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.
Well… here we are… If this is in fact the place we are supposed to be, like Styx says we are…
As Kamijou thought this, she stared at the doorway in front of her with a skeptical gaze on her face. The doorway was a pair of dark brown, expensive looking wooden doors of a type the student couldn't readily identify. In a normal case, Kamijou would have guessed that this doorway would have led to the office of someone important in the school, like the head of operations.
However, the thought of what could be behind the door right at that moment sent a shiver up Kamijou's spine. Turning to look at Styx, otherwise known as the source of Kamijou's current sense of fear, the student saw the magician staring at the door with a mixed expression of rage, fear, and strange determination.
There had been very little discussion between the two girls since they had left the park, due both to Styx not wanting to communicate, sealing her mouth with one of her cigarettes, and Kamijou not wanting to reach out to the magician, her mind completely taken up with what the magician had said at the park.
Though… now it is almost impossible to continue without one of us convincing the other to go in… though…
Kamijou stared at the magician in silence for a few moments more before sighing and launching into her question.
"So… Styx… Are you absolutely certain this is the place that we are supposed to be? Forgive me for not knowing what the fuck is going on, but… Can you tell me again how this is the place that alchemist lady and Index are?"
The magician plucked the cigarette from her mouth and sighed out a cloud of smoke in her annoyance. With a gesture from her cigarette filled hand, she pointed at the door with the air of someone who was bored.
On the very outside of the doors were a set of symbols that were carved directly into the wood, though the symbols meant nothing to the student other than that she had seen several other similar sets placed in various places and in various mediums on a path that led the duo from the entrance of the building to this very spot.
"Those are runes that, while not exactly like, are similar to the runes I use for my magic, thus it is a language that, to the best of my knowledge anyway, only I can decipher at the current moment. The runes on the door say 'here', while many of the runes we saw on the way here said 'this way' with a direction marker next to them."
As the magician took a moment to take a puff from her cigarette, Kamijou reached up to the back of her head and scratched it with a sigh.
"So… What you are saying is that someone led us to this exact spot, and, because of this, you are saying we should just waltz through the door?"
Styx nodded in a somewhat tired fashion as she continued to stare at the door, directly at the runes that ruined to almost perfect finished wooden surface.
"As far as I know, the only 'someone' in this city who knows about my literacy in Germanic runes, and has the ability to at least attempt such a stupid recreation is Trisha. And, knowing her, walking into the room is exactly what she wants us to do right now."
Kamijou put her hand over her face and massaged her brow in an effort to remove the anger and annoyance she felt, failing miserably in the attempt.
"So… again… You are saying that we should walk into a room that the alchemist, a person you have been sent here to fight, and were beaten by, says we should go into… Why exactly?"
Styx sighed out yet another cloud of smoke and rubbed the side of her head with her palm in an almost annoyed gesture.
"If you are perhaps worried that this is going to be a trap, then allow me to tell you that your suspicions are… mostly correct, in fact."
Kamijou again tried with all of her might to relieve herself of both her anger and her annoyance, this pinching the bridge of her nose with the force to break bone. Of course, the student's attempt to calm herself failed miserably.
"Can you please tell me why you want us to do this, despite knowing the fact that this might be a trap? I might be wrong… but, if I didn't know any better, I would say that you are trying to kill us."
The magician chuckled in a joyless fashion for a moment, before she frowned at the door and squinted in anger.
"Yeah… In a different situation, one where I didn't know who we were fighting, I would say the same thing as well. However, since we are dealing with Trisha, I know that the kinds of traps we will be dealing with won't be designed to kill us, but rather just be designed to annoy us to no end."
Kamijou sighed yet again and gestured at the doorway with annoyed look on her face as she was facing the magician.
"Listen… I know that you might know Trisha very well and all… But still! Shouldn't you be a little-…!"
Kamijou did not even get a chance to finish talking, a massive head splitting headache took control of the student's head, causing her to reach up and grab her head, holding it until it passed. These headaches had been happening ever since Kamijou had awoken in the park, but they had not been enough to nearly bring the student to her knees.
… Really now… I… I must be worn out or something with all of this shit that's going on tonight… If this keeps getting worse…
Before Kamijou could finish her thought, she heard Styx sigh aloud, and caught a whiff of the smoke from the magician's cigarette.
"I'm sorry… but weren't you the one who was worried earlier about Index being caught by Trisha? It's very strange how you can go from being worried about a person, to being more worried about yourself. I will admit that it is a very human feature to have, but it is also not the best in my opinion."
Kamijou glared at the magician with a look of pure venom, put bit back any words she was going to say to the magician in the favor of resolving the situation as quick as possible. So, instead, the student looked back at the door and sighed.
"So… Let's just say that both Trisha and Index are behind this door… Once we walk in… What sort of plan do you have on dealing with the alchemist? You do have something… right?"
The magician looked at the door with the look of complete concentration, the cigarette in her mouth slowly being spent as it hung loosely in place. After a few moments of staring at the door, Styx sighed as well.
"To be honest… there is only one plan I can come up with right now that will even have a chance of working. And… That is to simply walk through the door, assess the situation, and respond accordingly."
Kamijou felt a bead of sweat roll down her face as she sighed at the magician.
So… it's going to be wing it, is it? Ah well… It might be a bit stupid to leave it at that, but right now I have nothing else I can come up with to counter her.
Dropping any further discussion about the plan, Kamijou moved on to the last question that was hanging around in the back of her mind, a question that she had thought of before she and Styx had even arrived at the school.
"Styx… It might be too late to ask now… but… how do you plan on dealing with Trisha?"
Styx turned to look at Kamijou with a knowing look before sighing out yet another cloud of smoke in her annoyance.
"I can basically grasp what you are getting at… So… how about we clear something up before we do this? Because… if you go into this battle with that sort of attitude… You will surely die."
Styx through away the spent butt of the cigarette once she had finished with it, and almost instantly pulled out yet another cigarette and placed it in her mouth.
"I have been sent to this place by the Magic Side to remove the problem of Trisha Elric from Academy City using any means necessary. So if she chooses to leave the city of her own free will, then that will of course be the end of all discussion between us. However…"
The cigarette in the magician's mouth lit by itself as Styx looked at Kamijou with a cold, emotionless look that gave away the magician's true nature to the student. That one look caused Kamijou's blood to freeze for a moment out of pure fear.
"If Trisha decides to remain in the city despite being warned about leaving, then I will be forced make her leave… whether that be alive or dead is of no concern to my mission. Any other factor has absolutely no meaning to how I will be making my decisions, so how about you remember that and try your best not to mess anything up?"
Kamijou sighed aloud and held up her hands in a gesture of surrender. As much she was worried about the outcome of the oncoming confrontation, she could tell at that moment that there was absolutely nothing she could do to shape the outcome.
The magician blew out another cloud of smoke from her freshly lit cigarette, and looked at the door with an almost resolute gaze.
"So… are you done asking your idiotic questions? If you are, how about we put an end to all of this and get the hell out of here? The longer I have to deal with this sort of atmosphere, the more I just want to hurt something for no reason."
Kamijou looked at the doorway along with the magician, and having absolutely nothing else to dig up in a conversation, she nodded.
"Yeah… I'm ready to do this. So… Are we going in together, or are we doing this one at a time?"
Not even answering the student, the magician walked up to the door and grabbed ahold of the handle, turning it in and opening the door in one smooth motion. Styx stepped across the doorway and into the room with Kamijou following close behind.
The room that the two entered into was a fairly long office like room, set up with the walls on either side of the room being made of floor to ceiling bookshelves, with the wall on the far side of the entry way taken up mostly by a large window that looked out toward the skyline of Academy City.
At the far end of the room, behind what was obviously supposed to be the desk of the person who had been previously working in this office, both Kamijou and Styx saw their target.
Sitting in a chair on the other side of the desk was the sleeping form of Trisha Elric, a smile spread across her face as her breath flowed in a relaxed manner. As to why the woman was smiling, it could probably be attributed to what the alchemist was holding.
In the alchemist's hand was the also sleeping form of Index, however instead of the relaxed expression that the alchemist wore, the boy priest's face had an expression of minor discomfort. The alchemist's chin rested on Index's head, while her arms were wrapped around the waist of Index in what seemed to be a hug.
… You stupid idiot… You should have just stayed at home and then this wouldn't be as complicated as it is now… And where do you get off sleeping in some woman's arms while being kidnapped?
Somehow, looking at the scene of the alchemist holding onto Index like they were close annoyed Kamijou to no end, and strangely, most of her annoyance was directed at the boy priest rather than his captor. Styx must have been feeling the same annoyance, though whether or not it was directed at the boy or the alchemist was unknown to the student. Styx then began to clear her throat in an obnoxious manner as she glared over at the sleeping alchemist.
"Oi… Trisha… Why don't you wake up, considering you have two guests here?"
The alchemist slowly opened one of her eyes, looking around the room briefly for the source of whatever it was that had disturbed her sleep with an annoyed look on her face. Once she saw the forms of the two girls standing at the entryway of the room, the annoyed expression on the alchemist's face quickly turned into what appeared to be a normal smile, but Kamijou could detect that something was missing from that smile, something that was necessary for it to be truly called a smile.
"So… You are finally back, huh? Really now… It took you so long to break out of such a simple problem, that I was beginning to become slightly worried. If you hadn't found your way back by morning I was thinking of sending someone out to look for you so that you wouldn't make a complete fool of yourself."
Even with the pleasant words and tone that were being used in the conversation, Kamijou could not help but feel that they were missing something exactly like the smile the woman had given. There was a distinct feeling, or rather a distinct lack of a feeling, that the woman gave off that caused the student to feel uneasy, and even fearful, in her presence.
Kamijou gave a quick glance over at Styx and found that the magician was completely devoid of any noticeable expression, though the student could not tell if it was out of fear or if she was truly not afraid of what was in front of her.
The alchemist slowly, almost reluctantly, began to move Index off of her lap without trying to wake the boy priest up. After a very slow, methodical set of motions the alchemist was standing up behind the desk, stretching out her arms and back while Index was lying in the chair she had just vacated, still unconscious despite what had happened to him.
… Come on now Index! At the very least you should stir a little bit! How in the world can you stay asleep at a time like this?
Despite Kamijou thinking this, Index remained asleep in the chair, completely unaware of what was going to happen in the scene that was surrounding him.
The alchemist, after she had done a bit of stretching as if she was shaking off her tiredness, turned to look at the two girls with the same smile that was missing something, fixing her gaze directly on Styx as she began to speak.
"Well now… How have you been Styx? Before, we didn't really get a chance to talk because… well, we didn't get to talk because I knocked you out didn't I? I wasn't really in the mood for a pleasant conversation at the time, but now… now I have just enough patience to control myself while I talk to you."
Kamijou could almost physically feel the bite in the alchemist's words as she spoke, and she knew that if she had been the target of those words, she might have buckled underneath them on their own.
Styx looked over at the alchemist with a cold, logical glare. Her expression barely changed in response to the alchemist's words, and all she did in acknowledgement to them was a sigh.
"Well aren't I lucky that you are trying so hard to have a pleasant conversation with me. As an answer to your question, I am doing quite well for myself Trisha, minus the fact that someone made me remember something pretty horrible quite recently."
The alchemist smiled at Styx in a knowing way, walking out from behind the desk to stand in front of it, standing in such a way that she was blocking any view of Index from Styx.
"Really now? Remembering something caused you enough distress that you felt that you had to mention it? You know… that is strange coming from a person like you, who treats memories like they were things that can be simply manipulated at will."
There was the slightest twitch in Styx's eyebrow which was the only indication any sort of reaction from the magician, and whether she saw it or not, the alchemist made no indication of caring for that single twitch.
The alchemist sighed and placed a hand over her face as if it was a gesture to calm her down. After a moment of this, the alchemist looked back at Styx with the same pleasant smile that she had given the two girls when they had entered the room.
"So… Styx… For what reason do I owe you the… pleasure of seeing you again? As far as I know, neither of us had any reason to deal with each other after meeting with each other last time."
Styx ground the end of the cigarette in her mouth into a flat surface as she glared at the alchemist with an angry glare, before pointing at the window, at the skyline of Academy City.
"Well, Trisha… If you would kindly look out that conveniently placed window, you'll probably understand why we are meeting again after so long!"
Trisha almost innocently turned her upper body around to look out of the window behind her. After a few moments of looking, the alchemist turned back to look at Styx with an inquisitive look on her face.
"Am… Am I missing something here Styx? I will admit that the window does offer quite a great view, but other than that, I fail to see your reason."
Styx sighed aloud and placed a hand over her face as she glared back at Trisha.
"Of course you wouldn't… why would you? Well then, since you don't see it, then I guess I'm just going to have to explain it to you, aren't I?"
Trisha instantly threw up her hands and gestured toward Styx in a way that was telling her to calm down.
"Hold it! Hold it! I was joking! J-O-K-I-N-G! Really now… I should have expected you to go directly into lecturing mode when faced with something that doesn't comply with your sense of how things should be."
The alchemist sighed and smiled over at Styx.
"Yes, yes I know what the reason that you're here for. The magic side doesn't like me being here, the science side doesn't like me being here, so on and so forth, and that is why you are in front of me at this very moment."
Styx grit her teeth and glared at Trisha with a heated glare, taking the cigarette out of her mouth and blowing smoke out of her nostrils like some sort of angry bull.
"So you do know that you have done something that has gotten the attention of the people in charge. That just begs the question as to why you thought that you would be able to come here, mess around with this city, and not piss off both sides in one go?"
The alchemist continued to smile at Styx as playfully tilted her head to the side.
"Well… To be honest, I assumed that the magic side and the science side would be fine with my presence here, considering that my particular brand of magic is closer to a scientific discipline rather than a magical one."
Styx blew out more smoke through her nose as the alchemist began to chuckle at the magician's reaction.
"Calm down, Calm down, Styx. Geez… you really need to learn how to take a joke from time to time. The other reason I choose to come here despite the danger was the fact that I have something that I need to do, and after weighing my options, I felt that coming here was more important than keeping either side friendly with me."
Styx shook her head in annoyance and blew out another puff of cigarette smoke.
"Oh really now… then tell me. What in the world is it that requires you to blatantly violate the unspoken, and necessary, agreement between the magic side and the science side?"
The alchemist chuckled to herself and put her hand over her mouth as if she were trying to hide the words from Styx.
"Well…that is something I don't think I should tell you Styx. Not because I feel terrified of you figuring something out, but rather that I just don't feel like telling you."
Styx sighed in what could only be called annoyance and put the palm of the hand holding the cigarette to her forehead, as if she were trying to relieve herself of a headache.
"Really now… what should I have expected when dealing with you Trisha? Honestly… though even if you had told me the truth I probably wouldn't have believed you anyway. And in truth, the reason you came here in the first place aren't really important, are they?"
Styx pointed at Trisha with her still lit cigarette in her hand.
"What is important is that you leave this city this minute and never come back. If you leave this city without much of a fight then I'm certain that all of the sides involved might forgive and forget if that is the end of this event."
The alchemist sighed and smiled back at Styx, what the magician had said clearly going through one ear and out the other.
"Styx… I'm afraid I'm not going to be able to do that… I mean… if I leave now, when my goal in coming here has yet to be fulfilled, then I be in trouble wouldn't I? Besides, leaving this minute would require me to be defying the physical laws of this world, which in some cases I can-…!"
Before the alchemist could finish talking, a raging fireball shot past the woman's face, catching the smallest strands of her hair alight, leaving the smell of burning hair in the air for all to take in.
Whatever lack of emotion that the alchemist had been exhibiting throughout the entire conversation disappeared once the fireball dissipated in the air behind her. Her overall expression did not change however there was a distinct feeling of rage behind her features that anyone could see.
Kamijou briefly wondered how the room could go from a normal temperature to freezing cold in an instance as the alchemist addressed the source of the fireball with an obviously forced smile on her face.
"…Really now Styx? Violence almost the exact instant you are faced with rejection? What in the world are you … Some sort of savage? I expected better from you."
Styx clicked her tongue in disappointment as she lowered the hand holding the rune card in the palm of her hands, blowing out a plume of smoke out of the side of her mouth as she continued to grind the end of the cigarette in her mouth down.
"Well sorry for not meeting you expectations Trisha, but I was just trying to remind you what exactly is going on. This isn't a case where our previous relationship is important to the outcome. Right now… out relationship is that of criminal… and punisher. So tell me Trisha… Are you going to leave, or will I have to follow the rules of our new relationship?"
The alchemist smiled at Styx in an overly sadistic manner as she brought a hand up to her mouth in an attempt to hide it.
"You know Styx… in the relationship between punisher and criminal… Are you certain that you want me to become the one to deal out your just punishment?"
Styx blankly looked at the alchemist for a few moments, before dryly sighing and raising her hand into the air in an authoritative gesture.
"Innocentius!"
After shouting that one word out, from amongst the various hidden pockets of the magician's habit came a multitude of rune cards, flying up into the air and swirling around the magician like some sort of tornado of laminated paper. After a moment of this, the rune cards broke off from their path and instantly covered every nonliving surface of the room.
Once the cards were in place, there was a large and particularly bright spark in the air behind the magician, followed by several more sparks that grew in intensity until a ball of fire ignited. The ball began to grow larger and larger until the point that its diameter was about the height of Styx.
From the ball came a multitude of limbs, first a set of massive legs, then a pair of clawed arms, next two expansive blazing wings, and finally a massive horned head formed out of fire, completing the look of some sort of demonic figure.
The creature held out its hand, and out of thin air came forth a massive flaming cross, which the creature grabbed ahold of. The creature held its head up as the sound of air being sucked up to fuel the fire this creature was made of, which made it look like and sound like that the creature was shrieking out in an inhuman scream.
This had happened so quickly that Kamijou had barely blinked at the start of the action and once her eyes had opened again the creature was already forming it's flaming cross weapon.
Styx stared at the alchemist with a look of deathly seriousness as the creature behind her slowly pointed it's flaming cross at the alchemist.
"Well now Trisha… I would like to ask you… are you absolutely certain that you wish to remain in this city?"
The alchemist looked up at the creature that had suddenly appeared behind the magician, her expression still the same smile she had been giving throughout the conversation. After a moment of staring, the woman chuckled to herself as she raised a hand to cover her eyes.
"Styx… I've always had something to say about your magic… something that I noticed long ago…"
Styx tilted her head again and blew out a particularly large cloud of smoke from her cigarette.
"Oh… and what is that Trisha? Keep in mind I might lose my patience with you at any moment."
The alchemist chuckled and nodded her head at the magician and the creature behind them.
"Well then I'll keep this short then… The thing I've noticed about your magic is that it is all show…"
The alchemist at that moment clicked her fingers in a whimsical manner.
"And absolutely, positively, zero substance."
What happened next was something that Kamijou could not even begin to explain even if she had help from the two other conscious people there.
The shrieking sound of air being taken in by the creature stopped abruptly, and the light given off by the creature slowly dimmed to the point of nonexistence.
The student turned to look at what had happened, and her gaze arrived just in time to see the last lick of flame from the creature disappear into oblivion. While the student wanted to be puzzled by that, she then noticed something that made confused.
Styx was holding the same pose she had made when she had last spoken, same expression on her face, cigarette still glowing in her hands, but appearing to be completely frozen in time. Even the smoke that the magician had expelled was frozen in space, not disappearing at all.
… Styx…? What in the world…?
That moment, the alchemist laughed at the top of her lungs, causing Kamijou to put two and two together and realize what was going on.
The alchemist slowly stood up from the table in a slow, deliberate motion, assuming her full height that put her about a few centimeters above either girl.
"Really now Styx… did you really not figure out the reason that you had passed out earlier? Even for you… it was such a simple conclusion to reach, yet you couldn't even do that could you."
The alchemist sighed as she walked over to the frozen magician with a purposeful stride in her step, stopping just out of arms reach of red haired girl, with a smile on her face.
"Well… I really should expect something like this from you, shouldn't I Styx? You have done nothing but lower my expectations for you all night… Really you are absolutely good for nothing…"
Despite the biting words that the alchemist was saying, her smile was still glued to her face as she looked at the magician. Slowly, the woman reached her hand out to touch the red haired girl's face.
"Now then Styx… How in the world should I punish-…!?"
The moment before the alchemist could finish speaking Kamijou dove in between the woman and Styx, effectively protecting the magician from the alchemist. Kamijou did not know why she needed to jump at that moment, but she knew that only bad things would have happened if the alchemist touched Styx. The student held her arms up in a calming gesture, trying her best to smile at the woman.
"H-hold on a second there…! How about we all just calm down for a second and reexamine the situation before something-…!?"
It was at that moment that Kamijou had realized something that should have been painfully obvious to her before she dove in front of the alchemist.
The alchemist's gaze settled on the one entity that it had not focused on during the entire conversation, and the woman finally seemed to acknowledge Kamijou's existence with a slight frown.
That acknowledgement caused Kamijou's thought process to freeze for a few seconds along with the blood that was flowing through her body. With that single look that confirmed her existence, Kamijou briefly felt the urge to disappear to escape the look.
The alchemist sighed to herself with the frown on her face her annoyance towards Kamijou completely clear.
"Listen here… Little Miss Flavor of the Week… if I were you… I would stay out of the way right now. I doubt there is any force in the world that will keep me from delivering the punishment that is due to Styx here. Especially those among us who have absolutely no idea what is going on."
Kamijou could barely keep herself from shivering in fear underneath the gaze of the alchemist, yet she somehow was able to find her voice to talk back to the woman.
"Well… The reason some people do not know what in the world is going on is because someone had failed to explain it to them… So tell me… What in the world is it that Styx has done to deserve punishment?"
Kamijou felt the sweat dripping down her face as she spoke to the magician, and once she was done speaking she felt as if all the oxygen in her body had been spent on speaking for those few seconds.
With fear in every part of her body, Kamijou looked up at the alchemist while shivering.
The alchemist hand her hand over her face, the annoyance and impatience clear from the body language that Kamijou could read. Slowly she brought her hand down from her face with a sigh and looked at the student.
"Let me keep this as short as possible. Tell me… have you heard of a perfect memory?"
At that moment, when Kamijou heard the words 'perfect memory' was said, something in Kamijou's mind clicked and everything suddenly made sense to her.
"Wait a moment… You couldn't… Are you talking about Index's memory wipes?"
The alchemist the moment after Kamijou had said that was completely to the one that had been present prior to that moment. The woman's expression exuded genuine surprise as she looked at Kamijou, which quickly turned to curiosity.
"Wait… so you actually know about Index already? There's no way that you should know about that if you are Index's new caretaker… Styx would never tell someone that until near the end of Index's memory cycle… and, if I remember correctly, the end of the last cycle was about three or four weeks ago. Did Styx tell you about all of this up front?"
Kamijou could not help but smile as the weight that she had felt when the woman had been looking at her had disappeared, and all the fear that had caused her to shiver evaporated into thin air.
"Well… it isn't show much Styx told me but rather that she showed me everything to do with Index's condition… You see… I met Index about five or six weeks ago."
At that point the alchemist looked completely shocked.
"Wait! You mean… You got to know Index right before… Why in the world are you trying to stop me then! Of all the people in this world, you should be the first person to assist me in punishing Styx!"
Kamijou held up her hands yet again to calm down the alchemist, but it wasn't as urgent as she had done before.
"Well… I do not particularly enjoy Styx's company… but at the very least I can understand that what she did was for Index, first and foremost. And besides… Now that Index is better, I find it particularly hard to hate Styx."
The alchemist suddenly froze when she heard a specific phrase amongst Kamijou's explanation, causing the woman to look at the student with a confused glare.
"… What did you just say…? Index is …. Fixed?"
Kamijou smiled up at the alchemist as she dropped the key piece of information to the woman.
"What? You didn't know? Index was fixed about two weeks ago by yours truly. It was really an easy thing to figure out if you took a step back to look at it. Do you want to know-…!?"
Kamijou's mild amount of bragging was interrupted by the alchemist sighing and the woman's expression reverting to what it had been before Kamijou had interrupted her from messing with Styx.
"Really now… Here I thought I had found a comrade in my hatred of Styx, but instead I find that they are a complete and utter fool."
Kamijou felt the weight of the scene return and the fear that had disappeared so easily before now seeping back into her body like it had never left.
"Wait… What…? What in the world are you talking about? What have I said that could be considered foolish?"
The moment after Kamijou asked that question, she realized that there was no point to it, as the alchemist had gone back to ignoring the student. The woman turned her gaze back to her original target of Styx.
"Now then… where were we Styx? Oh right… my punishment for you. Let's see here… Like the girl said I can understand your feelings for keeping Index alive… but I'm sure that you can understand that I can't forgive you for that."
The alchemist's gaze wandered over the still frozen form of Styx, and smiled when she saw that the girl's cigarette was still alight in her mouth.
"Ah… I just found the perfect choice."
The alchemist again clicked her fingers in a whimsical manner.
The next moment, as if in response to the alchemist's finger snapping, the tip of the cigarette exploded in a fantastic display of fire, catching every part of the red haired magician's body ablaze in an instant. The girl's body did not move despite the fact that every part of it was on fire, meaning that the girl was still frozen underneath the flames.
Kamijou got the sudden urge to vomit as she smelt the fairly distinct smell of burning flesh in the air, and only numbly felt someone grabbing ahold of her left arm and extending it to its full reach.
"If I recall correctly… this was what gave that useless exorcist problems before wasn't it? Hmmmm…. I get the feeling that I should study it… but maybe in a more isolated form?"
The next moment, Kamijou felt a quick sharp pain at her shoulder, and by the time she looked down to see what had happened, she found that her left arm was missing completely, a bloody severing point was all that was left.
The student looked up at the alchemist, who was swinging the student's arm around like some sort of toy and smiling back at Kamijou.
"Really now… You guys didn't even let me to get even one percent serious when I was dealing with you. This… was a complete and utterly pointless day."
The alchemist swung around to put her back to Kamijou and Styx, putting Kamijou's left arm on her shoulder.
Before the alchemist body had completely turned her back to the student, Kamijou noticed a strange blue glint within the woman's clothes. She briefly felt some form of animalistic urge to run over and grab it before the pain of a severed arm finally reached her brain, causing her to scream out and collapse into unconsciousness.
