This work is based (mostly) on the work of Kazuma Kamachi and other writers. A translation from Baka Tsuki was used in its creation and I claim no ownership over their work. Please Read, Review, and Enjoy.
That damn lewd idiot! Tires me out all day with her perverted bullshit, and then she runs off as nothing happened!
As the daylight slowly disappeared as the sun sank below the horizon, Kamijou sighed to herself over the blue haired girl who was no longer with her and Index.
After the encounter with the white haired former exorcist, the trio had went off and started messing around, their escapades funded somewhat unwillingly from Kamijou's wallet. After they had exhausted the afternoon and Kamijou's funds, the blue haired girl had run off, saying that there was a certain café she wanted to check out before she went home. When Kamijou questioned what sort of café it was, the blue haired girl grinned at Kamijou and asked whether or not she wanted to come and see for herself.
In a less than graceful way, Kamijou had declined the offer, taking Index and what remained of her cash, leaving the blue haired girl with a disappointed pout on her face.
Now, as the warmth of the sun slowly disappeared, Kamijou sighed again as she felt the numbness of an overly long day spread throughout her body.
"Touka… Are you okay? You've been sighing a lot today, much more than usual in fact."
Touka looked over at Index, who had now been revitalized by the lack of summer heat, and was looking over at Kamijou with a concerned look in his eyes.
Kamijou resisted the urge to sigh again, and returned Index's gaze of concern with a smile that she wanted to say 'I'm fine'.
"You don't have to worry so much Index. I'm totally fine, I'm just a tiny bit tired from everything that's happened today."
Even though she had said that, Index continued to stare at Kamijou with a concerned look, but, after a moment, he nodded and turned his gaze elsewhere. When his gaze left Kamijou's face, Kamijou could not help but frown and internally sighed.
If only I didn't have to face all these situations where I could blow this entire charade, then I might not be as tired as I am. I just feel like some sort of weight has been has been dragging me down, but I can't do anything about it.
Kamijou again resisted the urge to sigh and instead stretched as if she were tired.
"Oi… Oi Touka!"
Kamijou snapped out of her trance to find that Index was tugging on her sleeve and pointing at something in the distance. When Kamijou followed the gesture Index gave her, she could only hold her head in annoyance.
Oh for fuck's sake Index.
Index was pointing at a cardboard box, sitting just outside of an alleyway. Within the cardboard box sat a quivering white form, its full form partially obscured by the looked back at Index, who had shining stars in his eyes as he saw the obvious animal in the cardboard box. When Kamijou saw that she could only sigh.
"No Index. We can't do that, so don't even think about. My dorm has a strict no pets policy, so bringing one back is an absolute no-no."
Not to mention that letting freeloaders, and especially males stay in a girls dorm is also forbidden, but let's not say anything about that, shall we?
Index, who knew nothing about Kamijou's plight, frowned in a disapproving manner and gestured towards the box with white form in it.
"Touka… If no one does something for that poor animal, it will most likely die. Whether it will be in the freezing cold of tonight or the blazing heat of tomorrow, that weak creature will die. As a person who is responsible for looking after all of God's children, be they animal or human, I cannot allow poor Sphinx over there to suffer like that."
Kamijou could do little else but sigh in the face of Index's argument.
"Look, Index, I can understand that the animal will have a hard time, and that you don't like it, but my dorm's policy explicitly states…"
Kamijou's argument trailed off as she realized something that had almost gotten by her.
"Uhmm… Index… Did you just give a name to that animal?"
Index jumped as he realized what he had done, before clapping his hands together in front of him in a rushed praying gesture, trying his best to pretend that Kamijou didn't ask a question at all.
"Oh my father who art in heaven, please lend me the skill necessary to soften this hardened heart and save one of the less fortunate."
Kamijou felt a sweat drop roll down her face as she looked at the priest, before she sighed in despair.
"Index… come on now. The fact stands that, regardless of your zeal, my dorm does not allow animals. The dorm manager is already angry for all the damage 'I' did, so it would be best not to piss her off more."
Not to mention getting you thrown out onto the street… along with me.
Despite Kamijou's sound argument, Index only clasped his hands tighter and put on a resolute expression.
"Touka, you just don't understand. A true saint should be able to do the lord's work, regardless of what the world does to them. Even if it causes them nothing but problems, the lord's work is greater than petty human concerns."
Kamijou felt her eyebrow twitch involuntarily and her body temperature rise in rage.
"Oh…? Then I must be doing the lord's work by taking you in, because you have given me nothing but problems, you Chibi priest."
"…"
Index fell silent after that, his entire resolute charade disappearing the second Kamijou's retort left her mouth. Index's robed shoulders slumped forward, and a defeated look took over his face.
When she saw him like this, Kamijou could only sigh.
Great… there I go sticking my foot into it again. I didn't want to sound so mean, but I couldn't really do anything else. God damn, it why do I feel so lonely right now?
Kamijou looked over at the cardboard box again, out of curiosity to the form which was in the box, just in time to watch it dart away into a nearby alleyway causing Kamijou to bite her lip in frustration.
And here I was going to help you out. Now what am I going to do?
Kamijou turned her gaze back to Index, who still looked fairly crestfallen from Kamijou's earlier comment and didn't look like he was going to recover easily. Kamijou could only scratch her head in distress as she looked at him.
Well… Let's just start by apologizing. I did kind of go too far.
"Hey… Index I'm-"
Suddenly, and without giving Kamijou a single warning, Index's head shot up and his crestfallen look on his face disappeared as one of concern filled the void left by it.
"Touka… Can you feel that?"
Kamijou was taken aback by how serious Index had gotten and struggled to find the words to reply, she was shocked so much.
"Wha-What are you talking about? Feel what?"
Index turned to look away from Kamijou, to look around the surrounding area with a critical eye. The face that had only seconds before begged for the chance to help an animal was now looking around as if his life was in danger.
"You don't feel it? Mana. Mana is in the air."
Kamijou put on a confused look as she looked around the area with Index, not seeing, and, more importantly not feeling, anything out of the ordinary.
"Mana…? What do you mean by Mana? You mean that energy that is used in spells?"
In fantasy games, Kamijou wordlessly added to the end of the comment.
Index did not pay close attention to Kamijou's questions, and finally seemed to lock on to whatever he was looking for.
"Over there. The Mana is being gathered into a spell not far from here. The spell's attribute is… earth I believe? The ritual for it… is to use some sort of medium to absorb mana, and then release it if someone activates the trigger. The effect of its release is…"
Kamijou looked at Index, whose comments had shrunk to simple mutterings to himself, with a blank and confused gaze.
… Is the heat stroke from earlier still affecting him? Because all I got from that was gibberish.
After a few more minutes of Index muttering to himself, he turned to look at Kamijou with a smile on his face, though anyone could see that he was clearly worried about something.
"Touka… You can go home ahead of me. It looks like I have to… get involved… with something."
Kamijou tilted her head in confusion as she looked at Index.
"Get… involved? What in the world are you talking about? Is something happening?"
Index looked as if he was struggling to come up with an answer to Kamijou's questions, and he began to gesture for Kamijou to leave.
"Uhmmm… Well the short answer is that someone is putting together a spell over in that direction, so I should go and investigate it."
Kamijou still looked at Index with a confused tilt to her head.
"What do you mean spell? Are you talking about Ma-?"
Before Kamijou could finish her question, Index's head spun around in the direction that he had said the spell was in, which was conveniently in the direction that the animal had run off in.
"There is someone… tampering with the spell?!"
Index began to run off, leaving Kamijou standing there in shocked silence without even saying a word. Before he disappeared into the back alleys of the city, Index turned back to look at Kamijou.
"Touka, please don't worry about me. I should be able to handle this real quick and be home soon."
And with that, Index disappeared out of Kamijou's view.
"…"
Wha… What in the world is going on!?
Kamijou sighed and looked after the direction where Index had run off in.
It's obvious to me that the idiot just came up with an excuse to run off and grab that animal, but did he really have to act so serious when he did that?
Kamijou put her hands on her hips and looked in the direction of her dorm.
Should I head home right now? I mean this place should be safe, but if he were to run into someone with powers and a misunderstanding were to come about…
"Yeah right I can leave. Knowing him he'll end getting attacked by some sort of pyrokinesis, or something worse. Guess I have no choice to but to go after him."
With a sigh, Kamijou started to walk forward toward the direction that Index had run off in.
She had taken two steps, when a voice spoke out from behind her.
"That is the appropriate response to take in this situation, though wholly unneeded in this situation."
Kamijou froze mid-step as those words reached her brain. While they seemed normal enough, there was something about them… a certain tone of familiarity that denoted a link between Kamijou and the owner of the voice.
Kamijou heard a sigh come from the voice behind her, and this time, Kamijou could clearly hear that the voice could only belong to a woman.
"Here I thought you two would be getting along strangely, but it seems that fear was all for not. The two of you seem to be getting along quite fine."
Kamijou swallowed dryly and began to turn towards the source of the female voice, trying her best to keep a blank expression.
Well if this person does truly know me, hopefully they aren't a complete weirdo like that lewd blue haired girl from before.
Kamijou finally turned fully toward the source of the voice, just in time to see the girl grin at her with a lazy grin.
"Well… Shall I say it's been a while, Kamijou Touka?"
The owner of those words was a girl maybe a year or two Kamijou's junior, but just slightly taller than her senior on the account of her being a foreigner. Her flaming red hair and snow white skin only proved to Kamijou that the girl was a foreigner beyond a shadow of a doubt.
The red haired girl was dressed in an all-black nun's habit, minus the hood that all nuns seemed to wear. However, Kamijou found it hard to look at this girl as nothing but a textbook heretic.
Her ears had several piercings in each of her ears, each one of them with some sort of strange symbol hanging from them, all made of silver. Every finger of her hands had ring on it, some made of silver or gold, and some even with precious stones embedded into them. From the girl's slowly frowning mouth hung a lit and smoking cigarette, the smoke rising up to cross the black barcode that rested underneath the girl's right eye.
As soon as Kamijou took the entirety of the girl, she could only swear to herself.
God dammit! I take that all back! I'll take a weirdo like the blue haired girl as long as I don't know this girl!
Despite Kamijou thinking this, the red haired girl removed her cigarette from her frowning mouth and gestured at the student.
"What the matter with you? No 'hello' even after we haven't seen each other for a while? Are you really that cold towards people you know?"
Kamijou gritted her teeth and forced herself not to say a word.
After this morning with that blue haired idiot, I'll take my chances with seeming strange with this one. Maybe they'll get so annoyed with me that they'll leave.
True to Kamijou's thoughts, the red haired girl's countenance slowly grew to become an annoyed glare directed at Kamijou.
"Really now? Nothing? Are you still so angry at me for two weeks ago? I know it must be hard to forgive me, but are you really still so pissed that you can't talk to me?"
Kamijou continued to grit her teeth and remain silent, cautiously looking behind her and judging the distance between her and the nearest alleyway.
This girl is seriously giving me that same 'misfortune' aura that I got from the 'exorcist' earlier, and I really don't like that. This girl might have a piece of info about my former self, but I don't want to associate with this girl at all. I just want to run.
As Kamijou prepped her heart to run away from the red haired girl in front of her, that same girl took Kamijou's fascination with the nearest alleyway as concern for the boy who had run off seconds ago.
"Oh come on now! Do you really think that I am going to harm Index after everything that happened two weeks ago?! C'mon! All I did was lay down some Ophelia runes just to create a mana flow, and distract him for a few minutes while I talk to you."
Upon hearing the word 'rune', something in Kamijou's brain clicked as she remembered an odd piece of information.
She knew that the word 'rune' was a reference to the language of tribes of Germanic peoples that lived during the 2nd century. By inscribing these runes as words of power on surfaces, and then uttering the words of power, one could cause any number of phenomenon to occur.
For example, if someone wrote the runic word 'kenaz', or flames, on a piece of paper, and then uttered the word kenaz, one could cause flames to appear in any form they wish.
And, as it just so happened, at that very moment, the red haired girl pulled out a single card like object from her nun's habit, and muttered a single word, a wide and maniac grin on her face.
"Kenaz."
In that instant, from the red haired girl's hand, there erupted a bout of red and orange flames as if the girl's hand had a flamethrower attached to it. Slowly, though with seemingly little effort from the red haired girl, the gout of flames focused and grew to become what looked like to be a giant flaming sword.
Kamijou entire body froze in place as she saw this happen in front of her, her mouth agape in pure horror. The red haired girl continued to grin like a maniac as she raised the hand holding the sword of flames high into the air, looking at Kamijou with her gaze tinged with bloodlust.
"Are you still just going to stand there silently like an idiot?! You could die at any second, you fool!"
Even though Kamijou could not understand the words that were said in a foreign language, she could clearly understand the malicious glee that was apparent in them. In an almost unthinking motion, Kamijou raised her left hand up in a gesture of protection.
Without a moment's delay, or hesitation, nor even a glimmer of mercy in the girl's face, the red haired girl swung the flaming sword down at a virtually defenseless Kamijou. The sword hit Kamijou's outstretched left hand, and as soon as it came into contact with the hand, the sword exploded like some sort of flaming bomb, sending the flames scattering around the area.
After the explosion, the surrounding area was silent save for the crackling of the flames and the ragged breathing of Kamijou.
"Ha… Ha…Ha…"
Kamijou looked to her sides and saw the flames that had to have been at least 3000 degrees still roaring and melting the concrete into some sort of melted slag mixture. Kamijou looked down at herself, standing in the center of the roaring flames, completely and totally unharmed by the flames.
"Ha, Ha, Ha…"
Kamijou shakily turned her head to look at her untouched left hand, not a single piece of her skin blackened by the flames.
Wa… Wasn't the name of that power… Imagine Breaker? Well… seems that it actually does exist…
Kamijou brought her left hand down to rest on her face, grinning wildly as she did so, before laughing aloud.
"HAHAHAHAHA!"
Kamijou brought her left hand down from her face as her expression changed from a excited grin to a disgusted grimace. The student directed the disgusted grimace towards the strangely dressed red haired girl.
"What the hell… Is your fucking problem?! Are you fucking insane?! I could have died if you had fucked up in a small way."
The red haired girl looked over at the student, with a grin on her face and chuckling in the face of Kamijou's unbound rage.
"Well now… It finally seems like you want to talk to me… Should I be happy about this, or should I have just left you as you were, standing there with some dumb look on your face?"
Kamijou put her hand over her face and sighed.
"Are you only asking this now? Shouldn't you have given this some thought before you decided a course of action? I mean, you're lucky no one was around to…"
Kamijou looked around the area, one of her eyebrows slowly rising from confusion.
Speaking of which, there was an explosion wasn't there? Usually if there is just the sound of something falling over people come to look, so why hasn't even one person come out to look at an explosion?
The red haired girl seemed to know exactly what Kamijou was thinking, and smiled as Kamijou continued to look around foolishly.
"What are you looking for? Expecting people to start pour of the woodwork after all that noise we made?"
Kamijou looked at the red haired girl with an expression of disgust before sighing in similar manner.
"Don't tell me… You had something to do with that, didn't you?"
The red haired chuckled and began to rummage through her robes with a grin on her face.
"Well… I won't say whether or not I did, but I will tell you that those Ophelia runes from earlier can also be used to direct attention away from certain areas; Such as an area where an explosion would possibly go off."
Kamijou face palmed yet again and sighed in a conceding manner.
"Why the hell are you doing this to me? Did I do something to piss you off in the scant two weeks we've been apart?"
The red haired girl continued to grin at Kamijou while digging in her robes, and finally, with the all the flourish of a stage magician, the girl pulled out a somewhat plain manila envelope, which had strange markings around the flap.
"I'm not doing this to you specifically that you pissed me off, but rather because there are something I need to discuss with you; something that a normal person's ears shouldn't hear."
The red haired girl muttered a word underneath her breath, and the moment after, the flap of the envelope popped open. Styx threw the envelope over at Kamijou, and the student caught it from out of the air with an air of reluctance.
Kamijou looked at the outside of the envelope, carefully inspecting the symbols on the flap of the envelope, but getting nothing from it.
So these are… runes… I guess? I'll guess they were used to seal the envelope and leave it at that.
With a sigh, Kamijou opened up the envelope and began to look inside at the papers within. At that moment, the red haired girl grinned and made a gesture with her hand.
"So tell me… Have you ever heard of the name 'Misawa Cram School'?"
The next moment all the pieces of paper that were within the envelope began to fly out of it, hitting Kamijou on the bridge of her nose.
"Gyahhh!"
Kamijou quickly grabbed the bridge of her nose, and, finding there was no major damage, glared over at the red haired girl. The red haired girl happily accepted the glare, smiling in a self-satisfied way that did nothing more than enrage Kamijou further.
Bitch, Bitch, Bitch, Bitch…!
Despite cursing out the girl in her mind, Kamijou swallowed any angry retort she could have given and began looking around herself in curiosity.
Floating in the air surrounding Kamijou were the several pieces of paper that were in the envelope, swirling and dancing around her as if they were animated sprites.
... Fuck it. I'll just go with it. I don't know what the hell is going on anymore.
Sighing to herself, Kamijou began inspecting the dancing papers for information with an unenthusiastic gaze. It might have been that Kamijou was quickly scanning the papers, as they were stopping and starting to quickly for a normal person to read, but nothing from Kamijou's limited knowledge seemed to fit in with what was on the paper. It was possible that none of the info matched up because the former Kamijou had now interest in any form of entrance exams.
The red haired girl stood silent as Kamijou scanned the papers, but after a few moments she gestured with her hand, stopping the papers motion, and launched into an explanation.
"So, as you can probably gather from those documents, The Misawa family of cram schools are a group of college preparatory schools that currently hold a dominant share of the market for college prep schools. Apparently, due to its special practices, this group has an unbelievable 95% success rate for getting people into college."
With a snap of the red haired girl's fingers, a small pamphlet flew in front of Kamijou's face and opened up for the student to read. Kamijou quickly began to scan the piece of paper, seeing the information that matched up with the red haired girl's explanation.
… Well I can see how this would be good in a normal situation, but considering the city we are in…
As Kamijou was thinking that to herself, the red haired girl gestured again, causing the pamphlet to fly away from Kamijou and be replaced with a new one, this one titled 'The Misawa family of College Preparatory School: Academy City Branch'. Again, the red haired girl launched into an explanation.
"However, despite its practices outside of Academy City, the Misawa family of Cram Schools had come up with special features in order to accommodate for the fact that 99% of the student population of Academy City go on to college."
The red haired girl looked at Kamijou with a mischievous glint in her eyes.
"Considering your intelligence, you must be in the 1% that doesn't go to college."
Kamijou shot the red haired girl was she though was a warning glare, but the red haired girl simply chuckled in response. Kamijou swallowed whatever retorts she would have shouted at the girl, and instead asked a fairly obvious question.
"… Why in the world are you showing all of this pointless stuff to me again? Is there some sort of offer on right now where you get a discount for signing up with a friend?"
The red haired girl looked at Kamijou with a bemused stare before gesturing again.
"Well, considering that I'm not a student, or even a citizen, of this city, signing up for any sort of program within the city would be impossible."
The papers began to swirl and dance around Kamijou yet again, causing her to feel slightly dizzy from all the movement. After a few seconds of this, a several pieces of paper flew out of the group to stop before Kamijou's face.
"The reason I am telling you all this pointless info… is because I wish to simply clarify the reason why I am here."
Kamijou tilted her head in confusion at the red haired girl's comment, after which she folded her arms together.
"So what exactly are you here for then? I'm guessing it's not just for you to annoy me, right?"
The red haired girl sighed in an annoyed manner and held her head as if she had suddenly came down with a migraine.
"You know… If you could piece together information like a normal person, then you would understand why I'm here."
Kamijou gritted her teeth to hold back a fairly scathing retort for the red haired girl, one that would have pointed out how bitchy she was being.
God damnit! If only I could remember who this bitch is then I could be as mean as I wanted.
The red haired girl did not recognize the struggle Kamijou was going through, shrugging in a conceding manner and sighed as if she were tired.
"Well I guess since you have such a low level of intelligence I guess I will have to explain it to you."
The red haired girl took a huge draw of her cigarette, sighing out a large could of nicotine laced smoke.
"There is something wrong within the halls of Misawa Cram School. And I… I have the wondrous job of dealing with it."
The red haired girl gestured at the papers that were floating in the air in front of Kamijou with an annoyed gaze in her eyes.
"As you can see from those reports there, some very strange occurrences have been going on in that school."
Kamijou sighed in a conceding way and began to look over the papers with a less than critical eye. Among the papers that were floating in front of her, Kamijou could pick out what the red haired girl was saying.
Among the papers were inspection reports, taken from the Academy City databases, that should have covered all the rooms in the Misawa Cram School building, but a second paper, containing a diagram of all the rooms inside of the building, showed that there were numerous rooms that were not listed in the reports, some of them in what would be inaccessible areas of the building.
Also among the papers was the electricity statistics of the building, and it clearly showed that the school was consuming much more electricity than it was expected to, making it clear that something big was taking up all that energy.
Finally, probably the most important factor that showed that something strange was going on was the entrance and exit numbers for the school, which showed a large number of people had entered the building, but not come out again.
With all of that evidence for it, Kamijou could not help but to believe what the red haired girl had said.
Missing resources, hidden rooms, and disappearing people? I might be a bit paranoid… but this seriously reminds me of…
The red haired girl sighed out another large cloud of cigarette smoke, and annoyed air about her as she did it.
"Well… as you can clearly see, all of that evidence points to some sort of cult existing within Misawa Cram School. And, considering where we are, I'm guessing it is a scientific one."
Kamijou looked over at the red haired girl with an annoyed look in her eye.
"…A scientific cult? …Really? Is that what you are going with? Just to clarify, you are talking about those groups that use gimmicks like false data or some dead Saint's DNA to try and legitimize their insanity?"
The red haired girl sighed out yet another cloud of smoke from her now exhausted cigarette, tossing the but of it out to the street and stepping on it.
"Well… To be honest I don't really know, I've never dealt with a scientific cult before. I suppose knowing what their motive was would be interesting, but as of right now it is irrelevant."
One of Kamijou's eyebrows rose in a questioning manner.
"Irrelevant? How in the world would information like that be irrelevant?"
The red haired girl looked at Kamijou with a grin that sent a shiver up Kamijou's spine.
"'How is it irrelevant?' Simple. It's irrelevant because the cult itself is irrelevant. The organization behind the cult has already been eliminated."
… Somehow… I don't like the way that she said eliminated. It might just be my imagination, but I still don't like it.
Kamijou gestured at the papers that were surrounding her.
"Well then, if the cult has indeed been eliminated, then what the hell is wrong with Misawa Cram School then?"
The red haired girl sighed again and put a hand to her forehead in annoyance.
"That too is simple to figure out just from my presence. The reason why there is still a problem with Misawa Cram School is because it is currently under the control of a magician."
Kamijou felt her body freeze over at the last word of the red haired girl's explanation.
… Magician? Is she joking with me or something? I know Index was going on about Mana and everything earlier but…
Kamijou sighed before the thought reached its conclusion and put her hand to face.
On second thought, let's just let that one go. If ESP can exist in the world, then I guess magic can as well. There is no point in such an argument right now.
With that thought, Kamijou redirected her full, undivided attention towards the red haired girl.
"So tell me… Why are you telling me all of this again? Because it just seems to me that you are telling me a bunch of random info with no real purpose."
The read haired girl sighed at Kamijou's question as if she were annoyed by it.
"Fine then. Let me explain it to you then."
The red haired girl glared at Kamijou with a ferocious gaze that caused the student to shiver once again.
"I'm the one who has to go and sort out Misawa Cram School, and you are going to be helping me."
"… Wait… What?!"
It had taken a few moments for the red haired girl's words to reach Kamijou brain, but once it did, Kamijou could not understand what had been said.
"What do you mean I'll be helping you?! I haven't agreed to help you out at all, so why in the world are you saying that I will help you?!"
The red haired girl sighed in a way that made it sound like she was annoyed at Kamijou's response.
"So let me get this straight… After giving you an accurate description of the situation, you decide that you can get away without doing anything? How very helpful of you."
Kamijou gritted her teeth in rage, but failed to keep her mouth shut.
"Now hold on a minute here! You might be fine going around and dealing with strange shit, but I'm just a just a normal high school student. I could die going into some strange situation like that!"
The red haired magician looked at Kamijou with a gaze of utter annoyance, one that made Kamijou afraid for her life.
"Now you're scared to fight a magician? Where was that fear two weeks ago when you were fighting me? As I recall you weren't too scared to charge headlong at me, even though the situation had nothing to do with you."
"Ghhh…"
So I fought with this girl… No wonder I lost my memory. Fighting someone who can summon fire must have been so scary that my mind must have just blocked it out.
Regardless of her humorous thoughts, Kamijou crossed her arms in defiance as she looked at the red haired girl.
"Well I can still refuse if I want, right? Regardless of the situation two weeks ago, that was then, this is now. Just because I was so gung ho last time doesn't mean that-"
Before Kamijou could finish speaking, the red haired girl sighed again in annoyance, cutting off Kamijou speech.
"Do you not realize that, by you not helping me, there will be consequences?"
Kamijou shrugged in gesture to say that she did not really care before speaking.
"Oh what sort of consequences are there going to be? Are you going to attack me or something?"
The red haired girl looked at Kamijou, not even a glint of joke or merriment in her eye as she stared at the student.
"No. The consequence won't be that I attack you, but instead, it will be that Index will be taken away from you."
Those words were like a bucket of ice water being poured over Kamijou, causing her to freeze from the chock of them.
"… Wha… What do you mean Index will be taken away from me? Index is free to come and go as he pleases, so isn't his decision whether or not he will stay with me?"
The red haired girl chuckled in a mirthless sort of way, a joyless smile on her face.
"Did you forget everything that happened two weeks ago? Do you think that the leaders of Necessarius would simply let Index go just because you bested them once?"
Kamijou felt here heart skip a beat when the red haired girl asked that question, but the red haired girl simply shook her head and continued talking.
"No… Necessarius won't allow Index to leave after just that. They are content to allow Index stay with you right now, but if they feel that you lack a 'strong moral compass', otherwise known as a willingness to do what they want, they won't hesitate to take Index away from you."
Kamijou could barely breathe from the pressure being placed upon her at that moment, but she was still able to squeeze out a timid question.
"S-So… If I don't help you…"
The red haired nodded, that being a suitable answer to Kamijou's unfinished question.
"Yes. The powers that be at Necessarius will take Index away."
The finality of that statement caused Kamijou to shiver in fear, but, in the back of her mind, thoughts began to stream back and forth.
She could just be lying to make me work for her. She is the person who just attacked me with a giant flaming sword.
Kamijou looked down at the ground as she began to think about the reason she was debating this in her head.
Why am I even debating this? Index has caused me nothing but trouble, and if he leaves I'll be able to live normally yet again. I can drop this façade…
"… Fine… I guess I can help you…"
The red haired girl looked at Kamijou, who had put on a sad expression, and after a few moments the red haired girl gave Kamijou a sad smile.
"Well that is a sufficient answer for me and the higher up in Necessarius. I had expected you to agree to help me instantly, but I guess this will have to do."
Kamijou waved away the red haired girls consoling comment as she raised her head up. Even though she knew of no legitimate reason to keep Index with her, something deep inside of her, possibly a fragment of her former self, told her that letting Index go was the last thing she wanted to do.
It might be a stupid thing to go off of… but I would follow that than anything else.
With that thought reaching its conclusion, Kamijou sighed as she glared at the red haired girl.
"So… What is it that you want me to do? Do you want me to be your meat shield or something for when you charge into that place?"
Styx waved away Kamijou accusing question as it appeared like she was in deep thought.
"There is still some time before my final preparations are ready, so you can head home now and, more importantly, find Index. I can feel that he has already removed the runes I laid out earlier, so I don't know what he is doing now."
Kamijou lazily waved in an attempt to hurry the conversation along.
"By the way… What are you going to do about all of these?"
Kamijou gestured towards the numerous papers still swirling around her, still dancing and and floating in midair.
"I doubt these are easy to carry around, and I'm not helping you clean them up."
The red haired girl looked at Kamijou with a slowly grinning expression that made Kamijou shiver in fear.
"Oh… did I not tell you? All of those papers have flame runes on them."
Kamijou froze in complete and utter shock and looked around at all the papers that were surrounding her. And inching ever so closer to her.
"… Wait… What?!"
The red haired girl simply smiled and said one word.
"Kenaz!"