Maybe I'm a Lion (KnK/Prototype Crossover)

[Andaeus]

I think this is the only fanfic I have ever read that has actually made me a little smarter. Each chapter has more culture than I do in my entire body.

I have say that this story is absolutely, indisputably, pants-tighteningly amazing. I would buy the Hell out of this if it were an actual book/encyclopedia of fiction. In fact, you should write actual encyclopedias. I would buy them.

[Dullahan]

Each chapter has more culture than I do in my entire body.

Sounds unhealthy. I recommend eating more yoghurt.

I have say that this story is absolutely, indisputably, pants-tighteningly amazing.

That penultimate qualifier's a bit suspect, but thank you anyway.

I would buy the Hell out of this if it were an actual book/encyclopedia of fiction. In fact, you should write actual encyclopedias. I would buy them.

I had a notion of formatting it all nice and getting it made up in an ebook format once it was done, but that's a long way off if it happens at all, so it's kind of academic.

[shiningphoenix]

If you had it made into a physical book, it would probably resemble an unabridged dictionary.

[Dullahan]

If you had it made into a physical book, it would probably resemble an unabridged dictionary.

Its current total length is now almost equal to that of A Storm of Swords, the longest ASOIAF novel yet.

If I had it made into a physical book, I could drop the hardcover copy on someone and they would die.

[Phearo]

Its current total length is now almost equal to that of A Storm of Swords, the longest ASOIAF novel yet.

If I had it made into a physical book, I could drop the hardcover copy on someone and they would die.

Question: does the book reach terminal velocity before hitting?

[R.Lock]

Oh no. Dullahan now has an avvie of a gazebo. Or, oh yes, we'll be getting a super-size update this time?

[Dullahan]

Question: does the book reach terminal velocity before hitting?

It'll be terminal enough for them, that's for sure.

*rimshot*

I'll see myself out.

[shiningphoenix]

Its current total length is now almost equal to that of A Storm of Swords, the longest ASOIAF novel yet.

If I had it made into a physical book, I could drop the hardcover copy on someone and they would die.

My estimate of the final length based on what you've said is 1.5 Megawords, which is approximately "Harry Potter series + 50%"

[ZidanReign]

man has it been a long time since i read th-HOLY SHIT LOOK AT THAT CHAPTER COUNT FUCK

[Dullahan]

This chapter's split into two posts due to length. Please, nobody post anything until they're both up.
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Garan no Dou

We're doing this, people. It's happening.

It's happening?

That's right, motherfucker. Only I'm not sure if you're up to the challenge. Can you handle the truth? Can you? Or are you out of order? 'cause I'll tell you who's out of order – you're out of order. You're out of order! This whole trial is out of order! They're out of order!

...what's happening?

Good question, but forget it, it's Chinatown. We've got more important matters to put to the floor while simultaneously keeping them on the table. For exemplars, empiricism. It's one of the universe's great ironies – and I do mean actual irony, neither the recommended daily dietary supplement nor the often ill-used adjective retroactively developed by Belfast shipyard workers to describe the hull of the Titanic, but the intrinsic essence of what's found in the more sociopathic schools of comedy, as perhaps exemplified in the example of wheelchair-bound diabetics getting run over and killed in disabled parking spots by trucks full of insulin – that for all that they are enamoured with 'mystery' as the base upon which everything remotely supernatural is the superstructure, your average Magus will without fail have a better and more familiar grasp of the scientific method than the average member of the general population, almost precisely to the extent that their grasp of common sense is worse and less familiar than that of the average Joe.

Well, there are worse choices for a dump stat, I guess.

Not only a joke, there's an entire stand-up routine in that, but like Fermat I haven't the margin space to extract it. Far from being the double-double-toil-and-be-King-hereafter type that popular culture's familiarised everyone with, the main business of most Magi is research, and even if said research happens to concern Kabbalistic numerology, spiritual evocation or determining the yield elasticity of the human soul, the way in which it's carried out would still read somewhat like a track listing for the debut album of little-known band Avicenna and The Islamic Rationalists: Hypothesis, Experiment, Qualitative Analysis, Reduction of Error, Removal of Variables, Control Groups, Mill's Methods, Induction (feat. Aristotle) and so on. Surely we can commend them for their appreciation of the fact that while standing around cauldrons cackling at irregular intervals constitutes near-ideal conditions for having hotpot with friends, you can't actually get anything useful done. Aside from the hotpot. Naturally, I wouldn't directly know about the ideal conditions for having hotpot with friends because I don't have friends, but that is precisely fifty percent of the reason ancient philosophers developed inductive reasoning.

The other fifty percent?

To develop a method to hit on women with one hundred percent success. You know those ancient philosophers. Knowing smile, sultry wink.

The 'Crouching Tiger' pastiche that never made it past the ratings board?

Oh, fuck y...actually, that was pretty good. Kudos.

Getting back on topic, it's not that you're saying you've ever had hotpot all by yourself. I mean, that would just be pathe-

Getting backer on topic, the point is that rational, scientific curiosity is the foundation of the thaumaturgical establishment's approach to what is generally held to be something utterly irrational and unscientific – a spiralling spiral of paradox which goes a long way towards explaining why Magi are fucked in the head. Yes, all of them. It's doublethink of the highest order.

We have always been at war with Eurasia.

Just so. Like a group of terrorists who use the threat of violence to try to put an end to armed conflict, their very existence is a contradiction. I'm surprised the entire community hasn't committed mass suicide out of self-loathing by now.

Or made like other shady cults and started recruiting celebrities.

Anyway, the point is that I think I have the BLACKLIGHT system down. That is to say, I have developed a hypothesis congruent with my observations. You'd be surprised how many simple experiments you can get done in a bit under half an hour. That's Mythbusters-level speed right there, and they'd probably have used time-lapse for half of it. I'm ahead of the curve.

So, what's the story?

BLACKLIGHT is fucked. That's the story. Story's over now. Roll credits, we're done here.

* * * *

Tokyo

“All right, so here's another thing.”

“I'm not sure if I'm gonna have to staple your mouth shu-”

“Loki Four, this is Red Crown. Requesting an update on your ETA to the target area.”

“Red Crown, this is Loki Four Actual. We're ten minutes out. Over.”

“Copy that, Loki Four; looks like you boys are right on schedule. Be advised, Loki Seven and Loki Two are experiencing minor delays due to traffic on their routes, so you may be called to cover their targets as well once you've cleared yours. Over.”

“Understood, Red Crown; we'll be ready. Loki Four, out.”

“All right, Nishimura, what the fuck is it?”

“I'm just pointing out that whoever's pulling call-sign duty today is a sick, sad person.”

“It's one of the Old Man's staff who sets most of them, isn't it?”

“Yeah, and it's fucked. Like, uh, FENRIS, you know? The Runner?”

“No, that somehow completely slipped our minds.”

“Ah, screw you.”

“I've heard of that, actually. The name, I mean...that's a, uh, Viking thing, right?”

“Yeah. Same with ours; Loki is a Norse god. Fenris is actually his son, so, uh, yeah...anyway, in the myth, Fenris is this fuck-off huge wolf who shows up at the end of world, where he fights, kills and eats goddamn Odin himself. Gets killed by Odin's son later on, but still.”

“Good thing our call-sign isn't Odin, then.”

“What's your point?”

“My point is it's bad juju, man. You don't name your ship the Titanic if you want to keep your feet dry, you don't name your Runner after something that's known for basically eating the world.”

“See, Nishimura, this is how everyone can tell you were with the Marines.”

“Because I'm God's gift to the opposite sex?”

“No, because you're a superstitious old woman, and there are more of them in the Corps than in my grandma's fucking retirement home.”

“Are you calling your mother a liar, my friend?”

“It's kind of ironic, though. The Runner's named after a giant wolf, but it's actually a giant lion.”

“Lioness. It doesn't have a mane, so it's female.”

“It's a Runner, so it's not either. But I don't think anyone knows what the fuck's going on there.”

“Besides, the Vikings didn't have lions in Scandinavia. It's too cold.”

“Okay, question – if they don't have lions in Scandinavia, why is there a lion on the Norwegian coat of arms?”

“How do you know what's on the Norwegian coat of arms?”

“Task Force K-Bar. We worked with elements of their Marinejegerkommandoen unit in Afghanistan. But anyway, like – how would they know, right? How would they know what a lion looks like, to put it on there?”

“I don't know. Probably got it from a picture. Like, a painting, or something.”

“Can the chatter back there. We'll be switching to Japanese soon.”

“Don't want anyone getting caught out like that guy in The Great Escape, right?”

“Which guy?”

“Ah...you know, he's the one that escapes with Bartlett. What's-his-name. It's the bit where they're getting onto a bus, and there's a Gestapo agent there, and he says 'Good luck' in English, and the guy says 'Thank you' in English on reflex-”

“-oh, yeah; and then he's like, oh shit, right? That's MacDonald.”

“Knew it was 'Mac'-something.”

“You sure this'll work, sir?”

“These uniforms are the same as used by the Special Assault Team – Japanese SWAT, basically – and all of us were selected for this op because we passed a native-level proficiency test on Okinawa within the last six months. Probability is only one of us in this team will have to do the talking, if necessary at all. Now, think about it – you're, for example, the day manager of a bank, and all of a sudden a bunch of SWAT guys come in with a legitimate-looking warrant to have a look through the footage of the CCTV cameras watching your branch's ATMs. Are you going to pick up on minor accent slipups and begin suspecting these guys are Americans, or are you going to shut up and show them the fucking video so you can get back to work? I rest my case.”

“Anyone ever told you you'd make a great lawyer, Sarge?”

“No-one still living, Nishimura; you may find that worth remembering...all right, it's T-minus eight minutes. Remember, no English.”

“Wakarimashita. Korekara wa, nihongo dake desu.”
[Understood. From here on out, it's just Japanese.]

“Ryoukai shimasu.”
[Roger that.]

“Ryoukai shimasu, gunsou.”
[Roger that, Sarge.]

“Sate...ima made, ano sousha wa shutsubotsujizai na yatsu dattandakedo, oyaji ni yoru to, kono Minami-Shinagawa de wa aitsu wo oitsumereru kanousei ga kanari takai sou da. Kondo koso, aitsu ni nukedasasenai.”
[All right...up to now, we've barely caught a ghost of the Runner, but according to the Old Man, odds are pretty good we'll be able to corner the fucker here in Minami-Shinagawa. This time, he's not getting away.]

* * * *

Garan no Dou

All right, fine. Take two. We're doing it live. Tonight's topic: BLACKLIGHT. Our panel will be posed these questions. What is it, how does it work, and where does it come from?

Oh, so we're going to speculate on where it came from?

What? No. That's absolutely out of the question; there's no time. Well, there is, but there's no data. We know it's been in existence in one form or another since the sixties at least, but all the juicy details of how it got started are quarantined far above my pay grade. Nothing to be done about that at this point. I just can't wrap my head around the idea of a Magus – any Magus – throwing in their lot with a national military, secret project or no. It'd be going against every instinct the thaumaturgical community has cultivated in its members for a very long time now, and moreover, it just doesn't make sense from a practical standpoint. There is nothing that a Magus might want that the American government could offer that one of the three great arms of the Mages' Association – Atlas, Clock Tower and the Sea of Estray – could not also provide, not to mention many things that could only be offered by the Mages' Association. If our hypothetical Magus wanted to sell his work to the Americans for whatever idiotic reason, one must wonder exactly how he pitched it. Despite the label that gets slapped on it, BLACKLIGHT is worse than useless as a bioweapon. The infection takes a significantly greater investment of resources to deal with than whatever you were targeting to begin with. The fact that it exists at all is at best illogical and at worst phenomenally stupid to a degree unlikely to be seen again in a human lifetime. Clearly, there's knowledge unknown to me which mitigates this, but by definition I don't know what that is. So, no, we're not going to speculate on that. I can't deduce things from thin air, and I have bigger things to worry about.

Whatever. Let's go. Start the clock.

Talking BLACKLIGHT now. To understand the system, it's important to make a distinction between the function of BLACKLIGHT in isolation and how it cooperates with Magic Circuits. First, the...uh...first one.

What is it, in isolation?

Let's reduce this to a system, and from there determine its properties regarding the input and output of prana. Where is the input? Well, there's no surprises there. It's the same two we're all familiar with – the Greater Source, enviromental mana, and the Lesser Source, internal od. Aside from those, there's no magical source of...magic...which...never mind. The point is that this is something which can be understood. As it's been established that 'consumption' acquires the target's soul as well, obviously those provide a source of od. Regarding that – it's curious, but BLACKLIGHT doesn't seem to draw in very much mana from the environment. It seems to make very efficient use of the od that it's given, rather than take in large amounts of external mana.

Proof for this?

I'll get to that. Don't worry; it's empirical as fuck, I assure you. Hayy ibn Yaqdhan would be wiping tears of rationalist pride from his eyes. Anyway, I believe this is to do with its nature. The body of a BLACKLIGHT host acts as one big, always-active Magic Circuit. You can think of it as an artificial realisation of what you see in certain extremely rare cases, where a person is born naturally able to perform magecraft without actually being a Magus. In that regard, though, BLACKLIGHT is a one-and-a-half-trick pony. As a single, specialised Circuit, it does one-and-a-half things and one-and-a-half-things only, and they relate to the concept of 'body'.

Definitions, please. Exactly what is the concept of 'body'?

Think of it as the concept which distinguishes you from your environment. It's what allows a line to be drawn between what is a part of you and what is not. In humans, this is something imposed naturally by the presence of the soul. It's pretty, you know, fundamental. To stuff.

Wicked.

So, basically, BLACKLIGHT is a machine for imposing and reinforcing the concept of 'body'. All prana that passes through it is given the attribute of 'my body'. Thing is, though – in a way, the Circuit is my body, and my body is the Circuit. They can't meaningfully be distinguished. If, using the Circuit that is BLACKLIGHT, I infuse my prana into something else, that something will naturally soon become part of the Circuit, and thus a part of my 'body'. This is the principle which underpins 'consumption'. Furthermore, in reinforcing the concept of 'body', the BLACKLIGHT Circuit exhibits a secondary function which is the mass-suppression effect. That's the half-trick, and that effect is constantly active.

Why is it a half-trick?

...because I don't know how it works.

You don't?

It just works, okay? It just...does.

Like King Crimson?

Look, I've never heard of any magecraft capable of suppressing the mass of an object. For altering the local strength of gravity, yes – there are nature-interference rituals, very difficult to execute; gravitation is something fundamental to the system of the World, so distortions tend to be hard to realise. But this effect clearly isn't a derivative of that, since gravity has no influence on felt inertia. Even if I were in zero gravity, I would still be able to feel when I moved it that my body does not actually have a mass of several tonnes. So what's going on?

Where does the extra mass go?

Straight to my thighs.

Yet obviously not.

I don't know. Maybe it's some kind of Bounded Field effect intrinsic to BLACKLIGHT's functioning?

Possible...

Executing Magecraft within one's own body can isolate it from the correcting influence of the World to a certain extent. The isolation can't be made perfect, of course; it becomes diminishing-returns investment past a certain point...but, then again, the effect isn't perfect, is it? There's still a disparity between my observed and my visually deductible weight. Maybe it simply can't suppress my weight completely, due to the correcting influence of the World. Or maybe it's just not getting enough prana to be able to do it. If the excess mass is going somewhere, though, it has to be 'inside' my body...it doesn't just disappear. It can come back; that I know for certain. When I cut off my hand a while back, the ash that flowed out to replace it must have come from that 'inner stockpile'. Perhaps there's some kind of orthogonal space which is cut off from the World...

Are you thinking what I'm thinking?

You are what I'm thinking, so what the hell do you think?

I think anyone not thinking what I'm thinking becomes what I'm thinking!

But what if I think otherwise? Didn't think of that, did you?

Sadly, this is a thinking man's game, so maybe you should think again.

I don't think so.

I think you need more food for thought.

Tell me what I'm thinking, and maybe I'll think about it.

You're thinking about how weird the word 'think' sounds now that you do think about it.

...oh, fuck you. What else?

Those three little words.

So impatient. You'll have to at least take me out to dinner first.

Innate Bounded Field.

You're kidding, right?

Continuously realised within the body. As a phenomenon, it might be capable of dealing with mass in the way I've observed here.

That's a meaningless statement. You can't say that it 'might be capable' of doing that because no-one has a clear idea of what Reality Marbles are and are not capable of doing. I'd refer you to an IBF specialist on the matter, except that I can't, because they're all too busy never having existed because their ostensible subject matter is both too rare to study on any rigorous basis and by definition impossible for anyone outside of the user to completely understand. In the entirety of the Sea of Estray over the past two centuries, there have been precisely two Magi who obtained that great taboo of an ability. They're not household names by any means, but their notoriety lingers in certain restricted circles. Count 'em: Octavian Waas, founder of the Konungseyjar Institute's Wind Element Faculty, who spent the twilight years of his life out in the tundra on the Kola Peninsula perfecting his 'Sylphid Canopy Domain', and Freiherr Andrej Obreschkow, the reclusive Bohemian five-elements user who realised the 'Gegenscheinschloss' after painstaking experimentation, and successfully kept it a secret for another three decades. Both of them are now long-dead, and their research was posthumously sealed and classified with extreme prejudice. I believe Clock Tower does something similar under the circumstances. Innate Bounded Fields are not common, and not well-understood. You can't just throw around ideas like that. It's like observing the scene of a murder and determining on first sight that it was not aliens from Zeta Reticuli who committed it but rather a member a subterranean race of reptilian creatures who walk among us wearing human skin and control all major world governments, except France.

Listen to what you said, though. 'Some kind of orthogonal space which is cut off from the World...'

That doesn't necessarily imply an Innate Bounded Field. There are other possibilities. Some kind of spatial distortion, for example. BLACKLIGHT's reinforcing of the self/world distinction lets it be insulated from the World's attempts to crush it. That could work.

Nope. Explains the space, but not the mass.

How about the Sixth Imaginary Element? Suppose that in its viral form, BLACKLIGHT possesses a real component and an imaginary component.

Sounds pretty...complex.

Get out.

Leaving now.

Anyway, the extra mass is being enveloped by the Sixth Imaginary Element – something comparable with the near-final stages of Demon possession, not that the Church enjoys letting things get that far – and is rendered 'imaginary'. That the forms of Demons tend to be biologically improbable might explain some things about Samantha Weaver, actuall-

Just for the record, you're proposing that BLACKLIGHT is a biological weapon made out of Demons.

For the record, you're proposing that BLACKLIGHT is a biological weapon made out of Reality Marbles.

The fact that both are arguments that are at least half-seriously being put on the table gives me cause to call bullshit.

Any sufficiently advanced magecraft is indistinguishable from bullshit, and thus BLACKLIGHT is bullshit. It basically can't exist, but it does. Look, let's step back a little and re-examine this. I don't have the time or resources to work out the exact composition of my body, suffice to say that of what's physically observable – leaving unfounded speculation about Demons or Reality Marbles out of it – this 'ash' is almost certainly not ash as we know it. What is it? Unclear. I think Ether is the key to it, but I'd need an entire workshop of my own full of specialised equipment – something like the Spiritual Metallurgy Laboratory up in Akureyri – to qualify that statement to the point where I'd feel secure publishing it, so let's take that with a grain of salt for now. Whether the ash is raw clumped Ether or a particulate material somehow bonded to Ether is out of my present ability to determine, but it's likely one of those in light of how it responds to the action of prana. The Nordic schools of Magecraft hold nowhere near as large of a role for Ether as what's found on the Continent, so the substance in general is somewhat out of my area of knowledge, but I theorise that a BLACKLIGHT host attains a material body with composition somewhat akin to that of a classical homunculus, although I still can't figure out how that ties into the carrier being something that is ostensibly a biological agent.

In which we consider the case of Samantha Weaver. Two Bluff, Arizona, 2001.

That was a BLACKLIGHT case without any 'extraneous modifiers' as mine might be said to have, and even then, it was...well. The idea of someone building that into a virus, a biological weapon, is quite frankly off the reservation. Speaking from the point of view of a Magus, the only way it could have come into being would have been at the hands of someone too insane to realise it was not only a bad idea, but also impossible.

Congratulations, you've just described a Magus to a normal person.

But what is to a Magus as a Magus is to a normal person? At what point along their path of development does a Magus stop being a Magus and become something that a diagonalisation argument can prove is on a completely different level to a Magus?

The problem is that a Magus accepts no upper limits to their ultimate aim, nor any sideways limits imposed by common sense, nor any lower limits what remains of their conscience might think to apply. They're an unlimited bunch, Magi.

Just as the exponential function is equal to its own derivative, the Magus is indistinguishable from a self-parody, down to n levels of iteration. There's nothing too impossible to be plausible. Especially when we consider that BLACKLIGHT can make you practically immortal, which is kind of a big deal. When you think about it, the whole ninety-nine-point-nine-nine-recurring-percent of infectees turning into zombies might just be an unexpected side-effect of an otherwise practical mortality solution. I mean, think about it – I, as I am now, can't infect people and cause a zombie apocalypse, 'cause I'm ash and not biological. So, what if – speculation, here – what if this body I have now is the 'perfected' form of BLACKLIGHT, towards which the virus is just an intermediate step? Of course, even if true-

It. Still. Doesn't. Explain. WHY. THE. AMERICAN. MILITARY. ARE! MESSING! WITH! IT!

Fuck it. Fuck it! Who cares? There's no time. Like Evariste Galois, je n'ai pas le temps. The mass-suppression thing is just...whatever. Some things man was not meant to know. I don't need to go on a diet. Those grapes were probably sour anyway. What was I talking about?

Prana output.

Gotcha. Okay, so by default everything runs through the BLACKLIGHT Circuit. Responsible corporate management strategies, there. In effect, you can think about what the BLACKLIGHT Circuit does as simply taking what the soul does normally – imposing the concept of 'body' – and making it much, much more efficient at doing so. This theory of mine actually also explains the deal with how my clothes became part of my 'body'. Well, kind of. They may be being passively 'consumed' over fairly long timespans by small amounts of body-attribute prana leaking out of the BLACKLIGHT Circuit and into things which are in contact with me. I can't really test if that's true since it takes a fairly long time to work, but it sounds plausible so I'm going with it.

The scientist at work, ladies and gentlemen.

It does, however, present some interesting possibilities for slow consumption...well, I can think about that later. Anyway, back onto the BLACKLIGHT Circuit. Where its normal functioning changes is during the process of 'consumption'. Necessarily, that involves infusing prana outside the body – that is, into something that's not part of the Circuit. That – if only momentarily – redirects a portion of the continuous flow of prana away from the BLACKLIGHT Circuit. And that means that the mass-suppression effect weakens temporarily.

So, eat and you will gain weight. Shit, never would have seen that one coming.

No, you wouldn't have, jackass, because as distinct from the increase in 'true mass' as brought on by taking new matter into the BLACKLIGHT Circuit, this is an issue by which the act of consumption itself causes a temporary increase in weight. Afterwards, my weight returns to a lower value only slightly above what it was beforehand – that, of course, is the increase in 'true mass' being reflected in my suppressed weight. I'm not sure if the relationship is a straightforward proportion or there's some polynomial or – God forbid – logarithmic element at play.

This does imply something interesting, though. If the amount of prana being provided to the BLACKLIGHT Circuit from the Lesser Source goes up with the amount of souls you consume, logically resulting in the mass-suppression effect increasing in strength, then the way to optimise consumption is to only take people's heads – or, rather, their brains, where the soul is anchored – in order to minimise your 'true mass' intake. Do that and you might even lose weight.

Oh, yes, because out of what's illegal, immoral or fattening, clearly the last qualifier is the most important. I could really do without the tips on how to get ahead in the world as a soul-eating eldritch abomination.

I'm just pointing it out.

I'll point you out in a minute.

...what?

Anyway, that's the deal.

Fine. So, tactically, how much of a problem is this?

Unclear. Finding a reliable basis for the weight gain brought about by consumption will take more experimentation, and I'm rapidly running out of objects I feel comfortable consuming. Aozaki's going to be pissed if she comes back to find I've been eating her stuff, even if it is for science. I mean, I would. The weight gain seems to be dependent on how difficult something is to consume, so there are certain targets – for instance, a Magus, who would likely be able to resist the intrusion of my prana by using their own Magic Circuits – which are probably best avoided. These boots I've got on distribute weight quite well, but if I'm forced to dump a huge amount of prana into consuming something difficult, I may just gain enough weight to sink through the floor. Not to mention my mobility will take a hit, which is probably the most pressing concern. However, there are concerns more pressing still, so I'd better press forward before I'm pressed for time.

Which are?

...well, actually they're the same concerns, but they arise for different reasons. Now that we've established a theory of how BLACKLIGHT operates in isolation, let us now examine its interplay with Magic Circuits. To begin with, they too are affected by what BLACKLIGHT seems to do – that is to say, by the difficulty it has in drawing mana from the outside. That, I think, is a natural consequence of what it does. The concept of 'body' is, as I said, what underpins the self/world distinction, which BLACKLIGHT exists to impose and reinforce. A strengthened distinction creates resistance to drawing mana from the world. It's more difficult to do so, in other words. No man is an island, but BLACKLIGHT tries its best. As a matter of fact, my present circumstances were what let me determine that.

Reason being?

I'm inside Aozaki's workshop right now. This entire building is enveloped in a Bounded Field. It's a fairly standard setup for a Magus working alone, and it's set up so that she controls the environmental mana within the building. Meaning that I can't use it. Sitting here as I am, I can't draw any mana from outside my body, period. However, if I go up to her office and step outside onto the balcony using the door directly across from the entrance, that places me outside the Bounded Field. Now, see, using Magic Circuits? That does basically the same thing as consumption. It gets between the Lesser Source and the BLACKLIGHT Circuit and diverts some of the flow of prana, leaving me with less to run mass-suppression. Simply by standing on a digital scale and executing the same simple spell – it's a sowilo rune; I wanted to set some stuff on fire – inside and outside the building's Bounded Field, I was able to determine the difference made by mana intake from the environment. Result: there was slightly less weight gain outside – that is, the minimum strength achieved by the mass-suppression effect during the course of the experiment was lower on the inside than on the outside of the building. Environmental mana does make a difference, but it's small relative to the effect of internal od. That, my friends, is some motherfucking science. Better than the regular kind. The Oedipal subtext adds...flavour.

So, let's sum everythi-

Denied, there's still more. It regards Magic Circuits. See, they are a mutation that's not normally part of the soul. They're by nature not natural, and using them will cause the body to try and reject them. Well, nothing's changed with BLACKLIGHT, and in fact, it's gotten worse. The prana that runs through my Magic Circuits lacks the attribute of 'body' that's found in the BLACKLIGHT Circuit, and is effectively recognised as foreign by the latter. Thus, using them has the potential to disrupt the structure of my body. I saw that when I activated the ehwaz rune on that piece of paper earlier – the numbness in my arm as I ran prana through it to trigger the rune. That was just the first stages; put more 'foreign' prana in, and its form will start to destabilise – your arm stays intact, but it loses its skin-ish...fleshy...arm-y consistency and effectively becomes something like an arm vaguely sculpted out of ash – and then eventually falls apart, leaving you with a forearm to regenerate. True, it takes a sizeable amount of prana to cause even a small part of my body to completely fall apart – I did the test standing up because I was afraid the weight gain would break the chair I was sitting on – but it's something that'll need to be taken into account if I need to use – for example – Reinforcement. I can do it, but the more I do, the more my body rejects the alterations. A happy medium will need to be struck between what level of Reinforcement is effective and what doesn't start destroying my body. Okay, go now.

So, to sum up:

BLACKLIGHT is fucked, and also bullshit, and also one big Circuit, which is also your body because souls are weird. Mass-suppression is still a mystery. Due to being wrapped up in yourself, you're out of touch with your environment. Consumption makes you gain weight. Magecraft, like dictionary neighbours marijuana, marriage, and McNuggets-comma-Chicken, is good in moderation but will destroy you in excess. And also makes you gain weight. Everything makes you gain weight! Everything you like really is illegal, immoral and fattening!

What is this, fucking Supersize Me?

And eating living brains is the only effective dieting choice.

My God. The zombies were right all along.

See, it's funny because zombie apocalypses are an actual real potential possibility due to the existence of BLACKLIGHT. Still, all things considered, this is not the worst thing that can happen.

Actually, zombie apocalypses are pretty bad. They're really, uh...they're not great. Would not recommend.

No, I'm talking about the other stuff. My situation is not the worst thing that could happen. All it means is that I have certain weaknesses which I'll need to conceal so that some jackass doesn't try to exploit them, and furthermore it means that I need to devote my remaining time here to developing techniques that allow BLACKLIGHT and Magecraft to supplement each other rather than come into conflict. This situation means that there's going to be only a few points at which their mutual actions can be optimised, and that's actually good. There's no point in trying to become a jack-of-all-trades here.

In the words of Bruce Lee, 'I fear not the man who has practised ten thousand kicks once, but the man who has practised one kick ten thousand times.'

That was Bruce Lee?

No, it's from Shakespeare's Richard II, a kung-fu rock opera political thriller in three acts. Of course it was fucking Bruce Lee!

Even if not, the man's advice is worth taking to heart. A handful of simple but well-developed techniques will always be more useful than a large number of poorly-developed moves. Simple is best in martial arts, with optimisation being towards taking down the opponent as quickly and as efficiently as possible. Ideally, what I need to create is a toolkit – a modular set of simple but powerful moves which can be combined to deal with almost any combat situation.

So, it's decided you're doing this hand-to-hand?

I don't remember saying that. I may be taking Bruce Lee's advice, but that doesn't mean I have to play by his rules. Araya certainly won't be, and I need to kill him, not look good on camera. I think it's generally accepted we're both going to cheat like crazy, and I have a few ideas I think I are workable.

Got to optimise your skill build to solo a raid boss.

Your comment just now about hand-to-hand was, I'll admit, not without justification; as things stand, my combat proficiencies are overwhelmingly skewed in favour of physical attacks, and thus optimising between that and what can be achieved with Runes – it's kind of an annoyance, but without m-Elísabet's Crest, I can't bring much in the way of complex stuff to the table quickly, so straightforward Runes are about the size of it for now – is likely to provide a good return on investment, I'd like to keep CQC to the last resort it should be. When engaging a hostile Magus, the first and greatest priority is interdicting their spellcasting ability. Self-hypnosis through spoken arias being the basis for the vast majority of magecraft activations, this generally means cutting off their ability to speak. Ain't no rule saying you can't do that from range...I wonder if tear gas would work on Araya? Likely not, he's probably tough enough to hack it through. Something more potent, then; one of those fuck-off illegal chemical warfare agents that strip the bark off trees and hit your lungs like a Brillo pad. Or maybe radiologicals?

Everyone thinks you're a terrorist anyway, so why not break out some WMDs?

I'm sure there are nuclear power plants reasonably close by where I could bust in and steal some fuel rods. Or maybe hospitals would have sources used in medical imaging. A makeshift dirty bomb is a possibility. I am probably immune to radiation, but Araya isn't likely to be. Sure, it might take a few more Sieverts than average before he starts vomiting black like a Chernobyl liquidator, but it'll work...hm. Well, maybe. That sounds like it might be too slow, is the problem...I mean, there's torturing someone to death slowly and painfully, and then there's just watching paint dry. Ugh, boring. Moreover, it'd be an absolute pain to set up, not to mention disposing of the material afterwards. Fuck it, we'll go with the simple method. To begin with, I need to score some guns and explosives.

That's a really great sentence-

Ain't it just? It's Genesis 1:1 in the Redneck Bible.

-and you can put it on a shirt later, but, just...before that.

What?

Haven't you missed something?

Missed?

Yes.

I don't think so. Did I miss explaining anything?

Yep.

Refresh my memory.

It's a very important question.

Not narrowing it down.

One might call it 'fundamental'.

Still not narrowing it down.

It relates to-

Just ask the goddamn question already.

What are the lines?

...ah.

You know. The golden-

Yes, I got it.

Being relevant to how consumption works, one would assume they're kind of important.

No declarative statements, okay?

What, me speculate?

So, alright, I'm not sure what the lines are yet. While it may seem like they correspond to my being able to perceive prana directly, it's too early to state that for certain. And it's difficult to test.

Why? Can't you just run prana through your Magic Circuits and observe it in the lines?

Yeah, funny story about that – no. I can't. It doesn't happen. They appear to be mutually exclusive. Or, rather, the Circuits override it. If I try to...'see' the lines, then activate my Circuits, I get pulled out of seeing them. If I have my Circuits already active and try to see the lines, I can't. They don't play nice together.

Implying...what?

I don't know.

But you've got a theory. Right?

It's not like I'm an endless repository of theories, you know.

Right?

Alright, yeah, I do.

Hit me.

To begin with, the amount and density of lines that I perceive on an object is proportionate to the amount of effort I put in to looking at it. The ease with which I am able to see them seems proportionate to how easily I am able to understand the object as being 'alive'. Seeing the lines inside a metal spanner, for example, takes more effort than seeing the lines inside a sunflower plant. The more effort I put in, the more lines appear on everything. It's not as if looking harder makes new lines appear; it's as if all the lines on all the objects are already there, except that some of them are just much dimmer than the others. It's like with a camera. You need to use a higher film speed to capture them, which ends up making everything else brighter too.

Okay, but what does 'effort' mean here?

That may not be the best word for it. It's not like straining your eyes to focus on something; it's a completely different feeling to that. If there's a feeling at all, it's not from my eyes. It's more...mental. Something inside your head. I imagine it like diving underwater, and holding your breath as you do so. You can choose to sink down or swim up, and the deeper you go, the more lines you see – but it gets harder as you progress, with your own buoyancy pulling you upwards, and however long you try to hold your breath for, eventually you'll return, gasping, to the surface.

Also, there may be side-effects.

Possibly.

Potentially.

Probably.

Definitely.

A little while ago, I was testing to see how far I could go with it. As it turns out, not that far. At my limit, I was able to make the lines in a shifting spanner clearly visible – the same level, I think, that I attained with regard to that katana Ryougi's brother pulled on me – for a little under a second, but I couldn't push it any further. At that level, you start seeing really bright, tiny little points in the air, floating around like snowflakes. I think those are actually dust mites; the lines present on or inside their bodies as they float on the air currents. But even seeing that, I felt – somehow – as if I had only dived a few metres, with kilometres of ocean still beneath me-

Anyway.

You have to come up for air at some point. It can't be readily described, but there is some nameless part of me which rebels at being down there. All too soon, it can become unbearable. See, when I 'see' the lines, it's – as I said to Aozaki – not like I'm seeing them overlaid on my ordinary vision. That's not how it works. When I see them, it's just them. There is nothing else. The spaces where I don't see lines – or, more accurately, where the lines are too dim to see at my present 'film speed' so to speak – are just...empty. I would call it darkness, but I'm not sure colour – and thus, the absence thereof – is a concept that can really be applied to this. I say that the lines are golden, but I'm not certain if that is a 'colour' I perceive with my eyes the same way as I see others. One gets the feeling I'm not exactly perceiving this with the rods and cones on my retina. But there's still more to it than that. Like I said, when I see the lines, it's just the lines – them, and nothing else. There's no sound down there. No smell, no taste, no touch, and not even sight, not in the proper sense. It feels like being buried alive. No-one could stay down there indefinitely.

And when you got out...

I was...disoriented. I'm not too sure of the specifics, but I think I wasted a full minute sitting perfectly still and being amazed – utterly amazed – at how weird my hand looked. What is this? Why is it attached to me? – those kinds of questions. It took me all of a tenth of a second after I came to my senses to connect it with good old Oliver Sacks; that case of his, The Man Who Fell Out Of Bed. The guy who'd lost all sense of his leg. Like I said, there's no sense of touch down there, and thus a diminished sense of your body. As you dive deeper, it starts to eat away at your proprioception. That dissonance you feel when you come up for air – that's the disorientation. And don't get me wrong, it's an issue, but it took me all of another tenth of a second to connect it with something infinitely closer to home.

Isn't that feeling just like-

Yes.

Beneath the surface.

I know what that feeling is.

You can't see or feel normally when you're down there.

That disorientation.

Everything is washed away.

That suffocation.

Recall, back when you consumed that woman. What did you see, when you looked at her?

That and what comes before – the sinking beneath the surface, the creeping obliteration of consciousness.

Seeing her like that, there couldn't have been any resistance to what you did. It was easy, after all.

It's only natural that I would know that feeling.

Killing a person is hard. But removing – no, repositioning – a bunch of lines is the easiest thing in the world.

Because-

Almost natural, isn't it?

Isn't that just like-

-the Impulse?

…

...I wonder.

From Origin arises Impulse. They're both the same, of course; it's just a convenient means of speaking about them. The Impulse progresses forward, distorting mind and body as it does so. But what is it? A direction, naturally. A verb, not a noun. Verbs are 'doing' words, you see; thus, an Origin is not teleological but continuous. It's the journey, not the destination. Destination is meaningless, and we'll never get there anyway; Zeno has seen to that. Because the real treasure was inside you all along. But what is it? We know what it's not. The prior theory was disproven by new evidence. Consumption is out, or is otherwise no longer conspicuous. The infinitive, 'to consume', has been split, and its fission byproducts sealed in a bunker for the next twenty-four millennia. It's only safe that way, down at the deepest level. So, tell me – your Origin enforced itself on your body beforehand, which produced results observable to you. But that body was far...'less' than your current one. Consider it like a camera. With a wider aperture, more light is let in, allowing you to perceive the subject more clearly. The greater the body, the greater the potential it has to actualise the 'direction' that is your Origin. Who knows? Perhaps, if you'd given it a few more months without picking up BLACKLIGHT, you'd have started seeing the lines normally. Then everything would have really gone to hell. I don't even want to think about that. But what is where is it?

In a way, we can consider the distance you sink beneath the surface as being congruent with the influence the Origin has over you.

Classic. Don't think. Feel. I don't need to prove I'm right. Because then, logically, procedurally, proportionally, the truest expression – that is to say, the form and feature of the Impulse and Origin itself – is at the bottom of the water.

I can't reach it from here.

There's something restraining me.

They've installed a bungee cord over the abyss, all the better to gaze into it.

We know what that is.

BLACKLIGHT.

The weight of the souls in the ash.

Operates against the Origin.

But what is it?

What where is it?

What is at the bottom of the water?

The true direction.

Useless. Useless. It can't be reached.

Restricted.

Buried too deep.

You can't go down far enough.

But.

But.

I can predict.

Guess.

Calculate.

Can you see?

The lines. Golden.

Depth proportionates film sensitivity.

Brightness and visibility increases.

Density thus also increases.

A simple trend. Too easy.

Taken to its conclusion?

At the bottom of the water.

If you reached it.

What would you see?

Lines within lines.

The blank spaces would be filled in.

And the spaces between the fillings-in.

And there'd be nothing but the lines.

No – you couldn't call them lines, then.

No distinction would exist.

No border.

No boundary.

No beginning.

No end.

Just an infinite-

-entirely golden world.

[Dullahan]

Ogawa Mansion, Kayamihama

They say curiosity killed the cat. Though the thrust of this well-worn cliché is generally held to be something to the effect that excess curiosity isn't worth your while, Aozaki has always taken it as an invitation to be as curious as you like, once you've gotten that troublesome 'death' issue out of the way. Certainly, there are few Magi who would risk venturing straight into another's workshop armed with only a waterproof coat and a gym bag full of necessary supplies, but circumstances – and immortality; mustn't forget that – will make daredevils of anyone. Aozaki doesn't yet think she's got a hope of challenging Shirazumi in the 'things-I-wasn't-expecting-to-be-doing-when-I-got-up-this-morning' stakes, but there's none who can deny she's in the running. Dusting off her coat as she stands on the asphalt floor, slinging the gym bag back over her shoulder soon afterwards, she casts her eyes around the place – giving a more weather eye to her second impression of the place – and finds herself regarding Victor Frankenstein's monument to symmetry.

'What immortal hand or eye...'

The room is semi-circular, and so offensively so that you could cleave it with a mirror right down the middle and be none the wiser until you walked into it. It's a vast and cavernous space, filled with the soft yet deafening hum of electricity and ventilation, lit from above by harsh, unrelenting fluorescents; the ceiling is easily two stories above the floor, with sheer concrete walls all the way up so as to inflict every centimetre of that distance on the viewer's eyes, while the semi-circle's diameter more likely than not exceeds fifty metres. Set into the flat wall of the room is an orderly pattern of rectangles – first, on either side of the centre, equidistant from it, there are two large metal shutters – huge ones, easily big enough to admit a semi-trailer – with yellow-and-black hazard stripes painted above them. Moving inward from there, there are two smaller shutters which don't reach the ground – rather, they cover wide but low rectangular windows a short way off the floor. Then, at the very centre of the wall, there is an elevator door. It's unremarkable. A button to call it – obviously, only a single button is required down here – and a set of lights above, indicating the elevator's present location.

Tenth floor, huh?

Away from the back wall, however, it's a very different story. Piled high against the curved interior wall are jars – large, bulky, cylindrical things, made out of thick glass with endcaps formed from some brass-coloured metal – in their hundreds. There's no discernible order to their arrangement; rather, they're just laid on top of one another haphazardly, almost carelessly. And within each and every jar is a single human brain. Stem, cerebellum, cerebrum, corpus callosum – it's all there. Some jars appear to be connected, by thick red or blue cables emerging from their endcaps, while other cables snake up to the ceiling, where – in the centre of an otherwise sterile concrete-and-ventilation affair – they join what can only be described as some kind of cancerous electrical growth; a vast, dark clump of entangled cables and nameless machinery, which sits on the ceiling like a scab over a wound. Emerging from it are four thick metal chains, on which is suspended a large, square metal plate over a circular pit carved into the asphalt floor of the parking lot. A bright, warm-coloured glow and a thin sensation of radiant heat pegs it as some kind of furnace – and, indeed, the centre of the metal plate is glowing faintly red in confirmation of this. The pit exists directly in line with the elevator door, straight in the middle of the room. Standing in front of the elevator, looking over it, Aozaki sees, positioned high up on the pile of jars, set against the far wall-

...My God, Shirazumi wasn't kidding. There really is a throne.

Of a large, angular, solidly-built stone construction, yes. It's unostentatious – lacking the usual flourishes and embellishments the word 'throne' brings to mind – and quite minimalist in appearance, save for an unusual mosaic-like pattern carved into the backrest. Really, though, this place couldn't feel further from a royal court. From the moment Aozaki entered, it has given the impression – however warped – of being some kind of shrine.

A temple to an invisible god.

Aozaki's shoes leave wet footprints on the floor as she walks, while occasional droplets of water precipitate off the damp lower edges of her coat, and soundlessly meet the floor. Approaching the fire pit, the radiant heat from below is – if nothing else – quite welcome under the circumstances.

Ah, the infamous 'superheated metal plate which obviously does something, but Araya never explained what.'

Examining the plate more closely, she notices – etched faintly into the surface – an unusual geometric pattern, drawn inside a series of concentric circles. In the red-hot centre, there is a single point, surrounded by an empty circle. The next layer out is divided into two equal segments, and the next to four, then to eight, then to sixty-four.

...I see.

Murmuring to herself as she stands before the fire pit, Aozaki looks over the dimly glowing metal once again, listing thoroughly the geometry on the surface as her gaze comes to it.

“Wuji, the Limitless, produces the delimited, and this is Taiji, the Supreme Ultimate.”

From the point in the centre to the empty circle.

“The Taiji produces two forms, named Yin and Yang.”

To the next layer, a ring split in half.

“The two forms produce four phenomena, which are the Lesser Yin, the Greater Yin, the Lesser Yang and the Greater Yang.”

And to the next, where the halves become quarters.

“Th-”

“-e four phenomena act on the eight trigrams – Qián, Xùn, Kǎn, Gèn, Kūn, Zhèn, Lí, Duì.”

Aozaki looks up.

“Eight eights are sixty-four hexagrams.”

There, standing on the opposite side of the suspended metal plate – having appeared without sound, without notice, as if he had been there all along – is a tall, dark-haired man in a long black coat. A silhouette in front of the throne, standing perfectly still. A man who seems not so much to have aged – and, indeed, he hasn't; the years since their last meeting appear to have left no discernible trace on him – as weathered, slowly, infinitesimally, like a piece of stone statuary in an ancient, abandoned temple. His face – seemingly composed entirely from extremes of light and shadow, like an artist's rough sketch in charcoal – regards her with practised indifference, an investment Aozaki makes a point of repaying in full.

“Fú Xī.” Souren Araya concludes the quotation with the name of its ostensible author; the ancient demigod of Chinese myth, first of the Three Sovereigns, notable for, among other things, the invention of writing, fishing, hunting, calligraphy, the institution of marriage, and – in his ample spare time, evidently – the origination of what would later become the I Ching. “Well remembered.”

“Presence concealment is in poor taste, Araya. I'm a guest, aren't I?”

“Even within this building, my ability to do that is not so advanced that you would be fooled by it.”

“Then that's a very impressive trick you've got there.”

“True spatial transference lies in the realm of Magic. This is simply an imitation.”

“But a good one. I felt your Bounded Field when I crossed the threshold. Am I to take it this is one of its functions?”

“One of them. After a fashion.”

“'One of them', you say...” Aozaki puts a hand in her outside coat pocket, and motions at the metal plate with the other. “And this – it's for divination, isn't it? Pyromancy?”

“Indeed.” His tone is polite, but quite intentionally not friendly. “Though it is nothing too original. The sages of the Shāng Dynasty would write queries on bones or shells, then anoint them with blood and heat them to breaking over a fire pit, taking the patterns made by the fractures as portents or revelations. I have merely streamlined the process.”

Aozaki suspected as much. Running a plan with as many variables as his generally requires some capacity to see ahead. It reduces the nigh-impossible to the merely very difficult.

Though, clearly, he can't predict everything.

“See, this is why the faculty at Clock Tower didn't know what to do with you. You show up in London with no Crest, no bloodline, hopeless at a lot of things they consider entry-level, and then you go ahead and build something like this.” Aozaki casts her eyes around the room. “Though not all of it, I don't think.”

“I imagine Shirazumi has told you about the function of this place, as far as he was able to understand it.”

“He understands more than you might think, that boy...some things, anyway. I think we both know you haven't the ability to assemble a puppet setup on this scale, and I know I didn't build it, so...” She clicks her tongue. “...tell me, how is Cornelius keeping himself these days?”

Still running away from that desk job at Sponheim Abbey?

“He is much the same as you remember.”

“Evidently. He always did have a penchant for the macabre, and this is about as Hammer Horror as it gets.” She slightly shifts the weight of the bag on her shoulder. “Though one thing does bother me. According to Shirazumi, there are only sixty-four puppets active within the building, for reasons that I suspect have to do with our friend Fu Xi. Am I correct?”

“You are.”

“Then why,” asks Aozaki, like a poker player raising her opponent, “are there more than sixty-four brains down here?”

Araya says nothing.

“These are the ones that run the puppets, yes? Courtesy of the original owners, no doubt. I'll admit it's impressive, in terms of scale at the very least; Cornelius really has improved these past few years, though you didn't hear that from me. But anyone can see,” she gestures around the room, “that there are at least a few hundred in here. Piled up, no less; a truly staggering show of disrespect for the human brain, that, not to mention just plain messy. I wonder if you can tell me why that is?”

“There is more to this experiment than you or Shirazumi are aware of. While there is no issue in my explaining it to you in full, I don't believe you have the necessary time to spare.”

“Ah, yes. It would have been too simple for you, if it were just matter of having a spiral of deaths repeat every day...anyway, I think I can guess how you enticed Cornelius out to Japan on this little venture of yours, but where is he now?”

“Nearby, relatively speaking. He is in the city.”

“Am I to treat him as one of your confederates?”

“There's no need to be concerned. He has chosen not to interfere in this matter.”

“That isn't like him.”

“I thought similarly at first. But he seems to know certain salient details about why the American military are interested in Shirazumi, among other things. Of what he knows, I am sure he has told me only some, but it has been informative nonetheless.”

Alba knows something?

Now there's a surprising thought.

BLACKLIGHT bears the marks of a Magus' handiwork. There's no question of that. Could Cornelius have observed Shirazumi today and recognised something?

The plot thickens. Of course, Aozaki isn't going to get to know anything, least of all what Araya knows. Those are the rules of the game; they're both aware of it. He has no reason to give information to one of the opposing faction.

“Moreover,” Araya continues, “Alba recognises the practicalities of the situation. A Magus with his specialities is poorly-suited to engaging Shirazumi in combat.”

“Unlike you, I take it.”

“Do you disagree?”

“I'll just say I'm not placing any bets. I don't know what tricks you've got lined up in here, but were I in your position, I wouldn't underestimate that kid. Luck is on his side today. He may think differently, but I'm of the opinion that he's only alive and in his present state due to a very, very fortunate confluence of circumstances.”

“That is only natural. As long as he is the instrument chosen by the Counter Force to obstruct me, coincidence will be his ally.”

“Is that paranoia talking? He could just be ordinarily lucky.”

“Fortune abandoned him the moment I found him. If not beforehand.”

“Yes, I've been wondering about that. How did you find him? That surname of his rings no bells whatsoever, and I wouldn't think you'd be able to pull someone with such an unusual Origin off the street.”

“You would be surprised.”

“Would I? To be honest, that you have the ability to awaken the Origin of a person at all is inexplicable enough. Is that a recent development, or just recently-used?”

“Without their secrets, a Magus would be nothing. Prying will get you nowhere, Aozaki. Were our positions reversed, I am sure you would agree.”

“Hm.” Aozaki casts her eyes down towards the fire pit, visible through the gap between the metal plate and the ground. Its depth is unclear, as is what exactly seems to be burning inside it. It's doubtful that it's any kind of ordinary fire. “You do realise you've only yourself to blame for this, don't you?”

“Why do you think that?”

“You kept him alive long after he stopped being useful to you. If you'd taken care of him two years ago, you wouldn't be having this problem.”

Aozaki is baiting him, and they both know it. In his extremely protracted existence, it's doubtful that Souren Araya has ever done anything without purpose. There is always a method. There is always a reason. It's just not always obvious.

“Indeed, I would not. I would instead be having a different problem, yet one borne out of the same impetus. The Counter Force wears many faces – this, you and I both understand. In a way, it is preferable that it chose him and not another.”

“You think you understand him.”

“More so than he does himself, most probably. More so than you do, without question.”

“Is that why you've got his parents?”

“Yes.” Araya casts his eyes upwards. His movements, as ever, have a sense of great efficiency about them. There is a complete lack of unnecessary motion, even – especially – when standing still. Frankly, it comes across as unnatural; the unearthly stillness exerts a kind of cold, intimidating pressure on those standing near him. Even having known him for as long as she has, it's still enough to make a sizeable portion of her nonchalant demeanour into an act. The only consolation there is that that still makes it less of a facade than Araya's unassailable front of indifference. “They are safe, of course. Unconscious as well, for the sake of convenience. Needless to say, they are in one of the rooms of this building, although naturally I will not allow you to find out which one.”

“Naturally. Well, it's not like they're my problem to begin with. But however good that move was tactically, isn't taking hostages a bit much, even for you? I daresay even Cornelius has more standards than that.”

“It was a necessity. If you do not understand my actions, it is because you have failed to understand Shirazumi.”

“Almost undoubtedly, but how so?”

“He,” says Araya, very carefully and very precisely, “is not what he appears to be. To think otherwise is a critical mistake.”

“Why?”

“There is no such person as Lio Shirazumi.”

“It's an original strategy, Araya, but I don't think disbelieving in him is going to make him go away.”

“There once was a person called Lio Shirazumi.” He continues, indifferently. “He was nobody of importance, and it is not surprising that his surname would be unfamiliar to you, as his ancestry is not distinguished in any way that you would hold to be relevant. But he was a human; as humans do, he had thoughts, interests, opinions, emotions, fears, desires, likes, dislikes, motivations and so on and so forth.”

“Past tense?”

“Much of him has been burned away. Extinguished, like the candle before the dawn.”

“The Reluctant Buddhist, is he? Dragged kicking and screaming to the nirvana. That said, he seems to be taking things in stride.”

“He is hollow, Aozaki; what superficialities you may have observed are just that. There is nothing inside him.”

“What, another one?” says Aozaki. It is a moment – although only a moment – before it clicks. “...ah. I see.”

“You understand now why he was kept alive.”

“Forgive me. You don't usually expect the first piece on the board to be one held in reserve until the endgame.”

“To begin, it is indeed true that the vestiges of the Demon Hunters' Organisation have found themselves given to the production of liminal existences as time has gone on. The faculties they retain have no place in the modern world, and so are their holders confined to the boundary line, to follow it indefinitely, or to cross it in one direction or another as they will. Ryougi herself is an example, as were Fujyou and Asagami. You recognise that the latter two are existences reflective of the nature of Shiki Ryougi.”

“That I understood, yes.”

“Shirazumi is dissimilar to them. Where Fujyou and Asagami remained static, as fixed points against which Ryougi was to be measured, Shirazumi has changed. At the beginning, his existence could scarcely have been further from that of Shiki Ryougi; this was no great issue, as the scenario had no requirement for it to be so. But when that attempt failed, his usefulness did not come to an end; I understood that the encroachment of his Origin would cause him to reflect Ryougi's nature to an increasing extent – albeit never a complete one – with the passage of time. In other words, his is an existence which 'approaches' Shiki Ryougi, but will never arrive entirely. For this reason he was kept in reserve; though it had not been my original intention, I foresaw that he could be of use at some point down the path.”

“That's assuming his Origin is something similar enough to Shiki's.”

“It is my belief that it is.”

“But you don't know that for certain.”

“I know enough. 'Consumption' was an educated guess, as all such estimations must be. The observations that led me to it have not been superseded by today's events; they have simply become part of a larger pool of data. It is impossible to determine the Origin of a person with absolute certainty, and even if it were, to define it is another matter entirely. Language is a human creation; it arose to convey concepts, but concepts themselves existed beforehand. There is no reason why the base concept of an existence should be something that a word or even a phrase can circumscribe, no matter the language. Such things can only ever approximate. The Buddhist masters would have termed them upāya; an expedient means towards apprehending the ultimate truth.”

“This is all very interesting, Araya, but frankly I'm doubtful even you have the ability to plumb the depths of that kid's mental state, from here in your basement or otherwise.”

“And rightly so. His mental state is, ultimately, irrelevant. It is in his behaviour that the truth will come to light. You may look no further than the case of his parents, the Doctor Kiyokazu and Mine Shirazumi.”

“I would be mystified at what standards under which you find wanting to rescue them from you to be in any way abnormal behaviour.”

Does Araya know that, though?

It's a bizarre question. He's one of those people who you simply can't imagine ever having had a childhood, or an upbringing of any description. Like he precipitated out of nowhere, fully-formed.

“Then ask yourself, Aozaki. Consider the period of time stretching from Shirazumi's departure from Nerima General Hospital after his eventful rebirth to his arrival at the Cafe Ahnenerbe in Shibuya this morning. In that interval, he was – as he is now – freed from my ability to interdict his actions. There was no longer any limitation to what he could have done. In that time, he had ample opportunity to return to and ensure the safety of his parents, before I or any other party would have been able to respond. Simply instructing them to leave the city for a handful of days would have been sufficient to take them out of my reach, and likely that of the American military as well. For all the concern he displays for them, would you not consider it unusual that he did not do this?”

...he has a point. But-

“People make poor decisions. Shirazumi has a history of it; I believe it's how you two met. Charitably, we can assume he wasn't thinking very clearly after coming back from the undiscovered country.”

“Perhaps. But with one whose Origin is awakened, it is necessary to look behind the decisions. They, like all other superficialities, are without substance. It is only in the subtle patterns of behaviour that the hidden impetus is most clearly realised.”

“Oh? Go on, then. Enlighten me.”

“Granted a second life and freedom from all which previously restrained him, the paths open to him were infinite. There was – and is – nothing stopping him from taking whichever he might desire. And yet,” says Araya, like a player putting the opposing king in check, “he still chooses to kill.”

“To kill you, specifically. He could just genuinely dislike you, you know. God knows you've given him enough reason to. Or is that just another 'superficiality'?”

“Yes.” Blunt like a hammer, that reply. “It is insubstantial in the face of the truth of the matter.”

Your problem, Araya, is that you tend to see humans not as people but rather as collections of impulses. Not that that particularly makes you much worse than many other Magi, but even so...

“If you're arguing away the differences between him before and after his resurrection, I'll only repeat that there are things about him you can't deduce from sitting in your basement. Though,” she says with a smirk, “naturally, I will not allow you to find out what they are. Besides, reducing everything to an abstraction makes for sloppy arguments.”

“An abstraction is precisely what Shirazumi should be considered to be. His choice of opponent and the rationale for action simply cannot be taken at face value; they are simply the form given to an otherwise-formless impetus.”

“Ah, this is your latest theory, is it? So his Origin's supposed to be something like 'murder' or 'killing humans', hm? Somewhat unimaginative, I think.”

“It is a possibility, although it is likely something far more complex than that. I will make no declarations at this juncture. If it is, its influence over him is something he cannot escape from. It rules him already. No matter his intentions, no matter his actions, he will always ultimately cause the death of others.”

For a brief moment, there is silence. And then, somewhat more quietly than before, Aozaki asks – very deliberately – a single question.

“Like you?”

And, check.

There it is. Just for a moment, gone so quickly it could just as easily never have been there at all. But Aozaki knows when she's got someone. It couldn't be described – there is nothing, no individual change to point to – but, for a tiny, infinitesimal fraction of a second, something flickers behind Araya's mask. Not anger – it could never be anger, with him – but from behind dark eyes in which have been reflected deaths beyond counting, beyond imagination, there is a momentary glint of hatred.

“You two are the same, aren't you? Both of you – awakened.”

For this world, these humans, and their countless paradoxes, there is nothing inside him. Nothing but a deep and abiding antipathy.

There was once a person called Souren Araya...

Aozaki has to suppress a wry grimace. It is perhaps only fitting – that the only one capable of holding such an ability would be one who has been its victim in the past.

The awakener of Origins has himself an awakened Origin.

When Araya speaks next – after a frozen, protracted silence – it is with a tone slightly different to the one he used before, though in what way Aozaki is unable to exactly place.

“You are as insightful as ever.”

“It was a lucky guess.”

There was something about his words – some note of applicability to the dark-clothed spectre standing opposite her.

...much of him has been burned away. Extinguished, like the candle before the dawn.

“I do not believe in coincidence.”

“There's always time to start.”

“My Origin is 'Stillness', Aozaki. Or, rather, 'the direction of coming to a halt'. And you are correct; I awakened to it long ago. For this reason, among others, my existence is not readily destroyed. How can you kill that which is already at rest?”

“That's Shirazumi's problem, not mine. What truly staggers me is that you must know – you know what it means, to be like that. You know what it means to be eaten alive by your past incarnations, and yet you went ahead and did it to him anyway. For convenience. For the sake of the scenario. I can't possibly claim to know what was going through your head at the time, but now I'm all but certain that some part of you – with the benefit of hindsight – regrets doing it.”

“For what reason would I regret?”

As a Magus? None. That's why you're here at all.

“You know exactly what. I know you've seen it; you've had eyes on Shirazumi all day, so there's no way you could have missed the main event. Even if you kill him, it seems death is even less a setback for him than it is for you; what you're concerned with is what tags in when he takes a moment out of the ring. I'm sure speculation's running wild on all sides of this conflict, but you know what I think? I think you've broken the first rule of summoning, Araya – Do not call up that which you cannot put down.”

“On what basis do you say that I cannot put him down?”

“What I'm saying is that your choices are what have led you here. This is where the path you've walked has delivered you to. And, honestly? I won't say I'm entirely without sympathy. But you brought this on yourself.”

After this, there is a long pause.

“There was a time,” he says, more quietly now, “when you and I were colleagues in pursuit of the same goal.”

“Past tense.”

“I do not believe it is in bad form to ask if you will join me.”

Aozaki sighs.

Too late. Far too late, old man; for the both of us.

“You were a good friend. But, unfortunately, our interest is not mutual. We both have become burdened with so much, and we don't have time for fun any more.”

“So. You truly have degenerated.”

“Again with that...if you're lucky, one day you're going to realise that the path of transcendence is just another kind of escapism. We Magi imagine it puts us above the so-called rabble, but the truth is it's something we retreat down. It is the sand we bury our heads in, because the world has outgrown us, and left us behind.”

“That would be true, if only there was nothing at the end of the path. You and I both know that is not the case.”

“How long have you been at this? A century? Two? All these experiments of yours; what do you have to show for them? What have you learned? Nothing.”

“On the contrary. I have learned much. Every prior attempt, though its failure, has brought the next one closer to completion. My strategies have changed substantially from when I first began, and with each iteration become more effective.”

“But you yourself haven't changed. No matter how many times you buy in to this game, the house always wins in the end.”

“I would ask you how many failures it took for you to give up. Aesop tells us of the apocryphal Fox, who – unable to reach the grapes on a vine he desired – came to believe that they were sour and not worth obtaining in the first place.”

“I enjoy my life as it is now, grapes or no grapes. Somehow I don't think you can say the same.”

“And what of it? You would have me stop?”

“I don't believe you can.”

That, in Aozaki's reckoning, is his greatest strength, and his greatest flaw. He has simply too much momentum. Even if he wanted to stop, he couldn't. The fire, once lit, cannot be extinguished. It can only burn out, or burn down the world.

“And I do not believe that I am necessarily doomed to failure.”

“No...” Aozaki sighs again. “...you really don't, do you?”

“Even if the grand artifice of industrial civilisation should collapse, I would find a way. Even if the arcane should fade from the world entirely, I would find a way. Even if I were to perish, destroyed utterly, my soul returned to the great Akasha like all others – even then, the impetus that has drawn the path I follow would not disappear. The spiral shall bring it around as many times as necessary, and it shall walk the path again.”

“Churchill would be proud.”

“You are not my opponent, Aozaki; nor is Shirazumi, nor Ryougi, nor anyone else. At most, you can be only an obstacle. My opponent is consensus, just as I am its opponent. And between these two, I shall not be the first to falter.”

And to that, Aozaki supposes, there is really nothing left to say. What a pointless conversation this has been. An argument in which each side begins and ends utterly unable to sway the other's conviction.

“I respected you, Araya. I still do.” Aozaki turns around, and begins to walk to the elevator. “But I won't be unhappy to see you go.”

“Then, at last, we are in accord.”

A long pause. Aozaki reaches the elevator without looking back. She presses the call button, and waits.

“Upstairs?”

“You will find Ryougi on the ground floor, in the East Lobby. As promised, I will not interfere in your departure.”

After a short while, the elevator arrives, signalled by an electronic bell. Brushed steel doors slide open; warm light spills out. Aozaki steps in, deposits the gym bag on the floor, and then casts one last look out into the garage as she holds the door open; looking across the room at the stony-faced shadow of a man behind the furnace.

“Araya. What do you seek?”

“True wisdom.”

A response, as if delivered thousands of times before.

“Araya. Where do you seek it?”

“Only within myself.”

A question, asked of him as if for the very first time.

“Araya. Why did you seek it to begin with?”

He wasn't expecting that one. Though he doesn't show it, it gives him pause for a moment.

“...the reason is long lost to memory.”

With that, the man in the long, dark coat vanishes, just as swiftly and silently as he appeared. The elevator door closes, and its ascent begins. It may be that she's just acclimatised to the interior of the building, but the air around her already feels cold.

“You and Shirazumi are really the same kind, you know. Or rather, you have the same problem.” She mutters, more to herself than any notional listener. “Both of you – you just can't stop.”

* * * *

Garan no Dou

Ring, ring.

I snap out of my ruminations in a state of profound disturbance, and immediately lose my balance and fall over.

“Ah, nonononon-SAFE!”

Fortunately, I land on my feet. Stand up, dust off. Probably should have mentioned it earlier, but I've been sustaining a flawless handstand for the past several minutes. It's just something I've done. The reason for this is...well, it's pretty in-depth, you know? Lot of ins, lot of outs; it's a complex thing. It's very important. It began as an attempt to prove a point about the nature of consciousness by seeing if I could feel the blood rushing to my brain when I was upside-down. As it turns out, I didn't feel the blood rushing to my brain when I was upside-down, so now I think I don't have blood, or a brain, or either, which lends itself to the question of how exactly I am able to think. Material basis of consciousness; that's empirical phenomenology going on here, but no, the phone insists that it's more important. God damn it. I was in the middle of something highly relevant to my current situation, and you, phone, insist on interrupting me like a teacher with some boring chore! Have you no conscience!?

Ring, ring.

“Evidently not.”

Just listen to that. Doubtless some callous, unfeeling sociopath has seen fit to make use of this country's government-subsidised telephone system at exactly the wrong time. The nerve! The sinew! The sedition! Despite being the world's second-largest market economy, this country is in reality a paragon of socialism. One needs only to look at the composition of successive Cabinets since the end of the Cold War t-

Ring, ring.

I need to develop a sequence of tones which, when perceived by the human brain, implant a subconscious suggestion in the mind of the listener which gradually develops into an irresistible impulse towards auto-defenestration, and then use that as my answering machine pickup. This will put a selection pressure on the population of telemarketers, resulting in a species of same adapted to working on the ground floor. That way, when rising sea levels flood the place, they'll be the first to go under. You see? Climate change isn't all bad.

But what if they're working on the ground floor in places that are already a significant distance above sea level?

For the record, I'm actually up in Aozaki's main workshop, the one with the big table and bookshelves all around. It's a source of great irritation to me now, since – if I had been downstairs in her soundproofed concrete serial killer basement instead – I would have had an ideal excuse for not being able to hear the phone ring. I mean, I probably would have still heard it, but it'd make it easier to lie about it later on. I grab the yellow legal pad and pen from the table – this is kind of a business, I guess, so if it's a client or whatever and they leave a number or a message, I'm sure as hell not wasting valuable potentially non-existent brain cells remembering that shit – and I resolve myself to irrationally despising the person on the other end of the line from the moment they start talking. I'll make my best effort towards it. Even if turns out to be Prince Siddhartha, Eirik Bloodaxe and Freddie Mercury all rolled into one, I'm still going to speak entirely in veiled death threats. You know – 'I hear competition in the cold-calling business is pretty cutthroat. Working there must be murder; your bosses are making a killing while you entry-level guys only get the smallest cut of the profits. I once thought of taking a stab at it, but I don't think I'd be able to hack-

Hack?

In, uh, you know, in the sense of a machete. Infinitive, to hack. To hack through the jungle foliage. Presume presence of doctors. Hastily hack a heavy hock of ham in half. Look, can we get back to the...fuck it, I don't even remember what I was doing. New challenge, what's your next step? Out the door, that's where. I have a phone to silence.

Make haste!

I'm on the stairwell before, while and after I know it. I can't be bothered climbing the flights normally, so I just jump up through the gaps in the middle, swinging myself around the handrails where necessary. Eventually, the fourth floor presents itself to me-

Ring, ring.

-yes, I'm coming, alright? I burst through the door into the office, and make a beeline for the phone on her desk. To the sound of the pouring rain outside is added a soft serenade of brainlessly burbling news anchors; we're coming up on five o'clock, it looks like, and Aozaki left the televisions on because she hates the environment.

Ring, ri-

Denied. Grab that handset and don't forget to sound menacing. I'm the one who rings around here.

“Seven days...”

“What?”

...Kokutou?

Fuck. Fuck! Abort!

No, wait. Hold that thought. Put your deerstalker on. Caller ID on the receiver gives me the number that's calling, and it's not a mobile number. I hear line noise and rain in the background. Must be fairly loud to come through that clearly. Conclusion? Kokutou is calling from a payphone outside. But why? He has a cell, but he's choosing not to use it. Lost? Unlikely. Out of battery and/or credit? He's too responsible to let that happen. Thus, he has some reason for not using his phone. What? Possibly, he may believe the line is being monitored by Blackwatch or affiliates. Not too likely; they probably wouldn't have the resources. If anything it's just a call log, not a direct tap. What else can you do with phones? Well, there's position tracking. Modern smartphones might have GPS functionality, but even regular mobiles can still be localised by tracking what cell in the network they're connecting too. He's in the company of yakuza; out of habit, they might have had him turn off his phone for that reason. However, that concern needs to be balanced against the need for people to remain contactable in circumstances like these, when the situation might change at the drop of a hat. This applies to Kokutou especially. Thus, it's logical to assume that his phone is off because the consequences of having it on are demonstrably worse. What could that possibly be? Consider Blackwatch's perspective. If they're interested in anyone – that means him or the Ryougi family – it's because they think this is a matter of finding the right person to waterboard until they give up my location. And, yeah, it kind of is. So, logically, what do they do? If they can find a way to track those people, then obviously they'd try to grab them if the opportunity arose. What is the probability of this? Not extremely likely – Blackwatch's capacity for operations is pretty neutered here in Japan; it's basically hilarious – but within the realm of possibility. You want my final answer? I'll have to phone a friend.

“Kokutou, has Blackwatch tried to kidnap you recently?”

“Wha...uh, I...um...actually – yes, that, ah...how did you-”

“From your tone of voice.”

“...but how-”

“Very well, thank you. Are you okay?”

It's time to relocate. Notebook in hand, phone in other hand, I make my way over to the sofas around the coffee table, and sit down on the one to the right side of the televisions plural. The cushion acquires a very deep indentation where I sit on it, but the underlying metal structure holds me up just fine. The notebook now goes on the table, and the phone goes nowhere. It's right where it needs to be.

“Well...yes, I'm fine now. I mean...we went out to this shrine in Yamanashi Prefecture to pick up some things, but an American agent followed us there and tried to kidnap me. He's dead now, but everyone else is fine.”

Huh. So the Ryougi family isn't completely useless after all. Well, that's cool, I guess, but more importantly I need to find out where Kokutou is. Let's ask him.

“Where ar-”

Actually, no. Better question. Is this line safe? I'm thinking...yeah, most probably. Phone booths are pretty well untouchable if you want a direct tap on the line without doing a lot of prior setup. Furthermore, there's no indication that Aozaki is on Blackwatch's radar. How would they link that, if it was? I covered my movements against the traffic cameras pretty well when I was driving over here, and the Ryougis probably took precautions; they'd be familiar with that kind of thing. Either way, from what I observed of this neighbourhood on the approach, even following the cameras wouldn't narrow things down at all. This area is dense with all kinds of back roads and alleyways, and cameras are only economically feasible to put on the main roads and intersections. They're to catch speeders and record accidents; they're optimised for getting a return on the investment by only being placed at the places most likely to require them. Saved by the market economy. But wait! That's just it. What usually screws people over in situations like this? It's the little things, the ones you don't expect. Like, for example, financial records. If the opposition cares enough about Kokutou to try and abduct him by force, then it's entirely possible that his bank statements have already been broken into and given a once-over. This place is legally a business, right? If they see transactions correspondent with his paydays, then...

We're fucked.

“No, before that – in what form does Aozaki pay you and Ryougi?”

“What?”

“Just answer the question.”

“...in cash. She doesn't like banks. Also, she doesn't pay Shiki...well, actually, it was Shiki who refused to, um...hold on. Why?”

Aozaki to the rescue. I should have expected this from her, actually. A Magus living in society would know her way around a paper trail. Hell, it may just be that she chose this particular suburb on purpose for setting up shop. Clever girl.

“Just checking if the line is secure.”

Is it, though? Is it really? Let's consider this..what else can Aozaki be pinned to? Design work on the Ogawa Mansion – that's one. The opposition must know the significance of that building in some capacity; they've clearly been inside my former apartment there.

Must have left a photo there...always thought there was something I missed when I moved out.

Still, that's not an issue. If a terrorist lives in a building, no-one immediately jumps to thinking that he's acquainted with the architect. So, no, I think we're good.

“Anyway, where are you now?”

“I'm just outside the Ryougi estate. I'm on a payphone.”

No shit.

If you're not, the Ryougi estate needs to do something about that hole in their roof.

“Yeah, I know.” I reach over for the remote, and turn off the televisions. Babbling cuts off mid-sentence. They're just going to get on my nerves if they stay on. Besides, I don't want to talk over them. I lean over the table and pull the notepad to me. Flip to a blank page. The previous one's covered in sketches of rune circles, Thorbjǫrg diagrams...you know, the usu – wait, why are the notes in Icelandic? Did I...was I not paying attention?

Possibly too much attention.

Whatever, irrelevant. One click and the ballpoint achieves liftoff. I don't really have an intention here; I just felt the need for a notepad. It's reassuring. I tap the pen on the paper and say, “So, you guys are back now, I take it. Is everyone reassembling back here, or do I have run over to their place?”

“Actually, only I, Mr. Akitaka and Shiki's brother are back. Mr. Ryougi is returning by himself. He'll be – hold on; Mr. Akitaka, when do you think Mr. Ryougi will be...ah, thank you – yes, he'll be back at around quarter to six.”

Quarter to six? But that's a little over fifty minutes from now!

...and?

And, that...uh...that...doesn't...actually make any difference. Never mind.

“Well, that's fine. I need some time anyway, to...”

Tricky. Probably not worth going in-depth here; he's not going to understand it. There's no conceivable way Aozaki would have taught him more than what's sufficient for him to not have to run for a dictionary every time the conversation gets heavy, but less than would keep the comprehension gap at a level enjoyable for her. The precise reason why I'm ransacking Aozaki's supply of gauze and athletic tape – no, I don't know why she has it. I didn't even break into the Cave of Wonders; she's just got a drawer in that huge desk in her workshop which is filled with rolls of the stuff, and I have only a vague inkling that it has some practical use in assembling or posing those puppets around the place – as well as the fact that I am is really not going to be important to him.

“...perform tasks.”

Wait, what? Shit, was that what I said? I didn't mean to say that! God damn it, that sounds ridiculously shady! Damage control, PDQ!

“By which I mean, make preparations.”

That is NOT damage control! That's almost exactly as bad!

“For Araya's impending death.”

Marginally better, but-

“Which I will prosecute.”

Smooth.

Oh God, I need a do-over.

“...all right. But – look, there's things I need to talk to you abo-”

The pen slips from my hand. Momentarily.

“You're absolutely right! To begin with, I have some good news for you. Namely, your girlfriend is as good as rescued.”

“Shiki's safe?”

That lifted his mood. He was sounding kind of grim beforehand.

Well, what do you expect?

Huh?

His sister just died.

Oh, right.

“Yeah, I spoke with her on the phone a while ago. She's lightly injured, nothing serious, and is otherwise in go...average spirits about the whole thing. Aozaki and I managed to negotiate a diplomatic solution to the hostage crisis.”

Well, I say that, but really the argument boiled down to the confluence of me coming over there regardless of my allergy to her or any other considerations, and of Araya needing her alive and feeling confident that he can beat me. Still, it works. Mutual self-interest is the foundation of diplomatic relations.

Still gonna kill him, though.

War is the continuation of diplomacy by other means.

Araya delendus est.

“Aozaki should currently be in the process of picking her up from Araya's place.”

Actually, she's probably wasting time in a long, meandering conversation with her former colleague, but this does not technically falsify my statement. It's 'in the process', see?

“After that the plan is for both of them to head to a safe location out of the city. I don't know where it is; she chose it. I should probably figure out a way to get you out there too before tonight...well, Aozaki and I can discuss it when she calls in once she and Ryougi are in the clear.”

Basically all that's left is I've got to kill Araya.

Exactly right. On the notepad, I put down a bullet point and carefully write KILL ARAYA next to it, in handwriting whose owner I can't quite determine. I put an empty checkbox next to that.

“Of course, after this there's still the problem with her and the police, but her family can probably figure something out there.”

I put another bullet point down and write DEAL WITH POLICE. Another empty checkbox goes next to that.

“So, what did you want to talk about?”

There's a pause on the line, which gives me enough time to put down another bullet point, write DEFEAT BLACKWATCH, and draw an empty checkbox next to tha-

“...thank you.”

What?

What?

“What?”

The pen slips.

“I mean, you didn't have to do any of this – for me or Shiki, or anyone. And I'm grateful that you are.”

I feel – all of a sudden – somehow feverish. Puddled thoughts, irrational mind.

-didn't have to do-

To do-

Cold pavement.

Flesh and blood-

-skin and bone.

I bring the knife down.

I reach out my hand.

And see it.

She wasn't a person.

Just golden-

“Ah – um – well, if you - I, uh – that is – no, I...I didn't...really...do anything.”

No; to begin with, you actually caused most of these problems, didn't you?

“So don't – uh – I, um; it was really, just...mostly Aozaki's doing. Really.”

And you're usually so eloquent, too.

Yeah, well, apparently talking to him turns me into a drooling idiot. Where is that pen? Where, where, where...where did I put that – there. Okay. Just...fuck. I don't know. Something.

“Even so-”

“Thank me,” I interrupt, with slightly more volume than I intended, paying more attention to the page than the phone, “when all this is over.”

I flip over to a new page. On it, in the centre, I write Thank you.

It looks wrong. No surprise. Not only the words, but even the handwriting is stolen.

“Calling just to say that now is, uh...is a waste of money.”

People have only a limited capacity for change.

“I know. I wanted you to know that first.”

Oh, did you, now? Well, that's just, ah...haha...well. It's...

“Because now I want to ask you some things. I-”

No.

Take the notepad, flip to a new page.

“I didn't kill your sister.”

Blurted out. So fast, it's almost all one word.

Oh, good job.

Feelings of claustrophobia. Headache. Dizzyness. Shortness of breath. Heart pounding in ears-

-but that can't be-

“Couldn't have died from infection. Proof. She was injured on arrival; would have been rushed ahead of the queue. Put through bio screening beforehand. Confirming BLACKLIGHT infection takes five minutes, tops, including drawing the blood sample. They've got a field kit for it. Unit couldn't function without it. You'd have still been in an interview. They'd have told you then. That part's legally above-board. They'd be required to, also, it'd be in their interest to tell you. That? Didn't happen. So – not infected. What happened? Unknown. Either she's been kidnapped with no possibility of ransom or experimented on or tortured or they had her killed for some reason but I don't know what, but, all right, I'll find out, I will think of...of something, I'll find out what, um...okay?”

Well done.

“...I never thought you were responsible for that, Shirazumi.”

Oh, of course. Of course. Of course, of course, of course-

“I'm talking about what you told us when we were at Garan no Dou.”

“...yeah? What about it?”

“You described the murders of two years ago as having been conducted by a third party. Right?”

“That...was several hours ago.” I hear a scratching noise from somewhere. Close by. Scratching, scratching, scratching, “I can't be expected to remem-”

“Were you misleading us?”

A sound of tearing paper. The pen falls from my hand. The world implodes – hand over eyes – into darkness and noise. A shadow of ragged breathing. Impossibly loud, and nothing else. Remain blind, headache worsens.

Well.

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, NO-

Is this not what you wanted?

NO! No. No, I...I...this isn't-

As you wished for, he's finally seen through you.

No. No, no, not now, not like this, it can't...it's not-

Behind the curve, as usual. After all, everyone else already knows.

I don't want-

So there's no reason not to. There's no longer any need to-

No, no, NO - I don't want it. Any of it. I, I...don't want your disbelief, your disappointment, disgust, hatred, your worthless help, your platitudes, your opinions, your homilies, your pointless forgiveness, that beaten-dog look on your face, your stupid pitying condescending fucking speeches – none of it! None of it. Not to hear it, not to see it, not to say it, nothing. There is nothing you can do here. Nothing you can help with. Not today. You have no right, no right to call...no right to say that to me. I am the one who needs this, I am the one who wants this, no matter what you think, no matter what you say, at least I'm not completely fucking useless like you!

Ah-

The weight of the phone in my hand is, all of a sudden, the most unbearable – intolerable – repulsive – hateful thing in the world. Just hate it. Hate it. Something like a fit – a seizure. Invisible pressure. Noise in the darkness. Sounds redoubled. Reduplicated. Pain behind my eyes. Can't see. It hurts. It hurts. It hurtsithurtsithurts-

-see it. Lines in the darkness. The golden-

“If I were you,”

Suddenly, I-

-I-

-I'm talking.

“I wouldn't pay any mind whatsoever to what's been happening to me.”

Tone low. Unrestrained, and vicious.

“That's been a success up to now, hasn't it?”

The heat rises inside me, uncontrolled, and-

Click.

-I hang up.

Just like that.

“Ah-”

The sound of disconnection cuts through me like a knife, and forces me to take a breath for what seems like the first time in hours. The heat vanishes, and I am left feeling – at once – very cold. A violent, involuntary shudder runs through me.

Cold?

...no.

Then-

I feel sick.

I...no, I...

So sick, I feel like I'm going to throw up, even though I know I won't. I can't.

I didn't mean to-

After all, there's nothing inside.

-couldn't stop myself-

Sound bleeds back into the world. Rain outside, television inside. News on all stations. Five o'clock update.

“-n the studio this afternoon is our commentato-”

I let the phone fall from my hand. I let my other hand fall from my eyes.

“-ic of discussion is, of course, to-”

I look down, and see the page of the notepad before me.

“-he question on everyone's lips i-”

...did I write this?

“-a very complex matter, tha-”

I don't remember. I recall – sounds of scratching, pen on paper. Perhaps unconsciously, when I was on the the phone, I-

“-eeds to be examined closel-”

Here. On this page. I wrote this. I must have. At some point, some time. A single word. Repeated, over and over, in varying sizes, filling the page entirely down to the point where the pen tore a large, ugly gash in the paper. Just one word, accusing-

“-Lio Shirazumi-”

YOU.

...

“-e suspected terrorist believed to b-”

YOU.

...remote. Where did I...?

“-ow known to be responsible for a series of killings i-”

YOU.

Where is it? Where did I put the remote?

“-ctims were brutally killed and dismembe-”

YOU.

Where, where, where...it was just over there, I'm certain...

“-mainder appeared to be partially eaten, alth-”

YOU.

It was right here. It was right here.

“-nd still has yet to be apprehended by pol-”

YOU.

It couldn't be anywhere else. No, no, no, no, no, no, it has to be here. But why can't I-

“-o be frank, I just can't understand what would motivate a teenager to do th-”

YOU.

“WELL, I CAN FUCKING UNDERSTAND IT!”

Tunnel vision. Head swimming in fever. I turn to face to screen, to scream and rage and see-

…

...nothing.

Nothing at all.

I turned them off beforehand, didn't I?

That's why.

That's why I see-

-reflected-

-in the dim and darkened glass-

-in my place-

-with my face-

-the half-smile, half-snarl-

“...you.”

Elísabet.

“YOU!”

Rage consumes the distinction.

“You did this! You're the one who made me-”

Choke on your words. My voice collapses into a coughing fit.

“-Damn it!”

Leaning forward in my seat. My hand over my eyes again.

“Hallucinations, now...?”

Teeth gritted. Frustration.

“Oh, no. No. No, no, no, no, no, NO! I am so! Fucking! OVER THIS!”

Punctuate by pounding my fist on the table. The final time so hard, I think it might splinter – but it holds. I rub my eyes, then lower my hand and look straight down at the floor. Ignore the reflection.

“I don't need this. Not now.”

Hands curl into fists.

“Why should I give a shit about you? Why should anyone? You're a Magus. You're all the fucking same!”

Oh, yeah. Of course. Naturally. There's no way a Magus would have friends – loved ones –

“You were beaten by Aozaki a long time ago. All that's irrelevant now. You'd be no use to anyone as you were before. At least now you're-”

– family –

“It was necessary! It had to be done. It had to be me. I had to-”

“-kill and eat a woman out of convenience-”

“Fuck you. FUCK YOU! Convenience? You don't...you don't know a goddamn thing! You want to know why? Because...because...”

Because?

“...listen. Somewhere, not too far away, in a certain room on a certain floor of a certain building, there's someone who wakes up every morning on the worst day of her life. By the time the sun goes down, she's killed herself. And the next day, she gets up and does it all over again. And she is not alone. The entire fucking building, it's all like that. I've seen it. And you know why? You know what they did to deserve it? Nothing. Not a fucking thing. They just have the singular misfortune of existing at the same time as Souren Araya.”

Like you?

“Not. Relevant.”

Really.

“It's about Araya, because he's a sick, lying, murdering fucking bastard son of a bitch who needs to die screaming! This is not difficult. This is not a mistake. You are not going to take this from me. It's mine. Understand that? I am the one who needs to do this, I am the one who has to kill him, I am the one who gets to win, me. And no-one else. Because I am right and he is wrong, and no amount of guilt trips will change that one fucking iota!”

No regrets?

“The ends will justify the means. When Araya's last earthly sensation is of me spitting in his face as he bleeds out, then you can ask me if I have regrets.”

Heated, shuddering breaths. You rub the bridge of your nose between your fingers, and find yourself stuck between laughing and crying.

“But...but...I can't fucking get there,” deep breath, “if I am sitting here, ARGUING WITH THE FURNITURE!”

And I turn to face the television again.

“If you're going to help, then help. If you're just here to sit in the peanut gallery, then fuck off.”

A shamefully long amount of time passes before I realise that the reflection is mine again. Not even a ghost of Elísabet.

“...what the fuck am I doing?”

Exhausted – more than I realised, it seems – I collapse sideways onto the couch.

...God, I just want this to be over already.

Over?

And done with. My checklist, completed. Everything...solved.

And then what?

Then, we can all go back to how it wa-

Ring, ring.

“Shit!”

No rest for the wicked.

Bolt upright. Fever returns in an instant. I reach out my hand – shaking – and I look, and I see, right there, on the screen of the handset-

Private Number.

“...someone else?”

I pick up the phone.

I press the 'answer' button.

And I hold it to my ear.

“Who is this?”

“Lio Shirazumi, I presume?”

--------------------------------------------------------------------

I apologise for the great delay. I hope the preposterous length of this update goes some way towards making up for that.

See, Blackwatch are a bunch of dudebros par excellence, right? So, when Lio's in a good mood, try reading his monologues in the voice of Bro Team Pill.

The Japanese as used by Loki Four was written by me. I take full responsibility for any mistakes made.

This update: in which Lio explains all the BLACKLIGHT mechanics. This is sort of setting up for a lot of the stuff he'll pull during the Araya fight (a.k.a. the Ever-Distant Utopia). Of course, I can't confirm how much of his speculation about BLACKLIGHT's origin and composition is correct, because that's a spoiler. You'll have to wait until we have Weisstein flashbacks. I'll say only that BLACKLIGHT is weird. It's like almost nothing else in the setting, for the simple reason that its creator is like almost no-one else in the setting. He's...well, when you see more of him, you'll understand.

Evariste Galois - source of the quote Je n'ai pas le temps (I have no time) - wrote that the night before he was due to fight a duel to the death, which he went on to lose. Foreshadowing, or a pointlessly self-indulgent reference? You decide, America.

Okay, so yeah. The golden world described in the bit before the first appearance of Great Gold Lion Lio is, in a manner of speaking, the logical conclusion of his ability to see the lines on things. Is it his Reality Marble? No. Lio's not cool enough to have one. Is it his Origin? Not really. It's far more complicated and spoilery than that. Remember how I said his Origin isn't unique? It's far less like he's a special snowflake and more like he's...really, really unlucky.

That the Inexplicable Metal Plate of Ogawa Mansion is used for oracle-bone type divination is complete invention on my part, but not without justification. When we see it in action in Paradox Spiral, it's where a droplet of blood match-cuts around to show a droplet of water falling onto the plate and evaporating. That was the association with 'anointing with blood', and it's mounted over a fire, so, yeah. As for the I Ching-y pattern on the surface, since that's not visible in the film, I'll only say that *furiously handwaves* there are two sides to the metal plate, each with different functions, and the pattern was on the underside in the movie.

This line - "You were a good friend. But, unfortunately, our interest is not mutual..." from Touko is near-verbatim something Harman says to Kun Lan near the beginning of Killer7.

Lio and Araya come across a little like broken records, don't they? Seems every time we cross to them, it's "I will kill him, no matter what." or "I will not lose to the likes of you." Their thought processes may change, but what's underneath generally...doesn't. This is intentional. The thing about people with awakened Origins is that they're not really 'characters' in the same way that others are...see, this is shaping up to be more like an unstoppable force meeting an immovable object. But just wait and see.

Araya's opinion about Origins - that there's no reason why you should be able to sum one up in a word or phrase - is my own. There's really no reason why anyone's Origin should be a pithy, deep and meaningful single word. Far more likely that they'd be something hard to define, like Kokutou's: 'normal and unable to hurt anyone'.

Araya's line - "Extinguished. Like the candle before the dawn." - was not only a metaphor used by the Buddha to describe nirvana, but the origin of the word itself. Nirvana literally means 'blown out', in the sense of a candle. Now, Araya and Lio are both symbolically associated with snow in that they are the only two villains in KnK where snow starts falling at their death, but here there's also an association with ash, which ties into Touko's comment about 'the fire, once lit, cannot be extinguished'. Lio is made of ash now, which is obvious, but remember that Araya has sarira embedded into his left arm. Sarira are Buddhist relics most often recovered from cremated ashes. In a way, they've both had parts of themselves burned away.

Easy to forget, but Elisabet was the first person Lio actually straight-up murdered since two years prior. Kills made by GGLL were out of his control, and all others were killed in combat. A lot of his reaction to Kokutou here is a result of guilt over that.

Lio is written - where applicable - as a sufferer of something like borderline personality disorder (plus a few others, for good measure), but taken to the EXTREEEEME, like all things in his life. Characteristic of this is his emotional dysregulation, very rapid mood swings, identity dissociation - his italics voice becomes very 'independent' and hostile when he's in a bad mood, for example - and a tendency to 'split' things into black-and-white categories. When Kokutou first calls, he's sunshine and rainbows. Then Kokutou's comments start provoking negative emotions, which rapidly overtake him, resulting in what you've seen above. Then he hangs up, and his negativity turns inward. Hallucinations aren't a symptom of BPD, but honestly, it's about time he started having them.

[shiningphoenix]

My thoughts after reading the first half: All of a sudden it makes sense: bungee jumping to the root. So, is Lio going to become a magician now?

The second half was good but confusing, and leaves me wanting MOAR. (The first half did too, but I felt like it had hit a climax)

[Dullahan]

My thoughts after reading the first half: All of a sudden it makes sense: bungee jumping to the root. So, is Lio going to become a magician now?

Hahaha, shit no. If reaching the Root was as simple as having an awakened Origin, Araya wouldn't be stalking teenage girls like the scumbag he is. The golden world is not the Origin. It's just Lio's Origin. Kind of. Not really.

The second half was good but confusing, and leaves me wanting MOAR. (The first half did too, but I felt like it had hit a climax)

Unfortunately, I'll be devoting the remainder of this month to frantically finishing my fanfic contest entry, so some delay is to be expected.

[shiningphoenix]

Hahaha, shit no. If reaching the Root was as simple as having an awakened Origin, Araya wouldn't be stalking teenage girls like the scumbag he is. The golden world is not the Origin. It's just Lio's Origin. Kind of. Not really.

I thought reaching the Root was as simple as killing yourself, and it was only hard if you wanted to be able to return.

[Dullahan]

I thought reaching the Root was as simple as killing yourself, and it was only hard if you wanted to be able to return.

Let's not split hairs, here. When we're talking about 'reaching the Root' in the context of a Magus, we all know we're talking about That Pastime That Makes Magi Do Dumb And/Or Evil Shit In The Hope Of Attaining True Wisdom And/Or Bitchin' Superpowers, not suicide.

[shiningphoenix]

Let's not split hairs, here. When we're talking about 'reaching the Root' in the context of a Magus, we all know we're talking about That Pastime That Makes Magi Do Dumb And/Or Evil Shit In The Hope Of Attaining True Wisdom And/Or Bitchin' Superpowers, not suicide.

They want to sudo su, and not just get the blocks of memory they're stored on transferred to the use of root?

[Dullahan]

They want to sudo su, and not just get the blocks of memory they're stored on transferred to the use of root?

Exactly. But it's guarded by a very nasty IDS, which tends to shut down attempts to access it from remote terminals with extreme prejudice.

[shiningphoenix]

Exactly. But it's guarded by a very nasty IDS, which tends to shut down attempts to access it from remote terminals with extreme prejudice.

[R.Lock]

This is the first. The first half of the chapter forced me to read the entire passages aloud, but hey, a li'l nice practice doesn't hurt. And understanding of the matter is better this way.

Anyway, simply delicious. Summing up in one word, complex. Heh, complex. Goddamit, mathematics, what you're doing to me.
By the way, due to the barrage of magi stuff in the first half, I constantly confused Lio's POV with Elisabeth's one. And what a surprise in the second half.

And foreshadowing. Gosh, never thought of a reason behind the military choosing such a codename for Lio. Too much information to digest from the first try for me, I think. Not an avid reader in terms of picking up hints, though.

Also, looking forward to Elisabeth - Elisabeth, for the God's sake - messing with Lio. And him cursing Tohko for such a partner.

[shiningphoenix]

By the way, due to the barrage of magi stuff in the first half, I constantly confused Lio's POV with Elisabeth's one. And what a surprise in the second half.

I just assumed there wasn't a difference and "Lio" was just talking to "Lio"