Toaru Majutsu no Index: Road to Endymion c3

After being taken the hospital, the magician girl was given first aid.

Naturally, they hid the fact that she was a magician. The doctors would not have understood if they had tried to explain and it would have caused problems if they did understand, so there was no point in mentioning it.

Kamijou and Index rode along in the ambulance while Stiyl pursued the main force of the magic cabal. That girl had merely been a decoy meant to buy time, so they did not have any time to spare if the main force was working to gain control of the center of Agni’s Festival Fire.

Kamijou spoke to Index in the waiting room.

“They say her condition is not as bad as it looked at first glance. She suffered light blood loss and a concussion. If she rests, she should be back to normal in a few hours.”

“Touma, what do we do now?”

“We don’t have time,” he said quickly. “When a patient with injuries that appear to be from some sort of incident comes in, the hospital will contact Anti-Skill. They should be here before long. We need to speak with her before that happens.”

They headed for the girl’s hospital room.

The magician girl had been provided with a private room. She lay on the single bed in the room and she was not wearing a hospital gown. It may have been that her treatment had not required her clothes to be cut away or it may have been that Stiyl’s restraining runes had prevented the clothes from being removed.

When Kamijou and Index entered, the girl glanced over and spoke with an emotionless voice.

“What do you want?”

“We’re going to get you out of here.” Kamijou cut to the chase. “The hospital will have called Anti-Skill, so they should be here soon. But Stiyl does not want you to be captured by them. He said the odds are good your magic cabal would notice. I don’t want to think about the possibility, but is there a chance you will be attacked again if we hand you over to them?”

“What if there is?” The girl tried to sit up but then sank back into the bed. “That is what I hope happens. They failed to kill me before, but they will succeed next time. That is all there is to it. At the very least, it is 100 times better than handing more information than necessary over to Academy City or the Anglican Church.”

“I see.”

Suddenly, they heard multiple sets of footsteps in the hallway.

“Touma!”

“Tch, so Anti-Skill’s already here. We can talk later. We can’t use the hallway, so we’ll use the window.”

“Hey, wait a second. What are you doing!?”

“We’re getting you out of here!”

The magician girl frowned.

“I never said I would go.”

“Sorry, but you have no say in the matter. I’ll carry you if need be.”

Kamijou approached the window and opened it. He looked down to find a height of about three stories. The eaves stuck out and the drain pipes for gutters continued vertically down, so there were plenty of points for handholds and footholds.

“Let’s go. They said you had no broken bones, so you can use your arms and legs, right?”

“You can shelter me if you like, but don’t your city’s rules put you at a disadvantage here?”

“Even if they do, it’s no reason to abandon you.”

“Even if I am refusing your help? You gain nothing from this.”

“That’s no reason either,” replied Kamijou as he checked to make sure there was no one on the ground directly below. “It was the same when you tried to save your sister, right? No one forced it onto you.”

The girl clicked her tongue.

With her head hanging down, she said, “You said the cabal might attack me if you leave me with this city’s Anti-Skill.”

“Y-yeah. What about it?”

“In that case, you could have threatened to hand me over to them if I did not cooperate. You could have said I had to tell you everything I knew about the cabal or you would not let me escape. Why didn’t you?”

Kamijou’s response was simple.

“The thought never occurred to me.”

“…You idiot.” As soon as she muttered that, the girl brought her feet out of the bed and to the ground. “It’s Sozty.”

“What?”

“My name is Sozty Exica. What’s yours?”

Kamijou smiled slightly.

“Kamijou Touma. And she’s Index.”

Cities had plenty of blind spots.

But people unfamiliar with the science side and Academy City were often unable to make full use of such spots. Such people tended to gather at the types of facilities that also existed outside of Academy City.

In this case, it was a car scrapyard.

That modern blind spot was completely surrounded by thick metal walls. It was the kind of place that could be found anywhere yet the people who walked by it had no idea what went on within. Even if humans were being chopped to pieces within, no one would know.

A large number of rusted vehicle chassis were piled up. A pile had been created out of nothing but tires. Bumpers and batteries were sectioned off in their own areas. The area gave a strong cluttered impression, but the people that used it kept it fairly organized.

The Gate of the Gods Come from the Heavens.

A Hindu magic cabal.

About 20 members of that cabal were gathered in the scrapyard. The only member missing was Sozty Exica.

“Sozty did it. The time she bought us was very valuable. If we take control of the center to Agni’s Festival Fire that we transferred here, we can turn this city into a sea of flames with our Anglican pursuer inside.”

“But Sozty interfered with Agni’s Festival Fire to buy this time. It is possible the network has been damaged.”

“If we take a passive stance here, this valuable time will go to waste.”

“But making any major moves without any guarantee of success could lead to a fatal failure.”

They were aware this unproductive discussion was accomplishing nothing more than strangling their own throats. And yet they could not help but do it. No matter how much one knew prayer would not change the result, no one would be able to easily pull the trigger in a game of Russian roulette.

A woman within the group sighed.

She had long silver hair and brown skin. The fact that everyone turned their focus to her showed that she had the composure left to intentionally gather their attention.

Someone in the group spoke to her.

“Should we continue on or fall back? What do you say?”

“Good question.” A thin smile appeared on her lips before she continued. “How about this?”

Part 3[edit]

“What!? That’s crazy! Those are supposed to be public!!”

“But you can order things like coffee and curry. Some of them even have a salad bar and buffet. In other words, it’s all you can eat.”

“Yahoo!! This is a new golden age of business, isn’t it, Touma!?”

Index’s opinions changed a lot as her primary information source was talk shows. Sozty brought a hand to her head when she saw the nun celebrating.

“Have you forgotten we’re supposed to be on the run? Why are you needlessly gathering attention?”

“It’s probably fine. A group with gloomy expressions remaining silent the entire time will stand out a lot more in the crowds of a shopping district.”

“…Is that so?” muttered Sozty.

Kamijou looked around at the signs, searching for a restaurant that would let them pay up front. That way they would not be treated as dine-and-ditchers if Anti-Skill or someone showed up and they had to run out the back entrance.

“Hmm… A main road near the station is probably the best spot. That way, taxis, a bus stop, and the subway are all nearby. Hey, Inde-…hm?”

Kamijou trailed off because Sozty’s small hand had tugged on his clothes.

“What is it, Sozty? Did you see a magician you know or something?” he asked, but the brown girl did not let go of his clothes.

“No…There is no deep meaning to this.”

“?”

“You said we could not look gloomy and remain silent the entire time, right? Then this will work as camouflage.”

“Hey, wait a second. This isn’t to blend into the area, is it? You’re just getting drawn in by the glittering atmosphere of the shopping district, aren’t-…gwep!?”

As Kamijou the gentleman tried to calmly point out what was happening, he felt a sharp pain in his back. It was similar to the damage done when a carnivorous jaguar used its claws to climb a tree. He could not turn around to see what was doing this because it was clinging to his back, but Kamijou could make a good guess based on what he heard.

Despite being shorter than him, he heard Index’s voice coming from overhead.

She was clearly climbing up his back.

“Touma, what is this you’re taking advantage of this situation to do?”

“Wait a second, Index! Let’s start by working out what the focus of this conversation is!! And I think someone getting bitten on the back of the head would stand out anywhere on the planet!!”

Just before Kamijou underwent severe damage, a simple electronic tone sounded from his pants pocket. It was the prepaid cell phone Stiyl had given him. Index was terrible with machines, so she faltered slightly at the noise. Kamijou did not overlook that opening. He shook her from his back and answered the phone.

“Stiyl!? Honestly, you only call when it benefits you. Don’t leave your number unlisted! I can’t save it to call you back!!”

“I would say you are the one acting out of line.”

The voice coming from the phone sounded angry.

For him, relying on Kamijou’s opinions and information was likely a last resort.

“You took the girl from the cabal out of the hospital, didn’t you? I need some information from her. It relates to the opinions and motives of the Gate of the Gods Come from the Heavens.”

“What? I thought you were chasing them down.” Kamijou looked confused. “And do you not need to know about their escape routes or hideouts?”

“I am not an idiot. I have already found and entered the car scrapyard the cabal was using.”

Kamijou heard some static.

Stiyl may have been sighing or blowing out some cigarette smoke.

“But…”

“?”

“They were already destroyed when I got there. From the number of footprints, it appears a few of them disappeared, but the ones still here are unrecoverable. All of the information within their bodies has been magically destroyed, so I cannot extract any from their brains or spirits. Any analysis work would likely be a waste.”

“Un…recoverable…?” muttered Kamijou.

Sozty gave a start next to him.

Stiyl’s merciless words continued.

“From the traces of the destruction, I doubt this was an attack from outside. In other words, this was infighting within the organization. That is why I want information from another magician in the cabal. I need to know what exactly is happening in their cabal.”

Part 4[edit]

Kamijou and the others ended up entering a manga café. They paid for three private rooms (using Kamijou’s pocket money), but they all met up in one of them.

Stiyl had sent a large amount of image data to the prepaid phone.

They were all photographs of the faces of the magic cabal members who had been defeated and left behind by the mystery attacker.

As Sozty Exica checked through them all, she asked, “Is this all of them?”

“Looks like it. Have you figured anything out?”

“…There aren’t enough people,” she said after looking through the photos multiple times to be sure. “Aurodasa Ginzhana, Kereelty Tanabrook, Sumtalak Shandeva, Kipsila Endinia, Pancavani Uddasala, and Slasoma Anruda. …Well, I can understand why those six are missing. They were the decision-makers of the cabal. If someone attacked, the rest of the cabal would position themselves to let them escape first.”

“Is that it?”

“Seven people are missing in total,” muttered Sozty Exica. She spoke a new name through gritted teeth. “Ureapaddy Exica. My older sister. There is no real reason she would be protected above anyone else. If the other magicians were wiped out to let those six escape, my sister should have been wiped out as well.”

Kamijou looked at Sozty’s face from the side.

She stared at the small screen rather than looking at him as she continued to speak.

“And…these wounds. They are very similar to those caused by the Astras our cabal uses.”

“Astras?” repeated Kamijou in confusion.

Index replied, “Those are the weapons of the gods in Hindu mythology.”

“It differs a bit from the original meaning, but our cabal uses the term Astra to refer to all powers and weapons that use symbols of the gods’ characteristics,” said Sozty in a low voice “We refer to what I used against you as the Agni Astra. However, they have to be downsized quite a bit for humans to wield them. The Astras we use are nothing but the effects. Take a spear Astra for example. We can create stab wounds with it, but we cannot produce the form of the spear itself.”

That meant the term Astra could refer to many different things. It would not be mistaken to assume there were different Astras for each element that had been prepared by the gods: fire, water, wind, and earth

In that case…

What was the element of the Astra that Ureapaddy had secretly brought in and used to drive the Gate of the Gods Come from the Heavens to destruction?

“My sister is supposed to be using a Shiva Astra, but she originally specialized in a different line of Astra.”

“?”

“The project was supposedly frozen. It was not a downsized version that a magician could safely use with no recoil. This was a pure Astra that was built up into the proper form of a weapon rather than simply creating the stab wound. The project was meant to draw out the full power of an Astra despite the great burden that would produce.” Sozty clenched her teeth and seemed to be forcing out the words. “In the end, the Astra itself was a success, but it still failed because the reinforcement of the magicians using it did not go well. Most of the participants were blown to pieces by the recoil and my sister was badly wounded. It had supposedly messed with her physical body too much to have any proper defenses left!!”

“What…? What kind of Astra does your sister have?”

“The Astra held by my sister Ureapaddy Exica is…”

Part 6[edit]

Somewhere, the younger sister spoke.

“It is the ultimate weapon within the Gate of the Gods Come from the Heavens.”

Somewhere, the older sister spoke.

“A weapon that symbolizes the god who rules the universe needs to at least be able to destroy the universe.”

Miraculously, their mouths seemed to move as one as they spoke its name.

“The Brahma Astra.”

Part 8[edit]

Kamijou, Index, Sozty, and Stiyl gathered in District 18. That district was adjacent to District 23.

Out of necessity, Kamijou was acting as their guide to the city.

“District 23 is filled with top secret information, so you cannot freely go in and out like the rest of the city. Plus, the gates will simply be impassable at this time of night.”

“In other words, we should assume we will be mowed down the instant we cross that fence?” asked Sozty in annoyance.

Index frowned and said, “But if what Touma said is accurate, Ureapaddy is heading for District 23, right?”

“It would be best to intercept her before she gets inside,” said Kamijou confidently, but Stiyl dashed his hopes.

“She has no reason to wait around. Up until now, she had to feign cooperation with the rest of the Gate of the Gods Come from the Heavens, so she put it off until later. But with that restriction gone, she would have headed directly for District 23. We should assume she is already inside.”

“…I’m not so sure,” muttered Sozty.

The others turned toward her.

As her sister, Sozty would have the most accurate information on Ureapaddy.

“District 23 was a high priority target even in the Gate of the Gods Come from the Heavens’ initial plan. And yet Agni’s Festival Fire was never set up there. The reason for that was simple: our cabal had no way of getting inside unnoticed.”

“What…?”

Stiyl frowned.

Sozty stared at the fellow magician.

“We could get in, but only for about 10 minutes. Any longer than that would mean a direct conflict with Academy City’s defensive forces. That was simply not enough time to fine-tune and set up such a delicate spiritual item. Our plan was to destroy a few prominent districts with Agni’s Festival Fire, use the confusion to directly attack District 23, and escape Academy City after destroying the facilities there.”

Even if the plan had failed, hearing it still sent a chill down Kamijou’s spine.

But another point stood out to him.

However, it seemed like it would digress too much from the topic at hand, so he decided to put it off until later.

Instead he asked, “So does that mean Ureapaddy has not entered District 23?”

“If she had headed there immediately after destroying our cabal, the alarms would have long since started ringing. Assuming she has no other tricks up her sleeve, of course.”

After hearing that last ominous statement by Sozty, Stiyl lightly tapped his shoes on the ground.

“If our assumptions are correct, Ureapaddy plans to sabotage a rocket to be launched at a specific time so that she can detonate it outside of the atmosphere and artificially create the shooting stars she needs for Brahma Astra. I doubt that is something she can accomplish in only 10 minutes. It is harder to sabotage than it is to simply destroy.”

They were overlooking something.

If Ureapaddy had foreseen this situation from the beginning, she would have known it was impossible to infiltrate District 23 for long using the magic she had on hand. In that case, she would have prepared some sort of countermeasure.

They were missing some factor involved.

Did she have a means of sabotaging the rocket in a short period of time?

Did she have a spell that allowed her to slip past the defenses of District 23 for a long period of time?

“…Wait,” muttered Kamijou. “That’s it. That’s it! It’s simple. She just needs a way of sabotaging a rocket without entering District 23!!”

“Touma, what do you mean? Are you saying she has something similar to a curse that can be used across national borders? Something that can alter this ‘rocket’ thing remotely?”

“No. If she had something that convenient, she wouldn’t have needed to enter Academy City at all.”

“Then what is it?” asked Sozty in confusion.

Kamijou’s response was simple.

“We were thinking about this backwards.”

“?”

“Sozty isn’t doing something to District 23 from outside. If the target rocket itself leaves District 23, the district’s security no longer matters.”

“And how does she manage that?” said Stiyl mockingly. “I may not be too knowledgeable about aerospace matters, but I do know how large the rockets on the other side of this fence are. If a rocket the size of a radio tower moves even slightly, anyone would notice it.”

“Not necessarily,” said Kamijou lightly. “The rockets are mostly constructed in District 23. The fuel is even loaded there. But one portion is not. The container portion. In this case, it’s a capsule for the probe rather than a satellite. The fuel for the auxiliary boosters used for attitude control is loaded in District 10.”

“Why?”

“The liquid fuel used is called hydrazine. Not only is it highly explosive, but it’s toxic. The districts it can be handled in are limited. The biggest of those districts is District 10. They were making a big deal about it on a talk show recently. They were asking what would happen if an accident occurred as the container was being transported and complaining that there would be no risk if it was all handled in District 23.”

“In that case, we need to search out every transport route from District 10 to District 23. Ureapaddy should be in wait along one of them.”

“Wait,” said Kamijou just as Stiyl was about to begin moving. “Even if this is just the container at the top of the rocket, it is still on a very large scale. The truck will be hauling an object 20 meters long. It can’t make the turns of a normal street. The rocket will head along the shortest, widest, and straightest path.”

“Touma, if we head back along that path…”

“We should run right into Ureapaddy along the way.”

Part 10[edit]

“We… The cabal was targeting Academy City because it was necessary. No matter how our actions would later be recorded in history, we decided we had no choice but to carry out the attack.” Sozty spoke her next words as if spitting them out. “And now you’re saying the target doesn’t matter? You just want to use your spell that had been frozen? You’re going to destroy a city of one million just for that? Now I see why the cabal was keeping a careful eye on you. Your ideas need to be thrown into a dark hole and sealed away with a stone.”

“Sozty. Do you really, truly understand what you are talking about?”

“I do,” said Sozty with disinterest. “Seeing someone like you has made me realize the truth. I finally know what it is like to see what I was trying to do from the outside. I am growing angry at the justifications I was making.”

“Sozty…?” said Kamijou in a whisper, but she did not turn in his direction.

She kept her gaze on her enemy and made an announcement in a shout.

“I was wrong!! What we were trying to do is wrong no matter what reason you have. Forcing this onto them does nothing to save the people who would be sacrificed. The existence of a reason makes no difference!! And if it’s wrong with a reason, there is no way I can let you do it without a reason!!”

“Oh.” Ureapaddy gave a thin smile that displayed disinterest from the very bottom of her heart. “So you’ve already made it that far. In that case, I suppose telling you this won’t have that much of an impact on you, will it, Sozty?”

“…?”

“Didn’t you find it bizarre?” continued Ureapaddy in a calm, flowing voice. “The original plan the pathetic leaders of the cabal came up with was to use Agni’s Festival Fire to destroy a few districts, use the confusion to head into the strictly guarded District 23, and then destroy the facilities within. Correct?”

“Looking at it now, that plan makes me want to puke. What about it?”

“Oh? And wasn’t this plan implemented because the cabal works to obtain bodies that surpass the limits using training methods that surpass the limits and so it took issue with Academy City’s optimal training methods using the optimal values?”

“Ah…” muttered Kamijou rather than Sozty.

Ureapaddy smiled in delight.

“It seems that student has figured it out. Don’t you find it odd, Sozty? We were opposed to their methods of training the mind and body, and yet our ultimate objective was to destroy District 23. Their aerospace technology should have been of no consequence to us.”

Sozty seemed completely dumbfounded as she muttered, “Did the cabal have information it was keeping from us?”

“Their true reason for attacking Academy City lay elsewhere. I had hoped to completely shock you by revealing that the justification you held so dear was completely meaningless, but it seems you freed yourself from that curse on your own. I was trying to say I was disappointed my revelation had lost most of its meaning. Do you understand now?”

“…”

“If you learn what it is and what it has brought about, you will finally reach my darkness,” said Ureapaddy. “But that is all for today. I do not have time to spare. My preparations are already complete, so I will be leaving now.”

A loud sound like several simultaneous metallic noises could be heard.

At some point, a giant golden bow had appeared in Ureapaddy’s hand.

A bow.

Or perhaps it should be called an Astra said to be held by the god Brahma.

Once it was fired, it would cleanly tear out a hole with a 50 meter radius in even the sturdiest structure.

“Is that Brahma Astra!?”

“Do not worry, student. The timing has not yet come. Plus, what use is a bow and arrow that always hits the target if I fire it from head on? From your fight against Sozty, it appears you have some powerful means of destroying magic.”

Then what was she targeting?

What was she trying to do?

As soon as those questions came to Kamijou’s mind, Ureapaddy answered them by means of the direction she aimed the bow and arrow.

She aimed at the satellite guidance vehicle.

Specifically, she targeted the rocket container that contained the toxic hydrazine.

“Escape is my top priority today.”

She held a completely normal metal arrow in the bow.

But that was enough.

“So I will give up on this.”

With a dull noise, the arrow pierced into the side of the container.

A hissing sound like carbonation being released could be heard. A clear liquid that was obviously different from water began flowing onto the road surface.

“Not good! That’s hydrazine!!” shouted Kamijou.

Ureapaddy smiled and stepped back. She then prepared to run. She would not allow them to follow her. It was blatantly obvious that was her intention.

Index then spoke to Stiyl.

“You can use Anglican-style spells, right? Blow that away with your flames!!”

Her statement sounded insane.

But it was not.

She added, “If I am correct, the base is fire and the meaning is punishment, but add purification to the 3rd and 5th words and loop it. In English, the initials are P, A, and R. That will cancel out the target’s toxicity!!”

“…I see.”

How had Stiyl felt about that “advice”?

How had that magician felt when he was briefly put back in the position he had once viewed as normal?

Without speaking much, Stiyl Magnus quickly took action.

The roar of flames consuming oxygen burst out.

A sword of flame appeared in the priest’s right hand.

For the first time, a bit of nervousness appeared on Ureapaddy’s face.

She was likely worried she would be caught in the explosion.

“What a wonderful expression.”

With his lips twisted into a smile, Stiyl swung his flame sword without hesitation.

Its form collapsed and it shot directly for the leaking hydrazine.

In the next instant, a great explosion wiped away the darkness of Academy City’s night.

Part 11[edit]

“Thinking about the sabotaged rockets will get us nowhere,” repl

Chapter end