Friday, July 1st, 2006. 8:21 PM.
The Kamijou Residence, Academy City, Japan.
Gripped with the utmost force in either of Kamijou Touma's hands, a construct of hardened, thick plastic was clutched; a controller, a means of manipulating the events and movements within a virtual environment.
With two, vaguely wing-like protrusions emerging from either side of its base, forming two grips, either of which were intended to act as a means of assisting its handler in holding it properly, the construct had many protruding, bubble-like buttons mounted within it; four were to the right, blue, orange, green, and red in coloration. Blue was labelled "A", orange "B", green "C", and red "D". Below it, and to the buttons' left, a thumbstick with a rounded point, designed to be gripped and moved about with as much precision as such a means could provide. To the left, below one of the controller's two thumbsticks, a four-directional pad was present.
The entire thing, practically, was plastered with Kamijou Touma's sweat, produced by the palms of his hands. The controller seemed to take on the physical properties of a wet bar of soap; with each individual movement, the device nearly slipped from between Touma's hands, seemingly attempting to flee from him. The black surfaces of the thing shined, effectively "sweat-shined"; if such a thing hadn't been a term prior, it had become a term.
The corresponding videogame console to which the controller was wirelessly connected was turned on, a singular, white globe alight with synthetic, glowing light, mounted in the center of the rather large box, and located on the shelf of the stand which held the flatscreen television.
On the television's LED screen, which had called for and subsequently received the respective attentions of both Kamijou Touma and Kanzaki Kaori, that was where the action was.
He sat upright, neck turned to one side in a manner which could only be referred to as awkward; his brow had furrowed, his eyebrows having arched, as he bit into his lower lip.
She sat with her either of her legs pulled towards her, her chin rested upon either of her knees.
A sidescroller, styled to be visually reminiscent of games produced for various 'home computers' and 'entertainment systems' of the eighties, with its eight-bit graphics and accompanying, appropriately-styled music, the game unfolded at Touma's physical command.
Upward, from platform to platform, forged seemingly of blackened, twisted metallic scraps and held together by dripping, glopping globules of boiling magma, was the videogame's protagonist, whom Touma had temporarily taken control of. A knightly fellow with a tiny body and a head far too large for their shoulders – the character's enormous, horned helmet, obscuring their face and the truth as to their gender or facial features seemingly negated the existence of their neck – leapt, as Touma controlled their every action. Scrolling within the background could be found numerous, dangling chains, and enormous masses of flesh, bound within perpetually-burning cages. Either of the stage's walls seemed to have been constructed utilizing the same raw materials that'd been utilized in the platforms' construction.
Leaping from a series of smaller platforms, and onto one larger, greater platform, which immediately began to shudder, before it achieved liftoff, propelled by what appeared to be geysers of lifeblood, the liquid ejected from beneath the platform.
The previous screens had been a brief reprieve, in truth; a moment of fairness. Touma's character, his pixilated avatar had been offered a moment to automatically regenerate each and every cartoonish, stereotypical portrayal of a heart, in a series of twenty, ten stacked upon ten.
"T-they're going to come any minute, now," Kaori warned, either of her index fingers' nails finding their way into her mouth, locked between the grip of her teeth. Having entirely consumed her meal, Kaori's tray, with her completely and utterly cleared dinner plate sat at her feet. "Do you think you can do it? Neither of us can seem to pull this part off… but I have faith in you Kamijou-san! You're better than I am at these."
"Not really," was Touma's brief, stilted acknowledgement. "I didn't drop the Black Knight on my first try. Give yourself more cred…"
From within the television's external speakers, a series of alarms rang out, entirely in the style of the videogame's soundtrack, crackly and screeching.
"HERE WE GO! KANZAKI! BUCKLE IN! I'M GOING FOR IT!"
"YOU CAN DO IT! FRIENDSHIP POWERS ACTIVATE!"
"BY THE POWER OF FRRRIIIEENNDDDSSHHIIIIPPPPP!"
From all sides, from both above and below, enemies leapt out at Touma's avatar, even as the enormous, rising platform upon which the character stood rose, perpetually. Styled as the videogame's main character was, with heads far too large for their small bodies, these enemies appeared to have armored themselves in chunks of metal, bound in place with chains, and 'glued' together through the use of hardened chunks of magma. Their skin tone was grey, and, from the sides of their heads, small, but pointed ears protruded, as did little, pixilated tusks, which rose upward, from their lower jaws. Where eyes should've been, sitting in their sockets, there were, instead, globules of pure, glowing red.
Touma's eight-bit avatar, upon his command, through "A" button presses swung their weapon of choice, which, in fact, was an enormous anchor. The frankly strange sight wouldn't have looked out of place at the bottom of a great body of water, resting upon said body of water's floor, perhaps gouged into the side of a waterlogged rock.
"THERE'S SO MANY OF THEM! STOOOPPPPP SPAAWWNNNIINNGGGG!" Touma cried aloud, as if he was demanding the non-sentient videogame to stop performing the actions it'd been programmed to perform.
"Do the spin! You have to spin!" Kaori exclaimed, nearly biting off either of her index fingers' nails. "Just spin, Kamijou-san! Spin like your life depends on it!"
With the platform rising, enemies were batted away by the enormous, rust-specked anchor, which crashed into them, roared down upon them, mowed them down, and crushed their mortal forms, causing pixilated masses of fictional lifeblood to emerge from their forms, splattering the hellscape in which Touma's avatar found themselves; those that came from above and from below landed multiple hits on the character, but, were eventually felled, when Touma would turn his attention to them. These individual enemies were quickly taken care of, through Touma's use of the 'spin', as Kaori had called it; by moving the left thumbstick downward, and by rapidly pressing "B", the on-screen character and the game's protagonist would, indeed, suddenly begin to spin, a few seconds for each press of the "B" button.
Then, with fourteen hearts remaining of his stock of twenty, the enemies stopped spawning, ceased to rush Touma's pixilated avatar. The mangled, broken earthly forms of those that had fallen before the character wouldn't stick around for long; each would disappear, gradually clearing the platform, whose ascent was slowing, with each second that passed of their clutter.
The platform stopped moving completely, soon enough; the entire screen violently shook in place, causing the character's tiny legs to shudder.
Touma's avatar had found themselves in an area that greatly resembled some sort of crucible. Though rendered only partially, due to the dimensional limitations presented by the sidescroller game's visual mechanics, both Kamijou Touma and Kanzaki Kaori, the onlookers, saw all they needed to see.
Concaved walls of wooden materials, reinforced by enormous, metallic beams, from which many pointed spikes jutted, outwards, to the side, upwards and downwards. The flooring beneath the character's feet was constructed, seemingly, of the usual mess of twisted, metallic chunks, bound with hardened magma. From the ceilings, great, elongated chains, stained with blots of lifeblood dangled, moving about of their own accord. Rumbling in the background were a long series of enormous, shuddering siege weapons, resembling a wicked hybrid of a modern tank and an olden-styled catapult.
Then, both videogame manipulator and onlooker started, jumping out of an instinctual sense of self-preservation, as something, a great, blackened, grey and red blur streaked across the television screen, slamming down upon the flooring of twisted metal from the open ceiling above; Touma's avatar was thrown back, knocked to the ground by the force of the impact.
Both Touma and Kaori observed World Nine's boss enemy, the second to last boss enemy in the entirety of the videogame they'd chosen to play, 'New Super Anchor Knight 8: The Sacred Stapler'.
Though seemingly warped and deformed in the same manner as all of the character and enemy sprites in the game, World Nine's boss enemy was enormous, easily ten times taller than the game's protagonist, to boot.
With arms whose musculature made them several times larger than the game's protagonist's entire body, and with legs, given their size and width, that might as well have been made the trunks of several gargantuan, ancient trees, bound together and forced to act as a single unit by some cruel lumberjack, World Nine's boss enemy was clad entirely in thick, plated armor, seemingly forged by messily and hastily hammering many, many individual plates of blackened metal together; individual, bent and rust-specked nails were even visible, protruding from within the plates. From the tips of the boss enemy's toes to their chin, their entire form had been consumed by metallic, plated armoring.
Wielding a hammer that was as long as the boss enemy was tall, with a flaming head wider than the boss enemy's entire waist, the boss enemy was, seemingly, of the same 'race' as the previous onslaught of enemies which had menaced the game's protagonist.
Below the scene, a box formed from nothingness; in the left side of the box, a detailed, if pixilated rendition of the boss enemy's face appeared.
As well, the musical score being played over the television's speakers changed, as well, apparently designed to reflect a change in the mood, and a change in the shifting of control, from the human who controlled the video game from beyond the console, to the game's own programming.
The music, previously set in mystery, with slight undertones of horror prepared to be unleashed within a split-second notice, warped, and twisted, becoming aggressive and overbearing, as the volume of the piece itself was elevated, increased significantly.
"You've invaded my Citadel, slaughtered my troops by the hundreds, and made a mess of everything… I love it! You seek the Sacred Stapler, Bearer of the Anchor? You'll have to go through me, first, and, I promise you, that won't be an easy task. Want my advice? Just turn around and abandon your stupid, little quest."
"Eat my ass!" Touma exclaimed, leaning forward as he glared into the television screen. "You're dead! You hear me?! DEAD! I'm going to shove that hammer up your DICK!"
It was then that the game paused; not of its own accord, but, because Kanzaki Kaori had pressed the 'pause' key, located directly next to the 'select' key, both mounted in the controller's center.
"This is how I was defeated during our last attempt," Kaori remarked, with an affirmative nod of her head, "I've been doing some thinking since then. Would you hear me out? I might have a strategy that'll help you succeed, where I failed."
"Hit me," was Touma's response.
Looking to her, his eyes locking with the Saint's own, the beginnings of a crimson blush soon, and swiftly, laid claim to either of her cheeks.
Noticing this, Kamijou Touma soon followed suit. His self-propelled anger, the result of his own attempt at invoking something akin to a bersker rage faded, as his gazing into the Saint's eyes was perpetuated, more by his own subconscious mind's desires than of his conscious mind's will.
Into the Saint's right hand, Touma's own found itself slipping, their fingers interlocking; a perfect fit.
"I… uh… wanted to do this for a long time, with you… you don't mind, right?"
"N-no, not at all, K-Kamijou-san, I t-think that it's… adorable, I've w-wanted to do this, too."
The two looked at one another, for a few moments longer, before the rate of Kaori's rapidly-beating heart nearly reached what she knew to be a 'critical' level. As Touma could, before, the Saint could practically feel her own crimson blush.
"Erm… Kamijou-san," Kaori began, awkwardly stumbling over her own words, as she attempted to force them out from between her lips, "h-here's my idea. I noticed that there's a clear opening in the boss's attack pattern."
"R-really? Heh… eheheh. I was too in the moment to even notice… g-good on you."
"T-thank you, sometimes, when he swings his weapon downward, in that arc, it results in the jagged edges of the hammer getting stuck in the ground, for a few seconds. It's not much of a window of opportunity, but, you should probably jump on his head, or try to hit his head with the Anchor of Destiny."
Touma turned away from the Saint, for a moment, as he examined the form of the boss enemy; frozen in time, the sprite's idle animation had been interrupted in the middle of its movement cycle, resulting in an almost humorous-looking half-crouch.
"You want to try?"
"H-huh?
"Well, I got all the way here, doesn't really matter if it's my turn. You noticed the opening, so, I think you'll be better at exploiting it. You must carry us to victory, Kanzaki-Sama!"
A nod of her head; Kaori reluctantly retrieved her hand, and, after Touma ran the bottom of his shirt over the controller, as best as he could, in order to remove most of the sweat caking its surfaces, took the controller from him.
Pressing the pause button, and immediately crossing either of her legs beneath her, the Saint leaned forward, lower lip shifting downward, into a pout of determination and concentration combined.
Almost immediately, without so much as a second's worth of a warning, the boss enemy rushed the game's protagonist, rocketing forward with enough force to cause the entirety of the television's screen to shake.
Kaori, however, responded with abject determination; with a tap of the "D" button, the character leapt above the boss enemy's head, effortlessly clearing the biological hurdle. A snap of the left thumbstick, and repeated taps of the "A" button allowed the character to, with their Anchor aimed downward, repeatedly thrust the makeshift, rust-specked weapon into the boss enemy's exposed head, once, twice, and, not a third time; the boss enemy's AI responded by swatting the character away, and shaking his head repeatedly, as a series of stars and small, chirping birds, with golden feathers and big, beady blackened eyes danced around his head.
Leaping, the boss enemy charged in mid-air, effortlessly closing the distance between himself, or, perhaps, itself and Kaori's avatar. Moving so quickly that its sprite had become little more than a multicolored blur, the protagonist was forced to leap.
Kamijou Touma's lips parted, as Kanzaki Kaori, with reflexes far beyond that of a normal human being, simply avoided the charge that had killed the videogame's protagonist so many times, while they were under Touma's control.
Then again, Touma could only figure that Kaori was a Saint, after all. It only figured that she was better at just about everything than he, or any other average human being could ever be.
Of course, he wasn't about to actually say something so ignorant and potentially hurtful.
Though Kamijou Touma was caught up in his own thoughts, Kanzaki Kaori was entirely and completely focused upon the events that were playing out before on, upon the television's screen, within the universe of the videogame.
Commanding her borrowed avatar to duck, Kaori flicked the controller's left thumbstick downward, and jammed the "C" button, which resulted in the protagonist performing something of a rolling kick. This, in fact, wasn't intended to be utilized as an offensive attack, but, rather, as a means of evading the incoming, downward strike of the boss enemy.
With a sideways swat, however, the boss enemy tossed the game's protagonist to one side, and, within the span of a few seconds, soared toward them, breaking into a sudden charge.
"JUMP!" exclaimed a terrified and shaken Kamijou Touma, who had begun to lean forward, observing every action each of the sprites on the television's screen performed.
Far ahead of Touma's command was a thought within Kaori's higher mind; she'd effortlessly hurtled the boss enemy's incoming charge, and landed a series of blows to its, or, perhaps, his exposed head, spawning more stars, and more birds, circling the boss enemy's head for a few moments, allowing Kaori to score yet more strikes upon the boss enemy, in its stunned state.
It was with a shake of its head that the boss enemy suddenly began to grow in size; turning completely red, like the color of a crimson sea of magma in some fictional depiction of Hell, the boss enemy tossed its head back and produced a crackling shriek.
"I don't know what's going on here, I've never gotten this far," Touma admitted, hanging his head slowly. "Just ride it out and see what happens, I guess?"
"My plans exactly," Kaori stated, as she commanded her pixilated avatar to swiftly leap over an incoming blow; she landed a series of strikes upon the boss enemy's head, resulting in their change of coloration deepening. Smoke billowed outwards, from within its nostrils, as it began to randomly swing its weapon at the empty air. Pixilated, dripping masses of a substance that resembled yellowed foam dripped downwards, from inside the boss enemy's mouth, along its lower lip and down its chin.
With every second that passed, the boss enemy's movements and rate of attack, while extremely inaccurate, was increasing steadily, to the point that there was hardly even a single moment in which the boss enemy wasn't sporadically moving about and swinging its massive hammer about.
"W-what's happening?! Are we close to winning?! T-there's no health indicator of any kind! This is quite unfair, all things considered!"
Kamijou Touma had no response; he simply watched on, as Kaori continually commanded her borrowed avatar to leap over, slide beneath, and strike the exposed head of the boss enemy.
Her borrowed controller, plastered with her own hands' sweat, however, soon enough turned its coat, and betrayed her; her left hand's thumb slipped, during an attempt at leaping over one of many hammer-strikes; Kaori's borrowed avatar was violently slammed, once, twice, a third time, and, then, in a state beyond Kaori's control, beyond the control of the player, who controlled the in-game protagonist, a forth, followed up by so many subsequent strikes, enough to completely decimate, and, subsequently, kill the in-game protagonist; this was represented by their entire body violently exploding, and radiating a mass of glowing light, accented by unrealistically high amounts of blood and organs spurting outward, flying sporadically in each and every direction possible, given the dimensional limitations of the two-dimensional sidescroller.
Truthfully, it took all of Kaori's willpower, focused into the metaphorical, central 'core' of her higher mind, to prevent her from violently hurling the videogame controller, the device which didn't belong to her, at the nearest wall, or, alternatively, at the nearest section of the flooring beneath her.
A quick, sudden inhalation of oxygenized air brought her back down to the plane in which her sanity, and her stability resided; turning her gaze to Touma, the young man who'd become her boyfriend, a factoid she'd almost completely forgotten about, so casual and so familiar with their interactions in the midst of their gaming session.
"It would seem that the power of friendship wasn't quite enough to defeat that boss," Kaori remarked, handing off the controller to its owner, who took the device into his own two hands. With the extended press of a singular button in the upper center of the controller, the console to which the controller belonged was wirelessly powered down. "Maybe next time, hm?"
"No one I know has managed to get as far as we have," Touma lamented, with a grumble. "I doubt we'll be able to manage it. The boss's mechanics are clownshit crazy. If you can't do it, Kanzaki, nobody can. You've got better reflexes, and, besides that, you've got that hand-eye co-ordination, too… it's hopeless! We'll only see the ending through gameplay footage on the Internet!"
It was during his praising of Kaori's ability to competently play videogames that he failed to notice the perpetually-growing, crimson blush upon her facial features, particularly glowing from her cheeks and the tip of her nose.
It was as he continued that Kanzaki Kaori threw either of her arms around Kamijou Touma's shoulders, and pushed herself forward, accidentally pushing him to the ground, and, subsequently, pinning him beneath her.
Finding himself in the throes of the embrace, Touma simply returned it; placing his own arms, and merely his arms around Kaori's waist, ensuring that his hands stayed hovering some few inches above the Saint's form, he permitted himself the chance to allow his facial muscles to etch a grin upon his features.
"W-when you compliment me like that, K-Kamijou-san, you j-just make me want to h-hold you, very, very tightly. Let's stay like this for a s-short… while… if you're comfortable of c-course!"
"You're really warm," Touma acknowledged, a blush forming upon his own features, "y-yeah, l-let's stay like this for a w-while."
And so Kamijou Touma and Kanzaki Kaori proceeded to, predictably enough do exactly that for indeed a while spanning a period of some twenty minutes.
This had become the status quo until Kamijou Touma, barely able to restrain his genitalia from acting of their own accord, barely capable of preventing his manhood from standing at attention, broke the silence.
"S-so… K-Kanzaki-san… d-do you, uh… erm… you're really warm. Really, really warm; do you want to… uh… do something? Go somewhere? This lowly K-Kamijou-san's living space is a sad sight."
"H-hardly a sad sight, at all," Kaori forcibly corrected, her embrace, her hold on Touma's shoulders tightening. Rubbing the side of her face against Touma's own, the Saint practically purred, before she continued to speak, from where she'd left off. "I w-wouldn't mind doing some s-sightseeing, though. Did you have anything in mind, particularly? Where you go, I'll follow."
Freeing one of his arms, and cupping his chin between his right hand's index finger and thumb, Kamijou Touma produced a soft, curious "hm".
"Master, if I could make a recommendation… there's a certain shop nearby our location, in fact, that deals in explicit nightwear. I know your tastes better than even you, Master, and…"
"Inthur, I don't need you becoming Aogami two point oh. Buzz off with that. Kanzaki's HOT, for sure, but… there's no way I could even think of trying to do that with her! That's disgusting! W-we j-just started d-dating… wow, me, dating a girl, who would've imagined?"
"Let me guess, Master. "I want to wait until marriage!" Oh, how you disappoint me, at times…"
"You're terrible. You're just like my guy friends, you know that? Always trying to pressure me into doing these kinds of things, as soon as Aogami and Tsuchimikado find out, I'm finished! I'll never hear the end of it!"
Before the internal debate between so-called Servant and so-called Master could continue, Kaori interrupted.
"Kamijou-san, are you feeling alright?"
"U-uh huh, absolutely, no issues here, I just… erm… spaced out! Places to go, huh? Let me think…"
Realizing his hand remained upon his chin, Touma was poised to remove it; Kaori quickly took it into her own, however, her blush deepening in its coloration.
He, Touma, seemed to freeze up, for a moment's time. His recovery was swift, however, as was his continuation of his previous remark.
"There's the Underground Mall, erm, Dianoid, but, we don't talk about the Dianoid, Playland Gau… oh! Hero Zone!"
Kaori tilted her head to one side, clearly curious.
Catching onto this fact in due time, Touma poised himself to elaborate, as briefly as possible.
"Newest, biggest arcade in Academy City, they finished construction… a few months ago. Remember, last time you came down, you, me, and Index passed by that big mess that looked like a building's skeleton? That's Hero Zone now. It's pretty crazy. It's got balconies and everything."
The Saint's response was delayed; looking downward, at her own attire, she rose to her feet soon enough, and shook her head.
"I don't see any reason why we can't see ourselves to this "Hero Zone"; but I'm going to need a change of attire. I've already received more than plenty of strange looks and half-glances. D-do… d-don't come into the bathroom until I say, o-okay? I think that's f-fair. There, t-that s-should help us avoid any… s-scenarios."
"Right on," Touma announced, a bit more loudly than he'd intended. Raising either of his hands, he offered the Saint two thumbs up, only lowering his arms once she stepped into the dorm's laundry room, beyond his field of vision.
Some minutes passed – Kamijou Touma couldn't quite be certain as to how many – before Kanzaki Kaori emerged from the laundry room, stepping out into the dorm's living quarters.
Turning his head, and his gaze to her, Touma's jaw practically fell off, completely, at the sight before him. If he happened to be a character in a manga or an anime, streams of lifeblood likely would've surged outward, from either of his nostrils.
There wasn't anything revealing at all, even in the slightest, about her outfit; but there didn't have to be.
Her upper body was clothed in a simple, yet fashionable button-up shirt, plaid, a checkered mix of light blue and bright, simple white, while her lower body had been clad in darkened, opaque leggings; clinging to her legs, accenting and highlighting their individual curves and contours, they added to the 'fashionable' vibe the Saint was likely attempting to radiate.
"S-so, what d-do you… think?"
With a burst of confidence, the origin of which he couldn't quite pinpoint, Touma remarked, "you look great. I think we both know that, wherever you go, heads always turn."
Rising, the level zero esper from Academy City took to the Saint's side, and, taking the initiative, slipped his hand into Kaori's own; as if it was a preprogrammed reaction, her blush returned, as she turned her vision to the flooring beneath her feet.
"T-thank y-you… t-that's very sweet of you to say."
"C'mon! Let's go show it off!"
"S-show it… o-off? I d-don't k-know about that! Such behavior sounds risqué, Kamijou-san!"
"Nonsense, hogwash, live a little, Kanzaki! Ya bend, or ya break! L-let this lowly Kamijou show you a good time! Actually, that came out wrong! SORRY!"
"It's… hehehehe… it's f-fine."
Soon enough, the door to the dorm slammed shut behind the two, quickly locked, security measures automatically engaged from within.
In the dorm's laundry room, a curious calico cat pawed at the golden hair of a slumbering pixie, a former Magic God who'd lost herself in the joy of sleep, curled up into a ball next to the feline.
Finally, things had quieted down. Finally, the feline would be able to catch some shut-eye of his own; with a yawn, Sphynx the cat laid his head down atop either of his front paws, and allowed his eyes to close.
Were all humans so loud and boisterous?