What is the ability of a certain rumored Level 0?
Really, what is it?
This was the most intriguing and discussive question about the mysterious boy from a certain rumor in Academy City alongside with questions about the existence of the project that produces clones of a certain Level 5 and the Level Upper.
This question certainly arouses interest in many residents of the urban linchpin of advanced science and technology. An enthusiastic tourist, visiting this futuristic Asian metropolis, who is vividly curious about its life and urban legends; or a recent newcomer, studying or working in this cutting-edge city, who wants to know his new place better. They both could or would, while either taking a walk or being busy in this city, sooner or later see and hear some children or adults talking about this rumor and discussing about what is actually the unfathomable, unknown ability of the person of this rumor.
Someone says that is the ability to create powerful illusions which could feel real.
Someone says that is the ability to regenerate the user to the point he is immortal.
Someone says that is the ability to make the person mentally unstable and hallucinated.
Someone says that is the ability to affect esper powers negatively.
Someone says that is the ability same as the Dark Matter of the 2nd Level 5 esper.
Someone says that is the ability to twist the environment.
Someone even says that he can use the ability of any esper in this city and make it more powerful.
Alongside questions about the power of the boy, many residents talk about the fact of his existence as well. But it could be said about it later.
So what is his ability?
What power does Kamijou Touma possess?
[All-fiction] that can affect the reality.
[Bookmaker] that can affect the person.
[Imagination Manifestation] that can materialize some objects.
And maybe there are some more unknown, and yet, maybe not.
Those three mentioned abilities possibly could be related to each other in some way. But it is kind of a mistake to call them "abilities", much more correctly would've been to call them something like "functions". The functions of a certain power.
[Skill Minus]. At least that is how Kamijou Touma calls it.
The multi-functional power based on the aspect of 'negativity'.
But how, when and why did it appear?
Before we clear up about that we need to talk about another power. About something similar to what Kamijou Touma holds. Many magicians, including the most famous Aleister Crowley, refer to it as [Imagine Breaker]. This power is supposed to negate any supernatural phenomena in our world. It was appeared to represent all hopes, dreams and wishes of magicians and serve as the reference point to our world. It existed for many and many years throughout history in different forms. Some while ago [Imagine Breaker] was used by certain magicians from the Golden Dawn as an anti-summoning tool.
But why is it important to mention about [Imagine Breaker]?
Because [Skill Minus] appeared in a similar way.
It appeared due to a certain being.
It is unknown whether a certain being came from another reality or existed from the beginning in ours.
But it is known that this being is the cause of existence of this power.
That certain being held the power of god, capability to manipulate the reality to its whims.
The being was powerful enough to fundamentally change the laws of physics of the universe and make "2+2=5" to become true.
The being was powerful enough to alter the perception of reality to the point it can make the grass blue and the sky green or make the Earth moving around the moon as a regular fact.
The being was powerful enough to manipulate the life and death freely.
The being's power was also extended to the causality and time, and was capable to stop time, make it flow differently and even make it non-existent; or even manipulate the entire timeline and change the outcome of something.
And so on.
The being literally had the power to make own dreams become true.
And yet.
The being felt many negative expressions.
It felt hollow, frustrated, disappointed, despaired, apathetical.
It felt as if there is no reason to live.
So how the god-like being had reached that negative development?
Did the being realize that the power possessed some limits, and because of that, it couldn't make own exact genuine dream come true?
Did the being had no dreams or wishes at all and simply thought of this power as something worthless and unnecessary?
It could be both, or none, or something else.
But it is known that the development of the being made [Skill Minus] come into the existence unintentionally from the being, making Kamijou Touma the first owner of [Skill Minus]. The power most likely chose him as his negative and miserable nature is comparable to its own essence.
If [Imagine Breaker] appeared as the representation of magician's dreams and wishes and serve as the reference point of the world; then [Skill Minus] came into the existence as the representation of the negativity of this being and serve as the end button of the world.
A while later a certain being met the owner of this power while wandering aimlessly in this world. The boy sealed the being with his power. And it is important to denote that the being didn't try to fight him.
And the name of the being was.
Magic God Othinus.
The echo of the foot stepped inside of the lobby has ranged out as Kamijou Touma entered the lobby through automatic glass doors.
Emptiness.
Silence.
These words perfectly describe the lobby of this building. Electric lights were either turned off or weren't working anymore, and only the light of the moon weakly illuminated the lobby through glass panes. There wasn't anything visibly menacing here, and yet, a normal teenager would've felt chills run down his spine from the lack of sound, light or any soul here as it added the aura of mysterious and ominous creepiness. As if there is a ghost or monster hiding nearby, waiting silently for its victim to come.
Seeing four elevators ahead of him, Kamijou Touma slowly took his foots towards them across the lobby. As he appeared to be closer to them, he put his index finger under the chin, thinking about something.
「'Hm…..Will be I okay if I use any of these elevators? Nah, it is probably set with some trap that will mess with my mind. It is probably just how I forgot anything that was two hours ago and prior to that. This place certainly has some annoying traps. Sigh, such misfortune. I'll just look for the stairs, I very hope that there is nothing filled with them.'｣
As the boy made his decision, he went to search for alternatives ways to move to higher floors of this building.
It is important to denote that if the boy had his memories intact, he would've had noticed the absence of the body of a certain magician.
"That shitty brat." said to himself the green-haired man with the tone of silent hatred and displease as he lifted the glass of red wine to his mouth, conveying all of its content down his throat swiftly.
The moonlight through the window weakly illuminated the room.
He put the emptied glass on the desk behind him, where the nun was lying sleepily, without averting his gaze to the shining moon. The man was seemed to be wandering in deep thoughts while sitting in his comfortable chair. The physical damage done from Kamijou Touma's enormous screw was completely fixed by Ars Magna to the point it looked like it never occurred; but it couldn't fix the damage done to the ego and pride of Aureolus Izzard.
He couldn't forget the cocky, sadistic smirk of the boy.
He couldn't forget how he easily got past of his defense, making him completely look like a fool.
He couldn't get rid of anger caused by that boy, and he couldn't put aside his grudge against him either.
'I know that he is an esper, but I wish I wouldn't have left him getting scot off free so easily for the crap he had done to me. I feel that beating the shit out of him was not simply enough. Hmm….what I could've done more to this smirky lowlife? Maybe I could've poured the bucket of lava onto him? Make him be eaten alive by man-eating flies? Rip his skin off over and over again? Oh wait, I could've painfully tortured him, and later, leave him blind, deaf, mute and immovable for the rest of his pathetic life. Hehehe~…. it is sure fun to imagine. And what was his ability? It looked like he can create objects out of nothingness, but then he showed some sort of auto-regeneration. Aren't espers one-trick ponies, or he simply possess some sort of complex ability? Maybe he was an esper-magician hybrid?'
As the man continued to wander into his thoughts, a certain girl came into the room. The girl had a long black hair with hime cut and was dressed into a basic shrine maiden outfit. Her expression bore blankness, and yet, it can't be helped but suspect that there is a melancholy behind it.
The girl brought her hand to her mouth as to mimic a cough.
"Ahem." The girl cleared her throat in order to catch the attention of the man in this room.
The man tensely turned his head to the source of sound and swiftly rose from the seat, but as he saw the source of the sound, he eased up and sat back.
"Ah, it is you. What do you want?"
The girl replied to his question with the cold, business-like tone.
"I'm here to report about the intruder."
"The intruder? Who is that now?"
"It is the same boy whom you erased memories."
"Him?!" said Aureolus as he raised his eyebrows as high as possible.
It will be a lie to say that Aureolus Izzard wasn't surprised. He didn't expect this boy to come back. After acknowledging this fact, Izzard silenced a bit as he let his mind to think this fact over.
'Did he manage to return his memories back somehow?! Why did he decide to come back? Anyway, it doesn't matter. It seems lady luck smiles at me today. Hehehe…I will finally release all of my bottled up anger and hatred on this piece of crap.' with the last sentence a small smile appeared on the face of the alchemist.
Seeing his smile, the girl slightly furrowed her eyebrows, she found it not simply as something creepy, but it told her mind that his actions will surely lead to something terrific for that boy. Wanting to doubt that, the girl let out a question.
"You won't kill him, right? He is just some foolish bystander. He is neither a magician nor an alchemist. Remember our deal, Aureolus Izzard."
"Well, that boy could be an esper-magician hybrid, so he can be technically a part of Magic Side. But for you, if you really don't want this boy be dead, I will just erase his memories again. And even if he comes back again, I will again erase his memories, just for you~" said the alchemist in a sweet voice, trying to calm the maiden and ensure in his words.
And still, the doubt in this girl wasn't lowered not in a single bit, but instead, it raised more suspicion to her.
"I hope you will keep your promise."
"Trust my words, Himeguma Aira. I am the man of the word."
"It is Himegami Aisa."
As the girl corrected his mispronounce of her full name, the tone of Aureolus Izzard was swiftly changed into nonchalant and rude, like an actor in theatre putting down his mask at the end of the play.
"Himegami, Himegumi, Himegoto… I don't care, to be honestly. Just go already and escort him to me! I will erase his memories again like you want. So don't just stand here like a log!"
Himegami Aisa furrowing her eyebrows more deeply and putting a scowl on her face, tacitly turned around and went to do what the alchemist ordered.
As the girl left the room, the alchemist turned his head. Not to gaze at the shining moon, but at the nun lying on the desk. Seeing her, he put a scowl on his face, as if seeing some annoying bug.
As if she is nothing but solely a burden to him.
「"Yawn~ "｣
With suppressed desire to go home and sleep, Kamijou Touma continued to wander in dark, lightless hallways of the Misawa Cram School. If he wouldn't have his flip phone, to use as a 'torch' inside of this school labyrinth, the boy would've certainly got lost inside of that tall building, completely giving up on his search. Less than half of the hour passed, and the boy still couldn't find whom he searched. Not the priest; not the esper who had messed with his mind; and certainly not that sister. The boy wondered why she makes him feel kind of... how to say that? Could he assume 'weird'? Anyway, she manifestly makes him feel in some way. He doesn't know why. He doesn't know her at all. He doesn't know her face, or her actual name, nothing at all. Only that she is some sister from the church. And yet; why she makes him feel that way? Maybe she was some sort of friend? But he felt that she is something more than a friend; so who she was to him?
"Sigh. It is so confusing."
As he roamed inside of his thoughts, the boy finally had found 'something' inside of this dark and obscure labyrinth. Kamijou Touma discovered it on the left side of the passage a certain entrance. The entrance that led to a brightly litted up room.
「"Oh, finally! It seems lady luck smiles at me!"｣ said the boy as if he found the oasis after wandering a long time in a torrid desert.
Without any cautious or fearful thought, he put his foots towards that entrance. As he entered, he saw that this room was a wide cafeteria, brimmed with hundreds and hundreds of students around his age. Some of them were searching for a free seat; some of them were eating on the table and chatting up with others; some of them simply were wandering somewhere.
On the first glance, it seemed to be that there is nothing unusual, and yet, a normal and bright person would've definitely raised suspicion about this place. That kind of person would've definitely wondered why there are so many students inside of the school so late and why they are all only in the cafeteria?
But Kamijou Touma wasn't that kind of person.
Either he didn't think about that, or didn't care at all.
He set his foots towards the center of the cafeteria, passing some students who were busy doing their own things. Reaching the center, he brought his right hand to the mouth, mimicking a cough.
「"AHEM!"｣ loudly cleared the throat to catch the attention of inhabitants of this cafeteria; it was loud enough to reach anyone who was in this room.
Normally, people would turn their heads towards the weird boy, and sooner or later would've continued what they were doing if he seemed to be an unworthy of attention. But; these people reacted at him in a strange, even creepy manner.
As the boy had cleared his throat, they all stopped. No, more correctly to say, they all froze. Instantly and simultaneously, they froze and stopped what they were doing, as if they were a hivemind; parts of operation controlled by a computer program. Some of them stopped searching for a seat; some of them stopped talking with someone or eating; some of them stopped doing their own things.
They all froze; without turning their heads towards the source of the voice.
As if the time was stopped.
And yet, it seems that the boy either didn't notice that for some reason, or didn't care at all. Casually looking left and right at the crowd of frozen students he spoke, as if he was a confident orator.
「"Attention, my dear unimportant background characters! Can one of you be so kind to answer a question of this poor lost guy? Did anyone see in this school some nun or priest passing around? If somebody gives me a fully fledged answer I won't only be thankful, but I will make sure that you would be the character that sometimes makes an appearance later!"｣
As he was speaking to the people in a confident manner, they turned their heads to his direction. As if they were robots, they did that slowly and simultaneously. They were staring at him with their dull, lifeless eyes.
As he finished speaking, students from all directions began walking towards the spiky-haired boy in the center of the room, eventually circling him from all sides. Kamijou turned his head left and right to students circling him. A sweat appeared on his face, but his fake smile was still on his face
「"I see. And I thought people here are just awkward super-altruists, but it seems you are nothing more than just some mindless puppets."｣
A couple of seconds later, mindless puppets began their overlapping chorus.
"The seraph's wings are a shining light, the shining light is the immaculate white, which exposes sin."
"The immaculate white is the proof of purification, the proof of purification is the result of motion."
Kamijou Touma couldn't understand what they were saying, nor wasn't able to understand why they were doing that. As this scene was confusing him, rumblings of puppets started to grow louder and louder, louder and louder.
"Uniformity is all things, all things are created by the past, the past is the origin, the origin is the singularity, the singularity is sin, sin is man, man fears punishment, fear is crime, crime is within the self, if within the self lies something to be avoided, then-!"
Continuing their chorus of rumbling, something more supernatural started to happen with them. White-bluish orbs with the size of ping-pong balls started to appeared on heads of some students; more and more puppets started to have orbits on top of their heads. Seeing this abnormality, oversized screws materialized out of air in hands of Kamijou Touma.
「'Are those orbs supposed to affect minds of the enemy? Do I not remember because of those things?'｣
As Kamijou Touma positioned himself to fight, suddenly, an orb of light started to flew towards him from the head of some puppet ahead. The boy put his left hand, in which he held his screw, to block the upcoming attack; it was a foolish move. As soon as an orb touched the tip of screw, it didn't get blocked.
「"AAAAAGGGHHHH!"｣
It burnt his screw along with his hand up to wrist; it managed to evaporate them completely as a strong acid, even some chemical smoke rose from the tip of his severed hand. Some blood was dropping from his wound onto the floor.
「"S-such misfortune!"｣ said the boy, gritting his teeth from the pain.
It seems our spiky-haired fellow mistook the twisted smile of lady luck with kind one.
As some seconds passed, the left hand of Kamijou Touma had returned back to normal; as if the damage didn't happen at all. He didn't feel pain anymore, but it didn't mean he couldn't relax.
A couple of seconds later, orbs of white light flew from other directions towards him.
Himegami Aisa was walking through darkened corridors with the turned on flashlight gripped in her hand.
She knew that lights were turned off to not catch the attention but she wished that they were turned on; it is not only scary, but troublesome to walk inside of this building without the light. Only the cafeteria, where mindcontrolled puppets were, had it; by Aureolus words the cafeteria served not only as a storage for his puppets, but also a trap room for enemies, and also he needed some electricity in this room to keep somewhere his food and wine. She felt that the last reason was the main one why there was a light working there.
"I hope it will end very soon without any bloodshed." said to herself the girl.
She also hoped that the alchemist won't kill that boy. Lately, she was noticing something strange in his personality as if he was a completely different person. She knew he had some strong sense of pride, but recently, she had noticed that he was acting too much arrogantly, as if he had some king complex. Also, she was noticing that he was very rude, she remembers him as a man of some elegant manners since the first time she met him. She could say many strange things that she noticed in him.
With many thoughts in her mind, she met an entrance that led to a brightly litted room on the left side of the passage. It was the cafeteria; the room where puppets mindcontrolled by Aureolus were. She noticed that there was no sound from this place; she knew that puppets there imitated some 'life' as a cover. Noticing that lack of sound, she decided to enter the cafeteria to see what is so strange there.
She entered, and then…
A female, low-pitched cry has ranged out from this place.
Hello everyone!
What do you think about the explanation of the power that Kumagawih Touma holds? I know, it may sound somehow bad and straightforwardly silly, but I couldn't think up something better. Though it is better for it to have at least some explanation than none at all.