you in Japanese…) If I wanted to make someone who thought like a human, I figured I may as well just use a human. At a glance, it might seem like a human using a program, but if you’re a girl who’s not on Enshuu’s level, the program would end up guiding the human—just like how there are people in real life who overuse weight-tracking apps and astrology websites. When all’s said and done, I suppose it’s like a cursed item. As a side note, my ultimate impression of Enshuu ended up being something like “a normally plain girl who borrows the Kiharas’ power to do a wonderful transformation”! Byouri Kihara. She gets called Auntie a lot—obasan in Japanese—but the pajama lady isn’t actually that old. It makes me wonder what age obasan are in light novels these days. She’s a bewitching illness faker and a traditional Japanese transforming boss character. She loves the idea of being a strong enemy who seems to get killed, but then just when you breathe a sigh of relief, she gets you from behind, so her special trait is that she’s made several adjustments to her body to purposely make it seem like she gets defeated. That was why Kagun was so cautious of her. She used Number Two’s power in this book, but even if she didn’t have it, she probably would have made full use of her knowledge and technology as a Kihara to mess with her body anyway. Because Byouri only assembles transformation stages assuming scientific attacks, though, a surprise attack from outside that realm nullifies her entire “transforming several times and getting stronger each time” thing. Kagun Kihara. The joker this time around. Originally, he wasn’t restricted just to near-death experiences. He wanted to remove all occult concepts from the matters of life and the soul and explain it all with science, ultimately reaching a conclusion that every person has life, and their positions or situations don’t change that life’s worth. (Out of all the Kiharas, his objective at least was an admirable one—but only his objective.) But when his experimentation produced a technology that could switch a person’s life on and off at a whim, he realized that if he kept going, even if the value of those people’s lives didn’t change, that value would end up fixed very low. And so he retired from the life of a scientist. In his research days, he killed by far the most people out of all the Kiharas, but since he also revived them all, he had an insane final tally of zero kills. Through and through, a kind teacher advancing straight on a path of revenge—he might seem like that, but when you think about it logically, even though it was to gain strength for his revenge, he was still involved in the Radiosonde Castle and Hawaii incidents. While we can assume he saved the spectators in Baggage City, he was also the one who put together the whole plan to begin with. His notion that the ends justify the means is actually a trait he mostly shares with the other Kiharas—in other words, the Kihara who unleashed himself to protect the children from the slasher lost the ability to control himself after that. …Due in part to those circumstances, Maria Kumokawa decided that his final apology was directed at someone else, but in reality, it was directed at her as well. The teacher she’d spent so many years searching for was already nowhere to be found essentially. Bersi. I figured I’d treat him as a separate character. Because he has such an extreme defensive spell—nullifying only attacks that would normally kill someone instantly—he’s a troublesome person whose every action ends up being dramatic, ignoring his own personality and preferences. If he had normal sensibilities, it probably would have destroyed his mind, but the research results from Bersi’s past were working to his advantage in that respect. For all that he can nullify fatal attacks, he also has a sword spell whose power grows with each attack he receives, so if his enemy launches a fierce assault on him, he starts using that spell—its power is limitless. Unlike Accelerator, it isn’t a single instance of vector control, but rather, the attack power stays increased until he defeats his enemy or changes targets. He’s quite literally the character who breaks power scaling. But without that bonus, he can’t actually do much, so he’s bad at ambushing enemies and using other unilateral attacks. That was why he used his clenched fist in the beginning, too. Which also gives a glimpse of his wish—a battle of attrition where both he and his target fall in the end. As a side note, Ransuu Kihara and Utgardaloki, who got taken down pretty quickly in the beginning, would have otherwise been Bersi’s natural enemies. Utgardaloki. A sorcerer and illusionist. Like Sigyn and Marianne, he doesn’t normally participate in direct combat. The reason they’re all in Baggage City at all should have become clear when their plans were revealed near the end of the story. In short, Gremlin didn’t need people to win battles—they needed people to make subtle adjustments to the environment of Baggage City, battles included. Gremlin didn’t necessarily have to use Baggage City for their plans, but since the Anti–Academy City Science Guardians talked big about constructing a global standard for supernatural powers in place of Academy City’s, they were oddly interested, and they ended up taking full advantage. Sigyn. Someone who was already defeated by the time the story began. Normally, she would not only have provided appropriate advice to allies but also given false advice to enemies so that they would destroy themselves. She’s not so much a sorcerer as she is a master debater, one very good at analyzing someone’s logic and plugging the holes in it. Because her ability to plug holes in logic was one that worked with magic as well, she entered the “industry,” if you can call it that. Her position is incredibly irresponsible—she only gives advice, and only when it works out for the other person does she want to take the credit. Because she’s defended that position for a long time, even if it doesn’t turn out like that in the end, she has almost no sense of camaraderie and very little resistance to betraying people. It’s almost a mystery that Marianne, who I’ll talk about next, didn’t turn her into a chair or a table. Marianne Sringeneier. The human modification maniac, the root cause, the one who got way bloodier as the story went on—that’s how she may have seemed, but as you might have guessed from how Dáinsleif showed up at the very end, she didn’t originally specialize in the field of anatomy. It’s touched on in the story as well, but her human modifications have strategic value, sapping enemy morale by altering soldiers into intentionally grotesque shapes. She can modify nonhuman objects, too, and even when modifying people, she could still make them beautiful instead. The general rule is that if she just needs a tool, she could use minerals, and if she wanted to give something missile-like calculation functions, she could use life. …That said, her sensibilities mean she also finds solace in using that table and chair, so if she were to make a beautiful man or woman, I get the feeling they would come out looking incredibly ridiculous. Many of you probably read the explanation for Dáinsleif and thought, How does it have that much power if it’s just using whatever’s around?! But if you can freely make a Soul Arm with power like Stiyl talks about in the main character’s short story, for example, I turned the wheel toward having to do at least that much or else it won’t maintain its balance. Incidentally, Dáinsleif—unlike Gungnir, which was talked about in another story—is actually meant to be used by a human king in the original legends. That means she doesn’t need a connection spell a god would need for using a god’s weapon or considerations like Mjölnir, a weapon of the gods itself. Despite all the human modifications Marianne does, she gets quite out of sorts from one of her companions, Bersi, dying. That said, though, will Bersi’s “end” really be something that helps her…? Saflee Opendays. The plainest contestant in the Natural Selector martial arts tournament. She uses simple mixed martial arts. Ever since Academy City–made esper powers become the stars of one-on-one combat, though, martial arts as a whole have been in a depression (people watch martial arts for entertainment during events such as the Daihasei Festival), so Saflee came to Baggage City simply to look for a sponsor. Her goal wasn’t to win the Natural Selector tournament, just to stand out enough among all the people with supernatural powers so that some rich company or investor would scout her. Because of that, as the fighting evolved from official tournament matches to street fights to an outright war between science and magic, she wasn’t bothered at all. As you might have guessed from her bent toward finding the thrill in destruction, perhaps in her normal line of work, she’s always looking to put on a show. Shuri Oumi. She looks ten but only because she’s borrowing the power of things like botulinum toxin. She’s actually over thirty. Her attributes are all over the place—she’s a cheerleader, carries a schoolbag, and is a ninja who uses a garden spade as her main weapon. These are all conscious efforts on her part to stand out and draw the enemy’s attention… But once again, I feel I should apologize to the illustrator. If you got such a messy explanation and actually turned that into a messy image, it would affect your dignity—but if you made the design too unified, it would be a departure from the text. It was probably a super-difficult request to fulfill. Normally, ninja would use low-ranking (read: disposable) genin as decoys while the leaders, the jonin, safely take all the credit. (Which is how the leaders always survive and accumulate feats and exploits, thus keeping them in their position.) But not only does Shuri completely destroy that standard theory, she even pulls off the amazing feat of not being disposable and actually making it out alive. Her essence should be one that places great weight on protecting her comrades and subordinates, then, but by the time she first appears, her whole squad has already been wiped out, and she’s started running amok contrary to her usual way of thinking. …Speaking of the Koga. They exist in Academy City’s underworld, too, but their goals are very different. It should show that there are multiple factions of the Koga. Maria Kumokawa. Among all the fresh blood, illusions, human modifications, a falsely youthful ninja, biological weapons, a transforming boss, a negative-twenty-degree winter, and a hellscape where everyone is doing whatever they want, she’s a precious breath of fresh air and the little sister of the Kumokawas, a service industry panty-flash type. My image of her martial arts was a combination of things like capoeira, breaking, and ballroom dancing, and while that wasn’t depicted too much in the narration, her skirt would definitely have been in an interesting state the whole time. The hellishness of the main story could completely change depending on how many illustrations she was in! …Then again, illustrating this girl probably would have been super tough. In terms of a sense of energy or movement of weight. Her ability is called Storm Axle, which allows her to change the centrifugal force produced by her body anywhere from 0.5 times to 2 times. It’s a Level Two ability. Because it’s so fundamental to all martial arts, it makes them all more powerful. But her bones and muscles don’t get any stronger, so it has a downside: She would break her own bones if she really punched someone. Despite all the big talk she does, she doesn’t actually end up doing that much. But the same could be said of her older sister Seria—they both have that kind of characteristic. Looking at the implication in NT, Volume 2, of not being able to stop the twenty thousand clones from dying even though they knew about it should give an idea of the sisters’ positions. Touma Kamijou. As you all know, he’s the main character and the safe zone. But since one of the themes of this book was to destroy the rule of him being able to save every ally just from being present, the key word Touma Kamijou was misused in a variety of ways. Even in the story, that alone gave more weight to the name. But I think the boy who appeared in the last section of the book vividly showed how he’s different from the Touma Kamijou of the past. Going back to the usual chaptering scheme for only that part, too, was a meta trick to show how the cold rules dominating the world until then had just switched to something else. …Of course, even more serious damage was waiting for him after that. I purposely won’t comment on the “damaging” character, the boss character who so dramatically appeared. When a series like this goes on, it’s best to hold important characters like her in reserve lest I run out of them. I want to thank my illustrator, Haimura, and my editor, Miki. It must have been pretty tough to decide where to depict the before and after of the gimmicks with the limited pages we had. Maybe they held their heads in their hands and groaned when they saw the needlessly high-cost idea of having an RPG-like transforming boss. Really, thank you so much for this. And I’d like to thank all of you reading this, too. Since the idea of breaking safe zones can break the very pillars of the series if done incorrectly, it’s a difficult issue—I can’t easily execute it even though this is a problem that comes up whenever a series goes this long. I want to thank you all for giving me the courage to take on the challenge. Now then, as you close the pages, and as I pray you will open the pages again next time, here and now, I lay down my pen. A Valkyrie showed up, but don’t worry, she’ll be fully explained in the main story. Kazuma Kamachi