V

Chapter 27: The Battlefield that Lies Outside

Beyond_the_Boundaries

Part 1

As usual, the timing was just perfect to ruin any kind of planning he had in mind.

In order to keep himself in the safe zone, Hishiro knew he had to do two things:

1 - Extract as much information from Index (and in this particular case, the boy named Kamijou Touma as well) as he could;

2 - Prepare himself for the upcoming attacks from the magicians that were after him.

Regrettably, he never counted on the possibility of the latter happening just when he was finally fulfilling the former. For a long moment, all he did was stand there, holding the phone to his ear with his eyes wide open, uncertain of what to do.

"H-hello? Are you there? Please don't hang up on me!"

The girl's screams of despair finally dragged him back to reality, but he still was at a loss. "W-wait, I'm still here. Just… give me a second." He then turned back at Index, who was looking at the entrance of the hospital. Touma and a few more people were leaving through the front doors. Talking to them now was out of option, but the true question was… Should I get this girl involved in this? Last time, we only managed to win because of her, but on the other hand, I can tell just by looking that she already had her share of action for today. I don't want to bring her if there's a chance of her not being able to keep up with us.

After letting out a heavy sight, he forced out a smile to the nun, trying to hide the seriousness of the situation. "Sorry, but something important came up unfortunately."

She looked back at him and probably caught the weight on the boy voice, as she asked in a worried tone. "Is there a problem? You look just like Touma when he is about to leave me behind and fight something unreasonable all by himself."

Her line made the boy question what kind of relationship those two had, but that wasn't the time for this. "Nah, it's probably just some clean up job your little friend from the church left us. Nothing I'm not used to. And I won't be alone either so it'll be fine. Next time we meet, let's do something fun instead of just talking about the fate of the world, okay?"

He wasn't sure if she bought it or not, since she stared into him for good five seconds or so before smiling again and waving her hand. "Okay… until next time."

…

"First of all, are you absolutely SURE she was one of them?"

"Of course I am! Do you think anyone else in the world could do something so unrealistic?"

"Honestly, I'm having a hard time even believing that what you just told me actually happened."

"But that basically links her with that crazy magician guy from last time! I wouldn't believe him either if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes!"

"You got a fair point there. But still… why are we going AFTER her again?"

While hearing Frenda, the boy was running down the streets towards a rendezvous point they had decided while Asuka searched through the surveillance system trying to find any hint the magician could've left behind.

However, Frenda purposefully left one important bit out of the story, which made it complicated for her to find an answer for his question. "Well… t-that's… because… you see..."

"Think like this Shiro: why did this girl attack out of the blue then suddenly left without directly harming anyone?" Said Asuka, who had hacked her way into the call.

"Huh… now that you mention it, it really is strange. Rüdger never acted like this. I may be new to this whole magic thing, but if I were to make a wild guess, they would only leave if… their goal was somehow already accomplished."

"Yes, I think so too. And whatever that was, it is bad news for us, specially if we can't tell what it was. That's why it's better to take a preemptive route and go after her before anything happens. And we should keep a close eye on Frenda too just in case."

"Y-yeah, that! It's just as she says!" The girl agreed in relief. This should be enough. I wish I could solve this on my own, but that's impossible. I need their help, but at the same time, I can't risk having them knowing too much. I have to make it work like this… and I'll make sure to make that crazy girl pay for putting me in this situation!

With less than five minutes of difference, the two of them arrived at the southeast edge of District 7, just one street away from District 22. Having gotten there later, Frenda leaned against a light pole, trying to catch her breath while they waited for Asuka. Her voice over the phone already left clear her urgency, but looking at her right now, Hishiro felt surprised at how distressed she was, which made him question his own approach to this as a whole.

Of course, there was the fact that, this time, she was the one to make the first contact with the enemy. Last time, he was the one more nervous between the two. But even so, they were about to jump into a battlefield that defied any kind of logic. Underestimating that would only grant him certain death. He had to be on his guard the whole time from now on until the battle was over. Maybe that's why he didn't say anything to help her calm down and just stared into the ground. She also made no effort to communicate and just focused on herself. After all, our alliance is nothing but a temporary countermeasure for these emergencies. There's no need for a pointless exchange of words if there's nothing left to be said about the situation. But if that's it… why I'm having this bad feeling looking at her now? Something is not right… dammit, I hate this atmosphere.

Thankfully for the both of them, it didn't take long for Asuka to contact them again. "Found her. She went all the way to District 11 and she left Academy City from there."

"What?"

"She left the city? How!?"

"Weirdly enough, she was literally carried away by the staff working in one of the warehouses there as if she was some kind of cargo, and no one even noticed how irregular that was."

"Geez… what's with the security in this city, for fuck sake?" Hishiro spat in anger. "Now what? Do we leave it like this?"

"... We go after her."

"Huh? But-"

"I said we're going after her!" Frenda reaffirmed with a shout, slamming her fist on the light pole. "I can't leave Fr-… the score unsettled! Because it may be worse next time if we don't do anything right now! So even if you decide to stop here, I..."

Frenda stopped herself before suggesting something she would regret later. Meanwhile, the boy could only blink blankly at her reaction. Just what in the world could've pushed her over the edge to make her act like this? Still, her logic made sense… "Heh. I never said I wasn't going. Stop trying to act all cool in front of me, you're not earning any points. Besides, going alone will only get you killed. Also… how do you plan to leave, miss genius? I'm pretty sure we can't use the same method that girl used."

"I… I'll come up with something. I'll blast through the walls if I need to."

"Sure, that will totally work." He made fun of her "Asuka."

"*sigh*... I knew it would come to this. You will be owning me a lot for this, Shiro."

"Fine. I'll split the bill with our desperate guest here."

"Oh, you sure about that? Can I ask A-NY-THING from you two after this?"

"... Actually, I take that one back."

"That's a shame. And you would end up having so much fun, if you know what I mean. Hehehehe..."

"Just shut up and do your thing already."

"Aren't you the one trying to act all cool now? But that red face of you is giving you away. Not to mention your..."

"NO, THAT'S NOT WHAT'S HAPPENING! If you keep this up, I'll be blasting you through that wall!"

"You want to put me against the wall, Shiro? Oh my, I never thought you were this kind of man-"

"ASUKAAAAAAAAAAA!"

"Yup, yup, that's what I wanted, thanks for the delicious meal! Consider the debt paid ~*!"

Satisfied for making him somehow angrier than the blonde girl currently was, she typed like crazy on her keyboard for a few minutes and…

"A white truck?" Frenda asked, looking at the vehicle that had just parked next to them in disbelief.

"Yes, it'll take you two straight to the outer side of the walls."

"Simple like that?"

"S-simple? It takes a lot to get someone up to the job of taking Espers out of the city illegally, you know..."

"What, don't tell me you're the kind to cry over people not giving you enough credit for your job, Asuka?"

"NO! Of course not, Shiro!"

"Come to think of it, I always wondered why you became awfully quiet back in the day when Isay and Ryou ignored-"

"Anyway, aren't you two wasting time? Hurry up and get into the truck already!" Leaving these last words to put an end to the subject, she cut off the call without even waiting for a response, making the boy grim in satisfaction. So that's your weak spot? I'll make sure to rub a lot of salt in it in the future.

Part 2

More than 30 minutes had passed ever since the truck had left to the edges of the city and no one said a single word. A clear sense of tension hanged in the air inside the steel box shaped cart. There was literally nothing inside it besides the led lamp on the ceiling that dimly lit the interior, so Hishiro and Frenda had no other choice but to sit on the floor. He had his legs stretched out and prepared his equipment for the battle that would most likely to happen soon enough, while she just held a serious expression in her face and hugged her knees on the opposite corner.

"I wonder… in the end, are we going to be enough?"

"What do you mean?"

Frenda, who had broken the silence first, tightened the grip on her own legs and frowned before continuing. "Last time we had Mugino, Kinuhata and that silver haired girl… and even then we just barely made it."

"Who knows..." The boy replied coldly without taking his eyes away from the gun he had just loaded. "It depends on whether she stays dead or not once she is killed. If yes, then I can say for sure I'll kill her before she even has the chance to pull off any weird trick."

"How can you be so calm?"

"Getting nervous wouldn't help. I lost my temper last time and that almost got me killed more than once. And besides," having finished what he was doing, he looked at her with his usual smuggle smile, "that girl is yet to do anything that we could call an attack. Maybe she isn't the fighter type. Even though we should be prepared for everything, there's no need to panic before any evidence of her being stronger than us, right?"

There was no reply, but the shadow in Frenda's face seemed to diminish a little.

Still, they both knew they were heading into a battlefield and some kind of bloodshed would happen. They just weren't expecting it so soon.

All of a sudden, the truck made a sharp turn to the left, scratching its tires in the asphalt until the vehicle came to a stop. Hishiro and Frenda jumped to their feet in a flash and leaned themselves against the wall to keep their balance. "What was that? Is she attacking us?"

"No, we didn't even left the city yet…wait, can you hear this?" the boy asked with his ear glued to the wall. The blonde did the same, and there was indeed some noise coming from outside, which sounded exactly like…

"Gunshots?"

"Yeah… this is bad. We need to get out of here now!" Without wasting time, they dashed towards the steel double door and kicked it open at the same time. What they found outside was a scenery that seemed to be taken directly out of a war movie. The whole traffic was a mess, some cars were flipped upside down, Anti-Skill vehicles were parked transversely to be used as a shield against the storm of bullets flying all over the place, several officers and powered suits were running and shooting left and right… and all of it was happening just next to the checking post that led to the gates of the city.

The pair didn't even had enough time to question what was happening. Three men wearing black military suits armed with light machine guns split out of a larger group when they saw the two inside the truck. The man in the middle stepped forward and tried to grab Frenda by the wrist. "You two! Get over-"

The girl reacted before he could even finish his line. She slapped his hand away, kicked him between his legs and jump over his falling body, making sure to smash her knee in the middle of his face during the motion.

Seeing how the situation had turned out, Hishiro and the other two aggressors pulled out their guns. Given that the blonde was (apparently) unarmed, it was supposed to be a 2 on 1 situation, where the winning side would normally ask the losing one to drop their weapons or else they would shoot. However, the boy didn't care about it at all and pulled the trigger, digging a bullet into the closest man.

The other one fired at Frenda right after, since there was no sign of them surrendering. In response, she ducked low and kicked the man's hand upwards, making his shots fly off into the empty air. She then proceeded to swipe his feet with a perfect circular motion of her leg, followed by a punch in the chest that made him roll a few feet backwards.

Looking to the side, she saw the boy holding the last man at gunpoint. It seemed that their vest was bullet proof, since he had just took the shot at point blank and only feel to his knees. But all this protection was for naught.

"Ughhhh… G-gaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhh!"

Hishiro held his hand in the middle of the man's chest while he screamed in agony until he finally passed out. His head and limbs hang down unnaturally while the rest of his body was kept in place unable to fall down, as if it was glued to the boy's hand. Finally, after a few convulsions, Hishiro closed his eyes and retrieved his arm, letting the body collapse lifelessly. "What did you do to him?"

"Stopped his heart with my ability." He answered while holding his own wrist and looking around in search of more enemies. "I wasn't bluffing when I said I could do that."

"Creepy..."

"I don't want to hear that coming from someone who hides bombs in dolls. Anyway, do you have any clue of who are those guys?"

"No, but they are probably just amateurs. Did you see how they hesitated to fire?"

"Yeah. If they were from LIZARD or any other faction of the dark side, that would've been the first thing they would do."

The way they talked casually felt out of place in the middle of the chaos. As if to remind them of the situation, something caused the truck they were in just a moment ago burst into flames and explode, but Hishiro swung his arm and created a field to protect them from it without even glancing. "But they do hold quite the firepower with them..."

"In the end, it seems we'll have to break through on our own now."

"Heh, it'll serve as a good warm up. I just hope that the security at the gate is down due to all this."

No more words were needed. They both broke into a run, leaving behind the Anti-Skill officers and facing the obstacle in their way head on. Splitting up the moment they ran into a debris, they were welcomed with dozens of enemies giving warning shouts.

Hishiro let out a mocking giggle and made no effort to stop his sprint. He reached the closest one faster than they could react and kicked his knee, making the person fall and fail to catch him. A few shots were fired, but because they had to be cautious to not accidentally hit their grounded ally, there was a lag between the intention and the action, which was more than enough for the boy to predict and avoid the trajectory of the bullets.

Breezing through the attack with some ease, the boy passed by the aggressors one by one, getting them out of his way in the fastest way possible. An elbow to the face, a punch in the stomach, a knee in the back an only three bullets fired was enough for him to clear up the path.

As for Frenda, she didn't even wasted time engaging the opponents individually. The moment they pointed their guns at her, she simply sent one of her rockets flying to explode just in front of them. Using the smokescreen as cover, the blonde dashed through them in the middle of the confusion.

None in their group was capable of stopping them. They were almost at the wall, with Frenda just a couple of steps ahead of Hishiro. At this pace, they would be able to leave the city in no time.

And it was then when things got complicated.

Hishiro felt a shock wave just behind him and lost his balance, making him trip over Frenda and send they both rolling on the ground. It took him a while to get his sense in order again before he could try to stand back up, and once he did, he was not happy to find out what had hit him. Four large white machines with blue marks, six legs and a ridiculous number of cannon barrels were closing in from all directions with their weapons pointed towards them. Frenda clicked her tongue loudly when she saw them. "Not those again!"

"Have you seen them before?"

"Yeah, there were a ton of them during the Academic Assembly incident. They aren't too difficult to destroy, but watch out for the cannons. They fire beams similar to Mugino's."

"Wait, what?!"

The girl didn't even need to explain further. The Powered Suits opened fire, forcing the pair to dodge in opposite directions. The ground where they stood just a second before was simply no more, with only a crater filled with molten asphalt left in its place. Once he saw that, Hishiro broke into a cold sweat. You gotta be kidding me… isn't that the same as those Five Overs? Are you telling me they made a model for Meltdowner as well? No, more importantly, why do they even have those?

Whatever was he answer, the scale of the battle had just gone beyond the safe zone now. The boy put away his revolver and drew the AMCP before going towards the nearest foe. Each one of them have at least three cannons. Gotta take them out before they start shooting all at the same time again, because I can't count on Null Inertia to block multiple Meltdowners. Last time I tried… don't even want to remember that.

Seeing the movement of the barrel adjusting its aim, he foresaw the next shot and sidestepped it safely. This attack was followed by the gatling cannons of the machine, which rained beams of light on the boy who struggled to avoid them all and ended up getting a scratch hit on his right shoulder. Groaning in pain, he retaliated with four shots of his own weapon, disabling one of the cannons and two legs of the machine.

Hishiro wanted to finish it right away, but hearing the noise coming from behind him, he jumped to the side on instinct and managed to dodge the surprise attack from the second Powered Suit. "Tsk… it's one thing after the other!" Turning towards the new enemy, he unloaded the remaining bullets of his gun onto it, but from that distance, only a single one hit the target, opening a hole at the side of the hull.

The damage was trivial and wouldn't stop it from counterattacking. Luckily for him though, Frenda joined in and sent flying a couple of pen sized missiles, of which one sneaked into the hole he opened up and destroyed the machine from inside before it finished charging its cannons again.

There were three of them left, and one was severely damaged. While Hishiro reloaded his weapon, the girl took on the front line and spread out her explosive tape. She avoided the incoming shots by moving fast and taking cover on the debris around the place, until she finally reached the weakened Powered Suit. Still putting up a fight, it tried to strike the blonde with its long barrel, but she jumped over the attack neatly, leaving behind one of her dolls which took care of ripping the machine's arm off when it exploded.

In a last attempt to hit her, the remaining functional legs made a sloppy jump to reposition its falling apart body, so that she would be in in the aim of the final cannon. But that move was way too obvious and gave Frenda more than enough time to prepare against it. She moved to a well calculated position before the foe landed, and jumped sideways in the last second, making the light beam fly past her and towards another machine that had also shot at her at the same time, resulting in mutual friendly fire.

Still, only the Powered Suit Frenda was engaging head on was destroyed. The other one only lost its main weapon and was ready to fire its gatling cannons. She failed to avoid the attack correctly this time, and even though it wasn't a direct hit, the countless shots that struck the ground right beneath her feet caused a shock wave that sent her flying backwards.

Landing back first on the asphalt and dizzy from spinning in the air, all she managed to do was to throw her ignition device that sent sparks flying everywhere. More than one of then hit the tape she had left prepared before, making the light travel across the floor into several different directions until they finally converged in a single point: a sewer lid entrance at the edge of the road. That caused the ground to shatter in a radius of more than five meters, opening a hole that swallowed everything in its way, including the Powered Suit that had attacked her.

The last enemy was giving Hishiro some trouble a dozen of meters away. Whoever was piloting the suit had taken notice of the AMCP's firepower and was doing everything on its power to avoid taking a hit from it. On the other hand, the boy was having a hard time keeping himself from taking damage. No attack from the machine had been a clean hit so far, but even though the power of these beams paled in comparison to the real Meltdowner, they were more than enough to hurt by just getting near it, and that's not even counting the countless fragments that were sent flying every time it hit the ground. Over time, his body was worn out due to the increasing amount of small injuries which made him slow down his movements, and his impatience from failing to land a solid attack only made him make more mistakes, reducing his chances to turn the situation around.

"Heh… hehehehe, dammit. That crazy scientist was right about one thing: the pilot does make a hell of a difference. This pile of scrap is nothing but an ant compared to Alpha, but I can't even attempt to attack it without getting countered."

Hishiro was forced to run backwards to get out of the line of fire of the machine. After hearing the barrage of attacks finally stopping, he turned around with his just reloaded cannon pistol and prepared to fire.

It only took a mere second.

Just a single second between the final shot and him turning around.

"What the… SHIT!"

Whoever was piloting that machine had to have some combat experience, unlike the rest of the group. Noticing the pattern in Hishiro's actions, he stopped shooting on purpose to make the boy stop and lose his momentum, but not to recharge the weapons. This time, he hadn't used the left gatling cannons to attack in wait for the opportunity he had just created.

There was no time to dodge. Out of reflex, Hishiro activated his ability without thinking, but he regretted it right after. The amount of electrons contained in the Meltdowner's beams would accumulate inside the distorted field, increasing the pressure on his body and when released, they would repel each other and push the air around them causing an explosion of hot air, which can result in more than just a few burns. He had tasted that phenomenon first hand before when he fought against the #4.

All muscles of his body tensed up as more and more shots were forced into the field while he desperately searched for a solution. He had to find one fast, because the longer he took to act, the worse the result would be.

With great effort, he distanced himself from the area of effect of his ability, and pushing himself to the limit, he created another field just in front of him before releasing the first one. He hoped he would defend against the imminent blast this way, but unfortunately, that wasn't enough. The explosion not only got through his makeshift shield with less but still significant force, but also made its way around it hitting him from all sides.

The boy's body was pushed back, but he gritted his teeth and kept himself on his knees, enduring the heat passing by him. Ugh… it wasn't as bad as last time, but it still was a terrible idea. I can't let it happen again no matter what - wait a minute… maybe I should let it happen again!

The idea that went through Hishiro's mind at that moment distorted his lips in a grin that he couldn't hold back. Focusing all his remaining strength on his legs, he kicked the ground and blurred forward in the fastest sprint he could muster at his current situation. The Powered Suit tried to keep him away by moving backwards and shooting, but he sidestepped every time and kept going forward, not caring at all that he would be an easy target if he got too close.

Actually, that was exactly his plan. Getting into a distance where there was no way to miss.

It was difficult to measure exactly how close he needed to be, and he only had a single chance to do it.

It seemed like time had slowed down.

Hishiro could clearly see the light coming from inside the barrel in slow motion. At the same time, he stopped his dash, moved his arm to get a clear image of what he wanted to happen and…

The mass of electrons were sealed near the exit of the cannon and slowly started to increase in size. It looked like an inflating balloon attached to a blowpipe. The grinning boy felt the pressure on his body again, warning him that his ability was pushing his health beyond the line it shouldn't cross, but instead of pain and discomfort, the sensation felt pleasant as he anticipated what was about to come.

The pilot didn't even had a chance to understand what was going on.

The field Hishiro had created at the tip of the weapon was lifted, causing an explosion way larger than the one before, swallowing the whole machine. Scraps of metal flew everywhere, and once the blast was over, what was left had no semblance at all to the original form of the Powered Suit. While catching his breath, the boy approached the remainings and found the pilot half buried in the middle of the mess.

"Damn you… Esper… scum..."

"Well, that's a new one. Never been called this before, not even by members of the Skill Out." Hishiro leaned forward, trying to intimidate the other person. "Just who are you? And where did you get those weapons?"

"..."

"Answer me!"

"It's no use, he's unconscious." Frenda said it while shrugging as she approached from behind him. "The others were the same, we can't question them."

"Tsk. They appear outta nowhere, waste our time, give us all this trouble and we don't even get information in the end. That's not satisfying at all."

"For the record, I had no trouble handling them."

"Just shut up. Let's head to the gate already."

Part 3

If there was one good thing about the commotion that had happened at the edge of the city, was that the traffic control system regulating what went in and out of the walls was completely out. Hishiro and Frenda managed to slip by before Anti Skill had any chance to stop them while arresting the armed group. Even though that worked on our favor, the security of the city is way too lax recently… and what was that all about? It was way more than just your regular act of terrorism, and they even had those powered suits. I'll have Asuka looking into that later on. As for now…

"So this is how it's like outside of Academy City." The boy commented as he looked curiously at their surroundings while they made their through the streets. "This is Tokyo, isn't it? Gotta say I'm disappointed. Everything looks so… inferior."

"You never been out of the city before?" Asked Frenda in surprise.

"Nope. Been within these walls as far as I can remember and never stepped out of them until now."

"Not even during your job?"

"Hey, dealing with people that have to do with the outside is the job of teams like ITEM. My responsibilities are a bit different."

"Hmmm, is that so?" She said in mysterious tone. Hishiro had no idea if she was taking note of everything for ulterior reasons, just acknowledging his answer or simply uninterested. "Anyway, where do we go now? It's getting dark already. I don't want to want to search around a city that's about three times the size of Academy City with no clue."

"That's what Asuka is for. Wait, can we even contact her from all the way here?"

He panicked for a second and pulled out his phone in a hurry. They would be in serious trouble if they lost not only their guide, but also their only lifeline to getting inside the city again.

"Ah - you finally called Shiro. How was the trip?"

"An utter disaster, but that's a story for another time. Let's focus on what's important right now. We need directions as soon as possible. Can you really help from there?"

"Hmpf, don't underestimate the reach of my network. I could track anything anywhere in the world if i really needed to. Hang on for a second, I'll send you the coordinates."

Geez, she sounds annoyed… did that talk from before get to her that much?

As soon as she said it, the GPS on the boy's device pointed the location fifteen kilometers away from their current position, and the distance was slowly increasing. "She's on the move. We need to get to her fast!"

Thanks to Asuka's hacking abilities, they managed to make use of the subway system to shorten the distance in a matter of minutes. From the station they stopped, they only had to run four blocks to catch up with their target.

But what they found there wasn't exactly what they were expecting.

That place was a small park with something that looked like an unmaintained sports court, but several symbols and drawings were spread across the floor, and metal poles that could be from soccer goals or basketball hoops, but its shape was so distorted that it was impossible to say for sure what it was originally. And in the middle of it all, there were three people.

The first one was a girl with long light brown hair, black eyes and wearing a grey robe with golden decorations that hid the rest of her body completely. Frenda recognized the girl on the spot. "That's her! It's the crazy girl from earlier!"

The second one was a bit taller and wore the exactly same robe but with the hood on, making it impossible to see its face.

And the third one…

"Oh hell no..."

Hishiro recognized her pretty well.

It wasn't that difficult. There weren't that many people out there who wore ragged jeans and a white shirt tied into a knot like she did. But even more striking was the long katana she held at her side.

"This was a bad idea… that woman over there is way out of our league."

"H-huh? What are you saying? Weren't you all confident just half hour ago?"

"Remember the time I was almost killed?"

"Yes- … wait, do you mean?"

"It was her. She is one of the three intruders during that mission back in July. And believe me, fighting her is not an option. Rüdiger didn't stand a candle to her."

Hearing that, Frenda gulped loudly and felt at a loss. "What do we do now? We can't just give up, right?"

"I don't know..."

…

The three in the park were completely oblivious of the pair's presence not far from there. There was a clear tension in the air between them, as if the first one to make the wrong move would be killed instantly. The robed woman faced the one with the sword without a single hint of fear in her voice. "I won't warn you again, saint. Leave at once. We have nothing against you, but if you insist in getting in our way, we'll have no other choice but to remove you from the board."

The said saint displayed no intention of backing down. On the contrary, she narrowed her eyes and placed her free hand on the hilt of her sword. "Unfortunately for you, I cannot leave. No matter how many ask me to stay away, I will not turn a blind eye to the incident that is about to happen in this country. So whether you are involved in it or not, you are my enemy if you decide to intervene with my objective."

"I see… that is a shame. I would rather avoid a conflict with you, but given the situation, that seems impossible."

"Yes, I feel the same."

Impatient, the other robed girl started bouncing from side to side. "In that case, can I fight the saint? Please? Can I? Can I?"

"Don't make a fool of yourself, Cristina. You would be crushed before you even had a chance to blink if you were up against an enemy of her level. Leave her to me."

"That's unfair! I wanna fight too!"

"Don't be stubborn. Your target is the Seeds of Doubt. And I won't be doing it myself either."

All that was needed was a simple snap of fingers.

The sound served as a given by the robed woman to a fourth figure to enter the stage.

From within the shadows, a tall man with green combed hair wearing a white suit came walking with slow steps. On his hand, he spun a golden chain with a dart on it.

The saint widened her eyes and dropped her hand from the hilt when she saw him. "I-Impossible… what are you doing here, Aureolus Izzard!?"

Between the Lines

It was a day just like any other. The kids were playing and making noise all over the place. As for me, I was making some drawings in the corner of the room once again, avoiding getting cold due to the temperature drop caused by the sudden rain that happened in that afternoon.

It may be exactly because of that that I ended up picking her attention.

The door to the room opened, and many children we have never seen before went inside. Those were the ones being transferred over we were told about before. I was just watching they coming in from afar without paying much attention, so I failed to notice that she had approached me from the side.

"Hey, you. What are you doing alone in this corner?"

It was so sudden I almost jumped in surprise. "N-nothing. It's cold near the windows, so I like being here more."

Only after I answered that I stopped to look at her. She seemed to be at least three years older than me, had a long platinum blond hair with a flower shaped red ribbon, blue eyes that were so light that almost seemed to be gray and wore a pink one piece dress with white cats stamped on both sides.

My reply made her tilt her head to the side. "But it's so hot today."

"Not for me. If you feel hot, you should go play with everyone else where there's wind."

She looked around and saw her colleagues getting along with the other kids, and I was really expecting her to go there. I thought she would think of me as of weird like everyone else did, but instead…

She broke into a laughter.

"W-what's so funny?"

"You are."

"Why?"

She just sat down next to me without answering. "I like it more when it's hot too. Can I stay here?"

"... fine."

"I'm Lilly. What's your name?"

From that day onwards, she never left me alone anymore, for the good or the worse. I soon found out she was just as weird as I compared to the rest of the children, and the adults treated her differently was well. Little I knew, however, the true reason behind this.

Hello, and happy new year! Wait, is it too late to say that?

I lazed out a lot during my vacation, and in turn, the chapter was left incomplete for a long time, but like always, I eventually slapped myself in the face in front of the mirror and shouted "Gotta finish it!" until I finally actually did. Now I'm at a new job and I have a lot more free time than I used to have, so there's no excuse for such long gaps between chapters.

Again, I'm putting a lot inside the pot for the mix. There's the unknown group with the Artificial Meltdowners from Railgun's Silent Party arc, Kanzaki making a comeback from her absence after beating the crap out of Hishiro, and… Aureolus? Yup, I've done it now. Honestly, Styil was supposed to be the one present during this arc, but because I've brought Aureolus back, I thought it wouldn't be fun to see they fighting again just like happened in the main story, so I had to change that. Also, I don't know if there are anime watchers only among you all (I think it's unlikely, but who knows?), so for the case there are, be warned I'm going to be referring to a lot of stuff that was cut from the Anime version of the Deep Blood arc.

Replies:

adisagreeableperson: Better late than never! Welcome aboard and thank you for the review! If you like the dark side of Academy City, then you're just in the right place! ;)

Guest: Sorry, no Touma this time. The poor guy just dealt with Sherry and the golem Ellis in the timeline, let's have him rest for a bit. He'll have other chances to shine in the Backstage (probably…). And it wouldn't be fair for Cristina to meet the Imagine Breaker… you'll understand why later on.

The crack shipping guy: Like I said to the Guest above, Touma won't be in this time. And his role in the story won't be bigger than it was during Rüdiger's attack. I want to play around more with the less present characters in the series, so it wouldn't make sense for him to be the big one here. And yeah, I might play with the idea of "everyone loves him" or the stupid situations he put himself into (like what happened to Hinata) but nothing going beyond that.

Thanks for your support! Sometimes I compare what I wrote in the first chapters to now and I think "Ain't I getting worse at this?" for some reason, so it's good to know that's not happening. Same with the OCs, the original idea was for them to be just plot devices for the main cast to work together, but they grew into the main characters without me even noticing, but if you like them, then I guess this is a good thing? Still not letting they take the whole show, I think it's important for a side story to tie in with the main story, and the canon characters are a good way to do this. And lastly… Good to know that Asuka has a fan now!

Well then, that's it for now. Thank you all for your support, it really pumps me into making every chapter the best one I can. Keep giving me reviews if you have the time to spare, and see you all next time!